270. To Mrs. S. T. Coleridge Address: Mrs Coleridge | Nether Stowey | Somersetshire | England pay'd to Cuxhaven [Readdressed in another hand] No 17 Newfoundland Street | Bristol MS. New York Public Lib. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 271. Small parts of this letter were revised and published in Satyrane's Letters, ii and iii. See TheFriend -458- Friend, Nos. 16 and 18, 7 and 21 December 1809, and Biog. Lit., 1817, ii. 213-14 and 284-6. Postmark: Foreign Office, 6 March 1799. Monday, Jan. 14th, 1799. Ratzeburg My dearest Love -- Since the wind changed & it became possible for me to have Letters, I lost all my tranquillity. Last evening I was absent in company, & when I returned to Solitude, [was] restless in every fibre. A novel, which I attempted to read, seemed to interest me so extravagantly, that I threw it down -- & when it was out of my hands, I knew nothing of what I had been reading. This morning I awoke long before Light, feverish & unquiet -- I was certain in my mind, that I should have a Letter from you; but before it arrived my restlessness & the irregular pulsation of my Heart had quite wearied me down -- & I held the letter in my hand like as if I was stupid, without attempting to open it. -- 'Why don't you read the letter?' said Chester -- & I read it. -- Ah little Berkley -- I have misgivings-but my duty is rather to comfort you, my dear dear Sara! -- I am so exhausted that I could sleep. -- I am well; but my spirits have left me -- I am completely home-sick. I must walk half an hour -- for my mind is too scattered to continue writing. ---- I entreat & entreat you, Sara! take care of yourself -- if you are well, I think I could frame my thoughts so that I should not sink under other losses --. You do right in writing me the Truth -- Poole is kind -- but you do right, my dear! In a sense of reality there is always comfort -- the workings of one's imagination ever go beyond the worst that nature afflicts us with -- they have the terror of a superstitious circumstance. -- I express myself unintelligibly -- / Enough, that you write me always the whole Truth. Direct your next letter thus -- An den Herrn Coleridge, a la Post restante, Gottingen, Germany. -- If God permit, I shall be there before this day three weeks -- and I hope, on May day, to be once more at Stowey. My motives for going to Gottingen, I have written to Poole --. I hear as often from Wordsworth as letters can go backward & forward in a country where 50 miles in a day & night is expeditious Travelling! -- He seems to have employed more time in writing English [tha]n in studying German -- No wonder! -- for he might as well have been in England as at Goslar, in the situation which he chose, & with his unseeking manners ---- He has now left it, and is on Journey to Nordhousen. His taking his Sister with him was a wrong Step -- it is next to impossible for any but married women or in the suit of married women to be introduced to any company in Germany. Sister [here] is considered as only a name for Mistress. -- Still however male acquainta[nce] he might have -459- had -- & had I been at Goslar, I would [have] had them -- but [W., God] love him! seems to have lost his spirits & [almost his] inclination [for] it. In the mean time his expences have been almost less than [if he had] been in England. / [Mine have been . . . 1 very great; but I do not despair of returning to England, with somewhat to pay the whole. -- O God! I do languish to be at home! -- I will endeavor to give you some idea of Ratzeburgh; but I am a wretched Describer. -- First, you must conceive a Lake, running from South to North, about 9 miles in Length, and of very various breadths -- the broadest part may be perhaps two or three miles, the narrowest scarce more than half a mile. -- About a mile from the southernmost point of the lake, i.e. from the beginning of the Lake -- is the Island-town of Ratzeburgh. • is Ratzeburghr is our House / on the Hill -- from the bottom of the Hill there lies on the lake a slip of Land, scarcely two stone throws wide, at the end of which is a little Bridge with a superb military Gate -- and this Bridge joins Ratzeburgh to the slip of Land -- You pass thro' Ratzeburgh up a little Hill & down the little Hill, and this brings you to another Bridge, narrow but of an immense length, which communicates with the other shore. The water to the South of Ratzeburgh is called the little Lake, & the other the large Lake, tho' they are but one piece of water. -This little Lake is very beautiful -- the Shores just often enough green & bare to give the proper effect to the magnificent Groves, which mostly fringe them. The views vary almost every ten steps, such & so beautiful are the turnings & windings of the Shore -- they unite beauty & magnitude, & can be best expressed by feminine Grandeur! -- At the north of the great Lake, and peering over, you see the seven church-towers of Lubec, which is twelve or 14 miles from Ratzeburgh -- yet you see them as distinctly as if they were not 3 miles from you. The worse thing is that Ratzeburgh is built entirely of bricks & tiles -- & is therefore all red -- a clump of brick dust red -- it gives you a strong idea of perfect neatness; but it is not beautiful. -- In the beginning or middle of October, I forget which, we went to Lubec in a boat -- For about two miles the shores ____________________ 1 MS. blurred; two or three words obliterated. -460- of the Lake are exquisitely beautiful, the woods now running into the water, now retiring in all angles. 1 After this the left shore retreats,1the lake acquires it's utmost breadth & ceases to be beautiful -- at the end of the lake is the River, about as large as the River at Bristol -- but winding in infinite Serpentines thro' a dead flat, with willows & reeds, till you reach Lubec -- an old fantastic Town. We visited the churches at Lubec -- they were crowded with gawdy gilded Figures, & a profusion of Pictures, among which were always portraits of the popular Pastors who had served the Church. The Pastors here wear white ruffs, exactly like the pictures of Queen Elizabeth. There were in the Lubec Churches a very large attendance; but almost all women. The genteeler people dress'd precisely as the English; but behind every Lady sat her maid, the caps with gold & silver cawls. All together a Lubec Church is an amusing sight. In the evening I wished myself a painter, just to draw a German Party at Cards -- One man's long Pipe rested on the Table, smoking half [a y]ard from his mouth by the fish-dish; another who w[as] shuffling, and of course had both hands employed, held his pipe in his Teeth, and it hung down between his Thighs even to his ancles -- & the distortion which the attitude & effort occasioned made him a most ludicrous Phiz. -- . . . 2 [I would, had] it been possible, have loitered a week in those churches; & found incessant amusement. Every picture, every legend cut out in gilded wood-work, was a history of the manners & feelings of the ages, in which such works were admired & executed. -- The Sun both rises & sets over the little Lake by us / & both rising & setting presents most lovely spectacles -- In October Ratzeburg used at Sunset to appear completely beautiful -- A deep red light spread over all, in complete harmony with the red town, the brown red woods, & the yellow red Reeds on the skirts of the Lake & on the Slip of Land. A few boats paddled by single persons used generally to be floating up & down in the rich Light. But when first the Ice fell on the Lake, & the whole Lake was frozen, one huge piece of thick transparent Glass, O my God! what sublime scenery I have beheld. -- 3 Of a morning I have seen the little [lake] covered with Mist; when the Sun peeped over the Hill, the Mist broke in the middle; and at last stood as the waters of the red Sea are said to have done when the Israelites passed -- & between these two walls of Mist the Sunlight burnt upon the Ice in a strait road of golden Fire, all across the lake -- intolerably bright, & the walls of Mist ____________________ 1 Two small sketches at these points have not been reproduced. 2 8½ lines inked out in manuscript. 3 See The Friend, No. 19, 28 Dec. 1809, for a revised version of this passage, entitled Christmas out of Doors. -461- partaking of the light in a multitude of colours. -- About a month ago the vehemence of the wind had shattered the Ice 1 -- part of it, quite smattered, was driven to shore & had frozen anew; this was of a deep blue & represented an agitated sea -- the water, that ran up between the great islands of Ice, shone of a yellow green (it was at sunset) and all the scattered islands of smooth ice were blood; intensely bright Blood: on some of the largest Islands the Fishermen were pulling out their immense nets thro' the Holes made in the Ice for this purpose, & the Fishermen, the net-poles, & the huge nets made a part of the Glory! O my God! how I wished you to be with me! -- In skating there are three pleasing circumstances -- the infinitely subtle particles of Ice, which the Skate cuts up, & which creep & run before the Skater like a low mist, & in sun rise or sun set become coloured; 2nd the Shadow of the Skater in the water seen thro' the Transparent Ice, & 3rd the melancholy undulating sound from the Skate not without variety; & when very many are skating together, the sounds and the noises give an imp[ulse to] the icy Trees, & the woods all round the lake tinkle! -It is a plea[sant] Amusement to sit in an ice-stool (as they are called) and be driven along [the ice] by two Skaters -- I have [done] so, faster than most horses can gallop. ---- As to the customs here, [they are] nearly the same as in England -- except that [the men) never sit after dinner, [but dri]nk at dinner, which often lasts three or four hours; & in noble families is divided into three Gäng[e] -- that is -- walks. When you have sat about an hour, you rise up, each Lady takes a Gentleman's arm, and you walk about for a quarter of an Hour -- in the mean time another course is put upon the table; & this in great dinners is repeated 8 times. A man here seldom sees his wife till dinner -- they take their coffee in separate rooms, & never eat at breakfast; only as soon as they are up, they take their coffee -- & about 11 o clock eat a bit of bread & butter; & with the coffee, the men at least take a pipe. (Indee[d, a] pipe at Breakfast is a great addition to the comforts of Life: I shall [smoke] at no other time in England. Here I smoke four times a day -- 1 at breakfast, 1 half an hour before dinner, 1 in the afternoon at Tea, and one just before bed time -- but I shall give it all up, unless, as before observed, you should happen to like the smoke of a pipe at Breakfast.) Once when I first came here, I smoked a pipe imme- ____________________ 1 In The Friend Coleridge inserted the following beautiful passage: 'During the whole night, such were the thunders and howlings of the breaking ice, that they have left a conviction on my mind, that there are Sounds more sublime than any Sight can be, more absolutely suspending the power of comparison, and more utterly absorbing the mind's self-consciousness in it's total attention to the object working upon it.' -462- diately after dinner; the Pastor expressed his surprize: I expressed mine that he could smoke before breakfast -- 'O -- Herr Gott! (i.e. Lord God) quoth he -- it is delightful -- it invigorates the frame, & it cleans out the moutt so!' A common amusement at the German Universities is for a number of young men to smoke out a Candle -i.e. to fill a room with Tobacco-smoke till the Candle goes out. -Pipes are quite the rage -- a pipe of a particular kind, that has been smoked for a year or so, will sell here for twenty Guineas -- the same pipe, when new, costs about four or five. They are called Meerschaums. Price of Provisions &c at Hamburgh, & the same holds good, with very little variation of Ratzeburgh, & Lubec. Beef per pound -- from 3d to 5d -- that is, in summer the best beef is about 3d, about Christmas 5d Mutton ditto Veal from 5d to 7d Pork -- 4d to 6d A fat goose 4 Shillings A Turkey 7 to 9 Shillings Fowls 14 pence a couple Bread nearly the same as in England. Cheese / 4d a pound English Cheese / 16d. Eggs -- 6d a dozen. Vegetables & Fruit, dearer than in London. Soap 6d a pound Candles 8d a pound N.B. Most Housekeepers make their own Soap & Candles. Coffee 22 pence a pound. Sugar, two Shillings a pound Tea execrable and adulterated -- 8 Shillings, pnd Ordinary wine, 7d or 8d a bottle, when bought in the cask. Good Claret, 16d Best Claret 2 Shillings Old Hock from 2 to 9 Shillings Best Brandy 20d the bottle Rum 16d Gin 10d Common Spirit 6d or 7d. Fish cheap in Spring. -- Game, sold in the markets; but I could not hear the price. Salt, excessively cheap -- cheap as dirt. English Cloth more than one third as dear as in England; but the making up is cheaper. -- German Cloth comes cheap, as cheap again. -463- Firing, extravagantly dear --. The Amtman here in his house has six stoves, & the Kitchen fire, and besides two large loads of Turf he uses more than an hundred pounds' worth (sterling) of wood. Wood is 14 dollars the fathom: a dollar is 8 marks, & a mark is sixteen pence. House Rent in Lubec is much of a muchness with the House rent at Bristol; but there are no taxes -- at Ratzeburg the same as at Stowey; but at Hamburgh, O my God! the meanest House in any part of the town lets for 100£ a year, & some (nothing very handsome either) for 300£. -- Servants' wages here are very small -- if there are two Servants, the upper has about 50 Shillings a year, the under-maid not thirty -- & they eat but little flesh, & never taste Tea or Coffee or Beer. A man can keep a Coach, Coachman, & two Horses, for 40£ a year, including all expences. -- In short, with 1 or 200 a year you cannot live better, in Germany than in England; but if you [have] 1000£ a year you can live twice as well: on account of no Taxes, & servants. God bless you, my dear Love! -- I will soon write again -- My dear Love to Poole & his Mother -- S. T. Coleridge Perhaps, you are in Bristol / however, I had better direct it to Stowey. -- My love to Martha & your Mother, & your other Sisters. -- Once more, my dearest Love, God love & preserve us thro' this long absence! -- O my dear Babies! -- my Babies! -- 271. To Josiah Wedgwood Address: Josiah Wedgewood Esq. | Stoke House | near | Cobham | Surry | England pay'd to Cuxhaven MS. New York Public Lib. Pub. E. L. G. i. 116. As early as 4 January 1799 Coleridge planned to send Josiah Wedgwood 'in a few days' a series of letters on the history of the Bauers ( Letter269); again on 21 May he wrote to Wedgwood that he had lying by his side 'six huge Letters', all but one having been written three months previously. He had planned to send them by a Cambridge man, Hamilton, whom he had met at Göttingen on 16 February, but Hamilton's departure being delayed, Coleridge decided to carry them to England himself ( Letters272 and 288). The next we hear of these letters is on 1 November 1800, when Coleridge told Wedgwood that they would soon be published in a volume of his German tour. To save the labour of transcription he had sent them off to the printers as they were written, 'your name of course erased' ( Letter362). No such publication appeared, and the following letter, numbered I on the manuscript, is all that survives of Coleridge's history of the Bauers. [ February 1799] I. It is difficult to give a definite idea of the word Bauer without -464- running thro' the origin & history of this Class. Under the Roman Empire there existed nothing analogous to it. The free Citizens were either independent Proprietors of Land, or lived in towns & Cities -- the agricultural labor was performed by Slaves, as in the West India Islands. Gibbon calculates the number of the Subjects of the first Emperors at 120 millions, of which he computes one Half to have been Slaves. These seem to have been treated more humanely under the Emperors, than during the Republic. -- Of this I have been able to conceive two causes --: first, the Roman Empire had grown so large that it became the Policy of the Emperors to make no further conquests -- & the Peace of the whole civilized World, the consequence of this Policy, operated in the same manner on the Roman Slavery, as an actual abolition of the African Trade would operate on the West India Slavery. -- It stopped up the source: & made the masters from the advanced Price of the Slaves, &c more attentive to their well-being -- & in a generation or two they became to a certain degree naturalized in the countries where they laboured & the idea Enemy ceased to associate itself with that of Slave. -- Secondly, the Roman Empire was too large, & too incongruous in it's parts, for that national Religion, which built on national Events & working on the imagination thro' definite forms and on the feelings thro' incessant association of the mythology with the Laws & Scenes, which were exclusively theirs, had effected wonders on the Greeks & early Romans! for this it was grown too large. It gradually therefore suffered the National Religion to sink into contempt, & took up a World-Religion -- such as had always existed in Asia, from the largeness of the Asiatic Empires. To this cause I am inclined to attribute the easy Propagation of Christianity -- which was in truth the World-Religion common to the great Empires in Asia, divested of Asiatic forms & ceremonies. -- The consequence of Christianity or a World-Religion as opposed to a National Religion appears to me universally this -Personal and domestic Duties are far better attended to, but Patriotism & all Enthusiasm for the aggrandisement of a country as a country, are weakened or extinguished. -- In Greece & Rome on the contrary, under the influence of a national Religion, we find sorry Fathers, bad Husbands, & cruel Masters; but glowing & generous Patriots. -- In Christian Countries an excellent Private Character totally devoid of all public Spirit is the most common of characters. -- But on this subject a man might write a volume & bring out some curious observations on the March of Things in France; & how far a Passion for Statues &c will be able to smuggle a sort of Idolatry into the Feelings altho' it may be too late in the World to introduce it into the understanding. -- The more I think, -465- the more I am convinced that the greatest of differences is produced when in the one case the feelings are worked upon thro' the Imagination & the Imagination thro' definite Forms (i.e. the Religion of Greece & Rome); & in the other case where the Feelings are worked upon by Hopes & Fears purely individual, & the Imagination is kept barren in definite Forms & only in cooperation with the Understanding labours after an obscure & indefinite Vastness -- / this is Christianity. -- My dear Friend! I have made something like a digression -- but it is the first, & shall be the last -- The influence of the World-Religion operated slowly on the Roman Character; but it did operate & produced finally laws & regulations in favor of the Slaves; still Slavery continued. But soon after the Northern Nations had shattered the Roman Empire, Slavery began to transmute itself into Vassalage -- a state of Dependence more suited to a wild people who had not yet learnt to be luxurious, and on whom the doctrines of the Christian Priests worked with greater effect while according to the Testimony of Tacitus the Slaves in the German Nations were properly speaking, Vassals, i.e. the Master gave the Servant House & Land, & received in return a given share of the Produce, retaining however an arbitrary power of dispossession &c. -- N.B. I mean this whenever I use the word Vassals. At first the Northern Nations adopted absolute Slavery, which they had learnt from the Romans, but soon they formed part of their Slaves into Vassals, & in the year 1200 Slavery was wholly abolished throughout Germany & Italy, and in 1300, or somewhat earlier throughout France & Spain. -- In England Vassalage instead of Slavery appears to have been general, still earlier, than in Italy or Germany. -- / --. It appears however that the German Conquerors did by no means either make Slaves or Vassals of the Nations which they conquered -- / the Sclavonian Nations, who conquered Poland & Russia, did. -- And it is probable that the huge Body of Polish Nobles (the only free men in the country) are the descendants of the conquering Army / & the Wretches who form the Polish Peasantry, the conquered People. -- It remains therefore difficult to account for the amazing Proportion of Vassals in France, & Spain, countries conquered by the German Tribes; & still more for the still greater Number of Vassals in Germany, which had never been conquered. It is evident from this that altho' Vassalage originated in Slavery, yet in the middle ages the Vassals were not the descendants of Slaves. -- I find in the History of Hungaria by Palma 1 a distinct ____________________ 1 Carolus Franciscus Palma, Notitia Rerum Hungaricum, 3 vols., 3rd ed., 1785. Professor Francis Christensen has brought to my attention the fact that the names of nine of the twelve characters of Coleridge Zapolya and the only -466- account of the introduction of Vassalage in that country -- & I believe that Hungary is the only Country in which it was ever distinctly & suddenly introduced. -- Hungary had been conquered in 884 by an Asiatic Tribe, amounting to 20,000 men. The smallness of their number made these conquerors adopt, in part, the mildness of the German Tribes -- to the conquered nation they left untouched their personal Freedom, and permitted them the possession of their Estates, on the condition of receiving 1/9 of the yearly Profits. This the 20,000 divided among themselves / & the descendants of these 20,000 are the present Hungarian Nobility; at least, with such mixtures as 900 years necessarily bring along with them. In this state things continued till 1514, when Pope Leo X commissioned the Cardinal Thomas Baxato [Bakócz] to preach up a crusade against the Turks. 80,000 Hungarians assembled themselves under the holy banner, & being in distress for provisions, they plundered the cities, Ofen & Pesth -- & irritated by the execution of some of the Ringleaders, they elected a George Dofa [Dozsa] for King -- & declared war against the Nobles; but they were completely routed, & the King Bladislaus [Wladislaus] & the Senate of Nobles hereupon declared all the Country People of Hungary for Vassals -- leaving them no power of alienating their property & laying them under heavy Services & Taxes -- in short, they declared the whole of their Possessions to be the Estates of the Nobles, & the original Proprietors as parts of the Estate & transferable with the same. -- This accounts for the state of Vassalage in Hungary; but in France, Spain, Germany, & Italy we find no such events on record; & it is a certain fact, that the original German Conquerors did not introduce Vassalage. In Spain & in many parts of Italy they admitted the conquered people to fully equal Rights with themselves -- & in France altho' they reserved to themselves political superiority, yet the laws of property they left unaltered. -- They took from the natives nearly one third of the Lands; but these they possessed in the same manner as the natives possessed the remaining two thirds. -- Yet in Spain, Italy, France, & the unconquered Germany throughout the middle ages we find the most oppressive Vassalage universal. -- We must attribute this phaenomenon therefore to (I) the constant civil wars, in ____________________ place-name other than Illyria are from Hungarian history. Sarolta, for example, is the name of the mother of the first king of Hungary and Zapolya the name of the last national king. The rebellion under Dozsa which Coleridge mentions in this letter was put down by John Zapolya and Stephen Bathory (the Old Bathory and Bethlen Bathory of Coleridge's play) at Temesvar ( Coleridge's Temeswar). Generally Coleridge's spelling of the proper names is close to Palma's. ( Professor Christensen studied Coleridge's dramatic works in his doctoral dissertation, "Three Romantic Poets and the Drama", Harvard, 1934. -467- which Vassalage was uniformly the lot of all Prisoners, to whom was immediately allotted house & Land & they were obliged to cultivate the same for the advantage of the conquerors. -- 2ndly to the introduction of feudal Tenures. -- At first the Chief allotted or lent out his peculiar Domains on easy conditions. -- The Possessors of these feudal Tenures were constantly favoured at the expence of their fellow-subjects -- hence many voluntarily subjected themselves & properties -- these again by means of the civil wars & the horrid abuses of the courts of Justice obtained secondary Vassals& in this state of things we find the origin of the Aristocracy of the Nobles. -- The great & favoured Vassals formed the Nobles -- and accordingly as they made themselves independant of the Crown, as in England & great part of Germany, or were retained or brought back again, under the power of the same, as in France, so arose either mixed or absolute Monarchy. -- The secondary Vassals are the Bauers. -- 3rdly to the absence of Commerce & Manufactures. -- In purely agricultural states, in which from any cause Vassalage had taken root, the number of Vassals must constantly increase. -- For unpropertied persons could in such states find no other means of subsistence than by voluntarily subjecting themselves -- for accustomed to vassals the great Proprietors would form no idea of Farmers, or Hired Servants. -- But the number of unpropertied Persons must necessarily increase in every a[gri]cultural State, where in order to keep estates in the family the rights of Pri[mogenitur]e will be always established. -- In Germany, the Laws compelled ev[ery un]propertied man to arrange himself as Vassal under so[me] Proprietor -- who became answerable for him &c. -- 4thly to Superstition [&] the influence of the Clergy. -- It was generally believed that the Vassals of the Church had a better chance of heaven -- & it is pretty certain, that upon earth at least, they were better used & less liable to the devastations of War. -- It is said, that at the moment of the French Revolution there existed in France a million & a half Vassals on the lands belonging to the Clergy. ---- It appears then, that soon after the Irruption of the Northern Nations Slavery changed into Vassalage; but the number of Vassals became far greater than that of Slaves had been. -- At first, at least in the case of those who had been made vassals thro' Conquest or Civil war, the Lord gave house & land indeed, & was payed by a share of the Produce (a far less horrid state than that of Slaves on Roman or West India Plantations) -- but he retained a power of possession over the person of the Vassal, & could dispose of him to other estates. -- (This is still the case in many of the Russian Dominions.) This however had been always regarded as -468- tyranny, and from the year 988 the Clergy, following the example of the Bishop of Constanz, struggled to introduce the glebae adscriptio -- by which the Vassal or Bondman was rendered inseparable from his Family & from the estate. -- This is the first alleviation of the Vassalage of the Peasants. -- About the same time, the Princes & Nobles who prided themselves in keeping open tables for a large retinue, found the old method of receiving from their Vassals shares of the natural Produce inconvenient & precarious -they gave therefore to these Vassals certain pieces of Land which should be wholly their's -- & instead of rent exacted SERVICES -that is every Vassal with his Cattle & Family worked a given number of days on the Estate of his Lord. ---- This by fixing the idea of a distinct [right] may be considered as the second alleviation. -- The third is the jus ad glebam, which where combined with the glebae adscriptio, is still vassalage; but vassalage beginning to border on Freedom. To this some districts of Germany arrived very early in the middle ages; & I believe, there are still parts in Mecklenburg where the Vassals have not even yet arrived to it. -(The Duke of Mecklenburg, our Queen's Brother, is, by the by, a fine mixture of Fool & Tyrant / & Vassalage is in his dominions more cruel than in any part of Europe, except Russia & Russian Poland.) Of a formal Emancipation of the Vassals thro' Government History gives not one Example from the year 1247 (when Matilda, wife of Otto, Duke of Brunswick, stated by law a sum of money which being offered, no Vassal in the country of Luneburg could be refused his Freedom) till the reign of Frederic I of Prussia, who formally abolished Vassalage in his Westphalian Dominions. -- Yet in this interspace it had been insensibly abolishing throughout Germany -- so that before the Edict of Fred. I. the number of Vassals was trifling compared to that of free Peasants. -- This alteration must be ascribed 1st to the Crusades, when multitudes were freed on condition of becoming Soldiers -- or, more accurately, to make them become voluntary & of course, braver Soldiers -- & many bought their Freedom for a trifling Sum of their Lords who took all means of raising money for that expedition. -- 2 -- The Introduction of the Roman Law produced many happy effects on the state of property, & smoothed the way to the Emancipation. 3rdly Still however the state of Vassalage continued frequent & cruel to the beginning of the 16th Century when the obstinate & bloody Peasants-war contributed still more powerfully to their general Emancipation -- 4thly To these must be added, & perhaps, as the most powerful cause, the rise of Towns, & Cities, of commerce & Manufactures, which made it in the first place possible & -469- even easy for the Vassals to procure money to buy their Freedom& secondly, by affording safe places of Refuge to Fugitives, disposed the Lords to sell that Freedom, which if not sold would probably be taken. -- / -- Traces of Vassalage still exist in Holstein, Lausitz, and Silesia -- the latter is curious, as Frederic the Great gave all the Silesian Peasants jus ad glebam, & security of Inheritance; & limited the Ransom-money (which, being offered, perfect Freedom must be given) at a Ducat; i.e. 7 Shillings Sterling. ---- In Mecklenburg it is still universal -- & in Pommerania / if the present great & good King of Prussia, who is deservedly idolized in Germany, has not abolished it. -- If he has not, it may be considered as certain, that he shortly will do it. -- In the next, I will give the distinct History of the Hanoverian Bauers to the present day -- & in a third the account of them, as they are, in agriculture, size of property, education, &c &c &c &c -- / -- / ---- Your grateful & affectionate Friend S. T. Coleridge 272. To Mrs. S. T. Coleridge Address: Mrs Coleridge | Nether Stowey | Somersetshire | England Payed to Cuxhaven [Readdressed in another hand] Mrs Coleridge | No 17 Newfoundland Street | Bristol MS. New York Public Lib. