797. Robert Southey to Thomas
Southey, 14 June 1803
*
Day after day Tom do I look to the Portsmouth news to see “Saild
the Galatea”. [1] but the
Galatea saileth not. however I suppose you are glad enough to have escaped being
fixed in a floating battery off Guernsey. Spithead & hope is better than
that.
Our last letters crossed each other on the road. since that time
nothing has occurred here worth mentioning. Joe [2] the same vagabond. Cupid [3] the same mighty
hunter – Margary the
same Doctor Dodd. [4] only more alive, & more kicking than ever. Tobin is in town. King will soon have a Prince or a
Princess. Your namesake has lost his old friend Mrs
Oliver [5]
& that is all the news. Except indeed you have heard enough of Bill
Coates [6] & Underwood [7] to be interested
by hearing that they are prisoners of war in France.
Six week ago I said you might expect Amadis [8] in that space of time – & there you may
expect, & if you stay six weeks <more> which good fortune forbid!
perhaps you may expect on as much longer. the whole of the two first Volumes is
done, preface index & all. 3/4 of the third & 1/4 of the fourth.
yesterday I had a letter from Longman & Rees who had
just heard of that other Amadis. [9] they wrote to introduce Dallas to me
– the Author of the History of the Maroons. [10] & they say that because of this other book they will put
another printer to work upon mine, which if they do they may get it finished in
a fortnight.
My Uncle tells me their old
alarms are come upon them again at Lisbon. for himself he should be indifferent
but he wishes to remain there for the facility of procuring books for me. since
the Amadis & the Reviewing have been cleared off I have indeed done wonders
in history, [11] & am daily at it, in some shape or other,
morning noon & night: exclusively – for politics fill up the Morning Post,
& leave me nothing to do there.
Alack & a-well-a-day!
And what else have I to say!
Has cut a tooth
And by good hap
Has left off her cap
But my little girl
Has hair that wont curl
And her tooth is a snag-one
And as sharp as if it belonged to a Dragon,
Best of every one except one she loves her father
And that one is her mother whom she loves better rather
Like her fathers own child
She makes as much noise as if she was wild
Bawling
And calling
But not squalling
Early in the morning she behaves very ill to Papa
For she pulls his nose & cries Ah!
Or else she slaps his face
Which is not a sign of grace
She eats meat when we dine
And is a little too fond of port wine –
For if I <would> let her have her fill
She would get drunk with a very good will.
Because I dont like the common-place phrases of phrase praise
Which folks give their children now a days –
What did I do
But invent some that are quite new
& so I call her a very worthy child. & a most excellent
character.
And so good brother
mine
A Dios – A Dios [12] – in Spanish &
rhyme
R Southey
My picture is not a Miniature. it is the one which
Keenan [13] took when I was last in London – I – & a
great book, & my desk, & my desk carpet – poor Mrs Danvers’s
work – who – poor woman, was greatly pleased to hear that her carpet was
sitting for its picture
Near to famous Bristol Town –
Written all in the same tune
Upon a Tuesday morning the fourteenth day of June
In the year of our Lord God d’ye see
One Thousand, Eight Hundred & Three.
Notes
* Address: To/ Lieutenant Thomas Southey/ H. M.
S. Galatea/ Spithead/ Single
Postmark: [partial] BRISTOL/ JUN
14
MS: British Library, Add MS 30927
Unpublished. BACK
[1] Tom Southey’s ship, HMS Galatea, a 32-gun Royal Navy frigate. BACK
[4] William Dodd
(1729-1777; DNB), a writer who was hanged for forgery ‘alive
and kicking’; hence, an appropriate nickname for the infant Margaret
Southey. BACK
[5] Tom’s namesake is probably his
uncle Thomas Southey. Mrs
Oliver (d. 1803) was possibly a member of the family that ran the Bristol
linen drapers Oliver, Ridout and Oliver. She may have been related to William Oliver (1775-1830) of Hope Corner, Taunton, to whom Thomas Southey left his fortune. Thomas Southey had himself once
been a draper, in partnership with Robert and Tom Southey’s father. BACK
[6] William Coates (dates
unknown), was a Clifton resident. He was known to Davy and Coleridge and was
a subscriber to a number of Bristol literary works. His brother was Matthew
Mills Coates (d. 1819) of the law firm Morgan and Coates, Small St, Bristol.
Both brothers were radicals and may have been related to John Prior Estlin’s
first wife, Mary Coates (1753-1783). BACK
[7] Thomas Richard Underwood (1772-1835;
DNB), watercolourist and geologist. A proprietor of the
Royal Institution, he had been instrumental in Humphry Davy’s appointment as
assistant lecturer in 1801. His circle included Southey, Wordsworth and
Coleridge (who nicknamed him ‘Subligno’). In 1803 Underwood accompanied
Thomas Wedgwood on a European tour. After hostilities resumed on 16 May
1803, Wedgwood managed to make his way home, but Underwood was arrested at
Calais. His detention in France lasted until 1814. BACK
[8] Southey’s translation of Amadis of
Gaul (1803). BACK
[9] William
Stewart Rose (1775-1843; DNB), Amadis de Gaul, a Poem
in Three Books, Freely Translated from the First Part of the French
Version of Nicholas de Herberay, Sieur des Essars, with Notes by William
Stewart Rose (1803). BACK
[10] Robert Charles Dallas (1754-1824; DNB),
The History of the Maroons, from their Origin to the
Establishment of their Chief Tribe at Sierra Leone
(1803). BACK
[11] Southey’s unfinished
‘History of Portugal’. BACK
[12] The Spanish translates as ‘good-bye’. BACK
[13] John Keenan (fl.
1780-1819) had painted a portrait of Southey that was being exhibited at
the Royal Academy. BACK
