Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert SoutheyCottle, Joseph
General
Reminiscences of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Robert Southey
Cottle, Joseph
Authors, English -- 19th century -- Biography; Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 1772-1834; Southey, Robert, 1774-1843
"... Since my arrival at the Greyhound, Bath, I have been confined to my
bed-room, almost to my bed. Pray for my recovery, and request Mr.
Roberts's[89] prayers, for my infirm, wicked heart; that Christ may
mediate to the Father, to lead me to Christ, and give me a _living_
instead of a _reasoning_ faith! and for my health, so far only as it may
be the condition of my improvement, and final redemption.
My dear affectionate friend, I am your obliged, and grateful, and
affectionate, friend,
S. T. Coleridge."
I now proceed further to notice Mr. Coleridge's reappearance in Bristol.
Mr. C. had written from London in the year 1814, to a friend in Bristol,
to announce that he was coming down to give a course of Lectures on
Shakspeare, such as he had delivered at the Royal Institution, London,
and expressing a hope that his friends would obtain for him as many
subscribers as they could. Great efforts were made to obtain these
subscribers, and the lectures were accordingly advertised, to commence at
the time appointed by the lecturer, and the place specified with the day
and hour; of the whole of which arrangement Mr. C. had received due
notice, and expressed his approval.
On the morning on which the lectures were to begin, a brother of Mr.
George Cumberland, (a gentleman well known in the literary world,
residing in Bristol,) arrived in this city from London, on a visit to his
brother, and casually said to him, "I came as far as Bath with one of the
most amusing men I ever met with. At the White Horse, Piccadilly, he
entered the coach, when a jew boy came up with pencils to sell. This
amusing gentleman asked the boy a few questions, when his answers being
what he thought unusually acute, the gentleman said, 'that boy is not
where he ought to be. He has talent, and if I had not an important
engagement at Bristol to-morrow, I would not mind the loss of my fare,
but would stay a day or two in London to provide some better condition
for him.' He then called the waiter; wrote to a gentleman in the
neighbourhood, with a pencil, urging him to patronize the bearer; gave
the boy five shillings, and sent him, with the waiter, according to the
address of the note."
This same gentleman, he said, talked incessantly for thirty miles out of
London, in the most entertaining way, and afterwards, with little
intermission, till they arrived about Marlborough, when he discovered
that the lady who was in the coach with them, was the sister of a
particular friend of his. "On our arrival at Bath," said the brother,
"this entertaining gentleman observed to me, 'I must here quit you, as I
am determined not to leave this lady, who is going into North Wales, till
I have seen her safe at her brother's door;' so here the amusing
gentleman left us."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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