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National Library of Wales, MS 4811D. Previously published: Charles Cuthbert Southey (ed.), Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey, 6 vols (London, 1849-1850), II, pp. 179-181.
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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You will not be surprized to learn that I have lost my Mother. early on Tuesday morning there came on that difficulty of breathing which betokened death. till then all had been easy – for the most part she had slept – & when waking underwent no pain but that wretched sense of utter weakness. but then – the struggle & sound in the throat & the deadly appearance of the eyes that had lost all their tranquillity – she asked for laudanum – I dropt some but with so unsteady a hand that I knew not how much – she saw the colour of the water & cried with a stronger voice than I had heard during her illness – thats nothing Robert! thirty drops – six & thirty – it relieved her. she would not suffer me to remain by her bed side. that fearful kindness towards me had throughout distinguished her. ‘go down my dear – I shall sleep presently.’ – she knew & I knew what that sleep would be – however I bless God the last minutes were as easy as death can be. she breathed without effort – breath after breath weaker till all was over. I was not then in the room – but going up to bring down Edith – I could not but look at her to see if she was indeed gone. it was against my wish & will – but I did look –.
We had been suffering for twelve hours –
& the moment of her release was welcome. like one whose
limbs had just been amputated. he feels the immediate
ceasing of acute suffering, – the pain of the wound soon
begins – & the sense of the loss continues through life.
I calmed & curbed myself – & forced myself to
employment – but at night there was no sound of feet in her
bedroom – to which I had been used to listen – & in the
morning it was not my first business to see her – I had used
to carry her her food for I could persuade her better than
any one else to the effort of swallowing it. xxx xxxx xxxxxx of all then xxxxxxx
xxxxx xxxxxx
Thank God it is all over. Elmsley called on me & offered me money if I needed it. it was a kindness that I shall remember. Corry had paid me a second quarter however.
I have now lost all the friends of my infancy & childhood. the whole recollections of my first ten years are connected with the dead. there lives no one who can share them with me. it is losing so much of ones own existence. – I have not been yielding to – or rather indulging grief. that would have been folly. I have read – written – talked – Bedford has been often with me & kindly.
When I saw her after death Wynn – the
whole appearance was so much that of utter death – that the
first feeling was as if there could have been no world for
the dead. the feeling was very strong, & it required
thought & reasoning to recover my former state certainty that as
surely we must live hereafter – as all here is not the
creation of folly, or of chance.