3756. Robert Southey to John Rickman, [shortly after 8 December 1821]

3756. Robert Southey to John Rickman, [shortly after 8 December 1821] ⁠* 

My dear R.

I send Pople a packet of scraps, which xxxx scraps require an inclosure. They conclude my labours with this reprint. [1] 

The Capt. was so much broken when I was last in town that I thought it little likely I should ever see him again. His death was of that kind which one must needs wish for oneself. But of course I did not xxx see it in the newspapers without a natural shock. [2]  – Poor man; I am reading Kotzebues [3]  voyage, & the thought constantly occurs how interested he, above all men, would have been with it.

The Printers are pursuing me, – or I should have sent more journal [4] 

God bless you

RS.


Notes

* MS: Huntington Library, RS 421. ALS; 1p.
Unpublished.
Dating note: The content indicates that the letter was written shortly after that to Herbert Hill, 8 December 1821, Letter 3755. BACK

[1] The second edition of the first volume of the History of Brazil (1822). BACK

[2] James Burney died on 17 November 1821. BACK

[3] Otto von Kotzebue (1787–1846), Voyage of Discovery into the South Sea and Bering’s Straits (1821), no. 1576 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library. BACK

[4] Edith May Southey was transcribing Southey’s journal of his and Rickman’s tour of Scotland in August–September 1819, later published as Journal of a Tour in Scotland in 1819, ed. Charles Harold Herford (1819). BACK

People mentioned

Burney, James (1750–1821) (mentioned 1 time)