“I thought it so likely you would hear from Wynn the particulars concerning John Southey’s will*, that I felt no inclination to repeat the story to you, which would not have been the case had the old man done as he ought to have done. Good part of his property, consisting of a newly purchased estate, is given to a very distant relative of his mother’s family, and, of course, gone for ever. About 2000l. in legacies: the rest falls to his brother, as sole executor and residuary legatee. Neither my own name nor either of my brothers’ is mentioned. Thomas Southey apprised me of this the day of the old man’s death. With him I am on good terms,—that is, if we were in the same town, we should dine together, for the sake of relationship, about once a-month; and if any thing were to happen to me, of any kind of family importance,—such as the birth of a child,—I should write a letter to him, beginning ‘Dear Uncle.’ He invites me to the ‘Cottage,’ and I shall go there on my way to Lisbon. I think it likely that he will leave his property rather to Tom than to me, for the name’s sake, but not likely that he will leave it out of the family. He is about three or four-and-fifty, a man of no education, nor indeed of any thing else. And so
* An uncle of my father’s, a wealthy solicitor of Taunton. See vol. i. p. 6. |
| 46 | LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE | Ætat. 32. |
“. . . . . Last night I began the Preface*—huzza! And now, Grosvenor, let me tell you what I have to do. I am writing, 1. The History of Portugal; 2. The Chronicle of the Cid; 3. The Curse of Kehama; 4. Espriella’s Letters. Look you, all these I am writing. The second and third of these must get into the press, and out of it before this time twelvemonths, or else I shall be like the Civil List. By way of interlude comes in this Preface. Don’t swear, and bid me do one thing at a time. I tell you I can’t afford to do one thing at a time—no, nor two neither; and it is only by doing many things that I contrive to do so much: for I cannot work long together at any thing without hurting myself; and so I do every thing by heats; then, by the time I am tired of one, my inclination for another is come round.
“Dr. Southey is arrived here. He puts his degree in his pocket, summers here, and will winter in London, to attend at an hospital. About this, of course, I shall apply to Carlisle; and, if it should so
* To the “Specimens of English Poets.” |
| Ætat. 32. | OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. | 47 |
