312. Robert Bloomfield to Robert Southey, 3 May 1817* 

Dear Sir,

I have procured your address from Mess^rs. Longmans, and hasten to pay a debt of gratitude which has been too long delay'd. From Mr. Tillbrook of Cambridge I have the substance and extracts of the letter you addresst to him relative to me and my concerns. I despair of the honour of a personal interview, and therefore, relying upon it as a certainty that you could not Give, Offer, or write as you have done without feeling an interest in my welfare I beg once for all to return you my most sincere thanks. I am, and have a right to be proud of this opportunity of saying even this much, but you will be glad to hear that from pecuniary assistance, and a still unexpired somthing which belongs to my name I have been enabled to place a Daughter [1]  with a £40 premiums in a situation in which she may procure a living when I am under the turf.

Besides this I have the natural expectation that my eldest Son will get an appointment to a school on the plan of Dr Bell [2]  about to be established at Putney in Surrey, when he has at the Central School, learnd their methods of tuition, and acquired a certificate of his competency for the undertaking.

You See, Sir, that, I write abominably bad: I have recoverd in great measure the use of my eye, not to say eyes, And remain in much better health than I have had for years past.

Your

Most Obliged and Humble Serv^t.

Rob^t Bloomfield

No 19 Daggetts Court

Broker Row

Moorfields

PS Please to give my sincere respects to the Alps and Appenines on your Travels. I shall be meanwhile perhaps siting quietly on a stile, or watching a wild Rabit or trying to break back an unwilling Muse at the Age of fifty.

P.S. the second

Mr Park desires his respects to be recieved by you as a friend of some standing—Mr S Rogers to whom I made bold to show Mr Tillbrook's letter, immediately joined in your idea of the Iometeer. Further I will not trouble you.