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<title type="main">The Collected Letters of Robert Southey. Part 2: 1798-1803 </title>
<title type="subordinate">A Romantic Circles Electronic Edition</title>
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<name>Southey, Robert, 1774-1843</name>
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<editor>Lynda Pratt</editor>
<sponsor>Romantic Circles</sponsor>
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<idno type="nines">rce882</idno>
<idno type="edition">letterEEd.26.873</idno>
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<p>Huntington Library, RS
                        48.  Previously  published: Charles Cuthbert Southey
                        (ed.), Life and Correspondence of Robert
                            Southey, 6 vols (London, 1849-1850), II, pp.
                        243-244 [in part].</p>
<p>These letters were edited with the assistance of Carol Bolton, Tim Fulford and Ian Packer</p>
<p>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.</p>
<p>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.</p>
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<div n="873" type="letter">
<head>873. Robert Southey to <ref target="people.html#RickmanJohn">John Rickman</ref>,
                        <date when="1803-12-23">23 December 1803</date>
<note place="foot" resp="editors" type="headnote">Address: To/
                        John Rickman Esq<hi rend="sup">r</hi>
<lb/> Endorsement:
                        RS/ Dec 23:/ 1803<lb/>MS: Huntington Library, RS
                        48<lb/>Previously published: Charles Cuthbert Southey
                        (ed.), <title>Life and Correspondence of Robert
                            Southey</title>, 6 vols (London, 1849-1850), II, pp.
                        243-244 [in part].</note>
</head>
<opener>
<dateline rend="right">
<date when="1803-12-23">Dec. 23. 1803</date>
</dateline>
<salute>Dear Rickman</salute>
</opener>
<p rend="indent1"> Some translations from Camoens by a Lord
                        Strangford<note n="1" place="foot" resp="editors">Percy
                        Clinton Sydney, 6th Viscount Strangford (1780-1855;
                            <title>DNB</title>), <title>Poems from the
                            Portuguese of Camoens, with Remarks and
                            Notes</title> (1803), reviewed in <title>Annual
                            Review for 1803</title>, 2 (1804), 569-577.</note>
                    have reached me in the course of business, &amp; I shall be
                    enabled to make a two guinea job of them if you will send me
                    down by coach the originals in five duodecimo volumes,<note n="2" place="foot" resp="editors">Luis Vaz de Camoens
                        (1524-1580), <title>Obras</title> (1782), no. 3185 in
                        the sale catalogue of Southey’s library.</note> bound,
                    without any ornament on the backs which is rather unusual
                    for Portugueze books. I want this edition &amp; not an
                    unbound one in three volumes<note n="3" place="foot" resp="editors">Unidentified.</note> which is also in
                    your house, because it has more matter &amp; some useful
                    criticism &amp; notes. With them I should be glad also of
                    Mickles Luisad<note n="4" place="foot" resp="editors">William Julius Mickle, (1734/5-1788), <title>The
                            Lusiad, or the Discovery of India, a Poem</title>
                        (1778), no. 440 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s
                        library.</note> – a quarto in boards – but I am not
                    certain whether or no it be in your possession or among the
                    books still at <ref target="people.html#BiddlecombeCharles">Biddlecombes</ref>, from whom I shall be glad when you
                    have recovered them.</p>
<p rend="indent1"> Now as this implies charge &amp; trouble of
                    conveyance to the coach, &amp; as I shall ere long stand in
                    need of another supply for better purposes, it may be as
                    well if you have leisure to pack off a parcel per waggon at
                    the same time. In this I would have the Chronica del Rey D
                    Joaõ 3.<note n="5" place="foot" resp="editors">Francisco de
                        Rades y Andrada (d. 1599), <title>Chronica do Rey D.
