820. Robert Southey to John Rickman, 12 August 1803*
My Bibliopolæ1 have taught me a lesson which ought to have been beat into my numbskull long ago. – that in dealings between man & man there ought always to be writings & proper legal suspicion. they are frightened by the stagnation of their trade during this panic & write to desire that I will not “incur any expences on the Bibliotheca.”2 All this would be very well if I had not a week ago returned a definite answer about the house at Richmond. which is probably now actually upon my hands. Cursing & swearing however are against the third commandment3 & it would be a fools trick to fret my guts to fiddle-strings, musical as they are already. I am in a hobble & must get out how I can. it will be no very great exertion to fit Madoc4 for the press by Xmas. meantime I will try & procure subscribers privately not by printed proposals. if I can get off an edition of 500 in 4to thus at 25/ I shall clear about 250£. if that fails, at any rate I can raise the 150£ upon the poem which Longman & Rees were to have advanced me for furniture. this spider-trade has at least one advantage – fall which way I may I have still a thread to hang by.
Tis fortunate that since my return I have given but little time to this poor Bibliotheca, & stuck close to history5 instead, so close that another fortnight will bring me to the end of my materials. please to send me the Chronica do Principe D Joaõ.6 Chr. d El Rey D Joaõ 2.7 & also Chro. d El Rey D. Manuel.8 they are all bound alike, small 4tos. & stand in that bookcase next to the side board. a sheet of brown paper lined with Acts of Parliament will be sufficient package. I am half thro Joam the Second9 reign in another chronicle.
Burneys book10 & Clarkes11 are before my tribunal. Clarke is a wretched dog. he talks of the village Aldea in Africa – not knowing that Aldea is Portugueze for a village.12 as this man promises to write six more such quartos at £3 - 8 – each, I think I am in duty bound to use the scourge.
Burnett – George II I should say – sets out for London next week. I wrote to Carlisle about him, & he who does good to every body that falls in his way has promised to make him a surgeon as far as the Hospital13 goes without expence. he shall bring the books for C Burney. the treatise for navigation14 is by some Martin Cortes – the second that was ever published – if the old Cyclopædia15 says true. it must doubtless be curious.
Poor Margaret is very unwell. so feverish that we get no sleep anights, & very little rest by day. Altogether I feel so very well inclined to be out of temper that I am sure I am out of spirits.
Tom is off at last for the Cove of Cork. thank God!
vale. R Southey.
August 12. 1803. I am 29 this day.
Notes
Address: To/ John Rickman Esqr
Endorsement: RS/ Augt 12./ 1803
MS: Huntington Library, RS 41. ALS; 3p.
Unpublished. Back
1. The Latin translates as ‘Booksellers’. Back
2. Longman and Rees had abandoned their plan to publish Southey’s Bibliotheca Britannica, a chronological account of all literature published in Britain. Back
3. Exodus 20: 7, ‘You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God’. Back
4. Southey had finished a version of Madoc in 1797-1799 and was revising it for publication. It did not appear until 1805. Back
5. Southey’s unfinished ‘History of Portugal’. Back
6. Damiao de Gois (1502-1574), Chronica do Seren. Principe D. Joao (1790), no. 3263 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library. Back
7. Garcia de Resende (1470-1536), Chronica dos Valeros, e Insignes Feitos del Rey D. Joam II, de Gloriosa Memoria (1798), no. 3264 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library. Back
8. Damiao de Gois (1502-1574), Chronica do Senhor Rei D. Emanuel (1790), no. 3262 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library. Back
9. John II (1455-1495, King of Portugal 1481-1495). Back
10. James Burney, A Chronological History of the Voyages and Discoveries in the South Sea or Pacific Ocean (1803); reviewed by Southey in Annual Review for 1803, 2 (1804), 3-12. Back
11. James Stanier Clarke (1766-1834; DNB), The Progress of Maritime Discovery (1803); reviewed by Southey in the Annual Review for 1803, 2 (1804), 12-20. Back
12. James Stanier Clarke, The Progress of Maritime Discovery (London, 1803), p. 322. Back
13. The Westminster Hospital, where Carlisle was the surgeon. Back
14. Martin Cortes de Albacar (1510-1582), The Arte of Navigation (1561), translated by Richard Eden (c. 1520-1576; DNB), no. 890 in the sale catalogue of Southey’s library. Back
15. Ephraim Chambers (1680?-1740; DNB), Cyclopædia: Or, An Universal Dictionary of Arts and Sciences, 5 vols (London, 1786-1788), V, ‘Chart’. Back