Henry Crabb Robinson, Bury St Edmunds, to Mary Wordsworth, [London], 22 March [18]49.

Bury St Edmunds

22 Mar: 49

My dear friend –

     I am come down to have the melancholy pleasure of dining with the bar at the Judges lodgings – both the judges are personal acquaintance – One, was my Junior on the circuit – Among the bar, not above two or three were here in my time – This does not make me sad by making me feel old – I am sufficiently aware of the fact and practical philosopher enough to perceive it without sorrow – I have left the bar 21 years! I perceive also with no painful sense of humility, how much better the men do business than I was able to do. You perhaps recollect Mrs Clarksons younger sister Anne Buck – She did not marry young – Her Son was first an Attorney’s clerk – then lived with his mother on her farm, at length he married a cousin And was induced, I know not why, to go to the bar to which he was lately admitted but I do not see him on the circuit, tho’ he lives in the town – Such are the incidents of life – They make us grave when we record them, not so much from a sense of evil or wrong, as of the insignificance or worthlessness of life.

     Has it never occurred to you when musing on some of the most gloomy of the doctrines concerning the future destiny of the human race that it rather elevates unduly mankind in supposing it to be the object of Gods everlasting wrath – How I have been led to the expression of this thought now, it would be hard to say – It is very often in my mind.

     I have found a family of Invalids – Of five individuals not one in honest hearty health – My brother had a slight fit the day of my arrival, but he was able to walk home he deems it prudent to keep within to day – I came here on Tuesday – Old Mrs Hutchison keeps her room till tea time – My niece & Mrs H: have both had the influenza. It seized the throat And Mrs Robinson has sufferd severely – And the boy is kept from school by a cold.

     I am myself well in health, but I have a slight lameness owing to having walked to[o] much I believe – I am come here to rest – for I find it impossible when in town I had a fall last July And every now & then I shall feel the consequences in a weakness in the muscles of the leg.

     Really I ought to be ashamed of myself writing about one’s own & one’s family’s infirmities – I should not have dared to write such a letter to a young friend – you will sympathise in some of these – I wont say, – complaints, but statements.

     My lameness kept me from making calls before I left town – In particular, I did not see Mrs Coleridge which I wished – Her new Volume about her father will soon be out

     Moxon I find is going to print a Vol: of Hartley Coleridges remains – As publisher his recommendation will have an authority which no friend’s will have – he will not I believe suffer more than a few pages of biography For this sort of sketch by way of preface to works, the French have excellent models in what they modestly term notice de la Vie de  Half a dozen pages of Memoir will be quite as much as is required to exhibit the respectable & amiable qualities of poor Hartley.  His frailties may be well allowed to remain in the obscurity of a country residence

     My lameness occasioned my not calling at the very last on Mrs Twining and on Rogers.  When I last heard of him, he was at Brighton with his Sister – She is still capable of enjoyment in spite of many privations – Dr Aikin after his Paralysis used to say – “I must make the most I can of the Salvage of Life”  There is an excellent little tale in the “Evenings at home” illustrative of the <–> felicity of those whose happy temperament enables them to make the best of it – And I scarcely flatter myself that I belong to this happy class – Indeed I need not keep it a secret for we are not a dignified class And owe more to apathy than to a wisdom for our exemption from suffering I am sometimes ashamed of my comfort.

     Just before I left town the Second Edition of Layards Nineveh came out – I took the liberty to bring the copy destined for you to Bury with me – I shall return to London I have no doubt before you return to Rydal And as soon as I go it shall be sent you.

    I must now make up for a past neglect, but it will come too late to be of any use – I did ask Mr Wood whether the changes in the department of finance would cause, as was reported, the removal of the Stamp distributors – no removals, he said, but modifications – And I inferred from his manner, they would be not in favor of the office holder – And as I came here, on Tuesday, I read in the Times of the day a paragraph, which I doubt not some “d—d good natured friend” has shewn William. In this as in other like matters a homely rhyme must be borne in mind “What can’t be cured, must be endured.” Cold comfort! – For endurance does not imply indifference  Perhaps if I had had good news to communicate I should not have delayed so long.

     And now, dear friend, let me close a sad letter I have nothing chearful to add at last, for of dear Mrs Clarkson I have heard nothing

     To your dear Husband, your Son & his wife Mr Quilln: And all Rydal friends & acquaintance with due gradations my kind remembrances

                         Affectionately yours

                                    H. C. Robinson

Mrs Wordsworth

Text:  WLL, Robinson, Henry Crabb/15, Wordsworth Trust and Museum, Grasmere. Robinson writes in his diary on 22 March 1849: ‘I received a parcel from Armstrong with a letter complimenting me for my letter to him, but neither professing to be converted by it, nor controverting it – a forbearance on his part I did not expect. I wrote to Mrs Wordsworth today giving her an account of my friends here and of our London friends and I wrote a note to Mrs Gregory. My brother was tolerably well but Henry very poorly. The incident of the day was my dinner with the Judges. The Ch: Baron was very friendly and I chatted with him while he changed his dress – and his talk at the Bar table was lively & affable to everyone. Rolfe came in after dinner being detained.’