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MS untraced; text is taken from Robert Galloway Kirkpatrick, ‘The Letters of Robert Southey to Mary Barker From 1800 to 1826’ (unpublished PhD, Harvard, 1967), 405–408. Previously published: John Wood Warter (ed.), Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey, 4 vols (London, 1856), II, pp. 278–80.
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.
Any dashes occurring in line breaks have been removed.
Because of web browser variability, all hyphens have been typed on the U.S. keyboard.
Dashes have been rendered as a variable number of hyphens to give a more exact rendering of their length.
Southey’s spelling has not been regularized.
Writing in other hands appearing on these manuscripts has been indicated as such, the content recorded in brackets.
& has been used for the ampersand sign.
£ has been used for £, the pound sign
All other characters, those with accents, non-breaking spaces, etc., have been encoded in HTML entity decimals.
The first frank is carefully deposited in my desk till you come for it. I am sincerely glad of the young knight’s elections. per annum).
Sir Edward’s will seems to have been in all its provisions, perfectly
conformable to his life, — that is, all that it ought to have been.
My wicked summer cold has taken up its quarters with me, & will no doubt torment me for many weeks. It brings with it much discomfort, but, thank God does not disable me, & is less accompanied by any general indisposition than one would suppose possible from so violent a local affection. Last year I escaped it by setting out on a long journey just as it was beginning.
I have my eye upon that ugly house opposite, — which ugly as it is without, would become a pleasant object if it
can ever be got for you. Lord Sunderlin (a brother of Malone)
Do not send off anything but what is wanted for your own use, for this House tho rather of larger dimensions than a nutshell, is almost as full as one. Martha is coming next week, & Danvers, — & what is worse the boys holidays begin. — I shall march off with Danvers early in July for Durham, — & the holydays luckily have an end as well as a beginning. Hartley is grown a great fellow, all beard & eyes, — as odd & as extraordinary as ever he was, with very good disposition, but with ways & tendencies which will neither be to his own happiness, nor to the comfort of any body connected with him. Derwent contrary to all former appearances, is much weaker in body, — he is very tractable, may be made anything, — whereas Hartley is of such unmalleable materials that what he may make of himself God knows, but I suspect, nobody will be able to mould or manage him. — You will be much pleased with Herbert , who may best be characterised by calling him a sweet boy. — You can hardly conceive anything more gentle & more docile. He has just learnt his Greek alphabet & is so desirous of learning, so attentive, & so quick of comprehension, that if it please God he should live, there is little doubt but that something will come out of him.
I have long had many day dreams of what was to be done when you came to reside among us. One has been of a poem or
series of poems about this country, for which you were to make drawings, — so as to make a splendid book.
If you get off as soon as you expect — we may look for you early next week. — I had nearly forgotten what you say
about the Island. — it does not seem to me the kind of thing that could be asked.
We are afraid Neddy