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 277. The manuscript is torn and the words in brackets have been supplied from a transcript made by Thomas Ward. Postmark: Foreign Office, 21 March 1799. (bey dem Rademacher Göring, in der Burg Strasse, Göttingen) March 12th [10], 1799, Sunday Night. My dearest Love It has been a frightfully long Time, since we have heard from each other. I have not written, simply because my letters could have gone no further than Cuxhaven; & would have stayed there, to the [no] small hazard of their being lost. -- Even yet the Mouth of the Elbe is so much choked with Ice, that the Pacquets for England cannot set off. Why need I say, how anxious this long Interval of Silence has made me? I have thought & thought of you, and pictured you & the little ones so often & so often, that my Imagination is tired, down, flat and powerless; and I languish after Home for hours together, in vacancy; my feelings almost wholly unqualified by Thoughts. I have, at times, experienced such an extinction of Light in my mind, I have been so forsaken by all the forms and colourings of Existence, as if the organs of Life had been dried up; as if only simple BEING remained, blind and stagnant! -- After I -470- From a pastel portrait made in Germany in 1799 and now in the possession of Mrs. C. S. Gardner [This page intentionally left blank.] have recovered from this strange state, & reflected upon it, I have thought of a man who should lose his companion in a desart of sand where his weary Halloos drop down in the air without an Echo. -- I am deeply convinced that if I were to remain a few years among objects for whom I had no affection, I should wholly lose the powers of Intellect -- Love is the vital air of my Genius, & I have not seen one human Being in Germany, whom I can conceive it possible for me to love -- no, not one. To my mind, they are an unlovely Race, these Germans! -- We left Ratzeburg Feb. 6th, on a Wednesday Evening, 7 o'clock -- we have no analogy in England for a German Stage Coach, so perfectly wretched is it -- such a Temple of all the Winds of Heaven!! This was not the coldest night in the Century, because the night following was two Degrees colder -- the oldest man living remembers not such a night as Thursday, Feb. 7th. This whole winter I have heard incessant complaints of the unusual Cold; but I have felt very little of it. But that Night -- My God! [Now] I know what the Pain of Cold is, & what the Danger! -- The pious Care of the German Governments that none of their loving Subjects should be suffocated, is admirable! -- On Friday Morning when the Light dawned, the Coach looked like a shapeless Idol of Suspicion with an hundred Eyes -for there were at least so many holes in it! -- And as to rapidity, we left Ratzeburg at 7, Wed. Evening, & arrived at Lunenburg -- i.e. 85 English miles -- at 3 o'clock on Thursday Afternoon -- This is a fair Specimen. In England I used to laugh at the 'Flying Wa[ggons;]' but compared with a German Post Coach the metaphor is perfectly justifiable, & f[or the f]uture I shall never meet a flying Waggon without thinking respectfully of [it's] speed. -- The whole Country from Ratzeburg almost to Einbeck, i.e. 155 English miles, is a flat objectless hungry heath, bearing no marks of cultivation, except close by the Towns -- & the only remarks, which suggested themselves to me, were -- that it was cold -- very cold -- shocking Cold -- 'never felt it so cold in my life['] -- Meine Seele! es ist kalt! -- abscheulich kalt! widernatürlich kalt! ganz erstaunend kalt, &c & & &c. Hanover is 115 miles from Ratzeburg -- we arrived there Saturday Evening, having slept Friday Night at Celle (a large tolerably handsome Town.) -- The Herr von Döring, a Nobleman who resides at Ratzeburg, & distinguished me by constant attentions & civilities, gave me letters to his Brother in law at Hanover -- & by the manner in which his Brother-in-law received me I found that they were not ordinary letters of recommendation. He pressed me exceedingly to stay a week in Hanover, but I refused -- & left it on Monday Noon -- in the mean time however he had introduced me to all the great People, & presented me, 'as an -471- English Gentleman of first-rate Character & Talents,' to Baron Steinberg, the Minister of State, & to Von Brandes, the Secretary of State & Governor of the Gottingen University. -- The first was amazingly perpendicular; but civil & polite, & gave me letters to Heyne, the Head-Librarian at Gottingen, &, in truth, the real Governor of Gottingen. -- Brandes gave me letters likewise to Heyne & Blumenbach, 1 who are his Brothers in law. -- I had likewise other letters given me. Baron Steinberg offered to present me to the Prince( Adolphus) who is now in Hanover; but I deferred the honor till my return. -- I shall make Poole laugh, when I return, with the visiting Card which the Baron left at my Inn. -- I reasoned against the doctrine of Rights in the Presence of Brandes, who is an Author & a vehement aristocrat, & so delighted him that he has written me a complimentary letter ---- Description is not my Fort; but descriptions of Towns & Cities -- I abhor even to read them! -Besides, I saw nothing particular in Hanover -- it is a neat town, well-lighted, neither handsome or ugly, about the size of Taunton, (perhaps a little larger) & contains about 16,000 Inhabitants. It being the seat of the Government, the Inhabitants, at least the Gentry, dance and game & commit adultery ---- there is a Tobacco Manufacture & a Library with some curious books. -- (N.b. -- I hold the last line for a master-piece of informative & discriminative Description.) -- The two things worth seeing are -- I. A Conduit representing Mount Parnassus, with statues of Apollo, the Muses, & a great many others, flying Horses, Rhinoceroses, & Elephants -- & 2. A Bust of Leibnitz. -- The first for it's excessive absurdity, ugliness, & indecency -- absolutely, I could write the most humorous Octavo Volume containing the Description of it with a Commentary! -- The second -- i.e. the Bust of Leibnitz -- impressed on my whole soul a sensation which has ennobled and enriched it! -It is the face of a God! -- & Leibnitz was almost more than a man in the wonderful capaciousness of his Judgment & Imagination! ---- Well -- we left Hanover on Monday Noon -- after having payed a most extravagant Bill. We lived with Spartan Frugality & payed with Persian Pomp --. But I was an Englishman & visited by half a dozen Noblemen, & the Minister of State! -- the Landlord could not dream of affronting me by anything like a reasonable charge! -- On the road we stopped with the Postillion always, & our expences were nothing -- Chester & I made a very hearty dinner of cold Beef &c -- & both together payed only fourpence -- Coffee & Biscuits only three pence a piece -- in short -- a man may travel cheap in Germany -- but he must avoid great towns, [& not be ____________________ 1 Johann Friedrich Blumenbach ( 1752-1840), physiologist and founder of anthropology. -472- visi]ted by Ministers of State! -- The country, as I said, was dreary; but the Inhabitants were, one & all, warmly clothed -- I must say, that I have seen very few objects of misery in the whole Hanoverian Dominions. -- In the little Pot houses & Cottages where we stopped was a wonderful uniformity ---- their Diet consisted generally of Potatoes (always very small, but extremely good) soup, and a sort of sausage made of Grits (Grits or Gerts, I don't [know] how to spell the word) pigs' fat, and pigs' blood. -- These were universal & form a very nutritious & very economic food. -- The most frequent soups which we observed in the cottages were 1 -- a soup of Water, Barley or Buckwheat, Onions & Potatoes. 2 -- of water, and vetc[hes, w]ith clumps of the above described sausage. -- The Bread is every where [a blac]k sour Bread, of which I am grown very fond, & prefer it to [any other]. -- White Bread is so uncommon, that at a fair in a little Vi[llage,] instead of Sweetmeats & Gingerbread, as in England, there were in Trays, covered with nice white napkins, Rolls & Twists of White Bread. -- There was in the whole fair neither Gingerbread or Sweetmeat. -- Vetches are eaten all over Germany, by Rich as well as Poor -- I like them very much. In good truth, my Taste & Stomach are very catholic, & adapt themselves with great ease to all sorts of [Diets -- In a] village, some four miles from Einbeck we stopped about 4 o clock in the morning -- it was pitch dark, & the Postillion led us into a room where there was not a ray of Light -- we could not see our hands --! but it felt extremely warm. -- At length & suddenly, the Lamp came -- & we saw ourselves in a Room, 13 Strides in length, strewed with straw -- & lying by the side of each other on the straw twelve Jews -- I assure you, it was curious. -- Their dogs lay at their Feet -there was one very beautiful Boy among them, fast asleep, with the softest conceivable opening of the Mouth, with the white Beard of his Grandfather upon his right cheek, a fair rosy cheek! ---- I asked the Landlord how much they payed for their night's Lodging -- he told me, a Metier a piece -- that is -- an halfpenny. The Jews are horribly, unnaturally oppressed & persecuted all throughout Germany. ---- The Cottagers every where in Germany use little Lamps instead of Candles -- if it be cheaper here, where all make their own Candles, surely it must be vastly cheaper in England. ---- We were frequently obliged to stop in the night -- the road & track being completely lost in the Snow. In these cases the Postillions smoked on with undisturbed Phlegm, & simply said -- Schwer Noth! -- that is -- the Epilepsy! -- This oath is universal in Germany -- 'a curious fact, Tom'! Bye the bye, Swearing is almost unknown among genteel People here. -- It is a general Prejudice here, that the English are monstrous Eaters -- in England, that the Germans are Devils -473- for Drinking! -- The fact is, that a German eats more than any two Englishmen, but is exceedingly sober -- and I have reason to believe that no Country in God's Earth labours under the tremendous curse of Drunkenness equally with England. -- About Einbeck the country becomes Hilly & amphitheatrical -- & the Hills are cleft, woody, & run into each other / but there is neither stately River nor Lake. -- The country soon ceases to be beautiful -- however it continues tolerable, till we arrived at Gottingen, a most emphatically ugly Town in a plain surrounded by naked Hills, that are neither high or interesting -- 175 miles from Ratzeburg. -- We arrived in the evening of Tuesday, Feb. 12th. -- That my Descriptions of the Country are so uninteresting, is owing, partly to the intense Cold which obliged us to fasten up the Coach as much as possible -- & partly, to the Depth of the Snow, which not only concealed the shapes of Things, but by the Glitter & by the Sameness checked & discouraged me from watching them. ---- I forgot to say, that Schwer Noth is pronounced exactly Swear not! -- & at first this equivocation has an odd effect to an English Man who is ignorant of the Language. ---- / -- While we were drinking Tea, we heard a loud, very very loud Smacking of Whips -- ran to the Window, & lo! 30 Sledges full gallop, one after the other, each with one or two Ladies -- I must draw the Sledge. a the Student who sits [or) rather stands astride behind the Sledge, & (the reins running each side the [sledge) &] so manages the first Horse --. -- b. -- the Ladies in the Sledge. c c c -- the Reins -- (N.B. No[t in] the Sledge, as in the Picture.) d d. the first Horse. -c. c. c. c. c. the Reins -- aga[in -- ] d d d. the second Horse, at least 10 yards from the first. e e the Postillion [who] rides on the second Horse. -- All, Ladies, Student, Sledge, Horses, & Postillion, a[re] drest in all imaginable Pomp -- the Horses have Bells, & the Noise of the Whips is [inconceivable -- ] This is a darling [amuse]ment of the Students; but a very expensive one. I found afterw[ards] that young Parry, [Hobhous]e's Nephew, was at the head of this Party -- & he to[ld me] that his share [alone cost] him 85 dollars -- somewhat more than 5 gui[neas -- ] N.b. They gave refre(shments &c su]ch as Wine, Cakes &c. ---- Wednesday Morning we sought out Lodgings & took four very neat Rooms, [at the] rate of 25 Shillings a month, the Landlord to find us Plates, Knives, & [Forks] & our Tea Things -- We likewise agreed with the House opposite to us [for] a Dinner Portion, for 19 Shillings a month. This is amply sufficient for us Bo[th,] both -474- for dinner & Supper. Consequently for lodging & boarding for both we only pay two guineas & 2 Shillings, a month -- to these expences you must add bread, butter, wood, tea, & washing, & a trifle for the maid. Coffee is half a crown a pound, but it [is] not good. The Tea is very good; but you give 13 Shillings a pound for [it -- Sugar is) half a crown a pound -- Butter a Shilling, or 11d -- Washing somewhat cheaper than in England -- fire wood very expensive; but in the course of a week or so we shall be able to do without it -our rooms are so warm. -- In the lodgings we were a little cheated -we might have had four magnificently furnished Rooms in the best House in Gottingen at the Rate of fourteen Louis a year -- A Louis is about 16s & 3d. -- In short, you may live very cheap at Gottingen; but one must be always on the watch against being cheated. Every human Being from the highest to the lowest is in a conspiracy against you -- commercial Integrity is quite unknown in Germany, & cheating in business is a national, & therefore not an individual crime / for a German is educated to consider it as right. This day I called with my Letters on the Professor Heyne, a little, hopping, over-civil, sort of a Thing who talks very fast & with fragments of coughing between every ten words -- however, he behaved very courteously to me. -- The next day I took out my Matricula & commenced Student of the University of Gottingen -- for which I payed 15 Shillings -- without this I could not have used the Library &c --. Heyne has honoured me so far, that he has given me the Right, which properly only the Professors have, of sending to the Library for an indefinite number of Books, in my own name. 1 -- He told me that he wished the English had never been at Göttingen -- they had introduced expensive habits &c ---Friday Afternoon 3 Englishmen called on me, who gave me a melancholy picture of Gottingen -- of it's dullness -- of the impossibility of being introduced into mixed societies, &c &c -- I went with them & visited the Library, which without doubt is the very first in the World both in itself, & in the management of it. -- It consists of two immense large Rooms, ornamented with busts & Statues -- some Antiques, some Copies of Antiques -- there are very fine Copies of all the best ancient Statues -- but of the Library more hereafter. -- On Saturday Evening I went to the Concert where a Student declaimed a Monodrama to Music -- at first, it struck me as if a Parson was preaching during the chimes --; but after a little while I liked it. It was declaiming -- i.e. impassioned Reading -- not like Recitativo -- but Reading -- the Music sometimes ____________________ 1 For Coleridge's borrowings between 21 Feb. and 16 June 1799 see Alice D. Snyder, 'Books borrowed by Coleridge from the Library of the University of Göttingen, 1799', Modern Philology, Feb 1928, pp. 877-80. -475- accompanying, but more up the pauses of the Voice. -Here the other Englishmen introduced themselves -- three had known my Friends at Cambridge & were eager to make my acquaintance --: for they were Cambridge men -- two others were the Parries, 1 the Nephews of Mr Hobhouse, & acquaintances of Mr Estlin --. -- After the Concert Hamilton, 2 a Cambridge man, took me, as his Guest, to the Saturday Club -- where what is called the first Class of Students meet & sup once a week -- Here were all the nobility, & three Englishmen, Hamilton, Brown, & Kennet. -- Suchan Evening I never passed before -- roaring, kissing, embracing, fighting, smashing bottles & glasses against the wall, singing -- in short, such a scene of uproar I never witnessed before, no, not even at Cambridge. -- I drank nothing -- but all, except two of the Englishmen, were drunk -- & the party broke up a little after one o/clock in the morning. I thought of what I had been at Cambridge, & of what I was -- of the wild & bacchanalian Sympathy with which I had formerly joined similar Parties, & of my total inability now to do aught but meditate -- & the feeling of the deep alteration in my moral Being gave the scene a melancholy interest to me! -- There were two Customs which I had never seen before -- the one they call Smollets [Schmollis], & consists in two men drinking a glass of wine under each other's arm, & then kissing & embracing each other -- after which they always say Thou to each other. The other custom was this -- when all were drunk & all the Bottles smashed, they brought a huge Sword, sung a Song round it, then each fixed his Hat on the sword, Hat over Hat, still singing -- & then all kissed & embraced each other, still singing. -- This Kissing is a most loathsome Business -- & the English are known to have such an aversion to it, that it is never expected of them. -We are quite well. Chester will write soon to his Family -- in the meantime he sends Duty, Love, & Remembrances to all to whom they are due. -- I have drank no wine or fermented liquor now for more than 8 months -- in consequence of which I am apt to be costive & wakeful; but then I never feel any oppression after dinner & my Spirits are much more equable -- blessings which I deem inestimable! -- My dear Hartley! -- My Berkley -- how intensely I long for you! -- My Sara -- O my dear Love! To Poole -God bless him! -- To dear Mrs Poole, & Ward kindest Love -- & to all Love & Remembrance. S. T. Coleridge (Mr Coleridge, in der Burg Strasse, Göttingen, Germany.) ____________________ 1 Charles and Frederick Parry, brothers of Sir William Parry, the arctic explorer. 2 Anthony Hamilton of St. John's College, Cambridge. -476- 273. To Mrs. S. T. Coleridge [Addressed in another hand] 1 Mr Coleridge | Greata Hall | Keswick To be delivered to Mr Jackson MS. British Museum. Hitherto unpublished. This fragment, which is headed ' Gottingen', is all that remains of what was probably a letter to Mrs. Coleridge. Coleridge here defines the term Professor, as he had promised in Letter 259. March 1799] Gottingen Gottingen had been a considerable town long before George the second made it a university -- so early as 1475 there was calculated to be 800 Master Manufacturers of Cloth & Stuffs. Before the year 1400 it had been admitted into the Hanseatic League, & remained in it till the year 1572. But both town & manufactory received injuries in the famous thirty years war, from which it has never recovered. -- A Sovereign Prince in order to establish a University in his Dominions must receive the imperial Privilege: this privilege George the IId received from the Emperor Charles VIth; Jan. 13th. 1733 -- the University commenced in October 1734 & having been presented with complete rights of Jurisdiction, distinct from the civil power & dependent only on the Government, it was solemnly consecrated 17th Sept. 1737. From the name of it's founder it is called the Georgia Augusta University; & the King of England is always the Rector Magnificentissimus. The Prorector is elected annually from out of the ordinary Professors -- or rather they take it by turns. During his office he is an Imperial Count Palatine, and as such has the right (I quote from the charter) 'to nominate Notaries & laureate Poets, to legitimate Bastards, restore their honour to the Infamous' &c &c. ---- / -- A Professor is one who has received from the Government & University that especial Degree which authorizes him to teach publickly in the particular department or faculty, of which he is Professor. -- The Ordinary Professors (Professores ordinarii) are not only authorized to read lectures -- but are salaried by the Government so to do. -- Since the foundation of this University it has [ha]d a succession of the most eminent men in Germany as it's ordinary Professors -- among which the names of Mosheim, Gesner, Haller, Michaelis, Pütter, Kästner, Heyne, Letz or Less, 2 Blumenbach, Lichtenburg, Plank, Eichhorn, Meiners, and Jacobi are as well known to the Literati throughout Europe, as to their own Countrymen. -- The Professors are divided into ____________________ 1 The address indicates that this manuscript was forwarded to Coleridge at Keswick in 1800, when he was planning to publish his German tour. See Letters 340 and 362. 2 i.e. Gottfried Less ( 1736-97), biblical scholar. -477- four Faculties -- I the theological, consisting of 3 & sometimes 4 members, 2 the Jurists, of 4 members, the Medicinists, of 3 & (4) the Philosophers of 8 -- Sum total 18 or 19. -- These are the Professores ordinarii -- the number of those who can teach but are not appointed to do so, is in each faculty indefinite. -- The Professores ordinarii of the first faculty in all processions &c wear a black robe, of the second a light Scarlet, of the third a deep Red -- & the [Philo]sophers march in Purple -- with drum, fife, & trumpet, tool too! too! [Each of the fa]culties takes it in his turn yearly to be the President of. . . 274. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole | Nether Stowey | Somersetshire | England Pay'd to Cuxhaven MS. British Museum. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 282. Postmark: Foreign Office, 3 May 1799. April 6th, 1799 My dearest Poole Your two letters, dated, Jan. 24th and March 15th, followed close on each other. I was still enjoying 'the livelier impulse and the dance of thought' 1 which the first had given me, when I received the second. -- At the time, in which I read Sara's lively account of the miseries which herself and the infant had undergone, all was over & well -- there was nothing to think of -- only a mass of Pain was brought suddenly and closely within the sphere of my perception, and I was made to suffer it over again. For this bodily frame is an imitative Thing, and touched by the imagination gives the hour that is past, as faithfully as a repeating watch. -- But Death the death of an Infant -- of one's own Infant! 2 -- I read your letter in calmness, and walked out into the open fields, oppressed, not by my feelings, but by the riddles, which the Thought so easily proposes, and solves -- never! A Parent -- in the strict and exclusive sense a Parent -- ! to me it is a fable wholly without meaning except in the moral which it suggests -- a fable, of which the Moral is God. Be it so -- my dear dear Friend! O let it be so! La nature (says Pascal) 'La Nature confond les Pyrrhoniens, et la raison confond les Dogmatistes. Nous avons une impuissance à, prouver, ____________________ 1 Fears in Solitude, line 220. 2 Berkeley Coleridge died of consumption on 10 Feb. 1799. Poole at first thought it desirable to spare Coleridge's feelings by concealing the news; but later he thought better of his decision, perhaps fearing that Coleridge would hear of the baby's death from other sources, and on 15 Mar. wrote a tender letter containing the ill tidings. -478- invincible à, tout le Dogmatisme: nous avons une idée de la vérité, invincible à tout le Pyrrhonisme.' I find it wise and human to believe, even on slight evidence, opinions, the contrary of which cannot be proved, & which promote our happiness without hampering our Intellect. -- My Baby has not lived in vain -- this life has been to him what it is to all of us, education & developement! Fling yourself forward into your immortality only a few thousand years, & how small will not the difference between one year old & sixty years appear! -- Consciousness --! it is no otherwise necessary to our conceptions of future Continuance than as connecting the present link of our Being with the one immediately preceding it; & that degree of Consciousness, that small portion of memory, it would not only be arrogant, but in the highest degree absurd, to deny even to a much younger Infant. -- 'Tis a strange assertion, that the Essence of Identity lies in recollective Consciousness -- 'twere scarcely less ridiculous to affirm, that the 8 miles from Stowey to Bridgewater consist in the 8 mile stones. Death in a doting old age falls upon my feelings ever as a more hopeless Phaenomenon than Death in Infancy / ; but nothing is hopeless. -- What if the vital force which I sent from my arm into the stone, as I flung it in the air & skimm'd it upon the water -- what if even that did not perish! -- It was life --! it was a particle of Being --! it was Power! -- & how could it perish --? Life, Power, Being! -- organization may & probably is, their effect; their cause it cannot be! -- I have indulged very curious fancies concerning that force, that swarm of motive Powers which I sent out of my body into that Stone; & which, one by one, left the untractable or already possessed Mass, and ---- but the German Ocean lies between us. -- It is all too far to send you such fancies as these! ---- 'Grief' indeed, Doth love to dally with fantastic thoughts, And smiling, like a sickly Moralist, Finds some resemblance to her own Concerns In the Straws of Chance, & Things Inanimate! 1 But I cannot truly say that I grieve -- I am perplexed -- I am sad -and a little thing, a very trifle would make me weep; but for the death of the Baby I have not wept! -- Oh! this strange, strange, strange Scene-shifter, Death! that giddies one with insecurity, & so unsubstantiates the living Things that one has grasped and handled! --/ Some months ago Wordsworth transmitted to me a most sublime Epitaph / whether it had any reality, I cannot say. -- Most probably, in some gloomier moment he had fancied the moment in which his Sister might die. ____________________ 1 Osorio, v. i. 11-14. -479- Epitaph 1 A Slumber did my spirit seal, I had no human fears: She seem'd a Thing, that could not feel The touch of earthly years. No motion has she now, no force; She neither hears nor sees, Mov'd round in Earth's diurnal course With rocks, & stones, and trees! April 8th, 1799. I feel disappointed beyond doubt at the circumstance of which you have half informed me, deeply disappointed; but still we can hope. If you live at Stowey, & my moral & intellectual Being grows & purifies, as I would fain believe, that it will -- there will be always a motive, a strong one to their coming. 2 In your next letter, I pray you, be more minute. -- As to your servants & the people of Stowey in general -- Poole, my Beloved! you have been often unwisely fretful with me when I have pressed upon you their depravity. -- Without religious joys, and religious terrors nothing can be expected from the inferior Classes in society -- whether or no any class is strong enough to stand firm without them, is to me doubtful. -- There are favoured Individuals, but not Classes. Pray, where is Cruikshanks? & how go his affairs? -- and what good Luck has Sam. Chester had? -- / -- In this hurly burly of unlucky Things, I cannot describe to you how pure & deep Joy I have experienced from thinking of your clear Mother! -- O may God Almighty give her after all her agonies now at last a long, rich, yellow Sunset, in this, her evening of Life! -- So good, and so virtuous, and with such an untameable Sensibility to enjoy the blessings of the Almighty -surely God in heaven never made a Being more capable of enjoying with a deeper Thankfulness of Earth Life & it's Relations! -- With regard to myself I am very busy, very busy indeed! -- I attend several Professors, & am getting many kinds of knowlege; but I stick to my Lessing -- The Subject more & more interests me, & I doubt not in the least, that I shall wholly clear my expences by the end of October. -- I am sorry to tell you, that I find that work as hard as I may I cannot collect all the vast quantity of Materials which I must collect, in less than six weeks -- if I would do myself ____________________ 1 Poet. Works, ii. 216. 2 Poole had informed Coleridge of an unrealized plan of the Wedgwoods to buy an estate near Stowey. See Letter 283. -480- justice; & perhaps, it may be 8 weeks. -- / The materials which I have & shall have would of themselves make a quarto volume; but I must not work quite so hard as I have done / it so totally dries up all my colour. -- With regard to the house at Stowey, I must not disguise from you that to live in Stowey, & in that house which you mention, is to me an exceedingly unpleasant Thought. Rather than go any where else assuredly I would do it -- & be glad / but the thought is unpleasant to me. -- I do not like to live in a Town -- still less in Stowey where excepting yourself & Mother there is no human being attached to us & few who do not dislike us. -- Besides, it [is] a sad Tyranny that all who live in towns are subject to -- that of inoculating all at once &c &c. And then the impossibility of keeping one's children free from vice & profaneness -- & &c. -- If I do not send off this letter now, I must wait another week -What must I do? -- How you will look, when you see the blank Page! -- My next shall make up for it -- Heaven bless you & S. T. Coleridge 275. To Mrs. S. T. Coleridge Transcripi Thomas Ward copy-book, New York Public Lib. Pub. Letters, i. 284. Gottingen in der Wende Strasse April 8th. 1799 -- It is one of the discomforts of my absence, my dearest Love! that we feel the same calamities at different times -- I would fain write words of consolation to you; yet I know that I shall only fan into new activity the pang which was growing dead and dull in your heart -- Dear little Being! -- he had existed to me for so many months only in dreams and reveries, but in them existed and still exists so livelily, so like a real Thing, that although I know of his Death, yet when I am alone and have been long silent, it seems to me as if I did not understand it. -- Methinks, there is something awful in the thought, what an unknown Being one's own Infant is to one! -- a fit of sound -- a flash of light -- a summer gust, that is as it were created in the bosom of the calm Air, that rises up we know not how, and goes we know not whither! -- But we say well; it goes! it is gone! -- and only in states of Society in which the revealing voice of our most inward and abiding nature is no longer listened to, (when we sport and juggle with abstract phrases, instead of representing our feelings and ideas) only then we say it ceases! I will not believe that it ceases -- in this moving stirring and harmonious Universe I cannot believe it! -- Can cold and darkness -481- come from the Sun? where the Sun is not -- there is cold and darkness! But the living God is every where, & works every where -and where is there room for Death? -- To look back on the life of my Baby, how short it seems! -- but consider it referently to nonexistence, and what a manifold and majestic Thing does it not become? -- What a multitude of admirable actions, what a multitude of habits of actions it learnt even before it saw the light? and who shall count or conceive the infinity of its thoughts and feelings, it's hopes and fears, & joys, and pains, & desires, & presentiments, from the moment of it's birth to the moment when the Glass, through which we saw him darkly, was broken -- and he became suddenly invisible to us? -- Out of the Mount that might not be touched, and that burnt with fire, out of Darkness, and blackness and tempest, and with his own Voice, which they who heard entreated that they might not hear it again, the most high God forbad us to use his name vainly -- And shall we who are Christians, shall we believe that he himself uses his own power vainly? -- That like a child he builds palaces of mud and clay in the common road, and then he destroys them, as weary of his pastime, or leaves them to be trod under by the Hoof of Accident? -- That God works by general laws are to me words without meaning or worse than meaningless -- Ignorance and Imbecillity, and Limitation must wish in generals -- What and who are these horrible shadows necessity and general law, to which God himself must offer Sacrifices -hecatombs of Sacrifices? -- I feel a deep conviction that these shadows exist not -- they are only the dreams of reasoning Pride, that would fain find solutions for all difficulties without Faith! -that would make the discoveries which lie thick sown in the path of the eternal Future unnecessary; and so conceiting that there is sufficiency and completeness in the narrow present, weakens the presentiment of our wide and ever widening Immortality! -- God works in each for all -- most true -- but more comprehensively true is it, that he works in all for each. -- I confess that the more I think, the more I am discontented with the doctrines of Priestly. He builds the whole and sole hope of future existence on the words and miracles of Jesus -- yet doubts or denies the future existence of Infants -- only because according to his own System of Materialism he has not discovered how they can be made conscious -- But Jesus has declared that all who are in the grave shall arise -- and that those who should arise to perceptible progression must be ever as the Infant which he held in his Arms and blessed! -- And although the Man Jesus had never appeared in the world, yet I am Quaker enough to believe, that in the heart of every Man the Christ would have revealed himself, the Power of the Word, that was even in -482- the Wilderness -- To me who am absent this Faith is a real consolation -- & the few, the slow, the quiet tears which I shed, are the Accompaniments of high and solemn Thought, not the workings of Pain or Sorrow -- When I return indeed, and see the vacancy that has been made -- when no where any thing corresponds to the form which will perhaps for ever dwell on my mind, then it is possible that a keener pang will come upon me -- Yet I trust, my Love! -- I trust, my dear Sara! that this event which has forced us to think of the Death of what is most dear to us, as at all times probable, will in many and various ways be good for us -- To have shared -- nay, I should say -- to have divided with any human Being any one deep Sensation of Joy or of Sorrow, sinks deep the foundations of a lasting love -- When in Moments of fretfulness and Imbecillity I am disposed to anger or reproach, it will, I trust, be always a restoring thought -- 'We have wept over the same little one -- & with whom am I angry? -- with her who so patiently and unweariedly sustained my poor and sickly Infant through his long Pains -- with her -- who, if I too should be called away, would stay in the deep anguish over my death-pillow! who would never forget met!' -- Ah, my poor Berkley! -- A few weeks ago an Englishman desired me to write an Epitaph on an Infant who had died before it's Christening -- While I wrote it, my heart with a deep misgiving turned my thoughts homewards -- On an Infant, who died before it's Christening -- 1 Be rather than be call'd a Child of God! Death whisper'd. With assenting Nod It's head upon the Mother's breast The baby bow'd, and went without demur, Of the Kingdom of the blest Possessor, not Inheritor! ---- It refers to the second Question in the Church Catechism -- We are well, my dear Sara -- I hope to be home at the end of 10 or 11 weeks -- If you should be in Bristol, you will probably be shewn by Mr Estlin three letters which I have written to him all together -- & one to Mr Wade -- Mr Estlin will permit you to take the letters to Stowey that Poole may see them, & Poole will return them -- I have no doubt but I shall repay myself by the work which I am writing, to such an amount, that I shall have spent out of my income only 50 pounds at the end of August -- My love to your Sisters -- & love & duty to your Mother -- God bless you my love! and shield ____________________ 1 Poems, i. 312. -483- us from deeper Afflictions, or make us resigned unto them (and perhaps the latter Blessedness is greater than the former). Your affectionate & faithful | Husband S T Coleridge 276. To Mrs. S. T. Coleridge Address: Mrs Coleridge | Nether Stowey | Somersetshire | England Payed to Cuxhaven MS. New York Public Lib. