2206. Robert Southey to Grosvenor Charles Bedford, 19 January 1813 ⁠* 

My dear Grosvenor

Thank you for your solicitude. I am nearly arrived at that age when every man is said to be either a fool or a physician, – & I can explain my own attack satisfactorily. The head feeling I have been subject to since the year 1798; – it is no doubt the same sensation which is experienced, in fainting, & in an hysterical woman <it> would end in a fit. The sickness was an accidental effect of flatulence, – my stomach is so easily irritated, that in the sick head aches to which I am subject, no emetic is ever needed; – as soon as I perceive that it is necessary to clear the stomach, it is scarcely necessary to put my finger into my mouth, – I can xxxx effect the same purpose by an act of volition. The moment therefore in this last case I an apprehension of something was excited, – the thing itself followed – Your prescription of exercise however is followed. Before your letter arrived I had given Lunus full powers to rouse me at day break, & we fetch a walk before breakfast whenever the weather permits.

This goes with the last proof of my article upon the state of the populace. [1]  Pray secure the manuscript of this article, – or a set of the proofs before they receive that emasculation which they <it> may perhaps be destined to undergo. [2] 

Murray I see puts my name to Nelson. [3]  I left it to his discretion. –

I have just finished the tenth book of Roderick, [4]  – with what success I dare not say; – it is the most difficult part of the poem, & the difficulty is almost insuperable. Would the work were finished! I begin think seriously of dropping some of my engagements <in order> to have leisure for things of more ultimate importance. The Register [5]  may soon drop me, or perhaps I shall drop it, & get out of my dealings with John Ballantyne as well as I can. – And I shall most probably withdraw from the Review [6]  when those xxxx subjects which I have undertaken are cleared off. Jeffrey pays himself & Brougham (if not every body else) twenty guineas per sheet as the regular price. I have been paid twice at this rate, – (for Nelson [7]  & the Methodists [8]  – ) I ought to have received the same price oftener, (especially for the Inquisition [9] ) – the Q. ought to pay me as highly as the Ed. [10]  pays anybody, but I shall never give any hint of this kind, & in fact I am not sure that I wish any such arrangement to be made, – for it would tempt <me> to continue in a vocation which possibly even then is not the most profitable to which I could betake myself, & certes not the most worthy.

What is become of your papers? & where is my pension [11]  – where, ah – where!

I long to send you those books of Roderick [12]  which you have not seen.

RS.

Keswick. Jan^y. 19. 1813.