The publication of Clare's new volume, arranged for the spring of 1821, gave rise to some difficulties as the time grew near. It was the intention of his publishers to bring out the work with some artistic embellishments, including a portrait of the author and a sketch of his home; to both which Clare had certain objections, as far as the execution of the task was concerned. On the other hand, Messrs. Taylor and Hessey wished to exclude some of Clare's poems, which they did not think quite as good as the rest, under the pretence that they had already more than sufficient in hand to make a strong volume; but this again was opposed by the author, who sent in his ultimatum to print all his verses or none. The difficulty might have been easily arranged by Mr. Gilchrist, with his great influence both over Clare and his publishers, but he, unfortunately, was over head and ears in trouble, and had no time to attend to the perplexities of others. Mr. Gilchrist, in the summer of 1820, had the misfortune of being dragged into the great quarrel of the Rev. William Lisle Bowles, the editor of Pope, with Byron, Campbell, and the 'Quarterly Review;' a battle of the windmills which occupied the literary world of England for several years. Having despatched the chief of his big foes, the Rev. Mr. Bowles thought fit to turn round upon Mr. Gilchrist, whom he held to be the author of a severe article in the 'Quarterly.' This was not the case; nevertheless, Mr. Gilchrist took up the cudgels, striking out with all the impetus so much in vogue among the pen-wielding celebrities of the time. From the 'Quarterly'—too Jupiter-like to be long detained by street rows—the quarrel was transferred to the pages of the 'London Magazine,' where abundant space was allowed to both Mr. Gilchrist and the Rev. Mr. Bowles to fight out their battles. The great question was whether Mr. Bowles had done justice to the character of Pope, or drawn the figure of his hero in too hard outlines; and as there was much to be said on either side, the articles grew longer every month, and the spirit of the combatants became more and more embittered. The conflagration got general through a flaring pamphlet, 'by one of the family of the Bowles's,' and for a year or two the air was filled with squibs, flysheets, articles, and reviews, for and against Bowles. What with his grocery business at Stamford, and his multifarious literary engagements, poor Mr. Gilchrist fairly lost his head in the midst of this thunderstorm, and was unable to think of anything else but Bowles and Pope, and Pope and Bowles. Clare happening to visit him one day, when musing on this all-absorbing subject, he tried to inspire him with a sense of the wrongs he had suffered at the hands of the Rev. William Lisle Bowles; but meeting with utter apathy, Mr. Gilchrist turned in disgust from his poetic friend, shocked at his callousness. As a sort of revenge, on being appealed to for his aid in settling the difficulty between his friend and Messrs. Taylor and Hessey, he declared that he had no time to attend to the matter. This was certainly true, for the din of the great Bowles battles kept raging in the air and the pages of the 'London Magazine' for nigh another year.

After some lengthened correspondence between Clare and his publishers, it was arranged that the new work should be brought out in two volumes in the summer of 1821. This made it possible to give the whole of the poems, and to finish the engravings with the care desired by the author. In the meanwhile, to keep Clare before the public, specimens of the forthcoming volume were published at intervals in Mr. Taylor's periodical, and, finally, the September number of the 'London Magazine' contained at the head of the list of 'works preparing for publication,' the announcement that 'The Village Minstrel, and other Poems, by John Clare, the Northamptonshire Peasant, with a fine portrait, will be published in a few days.' The work was published accordingly, in the middle of September. In outward appearance, the two new volumes offered a great contrast to Clare's former book. The 'Poems descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery,' were dressed in more than rustic simplicity; stitched in rough cardboard and printed on coarse paper, with no artistic adornments whatever. On the other hand, the 'Village Minstrel' presented itself in beautiful type, with two fine steel engravings, the first a portrait of Clare, from the painting by William Hilton, R.A. and the latter a sketch of his cottage. Notwithstanding all these attractions, the new work met with but a cold reception. It was accounted for by the publishers in the fact that its price, 12_s_., was too high compared with the former volume, which was sold at 5_s_. 6_d_.; but the real cause undoubtedly was that the time of publication was very unfavourable. It was a period when the English book-mart was overstocked with poetry and fiction, and when the world seemed less than ever inclined to devote itself to poetry and fiction. The year 1821, in fact, formed a notable epoch in the annals of literature for the number of productions from celebrated authors. Sir Walter Scott published 'Kenilworth Castle;' Lord Byron issued his tragedy of 'Marino Faliero;' Southey, his 'Vision of Judgment;' Shelley, his 'Prometheus,' and Wordsworth a new edition of his poems. Besides these giants in the field of literature, numerous stars of the second and third magnitude sent forth their light. Charles Lamb, Hazlitt, Barry Cornwall, Tom Moore, Allan Cunningham, Leigh Hunt, and others, were busy writing and publishing, and John Keats sent his swan-song from the tombs of the Eternal City. In the midst of this galaxy of genius and fame, John Clare stood, in a sense, neglected and forlorn. The very reputation of his first book was against him, for most of his friends were unreasoning and uncritical enough to assert that the 'Poems on Rural Life and Scenery,' were less remarkable as poetic works, than as productions of a very poor and illiterate man. This statement was echoed far and wide, with the necessary result of getting 'the Northamptonshire Peasant' looked upon as but a nine-days' wonder. Quite as fatal to Clare's fame as a poet were the loud appeals made on his behalf for pecuniary assistance. There was, and, indeed, is at all times, an instinctive feeling, in the main a just one, among the public, that genius and talent are self-supporting, and that he who cannot live by the exercise of his own hand or brain, does not altogether deserve success. The feeling was even stronger than usual about this period, because of the repeated announcements of fabulous sums earned by book-makers, including the notoriously helpless poets. It was well known that Sir Walter Scott had made a large fortune by his verses and novels; that Moore got £3,000 for his 'Lalla Rookh,' and Crabbe £2,000 for his 'Tales of the Hall;' that Southey had no reason to be dissatisfied with the pecuniary result of his epics and articles, nor Mr. Millman cause to weep over the 'Fall of Jerusalem.' There were rumours even, embodied in sly newspaper paragraphs, that Mr. Murray was paying Lord Byron at the rate of a guinea a word; though this was disputed by others, who asserted that the remuneration was only five shillings a syllable. However, all these reports had led the public to the not unjust conclusion, that booksellers, on the whole, are no bad patrons of literature, and that the reward of genius might be safely left to them. As a consequence, from the moment that the begging-box was sent round for Clare—sent round, too, with a zeal far surpassing discretion—there arose a latent feeling among readers of books, that 'the Northamptonshire peasant' was not so much a poet as a talented pauper, able to string a few rhymes together. The feeling, for a time, was not outspoken; but nevertheless unmistakeable in its results.