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 288. Postmark: Foreign Office, 6 May 1799. Göttingen, bey Hüne in der Wende Strasse. April 23rd 1799 My dear Sara Surely it is unnecessary for me to say, how infinitely I languish to be in my native Country & with how many struggles I have remained even so long in Germany! -- I received your affecting letter, dated Easter Sunday; and had I followed my impulses, I should have packed up & gone with Wordsworth & his Sister, who passed thro', & only passed thro', this place, two or three days ago. -- If they burn with such impatience to return to their native Country, they who are all to each other, what must I feel, with every thing pleasant & every thing valuable, & every thing dear to me at a distance -- here, where I may truly say, my only amusement is -- to labour! --. But it is in the strictest sense of the word impossible that I can collect what I have to collect, in less than six weeks from this day; yet I read & transcribe from 8 to 10 hours every day. Nothing could support me but the knowlege that if I return now, we shall be embarrassed & in debt; & the moral certainty that having done what I am doing, we shall be more than cleared: / not to add that so large a work with so great a variety of information from sources so scattered, & so little known even in Germany, will, of course, establish my character -- for industry & erudition, certainly; & I would fain hope, for reflection & genius. -This day in June I hope, & trust, that I shall be in England --! -O that the Vessel could but land at Shurton Bars! -- Not that I should wish to see you & Poole immediately on my Landing -No! -- the sight, the touch of my native Country were sufficient for one whole Feeling -- one most deep unmingled Emotion! But then & after a lonely walk of the three miles -- then, first of all whom I knew, to see you, & my Friend! -- It lessens the delight of the thought of my Return, that I must get at you thro' a tribe of acquaintances, damping the freshness of one's Joy! -- My poor little Baby! -- at this moment I see the corner of the Room where his cradle stood -- -484- & his cradle too -- and I cannot help seeing him in the cradle. Little lamb! & the snow would not melt on his limbs! -- I have some faint recollection that he had that difficulty of breathing once before I left England -- or was it Hartley? --/-- 'A child! a child! is born, and the fond heart Dances: and yet the childless are more happyt!' --/-- In Christmas 1 I saw a custom which pleased & interested me here -- the children make little Presents to their Parents, & to one another; & the Parents to the Children. For three or four months before Christmas the Girls are all busy, & the boys save up their pocket-money, to make or purchase these presents -What the present is to be, is cautiously kept secret, & the Girls have a world of contrivances to conceal it -- such as, working when they are out on visits & the others are not with them, & getting up in the morning long before light, &c. -- Then on the Evening before Christmas Day one of the parlours is lighted up by the Children, into which the Parents must not go; a great yew-bough is fastened on the Table at a little distance from the wall, a multitude of little Tapers are fastened in the bough, but not so as to burn it till they are nearly burnt out -- & coloured paper &c hangs & flutters from the twigs. ---- Under this bough the Children lay out in great neatness the presents they mean for their parents; still concealing in their pockets what they intend for each other. Then the Parents are introduced -- & each presents his little gift -- & then they bring out the others & present them to each other, with kisses, & embraces. -- Where I saw the Scene, there were 8 or 9 children of different ages; and the eldest Daughter & the Mother wept aloud for joy & tenderness; & the tears ran down the face of the Father, & he clasped all his children so tight to his breast, as if he did it to stifle the Sob that was rising within him. -- I was very much affected. And the Shadow of the Bough on the wall, on the wall & arching over on the Ceiling, made a pretty picture -- & then the raptures of the very little ones, when at least [last] the Twigs & thread leaves began to catch fire, & snap -- O that was a delight for them! -- / On the next day, in the great parlour, the Parents lay out on the Tables the presents for the children / a scene of more sober joy succeeds / as on this day, after an old custom, the Mother says privately to each of her Daughters, & the Father to each of his Sons, that which he has observed most praiseworthy & that which he has observed most faulty in their conduct --. Formerly, & still in all the little Towns & villages through the whole of North Germanyy, these Presents were sent by all the parents of the village to some one Fellow who in high Buskins, a white Robe, a Mask, & ____________________ 1 The following passage was published almost verbatim in The Friend, No. 19, 28 Dec 1809, under the title Christmas within Doors. -485- an enormous Flax Wig personates Knecht y -- i.e. the Servant Rupert. On Christmas night he goes round [to] every house, & says that Jesus Christ, his Master, sent him there -- the Parents & older children receive him with great pomp of reverence, while the little ones are most terribly frightened / he then enquires for the children, & according to the character which he hears from the Parent, he gives them the intended Presents, as if they came out of Heaven from Jesus Christ -- or if they should have been bad children, he gives the Parents a rod, & in the Name of his Master Jesus recommends them to use it frequently. -- About 7 or 8 years old, the children are let into the secret; & it is curious, how faithfully they all keep it! -- There are a multitude of strange wild superstitions among the Bauers -- these still survive in spite of the efforts of the Clergy who in the north of Germany, i.e. in the Hanoverian, Saxon, & Prussian Dominions are almost all Deists. But they make little or no impressions on the Bauers, who are wonderfully religious & fantastically superstitious; but not in the least priestrid. -- But in the Catholic Countries of Germany the difference is vast indeed! -- I met lately an intelligent & calm-minded man who had spent a considerable time at Marburg, in the Bishoprich of Paderborn, in Westphalia. He told me, that Bead-prayers to the Holy Virgin are universal & universally too are magical Powers attributed to one particular formula of words which are absolutely jargon / at least, the words are to be found in no known Language. The Peasants believe it however to be a prayer to the Virgin, & happy is the man among them who is made confident by a Priest that he can repeat it perfectly; for heaven knows, what terrible calamity might not happen, if any one should venture to repeat it, & blunder. -- Vows, & Pilgrimages to particular Images, are still common among the Bauers / if any one die before the performance of his vow, they believe that he hovers between Heaven & Earth, and at times hobgoblins his relations till they perform it for him. Particular Saints are believed to be eminently favorable to particular Prayers -- & he assured me solemnly that a little before he left Marburg, a Lady of Marburg had prayed, & given money to have the public Prayers, at St Erasmus's Chapel to St Erasmus -for what, think you? -- That the Baby, with Which she was then pregnant, might be a Boy with white Hair & rosy Cheeks. -- When their Cows, Pigs, or Horses are sick they take them to the Dominican Monks who prescribe texts out of holy books, & perform exorcisms. -- When men or women are sick, they give largely to the Convent, who, on good conditions, dress them in Church-robes, & lay a particular & highly-venerated Crucifix on their Breasts / & perform a multitude of antic Ceremonies. -- In general, my In- -486- former confessed, that they cured the persons -- which he seemed to think extraordinary, but which I think very natural. Yearly on St Blasius' Day unusual multitudes go to receive the Lord's Supper; & while they are receiving it, the Monks hold a Blasius Taper (as it [is] called) before the Forehead of the kneeling Person, & then pray to St Blasius to drive away all head-achs for the ensuing year. -- Their wishes are often expressed in this form -'Mary, Mother of God, make her Son do so and so.' ---- Yet with all this, from every information which I can collect (& I have had very many opportunities of collating various accounts) the Peasants in the Catholic Countries of Germany, but especially in Austria, are far better off, & a far happier & livelier race than those in the Protestant Lands. --/ -- I fill up the sheet with scattered information, / put down in the order in which I happened to see them. -The Peasant children where ever I have been, are dressed warm & tight; but very ugly the dress looks; a frock-coat, some of coarse blue cloath, some of Plaid, buttoned behind -- the Row of Buttons running down the Back, & the seamless buttonless fore-part -- 't has an odd look! ---- When the Peasants marry, if the Girl is of a good character, the Clergyman gives her a virgin Crown -- (a tawdry ugly thing made of gold & silver Tinsel, like the Royal Crowns in Shape) -- this they wear, with cropped, powdered, & pomatumed Hair -- / in short, the Bride looks Ugliness personified. -- While I was at Ratzeburg, a girl came to beg the Pastor to let her be married in this crown -- & she had had two Bastards! -The Pastor refused, of course. -- I wondered that a reputable Farmer should marry her; but the Pastor told me that where a female Bauer is the heiress, her having had a bastard does not much stand in her way / and yet tho' little or no infamy attaches to it, the number of Bastards is but small / 2 in 70 has been the average at Ratzeburg among the Peasants. -- By the bye, the Bells in Germany are not rung as our's with ropes -- but two men stand, one on each side of the Bell -- & each pushes the Bell away from him with his foot. -- In the Churches, what is a Baptismal Font in our churches, is a great Angel with a Bason in his hand; -- he draws up & down with a chain, like a Lamp --. In a particular part of the Ceremony down comes the great Stone Angel with the Bason, presents it to the Pastor who having taken quant. suff., up flies my Angel to his old place in the Ceiling. You cannot conceive, how droll it looked. ---- The Graves, in the little village Church yards, are square; and in square or parallelogrammic wooden cases -- they look like Boxes without lids -- & Thorns & Briars are woven over them, as is done in some parts of England. Perhaps, you recollect that beautiful passage in Jeremy Taylor's Holy Dying / '& the -487- Summer brings briars to bud on our graves' --. -- The Shepherds, with iron-soled boots, walk before their Sheep (as in the East) -you know, our Saviour says -- My Sheep follow me. -- So it is here -the Dog and [the S]hepherd walk first, the Shepherd with his romantic fur-C[ap] & general[ly k]nitting a pair of white worsted Gloves -- he walks on, & his dog by him, & then follow the Sheep, winding along the roads in a beautiful Stream! In the fields I observed a multitude of poles with bands & trusses of Straw tied round the higher part, & the top -- on enquiry we found that they were put there for the Owls to perch on -- / And the Owls? -- O -they catch the Field mice, who do amazing damage in the light soil all throughout the north of Germany. --/ -- The Gallows near Gottingen like that near Ratzeburg is three great Stone Pillars, square like huge Tall chimneys, & connected with each other at the top by three iron bars with hooks to them -- & near them is a wooden pillar with a wheel on the top of it, on which the head is exposed, if the Person instead of being hung is beheaded. -- I was frightened at first to see such a multitude of bones & Skeletons of Sheep, Oxen, & Horses, & bones, as I imagined, of Men for many, many yards all round the Gallows --/ -- I found that in Germany the Hangman is by the laws of the Empire infamous -- these Hangmen form a cast -- & their Families always marry with each other &c -- and that all dead Cattle -- who have died belong [to] them -& are carried by the Owners to the Gallows & left [by] them there -When their cattle are bewitched or otherwise desperately sick, the Peasants take them, & tie them to the Gallows -- Drowned Dogs, & Kittens, &c are thrown there; in short, the Grass grows rank, & yet the Bones overtop it. -- The fancy of human bones must, I suppose, have arisen in my ignorance of comparative Anatomy. ---- God bless you, my Love! -- I will write again speedily. -- When I was at Ratzeburgh, I wrote one wintry night in bed but never sent you three stanzas which, I dare say, you will think very silly; & so they are: & yet they were not written without a yearning, yearning, yearning Inside -- for my yearning affects more than my heart -- I feel it all within me. 1 1 If I had but two little wings And were a little feath'ry Bird, To you I'd fly, my Dear! But Thoughts, like these, are idle Things -- And I stay here. ____________________ 1 Poems, i. 313. The lines are an imitation of the German folk song, Wenn ich ein Vöglein wär. -488- 2 But in my sleep to you I fly, I'm always with you in my sleep -- The World is all one's own. But then one wakes -- and where am I? All, all alone! 3 Sleep stays not tho' a Monarch bids, So I love to wake ere break of Day; For tho' my Sleep be gone, Yet while 'tis dark, one shuts one's lids, And still dreams on! If Mrs Southey be with you, remember me with all kindness / & thankfulness for their attention to you & Hartley. 1 ---- To dear Mrs Poole give my filial love -- My love to Ward. -- Why should I write the name of Tom Poole except for the pleasure of writing it? -- It grieves me to the heart that Nanny is not without [sic] you. I cannot bear changes ---- Death makes enough! -- God bless you, my dear dear Wife, & believe me with eagerness to clasp you to my heart, your faithful Husband S. T. Coleridge Here is a letter from Chester for his mother / she must pay you half the Postage. We save a shilling by sending a double letter -- for double, or treble, in Germany there is no difference in the P[ostag]e. I have received four letters -- three in one / & p[aid no] more than for a s[ingle one.] ____________________ 1 Southey had undertaken the interment of Berkeley Coleridge and had extended every kindness to Mrs. Coleridge. 'Edith and Southey', Mrs. Coleridge wrote to Coleridge on 24 Mar., 'have behaved towards me with particular kindness; in my trouble after the loss of my child Southey brought a Coach and carried me and Hartley over to Westbury where they both strove to amuse me and the child, who is excessively fond of them both as they are of him.' Perhaps, however, Southey's unfavourable opinion of Lyrical Ballads, as shown by his review of the volume in the Critical Review for Oct. 1798, was reflected in Mrs. Coleridge's tactless comment in her letter: 'The Lyrical Ballads are not esteemed well here, but the Nightingale and the River Y [Wye].' Even more pointedly Mrs. Coleridge wrote to Poole: 'The Lyrical Ballads are laughed at and disliked by all with very few excepted.' Her letter to Coleridge also reports on the literary activities of Lamb, Lloyd, and Southey, information which in the light of their recent mistreatment of him, Coleridge can hardly have relished. -489- 277. To Thomas Poole Address: [M]r T. Poole | Nether Stowey | Somersetshire | England pay'd to Cuxhaven MS. British Museum. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 295. The manuscript is torn and the words in brackets have been supplied from a transcript made by Thomas Ward. Postmark: Foreign Office, 17 May 1799. May 6th 1799, Monday Morning My dear Poole, my dear Poole! I am homesick. -- Society is a burthen to me; and I find relief only in labour. So I read & transcribe from morning to night / & never in my life have I worked so hard as this last month: for indeed I must sail over an ocean of matter with almost spiritual Speed, to do what I have to do in the time, in which I will do it, or leave it undone! -- / O my God! how I long to be at home -- My whole Being so yearns after you, that when I think of the moment of our meeting, I catch the fashion of German Joy, rush into your arms, and embrace you -- methinks, my Hand would swell, if the whole force of my feeling were crowded there. -- Now the Spring comes, the vital sap of my affections rises, as in a tree! -- And what a gloomy Spring! But a few days ago all the new buds were covered with snow; & every thing yet looks so brown & wintry, that yesterday the Roses (which the Ladies carried on the Ramparts, their Promenade) beautiful as they were, so little harmonized with the general face of Nature that they looked to me like silk & paper Roses. -- But these leafless spring Woods / O how I long to hear your whistle to the Rippers! ---There are a multitude of Nightingales here / poor things! they sang in the Snow / -- I thought of my own verses on the Nightingale, only because I thought of Hartley, my only child! -- Dear Lamb! I hope, he won't be dead, before I get home. -- There are moments in which I have such a power of Life within me, such a conceit of it, I mean -- that I lay the Blame of my Child's Death to my absence -- not intellectually; but I have a strange sort of sensation, as if while I was present, none could die whom I intensely loved -and doubtless it was no absurd idea of your's that there may be unions & connections out of the visible world. ---- Wordsworth & his Sister passed thro' here, as I have informed you -- / I walked on with them 5 english miles, & spent a day with them. They were melancholy & hypp'd -- W. was affected to tears at the thought of not being near me, wished me, of course, to live in the North of England near the Sir Frederic Vane's great Library / -- I told him, that independent of the expence of removing, & the impropriety of taking Mrs Coleridge to a place where she would have no -490- acquaintance, two insurmountable objections, the Library was no inducement -- for I wanted old books chiefly, such as could be procured any where better than in a Gentleman's new fashionable Collection / -- Finally, I told him plainly, that you had been the man in whom first and in whom alone, I had felt an anchor! With all my other Connections I felt a dim sense of insecurity & uncertainty, terribly uncomfortable / -- W. was affected to tears, very much affected; but he deemed the vicinity of a Library absolutely necessary to his health, nay to his existence. It is painful to me too to think of not living near him; for he is a good and kind man, & the only one whom in all things I feel my Superior -- & you will believe me, when I say, that I have few feelings more pleasurable than to find myself in intellectual Faculties an Inferior /. But my Resolve is fixed, not to leave you till you leave me! I still think that Wordsworth will be disappointed in his expectations of relief from reading, without Society -- & I think it highly probable, that where I live, there he will live, unless he should find in the North any person or persons, who can feel & understand him, can reciprocate & react on him. -- My many weaknesses are of some advantage to me; they unite me more with the great mass of my fellow-beings -but dear Wordsworth appears to me to have hurtfully segregated & isolated his Being / Doubtless, his delights are more deep and sublime; / but he has likewise more hours, that prey on his flesh & blood. --/ -- With regard to Hancock's House, if I can get no place within a mile or two of Stowey, I must try to get that -- but I confess, I like it not! -- not to say, that it is not altogether pleasant to live directly opposite to a person who had behaved so rudely to Mrs Coleridge, & whose Relation to your family necessarily makes me feel that rudeness, and remember it. But these are in the eye of reason all Trifles -- & if no other House can be got, in my eye too they shall be Trifles. ---- There have happened a multitude of Suicides in Germany within thes[e] last months; I have heard of eleven / and many of them curious enough. I relate the following, because I am sure of it's accuracy, & because it is quite German -- i.e. it has quite a Schiller-ish, Charles de Moorish Gloss about it. -- On the 3rd of Feb. Herlt, a Subaltern Officer in the Catholic Cours at Dresden, made a pleasure party in a Sledge with a woman with whom he lived in criminal connection, called Wilhelmine Pfeifer. The[y] went to the Heller, a little place in the midst of Woods two english miles from Dresden, to a Pleasure house there -- / here they feasted most gloriously, & enjoyed themselves / & in conclusion, Herlt shot the Girl dead, & then himself. -- He was a native of Bohemia, and had married a Tradesman's Daughter of Leibsic -- but had -491- lived unhappily with her, & became addicted to gambling & Drinking &c -- he had long declared his intention of destroying himself, to which the impossibility of being divorced, it was supposed, had impelled him. This however is contradicted by himself in a letter directed to his wife, which was found after his death on the table in the place where he shot himself, acquainting her with his Intention. The following is an extract from this letter -'Forgive me -- for ever! -- In yonder World perhaps we see each other again. My Death was unavoidable -- I and Thou are not the Causes; but Wicked Men; and the wickedest of all is Lieutenant Slawianowsky.' (N.B. On the news of Herlt's Suicide this man went off privately, & has not been heard of since.) 'Death must have it's Causes; mine has it's, has many causes which I will hold in silence. It may be easily supposed, that the Prospect into Futurity is a terrible one to me. But complain not. This Destiny was appointed me by the same being who appointed the Heavens & the Earth, and at the same time. I die as one who dies on a sick bed of a six months' Sickness. Since Michaelmas I too have been sick, & now I return again [to] the all-vivifying Being. From my Childhood Happiness has fled from me, [and) Misfortune persecuted me, especially in my Marriage. I utter no complaint against thee; for I knew that thou wert a weak Woman! Now & hereby receiv'st [thou] intelligence of my Death. The woman, with whom I am, I found by accident, loved her from day to day more impetuously, and we are, as thou seest, inseparable. Our Love cannot be legalized by Priests according to human ordinances -- in it's fitness to our being / it has legalized itself. This is not the reason why I leave this world. Thou knowest, how Mankind have treated me, how they have stripped me of my little Property. I am in debt; thou knowest how my Creditors surround me. Would to God that by living for years on bread & water I could satisfy their wishes. Entreat the Lieutenant Colonel in the name of all the Saints and of all the Departed that have ever lived upon Earth, that he procure us to be buried, let the spot of earth be where it will. (N.B. This has been done.) Provide for thine & my Child as a mother. He has lost a Father; a Father whom his fellow-men made miserable. The portrait of my Wilhelmine must S. carry to her Mother, & tell her, that we are insepara[ble] thro' the great all vivifying Being. -The Death hour strikes -- & we go! My Wilhelmine, last Being to me, for us both there is but one Grave. --' -- At the bottom of this letter Wilhelmine wrote the following, which in the original is in a wild irregular Verse -- 'To die with Herlt is my Will, I hope with exultation with thee, my Herlt! to die! And there in yonder Glory with thee to take possession of our Inheritance! I loved thee in -492- life impetuously, in death I love thee far more. Thou, whom I have found faithful, come with me -- let us go in triumph and ask Happiness of the Being that made us. Beautiful was the hour, in which thy fidelity was rewarded. (I presume, she means the hour of her first seduction by Herlt.) Thy resolve leads thee to the Cavern of Death; but a voice will echo there and call thee to a nobler Existence, the voice of him who in love destined thee to this Hour. I too am near to the Dwelling of the Grave. Thou hast led me to the Heller / there my Soul takes it's departure, goes full of Joy with thee and in thee in an inconceivable Inseparability to the spiritual World. -- Come, my Herlt!['] ---- In Tragedy we pronounce many things unnatural, only because we have drawn our notions of Nature from persons in a calm, or only moderately agitated state / but in all violent states of Passion the mind acts & plays a part, itself the actor & the spectator at once! -- My God! to think that this Girl should find a delight in the moment of Death in putting these thoughts into Rhyme; or rather from the wild nature of the verse the Rhymes perhaps half-led her to the Thoughts! --/ -- I have a number of affecting Stories of this kind to tell you, of winter Evenings. ---- O Poole! I am homesick. -- Yesterday, or rather, yesternight, I dittied the following hobbling Ditty; but my poor Muse is quite gone -- perhaps, she may return & meet me at Stowey. 