--The Ode to the Genius of
Africa.--To my own Miniature Picture.--The Eight Inscriptions.--Elinor,
Botany-bay Eclogue.--Frederick", ditto.--"The Ten Sonnets". (pp.
107-116.) "On the death of an Old Spaniel.--The Soldier's Wife,
Dactylics,--The Widow, Sapphics.--The Chapel Bell.--The Race of
Banco.--"Rudiger".
All these Poems are worthy the Author of "Joan of Arc". And
"The Musings on a Landscape", etc. and "The Hymn to the Penates",
deserve to have been published after "Joan of Arc", as proofs of
progressive genius.
God bless you,
S. T. C.
[Footnote 1: Mr. Wordsworth lived at Racedown, before he removed to
Allfoxden. (Cottle.)] [The dates of Letters 49 and 50 are determined by
that of a letter from Lamb to Coleridge of 5th January 1797 ("Ainger",
i, 57). Letter 49 implies that Coleridge was now acquainted with
Wordsworth. A letter from Mrs. Wordsworth to Sara Coleridge of 7th Nov.
1845 (Knight's "Life of Wordsworth", i, iii) gives the date of the first
meeting of the poets as "about the year 1795." Professor Knight thinks
this should be 1796. In the letter of Wordsworth to Wrangham, referred
to in Note to Letter 13, Wordsworth does not say that he knew Coleridge
personally. Letter 49 is the only trustworthy "contemporary" evidence on
the subject.]
After receiving Lamb's answer of 5th January, in which Lamb criticises
unfavourably the "Joan of Arc" lines ("Ainger", i, 57), Coleridge writes:
LETTER 50.
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