3336. Robert Southey to John Rickman, [c. 23 July 1819]
3336. Robert Southey to John Rickman, [c. 23 July 1819] *
My dear R.
I forgot to say that I attended to your remarks upon the Preface & conclusion as far as I could. – But I could find no means of altering the expression fit audience, – tho I felt as you did respecting upon transferring it from a poem to an historical composition. [1] The Pernambucan MS. for which Koster is thanked relates to 1710, – not to the recent rebellion. [2]
Davison (de Pauperibus) having been rewarded for his good works in that pamphlett & in the QR by a good living, has taken a wife, & is on his way to the Lakes. [3] He has introduced himself by letter, & will be at Keswick on Monday next.
I shall be ready to start upon receiving your summons, – & till it arrives must make the best use of my time.
God bless you
RS.
Notes
* MS: Huntington Library, RS 372.
ALS; 2p.
Unpublished.
Dating note: Dating from content; the reference to
Davison’s marriage and honeymoon journey. BACK
[1] History of Brazil, 3 vols (London, 1810–1819), III, p. 879: ‘fit audience however I know that it will find’. The phrase ‘fit audience’ echoes John Milton (1608–1674; DNB), Paradise Lost (1667), Book 7, line 31. BACK
[2] History of Brazil, 3 vols (London, 1810–1819), III, p. vi. Koster had given Southey a transcription of ‘Guerra Civil ou Sedissoens de Pernambuco Exemplo Memoravel aos vindouros 1710’, no. 3840 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library. This manuscript dealt with the Mascate War, or ‘War of the Peddlers’, in Pernambuco in 1710–1711, covered in History of Brazil (London, 1810–1819), III, pp. 85–107; not the Pernambuco insurrection of 1817. BACK