The Collected Letters of Robert Southey. Part 2: 1798-1803 A Romantic Circles Electronic Edition Southey, Robert, 1774-1843 Lynda Pratt Romantic Circles General Editor, Neil Fraistat General Editor, Steven E. Jones Technical Editor Laura Mandell 2011-08-15 rce642 letterEEd.26.633 Romantic Circles, http://www.rc.umd.edu, University of Maryland College Park, MD August 15, 2011

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Bodleian Library, MS Don. d. 3. Previously published: Kenneth Curry (ed.), New Letters of Robert Southey, 2 vols (London and New York, 1965), I, pp. 257-259.

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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 NINES categories for Genre and Material Form at http://www.performantsoftware.com/nines_wiki/index.php/Submitting_RDF#.3Cnines:genre.3E on 2009-02-26 Architecture Artifacts Bibliography Collection Criticism Letters Drama Life Writing Politics Folklore Ephemera Fiction History Leisure Manuscript Reference Works Humor Education Music nonfiction Paratext Perodical Philosphy Photograph Citation Family Life Poetry Religion Review Visual Art Translation Travel Book History Law Southey Letters: Biographies Southey Letters: Places Laura Mandell XSLT Transforming after latest corrections Laura Mandell XSLT Transforming Averill Buchanan corrections from proofing Averill Buchanan Part II added
633. Robert Southey to Henry Herbert Southey, 30 November 1801 Address: To/ Mr Henry Herbert Southey/ with Mr P. Martineau/ Norwich./ SingleStamped: [illegible]Postmark: No/ 30/ 1801MS: Bodleian Library, MS Don. d. 3Previously published: Kenneth Curry (ed.), New Letters of Robert Southey, 2 vols (London and New York, 1965), I, pp. 257-259. My dear Henry

I have sent off the ReviewAn article written by Henry Herbert Southey for the Critical Review. Its identity is unknown, and indeed it may not have been published. Henry Herbert Southey later contributed to the Annual Review. to Hamilton.Samuel Hamilton (fl. 1790s-1810s), owner of the Critical Review, 1799-1804. its insertion does not depend upon me, however – unless another account should already be printed, I suppose he will in common decency oblige me. You directed your letter to me at Mr Corrys, instead of inclosing it to him – in consequence it was charged at the Post Office. the outside should be to him only – & remember you cannot send above an ounce weight.

Your reading now would be more immediately pleasant, & every way more profitable – if you erected land-marks as you went along. Hearing that you are at AriostoLudovico Ariosto (1474-1533), Orlando Furioso (1532). an idea occurred to me which you may think of at leisure – & if you like pursue. about two or perhaps three year <ago,> a violent tho a well directed attack was made against the Italian Poets, in particular Ariosto, in the Monthly Magazine.See Monthly Magazine, 8 (August 1799), 440-442; 8 (December 1799), 870-872. The articles were signed ‘G.T.’. I know you like Ariosto, – & if you could with critically defend the Orlando Furioso – it would not be difficult to get your paper inserted in the same Magazine – & thus put you perhaps in a way of adding a little to your yearly income, while you improved yourself still more – I should like to help you in tracing the history of that Paladin story thro all its families, from TurpinArchbishop Turpin, 8th-century Archbishop of Reims, and reputed author of the 12th-century forgery, Historia de Vita Caroli Magni et Rolandi, an early source for the story of Orlando. – or from ought older than Turpin – if it can be found, analysing & criticising the various poems. if this made too large a digression in my own book upon Spanish literatureSouthey may have still been considering writing a book on the history of Spanish (and Portuguese) literature. – it might be published in a separate form. PulciLuigi Pulci (1432-1484), Italian poet, whose Morgante (1483) also concerned Orlando. & BoyardoMatteo Boiardo (1441-1494), Italian poet, whose Orlando Innamorato (1495) provided the early history of the hero of Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso. are doubtless within your reach – the rarer books I will hunt out, & furnish all the triumphant poems upon Roncesvalles that are to be found in SpanishThe battle of Roncesvalles in the Pyrenees in 778 was a minor affair, in which part of the rearguard of Charlemagne’s (742-814; King of the Franks 768-814, Holy Roman Emperor 800-814) army was defeated by local Basque forces. In legend it became the site of the last stand of the hero Roland, and the paladins of Charlemagne (of whom Orlando was one). There is an alternative Spanish tradition in which Roland was defeated by the legendary hero Bernardo del Carpio, whose deeds were most famously commemorated in Bernardo de Balbuena (1561-1627), El Bernardo (1624). – I think you would like some such leisure pursuit – that the subject would stimulate you sufficiently, & eventually the result be useful & creditable.

