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Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin. Previously published: Charles Ramos (ed.), The Letters of Robert Southey to John May: 1797–1838 (Austin, Texas, 1976), pp. 93–94.
These letters were edited with the assistance of Carol Bolton, Tim Fulford and Ian Packer
For permission to publish the text of MSS in their possession, the editor wishes to thank the Beinecke Rare Books and Manuscript Library, Yale University; Berg Collection of English and American Literature, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations; the Bodleian Library Oxford University; the British Library; Boston Public Library; the Syndics of Cambridge University Library; the Syndics of the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge; Haverford College, Connecticut; the Historical Society of Pennsylvania; the Hornby Library, Liverpool Libraries and Information Services; the Houghton Library, Harvard University; the John Rylands Library, Manchester; the Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas; Luton Museum (Bedfordshire County Council); Massachusetts Historical Society; McGill University Library; the National Library of Scotland; the Newberry Library, Chicago; the New York Public Library (Pforzheimer Collections); the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York; the Public Record Offices of Bedford, Suffolk (Bury St Edmunds) and Northumberland, the Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge; the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne; the Trustees of the William Salt Library, Stafford, the Wisbech and Fenland Museum; the University of Virginia Library.
A research grant from the British Academy made much of the archival work possible, as did support from the English Department of Nottingham Trent University.
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Southey’s spelling has not been regularized.
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& has been used for the ampersand sign.
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I have letters from my brother to say that he is appointed First Lieutenant of the Amelia, a much finer frigate than
the Galatea;Amelia was a finer ship than Thomas Southey’s previous ship, the Galatea, because she was a 38-gun
Hébé-class frigate of the French navy captured in 1796 and commissioned into the navy. Thomas’s captain was William Charles Fahie
(1763–1833).Amelia, William Allen Proby, Lord
Proby (1779–1804), eldest son of Sir John Joshua Proby 1st Earl of Carysfort (1751–1828;
The papers say we are certainly about to send forces to Portugal. Now could I get such an appointment as would enable
me in the course of two or three years to accumulate three or four hundred pounds <which would settle me at the end of the time>,
& in the meantime do my own business abroad – I should think myself a very fortunate man. I have written to my Uncle – who can perhaps may have some influence with Frere; & indeed it is not unlikely that Frere may be disposed to serve me, from what
little intercourse we had at Lisbon. I shall also contrive to get myself mentioned in General Moores family.
We are all well, & enjoying the most delightful weather I ever remember at this season <time> of
year. the days can hardly be finer in Portugal.
y 12. 1805