2131. Robert Southey to Charles Watkin Williams Wynn, 1 August 1812*

Keswick. Aug. 1. 1812.My dear Wynn

I found your letter on my return from a twelve days absence during which I made a round of 300 miles, mostly on foot, going eastward as far as Durham, & returning by Wensley-dale & the Yorkshire caves. My holydays are shorter than yours, – but my work, thank Heaven, of a less fatiguing nature. I must postpone my journey to London till Spring, for the purpose of getting out the Register¹ for 1811 in March, – a thing deemed esseantial to its interest, & perhaps to its continuance. It will not be difficult for me to do this, – but I doubt its continuance more than another year. It sells well in Scotland, & hardly has any sale in England. The London booksellers are mostly interested in the other Registers, & if they do not, as there is strong reason to suspect, unfairly keep this back, it is certain that they make little or no attempt to forward it. – This probable defalcation of [MS torn] would seem at first a very serious evil to a man in my situation, but I dare say by the time it comes I shall not consider it so. The marketable value of my time increases every year, & I am not without some expectation that even my poetry will prove a lucrative commodity at last. The 2d edition of Kehama is so nearly sold that a third is sent to press.² My profits on the two are about 260£. – there is hope then that a Poem may hereafter produce as much as a volume of the Register. Perhaps I shall quicken my pace with Pelayo³ in consequence, – because I have three other poems in contemplation, x each of a more taking xxx character.

Put the inclosed into a cover for me & direct it to Juan Alonso Ortiz Esqr⁴ – Spanish Consul General, Salisbury Street, Strand. – I inclose another letter to be franked, it contains one which is to find its way to our Consul at Bahia,⁵ & therefore ought to go free to London.

God bless you. RS.