1 'Tis sweet to him, who all the week Thro' city crowds must push his way, To stroll alone thro' fields and woods And hallow thus the Sabbath day. And sweet it is, in summer bower Sincere, affectionate, and gay, One's own dear Children feasting round, To celebrate one's marriage day. But what is all to his delight, Who having long been doom'd to roam Throws off the Bundle from his Back Before the Door, of his own Home? H[ome sickness] is no baby pang, [This feel] I hourly more and more: The[re's healing] only in thy wings, Thou Breeze, that play'st on Albion's shore! ____________________ 1 Poems, i. 314. -493- The Professors here are exceedingly read to all the Englishmen; but to me they pay [the most] flattering attention -- Especially, Blumenbach and Eichhorn. -- Nothing can be conce[ived more] delightful than Blumenbach's lectures / & in conversation he is indeed a most i[nteresting] man. / The learned Orientalist, Tychson, has given me instruction in the Gothic, [and] Theotiscan Languages, 1 which I can now read pretty well; & hope in the cou[rse of a] year to be thoroughly acquainted with all the Languages of the north, both [GERMAN] & Celtic. For I find being learned is a mighty easy thing, compared with [any study] else. My God! a miserable Poet must he be, & a despicable Metaphysician (whose] acquirements have not cost more trouble & reflection than all the lea[rning of] Tooke, Porson, & Parr united. With the advantage of a great Lib[rary] Learning is nothing, methinks -- merely a sort of excuse for being [idle -- Yet a] man gets reputation by it; and reputation gets money -- & for reputa[tion I don't care] a damn, but money -- yes -- Money I must get, in all honest [ways -- therefore) at the end of two or three years if God grant me life expect to see me come out with some horribly learned book, full of manuscript quotations from Laplandish and Patagonian Authors -possibly, on the striking resemblance between the Sweogothic & Sanscrit Languages, & so on! ---- N.B. Whether a sort of Parchment might not be made out of old Shoes; & whether Apples should not be engrafted on Oak Saplings; as then the Fruit would be the same as now, but the wood far more valuable? -- Two ideas of mine. To extract Aqua fortis from Cucumbers is a discovery not yet made; but Sugar from Bete, O! all Germany is mad about it. I have seen the Sugar, sent to Blumenbach from Achard, the great Chemist; & it is good enough. They say that an hundred pound weight of Bete will make 12 pound of Sugar; & that there is no expence in the preparation. It is the Beta altissima, belongs to the Beta vulgaris, and in Germany is called Runkel-rübe. Its leaves resemble those of the common red Bete. -- It is in shape like a clumsy nine pin, & about the size of a middling Turnip -- the flesh is white, but has rings of a reddish Cast. I will bring over a quantity of the Seed. --/ Likewise hath the Apothecary Cavette Sobies at Lille in Flanders discovered a means to heat rooms without Fire, in a pleasant & healthy manner. Take a tin vessel, the top of which must have screws in order to be screwed down / lay in a few pieces of Quick lime, which has been the moment before moistened with cold water, shut the vessel, screw down the top; & in two minutes the vessel will be burning hot, & it will keep a room in a comfortable ____________________ 1 See Biog. Lit., ch. x, for Coleridge's comments on Thomas Christian Tyschen ( 1758-1834), and on the Theotisc language. -494- & equable warmth for 2 Hours. ---- The Price of meat for Hanover as appointed by the Government for the month of May 1799 -- A pound of Beef L S D of the 1st sort -- 0 0 4 of the 2nd sort -- 0 0 3 1/2 of the 3rd sort -- 0 0 2 1/2 A pound of Veal of the 1st__________________ 3 1/2 of the ordinary sort____________ 2 3/4 a pound of Mutton of the 1st sort____________4 1/2 --2nd sort ____________ 3 3/4 -- 3rd sort ____________ 3 1/4 A Pound of Pork may not cost more [of whatever sort it is than] 3 pence. For Gottingen. D Wheat, 4 Shillings the Bushel Beef, 3 1/4 the pound Rye, three & eightpence. Veal, best 3 1/4 Barley half a crown. Veal, ordinary 2 1/4 Oats two shillings & 2d Veal of 3rd sort 2 Peas -- the same. Pork 3 1/4 Beans the same Mutton 3 1/4 x Venison 3 1/4 So you see, meat here is three pence farthing a pound in general; -- but People here complain bitterly of the dearness. [A Stupid l]etter -- I believe, my late proficiency in Learning has somewhat stupified me but live in hopes of one better worth the postage. In the last week of June, I trust, you will see me. -Chester is well, & desires love & duty to his family. -- I have a frightful Cold, which gives my Nose such a fecundity as beggars me in handkerchiefs -- I dry them, & use them three Lavas deep. Else I am well. -- To your dear Mother & to Ward give my kind Love ---- & to all who ask after me. -- My dear Poole! don't let little Hartley die before I come home. -That's silly -- true -- & I burst into tears as I wrote it. Your's S. T. Coleridge. -495- 278. To Mrs. S. T. Coleridge MS. British Museum. Pub. Thomas Poole, i. 300. This note was written on the address sheet of the preceding letter to Poole. [ 6 May 1799] My dear Sara On Saturday next I go to the famous Harz Mountains -- about 20 english miles from Gottingen -- to see the mines & other curiosities. On my return I will write you all that is writable. -- God bless you, my dear dear dear Love! & your affectionate & ever faithful Husband S. T. Coleridge. With regard to money, my Love I Poole can write to Mr Wedgewood if it is not convenient for him to let you have it. 279. To Charles Parry MS. McGill University. Hitherto unpublished. [Early May 1799] 1 My dear Parry Don't be afraid that I intend to keep it -- let not your Conscience alarm you -- I will bring it tomorrow with me --/. I pray you, lend me for this Evening the map of the Harz / and tomorrow morning you shall see what you shall see / S. T. Coleridge 280. To Mrs. S. T. Coleridge Address: Mrs Coleridge | Nether Stowey | Somersetshire | England Payed to Cuxhaven MS. New York Public Lib. Pub. with omis. New Monthly Magazine, October 1835. Parts of this and the following letter were printed in the Amulet in 1829, as 'Over the Brocken'. The manuscript is badly torn, especially at the edges of the pages, and the words in brackets have been supplied from a transcript made by Thomas Ward. Postmark: Foreign Office, 3 June 1799. Clausethal, Friday Morning, May 17th, 1799 [My de]arest Love, I wished to give you some idea of the manner in which the Women in this part [of the] country carry their infants; and of the baskets in which they put their Burthens, & the manner of [bearing] the basket, which is kept to the back by a ____________________ 1 This letter was probably written not long before the Harz tour, which began on 11 May 1799. -496- A sketch drawn by Charles Parry at the beginning of a letter to Mrs. S. T. Coleridge, dated May 17th, 1799 [This page intentionally left blank.] broad stripe of cloth going under the arm[pits and over] the shoulders. -- It is astonishing what burthens the Women here carry! These Baskets are universal both [in Götti]ngen, and all the Harz Country. -- The Women wear long strip'd cotton cloaks, almost but not quite [so long] as your white Cloak / -- The manner in which they fold them when they carry their infants [pre]sents commonly a most picturesque Drapery, & reminds you of the Statues of the ancients. -- [This] little Sketch here Mr Parry was so kind as to draw for me / both objects were taken [imme]diately from Nature. / -- I write to you from Clausethal, Friday Morning, May 17th, 1799. -- [On] Saturday, May 11th, 10 o clock, we left Gottingen, 7 in Part[y] -- Charles & Frederic Parry, Greenough, 1 Carlyon, 2 Chester, myself, and one German, the Son of Professor Blumenbach; an intelligent & well informed young man, especially in Natural History ----. We ascended a hill, N.E. of Göttingen, & passed thro' areas surrounded by woods, the areas now closing in upon us, now opening & retiring from us, till we came to Hessen Dreisch, which belongs to the Prince of Hesse Cassel / Here I observed a great wooden Post with the french words, Pais Neutre (Neutral Country) on it -- a precaution in case the French should march near. This miserable Post forcibly contrasted in my mind with the 'And Ocean 'mid his uproar [w]ild Speaks safety to his Island Child! [ '] 3 -- I bless God that my Country is an Island. -Here [we] dined on potatoes & pancakes -- the pancakes throughout this part of the Country are [exce]llent, but tho' pancakes in shape, in taste they more resemble good Yorkshire, [or batter pu]dding. These & eggs you may almost always procure, when you can [procure] nothing else. They were brewing at the Inn -- I enquired & found that they put [3] Bushels of Malt & five large Handfuls of Hops to the Hogshead. ---- The Beer [as] you may suppose, but indifferent stuff. Immediately from the Inn we passed into [a nar]row road thro' a very lofty Fir Grove / these tall Firs are branchless almost to the [top -- c]onsequently no wood is so gloomy, yet none has so many spots & patches of [Su]nshine / the Soil consisted of great stones & rocks covered wholly & deeply with a bright-green Moss, speckled with the sunshine, & only ornamented by the tender Umbrella three-leaves & virgin white flower of the Wood-sorrel -- a most delightful acid to a thirsty foot- ____________________ 1 Charles Bellas Greenough ( 1778-1855), geographer and geologist. See Edith J. Morley , "Coleridge in Germany", Wordsworth and Coleridge, ed. by E. L. Griggs , 1989, pp. 220-36, for Greenough's supplementary record of the Harz tour. 2 Clement Carlyon ( 1777-1864), physician. His Early Years and Late Reflections ( 4 vols., 1836-58) gives a further description of this excursion. 3 Ode to the Departing Year, 129-30. -497- traveller. / And now we emerged from the fir-grove, & saw a beautiful Prospect before us, with the little Village 'Wage' [Waake] before us on the slope of a low Hill. We pass thro' this village & journey on for a mile or two thro' Coombes very much [li]ke those about Stowey & Holford, but still more like those at Porlock, on account of [the] great rocky fragments which jut out from the Hills both here & at Porlock & which [alas! w]e have not at dear Stowey! ---- And now a green Hill, smooth & green [with] young Corn, faces us; & we pass at it's foot, and the Coomb curves away into [a] new & broader Coomb green with Corn, both the bottom & the Hills -- in no way interesting, except for the variety. -- In the former Coombe there were two or three neat Cottages with a bit of cultivated Ground around them, & Walnut Trees close by the House, exactly like a Cottage or rather Farm-house in one of the Holford Coombes. -- We passed thro' Rudolpshausen, a village near which is the Amtman's House & Farm-buildings. -- The Government give the Amtmen but moderate salaries; but then they let them great Farms at a very very low Rent -- so the Amtmen throughout the Han[over]ian Country are the great agriculturists, and form the only class that correspond[s to our G]entlemen-farmers. From them & in them originate all the innovations in the systems of agricultu[re here --] I have never seen in England farm-buildings so large, compact, & commodious for all the purp[oses of] storing, & stall-feeding as those of these Amtmen generally are. -- They have commonly from a thou[sand to] 1500 English acres. ---- From Rudolph's Hausen (i.e. Houses) we came to Womar's Hausen, a Catho[lic] Village belonging to the Elector of Mayence, & the first Catholic Village I had seen -- a crucifix, [i.e. a] wooden Image of Christ on the Christ [Cross], at the end of the Town & two others in the road [at a lit]tle distance from the Town. The greater part of the Children here were naked all but the Shirt, or rather the relique of a ci devant Shirt: but they were fat, healthy, & pl[ayful --] The Woman at the end wore a piece of Silver round her neck, having the figure of St Andrew on it -- She gravely informed us, that St Andrew had been a Man of the Forest & born near this village, & that he was remarkably good to People with sore eyes. -- Here we met some Students from the University of Halle, most adventurous Figures, with leather Jackets, long sabres, & great three cornered Hats, with small iron chains dangling from them -- & huge Pipes in the mouth, the Boles of which absolutely mounted above the Forehead. -- Poole would have called them Knights of the Times. I asked young Blumenbach, if it was a Uniform. He said No! -- but that it was a Student's Instinct to play a character, in some way or other / & that therefore -498- in the universities of Germany whim & caprice were exhausted in planning [&] executing blackguardisms of Dress. -- I have seen much of this at Gottingen; but beyond doubt Gottingen is a gentlemanly & rational place compared with the other Universities. Thro' roads no way rememb'rable we came to Gieboldshausen, over a bridge, on whic[h was] a mitred Statue with a great Crucifix in it's arms --/ the village long and ugly, [but the Church,] like most Catholic Churches, interesting -- & this being Whitsun Eve, all were crowding to [it with] their Mass-books & Rosaries -the little babies commonly with coral Crosses hanging [on the] Breast. -- Here we took a Guide / left the Village, ascended a Hill& now the Woods rose u[p before] us in a verdure which surprized us like a Sorcery! -- The Spring has burst forth with the (suddenness] of a Russian Summer / As we left Gottingen there were buds & here & there a Tree half-green; but here were Woods in full foliage, distinguished from summer only by the exquisite Freshness of their tender Green. We entered the Wood thro' a beautiful mossy Path, the Moon above us blending with the evening Lights; & every now & then a Nightingale would invite the others to sing / & some one other commonly answered, & said, as we supposed -- It is yet somewhat too early! ---- For the Song was not continued. -We came to a square piece of Greenery compleatly walled on all four sides by the Beeches -- again entered the Wood & having travelled about a mile emerged from it into a gran[d] Plain, Mountains in the distance, but ever by our road the Skirts of the Green-woo[d --] A very rapid River ran by our side. And now the Nightingales were all singing [and the] tender verdure grew paler in the moonlight -- only the smooth parts of the R[iver] were still deeply purpled with the reflections from the fiery red Lights in the West. -- So surrounded & so impressed, we arrived at Poele [Pöhlde], a dear little Cluster of Houses in the middle of a semicircle of woody Hills the area of the semicircle scarcely broader than the breadth of the Village -- the Trees still for the most part Beech. -- We left it, & now the Country ceased to be interesting, and we came to the town of Schlachtfeld [Scharzfeld] belonging to Hanover / Here we had Coffee & Supper, & with many a patriotic Song (for all of my Companions sing very sweetly, & are thorough Englishmen) we closed the Evening & went to Sleep in our Cloaths on the Straw laid for us in the Room / This is the only Bed which is procurable at the village Inns in Germany / . At half past seven, Whitsunday Morning, we left Schlachtfeld, passed thro' a broad Coomb, turned up a smooth Hill on the Right, & entered a Beech Wood / & after a few hundred yards we came to -499- the Brink of an enormous Cavern -- which we descended -- It went under Ground 800 feet, consisted of various apartments, dripping, stalactitious, & with mock chimnies; but I saw nothing unusual, except in the first apartment, or, as it were, antichamber. You descend from the Wood by steps cut into the Rock, pass under a most majestic natural Arch of Rock, & then you come into the Light -- for this antichamber is open at the Top for a space of 20 yards in length, & 8 in breadth -- the open space of an oval Form / and on the edges the Beeches grow & stretch their arms over the Cavern, but do not wholly form a ceiling. Their verdure contrasted most strikingly with the huge Heap of Snow which lay piled in this antichamber of the Cavern into a white Hill, imperfectly covered with withered Leaves. -- The sides of this antichamber were wet stones in various angles, all green with dripping Moss. -- Reascended -- journeyed thro' the wood with various ascents & descents; & now descending we came to a Slope of Greenery, almost perfectly round with walls [of woods, and] exactly 170 Strides in diameter. As we entered this sweet Spot, a [hoary Ruin peeped over] the opposite Woods in upon us --. We reentered the Woods, & still desce[nding came to a little] Brook where the Wood left us / & we ascended a smooth green Hill, on the Top of which [stood the] Ruined Castle. When we had nearly reached the Top, I layed down by a black & blaste[d Trun]k, the remains of a huge hollow Tree, surrounded by wild Gooseberry Bushes, & looked back [on the] Country, we had passed. Here again I could see my beautiful Rotundo of Greenery -- the rest [of the v]iew was woody Hills swelling over woody Hills in various outlines. -- The Ruin had nothing [obs]ervable in it / but here let me remark, that in all the Ruins I have seen in Germany, [and] this is no small number, I have never discovered the least vestige of Ivy. -- The Guide [inf]ormed us that the Castle had been besieged in the year 1760 by a French army of [110]00 men under General Beaubecour, who had pitched camp on the opposite Hills -- [and was] defended for eleven days by 80 Invalids under Prince Ysenburg, & at last taken by Treachery, & then dismantled &c ----. From the top of the Hill a large Plain opened before us, with villages -- a little village Neuhof lay at the foot of the Hill; we reached it, & then turned up thro' a valley on the left hand. The Hills on both sides the valley were prettily wooded, & a rapid lively river ran thro' it -- / So we went for about 2 miles, and almost at the end of the valley, or rather of it's first Turning, we found the Village of Lauterberg --. Just at the entrance of the Village two streams come out from two deep & woody Coombes close by each other, meet & run into a third deep woody Coomb -500- opposite / before you a wild Hill which seems the end & the Barrier of the valley; on the right hand low Hills now green with Corn, & now wooded --; and on the left a [m]ost majestic Hill indeed! the effect of whose simple outline Painting could not give / & how poor a Thing are Words? We pass thro' this neat little Town, the majestic Hill on the [left hand] soaring over the Houses, & at every interspace you see the whole of it, it's [Beeches, it's Firs, it's] Rocks, it's scattered Cottages, & the one neat little Pastor's House at the Foot [emb]osomed in Fruit-trees, all in Blossom/ the noisy Coombbrook dashing close by it. -- We [leave] the Valley or rather the first Turning on the left, following a stream -- & so the vale winds [on, the] river still at the foot of woody Hills, with every now [and) then other smaller valleys on [right] & left crossing our Vale, & ever before you the woody Hills running, like Groo[ves one] into the other / Sometimes I thought myself in the Coombes about Stowey, sometimes a[bout] Porlock, sometimes between Porlock & Linton / only the Stream was somewhat larger / -- sometimes the Scenery resembled parts in the River Wye almost to Identity except that the River was not quite so large. -- We turn'd, & turned & entering the fourth Curve of the Vale we perceived all at once that we had been ascending -- the Verdure vanished! All the Beech Trees were leafless / & so were the silver Birches, whose boughs always, winter & summer, hang so elegantly! -- But low down in the Valley, & in little companies on each [ban]k of the River a multitude of black green Conical Fir Trees -- with herds of [Catt]le wandering about, almost every one with a cylindrical Bell around it's neck [of no) inconsiderable size -- / And as they moved scattered over the narrow vale & [up] among the Trees on the Hill, the noise was like that of a large City in the stillness [o]f the Sabbath Morning, when all the Steeples all at once are ringing for Church. -- The whole was a melancholy & romantic Scene that was quite new to me ---- Again we turned, passed three smelting Houses which we visited -- A scene of terrible Beauty is a furnace of boiling Metal, darting out every moment blue, green, & scarlet Lightning, like serpents' Tongues! And now we ascended a steep Hill on the Top of which was St Andreas Burg, a Town built wholly of Wood -- We arrived here, Whitsunday Afternoon, May 12th, 1/2 past 4. Here we supped & slept / here we supped, & I not being quite well procured a Bed -- the others slept on Straw. ---We left St Andreas Burg, May 13th, 8 o clock, ascended still, the Hill unwooded except here & there with a few stubby Fir Trees. -We descended again to ascend far higher; & now we came to a most beautiful Road that winded on the breast of the Hill, from whence we looked down into a deep deep Valley or huge Bason full of Pines -501- & Firs, the opposite Hills full of Pines & Firs, & the Hill above us on whose breast we were winding, likewise full of Pines & Firs. -The Valley or Bason on our Right Hand into which we looked down is called the Vale of Rauschenbach, that is, the Valley of the Roaring Brook -- & roar it did, indeed, most solemnly! ---- The Road on which we walked was weedy with infant fir-trees, an inch or two High -- / And now on our left hand came before us a most tremendous Precipice of [y]ellow & black Rock, called the Rehburg, that is, the Mountain of the Roe. -- A Deer-stealer [once] was, as is customary in these cases throughout all Germany, fastened to a Roe-buck, his feet [to] the Horns, & his head towards the Tail -- & then the Roe let loose. -- The frighted Animal came [a]t length to the brink of this Precipice, leaped down it, & dashed both himself & the man to [a]toms. ---- Now again is nothing but Pines & Firs, above, below, around us! -- How awful is [the] deep Unison of their undividable Murmur -- What a one thing it is [ -- it is a sound] that [im]presses the dim notion of the Omnipresent! In various Parts of the deep [vale below us we be]held little dancing Waterfalls gleaming thro' the branches; & now on our left ha[nd from the very s]ummit of the Hill above us a powerful Stream flung itself down, leaping & foaming, & no[w c]oncealed, & now not concealed, & now half-concealed by the Fir Trees, till. towards the Roa[d i]t became a visible Sheet of Water, within whose immediate Neighbourhood no Pine [cou]ld have permanent abiding-place! -- The Snow lay every where on the sides of [the Ro]ads, & glimmered in company with the waterfall-foam -- snow-patches & water breaks [gli]mmering thro' the Branches in the Hill above, the deep Bason below & the Hill opposite. Over the high opposite Hills so dark in their Pine forests a far higher round barren stony Mountain looked in upon the Prospect from a distant Country. ---- Thro' this scenery we passed on, till our Road was crossed by a second Waterfall or rather aggregation of lit[tle] dancing Waterfalls, one by the side of the other, for a considerable breadth -- & all cam[e at] once out of the dark wood above, & rolled over the mossy rockfragments, little Firs growing in Islets scattered among them. -The same scenery continued till we came to the Oder Teich, a lake half made by man & half by nature -- / it is two miles in length, & but a few hundred yards in breadth, & winds between banks or rather, thro' high Walls of Pine Trees / it has the appearance of a most cal[m] & majestic River / it crosses the road, goes into a wood, & there at once plunges [itself] down into a most magnificent Cascade, & runs into the vale, to which it gives [the] Name of 'the Vale of the Roaring Brook.' -- We clomb down into the vale, & stood at the bottom of the Cascade, & climbed up again by it's -502- side / -- The rocks over which it plunged were unusually wild in their shape, giving fantastic resemblances of men & animals -- & the fir-boughs by the side were kept almost in a swing, which unruly motion contrasted well with the stern Quietness of the huge Forest-sea every where else. / Here & else where we found large rocks of violet Stone which when rubbed or when the Sun shines strong on them, emit a scent which I could not [have] distinguished from violet. It is yellow-red in colou[r.] My dear d[ear Love! & m]y Hartley! My blessed Hartley [! -- by hill and wood] & Stream, I close my ey[es and] dream of you! ---- If possib[le], I will this evening continue my little Tour in a second letter -- Your faithful Husband S. T. Coleridge 281: To Mrs. S. T. Coleridge Address: Mrs Coleridge | Nether Stowey | Somersetshire | England Pay'd to Cuxhaven MS. New York Public Lib. Pub. New Monthly Magazine, October 1835. The manuscript is badly torn, especially at the edges of the pages, and the words in brackets have been supplied from a transcript made by Thomas Ward. Postmark: Foreign Office, 3 June 1799. May 17th -- Friday Night. [ 1799] My dearest Love These Letters, & the Descriptions in them, may possibly recall to me real forms, i[f I should] ever take it into my head to read them again; but I fear that to you they must be [insupportably] unmeaning -- accumulated repetitions of the same words in almost the same Combinati[ons -- but how) can it be otherwise? In Nature all things are individual; but a Word is but an arb[itrary Character] for a whole Class of Things; so that the same description may in almost all cas[es be applied] to twenty different appearances -- & in addition to the difficulty of the Thing itse[lf I neither] am or ever was a good Hand at description. -- I see what I write / but alas[! I cannot] write what I see. / -- My last Letter concluded with the Oder Teich / from thence we enter[ed a second] Wood, & now the Snow met us in large masses, and we walked for two miles kn[ee deep in] it, with an inexpressible Fatigue, till we came to the Mount called Little Brock[en -- here even] the Firs deserted us, or only now & then, a patch of them, wind-shorn; no [higher than] one's knee, matted & cowering to the Ground like the Thorn bushes on our highest Sea-hills. -- The Soil was plashy & boggy / we -503- descended & came to the foot of the Great Brocken / without a rival the highest Mountain in all the north of Germany, & the seat of innumerable Superstitions. On the first day of May all the Witches dance here at midnight / & those who go may see their own Ghosts walking up & down with a little Billet on the Back, giving the Names of those who had wished them there: for 'I wish you on the Top of the Brock[en'] is a common Curse throughout the whole Empire. -- Well -- we ascended, the soil boggy, & [at] last reached the Height, which is 573 Toises above the level of the Sea. We visited the Blocksberg, a sort of Bowling Green inclosed by huge Stones, something like those at Stonehenge; & this is the Witches' Ball-room / thence proceeded to the house on the [hill] where we dined / & now we descended. My Toe was shockingly swoln, m[y feet] bladdered, and my whole frame seemed going to pieces with fatigu[e -- however] I went on, my key-note Pain, except when, as not unseldom happe[ned, I struck] my Toe against a Stone or Stub -- & this of course produced a bravura [of Torture --] In the evening about 7 we arrived at Elbinrode [Elbingerode] -- I was really unwell. The [transition] from my late Habit of sitting & writing for so many hours in the day to such in[tense] bodily exercise had been too rapid & violent / I went to bed with chattering Teeth / beca[me] feverish-hot, & remained tossing about & unable to sleep till two in the morning, [when] a perspiration burst out on me, I fell asleep, & got up in the morning qui[te well --] At the Inn they brought us an Album, or Stamm Buch, requesting that we w[ould write] our names, & something or other as a remembrance that we had been there. I wrote the follow[ing] Lines, which I send to you, not that they possess a grain of merit as Poetry: but because they contain a true account of my journey from the Brocken to Elbinrode. 1 I stood on Brocken's sovran height & saw Woods crowding upon woods, hills over hills, A surging Scene and only limited By the blue Distance. Wearily my way Downward I dragg'd thro' Fir-groves evermore, Where bright-green Moss heav'd in sepulchral forms, Speckled with sunshine; and, but seldom heard, The sweet Bird's Song became an hollow Sound; And the Gale murmuring indivisibly Preserv'd it's solemn murmur most distinct From many a Note of many a Waterbreak, And the Brook's Chatter; on whose islet stones ____________________ 1 Poems, i. 315. -504- The dingy Kidling with it's tinkling Bell Leapt frolicsome, or old romantic Goat Sat, his white Beard slow-waving! I mov'd on With low & languid thought: for I had found That grandest Scenes have but imperfect Charms, Where the sight 1 vainly wanders nor beholds One spot, with which the Heart associates Holy Remembrances of Child or Friend, Or gentle Maid, our first & early Love, Or Father, or the venerable Name Of our adored Country. O thou Queen, Thou delegated Deity of Earth, O 'dear dear' England, how my longing Eye Turn'd Westward, shaping in the steady Clouds Thy sands & high white Cliffs! Sweet Native Isle, This Heart was proud, yea, mine Eyes swam with Tears To think of Thee; & all the goodly view From sov'ran Brocken, woods and woody Hills, Floated away, like a departing Dream, Feeble and dim. -- Strangerl these Impulses Blame thou not lightly; nor will I profane With hasty Judgment or injurious Doubt That man's sublimer Spirit, who can feel That God is every where! the God who fram['d] Mankind to be one mighty Brotherhood, Himself our Father & the World our Ho[me!] We left Elbinrode, May the 14th (N.[B. Rode] signifies a Place from whence Roots [have] been grubbed up in order for building or Plantation. --) We travelled for half a mile thro' a wild Country of bleak stony Hills by our side with several Caverns, or rather mouths of Caverns, visible in their Breasts, & now we came to Rubell[and --] O it was a lovely Scene. Our road was at the foot of low Hills & here were a few neat Cottages -- behind us were high hil[Ls] with a few scattered Firs, & flocks [of] Goats visible on the topmo[st crags--] On our right Hand -- [a] fine shallow river of about thirty yards broad / & beyond the Ri[ver a crescent] Hill 2 clothed with firs that rise one above the other, like Spectators in an [Amphitheatre--] We advanced a little farther; the Crags behind us ceased to be visible; and now [the whole was on]e & complete; all that could be seen was the cottages at the foot of the low green ____________________ 1 eye. [Cancelled word in line above.] 