Samuel Taylor Coleridge Malta under the Civil Commissioner, Alexander Ball, a task he performed quite successfully. He lived in San Anton Palace in the village of Attard. However, he gave this up and returned to England in 1806. Dorothy Wordsworth was shocked at his condition upon his return. From 1807 to 1808, Coleridge returned to Malta and then travelled in Sicily and Italy, in the hope that leaving Britain's damp climate would improve his health and thus enable him to reduce his consumption of opium. Thomas De Quincey alleges in his "Recollections of the Lakes and the Lake Poets" that it was during
Joseph Cottle to Coleridge and Southey, and entered into details of Coleridge's opium habit. ‘The confusion in Cottle's "Recollections" is greater than any one would think possible,’ said Southey; the book is inaccurate in its dates, and documents quoted are garbled. It has details on others such as Robert Lovell and William Gilbert. It has youthful portraits of Coleridge, Southey, Wordsworth, and Charles Lamb. A second edition was published in 1847 under the title of "Reminiscences of Coleridge and Southey". The appendix to the fourth edition of his "Malvern Hills" (1829) contains several essays, including an account of his tutor Henderson, a