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Huntington Library, RS 83. Previously published: John Wood Warter (ed.), Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey, 4 vols (London, 1856), I, pp. 351–352 [in part; postscript missing].
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 find two letters from you unnoticed in my desk, which have remained so while you have been Christmassing in the country.
As I must come to London in the early spring it is not worth while to trouble you farther about Feyjoo & the
Ep. Tragicas.
What you say of pugilism as preventing murder, has made its due impression upon me. I should like to see the
pamphlet you mention, – tho as for bull baiting, I do not foresee any possible ground of defence or extenuation. The former point
I concede fairly & fully. Don Manuel must not, it will be more in character for the Translator to contradict him in a note,
& speak of assassinations.
Carlisles Tortoise reminds me of one which I caught in Algarve &
meant to have brought to England, but it was forgotten in the hurry of embarkation. He was about the size of two females hands. We
saw him in the bottom of a little pond or spring, where as soon as alarmed he concealed himself so well in the muddy bottom, that
tho the pond was very small we were half an hour groping him out, with our arms naked to the shoulder. I meant to eat him for my
supper, being in a land of starvation, – but he had such an odd look with him, when he put his head out of his own window &
dragged <trailed> his ridiculous tail along the ground, that I resolved to bring him to England. By day he
travelled in a brass pan of the muleteers, & every night made efforts really surprising for such an animal, regularly getting
out of the bason in which he was placed, & down from the table. I cannot tell how, & attempting to burrow in the corner of
the room. I kept him about three months without food – as they are commonly kept at Lisbon, in the large water-jar of the house, –
the people having a notion that they purify the water – a very Irish sort of xx idea. Perhaps they live eat
the insects which may be there.
Mine was of a small breed. There are large ones in the river which divides Algarve from Alentejo on the coast-side,
& the people eat them. I confess that the physiognomy of my poor fellow did not excite any appetite xx in me, he
was just like a lizard without any beauty of colour, & had a rank smell.
My turtle died at Cork during quarantine as did every one in the ship – so the captain tells me. If turtles are to
be made to perform quarantine it is time for the Court of Aldermen to interfere. it savours of a popish scheme for making them
keep Lent.
Don Manuel
Transcribe the inclosed for me – it relates to Clarkes book about Tactics
Jany. 6 – the day when the Devil is on the look out for Sir James Mc
Intosh,