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British Library, Add MS 30927. Previously published: John Wood Warter (ed.), Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey, 4 vols (London, 1856), II, pp. 116–118 [in part].
These letters were edited with the assistance of Carol Bolton, Tim Fulford and Ian Packer
For permission to publish the text of MSS in their possession, the editor wishes to thank the Beinecke Rare Books and Manuscript Library, Yale University; Berg Collection of English and American Literature, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations; the Bodleian Library Oxford University; the British Library; Boston Public Library; the Syndics of Cambridge University Library; the Syndics of the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge; Haverford College, Connecticut; the Historical Society of Pennsylvania; the Hornby Library, Liverpool Libraries and Information Services; the Houghton Library, Harvard University; the John Rylands Library, Manchester; the Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas; Luton Museum (Bedfordshire County Council); Massachusetts Historical Society; McGill University Library; the National Library of Scotland; the Newberry Library, Chicago; the New York Public Library (Pforzheimer Collections); the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York; the Public Record Offices of Bedford, Suffolk (Bury St Edmunds) and Northumberland, the Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge; the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne; the Trustees of the William Salt Library, Stafford, the Wisbech and Fenland Museum; the University of Virginia Library.
A research grant from the British Academy made much of the archival work possible, as did support from the English Department of Nottingham Trent University.
Any dashes occurring in line breaks have been removed.
Because of web browser variability, all hyphens have been typed on the U.S. keyboard.
Dashes have been rendered as a variable number of hyphens to give a more exact rendering of their length.
Southey’s spelling has not been regularized.
Writing in other hands appearing on these manuscripts has been indicated as such, the content recorded in brackets.
& has been used for the ampersand sign.
£ has been used for £, the pound sign
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You must I think ere this have received a letter, the parcel, & another book of Kehama.
You enquire about my Uncle just as if you supposed that a man
in England was likely to get any thing because he had good claim to it – I have not heard that the Dean of Hereford is dead, – & I
am sure that my Uncle has no little <no> expectation of obtaining any thing. He has made up his mind to pass the
remainder of his days at Staunton.
It is some satisfaction to me that I shall be able to leave upon record my opinion upon this infamous convention,xx –––. this his Majesty is not yet tired of hearing, & would go
on creating knights, & giving gracious replies to the end of the chapter. I rejoice to see the spirited manner in which the Common
Council has resented his most improper answer to their petition. If any thing is done in Cumberland here it will originate with Wordsworth, – he & Coleridge will set the business in its true light in the country newspapers, –
& frame the revolutions, to be brought forward by some weighty persons, – & Wordsworth will speak at the meeting, he being a
freeholder. We are all to meet Curwen
Do you know any thing of Capt. Philip Beaver? – he has I believe the Acasta at this time in the W. Indies. – If you
were in the way of falling in with him, I would have a copy of the CidAcasta and in her went to the West Indies, where he remained until after
the capture of Martinique in February 1809 (
I am in the 13th section of Kehama – 2345 lines – probably about half the poem. K has stormed the
Swerga, Ladurlad & Kalyal are once more upon earth, & Arvalan will soon be laid neck & xx heels in Padalon,
Herbert grows stout & continues short. What does Pappa call you Herby?
(which is what he calls himself) – ‘Mine Dog.’ – & then laughs. And what does Mamma call you? – Bright eyes.’ – You would laugh to see the faces he makes when he says of his sisters name – not Edaw, but Edis. – Edaw he used to call her. He says every thing, – rides pocko, rides towel, rides foot,
xx <makes me give him> three tosses, – & has no mercy upon either pocko, towel, foot or
father. – Your niece wants sadly to know when you are coming home, & is
surprized that you have not killed all the French yet. –
I verily believe Lord Chathamt Andero four months ago would have exterminated
all the French in Spain, & 100,000 Spaniards would have been beyond the Pyrenees, spreading fire sword & manifestoes, more
formidable than either before them. – I am glad to see they are infesting the towns upon the coast from Catalonia. With Ld
Cochranesshould might be ashamed of ones
country & tempted to wish oneself a Spaniard.
I shall make use of your stories of the hand