[172] “This Lime-Tree Bower,” l. 38. Poetical Works, p. 93.
[173] “Osorio,” Act V., Sc. 1, l. 39. Poetical Works, p. 507.
[174] Thelwall’s visit brought Coleridge and Wordsworth into trouble. At the instance of a “titled Dogberry,” Sir Philip Hale of Cannington, a government spy was sent to watch the movements of the supposed conspirators, and, a more serious matter, Mrs. St. Albyn, the owner of Alfoxden, severely censured her tenant for having sublet the house to Wordsworth. See letter of explanation and remonstrance from Poole to Mrs. St. Albyn, September 16, 1797. Thomas Poole and his Friends, i. 240. See, too, Cottle’s Early Recollections, i. 319, and for apocryphal anecdotes about the spy, etc., Biographia Literaria, cap. x.
[175] Their proposal was to settle on Coleridge “an annuity for life of £150, to be regularly paid by us, no condition whatever being annexed to it.” See letter of Josiah Wedgwood to Coleridge, dated January 10, 1798. Thomas Poole and his Friends, i. 258. An unpublished letter from Thelwall to Dr. Crompton dated Llyswen, March 3, 1798, contains one of several announcements of “his good fortune,” made by Coleridge at the time to his numerous friends.
To Dr. Crompton, Eton House, Nr. Liverpool.
Llyswen, 3d March, 1798.
I am surprised you have not heard the particulars of Coleridge’s good fortune. It is not a legacy, but a gift. The circumstances are thus expressed by himself in a letter of the 30th January: “I received an invitation from Shrewsbury to be the Unitarian minister, and at the same time an order for £100 from Thomas and Josiah Wedgwood. I accepted the former and returned the latter in a long letter explanatory of my motive, and went off to Shrewsbury, where they were on the point of electing me unanimously and with unusual marks of affection, where I received an offer from T. and J. Wedgwood of an annuity of £150 to be legally settled on me. Astonished, agitated, and feeling as I could not help feeling, I accepted the offer in the same worthy spirit, I hope, in which it was made, and this morning I have returned from Shrewsbury.” This letter was written in a great hurry in Cottle’s shop in Bristol, in answer to one which a friend of mine had left for him there, on his way from Llyswen to Gosport, and you will perceive that it has a dash of the obscure not uncommon to the rapid genius of C. Whether he did or did not accept the cure of Unitarian Souls, it is difficult from the account to make out. I suppose he did not, for I know his aversion to preachings God’s holy word for hire, which is seconded not a little, I expect, by his repugnance to all regular routine and application. I also hope he did not, for I know he cannot preach very often without travelling from the pulpit to the Tower. Mount him but upon his darling hobby-horse, “the republic of God’s own making,” and away he goes like hey-go-mad, spattering and splashing through thick and thin and scattering more levelling sedition and constructive treason than poor Gilly or myself ever dreamt of. He promised to write to me again in a few days; but, though I answered his letter directly, I have not heard from him since.
[176] Count Benyowsky, or the Conspiracy of Kamtschatka, a Tragi-comedy. Translated from the German by the Rev. W. Render, teacher of the German Language in the University of Cambridge. Cambridge, 1798.
[177] Coleridge’s copy of Monk Lewis’ play is dated January 20, 1798.
[178] The following memoranda, presumably in Wordsworth’s handwriting, have been scribbled on the outside sheet of the letter: “Tea—Thread fine—needles Silks—Strainer for starch—Mustard—Basil’s shoes—Shoe horn.