2 A small, indistinct drawing appearing here in the manuscript has not been reproduced. -505- Hill (cottages embosomed (in fruit trees] in blossom), the Stream, & the little crescent of Firs. -- I lingered here, & [unwillingly lost sig]ht of it for a little while -- the Firs were so beautiful, & the masses [of Rocks, walls], & obelisks of Rocks, started up among them, in the very places where if they [had not been, a] painter with the Poet's Feeling, would have imagined them! -- We crossed the [River (it's] name Bode) entered the sweet wood, & came to the mouth of the Cavern with the man [who shews i]t -- it was a huge place, 800 feet in length & more in depth; of many [different apar]tments / the only thing that distinguished it from other caverns was that the Guide [who was really a] character, had the Talent of finding out & seeing uncommon Likenesses [in the different] forms of the Stalactite: Here was a nun -- this was Solomon's Temple -- [th]at was a Roman Catholic chapel -- here was a Lion's claw -- nothing but flesh & blood wanting to make it completely a claw/! -- This was an organ & had all the notes of the organ / &c & &c -- but alas I with all possible straining my eyes, ears, & my imagination I could see nothing but common Stalactite; -- & hear nothing but the dull ding of common Cavern Stones. One thing was really striking -- a huge Cone of Stalactite hung from the roof [of] the largest apartment, & on being struck gave perfectly the sound of a Death bell. [I was] behind, & heard it repeatedly at some distance / & the effect was very much [in the] Fairy Kind. / ----Gnomes & Things unseen, That toll mock death bells for mock funerals! -- [After] this a little clear well, & a black stream pleased me the most; & multiplied by [fifty and] coloured ad libitum, might be well enough to read of in a novel or poem. -We [returned & now] before the Inn on the green Plat around the May pole the villagers were [celebrating Whit] Tuesday. -- This May Pole is hung as usual with garlands on the [top; and in these] garlands Spoons & other little valuables are placed -- the high smooth [round pole is th]en well greased -- & now he [who] can climb up to the Top may have what [he can get]/ -- a very laughable scene, as you may suppose of awkwardness, & agility / [and fail]ures on the very brink of success. -- Now began a Dance / the Women [danced] very well / & in general I have observed throughout Germany that the Women [in the] lower ranks degenerate far less from the Ideal of a Woman than [the Men] from that of man. / The Dances were Reels & the Walzen; but chiefly [the] latter. This dance is in the highest circles sufficiently voluptuous; but here, the motions etc were far more faithful Interpreters of the Passion or rather appetite, which doubtless the Dance was intended to shadow out. -- Yet even after that giddy Round & Round is over, the walking to music, the woman laying [her] arm with -506- confident affection on the man's shoulders, or (among the Rustics) round [his] Neck, has something inexpressibly charming in it. -The first Couple at the [Wa]lzen (pronounced Waltsen / z is pronounced always ts) was a very fine tall Girl [of] 2 or 8 & 20, in the full bloom & growth of limb & feature, & a fellow with [h]uge Whiskers, a long Tail, & a woolen night-cap on: -- he was a soldier, [and] from the more than usual glances of the Girl, I presumed, was her Lover. -- He [w]as beyond compare the Gallant & the Dancer of the Party -- Next came two Bauern, one of whom in the whole contour of his face & person, & above [all in] the laughably would-be-frolicsome fling-out of his Heel irresistably reminded [me of] Shakespear's Slender, & the other of his Dogberry -- O two such faces, [and two] such postures! O that I were an Hogarth! -What an enviable Talent it is to have [a G]enius in Painting! -Their Partners were pretty Lasses not so tall as the former, & [d]anced uncommonly light & airy. The fourth Couple was a sweet Girl of about 17, delicately slender & very prettily dressed, with a full blown Rose in the white Ribbon that went round her Head & confined her reddish-brown Hair -- & her Partner waltsed -- with a pipe in his mouth I smoking all the while! / & during the whole of [th]is voluptuous Dance the whole of his Face was a fair Personification of [true] German Phlegm. -- After these, but I suppose, not actually belonging to [the Par]ty, a little ragged Girl & a ragged boy with his stockings about his [heels w]albed & danced / waltsing & dancing in the rear / most entertainingly. [B]ut what most pleased me was a little Girl of about 8 or 4 years old, certainly not [mor]e than 4, [who] had been put to watch a little Babe of exactly a year old (for one of our party had asked) & who was just beginning to run away. -- The Girl teaching h[im to walk] was so animated by the Music that she began to waltse with him, & the [two babes] whirled round & round hugging & kissing each other, as if the Music had ma[de them mad --] I am no judge of music -- it pleased me! & Mr Parry who plays himself, as[sured me it was] uncommonly good. There were two Fiddles & a Bass Viol / the Fiddlers, but abov[e all, the] Bass Violist, most Hogarthian Phizzes! -- God love them! -- I felt far more a[ffection for] them than towards any other set of human beings whom I have met with in Germ[any, I suppose,] because they looked so happy! -- We left them -- as we go out of the Village the c[reseent shaped] Hill of Firs sinks, & forms an irregular Wood / but the opposite Hill rises, & bec[omes in it's] Turn a perfect Crescent, but of a far other character -- higher & more abrupt [and ornamented] not clothed with Firs, the larger part of the Hill being masses & variously [jutting Precipices] of Rocks, grey, sulphur-yellow, or mossy. -- -507- Shortly after we meet with huge marble Rocks -- & about a mile from Rubelland we arrived at a manufactury where the marble is polished. The veins of the Blankenburg marble have an exquisite Beauty / a foot square is valued at half a crown. Young Blumenbach informed us that marble was a marine substance -- that the veins, at least the Brown & the Red Veins were true Corals, & the white was the accidental Cement. -- Here a huge Angle of Rock comes out & divides the road / O[ur] path went on the left one way, & the River the other. We left the River [Bode] unwillingly -- for it went immediately into a deep deep Pine wood, where [we] saw high Pillars of Rock that, I don't [know] why, seemed to live among the black Fi[r trees], & I wished to be it's companion. But one always quits a dashing River unwil[lingly --] Our path led us over a green Plain that heaved up & down [in hillocks] & Embreastments of Earth / till we came to a Village, Hütten rode -- [We left it and] still the Country continued not particularly interesting, till we arriv[ed at the foot] of a Hill, up which our Road winded with many a scattered Fir by [the side of] the Road. We reached the Top -- & behold I now again the Spring meets us I [I look back] & see the snow on the Brocken, & all between the black mineral G[reen of] Pine-Groves, wintry, endlessly wintry / & the Beech & the Birch, & the [wild Ash] all leafless -- but lo! before us -- a sweet Spring! not indeed in the ful[l] youthful verdure as on our first day's Journey, but timidly soft, half-[wintrym --] and with here & there spots & patches of Iron brown. -- Interesting in the hig[hest] degree is it to have seen in the course of two or three days so many diffe[rent] climates with all their different Phaenomena! -- The vast plain was before us, Rocks on the Right Hand, a huge Wall of Rocks --! on the left & curving round into the front view, Hills of Beeches, soft surges of woody Hills. At the feet of the Hill lay the Castle & Town of Blankenburg, with all it's orchards of blossoming Fruit Trees. Blankenberg is a considerable Town, containing 500 Houses & 3000 Inhabitants; & belongs to the Duke of Brunswick. -- Immediately opposite to our Inn is the House in which the unfortunate Louis the 18th [lived] during 21 months -- he left Blankenberg last February, in consequence of a Lordship have [having] been given him by the Emperor of Russia, in Livonia. -Some enquiries which we had m[ade] concerning him at Rubeland had occasioned a suspicion of our being Spies, [&] one fellow whom we asked answered us -- 'I'll die for my King & Country / wh[at] sort of French Fellows are you?' Hence we were shy of the Subject; but our Landlord, a most communicative Fellow, soon relieved us -- & or at least two hours talked incessantly of the King, with whose most minute daily occupations he had made himself as -508- well acquainted or better, than I am with Poole's. -- These are a chapter of Contents for his Conversation -- 1. His majesty was very religious -- had prayers in his house every day, & an open Service there on Tuesdays, Thursdays, & Saturdays. 2. He kept a regular mistress, a large fine tall Woman of a fair Complexion, a French Woman, whose Husband at the sa[me] time lived in the House, observing the most distant Civilities & Respect tow[ard] his Wife. 3. A Washerwoman's Daughter however of Blankenberg, by the name of Hase, had struck his Majesty's Eye -- a young Girl of no unimpregnable [chastity -- and on]ce or twice a Week his Majesty was graciously accustomed to send one of his [Nobles for her] -on the first interview he presented her with 12 Laub Dollars (about [50 Shillings) wh]ich she had shewn with much glee to our Landlord. -- Afterwards his [presents declined]/. 4. He had 83 persons in his Household, 8 of whom were Dukes -- [& his daily ex]pences were an hundred Dollars (about 20£) -- & he received his money [always from H]amburg, & our Landlord had been informed by his Relation the Post Master, [that he rec]eived regularly 40,000 Dollars (6000£) at a time. 5. He never on any [occasion r]ode out of his own Gardens, & had so much personal Fear of Regicides [that he had] a subterraneous secret Passage under his House. 6. The number of his [Coaches was 15-- a]ll very handsome, & all ball-proof, & the Blinds likewise Ball-proof. [7. He] had 70 Horses; & at one time 7 Princesses in the same House with him. The quantity of meat used & wasted in the Household was prodigious-there were [eve]ry week two Oxen regularly consumed. 8. Twice a week his Majesty bathed in [G]ravy-soup, for which purpose 80 pounds of Beef were constantly used -- which [so]up with the meat was after given to the Poor. 9. He ordered his Surgeons & [Phy]sicians to attend the poor gratis. 10. And wept when he quitted the [pla]ce----/--/ We went & visited the Castle which was shewn us by a young Woman. [Suc]h an immense number of ugly Rooms with such an immense number [of pic]tures, not one of which possessed the least merit, or rather not one of which [whi]ch was not a despicable Daub! -- And almost all obscene! -So false is it [th]at our ancestors were more innocent than we --/ The Passions are much the same in all ages -- but Obscenity & Indelicacy are the fit & peculiar Company of Ignorance & Barbarous Manners. -- One thing amused me -- the young Woman opened a Room, pointed to us to go in, & then herself turned up another pair of Stairs --/ On entering we perceived a parcel of execrable Daubs on execrable Subjects / but the half-modesty of the Girl was interesting. There was no Reason on earth for her shewing us the Room -- & many which she herself [stood] looking -509- at with great calmness were not a whit better. / We returned, [and spent] the Evening with a round of old English Songs, of which God Save [the] King & Rule Britannia were, as you may suppose repeated no small number [of] Times -- for being abroad makes every man a Patriot & a Loyalist -- almost a [Pitti]te! God bless you, my Love & S. T. Coleridge & good night! 282. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole | Nether Stowey | Somersetshire | England Pay'd to Cuxhaven MS. British Museum. Pub. E.L.G. i. 107. Postmark: Foreign Office, 3 June 1799. Sunday Morning, 1/2 past 8/ May 19th, 1799 My dearest Poole I arrived at Göttingen last night, 9 o'clock, after a walk of thirty miles -- somewhat disappointed at finding no letters for me, but surprized that Chester had none. Surely, his family do not behave over-attentively towards him! -- We have been absent 8 months and 10 days; & he has received one Letter from them! -Well -- now to conclude my all too uninteresting Journal. -- In my second letter to Sara I was still at Blankenburg -- We left it on Wednesday Morning, May 15th taking first one survey more of the noble view which it commanded. -- I stood on the Castle Hill, on my Right a Hill half-wood, half rock, of a most grand outline (the rude sketch of it's outline is given in that little Drawing at the top of my first letter to Sara) 1 then a plain of young Corn -- then Rocks -- walls and towers / And pinnacles of Rock, a proud domain / Disdainful of the Seasons! these formed the right hand. On the left and curving round till they formed the front view, Hills here green with leafy Trees, here still iron-brown, dappled as it were with coming Spring & lingering Winter; not (like the single Hill) of abrupt & grand outlines, but rising & sinking yet on the whole still rising, in a frolic Surginess. -- In the Plain (or Area of the view) young Corn, herds of Cattle, troops of Goats, & shepherds at the head of Streams of Sheep. -- We left the town, proceeded thro' the Plain, & having walked about half a mile, turned to contemplate the backward view, to which was now added the Towers & castle of Bermburg, that looked in upon us from the distance, on our right hand as we then stood. -- We proceeded; and a mile from Blankenburg we came to a small Lake quite surrounded with Beech-trees, the margins of the Lake solid marble ____________________ 1 See Letter 281, where this drawing is indicated but not reproduced. -510- Rock -- two or three Stone-thrushes were flitting about those rocky margins. Our road itself was, for a few strides, occupied by a pretty little one arched Bridge, under which the Lake emptied itself, and at the distance of ten yards from the bridge, on our right hand, plunged itself down, (it's stream only once broken by a jutting rock nearly in the midst of the fall) into a chasm of 80 feet in depth and somewhat more in length (a chasm of black or mossy Rocks) & then ran under ground. -- We now entered the Woods, the morning thick & misty -- we saw a number of wild deer, & at least fifty Salamanders. -- / The salamander is a beautiful Lizard, perfectly harmless (I examined several in my naked hand.) Its length from six to seven Inches, with a Nightingale's Eye, and just 22 yellow streaks on it's glossy-black Skin. That it can live in the Fire, is a fable; but it is true, that if put on burning Coals, for the first, or even the second time, it emits a liquid so copiously as to extinguish the Coals. -- So we went, up hill & down dale, but all thro' woods, for four miles, when we came to a sort of Heath stubby with low trunks of old fir-trees -- & here were Women in various groups sowing the Fir-seed: a few ceasing from their work to look at us / Never did I behold aught so impressively picturesque, or rather statue-esque, as these Groups of Women in all their various attitudes -- The thick mist, thro' which their figures came to my eye, gave such a soft Unreality to them! These lines, my dear Poole, I have written rather for my own pleasure than your's -for it is impossible that this misery of words can give to you, that which it may yet perhaps be able to recall to me. -- What can be the cause that I am so miserable a Describer? Is it that I understand neither the practice nor the principles of Painting? -- or is it not true, that others have really succeeded? -- I could half suspect that what are deemed fine descriptions, produce their effects almost purely by a charm of words, with which & with whose combinations, we associate feelings indeed, but no distinct Images. --/ From these Women we discovered that we had gone out of our way precisely 4 miles / so we laughed, & trudged back again, & contrived to arrive at Werninger rode about 12 o'clock. -- This belongs to the Princely Count Stolberg, a Cousin of the two Brothers, the Princely Counts Stolberg of Stolberg, 1 who both of them are Poets & Christians -- good Poets, real Christians, & most kind-hearted Princes --/ what a combination of rarities for Germany! ---- The Prince -- Count Stolberg at Werninger rode gave on this day a feast to his People -- & almost all the family of the Stolbergs were assembled -- the nobles & people were shooting for a prize at a ____________________ 1 Counts Christian and Friedrich Leopold Stolberg. Coleridge translated the latter's Hymne an die Erde. Poems, i. 327. -511- Stuffed Bird placed on the Top of a high May-pole. A nobleman of the Family, who had been lately at Gottingen, recognized Parry, & was about to have introduced us; but neither our dress or time permitting it, we declined the honour. -- In this little town there is a School with about 12 or 18 poor Scholars in it, who are maintained by the Tenants & citizens -- they breakfast with one, dine with another, & sup with a third/managing their visits so as to divide the Burthen of their maintenance according to the capabilities of the People, to whose tables they solicit admission. -Thro' a country not sufficiently peculiarized to be worth describing we came to Drubeck, a pretty village -- far off on the right hand a semicircular Vale of an immense extent:/close by on the left, it's figure the Concave of a Crescent, a high woody Hill, the heights cloathed with firs with an intermixture of Beeches yellow-green in their opening Foliage; but below these & flowing adown the Hill into the valley, a noble Stream of Beeches, of freshest verdure. We enter[ed] the wood, passed woods & woods, every now & then coming to little spots of Greenery of various sizes & shapes, but always walled by Trees; & always as we entered, the first object which met us was a Mount of wild outline, black with firs soaring huge above the woods. / One of these Greeneries was in shape a Parallelogram, walled on three sides by the silver-barked weeping Birches, on the fourth by Conical Firs -- a rock on the Fir-side rose above the Trees just within the wood, & before us the huge Firmount / it was a most impressive Scene! -- Perhaps, not the less so from the mistiness of the wet Air. -- We travelled on & on, O what a weary way! now up, now down, now with path, now without it I having no other guides than a map, a compass, & the foot-paces of the Pigs, which had been the day before driven from Hartzburg to Dribbock [Drübeck] / where there had been a Pig-Fair. -- This intelligence was of more service to us than Map or Compass. -- At length we came to the foot of the huge Fir-mount roaring with woods, & winds, & waters! -- And now the Sky cleared up, and masses of crimson Light, fell around us from the fiery west, & from the Clouds over our heads that reflected the western fires. -- We wound along by the feet of the Mount, & left it behind us, close before us a high hill, a high hill close on our right, & close on our left a hill -- we were in a circular Prison of Hills / and many a mass of Light, moving & stationary, gave life & wildness to the Rocks & Woods that rose out of them. -- But now we emerged into a new scene! -- close by our left hand was a little Hamlet, each House with it's orchard of Blossom-Trees, in a very small & very narrow coomb! : the Houses were built on the lowest part of the Slope of the steeply-shelving Hills, that formed the Coomb; but on our -512- right hand was a huge Valley with rocks in the distance & a steady Mass of Clouds that afforded no mean substitute for a Sea. / On each side, as ever, high woody Hills -- but majestic River, or huge Lake -- O that was wanting, here & every where! -- And now we arrived at Hartsburg/ -- Hills ever by our sides, in all conceivable variety of forms & garniture -- It were idle in me to attempt by words to give their projections & their retirings & how they were now in Cones, now in roundnesses, now in tonguelike Lengths, now pyramidal, now a huge Bow, and all at every step varying the forms of their outlines; / or how they now stood abreast, now ran aslant, now rose up behind each other / or now, as at Harzburg, presented almost a Sea of huge motionless waves / too multiform for Painting, too multiform even for the Imagination to remember them / yea, my very sight seemed incapacitated by the novelty & Complexity of the Scene. / Ye red lights from the Rain Clouds! Ye gave the whole the last magic Touch! / I had now walked five & thirty miles over roughest Roads & had been sinking with fatigue / but so strong was the stimulus of this scene, that my frame seemed to have drank in a new vitality; for I now walked on to Goslar almost as if I had risen from healthy sleep on a fine spring morning: so light & lively were my faculties. -- On our road to Goslar we passed by several Smelting Houses & Wire Manufacturies, & one particularly noticeable where they separate the Sulphur from the Ores. The night was now upon us / & the white & blue flares from this Building formed a grand & beautiful Object -- & so white was the flame, that in the manufactury itself All appeared quite like a natural Day light. (It is strange, that we do not adopt some means to render our artificial Lights more white.) -- As the Clock struck ten we entered the silent City of Goslar / and thro' some few narrow Passages, called Streets by Courtesy, we arrived at our Inn -- / my Companions scarcely able to speak -- too tired even to be glad that the Journey was over / a journey of 40 miles, including the way which we lost. / On Thursday, May the 16th, we saw the Vitriol Manufactory, & the Dome Church at Goslar. The latter is a real Curiosity -- it is one of the oldest, if not the oldest, in Germany. The first thing that strikes you on entering it is a picture of St Christopher wading thro' the River with Jesus Christ (a boy with a globe in his hand) on his Shoulders -- this is universal in all the Churches that I have seen; but noticeable here for the enormous size of the Picture! & for the conceit of putting in the hand of the Giant Saint a fir Tree 'with which the Mast of some tall ammiral Hewn on Norwegian Hills, were but a wand' 1 --! & giving this huge fir Tree a crack in the middle, the face of the holy Giant with a ____________________ 1 Paradise Lost, i. 293-4. -513- horrid Grin of Toil & Effort corresponding with the said Crack in proof of the huge weight of the disguised Deity. - -The next was an Altar of the God Croto[Krodo] -- the only assured antiquity of German Heathenism. On this altar human sacrifices were offered -- it is of metal, brass I believed, with diamond holes all around it, & supported by four grotesque animals. -- Then two stone-baboons with monk's Cowls on them, grinning at each other -- said to have been likewise the work of the said savage Pagans, when the Monks first preached Christianity in Germany / -- Then an altar-piece by the celebrated Lucas Cranach / in which the faces of the Apostles are marvellously ugly, but lively & natural. -- It is an admirable Painting. -- Then tombs & thrones of Emperors & Queens & Princesses (for Goslar was formerly the Seat of the Saxon Emperors of Germany), the hole where the Devil entered, & how he set two Bishops by the Ears & how they fought in this church & how one killed the other -- a huge Crown of Bell-metal 7 strides in Diameter given by the victor Bishop for Penance -- / Alto Relievo of the Monk who had poisoned an Emperor in the Lord's Supper / & the under petticoat of leather which the Devil took from the Woman who rose from her bed at midnight, supposing it to be matin time, entered the church, began praying &c, wondered rather to see the Church so full / when all at once she heard the Clock strike 12, cried aloud, 'God & Christ' -- Rausch rausch rauschl [raus?] -- All nothing but Ghosts -- off flew the woman, but as she ran over the threshold, she tripped, fell down, & ere she could get up again, the Devil had pulled off her petticoat. -- I was much interested by this ruinous old Church -- half Lutheran, half Catholic -- the occasion of which I will explain when I come home. / -- We left this ugly silent old desert of a City, & strolled on thro' hill & dale of Pines, up which the little mists crept like smoke from Cottage chimneys -till we came to Clausthal, a large Town with a number of mines around it, one of which all but myself descended / I had before read a most minute Description of the said Mine; & from the same concluded that I should see nothing new after what I had seen at Stowey / & fr[om Che]ster's account my conclusion was perfectly right. / So I stayed at home & wr[ote tw]o letters to Sara. -- I saw the whole process of Mint[ing] here (for all the [Han]overian Money is here minted) & other little uncu[rious] Curiosities, which I have ever found hideously stupid. -- We were such a hospital of bruised Toes, swelled ancles, bladdered soles, & excoriated Heels, that we stayed in this town till Saturday Morning, May 18th. -- We passed up & down over little Hills thro' a pine-covered Country, still looking down into deep & wild Coombes of Pine & Fir Trees (I scarcely know the difference between Pine & Fir) till we came to -514- Lehrbech, a little village of wood with wooden tiles on the house tops, lying in the bottom of a narrow Coomb, three or four of the Houses scattered upon the Slopes of the Hills, that formed the Coomb. -- The Coomb is rich with the green green Beeches; the Slope of the Hills have Beeches & Firs intermixed; but the heights are wholly the property of the Firs. From here we proceeded to Osterode, a hilly pleasant country, the soil heav'd up & down in hillocks with many a little dell & hollow, & the pine trees picturesquely scattered. Osterode is a large & very ugly town, the people looking dirtier & poorer than is common in Germany -Over the Town Hall is the Rib of a Giant / -- these are common in the inland towns of Germany. They are generally Whales' Ribs -in the dark ages it was of course extremely unusual for any man to leave his plough, as the song says, to go ploughing the wild seas / when any did, they were of course ambitious to bring something curious home, as a present to their Countrymen / & this is no doubt the origin of these Whale ribs. -- From Osterode we proceeded to Catlenburg / Mem. the view of the Amtshouse on a woody Hill, part of the wood cleared / & the space occupied by a fine Garden. From henceforwards the views became quite English, except that in England we have water ever in our views, either sea or lake or river -- & we have elmy hedges -- & single Cottages -- & gentlemen's seats -- & many a house, the dwelling of Knowlege & virtue, between the Cottage & the Gentleman's Seat -- / Our fields & meadows too are so green, that it is comm[on h]ere for novellists & describers to say when they praise a prospect 'It had a British Greenness' -- all this & more is wanting in Germany / but their woods are far finer, & their hills more diversified, & their little villages far more interesting, every House being separate with it's little garden & orchard. This answers to my notion of human nature; which distinguishes itself equally from the Tyger & the Sheep -- & is neither solitary or gregarious, but mighbourly. -- Add to this too, that the extreme misery and the earth & heavenalarming wickedness & profanity of our English Villagers is a thing wholly unknown in Germany / The women too, who are working in the fields, always behave respectfully, modestly, & with courtesy. ---- Well -- I must hasten on to Göttingen / we proceeded -- but I ought to say that in the Church Yard at Catlenberg I was pleased with the following Epitaph.' Johann Reimbold of Catlenburg. Ach! sie haben Ah! they have Einen braven Put a brave Man begraben: Man in Grave! Vielen war er mehr.['] He was more than Many! This is word for word . -515- About a mile & a half from Catlenberg we came to a lovely scene, hillocks, & scattered Oaks, & Beeches, a sweet tho' very small Lake, a green meadow, & one white Cottage, & this spot exactly so filled was completely encircled by the grandest swell of woods, that I ever beheld -- the hills were clothed as with grass / so rich was the verdure. So complete was the circle that I stood & looked around me, in what part the wood opened to admit our road -- We entered the wood, and walked for two miles under a complete Bower, & as we emerged from it -- O I shall never forget that glorious Prospect. Behind me the Hartz Mountains with the snowspots shining on them / close around us Woods upon little Hills, little Hills of an hundred Shapes, a dance of Hills, whose variety of position supplied the effect of, & almost imitated, motion -- two higher than the rest of a conical form were bare & stony; the rest were all hid with Leafage / I cannot say, trees -- / for the Foliage concealed the Boughs that sustained [it.] And all these Hills in all their forms & bearings, which it were such a chaos to describe, were yet in all so pure a Harmony! -- before us green corn-field[s] that fill'd the Plain & crept up the opposite Hills in the far-off distance, and closing our view in the angle at the left that high woody Hill on which stands the Monarch Ruin of the Plesse -- & close by me in a deep dell was a sweet neighbourhood of houses with their Orchards in blossom. -- O wherefore was there no water! -- We were now only 7 miles from Gottingen / -- I shall write one letter more from Germany / & in that letter I will conclude my Tour, with some minuteness, as it will give you at the same time the account of the Country near Gottingen. --/ -- I hope to leave this place in about a fortnight; but Sara must not be uneasy, if I should be home a week later than she expects -- it may be a week earlier --/ but as I pass thro' Brunswick, Wolfenbüttel &c I may perhaps have opportunities of acquiring Information concerning Lessing which it were criminal in me to neglect -- but I pine, languish, & waste away to be at home / for tho' in England only I have those that hate me, yet there only I have those whom I love! -- God bless my Friend! -- S. T. Coleridge -516- 283. To Josiah Wedgwood Address: Josiah Wedgewood Esq. | York Street | St James's Square | by favor of I Mr Hamilton MS. Wedgwood Museum. Pub. Tom Wedgwood, 68. May 21st, 1799 -- Gottingen My dear Sir I have lying by my side six huge Letters, 1 with your name on each of them / & all excepting one have been written for these three months. About this time Mr Hamilton, by whom I send this & the little parcel for my wife, was as it were, setting off for England; & I seized the opportunity of sending them by him, as without any mock-modesty I really thought that the expence of the Postage to me & to you would be more than their Worth. -- Day after day, & Week after week, was Hamilton going / & still delayed -- and now that it is absolutely settled that he goes tomorrow, it is likewise absolutely settled that I shall go this day three weeks / & I have therefore sent only this & the Picture by him / but the letters I will now take myself --/ for I should not like them to be lost; as they comprize the only subject, on which I have had any opportunity of making myself thoroughly informed / & if I carry them myself, I can carry them without danger of their being seized at Yarmouth, as all my letters were, your's to the Von Axens, &c excepted which were luckily not sealed. ---- Before I left England, I had read the Book of which you speak 2 -- I must confess, that it appeared to me exceedingly illogical. Godwin's & Condorcet's Extravagancies were not worth confuting; and yet I thought, that the Essay on Population had not confuted them. -- Before Wallace, 3 Derham 4 & a number of German Statistic & Physiko-theological Writers had taken the same ground / namely, that Population increases in a geometrical but the accessional nutriment only in an arithmetical ratio -- & that Vice & Misery, the natural consequences of this order of things, were intended by Providence as the Counterpoise. I have here no means of procuring so obscure a book, as Rudgard's; but to the best of my recollection, at the time that the Fifth Monarchy Enthusiasts created so great a sensation in England, under the Protectorates & the beginning of Charles the second's reign, Rudgard or Rutgard 5 (I am not positive even of ____________________ 1 See Letter 271. 2 Wedgwood had asked Coleridge's opinion of Malthus's Essay on Population. 3 Robert Wallace ( 1697-1771) published in 1761 Various Prospect of Mankind, Nature, and Providence, a work which is said to have influenced Malthus. 4 Coleridge probably refers to William Derham ( 1657-1785), who was a frequent contributor to the Transactions of the Royal Society. 5 Cf. Thomas Tanner, Primordia. . . . To which are added Two Letters ofMr. Rvdyerd's . . . One about the Multiplying of Mankind until the Floud. The Other concerning the Multiplying of the Children of Israel in Egypt. -517- the name) wrote an Essay to the same purpose / [in which he asserted, that if War, Pestilence, Vice, & Poverty were wholly removed, the World could not exist two hundred years &c. Süssmilch 1 in his great work concerning the divine Order & Regularity in the Destiny of the human Race has a chapter entitled a confutation of this idea / I read it with great Eagerness, & found therein, that this idea militated against the Glory & Goodness of God, & must therefore be false -- but further confutation found I none! -- This book of Sfissmilch's has a prodigious character throughout Germany; & never methinks did a Work less deserve it. -- It is in 3 huge Octavos, & wholly on the general Laws that regulate the Population of the human Species -- but is throughout most unphilosophical, & the Tables, which he has collected with great Industry, proved nothing. -- My objections to the Essay on Population you will find in my sixth Letter, at large -- but do not, my dear Sir! suppose that because unconvinced by this Essay I am therefore convinced of the contrary. -- No! God knows -- I am sufficiently sceptical & in truth more than sceptical, concerning the possibility of universal Plenty & Wisdom / but my Doubts rest on other grounds. -- I had some conversation with you before I left England on this subject; & from that time I had proposed to myself to examine as thoroughly as it was possible for me the important Question -- Is the march of the Human Race progressive, or in Cycles? -- But more of this when we meet. ----/ What have I done in Germany? -- I have learnt the language, both high & low German / I can read both, & speak the former so fluently, that it must be a torture for a German to be in my company -- that is, I have words enough & phrases enough, & I arrange them tolerably; but my pronunciation is hideous. -- 2ndly, I can read the oldest German, the Frankish and the Swabian. 3dly -- I have attended the lectures on Physiology, Anatomy, & Natural History with regularity, & have endeavoured to understand these subjects. -- 4th -- I have read & made collections for an history of the Belles Lettres in Germany before the time of Lessing -- & 5thly -very large collections for a Life of Lessing; -- to which I was led by the miserably bald & unsatisf[act]ory Biographies that have been hitherto given, & by my personal acquaintance with two of Lessing's Friends. -- Soon after I came into Germany, I made up my mind fully not to publish any thing concerning my Travels, as people call them / yet I soon perceived that with all possible ____________________ 1 J. P. Süssmilch, Die göttliche Ordnung in den Veränderungen des menschlichen Geschlechts, 1761. 