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British Library, Add MS 30927. Not previously published.
These letters were edited with the assistance of Carol Bolton, Tim Fulford and Ian Packer
For permission to publish the text of MSS in their possession, the editor wishes to thank the Beinecke Rare Books and Manuscript Library, Yale University; Berg Collection of English and American Literature, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations; the Bodleian Library Oxford University; the British Library; Boston Public Library; the Syndics of Cambridge University Library; the Syndics of the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge; Haverford College, Connecticut; the Historical Society of Pennsylvania; the Hornby Library, Liverpool Libraries and Information Services; the Houghton Library, Harvard University; the John Rylands Library, Manchester; the Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas; Luton Museum (Bedfordshire County Council); Massachusetts Historical Society; McGill University Library; the National Library of Scotland; the Newberry Library, Chicago; the New York Public Library (Pforzheimer Collections); the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York; the Public Record Offices of Bedford, Suffolk (Bury St Edmunds) and Northumberland, the Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge; the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne; the Trustees of the William Salt Library, Stafford, the Wisbech and Fenland Museum; the University of Virginia Library.
A research grant from the British Academy made much of the archival work possible, as did support from the English Department of Nottingham Trent University.
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Another book of Kehamax made, & yet it is so obviously unreasonable that I altogether disregard it, there being nothing in common except
the name of snake, – if it were worth while I might turn him into a great cuttle fish with nine tails to & so destroy
the likeness. That book goes off to night for Edinburgh – Ballantyne I think
will come to it in something less than a month. – certainly not in less than three weeks. – If you find your way here in the course of
the next fortnight I will talk of over the scene in the first walk we take, & then it is ten to one but
something some radical alteration may be struck out in time to supply its place: for tho the battle is well-managed &
all circumstances kept skilfully in view, certes I do not like it myself
You will find upon comparing the printed with the mss copy that of the altered passages some things which appear
alterations & not improvements, have been made necessary by others which really are improvements: & others (that which you have
instanced is an example) made <became> necessary xx when it was determined to cast the poem in rhyme, which
you know was not wholly determined till it was resumed with a resolution of going thro with it.
And so after promising to write from Bristol, & after your ghostly silence, – you had the conscience to be half
vexd at that page & half of my letter! Ah Goblin! When I wanted to hear news of Charke of Antwerp,
A word to Sir Domine Doctor. What time in April does the
General Gallic Engagement take place?x mine in my trunk.
The bottle letter is oiled. By all means send an account to the newspapers.
For a Monument in the Church of Bishops Lydiard
I was sorry when the Col. askd me for an Epitaph, but am not so now that this is written.
Your way here x must be by Newcastle & Carlisle. The mail reaches Carlisle about 11 at night. You may
get on by stage the next day either to Penrith or Wigton the latter will be a new road for you, & preferable because it is a very
fine approach to these Lakes. –
My love to Mary – we shall bring her niece, – who is now old enough to enjoy the journey, & all I think the better for change of air