2720. Robert Southey to William Gifford, 20 February 1816⁠* 

My dear Sir

In reviewing this translation of Alfieri you will perceive that I have let the extracts speak for themselves. [1]  The history of the book is a very melancholy one. Poor Lloyd is a man with whom I have been intimately acquainted for twenty years, – during all that time there has been a tendency to insanity about him, – of which for the last ten years he has been fully conscious, – & this translation was undertaken as an object which by employing his mind might direct its diseased activity from self-contemplation. It xxxx xxxx xxx time was during the first decided attack of the disorder that I suggested it to him, – his wife had sent for me, at his desire, he was sensible of his state, & conversed upon it with a degree of acuteness peculiar to himself. He desired me to recommend him some author whom he might translate, & I could recollect none but Alfieri. [2]  For a time this succeeded, – he performed the task with wonderful ardour, – but he is now in confinement, – one of the last things he said upon leaving his own house was to express a hope that I should sometimes remember <think of> him with respect. He said this in tears, – & I cannot repeat it without them. – God only knows whether he may ever be able to read what I have said of his Alfieri. His father & his wife (one of the most admirable women I have ever known) will have a melancholy pleasure in seeing it, – & I have m derive more satisfaction from knowing this, than any public applause could give me. – I think you would allow this to be an excuse for the article, if it needed one.

I am not satisfied with Lord Elgins defence: – it is a plea of the grossest carelessness, set up x is pleading gross carelessness, in reply to a charge of the worst nature. A man steals my watch, he is tried for the theft, & says he found it, – I send my watch by another to the watchmaker, – he sells it upon the way, & says he lost it. The losing in one case is as obvious an excuse as the finding in the other. – Perhaps I am not altogether unprejudiced upon the subject. Tho I know nothing of Tweddell personally I have lived much with xxxx <his> friends, & saw many of his letters to Losh as they arrived. [3]  And I have known of Lord Elgins misconduct (to give it the lightest appellation) from the beginning.

Believe me my dear Sir

yrs very truly & respectfully

R Southey.