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diff --git a/old/10851-8.txt b/old/10851-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6f1c001 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/10851-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,25473 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) +by Charles and Mary Lamb + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) + Letters 1821-1842 + +Author: Charles and Mary Lamb + +Release Date: January 28, 2004 [EBook #10851] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WORKS OF C. & M. LAMB, V6 *** + + + + +Produced by Keren Vergon, Virginia Paque and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + + + + + THE WORKS OF + CHARLES AND MARY LAMB + VI. LETTERS + 1821-1842 + + + + + THE LETTERS + + OF + + CHARLES AND MARY LAMB + + 1821-1842 + + EDITED BY + + E.V. LUCAS + + WITH A FRONTISPIECE + + + + +CONTENTS OF VOLUME VI + +LETTER 1821 + +264 Charles Lamb to Dorothy Wordsworth Jan. 8 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +265 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop No date + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +266 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop No date + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +267 Charles Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton Jan. 23 + From the original. + +268 Charles Lamb to Miss Humphreys Jan. 27 + From the original at Rowfant. + +269 Charles Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton. March 15 + From the original. + +270 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop March 30 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +271 Charles Lamb to Leigh Hunt April 18 + From Leigh Hunt's _Correspondence_. + +272 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge May 1 + From the _Life of Charles Mathews_. + +273 Charles Lamb to James Gillman May 2 + From the _Life of Charles Mathews_. + +274 Charles Lamb to John Payne Collier May 16 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +275 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter ?Summer + From facsimile in Mrs. Field's _A Shelf of + Old Authors_. + +276 Charles Lamb to John Taylor June 8 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +277 Charles Lamb to John Taylor July 21 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +278 Charles Lamb to C.A. Elton Aug. 17 + From the original in the possession of + Sir Edmund Elton. + +279 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Summer + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +280 Mary Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton No date + From the original in the possession of + Mr. A.M.S. Methuen. + +281 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Oct. 21 + From the American owner. + +282 Charles Lamb to William Ayrton Oct. 27 + From the original. + + 1822. + +283 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge March 9 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +284 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth March 20 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +285 Charles Lamb to W. Harrison Ainsworth May 7 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +286 Charles Lamb to William Godwin May 16 + Mr. Kegan Paul's text (_William Godwin: + His Friends_, etc.). + +287 Charles Lamb to Mrs. John Lamb May 22 + From the original in the Bodleian. + +288 Charles Lamb to Mary Lamb (_fragment_) Aug. + From Crabb Robinson's _Diary_. + +289 Charles Lamb to John Clare Aug. 31 + From the original (British Museum). + +290 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 11 + From the original (British Museum). + +291 Charles Lamb to Barren Field Sept. 22 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. B.B. Macgeorge. + +292 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Autumn + From the _Century Magazine_. + +293 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Oct. 9 + From the original (British Museum). + +294 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon Oct. 9 + From _Haydon's Correspondence and Table + Talk_. + +295 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Oct. 22 + From the _Century Magazine_. + +296 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon Oct. 29 + From _Haydon's Correspondence and Table + Talk_. + +297 Charles Lamb to Sir Walter Scott Oct. 29 + From Scott's _Familiar Letters_. + +298 Charles Lamb to Thomas Robinson Nov. 11 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +299 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Nov. 13 + From the _Century Magazine_. + +300 Mary Lamb to Mrs. James Kenney ?Early Dec. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +301 Charles Lamb to John Taylor Dec. 7 + From _Elia_ (Bell's edition). + +302 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Dec. 16 + From the original (Bodleian). + +303 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 23 + From the original (British Museum). + + 1823. + +304 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Jan. + From the _Century Magazine_. + +305 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth Jan. + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +306 Charles Lamb to Mr. and Mrs. J.D. Collier Jan. 6 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.B. Adam. + +307 Charles Lamb to Charles Aders Jan. 8 + From the original (Mr. J. Dunlop). + +308 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Jan. 9 + From the original (British Museum). + +309 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Jan. 23 + From the _Century Magazine_. + +310 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Feb. 9 + From the _Century Magazine_. + +311 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 17 + From the original (British Museum). + +312 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Feb. 24 + From Mr. Hazlitt's text. + +313 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 11 + From the original (British Museum). + +314 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 5 + From the original (British Museum). + +315 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter April 13 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +316 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson April 25 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +317 Charles Lamb to Miss Hutchinson (?) + (_fragment_) No date + From _Notes and Queries_. + +318 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin No date + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +319 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton May 3 + From the original (British Museum). + +320 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin May 6 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +321 Mary Lamb to Mrs. Randal Norris June 18 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +322 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +323 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop July + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +324 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 2 + From the original (British Museum). + +325 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 6 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +326 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 9 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +327 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 10 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +328 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +329 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 17 + From the original (British Museum). + +330 Charles Lamb to Charles Lloyd + (_fragment_) Autumn + From _Letters and Poems of Bernard Barton_. + +331 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Oct. 14 + From _Memoir of H.F. Cary_. + +332 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop ?Oct. + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +333 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Oct. 28 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +334 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt Early Nov. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +335 Charles Lamb to Robert Southey Nov. 21 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +336 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Nov. 22 + From the original (British Museum). + +337 Charles Lamb to W. Harrison Ainsworth Dec. 9 + From the original. + +338 Charles Lamb to W. Harrison Ainsworth Dec. 29 + From the original. + + 1824. + +339 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Jan. 9 + From the original (British Museum). + +340 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Jan. 23 + From the original (British Museum). + +341 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +342 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 24 + From the original (British Museum). + +343 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Early Spring + From the original (British Museum). + +344 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Thomas Allsop April 13 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +345 Charles Lamb to William Hone April + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.A. Potts. + +346 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton May 15 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. B.B. Macgeorge. + +347 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 7 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +348 Charles Lamb to W. Marter. July 19 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +349 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin July 28 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +350 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood (?_fragment_) Aug. 10 + From the original. + +351 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 17 + From the original (British Museum). + +352 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 30 + From the original (British Museum). + +353 Charles Lamb to Mrs. John Dyer Collier Nov. 2 + From the original (South Kensington + Museum). + +354 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Nov. 11 + From Barry Cornwall's _Charles Lamb_ + with alterations. + +355 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Nov. 20 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +356 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson Nov. 25 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +357 Charles Lamb to Leigh Hunt ?Nov. + From Leigh Hunt's _Correspondence_ with + alterations. + +358 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 1 + Charles Lamb to Lucy Barton + From the original (British Museum). + + 1825. + +359 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Jan. 11 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +360 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Jan. 17 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +361 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson Jan. 20 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +362 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Jan. 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +363 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +364 Charles Lamb to Thomas Manning ?Feb. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +365 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson. March 1 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +366 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 23 + From the original (British Museum). + +367 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson March 29 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +368 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth April 6 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +369 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 6 + From the original (British Museum). + +370 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson April 18 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + (Last paragraph from original scrap at + Welbeck Abbey.) + +371 Charles Lamb to William Hone May 2 + From the original at Rowfant. + +372 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth May + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +373 Charles Lamb to Charles Chambers ?May + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +374 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge ?June + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +375 Charles Lamb to Henry Colburn (?) June 14 + From the original (South Kensington). + +376 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge July 2 + From the original (Morrison Collection). + +377 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 2 + From the original (British Museum). + +378 Charles Lamb to John Aitken July 5 + +379 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +380 Charles Lamb to Robert Southey Aug. 10 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +381 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 9 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +382 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 24 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +383 Charles Lamb to William Hone Oct. 24 + From the original at Rowfant. + +384 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Dec. 5 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +385 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier ?Dec. + From the original (South Kensington). + + 1826. + +386 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier Early in year + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +387 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier Jan. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +388 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 7 + From the original (British Museum). + +389 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier March 16 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.A. Potts. + +390 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 20 + From the original (British Museum). + +391 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge March 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +392 Charles Lamb to H.F. Gary April 3 + Mr. Hazlitt's text. + +393 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello May 9 + From the original (British Museum). + +394 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton May 16 + From the original (British Museum). + +395 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge June 1 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +396 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin June 30 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +397 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hill No year + From the original (British Museum). + +398 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin July 14 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +399 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth Sept. 6 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +400 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon (fragment). No date + +401 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 9 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +402 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 26 + From the original (British Museum). + +403 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Sept. + From the original in the possession of + Mr. Henry Poulton. + +404 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton No date + From the original (British Museum). + + 1827. + +405 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. 20 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +406 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. 20 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +407 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. 29 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +408 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +409 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon March + From Taylor's _Life of Haydon_. + +410 Charles Lamb to William Hone April + From the original at Rowfant. + +411 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood May + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +412 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton No date + From the original (British Museum). + +413 Charles Lamb to William Hone May + From the original at Rowfant. + +414 Charles Lamb to William Hone June + From the original at Rowfant. + +415 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton June 11 + From the original (British Museum). + +416 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson June 26 + From the original (British Museum). + +417 Charles Lamb to William Hone July + From the original at Rowfant. + +418 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 17 + From the original at Rowfant. + +419 Charles Lamb to P.G. Patmore July 19 + From Patmore's _My Friends and Acquaintances_. + +420 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Shelley July 26 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +421 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Basil Montagu Summer + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +422 Mary Lamb to Lady Stoddart Aug. 9 + +423 Charles Lamb to Sir John Stoddart + From the original (Messrs. Maggs). + +424 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +425 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 28 + From the original (British Museum). + +426 Charles Lamb to P.G. Patmore Sept. + From _My Friends and Acquaintances_. + +427 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 5 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +428 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 13 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +429 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 18 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +430 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood Sept. 18 + From the facsimile in Mrs. Balmanno's + _Pen and Pencil_. + +431 Charles Lamb to Henry Colburn Sept. 25 + From the original (South Kensington). + +432 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Sept. 26 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. Henry Poulton. + +433 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Oct. 1 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +434 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Oct. 2 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +435 Charles Lamb to Barron Field Oct. 4 + From the _Memoirs of Charles Matthews_. + +436 Charles Lamb to William Hone ?Oct. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +437 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood No date + From the _National Review_. + +438 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton No date + From the original (British Museum). + +439 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 4 + From the original (British Museum). + +440 Charles Lamb to Leigh Hunt Dec. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +441 Charles Lamb to William Hone Dec. 15 + +442 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop ?Dec. + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +443 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Dec. 20 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +444 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. 22 + From the original at Rowfant. + +445 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton End of year + From the original (British Museum). + + 1828. + +446 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Jan. 9 + From _Harper's Magazine_ with alterations. + +447 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Jan. + From the original at Rowfant. + +448 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. 18 + From the original at Rowfant. + +449 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Feb. 25 + From _Reminiscences of Writers_. + +450 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Feb. 26 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +451 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon March 19 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +452 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 21 + From the original (British Museum). + +453 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop May 1 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +454 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon May 3 + From the original. + +455 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson May 17 + From the original (British Museum). + +456 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd May 20 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +457 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth May + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +458 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Morgan June 17 + +459 Mary Lamb to the Thomas Hoods ?Summer + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +460 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon Aug. + From Taylor's _Life of Haydon_. + +461 Charles Lamb to John Rickman + (_translation_) Oct. 3 + +462 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Oct. 11 + From the original (British Museum). + +463 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Oct. + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +464 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Nov. 6 + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +465 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood Late autumn + From _Hood's Own_. + +466 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. + Text from Mr. Samuel Davey. + +467 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 5 + From the original (British Museum). + +468 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Dec. + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +469 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd End of year + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + + 1829. + +470 Charles Lamb to George Dyer ?Jan. + From the original (British Museum). + +471 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Jan.19 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +472 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Jan. 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +473 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Jan. 28 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +474 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Jan. 29 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +475 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Early in year + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +476 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Feb. 2 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +477 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Feb. 2 + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +478 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Feb. 27 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +479 Charles Lamb to Samuel Rogers March 22 + From _Rogers and His Contemporaries_. + +480 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +481 Charles Lamb to Miss Sarah James ?April + Text from Mr. Samuel Davey. + +482 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson ?April + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +483 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson April 17 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +484 Charles Lamb to George Dyer April 29 + From _The Mirror_, 1841. + +485 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood ?May + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +486 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon No date + From _The Autographic Mirror_. + +487 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson May 28 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +488 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton June 3 + From the original (British Museum). + +489 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +490 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Late July + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +491 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Sept. 22 + From the original at Rowfant. + +492 Charles Lamb to James Gillman Oct. 26 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +493 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Nov. 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +494 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Nov. 15 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +495 Charles Lamb to James Gillman ?Nov. 29 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +496 Charles Lamb to James Gillman Nov. 30 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +497 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 8 + From the original (British Museum). + +498 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth +499 Mary Lamb to Dorothy Wordsworth Jan. 22 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +500 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +501 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams Feb. 26 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +502 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams March 1 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +503 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt March 4 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +504 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams March 5 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +505 Charles Lamb to James Gillman March 8 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +506 Charles Lamb to William Ayrton March 14 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +507 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams March 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +508 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams April 2 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. Yates Thompson. + +509 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams April 9 + From the original. + +510 Charles Lamb to James Gillman ?Spring + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +511 Charles Lamb to Jacob Vale Asbury ?April + From _The Athenaewn_. + +512 Charles Lamb to Jacob Vale Asbury No date + By permission of Mr. Edward Hartley. + +513 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams April 21 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +514 Charles Lamb to Robert Southey May 10 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +515 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon May 12 + From the original at Rowfant. + +516 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello May 14 + From the original (British Museum). + +517 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello May 20 + From the original (British Museum). + +518 Charles Lamb to William Hone May 21 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +519 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt May 24 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +520 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt June 3 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +521 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton June 28 + From the original (British Museum). + +522 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 30 + From the original (British Museum). + +523 Charles Lamb to Samuel Rogers Oct. 5 + From _Rogers and His Contemporaries_. + +524 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Nov. 8 + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +525 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Nov. 12 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +9526 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Dec. + From the original at Rowfant. + +527 Charles Lamb to George Dyer Dec. 20 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +528 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Christmas + From the original (South Kensington). + + 1831. + +529 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. 3 + From the original at Rowfant. + +530 Charles Lamb to George Dyer Feb. 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +531 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 30 + From the original (British Museum). + +532 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary May 6 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +533 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 14 + From the original at Rowfant. + +534 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Early Aug. + From the original at Rowfant. + +535 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Aug. 5 + From the original at Rowfant. + +536 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Sept. 5 + From the original at Rowfant. + +537 Charles Lamb to William Hazlitt, junior Sept. 13 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_Lamb and Hazlitt_). + +538 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Oct. 24 + From the original at Rowfant. + +539 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. 15 + From the original at Rowfant. + + 1832. + +540 Charles Lamb to Joseph Hume's daughters No date + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +541 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke March 5 + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +542 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge April 14 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +543 Charles Lamb to James Sheridan Knowles ?April + From the original (South Kensington). + +544 Charles Lamb to John Forster ?Late April + From the original (South Kensington). + +545 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon? June 1 + From the original (South Kensington). + +546 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop July 2 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +547 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Aug. + From the original in the Bodleian. + +548 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson ?Early Oct. + From the original (South Kensington). + +549 Charles Lamb to Walter Savage Landor Oct. + From the original (South Kensington). + +550 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Late in year + From the original at Rowfant. + +551 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Winter + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bonn). + +552 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. + From the original (South Kensington). + +553 Charles Lamb to John Forster. Dec. 23 + From the original (South Kensington). + + 1833. + +554 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +555 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. 3 + From the original at Rowfant. + +556 Charles Lamb to John Forster No date + From the original (South Kensington). + +557 Charles Lamb to John Forster No date + From the original (South Kensington). + +558 Charles Lamb to John Forster No date + From the original (South Kensington). + +559 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. 24 + From the original at Rowfant. + +560 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. 11 + From the original (South Kensington). + +561 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. + From the original (South Kensington). + +562 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd Feb. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +563 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon No date + From the original in the possession of + Mr. Henry Poulton. + +564 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke Feb. + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +565 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Early in year + From the original at Rowfant. + +566 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter. No date + From Procter's Autobiographical Fragment. + +567 Charles Lamb to William Hone March 6 + From the original (National Portrait Gallery). + +568 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon March 19 + From the original (South Kensington). + +569 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Spring + From the original (South Kensington). + +570 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon March 30 + From the original at Rowfant. + +571 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Spring + From the original at Rowfant. + +572 Charles Lamb to John Forster ?March + From the original (South Kensington). + +573 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?April 10 + From the original at Rowfant. + +574 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke April + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +575 Charles Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton April 16 + From the original, lately in the possession + of Mr. Edward Ayrton. + +576 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon April 25 + From the original at Rowfant. + +577 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon April 27 + From the original at Rowfant. + +578 Charles Lamb to the Rev. James Gillman May 7 + +579 Charles Lamb to John Forster May + From the original (South Kensington). + +580 Charles Lamb to John Forster May 12 + From the original (South Kensington). + +581 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth End of May + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +582 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt May 31 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +583 Charles Lamb to Mary Betham June 5 + From _A House of Letters_. + +584 Charles Lamb to Matilda Betham June 5 + From _Fraser's Magazine_. + +585 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 14 + From the original at Rowfant. + +586 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 24 + From the original at Rowfant. + +587 Charles and Mary Lamb to Edward + and Emma Moxon ?July 31 + From the original at Rowfant. + +588 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Sept. 9 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +589 Charles and Mary Lamb to Edward Moxon Sept. 26 + From the original at Rowfant. + +590 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Oct. 17 + From the original at Rowfant. + +591 Charles Lamb to Edward and Emma Moxon Nov. 29 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +592 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke Mid. Dec. + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +593 Charles Lamb to Samuel Rogers Dec. 21 + From _Rogers and His Contemporaries_. + +594 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke No date + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +595 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke No date + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + + 1834. + +596 Charles Lamb to the printer of + _The Athenaeum_ No date + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +597 Charles Lamb to Mary Betham Jan. 24 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. B.B. Macgeorge. + +598 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. 28 + From the original (South Kensington). + +599 Charles Lamb to Miss Fryer Feb. 14 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +600 Charles Lamb to Miss Fryer No date + From the original in the possession of + Mr. A.M.S. Methuen. + +601 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth Feb. 22 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +602 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd No date + +603 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke + (_fragment_) End of June + From the _Life and Labours of Vincent Novello._ + +604 Charles Lamb to John Forster June 25 + From the original (South Kensington). + +605 Charles Lamb to J. Fuller Russell Summer + From _Notes and Queries_. + +606 Charles Lamb to J. Fuller Russell Summer + From _Notes and Queries_. + +607 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke End of July + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +608 Charles Lamb to the Rev. James Gillman Aug. 5 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +609 Charles and Mary Lamb to H.F. Cary Sept. 12 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +610 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Oct. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +611 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Oct. 18 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +612 Charles Lamb to Mr. Childs ?Dec. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +613 Charles Lamb to Mr. Childs No date + +614 Charles Lamb to Mrs. George Dyer Dec. 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +615 Mary Lamb to Jane Norris Dec. 25 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +616 Mary Lamb to Jane Norris Oct. 3 1842. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +Last letter. Miss James to Jane Norris July 25 1843. + + + + + APPENDIX + + Barton's "Spiritual Law" + Barton's "Translation of Enoch" + Talfourd's "Verses in Memory of a Child named after Charles Lamb" + FitzGerald's "Meadows in Spring" + Montgomery's "The Common Lot" + Barry Cornwall's "Epistle to Charles Lamb" + + + ALPHABETICAL LIST OF LETTERS + + + INDEX + + + + + FRONTISPIECE + + CHARLES LAMB (aged 51). + From the painting by Henry Meyer at the India Office. + + + + + THE LETTERS OF CHARLES AND MARY LAMB + + 1821-1834 + + + + +LETTER 264 + +CHARLES LAMB TO DOROTHY WORDSWORTH + +[P.M. January 8, 1821.] + +Mary perfectly approves of the appropriat'n of the _feathers_, and +wishes them Peacocks for your fair niece's sake! + +Dear Miss Wordsworth, I had just written the above endearing words when +Monkhouse tapped me on the shoulder with an invitation to cold goose +pye, which I was not Bird of that sort enough to decline. Mrs. M. I am +most happy to say is better. Mary has been tormented with a Rheumatism, +which is leaving her. I am suffering from the festivities of the season. +I wonder how my misused carcase holds it out. I have play'd the +experimental philosopher on it, that's certain. Willy shall be welcome +to a mince pye, and a bout at Commerce, whenever he comes. He was in our +eye. I am glad you liked my new year's speculations. Everybody likes +them, except the Author of the Pleasures of Hope. Disappointment attend +him! How I like to be liked, and _what I do_ to be liked! They flatter +me in magazines, newspapers, and all the minor reviews. The Quarterlies +hold aloof. But they must come into it in time, or their leaves be waste +paper. Salute Trinity Library in my name. Two special things are worth +seeing at Cambridge, a portrait of Cromwell at Sidney, and a better of +Dr. Harvey (who found out that blood was red) at Dr. Davy's. You should +see them. + +Coleridge is pretty well, I have not seen him, but hear often of him +from Alsop, who sends me hares and pheasants twice a week. I can hardly +take so fast as he gives. I have almost forgotten Butcher's meat, as +Plebeian. Are you not glad the Cold is gone? I find winters not so +agreeable as they used to be, when "winter bleak had charms for me." I +cannot conjure up a kind similitude for those snowy flakes--Let them +keep to Twelfth Cakes. + +Mrs. Paris, our Cambridge friend, has been in Town. You do not know the +Watfords? in Trumpington Street--they are capital people. + +Ask any body you meet, who is the biggest woman in Cambridge--and I'll +hold you a wager they'll say Mrs. Smith. + +She broke down two benches in Trinity Gardens, one on the confines of +St. John's, which occasioned a litigation between the societies as to +repairing it. In warm weather she retires into an ice-cellar +(literally!) and dates the returns of the years from a hot Thursday some +20 years back. She sits in a room with opposite doors and windows, to +let in a thorough draught, which gives her slenderer friends +tooth-aches. She is to be seen in the market every morning at 10, +cheapening fowls, which I observe the Cambridge Poulterers are not +sufficiently careful to stump. + +Having now answered most of the points containd in your Letter, let me +end with assuring you of our very best kindness, and excuse Mary from +not handling the Pen on this occasion, especially as it has fallen into +so much better hands! Will Dr. W. accept of my respects at the end of a +foolish Letter. + +C.L. + + +[Miss Wordsworth was visiting her brother, Christopher Wordsworth, the +Master of Trinity. + +Willy was William Wordsworth, junr. + +Lamb's New Year speculations were contained in his _Elia_ essay "New +Year's Eve," in the _London Magazine_ for January, 1821. There is no +evidence that Campbell disapproved of the essay. Canon Ainger suggests +that Lamb may have thus alluded playfully to the pessimism of his +remarks, so opposed to the pleasures of hope. When the _Quarterly_ did +"come in," in 1823, it was with cold words, as we shall see. + +"Trinity Library." It is here that are preserved those MSS. of Milton, +which Lamb in his essay "Oxford in the Vacation," in the _London +Magazine_ for October, 1820, says he regrets to have seen. + +"Cromwell at Sidney." See Mary Lamb's letter to Miss Hutchinson, August +20, 1815. + +"Harvey ... at Dr. Davy's"--Dr. Martin Davy, Master of Caius. + +"Alsop." This is the first mention of Thomas Allsop (1795-1880), +Coleridge's friend and disciple, who, meeting Coleridge in 1818, had +just come into Lamb's circle. We shall meet him frequently. Allsop's +_Letters, Conversations and Recollections of Samuel Taylor Coleridge_ +contain much matter concerning Lamb. + +"Winter bleak had charms for me." I could not find this for the large +edition. It is from Burns' "Epistle to William Simpson," stanza 13. + +Mrs. Paris was a sister of William Ayrton and the mother of John Ayrton +Paris, the physician. It was at her house at Cambridge that the Lambs +met Emma Isola, whom we are soon to meet. + +"Mrs. Smith." Lamb worked up this portion of his letter into the little +humorous sketch "The Gentle Giantess," printed in the _London Magazine_ +for December, 1822 (see Vol. I. of the present edition), wherein Mrs. +Smith of Cambridge becomes the Widow Blacket of Oxford. + +"Dr. W."--Dr. Christopher Wordsworth.] + + + +LETTER 265 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. 1821.] + +Dear Sir--The _hairs_ of our head are numbered, but those which emanate +from your heart defy arithmetic. I would send longer thanks but your +young man is blowing his fingers in the Passage. + +Yours gratefully C.L. + + +[The date of this scrap is unimportant; but it comes well here in +connection with the reference in the preceding letter. + +In _Harper's Magazine_ for December, 1859, were printed fifty of Lamb's +notes to Allsop, all of which are reproduced in at least two editions of +Lamb's letters. I have selected only those which say anything, as for +the most part Lamb was content with the merest message; moreover, the +date is often so uncertain as to be only misleading. + +Crabb Robinson says of Allsop, "I believe his acquaintance with Lamb +originated in his sending Coleridge a present of £100 in admiration of +his genius."] + + + +LETTER 266 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. 1821.] + +D'r Sir--Thanks for the Birds and your kindness. It was but yesterd'y. I +was contriving with Talf'd to meet you 1/2 way at his chamber. But night +don't do so well at present. I shall want to be home at Dalston by +Eight. + +I will pay an afternoon visit to you when you please. I dine at a +chop-house at ONE always, but I can spend an hour with you after that. + +Yours truly + +C.L. + +Would Saturdy serve? + + + +LETTER 267 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON + +[Dated at end: Jan. 23, 1821.] + +Dear Mrs. Ayrton, my sister desires me, as being a more expert penman +than herself, to say that she saw Mrs. Paris yesterday, and that she is +very much out of spirits, and has expressed a great wish to see your son +William, and Fanny-- + +I like to write that word _Fanny_. I do not know but it was one reason +of taking upon me this pleasing task-- + +Moreover that if the said William and Frances will go and sit an hour +with her at any time, she will engage that no one else shall see them +but herself, and the servant who opens the door, she being confined to +her private room. I trust you and the Juveniles will comply with this +reasonable request. + + & am + Dear Mrs. Ayrton + your's and yours' + Truly + C. LAMB. + Cov. Gar. + 23 Jan. 1821. + + +[Mrs. Ayrton (_née_ Arnold) was the wife of William Ayrton, the musical +critic.] + + + +LETTER 268 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MISS HUMPHREYS + +London 27 Jan'y. 1821. + +Dear Madam, Carriages to Cambridge are in such request, owing to the +Installation, that we have found it impossible to procure a conveyance +for Emma before Wednesday, on which day between the hours of 3 and 4 in +the afternoon you will see your little friend, with her bloom somewhat +impaired by late hours and dissipation, but her gait, gesture, and +general manners (I flatter myself) considerably improved by--_somebody +that shall be nameless_. My sister joins me in love to all true +Trumpingtonians, not specifying any, to avoid envy; and begs me to +assure you that Emma has been a very good girl, which, with certain +limitations, I must myself subscribe to. I wish I could cure her of +making dog's ears in books, and pinching them on poor Pompey, who, for +one, I dare say, will heartily rejoyce at her departure. + +Dear Madam, + +Yours truly + +foolish C.L. + + +[Addressed to "Miss Humphreys, with Mrs. Paris, Trumpington Street, +Cambridge." Franked by J. Rickman. + +This letter contains the first reference in the correspondence to Emma +Isola, daughter of Charles Isola, Esquire Bedell of Cambridge +University, and granddaughter of Agostino Isola, the Italian critic and +teacher, of Cambridge, among whose pupils had been Wordsworth. Miss +Humphreys was Emma Isola's aunt. Emma seems to have been brought to +London by Mrs. Paris and left with the Lambs. + +Pompey seems to have been the Lamb's first dog. Later, as we shall see, +they adopted Dash.] + + + +LETTER 269 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON + +[Dated at end: March 15, 1821.] + +Dear Madam, We are out of town of necessity till Wednesday next, when we +hope to see one of you at least to a rubber. On some future Saturday we +shall most gladly accept your kind offer. When I read your delicate +little note, I am ashamed of my great staring letters. + +Yours most truly + +CHARLES LAMB. + +Dalston near Hackney + +15 Mar. 1821. + + +[In my large edition I give a facsimile of this letter.] + + + +LETTER 270 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +30 March, 1821. + +My dear Sir--If you can come next Sunday we shall be equally glad to see +you, but do not trust to any of Martin's appointments, except on +business, in future. He is notoriously faithless in that point, and we +did wrong not to have warned you. Leg of Lamb, as before; hot at 4. And +the heart of Lamb ever. + +Yours truly, C.L. + + + +LETTER 271 + +CHARLES LAMB TO LEIGH HUNT + +_Indifferent Wednesday_ [April 18], 1821. + +Dear Hunt,--There was a sort of side talk at Mr. Novello's about our +spending _Good Friday_ at Hampstead, but my sister has got so bad a +cold, and we both want rest so much, that you shall excuse our putting +off the visit some little time longer. Perhaps, after all, you know +nothing of it.-- + +Believe me, yours truly, C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 272 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +May 1st [1821], + +Mr. Gilman's, Highgate. + +Mr. C.--I will not fail you on Friday by six, and Mary, perhaps, +earlier. I very much wish to meet "Master Mathew," and am much obliged +to the G----s for the opportunity. Our kind respects to them +always.--ELIA. + +Extract from a MS. note of S.T.C. in my Beaumont and Fletcher, dated +April 17th 1807. + +_Midnight_. + +"God bless you, dear Charles Lamb, I am dying; I feel I have not many +weeks left." + + +[Master Mathew is in Ben Jonson's "Every Man in His Humour." + +Lamb's "Beaumont and Fletcher" is in the British Museum. The note quoted +by Lamb is not there, or perhaps it is one that has been crossed out. +This still remains: "N.B. I shall not be long here, Charles! I gone, you +will not mind my having spoiled a book in order to leave a Relic. +S.T.C., Oct. 1811."] + + + +LETTER 273 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +[Dated at end: 2 May, 1821.] + +Dear Sir--You dine so late on Friday, it will be impossible for us to go +home by the eight o'clock stage. Will you oblige us by securing us beds +at some house from which a stage goes to the Bank in the morning? I +would write to Coleridge, but cannot think of troubling a dying man with +such a request. + + Yours truly, C. LAMB. + + +If the beds in the town are all engaged, in consequence of Mr. Mathews's +appearance, a hackney-coach will serve. Wednes'y. 2 May '21. + +We shall neither of us come much before the time. + + +[Mrs. Mathews (who was half-sister of Fanny Kelly) described this +evening in her _Memoirs_ of her husband, 1839. Her account of Lamb is +interesting:-- + + Mr. Lamb's first approach was not prepossessing. His figure was + small and mean; and no man certainly was ever less beholden to his + tailor. His "bran" new _suit_ of black cloth (in which he affected + several times during the day to take great pride, and to cherish as + a novelty that he had long looked for and wanted) was drolly + contrasted with his very rusty silk stockings, shown from his knees, + and his much too large _thick_ shoes, without polish. His shirt + rejoiced in a wide ill-plaited frill, and his very small, tight, + white neckcloth was hemmed to a fine point at the ends that formed + part of the little bow. His hair was black and sleek, but not + formal, and his face the gravest I ever saw, but indicating great + intellect, and resembling very much the portraits of King Charles I. + Mr. Coleridge was very anxious about his _pet_ Lamb's first + impression upon my husband, which I believe his friend saw; and + guessing that he had been extolled, he mischievously resolved to + thwart his panegyrist, disappoint the strangers, and altogether to + upset the suspected plan of showing him off. + +The Mathews' were then living at Ivy Cottage, only a short distance from +the Grove, Highgate, where the famous Mathews collection of pictures was +to be seen of which Lamb subsequently wrote in the _London Magazine_. + +Here should come a note to Ayrton saying that Madame Noblet is the least +graceful dancer that Lamb ever "did not see."] + + + +LETTER 274 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN PAYNE COLLIER + +May 16, 1821. + +Dear J.P.C.,--Many thanks for the "Decameron:" I have not such a +gentleman's book in my collection: it was a great treat to me, and I got +it just as I was wanting something of the sort. I take less pleasure in +books than heretofore, but I like books about books. In the second +volume, in particular, are treasures--your discoveries about "Twelfth +Night," etc. What a Shakespearian essence that speech of Osrades for +food!--Shakespeare is coarse to it--beginning "Forbear and eat no more." +Osrades warms up to that, but does not set out ruffian-swaggerer. The +character of the Ass with those three lines, worthy to be set in gilt +vellum, and worn in frontlets by the noble beasts for ever-- + + "Thou would, perhaps, he should become thy foe, + And to that end dost beat him many times: + He cares not for himself, much less thy blow." + +Cervantes, Sterne, and Coleridge, have said positively nothing for asses +compared with this. + +I write in haste; but p. 24, vol. i., the line you cannot appropriate is +Gray's sonnet, specimenifyed by Wordsworth in first preface to L.B., as +mixed of bad and good style: p. 143, 2nd vol., you will find last poem +but one of the collection on Sidney's death in Spenser, the line, + + "Scipio, Caesar, Petrarch of our time." + +This fixes it to be Raleigh's: I had guess'd it to be Daniel's. The last +after it, "Silence augmenteth rage," I will be crucified if it be not +Lord Brooke's. Hang you, and all meddling researchers, hereafter, that +by raking into learned dust may find me out wrong in my conjecture! + +Dear J.P.C., I shall take the first opportunity of personally thanking +you for my entertainment. We are at Dalston for the most part, but I +fully hope for an evening soon with you in Russell or Bouverie Street, +to talk over old times and books. Remember _us_ kindly to Mrs. J.P.C. +Yours very kindly, CHARLES LAMB. I write in misery. + +N.B.--The best pen I could borrow at our butcher's: the ink, I verily +believe, came out of the kennel. + + +[Collier's _Poetical Decameron_, in two volumes, was published in 1820: +a series of imaginary conversations on curious and little-known books. +His "Twelfth Night" discoveries will be found in the Eighth +Conversation; Collier deduces the play from Barnaby Rich's _Farewell to +Military Profession_, 1606. He also describes Thomas Lodge's +"Rosalynde," the forerunner of "As You Like It," in which is the +character Rosader, whom Lamb calls Osrades. His speech for food runs +thus:-- + + It hapned that day that _Gerismond_, the lawfull king of _France_ + banished by _Torismond_, who with a lustie crew of outlawes liued in + that Forrest, that day in honour of his birth, made a feast to all + his bolde yeomen, and frolickt it with store of wine and venison, + sitting all at a long table vnder the shadow of Limon trees: to that + place by chance fortune conducted Rosader, who seeing such a crew of + braue men, hauing store of that for want of which hee and Adam + perished, hee slept boldly to the boords end, and saluted the + Company thus.--Whatsoeuer thou be that art maister of these lustie + squires, I salute thee as graciously as a man in extreame distresse + may: knowe that I and a fellow friend of mine, are here famished in + the forrest for want of foode: perish we must, vnlesse relieued by + thy fauours. Therefore if thou be a Gentleman, giue meate to men, + and such as are euery way worthie of life: let the proudest Squire + that sits at thy table rise and encounter with me in any honourable + point of activitie whatsoeuer, and if he and thou proue me not a + man, send mee away comfortlesse: if thou refuse this, as a niggard + of thy cates, I will haue amongst you with my sword, for rather wil + I die valiantly, then perish with so cowardly an extreame (Collier's + _Poetical Decameron_, 174, Eighth Conversation). + +Lamb compares with that the passage in "As You Like It," II., 7, 88, +beginning with Orlando's "Forbear, and eat no more." The character of +the ass is quoted by Collier from an old book, _The Noblenesse of the +Asse_, 1595, in the Third Conversation:-- + + Thou wouldst (perhaps) he should become thy foe, + And to that end doost beat him many times; + He cares not for himselfe, much lesse thy blowe. + +Lamb wrote more fully of this passage in an article on the ass +contributed to Hone's _Every-Day Book_ in 1825 (see Vol. I. of the +present edition). + +The line from Gray's sonnet on the death of Mr. Richard West was this:-- + + And weep the more because I weep in vain. + +"Scipio, Caesar," etc. This line runs, in the epitaph on Sidney, +beginning "To praise thy life"-- + +Scipio, Cicero, and Petrarch of our time! + +It is generally supposed to be by Raleigh. The next poem, "Silence +Augmenteth Grief," is attributed by Malone to Sir Edward Dyer, and by +Hannah to Raleigh.] + + + +LETTER 275 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[No date. ?Summer, 1821.] + +Dear Sir, The _Wits_ (as Clare calls us) assemble at my Cell (20 Russell +St. Cov.-Gar.) this evening at 1/4 before 7. Cold meat at 9. Puns at--a +little after. Mr. Cary wants to see you, to scold you. I hope you will +not fail. Yours &c. &c. &c. + +C. LAMB. + +Thursday. + +I am sorry the London Magazine is going to be given up. + + +[I assume the date of this note to be summer, 1821, because it was then +that Baldwin, Cradock & Joy, the _London Magazine's_ first publishers, +gave it up. The reason was the death of John Scott, the editor, and +probably to a large extent the originator, of the magazine. It was sold +to Taylor & Hessey, their first number being dated July, 1821. + +Scott had become involved in a quarrel with _Blackwood_, which reached +such a pitch that a duel was fought, between Scott and Christie, a +friend of Lockhart's. The whole story, which is involved, and indeed not +wholly clear, need not be told here: it will be found in Mr. Lang's +memoir of Lockhart. The meeting was held at Chalk Farm on February 16, +1821. Peter George Patmore, sub-editor of the _London_, was Scott's +second. Scott fell, wounded by a shot which Christie fired purely in +self-defence. He died on February 27. + +Mr. Cary. Henry Francis Cary the translator of Dante and a contributor +to the _London Magazine_. + +The _London Magazine_ had four periods. From 1820 to the middle of 1821, +when it was Baldwin, Cradock & Joy's. From 1821 to the end of 1824, when +it was Taylor & Hessey's at a shilling. From January, 1825, to August of +that year, when it was Taylor & Hessey's at half-a-crown; and from +September, l825, to the end, when it was Henry Southern's, and was +published by Hunt & Clarke.] + + + +LETTER 276 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN TAYLOR + +Margate, June 8, 1821. + +Dear Sir,--I am extremely sorry to be obliged to decline the article +proposed, as I should have been flattered with a Plate accompanying it. +In the first place, Midsummer day is not a topic I could make anything +of--I am so pure a Cockney, and little read, besides, in May games and +antiquities; and, in the second, I am here at Margate, spoiling my +holydays with a Review I have undertaken for a friend, which I shall +barely get through before my return; for that sort of work is a hard +task to me. If you will excuse the shortness of my first +contribution-and I _know_ I can promise nothing more for July--I will +endeavour a longer article for _our next_. Will you permit me to say +that I think Leigh Hunt would do the article you propose in a masterly +manner, if he has not outwrit himself already upon the subject. I do not +return the proof--to save postage--because it is correct, with ONE +EXCEPTION. In the stanza from Wordsworth, you have changed DAY into AIR +for rhyme-sake: DAY is the right reading, and I IMPLORE you to restore +it. + +The other passage, which you have queried, is to my ear correct. Pray +let it stand. + +D'r S'r, yours truly, C. LAMB. + +On second consideration, I do enclose the proof. + + +[John Taylor (1781-1864), the publisher, with Hessey, of the _London +Magazine_ was, in 1813, the first publicly to identify Sir Philip +Francis with Junius. Taylor acted as editor of the _London Magazine_ +from 1821 to 1824, assisted by Thomas Hood. Later his interests were +centred in currency questions. + +"I am here at Margate." I do not know what review Lamb was writing. If +written and published it has not been reprinted. It was on this visit to +Margate that Lamb met Charles Cowden Clarke. + +"My first contribution." The first number to bear Taylor & Hessey's name +was dated July, but they had presumably acquired the rights in the +magazine before then. Lamb's first contribution to the _London Magazine_ +had been in August, 1820, "The South-Sea House." + +The proof which Lamb returned was that of the _Elia_, essay on "Mackery +End in Hertfordshire," printed in the July number of the _London +Magazine_, in which he quoted a stanza from Wordsworth's "Yarrow +Visited":-- + + But thou, that didst appear so fair + To fond imagination, + Dost rival in the light of day + Her delicate creation. + +Here should come a scrap from Lamb to Ayrton, dated July 17, 1821, +referring to the Coronation. Lamb says that in consequence of this event +he is postponing his Wednesday evening to Friday.] + + + +LETTER 277 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN TAYLOR + +July 21, 1821. + +D'r Sir,--The _Lond. Mag._ is chiefly pleasant to me, because some of my +friends write in it. I hope Hazlitt intends to go on with it, we cannot +spare Table Talk. For myself I feel almost exhausted, but I will try my +hand a little longer, and shall not at all events be written out of it +by newspaper paragraphs. Your proofs do not seem to want my helping +hand, they are quite correct always. For God's sake change _Sisera_ to +_Jael_. This last paper will be a choke-pear I fear to some people, but +as you do not object to it, I can be under little apprehension of your +exerting your Censorship too rigidly. + +Thanking you for your extract from M'r. E.'s letter, + +I remain, D'r Sir, + +Your obliged, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Hazlitt continued his Table Talk in the _London Magazine_ until +December, 1821. + +Lamb seems to have been treated foolishly by some newspaper critic; but +I have not traced the paragraphs in question. + +The proof was that of the _Elia_ essay "Imperfect Sympathies," which was +printed (with a fuller title) in the number for August, 1821. The +reference to Jael is in the passage on Braham and the Jewish character. + +I do not identify Mr. E. Possibly Elton. See next letter. + +Here should come a further letter to Taylor, dated July 30, 1821, in +which Lamb refers to some verses addressed to him by "Olen" (Charles +Abraham Elton: see note to next letter) in the _London Magazine_ for +August, remonstrating with him for the pessimism of the _Elia_ essay +"New Year's Eve" (see Vol. II. of this edition). + +Lamb also remarks that he borrowed the name Elia (pronounced Ellia) from +an old South-Sea House clerk who is now dead. + +Elia has recently been identified by Mr. R.W. Goulding, the librarian at +Welbeck Abbey, as F. Augustus Elia, author of a French tract entitled +_Considération sur l'état actuel de la France au mois de Juin 1815. Par +une anglais_. It is privately reprinted in _Letters from the originals +at Welbeck Abbey_, 1909.] + + + +LETTER 278 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES ABRAHAM ELTON + +India House + +to which place all letters addressed to C.L. commonly come. + +[August 17, 1821 (?).] + +My dear Sir, You have overwhelmed me with your favours. I have received +positively a little library from Baldwyn's. I do not know how I have +deserved such a bounty. We have been up to the ear in the classics ever +since it came. I have been greatly pleased, but most, I think, with the +Hesiod,--the Titan battle quite amazed me. Gad, it was no child's +play--and then the homely aphorisms at the end of the works--how +adroitly you have turned them! Can he be the same Hesiod who did the +Titans? the latter is-- + + "-----wine + Which to madness does incline." + +But to read the Days and Works, is like eating nice brown bread, homely +sweet and nutritive. Apollonius was new to me. I had confounded him with +the conjuror of that name. Medea is glorious; but I cannot give up Dido. +She positively is the only Fine Lady of Antiquity: her courtesy to the +Trojans is altogether queen-like. Eneas is a most disagreeable person. +Ascanius a pretty young master. Mezentius for my money. His dying speech +shames Turpin--not the Archbishop I mean, but the roadster of that name. + +I have been ashamed to find how many names of classics (and more than +their names) you have introduced me to, that before I was ignorant of. +Your commendation of Master Chapman arrideth me. Can any one read the +pert modern Frenchify'd notes, &c., in Pope's translation, and contrast +them with solemn weighty prefaces of Chapman, writing in full faith, as +he evidently does, of the plenary inspiration of his author--worshipping +his meanest scraps and relics as divine--without one sceptical misgiving +of their authenticity, and doubt which was the properest to expound +Homer to their countrymen. Reverend Chapman! you have read his hymn to +Pan (the Homeric)--why, it is Milton's blank verse clothed with rhyme. +Paradise Lost could scarce lose, could it be so accoutred. + +I shall die in the belief that he has improved upon Homer, in the +Odyssey in particular--the disclosure of Ulysses of himself, to +Alcinous, his previous behaviour at the song of the stern strife arising +between Achilles and himself (how it raises him above the _Iliad_ +Ulysses!) but you know all these things quite as well as I do. But what +a deaf ear old C. would have turned to the doubters in Homer's real +personality! They might as well have denied the appearance of J.C. in +the flesh.--He apparently believed all the fables of H.'s birth, &c. + +Those notes of Bryant have caused the greatest disorder in my brain-pan. +Well, I will not flatter when I say that we have had two or three long +evening's _good reading_ out of your kind present. + +I will say nothing of the tenderest parts in your own little volume, at +the end of such a slatternly scribble as this, but indeed they cost us +some tears. I scrawl away because of interruptions every moment. You +guess how it is in a busy office--papers thrust into your hand when your +hand is busiest--and every anti-classical disavocation. + +[_Conclusion cut away_.] + + +[Sir Charles Abraham Elton (1778-1853) seems to have sent Lamb a number +of his books, principally his _Specimens of the Classical_ _Poets ... +from Homer to Tryphiodorus translated into English Verse_, Baldwin, +1814, in three volumes. Lamb refers first to the passage from Hesiod's +_Theogony_, and then to his _Works and Days_ (which Chapman +translated)--"Dispensation of Providence to the Just and Unjust." + +Apollonius Rhodius was the author of _The Argonautics_. Lamb then passes +on to Virgil. For the death of Mezentius see the _Aeneid_, Book X., at +the end. The makers of broadsides had probably credited Dick Turpin with +a dying speech. + +"Those notes of Bryant." Lamb possibly refers to Jacob Bryant's _Essay +on the Original Genius and Writings of Homer_, 1775, or his pamphlet on +the Trojan War, 1795, 1799. + +"Your own little volume." Probably _The Brothers and Other Poems_, by +Elton, 1820.] + + + +LETTER 279 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +[Summer, 1821.] + +My dear Sir--Your letter has lain in a drawer of my desk, upbraiding me +every time I open the said drawer, but it is almost impossible to answer +such a letter in such a place, and I am out of the habit of replying to +epistles otherwhere than at office. You express yourself concerning H. +like a true friend, and have made me feel that I have somehow neglected +him, but without knowing very well how to rectify it. I live so remote +from him--by Hackney--that he is almost out of the pale of visitation at +Hampstead. And I come but seldom to Cov't Gard'n this summer time--and +when I do, am sure to pay for the late hours and pleasant Novello +suppers which I incur. I also am an invalid. But I will hit upon some +way, that you shall not have cause for your reproof in future. But do +not think I take the hint unkindly. When I shall be brought low by any +sickness or untoward circumstance, write just such a letter to some +tardy friend of mine--or come up yourself with your friendly Henshaw +face--and that will be better. I shall not forget in haste our casual +day at Margate. May we have many such there or elsewhere! God bless you +for your kindness to H., which I will remember. But do not show N. this, +for the flouting infidel doth mock when Christians cry God bless us. +Yours and _his, too_, and all our little circle's most affect'e. + +C. LAMB. + +Mary's love included. + + +[Charles Cowden Clarke (1787-1877) was the son of a schoolmaster who had +served as usher with George Dyer at Northampton. Afterwards he +established a school at Enfield, where Keats was one of the scholars. +Charles Cowden Clarke, at this time a bookseller, remained one of Keats' +friends and was a friend also of Leigh Hunt's, on whose behalf he seems +to have written to Lamb. Later he became a partner of Alfred Novello, +the musical publisher, son of Vincent Novello. In 1828 he married Mary +Victoria Novello. + +"Friendly Henshaw face." I cannot explain this. + +Leigh Hunt left England for Italy in November, 1821, to join Shelley and +Byron. + +Here should come a brief note to Allan Cunningham asking him to an +evening party of _London Magazine_ contributors at 20 Russell St., given +in the Boston Bibliophile edition.] + + + +LETTER 280 + +MARY LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON + +[No date. ?1821.] + +Thursday Morning. + +MY dear friend, + +The kind interest you took in my perplexities of yesterday makes me feel +that you will be well pleased to hear I got through my complicated +business far better than I had ventured to hope I should do. In the +first place let me thank you, my good friend, for your good advice; for, +had I not gone to Martin first he would have sent a senseless letter to +Mr. Rickman, and _now_ he is coming here to-day in order to frame one in +conjunction with my brother. + +What will be Mr. Rickman's final determination I know not, but he and +Mrs. Rickman both gave me a most kind reception, and a most patient +hearing, and then Mr. R. walked with me as far as Bishopsgate Street, +conversing the whole way on the same unhappy subject. I will see you +again the very first opportunity till when farewel with grateful thanks. + +How senseless I was not to make you go back in that empty coach. I never +have but one idea in my poor head at a time. + +Yours affectionately + +M. LAMB. + +at Mr. Coston's + +No. 14 Kingsland Row Dalston. + + +[The explanation of this letter is found in an entry in Crabb Robinson's +_Diary_, the unpublished portion, which tells us that owing to certain +irregularities Rickman, who was Clerk Assistant at the table of the +House of Commons, had been obliged to discharge Martin Burney, who was +one of his clerks. + +Here should come another scrap from Lamb to Ayrton, dated August 14, +stating that at to-morrow's rubber the windows will be closed on account +of Her Majesty's death. Her Majesty was Queen Caroline, whom Lamb had +championed. She died on August 7.] + + + +LETTER 281 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +Oct. 21, 1819. + +My dear Sir, I have to thank you for a fine hare, and unless I am +mistaken for _two_, the first I received a week since, the account given +with it was that it came from Mr. Alfourd--I have no friend of that +name, but two who come near it + +Mr. Talfourd + +Mr. Alsop + +so my gratitude must be divided between you, till I know the true +sender. We are and shall be some time, I fear, at Dalston, a distance +which does not improve hares by the circuitous route of Cov't Garden, +though for the sweetness of _this last_ I will answer. We dress it +to-day. I suppose you know my sister has been & is ill. I do not see +much hopes, though there is a glimmer, of her speedy recovery. When we +are all well, I hope to come among our town friends, and shall have +great pleasure in welcoming you from Beresford Hall. + +Yours, & old Mr. Walton's, & honest Mr. Cotton's Piscatorum Amicus, C.L. + +India House 19 Oct. 21 + + + +LETTER 282 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM AYRTON + +[Oct. 27, 1821.] + +I Come, Grimalkin! Dalston, near Hackney, 27th Oct'r. One thousand 8 +hundred and twenty one years and a wee-bit since you and I were +redeemed. I doubt if _you_ are done properly yet. + + +[A further letter to Ayrton, dated from Dalston, October 30, is printed +by Mr. Macdonald, in which Lamb speaks of his sister's illness and the +death of his brother John, who died on October 26, aged fifty-eight. It +is reasonable to suppose that Lamb, when the above note was written, was +unaware of his brother's death (see note to Letter 284 on page 610). On +October 26, however, he had written to the editor of the _London +Magazine_ saying that he was most uncomfortably situated at home and +expecting some trouble which might prevent further writing for some +time--which may have been an allusion to his brother's illness or to +signs of Mary Lamb's approaching malady. + +Here should come a note to William Hone, evidently in reply to a comment +on Lamb's essay on "Saying Grace." + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Rickman, dated November 20, 1821, +referring to Admiral Burney's death. "I have been used to death lately. +Poor Jim White's departure last year first broke the spell. I had been +so fortunate as to have lost no friends in that way for many long years, +and began to think people did not die." He says that Mary Lamb has +recovered from a long illness and is pretty well resigned to John Lamb's +death.] + + + +LETTER 283 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +March 9th, 1822. + +Dear C.,--It gives me great satisfaction to hear that the pig turned out +so well--they are interesting creatures at a certain age--what a pity +such buds should blow out into the maturity of rank bacon! You had all +some of the crackling --and brain sauce--did you remember to rub it with +butter, and gently dredge it a little, just before the crisis? Did the +eyes come away kindly with no Oedipean avulsion? Was the crackling the +colour of the ripe pomegranate? Had you no complement of boiled neck of +mutton before it, to blunt the edge of delicate desire? Did you flesh +maiden teeth in it? Not that I sent the pig, or can form the remotest +guess what part Owen could play in the business. I never knew him give +anything away in my life. He would not begin with strangers. I suspect +the pig, after all, was meant for me; but at the unlucky juncture of +time being absent, the present somehow went round to Highgate. To +confess an honest truth, a pig is one of those things I could never +think of sending away. Teals, wigeons, snipes, barn-door fowl, ducks, +geese--your tame villatic things--Welsh mutton, collars of brawn, +sturgeon, fresh or pickled, your potted char, Swiss cheeses, French +pies, early grapes, muscadines, I impart as freely unto my friends as to +myself. They are but self-extended; but pardon me if I stop +somewhere--where the fine feeling of benevolence giveth a higher smack +than the sensual rarity--there my friends (or any good man) may command +me; but pigs are pigs, and I myself therein am nearest to myself. Nay, I +should think it an affront, an undervaluing done to Nature who bestowed +such a boon upon me, if in a churlish mood I parted with the precious +gift. One of the bitterest pangs of remorse I ever felt was when a +child--when my kind old aunt had strained her pocketstrings to bestow a +sixpenny whole plum-cake upon me. In my way home through the Borough, I +met a venerable old man, not a mendicant, but thereabouts--a +look-beggar, not a verbal petitionist; and in the coxcombry of +taught-charity I gave away the cake to him. I walked on a little in all +the pride of an Evangelical peacock, when of a sudden my old aunt's +kindness crossed me--the sum it was to her--the pleasure she had a right +to expect that I--not the old impostor --should take in eating her +cake--the cursed ingratitude by which, under the colour of a Christian +virtue, I had frustrated her cherished purpose. I sobbed, wept, and took +it to heart so grievously, that I think I never suffered the like--and I +was right. It was a piece of unfeeling hypocrisy, and proved a lesson to +me ever after. The cake has long been masticated, consigned to dunghill +with the ashes of that unseasonable pauper. + +But when Providence, who is better to us all than our aunts, gives me a +pig, remembering my temptation and my fall, I shall endeavour to act +towards it more in the spirit of the donor's purpose. + +Yours (short of pig) to command in everything. C.L. + + +[This letter probably led to the immediate composition of the _Elia_ +essay "A Dissertation on Roast Pig" (see Vol. II. of the present +edition), which was printed in the _London Magazine_ for September, +1822. See also "Thoughts on Presents of Game," Vol. I. of this edition. + +"Owen." Lamb's landlord in Russell Street. + +"My kind old aunt... the Borough." This is rather perplexing. Lamb, to +the best of our knowledge, never as a child lived anywhere but in the +Temple. His only aunt of whom we know anything lived with the family +also in the Temple. But John Lamb's will proves Lamb to have had two +aunts. The reference to the Borough suggests therefore that the aunt in +question was not Sarah Lamb (Aunt Hetty) but her sister.] + + + +LETTER 284 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +20th March, 1822. + +My dear Wordsworth--A letter from you is very grateful, I have not seen +a Kendal postmark so long! We are pretty well save colds and rheumatics, +and a certain deadness to every thing, which I think I may date from +poor John's Loss, and another accident or two at the same time, that has +made me almost bury myself at Dalston, where yet I see more faces than I +could wish. Deaths over-set one and put one out long after the recent +grief. Two or three have died within this last two twelvem'ths, and so +many parts of me have been numbed. One sees a picture, reads an +anecdote, starts a casual fancy, and thinks to tell of it to this person +in preference to every other--the person is gone whom it would have +peculiarly suited. It won't do for _another_. Every departure destroys a +class of sympathies. There's Capt. Burney gone!--what fun has whist now? +what matters it what you lead, if you can no longer fancy him looking +over you? One never hears any thing, but the image of the particular +person occurs with whom alone almost you would care to share the +intelligence. Thus one distributes oneself about--and now for so many +parts of me I have lost the market. Common natures do not suffice me. +Good people, as they are called, won't serve. I want individuals. I am +made up of queer points and I want so many answering needles. The going +away of friends does not make the remainder more precious. It takes so +much from them as there was a common link. A. B. and C. make a party. A. +dies. B. not only loses A. but all A.'s part in C. C. loses A.'s part in +B., and so the alphabet sickens by subtraction of interchangeables. I +express myself muddily, capite dolente. I have a dulling cold. My theory +is to enjoy life, but the practice is against it. I grow ominously tired +of official confinement. Thirty years have I served the Philistines, and +my neck is not subdued to the yoke. You don't know how wearisome it is +to breathe the air of four pent walls without relief day after day, all +the golden hours of the day between 10 and 4 without ease or +interposition. Taedet me harum quotidianarum formarum, these +pestilential clerk faces always in one's dish. O for a few years between +the grave and the desk! they are the same, save that at the latter you +are outside the machine. The foul enchanter--letters four do form his +name--Busirane is his name in hell--that has curtailed you of some +domestic comforts, hath laid a heavier hand on me, not in present +infliction, but in taking away the hope of enfranchisement. I dare not +whisper to myself a Pension on this side of absolute incapacitation and +infirmity, till years have sucked me dry. Otium cum indignitate. I had +thought in a green old age (O green thought!) to have retired to +Ponder's End--emblematic name how beautiful! in the Ware road, there to +have made up my accounts with Heaven and the Company, toddling about +between it and Cheshunt, anon stretching on some fine Izaac Walton +morning to Hoddesdon or Amwell, careless as a Beggar, but walking, +walking ever, till I fairly walkd myself off my legs, dying walking! + +The hope is gone. I sit like Philomel all day (but not singing) with my +breast against this thorn of a Desk, with the only hope that some +Pulmonary affliction may relieve me. Vide Lord Palmerston's report of +the Clerks in the war office (Debates, this morning's Times) by which it +appears in 20 years, as many Clerks have been coughd and catarrhd out of +it into their freer graves. + +Thank you for asking about the Pictures. Milton hangs over my fire side +in Covt. Card, (when I am there), the rest have been sold for an old +song, wanting the eloquent tongue that should have set them off! + +You have gratifyd me with liking my meeting with Dodd. For the Malvolio +story--the thing is become in verity a sad task and I eke it out with +any thing. If I could slip out of it I sh'd be happy, but our chief +reputed assistants have forsaken us. The opium eater crossed us once +with a dazzling path, and hath as suddenly left us darkling; and in +short I shall go on from dull to worse, because I cannot resist the +Bookseller's importunity--the old plea you know of authors, but I +believe on my part sincere. + +Hartley I do not so often see, but I never see him in unwelcome hour. I +thoroughly love and honor him. + +I send you a frozen Epistle, but it is winter and dead time of the year +with me. May heaven keep something like spring and summer up with you, +strengthen your eyes and make mine a little lighter to encounter with +them, as I hope they shall yet and again, before all are closed. + +Yours, with every kind rem'be. + +C.L. + +I had almost forgot to say, I think you thoroughly right about +presentation copies. I should like to see you print a book I should +grudge to purchase for its size. D----n me, but I would have it though! + + +[John Lamb's will left everything to his brother. We must suppose that +his widow was independently provided for. I doubt if the brothers had +seen each other except casually for some time. The _Elia_ essay "My +Relations" contains John Lamb's full-length portrait under the name of +James Elia. + +Captain Burney died on November 17, 1821, + +"The foul enchanter--letters four do form his name." From Coleridge's +war eclogue, "Fire, Famine and Slaughter," where the letters form the +name of Pitt. Here they stand for Joseph Hume, not Lamb's friend, but +Joseph Hume, M.P. (1777-1855), who had attacked with success abuses in +the East India Company; had revised economically the system of +collecting the revenue, thus touching Wordsworth as Distributor of +Stamps; and had opposed Vansittart's scheme for the reduction of pension +charges. + +"_Vide_ Lord Palmerston's report." In the _Times_ of March 21 is the +report of a debate on the estimates. Palmerston proved a certain amount +of reduction of salary in the War Office. Incidentally he remarked that +"since 1810 not fewer than twenty-six clerks had died of pulmonary +complaints, and disorders arising from sedentary habits." + +Milton was the portrait, already described, which had been left to Lamb. +Lamb gave it as a dowry to Emma Isola when she became Mrs. Moxon. + +"My meeting with Dodd ... Malvolio story." In the essay "The Old +Actors," in the London Magazine for February, 1822 (see Vol. II. of this +edition). + +"Our chief reputed assistants." Hazlitt had left the _London Magazine_; +Scott, the original editor, was dead. + +De Quincey, whose _Confessions of an Opium-Eater_ were appearing in its +pages, has left a record of a visit to the Lambs about this time. See +his "London Reminiscences." + +"Hartley." Hartley Coleridge, then a young man of twenty-five, was +living in London after the unhappy sudden termination of his Oxford +career. + +Here should come a brief note to Mrs. Norris, dated March 26, 1822, +given in the Boston Bibliophile edition. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to William Godwin, dated April 13, +in which Lamb remarks that he cannot think how Godwin, who in his +writings never expresses himself disrespectfully of any one but his +Maker, can have given offence to Rickman. This reminds one of Godwin's +remark about Coleridge, "God bless him--to use a vulgar expression," as +recorded by Coleridge in one of his letters. Lamb also said of Godwin +(and to him) that he had read more books that were not worth reading +than any man in England.] + + + +LETTER 285 + +CHARLES LAMB TO W. HARRISON AINSWORTH + +[Dated at end: May 7, 1822.] + +Dear Sir,--I have read your poetry with pleasure. The tales are pretty +and prettily told, the language often finely poetical. It is only +sometimes a little careless, I mean as to redundancy. I have marked +certain passages (in pencil only, which will easily obliterate) for your +consideration. Excuse this liberty. For the distinction you offer me of +a dedication, I feel the honor of it, but I do not think it would +advantage the publication. I am hardly on an eminence enough to warrant +it. The Reviewers, who are no friends of mine--the two big ones +especially who make a point of taking no notice of anything I bring +out--may take occasion by it to decry us both. But I leave you to your +own judgment. Perhaps, if you wish to give me a kind word, it will be +more appropriate _before your republication of Tourneur_. + +The "Specimens" would give a handle to it, which the poems might seem to +want. But I submit it to yourself with the old recollection that +"beggars should not be chusers" and remain with great respect and +wishing success to both your publications + +Your obe't. Ser't. + +C. LAMB. + +No hurry at all for Tourneur. + +Tuesday 7 May '22. + + +[William Harrison Ainsworth (1805-1882), afterwards known as a novelist, +was then articled to a Manchester solicitor, but had begun his literary +career. The book to which Lamb refers was called _The Works of Cheviot +Tichburn_, 1822, and was dedicated to him in the following terms:--"To +my friend Charles Lamb, as a slight mark of gratitude for his kindness +and admiration of his character, these poems are inscribed." + +Ainsworth was meditating an edition of the works of Cyril Tourneur, +author of "The Atheist's Tragedy," to whom Lamb had drawn attention in +the _Dramatic Specimens_, 1808. The book was never published.] + + + +LETTER 286 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM GODWIN + +May 16, 1822. + +Dear Godwin--I sincerely feel for all your trouble. Pray use the +enclosed £50, and pay me when you can. I shall make it my business to +see you very shortly. + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + + +[Owing largely to a flaw in the title-deed of his house at 41 Skinner +Street, which he had to forfeit, Godwin had come upon poverty greater +than any he had previously suffered, although he had been always more or +less necessitous. Lamb now lent him £50. In the following year, after +being mainly instrumental in putting on foot a fund for Godwin's +benefit, he transformed this loan into a gift. An appeal was issued in +1823 asking for; £600, the following postscript to which, in Lamb's +hand, is preserved at the South Kensington Museum:-- + +"There are few circumstances belonging to the case which are not +sufficiently adverted to in the above letter. + +"Mr. Godwin's opponent declares himself determined to act against him +with the last degree of hostility: the law gives him the power the first +week in November to seize upon Mr. Godwin's property, furniture, books, +&c. together with all his present sources of income for the support of +himself and his family. Mr. Godwin has at this time made considerable +progress in a work of great research, and requiring all the powers of +his mind, to the completion of which he had lookd for future pecuniary +advantage. His mind is at this moment so entirely occupied in this work, +that he feels within himself the firmness and resolution that no +_prospect_ of evil or calamity shall draw him off from it or suspend his +labours. But the _calamity itself_, if permitted to arrive, will produce +the physical impossibility for him to proceed. His books and the +materials of his work, as well as his present sources of income, will be +taken from him. Those materials have been the collection of several +years, and it would require a long time to replace them, if they could +ever be replaced. + +"The favour of an early answer is particularly requested, that the +extent of the funds supplied may as soon as possible be ascertained, +particularly as any aid, however kindly intended, will, after the lapse +of a very few weeks, become useless to the purpose in view." + +The signatories to the appeal were: Crabb Robinson (£30), William Ayrton +(£10), John Murray (£10 10s.), Charles Lamb (£50), Lord Francis +Leveson-Gower (£10), Lord Dudley (£50), the Hon. W. Lamb (£20) and Sir +James Macintosh (£10). Other contributions were: Lord Byron, £26 5s.; +T.M. Alsager, £10; and "A B C, by Charles Lamb," £10. A B C was Sir +Walter Scott. + +The work on which Godwin was then labouring was his _History of the +Commonwealth_, 1824-1828. His new home was in the Strand. In 1833 he +received the post of Yeoman Usher of the Exchequer, which he held till +his death in 1836, although its duties had vanished ere then.] + + + +LETTER 287 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. JOHN LAMB + +22 May 1822. + +Dear Mrs. Lamb, A letter has come to Arnold for Mrs. Phillips, and, as I +have not her address, I take this method of sending it to you. That old +rogue's name is Sherwood, as you guessed, but as I named the shirts to +him, I think he must have them. Your character of him made me almost +repent of the bounty. + +You must consider this letter as Mary's--for writing letters is such a +trouble and puts her to such twitters (family modesty, you know; it is +the way with me, but I try to get over it) that in pity I offer to do it +for her.-- + +We hold our intention of seeing France, but expect to see you here +first, as we do not go till the 20th of next month. A steam boat goes to +Dieppe, I see.-- + +Christie has not sent to me, and I suppose is in no hurry to settle the +account. I think in a day or two (if I do not hear from you to the +contrary) I shall refresh his memory. + +I am sorry I made you pay for two Letters. I Peated it, and re-peated +it. + +Miss Wright is married, and I am a hamper in her debt, which I hope will +now not be remembered. She is in great good humour, I hear, and yet out +of spirits. + +Where shall I get such full flavor'd Geneva again? + +Old Mr. Henshaw died last night precisely at 1/2 past 11.--He has been +open'd by desire of Mrs. McKenna; and, where his heart should have been, +was found a stone. Poor Arnold is inconsolable; and, not having shaved +since, looks deplorable. + +With our kind remembrances to Caroline and your friends + +We remain yours affectionaly C.L. AND M. LAMB. + +[_Occupying the entire margin up the left-hand side of the letter is, in +Mary Lamb's hand_:--] + +I thank you for your kind letter, and owe you one in return, but Charles +is in such a hurry to send this to be franked. + +Your affectionate sister + +M. LAMB. + + +[_On the right-hand margin, beside the paragraph about Mr. Henshaw, is +written in the same hand, underlined_:--] + +He is not dead. + +[John Lamb's widow had been a Mrs. Dowden, with an unmarried daughter, +probably the Caroline referred to. The letter treats of family matters +which could not now be explained even if it were worth while. The Lambs +were arranging a visit to Versailles, to the Kenneys. Mr. Henshaw was +Lamb's godfather, a gunsmith.] + + + +LETTER 288 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO MARY LAMB (in Paris). + +[August, 1822.] + +Then you must walk all along the Borough side of the Seine facing the +Tuileries. There is a mile and a half of print shops and book stalls. If +the latter were but English. Then there is a place where the Paris +people put all their dead people and bring em flowers and dolls and +ginger bread nuts and sonnets and such trifles. And that is all I think +worth seeing as sights, except that the streets and shops of Paris are +themselves the best sight. + + +[The Lambs had left England for France in June. While they were there +Mary Lamb was taken ill again--in a diligence, according to Moore--and +Lamb had to return home alone, leaving a letter, of which this is the +only portion that has been preserved, for her guidance on her recovery. +It is also the only writing from Lamb to his sister that exists. Mary +Lamb, who had taken her nurse with her in case of trouble, was soon well +again, and in August had the company of Crabb Robinson in Paris. Mrs. +Aders was also there, and Foss, the bookseller in Pall Mall, and his +brother. And it was on this visit that the Lambs met John Howard Payne, +whom we shall shortly see.] + + + +LETTER 289 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN CLARE + +India House, 31 Aug., 1822. + +Dear Clare--I thank you heartily for your present. I am an inveterate +old Londoner, but while I am among your choice collections, I seem to be +native to them, and free of the country. The quantity of your +observation has astonished me. What have most pleased me have been +Recollections after a Ramble, and those Grongar Hill kind of pieces in +eight syllable lines, my favourite measure, such as Cowper Hill and +Solitude. In some of your story-telling Ballads the provincial phrases +sometimes startle me. I think you are too profuse with them. In poetry +_slang_ of every kind is to be avoided. There is a rustick Cockneyism, +as little pleasing as ours of London. Transplant Arcadia to Helpstone. +The true rustic style, the Arcadian English, I think is to be found in +Shenstone. Would his Schoolmistress, the prettiest of poems, have been +better, if he had used quite the Goody's own language? Now and then a +home rusticism is fresh and startling, but where nothing is gained in +expression, it is out of tenor. It may make folks smile and stare, but +the ungenial coalition of barbarous with refined phrases will prevent +you in the end from being so generally tasted, as you deserve to be. +Excuse my freedom, and take the same liberty with my _puns_. + +I send you two little volumes of my spare hours. They are of all sorts, +there is a methodist hymn for Sundays, and a farce for Saturday night. +Pray give them a place on your shelf. Pray accept a little volume, of +which I have [a] duplicate, that I may return in equal number to your +welcome presents. + +I think I am indebted to you for a sonnet in the London for August. + +Since I saw you I have been in France, and have eaten frogs. The nicest +little rabbity things you ever tasted. Do look about for them. Make Mrs. +Clare pick off the hind quarters, boil them plain, with parsley and +butter. The fore quarters are not so good. She may let them hop off by +themselves. + +Yours sincerely, + +CHAS. LAMB. + + +[John Clare (1793-1864) was the Northamptonshire poet whom the _London +Magazine_ had introduced to fame. Octavius Gilchrist had played to him +the same part that Capell Lofft had to Bloomfield. His first volume, +_Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery_, was published in January, +1820; his next, _The Village Minstrel_, in September of the next year. +These he had probably sent to Lamb. Helpstone was Clare's birthplace. +Lamb's two little return volumes were his _Works_. The sonnet in the +August _London Magazine_ was not signed by Clare. It runs thus:-- + + TO ELlA + + ELIA, thy reveries and vision'd themes + To Care's lorn heart a luscious pleasure prove; + Wild as the mystery of delightful dreams, + Soft as the anguish of remember'd love: + Like records of past days their memory dances + Mid the cool feelings Manhood's reason brings, + As the unearthly visions of romances + Peopled with sweet and uncreated things;-- + And yet thy themes thy gentle worth enhances! + Then wake again thy wild harp's tenderest strings, + Sing on, sweet Bard, let fairy loves again + Smile in thy dreams, with angel ecstacies; + Bright o'er our souls will break the heavenly strain + Through the dull gloom of earth's realities. + +Clare addressed to Lamb a sonnet on his _Dramatic Specimens_ which was +printed in Hone's _Year Book_ in 1831. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Ayrton dated Sept. 5, 1822, +referring to the writer's "drunken caput" and loss of memory. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Mrs. James Kenney, dated Sept. +11, 1822, in which Lamb says that Mary Lamb had reached home safely from +France, and that she failed to smuggle Crabb Robinson's waistcoat. He +adds that the Custom House people could not comprehend how a waistcoat, +marked Henry Robinson, could be a part of Miss Lamb's wearing apparel. +At the end of the letter is a charming note to Mrs. Kenney's little +girl, Sophy, whom Lamb calls his dear wife. He assures her that the few +short days of connubial felicity which he passed with her among the +pears and apricots of Versailles were some of the happiest of his life.] + + + +LETTER 290 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +India House, 11 Sept. 1822. + +Dear Sir--You have misapprehended me sadly, if you suppose that I meant +to impute any inconsistency (in your writing poetry) with your religious +profession. I do not remember what I said, but it was spoken sportively, +I am sure. One of my levities, which you are not so used to as my older +friends. I probably was thinking of the light in which your so indulging +yourself would appear to _Quakers_, and put their objection in my own +foolish mouth. I would eat my words (provided they should be written on +not very coarse paper) rather than I would throw cold water upon your, +and my once, harmless occupation. I have read Napoleon and the rest with +delight. I like them for what they are, and for what they are not. I +have sickened on the modern rhodomontade & Byronism, and your plain +Quakerish Beauty has captivated me. It is all wholesome cates, aye, and +toothsome too, and withal Quakerish. If I were George Fox, and George +Fox Licenser of the Press, they should have my absolute IMPRIMATUR. I +hope I have removed the impression. + +I am, like you, a prisoner to the desk. I have been chained to that +gally thirty years, a long shot. I have almost grown to the wood. If no +imaginative poet, I am sure I am a figurative one. Do "Friends" allow +puns? _verbal_ equivocations?--they are unjustly accused of it, and I +did my little best in the "imperfect Sympathies" to vindicate them. + +I am very tired of clerking it, but have no remedy. Did you see a sonnet +to this purpose in the Examiner?-- + + "Who first invented Work--and tied the free + And holy-day rejoycing spirit down + To the ever-haunting importunity + Of business, in the green fields, and the town-- + To plough--loom--anvil--spade--&, oh, most sad, + To this dry drudgery of the desk's dead wood? + Who but the Being Unblest, alien from good, + Sabbathless Satan! he who his unglad + Task ever plies 'mid rotatory burnings, + That round and round incalculably reel-- + For wrath Divine hath made him like a wheel-- + In that red realm from whence are no returnings; + Where toiling and turmoiling ever and aye + He, and his Thoughts, keep pensive worky-day." + +C.L. + +I fancy the sentiment exprest above will be nearly your own, the +expression of it probably would not so well suit with a follower of John +Woolman. But I do not know whether diabolism is a part of your creed, or +where indeed to find an exposition of your creed at all. In feelings and +matters not dogmatical, I hope I am half a Quaker. Believe me, with +great respect, yours + +C. LAMB. + +I shall always be happy to see, or hear from you.-- + + +[This is the first of the letters to Bernard Barton (1784-1849), a clerk +in a bank at Woodbridge, in Suffolk, who was known as the Quaker poet. +Lamb had met him at a _London Magazine_ dinner at 13 Waterloo Place, and +had apparently said something about Quakers and poetry which Barton, on +thinking it over, had taken too seriously. Bernard Barton was already +the author of four volumes of poetry, of which _Napoleon and other +Poems_ was the latest, published in 1822. Lamb's essay on "Imperfect +Sympathies" had been printed in the _London Magazine_ for August, 1821. +For John Woolman, see note on page 93. The sonnet "Work" had been +printed in the _Examiner_, August 29, 1819.] + + + +LETTER 291 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BARRON FIELD + +Sept. 22, 1822. + +My dear F.,--I scribble hastily at office. Frank wants my letter +presently. I & sister are just returned from Paris!! We have eaten +frogs. It has been such a treat! You know our monotonous general Tenor. +Frogs are the nicest little delicate things--rabbity-flavoured. Imagine +a Lilliputian rabbit! They fricassee them; but in my mind, drest +seethed, plain, with parsley and butter, would have been the decision of +Apicius. Shelley the great Atheist has gone down by water to eternal +fire! Hunt and his young fry are left stranded at Pisa, to be adopted by +the remaining duumvir, Lord Byron--his wife and 6 children & their maid. +What a cargo of Jonases, if they had foundered too! The only use I can +find of friends, is that they do to borrow money of you. Henceforth I +will consort with none but rich rogues. Paris is a glorious picturesque +old City. London looks mean and New to it, as the town of Washington +would, seen after _it_. But they have no St. Paul's or Westminster +Abbey. The Seine, so much despised by Cockneys, is exactly the size to +run thro' a magnificent street; palaces a mile long on one side, lofty +Edinbro' stone (O the glorious antiques!): houses on the other. The +Thames disunites London & Southwark. I had Talma to supper with me. He +has picked up, as I believe, an authentic portrait of Shakspere. He paid +a broker about £40 English for it. It is painted on the one half of a +pair of bellows--a lovely picture, corresponding with the Folio head. +The bellows has old carved wings round it, and round the visnomy is +inscribed, near as I remember, not divided into rhyme--I found out the +rhyme-- + + "Whom have we here, + Stuck on this bellows, + But the Prince of good fellows, + Willy Shakspere?" + + At top-- + + "O base and coward luck! + To be here stuck.--POINS." + + At bottom-- + + "Nay! rather a glorious lot is to him assign'd, + Who, like the Almighty, rides upon the wind.--PISTOL." + +This is all in old carved wooden letters. The countenance smiling, +sweet, and intellectual beyond measure, even as He was immeasurable. It +may be a forgery. They laugh at me and tell me Ireland is in Paris, and +has been putting off a portrait of the Black Prince. How far old wood +may be imitated I cannot say. Ireland was not found out by his +parchments, but by his poetry. I am confident no painter on either side +the Channel could have painted any thing near like the face I saw. +Again, would such a painter and forger have expected £40 for a thing, if +authentic, worth £4000? Talma is not in the secret, for he had not even +found out the rhymes in the first inscription. He is coming over with +it, and, my life to Southey's Thalaba, it will gain universal faith. + +The letter is wanted, and I am wanted. Imagine the blank filled up with +all kind things. + +Our joint hearty remembrances to both of you. Yours as ever, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Frank was Francis John Field, Barron Field's brother, in the India +House. + +Shelley was drowned on July 8, 1822. + +Talma was François Joseph Talma (1763-1826), the great French tragedian. +Lamb, introduced by John Howard Payne, saw him in "Regulus," but not +understanding French was but mildly interested. "Ah," said Talma in the +account by James Kenney printed in Henry Angelo's _Pic Nic_, "I was not +very happy to-night; you must see me in 'Scylla.'" "Incidit in Scyllam," +said Lamb, "qui vult vitare Charybdiro." "Ah, you are a rogue; you are a +great rogue," was Talma's reply. Talma had bought a pair of bellows with +Shakespeare's head on it. Lamb's belief in the authenticity of this +portrait was misplaced, as the following account from _Chambers' +Journal_ for September 27, 1856, will show:-- + +About the latter part of the last century, one Zincke, an artist of +little note, but grandson of the celebrated enameller of that name, +manufactured fictitious Shakespeares by the score.... The most famous of +Zincke's productions is the well-known Talma Shakespeare, which gentle +Charles Lamb made a pilgrimage to Paris to see; and when he did see, +knelt down and kissed with idolatrous veneration. Zincke painted it on a +larger panel than was necessary for the size of the picture, and then +cut away the superfluous wood, so as to leave the remainder in the shape +of a pair of bellows.... Zincke probably was thinking of "a muse of +fire" when he adopted this strange method of raising the wind; but he +made little by it, for the dealer into whose hands the picture passed, +sold it as a curiosity, not an original portrait, for £5. The buyer, +being a person of ingenuity, and fonder of money than curiosities, +fabricated a series of letters to and from Sir Kenelm Digby, and, +passing over to France, _planted_--the slang term used among the less +honest of the curiosity-dealing fraternity--the picture and the letters +in an old château near Paris. Of course a confederate managed to +discover the _plant_, in the presence of witnesses, and great was the +excitement that ensued. Sir Kenelm Digby had been in France in the reign +of Charles I., and the fictitious correspondence _proved_ that the +picture was an original, and had been painted by Queen Elizabeth's +command, on the lid of her favourite pair of bellows! + +It really would seem that the more absurd a deception is, the better it +succeeds. All Paris was in delight at possessing an original +Shakespeare, while the London amateurs were in despair at such a +treasure being lost to England. The ingenious person soon found a +purchaser, and a high price recompensed him for his trouble. But more +remains to be told. The happy purchaser took his treasure to Ribet, the +first Parisian picture-cleaner of the day, to be cleaned. Ribet set to +work; but we may fancy his surprise as the superficial _impasto_ of +Zincke washed off beneath the sponge, and Shakespeare became a female in +a lofty headgear adorned with blue ribbons. + +In a furious passion the purchaser ran to the seller. "Let us talk over +the affair quietly," said the latter; "I have been cheated as well as +you: let us keep the matter secret; if we let the public know it, all +Paris and even London too, will be laughing at us. I will return you +your money, and take back the picture, if you will employ Ribet to +restore it to the same condition as it was in when you received it." +This fair proposition was acceded to, and Ribet restored the picture; +but as he was a superior artist to Zincke, he greatly improved it, and +this improvement was attributed to his skill as a cleaner. The secret +being kept, and the picture, improved by cleaning, being again in the +market, Talma, the great Tragedian, purchased it at even a higher price +than that given by the first buyer. Talma valued it highly, enclosed it +in a case of morocco and gold, and subsequently refused 1000 Napoleons +for it; and even when at last its whole history was disclosed, he still +cherished it as a genuine memorial of the great bard. + +By kind permission of Mr. B.B. MacGeorge, the owner both of the letter +and bellows, I was enabled to give a reproduction of the portrait in my +large edition. + +Ireland was the author of "Vortigern," the forged play attributed to +Shakespeare.] + + + +LETTER 292 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +[Autumn, 1822.] + +Dear Payne--A friend and fellow-clerk of mine, Mr. White (a good fellow) +coming to your parts, I would fain have accompanied him, but am forced +instead to send a part of me, verse and prose, most of it from 20 to 30 +years old, such as I then was, and I am not much altered. + +Paris, which I hardly knew whether I liked when I was in it, is an +object of no small magnitude with me now. I want to be going, to the +Jardin des Plantes (is that right, Louisa?) with you to Pere de la +Chaise, La Morgue, and all the sentimentalities. How is Talma, and his +(my) dear Shakspeare? + +N.B.--My friend White knows Paris thoroughly, and does not want a guide. +We did, and had one. We both join in thanks. Do you remember a Blue-Silk +Girl (English) at the Luxembourg, that did not much seem to attend to +the Pictures, who fell in love with you, and whom I fell in love +with--an inquisitive, prying, curious Beauty--where is she? + +_Votre Très Humble Serviteur_, + +CHARLOIS AGNEAU, + +_alias_ C. LAMB. + +Guichy is well, and much as usual. He seems blind to all the +distinctions of life, except to those of sex. Remembrance to Kenny and +Poole. + + +[John Howard Payne (1792-1852) was born in New York. He began life as an +actor in 1809 as Young Norval in "Douglas," and made his English _début_ +in 1813 in the same part. For several years he lived either in London or +Paris, where among his friends were Washington Irving and Talma. He +wrote a number of plays, and in one of them, "Clari, or the Maid of +Milan," is the song "Home, Sweet Home," with Bishop's music, on which +his immortality rests. Payne died in Tunis, where he was American +Consul, in 1852, and when in 1883 he was reinterred at Washington, it +was as the author of "Home, Sweet Home." He seems to have been a +charming but ill-starred man, whom to know was to love. + +Mr. White was Edward White of the India House, by whom Lamb probably +sent a copy of the 1818 edition of his _Works_. Louisa was Louisa +Holcroft. Guichy was possibly the Frenchman, mentioned by Crabb +Robinson, with whom the Lambs had travelled to France. Poole was, I +imagine, John Poole, the dramatist, author of burlesque plays in the +_London Magazine_ and later of "Paul Pry," which, it is quite likely, he +based on Lamb's sketch "Tom Pry."] + + + +LETTER 293 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: 9 October 1822.] + +Dear Sir--I am asham'd not sooner to have acknowledged your letter and +poem. I think the latter very temperate, very serious and very +seasonable. I do not think it will convert the club at Pisa, neither do +I think it will satisfy the bigots on our side the water. Something like +a parody on the song of Ariel would please them better. + + Full fathom five the Atheist lies, + Of his bones are hell-dice made.-- + +I want time, or fancy, to fill up the rest. I sincerely sympathise with +you on your doleful confinement. Of Time, Health, and Riches, the first +in order is not last in excellence. Riches are chiefly good, because +they give us Time. What a weight of wearisome prison hours have [I] to +look back and forward to, as quite cut out [of] life--and the sting of +the thing is, that for six hours every day I have no business which I +could not contract into two, if they would let me work Task-work. I +shall be glad to hear that your grievance is mitigated. + +Shelly I saw once. His voice was the most obnoxious squeak I ever was +tormented with, ten thousand times worse than the Laureat's, whose voice +is the worst part about him, except his Laureatcy. Lord Byron opens upon +him on Monday in a Parody (I suppose) of the "Vision of Judgment," in +which latter the Poet I think did not much show _his_. To award his +Heaven and his Hell in the presumptuous manner he has done, was a piece +of immodesty as bad as Shelleyism. + +I am returning a poor letter. I was formerly a great Scribbler in that +way, but my hand is out of order. If I said my head too, I should not be +very much out, but I will tell no tales of myself. I will therefore end +(after my best thanks, with a hope to see you again some time in +London), begging you to accept this Letteret for a Letter--a Leveret +makes a better present than a grown hare, and short troubles (as the old +excuse goes) are best. + +I hear that C. Lloyd is well, and has returned to his family. I think +this will give you pleasure to hear. + +I remain, dear Sir, yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +E.I.H. + + +9 Oct. 22. + + +[Barton had just published his _Verses on the Death of P.B. Shelley_, a +lament for misapplied genius. The club at Pisa referred particularly to +Byron, Leigh Hunt, and Trelawney. Trelawney placed three lines from +Ariel's song in "The Tempest" on Shelley's monument; but whether Lamb +knew this, or his choice of rival lines is a coincidence, I do not know. +Trelawney chose the lines:-- + + Nothing of him that doth fade + But doth suffer a sea-change + Into something rich and strange. + +There is no other record of Lamb's meeting with Shelley, who, by the +way, admired Lamb's writings warmly, particularly _Mrs. Leicester's +School_ (see the letter to Barton, August 17, 1824). + +Byron's _Vision of Judgment_, a burlesque of Southey's poem of the same +name, was printed in _The Liberal_ for 1822.] + + + +LETTER 294 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON + +India House, 9th October, 1822. + +Dear Haydon, Poor Godwin has been turned out of his house and business +in Skinner Street, and if he does not pay two years' arrears of rent, he +will have the whole stock, furniture, &c., of his new house (in the +Strand) seized when term begins. We are trying to raise a subscription +for him. My object in writing this is simply to ask you, if this is a +kind of case which would be likely to interest Mrs. Coutts in his +behalf; and who in your opinion is the best person to speak with her on +his behalf. Without the aid of from £300 to £400 by that time, early in +November, he must be ruined. You are the only person I can think of, of +her acquaintance, and can, perhaps, if not yourself, recommend the +person most likely to influence her. Shelley had engaged to clear him of +all demands, and he has gone down to the deep insolvent. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Is Sir Walter to be applied to, and by what channel? + + +[Mrs. Coutts was probably Harriot Mellon, the actress, widow of the +banker, Thomas Coutts, and afterwards Duchess of St. Albans. She had +played the part of the heroine Melesinda in "Mr. H."] + + + +LETTER 295 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +Thursday [Oct. 22], 1822. + +"Ali Pacha" will do. I sent my sister the first night, not having been +able to go myself, and her report of its effect was most favourable. I +saw it last night--the third night--and it was most satisfactorily +received. I have been sadly disappointed in Talfourd, who does the +critiques in the "Times," and who promised his strenuous services; but +by some damn'd arrangement he was sent to the wrong house, and a most +iniquitous account of Ali substituted for his, which I am sure would +have been a kind one. The "Morning Herald" did it ample justice, without +appearing to puff it. It is an abominable misrepresentation of the +"Times," that Farren played Ali like Lord Ogilby. He acted infirmity of +body, but not of voice or purpose. His manner was even grand. A grand +old gentleman. His falling to the earth when his son's death was +announced was fine as anything I ever saw. It was as if he had been +blasted. Miss Foote looked helpless and beautiful, and greatly helped +the piece. It is going on steadily, I am sure, for _many nights_. Marry, +I was a little disappointed with Hassan, who tells us he subsists by +cracking court jests before Hali, but he made none. In all the rest, +scenery and machinery, it was faultless. I hope it will bring you here. +I should be most glad of that. I have a room for you, and you shall +order your own dinner three days in the week. I must retain my own +authority for the rest. As far as magazines go, I can answer for +Talfourd in the "New Monthly." He cannot be put out there. But it is +established as a favourite, and can do without these expletives. I long +to talk over with you the Shakspeare Picture. My doubts of its being a +forgery mainly rest upon the goodness of the picture. The bellows might +be trumped up, but where did the painter spring from? Is Ireland a +consummate artist--or any of Ireland's accomplices?--but we shall confer +upon it, I hope. The "New Times," I understand was favorable to "Ali," +but I have not seen it. I am sensible of the want of method in this +letter, but I have been deprived of the connecting organ, by a practice +I have fallen into since I left Paris, of taking too much strong spirits +of a night. I must return to the Hotel de l'Europe and Macon. + +How is Kenney? Have you seen my friend White? What is Poole about, &c.? +Do not write, but come and answer me. + +The weather is charming, and there is a mermaid to be seen in London. +You may not have the opportunity of inspecting such a _Poisarde_ once +again in ten centuries. + +My sister joins me in the hope of seeing you. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Lamb had met John Howard Payne, the American dramatist, at Kenney's, in +France. "Ali Pacha," a melodrama in two acts, was produced at Covent +Garden on October 19, 1822. It ran altogether sixteen nights. William +Farren played the hero. Lord Ogleby, an antiquated fop, is a character +in "The Clandestine Marriage" by Colman and Garrick. Miss Foote played +Helena. See notes to the letter above for other references.] + + + +LETTER 296 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON + +Tuesday, 29th [October, 1822]. + +Dear H., I have written a very respectful letter to Sir W.S. Godwin did +not write, because he leaves all to his committee, as I will explain to +you. If this rascally weather holds, you will see but one of us on that +day. + +Yours, with many thanks, + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 297 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SIR WALTER SCOTT + +East India House, London, + +29th October 1822. + +Dear Sir,--I have to acknowledge your kind attention to my application +to Mr. Haydon. I have transmitted your draft to Mr. G[odwin]'s committee +as an anonymous contribution through me. Mr. Haydon desires his thanks +and best respects to you, but was desirous that I should write to you on +this occasion. I cannot pass over your kind expressions as to myself. It +is not likely that I shall ever find myself in Scotland, but should the +event ever happen, I should be proud to pay my respects to you in your +own land. My disparagement of heaths and highlands--if I said any such +thing in half earnest,--you must put down as a piece of the old Vulpine +policy. I must make the most of the spot I am chained to, and console +myself for my flat destiny as well as I am able. I know very well our +mole-hills are not mountains, but I must cocker them up and make them +look as big and as handsome as I can, that we may both be satisfied. +Allow me to express the pleasure I feel on an occasion given me of +writing to you, and to subscribe myself, dear sir, your obliged and +respectful servant, + +CHARLES LAMB. + + +[See note to the letter to Godwin above. Lamb and Scott never met. +Talfourd, however, tells us that "he used to speak with gratitude and +pleasure of the circumstances under which he saw him once in +Fleet-street. A man, in the dress of a mechanic, stopped him just at +Inner Temple-gate, and said, touching his hat, 'I beg your pardon, sir, +but perhaps you would like to see Sir Walter Scott; that is he just +crossing the road;' and Lamb stammered out his hearty thanks to his +truly humane informer." + +Mr. Lang has recently discovered that also in 1818 or thereabouts Sir +Walter invited Lamb to Abbotsford.] + + + +LETTER 298 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ROBINSON + +[Dated at end: Nov. 11, 1822.] + +Dear Sir, We have to thank you, or Mrs. Robinson-- for I think her name +was on the direction--for the best pig, which myself, the warmest of +pig-lovers, ever tasted. The dressing and the sauce were pronounced +incomparable by two friends, who had the good fortune to drop in to +dinner yesterday, but I must not mix up my cook's praises with my +acknowledgments; let me but have leave to say that she and we did your +pig justice. I should dilate on the crackling--done to a turn--but I am +afraid Mrs. Clarkson, who, I hear, is with you, will set me down as an +Epicure. Let it suffice, that you have spoil'd my appetite for boiled +mutton for some time to come. Your brother Henry partook of the cold +relics--by which he might give a good guess at what it had been _hot_. + +With our thanks, pray convey our kind respects to Mrs. Robinson, and the +Lady before mentioned. + +Your obliged Ser't + +CHARLES LAMB. + +India House + +11 Nov. 22. + + +[This letter is addressed to R. Robinson, Esq., Bury, Suffolk, but I +think there is no doubt that Thomas Robinson was the recipient. + +Thomas Robinson of Bury St. Edmunds was Henry Crabb Robinson's brother. +Lamb's "Dissertation on Roast Pig" had been printed in the _London +Magazine_ in September, 1822, and this pig was one of the first of many +such gifts that came to him.] + + + +LETTER 299 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +Wednesday, 13 November, '22. + +Dear P.--Owing to the inconvenience of having two lodgings, I did not +get your letter quite so soon as I should. The India House is my proper +address, where I am sure for the fore part of every day. The instant I +got it, I addressed a letter, for Kemble to see, to my friend Henry +Robertson, the Treasurer of Covent Garden Theatre. He had a conference +with Kemble, and the result is, that Robertson, in the name of the +management, recognized to me the full ratifying of your bargain: £250 +for Ali, the Slaves, and another piece which they had not received. He +assures me the whole will be paid you, or the proportion for the two +former, as soon as ever the Treasury will permit it. He offered to write +the same to you, if I pleased. He thinks in a month or so they will be +able to liquidate it. He is positive no trick could be meant you, as Mr. +Planche's alterations, which were trifling, were not at all considered +as affecting your bargain. With respect to the copyright of Ali, he was +of opinion no money would be given for it, as Ali is quite laid aside. +This explanation being given, you would not think of printing the two +copies together by way of recrimination. He told me the secret of the +two Galley Slaves at Drury Lane. Elliston, if he is informed right, +engaged Poole to translate it, but before Poole's translation arrived, +finding it coming out at Cov. Gar., he procured copies of two several +translations of it in London. So you see here are four translations, +reckoning yours. I fear no copyright would be got for it, for anybody +may print it and anybody has. Your's has run seven nights, and R. is of +opinion it will not exceed in number of nights the nights of Ali,--about +thirteen. But your full right to your bargain with the management is in +the fullest manner recognized by him officially. He gave me every hope +the money will be spared as soon as they can spare it. He said _a month +or two_, but seemed to me to mean about _a month_. A new lady is coming +out in Juliet, to whom they look very confidently for replenishing their +treasury. Robertson is a very good fellow and I can rely upon his +statement. Should you have any more pieces, and want to get a copyright +for them, I am the worst person to negotiate with any bookseller, having +been cheated by all I have had to do with (except Taylor and +Hessey,--but they do not publish theatrical pieces), and I know not how +to go about it, or who to apply to. But if you had no better negotiator, +I should know the minimum you expect, for I should not like to make a +bargain out of my own head, being (after the Duke of Wellington) the +worst of all negotiators. I find from Robertson you have written to +Bishop on the subject. Have you named anything of the copyright of the +Slaves. R. thinks no publisher would pay for it, and you would not +risque it on your own account. This is a mere business letter, so I will +just send my love to my little wife at Versailles, to her dear mother, +etc. + +Believe me, yours truly, C.L. + + +[Payne's translation of the French play was produced at Covent Garden on +November 6, 1822, under the title "The Soldier's Daughter." On the same +night appeared a rival version at Drury Lane entitled "Two Galley +Slaves." Payne's was played eleven times. The new lady as Juliet was the +other Fanny Kelly not Lamb's: Fanny H. Kelly, from Dublin. The revival +began on November 14. Planché was James Robinson Planché (1796-1880), +the most prolific of librettists. Robert William Elliston, of whom Lamb +later wrote so finely, was then managing Drury Lane. + +"Having been cheated." Lamb's particular reference was to Baldwin (see +the letter to Barton, Jan. 9, 1823). + +"The Duke of Wellington." A reference to the Duke's failure in +representing England at the Congress of Powers in Vienna and Verona. + +Lamb's "dear little wife" was Sophy Kenney.] + + + +LETTER 300 + +MARY LAMB TO MRS. JAMES KENNEY + +[No date. ?Early December, 1822.] + +My dear Friend,--How do you like Harwood? Is he not a noble boy? I +congratulate you most heartily on this happy meeting, and only wish I +were present to witness it. Come back with Harwood, I am dying to see +you--we will talk, that is, you shall talk and I will listen from ten in +the morning till twelve at night. My thoughts are often with you, and +your children's dear faces are perpetually before me. Give them all one +additional kiss every morning for me. Remember there's one for Louisa, +one to Ellen, one to Betsy, one to Sophia, one to James, one to Teresa, +one to Virginia, and one to Charles. Bless them all! When shall I ever +see them again? Thank you a thousand times for all your kindness to me. +I know you will make light of the trouble my illness gave you; but the +recollection of it often sits heavy on my heart. If I could ensure my +health, how happy should I be to spend a month with you every summer! + +When I met Mr. Kenney there, I sadly repented that I had not dragged you +on to Dieppe with me. What a pleasant time we should have spent there! + +You shall not be jealous of Mr. Payne. Remember he did Charles and I +good service without grudge or grumbling. Say to him how much I regret +that we owe him unreturnable obligations; for I still have my old fear +that we shall never see him again. I received great pleasure from seeing +his two successful pieces. My love to your boy Kenney, my boy James, and +all my dear girls, and also to Rose; I hope she still drinks wine with +you. Thank Lou-Lou for her little bit of letter. I am in a fearful +hurry, or I would write to her. Tell my friend the Poetess that I expect +some French verses from her shortly. I have shewn Betsy's and Sophy's +letters to all who came near me, and they have been very much admired. +Dear Fanny brought me the bag. Good soul you are to think of me! Manning +has promised to make Fanny a visit this morning, happy girl! Miss James +I often see, I think never without talking of you. Oh the dear long +dreary Boulevards! how I do wish to be just now stepping out of a Cuckoo +into them! + +Farewel, old tried friend, may we meet again! Would you could bring your +house with all its noisy inmates, and plant it, garden, gables and all, +in the midst of Covent Garden. + +Yours ever most affectionately, + +M. LAMB. + +My best respects to your good neighbours. + + +[Harwood was Harwood Holcroft. + +"Louisa," etc. Mrs. Kenney's children by her first marriage were Louisa, +Ellen, Betsy and Sophia. By her second, with Kenney, the others. Charles +was named Charles Lamb Kenney. + +"Payne's two successful pieces"--"Ali Pacha" and "The Soldier's +Daughter." + +Fanny was Fanny Holcroft, Mrs. Kenney's stepdaughter. + +Miss Kelly has added to this letter a few words of affection to Mrs. +Kenney from "the real old original Fanny Kelly." + +Charles Lamb also contributed to this letter a few lines to James +Kenney, expressing his readiness to meet Moore the poet. He adds that he +made a hit at him as Little in the _London Magazine_, which though no +reason for not meeting him was a reason for not volunteering a visit to +him. The reference is to the sonnet to Barry Cornwall in the _London +Magazine_ for September, 1820, beginning-- + + Let hate, or grosser heats, their foulness mask + Neath riddling Junius, or in L----e's name. + +The second line was altered in Lamb's _Album Verses_, 1830, to-- + + Under the vizor of a borrowed name.] + + + +LETTER 301 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN TAYLOR + +[Dated: Dec. 7, 1822.] + +Dear Sir,--I should like the enclosed Dedication to be printed, unless +you dislike it. I like it. It is in the olden style. But if you object +to it, put forth the book as it is. Only pray don't let the Printer +mistake the word _curt_ for _curst_. + +C.L. + +Dec. 7, 1822. + +DEDICATION + +TO THE FRIENDLY AND JUDICIOUS READER, + +Who will take these Papers, as they were meant; not understanding every +thing perversely in the absolute and literal sense, but giving fair +construction as to an after-dinner conversation; allowing for the +rashness and necessary incompleteness of first thoughts; and not +remembering, for the purpose of an after taunt, words spoken +peradventure after the fourth glass. The Author wishes (what he would +will for himself) plenty of good friends to stand by him, good books to +solace him, prosperous events to all his honest undertakings, and a +candid interpretation to his most hasty words and actions. The other +sort (and he hopes many of them will purchase his book too) he greets +with the curt invitation of Timon, "Uncover, dogs, and lap:" or he +dismisses them with the confident security of the philosopher, "you beat +but on the case of ELIA." + +C.L. + +Dec. 7, 1822. + + +[_Elia. Essays which have appeared under that signature in the London +Magazine_ was just about to be published. The book came out with no +preface. + +"You beat but on the case." When Anaxarchus, the philosopher, was being +pounded to death in a mortar, by command of Alexander the Great, he made +use of this phrase. After these words, in Canon Ainger's transcript, +Lamb remarks:--"On better consideration, pray omit that Dedication. The +Essays want no Preface: they are _all Preface_. A Preface is nothing but +a talk with the reader; and they do nothing else. Pray omit it. + +"There will be a sort of Preface in the next Magazine, which may act as +an advertisement, but not proper for the volume. + +"Let ELIA come forth bare as he was born." + +The sort of Preface in the next magazine (January, 1823) was the +"Character of the Late Elia," used as a preface to the _Last Essays_ in +1833.] + + + +LETTER 302 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +E.I.H. 16 dec. 22. + +Dear Wilson + +_Lightening_ I was going to call you-- + +You must have thought me negligent in not answering your letter sooner. +But I have a habit of never writing letters, but at the office--'tis so +much time cribbed out of the Company--and I am but just got out of the +thick of a Tea Sale, in which most of the Entry of Notes, deposits &c. +usually falls to my share. Dodwell is willing, but alas! slow. To +compare a pile of my notes with his little hillock (which has been as +long a building), what is it but to compare Olympus with a mole-hill. +Then Wadd is a sad shuffler.-- + +I have nothing of Defoe's but two or three Novels, and the Plague +History. I can give you no information about him. As a slight general +character of what I remember of them (for I have not look'd into them +latterly) I would say that "in the appearance of _truth_ in all the +incidents and conversations that occur in them they exceed any works of +fiction I am acquainted with. It is perfect illusion. The _Author_ never +appears in these self-narratives (for so they ought to be called or +rather Autobiographies) but the _narrator_ chains us down to an implicet +belief in every thing he says. There is all the minute detail of a +log-book in it. Dates are painfully pressed upon the memory. Facts are +repeated over and over in varying phrases, till you cannot chuse but +believe them. It is like reading Evidence given in a Court of Justice. +So anxious the story-teller seems, that the truth should be clearly +comprehended, that when he has told us a matter of fact, or a motive, in +a line or two farther down he _repeats_ it with his favorite figure of +speech, 'I say' so and so,--though he had made it abundantly plain +before. This is in imitation of the common people's way of speaking, or +rather of the way in which they are addressed by a master or mistress, +who wishes to impress something upon their memories; and has a wonderful +effect upon matter-of-fact readers. Indeed it is to such principally +that he writes. His style is elsewhere beautiful, but plain _& homely_. +Robinson Crusoe is delightful to all ranks and classes, but it is easy +to see that it is written in phraseology peculiarly adapted to the lower +conditions of readers: hence it is an especial favorite with seafaring +men, poor boys, servant maids &c. His novels are capital +kitchen-reading, while they are worthy from their deep interest to find +a shelf in the Libraries of the wealthiest, and the most learned. His +passion for _matter of fact narrative_ sometimes betrayed him into a +long relation of common incidents which might happen to any man, and +have no interest but the intense appearance of truth in them, to +recommend them. The whole latter half, or two thirds, of Colonel Jack is +of this description. The beginning of Colonel Jack is the most affecting +natural picture of a young thief that was ever drawn. His losing the +stolen money in the hollow of a tree, and finding it again when he was +in despair, and then being in equal distress at not knowing how to +dispose of it, and several similar touches in the early history of the +Colonel, evince a deep knowledge of human nature; and, putting out of +question the superior _romantic_ interest of the latter, in my mind very +much exceed Crusoe. Roxana (1st Edition) is the next in Interest, though +he left out the best part of it**in** subsequent Editions from a foolish +hypercriticism of his friend, Southerne. But Moll Flanders, the account +of the Plague &c. &c. are all of one family, and have the same stamp of +character."-- + +[_At the top of the first page is added:--_] + +_Omitted at the end_ ... believe me with friendly recollections, +_Brother_ (as I used to call you) Yours C. LAMB. + +[_Below the "Dear Wilson" is added in smaller writing:--_] + +The review was not mine, nor have I seen it. + + +[Lamb's friend Walter Wilson was beginning his _Memoirs of the Life and +Times of Daniel Defoe_, 1830. The passage sent to him in this letter by +Lamb he printed in Vol. III., page 428. Some years later Lamb sent +Wilson a further criticism. See also letter below for the reference to +_Roxana_. + +Dodwell we have met. Of Wadd we have no information, except, according +to Crabb Robinson's _Diary_, that he once accidentally discharged a pen +full of ink into Lamb's eye and that Lamb wrote this epigram upon him:-- + + What Wadd knows, God knows, + But God knows _what_ Wadd knows.] + + + +LETTER 303 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: 23 December 1822.] + +Dear Sir--I have been so distracted with business and one thing or +other, I have not had a quiet quarter of an hour for epistolary +purposes. Christmas too is come, which always puts a rattle into my +morning scull. It is a visiting unquiet un-Quakerish season. I get more +and more in love with solitude, and proportionately hampered with +company. I hope you have some holydays at this period. I have one day, +Christmas day, alas! too few to commemorate the season. All work and no +play dulls me. Company is not play, but many times hard work. To play, +is for a man to do what he pleases, or to do nothing--to go about +soothing his particular fancies. I have lived to a time of life, to have +outlived the good hours, the nine o'Clock suppers, with a bright hour or +two to clear up in afterwards. Now you cannot get tea before that hour, +and then sit gaping, music-bothered perhaps, till half-past 12 brings up +the tray, and what you steal of convivial enjoyment after, is heavily +paid for in the disquiet of to-morrow's head. + +I am pleased with your liking John Woodvil, and amused with your +knowledge of our drama being confined to Shakspeare and Miss Bailly. +What a world of fine territory between Land's End and Johnny Grots have +you missed traversing. I almost envy you to have so much to read. I feel +as if I had read all the Books I want to read. O to forget Fielding, +Steele, &c., and read 'em new. + +Can you tell me a likely place where I could pick up, cheap, Fox's +Journal? There are no Quaker Circulating Libraries? Ellwood, too, I must +have. I rather grudge that S[outhe]y has taken up the history of your +People. I am afraid he will put in some Levity. I am afraid I am not +quite exempt from that fault in certain magazine Articles, where I have +introduced mention of them. Were they to do again, I would reform them. + +Why should not you write a poetical Account of your old Worthies, +deducing them from Fox to Woolman?--but I remember you did talk of +something in that kind, as a counterpart to the Ecclesiastical Sketches. +But would not a Poem be more consecutive than a string of Sonnets? You +have no Martyrs _quite to the Fire_, I think, among you. But plenty of +Heroic Confessors, Spirit-Martyrs--Lamb-Lions.--Think of it. + +It would be better than a series of Sonnets on "Eminent Bankers."--I +like a hit at our way of life, tho' it does well for me, better than +anything short of _all one's time to one's self_, for which alone I +rankle with envy at the rich. Books are good, and Pictures are good, and +Money to buy them therefore good, but to buy _TIME!_ in other words, +LIFE-- + +The "compliments of the time to you" should end my letter; to a Friend I +suppose I must say the "sincerity of the season;" I hope they both mean +the same. With excuses for this hastily penn'd note, believe me with +great respect-- + +C. LAMB. + +23 dec. 22. + + +[Miss Bailly would be Joanna Baillie (1762-1851), author of _Plays on +the Passions_. + +The copy of Fox's _Journal_, 1694, which was lent to Lamb is now in the +possession of the Society of Friends. In it is written: + +"This copy of George Fox's Journal, being the earliest edition of that +work, the property of John T. Shewell of Ipswich, is lent for six months +to Charles Lamb, at the request of Sam'l Alexander of Needham, Ipswich, +1st mo. 4 1823." Lamb has added: "Returned by Charles Lamb, within the +period, with many thanks to the Lender for the very great satisfaction +which he has derived from the perusal of it." + +Southey was meditating a Life of George Fox and corresponded with Barton +on the subject. He did not write the book. + +Barton had a plan to provide Wordsworth's Ecclesiastical Sonnets with a +Quaker pendant. He did not carry it out. + +Here might come an undated and unpublished letter from Lamb to Basil +Montagu, which is of little interest except as referring to Miss James, +Mary Lamb's nurse. Lamb says that she was one of four sisters, daughters +of a Welsh clergyman, who all became nurses at Mrs. Warburton's, Hoxton, +whither, I imagine, Mary Lamb had often retired. Mrs. Parsons, one of +the sisters, became Mary Lamb's nurse when, some time after Lamb's +death, she moved to 41 Alpha Road, Mrs. Parsons' house. The late John +Hollingshead, great-nephew of these ladies, says in his interesting +book, _My Lifetime_, that their father was rector of Beguildy, in +Shropshire.] + + + +LETTER 304 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +[January, 1823.] + +Dear Payne--Your little books are most acceptable. 'Tis a delicate +edition. They are gone to the binder's. When they come home I shall have +two--the "Camp" and "Patrick's Day"--to read for the first time. I may +say three, for I never read the "School for Scandal." "_Seen_ it I have, +and in its happier days." With the books Harwood left a truncheon or +mathematical instrument, of which we have not yet ascertained the use. +It is like a telescope, but unglazed. Or a ruler, but not smooth enough. +It opens like a fan, and discovers a frame such as they weave lace upon +at Lyons and Chambery. Possibly it is from those parts. I do not value +the present the less, for not being quite able to detect its purport. +When I can find any one coming your way I have a volume for you, my +Elias collected. Tell Poole, his Cockney in the Lon. Mag. tickled me +exceedingly. Harwood is to be with us this evening with Fanny, who comes +to introduce a literary lady, who wants to see me,--and whose portentous +name is _Plura_, in English "many things." Now, of all God's creatures, +I detest letters-affecting, authors-hunting ladies. But Fanny "will have +it so." So Miss Many Things and I are to have a conference, of which you +shall have the result. I dare say she does not play at whist. Treasurer +Robertson, whose coffers are absolutely swelling with pantomimic +receipts, called on me yesterday to say he is going to write to you, but +if I were also, I might as well say that your last bill is at the +Banker's, and will be honored on the instant receipt of the third Piece, +which you have stipulated for. If you have any such in readiness, strike +while the iron is hot, before the Clown cools. Tell Mrs. Kenney, that +the Miss F.H. (or H.F.) Kelly, who has begun so splendidly in Juliet, is +the identical little Fanny Kelly who used to play on their green before +their great Lying-Inn Lodgings at Bayswater. Her career has stopt short +by the injudicious bringing her out in a vile new Tragedy, and for a +third character in a stupid old one,--the Earl of Essex. This is +Macready's doing, who taught her. Her recitation, &c. (_not her voice or +person_), is masculine. It is so clever, it seemed a male _Debut_. But +cleverness is the bane of Female Tragedy especially. Passions uttered +logically, &c. It is bad enough in men-actors. Could you do nothing for +little Clara Fisher? Are there no French Pieces with a Child in them? By +Pieces I mean here dramas, to prevent male-constructions. Did not the +Blue Girl remind you of some of Congreve's women? Angelica or Millamant? +To me she was a vision of Genteel Comedy realized. Those kind of people +never come to see one. _N'import_--havn't I Miss Many Things coming? +Will you ask Horace Smith to----[_The remainder of this letter has been +lost_.] + + +[Payne seems to have sent Lamb an edition of Sheridan. "The Camp" and +"St. Patrick's Day" are among Sheridan's less known plays. + +Poole was writing articles on France in the _London Magazine_. Lamb +refers to "A Cockney's Rural Sports," in the number for December, 1822. + +Fanny was Fanny Holcroft. Plura I do not identify. + +The new tragedy in which Miss Kelly had to play was probably "The +Huguenot," produced December 11, 1822. "The Earl of Essex" was revived +December 30, 1822. Macready played in both. + +"Cleverness is the bane." See Lamb's little article on "The New Acting" +in Vol. I. + +The Blue Girl seems to refer to the lady mentioned at the end of the +first letter to Payne. + +Angelica is in Congreve's "Love for Love"; Millamant in his "Way of the +World."] + + + +LETTER 305 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[No date. January, 1823.] + +Dear Wordsworth, I beg your acceptance of ELIA, detached from any of its +old companions which might have been less agreeable to you. I hope your +eyes are better, but if you must spare them, there is nothing in my +pages which a Lady may not read aloud without indecorum, _which is more +than can be said of Shakspeare_. + +What a nut this last sentence would be for Blackwood! + +You will find I availed myself of your suggestion, in curtailing the +dissertation on Malvolio. + +I have been on the Continent since I saw you. + +I have eaten frogs. + +I saw Monkhouse tother day, and Mrs. M. being too poorly to admit of +company, the annual goosepye was sent to Russell Street, and with its +capacity has fed "A hundred head" (not of Aristotle's) but "of Elia's +friends." + +Mrs. Monkhouse is sadly confined, but chearful.-- + +This packet is going off, and I have neither time, place nor solitude +for a longer Letter. + +Will you do me the favor to forward the other volume to Southey? + +Mary is perfectly well, and joins me in kindest rememb'ces to you all. + +[_Signature cut away_.] + + +["What a nut... for Blackwood." To help on Maga's great cause against +Cockney arrogance. + +"The dissertation on Malvolio." In Elia the essays on the Old Actors +were much changed and rearranged (see Appendix to Vol. II. in this +edition).] + + + +LETTER 306 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MR. AND MRS. J.D. COLLIER + +Twelfth Day [January 6], 1823. + +THE pig was above my feeble praise. It was a dear pigmy. There was some +contention as to who should have the ears, but in spite of his obstinacy +(deaf as these little creatures are to advice) I contrived to get at one +of them. + +It came in boots too, which I took as a favor. Generally those petty +toes, pretty toes! are missing. But I suppose he wore them, to look +taller. + +He must have been the least of his race. His little foots would have +gone into the silver slipper. I take him to have been Chinese, and a +female.-- + +If Evelyn could have seen him, he would never have farrowed two such +prodigious volumes, seeing how much good can be contained in--how small +a compass! + +He crackled delicately. + +John Collier Jun has sent me a Poem which (without the smallest bias +from the aforesaid present, believe me) I pronounce _sterling_. + +I set about Evelyn, and finished the first volume in the course of a +natural day. To-day I attack the second--Parts are very interesting.-- + +I left a blank at top of my letter, not being determined _which_ to +address it to, so Farmer and Farmer's wife will please to divide our +thanks. May your granaries be full, and your rats empty, and your +chickens plump, and your envious neighbors lean, and your labourers +busy, and you as idle and as happy as the day is long! + + VIVE L'AGRICULTURE! + +Frank Field's marriage of course you have seen in the papers, and that +his brother Barron is expected home. + + How do you make your pigs so little? + They are vastly engaging at that age. + I was so myself. + Now I am a disagreeable old hog-- + A middle-aged-gentleman-and-a-half. + +My faculties, thank God, are not much impaired. I have my sight, +hearing, taste, pretty perfect; and can read the Lord's Prayer in the +common type, by the help of a candle, without making many mistakes. + +Believe me, while my faculties last, a proper appreciator of your many +kindnesses in this way; and that the last lingering relish of past +flavors upon my dying memory will be the smack of that little Ear. It +was the left ear, which is lucky. Many happy returns (not of the Pig) +but of the New Year to both.-- + +Mary for her share of the Pig and the memoirs desires to send the same-- + +D'r. M'r. C. and M'rs. C.-- + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + + +[This letter is usually supposed to have been addressed by Lamb to Mr. +and Mrs. Bruton of Mackery End. The address is, however, Mrs. Collier, +Smallfield Place, East Grinstead, Sussex. + +"If Evelyn could have seen him." John Evelyn's _Diary_ had recently been +published, in 1818 and 1819, in two large quarto volumes.] + +LETTER 307 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES ADERS + +[Jan. 8, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--We shall have great pleasure in surprising Mrs. Aders on her +Birthday--You will perceive how cunningly I have contrived the direction +of this note, _to evade postage_. + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +8 Jan. '23. + + +[This note is sent to me by Mr. G. Dunlop of Kilmarnock. It is the only +note to Aders, a friend of Crabb Robinson, to whose house Lamb often +went for talk and whist. Aders had a fine collection of German pictures. +See the verses to him in Vol. IV. The cunning in the address consisted +apparently in obtaining the signature of an India House colleague to +certify that it was "official."] + + + +LETTER 308 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +9 Jan., 1823. + +"Throw yourself on the world without any rational plan of support, +beyond what the chance employ of Booksellers would afford you"!!! + +Throw yourself rather, my dear Sir, from the steep Tarpeian rock, +slap-dash headlong upon iron spikes. If you had but five consolatory +minutes between the desk and the bed, make much of them, and live a +century in them, rather than turn slave to the Booksellers. They are +Turks and Tartars, when they have poor Authors at their beck. Hitherto +you have been at arm's length from them. Come not within their grasp. I +have known many authors for bread, some repining, others envying the +blessed security of a Counting House, all agreeing they had rather have +been Taylors, Weavers, what not? rather than the things they were. I +have known some starved, some to go mad, one clear friend literally +dying in a workhouse. You know not what a rapacious, dishonest set those +booksellers are. Ask even Southey, who (a single case almost) has made a +fortune by book drudgery, what he has found them. O you know not, may +you never know! the miseries of subsisting by authorship. 'Tis a pretty +appendage to a situation like yours or mine, but a slavery worse than +all slavery to be a book-seller's dependent, to drudge your brains for +pots of ale and breasts of mutton, to change your free thoughts and +voluntary numbers for ungracious TASK-WORK. Those fellows hate _us_. The +reason I take to be, that, contrary to other trades, in which the Master +gets all the credit (a Jeweller or Silversmith for instance), and the +Journeyman, who really does the fine work, is in the background, in +_our_ work the world gives all the credit to Us, whom _they_ consider +as +_their_ Journeymen, and therefore do they hate us, and cheat us, and +oppress us, and would wring the blood of us out, to put another sixpence +in their mechanic pouches. I contend, that a Bookseller has a _relative +honesty_ towards Authors, not like his honesty to the rest of the world. +B[aldwin], who first engag'd me as Elia, has not paid me up yet (nor any +of us without repeated mortifying applials), yet how the Knave fawned +while I was of service to him! Yet I dare say the fellow is punctual in +settling his milk-score, &c. Keep to your Bank, and the Bank will keep +you. Trust not to the Public, you may hang, starve, drown yourself, for +anything that worthy _Personage_ cares. I bless every star that +Providence, not seeing good to make me independent, has seen it next +good to settle me upon the stable foundation of Leadenhall. Sit down, +good B.B., in the Banking Office; what, is there not from six to Eleven +P.M. 6 days in the week, and is there not all Sunday? Fie, what a +superfluity of man's time,--if you could think so! Enough for +relaxation, mirth, converse, poetry, good thoughts, quiet thoughts. O +the corroding torturing tormenting thoughts, that disturb the Brain of +the unlucky wight, who must draw upon it for daily sustenance. +Henceforth I retract all my fond complaints of mercantile employment, +look upon them as Lovers' quarrels. I was but half in earnest. Welcome, +dead timber of a desk, that makes me live. A little grumbling is a +wholesome medicine for the spleen; but in my inner heart do I approve +and embrace this our close but unharassing way of life. I am quite +serious. If you can send me Fox, I will not keep it six _weeks_, and +will return it, with warm thanks to yourself and friend, without blot or +dog's ear. You much oblige me by this kindness. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Please to direct to me at India Ho. in future. [? I am] not always at +Russell St. + + +[Barton had long been meditating the advisability of giving up his place +in the bank at Woodbridge and depending upon his pen. Lamb's letter of +dissuasion is not the only one which he received. Byron had written to +him in 1812: "You deserve success; but we knew, before Addison wrote his +Cato, that desert does not always command it. But suppose it attained-- + + 'You know what ills the author's life assail-- + Toil, envy, want, the _patron_, and the jail.' + +Do not renounce writing, but never trust entirely to authorship. If you +have a profession, retain it; it will be like Prior's fellowship, a last +and sure resource." Barton had now broken again into dissatisfaction +with his life. He did not, however, leave the bank. + +Southey made no "fortune" by his pen. He almost always had to forestall +his new works.] + + + +LETTER 309 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +23 January, '23. + +Dear Payne--I have no mornings (my day begins at 5 P.M.) to transact +business in, or talents for it, so I employ Mary, who has seen +Robertson, who says that the Piece which is to be Operafied was sent to +you six weeks since by a Mr. Hunter, whose journey has been delayed, but +he supposes you have it by this time. On receiving it back properly +done, the rest of your dues will be forthcoming. You have received £30 +from Harwood, I hope? Bishop was at the theatre when Mary called, and he +has put your other piece into C. Kemble's hands (the piece you talk of +offering Elliston) and C.K. sent down word that he had not yet had time +to read it. So stand your affairs at present. Glossop has got the +Murderer. Will you address him on the subject, or shall I--that is, +Mary? She says you must write more _showable_ letters about these +matters, for, with all our trouble of crossing out this word, and giving +a cleaner turn to th' other, and folding down at this part, and +squeezing an obnoxious epithet into a corner, she can hardly communicate +their contents without offence. What, man, put less gall in your ink, or +write me a biting tragedy! + +C. LAMB. + + +[Here should come a letter from Lamb to Ayrton asking him to meet the +Burneys and Paynes on Wednesday at half-past four.] + + + +LETTER 310 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +February [9], 1823. + +My dear Miss Lamb--I have enclosed for you Mr. Payne's piece called +Grandpapa, which I regret to say is not thought to be of the nature that +will suit this theatre; but as there appears to be much merit in it, Mr. +Kemble strongly recommends that you should send it to the English Opera +House, for which it seems to be excellently adapted. As you have already +been kind enough to be our medium of communication with Mr. Payne, I +have imposed this trouble upon you; but if you do not like to act for +Mr. Payne in the business, and have no means of disposing of the piece, +I will forward it to Paris or elsewhere as you think he may prefer. + +Very truly yours, + +HENRY ROBERTSON. + +T.R.C.G., 8 Feb. 1823. + +Dear P---- We have just received the above, and want your instructions. +It strikes me as a very merry little piece, that should be played by +_very young actors_. It strikes me that Miss Clara Fisher would play the +_boy_ exactly. She is just such a forward chit. No young _man_ would do +it without its appearing absurd, but in a girl's hands it would have +just all the reality that a short dream of an act requires. Then for the +sister, if Miss Stevenson that was, were Miss Stevenson and younger, +they two would carry it off. I do not know who they have got in that +young line, besides Miss C.F., at Drury, nor how you would like Elliston +to have it--has he not had it? I am thick with Arnold, but I have always +heard that the very slender profits of the English Opera House do not +admit of his giving above a trifle, or next to none, for a piece of this +kind. Write me what I should do, what you would ask, &c. The music +(printed) is returned with the piece, and the French original. Tell Mr. +Grattan I thank him for his book, which as far as I have read it is a +very _companionable one_. I have but just received it. It came the same +hour with your packet from Cov. Gar., i.e. yester-night late, to my +summer residence, where, tell Kenney, the cow is quiet. Love to all at +Versailles. Write quickly. + +C.L. + +I have no acquaintance with Kemble at all, having only met him once or +twice; but any information, &c., I can get from R., who is a good +fellow, you may command. I am sorry the rogues are so dilitory, but I +distinctly believe they mean to fulfill their engagement. I am sorry you +are not here to see to these things. I am a poor man of business, but +command me to the short extent of my tether. My sister's kind +remembrance ever. + +C.L. + + +[The "Grandpapa" was eventually produced at Drury Lane, May 25, 1825, +and played thrice. Miss Stevenson was an actress praised by Lamb in _The +Examiner_ (see Vol. I. of this edition). C.F. was Clara Fisher, +mentioned above. + +Samuel James Arnold was manager of the Lyceum, then known as the English +Opera House; he was the brother of Mrs. William Ayrton, Lamb's friend. + +Mr. Grattan was Thomas Colley Grattan (1792-1864), who was then living +in Paris. His book would be _Highways and Byways_, first series, 1823. + +There is one other note to Payne in the _Century Magazine_, unimportant +and undated, suggesting a walk one Sunday.] + + + +LETTER 311 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. February 17, 1823.] + +My dear Sir--I have read quite through the ponderous folio of G.F. I +think Sewell has been judicious in omitting certain parts, as for +instance where G.F. _has_ revealed to him the natures of all the +creatures in their names, as Adam had. He luckily turns aside from that +compendious study of natural history, which might have superseded +Buffon, to his proper spiritual pursuits, only just hinting what a +philosopher he might have been. The ominous passage is near the +beginning of the Book. It is clear he means a physical knowledge, +without trope or figure. Also, pretences to miraculous healing and the +like are more frequent than I should have suspected from the epitome in +Sewell. He is nevertheless a great spiritual man, and I feel very much +obliged by your procuring me the Loan of it. How I like the Quaker +phrases--though I think they were hardly completed till Woolman. A +pretty little manual of Quaker language (with an endeavour to explain +them) might be gathered out of his Book. Could not you do it? I have +read through G.F. without finding any explanation of the term _first +volume_ in the title page. It takes in all, both his life and his death. +Are there more Last words of him? Pray, how may I venture to return it +to Mr. Shewell at Ipswich? I fear to send such a Treasure by a Stage +Coach. Not that I am afraid of the Coachman or the Guard _reading_ it. +But it might be lost. Can you put me in a way of sending it in safety? +The kind hearted owner trusted it to me for six months. I think I was +about as many days in getting through it, and I do not think that I +skipt a word of it. I have quoted G.F. in my Quaker's meeting, as having +said he was "lifted up in spirit" (which I felt at the time to be not a +Quaker phrase), "and the Judge and Jury were as dead men under his +feet." I find no such words in his Journal, and I did not get them from +Sewell, and the latter sentence I am sure I did not mean to invent. I +must have put some other Quaker's words into his mouth. Is it a fatality +in me, that every thing I touch turns into a Lye? I once quoted two +Lines from a translation of Dante, which Hazlitt very greatly admired, +and quoted in a Book as proof of the stupendous power of that poet, but +no such lines are to be found in the translation, which has been +searched for the purpose. I must have dreamed them, for I am quite +certain I did not forge them knowingly. What a misfortune to have a +Lying memory.--Yes, I have seen Miss Coleridge, and wish I had just such +a--daughter. God love her--to think that she should have had to toil +thro' five octavos of that cursed (I forget I write to a Quaker) +Abbeypony History, and then to abridge them to 3, and all for £113. At +her years, to be doing stupid Jesuits' Latin into English, when she +should be reading or writing Romances. Heaven send her Uncle do not +breed her up a Quarterly Reviewer!