“I am sorry to say that the prospect before me is not such as to allow much hope of my seeing Holland* this year. Time, the printers, and the constable are leagued together to oppose my wishes:
* My father had for some time wished to visit the Low Countries, and had planned a tour there with Mr. Senhouse, who had been his companion in a former journey. This was not accomplished until 1825, when Mr. S. was not able to accompany him. |
| Ætat. 48. | OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. | 135 |
“My winter has not been idly spent, but it has not carried me so far forward as I had anticipated, chiefly because writing a book is like building a house,—a work of more time and cost than the estimate has been taken at. This is the chief reason. But something, I confess, must be set down to my besetting sin—a sort of miser-like love of accumulation. Like those persons who frequent sales, and fill their own houses with useless purchases, because they may want them some time or other; so am I for ever making collections, and storing up materials which may not come into use till the Greek Calends. And this I have been doing for five-and-twenty years! It is true that I draw daily upon my hoards, and should be poor without them; but in prudence I ought now to be working up these materials rather than adding to so much dead stock.
“This volume, when it appears, will provoke a great
branch of the Satanic confederacy—the Bonapartists. It is the most damning
record of their wickedness that has yet appeared in this country, and in a form
to command both attention and belief. Only yesterday I learnt from General Whittingham, who was in the battle of
Medellin, that the French had orders to give no quarter. A wounded Spanish
officer was brought into the room where Victor was at supper, and Victor said to him, ‘If
| 136 | LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE | Ætat. 48. |
