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Bodleian Library, MS Eng. Lett. c. 23. Previously published: Charles Cuthbert Southey (ed.), Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey, 6 vols (London, 1849–1850), II, pp. 33–35 [in part; misdated 21 December 1799].
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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Gatholonabes – Aladeules – Aloadin –
By what ειλετο.
γευτο –
οτπερ.
Grosvenor I think seriously of going abroad.
my complaint, so am I told by the opinion of many medical
men is wholly a diseased sensibility – (mind you – physical
sensibility –) disordering the functions now of the heart –
now of the intestines – & gradually debilitating me.
climate is the obvious remedy. in my present state to
attempt to undergo the confinement of legal application were
actual suicide. I am anxious to be well – & to attempt
the profession. much in it I never
shall do – sometimes my principles will stand in my way –
sometimes the want of readiness which I felt from the first
– a want which I always know in company, & never in
solitude & silence. howbeit I will make the attempt –
but mark you, if by stage writing, or any other writing, I
can acquire independance, I will not make the sacrifice of
happiness it will inevitably cost me. I love the country – I
love study – devotedly I love it. but in legal studies it is
only the subtitly of the mind that is exercised – however I
need not philippicize – & it is too late to veer about.
in 96 I might have chosen physic & succeeded in it – I
caught at the first plank – & mist the great mast in my
reach. perhaps I may enable myself to swim by & by.
Grosvenor I have nothing of what the world call ambition. I
never thought it possible that I could be a great Lawyer – I
should as soon expect to be the Man in the Moon. my views
were bounded – my hopes – to an income of 500 a year, of
which I could lay by half to effect my escape with. possibly the stage may exceed this,
& that at an expence of time on my part allowing three
parts of the year to other labours. I am not indolent – I
loathe indolence. but indeed reading law is laborious
indolence. it is thrashing straw. I have read & read
& read – but the Devil a bit can I remember. I have
given all possible attention & attempted to command
volition – no! the eye read – the lips pronounced – I
understood – I re read it – it is was very clear – I remembered the page – the
sentence – but close the book – & all was gone! Were I
an independant man – even on less than I now possess. I
should long since have made the blessed bonfire &
rejoiced that I was free & contented. I need not tell
you this is only for your own eye.
I suffer a good deal from illness. & in a
way hardly understandable by those in health. I start from
sleep as if death had seizd me – I am sensible of every
pulsation – & compelld to attend to the motion of my
heart, till that attention disturbs it, the pain in my side
is I think lessened – nor do I at all think it was
consumption. organic affection it could not have been – else
it had been constant – & a heart disease would not have
been perceived there. I must go abroad,
& recruit under better skies. not to Lisbon. I will see
something new – & something better than Portugueze. Ask
Duppa about
Italy – about Trieste – & the way thro Vienna – &
say something to him on my part expressive of respect – of a
wish one day to see more of him.
But of these plans you shall know more when
they are more moulded into form. in the meantime I must
raise the supplies – & for this purpose there is
Thalaba. my expedition will not be a ruinous one, & it
shall be as oeconomical as it ought. I will at least xxx xxxx return w[MS torn]
not better. Italy will be safe if Austria have sense enou[MS
torn] an event of which I entertain little doubt. even if
the war i[MS torn] is always easy into Germany, – or Sicily
is accessible. [MS torn] is the way – to be obliged to cross
to Hamburgh instead [MS torn] man for subject to sea-sickness! Zounds – it is a
be[MS torn] peace than they had to go to war.
But now for more immediate affairs – the
Antholo[MS torn]x xxxx can xxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxx
N.B. Cursed Cold Weather!