Complete Poetical Works of Robert Southey

by Robert Southey

  Lisbon is plagued with a very small species of red ant, that swarm over everything in the house. Their remedy for this is, to send for the priest, and exorcise them. The drain from the new convent opens into the middle of the street. An English pigsty is cleaner than the metropolis of Portugal.

  To-night I shall see the procession of ‘Our Lord of the Passion.’ This image is a very celebrated one, and with great reason, for one night he knocked at the door of St Roque’s church, and there they would not admit him. After this he walked to the other end of the town, to the church of St. Grace, and there they took him in: but a dispute now arose between the two churches, to which the image belonged; whether to the church which he first chose, or the church that first chose him. The matter was compromised. One church has him, and the other fetches him for their processions, and he sleeps with the latter the night preceding. The better mode for deciding it, had been to place the gentleman between both, and let him walk to which he liked best. What think you of this story being believed in 1796!!!

  The power of the Inquisition still exists, though they never exercise it, and thus the Jews save their bacon. Fifty years ago it was the greatest delight of the Portuguese to see a Jew burnt. Geddes, the then chaplain, was present at one of these detestable Auto da Fe’s. He says, ‘the transports expressed by all ages, and all sexes, whilst the miserable sufferers were shrieking and begging mercy for God’s sake, formed a scene more horrible than any out of hell!’ He adds, that ‘this barbarity is not their national character, for no people sympathize so much at the execution of a criminal; but it is the damnable nature of their religion, and the most diabolical spirit of their priests; their celibacy deprives them of the affections of men, and their creed gives them the ferocity of devils.’ Geddes saw one man gagged, because, immediately he came out of the Inquisition gates, he looked up at the sun, whose light for many years had never visited him, and exclaimed, ‘How is it possible for men who behold that glorious orb, to worship any being but him who created it!’ My blood runs cold when I pass that accursed building; and though they do not exercise their power, it is a reproach to human nature that the building should exist.

  It is as warm here as in May with you; of course we broil in that month at Lisbon; but I shall escape the hot weather here, as I did the cold weather of England, and quit this place the latter end of April. You will of course see me the third day after my landing at Falmouth, or, if I can get companions in a post-chaise, sooner. This my resolution is like the law of the Medes and Persians, that altereth not. Be so good as to procure for me a set of Coleridge’s ‘Watchman,’ with his Lectures and Poems. I want to write a tragedy here, but can find no leisure to begin it.

  Portugal is much plagued with robbers, and they generally strip a man, and leave him to walk home in his birth-day suit. An Englishman was served thus at Almeyda, and the Lisbon magistrates, on his complaint, took up the whole village, and imprisoned them all. Contemplate this people in what light you will, you can never see them in a good one. They suffered their best epic poet to perish for want: and they burned to death their best dramatic writer, because he was a Jew.

  Pombal, whose heart was bad, though he made a good minister, reduced the church during his administration. He suffered no persons to enter the convents, and, as the old monks and nuns died, threw two convents into one, and sold the other estates. By this means, he would have annihilated the whole generation of vermin; but the king died, and the queen, whose religion has driven her mad, undid, through the influence of the priests, all that Pombal had done. He escaped with his life, but lived to see his bust destroyed, and all his plans for the improvement of Portugal reversed. He had the interest of his country at heart, and the punishment, added to the regret of having committed so many crimes to secure his power, must almost have been enough for this execrable marquis.

  The climate here is delightful, and the air so clear, that when the moon is young, I can often distinguish the whole circle, thus; O. You and Robert may look for this some fine night, but I do not remember ever to have observed it in England. The stars appear more brilliant here, but I often look up at the Pleiades, and remember how much happier I was when I saw them in Bristol. Fare you well. Let me know that my friends remember me….

  Robert Southey.”

  After the complete reconciliation had taken place with Mr. Coleridge, Mr. Southey in the autumn of 1796, settled in London, and purposed to study the law. From London he sent me the following letter.

  “London, Nov. 1796.

