[286] Compare Southey’s first impressions of Edinburgh, contained in a letter to Wynn, dated October 20, 1805: “You cross a valley (once a loch) by a high bridge, and the back of the old city appears on the edge of this depth—so vast, so irregular—with such an outline of roofs and chimneys, that it looks like the ruins of a giant’s palace. I never saw anything so impressive as the first sight of this; there was a wild red sunset slanting along it.” Selections from the Letters of R. Southey, i. 342.
[287] Compare Table Talk, for September 26, 1830, where a similar statement is made in almost the same words.
[288] The same sentence occurs in a letter to Sir G. Beaumont, dated September 22, 1803. Coleorton Letters, i. 6.
[289] The MS. of this letter was given to my father by the Rev. Dr. Wreford. I know nothing of the person to whom it was addressed, except that he was “Matthew Coates, Esq., of Bristol.”
[290] Dr. Joseph Adams, the biographer of Hunter, who in 1816 recommended Coleridge to the care of Mr. James Gillman.