My dear Frienda – I send you with this letter the Copie of the Win of Athens which[1] you desired ‒. I dont think it done quite well — but yet it is good[2] enough for remembering ‒ the old town and all those you saw there. The letter you send to1 me previosly of […]
My dear Frienda – I send you with this letter the Copie of the Win of Athens which[1] you desired ‒. I dont think it done quite well — but yet it is good[2] enough for remembering ‒ the old town and all those you saw there. The letter you send to1 me previosly of your departure of Vienna touched me indeed very much — and though I was allways perfectly convinced of your sincere attachement to me, yet there was a certain delicacy in it which proved me that you can be at once a good and very pleasant friend — I was extremly sorry to hear the lost2 of you pudel[3] and yet more dissapointed to see that he was found one day after your departure. –
There are many evenements3 which occured ‒ in respect of the Fate of young C[4] Szech[5] in the short time since you left Vienna.[6] “Every[7] hope of marriage vanished at once of[8] his gloomy soul – at I see now to clear – that the happiness of domestic life is for ever lost7 for1 me. –
I vant say more, but, that I am quite sure – that you vould not have done differently in my position — which you can not know thouroghly. – it is inpossible. — I am not very happy ‒ yet I never will be wretched -. The idea of doing right givs us a sort of consolation which never will fail to sustain us –
I am going to leave Vienna in about three weeks ‒ on purpose of a journey in hongerie and poland ‒ I shall pass the next Winter here and the next Spring in Switzerland.
My Father gets better every day – but his manner of seeing is so quite different of myn mine, that we cannot agree in so many respects – which in my present situation cannot be very pleasant of course ‒ Yet I shall allways behave well and gratefull.[b]
[1] Interlining afterwards.
[2] Corrected word.
[3] Széchenyi’s underlining with straight line.
[4] Count
[5] Széchényi
[6] Inserted afterwards.
[7] One word deleted by Széchenyi.
[8] One letter deleted.
[a] Robert Wilson was a Scottish physician who spent seven years in East India. On his way home, he met Széchenyi in Athens and they travelled together from there to Naples.
[b] The notes in the notebook K 247 are undated, but it can be established that they were written in July 1819.
Recommended reference:
István Széchenyi to Robert Wilson, Vienna, 31 July 1819. Edited and annotated by Szilvia Czinege. Published in Correspondence of István Széchenyi. Digital edition. Edited by Szilvia Czinege and Zoltán Fónagy. https://szechenyilevelezes.abtk.hu/ Abbreviation for further references: SzIL-Digit.