Endorsement: RS to JR 23 June 1823
MS: Huntington Library, RS 436. ALS; 3p.
Unpublished.
I send you two inscriptions, which – like clay for the finer sorts of China, – have lain <a long> awhile to mature: – & yet perhaps may be better if they lie longer before they see the light.
(1)
Southey had visited the Caledonian Canal with Rickman and Thomas Telford on their tour of Scotland in August–September 1819. He wrote three ‘Inscriptions for the Caledonian Canal’: ‘Inscription for a Tablet at Banavie, on the Caledonian Canal’, Friendship’s Offering. A Literary Album (London, 1826), pp. [167]–168; and ‘At Clachnacharry’ and ‘At Fort Augustus’, The Anniversary; or, Poetry and Prose for MDCCCXXIX (London, 1829), pp. 194–197. At this time, Southey had only written the first two of these poems.
It is a form of composition which I am fond of attempting, tho it is a very difficult one; & it is almost the only youthful predilection for any kind of composition which continues with me till this day.
I have introduced Telfords name in proper union with Rennies in an Ode to the praise & glory of Scotland,
(2)
‘Scotland, an Ode, Written after the King’s Visit to that Country. By Robert Southey, Esq. Poet Laureat’, The Bijou: Or Annual of Literature and the Arts (London, 1828), pp. 81–88. John Rennie (1761–1821; DNB) was a Scottish civil engineer and architect. He and Telford were praised in ‘Scotland, an Ode’, lines 48–77. The latter was Southey’s New Year’s ode for 1823, written to fulfil his obligations as Poet Laureate.
– which with an Irish companion (both as you may well suppose ex officio productions) I will some day send you.
(3)
‘Ireland’, Sir Thomas More: or, Colloquies on the Progress and Prospects of Society, 2 vols (London, 1829), I, pp. [295]–302. This was Southey’s New Year’s ode for 1822, in fulfilment of his obligations as Poet Laureate.
Mrs Coleridge & her daughter arrived on Wednesday last. I am struggling with my annual visitation of catarrh, – which throws me sometimes on the sofa when I would fain be at the desk. And I very much fear that before I can reach town you will have left it.
Hughes the Traveller, who preaches a crusade in favour of the Greeks is coming to tea this evening.
(4)
Thomas Smart Hughes (1786–1847; DNB), a clergyman and historian. He was the author of Travels in Sicily, Greece and Albania (1820), no. 1386 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library; An Address to the People of England in the Cause of the Greeks, Occasioned by the Late Inhuman Massacres in the Isle of Scio (1822); and Considerations upon the Greek Revolution, with a Vindication of the Author’s ‘Address to the People of England’ from the Attack of Mr. C. B. Sheridan (1823). The Greek War of Independence from the Ottoman Empire had begun in 1821 and generated a great deal of sympathy throughou…
Remember me to Mrs R. Miss Anne & my fellow travellers
(5)
Anne Rickman (b. 1808); Rickman’s two younger children, William Charles Rickman (1812–1886) and Frances Rickman (dates unknown, she married Richard Brindley Hone (1805–1881), Vicar of Halesowen 1836–1881, in 1836); and Emma Pigott (dates unknown), younger daughter and co-heiress of James Pigott (d. 1822) of Fitz-Hall, Iping, Sussex. All but Anne Rickman had accompanied Southey and Rickman on their Scottish tour in August–September 1819.
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God bless you
RS.
Keswick 20 June. 1823