5 Mr. Rvdyerd's . . . One about the Multiplying of Mankind until the Floud. The Other concerning the Multiplying of the Children of Israel in Egypt. 1683. -518- Economy my expences would be greater than I could justify, unless I did something that would to a moral certainty repay them. -- I chose the Life of Lessing for the reasons above assigned, & because it would give me an opportunity of conveying under a better name, than my own ever will be, opinions, which I deem of the highes[t] importance. -- Accordingly my main Business at Göttingen has been to read all the numerous Controversies in which L. was engaged / & the works of all those German Poets before the time of Lessing, which I could not, or could not afford to buy --. For these last 4 months, with the exception of last week in which I visited the Harz I have worked harder than, I trust in God Almighty, I shall ever have occasion to work again -- this endless Transcription is such a body-and-soul-wearying Purgatory! ---- I shall have bought 80 pounds worth of books (chiefly metaphysics / & with a view to the one work, to which I hope to dedicate in silence the prime of my life) -- but I believe & indeed doubt not, that before Christmas I shall have repayed myself; but before that time I shall have been under the necessity of requesting your permission, that I may during the year anticipate for 40 or fifty pound. -- I have hitherto drawn on you for 85 & 80 & 80 & 30 = 125£ -- of this sum I left about 32 or 33 pound in your hands, of Mr Chester's, when I left England -- & Chester has since desired his Brother to transmit 25£, & again in his last letter 30£ / Wordsworth has promised me that he will pay into your hands 4£ for me. 33 & 25 & 80 & 4 = 92£. -- Hitherto therefore I have drawn as it were about 88 or 84 pound / but this week, to pay both our Gottingen Bills, and our Journey to England I must draw for 70£. So that altogether I shall have in this year drawn for 103 Pound. ---.-- I never to the best of my recollection felt the fear of Death but once -- that was, yesterday when I delivered the Picture to Hamilton. -- I felt & shivered as I felt it, that I should not like to die by land or water before I see my wife & the little one that I hope yet remains to me! -- But it was an idle sort of feeling -- & I should not like to have it again. -- /Poole half mentioned in a hasty way a circumstance that depressed my Spirits for many days -- that you & Thomas were on the point of settling near Stowey but had abandoned it! -- 'God almighty! what a dream of happiness it held it [out?] to me'! writes Poole. -- I felt disappointment without having had hope! ---- -- In about a month I hope to see you. Till then may Heaven bless & preserve us! -- Believe me, my dear Sir! with every feeling of love, esteem, & gratitude Your affectionate Friend S. T. Coleridge -519- 284. To Charles Parry Transcript Ingpen and Company, Booksellers. Hitherto unpublished. June 25 -- 1799 My dear Fellowl my dear Parry! We are safe at Clausthal. 1 The Coach horse near Clausthal fell down; but old Kutscher took a walk up & down, mumbling a charm, then fell to, & up rose the horse -- Greenough & I lost our way and after much hallowing in which we were mocked by some fine echoes we recovered our Party -- We were however amply repayed by the sight of a Wild Boar with an immense Cluster of Glow-worms round his Tail & Rump -- Vale, φιλτɑ + ́τη μοι κεφαλή! God bless you again & again, my dear Fellow -- & my kind Love to Frederic -- & when I have a Night Mair, I shall probably dream of him a top of me under that charming Tree where we slept so warm & comfortable, some two miles from a village called Mentfeld. God bless you S. T. Coleridge. 285. To George Bellas Greenough Address: Den Herm Greenough | Göttingen Transcript Professor Edith J. Morley, Hitherto unpublished. [ Brunswick.] July 6th, 1799. Saturday Morning 1/2 past 8 -- My dear Greenough -- God bless you! And eke Carlyon, and Charles Parry, & little Fred. -- Health & Happiness be with you all. -- The date of this Letter, at present in its Infancy, or rather in the very act of Delivery (for Letters come into existence with their Heads forward, in which respect, as in some others, they agree with young Children) the date, I say, is July 6th, 1799, Saturday Morning 1/2 past 8. -- On Wednesday Morning after quitting you we took a melancholy Stroll on the Ramparts; then called on the Kaufmann & begged him to take our Places in the Post auf Hamburg for Saturday, & then walked forth for Helmstadt [Helmstedt]. ---With coat on my arm, & hat in hand, I walked before & Chester behind, & never stopped till we reached Helmstadt, which is ____________________ 1 On 24 June Coleridge and Chester set off on the first stage of their journey to England. Following a circuitous route in the company of Greenough and Carlyon, they went first to Clausthal, then over the Brocken to Elbingerode, and from thence to Wolfenbüttel and Braunschweig. On 3 July the party separated, Coleridge and Chester making an excursion to Helmstedt, and the others returning to Göttingen. -520- 28 miles from Brunswick -- they called it 5 G.M. but it certainly is not, for we walked it exactly in 7 Hours. -- Well -- when we arrived there, we were overdone / behind my ears, all down the side of [my] neck, a longitudinal Bladder, the colours shifting prettily betwixt blue & Red -- & such another on my Forehead -- Chester had acquired a whitloe on his nose, with one dot of black & the Bile had occupied his Face / Red, White, black, & Yellow -- poor Chester! -- God bless him! He fell down on his bed at Helmstadt, and in the literal sense, fell asleep. -- I drest myself (i.e. undrest myself & put on the same cloaths again) and delivered my letter to Hofrath Bruns -- I saw his wife, a pretty affable Woman; but the Hofrath was at the Library. I left my letter & Card; but had scarcely arrived at my Inn, when Bruns came after me -- welcomed me with great Kindness, took me in his arms to the Library, where we rummaged old Manuscripts, & looked at some Libri Rarissimi for about an Hour -- (N.B. The Library resembles strikingly the Libraries of some of the little Colleges at Oxford and Cambridge.) After this he took me to his House, spoke to me of a little translation which Lowth 1 had made in his Presence of an Ode of Ramley [?] -- talked of England, & Oxford, where he had resided some years, & I found, that he had been intimate with many of my Father's Friends -- eat Butterbrot in his arbor with him & his Wife -- a sweet Woman!/another Professor & Wife came -- smoked a Pipe -- all comfortable -- all even affectionate to me / went away at past eleven / Bruns having promised to send the next morning to Beireis &c ---- So passed Wednesday -- i.e. Arsenic. Now for Verdegris -- On Thursday morning received a note from Bruns that Beireis would see me & Chester at 10 o'clock. At ten Bruns came, introduced me to Beireis & left us there. -- Beireis! -- A short man, drear in black, with a very expressive Forehead -- & small eyes -- He went strait to work -- asked no questions-offered no Civilities -- but full of himself ever, & Retching began instantly -- 'You wish to see my Things -- what do you wish to see -- To see all, or half, or quarter is impossible in one or in two Days -- name the collection -Pictures or Coins or Minerals, or Anatomical Preparations, or, or, or, or, or, &c. &c. &c.['] -- Now I had heard that his Coins & Minerals were really admirable / so I would not see them / I was afraid of too much Truth, that Poisoner of Imagination! besides, for Coins, I don't care a dam! & minerals, have I not seen Professor Wiedermann's, & the Duke of Brunswick's, & Greenough's Collections? So I chose his Pictures -- O Lord! it was a Treat! -His Eloquence which is natural & unaffected, really surprized ____________________ 1 Probably Robert Lowth ( 1710-87). -521- me -- / in the space of half an hour, I counted on my fingers, at least half a million sterling that he had given as purchase money -The earliest attempts by Holbein, Michael Angelo, Raphael, Correggio &c &c &c -- & behind each a Distich, of Beireis's own Composition -- /---- I wondered at all with broad eyes, hands uplifted!! like two Notes of Admiration & such a stupid Face of Praise, that Beireis fell in raptures -- Extacied as I was with each & all, yet I never forgot to turn to the Back of each Picture, & read aloud with admiring emphasis, the Latin Distich / still trying the Experiment, whether I could not rise above Beireis's Self-Praises -in Vain! My most extravagant compliments were as German Mustard to Cayenne Pepper! -- / -- Some originals of Correggio he certainly has -- but of Rafael assuredly none / after all, his German Pictures are -- in my opinion, the most valuable -- But hang his Pictures -- it was the Man that interested. I asked him once with great earnestness whether he had not drawn on himself the envy of all the European Sovereigns! O Ja! entsetzlich! was his answer. But (rejoined I) it is lucky for you that the French Revolution has happened -- or beyond a Doubt you would have to fear an Invasion! -- On my Honour, even this was not too Extravagant ---- at last, after three hours' Picture-seeing during which he spoke constantly & always eloquently, I begged him, with trembling voice & downcast eyes, to favor our thirsty Ears with only the 'Geschichte seines weltberühmten Demants [Diamanten],' to see it would be too great a request -- Immediately he gave us a narrative quite as entertaining tho' not so probable as the story of the Wonderful Lamp -- then took me to see his Eating Duck of Brass, which quacked like rusty Hinges / tho' Beireis asked me seriously, if I could distinguish it from a real Duck's Quack! -- I shut my eyes ---- lifted up my hands, -- listened -- & cried -- Herr Jesus!!!! On our return from these Machineries into his Parlor, then, yesthen he shook my hand friendlily -- & out of his Pocket he pulled the Diamond -- apparently, a semi transparent Pebble almost as large as my Fist! -- I will write again from Celle -- for now I must interrupt my Narration to talk of piteous Cares. No Chest, no Portmanteau! -- the Kaufman has heard this Morning, that it ought to have been here on the first of July ----/ -- My Stars! What shall I do! -- Last night I sprinkled my shirt with [water?] hung it up at the window, & slept naked -- for my one clean shirt I must keep till I get to Hamburg. -- Heaven I I stink like an old Poultice! -I should mislead any Pack of Foxhounds in Great Britain / Put a Trail of Rusty Bacon at a Furlong Distance & me at a mile, and they would follow me -- I should hear a cry of Stop Thief close at my ears with a safe Conscience -- but if I caught only the Echo of -522- a Tally Ho! I should climb up into a Tree I You know me too well to suspect Hyperbole -- I stink damnably -- & that's the Truth! Lord a mercy on those poor Imps that are condemned to live between the Toes of the Devil's Dam who wears black Worsted Socks, & uses Turney Sarat for Corn Plaster -- & those that live under the Devil's Tail have a Heaven in comparison -- / Marry -& my Books -- I shall be ruined -- on the Debtor's Side in Newgate, just 5 Yards distant from Sodomy, Murder, & House-breaking -Soul of Lessing! hover over my Boxes! Ye Minnesänger! fly after them! -- Dear Greenough! Dear Parry! Carlyon, Fred -- I go -this Kaufmann had forgotten to take places so we go with the Packages / Chester has got St Antony's Fire in his Legs -- & his Arse is sore -- Your affectionate S. T. Coleridge. 286. To Robert Southey Address: Mr Southey | Mr Holloway's | Minehead MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 303. Stamped: Bridgewater. July 29th, 1799 Nether Stowey I am doubtful, Southey, whether the circumstances which impel me to write to you, ought not to keep me silent -- / & if it were only a feeling of delicacy, I should remain silent -- for it is good to do all things in faith. -- But I have been absent, Southey I ten months, & little Hartley prattles about you / and if you knew, that domestic affliction was hard upon me, and that my own health was declining, would you not have shootings within you of an affection, which ('tho' fall'n, tho' chang'd') has played too important a part in the events of our lives & the formation of our characters, ever to be forgotten? I am perplexed what to write, or how to state the object of my writing -- / Any participation in each other's moral Being I do not wish, simply because I know enough of the mind of man to know that is impossible. But, Southey, we have similar Talents, Sentiments nearly similar, & kindred pursuits -- we have likewise in more than one instance common objects of our esteem and love -- I pray and intreat you, if we should meet at any time, let us not withhold from each other the outward Expressions of daily Kindliness; and if it not be no [any] longer in your power to soften your opinions, make your feelings at least more tolerant towards me -- / a debt of humility which assuredly we all of us owe to our most feeble, imperfect and self-deceiving Nature. -- We are -523- few of us good enough to know our own Hearts -- and as to the Hearts of others, let us struggle to hope that they are better than we think them / & resign the rest to our common maker. God bless you & your's -- S. T. Coleridge 287. To Robert Southey Address: Mr Southey MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. E. L. G. i. 123. [ 8 August 1799] 1 Southey -- I had written a long letter to you & sent it to Minehead. -- Therein I had descended into particulars / but I now think that in the present state of your Feelings this was neither wise or delicate -- / I will therefore suppress it. Suffice it to aver, calmly and on my honor as a man & gentleman, that I never charged you with aught but your deep & implacable enmity towards me -- & that I founded this on the same Authorities, on which you founded your belief of my supposed Hatred to you. -- Southey! -- for nearly three years past Poole has been the Repository of my very Thoughts -- I have not written or received any letter of importance, ____________________ 1 On 8 Aug. 1799 a letter of self-justification and recrimination from Southey arrived at Stowey. This letter from Coleridge was written immediately on receipt of Southey's, and it was probably sent to Minehead, along with a letter from Poole, dated 8 Aug., and reading in part 'I am satisfied that the motive which induces me to write, you will consider a sufficient apology for the liberty I take in addressing you. Coleridge and myself have long been in the habit of confiding to each other those things which the most nearly and deeply interest us -- this being the case he naturally showed me your letter which he has just now received -- On perusing it I cannot help thinking but that my testimony must in a great measure clear your mind from those doubts concerning Coleridge's feelings and conduct towards you. . . . Without entering into particulars, I will say generally that in the many conversations I have had with Coleridge concerning yourself, he has never discovered the least personal enmity against, but on the contrary the strongest affection for you; stifled only by the untoward circumstances of your separation -- such has been the general impression I have received from him -- and from him alone I have been acquainted with your intellectual and moral character -- . . . As for Chas. Lloyd, it would be cruel to attribute his conduct to any thing but a diseased mind -- be assured from me, who have seen his contradictory letters, that his evidence amounts to nothing. . . . I send this letter, with the knowledge of Coleridge by an especial Messenger, thinking it probable that you may be induced to alter your plan, and instead of going to the Valley of Stones, to accompany Mrs Southey and Mrs Coleridge to Stowey -- / I have written this because it appears to me that the letter contains what Coleridge himself could not have written.' (MS. in editor's possession.) Poole's good offices were successful; Southey not only paid Coleridge a visit at Stowey but the two families journeyed together into Devonshire. -524- which he has not seen ---- For more than one whole year I was with Wordsworth almost daily -- & frequently for weeks together -Our conversations concerning you have been numberless -- and during the affair with Lloyd under suppositions of a highly irritating kind-- / If Wordsworth & Poole will not affirm to you solemnly that I have ever thought & spoken of you with respect & affection, never charging you with aught else than your restless enmity to me, & attributing even that to Delusion, I abandon myself for ever to the disesteem of every Man, whose Esteem is worth having. -- You have received Evidence to the contrary -- / and I could shew you written Testimonies contradictory to some sentences of your last Letter -- / Yet on my soul I believe you -- I do not require you to do at present the same with regard to me. But I pray you, let us be at least in the possibility of understanding each other's moral Being -- / and with regard to what you have heard, to think a little on the state of mind in which those were from whom you heard it. -- More I will not say; but end by thanking you for your letter which under your Convictions was a wise & temperate one -- God bless you, & your's! S. T. Coleridge 288. To Richard Wordsworth Address: Mr Wordsworth | attorney at Law | Staple's Inn | Holborn I London Post payed MS. Dove Cottage. Pub. Chambers, Life, 335. Postmark: 12 September 1799. Stamped: Exeter. Tuesday, Sept. 10, 1799 Exeter. Dear Wordsworth The letter by which I received the lottery Tickets gave me information that you had not received the Shirt &c / & this morning I received your letter to the express Purpose of the Same -- / I am vexed, as you will easily suppose when I tell you that within a week of my arrival at Stowey I sent them directed to you, by Mr Stutfield, 1 a Wine & Brandy Merchant, who happened then to be at Stowey & offered to take the said parcel for me -- promising me (with his own Mouth) to deliver the same ----/ -- This Evening I will write to my Friend Poole who knows Stutfield's Address, requesting him immediately on receipt of mine to write to Stutfield -- if I do not hear from Stutfield in the course of a decent time certifying that he has performed the promise, the performance of which he has so long & so unjustifiably neglected, Mrs Coleridge ____________________ 1 The father of Coleridge's later amanuensis, Charles Stutfield. -525- will not delay to do (what she now wishes) -- i.e. -- transmit a shirt & cravat, trusting to your goodness for the acceptance of = for =, it not being in my power to preserve absolute Identity ---- I received this morning a letter from William & was agitated to find that his Health is in a State which I should deem alarming ---- Your's sincerely S. T. Coleridge P.S. Till I hear from Stutfield the very idea of your Shirt will stick more burningly to my Memory than Deianira's Shirt did to Hercules's Skin -- altho' I entreat you to look into the Article of domestic News in the London Papers to see whether or no a Mr Stutfield was found on Hounslow Heath or elsewhere with his throat cut from Ear to Ear -- for he ought to be dead, as a Moral Being / having promised me that if alive he would not delay to deliver the parcel, the great importance of which I happened by a sort of prophetic Presentiment to impress upon him with almost a deathbed Energy & Solemnity. ---- 289. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole | Nether Stowey | near | Bridgewater. MS. British Museum. Hitherto unpublished. Stamped: Exeter. Sept. 10 1799 My dearest Poole We arrived safely, & were received with all love & attention -Southey & his wife sojourned at Ottery a few Days & went to Exeter from whence & from whose Room I now write -- to morrow I set off for a little Tour of 3 or 4 days with Southey ---- I now write to you on the spur or rather the Sting of the moment -- for I have just received a letter from Wordsworth of Staple's Inn bothering me with an ungentlemanlike Importunacy about that damned old Shirt which I sent by Stutfield / & which he has not. received -- Now I entreat you, my dear Poole, do not delay to write immediately to Stutfield, telling him the same, that if by any accident it be lost, I may transmit = for =. As to Stutfield, I could almost wish that some Incubus would get into Bed with him, & blow with a bellows the Wind of cold colic against his Posteriors -& Wordsworth -- nay -- I will not dare to utter any thing vituperative even of the Brother of my GREAT Friend / -- Please Heaven in the course of three days I will write you a letter that shall in some measure pay postage / ----/ -- I am afraid that I shall hear nothing from Cruckshanks about Alfoxden -- I am very anxious to -526- have it -- but expect nothing. -- Poor Cruckshanks! it seems hardhearted for me to mingle any selfish Concern with his Distresses-I have heard from W. Wordsworth -- he is ill -- & seems not happy -Montague has played the fool, I suspect, with him in pecuniary affairs -- he renounces Alfoxden altogether / -- God bless you, my dear dear Poole! & now that you have come to the End of my letter take up pen & paper & begin Dear Stutfield My Friend, the Bard, alias, S. T. Coleridge, has just received a damn'd disagreeable dunning dirty dribbling Letter about a beggarly Shirt &c &c &c ---- Heaven bless you, my dear Poole! & S. T. Coleridge We are all well ---- Wordsworth is an attorney at Law in Staple's Inn ---- 290. To William Wordsworth Pub. Memoirs of Wordsworth, i. 159. [Circa 10 September 1799] 1 I am anxiously eager to have you steadily employed on "The Recluse". . . . My dear friend, I do entreat you go on with "The Recluse"; and I wish you would write a poem, in blank verse, addressed to those, who, in consequence of the complete failure of the French Revolution, have thrown up all hopes of the amelioration of mankind, and are sinking into an almost epicurean selfishness, disguising the same under the soft titles of domestic attachment and contempt for visionary philosophes. It would do great good, and might form a part of "The Recluse", for in my present mood I am wholly against the publication of any small poems. 291. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole | Nether Stowey | Bridgewater | Somerset MS. British Museum. Pub. with orals. Letters, i. 305. Stamped: Exeter. Exeter -- Southey's Lodgings, Mr Tucker's, Forestreet Hill Monday Night Sep. 16 1799. My dear Poole Here I am, just returned from a little Tour of five days -having seen rocks; and waterfalls; & a pretty River or two; some ____________________ 1 This fragment may be an answer to Wordsworth's letter, which Coleridge received on 10 Sept. See Letter 288. -527- wide Landscapes; & a multitude of Ash-tree Dells; & the blue waters of the [']ROARING Seal' as little Hartley says -- who on Friday fell down stairs, & injured his arm -- 'tis swelled, & sprained; but God be praised, not broken. ---- The Views of Totness & Dartmouth are among the most impressive Things, I have ever seen / but in general, what of Devonshire I have lately traversed is tame to Quantock, Porlock, Culbone, & Linton. ---- So much for the Country -- now as to the inhabitants thereof, they are Bigots; unalphabeted in the first Feelings of Liberality; of course, in all they speak and all they do not speak, they give good reasons for the opinions which they hold -- viz. they hold the propriety of Slavery -- an opinion which being generally assented to by Englishmen makes Pitt & Paul the first among the moral Fitnesses of Things. -- I have three Brothers / that is to say, Relations by Gore -- two are Parsons and one is a Colonel -- George & the Colonel good men as times go -- very good men; but alas! we have neither Tastes or Feelings in common. This I wisely learnt from their Conversation; & did not suffer them to learn it from mine/What occasion for it? -- Hunger & Thirst -Roast Fowls, mealy Potatoes, Pies, & Clouted Cream -- bless the Inventors thereoff An honest Philosoph may find therewith preoccupation for his mouth/keeping his heart & brain, the latter in his Skull, the former in the Pericardium, some 5 or 6 Inches from the Roots of his Tongue! -- Church & King! -- Why, I drink Church & King -- mere cutaneous Scabs of Loyalty which only ape the King's Evil, but affect not the Interior of one's Health -Mendicant Sores! -- it requires some little Caution to keep them open, but they heal of their own accord. ---- Who such a friend as I am to the system of Fraternity could refuse such a Toast at the Table of a Clergyman and a Colonel -- his Brothers? -- /So, my dear Poole! I live in Peace--. ---- Of the other party, I have dined with a Mr Northmore, 1 a pupil of Wakefield's, who possesses a fine House half a mile from Exeter -- in his Boyhood he was at my Father's School -- & my Great-Grandfather was his Great great Grandfather's Bastard / but it was not this relationship however tender & interesting, which brought us acquainted / -- But Southey & self called upon him, as Authors, he having edited a Tryphiodorus & part of Plutarch & being a notorious Antiministerialist & Freethinker. -- He welcomed us, as he ought to do / -- and we met at dinner Hucks, at whose House I dine on Wednesday -- the man who toured with me into Wales & afterwards published his Tour -- / Kendall, a poet who really looks like a man of Genius, pale ____________________ 1 Thomas Northmore ( 1766-1851). Coleridge mentions his Tρυφιοδώρου ˒Iλίου "AΛωσις. De plurimis mendis purgata, et notis illustrata, 1791, and his Plutarch's Treatise upon the Distinction between a Friend and Flatterer, with Remarks, 1793. -528- & gnostic, has the merit of being a Jacobin or so / but is a shallowist/ and finally, a Mr Bamfield 1 -- a man of sense, information, & various Literature -- and most perfectly a Gentleman -- in short, a pleasant man. At his House we dine to morrow -- / Northmore himself is an honest vehement sort of Fellow, who splutters out all his opinions, like a Fizgig made of Gunpowder not thoroughly dry / sudden & explosive yet ever with an adhesive Blubberliness of Elocution -- Shallow, shallow -- a man who can read Greek well, but shallow -- / yet honest, one who ardently wishes the well-being of his fellow men, & believes that without more Liberty & more Equality this Well being is not possible. He possesses a most noble Library. The Victory at Novi! 2 -- If I were a good Caricaturist, I would sketch off Suwarrow, in a Car of Conquest drawn by huge Crabs!! with what retrograde Majesty the Vehicle advances! He may truly say he came off with Eclat -- i.e. A claw! -- I shall be back at Stowey in less than three weeks -- in the mean time I intreat you, my dearest Poole I to send Ward to my House and on one of the Shelves in the Parlour he will [find] Green's Pamphlet on Godwin 3 -- this he or you will not forget to take on Thursday to Bridgewater, & have it booked in the Exeter Coach, directed to / Mr Southey, at Mr Tucker's, Forestreet Hill, Exeter -- & Southey will walk over with it to me/. This is of the utmost Importance/. --. Likewise, my dear Poole! be so kind as to let me have five guineas / which shall not be long on your Books against us. -- This you will be so good as to transmit to Southey in a letter, from whom I have borrowed it, as soon as convenient -- at all events, within a week or 8 days / as Southey leaves Exeter about that Time / -- /. We hope & trust, your dear Mother remains well. -- Give my filial love to her. -- God bless her! -- I beg my kind Love to Ward. ---- God bless you & S. T. Coleridge Of course, I am uneasy about a House Business --. I am pretty certain, I could have a Pupil on very advantageous Terms. What do you think of this? Let me hear immediately from you -- Of course, you wrote to Stutfield about the Shirt --. -- Southey begs his kind remembrance to you. ____________________ 1 In Letter 298 Coleridge spells this name Banfyl; Southey refers to him as Banfill. 2 At Novi Ligure, Italy, an army of Russians and Austrians under Suvaroff and Melas defeated the French on 15 Aug. 1799. 3 Thomas Green, An Examination of the leading Principles of the New System of Morals in Godwin's Political Justice, 1798. -529- 292. To Robert Southey Address: Mr Southey | Mr Tucker's | Forestreet Hill | Exeter Single MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. E. L. G. i. 124. Stamped: Bridgewater. Wednesday Morning [ 25 September 1799] My dear Southey -- We arrived at Stowey last evening -- & this morning poor Fanny left us. -- As neither Sara or I have as yet any symptoms of infection, I hope & trust, that you & Edith, and Eliza, are safe. -- Believe me, tho' obliged to bear up against the FRESH of my Wife's hypersuperlative Grief on the occasion, I have nevertheless suffered much anxiety lest poor Eliza or Mrs S. should have been colonized by these damn'd invisible Skin-moles -Moses [ Hartley] received the Catholic Sacrament of Unction for the first time last night -- / He was very merry during the performance, singing or chanting -- I be a funny Fellow, And my name is Brimstonello. -- I doubt not, that all will be well by tomorrow or at farthest next day -- for he slept quiet & has never once scratched himself since his Embrimstonement. --/ -- Have you seen Isaac Weld's Travels 1 -- I find them interesting --/ he makes the American appear a most degraded & vile nation. ---In one of the ecclesiastical Historians I find that the Oak which Abraham planted at Mamre, was still existing in the time of Constantine & destroyed by his orders -- a famous Mart being held there every summer, persons of all Religions, both Jews & Christians & Asiatic Gentiles in a general confluence doing honor thereto/ --/ -What a delightful subject this for an eclogue, or pastoral, or philosophical poem -- / William Taylor 2 is the man to write it -- his knowlege, his style, his all-half believing Doubtingness of all, his -- in short, I wish that you would hint it to him. -- I wish, you would make my respects to Dyer, the Bookseller 3 -& beg to know the lowest price at which he will let me have Bacon's Works, & Milton's Prose Works -- / If he mention the former at not above two guineas, I shall have it / Likewise, if he send them, to send his Catalogue -- & should he have a Copy of Taylor's Sermons, by all means to let me have them / ---- / Any parcel for me,to be addressed, Mr T. Poole, the old Angel, Bridgewater ----/ -(for Mr Coleridge.)-- / -- The money shall be payed him immediately ____________________ 1 Isaac Weld, Travels through the States of North America and the Provinces of Upper and Lower Canada during the Years 1795, 1796, and 1797, 1799. 2 William Taylor of Norwich ( 1765-1836), translator and literary critic, was best known for his German studies. 