304. Robert Southey to Charles Watkin Williams Wynn, [10 April 1798]
304. Robert Southey to Charles Watkin Williams Wynn, [10 April 1798] *
My dear Wynn
I expected no letters on a Monday, & therefore did not look for any yesterday — but yours came from Maidenhead when a London one would not have come — & I have now only time to acknowledge it. The Ring [1] shall come tomorrow — you must expect nothing from it — one stanza may cause a smile — & that is all.
have you forgotten the subject I once mentioned to you for a ballad without a ghost? — the castle inhabited only by the maniac & young woman? [2]
I have thought of writing to you as a Member of Parliament [3] upon the subject of the moral mxxx property left to charitable uses & misapplied. I am very glad you did not speak upon the Slave Trade [4] — & yet I should <not> like you always to swim silently with the stream. it appears to me that on this subject much might be done — & the condition of the poor very greatly amended by only restoring to them what is pilfered.
God bless you.
yrs affectionately
R Southey.
Tuesday.
Notes
* Address: To/ C W Williams Wynn Esqr/ Dropmore Hill/
Maidenhead
Stamped: BRISTOL
Endorsement: April 10 1798
MS: National Library of Wales, MS 4811D. ALS; 2p.
Unpublished. BACK
[1] Southey’s poem had appeared in the Morning Post, 22 February 1798, under the signature ‘Walter’ (probably a version of ‘Wat Tyler’, a favourite pseudonym of Southey’s). The poem was later renamed ‘King Charlemain’. BACK
[2] Southey noted this idea in his Common-Place Book, ed. John Wood Warter, 4 series (London, 1849–1850), IV, pp. 95–96, but he did not turn it into a poem. BACK
