320. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole MS. Lord Latymer. Hitherto unpublished. Tuesday Evening. [ 25 February 1800] 1 My dear Poole I have received both your letters -- I should not write now, but, that Bathstone going to morrow, he must not go without a Letter -- if only to let you know that I am alive, & Stowey-sick -Stewart won't let me go, but I don't do much for him -- as you have seen / I am translating three manuscript Plays of Schiller 2 -- & positively for the last week have worked with my pen in my hand 14 hours evety day. -- Hartley is quite well -- Sara better -- I middling. -- I heard from Wordsworth -- he is well & happy. Of your dear Mother I can say nothing -- you know what I feel -- Of Darwin's work 3 I have heard nothing -- If I can get it given me by any Bookseller, I will send it you --. Poor Virgin! -- My Love to Ward & tell him to write me all the Particulars -- & of the Girl -directing to Lambe 4 -- as usual. You have a little Deal Box in your little Room -- you must unnail it -- & there are my loose Papers, & letters----The Letters I don't want; but all the loose Papers I wish to [ha]ve -- & Bathstone can [bri]ng'em up for me.----Cruckshankum tantum vidi -- but he has written me an affectionate Letter. -- My report of Pitt's Speech made a great noise here -- ____________________ 1 This letter was written in answer to one from Poole, dated 22 Feb. 1800. 2 The Piccolomini, or the First Part of Wallenstein. A Drama in Five Acts, and The Death of Wallenstein, A Tragedy in Five Acts, both translated from the German of Frederick Schiller by S. T. Coleridge, 1800, for which Coleridge received £50 from Longman. See Letter 459. A third play, Wallenstein's Camp, and an Essay on the Genius of Schiller, promised in the advertisement to The Piccolomini, never appeared. 3 Coleridge refers to Erasmus Darwin Phytologia; or the Philosophy of Agriculture and Gardening, 1799. 4 Coleridge had resumed his old intimacy with Lamb. Letters sent to London in care of Lamb but intended for Coleridge were addressed to Mr. Lambe, East India House, to identify them as Coleridge's. See Letter 592, and Lamb Letters, i. 313. -574- What a degraded Animal Man is to see any thing to admire in that wretched Rant --!---- I have a huge Hankering for Alfoxden / Sara's Love -- 'and my Lub -- Hartley Cöidge's Lub.' -- Hartley said some time ago -- that 'the Stars be dead Lamps -they be'nt naughty -- they be put up in the Sky with my Brother Berkley.[']---- God love you, my dearest Poole -- & S. T. Coleridge