While best known as a Romantic poet, Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) held government posts in the British government of Malta from April 1804 to September 1805.  The location was chosen in part to aid the poet’s poor health.

From April 1804 to September 1805, Coleridge served in Malta as Secretary to the Governor, Sir Alexander Ball.  Coleridge enjoyed his work, practicing his Italian (the official language used in the Maltese government) as he signed himself “Segretario Pubblico dell’ Isole di Malta, Gozo, e delle loro dipendenze” many times each day.  Ball was a popular figure, and Coleridge later described him as a “truly great man.” Privately, however, Coleridge was unhappy in Malta, and was frequently ill.

Hostility towards the Maltese Jewish population was increasing in the Spring of 1805.  On May 22, Coleridge wrote two official notices for the Governor; the first condemned the “popular prejudice” against the Jews, and the second alerted its readers that three people will be whipped and exiled for inventing and spreading false rumors, and advised those who would commit similar offenses that they will be treated the same way.

This kind of Coleridge ephemera is rather rare, and is an exciting addition to Houghton’s extensive holdings of Coleridge material, which include books from the poet’s library, Coleridge’s own publications, and manuscript collections of compositions and correspondence, all of which can be viewed by searching Hollis.

*2008-2030.  Houghton Library, Harvard University.  Image may not be reproduced without permission.

The records of the Reading Society indicate that writers such as Walter Scott, Lord Byron, Coleridge, and Maria Edgeworth were popular among these readers.  (Unsurprisingly, there is no Shelley, Keats, or Austen…at least, listed as such).  Aside from fiction, many works on travel were collected, along with works of history, biography, science, and even some nonconformist theology.  Many of the books were purchased from B. Crompton, as on the receipt pictured below (click on the images to enlarge them):

The book itself is a ledger-sized volume, with receipts and lists of books purchased affixed to the pages with straight pins. In this page from 1815, such varied works as Byron’s Hebrew Melodies, The Oxford Sausage, and the three-volume Lewis and Clark’s Travels share company.

The Dundas family library lists several thousand books, pamphlets, maps and atlases, from a library now dispersed (Melville Castle is now a hotel).  While the list includes items dating to the 16th century, the majority of the library included 18th-century works printed in London.  The family seems to have preferred collecting works on history, politics, finance, and travels over literature, science, or religion, which appear infrequently in the collection.  Many of the books pertain to America or India, as befitted the 3rd viscount, who spent his military career in both places.  Pictured below is an index to the work:

A selection of items from the Dundas family library, showing works on the East India Company, Edinburgh, and a book by Mrs. Edgeworth:

Books are listed alphabetically, by author and sometimes by subject, but also by their location within the castle. Pictured below is a page from the catalogue listing books found in the”Small Drawing Room,” which include Shakespeare, Addison, and “The Adventures of Ali Baba,” among others:

Catalogue of the Library at Melville Castle:  *2008M-2.  Purchased with the Harrison D. Horblit Book Fund and the Amy Lowell Fund.

Accounts of the Reading Society, Benevolent Society, and Sunday School of Bury:           f *2007M-86.  Purchased with the Amy Lowell Fund.

Images may not be reproduced without permission.

Crudely printed, rife with spelling errors, and displaying a woodcut of a young woman walking in the countryside, the ballad references such disparate figures as Eve and Lawrence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy (who mentions the necessity for a chapter on pockets, but in keeping with much of his story, never actually writes one).

This version of the ballad, attributed to George Colman (the Younger, 1762-1836), was printed in London around 1819. Printed on cheap paper, the ballad has remained in remarkably good condition.

Click on the image to enlarge it, or click here to read a clearer text of the poem on Google Books.   For an illustration of the ballad’s popularity, click here to see an 1819 playbill for a performance of the ballad in Edinburgh, from the National Library of Scotland’s Playbills of the Theatre Royal Edinburgh collection.

*2007-841.  Purchased with the Amy Lowell fund. Image may not be reproduced without permission.

A recent critical edition of Faustus, reviewed in February in the Times Literary Supplement, claims to have solved the mystery. In 1814, Coleridge was approached by Byron’s publisher, John Murray, to translate Faust. He worked at the translation for a little over a month, and then abandoned the project out of frustration. Following the publication of two very successful editions of the work in 1820, the editors surmise, Coleridge must have been inspired to take up the project again. The 1821 edition matches his poetic style very closely, however, it was published anonymously.

Soon after this review appeared in TLS, various reactions appeared from scholars arguing against the attribution, claiming it to be based too much on conjecture. (For more on the arguments of both sides, the “Friends of Coleridge” website has collected a list of reviews and responses to the new translation.) Dr. James Engell, Gurney Professor of English and Professor of Comparative Literature at Harvard, believes the following: “My opinion is that the verse in it–most of it though not perhaps all of it–is very likely [Coleridge's], a strong attribution by Burwick and McKusick. The prose summaries of the untranslated parts are probably not by [Coleridge], nor the prose introduction, though he may have directed the prose introduction’s sense of delicate subjects, tastes of the two countries, etc.”

In the midst of this scholarly fervor, we acquired a copy of the contested 1821 translation. The edition includes twenty-six plates engraved by Henry Moses after Friedrich August Moritz Retzsch’s well-known ‘outlines’. (The idea for this edition in the first place came from the successful 1820 publication of the plates by themselves.)

f*EC8.C6795.821f. Purchased with the Norton Perkins Memorial Fund and the Amy Lowell Trust. Images may not be reproduced without permission.

At the bottom of the page, the poet wrote, “Can’t the printers manage to put this song altogether. [sic] It looks very awkward thus divided – or at least to put the 1st stanza altogether before the eye?” He was referring to the last stanza on the page, a song that begins “What does the little birdie say,” and concluded with two lines on the next page. The printer must have paid attention, as the published version of the poem appears exactly as Tennyson requested (image from Google Books):

*2007M-64. Purchased with the Amy Lowell Fund. Houghton images may not be reproduced without permission.

Cole began by sending a telegram to the HMS Dreadnought, moored in Dorset, telling the crew to expect a visit from a group of North African princes.

Dressed as the “The Emperor of Abyssinia” and his attendants, the group was received by the Dreadnought’s crew, and was given a tour of the ship. The group spoke to each other in broken Latin, and shouted made-up words to show their appreciation.

Following the event, Cole sent this photograph to the Daily Mail to reveal the ruse. When the Royal Navy demanded that Cole be punished, he countered that it was they who should be punished for allowing themselves to be fooled.

In the photo of the group, Virginia Stephen can be seen, in beard and turban, on the far left. (Click on the image to see an enlarged version.)

An account of the “Dreadnought Hoax” was written by Adrian Stephen and published in 1936 by Virginia and Leonard Woolf’s Hogarth Press. 2530 copies of the book were printed, though 1530 copies were later pulped.

Unlike earlier Hogarth publications which were handprinted by the Woolfs and decorated with unique handmade papers, The Dreadnought Hoax is rather simple, printed commercially, and decorated only with photos of the adventure. The photo above is the frontispiece.

*EC9.W8827.Z936s. Purchased with the Theodore Sedgwick Library Fund. Image may not be reproduced without permission.