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British Library, Add MS 30,927. Previously published: John Wood Warter (ed.), Selections From the Letters of Robert Southey, 4 vols (London, 1856), I, pp. 46–47.
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.
All quotation marks and apostrophes have been changed: " for “," for ”, ' for ‘, and ' for ’.
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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.
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& has been used for the ampersand sign.
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I have been some fortnight at Bristol, with Danvers, where the time passed with most pleasant speed. last night we returned. I heard complaints that you had not written to Lloyd, & saw your letter. twere needless to say with what satisfaction I read the account of your new situation.
Amos Cottles translation of the Edda is published, & I have brought over a copy for you. you know it was my intention to write him some lines that might be prefixed, & perhaps sell some half dozen copies among my friends. you will find them there.
We go for London on Monday week. if you do not write sooner, my Mother will inform you my town direction as soon as I have one. Do you know that Lloyd has written a novel,
I would I had ought to inform you of. that my Mother has found some person to take her house, she must have informed you. (I have written to Thomas to come with all speed. & John May has offered me money for her small debts. you also know that Margery is become tutoress at a school) For myself — the most important personage in my drama of life — (in which drama, by the blessing of God I would have very few characters — this in a parenthesis) for myself — nothing has occurred to me worth pen ink & paper to record it — save only that after having inured myself to all weathers without a great coat for five years — I have mustered one at last, & now the old gentleman goes out in a bear skin wrapper to take care of himself. my new edition is in the press.
I have learnt to bind books. a great virtue — & moreover it may be useful in those days when a man will be glad of an honest trade. Ediths love — & Lloyds. & my Mother would send hers were she in the room.
now God bless you — & grant us no very distant meeting.
My Mother is very much better than when you left us.