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Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin. Previously published: Charles Ramos (ed.), The Letters of Robert Southey to John May: 1797—1838 (Austin, Texas, 1976), pp. 27–29.
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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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.
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with regard to my
mothers affairs my Uncle
has no reason to think me inattentive or neglectful. I could indeed have advised
her to quit her present situation, but of what
avail would that advice have availed, barren
of assistance as it must have been? — it would have been like advising a debtor sick prisoner to change the air. as to my
reserve towards him — here indeed he is justly displeased. I do not wish to
excuse or palliate what I know to have <been> wrong. yet there
<were> many powerful motives that occasioned this. a young man
easily opens his heart to those of his own age who are endeared to him by a real
or imagined similarity of sentiment; but the same feelings that in that case
induce a hasty & credulous confidence, occasion a reserve towards those
of whose approbation he is doubtful. I had informed my Uncle by letter, before he thought
of taking me abroad with him, of all my future expectations. I could not enter
upon this subject in conversing with him, because I had frustrated all his plans
for me. I feard he would disapprove my plan of making a book, when my knowledge
must necessarily be so little of the subject — but that I should make a book was
absolutely necessary to my support. I would have sent him the manuscript,
& wished to do it; but I had a Counsellor more importunate than wisdom,
“malesuada Fames”,
Of your friendly offer of assistance I have fortunately now no
need. my mothers affairs will
now I hope be settled. I am very anxious to have her live with me, it would
increase her happiness & very much lessen my Uncles expences. I thank you
likewise for what you tell me respecting my Uncle; I was never with him a fortnight, till my journey to
Lisbon; by letter I had always been unreserved towards him, but there is were a thousand causes to prevent the
confidence of unembarrassed conversation. all this I hope is over, I have
followed your advice in my letter as closely as was possible, & said
every thing for the past as well as for the present. I can write to him with
pleasure now that I have a subsistence, & am embarked in a profession
which promises independance.
I am sorry Burnrs Burn
My last letter was so engrossed by one subject that I forgot to
thank you for your offer of serving the good Frenchman.
My brothers Captainprize vessel in such weather that the boat must
inevitably have sunk in attempting to reach her — & yet he could not
refuse or remonstrance, & would have perished if a Lieutenant with him
had not ordered them to give over the attempt. this is called discipline. there
was no man on board his vessel would have risqued his life in the leaky prize
for the prize money they <he>
might share. if my brother had
brought her into port his share would not have exceeded five guineas, but the
Captains would have been considerable, & his loss nothing if those he
sent on board had been drowned. I have made application to have my brother
removed to another ship. tis a horrible life. I had rather associate with the
Botany Bay colonists than with the crew of a man of war. Some of the
Swedenbourgians have believe that every man will
meet the kind of heaven he imagined in the next world, & that the
enjoyment of this <it> will be
their <his> hell till they are <he is> fully sensible of
their <his> error &
hase learnt to form the wish of wisdom. I
wonder what strange place they allot for sailours! they have every thing good to
learn, & what is the more difficult task, a great deal to forget. the
ancients had a comfortable fiction in their waters of Lethe
God bless you my dear friend. you may judge with what fixed
habits of reserve I came to Lisbon by recollecting how little you knew of me
there. “I was a stricken deer”