                            Joaom o III</title> (1796), no. 3260 in the sale
                        catalogue of Southey’s library.</note> in four small
                    quartos well bound after their manner. Commentarios do
                        Albuquerque<note n="6" place="foot" resp="editors">Afonso de Albuquerque (1453-1515),
                            <title>Commentarios</title> (1774), no. 3165 in the
                        sale catalogue of Southey’s library.</note> 4 volumes
                    common Spectator size – they were in the bookcase to the
                    right of the fireplace. the volumes of that twenty-tomed
                    Historia Genealogica which contain the Provas (documents) I
                    forget whether four or six in number, but rather think
                        four.<note n="7" place="foot" resp="editors">Antonio
                        Caetano de Sousa (1674-1759), <title>Historia
                            Genealogica de Casa Real Portugueza</title>
                        (1735-1748), no. 3738 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s
                        library. There were six volumes of Documents.</note>
                    &amp; for Madoc<note n="8" place="foot" resp="editors">Southey had completed a version of <title>Madoc</title>
                        in 1797-1799 and was revising it for publication. It did
                        not appear until 1805.</note> omnia opera<note n="9" place="foot" resp="editors">The Latin translates as ‘all
                        the works’.</note> Sharonica,<note n="10" place="foot" resp="editors">Sharon Turner, <title>History of the
                            Anglo-Saxons</title> (1799-1805) and
                            <title>Vindication of the Genuineness of the Ancient
                            British Poems</title> (1803), no. 2776 in the sale
                        catalogue of Southey’s library.</note> Saxon as well as
                    Welsh, with my Pierce Ploughman,<note n="11" place="foot" resp="editors">William Langland (c. 1325-c. 1390;
                            <title>DNB</title>), <title>The Vision of Pierce
                            Plowman, Nowe the Second Time Imprinted</title>
                        (1550), no. 1414 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s
                        library.</note> a book which will materially help me to
                    delineate the moral history of Europe before the Maritime
                    Discoveries changed every thing. And now that I am on the
                    subject of my books let me mention the few at <ref target="places.html#Dublin">Dublin</ref> – I do not know
                        Roes<note n="12" place="foot" resp="editors">Possibly
                        Richard Baillie Roe (1764/5-1853; <title>DNB</title>),
                        Irish stenographer and writer.</note> direction – <ref target="people.html#DyerGeorge">George I</ref> can
                    obtain it from <ref target="people.html#Cottlefamily">Robert
                        Cottle</ref> who is at Hoares the banker<note n="13" place="foot" resp="editors">C. Hoare &amp; Co., a
                        private bank in Fleet St, London, founded in
                        1672.</note> – &amp; if you will write <del rend="strikethrough">xxx</del> cum potentia
                        frankande<note n="14" place="foot" resp="editors">The
                        Latin translates as ‘With the power of franking’, a
                        jokey reference to Rickman’s privileges as The Speaker’s
                        Secretary.</note> that will be the shortest way – &amp;
                    have them sent to you – for I shall not want them here,
                    &amp; my resting place at last must be within reach of some
                    public library.</p>
<p rend="indent1"> I am about a curious review of the Mission at
                        Otaheite.<note n="15" place="foot" resp="editors">Southey reviewed London Missionary Society,
                            <title>Transactions of the Missionary
                            Society</title> (1803) for <title>Annual Review for
                            1803</title>, 2 (1804), 189-201.</note>
<ref target="people.html#BurneyJames">Cap<hi rend="sup">t</hi> Burney</ref> will find his friends rather
                    roughly handled for I look upon them as the most degraded of
                    the human species – they have convinced me that Moses went
                    the right way to work with the Canaanites,<note n="16" place="foot" resp="editors">
<title>Numbers</title> 21:
                        34-35; 31: 1-54; 33: 50-52, contains numerous examples
                        of Moses urging the killing of all the
                        Canaanites.</note> &amp; induced me to think it probable
                    that the Spaniards did less evil in Hispaniola<note n="17" place="foot" resp="editors">The aboriginal population of
                        Hispaniola was virtually wiped out by disease in the
