4256. Robert Southey to Caroline Bowles, 1 October 1824

 

Address: [in another hand] London, Octo fifth 1824/ Miss Bowles/ Buckland/ Lymington/ Hants/ Wm Manning
Postmark: FREE/ 5 OC 5/ 1824
MS: British Library, Add MS 47889. ALS; 4p. 
Unpublished.

Keswick. 1st Oct. 1824

I write under cover to your franker,

(1)

William Manning (1763–1835; DNB), a West India merchant, a Director of the Bank of England, 1792–1810, 1814–1831, and MP for Lymington, 1818–1820 and 1821–1826.

– one of mine being on the Continent, – & Rickman perhaps at this time on the way to <MS obscured> – You will think I am wire-drawing my subject

(2)

Straining, or forcing, the argument.

by <MS obscured> stanzas which are here inclosed;

(3)

Southey and Bowles were beginning work on ‘Robin Hood’. The resulting incomplete poem was published in Robin Hood: a Fragment. By the Late Robert Southey, and Caroline Southey. With Other Fragments and Poems By R.S. and C.S. (London, 1847), pp. [1]–36. Southey had probably enclosed stanzas from the description of a funeral procession in the closing section of Canto One.

& in truth the personages there described have no business in the poem unless I make some for them, & bring them all three home again. There is one more character to introduce in this train & then the xxx canto must be brought to a close the sooner the better.

To night is the children’s ball, – an affair of great solemnity, for the dancing master comes only once in two years, – & this is the consummation, devoutly wished for, of a three months attendance at the dancing school. Kate & Bel are now figuring away there, – & if you were present you might find xxxxxxx for thxx of being displayed in another Packing up, – some three hours hence. I wish you were present, – not because I should be with <you> (for that would not be) – but because you would be near, & within reach, & I have half a hundred things to show, & to say to you.

My life of Hayley

(4)

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 the Friend and Biographer of Cowper, Written by Himself; with Extracts from his Private Correspondence, and Unpublished Poetry; and Memoirs of his Son Thomas Alphonso Hayley, the Young Sculptor (1823), no. 1179 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library. This appeared in Quarterly Review, 31 (March 1825), 263–311, published 11 March 1825.

is promised for the next number, – & I have a promise that you will not be forgotten,

(5)

Caroline Bowles’s Ellen Fitzarthur; a Metrical Tale, in Five Cantos (1820) and The Widow’s Tale: and Other Poems (1822) were not reviewed in the Quarterly Review.

– & an apology for having delayed its performance.

Bertha is now removed to Portsmouth, where Rickman has built a house, upon a place called Elms-hill, & they have taken one close by, to fit it up. Edith is at Exeter, & will leave Devonshire in about a fortnight, or sooner, for Taunton, there to rejoin Lady Malet

(6)

Lady Susanna Malet, née Wales (1779–1868), widow of Sir Charles Malet, 1st Baronet (1752–1815; DNB).

& return to London. I think of whistling them home about February, – for indeed we miss them greatly.

Cuthbert thank God is just well recovered from a bilious attack, xxx the complaint to which children are most liable in these parts. It was severe enough to reduce him much, & to make me very anxious But thank God that anxiety has been relieved.

Tell me how you are? – Oh – let me not forget to tell you, that in a late number of the London Magazine there is the story of – Semid & the banks of the Orontes.

(7)

‘The Power of Beauty. A Syrian Tale’, London Magazine, 10 (August 1824), 165–176. The author was John Carne (1789–1844; DNB), traveller and author, who had just returned from an extended visit to the Near East. He was a ‘holder forth’ because, on a visit to Southey in September 1823, he had held the Southey family and their visitors, including Caroline Bowles, spellbound with stories of his adventures.

– I have learnt that that holder forth xxx went out to the Holy Land as a holder-forth in a different line, which he took care not to let us know. Like his companion Wolf

(8)

Joseph Wolff (1795–1862; DNB), a German Jew who converted to Christianity in 1812 and moved to England in 1819, joining the Church of England. He travelled on a mission to the Jews of the Near East 1821–1826.

of whom he told, he went out as a Missionary to convert the Jews.

God bless you dear Caroline
RS.

Notes

1. William Manning (1763–1835; DNB), a West India merchant, a Director of the Bank of England, 1792–1810, 1814–1831, and MP for Lymington, 1818–1820 and 1821–1826.[back]
2. Straining, or forcing, the argument.[back]
3. Southey and Bowles were beginning work on ‘Robin Hood’. The resulting incomplete poem was published in Robin Hood: a Fragment. By the Late Robert Southey, and Caroline Southey. With Other Fragments and Poems By R.S. and C.S. (London, 1847), pp. [1]–36. Southey had probably enclosed stanzas from the description of a funeral procession in the closing section of Canto One.[back]
4. 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), no. 1179 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library. This appeared in Quarterly Review, 31 (March 1825), 263–311, published 11 March 1825.[back]
5. Caroline Bowles’s Ellen Fitzarthur; a Metrical Tale, in Five Cantos (1820) and The Widow’s Tale: and Other Poems (1822) were not reviewed in the Quarterly Review.[back]
6. Lady Susanna Malet, née Wales (1779–1868), widow of Sir Charles Malet, 1st Baronet (1752–1815; DNB).[back]
7. ‘The Power of Beauty. A Syrian Tale’, London Magazine, 10 (August 1824), 165–176. The author was John Carne (1789–1844; DNB), traveller and author, who had just returned from an extended visit to the Near East. He was a ‘holder forth’ because, on a visit to Southey in September 1823, he had held the Southey family and their visitors, including Caroline Bowles, spellbound with stories of his adventures.[back]
8. Joseph Wolff (1795–1862; DNB), a German Jew who converted to Christianity in 1812 and moved to England in 1819, joining the Church of England. He travelled on a mission to the Jews of the Near East 1821–1826.[back]
TEI Link
TEI
Volume Editor(s)
Lynda Pratt
Ian Packer