BIB_ID
415031
Accession number
MA 1849.13
Creator
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 1772-1834.
Display Date
Ballachulish, Scotland, 1803 September 2.
Credit line
Purchased from Joanna Langlais, 1957.
Description
1 item (4 pages, with address) ; 26.7 x 14.5 cm
Notes
Parts of the letter are torn away.
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 to "Mrs. Coleridge / Greta Hall / Keswick / Cumberland / S. Britain / Tour in Scotland with the Ws."
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 to "Mrs. Coleridge / Greta Hall / Keswick / Cumberland / S. Britain / Tour in Scotland with the Ws."
Provenance
Purchased from Joanna Langlais in 1957 as a gift of the Fellows with the special assistance of Mrs. W. Murray Crane, Mr. Homer D. Crotty, Mr. and Mrs. Donald F. Hyde, Mr. Robert H. Taylor and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne. Formerly in the possession of Ernest Hartley Coleridge and Thomas Burdett Money-Coutts, Baron Latymer.
Summary
Describing, in detail and at length, his tour of Scotland with the Wordsworths; describing his itinerary from Glasgow, to Dumbarton, Loch Lomond, E. Tarbet, Loch Ketterin, Trossach and to Glen Falloch; explaining that from Glen Falloch he intended to go to Glen Coe "...having found myself so happy alone - such blessing is there in perfect Liberty! - that I walked off - and have walked 45 miles since then - and except the last mile, I am sure, I may say, I have not met with ten houses. For 18 miles there are but 2 Habitations! - and all that way I met no Sheep, no Cattle - only one Goat! - all thro' Moorlands with huge mountains, some craggy & bare, but the most green with deep pinky channels worn by Torrents -. Glen Coe interested me; but rather disappointed me - there was no superincumbency of Crag, the Crags not so bare or precipitous, as I had expected / - / I am now going to cross the Ferry for Fort William - for I have resolved to eke out my Cash by all sorts of self-denial, & to walk along the whole line of the Forts. I am unfortunately shoeless - there is no Town where I can get a pair, & I have no money to spare to buy them - so I expect to enter Perth Barefooted - I burnt my shoes in drying them at the Boatman's Hovel on Loch Ketterin / and I have by this mean hurt my feet - likewise my left Leg is a little inflamed / & the Rheumatism in the right of my head afflicts me sorely when I begin to grow warm in my bed, chiefly my right eye, ear, cheek, & the three Teeth / but nevertheless, I am enjoying myself, having Nature with solitude & liberty; the liberty natural & solitary, the solitude natural & free!;" asking her to borrow £10 and send it to him; concluding with a brief comment his "middling" health and use of opiates.
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