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Huntington Library, RS 113. Previously published: Charles Cuthbert Southey (ed.), Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey, 6 vols (London, 1849–1850), III, pp. 94–96 [in part].
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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The pleasantest season in the country for one who lives in it is undoubtedly this month of blossoms & of beauty,
when we have not only immediate enjoyment, but summer before us. The best season for seeing a country, &
especially this country, is during the turn of the leaf. September & October are our best months, we have usually long &
delightful autumns, extending farther into winter than they do in the south of England. Our harvests such as they are – are sometimes
not in till the end of October, Every thing with us being proportionately late. If the Tantara-raras
Mrs Rickman has seen all that water colours can do for our Lakes, in seeing
them as delineated by Glover,xxxxxxxxxx travelling clouds, & columns of misty light <sunshine>, falling as if from an eye of light
in Heaven, – like that upon Guy Faux in his prayer book. Every point of sight is beautiful & Derwentwater can
only be guessed at <judged>. by a panorama, such as you will have from our boat, which the painter is at this very
time decorating. Do not wait for another year, for the sake of including your Scotch journey – God knows what another year may produce,
either of good or evil, to both of us. there is always so much chance of being summoned off on the grand tour of the universe, that a
man ought not without good reason, to postpone any little trip he may wish to take first upon our xxxxx microcosm.
Thank you for forwarding the chest &c – on this day week I shall look for their arrival, with much pleasurable impatience.
What you say of breeding up a boy to understand the Keltic language has often been in my mind. Have you seen a good
book in reply to Malthus by Dr Jarrold?before so before my eyes, as not never willingly to shape any plans about them,
which might xxx up <occasion> more cause for disappointment. – How easy would it be for the London Institution, or any
Society, to look out promising lads, xx & breed up them up for specific literary purposes. Should Herbert live I should more incline (as more connected with my own pursuits) to
let him pass two or three years in Biscay, & xxx so procure all that is thus to be gained of Cantabrianbelieve <learn> from the Keltic, but I xxxxxxx think <believe> that
one wave of our population came from those shores, of which the prevalence of black dark hair & rank complection is to
xx me physical proof. Nothing can be so little calculated to advance our stock of knowledge as our inveterate modes of
education, whereby we all spend so many years in learning so little. I was from the age of 6 till that of 20 learning Greek &
Latin, or to speak more truly learning nothing else, – the little Greek I ever had sleepeth, if it be not dead, & can hardly wake
without a miracle, & my Latin, tho abundantly enough for all useful purposes, would be held in great contempt by those people who
regard the classics as the Scriptures of taste.
Acuña
I have promised Artaxerxes
We have a dirty & deranged house – the masons have ejected me out of my study, & it will be probably a full
fortnight before I am reinstated – meantime I have the discomfort of having my books in a heap. & of course, am sure ten times in
the course of the day to want some book which proves to be in the least accessible part of it. These last two days have been given to
prefacing Palmerin,x own, & that Anthony Mondayr Mavor
I find privies at Valencia eight hundred years ago. The proofs of the Cid
Just at this time I am greatly in want of Thevet,some <put> the list into some booksellers hands & let him send to Paris for them
Your stories of Biddlecombe are truly Irish. he told these
himself with no very material alteration, – only laying fault in the first instance on Bingley.
You call Perceval a generous man. I dislike him for two
reasons. first because I cannot like any body who has ever been connected with that wretch Pitt;xxxxx the greedy manner in which he would have snavelled the
sinecure & the impudence of his accepting a post for which he is so utterly unfit. The Duke of Portlandappl use of hemp should be so
little understood in this country!
God bless you. Remember me to Mrs R. & make your preparation to start as soon as the session closes.