Material from the Romantic Circles Website may not be downloaded, reproduced or disseminated in any manner without authorization unless it is for purposes of criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, and/or classroom use as provided by the Copyright Act of 1976, as amended.
Unless otherwise noted, all Pages and Resources mounted on Romantic Circles are copyrighted by the author/editor and may be shared only in accordance with the Fair Use provisions of U.S. copyright law. Except as expressly permitted by this statement, redistribution or republication in any medium requires express prior written consent from the author/editors and advance notification of Romantic Circles. Any requests for authorization should be forwarded to Romantic Circles:>
By their use of these texts and images, users agree to the following conditions:
Users are not permitted to download these texts and images in order to mount them on their own servers. It is not in our interest or that of our users to have uncontrolled subsets of our holdings available elsewhere on the Internet. We make corrections and additions to our edited resources on a continual basis, and we want the most current text to be the only one generally available to all Internet users. Institutions can, of course, make a link to the copies at Romantic Circles, subject to our conditions of use.
Huntington Library, RS 35. Previously published: Kenneth Curry (ed.), New Letters of Robert Southey, 2 vols (London and New York, 1965), I, pp. 315-317.
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.
Any dashes occurring in line breaks have been removed.
Because of web browser variability, all hyphens have been typed on the U.S. keyboard.
Dashes have been rendered as a variable number of hyphens to give a more exact rendering of their length.
Southey’s spelling has not been regularized.
Writing in other hands appearing on these manuscripts has been indicated as such, the content recorded in brackets.
& has been used for the ampersand sign.
£ has been used for £, the pound sign
All other characters, those with accents, non-breaking spaces, etc., have been encoded in HTML entity decimals.
It is many a week since I have written to or heard from you, & probably you as well as myself have been silent more from industry than idleness. & silent I should have continued till my commissions from Lisbon arrive & enable me to say when I shall appear in town, if I had not a question to propound to my Oracle.
How is it that debasing the coin produces such ruinous effects, in countries that not carrying on any extensive
commerce, have but very little dealing with foreign states? & at a period when there were no Birmingham tradersxxxxx pass for five shillings – or five guineas as well as a piece of silver
paper. It is very clear that base money will not do for foreign traffic – but the iron money of Sparta served at home as well as gold.
the Castilian trade in the 14th century was too trifling to account for the general complaint. – When you have half
an hours leisure do make this matter plain to me.
That rascally Scotch Review of John Woodvillexx particular excellencies which outweigh their
defects. Coleridge thinks that the reason why those Scotchmen hate him
as they evidently do, is because Stoddart
I am promised access to the Kings Libraryxxxx winter – perhaps the Autumn of
next year all my materials here will be gone thro, & then I should go over, & fix no period for my return. Now as things are,
perhaps it would be my wisest way to go over at once & collect what I can while I can. but then I shall be wishing myself at home.
& to look one way & now another is not the way for any one, except a waterman, to get on. Since you heard from me I have had a
sad diabetes, a complaint to which I have been often subject – in consequence probably of general weakness, & both last Autumn
& last Spring I felt the climate like a confirmed valetudinarian. now I do not value my self so little as to think myself as well
underground as above it, for certainly I am good for something else beside church yard manure. & moreover I like life, for I enjoy
it, & have as xxx much reason to like it & as much actual happiness as falls to the lot of most
men. And I do verily believe that were I settled in such a climate as that of Lisbon it would renew my lifehold lease, & give me a
better tenure, & a chance of a much longer life than I can possibly have here – where I am going on somewhat like a myrtle at a
parlour window in London. If there should be an army sent to Portugal, as there was last war, I think I would try to get some civil appointment – there are plenty of such appointments with good pay & good rations into the bargain, &
perhaps my Uncles interest might help me to one – I could do the business
& yet have leisure.
It will not be long before I shall announce my appearance. I have begun to catalogue my books here with a view to
filling it up in London. since Amadis
Edith desires to be remembered. she is well & Margaret grows lustily, & has a pair of as quick eyes as were ever kindled by intelligence.