Saturday July 13. 99.
My dear Wynn
I received yours this morning – & write
hastily to acknowledge it.
The allusion to Alibeg [1] shall come out – I hardly
know how it came in – it seemed to have a resemblance &
yet has none. tocsin shall go if I can find a better word –
but its reference to the French Revolution seems to
appropriate it to that place. Misanthropy is so much the
best personification I ever made, & so much the feeling
with which I wrote the poem, that it must stay. it is in my
own mind one of the most original passages I ever
conceived. [2]
You will be pleased to hear that yesterday I
finished Madoc – & as all poems should it rises in
interest till the conclusion.
I have been breathing a newly discovered
gas [3] which produces the most
extraordinary effects. laughter, a delightful sensation in
every limb – in every part of the body – to the very teeth,
& increased strength with no after relaxation. it is a
high pleasure for which language has no name, & which
can be estimated by no known feeling. I took some this
morning & still feel increased strength &
spirits.
Edith is &
has been exceedingly unwell. she is taking the strongest
tonics, & is to bathe. We leave Bristol I believe on
Monday week – & I hope soon to give you a good account
of Queen Mary. [4]
God bless you –
yrs truly
R Southey.
Notes* Address: To/ C W Williams Wynn Esqr/ Shrewsbury
Postmark: BRISTOL/
JUL 15 99
Endorsement: July 13/ 99
MS: National
Library of Wales, MS
4811D
Unpublished. BACK [1] ‘Hymn to the Penates’ in
Poems (Bristol, 1797), p. 205
contained a reference to a Persian favourite who
preferred his former simple life as a shepherd to the
Court. This was a much-published story in the eighteenth
century, about a mythical Persian visier called Alibeg.
It derived from the fables of the French clergyman and
writer, Francois de Salignac de La Mothe-Fenelon
(1651–1715). For an English translation, see
Twenty-Seven Moral Tales and Fables
(London, 1729), pp. 69–84. Southey removed this passage
in the 1799 third edition of his
Poems. BACK [2] The
paragraph deals with proposed changes to ‘Hymn to the
Penates’, which Southey was revising for the third
edition of his Poems (1797). Southey
replaced the word ‘tocsin’, with ‘alarm’,
Poems, 2 vols (Bristol, 1799), I, p.
196, but kept the personification of Misanthropy, pp.
198–199. BACK [3] Nitrous
oxide, or ‘laughing gas’. BACK [4] Southey’s proposed tragedy, set during the reign of
Mary I (1516–1558; reigned 1553–1558;
DNB); see Common-Place
Book, ed. John Wood Warter, 4 series
(London, 1849–1850), IV, pp. 190–192. BACK |
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