  My dear friend,

  I am now entering on a new way of life which will lead me to independence. You know that I neither lightly undertake any scheme, nor lightly abandon what I have undertaken. I am happy because I have no want, and because the independence I labour to attain, and of attaining which, my expectations can hardly be disappointed, will leave me nothing to wish. I am indebted to you, Cottle, for the comforts of my later time. In my present situation I feel a pleasure in saying thus much.

  Thank God! Edith comes on Monday next. I say Thank God, for I have never since my return from Portugal, been absent from her so long before, and sincerely hope and intend never to be so again. On Tuesday we shall be settled, and on Wednesday my legal studies begin in the morning, and I shall begin with ‘Madoc’ in the evening. Of this it is needless to caution you to say nothing; as I must have the character of a lawyer; and though I can and will unite the two pursuits, no one would credit the possibility of the union. In two years the Poem shall be finished, and the many years it must lie by will afford ample time for correction.

  I have declined being a member of a Literary Club, which meet at the Chapter Coffee House, and of which I had been elected a member. Surely a man does not do his duty who leaves his wife to evenings of solitude; and I feel duty and happiness to be inseparable. I am happier at home than any other society can possibly make me. With Edith I am alike secure from the wearisomeness of solitude, and the disgust which I cannot help feeling at the contemplation of mankind, and which I do not wish to suppress.

  Here is a great deal about myself, and nothing about those whom I have seen in London, and of whom we have all heard in the country. I will make a report upon them in my next letter. God bless you.

  Yours sincerely,

  Robert Southey.”

  Letter from Robert Southey, to Amos Cottle, Magdalen College, Cambridge.

  “London, Feb. 28, 1797.

  20, Prospect Place, Newington Butts.

  … Here I am travelling on in the labyrinth of the law; and though I had rather make books myself than read the best lawyer’s composition, I am getting on cheerfully, and steadily, and well.

  While you are amusing yourself with mathematics, and I lounging over the law, the political and commercial world are all in alarm and confusion. I cannot call myself a calm witness of all this, for I sit by the fireside, hear little about it, think less, and see nothing; ‘all hoping, and expecting all in patient faith.’ Tranquillity of mind is a blessing too valuable to sacrifice for all the systems man has ever established. My day of political enthusiasm is over. I know what is right, and as I see that everything is wrong, care more about the changing of the wind, lest it should make the chimney smoke, than for all the empires of Europe….”

  “London, 1797.

  My dear friend,

  … I physiognomise everything, even the very oysters may be accurately judged by their shells. I discovered this at Lisbon, where they are all deformed, hump-backed, and good for nothing. Is it not possible by the appearance of a river to tell what fish are in it? In the slow sluggish stream you will find the heavy chub. In the livelier current, the trout and the pike. If a man loves prints you have an excellent clue to his character; take for instance, the inventory of mine at College: — Four views of the ruins at Rome; Charles Fox; Belisarius; Niobe; and four Landscapes of Poussin; and Claude Lorraine. These last are of constant source of pleasure. I become acquainted with the inhabitants in every house, and know
every inch of ground in the prospect. They have formed for me many a pleasant day-dream. I can methodise these into a little poem. I am now settled; my books are organised; and this evening I set off on my race.

  We have a story of a ghost here, who appears to the watchman, — the spirit of a poor girl, whose life was abandoned, and her death most horrible. I am in hopes it may prove true! as I have a great love for apparitions. They make part of the poetical creed. Fare you well.

  Sincerely yours,

  To Joseph Cottle.

  Robert Southey.”

  “London, March 6, 1797.

  … I am inclined to complain heavily of you, Cottle. Here am I committing grand larceny on my time, in writing to you; and you, who might sit at your fire, and write me huge letters, have not found time to fill even half a sheet. As you may suppose, I have enough of employment. I work like a negro at law, and therefore neglect nothing else, for he who never wastes time has always time enough.

