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National Library of Wales, MS 4812D. Previously published: John Wood Warter (ed.), Selections from the Letters of Robert Southey, 4 vols (London, 1856), II, pp. 323–325 [in part].
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.
Any dashes occurring in line breaks have been removed.
Because of web browser variability, all hyphens have been typed on the U.S. keyboard.
Dashes have been rendered as a variable number of hyphens to give a more exact rendering of their length.
Southey’s spelling has not been regularized.
Writing in other hands appearing on these manuscripts has been indicated as such, the content recorded in brackets.
& has been used for the ampersand sign.
£ has been used for £, the pound sign
All other characters, those with accents, non-breaking spaces, etc., have been encoded in HTML entity decimals.
Turner will put you in full possession of the law of the Trade, & can tell
you all the facts in Townsends case,
My opinion is that literary property ought to be inheritable like every other property, & that a law which should
allow you the use of the trees upon your estate for eight & twenty years, & after that term make them over to the Carpenters
Company, would not be more unjust than that which takes from me & my heirs the property of my literary labours & gives it to
the Company of Booksellers. – I am afraid you do not agree xx with me in this, – & certain that even if you do nothing
more can be done towards a restitution of the Authors rights than simply to make their complaint when you speak upon the subject.
It is doing something to get the 28 years absolute.
An Author advanced in years can have no copyright to sell except of the works of his old age – the lease of all his
others will be pretty far run out. I believe that very little more would be given for by the bookseller for the double, than
for the single term. – & that to the author the latter part of the term In reality the latter part of the term is
xxxx either worth nothing, – or more than the first. The gourd has produced its fruit & is withered & gone for
ever, – The xxx long before the olive begins to be productive. To the great body of authors it is the same thing whether
their right of property xx xxxxx expires at the end of fourteen years or xxxx last till the day of judgement; –
for even of the books which obtain reputation, not one in ten passes thro a second edition. But to those who acquire really
acquire a permanent rank in the literature of their country the injury becomes heavier year after the is heavy indeed.
I should rather the right of sale were limited, – it would give the author some share of those prizes in the lottery
which now fall, almost wholly, to the bookseller. – The second term would have enriched Cowper.
My labours in the Register end with this volume.B I hope however that he will not succeed in cheating me, as his
brother has the character of an honourable man – a character <reputation> directly the reverse of his own.
But for this occasion I should probably have continued the employment, tho the confinement which it imposed was inconvenient. Perhaps I
may not at first dispose of my time to be as with equal profit. My first thought is, if x it can be arranged with
the publishers of the Register, to write the history of the War in the Peninsula,xxxx xxxx xxx using the chapters in the Register – as I did the review of Nelson:xxx aside all consideration of the budget) – if this scheme should not be carried into effect.
I shall probably, after all, make my journey to London in four or five weeks hence, – an unlucky time, when half the people whom I should like to see will have left it. But if I miss you then, I may catch you on my return, as Ludlow will most likely be one of my halting places, – & Hodnett if Heber should be there. A journey will be serviceable to me. Of late I have had some anxiety about the childrens health, – & some indispositions of my own.