MS: National Library of Wales, MS 4813D. ALS; 3p.
Unpublished.
I use your name in favour of a packet of proof sheets for the Great King. They contain the life of H K White, in which the preface to the supplementary volume is incorporated.
(1)
Southey had added a new ‘Preface’ to the 9th edition of Southey’s The Remains of Henry Kirke White, 3 vols (London, 1822), III, pp. [iii]–xvi. The third volume of this 1822 edition was a ‘supplementary volume’ to the original edition of 1807, containing additional letters and poems by Kirke White. The 10th edition of the Remains, 2 vols (London, 1823) compressed the material into two volumes and required Southey to combine some of his ‘Preface’ with the ‘Life’ of Kirke White at pp. [v]–lxviii, adding the remainder at pp. [lxix]–lxxiii. He also added references to letters in the third volume of…
This book is now going into a tenth edition, – if any of my own had sold as well, I should be at this time a rich man.
Thank you for what you have done in my brothers affair.
(2)
Tom Southey was considering emigrating to Canada.
The prospect is not a bad one, but there are huge difficulties in the outset. I think he will go over alone to prepare the way, & then return for his family. – You know not what a weight this is, & long has been upon my mind. Time has not abated the natural chearfulness of my disposition, – but it has taken from me much of that hopefulness, that unhesitating, & almost unreflecting confidence which I used to possess; & the future will sometimes trouble the present, which it never did in the earlier part of my life.
I have heard my brother Henry when speaking of certain constitutional diseases say that the person who has them may very probably live to die of something else. With regard to my own affairs, it is at least an even chance that this sort of comfort is applicable, – that I shall be able to go on from hand to mouth, freely & fearlessly, & when the head rests from its labours, there will be a respectable provision accruing upon my death. But in the case of my brothers family
(3)
Tom Southey had eight children: Margaret Hill Southey (b. 1811); Mary Hill Southey (b. 1812); Robert Castle Southey (1813–1828); Herbert Castle Southey (1815–1864); Eleanor Thomasina Southey (1816–1835); Sarah Louise Southey (1818–1850); Nelson Castle Southey (1820–1834); and Sophia Jane Southey (1822–1859). Thomas Castle Southey (1824–1896) completed the family.
this does not apply, – & the greatest possible relief that I can have, will be to know that it is well settled in Canada, where, as in all new countries, children are wealth.
If the French were a nation from whom any thing just & honourable could be expected, they would have a fair opportunity of redeeming their national character in Spain.
(4)
The French government was considering whether to invade Spain and suppress the liberal regime. French forces crossed the Spanish border on 7 April 1823.
But if they mean well (which it is their interest do) still their character will render them suspected. I am far from partaking the Spanish fever which rages at this time in London. Between Ferdinand
(5)
Ferdinand VII (1784–1833; King of Spain 1808, 1813–1833). He had been forced to call a new Cortes in 1820 and was virtually a prisoner of the liberal regime 1820–1823.
& the Cortes there is not a pin to chuse. Oh xxxx how difficult, – how almost impossible it is to introduce a free government among a people who have been accustomed to despotism! If a set of school boys under ten years of age were to play at Parliament, – they would do it with more decorum than the French observe in their Chambers.
(6)
Louis XVIII (1755–1824; King of France 1814–1824) had been forced by the victorious allies to agree to govern in accordance with a Charter, whose provisions included an elected Chamber of Deputies and an appointed Chamber of Peers.
Did I ever tell you what Arguelles
(7)
Agustín Argüelles (1776–1844), a Spanish liberal politician. He was one of the architects of the Constitution of 1812 and was imprisoned by the absolutist regime in 1814–1820. After the 1820 revolution he was Minister of the Interior 1820–1821 and a deputy to the new Cortes 1822–1823.
said to Mackenzie
(8)
Colin Alexander Mackenzie (?1778–1851), a wealthy Scot who was employed on a number of delicate diplomatic missions and may well have been a government spy. In 1815 he was appointed one of the Commissioners of Liquidation, Arbitration and Deposit, who adjudicated on claims by British citizens for loss of property against the French government. Southey had met him in Paris in May 1817 and Mackenzie had provided the information about his role in the evacuation of the Spanish Army of the North from Denmark that appeared in Southey’s History of the Peninsular War, 3 vols (London, 1823–1832), I, pp…
two years ago? – that he did not like the English – he wanted such English as those of Oliver Cromwells
(9)
Oliver Cromwell (1599–1658; Lord Protector 1653–1658; DNB).
days. – Mr Littletons
(10)
A public dinner was held at the City of London Tavern on 7 March 1823 to support the Spanish liberal regime. The guests of honour were Juan Jabat Aztal (1772–1825), the Spanish Ambassador 1822–1823, João Francisco de Oliveira (dates unknown), the Portuguese chargé d’affaires 1821–1822, and Lorenzo Fernandez de Villavicencio y Canas, 3rd Duke of San Lorenzo and Valhermoso (1778–1859), formerly Spanish Ambassador to France. Littleton was one of a number of eminent speakers and proposed a toast to ‘Civil and Religious Liberty all over the World’. Littleton was a supporter of Canning, but might be…
appearance at the dinner surprized me, & made me fear that he spoke the sentiments of the Wellesleys. For it appears to me that our plain policy is to remain at peace. France might have done more wisely to have looked on yet awhile; – but I look upon this as a question of expediency, & one upon which I xx do not pretend to decide.
I am heartily glad to see that Hume & id genus omne
are treated somewhat more as they deserve than they used to be treated.
(12)
Joseph Hume (1777–1855; DNB) was a radical MP whom Southey despised. His campaign against government expenditure had gained a great deal of public support, but was making less headway by 1823. His motion attacking the Church of Ireland on 4 March 1823 was heavily defeated in the House of Commons.
It is one of those cases in which the way to make superiority felt, is by xxx xxxxx showing it.
God bless you
RS.
Keswick. 17 March 1823.
