Or let me add (for my
appetite for similes is truly canine at this moment), that as the
Italian nobles their new-fashioned doors, so thou dost make the
adamantine gate of Democracy turn on its golden hinges to most sweet
music. [1]
[Footnote 1: Letter XXXII gives the full text of No. 7. Letter XXXIII is dated
15 July, 1794.]
For the next fifteen months Coleridge and Southey were close companions,
Coleridge being the elder by two years.
Upon the present occasion, however, he left Oxford with an acquaintance,
Mr. Hucks, for a pedestrian tour in Wales. [2] Two other friends,
Brookes and Berdmore, joined them in the course of their ramble; and at
Caernarvon Mr. Coleridge wrote the following letter to Mr. Martin, of
Jesus College.
[Footnote 2: It is to this tour that he refers in the "Table Talk", p.
88.--"I took the thought of "grinning for joy" in that poem ("The
Ancient Mariner") from my companion (Berdmore's) remark to me, when we
had climbed to the top of Penmaenmaur, and were nearly dead with thirst.
We could not speak from the constriction, till we found a little puddle
under a stone. He said to me,--'You grinned like an idiot.' He had done
the same."]
LETTER 8. To HENRY MARTIN [1]
July 22d, 1794.
Dear Martin,
From Oxford to Gloucester,+ to Ross,+ to Hereford, to Leominster, to
Bishop's Castle,+ to Montgomery, to Welshpool, Llanvelling,+ Llangunnog,
Bala,+ Druid House,+ Llangollin, Wrexham,++ Ruthin, Denbigh,+ St.
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