                        16th century.</note> than we suppose. <ref target="people.html#ColeridgeSamuelTaylor">Coleridges</ref> scheme to mend them is by extirpating
                    the Bread Fruit from their island, &amp; making them live –
                    by the sweat of their brows. It always grieves me when I
                    think that you are no friend to colonization. my hopes fly
                    farther than yours – I want English knowledge &amp; the
                    English language diffused to the East &amp; the West &amp;
                    the South.</p>
<p rend="indent1"> Can you get for me the Evidence upon the
                    Slave Trade as printed for the House of Commons?<note n="18" place="foot" resp="editors">
<title>An Abstract of the
                            Evidence Delivered Before a Select Committee of the
                            House of Commons: in the Years 1790 and 1791; On the
                            Part of the Petitioners for the Abolition of the
                            Slave Trade</title> (1791).</note> I want to collect
                    all materials for speculating upon the negroes. that they
                    are a fallen people is certain – because being savages they
                    have among them the forms of civilization. It is remarkable
                    that in all our discoveries we have never discovered any
                    people in a state of progression except the Mexicans &amp;
                    Peruvians. that the Otaheiteans are a degraded race is
                    proved by their Mythology which is physical allegory – ergo
                    the work of people who thought of physics. I am very
                    desirous to know whether the Negro Priests or Jugglers be a
                    cast – or if any man may enter the fraternity; &amp; if they
                    have a sacred language. We must continue to grope in
                    darkness about early history till some strong-headed man
                    shall read the hieroglyphics<note n="19" place="foot" resp="editors">Egyptian hieroglyphics were not
                        deciphered until 1822.</note> for us. Much might yet be
                    done by comparison of languages. some hundred words of the
                    most common objects – sun moon &amp; stars – the parts of
                    the body the personal pronouns – the auxiliary verbs &amp;c
                    if these were collected as occasion could be found from
                    every different tribe, such languages as have been [MS
                    obscured]if fluent we should certainly be able to trace to
                    their source. In New Holland<note n="20" place="foot" resp="editors">Australia.</note> language is said to be
                    confluent – every tribe – &amp; almost family – having its
                    own. but that Island is an odd place – coral above water
                    &amp; coal – new birds beasts &amp; plants, &amp; such a
                    breed of savages! it looks like a new country, if one could
                    tell where the animals came from. Do you know that the Dodo
                    is actually extinct? having been beyond all doubt too stupid
                    to take care of himself. the learned Shavius<note n="21" place="foot" resp="editors">George Shaw (1751-1813;
                            <term>DNB</term>), <title>The Naturalist’s
                            Miscellany</title> (1793) illustrated a preserved
                        foot of a dodo. Shaw was assistant keeper of natural
                        history at the British Museum.</note> found part of one
                    in the Museum. There is no hope of recovering the species
                    unless you could get your friend the bridge-maker<note n="22" place="foot" resp="editors">Thomas Telford
                        (1757-1834; <title>DNB</title>), civil engineer. A close
                        friend of Rickman’s, the two were at this time members
                        of parliamentary commissions on the Caledonian Canal and
                        Highland Roads and Bridges.</note> to sit upon a ganders
                    egg.</p>
<closer>
<salute rend="indent1"> God bless you.</salute>
<signed rend="indent2"> R.S.</signed>
</closer>
<postscript>
<p>The Brig<note n="23" place="foot" resp="editors">The
                            brig-sloop HMS <hi rend="ital">Suffisante</hi>, on
                            which Edward Southey had briefly served.</note> has
                        been so succesful since <ref target="people.html#SoutheyEdward">my Whelp of a
                            brother</ref> left her that his share of prize
                        money, only as a foremast man would have exceeded <hi rend="ital">300</hi> £. so <ref target="people.html#SoutheyTom">Tom</ref> tells me –
                        who is now first Lieutenant &amp; going out with convoy
                        to the W Indies.</p>
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