I admire the critique on Wat Tyler less than you do, because the writer speaks with a contempt of Southey’s abilities quite disingenuous. No man of literary acquirements can really despise Southey as a poet—except, perhaps, one like Lord Byron in the first effervescence of youthful pride, fastidious ideas of perfection, and astonishment at his own splendid, and, in this our day, unrivalled powers. Read Don Roderick, and then judge whether Southey is not a poet, and of a very high order.
I am in high admiration of this long line of shore. Last night the sun set opposite to the sea, illuminating its smooth surface, and gilding the boats which skim along it with all the splendid colouring of Paul Veronese, and in an hour after the moon rose behind the waves in quiet and contrasted beauty.
Nov. 5, 1817.—November in nothing but name. The cannon firing, I hope for the Princess Charlotte’s becoming a happy mother.
Nov. 6.—The melancholy fate of our lovely Princess strikes with a heaviness of heart like a domestic calamity. So sweet, so spotless, so full of endearing qualities, so firm and ardent in her affections, so nobly bold in asserting them when it seemed her duty, so raised above the faults and follies of her age, sex, and station. It is tragic that she should have expired without a single friend or relative save him who must have been overwhelmed with the unfathomable depth of his affliction. That the heiress of the British Empire should not in her first confinement have had a single female but a mercenary, to watch over her the first night after a dangerous and afflicting labour—that the barbarity of changing her household in her youth so frequently as not to permit her forming an attachment for some valuable married woman, should have deprived her of the cares of a friend—the coldness of the Queen prevented her from wishing for those of an experienced grandmother,—and the faults, perhaps, of both parents cut her off from the assistance of a mother, is indeed a melancholy thought. I did not think anything but the loss of a dear friend could have given me so much pain.
TO CHARLES MANNERS ST. GEORGE, ESQ.,
FRANKFORT.
Bursledon Lodge, Nov. 25, 1817.
After a fortnight of that stillness and depression into which our lovely Princess’s untimely fate had thrown the whole country, some of those whose interest in her was founded on everything but personal knowledge, begin to recover their usual tone of spirits—that tone which, while it does not prevent us from regretting a loss, follows our being in some degree accustomed to the privation. Nothing but having been an actor in the scene, could convey an idea of the state of the kingdom. It seemed as if every family had lost an individual from its own circle, who was more or less dear. All was sorrow, lamentation, regret, varied only in kind and degree. The charge of want of religion and loyalty in the lower classes is totally disproved by the manner in which the day of her funeral was kept throughout the whole country. There was an universal pause from labour as on a Sabbath day—or rather as it ought to be on a Sabbath day—and a general laying aside of every thought of business and pleasure. It was a day of prayer and humiliation. The churches and all places of religious worship were overflowing. All sectarian barriers were broken down by the strong feelings of compassion for the living, reverence and regret for the dead. Indeed, when I say pleasure was laid aside, I express myself improperly, for it seemed never to have been thought of in any shape from the time of this deep disappointment to a generous, a devoted, and an enlightened nation. Had a fast day been appointed by public authority, this affecting expression of general sorrow would not have been so clear a proof of the impression made by one whose name is enshrined in our hearts, and who will be remembered for ever as a model of all that is touching and noble, spirited and affectionate, dignified and condescending. The Sunday after her death, all our servants, down to the very kitchen-maid, appeared at prayers in deep mourning. She has been wept in every cottage, and her loss has scarcely yet been thought of as a political calamity, it has come so near every heart as a private sorrow.