--which reminds me, that he has spoken +very respectfully of you in the last number, which is the next thing to +having a Review all to one's self. Your description of Mr. Mitford's +place makes me long for a pippin and some carraways and a cup of sack in +his orchard, when the sweets of the night come in. + +Farewell. + +C. LAMB. + + +[In the 1694 folio of George Fox's _Journal_ the revelation of the names +of creatures occurs twice, once under Notts in 1647 and again under +Mansfield in 1648. + +"Sewell." _The History of the Rise, Increase and Progress of the +Christian People called Quakers_, 1722. By William Sewell (1654-1720). + +"In my Quaker's meeting"--the _Elia_ essay (see Vol. II.). + +"I once quoted two Lines." Possibly, Mr. A.R. Waller suggests to me, the +lines:-- + + Because on earth their names + In Fame's eternal volume shine for aye, + +quoted by Hazlitt in his _Round Table_ essay "On Posthumous Fame," and +again in one of his _Edinburgh Review_ articles. They are presumably +based upon the _Inferno_, Canto IV. (see Haselfoot's translation, second +edition, 1899, page 21, lines 74-78). But the "manufacturer" of them +must have had Spenser's line in his mind, "On Fame's eternall bead-roll +worthie to be fyled" (_Faerie Queene_, Bk. IV., Canto II., Stanza 32). +They have not yet been found in any translation of Dante. This +explanation would satisfy Lamb's words "quoted in a book," i.e., _The +Round Table_, published in 1817. + +"Miss Coleridge"--Coleridge's daughter Sara, born in 1802, who had been +brought up by her uncle, Southey. She had translated Martin +Dobrizhoffer's Latin history of the Abipones in order to gain funds for +her brother Derwent's college expenses. Her father considered the +translation "unsurpassed for pure mother English by anything I have read +for a long time." Sara Coleridge married her cousin, Henry Nelson +Coleridge, in 1829. She edited her father's works and died in 1852. At +the present time she and her mother were visiting the Gillmans. + +Mr. Mitford was John Mitford (1781-1859), rector of Benhall, in Suffolk, +and editor of old poets. Later he became editor of the _Gentleman's +Magazine_. He was a cousin of Mary Russell Mitford. In the _Gentleman's +Magazine_ for May, 1838, is a review of Talfourd's edition of Lamb's +_Letters_, probably from his pen, in which he records a visit to the +Lambs in 1827.] + + + +LETTER 312 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +[Dated at end: February 24, 1823.] + +Dear W.--I write that you may not think me neglectful, not that I have +any thing to say. In answer to your questions, it was at _your_ house I +saw an edition of Roxana, the preface to which stated that the author +had left out that part of it which related to Roxana's daughter +persisting in imagining herself to be so, in spite of the mother's +denial, from certain hints she had picked up, and throwing herself +continually in her mother's way (as Savage is said to have done in +_his_, prying in at windows to get a glimpse of her), and that it was by +advice of Southern, who objected to the circumstances as being untrue, +when the rest of the story was founded on fact; which shows S. to have +been a stupid-ish fellow. The incidents so resemble Savage's story, that +I taxed Godwin with taking Falconer from his life by Dr. Johnson. You +should have the edition (if you have not parted with it), for I saw it +never but at your place at the Mews' Gate, nor did I then read it to +compare it with my own; only I know the daughter's curiosity is the best +part of _my_ Roxana. The prologue you speak of was mine, so named, but +not worth much. You ask me for 2 or 3 pages of verse. I have not written +so much since you knew me. I am altogether prosaic. May be I may touch +off a sonnet in time. I do not prefer Col. Jack to either Rob. Cr. or +Roxana. I only spoke of the beginning of it, his childish history. The +rest is poor. I do not know anywhere any good character of De Foe +besides what you mention. I do not know that Swift mentions him. Pope +does. I forget if D'Israeli has. Dunlop I think has nothing of him. He +is quite new ground, and scarce known beyond Crusoe. I do not know who +wrote Quarll. I never thought of Quarll as having an author. It is a +poor imitation; the monkey is the best in it, and his pretty dishes made +of shells. Do you know the Paper in the Englishman by Sir Rd. Steele, +giving an account of Selkirk? It is admirable, and has all the germs of +Crusoe. You must quote it entire. Captain G. Carleton wrote his own +Memoirs; they are about Lord Peterborough's campaign in Spain, & a good +Book. Puzzelli puzzles me, and I am in a cloud about Donald M'Leod. I +never heard of them; so you see, my dear Wilson, what poor assistances I +can give in the way of information. I wish your Book out, for I shall +like to see any thing about De Foe or from you. + +Your old friend, + +C. LAMB. + +From my and your old compound. 24 Feb. '23. + + +[With this letter compare the letter on September 9, 1801, to Godwin, +and the letter on December 16, 1822, to Wilson. + +Defoe's _Roxana_, first edition, does not, as a matter of fact, contain +the episode of the daughter which Lamb so much admired. Later editions +have it. Godwin says in his Preface to "Faulkener," 1807, the play to +which Lamb wrote a prologue in praise of Defoe (see Vol. IV.), that the +only accessible edition of _Roxana_ in which the story of Susannah is +fully told is that of 1745. + +Richard Savage was considered to be the natural son of the Countess of +Macclesfield and Earl Rivers. His mother at first disowned him, but +afterwards, when this became impossible, repulsed him. Johnson says in +his "Life of Savage," that it was his hero's "practice to walk in the +dark evenings for several hours before her door in hopes of seeing her +as she might come by accident to the window or cross her apartment with +a candle in her hand." + +Swift and Defoe were steady enemies, although I do not find that either +mentions the other by name. But Swift in _The Examiner_ often had Defoe +in mind, and Defoe in one of his political writings refers to Swift, +_apropos_ Wood's halfpence, as "the copper farthing author." + +Pope referred to Defoe twice in the _Dunciad_: once as standing high, +fearless and unabashed in the pillory, and once, libellously, as the +father of Norton, of the _Flying Post_. + +_Philip Quarll_ was the first imitation of _Robinson Crusoe_. It was +published in 1727, purporting to be the narrative of one Dorrington, a +merchant, and Quarll's discoverer. The title begins, _The Hermit; or, +The Unparalleled Sufferings and Surprising Adventures of Mr. Philip +Quarll, an Englishman_ ... Lamb says in his essay on Christ's Hospital +that the Blue-Coat boys used to read the book. The authorship of the +book is still unknown. + +Steele's account of Selkirk is in _The Englishman_, No. 26, Dec. 1, +1713. Wilson quoted it. + +Defoe's fictitious _Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton_ was +published in 1728. + +I cannot explain Puzzelli or Donald M'Leod. Later Lamb sent Wilson, who +seems to have asked for some verse about Defoe, the "Ode to the +Treadmill," but Wilson did not use it. + +"My old compound." Robinson's _Diary_ (Vol. I., page 333) has this: "The +large room in the accountant's office at the East India House is divided +into boxes or compartments, in each of which sit six clerks, Charles +Lamb himself in one. They are called Compounds. The meaning of the word +was asked one day, and Lamb said it was 'a collection of simples.'"] + + + +LETTER 313 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: March 11, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--The approbation of my little book by your sister is very +pleasing to me. The Quaker incident did not happen to me, but to +Carlisle the surgeon, from whose mouth I have twice heard it, at an +interval of ten or twelve years, with little or no variation, and have +given it as exactly as I could remember it. The gloss which your sister, +or you, have put upon it does not strike me as correct. Carlisle drew no +inference from it against the honesty of the Quakers, but only in favour +of their surprising coolness--that they should be capable of committing +a good joke, with an utter insensibility to its being any jest at all. I +have reason to believe in the truth of it, because, as I have said, I +heard him repeat it without variation at such an interval. The story +loses sadly in print, for Carlisle is the best story teller I ever +heard. The idea of the discovery of roasting pigs, I also borrowed, from +my friend Manning, and am willing to confess both my plagiarisms. + +Should fate ever so order it that you shall be in town with your sister, +mine bids me say that she shall have great pleasure in being introduced +to her. I think I must give up the cause of the Bank--from nine to nine +is galley-slavery, but I hope it is but temporary. Your endeavour at +explaining Fox's insight into the natures of animals must fail, as I +shall transcribe the passage. It appears to me that he stopt short in +time, and was on the brink of falling with his friend Naylor, my +favourite.--The book shall be forthcoming whenever your friend can make +convenient to call for it. + +They have dragged me again into the Magazine, but I feel the spirit of +the thing in my own mind quite gone. "Some brains" (I think Ben Jonson +says it) "will endure but one skimming." We are about to have an +inundation of poetry from the Lakes, Wordsworth and Southey are coming +up strong from the North. The she Coleridges have taken flight, to my +regret. With Sara's own-made acquisitions, her unaffectedness and +no-pretensions are beautiful. You might pass an age with her without +suspecting that she knew any thing but her mother's tongue. I don't mean +any reflection on Mrs. Coleridge here. I had better have said her +vernacular idiom. Poor C. I wish he had a home to receive his daughter +in. But he is but as a stranger or a visitor in this world. How did you +like Hartley's sonnets? The first, at least, is vastly fine. Lloyd has +been in town a day or two on business, and is perfectly well. I am +ashamed of the shabby letters I send, but I am by nature anything but +neat. Therein my mother bore me no Quaker. I never could seal a letter +without dropping the wax on one side, besides scalding my fingers. I +never had a seal too of my own. Writing to a great man lately, who is +moreover very Heraldic, I borrowed a seal of a friend, who by the female +side quarters the Protectorial Arms of Cromwell. How they must have +puzzled my correspondent!--My letters are generally charged as double at +the Post office, from their inveterate clumsiness of foldure. So you +must not take it disrespectful to your self if I send you such ungainly +scraps. I think I lose £100 a year at the India House, owing solely to +my want of neatness in making up Accounts. How I puzzle 'em out at last +is the wonder. I have to do with millions. _I?_ + +It is time to have done my incoherences. + +Believe me Yours Truly + +C. LAMB. + +Tuesd 11 Ma 23. + + +[Lamb had sent _Elia_ to Woodbridge. Bernard Barton's sister was Maria +Hack, author of many books for children. The Quaker incident is in the +essay "Imperfect Sympathies." Carlisle was Sir Anthony Carlisle. + +"Your endeavour at explaining Fox's insight." See letter above. James +Nayler (1617?-1660), an early Quaker who permitted his admirers to look +upon him as a new Christ. He went to extremes totally foreign to the +spirit of the Society. Barton made a paraphrase of Nayler's "Last +Testimony." + +"They have dragged me again." Lamb had been quite ready to give up +_Elia_ with the first essays. "Old China," one of his most charming +papers, was in the March _London Magazine_. + +"Some brains ..." I had to give this up in my large edition. I now find +that Swift says it, not Ben Jonson. "There is a brain that will endure +but one scumming." Preface to _Battle of the Books_. + +"Hartley's sonnets." Four sonnets by Hartley Coleridge were printed in +the _London Magazine_ for February, 1823, addressed to R.S. Jameson. + +"Writing to a great man lately." This was Sir Walter Scott (see page +626). Barron Field would be the friend with the seal. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Ayrton saying that there will be +cards and cold mutton in Russell St. from 8 to 9 and gin and jokes from +9.30 to 12.] + + + +LETTER 314 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 5 April 1823.] + +Dear Sir--You must think me ill mannered not to have replied to your +first letter sooner, but I have an ugly habit of aversion from letter +writing, which makes me an unworthy correspondent. I have had no spring, +or cordial call to the occupation of late. I have been not well lately, +which must be my lame excuse. Your poem, which I consider very +affecting, found me engaged about a humorous Paper for the London, which +I had called a "Letter to an _Old Gentleman_ whose Education had been +neglected"--and when it was done Taylor and Hessey would not print it, +and it discouraged me from doing any thing else, so I took up Scott, +where I had scribbled some petulant remarks, and for a make shift +father'd them on Ritson. It is obvious I could not make your Poem a part +of them, and as I did not know whether I should ever be able to do to my +mind what you suggested, I thought it not fair to keep back the verses +for the chance. Mr. Mitford's sonnet I like very well; but as I also +have my reasons against interfering at all with the Editorial +arrangement of the London, I transmitted it (not in my own hand-writing) +to them, who I doubt not will be glad to insert it. What eventual +benefit it can be to you (otherwise than that a kind man's wish is a +benefit) I cannot conjecture. Your Society are eminently men of +Business, and will probably regard you as an idle fellow, possibly +disown you, that is to say, if you had put your own name to a sonnet of +that sort, but they cannot excommunicate Mr. Mitford, therefore I +thoroughly approve of printing the said verses. When I see any Quaker +names to the Concert of Antient Music, or as Directors of the British +Institution, or bequeathing medals to Oxford for the best classical +themes, etc.--then I shall begin to hope they will emancipate you. But +what as a Society can they do for you? you would not accept a Commission +in the Army, nor they be likely to procure it; Posts in Church or State +have they none in their giving; and then if they disown you--think--you +must live "a man forbid." + +I wishd for you yesterday. I dined in Parnassus, with Wordsworth, +Coleridge, Rogers, and Tom Moore--half the Poetry of England +constellated and clustered in Gloster Place! It was a delightful Even! +Coleridge was in his finest vein of talk, had all the talk, and let 'em +talk as evilly as they do of the envy of Poets, I am sure not one there +but was content to be nothing but a listener. The Muses were dumb, while +Apollo lectured on his and their fine Art. It is a lie that Poets are +envious, I have known the best of them, and can speak to it, that they +give each other their merits, and are the kindest critics as well as +best authors. I am scribbling a muddy epistle with an aking head, for we +did not quaff Hippocrene last night. Many, it was Hippocras rather. Pray +accept this as a letter in the mean time, and do me the favor to mention +my respects to Mr. Mitford, who is so good as to entertain good thoughts +of Elia, but don't show this almost impertinent scrawl. I will write +more respectfully next time, for believe me, if not in words, in +feelings, yours most so. + + +["Your poem." Barton's poem was entitled "A Poet's Thanks," and was +printed in the _London Magazine_ for April, 1823, the same number that +contained Lamb's article on Ritson and Scott. It is one of his best +poems, an expression of contentment in simplicity. The "Letter to an Old +Gentleman," a parody of De Quincey's series of "Letters to a Young +Gentleman" in the _London Magazine_, was not published until January, +1825. Scott was John Scott of Amwell (Barton's predecessor as the Quaker +poet), who had written a rather foolish book of prose, _Critical Essays +on the English Poets_. Ritson was Joseph Ritson, the critic and +antiquarian. See Vol. I. of the present edition for the essay. Barton +seems to have suggested to Lamb that he should write an essay around the +poem "A Poet's Thanks." Mitford's sonnet, which was printed in the +_London Magazine_ for June, 1823, was addressed commiseratingly to +Bernard Barton. It began:-- + + What to thy broken Spirit can atone, + Unhappy victim of the Tyrant's fears; + +and continued in the same strain, the point being that Barton was the +victim of his Quaker employers, who made him "prisoner at once and +slave." Lamb's previous letter shows us that Barton was being worked +from nine till nine, and we must suppose also that an objection to his +poetical exercises had been lodged or suggested. The matter righted +itself in time. + +"I dined in Parnassus." This dinner, at Thomas Monkhouse's, No. 34 +Gloucester Place, is described both by Moore and by Crabb Robinson, who +was present. Moore wrote in his _Journal_:-- + +"Dined at Mr. Monkhouse's (a gentleman I had never seen before) on +Wordsworth's invitation, who lives there whenever he comes to town. A +singular party. Coleridge, Rogers, Wordsworth and wife, Charles Lamb +(the hero at present of the _London Magazine_), and his sister (the poor +woman who went mad in a diligence on the way to Paris), and a Mr. +Robinson, one of the _minora sidera_ of this constellation of the Lakes; +the host himself, a Maecenas of the school, contributing nothing but +good dinners and silence. Charles Lamb, a clever fellow, certainly, but +full of villainous and abortive puns, which he miscarries of every +minute. Some excellent things, however, have come from him." + +Lamb told Moore that he had hitherto always felt an antipathy to him, +but henceforward should like him. + +Crabb Robinson writes:-- + +"_April 4th_.--Dined at Monkhouse's. Our party consisted of Wordsworth, +Coleridge, Lamb, Moore, and Rogers. Five poets of very unequal worth and +most disproportionate popularity, whom the public probably would arrange +in the very inverse order, except that it would place Moore above +Rogers. During this afternoon, Coleridge alone displayed any of his +peculiar talent. He talked much and well. I have not for years seen him +in such excellent health and spirits. His subjects metaphysical +criticism--Wordsworth he chiefly talked to. Rogers occasionally let fall +a remark. Moore seemed conscious of his inferiority. He was very +attentive to Coleridge, but seemed to relish Lamb, whom he sat next. L. +was in a good frame--kept himself within bounds and was only cheerful at +last.... I was at the bottom of the table, where I very ill performed my +part.... I walked home late with Lamb." + +Many years later Robinson sent to The Athenaeum (June 25, 1853) a +further and fuller account of the evening.] + + + +LETTER 315 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +April 13th, 1823. + +Dear Lad,--You must think me a brute beast, a rhinoceros, never to have +acknowledged the receipt of your precious present. But indeed I am none +of those shocking things, but have arrived at that indisposition to +letter-writing, which would make it a hard exertion to write three lines +to a king to spare a friend's life. Whether it is that the Magazine +paying me so much a page, I am loath to throw away composition--how much +a sheet do you give your correspondents? I have hung up Pope, and a gem +it is, in my town room; I hope for your approval. Though it accompanies +the "Essay on Man," I think that was not the poem he is here meditating. +He would have looked up, somehow affectedly, if he were just conceiving +"Awake, my St. John." Neither is he in the "Rape of the Lock" mood +exactly. I think he has just made out the last lines of the "Epistle to +Jervis," between gay and tender, + + "And other beauties envy Worsley's eyes." + +I'll be damn'd if that isn't the line. He is brooding over it, with a +dreamy phantom of Lady Mary floating before him. He is thinking which is +the earliest possible day and hour that she will first see it. What a +miniature piece of gentility it is! Why did you give it me? I do not +like you enough to give you anything so good. + +I have dined with T. Moore and breakfasted with Rogers, since I saw you; +have much to say about them when we meet, which I trust will be in a +week or two. I have been over-watched and over-poeted since Wordsworth +has been in town. I was obliged for health sake to wish him gone: but +now he is gone I feel a great loss. I am going to Dalston to recruit, +and have serious thoughts--of altering my condition, that is, of taking +to sobriety. What do you advise me? + +T. Moore asked me your address in a manner which made me believe he +meant to call upon you. + +Rogers spake very kindly of you, as every body does, and none with so +much reason as your + +C.L. + + +[This is the first important letter to Bryan Waller Procter, better +known as Barry Cornwall, who was afterwards to write, in his old age, so +pleasant a memoir of Lamb. He was then thirty-five, was practising law, +and had already published _Marcian Colonna_ and _A Sicilian Story_. + +The Epistle to Mr. Jervas (with Mr. Dryden's translation of Fresnoy's +_Art of Painting_) did not end upon this line, but some eighteen lines +later. I give the portrait in my large edition. + +"Lady Mary." By Lady Mary Lamb means, as Pope did in the first edition, +Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. But after his quarrel with that lady Pope +altered it to Worsley, signifying Lady Frances Worsley, daughter of the +Duke of Marlborough and wife of Sir Robert Worsley.] + + + +LETTER 316 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +[P.M. April 25, 1823.] + +Dear Miss H----, Mary has such an invincible reluctance to any +epistolary exertion, that I am sparing her a mortification by taking the +pen from her. The plain truth is, she writes such a pimping, mean, +detestable hand, that she is ashamed of the formation of her letters. +There is an essential poverty and abjectness in the frame of them. They +look like begging letters. And then she is sure to omit a most +substantial word in the second draught (for she never ventures an +epistle, without a foul copy first) which is obliged to be interlined, +which spoils the neatest epistle, you know [_the word "epistle" is +underlined_). Her figures, 1, 2, 3, 4, &c., where she has occasion to +express numerals, as in the date (25 Apr 1823), are not figures, but +Figurantes. And the combined posse go staggering up and down shameless +as drunkards in the day time. It is no better when she rules her paper, +her lines are "not less erring" than her words--a sort of unnatural +parallel lines, that are perpetually threatening to meet, which you know +is quite contrary to Euclid [_here Lamb has ruled lines grossly +unparallel_]. Her very blots are not bold like this [_here a bold +blot_], but poor smears [_here a poor smear_] half left in and half +scratched out with another smear left in their place. I like a clean +letter. A bold free hand, and a fearless flourish. Then she has always +to go thro' them (a second operation) to dot her i s, and cross her t s. +I don't think she can make a cork screw, if she tried--which has such a +fine effect at the end or middle of an epistle--and fills up-- + +[_Here Lamb has made a corkscrew two inches long_.] + +There is a corkscrew, one of the best I ever drew. By the way what +incomparable whiskey that was of Monkhouse's. But if I am to write a +letter, let me begin, and not stand flourishing like a fencer at a fair. + +It gives me great pleasure (the letter now begins) to hear that you got +down smoothly, and that Mrs. Monkhouse's spirits are so good and +enterprising. It shews, whatever her posture may be, that her mind at +least is not supine. I hope the excursion will enable the former to keep +pace with its out-stripping neighbor. Pray present our kindest wishes to +her, and all. (That sentence should properly have come in the Post +Script, but we airy Mercurial Spirits, there is no keeping us in). +Time--as was said of one of us--toils after us in vain. I am afraid our +co-visit with Coleridge was a dream. I shall not get away before the end +(or middle) of June, and then you will be frog-hopping at Boulogne. And +besides I think the Gilmans would scarce trust him with us, I have a +malicious knack at cutting of apron strings. The Saints' days you speak +of have long since fled to heaven, with Astraea, and the cold piety of +the age lacks fervor to recall them--only Peter left his key--the iron +one of the two, that shuts amain--and that's the reason I am lockd up. +Meanwhile of afternoons we pick up primroses at Dalston, and Mary +corrects me when I call 'em cowslips. God bless you all, and pray +remember me euphoneously to Mr. Gnwellegan. That Lee Priory must be a +dainty bower, is it built of flints, and does it stand at Kingsgate? Did +you remem + +[_This is apparently the proper end of the letter. At least there is no +indication of another sheet_.] + + +[Addressed to "Miss Hutchinson, 17 Sion Hill, Ramsgate, Kent," where she +was staying with Mrs. Monkhouse. I give a facsimile of it in my large +edition. + +"'Time'--as was said of one of us." Johnson wrote of Shakespeare, in the +Prologue at the opening of Drury Lane Theatre in 1747:-- + +And panting Time toil'd after him in vain. + +"The Saints' days." See note to the letter to Mrs. Wordsworth, Feb. 18, +1818. + +"Mr. Gnwellegan." Probably Lamb's effort to write the name of Edward +Quillinan, afterwards Wordsworth's son-in-law, whose first wife had been +a Miss Brydges of Lee Priory. + +"Lee Priory"--the home of Sir Egerton Brydges, at Ickham, near +Canterbury, for some years. He had, however, now left, and the private +press was closed. + +In _Notes and Queries_, November 11, 1876, was printed the following +scrap, a postscript by Charles Lamb to a letter from Mary Lamb to Miss +H. I place it here, having no clue as to date, nor does it matter:--] + + + +LETTER 317 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO MISS HUTCHINSON (?) + +A propos of birds--the other day at a large dinner, being call'd upon +for a toast, I gave, as the best toast I knew, "Wood-cock toast," which +was drunk with 3 cheers. + +Yours affect'y + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 318 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[No date. Probably 1823.] + +It is hard when a Gentleman cannot remain concealed, who affecteth +obscurity with greater avidity than most do seek to have their good +deeds brought to light--to haye a prying inquisitive finger, (to the +danger of its own scorching), busied in removing the little peck measure +(scripturally a bushel) under which one had hoped to bury his small +candle. The receipt of fern-seed, I think, in this curious age, would +scarce help a man to walk invisible. + +Well, I am discovered--and thou thyself, who thoughtest to shelter under +the pease-cod of initiality (a stale and shallow device), art no less +dragged to light--Thy slender anatomy--thy skeletonian D---- fleshed and +sinewed out to the plump expansion of six characters--thy tuneful +genealogy deduced-- + +By the way, what a name is Timothy! + +Lay it down, I beseech thee, and in its place take up the properer sound +of Timotheus-- + +Then mayst thou with unblushing fingers handle the Lyre "familiar to the +D----n name." + +With much difficulty have I traced thee to thy lurking-place. Many a +goodly name did I run over, bewildered between Dorrien, and Doxat, and +Dover, and Dakin, and Daintry--a wilderness of D's--till at last I +thought I had hit it--my conjectures wandering upon a melancholy +Jew--you wot the Israelite upon Change--Master Daniels--a contemplative +Hebrew-- to the which guess I was the rather led, by the consideration +that most of his nation are great readers-- + +Nothing is so common as to see them in the Jews' Walk, with a bundle of +script in one hand, and the Man of Feeling, or a volume of Sterne, in +the other-- + +I am a rogue if I can collect what manner of face thou carriest, though +thou seemest so familiar with mine--If I remember, thou didst not dimly +resemble the man Daniels, whom at first I took thee for--a care-worn, +mortified, economical, commercio-political countenance, with an +agreeable limp in thy gait, if Elia mistake thee not. I think I sh'd +shake hands with thee, if I met thee. + +[John Bates Dibdin, the son of Charles Dibdin the younger and grandson +of the great Charles Dibdin, was at this time a young man of about +twenty-four, engaged as a clerk in a shipping office in the city. I +borrow from Canon Ainger an interesting letter from a sister of Dibdin +on the beginning of the correspondence:-- + +My brother ... had constant occasion to conduct the giving or taking of +cheques, as it might be, at the India House. There he always selected +"the little clever man" in preference to the other clerks. At that time +the _Elia Essays_ were appearing in print. No one had the slightest +conception who "Elia" was. He was talked of everywhere, and everybody +was trying to find him out, but without success. At last, from the style +and manner of conveying his ideas and opinions on different subjects, my +brother began to suspect that Lamb was the individual so widely sought +for, and wrote some lines to him, anonymously, sending them by post to +his residence, with the hope of sifting him on the subject. Although +Lamb could not _know_ who sent him the lines, yet he looked very hard at +the writer of them the next time they met, when he walked up, as usual, +to Lamb's desk in the most unconcerned manner, to transact the necessary +business. Shortly after, when they were again in conversation, something +dropped from Lamb's lips which convinced his hearer, beyond a doubt, +that his suspicions were correct. He therefore wrote some more lines +(anonymously, as before), beginning-- + + "I've found thee out, O Elia!" + +and sent them to Colebrook Row. The consequence was that at their next +meeting Lamb produced the lines, and after much laughing, confessed +himself to be _Elia_. This led to a warm friendship between them. + +Dibdin's letter of discovery was signed D. Hence Lamb's fumbling after +his Christian name, which he probably knew all the time.] + + + +LETTER 319 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 3 May, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--I am vexed to be two letters in your debt, but I have been +quite out of the vein lately. A philosophical treatise is wanting, of +the causes of the backwardness with which persons after a certain time +of life set about writing a letter. I always feel as if I had nothing to +say, and the performance generally justifies the presentiment. Taylor +and Hessey did foolishly in not admitting the sonnet. Surely it might +have followed the B.B. I agree with you in thinking Bowring's paper +better than the former. I will inquire about my Letter to the Old +Gentleman, but I expect it to _go in_, after those to the Young Gent'n +are completed. I do not exactly see why the Goose and little Goslings +should emblematize _a Quaker poet that has no children_. But after +all--perhaps it is a Pelican. The Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin around it I +cannot decypher. The songster of the night pouring out her effusions +amid a Silent Meeting of Madge Owlets, would be at least intelligible. A +full pause here comes upon me, as if I had not a word more left. I will +shake my brain. Once-- twice--nothing comes up. George Fox recommends +waiting on these occasions. I wait. Nothing comes. G. Fox--that sets me +off again. I have finished the Journal, and 400 more pages of the +_Doctrinals_, which I picked up for 7s. 6d. If I get on at this rate, +the Society will be in danger of having two Quaker poets--to patronise. +I am at Dalston now, but if, when I go back to Cov. Gar., I find thy +friend has not call'd for the Journal, thee must put me in a way of +sending it; and if it should happen that the Lender of it, having that +volume, has not the other, I shall be most happy in his accepting the +Doctrinals, which I shall read but once certainly. It is not a splendid +copy, but perfect, save a leaf of Index. + +I cannot but think _the London_ drags heavily. I miss Janus. And O how +it misses Hazlitt! Procter too is affronted (as Janus has been) with +their abominable curtailment of his things--some meddling Editor or +other--or phantom of one --for neither he nor Janus know their busy +friend. But they always find the best part cut out; and they have done +well to cut also. I am not so fortunate as to be served in this manner, +for I would give a clean sum of money in sincerity to leave them +handsomely. But the dogs--T. and H. I mean-- will not affront me, and +what can I do? must I go on to drivelling? Poor Relations is +tolerable--but where shall I get another subject--or who shall deliver +me from the body of this death? I assure you it teases me more than it +used to please me. Ch. Lloyd has published a sort of Quaker poem, he +tells me, and that he has order'd me a copy, but I have not got it. Have +you seen it? I must leave a little wafer space, which brings me to an +apology for a conclusion. I am afraid of looking back, for I feel all +this while I have been writing nothing, but it may show I am alive. +Believe me, cordially yours C. LAMB. + + +[The sonnet probably was Mitford's, which was printed in the June number +(see above). Bowring, afterwards Sir John, was writing in the _London +Magazine_ on "Spanish Romances." + +"The Goose and little Goslings." Possibly the design upon the seal of +Barton's last letter. + +"Janus." The first mention of Thomas Griffiths Wainewright (see note +below), who sometimes wrote in the _London_ over the pseudonym Janus +Weathercock. John Taylor, Hood and perhaps John Hamilton Reynolds, made +up the magazine for press. In the May number, in addition to Lamb's +"Poor Relations," were contributions from De Quincey, Hartley Coleridge, +Cary, and Barton. But it was not what it had been. + +Lloyd's Quaker poem would probably be one of those in his _Poems_, 1823, +which contains some of his most interesting work.] + + + +LETTER 320 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. May 6, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--Your verses were very pleasant, and I shall like to see more +of them--I do not mean _addressed to me_. + +I do not know whether you live in town or country, but if it suits your +convenience I shall be glad to see you some evening-- say Thursday--at +20 Great Russell Street, Cov't Garden. If you can come, do not trouble +yourself to write. We are old fashiond people who _drink tea_ at six, or +not much later, and give cold mutton and pickle at nine, the good old +hour. I assure you (if it suit you) we shall be glad to see you.-- + + Yours, etc. C. LAMB. + + E.I.H., Tuesday, My love to Mr. Railton. + Some day of May 1823. The same to Mr. Rankin, + Not official. to the whole Firm indeed. + + +[The verses are not, I fear, now recoverable. Dibdin's firm was Railton, +Rankin & Co., in Old Jury. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Hone, dated May 19, 1823. William +Hone (1780-1842), who then, his stormy political days over, was +publishing antiquarian works on Ludgate Hill, had sent Lamb his _Ancient +Mysteries Described_, 1823. Lamb thanks him for it, and invites him to +14 Kingsland Row, Dalston, the next Sunday: "We dine exactly at 4."] + + + +LETTER 321 + +MARY LAMB TO MRS. RANDAL NORRIS + +Hastings, at Mrs. Gibbs, York Cottage, Priory, No. 4. [June 18, 1823.] + +My dear Friend,--Day after day has passed away, and my brother has said, +"I will write to Mrs. [? Mr.] Norris to-morrow," and therefore I am +resolved to write to _Mrs. Norris_ to-day, and trust him no longer. We +took our places for Sevenoaks, intending to remain there all night in +order to see Knole, but when we got there we chang'd our minds, and went +on to Tunbridge Wells. About a mile short of the Wells the coach stopped +at a little inn, and I saw, "Lodgings to let" on a little, very little +house opposite. I ran over the way, and secured them before the coach +drove away, and we took immediate possession: it proved a very +comfortable place, and we remained there nine days. The first evening, +as we were wandering about, we met a lady, the wife of one of the India +House clerks, with whom we had been slightly acquainted some years ago, +which slight acquaintance has been ripened into a great intimacy during +the nine pleasant days that we passed at the Wells. She and her two +daughters went with us in an open chaise to Knole, and as the chaise +held only five, we mounted Miss James upon a little horse, which she +rode famously. I was very much pleased with Knole, and still more with +Penshurst, which we also visited. We saw Frant and the Rocks, and made +much use of your Guide Book, only Charles lost his way once going by the +map. We were in constant exercise the whole time, and spent our time so +pleasantly that when we came here on Monday we missed our new friends +and found ourselves very dull. We are by the seaside in a _still less +house_, and we have exchanged a very pretty landlady for a very ugly +one, but she is equally attractive to us. We eat turbot, and we drink +smuggled Hollands, and we walk up hill and down hill all day long. In +the little intervals of rest that we allow ourselves I teach Miss James +French; she picked up a few words during her foreign Tour with us, and +she has had a hankering after it ever since. + +We came from Tunbridge Wells in a Postchaise, and would have seen Battle +Abbey on the way, but it is only shewn on a Monday. We are trying to +coax Charles into a Monday's excursion. And Bexhill we are also thinking +about. Yesterday evening we found out by chance the most beautiful view +I ever saw. It is called "The Lovers' Seat."... You have been here, +therefore you must have seen [it, or] is it only Mr. and Mrs. Faint who +have visited Hastings? [Tell Mrs.] Faint that though in my haste to get +housed I d[ecided on] ... ice's lodgings, yet it comforted all th ... to +know that I had a place in view. + +I suppose you are so busy that it is not fair to ask you to write me a +line to say how you are going on. Yet if any one of you have half an +hour to spare for that purpose, it will be most thankfully received. +Charles joins with me in love to you all together, and to each one in +particular upstairs and downstairs. + +Yours most affectionately, M. LAMB. June 18 + + +[Mr. Hazlitt dates this letter 1825 or 1826, and considers it to refer +to a second visit to Hastings; but I think most probably it refers to +the 1823 visit, especially as the Lovers' Seat would assuredly have been +discovered then. Miss James was Mary Lamb's nurse. Mrs. Randal Norris +had been a Miss Faint. + +There is a curious similarity between a passage in this letter and in +one of Byron's, written in 1814: "I have been swimming, and eating +turbot, and smuggling neat brandies, and silk handkerchiefs ... and +walking on cliffs and tumbling down hills." + +A Hastings guide book for 1825 gives Mrs. Gibbs' address as 4 York +Cottages, near Priory Bridge. Near by, in Pelham Place, a Mr. Hogsflesh +had a lodging-house.] + + + +LETTER 322 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 10 July, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--I shall be happy to read the MS. and to forward it; but T. and +H. must judge for themselves of publication. If it prove interesting (as +I doubt not) I shall not spare to say so, you may depend upon it. +Suppose you direct it to Acco'ts. Office, India House. + +I am glad you have met with some sweetening circumstances to your +unpalatable draught. I have just returned from Hastings, where are +exquisite views and walks, and where I have given up my soul to walking, +and I am now suffering sedentary contrasts. I am a long time reconciling +to Town after one of these excursions. Home is become strange, and will +remain so yet a while. Home is the most unforgiving of friends and +always resents Absence; I know its old cordial looks will return, but +they are slow in clearing up. That is one of the features of this _our_ +galley slavery, that peregrination ended makes things worse. I felt out +of water (with all the sea about me) at Hastings, and just as I had +learned to domiciliate there, I must come back to find a home which is +no home. I abused Hastings, but learned its value. There are spots, +inland bays, etc., which realise the notions of Juan Fernandez. + +The best thing I lit upon by accident was a small country church (by +whom or when built unknown) standing bare and single in the midst of a +grove, with no house or appearance of habitation within a quarter of a +mile, only passages diverging from it thro' beautiful woods to so many +farm houses. There it stands, like the first idea of a church, before +parishioners were thought of, nothing but birds for its congregation, or +like a Hermit's oratory (the Hermit dead), or a mausoleum, its effect +singularly impressive, like a church found in a desert isle to startle +Crusoe with a home image; you must make out a vicar and a congregation +from fancy, for surely none come there. Yet it wants not its pulpit, and +its font, and all the seemly additaments of _our_ worship. + +Southey has attacked Elia on the score of infidelity, in the Quarterly, +Article, "Progress of Infidels [Infidelity]." I had not, nor have, seen +the Monthly. He might have spared an old friend such a construction of a +few careless flights, that meant no harm to religion. If all his +UNGUARDED expressions on the subject were to be collected-- + +But I love and respect Southey--and will not retort. I HATE HIS REVIEW, +and his being a Reviewer. + +The hint he has dropped will knock the sale of the book on the head, +which was almost at a stop before. + +Let it stop. There is corn in Egypt, while there is cash at Leadenhall. +You and I are something besides being Writers. Thank God. + +Yours truly C.L. + + +[What the MS. was I do not know. Lamb recurs more fully to the +description of the little church--probably Hollingdon Rural, about three +miles north-west from the town--in later letters. + +The thoughts in the second paragraph of this letter were amplified in +the _Elia_ essay "The Old Margate Hoy," in the _London Magazine_ for +July, 1823. + +"Southey has attacked Elia." In an article in the _Quarterly_ for +January, 1823, in a review of a work by Grégoire on Deism in France, +under the title "The Progress of Infidelity," Southey had a reference to +_Elia_ in the following terms:-- + +"Unbelievers have not always been honest enough thus to express their +real feelings; but this we know concerning them, that when they have +renounced their birthright of hope, they have not been able to divest +themselves of fear. From the nature of the human mind this might be +presumed, and in fact it is so. They may deaden the heart and stupify +the conscience, but they cannot destroy the imaginative faculty. There +is a remarkable proof of this in _Elia's Essays_, a book which wants +only a sounder religious feeling, to be as delightful as it is +original." + +And then Southey went on to draw attention to the case of Thornton Hunt, +the little child of Leigh Hunt, the (to Southey) notorious free-thinker, +who, as Lamb had stated in the essay "Witches and Other Night Fears," +would wake at night in terror of images of fear. + +"I will not retort." Lamb, as we shall see, changed his mind. + +"Almost at a stop before." _Elia_ was never popular until long after +Lamb's death. It did not reach a second edition until 1836. There are +now several new editions every year.] + + + +LETTER 323 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[July, 1823.] + +D'r A.--I expect Proctor and Wainwright (Janus W.) this +evening; will you come? I suppose it is but a comp't +to ask Mrs. Alsop; but it is none to say that we should be +most glad to see her. Yours ever. How vexed I am at your +Dalston expedit'n. C.L. +Tuesday. + + +[Mrs. Allsop was a daughter of Mrs. Jordan, and had herself been an +actress.] + + + +LETTER 324 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: 2 September (1823).] + +Dear B.B.--What will you say to my not writing? You cannot say I do not +write now. Hessey has not used your kind sonnet, nor have I seen it. +Pray send me a Copy. Neither have I heard any more of your Friend's MS., +which I will reclaim, whenever you please. When you come London-ward you +will find me no longer in Cov't Gard. I have a Cottage, in Colebrook +row, Islington. A cottage, for it is detach'd; a white house, with 6 +good rooms; the New River (rather elderly by this time) runs (if a +moderate walking pace can be so termed) close to the foot of the house; +and behind is a spacious garden, with vines (I assure you), pears, +strawberries, parsnips, leeks, carrots, cabbages, to delight the heart +of old Alcinous. You enter without passage into a cheerful dining room, +all studded over and rough with old Books, and above is a lightsome +Drawing room, 3 windows, full of choice prints. I feel like a great +Lord, never having had a house before. + +The London I fear falls off.--I linger among its creaking rafters, like +the last rat. It will topple down, if they don't get some Buttresses. +They have pull'd down three, W. Hazlitt, Proctor, and their best stay, +kind light hearted Wainwright --their Janus. The best is, neither of our +fortunes is concern'd in it. + +I heard of you from Mr. Pulham this morning, and that gave a fillip to +my Laziness, which has been intolerable. But I am so taken up with +pruning and gardening, quite a new sort of occupation to me. I have +gather'd my Jargonels, but my Windsor Pears are backward. The former +were of exquisite raciness. I do now sit under my own vine, and +contemplate the growth of vegetable nature. I can now understand in what +sense they speak of FATHER ADAM. I recognise the paternity, while I +watch my tulips. I almost FELL with him, for the first day I turned a +drunken gard'ner (as he let in the serpent) into my Eden, and he laid +about him, lopping off some choice boughs, &c., which hung over from a +neighbor's garden, and in his blind zeal laid waste a shade, which had +sheltered their window from the gaze of passers by. The old gentlewoman +(fury made her not handsome) could scarcely be reconciled by all my fine +words. There was no buttering her parsnips. She talk'd of the Law. What +a lapse to commit on the first day of my happy "garden-state." + +I hope you transmitted the Fox-Journal to its Owner with suitable +thanks. + +Mr. Cary, the Dante-man, dines with me to-day. He is a model of a +country Parson, lean (as a Curate ought to be), modest, sensible, no +obtruder of church dogmas, quite a different man from Southey,--you +would like him. + +Pray accept this for a Letter, and believe me with sincere regards + +Yours C.L. + +2 Sept. + + +["Your kind sonnet." Barton's well-known sonnet to Elia (quoted below) +had been printed in the _London Magazine_ long before--in the previous +February. I do not identify this one among his writings. + +"I have a Cottage." This cottage still stands (1912). Within it is much +as in Lamb's day, but outwardly changed, for a new house has been built +on one side and it is thus no longer detached. The New River still runs +before it, but subterraneously. + +Barton was so attracted by one at least of Lamb's similes that, I fancy, +he borrowed it for an account of his grandfather's house at Tottenham +which he wrote some time later; for I find that gentleman's garden +described as "equal to that of old Alcinous." + +"Kind light hearted Wainwright." Lamb has caused much surprise by using +such words of one who was destined to become almost the most +cold-blooded criminal in English history; but, as Hartley Coleridge +wrote in another connection, it was Lamb's way to take things by the +better handle, and Wainewright's worst faults in those days seem to have +been extravagance and affectation. Lamb at any rate liked him and +Wainewright was proud to be on a footing with Elia and his sister, as we +know from his writings. Wainewright at this time was not quite +twenty-nine; he had painted several pictures, some of which were +accepted by the academy, and he had written a number of essays over +several different pseudonyms, chief of which was Janus Weathercock. He +lived in Great Marlborough Street in some style and there entertained +many literary men, among them Lamb. It was not until 1826 that his +criminal career began. + +"Mr. Pulham"--Brook Pulham of the India House, who made the caricature +etching of Elia. + +"While I watch my tulips." Lamb is, of course, embroidering here, but we +have it on the authority of George Daniel, the antiquary, that with his +removal to Colebrooke Cottage began an interest in horticulture, +particularly in roses. + +"Mr. Cary." The Rev. Henry Francis Cary (1772-1844), the translator of +Dante and afterwards, 1826, Assistant-Keeper of the Printed Books in the +British Museum. A regular contributor to the _London Magazine_.] + + + +LETTER 325 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[Dated at end: Sept. 6 (1823).] + +Dear Alsop--I am snugly seated at the cottage; Mary is well but weak, +and comes home on _Monday_; she will soon be strong enough to see her +friends here. In the mean time will you dine with me at 1/2 past four +to-morrow? Ayrton and Mr. Burney are coming. + +Colebrook Cottage, left hand side, end of Colebrook Row on +the western brink of the New River, a detach'd whitish house. +No answer is required but come if you can. C. LAMB. + +Saturday 6th Sep. + +I call'd on you on Sunday. Resp'cts to Mrs. A. & boy. + + + +LETTER 326 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. Sept. 9, 1823.] + +My dear A.--I am going to ask you to do me the greatest favour which a +man can do to another. I want to make my will, and to leave my property +in trust for my sister. _N.B._ I am not _therefore_ going to die.--Would +it be unpleasant for you to be named for one? The other two I shall beg +the same favor of are Talfourd and Proctor. If you feel reluctant, tell +me, and it sha'n't abate one jot of my friendly feeling toward you. + +Yours ever, C. LAMB. + +E.I. House, Aug. [_i.e_., Sept.] 9, 1823. + + + +LETTER 327 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. September 10, 1823.] + +My dear A.--Your kindness in accepting my request no words of mine can +repay. It has made you overflow into some romance which I should have +check'd at another time. I hope it may be in the scheme of Providence +that my sister may go first (if ever so little a precedence), myself +next, and my good Ex'rs survive to remembr us with kindness many years. +God bless you. + +I will set Proctor about the will forthwith. C. LAMB. + + +[Here should come another note to Allsop dated Sept. 16, 1823, saying +that Mary Lamb is still ill at Fulham. Given in the Boston Bibliophile +edition.] + + + +LETTER 328 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[September, 1823.] + +Dear A.--Your Cheese is the best I ever tasted; Mary will tell you so +hereafter. She is at home, but has disappointed me. She has gone back +rather than improved. However, she has sense enough to value the +present, for she is greatly fond of Stilton. Yours is the delicatest +rain-bow-hued melting piece I ever flavoured. Believe me. I took it the +more kindly, following so great a kindness. + +Depend upon't, yours shall be one of the first houses we shall present +ourselves at, when we have got our Bill of Health. + +Being both yours and Mrs. Allsop's truly. C.L. & M.L. + + +[Allsop and Procter may have been named as executors of Lamb's will at +one time, but when it came to be proved the executors were Talfourd and +Ryle, a fellow-clerk in the India House.] + + + +LETTER 329 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. September 17, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--I have again been reading your stanzas on Bloomfield, which +are the most appropriate that can be imagined, sweet with Doric +delicacy. I like that + + Our more chaste Theocritus-- + +just hinting at the fault of the Grecian. I love that stanza ending with + + Words phrases fashions pass away; + But Truth and nature live through all. + +But I shall omit in my own copy the one stanza which alludes to Lord +B.--I suppose. It spoils the sweetness and oneness of the feeling. +Cannot we think of Burns, or Thompson, without sullying the thought with +a reflection out of place upon Lord Rochester? These verses might have +been inscribed upon a tomb; are in fact an epitaph; satire does not look +pretty upon a tombstone. Besides, there is a quotation in it, always bad +in verse; seldom advisable in prose. + +I doubt if their having been in a Paper will not prevent T. and H. from +insertion, but I shall have a thing to send in a day or two, and shall +try them. Omitting that stanza, a _very little_ alteration is want'g in +the beginn'g of the next. You see, I use freedom. How happily (I flatter +not!) you have bro't in his subjects; and, (_I suppose_) his favorite +measure, though I am not acquainted with any of his writings but the +Farmer's Boy. He dined with me once, and his manners took me +exceedingly. + +I rejoyce that you forgive my long silence. I continue to estimate my +own-roof comforts highly. How could I remain all my life a lodger! My +garden thrives (I am told) tho' I have yet reaped nothing but some tiny +sallad, and withered carrots. But a garden's a garden anywhere, and +twice a garden in London. + +Somehow I cannot relish that word Horkey. Cannot you supply it by +circumlocution, and direct the reader by a note to explain that it means +the Horkey. But Horkey choaks me in the Text. It raises crowds of mean +associations, Hawking and sp-----g, Gauky, Stalky, Maukin. The sound is +every thing, in such dulcet modulations 'specially. I like + + Gilbert Meldrum's sterner tones, + +without knowing who Gilbert Meldrum is. You have slipt in your rhymes as +if they grew there, so natural-artificially, or artificial-naturally. +There's a vile phrase. + +Do you go on with your Quaker Sonnets--[to] have 'em ready with +Southey's Book of the Church? I meditate a letter to S. in the London, +which perhaps will meet the fate of the Sonnet. + +Excuse my brevity, for I write painfully at office, liable to 100 +callings off. And I can never sit down to an epistle elsewhere. I read +or walk. If you return this letter to the Post Office, I think they will +return 4d, seeing it is but half a one. Believe me tho' entirely yours +C.L. + + +[Barton's "Verses to the Memory of Bloomfield, the Suffolk Poet" (who +died in August, 1823), were printed in book form in his Poetic Vigils, +1824. This is the stanza that Lamb most liked:-- + + It is not quaint and local terms + Besprinkled o'er thy rustic lay, + Though well such dialect confirms + Its power unletter'd minds to sway, + It is not _these_ that most display + Thy sweetest charms, thy gentlest thrall,-- + Words, phrases, fashions, pass away, + But TRUTH and NATURE live through all. + +The stanza referring to Byron was not reprinted, nor was the word +Horkey, which means Harvest Home in Suffolk. Gilbert Meldrum is a +character in one of Bloomfield's _Rural Tales_. + +"Quaker Sonnets." Barton did not carry out this project. Southey's _Book +of the Church_ was published in 1824. + +"I meditate a letter to S." The "Letter of Elia to Mr. Southey" was +published in the _London Magazine_ for October, 1823.] + + + +LETTER 330 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES LLOYD + +[No date. Autumn, 1823.] + +Your lines are not to be understood reading on one leg. They are +_sinuous_, and to be won with wrestling. I assure you in sincerity that +nothing you have done has given me greater satisfaction. Your obscurity, +where you are dark, which is seldom, is that of too much meaning, not +the painful obscurity which no toil of the reader can dissipate; not the +dead vacuum and floundering place in which imagination finds no footing; +it is not the dimness of positive darkness, but of distance; and he that +reads and not discerns must get a better pair of spectacles. I admire +every piece in the collection; I cannot say the first is best; when I do +so, the last read rises up in judgment. To your Mother--to your +Sister--to Mary dead--they are all weighty with thought and tender with +sentiment. Your poetry is like no other:--those cursed Dryads and Pagan +trumperies of modern verse have put me out of conceit of the very name +of poetry. Your verses are as good and as wholesome as prose; and I have +made a sad blunder if I do not leave you with an impression that your +present is rarely valued. + +CHARLES LAMB. + + +[This scrap is in _Selections from the Poems and Letters of Bernard +Barton_, 1849, edited by Edward FitzGerald and Lucy Barton. Lloyd says: +"I had a very ample testimony from C. Lamb to the character of my last +little volume. I will transcribe to you what he says, as it is but a +note, and his manner is always so original, that I am sure the +introduction of the merest trifle from his pen will well compensate for +the absence of anything of mine." The volume was _Poems_, 1823, one of +the chief of which was "Stanzas on the Difficulty with which, in Youth, +we Bring Home to our Habitual Consciousness, the Idea of Death," to +which Lloyd appended the following sentence from Elia's essay on "New +Year's Eve," as motto: "Not childhood alone, but the young man till +thirty, never feels practically that he is mortal. He knows it indeed, +and, if need were, he could preach a homily on the fragility of life; +but he brings it not home to himself, any more than in a hot June, we +can appropriate to our imagination the freezing days of December."] + + + +LETTER 331 + +CHARLES LAMB TO REV. H.F. CARY + +India Office, 14th Oct., 1823. + +Dear Sir,--If convenient, will you give us house room on Saturday next? +I can sleep anywhere. If another Sunday suit you better, pray let me +know. We were talking of Roast _Shoulder_ of Mutton with onion sauce; +but I scorn to prescribe to the hospitalities of mine host. + +With respects to Mrs. C., yours truly, C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 332 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. ?Oct., 1823.] + +Dear Sir--Mary has got a cold, and the nights are dreadful; but at the +first indication of Spring (_alias_ the first dry weather in Nov'r +early) it is our intention to surprise you early some even'g. + +Believe me, most truly yours, + +C.L. + +The Cottage, Saturday night. + +Mary regrets very much Mrs. Allsop's fruitless visit. It made her swear! +She was gone to visit Miss Hutchins'n, whom she found OUT. + + + +LETTER 333 + +CHARLES LAMB TO J.B. DIBDIN + +[P.M. October 28, 1823.] + +My dear Sir--Your Pig was a _picture_ of a pig, and your Picture a _pig_ +of a picture. The former was delicious but evanescent, like a hearty fit +of mirth, or the crackling of thorns under a pot; but the latter is an +_idea_, and abideth. I never before saw swine upon sattin. And then that +pretty strawy canopy about him! he seems to purr (rather than grunt) his +satisfaction. Such a gentlemanlike porker too! Morland's are absolutely +clowns to it. Who the deuce painted it? + +I have ordered a little gilt shrine for it, and mean to wear it for a +locket; a shirt-pig. + +I admire the petty-toes shrouded in a veil of something, not _mud_, but +that warm soft consistency with [? which] the dust takes in Elysium +after a spring shower--it perfectly engloves them. + +I cannot enough thank you and your country friend for the delicate +double present--the Utile et Decorum--three times have I attempted to +write this sentence and failed; which shows that I am not cut out for a +pedant. + +_Sir_ + +(as I say to Southey) will you come and see us at our poor cottage of +Colebrook to tea tomorrow evening, as early as six? I have some friends +coming at that hour-- + +The panoply which covered your material pig shall be forthcoming-- The +pig pictorial, with its trappings, domesticate with me. + +Your greatly obliged + +ELIA. + +Tuesday. + + +["_Sir_ (as I say to Southey)." Elia's Letter to Southey in the London +Magazine began thus.] + + + +LETTER 334 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +[No date. Early November, 1823.] + +Dear Mrs. H.,--Sitting down to write a letter is such a painful +operation to Mary, that you must accept me as her proxy. You have seen +our house. What I now tell you is literally true. Yesterday week George +Dyer called upon us, at one o'clock (_bright noon day_) on his way to +dine with Mrs. Barbauld at Newington. He sat with Mary about half an +hour, and took leave. The maid saw him go out from her kitchen window; +but suddenly losing sight of him, ran up in a fright to Mary. G.D., +instead of keeping the slip that leads to the gate, had deliberately, +staff in hand, in broad open day, marched into the New River. He had not +his spectacles on, and you know his absence. Who helped him out, they +can hardly tell; but between 'em they got him out, drenched thro' and +thro'. A mob collected by that time and accompanied him in. "Send for +the Doctor!" they said: and a one-eyed fellow, dirty and drunk, was +fetched from the Public House at the end, where it seems he lurks, for +the sake of picking up water practice, having formerly had a medal from +the Humane Society for some rescue. By his advice, the patient was put +between blankets; and when I came home at four to dinner, I found G.D. +a-bed, and raving, light-headed with the brandy-and-water which the +doctor had administered. He sung, laughed, whimpered, screamed, babbled +of guardian angels, would get up and go home; but we kept him there by +force; and by next morning he departed sobered, and seems to have +received no injury. All my friends are open-mouthed about having paling +before the river, but I cannot see that, because a.. lunatic chooses to +walk into a river with his eyes open at midday, I am any the more likely +to be drowned in it, coming home at midnight. + +I had the honour of dining at the Mansion House on Thursday last, by +special card from the Lord Mayor, who never saw my face, nor I his; and +all from being a writer in a magazine! The dinner costly, served on +massy plate, champagne, pines, &c.; forty-seven present, among whom the +Chairman and two other directors of the India Company. There's for you! +and got away pretty sober! Quite saved my credit! + +We continue to like our house prodigiously. Does Mary Hazlitt go on with +her novel, or has she begun another? I would not discourage her, tho' we +continue to think it (so far) in its present state not saleable. + +Our kind remembrances to her and hers and you and yours.-- + + Yours truly, C. LAMB. + +I am pleased that H. liked my letter to the Laureate. + + +[Addressed to "Mrs. Hazlitt, Alphington, near Exeter." This letter is +the first draft of the _Elia_ essay "Amicus Redivivus," which was +printed in the _London Magazine_ in December, 1823. George Dyer, who was +then sixty-eight, had been getting blind steadily for some years. A +visit to Lamb's cottage to-day, bearing in mind that the ribbon of green +between iron railings that extends along Colebrooke Row was at that time +an open stream, will make the nature of G.D.'s misadventure quite +plain. + +"Mary Hazlitt"-the daughter of John Hazlitt, the essayist's brother. + +"I am pleased that H. liked my letter to the Laureate." Hazlitt wrote, +in the essay "On the Pleasures of Hating," "I think I must be friends +with Lamb again, since he has written that magnanimous Letter to +Southey, and told him a piece of his mind!" Coleridge also approved of +it, and Crabb Robinson's praise was excessive. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Mrs. Shelley dated Nov. 12, 1823, +saying that Dyer walked into the New River on Sunday week at one o'clock +with his eyes open.] + + + +LETTER 335 + +CHARLES LAMB TO ROBERT SOUTHEY + +E.I.H., 21st November, 1823. + +DEAR Southey,-The kindness of your note has melted away the mist which +was upon me. I have been fighting against a shadow. That accursed +"Quarterly Review" had vexed me by a gratuitous speaking, of its own +knowledge, that the "Confessions of a Drunkard" was a genuine +description of the state of the writer. Little things, that are not ill +meant, may produce much ill. _That_ might have injured me alive and +dead. I am in a public office, and my life is insured. I was prepared +for anger, and I thought I saw, in a few obnoxious words, a hard case of +repetition directed against me. I wished both magazine and review at the +bottom of the sea. I shall be ashamed to see you, and my sister (though +innocent) will be still more so; for the folly was done without her +knowledge, and has made her uneasy ever since. My guardian angel was +absent at that time. + +I will muster up courage to see you, however, any day next week +(Wednesday excepted). We shall hope that you will bring Edith with you. +That will be a second mortification. She will hate to see us; but come +and heap embers. We deserve it, I for what I've done, and she for being +my sister. + +Do come early in the day, by sun-light, that you may see my _Milton_. + +I am at Colebrook Cottage, Colebrook Row, Islington. A detached whitish +house, close to the New River, end of Colebrook Terrace, left hand from +Sadler's Wells. + +Will you let me know the day before? + +Your penitent C. LAMB. + +P.S.--I do not think your handwriting at all like Hunt's. I do not think +many things I did think. + + +[For the right appreciation of this letter Elia's Letter to Southey must +be read (see Vol. I. of the present edition). It was hard hitting, and +though Lamb would perhaps have been wiser had he held his hand, yet +Southey had taken an offensive line of moral superiority and rebuke, and +much that was said by Lamb was justified. + +Southey's reply ran thus:-- + + My Dear Lamb--On Monday I saw your letter in the _London Magazine_, + which I had not before had an opportunity of seeing, and I now take + the first interval of leisure for replying to it. + + Nothing could be further from my mind than any intention or + apprehension of any way offending or injuring a man concerning whom + I have never spoken, thought, or felt otherwise than with affection, + esteem, and admiration. + + If you had let me know in any private or friendly manner that you + felt wounded by a sentence in which nothing but kindness was + intended--or that you found it might injure the sale of your book--I + would most readily and gladly have inserted a note in the next + Review to qualify and explain what had hurt you. + + You have made this impossible, and I am sorry for it. But I will not + engage in controversy with you to make sport for the Philistines. + + The provocation must be strong indeed that can rouse me to do this, + even with an enemy. And if you can forgive an unintended offence as + heartily as I do the way in which you have resented it, there will + be nothing to prevent our meeting as we have heretofore done, and + feeling towards each other as we have always been wont to do. + + Only signify a correspondent willingness on your part, and send me + your address, and my first business next week shall be to reach your + door, and shake hands with you and your sister. Remember me to her + most kindly and believe me--. Yours, with unabated esteem and + regards, Robert Southey. + +The matter closed with this exchange of letters, and no hostility +remained on either side. + +Lamb's quarrel with the _Quarterly_ began in 1811, when in a review of +Weber's edition of Ford Lamb was described as a "poor maniac." It was +renewed in 1814, when his article on Wordsworth's _Excursion_ was +mutilated. It broke out again in 1822, as Lamb says here, when a +reviewer of Reid's treatise on _Hypochondriasis and other Nervous +Affections_ (supposed to be Dr. Gooch, a friend of Dr. Henry Southey's) +referred to Lamb's "Confessions of a Drunkard" (see Vol. I.) as being, +from his own knowledge, true. Thus Lamb's patience was naturally at +breaking point when his own friend Southey attacked _Elia_ a few numbers +later. + +"I do not think your handwriting at all like Hunt's." Lamb had said, in +the Letter, of Leigh Hunt: "His hand-writing is so much the same with +your own, that I have opened more than one letter of his, hoping, nay, +not doubting, but it was from you, and have been disappointed (he will +bear with my saying so) at the discovery of my error."] + + + +LETTER 336 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. November 22, 1823.] + +Dear B.B.--I am ashamed at not acknowledging your kind little poem, +which I must needs like much, but I protest I thought I had done it at +the moment. Is it possible a letter has miscarried? Did you get one in +which I sent you an extract from the poems of Lord Sterling? I should +wonder if you did, for I sent you none such.--There was an incipient lye +strangled in the birth. Some people's conscience is so tender! But in +plain truth I thank you very much for the verses. I have a very kind +letter from the Laureat, with a self-invitation to come and shake hands +with me. This is truly handsome and noble. 'Tis worthy of my old idea of +Southey. Shall not I, think you, be covered with a red suffusion? + +You are too much apprehensive of your complaint. I know many that are +always ailing of it, and live on to a good old age. I know a merry +fellow (you partly know him) who when his Medical Adviser told him he +had drunk away all _that part_, congratulated himself (now his liver was +gone) that he should be the longest liver of the two. The best way in +these cases is to keep yourself as ignorant as you can--as ignorant as +the world was before Galen--of the entire inner construction of the +Animal Man--not to be conscious of a midriff--to hold kidneys (save of +sheep and swine) to be an agreeable fiction--not to know whereabout the +gall grows--to account the circulation of the blood an idle whimsey of +Harvey's--to acknowledge no mechanism not visible. For, once fix the +seat of your disorder, and your fancies flux into it like bad humours. +Those medical gentries chuse each his favourite part--one takes the +lungs--another the aforesaid liver--and refer to _that_ whatever in the +animal economy is amiss. Above all, use exercise, take a little more +spirituous liquors, learn to smoke, continue to keep a good conscience, +and avoid tampering with hard terms of art--viscosity, schirossity, and +those bugbears, by which simple patients are scared into their grave. +Believe the general sense of the mercantile world, which holds that +desks are not deadly. It is the mind, good B.B., and not the limbs, +that taints by long sitting. Think of the patience of taylors--think how +long the Chancellor sits-- think of the Brooding Hen. + +I protest I cannot answer thy Sister's kind enquiry, but I judge I shall +put forth no second volume. More praise than buy, and T. and H. are not +particularly disposed for Martyrs. + +Thou wilt see a funny passage, and yet a true History, of George Dyer's +Aquatic Incursion, in the next "London." Beware his fate, when thou +comest to see me at my Colebrook Cottage. I have filled my little space +with my little thoughts. I wish thee ease on thy sofa, but not too much +indulgence on it. From my poor desk, thy fellow-sufferer this bright +November, C.L. + + +[Again I do not identify the kind little poem. It may have been a trifle +enclosed in a letter, which Barton did not print and Lamb destroyed.] + + + +LETTER 337 + +CHARLES LAMB TO W. HARRISON AINSWORTH India-House, 9th Dec., 1823. + +(If I had time I would go over this letter again, and dot all my i's.) + +Dear Sir,--I should have thanked you for your Books and Compliments +sooner, but have been waiting for a revise to be sent, which does not +come, tho' I returned the proof on the receit of your letter. I have +read Warner with great pleasure. What an elaborate piece of alliteration +and antithesis! why it must have been a labour far above the most +difficult versification. There is a fine simile of or picture of +Semiramis arming to repel a siege. I do not mean to keep the Book, for I +suspect you are forming a curious collection, and I do not pretend to +any thing of the kind. I have not a Blackletter Book among mine, old +Chaucer excepted, and am not Bibliomanist enough to like Blackletter. It +is painful to read. Therefore I must insist on returning it at +opportunity, not from contumacity and reluctance to be oblig'd, but +because it must suit you better than me. The loss of a present _from_ +should never exceed the gain of a present _to_. I hold this maxim +infallible in the accepting Line. I read your Magazines with +satisfaction. I throughly agree with you as to the German Faust, as far +[as] I can do justice to it from an English translation. 'Tis a +disagreeable canting tale of Seduction, which has nothing to do with the +Spirit of Faustus-- Curiosity. Was the dark secret to be explored to end +in the seducing of a weak girl, which might have been accomplished by +earthly agency? When Marlow gives _his_ Faustus a mistress, he flies him +at Helen, flower of Greece, to be sure, and not at Miss Betsy, or Miss +Sally Thoughtless. + + "Cut is the branch that bore the goodly fruit, + And wither'd is Apollo's laurel tree: + Faustus is dead." + +What a noble natural transition from metaphor to plain speaking! as if +the figurative had flagged in description of such a Loss, and was +reduced to tell the fact simply.-- + +I must now thank you for your very kind invitation. It is not out of +prospect that I may see Manchester some day, and then I will avail +myself of your kindness. But Holydays are scarce things with me, and the +Laws of attendance are getting stronger and stronger at Leadenhall. But +I shall bear it in mind. Meantime something may (more probably) bring +you to town, where I shall be happy to see you. I am always to be found +(alas!) at my desk in the forepart of the day. + +I wonder why they do not send the revise. I leave late at office, and my +abode lies out of the way, or I should have seen about it. If you are +impatient, Perhaps a Line to the Printer, directing him to send it me, +at Accountant's Office, may answer. You will see by the scrawl that I +only snatch a few minutes from intermitting Business. + + Your oblig. Ser., C. LAMB. + + +[William Harrison Ainsworth, afterwards to be known as a novelist, was +then a solicitor's pupil at Manchester, aged 18. He had sent Lamb +William Warner's _Syrinx; or, A Sevenfold History_, 1597. The book was a +gift, and is now in the Dyce and Foster library at South Kensington. + +Goethe's _Faust_. Lamb, as we have seen, had read the account of the +play in Madame de Staël's _Germany_. He might also have read the +translation by Lord Francis Leveson-Gower, 1823. Hayward's translation +was not published till 1834. Goethe admired Lamb's sonnet on his family +name.] + + + +LETTER 338 + +CHARLES LAMB TO W. HARRISON AINSWORTH + +[Dated at end: December 29 (1823).] + +My dear Sir--You talk of months at a time and I know not what +inducements to visit Manchester, Heaven knows how gratifying! but I have +had my little month of 1823 already. It is all over, and without +incurring a disagreeable favor I cannot so much as get a single holyday +till the season returns with the next year. Even our half-hour's +absences from office are set down in a Book! Next year, if I can spare a +day or two of it, I will come to Manchester, but I have reasons at home +against longer absences.-- + +I am so ill just at present--(an illness of my own procuring last night; +who is Perfect?)--that nothing but your very great kindness could make +me write. I will bear in mind the letter to W.W., you shall have it +quite in time, before the 12. + +My aking and confused Head warns me to leave off.--With a muddled sense +of gratefulness, which I shall apprehend more clearly to-morrow, I +remain, your friend unseen, + +C.L. + +I.H. 29th. + +Will your occasions or inclination bring _you_ to London? It will give +me great pleasure to show you every thing that Islington can boast, if +you know the meaning of that very Cockney sound. We have the New River! + +I am asham'd of this scrawl: but I beg you to accept it for the present. +I am full of qualms. + +A fool at 50 is a fool indeed. + + +[W.W. was Wordsworth. + +"A fool at 50 is a fool indeed." "A fool at forty is a fool indeed" was +Young's line in Satire II. of the series on "Love of Fame." Lamb was +nearing forty-nine.] + + + +LETTER 339 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[January 9, 1824.] + +Dear B.B.--Do you know what it is to succumb under an insurmountable day +mare--a whoreson lethargy, Falstaff calls it--an indisposition to do any +thing, or to be any thing--a total deadness and distaste--a suspension +of vitality --an indifference to locality--a numb soporifical +goodfornothingness--an ossification all over--an oyster-like +insensibility to the passing events--a mind-stupor,--a brawny defiance +to the needles of a thrusting-in conscience--did you ever have a very +bad cold, with a total irresolution to submit to water gruel +processes?--this has been for many weeks my lot, and my excuse--my +fingers drag heavily over this paper, and to my thinking it is three and +twenty furlongs from here to the end of this demi-sheet--I have not a +thing to say--nothing is of more importance than another--I am flatter +than a denial or a pancake--emptier than Judge Park's wig when the head +is in it--duller than a country stage when the actors are off it --a +cypher--an O--I acknowledge life at all, only by an occasional +convulsional cough, and a permanent phlegmatic pain in the chest--I am +weary of the world--Life is weary of me-- My day is gone into Twilight +and I don't think it worth the expence of candles--my wick hath a thief +in it, but I can't muster courage to snuff it--I inhale suffocation--I +can't distinguish veal from mutton--nothing interests me--'tis 12 +o'clock and Thurtell is just now coming out upon the New Drop--Jack +Ketch alertly tucking up his greasy sleeves to do the last office of +mortality, yet cannot I elicit a groan or a moral reflection-- if you +told me the world will be at end tomorrow, I should just say, "will +it?"--I have not volition enough to dot my i's --much less to comb my +EYEBROWS--my eyes are set in my head--my brains are gone out to see a +poor relation in Moorfields, and they did not say when they'd come back +again-- my scull is a Grub street Attic, to let--not so much as a joint +stool or a crackd jordan left in it--my hand writes, not I, from habit, +as chickens run about a little when their heads are off-- O for a +vigorous fit of gout, cholic, tooth ache--an earwig in my auditory, a +fly in my visual organs--pain is life--the sharper, the more evidence of +life--but this apathy, this death--did you ever have an obstinate cold, +a six or seven weeks' unintermitting chill and suspension of hope, fear, +conscience, and every thing--yet do I try all I can to cure it, I try +wine, and spirits, and smoking, and snuff in unsparing quantities, but +they all only seem to make me worse, instead of better--I sleep in a +damp room, but it does me no good; I come home late o' nights, but do +not find any visible amendment. + +Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? + +It is just 15 minutes after 12. Thurtell is by this time a good way on +his journey, baiting at Scorpion perhaps, Ketch is bargaining for his +cast coat and waistcoat, the Jew demurs at first at three half crowns, +but on consideration that he, may get somewhat by showing 'em in the +Town, finally closes.-- + +C.L. + + +["Judge Park's wig." Sir James Alan Park, of the Bench of Common Pleas, +who tried Thurtell, the murderer of Mr. William Weare of Lyon's Inn, in +Gill's Hill Lane, Radlett, on October 24, 1823.] + + + +LETTER 340 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. January 23, 1824.] + +My dear Sir--That peevish letter of mine, which was meant to convey an +apology for my incapacity to write, seems to have been taken by you in +too serious a light. It was only my way of telling you I had a severe +cold. The fact is I have been insuperably dull and lethargic for many +weeks, and cannot rise to the vigour of a Letter, much less an Essay. +The London must do without me for a time, a time, and half a time, for I +have lost all interest about it, and whether I shall recover it again I +know not. I will bridle my pen another time, & not teaze and puzzle you +with my aridities. I shall begin to feel a little more alive with the +spring. Winter is to me (mild or harsh) always a great trial of the +spirits. I am ashamed not to have noticed your tribute to Woolman, whom +we love so much. It is done in your good manner. Your friend Taylor +called upon me some time since, and seems a very amiable man. His last +story is painfully fine. His Book I "like." It is only too stuft with +scripture, too Parsonish. The best thing in it is the Boy's own story. +When I say it is too full of Scripture, I mean it is too full of direct +quotations; no book can have too much of SILENT SCRIPTURE in it. But the +natural power of a story is diminished when the uppermost purpose in the +writer seems to be to recommend something else, viz Religion. You know +what Horace says of the DEUS INTERSIT. I am not able to explain myself, +you must do it for me.-- + +My Sister's part in the Leicester School (about two thirds) was purely +her own; as it was (to the same quantity) in the Shakspeare Tales which +bear my name. I wrote only the Witch Aunt, the first going to Church, +and the final Story about a little Indian girl in a Ship. + +Your account of my Black Balling amused me. _I think, as Quakers, they +did right_. There are some things hard to be understood. + +The more I think the more I am vexed at having puzzled you with that +Letter, but I have been so out of Letter writing of late years, that it +is a sore effort to sit down to it, & I felt in your debt, and sat down +waywardly to pay you in bad money. Never mind my dulness, I am used to +long intervals of it. The heavens seem brass to me--then again comes the +refreshing shower. "I have been merry once or twice ere now." + +You said something about Mr. Mitford in a late letter, which I believe I +did not advert to. I shall be happy to show him my Milton (it is all the +show things I have) at any time he will take the trouble of a jaunt to +Islington. I do also hope to see Mr. Taylor there some day. Pray say so +to both. + +Coleridge's book is good part printed, but sticks a little for _more +copy_. It bears an unsaleable Title--Extracts from Bishop Leighton--but +I am confident there will be plenty of good notes in it, more of Bishop +Coleridge than Leighton, I hope; for what is Leighton? + +Do you trouble yourself about Libel cases? The Decision against Hunt for +the "Vision of Judgment" made me sick. What is to become of the old talk +about OUR GOOD OLD KING --his personal virtues saving us from a +revolution &c. &c. Why, none that think it can utter it now. It must +stink. And the Vision is really, as to Him-ward, such a tolerant good +humour'd thing. What a wretched thing a Lord Chief Justice is, always +was, & will be! + +Keep your good spirits up, dear BB--mine will return--They are at +present in abeyance. But I am rather lethargic than miserable. I don't +know but a good horse whip would be more beneficial to me than Physic. +My head, without aching, will teach yours to ache. It is well I am +getting to the conclusion. I will send a better letter when I am a +better man. Let me thank you for your kind concern for me (which I trust +will have reason soon to be dissipated) & assure you that it gives me +pleasure to hear from you.-- + +Yours truly C.L. + + +["The London must do without me." Lamb contributed nothing between +December, 1823 ("Amicus Redivivus"), and September, 1824 ("Blakesmoor in +H----shire"). + +Barton's tribute to Woolman was the poem "A Memorial to John Woolman," +printed in Poetic Vigils. + +Taylor was Charles Benjamin Tayler (1797-1875), the curate of Hadleigh, +in Suffolk, and the author of many religious books. Lamb refers to _May +You Like It_, 1823. + +"What Horace says":-- + + Nec deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus + Inciderit. + +_Ars Poetica_, 191, 192. + +Neither let a god interfere, unless a difficulty worth a god's +unravelling should happen (Smart's translation). + +"My Black Balling." _Elia_ had been rejected by a Book Club in +Woodbridge. + +"Coleridge's book"--the _Aids to Reflection_, 1825. The first intention +had been a selection of "Beauties" from Bishop Leighton (1611-1684), +Archbishop of Glasgow, and author, among other works, of _Rules and +Instructions for a Holy Life_. + +"The Decision against Hunt." John Hunt, the publisher of _The Liberal_, +in which Byron's "Vision of Judgment" had been printed in 1822, had just +been fined £100 for the libel therein contained on George III. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Charles Ollier, thanking him for a +copy of his _Inesilla; or, The Tempter: A Romance, with Other Tales_.] + + + +LETTER 341 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. February 25, 1824.] + +My dear Sir--Your title of Poetic Vigils arrides me much more than A +Volume of Verse, which is no meaning. The motto says nothing, but I +cannot suggest a better. I do not like mottoes but where they are +singularly felicitous; there is foppery in them. They are unplain, +un-Quakerish. They are good only where they flow from the Title and are +a kind of justification of it. There is nothing about watchings or +lucubrations in the one you suggest, no commentary on Vigils. By the +way, a wag would recommend you to the Line of Pope + + Sleepless himself--to give his readers sleep-- + +I by no means wish it. But it may explain what I mean, that a neat motto +is child of the Title. I think Poetic Virgils as short and sweet as can +be desired; only have an eye on the Proof, that the Printer do not +substitute Virgils, which would ill accord with your modesty or meaning. +Your suggested motto is antique enough in spelling, and modern enough in +phrases; a good modern antique: but the matter of it is germane to the +purpose only supposing the title proposed a vindication of yourself from +the presumption of authorship. The 1st title was liable to this +objection, that if you were disposed to enlarge it, and the bookseller +insisted on its appearance in Two Tomes, how oddly it would sound-- + + A Volume of Verse + in Two Volumes + 2d edition &c-- + +You see thro' my wicked intention of curtailing this Epistolet by the +above device of large margin. But in truth the idea of letterising has +been oppressive to me of late above your candour to give me credit for. +There is Southey, whom I ought to have thank'd a fortnight ago for a +present of the Church Book. I have never had courage to buckle myself in +earnest even to acknowledge it by six words. And yet I am accounted by +some people a good man. How cheap that character is acquired! Pay your +debts, don't borrow money, nor twist your kittens neck off, or disturb a +congregation, &c.-- your business is done. I know things (thoughts or +things, thoughts are things) of myself which would make every friend I +have fly me as a plague patient. I once * * *, and set a dog upon a +crab's leg that was shoved out under a moss of sea weeds, a pretty +little feeler.--Oh! pah! how sick I am of that; and a lie, a mean one, I +once told!-- I stink in the midst of respect. + +I am much hypt; the fact is, my head is heavy, but there is hope, or if +not, I am better than a poor shell fish--not morally when I set the +whelp upon it, but have more blood and spirits; things may turn up, and +I may creep again into a decent opinion of myself. Vanity will return +with sunshine. Till when, pardon my neglects and impute it to the wintry +solstice. + +C. LAMB. + + +[The motto eventually adopted for Barton's _Poetic Vigils_ was from +Vaughan's _Silex Scintillans:_-- + + Dear night! this world's defeat; + The stop to busie fools; care's check and curb; + The day of spirits; my soul's calm retreat + Which none disturb!] + + + +LETTER 342 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 24 March, 1824.] + +DEAR B.B.--I hasten to say that if my opinion can strengthen you in your +choice, it is decisive for your acceptance of what has been so +handsomely offered. I can see nothing injurious to your most honourable +sense. Think that you are called to a poetical Ministry--nothing +worse--the Minister is worthy of the hire. + +The only objection I feel is founded on a fear that the acceptance may +be a temptation to you to let fall the bone (hard as it is) which is in +your mouth and must afford tolerable pickings, for the shadow of +independence. You cannot propose to become independent on what the low +state of interest could afford you from such a principal as you mention; +and the most graceful excuse for the acceptance, would be, that it left +you free to your voluntary functions. That is the less _light_ part of +the scruple. It has no darker shade. I put in _darker_, because of the +ambiguity of the word light, which Donne in his admirable poem on the +Metempsychosis, has so ingeniously illustrated in his invocation + + 1 2 1 2 +Make my _dark heavy_ poem, _light_ and _light_-- + +where the two senses of _light_ are opposed to different opposites. A +trifling criticism.--I can see no reason for any scruple then but what +arises from your own interest; which is in your own power of course to +solve. If you still have doubts, read over Sanderson's Cases of +Conscience, and Jeremy Taylor's Ductor Dubitantium, the first a moderate +Octavo, the latter a folio of 900 close pages, and when you have +thoroughly digested the admirable reasons pro and con which they give +for every possible Case, you will be--just as wise as when you began. +Every man is his own best Casuist; and after all, as Ephraim Smooth, in +the pleasant comedy of Wild Oats, has it, "there is no harm in a +Guinea." A fortiori there is less in 2000. + +I therefore most sincerely congratulate with you, excepting so far as +excepted above. If you have fair Prospects of adding to the Principal, +cut the Bank; but in either case do not refuse an honest Service. Your +heart tells you it is not offered to bribe you _from_ any duty, but +_to_ +a duty which you feel to be your vocation. Farewell heartily C.L. + + +[In the memoir of Barton by Edward FitzGerald, prefixed to the _Poems +and Letters_, it is stated that in this year Barton received a handsome +addition to his income. "A few members of his Society, including some of +the wealthier of his own family, raised £1200 among them for his benefit +[not 2000 guineas, as Lamb says]. It seems that he felt some delicacy at +first in accepting this munificent testimony which his own people +offered to his talents." Birton had written to Lamb on the subject.] + + + +LETTER 343 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[(Early spring), 1824.] + +I am sure I cannot fill a letter, though I should disfurnish my scull to +fill it. But you expect something, and shall have a Note-let. Is Sunday, +not divinely speaking, but humanly and holydaysically, a blessing? +Without its institution, would our rugged taskmasters have given us a +leisure day, so often, think you, as once in a month?--or, if it had not +been instituted, might they not have given us every 6th day? Solve me +this problem. If we are to go 3 times a day to church, why has Sunday +slipped into the notion of a _Holli_day? A Holyday I grant it. The +puritans, I have read in Southey's Book, knew the distinction. They made +people observe Sunday rigorously, would not let a nursery maid walk out +in the fields with children for recreation on that day. But _then_--they +gave the people a holliday from all sorts of work every second Tuesday. +This was giving to the Two Caesars that which was _his_ respective. +Wise, beautiful, thoughtful, generous Legislators! Would Wilberforce +give us our Tuesdays? No, d--n him. He would turn the six days into +sevenths, + + And those 3 smiling seasons of the year + Into a Russian winter. + _Old Play_. + +I am sitting opposite a person who is making strange distortions with +the gout, which is not unpleasant--to me at least. What is the reason we +do not sympathise with pain, short of some terrible Surgical operation? +Hazlitt, who boldly says all he feels, avows that not only he does not +pity sick people, but he hates them. I obscurely recognise his meaning. +Pain is probably too selfish a consideration, too simply a consideration +of self-attention. We pity poverty, loss of friends etc. more complex +things, in which the Sufferers feelings are associated with others. This +is a rough thought suggested by the presence of gout; I want head to +extricate it and plane it. What is all this to your Letter? I felt it to +be a good one, but my turn, when I write at all, is perversely to travel +out of the record, so that my letters are any thing but answers. So you +still want a motto? You must not take my ironical one, because your +book, I take it, is too serious for it. Bickerstaff might have used it +for _his_ lucubrations. What do you think of (for a Title) + +RELIGIO TREMULI OR TREMEBUNDI + +There is Religio-Medici and Laici.--But perhaps the volume is not quite +Quakerish enough or exclusively for it--but your own VIGILS is perhaps +the Best. While I have space, let me congratulate with you the return of +Spring--what a Summery Spring too! all those qualms about the dog and +cray-fish melt before it. I am going to be happy and _vain_ again. + + A hasty farewell C. LAMB. + + +["Southey's Book"--_The Book of the Church_. + +"Would Wilberforce give us our Tuesdays?"--William Wilberforce, the +abolitionist and the principal "Puritan" of that day.] + + + +LETTER 344 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. April 13, 1824.] + +Dear Mrs. A.--Mary begs me to say how much she regrets we can not join +you to Reigate. Our reasons are --1st I have but one holyday namely Good +Friday, and it is not pleasant to solicit for another, but that might +have been got over. 2dly Manning is with us, soon to go away and we +should not be easy in leaving him. 3dly Our school girl Emma comes to us +for a few days on Thursday. 4thly and lastly, Wordsworth is returning +home in about a week, and out of respect to them we should not like to +absent ourselves just now. In summer I shall have a month, and if it +shall suit, should like to go for a few days of it out with you both +_any where_. In the mean time, with many acknowledgments etc. etc., I +remain yours (both) truly, C. LAMB. + +India Ho. 13 Apr. Remember Sundays. + + + +LETTER 345 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE [No date. April, 1824.] + +Dear Sir,--Miss Hazlitt (niece to Pygmalion) begs us to send to you _for +Mr. Hardy_ a parcel. I have not thank'd you for your Pamphlet, but I +assure you I approve of it in all parts, only that I would have seen my +Calumniators at hell, before I would have told them I was a Xtian, _tho' +I am one_, I think as much as you. I hope to see you here, some day +soon. The parcel is a novel which I hope Mr. H. may sell for her. I am +with greatest friendliness + + Yours C. LAMB. + +Sunday. + + +["Pygmalion." A reference to Hazlitt's _Liber Amoris; or, The New +Pygmalion_, 1823. + +Hone's pamphlet would be his _Aspersions Answered: an Explanatory +Statement to the Public at Large and Every Reader of the "Quarterly +Review_," 1824. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Thomas Hardy, dated April 24, 1824, +in which Lamb says that Miss Hazlitt's novel, which Mr. Hardy promised +to introduce to Mr. Ridgway, the publisher, is lying at Mr. Hone's. +Hardy was a bootmaker in Fleet Street.] + + + +LETTER 346 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +May 15, 1824. + +DEAR B.B.--I am oppressed with business all day, and Company all night. +But I will snatch a quarter of an hour. Your recent acquisitions of the +Picture and the Letter are greatly to be congratulated. I too have a +picture of my father and the copy of his first love verses; but they +have been mine long. Blake is a real name, I assure you, and a most +extraordinary man, if he be still living. He is the Robert [William] +Blake, whose wild designs accompany a splendid folio edition of the +"Night Thoughts," which you may have seen, in one of which he pictures +the parting of soul and body by a solid mass of human form floating off, +God knows how, from a lumpish mass (fac Simile to itself) left behind on +the dying bed. He paints in water colours marvellous strange pictures, +visions of his brain, which he asserts that he has seen. They have great +merit. He has _seen_ the old Welsh bards on Snowdon--he has seen the +Beautifullest, the strongest, and the Ugliest Man, left alone from the +Massacre of the Britons by the Romans, and has painted them from memory +(I have seen his paintings), and asserts them to be as good as the +figures of Raphael and Angelo, but not better, as they had precisely the +same retro-visions and prophetic visions with themself [himself]. The +painters in oil (which he will have it that neither of them practised) +he affirms to have been the ruin of art, and affirms that all the while +he was engaged in his Water paintings, Titian was disturbing him, Titian +the III Genius of Oil Painting. His Pictures--one in particular, the +Canterbury Pilgrims (far above Stothard's)--have great merit, but hard, +dry, yet with grace. He has written a Catalogue of them with a most +spirited criticism on Chaucer, but mystical and full of Vision. His +poems have been sold hitherto only in Manuscript. I never read them; but +a friend at my desire procured the "Sweep Song." There is one to a +tiger, which I have heard recited, beginning-- + + "Tiger, Tiger, burning bright, + Thro' the desarts of the night," + +which is glorious, but, alas! I have not the book; for the man is flown, +whither I know not--to Hades or a Mad House. But I must look on him as +one of the most extraordinary persons of the age. Montgomery's book I +have not much hope from. The Society, with the affected name, has been +labouring at it for these 20 years, and made few converts. I think it +was injudicious to mix stories avowedly colour'd by fiction with the sad +true statements from the parliamentary records, etc., but I wish the +little Negroes all the good that can come from it. I batter'd my brains +(not butter'd them--but it is a bad _a_) for a few verses for them, but +I could make nothing of it. You have been luckier. But Blake's are the +flower of the set, you will, I am sure, agree, tho' some of Montgomery's +at the end are pretty; but the Dream awkwardly paraphras'd from B. + +With the exception of an Epilogue for a Private Theatrical, I have +written nothing now for near 6 months. It is in vain to spur me on. I +must wait. I cannot write without a genial impulse, and I have none. +'Tis barren all and dearth. No matter; life is something without +scribbling. I have got rid of my bad spirits, and hold up pretty well +this rain-damn'd May. + +So we have lost another Poet. I never much relished his Lordship's mind, +and shall be sorry if the Greeks have cause to miss him. He was to me +offensive, and I never can make out his great _power_, which his +admirers talk of. Why, a line of Wordsworth's is a lever to lift the +immortal spirit! Byron can only move the Spleen. He was at best a +Satyrist,--in any other way he was mean enough. I dare say I do him +injustice; but I cannot love him, nor squeeze a tear to his memory. He +did not like the world, and he has left it, as Alderman Curtis advised +the Radicals, "If they don't like their country, damn 'em, let 'em leave +it," they possessing no rood of ground in England, and he 10,000 acres. +Byron was better than many Curtises. + +Farewell, and accept this apology for a letter from one who owes you so +much in that kind. + + Yours ever truly, C.L. + + +[Lamb's portrait of his father is reproduced in Vol. II. of my large +edition. The first love verses are no more. + +William Blake was at this time sixty-six years of age. He was living in +poverty and neglect at 3 Fountain Court, Strand. Blake made 537 +illustrations to Young's _Night Thoughts_, of which only forty-seven +were published. Lamb is, however, thinking of his edition of Blair's +_Grave_. The exhibition of his works was held in 1809, and it was for +this that Blake wrote the descriptive catalogue. Lamb had sent Blake's +"Sweep Song," which, like "Tiger, Tiger," is in the _Songs of +Innocence_, to James Montgomery for his _Chimney-Sweepers' Friend and +Climbing Boys' Album_, 1824, a little book designed to ameliorate the +lot of those children, in whose interest a society existed. Barton also +contributed something. It was Blake's poem which had excited Barton's +curiosity. Probably he thought that Lamb wrote it. Lamb's mistake +concerning Blake's name is curious in so far as that it was Blake's +brother Robert, who died in 1787, who in a vision revealed to the poet +the method by which the _Songs of Innocence_ were to be reproduced. + +"The Dream awkwardly paraphras'd from B." The book ended with three +"Climbing-Boys' Soliloquies" by Montgomery. The second was a dream in +which the dream in Blake's song was extended and prosified. + +"An Epilogue for a Private Theatrical." Probably the epilogue for the +amateur performance of "Richard II.," given by the family of Henry +Field, Barren Field's father (see Vol. IV. of the present edition). + +"Another great Poet." Byron died on April 19, 1824. + +"Alderman Curtis." See note above.] + + + +LETTER 347 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +July 7th, 1824. + +DEAR B.B.--I have been suffering under a severe inflammation of the +eyes, notwithstanding which I resolutely went through your very pretty +volume at once, which I dare pronounce in no ways inferior to former +lucubrations. "_Abroad_" and "_lord_" are vile rhymes notwithstanding, +and if you count you will wonder how many times you have repeated the +word _unearthly_--thrice in one poem. It is become a slang word with the +bards; avoid it in future lustily. "Time" is fine; but there are better +a good deal, I think. The volume does not lie by me; and, after a long +day's smarting fatigue, which has almost put out my eyes (not blind +however to your merits), I dare not trust myself with long writing. The +verses to Bloomfield are the sweetest in the collection. Religion is +sometimes lugged in, as if it did not come naturally. I will go over +carefully when I get my seeing, and exemplify. You have also too much of +singing metre, such as requires no deep ear to make; lilting measure, in +which you have done Woolman injustice. Strike at less superficial +melodies. The piece on Nayler is more to my fancy. + +My eye runs waters. But I will give you a fuller account some day. The +book is a very pretty one in more than one sense. The decorative harp, +perhaps, too ostentatious; a simple pipe preferable. + +Farewell, and many thanks. C. LAMB. + + +[Barton's new book was _Poetic Vigils_, 1824. It contained among other +poems "An Ode to Time," "Verses to the Memory of Bloomfield," "A +Memorial of John Woolman," beginning-- + + There is glory to me in thy Name, + Meek follower of Bethlehem's Child, + More touching by far than the splendour of Fame + With which the vain world is beguil'd, + +and "A Memorial of James Nayler." The following "Sonnet to Elia," from +the _London Magazine_, is also in the volume: it is odd that Lamb did +not mention it:-- + + +SONNET TO ELIA + + Delightful Author! unto whom I owe + Moments and moods of fancy and of feeling, + Afresh to grateful memory now appealing, + Fain would I "bless thee--ere I let thee go!" + From month to month has the exhaustless flow + Of thy original mind, its wealth revealing, + With quaintest humour, and deep pathos healing + The World's rude wounds, revived Life's early glow: + And, mixt with this, at times, to earnest thought, + Glimpses of truth, most simple and sublime, + By thy imagination have been brought + Over my spirit. From the olden time + Of authorship thy patent should be dated, + And thou with Marvell, Brown, and Burton mated.] + + + +LETTER 348 + +CHARLES LAMB TO W. MARTER [Dated at end: July 19 (1824).] + +Dear Marter,--I have just rec'd your letter, having returned from a +month's holydays. My exertions for the London are, tho' not dead, in a +dead sleep for the present. If your club like scandal, Blackwood's is +your magazine; if you prefer light articles, and humorous without +offence, the New Monthly is very amusing. The best of it is by Horace +Smith, the author of the Rejected Addresses. The Old Monthly has more of +matter, information, but not so merry. I cannot safely recommend any +others, as not knowing them, or knowing them to their disadvantage. Of +Reviews, beside what you mention, I know of none except the Review on +Hounslow Heath, which I take it is too expensive for your ordering. Pity +me, that have been a Gentleman these four weeks, and am reduced in one +day to the state of a ready writer. I feel, I feel, my gentlemanly +qualities fast oozing away--such as a sense of honour, neckcloths twice +a day, abstinence from swearing, &c. The desk enters into my soul. + +See my thoughts on business next Page. + + SONNET + + Who first invented _work?_--and bound the free + And holyday-rejoicing Spirit down + To the ever-haunting importunity + Of _Business_ in the green fields, and the Town-- + To plough, loom, [anvil], spade, and (oh most sad!) + To this dry drudgery of the desk's dead wood? + Who but the Being unblest, alien from good, + Sabbathless Satan! He, who his unglad + Task ever plies 'mid rotatory burnings, + That round and round incalculably reel-- + For wrath divine hath made him like a wheel-- + In that red realm from whence are no returnings; + Where toiling & turmoiling ever & aye + He and his Thoughts keep pensive worky-day. + +With many recollections of pleasanter times, my old compeer, +happily released before me, Adieu. C. LAMB. + +E.I.H. + +19 July [1824]. + + +[Marter was an old India House clerk; we do not meet with him again. The +sonnet had been printed in _The Examiner_ in 1819. Lamb, who was fond of +it, reprinted it in _Album Verses_, 1830.] + + + +LETTER 349 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. July 28, 1824.] + +My dear Sir--I must appear negligent in not having thanked you for the +very pleasant books you sent me. Arthur, and the Novel, we have both of +us read with unmixed satisfaction. They are full of quaint conceits, and +running over with good humour and good nature. I naturally take little +interest in story, but in these the manner and not the end is the +interest; it is such pleasant travelling, one scarce cares whither it +leads us. Pray express our pleasure to your father with my best thanks. + +I am involved in a routine of visiting among the family of Barren Field, +just ret'd, from Botany Bay--I shall hardly have an open Evening before +TUESDAY next. Will you come to us then? + + Yours truly, C. LAMB. + + +Wensday + +28 July 24. + + +[_Arthur_ and the Novel were two books by Charles Dibdin the Younger, +the father of Lamb's correspondent. Arthur was _Young Arthur; or, The +Child of Mystery: A Metrical Romance_, 1819, and the novel was _Isn't It +Odd?_ three volumes of high-spirited ramblings something in the manner +of _Tristram Shandy_, nominally written by Marmaduke Merrywhistle, and +published in 1822. + +Barron Field had returned from his Judgeship in New South Wales on June +18.] + + + +LETTER 350 + +(_Possibly incomplete_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD [P.M. August 10, 1824.] + +And what dost thou at the Priory? _Cucullus non facit Monachum_. English +me that, and challenge old Lignum Janua to make a better. + +My old New River has presented no extraordinary novelties lately; but +there Hope sits every day, speculating upon traditionary gudgeons. I +think she has taken the fisheries. I now know the reason why our +forefathers were denominated East and West Angles. Yet is there no lack +of spawn; for I wash my hands in fishets that come through the pump +every morning thick as motelings,--little things o o o like _that_, that +perish untimely, and never taste the brook. You do not tell me of those +romantic land bays that be as thou goest to Lover's Seat: neither of +that little churchling in the midst of a wood (in the opposite +direction, nine furlongs from the town), that seems dropped by the Angel +that was tired of carrying two packages; marry, with the other he made +shift to pick his flight to Loretto. Inquire out, and see my little +Protestant Loretto. It stands apart from trace of human habitation; yet +hath it pulpit, reading-desk, and trim front of massiest marble, as if +Robinson Crusoe had reared it to soothe himself with old church-going +images. I forget its Christian name, and what she-saint was its gossip. + +You should also go to No. 13, Standgate Street,--a baker, who has the +finest collection of marine monsters in ten sea counties,--sea dragons, +polypi, mer-people, most fantastic. You have only to name the old +gentleman in black (not the Devil) that lodged with him a week (he'll +remember) last July, and he will show courtesy. He is by far the +foremost of the savans. His wife is the funniest thwarting little +animal! They are decidedly the Lions of green Hastings. Well, I have +made an end of my say. My epistolary time is gone by when I could have +scribbled as long (I will not say as agreeable) as thine was to both of +us. I am dwindled to notes and letterets. But, in good earnest, I shall +be most happy to hail thy return to the waters of Old Sir Hugh. There is +nothing like inland murmurs, fresh ripples, and our native minnows. + + "He sang in meads how sweet the brooklets ran, + To the rough ocean and red restless sands." + +I design to give up smoking; but I have not yet fixed upon the +equivalent vice. I must have _quid pro quo;_ or _quo pro quid_, as Tom +Woodgate would correct me. My service to him. C.L. + + +[This is the first letter to Hood, then a young man of twenty-five, and +assistant editor of the _London Magazine_. He was now staying at +Hastings, on his honeymoon, presumably, and, like the Lambs, near the +Priory. + +"_Cucullus non facit Monachum_"--A "Lamb-pun." The Hood does not make +the monk. + +"Old Lignum Janua"--the Tom Woodgate mentioned at the end of the letter, +a boatman at Hastings. Hood wrote some verses to him. + +"My old New River." This passage was placed by Hood as the motto of his +verses "Walton Redivivus," in _Whims and Oddities_, 1826. + +"Little churchling." This is Lamb's second description of Hollingdon +Rural. The third and best is in a later letter. + +"There is nothing like inland murmurs." Lamb is here remembering +Wordsworth's Tintern Abbey lines:-- + + With a sweet inland murmur. + +In the _Elia_ essay "The Old Margate Hoy" Lamb, in speaking of Hastings, +had made the same objection. + +In a letter to his sister, written from Hastings at this time, Hood +says:-- + + This is the last of our excursions. We have tried, but in vain, to + find out the baker and his wife recommended to us by Lamb as the + very lions of green Hastings. There is no such street as he has + named throughout the town, and the ovens are singularly numerous. We + have given up the search, therefore, but we have discovered the + little church in the wood, and it is such a church! It ought to have + been our St. Botolph's. ... Such a verdant covert wood Stothard + might paint for the haunting of Dioneus, Pamphillus, and Fiammetta + as they walk in the novel of Boccacce. The ground shadowed with + bluebells, even to the formation of a plumb-like bloom upon its + little knolls and ridges; and ever through the dell windeth a little + path chequered with the shades of aspens and ashes and the most + verdant and lively of all the family of trees. Here a broad, rude + stone steppeth over a lazy spring, oozing its way into grass and + weeds; anon a fresh pathway divergeth, you know not whither. + Meanwhile the wild blackbird startles across the way and singeth + anew in some other shade. To have seen Fiammetta there, stepping in + silk attire, like a flower, and the sunlight looking upon her + betwixt the branches! I had not walked (in the body) with Romance + before. Then suppose so much of a space cleared as maketh a small + church _lawn_ to be sprinkled with old gravestones, and in the midst + the church itself, a small Christian dovecot, such as Lamb has truly + described it, like a little temple of Juan Fernandes. I could have + been sentimental and wished to lie some day in that place, its calm + tenants seeming to come through such quiet ways, through those + verdant alleys, to their graves. + + In coming home I killed a viper in our serpentine path, and Mrs. + Fernor says I am by that token to overcome an enemy. Is Taylor or + Hessey dead? The reptile was dark and dull, his blood being yet + sluggish from the cold; howbeit, he tried to bite, till I cut him in + two with a stone. I thought of Hessey's long back-bone when I did + it. + + They are called _adders_, tell your father, because two and two of + them together make four.] + + + +LETTER 351 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. August 17, 1824.] + +Dear B.B.--I congratulate you on getting a house over your head. I find +the comfort of it I am sure. At my town lodgings the Mistress was always +quarrelling with our maid; and at my place of rustication, the whole +family were always beating one another, brothers beating sisters (one a +most beautiful girl lamed for life), father beating sons and daughters, +and son again beating his father, knocking him fairly down, a scene I +never before witnessed, but was called out of bed by the unnatural +blows, the parricidal colour of which, tho' my morals could not but +condemn, yet my reason did heartily approve, and in the issue the house +was quieter for a day or so than I had ever known. I am now all harmony +and quiet, even to the sometimes wishing back again some of the old +rufflings. There is something stirring in these civil broils. + +The Album shall be attended to. If I can light upon a few appropriate +rhymes (but rhymes come with difficulty from me now) I shall beg a place +in the neat margin of your young housekeeper. + +The Prometheus Unbound, is a capital story. The Literal rogue! What if +you had ordered Elfrida in _sheets!_ She'd have been sent up, I warrant +you. Or bid him clasp his bible (_i.e._ to his bosom)-he'd ha clapt on a +brass clasp, no doubt.-- + +I can no more understand Shelly than you can. His poetry is "thin sewn +with profit or delight." Yet I must point to your notice a sonnet +conceivd and expressed with a witty delicacy. It is that addressed to +one who hated him, but who could not persuade him to hate _him_ again. +His coyness to the other's passion (for hate demands a return as much as +Love, and starves without it) is most arch and pleasant. Pray, like it +very much. + +For his theories and nostrums they are oracular enough, but I either +comprehend 'em not, or there is miching malice and mischief in 'em. But +for the most part ringing with their own emptiness. Hazlitt said well of +'em--Many are wiser and better for reading Shakspeare, but nobody was +ever wiser or better for reading Sh----y. + +I wonder you will sow your correspondence on so barren a ground as I am, +that make such poor returns. But my head akes at the bare thought of +letter writing. I wish all the ink in the ocean dried up, and would +listen to the quills shivering [? shrivelling] up in the candle flame, +like parching martyrs. The same indisposit'n to write it is has stopt my +Elias, but you will see a futile Effort in the next No., "wrung from me +with slow pain." + +The fact is, my head is seldom cool enough. I am dreadfully indolent. To +have to do anything-to order me a new coat, for instance, tho' my old +buttons are shelled like beans-- is an effort. + +My pen stammers like my tongue. What cool craniums +those old enditers of Folios must have had. What a mortify'd +pulse. Well, once more I throw myself on your mercy-- +Wishing peace in thy new dwelling-- C. LAMB. + + +[The Lambs gave up their "country lodgings" at Dalston on moving to +Colebrooke Row. + +"The album." See next letter to Barton. + +"The Prometheus Unbound." A bookseller, asked for _Prometheus Unbound_, +Shelley's poem, had replied that _Prometheus_ was not to be had "in +sheets." _Elfrida_ was a dramatic poem by William Mason, Gray's friend. + +This is Shelley's poem (not a sonnet) which Lamb liked:-- + + LINES TO A REVIEWER + + Alas! good friend, what profit can you see + In hating such an hateless thing as me? + There is no sport in hate, where all the rage + Is on one side. In vain would you assuage + Your frowns upon an unresisting smile, + In which not even contempt lurks, to beguile + Your heart by some faint sympathy of hate. + Oh conquer what you cannot satiate! + For to your passion I am far more coy + Then ever yet was coldest maid or boy + In winter-noon. Of your antipathy + If I am the Narcissus, you are free + To pine into a sound with hating me. + +Hazlitt writes of Shelley in his essay "On Paradox and Commonplace" in +_Table Talk_; but he does not make this remark there. Perhaps he said it +in conversation. + +"The next Number." The "futile Effort" was "Blakesmoor in H----shire" in +the _London Magazine_ for September, 1824. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Cary, August 19, 1824, in which +Lamb thanks him for his translation of _The Birds_ of Aristophanes and +accepts an invitation to dine.] + + + +LETTER 352 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: September 30, 1824.] + + Little Book! surnam'd of White; + Clean, as yet, and fair to sight; + Keep thy attribution right, + + Never disproportion'd scrawl; + Ugly blot, that's worse than all; + On thy maiden clearness fall. + + In each Letter, here design'd, + Let the Reader emblem'd find + Neatness of the Owner's mind. + + Gilded margins count a sin; + Let thy leaves attraction win + By thy Golden Rules within: + + Sayings, fetch'd from Sages old; + Saws, which Holy Writ unfold, + Worthy to be writ in Gold: + + Lighter Fancies not excluding; + Blameless wit, with nothing rude in, + Sometimes mildly interluding + + Amid strains of graver measure:-- + Virtue's self hath oft her pleasure + In sweet Muses' groves of leisure. + + Riddles dark, perplexing sense; + Darker meanings of offence; + What but _shades_, be banish'd hence. + + Whitest Thoughts, in whitest dress-- + Candid Meanings--best express + Mind of quiet Quakeress. + +Dear B.B.--"I am ill at these numbers;" but if the above be not too +mean to have a place in thy Daughter's Sanctum, take them with pleasure. +I assume that her Name is Hannah, because it is a pretty scriptural +cognomen. I began on another sheet of paper, and just as I had penn'd +the second line of Stanza 2 an ugly Blot [_here is a blot_] as big as +this, fell, to illustrate my counsel.--I am sadly given to blot, and +modern blotting-paper gives no redress; it only smears and makes it +worse, as for example [_here is a smear_]. The only remedy is scratching +out, which gives it a Clerkish look. The most innocent blots are made +with red ink, and are rather ornamental. [_Here are two or three blots +in red ink._] Marry, they are not always to be distinguished from the +effusions of a cut finger. + +Well, I hope and trust thy Tick doleru, or however you spell it, is +vanished, for I have frightful impressions of that Tick, and do +altogether hate it, as an unpaid score, or the Tick of a Death Watch. I +take it to be a species of Vitus's dance (I omit the Sanctity, writing +to "one of the men called Friends"). I knew a young Lady who could dance +no other, she danced thro' life, and very queer and fantastic were her +steps. Heaven bless thee from such measures, and keep thee from the Foul +Fiend, who delights to lead after False Fires in the night, +Flibbertigibit, that gives the web and the pin &c. I forget what else.-- + +From my den, as Bunyan has it, 30 Sep. 24. C.L. + + +[The verses were for the album of Barton's daughter, Lucy (afterwards +Mrs. Edward FitzGerald). Lucy was her only name. Lamb afterwards printed +them in his _Album Verses_, 1830.] + + + +LETTER 353 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. JOHN DYER COLLIER + +[Dated at end: November 2, 1824.] + +Dear Mrs. Collier--We receive so much pig from your kindness, that I +really have not phrase enough to vary successive acknowledg'mts. + +I think I shall get a printed form: to serve on all occasions. + +To say it was young, crisp, short, luscious, dainty-toed, is but to say +what all its predecessors have been. It was eaten on Sunday and Monday, +and doubts only exist as to which temperature it eat best, hot or cold. +I incline to the latter. The Petty-feet made a pretty surprising +proe-gustation for supper on Saturday night, just as I was loathingly in +expectation of bren-cheese. I spell as I speak. + +I do not know what news to send you. You will have heard of Alsager's +death, and your Son John's success in the Lottery. I say he is a wise +man, if he leaves off while he is well. The weather is wet to weariness, +but Mary goes puddling about a-shopping after a gown for the winter. She +wants it good & cheap. Now I hold that no good things are cheap, +pig-presents always excepted. In this mournful weather I sit moping, +where I now write, in an office dark as Erebus, jammed in between 4 +walls, and writing by Candle-light, most melancholy. Never see the light +of the Sun six hours in the day, and am surprised to find how pretty it +shines on Sundays. I wish I were a Caravan driver or a Penny post man, +to earn my bread in air & sunshine. Such a pedestrian as I am, to be +tied by the legs, like a Fauntleroy, without the pleasure of his +Exactions. I am interrupted here with an official question, which will +take me up till it's time to go to dinner, so with repeated thanks & +both our kindest rememb'ces to Mr. Collier & yourself, I conclude in +haste. + + Yours & his sincerely, C. LAMB. + +from my den in Leadenhall, + +2 Nov. 24. + +On further enquiry Alsager is not dead, but Mrs. A. is bro't. to bed. + + +[Mrs. Collier was the mother of John Payne Collier. Alsager we have +already met. Henry Fauntleroy was the banker, who had just been found +guilty of forgery and on the day that Lamb wrote was sentenced to death. +He was executed on the 30th (see a later letter).] + + + +LETTER 354 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[Dated at end: November 11, '24.] + +My dear Procter,-- + +I do agnise a shame in not having been to pay my congratulations to Mrs. +Procter and your happy self, but on Sunday (my only morning) I was +engaged to a country walk; and in virtue of the hypostatical union +between us, when Mary calls, it is understood that I call too, we being +univocal. + +But indeed I am ill at these ceremonious inductions. I fancy I was not +born with a call on my head, though I have brought one down upon it with +a vengeance. I love not to pluck that sort of fruit crude, but to stay +its ripening into visits. In probability Mary will be at Southampton Row +this morning, and something of that kind be matured between you, but in +any case not many hours shall elapse before I shake you by the hand. + +Meantime give my kindest felicitations to Mrs. Procter, and assure her I +look forward with the greatest delight to our acquaintance. By the way, +the deuce a bit of Cake has come to hand, which hath an inauspicious +look at first, but I comfort myself that that Mysterious Service hath +the property of Sacramental Bread, which mice cannot nibble, nor time +moulder. + +I am married myself--to a severe step-wife, who keeps me, not at bed and +board, but at desk and board, and is jealous of my morning aberrations. +I can not slip out to congratulate kinder unions. It is well she leaves +me alone o' nights--the damn'd Day-hag _BUSINESS_. She is even now +peeping over me to see I am writing no Love Letters. I come, my dear-- +Where is the Indigo Sale Book? + +Twenty adieus, my dear friends, till we meet. + + Yours most truly, C. LAMB. + +Leadenhall, 11 Nov. '24. + + +[Procter married Anne Skepper, step-daughter of Basil Montagu, in +October, 1824. One of their daughters was Adelaide Ann Procter. + +"Agnise"--acknowledge. It has been suggested that Lamb favoured this old +word also on account of its superficial association with _agnus_, a +lamb.] + + + +LETTER 355 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. Nov. 20, 1824.] + +Dr. R. Barren Field bids me say that he is resident at his brother +Henry's, a surgeon &c., a few doors west of Christ Church Passage +Newgate Street; and that he shall be happy to accompany you up thence to +Islington, when next you come our way, but not so late as you sometimes +come. I think we shall be out on Tuesd'y. + +Yours ever + +C. LAMB. + +Sat'y. + + +[Barron Field, as I have said, had returned from New South Wales in June +of this year. Later he became Chief Justice at Gibraltar.] + + + +LETTER 356 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +Desk II, Nov. 25 [1824]. + +My dear Miss Hutchinson, Mary bids me thank you for your kind letter. We +are a little puzzled about your where-abouts: Miss Wordsworth writes +Torkay, and you have queerly made it Torquay. Now Tokay we have heard +of, and Torbay, which we take to be the true _male_ spelling of the +place, but somewhere we fancy it to be on "Devon's leafy shores," where +we heartily wish the kindly breezes may restore all that is invalid +among you. Robinson is returned, and speaks much of you all. We shall be +most glad to hear good news from you from time to time. The best is, +Proctor is at last married. We have made sundry attempts to see the +Bride, but have accidentally failed, she being gone out a gadding. + +We had promised our dear friends the Monkhouses, promised ourselves +rather, a visit to them at Ramsgate, but I thought it best, and Mary +seemed to have it at heart too, not to go far from home these last holy +days. It is connected with a sense of unsettlement, and secretly I know +she hoped that such abstinence would be friendly to her health. She +certainly has escaped her sad yearly visitation, whether in consequence +of it, or of faith in it, and we have to be thankful for a good 1824. To +get such a notion into our heads may go a great way another year. Not +that we quite confined ourselves; but assuming Islington to be head +quarters, we made timid flights to Ware, Watford &c. to try how the +trouts tasted, for a night out or so, not long enough to make the sense +of change oppressive, but sufficient to scour the rust of home. + +Coleridge is not returned from the Sea. As a little scandal +may divert you recluses--we were in the Summer dining at a +Clergyman of Southey's "Church of England," at Hertford, +the same who officiated to Thurtell's last moments, and indeed +an old contemporary Blue of C.'s and mine at School. After +dinner we talked of C., and F. who is a mighty good fellow in +the main, but hath his cassock prejudices, inveighed against +the moral character of C. I endeavoured to enlighten him on +the subject, till having driven him out of some of his holds, he +stopt my mouth at once by appealing to me whether it was not +very well known that C. "at that very moment was living in +a state of open a------y with Mrs. * * * * * at Highgate?" +Nothing I could say serious or bantering after that +could remove the deep inrooted conviction of the whole company +assembled that such was the case! Of course you will +keep this quite close, for I would not involve my poor blundering +friend, who I dare say believed it all thoroughly. My +interference of course was imputed to the goodness of my heart, +that could imagine nothing wrong &c. Such it is if Ladies +will go gadding about with other people's husbands at watering +places. How careful we should be to avoid the appearance of +Evil. I thought this Anecdote might amuse you. It is not +worth resenting seriously; only I give it as a specimen of +orthodox candour. O Southey, Southey, how long would it +be before you would find one of us _Unitarians_ propagating +such unwarrantable Scandal! Providence keep you all from +the foul fiend Scandal, and send you back well and happy to +dear Gloster Place. C.L. + + +[Thomas Monkhouse, who was in a decline, had been ordered to Torquay. +Crabb Robinson had been in Normandy for some weeks. The too credulous +clergyman at Hertford was Frederick William Franklin, Master of the Blue +Coat school there (from 1801 to 1827), who was at Christ's Hospital with +Lamb. + +"Mrs. * * * * * *." Mrs. Gillman.] + + + +LETTER 357 + +CHARLES LAMB TO LEIGH HUNT + +[No date. ? November, 1824.] + +ILLUSTREZZIMO Signor,--I have obeyed your mandate to a tittle. I +accompany this with a volume. But what have you done with the first I +sent you?--have you swapt it with some lazzaroni for macaroni? or +pledged it with a gondolierer for a passage? Peradventuri the Cardinal +Gonsalvi took a fancy to it:--his Eminence has done my Nearness an +honour. 'Tis but a step to the Vatican. As you judge, my works do not +enrich the workman, but I get vat I can for 'em. They keep dragging me +on, a poor, worn mill-horse, in the eternal round of the damn'd +magazine; but 'tis they are blind, not I. Colburn (where I recognise +with delight the gay W. Honeycomb renovated) hath the ascendency. + +I was with the Novellos last week. They have a large, cheap house and +garden, with a dainty library (magnificent) without books. But what will +make you bless yourself (I am too old for wonder), something has touched +the right organ in Vincentio at last. He attends a Wesleyan chapel on +Kingsland Green. He at first tried to laugh it off--he only went for the +singing; but the cloven foot--I retract--the Lamb's trotters--are at +length apparent. Mary Isabella attributes it to a lightness induced by +his headaches. But I think I see in it a less accidental influence. +Mister Clark is at perfect staggers! the whole fabric of his infidelity +is shaken. He has no one to join him in his coarse-insults and indecent +obstreperousnesses against Christianity, for Holmes (the bonny Holmes) +is gone to Salisbury to be organist, and Isabella and the Clark make but +a feeble quorum. The children have all nice, neat little clasped +pray-books, and I have laid out 7s. 8d. in Watts's Hymns for Christmas +presents for them. The eldest girl alone holds out; she has been at +Boulogne, skirting upon the vast focus of Atheism, and imported bad +principles in patois French. But the strongholds are crumbling. N. +appears as yet to have but a confused notion of the Atonement. It makes +him giddy, he says, to think much about it. But such giddiness is +spiritual sobriety. + +Well, Byron is gone, and ------ is now the best poet in England. Fill up +the gap to your fancy. Barry Cornwall has at last carried the pretty A. +S. They are just in the treacle-moon. Hope it won't clog his wings--gaum +we used to say at school. + +Mary, my sister, has worn me out with eight weeks' cold and toothache, +her average complement in the winter, and it will not go away. She is +otherwise well, and reads novels all day long. She has had an exempt +year, a good year, for which, forgetting the minor calamity, she and I +are most thankful. + +Alsager is in a flourishing house, with wife and children about him, in +Mecklenburg Square--almost too fine to visit. + +Barron Field is come home from Sydney, but as yet I can hear no tidings +of a pension. He is plump and friendly, his wife really a very superior +woman. He resumes the bar. + +I have got acquainted with Mr. Irving, the Scotch preacher, whose fame +must have reached you. He is a humble disciple at the foot of Gamaliel +S.T.C. Judge how his own sectarists must stare when I tell you he has +dedicated a book to S.T.C., acknowledging to have learnt more of the +nature of Faith, Christianity, and Christian Church, from him than from +all the men he ever conversed with. He is a most amiable, sincere, +modest man in a room, this Boanerges in the temple. Mrs. Montague told +him the dedication would do him no good. "That shall be a reason for +doing it," was his answer. Judge, now, whether this man be a quack. + +Dear H., take this imperfect notelet for a letter; it looks so much the +more like conversing on nearer terms. Love to all the Hunts, old friend +Thornton, and all. + + Yours ever, C. LAMB. + + +[Leigh Hunt was still living at Genoa. Shelley and Byron, whom he had +left England to join, were both dead. Lamb, I assume, sent him a second +copy of _Elia_, with this letter. + +Cardinal Gonsalvi was Ercole Gonsalvi (1757-1824), secretary to Pius +VII. and a patron of the arts. Lawrence painted him. + +For the present state of the _London Magazine_ see next letter. Leigh +Hunt contributed to Colburn's _New Monthly Magazine_, among other +things, a series of papers on "The Months." Hunt also contributed an +account of the Honeycomb family, by Harry Honeycomb. + +By Mary Isabella Lamb meant Mary Sabilla Novello, Vincent Novello's +wife. The eldest girl was Mary Victoria, afterwards the wife of Charles +Cowden Clarke, the Mr. Clark mentioned here. Novello (now living at +Shackleford Green) remained a good Roman Catholic to the end. Holmes was +Edward Holmes (1797-1859), a pupil of Cowden Clarke's father at Enfield +and schoolfellow of Keats. He had lived with the Novellos, studying +music, and later became a musical writer and teacher and the biographer +of Mozart. + +Mrs. Barron Field was a Miss Jane Carncroft, to whom Lamb addressed some +album verses (see Vol. IV. of this edition). Leigh Hunt knew of Field's +return, for he had contributed to the _New Monthly_ earlier in the year +a rhymed letter to him in which he welcomed him home again. + +Irving was Edward Irving (1792-1834), afterwards the founder of the +Catholic Apostolic sect, then drawing people to the chapel in Hatton +Garden, attached to the Caledonian Asylum. The dedication, to which Lamb +alludes more than once in his correspondence, was that of his work, _For +Missionaries after the Apostolical School, a series of orations in four +parts_, ... 1825. It runs:-- + +DEDICATION + +TO + +SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE, ESQ. + +MY DEAR AND HONOURED FRIEND, + +Unknown as you are, in the true character either of your mind or of your +heart, to the greater part of your countrymen, and misrepresented as +your works have been, by those who have the ear of the vulgar, it will +seem wonderful to many that I should make choice of you, from the circle +of my friends, to dedicate to you these beginnings of my thoughts upon +the most important subject of these or any times. And when I state the +reason to be, that you have been more profitable to my faith in orthodox +doctrine, to my spiritual understanding of the Word of God, and to my +right conception of the Christian Church, than any or all of the men +with whom I have entertained friendship and conversation, it will +perhaps still more astonish the mind, and stagger the belief, of those +who have adopted, as once I did myself, the misrepresentations which are +purchased for a hire and vended for a price, concerning your character +and works. You have only to shut your ear to what they ignorantly say of +you, and earnestly to meditate the deep thoughts with which you are +instinct, and give them a suitable body and form that they may live, +then silently commit them to the good sense of ages yet to come, in +order to be ranked hereafter amongst the most gifted sages and greatest +benefactors of your country. Enjoy and occupy the quiet which, after +many trials, the providence of God hath bestowed upon you, in the bosom +of your friends; and may you be spared until you have made known the +multitude of your thoughts, unto those who at present value, or shall +hereafter arise to value, their worth. + +I have partaken so much high intellectual enjoyment from being admitted +into the close and familiar intercourse with which you have honoured me, +and your many conversations concerning the revelations of the Christian +faith have been so profitable to me in every sense, as a student and a +preacher of the Gospel, as a spiritual man and a Christian pastor, and +your high intelligence and great learning have at all times so kindly +stooped to my ignorance and inexperience, that not merely with the +affection of friend to friend, and the honour due from youth to +experienced age, but with the gratitude of a disciple to a wise and +generous teacher, of an anxious inquirer to the good man who hath helped +him in the way of truth, I do now presume to offer you the first-fruits +of my mind since it received a new impulse towards truth, and a new +insight into its depths, from listening to your discourse. Accept them +in good part, and be assured that however insignificant in themselves, +they are the offering of a heart which loves your heart, and of a mind +which looks up with reverence to your mind. + +EDWARD IRVING. + +"Old friend Thornton" was Leigh Hunt's son, Thornton Leigh Hunt, whom +Lamb had addressed in verse in 1815 as "my favourite child." He was now +fourteen.] + + + +LETTER 358 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON AND LUCY BARTON + +[P.M. December 1, 1824.] + +Dear B.B.--If Mr. Mitford will send me a full and circumstantial +description of his desired vases, I will transmit the same to a +Gentleman resident at Canton, whom I think I have interest enough in to +take the proper care for their execution. But Mr. M. must have patience. +China is a great way off, further perhaps than he thinks; and his next +year's roses must be content to wither in a Wedgewood pot. He will +please to say whether he should like his Arms upon them, &c. I send +herewith some patterns which suggest themselves to me at the first blush +of the subject, but he will probably consult his own taste after all. + +[Illustration: Handdrawn sketch] + +The last pattern is obviously fitted for ranunculuses only. The two +former may indifferently hold daisies, marjoram, sweet williams, and +that sort. My friend in Canton is Inspector of Teas, his name Ball; and +I can think of no better tunnel. I shall expect Mr. M.'s decision. + +Taylor and Hessey finding their magazine goes off very heavily at 2s. +6d. are prudently going to raise their price another shilling; and +having already more authors than they want, intend to increase the +number of them. If they set up against the New Monthly, they must change +their present hands. It is not tying the dead carcase of a Review to a +half-dead Magazine will do their business. It is like G.D. multiplying +his volumes to make 'em sell better. When he finds one will not go off, +he publishes two; two stick, he tries three; three hang fire, he is +confident that four will have a better chance. + +And now, my dear Sir, trifling apart, the gloomy catastrophe of +yesterday morning prompts a sadder vein. The fate of the unfortunate +Fauntleroy makes me, whether I will or no, to cast reflecting eyes +around on such of my friends as by a parity of situation are exposed to +a similarity of temptation. My very style, seems to myself to become +more impressive than usual, with the change of theme. Who that standeth, +knoweth but he may yet fall? Your hands as yet, I am most willing to +believe, have never deviated into others' property. You think it +impossible that you could ever commit so heinous an offence. But so +thought Fauntleroy once; so have thought many besides him, who at last +have expiated, as he hath done. You are as yet upright. But you are a +Banker, at least the next thing to it. I feel the delicacy of the +subject; but cash must pass thro' your hands, sometimes to a great +amount. If in an unguarded hour--but I will hope better. Consider the +scandal it will bring upon those of your persuasion. Thousands would go +to see a Quaker hanged, that would be indifferent to the fate of a +Presbyterian, or an Anabaptist. Think of the effect it would have on the +sale of your poems alone; not to mention higher considerations. I +tremble, I am sure, at myself, when I think that so many poor victims of +the Law at one time of their life made as sure of never being hanged as +I in my presumption am too ready to do myself. What are we better than +they? Do we come into the world with different necks? Is there any +distinctive mark under our left ears? Are we unstrangulable? I ask you. +Think of these things. I am shocked sometimes at the shape of my own +fingers, not for their resemblance to the ape tribe (which is something) +but for the exquisite adaptation of them to the purposes of picking, +fingering, &c. No one that is so framed, I maintain it, but should +tremble. + +Postscript for your Daughter's eyes only. + +Dear Miss ---- Your pretty little letterets make me ashamed of my great +straggling coarse handwriting. I wonder where you get pens to write so +small. Sure they must be the pinions of a small wren, or a robin. If you +write so in your Album, you must give us glasses to read by. I have seen +a Lady's similar book all writ in following fashion. I think it pretty +and fanciful. + + "O how I love in early dawn + To bend my steps o'er flowery dawn [lawn]," + +which I think has an agreeable variety to the eye. Which I recommend to +your notice, with friend Elia's best wishes. + + +[The _London Magazine_ began a new series at half a crown with the +number for January, 1825. It had begun to decline very noticeably. The +_New Monthly Magazine_, to the January number of which Lamb contributed +his "Illustrious Defunct" essay, was its most serious rival. Lamb +returned to some of his old vivacity and copiousness in the _London +Magazine_ for January, 1825. To that number he contributed his +"Biographical Memoir of Mr. Liston" and the "Vision of Horns"; and to +the February number "Letter to an Old Gentleman," "Unitarian Protests" +and the "Autobiography of Mr. Munden." + +"G.D."--George Dyer again. + +"Fauntleroy." See note above. Fauntleroy's fate seems to have had great +fascination for Lamb. He returned to the subject, in the vein of this +letter, in "The Last Peach," a little essay printed in the _London +Magazine_ for April, 1825 (see Vol. I. of this edition); and in +_Memories of old Friends, being Extracts from the Journals and Letters +of Caroline Fox, ... from 1835 to 1871_, 1882, I find the following +entry:-- + +October 25 [l839].--G. Wightwick and others dined with us. He talked +agreeably about capital punishments, greatly doubting their having any +effect in preventing crime. Soon after Fauntleroy was hanged, an +advertisement appeared, "To all good Christians! Pray for the soul of +Fauntleroy." This created a good deal of speculation as to whether he +was a Catholic, and at one of Coleridge's soirées it was discussed for a +considerable time; at length Coleridge, turning to Lamb, asked, "Do you +know anything about this affair?" "I should think I d-d-d-did," said +Elia, "for I paid s-s-s-seven and sixpence for it!" + +Lamb's postscript is written in extremely small characters, and --the +letters of the two lines of verse are in alternate red and black inks. +It was this letter which, Edward FitzGerald tells us, Thackeray pressed +to his forehead, with the remark "Saint Charles!" Hitherto, the +postscript not having been thought worthy of print by previous editors, +it was a little difficult to understand why this particular letter had +been selected for Thackeray's epithet. But when one thinks of the +patience with which, after making gentle fun of her father, Lamb sat +down to amuse Lucy Barton, and, as Thackeray did, thinks also of his +whole life, it becomes more clear. + +Here should come a letter to Alaric A. Watts dated Dec. 28, 1824, in +reply to a request for a contribution to one of this inveterate +album-maker's albums. Lamb acquiesces. Later he came to curse the +things. Given in the Boston Bibliophile edition.] + + + +LETTER 359 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. January II, 1825.] + +My Dear Sir--Pray return my best thanks to your father for his little +volume. It is like all of his I have seen, spirited, good humoured, and +redolent of the wit and humour of a century ago. He should have lived +with Gay and his set. The Chessiad is so clever that I relish'd it in +spite of my total ignorance of the game. I have it not before me, but I +remember a capital simile of the Charwoman letting in her Watchman +husband, which is better than Butler's Lobster turned to Red. Hazard is +a grand Character, Jove in his Chair. When you are disposed to leave +your one room for my six, Colebrooke is where it was, and my sister begs +me to add that as she is disappointed of meeting your sister _your way_, +we shall be most happy to see her _our way_, when you have an even'g to +spare. Do not stand on ceremonies and introductions, but come at once. I +need not say that if you can induce your father to join the party, it +will be so much the pleasanter. Can you name an evening _next week_? I +give you long credit. + +Meantime am as usual yours truly C.L. + +E.I.H. + +11 Jan. 25. + +When I saw the Chessiad advertised by C.D. the Younger, I hoped it +might be yours. What title is left for you-- + +Charles Dibdin _the Younger, Junior_. + +O No, you are Timothy. + + +[Charles Dibdin the Younger wrote a mock-heroic poem, "The Chessiad," +which was published with _Comic Tales_ in 1825. The simile of the +charwoman runs thus:-- + + Now Morning, yawning, rais'd her from her bed, + Slipp'd on her wrapper blue and 'kerchief red, + And took from Night the key of Sleep's abode; + For Night within that mansion had bestow'd + The Hours of day; now, turn and turn about, + Morn takes the key and lets the Day-hours out; + Laughing, they issue from the ebon gate, + And Night walks in. As when, in drowsy state, + Some watchman, wed to one who chars all day, + Takes to his lodging's door his creeping way; + His rib, arising, lets him in to sleep, + While she emerges to scrub, dust, and sweep. + +This is the lobster simile in _Hudibras_, Part II., Canto 2, lines +29-32:-- + + The sun had long since, in the lap + Of Thetis, taken out his nap, + And, like a lobster boiled, the morn + From black to red began to turn. + +Hazard is the chief of the gods in the Chessiad's little drama. + +"You are Timothy." See letter to Dibdin above. + +I have included in Vol. I. of the present edition a review of Dibdin's +book, in the _New Times_, January 27, 1825, which both from internal +evidence and from the quotation of the charwoman passage I take to be by +Lamb, who was writing for that paper at that time.] + + + +LETTER 360 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +Jan. 17, 1825. + +Dear Allsop--I acknowledge with thanks the receipt of a draft on Messrs. +Wms. for £81:11:3 which I haste to cash in the present alarming state of +the money market. Hurst and Robinson gone. I have imagined a chorus of +ill-used authors singing on the occasion: + + What should we when Booksellers break? + We should rejoice + da Capo. + +We regret exceed'ly Mrs. Allsop's being unwell. Mary or both will come +and see her soon. The frost is cruel, and we have both colds. I take +Pills again, which battle with your wine & victory hovers doubtful. By +the bye, tho' not disinclined to presents I remember our bargain to take +a dozen at sale price and must demur. With once again thanks and best +loves to Mrs. A. + + Turn over--Yours, C. LAMB. + + +[Hurst and Robinson were publishers. Lamb took the idea for his chorus +from Davenant's version of "Macbeth" which he described in _The +Spectator_ in 1828 (see Vol. I. of the present edition). It is there a +chorus of witches-- + + We should rejoice when good kings bleed. ] + + + +LETTER 361 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +[P.M. January 20, 1825.] + +The brevity of this is owing to scratching it off at my desk amid +expected interruptions. By habit, I can write Letters only at office. + +Dear Miss H. Thank you for a noble Goose, which wanted only the massive +Encrustation that we used to pick-axe open about this season in old +Gloster Place. When shall we eat another Goosepye together? The pheasant +too must not be forgotten, twice as big and half as good as a partridge. +You ask about the editor of the Lond. I know of none. This first +specimen is flat and pert enough to justify subscribers who grudge at +t'other shilling. De Quincey's Parody was submitted to him before +printed, and had his Probatum. The "Horns" is in a poor taste, +resembling the most laboured papers in the Spectator. I had sign'd it +"Jack Horner:" but Taylor and Hessey said, it would be thought an +offensive article, unless I put my known signature to it; and wrung from +me my slow consent. But did you read the "Memoir of Liston"? and did you +guess whose it was? Of all the Lies I ever put off, I value this most. +It is from top to toe, every paragraph, Pure Invention; and has passed +for Gospel, has been republished in newspapers, and in the penny +play-bills of the Night, as an authentic Account. I shall certainly go +to the Naughty Man some day for my Fibbings. In the next No. I figure as +a Theologian! and have attacked my late brethren, the Unitarians. What +Jack Pudding tricks I shall play next, I know not. I am almost at the +end of my Tether. + +Coleridge is quite blooming; but his Book has not budded yet. I hope I +have spelt Torquay right now, and that this will find you all mending, +and looking forward to a London flight with the Spring. Winter _we_ have +had none, but plenty of foul weather. I have lately pick'd up an Epigram +which pleased me. + + Two noble Earls, whom if I quote, + Some folks might call me Sinner; + The one invented half a coat; + The other half a dinner. + + The plan was good, as some will say + And fitted to console one: + Because, in this poor starving day, + Few can afford a whole one. + +I have made the Lame one still lamer by imperfect memory, but spite of +bald diction, a little done to it might improve it into a good one. You +have nothing else to do at [_"Talk kay" here written and scratched out_] +Torquay. Suppose you try it. Well God bless you all, as wishes Mary, +[most] sincerely, with many thanks for Letter &c. ELIA. + + +[The Monkhouses' house in London was at 34 Gloucester Place. + +Lamb's De Quincey parody was the "Letter to an Old Gentleman, whose +Education has been Neglected." + +"Coleridge's book"--the _Aids to Reflection_, published in May or June, +1825. + +"I have lately pick'd up an Epigram." This is by Henry Man, an old +South-Sea House clerk, whom in his South-Sea House essay Lamb mentions +as a wit. The epigram, which refers to Lord Spencer and Lord Sandwich, +will be found in Man's _Miscellaneous Works_, 1802.] + + + +LETTER 362 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[P.M. Jan. 25, 1825.] + +Dear Corelli, My sister's cold is as obstinate as an old Handelian, whom +a modern amateur is trying to convert to Mozart-ism. As company must & +always does injure it, Emma and I propose to come to you in the evening +of to-morrow, _instead of meeting here_. An early bread-and-cheese +supper at 1/2 past eight will oblige us. +Loves to the Bearer of many Children. C. LAMB. + +Tuesday Colebrooke. + +I sign with a black seal, that you may begin to think, her cold has +killed Mary, which will be an agreeable UNSURPRISE when you read the +Note. + + +[This is the first letter to Novello, who was the peculiar champion of +Mozart and Haydn. Lamb calls him Corelli after Archangelo Corelli +(1653-1713), the violinist and composer. It was part of a joke between +Lamb and Novello that Lamb should affect to know a great deal about +music. See the _Elia_ essay "A Chapter on Ears" for a description of +Novello's playing. Mrs. Novello was the mother of eleven children.] + + + +LETTER 363 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: 10 February, 1825.] + +Dear B.B.--I am vexed that ugly paper should have offended. I kept it +as clear from objectionable phrases as possible, and it was Hessey's +fault, and my weakness, that it did not appear anonymous. No more of it +for God's sake. + +The Spirit of the Age is by Hazlitt. The characters of Coleridge, &c. he +had done better in former publications, the praise and the abuse much +stronger, &c. but the new ones are capitally done. Horne Tooke is a +matchless portrait. My advice is, to borrow it rather than read [? buy] +it. I have it. He has laid on too many colours on my likeness, but I +have had so much injustice done me in my own name, that I make a rule of +accepting as much over-measure to Elia as Gentlemen think proper to +bestow. Lay it on and spare not. + +Your Gentleman Brother sets my mouth a watering after Liberty. O that I +were kicked out of Leadenhall with every mark of indignity, and a +competence in my fob. The birds of the air would not be so free as I +should. How I would prance and curvet it, and pick up cowslips, and +ramble about purposeless as an ideot! The Author-mometer is a good +fancy. I have caused great speculation in the dramatic (not _thy_) world +by a Lying Life of Liston, all pure invention. The Town has swallowed +it, and it is copied into News Papers, Play Bills, etc., as authentic. +You do not know the Droll, and possibly missed reading the article (in +our 1st No., New Series). A life more improbable for him to have lived +would not be easily invented. But your rebuke, coupled with "Dream on J. +Bunyan," checks me. I'd rather do more in my favorite way, but feel dry. +I must laugh sometimes. I am poor Hypochondriacus, and _not_ Liston. + +Our 2'nd N'o is all trash. What are T. and H. about? It is whip +syllabub, "thin sown with aught of profit or delight." Thin sown! not a +germ of fruit or corn. Why did poor Scott die! There was comfort in +writing with such associates as were his little band of Scribblers, some +gone away, some affronted away, and I am left as the solitary widow +looking for water cresses. + +The only clever hand they have is Darley, who has written on the +Dramatists, under name of John Lacy. But his function seems suspended. + +I have been harassed more than usually at office, which has stopt my +correspondence lately. I write with a confused aching head, and you must +accept this apology for a Letter. + +I will do something soon if I can as a peace offering to the Queen of +the East Angles. Something she shan't scold about. + +For the Present, farewell. + + Thine C.L. + +10 Feb. 1825. + +I am fifty years old this day. Drink my health. + + +["That ugly paper" was "A Vision of Horns." + +Hazlitt's _Spirit of the Age_ had just been published, containing +criticisms, among others, of Coleridge, Horne Tooke, and Lamb. Lamb was +very highly praised. Here is a passage from the article:-- + + How admirably he has sketched the former inmates of the South-Sea + House; what "fine fretwork he makes of their double and single + entries!" With what a firm yet subtle pencil he has embodied "Mrs. + Battle's Opinions on Whist!" How notably he embalms a battered + _beau_; how delightfully an amour, that was cold forty years ago, + revives in his pages! With what well-disguised humour he introduces + us to his relations, and how freely he serves up his friends! + Certainly, some of his portraits are _fixtures_, and will do to hang + up as lasting and lively emblems of human infirmity. Then there is + no one who has so sure an ear for "the chimes at midnight," not even + excepting Mr. Justice Shallow; nor could Master Silence himself take + his "cheese and pippins" with a more significant and satisfactory + air. With what a gusto Mr. Lamb describes the Inns and Courts of + law, the Temple and Gray's Inn, as if he had been a student there + for the last two hundred years, and had been as well acquainted with + the person of Sir Francis Bacon as he is with his portrait or + writings! It is hard to say whether St. John's Gate is connected + with more intense and authentic associations in his mind, as a part + of old London Wall, or as the frontispiece (time out of mind) of the + _Gentleman's Magazine_. He hunts Watling Street like a gentle + spirit; the avenues to the play-houses are thick with panting + recollections; and Christ's Hospital still breathes the balmy breath + of infancy in his description of it! + +"Your Gentleman Brother"--John Barton, Bernard's younger half-brother. + +"The Author-mometer." I have not discovered to what Lamb refers. + +"Dream on J. Bunyan." Probably a poem by Barton, but I have not traced +it. + +"T. and H."--Taylor & Hessey. + +"Poor Scott"--John Scott, who founded the _London Magazine_. + +"Darley"--George Darley (1795-1846), author of _Sylvia; or, The May +Queen_, 1827. + +"The Queen of the East Angles." Possibly Lucy Barton, possibly Anne +Knight, a friend of Barton's.] + + + +LETTER 364 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS MANNING + +[Not dated. ? February, 1825.] + +My dear M.,--You might have come inopportunely a week since, when we had +an inmate. At present and for as long as _ever_ you like, our castle is +at your service. I saw Tuthill yesternight, who has done for me what may + + "To all my nights and days to come, + Give solely sovran sway and masterdom." + +But I dare not hope, for fear of disappointment. I cannot be more +explicit at present. But I have it under his own hand, that I am +_non_-capacitated (I cannot write it _in_-) for business. O joyous +imbecility! Not a susurration of this to _anybody!_ + +Mary's love. + +C. LAMB. + +[Lamb had just taken a most momentous step in his career and had +consulted Tuthill as to his health, in the hope of perhaps obtaining +release and a pension from the East India House. We learn more of this +soon. + +Here might come two brief notes to Dibdin, of no importance.] + + + +LETTER 365 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +[Dated at end: March 1, 1825.] + +Dear Miss Hutchinson Your news has made us all very sad. I had my hopes +to the last. I seem as if I were disturbing you at such an awful time +even by a reply. But I must acknowledge your kindness in presuming upon +the interest we shall all feel on the subject. No one will more feel it +than Robinson, to whom I have written. No one more than he and we +acknowleged the nobleness and worth of what we have lost. Words are +perfectly idle. We can only pray for resignation to the Survivors. Our +dearest expressions of condolence to Mrs. M------ at this time in +particular. God bless you both. I have nothing of ourselves to tell you, +and if I had, I could not be so unreverent as to trouble you with it. We +are all well, that is all. Farewell, the departed--and the left. Your's +and his, while memory survives, cordially + +C. LAMB. + +1 Mar. 1825. + + +[The letter refers to the death of Thomas Monkhouse. + +Here should come an undated note from Lamb to Procter, in which Lamb +refers to the same loss: "We shall be most glad to see you, though more +glad to have seen double _you_."] + + + +LETTER 366 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. March 23, 1825.] + +Wednesday. + +Dear B.B.--I have had no impulse to write, or attend to any single +object but myself, for weeks past. My single self. I by myself I. I am +sick of hope deferred. The grand wheel is in agitation that is to turn +up my Fortune, but round it rolls and will turn up nothing. I have a +glimpse of Freedom, of becoming a Gentleman at large, but I am put off +from day to day. I have offered my resignation, and it is neither +accepted nor rejected. Eight weeks am I kept in this fearful suspence. +Guess what an absorbing stake I feel it. I am not conscious of the +existence of friends present or absent. The E.I. Directors alone can be +that thing to me--or not.-- + +I have just learn'd that nothing will be decided this week. Why the +next? Why any week? It has fretted me into an itch of the fingers, I rub +'em against Paper and write to you, rather than not allay this Scorbuta. + +While I can write, let me adjure you to have no doubts of Irving. Let +Mr. Mitford drop his disrespect. Irving has prefixed a dedication (of a +Missionary Subject 1st part) to Coleridge, the most beautiful cordial +and sincere. He there acknowledges his obligation to S.T.C. for his +knowledge of Gospel truths, the nature of a Xtian Church, etc., to the +talk of S.T.C. (at whose Gamaliel feet he sits weekly) [more] than to +that of all the men living. This from him--The great dandled and petted +Sectarian--to a religious character so equivocal in the world's Eye as +that of S.T.C., so foreign to the Kirk's estimate!