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National Library of Wales, MS 4812D. Previously published: Kenneth Curry (ed.), New Letters of Robert Southey, 2 vols (London and New York, 1965), I, pp. 541–543.
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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Your letter gave me no little pleasure, for tho I have the happy faculty of caring nothing for any thing that can be
said against me in prose or rhyme, I am exceedingly gratified when those whom I esteem are satisfied with my works. Doubtless it would
have been a great advantage to me if while I was employed upon the Annals for 1808,been had opportunities of conversing with
you, & other persons who capable of giving me authentic information & correcting those erroneous opinions into which
it is so easy to fall when your ones judgement is formed upon partial or imperfect statements. In many instances I am sure I
should have derived this benefit from you. You have now shown me that the subordinate changes made by the last Administration were not
unprecedented,xxxxxxxxx <do not think> that the precedent
justifies the measure, – but assuredly had this been known to me I would have taken care that the assertion
<statement> should have been correct. With regard to Egypt & the Dardanelles I do not perceive any difference between us in
reality. Both expeditions failed, & both from misconduct, which misconduct never was investigated & fixed upon the right
person. I was always of opinion that Egypt ought to have been occupied – not Alexandria alone. But for Constantinople the project
itself seems not to have been well considered, & with such an Admiral & such an Ambassador to put it in execution, – little
else was to have been expected.
These however are topics which I have done with. Give me any information respecting 1809 & passing events, &
you shall perceive that your views & opinions will always have great weight with me, whether they accord with my own or not. My
Spanish fever as you call it continues unabated, – & is I flatter myself, a much more hopeful disease than the French ague with
which so large a part of the opposition were seized when Buonaparte entered Spain. I am in the midst of Spanish affairs, & greatly
distressed for details of the second siege of Zaragozafor of that of Gerona.
Thank you for the shipwreck, – had it fallen within the year I should it would have furnished me with a very
impressive page, but you date it in 1807 which is out of my limits. I have lookd for your promised narrative concerning La Fayette, –
that I could introduce, because the Austrian war ought to be introduced prefaced by a view of the conduct of Austria from
the commencement of the French Revolution, & I, who only hate that power less than the French Despotism, rejoice on that account in
any thing which can tend to reconcile me to its degradation & future destruction. Besides the story is so interesting – & so
honourable to English feelings that it ought to be made public & I am sure it would prove one of the most interesting parts of the
volume. Pray obtain it for me.
I think you will be pleased with the temper in which I consider the D of Yorks businessxx (I have no doubt) by Capt Pasley
Grosvenor set off today, better than when he arrived, but I fear with
no radical amendment. He stays a week at Ambleside on his way. Rickman has paid me a short visit. From him I get the Parl. Proc. xxx which I
shall receive in regular order hereafter. The D of Yorks papers came to night with your honours name in the direction.
I know nothing of the makers of the second part of the Register except that the Chronicle is now in other hands – a
Scotch Clergyman – who has written me two enormous letters of consultation
about it, which I answerd in one very short one.