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. Not previously published.
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.
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I write to you from Minehead – where I have past the longest week that ever uneasiness lengthened out. Edith has been very ill & is recovering so very slowly as hardly to render the daily amendment perceptible. I know not her complaint – it is a general debility – a wasting away – want of appetite – want of sleep – Grosvenor you have no anxieties of this kind.
Your balladto <in> the
point – but a woman who should be reading the book aloud at haphazard – would
feel very awkward when she came to the conclusion. I took counsel &
reluctantly yielded to an unanimous opinion, for the ballad is admirable. I did
not expect one so good. write more in this way & you will find a talent rich
& improveable.
Cottle is commissioned to forward
your copym Taylor –) is in my judgement of uncommon excellence, more
profuse in new & rich imagery than almost any piece that I remember. I look
to you for some supplies in the succeeding volumes – I look on this volume <Anthology> with very interesting
feelings – it reminds me of many friends. let me never wreathe a garland
Grosvenor without one flower from you.
I write under the impression of uneasy thoughts, we meant to go round Devonshire & I am fearful that we must return to Bristol that Edith may be under Beddoes. she is however recovering I think. bad weather keeps me within doors, & anxiety takes away the power of employing myself there.
Some day when you are in the library & with no immediate
employment refer to Picart for me.
Duppa sent me his book.
Grosvenor I have more than once felt an inclination to write to
you respecting Carlisle. you
perhaps overrated his good qualities once – but do you not under-rate them now?
& subtracting the due deficit from them, are there not enough remaining to
constitute him – if not quite a friend – yet something very near it – one to
regard & from whose company much pleasure may be derivable? it is very
painful – I know it by much experience, to have your friends sink in the
thermometer of your esteem, but I am afraid we like [MS obscured] xxxx we are with friends like Astronomers, who
when they discover a spot in the sun look at nothing else. friendship on the
wane is like the sick person who loathes the favourite food of his health. by
all this I only mean that tho Carlisle has some faults he has more good qualities, that tho
bipennated beingsmay be are much better, a great proportion of
bipeds are much worse. I do not want you to throw away your heart upon him – but
I would have your hand ready to receive him with the grasp of cordiality – this
last phrase makes my fingers itch for a shake of the hand with you –
do not forget my remembrances to Mr & Mrs B.