--Can this man be a +Quack? The language is as affecting as the Spirit of the Dedication. +Some friend told him, "This dedication will do you no Good," _i.e._ not +in the world's repute, or with your own People. "That is a reason for +doing it," quoth Irving. + +I am thoroughly pleased with him. He is firm, outspeaking, intrepid--and +docile as a pupil of Pythagoras. + +You must like him. + +Yours, in tremors of painful hope, + +C. LAMB. + + +[In the first paragraphs Lamb refers to the great question of his +release from the India House. + +In a letter dated February 19, 1825, of Mary Russell Mitford, who looked +upon Irving as quack absolute, we find her discussing the preacher with +Charles Lamb.] + + + +LETTER 367 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[March 29], 1825. + +I have left the d------d India House for Ever! + +Give me great joy. + +C. LAMB. + +[Robinson states in his Reminiscences of Coleridge, Wordsworth and Lamb, +preserved in MS. at Dr. Williams' Library: "A most important incident in +Lamb's life, tho' in the end not so happy for him as he anticipated, was +his obtaining his discharge, with a pension of almost £400 a year, from +the India House. This he announced to me by a note put into my letter +box: 'I have left the India House. D------ Time. I'm all for eternity.' +He was rather more than 50 years of age. I found him and his Sister in +high spirits when I called to wish them joy on the 22 of April. 'I never +saw him so calmly cheerful,' says my journal, 'as he seemed then.'" See +the next letters for Lamb's own account of the event.] + + + +LETTER 368 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +Colebrook Cottage, + +6 April, 1825. + +Dear Wordsworth, I have been several times meditating a letter to you +concerning the good thing which has befallen me, but the thought of poor +Monkhouse came across me. He was one that I had exulted in the prospect +of congratulating me. He and you were to have been the first +participators, for indeed it has been ten weeks since the first motion +of it. + +Here I am then after 33 years slavery, sitting in my own room at 11 +o'Clock this finest of all April mornings a freed man, with £441 a year +for the remainder of my life, live I as long as John Dennis, who +outlived his annuity and starved at 90. £441, i.e. £450, with a +deduction of £9 for a provision secured to my sister, she being +survivor, the Pension guaranteed by Act Georgii Tertii, &c. + +I came home for ever on Tuesday in last week. The incomprehensibleness +of my condition overwhelm'd me. It was like passing from life into +Eternity. Every year to be as long as three, i.e. to have three times as +much real time, time that is my own, in it! I wandered about thinking I +was happy, but feeling I was not. But that tumultuousness is passing +off, and I begin to understand the nature of the gift. Holydays, even +the annual month, were always uneasy joys: their conscious +fugitiveness--the craving after making the most of them. Now, when all +is holyday, there are no holydays. I can sit at home in rain or shine +without a restless impulse for walkings. I am daily steadying, and shall +soon find it as natural to me to be my own master, as it has been +irksome to have had a master. Mary wakes every morning with an obscure +feeling that some good has happened to us. + +Leigh Hunt and Montgomery after their releasements describe the shock of +their emancipation much as I feel mine. But it hurt their frames. I eat, +drink, and sleep sound as ever. I lay no anxious schemes for going +hither and thither, but take things as they occur. Yesterday I +excursioned 20 miles, to day I write a few letters. Pleasuring was for +fugitive play days, mine are fugitive only in the sense that life is +fugitive. Freedom and life co-existent. + +At the foot of such a call upon you for gratulation, I am ashamd to +advert to that melancholy event. Monkhouse was a character I learnd to +love slowly, but it grew upon me, yearly, monthly, daily. What a chasm +has it made in our pleasant parties! His noble friendly face was always +coming before me, till this hurrying event in my life came, and for the +time has absorpt all interests. In fact it has shaken me a little. My +old desk companions with whom I have had such merry hours seem to +reproach me for removing my lot from among them. They were pleasant +creatures, but to the anxieties of business, and a weight of possible +worse ever impending, I was not equal. Tuthill and Gilman gave me my +certificates. I laughed at the friendly lie implied in them, but my +sister shook her head and said it was all true. Indeed this last winter +I was jaded out, winters were always worse than other parts of the year, +because the spirits are worse, and I had no daylight. In summer I had +daylight evenings. The relief was hinted to me from a superior power, +when I poor slave had not a hope but that I must wait another 7 years +with Jacob--and lo! the Rachel which I coveted is bro't to me-- + +Have you read the noble dedication of Irving's "Missionary Orations" to +S.T.C. Who shall call this man a Quack hereafter? What the Kirk will +think of it neither I nor Irving care. When somebody suggested to him +that it would not be likely to do him good, videlicet among his own +people, "That is a reason for doing it" was his noble answer. + +That Irving thinks he has profited mainly by S.T.C., I have no doubt. +The very style of the Ded. shows it. + +Communicate my news to Southey, and beg his pardon for my being so long +acknowledging his kind present of the "Church," which circumstances I do +not wish to explain, but having no reference to himself, prevented at +the time. Assure him of my deep respect and friendliest feelings. + +Divide the same, or rather each take the whole to you, I mean you and +all yours. To Miss Hutchinson I must write separate. What's her address? +I want to know about Mrs. M. + +Farewell! and end at last, long selfish Letter! + +C. LAMB. + + +[Lamb expanded the first portion of this letter into the _Elia_ essay +"The Superannuated Man," which ought to be read in connection with it +(see Vol. II. of the present edition). + +Leigh Hunt and James Montgomery, the poet, had both undergone +imprisonment for libel. + +At a Court of Directors of the India House held on March 29, 1825, it +was resolved "that the resignation of Mr. Charles Lamb of the Accountant +General's Office, on account of certified ill-health, be accepted, and, +it appearing that he has served the Company faithfully for 33 years, and +is now in the receipt of an income of £730 per annum, he be allowed a +pension of £450 (four hundred and fifty pounds) per annum, under the +provisions of the act of the 53 Geo. III., cap. 155, to commence from +this day."] + + + +LETTER 369 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. April 6, 1825.] + +Dear B.B.--My spirits are so tumultuary with the novelty of my recent +emancipation, that I have scarce steadiness of hand, much more mind, to +compose a letter. + +I am free, B.B.--free as air. + + The little bird that wings the sky + Knows no such Liberty! + +I was set free on Tuesday in last week at 4 o'Clock. + + I came home for ever! + +I have been describing my feelings as well as I can to Wordsw'th. in a +long letter, and don't care to repeat. Take it briefly that for a few +days I was painfully oppressed by so mighty a change, but it is becoming +daily more natural to me. + +I went and sat among 'em all at my old 33 years desk yester morning; and +deuce take me if I had not yearnings at leaving all my old pen and ink +fellows, merry sociable lads, at leaving them in the Lurch, fag, fag, +fag. + +The comparison of my own superior felicity gave me any thing but +pleasure. + +B.B., I would not serve another 7 years for seven hundred thousand +pounds! + +I have got £441 net for life, sanctioned by Act of Parliament, with a +provision for Mary if she survives me. + +I will live another 50 years; or, if I live but 10, they will be thirty, +reckoning the quantity of real time in them, _i.e._ the time that is a +man's own. + +Tell me how you like "Barbara S."--will it be received in atonement for +the foolish Vision, I mean by the Lady? + +_Apropos_, I never saw Mrs. Crawford in my life, nevertheless 'tis all +true of Somebody. + +Address me in future Colebrook Cottage, Islington. + +I am really nervous (but that will wear off) so take this brief +announcement. + + Yours truly C.L. + + +["Barbara S----," the _Elia_ essay, was printed in the _London +Magazine_, April, 1825 (see Vol II. of this edition). It purports to be +an incident in the life of Mrs. Crawford, the actress, but had really +happened to Fanny Kelly.] + + + +LETTER 370 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +[P.M. April 18, 1825.] + +Dear Miss Hutchinson--You want to know all about my gaol delivery. Take +it then. About 12 weeks since I had a sort of intimation that a +resignation might be well accepted from me. This was a kind bird's +whisper. On that hint I spake. Gilman and Tuthill furnishd me with +certificates of wasted health and sore spirits--not much more than the +truth, I promise you--and for 9 weeks I was kept in a fright-- I had +gone too far to recede, and they might take advantage and dismiss me +with a much less sum than I had reckoned on. However Liberty came at +last with a liberal provision. I have given up what I could have lived +on in the country, but have enough to live here by managem't and +scribbling occasionally. I would not go back to my prison for seven +years longer for £10000 a year. 7 years after one is 50 is no trifle to +give up. Still I am a young _Pensioner_, and have served but 33 years, +very few I assure you retire before 40, 45, or 50 years' service. + +You will ask how I bear my freedom. Faith, for some days I was +staggered. Could not comprehend the magnitude of my deliverance, was +confused, giddy, knew not whether I was on my head or my heel as they +say. But those giddy feelings have gone away, and my weather glass +stands at a degree or two above + + CONTENT + +I go about quiet, and have none of that restless hunting after +recreation which made holydays formerly uneasy joys. All being holydays, +I feel as if I had none, as they do in heaven, where 'tis all red letter +days. + +I have a kind letter from the Words'wths _congratulatory_ not a little. + +It is a damp, I do assure you, amid all my prospects that I can receive +_none_ from a quarter upon which I had calculated, almost more than from +any, upon receiving congratulations. I had grown to like poor M. more +and more. I do not esteem a soul living or not living more warmly than I +had grown to esteem and value him. But words are vain. We have none of +us to count upon many years. That is the only cure for sad thoughts. If +only some died, and the rest were permanent on earth, what a thing a +friend's death would be then! + +I must take leave, having put off answering [a load] of letters to this +morning, and this, alas! is the 1st. Our kindest remembrances to Mrs. +Monkhouse and believe us + + Yours most Truly, C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 371 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HORNE + +[P.M. May 2, 1825.] + +Dear Hone,--I send you a trifle; you have seen my lines, I suppose, in +the "London." I cannot tell you how much I like the "St. Chad Wells." + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +P.S. Why did you not stay, or come again, yesterday? + + +[These words accompany Lamb's contribution, "Remarkable Correspondent," +to Hone's _Every-Day Book_ (see Vol. I. of this edition). Lamb was +helping Hone in his new venture as much as he was able; and Hone in +return dedicated the first volume to him. "St. Chad's Wells" was an +article by Hone in the number for March 2.] + + + +LETTER 372 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[No date. May, 1825.] + +Dear W. I write post-hoste to ensure a frank. Thanks for your hearty +congratulations. I may now date from the 6th week of my Hegira or Flight +from Leadenhall. I have lived so much in it, that a Summer seems already +past, and 'tis but early May yet with you and other people. How I look +down on the Slaves and drudges of the world! its inhabitants are a vast +cotton-web of spin spin spinners. O the carking cares! O the +money-grubbers-sempiternal muckworms! + +Your Virgil I have lost sight of, but suspect it is in the hands of Sir +G. Beaumont. I think that circumstances made me shy of procuring it +before. Will you write to him about it? and your commands shall be +obeyed to a tittle. + +Coleridge has just finishd his prize Essay, which if it get the Prize +he'll touch an additional £100 I fancy. His Book too (commentary on +Bishop Leighton) is quite finished and _penes_ Taylor and Hessey. + +In the London which is just out (1st May) are 2 papers entitled the +_Superannuated Man_, which I wish you to see, and also 1st Apr. a little +thing called Barbara S------ a story gleaned from Miss Kelly. The L.M. +if you can get it will save my enlargement upon the topic of my +manumission. + +I must scribble to make up my hiatus crumenae, for there are so many +ways, pious and profligate, of getting rid of money in this vast city +and suburbs that I shall miss my third: but couragio. I despair not. +Your kind hint of the Cottage was well thrown out. An anchorage for +_age_ and school of economy when necessity comes. But without this +latter I have an unconquerable terror of changing Place. It does not +agree with us. I say it from conviction. Else--I do sometimes ruralize +in fancy. + +Some d------d people are come in and I must finish abruptly. By +d------d, I only mean _deuced_. 'Tis these suitors of Penelope that make +it necessary to authorise a little for gin and mutton and such trifles. + +Excuse my abortive scribble. + +Yours not in more haste than heart C.L. + +Love and recollects to all the Wms. Doras, Maries round your Wrekin. + +Mary is capitally well. + +Do write to Sir G.B. for I am shyish of applying to him. + + +[Coleridge had been appointed to one of the ten Royal Associateships of +the newly chartered Royal Society of Literature, thus becoming entitled +to an annuity of 100 guineas. An essay was expected from each associate. +Coleridge wrote on the _Prometheus_ of Aeschylus, and read it on May 18. +His book was _Aids to Reflection_. See note on page 734. + +"I shall miss my thirds." Lamb's pension was two-thirds of his stipend. + +"Some d-----d people." A hint for Lamb's Popular Fallacy on Home, soon +to be written. + +"Round your Wrekin." Lamb repeats this phrase twice in the next few +months. He got it from the Dedication to Farquhar's play "The Recruiting +Officer"--"To all friends round the Wrekin." + +Here perhaps should come a letter to Mrs. Norris printed in the Boston +Bibliophile edition containing some very interesting comic verses on +England somewhat in the manner of _Don Juan_-- + + I like the weather when it's not too rainy, + That is, I like two months of every year, + +and so on.] + + + +LETTER 373 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES CHAMBERS + +[Undated. ? May, 1825.] + +With regard to a John-dory, which you desire to be particularly informed +about, I honour the fish, but it is rather on account of Quin who +patronised it, and whose taste (of a _dead_ man) I had as lieve go by as +anybody's (Apicius and Heliogabalus excepted--this latter started +nightingales' tongues and peacocks' brains as a garnish). + +Else in _itself_, and trusting to my own poor single judgment, it hath +not that moist mellow oleaginous gliding smooth descent from the tongue +to the palate, thence to the stomach, &c., that your Brighton Turbot +hath, which I take to be the most friendly and familiar flavor of any +that swims--most genial and at home to the palate. + +Nor has it on the other hand that fine falling off flakiness, that +oleaginous peeling off (as it were, like a sea onion), which endears +your cod's head & shoulders to some appetites; that manly firmness, +combined with a sort of womanish coming-in-pieces, which the same cod's +head & shoulders hath, where the whole is easily separable, pliant to a +knife or a spoon, but each individual flake presents a pleasing +resistance to the opposed tooth. You understand me--these delicate +subjects are necessarily obscure. + +But it has a third flavor of its own, perfectly distinct from Cod or +Turbot, which it must be owned may to some not injudicious palates +render it acceptable--but to my unpractised tooth it presented rather a +crude river-fish-flavor, like your Pike or Carp, and perhaps like them +should have been tamed & corrected by some laborious & well chosen +sauce. Still I always suspect a fish which requires so much of +artificial settings-off. Your choicest relishes (like nature's +loveliness) need not the foreign aid of ornament, but are when unadorned +(that is, with nothing but a little plain anchovy & a squeeze of lemon) +then adorned the most. However, I shall go to Brighton again next +Summer, and shall have an opportunity of correcting my judgment, if it +is not sufficiently informed. I can only say that when Nature was +pleased to make the John Dory so notoriously deficient in outward graces +(as to be sure he is the very Rhinoceros of fishes, the ugliest dog that +swims, except perhaps the Sea Satyr, which I never saw, but which they +say is terrible), when she formed him with so few external advantages, +she might have bestowed a more elaborate finish in his parts internal, & +have given him a relish, a sapor, to recommend him, as she made Pope a +Poet to make up for making him crooked. + +I am sorry to find that you have got a knack of saying things which are +not true to shew your wit. If I had no wit but what I must shew at the +expence of my virtue or my modesty, I had as lieve be as stupid as * * * +at the Tea Warehouse. Depend upon it, my dear Chambers, that an ounce of +integrity at our death-bed will stand us in more avail than all the wit +of Congreve or... For instance, you tell me a fine story about Truss, +and his playing at Leamington, which I know to be false, because I have +advice from Derby that he was whipt through the Town on that very day +you say he appeared in some character or other, for robbing an old woman +at church of a seal ring. And Dr. Parr has been two months dead. So it +won't do to scatter these untrue stories about among people that know +any thing. Besides, your forte is not invention. It is _judgment_, +particularly shown in your choice of dishes. We seem in that instance +born under one star. I like you for liking hare. I esteem you for +disrelishing minced veal. Liking is too cold a word.--I love you for +your noble attachment to the fat unctuous juices of deer's flesh & the +green unspeakable of turtle. I honour you for your endeavours to esteem +and approve of my favorite, which I ventured to recommend to you as a +substitute for hare, bullock's heart, and I am not offended that you +cannot taste it with _my_ palate. A true son of Epicurus should reserve +one taste peculiar to himself. For a long time I kept the secret about +the exceeding deliciousness of the marrow of boiled knuckle of veal, +till my tongue weakly ran riot in its praises, and now it is prostitute +& common.--But I have made one discovery which I will not impart till my +dying scene is over, perhaps it will be my last mouthful in this world: +delicious thought, enough to sweeten (or rather make savoury) the hour +of death. It is a little square bit about this size in or near the +knuckle bone of a fried joint of... fat I can't call it nor lean + +[Illustration: Handrawn sketch] + +neither altogether, it is that beautiful compound, which Nature must +have made in Paradise Park venison, before she separated the two +substances, the dry & the oleaginous, to punish sinful mankind; Adam ate +them entire & inseparate, and this little taste of Eden in the knuckle +bone of a fried... seems the only relique of a Paradisaical state. When +I die, an exact description of its topography shall be left in a +cupboard with a key, inscribed on which these words, "C. Lamb dying +imparts this to C. Chambers as the only worthy depository of such a +secret." You'll drop a tear.... + + +[Charles Chambers was the brother of John Chambers (see above). He had +been at Christ's Hospital with Lamb and subsequently became a surgeon in +the Navy. He retired to Leamington and practised there until his death, +somewhen about 1857, says Mr. Hazlitt. He seems to have inherited some +of the epicure's tastes of his father, the "sensible clergyman in +Warwickshire" who, Lamb tells us in "Thoughts on Presents of Game," +"used to allow a pound of Epping to every hare." + +This letter adds one more to the list of Lamb's gustatory raptures, and +it is remarkable as being his only eulogy of fish. Mr. Hazlitt says that +the date September 1, 1817, has been added by another hand; but if the +remark about Dr. Parr is true (he died March 6, 1825) the time is as I +have stated. Fortunately the date in this particular case is +unimportant. Mr. Hazlitt suggests that the stupid person in the Tea +Warehouse was Bye, whom we met recently. + +Of Truss we know nothing. The name may be a misreading of Twiss (Horace +Twiss, 1787-1849, politician, buffoon, and Mrs. Siddons' nephew), who +was quite a likely person to be lied about in joke at that time. + +Here should come a note to Allsop dated May 29, 1825, changing an +appointment: "I am as mad as the devil." Given in the Boston Bibliophile +edition.] + + + +LETTER 374 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +[? June, 1825.] + +My dear Coleridge,--With pain and grief, I must entreat you to excuse us +on Thursday. My head, though externally correct, has had a severe +concussion in my long illness, and the very idea of an engagement +hanging over for a day or two, forbids my rest; and I get up miserable. +I am not well enough for company. I do assure you, no other thing +prevents my coming. I expect Field and his brothers this or to-morrow +evening, and it worries me to death that I am not ostensibly ill enough +to put 'em off. I will get better, when I shall hope to see your nephew. +He will come again. Mary joins in best love to the Gillmans. Do, I +earnestly entreat you, excuse me. I assure you, again, that I am not fit +to go out yet. + + Yours (though shattered), C. LAMB. +Tuesday. + + +[This letter has previously been dated 1829, but I think wrongly. Lamb +had no long illness then, and Field was then in Gibraltar, where he was +Chief-Justice. Lamb's long illness was in 1825, when Coleridge's +Thursday evenings at Highgate were regular. Coleridge's nephew may have +been one of several. I fancy it was the Rev. Edward Coleridge. Henry +Nelson Coleridge had already left, I think, for the West Indies.] + + + +LETTER 375 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY COLBURN (?) + +[Dated at end: June 14 (? 1825).] + +Dear Sir, + +I am quite ashamed, after your kind letter, of having expressed any +disappointment about my remuneration. It is quite equivalent to the +value of any thing I have yet sent you. I had Twenty Guineas a sheet +from the London; and what I did for them was more worth that sum, than +any thing, I am afraid, I can now produce, would be worth the lesser +sum. I used up all my best thoughts in that publication, and I do not +like to go on writing worse & worse, & feeling that I do so. I want to +try something else. However, if any subject turns up, which I think will +do your Magazine no discredit, you shall have it at _your_ price, or +something between _that_ and my old price. I prefer writing to seeing +you just now, for after such a letter as I have received from you, in +truth I am ashamed to see you. We will never mention the thing again. + +Your obliged friend & Serv't + +C. LAMB. + +June 14. + + +[In the absence of any wrapper I have assumed this note to be addressed +to Colburn, the publisher of the _New Monthly Magazine_. Lamb's first +contribution to that periodical was "The Illustrious Defunct" (see Vol. +I. of this edition) in January, 1825. A year later he began the "Popular +Fallacies," and continued regularly for some months.] + + + +LETTER 376 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +[P.M. July 2, 1825.] + +Dear C.--We are going off to Enfield, to Allsop's, for a day or 2, with +some intention of succeeding them in their lodging for a time, for this +damn'd nervous Fever (vide Lond. Mag. for July) indisposes me for seeing +any friends, and never any poor devil was so befriended as I am. Do you +know any poor solitary human that wants that cordial to life a--true +friend? I can spare him twenty, he shall have 'em good cheap. I have +gallipots of 'em--genuine balm of cares--a going--a going--a going. +Little plagues plague me a 1000 times more than ever. I am like a +disembodied soul--in this my eternity. I feel every thing entirely, all +in all and all in etc. This price I pay for liberty, but am richly +content to pay it. The Odes are 4-5ths done by Hood, a silentish young +man you met at Islinton one day, an invalid. The rest are Reynolds's, +whose sister H. has recently married. I have not had a broken finger in +them. + +They are hearty good-natured things, and I would put my name to 'em +chearfully, if I could as honestly. I complimented them in a Newspaper, +with an abatement for those puns you laud so. They are generally an +excess. A Pun is a thing of too much consequence to be thrown in as a +make-weight. You shall read one of the addresses over, and miss the +puns, and it shall be quite as good and better than when you discover +'em. A Pun is a Noble Thing per se: O never lug it in as an accessory. A +Pun is a sole object for reflection (vide _my_ aids to that recessment +from a savage state)--it is entire, it fills the mind: it is perfect as +a Sonnet, better. It limps asham'd in the train and retinue of Humour: +it knows it should have an establishment of its own. The one, for +instance, I made the other day, I forget what it was. + +Hood will be gratify'd, as much as I am, by your mistake. I liked +'Grimaldi' the best; it is true painting, of abstract Clownery, and that +precious concrete of a Clown: and the rich succession of images, and +words almost such, in the first half of the Mag. Ignotum. Your picture +of the Camel, that would not or could not thread your nice needle-eye of +Subtilisms, was confirm'd by Elton, who perfectly appreciated his abrupt +departure. Elton borrowed the "Aids" from Hessey (by the way what is +your Enigma about Cupid? I am Cytherea's son, if I understand a tittle +of it), and returnd it next day saying that 20 years ago, when he was +pure, he _thought_ as you do now, but that he now thinks as you did 20 +years ago. But E. seems a very honest fellow. Hood has just come in; his +sick eyes sparkled into health when he read your approbation. They had +meditated a copy for you, but postponed it till a neater 2d Edition, +which is at hand. + +Have you heard _the Creature_ at the Opera House--Signor Non-vir sed +VELUTI Vir? + +Like Orpheus, he is said to draw storks &c, _after_ him. A picked raisin +for a sweet banquet of sounds; but I affect not these exotics. Nos DURUM +genus, as mellifluous Ovid hath it. + +Fanny Holcroft is just come in, with her paternal severity of aspect. +She has frozen a bright thought which should have follow'd. She makes us +marble, with too little conceiving. Twas respecting the Signor, whom I +honour on this side idolatry. Well, more of this anon. + +We are setting out to walk to Enfield after our Beans and Bacon, which +are just smoking. + +Kindest remembrances to the G.'s ever. + +From Islinton, + +2d day, 3d month of my Hegira or Flight from Leadenhall. + +C.L. Olim Clericus. + + +["To Allsop's." Allsop says in his _Letters... of Coleridge_ that he and +the Lambs were housemates for a long time. + +"Vide Lond. Mag. for July"--where the _Elia_ essay "The Convalescent" +was printed. + +"The Odes"--_Odes and Addresses to Great People, 1825._ Coleridge after +reading the book had written to Lamb as follows (the letter is printed +by Hood):-- + +MY DEAR CHARLES,--This afternoon, a little, thin, mean-looking sort of a +foolscap, sub-octavo of poems, printed on very dingy outsides, lay on +the table, which the cover informed me was circulating in our book-club, +so very Grub-Streetish in all its appearance, internal as well as +external, that I cannot explain by what accident of impulse (assuredly +there was no _motive_ in play) I came to look into it. Least of all, the +title, Odes and Addresses to Great Men, which connected itself in my +head with Rejected Addresses, and all the Smith and Theodore Hook squad. +But, my dear Charles, it was certainly written by you, or under you, or +_una eum_ you. I know none of your frequent visitors capacious and +assimilative enough of your converse to have reproduced you so honestly, +supposing you had left yourself in pledge in his lock-up house. Gillman, +to whom I read the spirited parody on the introduction to Peter Bell, +the Ode to the Great Unknown, and to Mrs. Fry; he speaks doubtfully of +Reynolds and Hood. But here come Irving and Basil Montagu. + +_Thursday night 10 o'clock_.--No! Charles, it is _you_. I have read them +over again, and I understand why you have _anon'd_ the book. The puns +are nine in ten good--many excellent --the Newgatory transcendent. And +then the _exemplum sine exemplo_ of a volume of personalities, and +contemporaneities, without a single line that could inflict the +infinitesimal of an unpleasance on any man in his senses: saving and +except perhaps in the envy-addled brain of the despiser of your _Lays_. +If not a triumph over him, it is at least an _ovation_. Then, moreover, +and besides, to speak with becoming modesty, excepting my own self, who +is there but you who can write the musical lines and stanzas that are +intermixed? + +Here, Gillman, come up to my Garret, and driven back by the guardian +spirits of four huge flower-holders of omnigenous roses and +honeysuckles--(Lord have mercy on his hysterical olfactories! What will +he do in Paradise? I must have a pair or two of nostril-plugs, or +nose-goggles laid in his coffin)--stands at the door, reading that to +M'Adam, and the washer-woman's letter, and he admits _the facts_. You +are found _in the manner_, as the lawyers say! so, Mr. Charles! hang +yourself up, and send me a line, by way of token and acknowledgment. My +dear love to Mary. God bless you and your Unshamabramizer. + +S.T. COLERIDGE. + +Reynolds was John Hamilton Reynolds. According to a marked copy in the +possession of Mr. Buxton Forman, Reynolds wrote only the odes to Mr. +M'Adam, Mr. Dymoke, Sylvanus Urban, Elliston and the Dean and Chapter of +Westminster. + +The newspaper in which Lamb complimented the book was the _New Times_, +for April 12, 1825. See Vol. I. of the present edition for the review, +where the remarks on puns are repeated. The "Mag. Ignotum" was the ode +to the Great Unknown, the author of the Scotch novels. In the same paper +on January 8, 1825, Lamb had written an essay called "Many Friends" (see +Vol. I.) a little in the manner of this first paragraph. + +"Your picture of the Camel." Probably the story of a caller told by +Coleridge to Lamb in a letter. + +"Your Enigma about Cupid." Possibly referring to the following passage +in the _Aids to Reflection_, 1825, pages 277-278:-- + + From the remote East turn to the mythology of Minor Asia, to the + Descendants of Javan _who dwelt in the tents of Shem, and possessed + the Isles_. Here again, and in the usual form of an historic + Solution, we find the same _Fact_, and as characteristic of the + Human _Race_, stated in that earliest and most venerable Mythus (or + symbolic Parable) of Prometheus--that truly wonderful Fable, in + which the characters of the rebellious Spirit and of the Divine + Friend of Mankind ([Greek: Theos philanthropos]) are united in the + same Person: and thus in the most striking manner noting the forced + amalgamation of the Patriarchal Tradition with the incongruous + Scheme of Pantheism. This and the connected tale of Io, which is but + the sequel of the Prometheus, stand alone in the Greek Mythology, in + which elsewhere both Gods and Men are mere Powers and Products of + Nature. And most noticeable it is, that soon after the promulgation + and spread of the Gospel had awakened the moral sense, and had + opened the eyes even of its wiser Enemies to the necessity of + providing some solution of this great problem of the Moral World, + the beautiful Parable of Cupid and Psyche was brought forward as a + _rival_ FALL OF MAN: and the fact of a moral corruption connatural + with the human race was again recognized. In the assertion of + ORIGINAL SIN the Greek Mythology rose and set. + +"Have you heard _the Creature?_"--Giovanni Battista Velluti (1781-1861), +an Italian soprano singer who first appeared in England on June 30, +1825, in Meyerbeer's "Il Crociato in Egitto." He received £2,500 for +five months' salary.] + + + +LETTER 377 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. July 2, 1825.] + +My dear B.B.--My nervous attack has so unfitted me, that I have not +courage to sit down to a Letter. My poor pittance in the London you will +see is drawn from my sickness. Your Book is very acceptable to me, +because most of it [is] new to me, but your Book itself we cannot thank +you for more sincerely than for the introduction you favoured us with to +Anne Knight. Now cannot I write _Mrs._ Anne Knight for the life of me. +She is a very pleas--, but I won't write all we have said of her so +often to ourselves, because I suspect you would read it to her. Only +give my sister's and my kindest rememb'ces to her, and how glad we are +we can say that word. If ever she come to Southwark again I count upon +another pleasant BRIDGE walk with her. Tell her, I got home, time for a +rubber; but poor Tryphena will not understand that phrase of the +worldlings. + +I am hardly able to appreciate your volume now. But I liked the +dedicat'n much, and the apology for your bald burying grounds. To +Shelly, but _that_ is not new. To the young Vesper-singer, Great +Bealing's, Playford, and what not? + +If there be a cavil it is that the topics of religious consolation, +however beautiful, are repeated till a sort of triteness attends them. +It seems as if you were for ever losing friends' children by death, and +reminding their parents of the Resurrection. Do children die so often, +and so good, in your parts? The topic, taken from the considerat'n that +they are snatch'd away from _possible vanities_, seems hardly sound; for +to an omniscient eye their conditional failings must be one with their +actual; but I am too unwell for Theology. Such as I am, I am yours and +A.K.'s truly + +C. LAMB. + + +["My poor pittance"-"The Convalescent." + +"Your Book"-Barton's _Poems_, 4th edition, 1825. The dedication was to +Barton's sister, Maria Hack. + +"Anne Knight." A Quaker lady, who kept a school at Woodbridge.] + + + +LETTER 378 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN AITKEN + +Colebrooke Cottage, Islington, July 5, 1825. + +DEAR Sir,--With thanks for your last No. of the Cabinet-- as I cannot +arrange with a London publisher to reprint "Rosamund Gray" as a book, it +will be at your service to admit into the Cabinet as soon as you please. +Your h'ble serv't, CH's LAMB. + + EMMA, eldest of your name, + Meekly trusting in her God + Midst the red-hot plough-shares trod, + And unscorch'd preserved her fame. + By that test if _you_ were tried, + Ugly names might be defied; + Though devouring fire's a glutton, + Through the trial you might go + 'On the light fantastic toe,' + Nor for plough-shares care a BUTTON. + + +[Aitken was an Edinburgh bookseller who edited _The Cabinet; or, The +Selected Beauties of Literature_, 1824, 1825 and 1831. The particular +interest of the letter is that it shows Lamb to have wanted to publish +_Rosamund Gray_ a third time in his life. Hitherto we had only his +statement that Hessey said that the world would not bear it. Aitken +printed the story in _The Cabinet_ for 1831. Previously he had printed +"Dream Children" and "The Inconveniences of being Hanged." + +I have been told (but have had no opportunity of verifying the +statement) that the Buttons, for one of whom the appended acrostic was +written, were cousins of the Lambs. + +Here should come an unpublished letter to Miss Kelly thanking her for +tickets and saying that Liston is to produce Lamb's farce "The +Pawnbroker's Daughter," which "will take." + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Hone, dated Enfield, July 25, +1825. Lamb had written some quatrains to the editor of the _Every-Day +Book_, which were printed in the _London Magazine_ for May, 1825. Hone +copied them into his periodical, accompanied by a reply. Lamb began:-- + + I like you, and your book, ingenuous Hone! + +Hone's reply contained the sentiment:-- + + I am "ingenuous": it is all I can + Pretend to; it is all I wish to be. + +See the _Every-Day Book_, Vol. I., July 9. Hone at this time was +occupying Lamb's house at Colebrooke Row, while the Lambs were staying +at the Allsops' lodgings at Enfield. + +Lamb again refers to "The Pawnbroker's Daughter." He says it is at the +theatre now and Harley is there too. This would be John Pritt Harley, +the actor. The play, as it happened, was never acted. + +Here should come three notes to Thomas Allsop in July and August, 1825, +one of which damns the afternoon sun. Given in the Boston Bibliophile +edition.] + + + +LETTER 379 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. August 10, 1825.] + +We shall be soon again at Colebrook. + +Dear B.B.--You must excuse my not writing before, when I tell you we are +on a visit at Enfield, where I do not feel it natural to sit down to a +Letter. It is at all times an exertion. I had rather talk with you, and +Ann Knight, quietly at Colebrook Lodge, over the matter of your last. +You mistake me when you express misgivings about my relishing a series +of scriptural poems. I wrote confusedly. What I meant to say was, that +one or two consolatory poems on deaths would have had a more condensed +effect than many. Scriptural-- devotional topics--admit of infinite +variety. So far from poetry tiring me because religious, I can read, and +I say it seriously, the homely old version of the Psalms in our +Prayer-books for an hour or two together sometimes without sense of +weariness. + +I did not express myself clearly about what I think a false topic +insisted on so frequently in consolatory addresses on the death of +Infants. I know something like it is in Scripture, but I think humanly +spoken. It is a natural thought, a sweet fallacy to the Survivors--but +still a fallacy. If it stands on the doctrine of this being a +probationary state, it is liable to this dilemma. Omniscience, to whom +possibility must be clear as act, must know of the child, what it would +hereafter turn out: if good, then the topic is false to say it is +secured from falling into future wilfulness, vice, &c. If bad, I do not +see how its exemption from certain future overt acts by being snatched +away at all tells in its favor. You stop the arm of a murderer, or +arrest the finger of a pickpurse, but is not the guilt incurred as much +by the intent as if never so much acted? Why children are hurried off, +and old reprobates of a hundred left, whose trial humanly we may think +was complete at fifty, is among the obscurities of providence. The very +notion of a state of probation has darkness in it. The all-knower has no +need of satisfying his eyes by seeing what we will do, when he knows +before what we will do. Methinks we might be condemn'd before +commission. In these things we grope and flounder, and if we can pick up +a little human comfort that the child taken is snatch'd from vice (no +great compliment to it, by the bye), let us take it. And as to where an +untried child goes, whether to join the assembly of its elders who have +borne the heat of the day--fire-purified martyrs, and torment-sifted +confessors--what know we? We promise heaven methinks too cheaply, and +assign large revenues to minors, incompetent to manage them. Epitaphs +run upon this topic of consolation, till the very frequency induces a +cheapness. Tickets for admission into Paradise are sculptured out at a +penny a letter, twopence a syllable, &c. It is all a mystery; and the +more I try to express my meaning (having none that is clear) the more I +flounder. Finally, write what your own conscience, which to you is the +unerring judge, seems best, and be careless about the whimsies of such a +half-baked notionist as I am. We are here in a most pleasant country, +full of walks, and idle to our hearts desire. Taylor has dropt the +London. It was indeed a dead weight. It has got in the Slough of +Despond. I shuffle off my part of the pack, and stand like Xtian with +light and merry shoulders. It had got silly, indecorous, pert, and every +thing that is bad. Both our kind _remembrances_ to Mrs. K. and yourself, +and stranger's-greeting to Lucy--is it Lucy or Ruth?--that gathers wise +sayings in a Book. C. LAMB. + + +[The London Magazine passed into the hands of Henry Southern in +September, 1825. Lamb's last article for it was in the August +number--"Imperfect Dramatic Illusion," reprinted in the _Last Essays of +Elia_ as "Stage Illusion."] + + + +LETTER 380 + +CHARLES LAMB TO ROBERT SOUTHEY + +August 10, 1825. + +Dear Southey,--You'll know who this letter comes from by opening +slap-dash upon the text, as in the good old times. I never could come +into the custom of envelopes; 'tis a modern foppery; the Plinian +correspondence gives no hint of such. In singleness of sheet and meaning +then I thank you for your little book. I am ashamed to add a codicil of +thanks for your "Book of the Church." I scarce feel competent to give an +opinion of the latter; I have not reading enough of that kind to venture +at it. I can only say the fact, that I have read it with attention and +interest. Being, as you know, not quite a Churchman, I felt a jealousy +at the Church taking to herself the whole deserts of Christianity, +Catholic and Protestant, from Druid extirpation downwards. I call all +good Christians the Church, Capillarians and all. But I am in too light +a humour to touch these matters. May all our churches flourish! Two +things staggered me in the poem (and one of them staggered both of us). +I cannot away with a beautiful series of verses, as I protest they are, +commencing "Jenner." 'Tis like a choice banquet opened with a pill or an +electuary-- physic stuff. T'other is, we cannot make out how Edith +should be no more than ten years old. By'r Lady, we had taken her to be +some sixteen or upwards. We suppose you have only chosen the round +number for the metre. Or poem and dedication may be both older than they +pretend to; but then some hint might have been given; for, as it stands, +it may only serve some day to puzzle the parish reckoning. But without +inquiring further (for 'tis ungracious to look into a lady's years), the +dedication is eminently pleasing and tender, and we wish Edith May +Southey joy of it. Something, too, struck us as if we had heard of the +death of John May. A John May's death was a few years since in the +papers. We think the tale one of the quietest, prettiest things we have +seen. You have been temperate in the use of localities, which generally +spoil poems laid in exotic regions. You mostly cannot stir out (in such +things) for humming-birds and fire-flies. A tree is a Magnolia, &c.--Can +I but like the truly Catholic spirit? "Blame as thou mayest the Papist's +erring creed"--which and other passages brought me back to the old +Anthology days and the admonitory lesson to "Dear George" on the "The +Vesper Bell," a little poem which retains its first hold upon me +strangely. + +The compliment to the translatress is daintily conceived. Nothing is +choicer in that sort of writing than to bring in some remote, impossible +parallel,--as between a great empress and the inobtrusive quiet soul who +digged her noiseless way so perseveringly through that rugged Paraguay +mine. How she Dobrizhoffered it all out, it puzzles my slender Latinity +to conjecture. Why do you seem to sanction Lander's unfeeling +allegorising away of honest Quixote! He may as well say Strap is meant +to symbolise the Scottish nation before the Union, and Random since that +act of dubious issue; or that Partridge means the Mystical Man, and Lady +Bellaston typifies the Woman upon Many Waters. Gebir, indeed, may mean +the state of the hop markets last month, for anything I know to the +contrary. That all Spain overflowed with romancical books (as Madge +Newcastle calls them) was no reason that Cervantes should not smile at +the matter of them; nor even a reason that, in another mood, he might +not multiply them, deeply as he was tinctured with the essence of them. +Quixote is the father of gentle ridicule, and at the same time the very +depository and treasury of chivalry and highest notions. Marry, when +somebody persuaded Cervantes that he meant only fun, and put him upon +writing that unfortunate Second Part with the confederacies of that +unworthy duke and most contemptible duchess, Cervantes sacrificed his +instinct to his understanding. + +We got your little book but last night, being at Enfield, to which place +we came about a month since, and are having quiet holydays. Mary walks +her twelve miles a day some days, and I my twenty on others. 'Tis all +holiday with me now, you know. The change works admirably. + +For literary news, in my poor way, I have a one-act farce going to be +acted at the Haymarket; but when? is the question. 'Tis an extravaganza, +and like enough to follow "Mr. H." "The London Magazine" has shifted its +publishers once more, and I shall shift myself out of it. It is fallen. +My ambition is not at present higher than to write nonsense for the +playhouses, to eke out a somewhat contracted income. _Tempus erat_. +There was a time, my dear Cornwallis, when the Muse, &c. But I am now in +MacFleckno's predicament,-- + + "Promised a play, and dwindled to a farce." + +Coleridge is better (was, at least, a few weeks since) than he has been +for years. His accomplishing his book at last has been a source of +vigour to him. We are on a half visit to his friend Allsop, at a Mrs. +Leishman's, Enfield, but expect to be at Colebrooke Cottage in a week or +so, where, or anywhere, I shall be always most happy to receive tidings +from you. G. Dyer is in the height of an uxorious paradise. His +honeymoon will not wane till he wax cold. Never was a more happy pair, +since Acme and Septimius, and longer. Farewell, with many thanks, dear +S. Our loves to all round your Wrekin. + + Your old friend, C. LAMB. + + +[In the letter to Barton of March 20, 1826, Lamb continues or amplifies +his remarks on his own letter-writing habits. + +"Capillarians." The _New English Dictionary_ gives Lamb's word in this +connection as its sole example, meaning without stem. + +"The poem"--Southey's _Tale of Paraguay_, 1825, which begins with an +address to Jenner, the physiologist:-- + + Jenner! for ever shall thy honour'd name, + +and is dedicated to Edith May Southey-- + + Edith! ten years are number'd, since the day. + +Edith Southey was born in 1804. The dedication was dated 1814. + +John May was Southey's friend and correspondent. It was not he that had +died. + +"The Vesper Bell"--"The Chapel Bell," which was not in the _Annual +Anthology_, but in Southey's _Poems_, 1797. Dear George would perhaps be +Burnett, who was at Oxford with Southey when the verses were written. + +"The compliment to the translatress." Southey took his _Tale of +Paraguay_ from Dobrizhoffer's _History of the Abipones_, which his +niece, Sara Coleridge, had translated. Southey remarks in the poem that +could Dobrizhoffer have foreseen by whom his words were to be turned +into English, he would have been as pleased as when he won the ear of +the Empress Queen. + +"Landor's ... allegorising." Landor, in the conversation between "Peter +Leopold and the President du Paty," makes President du Paty say that +Cervantes had deeper purpose than the satirising of knight-errants, Don +Quixote standing for the Emperor Charles V. and Sancho Panza symbolising +the people. Southey quoted the passage in the Notes to the Proem. Lamb's +_Elia_ essay on the "Defect of Imagination" (see Vol. II.) amplifies +this criticism of Don Quixote. + +"A one-act farce." This was, I imagine, "The Pawnbroker's Daughter," +although that is in two acts. It was not, however, acted. + +George Dyer had just been married to the widow of a solicitor who lived +opposite him in Clifford's Inn. + +Here should come three unimportant notes to Hone with reference to the +_Every-Day Book_--adding an invitation to Enfield to be shown "dainty +spots."] + + + +LETTER 381 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. Sept. 9, 1825.] + +My dear Allsop--We are exceedingly grieved for your loss. When your note +came, my sister went to Pall Mall, to find you, and saw Mrs. L. and was +a little comforted to find Mrs. A. had returned to Enfield before the +distresful event. I am very feeble, can scarce move a pen; got home from +Enfield on the Friday, and on Monday follow'g was laid up with a most +violent nervous fever second this summer, have had Leeches to my +Temples, have not had, nor can not get, a night's sleep. So you will +excuse more from Yours truly, C. LAMB. + +Islington, 9 Sept. + +Our most kind rememb'ces to poor Mrs. Allsop. A line to say how you both +are will be most acceptable. + + +[Allsop's loss was, I imagine, the death of one of his children.] + + + +LETTER 382 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. Sept. 24, 1825.] + +My dear Allsop--Come not near this unfortunate roof yet a while. My +disease is clearly but slowly going. Field is an excellent attendant. +But Mary's anxieties have overturned her. She has her old Miss James +with her, without whom I should not feel a support in the world. We keep +in separate apartments, and must weather it. Let me know all of your +healths. Kindest love to Mrs. Allsop. C. LAMB. + +Saturday. + +Can you call at Mrs. Burney 26 James Street, and _tell her_, & that I +can see no one here in this state. If Martin return-- if well enough, I +will meet him some where, _don't let him come_. + + +[Field was Henry Field, Barren Field's brother. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Hone, dated September 30, 1825, in +which Lamb describes the unhappy state of the house at Colebrooke Row, +with himself and his sister both ill. + +Here also should come a similar note to William Ayrton. "All this summer +almost I have been ill. I have been laid up (the second nervous attack) +now six weeks." + +On October 18 Lamb sends Hone the first "bit of writing" he has done +"these many weeks."] + + + +LETTER 383 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[P.M. Oct. 24, 1825.] + +I send a scrap. Is it worth postage? My friends are fairly surprised +that you should set me down so unequivocally for an ass, as you have +done, Page 1358. + + HERE HE IS + what follows? + THE ASS + +Call you this friendship? + +Mercy! What a dose you have sent me of Burney!--a perfect _opening_* +draught. + +*A Pun here is intended. + + +[This is written on the back of the MS. "In _re_ Squirrels" for Hone's +_Every-Day Book_ (see Vol. I. of this edition). Lamb's previous +contribution had been "The Ass" which Hone had introduced with a few +words.] + + + +LETTER 384 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[Dec. 5, 1825.] + +Dear A.--You will be glad to hear that _we_ are at home to visitors; not +too many or noisy. Some fine day shortly Mary will surprise Mrs. Allsop. +The weather is not seasonable for formal engagements. + +Yours _most ever_, + +C. LAMB. + +Satr'd. + + +[Here should come a note to Manning at Totteridge, signed Charles and +Mary Lamb, and dated December 10, 1825. It indicates that both are well +again, and hoping to see Manning at Colebrooke.] + + + +LETTER 385 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES OLLIER + +[No date. ? Dec., 1825.] + +Dear O.--I leave it _entirely to Mr. Colburn_; but if not too late, I +think the Proverbs had better have L. signd to them and reserve _Elia_ +for Essays _more Eliacal_. May I trouble you to send my Magazine, not to +Norris, but H.C. Robinson Esq. King's bench walks, instead. + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +My friend Hood, a prime genius and hearty fellow, brings this. + + +[Lamb's "Popular Fallacies" began in the _New Monthly Magazine_ in +January, 1826. Henry Colburn was the publisher of that magazine, which +had now obtained Lamb's regular services. The nominal editor was +Campbell, the poet, who was assisted by Cyrus Redding. Ollier seems to +have been a sub-editor.] + + + +LETTER 386 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES OLLIER + +Colebrook Cottage, Colebrook Row, Tuesday [early 1826]. + +Dear Ollier,--I send you two more proverbs, which will be the last of +this batch, unless I send you one more by the post on THURSDAY; none +will come after that day; so do not leave any open room in that case. +Hood sups with me to-night. Can you come and eat grouse? 'Tis not often +I offer at delicacies. + + Yours most kindly, C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 387 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES OLLIER + +January, 1826. + +Dear O.,--We lamented your absence last night. The grouse were piquant, +the backs incomparable. You must come in to cold mutton and oysters some +evening. Name your evening; though I have qualms at the distance. Do you +never leave early? My head is very queerish, and indisposed for much +company; but we will get Hood, that half Hogarth, to meet you. The scrap +I send should come in AFTER the "Rising with the Lark." + +Yours truly. + +Colburn, I take it, pays postages. + + +[The scrap was the Fallacy "That we Should Lie Down with the Lamb," +which has perhaps the rarest quality of the series. + +Here perhaps should come two further notes to Ollier, referring to some +articles on Chinese jests by Manning. + +Here should come a letter to Mr. Hudson dated February 1, 1826, +recommending a nurse for a mental case. Given in the Boston Bibliophile +edition.] + + + +LETTER 388 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. February 7, 1826.] + +My kind remembrances to your daughter and A.K. always. + +Dear B.B.--I got your book not more than five days ago, so am not so +negligent as I must have appeared to you with a fortnight's sin upon my +shoulders. I tell you with sincerity that I think you have completely +succeeded in what you intended to do. What is poetry may be disputed. +These are poetry to me at least. They are concise, pithy, and moving. +Uniform as they are, and unhistorify'd, I read them thro' at two +sittings without one sensation approaching to tedium. I do not know that +among your many kind presents of this nature this is not my favourite +volume. The language is never lax, and there is a unity of design and +feeling, you wrote them _with love_--to avoid the cox-_combical_ phrase, +con amore. I am particularly pleased with the "Spiritual Law," page +34-5. It reminded me of Quarles, and Holy Mr. Herbert, as Izaak Walton +calls him: the two best, if not only, of our devotional poets, tho' some +prefer Watts, and some _Tom Moore_. + +I am far from well or in my right spirits, and shudder at pen and ink +work. I poke out a monthly crudity for Colburn in his magazine, which I +call "Popular Fallacies," and periodically crush a proverb or two, +setting up my folly against the wisdom of nations. Do you see the "New +Monthly"? + +One word I must object to in your little book, and it recurs +more than once--FADELESS is no genuine compound; loveless +is, because love is a noun as well as verb, but what is a +fade?--and I do not quite like whipping the Greek drama upon +the back of "Genesis," page 8. I do not like praise handed +in by disparagement: as I objected to a side censure on Byron, +etc., in the lines on Bloomfield: with these poor cavils excepted, +your verses are without a flaw. C. LAMB. + + +[Barton's new book was _Devotional Verses: founded on, and illustrative +of Select Texts of Scripture_, 1826. See the Appendix for "The Spiritual +Law." + +"Holy Mr. Herbert." Writing to Lady Beaumont in 1826 Coleridge says: "My +dear old friend Charles Lamb and I differ widely (and in point of taste +and moral feeling this is a rare occurrence) in our estimate and liking +of George Herbert's sacred poems. He greatly prefers Quarles--nay, he +dislikes Herbert." + +Barton whipped the Greek drama on the back of Genesis in the following +stanza, referring to Abraham's words before preparing to sacrifice +Isaac:-- + + Brief colloquy, yet more sublime, + To every feeling heart, + Than all the boast of classic time, + Or Drama's proudest art: + Far, far beyond the Grecian stage, + Or Poesy's most glowing page. + +For Lamb's reference to Byron, see above.] + + + +LETTER 389 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES OLLIER + +[P.M. March 16, 1826.] + +D'r Ollier if not too late, pray omit the last paragraph in "Actor's +Religion," which is clumsy. It will then end with the word Mugletonian. +I shall not often trouble you in this manner, but I am suspicious of +this article as lame. + +C. LAMB. + + +["The Religion of Actors" was printed in the _New Monthly Magazine_ for +April, 1826. The essay ends at "Muggletonian." See Vol. I. of this +edition.] + + + +LETTER 390 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. March 20, 1826.] + +Dear B.B.--You may know my letters by the paper and the folding. For the +former, I live on scraps obtained in charity from an old friend whose +stationary is a permanent perquisite; for folding, I shall do it neatly +when I learn to tye my neckcloths. I surprise most of my friends by +writing to them on ruled paper, as if I had not got past pothooks and +hangers. Sealing wax, I have none on my establishment. Wafers of the +coarsest bran supply its place. When my Epistles come to be weighed with +Pliny's, however superior to the Roman in delicate irony, judicious +reflexions, etc., his gilt post will bribe over the judges to him. All +the time I was at the E.I.H. I never mended a pen; I now cut 'em to the +stumps, marring rather than mending the primitive goose quill. I cannot +bear to pay for articles I used to get for nothing. When Adam laid out +his first penny upon nonpareils at some stall in Mesopotamos, I think it +went hard with him, reflecting upon his old goodly orchard, where he had +so many for nothing. When I write to a Great man, at the Court end, he +opens with surprise upon a naked note, such as Whitechapel people +interchange, with no sweet degrees of envelope: I never inclosed one bit +of paper in another, nor understand the rationale of it. Once only I +seald with borrow'd wax, to set Walter Scott a wondering, sign'd with +the imperial quarterd arms of England, which my friend Field gives in +compliment to his descent in the female line from O. Cromwell. It must +have set his antiquarian curiosity upon watering. To your questions upon +the currency, I refer you to Mr. Robinson's last speech, where, if you +can find a solution, I cannot. I think this tho' the best ministry we +ever stumbled upon. Gin reduced four shillings in the gallon, wine 2 +shillings in the quart. This comes home to men's minds and bosoms. My +tirade against visitors was not meant _particularly_ at you or A.K. I +scarce know what I meant, for I do not just now feel the grievance. I +wanted to make an _article_. So in another thing I talkd of somebody's +_insipid wife_, without a correspondent object in my head: and a good +lady, a friend's wife, whom I really _love_ (don't startle, I mean in a +licit way) has looked shyly on me ever since. The blunders of personal +application are ludicrous. I send out a character every now and then, on +purpose to exercise the ingenuity of my friends. "Popular Fallacies" +will go on; that word concluded is an erratum, I suppose, for continued. +I do not know how it got stuff'd in there. A little thing without name +will also be printed on the Religion of the Actors, but it is out of +your way, so I recommend you, with true Author's hypocrisy, to skip it. +We are about to sit down to Roast beef, at which we could wish A.K., +B.B., and B.B.'s pleasant daughter to be humble partakers. So much for +my hint at visitors, which was scarcely calculated for droppers in from +Woodbridge. The sky does not drop such larks every day. + +My very kindest wishes to you all three, with my sister's best love. +C. LAMB. + + +["Mr. Robinson's last speech." Frederick John Robinson, afterwards Earl +of Ripon, then Chancellor of the Exchequer under the Earl of Liverpool. +The Government had decided to check the use of paper-money by stopping +the issue of notes for less than £5; and Robinson had made a speech on +the subject on February 10. The motion was carried, but to some extent +was compromised. It was Robinson who, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, +found the money for building the new British Museum and purchasing +Angerstein's pictures as the beginning of the National Gallery. + +"My tirade against visitors"--the Popular Fallacy "That Home is Home," +in the _New Monthly Magazine_ for March. + +"Somebody's insipid wife." In the Popular Fallacy "That You Must Love Me +and Love My Dog," in the February number, Lamb had spoken of Honorius' +"vapid wife." + +Barton and his daughter visited Lamb at Colebrooke Cottage somewhen +about this time. Mrs. FitzGerald, in 1893, wrote out for me her +recollections of the day. Lamb, who was alone, opened the door himself. +He sent out for a luncheon of oysters. The books on his shelves, Mrs. +FitzGerald remembered, retained the price-labels of the stalls where he +had bought them. She also remembered a portrait over the fireplace. This +would be the Milton. In the _Gem_ for 1831 was a poem by Barton, "To +Milton's Portrait in a Friend's Parlour."] + + + +LETTER 391 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +March 22nd, 1826. + +Dear C.,--We will with great pleasure be with you on Thursday in the +next week early. Your finding out my style in your nephew's pleasant +book is surprising to me. I want eyes to descry it. You are a little too +hard upon his morality, though I confess he has more of Sterne about him +than of Sternhold. But he saddens into excellent sense before the +conclusion. Your query shall be submitted to Miss Kelly, though it is +obvious that the pantomime, when done, will be more easy to decide upon +than in proposal. I say, do it by all means. I have Decker's play by me, +if you can filch anything out of it. Miss Gray, with her kitten eyes, is +an actress, though she shows it not at all, and pupil to the former, +whose gestures she mimics in comedy to the disparagement of her own +natural manner, which is agreeable. It is funny to see her bridling up +her neck, which is native to F.K.; but there is no setting another's +manners upon one's shoulders any more than their head. I am glad you +esteem Manning, though you see but his husk or shrine. He discloses not, +save to select worshippers, and will leave the world without any one +hardly but me knowing how stupendous a creature he is. I am perfecting +myself in the "Ode to Eton College" against Thursday, that I may not +appear unclassic. I have just discovered that it is much better than the +"Elegy." + + In haste, C.L. + +P.S.--I do not know what to say to your _latest_ theory about Nero being +the Messiah, though by all accounts he was a 'nointed one. + + +["Next week early." Canon Ainger's text here has: "May we venture to +bring Emma with us?" + +"Your nephew's pleasant book"--Henry Nelson Coleridge's _Six Months in +the West Indies in 1825_. In the last chapter but one of the book is an +account of the slave question, under the title "Planters and Slaves." + +"Sternhold"--Thomas Sternhold, the coadjutor of Hopkins in paraphrasing +the Psalms. + +"The pantomime." Coleridge seems to have had some project for +modernising Dekker for Fanny Kelly. Mr. Dykes Campbell suggested that +the play to be treated was "Old Fortunatus." + +"Miss Gray." I have found nothing of this lady. + +"Manning." Writing to Robert Lloyd twenty-five years earlier Lamb had +said of Manning: "A man of great Power--an enchanter almost.--Far beyond +Coleridge or any man in power of impressing --when he gets you alone he +can act the wonders of Egypt. Only he is lazy, and does not always put +forth all his strength; if he did, I know no man of genius at all +comparable to him." + +"Against Thursday." Coleridge was "at home" on Thursday evenings. +Possibly on this occasion some one interested in Gray was to be there, +or the allusion may be a punning one to Miss Gray. + +"Your _latest_ theory." I cannot explain this.] + + + +LETTER 392 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +April 3, 1826. + +Dear Sir,--It is whispered me that you will not be unwilling to look +into our doleful hermitage. Without more preface, you will gladden our +cell by accompanying our old chums of the London, Darley and Allan +Cunningham, to Enfield on Wednesday. You shall have hermit's fare, with +talk as seraphical as the novelty of the divine life will permit, with +an innocent retrospect to the world which we have left, when I will +thank you for your hospitable offer at Chiswick, and with plain hermit +reasons evince the necessity of abiding here. + +Without hearing from you, then, you shall give us leave to expect you. I +have long had it on my conscience to invite you, but spirits have been +low; and I am indebted to chance for this awkward but most sincere +invitation. + + Yours, with best love to Mrs. Cary, C. LAMB. + +Darley knows all about the coaches. Oh, for a Museum in the wilderness! + + +[Cary, who had been afternoon lecturer at Chiswick and curate of the +Savoy, this year took up his post as Assistant Keeper of the Printed +Books at the British Museum. George Darley, who wrote some notes to +Gary's _Dante_, we have met. Allan Cunningham was the Scotch poet and +the author of the Lives of the Painters, the "Giant" of the _London +Magazine_. The Lambs seem to have been spending some days at Enfield. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Ollier asking for a copy of the +April _New Monthly Magazine_ for himself, and one for his Chinese friend +(Manning) if his jests are in.] + + + +LETTER 393 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[P.M. May 9, 1826.] + +Dear N. You will not expect us to-morrow, I am sure, while these damn'd +North Easters continue. We must wait the Zephyrs' pleasures. By the bye, +I was at Highgate on Wensday, the only one of the Party. + + Yours truly C. LAMB. + +_Summer_, as my friend Coleridge waggishly writes, has set in with its +usual severity. + +Kind rememb'ces to Mrs. Novello &c. + + + +LETTER 394 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. May 16, 1826.] + +Dear B.B.--I have had no spirits lately to begin a letter to you, though +I am under obligations to you (how many!) for your neat little poem, +'Tis just what it professes to be, a simple tribute in chaste verse, +serious and sincere. I do not know how Friends will relish it, but we +out-lyers, Honorary Friends, like it very well. I have had my head and +ears stuff'd up with the East winds. A continual ringing in my brain of +bells jangled, or The Spheres touchd by some raw Angel. It is not George +3 trying the 100th psalm? I get my music for nothing. But the weather +seems to be softening, and will thaw my stunnings. Coleridge writing to +me a week or two since begins his note--"Summer has set in with its +usual Severity." A cold Summer is all I know of disagreeable in cold. I +do not mind the utmost rigour of real Winter, but these smiling +hypocrites of Mays wither me to death. My head has been a ringing Chaos, +like the day the winds were made, before they submitted to the +discipline of a weather-cock, before the Quarters were made. In the +street, with the blended noises of life about me, I hear, and my head is +lightened, but in a room the hubbub comes back, and I am deaf as a +Sinner. Did I tell you of a pleasant sketch Hood has done, which he +calls _Very Deaf Indeed_? It is of a good naturd stupid looking old +gentleman, whom a footpad has stopt, but for his extreme deafness cannot +make him understand what he wants; the unconscious old gentleman is +extending his ear-trumpet very complacently, and the fellow is firing a +pistol into it to make him hear, but the ball will pierce his skull +sooner than the report reach his sensorium. I chuse a very little bit of +paper, for my ear hisses when I bend down to write. I can hardly read a +book, for I miss that small soft voice which the idea of articulated +words raises (almost imperceptibly to you) in a silent reader. I seem +too deaf to see what I read. But with a touch or two of returning Zephyr +my head will melt. What Lyes you Poets tell about the May! It is the +most ungenial part of the Year, cold crocuses, cold primroses, you take +your blossoms in Ice --a painted Sun-- + + Unmeaning joy around appears, + And Nature smiles as if she sneers. + +It is ill with me when I begin to look which way the wind sits. Ten +years ago I literally did not know the point from the broad end of the +Vane, which it was the [?that] indicated the Quarter. I hope these ill +winds have blowd _over_ you, as they do thro' me. Kindest rememb'ces to +you and yours. C.L. + + +["Your neat little poem." It is not possible to trace this poem. +Probably, I think, the "Stanzas written for a blank leaf in Sewell's +History of the Quakers," printed in _A Widow's Tale_, 1827. + +"George 3." Byron's "Vision of Judgment" thus closes:-- + + King George slipp'd into Heaven for one; + And when the tumult dwindled to a calm, + I left him practising the hundredth psalm. + +This is Hood's sketch, in his _Whims and Oddities_:-- + +[Illustration: "Very deaf indeed."] + +"Unmeaning joy around appears..." I have not found this.] + + + +LETTER 395 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +June 1st, 1826. + +Dear Coleridge,--If I know myself, nobody more detests the display of +personal vanity which is implied in the act of sitting for one's picture +than myself. But the fact is, that the likeness which accompanies this +letter was stolen from my person at one of my unguarded moments by some +too partial artist, and my friends are pleased to think that he has not +much flattered me. Whatever its merits may be, you, who have so great an +interest in the original, will have a satisfaction in tracing the +features of one that has so long esteemed you. There are times when in a +friend's absence these graphic representations of him almost seem to +bring back the man himself. The painter, whoever he was, seems to have +taken me in one of those disengaged moments, if I may so term them, when +the native character is so much more honestly displayed than can be +possible in the restraints of an enforced sitting attitude. Perhaps it +rather describes me as a thinking man than a man in the act of thought. +Whatever its pretensions, I know it will be dear to you, towards whom I +should wish my thoughts to flow in a sort of an undress rather than in +the more studied graces of diction. + + I am, dear Coleridge, yours sincerely, C. LAMB. + + +[The portrait to which Lamb refers will be found opposite page 706 in my +large edition. It was etched by Brook Pulham of the India House. It was +this picture which so enraged Procter when he saw it in a printshop +(probably that referred to by Lamb in a later letter) that he +reprimanded the dealer. + +Here should come a charming letter to Louisa Holcroft dated June, +offering her a room at Enfield "pretty cheap, only two smiles a week."] + + + +LETTER 396 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +Friday, someday in June, 1826. [P.M. June 30, 1826.] + +Dear D.--My first impulse upon opening your letter was pleasure at +seeing your old neat hand, nine parts gentlemanly, with a modest dash of +the clerical: my second a Thought, natural enough this hot weather, Am I +to answer all this? why 'tis as long as those to the Ephesians and +Galatians put together--I have counted the words for curiosity. But then +Paul has nothing like the fun which is ebullient all over yours. I don't +remember a good thing (good like yours) from the 1st Romans to the last +of the Hebrews. I remember but one Pun in all the Evangely, and that was +made by his and our master: Thou art Peter (that is Doctor Rock) and +upon this rock will I build &c.; which sanctifies Punning with me +against all gainsayers. I never knew an enemy to puns, who was not an +ill-natured man. + +Your fair critic in the coach reminds me of a Scotchman who assured me +that he did not see much in Shakspeare. I replied, I dare say _not_. He +felt the equivoke, lookd awkward, and reddish, but soon returnd to the +attack, by saying that he thought Burns was as good as Shakspeare: I +said that I had no doubt he was--to a _Scotchman_. We exchangd no more +words that day.--Your account of the fierce faces in the Hanging, with +the presumed interlocution of the Eagle and the Tyger, amused us +greatly. You cannot be so very bad, while you can pick mirth off from +rotten walls. But let me hear you have escaped out of your oven. May the +Form of the Fourth Person who clapt invisible wet blankets about the +shoulders of Shadrach Meshach and Abednego, be with you in the fiery +Trial. But get out of the frying pan. Your business, I take it, is +bathing, not baking. + +Let me hear that you have clamber'd up to Lover's Seat; it is as fine in +that neighbourhood as Juan Fernandez, as lonely too, when the Fishing +boats are not out; I have sat for hours, staring upon a shipless sea. +The salt sea is never so grand as when it is left to itself. One +cock-boat spoils it. A sea-mew or two improves it. And go to the little +church, which is a very protestant Loretto, and seems dropt by some +angel for the use of a hermit, who was at once parishioner and a whole +parish. It is not too big. Go in the night, bring it away in your +portmanteau, and I will plant it in my garden. It must have been erected +in the very infancy of British Christianity, for the two or three first +converts; yet hath it all the appertenances of a church of the first +magnitude, its pulpit, its pews, its baptismal font; a cathedral in a +nutshell. Seven people would crowd it like a Caledonian Chapel. The +minister that divides the word there, must give lumping penny-worths. It +is built to the text of two or three assembled in my name. It reminds me +of the grain of mustard seed. If the glebe land is proportionate, it may +yield two potatoes. Tythes out of it could be no more split than a hair. +Its First fruits must be its Last, for 'twould never produce a couple. +It is truly the strait and narrow way, and few there be (of London +visitants) that find it. The still small voice is surely to be found +there, if any where. A sounding board is merely there for ceremony. It +is secure from earthquakes, not more from sanctity than size, for +'twould feel a mountain thrown upon it no more than a taper-worm would. +Go and see, but not without your spectacles. By the way, there's a +capital farm house two thirds of the way to the Lover's Seat, with +incomparable plum cake, ginger beer, etc. Mary bids me warn you not to +read the Anatomy of Melancholy in your present _low way_. You'll fancy +yourself a pipkin, or a headless bear, as Burton speaks of. You'll be +lost in a maze of remedies for a labyrinth of diseasements, a plethora +of cures. Read Fletcher; above all the Spanish Curate, the Thief or +Little Nightwalker, the Wit Without Money, and the Lover's Pilgrimage. +Laugh and come home fat. Neither do we think Sir T. Browne quite the +thing for you just at present. Fletcher is as light as Soda water. +Browne and Burton are too strong potions for an Invalid. And don't thumb +or dirt the books. Take care of the bindings. Lay a leaf of silver paper +under 'em, as you read them. And don't smoke tobacco over 'em, the +leaves will fall in and burn or dirty their namesakes. If you find any +dusty atoms of the Indian Weed crumbled up in the Beaum't and Fletcher, +they are _mine_. But then, you know, so is the Folio also. A pipe and a +comedy of Fletcher's the last thing of a night is the best recipe for +light dreams and to scatter away Nightmares. Probatum est. But do as you +like about the former. Only cut the Baker's. You will come home else all +crust; Rankings must chip you before you can appear in his counting +house. And my dear Peter Fin Junr., do contrive to see the sea at least +once before you return. You'll be ask'd about it in the Old Jewry. It +will appear singular not to have seen it. And rub up your Muse, the +family Muse, and send us a rhyme or so. Don't waste your wit upon that +damn'd Dry Salter. I never knew but one Dry Salter, who could relish +those mellow effusions, and he broke. You knew Tommy Hill, the wettest +of dry salters. Dry Salters, what a word for this thirsty weather! I +must drink after it. Here's to thee, my dear Dibdin, and to our having +you again snug and well at Colebrooke. But our nearest hopes are to hear +again from you shortly. An epistle only a quarter as agreeable as your +last, would be a treat. + + Yours most truly C. LAMB + +Timothy B. Dibdin, Esq., No. 9, Blucher Row, Priory, Hastings. + + +[Dibdin, who was in delicate health, had gone to Hastings to recruit, +with a parcel of Lamb's books for company. He seems to have been lodged +above the oven at a baker's. This letter contains Lamb's crowning +description of Hollingdon Rural church. + +"A Caledonian Chapel." Referring to the crowds that listened to Irving. + +"Peter Fin." A character in Jones' "Peter Finn's Trip to Brighton," +1822, as played by Liston. + +"Tommy Hill." In the British Museum is preserved the following brief +note addressed to Mr. Thomas Hill--probably the same. The date is +between 1809 and 1817:--] + + + +LETTER 397 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HILL + +D'r Sir It is necessary _I see you sign_, can you step up to me 4 Inner +Temple Lane this evening. I shall wait at home. + +Yours, + +C. LAMB. + + +[I have no notion to what the note refers. It is quite likely, Mr. J.A. +Rutter suggests, that Hill the drysalter, a famous busy-body, and a +friend of Theodore Hook, stood for the portrait of Tom Pry in Lamb's +"Lepus Papers" (see Vol. I.). S.C. Hall, in his _Book of Memories_, says +of Hill that "his peculiar faculty was to find out what everybody did, +from a minister of state to a stableboy."] + + + +LETTER 398 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. July 14, 1826.] + + Because you boast poetic Grandsire, + And rhyming kin, both Uncle and Sire, + Dost think that none but _their_ Descendings + Can tickle folks with double endings? + I had a Dad, that would for half a bet + Have put down thine thro' half the Alphabet. + Thou, who would be Dan Prior the second, + For Dan Posterior must be reckon'd. + In faith, dear Tim, your rhymes are slovenly, + As a man may say, dough-baked and ovenly; + Tedious and long as two Long Acres, + And smell most vilely of the Baker's. + (I have been cursing every limb o' thee, + Because I could not hitch in _Timothy_. + Jack, Will, Tom, Dick's, a serious evil, + But Tim, plain Tim's--the very devil.) + Thou most incorrigible scribbler, + Right Watering place and cockney dribbler, + What _child_, that barely understands _A, + B, C_, would ever dream that Stanza + Would tinkle into rhyme with "Plan, Sir"? + Go, go, you are not worth an answer. + I had a Sire, that at plain Crambo + Had hit you o'er the pate a damn'd blow. + How now? may I die game, and you die brass, + But I have stol'n a quip from Hudibras. + 'Twas thinking on that fine old Suttler, } + That was in faith a second Butler; } + Mad as queer rhymes as he, and subtler. } + He would have put you to 't this weather + For rattling syllables together; + Rhym'd you to death, like "rats in Ireland," + Except that he was born in High'r Land. + His chimes, not crampt like thine, and rung ill, + Had made Job split his sides on dunghill. + There was no limit to his merryings + At christ'nings, weddings, nay at buryings. + No undertaker would live near him, + Those grave practitioners did fear him; + Mutes, at his merry mops, turned "vocal." + And fellows, hired for silence, "spoke all." + No _body_ could be laid in cavity, + Long as he lived, with proper gravity. + His mirth-fraught eye had but to glitter, + And every mourner round must titter. + The Parson, prating of Mount Hermon, + Stood still to laugh, in midst of sermon. + The final Sexton (smile he _must_ for him) + Could hardly get to "dust to dust" for him. + He lost three pall-bearers their livelyhood, + Only with simp'ring at his lively mood: + Provided that they fresh and neat came, + All jests were fish that to his net came. + He'd banter Apostolic castings, + As you jeer fishermen at Hastings. + When the fly bit, _like me_, he leapt-o'er-all, + And stood not much on what was scriptural. + +P.S. + + I had forgot, at Small Bohemia + (Enquire the way of your maid Euphemia) + Are sojourning, of all good fellows + The prince and princess,--the _Novellos_-- + Pray seek 'em out, and give my love to 'em; + You'll find you'll soon be hand and glove to 'em. + +In prose, Little Bohemia, about a mile from Hastings in the Hollington +road, when you can get so far. Dear Dib, I find relief in a word or two +of prose. In truth my rhymes come slow. You have "routh of 'em." It +gives us pleasure to find you keep your good spirits. Your Letter did us +good. Pray heaven you are got out at last. Write quickly. + +This letter will introduce you, if 'tis agreeable. Take a donkey. 'Tis +Novello the Composer and his Wife, our very good friends. + +C.L. + + +[Dibdin must have sent the verses which Lamb asked for in the previous +letter, and this is Lamb's reply. Pride of ancestry seems to have been +the note of Dibdin's effort. Probably there is a certain amount of truth +in Lamb's account of the resolute merriment of his father. It is not +inconsistent with his description of Lovel in the _Elia_ essay "The Old +Benchers of the Inner Temple." + +"I have stol'n a quip." The manner rather than the precise matter, I +think. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to the Rev. Edward Coleridge, +Coleridge's nephew, dated July 19, 1826. It thanks the recipient for his +kindness to the child of a friend of Lamb's, Samuel Anthony Bloxam, +Coleridge having assisted in getting Frederick Bloxam into Eton (where +he was a master) on the foundation. Samuel Bloxam and Lamb were at +Christ's Hospital together.] + + + +LETTER 399 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[P.M. September 6, 1826.] + +My dear Wordsworth, The Bearer of this is my young friend Moxon, a +young lad with a Yorkshire head, and a heart that would do honour to a +more Southern county: no offence to Westmoreland. He is one of Longman's +best hands, and can give you the best account of The Trade as 'tis now +going; or stopping. For my part, the failure of a Bookseller is not the +most unpalatable accident of mortality: + + sad but not saddest + The desolation of a hostile city. + +When Constable fell from heaven, and we all hoped Baldwin was next, I +tuned a slight stave to the words in Macbeth (D'avenant's) to be sung by +a Chorus of Authors, + + What should we do when Booksellers break? + We should rejoyce. + +Moxon is but a tradesman in the bud yet, and retains his virgin Honesty; +Esto perpetua, for he is a friendly serviceable fellow, and thinks +nothing of lugging up a Cargo of the Newest Novels once or twice a week +from the Row to Colebrooke to gratify my Sister's passion for the newest +things. He is her Bodley. He is author besides of a poem which for a +first attempt is promising. It is made up of common images, and yet +contrives to read originally. You see the writer felt all he pours +forth, and has not palmed upon you expressions which he did not believe +at the time to be more his own than adoptive. Rogers has paid him some +proper compliments, with sound advice intermixed, upon a slight +introduction of him by me; for which I feel obliged. Moxon has +petition'd me by letter (for he had not the confidence to ask it in +London) to introduce him to you during his holydays; pray pat him on the +head, ask him a civil question or two about his verses, and favor him +with your genuine autograph. He shall not be further troublesome. I +think I have not sent any one upon a gaping mission to you a good while. +We are all well, and I have at last broke the bonds of business a second +time, never to put 'em on again. I pitch Colburn and his magazine to the +divil. I find I can live without the necessity of writing, tho' last +year I fretted myself to a fever with the hauntings of being starved. +Those vapours are flown. All the difference I find is that I have no +pocket money: that is, I must not pry upon an old book stall, and cull +its contents as heretofore, but shoulders of mutton, Whitbread's entire, +and Booth's best, abound as formerly. + +I don't know whom or how many to send our love to, your household is so +frequently divided, but a general health to all that may be fixed or +wandering; stars, wherever. We read with pleasure some success (I forget +quite what) of one of you at Oxford. Mrs. Monkhouse (... was one of you) +sent us a kind letter some [months back], and we had the pleasure to +[see] her in tolerable spirits, looking well and kind as in by-gone +days. + +Do take pen, or put it into goodnatured hands Dorothean +or Wordsworthian-female, or Hutchinsonian, to inform us of +your present state, or possible proceedings. I am ashamed +that this breaking of the long ice should be a letter of business. +There is none circum praecordia nostra I swear by the honesty +of pedantry, that wil I nil I pushes me upon scraps of Latin. +We are yours cordially: CHAS. & MARY LAMB. + +September. 1826. + + +[In this letter, the first to Wordsworth for many months, we have the +first mention of Edward Moxon, who was to be so closely associated with +Lamb in the years to come. Moxon, a young Yorkshireman, educated at the +Green Coat School, was then nearly twenty-five, and was already author +of _The Prospect and other Poems_, dedicated to Rogers, who was destined +to be a valuable patron. Moxon subsequently became Wordsworth's +publisher. + +"Constable ... Baldwin." Archibald Constable & Co., Scott's publishers, +failed in 1826. Baldwin was the first publisher of the _London +Magazine_. + +"I pitch Colburn and his magazine." Lamb wrote nothing in the _New +Monthly Magazine_ after September, 1826. + +I append portions of what seems to be Lamb's first letter to Edward +Moxon, obviously written before this date, but not out of place here. +The letter seems to have accompanied the proof of an article on Lamb +which he had corrected and was returning to Moxon.] + + + +LETTER 400 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +(_Fragment_) + +Were my own feelings consulted I should print it verbatim, but I won't +hoax you, else I love a Lye. My biography, parentage, place of birth, is +a strange mistake, part founded on some nonsense I wrote about Elia, and +was true of him, the real Elia, whose name I took.... C.L. was born in +Crown Office Row, Inner Temple in 1775. Admitted into Christs Hospital, +1782, where he was contemporary with T.F.M. [Thomas Fanshawe Middleton], +afterwards Bishop of Calcutta, and with S.T.C. with the last of these +two eminent scholars he has enjoyed an intimacy through life. On +quitting this foundation he became a junior clerk in the South Sea House +under his Elder Brother who died accountant there some years since.... I +am not the author of the Opium Eater, &c. + + +[I have not succeeded in finding the article in question.] + + + +LETTER 401 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. September 9, 1826.] + +An answer is requested. + +Saturday. + +Dear D.--I have observed that a Letter is never more acceptable than +when received upon a rainy day, especially a rainy Sunday; which moves +me to send you somewhat, however short. This will find you sitting after +Breakfast, which you will have prolonged as far as you can with +consistency to the poor handmaid that has the reversion of the Tea +Leaves; making two nibbles of your last morsel of _stale_ roll (you +cannot have hot new ones on the Sabbath), and reluctantly coming to an +end, because when that is done, what can you do till dinner? You cannot +go to the Beach, for the rain is drowning the sea, turning rank Thetis +fresh, taking the brine out of Neptune's pickles, while mermaids sit +upon rocks with umbrellas, their ivory combs sheathed for spoiling in +the wet of waters foreign to them. You cannot go to the library, for +it's shut. You are not religious enough to go to church. O it is worth +while to cultivate piety to the gods, to have something to fill the +heart up on a wet Sunday! You cannot cast accounts, for your ledger is +being eaten up with moths in the Ancient Jewry. You cannot play at +draughts, for there is none to play with you, and besides there is not a +draught board in the house. You cannot go to market, for it closed last +night. You cannot look in to the shops, their backs are shut upon you. +You cannot read the Bible, for it is not good reading for the sick and +the hypochondriacal. You cannot while away an hour with a friend, for +you have no friend round that Wrekin. You cannot divert yourself with a +stray acquaintance, for you have picked none up. You cannot bear the +chiming of Bells, for they invite you to a banquet, where you are no +visitant. You cannot cheer yourself with the prospect of a tomorrow's +letter, for none come on Mondays. You cannot count those endless vials +on the mantlepiece with any hope of making a variation in their numbers. +You have counted your spiders: your Bastile is exhausted. You sit and +deliberately curse your hard exile from all familiar sights and sounds. +Old Ranking poking in his head unexpectedly would just now be as good to +you as Grimaldi. Any thing to deliver you from this intolerable weight +of Ennui. You are too ill to shake it off: not ill enough to submit to +it, and to lie down as a lamb under it. The Tyranny of Sickness is +nothing to the Cruelty of Convalescence: 'tis to have Thirty Tyrants for +one. That pattering rain drops on your brain. You'll be worse after +dinner, for you must dine at one to-day, that Betty may go to afternoon +service. She insists upon having her chopped hay. And then when she goes +out, who _was_ something to you, something to speak to--what an +interminable afternoon you'll have to go thro'. You can't break yourself +from your locality: you cannot say "Tomorrow morning I set off for +Banstead, by God": for you are book'd for Wednesday. Foreseeing this, I +thought a _cheerful letter_ would come in opportunely. If any of the +little topics for mirth I have thought upon should serve you in this +utter extinguishment of sunshine, to make you a little merry, I shall +have had my ends. I love to make things comfortable. [_Here is an +erasure._] This, which is scratch'd out was the most material thing I +had to say, but on maturer thoughts I defer it. + +P.S.--We are just sitting down to dinner with a pleasant party, +Coleridge, Reynolds the dramatist, and Sam Bloxam: to-morrow (that is, +to_day_), Liston, and Wyat of the Wells, dine with us. May this find you +as jolly and freakish as we mean to be. + +C. LAMB. + + +[Addressed to "T. Dibdin Esq're. No. 4 Meadow Cottages, Hastings, +Sussex." + +"You have counted your spiders." Referring, I suppose, to Paul +Pellisson-Fontanier, the academician, and a famous prisoner in the +Bastille, who trained a spider to eat flies from his hand. + +"Grimaldi"--Joseph Grimaldi, the clown. Ranking was one of Dibdin's +employers. + +"A pleasant party." Reynolds, the dramatist, would be Frederic Reynolds +(1764-1841); Bloxam we have just met; and Wyat of the Wells was a comic +singer and utility actor at Sadler's Wells. + +Canon Ainger remarks that as a matter of fact Dibdin was a religious +youth.] + + + +LETTER 402 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. September 26, 1826.] + +Dear B.B.--I don't know why I have delay'd so long writing. 'Twas a +fault. The under current of excuse to my mind was that I had heard of +the Vessel in which Mitford's jars were to come; that it had been +obliged to put into Batavia to refit (which accounts for its delay) but +was daily expectated. Days are past, and it comes not, and the mermaids +may be drinking their Tea out of his China for ought I know; but let's +hope not. In the meantime I have paid £28, etc., for the freight and +prime cost, (which I a little expected he would have settled in London.) +But do not mention it. I was enabled to do it by a receipt of £30 from +Colburn, with whom however I have done. I should else have run short. +For I just make ends meet. We will wait the arrival of the Trinkets, and +to ascertain their full expence, and then bring in the bill. (Don't +mention it, for I daresay 'twas mere thoughtlessness.) + +I am sorry you and yours have any plagues about dross matters. I have +been sadly puzzled at the defalcation of more than one third of my +income, out of which when entire I saved nothing. But cropping off wine, +old books, &c. and in short all that can be call'd pocket money, I hope +to be able to go on at the Cottage. Remember, I beg you not to say +anything to Mitford, for if he be honest it will vex him: if not, which +I as little expect as that you should [not] be, I have a hank still upon +the JARS. + +Colburn had something of mine in last month, which he has had in hand +these 7 months, and had lost, or cou'dnt find room for: I was used to +different treatment in the London, and have forsworn Periodicals. + +I am going thro' a course of reading at the Museum: the Garrick plays, +out of part of which I formed my Specimens: I have Two Thousand to go +thro'; and in a few weeks have despatch'd the tythe of 'em. It is a sort +of Office to me; hours, 10 to 4, the same. It does me good. Man must +have regular occupation, that has been used to it. So A.K. keeps a +School! She teaches nothing wrong, I'll answer for't. I have a Dutch +print of a Schoolmistress; little old-fashioned Fleminglings, with only +one face among them. She a Princess of Schoolmistress, wielding a rod +for form more than use; the scene an old monastic chapel, with a Madonna +over her head, looking just as serious, as thoughtful, as pure, as +gentle, as herself. Tis a type of thy friend. + +Will you pardon my neglect? Mind, again I say, don't shew this to M.; +let me wait a little longer to know the event of his Luxuries. (I am +sure he is a good fellow, tho' I made a serious Yorkshire Lad, who met +him, stare when I said he was a Clergyman. He is a pleasant Layman +spoiled.) Heaven send him his jars uncrack'd, and me my---- Yours with +kindest wishes to your daughter and friend, in which Mary joins + +C.L. + + +["I saved nothing." Lamb, however, according to Procter, left £2000 at +his death eight years later. He must have saved £200 a year from his +pension of £441, living at the rate of £241 per annum, plus small +earnings, for the rest of his life, and investing the £200 at 5 per +cent, compound interest. + +"Colburn had something of mine." The Popular Fallacy "That a Deformed +Person is a Lord," not included by Lamb with the others when he +reprinted them. Printed in Vol. I. of this edition. + +"Reading at the Museum." Lamb had begun to visit the Museum every day to +collect extracts from the Garrick plays for Hone's _Table Book_, 1827. + +"A.K."--Anne Knight again. + +The pleasant Yorkshire lad whom Mitford's secular air surprised was +probably Moxon. + +Here might come a business letter, from Lamb to Barton, preserved in the +British Museum, relating to Mitford's jars.] + + + +LETTER 403 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? Sept., 1826.] + +I have had much trouble to find Field to-day. No matter. He was packing +up for out of town. He has writ a handsomest letter, which you will +transmit to Murry with your proof-sheets. Seal it.-- + +Yours C. L----. + +Mrs. Hood will drink tea with us on Thursday at 1/2 past 5 _at Latest_. + +N.B. I have lost my Museum reading today: a day with Titus: owing to +your dam'd bisness.--I am the last to reproach anybody. I scorn it. + +If you shall have the whole book ready soon, it will be best for Murry +to see. + + +[I am not clear as to what proof-sheets of Moxon's Lamb refers. His +second book, _Christmas_, 1829, was issued through Hurst, Chance & Co. + +Barton Field and John Murray were friends. + +"A day with Titus." Can this (a friend suggests) have any connection +with the phrase _Amici! diem perdidi?_ There is no Titus play among the +Garrick Extracts.] + + + +LETTER 404 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[No postmark or date. Soon after preceding letter to Barton. 1826.] + +Dear B.B.--the _Busy Bee_, as Hood after Dr. Watts apostrophises thee, +and well dost thou deserve it for thy labors in the Muses' gardens, +wandering over parterres of Think-on-me's and Forget-me-nots, to a total +impossibility of forgetting thee,--thy letter was acceptable, thy +scruples may be dismissed, thou art Rectus in Curiâ, not a word more to +be said, Verbum Sapienti and so forth, the matter is decided with a +white stone, Classically, mark me, and the apparitions vanishd which +haunted me, only the Cramp, Caliban's distemper, clawing me in the +calvish part of my nature, makes me ever and anon roar Bullishly, squeak +cowardishly, and limp cripple-ishly. Do I write quakerly and simply, +'tis my most Master Mathew-like intention to do it. See Ben Jonson.--I +think you told me your acquaint'ce with the Drama was confin'd to +Shakspeare and Miss Bailly: some read only Milton and Croly. The gap is +as from an ananas to a Turnip. I have fighting in my head the plots +characters situations and sentiments of 400 old Plays (bran new to me) +which I have been digesting at the Museum, and my appetite sharpens to +twice as many more, which I mean to course over this winter. I can +scarce avoid Dialogue fashion in this letter. I soliloquise my +meditations, and habitually speak dramatic blank verse without meaning +it. Do you see Mitford? he will tell you something of my labors. Tell +him I am sorry to have mist seeing him, to have talk'd over those OLD +TREASURES. I am still more sorry for his missing Pots. But I shall be +sure of the earliest intelligence of the Lost Tribes. His Sacred +Specimens are a thankful addition to my shelves. Marry, I could wish he +had been more careful of corrigenda. I have discover'd certain which +have slipt his Errata. I put 'em in the next page, as perhaps thou canst +transmit them to him. For what purpose, but to grieve him (which yet I +should be sorry to do), but then it shews my learning, and the excuse is +complimentary, as it implies their correction in a future Edition. His +own things in the book are magnificent, and as an old Christ's +Hospitaller I was particularly refreshd with his eulogy on our Edward. +Many of the choice excerpta were new to me. Old Christmas is a coming, +to the confusion of Puritans, Muggletonians, Anabaptists, Quakers, and +that Unwassailing Crew. He cometh not with his wonted gait, he is shrunk +9 inches in the girth, but is yet a Lusty fellow. Hood's book is mighty +clever, and went off 600 copies the 1st day. Sion's Songs do not +disperse so quickly. The next leaf is for Rev'd J.M. In this ADIEU thine +briefly in a tall friendship C. LAMB. + + +[Barton's letter, to which this is an answer, not being preserved, we do +not know what his scruples were. B.B. was a great contributor to +annuals. + +"With a white stone." In trials at law a white stone was cast as a vote +for acquittal, a black stone for condemnation (see Ovid, +_Metamorphoses_, 15, 41). + +"Master Mathew"--in Ben Jonson's "Every Man in His Humour." + +"Croly"--the Rev. George Croly (1780-1860), of the _Literary Gazette_, +author of _The Angel of the World_ and other pretentious poems. + +"Mitford's Sacred Specimens"--_Sacred Specimens Selected from the Early +English Poets_, 1827. The last poem, by Mitford himself, was "Lines +Written under the Portrait of Edward VI." + +"Hood's book"--_Whims and Oddities_, second series, 1827. + +Here should come a note to Allsop stating that Lamb is "near killed with +Christmassing."] + + + +LETTER 405 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +Colebrooke Row, Islington, + +Saturday, 20th Jan., 1827. + +Dear Robinson,--I called upon you this morning, and found that you were +gone to visit a dying friend. I had been upon a like errand. Poor Norris +has been lying dying for now almost a week, such is the penalty we pay +for having enjoyed a strong constitution! Whether he knew me or not, I +know not, or whether he saw me through his poor glazed eyes; but the +group I saw about him I shall not forget. Upon the bed, or about it, +were assembled his wife and two daughters, and poor deaf Richard, his +son, looking doubly stupified. There they were, and seemed to have been +sitting all the week. I could only reach out a hand to Mrs. Norris. +Speaking was impossible in that mute chamber. By this time I hope it is +all over with him. In him I have a loss the world cannot make up. He was +my friend and my father's friend all the life I can remember. I seem to +have made foolish friendships ever since. Those are friendships which +outlive a second generation. Old as I am waxing, in his eyes I was still +the child he first knew me. To the last he called me Charley. I have +none to call me Charley now. He was the last link that bound me to the +Temple. You are but of yesterday. In him seem to have died the old +plainness of manners and singleness of heart. Letters he knew nothing +of, nor did his reading extend beyond the pages of the "Gentleman's +Magazine." Yet there was a pride of literature about him from being +amongst books (he was librarian), and from some scraps of doubtful Latin +which he had picked up in his office of entering students, that gave him +very diverting airs of pedantry. Can I forget the erudite look with +which, when he had been in vain trying to make out a black-letter text +of Chaucer in the Temple Library, he laid it down and told me that--"in +those old books, Charley, there is sometimes a deal of very indifferent +spelling;" and seemed to console himself in the reflection! His jokes, +for he had his jokes, are now ended, but they were old trusty +perennials, staples that pleased after _decies repetita_, and were +always as good as new. One song he had, which was reserved for the night +of Christmas-day, which we always spent in the Temple. It was an old +thing, and spoke of the flat bottoms of our foes and the possibility of +their coming over in darkness, and alluded to threats of an invasion +many years blown over; and when he came to the part + + "We'll still make 'em run, and we'll still make 'em sweat, + In spite of the devil and Brussels Gazette!" + +his eyes would sparkle as with the freshness of an impending event. And +what is the "Brussels Gazette" now? I cry while I enumerate these +trifles. "How shall we tell them in a stranger's ear?" His poor good +girls will now have to receive their afflicted mother in an inaccessible +hovel in an obscure village in Herts, where they have been long +struggling to make a school without effect; and poor deaf Richard--and +the more helpless for being so--is thrown on the wide world. + +My first motive in writing, and, indeed, in calling on you, was to ask +if you were enough acquainted with any of the Benchers, to lay a plain +statement before them of the circumstances of the family. I almost fear +not, for you are of another hall. But if you can oblige me and my poor +friend, who is now insensible to any favours, pray exert yourself. You +cannot say too much good of poor Norris and his poor wife. + + Yours ever, CHARLES LAMB. + + +[This letter, describing the death of Randal Norris, Sub-Treasurer and +Librarian of the Inner Temple, was printed with only very slight +alterations in Hone's _Table Book_, 1827, and again in the _Last Essays +of Elia_, 1833, under the title "A Death-Bed." It was, however, taken +out of the second edition, and "Confessions of a Drunkard" substituted, +in deference to the wishes of Norris's family. Mrs. Norris, as I have +said, was a native of Widford, where she had known Mrs. Field, Lamb's +grandmother. With her son Richard, who was deaf and peculiar, Mrs. +Norris moved to Widford again, where the daughters, Miss Betsy and Miss +Jane, had opened a school--Goddard House; which they retained until a +legacy restored the family prosperity. Soon after that they both +married, each a farmer named Tween. They survived until quite recently. + +Mrs. Coe, an old scholar at the Misses Morris's school in the twenties, +gave me, in 1902, some reminiscences of those days, from which I quote a +passage or so:-- + + When he joined the Norrises' dinner-table he kept every one + laughing. Mr. Richard sat at one end, and some of the school + children would be there too. One day Mr. Lamb gave every one a fancy + name all round the table, and made a verse on each. "You are + so-and-so," he said, "and you are so-and-so," adding the rhyme. + "What's he saying? What are you laughing at?" Mr. Richard asked + testily, for he was short-tempered. Miss Betsy explained the joke to + him, and Mr. Lamb, coming to his turn, said--only he said it in + verse--"Now, Dick, it's your turn. I shall call you Gruborum; + because all you think of is your food and your stomach." Mr. Richard + pushed back his chair in a rage and stamped out of the room. "Now + I've done it," said Mr. Lamb: "I must go and make friends with my + old chum. Give me a large plate of pudding to take to him." When he + came back he said, "It's all right. I thought the pudding would do + it." Mr. Lamb and Mr. Richard never got on very well, and Mr. + Richard didn't like his teasing ways at all; but Mr. Lamb often went + for long walks with him, because no one else would. He did many kind + things like that. + + There used to be a half-holiday when Mr. Lamb came, partly because + he would force his way into the schoolroom and make seriousness + impossible. His head would suddenly appear at the door in the midst + of lessons, with "Well, Betsy! How do, Jane?" "O, Mr. Lamb!" they + would say, and that was the end of work for that day. He was really + rather naughty with the children. One of his tricks was to teach + them a new kind of catechism (Mrs. Coe does not remember it, but we + may rest assured, I fear, that it was secular), and he made a great + fuss with Lizzie Hunt for her skill in saying the Lord's Prayer + backwards, which he had taught her. + +"We'll still make 'em run..." Garrick's "Hearts of Oak," sung in +"Harlequin's Invasion." + +"How shall we tell them in a stranger's ear?" A quotation from Lamb +himself, in the lines "Written soon after the Preceding Poem," in 1798 +(see Vol. IV.).] + + + +LETTER 406 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[No date. Jan. 20, 1827.] + +Dear R.N. is dead. I have writ as nearly as I could to look like a +letter meant for _your eye only_. Will it do? + +Could you distantly hint (do as your own judgment suggests) that if his +son could be got in as Clerk to the new Subtreasurer, it would be all +his father wish'd? But I leave that to you. I don't want to put you upon +anything disagreeable. + +Yours thankfully + +C.L. + + +[The reference at the beginning is to the preceding letter, which was +probably enclosed with this note. + +Here should come a note to Allsop dated Jan. 25, 1827, complaining of +the cold.] + + + +LETTER 407 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[Dated by H.C.R. Jan. 29, 1827.] + +Dear Robinson, If you have not seen Mr. Gurney, leave him quite alone +for the present, I have seen Mr. Jekyll, who is as friendly as heart can +desire, he entirely approves of my formula of petition, and gave your +very reasons for the propriety of the "little village of Hertf'shire." +Now, Mr. G. might not approve of it, and then we should clash. Also, Mr. +J. wishes it to be presented next week, and Mr. G. might fix earlier, +which would be aukward. Mr. J. was so civil to me, that I _think it +would be better NOT for you to show him that letter you intended_. +Nothing can increase his zeal in the cause of poor Mr. Norris. Mr. +Gardiner will see you with this, and learn from you all about it, & +consult, if you have seen Mr. G. & he has fixed a time, how to put it +off. Mr. J. is most friendly to the boy: I think you had better not +teaze the Treasurer any more about _him_, as it may make him less +friendly to the Petition + +Yours Ever + +C.L. + + +[Writing to Dorothy Wordsworth on February 13, 1827, Robinson says: "The +Lambs are well. I have been so busy that I have not lately seen them. +Charles has been occupied about the affair of the widow of his old +friend Norris whose death he has felt. But the health of both is good." + +Gurney would probably be John Gurney (afterwards Baron Gurney), the +counsel and judge. Jekyll was Joseph Jekyll, the wit, mentioned by Lamb +in his essay on "The Old Benchers of the Inner Temple." He was a friend +of George Dyer.] + + + +LETTER 408 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[Dated by H.C. R. Jan., 1827.] + +Dear R. do not say any thing to Mr. G. about the day _or_ Petition, for +Mr. Jekyll wishes it to be next week, and thoroughly approves of my +formula, and Mr. G. might not, and then they will clash. Only speak to +him of Gardner's wish to have the Lad. Mr. Jekyll was excessive +friendly. C.L. + + +[The matter referred to is still the Norrises' welfare. Mr. Hazlitt says +that an annuity of £80 was settled by the Inn on Mrs. Norris. + +Here perhaps should come a letter from Lamb to Allsop, printed by Mr. +Fitzgerald, urging Allsop to go to Highgate to see Coleridge and tell +him of the unhappy state of his, Allsop's, affairs. In Crabb Robinson's +_Diary_ for February 1, 1827, I read: "I went to Lamb. Found him in +trouble about his friend Allsop, who is a ruined man. Allsop is a very +good creature who has been a generous friend to Coleridge." Writing of +his troubles in _Letters, Conversations and Recollections of S.T. +Coleridge_, Allsop says: "Charles Lamb, Charles and Mary Lamb, 'union is +partition,' were never wanting in the hour of need."] + + + +LETTER 409 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON + +[March, 1827.] + +Dear Raffaele Haydon,--Did the maid tell you I came to see your picture, +not on Sunday but the day before? I think the face and bearing of the +Bucephalus-tamer very noble, his flesh too effeminate or painty. The +skin of the female's back kneeling is much more carnous. I had small +time to pick out praise or blame, for two lord-like Bucks came in, upon +whose strictures my presence seemed to impose restraint: I plebeian'd +off therefore. + +I think I have hit on a subject for you, but can't swear it was never +executed,--I never heard of its being,--"Chaucer beating a Franciscan +Friar in Fleet Street." Think of the old dresses, houses, &c. "It +seemeth that both these learned men (Gower and Chaucer) were of the +Inner Temple; for not many years since Master Buckley did see a record +in the same house where Geoffry Chaucer was fined two shillings for +beating a Franciscan Friar in Fleet Street." _Chaucer's Life by T. +Speght, prefixed to the black letter folio of Chaucer_, 1598. + + Yours in haste (salt fish waiting), C. LAMB. + + +[Haydon's picture was his "Alexander and Bucephalus." The two Bucks, he +tells us in his _Diary_, were the Duke of Devonshire and Mr. Agar Ellis. +Haydon did not take up the Chaucer subject.] + + + +LETTER 410 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE [No date. April, 1827.] + +Dear H. Never come to our house and not come in. I was quite vex'd. + +Yours truly. C.L. + +There is in Blackwood this month an article MOST AFFECTING indeed called +Le Revenant, and would do more towards abolishing Capital Punishments +than 400000 Romillies or Montagues. I beg you read it and see if you can +extract any of it. _The Trial scene in particular_. + + +[Written on the fourteenth instalment of the Garrick Play extracts. The +article was in _Blackwood_ for April, 1827. Hone took Lamb's advice, and +the extract from it will be found in the _Table Book_, Vol. I., col. +455. + +Lamb was peculiarly interested in the subject of survival after hanging. +He wrote an early _Reflector_ essay, "On the Inconveniences of Being +Hanged," on the subject, and it is the pivot of his farce "The +Pawnbroker's Daughter." + +"Romillies or Montagues." Two prominent advocates for the abolition of +capital punishment were Sir Samuel Romilly (who died in 1818) and Basil +Montagu.] + + + +LETTER 411 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +[No date. May, 1827.] + +Dearest Hood,--Your news has spoil'd us a merry meeting. Miss Kelly and +we were coming, but your letter elicited a flood of tears from Mary, and +I saw she was not fit for a party. God bless you and the mother (or +should be mother) of your sweet girl that should have been. I have won +sexpence of Moxon by the _sex_ of the dear gone one. + +Yours most truly and hers, + +[C.L.] + + +[This note refers to one of the Hoods' children, which was still-born. +It was upon this occasion that Lamb wrote the beautiful lines "On an +Infant Dying as soon as Born" (see Vol. IV.).] + + + +LETTER 412 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[No date. (1827.)] + +My dear B.B.--A gentleman I never saw before brought me your welcome +present--imagine a scraping, fiddling, fidgetting, petit-maitre of a +dancing school advancing into my plain parlour with a coupee and a +sideling bow, and presenting the book as if he had been handing a glass +of lemonade to a young miss--imagine this, and contrast it with the +serious nature of the book presented! Then task your imagination, +reversing this picture, to conceive of quite an opposite messenger, a +lean, straitlocked, wheyfaced methodist, for such was he in reality who +brought it, the Genius (it seems) of the Wesleyan Magazine. Certes, +friend B., thy Widow's tale is too horrible, spite of the lenitives of +Religion, to embody in verse: I hold prose to be the appropriate +expositor of such atrocities! No offence, but it is a cordial that makes +the heart sick. Still thy skill in compounding it I not deny. I turn to +what gave me less mingled pleasure. I find markd with pencil these pages +in thy pretty book, and fear I have been penurious. + + page 52, 53 capital. + page 59 6th stanza exquisite simile. + page 61 11th stanza equally good. + page 108 3d stanza, I long to see van Balen. + page 111 a downright good sonnet. _Dixi_. + page 153 Lines at the bottom. + +So you see, I read, hear, and _mark_, if I don't learn--In short this +little volume is no discredit to any of your former, and betrays none of +the Senility you fear about. Apropos of Van Balen, an artist who painted +me lately had painted a Blackamoor praying, and not filling his canvas, +stuff'd in his little girl aside of Blacky, gaping at him unmeaningly; +and then didn't know what to call it. Now for a picture to be promoted +to the Exhibition (Suffolk Street) as HISTORICAL, a subject is +requisite. What does me? I but christen it the "Young Catechist" and +furbishd it with Dialogue following, which dubb'd it an Historical +Painting. Nothing to a friend at need. + + While this tawny Ethiop prayeth, + Painter, who is She that stayeth + By, with skin of whitest lustre; + Sunny locks, a shining cluster; + Saintlike seeming to direct him + To the Power that must protect him? + Is she of the heav'nborn Three, + Meek Hope, strong Faith, sweet Charity? + Or some Cherub? + + They you mention + Far transcend my weak invention. + 'Tis a simple Christian child, + Missionary young and mild, + From her store of script'ral knowledge + (Bible-taught without a college) + Which by reading she could gather, + Teaches him to say OUR FATHER + To the common Parent, who + Colour not respects nor hue. + White and Black in him have part, + Who looks not to the skin, but heart.-- + +When I'd done it, the Artist (who had clapt in Miss merely as a +fill-space) swore I exprest his full meaning, and the damosel bridled up +into a Missionary's vanity. I like verses to explain Pictures: seldom +Pictures to illustrate Poems. Your wood cut is a rueful Lignum Mortis. +By the by, is the widow likely to marry again? + +I am giving the fruit of my Old Play reading at the Museum to Hone, who +sets forth a Portion weekly in the Table Book. Do you see it? How is +Mitford?-- + +I'll just hint that the Pitcher, the Chord and the Bowl are a little too +often repeated (_passim_) in your Book, and that on page 17 last line +but 4 _him_ is put for _he_, but the poor widow I take it had small +leisure for grammatical niceties. Don't you see there's _He, myself_, +and _him_; why not both _him_? likewise _imperviously_ is cruelly spelt +_imperiously_. These are trifles, and I honestly like your [book,] and +you for giving it, tho' I really am ashamed of so many presents. + +I can think of no news, therefore I will end with mine and Mary's +kindest remembrances to you and yours. C.L. + + +[It has been customary to date this letter December, 1827, but I think +that must be too late. Lamb would never have waited till then to tell +Barton that he was contributing the Garrick Plays to Hone's _Table +Book_, especially as the last instalment was printed in that month. + +Barton's new volume was _A Widow's Tale and Other Poems_, 1827. The +title poem tells how a missionary and his wife were wrecked, and how +after three nights and days of horror she was saved. The woodcut on the +title-page of Barton's book represented the widow supporting her dead or +dying husband in the midst of the storm. + +This is the "exquisite simile" on page 59, from "A Grandsire's Tale":-- + + Though some might deem her pensive, if not sad, + Yet those who knew her better, best could tell + How calmly happy, and how meekly glad + Her quiet heart in its own depths did dwell: + Like to the waters of some crystal well, + In which the stars of heaven at noon are seen. + Fancy might deem on her young spirit fell + Glimpses of light more glorious and serene + Than that of life's brief day, so heavenly was her mien. + +This was the "downright good sonnet":-- + + TO A GRANDMOTHER + + "Old age is dark and unlovely."--Ossian. + + O say not so! A bright old age is thine; + Calm as the gentle light of summer eves, + Ere twilight dim her dusky mantle weaves; + Because to thee is given, in strength's decline, + A heart that does not thanklessly repine + At aught of which the hand of God bereaves, + Yet all He sends with gratitude receives;-- + May such a quiet, thankful close be mine. + And hence thy fire-side chair appears to me + A peaceful throne--which thou wert form'd to fill; + Thy children--ministers, who do thy will; + And those grand-children, sporting round thy knee, + Thy little subjects, looking up to thee, + As one who claims their fond allegiance still. + +And these are the lines at the foot of page 153 in a poem addressed to a +child seven years old:-- + + There is a holy, blest companionship + In the sweet intercourse thus held with those + Whose tear and smile are guileless; from whose lip + The simple dictate of the heart yet flows;-- + Though even in the yet unfolded rose + The worm may lurk, and sin blight blooming youth, + The light born with us long so brightly glows, + That childhood's first deceits seem almost truth, + To life's cold after lie, selfish, and void of ruth. + +Van Balen was the painter of the picture of the "Madonna and Child" +which Mrs. FitzGerald (Edward FitzGerald's mother) had given to Barton +and for which he expressed his thanks in a poem. + +The artist who painted Lamb recently was Henry Meyer (1782?-1847), the +portrait being that which serves as frontispiece to this volume. I give +in my large edition a reproduction of "The Young Catechist," which Meyer +also engraved, with Lamb's verses attached. In 1910 I saw the original +in a picture shop in the Charing Cross Road, now removed.] + + + +LETTER 413 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[No date. End of May, 1827.] + +Dear H. in the forthcoming "New Monthly" are to be verses of mine on a +Picture about Angels. Translate em to the Table-book. I am off for +Enfield. + + Yours. C.L. + + +[Written on the back of the XXI. Garrick Extracts. The poem "Angel Help" +was printed in the _New Monthly Magazine_ for June and copied by Hone in +the _Table-Book_, No. 24, 1827.] + + + +LETTER 414 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[No date. June, 1827.] + +Dear Hone, I should like this in your next book. We +are at Enfield, where (when we have solituded awhile) +we shall be glad to see you. Yours, + +C. LAMB. + + +[This was written on the back of the MS. of "Going or Gone" (see Vol. +IV.), a poem of reminiscences of Lamb's early Widford days, printed in +Hone's _Table-Book_, June, 1827, signed Elia.] + + + +LETTER 415 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +Enfield, and for some weeks to come, "_June 11, 1827_." + +Dear B.B.--One word more of the picture verses, and that for good and +all; pray, with a neat pen alter one line + + His learning seems to lay small stress on + +to + + His learning lays no mighty stress on + +to avoid the unseemly recurrence (ungrammatical also) of "seems" in the +next line, besides the nonsence of "but" there, as it now stands. And I +request you, as a personal favor to me, to erase the last line of all, +which I should never have written from myself. The fact is, it was a +silly joke of Hood's, who gave me the frame, (you judg'd rightly it was +not its own) with the remark that you would like it, because it was b--d +b--d,--and I lugg'd it in: but I shall be quite hurt if it stands, +because tho' you and yours have too good sense to object to it, I would +not have a sentence of mine seen, that to any foolish ear might sound +unrespectful to thee. Let it end at appalling; the joke is coarse and +useless, and hurts the tone of the rest. Take your best "ivory-handled" +and scrape it forth. + +Your specimen of what you might have written is hardly fair. Had it been +a present to me, I should have taken a more sentimental tone; but of a +trifle from me it was my cue to speak in an underish tone of +commendation. Prudent _givers_ (what a word for such a nothing) +disparage their gifts; 'tis an art we have. So you see you wouldn't have +been so wrong, taking a higher tone. But enough of nothing. + +By the bye, I suspected M. of being the disparager of the frame; hence a +_certain line_. + +For the frame,'tis as the room is, where it hangs. It hung up fronting +my old cobwebby folios and batter'd furniture (the fruit piece has +resum'd its place) and was much better than a spick and span one. But if +your room be very neat and your _other pictures_ bright with gilt, it +should be so too. I can't judge, not having seen: but my dingy study it +suited. + +Martin's Belshazzar (the picture) I have seen. Its architectural effect +is stupendous; but the human figures, the squalling contorted little +antics that are playing at being frightend, like children at a sham +ghost who half know it to be a mask, are detestable. Then the _letters_ +are nothing more than a transparency lighted up, such as a Lord might +order to be lit up, on a sudden at a Xmas Gambol, to scare the ladies. +The _type_ is as plain as Baskervil's--they should have been dim, full +of mystery, letters to the mind rather than the eye.--Rembrandt has +painted only Belshazzar and a courtier or two (taking a part of the +banquet for the whole) not fribbled out a mob of fine folks. Then every +thing is so distinct, to the very necklaces, and that foolish little +prophet. What _one_ point is there of interest? The ideal of such a +subject is, that you the spectator should see nothing but what at the +time you would have seen, the _hand_--and the _King_--not to be at +leisure to make taylor-remarks on the dresses, or Doctor Kitchener-like +to examine the good things at table. + +Just such a confusd piece is his Joshua, fritterd into 1000 fragments, +little armies here, little armies there--you should see only the _Sun_ +and _Joshua_; if I remember, he has not left out that luminary entirely, +but for Joshua, I was ten minutes a finding him out. + +Still he is showy in all that is not the human figure or the +preternatural interest: but the first are below a drawing school girl's +attainment, and the last is a phantasmagoric trick, "Now you shall see +what you shall see, dare is Balshazar and dare is Daniel." You have my +thoughts of M. and so adieu C. LAMB. + + +[Lamb had sent Barton the picture that is reproduced in Vol. V. of my +large edition. Later Lamb had sent the following lines:-- + + When last you left your Woodbridge pretty, + To stare at sights, and see the City, + If I your meaning understood, + You wish'd a Picture, cheap, but good; + The colouring? decent; clear, not muddy; + To suit a Poet's quiet study, + Where Books and Prints for delectation + Hang, rather than vain ostentation. + The subject? what I pleased, if comely; + But something scriptural and homely: + A sober Piece, not gay or wanton, + For winter fire-sides to descant on; + The theme so scrupulously handled, + A Quaker might look on unscandal'd; + Such as might satisfy Ann Knight, + And classic Mitford just not fright. + Just such a one I've found, and send it; + If liked, I give--if not, but lend it. + The moral? nothing can be sounder. + The fable? 'tis its own expounder-- + A Mother teaching to her Chit + Some good book, and explaining it. + He, silly urchin, tired of lesson, + His learning seems to lay small stress on, + But seems to hear not what he hears; + Thrusting his fingers in his ears, + Like Obstinate, that perverse funny one, + In honest parable of Bunyan. + His working Sister, more sedate, + Listens; but in a kind of state, + The painter meant for steadiness; + But has a tinge of sullenness; + And, at first sight, she seems to brook + As ill her needle, as he his book. + This is the Picture. For the Frame-- + 'Tis not ill-suited to the same; + Oak-carved, not gilt, for fear of falling; + Old-fashion'd; plain, yet not appalling; + And broad brimm'd, as the Owner's Calling. + +It was not Obstinate, by the way, who thrust his fingers in his ears, +but Christian. + +"Hence a _certain line_"--line 16, I suppose. + +Martin's "Belshazzar." "Belshazzar's Feast," by John Martin (1789-1854), +had been exhibited for some years and had created an immense impression. +Lamb subjected Martin's work to a minute analysis a few years later (see +the _Elia_ essay on the "Barrenness of the Imaginative Faculty in the +Productions of Modern Art," Vol. II.). Barton did not give up Martin in +consequence of this letter. The frontispiece to his _New Year's Eve_, +1828, is by that painter, and the volume contains eulogistic poems upon +him, one beginning-- + + Boldest painter of our day. + +"Baskervil's"--John Baskerville (1706-1775), the printer, famous for his +folio edition of the Bible, 1763. + +Doctor William Kitchiner--the author of _Apicius Redivious; or, The +Cook's Oracle_, 1817.] + + + +LETTER 416 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. June 26, 1827.] + +Dear H.C. We are at Mrs. Leishman's, Chase, Enfield. Why not come down +by the Green Lanes on Sunday? Picquet all day. Pass the Church, pass the +"Rising Sun," turn sharp round the corner, and we are the 6th or 7th +house on the Chase: tall Elms darken the door. If you set eyes on M. +Burney, bring him. + + Yours truly C. LAMB. + + +[Mrs. Leishman's house, or its successor, is the seventh from the Rising +Sun. It is now on Gentleman's Row, not on Chase Side proper. The house +next it--still, as in Lamb's day, a girl's school--is called Elm House, +but most of the elms which darkened both doors have vanished. It has +been surmised that when later in the year Lamb took an Enfield house in +his own name, he took Mrs. Leishman's; but, as we shall see, his own +house was some little distance from hers.] + + + +LETTER 417 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[No date. Early July, 1827.] + +Dear H., This is Hood's, done from the life, of Mary getting over a +style here. Mary, out of a pleasant revenge, wants you to get it +_engrav'd_ in Table Book to surprise H., who I know will be amus'd with +you so doing. + +Append some observations about the awkwardness of country styles about +Edmonton, and the difficulty of elderly Ladies getting over 'em.---- + +That is to say, if you think the sketch good enough. + +I take on myself the warranty. + +Can you slip down here some day and go a Green-dragoning? C.L. + +Enfield (Mrs. Leishman's, Chase). + +If you do, send Hood the number, No. 2 Robert St., Adelphi, and keep the +sketch for me. + + +["This" was the drawing by Hood. I take it from the _Table-Book_, where +it represents Mrs. Gilpin resting on a stile:-- + +[Illustration] + +Lamb subsequently appended the observations himself. The text of his +little article, changing Mary Lamb into Mrs. Gilpin, was in the late Mr. +Locker-Lampson's collection. The postmark is July 17. 1827.] + + + +LETTER 418 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +Enfield. P.M. July 17, 182[7]. + +Dear M. Thanks for your attentions of every kind. Emma will not fail +Mrs. Hood's kind invitation, but her Aunt is so queer a one, that we +cannot let her go with a single gentleman singly to Vauxhall; she would +withdraw her from us altogether in a fright; but if any of the Hood's +family accompany you, then there can be small objection. + +I have been writing letters till too dark to see the marks. I can just +say we shall be happy to see you any Sunday _after the next_: say, the +Sunday after, and perhaps the Hoods will come too and have a merry other +day, before they go hence. But next Sunday we expect as many as we can +well entertain. + + With ours and Emma's + acknowlgm's + yours + C.L. + + +[The earliest of a long series of letters to Edward Moxon, preserved at +Rowfant by the late Mr. Locker-Lampson, but now in America. Emma Isola's +aunt was Miss Humphreys.] + + + +LETTER 419 + +CHARLES LAMB TO P.G. PATMORE + +[Dated at end: July 19, 1827.] + +Dear P.--I am so poorly! I have been to a funeral, where I made a pun, +to the consternation of the rest of the mourners. And we had wine. I +can't describe to you the howl which the widow set up at proper +intervals. Dash could, for it was not unlike what he makes. + +The letter I sent you was one directed to the care of E. White, India +House, for Mrs. Hazlitt. _Which_ Mrs. Hazlitt I don't yet know, but A. +has taken it to France on speculation. Really it is embarrassing. There +is Mrs. present H., Mrs. late H., and Mrs. John H., and to which of the +three Mrs. Wiggins's it appertains, I don't know. I wanted to open it, +but it's transportation. + +I am sorry you are plagued about your book. I would strongly recommend +you to take for one story Massinger's "Old Law." It is exquisite. I can +think of no other. + +Dash is frightful this morning. He whines and stands up on his hind +legs. He misses Beckey, who is gone to town. I took him to Barnet the +other day, and he couldn't eat his victuals after it. Pray God his +intellectuals be not slipping. + +Mary is gone out for some soles. I suppose 'tis no use to ask you to +come and partake of 'em; else there's a steam-vessel. + +I am doing a tragi-comedy in two acts, and have got on tolerably; but it +will be refused, or worse. I never had luck with anything my name was +put to. + +Oh, I am so poorly! I _waked_ it at my cousin's the bookbinder's, who is +now with God; or, if he is not, it's no fault of mine. + +We hope the Frank wines do not disagree with Mrs. Patmore. By the way, I +like her. + +Did you ever taste frogs? Get them, if you can. They are like little +Lilliput rabbits, only a thought nicer. + +Christ, how sick I am!--not of the world, but of the widow's shrub. +She's sworn under £6000, but I think she perjured herself. She howls in +E _la_, and I comfort her in B flat. You understand music?... + +"No shrimps!" (That's in answer to Mary's question about how the soles +are to be done.) + +I am uncertain where this _wandering_ letter may reach you. What you +mean by Poste Restante, God knows. Do you mean I must pay the postage? +So I do to Dover. + +We had a merry passage with the widow at the Commons. She was +howling--part howling and part giving directions to the proctor--when +crash! down went my sister through a crazy chair, and made the clerks +grin, and I grinned, and the widow tittered--_and then I knew that she +was not inconsolable_. Mary was more frightened than hurt. + +She'd make a good match for anybody (by she, I mean the widow). + + "If he bring but a _relict_ away, + He is happy, nor heard to complain." + +SHENSTONE. + +Procter has got a wen growing out at the nape of his neck, which his +wife wants him to have cut off; but I think it rather an agreeable +excrescence--like his poetry--redundant. Hone has hanged himself for +debt. Godwin was taken up for picking pockets.... Beckey takes to bad +courses. Her father was blown up in a steam machine. The coroner found +it Insanity. I should not like him to sit on my letter. + +Do you observe my direction? Is it Gallic?--Classical? + +Do try and get some frogs. You must ask for "grenouilles" (green-eels). +They don't understand "frogs," though it's a common phrase with us. + +If you go through Bulloign (Boulogne) enquire if old Godfrey is living, +and how he got home from the Crusades. He must be a very old man now. + +If there is anything new in politics or literature in France, keep it +till I see you again, for I'm in no hurry. Chatty-Briant is well I hope. + +I think I have no more news; only give both our loves ("all three," says +Dash) to Mrs. Patmore, and bid her get quite well, as I am at present, +bating qualms, and the grief incident to losing a valuable relation. + +C.L. + +Londres, July 19, 1827. + + +[This is from Patmore's _My Friends and Acquaintances_, 1854; but I have +no confidence in Patmore's transcription. After "picking pockets" should +come, for example, according to other editors, the sentence, "Moxon has +fallen in love with Emma, our nut-brown maid." This is the first we hear +of the circumstance and quite probably Lamb was then exaggerating. As it +happened, however, Moxon and Miss Isola, as we shall see, were married +in 1833. + +We do not know the name of the widow; but her husband was Lamb's cousin, +the bookbinder. + +The doubt about the Hazlitts refers chiefly to William Hazlitt's divorce +from his first wife in 1822, and his remarriage in 1824 with a Mrs. +Bridgewater. + +"Your book." Patmore, in _My Friends and Acquaintances_, writes:-- + +This refers to a series of tales that I was writing, (since published +under the title of _Chatsworth, or the Romance of a Week_.) for the +subject of one of which he had recommended me to take "The Old Law." As +Lamb's critical faculties (as displayed in the celebrated "specimens" +which created an era in the dramatic taste of England) were not +surpassed by those of any writer of his day, the reader may like to see +a few "specimens" of some notes which Lamb took the pains to make on two +of the tales that were shown to him. I give these the rather that there +is occasionally blended with their critical nicety of tact, a drollery +that is very characteristic of the writer. I shall leave these notes and +verbal criticisms to speak for themselves, after merely explaining that +they are written on separate bits of paper, each note having a numerical +reference to that page of the MS. in which occurs the passage commented +on. + +"Besides the words 'riant' and 'Euphrosyne,' the sentence is senseless. +'A sweet sadness' capable of inspiring 'a more _grave joy_'--than +what?--than demonstrations of _mirth_? Odd if it had not been. I had +once a _wry aunt_, which may make me dislike the phrase. + +"'Pleasurable:'--no word is good that is awkward to spell. (Query.) +Welcome or Joyous. + +"'_Steady self-possession_ rather than _undaunted courage_,' etc. The +two things are not opposed enough. You mean, rather than rash fire of +valour in action. + +"'Looking like a heifer,' I fear wont do in prose. (Qy.) 'Like to some +spotless heifer,'--or,'that you might have compared her to some spotless +heifer,' etc.--or 'Like to some sacrificial heifer of old.' I should +prefer, 'garlanded with flowers as for a sacrifice '--and cut the cow +altogether. + +"(Say) 'Like the muttering of some strange spell,'--omitting the +demon,--they are _subject_ to spells, they don't use them. + +"'Feud' here (and before and after) is wrong. (Say) old malice, or, +difference. _Feud_ is of clans. It might be applied to family quarrels, +but is quite improper to individuals falling out. + +"'Apathetic.' Vile word. + +"'Mechanically,' faugh!--insensibly--involuntarily--in-any-thing-ly but +mechanically. + +"Calianax's character should be somewhere briefly _drawn_, not left to +be dramatically inferred. + +"'Surprised and almost vexed while it troubled her.' (Awkward.) Better, +'in a way that while it deeply troubled her, could not but surprise and +vex her to think it should be a source of trouble at all.' + +"'Reaction' is vile slang. 'Physical'--vile word. + +"Decidedly, Dorigen should simply propose to him to remove the rocks as +_ugly_ or _dangerous_, not as affecting her with fears for her husband. +The idea of her husband should be excluded from a promise which is meant +to be _frank_ upon impossible conditions. She cannot promise in one +breath infidelity to him, and make the conditions a good to him. Her +reason for hating the rocks is good, but not to be expressed here. + +"Insert after 'to whatever consequences it might lead,'--'Neither had +Arviragus been disposed to interpose a husband's authority to prevent +the execution of this rash vow, was he unmindful of that older and more +solemn vow which, in the days of their marriage, he had imposed upon +himself, in no instance to control the settled purpose or determination +of his wedded wife;--so that by the chains of a double contract he +seemed bound to abide by her decision in this instance, whatever it +might be.'" + +"A tragi-comedy"--Lamb's dramatic version of Crabbe's "Confidante," +which he called "The Wife's Trial" (see Vol. IV. of this edition). + +"Procter has got a wen." This paragraph must be taken with salt. Poor +Hone, however, had the rules of the King's Bench at the time. Beckey was +the Lambs' servant and tyrant; she had been Hazlitt's. Patmore described +her at some length in his reminiscences of Lamb. + +"Chatty-Briant"--Chateaubriand.] + + + +LETTER 420 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY + +Enfield, July 26th, 1827. + +Dear Mrs. Shelley,--At the risk of throwing away some fine thoughts, I +must write to say how pleased we were with your very kind remembering of +us (who have unkindly run away from all our friends) before you go. +Perhaps you are gone, and then my tropes are wasted. If any piece of +better fortune has lighted upon you than you expected, but less than we +wish you, we are rejoiced. We are here trying to like solitude, but have +scarce enough to justify the experiment. We get some, however. The six +days are our Sabbath; the seventh--why, Cockneys will come for a little +fresh air, and so-- + +But by _your month_, or October at furthest, we hope to see Islington: I +like a giant refreshed with the leaving off of wine, and Mary, pining +for Mr. Moxon's books and Mr. Moxon's society. Then we shall meet. + +I am busy with a farce in two acts, the incidents tragi-comic. I can do +the dialogue _commey fo_: but the damned plot--I believe I must omit it +altogether. The scenes come after one another like geese, not +marshalling like cranes or a Hyde Park review. The story is as simple as +G[eorge] D[yer], and the language plain as his spouse. The characters +are three women to one man; which is one more than laid hold on him in +the "Evangely." I think that prophecy squinted towards my drama. + +I want some Howard Paine to sketch a skeleton of artfully succeeding +scenes through a whole play, as the courses are arranged in a cookery +book: I to find wit, passion, sentiment, character, and the like +trifles: to lay in the dead colours,--I'd Titianesque 'em up: to mark +the channel in a cheek (smooth or furrowed, yours or mine), and where +tears should course I'd draw the waters down: to say where a joke should +come in or a pun be left out: to bring my _personae_ on and off like a +Beau Nash; and I'd Frankenstein them there: to bring three together on +the stage at once; they are so shy with me, that I can get no more than +two; and there they stand till it is the time, without being the season, +to withdraw them. + +I am teaching Emma Latin to qualify her for a superior governess-ship; +which we see no prospect of her getting. 'Tis like feeding a child with +chopped hay from a spoon. Sisyphus--his labours were as nothing to it. + +Actives and passives jostle in her nonsense, till a deponent enters, +like Chaos, more to embroil the fray. Her prepositions are suppositions; +her conjunctions copulative have no connection in them; her concords +disagree; her interjections are purely English "Ah!" and "Oh!" with a +yawn and a gape in the same tongue; and she herself is a lazy, +block-headly supine. As I say to her, ass _in praesenti_ rarely makes a +wise man _in futuro_. + +But I daresay it was so with you when you began Latin, and a good while +after. + +Good-by! Mary's love. + +Yours truly, C. LAMB. + + +[This is the second letter to Mrs. Shelley, _née_ Mary Wollstonecraft +Godwin, the widow of the poet and the author of _Frankenstein_. She had +been living in England since 1823; and in 1826 had issued anonymously +_The Last Man_. That she kept much in touch with the Lambs' affairs we +know by her letters to Leigh Hunt. + +Major Butterworth has kindly supplied me with a copy of her letter to +Mary Lamb which called forth Lamb's reply. It runs thus:-- + +Kentish Town, 22 July, 1827. + +My dear Miss Lamb, + +You have been long at Enfield--I hardly know yet whether you are +returned--and I quit town so very soon that I have not time to--as I +exceedingly wish--call on you before I go. Nevertheless believe (if such +familiar expression be not unmeet from me) that I love you with all my +heart--gratefully and sincerely--and that when I return I shall seek you +with, I hope, not too much zeal--but it will be with great eagerness. + +You will be glad to hear that I have every reason to believe that the +worst of my pecuniary troubles are over--as I am promised a regular tho' +small income from my father-in-law. I mean to be very industrious _on +other accounts_ this summer, so I hope nothing will go very ill with me +or mine. + +I am afraid Miss Kelly will think me dreadfully rude for not having +availed myself of her kind invitation. Will you present my compliments +to her, and say that my embarassments, harassings and distance from town +are the guilty causes of my omission--for which with her leave I will +apologize in person on my return to London. + +All kind and grateful remembrances to Mr. Lamb, he must not forget me +nor like me one atom less than I delight to flatter myself he does now, +when again I come to seize a dinner perforce at your cottage. Percy is +quite well--and is reading with great extacy (_sic_) the Arabian Nights. +I shall return I suppose some one day in September. God bless you. + +Yours affectionately, + +MARY W. SHELLEY. + +_Commey fo_ is Lamb's _comme il faut_. + +"In the 'Evangely.'" If by Evangely he meant Gospel, Lamb was a little +confused here, I think. Probably Isaiah iv. I was in his mind: "and in +that day seven women shall take hold of one man." But he may also have +half remembered Luke xvii. 35. + +"I am teaching Emma Latin." Mary Lamb contributed to _Blackwood's +Magazine_ for June, 1829, the following little poem describing Emma +Isola's difficulties in these lessons:-- + + TO EMMA, LEARNING LATIN, AND DESPONDING + + Droop not, dear Emma, dry those falling tears, + And call up smiles into thy pallid face, + Pallid and care-worn with thy arduous race: + In few brief months thou hast done the work of years. + To young beginnings natural are these fears. + A right good scholar shalt thou one day be, + And that no distant one; when even she, + Who now to thee a star far off appears, + That most rare Latinist, the Northern Maid-- + The language-loving Sarah[1] of the Lake-- + Shall hail thee Sister Linguist. This will make + Thy friends, who now afford thee careful aid, + A recompense most rich for all their pains, + Counting thy acquisitions their best gains. + + +[Footnote 1: Daughter of S.T. Coleridge, Esq.; an accomplished linguist +in the Greek and Latin tongues, and translatress of a History of the +Abipones.] + +A letter to an anonymous correspondent, in the summer of 1827, has an +amusing passage concerning Emma Isola's Latin. Lamb says that they made +Cary laugh by translating "Blast you" into such elegant verbiage as +"Deus afflet tibi." He adds, "How some parsons would have goggled and +what would Hannah More say? I don't like clergymen, but here and there +one. Cary, the Dante Cary, is a model quite as plain as Parson Primrose, +without a shade of silliness." + +On July 21, 1827, is a letter to Mr. Dillon, whom I do not identify, +saying that Lamb has been teaching Emma Isola Latin for the past seven +weeks. + +"Ass _in praesenti_." This was Boyer's joke, at Christ's Hospital (see +Vol. I. of this edition). + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Edward White, of the India House, +dated August 1, 1827, in which Lamb has some pleasantry about paying +postages, and ends by heartily commending White to mind his ledger, and +keep his eye on Mr. Chambers' balances.] + + + +LETTER 421 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. BASIL MONTAGU + +[Summer, 1827.] + +Dear Madam,--I return your List with my name. I should be sorry that any +respect should be going on towards [Clarkson,] and I be left out of the +conspiracy. Otherwise I frankly own that to pillarize a man's good +feelings in his lifetime is not to my taste. Monuments to goodness, even +after death, are equivocal. I turn away from Howard's, I scarce know +why. Goodness blows no trumpet, nor desires to have it blown. We should +be modest for a modest man--as he is for himself. The vanities of +Life--Art, Poetry, Skill military, are subjects for trophies; not the +silent thoughts arising in a good man's mind in lonely places. Was I +C[larkson,] I should never be able to walk or ride near ------ again. +Instead of bread, we are giving him a stone. Instead of the locality +recalling the noblest moment of his existence, it is a place at which +his friends (that is, himself) blow to the world, "What a good man is +he!" I sat down upon a hillock at Forty Hill yesternight--a fine +contemplative evening,--with a thousand good speculations about mankind. +How I yearned with cheap benevolence! I shall go and inquire of the +stone-cutter, that cuts the tombstones here, what a stone with a short +inscription will cost; just to say--"Here C. Lamb loved his brethren of +mankind." Everybody will come there to love. As I can't well put my own +name, I shall put about a subscription: + + _s. d_. + Mrs. ---- 5 0 + Procter 2 6 + G. Dyer 1 0 + Mr. Godwin 0 0 + Mrs. Godwin 0 0 + Mr. Irving a watch-chain. + Mr. ------- the proceeds of ------ first edition.* + ___ ___ + 8 6 + +I scribble in haste from here, where we shall be some time. Pray request +Mr. M[ontagu] to advance the guinea for me, which shall faithfully be +forthcoming; and pardon me that I don't see the proposal in quite the +light that he may. The kindness of his motives, and his power of +appreciating the noble passage, I thoroughly agree in. + +With most kind regards to him, I conclude, Dear Madam, + + Yours truly, C. LAMB. + +From Mrs. Leishman's, Chase, Enfield. + +*A capital book, by the bye, but not over saleable. + + +[The memorial to Thomas Clarkson stands on a hill above Wade Mill, on +the Buntingford Road, in Hertfordshire. + +Forty Hill is close to Enfield. + +Edward Irving's watch-chain. The explanation of Lamb's joke is to be +found in Carlyle's _Reminiscences_ (quoted also in Froude's _Life_, Vol. +I., page 326). Irving had put down as his contribution to some +subscription list, at a public meeting, "an actual gold watch, which he +said had just arrived to him from his beloved brother lately dead in +India." This rather theatrical action had evidently amused Lamb as it +had disgusted Carlyle. + +The "first edition" of "Mr. -----" was, I suppose, Basil Montagu's work +on Bacon, which Macaulay reviewed.] + + + +LETTER 422 + +MARY LAMB TO LADY STODDART + +[August 9, 1827.] + +My dear Lady-Friend,--My brother called at our empty cottage yesterday, +and found the cards of your son and his friend, Mr. Hine, under the +door; which has brought to my mind that I am in danger of losing this +post, as I did the last, being at that time in a confused state of +mind--for at that time we were talking of leaving, and persuading +ourselves that we were intending to leave town and all our friends, and +sit down for ever, solitary and forgotten, here. Here we are; and we +have locked up our house, and left it to take care of itself; but at +present we do not design to extend our rural life beyond Michaelmas. +Your kind letter was most welcome to me, though the good news contained +in it was already known to me. Accept my warmest congratulations, though +they come a little of the latest. In my next I may probably have to hail +you Grandmama; or to felicitate you on the nuptials of pretty Mary, who, +whatever the beaux of Malta may think of her, I can only remember her +round shining face, and her "O William!"--"dear William!" when we +visited her the other day at school. Present my love and best wishes--a +long and happy married life to dear Isabella--I love to call her +Isabella; but in truth, having left your other letter in town, I +recollect no other name she has. + +The same love and the same wishes--in futuro--to my friend Mary. Tell +her that her "dear William" grows taller, and improves in manly looks +and manlike behaviour every time I see him. What is Henry about? and +what should one wish for him? If he be in search of a wife, I will send +him out Emma Isola. + +You remember Emma, that you were so kind as to invite to your ball? She +is now with us; and I am moving heaven and earth, that is to say, I am +pressing the matter upon all the very few friends I have that are likely +to assist me in such a case, to get her into a family as a governess; +and Charles and I do little else here than teach her something or other +all day long. + +We are striving to put enough Latin into her to enable her to begin to +teach it to young learners. So much for Emma --for you are so fearfully +far away, that I fear it is useless to implore your patronage for her. + +I have not heard from Mrs. Hazlitt a long time. I believe she is still +with Hazlitt's mother in Devonshire. + +I expect a pacquet of manuscript from you: you promised me the office of +negotiating with booksellers, and so forth, for your next work. Is it in +good forwardness? or do you grow rich and indolent now? It is not +surprising that your Maltese story should find its way into Malta; but I +was highly pleased with the idea of your pleasant surprise at the sight +of it. I took a large sheet of paper, in order to leave Charles room to +add something more worth reading than my poor mite. + +May we all meet again once more! + +M. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 423 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SIR JOHN STODDART + +(_Same letter: Lamb's share_) + +Dear Knight--Old Acquaintance--'Tis with a violence to the _pure +imagination_ (_vide_ the "Excursion" _passim_) that I can bring myself +to believe I am writing to Dr. Stoddart once again, at Malta. But the +deductions of severe reason warrant the proceeding. I write from +Enfield, where we are seriously weighing the advantages of dulness over +the over-excitement of too much company, but have not yet come to a +conclusion. What is the news? for we see no paper here; perhaps you can +send us an old one from Malta. Only, I heard a butcher in the +market-place whisper something about a change of ministry. I don't know +who's in or out, or care, only as it might affect _you_. For domestic +doings, I have only to tell, with extreme regret, that poor Elisa +Fenwick (that was)--Mrs. Rutherford--is dead; and that we have received +a most heart-broken letter from her mother--left with four +grandchildren, orphans of a living scoundrel lurking about the pothouses +of Little Russell Street, London: they and she--God help 'em!--at New +York. I have just received Godwin's third volume of the _Republic_, +which only reaches to the commencement of the Protectorate. I think he +means to spin it out to his life's thread. Have you seen Fearn's +_Anti-Tooke_? I am no judge of such things--you are; but I think it very +clever indeed. If I knew your bookseller, I'd order it for you at a +venture: 'tis two octavos, Longman and Co. Or do you read now? Tell it +not in the Admiralty Court, but my head aches _hesterno vino_. I can +scarce pump up words, much less ideas, congruous to be sent so far. But +your son must have this by to-night's post.[_Here came a passage +relating to an escapade of young Stoddart, then at the Charterhouse, +which, probably through Lamb's intervention, was treated leniently. Lamb +helped him--with his imposition-- Gray's "Elegy" into Greek elegiacs_.] +Manning is gone to Rome, Naples, etc., probably to touch at Sicily, +Malta, Guernsey, etc.; but I don't know the map. Hazlitt is resident at +Paris, whence he pours his lampoons in safety at his friends in England. +He has his boy with him. I am teaching Emma Latin. By the time you can +answer this, she will be qualified to instruct young ladies: she is a +capital English reader: and S.T.C. acknowledges that a part of a passage +in Milton she read better than he, and part he read best, her part being +the shorter. But, seriously, if Lady St------ (oblivious pen, that was +about to write _Mrs._!) could hear of such a young person wanted (she +smatters of French, some Italian, music of course), we'd send our loves +by her. My congratulations and assurances of old esteem. C.L. + + +[Stoddart had been appointed in 1826 Chief-Justice and Justice of the +Vice-Admiralty Court in Malta and had been knighted in the same year. +His daughter Isabella had just married. Lady Stoddart's literary efforts +did not, I think, reach print. + +"The deductions of severe reason." See the quotation from Cottle in the +letter to Manning of November, 1802. + +"A change of ministry." On Liverpool's resignation early in 1827 Canning +had been called in to form a new Ministry, which he effected by an +alliance with the Whigs. + +"Godwin's _Republic_"--_History of the Commonwealth of England_, in +four volumes, 1824-1828. + +"Fearn's _Anti-Tooke_"--_Anti-Tooke; or, An Analysis of the Principles +and Structure of Language Exemplified in the English Tongue_, 1824. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Hone, dated August 10, 1827, in +which Lamb expresses regret for Matilda Hone's illness.] + + + +LETTER 424 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 10 August, 1827.] + +Dear B.B.--I have not been able to: answer you, for we have had, and +are having (I just snatch a moment), our poor quiet retreat, to which we +fled from society, full of company, some staying with us, and this +moment as I write almost a heavy importation of two old Ladies has come +in. Whither can I take wing from the oppression of human faces? Would I +were in a wilderness of Apes, tossing cocoa nuts about, grinning and +grinned at! + +Mitford was hoaxing you surely about my Engraving, 'tis a little +sixpenny thing, too like by half, in which the draughtsman has done his +best to avoid flattery. There have been 2 editions of it, which I think +are all gone, as they have vanish'd from the window where they hung, a +print shop, corner of Great and Little Queen Streets, Lincolns Inn +fields, where any London friend of yours may inquire for it; for I am +(tho' you _won't understand_ it) at Enfield (Mrs. Leishman's, Chase). We +have been here near 3 months, and shall stay 2 or more, if people will +let us alone, but they persecute us from village to village. So don't +direct to _Islington_ again, till further notice. + +I am trying my hand at a Drama, in 2 acts, founded on Crabbe's +"Confidant," mutatis mutandis. + +You like the Odyssey. Did you ever read my "Adventures of Ulysses," +founded on Chapman's old translation of it? for children or _men_. Ch. +is divine, and my abridgment has not quite emptied him of his divinity. +When you come to town I'll show it you. + +You have well described your old fashioned Grand-paternall Hall. Is it +not odd that every one's earliest recollections are of some such place. +I had my Blakesware (Blakesmoor in the "London"). Nothing fills a childs +mind like a large old Mansion [_one or two words wafered over_]; better +if un-or-partially-occupied; peopled with the spirits of deceased +members of [for] the County and Justices of the Quorum. Would I were +buried in the peopled solitude of one, with my feelings at 7 years old. + +Those marble busts of the Emperors, they seem'd as if they were to stand +for ever, as they had stood from the living days of Rome, in that old +Marble Hall, and I to partake of their permanency; Eternity was, while I +thought not of Time. But he thought of me, and they are toppled down, +and corn covers the spot of the noble old Dwelling and its princely +gardens. I feel like a grasshopper that chirping about the grounds +escaped his scythe only by my littleness. Ev'n now he is whetting one of +his smallest razors to clean wipe me out, perhaps. Well! + + +["My Engraving"--Brook Pulham's caricature. + +"You have well described your ... Grand-paternall Hall." Barton wrote +the following account of this house, the home of his step-grandfather at +Tottenham; but I do not know whether it is the same that Lamb saw:-- + + My most delightful recollections of boyhood are connected with the + fine old country-house in a green lane diverging from the high road + which runs through Tottenham. I would give seven years of life as it + now is, for a week of that which I then led. It was a large old + house, with an iron palisade and a pair of iron gates in front, and + a huge stone eagle on each pier. Leading up to the steps by which + you went up to the hall door, was a wide gravel walk, bordered in + summer time by huge tubs, in which were orange and lemon trees, and + in the centre of the grass-plot stood a tub yet huger, holding an + enormous aloe, The hall itself, to my fancy then lofty and wide as a + cathedral would seem now, was a famous place for battledore and + shuttlecock; and behind was a garden, equal to that of old Alcinous + himself. My favourite walk was one of turf by a long straight pond, + bordered with lime-trees. But the whole demesne was the fairy ground + of my childhood; and its presiding genius was grandpapa. He must + have been a very handsome man in his youth, for I remember him at + nearly eighty, a very fine-looking one, even in the decay of mind + and body. In the morning a velvet cap; by dinner, a flaxen wig; his + features always expressive of benignity and placid cheerfulness. + When he walked out into the garden, his cocked hat and amber-headed + cane completed his costume. To the recollection of this delightful + personage, I am, I think, indebted for many soothing and pleasing + associations, with old age. + +"Those marble busts of the Emperors." See the _Elia_ essay "Blakesmoor +in H----shire," in Vol. II, of this edition.] + + + +LETTER 425 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +28th of Aug., 1827. + +I have left a place for a wafer, but can't find it again. + +Dear B.B.