444. Robert Southey to Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 11 October 1799 ⁠* 

Christ Church. Friday night. Oct 11. 1799.

Here we are, in lodgings, waiting the revolutionizing of an old house. this is a business that suits me – & I have not to pay for it. nothing like a thorough reformation! radical improvements! the waters are abating & the country losing its dreariness & xx sublimity. the night of our arrival it was magnificent. I stood on the bridge – you have heard me describe it. the water washes the walls of a small but striking ruin. above stands the keep, with a huge rift in the side thro which the sky is seen. behind, the church, one of the finest in the Kingdom. to the right & left the flats were inundated. the night was wild, the moon rolling among driven clouds, & the rush of the flood now mingled with the xx roar of the wind, & now was heard in its pauses. every object was distinct & solemn – I cannot remember it without emotion.

Dorsetshire is a vile county, bare & barren, or cultivated without enclosures & scored like roast-pork. we are just out of its limits – in a singular place, sadly uninteresting to a common & cursory eye – but having in its vicinity much variety of scenery. the marsh is narrow, watered by a beautifully clear river, & stretching green & open to the foot of a dark chalk hill, assuming a different shape from every point of view, & every where striking. Burton is a little elmey village, east of the marsh. two miles east of Burton is the Forest. [1]  the sea a mile & half from us – & it is a noble sea view – to the right open – on the left assuming the appearance of a nobl large bay, of which the Island & the Needles [2]  form the opposit extremity. the cliffs high & silvery, & at evening often purple. The Church every where seen – in Cathedral grandeur. [3]  the soil the cleanest in the world – our very ducks white as swans, from the total absence of all mud. Two persons make the neighbourhood agreable. the one is rich enough to buy books, & very friendly. all that a neighbour should be. of the other you have heard me speak – rough – coarse – well informed on all subjects – believing nothing – jacobinical – & watching every little opportunity of doing showing attention & supplying your wants. this is my society – for I do not mention the pecus ignobile. [4]  I am as self-sufficient for enjoyment as Sommona-Codom [5]  – but I had rather have some body to be happy with, & think myself well off.

Will you believe? I converted Kendall [6]  to English Hexameters – & he said it would do: & Banfill [7]  whom I thoroughly astonishd. Northmore [8]  is that had his quantity & his spondees so stuck in the mud of his brain that he could not get rid of them. he is an excellent man whom every body teaches me to esteem – but he has an obstinacy that would do honour to a pig. I was one day surprized by a visit from an old Westminster, Lane [9]  – a man of whom the little I remember was not favourable. he brought with him Cosserat the clergyman, [10]  at whose mothers I dined. you know the man – shallow, good-natured, apparently a man who left off debauchery when he took orders. he talked of Jackson, & of his son [11]  who shot himself in a hard hearted stile which only a bigot could have used. the funeral was at midnight, & when it was over the old man laid his hand on Cosserats shoulder, who was the minister – I have followed six children to the grave – & this is the heaviest blow of all! – & the man told me this with exultation – because Jackson is an Atheist! I do not like Jackson – he is an aristocrat & an old debauchee – but he has had some severe blows lately, & he feels them. at Keenans [12]  I had been much interested by the picture of a woman leaning on a harpsichord. the face was not beautiful – but in the eyes there was an expression which spoke more than I had ever yet seen picture speak – I should have expected quick feeling & good sense from the original – & Keenan had painted her in a morning cap & given such a home appearance to her that I associated all domestic comforts with her. it was not till the day or two before my departure that I learnt it was the portrait of Miss Bradford, [13]  whom Jackson had kept – & not used kindly. she died in child-birth. it was said, poisoned by herself, & the report was countenanced by her previous state of wretchedness. they tell me he suffered bitterly on this occasion. nobody likes Jackson – but it is curious – I heard the reverend aristocrats object only to his atheism – & the democrats complained of his immorality.

I did not leave Exeter without a wish to revisit it. at Dorchester I spent half an [MS torn] with Gilbert Wakefield. his Lexicon was before him, & it is to be an English [MS torn] but he has no immediate intention of fitting it for publication. [14]  I found him well & chearful – in a comfortable room, peeping im[MS torn] one, at green fields thro iron bars & over a prison wall. he told me there was a plan for making George Dyer comfortable – that is his friends were to hold themselves ready to supply him to the amount of a hundred a-year – but George was not to know it – for if he did he would always anticipate his resources, & where he publishes one book, publish three, – for it seems it is his everlasting corrections of the press that perpetually keep him in debt.

On my arrival here I found a letter from Lloyd. he tells me his motive for being christened was that he might not be unlike other people! that he was sick of antisocial speculations – that he ceasd to expect virtue in the world – & about taking orders – that conformity was more irksome than ever, & that he did not mean to budge an inch in matter of conscience. Since I left Minehead I have never written to Lloyd, & with the conviction I feel that he has belie belied you & me to each other, I am somewhat irresolute how to act towards him. I am averse to any irritating correspondence & probably shall maintain an unfrequent intercourse with him, till he take orders, as I believe he will, & become ashamed to recollect me.

Let me have Christobel [15]  for the Anthology as soon as you can find inclination. it should be the opening poem – & the book should go to press as early in December as possible. perhaps you may be in Bristol & correct your own proofs otherwise they may be sent to you. I am sanguine about Mohammed [16]  & wish I had nothing to call my attention from it. when we have our scattered members ready you must come here & tack them all together. I wish we were nearer each other, but luckily by way of Bristol the staging is not expensive. – Tom is taken prisoner & carried into Ferrol. [17]  this was our first news here & we learnt it from the papers. whether after an action, we are ignorant & of course in some uneasiness. Edith would have written to her sister if I had not written to you. love from all – God bless you.

R Southey

direct Burton, near Ringwood. Hampshire