775. Robert Southey to Thomas Southey, 22 April 1803 ⁠* 

Friday. April 22. 1803.

My dear Tom

Huzza! huzza! huzza! the bottle is a good post & the Atlantic delivers letters according to direction!

Yours of May 23. 1802. Lat. 33. 46 N.

Long. 64. 27. W –

was found by Mess^rs Calmer & Seymour of S^t Salvadors. [1]  Dec. 18. 1802. on the N W end of that Island

Lat. 23. 30 N.

Long. 73. 30 W.

very civilly inclosed by some M^r – Aley Pratt [2]  Feb^y 10, sent per Betsey Cains. [3]  Cap^t Wilmott, [4]  & has this day reached me from Ramsgate to my very great surprize & satisfaction.

You had sealed it so clumsily that some of the writing is torn – & the salt water had got at it, so that the Letter is in a ruinous state – but by the Lord it shall be preserved as the greatest curiosity in my collection.

I shall send the account to Stuart. [5] 

I did heartily regret that you were not here. we would have drawn a cork in honour of Mess^rs Calmer & Seymour & Aley Pratt, who by keeping the letter two months really seem to have been sensible that the experiment was of value. When I consider the quadrillion chances against such a circumstance it seems like a dream. the middle of the Atlantic – thrown in there! cast on a corner of S^t Salvadores & now here at No 12 St Jamess Place Kingsdown Bristol – hunting me thro the ocean to the Bahamas & then to this very individual spot. Oh that the Bottle had kept a log-book! What if the Bottle Conjurer had been in it now.

I think this letter decisive of a current, chance winds would never have carried it 600 miles in less than seven months. & if I recollect aright, by theory there ought to be a current in that direction. Supposing the bottle to have been found the very day it landed it must have sailed at the rate of three knots in a day & night – it was picked up 209 days after the Post set off. More letters should be thrown overboard about the same latitude, & then when we have charts of all the currents some dozen centuries hence that particular one shall be called Southeys current.

As I shall send our names with the account it will get copied into all the newspapers & may perhaps set others upon making the same experiment

I have half a mind to send a letter to S^t Pierre [6]  –

The news is all pacific [7]  – & I fully expect you will be paid off ere long. all goes on as usual here. Margaret screams as loud as the Parrot [8]  – that she inherited. Cupid [9]  came to tea <this evening> & seems disposed to stay supper. Puss caught a mouse last night & we had a hang fair to day – so you see the course of justice continues. Juniper [10]  is juniperizing a duck which you should be here to examine – a Compleat Art of Navigation printed 1567 & translated from the Spanish. [11]  full of diagrams, & which doubtless represent the exact state of the science in the great age of discovery. I had a good bargain of Cody [12]  yesterday – the six volumes of Asiatic Researches published at £3-5-0 – new for forty shillings. [13] 

Is there any thing more to be inserted in the Kingsdown gazette? – oh – I have altered & adapted the fifth commandment [14]  for Margery, & made it the a summary of morals for her present age – Thou shalt not piddle thy father. this & my three Cat-Commandments I think entitle me to a high rank among moralists hereafter.

Write – for I am uneasy about the Amsterdam men [15]  – I wish they were at Amsterdam! damn-em! damn-em! you know the song & they suit the burden very unhappily – [16] 

Ediths love & remembrance from Charles. poor fellow when he saw your bottle-letter he saw how it would have pleased his mother. every thing reminds him of her – I I I also miss her. God bless you

R Southey.