--I am thankful to you for your ready compliance with my +wishes. Emma is delighted with your verses, to which I have appended +this notice "The 6th line refers to the child of a dear friend of the +author's, named Emma," without which it must be obscure; and have sent +it with four Album poems of my own (your daughter's with _your_ heading, +requesting it a place next mine) to a Mr. Fraser, who is to be editor of +a more superb Pocket book than has yet appeared by far! the property of +some wealthy booksellers, but whom, or what its name, I forgot to ask. +It is actually to have in it schoolboy exercises by his present Majesty +and the late Duke of York, so Lucy will come to Court; how she will be +stared at! Wordsworth is named as a Contributor. Frazer, whom I have +slightly seen, is Editor of a forth-come or coming Review of foreign +books, and is intimately connected with Lockhart, &c. so I take it that +this is a concern of Murray's. Walter Scott also contributes mainly. I +have stood off a long time from these Annuals, which are ostentatious +trumpery, but could not withstand the request of Jameson, a particular +friend of mine and Coleridge. + +I shall hate myself in frippery, strutting along, and vying finery with +Beaux and Belles + + with "Future Lord Byrons and sweet L.E.L.'s."-- + +Your taste I see is less simple than mine, which the difference of our +persuasions has doubtless effected. In fact, of late you have so +frenchify'd your style, larding it with hors de combats, and au +desopoirs, that o' my conscience the Foxian blood is quite dried out of +you, and the skipping Monsieur spirit has been infused. Doth Lucy go to +Balls? I must remodel my lines, which I write for her. I hope A.K. keeps +to her Primitives. If you have any thing you'd like to send further, I +don't know Frazer's address, but I sent mine thro' Mr. Jameson, 19 or 90 +Cheyne Street, Totnam Court road. I dare say an honourable place wou'd +be given to them; but I have not heard from Frazer since I sent mine, +nor shall probably again, and therefore I do not solicit it as from him. + +Yesterday I sent off my tragi comedy to Mr. Kemble. Wish it luck. I made +it all ('tis blank verse, and I think, of the true old dramatic cut) or +most of it, in the green lanes about Enfield, where I am and mean to +remain, in spite of your peremptory doubts on that head. + +Your refusal to lend your poetical sanction to my Icon, and your reasons +to Evans, are most sensible. May be I may hit on a line or two of my own +jocular. May be not. + +Do you never Londonize again? I should like to talk over old poetry with +you, of which I have much, and you I think little. Do your Drummonds +allow no holydays? I would willingly come and w[ork] for you a three +weeks or so, to let you loose. Would I could sell or give you some of my +Leisure! Positively, the best thing a man can have to do is nothing, and +next to that perhaps--good works. + +I am but poorlyish, and feel myself writing a dull letter; poorlyish +from Company, not generally, for I never was better, nor took more +walks, 14 miles a day on an average, with a sporting dog--Dash--you +would not know the plain Poet, any more than he doth recognize James +Naylor trick'd out au deserpoy (how do you spell it.) En Passant, J'aime +entendre da mon bon hommè sur surveillance de croix, ma pas l'homme +figuratif--do you understand me? + + +[The verses with which Emma was delighted were probably written for her +album. I have not seen them. That album was cut up for the value of its +autographs and exists now only in a mutilated state: where, I cannot +discover. The pocket-book was _The Bijou_, 1828, edited by William +Fraser for Pickering. Only one of Lamb's contributions was included: his +verses for his own album (see Vol. IV. of this edition). + +Jameson was Robert Jameson, to whom Hartley Coleridge addressed the +sonnets in the _London Magazine_ to which Lamb alludes in a previous +letter. He was the husband of Mrs. Jameson, author of _Sacred and +Legendary Art_, but the marriage was not happy. He lived in Chenies +Street. + +"Future Lord Byrons and sweet L.E.L.'s." A line from some verses written +by Lamb in more than one album. Probably originally intended for Emma +Isola's album. The passage runs, answering the question, "What is an +Album?"-- + + 'Tis a Book kept by modern Young Ladies for show, + Of which their plain grandmothers nothing did know. + 'Tis a medley of scraps, fine verse, and fine prose, + And some things not very like either, God knows. + The soft First Effusions of Beaux and of Belles, + Of future Lord Byrons and sweet L.E.L.'s. + +L.E.L. was, of course, the unhappy Letitia Landon, a famous contributor +to the published albums. + +"My tragi comedy." Still "The Wife's Trial." Kemble was Charles Kemble, +manager of Covent Garden Theatre. The play was never acted. + +"Your refusal to lend your poetical sanction." This is not clear, but I +think the meaning to be deducible. The Icon was Pulham's etching of +Lamb. Evans was William Evans, who had grangerised Byron's _English +Bards and Scotch Reviewers_. I take it that he was now making another +collection of portraits of poets and was asking other poets, their +friends, to write verses upon them. In this way he had applied through +Lamb to Barton for verses on Pulham's Elia, and had been refused. This +is, of course, only conjecture. + +"Your Drummonds"--your bankers. Barton's bankers were the Alexanders, a +Quaker firm. + +"James Naylor." Barton had paraphrased Nayler's "Testimony." + +Following this letter, under the date August 29, 1827, should come a +letter from Lamb to Robert Jameson (husband of Mrs. Jameson) asking him +to interest himself in Miss Isola's career. "Our friend Coleridge will +bear witness to the very excellent manner in which she read to him some +of the most difficult passages in the Paradise Lost."] + + + +LETTER 426 + +CHARLES LAMB TO P.G. PATMORE + +Mrs. Leishman's, Chace, Enfield, + +September, 1827. + +Dear Patmore--Excuse my anxiety--but how is Dash? (I should have asked +if Mrs. Patmore kept her rules, and was improving--but Dash came +uppermost. The order of our thoughts should be the order of our +writing.) Goes he muzzled, or _aperto ore_? Are his intellects sound, or +does he wander a little in _his_ conversation? You cannot be too careful +to watch the first symptoms of incoherence. The first illogical snarl he +makes, to St. Luke's with him! All the dogs here are going mad, if you +believe the overseers; but I protest they seem to me very rational and +collected. But nothing is so deceitful as mad people to those who are +not used to them. Try him with hot water. If he won't lick it up, it is +a sign he does not like it. Does his tail wag horizontally or +perpendicularly? That has decided the fate of many dogs in Enfield. Is +his general deportment cheerful? I mean when he is pleased--for +otherwise there is no judging. You can't be too careful. Has he bit any +of the children yet? If he has, have them shot, and keep _him_ for +curiosity, to see if it was the hydrophobia. They say all our army in +India had it at one time--but that was in _Hyder_-Ally's time. Do you +get paunch for him? Take care the sheep was sane. You might pull out his +teeth (if he would let you), and then you need not mind if he were as +mad as a Bedlamite. It would be rather fun to see his odd ways. It might +amuse Mrs. Patmore and the children. They'd have more sense than he! +He'd be like a Fool kept in the family, to keep the household in good +humour with their own understanding. You might teach him the mad dance +set to the mad howl. _Madge Owl-et_ would be nothing to him. "My, how he +capers!" [_In the margin is written_:] One of the children speaks this. + +[_Three lines here are erased_.] What I scratch out is a German +quotation from Lessing on the bite of rabid animals; but, I remember, +you don't read German. But Mrs. Patmore may, so I wish I had let it +stand. The meaning in English is--"Avoid to approach an animal suspected +of madness, as you would avoid fire or a precipice:--" which I think is +a sensible observation. The Germans are certainly profounder than we. + +If the slightest suspicion arises in your breast, that all is not right +with him (Dash), muzzle him, and lead him in a string (common +pack-thread will do; he don't care for twist) to Hood's, his quondam +master, and he'll take him in at any time. You may mention your +suspicion or not, as you like, or as you think it may wound or not Mr. +H.'s feelings. Hood, I know, will wink at a few follies in Dash, in +consideration of his former sense. Besides, Hood is deaf, and if you +hinted anything, ten to one he would not hear you. Besides, you will +have discharged your conscience, and laid the child at the right door, +as they say. + +We are dawdling our time away very idly and pleasantly, at a Mrs. +Leishman's, Chace, Enfield, where, if you come a-hunting, we can give +you cold meat and a tankard. Her husband is a tailor; but that, you +know, does not make her one. I knew a jailor (which rhymes), but his +wife was a fine lady. + +Let us hear from you respecting Mrs. Patmore's regimen. I send my love +in a ------ to Dash. C. LAMB. + +[_On the outside of the letter was written_:--] + +Seriously, I wish you would call upon Hood when you are that way. He's a +capital fellow. I sent him a couple of poems --one ordered by his wife, +and written to order; and 'tis a week since, and I've not heard from +him. I fear something is the matter. + +_Omitted within_ + +Our kindest remembrance to Mrs. P. + + +[This is from Patmore's _My Friends and Acquaintances_, 1854; but again +I have no confidence in Patmore's transcription. + +Dash had been Hood's dog, and afterwards was Lamb's; while at one time +Moxon seems to have had the care of it. Patmore possibly was taking Dash +while the Lambs were at Mrs. Leishman's. One of the children who might +be amused by the dog's mad ways was Coventry Patmore, afterwards the +poet, then nearly four years old.] + + + +LETTER 427 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. September 5, 1827.] + +Dear Dib,--Emma Isola, who is with us, has opened an ALBUM: bring some +verses with you for it on Sat'y evening. Any _fun_ will do. I am +teaching her Latin; you may make something of that. Don't be modest. For +in it you shall appear, if I rummage out some of your old pleasant +letters for rhymes. But an original is better. + +Has your pa[1] any scrap? C.L. + +We shall be MOST glad to see your sister or sisters with you. Can't you +contrive it? Write in that case. + + +[Footnote 1: the infantile word for father.] + + +[On the blank pages inside the letter Dibdin seems to have jotted down +ideas for his contribution to the album. Unfortunately, as I have said, +the album is not forthcoming.] + + + +LETTER 428 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. September 13, 1827.] + +Dear _John_--Your verses are very pleasant, and have been adopted into +the splendid Emmatic constellation, where they are not of the least +magnitude. She is delighted with their merit and readiness. They are +just the thing. The 14th line is found. We advertised it. Hell is +cooling for want of company. We shall make it up along with our kitchen +fire to roast you into our new House, where I hope you will find us in a +few Sundays. We have actually taken it, and a compact thing it will be. + +Kemble does not return till the month's end. My heart sometimes is good, +sometimes bad, about it, as the day turns out wet or walky. + +Emma has just died, choak'd with a Gerund in dum. On opening her we +found a Participle in rus in the pericordium. The king never dies, which +may be the reason that it always REIGNS here. + +We join in loves. C.L. his orthograph. + +what a pen! + +the Umberella is cum bak. + + + +LETTER 429 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. September 18, 1827.] + +My dear, and now more so, JOHN-- + +How that name smacks! what an honest, full, English, +and yet withal holy and apostolic sound it bears, above the +methodistical priggish Bishoppy name of Timothy, under +which I had obscured your merits! + +What I think of the paternal verses, you shall read within, +which I assure you is not pen praise but heart praise. + +It is the gem of the Dibdin Muses. + +I have got all my books into my new house, and their +readers in a fortnight will follow, to whose joint converse nobody +shall be more welcome than you, and _any of yours_. + +The house is perfection to our use and comfort. + +Milton is come. I wish Wordsworth were here to meet him. +The next importation is of pots and saucepans, window curtains, +crockery and such base ware. + +The pleasure of moving, when Becky moves for you. O +the moving Becky! + +I hope you will come and _warm_ the house with the first. + +From my temporary domicile, Enfield. + +ELIA, that "is to go."-- + + +[The paternal verses were probably a contribution by Charles +Dibdin the Younger for Emma Isola's album. The Lambs were +just moving to Enfield for good, as they hoped (see next letter), +Milton was the portrait.] + + + +LETTER 430 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +Tuesday [September 18, 1827], + +Dear Hood, + +If I have any thing in my head, I will send it to Mr. +Watts. Strictly speaking he should have had my Album +verses, but a very intimate friend importund me for the trifles, +and I believe I forgot Mr. Watts, or lost sight at the time of his +similar Souvenir. Jamieson conveyed the farce from me to +Mrs. C. Kemble, _he_ will not be in town before the 27th. Give +our kind loves to all at Highgate, and tell them that we have +finally torn ourselves out right away from Colebrooke, where I +had no health, and are about to domiciliate for good at Enfield, +where I have experienced _good_. + + Lord what good hours do we keep! + How quietly we sleep! + +See the rest in the Complete Angler. We have got our books into our new +house. I am a drayhorse if I was not asham'd of the indigested dirty +lumber, as I toppled 'em out of the cart, and blest Becky that came with +'em for her having an unstuffd brain with such rubbish. We shall get in +by Michael's mass. Twas with some pain we were evuls'd from Colebrook. +You may find some of our flesh sticking to the door posts. To change +habitations is to die to them, and in my time I have died seven deaths. +But I don't know whether every such change does not bring with it a +rejuvenescence. Tis an enterprise, and shoves back the sense of death's +approximating, which tho' not terrible to me, is at all times +particularly distasteful. My house-deaths have generally been +periodical, recurring after seven years, but this last is premature by +half that time. Cut off in the flower of Colebrook. The Middletonian +stream and all its echoes mourn. Even minnows dwindle. A parvis fiunt +MINIMI. I fear to invite Mrs. Hood to our new mansion, lest she envy it, +& rote [? rout] us. But when we are fairly in, I hope she will come & +try it. I heard she & you were made uncomfortable by some unworthy to be +cared for attacks, and have tried to set up a feeble counteraction thro' +the Table Book of last Saturday. Has it not reach'd you, that you are +silent about it? Our new domicile is no manor house, but new, & +externally not inviting, but furnish'd within with every convenience. +Capital new locks to every door, capital grates in every room, with +nothing to pay for incoming & the rent £10 less than the Islington one. +It was built a few years since at £1100 expence, they tell me, & I +perfectly believe it. And I get it for £35 exclusive of moderate taxes. +We think ourselves most lucky. It is not our intention to abandon Regent +Street, & West End perambulations (monastic & terrible thought!), but +occasionally to breathe the FRESHER AIR of the metropolis. We shall put +up a bedroom or two (all we want) for occasional ex-rustication, where +we shall visit, not be visited. Plays too we'll see,--perhaps our own. +Urban! Sylvani, & Sylvan Urbanuses in turns. Courtiers for a spurt, then +philosophers. Old homely tell-truths and learn-truths in the virtuous +shades of Enfield, Liars again and mocking gibers in the coffee houses & +resorts of London. What can a mortal desire more for his bi-parted +nature? + +O the curds & cream you shall eat with us here! + +O the turtle soup and lobster sallads we shall devour with you there! + +O the old books we shall peruse here! + +O the new nonsense we shall trifle over there! + +O Sir T. Browne!--here. + +O Mr. Hood & Mr. Jerdan there, + +thine, + +C (urbanus) L (sylvanus) (ELIA ambo)-- + +Inclos'd are verses which Emma sat down to write, her first, on the eve +after your departure. Of course they are only for Mrs. H.'s perusal. +They will shew at least, that one of our party is not willing to cut old +friends. What to call 'em I don't know. Blank verse they are not, +because of the rhymes--Rhimes they are not, because of the blank verse. +Heroics they are not, because they are lyric, lyric they are not, +because of the Heroic measure. They must be call'd EMMAICS.------ + + +[Mr. Watts was Alaric A. Watts. + +"Thro' the _Table Book_." Lamb contributed to Hone's _Table Book_ a +prose paraphrase of Hood's _Plea, of the Midsummer Fairies_, just +published, which had been dedicated to him, under the title "The Defeat +of Time." In a previous number Moxon had addressed to Hood a eulogistic +sonnet on the same subject. The attacks on Hood I have not sought. + +"We shall put up a bedroom." This project was very imperfectly carried +out. Indeed Lamb practically lost London from this date, his subsequent +visits there being as a rule not fortunate. + +"Mr. Jerdan"--William Jerdan, editor of the _Literary Gazette_. + +"Emmaics." These verses are no longer forthcoming. + +Here should come a letter to Allsop dated September 25, 1827, saying +that Mary Lamb has her nurse Miss James and the house is melancholy. +Given in the Boston Bibliophile edition.] + + + +LETTER 431 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY COLBURN + +[Dated at end: September 25, 1827.] + +Dear Sir--I beg leave in the warmest manner to recommend to your notice +Mr. Moxon, the Bearer of this, if by any chance yourself should want a +steady hand in your business, or know of any Publisher that may want +such a one. He is at present in the house of Messrs. Longman and Co., +where he has been established for more than six years, and has the +conduct of one of the four departments of the Country line. A difference +respecting Salary, which he expected to be a little raised on his last +promotion, makes him wish to try to better himself. I believe him to be +a young man of the highest integrity, and a thorough man of business; +and should not have taken the liberty of recommending him, if I had not +thought him capable of being highly useful. + + I am, + Sir, + with great respect, + your hble Serv't + CHARLES LAMB. + +Enfield, Chace Side, 25th Sep. 1827. + + +[Moxon did not go to Colburn, but to Hurst & Co. in St. Paul's +Churchyard.] + + + +LETTER 432 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ?Sept. 26, 1827.] + +Pray, send me the Table Book. + +Dear M. Our pleasant meeting[s] for some time are suspended. My sister +was taken very ill in a few hours after you left us (I had suspected +it),--and I must wait eight or nine weeks in slow hope of her recovery. +It is her old complaint. You will say as much to the Hoods, and to Mrs. +Lovekin, and Mrs. Hazlitt, with my kind love. + +We are in the House, that is all. I hope one day we shall both enjoy it, +and see our friends again. But till then I must be a solitary nurse. + +I am trying Becky's sister to be with her, so don't say anything to Miss +James. + +Yours truly + +CH. LAMB. + +Monday. I will send your books soon. + + +[Miss James was, as we have seen, Mary Lamb's regular nurse. She had +subsequently to be sent for. I do not identify Mrs. Lovekin.] + + + +LETTER 433 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[Dated at end: October 1 (1827).] + +Dear R.--I am settled for life I hope, at Enfield. I have taken the +prettiest compactest house I ever saw, near to Antony Robinson's, but +alas! at the expence of poor Mary, who was taken ill of her old +complaint the night before we got into it. So I must suspend the +pleasure I expected in the surprise you would have had in coming down +and finding us householders. + +Farewell, till we can all meet comfortable. Pray, apprise Martin Burney. +Him I longed to have seen with you, but our house is too small to meet +either of you without her knowledge. + +God bless you. + +C. LAMB. + +Chase Side 1st Oct'r + + +[Antony Robinson, a prominent Unitarian, a friend but no relation of +Crabb Robinson's, had died in the previous January. His widow still +lived at Enfield.] + + + +LETTER 434 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. October 2, 1827.] + +My dear Dibdin, It gives me great pain to have to say that I cannot have +the pleasure of seeing you for some time. We are in our house, but Mary +has been seized with one of her periodical disorders--a temporary +derangement--which commonly lasts for two months. You shall have the +first notice of her convalescence. Can you not send your manuscript by +the Coach? directed to Chase Side, next to Mr. Westwood's Insurance +office. I will take great care of it. + + Yours most Truly C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 435 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BARRON FIELD + +Oct. 4th, 1827. + +I am not in humour to return a fit reply to your pleasant letter. We are +fairly housed at Enfield, and an angel shall not persuade me to wicked +London again. We have now six sabbath days in a week for--_none_! The +change has worked on my sister's mind, to make her ill; and I must wait +a tedious time before we can hope to enjoy this place in unison. Enjoy +it, when she recovers, I know we shall. I see no shadow, but in her +illness, for repenting the step! For Mathews --I know my own utter +unfitness for such a task. I am no hand at describing costumes, a great +requisite in an account of mannered pictures. I have not the slightest +acquaintance with pictorial language even. An imitator of me, or rather +pretender to be _me_, in his Rejected Articles, has made me minutely +describe the dresses of the poissardes at Calais!--I could as soon +resolve Euclid. I have no eye for forms and fashions. I substitute +analysis, and get rid of the phenomenon by slurring in for it its +impression. I am sure you must have observed this defect, or +peculiarity, in my writings; else the delight would be incalculable in +doing such a thing for Mathews, whom I greatly like--and Mrs. Mathews, +whom I almost greatlier like. What a feast 'twould be to be sitting at +the pictures painting 'em into words; but I could almost as soon make +words into pictures. I speak this deliberately, and not out of modesty. +I pretty well know what I can't do. + +My sister's verses are homely, but just what they should be; I send +them, not for the poetry, but the good sense and good-will of them. I +was beginning to transcribe; but Emma is sadly jealous of its getting +into more hands, and I won't spoil it in her eyes by divulging it. Come +to Enfield, and _read it_. As my poor cousin, the bookbinder, now with +God, told me, most sentimentally, that having purchased a picture of +fish at a dead man's sale, his heart ached to see how the widow grieved +to part with it, being her dear husband's favourite; and he almost +apologised for his generosity by saying he could not help telling the +widow she was "welcome to come and look at it"--e.g. at _his house_--"as +often as she pleased." There was the germ of generosity in an uneducated +mind. He had just _reading_ enough from the backs of books for the "_nec +sinit esse feros_"--had he read inside, the same impulse would have led +him to give back the two-guinea thing--with a request to see it, now and +then, at _her_ house. We are parroted into delicacy.--Thus you have a +tale for a Sonnet. + +Adieu! with (imagine both) our loves. C. LAMB. + + +[The suggestion had been made to Lamb, through Barron Field, that he +should write a descriptive catalogue of Charles Mathews' collection of +theatrical portraits; Lamb having already touched upon them in his "Old +Actors" articles in the _London Magazine_ (see Vol. II. of this +edition). When they were exhibited, after Mathews' death, at the +Pantheon in Oxford Street, Lamb's remarks were appended to the catalogue +_raisonné_. They are now at the Garrick Club. + +"An imitator of me." P.G. Patmore's _Rejected Articles_, 1826, leads off +with "An Unsentimental Journey" by Elia which is, except for a fitful +superficial imitation of some of Lamb's mannerisms, as unlike him as +could well be. The description of the butterwomen's dress, to which Lamb +refers, will illustrate the divergence between Elia and his parodist:-- + + Her attire is fashioned as follows: and it differs from all her + tribe only in the relative arrangement of its colours. On the body a + crimson jacket, of a thick, solid texture, and tight to the shape; + but without any pretence at ornament. This is met at the waist + (which is neither long, nor short, but exactly where nature placed + it) by a dark blue petticoat, of a still thicker texture, so that it + hangs in large plaits where it is gathered in behind. Over this, in + front, is tied tightly round the waist, so as to keep all trim and + compact, a dark apron, the string of which passes over the little + fulled skirt of the jacket behind, and makes it stick out smartly + and tastily, while it clips the waist in. The head-gear consists of + a sort of mob cap, nothing of which but the edge round the face can + be seen, on account of the kerchief (of flowered cotton) which is + passed over it, hood fashion, and half tied under the chin. This + head-kerchief is in place of the bonnet--a thing not to be seen + among the whole five hundred females who make up this pleasant show. + Indeed, varying the colours of the different articles, this + description applies to every dress of the whole assembly; except + that in some the fineness of the day has dispensed with the + kerchief, and left the snow-white cap exposed; and in others, the + whole figure (except the head) is coyishly covered and concealed by + a large hooded cloak of black cloth, daintily lined with silk, and + confined close up to the throat by an embossed silver clasp, but + hanging loosely down to the heels, in thick, full folds. The + petticoat is very short; the trim ancles are cased in close-fit hose + of dark, sober, slate colour; and the shoes, though thick and + serviceable like all the rest of the costume, fit the foot as neatly + as those which are not made to walk in. + +Patmore tells us that his first meeting with the Lambs was immediately +after they had first seen his book; and they left the house intent upon +reading it. + +"My sister's verses." I think these would probably be the lines on Emma +learning Latin which I have quoted above. + +Here should come a very pleasant letter from Lamb to Dodwell, of the +India House, dated October 7, 1827. Lamb thanks Dodwell, to whom there +is an earlier letter extant, for a pig. He first describes his new house +at Enfield, and then breaks off about the cooking of the pig, bidding +Becky do it "nice and _crips_." The rest is chaff concerning the India +House and Dodwell's fellow-clerks.] + + + +LETTER 436 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[No date. ? Oct., 1827.] + +Dear Hone,--having occasion to write to Clarke I put in a bit to you. I +see no Extracts in this N'o. You should have three sets in hand, one +long one in particular from Atreus and Thyestes, terribly fine. Don't +spare 'em; with fragments, divided as you please, they'll hold out to +Xmas. What I have to say is enjoined me most seriously to say to you by +Moxon. Their country customers grieve at getting the Table Book so late. +It is indispensable it should appear on Friday. Do it but _once_, & +you'll never know the difference. + +FABLE + +A boy at my school, a cunning fox, for one penny ensured himself a hot +roll & butter every morning for ever. Some favor'd ones were allowed a +roll & butter to their breakfasts. He had none. But he bought one one +morning. What did he do? He did not eat it, but cutting it in two, sold +each one of the halves to a half-breakfasted Blue Boy for _his_ whole +roll to-morrow. The next day he had a whole roll to eat, and two halves +to swap with other two boys, who had eat their cake & were still not +satiated, for whole ones to-morrow. So on ad infinitum. By one morning's +abstinence he feasted seven years after. + +APPLICATION + +Bring out the next N'o. on Friday, for country correspondents' sake. +I[t] will be one piece of exertion, and you will go right ever after, +for you will have just the time you had before, to bring it out ever +after by the Friday. + +You don't know the difference in getting a thing early. Your +correspondents are your authors. You don't know how an author frets to +know the world has got his contribution, when he finds it not on his +breakfast table. + +ONCE in this case is EVER without a grain of trouble afterw'ds. + +I won't like you or speak to you if you don't try it once. + +Yours, on that condition, + +C. LAMB. + + +[This letter is dated by Mr. Hazlitt conjecturally 1826, but I think it +more probably October, 1827, as the extracts (passages from Crowne's +"Thyestes") contributed by Lamb to Hone's _Table Book_ were printed late +in 1827. + +In Lamb's next note to Hone he says how glad he was to receive the +_Table Book_ early on Friday: the result of the fable.] + + + +LETTER 437 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +[No date. ? 1827.] + +Dear H.,--Emma has a favour, besides a bed, to ask of Mrs. Hood. Your +parcel was gratifying. We have all been pleased with Mrs. Leslie; I +speak it most sincerely. There is much manly sense with a feminine +expression, which is my definition of ladies' writing. + +[_Mrs. Leslie and Her Grandchildren_, 1827, was the title of a book for +children by Mrs. Reynolds, mother of John Hamilton Reynolds and Mrs. +Hood, and wife of the Writing Master at Christ's Hospital.] + + + +LETTER 438 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[No date. Late 1827.] + +My dear B.B.--You will understand my silence when I tell you that my +sister, on the very eve of entering into a new house we have taken at +Enfield, was surprised with an attack of one of her sad long illnesses, +which deprive me of her society, tho' not of her domestication, for +eight or nine weeks together. I see her, but it does her no good. But +for this, we have the snuggest, most comfortable house, with every thing +most compact and desirable. Colebrook is a wilderness. The Books, +prints, etc., are come here, and the New River came down with us. The +familiar Prints, the Bust, the Milton, seem scarce to have changed their +rooms. One of her last observations was "how frightfully like this room +is to our room in Islington"--our up-stairs room, she meant. How I hope +you will come some better day, and judge of it! We have tried quiet here +for four months, and I will answer for the comfort of it enduring. + +On emptying my bookshelves I found an Ulysses, which I will send to A.K. +when I go to town, for her acceptance-- unless the Book be out of print. +One likes to have one copy of every thing one does. I neglected to keep +one of "Poetry for Children," the joint production of Mary and me, and +it is not to be had for love or money. It had in the title-page "by the +author of Mrs. Lester's School." Know you any one that has it, and would +exchange it? + +Strolling to Waltham Cross the other day, I hit off these lines. It is +one of the Crosses which Edw'd 1st caused to be built for his wife at +every town where her corpse rested between Northamptonsh'r and London. + + A stately Cross each sad spot doth attest, + Whereat the corpse of Elinor did rest, + From Herdby fetch'd--her Spouse so honour'd her-- + To sleep with royal dust at Westminster. + And, if less pompous obsequies were thine, + Duke Brunswick's daughter, princely Caroline, + Grudge not, great ghost, nor count thy funeral losses: + Thou in thy life-time had'st thy share of crosses. + +My dear B.B.--My head akes with this little excursion. Pray accept 2 +sides for 3 for once. + + And believe me + Yours sadly C.L. + +Chace side Enfield. + + +["An Ulysses"--Lamb's book for children, _The Adventures of Ulysses_, +1808. + +_The Poetry for Children_. The known copies of the first edition of this +work can be counted on the fingers. + +"A stately Cross..." These verses were printed in the _Englishman's +Magazine_ in September, 1831. Lamb's sympathies were wholly with +Caroline of Brunswick, as his epigrams in _The Champion_ show (see Vol. +IV. of this edition).] + + + +LETTER 439 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. December 4, 1827.] + +My dear B.B.--I have scarce spirits to write, yet am harass'd with not +writing. Nine weeks are completed, and Mary does not get any better. It +is perfectly exhausting. Enfield and every thing is very gloomy. But for +long experience, I should fear her ever getting well. + +I feel most thankful for the spinsterly attentions of your sister. Thank +the kind "knitter in the sun." + +What nonsense seems verse, when one is seriously out of hope and +spirits! I mean that at this time I have some nonsense to write, pain of +incivility. Would to the fifth heaven no coxcombess had invented Albums. + +I have not had a Bijoux, nor the slightest notice from Pickering about +omitting 4 out of 5 of my things. The best thing is never to hear of +such a thing as a bookseller again, or to think there are publishers: +second hand Stationers and Old Book Stalls for me. Authorship should be +an idea of the Past. + +Old Kings, old Bishops, are venerable. All present is hollow. + +I cannot make a Letter. I have no straw, not a pennyworth of chaff, only +this may stop your kind importunity to know about us. + +Here is a comfortable house, but no tenants. One does not make a +household. + +Do not think I am quite in despair, but in addition to hope protracted, +I have a stupifying cold and obstructing headache, and the sun is dead. + +I will not fail to apprise you of the revival of a Beam. + +Meantime accept this, rather than think I have forgotten you all. + +Best rememb + + & Yours and theirs truly, C.L. + + + +LETTER 440 + +CHARLES LAMB TO LEIGH HUNT + +[No date. December, 1827.] + +Dear H.,--I am here almost in the eleventh week of the longest illness +my sister ever had, and no symptoms of amendment. Some had begun, but +relapsed with a change of nurse. If she ever gets well, you will like my +house, and I shall be happy to show you Enfield country. + +As to my head, it is perfectly at your or any one's service; either +M[e]yers' or Hazlitt's, which last (done fifteen or twenty years since) +White, of the Accountant's office, India House, has; he lives in Kentish +Town: I forget where, but is to be found in Leadenhall daily. Take your +choice. I should be proud to hang up as an alehouse sign even; or, +rather, I care not about my head or anything, but how we are to get well +again, for I am tired out. + +God bless you and yours from the worst calamity.--Yours truly, C.L. + +Kindest remembrances to Mrs. Hunt. H.'s is in a queer dress. M.'s would +be preferable _ad populum_. + + +[Leigh Hunt had asked Lamb for his portrait to accompany his _Lord Byron +and Some of His Contemporaries_. Lamb had been painted by Hazlitt in +1804, and by Henry Meyer, full size, in May, 1826, as well as by others. +Hunt chose Meyer's picture, which was beautifully engraved, for his +book, in the large paper edition. The original is now in the India +Office; a reproduction serves as the frontispiece to this volume. The +Hazlitt portrait, representing Lamb in the garb of a Venetian senator, +is now in the National Portrait Gallery; a reproduction serves as the +frontispiece to Vol. I. of this edition.] + + + +LETTER 441 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[P.M. Dec. 15, 1827.] + +My dear Hone, I read the sad accident with a careless eye, the newspaper +giving a wrong name to the poor Sufferer, but learn'd the truth from +Clarke. God send him ease, and you comfort in your thick misfortunes. I +am in a sorry state. Tis the eleventh week of the illness, and I cannot +get her well. To add to the calamity, Miss James is obliged to leave us +in a day or two. We had an Enfield Nurse for seven weeks, and just as +she seem'd mending, _she_ was call'd away. Miss J.'s coming seem'd to +put her back, and now she is going. I do not compare my sufferings to +yours, but you see the world is full of troubles. I wish I could say a +word to comfort you. You must cling to all that is left. I fear to ask +you whether the Book is to be discontinued. What a pity, when it must +have delighted so many! Let me hear about you and it, and believe me +with deepest fellow feeling + +Your friend C. LAMB. Friday eveng. + + +[Hone's son Alfred, who had met with an accident, was a sculptor. The +_Table Book_ was to close with the year.] + + + +LETTER 442 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. ? Middle Dec., 1827.] + +My dear Allsop--Thanks for the Birds. Your announcement puzzles me sadly +as nothing came. I send you back a word in your letter, which I can +positively make nothing [of] and therefore return to you as useless. It +means to refer to the birds, but gives me no information. They are at +the fire, however. + +My sister's illness is the most obstinate she ever had. It will not go +away, and I am afraid Miss James will not be able to stay above a day or +two longer. I am desperate to think of it sometimes. 'Tis eleven weeks! + +The day is sad as my prospects. + +With kindest love to Mrs. A. and the children, + + Yours, C.L. + +No Atlas this week. Poor Hone's good boy Alfred has fractured his skull, +another son is returned "dead" from the Navy office, & his Book is going +to be given up, not having answered. What a world of troubles this is! + + +[The _Atlas_ was the paper which Allsop sent to Lamb every week.] + + + +LETTER 443 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[December 20, 1827.] + +My dear Allsop--I have writ to say to you that I hope to have a +comfortable Xmas-day with Mary, and I can not bring myself to go from +home at present. Your kind offer, and the kind consent of the young Lady +to come, we feel as we should do; pray accept all of you our kindest +thanks: at present I think a visitor (good & excellent as we remember +her to be) might a little put us out of our way. Emma is with us, and +our small house just holds us, without obliging Mary to sleep with +Becky, &c. + +We are going on extremely comfortably, & shall soon be in +capacity of seeing our friends. Much weakness is left still. +With thanks and old rememb'rs, Yours, C.L. + + + +LETTER 444 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Dec. 22, 1827.] + +My dear Moxon, I am at length able to tell you that we are all doing +well, and shall be able soon to see our friends as usual. If you will +venture a winter walk to Enfield tomorrow week (Sunday 3Oth) you will +find us much as usual; we intend a delicious quiet Christmas day, dull +and friendless, for we have not spirits for festivities. Pray +communicate the good news to the Hoods, and say I hope he is better. I +should be thankful for any of the books you mention, but I am so +apprehensive of their miscarriage by the stage,--at all events I want +none just now. Pray call and see Mrs. Lovekin, I heard she was ill; say +we shall be glad to see them some fine day after a week or so. + +May I beg you to call upon Miss James, and say that we are quite well, +and that Mary hopes she will excuse her writing herself yet; she knows +that it is rather troublesome to her to write. We have rec'd her letter. +Farewell, till we meet. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Enfield. + + + +LETTER 445 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[No date. End of 1827.] + +My dear B.--We are all pretty well again and comfortable, and I take a +first opportunity of sending the Adventures of Ulysses, hoping that +among us--Homer, Chapman, and _C'o_.--we shall afford you some pleasure. +I fear, it is out of print, if not, A.K. will accept it, with wishes it +were bigger; if another copy is not to be had, it reverts to me and my +heirs _for ever_. With it I send a trumpery book; to which, without my +knowledge, the Editor of the Bijoux has contributed Lucy's verses: I am +asham'd to ask her acceptance of the trash accompanying it. Adieu to +Albums--for a great while, I said when I came here, and had not been +fixed two days but my Landlord's daughter (not at the Pot house) +requested me to write in her female friend's, and in her own; if I go to +[blank space: something seems to be missing] thou art there also, O all +pervading ALBUM! All over the Leeward Islands, in Newfoundland, and the +Back Settlements, I understand there is no other reading. They haunt me. +I die of Albo-phobia! + + +["A trumpery book." I have not found it. Writing in the _Englishman's +Magazine_ in 1831, in a review of his own _Album Verses_, Lamb amplifies +his sentiments on albums (see Vol. I.).] + + + +LETTER 446 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[January 9, 1828.] + +Dear Allsop--I have been very poorly and nervous lately, but am +recovering sleep, &c. I do not invite or make engagements for particular +days; but I need not say how pleasant your dropping in _any_ Sunday +morn'g would be. Perhaps Jameson would accompany you. Pray beg him to +keep an accurate record of the warning I sent by him to old Pan, for I +dread lest he should at the 12 months' end deny the warning. The house +is his daughter's, but we took it through him, and have paid the rent to +his receipts for his daughter's. Consult J. if he thinks the warning +sufficient. I am very nervous, or have been, about the house; lost my +sleep, & expected to be ill; but slumbered gloriously last night golden +slumbers. I shall not relapse. You fright me with your inserted slips in +the most welcome Atlas. They begin to charge double for it, & call it +two sheets. How can I confute them by opening it, when a note of yours +might slip out, & we get in a hobble? When you write, write real +letters. Mary's best love & mine to Mrs. A. + + Yours ever, C. LAMB. + + +[I cannot explain the business part of this letter.] + + + +LETTER 447 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. (? January, Sunday) 1828.] + +Dear Moxon I have to thank you for despatching so much business for me. +I am uneasy respecting the enclosed receipts which you sent me and are +dated Jan. 1827. Pray get them chang'd by Mr. Henshall to 182_8_. I have +been in a very nervous way since I saw you. Pray excuse me to the Hoods +for not answering his very pleasant letter. I am very poorly. The +"Keepsake" I hope is return'd. I sent it back by Mrs. Hazlitt on +Thursday. 'Twas blotted outside when it came. The rest I think are mine. +My heart bleeds about poor Hone, that such an agreeable book, and a Book +there seem'd no reason should not go on for ever, should be given up, +and a thing substituted which in its Nature cannot last. Don't send me +any more "Companions," for it only vexes me about the Table Book. This +is not weather to hope to see any body _to day_, but without any +particular invitations, pray consider that we are _at any time_ most +glad to see you, You (with Hunt's "Lord Byron" or Hazlitt's "Napoleon" +in your hand) or You simply with your switch &c. The night was damnable +and the morning is not too bless-able. If you get my dates changed, I +will not trouble you with business for some time. Best of all rememb'ces +to the Hoods, with a malicious congratulation on their friend Rice's +advancem't. + + Yours truly C. LAMB. + + +[Hone's _Table Book_ ceased with 1827: it was succeeded by a reprint, in +monthly parts, of Strutt's _Sports and Pastimes_. + +_The Companion_ would be the periodical started by Leigh Hunt in 1828. + +"Hazlitt's 'Napoleon.'" Of this work the first two volumes appeared in +1828, and the next two in 1830. + +"Their friend Rice's advancement." I cannot say to what this would +refer. Rice was Edward Rice.] + + + +LETTER 448 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Feb. 18, 1828.] + +Dear M. I had rather thought to have seen you yesterday, +or I should have written to thank you for your attentions +in the Book way &c. Hone's address is, _22_ Belvidere Place, +Southwark. 'Tis near the Obelisk. I can only say we shall +be most glad to see you, when weather suits, and that it will +be a joyful surprisal to see the Hoods. I should write to +them, but am poorly and nervous. Emma is very proud of +her Valentine. Mary does not immediately want Books, +having a damn'd consignment of Novels in MS. from Malta: +which I wish the Mediterranean had in its guts. Believe me +yours truly C.L. + +Monday. + + +[Emma's valentine probably came from Moxon, who, I feel sure, in spite +of Lamb's utterance in a previous letter, had not yet told his love, if +it had really budded. + +"Novels in MS."--Lady Stoddart's, we may suppose (see letter above).] + + + +LETTER 449 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +Enfield, 25 Feb. [1828]. + +My dear Clarke,--You have been accumulating on me such a heap of +pleasant obligations that I feel uneasy in writing as to a Benefactor. +Your smaller contributions, the little weekly rills, are refreshments in +the Desart, but your large books were feasts. I hope Mrs. Hazlitt, to +whom I encharged it, has taken Hunt's Lord B. to the Novellos. His +picture of Literary Lordship is as pleasant as a disagreeable subject +can be made, his own poor man's Education at dear Christ's is as good +and hearty as the subject. Hazlitt's speculative episodes are capital; I +skip the Battles. But how did I deserve to have the Book? The +_Companion_ has too much of Madam Pasta. Theatricals have ceased to be +popular attractions. His walk home after the Play is as good as the best +of the old Indicators. The watchmen are emboxed in a niche of fame, save +the skaiting one that must be still fugitive. I wish I could send a +scrap for good will. But I have been most seriously unwell and nervous a +long long time. I have scarce mustered courage to begin this short note, +but conscience duns me. + +I had a pleasant letter from your sister, greatly over-acknowledging my +poor sonnet. I think I should have replied to it, but tell her I think +so. Alas for sonnetting, 'tis as the nerves are; all the summer I was +dawdling among green lanes, and verses came as thick as fancies. I am +sunk winterly below prose and zero. + +But I trust the vital principle is only as under snow. That I shall yet +laugh again. + +I suppose the great change of place affects me, but I could not have +lived in Town, I could not bear company. + +I see Novello flourishes in the Del Capo line, and dedications are not +forgotten. I read the _Atlas_. When I pitched on the Ded'n I looked for +the Broom of "_Cowden_ knows" to be harmonized, but 'twas summat of +Rossini's. + +I want to hear about Hone, does he stand above water, how is his son? I +have delay'd writing to him, till it seems impossible. Break the ice for +me. + +The wet ground here is intolerable, the sky above clear and delusive, +but under foot quagmires from night showers, and I am cold-footed and +moisture-abhorring as a cat; nevertheless I yesterday tramped to Waltham +Cross; perhaps the poor bit of exertion necessary to scribble this was +owing to that unusual bracing. + +If I get out, I shall get stout, and then something will out --I mean +for the _Companion_--you see I rhyme insensibly. + +Traditions are rife here of one Clarke a schoolmaster, and a runaway +pickle named Holmes, but much obscurity hangs over it. Is it possible +they can be any relations? + +'Tis worth the research, when you can find a sunny day, with ground +firm, &c. Master Sexton is intelligent, and for half-a-crown he'll pick +you up a Father. + +In truth we shall be most glad to see any of the Novellian circle, +middle of the week such as can come, or Sunday, as can't. But Spring +will burgeon out quickly, and then, we'll talk more. + +You'd like to see the improvements on the Chase, the new Cross in the +market-place, the Chandler's shop from whence the rods were fetch'd. +They are raised a farthing since the spread of Education. But perhaps +you don't care to be reminded of the Holofernes' days, and nothing +remains of the old laudable profession, but the clear, firm, +impossible-to-be-mistaken schoolmaster text hand with which is +subscribed the ever-welcome name of Chas. Cowden C. Let me crowd in +both our loves to all. C.L. + +Let me never be forgotten to include in my rememb'ces my good friend and +whilom correspondent Master Stephen. + +How, especially, is Victoria? + +I try to remember all I used to meet at Shacklewell. The little +household, cake-producing, wine-bringing out Emma--the old servant, that +didn't stay, and ought to have staid, and was always very dirty and +friendly, and Miss H., the counter-tenor with a fine voice, whose sister +married Thurtell. They all live in my mind's eye, and Mr. N.'s and +Holmes's walks with us half back after supper. Troja fuit! + + +["_The Companion_." Leigh Hunt's paper lasted only for seven months. +Madame Pasta, of whom too much was written, was Giudetta Pasta +(1798-1865), a singer of unusual compass, for whom Bellini wrote "La +Somnambula." + +The following is the account of the Sliding Watchman in the essay, +"Walks Home by Night in Bad Weather. Watchmen":-- + + But the oddest of all was the _Sliding_ Watchman. Think of walking + up a street in the depth of a frosty winter, with long ice in the + gutters, and sleet over head, and then figure to yourself a sort of + bale of a man in white, coming towards you with a lantern in one + hand, and an umbrella over his head. It was the oddest mixture of + luxury and hardship, of juvenility and old age! But this looked + agreeable. Animal spirits carry everything before them; and our + invincible friend seemed a watchman for Rabelais. Time was run at + and butted by him like a goat. The slide seemed to bear him half + through the night at once; he slipped from out of his box and his + common-places at one rush of a merry thought, and seemed to say, + "Everything's in imagination;--here goes the whole weight of my + office." + +"Your sister"--Mrs. Isabella Jane Towers, author of _The Children's +Fireside_, 1828, and other books for children, to whom Lamb had sent a +sonnet (see Vol. IV.). + +"Novello... dedications... I read the _Atlas_." In _The Atlas_ for +February 17 was reviewed _Select Airs from Spohr's celebrated Opera of +Faust, arranged as duetts for the Pianoforte and inscribed to his friend +Charles Cowden Clarke by Vincent Novello_. Holmes was musical critic for +_The Atlas_. + +"One Clarke a schoolmaster." See note to the letter to Clarke in the +summer of 1821. + +"Holofernes' days"--Holofernes, the schoolmaster, in "Love's Labour's +Lost." Cowden Clarke had assisted his father. + +"Master Stephen." I do not identify Stephen. + +"Victoria"--Mary Victoria Novello, afterwards Mrs. Charles Cowden +Clarke. + +"At Shacklewell"--the Novellos' old home. They now lived in Bedford +Street, Covent Garden. + +"Whose sister married Thurtell." Thurtell, the murderer of Mr. Weare, I +suppose. + +In the Boston Bibliophile edition there is also a brief note to Clarke.] + + + +LETTER 450 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. Feb. 26, 1828.] + +My dear Robinson, It will be a very painful thing to us indeed, if you +give up coming to see us, as we fear, on account of the nearness of the +poor Lady you inquire after. It is true that on the occasion she +mentions, which was on her return from last seeing her daughter, she was +very heated and feverish, but there seems to be a great amendment in her +since, and she has within a day or two passed a quiet evening with us. +At the same time I dare not advise any thing one way or another +respecting her daughter coming to live with her. I entirely disclaim the +least opinion about it. If we named any thing before her, it was +erroneously, on the notion that _she_ was the obstacle to the plan which +had been suggested of placing her daughter in a Private Family, _which +seem'd your wish_. But I have quite done with the subject. If we can be +of any amusement to the poor Lady, without self disturbance, we will. +But come and see us after Circuit, as if she were not. You have no more +affect'te friends than C. AND M. LAMB. + + +["The poor Lady" was, I imagine, the widow of Antony Robinson.] + + + +LETTER 451 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +March 19th, 1828. + +My dear M.--It is my firm determination to have nothing to do with +"Forget-me-Nots"--pray excuse me as civilly as you can to Mr. Hurst. I +will take care to refuse any other applications. The things which +Pickering has, if to be had again, I have promised absolutely, you know, +to poor Hood, from whom I had a melancholy epistle yesterday; besides +that, Emma has decided objections to her own and her friend's Album +verses being published; but if she gets over that, they are decidedly +Hood's. + +Till we meet, farewell. Loves to Dash. C.L. + + +[Moxon seems to have asked Lamb for a contribution for one of Hurst's +annuals, probably the _Keepsake_. + +Hood was to edit _The Gem_ for 1829. + +"Dash."--Moxon seems to have been the present master of the dog. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Edward Irving, introducing Hone, +who in later life became devout and preached at the Weigh House Chapel +in Eastcheap.] + + + +LETTER 452 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. April 21, 1828.] + +DEAR B.B.--You must excuse my silence. I have been in very poor health +and spirits, and cannot write letters. I only write to assure you, as +you wish'd, of my existence. All that which Mitford tells you of H.'s +book is rhodomontade, only H. has written unguardedly about me, and +nothing makes a man more foolish than his own foolish panegyric. But I +am pretty well cased to flattery, or its contrary. Neither affect[s] me +a turnip's worth. Do you see the Author of May you Like it? Do you write +to him? Will you give my present plea to him of ill health for not +acknowledge a pretty Book with a pretty frontispiece he sent me. He is +most esteem'd by me. As for subscribing to Books, in plain truth I am a +man of reduced income, and don't allow myself 12 shillings a-year to buy +OLD BOOKS with, which must be my Excuse. I am truly sorry for Murray's +demur, but I wash my hands of all booksellers, and hope to know them no +more. I am sick and poorly and must leave off, with our joint kind +remembrances to your daughter and friend A.K. C.L. + + +["H.'s book." In Hunt's _Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_ Lamb +was praised very warmly. + +"The Author of May you Like it"--the Rev. C.B. Tayler. The book with a +pretty frontispiece was _A Fireside Book_, 1828, with a frontispiece by +George Cruikshank. + +"Murray's demur"-an unfavourable reply, possibly to a suggestion of +Barton's concerning a new volume.] + + + +LETTER 453 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[May 1st, 1828.] + +Dear A.--I am better. Mary quite well. We expected to see you before. I +can't write long letters. So a friendly love to you all. + +Yours ever, + +C.L. + +Enfield. + +This sunshine is healing. + + + +LETTER 454 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. May 3rd, 1828.] + +Dear M.,--My friend Patmore, author of the "Months," a very pretty +publication, [and] of sundry Essays in the "London," "New Monthly," &c., +wants to dispose of a volume or two of "Tales." Perhaps they might +Chance to suit Hurst; but be that as it may, he will call upon you, +_under favor of my recommendation_; and as he is returning to France, +where he lives, if you can do anything for him in the Treaty line, to +save him dancing over the Channel every week, I am sure you will. I said +I'd never trouble you again; but how vain are the resolves of mortal +man! P. is a very hearty friendly fellow, and was poor John Scott's +second, as I will be yours when you want one. May you never be mine! + + Yours truly, C.L. + +Enfield. + + +[Patmore was the author of _The Mirror of the Months_, 1826.] + + + +LETTER 455 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +[Dated at end: 17 May (1828).] + +Dear Walter, The sight of your old name again was like a resurrection. +It had passed away into the dimness of a dead friend. We shall be most +joyful to see you here next week,--if I understand you right--for your +note dated the 10th arrived only yesterday, Friday the _16th_. Suppose I +name _Thursday_ next. If that don't suit, write to say so. A morning +coach comes from the Bell or Bell & Crown by Leather Lane Holborn, and +sets you down at our house on the Chase Side, next door to Mr. +Westwood's, whom all the coachmen know. + +I have four more notes to write, so dispatch this with again assuring +you how happy we shall be to see you, & to discuss Defoe & old matters. + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +Enf'd. Satur'dy. 17th May. + + +[The last letter to Wilson was on Feb. 24, 1823. Lamb wrote to Hone a +few days later: "Valter Vilson dines with us to-morrow. Vell! How I +should like to see Hone!"] + + + +LETTER 456 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS NOON TALFOURD + +[P.M. May 20, 1828.] + +My dear Talfourd, we propose being with you on Wednesday not unearly, +Mary to take a bed with you, and I with Crabbe, if, as I understand, he +be of the party. + +Yours ever, + +CH. LAMB. + + +[Lamb's future biographer was then living at 26 Henrietta Street, +Brunswick Square. He had married in 1822. Crabb Robinson's _Diary_ for +May 21 tells us that Talfourd's party consisted of the Lambs, +Wordsworth, Miss Anne Rutt, three barristers and himself. Lamb was in +excellent spirits. He slept at Robinson's that night.] + + + +LETTER 457 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[No date. May, 1828.] + +Dear Wordsworth, we had meant to have tried to see Mrs. Wordsworth and +Dora next Wednesday, but we are intercepted by a violent toothache which +Mary has got by getting up next morning after parting with you, to be +with my going off at 1/2 past 8 Holborn. We are poor travellers, and +moreover we have company (damn 'em) good people, Mr. Hone and an old +crony not seen for 20 years, coming here on Tuesday, one stays night +with us, and Mary doubts my power to get up time enough, and comfort +enough, to be so far as you are. Will you name a day in the same or +coming week that we can come to you in the morning, for it would plague +us not to see the other two of you, whom we cannot individualize from +you, before you go. It is bad enough not to see your Sister Dorothy. + +God bless you sincerely + +C. LAMB. + + +[Robinson dates this letter 1810, but this is clearly wrong. It was +obviously written after Lamb's liberation from the India House. If, as I +suppose, the old crony is Walter Wilson, we get the date from Lamb's +letters to him and to Hone, mentioned above. + +By "the other two of you" Lamb means Dora Wordsworth and Johnny +Wordsworth. Lamb had already seen William. The address of the present +letter is W. Wordsworth, Esq., 12 Bryanstone Street, Portman Square. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Cary, dated June 10, 1828, +declining on account of ill-health an invitation to dinner, to meet +Wordsworth. Instead he asks Cary to Enfield with Darley and Procter.] + + + +LETTER 458 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. MORGAN + +Enfield, 17 June, 1828. + +The gentleman who brings this to you has been 12 years principal +assistant at the first School in Enfield, and bears the highest +character for carefulness and scholarship. He is about opening an +Establishment of his own, a Classical and _Commercial_ Academy at +Peckham. He has just married a very notable and amiable young person, +our next neighbour's daughter, and I do not doubt of their final +success, but everything must have a beginning and he wants pupils. It +strikes me, that one or two of Mr. Thompson's sons may be about leaving +you,--in that case, if you can recommend my friend's school, you will +much oblige me. I can answer for the very excellent manner in which he +has conducted himself here as an assistant, for I have talked it over +with Dr. May's brother and I _know_ him to be very learned. He will +explain to you the situation of our cottage, where we hope to see you +soon--with Mary's kind love. + + +[The gentleman was a Mr. Sugden.] + + + +LETTER 459 + +MARY LAMB TO THE THOMAS HOODS + +[No date. ? Summer, 1828.] + +My dear Friends,--My brother and Emma are to send you a partnership +letter, but as I have a great dislike to my stupid scrap at the fag end +of a dull letter, and, as I am left alone, I will say my say first; and +in the first place thank you for your kind letter; it was a mighty +comfort to me. Ever since you left me, I have been thinking I know not +what, but every possible thing that I could invent, why you should be +angry with me for something I had done or left undone during your +uncomfortable sojourn with us, and now I read your letter and think and +feel all is well again. Emma and her sister Harriet are gone to +Theobalds Park, and Charles is gone to Barnet to cure his headache, +which a good old lady has talked him into. She came on Thursday and left +us yesterday evening. I mean she was Mrs. Paris, with whom Emma's aunt +lived at Cambridge, and she had so much to [tell] her about Cambridge +friends, and to [tell] us about London ditto, that her tongue was never +at rest through the whole day, and at night she took Hood's Whims and +Oddities to bed with her and laught all night. Bless her spirits! I wish +I had them and she were as mopey as I am. Emma came on Monday, and the +week has passed away I know not how. But we have promised all the week +that we should go and see the Picture friday or saturday, and stay a +night or so with you. Friday came and we could not turn Mrs. Paris out +so soon, and on friday evening the thing was wholly given up. Saturday +morning brought fresh hopes; Mrs. Paris agreed to go to see the picture +with us, and we were to walk to Edmonton. My Hat and my _new gown_ were +put on in great haste, and his honor, who decides all things here, would +have it that we could not get to Edmonton in time; and there was an end +of all things. Expecting to see you, I did not write. + +Monday evening. + +Charles and Emma are taking a second walk. Harriet is gone home. Charles +wishes to know more about the Widow. Is it to be made to match a +drawing? If you could throw a little more light on the subject, I think +he would do it, when Emma is gone; but his time will be quite taken up +with her; for, besides refreshing her Latin, he gives her long lessons +in arithmetic, which she is sadly deficient in. She leaves in a week, +unless she receives a renewal of her holydays, which Mrs. Williams has +half promised to send her. I do verily believe that I may hope to pass +the last one, or two, or three nights with you, as she is to go from +London to Bury. We will write to you the instant we receive Mrs. W.'s +letter. As to my poor sonnet--and it is a very poor sonnet, only [it] +answered very well the purpose it was written for--Emma left it behind +her, and nobody remembers more than one line of it, which is, I think, +sufficient to convince you it would make no great impression in an +Annual. So pray let it rest in peace, and I will make Charles write a +better one instead. + +This shall go to the Post to-night. If any [one] chooses to add anything +to it they may. It will glad my heart to see you again. + +Yours (both yours) truly and affectionately, M. LAMB. + +Becky is going by the Post office, so I will send it away. I mean to +commence letter-writer to the family. + + +[Mr. Hazlitt dates this letter April, 1828. The reference to the Widow, +towards the end, shows that Hood was preparing _The Gem_, and, what is +not generally known, that Lamb had been asked to write on that subject. +As it happened, Hood wrote the essay for him and signed it Elia (see +note below). Mrs. Paris we have met. Harriet, Emma Isola's sister, we do +not hear of again. I was recently shown a copy of Lamb's _Works_, 1818, +inscribed in his hand to Miss Isola: this would be Harriet Isola. Emma +had just begun her duties at Fornham, in Suffolk, where she taught the +children of a Mr. Williams, a clergyman. I cannot say what the Picture +was. The sonnet was probably that printed in the note to the letter to +Mrs. Shelley of July 26, 1827. Charles Lamb's and Emma's joint letter has +not been preserved.] + + + +LETTER 460 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON + +August, 1828. + +Dear Haydon,--I have been tardy in telling you that your Chairing the +Member gave me great pleasure;--'tis true broad Hogarthian fun, the High +Sheriff capital. Considering, too, that you had the materials imposed +upon you, and that you did not select them from the rude world as H. +did, I hope to see many more such from your hand. If the former picture +went beyond this I have had a loss, and the King a bargain. I longed to +rub the back of my hand across the hearty canvas that two senses might +be gratified. Perhaps the subject is a little discordantly placed +opposite to another act of Chairing, where the huzzas were +Hosannahs,--but I was pleased to see so many of my old acquaintances +brought together notwithstanding. + +Believe me, yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Haydon's "Chairing the Member" was exhibited in Bond Street this year, +together with "Christ's Entry into Jerusalem," and other of his works. +"The former picture" was his "Mock Election," which the King had bought +for 500 guineas. For "Chairing the Member" Haydon received only half +that price. + +Here should come a letter to Rickman, dated September 11, 1828, in which +Lamb thanks him for a present of nuts and apples, but is surprised that +apples should be offered to the owner of a "whole tree, almost an +orchard," and "an apple chamber redolent" to boot. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Louisa Holcroft, dated October 2, +1828, in which, so soon after Mary Lamb's determination to be the letter +writer of the family, he says, "Mary Lamb has written her last letter in +this world," adding that he has been left her _writing legatee_. He +calls geese "those pretty birds that look like snow in summer, and +cackle like ice breaking up." + +Here should come a long Latin letter to Rickman, dated October 4, 1828. +Canon Ainger prints the Latin. I append an English version:--] + + + +LETTER 461 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN RICKMAN + +(_Translation_) + +[Postmark Oct. 3, 1828.] + +I have been thinking of sending some kind of an answer in Latin to your +very elaborate letter, but something has arisen every day to hinder me. +To begin with our awkward friend M.B. has been with us for a while, and +every day and all day we have had such a lecture, you know how he +stutters, on legal, mind, nothing but legal notices, that I have been +afraid the Latin I want to write might prove rather barbaro-forensic +than Ciceronian. He is swallowed up, body and soul, in law; he eats, +drinks, plays (at the card table) Law, nothing but Law. He acts +Ignoramus in the play so thoroughly, that you w'd swear that in the +inmost marrow of his head (is not this the proper anatomical term?) +there have housed themselves not devils but pettifoggers, to bemuddle +with their noisy chatter his own and his friends' wits. He brought here, +'twas all his luggage, a book, Fearn on Contingent Remainders. This book +he has read so hard, and taken such infinite pains to understand, that +the reader's brain has few or no Remainders to continge. Enough, +however, of M.B. and his luggage. To come back to your claims upon me. +Your return journey, with notes, I read again and again, nor have I done +with them yet. You always make something fresh out of a hackneyed theme. +Our milestones, you say, bristle with blunders, but I must shortly +explain why I cannot comply with your directions herein. + +Suppose I were to consult the local magnates about a matter of this +kind.--Ha! says one of our waywardens or parish overseers,--What +business is this of _yours_? Do you want to drop the Lodger and come out +as a Householder?--Now you must know that I took this house of mine at +Enfield, by an obvious domiciliary fiction, in my Sister's name, to +avoid the bother and trouble of parish and vestry meetings, and to +escape finding myself one day an overseer or big-wig of some sort. What +then w'd be my reply to the above question? + +Leisure I have secured: but of dignity, not a tittle. Besides, to tell +you the truth, the aforesaid irregularities are, to my thinking, most +entertaining, and in fact very touching indeed. Here am I, quit of +worldly affairs of every kind; for if superannuation does not mean that, +what does it mean? The world then, being, as the saying is, beyond my +ken, and being myself entirely removed from any accurate distinctions of +space or time, these mistakes in road-measure do not seriously offend +me. For in the infinite space of the heavens above (which in this +contracted sphere of mine I desire to imitate so far as may be) what +need is there of milestones? Local distance has to do with mortal +affairs. In my walks abroad, limited though they must be, I am quite at +my own disposal, and on that account I have a good word for our Enfield +clocks too. Their hands generally point without any servile reference to +this Sun of our World, in his _sub_-Empyrean position. They strike too +just as it happens, according to their own sweet +wiles,--one--two--three--anything they like, and thus to me, a more +fortunate Whittington, they pleasantly announce, that Time, so far as I +am concerned, is no more. Here you have my reasons for not attending in +this matter to the requests of a busy subsolar such as you are. + +Furthermore, when I reach the milestone that counts from the Hicks-Hall +that stands now, I own at once the Aulic dignity, and, were I a +gaol-bird, I should shake in my shoes. When I reach the next which +counts from the site of the old Hall, my thoughts turn to the fallen +grandeur of the pile, and I reflect upon the perishable condition of the +most imposing of human structures. Thus I banish from my soul all pride +and arrogance, and with such meditations purify my heart from day to +day. A wayfarer such as I am, may learn from Vincent Bourne, in words +terser and neater than any of mine, the advantages of milestones +properly arranged. The lines are at the end of a little poem of his, +called Milestones--(Do you remember it or shall I write it all out?) + + How well the Milestones' use doth this express, + Which make the miles [seem] more and way seem less. + +What do you mean by this--I am borrowing hand and style from this +youngster of mine--your son, I take it. The style looks, nay on careful +inspection by these old eyes, is most clearly your very own, and the +writing too. Either R's or the Devil's. I will defer your explanation +till our next meeting--may it be soon. + +My Latin failing me, as you may infer from erasures above, there is only +this to add. Farewell, and be sure to give Mrs. Rickman my kind +remembrances. + +C. LAMB. + +Enfield, Chase Side, 4th Oct., 1828. I can't put this properly into +Latin. Dabam--what is it? + + + +LETTER 462 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. October 11, 1828.] + +A splendid edition of Bunyan's Pilgrim--why, the thought is enough to +turn one's moral stomach. His cockle hat and staff transformed to a +smart cockd beaver and a jemmy cane, his amice gray to the last Regent +Street cut, and his painful Palmer's pace to the modern swagger. Stop +thy friend's sacriligious hand. Nothing can be done for B. but to +reprint the old cuts in as homely but good a style as possible. The +Vanity Fair, and the pilgrims there--the silly soothness in his setting +out countenance--the Christian idiocy (in a good sense) of his +admiration of the Shepherds on the Delectable Mountains--the Lions so +truly Allegorical and remote from any similitude to Pidcock's. The great +head (the author's) capacious of dreams and similitudes dreaming in the +dungeon. Perhaps you don't know _my_ edition, what I had when a child: +if you do, can you bear new designs from--Martin, enameld into copper or +silver plate by--Heath, accompanied with verses from Mrs. Heman's pen O +how unlike his own-- + + Wouldst thou divert thyself from melancholy? + Wouldst thou be pleasant, yet be far from folly? + Wouldst thou read riddles and their explanation? + Or else be drowned in thy contemplation? + Dost thou love picking meat? or wouldst thou see + A man i' th' clouds, and hear him speak to thee? + Wouldst thou be in a dream, and yet not sleep? + Or wouldst thou in a moment laugh and weep? + Or wouldst thou lose thyself, and catch no harm, + And find thyself again without a charm? + Wouldst read _thyself_, and read thou knowst not what, + And yet know whether thou art blest or not + By reading the same lines? O then come hither, + And lay my book, thy head and heart together. + + JOHN BUNYAN. + +Shew me such poetry in any of the 15 forthcoming combinations of show +and emptiness, yclept Annuals. Let me whisper in your ear that wholesome +sacramental bread is not more nutritious than papistical wafer stuff, +than these (to head and heart) exceed the visual frippery of Mitford's +Salamander God, baking himself up to the work of creation in a solar +oven, not yet by the terms of the context itself existing. Blake's +ravings made genteel. So there's verses for thy verses; and now let me +tell you that the sight of your hand gladdend me. I have been daily +trying to write to you, but paralysed. You have spurd me on this tiny +effort, and at intervals I hope to hear from and talk to you. But my +spirits have been in a deprest way for a long long time, and they are +things which must be to you of faith, for who can explain depression? +Yes I am hooked into the Gem, but only for some lines written on a dead +infant of the Editor's, which being as it were his property, I could not +refuse their appearing, but I hate the paper, the type, the gloss, the +dandy plates, the names of contributors poked up into your eyes in 1st +page, and whistled thro' all the covers of magazines, the barefaced sort +of emulation, the unmodest candidateship, bro't into so little space--in +those old Londons a signature was lost in the wood of matter--the paper +coarse (till latterly, which spoil'd them)--in short I detest to appear +in an Annual. What a fertile genius (an[d] a quiet good soul withal) is +Hood. He has 50 things in hand, farces to supply the Adelphi for the +season, a comedy for one of the great theatres, just ready, a whole +entertainment by himself for Mathews and Yates to figure in, a meditated +Comic Annual for next year, to be nearly done by himself.-- You'd like +him very much. Wordsworth I see has a good many pieces announced in one +of em, not our Gem. W. Scott has distributed himself like a bribe haunch +among 'em. Of all the poets, Cary has had the good sense to keep quite +clear of 'em, with Clergy-gentle-manly right notions. Don't think I set +up for being proud in this point, I like a bit of flattery tickling my +vanity as well as any one. But these pompous masquerades without masks +(naked names or faces) I hate. So there's a bit of my mind. Besides they +infallibly cheat you, I mean the booksellers. If I get but a copy, I +only expect it from Hood's being my friend. Coleridge has lately been +here. He too is deep among the Prophets--the Yearservers--the mob of +Gentlemen Annuals. But they'll cheat him, I know. + +And now, dear B.B., the Sun shining out merrily, and the dirty clouds +we had yesterday having washd their own faces clean with their own rain, +tempts me to wander up Winchmore Hill, or into some of the delightful +vicinages of Enfield, which I hope to show you at some time when you can +get a few days up to the great Town. Believe me it would give both of us +great pleasure to show you all three (we can lodge you) our pleasant +farms and villages.-- + +We both join in kindest loves to you and yours.-- + +CH. LAMB REDIVIVUS. + +Saturday. + + +[The edition of Bunyan was that published for Barton's friend, John +Major, and John Murray in 1830, with a life of Bunyan by Southey, and +illustrations by John Martin and W. Harvey, and a prefatory poem not by +Mrs. Hemans but by Bernard Barton immediately before Bunyan's "Author's +Apology for his Book," from which Lamb quotes. + +"Pidcock's." Pidcock showed his lions at Bartholomew Fair; he was +succeeded by Polito of Exeter Change. + +"Heath." This was Charles Heath (1785-1848), son of James Heath, a great +engraver of steel plates for the Annuals. + +"Mitford's Salamander God." I cannot explain this, except by Mr. +Macdonald's supposition that Lamb meant to write "Martin's." + +"The Gem." See note below, p. 839. + +Hood's entertainment for Mathews and Frederick Yates, then +joint-managers of the Adelphi, I have not identified. Authors' names on +play-bills were, in those days, unimportant. The play was the thing. + +Cary. The Rev. H.F. Cary, translator of Dante. + +Coleridge and the Annuals. For example, Coleridge's "Names" was in the +_Keepsake_ for 1829; his "Lines written in the Album at Elbingerode" in +part in the _Amulet_ for 1829. He had also contributed previously to the +_Literary Souvenir_, the _Amulet_ and the _Bijou_. + +Here should come an unprinted note from Lamb to Charles Mathews, dated +October 27, 1828, referring to the farce "The Pawnbroker's Daughter," +which Lamb offered to Mathews for the Adelphi. As I have said, this +farce was never acted.] + + + +LETTER 463 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +[Enfield, October, 1828.] + +Dear Clarke,--We did expect to see you with Victoria and the Novellos +before this, and do not quite understand why we have not. Mrs. N. and V. +[Vincent] promised us after the York expedition; a day being named +before, which fail'd. 'Tis not too late. The autumn leaves drop gold, +and Enfield is beautifuller--to a common eye--than when you lurked at +the Greyhound. Benedicks are close, but how I so totally missed you at +that time, going for my morning cup of ale duly, is a mystery. 'Twas +stealing a match before one's face in earnest. But certainly we had not +a dream of your appropinquity. I instantly prepared an Epithalamium, in +the form of a Sonata--which I was sending to Novello to compose--but +Mary forbid it me, as too light for the occasion--as if the subject +required anything heavy-- so in a tiff with her I sent no congratulation +at all. Tho' I promise you the wedding was very pleasant news to me +indeed. Let your reply name a day this next week, when you will come as +many as a coach will hold; such a day as we had at Dulwich. My very +kindest love and Mary's to Victoria and the Novellos. The enclosed is +from a friend nameless, but highish in office, and a man whose accuracy +of statement may be relied on with implicit confidence. He wants the +_exposé_ to appear in a newspaper as the "greatest piece of legal and +Parliamentary villainy he ever rememb'd," and he has had experience in +both; and thinks it would answer afterwards in a cheap pamphlet printed +at Lambeth in 8'o sheet, as 16,000 families in that parish are +interested. I know not whether the present _Examiner_ keeps up the +character of exposing abuses, for I scarce see a paper now. If so, you +may ascertain Mr. Hunt of the strictest truth of the statement, at the +peril of my head. But if this won't do, transmit it me back, I beg, per +coach, or better, bring it with you. Yours unaltered, C. LAMB. + + +[Clarke had married Mary Victoria Novello on July 5, 1828, and they had +spent their honeymoon at the Greyhound, Enfield, unknown to the Lambs. +See the next letter. + +"The enclosed." This has vanished. Hunt was Leigh Hunt.] + + + +LETTER 464 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[Enfield, November 6, 1828.] + +My dear Novello,--I am afraid I shall appear rather tardy in offering my +congratulations, however sincere, upon your daughter's marriage. The +truth is, I had put together a little Serenata upon the occasion, but +was prevented from sending it by my sister, to whose judgment I am apt +to defer too much in these kind of things; so that, now I have her +consent, the offering, I am afraid, will have lost the grace of +seasonableness. Such as it is, I send it. She thinks it a little too +old-fashioned in the manner, too much like what they wrote a century +back. But I cannot write in the modern style, if I try ever so hard. I +have attended to the proper divisions for the music, and you will have +little difficulty in composing it. If I may advise, make Pepusch your +model, or Blow. It will be necessary to have a good second voice, as the +stress of the melody lies there:-- + + SERENATA, FOR TWO VOICES, + + _On the Marriage of Charles Cowden Clarke, Esqre., to Victoria, + eldest daughter of Vincent Novello, Esqre._ + + DUETTO + + Wake th' harmonious voice and string, + Love and Hymen's triumph sing, + Sounds with secret charms combining, + In melodious union joining, + Best the wondrous joys can tell, + That in hearts united dwell. + + RECITATIVE + + _First Voice_.--To young Victoria's happy fame + Well may the Arts a trophy raise, + Music grows sweeter in her praise. + And, own'd by her, with rapture speaks her name. + To touch the brave Cowdenio's heart, + The Graces all in her conspire; + Love arms her with his surest dart, + Apollo with his lyre. + + AIR + + The list'ning Muses all around her + Think 'tis Phoebus' strain they hear; + And Cupid, drawing near to wound her, + Drops his bow, and stands to hear. + + RECITATIVE + + _Second Voice_.--While crowds of rivals with despair + Silent admire, or vainly court the Fair, + Behold the happy conquest of her eyes, + A Hero is the glorious prize! + In courts, in camps, thro' distant realms renown'd, + Cowdenio comes!--Victoria, see, + He comes with British honour crown'd, + Love leads his eager steps to thee. + + AIR + + In tender sighs he silence breaks, + The Fair his flame approves, + Consenting blushes warm her cheeks, + She smiles, she yields, she loves. + + RECITATIVE + + _First Voice_.--Now Hymen at the altar stands, + And while he joins their faithful hands, + Behold! by ardent vows brought down, + Immortal Concord, heavenly bright, + Array'd in robes of purest light, + Descends, th' auspicious rites to crown. + Her golden harp the goddess brings; + Its magic sound + Commands a sudden silence all around, + And strains prophetic thus attune the strings. + + DUETTO + + _First Voice_.-- The Swain his Nymph possessing, + _Second Voice_.-- The Nymph her swain caressing, + _First and Second_.-- Shall still improve the blessing, + For ever kind and true. + _Both_.-- While rolling years are flying, + Love, Hymen's lamp supplying, + With fuel never dying, + Shall still the flame renew. + +To so great a master as yourself I have no need to suggest that the +peculiar tone of the composition demands sprightliness, occasionally +checked by tenderness, as in the second air,-- + +She smiles,--she yields,--she loves. + +Again, you need not be told that each fifth line of the two first +recitatives requires a crescendo. + +And your exquisite taste will prevent your falling into the error of +Purcell, who at a passage similar to _that_ in my first air, + +Drops his bow, and stands to hear, + +directed the first violin thus:-- + +Here the first violin must drop his _bow_. + +But, besides the absurdity of disarming his principal performer of so +necessary an adjunct to his instrument, in such an emphatic part of the +composition too, which must have had a droll effect at the time, all +such minutiae of adaptation are at this time of day very properly +exploded, and Jackson of Exeter very fairly ranks them under the head of +puns. + +Should you succeed in the setting of it, we propose having it performed +(we have one very tolerable second voice here, and Mr. Holmes, I dare +say, would supply the minor parts) at the Greyhound. But it must be a +secret to the young couple till we can get the band in readiness. + +Believe me, dear Novello, + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Enfield, 6 Nov., '28. + + +[Mrs. Cowden Clarke remarks in her notes on this letter that the +references to Purcell and to Jackson of Exeter are inventions. For Mr. +Holmes see note above. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Laman Blanchard, dated Enfield, +November 9, 1828, thanking him for a book and dedication. Samuel Laman +Blanchard (1804-1845), afterwards known as a journalist, had just +published, through Harrison Ainsworth, a little volume entitled _Lyric +Offerings_, which was dedicated to Lamb. After Lamb's death Blanchard +contributed to the _New Monthly Magazine_ some additional Popular +Fallacies.] + + + +LETTER 465 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +Late autumn, 1828. + +Enfield. + +Dear Lamb--You are an impudent varlet; but I will keep your secret. We +dine at Ayrton's on Thursday, and shall try to find Sarah and her two +spare beds for that night only. Miss M. and her tragedy may be dished: +so may not you and your rib. Health attend you. + +Yours, T. HOOD, ESQ. + +Miss Bridget Hood sends love. + + +[In _The Gem_, 1829, in addition to his poem, "On an Infant Dying as +Soon as Born," Lamb was credited with the following piece of prose, +entitled "A Widow," which was really the work of Hood (see letter +above):-- + + A WIDOW + + Hath always been a mark for mockery:--a standing butt for wit to + level at. Jest after jest hath been huddled upon her close cap, and + stuck, like burrs, upon her weeds. Her sables are a perpetual "Black + Joke." + + Satirists--prose and verse--have made merry with her bereavements. + She is a stock character on the stage. Farce bottleth up her + crocodile tears, or labelleth her empty lachrymatories. Comedy + mocketh her precocious flirtations--Tragedy even girdeth at her + frailty, and twitteth her with "the funeral baked meats coldly + furnishing forth the marriage tables." + + I confess when I called the other day on my kinswoman G.--then in + the second week of her widowhood--and saw her sitting, her young boy + by her side, in her recent sables, I felt unable to reconcile her + estate with any risible associations. The Lady with a skeleton + moiety--in the old print, in Bowles' old shop window--seemed but a + type of her condition. Her husband,--a whole hemisphere in love's + world--was deficient. One complete side--her left--was + death-stricken. It was a matrimonial paralysis, unprovocative of + laughter. I could as soon have tittered at one of those melancholy + objects that drag their poor dead-alive bodies about the streets. + + It seems difficult to account for the popular prejudice against lone + women. There is a majority, I trust, of such honest, decorous + mourners as my kinswoman: yet are Widows, like the Hebrew, a proverb + and a byeword amongst nations. From the first putting on of the + sooty garments, they become a stock joke--chimney-sweep or + blackamoor is not surer--by mere virtue of their nigritude. + + Are the wanton amatory glances of a few pairs of graceless eyes, + twinkling through their cunning waters, to reflect so evil a light + on a whole community? Verily the sad benighted orbs of that noble + relict--the Lady Rachel Russell--blinded through unserene drops for + her dead Lord,--might atone for such oglings! + + Are the traditional freaks of a Dame of Ephesus, or a Wife of Bath, + or a Queen of Denmark, to cast so broad a shadow over + a whole sisterhood. There must be, methinks, some more general + infirmity--common, probably, to all Eve-kind--to justify so sweeping + a stigma. + + Does the satiric spirit, perhaps, institute splenetic comparisons + between the lofty poetical pretensions of posthumous tenderness and + their fulfilment? The sentiments of Love especially affect a high + heroical pitch, of which the human performance can present, at best, + but a burlesque parody. A widow, that hath lived only for her + husband, should die with him. She is flesh of his flesh, and bone of + his bone; and it is not seemly for a mere rib to be his survivor. + The prose of her practice accords not with the poetry of her + professions. She hath done with the world,--and you meet her in + Regent Street. Earth hath now nothing left for her--but she swears + and administers. She cannot survive him--and invests in the _Long_ + Annuities. + + The romantic fancy resents, and the satiric spirit records, these + discrepancies. By the conjugal theory itself there ought to be no + Widows; and, accordingly, a class, that by our milder manners is + merely ridiculed, on the ruder banks of the Ganges is literally + _roasted_. C. LAMB. + +"Miss M. and her tragedy." I fancy Miss M. would be Miss Mitford, and +her tragedy "Rienzi," produced at Drury Lane October 9, 1828. It was a +success. Hood's rib would probably be the play I have not identified. +See letter to Barton of October 11. + +Here, a little out of its order, might come a letter from Lamb to Hood, +December 17, 1828, which is facsimiled in a privately-printed American +bibliography of Lamb, the owner of which declines to let not only me but +the Boston Bibliophile Society include it with the correspondence. In it +Lamb expresses regret, not so much that Hood had signed "The Widow" with +Lamb's name, but that an unfortunately ambiguous jest, pointed out to +him by certain friends, had crept into it. He asks that the subject may +never be referred to again. + +Here perhaps should come a note to Miss Reynolds, Hood's sister-in-law, +accompanying Lamb's Essay on Hogarth.] + + + +LETTER 466 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Dec., 1828.] + +Dear M.,--As I see no blood-marks on the Green Lanes Road, I conclude +you got in safe skins home. Have you thought of inquiring Miss Wilson's +change of abode? Of the 2 copies of my drama I want one sent to +Wordsworth, together with a complete copy of Hone's "Table Book," for +which I shall be your debtor till we meet. Perhaps Longman will take +charge of this parcel. The other is for Coleridge at Mr. Gilman's, +Grove, Highgate, which may be sent, or, if you have a curiosity to see +him you will make an errand with it to him, & tell him we mean very soon +to come & see him, if the Gilmans can give or get us a bed. I am ashamed +to be so troublesome. Pray let Hood see the "Ecclectic Review"--a rogue! +The 2'd parts of the Blackwood you may make waste paper of. Yours truly, + +C.L. + + +[I do not identify Miss Wilson. Lamb's drama was "A Wife's Trial" in +_Blackwood_ for December, 1828. The same number of the _Eclectic Review_ +referred to Hood's parody of Lamb, "The Widow," as profaning Leslie's +picture of the widow by its "heartless ribaldry." By the 2d parts of +_Blackwood_ Lamb referred, I imagine, to the pages on which his play was +not printed.] + + + +LETTER 467 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. December 5, 1828.] + +Dear B.B.--I am ashamed to receive so many nice Books from you, and to +have none to send you in return; You are always sending me some fruits +or wholesome pot-herbs, and mine is the garden of the Sluggard, nothing +but weeds or scarce they. Nevertheless if I knew how to transmit it, I +would send you Blackwood's of this month, which contains a little Drama, +to have your opinion of it, and how far I have improved, or otherwise, +upon its prototype. Thank you for your kind Sonnet. It does me good to +see the Dedication to a Christian Bishop. I am for a Comprehension, as +Divines call it, but so as that the Church shall go a good deal more +than halfway over to the Silent Meeting house. I have ever said that the +Quakers are the only _Professors_ of Christianity as I read it in the +Evangiles; I say _Professors_--marry, as to practice, with their gaudy +hot types and poetical vanities, they are much at one with the sinful. +Martin's frontispiece is a very fine thing, let C.L. say what he please +to the contrary. Of the Poems, I like them as a volume better than any +one of the preceding; particularly, Power and Gentleness; The Present; +Lady Russell--with the exception that I do not like the noble act of +Curtius, true or false, one of the grand foundations of old Roman +patriotism, to be sacrificed to Lady R.'s taking notes on her husband's +trial. If a thing is good, why invidiously bring it into light with +something better? There are too few heroic things in this world to admit +of our marshalling them in anxious etiquettes of precedence. Would you +make a poetn on the Story of Ruth (pretty Story!) and then say, Aye, but +how much better is the story of Joseph and his Brethren! To go on, the +Stanzas to "Chalon" want the _name_ of Clarkson in the body of them; it +is left to inference. The Battle of Gibeon is spirited again--but you +sacrifice it in last stanza to the Song at Bethlehem. Is it quite +orthodox to do so. The first was good, you suppose, for that +dispensation. Why set the word against the word? It puzzles a weak +Christian. So Watts's Psalms are an implied censure on David's. But as +long as the Bible is supposed to be an equally divine Emanation with the +Testament, so long it will stagger weaklings to have them set in +opposition. Godiva is delicately touch'd. I have always thought it a +beautiful story characteristic of old English times. But I could not +help amusing myself with the thought--if Martin had chosen this subject +for a frontispiece, there would have been in some dark corner a white +Lady, white as the Walker on the waves--riding upon some mystical +quadruped --and high above would have risen "tower above tower a massy +structure high" the Tenterden steeples of Coventry, till the poor Cross +would scarce have known itself among the clouds, and far above them all, +the distant Clint hills peering over chimney pots, piled up, +Ossa-on-Olympus fashion, till the admiring Spectator (admirer of a noble +deed) might have gone look for the Lady, as you must hunt for the other +in the Lobster. But M. should be made Royal Architect. What palaces he +would pile--but then what parliamentary grants to make them good! +ne'ertheless I like the frontispiece. The Elephant is pleasant; and I am +glad you are getting into a wider scope of subjects. There may be too +much, not religion, but too many _good words_ into a book, till it +becomes, as Sh. says of religion, a rhapsody of words. I will just name +that you have brought in the Song to the Shepherds in four or five if +not six places. Now this is not good economy. The Enoch is fine; and +here I can sacrifice Elijah to it, because 'tis illustrative only, and +not disparaging of the latter prophet's departure. I like this best in +the Book. Lastly, I much like the Heron, 'tis exquisite: know you Lord +Thurlow's Sonnet to a Bird of that sort on Lacken water? If not, 'tis +indispensable I send it you, with my Blackwood, if you tell me how best +to send them. Fludyer is pleasant. You are getting gay and Hood-ish. +What is the Enigma? money--if not, I fairly confess I am foiled--and +sphynx must [_here are words crossed through_] 4 times I've tried to +write eat--eat me--and the blotting pen turns it into cat me. And now I +will take my leave with saying I esteem thy verses, like thy present, +honour thy frontispicer, and right-reverence thy Patron and Dedicatee, +and am, dear B.B. + + Yours heartily, C.L. + +Our joint kindest Loves to A.K. and your Daughter. + + +[Barton's new book was _A New Year's Eve and other Poems_, 1828, +dedicated to Charles Richard Sumner, Bishop of Winchester. This volume +contains Barton's "Fireside Quatrains to Charles Lamb" (quoted in Vol. +IV.) and also the following "Sonnet to a Nameless Friend," whom I take +to be Lamb:-- + + SONNET TO A NAMELESS FRIEND + + In each successive tome that bears _my_ name + Hast thou, though veiled _thy own_ from public eyes, + Won from my muse that willing sacrifice + Which worth and talents such as thine should claim: + And I should close my minstrel task with shame, + Could I forget the indissoluble ties + Which every grateful thought of thee supplies + To one who deems thy friendship more than fame. + Accept then, thus imperfectly, once more, + The homage of thy poet and thy friend; + And should thy partial praise my lays commend, + Versed as thou art in all the gentle lore + Of English poesy's exhaustless store, + Whom I most love they never can offend. + +Martin's frontispiece represented Christ walking on the water. Lamb +recalls his remarks in a previous letter about this painter, who though +he never became Royal Architect was the originator of the present Thames +Embankment. Macaulay, in his essay on Southey's edition of the +_Pilgrim's Progress_, in the _Edinburgh_ for December, 1831, makes some +very similar remarks about Martin and the way in which he would probably +paint Lear. + +In the poem "Lady Rachel Russell; or, A Roman Hero and an English +Heroine Compared," Barton compared the act of Curtius, who leaped into +the gulf in the Forum, with Lady Russell standing beside her lord. + +Chalon was the painter of a portrait of Thomas Clarkson. + +The "Battle of Gibeon" is a poem inspired by Martin's picture of Joshua; +the last stanza runs thus:-- + + Made known by marvels awfully sublime! + Yet far more glorious in the Christian's sight + Than these stern terrors of the olden time, + The gentler splendours of that peaceful night, + When opening clouds displayed, in vision bright, + The heavenly host to Bethlehem's shepherd train, + Shedding around them more than cloudless light! + "Glory to God on high!" their opening strain, + Its chorus, "Peace on Earth!" its theme Messiah's reign! + +"In the Lobster." Referring to that part of a lobster which is called +Eve. + +"The Elephant." Some mildly humorous verses "To an Elephant." + +"As Sh. says of religion"--Shakespeare, I assume, in "Hamlet," III., 4, +47, 48:-- + + And sweet Religion makes + A rhapsody of words. + +I quote in the Appendix the poem which Lamb liked best. Barton had +written a poem called "Syr Heron." This is Lord Thurlow's sonnet, of +which Lamb was very fond. He quoted it in a note to his _Elia_ essay on +the sonnets of Sidney in the _London Magazine_, and copied it into his +album:-- + + TO A BIRD, THAT HAUNTED THE WATERS OF LACKEN, IN THE WINTER + + O melancholy Bird, a winter's day, + Thou standest by the margin of the pool, + And, taught by God, dost thy whole being school + To Patience, which all evil can allay. + God has appointed thee the fish thy prey; + And giv'n thyself a lesson to the fool + Unthrifty, to submit to moral rule, + And his unthinking course by thee to weigh. + There need not schools, nor the professor's chair, + Though these be good, true wisdom to impart: + He, who has not enough, for these, to spare, + Of time, or gold, may yet amend his heart, + And teach his soul, by brooks, and rivers fair: + Nature is always wise in every part. + +"Fludyer" was a poem to Sir Charles Fludyer on the devastation effected +on his marine villa at Felixstowe by the encroachments of the sea. The +answer to the enigma, Mrs. FitzGerald (Lucy Barton) told Canon Ainger, +was not money but an auctioneer's hammer. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Louisa Holcroft, dated December +5, 1828. Louisa Holcroft was a daughter of Thomas Holcroft, Lamb's +friend, whose widow married Kenney. A good letter with some excellent +nonsense about measles in it.] + + + +LETTER 468 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +[December, 1828.] + +My dear three C.'s--The way from Southgate to Colney Hatch thro' the +unfrequentedest Blackberry paths that ever concealed their coy bunches +from a truant Citizen, we have accidentally fallen upon--the giant Tree +by Cheshunt we have missed, but keep your chart to go by, unless you +will be our conduct--at present I am disabled from further flights than +just to skirt round Clay Hill, with a peep at the fine back woods, by +strained tendons, got by skipping a skipping-rope at 53--heu mihi non +sum qualis. But do you know, now you come to talk of walks, a ramble of +four hours or so--there and back--to the willow and lavender plantations +at the south corner of Northaw Church by a well dedicated to Saint +Claridge, with the clumps of finest moss rising hillock fashion, which I +counted to the number of two hundred and sixty, and are called +"Claridge's covers"--the tradition being that that saint entertained so +many angels or hermits there, upon occasion of blessing the waters? The +legends have set down the fruits spread upon that occasion, and in the +Black Book of St. Albans some are named which are not supposed to have +been introduced into this island till a century later. But waiving the +miracle, a sweeter spot is not in ten counties round; you are knee deep +in clover, that is to say, if you are not above a middling man's height; +from this paradise, making a day of it, you go to see the ruins of an +old convent at March Hall, where some of the painted glass is yet whole +and fresh. + +If you do not know this, you do not know the capabilities of this +country, you may be said to be a stranger to Enfield. I found it out one +morning in October, and so delighted was I that I did not get home +before dark, well a-paid. + +I shall long to show you the clump meadows, as they are called; we might +do that, without reaching March Hall. When the days are longer, we might +take both, and come home by Forest Cross, so skirt over Pennington and +the cheerful little village of Churchley to Forty Hill. + +But these are dreams till summer; meanwhile we should be most glad to +see you for a lesser excursion--say, Sunday next, you and _another_, or +if more, best on a weekday with a notice, but o' Sundays, as far as a +leg of mutton goes, most welcome. We can squeeze out a bed. Edmonton +coaches run every hour, and my pen has run out its quarter. Heartily +farewell. + + +[Much of the "Lamb country" touched upon in this letter is now built on. +In my large edition I give a map of Lamb's favourite walking region. + +"The giant Tree by Cheshunt" is Goff's Oak. + +"The Black Book of St. Albans." The Black Books exposed abuses in the +church.] + + + +LETTER 469 + +CHARLES LAMB TO T.N. TALFOURD + +[No date. End of 1828.] + +Dear Talfourd,--You could not have told me of a more friendly thing than +you have been doing. I am proud of my namesake. I shall take care never +to do any dirty action, pick pockets, or anyhow get myself hanged, for +fear of reflecting ignominy upon your young Chrisom. I have now a motive +to be good. I shall not _omnis moriar_;--my name borne down the black +gulf of oblivion. + +I shall survive in eleven letters, five more than Caesar. Possibly I +shall come to be knighted, or more: Sir C.L. Talfourd, Bart.! + +Yet hath it an authorish twang with it, which will wear out my name for +poetry. Give him a smile from me till I see him. If you do not drop down +before, some day in the _week after next_ I will come and take one +night's lodging with you, if convenient, before you go hence. You shall +name it. We are in town to-morrow _speciali gratia_, but by no +arrangement can get up near you. + +Believe us both, with greatest regards, yours and Mrs. Talfourd's. + +CHARLES LAMB-PHILO-TALFOURD + +I come as near it as I can. + + +[This may be incorrectly dated, but I place it here because in that to +Hood of December 17, summarised above, Lamb speaks of his godson at +Brighton. + +Talfourd (who himself dates this letter 1829) had named his latest child +Charles Lamb Talfourd. The boy lived only until 1835. I quote in the +Appendix the verses which Talfourd wrote on his death. Another of Lamb's +name children, Charles Lamb Kenney, grew to man's estate and became a +ready writer.] + + + +LETTER 470 + +CHARLES LAMB TO GEORGE DYER + +[No date. ? January, 1829.] + +Dear Dyer, My very good friend, and Charles Clarke's father in law, +Vincent Novello, wishes to shake hands with you. Make him play you a +tune. He is a damn'd fine musician, and what is better, a good man and +true. He will tell you how glad we should be to have Mrs. Dyer and you +here for a few days. Our young friend, Miss Isola, has been here +holydaymaking, but leaves us tomorrow. + + Yours Ever CH. LAMB. + +Enfield. + +[_Added in a feminine hand_:] Emma's love to Mr. and Mrs. Dyer. + + +[The date of this note is pure conjecture on my part, but is +unimportant. Novello had become Charles Clarke's father-in-law in 1828, +and Emma Isola, who was now teaching the children of a clergyman named +Williams, at Fornham, in Suffolk, spent her Christmas holidays with the +Lambs that year. + +Here, perhaps, should come an undated letter from Lamb to Louisa Martin. +Lamb begins "Dear Monkey," and refers to his "niece," Mrs. Dowden, and +some business which she requires him to transact, Mrs. Dowden being Mrs. +John Lamb's daughter-in-law. Lamb describes himself as "a sick cat that +loves to be alone on housetops or at cellar bottoms."] + + + +LETTER 471 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[19th Jan., 1829.] + +My dear Procter,--I am ashamed to have not taken the drift of your +pleasant letter, which I find to have been pure invention. But jokes are +not suspected in Boeotian Enfield. We are plain people; and our talk is +of corn, and cattle, and Waltham markets. Besides, I was a little out of +sorts when I received it. The fact is, I am involved in a case which has +fretted me to death; and I have no reliance, except on you, to extricate +me. I am sure you will give me your best legal advice, having no +professional friend besides but Robinson and Talfourd, with neither of +whom at present I am on the best terms. My brother's widow left a will, +made during the lifetime of my brother, in which I am named sole +executor, by which she bequeaths forty acres of arable property, which +it seems she held under Covert Baron, unknown to my brother, to the +heirs of the body of Elizabeth Dowden, her married daughter by a first +husband, in fee-simple, recoverable by fine--_invested_ property, mind; +for there is the difficulty--subject to leet and quit-rent; in short, +worded in the most guarded terms, to shut out the property from Isaac +Dowden, the husband. Intelligence has just come of the death of this +person in India, where he made a will, entailing this property (which +seem'd entangled enough already) to the heirs of his body, that should +not be born of his wife; for it seems by the law in India, natural +children can recover. They have put the cause into Exchequer process, +here removed by Certiorari from the native Courts; and the question is, +whether I should, as executor, try the cause here, or again re-remove it +to the Supreme Sessions at Bangalore? (which I understand I can, or +plead a hearing before the Privy Council here). As it involves all the +little property of Elizabeth Dowden, I am anxious to take the fittest +steps, and what may be least expensive. Pray assist me, for the case is +so embarrassed, that it deprives me of sleep and appetite. M. Burney +thinks there is a case like it in Chapt. 170, sect. 5, in Fearne's +Contingent Remainders. Pray read it over with him dispassionately, and +let me have the result. The complexity lies in the questionable power of +the husband to alienate.... + +I had another favour to beg, which is the beggarliest of beggings. + +A few lines of verse for a young friend's Album (six will be enough). M. +Burney will tell you who she is I want 'em for. A girl of gold. Six +lines--make 'em eight--signed Barry C----. They need not be very good, +as I chiefly want 'em as a foil to mine. But I shall be seriously +obliged by any refuse scrap. We are in the last ages of the world, when +St. Paul prophesied that women should be "headstrong, lovers of their +own wills, having Albums." I fled hither to escape the Albumean +persecution, and had not been in my new house twenty-four hours, when +the daughter of the next house came in with a friend's Album to beg a +contribution, and the following day intimated she had one of her own. +Two more have sprung up since. If I take the wings of the morning and +fly unto the uttermost parts of the earth, there will Albums be. New +Holland has Albums. But the age is to be complied with. M.B. will tell +you the sort of girl I request the ten lines for. Somewhat of a pensive +cast, what you admire. The lines may come before the Law question, as +that can not be determined before Hilary Term, and I wish your +deliberate judgment on that. The other may be flimsy and superficial. +And if you have not burnt your returned letter, pray re-send it me, as a +monumental token of my stupidity. 'Twas a little unthinking of you to +touch upon a sore subject. Why, by dabbling in those accursed Albums, I +have become a byword of infamy all over the kingdom. I have sicken'd +decent women for asking me to write in Albums. There be "dark jests" +abroad, Master Cornwall; and some riddles may live to be clear'd up. And +'tis not every saddle is put on the right steed; and forgeries and false +Gospels are not peculiar to the Age following the Apostles. And some +tubs don't stand on their right bottoms. Which is all I wish to say in +these ticklish Times--and so your Servant, + +CHS. LAMB. + + +[We do not know the nature of the "bite" that Procter had put upon Lamb; +but Lamb quickly retaliated with the first paragraph of this letter, +which is mainly invention. In his _Old Acquaintance_ Mr. Fields wrote: +"He [Procter] told me that the law question raised in this epistle was a +sheer fabrication of Lamb's, gotten up by him to puzzle his young +correspondent, the conveyancer. The coolness referred to between himself +and Robinson and Talfourd, Procter said, was also a fiction invented by +Lamb to carry out his legal mystification." + +At the end of the first paragraph came some words in another hand: "_in +usum_ enfeoffments whereof he was only collaterally seized, &c.," +beneath which Lamb wrote: "The above is some of M. Burney's memoranda +which he has left me, and you may cut out and give him." + +Procter's verses for Emma Isola's album I have not seen, but Canon +Ainger says that they refer to "Isola Bella, whom all poets love," the +island in Lago di Maggiore. + +This is a list of the contents of Emma Isola's Album, all autographs +(from Quaritch's catalogue, September, 1886):-- + +CHARLES LAMB. "What is an Album?" a poem addressed to + Miss Emma Isola. + + "To Emma on her Twenty-first Birthday," May 25, 1830. + + "Harmony in Unlikeness." Without date. + +JOHN KEATS. "To my Brother," a sonnet on the birthday of his + brother Tom, dated Nov. 18 (? 1814 or 1815). + +WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. "She dwelt among the untrodden + ways," three verses of his poem on Lucy, copied in his + own hand on March 18, 1837. + + "Blessings be with them, and enduring praise," five lines of + a sonnet dated Rydal, 1838. + +ALFRED TENNYSON. "When Lazarus left his charnel-cave," four + stanzas, undated. + +THOMAS MOORE. "Woman gleans but sorrow," and note to + Moxon, June, 1844. + +LEIGH HUNT. "Apollo's Autograph," from an unpublished poem + called "The Feast of the Violets." Undated, _circa_ 1838. + +THOMAS HOOD. "Dreams," a prose fragment, without date, _circa_ + 1840. + +JAMES HOGG. "I'm a' gaen wrang," a song by the Ettrick Shepherd, + _circa_ 1830. + +JOANNA BAILLIE. "Up! quit thy bower," a song, undated, _circa_ + 1830. + +ROBERT SOUTHEY. Epitaph on himself, in verse, Feb. 18, 1837. + +THOMAS CAMPBELL. "Victoria's sceptre o'er the waves," _circa_ + 1837. + +ALLAN CUNNINGHAM. "The Pirate's Song," _circa_ 1838. + +CHARLES DIBDIN. "An Album's like the Dream of Hope," _circa_ + 1827. + +BERNARD BARTON. "To Emma," with a note by Charles Lamb + at foot, 1827. + +WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR. "To Emma Isola," _circa_ 1827. + +BARRY CORNWALL. "To the Spirit of Italy," _circa_ 1827. + +SAMUEL ROGERS. Two letters, and a poem, "My Last," 1829-36. + +FREDERICK LOCKER (afterwards Locker-Lampson). A quatrain, + dated July, 1873. + +George Dyer, J.B. Dibdin, George Darley, Matilda Betham, H.F. + Cary, Mrs. Piozzi, Edward Moxon, T.N. Talfourd, are + the other writers.] + + + +LETTER 472 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +Jan. 22nd, 1829. + +Don't trouble yourself about the verses. Take 'em coolly as they come. +Any day between this and Midsummer will do. Ten lines the extreme. There +is no mystery in my incognita. She has often seen you, though you may +not have observed a silent brown girl, who for the last twelve years has +run wild about our house in her Christmas holidays. She is Italian by +name and extraction. Ten lines about the blue sky of her country will +do, as it's her foible to be proud of it. But they must not be over +courtly or Lady-fied as she is with a Lady who says to her "go and she +goeth; come and she cometh." Item, I have made her a tolerable Latinist. +The verses should be moral too, as for a Clergyman's family. She is +called Emma Isola. I approve heartily of your turning your four vols. +into a lesser compass. 'Twill Sybillise the gold left. I shall, I think, +be in town in a few weeks, when I will assuredly see you. I will put in +here loves to Mrs. Procter and the Anti-Capulets, because Mary tells me +I omitted them in my last. I like to see my friends here. I have put my +lawsuit into the hands of an Enfield practitioner--a plain man, who +seems perfectly to understand it, and gives me hopes of a favourable +result. + +Rumour tells us that Miss Holcroft is married; though the varlet has not +had the grace to make any communication to us on the subject. Who is +Badman, or Bed'em? Have I seen him at Montacute's? I hear he is a great +chymist. I am sometimes chymical myself. A thought strikes me with +horror. Pray heaven he may not have done it for the sake of trying +chymical experiments upon her,--young female subjects are so scarce! +Louisa would make a capital shot. An't you glad about Burke's case? We +may set off the Scotch murders against the Scotch novels--Hare, the +Great Un-hanged. + +Martin Burney is richly worth your knowing. He is on the top scale of my +friendship ladder, on which an angel or two is still climbing, and some, +alas! descending. I am out of the literary world at present. Pray, is +there anything new from the admired pen of the author of the _Pleasures +of Hope_? Has Mrs. He-mans (double masculine) done anything pretty +lately? Why sleeps the lyre of Hervey, and of Alaric Watts? Is the muse +of L.E.L. silent? Did you see a sonnet of mine in Blackwood's last? +Curious construction! _Elaborata facilitas_! And now I'll tell. 'Twas +written for the "_Gem_;" but the editors declined it, on the plea that +it would _shock all mothers_; so they published "The Widow" instead. I +am born out of time. I have no conjecture about what the present world +calls delicacy. I thought "Rosamund Gray" was a pretty modest thing. +Hessey assures me that the world would not bear it. I have lived to grow +into an indecent character. When my sonnet was rejected, I exclaimed, +"Damn the age; I will write for Antiquity!" + +_Erratum_ in sonnet:--Last line but something, for _tender_, read +_tend_. The Scotch do not know our law terms; but I find some remains of +honest, plain, old writing lurking there still. They were not so +mealy-mouthed as to refuse my verses. Maybe, 'tis their oatmeal. + +Blackwood sent me £20 for the drama. Somebody cheated me out of it next +day; and my new pair of breeches, just sent home, cracking at first +putting on, I exclaimed, in my wrath, "All tailors are cheats, and all +men are tailors." Then I was better. [_Rest lost_.] + + +["Your four vols." Procter's poetical works, in three volumes, were +published in 1822. Since then he had issued _The Flood of Thessaly_, +1823. He was perhaps meditating a new one-volume selection. + +"Anti-Capulets"--the Basil Montagus (Montacutes). + +"Badman." Louisa Holcroft married Carlyle's friend Badams, a +manufacturer and scientific experimentalist of Birmingham, with whom the +philosopher spent some weeks in 1827 in attempting a cure for dyspepsia +(see the _Early Recollections_). + +"Burke's case." William Burke and William Hare, the body-snatchers and +murderers of Edinburgh, who killed persons to sell their corpses to +Knox's school of anatomy. Burke was hanged a week later than this +letter, on January 28. Hare turned King's evidence and disappeared. A +"shot" was a subject in these men's vocabulary. The author of the +Waverley novels--the Great Unknown-- had, of course, become known long +before this. + +"M.B."--Martin Burney. In 1818 Lamb had dedicated the prose volume of +his _Works_ to Burney, in a sonnet ending with the lines:-- + + Free from self-seeking, envy, low design, + I have not found a whiter soul than thine. + +Hervey was Thomas Kibble Hervey (1799-1859), a great album poet. + +"A sonnet of mine in Blackwood"--in the number for January, 1829 (see +below). + +"Hessey"--of the firm of Taylor & Hessey, the late publishers of the +_London Magazine_. + +Another letter from Lamb to Procter, repeating the request for verses, +was referred to by Canon Ainger in the preface to his edition of the +correspondence. Canon Ainger printed a delightful passage. It is +disappointing not to find it among the letters proper in his latest +edition. + +Here (had I permission from its American owner to print it, which I have +not) I should place Lamb's instructions as to playing whist drawn up for +Mrs. Badams' use and as an introduction to Captain Burney's treatise on +the game. It is a very interesting document and England has never seen +it yet. + +The Boston Bibliophile edition also gives a letter from Lamb to Badams +apologising for his heatedness yesterday and explaining it by saying +that he had been for some hours dissuading a friend from settling at +Enfield "which friend would have attracted down crowds of literary men, +which men would have driven me wild."] + + + +LETTER 473 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +Jan. 28, 1829. + +Dear Allsop--Old Star is setting. Take him and cut him into Little +Stars. Nevertheless the extinction of the greater light is not by the +lesser light (Stella, or Mrs. Star) apprehended so nigh, but that she +will be thankful if you can let young Scintillation (Master Star) +twinkle down by the coach on Sunday, to catch the last glimmer of the +decaying parental light. No news is good news; so we conclude Mrs. A. +and little a are doing well. Our kindest loves, C.L. + + +[I cannot explain the mystery of these Stars.] + + + +LETTER 474 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[? Jan. 29th, 1829.] + +When Miss Ouldcroft (who is now Mrs. Beddome, and Bed--dom'd to her!) +was at Enfield, which she was in summertime, and owed her health to its +sun and genial influences, she wisited (with young lady-like +impertinence) a poor man's cottage that had a pretty baby (O the +yearnling!), and gave it fine caps and sweetmeats. On a day, broke into +the parlour our two maids uproarious. "O ma'am, who do you think Miss +Ouldcroft (they pronounce it Holcroft) has been working a cap for?" "A +child," answered Mary, in true Shandean female simplicity. "It's the +man's child as was taken up for sheep-stealing." Miss Ouldcroft was +staggered, and would have cut the connection; but by main force I made +her go and take her leave of her _protégée_ (which I only spell with a g +because I can't make a pretty j). I thought, if she went no more, the +Abactor or Abactor's wife (vide Ainsworth) would suppose she had heard +something; and I have delicacy for a sheep-stealer. The overseers +actually overhauled a mutton-pie at the baker's (his first, last, and +only hope of mutton-pie), which he never came to eat, and thence +inferred his guilt. _Per occasionem cujus_ I framed the sonnet; observe +its elaborate construction. I was four days about it. + + THE GYPSY'S MALISON + + Suck, baby, suck, Mother's love grows by giving, + Drain the sweet founts that only thrive by wasting; + Black Manhood comes, when riotous guilty living + Hands thee the cup that shall be death in tasting. + Kiss, baby, kiss, Mother's lips shine by kisses, + Choke the warm breath that else would fall in blessings; + Black Manhood comes, when turbulent guilty blisses + Tend thee the kiss that poisons 'mid caressings. + Hang, baby, hang, mother's love loves such forces, + Choke the fond neck that bends still to thy clinging; + Black Manhood comes, when violent lawless courses + Leave thee a spectacle in rude air swinging. + So sang a wither'd Sibyl energetical, + And bann'd the ungiving door with lips prophetical. + +Barry, study that sonnet. It is curiously and perversely elaborate. 'Tis +a choking subject, and therefore the reader is directed to the structure +of it. See you? and was this a fourteener to be rejected by a trumpery +annual? forsooth, 'twould shock all mothers; and may all mothers, who +would so be shocked, bed dom'd! as if mothers were such sort of +logicians as to infer the future hanging of _their_ child from the +theoretical hangibility (or capacity of being hanged, if the judge +pleases) of every infant born with a neck on. Oh B.C., my whole heart is +faint, and my whole head is sick (how is it?) at this damned, canting, +unmasculine unbawdy (I had almost said) age! Don't show this to your +child's mother or I shall be Orpheusized, scattered into Hebras. Damn +the King, lords, commons, and _specially_ (as I said on Muswell Hill on +a Sunday when I could get no beer a quarter before one) all Bishops, +Priests and Curates. Vale. + + +["Ainsworth." Referring to Robert Ainsworth's _Thesaurus_, 1736. +_Abactor_ (see Forcellini), a stealer or driver away of cattle. +Ainsworth gives only _abactus_--to drive away by force. + +"The Gypsy's Malison." This is the sonnet in _Blackwood_ for January, +1829.] + + + +LETTER 475 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[No date. Early 1829.] + +The comings in of an incipient conveyancer are not adequate to the +receipt of three twopenny post non-paids in a week. Therefore, after +this, I condemn my stub to long and deep silence, or shall awaken it to +write to lords. Lest those raptures in this honeymoon of my +correspondence, which you avow for the gentle person of my Nuncio, after +passing through certain natural grades, as Love, Love and Water, Love +with the chill off, then subsiding to that point which the heroic suitor +of his wedded dame, the noble-spirited Lord Randolph in the play, +declares to be the ambition of his passion, a reciprocation of +"complacent kindness,"--should suddenly plump down (scarce staying to +bait at the mid point of indifference, so hungry it is for distaste) to +a loathing and blank aversion, to the rendering probable such counter +expressions as this,--"Damn that infernal twopenny postman" (words which +make the not yet glutted inamorato "lift up his hands and wonder who can +use them.") While, then, you are not ruined, let me assure thee, O thou +above the painter, and next only under Giraldus Cambrensis, the most +immortal and worthy to be immortal Barry, thy most ingenious and golden +cadences do take my fancy mightily. They are at this identical moment +under the snip and the paste of the fairest hands (bating chilblains) in +Cambridge, soon to be transplanted to Suffolk, to the envy of half of +the young ladies in Bury. But tell me, and tell me truly, gentle Swain, +is that Isola Bella a true spot in geographical denomination, or a +floating Delos in thy brain? Lurks that fair island in verity in the +bosom of Lake Maggiore, or some other with less poetic name, which thou +hast Cornwallized for the occasion? And what if Maggiore itself be but a +coinage of adaptation? Of this pray resolve me immediately, for my +albumess will be catechised on this subject; and how can I prompt her? +Lake Leman, I know, and Lemon Lake (in a punch bowl) I have swum in, +though those lymphs be long since dry. But Maggiore may be in the moon. +Unsphinx this riddle for me, for my shelves have no gazetteer. And +mayest thou never murder thy father-in-law in the Trivia of Lincoln's +Inn New Square Passage, where Searl Street and the Street of Portugal +embrace, nor afterwards make absurd proposals to the Widow M. But I know +you abhor any such notions. Nevertheless so did O-Edipus (as Admiral +Burney used to call him, splitting the diphthong in spite or ignorance) +for that matter. C.L. + + +["Above the painter"--James Barry, R.A., but I do not understand the +allusion here. + +"Giraldus Cambrensis"--the historian, Giraldus de Barri. + +Procter's poem for Emma Isola's album, as we have seen, mentions Isola +Bella, the island in Lago de Maggiore. Delos was the floating island +which Neptune fixed in order that Latona might rest there and Apollo and +Diana be born. + +Oedipus, who solved the riddle of the Sphinx, was the murderer of his +father. Basil Montagu was Procter's father-in-law. Procter's address was +10 Lincolns Inn, New Square. + +At the end of the letter came a passage which for family reasons cannot +be printed.] + + + +LETTER 476 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +February 2, 1829. + +Facundissime Poeta! quanquam istiusmodi epitheta oratoribus potiùs quam +poetis attinere facilè scio--tamen, facundissime! + +Commoratur nobiscum jamdiu, in agro Enfeldiense, scilicet, leguleius +futurus, illustrissimus Martinus Burneius, otium agens, negotia +nominalia, et officinam clientum vacuam, paululum fugiens. Orat, +implorat te--nempe, Martinus--ut si (quòd Dii faciant) fortè fortunâ, +absente ipso, advenerit tardus cliens, eum certiorem feceris per literas +hûc missas. Intelligisne? an me Anglicè et barbarice ad te hominem +perdoctum scribere oportet? + +Si status de franco tenemento datur avo, et in codem facto si mediate +vel immediate datur _haeredibus vel haeredibus corporis dicti avi_, +postrema, haec verba sunt Limitations, non Perquisitionis. + +Dixi. + +CARLAGNULUS. + + +[Mr. Stephen Gwynn has made the following translation for me:-- + +"Most eloquent Poet: though I know well such epithet befits orators +rather than poets--and yet, Most eloquent! + +"There has been staying with us this while past at our country seat of +Enfield to wit, the future attorney, the illustrious Martin Burney, +taking his leisure, flying for a space from his nominal occupations, and +his office empty of clients. He--that is, Martin--begs and entreats of +you that if (heaven send it so!) by some stroke of fortune, in his +absence there should arrive a belated client, you would inform him by +letter here. Do you understand? or must I write in barbarous English to +a scholar like you? + +"If an estate in freehold is given to an ancestor, and if in the same +deed directly or indirectly the gift is made to the heir or heirs of the +body of the said ancestor, these last words have the force of Limitation +not of Purchase. + +"I have spoken. + +CHARLES LAMB." + +The last passage was copied probably direct from some law book of +Burney's, and is unintelligible except to students of law-Latin.] + + + +LETTER 477 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +Edmonton, Feb. 2, 1829. + +Dear Cowden,--Your books are as the gushing of streams in a desert. By +the way, you have sent no autobiographies. Your letter seems to imply +you had. Nor do I want any. Cowden, they are of the books which I give +away. What damn'd Unitarian skewer-soul'd things the general biographies +turn out. Rank and Talent you shall have when Mrs. May has done with +'em. Mary likes Mrs. Bedinfield much. For me I read nothing but +Astrea--it has turn'd my brain--I go about with a switch turn'd up at +the end for a crook; and Lambs being too old, the butcher tells me, my +cat follows me in a green ribband. Becky and her cousin are getting +pastoral dresses, and then we shall all four go about Arcadizing. O +cruel Shepherdess! Inconstant yet fair, and more inconstant for being +fair! Her gold ringlets fell in a disorder superior to order! + +Come and join us. + +I am called the Black Shepherd--you shall be Cowden with the Tuft. + +Prosaically, we shall be glad to have you both,--or any two of you--drop +in by surprise some Saturday night. This must go off. + +Loves to Vittoria. C.L. + + +["Rank and Talent"-a novel by W.P. Scargill, 1829. + +Mrs. Bedinfield wrote _Longhollow: a Country Tale_, 1829. + +"Astrea." Probably the romance by Honoré D'Urfé. + +"Cowden with the Tuft." So called from his hair, and from _Riquet with +the Tuft_, the fairy tale. We read in the Cowden Clarkes' _Recollections +of Writers:_ "The latter name ('Cowden with the Tuft') slyly implies the +smooth baldness with scant curly hair distinguishing the head of the +friend addressed, and which seemed to strike Charles Lamb so forcibly, +that one evening, after gazing at it for some time, he suddenly broke +forth with the exclamation, ''Gad, Clarke! what whiskers you have behind +your head!'"] + + + +LETTER 478 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. February 27, 1829.] + +Dear R.--Expectation was alert on the receit of your strange-shaped +present, while yet undisclosed from its fuse envelope. Some said,'tis a +viol da Gamba, others pronounced it a fiddle. I myself hoped it a Liquer +case pregnant with Eau de Vie and such odd Nectar. When midwifed into +daylight, the gossips were at loss to pronounce upon its species. Most +took it for a marrow spoon, an apple scoop, a banker's guinea shovel. At +length its true scope appeared, its drift-- to save the backbone of my +sister stooping to scuttles. A philanthropic intent, borrowed no doubt +from some of the Colliers. You save people's backs one way, and break +'em again by loads of obligation. The spectacles are delicate and +Vulcanian. No lighter texture than their steel did the cuckoldy +blacksmith frame to catch Mrs. Vulcan and the Captain in. For ungalled +forehead, as for back unbursten, you have Mary's thanks. Marry, for my +own peculium of obligation, 'twas supererogatory. A second part of +Pamela was enough in conscience. Two Pamelas in a house is too much +without two Mr. B.'s to reward 'em. + +Mary, who is handselling her new aerial perspectives upon a pair of old +worsted stockings trod out in Cheshunt lanes, sends love. I, great good +liking. Bid us a personal farewell before you see the Vatican. + +Chas. Lamb, Enfield. + + +[Crabb Robinson, just starting for Rome, had sent Lamb a copy of +_Pamela_ under the impression that he had borrowed one. + +"Two Mr. B.'s." In Richardson's novel Pamela marries the young Squire B. +and reforms him.] + + + +LETTER 479 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SAMUEL ROGERS + +Chase, Enfield: 22nd Mar., 1829. + +My dear Sir,--I have but lately learned, by letter from Mr. Moxon, the +death of your brother. For the little I had seen of him, I greatly +respected him. I do not even know how recent your loss may have been, +and hope that I do not unseasonably present you with a few lines +suggested to me this morning by the thought of him. I beg to be most +kindly remembered to your remaining brother, and to Miss Rogers. + +Your's truly, CHARLES LAMB. + + Rogers, of all the men that I have known + But slightly, who have died, your brother's loss + Touched me most sensibly. There came across + My mind an image of the cordial tone + Of your fraternal meetings, where a guest + I more than once have sate; and grieve to think, + That of that threefold cord one precious link + By Death's rude hand is sever'd from the rest. + Of our old gentry he appear'd a stem; + A magistrate who, while the evil-doer + He kept in terror, could respect the poor, + And not for every trifle harass them-- + As some, divine and laic, too oft do. + This man's a private loss and public too. + + +[Daniel Rogers, the banker's elder brother, had just died.] + + + +LETTER 480 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. March 25, 1829.] + +Dear B.B.--I send you by desire Barley's very poetical poem. You will +like, I think, the novel headings of each scene. Scenical directions in +verse are novelties. With it I send a few _duplicates_, which are +_therefore_ no value to me, and may amuse an idle hour. Read +"Christmas," 'tis the production of a young author, who reads all your +writings. A good word from you about his little book would be as balm to +him. It has no pretensions, and makes none. But parts are pretty. In +"Field's Appendix" turn to a Poem called the Kangaroo. It is in the best +way of our old poets, if I mistake not. I have just come from Town, +where I have been to get my bit of quarterly pension. And have brought +home, from stalls in Barbican, the old Pilgrim's Progress with the +prints--Vanity Fair, &c.--now scarce. Four shillings. Cheap. And also +one of whom I have oft heard and had dreams, but never saw in the +flesh--that is, in sheepskin--The whole theologic works of-- + + THOMAS AQUINAS! + +My arms aked with lugging it a mile to the stage, but the burden was a +pleasure, such as old Anchises was to the shoulders of Aeneas--or the +Lady to the Lover in old romance, who having to carry her to the top of +a high mountain--the price of obtaining her--clamber'd with her to the +top, and fell dead with fatigue. + +O the glorious old Schoolmen! + +There must be something in him. Such great names imply greatness. Who +hath seen Michael Angelo's things--of us that never pilgrimaged to +Rome--and yet which of us disbelieves his greatness. How I will revel in +his cobwebs and subtleties, till my brain spins! + +N.B. I have writ in the old Hamlet, offer it to Mitford in my name, if +he have not seen it. Tis woefully below our editions of it. But keep it, +if you like. (What is M. to me?) + +I do not mean this to go for a letter, only to apprize you, that the +parcel is booked for you this 25 March 1829 from the Four Swans +Bishopsgate. + +With both our loves to Lucy and A.K. Yours Ever + +C.L. + + +["Darley's... poem"--_Sylvia; or, The May Queen_, by George Darley. + +"Christmas"--a poem by Edward Moxon, dedicated to Lamb. + +"Field's Appendix"--_Geographical Memoirs on New South Wales_, edited by +Barron Field, with his _First-Fruits of Australian Poetry_ as Appendix. + +The old romance, Dr. Paget Toynbee points out, is _Les Dous Amanz_ of +Marie of France, which Lamb had read in Miss Betham's metrical +translation, _The Lay of Marie_.] + + + +LETTER 481 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MISS SARAH JAMES + +[No date. ? April, 1829.] + +We have just got your letter. I think Mother Reynolds will go on +quietly, Mrs. Scrimpshaw having kittened. The name of the late Laureat +was Henry James Pye, and when his 1st Birthday Ode came out, which was +very poor, somebody being asked his opinion of it, said:-- + + And when the Pye was open'd + The birds began to sing, + And was not this a dainty dish + To set before the King! + +Pye was brother to old Major Pye, and father to Mrs. Arnold, and uncle +to a General Pye, all friends of Miss Kelly. Pye succeeded Thos. Warton, +Warton succeeded Wm. Whitehead, Whitehead succeeded Colley Cibber, +Cibber succeeded Eusden, Eusden succeeded Thos. Shadwell, Shadwell +succeeded Dryden, Dryden succeeded Davenant, Davenant God knows whom. +There never was a Rogers a Poet Laureat; there is an old living Poet of +that name, a Banker as you know, Author of the "Pleasures of Memory," +where Moxon goes to breakfast in a fine house in the green Park, but he +was never Laureat. Southey is the present one, and for anything I know +or care, Moxon may succeed him. We have a copy of "Xmas" for you, so you +may give your own to Mary as soon as you please. We think you need not +have exhibited your mountain shyness before M.B. He is neither shy +himself, nor patronizes it in others.--So with many thanks, good-bye. +Emma comes on Thursday. C.L. + +The Poet Laureat, whom Davenant succeeded was Rare 'Ben Jonson,' who I +believe was the first regular Laureat with the appointment of £100 a +year and a Butt of Sack or Canary--so add that to my little list.--C.L. + + +[Mr. Macdonald dates this letter December 31, 1828, perhaps rightly. I +have dated it at a venture April, 1829, because Moxon's _Christmas_ was +published in March of that year. It is the only letter to Mary Lamb's +nurse, Miss James, that exists. Mrs. Reynolds was Lamb's aged pensioner, +whom we have met. Pye died in 1813 and was succeeded by Southey. The +author of the witticism on his first ode was George Steevens, the +critic. The comment gained point from the circumstance that Pye had +drawn largely on images from bird life in his verses.] + + + +LETTER 482 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H. CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. April ? 1829.] + +Dear Robinson, we are afraid you will slip from us from England without +again seeing us. It would be charity to come and see me. I have these +three days been laid up with strong rheumatic pains, in loins, back, +shoulders. I shriek sometimes from the violence of them. I get scarce +any sleep, and the consequence is, I am restless, and want to change +sides as I lie, and I cannot turn without resting on my hands, and so +turning all my body all at once like a log with a lever. While this +rainy weather lasts, I have no hope of alleviation. I have tried +flannels and embrocation in vain. Just at the hip joint the pangs +sometimes are so excruciating, that I cry out. It is as violent as the +cramp, and far more continuous. I am ashamed to whine about these +complaints to you, who can ill enter into them. But indeed they are +sharp. You go about, in rain or fine at all hours without discommodity. +I envy you your immunity at a time of life not much removed from my own. +But you owe your exemption to temperance, which it is too late for me to +pursue. I in my life time have had my good things. Hence my frame is +brittle--yours strong as brass. I never knew any ailment you had. You +can go out at night in all weathers, sit up all hours. Well, I don't +want to moralise. I only wish to say that if you are enclined to a game +at Doubly Dumby, I would try and bolster up myself in a chair for a +rubber or so. My days are tedious, but less so and less painful than my +nights. May you never know the pain and difficulty I have in writing so +much. Mary, who is most kind, joins in the wish. + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 483 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. April 17, 1829.] + +I do confess to mischief. It was the subtlest diabolical piece of +malice, heart of man has contrived. I have no more rheumatism than that +poker. Never was freer from all pains and aches. Every joint sound, to +the tip of the ear from the extremity of the lesser toe. The report of +thy torments was blown circuitously here from Bury. I could not resist +the jeer. I conceived you writhing, when you should just receive my +congratulations. How mad you'd be. Well, it is not in my method to +inflict pangs. I leave that to heaven. But in the existing pangs of a +friend, I have a share. His disquietude crowns my exemption. I imagine +you howling, and pace across the room, shooting out my free arms legs +&c. + +[Illustration: Handrawn lines] + +this way and that way, with an assurance of not kindling a spark of pain +from them. I deny that Nature meant us to sympathise with agonies. Those +face-contortions, retortions, distortions, have the merriness of antics. +Nature meant them for farce--not so pleasant to the actor indeed, but +Grimaldi cries when we laugh, and 'tis but one that suffers to make +thousands rejoyce. + +You say that Shampooing is ineffectual. But _per se_ it is good, to show +the introv[ol]utions, extravolutions, of which the animal frame is +capable. To show what the creature is receptible of, short of +dissolution. + +You are worst of nights, a'nt you? + +Twill be as good as a Sermon to you to lie abed all this night, and +meditate the subject of the day. 'Tis Good Friday. How appropriate! + +Think when but your little finger pains you, what endured to white-wash +you and the rest of us. + +Nobody will be the more justified for your endurance. You won't save the +soul of a mouse. 'Tis a pure selfish pleasure. + +You never was rack'd, was you? I should like an authentic map of those +feelings. + +You seem to have the flying gout. + +You can scarcely scrue a smile out of your face--can you? I sit at +immunity, and sneer _ad libitum._ + +'Tis now the time for you to make good resolutions. I may go on breaking +'em, for any thing the worse I find myself. + +Your Doctor seems to keep you on the long cure. Precipitate healings are +never good. + +Don't come while you are so bad. I shan't be able to attend to your +throes and the dumbee at once. + +I should like to know how slowly the pain goes off. But don't write, +unless the motion will be likely to make your sensibility more +exquisite. + +Your affectionate and truly healthy friend C. LAMB. + +Mary thought a Letter from me might amuse you in your torment-- + + +[Robinson was the victim of a sudden attack of acute rheumatism. He had +a course of Turkish baths at Brighton to cure him.] + + + +LETTER 484 + +CHARLES LAMB TO GEORGE DYER + +Enfield, April 29, 1829. + +Dear Dyer--As well as a bad pen can do it, I must thank you for your +friendly attention to the wishes of our young friend Emma, who was +packing up for Bury when your sonnet arrived, and was too hurried to +express her sense of its merits. I know she will treasure up that and +your second communication among her choicest rarities, as from her +_grandfather's_ friend, whom not having seen, she loves to hear talked +of. The second letter shall be sent after her, with our first parcel to +Suffolk, where she is, to us, alas dead and Bury'd; we solely miss her. +Should you at any hour think of four or six lines, to send her, +addressed to herself simply, naming her grandsire, and to wish she may +pass through life as much respected, with your own G. Dyer at the end, +she would feel rich indeed, for the nature of an Album asks for verses +that have not been in print before; but this quite at your convenience: +and to be less trouble to yourself, four lines would be sufficient. +Enfield has come out in summer beauty. Come when you will and we will +give you a bed. Emma has left hers, you know. I remain, my dear Dyer, +your affectionate friend, + +CHARLES LAMB. + + +[From _The Mirror_, 1841. Lamb made the same pun--Bury'd--to George Dyer +in his letter of December 5, 1808. His Album verses for Miss Isola I +have not seen.] + + + +LETTER 485 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +[No date. ? May, 1829.] + +Dear Hood,--We will look out for you on Wednesday, be sure, tho' we have +not eyes like Emma, who, when I made her sit with her back to the window +to keep her to her Latin, literally saw round backwards every one that +past, and, O, [that] she were here to jump up and shriek out "There are +the Hoods!" We have had two pretty letters from her, which I long to +show you--together with Enfield in her May beauty. + +Loves to Jane. + +[_Here follow rough caricatures of Charles and his sister, and_] "I +can't draw no better." + + +[I have dated this letter May, 1829, because Miss Isola had just gone to +Fornham, in Suffolk, whence presumably the two letters had come.] + + + +LETTER 486 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date.] + +Calamy is _good reading_. Mary is always thankful for Books in her way. +I won't trouble you for any in _my way_ yet, having enough to read. +Young Hazlitt lives, at least his father does, at _3_ or _36_ [36 I have +it down, with the _6_ scratch'd out] Bouverie Street, Fleet Street. If +not to be found, his mother's address is, Mrs. Hazlitt, Mrs. +Tomlinson's, Potters Bar. At one or other he must be heard of. We shall +expect you with the full moon. Meantime, our thanks. + +C.L. + +We go on very quietly &c. + + +["Calamy" would be Edmund Calamy (1671-1732), the historian of +Nonconformity. + +Mr. W.C. Hazlitt in his _Memoir of Hazlitt_ says that his grandfather +moved in 1829 to 3 Bouverie Street, and in the beginning of 1830 to 6 +Frith Street, Soho. Young Hazlitt was William junior, afterwards Mr. +Registrar Hazlitt and then seventeen years of age.] + + + +LETTER 487 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +May 28, 1829. + +Dear W.,--Introduce this, or omit it, as you like. I think I wrote +better about it in a letter to you from India H. If you have that, +perhaps out of the two I could patch up a better thing, if you'd return +both. But I am very poorly, and have been harassed with an illness of my +sister's. + +The Ode was printed in the "New Times" nearly the end of 1825, and I +have only omitted some silly lines. Call it a corrected copy. + +Yours ever, C. LAMB. + +Put my name to either or both, as you like. + + +[This letter contains Lamb's remarks on the Secondary Novels of Defoe, +printed in Wilson's _Life and Times of De Foe_, Chapter XVII. of Vol. +III., and also his "Ode to the Treadmill," which Wilson omitted from +that work. See Vols. I. and IV. of the present edition for both pieces.] + + +LETTER 488 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. June 3, 1829.] + +Dear B.B.--I am very much grieved indeed for the indisposition of poor +Lucy. Your letter found me in domestic troubles. My sister is again +taken ill, and I am obliged to remove her out of the house for many +weeks, I fear, before I can hope to have her again. I have been very +desolate indeed. My loneliness is a little abated by our young friend +Emma having just come here for her holydays, and a schoolfellow of hers +that was, with her. Still the house is not the same, tho' she is the +same. Mary had been pleasing herself with the prospect of seeing her at +this time; and with all their company, the house feels at times a +frightful solitude. May you and I in no very long time have a more +cheerful theme to write about, and congratulate upon a daughter's and a +Sister's perfect recovery. Do not be long without telling me how Lucy +goes on. I have a right to call her by her quaker-name, you know. + +Emma knows that I am writing to you, and begs to be remembered to you +with thankfulness for your ready contribution. Her album is filling +apace. But of her contributors one, almost the flower of it, a most +amiable young man and late acquaintance of mine, has been carried off by +consumption, on return from one of the Azores islands, to which he went +with hopes of mastering the disease, came back improved, went back to a +most close and confined counting house, and relapsed. His name was +Dibdin, Grandson of the Songster. You will be glad to hear that Emma, +tho' unknown to you, has given the highest satisfaction in her little +place of Governante in a Clergyman's family, which you may believe by +the Parson and his Lady drinking poor Mary's health on her birthday, +tho' they never saw her, merely because she was a friend of Emma's, and +the Vicar also sent me a brace of partridges. To get out of home themes, +have you seen Southey's Dialogues? His lake descriptions, and the +account of his Library at Keswick, are very fine. But he needed not have +called up the Ghost of More to hold the conversations with, which might +as well have pass'd between A and B, or Caius and Lucius. It is making +too free with a defunct Chancellor and Martyr. + +I feel as if I had nothing farther to write about--O! I forget the +prettiest letter I ever read, that I have received from "Pleasures of +Memory" Rogers, in acknowledgment of a Sonnet I sent him on the Loss of +his Brother. It is too long to transcribe, but I hope to shew it you +some day, as I hope sometime again to see you, when all of us are well. +Only it ends thus "We were nearly of an age (he was the elder). He was +the only person in the world in whose eyes I always appeared young."-- + +I will now take my leave with assuring you that I am most interested in +hoping to hear favorable accounts from you.-- + +With kindest regards to A.K. and you + +Yours truly, C.L. + + +["Lucy"--Lucy Barton. + +"Your ready contribution." I do not find that Barton ever printed his +lines for Emma Isola's album. + +"Dibdin"-John Bates Dibdin died in May, 1828. + +Southey's _Sir Thomas More; or, Colloquies on the Progress and Prospects +of Society_, had just been published. + +This was Rogers' letter:-- + + Many, many thanks. The verses are beautiful. I need not say with + what feelings they were read. Pray accept the grateful + acknowledgments of us all, and believe me when I say that nothing + could have been a greater cordial to us in our affliction than such + a testimony from such a quarter. He was --for none knew him so + well--we were born within a year or two of each other--a man of a + very high mind, and with less disguise than perhaps any that ever + lived. Whatever he was, _that_ we saw. He stood before his fellow + beings (if I may be forgiven for saying so) almost as before his + Maker: and God grant that we may all bear as severe an examination. + He was an admirable scholar. His Dante and his Homer were as + familiar to him as his Alphabets: and he had the tenderest heart. + When a flock of turkies was stolen from his farm, the indignation of + the poor far and wide was great and loud. To me he is the greatest + loss, for we were nearly of an age; and there is now no human being + alive in whose eyes I have always been young. + +Under the date June 10, 1829, Mr. Macdonald prints a note from Lamb to +Ayrton, which states that he has two young friends in the house. Here, +therefore, I think, should come a letter from Lamb to William Hazlitt, +Junior, in which Lamb says that he cannot see Mrs. Hazlitt this time. He +adds that the ladies are very pleasant. Emma Isola adds a letter which +tells us that the ladies are herself and her friend Maria. This would be +the Maria of Lamb's sonnet "Harmony in Unlikeness," evidently written at +this time (see Vol. IV.).] + + + +LETTER 489 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +Enfield Chase Side + +Saturday 25 July A.D. 1829.--11 A.M. + +There--a fuller plumper juiceier date never dropt from Idumean palm. Am +I in the dateive case now? if not, a fig for dates, which is more than a +date is worth. I never stood much affected to these limitary +specialities. Least of all since the date of my superannuation. + + What have I with Time to do? } Dear B.B.--Your hand writing has + Slaves of desks, twas meant for you.} conveyed much pleasure to me + +in report of Lucy's restoration. Would I could send you as good news of +my poor Lucy. But some wearisome weeks I must remain lonely yet. I have +had the loneliest time near 10 weeks, broken by a short apparition of +Emma for her holydays, whose departure only deepend the returning +solitude, and by 10 days I have past in Town. But Town, with all my +native hankering after it, is not what it was. The streets, the shops +are left, but all old friends are gone. And in London I was frightfully +convinced of this as I past houses and places--empty caskets now. I have +ceased to care almost about any body. The bodies I cared for are in +graves, or dispersed. My old Clubs, that lived so long and flourish'd so +steadily, are crumbled away. When I took leave of our adopted young +friend at Charing Cross, 'twas heavy unfeeling rain, and I had no where +to go. Home have I none--and not a sympathising house to turn to in the +great city. Never did the waters of the heaven pour down on a forlorner +head. Yet I tried 10 days at a sort of a friend's house, but it was +large and straggling--one of the individuals of my old long knot of +friends, card players, pleasant companions--that have tumbled to pieces +into dust and other things--and I got home on Thursday, convinced that I +was better to get home to my hole at Enfield, and hide like a sick cat +in my corner. Less than a month I hope will bring home Mary. She is at +Fulham, looking better in her health than ever, but sadly rambling, and +scarce showing any pleasure in seeing me, or curiosity when I should +come again. But the old feelings will come back again, and we shall +drown old sorrows over a game at Picquet again. But 'tis a tedious cut +out of a life of sixty four, to lose twelve or thirteen weeks every year +or two. And to make me more alone, our illtemperd maid is gone, who with +all her airs, was yet a home piece of furniture, a record of better +days; the young thing that has succeeded her is good and attentive, but +she is nothing--and I have no one here to talk over old matters with. +Scolding and quarreling have something of familiarity and a community of +interest--they imply acquaintance--they are of resentment, which is of +the family of dearness. I can neither scold nor quarrel at this +insignificant implement of household services; she is less than a cat, +and just better than a deal Dresser. What I can do, and do overdo, is to +walk, but deadly long are the days--these summer all-day days, with but +a half hour's candlelight and no firelight. I do not write, tell your +kind inquisitive Eliza, and can hardly read. In the ensuing Blackwood +will be an old rejected farce of mine, which may be new to you, if you +see that same dull Medley. What things are all the Magazines now! I +contrive studiously not to see them. The popular New Monthly is perfect +trash. Poor Hessey, I suppose you see, has failed. Hunt and Clarke too. +Your "Vulgar truths" will be a good name--and I think your prose must +please--me at least--but 'tis useless to write poetry with no +purchasers. 'Tis cold work Authorship without something to puff one into +fashion. Could you not write something on Quakerism--for Quakers to +read--but nominally addrest to Non Quakers? explaining your +dogmas--waiting on the Spirit--by the analogy of human calmness and +patient waiting on the judgment? I scarcely know what I mean, but to +make Non Quakers reconciled to your doctrines, by shewing something like +them in mere human operations--but I hardly understand myself, so let it +pass for nothing. I pity you for over-work, but I assure you no-work is +worse. The mind preys on itself, the most unwholesome food. I brag'd +formerly that I could not have too much time. I have a surfeit. With few +years to come, the days are wearisome. But weariness is not eternal. +Something will shine out to take the load off, that flags me, which is +at present intolerable. I have killed an hour or two in this poor +scrawl. I am a sanguinary murderer of time, and would kill him inchmeal +just now. But the snake is vital. Well, I shall write merrier +anon.--'Tis the present copy of my countenance I send--and to complain +is a little to alleviate.--May you enjoy yourself as far as the wicked +wood will let you--and think that you are not quite alone, as I am. +Health to Lucia and to Anna and kind rememb'ces. + +Yours forlorn. + +C.L. + + +["Out of a life of sixty-four." Mary Lamb was born December 3, 1764. + +"Your kind ... Eliza"--Eliza Barton, Bernard's sister. + +"Rejected farce." "The Pawnbroker's Daughter" was printed in +_Blackwood_, January, 1830. + +"I brag'd formerly." Referring I think to his sonnet "Leisure."] + + + +LETTER 490 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. Late July, 1829.] + +My dear Allsop--I thank you for thinking of my recreation. But I am best +here, I feel I am. I have tried town lately, but came back worse. Here I +must wait till my loneliness has its natural cure. Besides that, though +I am not very sanguine, yet I live in hopes of better news from Fulham, +and can not be out of the way. 'Tis ten weeks to-morrow.--I saw Mary a +week since, she was in excellent bodily health, but otherwise far from +well. But a week or so may give a turn. Love to Mrs. A. and children, +and fair weather accomp'y you. + +C.L. + +Tuesday. + + + +LETTER 491 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Sept. 22, 1829.] + +Dear Moxon, If you can oblige me with the Garrick Papers or Ann of +Gierstien, I shall be thankful. I am almost fearful whether my Sister +will be able to enjoy any reading at present for since her coming home, +after 12 weeks, she has had an unusual relapse into the saddest low +spirits that ever poor creature had, and has been some weeks under +medical care. She is unable to see any yet. When she is better I shall +be very glad to talk over your ramble with you. Have you done any +sonnets, can you send me any to overlook? I am almost in despair, Mary's +case seems so hopeless. + +Believe me + +Yours + +C.L. + +I do not want Mr. Jameson or Lady Morgan. + +Enfield + +Wedn'y + + +["The Garrick Papers." Lamb refers, I suppose, to the _Private +Correspondence of David Garrick_, in some form previous to its +publication in 1832. + +"Anne of Geierstein." Scott's novel was published this year. + +"Mr. Jameson." I cannot find any book by a Mr. Jameson likely to have +been offered to Lamb; but Mrs. Jameson's _Loves of the Poets_ was +published this year. Probably he meant to write Mrs. Jameson. Lady +Morgan was the author of _The Wild Irish Girl_ and other novels. Her +1829 book was _The Book of the Boudoir_.] + + + +LETTER 492 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +Chase-Side, Enfield, 26th Oct., 1829. + +Dear Gillman,--Allsop brought me your kind message yesterday. How can I +account for having not visited Highgate this long time? Change of place +seemed to have changed me. How grieved I was to hear in what indifferent +health Coleridge has been, and I not to know of it! A little school +divinity, well applied, may be healing. I send him honest Tom of Aquin; +that was always an obscure great idea to me: I never thought or dreamed +to see him in the flesh, but t'other day I rescued him from a stall in +Barbican, and brought him off in triumph. He comes to greet Coleridge's +acceptance, for his shoe-latchets I am unworthy to unloose. Yet there +are pretty pro's and con's, and such unsatisfactory learning in him. +Commend me to the question of etiquette-- "_utrum annunciatio debuerit +fieri per angelum_"--_Quaest. 30, Articilus 2_. I protest, till now I +had thought Gabriel a fellow of some mark and livelihood, not a simple +esquire, as I find him. Well, do not break your lay brains, nor I +neither, with these curious nothings. They are nuts to our dear friend, +whom hoping to see at your first friendly hint that it will be +convenient, I end with begging our very kindest loves to Mrs. Gillman. +We have had a sorry house of it here. Our spirits have been reduced till +we were at hope's end what to do-- obliged to quit this house, and +afraid to engage another, till in extremity I took the desperate resolve +of kicking house and all down, like Bunyan's pack; and here we are in a +new life at board and lodging, with an honest couple our neighbours. We +have ridded ourselves of the cares of dirty acres; and the change, +though of less than a week, has had the most beneficial effects on Mary +already. She looks two years and a half younger for it. But we have had +sore trials. + +God send us one happy meeting!