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National Library of Scotland, MS 3883. Previously published: Wilfred Partington, Sir Walter’s Post-Bag (London, 1932), pp. 87–88 [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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Thank you for your good offices. You will have seen ere this that they were too late, & that M. Dutens having
fallen asleep, Stanier Clarke reigneth in his stead.am certainly acquiring <have acquired so many> additional documents, & have such
sources of information opened that I am sure the work could be well executed, – & if the Lord Chamberlain had been pleased to give me this title, the speculation might have proved a
good one for the publisher. The project however may now take its way ‘oer the backside of the world’ into that Paradise where a good
many of my projects have gone before it.
I had a very kind letter from Canning upon this business, before
it was decided. He hints at other opportunities. For myself I know but one thing which would strongly tempt me to break up my quarters,
& that would be if they would make me Governor of Botany Bay,deportation, under the revolution which so many unhappy causes are now cooperating to
hasten on.
None of our political men are sufficiently aware of the danger, they live in such a cloud of their own dust, that they
cannot see the signs of the tempest gathering round them. A sense of this danger however is spreading & I will do my best to extend
it. It might be crushed, – but the more I consider how deeply the causes are laid, how widely they are spread, & how long they have
been maturing, xxxxxxx the worse does the evil appear; – & the end which I deprecate seems so necessary a xxxx xx
the xxxxx of xxxxxx consequence of these causes, – that I confess my fears very far weigh down outweigh my hopes.
When I was last in Portugalxxxxx in my own mind looked about for a place of retreat, – yet we
all lived as usual, ate, drank & slept, took our evening rides, & went to our evening pe[MS torn] as gaily as if there no
pestilence threatening us at the door. So it is now. & God grant that the issue may be as fortunate.
I look forward with great pleasure to seeing you here. x I have all my books about me now, – venerable
company they are, & you will admire my Portugueze & Spanish treasures. The latter end of July I shall be in Durham, – your
journey I hope may be before that time or after it, – even if it should prove otherwise we may meet on the way, – your road may be thro
Durham, – & mine on the way home will be by Greta Bridge.