Literary habits are not acquired late in life. if you think them worth acquiring, this is the time. they are always a source of pleasure – & that pleasure the most lasting. a more palpable & pressing motive may be urged to you. at present you are plentifully supplied with money, but hereafter you will be compelled to oeconomize, – if the resources of literature should not be absolutely necessary, you will find them convenient. I would now young as you are – introduce you to the Reviews – if it were in my power. but in this way I have no influence whatever. I could not even transfer my own employment on going abroad – neither can I now recover it.

You imagine me in the high road to wealth & power – & travelling full gallop – the whole truth is that for the next year I have an income without working – not exceeding what I should have else have earned & received. that what I write – in my vocation – will be for Mr Corry instead of a newspaper or a bookseller, & that at the years end the only certainty is that I shall be richer – by whatever my leisure hours may have produced. A possibility exists that some birth may be given me in Ireland – a bare possibility – naked as the legal phrase expre to which I have no claim – of which no expectation. the South of Europe is still the point of my wishes. a Secretaryship – & the regular salary there is but £300 – would satisfy my wants – & I would for it abandon far brighter prospects than lie before me. the climate annoys me here, & I find no advantages in England to counterbalance that heavy evil.

I wish it were in my power to visit Norwich – but God knows when that will be. if there were no other objection – I am tethered here.

Burnett is going on miserably & in a way that distresses all his friends. he is earning a poor & precarious subsistence by writing for PhilipsSir Richard Phillips (1767-1840; DNB), publisher and proprietor of the Monthly Magazine. – a task for which he has neither activity nor knowledge. there is a hope – but a very poor one – that some office may be found for him in Ireland – if he will stoop to the duties of common attention. I labour to convince him, that if he has the power of ever producing any thing great – any situation is more favourable than that of a hackney author. that he ought to take a tutors place – or an Ushers if it could be got, & give his leisure to what he calls asserting his literary rank. he writes well – but he really possesses no knowledge – & from the little use he ever made of leisure I may say, no love of knowledge for its own sake. & now he has to get knowledge for the sake of getting literary reputation. It is not the first instance I have seen of Vanity misleading a man – but it is the most unfortunate one. poor fellow – I will do what I can to serve him – & wish heartily more were in my power.

I have turned over a whole bundle of Anthology <papers> to some new EditorsThe project to produce a successor to the Annual Anthology (1799) and (1800). James Webbe Tobin was one of the proposed editors. who are about to publish print a third volume. the fault they find with my selection ought to imply severer conduct in themselves. Wm Taylors HexametersWilliam Taylor (under the signature ‘RYALTO’), ‘The Show, an English Eclogue’, Annual Anthology (Bristol, 1800), pp. 200-210. If Southey is referring to reviews he was mistaken, as Taylor’s poem was not singled out for particular attention. He could, however, be reporting things said to him in conversation. are the great mark of xxxxx abuse in the last volume – I smile to hear the Authors of the very dullest poems there complain of the dull pieces inserted.

My Mother is coming to town with Mrs Lovell. I have been expecting them since Friday – & growling at the lazy & uncivil trick of not [MS torn] to prevent expectation. She was well enough to talk of travelling from Bath to Reading in one day. Of Tom I have not heard for many months. Edward & his Aunt both grow worse & worse – every thing I hear of them only vexes & irritates & distresses me –

Ediths love – God bless you –

yr affectionate brother R Southey. Monday. November – 30. 1801.