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National Library of Wales, MS 4811D . Previously published: John Wood Warter (ed.), Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey, 4 vols (London, 1856), I, pp. 88–90.
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 have for sometime past been thinking
seriously & anxiously upon the future. if you knew the
nature of my own talents as well as I know them myself – if
you had oftener seen them tried in conversational argument,
you would I think be convinced that they are here <the work less> calculated
for common law than for any other possible employment. is
not the chancery linexxx a
case of life & death without forfi sacrificing my feelings & my peace of
mind. why not chancery? I will labour with all possible
diligence & with conscientious assiduity – & will
not this procure me practice?
I am uneasy at time on unavoidably lost. now better – now worse –
there is danger that hypochondriacal feelings may take root
in me, & the sooner I adopt some efficacious remedy the
better. it is better to go abroad for twelvemonths – than
still to expect strength in England. the journey will be as
useful as the climate from the perpetual excitement of
novelty. I should certainly prefer going to France – but in
this there would be difficulty & delay. Trieste is
accessible – & the journey thro Germany safe. at Trieste
I can judge of the security of Italy, & perhaps remove
to Padua or Vicenza, the places recommended by Duppa.
Of late I have done nothing except some
little to Thalaba.nearly three months since I
have reviewed a book – & the newspaper writing I have
given up for some time.xxxing going up to keep this term, – but the
expense would be inconvenient, & it will be as well to
make up my plans here, & not visit London till it lies
in my way to Hamburgh. Immediately on my return I will take
a house in London & settle to my profession.
Go where I will I shall take Edith with me.
her health alone would be motive sufficient. – my eyes &
ears are sufficiently open & quick – & I shall
certainly pick up an hundred pounds worth of matter upon my
way. – did I tell you that the copy right of my Joan of Arc
– & the first volume of Poems,
If I go to Trieste it will be necessary to have the summer for travelling & to land at Hambro as near the beginning of June as possible. Italy may very likely be re-revolutionized – but the Adriatic will always be open – & a retreat to Sicily or Sardinia or Portugal. besides a French army is not so formidable in its conquests as a Russian one, & those Bears you know do not eat English-folk.
When will the Homer