  I have to see many of the London lions, or literati, George Dyer is to take me to Mary Hayes, Miss Christal, and Taylor, the Pagan, my near neighbour. You shall have my physiognomical remarks upon them. I hate this city more and more, although I see little of it. You do not know with what delight I anticipate a summer in Wales, and I hope to spend the summer of the next year there, and to talk Welsh most gutturally. I shall see Meirion this week, whose real name is William Owen. He is the author of the new Welsh dictionary, a man of uncommon erudition, and who ought to esteem me for Madoc’s sake. Fare you well. Remember me to all friends. God bless you.

  Yours sincerely,

  Robert Southey.”

  “… Perhaps you will be surprised to hear, that of all the lions of literati that I have seen here, there is not one whose countenance has not some unpleasant trait. Mary Imlay is the best, infinitely the best. The only fault in it, is an expression somewhat similar to what the prints of Horne Tooke display; an expression indicating superiority, not haughtiness, not conceit, not sarcasm, in Mary Imlay, but still it is unpleasant. Her eyes are light brown, and though the lid of one of them is affected by a slight paralysis, they are the most meaning I ever saw. Her complexion is dark, sun-burnt, and her skin a little cracked, for she is near forty, and affliction has borne harder on her than years; but her manners are the most pleasing I ever witnessed, they display warm feeling, and strong understanding; and the knowledge she has acquired of men and manners, ornaments, not disguises, her own character. I have given an unreserved opinion of Mrs. Barbauld to Charles Danvers.

  While I was with George Dyer one morning last week, Mary Hayes and Miss Christal entered, and the ceremony of introduction followed. Mary Hayes writes in the New Monthly Magazine, under the signature of M. H., and sometimes writes nonsense there about Helvetius. She has lately published a novel, ‘Emma Courtney,’ a book much praised and much abused. I have not seen it myself, but the severe censure passed on it by persons of narrow mind, have made me curious, and convinced me that it is at least an uncommon book. Mary Hayes is an agreeable woman and a Godwinite. Now if you will read Godwin’s book with attention, we will determine between us, in what light to consider that sectarian title. As for Godwin himself, he has large noble eyes, and a nose, — oh, most abominable nose! Language is not vituperative enough to express the effect of its downward elongation. He loves London, literary society, and talks nonsense about the collision of mind, and Mary Hayes echoes him.

  But Miss Christal, have you seen her Poems? A fine, artless, sensible girl. Now, Cottle, that word sensible must not be construed here in its dictionary acceptation. Ask a Frenchman what it means, and he will understand it, though, perhaps, he can by no circumlocution explain its French meaning. Her heart is alive. She loves poetry. She loves retirement. She loves the country. Her verses are very incorrect, and the literary circle say, she has no genius, but she has genius, Joseph Cottle, or there is no truth in physiognomy. Gilbert Wakefield came in while I was disputing with Mary Hayes upon the moral effects of towns. He has a most critic-like voice, as if he had snarled himself hoarse. You see I like the women better than the men. Indeed they are better animals in general, perhaps because more is left to nature in their education. Nature is very good, but God knows there is very little of it left.

  I wish you were within a morning’s walk, but I am always persecuted by time and space. Robert Southey, and law, and poetry, make up an odd kind of tri-union. We jog on easily together, and I advance with sufficient rapidity in Blackstone, and ‘Madoc.’ I hope to finish my poem, and to begin my practice in about two years.

  God bless you.

  Yours affectionately,

  Robert Southey.”

  “… I am running a race with the printers again: translating a work from the French: ‘Necker on the French Revolution,’ vol. II. Dr. Aikin and his son translate the 1st volume. My time is wholly engrossed by the race, for I run at the rate of sixteen pages a day; as hard going as sixteen miles for a hack horse. About sixteen days more will complete it.

  There is no necessity for my residing in London till the close of the autumn. Therefore after keeping the next term, which may be kept the first week in May, I intend to go into the country for five months; probably near the sea, at the distance of one day’s journey from London, for the convenience of coming up to keep the Trinity Term. This will not increase my expenses, though it will give me all the pleasure of existence which London annihilates. God bless you,

  Yours affectionately,

  Robert Southey.”

  “My dear Cottle,

  … George Dyer gave me what he calls his ‘Crotchet,’ and what I call an indifferent poem. Said he to me, ‘I could not bring in Wordsworth, and Lloyd, and Lamb, but I put them in a note.’ That man is all benevolence.

