4069. Robert Southey to Henry Herbert Southey, 17 October 1823

Address: To/ D^r Southey/ 15. Queen Anne Street/ Cavendish Square/ London
Stamped: KESWICK/ 298
Postmark: E/ 20 OC 20/ 1823
Seal: red wax; design illegible
MS: Keswick Museum and Art Gallery, 1996.5.328. ALS; 4p.
Unpublished.

Keswick. 17 Oct. 1823

My dear Harry

The easiest way to procure a potential frank will be to ask it of Murray, who has always the Admiralty to resort to.

⁽¹⁾

Wynn would be a more direct channel, but I rather think he is not in town.

Your letter viâ Tookii made its appearance in a parcel from Murrays, with a note saying that Tooke was called in a different direction – xx a republication by him of D^r Watts’s Essays very prettily bound

⁽²⁾

– & some papers about Nova Scotia, – for all which I have to thank him when opportunity offers: for whether I wrote to do so at the time I really am quite uncertain.

I am sorry to hear of Louisa’s accident, tho it is one of those I trust which leave no ill consequences behind it.

Our plans are to start on Monday Nov 3. & to look at so many things on the way (Beelzebubs posteriors

⁽³⁾

among the rest) that if the weather be favourable we shall be a week before we reach Derby. I have not heard from Sir G Beaumont, & therefore think it doubtful whether he has returned, or will by that time have returned from Devonshire. If he should – we part company from the Islanders

⁽⁴⁾

there, & go for two or three days to Cole Orton. In that case we should probably arrive in town on the Friday or Saturday. But if he should not be at home to receive us, then we shall proceed all together, & arrive on the Wednesday. I shall come in such plight as to require the promptest aid of the tailor & shoemaker. As for seasons, the oyster season

⁽⁵⁾

is that which concerns me most, because I then always know how to lay in a compendious dinner at a time when Archeus

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calls for it. The less I get among strangers, the better I shall be pleased, & indeed I shall have no time for them, for I must move speedily to Streatham, where I can finish my book,

⁽⁷⁾

& when that is done it will be time for me to set out on my flying visit to the West. There will be little rest for the sole of my foot after I leave home, – or to speak more accurately, considering that the greater part of the motion will be in stage coaches, – for the seat of my pantaloons.

Any quarters will do for E May. She must pass a little time with Lady Malet, & when I have done with London I shall take her for two or three days to Cambridge where M^rs Hughes (the wife of the traveller)

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has invited them <her>, then to Clarksons near Ipswich, & lastly to Neville Whites. She likes the thought of all this very well at present – & yet I dare say she will be as well pleased to get home again as I shall.

You will think all these movements enough for me in all conscience. They will probably help me to brace me, which I stand in need of, not having recovered the relaxation which the last summers cold brought on.

We have had the worst imaginable weather, but have made use of every interval; & had magnificent parties, – in one of which we sat down thirty to dinner at the foot of Causey Pike.

⁽⁹⁾

Love from all –
God bless you
RS.

Notes

1. i.e. Murray could ask either John Wilson Croker or Sir John Barrow, 1st Baronet (1764–1848; DNB), Second Secretary to the Admiralty 1804–1806, 1807–1845, for a frank, as both were closely connected to the Quarterly Review.[back]

2. William Tooke (1777–1863; DNB), Reliquae Juveniles: Miscellaneous Thoughts in Prose and Verse, on Natural, Moral, and Divine Subjects; Written Chiefly in Younger Years By I. Watts, D. D. New Edition, Carefully Revised and Corrected (1823). Tooke was a well-connected London lawyer who was also active in literary circles; Isaac Watts (1674–1748; DNB) was a Congregationalist Minister, theologian and hymn writer.[back]

3. Peak Cavern in Derbyshire, popularly known as the Devil’s Arse.[back]

4. Louisa Charter, and Elizabeth Charter (1782–1860), friend of the poet George Crabbe (1754–1832; DNB). They were the sisters of Emma Peachy, first wife of William Peachy, and nieces of Sir Charles Malet (1752–1815; DNB), 1st Baronet, a prominent diplomat with the East India Company. Peachy had lent the Charter sisters his home on Derwent Island. They were accompanied by Lady Susanna Malet, née Wales (1779–1868), widow of Sir Charles Malet, 1st Baronet (1752–1815; DNB), the maternal uncle of the Charter sisters. Their other companion was one of the three children born in India to Sir Charles Malet and Amber Kaur (b. 1772): Eliza (b. 1791); Henry Charles (1793–1844); and Louisa (b. 1795). They accompanied Malet to Britain in 1798 and were brought up with his children by Susanna Malet. Eliza Malet married, in 1812, Robert Ekins (1785–1874), Vicar of Godalming 1810–1833, Rector of Folke, Dorset 1833–1843, Perpetual Curate of North Wootton 1843–1854. Southey is probably referring here to Louisa Malet.[back]

5. September–April: Southey was very fond of oysters.[back]

6. In some forms of alchemy, Archeus is the principle that directs and maintains living beings.[back]

7. Southey’s The Book of the Church (1824).[back]

8. Thomas Smart Hughes (1786–1847; DNB), a clergyman, Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and author of Travels in Sicily, Greece and Albania (1820), no. 1386 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library. Hughes had married, in April 1823, Anna Maria Forster (d. 1890), daughter of John Forster (c. 1751–1837), Vicar of Tunstead 1782–1837.[back]

9. A fell in the Newlands valley, visible from Greta Hall.[back]

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Lynda Pratt

Ian Packer

4069. Robert Southey to Henry Herbert Southey, 17 October 1823

4069. Robert Southey to Henry Herbert Southey, 17 October 1823

Notes

The Collected Letters of Robert Southey: Part Seven

Lynda Pratt, Ian Packer