You are right in your opinion of the last scene in Eleemon*, but it cannot be altered now, and I am
* This poem is entitled “All for Love, or a Sinner well saved.” |
| 20 | LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE | Ætat. 55. |
“Dear H. T., however fast my thoughts may germinate and flower, my opinions have been of slow growth since I came to years of discretion; and since the age of forty they have undergone very little change; but increase of knowledge has tended to confirm them. My friends—those whom I call so—have never been the persons who have flattered me; if they had, they would not have held that place which they possess in my esteem.
“The experiment of pauper colonies has been long enough in progress to satisfy such a man as Jacob of its success. Remember what a matter-of-fact man he is: all the travels which have fallen in my way agree with him.
“I require a first outlay, from the money expended in
workhouse and poor-rates. Feed the pauper while he builds his cottage, fences
his allotment and digs his garden, as you feed him while he breaks stones or
lives in idleness. You think of the plough, I of the spade; you of fields, I of
gardens;
| Ætat. 55. | OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. | 21 |
