The Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey
Robert Southey to Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 28 March 1801
“The sight of your hand-writing did not give me much
pleasure; ’twas the leg of a lark to a hungry man—yet it was your
hand-writing. . . . .
“I have been more than once tottering on the brink of a
letter to you, and more than once the glimpse at some old Spaniard, or the whim
of a walk, or an orange, or a bunch of grapes, has tempted me either to
industry or idleness. I return rich in materials: a twelvemonth’s work in
England will produce a first volume of my History, and also of the Literary
History. Of success I am not sanguine, though sufficiently so of desert; yet I
shall leave a monument to my own memory, and perhaps, which is of more
consequence, procure a few life-enjoyments.
“My poetising has been exclusively confined to the
completion of Thalaba. I
have planned a Hindoo romance of original extravagance, and have christened it
‘The Curse of
Keradon;’ but it were unwise to do anything here which were as
well done in England; and indeed the easy business of hunting out everything to
be seen has taken up no small portion of my time. I have ample materials for a
volume of miscellaneous information; my work in England will be chiefly to
arrange and tack together; here, I have been glutting, and go home to digest.
In May we return; and, on my part, with much reluctance. I have formed local
attachments and not personal ones: ![]()
| Ætat. 26. | OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. | 137 |
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this glorious river,
with its mountain boundaries, this blessed winter sun, and the summer paradise
of Cintra. I would gladly live and die here. My health is amended materially,
but I have seizures enough to assure me that our own unkindly climate will
blight me, as it does the myrtle and oranges of this better land; howbeit,
business must lead me here once more for the after-volumes of the History. If
your ill-health should also proceed from English skies, we may perhaps emigrate
together at last. One head fall of brains, and I should ask England nothing
else.
“Meantime my nearer dreams lay their scenes about the
Lakes.* Madoc compels me to
visit Wales; perhaps we can meet you in the autumn: but for the unreasonable
distance from Bristol and London, we might take up our abiding near you. I wish
you were at Allfoxen†,—there was a house big enough: you would talk
me into a healthy indolence, and I should spur you to profitable industry.
“. . . . . We are threatened with speedy invasion, and
the critical hour of Portugal is probably arrived. No alarm has been so
general; they have sent for transports to secure us a speedy retreat; nor is it
impossible that all idlers may be requested to remove before the hurry and
crowd of a general departure. Yet I doubt the reality of the danger. Portugal
buys respite; will they kill the goose that lays
golden eggs?
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| 138 | LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE | Ætat. 26. |
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Will Spain consent to admit an army through that will
shake her rotten throne? Will Bonaparte
venture an army where there is danger of the yellow fever? to a part whence all
plunder will be removed, where that army will find nothing to eat after a march
of 1000 miles, through a starved country? On the other hand, this country may
turn round, may join the coalition, seize on English property, and bid us all
decamp; this was apprehended; and what dependence can be placed upon utter
imbecility? Were it not for Edith, I
would fairly see it out, and witness the whole boderation. There is a worse
than the Bastile here, over whose dungeons I often walk . . . . But this is not
what is to be wished for Portugal,—this conquest which would excite good
feelings against innovation; if there was peace, the business would probably be
done at home. England is now the bedarkening power; she is in politics, what
Spain was to religion at the Reformation. Change here involves the loss of
their colonies; and an English fleet would cut off the supplies of Lisbon. . .
. . The monastic orders will accelerate revolution, because the begging friars,
mostly young, are mostly discontented, and the rich friars everywhere objects
of envy. I have heard the people complain of monastic oppression, and
distinguish between the friars and the religion they profess. I even fear, so
generally is that distinction made, that popery may exist when monkery is
abolished.
“In May I hope to be in Bristol; and if it can be so
arranged, in September at the Lakes. I should ![]()
| Ætat. 26. | OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. | 139 |
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like to
winter there; then I might labour at my History; and we might perhaps amuse
ourselves with some joint journeyman work, which might keep up winter fires and
Christmas tables. Of all this we will write on my return. I now long to be in
England; as it is impossible to remain and root here at present. We shall soon
and inevitably be expelled, unless a general peace redeem the merchants here
from ruin. England has brought Portugal into the scrape, and with rather more
than usual prudence, left her in it; it is understood that this country may
make her own terms, and submit to France without incurring the resentment of
England. When the Portuguese first entered this happy war, the phrase of their
ministers was, that they were going to be pall-bearers at the funeral of
France. Fools! they were digging a grave, and have fallen into it.
