Stowey (May, 1797).

My dear friend,

I found George Burnett ill enough, heaven knows, Yellow Jaundice—the introductory symptoms very violent. I return to Bristol on Thursday, and shall not leave till "all be done".

Remind Mrs. Coleridge of the kittens, and tell her that George's brandy is just what smuggled spirits might be expected to be, execrable! The smack of it remains in my mouth, and I believe will keep me most horribly temperate for half a century. He (Burnett) was bit, but I caught the Brandiphobia.[1] (obliterations * * * * * * *

—scratched out, well knowing that you never allow such things to pass, uncensured. A good joke, and it slipped out most impromptu—ishly.)

The mice play the very devil with us. It irks me to set a trap. By all the whiskers of all the pussies that have mewed plaintively, or amorously, since the days of Whittington, it is not fair. 'Tis telling a lie. 'Tis as if you said, "Here is a bit of toasted cheese; come little mice! I invite you!" when, oh, foul breach of the rites of hospitality! I mean to assassinate my too credulous guests! No, I cannot set a trap, but I should vastly like to make a Pitt—fall. (Smoke the Pun!) But concerning the mice, advise thou, lest there be famine in the land. Such a year of scarcity! Inconsiderate mice! Well, well, so the world wags.

Farewell, S. T. C.

P.S. A mad dog ran through our village, and bit several dogs. I have desired the farmers to be attentive, and tomorrow shall give them, in writing, the first symptoms of madness in a dog.

I wish my pockets were as yellow as George's Phiz!

[Footnote 1: It appears that Mr. Burnett had been prevailed upon by smugglers to buy some prime cheap brandy, but which Mr. Coleridge affirmed to be a compound of Hellebore, kitchen grease, and Assafoetida! or something as bad.—[Cottle's note.]]

The next letter must belong to the end of May or beginning of June. Cottle's note shows that the second edition of the poems was now published.

LETTER 60. TO COTTLE

Stowey (June), 1797.

My dear Cottle,

I deeply regret, that my anxieties and my slothfulness, acting in a combined ratio, prevented me from finishing my "Progress of Liberty, or Visions of the Maid of Orleans", with that Poem at the head of the volume, with the "Ode" in the middle, and the "Religious Musings" at the end. * * *

In the "Lines on the Man of Ross", immediately after these lines,

He heard the widow's heaven-breathed prayer of praise,
He mark'd the shelter'd orphan's tearful gaze.

Please to add these two lines.

And o'er the portion'd maiden's snowy cheek,
Bade bridal love suffuse its blushes meek.

And for the line,

Beneath this roof, if thy cheer'd moments pass.

I should be glad to substitute this,

If near this roof thy wine-cheer'd moments pass.

"These emendations," Cottle adds, "came too late for admission in the second edition; nor have they appeared in the last edition. They will remain therefore for insertion in any future edition of Mr. Coleridge's Poems."

The exact date on which Coleridge and Wordsworth met in the year 1796 has not been ascertained; but Coleridge speaks in the next letter as if he was now well acquainted with Wordsworth. Coleridge had been at Taunton early in June ('Letters, 220). On the 8th of June he wrote to Cottle.

LETTER 61. TO COTTLE

(8th) June, 1797.

My dear Cottle,

I am sojourning for a few days at Racedown, Dorset, the mansion of our friend Wordsworth; who presents his kindest respects to you. * * *

Wordsworth admires my tragedy, which gives me great hopes. Wordsworth has written a tragedy himself. I speak with heartfelt sincerity, and I think, unblinded judgment, when I tell you that I feel myself a little man by his side, and yet I do not think myself a less man than I formerly thought myself. His drama is absolutely wonderful. You know I do not commonly speak in such abrupt and unmingled phrases, and therefore will the more readily believe me. There are, in the piece, those profound touches of the human heart, which I find three or four times in the 'Robbers' of Schiller, and often in Shakespeare, but in Wordsworth there are no inequalities. * * *

God bless you, and eke [1]

S. T. COLERIDGE. [2]

[Footnote 1: The reader will have observed a peculiarity in most of Mr. Coleridge's conclusions to his letters. He generally says, "God bless you, and, or eke, S. T. C." so as to involve a compound blessing.—[Cottle.]]

[Footnote 2: Letter LXXIII is our 61.]

Shakespeare evidently occupied an important place in Coleridge's mind even at this early date. His discovery of rivals to the prince of English dramatists in his friends Southey and Wordsworth only indicates how largely Shakespeare already bulked in his view of the dramatic art.

The next letter to Cottle is of a milder type, and leads up to an interesting meeting, famous in the lives of Lamb, Coleridge, and Wordsworth.

LETTER 62. TO COTTLE

Stowey, June 29th, 1797.

My very dear Cottle,

***Charles Lamb will probably be here in about a fortnight. Could you not contrive to put yourself in a Bridgwater coach, and T. Poole would fetch you in a one-horse chaise to Stowey. What delight would it not give us. ***

Still more interesting is the often quoted letter describing Dorothy
Wordsworth.

LETTER 63. TO COTTLE

Stowey (3-17 July), 1797.

My dear Cottle,

Wordsworth and his exquisite sister are with me. She is a woman indeed! in mind I mean, and heart; for her person is such, that if you expected to see a pretty woman, you would think her rather ordinary; if you expected to see an ordinary woman, you would think her pretty! but her manners are simple, ardent, impressive. In every motion, her most innocent soul outbeams so brightly, that who saw would say,

Guilt was a thing impossible in her.

Her information various. Her eye watchful in minutest observation of nature; and her taste, a perfect electrometer. It bends, protrudes, and draws in, at subtlest beauties, and most recondite faults.

She and W. desire their kindest respects to you.

Give my love to your brother Amos. I condole with him in the loss of the prize, but it is the fortune of war. The finest Greek Poem I ever wrote lost the prize, and that which gained it was contemptible. An Ode may sometimes be too bad for the prize, but very often too good.

Your ever affectionate friend.

S. T. C.[1]

[Footnote 1: Letter LXXIV follows 63.]

Dorothy Wordsworth's description of Coleridge whom she met now for the first time is as follows: "You had a great loss," she wrote to a friend, "in not seeing Coleridge. He is a wonderful man. His conversation teems with soul, mind, and spirit. Then he is so benevolent, so good tempered and cheerful, and, like William, interests himself so much about every little trifle. At first I thought him very plain, that is, for about three minutes. He is pale, thin, has a wide mouth, thick lips, and not very good teeth, longish, loose-growing, half curling, rough, black hair. But if you hear him speak for five minutes you think no more of them. His eye is large and full, and not very dark, but grey, such an eye as would receive from a heavy soul the dullest expression; but it speaks every emotion of his animated mind: it has more of 'the poet's eye in a fine frenzy rolling' than I ever witnessed. He has fine dark eyebrows, and an overhanging forehead.

"The first thing that was read after he came was William's new poem, "The Ruined Cottage", with which he was much delighted; and after tea he repeated to us two acts and a half of his tragedy, "Osorio". The next morning William read his tragedy, "The Borderers"." (Knight's "Life of Wordsworth", i, 111-112.)

The line Coleridge quotes in his description of Dorothy:

Guilt is a thing impossible in her

occurs in the additional verses Coleridge had written to the "Joan of Arc" lines sent to Lamb.

John Thelwall, one of the sturdy democrats of the time who had made no small commotion with his Revolutionary principles, had also visited Coleridge at Stowey in the summer of 1797. Coleridge had corresponded with him before knowing him personally ("Letters", 202), chiefly about politics, religion and books. Coleridge thus describes Thelwall to Wade.