2101. Robert Southey to Thomas Southey, 27 May 1812 ⁠* 

Keswick. Wednesday May 27. 1812.

My dear Tom

You will see me, if no unforeseen cause should frustrate the intention about the first week in July, with Danvers. We shall make a march of it, seeing all the things seeables on the way, to Newcastle, cross the Tyne at Shields that I may make a pilgrimage to Jarrow in honour of the Venerable Bede, [1]  & thence to Sunderland. But we will arrange all this so that you may meet us at Durham. I shall leave Danvers either at Kendal or Lancaster on his way to back to Liverpool, – then taking the caves in my homeward route. – Danvers asks if there be any objection to David Jardine’s joining us in this expedition. Three upon a walk are better than two, – & at Durham there are inns to sleep at, – but how can <he> be lodged at S^t Helens? If you can answer the question favourably, it will save time by doing replying to Charles himself without delay.

My hopes were highly raised by a letter from the Consul at Bahia [2]  telling me the Directors of the Public Library [3]  had commissioned him to send me some Manuscripts. I consigned the parcel to my Uncle & they proved to be no manuscripts at all. The obligation on my part is the same, the & the Consuls blunder the only cause of disappointment. The contents were Anchietas Tupi Grammar, [4]  a book which I had despaired of ever obtaining, from its exceeding rarity, & O Valeroso Lucideno, [5]  – the same work which our Envoy M^r Stewart [6]  contrived so ingeniously to forward me by the post, – a very interesting book it is. The parcel came over with the dispatches, & was announced to me from the Secretary of States Office in a letter ‘on his Majesty’s service.” which might <have> frightened Sarah if she had been here. – I have had another very interesting communication since my last; – a letter from the Countess of Bureta, the Zaragozan, [7]  inclosing the copy of the last intelligence which she had received from that city, – & offering to me as the warm friend & historian of the Spaniards in their struggles any services in her power. I shall endeavour to collect materials for a full & separate account of the two sieges, thro this channel.

I should perhaps have told you all this sooner, but my mind has been opprest by Percevals death, [8]  & the dreadful state of the mob which it has disclosed. You know I am no aguish politician, xxxxxx form the despondency xxxxxxxxxxxxx but it is a d but I fear the happiest days of England are over: the abuse of liberty has uniformly been punished by with the loss of liberty, now the crime has been committed, & if we escape the penalty it will be contrary to the whole experience of history. In the rejoicings at Nottingham & in Cornwall, & in the attempt to rescue Bellingham, [9]  we see the effect which Cobbett & Hunt, & Burdett & the Common Council &c [10]  have produced upon the feelings of the English mob. The speeches of the Burdettites & the leading paragraphs of the demagogue newspapers are printed like dying speeches & sold in the manufacturing districts. – Every pot-house also is supplied with these <the Sunday papers – > doses of weekly poison: one reader serves for a xxx tap – room full of open mouthed xxx listeners, & the consequence is that at this moment the army is the single plank between us & destruction. We are on the brink of the most dreadful of all imaginable xxxx evils, – a war of the poor against the rich, of brute ignorance against every thing above its own degraded level. How long the army may be depended upon is a question which the Royal Dukes [11]  & the floggers [12]  may tremble to ask themselves.

Herries has at this time a letter of mine in his hands urging the necessity of winning the hearts of the soldiers, & recommending honorary distinction as one means, & another that a certain number of the oldest soldiers <in every company> employed in the storming C Rodrigo & Badajoz [13]  should have their discharge upon full pay, – or an increase if they chose to continue in the service: – & xxxxxx xxxxx I learn that my letter made an impression upon xxxx poor Percevals secretatries to whom it was shown, & Herries has taken it in the hope that it may do its work in higher quarters. But this is a distant good, – alterations xxxx are poor things to trust to in diseases which require the knife & the cautery.

This I feel assured of, that unless the licentiousness of the press is stopt, – there will soon be an end of its liberty. Were I in the H of Commons I would clear the hou gallery whenever Burdett rose, – if his speeches were published, I would punish the publication as a breach of privilege, – & if he spoke elsewhere I would teach <him> that this privilege of exciting rebellion did not x was confined to the walls of S^t Stephens. [14]  It is absurd to talk of his virtues, or his motives now. By the fruit we must judge of the tree, [15]  – & the mob who attempted to rescue an assassin, of them xx all that was known at that moment was that he had committed a most atrocious assassination – shouted cried Burdett for ever. As for Bellingham I do not con class him with these wretches who applauded him: the man had that in him which would have been greatness, if his mind <he> had not been insane. It was an insanity <however> which ought not to have exempted him from punishment.

In the manufacturing districts there is clearly a system as well laid as that of the United Irishmen  [16]  & carried on more dangerously, – because it is carried on by Englishmen. Ryder [17]  we is a man of <in> infirm health, – a nervous man, – & very unfit for his office in such times. I am told that the shock of Percevals death will kill him be fatal to him. – Poor Perceval breathed his last upon the green table in Rickmans H of Commons’-room! But to return to the Luddites [18]  – the danger is of the most imminent kind. I would hang about a score in a county, & send off ship-loads to B. Bay. [19]  & if there were no other means of cutting off there checking the treasonable practices which are carried on in the Sunday newspapers, I would suspend the Habeus Corpus. [20]  Cut off there Shut up these bellows-blowers, & the fire will <may perhaps> go out.

Here another danger stares us in the face. Perceval might have been trusted with that dictatorial power which is necessary to save the Commonwealth: – he held his power as much by the virtues as his ability. Alas he has left no successor. Lord Liverpool wants his reputation, – Ld Sidmouth [21]  & Vansittart [22]  (all good men) want his talents. – M. Wellesley is a vicious man & a tyrant at heart. – My fears are these – that let what will happen the liberties of England are in greater peril than they have ever have been <before,> – & that the alternative is whether we shall have a despotism, before a civil war – or after it. The proudest days of England are to come, but her happiest days – in my utmost heart I fear it – are over. We shall hav Even if this thunder-storm should pass away, – & with as atmosphere charged like that of Padalon [23]  itself – I do not see how it is can pass without an explosion, – still I see great evil in store. We shall have a glorious & triumphant war. But M Wellesley will not hesitate at national bankruptcy, – & Catholic concessions will draw on the sale of tythes. that is in other words the plunder of the Church property to relieve the necessities of the state. A revolution in the religion of a country produces more evil than a century is sufficient to allay. – The sale of the tythes leads immediately to putting up the Establishment for the lowest bidder, – a measure of course, when it is to be paid by the Government. The Methodists then come in; & the reign of the Saints xxx led to the reign of the Sinners in days when there was more virtue & more wisdom than in England than can be found among us now [24]  – What is the end of all this? – the best I can hope for myself is, that Portugal may be a freer country, when I shall find it necessary to leave my own shake off the dust of my own.

God bless you.

RS.