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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. 27–29.
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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with regard to my mothers affairs my Uncle has no reason to think me inattentive or neglectful. I could indeed have
advised her to quit her present situation, but of what avail would that
advice have availed, barren of assistance as it must have been? — it would have been like advising a debtor sick prisoner to change the air. as to my reserve towards him — here indeed he is justly displeased. I do not wish to
excuse or palliate what I know to have <been> wrong. yet there <were> many powerful motives that occasioned this. a young
man easily opens his heart to those of his own age who are endeared to him by a real or imagined similarity of sentiment; but the same
feelings that in that case induce a hasty & credulous confidence, occasion a reserve towards those of whose approbation he is
doubtful. I had informed my Uncle by letter, before he thought of taking me
abroad with him, of all my future expectations. I could not enter upon this subject in conversing with him, because I had frustrated
all his plans for me. I feard he would disapprove my plan of making a book, when my knowledge must necessarily be so little of the
subject — but that I should make a book was absolutely necessary to my support. I would have sent him the manuscript, & wished to
do it; but I had a Counsellor more importunate than wisdom, “malesuada Fames”,
Of your friendly offer of assistance I have fortunately now no need. my mothers affairs will now I hope be settled. I am very anxious to have her live with me, it would increase her happiness
& very much lessen my Uncles expences. I thank you likewise for what you
tell me respecting my Uncle; I was never with him a fortnight, till my
journey to Lisbon; by letter I had always been unreserved towards him, but there is were a thousand
causes to prevent the confidence of unembarrassed conversation. all this I hope is over, I have followed your advice in my letter as
closely as was possible, & said every thing for the past as well as for the present. I can write to him with pleasure now that I
have a subsistence, & am embarked in a profession which promises independance.
I am sorry Burnrs Burn
My last letter was so engrossed by one subject that I forgot to thank you for your offer of serving the good
Frenchman.
My brothers Captainprize vessel in such weather that the boat must inevitably have
sunk in attempting to reach her — & yet he could not refuse or remonstrance, & would have perished if a Lieutenant with him had
not ordered them to give over the attempt. this is called discipline. there was no man on board his vessel would have risqued his life
in the leaky prize for the prize money they <he> might share. if my brother had brought her into port his share would not have exceeded five guineas, but the
Captains would have been considerable, & his loss nothing if those he sent on board had been drowned. I have made application to
have my brother removed to another ship. tis a horrible life. I had rather associate with the Botany Bay colonists than with the crew
of a man of war. Some of the Swedenbourgians have believe that every man will meet the kind of heaven
he imagined in the next world, & that the enjoyment of this <it> will be their <his> hell till they are <he is> fully sensible of their <his> error & hase learnt to form the wish of wisdom. I
wonder what strange place they allot for sailours! they have every thing good to learn, & what is the more difficult task, a great
deal to forget. the ancients had a comfortable fiction in their waters of Lethe
God bless you my dear friend. you may judge with what fixed habits of reserve I came to Lisbon by recollecting how
little you knew of me there. “I was a stricken deer”