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Keswick Museum and Art Gallery, KESMG 1996.5.73. Previously published: John Wood Warter (ed.), Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey, 4 vols (London, 1856), II, pp. 155–159 [with omissions].
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
All other characters, those with accents, non-breaking spaces, etc., have been encoded in HTML entity decimals.
Last night a letter from Thomas Rees communicated to me the
intelligence of the death of the Annual Review. The Longmen Men of the Row
Now then supposing that you will seriously set about the Crusades I will give you such directions in the art of
historical book-keeping as may save time & facilitate labour.
Make your writing books in foolscap quarto & write onl on only one side of a leaf; draw a line down the
margin, marking off space enough for your references, which should be given at the end of every paragraph, – min noting
page, book or chapter of the author referred to. This minuteness is now demanded, & you will yourself find it useful, for in
transcribing, or in correcting proofs it is often requisite to turn to the original authority. Take the best author, that is to say the
one who has written most at length of all the original authors upon the particular point of time on which you are employed; – &
draw up your account from him, – then on the opposite page correct & amplify this from every other who has written upon the same
subject, this page should be divided into two columns, one of about two thirds of th its breadth, the other the remaining
one; – you are thus enabled to add to your additions.
One of these books you should have for your geography, – that is to say for collecting descriptions of all the principal scenes of action, – which must be done from books of travels – their situation, their strength, their previous history, – & in the notes their present state. These descriptions you can insert in their proper place when you transcribe. Thus also you should collect accounts of the different tribes & Dynasties whom you have occasion to mention. In this manner the information which is only to be got at piece meal, & oftentimes incidentally when you are looking for something else, – is brought together with least trouble, & almost imperceptibly.
All relative matter, not absolutely essential to the subject, should go in the form of supplementary notes, & these you may make as amusing as you please, the more so & the more curious the better. Much trouble is saved by writing them on separate bits of paper, each the half of a quarter of a foolscap sheet, numbering them, & making an index of them; – in this manner they are ready for use when they are wanted.
It was sometime before I fell into this system of book-keeping, & I believe no better can be desired. A Welsh Triad
might comprehend all the rules for style, say what you have to say as perspicuously as possible, as briefly as possible, & as rememberably as possible, & take no other thought about
it.
Gibbon will supply you with the names of the main authorities.Gesta Dei per Francos
first importance quoad order
of time. This Gibbon refers to for the best account of the state of Jerusalem from the time of Heracliusto also to a memoir of M de Guignes sur le Commerce des Francois dans le Levant avant les
Croisades,Mem de
l’Academie des Inscriptions 7. 37. p 467–500).to begin with the xxxx xxxxx xx xx not <to> think of introductory matter till you are far
advanced in the work & find your stock of knowledge of considerable amount.
For the first crusade you will want the Geste Dei,th note to his 58th chapter for his authorities. His 41st to the same
chapter is full of minute references,give security to
yourself that you will do more, I will put in requisition all my means of obtaining books, & borrow for you from Heber whatever his library contains. Read every traveller that has every written
upon Syria, Egypt or Palestine, – in the worst of them you may chance to find something which will throw light & upon
history, & make you fully understand circumstances which else you might imperfectly have comprehended. – I can be of some use to
you in the way of annotations, – & nothing in the course of my reading which bears upon your subject shall be let slip. Go to work
with a good heart & you will soon find yourself the happier for having so such a work in hand.
I have undertaken to write for Ballantynes Edinb. Annual
Register the history of affairs in Spain & Portugal last year, – for which I shall be well paid, but hard worked being pressed for
time.rs C. got into a bog some way above her knees, & I saved her life!
I wish you had been there to have assisted in it. Afterwards I washed her pettycoat in one of the becks gills, & carried
it home upon my stick. Oh Domine Doctor
My lease for 21 years is executed; – that’s well. Poor Jackson
is alive but will hardly outlive this month. I know not which will carry him off x, diarrhœa or dropsy. His brothers have
been to see him & his sister from London. He however happily does not seem to apprehend that his end is so near. Our love to Mary –
Aug August 17. 1809.