636. Robert Southey to Charles
Danvers, [c. 4 December
1801]
*
At last my dear Danvers, I repay you the
thirty pounds, & remit Hamiltons [1] old debt. I wish this last had been a
larger sum. let me know the amount of Maurices [2] bill – the taylor
being paid & the smaller sums that you have expended for
me there will remain from ten to twelve pounds towards
defraying it. I had nearly forgotten to say that a Mr Lomax of Liverpool [3] foolishly sent his subscription for
Chatterton to me – making it two £. it is better pay it at
once to Mrs Newton [4] be good enough when you go near that end
of the town to pay it her – & just take her
memorandum.
If Maurices account be not a heavy one – may
I ask you to discharge it for me? it hangs upon my mind,
& I have no immediate means of clearing myself. Corry advanced me
my first quarter – you will conceive what a hole the
journeys from Llangedwin to Keswick – thence to
Ireland – again to Keswick & to London must have made in it.
probably my second quarter will not be paid till the end of
the half year. meantime I must labour to keep pace with an
increased expenditure. Hamilton promises to send me books. I
have again engaged with Stuart
[5] – the two will bring me I trust fifty
pounds in the half year. Sometimes I look at Kehama, [6] sometimes
dream of a play which would be a great prize & indeed
float me for the rest of my voyage. Madoc [7] shall not be sacrificed to any temporary
exigence. I schemed a prose story one day in a stage [8] – the opposite moral to that stupid
Forester of Miss Edgeworth. [9] a plain tale how a young man by acting
consistently upon philosophical principles preserved himself
in difficult circumstances from what would else have been
utter misery – so much for my embryos – the play I suppose
must come to something – according to all laws of
motive.
My Mother is
as may be expected, one day better – one day worse. her
present exceeding weakness she attributes to a bowel
complaint when at Knowle. if I could see her gain any, the
least strength perhaps I also might think so, & fancy
the cough was her old one, & the expectoration not
consumptive. but every symptom is against this. neither the
present is agreable – nor the prospect chearing. I wish my
years service were over – that the time were past & my
own lot determined –
We expect soon to see Charlotte Smith [10] – indeed she will probably be our
neighbour, & I promise myself some pleasure in her
company. – My visit to Holland House did not take place.
Lady H. [11] was unwell – & since that time
Wynn has
left town – so it is prorogued indefinitely. – Of Coleridge we see little – he talks of leaving
town – foolishly I think as Stuart pays him
– almost prodigally – for doing little – but doing any thing
is a labour from which he would willingly shrink. I have not
yet heard how Burnett goes on in his new employment.
Phillips [12] has used him so scurvily
that if Georges account be quite accurate he ought to be
paragraphed for a rascal in every newspaper. he bargained
with him for two sheets – of which the price was to be ten
guineas. Phillips afterwards sent him word that he might
make it three sheets. accordingly Burnett did so
– & when he demanded the 15 guineas in ratio – no Sir –
said the overgrown scoundrel – I told you you might make it
thr[MS torn] sheets if you pleased – but I never said I
would pay for three. – So ends [MS torn] only connection
with a bookseller which Burnett can
hope to make. I doubt [MS torn]s ability for his present
task – tho it be the easiest possible. for he is very
inactive & the little time his indolence has ever
sacrificed to reading has been wasted upon metaphysics –
ploughing sand!
I should be less pleased than surprized if
Corry was to
set about trans metap
metamorphosising me from a secretary into a tutor for his
son. [13] already I go with him to
Walkers Lectures. [14] no bad way of spending
two hours – if they must be spent apart from the great desk
& the carpet. Out of his own branch of business he
possesses very little knowledge – doubtless I must appear to
him as deficient as he does to me – as in every conversation
one or the other must betray some ignorance. my own
expectations & intentions I laid open fully in my last.
if it were but possible to drop your house & its
concerns at Keswick,
I should wish no alteration in them.
Our love to Mrs
D. you had better acknowledge this in a letter
directed straight, else it may be delayed at Mr
Corrys. I am obliged to make the draft payable to
bearer, it being without a stamp
God bless you
yrs affectionately
R Southey
Notes* Address:
To/ Mr Danvers/ 9. St James’s Place/ Kingsdown/
Bristol
Stamped: BRIDGE-St./
Westminster
Postmark: [partial] BDE/ 801
MS:
British Library, Add MS
47890
Unpublished.
Dating note: The letter’s
contents suggest a date in early December 1801, round
about 4 December, when Southey began to attend the
lectures given by Adam Walker. BACK [1] Samuel Hamilton (fl. 1790s-1810s), owner
of the Critical Review, 1799-1804.
Southey had reviewed intermittently for the journal
since 1797. BACK [2] Joseph Maurice (dates
unknown), an apothecary with a shop on St Michael’s
Hill, Bristol. He had treated Southey and his family
while they lived in Bristol. BACK [3] Mr Lomax (dates unknown) had
sent Southey £2 for a copy of The Works of Thomas
Chatterton (1803), edited by Southey and
Joseph Cottle. In the list of subscribers at the
beginning of volume 1, he was described as ‘Mr. J.
Lomax, one Copy, 2l.’ He might have
been either the merchant James Lomax or John Lomax, both
of whom lived in Bold St, Hanover St, Liverpool, in
1800. BACK [4] Mary Newton (1749-1806),
Chatterton’s sister, who was the beneficiary of
Southey’s and Cottle’s edition of her brother’s
works. BACK [5] Southey had ‘engaged’
to write poems for the Morning Post,
owned by Daniel Stuart, as he had done in 1798-1799. But
only three of his poems appeared in September-December
1801, and Southey did not publish anything further in
the Morning Post until 4 February
1803. BACK [6] For Southey’s plan for
The Curse of Kehama (1810), see
Common-Place Book, ed. John Wood
Warter, 4 series (London, 1849–1850), IV, pp. 12-15. By
this date he had only drafted Book 1. BACK [7] Southey had finished a
version of Madoc in 1797-1799. He was
revising it for publication, but it did not appear until
1805. BACK [8]
Common-Place
Book, ed. John Wood Warter, 4 series
(London, 1849–1850), IV, pp. 9-10, contains Southey’s
sketch for a novel with a hero called ‘Oliver Elton’. In
a subsequent note (IV, p. 10) dated ‘Parkgate. Saturday
Oct. 10, 1801’, Southey described the story as
concerning ‘a man who, by practical wisdom and useful
knowledge, preserves himself from misery in difficult
circumstances, and makes and deserves his own
happiness.’ BACK [9] Maria Edgeworth (1768-1849;
DNB). ‘Forester’ was one of the short
stories in Moral Tales for Young People
(1801). It dealt with a young man of high principles but
no tact. BACK [10] Charlotte Turner
Smith (1749-1806; DNB), poet and
novelist; author, among many other works, of
Celestina (1791) and The Old
Manor House (1793). She was an old friend of
Mary Barker; the two spent the winter together in London
in 1801-1802. BACK [11] Elizabeth
Vassall Fox, Lady Holland (c. 1771-1845;
DNB), literary and political hostess.
Her second husband was Henry Richard
Fox, 3rd Lord Holland, Whig politician and
Hispanophile. BACK [12] Sir
Richard Phillips (1767-1840; DNB),
publisher and proprietor of the Monthly
Magazine. BACK [14] Probably given by Adam Walker (1730/1-1821;
DNB), famed for his lectures,
especially on astronomy. BACK |
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