Description of the design for Blake's drawing, The Goblin, and quotation from Milton's L'Allegro : autograph manuscript : [England], [ca. 1816-1820].

Accompanies no. 5 of 12 watercolor designs for Milton's early poems L'Allegro and Il Penseroso that contrast the cheerful man with the melancholic, thoughtful one. Blake created them on commission for Thomas Butts about 1816-1820. The two series were separated in 1903 and were not reunited until 1949, when they were acquired by the Library. Each of the watercolors in this series is accompanied by Blake's transcription of the relevant portion of the poem as well as his notes on his design.
22 lines of text written in ink on the recto of a sheet of laid paper accompanying the watercolor, Old Age (1949.4:5, cataloged separately). Lines 1-12 are quoted from Milton's "L'Allegro," lines 100-109, 113-14.
Transcription: "5 Then to the Spicy Nut brown Ale / With Stories told of many a Treat / How the Fairy Mab the junkets eat / She was pinchd & pulld she said / And he by Friars Lantern led / Tells how the drudging Goblin sweat / To earn his Cream Bowl duly Set / When in one Night e'er glimpse of Morn / His shadowy Flail had threshd the Corn / That ten day labourers could not end / Then crop-full out of door he flings / E'er the first Cock his Matin rings / The Goblin crop full flings out of doors / from his Laborious task dropping his Flail / & Cream bowl yawning & stretching vanishes / into the Sky. in which is Seen Queen Mab / Eating the Junkets. The Sports of the Fairies / are seen thro the Cottage where "She" lays / in Bed "pinchd & pulld" by Fairies as they dance / on the Bed the Ceiling & the Floor & a Ghost / pulls the Bed Clothes at her Feet. "He" is seen / following the Friars Lantern towards the Convent"