3009. Robert Southey to Edith Southey, [7 August 1817]

3009. Robert Southey to Edith Southey, [7 August 1817]⁠* 

Dover. Thursday morning.

My dear Edith

Here we are safe & sound. We landed last night between ten & eleven after a delightful passage of six hours. Of course it was too late to write. We are waiting for the Custom House, & shall only be able to reach Rochester to night. Mrs V. for whom we waited a day at Brussels is laid up at Tournay, – but by resting in time it is hoped that young Remacle may not be born a Belgian. [1]  We have brought George [2]  over with us.

I suppose you received my letter from Brussels by yesterdays post. I am as you may suppose most anxious to hear from home – the only letter which I have received is two months old.

God bless you.

RS.

Notes

* Address: To/ Mrs Southey/ Keswick/ Cumberland
Stamped: [partial] DOVER/ 2
Postmark: [partial, illegible]
MS: British Library, Add MS 47888. ALS; 2p.
Unpublished.
Dating note: Dating from content. BACK

[1] Mrs Vardon was pregnant. In the Belgian town of Spa, women wishing to become pregnant put a foot into a footstep cut in stone and dedicated to St Remaclus (d. 673) – as Mrs Vardon had done when she visited the town with Southey on 8 October 1815. BACK

[2] George Tarbutt Vardon (b. 1803), son of Mrs Vardon. George was going to enrol at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst; he emigrated to Canada in 1832, where he worked in the Indian Department. BACK

Addressee

Fricker, Edith (1774–1837)

People mentioned

Vardon, Elizabeth Bryan (née Tarbutt; dates unknown) (mentioned 1 time)
The Collected Letters of Robert Southey, Part Five
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