2119. Robert Southey to John James Morgan, 1 July 1812
2119. Robert Southey to John James Morgan, 1 July 1812 *
Keswick. July 1. 1812.
My dear Morgan
I am casting about in my mind how to get payment remitted to you, – which I believe cannot very well be done in the manner you recommend, Edinburgh-men having no London bankers. Had you thought of taking the draft to Longman or to Murray I think there would have been no difficulty. Indeed I found none in negociating a bill upon Ballantyne when last in London myself, – nor in remitting one to a larger amount on a former occasion. However by some means or other the money shall speedily be sent. [1]
My object in writing now relates to Mr Dawe [2] – I wish him to know that on Monday week next I am going to Durham, & shall be absent till the end of the month, but certainly at home (if no accident prevent) by the first of August. And I should be very sorry if his journey should be so timed that I should not be here when he arrives to show him such attentions as may be in my power. The business of his trunk is very knavish. The words by waggon are legible upon the direction, tho they have been inked over. I suppose the xxxxx carriage per coach must be paid here, & the London office where the roguery was practiced threatened with an action to procure redress.
Thank you for the extract. your former letter is now explained; it puzzled me excessively, when you said you had only just received the draft, & that it was not directed to you, I could neither <not> conceive what you meant this habit of C’s is I fear perfectly incurable. I suppose he has not read my letter in reply to his, – or he would doubtless have answered it. Will you ask him to write Mrs to Mrs C. – he promised to send the boys [3] some books of which they are in want; – only let him say if it be not convenient for him to do this only let him say so, & she will procure them by other means. ––There was an attack upon him (not indeed by name) in the Examiner about a fortnight ago, for which Hunt [4] ought to have be x well horse whipped. Gentlemen who make this kind of use of the liberty of the press must expect that the liberty of the horse whip will be the natural consequence.
Remember me to Mrs M.
Yrs very truly
R Southey
Notes
* Address: To/ J. J. Morgan Esqr/ 71 – Berners Street/ Oxford
Street/ London.
Endorsement: R Southey Esqr
Stamped: KESWICK/ 298
Postmarks: E/ 4 JY 4/ 1812
MS: Brotherton Library, University of Leeds. ALS; 3p.
Unpublished. BACK
[1] The remittance was for silver tableware supplied by Morgan’s father-in-law, the silversmith Moses Brent (d. 1817); see Southey to Grosvenor Charles Bedford, 8 [July] 1812 (Letter 2121) and Robert Southey to John James Morgan, 8 July 1812 (Letter 2123). BACK
[2] The history and portrait painter George Dawe (1781–1829; DNB). He visited Greta Hall in September-October 1812, and whilst there worked on the 9 foot by 8 foot canvas ‘Mother Rescuing her Child from an Eagle’s Nest’. His visit was not without controversy, with some members of the household complaining about his habit of keeping windows open. The picture was based on William Hayley’s (1745–1820; DNB), ‘The Eagle’, first published in Designs to a Series of Ballads (1802). BACK
[3] Hartley and Derwent Coleridge. BACK
[4] As Coleridge was not named in the ‘attack’ in The Examiner to which Southey refers, it is not entirely clear which article is being referred to here. One possibility is The Examiner, 9 (21 June 1812), 387: ‘A love of drinking, especially if it has any gift of talking to work upon, will make a man exceedingly didactic; … he will sometimes deceive his very self into a notion that he is a worthy person, and attribute his bad habits to a vague sort of destiny that besets him, and renders him more to be pitied than blamed. The most didactic and talkative person of the day appears to be one of this description, and wants nothing but his supply of brandy and water to be set a-doling about the “moral feeling” from morning to night.’ BACK