  If, which is probable, we go to Hampshire, I shall expect to see you there. It is an easy day’s ride from Bristol to Southampton; but I shall lay before you a correct map of the road when all is settled.

  I have seen your Dr. Baynton’s book. It is vilely written; but the theory, seems good, (that of bandaging wounded legs) My friend Carlisle means to try it at the Westminster Hospital. I was somewhat amused at seeing a treatise on sore legs, printed on wove paper, and hot pressed.

  I met Townsend, the Spanish traveller, a few days since at Carlisle’s. He flattered me most unpleasantly on ‘Joan of Arc.’ Townsend is much taller than I am, and almost as thin. He invited me to Pewsey, and I shall breakfast with him soon. He is engaged in a work of immense labour; the origin of languages. I do not like him; he is too polite to be sincere.

  Yours affectionately,

  Robert Southey.”

  The late George Dyer, referred to by Mr. Southey, was an University man who exercised his talents chiefly in writing for the Periodicals. His chief work was “The History of the Halls and Colleges of Cambridge.” He published also several small works. The Poem, referred to above, was complimentary, in which he noticed most of his literary friends. The way in which he “brought in” the author of the “Pleasures of Memory” was, very properly putting wit before wealth,

  “Was born a banker, and then rose a bard,”

  George Dyer was sincere, and had great simplicity of manners, so that he was a favourite with all his friends. No man in London encouraged so much as he did, Bloomfield, the author of the “Farmer’s Boy;” and he was equally prepared with kind offices for every body. He had some odd fancies, one of which was, that men ought to live more sparingly and drink plenty of water-gruel. By carrying this wholesome precept on one occasion, rather too far, he unhappily reduced himself to death’s door. Charles Lamb told me, that having once called on him, at his room in Clifford’s Inn, he found a little girl with him, (one of his nieces) whom he was teaching to sing hymns.

  Mr. Coleridge related to me a rather ludicrous circumstance concerning George Dyer, which Charles Lamb had told him, the last time he passed through London. Charles Lamb had heard that George Dyer was very ill, and hastened to see him. He found him in
an emaciated state, shivering over a few embers. “Ah!” said George, as Lamb entered, “I am glad to see you. You wont have me here long. I have just written this letter to my young nephews and nieces, to come immediately and take a final leave of their uncle.” Lamb found, on inquiry, that he had latterly been living on water-gruel, and a low starving diet, and readily divined the cause of his maladies. “Come,” said Lamb, “I shall take you home immediately to my house, and I and my sister will nurse you.” “Ah!” said George Dyer, “it wont do.” The hackney coach was soon at the door, and as the sick man entered it, he said to Lamb, “Alter the address, and then send the letter with all speed to the poor children.” “I will,” said Lamb, “and at the same time call the doctor.”

  George Dyer was now seated by Charles Lamb’s comfortable fire, while Lamb hastened to his medical friend, and told him that a worthy man was at his house who had almost starved himself on water-gruel. “You must come,” said he, “directly, and prescribe some kitchen stuff, or the poor man will be dead. He wont take any thing from me; he says, ’tis all useless.” Away both the philanthropists hastened, and Charles Lamb, anticipating what would be required, furnished himself, on the road, with a pound of beef steaks. The doctor now entered the room, and advancing towards his patient, felt his pulse, and asked him a few questions; when, looking grave, he said, “Sir, you are in a very dangerous way,” “I know it Sir, I know it Sir,” said George Dyer. The Dr. replied, “Sir, yours is a very peculiar case, and if you do not implicitly follow my directions, you will die of atrophy before to-morrow morning. It is the only possible chance of saving your life. You must directly make a good meal off beef-steaks, and drink the best part of a pot of porter.” “Tis too late,” said George, but “I’ll eat, I’ll eat.” The doctor now withdrew, and so nicely had Lamb calculated on results, that the steaks were all this time broiling on the fire! and, as though by magic, the doctor had scarcely left the room, when the steaks and the porter were both on the table.