March, 1800.

If I had the least love of money I could make almost sure of £2,000 a year, for Stuart has offered me half shares in the two papers, the "Morning Post" and "Courier", if I would devote myself with him to them. But I told him that I would not give up the country, and the lazy reading of old folios for two thousand times two thousand pound—in short that beyond £250 a year I considered money as a real evil.—

I think there are but two good ways of writing—one for immediate and wide impression, though transitory—the other for permanence. Newspapers are the first—the best one can do is the second. That middle class of translating books is neither the one nor the other. When I have settled myself "clear", I shall write nothing for money but for the newspaper. You of course will not hint a word of Stuart's offer to me. He has behaved with abundant honour and generosity.

CHAPTER IX

KESWICK

Coleridge had determined not to live in London; his engagement with Stuart he regarded as only a temporary shift to clear off some debt which he had incurred in his visit to Germany. After a short stay with Lamb ("Ainger", i, 113), and a tour to the North to see Wordsworth (J. Dykes Campbell's "Life", 113), he returned to Stowey, writing to Godwin on 21st May.

LETTER 91. TO GODWIN

Wednesday, May 21, 1800.

Dear Godwin,

I received your letter this morning, and had I not, still I am almost confident that I should have written to you before the end of the week. Hitherto the translation of the "Wallenstein" has prevented me, not that it engrossed my time, but that it wasted and depressed my spirits, and left a sense of wearisomeness and disgust which unfitted me for anything but sleeping or immediate society. I say this because I ought to have written to you first; yet, as I am not behind you in affectionate esteem, so I would not be thought to lag in those outward and visible signs that both show and verify the inward spiritual grace. Believe me, you recur to my thoughts frequently, and never without pleasure, never without my making out of the past a little day-dream for the future. I left Wordsworth on the 4th of this month; if I cannot procure a suitable house at Stowey I return to Cumberland and settle at Keswick, in a house of such prospect that if, according to you and Hume, impressions constitute our being, I shall have a tendency to become a god, so sublime and beautiful will be the series of my visual existence. But, whether I continue here or migrate thither, I shall be in a beautiful country, and have house-room and heart-room for you, and you must come and write your next work at my house. My dear Godwin! I remember you with so much pleasure, and our conversations so distinctly, that, I doubt not, we have been mutually benefited; but as to your poetic and physiopathic feelings, I more than suspect that dear little Fanny and Mary have had more to do in that business than I. Hartley sends his love to Mary. [1] "What, and not to Fanny?" "Yes, and to Fanny, but I'll 'have' Mary." He often talks about them.

My poor Lamb, how cruelly afflictions crowd upon him! I am glad that you think of him as I think: he has an affectionate heart, a mind "sui generis"; his taste acts so as to appear like the unmechanic simplicity of an instinct; in brief, he is worth an hundred men of mere talents. Conversation with the latter tribe is like the use of leaden bells—one wearies by exercise. Lamb every now and then "irradiates", and the beam, though single and fine as a hair, yet is rich with colours, and I both see and feel it. In Bristol I was much with Davy, almost all day. He always talks of you with great affection, and defends you with a friendly zeal. If I settle at Keswick he will be with me in the fall of the year, and so must you: and let me tell you, Godwin, that four such men as you, I, Davy, and Wordsworth, do not meet together in one house every day in the year—I mean four men so distinct with so many sympathies. I received yesterday a letter from Southey. He arrived at Lisbon after a prosperous voyage, on the last day of April; his letter to me is dated May-Day. He girds up his loins for a great history of Portugal, which will be translated into Portuguese in the first year of the Lusitanian Republic.

Have you seen Mrs. Robinson [2] lately—how is she? Remember me in the kindest and most respectful phrases to her. I wish I knew the particulars of her complaint; for Davy has discovered a perfectly new acid by which he has restored the use of limbs to persons who had lost it for many years (one woman nine years), in cases of supposed rheumatism. At all events, Davy says, it can do no harm in Mrs. Robinson's case, and, if she will try it, he will make up a little parcel and write her a letter of instructions, etc. Tell her, and it is the truth, that Davy is exceedingly delighted with the two poems in the "Anthology".

N.B. Did you get my attempt at a tragedy from Mrs. Robinson?

To Mrs. Smith I am about to write a letter, with a book; be so kind as to inform me of her direction.

Mrs. Inchbald I do not like at all; every time I recollect her I like her less. That segment of a look at the corner of her eye—O God in heaven! it is so cold and cunning. Through worlds of wildernesses I would run away from that look, that "heart-picking" look! 'Tis marvellous to me that you can like that woman.

I shall remain here about ten days for certain. If you have leisure and inclination in that time, write; if not, I will write to you where I am going, or at all events whither I am gone.

God bless you, and

Your sincerely affectionate

S. T. COLERIDGE.

Mr. T. Poole's,

N[ether] Stowey, Bridgwater.

Sara desires to be remembered kindly to you, and sends a kiss to Fanny, and "dear meek little Mary."

[Footnote 1: Mrs. Shelley.]

[Footnote 2: The celebrated Perdita. She died in the following
December.]

Next month Coleridge wrote to Davy.