Gents Mag 1850 part 1 p.611

Gents Mag 1850 part 1 p.611




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	Gentleman's Magazine 1850 part 1 p.611 LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. * WE left Mr. Southey in our last article (Gent. Mag. for April, 1850, p.353) settled in his new habitation at Keswick. The third volume contains a history of the six years which he passed there, from 1806 to 1812. His habitual manner of life, from which he seldom deviated, is thus described by him: "Three pages of history after breakfast (equivalent to five in small quarto printing), then to transcribe and copy for the press, or to make my selections and biographies, or what else suits my humour, till dinner time; from dinner till tea, I read, write letters, see the newspaper, and very often indulge in a siesta: for sleep agrees with me, and I have a good substantial theory to prove that it must. For as a man who walks much requires to sit down and rest himself, so does the brain, if it be the part most worked, require its repose. Well, after tea, I go to poetry, and correct and re-write and copy till I am tired, and then turn to anything else till supper. And this is my life; which, if it be not a very merry one, is yet as happy as heart could wish. At least I should think so if I had not once been happier, and I do think so, except when that recollection comes upon me. And then, when I cease to be cheerful, it is only to become contemplative,- to feel at times a wish that I was in that state of existence which passes not away; and this always ends in a new impulse to proceed, that I may leave some durable monument and some efficient good behind me." list, During the progress of this period his politics were becoming conservative,† and his religious views orthodox; his visionary projects had floated away, and he was content to earn his daily bread "in peace and privacy."‡ He now wrote for the Annual Review, and was one of its best contributors; but the proprietors (the Aitkins), who perhaps had heard of what Barretti mentions of a Spaniard translating at five shillings a sheet, were too brazen-bowelled to their scribes, and fixed their remuneration at so low a standard that he went over to the more liberal establishment of the Qtrly. Besides King Arthur used to play many editorial tricks, and cut out what was displeasing to the booksellers; whereas Mr. Gifford, caring nothing about booksellers, used only to expunge what was displeasing to himself. In 1807 he edited the interesting remains of Henry Kirk White; translated the Romance of Palmerin in England; published Espriella's Letters; and the Chronicle of the Cid, an interesting book, the only fault of which was its not being printed in the octavo form.§ But we must not forget to mention, in the hurry of enumerating the multiplicity of his works, that Mr. Southey, instead of weaving, as the ancient writers did, a wreath of myrtle or laurel round his brows to animate his composition, used to appear at his desk in an old green velvet bonnet of his wife's, which covered all his face except the nose,
	* "The Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey. Edited by his Son, the Rev. Charles Cuthbert Southey, M.A. Curate of Plumbland, Cumberland. Vols.II. and III. (To be completed in six volumes.)" † His political opinions at the time (1811) may be found concentrated in the following sentence:- "Of three great points I have now convinced myself, that the great desideratum in our own government is a Premier instead of a Cabinet,- that regular opposition is an absurdity which could not exist anywhere but in an island without destroying the government,- and that parliamentary reform is the shortest road to anarchy." - P.303. To this text we had for some years a running commentary, not to be studied without advantage. ‡ What was his situation at the time of his marriage (which that part of the world who are not poetsdo not think of engaging in till they have some means of support) may be seen from a letter to Mr. Cottle, April 1808:- "Your house was my house when I had no other. The very money with which I bought my wedding-ring and paid my marriage fees was supplied by you. It was with your sisters I left Edith during my six months' absence, and for the six months after my return it was from you that I received, week by week, the little on which we lived, till I was enabled to live by other means," &c. § Mr. Southey justly says, "The translations in the Appendix are by Frere, and they without any exception the most masterly I have seen."

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