The sale of the 'Village Minstrel and other Poems,' was not large at the commencement, and the book was scarcely noticed by the literary periodicals of the day. Though containing verses far surpassing in beauty anything previously published by Clare, the work passed over the heads of critics and public alike as unworthy of consideration. It drew passing notes of praise from a few genuine admirers of poetry; but which resulted in nothing but a couple of letters to the author, and the present of some cheap books. From one of these letters, it appears that the ballad commencing 'I love thee, sweet Mary,' printed in the first volume of the 'Village Minstrel,' was read one evening at the house of a nobleman at the West End of London, before the assembled guests. All were in raptures about the sweetness of the softly-flowing stream of verse, and all inquired eagerly after the author. But there was but one person in the room who knew anything about him; and his whole knowledge consisted in the fact, told somewhere by somebody, that Clare was a young 'peasant,' formerly very poor, but now in a state of affluence through a most liberal subscription fund, amounting to some twenty thousand pounds, which had been collected for him and invested in the Funds. The news gave universal satisfaction to the distinguished company; and though none had contributed a penny to the wonderful subscription list, every guest felt an inward pride of living in a land offering the bountiful reward of 'the Funds' to poetic genius, born in obscurity. After the applause had subsided, the portrait of Clare, prefixed to the 'Village Minstrel,' passed round the circle of noble West End visitors. All pronounced the face to be highly distinguÉ, and one young lady enthusiastically declared that John Clare looked 'like a nobleman in disguise.' In which saying there was a certain amount of truth.

Notwithstanding many unfavourable circumstances, and the ill-considered zeal of his patrons, who continued to importune the public with demands for charitable contributions, the coldness with which Clare's new work was received at its appearance, was really very extraordinary. The greatest share of it, in all probability, was due to the period of publication, which could not well have been more ill-timed. Besides the natural anxiety of a civilized community to read, in preference to cheap rural poetry, verses paid for at the rate of 'a guinea a word,' or at the least 'five shillings a syllable,' there were many notable matters directing public attention away from village minstrelsy to other things. The book was brought out in the same month that the 'injured Queen of England' died; that the populace fought for the honour of participating in the funeral; and that royal lifeguardsmen killed the loyal people like rabbits in the streets of London. Political passions soared high, and public indignation was running still higher in newspapers and pamphlets. It was not to be expected that, at such a moment of universal excitement, there should be many people willing to withdraw to rural poetry. Thus Clare, 'piping low, in shade of lowly grove,' was condemned to pipe unheard, or very nearly so.

A copy of his 'Village Minstrel' Clare sent to Robert Bloomfield, for whose poetic genius he felt the most sincere admiration. In acknowledgment he received, about seven months afterwards, the following characteristic letter:—

'Shefford, Beds, May 3d, 1822.

Neighbour John,—If we were still nearer neighbours I would see you, and thank you personally for the two volumes of your poems sent me so long ago. I write with such labour and difficulty that I cannot venture to praise, or discriminate, like a critic, but must only say that you have given us great pleasure.

I beg your acceptance of my just published little volume; and, sick and ill as I continually feel, I can join you heartily in your exclamation—"What is Life?"

With best regards and wishes,

I am yours sincerely,

Robert Bloomfield.'

The above letter, as will be seen from the date, was written little more than a year before Bloomfield's death, he living at the time in great retirement, broken in mind and body. The author of the 'Farmer's Boy,' like Clare, felt a noble contempt for punctuation and spelling, and in the original note the word 'vollumn,' twice repeated, stands for volume—representing, no doubt, the way in which he used to pronounce the word.

How entirely free John Clare was from the common failing of literary jealousy, is shown by his admiration of Bloomfield. He not only freely acknowledged the high standard of Bloomfield's works; but, what was more, held him up to all his friends as a poet far greater than himself. Untrue as was this comparison, it strikingly exhibited the innate nobility of soul of the poor 'Northamptonshire Peasant.' Yet even this humility, the true sign of genius, was ill-construed by some of Clare's lukewarm patrons, who reproached him for being a flatterer when he only wanted to be just.