3 Gilbert Dyer ( 1743-1820), bookseller and antiquary of Exeter. He is not to be confused with the poet, George Dyer. -530- on my receipt of the Books, by some of my relations in Exeter. -Tell him, that if he rides any where near Nether Stowey, I hope, he will not forget my invitation, or consider it as a commonplace Compliment. -- That Dyer, whom my Brother names a dark-hearted Jacobin, is really an honest man -- & I like him. The respect to men of Genius which he payed in you in letting you have the Mambrinos, at your own price, pleased me ----/ -- This letter is not worth postage / but my Brain is dry, I having been letter writing the whole morning---- / Sara's love -- she hopes, that if Eliza was gone before Edith received her letter, that Edith has written to caution her of what has happened. I shall go on with the Mohammed 1 / tho' something I must do for pecuniary emolument / -- I think of writing a School-book. -- Let me hear from you & of your proceedings ---- Your's affectionately S. T. Coleridge 293. To George Coleridge Address: Revd G. Coleridge | Ottery St Mary | near | Honiton | Devon MS. Lady Cave. Hitherto unpublished. Stamped: Bridgewater. Sunday, 29th Sept. 1799 Dear Brother The little parcel may be put into the box of my books up at my mother's, & go when they go. -- At Mr Hart's are two folio volumes, Sennerti opera, 2 standing by themselves on the chest in the back part of his Book-golgotha -- / say when you see him that he would much oblige me by letting me have them at the price of their Weight. -- Be so kind as not to forget this -- for there are facts in Sennertus which I mean to cite in a future Work. -- These too may be packed with the others in the Box -- there is ample room for them / & I should be glad to borrow the four books which I have not read, & which lie in our bedroom under the table (there are 5, ____________________ 1 As early as 1 Sept. Coleridge and Southey had planned a poem in hexameters on Mahomet; and though only 14 lines by Coleridge ( Poems, i. 329) and 109 lines by Southey ( Oliver Newman, 1845, p. 118) were actually written, a rather ambitious plan was evolved. In the Mitchell Library, Sydney, Aus. tralia, there is an unpublished manuscript, mainly in Coleridge's handwriting but with corrections and additions by Southey; it gives a bare outline of this proposed poem in eight books. 2 Daniel Sennertus, Opera omnia, 2 vols., 1656. -531- but Morice's Coena quasi κοινη 1 I read, & of course do not want --) I pledge myself to bring them back on my next visit. -- If this can be done, the Box will then be full & I will beg you, or rather Brother Edward as having less to do, to have the said Box well corded, & sent by the Carrier to Exeter to the place where the Taunton Waggon or the Waggon which goes thro' Taunton sets off -- Mr Hart can tell him where it is / the Box, he sent, has arrived safely -- Pray, return my best Thanks to him for his Kindness & Trouble. The address must be -- Mr T. Poole at the Old Angel | Bridgewater. | for Mr Coleridge Oh -- I left the Annual Anthology behind! -- Save, O save it from Edward's papyrologiophagous Cacodaemony! -- It can come with the rest. -- As to the Commemoration Sermon I know but one person now resident at Cambridge -- he is not a Clergyman, and I have not written these 5 years to him. -- But if it would give you any pleasure, I remember very well what Commemoration Sermons are, & will write one with great willingness & without an hour's procrastination -- but I do not know Mr Sparrow's Address, or how I am to convey it. 2 -- I rejoice that young Brimstonello has not proved himself a member of the Propagandi Society / --he seems indeed totally freed. -- But alas! we have reason to suspect that in his fall down the stairs at Exeter he seriously injured the bone -- & poor little Lamb! this morning as his Mother was pushing the door to, he put his little arm in, & bruised it severely. -- We were talking of Hexameters while with you. I will for want of something better fill up the paper with a translation of one of my favourite Psalms into that metre, which allowing trochees for Spondees as the nature of our Language demands, you will find pretty accurate in Scansion. 3 Sink in the Swell of the Ocean! God is our Strength & our Refuge. ____________________ 1 William Morice, Coena quasi κοινη, 1657. 2 Using the Wisdom of Solomon iv. 16 as his text, Coleridge prepared a Commemoration Sermon. He thus describes it: 'The original of a discourse Written for whom I neither know or care as a College Commemoration Sermon -- Oct. 6th 1799. N.B. The one Side is all too hugely beangel'd, the other all too desperately bedevil'd: yet spite of the Flattery, and spite of the Caricature both are Likenesses. Sic de suo opere cogitabat S. T. Coleridge Oct. 8. 1799. Stowey.' [MS. British Museum.] 3 Poems, i. 326. The paraphrase is of Psalm xlvi. -532- There is a River, the Flowing whereof shall gladden the City, Hallelujah! the City of God! Jehova shall help her. The Idolaters raged, the Kingdoms were moving in fury -But He utter'd his Voice: Earth melted away from beneath them. Halleluja! th' Eternal is with us, Almighty Jehova! Fearful the works of the Lord, yea, fearful his Desolations -But He maketh the Battle to cease, he burneth the Spear & the Chariot. Hallelujal th' Eternal is with us, the God of our Fathers! -- God bless you -- We desire love to all. -- Your affectionate S. T. Coleridge 294. To Robert Southey Address: Mr Southey | Mr Tucker's | Forestreet Hill | Exeter Single MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. E. L. G. i. 126. Stamped: Bridgewater. Monday Evening. Sept. 30 [, 1799] My dear Southey I am extremely interested with your account of Mr & Mrs Keenan. You have of course asked her whether Buonaparte is a man of Science / it is the mode & fashion to deny it. -- Do not forget to procure from old Jackson a copy of poor Bamfield's Sonnets & Poems 1 -- he will at least lend them you to copy out: -- & let me know what you think of old Jackson. 2 -- Male and Female Rhymes are neither more or less than single and double Rhymes -- Right, Light, are Masculine Rhymes; Ocean, Motion, feminine. -- At present, they are called Masculine & Feminine, not Male & Female -I should think that in Thalaba it would be better, on many accounts, if Allah were uniformly substituted for God -- the so frequent Repetition of that last word gives somehow or other a sermonic Cast to a Poem / and perhaps too it might give a not altogether unfounded offence, that a name so connected with awful realities, is (so often, & so solemnly) blended with those bold Fictions which ask & gain only a transient Faith. -- But I object now only from Recollection. Our little Hovel is almost afloat -- poor Sara tired off her legs ____________________ 1 John C. Bampfylde ( 1754-96) published Sixteen Sonnets in 1778. 2 William Jackson ( 1780-1808), musical composer of Exeter. It was Jackson who befriended Bampfylde and who gave Southey details of that unfortunate poet's life. See Life and Corres. ii. 26-29. -533- with servanting -- the young one fretful & noisy from confinement exerts his activities on all forbidden Things -- the house stinks of Sulphur -- I however, sunk in Spinoza, remain as undisturbed as a Toad in a Rock / that is to say, when my rheumatic pains are asleep. For you must know that our apothecary persuaded me & Sara to wear Mercurial Girdles, as Preventives -- accordingly Sara arrayed herself with this Cest of the Caledonian Venus, and I eke/ -On the first day I walked myself into a perspiration, and O Christus Jesus! -- how I stunk! -- Convinced as I was before of the necessity of all parts of the human body, I now received double-damning Nose-conviction, that all my pores were Necessary Holes with a Vengeance -- I walked, one Magnum Mercurii Excrementum, cursed with the faculty of Self-sentience. -- Well but the Nose is the most placable of all the senses / and to one's own evil odours one can reconcile oneself almost as easily as to one's own Vices. But whether I caught cold or no, I cannot tell; but the next day a fit of the Rheumatism laid hold of me from the small of my back down to the Calves of my Legs, shooting thro' me like hot arrows headed with adders' Teeth. Since my Rheumatic Fever at School I have suffered nothing like it! -- Of course, I threw off my girdle -- for such damned Twitches! I would rather have old Scratch himself, whom all the Brimstone in Hell can't cure, than endure them! ---- I am still however not free from them / tho' the latter attacks have decreased in violence. You'd laugh to see how pale & haggard I look -- & by way of a Clincher, I am almost certain that Hartley has not had the Itch --. A great affliction has fallen on poor Daddy Rich & his Wife. The old man's Son went away some two years ago for a Marine leaving his Currying Business / to bring him up to which the good old Creature had pinched his Belly & robbed his Back -- / Ever since he has been wishing & praying only to see him once more / and about a fortnight ago he returned, discharged as an ideot. -- The day after I came back to Stowey, I heard a cry of Murder, & rushed into the House, where I found the poor Wretch, whose physiognomy is truly hellish, beating his Father most unmercifully with a great stick -- / I seized him & pinioned him to the wall, till the peace-officer came -- / -- He vows vengeance on me; but what is really shocking he never sees little Hartley but he grins with hideous distortions of rage, & hints that he'll do him a mischief. -And the poor old People, who just get enough to feed themselves, are now absolutely pinched / & never fall to sleep without fear & trembling, lest the Son should rise in a fit of insanity, & murder them. -- I shall not let Poole rest, till he has called the Parish, that something may be done for them. -- -534- The money shall be remitted to Dyer as soon as the Books are received / The Bacon is for Poole. ----- I suppose you have read Stedman's Narrative of an Expedition to Surinam. 1 Vol. 2nd, page 299 are these remarkable Words, 'Vultures are compared by some to the Eagle, though those of Surinam possess very opposite Qualities. They are indeed Birds of Prey, but instead of feeding on what they kill, like the other noble animal, their chief pursuit is Carrion --' Now this tickles me -- the poor Vulture, the useful Scavenger in a Climate where Carrion would but for him breed the plague / the noble Eagle not only useless but a murderer, & probably tainting the air with his half devoured prey --! / There is indeed a sort of living Carrion, Sons of Corruption &c & eke some of the merciful Lady-Planters in Surinam, &c &c, &c, on which the Vulture might, without departing from his utility as a Scavenger, exercise the Eagle attribute of first knocking on the head -- /.When you want a subject for Stewart, do prefix the Quotation from Stedman, & make some Verses underneath. -- As to what you say about the School book, I dissent -- / I am decisive against ever publishing the Letters 2 -- & were I not, it would take me more trouble to fit 'em up, than they are worth. As to a Volume of Poems, I am not in a poetical Mood / & moreover am resolved to publish nothing with my name till my Great Work. -- But the School book, which I am planning, will I think be a lucrative Speculation / & it will be an entertaining Job When I have licked the plan enough for you to discern it's embryo Lineaments, I will send it you / -- There are two works which I particularly want -- & perhaps William Taylor has them -- the one is, Herder's Ideas for the History of the Human Race 3 -- I do not accurately remember the German Title / the second, Zimmerman's Geographie des Mensche 4 -- It is not the Zimmerman who wrote the dull Thing about Solitude 5 -- Would there be any impropriety in your asking W. Taylor to lend them me? -- Probably, you know some one in London who would take the Trouble of receiving them, & booking them off in the Bridgewater Mail, directed to be ____________________ 1 J. G. Stedman, Narrative of a Five Years' Expedition against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam, in Guiana, on the Wild Coast of South America, from the Year 1772 to 1777, 2 vols., 1796. 2 Presumably Coleridge refers to his German letters to Poole and to Mrs. Coleridge. 3 Cf. J. G. von Herder, Ideen zur Philosophie der Geschichte der Mensehheit, 1784-91. 4 Cf. E. A. W. von Zimmermann, Geographische Geschichte des Mensehen, 1784-91. 5 J. G. Zimmermann, ber die Einsamkeit, 1756. The work ran to a number of English editions. -535- left at the old Angel, with my direction. -- But if there be the least Impropriety, I pray you, think no more of it ----- I would take care that they should be safely redelivered within a month --. -- I have very serious Thoughts of trying to get a couple of Pupils / very serious ones. ----- Poole desires to be kindly remembered to you. -- I wrote this Epigram on Naso Rubicund, Esq. a dealer in Secrets. 1 -- You're perfectly safe -- for so ruddy your Nose, That talk what you will, 'tis all under the Rose. I have found the long rigmarole Verses which I wrote about Pratt &c / but there's nothing in 'em, save facility of Language & oddity of Rhyme --. If however I go to Bristol, I will leave it with Cottle to be sent with any parcel that may be moving towards you -- Sara is anxious to hear from Eliza -- She desires her kind Love. Young Brimstonello is fast asleep -- he is a quaint Boy. When I told him, you had sent your love to him in the Letter, he sat, & thought & thought, and at last burst into a fit of Laughter -- /. God bless you & Edith -- & all of us! -- Your's with affectionate Esteem S. T. Coleridge 295. To Thomas Ward Address: To Mr Ward | this pentagonal | Letter | comes | as penn'd. MS. Miss Helen M. Cam. Pub. Thomas Poole, i. 304. 'Letter the first' thanks Ward for some quill pens which he had commissioned the clerk, Govett, to mend; 'Letter the second' is an acknowledgement of another batch of pens which Ward, fearing Govett's might not be satisfactory, prepared himself. Octob. 7. 1799 Stowey Letter the first My dear Ward Thank you! -- S. T. Coleridge Letter the second Most exquisite Benefactor! -- I will speak dirt & daggers of the Wretch who shall deny thee to be the most heaven-inspired, munificent Penmaker that these latter Times, these superficial, weak, and evirtuate ages, have produced -- to redeem themselves from ignominy! -- And may he, great Calamist! who shall vilipend or derogate from thy penmaking merits, do penance & suffer penitential penality, penn'd up in some penurious peninsula of ____________________ 1 Poems, ii. 958. -536- penal & penetrant Fire, pensive and pendulous, pending a huge slice of Eternity! -- Were I to write till Pentecost, filling whole Pentateuchs, my grateful Expressions would still remain merely a Penumbra of my Debt & Gratitude - thine, S. T. Coleridge Your Messenger neither came or returns penniless. 296. To Thomas Ward Address: Mr Ward | at Mr T. Poole's | Nether Stowey | Somerset MS. Miss Helen M. Cam. Pub. Thomas Poole, i. 305. 1799 -- Oct. 8 Ward! I recant -- I recant -- solemnly recant and disannul all praise, puff, and panegyric on you and your damn'd Pens -- I have this moment read the note which you had wrapped round your last present1 -- and last night therefore wrote my Elogy on the assured Belief that the first Batch were your's, and before I had tried the second --. -- The second! I'm sick on't -- such execrable Blurrers of innocent white paper, Villains with uneven Legs -- Hexameter & Pentameter Pens -- Elogy -- no -- no -- no -- Elegies written with elegiac Pens (whose L E Gees I wish in your Guts) elegies on my poor Thoughts doing penance in white sheets, filthily illegible -- My 1 ' T Ward not having had time to mend the pens before tea delegated that commission to Rd. Govett, but fearing their workmanship may not prove of so superior a kind as his own, he now begs Mr Coleridge's acceptance of these few pens which are his own manufacture, and which he hopes will suit Mr C ----' On Ward's note Coleridge wrote the following fable: The Fox, the Goose, and the Swan, a new Fable. The Fox observing a white Bird on the lake thought it a Goose -- leapt in, & meant to have payed his respects, but met such a rebuff as had nearly made his fate similar to that of his namesake, the celebrated Guy. However he got off -- with a most profound respect for the supposed Goose; but soon received a Message from the Goose to this purport -- Dear Frind! I have sent this hopping -- hir'd has ow u dun mee the onnur of a vissat -- sorry u dident hap to have meat with I -- / That dowdy lanky neck'd Thing that u saw is a distant relashon of I's, and I suffers r to swum about the Pond when I is not at hum / but I is at hum now -- & hop for the onnur of ure cumpany -- Your luvving Frind Guse. The Fox came -- & -- you guess the Rest. -- / / This Fable I address to the Writer of the above notable instance of Incapacity self-detected thro' Vardty! -- -537- rage prevents me from writing sense -- but o Govatt! dear Govatt! kick that spectacle-mongering Son of Pen-hatchet out of Creation -and remain alone, from the date hereof invested with the rank and office of Penmaker to my immortal Bardship, with all the dignities and emoluments thereunto annexed -- Given from Apollo's | Temple in the | odoriferous Lime-Grove -alias | Street ----- in what | olympiad our Inspiration | knows not, but of the | usurping Christian Æra | 1799 -- Oct. 8. S. T. Coleridge Govatt is expected to express his Gratitude by an immediate present of half a dozen pens -- amended if indeed the reprobates be not incorrigible. -- 297. To William Wordsworth Pub. Memoirs of Wordsworth, i. 159. Oct. 12. 1799 I long to see what you have been doing. O let it be the tail-piece of 'The Recluse!' for of nothing but 'The Recluse' can I hear patiently. That it is to be addressed to me makes me more desirous that it should not be a poem of itself. To be addressed, as a beloved man, by a thinker, at the close of such a poem as 'The Recluse,' a poem non unius populi, is the only event, I believe, capable of inciting in me an hour's vanity -- vanity, nay, it is too good a feeling to be so called; it would indeed be a self-elevation produced ab extra. 1 298. To Robert Southey Address: Mr Southey | Burton | near | Ringwood | Hampshire Single Sheet MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 307. Stamped: Bridgewater. Stowey, Tuesday Evening, Oct. 15,1799 It is fashionable among our philosophizers to assert the existence of a surplus of misery in the world / which in my opinion is no proof, that either systematic Thinking or unaffected Self-observation is fashionable among them. -- But Hume wrote -- and the French imitated him -- and we the French -- and the French us -- and so philosophisms fly to and fro -- in serieses of imitated Imitations -- Shadows of shadows of shadows of a farthing Candle placed between two Looking-glasses. I was meditating on this when I received your last letter -- so I have begun with it. For in truth, ____________________ 1 The poem addressed to Coleridge became, of course, The Prelude. -538- my dear Southey! -- I am harrassed with the Rheumatism in my head and shoulders not without arm-and-thigh-twitches -- / but when the Pain intermits, it leaves my sensitive Frame so sensitive! My enjoyments are so deep, of the fire, of the Candle, of the Thought I am thinking, of the old Folio I am reading -- and the silence of the silent House is so most & very delightful -- that upon my soul! the Rheumatism is no such bad thing as people make for. -- And yet I have & do suffer from it, in much pain, and sleeplessness, & often sick at stomach thro' indigestion of the Food, which I eat from Compulsion -- / -- Since I received your former Letter, I have spent a few days at Upcott; 1 but was too unwell to be comfortable -- so I returned yesterday. -- Poor Tom! he has an adventurous Calling. I have so wholly forgotten my Geography, that I don't know where Ferrols 2 is, whether in France or Spain --. Your dear Mother must be very anxious indeed. -- If he return safe, it will have been good -- God grant, he may! ----- MASSENA! -- and what say you of the Resurrection & Glorification of the Saviour of the East after his Tryals in the Wilderness? 3 I am afraid that this is a piece of Blasphemy -- / but it was in simple verity such an Infusion of animal Spirits into me -- / -Buonaparte --! Buonaparte! dear dear DEAR Buonaparte! -- It would be no bad fun to hear the Clerk of the Privy Council read this paragraph before Pitt &c. -- You ill-looking frog-voiced Reptile! mind you lay the proper emphasis on the third DEAR / or I'll split your Clerkship's Skull for you! -- Poole has ordered a paper ----- he has found out, he says, why the newspapers had become so indifferent to him. -- Inventive Genius!s ----- he begs his kind remembrances to you -- / in consequence of the News he burns, like Greek Fire, under all the Wets and Waters of this health-and-harvest-destroying Weather. -- He flames while his Barley smokes ----- see! he says how it grows out again, ruining the prospects of those, who had cut it down! -- You are harvest man enough, I suppose, to understand the metaphor. -- Jackson is, I believe, out of all doubt a bad man. Why is it, if it be -- and I fear, it is -- why is it that the studies of Music & Painting are so unfavorable to the human Heart? -- Painters have been commonly very clever men -- which is not so generally the case with Musicians -- but both alike are almost uniformly ____________________ 1 The temporary residence of Josiah Wedgwood. 2 An erroneous report had reached England that the Sylph, on which Southey's brother Thomas was a midshipman, had been captured and brought to the port of Ferrol, a seaport in the province of Coruña, Spain. 3 On 25-26 Sept. 1799 André Masséna won a battle over the Russians at Zürich, where he had been earlier defeated by the Austrians in June. -539- Debauchees. -- It is superfluous to say how much your account of Bampfylde interested me -- / -- Predisposition to Madness gave him a cast of originality -- and he had a species of Taste which only Genius could give; but his Genius does not appear a powerful or ebullient Faculty -- / nearer to Lamb's than to the Gebir-man. 1 So I judge from the few specimens I have seen / if you think otherwise, you are right, I doubt not. -- I shall be glad to give Mr & Mrs Keenan the right hand of welcome with looks & tones in fit accompaniment -- / for the Wife of a man of Genius who sympathizes effectively with her Husband in his habits & feelings is a rara avis with me; tho' a vast majority of her own sex & too many of ours will scout her for a rara piscis. -- If I am well enough, Sara & I go to Bristol in a few days -- I hope, they will not come in the mean time. It is singularly unpleasant to me that I cannot renew our late acquaintance in Exeter without creating very serious uneasinesses at Ottery: Northmore is so preeminently an offensive character to the Aristocrats. -- He sent Payne's Books as a present to a Clergyman of my Brother's Acquaintance / a Mr Markes -- this was silly enough. -- Either however I will not visit Exeter, or I will visit Banfyl / for I am much taken with him. -- Did Hucks say aught of having received a letter from me, from Taunton, written on the same day on which we left Ottery? ----- Talking of Lane & Cosserat, do you know Baugh Allen, who was I believe in the same form with you --? -- Your intelligence concerning George Dyer rejoices me. -- I will set about Christabel with all speed; but I do not think it a fit opening Poem. -- What I think would be a fit opener, and what I would humbly lay before you as the best plan of the next anthologia, 2 I will communicate shortly in another letter entirely on this Subject. -- Mohammed I will not forsake; but my money-book I must write first. ----- In the last, or at least, in a late, monthly Magazine was an Essay on a Jesuitic Conspiracy & about the Russians. There was so much Genius in it, that I suspected William Taylor for the author -- but the style was so nauseously affected, so absurdly pedantic, that I was half-angry with myself for the suspicion. Have you seen Bishop Prettyman's Book? 3 ----- I hear, it is a curiosity. You remember Scott, the Attorney -- who held such a disquisition on my Simile of Property resembling Matter rather than Blood? -- and eke of St John? ____________________ 1 Coleridge did not know that Walter Savage Landor was the author of Gebir, published anonymously in 1798. 2 Coleridge refers to the Annual Anthology, edited by Southey in 1799 and 1800. Christabel was not published until 1816. 3 George Pretyman, Bishop of Lincoln, published Elements of Christian Theology in 1799. -540- And you remember too that I shewed him in my Face that there was no Room for him in my heart? -- Well, Sir! this man has taken a most deadly Hatred to me -- & how do you think he revenges himself? -- He imagines that I write for the Morning Post -- and he goes regularly to the Coffee houses, calls for the Paper -- & reading in it observes aloud -- 'What damn'd Stuff of Poetry is always crammed in this paper -----! such damn'd silly Nonsense! I wonder what Coxcomb it is that writes it! I wish, the Paper was kicked out of the Coffee House! --' Now but for Cruckshanks I could play Scott a precious Trick by sending to Stuart -- the Angry Attorney, a true Tale -- and I know more than enough of Scott's most singular particoloured Rascalities to make a most humorous & biting Satire of it. I have heard of a young Quaker who went to the Lobby, with a whore under his arm, a monstrous military cock'd Hat on his Head, with a scarlet coat, & up to his mouth in flower'd Muslin -swearing too most bloodily -- all 'that he might not be unlike other people!' A Quaker's Son getting himself christen'd to avoid being remarkable is as improbable a Lie as ever Self-delusion permitted the heart to impose upon the understanding -- or the understanding to invent without consent of the heart. -- But so it is. 1 -- Soon after Lloyd's arrival at Cambridge I understand Christopher Wordsworth wrote his Uncle Mr Cookson, that Lloyd was going to read Greek with him -- Cookson wrote back recommending caution & whether or no an intimacy with so marked a character might not be prejudicial to his academical Interests -- (this in his usual mild manner --) Christopher Wordsworth returned for answer that Lloyd was by no means a Democrat, & as a proof of it, transcribed the most favorable Passages from the Edmund Oliver -- and here the affair ended. -- You remember Lloyd's own account of this story of course more accurately than I -- and can therefore best judge how far my suspicions of falsehood & exaggeration were wellfounded. -- My dear Southey I the having a bad Heart, and the not having a good one are different Things. That Charles Lloyd has a bad Heart, I do not even think; but I venture to say & that openly, that he has not a good one. -- He is unfit to be any man's Friend, and to all but a very guarded man he is a perilous acquaintance. -Your conduct towards him, while it is wise, will, I doubt not, be ____________________ 1 In an unpublished letter to Coleridge Southey had written that Charles Lloyd's 'motive for being christened was that he might not be unlike other people, . . . and that he did not mean to budge an inch in matters of conscience. . . . With the conviction I feel that he has belied you and me to each other, I am somewhat irresolute how to act towards him.' MS. Bodleian Library. -541- gentle -- of confidence he is not worthy; but social Kindness and communicativeness purely intellectual can do you no harm, and may be the means of benefiting his character essentially. Aut ama me quia sum Dei, aut ut sim Dei, said St Augustin -- and in the laxer sense of the word 'Ama' there is wisdom in the expression notwithstanding it's wit. -- Besides, it is the way of PEACE. I have great affection for Lamb / but I have likewise a perfect Lloydand-Lambophobia! -- Independent of the irritation attending an epistolary Controversy with them, their Prose comes so damn'd dear! - Lloyd especially writes with a woman's fluency in a large rambling hand -- most dull tho' profuse of Feeling -- / I received from them in the last Quarter Letters so many, that with the Postage I might have bought Birch's Milton. ----- Sara will write soon -- our Love to Edith & your Mother -- from Bristol perhaps I go to London 1 / but I will write you where I am. Your's affectionately S. T. Coleridge 299. To Dorothy Wordsworth Transcript Mary Wordsworth, Dove Cottage. Pub. with omis. Memoirs of Wordsworth, i. 147. Across the top of her transcript Mary Wordsworth wrote: 'Extract from a letter written . . . from Keswick to D. W. to Sockburn where they left her to make an Excursion among the Lakes -- Coleridge's first visit ____________________ 1 Shortly after this letter was written, Coleridge left Stowey for Bristol, but instead of going to London he set off with Cottle on a trip to Sockburn, Durham, where the Wordsworths were visiting the Hutchinsons. That Coleridge rushed off to Sockburn without notifying Mrs. Coleridge is evident from her letter to her sister-in-law, Mrs. George Coleridge. The letter is dated 2 Nov. 1799 and was written from Old Cleeve Vicarage, a small hamlet near Watchet and twelve miles from Nether Stowey. 'You will perceive by the date of this that all my troubles respecting the Child are at an end. He is, I thank God I in all respects perfectly well. We have been at this place above a week, that is, myself and Hartley; for Samuel has been in Bristol nearly a fortnight. He left Stowey with an intention of proceeding to London in search of his travel. ling Chests if he did not find them in Bristol, but fortunately they arrived at Stowey two days after his departure. I am going to Stowey to-morrow and hope to find him safe at Mr Poole's, for our Cottage is shut up. . . . Samuel, too, . . . had the Rheumatism by getting wet through, and remaining unchanged. He went to Upcott in the midst of his pain, that I might have the house, sheets, blankets, and Cloaths washed, and the latter buried, but the scent still remains. . . . I expect when I return to Stowey, if Coleridge is not there, to find a letter inviting me and the Child to Bristol, for as I have no maid I cannot remain in the house alone.' (MS. letter.) In view of the affectionate letters Coleridge sent his wife from Germany, his abrupt and unannounced departure for the north is a little surprising. Apparently he did not write to her until December, for when he wrote to Cottle early in that month he did not even know where she was! -542- to the North --' Of this joint journal letter written by Coleridge and Words. worth during their tour in 1799 only the excerpts made by Mrs. Wordsworth survive. In order to give continuity to the account of Coleridge's activities I have printed the whole of the transcript, including the Wordsworth extracts. Coleridge left Bristol in the company of Cottle on 22 October, 'for my most important journey to the North', and was at Sockburn by 26 October. The next day he, Cottle, and Wordsworth set off for the Lake Country, but on 80 October Cottle returned to Bristol by way of London. Wordsworth and Coleridge continued their excursion, lingering several days in Grasmere, and arrived at Keswick, presumably on 10 November. John Wordsworth, the poet's brother, was a member of the party from 80 October to 5 November. See G. H. B. Coleridge, Samuel Taylor Coleridge discovers the Lake Country, Wordsworth and Coleridge, ed. by E. L. Griggs, 1939, pp. 135-49, for an account of the excursion drawn from Coleridge's notebooks. [ Keswick, circa 10 November 1799] . . . William has received your 2 letters. At Temple Sowerby we met your Br. John who accompanied us to Hawes Water, Windermere, Ambleside & the divine Sisters, Rydal & Grasmere -- here we [he] stayed two days, & left on Tuesday [5 November]. We accompanied John over the fork of Helvellyn on a day when light & darkness coexisted in contiguous masses, & the earth & sky were but one! Nature lived for us in all her grandest accidents -- we quitted him by a wild Tarn just as we caught a view of the gloomy Ulswater. Your Br. John is one of you; a man who hath solitary usings of his own Intellect, deep in feeling, with a subtle Tact, a swift instinct of Truth & Beauty. He interests me much. It was most lucky for us that poor dear Cottle returned. His timidity is indeed not greater than is easily explicable from his lameness & sedentary STATIONERY occupations; but it is extreme, & poor dear fellow! his self-involution (for Alfred is his Self) O me that Alfred! 