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British Library, Add MS 47891. Not previously published.
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.
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[Start of section in Edith Southey’s hand]
It gave me no great pleasure to hear that you had all arrived in safety at your distant-dwelling; & that you
received pleasant accounts of the young ladies,
I am not that all surprized that your meek Mary
We are all very much obliged by your kind inquiries. I left my room much earlier than after my other confinement, &
felt no inconvenience from it: – the dear child thrives. they are both to <be> Christianed immediately, & we mean to call the
new-born Katharine; after Mrs
Hill, who is to stand for her, with my Sister Coleridge & Sir Edward Littleton. I have only two pieces of news to relate to you from
this neighbourhood; the one is that we are to have a regatta on Thursday, Mr Whiter & Mrs Janson of the Royal Oak,utmost rigour of the law. We hear he has since commensed his operations, he is the son of
Alderman Brown,Madman as Mrs Janson, she, poor deluded woman, a few
days since turned away a Noble Lord from her own door before she had glanced her eye at the Coronet upon his Carriage which she did not
discover untill he was on the wing, but her dispair was witnessed by some of her servants who relate the story with no small glee.
Derwents arm gains strength very fast, & he will join his brother after the regatta. The Ponsonby’srs Calvert,
My Sisters
E. Southey
[End of section in Edith Southey’s hand]
My dear Madam
I have requested Edith to leave me a page of the letter that I
may request your assistance in a business wherein I am taking great interest. A Bristol youth by name Wm Roberts died not long since of consumption at the age of 19. leaving a collection
of poems to two of his friends (to be by them published) for the benefit of an only sister.
Under these circumstances it is easily possible that the poor legacy bequeathed by William to his sister, friends <persons> to whose care
they <papers> were left (P.M. James, a banker at Birmingham)
sent them to me, with a history of the circumstances, – he edites them & will prefix an account of the life of his friend.
The book will be a half-guinea volume, to be paid for on delivery. What merit it may possess I should now consider was
its least claim, but the truth is that William Roberts was a youth of the
most promising genius, ardently devoted to literary pursuits, & certainly (in my judgement) capable of attaining a very
distinguished rank, had it pleased God to prolong his life. In his whole conduct, his hopes & habits, & in every domestic
relation, he was as far as I can learn from his most intimate friends, or judge from his letters, as nearly as man can be supposed to
be, without spot or stain. I am sure that no person who subscribes to the book will consider its cost as ill-bestowed, even if in
bestowing the half-guinea they looked to the half-guineas worth. In its form, arrangement & embellishments it will resemble Henry Kirke Whites Remains,
I must not conclude without communicating to Mr Browne some information which will probably
surprize him as much as it did me. That pamphlett upon the State of Ireland which he formerly sent me, & from which I have made
some extracts in the Edinburgh Annual Register, was written by Mr Croker.