“Of all English doings I am quite ignorant. Thomas Dermody, I see, has risen again; and
the Farmer’s Boy is most
miraculously overrated. The Monthly
Magazine speaks with shallow-pated pertness of your Wallenstein; it interests
me much; and what is better praise, invited me to a frequent reperusal of its
parts: will you think me wrong in preferring it to Schiller’s other plays? it appears to me more
dramatically true. Max may, perhaps, be
overstrained, and the woman is like all German heroines; but in Wallenstein is that greatness and littleness
united, which stamp the portrait. William
Taylor, you see, is making quaint theories of the Old Testament
writers; how are you employed? Must Lessing wait for the Resurrection before he receives a new
life?
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LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE |
Ætat. 26. |
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“So you dipped your young
Pagan* in the Derwent, and baptized him in the name of the
river! Should he be drowned there, he will get into the next edition of
Wanley’s Wonders, under the head of
God’s Judgments. And how comes on Moses, and will he remember me? God bless you!
Robert Bloomfield (1766-1823)
The shoemaker-poet patronized by Capel Lofft; he wrote the very popular
The Farmer's Boy (1800).
Derwent Coleridge (1800-1883)
The son of Samuel Taylor Coleridge; educated at St John's College, Cambridge, he was
rector of Helston in Cornwall, principal of St Mark's College (1841), and a writer on
education. He contributed to
Knight's Quarterly Review.
Hartley Coleridge [Old Bachelor] (1796-1849)
The eldest son of the poet; he was educated at Merton College, Oxford, contributed essays
in the
London Magazine and
Blackwood's, and
published
Lives of Distinguished Northerns (1832).
Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834)
English poet and philosopher who projected
Lyrical Ballads (1798)
with William Wordsworth; author of
Biographia Literaria (1817),
On the Constitution of the Church and State (1829) and other
works.
Thomas Dermody (1775-1802)
Prolific Irish poet whose early promise a child prodigy went unfulfilled; after the
publication of James Grant Raymond's 1806 biography he became a type of the wastrel
bard.
Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (1729-1781)
Germman playwright and critic who extolled Shakespeare in opposition to French models; he
was the author of
Emelia Galotti (1779) and
Nathan
der Weise (1779).
Emperor Napoleon I (1769-1821)
Military leader, First Consul (1799), and Emperor of the French (1804), after his
abdication he was exiled to Elba (1814); after his defeat at Waterloo he was exiled to St.
Helena (1815).
Edith Southey [née Fricker] (1774-1837)
The daughter of Stephen Fricker, she was the first wife of Robert Southey and the mother
of his children; they married in secret in 1795.
William Taylor of Norwich (1765-1836)
Translator, poet, and essayist; he was a pupil of Anna Letitia Barbauld and correspondent
of Robert Southey who contributed to the
Monthly Magazine, the
Monthly Review, the
Critical Review, and
other periodicals.
Nathaniel Wanley (1633-1680)
Educated at Peterhouse, Cambridge, he was an English clergyman, poet, and antiquary; he
was the father of the librarian Humfrey Wanley.
William Wordsworth (1770-1850)
With Coleridge, author of
Lyrical Ballads (1798), Wordsworth
survived his early unpopularity to succeed Robert Southey as poet laureate in 1843.
The Monthly Magazine. (1796-1843). The original editor of this liberal-leaning periodical was John Aikin (1747-1822); later
editors included Sir Richard Phillips (1767-1840), the poet John Abraham Heraud
(1779-1887), and Benson Earle Hill (1795-45).
Robert Southey (1774-1843)
Madoc. (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, 1805). A verse romance relating the legendary adventures of a Welsh prince in Wales and
pre-Columbian America.
Nathaniel Wanley (1633-1680)
The Wonders of the Little World, or, a General History of Man: in Six Books,
wherein by many thousand of Examples is shewed what Man hath been, from the First Ages of
the World to these Times, in respect of his Body, Senses, Passions, Affections. (London: T. Basset, R. Cheswel, J. Wright, and T. Sawbridge, 1678). Long reprinted.
