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Huntington Library, RS 7. Previously published: Kenneth Curry (ed.), New Letters of Robert Southey, 2 vols (London and New York, 1965), I, pp. 223–227.
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.
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Southey’s spelling has not been regularized.
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& has been used for the ampersand sign.
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The voyage is over. we had fair weather, light winds, & a fine passage of only five days & a half. soon said –
but what a world of misery was comprized in those five days & half! I neither could eat or sleep, & Edith suffered more than me. all my former sea nausea was trifling to this – & yet our
weather was so singularly favourable. I saw porpusses – & a grampus. a shark was seen but not by me. one only adventure diversified
our voyage. a cutterEndymion.
We arrived yesterday morning, & are now half settled in our house. My old friend Manuel
Four years have passed away since I left Lisbon. so long a time had blunted memory, & every thing seems half new to
me – new enough to interest – not to depress by a total strangeness. I see much which would else have escaped me thro Ediths eyes. she is as much amused at seeing the Portugueze women walking in thick heavy
large woollen cloaks in their May, as they would be at her muslin in an English December. Every thing, while it amuses her, makes her
like England – but you know how any foreign country makes an Englishman proud – & will easily conceive that I am all Anglicanized
already. An Englishman in the streets of Lisbon – is like the Heathen Gods of poetry when they descend you know them by their gait –
their figure – not by their odours indeed – for the difference between them & the natives is that they do not smell, & the
perfumes of ambrosia could have been nothing to the delight of having no stink at all here. Edith has discovered that there are no middle-aged women to be seen – this is a well known
effect of hot climate. like the primrose that blossom flowers the Portugueze women burst into full
bloom at once – & then wither away. I have discovered something too – that married persons use seperate beds – this is the
necessity of the climate, which I might have guessed. the natives are a libidinous people & perhaps this custom may be one of the
disposing causes.
I learnt from a fellow passenger, who has been two years ago in Spain, that their abridged translation of Adam Smiths
bookxxxxxxx discount! this occasioned an odd symptom here some
fortnight ago only. they paid their sailors chiefly in this paper – the men went to pay it away as they received it, at par – &
their disappointment produced a sort of riot – they shouted out Liberty – & Bonaparte. it was quelled & some of the ring
leaders are in custody, but no punishment has been inflicted.
I must not forget one great innovation – a mail coach runs to Coimbra – on the way to Porto & is to go all the way when the road is compleated. it travels eight miles an hour. true Rickman – my Uncle has taken the journey in it. tis a Royal business, & it answers for the road is frequented. one might prophecy good from this, the establishment of decent inns & the growth of civilization.
___
Half a days delay has already given me something to correct. the Mail Coach is not well managed & not expected to
last. tis a government business & priced so high as to exclude the great body of travellers – the little dealers who mount their
mules. now a single persons expences amount to as much as if he was in a chaise singly. the Paper money has produced its usual
consequence – Forgery. you must note however that Portugueze eyes can see these slippery places for roguery. a German of talents &
once of respectability is in custody for it in England.
Some inconvenience xx has been produced to Strangers by the wish of England to send her
wild Irishmen here. they are detained at a little fort to give in their names & be vouched for by some settler, & the nephew of
a settler was not sent back by the ship in which he came only because he was born in Ireland! –
Counsellor Sampsonxx answered – o yes – as many as
please may see him – but then you shall stay with him – & they actually did shut one up one person
for his visit. Sampson has since been sent to Hambro.
An imposition of some consequence takes place upon passengers at Falmouth. four guineas are taken – by no authority
whatever, at the passport off[MS torn] say it is a Post Office charge. & that the money goes to some charity. When my Uncle & I crossed in the Spanish captain the same charge was made. why how is
this? said he to the Spanish Captain. the Post Office cannot put this on. No. said Aruspini
We landed without difficulty & our trunks were not examined. for this we were obliged to the Commissary here who
came on board with my Uncle to serve us in this business. – I have been
paying my form visits to the Envoyxxx have begun
immediately my plan of early rising & it has helped me thro my letter writing, which on arrival in a foreign country is a serious
job. this once done – & the next packet will finish it, for I cannot write all by this. I turn to serious employment. in my next I
will tell you my intended plan of proceeding in my historical undertaking.
If the Magazine plan xxxxxxx xxx xxxx like xxxxxx rhyme xxxx xxxxxxx xxxxxxxx be of any xxxx – but my xx
xxxxxxx xxxxxxxx of the scheme xxxx xxxxx xxxxxx these xx xxxxxxxx xxxx of xxxxxxx xxxxxx & xxxx & xxxxxxxx for you & xx
xxxxxx I wrote to xxxxxx xxxxxxxx xxxx xx xxxx xx my plan xxxxx up to xxxx xxxxxx xxxx xxxxx xxx – I had almost forgotten
Remember me to George Dyer, my very good friend, who is the friend
of every body & to Amos & Robert Cottle – I have brought a pair of the clogs over – but dare not show them before the wet weather – for now they are
preposterous as a parasol would be in Greenland. Edith begs to be remembered. we
felt your loss at Bristol – & I often wish Davy could annihilate space as well
as matter & enable me to perceive the percipient Perception which conveys to me the xxx impression
called John Rickman.