MS: National Library of Wales, MS 4813D. ALS; 3p.
Previously published: John Wood Warter (ed.), Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey, 4 vols (London, 1856), III, pp. 416–417.
I think you & Reginald Heber saw such of my Inscriptions
(1)
Southey’s inscriptions on the Peninsular War, most of which were unpublished until the eighteen finished poems were collected in Poetical Works, 10 vols (London, 1837–1838), III, pp. 122–156.
as were then written, when I was at Llangedwyn. I send you one more which was finished a few days ago, – if finished that may be called which will probably receive many corrections before it goes abroad.
(2)
‘Lines. To the Memory of a Young Officer, Who was Mortally Wounded in the Battle of Coruña. By Robert Southey, Esq. Poet Laureate’, The Literary Souvenir; Or, Cabinet of Poetry and Romance (London, 1826), pp. [341]–344.
The subject was Sir Henry Burrards eldest son,
(3)
Paul Harry Durell Burrard (1790–1809), an Ensign in the 1st Foot Guards and eldest son of Lieutenant-General Sir Harry Burrard (1755–1813; DNB). The elder Burrard was recalled to England after his undistinguished role at the Battle of Vimeiro (1808) and the controversy over the lenient terms offered to the defeated French forces in the Convention of Cintra (1808). Paul Burrard remained in Spain and was mortally wounded at the Battle of Corunna on 16 January 1809, dying at sea five days later. He was a cousin of Caroline Bowles.
one of Sir J Moores
(4)
Sir John Moore (1761–1809; DNB), the British commander in the Peninsular War who was killed at the Battle of Corunna on 16 January 1809.
aid-de camps – whose horse was killed under him by the Generals side when he fell, – & who a few minutes afterwards received his mortal wound upon the same spot. What I have said of his character is from an account written of him before his death, by one of the Chaplains – (Owen
(5)
John Owen (1754–1824; DNB), Senior Chaplain to the Forces in Spain and Portugal 1809–1810, Chaplain General 1810–1824. Southey did not realise this was the John Owen whom he had met in Keswick in 1816; see Southey to Josiah Conder, 10 December 1816, Collected Letters of Robert Southey. Part Five, Letter 2876.
I think his name) to his mother.
(6)
Hannah Burrard, née Darby (d. 1833).
There will be from thirty to forty of these Inscriptions, & they will most likely make their appearance when the History of the War
(7)
Southey’s History of the Peninsular War (1823–1832).
is compleated, x in a quarto form, to accompany it, – for those who may like to purchase verse as well as prose.
I think you will like the temper in which I have spoken of America in the last QR.
(8)
Southey’s review of Timothy Dwight (1752–1817), Travels in New-England and New-York (1821–1822), no. 881 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library, Quarterly Review, 30 (October 1823), 1–40, published 17 April 1824.
Gifford could not let it pass without making one offensive alteration. I had spoken of the state of toleration & science as existing in N. England, & he altered the sentence so as to imply a doubt suspicion that there was none there.
(9)
‘if science and literature are making such progress in this part of the United States as some suppose …’ (Quarterly Review, 30 (October 1823), 17).
However it must have gone very much against the grain with him to insert the paper. The truth is that he thinks me too liberal, & Murray thinks me too bigotted. The middle way – whatever it might have been for Phaeton,
(10)
In Greek mythology, Phaeton was the son of Helios, the god of the sun, and a mortal woman, Clymene. He persuaded his father to allow him to drive the chariot of the sun for one day and Helios advised him to pursue a middle course, neither rising too high, nor going too near the earth. Unfortunately for Phaeton, he crashed the chariot into the earth.
is not only the most difficult to keep on earth, but the most dangerous, – for you have enemies on both sides.
I am reviewing Hayley’s life
(11)
Southey’s review of John Johnson (1769–1833; DNB), Memoirs of the Life and Writings of William Hayley, Esq. the Friend and Biographer of Cowper, Written by Himself; with Extracts from his Private Correspondence, and Unpublished Poetry; and Memoirs of his Son Thomas Alphonso Hayley, the Young Sculptor (1823), Quarterly Review, 31 (March 1825), 263–311.
– to pay my Midsummer bills. I have written some forty stanzas in the T. of Paraguay
(12)
Southey’s A Tale of Paraguay (1825).
– & have brought myself more into the run of verse than I have been for many years.
My inclination would lead me strongly to think about a view of our civil history down to the accession of the House of Hanover,
(13)
The House of Hanover succeeded to the British throne in 1714.
– upon such a scale as the B of the Church.
(14)
Southey’s The Book of the Church (1824).
& to follow it with the Age of George 3.
(15)
George III (1738–1760; King of Great Britain 1760–1820; DNB).
– connecting them by an introductory sketch of the two intermediate reigns.
(16)
The reigns of George I (1660–1714; King of Great Britain 1714–1727; DNB) and George II (1683–1760; King of Great Britain 1727–1760; DNB). Southey did not write any of these works.
– Had I been made Historiographer with a becoming salary
(17)
Southey had unsuccessfully campaigned to become Historiographer Royal in 1812 but had not been too disappointed at his failure once he learned the salary was only £200 p.a., rather than the £400 p.a. that he had been led to believe was the case; see Southey to Grosvenor Charles Bedford, 16 June 1812, Collected Letters of Robert Southey. Part Four, Letter 2115.
I should have earned my pay.
God bless you
RS.
