This collection, MA 1849, is comprised of forty-six autograph letters signed from Samuel Taylor Coleridge to his wife, Sara Coleridge, written between 1802 and 1824.
This letter is from the Joanna Langlais Collection, a large collection of letters written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge to various recipients. The collection has been divided into subsets, based primarily on Coleridge's addressees, and these sub-collections have been cataloged individually as MA 1848- MA 1857.
Address panel with postmark and fragments of a seal to "Mrs. Coleridge / Keswick / Cumberland."
Describing, in detail, his walking tour of the lake country of Wales and saying that by comparison "...S. Wales together - with all it's richer fields, woods, & ancient Trees, S. Wales would needs appear flat & tame, as ditch-water. I have no firmer persuasion than this - that there is no place in our island - (& saving Switzerland - none in Europe, perhaps ) which really equals the vale of Keswick, including Borrodale, Newlands, & Bassenthwaite;" continuing to discuss, in detail, where he is walking and what he is seeing; commenting on his time with Tom Wedgwood; saying "He is much better than I expected to have found him / he says, the Thought of my coming, & my really coming so immediately, has sent a new Life into him. - He will be out all the mornings - the evenings we chat, discuss, or I read to him. To me he is a delightful & instructive Companion. He possesses the finest, the subtlest mind & taste, I have ever yet met with;" reporting, in detail, on his health, his troubles with his stomach and the regimen of ginger tea he is taking to relieve the symptoms; adding "...& once in the 24 hours (but not always at the same hour) I take half a grain of purified opium, equal to 12 drops of Laudanum...and will give this Regimen a fair compleat Trial of one month - with no other deviation, than that I shall sometimes lessen the opiate & sometimes miss a day. But I am fully convinced, & so is T. Wedgewood [sic] that to a person, with such a Stomach & Bowels as mine, if any stimulus is needful, Opium in the small quantities I now take it, is incomparably better in every respect than Beer, Wine Spirits, or any fermented Liquor - nay, far less pernicious than even Tea;" recommending ginger tea with milk for Hartley and Derwent saying "...& tell him that his dear Father takes it instead of Tea, & believes that it will make his dear Hartley grow, & cure the Worms. The whole Kingdom is getting Ginger-mad;" adding that their plans to go to Italy are uncertain and appear dependent on the Tom Wedgwood's plans.