4210. Robert Southey to Mary Ann Watts Hughes, 4 July 1824

 

Address: [in another hand] London July seven 1824/ Mrs Hughes/ Uffington/ Faringdon/ CW Williams Wynn 
Postmark: FREE/ 7 JY 7/ 1824
MS: The Carl H. Pforzheimer Collection of Shelley and His Circle, New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundations, Misc 3797. ALS; 4p.
Previously published: John Wood Warter (ed.), Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey, 4 vols (London, 1856), III, pp. 430–432.

Keswick. 4 July. 1824
My dear Madam

Your letter brought me the first, & only intelligence that I have received of Elmsleys death.

(1)

Mary Anne Watts Hughes was misinformed. Elmsley was very ill, but he did not die until 8 March 1825.

His place will not easily be filled at Oxford, & in that walk of letters which he had chosen,

(2)

Elmsley was a leading classicist. Since 1823 he had been Principal of St Alban Hall, Oxford, and Camden Professor of Ancient History.

– but to his friends it never can be supplied. For myself, it is a loss which will be perceived whether I look backward or forward. Many recollections which used to be chearful ones, must now change their character, – & I feel myself left with one friend less in the world, at an age when we rarely make ne form new friendships, even if a new friend could ever supply the place of an old one.

I have been very much confined to the house since your departure by that annual visitation of catarrh

(3)

Southey suffered very badly from hay fever.

which was then upon me. It has now taken the form of cough, which is usually its last stage, but this year, the cough seems to lie deeper & take stronger hold than it was wont. Next year, if it be possible for me to break away from my employments, I will leave home at the end of April, & try as the only probable means of escaping it, to make a journey of six or eight weeks, – into Holland & the North of Germany if I can find a companion

You were fortunate while you were here in the weather, – but had you been a month later, you would have seen our wonder of wonders, which tho there is nothing beautiful in it, it is still very well worth seeing, for I believe nothing of the kind has ever been observed else where. What is called the Floating Island has made its appearance.

(4)

The Floating Island of Derwentwater is a mass of vegetation that rises to the surface every few years. It appeared from 21 June 1824 to the end of September, its first siting since 1819.

By good fortune Sedgewick, the Cambridge Professor of Geology

(5)

Adam Sedgwick (1785–1873; DNB), Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and Woodwardian Professor of Geology 1818–1873.

is here. I went with him to reconnoitre it on Monday last, – & yesterday he investigated it thoroughly.

The bottom of the lake in that part (near Lodore) is covered with aquatic plants, growing in a soft vegetable mould which is about xxxx hardly a foot thick, & lies upon a bed of peat, – that bed is six feet in thickness & rests upon a stratum of fine white clay. From time to time a quantity of xxx <gas> is generated (whether in the peat, or below it remains to be discovered) which fills this peat, till it becomes so buoyant that it is seperated from the clay, & then that part of the bottom of the lake floats & rises to the surface. But so great was the accumulation when this took place that it has made a rent in the bottom some fifty yards long, & some six feet deep. Upon probing the gas comes out freely but not so plentifully, on the sides of this chasm, – as in another portion at some little distance, where instead of forcing for itself a vent, the gas has puffed up the bottom in a convex form. Then when a pole is thrust down, the air rushes out like a jet.

We have had rain enough in the course of the lake to raise the lake full four feet. The convex part is therefore now under water, – & probably the two other pieces, or the sides of the chasm will soon subside.

My young ones, thank God, are well, & Isabel’s face which has been frightfully swoln, from an inflammation of the ear, is recovering its usual dimensions. Sara Coleridge is still complaining of her eyes, & talking of going to the South to have them cured, – but in this family every thing is talked of a long while before it is done. My eldest daughter has deferred all account of her visit to St Pauls till she returns, – as certain having too <so> much to say that she dared not begin to write it. She is now on her way to Devonshire. Last week she met Mrs W Wynn at the Caledonian Ball,

(6)

The Caledonian Ball is a major event in the London Season. In 1824 it was held on 25 June at Almack’s Assembly Rooms.

& thought her looking very ill. She gives a good account of Bertha, who spent the last week with her, & Bertha gives good accounts of herself.

And now my dear Madam present our united regards to Dr Hughes not forgetting mine to your son,

(7)

John Hughes (1790–1857; DNB), a miscellaneous author, most recently of An Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone made During the Year 1819 (1822), which Southey admired.

& believe me

Yrs very truly
Robert Southey

Notes

1. Mary Anne Watts Hughes was misinformed. Elmsley was very ill, but he did not die until 8 March 1825.[back]
2. Elmsley was a leading classicist. Since 1823 he had been Principal of St Alban Hall, Oxford, and Camden Professor of Ancient History.[back]
3. Southey suffered very badly from hay fever.[back]
4. The Floating Island of Derwentwater is a mass of vegetation that rises to the surface every few years. It appeared from 21 June 1824 to the end of September, its first siting since 1819.[back]
5. Adam Sedgwick (1785–1873; DNB), Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and Woodwardian Professor of Geology 1818–1873.[back]
6. The Caledonian Ball is a major event in the London Season. In 1824 it was held on 25 June at Almack’s Assembly Rooms.[back]
7. John Hughes (1790–1857; DNB), a miscellaneous author, most recently of An Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone made During the Year 1819 (1822), which Southey admired.[back]
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