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Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center, University of Texas, Austin. Previously published: Charles Ramos, The Letters of Robert Southey to John May: 1797–1838 (Austin, Texas, 1976), pp. 39–40.
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 ’.
Any dashes occurring in line breaks have been removed.
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.
Writing in other hands appearing on these manuscripts has been indicated as such, the content recorded in brackets.
& has been used for the ampersand sign.
£ has been used for £, the pound sign
All other characters, those with accents, non-breaking spaces, etc., have been encoded in HTML entity decimals.
I have received a few lines from my Uncle
since I wrote, stating that he had sent twenty pounds to
Burnr
Thomas. I am obliged to Burn for his offer of
writing to my
Uncle, but it will come more properly from me.
For your offer of pecuniary aid I thank you.
but I need it not. I have kept pace with my increased
expences, by what resources you shall know when we meet. At
present I am unexpectedly perplexed about Harry,
who I thought was properly situated till he should be old
enough to commence some pursuit in life. but Burnett has
taken an unhappy dislike to his situation, & is about to
quit it. I am concerned very much on his account, &
perplexed as to settling Harry. to
educate him myself is utterly impracticable. my time was
always little enough for my business, & now I am obliged
to walk eight miles a day, & read & write less, xx I have been much
indisposed in consequence of too sedentary a life, &
this is my prescription. Harry is
now nearly fifteen & a year well employed would make him
fit for any thing.
Whom do you suppose I have met with for a
fellow traveller to London –? with Pond.
I have no written account of my Welsh Walk. Edith spent the days of my journey with Danvers’s mother, so Danvers & I wrote alternately. I saw enough to think the book makers who travel in Wales very stupid not to write more entertaining volumes. we were but seven days & a half walking to Hereford, one of which was spent with Maber, & I am sure if we had but doubled the distance I should enough matter, & that new enough for a volume. you will be amused to hear that we were examined on suspicion of being spies.
I am very glad you like my letters,
When I see you I will show you my English
Eclogues,