1 William & I have atchieved one good Thing -- he has solemnly promised not to publish on his own account. S. T. C. [W.W. writes upon the same sheet.] . . . We left Cottle as you know on Wed. Mg. [30 October] at Greta Bridge. We were obliged to take the Mail over Stanemoor, the road interesting with sun & mist. At Temple Sowerby I learned from the address of a letter lying on the table with the Cambridge post mark, the Letter from Kit 2 to Mrs C. 3 that he was gone to Cambridge. I learned also from the Woman that John was at New-biggin. I sent a note -- he came, looks very well -- . . . Your Uncle has left you £100, nobody else is named in his Will. Having ____________________ 1 Coleridge refers to Cottle's Alfred, an Epic Poem, 2 vols., 1801. 2 Wordsworth's youngest brother, Christopher ( 1774-1846). 3 Mrs. Crackanthorpe, widow of Wordsworth's maternal uncle, Christopher Crackanthorpe ( Cookson). -543- learnt our plans said he would accompany us a few days. Next day, Thursday we set off, & dined at Mr Myers', thence to Bampton where we slept -- on Friday proceeded along the Lake of Hawes water (a noble scene which pleased us much) the mists hung so low upon the mountains that we could not go directly over to Ambleside, so went round by Long Sleddale to Kentmere. Next to Troutbeck, & thence by Rayrigg & Bowness -- a rainy & raw day, did not stop at Bowness but went on to the Ferry -- a cold passage -were much disgusted with the New Erections & objects about Windermere -- thence to Hawkshead --. . . No horses or lodgings at Hawkshead; great change among the People since we were last there. Next day Sunday [8 November] by Rydal & the Road by which we approached Grasmere to Robt. Newton's. Coleridge enchanted with Grasmere & Rydal. At Robt. Newton's we have remained till to day. John left us on Tuesday; we walked with him to the Tarn. . . . This day was a fine one & we had some grand mountain scenery -- the rest of the week has been bad weather. -- Yesterday we set off with a view of going to Dungeon Ghyll -- the day so bad forced to return. The evening before last we walked to the upper Water fall at Rydal & saw it through the gloom, & it was very magnificent. C. was much struck with Grasmere & its neighbourhood & I have much to say to you, you will think my plan a mad one, but I have thought of building a house there by the Lake side. John would give me £40 to buy the ground, & for £250 I am sure I could build one as good as we can wish. I speak with tolerable certainty on this head as a Devonshire Gentleman has built a Cottage there which cost a £130 which would exactly suit us every way, but the size of the bed rooms; we shall talk of this. . . . We shall go to Buttermere the day after tomorrow but I think it will be full ten days before we shall see you. There is a small house at Grasmere 1 empty which perhaps we may take, & purchase furniture but of this we will speak; but I shall write again when I. know more on this subject. W. W. [ Coleridge writes again.] You can feel what I cannot express for myself -- how deeply I have been impressed by a world of scenery absolutely new to me. At Rydal & Grasmere I recd I think the deepest delight, yet Hawes Water thro' many a varying view kept my eyes dim with tears, and this evening, approaching Derwentwater in diversity ____________________ 1 Wordsworth and Dorothy entered Dove Cottage on 20 Dec. 1799. See Early Letters, 284. -544- of harmonious features, in the majesty of its beauties & in the Beauty of its majesty -- O my God! & the Black Crags close under the snowy mountains, whose snows were pinkish with the setting sun & the reflections from the sandy rich Clouds that floated over some & rested upon others! It was to me a vision of a fair Country. Why were you not with us Dorothy? Why were not you Mary with us? 300. To Robert Southey MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 312. Keswick, Sunday Nov. 10 [ 1799] My dear Southey I am anxious lest so long silence should seem unaffectionate / or I would not, having so little to say, write to you from such a distant corner of the Kingdom. I was called up to the North by alarming accounts of Wordsworth's Health / which, thank God! are but little more than alarms -- Since, I have visited the Lakes / & in a pecuniary way have made the Trip answer to me. -- From hence I go to London / having had (by accident here) a sort of offer made to me of a pleasant kind, 1 which, if it turn out well, will enable me & Sara to reside in London for the next four or five months -- a thing I wish extremely on many & important accounts. So much for myself. -- In my last letter I said I would give you my reasons for thinking Christabel, were it finished & finished as spiritedly as it commences, yet still an improper opening Poem. My reason is -- it cannot be expected to please all / Those who dislike it will deem it extravagant Ravings, & go on thro' the rest of the Collection with the feeling of Disgust -- & it is not impossible that were it liked by any, it would still not harmonize with the real-life Poems that follow. -- It ought I think to be the last. -The first ought, me judice, to be a poem in couplets, didactic or satirical -- such a one as the lovers of genuine poetry would call sensible and entertaining, such as the Ignoramuses & Popeadmirers would deem genuine Poetry. -- I had planned such a one; & but for the absolute necessity of scribbling prose I should have written it. -- The great & master fault of the last anthology was the want of arrangement / it is called a Collection, & meant to be continued annually; yet was distinguished in nothing from any other single volume of poems, equally good. -- Your's ought to have been a cabinet with proper compartments, & papers in them. ____________________ 1 Daniel Stuart had offered Coleridge regular employment on the Morning Post. -545- Whereas it was only the Papers. -- Some such arrangement as this should have been adopted / First, Satirical & Didactic. 2. Lyrical. 8. Narrative. 4. Levities ----- Sic positi quoniam suaves miscetis odores. 1 -- . -- Neve inter vites corylum sere, 2 is, I am convinced, excellent advice of Master Virgil's. -- N.B. A Good Motto -- 'tis from Virgil's seventh Eclogue, 61 Line -- Populus Alcidae gratissima, vitis Iaccho, Formosae myrtus Veneri, sua laurea Phoebo; Phyllis amat corylos. But still, my dear Southey! it goes grievously against the Grain with me, that you should be editing anthologies. I would to Heaven, that you could afford to write nothing, or at least, to publish nothing till the completion & publication of the Madoc. 3 I feel as certain, as my mind dare feel on any subject, that it would lift you with a spring into a reputation that would give immediate sale to your after Compositions, & a license of writing more at ease. -- Whereas Thalaba 4 would gain you (for a time at least) more ridiculers than admirers -- & the Madoc might in consequence be welcomed with an Ecce iterum. -- Of course, I mean the verse & metres of Thalaba. ----- Do, do, my dear Southeyl publish the Madoc quam citissime -- not hastily, but yet speedily. -- I will instantly publish an Essay on Epic Poetry in reference to it -- / I have been reading the Æneid -- & there you will be all victorious, excepting the importance of Æneas, & his connection with events existing in Virgil's Time. -- This cannot be said of Madoc / there are other faults in the construction of your poem, but nothing compared to those in the Æneid -- / Homer I shall read too -- that is -if I can / for the good old . . . [remainder of manuscript missing.] 301.To Joseph Cottle Pub. Early Rec. i. 255. To this letter Cottle added as a postscript a passage from Letter 195. Leaving Keswick on 11 November, Wordsworth and Coleridge continued their tour of the Lake Country for another week or ten days; but by 24 November Coleridge had parted from Wordsworth and was back again with the Hutchinsons at Sockburn. A notebook entry for that date records a flirtation with Sara. Hutchinson, for whom he was to harbour a hopeless passion for many years. See T. M. Raysor, Coleridge and "Asra, Studies in Philology, July 1929, p. 807. ____________________ 1 Virgil, Eclogue, ii. 55. 2 Id. Georgics, ii. 299. 3 Madoc, published 1805. 4 Thalaba the Destroyer, published 1801. -546- London, [Circa 1 December 1799] 1 Dear Cottle, If Mrs. Coleridge be in Bristol, pray desire her to write to me immediately, and I beg you, the moment you receive this letter, to send to No. 17, Newfoundland Street, to know whether she be there. I have written to Stowey, but if she be in Bristol, beg her to write me of it by return of post, that I may immediately send down some cash for her travelling expenses, &c. We shall reside in London for the next four months. God bless you, Cottle, I love you, S. T. Coleridge. 302. To William Wordsworth Pub. Memoirs of Wordsworth, i. 160. London, Dec. 1799 2 As to myself, I dedicate my nights and days to Stuart. . . . By all means let me have the tragedy and ' Peter Bell' as soon as possible. 3 303. To Robert Southey Address: Mr. Southey ∣ Kingsdown Parade ∣ Bristol Single MS.Lord Latymer. Pub. Letters, i. 314. Postmark: 19 December 1799. Thursday Evening. [ 19 December 1799] 4 My dear Southey I pray you in your next give me the particulars of your Health. I hear accounts so contradictory that I know only enough to be a good deal frightened. -- You will surely think it your duty to suspend all intellectual exertion -- as to money, you will get it easily enough. You may easily make twice the money you receive from Stewart by the use of the Scissors / for your name is prodigiously high among the London Publishers. I would to God, your Health permitted you to come to London -- You might have Lodgings in the same House with us, & this I am certain of, that ____________________ 1 Coleridge arrived in London 27 Nov. 1799; this letter must have been written shortly afterwards. 2 This fragment is probably from one of the 'two Letters' Wordsworth mentions finding at Grasmere on his arrival there on 20 Dec. Early Letters, 284. 3 On 24 Dec. Wordsworth wrote in answer to this letter: 'As to the Tragedy and Peter Bell, D will do all in her power to put them forward.' Ibid. 287. 4 Misdated 'December 9, [1799]' by E. H. Coleridge. -547- not even Kingsdown is a more airy or heealthful Place. I have enough for us to do that would be mere Child's work to us, and in which the Women might assist us essentially -- by the doing of which we might easily get 150£ each before the first of April. This I speak not from Guess but from absolute Conditions with Booksellers. The principal work to which I allude would be likewise a great source of amusement & profit to us in the Execution / & assuredly we should be a mutual comfort to each other. This I should press on you, were not Davy 1 at Bristol -- but he is indeed an admirable young man / not only must he be of comfort to you / but on whom can you place such reliance as a medical man? -- But for Davy, I should advise your coming to London / the difference of expence for three months could not be above 50£ -- I do not see how it could be half as much. But I pray you write me all particulars-how you have been, how you are -- & what you think the particular nature of your Disease. Now for poor George. 2 Assuredly I am ready & willing to become his Bondsman for 500£, if on the whole you think the Scheme a good one --. I see enough of the Boy to be fully convinced of his goodness & well-intentionedness -- of his present or probable Talents I know little. To remain all his Life an under Clerk as many have done; and earn 50£ a year in his old age with a trembling hand ----- alas! that were a dreary Prospect. No Creature under the Sun is so helpless, so unfitted, I should think, for any other mode of Life as a Clerk, a mere Clerk. -- Yet still many have begun so -- & risen into wealth & importance -- & it is not impossible that before his term closed we might be able, if nought better offered, perhaps to procure him a place in some public office. -- We might between us keep him neat in Cloaths from our own Wardrobes, I should think -- & I am ready to allow five guineas this year in addition to Mr Savary's twelve £. More I am not justified to promise. Yet still I think it matter of much reflection with you -- The Commercial Prospects of this Country are, in my opinion, gloomy -- our present Commerce is enormous --; that it must diminish after a peace is certain / & should any accident injure the West India Trade, & give to France a Paramountship in the American Affections, that diminution would be vast indeed -- & of course, great would be the number of Clerks etc wholly out of employment. This is no visionary speculation: for we are consulting concerning a Life for probably ____________________ 1 Hurnphry Davy ( 1778-1829). Davy, a native of Cornwall, arrived in Bristol on 2 Oct. 1798 to join Dr. Beddoes's Pneumatic Institution. Coleridge probably met him just before going from Bristol to Sockburn in Oct. 1799. 2 George Fricker, Mrs. Coleridge's brother. Southey had written that 'Savary will take George into his bank -- if we each become security for £500.' -548- 50 years. I should have given a more intense conviction to the goodness of the former Scheme of apprenticing him to a Printer / & would make every exertion to raise any share of the money wanting. -- However, all this is talk at random / I leave it to you to decide. -- What does Charles Danvers think? He has been very kind to George -- but to whom is he not kind, that body-bloodbone-muscle-nerve-heart & head-good Man! -- I lay final stress on his opinion in almost every thing except verses -- / those I know more about than he does -- 'God bless him, to use a vulgar Phrase.' -- This is a quotation from Godwin who used these words in conversation with me & Davy -- the pedantry of atheism tickled me hugely. -- Godwin is no great Things in Intellect; but in heart & manner he is all the better for having been the Husband of Mary Wolstonecroft --. 1 Why did not George Dyer (who bye the bye has written a silly milk-&-water Life of you, 2 in which your Talents for pastoral & rural imagery are extolled, in which you are asserted to be a Republican) why did not George Dyer send to the Anthology that Poem in the last monthly Magazine? -- It is so very far superior to any thing I have ever seen of his -- & might have made some atonement for his former Transgressions. -- God love him -- he is a very good man; but he ought not to degrade himself by writing Lives of Living Characters for Phillips; & all his Friends make wry faces, peeping out of the Pillory of his advertisemental Notes. -- I hold to my former opinion concerning the arrangement of the anthology / & the Booksellers, with whom I have talked, coincide with me. -On this I am decided, that all the light Pieces should be put together under one tit[le] with a motto thus -- Nos haec novimus esse nihil 3 -- Phillis amat corylos. --. -- I am afraid that I have scarce poetic Enthusiasm enough to finish Christabel -- but the poem, with which Davy is so much delighted, I probably may finish time enough. -- I shall probably not publish my letters -- & if I do, I shall most certainly not publish any verses in them. Of course, I expect to see them in the Anthology. -- As to title, I ____________________ 1 Mary Wollstonecraft ( 1759-97), author of Vindication of the Rights of Women, 1792, had married Godwin in Mar. 1797. 2 'A gossiping account of the early history and writings of "Mr. Robert Southey" appeared in Public Characters for 1799-1800, a humble forerunner of Men of the Time, published by Richard Phillips, the founder of the Monthly Magazine, and afterwards knighted as a sheriff of the city of London. Possibly Coleridge was displeased at the mention of his name in connexion with Pantisocracy, and still more by the following sentence: "The three young poetical friends, Lovel, Southey, and Coleridge, married three sisters. Southey is attached to domestic life, and, fortunately, was very happy in his matrimonial connection".' Letters, i. 317 n. 3 Southey used this motto in The Minor Poems of Robert Southey, 3 vols., 1815. -549- should wish a fictitious one or none / were I sure, that I could finish the poem, I spoke of. -- I do not know how to get the conclusion of Mrs Robinson's Poem for you -- perhaps, it were better omitted -- & I mean to put the thoughts of that Concert Poem into smoother metre. 1 -- Our 'Devil's Thoughts' 2 have been admired far & wide -- most enthusiasticallyadmired I I wish to have my name in the Collection at all events; but I should better like it to better poems than those I have been hitherto able to give you. -- But I will write again on Saturday. Supposing that Johnson should mean to do nothing more with the Fears in Solitude & the two accompanying Poems, would they be excluded from the Plan of your Anthology? 3 -- There were not above two hundred sold -- and what is that to a newspaper Circulation? Collins's Odes were thus reprinted in Dodsley's Collection. As to my future Residence I can say nothing -- only this, that to be near you would be a strong motive with me, for my Wife's sake as well as myself. -- I think it not impossible, that a number might be found to go with you & settle in a warmer Climate. -- My kind Love to your Wife -- Sara & Hartley arrived safe, and here they are -- No / 21, Buckingham Street, Strand. -- God bless you & your affectionate S. T. Coleridge P.S. Mary Hayes 4 is writing the Lives of famous Women -- & is now about your friend, Joan. She begs you to tell her what books to consult, or to communicate something to her. -- This from Tobin who sends his Love. -- 304. To the Editor of the 'Morning Post' Pub. Morning Post, 21 December 1799. Since the poem, Introduction to the Tale of the Dark Ladie, is printed in Poems, ii. 1052, in the form in which it appeared in the Morning Post, it has been omitted here. See Letter 887 for the version of the poem published in Lyrical Ballads, 1800, where it is entitled Love. December 21, 1799 Sir, The following Poem is the Introduction to a somewhat longer one, for which I shall solicit insertion on your next open day. The use of the Old Ballad word, Ladie, for Lady, is the only piece of ____________________ 1 First published in the Morning Post, 24 Sept 1799. Poems, i. 324. 2 This joint production of Coleridge and Southey was published anony. mously in the Morning Post, 6 Sept 1799. Poems, i. 819. 3 Fears in Solitude, and the accompanying poems, France, an Ode, and Frost at Midnight, published by Johnson in 1798, were not included in the Annual Anthology. 4 Mary Hays published Female Biography, or Memoirs of Illustrious and Celebrated Women, 6 vols., 1803. -550- obsoleteness in it; and as it is professedly a tale of antient times, I trust, that 'the affectionate lovers of venerable antiquity' (as Cambden says) will grant me their pardon, and perhaps may be induced to admit a force and propriety in it. A heavier objection may be adduced against the Author, that in these times of fear and expectation, when novelties explode around us in all directions, he should presume to offer to the public a silly tale of old fashioned love: and, five years ago, I own, I should have allowed and felt the force of this objection. But, alas! explosion has succeeded explosion so rapidly, that novelty itself ceases to appear new; and it is possible that now, even a simple story, wholly unspired [unspiced?] with politics or personality, may find some attention amid the hubbub of Revolutions, as to those who have remained a long time by the falls of Niagara, the lowest whispering becomes distinctly audible. S. T. Coleridge. 305. To Robert Southey Address: Mr Southey | Kingsdown Parade | Bristol Single MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. Letters, i. 319. Postmark: 25 December 1799. Tuesday Night -- 12 o/clock. [ 24 December 1799] My dear Southey My Spinosism (if Spinosism it be and i' faith 'tis very like it) disposed me to consider this big City as that part of the Supreme One, which the prophet Moses was allowed to see. -- I should be more disposed to pull off my shoes, beholding him in a Bush, than while I am forcing my reason to believe that even in Theatres he is, yea, even in the Opera House. -- / ----- Your Thalaba will beyond all doubt bring you 200£, if you will sell it at once -- but do not print at a venture, under the notion of selling the Edition ----- I assure you, that Longman regretted the Bargain he made with Cottle concerning the 2nd Edition of the Joan of Arc -- & is indisposed to similar negociations --; but most & very eager to have the property of your works at almost any price. -- If you have not heard it from Cottle, why, you may hear it from me -- that in the arrangement of Cottle's affairs in London the whole & total Copyright of your Joan & the first Volume of your poems (exclusive of what Longman had before given) was taken by him at 370£ -- You are a strong Swimmer & have borne up poor Joey with all his leaden weights about him, his own & other people's. -- Nothing has answered to him but your works. By me he has lost somewhat -- by Fox, Amos, & himself very much. I can -551- sell your Thalaba quite as well in your absence as in your presence. -I am employed from I-rise to I-set -- i.e. from 9 in the morning to 12 at night -- a pure Scribbler. My Mornings to Booksellers' Compilations 1 -- after dinner to Stewart, who pays all my expences here, let them be what they will --: the earnings of the Morning go to make up an 150£ for my year's expenditure --: for supposing all clear, my year's ( 1800) allowance is anticipated. But this I can do by the first of April / at which time I leave London. -- For Stewart I write often his leading Paragraphs, on Secession, Peace, Essay on the new French Constitution, Advice to Friends of Freedom, 2 Critiques on Sir W. Anderson's nose, 3 Ode to Georgiana, D. of D. 4 (horribly misprinted) christmas Caro 5, &c &c -- any thing not bad in the Paper that is not your's is mine -- so if any Verses there strike you as worthy the Anthology, 'do me the honor, Sir!' -- However, in the course of a week I do mean to conduct a series of Essays in that paper, which may be of public Utility. So much for myself -- except that I long to be out of London; & that my Xstmas Carol is a quaint performance -- & in as strict a sense as is possible, an Impromptu. Had I done all I had planned, that Ode to the Dutchess would have been a better thing than it is -- it being somewhat dullish/ -- I have bought the Beauties of the Antijacobin -- & Attorneys & Counsellors advise me to prosecute -offer to undertake it, so as that I shall have neither trouble or expence. They say, it is a clear Case. 6 -- I will speak to Johnson about the Fears in Solitude -- if he give them up, they are your's. That dull ode has been printed often enough; & may now be allowed to 'sink with dead swoop, & to the bottom go' -- to quote an admired Author 7 ; -- but the two others will do with a little Trimming. ----- My dear Southey! I have said nothing concerning that which most oppresses me. Immediately on my leaving London, I fall to ____________________ 1 There is no evidence that Coleridge prepared any 'Compilations', but he certainly entered into negotiations with Richard Phillips. See Letters 373 and 875, for Phillips's demand for the repayment of £25. 2 For a list of Coleridge's forty prose contributions appearing in the Morning Post from 7 Dec. 1799 to 21 Apr. 1800 see Wise, Bibliography, 257-64. 3 On Sir Rubicund Naso, Morning Post, 7 Dec 1799. 4 Ibid., 24 Dec 1799. 5 Ibid., 25 Dec 1799. 6 In 1799 The New Morality, a poem which had appeared in the AntiJacobin, 9 July 1798, was reprinted in The Beauties of the Anti-Jacobin, with an editorial note reading in part: 'He [ Coleridge] has left his native country, commenced citizen of the world, left his poor children fatherless and his wife destitute. Ex his disce his friends Lamb and Southey V Coleridge did not take legal action for what Chambers calls a 'premature' charge. Chambers, Life, 92-98 and 120-1. See also Biog. Lit., 1817, i. 70n . 7 See Coleridge, To the Author of Poems, line 14. -552- the Life of Lessing -- till that is done, till I have given the Ws some proof that I am endeavoring to do well for my fellow-creatures, I cannot stir. That being done -- I would accompany you -- & see no impossibility of forming a pleasant little Colony for a few years in Italy or the South of France. Peace will soon come. God love you, my dear Southey! -- I would wr[ite] to Stewart & give up his paper immediately. You should [do] nothing that does not absolutely please you. Be idle -- be very idle! The habits of your mind are such that you will necessarily do much -- but be as idle as you can. Our love to dear Edith -- if you see Mary, tell her that we have received our Trunk. Hartley is quite well, & my talkativeness is his, without diminution on my side. 'Tis strange, but certainly many things go in the Blood, beside Gout & Scrophula. -- Yesterday I dined at Longman's & met Pratt, & that honest piece of prolix Dullity & Nullity, young Towers who desired to be remembered to you. To morrow Sara & I dine at Mister Gobwin's as Hartley calls him -- who gave the philosopher such a Rap on the shins with a ninepin that Gobwin in huge pain lectured Sara on his boisterousness. I was not at home. Est modus in rebus. Moshes is somewhat too rough & noisy / but the cadaverous Silence of Godwin's Children is to me quite catacomb-ish: & thinking of Mary Wolstencroft I was oppressed by it the day Davy & I dined there. God love you, & S. T. Coleridge 306. To Robert Southey MS. Lord Latymer, Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 328. No 21 Buckingham Street -- Saturday. [ 28 December 1799] 1 My dear Southey I will see Longman on Tuesday at the farthest; but I pray you, send me up what you have done, if you can, as I will read it to him; unless he will take my word for it. But we cannot expect that he will treat finally without seeing a considerable Specimen. Send it by the Coach; and be assured that it will be as safe as in your own Escritoire -- & I will remit it the very day Longman or any Bookseller has treated for it satisfactorily. Less than 200£ I would not take. -- Have you tried warm Bathing in a high Temperature? ----- As to your Travelling, your first Business must of course be to settle. The Greek Islands & Turkey in General are one continued Hounslow Heath, only that the Highwaymen there have ____________________ 1 This letter was written in answer to one from Southey, dated 27 Dec. 1799 (see Life and Correa. ii. 85); and it was answered by Southey on 1 Jan. 1800. (See National Review, 1892, p. 704.) -553- an awkward Habit of murdering People. As to Poland and Hungarym -- the detestable Roads & Inns of them both, & the severity of the Climate in the former render travelling there little suited to your state of Health. -- O for Peace & the South of France! -- What a detestable Villainy is not this new Constitution? I have written all that relates to it which has appeared in the Morning Post -- and not without strength or elegance. But the French are Children. -- 'Tis an infirmity to hope or fear concerning them -- I wish they had a King again, if it were only that Sieyes & Bonaparte might be hung. Guillotining is too a republican a death for such Reptiles! ----- You'll write another Quarter for Stewart? you will torture yourself for 12 or 13 guineas? I pray you, do not do so! -- You might get without the exertion and with but little more expenditure of time from 50 to an 100£. -- Thus, for instance -- Bring together on your table or skim over successively -- Brucker, Lardner's History of Heretics, Russel's Modern Europe, and Andrews' History of England 1 -- & write a History of Levellers and the Levelling Principle under some goodly Title, neither praising or abusing them. Lacedaemon, Crete, and the attempts at agrarian Laws in Rome -- all these you have by heart. ----- Plato & Zeno are I believe nearly all that relates to the purpose in Brucker -- Lardner's is a most amusing Book to read -Write only a sheet of Letter Paper a day, which you can do easily in an hour, and in 12 weeks you will have produced (without any toil of Brains, observing none but chronological arrangement, & giving your[self] little more than the trouble of Transcription) 24 Sheets Octavo -- I will gladly write a philosophical Introduction that shall enlighten without offending, & therein state the rise of Property &c. -- For this you might secure 60 or 70 guineas -- and receive half the money on producing the first 8 Sheets -- in a month from your first Commencement of the work. ----- Many other works occur to me; but I mention this, because it might be doing great good -- in[asmuch] as Boys & Youths would read it with far different Impressions from their Fathers & Godfathers -& yet the latter find nothing alarming in the nature of the Work, it being purely Historical. -- If I am not deceived by the recency of their date, my ode to the Dutchess, & my Xtmas Carol will do for your Anthology. -- I have therefore transcribed them for you. But I need not ask you for God's sake to use your own Judgment without spare. ____________________ 1 Nathaniel Lardner, The History of the Heretics of the Two First Centuries after Christ, 1780; William Russell, The History of Modern Europe, 5 vols., 1786; J. P. Andrews, The History of Great Britain from the Death of Henry VIII to the Accession of James V1 of Scotland, 1796. -554- Xtmas Carol 1 1 The Shepherds went their hasty way And found the lowly Stable shed, Where the Virgin Mother lay. And now they check'd their eager Tread, For to the Babe, that at her Bosom clung, A Mother's Song the Virgin Mother sung! 2 They told her, how a glorious Light Streaming from an heavenly Throng Around them shone, suspending Night! While sweeter, than a Mother's Song, Blest Angels heralded the Saviour's Birth, Glory to God on high! and PEACE ON EARTH! 3 She listen'd to the Tale divine And closer still the Babe she prest; And while she cry'd, 'The Babe is mine!['] The Milk rush'd faster to her Breast. Joy rose within her, like a Summer's Morn: 'PEACE, PEACE ON EARTH! The Prince of Peace is born!['] 4 Thou Mother of the Prince of Peace, Poor, simple, and of low estate! That Strife should vanish, Battle cease, O why does this thy soul elate? Sweet music's loudest note, the Poet's Story, Didst thou ne'er love to hear of Fame & Glory. 5 And is not WAR a youthful King, A stately Hero clad in Mail? Beneath his footsteps Laurels spring, Him Earth's majestic Monarchs hail Their Friend, their Playmate! And his bold bright Eye Compels the Maiden's love-confessing Sigh! [Remainder of manuscript is missing.] ____________________ 1 Poems, i. 333. -555- 307. To Thomas Poole Pub. Thomas Poole, i. 1. December 31st, 1799 . . . I work from I-rise to I-set (that is, from 9 A.M. to 12 at night), almost without intermission. . . . I hope you receive the papers regularly. They are regularly sent, as I commonly put them in myself. . . . Being so hurried for time I should have delayed writing till to-morrow; but to-day is the last day of the year, and a sort of superstitious feeling oppressed me that the year should not end without my writing, if it were only to subscribe myself with the old words of an old affection. . . . God bless you, and him who is ever, ever yours -- who, among all his friends, has ever called and ever felt you the Friend. S. T. Coleridge.