--Yours faithfully, + +C. LAMB. + + +["The question of etiquette." See the _Summa Theologies_, Pars Tertia, +Quest. XXX., Articulus II. It would be interesting to know whether Lamb +remembered an earlier letter in which he had set Coleridge some similar +"nuts." + +"In a new life." The Lambs moved next door, to the Westwoods. The house, +altered externally, still stands (1912) and is known as "Westwood +Cottage."] + + + +LETTER 493 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[P.M. Probably Nov. 10, 1829.] + +Dear FUGUE-IST, + +or hear'st thou rather + +CONTRAPUNTIST--? + +We expect you four (as many as the Table will hold without squeeging) at +Mrs. Westwood's Table D'Hote on Thursday. You will find the White House +shut up, and us moved under the wing of the Phoenix, which gives us +friendly refuge. Beds for guests, marry, we have none, but cleanly +accomodings at the Crown & Horseshoe. + +Yours harmonically, + +C.L. + +[Addressed: Vincentio (what Ho!) Novello, a Squire, 66, Great Queen +Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields.] + + +["The Phoenix." Mr. Westwood was agent for the Phoenix Insurance +Company, and the badge of that office was probably on the house.] + + + +LETTER 494 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +Enfield, 15th November, 1829. + +My dear Wilson,--I have not opened a packet of unknown contents for many +years, that gave me so much pleasure as when I disclosed your three +volumes. I have given them a careful perusal, and they have taken their +degree of classical books upon my shelves. De Foe was always my darling; +but what darkness was I in as to far the larger part of his writings! I +have now an epitome of them all. I think the way in which you have done +the "Life" the most judicious you could have pitched upon. You have made +him tell his own story, and your comments are in keeping with the tale. +Why, I never heard of such a work as "the Review." Strange that in my +stall-hunting days I never so much as lit upon an odd volume of it. This +circumstance looks as if they were never of any great circulation. But I +may have met with 'em, and not knowing the prize, overpast 'em. I was +almost a stranger to the whole history of Dissenters in those reigns, +and picked my way through that strange book the "Consolidator" at +random. How affecting are some of his personal appeals! what a machine +of projects he set on foot! and following writers have picked his pocket +of the patents. I do not understand where-abouts in _Roxana_ he himself +left off. I always thought the complete-tourist-sort of description of +the town she passes through on her last embarkation miserably +unseasonable and out of place. I knew not they were spurious. Enlighten +me as to where the apocryphal matter commences. I, by accident, can +correct one A.D. "Family Instructor," vol. ii. 1718; you say his first +volume had then reached the fourth edition; now I have a fifth, printed +for Eman. Matthews, 1717. So have I plucked one rotten date, or rather +picked it up where it had inadvertently fallen, from your flourishing +date tree, the Palm of Engaddi. I may take it for my pains. I think +yours a book which every public library must have, and every English +scholar should have. I am sure it has enriched my meagre stock of the +author's works. I seem to be twice as opulent. Mary is by my side just +finishing the second volume. It must have interest to divert her away so +long from her modern novels. Colburn will be quite jealous. I was a +little disappointed at my "Ode to the Treadmill" not finding a place; +but it came out of time. The two papers of mine will puzzle the reader, +being so akin. Odd that, never keeping a scrap of my own letters, with +some fifteen years' interval I should nearly have said the same things. +But I shall always feel happy in having my name go down any how with De +Foe's, and that of his historiographer. I promise myself, if not +immortality, yet diuternity of being read in consequence. We have both +had much illness this year; and feeling infirmities and fretfulness grow +upon us, we have cast off the cares of housekeeping, sold off our goods, +and commenced boarding and lodging with a very comfortable old couple +next door to where you found us. We use a sort of common table. +Nevertheless, we have reserved a private one for an old friend; and when +Mrs. Wilson and you revisit Babylon, we shall pray you to make it yours +for a season. Our very kindest remembrances to you both. From your old +friend and _fellow-journalist_, now in _two instances_, + +C. LAMB. + +Hazlitt is going to make your book a basis for a review of De Foe's +Novels in the "Edinbro'." I wish I had health and spirits to do it. Hone +I have not seen, but I doubt not he will be much pleased with your +performance. I very much hope you will give us an account of Dunton, &c. +But what I should more like to see would be a Life and Times of Bunyan. +Wishing health to you and long life to your healthy book, again I +subscribe me, + +Yours in verity, + +C.L. + + +[Wilson's _Memoirs of the Life and Times of Daniel De Foe_ had just been +published in three volumes, with the date 1830. + +Defoe's _Review_ was started in February, 1704, under the title, _A +Review of the Affairs of France.... purged from the Errors and +Partiality of News-writers, and Petty-Statesmen, of all sides_. It +continued until May, 1713. _The Consolidator; or, Memoirs of sundry +Transactions from the world in the moon. Translated from the Lunar +Language_, was published in 1765, a political satire, which, it has been +thought, gave hints to Swift for Gulliver. + +Lamb had sent Wilson his "Ode to the Treadmill." The substance of his +letter of December 16, 1822, was printed by Wilson in Chapter XXII. of +Vol. III.; the new material which he wrote especially for the book, was +printed in Chapter XVII. of the same volume. The space dividing them was +not fifteen years but seven. + +"Diuternity." Spelt "diuturnity." A rare word signifying long duration. + +"_Fellow-journalist_." The other instance would be in connection with +the journals of the India House, where Wilson had once been a clerk with +Lamb. + +Hazlitt's review of Wilson's book is in the _Edinburgh_ for January, +1830, with this reference to Lamb's criticisms: "_Captain Singleton_ is +a hardened, brutal desperado, without one redeeming trait, or almost +human feeling; and, in spite of what Mr. Lamb says of his lonely musings +and agonies of a conscience-stricken repentance, we find nothing of this +in the text." + +"Dunton." This would be John Dunton (1659-1733), the bookseller, and +author of _The Athenian Gazette, Dunton's Whipping-Post_, and scores of +pamphlets and satires.] + + + +LETTER 495 + +(_? Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +[No date. ? November 29, 1829.] + +Pray trust me with the "Church History," as well as the "Worthies." A +moon shall restore both. Also give me back Him of Aquinum. In return you +have the _light of my countenance_. Adieu. + +P.S.--A sister also of mine comes with it. A son of Nimshi drives her. +Their driving will have been furious, impassioned. Pray God they have +not toppled over the tunnel! I promise you I fear their steed, bred out +of the wind without father, semi-Melchisedecish, hot, phaetontic. From +my country lodgings at Enfield. + +C.L. + + +[The _Church History_ and the _Worthies_ are by Fuller. + +"Light of my countenance." Mr. Hazlitt says that this was a copy of +Brook Pulham's etching. + +"The tunnel"--the Highgate Archway.] + + + +LETTER 496 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +30 Nov., 1829. + +Dear G.,--The excursionists reached home, and the good town of Enfield a +little after four, without slip or dislocation. Little has transpired +concerning the events of the back-journey, save that on passing the +house of 'Squire Mellish, situate a stone-bow's cast from the hamlet, +Father Westwood, with a good-natured wonderment, exclaimed, "I cannot +think what is gone of Mr. Mellish's rooks. I fancy they have taken +flight somewhere; but I have missed them two or three years past." All +this while, according to his fellow-traveller's report, the rookery was +darkening the air above with undiminished population, and deafening all +ears but his with their cawings. But nature has been gently withdrawing +such phenomena from the notice of Thomas Westwood's senses, from the +time he began to miss the rooks. T. Westwood has passed a retired life +in this hamlet of thirty or forty years, living upon the minimum which +is consistent with gentility, yet a star among the minor gentry, +receiving the bows of the tradespeople and courtesies of the alms' women +daily. Children venerate him not less for his external show of gentry, +than they wonder at him for a gentle rising endorsation of the person, +not amounting to a hump, or if a hump, innocuous as the hump of the +buffalo, and coronative of as mild qualities. 'Tis a throne on which +patience seems to sit--the proud perch of a self-respecting humility, +stooping with condescension. Thereupon the cares of life have sate, and +rid him easily. For he has thrid the _angustiae domûs_ with dexterity. +Life opened upon him with comparative brilliancy. He set out as a rider +or traveller for a wholesale house, in which capacity he tells of many +hair-breadth escapes that befell him; one especially, how he rode a mad +horse into the town of Devizes; how horse and rider arrived in a foam, +to the utter consternation of the expostulating hostlers, inn-keepers, +&c. It seems it was sultry weather, piping hot; the steed tormented into +frenzy with gad-flies, long past being roadworthy; but safety and the +interest of the house he rode for were incompatible things; a fall in +serge cloth was expected; and a mad entrance they made of it. Whether +the exploit was purely voluntary, or partially; or whether a certain +personal defiguration in the man part of this extraordinary centaur +(non-assistive to partition of natures) might not enforce the +conjunction, I stand not to inquire. I look not with 'skew eyes into the +deeds of heroes. The hosier that was burnt with his shop, in Field-lane, +on Tuesday night, shall have past to heaven for me like a Marian Martyr, +provided always, that he consecrated the fortuitous incremation with a +short ejaculation in the exit, as much as if he had taken his state +degrees of martyrdom _in formâ_ in the market vicinage. There is +adoptive as well as acquisitive sacrifice. Be the animus what it might, +the fact is indisputable, that this composition was seen flying all +abroad, and mine host of Daintry may yet remember its passing through +his town, if his scores are not more faithful than his memory. After +this exploit (enough for one man), Thomas Westwood seems to have +subsided into a less hazardous occupation; and in the twenty-fifth year +of his age we find him a haberdasher in Bow Lane: yet still retentive of +his early riding (though leaving it to rawer stomachs), and Christmasly +at night sithence to this last, and shall to his latest Christmas, hath +he, doth he, and shall he, tell after supper the story of the insane +steed and the desperate rider. Save for Bedlam or Luke's no eye could +have guessed that melting day what house he rid for. But he reposes on +his bridles, and after the ups and downs (metaphoric only) of a life +behind the counter--hard riding sometimes, I fear, for poor T.W.--with +the scrapings together of the shop, and _one anecdote_, he hath finally +settled at Enfield; by hard economising, gardening, building for +himself, hath reared a mansion, married a daughter, qualified a son for +a counting-house, gotten the respect of high and low, served for self or +substitute the greater parish offices: hath a special voice at vestries; +and, domiciliating us, hath reflected a portion of his house-keeping +respectability upon your humble servants. We are greater, being his +lodgers, than when we were substantial renters. His name is a passport +to take off the sneers of the native Enfielders against obnoxious +foreigners. We are endenizened. Thus much of T. Westwood have I thought +fit to acquaint you, that you may see the exemplary reliance upon +Providence with which I entrusted so dear a charge as my own sister to +the guidance of a man that rode the mad horse into Devizes. To come from +his heroic character, all the amiable qualities of domestic life +concentre in this tamed Bellerophon. He is excellent over a glass of +grog; just as pleasant without it; laughs when he hears a joke, and when +(which is much oftener) he hears it not; sings glorious old sea songs on +festival nights; and but upon a slight acquaintance of two years, +Coleridge, is as dear a deaf old man to us, as old Norris, rest his +soul! was after fifty. To him and his scanty literature (what there is +of it, _sound_) have we flown from the metropolis and its cursed +annualists, reviewers, authors, and the whole muddy ink press of that +stagnant pool. + +Now, Gillman again, you do not know the treasure of the Fullers. I +calculate on having massy reading till Christmas. All I want here, is +books of the true sort, not those things in boards that moderns mistake +for books--what they club for at book clubs. + +I did not mean to cheat you with a blank side; but my eye smarts, for +which I am taking medicine, and abstain, this day at least, from any +aliments but milk-porridge, the innocent taste of which I am anxious to +renew after a half-century's dis-acquaintance. If a blot fall here like +a tear, it is not pathos, but an angry eye. + +Farewell, while my _specilla_ are sound. + +Yours and yours, + +C. LAMB. + + +[This letter records the safe return of Mary Lamb with the Fullers. + +"Squire Mellish." William Mellish, M.P. for Middlesex for some years. + +Thomas Westwood's son, for whom Lamb found an appointment, wrote some +excellent articles in _Notes and Queries_ many years later describing +the Lambs' life at his father's. + +"Old Norris." See letter to Crabb Robinson, Jan. 20, 1827. + +_Specilla_ is probably a slip for _Conspicilla_.] + + + +LETTER 497 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. December 8, 1829.] + +My dear B.B.--You are very good to have been uneasy +about us, and I have the satisfaction to tell you, that we +are both in better health and spirits than we have been for a year +or two past; I may say, than we have been since we have been +at Enfield. The cause may not appear quite adequate, when +I tell you, that a course of ill health and spirits brought us to the +determination of giving up our house here, and we are boarding +and lodging with a worthy old couple, long inhabitants +of Enfield, where everything is done for us without our trouble, +further than a reasonable weekly payment. We should have +done so before, but it is not easy to flesh and blood to give up an +ancient establishment, to discard old Penates, and from house +keepers to turn house-sharers. (N.B. We are not in the Work-house.) +Dioclesian in his garden found more repose than +on the imperial seat of Rome, and the nob of Charles the Fifth +aked seldomer under a monk's cowl than under the diadem. +With such shadows of assimilation we countenance our degradation. +With such a load of dignifyd cares just removed from +our shoulders, we can the more understand and pity the accession +to yours, by the advancement to an Assigneeship. I will +tell you honestly B.B. that it has been long my deliberate judgment, +that all Bankrupts, of what denomination civil or religious +whatever, ought to be hang'd. The pity of mankind has for +ages run in a wrong channel, and has been diverted from poor +Creditors (how many I have known sufferers! Hazlitt has just +been defrauded of £100 by his Bookseller-friend's breaking) +to scoundrel Debtors. I know all the topics, that distress may +come upon an honest man without his fault, that the failure of +one that he trusted was his calamity &c. &c. Then let _both_ be +hang'd. O how careful it would make traders! These are +my deliberate thoughts after many years' experience in matters +of trade. What a world of trouble it would save you, if Friend +* * * * * had been immediately hangd, without benefit of +clergy, which (being a Quaker I presume) he could not +reasonably insist upon. Why, after slaving twelve months +in your assign-business, you will be enabled to declare seven +pence in the Pound in all human probabilty. B.B., he should +be _hanged_. Trade will never re-flourish in this land till such +a Law is establish'd. I write big not to save ink but eyes, +mine having been troubled with reading thro' three folios of +old Fuller in almost as few days, and I went to bed last +night in agony, and am writing with a vial of eye water before +me, alternately dipping in vial and inkstand. This may enflame +my zeal against Bankrupts--but it was my speculation when +I could see better. Half the world's misery (Eden else) is +owing to want of money, and all that want is owing to Bankrupts. +I declare I would, if the State wanted Practitioners, +turn Hangman myself, and should have great pleasure in +hanging the first after my salutary law should be establish'd. +I have seen no annuals and wish to see none. I like your +fun upon them, and was quite pleased with Bowles's sonnet. +Hood is or was at Brighton, but a note, prose or rhime, to him, +Robert Street, Adelphi, I am sure would extract a copy of +_his_, which also I have not seen. Wishing you and yours all +Health, I conclude while these frail glasses are to me--eyes. + +C.L. + + +["Dioclesian." The Emperor Diocletian abdicated the throne after +twenty-one years' reign, and retired to his garden. Charles V. of +Germany imitated the Roman Emperor, and after thirty-six years took the +cowl. + +"Hazlitt has just been defrauded." The failure of Hunt & Clarke, the +publishers of the _Life of Napoleon_, cost Hazlitt £500. He had received +only £140 towards this, in a bill which on their insolvency became +worthless. + +"Friend * * * * *." Not identifiable.] + + + +LETTER 498 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[P.M. January 22, 1830.] + +And is it a year since we parted from you at the steps of Edmonton +Stage? There are not now the years that there used to be. The tale of +the dwindled age of men, reported of successional mankind, is true of +the same man only. We do not live a year in a year now. 'Tis a punctum +stans. The seasons pass us with indifference. Spring cheers not, nor +winter heightens our gloom, Autumn hath foregone its moralities, they +are hey-pass re-pass [as] in a show-box. Yet as far as last year occurs +back, for they scarce shew a reflex now, they make no memory as +heretofore--'twas sufficiently gloomy. Let the sullen nothing pass. + +Suffice it that after sad spirits prolonged thro' many of its months, as +it called them, we have cast our skins, have taken a farewell of the +pompous troublesome trifle calld housekeeping, and are settled down into +poor boarders and lodgers at next door with an old couple, the Baucis +and Baucida of dull Enfield. Here we have nothing to do with our +victuals but to eat them, with the garden but to see it grow, with the +tax gatherer but to hear him knock, with the maid but to hear her +scolded. Scot and lot, butcher, baker, are things unknown to us save as +spectators of the pageant. We are fed we know not how, quietists, +confiding ravens. We have the otium pro dignitate, a respectable +insignificance. Yet in the self condemned obliviousness, in the +stagnation, some molesting yearnings of life, not quite kill'd, rise, +prompting me that there was a London, and that I was of that old +Jerusalem. In dreams I am in Fleetmarket, but I wake and cry to sleep +again. I die hard, a stubborn Eloisa in this detestable Paraclete. What +have I gained by health? intolerable dulness. What by early hours and +moderate meals?--a total blank. O never let the lying poets be believed, +who 'tice men from the chearful haunts of streets--or think they mean it +not of a country village. In the ruins of Palmyra I could gird myself up +to solitude, or muse to the snorings of the Seven Sleepers, but to have +a little teazing image of a town about one, country folks that do not +look like country folks, shops two yards square, half a dozen apples and +two penn'orth of overlookd gingerbread for the lofty fruiterers of +Oxford Street--and, for the immortal book and print stalls, a +circulating library that stands still, where the shew-picture is a last +year's Valentine, and whither the fame of the last ten Scotch novels has +not yet travel'd (marry, they just begin to be conscious of the Red +Gauntlet), to have a new plasterd flat church, and to be wishing that it +was but a Cathedral. The very blackguards here are degenerate. The +topping gentry, stock brokers. The passengers too many to ensure your +quiet, or let you go about whistling, or gaping--too few to be the fine +indifferent pageants of Fleet Street. Confining, room-keeping thickest +winter is yet more bearable here than the gaudy months. Among one's +books at one's fire by candle one is soothed into an oblivion that one +is not in the country, but with the light the green fields return, till +I gaze, and in a calenture can plunge myself into Saint Giles's. O let +no native Londoner imagine that health, and rest, and innocent +occupation, interchange of converse sweet and recreative study, can make +the country any thing better than altogether odious and detestable. A +garden was the primitive prison till man with promethean felicity and +boldness luckily sinn'd himself out of it. Thence followd Babylon, +Nineveh, Venice, London, haberdashers, goldsmiths, taverns, playhouses, +satires, epigrams, puns--these all came in on the town part, and the +thither side of innocence. Man found out inventions. + +From my den I return you condolence for your decaying sight, not for any +thing there is to see in the country, but for the miss of the pleasure +of reading a London newspaper. The poets are as well to listen to, any +thing high may, nay must, be read out--you read it to yourself with an +imaginary auditor--but the light paragraphs must be glid over by the +proper eye, mouthing mumbles their gossamery substance. 'Tis these +trifles I should mourn in fading sight. A newspaper is the single gleam +of comfort I receive here, it comes from rich Cathay with tidings of +mankind. Yet I could not attend to it read out by the most beloved +voice. But your eyes do not get worse, I gather. O for the collyrium of +Tobias inclosed in a whiting's liver to send you with no apocryphal good +wishes! The last long time I heard from you, you had knock'd your head +against something. Do not do so. For your head (I do not flatter) is not +a nob, or the top of a brass nail, or the end of a nine pin--unless a +Vulcanian hammer could fairly batter a Recluse out of it, then would I +bid the smirch'd god knock and knock lustily, the two-handed skinker. +What a nice long letter Dorothy has written! Mary must squeeze out a +line propriâ manu, but indeed her fingers have been incorrigibly nervous +to letter writing for a long interval. 'Twill please you all to hear +that, tho' I fret like a lion in a net, her present health and spirits +are better than they have been for some time past: she is absolutely +three years and a half younger, as I tell her, since we have adopted +this boarding plan. Our providers are an honest pair, dame Westwood and +her husband--he, when the light of prosperity shined on them, a +moderately thriving haberdasher within Bow Bells, retired since with +something under a competence, writes himself parcel gentleman, hath +borne parish offices, sings fine old sea songs at threescore and ten, +sighs only now and then when he thinks that he has a son on his hands +about 15, whom he finds a difficulty in getting out into the world, and +then checks a sigh with muttering, as I once heard him prettily, not +meaning to be heard, "I have married my daughter however,"--takes the +weather as it comes, outsides it to town in severest season, and a' +winter nights tells old stories not tending to literature, how +comfortable to author-rid folks! and has _one anecdote_, upon which and +about forty pounds a year he seems to have retired in green old age. It +was how he was a _rider_ in his youth, travelling for shops, and once +(not to baulk his employer's bargain) on a sweltering day in August, +rode foaming into Dunstable upon a _mad horse_ to the dismay and +expostulary wonderment of innkeepers, ostlers &c. who declared they +would not have bestrid the beast to win the Darby. Understand the +creature gall'd to death and desperation by gad flies, cormorants +winged, worse than beset Inachus' daughter. This he tells, this he +brindles and burnishes on a' winter's eves, 'tis his star of set glory, +his rejuvenescence to descant upon. Far from me be it (dii avertant) to +look a gift story in the mouth, or cruelly to surmise (as those who +doubt the plunge of Curtius) that the inseparate conjuncture of man and +beast, the centaur-phenomenon that staggerd all Dunstable, might have +been the effect of unromantic necessity, that the horse-part carried the +reasoning, willy nilly, that needs must when such a devil drove, that +certain spiral configurations in the frame of Thomas Westwood unfriendly +to alighting, made the alliance more forcible than voluntary. Let him +enjoy his fame for me, nor let me hint a whisper that shall dismount +Bellerophon. Put case he was an involuntary martyr, yet if in the fiery +conflict he buckled the soul of a constant haberdasher to him, and +adopted his flames, let Accident and He share the glory! You would all +like Thomas Westwood. + +[Illustration: Hand drawn sketch] + +How weak is painting to describe a man! Say that he stands four feet and +a nail high by his own yard measure, which like the Sceptre of Agamemnon +shall never sprout again, still you have no adequate idea, nor when I +tell you that his dear hump, which I have favord in the picture, seems +to me of the buffalo--indicative and repository of mild qualities, a +budget of kindnesses, still you have not the man. Knew you old Norris of +the Temple, 60 years ours and our father's friend, he was not more +natural to us than this old W. the acquaintance of scarce more weeks. +Under his roof now ought I to take my rest, but that back-looking +ambition tells me I might yet be a Londoner. Well, if we ever do move, +we have encumbrances the less to impede us: all our furniture has faded +under the auctioneer's hammer, going for nothing like the tarnishd +frippery of the prodigal, and we have only a spoon or two left to bless +us. Clothed we came into Enfield, and naked we must go out of it. I +would live in London shirtless, bookless. Henry Crabb is at Rome, +advices to that effect have reach'd Bury. But by solemn legacy he +bequeath'd at parting (whether he should live or die) a Turkey of +Suffolk to be sent every succeeding Xmas to us and divers other friends. +What a genuine old Bachelor's action! I fear he will find the air of +Italy too classic. His station is in the Hartz forest, his soul is +_Bego'ethed_. Miss Kelly we never see; Talfourd not this half-year; the +latter flourishes, but the exact number of his children, God forgive me, +I have utterly forgotten, we single people are often out in our count +there. Shall I say two? One darling I know they have lost within a +twelvemonth, but scarce known to me by sight, and that was a second +child lost. We see scarce anybody. We have just now Emma with us for her +holydays; you remember her playing at brag with Mr. Quillinan at poor +Monkhouse's! She is grown an agreeable young woman; she sees what I +write, so you may understand me with limitations. She was our inmate for +a twelvemonth, grew natural to us, and then they told us it was best for +her to go out as a Governess, and so she went out, and we were only two +of us, and our pleasant house-mate is changed to an occasional visitor. +If they want my sister to go out (as they call it) there will be only +one of us. Heaven keep us all from this acceding to Unity! + +Can I cram loves enough to you all in this little O? Excuse +particularizing. + +C.L. + + + +LETTER 499 + +MARY LAMB TO DOROTHY WORDSWORTH + +(_Same letter_) + +My dear Miss Wordsworth, Charles has left me space to fill up with my +own poor scribble; which I must do as well as I can, being quite out of +practise, and after he has been reading his queer letter out to us I can +hardly put down in a plain style all I had to tell you, how pleasant +your handwriting was to me. He has lumped you all together in one rude +remembrance at the end, but I beg to send my love individually and by +name to Mr. and Mrs. Wordsworth, to Miss Hutchinson, whom we often talk +of, and think of as being with you always, to the dutiful good daughter +and patient amanuensis Dora, and even to Johanna, whom we have not seen, +if she will accept it. Charles has told you of my long illness and our +present settlement, which I assure you is very quiet and comfortable to +me, and to him too, if he would own it. I am very sorry we shall not see +John, but I never go to town, nor my brother but at his quarterly visits +at the India House, and when he does, he finds it melancholy, so many of +our old friends being dead or dispersed, and the very streets, he says +altering every day. Many thanks for your Letter and the nice news in it, +which I should have replied to more at large than I see he has done. I +am sure it deserved it. He has not said a word about your intentions for +Rome, which I sincerely wish you health one day to accomplish. In that +case we may meet by the way. We are so glad to hear dear _little_ +William is doing well. If you knew how happy your letters made us you +would write I know more frequently. Pray think of this. How chearfully +should we pay the postage _every week_. + +Your affectionate + +MARY LAMB. + + +["Baucis and Baucida." A slip, I suppose, for Philemon and Baucis (Ovid, +_Metamorphoses_). + +_Redgauntlet_ dated from 1824. + +"In a calenture." A calenture is a form of fever at sea in which the +sufferer believes himself to be surrounded by green fields, and often +leaps overboard. Wordsworth describes one in "The Brothers." + +"A Recluse"--Wordsworth's promised poem, that was never completed. First +printed in 1888. + +Inachus' daughter was Io, persecuted by a malignant insect sent by Juno. + +"Henry Crabb." Crabb Robinson was a personal friend of Goethe's. He had +spent some days with him at Weimar in the summer of 1829. Goethe told +Robinson that he admired Lamb's sonnet "The Family Name." + +"Mr. Quillinan"--Edward Quillinan, afterwards Wordsworth's son-in-law. + +"Johanna." Joanna Hutchinson, Mrs. Wordsworth's sister. Joanna of the +laugh. + +"John." John Wordsworth, Wordsworth's eldest son, was now twenty-six; +William, Wordsworth's second son, no longer little, was nineteen.] + + + +LETTER 500 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 25 February, 1830.] + +Dear B.B.--To reply to you by return of post, I must gobble up my +dinner, and dispatch this in propriâ Personâ to the office, to be in +time. So take it from me hastily, that you are perfectly welcome to +furnish A.C. with the scrap, which I had almost forgotten writing. The +more my character comes to be known, the less my veracity will come to +be suspected. Time every day clears up some suspected narrative of +Herodotus, Bruce, and others of us great Travellers. Why, that Joseph +Paice was as real a person as Joseph Hume, and a great deal pleasanter. +A careful observer of life, Bernard, has no need to invent. Nature +romances it for him. Dinner plates rattle, and I positively shall incur +indigestion by carrying it half concocted to the Post House. Let me +congratulate you on the Spring coming in, and do you in return condole +with me for the Winter going out. When the old one goes, seldome comes a +better. I dread the prospect of Summer, with his all day long days. No +need of his assistance to make country places dull. With fire and candle +light, I can dream myself in Holborn. With lightsome skies shining in to +bed time, I can not. This Meseck, and these tents of Kedar--I would +dwell in the skirts of Jericho rather, and think every blast of the +coming in Mail a Ram's Horn. Give me old London at Fire and Plague +times, rather than these tepid gales, healthy country air, and +purposeless exercise. Leg of mutton absolutely on the table. + +Take our hasty loves and short farewell. + +C.L. + + +[A.C. was Allan Cunningham, who wanted Lamb's letter on Blake (see +above) for his _Lives of the Painters_. It was not, however, used there +until included in Mrs. Charles Heaton's edition in Bohn's Library. + +"Bruce"--the Abyssinian explorer, whom the Christ's Hospital boys used +to emulate, as Lamb tells us in the _Elia_ essay on Newspapers. + +"Joseph Paice"--a Director of the South-Sea Company and Lamb's first +employer, of whom he writes in the _Elia_ essay on "Modern Gallantry" +(see notes to Vol. II.). + +Here should come a letter to Moxon, February 21, 1830, saying that a +letter has just arrived from Mrs. Williams indicating that Miss Isola +was not well and must have a long holiday. The illness increased very +rapidly, becoming a serious attack of brain fever.] + + + +LETTER 501 + +CHARLCHARLES TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +[February 26, 1830.] + +Dear Madam,--May God bless you for your attention to our poor Emma! I am +so shaken with your sad news I can scarce write. She is too ill to be +removed at present; but we can only say that if she is spared, when that +can be practicable, we have always a home for her. Speak to her of it, +when she is capable of understanding, and let me conjure you to let us +know from day to day, the state she is in. But one line is all we crave. +Nothing we can do for her, that shall not be done. We shall be in the +terriblest suspense. We had no notion she was going to be ill. A line +from anybody in your house will much oblige us. I feel for the situation +this trouble places you in. + +Can I go to her aunt, or do anything? I do not know what to offer. We +are in great distress. Pray relieve us, if you can, by somehow letting +us know. I will fetch her here, or anything. Your kindness can never be +forgot. Pray excuse my abruptness. I hardly know what I write. And take +our warmest thanks. Hoping to hear something, I remain, dear Madam, + +Yours most faithfully, + +C. LAMB. + +Our grateful respects to Mr. Williams. + + + +LETTER 502 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, 1 March, 1830. + +Dear Madam,--We cannot thank you enough. Your two words "much better" +were so considerate and good. The good news affected my sister to an +agony of tears; but they have relieved us from such a weight. We were +ready to expect the worst, and were hardly able to bear the good +hearing. You speak so kindly of her, too, and think she may be able to +resume her duties. We were prepared, as far as our humble means would +have enabled us, to have taken her from all duties. But, far better for +the dear girl it is that she should have a prospect of being useful. + +I am sure you will pardon my writing again; for my heart is so full, +that it was impossible to refrain. Many thanks for your offer to write +again, should any change take place. I dare not yet be quite out of +fear, the alteration has been so sudden. But I will hope you will have a +respite from the trouble of writing again. I know no expression to +convey a sense of your kindness. We were in such a state expecting the +post. I had almost resolved to come as near you as Bury; but my sister's +health does not permit my absence on melancholy occasions. But, O, how +happy will she be to part with me, when I shall hear the agreeable news +that I may come and fetch her. She shall be as quiet as possible. No +restorative means shall be wanting to restore her back to you well and +comfortable. + +She will make up for this sad interruption of her young friend's +studies. I am sure she will--she must--after you have spared her for a +little time. Change of scene may do very much for her. I think this last +proof of your kindness to her in her desolate state can hardly make her +love and respect you more than she has ever done. O, how glad shall we +be to return her fit for her occupation. Madam, I trouble you with my +nonsense; but you would forgive me, if you knew how light-hearted you +have made two poor souls at Enfield, that were gasping for news of their +poor friend. I will pray for you and Mr. Williams. Give our very best +respects to him, and accept our thanks. We are happier than we hardly +know how to bear. God bless you! My very kindest congratulations to Miss +Humphreys. + +Believe me, dear Madam, + +Your ever obliged servant, + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 503 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +March 4th, 1830. + +Dear Sarah,--I was meditating to come and see you, but I am unable for +the walk. We are both very unwell, and under affliction for poor Emma, +who has had a very dangerous brain fever, and is lying very ill at Bury, +from whence I expect a summons to fetch her. We are very sorry for your +confinement. Any books I have are at your service. I am almost, I may +say _quite_, sure that letters to India pay no postage, and may go by +the regular Post Office, now in St. Martin's le Grand. I think any +receiving house would take them-- + +I wish I could confirm your hopes about Dick Norris. But it is quite a +dream. Some old Bencher of his surname is made _Treasurer_ for the year, +I suppose, which is an annual office. Norris was Sub-Treasurer, quite a +different thing. They were pretty well in the Summer, since when we have +heard nothing of them. Mrs. Reynolds is better than she has been for +years; she is with a disagreeable woman that she has taken a mighty +fancy to out of spite to a rival woman she used to live and quarrel +with; she grows quite _fat_, they tell me, and may live as long as I do, +to be a tormenting rent-charge to my diminish'd income. We go on pretty +comfortably in our new plan. I will come and have a talk with you when +poor Emma's affair is settled, and will bring books. At present I am +weak, and could hardly bring my legs home yesterday after a much shorter +stroll than to Northaw. Mary has got her bonnet on for a short +expedition. May you get better, as the Spring comes on. She sends her +best love with mine. + +C.L. + + +[Addressed to "Mrs. Hazlitt, Mrs. Tomlinson's, Northaw, near Potter's +Bar, Herts." + +Mrs. Hazlitt was in later years a sufferer from rheumatism. Dick Norris +was the son of Randal Norris. He had retired to Widford. Mrs. Reynolds, +Lamb's old schoolmistress and dependant, we have met.] + + + +LETTER 504 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, 5 Mar., 1830. + +Dear Madam,--I feel greatly obliged by your letter of Tuesday, and +should not have troubled you again so soon, but that you express a wish +to hear that our anxiety was relieved by the assurances in it. You have +indeed given us much comfort respecting our young friend, but +considerable uneasiness respecting your own health and spirits, which +must have suffered under such attention. Pray believe me that we shall +wait in quiet hope for the time when I shall receive the welcome summons +to come and relieve you from a charge, which you have executed with such +tenderness. We desire nothing so much as to exchange it with you. +Nothing shall be wanting on my part to remove her with the best judgment +I can, without (I hope) any necessity for depriving you of the services +of your valuable housekeeper. Until the day comes, we entreat that you +will spare yourself the trouble of writing, which we should be ashamed +to impose upon you in your present weak state. Not hearing from you, we +shall be satisfied in believing that there has been no relapse. +Therefore we beg that you will not add to your troubles by unnecessary, +though _most kind_, correspondence. Till I have the pleasure of thanking +you personally, I beg you to accept these written acknowledgments of all +your kindness. With respects to Mr. Williams and sincere prayers for +both your healths, I remain, + +Your ever obliged servant, + +C. LAMB. + +My sister joins me in respects and thanks. + + + +LETTER 505 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +March 8th, 1830. + +My dear G.,--Your friend Battin (for I knew him immediately by the +smooth satinity of his style) must excuse me for advocating the cause of +his friends in Spitalfields. The fact is, I am retained by the Norwich +people, and have already appeared in their paper under the signatures of +"Lucius Sergius," "Bluff," "Broad-Cloth," +"No-Trade-to-the-Woollen-Trade," "Anti-plush," &c., in defence of +druggets and long camblets. And without this pre-engagement, I feel I +should naturally have chosen a side opposite to ----, for in the silken +seemingness of his nature there is that which offends me. My flesh +tingles at such caterpillars. He shall not crawl me over. Let him and +his workmen sing the old burthen, + + "Heigh ho, ye weavers!" + +for any aid I shall offer them in this emergency. I was over Saint +Luke's the other day with my friend Tuthill, and mightily pleased with +one of his contrivances for the comfort and amelioration of the +students. They have double cells, in which a pair may lie feet to feet +horizontally, and chat the time away as rationally as they can. It must +certainly be more sociable for them these warm raving nights. The +right-hand truckle in one of these friendly recesses, at present vacant, +was preparing, I understood, for Mr. Irving. Poor fellow! it is time he +removed from Pentonville. I followed him as far as to Highbury the other +day, with a mob at his heels, calling out upon Ermigiddon, who I suppose +is some Scotch moderator. He squinted out his favourite eye last Friday, +in the fury of possession, upon a poor woman's shoulders that was crying +matches, and has not missed it. The companion truck, as far as I could +measure it with my eye, would conveniently fit a person about the length +of Coleridge, allowing for a reasonable drawing up of the feet, not at +all painful. Does he talk of moving this quarter? You and I have too +much sense to trouble ourselves with revelations; marry, to the same in +Greek you may have something professionally to say. Tell C. that he was +to come and see us some fine day. Let it be before he moves, for in his +new quarters he will necessarily be confined in his conversation to his +brother prophet. Conceive the two Rabbis foot to foot, for there are no +Gamaliels there to affect a humbler posture! All are masters in that +Patmos, where the law is perfect equality--Latmos, I should rather say, +for they will be Luna's twin darlings; her affection will be ever at the +full. Well; keep _your_ brains moist with gooseberry this mad March, for +the devil of exposition seeketh dry places. + +C.L. + + +[The letter is assigned to the Rev. James Gillman by some editors; but I +think that a mistake. See the reference below to a medical matter. +Battin was interested in the Spitalfields weavers to the detriment of +the Norwich. + +Major Butterworth in a letter to _Notes and Queries_, March 24, 1906, +thus explains the reference to Battin:-- + + "In lately going over the pages of _The New Monthly Magazine_ for + 1826 I came across a paragraph in the June number, extracted from a + daily newspaper, in which the following occurs: 'Great merit is due + to Mr. Lamb junior for his exertions to relieve the weavers of + Norwich.'... + + "As his 'Reminiscences of Juke Judkins, Esq.,' was printed in the + same number of the _Magazine_, Lamb's attention would no doubt be + arrested by the remarks about his namesake, which would probably be + retained in his memory, to be used subsequently, as occasion served, + in mystifying his friend." + +Tuthill, whom we have met, was one of the physicians at St. Luke's +Hospital for the insane. + +"He squinted out...." Irving had sight only in one eye, an obliquity +caused, it is suggested, by lying when a baby in a wooden cradle, the +sides of which prevented the other from gathering light. + +"To the same in Greek." An atrocious pun, which I leave to the reader to +discover. Gillman was a doctor.] + + + +LETTER 506 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM AYRTON + +Mr. Westwood's, Chase Side, Enfield, + +14th March, 1830. + +My dear Ayrton,--Your letter, which was only not so pleasant as your +appearance would have been, has revived some old images; Phillips (not +the Colonel), with his few hairs bristling up at the charge of a revoke, +which he declares impossible; the old Captain's significant nod over the +right shoulder (was it not?); Mrs. Burney's determined questioning of +the score, after the game was absolutely gone to the devil, the plain +but hospitable cold boiled-beef suppers at sideboard; all which fancies, +redolent of middle age and strengthful spirits, come across us ever and +anon in this vale of deliberate senectitude, ycleped Enfield. + +You imagine a deep gulf between you and us; and there is a pitiable +hiatus in _kind_ between St. James's Park and this extremity of +Middlesex. But the mere distance in turnpike roads is a trifle. The roof +of a coach swings you down in an hour or two. We have a sure hot joint +on a Sunday, and when had we better? I suppose you know that ill health +has obliged us to give up housekeeping; but we have an asylum at the +very next door--only twenty-four inches further from town, which is not +material in a country expedition--where a _table d'hôte_ is kept for us, +without trouble on our parts, and we adjourn after dinner, when one of +the old world (old friends) drops casually down among us. Come and find +us out, and seal our judicious change with your approbation, whenever +the whim bites, or the sun prompts. No need of announcement, for we are +sure to be at home. + +I keep putting off the subject of my answer. In truth I am not in +spirits at present to see Mr. Murray on such a business; but pray offer +him my acknowledgments and an assurance that I should like at least one +of his propositions, as I have so much additional matter for the +SPECIMENS, as might make two volumes in all, or ONE (new edition) +omitting such better known authors as Beaumont and Fletcher, Jonson, &c. + +But we are both in trouble at present. A very dear young friend of ours, +who passed her Christmas holidays here, has been taken dangerously ill +with a fever, from which she is very precariously recovering, and I +expect a summons to fetch her when she is well enough to bear the +journey from Bury. It is Emma Isola, with whom we got acquainted at our +first visit to your sister at Cambridge, and she has been an occasional +inmate with us--and of late years much more frequently--ever since. +While she is in this danger, and till she is out of it and here in a +probable way to recovery, I feel that I have no spirits for an +engagement of any kind. It has been a terrible shock to us; therefore I +beg that you will make my handsomest excuses to Mr. Murray. + +Our very kindest loves to Mrs. A. and the younger A.'s. + +Your unforgotten, + +C. LAMB. + + +["Phillips." This would be Edward Phillips, who, I think, succeeded +Rickman as secretary to Abbot (afterwards Lord Colchester), the Speaker. +Colonel Erasmus Phillips we have also met. The Captain was Captain +Burney. + +Mr. Murray's propositions. I presume that Murray had, through Ayrton, +suggested either the republication of the _Dramatic Specimens_, 1808, in +one volume, or in two volumes, with the Garrick Extracts added. The plan +came to nothing. Moxon published them in the two volume style in 1835. +Murray had refused Lamb's "Works" some twelve years before. For the +_Dramatic Specimens_ see Vol. IV. of my large edition.] + + + +LETTER 507 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +[Dated at end: March 22 (1830).] + +Dear Madam,--Once more I have to return you thanks for a very kind +letter. It has gladdened us very much to hear that we may have hope to +see our young friend so soon, and through your kind nursing so well +recovered. I sincerely hope that your own health and spirits will not +have been shaken: you have had a sore trial indeed, and greatly do we +feel indebted to you for all which you have undergone. If I hear nothing +from you in the mean time, I shall secure myself a place in the +Cornwallis Coach for Monday. It will not be at all necessary that I +shall be met at Bury, as I can well find my way to the Rectory, and I +beg that you will not inconvenience yourselves by such attention. +Accordingly as I find Miss Isola able to bear the journey, I intend to +take the care of her by the same stage or by chaises perhaps, dividing +the journey; but exactly as you shall judge fit. It is our misfortune +that long journeys do not agree with my sister, who would else have +taken this care upon herself, perhaps more properly. It is quite out of +the question to rob you of the services of any of your domestics. I +cannot think of it. But if in your opinion a female attendant would be +requisite on the journey, and if you or Mr. Williams would feel _more +comfortable_ by her being in charge of two, I will most gladly engage +one of her nurses or any young person near you, that you can recommend; +for my object is to remove her in the way that shall be most +satisfactory to yourselves. + +On the subject of the young people that you are interesting yourselves +about, I will have the pleasure to talk to you, when I shall see you. I +live almost out of the world and out of the sphere of being useful; but +no pains of mine shall be spared, if but a prospect opens of doing a +service. Could I do all I wish, and I indeed have grown helpless to +myself and others, it must not satisfy the arrears of obligation I owe +to Mr. Williams and yourself for all your kindness. + +I beg you will turn in your mind and consider in what most comfortable +way Miss Isola can leave your house, and I will implicitly follow your +suggestions. What you have done for her can never be effaced from our +memories, and I would have you part with her in the way that would best +satisfy yourselves. + +I am afraid of impertinently extending my letter, else I feel I have not +said half what I would say. So, dear madam, till I have the pleasure of +seeing you both, of whose kindness I have heard so much before, I +respectfully take my leave with our kindest love to your poor patient +and most sincere regards for the health and happiness of Mr. Williams +and yourself. + +May God bless you. CH. LAMB. + +Enfield, Monday, 22 March. + + + +LETTER 508 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, 2 Apr., 1830. + +Dear Madam + +I have great pleasure in letting you know that Miss Isola has suffered +very little from fatigue on her long journey. I am ashamed to say that I +came home rather the more tired of the two. But I am a very unpractised +traveller. She has had two tolerable nights' sleeps since, and is +decidedly not worse than when we left you. I remembered the Magnesia +according to your directions, and promise that she shall be kept very +quiet, never forgetting that she is still an invalid. We found my Sister +very well in health, only a little impatient to see her; and, after a +few hysterical tears for gladness, all was comfortable again. We arrived +here from Epping between five and six. The incidents of our journey were +trifling, but you bade me tell them. We had then in the coach a rather +talkative Gentleman, but very civil, all the way, and took up a servant +maid at Stamford, going to a sick mistress. To the _latter_, a +participation in the hospitalities of your nice rusks and sandwiches +proved agreeable, as it did to my companion, who took merely a sip of +the weakest wine and water with them. The _former_ engaged me in a +discourse for full twenty miles on the probable advantages of Steam +Carriages, which being merely problematical, I bore my part in with some +credit, in spite of my totally un-engineer-like faculties. But when +somewhere about Stanstead he put an unfortunate question to me as to the +"probability of its turning out a good turnip season;" and when I, who +am still less of an agriculturist than a steam-philosopher, not knowing +a turnip from a potato ground, innocently made answer that I believed it +depended very much upon boiled legs of mutton, my unlucky reply set Miss +Isola a laughing to a degree that disturbed her tranquility for the only +moment in our journey. I am afraid my credit sank very low with my other +fellow-traveller, who had thought he had met with a _well-informed +passenger_, which is an accident so desirable in a Stage Coach. We were +rather less communicative, but still friendly, the rest of the way. How +I employed myself between Epping and Enfield the poor verses in the +front of my paper may inform you which you may please to Christen an +Acrostic in a Cross Road, and which I wish were worthier of the Lady +they refer to. But I trust you will plead my pardon to her on a subject +so delicate as a Lady's good _name_. Your candour must acknowledge that +they are written _strait_. And now dear Madam, I have left myself hardly +space to express my sense of the friendly reception I found at Fornham. +Mr. Williams will tell you that we had the pleasure of a slight meeting +with him on the road, where I could almost have told him, but that it +seemed ungracious, that such had been your hospitality, that I scarcely +missed the good Master of the Family at Fornham, though heartily I +should [have] rejoiced to have made a little longer acquaintance with +him. I will say nothing of our deeper obligations to both of you, +because I think we agreed at Fornham, that gratitude may be over-exacted +on the part of the obliging, and over-expressed on the part of the +obliged, person. My Sister and Miss Isola join in respects to Mr. +Williams and yourself, and I beg to be remembered kindly to the Miss +Hammonds and the two gentlemen whom I had the good fortune to meet at +your house. I have not forgotten the Election in which you are +interesting yourself, and the little that I can, I will do immediately. +Miss Isola will have the pleasure of writing to you next week, and we +shall hope, at your leisure, to hear of your own health, etc. I am, Dear +Madam, with great respect, + +your obliged + +CHARLES LAMB. + +[_Added in Miss Isola's hand:_] I must just add a line to beg you will +let us hear from you, my dear Mrs. Williams. I have just received the +forwarded letter. Fornham we have talked about constantly, and I felt +quite strange at this home the first day. I will attend to all you said, +my dear Madam. + + +[I do not know which of Lamb's acrostics was the one in question. +Possibly this, on Mrs. Williams' youngest daughter, Louisa Clare +Williams:-- + + Least Daughter, but not least beloved, of _Grace_! + O frown not on a stranger, who from place + Unknown and distant these few lines hath penn'd. + I but report what thy Instructress Friend + So oft hath told us of thy gentle heart. + A pupil most affectionate thou art, + + Careful to learn what elder years impart. + _Louisa_--_Clare_--by which name shall I call thee? + A prettier pair of names sure ne'er was found, + Resembling thy own sweetness in sweet sound. + Ever calm peace and innocence befal thee! + +See Vol. IV. of this edition.] + + + +LETTER 509 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, Good Friday [April 9, 1830]. + +P.S.--I am the worst folder-up of a letter in the world, except certain +Hottentots, in the land of Caffre, who never fold up their letters at +all, writing very badly upon skins, &c. + +Dear Madam,--I do assure you that your verses gratified me very much, +and my sister is quite _proud_ of them. For the first time in my life I +congratulated myself upon the shortness and meanness of my name. Had it +been Schwartzenberg or Esterhazy, it would have put you to some puzzle. +I am afraid I shall sicken you of acrostics; but this last was written +_to order_. I beg you to have inserted in your county paper something +like this advertisement. "To the nobility, gentry, and others, about +Bury.--C. Lamb respectfully informs his friends and the public in +general, that he is leaving off business in the acrostic line, as he is +going into an entirely new line. Rebuses and charades done as usual, and +upon the old terms. Also, Epitaphs to suit the memory of any person +deceased." I thought I had adroitly escaped the rather unpliable name of +"Williams," curtailing your poor daughters to their proper surnames; but +it seems you would not let me off so easily. If these trifles amuse you, +I am paid. Tho really 'tis an operation too much like--"A, apple-pye; B, +bit it." To make amends, I request leave to lend you the "Excursion," +and to recommend, in particular, the "Churchyard Stories," in the +seventh book, I think. They will strengthen the tone of your mind after +its weak diet on acrostics. Miss Isola is writing, and will tell you +that we are going on very comfortably. Her sister is just come. She +blames my last verses, as being more written on _Mr._ Williams than on +yourself; but how should I have parted whom a Superior Power has brought +together? I beg you will jointly accept of our best respects, and pardon +your obsequious if not troublesome Correspondent, C.L. + + +[Mr. Cecil Turner, a grandson of Mrs. Williams, tells me that her +acrostic on Lamb ran thus:-- + +TO CHARLES LAMB + + _Answer to Acrostics on the Names of Two Friends_ + + Charmed with the lines thy hand has sent, + Honour I feel the compliment, + Amongst thy products that have won the ear, + Ranged in thy verse two friends most dear. + Lay not thy winning pen away, + Each line thou writest we bid thee stay, + Still ask to charm us with another lay. + + Long liked, long lived by public Fame + A friend to misery, whate'er its claim. + Marvel I must if e'er we find + Bestowed by heaven a kindlier mind. + +The two friends were probably Edward Hogg and Cecilia Catherine Lawton, +on whose names Lamb wrote acrostics (see Vol. IV.). + +This was Lamb's effort:-- + + Go little Poem, and present + Respectful terms of compliment; + A gentle lady bids thee speak! + Courteous is she, tho' thou be weak-- + Evoke from Heaven as thick as manna + + Joy after joy on Grace Joanna: + On Fornham's Glebe and Pasture land + A blessing pray. Long, long may stand, + Not touched by Time, the Rectory blithe; + No grudging churl dispute his Tithe; + At Easter be the offerings due + + With cheerful spirit paid; each pew + In decent order filled; no noise + Loud intervene to drown the voice, + Learning, or wisdom of the Teacher; + Impressive be the Sacred Preacher, + And strict his notes on holy page; + May young and old from age to age + Salute, and still point out, "The good man's Parsonage!"] + + + +LETTER 510 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +[? Early Spring, 1830.] + +Dear Gillman,--Pray do you, or S.T.C., immediately write to say you have +received back the golden works of the dear, fine, silly old angel, which +I part from, bleeding, and to say how the Winter has used you all. + +It is our intention soon, weather permitting, to come over for a day at +Highgate; for beds we will trust to the Gate-House, should you be full: +tell me if we may come casually, for in this change of climate there is +no naming a day for walking. With best loves to Mrs. Gillman, &c. + +Yours, mopish, but in health, + +C. LAMB. + +I shall be uneasy till I hear of Fuller's safe arrival. + + +[See letter to Gillman above. The "dear, fine, silly old angel" was +Thomas Fuller.] + + + +LETTER 511 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JACOB VALE ASBURY + +[? April, 1830.] + +Dear Sir--Some draughts and boluses have been brought here which we +conjecture were meant for the young lady whom you saw this morning, +though they are labelled for + +MISS ISOLA LAMB. + +No such person is known on the Chase Side, and she is fearful of taking +medicines which may have been made up for another patient. She begs me +to say that she was born an _Isola_ and christened _Emma_. Moreover that +she is Italian by birth, and that her ancestors were from Isola Bella +(Fair Island) in the kingdom of Naples. She has never changed her name +and rather mournfully adds that she has no prospect at present of doing +so. She is literally I. SOLA, or single, at present. Therefore she begs +that the obnoxious monosyllable may be omitted on future Phials,--an +innocent syllable enough, you'll say, but she has no claim to it. It is +the bitterest pill of the seven you have sent her. When a lady loses her +good _name_, what is to become of her? Well she must swallow it as well +as she can, but begs the dose may not be repeated. + +Yours faithfully, + +CHARLES LAMB (not Isola). + + +[Asbury was a doctor at Enfield. I append another letter to him, without +date:--] + + + +LETTER 512 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JACOB VALE ASBURY + +Dear Sir, It is an observation of a wise man that "moderation is best in +all things." I cannot agree with him "in liquor." There is a smoothness +and oiliness in wine that makes it go down by a natural channel, which I +am positive was made for that descending. Else, why does not wine choke +us? could Nature have made that sloping lane, not to facilitate the +down-going? She does nothing in vain. You know that better than I. You +know how often she has helped you at a dead lift, and how much better +entitled she is to a fee than yourself sometimes, when you carry off the +credit. Still there is something due to manners and customs, and I +should apologise to you and Mrs. Asbury for being absolutely carried +home upon a man's shoulders thro' Silver Street, up Parson's Lane, by +the Chapels (which might have taught me better), and then to be +deposited like a dead log at Gaffar Westwood's, who it seems does not +"insure" against intoxication. Not that the mode of conveyance is +objectionable. On the contrary, it is more easy than a one-horse chaise. +Ariel in the "Tempest" says + + "On a Bat's back do I fly, + After sunset merrily." + +Now I take it that Ariel must sometimes have stayed out late of nights. +Indeed, he pretends that "where the bee sucks, there lurks he," as much +as to say that his suction is as innocent as that little innocent (but +damnably stinging when he is provok'd) winged creature. But I take it, +that Ariel was fond of metheglin, of which the Bees are notorious +Brewers. But then you will say: What a shocking sight to see a +middle-aged gentleman-and-a-half riding upon a Gentleman's back up +Parson's Lane at midnight. Exactly the time for that sort of conveyance, +when nobody can see him, nobody but Heaven and his own conscience; now +Heaven makes fools, and don't expect much from her own creation; and as +for conscience, She and I have long since come to a compromise. I have +given up false modesty, and she allows me to abate a little of the true. +I like to be liked, but I don't care about being respected. I don't +respect myself. But, as I was saying, I thought he would have let me +down just as we got to Lieutenant Barker's Coal-shed (or emporium) but +by a cunning jerk I eased myself, and righted my posture. I protest, I +thought myself in a palanquin, and never felt myself so grandly carried. +It was a slave under me. There was I, all but my reason. And what is +reason? and what is the loss of it? and how often in a day do we do +without it, just as well? Reason is only counting, two and two makes +four. And if on my passage home, I thought it made five, what matter? +Two and two will just make four, as it always did, before I took the +finishing glass that did my business. My sister has begged me to write +an apology to Mrs. A. and you for disgracing your party; now it does +seem to me, that I rather honoured your party, for every one that was +not drunk (and one or two of the ladies, I am sure, were not) must have +been set off greatly in the contrast to me. I was the scapegoat. The +soberer they seemed. By the way is magnesia good on these occasions? +_iii_ pol: med: sum: ante noct: in rub: can:. I am no licentiate, but +know enough of simples to beg you to send me a draught after this model. +But still you'll say (or the men and maids at your house will say) that +it is not a seemly sight for an old gentleman to go home pick-a-back. +Well, may be it is not. But I have never studied grace. I take it to be +a mere superficial accomplishment. I regard more the internal +acquisitions. The great object after supper is to get home, and whether +that is obtained in a horizontal posture or perpendicular (as foolish +men and apes affect for dignity) I think is little to the purpose. The +end is always greater than the means. Here I am, able to compose a +sensible rational apology, and what signifies how I got here? I have +just sense enough to remember I was very happy last night, and to thank +our kind host and hostess, and that's sense enough, I hope. + +CHARLES LAMB. + +N.B.--What is good for a desperate head-ache? Why, Patience, and a +determination not to mind being miserable all day long. And that I have +made my mind up to. + +So, here goes. It is better than not being alive at all, which I might +have been, had your man toppled me down at Lieut. Barker's Coal-shed. My +sister sends her sober compliments to Mrs. A. She is not much the worse. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + + +["Ariel." In two other of his letters, Lamb confesses similarly to a +similar escapade. And in his _Elia_ essay "Rejoicings on the New Year's +Coming of Age," he sends Ash Wednesday home in the same manner. + +Lieut. John Barker, R.N., was a local character, a coal merchant and a +man with a grievance. He had thirteen children, some of whose names +probably greatly amused Lamb--John Thomas, William Charles, Frederick +Alexander, Marius Collins, Caius Marcius, Marcus Aurelius Antonius, +Coriolanus Aurelius, Horatius Tertius Decimus, Elizabeth Mary, +Concordia, Lousia Clarissa, Caroline Maria Quiroja and Volumnia +Hortensia.] + + + +LETTER 513 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, Tuesday [April 21, 1830]. + +Dear Madam,--I have ventured upon some lines, which combine my old +acrostic talent (which you first found out) with my new profession of +epitaph-monger. As you did not please to say, when you would die, I have +left a blank space for the date. May kind heaven be a long time in +filling it up. At least you cannot say that these lines are not about +you, though not much to the purpose. We were very sorry to hear that you +have not been very well, and hope that a little excursion may revive +you. Miss Isola is thankful for her added day; but I verily think she +longs to see her young friends once more, and will regret less than ever +the end of her holydays. She cannot be going on more quietly than she is +doing here, and you will perceive amendment. + +I hope all her little commissions will all be brought home to your +satisfaction. When she returns, we purpose seeing her to Epping on her +journey. We have had our proportion of fine weather and some pleasant +walks, and she is stronger, her appetite good, but less wolfish than at +first, which we hold a good sign. I hope Mr. Wing will approve of its +abatement. She desires her very kindest respects to Mr. Williams and +yourself, and wishes to rejoin you. My sister and myself join in +respect, and pray tell Mr. Donne, with our compliments, that we shall be +disappointed, if we do not see him. This letter being very neatly +written, I am very unwilling that Emma should club any of her +disproportionate scrawl to deface it. + +Your obliged servant, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Addressed to "Mrs. Williams, W.B. Donne, Esq., Matteshall, East +Dereham, Norfolk." + +Mr. Wing was probably Miss Isola's doctor. Mr. Donne was William Bodham +Donne (1807-1882), the friend of Edward FitzGerald, and Examiner of +Plays. + +This was Lamb's acrostic-epitaph on Mrs. Williams:-- + + Grace Joanna here doth lie: + Reader, wonder not that I + Ante-date her hour of rest. + Can I thwart her wish exprest, + Ev'n unseemly though the laugh + + Jesting with an Epitaph? + On her bones the turf lie lightly, + And her rise again be brightly! + No dark stain be found upon her-- + No, there will not, on mine honour-- + Answer that at least I can. + + Would that I, thrice happy man, + In as spotless garb might rise, + Light as she will climb the skies, + Leaving the dull earth behind, + In a car more swift than wind. + All her errors, all her failings, + (Many they were not) and ailings, + Sleep secure from Envy's railings. + +Here should come an undated note from Lamb to Basil Montagu, in which +Lamb asks for help for Hone in his Coffee-House. "If you can help a +worthy man you will have _two worthy men_ obliged to you." Hone, having +fallen upon bad times, Lamb helped in the scheme to establish him in the +Grasshopper Coffee-House, at 13 Gracechurch Street (see next letter).] + + + +LETTER 514 + +CHARLES LAMB TO ROBERT SOUTHEY + +May 10, 1830. + +Dear Southey,--My friend Hone, whom you would like _for a friend_, I +found deeply impressed with your generous notice of him in your +beautiful "Life of Bunyan," which I am just now full of. He has written +to you for leave to publish a certain good-natured letter. I write not +this to enforce his request, for we are fully aware that the refusal of +such publication would be quite consistent with all that is good in your +character. Neither he nor I expect it from you, nor exact it; but if you +would consent to it, you would have me obliged by it, as well as him. He +is just now in a critical situation: kind friends have opened a +coffee-house for him in the City, but their means have not extended to +the purchase of coffee-pots, credit for Reviews, newspapers, and other +paraphernalia. So I am sitting in the skeleton of a possible divan. What +right I have to interfere, you best know. Look on me as a dog who went +once temporarily insane, and bit you, and now begs for a crust. Will you +set your wits to a dog? + +Our object is to open a subscription, which my friends of the "Times" +are most willing to forward for him, but think that a leave from you to +publish would aid it. + +But not an atom of respect or kindness will or shall it abate in either +of us if you decline it. Have this strongly in your mind. + +Those "Every-Day" and "Table" Books will be a treasure a hundred years +hence; but they have failed to make Hone's fortune. + +Here his wife and all his children are about me, gaping for coffee +customers; but how should they come in, seeing no pot boiling! + +Enough of Hone. I saw Coleridge a day or two since. He has had some +severe attack, not paralytic; but, if I had not heard of it, I should +not have found it out. He looks, and especially speaks, strong. How are +all the Wordsworths and all the Southeys? whom I am obliged to you if +you have not brought up haters of the name of + +C. LAMB. + +P.S.--I have gone lately into the acrostic line. I find genius (such as +I had) declines with me, but I get clever. Do you know anybody that +wants charades, or such things, for Albums? I do 'em at so much a sheet. +Perhaps an epigram (not a very happy-gram) I did for a school-boy +yesterday may amuse. I pray Jove he may not get a flogging for any false +quantity; but 'tis, with one exception, the only Latin verses I have +made for forty years, and I did it "to order." + +SUUM CUIQUE + + Adsciscit sibi divitias et opes alienas + Fur, rapiens, spolians, quod mihi, quod-que tibi, + Proprium erat, temnens haec verba, Meum-que, Suum-que; + Omne suum est: tandem Cui-que Suum tribuit. + Dat laqueo collum; vestes, vah! carnifici dat; + Sese Diabolo: sic bene: Cuique Suum. + +I write from Hone's, therefore Mary cannot send her love to Mrs. +Southey, but I do. + + Yours ever, C.L. + + +[Major's edition of _The Pilgrim's Progress_, mentioned in a letter to +Barton above, was issued in 1830 with a memoir of Bunyan by Southey. It +was reviewed in _The Times_ for May 7, 1830, I think probably by Lamb, +in the following terms:-- + + The public is aware that the unexhausted diligence and unwearied pen + of Mr. Southey have produced a new and excellent edition of the + celebrated _Pilgrim's Progress_, with the Life of the Author + prefixed. This Life is, no doubt, an interesting work, though we + wish the author, both in that and in the account, which is + attributed to him, of the founder of the Jesuits, contained in a + recent periodical work, had taken more time. The narrative in both + is hasty and tumultuary, if we may use the latter expression: there + is no time or room for reflection; and when a reflection comes, it + is so mixed and jambed in with the story, or with quotations from + the works or words of the respective heroes of the history, that it + escapes unobserved. Could we, without grievous offence, recommend, + both to Mr. Southey and Sir Walter Scott, to recollect the man + spoken of by Horace?-- + +quem fama est esse librisque Ambustum propriis."--_Sat_, i., 61. + + Yet still, as we said above, the Life of Bunyan is an interesting + work. How different the origin of all the sects and their founders, + from that of our sober, staid, and, we trust, permanent + establishment, and the learned and pious reformers from whom it + sprang! + + But that for which we chiefly notice this work of Mr. Southey, is + the very last sentence in it, wherein is contained his frank and + honourable recommendation (though not more than they deserve) of the + works of one whom the iron hand of oppression would have levelled + with the dust:-- + + "In one of the volumes collected from various quarters, which were + sent to me for this purpose, I observe the name of W. Hone, and + notice it that I may take the opportunity of recommending his + _Every-Day Book_ and _Table Book_ to those who are interested in the + preservation of our national and local customs. By these very + curious publications their compiler has rendered good service in an + important department of literature; and he may render yet more, if + he obtain the encouragement which he well deserves." + + Not only we, and the person mentioned in this paragraph, but all the + friends of pure English literature,--all the curious in old English + customs,--in short, all intelligent men, with the hearts of + Englishmen in them,--owe Mr. Southey their gratitude for this + recommendation: it springs from a just taste and right feeling + united. + +Hone wrote to _The Times_ at once to thank both the paper and Southey +for the compliment. A few days later, on May 21, appeared an article in +_The Times_ containing correspondence between Hone and Southey. I quote +the introduction, again probably the work of Lamb, and Southey's letter +(see Lamb's letter to Hone below):-- + + We alluded some days ago to the handsome notice of Mr. Hone in Mr. + Southey's _Life of Bunyan_. The following correspondence has since + been sent to us: it displays in an advantageous light the modesty of + Mr. Hone and the amiable and candid disposition of Mr. Southey. The + business, wholly foreign to Mr. Hone's former pursuits, which is + alluded to in the letter, is explained in an advertisement in this + day's paper. + + * * * * * + + "To Mr. Hone, 13, Gracechurch-Street, + + "Keswick, April 26. + + "Sir,--Your letter has given me both pain and pleasure. I am sorry + to learn that you are still, in the worldly sense of the word, an + unfortunate man,--that you are withdrawn from pursuits which were + consonant to your habits and inclinations, and that a public + expression of respect and good-will, made in the hope that it might + have been serviceable to you, can have no such effect. + + "When I observed your autograph in the little book, I wrote to + inquire of Mr. Major whether it had come to his hands from you, + directly or indirectly, for my use, that, in that case, I might + thank you for it. It proved otherwise, but I would not lose an + opportunity which I had wished for. + + "Judging of you (as I would myself be judged) by your works, I saw + in the editor of the _Every-Day_ and _Table Books_ a man who had + applied himself with great diligence to useful and meritorious + pursuits. I thought that time, and reflection, and affliction, (of + which it was there seen that he had had his share,) had contributed + to lead him into this direction, which was also that of his better + mind. What alteration had been produced in his opinions it concerned + not me to inquire; here there were none but what were + unexceptionable,--no feelings but what were to be approved. From all + that appeared, I supposed he had become 'a sadder and a wiser man:' + I therefore wished him success in his literary undertakings. + + "The little parcel which you mention I shall receive with pleasure. + + "I wish you success in your present undertaking, whatever it be, and + that you may one day, under happier circumstances, resume a pen + which has, of late years, been so meritoriously employed. If your + new attempt prosper, you will yet find leisure for intellectual + gratification, and for that self-improvement which may be carried on + even in the busiest concerns of life. + + "I remain, Sir, yours with sincere good will, + + "ROBERT SOUTHEY." + +In the advertisement columns of the same issue of _The Times_ (May 21) +was the following notice, drawn up, I assume, by Lamb:-- + + THE FAMILY OF WILLIAM HONE, in the course of last winter, were + kindly assisted by private friends to take and alter the premises + they now reside in, No. 13, Gracechurch-street, for the purpose of a + coffeehouse, to be managed by Mrs. Hone and her elder daughters; but + they are in a painful exigency which increases hourly, and renders a + public appeal indispensable. The wellwishers to Mr. Hone throughout + the kingdom, especially the gratified readers of his literary + productions (in all of which he has long ceased to have an interest, + and from none of which can he derive advantage), are earnestly + solicited to afford the means of completing the fittings and opening + the house in a manner suited to its proposed respectability. If this + aid be yielded without loss of time, it will be of indescribable + benefit, inasmuch as it will put an end to many grievous anxieties + and expenses, inseparable from the lengthened delay which has + hitherto been inevitable, and will enable the family to immediately + commence the business, which alone they look forward to for support. + Subscriptions will be received by the following bankers:--Messrs. + Ransom and Co., Pall-mall east; Messrs. Dixon, Sons, and Brookes, + Chancery-lane; Messrs. Ladbroke and Co., Bank-buildings, Cornhill; + and by Mr. Clowes, printer, 14, Charing-cross; Mr. Thomas Rodd, + bookseller, 2, Great Newport-street; Mr. Griffiths, bookseller, 13, + Wellington-street, Strand; Mr. Effingham Wilson, bookseller, Royal + Exchange; and Messrs. Fisher and Moxhay, biscuit-bakers, 55, + Threadneedle-street. + +The first list of subscriptions, headed by "Charles Lamb, Esq., Enfield, +£10," came to £103. This was Monday, May 31. The next list was published +on June 10, accompanied by the following note in the body of the +paper:-- + + The subscriptions for Mr. Hone, it will be perceived, are going on + favourably. In the list now published is the name of the Duke of + Bedford, who has sent 20_l_. His cause has been warmly espoused by + the provincial journals, more than 20 of which have inserted his + appeal gratuitously, with offers to receive and remit subscriptions. + The aphorism, "he gives twice who gives quickly," could not receive + a more cogent application than in the present instance, for the + funds are required to enable Mr. Hone to commence business in his + new undertaking, where he is already placed with his family, liable + to rent and taxes, and other claims, but gaining nothing until his + outfit is completed. + + Hone, however, did not prosper, in spite of his friends, who were + not sufficiently numerous to find the requisite capital. + + "Suum Cuique." The boy for whom this epigram was composed was a son + of Hessey, the publisher, afterwards Archdeacon Hessey. He was at + the Merchant Taylors' School, where it was a custom to compose Latin + and English epigrams for speech day, the boys being permitted to get + help. Archdeacon Hessey wrote as follows in the Taylorian a few + years ago:-- + + The subjects for 1830 were _Suum Cuique_ and _Brevis esse laboro_. + After some three or four exercise nights I confess that I was + literally "at my wits' end." But a brilliant idea struck me. I had + frequently, boy as I was, seen Charles Lamb at my father's house, + and once, in 1825 or 1826, I had been taken to have tea with him and + his sister, Mary Lamb, at their little house, Colebrook Cottage, a + whitish-brown tenement, standing by itself, close to the New River, + at Islington. He was very kind, as he always was to young people, + and very quaint. I told him that I had devoured his "Roast Pig"; he + congratulated me on possessing a thorough schoolboy's appetite. And + he was pleased when I mentioned my having seen the boys at Christ's + Hospital at their public suppers, which then took place on the + Sunday evenings in Lent. "Could this good-natured and humorous old + gentleman be prevailed upon to give me an Epigram?" "I don't know," + said my father, to whom I put the question, "but I will ask him at + any rate, and send him the mottoes." In a day or two there arrived + from Enfield, to which Lamb had removed some time in 1827, not one, + but two epigrams, one on each subject. That on _Suum Cuique_ was in + Latin, and was suggested by the grim satisfaction which had recently + been expressed by the public at the capture and execution of some + notorious highwayman. + +See also Vol. IV. of this edition for a slightly differing version. Lamb +had many years before, he says in a letter to Godwin, written similar +epigrams. + +"With one exception." Perhaps the Latin verses on Haydon's picture. See +Vol. IV.] + + + +LETTER 515 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +Enfield, Tuesday. [P.M. May 12, 1830.] + +Dear M. I dined with your and my Rogers at Mr. Gary's yesterday. Gary +consulted me on the proper bookseller to offer a Lady's MS novel to. I +said I would write to you. But I wish you would call on the Translator +of Dante at the British Museum, and talk with him. He is the pleasantest +of clergymen. I told him of all Rogers's handsome behaviour to you, and +you are already no stranger. Go. I made Rogers laugh about your +Nightingale sonnet, not having heard one. 'Tis a good sonnet +notwithstanding. You shall have the books shortly. + +C.L. + + +[Samuel Rogers had just lent Moxon £500 on which to commence publisher. + +Moxon had dedicated his first book to Rogers. This is Moxon's "Sonnet to +the Nightingale," but I cannot explain why Rogers laughed:-- + + Lone midnight-soothing melancholy bird, + That send'st such music to my sleepless soul, + Chaining her faculties in fast controul, + Few listen to thy song; yet I have heard, + When Man and Nature slept, nor aspen stirred, + Thy mournful voice, sweet vigil of the sleeping + And liken'd thee to some angelic mind, + That sits and mourns for erring mortals weeping. + The genius, not of groves, but of mankind, + Watch at this solemn hour o'er millions keeping. + In Eden's bowers, as mighty poets tell, + Did'st thou repeat, as now that wailing call-- + Those sorrowing notes might seem, sad Philomel, + Prophetic to have mourned of _man_ the _fall_.] + + + +LETTER 516 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +Friday. [P.M. May 14, 1830.] + +Dear Novello, Mary hopes you have not forgot you are to spend a day with +us on Wednesday. That it may be a long one, cannot you secure places now +for Mrs. Novello yourself and the Clarkes? We have just table room for +four. Five make my good Landlady fidgetty; six, to begin to fret; seven, +to approximate to fever point. But seriously we shall prefer four to two +or three; we shall have from 1/2 past 10 to six, when the coach goes +off, to scent the country. And pray write _now_, to say you do so come, +for dear Mrs. Westwood else will be on the tenters of incertitude. + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 517 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[May 20, 1830.] + +Dear N.--pray write immediately to say "The book has come safe." I am +anxious, not so much for the autographs, as for that bit of the hair +brush. I enclose a cinder, which belonged to _Shield_, when he was poor, +and lit his own fires. Any memorial of a great Musical Genius, I know, +is acceptable; and Shield has his merits, though Clementi, in my +opinion, is far above him in the Sostenuto. Mr. Westwood desires his +compliments, and begs to present you with a nail that came out of +Jomelli's coffin, who is buried at Naples. + + +[Vincent Novello writes on this: "A very characteristic note from Dear +Charles Lamb, who always pretended to Rate all kinds of memorials and +_Relics_, and assumed a look of fright and horror whenever he reproached +me with being a _Papist_, instead of a _Quaker_, which sect he pretended +to doat upon." The book would be Novello's album, with Lamb's "Free +Thoughts on Eminent Composers" in it (see next letter but one). + +Shield was William Shield (1748-1829), the composer. He was buried in +Westminster Abbey in the same grave as Clementi. Nicolo Jomelli +(1714-1774) was a Neapolitan composer.] + + + +LETTER 518 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +May 21, 1830. + +Dear Hone--I thought you would be pleased to see this letter. Pray if +you have time to, call on Novello, No. 66, Great Queen St. I am anxious +to learn whether he received his album I sent on Friday by our nine +o'clock morning stage. If not, beg inquire at the _Old Bell_, Holborn. + +CHARLES LAMB. + +Southey will see in the _Times_ all we proposed omitting is omitted. + + +[See notes to the letter to Southey above.] + + + +LETTER 519 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +[Enfield, Saturday, May 24th, 1830.] + +Mary's love? Yes. Mary Lamb quite well. + +Dear Sarah,--I found my way to Northaw on Thursday and a very good woman +behind a counter, who says also that you are a very good lady but that +the woman who was with you was naught. These things may be so or not. I +did not accept her offered glass of wine (home-made, I take it) but +craved a cup of ale, with which I seasoned a slice of cold Lamb from a +sandwich box, which I ate in her back parlour, and proceeded for +Berkhampstead, &c.; lost myself over a heath, and had a day's pleasure. +I wish you could walk as I do, and as you used to do. I am sorry to find +you are so poorly; and, now I have found my way, I wish you back at +Goody Tomlinson's. What a pretty village 'tis! I should have come +sooner, but was waiting a summons to Bury. Well, it came, and I found +the good parson's lady (he was from home) exceedingly hospitable. + +Poor Emma, the first moment we were alone, took me into a corner, and +said, "Now, pray, don't _drink_; do check yourself after dinner, for my +sake, and when we get home to Enfield, you shall drink as much as ever +you please, and I won't say a word about it." How I behaved, you may +guess, when I tell you that Mrs. Williams and I have written acrostics +on each other, and she hoped that she should have "no reason to regret +Miss Isola's recovery, by its depriving _her_ of our begun +correspondence." Emma stayed a month with us, and has gone back (in +tolerable health) to her long home, for _she_ comes not again for a +twelvemonth. I amused Mrs. Williams with an occurrence on our road to +Enfield. We travelled with one of those troublesome fellow-passengers in +a stage-coach, that is called a well-informed man. For twenty miles we +discoursed about the properties of steam, probabilities of carriages by +ditto, till all my science, and more than all, was exhausted, and I was +thinking of escaping my torment by getting up on the outside, when, +getting into Bishops Stortford, my gentleman, spying some farming land, +put an unlucky question to me: "What sort of a crop of turnips I thought +we should have this year?" Emma's eyes turned to me, to know what in the +world I could have to say; and she burst into a violent fit of laughter, +maugre her pale, serious cheeks, when, with the greatest gravity, I +replied, that "it depended, I believed, upon boiled legs of mutton." +This clench'd our conversation; and my Gentleman, with a face half wise, +half in scorn, troubled us with no more conversation, scientific or +philosophical, for the remainder of the journey. Ayrton was here +yesterday, and as _learned_ to the full as my fellow-traveller. What a +pity that he will spoil a wit and a devilish pleasant fellow (as he is) +by wisdom! He talk'd on Music; and by having read Hawkins and Burney +recently I was enabled to talk of Names, and show more knowledge than he +had suspected I possessed; and in the end he begg'd me to shape my +thoughts upon paper, which I did after he was gone, and sent him. + + FREE THOUGHTS ON SOME EMINENT COMPOSERS + + Some cry up Haydn, some Mozart, + Just as the whim bites. For my part, + I do not care a farthing candle + For either of them, or for Handel. + Cannot a man live free and easy, + Without admiring Pergolesi! + Or thro' the world with comfort go + That never heard of Doctor Blow! + So help me God, I hardly have; + And yet I eat, and drink, and shave, + Like other people, (if you watch it,) + And know no more of stave and crotchet + Than did the un-Spaniardised Peruvians; + Or those old ante-queer-Diluvians + That lived in the unwash'd world with Jubal, + Before that dirty Blacksmith Tubal, + By stroke on anvil, or by summ'at, + Found out, to his great surprise, the gamut. + I care no more for Cimerosa + Than he did for Salvator Rosa, + Being no Painter; and bad luck + Be mine, if I can bear that Gluck! + Old Tycho Brahe and modern Herschel + Had something in them; but who's Purcel? + The devil, with his foot so cloven, + For aught I care, may take Beethoven; + And, if the bargain does not suit, + I'll throw him Weber in to boot! + There's not the splitting of a splinter + To chuse 'twixt _him last named_, and Winter. + Of Doctor Pepusch old queen Dido + Knew just as much, God knows, as I do. + I would not go four miles to visit + Sebastian Bach-or Batch-which is it? + No more I would for Bononcini. + As for Novello and Rossini, + I shall not say a word about [to grieve] 'em, + Because they're living. So I leave 'em. + + +Martin Burney is as odd as ever. We had a dispute about the word "heir," +which I contended was pronounced like "air;" he said that might be in +common parlance; or that we might so use it, speaking of the +"Heir-at-Law," a comedy; but that in the Law Courts it was necessary to +give it a full aspiration, and to say _Hayer_; he thought it might even +vitiate a cause, if a Counsel pronounced it otherwise. In conclusion, he +"would consult Serjeant Wilde;" who gave it against him. Sometimes he +falleth into the water, sometimes into the fire. He came down here, and +insisted on reading Virgil's "Eneid" all through with me (which he did,) +because a Counsel must know Latin. Another time he read out all the +Gospel of St. John, because Biblical quotations are very emphatic in a +Court of Justice. A third time, he would carve a fowl, which he did very +ill-favoredly, because "we did not know how indispensable it was for a +Barrister to do all those sort of things well. Those little things were +of more consequence than we supposed." So he goes on, harassing about +the way to prosperity, and losing it. With a long head, but somewhat a +wrong one--harum-scarum. Why does not his guardian angel look to him? He +deserves one--: may be, he has tired him out. + +I am----with this long scrawl, but I thought in your exile, you might +like a letter. Commend me to all the wonders in Derbyshire, and tell the +devil I humbly kiss--my hand to him. Yours ever, + +C. LAMB. + + +["Free Thoughts." The version in Ayrton's album differs a little from +this, the principal difference being in line 13, "primitive" for +"un-Spaniardised." Lamb's story of the origin of the verses is not +necessarily correct. I fancy that he had written them for Novello before +he produced them in reply to Ayrton's challenge. When sending the poem +to Ayrton in a letter at this time, not available for this edition +(written apparently just after Novello had paid the visit, referred to +above), Lamb wrote that it was written to gratify Novello. + +Mary Lamb (or Charles Lamb, personating her) appended the following +postscript to the verses in Novello's album:-- + + The reason why my brother's so severe, + Vincentio is--my brother has no ear: + And Caradori her mellifluous throat + Might stretch in vain to make him learn a note. + Of common tunes he knows not anything, + Nor "Rule, Britannia" from "God save the King." + He rail at Handel! He the gamut quiz! + I'd lay my life he knows not what it is. + His spite at music is a pretty whim-- + He loves not it, because it loves not him. + +M. LAMB. + +"Serjeant Wilde"-Thomas Wilde (1782-1855), afterwards Lord Truro, a +friend of Lamb's, who is said to have helped him with squibs in the +Newark election in 1829, when Martin Burney was among his supporters +(see Vol. V. of my large edition, page 341). + +Here had I permission, I would print Lamb's letter to Ayrton, given in +the Boston Bibliophile edition, incorporating the same poem.] + + + +LETTER 520 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +June 3, 1830. + +Dear Sarah,--I named your thought about William to his father, who +expressed such horror and aversion to the idea of his singing in public, +that I cannot meddle in it directly or indirectly. Ayrton is a kind +fellow, and if you chuse to consult him by Letter, or otherwise, he will +give you the best advice, I am sure, very readily. _I have no doubt that +M. Burney's objection to interfering was the same--with mine._ With +thanks for your pleasant long letter, which is not that of an Invalid, +and sympathy for your sad sufferings, I remain, in haste, + +Yours Truly, + +Mary's kindest Love. + + +[There was some talk of William Hazlitt Junr. becoming a pupil of Braham +and taking up music seriously. He did not do so. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Hone, dated Enfield, June 17, 1830, +in which Lamb offers Hone £1 per quarter for yesterday's Times, after +the Coffee-House customers have done with it. He ends with the wish, +"Vivant Coffee, Coffee-potque!"] + + + +LETTER 521 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. June 28, 1830.] + +DEAR B.B.--Could you dream of my publishing without sending a copy to +you? You will find something new to you in the vol. particularly the +Translations. Moxon will send to you the moment it is out. He is the +young poet of Xmas, whom the Author of the Pleasures of Memory has set +up in the bookvending business with a volunteer'd loan of £500--such +munificence is rare to an almost stranger. But Rogers, I am told, has +done many goodnatured things of this nature. I need not say how glad to +see A.K. and Lucy we should have been,--and still shall be, if it be +practicable. Our direction is Mr. Westwood's, Chase Side Enfield, but +alas I know not theirs. We can give them a bed. Coaches come daily from +the Bell, Holborn. + +You will see that I am worn to the poetical dregs, condescending to +Acrostics, which are nine fathom beneath Album verses--but they were +written at the request of the Lady where our Emma is, to whom I paid a +visit in April to bring home Emma for a change of air after a severe +illness, in which she had been treated like a daughter by the good +Parson and his whole family. She has since return'd to her occupation. I +thought on you in Suffolk, but was 40 miles from Woodbridge. I heard of +you the other day from Mr. Pulham of the India House. + +Long live King William the 4th. + +S.T.C. says, we have had wicked kings, foolish kings, wise kings, good +kings (but few) but never till now have we had a Blackguard King-- + +Charles 2d was profligate, but a Gentleman. + +I have nineteen Letters to dispatch this leisure Sabbath for Moxon to +send about with Copies-so you will forgive me short measure--and believe +me + +Yours ever + +C.L. + +Pray do let us see your Quakeresses if possible. + + +[Lamb's _Album Verses_ was almost ready. The translations were those +from Vincent Bourne. + +William IV. came to the throne on June 26, 1830. + +"I have nineteen Letters." The fact that none of these is forthcoming +helps to illustrate the imperfect state of Lamb's correspondence as +(even among so many differing editions) we now have it. But of course +the number may have been an exaggeration. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Hone, dated July 1, 1830, in which +Lamb asks that the newspaper be kept as he is meditating a town +residence (see next letter). + +Here probably should come an undated letter to Mrs. John Rickman, +accompanying a gift of _Album Verses_. Lamb says: "Will you re-give, or +_lend_ me, by the bearer, the one Volume of juvenile Poetry? I have +tidings of a second at Brighton." He proposes that he and Mrs. Rickman +shall some day play old whist for the two.] + + + +LETTER 522 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 30 August, 1830.] + +Dear B.B.--my address is 34 Southampton Buildings, Holborn. For God's +sake do not let me [be] pester'd with Annuals. They are all rogues who +edit them, and something else who write in them. I am still alone, and +very much out of sorts, and cannot spur up my mind to writing. The sight +of one of those Year Books makes me sick. I get nothing by any of 'em, +not even a Copy-- + +Thank you for your warm interest about my little volume, for the critics +on which I care [? not] the 5 hundred thousandth part of the tythe of a +half-farthing. I am too old a Militant for that. How noble, tho', in +R.S. to come forward for an old friend, who had treated him so +unworthily. Moxon has a shop without customers, I a Book without +readers. But what a clamour against a poor collection of album verses, +as if we had put forth an Epic. I cannot scribble a long Letter--I am, +when not at foot, very desolate, and take no interest in any thing, +scarce hate any thing, but annuals. I am in an interregnum of thought +and feeling-- + +What a beautiful Autumn morning this is, if it was but with me as in +times past when the candle of the Lord shined round me-- + +I cannot even muster enthusiasm to admire the French heroism. + +In better times I hope we may some day meet, and discuss an old poem or +two. But if you'd have me not sick no more of Annuals. + +C.L. Ex-Elia. + +Love to Lucy and A.K. always. + + +[_The Literary Gazette_, Jerdan's paper, had written offensively of +_Album Verses_ and its author's vanity in the number for July 10, 1830. +Southey published in _The Times_ of August 6 some lines in praise of +Lamb and against Jerdan. It was Southey's first public utterance on Lamb +since the famous letter by Elia to himself, and is the more noble in +consequence. The lines ran thus:-- + + TO CHARLES LAMB + + On the Reviewal of his _Album Verses_ in the _Literary Gazette_ + + + Charles Lamb, to those who know thee justly dear + For rarest genius, and for sterling worth, + Unchanging friendship, warmth of heart sincere, + And wit that never gave an ill thought birth, + Nor ever in its sport infix'd a sting; + To us who have admired and loved thee long, + It is a proud as well as pleasant thing + To hear thy good report, now borne along + Upon the honest breath of public praise: + We know that with the elder sons of song + In honouring whom thou hast delighted still, + Thy name shall keep its course to after days. + The empty pertness, and the vulgar wrong, + The flippant folly, the malicious will, + Which have assailed thee, now, or heretofore, + Find, soon or late, their proper meed of shame; + The more thy triumph, and our pride the more, + When witling critics to the world proclaim, + In lead, their own dolt incapacity. + Matter it is of mirthful memory + To think, when thou wert early in the field, + How doughtily small Jeffrey ran at thee + A-tilt, and broke a bulrush on thy shield. + And now, a veteran in the lists of fame, + I ween, old Friend! thou art not worse bested + When with a maudlin eye and drunken aim, + Dulness hath thrown a _jerdan_ at thy head. + + SOUTHEY. + +Leigh Hunt attacked Jerdan in the _Examiner_ in a number of "Rejected +Epigrams" signed T.A. See later. He also took up the matter in the +Tatler, in the first number of which the following "Inquest +Extraordinary" was printed:-- + + Last week a porter died beneath his burden; + Verdict: Found carrying a _Gazette_ from Jerdan. + +Moxon's shop without customers was at 64 New Bond Street. "The candle of +the Lord." In my large edition I gave this reference very thoughtlessly +to Proverbs xx. 27. It is really to Job. xxix. 3. + +"The French heroism." The July Revolution, in which the Bourbons were +routed and Louis Philippe placed on the throne.] + + + +LETTER 523 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SAMUEL ROGERS + +[Dated at end: Oct. 5, 1830.] + +Dear Sir,--I know not what hath bewitch'd me that I have delayed +acknowledging your beautiful present. But I have been very unwell and +nervous of late. The poem was not new to me, tho' I have renewed +acquaintance with it. Its metre is none of the least of its +excellencies. 'Tis so far from the stiffness of blank verse--it gallops +like a traveller, as it should do--no crude Miltonisms in [it]. Dare I +pick out what most pleases me? It is the middle paragraph in page +thirty-four. It is most tasty. Though I look on every impression as a +_proof_ of your kindness, I am jealous of the ornaments, and should have +prized the verses naked on whitybrown paper. + +I am, Sir, yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Oct. 5th. + + +[Rogers had sent Lamb a copy of his Italy, with illustrations by Turner +and Stothard, which was published by Moxon with other firms in 183O. +This is the middle paragraph on page 34:-- + + Here I received from thee, Basilico, + One of those _courtesies so sweet, so rare!_ + When, as I rambled thro' thy vineyard-ground + On the hill-side, thou sent'st thy little son, + Charged with a bunch almost as big as he, + To press it on the stranger. May thy vats + O'erflow, and he, thy willing gift-bearer, + Live to become a giver; and, at length, + When thou art full of honour and wouldst rest, + The staff of thine old age!] + + + +LETTER 524 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[P.M. November 8, 1830.] + + Tears are for lighter griefs. Man weeps the doom + That seals a single victim to the tomb. + But when Death riots, when with whelming sway + Destruction sweeps a family away; + When Infancy and Youth, a huddled mass, + All in an instant to oblivion pass, + And Parent's hopes are crush'd; what lamentation + Can reach the depth of such a desolation? + Look upward, Feeble Ones! look up, and trust + That He, who lays this mortal frame in dust, + Still hath the immortal Spirit in His keeping. + In Jesus' sight they are not dead, but sleeping. + +Dear N., will these lines do? I despair of better. Poor Mary is in a +deplorable state here at Enfield. + +Love to all, + +C. LAMB. + + +[The four sons and two daughters of John and Ann Rigg, of York, had been +drowned in the Ouse. A number of poets were asked for verses, the best +to be inscribed on a monument in York Minster. Those of James Montgomery +were chosen. + +It was possibly the death of Hazlitt, on September 18, while the Lambs +were in their London lodgings, that brought on Mary Lamb's attack.] + + + +LETTER 525 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +November 12, 1830. + +Dear Moxon,--I have brought my sister to Enfield, being sure that she +had no hope of recovery in London. Her state of mind is deplorable +beyond any example. I almost fear whether she has strength at her time +of life ever to get out of it. Here she must be nursed, and neither see +nor hear of anything in the world out of her sick chamber. The mere +hearing that Southey had called at our lodgings totally upset her. Pray +see him, or hear of him at Mr. Rickman's, and excuse my not writing to +him. I dare not write or receive a letter in her presence; every little +task so agitates her. Westwood will receive any letter for me, and give +it me privately. Pray assure Southey of my kindliest feelings towards +him; and, if you do not see him, send this to him. + +Kindest remembrances to your sister, and believe me ever yours, C. LAMB. + +Remember me kindly to the Allsops. + + +[Southey was visiting Rickman, then Clerk Assistant to the House of +Commons, where he lived.] + + + +LETTER 526 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? Dec., 1830.] + +Dear M. Something like this was what I meant. But on reading it over, I +see no great fun or use in it. It will only stuff up and encroach upon +the sheet you propose. Do as, and _what_, you please. Send Proof, or +not, as you like. If you send, send me a copy or 2 of the Album Verses, +and the Juvenile Poetry if _bound_. + +I am happy to say Mary is mending, but not enough to give me hopes of +being able to leave her. I sadly regret that I shall possibly not see +Southey or Wordsworth, but I dare not invite either of them here, for +fear of exciting my sister, whose only chance is quiet. You don't know +in what a sad state we have been. + +I think the Devil may come out without prefaces, but use your +discretion. + +Make my kindest remembces to Southey, with my heart's thanks for his +kind intent. I am a little easier about my Will, and as Ryle is +Executor, and will do all a friend can do at the Office, and what little +I leave will buy an annuity to piece out tolerably, I am much easier. + +Yours ever + +C.L. + +To 64 New Bond St. + + +[I cannot say to what the opening sentences refer: probably an +advertisement for _Satan in Search of a Wife_ ("the Devil"), which Lamb +had just written and Moxon was publishing. + +The reference to the Juvenile Poetry suggests that Moxon had procured +some of the sheets of the _Poetry for Children_ which Godwin brought out +in 1809, and was binding up a few. This theory is borne out by the +statement in the letter to Mrs. Norris, later, that the book was not to +be had for love or money, and the circumstance that in 1833 Lamb seems +to send her a copy. Ryle was Charles Ryle. an India House clerk, and +Lamb's executor with Talfourd.] + + + +LETTER 527 + +CHARLES LAMB TO GEORGE DYER + +Dec. 20, 1830. + +Dear Dyer,--I would have written before to thank you for your kind +letter, written with your own hand. It glads us to see your writing. It +will give you pleasure to hear that, after so much illness, we are in +tolerable health and spirits once more. Miss Isola intended to call upon +you after her night's lodging at Miss Buffam's, but found she was too +late for the stage. If she comes to town before she goes home, she will +not miss paying her respects to Mrs. Dyer and you, to whom she desires +best love. Poor Enfield, that has been so peaceable hitherto, has caught +the inflammatory fever, the tokens are upon her! and a great fire was +blazing last night in the barns and haystacks of a farmer, about half a +mile from us. Where will these things end? There is no doubt of its +being the work of some ill-disposed rustic; but how is he to be +discovered? They go to work in the dark with strange chemical +preparations unknown to our forefathers. There is not even a dark +lantern to have a chance of detecting these Guy Fauxes. We are past the +iron age, and are got into the fiery age, undream'd of by Ovid. You are +lucky in Clifford's Inn where, I think, you have few ricks or stacks +worth the burning. Pray keep as little corn by you as you can, for fear +of the worst. + +It was never good times in England since the poor began to speculate +upon their condition. Formerly, they jogged on with as little reflection +as horses: the whistling ploughman went cheek by jowl with his brother +that neighed. Now the biped carries a box of phosphorus in his +leather-breeches; and in the dead of night the half-illuminated beast +steals his magic potion into a cleft in a barn, and half a country is +grinning with new fires. Farmer Graystock said something to the touchy +rustic that he did not relish, and he writes his distaste in flames. +What a power to intoxicate his crude brains, just muddlingly awake, to +perceive that something is wrong in the social system!-what a hellish +faculty above gunpowder! + +Now the rich and poor are fairly pitted; we shall see who can hang or +burn fastest. It is not always revenge that stimulates these kindlings. +There is a love of exerting mischief. Think of a disrespected clod that +was trod into earth, that was nothing, on a sudden by damned arts +refined into an exterminating angel, devouring the fruits of the earth +and their growers in a mass of fire! What a new existence!--what a +temptation above Lucifer's! Would clod be any thing but a clod, if he +could resist it? Why, here was a spectacle last night for a whole +country!--a Bonfire visible to London, alarming her guilty towers, and +shaking the Monument with an ague fit--all done by a little vial of +phosphor in a Clown's fob! How he must grin, and shake his empty noddle +in clouds, the Vulcanian Epicure! Can we ring the bells backward? Can we +unlearn the arts that pretend to civilize, and then burn the world? +There is a march of Science; but who shall beat the drums for its +retreat? Who shall persuade the boor that phosphor will not ignite? + +Seven goodly stacks of hay, with corn-barns proportionable, lie smoking +ashes and chaff, which man and beast would sputter out and reject like +those apples of Asphaltes and bitumen. The food for the inhabitants of +earth will quickly disappear. Hot rolls may say: "Fuimus panes, fuit +quartern-loaf, et ingens gloria Apple-pasty-orum." That the good old +munching system may last thy time and mine, good un-incendiary George, +is the devout prayer of thine, + +To the last crust, + +CH. LAMB. + + +[Incendiarism, the result of agricultural distress and in opposition to +the competition of the new machinery, was rife in the country at this +time.] + + + +LETTER 528 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? Christmas, 1830.] + +Dear M. A thousand thanks for your punctualities. What a cheap Book is +the last Hogarth you sent me! I am pleased now that Hunt _diddled_ me +out of the old one. Speaking of this, only think of the new farmer with +his 30 acres. There is a portion of land in Lambeth parish called Knaves +Acre. I wonder he overlook'd it. Don't show this to the firm of Dilk & +C'o. I next want one copy of Leicester School, and wish you to pay +Leishman, Taylor, 2 Blandford Place, Pall Mall, opposite the British +Institution, £6. 10. for coat waistcoat &c. And I vehemently thirst for +the 4th No. of Nichols's Hogarth, to bind 'em up (the 2 books) as +"Hogarth, and Supplement." But as you know the price, don't stay for its +appearance; but come as soon as ever you can with your bill of all +demands in full, and, as I have none but £5 notes, bring with you +sufficient change. Weather is beautiful. I grieve sadly for Miss +Wordsworth. We are all well again. Emma is with us, and we all shall be +glad of a sight of you. COME ON Sunday, if you _can_; better, if you +come before. Perhaps Rogers would smile at this.--A pert half chemist +half apothecary, in our town, who smatters of literature and is +immeasurable unletterd, said to me "Pray, Sir, may not Hood (he of the +acres) be reckon'd the Prince of wits in the present day?" to which I +assenting, he adds "I had always thought that Rogers had been reckon'd +the Prince of Wits, but I suppose that now Mr. Hood has the better title +to that appellation." To which I replied that Mr. R. had wit with much +better qualities, but did not aspire to the principality. He had taken +all the puns manufactured in John Bull for our friend, in sad and stupid +earnest. One more Album verses, please. + +Adieu. + +C.L. + + +["Hunt." This would, I think, be not Leigh Hunt but his nephew, Hunt of +Hunt & Clarke. The diddling I cannot explain. Leishman was the husband +of Mrs. Leishman, the Lambs' old landlady at Enfield. + +"Miss Wordsworth"--Dorothy Wordsworth, who was ill. + +"Perhaps Rogers would smile at this." I take the following passage from +the _Maclise Portrait Gallery:_-- + + In the early days of the _John Bull_ it was the fashion to lay every + foundling witticism at the door of Sam Rogers; and thus the refined + poet and man of letters became known as a sorry jester. + +_John Bull_ was Theodore Hook's paper. Maginn wrote in _Fraser's +Magazine:_-- + + Joe Miller vails his bonnet to Sam Rogers; in all the newspapers, + not only of the kingdom but its dependencies,--Hindostan, Canada, + the West Indies, the Cape, from the tropics,--nay, from the + Antipodes to the Orkneys, Sam is godfather-- general to all the bad + jokes in existence. The Yankees have caught the fancy, and from New + Orleans to New York it is the same,--Rogers is synonymous with a + pun. All British-born or descended people,--yea the very negro and + the Hindoo--father their calembourgs on Rogers. Quashee, or + Ramee-Samee, who knows nothing of Sir Isaac Newton, John Milton, or + _Fraser's Magazine_, grins from ear to ear at the name of the + illustrious banker, and with gratified voice exclaims, "Him dam + funny, dat Sam!"] + + + +LETTER 529 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. February 3, 1831.] + +Dear Moxon, The snows are ancle deep slush and mire, that 'tis hard to +get to the post office, and cruel to send the maid out. 'Tis a slough of +despair, or I should sooner have thankd you for your offer of the +_Life_, which we shall very much like to have, and will return duly. I +do not know when I shall be in town, but in a week or two at farthest, +when I will come as far as you if I can. We are moped to death with +confinement within doors. I send you a curiosity of G. Dyer's +tender-conscience. Between 30 and 40 years since, G. published the +Poet's Fate, in which were two very harmless lines about Mr. Rogers, but +Mr. R. not quite approving of them, they were left out in a subsequent +edition 1801. But G. has been worryting about them ever since; if I have +heard him once, I have heard him a hundred times express a remorse +proportiond to a consciousness of having been guilty of an atrocious +libel. As the devil would have it, a fool they call _Barker_, in his +Parriana has quoted the identical two lines as they stood in some +obscure edition anterior to 1801, and the withers of poor G. are again +wrung. His letter is a gem--with his poor blind eyes it has been +laboured out at six sittings. The history of the couplet is in page 3 of +this irregular production, in which every variety of shape and size that +Letters can be twisted into, is to be found. Do _shew_ his part of it to +Mr. R. some day. If he has bowels, they must melt at the contrition so +queerly character'd of a contrite sinner. G. was born I verily think +without original sin, but chuses to have a conscience, as every +Christian Gentleman should have. His dear old face is insusceptible of +the twist they call a sneer, yet he is apprehensive of being suspected +of that ugly appearance. When he makes a compliment, he thinks he has +given an affront. A name is personality. But shew (no hurry) this unique +recantation to Mr. R. 'Tis like a dirty pocket handkerchief muck'd with +tears of some indigent Magdalen. There is the impress of sincerity in +every pot-hook and hanger. And then the gilt frame to such a pauper +picture! It should go into the Museum. I am heartily sorry my Devil does +not answer. We must try it a little longer, and after all I think I must +insist on taking a portion of the loss upon myself. It is too much you +should lose by two adventures. You do not say how your general business +goes on, and I should very much like to talk over it with you here. Come +when the weather will possibly let you. I want to see the Wordsworths, +but I do not much like to be all night away. It is dull enough to be +here together, but it is duller to leave Mary; in short it is painful, +and in a flying visit I should hardly catch them. I have no beds for +them, if they came down, and but a sort of a house to receive them in, +yet I shall regret their departure unseen. I feel cramped and straiten'd +every way. Where are they? + +We have heard from Emma but once, and that a month ago, and are very +anxious for another letter. + +You say we have forgot your powers of being serviceable to us. _That_ we +never shall. I do not know what I should do without you when I want a +little commission. Now then. There are left at Miss Buffam's, the Tales +of the Castle, and certain vols. Retrospective Review. The first should +be conveyd to Novello's, and the Reviews should be taken to Talfourd's +office, ground floor, East side, Elm Court, Middle Temple, to whom I +should have written, but my spirits are wretched. It is quite an effort +to write this. So, with the _Life_, I have cut you out 3 Pieces of +service. What can I do for you here, but hope to see you very soon, and +think of you with most kindness. I fear tomorrow, between rains and +snows, it would be impossible to expect you, but do not let a +practicable Sunday pass. We are always at home! + +Mary joins in remembrances to your sister, whom we hope to see in any +fine-ish weather, when she'll venture. + +Remember us to Allsop, and all the dead people--to whom, and to London, +we seem dead. + + +["The _Life_." The Life which every one was then reading was Moore's +_Life of Byron_. + +"George Dyer's." The explanation is that years before, in his _Poems_, +1801, Dyer had written in a piece called "The Poet's Fate"-- + + And Rogers, if he shares the town's regard, + Was first a banker ere he rose a bard. + +In the second edition Dyer altered this to-- + + And Darwin, if he share the town's regard, + Was first a doctor ere he rose a bard. + +Lamb notes the alteration in his copy of the second edition, now in the +British Museum. In 1828-1829 appeared _Parriana_, by Edmund Henry +Barker, which quoted the couplet in its original form, to Dyer's +distress. + +_Tales of the Castle_. By the Countess de Genlis. Translated by Thomas +Holcroft] + + + +LETTER 530 + +CHARLES LAMB TO GEORGE DYER + +Feb. 22nd, 1831. + +Dear Dyer,--Mr. Rogers, and Mr. Rogers's friends, are perfectly assured, +that you never intended any harm by an innocent couplet, and that in the +revivification of it by blundering Barker you had no hand whatever. To +imagine that, at this time of day, Rogers broods over a fantastic +expression of more than thirty years' standing, would be to suppose him +indulging his "Pleasures of Memory" with a vengeance. You never penned a +line which for its own sake you need (dying) wish to blot. You mistake +your heart if you think you _can_ write a lampoon. Your whips are rods +of roses. Your spleen has ever had for its objects vices, not the +vicious-abstract offences, not the concrete sinner. But you are +sensitive, and wince as much at the consciousness of having committed a +compliment, as another man would at the perpetration of an affront. But +do not lug me into the same soreness of conscience with yourself. I +maintain, and will to the last hour, that I never writ of you but _con +amore_. That if any allusion was made to your near-sightedness, it was +not for the purpose of mocking an infirmity, but of connecting it with +scholar-like habits: for is it not erudite and scholarly to be somewhat +near of sight, before age naturally brings on the malady? You could not +then plead the _obrepens senectus_. Did I not moreover make it an +apology for a certain _absence_, which some of your friends may have +experienced, when you have not on a sudden made recognition of them in a +casual street-meeting, and did I not strengthen your excuse for this +slowness of recognition, by further accounting morally for the present +engagement of your mind in worthy objects? Did I not, in your person, +make the handsomest apology for absent-of-mind people that was ever +made? If these things be not so, I never knew what I wrote or meant by +my writing, and have been penning libels all my life without being aware +of it. Does it follow that I should have exprest myself exactly in the +same way of those dear old eyes of yours _now_--now that Father Time has +conspired with a hard task-master to put a last extinguisher upon them? +I should as soon have insulted the Answerer of Salmasius, when he awoke +up from his ended task, and saw no more with mortal vision. But you are +many films removed yet from Milton's calamity. You write perfectly +intelligibly. Marry, the letters are not all of the same size or +tallness; but that only shows your proficiency in the _hands_--text, +german-hand, court-hand, sometimes law-hand, and affords variety. You +pen better than you did a twelvemonth ago; and if you continue to +improve, you bid fair to win the golden pen which is the prize at your +young gentlemen's academy. But you must beware of Valpy, and his +printing-house, that hazy cave of Trophonius, out of which it was a +mercy that you escaped with a glimmer. Beware of MSS. and Variae +Lectiones. Settle the text for once in your mind, and stick to it. You +have some years' good sight in you yet, if you do not tamper with it. It +is not for you (for _us_ I should say) to go poring into Greek +contractions, and star-gazing upon slim Hebrew points. We have yet the +sight + + Of sun, and moon, and star, throughout the year, + And man and woman. + +You have vision enough to discern Mrs. Dyer from the other comely +gentlewoman who lives up at staircase No. 5; or, if you should make a +blunder in the twilight, Mrs. Dyer has too much good sense to be jealous +for a mere effect of imperfect optics. But don't try to write the Lord's +Prayer, Creed, and Ten Commandments, in the compass of a halfpenny; nor +run after a midge or a mote to catch it; and leave off hunting for +needles in bushels of hay, for all these things strain the eyes. The +snow is six feet deep in some parts here. I must put on jack-boots to +get at the post-office with this. It is not good for weak eyes to pore +upon snow too much. It lies in drifts. I wonder what its drift is; only +that it makes good pancakes, remind Mrs. Dyer. It turns a pretty green +world into a white one. It glares too much for an innocent colour, +methinks. I wonder why you think I dislike gilt edges. They set off a +letter marvellously. Yours, for instance, looks for all the world like a +tablet of curious _hieroglyphics_ in a gold frame. But don't go and lay +this to your eyes. You always wrote hieroglyphically, yet not to come up +to the mystical notations and conjuring characters of Dr. Parr. You +never wrote what I call a schoolmaster's hand, like Clarke; nor a +woman's hand, like Southey; nor a missal hand, like Porson; nor an +all-of-the-wrong-side-sloping hand, like Miss Hayes; nor a dogmatic, +Mede-and-Persian, peremptory hand, like Rickman; but you ever wrote what +I call a Grecian's hand; what the Grecians write (or used) at Christ's +Hospital; such as Whalley would have admired, and Boyer have applauded, +but Smith or Atwood (writing-masters) would have horsed you for. Your +boy-of-genius hand and your mercantile hand are various. By your +flourishes, I should think you never learned to make eagles or +corkscrews, or flourish the governors' names in the writing-school; and +by the tenor and cut of your letters I suspect you were never in it at +all. By the length of this scrawl you will think I have a design upon +your optics; but I have writ as large as I could out of respect to +them--too large, indeed, for beauty. Mine is a sort of deputy Grecian's +hand; a little better, and more of a worldly hand, than a Grecian's, but +still remote from the mercantile. I don't know how it is, but I keep my +rank in fancy still since school-days. I can never forget I was a deputy +Grecian! And writing to you, or to Coleridge, besides affection, I feel +a reverential deference as to Grecians still. I keep my soaring way +above the Great Erasmians, yet far beneath the other. Alas! what am I +now? what is a Leadenhall clerk or India pensioner to a deputy Grecian? +How art thou fallen, O Lucifer! Just room for our loves to Mrs. D., &c. + +C. LAMB. + + +["I never writ of you but _con amore_." Lamb refers particularly to the +_Elia_ essay "Oxford in the Vacation" in the _London Magazine_, where +G.D.'s absence of mind and simplicity of character were dwelt upon more +intimately than Dyer liked (see Vol. II.). + +Dyer was gradually going blind. + +"The Answerer of Salmasius"--Milton. + +"Comely" Mrs. Dyer. But in the letter to Mrs. Shelley, Mrs. D. had been +"plain"! + +Dyer had been a Grecian before Lamb was born. Clarke would be Charles +Cowden Clarke, with whose father Dyer had been an usher. Miss Hayes we +have met. The Rev. Peter Whalley was Upper Grammar Master in Dyer's day; +Boyer, Lamb and Coleridge's master, succeeded him in 1776. Smith was +Writing Master at the end of the seventeenth century. + +Lamb had never become a Grecian, having an impediment in his speech +which made it impossible that he should take orders, the natural fate of +Grecians, with profit. Great Erasmus and Little Erasmus are still the +names of classes in the Blue-Coat School. Grecians were the Little +Erasmians. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to P.G. Patmore, dated April 10, +1831, in which Lamb says of the publisher of the _New Monthly Magazine_: +"Nature never wrote Knave upon a face more legible than upon that +fellow's--'Coal-burn him in Beelzebub's deepest pit.' I can promise +little help if you mean literary, when I reflect that for 5 years I have +been feeling the necessity of scribbling but have never found the +power.... _Moxon_ is my go between, call on _him_, 63 New Bond St., he +is a very good fellow and the bookseller is not yet burn'd into him." +Patmore was seeking a publisher for, I imagine, his _Chatsworth_. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb, dated April 13, 1831, which Canon +Ainger considers was written to Gary and Mr. Hazlitt to Coleridge. It +states that Lamb is daily expecting Wordsworth.] + + + +LETTER 531 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +April 30, 1831. + +Vir Bone!--Recepi literas tuas amicissimas, et in mentem venit +responsuro mihi, vel raro, vel nunquam, inter nos intercedisse Latinam +linguam, organum rescribendi, loquendive. Epistolae tuae, Plinianis +elegantiis (supra quod TREMULO deceat) refertae, tam a verbis Plinianis +adeo abhorrent, ut ne vocem quamquam (Romanam scilicet) habere videaris, +quam "ad canem," ut aiunt, "rejectare possis." Forsan desuetudo +Latinissandi ad vernaculam linguam usitandam, plusquam opus sit, coegit. +Per adagia quaedam nota, et in ore omnium pervulgata, ad Latinitatis +perditae recuperationem revocare te institui. + +Felis in abaco est, et aegrè videt. Omne quod splendet nequaquam aurum +putes. Imponas equo mendicum, equitabit idem ad diabolum. Fur commodè a +fure prenditur. O MARIA, MARIA, valdè CONTRARIA, quomodo crescit +hortulus tuus? Nunc majora canamus. Thomas, Thomas, de Islington, uxorem +duxit die nupera Dominicâ. Reduxit domum posterâ. Succedenti baculum +emit. Postridiè ferit illam. Aegrescit ilia subsequenti. Proximâ (nempe +Veneris) est Mortua. Plurimum gestiit Thomas, quòd appropinquanti +Sabbato efferenda sit. + +Horner quidam Johannulus in angulo sedebat, artocreas quasdam +deglutiens. Inseruit pollices, pruna nana evellens, et magnâ voce +exclamavit "Dii boni, quàm bonus puer fio!" + +Diddle-diddle-dumkins! meus unicus filius Johannes cubitum ivit, +integris braccis, caligâ unâ tantum, indutus. Diddle-diddle, etc. DA +CAPO. + +Hie adsum saltans Joannula. Cum nemo adsit mihi, semper resto sola. + +Aenigma mihi hoc solvas, et Oedipus fies. + +Quâ ratione assimulandus sit equus TREMULO? + +Quippe cui tota communicatio sit per HAY et NEIGH, juxta consilium illud +Dominicum, "Fiat omnis communicatio vestra YEA et NAY." + +In his nugis caram diem consume, dum invigilo valetudini carioris +nostras Emmae, quae apud nos jamdudum aegrotat. Salvere vos jubet mecum +Maria mea, ipsa integrâ valetudine. + +ELIA. + +Ab agro Enfeldiense datum, Aprilis nescio quibus Calendis-- Davus sum, +non Calendarius. + +P.S.--Perdita in toto est Billa Reformatura. + + [Mr. Stephen Gwynn gives me the following translation:-- + + Good Sir, I have received your most kind letter, and it has entered + my mind as I began to reply, that the Latin tongue has seldom or + never been used between us as the instrument of converse or + correspondence. Your letters, filled with Plinian elegancies (more + than becomes a Quaker), are so alien to Pliny's language, that you + seem not to have a word (that is, a Roman word) to throw, as the + saying is, at a dog. Perchance the disuse of Latinising had + constrained you more than is right to the use of the vernacular. I + have determined to recall you to the recovery of your lost Latinity + by certain well-known adages common in all mouths. + + The cat's in the cupboard and she can't see. + All that glitters is not gold. + Set a beggar on horseback and he'll ride to the Devil. + Set a thief to catch a thief. + Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow? + Now let us sing of weightier matters. + + Tom, Tom, of Islington, wed a wife on Sunday. He brought her home on + Monday. Bought a stick on Tuesday. Beat her well on Wednesday. She + was sick on Thursday. Dead on Friday. Tom was glad on Saturday night + to bury his wife on Sunday. + + Little Jack Homer sat in a corner, eating his Christmas pie. He put + in his thumb and drew out a plum, and cried "Good Heavens, what a + good boy am I!" + + Diddle, diddle, dumkins! my son John Went to bed with his breeches + on; One shoe off and the other shoe on, Diddle, diddle, etc. (Da + Capo.) + + Here am I, jumping Joan. When no one's by, I'm all alone. + + Solve me this enigma, you shall be an Oedipus. + + Why is a horse like a Quaker? + + Because all his communication is by Hay and Neigh, after the Lord's + counsel, "Let all your communication be Yea and Nay." + + In these trifles I waste the precious day, while watching over the + health of our more precious Emma, who has been sick in our house + this long time. My Mary sends you greeting with me, she herself in + sound health. + + Given from the Enfield country seat, on I know not what Calends of + April--I am Davus not an Almanac.[l] + + P.S.--The Reform Bill is lost altogether. + +The Reform Bill was introduced on March 1, 1831, by Lord John Russell; +the second reading was carried on March 22 by a majority of 1. On its +commitment on April 19 there was a majority of 8 against the Government. +Four days later the Government was again defeated by 22 and Parliament +was dissolved. But later, of course, the Reform Bill was passed.] + + +[Footnote 1: Allusion to the phrase of Davus the servant in +Plautus--"Davus sum non Oedipus."] + + + +LETTER 532 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +[Dated at end:] Datum ab agro Enfeldiensi, Maii die sextâ, 1831. + +Assidens est mihi bona soror, Euripiden evolvens, donum vestrum, +carissime Cary, pro quo gratias agimus, lecturi atque iterum lecturi +idem. Pergratus est liber ambobus, nempe "Sacerdotis Commiserationis," +sacrum opus a te ipso Humanissimae Religionis Sacerdote dono datum. +Lachrymantes gavisuri sumus; est ubi dolor fiat voluptas; nee semper +dulce mihi est ridere; aliquando commutandum est he! he! he! cum heu! +heu! heu! + +A Musis Tragicis me non penitus abhorruisse lestis sit Carmen +Calamitosum, nescio quo autore linguâ prius vernaculi scriptum, et +nuperrimè a me ipso Latine versum, scilicet, "Tom Tom of Islington." +Tenuistine? + + "Thomas Thomas de Islington, + Uxorem duxit Die quâdam Solis, + Abduxit domum sequenti die, + Emit baculum subsequenti, + Vapulat ilia posterâ, + Aegrotat succedenti, Mortua fit crastina." + +Et miro gaudio afficitur Thomas luce posterâ quod subsequenti (nempe, +Dominicâ) uxor sit efferenda. + + "En Iliades Domesticas! + En circulum calamitatum! + Planè hebdomadalem tragoediam." + +I nunc et confer Euripiden vestrum his luctibus, hâc morte uxoriâ; +confer Alcesten! Hecuben! quasnon antiquas Heroinas Dolorosas. + +Suffundor genas lachrymis, tantas strages revolvens. Quid restat nisi +quod Tecum Tuam Caram salutamus ambosque valere jubeamus, nosmet ipsi +bene valentes. ELIA. + + +[Mr. Stephen Gwynn gives me the following translation:-- + + Sitting by me is my good sister, turning over Euripides, your gift, + dear Cary [a pun here, "carissime care"], for which we thank you, + and will read and re-read it. Most acceptable to both of us is this + book of "Pity's Priest," a sacred work of your bestowing, yourself a + priest of the most humane Religion. We shall take our pleasure + weeping; there are times when pain turns pleasure, and I would not + always be laughing: sometimes there should be a change--_heu heu!_ + for _he! he!_ + + That I have not shrunk from the Tragic Muses, witness this + Lamentable Ballad, first written in the vernacular by I know not + what author and lately by myself put into Latin T. T. of Islington. + Have you heard it? (_See translation of preceding letter_.) + + And Thomas is possessed with a wondrous joy on the following + morning, because on the next day, that is, Sunday, his wife must be + buried. + + Lo, your domestic Iliads! + Lo, the wheel of Calamities + The true tragedy of a week. + + Go to now, compare your Euripides with these sorrows, this death of + a wife! Compare Alcestis! Hecuba! or what not other sorrowing + Heroines of antiquity. + + My cheeks are tear-bedewed as I revolve such slaughter. What more to + say, but to salute you Cary and your Cara, and wish you health, + ourselves enjoying it. + +In _Mary and Charles Lamb_, 1874, by W.C. Hazlitt, in the Catalogue of +Charles Lamb's Library, for sale by Bartlett and Welford, New York, is +this item:--"_Euripidis Tragediae, interp. Lat_. 8vo. Oxonii, 1821". "C. +and M. Lamb, from H.F. Cary," on flyleaf. This must be the book +referred to. Euripides has been called the priest of pity.] + + + +LETTER 533 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. July 14, 1831.] + +Collier's Book would be right acceptable. And also a sixth vol. just +publish'd of Nichols's Illustrations of the Literary History of 18th +Century. I agree with you, and do yet _not disagree_ with W.W., as to +H. It rejoyced my heart to read his friendly spirited mention of your +publications. It might be a drawback to my pleasure, that he has tried +to decry my "Nicky," but on deliberate re- and reperusal of his censure +I cannot in the remotest degree understand what he means to say. He and +I used to dispute about Hell Eternities, I taking the affirmative. I +love to puzzle atheists, and--parsons. I fancy it runs in his head, +that I meant to rivet the idea of a personal devil. Then about the +glorious three days! there was never a year or day in my past life, +since I was pen-worthy, that I should not have written precisely as I +have. Logic and modesty are not among H.'s virtues. Talfourd flatters me +upon a poem which "nobody but I could have written," but which I have +neither seen nor heard of--"The Banquet," or "Banqueting Something," +that has appeared in The Tatler. Know you of it? How capitally the +Frenchman has analysed Satan! I was hinder'd, or I was about doing the +same thing in English, for him to put into French, as I prosified Hood's +midsummer fairies. The garden of _cabbage_ escap'd him, he turns it into +a garden of pot herbs. So local allusions perish in translation. About 8 +days before you told me of R.'s interview with the Premier, I, at the +desire of Badams, wrote a letter to him (Badams) in the most moving +terms setting forth the age, infirmities &c. of Coleridge. This letter +was convey'd to [by] B. to his friend Mr. Ellice of the Treasury, +Brother in Law to Lord Grey, who immediately pass'd it on [to] Lord +Grey, who assured him of immediate relief by a grant on the King's +Bounty, which news E. communicated to B. with a desire to confer with me +on the subject, on which I went up to THE Treasury (yesterday fortnight) +and was received by the Great Man with the utmost cordiality, (shook +hands with me coming and going) a fine hearty Gentleman, and, as seeming +willing to relieve any anxiety from me, promised me an answer thro' +Badams in 2 or 3 days at furthest. Meantime Gilman's extraordinary +insolent letter comes out in the Times! As to _my_ acquiescing in this +strange step, I told Mr. Ellice (who expressly said that the thing was +renewable three-yearly) that I consider'd such a grant as almost +equivalent to the lost pension, as from C.'s appearance and the +representations of the Gilmans, I scarce could think C.'s life worth 2 +years' purchase. I did not know that the Chancellor had been previously +applied to. Well, after seeing Ellice I wrote in the most urgent manner +to the Gilmans, insisting on an immediate letter of acknowledgment from +Coleridge, or them _in his name_ to Badams, who not knowing C. had come +forward so disinterestedly amidst his complicated illnesses and +embarrassments, to _use up_ an interest, which he may so well need, in +favor of a stranger; and from that day not a letter has B. or even +myself, received from Highgate, unless _that publish'd one in the Times +is meant as a general answer to all the friends who have stirr'd to do +C. service_! Poor C. is not to blame, for he is in leading strings.--I +particularly wish you would read this part of my note to Mr. Rogers. Now +for home matters--Our next 2 Sundays will be choked up with all the +Sugdens. The third will be free, when we hope you will show your sister +the way to Enfield and leave her with us for a few days. In the mean +while, could you not run down some week day (afternoon, say) and sleep +at the Horse Shoe? I want to have my 2d vol. Elias bound Specimen +fashion, and to consult you about 'em. Kenney has just assured me, that +he has just touch'd £100 from the theatre; you are a damn'd fool if you +don't exact your Tythe of him, and with that assurance I rest + +Your Brother fool C.L. + + +[Collier's book would be his _History of English Dramatic Poetry_, 1831. +Nichols's _Illustrations_ had been begun by John Nichols, and six +volumes were published between 1817 and 1831. It was completed in two +more volumes by his son, John Bowyer Nichols, in 1848 and 1858. + +"H."--Leigh Hunt. We do not know what W.W., presumably Wordsworth, had +to say of him; but this is how Hunt had referred to Moxon's publications +and Lamb's _Satan in Search of a Wife_ in _The Tatler_ for June 4, 1831, +the occasion being a review of "Selections from Wordsworth" for +schools:-- + + Mr. Moxon has begun his career as a bookseller in singularly high + taste. He has no connection but with the select of the earth. The + least thing he does, is to give us a dandy poem, suitable to Bond + street, and not without wit. We allude to the Byronian brochure, + entitled "_Mischief_." But this is a mere condescension to the + elegance of the street he lives in. Mr. Moxon commenced with some of + the primaeval delicacies of _Charles Lamb_. He then astonished us + with Mr. Rogers' poems on _Italy_.... Of some of these publications + we have already spoken,--Mr. Lamb's _Album Verses_ among them. And + why (the reader may ask) not have noticed his _Satan in Search of a + Wife_? Because, to say the truth, we did not think it worthy of him. + We rejoice in Mr. Lamb's accession to the good cause advocated by + Sterne and Burns, refreshed by the wholesome mirth of Mr. Moncrieff, + and finally carried (like a number of other astonished humanities, + who little thought of the matter, and are not all sensible of it + now) on the triumphant shoulders of the Glorious Three Days. But Mr. + Lamb, in the extreme sympathy of his delight, has taken for granted, + that everything that can be uttered on the subject will be held to + be worth uttering, purely for its own sake, and because it could not + well have been said twelve months ago. He merges himself, out of the + pure transport of his good will, into the joyous common-places of + others; just as if he had joined a great set of children in tossing + over some mighty bowl of snap-dragon, too scalding to bear; and + thought that nothing could be so good as to echo their "hurras!" + Furthermore, we fear that some of his old friends, on the wrong side + of the _House_, would think a little of his merriment profane: + though for our parts, if we are certain of anything in this world, + it is that nothing can be more Christian. + +"The Banquet." I cannot find this poem. It is, I think, not in _The +Tatler_. + +"How capitally the Frenchman ..." I cannot find any French paraphrase of +_Satan in Search of a Wife_, nor has a search at the Bibliotheque +Nationale in Paris revealed one. + +"R.'s interview with the Premier." R. would be Rogers. Perhaps the best +explanation of this portion of Lamb's letter is the following passage +from Mr. Dykes Campbell's memoir of Coleridge:-- + +On June 26, 1830, died George IV., and with him died the pensions of the +Royal Associates. Apparently they did not find this out until the +following year. In the _Englishman's Magazine_ for June, 1831, attention +was directed to the fact that "intimation had been given to Mr. +Coleridge and his brother Associates that they must expect their +allowances 'very shortly' to cease"--the allowances having been a +personal bounty of the late King. On June 3, 1831, Gillman wrote a +letter to the _Times_, "in consequence of a paragraph which appeared in +the _Times_ of this day." He states that on the sudden suppression of +the honorarium, representations on Coleridge's behalf were made to Lord +Brougham, with the result that the Treasury (Lord Grey) offered a +private grant of £200, which Coleridge "had felt it his duty most +respectfully to decline." Stuart, however, wrote to King William's son, +the Earl of Munster, pointing out the hardship entailed on Coleridge, +"who is old and infirm, and without other means of subsistence." He begs +the Earl to lay the matter before his royal father. To this a reply +came, excusing the King on account of his "very reduced income," but +promising that the matter shall be laid before His Majesty. To these +letters, which are printed in _Letters from the Lake Poets_ (pages +319-322), the following note is appended: "The annuity ... was not +renewed, but a sum of £300 was ultimately handed over to Coleridge by +the Treasury." Even apart from this bounty, Coleridge was not a sufferer +by the withdrawal of the King's pension, for Frere made it up to him +annually. + +It is interesting to know that Lamb played so useful and characteristic +a part in this matter. + +"The Sugdens." I do not identify these friends. + +"2d vol. Elias." This would refer, I think, to the American volume, +published without authority, in 1828, under the title _Elia; or, Second +Series_, which Lamb told N.P. Willis he liked. It contained three pieces +not by Lamb; the rest made up from the _Works_ and the _London +Magazine_ (see Vol. II., notes).] + + + +LETTER 534 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +Pray forward the enclosed, or put it in the post. + +[No date. Early August, 1831.] + +Dear M.--The _R.A_. here memorised was George Dawe, whom I knew well and +heard many anecdotes of, from DANIELS and WESTALL, at H. Rogers's--_to +each of them_ it will be well to send a Mag. in my name. It will fly +like wild fire among the R. Academicians and artists. Could you get hold +of Proctor--his chambers are in Lincoln's Inn at Montagu's--or of Janus +Weathercock?--both of their _prose_ is capital. Don't encourage poetry. +The Peter's Net does not intend funny things only. All is fish. And +leave out the sickening Elia at the end. Then it may comprise letters +and characters addrest to Peter--but a signature forces it to be all +characteristic of the one man Elia, or the one man Peter, which cramped +me formerly. I have agreed _not_ for my sister to know the subjects I +chuse till the Mag. comes out; so beware of speaking of 'em, or writing +about 'em, save generally. Be particular about this warning. Can't you +drop in some afternoon, and take a bed? + +The _Athenaeum_ has been hoaxed with some exquisite poetry that was 2 or +3 months ago in Hone's Book. I like your 1st No. capitally. But is it +not small? Come and see us, week day if possible. C.L. + + +[Moxon had just acquired _The Englishman's Magazine_ and Lamb +contributed to the September number his "Recollections of a Late Royal +Academician," George Dawe (see Vol. I. of this edition), under the +general title "Peter's Net." Daniels may have been Thomas or William +Daniell, both landscape painters. Westall may have been Richard Westall, +the historical painter, or William Westall, the topographical painter. +H. Rogers was Henry Rogers, brother of the poet. + +"The _Athenaeum_ has been hoaxed." The exquisite poetry was FitzGerald's +"Meadows in Spring" (see next letter).] + + + +LETTER 535 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Aug. 5, 1831.] + +Send, or bring me, Hone's No. for August. + +Hunt is a fool, and his critics----The anecdotes of E. and of G.D. are +substantially true. What does Elia (or Peter) care for dates? + +That _is_ the poem I mean. I do not know who wrote it, but is in Hone's +book as far back as April. + +Tis a poem I envy--_that_ & Montgomery's Last Man (nothing else of his). +I envy the writers, because I feel I could have done something like it. +S---- is a coxcomb. W---- is a ---- & a great Poet. L. + + +[Hone was now editing his _Year Book_. Under the date April 30 had +appeared Edward FitzGerald's poem, "The Meadows in Spring," with the +following introduction:-- + +These verses are in the old style; rather homely in expression; but I +honestly profess to stick more to the simplicity of the old poets than +the moderns, and to love the philosophical good humor of our old writers +more than the sickly melancholy of the Byronian wits. If my verses be +not good, they are good humored, and that is something. + +The editor of _The Athenaeum_, in reprinting the poem, suggested +delicately that it was by Lamb. There is no such poem by James +Montgomery as "The Last Man." Campbell wrote a "Last Man," and so did +Hood, but I agree with Canon Ainger that what Lamb meant was +Montgomery's "Common Lot." I give the two poems in the Appendix as +illustrations of what Lamb envied. + +"Hunt is a fool." In _The Tatler_ for August 1 Leigh Hunt had quoted +much of Lamb's essay on Elliston. I do not, however, find any adverse +criticism. + +"E. and G.D." Lamb had written in the August number of _The Englishman's +Magazine_ his "Reminiscences of Elliston." Lamb's article on George Dawe +did not appear till the September number, but perhaps Moxon already had +the copy.] + + + +LETTER 536 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Sept. 5, 1831.] + +Dear M., Your Letter's contents pleased me. I am only afraid of taxing +you, yet I want a stimulus, or I think I should drag sadly. I shall keep +the monies in trust till I see you fairly over the next 1 January. Then +I shall look upon 'em as earned. Colburn shall be written to. No part of +yours gave me more pleasure (no, not the £,10, tho' you may grin) than +that you will revisit old Enfield, which I hope will be always a +pleasant idea to you. + +Yours very faithfully + +C.L. + + +[The letter's contents was presumably payment for Lamb's contribution to +_The Englishman's Magazine_.] + + + +LETTER 537 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HAZLITT, JR. + +[P.M. Sept. 13, 1831.] + +Dear Wm--We have a sick house, Mrs. Westw'ds daughter in a fever, & +Grandaughter in the meazles, & it is better to see no company just now, +but in a week or two we shall be very glad to see you; come at a hazard +then, on a week day if you can, because Sundays are stuffd up with +friends on both parts of this great ill-mix'd family. Your second +letter, dated 3d Sept'r, came not till Sund'y & we staid at home in +even'g in expectation of seeing you. I have turned & twisted what you +ask'd me to do in my head, & am obliged to say I can not undertake +it--but as a composition for declining it, will you accept some verses +which I meditate to be addrest to you on your father, & prefixable to +your Life? Write me word that I may have 'em ready against I see you +some 10 days hence, when I calculate the House will be uninfected. Send +your mother's address. + +If you are likely to be again at Cheshunt before that time, on second +thoughts, drop in here, & consult-- + +Yours, + +C.L. + +Not a line is yet written--so say, if I shall do 'em. + + +[This is the only letter extant to the younger Hazlitt, who was then +nearly twenty. William Hazlitt, the essayist, had died September 18, +1830. Lamb was at his bedside. The memoir of him, by his son, was +prefixed to the _Literary Remains_ in 1836, but no verses by Lamb +accompanied it. When this letter was last sold at Sotheby's in June, +1902, a copy of verses was attached beginning-- + + There lives at Winterslow a man of such + Rare talents and deep learning ... + +in the handwriting of William Hazlitt. They bear more traces of being +Mary Lamb's work than her brother's.] + + + +LETTER 538 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. October 24, 1831.] + +To address an abdicated monarch is a nice point of breeding. To give him +his lost titles is to mock him; to withhold 'em is to wound him. But his +Minister who falls with him may be gracefully sympathetic. I do honestly +feel for your diminution of honors, and regret even the pleasing cares +which are part and parcel of greatness. Your magnanimous submission, and +the cheerful tone of your renunciation, in a Letter which, without +flattery, would have made an "ARTICLE," and which, rarely as I keep +letters, shall be preserved, comfort me a little. Will it please, or +plague you, to say that when your Parcel came I damned it, for my pen +was warming in my hand at a ludicrous description of a Landscape of an +R.A., which I calculated upon sending you to morrow, the last day you +gave me. Now any one calling in, or a letter coming, puts an end to my +writing for the day. Little did I think that the mandate had gone out, +so destructive to my occupation, so relieving to the apprehensions of +the whole body of R.A.'s. So you see I had not quitted the ship while a +plank was remaining. + +To drop metaphors, I am sure you have done wisely. The +very spirit of your epistle speaks that you have a weight off +your mind. I have one on mine. The cash in hand, which, +as * * * * * * less truly says, burns in my pocket. I feel queer +at returning it (who does not?). You feel awkward at re-taking +it (who ought not?) Is there no middle way of adjusting this +fine embarrassment? I think I have hit upon a medium to +skin the sore place over, if not quite to heal it. You hinted +that there might be something under £10 by and by accruing +to me _Devil's Money_. You are sanguine--say £7: 10s.--that +I entirely renounce and abjure all future interest in, I insist +upon it, and "by Him I will not name" I won't touch a penny +of it. That will split your Loss one half--and leave me conscientious +possessor of what I hold. Less than your assent to this, no proposal +will I accept of. + +The Rev. Mr.------, whose name you have left illegible (is it +_Sea-gull_?) never sent me any book on Christ's Hospit. by which I could +dream that I was indebted to him for a dedication. Did G.D. send his +penny tract to me to convert me to Unitarianism? Dear blundering soul! +why I am as old a one-Goddite as himself. Or did he think his cheap +publication would bring over the Methodists over the way here? However +I'll give it to the pew-opener (in whom I have a little interest,) to +hand over to the Clerk, whose wife she sometimes drinks tea with, for +him to lay before the Deacon, who exchanges the civility of the hat with +him, for him to transmit to the Minister, who shakes hand with him out +of Chapel, and he, in all odds, will ---- with it. + +I wish very much to see you. I leave it to you to come how you will. We +shall be very glad (we need not repeat) to see your sister, or sisters, +with you--but for you individually I will just hint that a dropping in +to Tea unlook'd for about 5, stopping bread-n-cheese and gin-and-water, +is worth a thousand Sundays. I am naturally miserable on a Sunday, but a +week day evening and Supper is like old times. Set out _now_, and give +no time to deliberation-- + +_P.S_.--The 2d vol. of Elia is delightful(-ly bound, I mean) and quite +cheap. Why, man, 'tis a Unique-- + +If I write much more I shall expand into an article, which I cannot +afford to let you have so cheap. + +By the by, to shew the perverseness of human will--while I thought I +_must_ furnish one of those accursed things monthly, it seemed a Labour +above Hercules's "Twelve" in a year, which were evidently Monthly +Contributions. Now I am emancipated, I feel as if I had a thousand +Essays swelling within me. False feelings both. + +I have lost Mr. Aitken's Town address--do you know it? Is he there? + +Your ex-Lampoonist, or Lamb-punnist--from Enfield, Oct. 24, or "last day +but one for receiving articles that can be inserted." + + +[Moxon, finding _The Englishman's Magazine_ unsuccessful, gave it up +suddenly after the October number, the third under his direction. His +letter to Lamb on the subject is not now forthcoming. The ludicrous +description of a landscape by an R.A. is, I imagine, that of the garden +of the Hesperides in the _Elia_ essay on the "Barrenness of the +Imaginative Faculty in the Production of Modern Art" (see Vol. II.). +Probably Turner's "Garden of the Hesperides" in the National Gallery. + +By "Devil's Money" Lamb means money due for _Satan in +Search of a Wife_. I do not identify * * * * * *. + +"The Rev. Mr. ----." I have not identified this gentleman. + +"G.D.... penny tract." I have not found Dyer's tract. + +"Mr. Aitken." John Aitken, editor of _Constable's Miscellany_, whom +Moxon would have known at Hurst & Co.'s.] + + + +LETTER 539 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Dec. 15, 1831.] + +Dear M. +S. I know, has an aversion, amounting almost to horror, of H. +He _would not_ lend his name. The other I might wring a guinea from, but +he is _very properly_ shy of his guineas. It would be improper in me to +apply to him, and impertinent to the other. I hope this will satisfy +you, but don't give my reason to H.'s friend, simply, say I decline it. + +I am very much obliged to you for thinking of Gary. Put me down seven +shillings (wasn't it?) in your books, and I set you down for more in my +good ones. One Copy will go down to immortality _now_, the more lasting +as the less its leaves are disturbed. This Letter will cost you 3d.--but +I did not like to be silent on the above +. + +Nothing with my name will sell, a blast is upon it. Do not think of such +a thing, unless ever you become rich enough to speculate. + +Being praised, and being bought, are different things to a Book. Fancy +books sell from fashion, not from the number of their real likers. Do +not come at so long intervals. Here we are sure to be. + + +[S. and H. I do not identify--perhaps Southey and Hunt. Hunt's need of +guineas was chronic. The reference to Gary is not very clear. Lamb seems +to suggest that he is giving Gary a copy of a book that Gary will not +read, but will preserve. + +"Nothing with my name." Moxon may perhaps have just suggested publishing +a second series of _Elia_.] + + + +LETTER 540 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOSEPH HUME'S DAUGHTERS + +[No date. 1832.] + +Many thanks for the wrap-rascal, but how delicate the insinuating in, +into the pocket, of that 3-1/2d., in paper too! Who was it? Amelia, +Caroline, Julia, Augusta, or "Scots who have"? + +As a set-off to the very handsome present, which I shall lay out in a +pot of ale certainly to _her_ health, I have paid sixpence for the mend +of two button-holes of the coat now return'd. She shall not have to say, +"I don't care a button for her." + +Adieu, très aimables! + + Buttons 6d. + Gift 3-1/2 + + Due from ---- 2-1/2 + +which pray accept ... from your foolish coatforgetting + +C.L. + + +[Joseph Hume we have met. Mr. Hazlitt writes: "Amelia Hume became Mrs. +Bennett, Julia Mrs. Todhunter. The latter personally informed me in 1888 +that her Aunt Augusta perfectly recollected all the circumstances [of +the present note]. The incident seems to have taken place at the +residence of Mr. Hume, in Percy Street, Bloomsbury, and it was Amelia +who found the three-pence-halfpenny in the coat which Lamb left behind +him, and who repaired the button-holes. The sister who is described as +'Scots wha ha'e' was Louisa Hume; it was a favourite song with her." +Mrs. Todhunter supplied the date, 1832.] + + + +LETTER 541 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[P.M. March 5, 1832.] + +D'r Sir, My friend Aders, a German merchant, German born, has opend to +the public at the Suffolk St. Gallery his glorious Collection of old +Dutch and German Pictures. Pray see them. You have only to name my name, +and have a ticket--if you have not received one already. You will +possibly notice 'em, and might lug in the inclosed, which I wrote for +Hone's Year Book, and has appear'd only there, when the Pictures were at +home in Euston Sq. The fault of this matchless set of pictures is, _the +admitting a few Italian pictures with 'em_, which I would turn out to +make the Collection unique and pure. Those old Albert Durers have not +had their fame. I have tried to illustrate 'em. If you print my verses, +a Copy, please, for me. + + +[The first letter to Charles Wentworth Dilke (1789-1864), a friend of +Keats, Hunt and Hood, editor of Dodsley and at this time editor of _The +Athenaeum_. Lamb's verses ran thus:-- + + TO C. ADERS, ESQ. + +_On his Collection of Paintings by the old German Masters_ + + Friendliest of men, Aders, I never come + Within the precincts of this sacred Room, + But I am struck with a religious fear, + Which says "Let no profane eye enter here." + With imagery from Heav'n the walls are clothed, + Making the things of Time seem vile and loathed. + Spare Saints, whose bodies seem sustain'd by Love + With Martyrs old in meek procession move. + Here kneels a weeping Magdalen, less bright + To human sense for her blurr'd cheeks; in sight + Of eyes, new-touch'd by Heaven, more winning fair + Than when her beauty was her only care. + A Hermit here strange mysteries doth unlock + In desart sole, his knees worn by the rock. + There Angel harps are sounding, while below + Palm-bearing Virgins in white order go. + Madonnas, varied with so chaste design. + While all are different, each seems genuine, + And hers the only Jesus: hard outline, + And rigid form, by Dürer's hand subdued + To matchless grace, and sacro-sanctitude; + Dürer, who makes thy slighted Germany + Vie with the praise of paint-proud Italy. + + Whoever enter'st here, no more presume + To name a Parlour, or a Drawing Room; + But, bending lowly to each, holy Story, + Make this thy Chapel, and thine Oratory.] + + + +LETTER 542 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +April 14th, 1832. + +My dear Coleridge,--Not an unkind thought has passed in my brain about +you. But I have been wofully neglectful of you, so that I do not deserve +to announce to you, that if I do not hear from you before then, I will +set out on Wednesday morning to take you by the hand. I would do it this +moment, but an unexpected visit might flurry you. I shall take silence +for acquiescence, and come. I am glad you could write so long a letter. +Old loves to, and hope of kind looks from, the Gilmans, when I come. + +Yours _semper idem_ C.L. + +If you ever thought an offence, much more wrote it, against me, it must +have been in the times of Noah; and the great waters swept it away. +Mary's most kind love, and maybe a wrong prophet of your bodings!--here +she is crying for mere love over your letter. I wring out less, but not +sincerer, showers. + +My direction is simply, Enfield. + + +[Mr. Dykes Campbell's comment upon this note is that it was written to +remove some mistaken sick-man's fancy.] + + + +LETTER 543 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES SHERIDAN KNOWLES + +[No date. ? April, 1832.] + +Dear Kn.