whichever way I turn, a thorn runs into me. The future is cloud and
thick darkness. Poverty, perhaps, and the thin faces of them that want
bread looking up to me! Nor is this all. My happiest moments for
composition are broken in upon by the reflection that I must make haste.
"I am too late." "I am already months behind." "I have received my pay
beforehand."----O wayward and desultory spirit of Genius, ill can'st
thou brook a taskmaster! The tenderest touch from the hand of obligation
wounds thee like a scourge of scorpions!

I have been composing in the fields this morning, and came home to write
down the first rude sheet of my Preface, when I heard that your man had
brought a note from you. I have not seen it, but I guess its contents. I
am writing as fast as I can. Depend on it, you shall not be out of
pocket for me. I feel what I owe you, and, independently of this, I love
you as a friend,--indeed so much that I regret, seriously regret, that
you have been my copyholder.

If I have written petulantly, forgive me. God knows I am sore all over.
God bless you! and believe me that, setting gratitude aside, I love and
esteem you, and have your interest at heart full as much as my own.

S. T. COLERIDGE. [1]

On the 1st of March, 1796, "The Watchman" was published; it ended with
the tenth number on the 13th of May following. In March Mr. C. removed
to a house in Oxford Street in Kingsdown, and thence wrote the following
letter to Mr. Poole:

[1: Letter LIV is our 25.]