There were two fiddles and a bass viol. The fiddlers,--above all,
the bass violer,--most Hogarthian phizzes! God love them! I felt far
more affection for them than towards any other set of human beings I
have met with since I have been in Germany, I suppose because they
looked so happy!
[Footnote 1: marked with an asterisk in the proofing (not the original
text), but not explained further.]
CHAPTER VIII
RETURN TO ENGLAND; "WALLENSTEIN", AND
THE "MORNING POST"
On the 21st May, Coleridge wrote the following letter in which he
informs Josiah Wedgwood what he had done in Germany, and what he
expected to do with the knowledge which he had acquired there.
LETTER 85. TO JOSIAH WEDGWOOD
May 21st, 1799. Gottingen.
My dear sir,
I have lying by my side six huge letters, with your name on each of
them, and all, excepting one, have been written for these three months.
About this time Mr. Hamilton, by whom I send this and the little parcel
for my wife, was, as it were, setting off for England; and I seized the
opportunity of sending them by him, as without any mock-modesty I really
thought that the expense of the postage to me and to you would be more
than their worth. Day after day, and week after week, was Hamilton
going, and still delayed. And now that it is absolutely settled that he
goes to-morrow, it is likewise absolutely settled that I shall go this
day three weeks, and I have therefore sent only this and the picture by
him, but the letters I will now take myself, for I should not like them
to be lost, as they comprise the only subject on which I have had an
opportunity of making myself thoroughly informed, and if I carry them
myself, I can carry them without danger of their being seized at
Yarmouth, as all my letters were, yours to ---- excepted, which were,
luckily, not sealed.
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