1231. Robert Southey to Grosvenor Charles Bedford, 2 November 1806*
My dear Grosvenor
I have yet to send you Merry1 & Churchey.2 the first you shall receive with the Preface in two days. I will write again about Churchey – & at the same time enquire the date of poor Amos’s birth.3
Have you a specimen of Headley?4 Horace might ask Beloe5 (who spoke to me about him) the place & date of his birth, – & pray remember that it be said of him that he had a feeling of the real merits of our early poets.
Your relapses Grosvenor give me great concern. Is your liver affected? If it be I wish I could persuade of what I myself certainly believe – that no man living is so successful in cases of the liver as Beddoes.
All well here. God bless you RS.
Sunday Nov. 2. 1806.
Notes
Address: To/ G. C. Bedf [MS torn]/ E[MS torn]/ Single
Postmark: E/ NOV 5/
1806
MS: Bodleian Library, Eng. Lett. c. 24. ALS; 2p.
Unpublished. Back
1. Robert Merry (1755–1798), a poet who moved to Florence and published collections of poems entitled Arno (1784) and Florence Miscellany (1785). Selections of his poems are included in Specimens of the Later English Poets, 3 vols (London, 1807), III, pp. 446–454. Back
2. Walter Churchey (1747–1805; DNB), a Welsh poet who published Poems and Imitations of the British Poets in 1789. He is not included in Specimens of the Later English Poets (1807). Back
3. Southey had written to Joseph Cottle requesting an account of Churchey’s life and some information about his brother Amos Cottle, for inclusion in the Specimens of the Later English Poets; see Southey to Joseph Cottle, 11 August 1806, Letter 1210. Amos Cottle is not included in the Specimens. For Southey’s follow up, see Southey to Joseph Cottle, 2 November 1806, Letter 1232. Back
4. Henry Headley (1765–1788), poet and writer on literature, whose best-known work was Select Beauties of English Poetry, with Remarks (1787). Selections of his poems are included in Specimens of the Later English Poets, 3 vols (London, 1807), III, pp. 303–305. Back
5. Reverend William Beloe (1756–1817), author of Anecdotes of Literature and Scarce Books (1807). From 1803–1806, Beloe was Keeper of Printed Books at the British Museum. Back