--I will not see London again without seeing your pleasant Play. +In meanwhile, pray, send three or four orders to a Lady who can't afford +to pay: Miss James, No. 1 Grove Road, Lisson Grove, Paddington, a day or +two before--and come and see us some _Evening_ with my hitherto +uncorrupted and honest bookseller + +Moxon. C. LAMB. + + +[I have dated this April, 1832, because it may refer to Knowles' play +"The Hunchback," produced April 5, 1832. It might also possibly refer to +"The Wife" of a year later, but I think not.] + + + +LETTER 544 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[? Late April, 1832.] + + One day in my life + Do come. C.L. + +I have placed poor Mary at Edmonton-- + +I shall be very glad to see the Hunch Back and Straitback the 1st Even'g +they can come. I am very poorly indeed. I have been cruelly thrown out. +Come and don't let me drink too much. I drank more yesterday than I ever +did any one day in my life. + +C.L. + +Do come. + +Cannot your Sister come and take a half bed--or a whole one? Which, +alas, we have to spare. + + +[Mary Lamb would have been taken to Walden House, Edmonton, where mental +patients were received. A year later the Lambs moved there altogether. + +The Hunchback would be Knowles; the Straitback I do not recognise. + +John Forster (1812-1876), whom we now meet for the first time, one of +Lamb's last new friends, was the author, later, of _Lives of the +Statesmen of the Commonwealth_ and the Lives also of Goldsmith and of +Landor and Dickens, whose close friend he was. His _Life of Pym_, which +was in Vol. II. of the _Statesman_, did not appear until 1837, but I +assume that he had ridden the hobby for some years.] + + + +LETTER 545 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON (?) + +[P.M. June 1, 1832.] + + I am a little more than half alive-- + I was more than half dead-- + the Ladies are very agreeable-- + I flatter myself I am less than disagreeable-- + Convey this to Mr. Forster-- + Whom, with you, I shall just be able to see some 10 days + hence and believe me ever yours C.L. + + I take Forster's name to be John, + But you know whom I mean, + the Pym-praiser + not pimp-raiser. + + +[This letter possibly is not to Moxon at all, as the wrapper (on which +is the postmark) may belong to another letter.] + + + +LETTER 546 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +July 2, 1832. + +AT midsummer or soon after (I will let you know the previous day), I +will take a day with you in the purlieus of my old haunts. No offence +has been taken, any more than meant. My house is full at present, but +empty of its chief pride. She is dead to me for many months. But when I +see you, then I will say, Come and see me. With undiminished friendship +to you both, + +Your faithful but queer C.L. + +How you frighted me! Never write again, "Coleridge is dead," at the end +of a line, and tamely come in with "to his friends" at the beginning of +another. Love is quicker, and fear from love, than the transition ocular +from Line to Line. + + + +LETTER 547 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +[Dated at end: Aug., 1832.] + +My dear Wilson, I cannot let my old friend Mrs. Hazlitt (Sister in Law +to poor Wm. Hazlitt) leave Enfield, without endeavouring to introduce +her to you, and to Mrs. Wilson. Her daughter has a School in your +neighbourhood, and for her talents and by [for] her merits I can +_answer_. If it lies in your power to be useful to them in any way, the +obligation to your old office-fellow will be great. I have not forgotten +Mrs. Wilson's Album, and if you, or she, will be the means of procuring +but one pupil for Miss Hazlitt, I will rub up my poor poetic faculty to +the best. But you and she will one day, I hope, bring the Album with you +to Enfield-- Poor Mary is ill, or would send her love-- + +Yours very Truly + +C. LAMB. + +News.--Collet is dead, Du Puy is dead. I am _not_.--Hone! is turned +Believer in Irving and his unknown Tongues. + +In the name of dear Defoe which alone might be a Bond of Union between +us, Adieu! + + +[Mrs. Hazlitt was the wife of John Hazlitt, the miniature painter, who +died in 1837. I have been unable to trace her daughter's history. + +Collet I do not recognise. Probably an old fellow-clerk at the India +House, as was Du Puy. It is true that Hone was converted by Irving, and +became himself a preacher.] + + + +LETTER 548 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[No date. ? Early October, 1832.] + +For Lander's kindness I have just esteem. I shall tip him a Letter, when +you tell me how to address him. + +Give Emma's kindest regrets that I could not entice her good friend, +your Nephew, here. + +Her warmest love to the Bury Robinsons--our all three to + +H. Crab. C.L. + + +[Mr. Macdonald's transcript adds: "Accompanying copy of Lander's verses +to Emma Isola, and others, contributed to Miss Wordsworth's Album, and +poem written at Wast-water. C.L." + +The Bury Robinsons were Crabb Robinson's brother and other relatives, +whom Miss Isola had met when at Fornham.] + + + +LETTER 549 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR + +[No date. October, 1832.] + +Dear Sir, pray accept a little volume. 'Tis a legacy from Elia, you'll +see. Silver and Gold had he none, but such as he had, left he you. I do +not know how to thank you for attending to my request about the Album. I +thought you would never remember it. Are not you proud and thankful, +Emma? + +Yes, _very, both_-- EMMA ISOLA. + +Many things I had to say to you, which there was not time for. _One_ why +should I forget? 'tis for Rose Aylmer, which has a charm I cannot +explain. I lived upon it for weeks.-- + +Next I forgot to tell you I knew all your Welch annoyancers, the +measureless Beethams. I knew a quarter of a mile of them. 17 brothers +and 16 sisters, as they appear to me in memory. There was one of them +that used to fix his long legs on my fender, and tell a story of a +shark, every night, endless, immortal. How have I grudged the salt sea +ravener not having had his gorge of him! + +The shortest of the daughters measured 5 foot eleven without her shoes. +Well, some day we may confer about them. But they were tall. Surely I +have discover'd the longitude-- + +Sir, If you can spare a moment, I should be happy to hear from you--that +rogue Robinson detained your verses, till I call'd for them. Don't +entrust a bit of prose to the rogue, but believe me + +Your obliged C.L. + +My Sister sends her kind regards. + + +[Crabb Robinson took Landor to see Lamb on September 28, 1832. The +following passage in Forster's _Life of Landor_ describes the visit and +explains this letter:-- + +The hour he passed with Lamb was one of unalloyed enjoyment. A letter +from Crabb Robinson before he came over had filled him with affection +for that most lovable of men, who had not an infirmity to which his +sweetness of nature did not give something of kinship to a virtue. "I +have just seen Charles and Mary Lamb," Crabb Robinson had written (20th +October, 1831), "living in absolute solitude at Enfield. I find your +poems lying open before Lamb. Both tipsy and sober he is ever muttering +_Rose Aylmer_. But it is not those lines only that have a curious +fascination for him. He is always turning to _Gebir_ for things that +haunt him in the same way." Their first and last hour was now passed +together, and before they parted they were old friends. I visited Lamb +myself (with Barry Cornwall) the following month, and remember the +boyish delight with which he read to us the verses which Landor has +written in the album of Emma Isola. He had just received them through +Robinson, and had lost little time in making rich return by sending +Landor his Last Essays of Elia. + +These were Landor's verses:-- + + TO EMMA ISOLA + + Etrurian domes, Pelasgian walls, + Live fountains, with their nymphs around + Terraced and citron-scented halls, + Skies smiling upon sacred ground-- + + The giant Alps, averse to France, + Point with impatient pride to those, + Calling the Briton to advance, + Amid eternal rocks and snows-- + + I dare not bid him stay behind, + I dare not tell him where to see + The fairest form, the purest mind, + Ausonia! that e'er sprang from thee, + +and this is "Rose Aylmer";-- + + Ah what avails the sceptred race! + Ah what the form divine! + What every virtue, every grace! + Rose Aylmer, all were thine. + Rose Aylmer, whom these wakeful eyes + May weep, but never see, + A night of memories and of sighs + I consecrate to thee. + +Of the measureless Bethams Lamb wrote in similar terms, but more fully, +in an article in the _New Times_ in 1825, entitled "Many Friends" (see +Vol. I.). + +On April 9, 1834, Landor wrote to Lady Blessington:-- + +I do not think that you ever knew Charles Lamb, who is lately dead. +Robinson took me to see him. + + "Once, and once only, have I seen thy face, + Elia! once only has thy tripping tongue + Run o'er my heart, yet never has been left + Impression on it stronger or more sweet. + Cordial old man! what youth was in thy years, + What wisdom in thy levity, what soul + In every utterance of thy purest breast! + Of all that ever wore man's form,'tis thee + I first would spring to at the gate of Heaven." + +I say _tripping_ tongue, for Charles Lamb stammered and spoke hurriedly. +He did not think it worth while to put on a fine new coat to come down +and see me in, as poor Coleridge did, but met me as if I had been a +friend of twenty years' standing; indeed, he told me I had been so, and +shewed me some things I had written much longer ago, and had utterly +forgotten. The world will never see again two such delightful volumes as +"The Essays of Elia;" no man living is capable of writing the worst +twenty pages of them. The Continent has Zadig and Gil Bias, we have Elia +and Sir Roger de Coverly. + +Mrs. Fields, writing in the _Atlantic Monthly_ for April, 1866, on +Landor, says that Landor told her of his visit to Lamb and said that +Lamb read to him some poetry and asked his opinion of it. Landor said it +was very good, whereupon Lamb laughed and called Landor the vainest of +men, for it was his own. + +In a letter to Southey the lines differed, ending thus: + + Few are the spirits of the glorified + I'd spring to earlier at the gate of Heaven.] + + + +LETTER 550 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[Late 1832.] + +A poor mad usher (and schoolfellow of mine) has been pestering me +_through you_ with poetry and petitions. I have desired him to call upon +you for a half sovereign, which place to my account. + +I have buried Mrs. Reynolds at last, who has _virtually at least_ +bequeath'd me a legacy of £32 per Ann., to which add that my other +pensioner is safe housed in the workhouse, which gets me £10. + +Richer by both legacies £42 per Ann. + +For a loss of a loss is as good as a gain of a gain. + +But let this be _between ourselves_, specially keep it from A----- or I +shall speedily have candidates for the Pensions. + +Mary is laid up with a cold. + +Will you convey the inclosed by hand? + +When you come, if you ever do, bring me one _Devil's Visit_, I mean +_Southey's_; also the Hogarth which is complete, Noble's I think. Six +more letters to do. Bring my bill also. C.L. + +[I do not identify the usher. Mrs. Reynolds, Lamb's first +schoolmistress, we have met. The other pensioner I do not positively +identify; presumably it was Morgan, Coleridge's old friend, to whom Lamb +and Southey had each given ten pounds annually from 1819. + +A----- I cannot positively identify. Perhaps the philanthropic Allsop. + +Southey's "Devil's Visit" was a new edition of _The Devil's Walk_ +illustrated by Thomas Landseer. + +Noble's "Hogarth." Noble was the engraver.] + + + +LETTER 551 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Winter, 1832.] + +Thank you for the books. I am ashamed to take tythe thus of your press. +I am worse to a publisher than the two Universities and the Brit. Mus. +A[llan] C[unningham] I will forthwith read. B[arry] C[ornwall] (I can't +get out of the A, B, C) I have more than read. Taken altogether, 'tis +too Lovey; but what delicacies! I like most "King Death;" glorious 'bove +all, "The Lady with the Hundred Rings;" "The Owl;" "Epistle to What's +his Name" (here may be I'm partial); "Sit down, Sad Soul;" "The Pauper's +Jubilee" (but that's old, and yet 'tis never old); "The Falcon;" +"Felon's Wife;" damn "Madame Pasty" (but that is borrowed); + + Apple-pie is very good, + And so is apple-pasty; + But-- + O Lard! 'tis very nasty: + +but chiefly the dramatic fragments,--scarce three of which should have +escaped my Specimens, had an antique name been prefixed. They exceed his +first. So much for the nonsense of poetry; now to the serious business +of life. Up a court (Blandford Court) in Pall Mall (exactly at the back +of Marlbro' House), with iron gate in front, and containing two houses, +at No. 2 did lately live Leishman my taylor. He is moved somewhere in +the neighbourhood, devil knows where. Pray find him out, and give him +the opposite. I am so much better, tho' my hand shakes in writing it, +that, after next Sunday, I can well see F[orster] and you. Can you throw +B.C. in? Why tarry the wheels of my Hogarth? + +CHARLES LAMB. + + +["I am worse to a publisher." There is a rule by which a publisher must +present copies of every book to the Stationers' Hall, to be distributed +to the British Museum, the Bodleian, and Cambridge University Library. + +"A.C.... B.C." Allan Cunningham's _Maid of Elvar_ and Barry Cornwall's +_English Songs_, both published by Moxon. This is Barry Cornwall's "King +Death":-- + + KING DEATH + + King Death was a rare old fellow! + He sate where no sun could shine; + And he lifted his hand so yellow, + And poured out his coal-black wine. + _Hurrah! for the coal-black Wine!_ + + There came to him many a Maiden, + Whose eyes had forgot to shine; + And Widows, with grief o'erladen, + For a draught of his sleepy wine. + _Hurrah! for the coal-black Wine!_ + + The Scholar left all his learning; + The Poet his fancied woes; + And the Beauty her bloom returning, + Like life to the fading rose. + _Hurrah! for the coal-black Wine!_ + + All came to the royal old fellow, + Who laugh'd till his eyes dropped brine, + As he gave them his hand so yellow, + And pledged them in Death's black wine. + _Hurrah!--Hurrah!_ + _Hurrah! for the coal-black Wine!_ + +By the "Epistle to What's his Name" Lamb refers to some lines to himself +which had been printed first in the _London Magazine_ in 1825, entitled +"The Epistle to Charles Lamb." See in the Appendix. + +"Madame Pasty." Procter had some lines on Madame Pasta. + +"My Specimens." Lamb's _Dramatic Specimens_, which very likely suggested +to Procter the idea of "Dramatic Fragments." + +Under the date November 30, 1832, an unsigned letter endorsed "From +Charles Lamb to Professor Wilson" is printed in Mrs. Gordon's +_"Christopher North:" A Memoir of John Wilson_. Although in its first +paragraph it might be Lamb's, there is evidence to the contrary in the +remainder, and I have no doubt that the endorsement was a mistake. It is +therefore not printed here.] + + + +LETTER 552 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[Dated by Forster at end: Dec., 1832.] + +This is my notion. Wait till you are able to throw away a round sum (say +£1500) upon a speculation, and then --don't do it. For all your loving +encouragem'ts--till this final damp came in the shape of your letter, +thanks--for Books also--greet the Fosters and Proctors--and come singly +or conjunctively as soon as you can. Johnson and Fare's sheets have been +wash'd--unless you prefer Danby's _last_ bed--at the Horseshoe. + + +[I assume Lamb's advice to refer to Moxon's intention of founding a +paper called _The Reflector_, which Forster was to edit. All trace of +this periodical has vanished, but it existed in December, 1832, for +three numbers, and was then withdrawn. Lamb contributed to it. + +Johnson and Fare had just murdered--on December l9--a Mr. Danby, at +Enfield. They had met him in the Crown and Horseshoes (see note to next +Letter). + +Mr. W.C. Hazlitt prints a note to Moxon in his Bohn edition in which +Lamb advises the withdrawal of _The Reflector_ at once. This would be +December, 1832.] + + + +LETTER 553 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +To Messrs. Bradbury & Evans, 14 Bouverie Street, Fleet Street. For the +Editor of the Reflector from C. Lamb. + +[P.M. Dec. 23, 1832.] + +I am very sorry the poor Reflector is abortive. Twas a child of good +promise for its _weeks_. But if the chances are so much against it, +withdraw immediately. It is idle up hill waste of money to spend another +stamp on it. + + +[Around the seal of this note are the words in Lamb's hand: "Obiit +Edwardus Reflector Armiger, 31 Dec., 1832. Natus tres hebdomidas. Pax +animae ejus." + +The newspaper stamp at that time was fourpence (less 25 per cent.). + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Louisa Badams (_née_ Holcroft), +dated December 31, 1832, not available for this edition, in which, after +some plain speaking about the Westwoods, Lamb refers to the murder of +Mr. Danby at Enfield by Fare and two other men on the night of December +19, and says that he had been in their company at the inn a little +before, and the next morning was asked to give his evidence. Canon +Ainger says that Lamb's story is a hoax, but it reads reasonably enough +and might as easily have happened as not.] + + + +LETTER 554 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Jan., 1833.] + +I have a proof from Dilke. _That_ serves for next Saturday. What Forster +had, will serve a second. I sent you a _third_ concluding article for +_him_ and _us_ (a capital hit, I think, about Cervantes) of which I +leave you to judge whether we shall not want it to print _before_ a +third or even second week. In that case beg D. to clap them in all at +once; and keep the Atheneums to print from. What I send is the +concluding Article of the painters. + +Soften down the Title in the Book to + +"Defect of the Imaginative Faculty in Artists." + +Consult Dilke. + + +[Lamb's _Elia_ essay "Barrenness of the Imaginative Faculty in the +Production of Modern Art," intended originally for _The Englishman's +Magazine_, was partly printed by Forster in _The Reflector_ and finally +printed in full in _The Athenaeum_ in January and February, 1833. The +reference to Don Quixote is at the end. Moxon was already printing the +_Last Essays of Elia_. + +"Consult Dilke" was a favourite phrase with Lamb and Hood and, long +before, with Keats.] + + + +LETTER 555 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Jan. 3(1833).] + +Be sure and let me have the Atheneum--or, if they don't appear, the Copy +back again. I have no other. + +I am glad you are introduced to Rickman, _cultivate the introduction_. I +will not forget to write to him. + +I want to see Blackwood, but _not without you_. + +We are yet Emma-less. + +And so that is all I can remember. + +This is a corkscrew. + +[_Here is a florid corkscrew._] + + C. Lamb, born 1775 + flourished about + the year 1832. + + C.L. Fecit.-- + + +[Lamb refers still to the "Barrenness of Imagination" series. + +There are several scraps addressed by Lamb to Forster in the South +Kensington Museum; but they are undated and of little importance. I +append one or two here:--] + + + +LETTER 556 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date.] + +Orders. + +Go to Dilke's, or Let Mockson, and ax him to add this to what I sent him +a few days since, or to continue it the week after. The Plantas &c. are +capital. + +Requests. + +Come down with M. and _Dante_ and L.E.L. on Sunday. + +ELIA. + +I don't mean at his House, but the Atheneum office. Send it there. Hand +shakes. + + +[The Plantas would probably be a reference to the family of Joseph +Plantas of the British Museum. M. and Dante and L.E.L. would be Moxon, +Cary and Letitia Landon, the poetess, to whom Forster was for a while +engaged. + +This letter, up to a certain point, was repeated as follows. It also is +at South Kensington:--] + + + +LETTER 557 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date.] + +I wish youd go to Dilke's, or let Mockson, and ax him to add this to +what I sent him a few days since, or to continue it the week after. The +Plantas &c. are capital. Come down with Procter and Dante on Sunday. I +send you the last proof--not of my friendship. I knew you would like the +title. I do thoroughly. The Last Essays of Elia keeps out any notion of +its being a second volume. + + + +LETTER 558 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date.] + +There was a talk of Richmond on Sunday but we were hampered with an +unavoidable engagement that day, besides that I wish to show it you when +the woods are in full leaf. Can you have a quiet evening here to night +or tomorrow night? We are certainly at home. + +Yours C. LAMB. + +Friday. + + + +LETTER 559 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Jan. 24, 1833.] + +Dear Murray! _Moxon_ I mean.--I am not to be making you pay postage +every day, but cannot let pass the congratulations of sister, brother, +and "Silk Cloak," _all most cordial_ on your change of place. Rogers +approving, who can demur? Tell me when you get into Dover St. and what +the _No_. is--that I may change foolscap for gilt, and plain Mr. for +Esqr. I shall _Mister_ you while you stay-- + +If you are not too great to attend to it, I wish us to do without the +Sonnets of Sydney: 12 will take up as many pages, and be too palpable a +fill up. Perhaps we may leave them out, retaining the article, but that +is not worth saving. I hope you liked my Cervantes Article which I sent +you yesterday. + +Not an inapt quotation, for your fallen predecessor in Albemarle Street, +to whom you must give the _coup du main_-- + + Murray, long enough his country's pride. + +_Pope._ + + +[_Then, written at the bottom of the page_] there's [_and written on the +next page_] there's nothing over here. + + +[Moxon was moving from 64 New Bond Street to 33 Dover Street. + +"Silk Cloak" would, I imagine, probably be a name for Emma Isola. + +"The Sonnets of Sydney"--Lamb's _Elia_ essay on this subject. It was not +omitted from the _Last Essay_, which Moxon was to publish, and eleven +sonnets were quoted. + +"Your fallen predecessor." It is hardly needful to say that Moxon made +very little difference to Murray's business. The line is from Pope's +Sixth Epistle of the First Book of Horace. To Mr. Murray, who afterwards +was Earl of Mansfield.] + + + +LETTER 560 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[Feb. 10. P.M. Feby. 11, 1833.] + +I wish you would omit "by the author of Elia," _now_, in advertising +that damn'd "Devil's Wedding." + +I had sneaking hopes you would have dropt in today--tis my poor +birthday. Don't stay away so. Give Forster a hint--you are to bring your +brother some day--_sisters_ in better weather. + +Pray give me one line to say if you receiv'd and forwarded Emma's +pacquet to Miss Adams, + +and how Dover St. looks. + +Adieu. + +Is there no Blackwood this month? + +[_Added on cover_:--] + +What separation will there be between the friend's preface, and THE +ESSAYS? Should not "Last Essays &c." head them? If 'tis too late, don't +mind. I don't care a farthing about it. + + +["What separation"--the _Last Essays of Elia_ were preceded by "A +Character of the Late Elia." + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Louisa Badams, dated February 15, +1833. Lamb begins with a further reference to the Enfield murder. He +says that his sister and himself have got through the _Inferno_ with the +help of Cary, and Mary is beginning Tasso.] + + + +LETTER 561 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Feb., 1833.] + +My dear M.--I send you the last proof--not of my friendship-- pray see +to the finish. + +I think you will see the necessity of adding those words after +"Preface"--and "Preface" should be in the "contents-table"-- + +I take for granted you approve the title. I do thoroughly-- Perhaps if +you advertise it in full, as it now stands, the title page might have +simply the Last Essays of Elia, to keep out any notion of its being a +second vol.-- + +Well, I wish us luck heartily for your sake who have smarted by me.-- + + + +LETTER 562 + +CHARLES LAMB TO T.N. TALFOURD + +February, 1833. + +My dear T.,--Now cannot I call him _Serjeant_; what is there in a coif? +Those canvas-sleeves protective from ink, when he was a law-chit--a +_Chitty_ling, (let the leathern apron be apocryphal) do more 'specially +plead to the Jury Court of old memory. The costume (will he agnize it?) +was as of a desk-fellow or Socius Plutei. Methought I spied a brother! + +That familiarity is extinct for ever. Curse me if I can call him Mr. +Serjeant--except, mark me, in _company_. Honour where honour is due; but +should he ever visit us, (do you think he ever will, Mary?) what a +distinction should I keep up between him and our less fortunate friend, +H.C.R.! Decent respect shall always be the Crabb's--but, somehow, short +of reverence. + +Well, of my old friends, I have lived to see two knighted: one made a +judge, another in a fair way to it. Why am I restive? why stands my sun +upon Gibeah? + +Variously, my dear Mrs. Talfourd, (I can be more familiar with her!) +_Mrs. Serjeant Talfourd_,--my sister prompts me--(these ladies stand +upon ceremonies)--has the congratulable news affected the members of our +small community. Mary comprehended it at once, and entered into it +heartily. Mrs. W---- was, as usual, perverse--wouldn't, or couldn't, +understand it. A Serjeant? She thought Mr. T. was in the law. Didn't +know that he ever 'listed. + +Emma alone truly sympathised. _She_ had a silk gown come home that very +day, and has precedence before her learned sisters accordingly. + +We are going to drink the health of Mr. and Mrs. Serjeant, with all the +young serjeantry--and that is all that I can see that I shall get by the +promotion. + +Valete, et mementote amici quondam vestri humillimi. + +C.L. + + +[Talfourd, who had been pupil of Joseph Chitty, had just become a +serjeant. + +"H.C.R."--Crabb Robinson. + +"My old friends." Stoddart and Tuthill were knighted; Barron Field was a +judge; Talfourd was to become both a knight and a judge. + +"Mrs. W----." Mrs. Westwood, I suppose.] + + + +LETTER 563 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. 1833.] + +D'r M. let us see you & your Brother on Sunday--The Elias are +beautifully got up. Be cautious how you name the _probability_ of +bringing 'em ever out complete--till these are gone off. Everybody'd say +"O I'll wait then." + +An't we to have a copy of the Sonnets-- + +Mind, I shall _insist_ upon having no more copies: only I shall take 3 +or 4 more of you at trade price. I am resolute about this. Yours ever-- + + + +LETTER 564 + +CHARLES LAMB TO C.W. DILKE + +[P.M. Feb., 1833.] + + CHRISTIAN NAMES OF WOMEN + + (TO EDITH S-----) + + In Christian world MARY the garland wears! + REBECCA sweetens on a Hebrew's ear; + Quakers for pure PRISCILLA are more clear; + And the light Gaul by amorous NINON swears. + Among the lesser lights how LUCY shines! + What air of fragrance ROSAMUND throws round! + How like a hymn doth sweet CECILIA sound! + Of MARTHAS, and of ABIGAILS, few lines + Have bragg'd in verse. Of coarsest household stuff + Should homely JOAN be fashioned. But can + You BARBARA resist, or MARIAN? + And is not CLARE for love excuse enough? + Yet, by my faith in numbers, I profess, + These all, than Saxon EDITH, please me less. + +Many thanks for the life you have given us--I am perfectly satisfied. +But if you advert to it again, I give you a delicate hint. Barbara S---- +shadows under that name Miss Kelly's early life, and I had the Anecdote +beautifully from her. + + +[The sonnet, addressed to Edith Southey, was printed in _The Athenaeum_ +for March 9, 1833. + +For "Barbara S----" see Vol. II. of the present edition.] + + + +LETTER 565 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Early 1833.] + +No _writing_, and no _word_, ever passed between Taylor, or Hessey, and +me, respecting copy right. This I can swear. They made a volume at their +own will, and volunteerd me a third of profits, which came to £30, which +came to _Bilk_, and never came back to me. Proctor has acted a friendly +part--when did he otherwise? I am very sorry to hear Mrs. P---- _as I +suppose_ is not so well. I meditated a rallying epistle to him on his +Gemini--his two Sosias, accusing him of having acted a notable piece of +duplicity. But if his partner in the double dealing suffers--it would be +unseasonable. You cannot rememb'r me to him too kindly. Your chearful +letter has relieved us from the dumps; all may be well. I rejoice at +your letting your house so magnificently. Talfourd's letter may be +directed to him "On the Western Circuit."* That is the way, send it. +With Blackwood pray send Piozziana and a Literary Gazette if you have +one. The Piozzi and that shall be immed'tly return'd, and I keep Mad. +Darblay for you eventually, a longwinded reader at present having use of +it. + +The weather is so queer that I will not say I _expect_ you &c.--but am +prepared for the pleasure of seeing you when you can come. + +We had given you up (the post man being late) and Emma and I have 20 +times this morning been to the door in the rain to spy for him coming. + +Well, I know it is not all settled, but your letter is chearful and +cheer-making. + +We join in triple love to you. + +ELIA & Co. + +I am settled _in any case_ to take at Bookseller's price any copies I +have more. Therefore oblige me by sending a copy of Elia to Coleridge +and B. Barton, and enquire (at your leisure of course) how I can send +one, with a letter, to Walter Savage Landor. These 3 put in your next +bill on me. I am peremptory that it shall be so. These are all I can +want. + +*Is it the Western? he goes to Reading &c. + + +[John Taylor, representing the firm of Taylor & Hessey, seems to have +set up a claim of copyright in those essays in the _Last Essays of Elia_ +that were printed in the _London Magazine_. For Procter's part, see next +letter. + +_Piozziana; or, Recollections of the late Mrs. Piozzi_ (Johnson's Mrs. +Thrale), was published in 1833. It was by the Rev. E. Mangin. + +Mad. Darblay would be _The Memoirs of Dr. Burney_, 1832, by his daughter +Madame d'Arblay (Admiral Burney's niece). The book was severely handled +in the _Quarterly_ for April, 1833. + +The following letter, which is undated, seems to refer to the difficulty +mentioned above:--] + + + +LETTER 566 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +Enfield, Monday. + +Dear P----, I have more than £30 in my house, and am independent of +quarter-day, not having received my pension. + +Pray settle, I beg of you, the matter with Mr. Taylor. I know nothing of +bills, but most gladly will I forward to you that sum for him, for Mary +is very anxious that M[oxon] may not get into any litigation. The money +is literally rotting in my desk for want of use. I should not interfere +with M----, tell M---- when you see him, but Mary is really uneasy; so +lay it to that account, not mine. + +Yours ever and two evers, + +C.L. + +Do it smack at once, and I will explain to M---- why I did it. It is +simply done to ease her mind. When you have settled, write, and I'll +send the bank notes to you twice, in halves. + +Deduct from it your share in broken bottles, which, you being capital in +your lists, I take to be two shillings. Do it as you love Mary and me. +Then Elia's himself again. + + + +LETTER 567 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[March 6, 1833.] + +Dear Friend--Thee hast sent a Christian epistle to me, and I should not +feel clear if I neglected to reply to it, which would have been sooner +if that vain young man, to whom thou didst intrust it, had not kept it +back. We should rejoice to see thy outward man here, especially on a day +which should not be a first day, being liable to worldly callers in on +that day. Our little book is delayed by a heathenish injunction, +threatened by the man Taylor. Canst thou copy and send, or bring with +thee, a vanity in verse which in my younger days I wrote on friend +Aders' pictures? Thou wilt find it in the book called the Table Book. + +Tryphena and Tryphosa, whom the world calleth Mary and Emma, greet you +with me. + +CH. LAMB. + +6th of 3d month 4th day. + + +[On this letter is written by Hone in pencil: "This acknowledges a note +from me to C.L. written in January preceding and sent by young Will +Hazlitt. Received in my paralysis. March, 1833." + +On this day Lamb gave Hone two books with the same inscription in +each--very tipsily written.] + + + +LETTER 568 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. March 19, 1833.] + +I shall _expect_ Forster and two Moxons on Sunday, and _hope_ for +Procter. + +I am obliged to be in town next Monday. Could we contrive to make a +party (paying or not is immaterial) for Miss Kelly's that night, and can +you shelter us after the play, I mean Emma and me? I fear, I cannot +persuade Mary to join us. + +N.B. _I can sleep at a public house._ + +Send an Elia (mind, I _insist_ on buying it) to T. Manning Esq. at Sir +G. Tuthill's Cavendish Square. + +DO WRITE. + + +[Miss Kelly was then giving an entertainment called "Dramatic +Recollections" at the Strand Theatre.] + + + +LETTER 569 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? Spring, 1833.] + +One o Clock. + +This instant receiv'd, this instant I answer your's--Dr. Cresswell has +one copy, which I cannot just now re-demand, because at his desire I +have sent a "Satan" to him, which when he ask'd for, I frankly told him, +was imputed a lampoon on HIM!!! I have sent it him, and cannot, till we +come to explanation, go to him or send-- + +But on the faith of a Gentleman, you shall have it back some day _for +another_. The 3 I send. I think 2 of the blunders perfectly immaterial. +But your feelings, and I fear _pocket_, is every thing. I have just time +to pack this off by the 2 o Clock stage. Yours till me meet + +At all events I behave more gentlemanlike than Emma did, in returning +the copies. + +Yours till we meet--DO COME. + +Bring the Sonnets-- + +Why not publish 'em?--or let another Bookseller? + + +[Dr. Cresswell was vicar of Edmonton. Having married the daughter of a +tailor--or so Mr. Fuller Russell states in his account of a conversation +with Lamb in _Notes and Queries_--he was in danger of being ribaldly +associated with Satan's matrimonial adventures in Lamb's ballad. I +cannot explain to what book Lamb refers: possibly to the _Last Essays of +Elia_, which Moxon, having found errors in, wished to withdraw, +substituting another. The point probably cannot be cleared up. The +sonnets would be Moxon's own, which he had printed privately (see a +later letter).] + + + +LETTER 570 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. March 30, 1833.] + +D'r M. Emma and we are _delighted_ with the Sonnets, and she with her +nice Walton. Mary is deep in the novel. Come as early as you can. I +stupidly overlookd your proposal to meet you in Green Lanes, for in some +strange way I _burnt my leg_, shin-quarter, at Forster's;* it is laid up +on a stool, and Asbury attends. You'll see us all as usual, about +Taylor, when you come. + +Yours ever + +C.L. + +*Or the night I came home, for I felt it not bad till yesterday. But I +scarce can hobble across the room. + +I have secured 4 places for night: in haste. + +Mary and E. do not dream of any thing we have discussed. + + +[I fancy that the last sentence refers to an offer for Miss Isola's hand +which Moxon had just made to Lamb.] + + + +LETTER 571 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Spring, 1833.] + +Dear M. many thanks for the Books; the _Faust_ I will acknowledge to the +Author. But most thanks for one immortal sentence, "If I do not _cheat_ +him, never _trust_ me again." I do not know whether to admire most, the +wit or justness of the sentiment. It has my cordial approbation. My +sense of meum and tuum applauds it. I maintain it, the eighth +commandment hath a secret special reservation, by which the reptile is +exempt from any protection from it; as a dog, or a nigger, he is not a +holder of property. Not a ninth of what he detains from the world is his +own. Keep your hands from picking and stealing is no ways referable to +his acquists. I doubt whether bearing false witness against thy neighbor +at all contemplated this possible scrub. Could Moses have seen the speck +in vision? An ex post facto law alone could relieve him, and we are +taught to expect no eleventh commandment. The out-law to the Mosaic +dispensation!--unworthy to have seen Moses' behind--to lay his +desecrating hands upon Elia! Has the irriverent ark-toucher been struck +blind I wonder--? The more I think of him, the less I think of him. His +meanness is invisible with aid of solar microscope, my moral eye smarts +at him. The less flea that bites little fleas! The great Beast! the +beggarly nit! + +More when we meet. + +Mind, you'll come, two of you--and couldn't you go off in the morning, +that we may have a daylong curse at him, if curses are not dis-hallowed +by descending so low? Amen. + +Maledicatur in extremis. + + +[Abraham Hayward's translation of Faust was published by Moxon in +February, 1833. Lamb's letter of thanks was said by the late Edmund +Yates to be a very odd one. I have not seen it. + +We may perhaps assume that Moxon's reply to Lamb's letter stating that +Taylor's claim had been paid contained the "immortal sentence." + +"Not a ninth." A tailor (Taylor) is only a ninth of a man. + +"The less flea." Remembering Swift's lines in "On Poetry, a Rhapsody":-- + + So, naturalists observe, a flea + Has smaller fleas that on him prey; + And these have smaller still to bite 'em, + And so proceed _ad infinitum_.] + + + +LETTER 572 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date. ? March, 1833.] + +Swallow your damn'd dinner and your brandy and water fast-- + +& come immediately + +I want to take Knowles in to Emma's only female friend for 5 minutes +only, and we are free for the even'g. + +I'll do a Prologue. + + +[The prologue was for Sheridan Knowles' play "The Wife." Lamb wrote both +prologue and epilogue (see Vol. IV.).] + + + +LETTER 573 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? April 10, 1833.] + +Dear M. The first Oak sonnet, and the Nightingale, may show their faces +in any Annual unblushing. Some of the others are very good. + +The Sabbath too much what you have written before. + +You are destined to shine in Sonnets, I tell you. + +Shall we look for you Sunday, we did in vain Good Friday [April 5]. + +[_A signature was added by Mrs. Moxon for Mr. Frederick Locker-Lampson, +evidently from another letter_:--] + +Your truest friend + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 574 + +CHARLES LAMB TO C.W. DILKE + +[No date. April, 1833.] + +D'r Sir, I read your note in a moment of great perturbation with my +Landlady and chuck'd it in the fire, as I should have done an epistle of +Paul, but as far as my Sister recalls the import of it, I reply. The +Sonnets (36 of them) have never been printed, much less published, till +the other day,* save that a few of 'em have come out in Annuals. Two +vols., of poetry of M.'s, have been publish'd, but they were not these. +The "Nightingale" has been in one of the those gewgaws, the Annuals; +whether the other I sent you has, or not, penitus ignoro. But for +heaven's sake do with 'em what you like. + +Yours + +C.L. + +*The proof sheets only were in my hand about a fortnight ago. + + +[Moxon's sonnets were reviewed, probably by Lamb, in _The Athenaeum_ for +April 13, 1833. The sonnet to the nightingale (see above) was quoted. +This review will be found in Vol. I. of the present edition.] + + + +LETTER 575 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON + +[P.M. April (16), 1833.] + +Dear Mrs. Ayrton, I do not know which to admire most, your kindness, or +your patience, in copying out that intolerable rabble of panegryc from +over the Atlantic. By the way, now your hand is in, I wish you would +copy out for me the l3th l7th and 24th of Barrow's sermons in folio, and +all of Tillotson's (folio also) except the first, which I have in +Manuscript, and which, you know, is Ayrton's favorite. Then--but I won't +trouble you any farther just now. Why does not A come and see me? Can't +he and Henry Crabbe concert it? 'Tis as easy as lying is to me. Mary's +kindest love to you both. + +ELIA. + + +[The letter is accompanied by a note in the writing of William Scrope +Ayrton, the son of William Ayrton, copied from Mrs. Ayrton's Diary:-- + +"March 17, 1833.--Copied a critique upon Elia's works from the Mirror of +America a sort of news paper."] + + + +LETTER 576 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. April 25, 1833.] + +My dear Moxon, We perfectly agree in your arrangement. _It has quite set +my sister's mind at rest._ She will come with you on Sunday, and return +at eve, and I will make comfortable arrangem'ts with the Buffams. We +desire to have you here dining unWestwooded, and I will try and get you +a bottle of choice port. I have transferr'd the stock I told you to +Emma. The plan of the Buffams steers admirably between two niceties. +Tell Emma we thoroughly approve it. As our damnd Times is a day after +the fair, I am setting off to Enfield Highway to see in a morning paper +(alas! the Publican's) how the play ran. Pray, bring 4 orders for Mr. +Asbury--undated. + +In haste (not for neglect) + +Yours ever + +C. LAMB. + +Thursday. + + +[Lamb evidently refers to Moxon's engagement to Miss Isola being now +settled. + +The play was Sheridan Knowles' "The Wife," produced on April 24. + +The Buffams were the landladies of the house in Southampton Buildings, +where Lamb lodged in town.] + + + +LETTER 577 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. April 27, 1833.] + +Dear M. Mary and I are very poorly. Asbury says tis nothing but +influenza. Mr. W. appears all but dying, he is delirious. Mrs. W. was +taken so last night, that Mary was obliged at midnight to knock up Mrs. +Waller to come and sit up with her. We have had a sick child, who +sleeping, or not sleeping, next me with a pasteboard partition between, +killed my sleep. The little bastard is gone. My bedfellows are Cough and +cramp, we sleep 3 in a bed. Domestic arrangem'ts (Blue Butcher and all) +devolve on Mary. Don't come yet to this house of pest and age. We +propose when E. and you agree on the time, to come up and meet her at +the Buffams', say a week hence, but do you make the appointm't. The +Lachlans send her their love. + +I do sadly want those 2 last Hogarths--and an't I to have the Play? + +Mind our spirits are good and we are happy in your happiness_es_. + +C.L. + +Our old and ever loves to dear Em. + + +["Mr. W." was Mr. Westwood.--I know nothing of the Lachlans.--The Play +would be "The Wife" probably.--Miss Isola was, I imagine, staying with +the Moxons.] + + + +LETTER 578 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THE REV. JAMES GILLMAN + +May 7, 1833. + +By a strange occurrence we have quitted Enfield for ever. Oh! the happy +eternity! Who is Vicar or Lecturer for that detestable place concerns us +not. But Asbury, surgeon and a good fellow, has offered to get you a +Mover and Seconder, and you may use my name freely to him. Except him +and Dr. Creswell, I have no respectable acquaintance in the dreary +village. At least my friends are all in the _public_ line, and it might +not suit to have it moved at a special vestry by John Gage at the Crown +and Horseshoe, licensed victualler, and seconded by Joseph Horner of the +Green Dragon, ditto, that the Rev. J.G. is a fit person to be Lecturer, +&c. + +My dear James, I wish you all success, but am too full of my own +emancipation almost to congratulate anyone else. With both our loves to +your father and mother and glorious S.T.C. + +Yours, + +C. LAMB. + + +[The Rev. James Gillman was the eldest son of Coleridge's physician and +friend. He was born in 1808 and ordained in 1831. He thought in 1833 of +standing as candidate for the vicarship of Enfield, but did not obtain +it. After acting as Under Master of Highgate Grammar School he became in +1836 Rector of Barfreystone, in Kent. In 1847 he became Vicar of Holy +Trinity, Lambeth. He died in 1877. + +Mary Lamb having become ill again had been moved to Edmonton, to a +private home for mental patients. Lamb followed her soon after, and +settled in the same house. It still stands (1912) almost exactly as in +the Lambs' day.] + + + +LETTER 579 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date. May, 1833.] + +D'r F. Can you oblige me by sending 4 Box orders undated for the Olympic +Theatre? I suppose Knowles can get 'em. It is for the Waldens, with whom +I live. The sooner, the better, that they may not miss the "Wife"--I +meet you at the Talfourds' Saturday week, and if they can't, perhaps you +can, give me a bed. + +Yours ratherish unwell + +C. LAMB. + +Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton. + +Or write immediately to say if you can't get em. + + +[Knowles' play "The Wife," produced at Covent Garden, was moved to the +Olympic on May 9.] + + + +LETTER 580 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[P.M. May 12, 1833.] + +Dear Boy, I send you the original Elias, complete. When I am a little +composed, I shall hope to see you and Proctor here; may be, may see you +first in London. + +C.L. + + +[In the Dyce and Forster collection, at South Kensington, are preserved +some of these MSS. + +Here should come a letter to Miss Rickman, dated May 23, 1833. "Perhaps, +as Miss Kelly is just now in notoriety, it may amuse you to know that +'Barbara S.' is _all_ of it true of _her_, being all communicated to +me +from her own mouth. The 'wedding' you of course found out to be Sally +Burney's."] + + + +LETTER 581 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +End of May nearly, [1833]. + +Dear Wordsworth, Your letter, save in what respects your dear Sister's +health, chear'd me in my new solitude. Mary is ill again. Her illnesses +encroach yearly. The last was three months, followed by two of +depression most dreadful. I look back upon her earlier attacks with +longing. Nice little durations of six weeks or so, followed by complete +restoration--shocking as they were to me then. In short, half her life +she is dead to me, and the other half is made anxious with fears and +lookings forward to the next shock. With such prospects, it seem'd to me +necessary that she should no longer live with me, and be fluttered with +continual removals, so I am come to live with her, at a Mr. Walden's and +his wife, who take in patients, and have arranged to lodge and board us +only. They have had the care of her before. I see little of her; alas! I +too often hear her. Sunt lachrymae rerum--and you and I must bear it-- + +To lay a little more load on it, a circumstance has happen'd, _cujus +pars magna fui_, and which at another crisis I should have more rejoiced +in. I am about to lose my old and only walk-companion, whose mirthful +spirits were the "youth of our house," Emma Isola. I have her here now +for a little while, but she is too nervous properly to be under such a +roof, so she will make short visits, be no more an inmate. With my +perfect approval, and more than concurrence, she is to be wedded to +Moxon at the end of Aug'st. So "perish the roses and the flowers"--how +is it? + +Now to the brighter side, I am emancipated from most _hated_ and +_detestable_ people, the Westwoods. I am with attentive people, and +younger--I am 3 or 4 miles nearer the Great City, Coaches half-price +less, and going always, of which I will avail myself. I have few friends +left there, one or two tho' most beloved. But London Streets and faces +cheer me inexpressibly, tho' of the latter not one known one were +remaining. + +Thank you for your cordial reception of Elia. Inter nos the Ariadne is +not a darling with me, several incongruous things are in it, but in the +composition it served me as illustrative + +I want you in the popular fallacies to like the "Home that is no home" +and "rising with the lark." + +I am feeble, but chearful in this my genial hot weather,--walk'd 16 +miles yesterd'y. I can't read much in Summer time. With very kindest +love to all and prayers for dear Dorothy, + +I remain + +most attachedly yours + +C. LAMB. + +at mr. walden's, church street, _edmonton_, middlesex. + +Moxon has introduced Emma to Rogers, and he smiles upon the project. I +have given E. my MILTON--will you pardon me?--in part of a _portion_. It +hangs famously in his Murray-like shop. + +[_On the wrapper is written_:--] + +D'r M[oxon], inclose this in a better-looking paper, and get it frank'd, +and good by'e till Sund'y. Come early-- + +C.L. + + +["The Ariadne." See the essay on "Barrenness of the Imaginative +Faculty," where Titian's "Bacchus and Ariadne" in the National Gallery +is highly praised (see Vol. II.). Wordsworth's favourite essays in this +volume were "The Wedding" and "Old China." + +"My Milton." Against the reference to the portrait of Milton, in the +postscript, some one, possibly Wordsworth, has pencilled a note, now +only partially legible. It runs thus: "It had been proposed by L. that +W.W. should be the Possessor of [? this picture] his friend and that +afterwards it was to be bequeathed to Christ's Coll. Cambridge." + +Lamb had given Wordsworth in 1820 a copy of _Paradise Regained_, 1671, +with this inscription: "C. Lamb to the best Knower of Milton, and +therefore the worthiest occupant of this pleasant Edition. June 2'd +1820."] + + + +LETTER 582 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +[Dated at end:] Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton, May 31, 1833. + +Dear Mrs. Hazlitt,--I will assuredly come, and find you out, when I am +better. I am driven from house and home by Mary's illness. I took a +sudden resolution to take my sister to Edmonton, where she was under +medical treatment last time, and have arranged to board and lodge with +the people. Thank God, I have repudiated Enfield. I have got out of +hell, despair of heaven, and must sit down contented in a half-way +purgatory. Thus ends this strange eventful history-- + +But I am nearer town, and will get up to you somehow before long-- + +I repent not of my resolution. + +'Tis late, and my hand unsteady, so good b'ye till we meet. + +Your old + +C.L. + + + +LETTER 583 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MARY BETHAM + +June 5, 1833. + +Dear Mary Betham,--I remember You all, and tears come out when I think +on the years that have separated us. That dear Anne should so long have +remembered us affects me. My dear Mary, my poor sister is not, nor will +be for two months perhaps capable of appreciating the _kind old long +memory_ of dear Anne. + +But not a penny will I take, and I can answer for my Mary when she +recovers, if the sum left can contribute in any way to the comfort of +Matilda. + +We will halve it, or we will take a bit of it, as a token, rather than +wrong her. So pray consider it as an amicable arrangement. I write in +great haste, or you won't get it before you go. + +_We do not want the money_; but if dear Matilda does not much want it, +why, we will take our thirds. God bless you. + +C. LAMB. + + +[Miss Betham's sister, Anne, who had just died, had left thirty pounds +to Mary Lamb. Mr. Ernest Betham allows me to take this note from _A +House of Letters_.] + + + +LETTER 584 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MATILDA BETHAM + +[June 5, 1833.] + +Dear Miss Betham,--I sit down, very poorly, to write to you, being come +to _Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton_, to be altogether with poor +Mary, who is very ill, as usual, only that her illnesses are now as many +months as they used to be weeks in duration--the reason your letter only +just found me. I am saddened with the havoc death has made in your +family. I do not know how to appreciate the kind regard of dear Anne; +Mary will understand it two months hence, I hope; but neither she nor I +would rob you, if the legacy will be of use to, or comfort to you. My +hand shakes so I can hardly write. On Saturday week I must come to town, +and will call on you in the morning before one o'clock. Till when I take +kindest leave. + +Your old Friend, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Here should come a note from Lamb to Mrs. Randal Norris, postmarked +July 10, 1833, which encloses a note from Joseph Jekyll, the Old +Bencher, thanking Lamb for a presentation copy of the _Last Essays of +Elia_ ("I hope not the last Essays of Elia") and asking him to accompany +Mrs. Norris and her daughters on a visit to him. Jekyll adds that "poor +George Dyer, blind, but as usual chearful and content, often gives ... +good accounts of you." + +Here should come notes to Allsop, declining an invitation to Highgate, +and to a Mr. Tuff, warning him to be quick to use some theatre tickets +which Lamb had sent him.] + + + +LETTER 585 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. July 14, 1833.] + +Dear M. the Hogarths are _delicate_. Perhaps it will amuse Emma to tell +her, that, a day or two since, Miss Norris (Betsy) call'd to me on the +road from London from a gig conveying her to Widford, and engaged me to +come down this afternoon. I think I shall stay only one night; she would +have been glad of E's accompaniment, but I would not disturb her, and +Mrs. N. is coming to town on Monday, so it would not have suited. Also, +C.V. Le Grice gave me a dinner at Johnny Gilpin's yesterday, where we +talk'd of what old friends were taken or left in the 30 years since we +had met. + +I shall hope to see her on Tuesd'y. + +To Bless you both + +C.L. + +Friday. + + +[Le Grice we have met. "Johnny Gilpin's" was The Bell at Edmonton. + +Here should come another note from Lamb to Mrs. Randal Norris, in which +Lamb says that he reached home safely and thanks her for three agreeable +days. Also he sends some little books, which were, I take it, copies of +Moxon's private reissue of _Poetry for Children_. + +Mr. W.C. Hazlitt records that a letter from Lamb to Miss Norris was in +existence in which the writer gave "minute and humorous instructions for +his own funeral, even specifying the number of nails which he desired to +be inserted in his coffin."] + + + +LETTER 586 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. July 24, 1833.] + +For god's sake, give Emma no more watches. _One_ has turn'd her head. +She is arrogant, and insulting. She said something very unpleasant to +our old Clock in the passage, as if he did not keep time, and yet he had +made her no appointment. She takes it out every instant to look at the +moment-hand. She lugs us out into the fields, because there the +bird-boys ask you "Pray, Sir, can you tell us what's a Clock," and she +answers them punctually. She loses all her time looking "what the time +is." I overheard her whispering, "Just so many hours, minutes &c. to +Tuesday--I think St. George's goes too slow"--This little present of +Time, why, 'tis Eternity to her-- + +What can make her so fond of a gingerbread watch? + +She has spoil'd some of the movements. Between ourselves, she has kissed +away "half past 12," which I suppose to be the canonical hour in Hanover +Sq. + +Well, if "love me, love my watch," answers, she will keep time to you-- + +It goes right by the Horse Guards-- + +[_On the next page_:--] + +Emma hast kist this yellow wafer--a hint. + +DEAREST M. + +Never mind opposite nonsense. She does not love you for the watch, but +the watch for you. + +I will be at the wedding, and keep the 30 July as long as my poor months +last me, as a festival gloriously. + +Your _ever + +ELIA._ + +We have not heard from Cambridge. I will write the moment we do. + +Edmonton, 24th July, 3.20 post mer. minutes 4 instants by Emma's watch. + + +[There used to be preserved at Rowfant (it is now in America) a letter +from Lamb to Moxon, postmarked July 28, 1833, mentioning Lamb's anxiety +about Martin Burney. It is unnecessary to print this.] + + + +LETTER 587 + +CHARLES AND MARY LAMB TO EDWARD AND EMMA MOXON + +[No date. ? July 31, 1833.] + +Dear Mr. and Mrs. Moxon-- + +Time very short. I wrote to Miss Fryer, and had the sweetest letter +about you, Emma, that ever friendship dictated. "I am full of good +wishes, I am crying with good wishes," she says; but you shall see it.-- + +Dear Moxon, I take your writing most kindly and shall most kindly your +writing from Paris-- + +I want to crowd another letter to Miss Fry[er] into the little time +after dinner before Post time. + +So with 20000 congratulations, + +Yours, + +C.L. + +I am calm, sober, happy. Turn over for the reason. + +I got home from Dover St., by Evens, _half as sober as a judge_. I am +turning over a new leaf, as I hope you will now. + +[_On the next leaf Mary Lamb wrote_:--] + +MY DEAR EMMA AND EDWARD MOXON, + +Accept my sincere congratulations, and imagine more good wishes than my +weak nerves will let me put into good set words. The dreary blank of +_unanswered questions_ which I ventured to ask in vain was cleared up on +the wedding-day by Mrs. W. taking a glass of wine, and, with a total +change of countenance, begged leave to drink Mr. and Mrs. Moxon's +health. It restored me, from that moment: as if by an electrical stroke: +to the entire possession of my senses--I never felt so calm and quiet +after a similar illness as I do now. I feel as if all tears were wiped +from my eyes, and all care from my heart. + +MARY LAMB. + +[_At the foot of this letter Charles Lamb added_:--] + +Wednesday. + +DEARS AGAIN + +Your letter interrupted a seventh game at Picquet which _we_ were +having, after walking to _Wright's_ and purchasing shoes. We pass our +time in cards, walks, and reading. We attack Tasso soon. + +C.L. + +Never was such a calm, or such a recovery. 'Tis her own words, +undictated. + + +[The marriage of Edward Moxon and Emma Isola was celebrated on July 30. +They afterwards went to Paris. + +"Mrs. W."--Mrs. Walden, I imagine. + +Here should come an amusing but brief account of the wedding sent by +Lamb to Louisa Badams on August 20 (printed by Canon Ainger). "I am not +fit for weddings or burials. Both incite a chuckle:" a sentiment which +Lamb more than once expresses. + +Here should come a note thanking Matilda Betham for some bridal verses +written for the wedding of Edward Moxon and Emma Isola. "In haste and +headake."] + + + +LETTER 588 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +Sept. 9th, 1833. + +Dear Sir,--Your packet I have only just received, owing, I suppose, to +the absence of Moxon, who is flaunting it about _à la Parisienne_ with +his new bride, our Emma, much to his satisfaction and not a little to +our dulness. We shall be quite well by the time you return from +Worcestershire and most most (observe the repetition) glad to see you +here or anywhere. + +I will take my time with Darley's act. I wish poets would write a little +plainer; he begins some of his words with a letter which is unknown to +the English typography. + +Yours, most truly, + +C. LAMB. + +P.S.--Pray let me know when you return. We are at Mr. Walden's, +Church-street, Edmonton; no longer at Enfield. You will be amused to +hear that my sister and I have, with the aid of Emma, scrambled through +the "Inferno" by the blessed furtherance of your polar-star translation. +I think we scarce left anything unmadeout. But our partner has left us, +and we have not yet resumed. Mary's chief pride in it was that she +should some day brag of it to you. Your Dante and Sandys' Ovid are the +only helpmates of translations. Neither of you shirk a word. + +Fairfax's Tasso is no translation at all. It's better in some places; +but it merely observes the number of stanzas; as for images, similes, +&c., he finds 'em himself, and never "troubles Peter for the matter." + +In haste, dear Gary, yours ever, + +C. LAMB. + +Has Moxon sent you "Elia," second volume? if not, he shall. Taylor and +we are at law about it. + + +["Darley's act." Not now identifiable, I think. + +"Taylor and we." The case had apparently not been settled by Procter. I +have not found any report of a law-suit.] + + + +LETTER 589 + +CHARLES AND MARY LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Sept. 26, 1833.] + +Thursday. + +We shall be most happy to see Emma, dear to every body. Mary's spirits +are much better, and she longs to see again our twelve years' friend. +You shall afternoon sip with me a bottle of superexcellent Port, after +deducting a dinner-glass for them. We rejoyce to have E. come, the +_first Visit_, without Miss ----, who, I trust, will yet behave well; +but she might perplex Mary with questions. Pindar sadly wants Preface +and notes. Pray, E., get to Snow Hill before 12, for we dine before 2. +We will make it 2. By mistake I gave you Miss Betham's letter, with the +exquisite verses, which pray return to me, or if it be an improved copy, +give me the other, and Albumize mine, keeping the signature. It is too +pretty a family portrait, for you not to cherish. + +Your loving friends + +C. LAMB. + +M. LAMB. + + +[Pindar was Cary's edition, which Moxon had just published. Miss +Betham's verses I am sorry not to be able to give; but the following +poem was addressed to Moxon by Lamb and printed in _The Athenaeum_ for +December 7, 1833:-- + + TO A FRIEND ON HIS MARRIAGE + + What makes a happy wedlock? What has fate + Not given to thee in thy well-chosen mate? + Good sense--good humour;--these are trivial things, + Dear M-----, that each trite encomiast sings. + But she hath these, and more. A mind exempt + From every low-bred passion, where contempt, + Nor envy, nor detraction, ever found + A harbour yet; an understanding sound; + Just views of right and wrong; perception full + Of the deformed, and of the beautiful, + In life and manners; wit above her sex, + Which, as a gem, her sprightly converse decks; + Exuberant fancies, prodigal of mirth, + To gladden woodland walk, or winter hearth; + A noble nature, conqueror in the strife + Of conflict with a hard discouraging life, + Strengthening the veins of virtue, past the power + Of those whose days have been one silken hour, + Spoil'd fortune's pamper'd offspring; a keen sense + Alike of benefit, and of offence, + With reconcilement quick, that instant springs + From the charged heart with nimble angel wings; + While grateful feelings, like a signet sign'd + By a strong hand, seem burnt into her mind. + If these, dear friend, a dowry can confer + Richer than land, thou hast them all in her; + And beauty, which some hold the chiefest boon, + Is in thy bargain for a make-weight thrown.] + + + +LETTER 590 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Oct. 17, 1833.] + +Dear M.--Get me Shirley (there's a dear fellow) and send it soon. We +sadly want books, and this will be readable again and again, and pay +itself. Tell Emma I grieve for the poor self-punishing self-baffling +Lady; with all our hearts we grieve for the pain and vexation she has +encounterd; but we do not swerve a pin's-thought from the propriety of +your measures. God comfort her, and there's an end of a painful +necessity. But I am glad she goes to see her. Let her keep up all the +kindness she can between them. In a week or two I hope Mary will be +stout enough to come among ye, but she is not now, and I have scruples +of coming alone, as she has no pleasant friend to sit with her in my +absence. We are lonely. I fear the visits must be mostly from you. By +the way omnibuses are 1's/3'd and coach _insides_ sunk to l/6--a hint. +Without disturbance to yourselves, or upsetting the economy of the dear +new mistress of a family, come and see us as often as ever you can. We +are so out of the world, that a letter from either of you now and then, +detailing any thing, Book or Town news, is as good as a newspaper. I +have desperate colds, cramps, megrims &c., but do not despond. My +fingers are numb'd, as you see by my writing. Tell E. I am _very good_ +also. But we are poor devils, that's the truth of it. I won't apply to +Dilke-- just now at least--I sincerely hope the pastoral air of Dover +St. will recruit poor Harriet. With best loves to all. + +Yours ever + +C.L. + +Ryle and Lowe dined here on Sunday; the manners of the latter, so +gentlemanly! have attracted the special admiration of our Landlady. She +guest R. to be nearly of my age. He always had an old head on young +shoulders. I fear I shall always have the opposite. Tell me any thing of +Foster [Forster] or any body. Write any thing you think will amuse me. I +do dearly hope in a week or two to surprise you with our appearance in +Dover St.... + + +[Shirley would be Dyce's edition of James Shirley, the dramatist, in six +volumes, 1833. + +Harriet was Harriet Isola. + +"Ryle and Lowe." Ryle we have met, but I do not identify Lowe. + +I have omitted some lines about family matters at the end of the +letter.] + + + +LETTER 591 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD AND EMMA MOXON + +Nov. 29th, 1833. + +Mary is of opinion with me, that two of these Sonnets are of a higher +grade than any poetry you have done yet. The one to Emma is so pretty! I +have only allowed myself to transpose a word in the third line. Sacred +shall it be for any intermeddling of mine. But we jointly beg that you +will make four lines in the room of the four last. Read "Darby and +Joan," in Mrs. Moxon's first album. There you'll see how beautiful in +age the looking back to youthful years in an old couple is. But it is a +violence to the feelings to anticipate that time in youth. I hope you +and Emma will have many a quarrel and many a make-up (and she is +beautiful in reconciliation!) before the dark days shall come, in which +ye shall say "there is small comfort in them." You have begun a sort of +character of Emma in them very sweetly; carry it on, if you can, through +the last lines. + +I love the sonnet to my heart, and you _shall_ finish it, and I'll be +damn'd if I furnish a line towards it. So much for that. The next best +is + + TO THE OCEAN + + "Ye gallant winds, if e'er your LUSTY CHEEKS + Blew longing lover to his mistress' side, + O, puff your loudest, spread the canvas wide," + +is spirited. The last line I altered, and have re-altered it as it +stood. It is closer. These two are your best. But take a good deal of +time in finishing the first. How proud should Emma be of her poets! + +Perhaps "O Ocean" (though I like it) is too much of the open vowels, +which Pope objects to. "Great Ocean!" is obvious. "To save sad thoughts" +I think is better (though not good) than for the mind to save herself. +But 'tis a noble Sonnet. "St. Cloud" I have no fault to find with. + +If I return the Sonnets, think it no disrespect; for I look for a +printed copy. You have done better than ever. And now for a reason I did +not notice 'em earlier. On Wednesday they came, and on Wednesday I was +a-gadding. Mary gave me a holiday, and I set off to Snow Hill. From Snow +Hill I deliberately was marching down, with noble Holborn before me, +framing in mental cogitation a map of the dear London in prospect, +thinking to traverse Wardour-street, &c., when diabolically I was +interrupted by + + Heigh-ho! + Little Barrow!-- + +Emma knows him,--and prevailed on to spend the day at his sister's, +where was an album, and (O march of intellect!) plenty of literary +conversation, and more acquaintance with the state of modern poetry than +I could keep up with. I was positively distanced. Knowles' play, which, +epilogued by me, lay on the PIANO, alone made me hold up my head. When I +came home I read your letter, and glimpsed at your beautiful sonnet, + +"Fair art them as the morning, my young bride," + +and dwelt upon it in a confused brain, but determined not to open them +till next day, being in a state not to be told of at Chatteris. Tell it +not in Gath, Emma, lest the daughters triumph! I am at the end of my +tether. I wish you could come on Tuesday with your fair bride. Why can't +you! Do. We are thankful to your sister for being of the party. Come, +and _bring_ a sonnet on Mary's birthday. Love to the whole Moxonry, and +tell E. I every day love her more, and miss her less. Tell her so from +her loving uncle, as she has let me call myself. I bought a fine +embossed card yesterday, and wrote for the Pawnbrokeress's album. She is +a Miss Brown, engaged to a Mr. White. One of the lines was (I forget the +rest--but she had them at twenty-four hours' notice; she is going out to +India with her husband):-- + + "May your fame +And fortune, Frances, WHITEN with your name!" + +Not bad as a pun. I _wil_ expect you before two on Tuesday. I am well +and happy, tell E. + + +[Moxon subsequently published his _Sonnets_, in two parts, one of which +was dedicated to his brother and one to Wordsworth. There are several to +his wife, so that it is difficult to identify that in which the last +lines were to be altered. Mrs. Moxon's first album was an extract book +in which Lamb had copied a number of old ballads and other poems. + +I quote one of Moxon's many sonnets to Emma Moxon:-- + + Fair art thou as the morning, my young Bride! + Her freshness is about thee; like a river + To the sea gliding with sweet murmur ever + Thou sportest; and, wherever thou dost glide, + Humanity a livelier aspect wears. + Fair art thou as the morning of that land + Where Tuscan breezes in his youth have fanned + Thy grandsire oft. Thou hast not many tears, + Save such as pity from the heart will wring, + And then there is a smile in thy distress! + Meeker thou art than lily of the spring, + Yet is thy nature full of nobleness! + And gentle ways, that soothe and raise me so, + That henceforth I no worldly sorrow know! + +"Heigh-ho! Little Barrow!" I cannot identify this acquaintance. + +"Knowles's play"--"The Wife." Prologued by Lamb too. + +"At Chatteris." I cannot say who were the teetotal, or abstinent, +Philistines. + +"Mary's birthday." Mary Lamb would be sixty-nine on December 3, 1833. + +Lamb's verses to Miss Brown seem to be no longer preserved. Mr. Hazlitt +prints a letter to a Miss Frances Brown, wherein Lamb offers the verses, +adding "I hope your sweetheart's name is WHITE. Else it would spoil all. +May be 'tis BLACK. Then we must alter it. And may your fortunes BLACKEN +with your name."] + + + +LETTER 592 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[No date. Middle Dec., 1833.] + +I hoped R. would like his Sonnet, but I fear'd S. that _fine old man_, +might not quite like the turn of it. This last was penn'd almost +literally extempore. + +YOUR LAUREAT. + +Is S.'s Christian name Thomas? if not, correct it. + + +["R."--Rogers; "S."--Stothard. See next letter.] + + + +LETTER 593 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SAMUEL ROGERS + +[No date. Probably Saturday, December 21, 1833.] + +My dear Sir,--Your book, by the unremitting punctuality of your +publisher, has reached me thus early. I have not opened it, nor will +till to-morrow, when I promise myself a thorough reading of it. "The +Pleasures of Memory" was the first school present I made to Mrs. Moxon, +it had those nice wood-cuts; and I believe she keeps it still. Believe +me, that all the kindness you have shown to the husband of that +excellent person seems done unto myself. I have tried my hand at a +sonnet in "The Times." But the turn I gave it, though I hoped it would +not displease you, I thought might not be equally agreeable to your +artist. I met that dear old man at poor Henry's--with you--and again at +Cary's--and it was sublime to see him sit deaf and enjoy all that was +going on in mirth with the company. He reposed upon the many graceful, +many fantastic images he had created; with them he dined and took wine. + +I have ventured at an antagonist copy of verses in "The Athenaeum" to +_him_, in which he is as everything and you as nothing. He is no lawyer +who cannot take two sides. But I am jealous of the combination of the +sister arts. Let them sparkle apart. What injury (short of the theatres) +did not Boydell's "Shakespeare Gallery" do me with Shakespeare?--to have +Opie's Shakespeare, Northcote's Shakespeare, light-headed Fuseli's +Shakespeare, heavy-headed Romney's Shakespeare, wooden-headed West's +Shakespeare (though he did the best in "Lear"), deaf-headed Reynolds's +Shakespeare, instead of my, and everybody's Shakespeare. To be tied down +to an authentic face of Juliet! To have Imogen's portrait! To confine +the illimitable! I like you and Stothard (you best), but "out upon this +half-faced fellowship." Sir, when I have read the book I may trouble +you, through Moxon, with some faint criticisms. It is not the +flatteringest compliment, in a letter to an author, to say you have not +read his book yet. But the devil of a reader he must be who prances +through it in five minutes, and no longer have I received the parcel. It +was a little tantalizing to me to receive a letter from Landor, _Gebir_ +Landor, from Florence, to say he was just sitting down to read my +"Elia," just received, but the letter was to go out before the reading. +There are calamities in authorship which only authors know. I am going +to call on Moxon on Monday, if the throng of carriages in Dover Street +on the morn of publication do not barricade me out. + +With many thanks, and most respectful remembrances to your sister, + +Yours, + +C. LAMB. + +Have you seen Coleridge's happy exemplification in English of the +Ovidian elegiac metre?-- + + In the Hexameter rises the fountain's silvery current, + In the Pentameter aye falling in melody down. + +My sister is papering up the book--careful soul! + + +[Moxon published a superb edition of Rogers' _Poems_ illustrated by +Turner and Stothard. Lamb had received an advance copy. The sonnet to +Rogers in _The Times_ was printed on December 13, 1833. It ran thus:-- + + TO SAMUEL ROGERS, ESQ., ON THE NEW EDITION OF + HIS "PLEASURES OF MEMORY" + + When thy gay book hath paid its proud devoirs, + Poetic friend, and fed with luxury + The eye of pampered aristocracy + In glittering drawing-rooms and gilt boudoirs, + O'erlaid with comments of pictorial art, + However rich and rare, yet nothing leaving + Of healthful action to the soul-conceiving + Of the true reader--yet a nobler part + Awaits thy work, already classic styled. + Cheap-clad, accessible, in homeliest show + The modest beauty through the land shall go + From year to year, and render life more mild; + Refinement to the poor man's hearth shall give, + And in the moral heart of England live. + +C. LAMB. + +Thomas Stothard, then in his seventy-ninth year, Lamb had met at Henry +Rogers', who had died at Christmas, 1832. The following was the copy of +verses printed in _The Athenaeum_, December 21, 1833 ("that most +romantic tale" was _Peter Wilkins_):-- + + TO T. STOTHARD, ESQ. + + _On his Illustrations of the Poems of Mr. Rogers_ + + Consummate Artist, whose undying name + With classic Rogers shall go down to fame, + Be this thy crowning work! In my young days + How often have I with a child's fond gaze + Pored on the pictured wonders thou hadst done: + Clarissa mournful, and prim Grandison! + All Fielding's, Smollett's heroes, rose to view; + I saw, and I believed the phantoms true. + But, above all, that most romantic tale + Did o'er my raw credulity prevail, + Where Glums and Gawries wear mysterious things, + That serve at once for jackets and for wings. + Age, that enfeebles other men's designs, + But heightens thine, and thy free draught refines. + In several ways distinct you make us feel-- + _Graceful_ as Raphael, as Watteau _genteel_. + Your lights and shades, as Titianesque, we praise; + And warmly wish you Titian's length of days. + +"Short of the theatres." The injury done by the theatres is of course +the subject of Lamb's _Reflector_ essay on Shakespeare's Tragedies (see +Vol. I.). + +"Boydell's 'Shakespeare Gallery'"--the series of 170 illustrations to +Shakespeare by leading artists of the day projected by Alderman Boydell +in 1786. + +"Coleridge's... exemplification." Lamb quoted incorrectly. The lines had +just appeared in _Friendship's Offering_ for 1834:-- + + In the hexameter rises the fountain's silvery column; + In the pentameter aye falling in melody back. + +Coleridge took the lines from Schiller. + +At Dr. Williams' Library is a note from Thos. Robinson to Crabb +Robinson, dated December 22, 1833, concerning Lamb's Christmas turkey, +which went first to Crabb Robinson at the Temple and was then sent on to +Lamb, presumably with the note in the hamper. Lamb adds at the foot of +the note:-- + +"The parcel coming thro' _you_, I open'd this note, but find no treason +in it. + +With thanks + +C. LAMB." + +I give here three other notes to Dilke, belonging probably to the early +days of 1834. The first refers to the proof of one of Lamb's +contributions to The Athenaeum.] + + + +LETTER 594 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[No date.] + +May I now claim of you the benefit of the loan of some books. Do not +fear sending too many. But do not if it be irksome to yourself,--such as +shall make you say, 'damn it, here's Lamb's box come again.' Dog's +leaves ensured! Any light stuff: no natural, history or useful learning, +such as Pyramids, Catacombs, Giraffes, Adventures in Southern Africa, +&c. &c. + +With our joint compliments, yours, + +C. LAMB. + +Church Street, Edmonton. + +Novels for the last two years, or further back-nonsense of any period. + + + +LETTER 595 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[No date. Spring, 1834.] + +Dear Sir, I return 44 volumes by Tate. If they are not all your own, and +some of mine have slipt in, I do not think you will lose much. Shall I +go on with the Table talk? I will, if you like it, when the Culinary +article has appear'd. + +_Robins_, the Carrier, from the _Swan_, Snow Hill, will bring any more +contributions, thankfully to be receiv'd--I pay backwards and forwards. + +C. LAMB. + + +["Table Talk by the late Elia" appeared in _The Athenaeum_ on January 4, +May 31, June 7 and July 19, 1834. The Culinary article is the paragraph +that now closes the "Table Talk" (see Vol. I.).] + + + +LETTER 596 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THE PRINTER OF THE _ATHENAEUM_ + +[No date.] + +I have read the enclosed five and forty times over. I have submitted it +to my Edmonton friends; at last (O Argus' penetration), I have +discovered a dash that might be dispensed with. Pray don't trouble +yourself with such useless courtesies. I can well trust your editor, +when I don't use queer phrases which prove themselves wrong by creating +a distrust in the sober compositor. + + + +LETTER 597 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MARY BETHAM + +January 24, 1834, + +Church Street, Edmonton. + +Dear Mary Betham--I received the Bill, and when it is payable, some ten +or twelve days hence, will punctually do with the overplus as you +direct: I thought you would like to know it came to hand, so I have not +waited for the uncertainty of when your nephew sets out. I suppose my +receipt will serve, for poor Mary is not in a capacity to sign it. After +being well from the end of July to the end of December, she was taken +ill almost on the first day of the New Year, and is as bad as poor +creature can be. I expect her fever to last 14 or 15 weeks--if she gets +well at all, which every successive illness puts me in fear of. She has +less and less strength to throw it off, and they leave a dreadful +depression after them. She was quite comfortable a few weeks since, when +Matilda came down here to see us. + +You shall excuse a short letter, for my hand is unsteady. Indeed, the +situation I am in with her shakes me sadly. She was quite able to +appreciate the kind legacy while she was well. Imagine her kindest love +to you, which is but buried awhile, and believe all the good wishes for +your restoration to health from + +C. LAMB. + + +[This letter refers to the legacy mentioned above. It had now been +paid.] + + + +LETTER 598 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Jan. 28, 1834.] + +I met with a man at my half way house, who told me many anecdotes of +Kean's younger life. He knew him thoroughly. His name is Wyatt, living +near the Bell, Edmonton. Also he referred me to West, a publican, +opposite St. Georges Church, Southwark, who knew him _more_ intimately. +Is it worth Forster's while to enquire after them? + +C.L. + + +[Edmund Kean had died in the previous May. Forster, who was at this time +theatrical critic of _The Examiner_, was probably at work upon a +biographical article. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Matilda Betham, dated January 29, +1834. "My poor Mary is terribly ill again." + +Here also, dated February 7, should come a letter to William Hone, in +which Lamb, after mentioning his sister's illness, urges upon Hone the +advisability of applying to the Literary Fund for some relief, and +offers to support him in his appeal.] + + + +LETTER 599 + +CHARLES LAMB TO Miss FRYER + +Feb. 14, 1834. + +Dear Miss Fryer,--Your letter found me just returned from keeping my +birthday (pretty innocent!) at Dover-street. I see them pretty often. I +have since had letters of business to write, or should have replied +earlier. In one word, be less uneasy about me; I bear my privations very +well; I am not in the depths of desolation, as heretofore. Your +admonitions are not lost upon me. Your kindness has sunk into my heart. +Have faith in me! It is no new thing for me to be left to my sister. +When she is not violent, her rambling chat is better to me than the +sense and sanity of this world. Her heart is obscured, not buried; it +breaks out occasionally; and one can discern a strong mind struggling +with the billows that have gone over it. I could be nowhere happier than +under the same roof with her. Her memory is unnaturally strong; and from +ages past, if we may so call the earliest records of our poor life, she +fetches thousands of names and things that never would have dawned upon +me again, and thousands from the ten years she lived before me. What +took place from early girlhood to her coming of age principally lives +again (every important thing and every trifle) in her brain with the +vividness of real presence. For twelve hours incessantly she will pour +out without intermission all her past life, forgetting nothing, pouring +out name after name to the Waldens as a dream; sense and nonsense; +truths and errors huddled together; a medley between inspiration and +possession. What things we are! I know you will bear with me, talking of +these things. It seems to ease me; for I have nobody to tell these +things to now. Emma, I see, has got a harp! and is learning to play. She +has framed her three Walton pictures, and pretty they look. That is a +book you should read; such sweet religion in it--next to Woolman's! +though the subject be baits and hooks, and worms, and fishes. She has my +copy at present to do two more from. + +Very, very tired, I began this epistle, having been epistolising all the +morning, and very kindly would I end it, could I find adequate +expressions to your kindness. We did set our minds on seeing you in +spring. One of us will indubitably. But I am not skilled in almanac +learning, to know when spring precisely begins and ends. Pardon my +blots; I am glad you like your book. I wish it had been half as worthy +of your acceptance as "John Woolman." But 'tis a good-natured book. + + +[Miss Fryer was a school-fellow of Mrs. Moxon's. + +I append another letter, undated, to the same lady. It belongs obviously +to an earlier period, but the exact position is unimportant:--] + + + +LETTER 600 + +CHARLES LAMB TO Miss FRYER + +[No date.] + +My dear Miss Fryer, By desire of Emma I have attempted new words to the +old nonsense of Tartar Drum; but _with_ the nonsense the sound and +spirit of the tune are unaccountably gone, and _we_ have agreed to +discard the new version altogether. As _you_ may be more fastidious in +singing mere silliness, and a string of well-sounding images without +sense or coherence--Drums of Tartars, who use _none_, and Tulip trees +ten foot high, not to mention Spirits in Sunbeams &c,--than we are, so +you are at liberty to sacrifice an enspiriting movement to a little +sense, tho' I like LITTLE-SENSE less than his vagarying younger sister +NO-SENSE--so I send them---- + +The 4th line of 1st stanza is from an old Ballad. + +Emma is looking weller and handsomer (as you say) than ever. Really, if +she goes on thus improving, by the time she is nine and thirty she will +be a tolerable comely person. But I may not live to see it.--I take +Beauty to be _catching_-- a Cholera sort of thing--Now, whether the +constant presence of a handsome object--for there's only two of us--may +not have the effect------but the subject is delicate, and as my old +great Ant* used to say--"Andsome is as andsome duzz"--that was my +great Ant's way of spelling---- + +Most and best kind things say to yourself and dear Mother for all your +kindnesses to our Em., tho' in truth I am a little tired with her +everlasting repetition of 'em. Yours very Truly, + +CHS LAMB. + +* Emma's way of spelling Miss _Umfris_, as I spell her +_Aunt_. + + LOVE WILL COME + + _Tune: "The Tartar Drum"_ + + I + + Guard thy feelings, pretty Vestal, + From the smooth Intruder free; + Cage thine heart in bars of chrystal, + Lock it with a golden key; + Thro' the bars demurely stealing-- + Noiseless footstep, accent dumb, + His approach to none revealing-- + Watch, or watch not, LOVE WILL COME. + His approach to none revealing-- + Watch, or watch not, Love will come--Love, + Watch, or watch not, Love will come. + + II + + Scornful Beauty may deny him-- + He hath spells to charm disdain; + Homely Features may defy him-- + Both at length must wear the chain. + Haughty Youth in Courts of Princes-- + Hermit poor with age oercome-- + His soft plea at last convinces; + Sooner, later, LOVE WILL COME-- + + His soft plea at length convinces; + Sooner, later, Love will come--Love, + Sooner, later, Love will come. + + + +LETTER 601 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +Church S't, Edmonton, + +22 feb. [1834]. + +Dear Wordsworth, I write from a house of mourning. The oldest and best +friends I have left, are in trouble. A branch of them (and they of the +best stock of God's creatures, I believe) is establishing a school at +Carlisle. Her name is Louisa Martin, her address 75 Castle Street, +Carlisle; her qualities (and her motives for this exertion) are the most +amiable, most upright. For thirty years she has been tried by me, and on +her behaviour I would stake my soul. O if you can recommend her, how +would I love you--if I could love you better. Pray, pray, recommend her. +She is as good a human creature,--next to my Sister, perhaps the most +exemplary female I ever knew. Moxon tells me, you would like a Letter +from me. You shall have one. _This_ I cannot mingle up with any nonsense +which you usually tolerate from, C. LAMB. Need he add loves to Wife, +Sister, and all? Poor Mary is ill again, after a short lucid interval of +4 or 5 months. In short, I may call her half dead to me. + +Good you are to me. Yours with fervor of friendship; for ever + +turn over + +If you want references, the Bishop of Carlisle may be one. Louisa's +Sister, (as good as she, she cannot be better tho' she tries,) educated +the daughters of the late Earl of Carnarvon, and he settled a handsome +Annuity on her for life. In short all the family are a sound rock. The +present Lord Carnarvon married Howard of Graystock's Sister. + + +[Wordsworth has written on the wrapper, "Lamb's last letter." + +We met the Martins in the early correspondence. It was Louisa whom, many +years, before, Lamb used to call "Monkey." + +Here should come Lamb's last letter to Thomas Manning, dated May 10, +1834. Mary has, he says, been ill for nigh twenty weeks; "she is, I +hope, recovering." "I struggle to town rarely, and then to see London, +with little other motive--for what is left there hardly? The streets and +shops entertaining ever, else I feel as in a desert, and get me home to +my cave." Once a month, he adds, he passes a day with Cary at the +Museum. When Mary was getting better in the previous year she would read +all the auctioneers' advertisements on the walk. "These are _my_ +Play-bills," she said. "I walk 9 or 10 miles a day, always up the road, +dear Londonwards." Addressed to Manning at Puckeridge. + +Manning lived on, an eccentric recluse, until 1840. + +Here perhaps should come the following melancholy letter to Talfourd, +which Mr. Dobell permits me to print:--] + + + +LETTER 602 + +CHARLES LAMB TO T.N. TALFOURD + +[No date. Early 1834?] + +D'r T.--[1]Moxon & Knowles are coming to Enfield on Sunday _afternoon_. +My poor shaken head cannot at present let me ask any dinner company; for +two drinkings in a day, which must ensue, would incapacity me. I am very +poorly. They can only get an Edmont'n stage, from which village 'tis but +a 2 miles walk, & I have only _inn beds_ to offer. _Pray_, join 'em if +you can. Our first morning stage to London is 1/2 past 8. If that won't +suit your avocations, arrange with Ryle (or without him)--but how can I +separate him morally?--logically and legally, poetically and critically +I can,--from you? No disparagement (for a better Christian exists +not)--well arrange _cum_ or _absque illo_--this is latin-- the first +Sunday you can, _morning_. + +I am poorly, but I always am on these occasions, a week or two. Then I +get sober,--I mean less insober. Yours till death; you are mine _after_. +Don't mind a touch of pathos. Love to Mrs. Talfourd. + +The Edmonton stages come almost every hour from Snow Hill. + + +[Footnote 1: Erratum, for M. & K. read K. & M. Booksellers _after_ +Authors.] + + +[Ryle, as I have already said, was Lamb's executor, with Talfourd. Hence +the phrase to Talfourd, "you are mine after."] + + + +LETTER 603 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +[No date. End of June, 1834.] + +We heard the Music in the Abbey at Winchmore Hill! and the notes were +incomparably soften'd by the distance. Novello's chromatics were +distinctly audible. Clara was faulty in B flat. Otherwise she sang like +an angel. The trombone, and Beethoven's walzes, were the best. Who +played the oboe? + + +[The letter refers to the performance of Handel's "Creation" at the +Musical Festival in Westminster Abbey on June 24, 1834, when Novello and +Atwood were the organists, and Clara Novello one of the singers.] + + + +LETTER 604 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[P.M. June 25, 1834.] + +D'r F.--I simply sent for the Miltons because Alsop has some Books of +mine, and I thought they might travel with them. But keep 'em as much +longer as you like. I never trouble my head with other people's +quarrels, I do not always understand my own. I seldom see them in Dover +Street. I know as little as the Man in the Moon about your joint +transactions, and care as little. If you have lost a little portion of +my "good will," it is that you do not come and see me. Arrange with +Procter, when you have done with your moving accidents. + +Yours, ambulaturus, + +C.L. + + + +LETTER 605 + +CHARLES LAMB TO J. FULLER RUSSELL + +[Summer, 1834.] + +M'r Lamb's compt's and shall be happy to look over the lines as soon as +ever Mr. Russell shall send them. He is at Mr. Walden's, Church, _not +Bury_--St, Edm'd. + +_Line_ 10. "Ween," and "wist," and "wot," and "eke" are antiquated +frippery, and unmodernize a poem rather than give it an antique air, as +some strong old words may do. "I guess," "I know," "I knew," are quite +as significant. + +31. Why "ee"--barbarous Scoticism!--when "eye" is much better and chimes +to "cavalry"? A sprinkling of dis-used words where all the style else is +after the approved recent fashion teases and puzzles. + +37. [Anon the storm begins to slake, The sullen clouds to melt +away, The moon becalmed in a blue lake Looks down with melancholy ray.] + +The moon becalmed in a blue lake would be more apt to _look up_. I see +my error--the sky is the lake--and beg you to laugh at it. + +59. What is a maiden's "een," south of the Tweed? You may as well call +her prettily turned ears her "lugs." + + "On the maiden's lugs they fall" (verse 79). + +144. "A coy young Miss" will never do. For though you are presumed to be +a modern, writing only of days of old, yet you should not write a word +purely unintelligible to your heroine. Some understanding should be kept +up between you. "Miss" is a nickname not two centuries old; came in at +about the Restoration. The "King's Misses" is the oldest use of it I can +remember. It is Mistress Anne Page, not Miss Page. Modern names and +usages should be kept out of sight in an old subject. W. Scott was sadly +faulty in this respect. + +208. [Tear of sympathy.] Pity's sacred dew. Sympathy is a young lady's +word, rife in modern novels, and is almost always wrongly applied. To +sympathize is to feel--_with_, not simply _for_ another. I write +verses and _sympathize_ with you. You have the tooth ache, I have not; +I feel for you, I cannot sympathize. + +243. What is "sheen"? Has it more significance than "bright"? Richmond +in its old name was Shene. Would you call an omnibus to take you to +Shene? How the "all's right" man would stare! + +363. [The violet nestled in the shade, + Which fills with perfume all the glade, + Yet bashful as a timid maid + Thinks to elude the searching eye + Of every stranger passing by, + Might well compare with Emily.] + +A strangely involved simile. The maiden is likend [_sic_] to a _violet_ +which has been just before likened to a _maid_. Yet it reads prettily, +and I would not have it alter'd. + +420. "Een" come again? In line 407 you speak it out "eye," bravely like +an Englishman. + +468. Sorceresses do not entice by wrinkles, but, being essentially aged, +appear in assumed beauty. + + +[This communication and that which follows (with trifling omissions) +were sent to _Notes and Queries_ by the late Mr. J. Fuller Russell, +F.S.A., with this explanation: "I was residing at Enfield in the +Cambridge Long Vacation, 1834, and--perhaps to the neglect of more +improving pursuits--composed a metrical novel, named 'Emily de Wilton,' +in three parts. When the first of them was completed, I ventured to +introduce myself to Charles Lamb (who was living at Edmonton at the +time), and telling him what I had done, and that I had 'scarcely heart +to proceed until I had obtained the opinion of a competent judge +respecting my verses,' I asked him to 'while away an idle hour in their +perusal,' adding, 'I fear you will think me very rude and very +intrusive, but I am one of the most nervous souls in Christendom.' +Moved, possibly, by this diffident (not to say unusual) confession, Elia +speedily gave his consent." + +The poem was never printed. Lamb's pains in this matter serve to show +how kindly disposed he was in these later years to all young men; and +how exact a sense of words he had. + +In the British Museum is preserved a sheet of similar comments made by +Lamb upon a manuscript of P.G. Patmore's, from which I have quoted a few +passages above. In _Charles Lamb and the Lloyds_ will also be found a +number of interesting criticisms on a translation of Homer.] + + + +LETTER 606 + +CHARLES LAMB TO J. FULLER RUSSELL + +[Summer, 1834.] + +Sir,--I hope you will finish "Emily." The story I cannot at this stage +anticipate. Some looseness of diction I have taken liberty to advert to. +It wants a little more severity of style. There are too many +prettinesses, but parts of the Poem are better than pretty, and I thank +you for the perusal. + +Your humble Servt. + +C. LAMB. + +Perhaps you will favour me with a call while you stay. + +Line 42. "The old abbaye" (if abbey _was_ so spelt) I do not object to, +because it does not seem your own language, but humoursomely adapted to +the "how folks called it in those times." + +82. "Flares"! Think of the vulgarism "flare up;" let it be "burns." + +112. [In her pale countenance is blent + The majesty of high intent + With meekness by devotion lent, + And when she bends in prayer + Before the Virgin's awful shrine,-- + The rapt enthusiast might deem + The seraph of his brightest dream, + Were meekly kneeling there.] + +"Was" decidedly, not "were." The deeming or supposition, is of a +reality, not a contingency. The enthusiast does not deem that a thing +may be, but that it _is_. + +118. [When first young Vernon's flight she knew, + The lady deemed the tale untrue.] + +"Deemed"! This word is just repeated above; say "thought" or "held." +"Deem" is half-cousin to "ween" and "wot." + +143. [By pure intent and soul sincere + Sustained and nerved, I will not fear + Reproach, shame, scorn, the taunting jeer, + And worse than all, a father's sneer.] + +A father's "sneer"? Would a high-born man in those days _sneer_ at a +daughter's disgrace--would he _only_ sneer? + + Reproach, and biting shame, and--worse + Than all--the estranged father's curse. + +I only throw this hint out in a hurry. + +177. "Stern and _sear_"? I see a meaning in it, but no word is good that +startles one at first, and then you have to make it out: "drear," +perhaps. Then why "to minstrel's glance"? "To fancy's eye," you would +say, not "to fiddler's eye." + +422. A knight thinks, he don't "trow." + +424. "Mayhap" is vulgarish. Perchance. + +464. "Sensation" is a philosophic prose word. Feeling. + +27. [The hill, where ne'er rang woodman's stroke, + Was clothed with elm and spreading oak, + Through whose black boughs the moon's mild ray + As hardly strove to win a way, + As pity to a miser's heart.] + +Natural illustrations come more naturally when by _them_ we expound +mental operations than when we deduce from natural objects similes of +the mind's workings. The miser's struggle thus compared is a beautiful +image. But the storm and clouds do not inversely so readily suggest the +miser. + +160. [Havock and Wrath, his maniac bride, + Wheel o'er the conflict, &c.] + +These personified gentry I think are not in taste. Besides, Fear has +been pallid any time these 2,000 years. It is mixing the style of +Aeschylus and the _Last Minstrel_. + +175. Bracy is a good rough vocative. No better suggests itself, unless +Grim, Baron Grimm, or Grimoald, which is Saxon, or Grimbald! Tracy would +obviate your objection [that the name Bracy occurs in _Ivanhoe_] but +Bracy is stronger. + +231. [The frown of night + Conceals him, and bewrays their sight.] + +Betrays. The other has an _unlucky association_. + +243. [The glinting moon's half-shrouded ray.] + +Why "glinting," Scotch, when "glancing" is English? + +421. [Then solemnly the monk did say, + (The Abbot of Saint Mary's gray,) + The leman of a wanton youth + Perhaps may gain her father's _ruth_, + But _never_ on his injured breast + May lie, caressing and caressed. + Bethink you of the vow you made + When your light daughter, all distraught, + From yonder slaughter-plain was brought, + That if in some secluded cell + She might till death securely dwell, + The house of God should share her wealth.] + +Holy abbots surely never so undisguisedly blurted out their secular +aims. + +I think there is so much of this kind of poetry, that it would not be +_very taking_, but it is well worthy of pleasing a private circle. One +blemish runs thro', the perpetual accompaniment of natural images. +Seasons of the year, times of day, phases of the moon, phenomena of +flowers, are quite as much your _dramatis personae_ as the warriors and +the ladies. This last part is as good as what precedes. + + + +LETTER 607 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[No date. End of July, 1834.] + +Dear Sir, I am totally incapable of doing what you suggest at present, +and think it right to tell you so _without delay_. It would shock me, +who am shocked enough already, to sit down to _write_ about it. I have +no letters of poor C. By and bye what scraps I have shall be yours. Pray +excuse me. It is not for want of obliging you, I assure you. For your +Box we most cordially feel thankful. I shall be your debtor in my poor +way. I do assure you I am incapable. + +Again, excuse me + +Yours sincerely + +C.L. + + +[Coleridge's death had occurred on July 25, in his sixty-second year; +and Dilke had written to Lamb asking for some words on that event, for +_The Athenaeum_. A little while later a request was made by John Forster +that Lamb would write something for the album of a Mr. Keymer. It was +then that Lamb wrote the few words that stand under the title "On the +Death of Coleridge" (see Vol. I.). Forster wrote thus of the effect of +Coleridge's death upon Lamb:-- + + He thought of little else (his sister was but another portion of + himself) until his own great spirit joined his friend. He had a + habit of venting his melancholy in a sort of mirth. He would, with + nothing graver than a pun, "cleanse his bosom of the perilous stuff + that weighed" upon it. In a jest, or a few light phrases, he would + lay open the last recesses of his heart. So in respect of the death + of Coleridge. Some old friends of his saw him two or three weeks + ago, and remarked the constant turning and reference of his mind. He + interrupted himself and them almost every instant with some play of + affected wonder, or astonishment, or humorous melancholy, on the + words, "_Coleridge is dead_." Nothing could divert him from that, + for the thought of it never left him. + +Wordsworth said that Coleridge's death hastened Lamb's.] + + + +LETTER 608 + +CHARLES LAMB TO REV. JAMES GILLMAN + +Mr. Walden's, Church Street, + +Edmonton, August 5, 1834. + +My dear Sir,--The sad week being over, I must write to you to say, that +I was glad of being spared from attending; I have no words to express my +feeling with you all. I can only say that when you think a short visit +from me would be acceptable, when your father and mother shall be able +to see me _with comfort_, I will come to the bereaved house. Express to +them my tenderest regards and hopes that they will continue our friends +still. We both love and respect them as much as a human being can, and +finally thank them with our hearts for what they have been to the poor +departed. + +God bless you all, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Talfourd writes: "Shortly after, assured that his presence would be +welcome, Lamb went to Highgate. There he asked leave to see the nurse +who had attended upon Coleridge; and being struck and affected by the +feeling she manifested towards his friend, insisted on her receiving +five guineas from him." + +Here should come a letter to J.H. Green dated August 26, 1834, thanking +him for a copy of Coleridge's will and offering to send all letters, +etc., and "fragments of handwriting from leaves of good old books."] + + + +LETTER 609 + +CHARLES AND MARY LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +Sept. 12, 1834. + +"By Cot's plessing we will not be absence at the grace." + +DEAR C.,--We long to see you, and hear account of your peregrinations, +of the Tun at Heidelburg, the Clock at Strasburg, the statue at +Rotterdam, the dainty Rhenish and poignant Moselle wines, Westphalian +hams, and Botargoes of Altona. But perhaps you have seen nor tasted any +of these things. + +Yours, very glad to claim you back again to your proper centre, books +and Bibliothecae, + +C. AND M. LAMB. + +I have only got your note just now _per negligentiam per iniqui Moxoni_. + + +[Charles and Mary Lamb at this time were supposed to dine at Cary's on +the third Wednesday in every month. When the plan was suggested by Cary, +Lamb was for declining, but Mary Lamb said, "Ah, when we went to +Edmonton, I told Charles that something would turn up, and so it did, +you see."] + + + +LETTER 610 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +Oct., 1834. + +I protest I know not in what words to invest my sense of the shameful +violation of hospitality, which I was guilty of on that fatal Wednesday. +Let it be blotted from the calendar. Had it been committed at a layman's +house, say a merchant's or manufacturer's, a cheesemonger's' or +greengrocer's, or, to go higher, a barrister's, a member of +Parliament's, a rich banker's, I should have felt alleviation, a drop of +self-pity. But to be seen deliberately to go out of the house of a +clergyman drunk! a clergyman of the Church of England too! not that +alone, but of an expounder of that dark Italian Hierophant, an +exposition little short of _his_ who dared unfold the Apocalypse: divine +riddles both and (without supernal grace vouchsafed) Arks not to be +fingered without present blasting to the touchers. And, then, from what +house! Not a common glebe or vicarage (which yet had been shameful), but +from a kingly repository of sciences, human and divine, with the primate +of England for its guardian, arrayed in public majesty, from which the +profane vulgar are bid fly. Could all those volumes have taught me +nothing better! With feverish eyes on the succeeding dawn I opened upon +the faint light, enough to distinguish, in a strange chamber not +immediately to be recognised, garters, hose, waistcoat, neckerchief, +arranged in dreadful order and proportion, which I knew was not mine +own. 'Tis the common symptom, on awaking, I judge my last night's +condition from. A tolerable scattering on the floor I hail as being too +probably my own, and if the candlestick be not removed, I assoil myself. +But this finical arrangement, this finding everything in the morning in +exact diametrical rectitude, torments me. By whom was I divested? +Burning blushes! not by the fair hands of nymphs, the Buffam Graces? +Remote whispers suggested that I _coached_ it home in triumph--far be +that from working pride in me, for I was unconscious of the locomotion; +that a young Mentor accompanied a reprobate old Telemachus; that, the +Trojan like, he bore his charge upon his shoulders, while the wretched +incubus, in glimmering sense, hiccuped drunken snatches of flying on the +bats' wings after sunset. An aged servitor was also hinted at, to make +disgrace more complete: one, to whom my ignominy may offer further +occasions of revolt (to which he was before too fondly inclining) from +the true faith; for, at a sight of my helplessness, what more was needed +to drive him to the advocacy of independency? Occasion led me through +Great Russell Street yesterday. I gazed at the great knocker. My feeble +hands in vain essayed to lift it. I dreaded that Argus Portitor, who +doubtless lanterned me out on that prodigious night. I called the +Elginian marbles. They were cold to my suit. I shall never again, I +said, on the wide gates unfolding, say without fear of thrusting back, +in a light but a peremptory air, "I am going to Mr. Cary's." I passed by +the walls of Balclutha. I had imaged to myself a zodiac of third +Wednesdays irradiating by glimpses the Edmonton dulness. I dreamed of +Highmore! I am de-vited to come on Wednesdays. Villanous old age that, +with second childhood, brings linked hand in hand her inseparable twin, +new inexperience, which knows not effects of liquor. Where I was to have +sate for a sober, middle-aged-and-a-half gentleman, literary too, the +neat-fingered artist can educe no notions but of a dissolute Silenus, +lecturing natural philosophy to a jeering Chromius or a Mnasilus. Pudet. +From the context gather the lost name of ----. + + +["The Buffam Graces." Lamb's landladies at Southampton Buildings. + +"I passed by the walls of Balclutha." From Ossian. Lamb uses this +quotation in his _Elia_ essay on the South-Sea House. + +"Highmore." I cannot explain this reference. + +Not long before Mrs. Procter's death a letter from Charles Lamb to Mrs. +Basil Montagu was sold, in which Lamb apologised for having become +intoxicated while visiting her the night before. Some one mentioned the +letter in Mrs. Procter's presence. "Ah," she said, "but they haven't +seen the second letter, which I have upstairs, written next day, in +which he said that my mother might ask him again with safety as he never +got drunk twice in the same house." Unhappily, a large number of Lamb's +and other letters were burned by Mrs. Procter.] + + + +LETTER 611 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +[Oct. 18, 1834.] + +Dear Sir,--The unbounded range of munificence presented to my choice +staggers me. What can twenty votes do for one hundred and two widows? I +cast my eyes hopeless among the viduage. N.B.--Southey might be ashamed +of himself to let his aged mother stand at the top of the list, with his +£100 a year and butt of sack. Sometimes I sigh over No. 12, Mrs. +Carve-ill, some poor relation of mine, no doubt. No. 15 has my wishes; +but then she is a Welsh one. I have Ruth upon No. 21. I'd tug hard for +No. 24. No. 25 is an anomaly: there can be no Mrs. Hogg. No. 34 ensnares +me. No. 73 should not have met so foolish a person. No. 92 may bob it as +she likes; but she catches no cherry of me. So I have even fixed at +hap-hazard, as you'll see. + +Yours, every third Wednesday, + +C.L. + + +[Talfourd states that the note is in answer to a letter enclosing a list +of candidates for a Widow's Fund Society, for which he was entitled to +vote. A Mrs. Southey headed the list. + +Here, according to Mr. Hazlitt's dating, should come a note from Lamb to +Mrs. Randal Norris, belonging to November, in which Lamb says that he +found Mary on his return no worse and she is now no better. He sends all +his nonsense that he can scrape together and hopes the young ladies will +like "Amwell" (_Mrs. Leicester's School_).] + + + +LETTER 612 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MR. CHILDS + +Monday. Church Street, EDMONTON (not Enfield, as you erroneously direct +yours). [? Dec., 1834.] + +Dear Sir,--The volume which you seem to want, is not to be had for love +or money. I with difficulty procured a copy for myself. Yours is gone to +enlighten the tawny Hindoos. What a supreme felicity to the author (only +he is no traveller) on the Ganges or Hydaspes (Indian streams) to meet a +smutty Gentoo ready to burst with laughing at the tale of Bo-Bo! for +doubtless it hath been translated into all the dialects of the East. I +grieve the less, that Europe should want it. I cannot gather from your +letter, whether you are aware that a second series of the Essays is +published by Moxon, in Dover-street, Piccadilly, called "The Last Essays +of Elia," and, I am told, is not inferior to the former. Shall I order a +copy for you, and will you accept it? Shall I _lend_ you, at the same +time, my sole copy of the former volume (Oh! return it) for a month or +two? In return, you shall favour me with the loan of one of those +Norfolk-bred grunters that you laud so highly; I promise not to keep it +above a day. What a funny name Bungay is! I never dreamt of a +correspondent thence. I used to think of it as some Utopian town or +borough in Gotham land. I now believe in its existence, as part of merry +England! + +[_Some lines scratched out._] + +The part I have scratched out is the best of the letter. Let me have +your commands. + +CH. LAMB, _alias_ ELIA. + + +[Talfourd thus explains this letter: "In December, 1834, Mr. Lamb +received a letter from a gentleman, a stranger to him--Mr. Childs of +Bungay, whose copy of _Elia_ had been sent on an Oriental voyage, and +who, in order to replace it, applied to Mr. Lamb." Mr. Childs was a +printer. His business subsequently became that of Messrs. R.&R. Clark, +which still flourishes. + +This letter practically disposes of the statement made by more than one +bibliographer that a second edition of Elia was published in 1833. The +tale of Bo-Bo is in the "Dissertation on Roast Pig." + +Lamb sent Mr. Childs a copy of _John Woodvil_, in which he wrote:--] + + + +LETTER 613 + +FROM THE AUTHOR + +In great haste, the Pig was _faultless_,--we got decently merry after it +and chirpt and sang "Heigh! Bessy Bungay!" in honour of the Sender. Pray +let me have a line to say you got the Books; keep the _1st vol._--two or +three months, so long as it comes home at last. + + + +LETTER 614 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. GEORGE DYER + +Dec. 22nd, 1834. + +Dear Mrs. Dyer,--I am very uneasy about a _Book_ which I either have +lost or left at your house on Thursday. It was the book I went out to +fetch from Miss Buffam's, while the tripe was frying. It is called +Phillip's Theatrum Poetarum; but it is an English book. I think I left +it in the parlour. It is Mr. Cary's book, and I would not lose it for +the world. Pray, if you find it, book it at the Swan, Snow Hill, by an +Edmonton stage immediately, directed to Mr. Lamb, Church-street, +Edmonton, or write to say you cannot find it. I am quite anxious about +it. If it is lost, I shall never like tripe again. + +With kindest love to Mr. Dyer and all, + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + + +[In the life of H.F. Cary by his son we read: "He [Lamb] had borrowed of +my father Phillips's _Theatrum Poetarum Anglicanorum_, which was +returned by Lamb's friend, Mr. Moxon, with the leaf folded down at the +account of Sir Philip Sydney." Mr. Cary acknowledged the receipt of the +book by the following + + LINES TO THE MEMORY OF CHARLES LAMB + + So should it be, my gentle friend; + Thy leaf last closed at Sydney's end. + Thou too, like Sydney, wouldst have given + The water, thirsting and near heaven; + Nay were it wine, fill'd to the brim, + Thou hadst look'd hard, but given, like him. + + And art thou mingled then among + Those famous sons of ancient song? + And do they gather round, and praise + Thy relish Of their nobler lays? + Waxing in mirth to hear thee tell + With what strange mortals thou didst dwell! + At thy quaint sallies more delighted, + Than any's long among them lighted! + + 'Tis done: and thou hast join'd a crew, + To whom thy soul was justly due; + And yet I think, where'er thou be, + They'll scarcely love thee more than we. + +This is the last letter of Charles Lamb, who tripped and fell in Church +Street, Edmonton, on December 22, and died of erysipelas on December 27. + +At the time of his death Lamb was very nearly sixty. His birthday was +February 10. + +Mary Lamb, with occasional lapses into sound health, survived him until +May 20, 1847. At first she continued to live at Edmonton, but a few +years later moved to the house of Mrs. Parsons, sister of her old nurse, +Miss James, in St. John's Wood. I append three letters, two written and +one inspired, by her, to Miss Jane Norris, one of the daughters of +Randal Norris. Of the friends mentioned therein I might add that Edward +Moxon lived until 1858; Mrs. Edward Moxon until 1891; James Kenney until +1849; Thomas Hood until 1845; and Barron Field until 1846.] + + + +LETTER 615 + +MARY LAMB TO JANE NORRIS + +[41 Alpha Road, Regent's Park] + +Christmas Day [1841]. + +My dear Jane,--Many thanks for your kind presents--your Michalmas goose. +I thought Mr. Moxon had written to thank you--the turkeys and nice +apples came yesterday. + +Give my love to your dear Mother. I was unhappy to find your note in the +basket, for I am always thinking of you all, and wondering when I shall +ever see any of you again. I long to shew you what a nice snug place I +have got into--in the midst of a pleasant little garden. I have a room +for myself and my old books on the ground floor, and a little bedroom up +two pairs of stairs. When you come to town, if you have not time to go +[to] the Moxons, an Omnibus from the Bell and Crown in Holborn would +[bring] you to our door in [a] quarter of an hour. If your dear Mother +does not venture so far, I will contrive to pop down to see [her]. Love +and all seasonable wishes to your sister and Mary, &c. I am in the midst +of many friends--Mr. & Mrs. Kenney, Mr. & Mrs. Hood, Bar[r]on Field & +his brother Frank, & their wives &c., all within a short walk. + +If the lodger is gone, I shall have a bedroom will hold two! Heaven +bless & preserve you all in health and happiness many a long year. + +Yours affectionately, + +M.A. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 616 + +MARY LAMB TO JANE NORRIS + +Oct. 3, 1842. + +My dear Jane Norris,--Thanks, many thanks, my dear friend, for your kind +remembrances. What a nice Goose! That, and all its accompaniments in the +basket, we all devoured; the two legs fell to my share!!! + +Your chearful [letter,] my Jane, made me feel "almost as good as new." + +Your Mother and I _must meet again_. Do not be surprized if I pop in +again for a half-hour's call some fine frosty morning. + +Thank you, dear Jane, for the happy tidings that my _old_ friend Miss +Bangham is alive, an[d] that Mary is still with you, unmarried. Heaven +bless you all. + +Love to Mother, _Betsey_, Mary, &c. How I do long to see you. + +I am always your affecately grateful friend, + +MARY ANN LAMB. + + + +LAST LETTER + +Miss JAMES TO JANE NORRIS + +41 Alpha Road, Regent's Park, + +London, July 25, 1843. + +Madam,--Miss Lamb, having seen the Death of your dear Mother in the +Times News Paper, is most anxious to hear from or to see one of you, as +she wishes to know how you intend settling yourselves, and to have a +full account of your dear Mother's last illness. She was much shocked on +reading of her death, and appeared very vexed that she had not been to +see her, [and] wanted very much to come down and see you both; but we +were really afraid to let her take the journey. If either of you are +coming up to town, she would be glad if you would call upon her, but +should you not be likely to come soon, she would be very much pleased if +one of you would have the goodness to write a few lines to her, as she +is most anxious about you. She begs you to excuse her writing to you +herself, as she don't feel equal to it; she asked me yesterday to write +for her. I am happy to say she is at present pretty well, although your +dear Mother's death appears to dwell much upon her mind. She desires her +kindest love to you both, and hopes to hear from you very soon, if you +are equal to writing. I sincerely hope you will oblige her, and am, + +Madam, + +Your obedient, &c., + +SARAH JAMES. + +Pray don't invite her to come down to see you. + + + + +APPENDIX + + +CONSISTING OF THE LONGER PASSAGES FROM BOOKS REFERRED TO BY LAMB IN HIS +LETTERS + +BERNARD BARTON'S "THE SPIRITUAL LAW" + + +FROM DEVOTIONAL VERSES, 1826 (_See_ Letter 388, _page_ 746) + +"But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, +that them mayest do it."--Deut. xxx. 14. + + Say not The law divine + Is hidden from thee, or far remov'd: + That law within would shine, + If there its glorious light were sought and lov'd. + + Soar not on high, + Nor ask who thence shall bring it down to earth; + That vaulted sky + Hath no such star, didst thou but know its worth. + + Nor launch thy bark + In search thereof upon a shoreless sea, + Which has no ark, + No dove to bring this olive-branch to thee. + + Then do not roam + In search of that which wandering cannot win; + At home! At home! + That word is plac'd, thy mouth, thy heart within. + + Oh! seek it there, + Turn to its teachings with devoted will; + Watch unto prayer, + And in the power of faith this law fulfil. + + +BARTON'S "THE TRANSLATION OF ENOCH" + +FROM _NEW YEAR'S EVE_, 1828 + +(_See Letter_ 467, _page_ 841) + +"And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him." + +Genesis. + + Through proudly through the vaulted sky + Was borne Elisha's sire, + And dazzling unto mortal eye + His car and steeds of fire: + + To me as glorious seems the change + Accorded to thy worth; + As instantaneous and as strange + Thy exit from this earth. + + Something which wakes a deeper thrill, + These few brief words unfold, + Than all description's proudest skill + Could of that hour have told. + + Fancy's keen eye may trace the course + Elijah held on high: + The car of flame, each fiery horse, + Her visions may supply;-- + + But THY transition mocks each dream + Framed by her wildest power, + Nor can her mastery supreme + _Conceive_ thy parting hour. + + Were angels, with expanded wings, + As guides and guardians given? + Or did sweet sounds from seraphs' strings + Waft thee from earth to heaven? + + 'Twere vain to ask: we know but this-- + Thy path from grief and time + Unto eternity and bliss, + Mysterious and sublime! + + With God thou walkedst: and wast not! + And thought and fancy fail + Further than this to paint thy lot, + Or tell thy wondrous tale. + + +TALFOURD'S "VERSES IN MEMORY OF A CHILD NAMED AFTER CHARLES LAMB" + +FROM THE FINAL MEMORIALS OF CHARLES LAMB + +(_See_ Letter 469, _page_ 846) + + Our gentle Charles has pass'd away + From Earth's short bondage free, + And left to us its leaden day + And mist-enshrouded sea. + + Here, by the restless ocean's side, + Sweet hours of hope have flown, + When first the triumph of its tide + Seem'd omen of our own. + + That eager joy the sea-breeze gave, + When first it raised his hair, + Sunk with each day's retiring wave, + Beyond the reach of prayer. + + The sun-blink that through drizzling mist, + To flickering hope akin, + Lone waves with feeble fondness kiss'd, + No smile as faint can win; + + Yet not in vain, with radiance weak, + The heavenly stranger gleams-- + Not of the world it lights to speak, + But that from whence it streams. + + That world our patient sufferer sought, + Serene with pitying eyes, + As if his mounting Spirit caught + The wisdom of the skies. + + With boundless love it look'd abroad + For one bright moment given; + Shone with a loveliness that aw'd, + And quiver'd into Heaven. + + A year made slow by care and toil + Has paced its weary round, + Since Death enrich'd with kindred spoil + The snow-clad, frost-ribb'd ground. + + Then LAMB, with whose endearing name + Our boy we proudly graced, + Shrank from the warmth of sweeter fame + Than mightier Bards embraced. + + Still 'twas a mournful joy to think + Our darling might supply + For years to us, a living link, + To name that cannot die. + + And though such fancy gleam no more + On earthly sorrow's night, + Truth's nobler torch unveils the shore + Which lends to both its light. + + The nurseling there that hand may take, + None ever grasp'd in vain, + And smiles of well-known sweetness wake, + Without their tinge of pain. + + Though,'twixt the Child and child-like Bard, + Late seemed distinction wide. + They now may trace in Heaven's regard, + How near they were allied. + + Within the infant's ample brow + Blythe fancies lay unfurl'd, + Which, all uncrush'd, may open now, + To charm a sinless world. + + Though the soft spirit of those eyes + Might ne'er with LAMB'S compete-- + Ne'er sparkle with a wit as wise, + Or melt in tears, as sweet; + + That calm and unforgotten look + A kindred love reveals, + With his who never friend forsook, + Or hurt a thing that feels. + + In thought profound, in wildest glee, + In sorrows dark and strange, + The soul of Lamb's bright infancy + Endured no spot or change. + + From traits of each our love receives + For comfort, nobler scope; + While light, which child-like genius leaves. + Confirms the infant's hope; + + And in that hope with sweetness fraught + Be aching hearts beguiled, + To blend in one delightful thought + The POET and the CHILD! + + + EDWARD FITZGERALD'S "THE MEADOWS IN SPRING" + + FROM HONE'S _YEAR BOOK_ + + (_See Letter_ 535, _page_ 938) + + 'Tis a sad sight + To see the year dying; + When autumn's last wind + Sets the yellow wood sighing; + Sighing, oh sighing! + + When such a time cometh, + I do retire + Into an old room, + Beside a bright fire; + Oh! pile a bright fire! + + And there I sit + Reading old things + Of knights and ladies, + While the wind sings: + Oh! drearily sings! + + I never look out, + Nor attend to the blast; + For, all to be seen, + Is the leaves falling fast: + Falling, falling! + + But, close at the hearth, + Like a cricket, sit I; + Reading of summer + And chivalry: + Gallant chivalry! + + Then, with an old friend, + I talk of our youth; + How 'twas gladsome, but often + Foolish, forsooth, + But gladsome, gladsome. + + Or, to get merry, + We sing an old rhyme + That made the wood ring again + In summer time: + Sweet summer time! + + Then take we to smoking, + Silent and snug: + Naught passes between us, + Save a brown jug; + Sometimes! sometimes! + + And sometimes a tear + Will rise in each eye, + Seeing the two old friends, + So merrily; + So merrily! + + And ere to bed + Go we, go we, + Down by the ashes + We kneel on the knee; + Praying, praying! + + Thus then live I, + Till, breaking the gloom + Of winter, the bold sun + Is with me in the room! + Shining, shining! + + Then the clouds part, + Swallows soaring between: + The spring is awake, + And the meadows are green,-- + + I jump up like mad; + Break the old pipe in twain; + And away to the meadows, + The meadows again! + + EPSILON. + + +JAMES MONTGOMERY'S "THE COMMON LOT" + +(_See Letter_ 535, _page_ 938) + +A Birth-day Meditation, during a solitary winter walk of seven miles, +between a village in Derbyshire and Sheffield, when the ground was +covered with snow, the sky serene, and the morning air intensely pure. + + Once in the flight of ages past, + There lived a man:--and WHO was HE? + --Mortal! howe'er thy lot be cast, + That man resembled Thee. + + Unknown the region of his birth, + The land in which he died unknown: + His name has perish'd from the earth; + This truth survives alone:-- + + That joy and grief, and hope and fear, + Alternate triumph'd in his breast; + His bliss and woe,--a smile, a tear!-- + Oblivion hides the rest. + + The bounding pulse, the languid limb, + The changing spirits' rise and fall; + We know that these were felt by him, + For these are felt by all. + + He suffer'd,--but his pangs are o'er; + Enjoy'd,--but his delights are fled; + Had friends,--his friends are now no more; + And foes,--his foes are dead. + + He loved,--but whom he loved, the grave + Hath lost in its unconscious womb: + O. she was fair!--but nought could save + Her beauty from the tomb. + + He saw whatever thou hast seen; + Encounter'd all that troubles thee: + He was--whatever thou hast been; + He is--what thou shalt be. + + The rolling seasons, day and night, + Sun, moon, and stars, the earth and main, + Erewhile his portion, life and light, + To him exist in vain. + + The clouds and sunbeams, o'er his eye + That once their shades and glory threw, + Have left in yonder silent sky + No vestige where they flew. + + The annals of the human race, + Their ruins, since the world began, + Of HIM afford no other trace + Than this,--THERE LIVED A MAN! + + +November 4, 1805. BARRY CORNWALL'S "EPISTLE TO CHARLES LAMB; + +ON HIS EMANCIPATION FROM CLERKSHIP" + +(WRITTEN OVER A FLASK OF SHERRIS) + +FROM _ENGLISH SONGS_ + +(_See Letter_ 551, _page_ 952) + + Dear Lamb! I drink to thee,--to _thee_ + Married to sweet Liberty! + + What, old friend, and art thou freed + From the bondage of the pen? + Free from care and toil indeed? + Free to wander amongst men + When and howsoe'er thou wilt? + _All_ thy drops of labour spilt, + On those huge and figured pages, + Which will sleep unclasp'd for ages, + Little knowing who did wield + The quill that traversed their white field? + + Come,--another mighty health! + Thou hast earn'd thy sum of wealth,-- + Countless ease,--immortal leisure,-- + Days and nights of boundless pleasure, + Checquer'd by no dreams of pain, + Such as hangs on clerk-like brain + Like a night-mare, and doth press + The happy soul from happiness. + + Oh! happy thou,--whose all of time + (Day and eve, and morning prime) + Is fill'd with talk on pleasant themes,-- + Or visions quaint, which come in dreams + Such as panther'd Bacchus rules, + When his rod is on "the schools," + Mixing wisdom with their wine;-- + Or, perhaps, thy wit so fine + Strayeth in some elder book, + Whereon our modern Solons look + With severe ungifted eyes, + Wondering what thou seest to prize. + Happy thou, whose skill can take + Pleasure at each turn, and slake + Thy thirst by every fountain's brink, + Where less wise men would pause to shrink: + Sometimes, 'mid stately avenues + With Cowley thou, or Marvel's muse, + Dost walk; or Gray, by Eton's towers; + Or Pope, in Hampton's chesnut bowers; + Or Walton, by his loved Lea stream: + Or dost thou with our Milton dream, + Of Eden and the Apocalypse, + And hear the words from his great lips? + + Speak,--in what grove or hazel shade, + For "musing meditation made," + Dost wander?--or on Penshurst Lawn, + Where Sidney's fame had time to dawn + And die, ere yet the hate of Men + Could envy at his perfect pen? + Or, dost thou, in some London street, + (With voices fill'd and thronging feet,) + Loiter, with mien 'twixt grave and gay?-- + Or take along some pathway sweet, + Thy calm suburban way? + + Happy beyond that man of Ross, + Whom mere content could ne'er engross, + Art thou,--with hope, health, "learned leisure;" + Friends, books, thy thoughts, an endless pleasure! + --Yet--yet,--(for when was pleasure made + Sunshine all without a shade?) + Thou, perhaps, as now thou rovest + Through the busy scenes thou lovest, + With an Idler's careless look, + Turning some moth-pierced book, + Feel'st a sharp and sudden woe + For visions vanished long ago! + And then thou think'st how time has fled + Over thy unsilvered head, + Snatching many a fellow mind + Away, and leaving--what?--behind! + Nought, alas! save joy and pain + Mingled ever, like a strain + Of music where the discords vie + With the truer harmony. + So, perhaps, with thee the vein + Is sullied ever,--so the chain + Of habits and affections old, + Like a weight of solid gold, + Presseth on thy gentle breast, + Till sorrow rob thee of thy rest. + + Ay: so't must be!--Ev'n I, (whose lot + The fairy Love so long forgot,) + Seated beside this Sherris wine, + And near to books and shapes divine, + Which poets, and the painters past + Have wrought in lines that aye shall last,-- + Ev'n I, with Shakspeare's self beside me, + And one whose tender talk can guide me + Through fears, and pains, and troublous themes, + Whose smile doth fall upon my dreams + Like sunshine on a stormy sea,-- + Want _something_--when I think of thee! + + + + + LIST OF LETTERS + + ALPHABETICALLY ARRANGED + + Aders, Charles, to Jan. 8, 1823 + Ainsworth, W. Harrison, to May 7, 1822 + Dec. 9, 1823 + Dec. 29, -- + Aitken, J., to July 5, 1825 + Allsop, Thomas, to July 13, 1820 + ? 1821 + ? -- + March 30, -- + Oct. 21, -- + July, 1823 + Sept. 6, -- + Sept. 9, -- + Sept. 10, -- + Sept. -- + ? Oct. -- + Jan. 17, 1825 + Sept. 9, -- + Sept. 24, -- + Dec. 5, -- + ? Middle + Dec., 1827 + Dec. 20, -- + Jan. 9, 1828 + May 1, -- + Jan. 28, 1829 + Late July, -- + July 2, 1832 + Mrs. Thomas, to April 13, 1824 + Arnold, S.J., to (from Charles and Mary Lamb) No date. + Asbury, Jacob Vale, to ? April, 1830 + No date. + _Athenaeum_, printer of, to No date. 1834 + + Ayrton, William, to May 12, 1817 + Oct. 27, 1821 + March 14, 1830 + Mrs. William, to Jan. 23, 1821 + March 15, -- + (from Mary Lamb) No date. + April 16, 1833 + + Barton, Bernard, to Sept. 11, 1822 + Oct. 9, -- + Dec. 23, -- + Jan. 9, 1823 + Feb. 17, -- + March 11, -- + April 5, -- + May 3, -- + July 10, -- + Sept. 2, -- + Sept. 17, -- + Nov. 22, -- + Jan. 9, 1824 + Jan. 23, -- + Feb. 25, -- + March 24, -- + Early + Spring, -- + May 15, -- + July 7, -- + Aug. 17, -- + Sept. 30, -- + Dec. 1, -- + Feb. 10, 1825 + March 23, -- + April 6, -- + July 2, -- + Aug. 10, -- + Feb. 7, 1826 + March 20, -- + May 16, -- + Sept. 26, -- + No date. -- + No date. 1827 + June 11, -- + Aug. 10, -- + Aug. 28, -- + Late -- + Dec. 4, -- + End of -- + April 21, 1828 + Oct. 11, -- + Dec. 5, -- + March 25, 1829 + June 3, -- + July 25, -- + Dec. 8, -- + Feb. 25, 1830 + June 28, -- + Aug. 30, -- + April 30, 1831 + Lucy, to (P.S. to letter to B.B.) Dec. 1, 1824 + Betham, Barbara, to (from Mary Lamb) Nov. 2, 1814 + Mary, to June 5, 1833 + June 5, -- + Jan. 24, 1834 + Matilda, to No date. 1808 + No date. -- + (from Mary Lamb) ? 1811 + ? Late + Summer, 1815 + No date. -- + No date. -- + June 1, 1816 + June, 1833 + + Cary, Rev. H.F., to Oct. 14, 1823 + April 3, 1826 + May 6, 1831 + Sept. 9, 1833 + (from Charles and Mary Lamb) Sept. 12, 1834 + Oct. -- + Oct. 18, -- + Chambers, Charles, to ? May, 1825 + Childs, Mr., to ? Dec., 1834 + No date. -- + Clare, John, to Aug. 31, 1822 + Clarke, Charles Cowden, to Summer, 1821 + Feb. 25, 1828 + Oct., -- + Dec., -- + Feb. 2, 1829 + End of + June, 1834 + Clarkson, Thomas and Catherine, to June, 1807 + Clarkson, Mrs. Thomas, to (from Mary Lamb) Dec. 10, 1808 + Dec. 10, -- + Colburn (?), Henry, to June 14, (?1825) + Sept. 25, 1837 + Coleridge, S.T., to May 27, 1796 + End of May -- + June 10, -- + June 13, -- + July 1, -- + July 5, -- + July 6, -- + Sept. 27, -- + Oct. 3, -- + Oct. 17, -- + Oct. 24, -- + Oct. 28, -- + Nov. 8, -- + Nov. 14, -- + Dec. 2, -- + Dec. 5, -- + Dec. 9, -- + Dec. 10, -- + Jan. 2, 1797 + Jan. 10, -- + Jan. 18, -- + Feb. 5, -- + Feb. 13, -- + April 7, -- + April 15, -- + June 13, -- + June 24, -- + ? June 29, -- + Late July -- + Aug. 24, -- + About + Sept. 20, -- + Jan. 28, 1798 + Early + Summer, -- + ? Jan. 23, 1800 + ? April + 16 or 17, -- + ? Spring, -- + May 12, -- + Coleridge, S.T., to ? Late + July, -- + Aug. 6, -- + Aug. 14, -- + Aug. 26, -- + Sept. 8, 1802 + Oct. 9, -- + Oct. 11, -- + Oct. 23, -- + Nov. 4, -- + April 13, 1803 + May 27, -- + March 10, 1804 + April 5, -- + (from Mary Lamb) No date. + June 7, 1809 + Oct. 30, -- + Aug. 13, 1814 + Aug. 26, -- + Dec. 24, 1818 + ? Summer, 1819 + Jan 10, 1820 + ? Autumn, -- + May 1, 1821 + March 9, 1822 + ? June, 1825 + July 2, -- + March 22, 1826 + June 1, -- + April 14, 1832 + Mrs. S.T., to (from Mary Lamb) Oct. 13, 1804 + Collier, John Dyer, to No date. 1812 + Mr. and Mrs. J.D., to Jan. 6, 1823 + Mrs. J.D., to (from Mary Lamb) No date. + Nov. 2, 1824 + John Payne, to Dec 10, 1817 + May 16, 1821 + Cottle, Joseph, to Nov. 5, 1819 + ? Late -- + ? May 26, 1820 + Dibdin, John Bates, to ? 1823 + May 6, -- + Oct 28, -- + July 28, 1824 + Jan. 11, 1825 + June 30, 1826 + July 14, -- + Sept. 9, -- + Sept. 5, 1827 + Sept. 13, -- + Sept. 18 -- + Oct. 2, -- + Dilke, Charles Wentworth, to March 5, 1832 + Feb., 1833 + April, -- + Middle Dec -- + No date. ? 1834 + No date. -- + End of July -- + Dyer, George, to Dec. 5, 1808 + ? Jan., 1829 + April 29, -- + Dec. 20, 1830 + Feb. 22, 1831 + Mrs. George, to Dec. 22, 1834 + + Elton, C.A., to Aug. 17, 1821 + + Field, Barren, to Aug. 31, 1817 + Aug. 16, 1820 + Sept. 22, 1822 + Oct. 4, 1827 + Forster, John, to ? Late + April, 1832 + Dec. 23, -- + No date. + No date. + No date. + ? March, 1833 + May, -- + May 12, -- + June 25, 1834 + Fryer, Miss, to Feb. 14, -- + No date. + + Gillman, James, to May 2, 1821 + Oct. 26, 1829 + ? Nov. 29, -- + Nov. 30 -- + March 8, 1830 + ? Early + Spring, -- + Gillman, Rev. James, to May 7, 1833 + Aug. 5, 1834 + Godwin, William, to Dec. 4, 1800 + No date. + Autumn, -- + Dec. 10, -- + Dec. 14, -- + June 29, 1801 + Sept. 9, -- + Sept. 17, -- + Nov. 8, 1803 + Nov. 10, -- + ? 1806 + March 11, 1808 + ? 1810 + May 16, 1822 + Mrs., to No date. + Gutch, John Mathew, to No date. 1800 + April 9, 1810 + + Haydon, Benjamin Robert, to Dec. 26, 1817 + Oct. 9, 1822 + Oct. 29, -- + March, 1827 + Aug., 1828 + Hazlitt, William, to Nov. 10, 1805 + Jan. 15, 1806 + Feb. 19, -- + March 15, -- + Aug. 9, 1810 + Nov. 28, -- + Oct. 2, 1811 + Mrs. W. _See_ Stoddart, Sarah + jr., William, to Sept. 13, 1831 + Rev. W., to Feb. 18, 1808 + Hill, Thomas, to No date. + Holcroft, jr., Thomas, to Autumn, 1819 + Hone, William, to April, 1824 + May 2, 1825 + Oct. 24, -- + April, 1827 + End of May, -- + June, -- + Early July, -- + Oct., -- + Dec. 15, -- + May 21, 1830 + March 6, 1833 + Hood, Thomas, to Aug. 10, 1824 + May, 1827 + Sept. 18, -- + No date. ?-- + Late + Autumn, 1828? + ? May, 1829? + Hoods, the Thomas, to (from Mary Lamb) ? Summer, 1828 + Hume, Joseph, to No date. + his daughters, to No date. 1832 + Mrs., to No date. + Humphreys, Miss, to Jan. 27 1821 + Hunt, Leigh, to April 18, -- + ? Nov., 1824 + Dec., 1827 + Hutchinson, Sarah, to (from Mary Lamb) Aug. 29 1815 + Aug. 20, -- + Oct. 19, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Middle of + Nov., 1816 + ? Late -- + April 25, 1823 + (?) No date. + Nov. 25, 1824 + Jan. 20, 1825 + March 1, -- + April 18, -- + + James, Miss Sarah, to ? April, 1829 + Kelly, Fanny, to July 20, 1819 + July 20, -- + Kenny, James and Louisa, to Oct., 1817 + Mrs. James, to (from Mary Lamb) ? Early + Dec., 1822 + Knowles, James Sheridan, to ? April, 1832 + Lamb, Mrs. John, to May 22, 1822 + Mary, to August, -- + Landor, Walter Savage, to Oct., 1832 + Lloyd, Charles, to Autumn, 1823 + Manning, Thomas, to Dec., 1799 + Dec. 28, -- + Feb. 13, 1800 + March 1, -- + March 17, -- + April 5, -- + May 20, -- + ? May 25, -- + Aug. 9, -- + Aug. 11, -- + Aug. 24, -- + Aug. 28, -- + Sept. 22, -- + Oct. 16, -- + Nov. 3, -- + Nov. 28, -- + Dec. 13, -- + Dec. 16, -- + End of Dec.,-- + Dec. 27, -- + Feb. 15, 1801 + Late Feb., -- + April, -- + ? April, -- + Aug., -- + Aug. 31, -- + ? Feb. 15, 1802 + ? April, -- + Sept. 24, -- + Nov., -- + Feb. 19, 1803 + March, -- + Feb. 23, 1805 + July 27, -- + Nov. 15, -- + May 10, 1806 + Dec. 5, -- + Feb. 26, 1808 + March 28, 1809 + Jan. 2, 1810 + Dec. 25, 1815 + Dec. 26, -- + May 28, 1819 + ? Feb 1825 + Marter, W., to July 19, 1824 + Montagu, Basil, to July 12, 1810 + Mrs. Basil, to Summer, 1827 + Morgan, John, to March 8, 1811 + Mrs., to June 17, 1828 + Moxon, Edward, to No date. 1826 + ? Sept., -- + July 17, 1827 + ? Sept. 26, -- + Dec. 22, -- + ? Jan., 1828 + Feb. 18, -- + March 19, -- + May 3, -- + Dec., -- + No date. 1829 + Sept. 22, -- + May 12, 1830 + Nov. 12, -- + ? Dec., -- + ? Dec. 25, -- + Feb. 3, 1831 + July 14, -- + Early + August, -- + Aug. 5, -- + Sept. 5, -- + Oct. 24, -- + Dec. 15, -- + June 1, 1832 + Late -- + Winter, -- + Dec., -- + Jan., 1833 + Jan. 3, -- + Jan. 24, -- + Feb. 11, -- + Feb., -- + No date. -- + Early -- + March 19, -- + ? Spring, -- + March 30, -- + Spring, -- + ? April 10, -- + April 25, -- + April 27, -- + July 14, -- + July 24, -- + and Emma (from Mary and Charles Lamb) ? July 31, -- + (from Mary and Charles Lamb) Sept. 26, -- + Oct. 17, -- + Nov. 29, -- + Jan. 28, 1834 + Norris, Jane, to (from Mary Lamb) Dec. 25, 1841 + Oct. 3, 1842 + (from Miss James) July 25, 1843 + Mrs. Randal, to (from Mary Lamb) June 18, 1823 + Novello, Vincent, to Jan. 25, 1825 + May 9, 1826 + Nov. 6, 1828 + ? Nov. 10, 1829 + May 14, 1830 + Nov. 8, -- + Mrs. Vincent, to (from Mary Lamb) Spring, 1820 + + Ollier, Charles, to ? Dec., 1825 + Early 1826 + March 16, -- + Charles and James, to June 18, 1818 + + Patmore, P.G., to July 19, 1827 + Sept., -- + Payne, J.H., to Autumn, 1822 + Oct. 22, -- + Nov. 13, -- + Jan., 1823 + Jan. 23, -- + Feb. [9], -- + Poole, Thomas, to Feb. 14, 1804 + May 4, -- + May 5, -- + Proctor, B.W., to ? Summer, 1821 + April 13, 1823 + Nov. 11, 1824 + Jan. 19, 1829 + Jan. 22, -- + ? Jan 29, -- + No date. -- + Feb. 2, -- + No date. 1833 + + Rickman, John, to ? Nov., 1801 + April 10, 1802 + July 16, 1803 + Jan. 25, 1806 + March, -- + Oct. 3, 1828 + Robinson, H.C., to March 12, 1808 + May, 1809 + Feb. 7, 1810 + Nov. 20, 1824 + March 29, 1825 + Jan. 20, 1827 + Jan. 20, -- + Jan. 29, -- + Jan., -- + June 26, -- + Oct. 1, -- + Feb. 26, 1828 + Feb. 27, 1829 + ? April, -- + April 17, -- + ? Early + Oct., 1832 + Thomas, to Nov. 11, 1822 + Rogers, Samuel, to March 22, 1829 + Oct. 5, 1830 + ? Dec. 21, 1833 + Russell, J. Fuller, to Summer, 1834 + + Sargus, Mr., to Feb. 23, 1815 + Scott, John, to ? Feb., 1814 + Dec. 12, -- + Sir Walter, to Oct. 29, 1822 + Shelley, Mrs. Percy Bysshe, to July 26, 1827 + Southey, Robert, to July 28, 1798 + Oct. 18, -- + Oct. 29, -- + Nov. 3, -- + Nov. 8, -- + ? Nov., -- + Nov. 28, -- + Dec. 27, -- + Jan. 21, 1799 + Late Jan. + or early + Feb., -- + March 15, -- + March 20, -- + Oct. 31, -- + Nov. 7, 1804 + May 6, 1815 + Aug. 9, -- + Oct. 26, 1818 + Nov. 21, 1823 + Aug. 10, 1825 + May 10, 1830 + Stoddart, Sir John, to Aug. 9, -- + Lady, to (from Mary Lamb) Aug. 9, 1827 + Sarah (later Mrs. Hazlitt), to + (from Mary Lamb) Sept. 21, 1803 + (from Mary Lamb) ? March, 1804 + Late July, -- + Late July, -- + (from Mary Lamb) ? Sept.18, 1805 + Early Nov., -- + Nov. 9 + and 14, -- + ? Feb. 20, 21 + and 22, 1806 + March, -- + June 2, -- + ? July 4, -- + Oct 23, -- + Dec. 11, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Oct., 1807 + Dec. 21, -- + Feb. 12, 1808 + March 16, -- + Dec. 10, -- + Dec. 10, -- + (from Mary Lamb) June 2, 1809 + Nov. 7, -- + ? End of 1810 + Oct. 2, 1811 + Early + Nov., 1823 + March 4, 1830 + May 24, -- + June 3, -- + May 31, 1833 + + Talfourd, T.N., to Aug., 1819 + May 20, 1828 + End of -- + Feb., 1833 + No date. 1834 + Taylor, John, to June 8, 1821 + July 21, -- + Dec. 7, 1822 + + Williams, Mrs., to Feb. 26, 1830 + March 1, -- + March 5, -- + March 22, -- + April 2, -- + April 9, -- + April 21, -- + Wilson, Walter, to Aug. 14, 1801 + Dec. 16, 1822 + Feb. 24, 1823 + May 17, 1828 + May 28, 1829 + Nov. 15, -- + Aug., 1832 + Wordsworth, Dorothy, to (from Mary Lamb) July 9, 1803 + June 2, 1804 + (from Mary Lamb) Oct. 13, -- + May 7, 1805 + June 14, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Aug. 29, 1806 + Nov. 13, 1810 + Nov. 13, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Nov. 23, -- + Nov. 23, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Nov. 21, 1817 + Nov. 21, -- + Nov. 25, 1819 + May 25, 1820 + Jan. 8, 1821 + (from Mary Lamb) Jan. 22, 1830 + Mrs., to Feb. 18, 1818 + William, to Jan. 30, 1801 + March 5, 1803 + Oct. 13, 1804 + Feb. 18, 1805 + Feb. 19, -- + March 5, -- + March 21, -- + April 5, -- + (and Dorothy) Sept. 28, -- + Feb. 1, 1806 + June 26, -- + Dec. 11, -- + Wordsworth, William, to Jan. 29, 1807 + Oct. 19, 1810 + Aug. 9, 1814 + Sept. 19, -- + Dec. 28, -- + ? Early + Jan., 1815 + April 7, -- + April 28, -- + Aug. 9, -- + April 9, 1816 + April 26, -- + Sept. 23, -- + April 26, 1819 + June 7, -- + March 20, 1822 + Jan., 1823 + April 6, 1825 + May, -- + Sept. 6, 1826 + May, 1828 + Jan. 22, 1830 + End of + May, 1833 + Feb. 27, 1834 + + + + + INDEX + + + A + + Acrostics + + Aders, Charles + his pictures, + Lamb's poem to + + _Adventures of Ulysses_ + + "After Blenheim," by Southey + + Agricultural Depression, Lamb on + + Ainsworth, W.H. _See_ Letters. + his dedication to Lamb + his gift of _Syrinx_ + and "Faust" + + Aitken, John. _See_ Letters. + his _Cabinet_ + + _Albion_, Lamb and the + + Albums, Lamb on + + _Album Verses_ + + "Ali Pacha," by Howard Payne + + Allen, Robert + + Allsop, Thomas. _See_ Letters. + + Alsager, T.M. + + "Amicus Redivivus" + + "Ancient Mariner, The" + + Anderson, Dr. + + "Angel Help" + + Angerstein, John Julius + + Angling, Lamb and + + Animal poetry + + "Anna." _See_ Simmons. + + _Annual Anthology, The_ + + _Anti-Jacobin, The_ + + "Antonio," by Godwin + + Appendix: Passages from Books referred to by Lamb + + Aquinas, Thomas + + "Ariadne," by Titian + + Ariel, Lamb as + + Arnold, Samuel James. _See_ Letters. + + "Arthur's Bower" + + Asbury, J.V. _See_ Letters. + and Emma Isola + and Lamb as Ariel + + Asses, old poem on + + _Astrea_ + + Australia, Lamb on + + Authors and Publishers, Lamb on + + Ayrton, William. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. _See_ Letters. + + + B + + Badams, Carlyle's friend + + Mrs., _née_ Louisa Holcroft. _See_ Letters. + + Baldwin the publisher + + Ball, Sir Alexander + + "Ballad," by Lamb + + Bankrupts, Lamb on + + "Barbara S." + + Barbauld, Mrs. + + Barker, Lieut. John + + Barnes, Thomas + + Bartholomew Fair + + Barton, Bernard. _See_ Letters. + first mention + his suggested retirement from the bank + his testimonial + Lamb on his poems + _Poetic Vigils_ + "Sonnet to Elia" + _Poems_, 4th edition + his _Devotional Verses_ + his _Widow's Tale_ + extracts from his poems + Lamb sends him a picture + his step-grandfather + his _New Year's Eve_ + sonnet to Lamb + his "Spiritual Law" + his "Translation of Enoch" + Lucy, verses to + note to + at Islington + + Baskerville, John + + Battle, Mrs. + + Beaumont and Fletcher + + Beaumont, Sir George + + Bellows Shakespeare + + "Belshazzar's Feast" + + Benger, Miss + + Berkleyans + + Betham, Anne, her legacy + + Barbara. _See_ Letters. + + Mary Matilda. _See_ Letters. + + Bethams, the, their tallness + + Betty, Master + + _Bijou, The_ + + Binding, the perfect + + "Bites," Lamb's + + Blake, William + + Blakesware + + Blanchard, Laman + + Bland, Mrs. + + _Blank Verse_, by Lamb and Lloyd + + Blenheim, its pictures + + Bloomfield, his _Farmer's Boy_ + + Bloxam, Samuel + + Blue-stockings, Lamb among + + Bodleian Library + + Book-binder, Lamb's poor relation + + Book-borrowing, Lamb on + + "Borderers, The," by Wordsworth + + Bourne, Vincent + + Bowles, William Lisle + his allegory, "Hope" + his "Elegiac Stanzas" + + Boyer, James + + Braham, John + + Brawn, Lamb on + + Brighton, the Lambs at + + British Museum, Lamb at + + Brown, Miss, her album verses + + Brutons, the Lambs' cousins + + Buchan, the Earl of + + _Buncle, John_ + + Bungay, Lamb on + + Bunyan + + Burke and Hare + + Burke, Edmund + + Burnet, Bishop, his _Own Times_ + + Burnett, George + and Dyer + + Burney, Captain + + Martin + + Sarah + + Burns, Robert + + Burrell, Miss + + Burton, Lamb's imitations of + + Butterworth, Major + + Button, Emma, Lamb's acrostic + + Button Snap, Lamb's cottage + + Bye, Thomas + + Byron, Lord + + + C + + _Cabinet, The_ + + Callers, Lamb on + + Calne, the Lambs at + + Cambridge, the Lambs' visit in + Lamb at + + "Cambridge Brawn" + + Campbell, J. Dykes + on Coleridge in 1806 + on Coleridge's pension + + Capital Punishment, Lamb on + + Carlisle, Sir Antony + + Caroline of Brunswick + + Cary, H.F. _See_ Letters. + a model parson + his career + at the Museum + and Miss Isola's Latin + and Moxon + his _Euripides_ + his translation of Dante + at the Museum + his verses on Lamb + + Catalani and Coleridge + + Cellini, his autobiography + + Chambers, Charles. _See_ Letters. + and Lamb's praise of fish + his family + + John. _See_ Letters. + + _Champion, The_ + + "Chapel Bell, The," by Southey + + Chapman's _Homer_ + + _Chatsworth_, by Patmore + + Chaucer, Godwin's _Life_ + + Cheshire cats + + _Chessiad, The_ + + Children's books, Lamb on + + Childs, Mr. _See_ Letters. + + Chimney-sweepers + + China, Manning's intentions + Lamb on + + _Christabel_ + + "Christian Names of Women" + + Christ's Hospital + + Christy, Dr. + + Clare, John. _See_ Letters. + + Clarke, Charles Cowden. _See_ Letters. + his career + and Novello + his marriage + his tuft + + Mary Anne + + Mary Victoria (_née_ Novello) + + Clarkson, Thomas and Catherine. _See_ Letters. + + Coe, Mrs. Elizabeth + + _Caelebs in Search of a Wife_ + + Colburn, Henry. _See_ Letters. + Lamb on + + Zerah + + Cold in the head, Lamb on + + Colebrooke Cottage + + Coleridge, Derwent + + Rev. Edward. _See_ Letters. + + Hartley + + Henry Nelson, his _Six Months in the West Indies_ + + Samuel Taylor. _See_ Letters. + and religion, I + in 1796 + and Southey + his Poems + his share of _Joan of Arc_ + alters Lamb's sonnets + his letter of consolation + and opium + and the 1797 volume + and John Lamb, jr. + his baby song + his Ode on the Departing Year + as a husbandman + his Joan of Arc verses + and Rogers + on Lamb + his refusal to write + his "Osorio" + and the Stowey visit + his "Lime-tree Bower" + and Lamb's greatcoat + and C. Lloyd + the Wedgwood annuity + and Lamb's "Theses Qusaedam Theologicae" + the quarrel with Lamb and Lloyd + his letter of remonstrance to Lamb + with Wordsworth in Germany + in Buckingham Street + his articles in the Morning Post + with Lamb in 1800 + his translation of Schiller + his books + his affection for the Lambs + his Anthology poems + on Wordsworth + at Keswick + his Chamounix Hymn + suggests collaboration with Lamb + on Mary Lamb's illness + his Poems, 3rd edition + his Malta plans + at Malta, + and the Wordsworths + in Italy + returns home + and his wife, + The Friend + neglects the Lambs + his potations + his difference with Wordsworth + and Catalani + in 1814 + his "Remorse" + and the translation of "Faust" + his Biographia Literaria + his Sibylline Leaves + a characteristic end + his "Zapolya" + at a chemist's + recites "Kubla Khan" + puts himself under Gillman + attacked by Hazlitt + at Highgate + his Statesman's Manual + his lectures + at Gillman's + on Peter Bell the Third + his "Fancy in Nubibus" + in Lloyd's poem + his book-borrowing + and Allsop + his dying message in 1807 + at Monkhouse's dinner + and Mrs. Gillman + and Irving + and the Prize Essay + and Hood's _Odes_ + his _Aids to Reflection_ + on Lamb and Herbert + his joke on summer + and the Albums + for St. Luke's + on William IV. + and the pension + imagines an affront + his death + + Sara + the younger + + Collier, John Dyer. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. John Dyer. _See_ Letters. + + John Payne. _See_ Letters. + + _Colonel Jack_ + + "Common Lot, The," by Montgomery + + _Companion, The_ + + _Conciones ad Populum_ + + "Confessions of a Drunkard" + + Congreve and Voltaire + + Cooke, G.F. + + Cooper, Samuel + + Cornwall, Barry. _See also_ B.W. Procter. + his _English Songs_ + his "King Death," + his "Epistle to Charles Lamb" + + Cottle, Joseph. _See_ Letters. + his "Monody on Henderson," + his epic + his brother's death + his _Malvern Hills_ + his _Alfred_ + his portrait + his _Messiah_ + his _Fall of Cambria_ + + Cotton on "Winter" + on "Old Age" + + Coulson, Walter + + Country, Lamb on the + + Coutts, Mrs. + + Covent Garden, Lamb's love for + + Cowes, the Lambs and Burneys there + + Cowper, William + and Milton + _The Royal George_ + + Cresswell, Dr., vicar of Edmonton + + Croly, Rev. George + + Cromwell and Napoleon + + Cromwell, Cooper's portrait of + + Cruelty to animals, John Lamb's pamphlet + + Cunningham, Allan + + _Curse of Kehama_ + + Curtis, Alderman + + + D + + Dalston, the Lambs at + + Danby, the murder of + + Daniel, George + + Samuel + + Darley, George + + Dash, Lamb's dog + + Dawe, George + + "Deathbed, A" + + "Decay of Imagination," Lamb's essay on + + Dedications to Lamb + + Defoe, Daniel + + De Quincey, Thomas + + Dermody, Thomas + + Despard, Colonel + + De Staël, Madame, on Germany + + _Desultory Thoughts in London_ + + "Dialogue between a Mother and Child" + + Dibdin, Charles + + John Bates. _See_ Letters. + his meeting with Lamb + his death + + "Dick Strype" + + Dilke, Charles Wentworth. _See_ Letters + + "Dissertation on Roast Pig" + + Dobell, Mr. Bertram + + Dodd, Dr. + + Dodwell, H., Lamb's letters to + + "Don Giovanni" + + "Douglas," by Home + + Dowden, Mrs. _See_ Mrs. John Lamb. + + _Dramatic Specimens_ + + Drink, Lamb on + + Druitt, Mary + + Duddon Sonnets + + Duncan, Miss + + Dupuy, P.S., his translation + + Dyer, George. _See_ Letters + and Horne Tooke + his poetry + his twin volumes + his many "veins" + his critical preface + and the epic + on Shakespeare + his phrenesis + his fallacy + his _Poems_ + and Burnett + his hunger-madness + as the hero of a novel + and the Earl of Buchan + his autobiography + his annuity + his disappearance + and Earl Stanhope + and Lord Stanhope + on other people's poetry + his "Poetic Sympathies" + his immersion + his novel way with dead books + his marriage + and Novello + and Emma Isola's album + and Rogers + his Unitarian tract + his blindness + + Mrs. George. _See_ Letters + + "Dying Lover, The" + + + E + + _Earl of Abergavenny_ + + East India House + + _Edinburgh Review_ and Wordsworth + + Edmonton, the Lambs' home there + + _Edmund Oliver_ + + "Edward, Edward" + + Elia, F. Augustus + death of the original + + "Elia, Sonnet to" + + _Elia_, dedication of + the American second series + _Last Essays of_ + + Elton, Sir C.A. + + Enfield, Lamb at + Lamb settles there + Lamb's house there + and neighbourhood + + _English Bards and Scotch Reviewers_ + + _English Songs_, by Procter + + _Englishman's Magazine_ + + "Enviable," Lamb on + + Epic poetry and George Dyer + + "Epitaph on Ensign Peacock" + + "--on Mary Druitt" + + "--on the Rigg Children" + + Epitaphs, Lamb on + Wordsworth on + + Evans, William + + Examiner, The, references to Miss Kelly + and Lamb's _Album Verses_ + + _Excursion_, the + + Exeter Change + + + F + + Fairfax's _Tasso_ + + _Falstaffs Letters_ + + "Fancy in Nubibus" + + "Farewell to Tobacco" + + Farmer, Priscilla, Lloyd's grandmother + + "Faulkener," Godwin's play + + Fauntleroy, the forger + + "Faust," by Goethe + + Fawcetts, the two + + Fell, Lamb's friend + + Fénélon + + Fenwick, John + + Field, Barron. _See_ Letters. + + Mary, Lamb's grandmother + + Fireworks, Lamb on + + First-fruits of Australian Poetry + + FitzGerald, Edward, his "Meadows in Spring" + his memoir of Barton + + FitzGerald, Mrs., at Islington + + Fleet Prison + + Fletcher, John, Lamb on + + Ford, John + + Fornham + + Forster, John. _See_ Letters. + + Fox, George, his Journal + + Franklin, Marmaduke + + _Fraser's Magazine_ + + "Free Thoughts on Some Eminent Composers" + + Frenchmen, Lamb on + + Frend, William + + _Friend, The_ + + Fryer, Miss. _See_ Letters. + Lamb's song for + + Fuller, Thomas + + + G + + Gardener, Lamb as a + + _Garrick Extracts_ + + _Gebir_, by Landor + + _Gem, The_ + + "Gentle Giantess, The" + + "Gentle-hearted Charles" + + George III. + + Ghoul, the + + Gilford, William + + Gigliucci, Countess. _See_ Novello, Clara. + + Gillman, James. _See_ Letters. + and Coleridge + + Rev. James. _See_ Letters. + + Gilray, his caricature of Coleridge and Co. + + Goddard House School, Lamb at + + Godiva, Lady, and John Martin + + Godwin, William. _See_ Letters. + and Allen + first meeting + and Coleridge + in Ireland + and Mary Lamb's appetite + his "Antonio" + his pride + his Persian play + his courtship, Lamb on + his "Faulkener" + his dulness + his _Chaucer_ + and Hazlitt + Lamb's apology to + and the _Tales from Shakespear_ + his shop + and the Adventures of Ulysses + his letter of criticism to Lamb + on sepulchres + and Mrs. Godwin + his "tomb" + his disrespect + his difficulties + + Mrs. _See_ Letters. + + Goethe, Lamb on + + Gould, Mrs. _See_ Miss Burrell. + + "Grandame, The" + + "Grandpapa," the, by J. Howard Payne + + Great Russell Street, Lamb's home in + + Grecians, Lamb on + + Green, J.H. + + Greg, Mr., Lamb's tenant + + Gregory, Dr. + + Grenville, Lord, and Coleridge + + Gum-boil and Tooth-ache + + Gutch, John Mathew + + Gwynn, Mr. Stephen, his translations of Lamb's Latin letters + + "Gypsy's Malison, The" + + + H + + Hancock, his drawing of Lamb + + Handwriting, Lamb on + + Harley, J.P. + + Harrow Church, Lamb in + + Hastings, the Lambs at + Hood at, + Lamb on, + Dibdin at + + Haydon, B.R. _See_ Letters. + his career + his party + and Godwin's difficulties + subjects for pictures + his "Chairing the Member" + + Hayes, Mary, and Charles Lloyd + + Hayward, A., his _Faust_ + + Hazlitt, John + + Mrs. John + + Mary + + Sarah. _See_ Sarah Stoddart + + Rev. W. _See_ Letters. + + William. _See_ Letters. + on Lamb + his portrait of Lamb + his first meeting with Lamb + and Ned Search + the misogynist + and Lamb scolded + woos Sarah Stoddart + his love affair + the joke of his death + plans for his wedding + his wedding + missed in London + his _Grammar_ + and the _Political Register_ + his son born + his post on the _Chronicle_ + misunderstanding with Lamb + his review of the _Excursion_ + his Lake Country "scapes" + on Coleridge + his conversation + his borrowings from Lamb + knocked down by John Lamb + his lectures in 1818 + his "Conversation of Authors" + on Lamb's Letter to Southey + on bodily pain + on Shelley + on Lamb + his _Spirit of the Age_ + his second marriage + in Paris + his portrait of Lamb + on Defoe and Lamb + his losses + his death + jr. _See_ Letters. + + "Helen Repentant too Late" + + Hell-fire Dick + + Hemans, Mrs. + + Henderson, Cottle's Monody on + + Henshaw, William, Lamb's godfather + + Herbert, George, Lamb on + + Hesiod, Lamb on + + "Hester" + + Hetty, the Lambs' servant + + Hicks' Hall + + Higginbottom Sonnet + + Hill, Thomas. _See_ Letters. + + Hissing, Lamb on + + Holcroft, Fanny + + Harwood + + Louisa + + Thomas + + Mrs. Thomas. _See_ Mrs. Kenney. + + Tom. _See_ Letter. + + Hollingdon Rural Church + + Hollingshead, Mr. John + + Holmes, Edward + + Homer, Lamb on + + Hone, Alfred + + Matilda + + William. _See_ Letters. + first letter to + _Every-Day Book_ + Lamb's lines to + and the Garrick plays + his _Table Book_ stops + and his difficulties + and the _Times_ + + Hood, Thomas. _See_ Letters. + his _Odes and Addresses_ + Lamb on + his "Very Deaf Indeed" + his still-born child + frames picture with Lamb + his picture of Mary Lamb + and Dash + his _Plea of the Midsummer Fairies_ + his genius + his parody of Lamb + + Hoole, John + + Hopkins, Dick, the swearing scullion + + Howell, James, his _Familiar Letters_ quoted + + Mrs. + + _Hudibras_ quoted + + Hudson, Mr. + + Hugo, Victor, and Lamb + + Hume, Joseph, M.P. + _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. + + the Misses + + Humphreys, Miss. _See_ Letters. + + Hunt, John + + Hunt, Leigh. _See_ Letters. + on Lamb's books + and the Lambs + a lost letter to + his need of friends + in Italy + and freethinking + his handwriting + his _Lord Byron_ + his _Companion_ + and Lamb's _Album Verses_ + and Lamb's _Satan_ + + Hunt, Thornton + + Hurst and Robinson's failure + + Hyde Park, the jubilation in 1814 + + + I + + Imagination, Lamb on + + Imlay, Fanny + + Incendiarism at Enfield + + India, Lamb on + + Inner Temple Lane + + "Innocence," Lamb's sonnet + + Irving, Edward, and Coleridge + his watch chain + with Coleridge at St. Luke's + his squint + + Isle of Wight, the Lambs in + + Isola, Emma + her Latin + to become a governess + her reading of Milton + her album + her engagement at Pornham + her illness + and her physic + and her watch + her marriage + a sonnet to + her appearance + + Harriet + + Italian, the Lambs read + + + J + + James, Sarah, _See_ Letters. + + Jameson, R.S., Hartley Coleridge's sonnets + + Jameson, R.S., and Miss Isola + + "Janus Weathercock," _See also_ Wainewright, T.G. + + Jekyll, Joseph + + Jerdan, William, and Lamb + + _Joan of Arc_, + and Coleridge + + _John Bull_ and Rogers + + _John Buncle_ + + John-Dory, Lamb on + + _John Woodvil_ + + Johnson, Dr. + + Joshua, Martin's picture + + + K + + "Kais," the opera + + Keats, John, at Haydon's + + Kelly, Fanny H. + + Maria. _See_ Letters. + her divine plain face + Lamb's proposal to her + Lamb's sonnet to + her letter to Lamb + learns Latin from Mary Lamb + and "Barbara S." + at the Strand Theatre + + Kenney family + + Mrs. James. