Henry Crabb Robinson, 30 Russell Square, London, to Mary Wordsworth, [Rydal Mount], 3 December [18]49.

30 Russell Square

3 Decr 49.

My dear friend

     I rejoiced at the reception of your letter – Had it been addressed to any one the mere hand writing so clear and so firm would have given me pleasure, contrasted as it was with the hardly legible lines under my brother’s hand received at the same time – But to receive so cordial an invitation from you was really a high enjoyment – You say you have hope that nothing will occur to impede my being with you at the usual time – Most anxiously do I wish this may be the case – But this is very uncertain –

     I lately learned to my great astonishment that it is now seven years since my brother has sustained these severe epileptic attacks which sometimes by sudden blast carry off the sufferer – More frequently his mind perishes by “slow decline” – There has been one great consolation during this long trial His perceptive powers have been weakend But his moral feelings, his affections have never been perverted – And he has been for the greater part of the time quite happy – My visits to him have been frequent – Indeed I have placed myself at the Service of my niece, who is the most assiduous & kind of attendants – I go to Bury when she wishes for me, And I stay as long as she approves of it – She sometimes thinks that my presence is too exciting – I wrote to her on Saturday, informed her of your very gratifying letter, but that she, not I, should determine about my availing myself of your invitation – I need not say how much I desire once more to enjoy a Rydal Christmas – I shall miss certainly my walk to Grasmere before breakfast but the Sum total of enjoyment will not be sensibly diminished

     I was lately at Brighton for nine days my great nephew is there under the care of his Aunt, for a change of air & a milder climate were prescribed – And his fond mother has no other consolation for the loss of her childs company, but ^than^ the consciousness of discharging a duty of affliction to her father in law – her own mother older than my brother is her companion – She is afflicted also by a stricture of the throat And is in danger of death from starvation – So sad a house is that at Bury –!

     When at Brighton I saw repeatedly Miss Rogers – Her brother was with her – I dined once with her – It was a pleasure to her to sit at the head of the table And make a shew of doing the honour with her paralytic hands – a mere shew of course. On Tuesday I came up, taking the early train in order to breakfast in St James’s Place – I was there in good time Such are the results of Rail Road Travelling

     At Brighton I called twice on Mr Graham It really does one good to look on the benignant smile of his fine face – There is something very attractive & even gracious in his look His Son is gone to the South, I suppose for his health – He is expecting – I should say was – his daughter on whom his affections are now so concentrated – They spoke of her health as good now And I hope you share in the same favorable opinion –

     Brighton was very full & very gay when I was there – But gay people now give me no pleasure, not that I am myself triste This morning I have been breakfasting again with Rogers, having done so twice last week – He is more unchanged than you could have imagined – He retains his old habits – repeats his favorite passages from poets & prosaists, and tells again & again his old anecdotes, to his old associates –

     He has a Knot who usually meet on Tuesdays at his house, of whom those one most frequently meets are his nephew Sam: Sharpe, Luttrell, Harness, Dyce, & Mitford three ecclesiastics of whom the two latter are at large And the first tho’ an incumbent is quite as much of a <–> liberator as he is of a divine – Dr Henderson &c And of late I have joined them – At each of the late three visits Rogers has expatiated on the beauty of the head in the small folio Vol: I have seen the first two Vols of the new edition, but shall not appropriate it until it is complete Mrs Coleridge is looking very nicely –

     I learn this morning from the Ecclesiastical sources that there is a forthcoming election at Cambr: of the Regius Professorship of Divinity And that Dr Christ: Wordsworth And Mr French Archdeacon Hare’s friend are the rival candidates – The disputatious controversialists are eagerly bent on the impending trial before the Privy Council Judicial Comme of the great question of baptismal regenerations. Numerous secessions are threatned whatever the decision may be –    Parties are growing daily more & more vehement & contentious

     You will wonder that I should presume to send you a Hymn which was sung at the opening of the Liverpool Chapel lately, not written for the occasion, tho’ meant composed as an for the Service of opening a place of religious worship I felt half ashamed of myself when I found it to be written by a person I know & very much dislike so I shall not be offended tho’ surprised if you tell me on the highest authority that it is worthless and that I ought not to have thought it worth while copying –

     If I am able to visit you, I shall have a melancholy pleasure in making frequent calls on poor Mr Carr. To whom as well as to the Arnolds Davys &c &c I desire my kind remembrances –

     To your own family in which I included Mr Quillinan my especial & best regards – I believe I own him an answer to a short note in answer to a gossipping & rambling letter –

                                Affectionately your’s

                                                    H. C. Robinson

Mrs Wordsworth

Text: WLL, Robinson, Henry Crabb/18, Wordsworth Trust and Museum, Grasmere.  Robinson writes in his diary on 3 December 1849: ‘I left home early to breakfast with Rogers, Tagart, Henderson, Harness & Mitford – a lively 2½ hours. Then at the Athen:  where I wrote two long letters – one to Mrs Wordsworth chiefly on the uncertainty of my going to Rydal at the Christmas as usual and the other to Mrs Coleridge who sent me a letter from Miss Fenwick. They both want me to write to Wordsworth to induce him to make a settlement on a nice of Southey who is in poverty. I wrote at length shewing that I ought not to do so as I do not know Miss Southey myself and could only write being set on by others – and this indirect & circuitous mode of making the application would be justly offensive.’