1919. Robert Southey to Thomas Southey, 8 May 1811 ⁠* 

Keswick. May 8. 1811.

My dear Tom

Longman tells me he has 109 copies of Kehama left, which he hopes will soon go, – & therefore as it is desirable one edition should be ready by the time the other is sold, he wishes the second may go forthwith to press. [1]  Moreover he has only 50 of the small Madoc, [2]  – so this also goes to press tomorrow. I am exceedingly glad of this, for the current edition is so ill clumsily divided, & so ill printed that I never could look at it without displeasure. Slow & sure Tom. There will now be three of my poems in the press at once. [3]  I make no alterations except adding something to the notes, for which service if Sarah were here I should be glad to put her in requisition.

My Aunt Mary has not written to me again, which I am sorry for, because her letter made me something rather uneasy about her own state of health, & because I am anxious to know what she has done with her own littler property. Besides I prest her earnestly to return come to Keswick, promising to fetch her. I have not heard what Mr T Southey died of, [4]  but it seems he was ill sometime, & repeatedly declared his determination that not a shilling should ever go to one of his own family. For my own part I give him a receipt in full for all injustices toward me. I always thought the Olivers [5]  most likely to be his heirs, & that opinion implies as much reason as there could be for so unreasonable a thing as making them so.

Poor Mr Bunbury died last night. His new house is just finished – & the garden &c about which he took so much pains for the last three or four years – now in compleat order for somebody else to enjoy. – I see too by to nights papers that Mr Smith the Quaker is dead – this I have long expected to hear.

Let me pass to some chearfuller topic. What for Heavens sake has Cunliffe Owen been about? [6]  – I am afraid the story cannot be all false, if he has been playing the rascal in giving information as they say, far better had he been shot in your ships boats.

A homo from Edinburgh [7]  brought me the Register [8]  sheets yesterday & an ill-looking letter from Ballantyne. I had urged him to turn over the super abundant bulk of the first volume into the second, & turn out some of the anneafiaries [9]  to make room for it: by way of comfort he tells me that the second is still fuller than the first that he dares not raise the price yet, & that this extra bulk <quantity> will eat up the profits of the year. So that I have the pleasure of three months additional labour, xx the only payment for which will be to find myself 50 or 60£ minus in my division of profits when the accounts come to be made up. 464 pages are printed. he has 100 more in his hands, & I have still God knows how much to write. To night I shall finish the Austrian war, except the Tyrolean affairs. they will fill one chapter. the Douro & Galician campaign 1. Talavera 1. subsequent events 1. Gerona 1. Tamames & Ocana 1. Change of ministry & Buonapartes divorce 1. [10]  seven chapters still before me! they will keep me till the end of the month – but certes I trust not longer. so I expect to be at Streatham (God willing) the first week in June. By the Lord I shall like my old friend in the Pilgrims Progress [11]  when the burthen is off my shoulders! Not that my attention has ever flagged nor that I am in the slightest degree weary of the work. Thank God I do not know what it is to be weary of doing that which ought to be done.

This obstinacy on the part of the Spanish Regency about placing troops under British officers is a great & provoking evil.

I have seen Jeffrays review, [12]  was there ever such a compound of contradictory malice, insolence & ignorance! The man however cannot speak half so contemptuously of me as I think of him, & he has the comfort of knowing that.

Pelayo [13]  has been standing still. I lay the fault upon Puss Katharine, – tho some of it is owing to myself. Perhaps I may get on with at it at Streatham. indeed as soon as I begin to think seriously of printing it, & to see in imagination the goodly image of a first proof sheet, – then I shall spur on amain

The men are at work upon our house rough-casting it at last. Your nephew has began Robinson Crusoe yesterday. [14]  To day having read thro M^r Crusoe’s description of the evils Robinson must expect at sea, he looked up to his aunt & exclaimed – ‘poor miserable man!” – So I think the Moon has <discovers> no inclination to be a sailor. – Ediths love –

God bless you

RS.