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. Louisa (afterwards Mrs. Badams). _See_ Letters. + + Sophy, Lamb's wife + + Keymer, Mr., his album + + Kew Palace, the Lambs at + + "King Death," by Barry Cornwall + + _King and Queen of Hearts, The_ + + "Kirkstone Pass" + + Kitchener, Doctor + + Knight, Anne + + Knowles, J.S. + + Kosciusko, Thaddeus + + "Kubla Khan" + + + L + + "Lady Blanche," verses by Mary Lamb + + Lakes, the Lambs among the + + Lamb family in + + Charles, his temporary madness + his love sonnets + on Priestley + and Coleridge in + on his sonnets + on old plays + on Hope and Fear + and the Bristol holiday + on the tragedy of Sept. 22 + on his sister's virtues + his salary + on his love + his share of Coleridge's _Poems_, 1797 + on simplicity + on Bowles + and his mother + on Coleridge's 2nd edition + his "Tomb of Douglas" + on Cowper and Milton + on Burns + his second sonnet to his sister + on his share of the 1797 _Poems_ + he exhorts Coleridge to attempt an epic + on friendship + his first poem to Lloyd + on a subject for Coleridge + on Cowper + on Quakerism + his "Vision of Repentance" + on the 1797 _Poems_ + at Stowey + leaves Little Queen Street + at Southey's + his lines on his mother's death + his second poem to C. Lloyd + and Lloyd and White + his sarcastic propositions for Coleridge + the quarrel with Coleridge + on Wither and Quarles + on _Rosamund Gray_ + on Southey's "Eclogues" + on Marlowe + on the "Ancient Mariner" + and his tailor + his appeal for a poor friend + on his mind + on poems on dumb creatures + his epitaph on Ensign Peacock + on Blakesware + on alcoholic beverages + and mathematics + on Lloyd and Mary Hayes + on Bishop Burnet + on _Falstaff's Letters_ + among the Blue-stockings + as a linguist + on Hetty's death + on Lake society + on narrow means + on Oxford + his joke against Gutch + on the "Gentle Charles" + the use of the final "e" + by punch-light + as a consoler + and the snakes + his praise of London + he takes in Manning + and Godwin's supper + his Epilogue for "Antonio" + on the failure of "Antonio" + on his Cambridge plans + on the _Lyrical Ballads_ + his move to Mitre Court Buildings + his namesake + on his religious state in 1801 + at Margate + on Godwin's courtship + his dramatic suggestions + on Napoleon + his spare figure + at the Lakes + his project for collaborating with Coleridge + on children's books + on Napoleon and Cromwell + on Chapman's _Homer_ + on Milton's prose + on Cellini + on Independent Tartary + on Coleridge's _Poems_, 3rd edition + his 1803 holiday + his adventure at sea + his difficulties as a reviewer + ceases to be a journalist + his miserliness + on old books + his motto + his portrait by Hazlitt + on John Wordsworth's death + on brawn + on his sister + his portrait by Hancock + on pictures + on Nelson + in unsettled state + on Manning's departure for China + on "Mr. H." + and Hazlitt scolded + reconciled to Godwin + and Hazlitt's "death" + his difference with Godwin + at Hazlitt's wedding + on painter-authors + and the Sheridans + on moving + on critics + on the choice of a wife + criticises Mr. Lloyd's _Homer_ + visits Hazlitt + his books + on titles of honour + a list of friends + on Wither + on epitaphs + his aquavorousness + a servant difficulty + and Hazlitt's _Chronicle_ appointment + on the _Excursion_ + and _The Champion_ + blown up by Hazlitt + his new book room + and Gifford + a landed proprietor + on Wordsworth's 1815 poems + on Vincent Bourne + his office work + on presents + on the India House shackles + his diffidence as a critic + on his sister's illnesses + he lies to Manning + on Coleridge and Wordsworth + on _Christabel_ + his borrowed good things + on Australia + on distant correspondents + as matter-of-lie man + his Hogarths + on the plague of friends + his after-dinner speeches + on _Peter Bell_ + on Mackery End + on _The Waggoner_ + on two inks + his proposal to Miss Kelly + at Cambridge + on William Wordsworth + on other C L.'s + on Lord Byron + on book-borrowing + at Haydon's + and Leigh Hunt + and his aunt's cake + in praise of pig + on death + his efforts for Godwin + his directions for seeing Paris + and his child-wife + on India House + on Shelley + on Godwin's case + and Scott + on Moore + on Defoe + his epigram on Wadd + on George Fox + as _Elia_ + on the advantages of routine + on publishers + his propensity to lie + on Fox + on Quakers + on India House + in Parnassus, 651 + his after-dinner speeches + on Fox + on Colebrooke Cottage + makes his will + at the Mansion House + on Physiology + on Marlowe and Goethe + his cold + not a good man + on monetary gifts + and Thackeray + on booksellers breaking + Hazlitt on + resignation + his release + his pension + on fish + ill + on magazine payment + on puns + on Hood's _Odes_ + on Signor Velluti + on the death of children + lines to Hone + his last _London_ article + on Hood + on Quarles and Herbert + on stationery + on Manning + on a cold + on Brook Pulham's etching + on Hastings + on Fletcher's play + on publishers + his autobiography + on Sunday + his savings + on Randal Norris + at Goddard House School + and Mrs. Norris's pension + his criticism of Patmores Chatsworth + his difficulties with the drama + on Cary + on memorials + on Albums + on mad dogs + his house at Enfield + and Mathew's picture + his epigram on the Edward crosses + portraits of him + on milestones + on the Pilgrim's Progress + his serenata for Cowden Clarke's marriage + his favourite walk + his namesake + will write for antiquity + his "Gypsy's Malison" + his sonnet on Daniel Rogers + on Thomas Aquinas + on the Laureates + his joke upon Robinson + in London in 1829 + and Mary Lamb's absence + and the burden of leisure + moves to the Westwoods + on Defoe + on Thomas Westwood + on bankrupts + on town and country + asked to collect his _Specimens_ + the journey from Fornham + his turnip joke + his skill at acrostics + on an escapade + and Merchant Taylors' boys + and the Hone subscription + on Music + on Martin Burney + visits London in 1830 + on his critics + and his will + on incendiarism + on Dyer's blindness + on Christ's Hospital days + on Coleridge's pension + on Montgomery's "Common Lot" + and the _Englishman's Magazine_ + on FitzGerald's "Meadows in Spring" + on Unitarians + on his unsaleability + on Coleridge's imagined affront + on "Rose Aylmer" + his pensioners + his advice on speculation + spurious letter of + mistaken for a murderer + his sonnet on women's names + and the _Elia_ lawsuit + injury to his leg + on John Taylor, 966. + leaves Enfield for Edmonton + on the _Last Essays of Elia_ + his gift of Milton to Wordsworth + at Widford + his coffin nails + on Emma Isola's marriage + reads the _Inferno_ + his London holiday + his request for books + on Mr. Fuller Russell's poetry + on Coleridge's death + on his excesses at Gary's + his jokes on widows + his name child + Procter's "Epistle" to + + Elizabeth, her death + and her daughter + and John Lamb, jr. + and her sister-in-law + + John, his querulousness + his death + the younger, his accident + and the tragedy + on Coleridge + his pamphlet + his portrait of Milton + knocks down Hazlitt + death of + + Mrs. John. _See_ Letters. + + Mary. _See_ Letters. + her frenzy + and her mother + her recovery + dedication to + Lamb's second sonnet to + removed from confinement, + her 1798 relapse + invited to Stowey + her first poem + her appetite + taken ill + on her brother + on secrecy + on her mother and her aunt + two poems + on John Wordsworth's death + two other poems by + her calligraphy + projecting literary work + on marriage + plans for new books + on Coleridge in 1806 + her silk dress + on presents + on Coleridge + her water cure + on marriage + appeals for Miss Fricker + her letter to a child + discovers a room + her article on Needlework + her first joke + on the Cambridge excursion + on roadside churches + at the window + on the death of a child + teaches Miss Kelly Latin and learns French + ill in France + as a smuggler + her illness + drawn by Hood + her sonnet to Emma Isola + her 1827 illness + her 1829 illness + her verses on her brother + moved to Edmonton + and Emma Isola's marriage + Lamb's praise of + her death + on Mrs. Norris's death + + Sarah (Aunt Hetty) + and the rich relative + her death + her funeral + and her sister-in-law + + Landon, Letitia E. + + Landor, Walter Savage. _See_ Letters. + his _Julian_ + his _Imaginary Conversations_ + and _Elia_ + his visit to Lamb + his verses for Emma Isola + his "Rose Aylmer" + his verses on Lamb + + _Last Essays of Elia_ + + Latin letters by Lamb + + Laureates, Lamb on the + + _Lay of Marie, The + + Legal joke, a + + Le Grice, C.V. + + Samuel + + Leishman, Mrs. + + Leonardo da Vinci + + "Leonora," by Bürger + + Letters in verse + + "Letter to an Old Gentleman" + + "Lewti," by Coleridge + + Lies + + "Lime-tree Bower," Coleridge's poem + + Lincolnshire and the Lambs + + Liston, John + + _Literary Gazette, The_ + + "Living without God in the World" + + Livingston, Mr. Luther S. + + Lloyd, Charles, the elder, described by Robert Lloyd + the elder, Lamb's letters to + + the younger. _See_ Letters. + his career to 1796 + his sonnets on "Priscilla Farmer" + Lamb's lines to + on Lamb + his illness + and Coleridge + at Southey's + and Sophia Pemberton + Lamb's lines on + a quarrel averted + the quarrel with Coleridge + letter to Cottle + and _The Anti-Jacobin_ + and Mary Hayes + his first-born + an "American" + described by Robert Lloyd + a lost letter to + his illness in 1815 + in London, in 1819 + his _Desultory Thoughts in London_ + his _Poems_, 1823 + + Olivia + + Priscilla + + Robert, Lamb's first letter to + with Lamb + advice from his sister + advice from Lamb + in London, 1800 + Lamb's letters to + on his father + his marriage + in London + his death + + Sophia + + Lockhart, J.G. + + Lofft, Capell + + Logan quoted + + London, Lamb's praise of + + _London Magazine, The_ + + London Tavern dinner + + "Londoner, The," by Lamb + + Lord Chief Justice, Lamb on + + Lord Mayor of London and Leviathan + + Lottery puffs + tickets + + "Love will Come," by Lamb + + Love sonnets, Lamb's + + Lovell, Robert + + Luther in the Warteburg + + lyrical Ballads + + + M + + Mackery End, Lamb on + + Mackintosh, Sir James, Lamb's epigram + + Macready and Lamb + + Magazines, Lamb on + + Man, Henry, his epigram + + "Man of Ross" + + Manning, Thomas. _See_ Letters. + his career to 1799 + his grimaces + his letters to Lamb + unpublished Setters from Lamb + first news of China + in Paris + and Napoleon + his Chinese project + he leaves for China + Thibet and China + his return to England + on Wordsworth + and Fanny Holcroft + at the Lambs + Lamb on + his last days + + Mansion House, Lamb at + + Marlowe, Christopher + + Marriage, Lamb on + + Mary Lamb on + + Marshall, Godwin's friend + + Marter, William. _See_ Letters. + + Martin, John + + Louisa, viii. + + Marvell quoted + + Mary of Buttermere + + Maseres, Baron + + Massinger, Philip + + Mathematics and Lamb + + Mathews, Charles, his picture + + Mrs. Charles, and the Lambs + + Mathias' _Pursuits of Literature_ + + "Matter-of-lie man," Lamb as + + May, John + + William, I. + + "Meadows in Spring," by FitzGerald + + Mellish, Mr. + + Mellon, Harriet + + Merchant Taylors' epigrams + + Meyer, Henry, "The Young Catechist" + his portrait of Lamb + + Milestones, Lamb on + + Milton, John, and Cowper + + Milton, John, his Defence + John Lamb's portrait + Lamb's gift to Wordsworth + + Mitchell, Thomas + + Mitford, Rev. John + + Mary Russell + + Monkhouse, Thomas + + "Monody on Chatterton" + + Montagu, Basil. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. Basil. _See_ Letters. + + Montgomery, James, and chimney-sweepers + his "Common Lot" + + Moore, Thomas, and Lamb + + Morgan, John + + Mrs. John + + _Morning Chronicle_ + + _Morning Post_ + + Moving, Lamb on + + Moxon, Edward. _See_ Letters. + first mention + his career to 1826 + Lamb's first letter to + his early poems + his _Christmas_ + his Nightingale sonnet + and Rogers + his _Reflector_ + small commissions for Lamb + and Murray + his proposal to Miss Isola + his Oak sonnet + his marriage + his sonnets + + "Mr. H." + + _Mrs. Leicester's School_ + + _Mrs. Leslie and Her Grandchildren_ + + Murray, John + + Music, Lamb on + + + N + + Napoleon + and Manning + and Cromwell + his height + + Nayler, James + + Necessarianism + + Nelson, his death + + _New Monthly Magazine_ + + New River, Lamb on + + "New Year's Eve" + + _New Year's Eve, A_, by Barton + + "Newspapers," Lamb's essay on + + Norris, Miss Jane. _See_ Letters. + + Randal + + Mrs. Randal. _See_ Letters. + + Richard + + Nott, Dr. John + + Novello, Clara (Countess Gigliucci) + + Vincent. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. Vincent. _See_ Letters. + + Novellos, the + + + O + + _Ode on the Departing Year_ + + "Ode to the Treadmill" + + _Odes and Addresses_, by Hood and Reynolds + + Office work, Lamb on + + "Old Actors, The" + + "Old Familiar Faces, The" + + Oilier, C. and J. _See_ Letters. + + "On an Infant Dying as soon as Born" + + "Osorio," Coleridge's drama + + Oxford, Lamb at + + + P + + Paice, Joseph + + Palmerston, Lord + + Pantisocracy, II. + + Pardo, Father + + Paris, Lamb on + + Mrs. + + Park, Judge + + Parr, Dr., and Lamb + + Parsons, Mrs. + + Pasta, Madame + + Patmore, Coventry + + P.G. _See_ Letters. + John Scott's second + a nonsense letter to + his _Chatsworth_ + his imitation of Lamb + seeking a publisher + + Paul, C. Kegan, and the "Theses" + + "Pawnbroker's Daughter, The" + + Payne, John Howard. _See_ Letters. + + Peacock, Ensign + + Pemberton, Sophia + + Penn, William, his _No Cross, No Crown_ + + Persian ambassador + + _Peter Bell_, by Wordsworth + + _Peter Bell the Third_ + + "Peter's Net" + + _Philip Quarll_ + + Phillips, Colonel + + Ned + + Sir Richard + + Phillips's _Theatrum Poetarum_ + + Physiology, Lamb on + + Pictures, Lamb on + + Pig, Lamb's praise of + + _Pilgrims Progress_ + + Pindar, Peter + + "Pipos." _See_ Derwent Coleridge + + "Pizarro," Sheridan's play + + Plantus, Joseph + + _Plea of the Midsummer Fairies_ + + Plumer family + + Plura, a mysterious woman + + "Poetic Sympathies," by George Dyer + + _Poetry for Children_ + + Poets' dinner party + + "Poet's Epitaph," by Wordsworth + + _Political Decameron, The_ + + Pompey, Lamb's dog + + Poole, John + + Thomas. _See_ Letters. + + "Poor Susan, Reverie of" + + Pope, Alexander + + "Popular Fallacies" + + Postage rates in 1797 + + Presentation copies, Lamb on + + Presents, Lamb on + + "Pride's Cure." _See John Woodvil._ + + Priestley, Joseph + + Procter, B.W. _See_ Letters. + _See also_ Barry Cornwall. + in 1823 + his marriage + and Lamb's will + and Pulham's etching + + Mrs., and Lamb + + _Prometheus Unbound_ story + + Pry, Tom + + Publishers, Lamb on + + Pulham, Brook, his etching of Lamb + + Pun at Salisbury + + Puns, Lamb on + + _Purchas, His Pilgrimage_ + + Pye, Henry James + + + Q + + Quakers + + Quarles, Lamb on + + _Quarterly Review_, Lamb's review for + and Lamb + + Quillinan, Edward + + + R + + _Recreations in Agriculture_, etc. + + _Reflector, The_, Moxon's paper + + Reform Bill + + _Rejected Addresses_ + + _Rejected Articles_ + + "Religion of Actors" + + "Religious Musings" + + Rembrandt + + "Remorse," by Coleridge + + Reynolds, John Hamilton + + Miss + + Mrs., Lamb's schoolmistress + + Rheumatism, Lamb on + + "Richard II.," Lamb's epilogue to + + Richmond, the Lambs at + + Rickman, John. _See_ Letters. + + Miss + + Mrs. + + Rigg children, Lamb's verses on + + _Rimini_, Leigh Hunt's poem + + "Road to Ruin, The" + + _Robinson Crusoe_ + + Robinson, Anthony + + Mrs. Anthony + + Henry Crabb. _See_ Letters. + he meets Lamb + Lamb on + and "Peter Bell," + his admiration of Wordsworth + his presents to Lamb + at Monkhouse's dinner + his present to Mary Lamb + his rheumatism. + + Thomas. _See_ Letters. + + _Roderick_, by Southey + + Rogers, Daniel, Lamb's sonnet on + + Rogers, Samuel. _See_ Letters. + and Coleridge + and Wordsworth's "Force of Prayer" + at Monkhouse's dinner + his letter to Lamb + and Moxon + his _Italy_ + and _John Bull_ + and G. Dyer + Lamb's sonnet to + + Romilly, Sir Samuel + + _Rosamund Gray_ + + "Rose Aylmer," by Landor + + _Roxana_ + + Russell, J. Fuller. _See_ Letters. + and _Satan in Search of a Wife_ + his poem criticised + + Ryle, Charles + + + S + + Sadler's Wells + + "Saint Charles" + + "St. Crispin to Mr. Gifford" + + St. Luke's Hospital + + Salisbury, Lamb's pun at + + Salt-water soap + + Salutation and Cat + + Sargus, Mr. _See_ Letters. + Lamb's tenant + + _Satan in Search of a Wife_ + + Savage, Richard + + Savory, Hester + + Scott, John. _See_ Letters. + + Sir Walter. _See_ Letters. + + Sentiment, Lamb on + + Settle, Elkanah + + Shakespeare, George Dyer on + the Bellows portrait + and _Elia_ + his illustrations + + "She dwelt among the untrodden ways" + + Sheep-stealing, Lamb on + + Shelley, P.B. + death of + Lamb on + Hazlitt on, + "Lines to a Reviewer" + + Mrs. P.B. _See_ Letters. + + Sheridan and Lamb + + Simmons, Ann + + Simonds, the ghoul + + _Six Months in the West Indies_ + + Skeffington, Sir Lumley + + Skiddaw, Lamb on + + Smith, Charlotte + + Mrs. + + Smoking, Lamb on + + Snakes, Lamb visits + + "Soldier's Daughter, The," by J. Howard Payne + + Sonnet to Elia + on "Work" + + "Sonnet to a Nameless Friend" + + Southampton Buildings + + Southey, Edith + sonnet to + + Dr. + + Robert, his _Joan of Arc_ + 1796 + and Cowper + his daetyl + and Coleridge + his _Madoc_ + entertains Lamb and Lloyd + and the "Sonnet to Simplicity" + his _Joan of Arc_ + his "Eclogues" + on "The Ancient Mariner" + his _Poems_, 2nd edition + his description of Manning + in Dublin + on the perfect household + his _Curse of Kehama_ + his _Roderick_ + death of his son + the lapidary style + his fortune + his criticism of _Elia_ + Lamb's Letter to + his reply to Lamb + his _Tale of Paraguay_ + his _Book of the Church_ + his "Vesper Bell" + his "Chapel Bell" + his _Life of Bunyan_ + and Hone + his defence of Lamb + + Spenser, Edmund, and Mr. Spencer + his sonnet to Harvey + + _Spirit of the Age, The_ + + "Spiritual Law," by Barton + + Stamps, Comptroller of + + Stationery, Lamb on + + Stoddart, John. _See_ Letters. + + Lady. _See_ Letters. + + Sarah (afterwards Sarah Hazlitt). _See_ Letters. + her love affairs + her mother's illness + plans for her wedding + her wedding + + Stoke Newington, the Lambs at + + Stothard, Thomas, Lamb's lines to + + Stowey, Lamb at + + Stuart, Daniel, on Lamb + + Sunday, Lamb on + + "Superannuated Man" + + "Supersedeas," by Wither + + "Suum Cuique," by Lamb + + Swift, Dean + + Swinburne, A.C., and Lamb, and + + Hugo + on Lamb's dramatic suggestions + + Sydney, Sir Philip, and Lamb + + _Sylvia_, by George Darley + + + T + + _Table Book_, Lamb's fable + + Tailors, Lamb on + + _Tales from Shakespear_ + + Talfourd, Thomas Noon. _See_ Letters. + made a serjeant + his "Verses in Memory of a Child" + + Talma and Lamb + + "Tartar Drum," Lamb's version + + Tartary, Lamb on + + _Tatler, The_, and Jerdan + + Tayler, C.B. + + Taylor, Jeremy + John. _See_ Letters. + editor of the _London Magazine_ + and the _Elia_ lawsuit + + Temple finally left + + Thackeray and Lamb + + _Thanksgiving Ode_, by Wordsworth + + Thekla's song in "Wallenstein" + + Thelwall, John + + "Theses Quaedam Theologicae" + + Thievery in Australia + + Thurlow, Lord + + Thurtell the murderer + + Titian, Mary Lamb's verses + the Music Piece + + Titles of honour, Lamb on + + "To a Bird that Haunted the Waters of Lacken" + + "To Emma Learning Latin and Desponding" + + "To a Friend on his Marriage" + + "To the Poet Cowper" + + "To Sarah and her Samuel" + + "To my Sister," sonnet + + "To a Young Lady going out to India" + + Tobin, James Webbe + + John + + "Tomb of Douglas, The" + + "Tooth-ache and Gum-boil" + + Towers, Mrs., Lamb's sonnet to + + Town and country, Lamb on + + Toynbee, Dr. Paget + + "Translation of Enoch," by Barton + + Travels, Lamb on + + Trelawney, E.J. + + Trimmer, Mrs. + + Tunbridge Wells, the Lambs at + + Turbot, Lamb on + + Turnips and legs of mutton + + Tuthill, Sir George + + Twiss, Horace + + + U + + Unitarianism + + + V + + Velluti, Signer + + "Vindictive Man, The" + + Virgin and Child, Mary Lamb's verses + + "Vision of Horns" + + "Vision of Judgment," by Byron + + "Vision of Repentance, A" + + Voltaire and Congreve + + Voltaire and Wordsworth + Lamb on + + + W + + Wadd, Lamb's colleague + + Waggoner, The + + Wainewright, T.G., _See also_ "Janus Weathercock" + + Walton, Isaak + + Warner's _Syrinx_ + + Watch, Emma Isola's + + _Watchman, The_ + + Webster, his "Vittoria Corombona" + + Wednesdays, Lamb's evening + + Wesley, Miss + + Westwood, Thomas + Cottage + + Wharry, Dr. + + Whist + + "White Devil, The" + + _White Doe of Rylstone_ + + White, Edward + James + + Widford + + "Widow, The" + + _Widow's Tale, The_, by Barton + + Widows, a list of + + "Wife, The," by Sheridan Knowles + + "Wife's Trial, The," by Lamb + + Wilde, Serjeant + + William IV. + + Williams, Mrs. _See_ Letters + and Emma Isola + and the acrostics + + Wilson, John, his biography + + Wilson, Walter. _See_ Letters. + and Lamb's apology + Lamb's fellow-clerk + visits Lamb + his _Life of Defoe_ + + Windham, William + + Winterslow + the Lambs at + + "Witch, The," by Lamb + + Wither, George, and Quarles + Lamb on + his "Supersedeas" + + Woolman, John + + Wordsworth, Dorothy. _See_ Letters. + at Stowey + a letter from + her poems + + Wordsworth, William, _See_ Letters. + at Stowey + and Coleridge in Germany + his economy + _Lyrical Ballads_, 2nd edition + at Bartholomew Fair + his marriage + his £8 worth of books + and Shakespeare + his difference with Coleridge + _The Excursion_ + and Voltaire + his _Poems_, 1815 edition + his illegible hand + on Burns + and _Peter Bell the Third_ + _The Waggoner_ + his Duddon sonnets + at Haydon's + + Wordsworth, William, at Monkhouse's dinner + in London + his Milton, a gift from Lamb + + John, his death + William, jr. + + "Work," Lamb's sonnet + + _Works_, Lamb's + + Worsley, Lady Frances + + Wortley, Lady Mary + + Wroughton, Richard, his letter about "Mr. H." + + + Y + + "Yarrow Visited" + + "Yew Trees," Wordsworth's poem + + "Young Catechist, The" + + + Z + + "Zapolya" + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb +(Vol. 6), by Charles and Mary Lamb + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WORKS OF C. & M. LAMB, V6 *** + +***** This file should be named 10851-8.txt or 10851-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/8/5/10851/ + +Produced by Keren Vergon, Virginia Paque and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) + Letters 1821-1842 + +Author: Charles and Mary Lamb + +Release Date: January 28, 2004 [EBook #10851] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WORKS OF C. & M. LAMB, V6 *** + + + + +Produced by Keren Vergon, Virginia Paque and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + + + + + THE WORKS OF + CHARLES AND MARY LAMB + VI. LETTERS + 1821-1842 + + + + + THE LETTERS + + OF + + CHARLES AND MARY LAMB + + 1821-1842 + + EDITED BY + + E.V. LUCAS + + WITH A FRONTISPIECE + + + + +CONTENTS OF VOLUME VI + +LETTER 1821 + +264 Charles Lamb to Dorothy Wordsworth Jan. 8 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +265 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop No date + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +266 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop No date + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +267 Charles Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton Jan. 23 + From the original. + +268 Charles Lamb to Miss Humphreys Jan. 27 + From the original at Rowfant. + +269 Charles Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton. March 15 + From the original. + +270 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop March 30 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +271 Charles Lamb to Leigh Hunt April 18 + From Leigh Hunt's _Correspondence_. + +272 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge May 1 + From the _Life of Charles Mathews_. + +273 Charles Lamb to James Gillman May 2 + From the _Life of Charles Mathews_. + +274 Charles Lamb to John Payne Collier May 16 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +275 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter ?Summer + From facsimile in Mrs. Field's _A Shelf of + Old Authors_. + +276 Charles Lamb to John Taylor June 8 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +277 Charles Lamb to John Taylor July 21 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +278 Charles Lamb to C.A. Elton Aug. 17 + From the original in the possession of + Sir Edmund Elton. + +279 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Summer + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +280 Mary Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton No date + From the original in the possession of + Mr. A.M.S. Methuen. + +281 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Oct. 21 + From the American owner. + +282 Charles Lamb to William Ayrton Oct. 27 + From the original. + + 1822. + +283 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge March 9 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +284 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth March 20 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +285 Charles Lamb to W. Harrison Ainsworth May 7 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +286 Charles Lamb to William Godwin May 16 + Mr. Kegan Paul's text (_William Godwin: + His Friends_, etc.). + +287 Charles Lamb to Mrs. John Lamb May 22 + From the original in the Bodleian. + +288 Charles Lamb to Mary Lamb (_fragment_) Aug. + From Crabb Robinson's _Diary_. + +289 Charles Lamb to John Clare Aug. 31 + From the original (British Museum). + +290 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 11 + From the original (British Museum). + +291 Charles Lamb to Barren Field Sept. 22 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. B.B. Macgeorge. + +292 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Autumn + From the _Century Magazine_. + +293 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Oct. 9 + From the original (British Museum). + +294 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon Oct. 9 + From _Haydon's Correspondence and Table + Talk_. + +295 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Oct. 22 + From the _Century Magazine_. + +296 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon Oct. 29 + From _Haydon's Correspondence and Table + Talk_. + +297 Charles Lamb to Sir Walter Scott Oct. 29 + From Scott's _Familiar Letters_. + +298 Charles Lamb to Thomas Robinson Nov. 11 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +299 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Nov. 13 + From the _Century Magazine_. + +300 Mary Lamb to Mrs. James Kenney ?Early Dec. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +301 Charles Lamb to John Taylor Dec. 7 + From _Elia_ (Bell's edition). + +302 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Dec. 16 + From the original (Bodleian). + +303 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 23 + From the original (British Museum). + + 1823. + +304 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Jan. + From the _Century Magazine_. + +305 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth Jan. + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +306 Charles Lamb to Mr. and Mrs. J.D. Collier Jan. 6 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.B. Adam. + +307 Charles Lamb to Charles Aders Jan. 8 + From the original (Mr. J. Dunlop). + +308 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Jan. 9 + From the original (British Museum). + +309 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Jan. 23 + From the _Century Magazine_. + +310 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Feb. 9 + From the _Century Magazine_. + +311 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 17 + From the original (British Museum). + +312 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Feb. 24 + From Mr. Hazlitt's text. + +313 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 11 + From the original (British Museum). + +314 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 5 + From the original (British Museum). + +315 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter April 13 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +316 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson April 25 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +317 Charles Lamb to Miss Hutchinson (?) + (_fragment_) No date + From _Notes and Queries_. + +318 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin No date + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +319 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton May 3 + From the original (British Museum). + +320 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin May 6 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +321 Mary Lamb to Mrs. Randal Norris June 18 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +322 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +323 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop July + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +324 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 2 + From the original (British Museum). + +325 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 6 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +326 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 9 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +327 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 10 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +328 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +329 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 17 + From the original (British Museum). + +330 Charles Lamb to Charles Lloyd + (_fragment_) Autumn + From _Letters and Poems of Bernard Barton_. + +331 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Oct. 14 + From _Memoir of H.F. Cary_. + +332 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop ?Oct. + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +333 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Oct. 28 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +334 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt Early Nov. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +335 Charles Lamb to Robert Southey Nov. 21 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +336 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Nov. 22 + From the original (British Museum). + +337 Charles Lamb to W. Harrison Ainsworth Dec. 9 + From the original. + +338 Charles Lamb to W. Harrison Ainsworth Dec. 29 + From the original. + + 1824. + +339 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Jan. 9 + From the original (British Museum). + +340 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Jan. 23 + From the original (British Museum). + +341 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +342 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 24 + From the original (British Museum). + +343 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Early Spring + From the original (British Museum). + +344 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Thomas Allsop April 13 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +345 Charles Lamb to William Hone April + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.A. Potts. + +346 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton May 15 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. B.B. Macgeorge. + +347 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 7 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +348 Charles Lamb to W. Marter. July 19 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +349 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin July 28 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +350 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood (?_fragment_) Aug. 10 + From the original. + +351 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 17 + From the original (British Museum). + +352 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 30 + From the original (British Museum). + +353 Charles Lamb to Mrs. John Dyer Collier Nov. 2 + From the original (South Kensington + Museum). + +354 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Nov. 11 + From Barry Cornwall's _Charles Lamb_ + with alterations. + +355 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Nov. 20 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +356 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson Nov. 25 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +357 Charles Lamb to Leigh Hunt ?Nov. + From Leigh Hunt's _Correspondence_ with + alterations. + +358 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 1 + Charles Lamb to Lucy Barton + From the original (British Museum). + + 1825. + +359 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Jan. 11 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +360 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Jan. 17 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +361 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson Jan. 20 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +362 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Jan. 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +363 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +364 Charles Lamb to Thomas Manning ?Feb. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +365 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson. March 1 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +366 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 23 + From the original (British Museum). + +367 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson March 29 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +368 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth April 6 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +369 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 6 + From the original (British Museum). + +370 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson April 18 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + (Last paragraph from original scrap at + Welbeck Abbey.) + +371 Charles Lamb to William Hone May 2 + From the original at Rowfant. + +372 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth May + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +373 Charles Lamb to Charles Chambers ?May + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +374 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge ?June + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +375 Charles Lamb to Henry Colburn (?) June 14 + From the original (South Kensington). + +376 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge July 2 + From the original (Morrison Collection). + +377 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 2 + From the original (British Museum). + +378 Charles Lamb to John Aitken July 5 + +379 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +380 Charles Lamb to Robert Southey Aug. 10 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +381 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 9 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +382 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 24 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +383 Charles Lamb to William Hone Oct. 24 + From the original at Rowfant. + +384 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Dec. 5 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +385 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier ?Dec. + From the original (South Kensington). + + 1826. + +386 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier Early in year + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +387 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier Jan. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +388 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 7 + From the original (British Museum). + +389 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier March 16 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.A. Potts. + +390 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 20 + From the original (British Museum). + +391 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge March 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +392 Charles Lamb to H.F. Gary April 3 + Mr. Hazlitt's text. + +393 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello May 9 + From the original (British Museum). + +394 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton May 16 + From the original (British Museum). + +395 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge June 1 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +396 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin June 30 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +397 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hill No year + From the original (British Museum). + +398 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin July 14 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +399 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth Sept. 6 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +400 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon (fragment). No date + +401 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 9 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +402 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 26 + From the original (British Museum). + +403 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Sept. + From the original in the possession of + Mr. Henry Poulton. + +404 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton No date + From the original (British Museum). + + 1827. + +405 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. 20 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +406 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. 20 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +407 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. 29 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +408 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +409 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon March + From Taylor's _Life of Haydon_. + +410 Charles Lamb to William Hone April + From the original at Rowfant. + +411 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood May + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +412 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton No date + From the original (British Museum). + +413 Charles Lamb to William Hone May + From the original at Rowfant. + +414 Charles Lamb to William Hone June + From the original at Rowfant. + +415 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton June 11 + From the original (British Museum). + +416 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson June 26 + From the original (British Museum). + +417 Charles Lamb to William Hone July + From the original at Rowfant. + +418 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 17 + From the original at Rowfant. + +419 Charles Lamb to P.G. Patmore July 19 + From Patmore's _My Friends and Acquaintances_. + +420 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Shelley July 26 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +421 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Basil Montagu Summer + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +422 Mary Lamb to Lady Stoddart Aug. 9 + +423 Charles Lamb to Sir John Stoddart + From the original (Messrs. Maggs). + +424 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +425 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 28 + From the original (British Museum). + +426 Charles Lamb to P.G. Patmore Sept. + From _My Friends and Acquaintances_. + +427 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 5 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +428 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 13 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +429 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 18 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +430 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood Sept. 18 + From the facsimile in Mrs. Balmanno's + _Pen and Pencil_. + +431 Charles Lamb to Henry Colburn Sept. 25 + From the original (South Kensington). + +432 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Sept. 26 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. Henry Poulton. + +433 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Oct. 1 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +434 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Oct. 2 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. R.W. Dibdin. + +435 Charles Lamb to Barron Field Oct. 4 + From the _Memoirs of Charles Matthews_. + +436 Charles Lamb to William Hone ?Oct. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +437 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood No date + From the _National Review_. + +438 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton No date + From the original (British Museum). + +439 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 4 + From the original (British Museum). + +440 Charles Lamb to Leigh Hunt Dec. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +441 Charles Lamb to William Hone Dec. 15 + +442 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop ?Dec. + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +443 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Dec. 20 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +444 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. 22 + From the original at Rowfant. + +445 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton End of year + From the original (British Museum). + + 1828. + +446 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Jan. 9 + From _Harper's Magazine_ with alterations. + +447 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Jan. + From the original at Rowfant. + +448 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. 18 + From the original at Rowfant. + +449 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Feb. 25 + From _Reminiscences of Writers_. + +450 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Feb. 26 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +451 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon March 19 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +452 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 21 + From the original (British Museum). + +453 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop May 1 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +454 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon May 3 + From the original. + +455 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson May 17 + From the original (British Museum). + +456 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd May 20 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +457 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth May + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +458 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Morgan June 17 + +459 Mary Lamb to the Thomas Hoods ?Summer + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +460 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon Aug. + From Taylor's _Life of Haydon_. + +461 Charles Lamb to John Rickman + (_translation_) Oct. 3 + +462 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Oct. 11 + From the original (British Museum). + +463 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Oct. + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +464 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Nov. 6 + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +465 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood Late autumn + From _Hood's Own_. + +466 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. + Text from Mr. Samuel Davey. + +467 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 5 + From the original (British Museum). + +468 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Dec. + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +469 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd End of year + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + + 1829. + +470 Charles Lamb to George Dyer ?Jan. + From the original (British Museum). + +471 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Jan.19 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +472 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Jan. 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +473 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Jan. 28 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +474 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Jan. 29 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +475 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Early in year + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +476 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Feb. 2 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +477 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Feb. 2 + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +478 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Feb. 27 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +479 Charles Lamb to Samuel Rogers March 22 + From _Rogers and His Contemporaries_. + +480 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +481 Charles Lamb to Miss Sarah James ?April + Text from Mr. Samuel Davey. + +482 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson ?April + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +483 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson April 17 + From the original (Dr. Williams' Library). + +484 Charles Lamb to George Dyer April 29 + From _The Mirror_, 1841. + +485 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood ?May + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +486 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon No date + From _The Autographic Mirror_. + +487 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson May 28 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +488 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton June 3 + From the original (British Museum). + +489 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +490 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Late July + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +491 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Sept. 22 + From the original at Rowfant. + +492 Charles Lamb to James Gillman Oct. 26 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +493 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Nov. 10 + From the original (British Museum). + +494 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Nov. 15 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +495 Charles Lamb to James Gillman ?Nov. 29 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +496 Charles Lamb to James Gillman Nov. 30 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +497 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 8 + From the original (British Museum). + +498 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth +499 Mary Lamb to Dorothy Wordsworth Jan. 22 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +500 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 25 + From the original (British Museum). + +501 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams Feb. 26 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +502 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams March 1 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +503 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt March 4 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +504 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams March 5 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +505 Charles Lamb to James Gillman March 8 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +506 Charles Lamb to William Ayrton March 14 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +507 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams March 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +508 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams April 2 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. Yates Thompson. + +509 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams April 9 + From the original. + +510 Charles Lamb to James Gillman ?Spring + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +511 Charles Lamb to Jacob Vale Asbury ?April + From _The Athenaewn_. + +512 Charles Lamb to Jacob Vale Asbury No date + By permission of Mr. Edward Hartley. + +513 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams April 21 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +514 Charles Lamb to Robert Southey May 10 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +515 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon May 12 + From the original at Rowfant. + +516 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello May 14 + From the original (British Museum). + +517 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello May 20 + From the original (British Museum). + +518 Charles Lamb to William Hone May 21 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +519 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt May 24 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +520 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt June 3 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +521 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton June 28 + From the original (British Museum). + +522 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 30 + From the original (British Museum). + +523 Charles Lamb to Samuel Rogers Oct. 5 + From _Rogers and His Contemporaries_. + +524 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Nov. 8 + From _Recollections of Writers_. + +525 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Nov. 12 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +9526 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Dec. + From the original at Rowfant. + +527 Charles Lamb to George Dyer Dec. 20 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +528 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Christmas + From the original (South Kensington). + + 1831. + +529 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. 3 + From the original at Rowfant. + +530 Charles Lamb to George Dyer Feb. 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +531 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 30 + From the original (British Museum). + +532 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary May 6 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +533 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 14 + From the original at Rowfant. + +534 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Early Aug. + From the original at Rowfant. + +535 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Aug. 5 + From the original at Rowfant. + +536 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Sept. 5 + From the original at Rowfant. + +537 Charles Lamb to William Hazlitt, junior Sept. 13 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_Lamb and Hazlitt_). + +538 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Oct. 24 + From the original at Rowfant. + +539 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. 15 + From the original at Rowfant. + + 1832. + +540 Charles Lamb to Joseph Hume's daughters No date + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +541 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke March 5 + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +542 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge April 14 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +543 Charles Lamb to James Sheridan Knowles ?April + From the original (South Kensington). + +544 Charles Lamb to John Forster ?Late April + From the original (South Kensington). + +545 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon? June 1 + From the original (South Kensington). + +546 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop July 2 + From _Harper's Magazine_. + +547 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Aug. + From the original in the Bodleian. + +548 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson ?Early Oct. + From the original (South Kensington). + +549 Charles Lamb to Walter Savage Landor Oct. + From the original (South Kensington). + +550 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Late in year + From the original at Rowfant. + +551 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Winter + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bonn). + +552 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. + From the original (South Kensington). + +553 Charles Lamb to John Forster. Dec. 23 + From the original (South Kensington). + + 1833. + +554 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +555 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. 3 + From the original at Rowfant. + +556 Charles Lamb to John Forster No date + From the original (South Kensington). + +557 Charles Lamb to John Forster No date + From the original (South Kensington). + +558 Charles Lamb to John Forster No date + From the original (South Kensington). + +559 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. 24 + From the original at Rowfant. + +560 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. 11 + From the original (South Kensington). + +561 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. + From the original (South Kensington). + +562 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd Feb. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +563 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon No date + From the original in the possession of + Mr. Henry Poulton. + +564 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke Feb. + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +565 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Early in year + From the original at Rowfant. + +566 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter. No date + From Procter's Autobiographical Fragment. + +567 Charles Lamb to William Hone March 6 + From the original (National Portrait Gallery). + +568 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon March 19 + From the original (South Kensington). + +569 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Spring + From the original (South Kensington). + +570 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon March 30 + From the original at Rowfant. + +571 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Spring + From the original at Rowfant. + +572 Charles Lamb to John Forster ?March + From the original (South Kensington). + +573 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?April 10 + From the original at Rowfant. + +574 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke April + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +575 Charles Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton April 16 + From the original, lately in the possession + of Mr. Edward Ayrton. + +576 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon April 25 + From the original at Rowfant. + +577 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon April 27 + From the original at Rowfant. + +578 Charles Lamb to the Rev. James Gillman May 7 + +579 Charles Lamb to John Forster May + From the original (South Kensington). + +580 Charles Lamb to John Forster May 12 + From the original (South Kensington). + +581 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth End of May + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +582 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt May 31 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations. + +583 Charles Lamb to Mary Betham June 5 + From _A House of Letters_. + +584 Charles Lamb to Matilda Betham June 5 + From _Fraser's Magazine_. + +585 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 14 + From the original at Rowfant. + +586 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 24 + From the original at Rowfant. + +587 Charles and Mary Lamb to Edward + and Emma Moxon ?July 31 + From the original at Rowfant. + +588 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Sept. 9 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +589 Charles and Mary Lamb to Edward Moxon Sept. 26 + From the original at Rowfant. + +590 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Oct. 17 + From the original at Rowfant. + +591 Charles Lamb to Edward and Emma Moxon Nov. 29 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +592 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke Mid. Dec. + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +593 Charles Lamb to Samuel Rogers Dec. 21 + From _Rogers and His Contemporaries_. + +594 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke No date + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +595 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke No date + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + + 1834. + +596 Charles Lamb to the printer of + _The Athenaeum_ No date + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +597 Charles Lamb to Mary Betham Jan. 24 + From the original in the possession of + Mr. B.B. Macgeorge. + +598 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. 28 + From the original (South Kensington). + +599 Charles Lamb to Miss Fryer Feb. 14 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +600 Charles Lamb to Miss Fryer No date + From the original in the possession of + Mr. A.M.S. Methuen. + +601 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth Feb. 22 + From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. + +602 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd No date + +603 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke + (_fragment_) End of June + From the _Life and Labours of Vincent Novello._ + +604 Charles Lamb to John Forster June 25 + From the original (South Kensington). + +605 Charles Lamb to J. Fuller Russell Summer + From _Notes and Queries_. + +606 Charles Lamb to J. Fuller Russell Summer + From _Notes and Queries_. + +607 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke End of July + From Sir Charles Dilke's original. + +608 Charles Lamb to the Rev. James Gillman Aug. 5 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +609 Charles and Mary Lamb to H.F. Cary Sept. 12 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +610 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Oct. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +611 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Oct. 18 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +612 Charles Lamb to Mr. Childs ?Dec. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +613 Charles Lamb to Mr. Childs No date + +614 Charles Lamb to Mrs. George Dyer Dec. 22 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn). + +615 Mary Lamb to Jane Norris Dec. 25 + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +616 Mary Lamb to Jane Norris Oct. 3 1842. + Mr. Hazlitt's text (_The Lambs_). + +Last letter. Miss James to Jane Norris July 25 1843. + + + + + APPENDIX + + Barton's "Spiritual Law" + Barton's "Translation of Enoch" + Talfourd's "Verses in Memory of a Child named after Charles Lamb" + FitzGerald's "Meadows in Spring" + Montgomery's "The Common Lot" + Barry Cornwall's "Epistle to Charles Lamb" + + + ALPHABETICAL LIST OF LETTERS + + + INDEX + + + + + FRONTISPIECE + + CHARLES LAMB (aged 51). + From the painting by Henry Meyer at the India Office. + + + + + THE LETTERS OF CHARLES AND MARY LAMB + + 1821-1834 + + + + +LETTER 264 + +CHARLES LAMB TO DOROTHY WORDSWORTH + +[P.M. January 8, 1821.] + +Mary perfectly approves of the appropriat'n of the _feathers_, and +wishes them Peacocks for your fair niece's sake! + +Dear Miss Wordsworth, I had just written the above endearing words when +Monkhouse tapped me on the shoulder with an invitation to cold goose +pye, which I was not Bird of that sort enough to decline. Mrs. M. I am +most happy to say is better. Mary has been tormented with a Rheumatism, +which is leaving her. I am suffering from the festivities of the season. +I wonder how my misused carcase holds it out. I have play'd the +experimental philosopher on it, that's certain. Willy shall be welcome +to a mince pye, and a bout at Commerce, whenever he comes. He was in our +eye. I am glad you liked my new year's speculations. Everybody likes +them, except the Author of the Pleasures of Hope. Disappointment attend +him! How I like to be liked, and _what I do_ to be liked! They flatter +me in magazines, newspapers, and all the minor reviews. The Quarterlies +hold aloof. But they must come into it in time, or their leaves be waste +paper. Salute Trinity Library in my name. Two special things are worth +seeing at Cambridge, a portrait of Cromwell at Sidney, and a better of +Dr. Harvey (who found out that blood was red) at Dr. Davy's. You should +see them. + +Coleridge is pretty well, I have not seen him, but hear often of him +from Alsop, who sends me hares and pheasants twice a week. I can hardly +take so fast as he gives. I have almost forgotten Butcher's meat, as +Plebeian. Are you not glad the Cold is gone? I find winters not so +agreeable as they used to be, when "winter bleak had charms for me." I +cannot conjure up a kind similitude for those snowy flakes--Let them +keep to Twelfth Cakes. + +Mrs. Paris, our Cambridge friend, has been in Town. You do not know the +Watfords? in Trumpington Street--they are capital people. + +Ask any body you meet, who is the biggest woman in Cambridge--and I'll +hold you a wager they'll say Mrs. Smith. + +She broke down two benches in Trinity Gardens, one on the confines of +St. John's, which occasioned a litigation between the societies as to +repairing it. In warm weather she retires into an ice-cellar +(literally!) and dates the returns of the years from a hot Thursday some +20 years back. She sits in a room with opposite doors and windows, to +let in a thorough draught, which gives her slenderer friends +tooth-aches. She is to be seen in the market every morning at 10, +cheapening fowls, which I observe the Cambridge Poulterers are not +sufficiently careful to stump. + +Having now answered most of the points containd in your Letter, let me +end with assuring you of our very best kindness, and excuse Mary from +not handling the Pen on this occasion, especially as it has fallen into +so much better hands! Will Dr. W. accept of my respects at the end of a +foolish Letter. + +C.L. + + +[Miss Wordsworth was visiting her brother, Christopher Wordsworth, the +Master of Trinity. + +Willy was William Wordsworth, junr. + +Lamb's New Year speculations were contained in his _Elia_ essay "New +Year's Eve," in the _London Magazine_ for January, 1821. There is no +evidence that Campbell disapproved of the essay. Canon Ainger suggests +that Lamb may have thus alluded playfully to the pessimism of his +remarks, so opposed to the pleasures of hope. When the _Quarterly_ did +"come in," in 1823, it was with cold words, as we shall see. + +"Trinity Library." It is here that are preserved those MSS. of Milton, +which Lamb in his essay "Oxford in the Vacation," in the _London +Magazine_ for October, 1820, says he regrets to have seen. + +"Cromwell at Sidney." See Mary Lamb's letter to Miss Hutchinson, August +20, 1815. + +"Harvey ... at Dr. Davy's"--Dr. Martin Davy, Master of Caius. + +"Alsop." This is the first mention of Thomas Allsop (1795-1880), +Coleridge's friend and disciple, who, meeting Coleridge in 1818, had +just come into Lamb's circle. We shall meet him frequently. Allsop's +_Letters, Conversations and Recollections of Samuel Taylor Coleridge_ +contain much matter concerning Lamb. + +"Winter bleak had charms for me." I could not find this for the large +edition. It is from Burns' "Epistle to William Simpson," stanza 13. + +Mrs. Paris was a sister of William Ayrton and the mother of John Ayrton +Paris, the physician. It was at her house at Cambridge that the Lambs +met Emma Isola, whom we are soon to meet. + +"Mrs. Smith." Lamb worked up this portion of his letter into the little +humorous sketch "The Gentle Giantess," printed in the _London Magazine_ +for December, 1822 (see Vol. I. of the present edition), wherein Mrs. +Smith of Cambridge becomes the Widow Blacket of Oxford. + +"Dr. W."--Dr. Christopher Wordsworth.] + + + +LETTER 265 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. 1821.] + +Dear Sir--The _hairs_ of our head are numbered, but those which emanate +from your heart defy arithmetic. I would send longer thanks but your +young man is blowing his fingers in the Passage. + +Yours gratefully C.L. + + +[The date of this scrap is unimportant; but it comes well here in +connection with the reference in the preceding letter. + +In _Harper's Magazine_ for December, 1859, were printed fifty of Lamb's +notes to Allsop, all of which are reproduced in at least two editions of +Lamb's letters. I have selected only those which say anything, as for +the most part Lamb was content with the merest message; moreover, the +date is often so uncertain as to be only misleading. + +Crabb Robinson says of Allsop, "I believe his acquaintance with Lamb +originated in his sending Coleridge a present of L100 in admiration of +his genius."] + + + +LETTER 266 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. 1821.] + +D'r Sir--Thanks for the Birds and your kindness. It was but yesterd'y. I +was contriving with Talf'd to meet you 1/2 way at his chamber. But night +don't do so well at present. I shall want to be home at Dalston by +Eight. + +I will pay an afternoon visit to you when you please. I dine at a +chop-house at ONE always, but I can spend an hour with you after that. + +Yours truly + +C.L. + +Would Saturdy serve? + + + +LETTER 267 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON + +[Dated at end: Jan. 23, 1821.] + +Dear Mrs. Ayrton, my sister desires me, as being a more expert penman +than herself, to say that she saw Mrs. Paris yesterday, and that she is +very much out of spirits, and has expressed a great wish to see your son +William, and Fanny-- + +I like to write that word _Fanny_. I do not know but it was one reason +of taking upon me this pleasing task-- + +Moreover that if the said William and Frances will go and sit an hour +with her at any time, she will engage that no one else shall see them +but herself, and the servant who opens the door, she being confined to +her private room. I trust you and the Juveniles will comply with this +reasonable request. + + & am + Dear Mrs. Ayrton + your's and yours' + Truly + C. LAMB. + Cov. Gar. + 23 Jan. 1821. + + +[Mrs. Ayrton (_nee_ Arnold) was the wife of William Ayrton, the musical +critic.] + + + +LETTER 268 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MISS HUMPHREYS + +London 27 Jan'y. 1821. + +Dear Madam, Carriages to Cambridge are in such request, owing to the +Installation, that we have found it impossible to procure a conveyance +for Emma before Wednesday, on which day between the hours of 3 and 4 in +the afternoon you will see your little friend, with her bloom somewhat +impaired by late hours and dissipation, but her gait, gesture, and +general manners (I flatter myself) considerably improved by--_somebody +that shall be nameless_. My sister joins me in love to all true +Trumpingtonians, not specifying any, to avoid envy; and begs me to +assure you that Emma has been a very good girl, which, with certain +limitations, I must myself subscribe to. I wish I could cure her of +making dog's ears in books, and pinching them on poor Pompey, who, for +one, I dare say, will heartily rejoyce at her departure. + +Dear Madam, + +Yours truly + +foolish C.L. + + +[Addressed to "Miss Humphreys, with Mrs. Paris, Trumpington Street, +Cambridge." Franked by J. Rickman. + +This letter contains the first reference in the correspondence to Emma +Isola, daughter of Charles Isola, Esquire Bedell of Cambridge +University, and granddaughter of Agostino Isola, the Italian critic and +teacher, of Cambridge, among whose pupils had been Wordsworth. Miss +Humphreys was Emma Isola's aunt. Emma seems to have been brought to +London by Mrs. Paris and left with the Lambs. + +Pompey seems to have been the Lamb's first dog. Later, as we shall see, +they adopted Dash.] + + + +LETTER 269 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON + +[Dated at end: March 15, 1821.] + +Dear Madam, We are out of town of necessity till Wednesday next, when we +hope to see one of you at least to a rubber. On some future Saturday we +shall most gladly accept your kind offer. When I read your delicate +little note, I am ashamed of my great staring letters. + +Yours most truly + +CHARLES LAMB. + +Dalston near Hackney + +15 Mar. 1821. + + +[In my large edition I give a facsimile of this letter.] + + + +LETTER 270 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +30 March, 1821. + +My dear Sir--If you can come next Sunday we shall be equally glad to see +you, but do not trust to any of Martin's appointments, except on +business, in future. He is notoriously faithless in that point, and we +did wrong not to have warned you. Leg of Lamb, as before; hot at 4. And +the heart of Lamb ever. + +Yours truly, C.L. + + + +LETTER 271 + +CHARLES LAMB TO LEIGH HUNT + +_Indifferent Wednesday_ [April 18], 1821. + +Dear Hunt,--There was a sort of side talk at Mr. Novello's about our +spending _Good Friday_ at Hampstead, but my sister has got so bad a +cold, and we both want rest so much, that you shall excuse our putting +off the visit some little time longer. Perhaps, after all, you know +nothing of it.-- + +Believe me, yours truly, C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 272 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +May 1st [1821], + +Mr. Gilman's, Highgate. + +Mr. C.--I will not fail you on Friday by six, and Mary, perhaps, +earlier. I very much wish to meet "Master Mathew," and am much obliged +to the G----s for the opportunity. Our kind respects to them +always.--ELIA. + +Extract from a MS. note of S.T.C. in my Beaumont and Fletcher, dated +April 17th 1807. + +_Midnight_. + +"God bless you, dear Charles Lamb, I am dying; I feel I have not many +weeks left." + + +[Master Mathew is in Ben Jonson's "Every Man in His Humour." + +Lamb's "Beaumont and Fletcher" is in the British Museum. The note quoted +by Lamb is not there, or perhaps it is one that has been crossed out. +This still remains: "N.B. I shall not be long here, Charles! I gone, you +will not mind my having spoiled a book in order to leave a Relic. +S.T.C., Oct. 1811."] + + + +LETTER 273 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +[Dated at end: 2 May, 1821.] + +Dear Sir--You dine so late on Friday, it will be impossible for us to go +home by the eight o'clock stage. Will you oblige us by securing us beds +at some house from which a stage goes to the Bank in the morning? I +would write to Coleridge, but cannot think of troubling a dying man with +such a request. + + Yours truly, C. LAMB. + + +If the beds in the town are all engaged, in consequence of Mr. Mathews's +appearance, a hackney-coach will serve. Wednes'y. 2 May '21. + +We shall neither of us come much before the time. + + +[Mrs. Mathews (who was half-sister of Fanny Kelly) described this +evening in her _Memoirs_ of her husband, 1839. Her account of Lamb is +interesting:-- + + Mr. Lamb's first approach was not prepossessing. His figure was + small and mean; and no man certainly was ever less beholden to his + tailor. His "bran" new _suit_ of black cloth (in which he affected + several times during the day to take great pride, and to cherish as + a novelty that he had long looked for and wanted) was drolly + contrasted with his very rusty silk stockings, shown from his knees, + and his much too large _thick_ shoes, without polish. His shirt + rejoiced in a wide ill-plaited frill, and his very small, tight, + white neckcloth was hemmed to a fine point at the ends that formed + part of the little bow. His hair was black and sleek, but not + formal, and his face the gravest I ever saw, but indicating great + intellect, and resembling very much the portraits of King Charles I. + Mr. Coleridge was very anxious about his _pet_ Lamb's first + impression upon my husband, which I believe his friend saw; and + guessing that he had been extolled, he mischievously resolved to + thwart his panegyrist, disappoint the strangers, and altogether to + upset the suspected plan of showing him off. + +The Mathews' were then living at Ivy Cottage, only a short distance from +the Grove, Highgate, where the famous Mathews collection of pictures was +to be seen of which Lamb subsequently wrote in the _London Magazine_. + +Here should come a note to Ayrton saying that Madame Noblet is the least +graceful dancer that Lamb ever "did not see."] + + + +LETTER 274 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN PAYNE COLLIER + +May 16, 1821. + +Dear J.P.C.,--Many thanks for the "Decameron:" I have not such a +gentleman's book in my collection: it was a great treat to me, and I got +it just as I was wanting something of the sort. I take less pleasure in +books than heretofore, but I like books about books. In the second +volume, in particular, are treasures--your discoveries about "Twelfth +Night," etc. What a Shakespearian essence that speech of Osrades for +food!--Shakespeare is coarse to it--beginning "Forbear and eat no more." +Osrades warms up to that, but does not set out ruffian-swaggerer. The +character of the Ass with those three lines, worthy to be set in gilt +vellum, and worn in frontlets by the noble beasts for ever-- + + "Thou would, perhaps, he should become thy foe, + And to that end dost beat him many times: + He cares not for himself, much less thy blow." + +Cervantes, Sterne, and Coleridge, have said positively nothing for asses +compared with this. + +I write in haste; but p. 24, vol. i., the line you cannot appropriate is +Gray's sonnet, specimenifyed by Wordsworth in first preface to L.B., as +mixed of bad and good style: p. 143, 2nd vol., you will find last poem +but one of the collection on Sidney's death in Spenser, the line, + + "Scipio, Caesar, Petrarch of our time." + +This fixes it to be Raleigh's: I had guess'd it to be Daniel's. The last +after it, "Silence augmenteth rage," I will be crucified if it be not +Lord Brooke's. Hang you, and all meddling researchers, hereafter, that +by raking into learned dust may find me out wrong in my conjecture! + +Dear J.P.C., I shall take the first opportunity of personally thanking +you for my entertainment. We are at Dalston for the most part, but I +fully hope for an evening soon with you in Russell or Bouverie Street, +to talk over old times and books. Remember _us_ kindly to Mrs. J.P.C. +Yours very kindly, CHARLES LAMB. I write in misery. + +N.B.--The best pen I could borrow at our butcher's: the ink, I verily +believe, came out of the kennel. + + +[Collier's _Poetical Decameron_, in two volumes, was published in 1820: +a series of imaginary conversations on curious and little-known books. +His "Twelfth Night" discoveries will be found in the Eighth +Conversation; Collier deduces the play from Barnaby Rich's _Farewell to +Military Profession_, 1606. He also describes Thomas Lodge's +"Rosalynde," the forerunner of "As You Like It," in which is the +character Rosader, whom Lamb calls Osrades. His speech for food runs +thus:-- + + It hapned that day that _Gerismond_, the lawfull king of _France_ + banished by _Torismond_, who with a lustie crew of outlawes liued in + that Forrest, that day in honour of his birth, made a feast to all + his bolde yeomen, and frolickt it with store of wine and venison, + sitting all at a long table vnder the shadow of Limon trees: to that + place by chance fortune conducted Rosader, who seeing such a crew of + braue men, hauing store of that for want of which hee and Adam + perished, hee slept boldly to the boords end, and saluted the + Company thus.--Whatsoeuer thou be that art maister of these lustie + squires, I salute thee as graciously as a man in extreame distresse + may: knowe that I and a fellow friend of mine, are here famished in + the forrest for want of foode: perish we must, vnlesse relieued by + thy fauours. Therefore if thou be a Gentleman, giue meate to men, + and such as are euery way worthie of life: let the proudest Squire + that sits at thy table rise and encounter with me in any honourable + point of activitie whatsoeuer, and if he and thou proue me not a + man, send mee away comfortlesse: if thou refuse this, as a niggard + of thy cates, I will haue amongst you with my sword, for rather wil + I die valiantly, then perish with so cowardly an extreame (Collier's + _Poetical Decameron_, 174, Eighth Conversation). + +Lamb compares with that the passage in "As You Like It," II., 7, 88, +beginning with Orlando's "Forbear, and eat no more." The character of +the ass is quoted by Collier from an old book, _The Noblenesse of the +Asse_, 1595, in the Third Conversation:-- + + Thou wouldst (perhaps) he should become thy foe, + And to that end doost beat him many times; + He cares not for himselfe, much lesse thy blowe. + +Lamb wrote more fully of this passage in an article on the ass +contributed to Hone's _Every-Day Book_ in 1825 (see Vol. I. of the +present edition). + +The line from Gray's sonnet on the death of Mr. Richard West was this:-- + + And weep the more because I weep in vain. + +"Scipio, Caesar," etc. This line runs, in the epitaph on Sidney, +beginning "To praise thy life"-- + +Scipio, Cicero, and Petrarch of our time! + +It is generally supposed to be by Raleigh. The next poem, "Silence +Augmenteth Grief," is attributed by Malone to Sir Edward Dyer, and by +Hannah to Raleigh.] + + + +LETTER 275 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[No date. ?Summer, 1821.] + +Dear Sir, The _Wits_ (as Clare calls us) assemble at my Cell (20 Russell +St. Cov.-Gar.) this evening at 1/4 before 7. Cold meat at 9. Puns at--a +little after. Mr. Cary wants to see you, to scold you. I hope you will +not fail. Yours &c. &c. &c. + +C. LAMB. + +Thursday. + +I am sorry the London Magazine is going to be given up. + + +[I assume the date of this note to be summer, 1821, because it was then +that Baldwin, Cradock & Joy, the _London Magazine's_ first publishers, +gave it up. The reason was the death of John Scott, the editor, and +probably to a large extent the originator, of the magazine. It was sold +to Taylor & Hessey, their first number being dated July, 1821. + +Scott had become involved in a quarrel with _Blackwood_, which reached +such a pitch that a duel was fought, between Scott and Christie, a +friend of Lockhart's. The whole story, which is involved, and indeed not +wholly clear, need not be told here: it will be found in Mr. Lang's +memoir of Lockhart. The meeting was held at Chalk Farm on February 16, +1821. Peter George Patmore, sub-editor of the _London_, was Scott's +second. Scott fell, wounded by a shot which Christie fired purely in +self-defence. He died on February 27. + +Mr. Cary. Henry Francis Cary the translator of Dante and a contributor +to the _London Magazine_. + +The _London Magazine_ had four periods. From 1820 to the middle of 1821, +when it was Baldwin, Cradock & Joy's. From 1821 to the end of 1824, when +it was Taylor & Hessey's at a shilling. From January, 1825, to August of +that year, when it was Taylor & Hessey's at half-a-crown; and from +September, l825, to the end, when it was Henry Southern's, and was +published by Hunt & Clarke.] + + + +LETTER 276 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN TAYLOR + +Margate, June 8, 1821. + +Dear Sir,--I am extremely sorry to be obliged to decline the article +proposed, as I should have been flattered with a Plate accompanying it. +In the first place, Midsummer day is not a topic I could make anything +of--I am so pure a Cockney, and little read, besides, in May games and +antiquities; and, in the second, I am here at Margate, spoiling my +holydays with a Review I have undertaken for a friend, which I shall +barely get through before my return; for that sort of work is a hard +task to me. If you will excuse the shortness of my first +contribution-and I _know_ I can promise nothing more for July--I will +endeavour a longer article for _our next_. Will you permit me to say +that I think Leigh Hunt would do the article you propose in a masterly +manner, if he has not outwrit himself already upon the subject. I do not +return the proof--to save postage--because it is correct, with ONE +EXCEPTION. In the stanza from Wordsworth, you have changed DAY into AIR +for rhyme-sake: DAY is the right reading, and I IMPLORE you to restore +it. + +The other passage, which you have queried, is to my ear correct. Pray +let it stand. + +D'r S'r, yours truly, C. LAMB. + +On second consideration, I do enclose the proof. + + +[John Taylor (1781-1864), the publisher, with Hessey, of the _London +Magazine_ was, in 1813, the first publicly to identify Sir Philip +Francis with Junius. Taylor acted as editor of the _London Magazine_ +from 1821 to 1824, assisted by Thomas Hood. Later his interests were +centred in currency questions. + +"I am here at Margate." I do not know what review Lamb was writing. If +written and published it has not been reprinted. It was on this visit to +Margate that Lamb met Charles Cowden Clarke. + +"My first contribution." The first number to bear Taylor & Hessey's name +was dated July, but they had presumably acquired the rights in the +magazine before then. Lamb's first contribution to the _London Magazine_ +had been in August, 1820, "The South-Sea House." + +The proof which Lamb returned was that of the _Elia_, essay on "Mackery +End in Hertfordshire," printed in the July number of the _London +Magazine_, in which he quoted a stanza from Wordsworth's "Yarrow +Visited":-- + + But thou, that didst appear so fair + To fond imagination, + Dost rival in the light of day + Her delicate creation. + +Here should come a scrap from Lamb to Ayrton, dated July 17, 1821, +referring to the Coronation. Lamb says that in consequence of this event +he is postponing his Wednesday evening to Friday.] + + + +LETTER 277 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN TAYLOR + +July 21, 1821. + +D'r Sir,--The _Lond. Mag._ is chiefly pleasant to me, because some of my +friends write in it. I hope Hazlitt intends to go on with it, we cannot +spare Table Talk. For myself I feel almost exhausted, but I will try my +hand a little longer, and shall not at all events be written out of it +by newspaper paragraphs. Your proofs do not seem to want my helping +hand, they are quite correct always. For God's sake change _Sisera_ to +_Jael_. This last paper will be a choke-pear I fear to some people, but +as you do not object to it, I can be under little apprehension of your +exerting your Censorship too rigidly. + +Thanking you for your extract from M'r. E.'s letter, + +I remain, D'r Sir, + +Your obliged, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Hazlitt continued his Table Talk in the _London Magazine_ until +December, 1821. + +Lamb seems to have been treated foolishly by some newspaper critic; but +I have not traced the paragraphs in question. + +The proof was that of the _Elia_ essay "Imperfect Sympathies," which was +printed (with a fuller title) in the number for August, 1821. The +reference to Jael is in the passage on Braham and the Jewish character. + +I do not identify Mr. E. Possibly Elton. See next letter. + +Here should come a further letter to Taylor, dated July 30, 1821, in +which Lamb refers to some verses addressed to him by "Olen" (Charles +Abraham Elton: see note to next letter) in the _London Magazine_ for +August, remonstrating with him for the pessimism of the _Elia_ essay +"New Year's Eve" (see Vol. II. of this edition). + +Lamb also remarks that he borrowed the name Elia (pronounced Ellia) from +an old South-Sea House clerk who is now dead. + +Elia has recently been identified by Mr. R.W. Goulding, the librarian at +Welbeck Abbey, as F. Augustus Elia, author of a French tract entitled +_Consideration sur l'etat actuel de la France au mois de Juin 1815. Par +une anglais_. It is privately reprinted in _Letters from the originals +at Welbeck Abbey_, 1909.] + + + +LETTER 278 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES ABRAHAM ELTON + +India House + +to which place all letters addressed to C.L. commonly come. + +[August 17, 1821 (?).] + +My dear Sir, You have overwhelmed me with your favours. I have received +positively a little library from Baldwyn's. I do not know how I have +deserved such a bounty. We have been up to the ear in the classics ever +since it came. I have been greatly pleased, but most, I think, with the +Hesiod,--the Titan battle quite amazed me. Gad, it was no child's +play--and then the homely aphorisms at the end of the works--how +adroitly you have turned them! Can he be the same Hesiod who did the +Titans? the latter is-- + + "-----wine + Which to madness does incline." + +But to read the Days and Works, is like eating nice brown bread, homely +sweet and nutritive. Apollonius was new to me. I had confounded him with +the conjuror of that name. Medea is glorious; but I cannot give up Dido. +She positively is the only Fine Lady of Antiquity: her courtesy to the +Trojans is altogether queen-like. Eneas is a most disagreeable person. +Ascanius a pretty young master. Mezentius for my money. His dying speech +shames Turpin--not the Archbishop I mean, but the roadster of that name. + +I have been ashamed to find how many names of classics (and more than +their names) you have introduced me to, that before I was ignorant of. +Your commendation of Master Chapman arrideth me. Can any one read the +pert modern Frenchify'd notes, &c., in Pope's translation, and contrast +them with solemn weighty prefaces of Chapman, writing in full faith, as +he evidently does, of the plenary inspiration of his author--worshipping +his meanest scraps and relics as divine--without one sceptical misgiving +of their authenticity, and doubt which was the properest to expound +Homer to their countrymen. Reverend Chapman! you have read his hymn to +Pan (the Homeric)--why, it is Milton's blank verse clothed with rhyme. +Paradise Lost could scarce lose, could it be so accoutred. + +I shall die in the belief that he has improved upon Homer, in the +Odyssey in particular--the disclosure of Ulysses of himself, to +Alcinous, his previous behaviour at the song of the stern strife arising +between Achilles and himself (how it raises him above the _Iliad_ +Ulysses!) but you know all these things quite as well as I do. But what +a deaf ear old C. would have turned to the doubters in Homer's real +personality! They might as well have denied the appearance of J.C. in +the flesh.--He apparently believed all the fables of H.'s birth, &c. + +Those notes of Bryant have caused the greatest disorder in my brain-pan. +Well, I will not flatter when I say that we have had two or three long +evening's _good reading_ out of your kind present. + +I will say nothing of the tenderest parts in your own little volume, at +the end of such a slatternly scribble as this, but indeed they cost us +some tears. I scrawl away because of interruptions every moment. You +guess how it is in a busy office--papers thrust into your hand when your +hand is busiest--and every anti-classical disavocation. + +[_Conclusion cut away_.] + + +[Sir Charles Abraham Elton (1778-1853) seems to have sent Lamb a number +of his books, principally his _Specimens of the Classical_ _Poets ... +from Homer to Tryphiodorus translated into English Verse_, Baldwin, +1814, in three volumes. Lamb refers first to the passage from Hesiod's +_Theogony_, and then to his _Works and Days_ (which Chapman +translated)--"Dispensation of Providence to the Just and Unjust." + +Apollonius Rhodius was the author of _The Argonautics_. Lamb then passes +on to Virgil. For the death of Mezentius see the _Aeneid_, Book X., at +the end. The makers of broadsides had probably credited Dick Turpin with +a dying speech. + +"Those notes of Bryant." Lamb possibly refers to Jacob Bryant's _Essay +on the Original Genius and Writings of Homer_, 1775, or his pamphlet on +the Trojan War, 1795, 1799. + +"Your own little volume." Probably _The Brothers and Other Poems_, by +Elton, 1820.] + + + +LETTER 279 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +[Summer, 1821.] + +My dear Sir--Your letter has lain in a drawer of my desk, upbraiding me +every time I open the said drawer, but it is almost impossible to answer +such a letter in such a place, and I am out of the habit of replying to +epistles otherwhere than at office. You express yourself concerning H. +like a true friend, and have made me feel that I have somehow neglected +him, but without knowing very well how to rectify it. I live so remote +from him--by Hackney--that he is almost out of the pale of visitation at +Hampstead. And I come but seldom to Cov't Gard'n this summer time--and +when I do, am sure to pay for the late hours and pleasant Novello +suppers which I incur. I also am an invalid. But I will hit upon some +way, that you shall not have cause for your reproof in future. But do +not think I take the hint unkindly. When I shall be brought low by any +sickness or untoward circumstance, write just such a letter to some +tardy friend of mine--or come up yourself with your friendly Henshaw +face--and that will be better. I shall not forget in haste our casual +day at Margate. May we have many such there or elsewhere! God bless you +for your kindness to H., which I will remember. But do not show N. this, +for the flouting infidel doth mock when Christians cry God bless us. +Yours and _his, too_, and all our little circle's most affect'e. + +C. LAMB. + +Mary's love included. + + +[Charles Cowden Clarke (1787-1877) was the son of a schoolmaster who had +served as usher with George Dyer at Northampton. Afterwards he +established a school at Enfield, where Keats was one of the scholars. +Charles Cowden Clarke, at this time a bookseller, remained one of Keats' +friends and was a friend also of Leigh Hunt's, on whose behalf he seems +to have written to Lamb. Later he became a partner of Alfred Novello, +the musical publisher, son of Vincent Novello. In 1828 he married Mary +Victoria Novello. + +"Friendly Henshaw face." I cannot explain this. + +Leigh Hunt left England for Italy in November, 1821, to join Shelley and +Byron. + +Here should come a brief note to Allan Cunningham asking him to an +evening party of _London Magazine_ contributors at 20 Russell St., given +in the Boston Bibliophile edition.] + + + +LETTER 280 + +MARY LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON + +[No date. ?1821.] + +Thursday Morning. + +MY dear friend, + +The kind interest you took in my perplexities of yesterday makes me feel +that you will be well pleased to hear I got through my complicated +business far better than I had ventured to hope I should do. In the +first place let me thank you, my good friend, for your good advice; for, +had I not gone to Martin first he would have sent a senseless letter to +Mr. Rickman, and _now_ he is coming here to-day in order to frame one in +conjunction with my brother. + +What will be Mr. Rickman's final determination I know not, but he and +Mrs. Rickman both gave me a most kind reception, and a most patient +hearing, and then Mr. R. walked with me as far as Bishopsgate Street, +conversing the whole way on the same unhappy subject. I will see you +again the very first opportunity till when farewel with grateful thanks. + +How senseless I was not to make you go back in that empty coach. I never +have but one idea in my poor head at a time. + +Yours affectionately + +M. LAMB. + +at Mr. Coston's + +No. 14 Kingsland Row Dalston. + + +[The explanation of this letter is found in an entry in Crabb Robinson's +_Diary_, the unpublished portion, which tells us that owing to certain +irregularities Rickman, who was Clerk Assistant at the table of the +House of Commons, had been obliged to discharge Martin Burney, who was +one of his clerks. + +Here should come another scrap from Lamb to Ayrton, dated August 14, +stating that at to-morrow's rubber the windows will be closed on account +of Her Majesty's death. Her Majesty was Queen Caroline, whom Lamb had +championed. She died on August 7.] + + + +LETTER 281 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +Oct. 21, 1819. + +My dear Sir, I have to thank you for a fine hare, and unless I am +mistaken for _two_, the first I received a week since, the account given +with it was that it came from Mr. Alfourd--I have no friend of that +name, but two who come near it + +Mr. Talfourd + +Mr. Alsop + +so my gratitude must be divided between you, till I know the true +sender. We are and shall be some time, I fear, at Dalston, a distance +which does not improve hares by the circuitous route of Cov't Garden, +though for the sweetness of _this last_ I will answer. We dress it +to-day. I suppose you know my sister has been & is ill. I do not see +much hopes, though there is a glimmer, of her speedy recovery. When we +are all well, I hope to come among our town friends, and shall have +great pleasure in welcoming you from Beresford Hall. + +Yours, & old Mr. Walton's, & honest Mr. Cotton's Piscatorum Amicus, C.L. + +India House 19 Oct. 21 + + + +LETTER 282 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM AYRTON + +[Oct. 27, 1821.] + +I Come, Grimalkin! Dalston, near Hackney, 27th Oct'r. One thousand 8 +hundred and twenty one years and a wee-bit since you and I were +redeemed. I doubt if _you_ are done properly yet. + + +[A further letter to Ayrton, dated from Dalston, October 30, is printed +by Mr. Macdonald, in which Lamb speaks of his sister's illness and the +death of his brother John, who died on October 26, aged fifty-eight. It +is reasonable to suppose that Lamb, when the above note was written, was +unaware of his brother's death (see note to Letter 284 on page 610). On +October 26, however, he had written to the editor of the _London +Magazine_ saying that he was most uncomfortably situated at home and +expecting some trouble which might prevent further writing for some +time--which may have been an allusion to his brother's illness or to +signs of Mary Lamb's approaching malady. + +Here should come a note to William Hone, evidently in reply to a comment +on Lamb's essay on "Saying Grace." + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Rickman, dated November 20, 1821, +referring to Admiral Burney's death. "I have been used to death lately. +Poor Jim White's departure last year first broke the spell. I had been +so fortunate as to have lost no friends in that way for many long years, +and began to think people did not die." He says that Mary Lamb has +recovered from a long illness and is pretty well resigned to John Lamb's +death.] + + + +LETTER 283 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +March 9th, 1822. + +Dear C.,--It gives me great satisfaction to hear that the pig turned out +so well--they are interesting creatures at a certain age--what a pity +such buds should blow out into the maturity of rank bacon! You had all +some of the crackling --and brain sauce--did you remember to rub it with +butter, and gently dredge it a little, just before the crisis? Did the +eyes come away kindly with no Oedipean avulsion? Was the crackling the +colour of the ripe pomegranate? Had you no complement of boiled neck of +mutton before it, to blunt the edge of delicate desire? Did you flesh +maiden teeth in it? Not that I sent the pig, or can form the remotest +guess what part Owen could play in the business. I never knew him give +anything away in my life. He would not begin with strangers. I suspect +the pig, after all, was meant for me; but at the unlucky juncture of +time being absent, the present somehow went round to Highgate. To +confess an honest truth, a pig is one of those things I could never +think of sending away. Teals, wigeons, snipes, barn-door fowl, ducks, +geese--your tame villatic things--Welsh mutton, collars of brawn, +sturgeon, fresh or pickled, your potted char, Swiss cheeses, French +pies, early grapes, muscadines, I impart as freely unto my friends as to +myself. They are but self-extended; but pardon me if I stop +somewhere--where the fine feeling of benevolence giveth a higher smack +than the sensual rarity--there my friends (or any good man) may command +me; but pigs are pigs, and I myself therein am nearest to myself. Nay, I +should think it an affront, an undervaluing done to Nature who bestowed +such a boon upon me, if in a churlish mood I parted with the precious +gift. One of the bitterest pangs of remorse I ever felt was when a +child--when my kind old aunt had strained her pocketstrings to bestow a +sixpenny whole plum-cake upon me. In my way home through the Borough, I +met a venerable old man, not a mendicant, but thereabouts--a +look-beggar, not a verbal petitionist; and in the coxcombry of +taught-charity I gave away the cake to him. I walked on a little in all +the pride of an Evangelical peacock, when of a sudden my old aunt's +kindness crossed me--the sum it was to her--the pleasure she had a right +to expect that I--not the old impostor --should take in eating her +cake--the cursed ingratitude by which, under the colour of a Christian +virtue, I had frustrated her cherished purpose. I sobbed, wept, and took +it to heart so grievously, that I think I never suffered the like--and I +was right. It was a piece of unfeeling hypocrisy, and proved a lesson to +me ever after. The cake has long been masticated, consigned to dunghill +with the ashes of that unseasonable pauper. + +But when Providence, who is better to us all than our aunts, gives me a +pig, remembering my temptation and my fall, I shall endeavour to act +towards it more in the spirit of the donor's purpose. + +Yours (short of pig) to command in everything. C.L. + + +[This letter probably led to the immediate composition of the _Elia_ +essay "A Dissertation on Roast Pig" (see Vol. II. of the present +edition), which was printed in the _London Magazine_ for September, +1822. See also "Thoughts on Presents of Game," Vol. I. of this edition. + +"Owen." Lamb's landlord in Russell Street. + +"My kind old aunt... the Borough." This is rather perplexing. Lamb, to +the best of our knowledge, never as a child lived anywhere but in the +Temple. His only aunt of whom we know anything lived with the family +also in the Temple. But John Lamb's will proves Lamb to have had two +aunts. The reference to the Borough suggests therefore that the aunt in +question was not Sarah Lamb (Aunt Hetty) but her sister.] + + + +LETTER 284 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +20th March, 1822. + +My dear Wordsworth--A letter from you is very grateful, I have not seen +a Kendal postmark so long! We are pretty well save colds and rheumatics, +and a certain deadness to every thing, which I think I may date from +poor John's Loss, and another accident or two at the same time, that has +made me almost bury myself at Dalston, where yet I see more faces than I +could wish. Deaths over-set one and put one out long after the recent +grief. Two or three have died within this last two twelvem'ths, and so +many parts of me have been numbed. One sees a picture, reads an +anecdote, starts a casual fancy, and thinks to tell of it to this person +in preference to every other--the person is gone whom it would have +peculiarly suited. It won't do for _another_. Every departure destroys a +class of sympathies. There's Capt. Burney gone!--what fun has whist now? +what matters it what you lead, if you can no longer fancy him looking +over you? One never hears any thing, but the image of the particular +person occurs with whom alone almost you would care to share the +intelligence. Thus one distributes oneself about--and now for so many +parts of me I have lost the market. Common natures do not suffice me. +Good people, as they are called, won't serve. I want individuals. I am +made up of queer points and I want so many answering needles. The going +away of friends does not make the remainder more precious. It takes so +much from them as there was a common link. A. B. and C. make a party. A. +dies. B. not only loses A. but all A.'s part in C. C. loses A.'s part in +B., and so the alphabet sickens by subtraction of interchangeables. I +express myself muddily, capite dolente. I have a dulling cold. My theory +is to enjoy life, but the practice is against it. I grow ominously tired +of official confinement. Thirty years have I served the Philistines, and +my neck is not subdued to the yoke. You don't know how wearisome it is +to breathe the air of four pent walls without relief day after day, all +the golden hours of the day between 10 and 4 without ease or +interposition. Taedet me harum quotidianarum formarum, these +pestilential clerk faces always in one's dish. O for a few years between +the grave and the desk! they are the same, save that at the latter you +are outside the machine. The foul enchanter--letters four do form his +name--Busirane is his name in hell--that has curtailed you of some +domestic comforts, hath laid a heavier hand on me, not in present +infliction, but in taking away the hope of enfranchisement. I dare not +whisper to myself a Pension on this side of absolute incapacitation and +infirmity, till years have sucked me dry. Otium cum indignitate. I had +thought in a green old age (O green thought!) to have retired to +Ponder's End--emblematic name how beautiful! in the Ware road, there to +have made up my accounts with Heaven and the Company, toddling about +between it and Cheshunt, anon stretching on some fine Izaac Walton +morning to Hoddesdon or Amwell, careless as a Beggar, but walking, +walking ever, till I fairly walkd myself off my legs, dying walking! + +The hope is gone. I sit like Philomel all day (but not singing) with my +breast against this thorn of a Desk, with the only hope that some +Pulmonary affliction may relieve me. Vide Lord Palmerston's report of +the Clerks in the war office (Debates, this morning's Times) by which it +appears in 20 years, as many Clerks have been coughd and catarrhd out of +it into their freer graves. + +Thank you for asking about the Pictures. Milton hangs over my fire side +in Covt. Card, (when I am there), the rest have been sold for an old +song, wanting the eloquent tongue that should have set them off! + +You have gratifyd me with liking my meeting with Dodd. For the Malvolio +story--the thing is become in verity a sad task and I eke it out with +any thing. If I could slip out of it I sh'd be happy, but our chief +reputed assistants have forsaken us. The opium eater crossed us once +with a dazzling path, and hath as suddenly left us darkling; and in +short I shall go on from dull to worse, because I cannot resist the +Bookseller's importunity--the old plea you know of authors, but I +believe on my part sincere. + +Hartley I do not so often see, but I never see him in unwelcome hour. I +thoroughly love and honor him. + +I send you a frozen Epistle, but it is winter and dead time of the year +with me. May heaven keep something like spring and summer up with you, +strengthen your eyes and make mine a little lighter to encounter with +them, as I hope they shall yet and again, before all are closed. + +Yours, with every kind rem'be. + +C.L. + +I had almost forgot to say, I think you thoroughly right about +presentation copies. I should like to see you print a book I should +grudge to purchase for its size. D----n me, but I would have it though! + + +[John Lamb's will left everything to his brother. We must suppose that +his widow was independently provided for. I doubt if the brothers had +seen each other except casually for some time. The _Elia_ essay "My +Relations" contains John Lamb's full-length portrait under the name of +James Elia. + +Captain Burney died on November 17, 1821, + +"The foul enchanter--letters four do form his name." From Coleridge's +war eclogue, "Fire, Famine and Slaughter," where the letters form the +name of Pitt. Here they stand for Joseph Hume, not Lamb's friend, but +Joseph Hume, M.P. (1777-1855), who had attacked with success abuses in +the East India Company; had revised economically the system of +collecting the revenue, thus touching Wordsworth as Distributor of +Stamps; and had opposed Vansittart's scheme for the reduction of pension +charges. + +"_Vide_ Lord Palmerston's report." In the _Times_ of March 21 is the +report of a debate on the estimates. Palmerston proved a certain amount +of reduction of salary in the War Office. Incidentally he remarked that +"since 1810 not fewer than twenty-six clerks had died of pulmonary +complaints, and disorders arising from sedentary habits." + +Milton was the portrait, already described, which had been left to Lamb. +Lamb gave it as a dowry to Emma Isola when she became Mrs. Moxon. + +"My meeting with Dodd ... Malvolio story." In the essay "The Old +Actors," in the London Magazine for February, 1822 (see Vol. II. of this +edition). + +"Our chief reputed assistants." Hazlitt had left the _London Magazine_; +Scott, the original editor, was dead. + +De Quincey, whose _Confessions of an Opium-Eater_ were appearing in its +pages, has left a record of a visit to the Lambs about this time. See +his "London Reminiscences." + +"Hartley." Hartley Coleridge, then a young man of twenty-five, was +living in London after the unhappy sudden termination of his Oxford +career. + +Here should come a brief note to Mrs. Norris, dated March 26, 1822, +given in the Boston Bibliophile edition. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to William Godwin, dated April 13, +in which Lamb remarks that he cannot think how Godwin, who in his +writings never expresses himself disrespectfully of any one but his +Maker, can have given offence to Rickman. This reminds one of Godwin's +remark about Coleridge, "God bless him--to use a vulgar expression," as +recorded by Coleridge in one of his letters. Lamb also said of Godwin +(and to him) that he had read more books that were not worth reading +than any man in England.] + + + +LETTER 285 + +CHARLES LAMB TO W. HARRISON AINSWORTH + +[Dated at end: May 7, 1822.] + +Dear Sir,--I have read your poetry with pleasure. The tales are pretty +and prettily told, the language often finely poetical. It is only +sometimes a little careless, I mean as to redundancy. I have marked +certain passages (in pencil only, which will easily obliterate) for your +consideration. Excuse this liberty. For the distinction you offer me of +a dedication, I feel the honor of it, but I do not think it would +advantage the publication. I am hardly on an eminence enough to warrant +it. The Reviewers, who are no friends of mine--the two big ones +especially who make a point of taking no notice of anything I bring +out--may take occasion by it to decry us both. But I leave you to your +own judgment. Perhaps, if you wish to give me a kind word, it will be +more appropriate _before your republication of Tourneur_. + +The "Specimens" would give a handle to it, which the poems might seem to +want. But I submit it to yourself with the old recollection that +"beggars should not be chusers" and remain with great respect and +wishing success to both your publications + +Your obe't. Ser't. + +C. LAMB. + +No hurry at all for Tourneur. + +Tuesday 7 May '22. + + +[William Harrison Ainsworth (1805-1882), afterwards known as a novelist, +was then articled to a Manchester solicitor, but had begun his literary +career. The book to which Lamb refers was called _The Works of Cheviot +Tichburn_, 1822, and was dedicated to him in the following terms:--"To +my friend Charles Lamb, as a slight mark of gratitude for his kindness +and admiration of his character, these poems are inscribed." + +Ainsworth was meditating an edition of the works of Cyril Tourneur, +author of "The Atheist's Tragedy," to whom Lamb had drawn attention in +the _Dramatic Specimens_, 1808. The book was never published.] + + + +LETTER 286 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM GODWIN + +May 16, 1822. + +Dear Godwin--I sincerely feel for all your trouble. Pray use the +enclosed L50, and pay me when you can. I shall make it my business to +see you very shortly. + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + + +[Owing largely to a flaw in the title-deed of his house at 41 Skinner +Street, which he had to forfeit, Godwin had come upon poverty greater +than any he had previously suffered, although he had been always more or +less necessitous. Lamb now lent him L50. In the following year, after +being mainly instrumental in putting on foot a fund for Godwin's +benefit, he transformed this loan into a gift. An appeal was issued in +1823 asking for; L600, the following postscript to which, in Lamb's +hand, is preserved at the South Kensington Museum:-- + +"There are few circumstances belonging to the case which are not +sufficiently adverted to in the above letter. + +"Mr. Godwin's opponent declares himself determined to act against him +with the last degree of hostility: the law gives him the power the first +week in November to seize upon Mr. Godwin's property, furniture, books, +&c. together with all his present sources of income for the support of +himself and his family. Mr. Godwin has at this time made considerable +progress in a work of great research, and requiring all the powers of +his mind, to the completion of which he had lookd for future pecuniary +advantage. His mind is at this moment so entirely occupied in this work, +that he feels within himself the firmness and resolution that no +_prospect_ of evil or calamity shall draw him off from it or suspend his +labours. But the _calamity itself_, if permitted to arrive, will produce +the physical impossibility for him to proceed. His books and the +materials of his work, as well as his present sources of income, will be +taken from him. Those materials have been the collection of several +years, and it would require a long time to replace them, if they could +ever be replaced. + +"The favour of an early answer is particularly requested, that the +extent of the funds supplied may as soon as possible be ascertained, +particularly as any aid, however kindly intended, will, after the lapse +of a very few weeks, become useless to the purpose in view." + +The signatories to the appeal were: Crabb Robinson (L30), William Ayrton +(L10), John Murray (L10 10s.), Charles Lamb (L50), Lord Francis +Leveson-Gower (L10), Lord Dudley (L50), the Hon. W. Lamb (L20) and Sir +James Macintosh (L10). Other contributions were: Lord Byron, L26 5s.; +T.M. Alsager, L10; and "A B C, by Charles Lamb," L10. A B C was Sir +Walter Scott. + +The work on which Godwin was then labouring was his _History of the +Commonwealth_, 1824-1828. His new home was in the Strand. In 1833 he +received the post of Yeoman Usher of the Exchequer, which he held till +his death in 1836, although its duties had vanished ere then.] + + + +LETTER 287 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. JOHN LAMB + +22 May 1822. + +Dear Mrs. Lamb, A letter has come to Arnold for Mrs. Phillips, and, as I +have not her address, I take this method of sending it to you. That old +rogue's name is Sherwood, as you guessed, but as I named the shirts to +him, I think he must have them. Your character of him made me almost +repent of the bounty. + +You must consider this letter as Mary's--for writing letters is such a +trouble and puts her to such twitters (family modesty, you know; it is +the way with me, but I try to get over it) that in pity I offer to do it +for her.-- + +We hold our intention of seeing France, but expect to see you here +first, as we do not go till the 20th of next month. A steam boat goes to +Dieppe, I see.-- + +Christie has not sent to me, and I suppose is in no hurry to settle the +account. I think in a day or two (if I do not hear from you to the +contrary) I shall refresh his memory. + +I am sorry I made you pay for two Letters. I Peated it, and re-peated +it. + +Miss Wright is married, and I am a hamper in her debt, which I hope will +now not be remembered. She is in great good humour, I hear, and yet out +of spirits. + +Where shall I get such full flavor'd Geneva again? + +Old Mr. Henshaw died last night precisely at 1/2 past 11.--He has been +open'd by desire of Mrs. McKenna; and, where his heart should have been, +was found a stone. Poor Arnold is inconsolable; and, not having shaved +since, looks deplorable. + +With our kind remembrances to Caroline and your friends + +We remain yours affectionaly C.L. AND M. LAMB. + +[_Occupying the entire margin up the left-hand side of the letter is, in +Mary Lamb's hand_:--] + +I thank you for your kind letter, and owe you one in return, but Charles +is in such a hurry to send this to be franked. + +Your affectionate sister + +M. LAMB. + + +[_On the right-hand margin, beside the paragraph about Mr. Henshaw, is +written in the same hand, underlined_:--] + +He is not dead. + +[John Lamb's widow had been a Mrs. Dowden, with an unmarried daughter, +probably the Caroline referred to. The letter treats of family matters +which could not now be explained even if it were worth while. The Lambs +were arranging a visit to Versailles, to the Kenneys. Mr. Henshaw was +Lamb's godfather, a gunsmith.] + + + +LETTER 288 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO MARY LAMB (in Paris). + +[August, 1822.] + +Then you must walk all along the Borough side of the Seine facing the +Tuileries. There is a mile and a half of print shops and book stalls. If +the latter were but English. Then there is a place where the Paris +people put all their dead people and bring em flowers and dolls and +ginger bread nuts and sonnets and such trifles. And that is all I think +worth seeing as sights, except that the streets and shops of Paris are +themselves the best sight. + + +[The Lambs had left England for France in June. While they were there +Mary Lamb was taken ill again--in a diligence, according to Moore--and +Lamb had to return home alone, leaving a letter, of which this is the +only portion that has been preserved, for her guidance on her recovery. +It is also the only writing from Lamb to his sister that exists. Mary +Lamb, who had taken her nurse with her in case of trouble, was soon well +again, and in August had the company of Crabb Robinson in Paris. Mrs. +Aders was also there, and Foss, the bookseller in Pall Mall, and his +brother. And it was on this visit that the Lambs met John Howard Payne, +whom we shall shortly see.] + + + +LETTER 289 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN CLARE + +India House, 31 Aug., 1822. + +Dear Clare--I thank you heartily for your present. I am an inveterate +old Londoner, but while I am among your choice collections, I seem to be +native to them, and free of the country. The quantity of your +observation has astonished me. What have most pleased me have been +Recollections after a Ramble, and those Grongar Hill kind of pieces in +eight syllable lines, my favourite measure, such as Cowper Hill and +Solitude. In some of your story-telling Ballads the provincial phrases +sometimes startle me. I think you are too profuse with them. In poetry +_slang_ of every kind is to be avoided. There is a rustick Cockneyism, +as little pleasing as ours of London. Transplant Arcadia to Helpstone. +The true rustic style, the Arcadian English, I think is to be found in +Shenstone. Would his Schoolmistress, the prettiest of poems, have been +better, if he had used quite the Goody's own language? Now and then a +home rusticism is fresh and startling, but where nothing is gained in +expression, it is out of tenor. It may make folks smile and stare, but +the ungenial coalition of barbarous with refined phrases will prevent +you in the end from being so generally tasted, as you deserve to be. +Excuse my freedom, and take the same liberty with my _puns_. + +I send you two little volumes of my spare hours. They are of all sorts, +there is a methodist hymn for Sundays, and a farce for Saturday night. +Pray give them a place on your shelf. Pray accept a little volume, of +which I have [a] duplicate, that I may return in equal number to your +welcome presents. + +I think I am indebted to you for a sonnet in the London for August. + +Since I saw you I have been in France, and have eaten frogs. The nicest +little rabbity things you ever tasted. Do look about for them. Make Mrs. +Clare pick off the hind quarters, boil them plain, with parsley and +butter. The fore quarters are not so good. She may let them hop off by +themselves. + +Yours sincerely, + +CHAS. LAMB. + + +[John Clare (1793-1864) was the Northamptonshire poet whom the _London +Magazine_ had introduced to fame. Octavius Gilchrist had played to him +the same part that Capell Lofft had to Bloomfield. His first volume, +_Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery_, was published in January, +1820; his next, _The Village Minstrel_, in September of the next year. +These he had probably sent to Lamb. Helpstone was Clare's birthplace. +Lamb's two little return volumes were his _Works_. The sonnet in the +August _London Magazine_ was not signed by Clare. It runs thus:-- + + TO ELlA + + ELIA, thy reveries and vision'd themes + To Care's lorn heart a luscious pleasure prove; + Wild as the mystery of delightful dreams, + Soft as the anguish of remember'd love: + Like records of past days their memory dances + Mid the cool feelings Manhood's reason brings, + As the unearthly visions of romances + Peopled with sweet and uncreated things;-- + And yet thy themes thy gentle worth enhances! + Then wake again thy wild harp's tenderest strings, + Sing on, sweet Bard, let fairy loves again + Smile in thy dreams, with angel ecstacies; + Bright o'er our souls will break the heavenly strain + Through the dull gloom of earth's realities. + +Clare addressed to Lamb a sonnet on his _Dramatic Specimens_ which was +printed in Hone's _Year Book_ in 1831. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Ayrton dated Sept. 5, 1822, +referring to the writer's "drunken caput" and loss of memory. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Mrs. James Kenney, dated Sept. +11, 1822, in which Lamb says that Mary Lamb had reached home safely from +France, and that she failed to smuggle Crabb Robinson's waistcoat. He +adds that the Custom House people could not comprehend how a waistcoat, +marked Henry Robinson, could be a part of Miss Lamb's wearing apparel. +At the end of the letter is a charming note to Mrs. Kenney's little +girl, Sophy, whom Lamb calls his dear wife. He assures her that the few +short days of connubial felicity which he passed with her among the +pears and apricots of Versailles were some of the happiest of his life.] + + + +LETTER 290 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +India House, 11 Sept. 1822. + +Dear Sir--You have misapprehended me sadly, if you suppose that I meant +to impute any inconsistency (in your writing poetry) with your religious +profession. I do not remember what I said, but it was spoken sportively, +I am sure. One of my levities, which you are not so used to as my older +friends. I probably was thinking of the light in which your so indulging +yourself would appear to _Quakers_, and put their objection in my own +foolish mouth. I would eat my words (provided they should be written on +not very coarse paper) rather than I would throw cold water upon your, +and my once, harmless occupation. I have read Napoleon and the rest with +delight. I like them for what they are, and for what they are not. I +have sickened on the modern rhodomontade & Byronism, and your plain +Quakerish Beauty has captivated me. It is all wholesome cates, aye, and +toothsome too, and withal Quakerish. If I were George Fox, and George +Fox Licenser of the Press, they should have my absolute IMPRIMATUR. I +hope I have removed the impression. + +I am, like you, a prisoner to the desk. I have been chained to that +gally thirty years, a long shot. I have almost grown to the wood. If no +imaginative poet, I am sure I am a figurative one. Do "Friends" allow +puns? _verbal_ equivocations?--they are unjustly accused of it, and I +did my little best in the "imperfect Sympathies" to vindicate them. + +I am very tired of clerking it, but have no remedy. Did you see a sonnet +to this purpose in the Examiner?-- + + "Who first invented Work--and tied the free + And holy-day rejoycing spirit down + To the ever-haunting importunity + Of business, in the green fields, and the town-- + To plough--loom--anvil--spade--&, oh, most sad, + To this dry drudgery of the desk's dead wood? + Who but the Being Unblest, alien from good, + Sabbathless Satan! he who his unglad + Task ever plies 'mid rotatory burnings, + That round and round incalculably reel-- + For wrath Divine hath made him like a wheel-- + In that red realm from whence are no returnings; + Where toiling and turmoiling ever and aye + He, and his Thoughts, keep pensive worky-day." + +C.L. + +I fancy the sentiment exprest above will be nearly your own, the +expression of it probably would not so well suit with a follower of John +Woolman. But I do not know whether diabolism is a part of your creed, or +where indeed to find an exposition of your creed at all. In feelings and +matters not dogmatical, I hope I am half a Quaker. Believe me, with +great respect, yours + +C. LAMB. + +I shall always be happy to see, or hear from you.-- + + +[This is the first of the letters to Bernard Barton (1784-1849), a clerk +in a bank at Woodbridge, in Suffolk, who was known as the Quaker poet. +Lamb had met him at a _London Magazine_ dinner at 13 Waterloo Place, and +had apparently said something about Quakers and poetry which Barton, on +thinking it over, had taken too seriously. Bernard Barton was already +the author of four volumes of poetry, of which _Napoleon and other +Poems_ was the latest, published in 1822. Lamb's essay on "Imperfect +Sympathies" had been printed in the _London Magazine_ for August, 1821. +For John Woolman, see note on page 93. The sonnet "Work" had been +printed in the _Examiner_, August 29, 1819.] + + + +LETTER 291 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BARRON FIELD + +Sept. 22, 1822. + +My dear F.,--I scribble hastily at office. Frank wants my letter +presently. I & sister are just returned from Paris!! We have eaten +frogs. It has been such a treat! You know our monotonous general Tenor. +Frogs are the nicest little delicate things--rabbity-flavoured. Imagine +a Lilliputian rabbit! They fricassee them; but in my mind, drest +seethed, plain, with parsley and butter, would have been the decision of +Apicius. Shelley the great Atheist has gone down by water to eternal +fire! Hunt and his young fry are left stranded at Pisa, to be adopted by +the remaining duumvir, Lord Byron--his wife and 6 children & their maid. +What a cargo of Jonases, if they had foundered too! The only use I can +find of friends, is that they do to borrow money of you. Henceforth I +will consort with none but rich rogues. Paris is a glorious picturesque +old City. London looks mean and New to it, as the town of Washington +would, seen after _it_. But they have no St. Paul's or Westminster +Abbey. The Seine, so much despised by Cockneys, is exactly the size to +run thro' a magnificent street; palaces a mile long on one side, lofty +Edinbro' stone (O the glorious antiques!): houses on the other. The +Thames disunites London & Southwark. I had Talma to supper with me. He +has picked up, as I believe, an authentic portrait of Shakspere. He paid +a broker about L40 English for it. It is painted on the one half of a +pair of bellows--a lovely picture, corresponding with the Folio head. +The bellows has old carved wings round it, and round the visnomy is +inscribed, near as I remember, not divided into rhyme--I found out the +rhyme-- + + "Whom have we here, + Stuck on this bellows, + But the Prince of good fellows, + Willy Shakspere?" + + At top-- + + "O base and coward luck! + To be here stuck.--POINS." + + At bottom-- + + "Nay! rather a glorious lot is to him assign'd, + Who, like the Almighty, rides upon the wind.--PISTOL." + +This is all in old carved wooden letters. The countenance smiling, +sweet, and intellectual beyond measure, even as He was immeasurable. It +may be a forgery. They laugh at me and tell me Ireland is in Paris, and +has been putting off a portrait of the Black Prince. How far old wood +may be imitated I cannot say. Ireland was not found out by his +parchments, but by his poetry. I am confident no painter on either side +the Channel could have painted any thing near like the face I saw. +Again, would such a painter and forger have expected L40 for a thing, if +authentic, worth L4000? Talma is not in the secret, for he had not even +found out the rhymes in the first inscription. He is coming over with +it, and, my life to Southey's Thalaba, it will gain universal faith. + +The letter is wanted, and I am wanted. Imagine the blank filled up with +all kind things. + +Our joint hearty remembrances to both of you. Yours as ever, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Frank was Francis John Field, Barron Field's brother, in the India +House. + +Shelley was drowned on July 8, 1822. + +Talma was Francois Joseph Talma (1763-1826), the great French tragedian. +Lamb, introduced by John Howard Payne, saw him in "Regulus," but not +understanding French was but mildly interested. "Ah," said Talma in the +account by James Kenney printed in Henry Angelo's _Pic Nic_, "I was not +very happy to-night; you must see me in 'Scylla.'" "Incidit in Scyllam," +said Lamb, "qui vult vitare Charybdiro." "Ah, you are a rogue; you are a +great rogue," was Talma's reply. Talma had bought a pair of bellows with +Shakespeare's head on it. Lamb's belief in the authenticity of this +portrait was misplaced, as the following account from _Chambers' +Journal_ for September 27, 1856, will show:-- + +About the latter part of the last century, one Zincke, an artist of +little note, but grandson of the celebrated enameller of that name, +manufactured fictitious Shakespeares by the score.... The most famous of +Zincke's productions is the well-known Talma Shakespeare, which gentle +Charles Lamb made a pilgrimage to Paris to see; and when he did see, +knelt down and kissed with idolatrous veneration. Zincke painted it on a +larger panel than was necessary for the size of the picture, and then +cut away the superfluous wood, so as to leave the remainder in the shape +of a pair of bellows.... Zincke probably was thinking of "a muse of +fire" when he adopted this strange method of raising the wind; but he +made little by it, for the dealer into whose hands the picture passed, +sold it as a curiosity, not an original portrait, for L5. The buyer, +being a person of ingenuity, and fonder of money than curiosities, +fabricated a series of letters to and from Sir Kenelm Digby, and, +passing over to France, _planted_--the slang term used among the less +honest of the curiosity-dealing fraternity--the picture and the letters +in an old chateau near Paris. Of course a confederate managed to +discover the _plant_, in the presence of witnesses, and great was the +excitement that ensued. Sir Kenelm Digby had been in France in the reign +of Charles I., and the fictitious correspondence _proved_ that the +picture was an original, and had been painted by Queen Elizabeth's +command, on the lid of her favourite pair of bellows! + +It really would seem that the more absurd a deception is, the better it +succeeds. All Paris was in delight at possessing an original +Shakespeare, while the London amateurs were in despair at such a +treasure being lost to England. The ingenious person soon found a +purchaser, and a high price recompensed him for his trouble. But more +remains to be told. The happy purchaser took his treasure to Ribet, the +first Parisian picture-cleaner of the day, to be cleaned. Ribet set to +work; but we may fancy his surprise as the superficial _impasto_ of +Zincke washed off beneath the sponge, and Shakespeare became a female in +a lofty headgear adorned with blue ribbons. + +In a furious passion the purchaser ran to the seller. "Let us talk over +the affair quietly," said the latter; "I have been cheated as well as +you: let us keep the matter secret; if we let the public know it, all +Paris and even London too, will be laughing at us. I will return you +your money, and take back the picture, if you will employ Ribet to +restore it to the same condition as it was in when you received it." +This fair proposition was acceded to, and Ribet restored the picture; +but as he was a superior artist to Zincke, he greatly improved it, and +this improvement was attributed to his skill as a cleaner. The secret +being kept, and the picture, improved by cleaning, being again in the +market, Talma, the great Tragedian, purchased it at even a higher price +than that given by the first buyer. Talma valued it highly, enclosed it +in a case of morocco and gold, and subsequently refused 1000 Napoleons +for it; and even when at last its whole history was disclosed, he still +cherished it as a genuine memorial of the great bard. + +By kind permission of Mr. B.B. MacGeorge, the owner both of the letter +and bellows, I was enabled to give a reproduction of the portrait in my +large edition. + +Ireland was the author of "Vortigern," the forged play attributed to +Shakespeare.] + + + +LETTER 292 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +[Autumn, 1822.] + +Dear Payne--A friend and fellow-clerk of mine, Mr. White (a good fellow) +coming to your parts, I would fain have accompanied him, but am forced +instead to send a part of me, verse and prose, most of it from 20 to 30 +years old, such as I then was, and I am not much altered. + +Paris, which I hardly knew whether I liked when I was in it, is an +object of no small magnitude with me now. I want to be going, to the +Jardin des Plantes (is that right, Louisa?) with you to Pere de la +Chaise, La Morgue, and all the sentimentalities. How is Talma, and his +(my) dear Shakspeare? + +N.B.--My friend White knows Paris thoroughly, and does not want a guide. +We did, and had one. We both join in thanks. Do you remember a Blue-Silk +Girl (English) at the Luxembourg, that did not much seem to attend to +the Pictures, who fell in love with you, and whom I fell in love +with--an inquisitive, prying, curious Beauty--where is she? + +_Votre Tres Humble Serviteur_, + +CHARLOIS AGNEAU, + +_alias_ C. LAMB. + +Guichy is well, and much as usual. He seems blind to all the +distinctions of life, except to those of sex. Remembrance to Kenny and +Poole. + + +[John Howard Payne (1792-1852) was born in New York. He began life as an +actor in 1809 as Young Norval in "Douglas," and made his English _debut_ +in 1813 in the same part. For several years he lived either in London or +Paris, where among his friends were Washington Irving and Talma. He +wrote a number of plays, and in one of them, "Clari, or the Maid of +Milan," is the song "Home, Sweet Home," with Bishop's music, on which +his immortality rests. Payne died in Tunis, where he was American +Consul, in 1852, and when in 1883 he was reinterred at Washington, it +was as the author of "Home, Sweet Home." He seems to have been a +charming but ill-starred man, whom to know was to love. + +Mr. White was Edward White of the India House, by whom Lamb probably +sent a copy of the 1818 edition of his _Works_. Louisa was Louisa +Holcroft. Guichy was possibly the Frenchman, mentioned by Crabb +Robinson, with whom the Lambs had travelled to France. Poole was, I +imagine, John Poole, the dramatist, author of burlesque plays in the +_London Magazine_ and later of "Paul Pry," which, it is quite likely, he +based on Lamb's sketch "Tom Pry."] + + + +LETTER 293 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: 9 October 1822.] + +Dear Sir--I am asham'd not sooner to have acknowledged your letter and +poem. I think the latter very temperate, very serious and very +seasonable. I do not think it will convert the club at Pisa, neither do +I think it will satisfy the bigots on our side the water. Something like +a parody on the song of Ariel would please them better. + + Full fathom five the Atheist lies, + Of his bones are hell-dice made.-- + +I want time, or fancy, to fill up the rest. I sincerely sympathise with +you on your doleful confinement. Of Time, Health, and Riches, the first +in order is not last in excellence. Riches are chiefly good, because +they give us Time. What a weight of wearisome prison hours have [I] to +look back and forward to, as quite cut out [of] life--and the sting of +the thing is, that for six hours every day I have no business which I +could not contract into two, if they would let me work Task-work. I +shall be glad to hear that your grievance is mitigated. + +Shelly I saw once. His voice was the most obnoxious squeak I ever was +tormented with, ten thousand times worse than the Laureat's, whose voice +is the worst part about him, except his Laureatcy. Lord Byron opens upon +him on Monday in a Parody (I suppose) of the "Vision of Judgment," in +which latter the Poet I think did not much show _his_. To award his +Heaven and his Hell in the presumptuous manner he has done, was a piece +of immodesty as bad as Shelleyism. + +I am returning a poor letter. I was formerly a great Scribbler in that +way, but my hand is out of order. If I said my head too, I should not be +very much out, but I will tell no tales of myself. I will therefore end +(after my best thanks, with a hope to see you again some time in +London), begging you to accept this Letteret for a Letter--a Leveret +makes a better present than a grown hare, and short troubles (as the old +excuse goes) are best. + +I hear that C. Lloyd is well, and has returned to his family. I think +this will give you pleasure to hear. + +I remain, dear Sir, yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +E.I.H. + + +9 Oct. 22. + + +[Barton had just published his _Verses on the Death of P.B. Shelley_, a +lament for misapplied genius. The club at Pisa referred particularly to +Byron, Leigh Hunt, and Trelawney. Trelawney placed three lines from +Ariel's song in "The Tempest" on Shelley's monument; but whether Lamb +knew this, or his choice of rival lines is a coincidence, I do not know. +Trelawney chose the lines:-- + + Nothing of him that doth fade + But doth suffer a sea-change + Into something rich and strange. + +There is no other record of Lamb's meeting with Shelley, who, by the +way, admired Lamb's writings warmly, particularly _Mrs. Leicester's +School_ (see the letter to Barton, August 17, 1824). + +Byron's _Vision of Judgment_, a burlesque of Southey's poem of the same +name, was printed in _The Liberal_ for 1822.] + + + +LETTER 294 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON + +India House, 9th October, 1822. + +Dear Haydon, Poor Godwin has been turned out of his house and business +in Skinner Street, and if he does not pay two years' arrears of rent, he +will have the whole stock, furniture, &c., of his new house (in the +Strand) seized when term begins. We are trying to raise a subscription +for him. My object in writing this is simply to ask you, if this is a +kind of case which would be likely to interest Mrs. Coutts in his +behalf; and who in your opinion is the best person to speak with her on +his behalf. Without the aid of from L300 to L400 by that time, early in +November, he must be ruined. You are the only person I can think of, of +her acquaintance, and can, perhaps, if not yourself, recommend the +person most likely to influence her. Shelley had engaged to clear him of +all demands, and he has gone down to the deep insolvent. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Is Sir Walter to be applied to, and by what channel? + + +[Mrs. Coutts was probably Harriot Mellon, the actress, widow of the +banker, Thomas Coutts, and afterwards Duchess of St. Albans. She had +played the part of the heroine Melesinda in "Mr. H."] + + + +LETTER 295 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +Thursday [Oct. 22], 1822. + +"Ali Pacha" will do. I sent my sister the first night, not having been +able to go myself, and her report of its effect was most favourable. I +saw it last night--the third night--and it was most satisfactorily +received. I have been sadly disappointed in Talfourd, who does the +critiques in the "Times," and who promised his strenuous services; but +by some damn'd arrangement he was sent to the wrong house, and a most +iniquitous account of Ali substituted for his, which I am sure would +have been a kind one. The "Morning Herald" did it ample justice, without +appearing to puff it. It is an abominable misrepresentation of the +"Times," that Farren played Ali like Lord Ogilby. He acted infirmity of +body, but not of voice or purpose. His manner was even grand. A grand +old gentleman. His falling to the earth when his son's death was +announced was fine as anything I ever saw. It was as if he had been +blasted. Miss Foote looked helpless and beautiful, and greatly helped +the piece. It is going on steadily, I am sure, for _many nights_. Marry, +I was a little disappointed with Hassan, who tells us he subsists by +cracking court jests before Hali, but he made none. In all the rest, +scenery and machinery, it was faultless. I hope it will bring you here. +I should be most glad of that. I have a room for you, and you shall +order your own dinner three days in the week. I must retain my own +authority for the rest. As far as magazines go, I can answer for +Talfourd in the "New Monthly." He cannot be put out there. But it is +established as a favourite, and can do without these expletives. I long +to talk over with you the Shakspeare Picture. My doubts of its being a +forgery mainly rest upon the goodness of the picture. The bellows might +be trumped up, but where did the painter spring from? Is Ireland a +consummate artist--or any of Ireland's accomplices?--but we shall confer +upon it, I hope. The "New Times," I understand was favorable to "Ali," +but I have not seen it. I am sensible of the want of method in this +letter, but I have been deprived of the connecting organ, by a practice +I have fallen into since I left Paris, of taking too much strong spirits +of a night. I must return to the Hotel de l'Europe and Macon. + +How is Kenney? Have you seen my friend White? What is Poole about, &c.? +Do not write, but come and answer me. + +The weather is charming, and there is a mermaid to be seen in London. +You may not have the opportunity of inspecting such a _Poisarde_ once +again in ten centuries. + +My sister joins me in the hope of seeing you. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Lamb had met John Howard Payne, the American dramatist, at Kenney's, in +France. "Ali Pacha," a melodrama in two acts, was produced at Covent +Garden on October 19, 1822. It ran altogether sixteen nights. William +Farren played the hero. Lord Ogleby, an antiquated fop, is a character +in "The Clandestine Marriage" by Colman and Garrick. Miss Foote played +Helena. See notes to the letter above for other references.] + + + +LETTER 296 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON + +Tuesday, 29th [October, 1822]. + +Dear H., I have written a very respectful letter to Sir W.S. Godwin did +not write, because he leaves all to his committee, as I will explain to +you. If this rascally weather holds, you will see but one of us on that +day. + +Yours, with many thanks, + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 297 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SIR WALTER SCOTT + +East India House, London, + +29th October 1822. + +Dear Sir,--I have to acknowledge your kind attention to my application +to Mr. Haydon. I have transmitted your draft to Mr. G[odwin]'s committee +as an anonymous contribution through me. Mr. Haydon desires his thanks +and best respects to you, but was desirous that I should write to you on +this occasion. I cannot pass over your kind expressions as to myself. It +is not likely that I shall ever find myself in Scotland, but should the +event ever happen, I should be proud to pay my respects to you in your +own land. My disparagement of heaths and highlands--if I said any such +thing in half earnest,--you must put down as a piece of the old Vulpine +policy. I must make the most of the spot I am chained to, and console +myself for my flat destiny as well as I am able. I know very well our +mole-hills are not mountains, but I must cocker them up and make them +look as big and as handsome as I can, that we may both be satisfied. +Allow me to express the pleasure I feel on an occasion given me of +writing to you, and to subscribe myself, dear sir, your obliged and +respectful servant, + +CHARLES LAMB. + + +[See note to the letter to Godwin above. Lamb and Scott never met. +Talfourd, however, tells us that "he used to speak with gratitude and +pleasure of the circumstances under which he saw him once in +Fleet-street. A man, in the dress of a mechanic, stopped him just at +Inner Temple-gate, and said, touching his hat, 'I beg your pardon, sir, +but perhaps you would like to see Sir Walter Scott; that is he just +crossing the road;' and Lamb stammered out his hearty thanks to his +truly humane informer." + +Mr. Lang has recently discovered that also in 1818 or thereabouts Sir +Walter invited Lamb to Abbotsford.] + + + +LETTER 298 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ROBINSON + +[Dated at end: Nov. 11, 1822.] + +Dear Sir, We have to thank you, or Mrs. Robinson-- for I think her name +was on the direction--for the best pig, which myself, the warmest of +pig-lovers, ever tasted. The dressing and the sauce were pronounced +incomparable by two friends, who had the good fortune to drop in to +dinner yesterday, but I must not mix up my cook's praises with my +acknowledgments; let me but have leave to say that she and we did your +pig justice. I should dilate on the crackling--done to a turn--but I am +afraid Mrs. Clarkson, who, I hear, is with you, will set me down as an +Epicure. Let it suffice, that you have spoil'd my appetite for boiled +mutton for some time to come. Your brother Henry partook of the cold +relics--by which he might give a good guess at what it had been _hot_. + +With our thanks, pray convey our kind respects to Mrs. Robinson, and the +Lady before mentioned. + +Your obliged Ser't + +CHARLES LAMB. + +India House + +11 Nov. 22. + + +[This letter is addressed to R. Robinson, Esq., Bury, Suffolk, but I +think there is no doubt that Thomas Robinson was the recipient. + +Thomas Robinson of Bury St. Edmunds was Henry Crabb Robinson's brother. +Lamb's "Dissertation on Roast Pig" had been printed in the _London +Magazine_ in September, 1822, and this pig was one of the first of many +such gifts that came to him.] + + + +LETTER 299 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +Wednesday, 13 November, '22. + +Dear P.--Owing to the inconvenience of having two lodgings, I did not +get your letter quite so soon as I should. The India House is my proper +address, where I am sure for the fore part of every day. The instant I +got it, I addressed a letter, for Kemble to see, to my friend Henry +Robertson, the Treasurer of Covent Garden Theatre. He had a conference +with Kemble, and the result is, that Robertson, in the name of the +management, recognized to me the full ratifying of your bargain: L250 +for Ali, the Slaves, and another piece which they had not received. He +assures me the whole will be paid you, or the proportion for the two +former, as soon as ever the Treasury will permit it. He offered to write +the same to you, if I pleased. He thinks in a month or so they will be +able to liquidate it. He is positive no trick could be meant you, as Mr. +Planche's alterations, which were trifling, were not at all considered +as affecting your bargain. With respect to the copyright of Ali, he was +of opinion no money would be given for it, as Ali is quite laid aside. +This explanation being given, you would not think of printing the two +copies together by way of recrimination. He told me the secret of the +two Galley Slaves at Drury Lane. Elliston, if he is informed right, +engaged Poole to translate it, but before Poole's translation arrived, +finding it coming out at Cov. Gar., he procured copies of two several +translations of it in London. So you see here are four translations, +reckoning yours. I fear no copyright would be got for it, for anybody +may print it and anybody has. Your's has run seven nights, and R. is of +opinion it will not exceed in number of nights the nights of Ali,--about +thirteen. But your full right to your bargain with the management is in +the fullest manner recognized by him officially. He gave me every hope +the money will be spared as soon as they can spare it. He said _a month +or two_, but seemed to me to mean about _a month_. A new lady is coming +out in Juliet, to whom they look very confidently for replenishing their +treasury. Robertson is a very good fellow and I can rely upon his +statement. Should you have any more pieces, and want to get a copyright +for them, I am the worst person to negotiate with any bookseller, having +been cheated by all I have had to do with (except Taylor and +Hessey,--but they do not publish theatrical pieces), and I know not how +to go about it, or who to apply to. But if you had no better negotiator, +I should know the minimum you expect, for I should not like to make a +bargain out of my own head, being (after the Duke of Wellington) the +worst of all negotiators. I find from Robertson you have written to +Bishop on the subject. Have you named anything of the copyright of the +Slaves. R. thinks no publisher would pay for it, and you would not +risque it on your own account. This is a mere business letter, so I will +just send my love to my little wife at Versailles, to her dear mother, +etc. + +Believe me, yours truly, C.L. + + +[Payne's translation of the French play was produced at Covent Garden on +November 6, 1822, under the title "The Soldier's Daughter." On the same +night appeared a rival version at Drury Lane entitled "Two Galley +Slaves." Payne's was played eleven times. The new lady as Juliet was the +other Fanny Kelly not Lamb's: Fanny H. Kelly, from Dublin. The revival +began on November 14. Planche was James Robinson Planche (1796-1880), +the most prolific of librettists. Robert William Elliston, of whom Lamb +later wrote so finely, was then managing Drury Lane. + +"Having been cheated." Lamb's particular reference was to Baldwin (see +the letter to Barton, Jan. 9, 1823). + +"The Duke of Wellington." A reference to the Duke's failure in +representing England at the Congress of Powers in Vienna and Verona. + +Lamb's "dear little wife" was Sophy Kenney.] + + + +LETTER 300 + +MARY LAMB TO MRS. JAMES KENNEY + +[No date. ?Early December, 1822.] + +My dear Friend,--How do you like Harwood? Is he not a noble boy? I +congratulate you most heartily on this happy meeting, and only wish I +were present to witness it. Come back with Harwood, I am dying to see +you--we will talk, that is, you shall talk and I will listen from ten in +the morning till twelve at night. My thoughts are often with you, and +your children's dear faces are perpetually before me. Give them all one +additional kiss every morning for me. Remember there's one for Louisa, +one to Ellen, one to Betsy, one to Sophia, one to James, one to Teresa, +one to Virginia, and one to Charles. Bless them all! When shall I ever +see them again? Thank you a thousand times for all your kindness to me. +I know you will make light of the trouble my illness gave you; but the +recollection of it often sits heavy on my heart. If I could ensure my +health, how happy should I be to spend a month with you every summer! + +When I met Mr. Kenney there, I sadly repented that I had not dragged you +on to Dieppe with me. What a pleasant time we should have spent there! + +You shall not be jealous of Mr. Payne. Remember he did Charles and I +good service without grudge or grumbling. Say to him how much I regret +that we owe him unreturnable obligations; for I still have my old fear +that we shall never see him again. I received great pleasure from seeing +his two successful pieces. My love to your boy Kenney, my boy James, and +all my dear girls, and also to Rose; I hope she still drinks wine with +you. Thank Lou-Lou for her little bit of letter. I am in a fearful +hurry, or I would write to her. Tell my friend the Poetess that I expect +some French verses from her shortly. I have shewn Betsy's and Sophy's +letters to all who came near me, and they have been very much admired. +Dear Fanny brought me the bag. Good soul you are to think of me! Manning +has promised to make Fanny a visit this morning, happy girl! Miss James +I often see, I think never without talking of you. Oh the dear long +dreary Boulevards! how I do wish to be just now stepping out of a Cuckoo +into them! + +Farewel, old tried friend, may we meet again! Would you could bring your +house with all its noisy inmates, and plant it, garden, gables and all, +in the midst of Covent Garden. + +Yours ever most affectionately, + +M. LAMB. + +My best respects to your good neighbours. + + +[Harwood was Harwood Holcroft. + +"Louisa," etc. Mrs. Kenney's children by her first marriage were Louisa, +Ellen, Betsy and Sophia. By her second, with Kenney, the others. Charles +was named Charles Lamb Kenney. + +"Payne's two successful pieces"--"Ali Pacha" and "The Soldier's +Daughter." + +Fanny was Fanny Holcroft, Mrs. Kenney's stepdaughter. + +Miss Kelly has added to this letter a few words of affection to Mrs. +Kenney from "the real old original Fanny Kelly." + +Charles Lamb also contributed to this letter a few lines to James +Kenney, expressing his readiness to meet Moore the poet. He adds that he +made a hit at him as Little in the _London Magazine_, which though no +reason for not meeting him was a reason for not volunteering a visit to +him. The reference is to the sonnet to Barry Cornwall in the _London +Magazine_ for September, 1820, beginning-- + + Let hate, or grosser heats, their foulness mask + Neath riddling Junius, or in L----e's name. + +The second line was altered in Lamb's _Album Verses_, 1830, to-- + + Under the vizor of a borrowed name.] + + + +LETTER 301 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN TAYLOR + +[Dated: Dec. 7, 1822.] + +Dear Sir,--I should like the enclosed Dedication to be printed, unless +you dislike it. I like it. It is in the olden style. But if you object +to it, put forth the book as it is. Only pray don't let the Printer +mistake the word _curt_ for _curst_. + +C.L. + +Dec. 7, 1822. + +DEDICATION + +TO THE FRIENDLY AND JUDICIOUS READER, + +Who will take these Papers, as they were meant; not understanding every +thing perversely in the absolute and literal sense, but giving fair +construction as to an after-dinner conversation; allowing for the +rashness and necessary incompleteness of first thoughts; and not +remembering, for the purpose of an after taunt, words spoken +peradventure after the fourth glass. The Author wishes (what he would +will for himself) plenty of good friends to stand by him, good books to +solace him, prosperous events to all his honest undertakings, and a +candid interpretation to his most hasty words and actions. The other +sort (and he hopes many of them will purchase his book too) he greets +with the curt invitation of Timon, "Uncover, dogs, and lap:" or he +dismisses them with the confident security of the philosopher, "you beat +but on the case of ELIA." + +C.L. + +Dec. 7, 1822. + + +[_Elia. Essays which have appeared under that signature in the London +Magazine_ was just about to be published. The book came out with no +preface. + +"You beat but on the case." When Anaxarchus, the philosopher, was being +pounded to death in a mortar, by command of Alexander the Great, he made +use of this phrase. After these words, in Canon Ainger's transcript, +Lamb remarks:--"On better consideration, pray omit that Dedication. The +Essays want no Preface: they are _all Preface_. A Preface is nothing but +a talk with the reader; and they do nothing else. Pray omit it. + +"There will be a sort of Preface in the next Magazine, which may act as +an advertisement, but not proper for the volume. + +"Let ELIA come forth bare as he was born." + +The sort of Preface in the next magazine (January, 1823) was the +"Character of the Late Elia," used as a preface to the _Last Essays_ in +1833.] + + + +LETTER 302 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +E.I.H. 16 dec. 22. + +Dear Wilson + +_Lightening_ I was going to call you-- + +You must have thought me negligent in not answering your letter sooner. +But I have a habit of never writing letters, but at the office--'tis so +much time cribbed out of the Company--and I am but just got out of the +thick of a Tea Sale, in which most of the Entry of Notes, deposits &c. +usually falls to my share. Dodwell is willing, but alas! slow. To +compare a pile of my notes with his little hillock (which has been as +long a building), what is it but to compare Olympus with a mole-hill. +Then Wadd is a sad shuffler.-- + +I have nothing of Defoe's but two or three Novels, and the Plague +History. I can give you no information about him. As a slight general +character of what I remember of them (for I have not look'd into them +latterly) I would say that "in the appearance of _truth_ in all the +incidents and conversations that occur in them they exceed any works of +fiction I am acquainted with. It is perfect illusion. The _Author_ never +appears in these self-narratives (for so they ought to be called or +rather Autobiographies) but the _narrator_ chains us down to an implicet +belief in every thing he says. There is all the minute detail of a +log-book in it. Dates are painfully pressed upon the memory. Facts are +repeated over and over in varying phrases, till you cannot chuse but +believe them. It is like reading Evidence given in a Court of Justice. +So anxious the story-teller seems, that the truth should be clearly +comprehended, that when he has told us a matter of fact, or a motive, in +a line or two farther down he _repeats_ it with his favorite figure of +speech, 'I say' so and so,--though he had made it abundantly plain +before. This is in imitation of the common people's way of speaking, or +rather of the way in which they are addressed by a master or mistress, +who wishes to impress something upon their memories; and has a wonderful +effect upon matter-of-fact readers. Indeed it is to such principally +that he writes. His style is elsewhere beautiful, but plain _& homely_. +Robinson Crusoe is delightful to all ranks and classes, but it is easy +to see that it is written in phraseology peculiarly adapted to the lower +conditions of readers: hence it is an especial favorite with seafaring +men, poor boys, servant maids &c. His novels are capital +kitchen-reading, while they are worthy from their deep interest to find +a shelf in the Libraries of the wealthiest, and the most learned. His +passion for _matter of fact narrative_ sometimes betrayed him into a +long relation of common incidents which might happen to any man, and +have no interest but the intense appearance of truth in them, to +recommend them. The whole latter half, or two thirds, of Colonel Jack is +of this description. The beginning of Colonel Jack is the most affecting +natural picture of a young thief that was ever drawn. His losing the +stolen money in the hollow of a tree, and finding it again when he was +in despair, and then being in equal distress at not knowing how to +dispose of it, and several similar touches in the early history of the +Colonel, evince a deep knowledge of human nature; and, putting out of +question the superior _romantic_ interest of the latter, in my mind very +much exceed Crusoe. Roxana (1st Edition) is the next in Interest, though +he left out the best part of it**in** subsequent Editions from a foolish +hypercriticism of his friend, Southerne. But Moll Flanders, the account +of the Plague &c. &c. are all of one family, and have the same stamp of +character."-- + +[_At the top of the first page is added:--_] + +_Omitted at the end_ ... believe me with friendly recollections, +_Brother_ (as I used to call you) Yours C. LAMB. + +[_Below the "Dear Wilson" is added in smaller writing:--_] + +The review was not mine, nor have I seen it. + + +[Lamb's friend Walter Wilson was beginning his _Memoirs of the Life and +Times of Daniel Defoe_, 1830. The passage sent to him in this letter by +Lamb he printed in Vol. III., page 428. Some years later Lamb sent +Wilson a further criticism. See also letter below for the reference to +_Roxana_. + +Dodwell we have met. Of Wadd we have no information, except, according +to Crabb Robinson's _Diary_, that he once accidentally discharged a pen +full of ink into Lamb's eye and that Lamb wrote this epigram upon him:-- + + What Wadd knows, God knows, + But God knows _what_ Wadd knows.] + + + +LETTER 303 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: 23 December 1822.] + +Dear Sir--I have been so distracted with business and one thing or +other, I have not had a quiet quarter of an hour for epistolary +purposes. Christmas too is come, which always puts a rattle into my +morning scull. It is a visiting unquiet un-Quakerish season. I get more +and more in love with solitude, and proportionately hampered with +company. I hope you have some holydays at this period. I have one day, +Christmas day, alas! too few to commemorate the season. All work and no +play dulls me. Company is not play, but many times hard work. To play, +is for a man to do what he pleases, or to do nothing--to go about +soothing his particular fancies. I have lived to a time of life, to have +outlived the good hours, the nine o'Clock suppers, with a bright hour or +two to clear up in afterwards. Now you cannot get tea before that hour, +and then sit gaping, music-bothered perhaps, till half-past 12 brings up +the tray, and what you steal of convivial enjoyment after, is heavily +paid for in the disquiet of to-morrow's head. + +I am pleased with your liking John Woodvil, and amused with your +knowledge of our drama being confined to Shakspeare and Miss Bailly. +What a world of fine territory between Land's End and Johnny Grots have +you missed traversing. I almost envy you to have so much to read. I feel +as if I had read all the Books I want to read. O to forget Fielding, +Steele, &c., and read 'em new. + +Can you tell me a likely place where I could pick up, cheap, Fox's +Journal? There are no Quaker Circulating Libraries? Ellwood, too, I must +have. I rather grudge that S[outhe]y has taken up the history of your +People. I am afraid he will put in some Levity. I am afraid I am not +quite exempt from that fault in certain magazine Articles, where I have +introduced mention of them. Were they to do again, I would reform them. + +Why should not you write a poetical Account of your old Worthies, +deducing them from Fox to Woolman?--but I remember you did talk of +something in that kind, as a counterpart to the Ecclesiastical Sketches. +But would not a Poem be more consecutive than a string of Sonnets? You +have no Martyrs _quite to the Fire_, I think, among you. But plenty of +Heroic Confessors, Spirit-Martyrs--Lamb-Lions.--Think of it. + +It would be better than a series of Sonnets on "Eminent Bankers."--I +like a hit at our way of life, tho' it does well for me, better than +anything short of _all one's time to one's self_, for which alone I +rankle with envy at the rich. Books are good, and Pictures are good, and +Money to buy them therefore good, but to buy _TIME!_ in other words, +LIFE-- + +The "compliments of the time to you" should end my letter; to a Friend I +suppose I must say the "sincerity of the season;" I hope they both mean +the same. With excuses for this hastily penn'd note, believe me with +great respect-- + +C. LAMB. + +23 dec. 22. + + +[Miss Bailly would be Joanna Baillie (1762-1851), author of _Plays on +the Passions_. + +The copy of Fox's _Journal_, 1694, which was lent to Lamb is now in the +possession of the Society of Friends. In it is written: + +"This copy of George Fox's Journal, being the earliest edition of that +work, the property of John T. Shewell of Ipswich, is lent for six months +to Charles Lamb, at the request of Sam'l Alexander of Needham, Ipswich, +1st mo. 4 1823." Lamb has added: "Returned by Charles Lamb, within the +period, with many thanks to the Lender for the very great satisfaction +which he has derived from the perusal of it." + +Southey was meditating a Life of George Fox and corresponded with Barton +on the subject. He did not write the book. + +Barton had a plan to provide Wordsworth's Ecclesiastical Sonnets with a +Quaker pendant. He did not carry it out. + +Here might come an undated and unpublished letter from Lamb to Basil +Montagu, which is of little interest except as referring to Miss James, +Mary Lamb's nurse. Lamb says that she was one of four sisters, daughters +of a Welsh clergyman, who all became nurses at Mrs. Warburton's, Hoxton, +whither, I imagine, Mary Lamb had often retired. Mrs. Parsons, one of +the sisters, became Mary Lamb's nurse when, some time after Lamb's +death, she moved to 41 Alpha Road, Mrs. Parsons' house. The late John +Hollingshead, great-nephew of these ladies, says in his interesting +book, _My Lifetime_, that their father was rector of Beguildy, in +Shropshire.] + + + +LETTER 304 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +[January, 1823.] + +Dear Payne--Your little books are most acceptable. 'Tis a delicate +edition. They are gone to the binder's. When they come home I shall have +two--the "Camp" and "Patrick's Day"--to read for the first time. I may +say three, for I never read the "School for Scandal." "_Seen_ it I have, +and in its happier days." With the books Harwood left a truncheon or +mathematical instrument, of which we have not yet ascertained the use. +It is like a telescope, but unglazed. Or a ruler, but not smooth enough. +It opens like a fan, and discovers a frame such as they weave lace upon +at Lyons and Chambery. Possibly it is from those parts. I do not value +the present the less, for not being quite able to detect its purport. +When I can find any one coming your way I have a volume for you, my +Elias collected. Tell Poole, his Cockney in the Lon. Mag. tickled me +exceedingly. Harwood is to be with us this evening with Fanny, who comes +to introduce a literary lady, who wants to see me,--and whose portentous +name is _Plura_, in English "many things." Now, of all God's creatures, +I detest letters-affecting, authors-hunting ladies. But Fanny "will have +it so." So Miss Many Things and I are to have a conference, of which you +shall have the result. I dare say she does not play at whist. Treasurer +Robertson, whose coffers are absolutely swelling with pantomimic +receipts, called on me yesterday to say he is going to write to you, but +if I were also, I might as well say that your last bill is at the +Banker's, and will be honored on the instant receipt of the third Piece, +which you have stipulated for. If you have any such in readiness, strike +while the iron is hot, before the Clown cools. Tell Mrs. Kenney, that +the Miss F.H. (or H.F.) Kelly, who has begun so splendidly in Juliet, is +the identical little Fanny Kelly who used to play on their green before +their great Lying-Inn Lodgings at Bayswater. Her career has stopt short +by the injudicious bringing her out in a vile new Tragedy, and for a +third character in a stupid old one,--the Earl of Essex. This is +Macready's doing, who taught her. Her recitation, &c. (_not her voice or +person_), is masculine. It is so clever, it seemed a male _Debut_. But +cleverness is the bane of Female Tragedy especially. Passions uttered +logically, &c. It is bad enough in men-actors. Could you do nothing for +little Clara Fisher? Are there no French Pieces with a Child in them? By +Pieces I mean here dramas, to prevent male-constructions. Did not the +Blue Girl remind you of some of Congreve's women? Angelica or Millamant? +To me she was a vision of Genteel Comedy realized. Those kind of people +never come to see one. _N'import_--havn't I Miss Many Things coming? +Will you ask Horace Smith to----[_The remainder of this letter has been +lost_.] + + +[Payne seems to have sent Lamb an edition of Sheridan. "The Camp" and +"St. Patrick's Day" are among Sheridan's less known plays. + +Poole was writing articles on France in the _London Magazine_. Lamb +refers to "A Cockney's Rural Sports," in the number for December, 1822. + +Fanny was Fanny Holcroft. Plura I do not identify. + +The new tragedy in which Miss Kelly had to play was probably "The +Huguenot," produced December 11, 1822. "The Earl of Essex" was revived +December 30, 1822. Macready played in both. + +"Cleverness is the bane." See Lamb's little article on "The New Acting" +in Vol. I. + +The Blue Girl seems to refer to the lady mentioned at the end of the +first letter to Payne. + +Angelica is in Congreve's "Love for Love"; Millamant in his "Way of the +World."] + + + +LETTER 305 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[No date. January, 1823.] + +Dear Wordsworth, I beg your acceptance of ELIA, detached from any of its +old companions which might have been less agreeable to you. I hope your +eyes are better, but if you must spare them, there is nothing in my +pages which a Lady may not read aloud without indecorum, _which is more +than can be said of Shakspeare_. + +What a nut this last sentence would be for Blackwood! + +You will find I availed myself of your suggestion, in curtailing the +dissertation on Malvolio. + +I have been on the Continent since I saw you. + +I have eaten frogs. + +I saw Monkhouse tother day, and Mrs. M. being too poorly to admit of +company, the annual goosepye was sent to Russell Street, and with its +capacity has fed "A hundred head" (not of Aristotle's) but "of Elia's +friends." + +Mrs. Monkhouse is sadly confined, but chearful.