JO U RNAL O F A TO U R IN THE N ETHE RLAN D S IN T HE AU T U M N O F 1 8 1 5 3 I N T RO D U C T I O N SOUTHEY wrote this Diary during one of the d of most prosperous perio s his anxious, labo ’ n an d . 1 8 1 8 Croker s infiu rio s , happy life In ’ R u ence with the egent, backed p by Scott s, procured for him the appointment of Poet of n ot h £1 00 Laureate , with a salary more t an . ’ That wreath which in Eliza s golden d ays M ma er d ea di i n e S e n r o e y st r, v st p se , w r ’ Tha hich re arde d Dra t on s l arn d l a t w w y e e ys , Which thoughtful Ben an d gentle Dan iel bore Grin En hrou h th a e d m a k of o n ! , vy , t g y r gg s sc r ” I n hon o i wa s iven ith hon our i i orn ur t g , w t s w . Tho ugh he had stipul ated that he should be excused the drudgery of compo sing birthday of odes , he was quite alive to the duties his position, and deemed himself bound to cele brate the victory of Waterloo. He did so in ’ the verses entitled The Poet s Pilgrimage t o ” Waterloo , which is a fair specimen of his l N T R O D U C T l O N on had e poems public events . He b en enjoy ing for some years a good income from the Qua rterly and from the Edinburgh Annual ” R a egister, and had chieved his greatest success ” i n as a prose writer his Life of Nelson , pub lished 1 8 1 R in 8 . His extensive poem , oderick ” b the Last of the Goths, had een applauded by “ the Edin b urg h as the best and the most ’ ” of . powerful all Mr. Southey s poems The Quarter ly had declared that the work would “ form an epoch in the literary hist orv of his t ” coun ry , convey to himself a name per on durable earth, and to the age in which he lives a character that need not fear compari son with that of any by which it has been preceded . Southey himself complacently ob “ served : Nothing can be more absurd than thinking of comparing any of my poems with ’ . w Paradise Lost With Tasso, ith Virgil, with Homer there may be fair grounds of compari son This praise had been followed by solid wa results in the y of cash , and Southey was induced to disturb the regul arity of his life by taking a Continental journey . There were few men was who whom it harder to move , few men vi I N T R O D U C T I O N miss ed more the comfortable routine of his days . He dined at four, and then read himself on was asleep his sofa . It the short nap then enjoyed which he most missed of all things when by any chance away from home . He wakened for his tea, and turned to work again , especially - t o happy ifthere were proof sheets correct . The correction of proofs was always the supreme luxury of his experiences . He supped lightly or at nine, indulged himself for an hour so with hot some solid folio , and a single glass of rum punch, enriched with a little black currant jelly — and so to bed . Though he was able to afford the expenses of this j ourney, yet it was not till 1 8 8 4 that he found himself in posse ssion of money suffi cient for the usual demands of a At the time of this excursion there was great ’ m peace in Southey s fa ily circle . There never was a heart more acutely responsive than his to of the joys and sorrows family life . He traced all his happiness to his early marriage ; and 1 8 8 4 ’ when in his wife s mind gave way, he said in one of his letters that for fort y years she ” of had been the life his life . To his children Vl l I N T R O D U C T I O N e he was attached with p culiar tenderness, and there can be little doubt that his sufferings from bereavement gradually broke him down . The greatest sorrow of all was impending when D a he wrote this i ry, though he did not antici i Hi t . s pate eldest and most gifted son , on 1 7th 1 8 1 6 . Herbert, died April , The Diary here printe d is a simple and artless ’ record, less elaborate than Southey s published “ of works the same kind, like the Letters on Spain and Portugal but nevertheless plea sing 0 of and individual . N reader Southey will expect D a contribution to military history . The uke ’ of n Welli gton himself, speaking of Southey s of P a History the eninsul r War, declared that Southey signally misapprehended his battles ’ and campaigns . Southey s elaborate Quarterly Review on D l article the uke of We lington shows , had however, that he given much attention to his subject . There are one or two glimpses of interesting people . Among them may be noted Mr . and Mrs . Locker . They were the parents of - his a Frederick Locker Lampson, who in utobio “ fi ” ' graphy, My Con dences, describes them at Yl l l I N T R O D U C T I O N some length . Jonathan Boucher (not Bouchers) d of had a lively career, and ied Vicar Epsom , 1 8 04 . in His daughter, Mrs Locker, the beauty of Cumberland, is described by her son as ex “ cee din l . g y handsome Tall and fine , she had a remarkably graceful carriage, a natural dignity of manner and movement ; and this description held good when she was more than sixty years old had . She an innocent anxious face . She told me that she was very timid as a girl, and that when first married to my father she was ” afraid of him . She was much younger than her husband . Mr . Locker was a man of fine old qualities , and an and true friend of Sir Walter Scott. The glimpses of Southey as a W book buyer are attractive . One wonders hether he bought his set of the Acta Sanctorum from the young man in dirty but scholarlike costume, in a Ghent library . Whether or not, n the Acta had a promine t place in his library . Lockhart sketches him there surrounded with lite of the é his books, mostly Spanish and P ortuguese, and bound in vellum . Works held unworthy of costly bindi ng were clad in calico d of had by the la ies his family , and a garret 1 X I N T R O D U C T I O N t o d themselves style the Cottonian Library. Southey sat at a rather tall desk in the middle of or the apartment, while three four ladies were d fi d either busy with nee lework by the resi e , or in corners copying extracts . One notices here, as elsewhere, the immense influence which Southey ’s short stay in Spain had and Portugal upon his life . It unquestion ably injured his literary work . He chose subjects ” of like the History Brazil , which had little interest for Englishmen , and were related with fatal minuteness . Whitwell Elwin is right in saying that if Southey had remained at home during the critical period when his tastes were f becoming ixed , he would have selected an English theme for his chief productions , and his fame would have been associated with some of standard history our language and literature . In this way the journey to Lisbon may have been in its permanent consequences a most un fortu ’ s . nate step in Southey life On the other hand, he had the utmost delight in the perpetual r exhila ation of a climate that not merely, as he said, prolonged life, but gave him double the f i f li e wh le it lasted . The mere act o breathing I N T R O D U C T I O N was a positive pleasure . When he got back to a Engl nd, his fondest hope, a hope never realised, was that he might obtain a position in Lisbon which would enable him to return and make it his home . W . R B RT N N I L L O E SO CO . t X1 A U T H O R ’ S I N T R O D U C T I O N I wa s not among those persons who took the earliest opportunity of going to the continent t when , af er having so long been closed to English s o e the traveller , it was once m re open d upon overthrow and abdication of Buonaparte . A journey which might have seemed easy from the south of England appeared formidable e when contemplat d in Cumberland ; moreover, I was wedded to the enj oym ents and occupa tions of domestic life ; and my wishes as well as s n ow habit were so disciplined that, except I and then in books, never incurred any ex enditure ul p which co d with propriety be spared .