Letter from Edward Thomas to the poet Gordon Bottomley. Sent from Elses Farm, The Weald, Kent. Archival ref: 424/1/1/1/10/23
Elses Farm
The Weald
Sevenoaks

13.xi.04

My dear Gordon,
I had to put an end to
my mountain walk on the 4th day
because I got blisters strained. But it
was a splendid time - the people so
hospitable, the country so magnificent -
& someday I may writ the better for it.
Nevertheless, it has only made my
present incompetence seem the greater and
I cannot write a word. I even think I may
have to give it up after all. Still I am
reading hard & making plans just as if I were
quite confident. Do let me have the Welsh
book you speak of.
Oh, I don't know what to do,
& I haven't at present the courage to do just
what I like, regardless of the publisher: nor
if I did, would it be of much use, since it
would be so little.
You should have seen the mountains
of Cardigan - and the hundred rivers -
& the peat & birches & white farms &
deserted houses & orchards - and five
miles without a man or a house in the
mist. In fact the mountains I crossed
were so wild & wet that few of the
farmers had ever been far over them:
there :
there were ravens & badgers & otter's there.
I am promised the prose translations
of the Welsh songs soon & will send them on
at once & with the music. I will mark
the internal rhymes for you & such
regular alliteration as there is. It should
make a fine patch on my hasty page.
Money difficulties make it impossible
for me to live in London just now. I don't want to if I can avoid it. And yet you can't
guess how the little things of life here trouble
me & incapacitate e. Merfyn fidgetting
is worse than a brass band practising at
Chelsea: truly; tho I am not sure why. So
I may not meet Balmer just yet. I must be in
form to use the Museum, however, in a week or
so, & then - if he is arrived - I hope I shall
see him: if you give me a letter I will
call on him - no, just his address is
all that is necessary.
Goodbye. I hope you will write in
spite of all discouragement from me: & believe that
I am what I am because I am perplexed by
Wales & by the reviewing I have to keep up as
usual & by problems beside which these are
amusements.
Helen & I send our love to you all.

Ever yours
Edward Thomas