On another occasion Mr. S. thus wrote.
"My dear Cottle,
I both wish and advise you to draw up your '_Reminiscences_', I
advise you for your own sake, as a valuable memorial, and wish it for
my own, that that part of my life might be faithfully reported by the
person who knows it best...." "You have enough to tell which is
harmless, as well as interesting, and not harmless only, but
instructive, and that ought to be told, _and which only you can
tell._"
It may be proper to notice that the title here adopted, of
"REMINISCENCES" is to be understood as a general, rather than as a
strictly applicable phrase, since the present miscellaneous work is
founded on letters, and various memoranda, that for the most part, have
lain in a dormant state for many years, and which were preserved as
mementos of past scenes, personally interesting, but without, in the
first instance, the least reference to ultimate publication.
I cannot withhold a final remark, with which my own mind is greatly
affected; from revolving on a most unexpected, as it is a singular
fact,--that these brief memorials of Mr. Coleridge, and Mr. Southey,
should be written by the _same individual_ who, more than _half a
century_ before, contributed his humble efforts to assist, and encourage
them, in their first entrance on a literary life. The whole of the events
thus recorded, appear through the dim vista of memory, already with the
scenes before the flood! while all the busy, the aspiring, and the
intellectual spirits here noticed, and once so well known, have been
hurried off our mortal stage!--Robert Lovell!--George Burnet!--Charles
Lloyd!--George Catcott!--Dr. Beddoes!--Charles Danvers!--Amos
Cottle!--William Gilbert!--John Morgan!--Ann Yearsley!--Sir H.
Davy!--Hannah More!--Robert Hall!--Samuel Taylor Coleridge!--Charles
Lamb!--Thomas Poole!--Josiah Wade!--Robert Southey!--and John
Foster!--confirming, with fresh emphasis,
"What shadows we are, and what shadows we pursue!"
Bristol, April 20, 1847.