-- + +This packet is going off, and I have neither time, place nor solitude +for a longer Letter. + +Will you do me the favor to forward the other volume to Southey? + +Mary is perfectly well, and joins me in kindest rememb'ces to you all. + +[_Signature cut away_.] + + +["What a nut... for Blackwood." To help on Maga's great cause against +Cockney arrogance. + +"The dissertation on Malvolio." In Elia the essays on the Old Actors +were much changed and rearranged (see Appendix to Vol. II. in this +edition).] + + + +LETTER 306 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MR. AND MRS. J.D. COLLIER + +Twelfth Day [January 6], 1823. + +THE pig was above my feeble praise. It was a dear pigmy. There was some +contention as to who should have the ears, but in spite of his obstinacy +(deaf as these little creatures are to advice) I contrived to get at one +of them. + +It came in boots too, which I took as a favor. Generally those petty +toes, pretty toes! are missing. But I suppose he wore them, to look +taller. + +He must have been the least of his race. His little foots would have +gone into the silver slipper. I take him to have been Chinese, and a +female.-- + +If Evelyn could have seen him, he would never have farrowed two such +prodigious volumes, seeing how much good can be contained in--how small +a compass! + +He crackled delicately. + +John Collier Jun has sent me a Poem which (without the smallest bias +from the aforesaid present, believe me) I pronounce _sterling_. + +I set about Evelyn, and finished the first volume in the course of a +natural day. To-day I attack the second--Parts are very interesting.-- + +I left a blank at top of my letter, not being determined _which_ to +address it to, so Farmer and Farmer's wife will please to divide our +thanks. May your granaries be full, and your rats empty, and your +chickens plump, and your envious neighbors lean, and your labourers +busy, and you as idle and as happy as the day is long! + + VIVE L'AGRICULTURE! + +Frank Field's marriage of course you have seen in the papers, and that +his brother Barron is expected home. + + How do you make your pigs so little? + They are vastly engaging at that age. + I was so myself. + Now I am a disagreeable old hog-- + A middle-aged-gentleman-and-a-half. + +My faculties, thank God, are not much impaired. I have my sight, +hearing, taste, pretty perfect; and can read the Lord's Prayer in the +common type, by the help of a candle, without making many mistakes. + +Believe me, while my faculties last, a proper appreciator of your many +kindnesses in this way; and that the last lingering relish of past +flavors upon my dying memory will be the smack of that little Ear. It +was the left ear, which is lucky. Many happy returns (not of the Pig) +but of the New Year to both.-- + +Mary for her share of the Pig and the memoirs desires to send the same-- + +D'r. M'r. C. and M'rs. C.-- + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + + +[This letter is usually supposed to have been addressed by Lamb to Mr. +and Mrs. Bruton of Mackery End. The address is, however, Mrs. Collier, +Smallfield Place, East Grinstead, Sussex. + +"If Evelyn could have seen him." John Evelyn's _Diary_ had recently been +published, in 1818 and 1819, in two large quarto volumes.] + +LETTER 307 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES ADERS + +[Jan. 8, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--We shall have great pleasure in surprising Mrs. Aders on her +Birthday--You will perceive how cunningly I have contrived the direction +of this note, _to evade postage_. + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +8 Jan. '23. + + +[This note is sent to me by Mr. G. Dunlop of Kilmarnock. It is the only +note to Aders, a friend of Crabb Robinson, to whose house Lamb often +went for talk and whist. Aders had a fine collection of German pictures. +See the verses to him in Vol. IV. The cunning in the address consisted +apparently in obtaining the signature of an India House colleague to +certify that it was "official."] + + + +LETTER 308 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +9 Jan., 1823. + +"Throw yourself on the world without any rational plan of support, +beyond what the chance employ of Booksellers would afford you"!!! + +Throw yourself rather, my dear Sir, from the steep Tarpeian rock, +slap-dash headlong upon iron spikes. If you had but five consolatory +minutes between the desk and the bed, make much of them, and live a +century in them, rather than turn slave to the Booksellers. They are +Turks and Tartars, when they have poor Authors at their beck. Hitherto +you have been at arm's length from them. Come not within their grasp. I +have known many authors for bread, some repining, others envying the +blessed security of a Counting House, all agreeing they had rather have +been Taylors, Weavers, what not? rather than the things they were. I +have known some starved, some to go mad, one clear friend literally +dying in a workhouse. You know not what a rapacious, dishonest set those +booksellers are. Ask even Southey, who (a single case almost) has made a +fortune by book drudgery, what he has found them. O you know not, may +you never know! the miseries of subsisting by authorship. 'Tis a pretty +appendage to a situation like yours or mine, but a slavery worse than +all slavery to be a book-seller's dependent, to drudge your brains for +pots of ale and breasts of mutton, to change your free thoughts and +voluntary numbers for ungracious TASK-WORK. Those fellows hate _us_. The +reason I take to be, that, contrary to other trades, in which the Master +gets all the credit (a Jeweller or Silversmith for instance), and the +Journeyman, who really does the fine work, is in the background, in +_our_ work the world gives all the credit to Us, whom _they_ consider +as +_their_ Journeymen, and therefore do they hate us, and cheat us, and +oppress us, and would wring the blood of us out, to put another sixpence +in their mechanic pouches. I contend, that a Bookseller has a _relative +honesty_ towards Authors, not like his honesty to the rest of the world. +B[aldwin], who first engag'd me as Elia, has not paid me up yet (nor any +of us without repeated mortifying applials), yet how the Knave fawned +while I was of service to him! Yet I dare say the fellow is punctual in +settling his milk-score, &c. Keep to your Bank, and the Bank will keep +you. Trust not to the Public, you may hang, starve, drown yourself, for +anything that worthy _Personage_ cares. I bless every star that +Providence, not seeing good to make me independent, has seen it next +good to settle me upon the stable foundation of Leadenhall. Sit down, +good B.B., in the Banking Office; what, is there not from six to Eleven +P.M. 6 days in the week, and is there not all Sunday? Fie, what a +superfluity of man's time,--if you could think so! Enough for +relaxation, mirth, converse, poetry, good thoughts, quiet thoughts. O +the corroding torturing tormenting thoughts, that disturb the Brain of +the unlucky wight, who must draw upon it for daily sustenance. +Henceforth I retract all my fond complaints of mercantile employment, +look upon them as Lovers' quarrels. I was but half in earnest. Welcome, +dead timber of a desk, that makes me live. A little grumbling is a +wholesome medicine for the spleen; but in my inner heart do I approve +and embrace this our close but unharassing way of life. I am quite +serious. If you can send me Fox, I will not keep it six _weeks_, and +will return it, with warm thanks to yourself and friend, without blot or +dog's ear. You much oblige me by this kindness. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Please to direct to me at India Ho. in future. [? I am] not always at +Russell St. + + +[Barton had long been meditating the advisability of giving up his place +in the bank at Woodbridge and depending upon his pen. Lamb's letter of +dissuasion is not the only one which he received. Byron had written to +him in 1812: "You deserve success; but we knew, before Addison wrote his +Cato, that desert does not always command it. But suppose it attained-- + + 'You know what ills the author's life assail-- + Toil, envy, want, the _patron_, and the jail.' + +Do not renounce writing, but never trust entirely to authorship. If you +have a profession, retain it; it will be like Prior's fellowship, a last +and sure resource." Barton had now broken again into dissatisfaction +with his life. He did not, however, leave the bank. + +Southey made no "fortune" by his pen. He almost always had to forestall +his new works.] + + + +LETTER 309 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +23 January, '23. + +Dear Payne--I have no mornings (my day begins at 5 P.M.) to transact +business in, or talents for it, so I employ Mary, who has seen +Robertson, who says that the Piece which is to be Operafied was sent to +you six weeks since by a Mr. Hunter, whose journey has been delayed, but +he supposes you have it by this time. On receiving it back properly +done, the rest of your dues will be forthcoming. You have received L30 +from Harwood, I hope? Bishop was at the theatre when Mary called, and he +has put your other piece into C. Kemble's hands (the piece you talk of +offering Elliston) and C.K. sent down word that he had not yet had time +to read it. So stand your affairs at present. Glossop has got the +Murderer. Will you address him on the subject, or shall I--that is, +Mary? She says you must write more _showable_ letters about these +matters, for, with all our trouble of crossing out this word, and giving +a cleaner turn to th' other, and folding down at this part, and +squeezing an obnoxious epithet into a corner, she can hardly communicate +their contents without offence. What, man, put less gall in your ink, or +write me a biting tragedy! + +C. LAMB. + + +[Here should come a letter from Lamb to Ayrton asking him to meet the +Burneys and Paynes on Wednesday at half-past four.] + + + +LETTER 310 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE + +February [9], 1823. + +My dear Miss Lamb--I have enclosed for you Mr. Payne's piece called +Grandpapa, which I regret to say is not thought to be of the nature that +will suit this theatre; but as there appears to be much merit in it, Mr. +Kemble strongly recommends that you should send it to the English Opera +House, for which it seems to be excellently adapted. As you have already +been kind enough to be our medium of communication with Mr. Payne, I +have imposed this trouble upon you; but if you do not like to act for +Mr. Payne in the business, and have no means of disposing of the piece, +I will forward it to Paris or elsewhere as you think he may prefer. + +Very truly yours, + +HENRY ROBERTSON. + +T.R.C.G., 8 Feb. 1823. + +Dear P---- We have just received the above, and want your instructions. +It strikes me as a very merry little piece, that should be played by +_very young actors_. It strikes me that Miss Clara Fisher would play the +_boy_ exactly. She is just such a forward chit. No young _man_ would do +it without its appearing absurd, but in a girl's hands it would have +just all the reality that a short dream of an act requires. Then for the +sister, if Miss Stevenson that was, were Miss Stevenson and younger, +they two would carry it off. I do not know who they have got in that +young line, besides Miss C.F., at Drury, nor how you would like Elliston +to have it--has he not had it? I am thick with Arnold, but I have always +heard that the very slender profits of the English Opera House do not +admit of his giving above a trifle, or next to none, for a piece of this +kind. Write me what I should do, what you would ask, &c. The music +(printed) is returned with the piece, and the French original. Tell Mr. +Grattan I thank him for his book, which as far as I have read it is a +very _companionable one_. I have but just received it. It came the same +hour with your packet from Cov. Gar., i.e. yester-night late, to my +summer residence, where, tell Kenney, the cow is quiet. Love to all at +Versailles. Write quickly. + +C.L. + +I have no acquaintance with Kemble at all, having only met him once or +twice; but any information, &c., I can get from R., who is a good +fellow, you may command. I am sorry the rogues are so dilitory, but I +distinctly believe they mean to fulfill their engagement. I am sorry you +are not here to see to these things. I am a poor man of business, but +command me to the short extent of my tether. My sister's kind +remembrance ever. + +C.L. + + +[The "Grandpapa" was eventually produced at Drury Lane, May 25, 1825, +and played thrice. Miss Stevenson was an actress praised by Lamb in _The +Examiner_ (see Vol. I. of this edition). C.F. was Clara Fisher, +mentioned above. + +Samuel James Arnold was manager of the Lyceum, then known as the English +Opera House; he was the brother of Mrs. William Ayrton, Lamb's friend. + +Mr. Grattan was Thomas Colley Grattan (1792-1864), who was then living +in Paris. His book would be _Highways and Byways_, first series, 1823. + +There is one other note to Payne in the _Century Magazine_, unimportant +and undated, suggesting a walk one Sunday.] + + + +LETTER 311 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. February 17, 1823.] + +My dear Sir--I have read quite through the ponderous folio of G.F. I +think Sewell has been judicious in omitting certain parts, as for +instance where G.F. _has_ revealed to him the natures of all the +creatures in their names, as Adam had. He luckily turns aside from that +compendious study of natural history, which might have superseded +Buffon, to his proper spiritual pursuits, only just hinting what a +philosopher he might have been. The ominous passage is near the +beginning of the Book. It is clear he means a physical knowledge, +without trope or figure. Also, pretences to miraculous healing and the +like are more frequent than I should have suspected from the epitome in +Sewell. He is nevertheless a great spiritual man, and I feel very much +obliged by your procuring me the Loan of it. How I like the Quaker +phrases--though I think they were hardly completed till Woolman. A +pretty little manual of Quaker language (with an endeavour to explain +them) might be gathered out of his Book. Could not you do it? I have +read through G.F. without finding any explanation of the term _first +volume_ in the title page. It takes in all, both his life and his death. +Are there more Last words of him? Pray, how may I venture to return it +to Mr. Shewell at Ipswich? I fear to send such a Treasure by a Stage +Coach. Not that I am afraid of the Coachman or the Guard _reading_ it. +But it might be lost. Can you put me in a way of sending it in safety? +The kind hearted owner trusted it to me for six months. I think I was +about as many days in getting through it, and I do not think that I +skipt a word of it. I have quoted G.F. in my Quaker's meeting, as having +said he was "lifted up in spirit" (which I felt at the time to be not a +Quaker phrase), "and the Judge and Jury were as dead men under his +feet." I find no such words in his Journal, and I did not get them from +Sewell, and the latter sentence I am sure I did not mean to invent. I +must have put some other Quaker's words into his mouth. Is it a fatality +in me, that every thing I touch turns into a Lye? I once quoted two +Lines from a translation of Dante, which Hazlitt very greatly admired, +and quoted in a Book as proof of the stupendous power of that poet, but +no such lines are to be found in the translation, which has been +searched for the purpose. I must have dreamed them, for I am quite +certain I did not forge them knowingly. What a misfortune to have a +Lying memory.--Yes, I have seen Miss Coleridge, and wish I had just such +a--daughter. God love her--to think that she should have had to toil +thro' five octavos of that cursed (I forget I write to a Quaker) +Abbeypony History, and then to abridge them to 3, and all for L113. At +her years, to be doing stupid Jesuits' Latin into English, when she +should be reading or writing Romances. Heaven send her Uncle do not +breed her up a Quarterly Reviewer!--which reminds me, that he has spoken +very respectfully of you in the last number, which is the next thing to +having a Review all to one's self. Your description of Mr. Mitford's +place makes me long for a pippin and some carraways and a cup of sack in +his orchard, when the sweets of the night come in. + +Farewell. + +C. LAMB. + + +[In the 1694 folio of George Fox's _Journal_ the revelation of the names +of creatures occurs twice, once under Notts in 1647 and again under +Mansfield in 1648. + +"Sewell." _The History of the Rise, Increase and Progress of the +Christian People called Quakers_, 1722. By William Sewell (1654-1720). + +"In my Quaker's meeting"--the _Elia_ essay (see Vol. II.). + +"I once quoted two Lines." Possibly, Mr. A.R. Waller suggests to me, the +lines:-- + + Because on earth their names + In Fame's eternal volume shine for aye, + +quoted by Hazlitt in his _Round Table_ essay "On Posthumous Fame," and +again in one of his _Edinburgh Review_ articles. They are presumably +based upon the _Inferno_, Canto IV. (see Haselfoot's translation, second +edition, 1899, page 21, lines 74-78). But the "manufacturer" of them +must have had Spenser's line in his mind, "On Fame's eternall bead-roll +worthie to be fyled" (_Faerie Queene_, Bk. IV., Canto II., Stanza 32). +They have not yet been found in any translation of Dante. This +explanation would satisfy Lamb's words "quoted in a book," i.e., _The +Round Table_, published in 1817. + +"Miss Coleridge"--Coleridge's daughter Sara, born in 1802, who had been +brought up by her uncle, Southey. She had translated Martin +Dobrizhoffer's Latin history of the Abipones in order to gain funds for +her brother Derwent's college expenses. Her father considered the +translation "unsurpassed for pure mother English by anything I have read +for a long time." Sara Coleridge married her cousin, Henry Nelson +Coleridge, in 1829. She edited her father's works and died in 1852. At +the present time she and her mother were visiting the Gillmans. + +Mr. Mitford was John Mitford (1781-1859), rector of Benhall, in Suffolk, +and editor of old poets. Later he became editor of the _Gentleman's +Magazine_. He was a cousin of Mary Russell Mitford. In the _Gentleman's +Magazine_ for May, 1838, is a review of Talfourd's edition of Lamb's +_Letters_, probably from his pen, in which he records a visit to the +Lambs in 1827.] + + + +LETTER 312 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +[Dated at end: February 24, 1823.] + +Dear W.--I write that you may not think me neglectful, not that I have +any thing to say. In answer to your questions, it was at _your_ house I +saw an edition of Roxana, the preface to which stated that the author +had left out that part of it which related to Roxana's daughter +persisting in imagining herself to be so, in spite of the mother's +denial, from certain hints she had picked up, and throwing herself +continually in her mother's way (as Savage is said to have done in +_his_, prying in at windows to get a glimpse of her), and that it was by +advice of Southern, who objected to the circumstances as being untrue, +when the rest of the story was founded on fact; which shows S. to have +been a stupid-ish fellow. The incidents so resemble Savage's story, that +I taxed Godwin with taking Falconer from his life by Dr. Johnson. You +should have the edition (if you have not parted with it), for I saw it +never but at your place at the Mews' Gate, nor did I then read it to +compare it with my own; only I know the daughter's curiosity is the best +part of _my_ Roxana. The prologue you speak of was mine, so named, but +not worth much. You ask me for 2 or 3 pages of verse. I have not written +so much since you knew me. I am altogether prosaic. May be I may touch +off a sonnet in time. I do not prefer Col. Jack to either Rob. Cr. or +Roxana. I only spoke of the beginning of it, his childish history. The +rest is poor. I do not know anywhere any good character of De Foe +besides what you mention. I do not know that Swift mentions him. Pope +does. I forget if D'Israeli has. Dunlop I think has nothing of him. He +is quite new ground, and scarce known beyond Crusoe. I do not know who +wrote Quarll. I never thought of Quarll as having an author. It is a +poor imitation; the monkey is the best in it, and his pretty dishes made +of shells. Do you know the Paper in the Englishman by Sir Rd. Steele, +giving an account of Selkirk? It is admirable, and has all the germs of +Crusoe. You must quote it entire. Captain G. Carleton wrote his own +Memoirs; they are about Lord Peterborough's campaign in Spain, & a good +Book. Puzzelli puzzles me, and I am in a cloud about Donald M'Leod. I +never heard of them; so you see, my dear Wilson, what poor assistances I +can give in the way of information. I wish your Book out, for I shall +like to see any thing about De Foe or from you. + +Your old friend, + +C. LAMB. + +From my and your old compound. 24 Feb. '23. + + +[With this letter compare the letter on September 9, 1801, to Godwin, +and the letter on December 16, 1822, to Wilson. + +Defoe's _Roxana_, first edition, does not, as a matter of fact, contain +the episode of the daughter which Lamb so much admired. Later editions +have it. Godwin says in his Preface to "Faulkener," 1807, the play to +which Lamb wrote a prologue in praise of Defoe (see Vol. IV.), that the +only accessible edition of _Roxana_ in which the story of Susannah is +fully told is that of 1745. + +Richard Savage was considered to be the natural son of the Countess of +Macclesfield and Earl Rivers. His mother at first disowned him, but +afterwards, when this became impossible, repulsed him. Johnson says in +his "Life of Savage," that it was his hero's "practice to walk in the +dark evenings for several hours before her door in hopes of seeing her +as she might come by accident to the window or cross her apartment with +a candle in her hand." + +Swift and Defoe were steady enemies, although I do not find that either +mentions the other by name. But Swift in _The Examiner_ often had Defoe +in mind, and Defoe in one of his political writings refers to Swift, +_apropos_ Wood's halfpence, as "the copper farthing author." + +Pope referred to Defoe twice in the _Dunciad_: once as standing high, +fearless and unabashed in the pillory, and once, libellously, as the +father of Norton, of the _Flying Post_. + +_Philip Quarll_ was the first imitation of _Robinson Crusoe_. It was +published in 1727, purporting to be the narrative of one Dorrington, a +merchant, and Quarll's discoverer. The title begins, _The Hermit; or, +The Unparalleled Sufferings and Surprising Adventures of Mr. Philip +Quarll, an Englishman_ ... Lamb says in his essay on Christ's Hospital +that the Blue-Coat boys used to read the book. The authorship of the +book is still unknown. + +Steele's account of Selkirk is in _The Englishman_, No. 26, Dec. 1, +1713. Wilson quoted it. + +Defoe's fictitious _Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton_ was +published in 1728. + +I cannot explain Puzzelli or Donald M'Leod. Later Lamb sent Wilson, who +seems to have asked for some verse about Defoe, the "Ode to the +Treadmill," but Wilson did not use it. + +"My old compound." Robinson's _Diary_ (Vol. I., page 333) has this: "The +large room in the accountant's office at the East India House is divided +into boxes or compartments, in each of which sit six clerks, Charles +Lamb himself in one. They are called Compounds. The meaning of the word +was asked one day, and Lamb said it was 'a collection of simples.'"] + + + +LETTER 313 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: March 11, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--The approbation of my little book by your sister is very +pleasing to me. The Quaker incident did not happen to me, but to +Carlisle the surgeon, from whose mouth I have twice heard it, at an +interval of ten or twelve years, with little or no variation, and have +given it as exactly as I could remember it. The gloss which your sister, +or you, have put upon it does not strike me as correct. Carlisle drew no +inference from it against the honesty of the Quakers, but only in favour +of their surprising coolness--that they should be capable of committing +a good joke, with an utter insensibility to its being any jest at all. I +have reason to believe in the truth of it, because, as I have said, I +heard him repeat it without variation at such an interval. The story +loses sadly in print, for Carlisle is the best story teller I ever +heard. The idea of the discovery of roasting pigs, I also borrowed, from +my friend Manning, and am willing to confess both my plagiarisms. + +Should fate ever so order it that you shall be in town with your sister, +mine bids me say that she shall have great pleasure in being introduced +to her. I think I must give up the cause of the Bank--from nine to nine +is galley-slavery, but I hope it is but temporary. Your endeavour at +explaining Fox's insight into the natures of animals must fail, as I +shall transcribe the passage. It appears to me that he stopt short in +time, and was on the brink of falling with his friend Naylor, my +favourite.--The book shall be forthcoming whenever your friend can make +convenient to call for it. + +They have dragged me again into the Magazine, but I feel the spirit of +the thing in my own mind quite gone. "Some brains" (I think Ben Jonson +says it) "will endure but one skimming." We are about to have an +inundation of poetry from the Lakes, Wordsworth and Southey are coming +up strong from the North. The she Coleridges have taken flight, to my +regret. With Sara's own-made acquisitions, her unaffectedness and +no-pretensions are beautiful. You might pass an age with her without +suspecting that she knew any thing but her mother's tongue. I don't mean +any reflection on Mrs. Coleridge here. I had better have said her +vernacular idiom. Poor C. I wish he had a home to receive his daughter +in. But he is but as a stranger or a visitor in this world. How did you +like Hartley's sonnets? The first, at least, is vastly fine. Lloyd has +been in town a day or two on business, and is perfectly well. I am +ashamed of the shabby letters I send, but I am by nature anything but +neat. Therein my mother bore me no Quaker. I never could seal a letter +without dropping the wax on one side, besides scalding my fingers. I +never had a seal too of my own. Writing to a great man lately, who is +moreover very Heraldic, I borrowed a seal of a friend, who by the female +side quarters the Protectorial Arms of Cromwell. How they must have +puzzled my correspondent!--My letters are generally charged as double at +the Post office, from their inveterate clumsiness of foldure. So you +must not take it disrespectful to your self if I send you such ungainly +scraps. I think I lose L100 a year at the India House, owing solely to +my want of neatness in making up Accounts. How I puzzle 'em out at last +is the wonder. I have to do with millions. _I?_ + +It is time to have done my incoherences. + +Believe me Yours Truly + +C. LAMB. + +Tuesd 11 Ma 23. + + +[Lamb had sent _Elia_ to Woodbridge. Bernard Barton's sister was Maria +Hack, author of many books for children. The Quaker incident is in the +essay "Imperfect Sympathies." Carlisle was Sir Anthony Carlisle. + +"Your endeavour at explaining Fox's insight." See letter above. James +Nayler (1617?-1660), an early Quaker who permitted his admirers to look +upon him as a new Christ. He went to extremes totally foreign to the +spirit of the Society. Barton made a paraphrase of Nayler's "Last +Testimony." + +"They have dragged me again." Lamb had been quite ready to give up +_Elia_ with the first essays. "Old China," one of his most charming +papers, was in the March _London Magazine_. + +"Some brains ..." I had to give this up in my large edition. I now find +that Swift says it, not Ben Jonson. "There is a brain that will endure +but one scumming." Preface to _Battle of the Books_. + +"Hartley's sonnets." Four sonnets by Hartley Coleridge were printed in +the _London Magazine_ for February, 1823, addressed to R.S. Jameson. + +"Writing to a great man lately." This was Sir Walter Scott (see page +626). Barron Field would be the friend with the seal. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Ayrton saying that there will be +cards and cold mutton in Russell St. from 8 to 9 and gin and jokes from +9.30 to 12.] + + + +LETTER 314 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 5 April 1823.] + +Dear Sir--You must think me ill mannered not to have replied to your +first letter sooner, but I have an ugly habit of aversion from letter +writing, which makes me an unworthy correspondent. I have had no spring, +or cordial call to the occupation of late. I have been not well lately, +which must be my lame excuse. Your poem, which I consider very +affecting, found me engaged about a humorous Paper for the London, which +I had called a "Letter to an _Old Gentleman_ whose Education had been +neglected"--and when it was done Taylor and Hessey would not print it, +and it discouraged me from doing any thing else, so I took up Scott, +where I had scribbled some petulant remarks, and for a make shift +father'd them on Ritson. It is obvious I could not make your Poem a part +of them, and as I did not know whether I should ever be able to do to my +mind what you suggested, I thought it not fair to keep back the verses +for the chance. Mr. Mitford's sonnet I like very well; but as I also +have my reasons against interfering at all with the Editorial +arrangement of the London, I transmitted it (not in my own hand-writing) +to them, who I doubt not will be glad to insert it. What eventual +benefit it can be to you (otherwise than that a kind man's wish is a +benefit) I cannot conjecture. Your Society are eminently men of +Business, and will probably regard you as an idle fellow, possibly +disown you, that is to say, if you had put your own name to a sonnet of +that sort, but they cannot excommunicate Mr. Mitford, therefore I +thoroughly approve of printing the said verses. When I see any Quaker +names to the Concert of Antient Music, or as Directors of the British +Institution, or bequeathing medals to Oxford for the best classical +themes, etc.--then I shall begin to hope they will emancipate you. But +what as a Society can they do for you? you would not accept a Commission +in the Army, nor they be likely to procure it; Posts in Church or State +have they none in their giving; and then if they disown you--think--you +must live "a man forbid." + +I wishd for you yesterday. I dined in Parnassus, with Wordsworth, +Coleridge, Rogers, and Tom Moore--half the Poetry of England +constellated and clustered in Gloster Place! It was a delightful Even! +Coleridge was in his finest vein of talk, had all the talk, and let 'em +talk as evilly as they do of the envy of Poets, I am sure not one there +but was content to be nothing but a listener. The Muses were dumb, while +Apollo lectured on his and their fine Art. It is a lie that Poets are +envious, I have known the best of them, and can speak to it, that they +give each other their merits, and are the kindest critics as well as +best authors. I am scribbling a muddy epistle with an aking head, for we +did not quaff Hippocrene last night. Many, it was Hippocras rather. Pray +accept this as a letter in the mean time, and do me the favor to mention +my respects to Mr. Mitford, who is so good as to entertain good thoughts +of Elia, but don't show this almost impertinent scrawl. I will write +more respectfully next time, for believe me, if not in words, in +feelings, yours most so. + + +["Your poem." Barton's poem was entitled "A Poet's Thanks," and was +printed in the _London Magazine_ for April, 1823, the same number that +contained Lamb's article on Ritson and Scott. It is one of his best +poems, an expression of contentment in simplicity. The "Letter to an Old +Gentleman," a parody of De Quincey's series of "Letters to a Young +Gentleman" in the _London Magazine_, was not published until January, +1825. Scott was John Scott of Amwell (Barton's predecessor as the Quaker +poet), who had written a rather foolish book of prose, _Critical Essays +on the English Poets_. Ritson was Joseph Ritson, the critic and +antiquarian. See Vol. I. of the present edition for the essay. Barton +seems to have suggested to Lamb that he should write an essay around the +poem "A Poet's Thanks." Mitford's sonnet, which was printed in the +_London Magazine_ for June, 1823, was addressed commiseratingly to +Bernard Barton. It began:-- + + What to thy broken Spirit can atone, + Unhappy victim of the Tyrant's fears; + +and continued in the same strain, the point being that Barton was the +victim of his Quaker employers, who made him "prisoner at once and +slave." Lamb's previous letter shows us that Barton was being worked +from nine till nine, and we must suppose also that an objection to his +poetical exercises had been lodged or suggested. The matter righted +itself in time. + +"I dined in Parnassus." This dinner, at Thomas Monkhouse's, No. 34 +Gloucester Place, is described both by Moore and by Crabb Robinson, who +was present. Moore wrote in his _Journal_:-- + +"Dined at Mr. Monkhouse's (a gentleman I had never seen before) on +Wordsworth's invitation, who lives there whenever he comes to town. A +singular party. Coleridge, Rogers, Wordsworth and wife, Charles Lamb +(the hero at present of the _London Magazine_), and his sister (the poor +woman who went mad in a diligence on the way to Paris), and a Mr. +Robinson, one of the _minora sidera_ of this constellation of the Lakes; +the host himself, a Maecenas of the school, contributing nothing but +good dinners and silence. Charles Lamb, a clever fellow, certainly, but +full of villainous and abortive puns, which he miscarries of every +minute. Some excellent things, however, have come from him." + +Lamb told Moore that he had hitherto always felt an antipathy to him, +but henceforward should like him. + +Crabb Robinson writes:-- + +"_April 4th_.--Dined at Monkhouse's. Our party consisted of Wordsworth, +Coleridge, Lamb, Moore, and Rogers. Five poets of very unequal worth and +most disproportionate popularity, whom the public probably would arrange +in the very inverse order, except that it would place Moore above +Rogers. During this afternoon, Coleridge alone displayed any of his +peculiar talent. He talked much and well. I have not for years seen him +in such excellent health and spirits. His subjects metaphysical +criticism--Wordsworth he chiefly talked to. Rogers occasionally let fall +a remark. Moore seemed conscious of his inferiority. He was very +attentive to Coleridge, but seemed to relish Lamb, whom he sat next. L. +was in a good frame--kept himself within bounds and was only cheerful at +last.... I was at the bottom of the table, where I very ill performed my +part.... I walked home late with Lamb." + +Many years later Robinson sent to The Athenaeum (June 25, 1853) a +further and fuller account of the evening.] + + + +LETTER 315 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +April 13th, 1823. + +Dear Lad,--You must think me a brute beast, a rhinoceros, never to have +acknowledged the receipt of your precious present. But indeed I am none +of those shocking things, but have arrived at that indisposition to +letter-writing, which would make it a hard exertion to write three lines +to a king to spare a friend's life. Whether it is that the Magazine +paying me so much a page, I am loath to throw away composition--how much +a sheet do you give your correspondents? I have hung up Pope, and a gem +it is, in my town room; I hope for your approval. Though it accompanies +the "Essay on Man," I think that was not the poem he is here meditating. +He would have looked up, somehow affectedly, if he were just conceiving +"Awake, my St. John." Neither is he in the "Rape of the Lock" mood +exactly. I think he has just made out the last lines of the "Epistle to +Jervis," between gay and tender, + + "And other beauties envy Worsley's eyes." + +I'll be damn'd if that isn't the line. He is brooding over it, with a +dreamy phantom of Lady Mary floating before him. He is thinking which is +the earliest possible day and hour that she will first see it. What a +miniature piece of gentility it is! Why did you give it me? I do not +like you enough to give you anything so good. + +I have dined with T. Moore and breakfasted with Rogers, since I saw you; +have much to say about them when we meet, which I trust will be in a +week or two. I have been over-watched and over-poeted since Wordsworth +has been in town. I was obliged for health sake to wish him gone: but +now he is gone I feel a great loss. I am going to Dalston to recruit, +and have serious thoughts--of altering my condition, that is, of taking +to sobriety. What do you advise me? + +T. Moore asked me your address in a manner which made me believe he +meant to call upon you. + +Rogers spake very kindly of you, as every body does, and none with so +much reason as your + +C.L. + + +[This is the first important letter to Bryan Waller Procter, better +known as Barry Cornwall, who was afterwards to write, in his old age, so +pleasant a memoir of Lamb. He was then thirty-five, was practising law, +and had already published _Marcian Colonna_ and _A Sicilian Story_. + +The Epistle to Mr. Jervas (with Mr. Dryden's translation of Fresnoy's +_Art of Painting_) did not end upon this line, but some eighteen lines +later. I give the portrait in my large edition. + +"Lady Mary." By Lady Mary Lamb means, as Pope did in the first edition, +Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. But after his quarrel with that lady Pope +altered it to Worsley, signifying Lady Frances Worsley, daughter of the +Duke of Marlborough and wife of Sir Robert Worsley.] + + + +LETTER 316 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +[P.M. April 25, 1823.] + +Dear Miss H----, Mary has such an invincible reluctance to any +epistolary exertion, that I am sparing her a mortification by taking the +pen from her. The plain truth is, she writes such a pimping, mean, +detestable hand, that she is ashamed of the formation of her letters. +There is an essential poverty and abjectness in the frame of them. They +look like begging letters. And then she is sure to omit a most +substantial word in the second draught (for she never ventures an +epistle, without a foul copy first) which is obliged to be interlined, +which spoils the neatest epistle, you know [_the word "epistle" is +underlined_). Her figures, 1, 2, 3, 4, &c., where she has occasion to +express numerals, as in the date (25 Apr 1823), are not figures, but +Figurantes. And the combined posse go staggering up and down shameless +as drunkards in the day time. It is no better when she rules her paper, +her lines are "not less erring" than her words--a sort of unnatural +parallel lines, that are perpetually threatening to meet, which you know +is quite contrary to Euclid [_here Lamb has ruled lines grossly +unparallel_]. Her very blots are not bold like this [_here a bold +blot_], but poor smears [_here a poor smear_] half left in and half +scratched out with another smear left in their place. I like a clean +letter. A bold free hand, and a fearless flourish. Then she has always +to go thro' them (a second operation) to dot her i s, and cross her t s. +I don't think she can make a cork screw, if she tried--which has such a +fine effect at the end or middle of an epistle--and fills up-- + +[_Here Lamb has made a corkscrew two inches long_.] + +There is a corkscrew, one of the best I ever drew. By the way what +incomparable whiskey that was of Monkhouse's. But if I am to write a +letter, let me begin, and not stand flourishing like a fencer at a fair. + +It gives me great pleasure (the letter now begins) to hear that you got +down smoothly, and that Mrs. Monkhouse's spirits are so good and +enterprising. It shews, whatever her posture may be, that her mind at +least is not supine. I hope the excursion will enable the former to keep +pace with its out-stripping neighbor. Pray present our kindest wishes to +her, and all. (That sentence should properly have come in the Post +Script, but we airy Mercurial Spirits, there is no keeping us in). +Time--as was said of one of us--toils after us in vain. I am afraid our +co-visit with Coleridge was a dream. I shall not get away before the end +(or middle) of June, and then you will be frog-hopping at Boulogne. And +besides I think the Gilmans would scarce trust him with us, I have a +malicious knack at cutting of apron strings. The Saints' days you speak +of have long since fled to heaven, with Astraea, and the cold piety of +the age lacks fervor to recall them--only Peter left his key--the iron +one of the two, that shuts amain--and that's the reason I am lockd up. +Meanwhile of afternoons we pick up primroses at Dalston, and Mary +corrects me when I call 'em cowslips. God bless you all, and pray +remember me euphoneously to Mr. Gnwellegan. That Lee Priory must be a +dainty bower, is it built of flints, and does it stand at Kingsgate? Did +you remem + +[_This is apparently the proper end of the letter. At least there is no +indication of another sheet_.] + + +[Addressed to "Miss Hutchinson, 17 Sion Hill, Ramsgate, Kent," where she +was staying with Mrs. Monkhouse. I give a facsimile of it in my large +edition. + +"'Time'--as was said of one of us." Johnson wrote of Shakespeare, in the +Prologue at the opening of Drury Lane Theatre in 1747:-- + +And panting Time toil'd after him in vain. + +"The Saints' days." See note to the letter to Mrs. Wordsworth, Feb. 18, +1818. + +"Mr. Gnwellegan." Probably Lamb's effort to write the name of Edward +Quillinan, afterwards Wordsworth's son-in-law, whose first wife had been +a Miss Brydges of Lee Priory. + +"Lee Priory"--the home of Sir Egerton Brydges, at Ickham, near +Canterbury, for some years. He had, however, now left, and the private +press was closed. + +In _Notes and Queries_, November 11, 1876, was printed the following +scrap, a postscript by Charles Lamb to a letter from Mary Lamb to Miss +H. I place it here, having no clue as to date, nor does it matter:--] + + + +LETTER 317 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO MISS HUTCHINSON (?) + +A propos of birds--the other day at a large dinner, being call'd upon +for a toast, I gave, as the best toast I knew, "Wood-cock toast," which +was drunk with 3 cheers. + +Yours affect'y + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 318 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[No date. Probably 1823.] + +It is hard when a Gentleman cannot remain concealed, who affecteth +obscurity with greater avidity than most do seek to have their good +deeds brought to light--to haye a prying inquisitive finger, (to the +danger of its own scorching), busied in removing the little peck measure +(scripturally a bushel) under which one had hoped to bury his small +candle. The receipt of fern-seed, I think, in this curious age, would +scarce help a man to walk invisible. + +Well, I am discovered--and thou thyself, who thoughtest to shelter under +the pease-cod of initiality (a stale and shallow device), art no less +dragged to light--Thy slender anatomy--thy skeletonian D---- fleshed and +sinewed out to the plump expansion of six characters--thy tuneful +genealogy deduced-- + +By the way, what a name is Timothy! + +Lay it down, I beseech thee, and in its place take up the properer sound +of Timotheus-- + +Then mayst thou with unblushing fingers handle the Lyre "familiar to the +D----n name." + +With much difficulty have I traced thee to thy lurking-place. Many a +goodly name did I run over, bewildered between Dorrien, and Doxat, and +Dover, and Dakin, and Daintry--a wilderness of D's--till at last I +thought I had hit it--my conjectures wandering upon a melancholy +Jew--you wot the Israelite upon Change--Master Daniels--a contemplative +Hebrew-- to the which guess I was the rather led, by the consideration +that most of his nation are great readers-- + +Nothing is so common as to see them in the Jews' Walk, with a bundle of +script in one hand, and the Man of Feeling, or a volume of Sterne, in +the other-- + +I am a rogue if I can collect what manner of face thou carriest, though +thou seemest so familiar with mine--If I remember, thou didst not dimly +resemble the man Daniels, whom at first I took thee for--a care-worn, +mortified, economical, commercio-political countenance, with an +agreeable limp in thy gait, if Elia mistake thee not. I think I sh'd +shake hands with thee, if I met thee. + +[John Bates Dibdin, the son of Charles Dibdin the younger and grandson +of the great Charles Dibdin, was at this time a young man of about +twenty-four, engaged as a clerk in a shipping office in the city. I +borrow from Canon Ainger an interesting letter from a sister of Dibdin +on the beginning of the correspondence:-- + +My brother ... had constant occasion to conduct the giving or taking of +cheques, as it might be, at the India House. There he always selected +"the little clever man" in preference to the other clerks. At that time +the _Elia Essays_ were appearing in print. No one had the slightest +conception who "Elia" was. He was talked of everywhere, and everybody +was trying to find him out, but without success. At last, from the style +and manner of conveying his ideas and opinions on different subjects, my +brother began to suspect that Lamb was the individual so widely sought +for, and wrote some lines to him, anonymously, sending them by post to +his residence, with the hope of sifting him on the subject. Although +Lamb could not _know_ who sent him the lines, yet he looked very hard at +the writer of them the next time they met, when he walked up, as usual, +to Lamb's desk in the most unconcerned manner, to transact the necessary +business. Shortly after, when they were again in conversation, something +dropped from Lamb's lips which convinced his hearer, beyond a doubt, +that his suspicions were correct. He therefore wrote some more lines +(anonymously, as before), beginning-- + + "I've found thee out, O Elia!" + +and sent them to Colebrook Row. The consequence was that at their next +meeting Lamb produced the lines, and after much laughing, confessed +himself to be _Elia_. This led to a warm friendship between them. + +Dibdin's letter of discovery was signed D. Hence Lamb's fumbling after +his Christian name, which he probably knew all the time.] + + + +LETTER 319 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 3 May, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--I am vexed to be two letters in your debt, but I have been +quite out of the vein lately. A philosophical treatise is wanting, of +the causes of the backwardness with which persons after a certain time +of life set about writing a letter. I always feel as if I had nothing to +say, and the performance generally justifies the presentiment. Taylor +and Hessey did foolishly in not admitting the sonnet. Surely it might +have followed the B.B. I agree with you in thinking Bowring's paper +better than the former. I will inquire about my Letter to the Old +Gentleman, but I expect it to _go in_, after those to the Young Gent'n +are completed. I do not exactly see why the Goose and little Goslings +should emblematize _a Quaker poet that has no children_. But after +all--perhaps it is a Pelican. The Mene Mene Tekel Upharsin around it I +cannot decypher. The songster of the night pouring out her effusions +amid a Silent Meeting of Madge Owlets, would be at least intelligible. A +full pause here comes upon me, as if I had not a word more left. I will +shake my brain. Once-- twice--nothing comes up. George Fox recommends +waiting on these occasions. I wait. Nothing comes. G. Fox--that sets me +off again. I have finished the Journal, and 400 more pages of the +_Doctrinals_, which I picked up for 7s. 6d. If I get on at this rate, +the Society will be in danger of having two Quaker poets--to patronise. +I am at Dalston now, but if, when I go back to Cov. Gar., I find thy +friend has not call'd for the Journal, thee must put me in a way of +sending it; and if it should happen that the Lender of it, having that +volume, has not the other, I shall be most happy in his accepting the +Doctrinals, which I shall read but once certainly. It is not a splendid +copy, but perfect, save a leaf of Index. + +I cannot but think _the London_ drags heavily. I miss Janus. And O how +it misses Hazlitt! Procter too is affronted (as Janus has been) with +their abominable curtailment of his things--some meddling Editor or +other--or phantom of one --for neither he nor Janus know their busy +friend. But they always find the best part cut out; and they have done +well to cut also. I am not so fortunate as to be served in this manner, +for I would give a clean sum of money in sincerity to leave them +handsomely. But the dogs--T. and H. I mean-- will not affront me, and +what can I do? must I go on to drivelling? Poor Relations is +tolerable--but where shall I get another subject--or who shall deliver +me from the body of this death? I assure you it teases me more than it +used to please me. Ch. Lloyd has published a sort of Quaker poem, he +tells me, and that he has order'd me a copy, but I have not got it. Have +you seen it? I must leave a little wafer space, which brings me to an +apology for a conclusion. I am afraid of looking back, for I feel all +this while I have been writing nothing, but it may show I am alive. +Believe me, cordially yours C. LAMB. + + +[The sonnet probably was Mitford's, which was printed in the June number +(see above). Bowring, afterwards Sir John, was writing in the _London +Magazine_ on "Spanish Romances." + +"The Goose and little Goslings." Possibly the design upon the seal of +Barton's last letter. + +"Janus." The first mention of Thomas Griffiths Wainewright (see note +below), who sometimes wrote in the _London_ over the pseudonym Janus +Weathercock. John Taylor, Hood and perhaps John Hamilton Reynolds, made +up the magazine for press. In the May number, in addition to Lamb's +"Poor Relations," were contributions from De Quincey, Hartley Coleridge, +Cary, and Barton. But it was not what it had been. + +Lloyd's Quaker poem would probably be one of those in his _Poems_, 1823, +which contains some of his most interesting work.] + + + +LETTER 320 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. May 6, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--Your verses were very pleasant, and I shall like to see more +of them--I do not mean _addressed to me_. + +I do not know whether you live in town or country, but if it suits your +convenience I shall be glad to see you some evening-- say Thursday--at +20 Great Russell Street, Cov't Garden. If you can come, do not trouble +yourself to write. We are old fashiond people who _drink tea_ at six, or +not much later, and give cold mutton and pickle at nine, the good old +hour. I assure you (if it suit you) we shall be glad to see you.-- + + Yours, etc. C. LAMB. + + E.I.H., Tuesday, My love to Mr. Railton. + Some day of May 1823. The same to Mr. Rankin, + Not official. to the whole Firm indeed. + + +[The verses are not, I fear, now recoverable. Dibdin's firm was Railton, +Rankin & Co., in Old Jury. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Hone, dated May 19, 1823. William +Hone (1780-1842), who then, his stormy political days over, was +publishing antiquarian works on Ludgate Hill, had sent Lamb his _Ancient +Mysteries Described_, 1823. Lamb thanks him for it, and invites him to +14 Kingsland Row, Dalston, the next Sunday: "We dine exactly at 4."] + + + +LETTER 321 + +MARY LAMB TO MRS. RANDAL NORRIS + +Hastings, at Mrs. Gibbs, York Cottage, Priory, No. 4. [June 18, 1823.] + +My dear Friend,--Day after day has passed away, and my brother has said, +"I will write to Mrs. [? Mr.] Norris to-morrow," and therefore I am +resolved to write to _Mrs. Norris_ to-day, and trust him no longer. We +took our places for Sevenoaks, intending to remain there all night in +order to see Knole, but when we got there we chang'd our minds, and went +on to Tunbridge Wells. About a mile short of the Wells the coach stopped +at a little inn, and I saw, "Lodgings to let" on a little, very little +house opposite. I ran over the way, and secured them before the coach +drove away, and we took immediate possession: it proved a very +comfortable place, and we remained there nine days. The first evening, +as we were wandering about, we met a lady, the wife of one of the India +House clerks, with whom we had been slightly acquainted some years ago, +which slight acquaintance has been ripened into a great intimacy during +the nine pleasant days that we passed at the Wells. She and her two +daughters went with us in an open chaise to Knole, and as the chaise +held only five, we mounted Miss James upon a little horse, which she +rode famously. I was very much pleased with Knole, and still more with +Penshurst, which we also visited. We saw Frant and the Rocks, and made +much use of your Guide Book, only Charles lost his way once going by the +map. We were in constant exercise the whole time, and spent our time so +pleasantly that when we came here on Monday we missed our new friends +and found ourselves very dull. We are by the seaside in a _still less +house_, and we have exchanged a very pretty landlady for a very ugly +one, but she is equally attractive to us. We eat turbot, and we drink +smuggled Hollands, and we walk up hill and down hill all day long. In +the little intervals of rest that we allow ourselves I teach Miss James +French; she picked up a few words during her foreign Tour with us, and +she has had a hankering after it ever since. + +We came from Tunbridge Wells in a Postchaise, and would have seen Battle +Abbey on the way, but it is only shewn on a Monday. We are trying to +coax Charles into a Monday's excursion. And Bexhill we are also thinking +about. Yesterday evening we found out by chance the most beautiful view +I ever saw. It is called "The Lovers' Seat."... You have been here, +therefore you must have seen [it, or] is it only Mr. and Mrs. Faint who +have visited Hastings? [Tell Mrs.] Faint that though in my haste to get +housed I d[ecided on] ... ice's lodgings, yet it comforted all th ... to +know that I had a place in view. + +I suppose you are so busy that it is not fair to ask you to write me a +line to say how you are going on. Yet if any one of you have half an +hour to spare for that purpose, it will be most thankfully received. +Charles joins with me in love to you all together, and to each one in +particular upstairs and downstairs. + +Yours most affectionately, M. LAMB. June 18 + + +[Mr. Hazlitt dates this letter 1825 or 1826, and considers it to refer +to a second visit to Hastings; but I think most probably it refers to +the 1823 visit, especially as the Lovers' Seat would assuredly have been +discovered then. Miss James was Mary Lamb's nurse. Mrs. Randal Norris +had been a Miss Faint. + +There is a curious similarity between a passage in this letter and in +one of Byron's, written in 1814: "I have been swimming, and eating +turbot, and smuggling neat brandies, and silk handkerchiefs ... and +walking on cliffs and tumbling down hills." + +A Hastings guide book for 1825 gives Mrs. Gibbs' address as 4 York +Cottages, near Priory Bridge. Near by, in Pelham Place, a Mr. Hogsflesh +had a lodging-house.] + + + +LETTER 322 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 10 July, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--I shall be happy to read the MS. and to forward it; but T. and +H. must judge for themselves of publication. If it prove interesting (as +I doubt not) I shall not spare to say so, you may depend upon it. +Suppose you direct it to Acco'ts. Office, India House. + +I am glad you have met with some sweetening circumstances to your +unpalatable draught. I have just returned from Hastings, where are +exquisite views and walks, and where I have given up my soul to walking, +and I am now suffering sedentary contrasts. I am a long time reconciling +to Town after one of these excursions. Home is become strange, and will +remain so yet a while. Home is the most unforgiving of friends and +always resents Absence; I know its old cordial looks will return, but +they are slow in clearing up. That is one of the features of this _our_ +galley slavery, that peregrination ended makes things worse. I felt out +of water (with all the sea about me) at Hastings, and just as I had +learned to domiciliate there, I must come back to find a home which is +no home. I abused Hastings, but learned its value. There are spots, +inland bays, etc., which realise the notions of Juan Fernandez. + +The best thing I lit upon by accident was a small country church (by +whom or when built unknown) standing bare and single in the midst of a +grove, with no house or appearance of habitation within a quarter of a +mile, only passages diverging from it thro' beautiful woods to so many +farm houses. There it stands, like the first idea of a church, before +parishioners were thought of, nothing but birds for its congregation, or +like a Hermit's oratory (the Hermit dead), or a mausoleum, its effect +singularly impressive, like a church found in a desert isle to startle +Crusoe with a home image; you must make out a vicar and a congregation +from fancy, for surely none come there. Yet it wants not its pulpit, and +its font, and all the seemly additaments of _our_ worship. + +Southey has attacked Elia on the score of infidelity, in the Quarterly, +Article, "Progress of Infidels [Infidelity]." I had not, nor have, seen +the Monthly. He might have spared an old friend such a construction of a +few careless flights, that meant no harm to religion. If all his +UNGUARDED expressions on the subject were to be collected-- + +But I love and respect Southey--and will not retort. I HATE HIS REVIEW, +and his being a Reviewer. + +The hint he has dropped will knock the sale of the book on the head, +which was almost at a stop before. + +Let it stop. There is corn in Egypt, while there is cash at Leadenhall. +You and I are something besides being Writers. Thank God. + +Yours truly C.L. + + +[What the MS. was I do not know. Lamb recurs more fully to the +description of the little church--probably Hollingdon Rural, about three +miles north-west from the town--in later letters. + +The thoughts in the second paragraph of this letter were amplified in +the _Elia_ essay "The Old Margate Hoy," in the _London Magazine_ for +July, 1823. + +"Southey has attacked Elia." In an article in the _Quarterly_ for +January, 1823, in a review of a work by Gregoire on Deism in France, +under the title "The Progress of Infidelity," Southey had a reference to +_Elia_ in the following terms:-- + +"Unbelievers have not always been honest enough thus to express their +real feelings; but this we know concerning them, that when they have +renounced their birthright of hope, they have not been able to divest +themselves of fear. From the nature of the human mind this might be +presumed, and in fact it is so. They may deaden the heart and stupify +the conscience, but they cannot destroy the imaginative faculty. There +is a remarkable proof of this in _Elia's Essays_, a book which wants +only a sounder religious feeling, to be as delightful as it is +original." + +And then Southey went on to draw attention to the case of Thornton Hunt, +the little child of Leigh Hunt, the (to Southey) notorious free-thinker, +who, as Lamb had stated in the essay "Witches and Other Night Fears," +would wake at night in terror of images of fear. + +"I will not retort." Lamb, as we shall see, changed his mind. + +"Almost at a stop before." _Elia_ was never popular until long after +Lamb's death. It did not reach a second edition until 1836. There are +now several new editions every year.] + + + +LETTER 323 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[July, 1823.] + +D'r A.--I expect Proctor and Wainwright (Janus W.) this +evening; will you come? I suppose it is but a comp't +to ask Mrs. Alsop; but it is none to say that we should be +most glad to see her. Yours ever. How vexed I am at your +Dalston expedit'n. C.L. +Tuesday. + + +[Mrs. Allsop was a daughter of Mrs. Jordan, and had herself been an +actress.] + + + +LETTER 324 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: 2 September (1823).] + +Dear B.B.--What will you say to my not writing? You cannot say I do not +write now. Hessey has not used your kind sonnet, nor have I seen it. +Pray send me a Copy. Neither have I heard any more of your Friend's MS., +which I will reclaim, whenever you please. When you come London-ward you +will find me no longer in Cov't Gard. I have a Cottage, in Colebrook +row, Islington. A cottage, for it is detach'd; a white house, with 6 +good rooms; the New River (rather elderly by this time) runs (if a +moderate walking pace can be so termed) close to the foot of the house; +and behind is a spacious garden, with vines (I assure you), pears, +strawberries, parsnips, leeks, carrots, cabbages, to delight the heart +of old Alcinous. You enter without passage into a cheerful dining room, +all studded over and rough with old Books, and above is a lightsome +Drawing room, 3 windows, full of choice prints. I feel like a great +Lord, never having had a house before. + +The London I fear falls off.--I linger among its creaking rafters, like +the last rat. It will topple down, if they don't get some Buttresses. +They have pull'd down three, W. Hazlitt, Proctor, and their best stay, +kind light hearted Wainwright --their Janus. The best is, neither of our +fortunes is concern'd in it. + +I heard of you from Mr. Pulham this morning, and that gave a fillip to +my Laziness, which has been intolerable. But I am so taken up with +pruning and gardening, quite a new sort of occupation to me. I have +gather'd my Jargonels, but my Windsor Pears are backward. The former +were of exquisite raciness. I do now sit under my own vine, and +contemplate the growth of vegetable nature. I can now understand in what +sense they speak of FATHER ADAM. I recognise the paternity, while I +watch my tulips. I almost FELL with him, for the first day I turned a +drunken gard'ner (as he let in the serpent) into my Eden, and he laid +about him, lopping off some choice boughs, &c., which hung over from a +neighbor's garden, and in his blind zeal laid waste a shade, which had +sheltered their window from the gaze of passers by. The old gentlewoman +(fury made her not handsome) could scarcely be reconciled by all my fine +words. There was no buttering her parsnips. She talk'd of the Law. What +a lapse to commit on the first day of my happy "garden-state." + +I hope you transmitted the Fox-Journal to its Owner with suitable +thanks. + +Mr. Cary, the Dante-man, dines with me to-day. He is a model of a +country Parson, lean (as a Curate ought to be), modest, sensible, no +obtruder of church dogmas, quite a different man from Southey,--you +would like him. + +Pray accept this for a Letter, and believe me with sincere regards + +Yours C.L. + +2 Sept. + + +["Your kind sonnet." Barton's well-known sonnet to Elia (quoted below) +had been printed in the _London Magazine_ long before--in the previous +February. I do not identify this one among his writings. + +"I have a Cottage." This cottage still stands (1912). Within it is much +as in Lamb's day, but outwardly changed, for a new house has been built +on one side and it is thus no longer detached. The New River still runs +before it, but subterraneously. + +Barton was so attracted by one at least of Lamb's similes that, I fancy, +he borrowed it for an account of his grandfather's house at Tottenham +which he wrote some time later; for I find that gentleman's garden +described as "equal to that of old Alcinous." + +"Kind light hearted Wainwright." Lamb has caused much surprise by using +such words of one who was destined to become almost the most +cold-blooded criminal in English history; but, as Hartley Coleridge +wrote in another connection, it was Lamb's way to take things by the +better handle, and Wainewright's worst faults in those days seem to have +been extravagance and affectation. Lamb at any rate liked him and +Wainewright was proud to be on a footing with Elia and his sister, as we +know from his writings. Wainewright at this time was not quite +twenty-nine; he had painted several pictures, some of which were +accepted by the academy, and he had written a number of essays over +several different pseudonyms, chief of which was Janus Weathercock. He +lived in Great Marlborough Street in some style and there entertained +many literary men, among them Lamb. It was not until 1826 that his +criminal career began. + +"Mr. Pulham"--Brook Pulham of the India House, who made the caricature +etching of Elia. + +"While I watch my tulips." Lamb is, of course, embroidering here, but we +have it on the authority of George Daniel, the antiquary, that with his +removal to Colebrooke Cottage began an interest in horticulture, +particularly in roses. + +"Mr. Cary." The Rev. Henry Francis Cary (1772-1844), the translator of +Dante and afterwards, 1826, Assistant-Keeper of the Printed Books in the +British Museum. A regular contributor to the _London Magazine_.] + + + +LETTER 325 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[Dated at end: Sept. 6 (1823).] + +Dear Alsop--I am snugly seated at the cottage; Mary is well but weak, +and comes home on _Monday_; she will soon be strong enough to see her +friends here. In the mean time will you dine with me at 1/2 past four +to-morrow? Ayrton and Mr. Burney are coming. + +Colebrook Cottage, left hand side, end of Colebrook Row on +the western brink of the New River, a detach'd whitish house. +No answer is required but come if you can. C. LAMB. + +Saturday 6th Sep. + +I call'd on you on Sunday. Resp'cts to Mrs. A. & boy. + + + +LETTER 326 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. Sept. 9, 1823.] + +My dear A.--I am going to ask you to do me the greatest favour which a +man can do to another. I want to make my will, and to leave my property +in trust for my sister. _N.B._ I am not _therefore_ going to die.--Would +it be unpleasant for you to be named for one? The other two I shall beg +the same favor of are Talfourd and Proctor. If you feel reluctant, tell +me, and it sha'n't abate one jot of my friendly feeling toward you. + +Yours ever, C. LAMB. + +E.I. House, Aug. [_i.e_., Sept.] 9, 1823. + + + +LETTER 327 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. September 10, 1823.] + +My dear A.--Your kindness in accepting my request no words of mine can +repay. It has made you overflow into some romance which I should have +check'd at another time. I hope it may be in the scheme of Providence +that my sister may go first (if ever so little a precedence), myself +next, and my good Ex'rs survive to remembr us with kindness many years. +God bless you. + +I will set Proctor about the will forthwith. C. LAMB. + + +[Here should come another note to Allsop dated Sept. 16, 1823, saying +that Mary Lamb is still ill at Fulham. Given in the Boston Bibliophile +edition.] + + + +LETTER 328 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[September, 1823.] + +Dear A.--Your Cheese is the best I ever tasted; Mary will tell you so +hereafter. She is at home, but has disappointed me. She has gone back +rather than improved. However, she has sense enough to value the +present, for she is greatly fond of Stilton. Yours is the delicatest +rain-bow-hued melting piece I ever flavoured. Believe me. I took it the +more kindly, following so great a kindness. + +Depend upon't, yours shall be one of the first houses we shall present +ourselves at, when we have got our Bill of Health. + +Being both yours and Mrs. Allsop's truly. C.L. & M.L. + + +[Allsop and Procter may have been named as executors of Lamb's will at +one time, but when it came to be proved the executors were Talfourd and +Ryle, a fellow-clerk in the India House.] + + + +LETTER 329 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. September 17, 1823.] + +Dear Sir--I have again been reading your stanzas on Bloomfield, which +are the most appropriate that can be imagined, sweet with Doric +delicacy. I like that + + Our more chaste Theocritus-- + +just hinting at the fault of the Grecian. I love that stanza ending with + + Words phrases fashions pass away; + But Truth and nature live through all. + +But I shall omit in my own copy the one stanza which alludes to Lord +B.--I suppose. It spoils the sweetness and oneness of the feeling. +Cannot we think of Burns, or Thompson, without sullying the thought with +a reflection out of place upon Lord Rochester? These verses might have +been inscribed upon a tomb; are in fact an epitaph; satire does not look +pretty upon a tombstone. Besides, there is a quotation in it, always bad +in verse; seldom advisable in prose. + +I doubt if their having been in a Paper will not prevent T. and H. from +insertion, but I shall have a thing to send in a day or two, and shall +try them. Omitting that stanza, a _very little_ alteration is want'g in +the beginn'g of the next. You see, I use freedom. How happily (I flatter +not!) you have bro't in his subjects; and, (_I suppose_) his favorite +measure, though I am not acquainted with any of his writings but the +Farmer's Boy. He dined with me once, and his manners took me +exceedingly. + +I rejoyce that you forgive my long silence. I continue to estimate my +own-roof comforts highly. How could I remain all my life a lodger! My +garden thrives (I am told) tho' I have yet reaped nothing but some tiny +sallad, and withered carrots. But a garden's a garden anywhere, and +twice a garden in London. + +Somehow I cannot relish that word Horkey. Cannot you supply it by +circumlocution, and direct the reader by a note to explain that it means +the Horkey. But Horkey choaks me in the Text. It raises crowds of mean +associations, Hawking and sp-----g, Gauky, Stalky, Maukin. The sound is +every thing, in such dulcet modulations 'specially. I like + + Gilbert Meldrum's sterner tones, + +without knowing who Gilbert Meldrum is. You have slipt in your rhymes as +if they grew there, so natural-artificially, or artificial-naturally. +There's a vile phrase. + +Do you go on with your Quaker Sonnets--[to] have 'em ready with +Southey's Book of the Church? I meditate a letter to S. in the London, +which perhaps will meet the fate of the Sonnet. + +Excuse my brevity, for I write painfully at office, liable to 100 +callings off. And I can never sit down to an epistle elsewhere. I read +or walk. If you return this letter to the Post Office, I think they will +return 4d, seeing it is but half a one. Believe me tho' entirely yours +C.L. + + +[Barton's "Verses to the Memory of Bloomfield, the Suffolk Poet" (who +died in August, 1823), were printed in book form in his Poetic Vigils, +1824. This is the stanza that Lamb most liked:-- + + It is not quaint and local terms + Besprinkled o'er thy rustic lay, + Though well such dialect confirms + Its power unletter'd minds to sway, + It is not _these_ that most display + Thy sweetest charms, thy gentlest thrall,-- + Words, phrases, fashions, pass away, + But TRUTH and NATURE live through all. + +The stanza referring to Byron was not reprinted, nor was the word +Horkey, which means Harvest Home in Suffolk. Gilbert Meldrum is a +character in one of Bloomfield's _Rural Tales_. + +"Quaker Sonnets." Barton did not carry out this project. Southey's _Book +of the Church_ was published in 1824. + +"I meditate a letter to S." The "Letter of Elia to Mr. Southey" was +published in the _London Magazine_ for October, 1823.] + + + +LETTER 330 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES LLOYD + +[No date. Autumn, 1823.] + +Your lines are not to be understood reading on one leg. They are +_sinuous_, and to be won with wrestling. I assure you in sincerity that +nothing you have done has given me greater satisfaction. Your obscurity, +where you are dark, which is seldom, is that of too much meaning, not +the painful obscurity which no toil of the reader can dissipate; not the +dead vacuum and floundering place in which imagination finds no footing; +it is not the dimness of positive darkness, but of distance; and he that +reads and not discerns must get a better pair of spectacles. I admire +every piece in the collection; I cannot say the first is best; when I do +so, the last read rises up in judgment. To your Mother--to your +Sister--to Mary dead--they are all weighty with thought and tender with +sentiment. Your poetry is like no other:--those cursed Dryads and Pagan +trumperies of modern verse have put me out of conceit of the very name +of poetry. Your verses are as good and as wholesome as prose; and I have +made a sad blunder if I do not leave you with an impression that your +present is rarely valued. + +CHARLES LAMB. + + +[This scrap is in _Selections from the Poems and Letters of Bernard +Barton_, 1849, edited by Edward FitzGerald and Lucy Barton. Lloyd says: +"I had a very ample testimony from C. Lamb to the character of my last +little volume. I will transcribe to you what he says, as it is but a +note, and his manner is always so original, that I am sure the +introduction of the merest trifle from his pen will well compensate for +the absence of anything of mine." The volume was _Poems_, 1823, one of +the chief of which was "Stanzas on the Difficulty with which, in Youth, +we Bring Home to our Habitual Consciousness, the Idea of Death," to +which Lloyd appended the following sentence from Elia's essay on "New +Year's Eve," as motto: "Not childhood alone, but the young man till +thirty, never feels practically that he is mortal. He knows it indeed, +and, if need were, he could preach a homily on the fragility of life; +but he brings it not home to himself, any more than in a hot June, we +can appropriate to our imagination the freezing days of December."] + + + +LETTER 331 + +CHARLES LAMB TO REV. H.F. CARY + +India Office, 14th Oct., 1823. + +Dear Sir,--If convenient, will you give us house room on Saturday next? +I can sleep anywhere. If another Sunday suit you better, pray let me +know. We were talking of Roast _Shoulder_ of Mutton with onion sauce; +but I scorn to prescribe to the hospitalities of mine host. + +With respects to Mrs. C., yours truly, C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 332 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. ?Oct., 1823.] + +Dear Sir--Mary has got a cold, and the nights are dreadful; but at the +first indication of Spring (_alias_ the first dry weather in Nov'r +early) it is our intention to surprise you early some even'g. + +Believe me, most truly yours, + +C.L. + +The Cottage, Saturday night. + +Mary regrets very much Mrs. Allsop's fruitless visit. It made her swear! +She was gone to visit Miss Hutchins'n, whom she found OUT. + + + +LETTER 333 + +CHARLES LAMB TO J.B. DIBDIN + +[P.M. October 28, 1823.] + +My dear Sir--Your Pig was a _picture_ of a pig, and your Picture a _pig_ +of a picture. The former was delicious but evanescent, like a hearty fit +of mirth, or the crackling of thorns under a pot; but the latter is an +_idea_, and abideth. I never before saw swine upon sattin. And then that +pretty strawy canopy about him! he seems to purr (rather than grunt) his +satisfaction. Such a gentlemanlike porker too! Morland's are absolutely +clowns to it. Who the deuce painted it? + +I have ordered a little gilt shrine for it, and mean to wear it for a +locket; a shirt-pig. + +I admire the petty-toes shrouded in a veil of something, not _mud_, but +that warm soft consistency with [? which] the dust takes in Elysium +after a spring shower--it perfectly engloves them. + +I cannot enough thank you and your country friend for the delicate +double present--the Utile et Decorum--three times have I attempted to +write this sentence and failed; which shows that I am not cut out for a +pedant. + +_Sir_ + +(as I say to Southey) will you come and see us at our poor cottage of +Colebrook to tea tomorrow evening, as early as six? I have some friends +coming at that hour-- + +The panoply which covered your material pig shall be forthcoming-- The +pig pictorial, with its trappings, domesticate with me. + +Your greatly obliged + +ELIA. + +Tuesday. + + +["_Sir_ (as I say to Southey)." Elia's Letter to Southey in the London +Magazine began thus.] + + + +LETTER 334 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +[No date. Early November, 1823.] + +Dear Mrs. H.,--Sitting down to write a letter is such a painful +operation to Mary, that you must accept me as her proxy. You have seen +our house. What I now tell you is literally true. Yesterday week George +Dyer called upon us, at one o'clock (_bright noon day_) on his way to +dine with Mrs. Barbauld at Newington. He sat with Mary about half an +hour, and took leave. The maid saw him go out from her kitchen window; +but suddenly losing sight of him, ran up in a fright to Mary. G.D., +instead of keeping the slip that leads to the gate, had deliberately, +staff in hand, in broad open day, marched into the New River. He had not +his spectacles on, and you know his absence. Who helped him out, they +can hardly tell; but between 'em they got him out, drenched thro' and +thro'. A mob collected by that time and accompanied him in. "Send for +the Doctor!" they said: and a one-eyed fellow, dirty and drunk, was +fetched from the Public House at the end, where it seems he lurks, for +the sake of picking up water practice, having formerly had a medal from +the Humane Society for some rescue. By his advice, the patient was put +between blankets; and when I came home at four to dinner, I found G.D. +a-bed, and raving, light-headed with the brandy-and-water which the +doctor had administered. He sung, laughed, whimpered, screamed, babbled +of guardian angels, would get up and go home; but we kept him there by +force; and by next morning he departed sobered, and seems to have +received no injury. All my friends are open-mouthed about having paling +before the river, but I cannot see that, because a.. lunatic chooses to +walk into a river with his eyes open at midday, I am any the more likely +to be drowned in it, coming home at midnight. + +I had the honour of dining at the Mansion House on Thursday last, by +special card from the Lord Mayor, who never saw my face, nor I his; and +all from being a writer in a magazine! The dinner costly, served on +massy plate, champagne, pines, &c.; forty-seven present, among whom the +Chairman and two other directors of the India Company. There's for you! +and got away pretty sober! Quite saved my credit! + +We continue to like our house prodigiously. Does Mary Hazlitt go on with +her novel, or has she begun another? I would not discourage her, tho' we +continue to think it (so far) in its present state not saleable. + +Our kind remembrances to her and hers and you and yours.-- + + Yours truly, C. LAMB. + +I am pleased that H. liked my letter to the Laureate. + + +[Addressed to "Mrs. Hazlitt, Alphington, near Exeter." This letter is +the first draft of the _Elia_ essay "Amicus Redivivus," which was +printed in the _London Magazine_ in December, 1823. George Dyer, who was +then sixty-eight, had been getting blind steadily for some years. A +visit to Lamb's cottage to-day, bearing in mind that the ribbon of green +between iron railings that extends along Colebrooke Row was at that time +an open stream, will make the nature of G.D.'s misadventure quite +plain. + +"Mary Hazlitt"-the daughter of John Hazlitt, the essayist's brother. + +"I am pleased that H. liked my letter to the Laureate." Hazlitt wrote, +in the essay "On the Pleasures of Hating," "I think I must be friends +with Lamb again, since he has written that magnanimous Letter to +Southey, and told him a piece of his mind!" Coleridge also approved of +it, and Crabb Robinson's praise was excessive. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Mrs. Shelley dated Nov. 12, 1823, +saying that Dyer walked into the New River on Sunday week at one o'clock +with his eyes open.] + + + +LETTER 335 + +CHARLES LAMB TO ROBERT SOUTHEY + +E.I.H., 21st November, 1823. + +DEAR Southey,-The kindness of your note has melted away the mist which +was upon me. I have been fighting against a shadow. That accursed +"Quarterly Review" had vexed me by a gratuitous speaking, of its own +knowledge, that the "Confessions of a Drunkard" was a genuine +description of the state of the writer. Little things, that are not ill +meant, may produce much ill. _That_ might have injured me alive and +dead. I am in a public office, and my life is insured. I was prepared +for anger, and I thought I saw, in a few obnoxious words, a hard case of +repetition directed against me. I wished both magazine and review at the +bottom of the sea. I shall be ashamed to see you, and my sister (though +innocent) will be still more so; for the folly was done without her +knowledge, and has made her uneasy ever since. My guardian angel was +absent at that time. + +I will muster up courage to see you, however, any day next week +(Wednesday excepted). We shall hope that you will bring Edith with you. +That will be a second mortification. She will hate to see us; but come +and heap embers. We deserve it, I for what I've done, and she for being +my sister. + +Do come early in the day, by sun-light, that you may see my _Milton_. + +I am at Colebrook Cottage, Colebrook Row, Islington. A detached whitish +house, close to the New River, end of Colebrook Terrace, left hand from +Sadler's Wells. + +Will you let me know the day before? + +Your penitent C. LAMB. + +P.S.--I do not think your handwriting at all like Hunt's. I do not think +many things I did think. + + +[For the right appreciation of this letter Elia's Letter to Southey must +be read (see Vol. I. of the present edition). It was hard hitting, and +though Lamb would perhaps have been wiser had he held his hand, yet +Southey had taken an offensive line of moral superiority and rebuke, and +much that was said by Lamb was justified. + +Southey's reply ran thus:-- + + My Dear Lamb--On Monday I saw your letter in the _London Magazine_, + which I had not before had an opportunity of seeing, and I now take + the first interval of leisure for replying to it. + + Nothing could be further from my mind than any intention or + apprehension of any way offending or injuring a man concerning whom + I have never spoken, thought, or felt otherwise than with affection, + esteem, and admiration. + + If you had let me know in any private or friendly manner that you + felt wounded by a sentence in which nothing but kindness was + intended--or that you found it might injure the sale of your book--I + would most readily and gladly have inserted a note in the next + Review to qualify and explain what had hurt you. + + You have made this impossible, and I am sorry for it. But I will not + engage in controversy with you to make sport for the Philistines. + + The provocation must be strong indeed that can rouse me to do this, + even with an enemy. And if you can forgive an unintended offence as + heartily as I do the way in which you have resented it, there will + be nothing to prevent our meeting as we have heretofore done, and + feeling towards each other as we have always been wont to do. + + Only signify a correspondent willingness on your part, and send me + your address, and my first business next week shall be to reach your + door, and shake hands with you and your sister. Remember me to her + most kindly and believe me--. Yours, with unabated esteem and + regards, Robert Southey. + +The matter closed with this exchange of letters, and no hostility +remained on either side. + +Lamb's quarrel with the _Quarterly_ began in 1811, when in a review of +Weber's edition of Ford Lamb was described as a "poor maniac." It was +renewed in 1814, when his article on Wordsworth's _Excursion_ was +mutilated. It broke out again in 1822, as Lamb says here, when a +reviewer of Reid's treatise on _Hypochondriasis and other Nervous +Affections_ (supposed to be Dr. Gooch, a friend of Dr. Henry Southey's) +referred to Lamb's "Confessions of a Drunkard" (see Vol. I.) as being, +from his own knowledge, true. Thus Lamb's patience was naturally at +breaking point when his own friend Southey attacked _Elia_ a few numbers +later. + +"I do not think your handwriting at all like Hunt's." Lamb had said, in +the Letter, of Leigh Hunt: "His hand-writing is so much the same with +your own, that I have opened more than one letter of his, hoping, nay, +not doubting, but it was from you, and have been disappointed (he will +bear with my saying so) at the discovery of my error."] + + + +LETTER 336 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. November 22, 1823.] + +Dear B.B.--I am ashamed at not acknowledging your kind little poem, +which I must needs like much, but I protest I thought I had done it at +the moment. Is it possible a letter has miscarried? Did you get one in +which I sent you an extract from the poems of Lord Sterling? I should +wonder if you did, for I sent you none such.--There was an incipient lye +strangled in the birth. Some people's conscience is so tender! But in +plain truth I thank you very much for the verses. I have a very kind +letter from the Laureat, with a self-invitation to come and shake hands +with me. This is truly handsome and noble. 'Tis worthy of my old idea of +Southey. Shall not I, think you, be covered with a red suffusion? + +You are too much apprehensive of your complaint. I know many that are +always ailing of it, and live on to a good old age. I know a merry +fellow (you partly know him) who when his Medical Adviser told him he +had drunk away all _that part_, congratulated himself (now his liver was +gone) that he should be the longest liver of the two. The best way in +these cases is to keep yourself as ignorant as you can--as ignorant as +the world was before Galen--of the entire inner construction of the +Animal Man--not to be conscious of a midriff--to hold kidneys (save of +sheep and swine) to be an agreeable fiction--not to know whereabout the +gall grows--to account the circulation of the blood an idle whimsey of +Harvey's--to acknowledge no mechanism not visible. For, once fix the +seat of your disorder, and your fancies flux into it like bad humours. +Those medical gentries chuse each his favourite part--one takes the +lungs--another the aforesaid liver--and refer to _that_ whatever in the +animal economy is amiss. Above all, use exercise, take a little more +spirituous liquors, learn to smoke, continue to keep a good conscience, +and avoid tampering with hard terms of art--viscosity, schirossity, and +those bugbears, by which simple patients are scared into their grave. +Believe the general sense of the mercantile world, which holds that +desks are not deadly. It is the mind, good B.B., and not the limbs, +that taints by long sitting. Think of the patience of taylors--think how +long the Chancellor sits-- think of the Brooding Hen. + +I protest I cannot answer thy Sister's kind enquiry, but I judge I shall +put forth no second volume. More praise than buy, and T. and H. are not +particularly disposed for Martyrs. + +Thou wilt see a funny passage, and yet a true History, of George Dyer's +Aquatic Incursion, in the next "London." Beware his fate, when thou +comest to see me at my Colebrook Cottage. I have filled my little space +with my little thoughts. I wish thee ease on thy sofa, but not too much +indulgence on it. From my poor desk, thy fellow-sufferer this bright +November, C.L. + + +[Again I do not identify the kind little poem. It may have been a trifle +enclosed in a letter, which Barton did not print and Lamb destroyed.] + + + +LETTER 337 + +CHARLES LAMB TO W. HARRISON AINSWORTH India-House, 9th Dec., 1823. + +(If I had time I would go over this letter again, and dot all my i's.) + +Dear Sir,--I should have thanked you for your Books and Compliments +sooner, but have been waiting for a revise to be sent, which does not +come, tho' I returned the proof on the receit of your letter. I have +read Warner with great pleasure. What an elaborate piece of alliteration +and antithesis! why it must have been a labour far above the most +difficult versification. There is a fine simile of or picture of +Semiramis arming to repel a siege. I do not mean to keep the Book, for I +suspect you are forming a curious collection, and I do not pretend to +any thing of the kind. I have not a Blackletter Book among mine, old +Chaucer excepted, and am not Bibliomanist enough to like Blackletter. It +is painful to read. Therefore I must insist on returning it at +opportunity, not from contumacity and reluctance to be oblig'd, but +because it must suit you better than me. The loss of a present _from_ +should never exceed the gain of a present _to_. I hold this maxim +infallible in the accepting Line. I read your Magazines with +satisfaction. I throughly agree with you as to the German Faust, as far +[as] I can do justice to it from an English translation. 'Tis a +disagreeable canting tale of Seduction, which has nothing to do with the +Spirit of Faustus-- Curiosity. Was the dark secret to be explored to end +in the seducing of a weak girl, which might have been accomplished by +earthly agency? When Marlow gives _his_ Faustus a mistress, he flies him +at Helen, flower of Greece, to be sure, and not at Miss Betsy, or Miss +Sally Thoughtless. + + "Cut is the branch that bore the goodly fruit, + And wither'd is Apollo's laurel tree: + Faustus is dead." + +What a noble natural transition from metaphor to plain speaking! as if +the figurative had flagged in description of such a Loss, and was +reduced to tell the fact simply.-- + +I must now thank you for your very kind invitation. It is not out of +prospect that I may see Manchester some day, and then I will avail +myself of your kindness. But Holydays are scarce things with me, and the +Laws of attendance are getting stronger and stronger at Leadenhall. But +I shall bear it in mind. Meantime something may (more probably) bring +you to town, where I shall be happy to see you. I am always to be found +(alas!) at my desk in the forepart of the day. + +I wonder why they do not send the revise. I leave late at office, and my +abode lies out of the way, or I should have seen about it. If you are +impatient, Perhaps a Line to the Printer, directing him to send it me, +at Accountant's Office, may answer. You will see by the scrawl that I +only snatch a few minutes from intermitting Business. + + Your oblig. Ser., C. LAMB. + + +[William Harrison Ainsworth, afterwards to be known as a novelist, was +then a solicitor's pupil at Manchester, aged 18. He had sent Lamb +William Warner's _Syrinx; or, A Sevenfold History_, 1597. The book was a +gift, and is now in the Dyce and Foster library at South Kensington. + +Goethe's _Faust_. Lamb, as we have seen, had read the account of the +play in Madame de Stael's _Germany_. He might also have read the +translation by Lord Francis Leveson-Gower, 1823. Hayward's translation +was not published till 1834. Goethe admired Lamb's sonnet on his family +name.] + + + +LETTER 338 + +CHARLES LAMB TO W. HARRISON AINSWORTH + +[Dated at end: December 29 (1823).] + +My dear Sir--You talk of months at a time and I know not what +inducements to visit Manchester, Heaven knows how gratifying! but I have +had my little month of 1823 already. It is all over, and without +incurring a disagreeable favor I cannot so much as get a single holyday +till the season returns with the next year. Even our half-hour's +absences from office are set down in a Book! Next year, if I can spare a +day or two of it, I will come to Manchester, but I have reasons at home +against longer absences.-- + +I am so ill just at present--(an illness of my own procuring last night; +who is Perfect?)--that nothing but your very great kindness could make +me write. I will bear in mind the letter to W.W., you shall have it +quite in time, before the 12. + +My aking and confused Head warns me to leave off.--With a muddled sense +of gratefulness, which I shall apprehend more clearly to-morrow, I +remain, your friend unseen, + +C.L. + +I.H. 29th. + +Will your occasions or inclination bring _you_ to London? It will give +me great pleasure to show you every thing that Islington can boast, if +you know the meaning of that very Cockney sound. We have the New River! + +I am asham'd of this scrawl: but I beg you to accept it for the present. +I am full of qualms. + +A fool at 50 is a fool indeed. + + +[W.W. was Wordsworth. + +"A fool at 50 is a fool indeed." "A fool at forty is a fool indeed" was +Young's line in Satire II. of the series on "Love of Fame." Lamb was +nearing forty-nine.] + + + +LETTER 339 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[January 9, 1824.] + +Dear B.B.--Do you know what it is to succumb under an insurmountable day +mare--a whoreson lethargy, Falstaff calls it--an indisposition to do any +thing, or to be any thing--a total deadness and distaste--a suspension +of vitality --an indifference to locality--a numb soporifical +goodfornothingness--an ossification all over--an oyster-like +insensibility to the passing events--a mind-stupor,--a brawny defiance +to the needles of a thrusting-in conscience--did you ever have a very +bad cold, with a total irresolution to submit to water gruel +processes?--this has been for many weeks my lot, and my excuse--my +fingers drag heavily over this paper, and to my thinking it is three and +twenty furlongs from here to the end of this demi-sheet--I have not a +thing to say--nothing is of more importance than another--I am flatter +than a denial or a pancake--emptier than Judge Park's wig when the head +is in it--duller than a country stage when the actors are off it --a +cypher--an O--I acknowledge life at all, only by an occasional +convulsional cough, and a permanent phlegmatic pain in the chest--I am +weary of the world--Life is weary of me-- My day is gone into Twilight +and I don't think it worth the expence of candles--my wick hath a thief +in it, but I can't muster courage to snuff it--I inhale suffocation--I +can't distinguish veal from mutton--nothing interests me--'tis 12 +o'clock and Thurtell is just now coming out upon the New Drop--Jack +Ketch alertly tucking up his greasy sleeves to do the last office of +mortality, yet cannot I elicit a groan or a moral reflection-- if you +told me the world will be at end tomorrow, I should just say, "will +it?"--I have not volition enough to dot my i's --much less to comb my +EYEBROWS--my eyes are set in my head--my brains are gone out to see a +poor relation in Moorfields, and they did not say when they'd come back +again-- my scull is a Grub street Attic, to let--not so much as a joint +stool or a crackd jordan left in it--my hand writes, not I, from habit, +as chickens run about a little when their heads are off-- O for a +vigorous fit of gout, cholic, tooth ache--an earwig in my auditory, a +fly in my visual organs--pain is life--the sharper, the more evidence of +life--but this apathy, this death--did you ever have an obstinate cold, +a six or seven weeks' unintermitting chill and suspension of hope, fear, +conscience, and every thing--yet do I try all I can to cure it, I try +wine, and spirits, and smoking, and snuff in unsparing quantities, but +they all only seem to make me worse, instead of better--I sleep in a +damp room, but it does me no good; I come home late o' nights, but do +not find any visible amendment. + +Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? + +It is just 15 minutes after 12. Thurtell is by this time a good way on +his journey, baiting at Scorpion perhaps, Ketch is bargaining for his +cast coat and waistcoat, the Jew demurs at first at three half crowns, +but on consideration that he, may get somewhat by showing 'em in the +Town, finally closes.-- + +C.L. + + +["Judge Park's wig." Sir James Alan Park, of the Bench of Common Pleas, +who tried Thurtell, the murderer of Mr. William Weare of Lyon's Inn, in +Gill's Hill Lane, Radlett, on October 24, 1823.] + + + +LETTER 340 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. January 23, 1824.] + +My dear Sir--That peevish letter of mine, which was meant to convey an +apology for my incapacity to write, seems to have been taken by you in +too serious a light. It was only my way of telling you I had a severe +cold. The fact is I have been insuperably dull and lethargic for many +weeks, and cannot rise to the vigour of a Letter, much less an Essay. +The London must do without me for a time, a time, and half a time, for I +have lost all interest about it, and whether I shall recover it again I +know not. I will bridle my pen another time, & not teaze and puzzle you +with my aridities. I shall begin to feel a little more alive with the +spring. Winter is to me (mild or harsh) always a great trial of the +spirits. I am ashamed not to have noticed your tribute to Woolman, whom +we love so much. It is done in your good manner. Your friend Taylor +called upon me some time since, and seems a very amiable man. His last +story is painfully fine. His Book I "like." It is only too stuft with +scripture, too Parsonish. The best thing in it is the Boy's own story. +When I say it is too full of Scripture, I mean it is too full of direct +quotations; no book can have too much of SILENT SCRIPTURE in it. But the +natural power of a story is diminished when the uppermost purpose in the +writer seems to be to recommend something else, viz Religion. You know +what Horace says of the DEUS INTERSIT. I am not able to explain myself, +you must do it for me.-- + +My Sister's part in the Leicester School (about two thirds) was purely +her own; as it was (to the same quantity) in the Shakspeare Tales which +bear my name. I wrote only the Witch Aunt, the first going to Church, +and the final Story about a little Indian girl in a Ship. + +Your account of my Black Balling amused me. _I think, as Quakers, they +did right_. There are some things hard to be understood. + +The more I think the more I am vexed at having puzzled you with that +Letter, but I have been so out of Letter writing of late years, that it +is a sore effort to sit down to it, & I felt in your debt, and sat down +waywardly to pay you in bad money. Never mind my dulness, I am used to +long intervals of it. The heavens seem brass to me--then again comes the +refreshing shower. "I have been merry once or twice ere now." + +You said something about Mr. Mitford in a late letter, which I believe I +did not advert to. I shall be happy to show him my Milton (it is all the +show things I have) at any time he will take the trouble of a jaunt to +Islington. I do also hope to see Mr. Taylor there some day. Pray say so +to both. + +Coleridge's book is good part printed, but sticks a little for _more +copy_. It bears an unsaleable Title--Extracts from Bishop Leighton--but +I am confident there will be plenty of good notes in it, more of Bishop +Coleridge than Leighton, I hope; for what is Leighton? + +Do you trouble yourself about Libel cases? The Decision against Hunt for +the "Vision of Judgment" made me sick. What is to become of the old talk +about OUR GOOD OLD KING --his personal virtues saving us from a +revolution &c. &c. Why, none that think it can utter it now. It must +stink. And the Vision is really, as to Him-ward, such a tolerant good +humour'd thing. What a wretched thing a Lord Chief Justice is, always +was, & will be! + +Keep your good spirits up, dear BB--mine will return--They are at +present in abeyance. But I am rather lethargic than miserable. I don't +know but a good horse whip would be more beneficial to me than Physic. +My head, without aching, will teach yours to ache. It is well I am +getting to the conclusion. I will send a better letter when I am a +better man. Let me thank you for your kind concern for me (which I trust +will have reason soon to be dissipated) & assure you that it gives me +pleasure to hear from you.-- + +Yours truly C.L. + + +["The London must do without me." Lamb contributed nothing between +December, 1823 ("Amicus Redivivus"), and September, 1824 ("Blakesmoor in +H----shire"). + +Barton's tribute to Woolman was the poem "A Memorial to John Woolman," +printed in Poetic Vigils. + +Taylor was Charles Benjamin Tayler (1797-1875), the curate of Hadleigh, +in Suffolk, and the author of many religious books. Lamb refers to _May +You Like It_, 1823. + +"What Horace says":-- + + Nec deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus + Inciderit. + +_Ars Poetica_, 191, 192. + +Neither let a god interfere, unless a difficulty worth a god's +unravelling should happen (Smart's translation). + +"My Black Balling." _Elia_ had been rejected by a Book Club in +Woodbridge. + +"Coleridge's book"--the _Aids to Reflection_, 1825. The first intention +had been a selection of "Beauties" from Bishop Leighton (1611-1684), +Archbishop of Glasgow, and author, among other works, of _Rules and +Instructions for a Holy Life_. + +"The Decision against Hunt." John Hunt, the publisher of _The Liberal_, +in which Byron's "Vision of Judgment" had been printed in 1822, had just +been fined L100 for the libel therein contained on George III. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Charles Ollier, thanking him for a +copy of his _Inesilla; or, The Tempter: A Romance, with Other Tales_.] + + + +LETTER 341 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. February 25, 1824.] + +My dear Sir--Your title of Poetic Vigils arrides me much more than A +Volume of Verse, which is no meaning. The motto says nothing, but I +cannot suggest a better. I do not like mottoes but where they are +singularly felicitous; there is foppery in them. They are unplain, +un-Quakerish. They are good only where they flow from the Title and are +a kind of justification of it. There is nothing about watchings or +lucubrations in the one you suggest, no commentary on Vigils. By the +way, a wag would recommend you to the Line of Pope + + Sleepless himself--to give his readers sleep-- + +I by no means wish it. But it may explain what I mean, that a neat motto +is child of the Title. I think Poetic Virgils as short and sweet as can +be desired; only have an eye on the Proof, that the Printer do not +substitute Virgils, which would ill accord with your modesty or meaning. +Your suggested motto is antique enough in spelling, and modern enough in +phrases; a good modern antique: but the matter of it is germane to the +purpose only supposing the title proposed a vindication of yourself from +the presumption of authorship. The 1st title was liable to this +objection, that if you were disposed to enlarge it, and the bookseller +insisted on its appearance in Two Tomes, how oddly it would sound-- + + A Volume of Verse + in Two Volumes + 2d edition &c-- + +You see thro' my wicked intention of curtailing this Epistolet by the +above device of large margin. But in truth the idea of letterising has +been oppressive to me of late above your candour to give me credit for. +There is Southey, whom I ought to have thank'd a fortnight ago for a +present of the Church Book. I have never had courage to buckle myself in +earnest even to acknowledge it by six words. And yet I am accounted by +some people a good man. How cheap that character is acquired! Pay your +debts, don't borrow money, nor twist your kittens neck off, or disturb a +congregation, &c.-- your business is done. I know things (thoughts or +things, thoughts are things) of myself which would make every friend I +have fly me as a plague patient. I once * * *, and set a dog upon a +crab's leg that was shoved out under a moss of sea weeds, a pretty +little feeler.--Oh! pah! how sick I am of that; and a lie, a mean one, I +once told!-- I stink in the midst of respect. + +I am much hypt; the fact is, my head is heavy, but there is hope, or if +not, I am better than a poor shell fish--not morally when I set the +whelp upon it, but have more blood and spirits; things may turn up, and +I may creep again into a decent opinion of myself. Vanity will return +with sunshine. Till when, pardon my neglects and impute it to the wintry +solstice. + +C. LAMB. + + +[The motto eventually adopted for Barton's _Poetic Vigils_ was from +Vaughan's _Silex Scintillans:_-- + + Dear night! this world's defeat; + The stop to busie fools; care's check and curb; + The day of spirits; my soul's calm retreat + Which none disturb!] + + + +LETTER 342 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 24 March, 1824.] + +DEAR B.B.--I hasten to say that if my opinion can strengthen you in your +choice, it is decisive for your acceptance of what has been so +handsomely offered. I can see nothing injurious to your most honourable +sense. Think that you are called to a poetical Ministry--nothing +worse--the Minister is worthy of the hire. + +The only objection I feel is founded on a fear that the acceptance may +be a temptation to you to let fall the bone (hard as it is) which is in +your mouth and must afford tolerable pickings, for the shadow of +independence. You cannot propose to become independent on what the low +state of interest could afford you from such a principal as you mention; +and the most graceful excuse for the acceptance, would be, that it left +you free to your voluntary functions. That is the less _light_ part of +the scruple. It has no darker shade. I put in _darker_, because of the +ambiguity of the word light, which Donne in his admirable poem on the +Metempsychosis, has so ingeniously illustrated in his invocation + + 1 2 1 2 +Make my _dark heavy_ poem, _light_ and _light_-- + +where the two senses of _light_ are opposed to different opposites. A +trifling criticism.--I can see no reason for any scruple then but what +arises from your own interest; which is in your own power of course to +solve. If you still have doubts, read over Sanderson's Cases of +Conscience, and Jeremy Taylor's Ductor Dubitantium, the first a moderate +Octavo, the latter a folio of 900 close pages, and when you have +thoroughly digested the admirable reasons pro and con which they give +for every possible Case, you will be--just as wise as when you began. +Every man is his own best Casuist; and after all, as Ephraim Smooth, in +the pleasant comedy of Wild Oats, has it, "there is no harm in a +Guinea." A fortiori there is less in 2000. + +I therefore most sincerely congratulate with you, excepting so far as +excepted above. If you have fair Prospects of adding to the Principal, +cut the Bank; but in either case do not refuse an honest Service. Your +heart tells you it is not offered to bribe you _from_ any duty, but +_to_ +a duty which you feel to be your vocation. Farewell heartily C.L. + + +[In the memoir of Barton by Edward FitzGerald, prefixed to the _Poems +and Letters_, it is stated that in this year Barton received a handsome +addition to his income. "A few members of his Society, including some of +the wealthier of his own family, raised L1200 among them for his benefit +[not 2000 guineas, as Lamb says]. It seems that he felt some delicacy at +first in accepting this munificent testimony which his own people +offered to his talents." Birton had written to Lamb on the subject.] + + + +LETTER 343 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[(Early spring), 1824.] + +I am sure I cannot fill a letter, though I should disfurnish my scull to +fill it. But you expect something, and shall have a Note-let. Is Sunday, +not divinely speaking, but humanly and holydaysically, a blessing? +Without its institution, would our rugged taskmasters have given us a +leisure day, so often, think you, as once in a month?--or, if it had not +been instituted, might they not have given us every 6th day? Solve me +this problem. If we are to go 3 times a day to church, why has Sunday +slipped into the notion of a _Holli_day? A Holyday I grant it. The +puritans, I have read in Southey's Book, knew the distinction. They made +people observe Sunday rigorously, would not let a nursery maid walk out +in the fields with children for recreation on that day. But _then_--they +gave the people a holliday from all sorts of work every second Tuesday. +This was giving to the Two Caesars that which was _his_ respective. +Wise, beautiful, thoughtful, generous Legislators! Would Wilberforce +give us our Tuesdays? No, d--n him. He would turn the six days into +sevenths, + + And those 3 smiling seasons of the year + Into a Russian winter. + _Old Play_. + +I am sitting opposite a person who is making strange distortions with +the gout, which is not unpleasant--to me at least. What is the reason we +do not sympathise with pain, short of some terrible Surgical operation? +Hazlitt, who boldly says all he feels, avows that not only he does not +pity sick people, but he hates them. I obscurely recognise his meaning. +Pain is probably too selfish a consideration, too simply a consideration +of self-attention. We pity poverty, loss of friends etc. more complex +things, in which the Sufferers feelings are associated with others. This +is a rough thought suggested by the presence of gout; I want head to +extricate it and plane it. What is all this to your Letter? I felt it to +be a good one, but my turn, when I write at all, is perversely to travel +out of the record, so that my letters are any thing but answers. So you +still want a motto? You must not take my ironical one, because your +book, I take it, is too serious for it. Bickerstaff might have used it +for _his_ lucubrations. What do you think of (for a Title) + +RELIGIO TREMULI OR TREMEBUNDI + +There is Religio-Medici and Laici.--But perhaps the volume is not quite +Quakerish enough or exclusively for it--but your own VIGILS is perhaps +the Best. While I have space, let me congratulate with you the return of +Spring--what a Summery Spring too! all those qualms about the dog and +cray-fish melt before it. I am going to be happy and _vain_ again. + + A hasty farewell C. LAMB. + + +["Southey's Book"--_The Book of the Church_. + +"Would Wilberforce give us our Tuesdays?"--William Wilberforce, the +abolitionist and the principal "Puritan" of that day.] + + + +LETTER 344 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. April 13, 1824.] + +Dear Mrs. A.--Mary begs me to say how much she regrets we can not join +you to Reigate. Our reasons are --1st I have but one holyday namely Good +Friday, and it is not pleasant to solicit for another, but that might +have been got over. 2dly Manning is with us, soon to go away and we +should not be easy in leaving him. 3dly Our school girl Emma comes to us +for a few days on Thursday. 4thly and lastly, Wordsworth is returning +home in about a week, and out of respect to them we should not like to +absent ourselves just now. In summer I shall have a month, and if it +shall suit, should like to go for a few days of it out with you both +_any where_. In the mean time, with many acknowledgments etc. etc., I +remain yours (both) truly, C. LAMB. + +India Ho. 13 Apr. Remember Sundays. + + + +LETTER 345 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE [No date. April, 1824.] + +Dear Sir,--Miss Hazlitt (niece to Pygmalion) begs us to send to you _for +Mr. Hardy_ a parcel. I have not thank'd you for your Pamphlet, but I +assure you I approve of it in all parts, only that I would have seen my +Calumniators at hell, before I would have told them I was a Xtian, _tho' +I am one_, I think as much as you. I hope to see you here, some day +soon. The parcel is a novel which I hope Mr. H. may sell for her. I am +with greatest friendliness + + Yours C. LAMB. + +Sunday. + + +["Pygmalion." A reference to Hazlitt's _Liber Amoris; or, The New +Pygmalion_, 1823. + +Hone's pamphlet would be his _Aspersions Answered: an Explanatory +Statement to the Public at Large and Every Reader of the "Quarterly +Review_," 1824. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Thomas Hardy, dated April 24, 1824, +in which Lamb says that Miss Hazlitt's novel, which Mr. Hardy promised +to introduce to Mr. Ridgway, the publisher, is lying at Mr. Hone's. +Hardy was a bootmaker in Fleet Street.] + + + +LETTER 346 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +May 15, 1824. + +DEAR B.B.--I am oppressed with business all day, and Company all night. +But I will snatch a quarter of an hour. Your recent acquisitions of the +Picture and the Letter are greatly to be congratulated. I too have a +picture of my father and the copy of his first love verses; but they +have been mine long. Blake is a real name, I assure you, and a most +extraordinary man, if he be still living. He is the Robert [William] +Blake, whose wild designs accompany a splendid folio edition of the +"Night Thoughts," which you may have seen, in one of which he pictures +the parting of soul and body by a solid mass of human form floating off, +God knows how, from a lumpish mass (fac Simile to itself) left behind on +the dying bed. He paints in water colours marvellous strange pictures, +visions of his brain, which he asserts that he has seen. They have great +merit. He has _seen_ the old Welsh bards on Snowdon--he has seen the +Beautifullest, the strongest, and the Ugliest Man, left alone from the +Massacre of the Britons by the Romans, and has painted them from memory +(I have seen his paintings), and asserts them to be as good as the +figures of Raphael and Angelo, but not better, as they had precisely the +same retro-visions and prophetic visions with themself [himself]. The +painters in oil (which he will have it that neither of them practised) +he affirms to have been the ruin of art, and affirms that all the while +he was engaged in his Water paintings, Titian was disturbing him, Titian +the III Genius of Oil Painting. His Pictures--one in particular, the +Canterbury Pilgrims (far above Stothard's)--have great merit, but hard, +dry, yet with grace. He has written a Catalogue of them with a most +spirited criticism on Chaucer, but mystical and full of Vision. His +poems have been sold hitherto only in Manuscript. I never read them; but +a friend at my desire procured the "Sweep Song." There is one to a +tiger, which I have heard recited, beginning-- + + "Tiger, Tiger, burning bright, + Thro' the desarts of the night," + +which is glorious, but, alas! I have not the book; for the man is flown, +whither I know not--to Hades or a Mad House. But I must look on him as +one of the most extraordinary persons of the age. Montgomery's book I +have not much hope from. The Society, with the affected name, has been +labouring at it for these 20 years, and made few converts. I think it +was injudicious to mix stories avowedly colour'd by fiction with the sad +true statements from the parliamentary records, etc., but I wish the +little Negroes all the good that can come from it. I batter'd my brains +(not butter'd them--but it is a bad _a_) for a few verses for them, but +I could make nothing of it. You have been luckier. But Blake's are the +flower of the set, you will, I am sure, agree, tho' some of Montgomery's +at the end are pretty; but the Dream awkwardly paraphras'd from B. + +With the exception of an Epilogue for a Private Theatrical, I have +written nothing now for near 6 months. It is in vain to spur me on. I +must wait. I cannot write without a genial impulse, and I have none. +'Tis barren all and dearth. No matter; life is something without +scribbling. I have got rid of my bad spirits, and hold up pretty well +this rain-damn'd May. + +So we have lost another Poet. I never much relished his Lordship's mind, +and shall be sorry if the Greeks have cause to miss him. He was to me +offensive, and I never can make out his great _power_, which his +admirers talk of. Why, a line of Wordsworth's is a lever to lift the +immortal spirit! Byron can only move the Spleen. He was at best a +Satyrist,--in any other way he was mean enough. I dare say I do him +injustice; but I cannot love him, nor squeeze a tear to his memory. He +did not like the world, and he has left it, as Alderman Curtis advised +the Radicals, "If they don't like their country, damn 'em, let 'em leave +it," they possessing no rood of ground in England, and he 10,000 acres. +Byron was better than many Curtises. + +Farewell, and accept this apology for a letter from one who owes you so +much in that kind. + + Yours ever truly, C.L. + + +[Lamb's portrait of his father is reproduced in Vol. II. of my large +edition. The first love verses are no more. + +William Blake was at this time sixty-six years of age. He was living in +poverty and neglect at 3 Fountain Court, Strand. Blake made 537 +illustrations to Young's _Night Thoughts_, of which only forty-seven +were published. Lamb is, however, thinking of his edition of Blair's +_Grave_. The exhibition of his works was held in 1809, and it was for +this that Blake wrote the descriptive catalogue. Lamb had sent Blake's +"Sweep Song," which, like "Tiger, Tiger," is in the _Songs of +Innocence_, to James Montgomery for his _Chimney-Sweepers' Friend and +Climbing Boys' Album_, 1824, a little book designed to ameliorate the +lot of those children, in whose interest a society existed. Barton also +contributed something. It was Blake's poem which had excited Barton's +curiosity. Probably he thought that Lamb wrote it. Lamb's mistake +concerning Blake's name is curious in so far as that it was Blake's +brother Robert, who died in 1787, who in a vision revealed to the poet +the method by which the _Songs of Innocence_ were to be reproduced. + +"The Dream awkwardly paraphras'd from B." The book ended with three +"Climbing-Boys' Soliloquies" by Montgomery. The second was a dream in +which the dream in Blake's song was extended and prosified. + +"An Epilogue for a Private Theatrical." Probably the epilogue for the +amateur performance of "Richard II.," given by the family of Henry +Field, Barren Field's father (see Vol. IV. of the present edition). + +"Another great Poet." Byron died on April 19, 1824. + +"Alderman Curtis." See note above.] + + + +LETTER 347 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +July 7th, 1824. + +DEAR B.B.--I have been suffering under a severe inflammation of the +eyes, notwithstanding which I resolutely went through your very pretty +volume at once, which I dare pronounce in no ways inferior to former +lucubrations. "_Abroad_" and "_lord_" are vile rhymes notwithstanding, +and if you count you will wonder how many times you have repeated the +word _unearthly_--thrice in one poem. It is become a slang word with the +bards; avoid it in future lustily. "Time" is fine; but there are better +a good deal, I think. The volume does not lie by me; and, after a long +day's smarting fatigue, which has almost put out my eyes (not blind +however to your merits), I dare not trust myself with long writing. The +verses to Bloomfield are the sweetest in the collection. Religion is +sometimes lugged in, as if it did not come naturally. I will go over +carefully when I get my seeing, and exemplify. You have also too much of +singing metre, such as requires no deep ear to make; lilting measure, in +which you have done Woolman injustice. Strike at less superficial +melodies. The piece on Nayler is more to my fancy. + +My eye runs waters. But I will give you a fuller account some day. The +book is a very pretty one in more than one sense. The decorative harp, +perhaps, too ostentatious; a simple pipe preferable. + +Farewell, and many thanks. C. LAMB. + + +[Barton's new book was _Poetic Vigils_, 1824. It contained among other +poems "An Ode to Time," "Verses to the Memory of Bloomfield," "A +Memorial of John Woolman," beginning-- + + There is glory to me in thy Name, + Meek follower of Bethlehem's Child, + More touching by far than the splendour of Fame + With which the vain world is beguil'd, + +and "A Memorial of James Nayler." The following "Sonnet to Elia," from +the _London Magazine_, is also in the volume: it is odd that Lamb did +not mention it:-- + + +SONNET TO ELIA + + Delightful Author! unto whom I owe + Moments and moods of fancy and of feeling, + Afresh to grateful memory now appealing, + Fain would I "bless thee--ere I let thee go!" + From month to month has the exhaustless flow + Of thy original mind, its wealth revealing, + With quaintest humour, and deep pathos healing + The World's rude wounds, revived Life's early glow: + And, mixt with this, at times, to earnest thought, + Glimpses of truth, most simple and sublime, + By thy imagination have been brought + Over my spirit. From the olden time + Of authorship thy patent should be dated, + And thou with Marvell, Brown, and Burton mated.] + + + +LETTER 348 + +CHARLES LAMB TO W. MARTER [Dated at end: July 19 (1824).] + +Dear Marter,--I have just rec'd your letter, having returned from a +month's holydays. My exertions for the London are, tho' not dead, in a +dead sleep for the present. If your club like scandal, Blackwood's is +your magazine; if you prefer light articles, and humorous without +offence, the New Monthly is very amusing. The best of it is by Horace +Smith, the author of the Rejected Addresses. The Old Monthly has more of +matter, information, but not so merry. I cannot safely recommend any +others, as not knowing them, or knowing them to their disadvantage. Of +Reviews, beside what you mention, I know of none except the Review on +Hounslow Heath, which I take it is too expensive for your ordering. Pity +me, that have been a Gentleman these four weeks, and am reduced in one +day to the state of a ready writer. I feel, I feel, my gentlemanly +qualities fast oozing away--such as a sense of honour, neckcloths twice +a day, abstinence from swearing, &c. The desk enters into my soul. + +See my thoughts on business next Page. + + SONNET + + Who first invented _work?_--and bound the free + And holyday-rejoicing Spirit down + To the ever-haunting importunity + Of _Business_ in the green fields, and the Town-- + To plough, loom, [anvil], spade, and (oh most sad!) + To this dry drudgery of the desk's dead wood? + Who but the Being unblest, alien from good, + Sabbathless Satan! He, who his unglad + Task ever plies 'mid rotatory burnings, + That round and round incalculably reel-- + For wrath divine hath made him like a wheel-- + In that red realm from whence are no returnings; + Where toiling & turmoiling ever & aye + He and his Thoughts keep pensive worky-day. + +With many recollections of pleasanter times, my old compeer, +happily released before me, Adieu. C. LAMB. + +E.I.H. + +19 July [1824]. + + +[Marter was an old India House clerk; we do not meet with him again. The +sonnet had been printed in _The Examiner_ in 1819. Lamb, who was fond of +it, reprinted it in _Album Verses_, 1830.] + + + +LETTER 349 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. July 28, 1824.] + +My dear Sir--I must appear negligent in not having thanked you for the +very pleasant books you sent me. Arthur, and the Novel, we have both of +us read with unmixed satisfaction. They are full of quaint conceits, and +running over with good humour and good nature. I naturally take little +interest in story, but in these the manner and not the end is the +interest; it is such pleasant travelling, one scarce cares whither it +leads us. Pray express our pleasure to your father with my best thanks. + +I am involved in a routine of visiting among the family of Barren Field, +just ret'd, from Botany Bay--I shall hardly have an open Evening before +TUESDAY next. Will you come to us then? + + Yours truly, C. LAMB. + + +Wensday + +28 July 24. + + +[_Arthur_ and the Novel were two books by Charles Dibdin the Younger, +the father of Lamb's correspondent. Arthur was _Young Arthur; or, The +Child of Mystery: A Metrical Romance_, 1819, and the novel was _Isn't It +Odd?_ three volumes of high-spirited ramblings something in the manner +of _Tristram Shandy_, nominally written by Marmaduke Merrywhistle, and +published in 1822. + +Barron Field had returned from his Judgeship in New South Wales on June +18.] + + + +LETTER 350 + +(_Possibly incomplete_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD [P.M. August 10, 1824.] + +And what dost thou at the Priory? _Cucullus non facit Monachum_. English +me that, and challenge old Lignum Janua to make a better. + +My old New River has presented no extraordinary novelties lately; but +there Hope sits every day, speculating upon traditionary gudgeons. I +think she has taken the fisheries. I now know the reason why our +forefathers were denominated East and West Angles. Yet is there no lack +of spawn; for I wash my hands in fishets that come through the pump +every morning thick as motelings,--little things o o o like _that_, that +perish untimely, and never taste the brook. You do not tell me of those +romantic land bays that be as thou goest to Lover's Seat: neither of +that little churchling in the midst of a wood (in the opposite +direction, nine furlongs from the town), that seems dropped by the Angel +that was tired of carrying two packages; marry, with the other he made +shift to pick his flight to Loretto. Inquire out, and see my little +Protestant Loretto. It stands apart from trace of human habitation; yet +hath it pulpit, reading-desk, and trim front of massiest marble, as if +Robinson Crusoe had reared it to soothe himself with old church-going +images. I forget its Christian name, and what she-saint was its gossip. + +You should also go to No. 13, Standgate Street,--a baker, who has the +finest collection of marine monsters in ten sea counties,--sea dragons, +polypi, mer-people, most fantastic. You have only to name the old +gentleman in black (not the Devil) that lodged with him a week (he'll +remember) last July, and he will show courtesy. He is by far the +foremost of the savans. His wife is the funniest thwarting little +animal! They are decidedly the Lions of green Hastings. Well, I have +made an end of my say. My epistolary time is gone by when I could have +scribbled as long (I will not say as agreeable) as thine was to both of +us. I am dwindled to notes and letterets. But, in good earnest, I shall +be most happy to hail thy return to the waters of Old Sir Hugh. There is +nothing like inland murmurs, fresh ripples, and our native minnows. + + "He sang in meads how sweet the brooklets ran, + To the rough ocean and red restless sands." + +I design to give up smoking; but I have not yet fixed upon the +equivalent vice. I must have _quid pro quo;_ or _quo pro quid_, as Tom +Woodgate would correct me. My service to him. C.L. + + +[This is the first letter to Hood, then a young man of twenty-five, and +assistant editor of the _London Magazine_. He was now staying at +Hastings, on his honeymoon, presumably, and, like the Lambs, near the +Priory. + +"_Cucullus non facit Monachum_"--A "Lamb-pun." The Hood does not make +the monk. + +"Old Lignum Janua"--the Tom Woodgate mentioned at the end of the letter, +a boatman at Hastings. Hood wrote some verses to him. + +"My old New River." This passage was placed by Hood as the motto of his +verses "Walton Redivivus," in _Whims and Oddities_, 1826. + +"Little churchling." This is Lamb's second description of Hollingdon +Rural. The third and best is in a later letter. + +"There is nothing like inland murmurs." Lamb is here remembering +Wordsworth's Tintern Abbey lines:-- + + With a sweet inland murmur. + +In the _Elia_ essay "The Old Margate Hoy" Lamb, in speaking of Hastings, +had made the same objection. + +In a letter to his sister, written from Hastings at this time, Hood +says:-- + + This is the last of our excursions. We have tried, but in vain, to + find out the baker and his wife recommended to us by Lamb as the + very lions of green Hastings. There is no such street as he has + named throughout the town, and the ovens are singularly numerous. We + have given up the search, therefore, but we have discovered the + little church in the wood, and it is such a church! It ought to have + been our St. Botolph's. ... Such a verdant covert wood Stothard + might paint for the haunting of Dioneus, Pamphillus, and Fiammetta + as they walk in the novel of Boccacce. The ground shadowed with + bluebells, even to the formation of a plumb-like bloom upon its + little knolls and ridges; and ever through the dell windeth a little + path chequered with the shades of aspens and ashes and the most + verdant and lively of all the family of trees. Here a broad, rude + stone steppeth over a lazy spring, oozing its way into grass and + weeds; anon a fresh pathway divergeth, you know not whither. + Meanwhile the wild blackbird startles across the way and singeth + anew in some other shade. To have seen Fiammetta there, stepping in + silk attire, like a flower, and the sunlight looking upon her + betwixt the branches! I had not walked (in the body) with Romance + before. Then suppose so much of a space cleared as maketh a small + church _lawn_ to be sprinkled with old gravestones, and in the midst + the church itself, a small Christian dovecot, such as Lamb has truly + described it, like a little temple of Juan Fernandes. I could have + been sentimental and wished to lie some day in that place, its calm + tenants seeming to come through such quiet ways, through those + verdant alleys, to their graves. + + In coming home I killed a viper in our serpentine path, and Mrs. + Fernor says I am by that token to overcome an enemy. Is Taylor or + Hessey dead? The reptile was dark and dull, his blood being yet + sluggish from the cold; howbeit, he tried to bite, till I cut him in + two with a stone. I thought of Hessey's long back-bone when I did + it. + + They are called _adders_, tell your father, because two and two of + them together make four.] + + + +LETTER 351 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. August 17, 1824.] + +Dear B.B.--I congratulate you on getting a house over your head. I find +the comfort of it I am sure. At my town lodgings the Mistress was always +quarrelling with our maid; and at my place of rustication, the whole +family were always beating one another, brothers beating sisters (one a +most beautiful girl lamed for life), father beating sons and daughters, +and son again beating his father, knocking him fairly down, a scene I +never before witnessed, but was called out of bed by the unnatural +blows, the parricidal colour of which, tho' my morals could not but +condemn, yet my reason did heartily approve, and in the issue the house +was quieter for a day or so than I had ever known. I am now all harmony +and quiet, even to the sometimes wishing back again some of the old +rufflings. There is something stirring in these civil broils. + +The Album shall be attended to. If I can light upon a few appropriate +rhymes (but rhymes come with difficulty from me now) I shall beg a place +in the neat margin of your young housekeeper. + +The Prometheus Unbound, is a capital story. The Literal rogue! What if +you had ordered Elfrida in _sheets!_ She'd have been sent up, I warrant +you. Or bid him clasp his bible (_i.e._ to his bosom)-he'd ha clapt on a +brass clasp, no doubt.-- + +I can no more understand Shelly than you can. His poetry is "thin sewn +with profit or delight." Yet I must point to your notice a sonnet +conceivd and expressed with a witty delicacy. It is that addressed to +one who hated him, but who could not persuade him to hate _him_ again. +His coyness to the other's passion (for hate demands a return as much as +Love, and starves without it) is most arch and pleasant. Pray, like it +very much. + +For his theories and nostrums they are oracular enough, but I either +comprehend 'em not, or there is miching malice and mischief in 'em. But +for the most part ringing with their own emptiness. Hazlitt said well of +'em--Many are wiser and better for reading Shakspeare, but nobody was +ever wiser or better for reading Sh----y. + +I wonder you will sow your correspondence on so barren a ground as I am, +that make such poor returns. But my head akes at the bare thought of +letter writing. I wish all the ink in the ocean dried up, and would +listen to the quills shivering [? shrivelling] up in the candle flame, +like parching martyrs. The same indisposit'n to write it is has stopt my +Elias, but you will see a futile Effort in the next No., "wrung from me +with slow pain." + +The fact is, my head is seldom cool enough. I am dreadfully indolent. To +have to do anything-to order me a new coat, for instance, tho' my old +buttons are shelled like beans-- is an effort. + +My pen stammers like my tongue. What cool craniums +those old enditers of Folios must have had. What a mortify'd +pulse. Well, once more I throw myself on your mercy-- +Wishing peace in thy new dwelling-- C. LAMB. + + +[The Lambs gave up their "country lodgings" at Dalston on moving to +Colebrooke Row. + +"The album." See next letter to Barton. + +"The Prometheus Unbound." A bookseller, asked for _Prometheus Unbound_, +Shelley's poem, had replied that _Prometheus_ was not to be had "in +sheets." _Elfrida_ was a dramatic poem by William Mason, Gray's friend. + +This is Shelley's poem (not a sonnet) which Lamb liked:-- + + LINES TO A REVIEWER + + Alas! good friend, what profit can you see + In hating such an hateless thing as me? + There is no sport in hate, where all the rage + Is on one side. In vain would you assuage + Your frowns upon an unresisting smile, + In which not even contempt lurks, to beguile + Your heart by some faint sympathy of hate. + Oh conquer what you cannot satiate! + For to your passion I am far more coy + Then ever yet was coldest maid or boy + In winter-noon. Of your antipathy + If I am the Narcissus, you are free + To pine into a sound with hating me. + +Hazlitt writes of Shelley in his essay "On Paradox and Commonplace" in +_Table Talk_; but he does not make this remark there. Perhaps he said it +in conversation. + +"The next Number." The "futile Effort" was "Blakesmoor in H----shire" in +the _London Magazine_ for September, 1824. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Cary, August 19, 1824, in which +Lamb thanks him for his translation of _The Birds_ of Aristophanes and +accepts an invitation to dine.] + + + +LETTER 352 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: September 30, 1824.] + + Little Book! surnam'd of White; + Clean, as yet, and fair to sight; + Keep thy attribution right, + + Never disproportion'd scrawl; + Ugly blot, that's worse than all; + On thy maiden clearness fall. + + In each Letter, here design'd, + Let the Reader emblem'd find + Neatness of the Owner's mind. + + Gilded margins count a sin; + Let thy leaves attraction win + By thy Golden Rules within: + + Sayings, fetch'd from Sages old; + Saws, which Holy Writ unfold, + Worthy to be writ in Gold: + + Lighter Fancies not excluding; + Blameless wit, with nothing rude in, + Sometimes mildly interluding + + Amid strains of graver measure:-- + Virtue's self hath oft her pleasure + In sweet Muses' groves of leisure. + + Riddles dark, perplexing sense; + Darker meanings of offence; + What but _shades_, be banish'd hence. + + Whitest Thoughts, in whitest dress-- + Candid Meanings--best express + Mind of quiet Quakeress. + +Dear B.B.--"I am ill at these numbers;" but if the above be not too +mean to have a place in thy Daughter's Sanctum, take them with pleasure. +I assume that her Name is Hannah, because it is a pretty scriptural +cognomen. I began on another sheet of paper, and just as I had penn'd +the second line of Stanza 2 an ugly Blot [_here is a blot_] as big as +this, fell, to illustrate my counsel.--I am sadly given to blot, and +modern blotting-paper gives no redress; it only smears and makes it +worse, as for example [_here is a smear_]. The only remedy is scratching +out, which gives it a Clerkish look. The most innocent blots are made +with red ink, and are rather ornamental. [_Here are two or three blots +in red ink._] Marry, they are not always to be distinguished from the +effusions of a cut finger. + +Well, I hope and trust thy Tick doleru, or however you spell it, is +vanished, for I have frightful impressions of that Tick, and do +altogether hate it, as an unpaid score, or the Tick of a Death Watch. I +take it to be a species of Vitus's dance (I omit the Sanctity, writing +to "one of the men called Friends"). I knew a young Lady who could dance +no other, she danced thro' life, and very queer and fantastic were her +steps. Heaven bless thee from such measures, and keep thee from the Foul +Fiend, who delights to lead after False Fires in the night, +Flibbertigibit, that gives the web and the pin &c. I forget what else.-- + +From my den, as Bunyan has it, 30 Sep. 24. C.L. + + +[The verses were for the album of Barton's daughter, Lucy (afterwards +Mrs. Edward FitzGerald). Lucy was her only name. Lamb afterwards printed +them in his _Album Verses_, 1830.] + + + +LETTER 353 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. JOHN DYER COLLIER + +[Dated at end: November 2, 1824.] + +Dear Mrs. Collier--We receive so much pig from your kindness, that I +really have not phrase enough to vary successive acknowledg'mts. + +I think I shall get a printed form: to serve on all occasions. + +To say it was young, crisp, short, luscious, dainty-toed, is but to say +what all its predecessors have been. It was eaten on Sunday and Monday, +and doubts only exist as to which temperature it eat best, hot or cold. +I incline to the latter. The Petty-feet made a pretty surprising +proe-gustation for supper on Saturday night, just as I was loathingly in +expectation of bren-cheese. I spell as I speak. + +I do not know what news to send you. You will have heard of Alsager's +death, and your Son John's success in the Lottery. I say he is a wise +man, if he leaves off while he is well. The weather is wet to weariness, +but Mary goes puddling about a-shopping after a gown for the winter. She +wants it good & cheap. Now I hold that no good things are cheap, +pig-presents always excepted. In this mournful weather I sit moping, +where I now write, in an office dark as Erebus, jammed in between 4 +walls, and writing by Candle-light, most melancholy. Never see the light +of the Sun six hours in the day, and am surprised to find how pretty it +shines on Sundays. I wish I were a Caravan driver or a Penny post man, +to earn my bread in air & sunshine. Such a pedestrian as I am, to be +tied by the legs, like a Fauntleroy, without the pleasure of his +Exactions. I am interrupted here with an official question, which will +take me up till it's time to go to dinner, so with repeated thanks & +both our kindest rememb'ces to Mr. Collier & yourself, I conclude in +haste. + + Yours & his sincerely, C. LAMB. + +from my den in Leadenhall, + +2 Nov. 24. + +On further enquiry Alsager is not dead, but Mrs. A. is bro't. to bed. + + +[Mrs. Collier was the mother of John Payne Collier. Alsager we have +already met. Henry Fauntleroy was the banker, who had just been found +guilty of forgery and on the day that Lamb wrote was sentenced to death. +He was executed on the 30th (see a later letter).] + + + +LETTER 354 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[Dated at end: November 11, '24.] + +My dear Procter,-- + +I do agnise a shame in not having been to pay my congratulations to Mrs. +Procter and your happy self, but on Sunday (my only morning) I was +engaged to a country walk; and in virtue of the hypostatical union +between us, when Mary calls, it is understood that I call too, we being +univocal. + +But indeed I am ill at these ceremonious inductions. I fancy I was not +born with a call on my head, though I have brought one down upon it with +a vengeance. I love not to pluck that sort of fruit crude, but to stay +its ripening into visits. In probability Mary will be at Southampton Row +this morning, and something of that kind be matured between you, but in +any case not many hours shall elapse before I shake you by the hand. + +Meantime give my kindest felicitations to Mrs. Procter, and assure her I +look forward with the greatest delight to our acquaintance. By the way, +the deuce a bit of Cake has come to hand, which hath an inauspicious +look at first, but I comfort myself that that Mysterious Service hath +the property of Sacramental Bread, which mice cannot nibble, nor time +moulder. + +I am married myself--to a severe step-wife, who keeps me, not at bed and +board, but at desk and board, and is jealous of my morning aberrations. +I can not slip out to congratulate kinder unions. It is well she leaves +me alone o' nights--the damn'd Day-hag _BUSINESS_. She is even now +peeping over me to see I am writing no Love Letters. I come, my dear-- +Where is the Indigo Sale Book? + +Twenty adieus, my dear friends, till we meet. + + Yours most truly, C. LAMB. + +Leadenhall, 11 Nov. '24. + + +[Procter married Anne Skepper, step-daughter of Basil Montagu, in +October, 1824. One of their daughters was Adelaide Ann Procter. + +"Agnise"--acknowledge. It has been suggested that Lamb favoured this old +word also on account of its superficial association with _agnus_, a +lamb.] + + + +LETTER 355 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. Nov. 20, 1824.] + +Dr. R. Barren Field bids me say that he is resident at his brother +Henry's, a surgeon &c., a few doors west of Christ Church Passage +Newgate Street; and that he shall be happy to accompany you up thence to +Islington, when next you come our way, but not so late as you sometimes +come. I think we shall be out on Tuesd'y. + +Yours ever + +C. LAMB. + +Sat'y. + + +[Barron Field, as I have said, had returned from New South Wales in June +of this year. Later he became Chief Justice at Gibraltar.] + + + +LETTER 356 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +Desk II, Nov. 25 [1824]. + +My dear Miss Hutchinson, Mary bids me thank you for your kind letter. We +are a little puzzled about your where-abouts: Miss Wordsworth writes +Torkay, and you have queerly made it Torquay. Now Tokay we have heard +of, and Torbay, which we take to be the true _male_ spelling of the +place, but somewhere we fancy it to be on "Devon's leafy shores," where +we heartily wish the kindly breezes may restore all that is invalid +among you. Robinson is returned, and speaks much of you all. We shall be +most glad to hear good news from you from time to time. The best is, +Proctor is at last married. We have made sundry attempts to see the +Bride, but have accidentally failed, she being gone out a gadding. + +We had promised our dear friends the Monkhouses, promised ourselves +rather, a visit to them at Ramsgate, but I thought it best, and Mary +seemed to have it at heart too, not to go far from home these last holy +days. It is connected with a sense of unsettlement, and secretly I know +she hoped that such abstinence would be friendly to her health. She +certainly has escaped her sad yearly visitation, whether in consequence +of it, or of faith in it, and we have to be thankful for a good 1824. To +get such a notion into our heads may go a great way another year. Not +that we quite confined ourselves; but assuming Islington to be head +quarters, we made timid flights to Ware, Watford &c. to try how the +trouts tasted, for a night out or so, not long enough to make the sense +of change oppressive, but sufficient to scour the rust of home. + +Coleridge is not returned from the Sea. As a little scandal +may divert you recluses--we were in the Summer dining at a +Clergyman of Southey's "Church of England," at Hertford, +the same who officiated to Thurtell's last moments, and indeed +an old contemporary Blue of C.'s and mine at School. After +dinner we talked of C., and F. who is a mighty good fellow in +the main, but hath his cassock prejudices, inveighed against +the moral character of C. I endeavoured to enlighten him on +the subject, till having driven him out of some of his holds, he +stopt my mouth at once by appealing to me whether it was not +very well known that C. "at that very moment was living in +a state of open a------y with Mrs. * * * * * at Highgate?" +Nothing I could say serious or bantering after that +could remove the deep inrooted conviction of the whole company +assembled that such was the case! Of course you will +keep this quite close, for I would not involve my poor blundering +friend, who I dare say believed it all thoroughly. My +interference of course was imputed to the goodness of my heart, +that could imagine nothing wrong &c. Such it is if Ladies +will go gadding about with other people's husbands at watering +places. How careful we should be to avoid the appearance of +Evil. I thought this Anecdote might amuse you. It is not +worth resenting seriously; only I give it as a specimen of +orthodox candour. O Southey, Southey, how long would it +be before you would find one of us _Unitarians_ propagating +such unwarrantable Scandal! Providence keep you all from +the foul fiend Scandal, and send you back well and happy to +dear Gloster Place. C.L. + + +[Thomas Monkhouse, who was in a decline, had been ordered to Torquay. +Crabb Robinson had been in Normandy for some weeks. The too credulous +clergyman at Hertford was Frederick William Franklin, Master of the Blue +Coat school there (from 1801 to 1827), who was at Christ's Hospital with +Lamb. + +"Mrs. * * * * * *." Mrs. Gillman.] + + + +LETTER 357 + +CHARLES LAMB TO LEIGH HUNT + +[No date. ? November, 1824.] + +ILLUSTREZZIMO Signor,--I have obeyed your mandate to a tittle. I +accompany this with a volume. But what have you done with the first I +sent you?--have you swapt it with some lazzaroni for macaroni? or +pledged it with a gondolierer for a passage? Peradventuri the Cardinal +Gonsalvi took a fancy to it:--his Eminence has done my Nearness an +honour. 'Tis but a step to the Vatican. As you judge, my works do not +enrich the workman, but I get vat I can for 'em. They keep dragging me +on, a poor, worn mill-horse, in the eternal round of the damn'd +magazine; but 'tis they are blind, not I. Colburn (where I recognise +with delight the gay W. Honeycomb renovated) hath the ascendency. + +I was with the Novellos last week. They have a large, cheap house and +garden, with a dainty library (magnificent) without books. But what will +make you bless yourself (I am too old for wonder), something has touched +the right organ in Vincentio at last. He attends a Wesleyan chapel on +Kingsland Green. He at first tried to laugh it off--he only went for the +singing; but the cloven foot--I retract--the Lamb's trotters--are at +length apparent. Mary Isabella attributes it to a lightness induced by +his headaches. But I think I see in it a less accidental influence. +Mister Clark is at perfect staggers! the whole fabric of his infidelity +is shaken. He has no one to join him in his coarse-insults and indecent +obstreperousnesses against Christianity, for Holmes (the bonny Holmes) +is gone to Salisbury to be organist, and Isabella and the Clark make but +a feeble quorum. The children have all nice, neat little clasped +pray-books, and I have laid out 7s. 8d. in Watts's Hymns for Christmas +presents for them. The eldest girl alone holds out; she has been at +Boulogne, skirting upon the vast focus of Atheism, and imported bad +principles in patois French. But the strongholds are crumbling. N. +appears as yet to have but a confused notion of the Atonement. It makes +him giddy, he says, to think much about it. But such giddiness is +spiritual sobriety. + +Well, Byron is gone, and ------ is now the best poet in England. Fill up +the gap to your fancy. Barry Cornwall has at last carried the pretty A. +S. They are just in the treacle-moon. Hope it won't clog his wings--gaum +we used to say at school. + +Mary, my sister, has worn me out with eight weeks' cold and toothache, +her average complement in the winter, and it will not go away. She is +otherwise well, and reads novels all day long. She has had an exempt +year, a good year, for which, forgetting the minor calamity, she and I +are most thankful. + +Alsager is in a flourishing house, with wife and children about him, in +Mecklenburg Square--almost too fine to visit. + +Barron Field is come home from Sydney, but as yet I can hear no tidings +of a pension. He is plump and friendly, his wife really a very superior +woman. He resumes the bar. + +I have got acquainted with Mr. Irving, the Scotch preacher, whose fame +must have reached you. He is a humble disciple at the foot of Gamaliel +S.T.C. Judge how his own sectarists must stare when I tell you he has +dedicated a book to S.T.C., acknowledging to have learnt more of the +nature of Faith, Christianity, and Christian Church, from him than from +all the men he ever conversed with. He is a most amiable, sincere, +modest man in a room, this Boanerges in the temple. Mrs. Montague told +him the dedication would do him no good. "That shall be a reason for +doing it," was his answer. Judge, now, whether this man be a quack. + +Dear H., take this imperfect notelet for a letter; it looks so much the +more like conversing on nearer terms. Love to all the Hunts, old friend +Thornton, and all. + + Yours ever, C. LAMB. + + +[Leigh Hunt was still living at Genoa. Shelley and Byron, whom he had +left England to join, were both dead. Lamb, I assume, sent him a second +copy of _Elia_, with this letter. + +Cardinal Gonsalvi was Ercole Gonsalvi (1757-1824), secretary to Pius +VII. and a patron of the arts. Lawrence painted him. + +For the present state of the _London Magazine_ see next letter. Leigh +Hunt contributed to Colburn's _New Monthly Magazine_, among other +things, a series of papers on "The Months." Hunt also contributed an +account of the Honeycomb family, by Harry Honeycomb. + +By Mary Isabella Lamb meant Mary Sabilla Novello, Vincent Novello's +wife. The eldest girl was Mary Victoria, afterwards the wife of Charles +Cowden Clarke, the Mr. Clark mentioned here. Novello (now living at +Shackleford Green) remained a good Roman Catholic to the end. Holmes was +Edward Holmes (1797-1859), a pupil of Cowden Clarke's father at Enfield +and schoolfellow of Keats. He had lived with the Novellos, studying +music, and later became a musical writer and teacher and the biographer +of Mozart. + +Mrs. Barron Field was a Miss Jane Carncroft, to whom Lamb addressed some +album verses (see Vol. IV. of this edition). Leigh Hunt knew of Field's +return, for he had contributed to the _New Monthly_ earlier in the year +a rhymed letter to him in which he welcomed him home again. + +Irving was Edward Irving (1792-1834), afterwards the founder of the +Catholic Apostolic sect, then drawing people to the chapel in Hatton +Garden, attached to the Caledonian Asylum. The dedication, to which Lamb +alludes more than once in his correspondence, was that of his work, _For +Missionaries after the Apostolical School, a series of orations in four +parts_, ... 1825. It runs:-- + +DEDICATION + +TO + +SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE, ESQ. + +MY DEAR AND HONOURED FRIEND, + +Unknown as you are, in the true character either of your mind or of your +heart, to the greater part of your countrymen, and misrepresented as +your works have been, by those who have the ear of the vulgar, it will +seem wonderful to many that I should make choice of you, from the circle +of my friends, to dedicate to you these beginnings of my thoughts upon +the most important subject of these or any times. And when I state the +reason to be, that you have been more profitable to my faith in orthodox +doctrine, to my spiritual understanding of the Word of God, and to my +right conception of the Christian Church, than any or all of the men +with whom I have entertained friendship and conversation, it will +perhaps still more astonish the mind, and stagger the belief, of those +who have adopted, as once I did myself, the misrepresentations which are +purchased for a hire and vended for a price, concerning your character +and works. You have only to shut your ear to what they ignorantly say of +you, and earnestly to meditate the deep thoughts with which you are +instinct, and give them a suitable body and form that they may live, +then silently commit them to the good sense of ages yet to come, in +order to be ranked hereafter amongst the most gifted sages and greatest +benefactors of your country. Enjoy and occupy the quiet which, after +many trials, the providence of God hath bestowed upon you, in the bosom +of your friends; and may you be spared until you have made known the +multitude of your thoughts, unto those who at present value, or shall +hereafter arise to value, their worth. + +I have partaken so much high intellectual enjoyment from being admitted +into the close and familiar intercourse with which you have honoured me, +and your many conversations concerning the revelations of the Christian +faith have been so profitable to me in every sense, as a student and a +preacher of the Gospel, as a spiritual man and a Christian pastor, and +your high intelligence and great learning have at all times so kindly +stooped to my ignorance and inexperience, that not merely with the +affection of friend to friend, and the honour due from youth to +experienced age, but with the gratitude of a disciple to a wise and +generous teacher, of an anxious inquirer to the good man who hath helped +him in the way of truth, I do now presume to offer you the first-fruits +of my mind since it received a new impulse towards truth, and a new +insight into its depths, from listening to your discourse. Accept them +in good part, and be assured that however insignificant in themselves, +they are the offering of a heart which loves your heart, and of a mind +which looks up with reverence to your mind. + +EDWARD IRVING. + +"Old friend Thornton" was Leigh Hunt's son, Thornton Leigh Hunt, whom +Lamb had addressed in verse in 1815 as "my favourite child." He was now +fourteen.] + + + +LETTER 358 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON AND LUCY BARTON + +[P.M. December 1, 1824.] + +Dear B.B.--If Mr. Mitford will send me a full and circumstantial +description of his desired vases, I will transmit the same to a +Gentleman resident at Canton, whom I think I have interest enough in to +take the proper care for their execution. But Mr. M. must have patience. +China is a great way off, further perhaps than he thinks; and his next +year's roses must be content to wither in a Wedgewood pot. He will +please to say whether he should like his Arms upon them, &c. I send +herewith some patterns which suggest themselves to me at the first blush +of the subject, but he will probably consult his own taste after all. + +[Illustration: Handdrawn sketch] + +The last pattern is obviously fitted for ranunculuses only. The two +former may indifferently hold daisies, marjoram, sweet williams, and +that sort. My friend in Canton is Inspector of Teas, his name Ball; and +I can think of no better tunnel. I shall expect Mr. M.'s decision. + +Taylor and Hessey finding their magazine goes off very heavily at 2s. +6d. are prudently going to raise their price another shilling; and +having already more authors than they want, intend to increase the +number of them. If they set up against the New Monthly, they must change +their present hands. It is not tying the dead carcase of a Review to a +half-dead Magazine will do their business. It is like G.D. multiplying +his volumes to make 'em sell better. When he finds one will not go off, +he publishes two; two stick, he tries three; three hang fire, he is +confident that four will have a better chance. + +And now, my dear Sir, trifling apart, the gloomy catastrophe of +yesterday morning prompts a sadder vein. The fate of the unfortunate +Fauntleroy makes me, whether I will or no, to cast reflecting eyes +around on such of my friends as by a parity of situation are exposed to +a similarity of temptation. My very style, seems to myself to become +more impressive than usual, with the change of theme. Who that standeth, +knoweth but he may yet fall? Your hands as yet, I am most willing to +believe, have never deviated into others' property. You think it +impossible that you could ever commit so heinous an offence. But so +thought Fauntleroy once; so have thought many besides him, who at last +have expiated, as he hath done. You are as yet upright. But you are a +Banker, at least the next thing to it. I feel the delicacy of the +subject; but cash must pass thro' your hands, sometimes to a great +amount. If in an unguarded hour--but I will hope better. Consider the +scandal it will bring upon those of your persuasion. Thousands would go +to see a Quaker hanged, that would be indifferent to the fate of a +Presbyterian, or an Anabaptist. Think of the effect it would have on the +sale of your poems alone; not to mention higher considerations. I +tremble, I am sure, at myself, when I think that so many poor victims of +the Law at one time of their life made as sure of never being hanged as +I in my presumption am too ready to do myself. What are we better than +they? Do we come into the world with different necks? Is there any +distinctive mark under our left ears? Are we unstrangulable? I ask you. +Think of these things. I am shocked sometimes at the shape of my own +fingers, not for their resemblance to the ape tribe (which is something) +but for the exquisite adaptation of them to the purposes of picking, +fingering, &c. No one that is so framed, I maintain it, but should +tremble. + +Postscript for your Daughter's eyes only. + +Dear Miss ---- Your pretty little letterets make me ashamed of my great +straggling coarse handwriting. I wonder where you get pens to write so +small. Sure they must be the pinions of a small wren, or a robin. If you +write so in your Album, you must give us glasses to read by. I have seen +a Lady's similar book all writ in following fashion. I think it pretty +and fanciful. + + "O how I love in early dawn + To bend my steps o'er flowery dawn [lawn]," + +which I think has an agreeable variety to the eye. Which I recommend to +your notice, with friend Elia's best wishes. + + +[The _London Magazine_ began a new series at half a crown with the +number for January, 1825. It had begun to decline very noticeably. The +_New Monthly Magazine_, to the January number of which Lamb contributed +his "Illustrious Defunct" essay, was its most serious rival. Lamb +returned to some of his old vivacity and copiousness in the _London +Magazine_ for January, 1825. To that number he contributed his +"Biographical Memoir of Mr. Liston" and the "Vision of Horns"; and to +the February number "Letter to an Old Gentleman," "Unitarian Protests" +and the "Autobiography of Mr. Munden." + +"G.D."--George Dyer again. + +"Fauntleroy." See note above. Fauntleroy's fate seems to have had great +fascination for Lamb. He returned to the subject, in the vein of this +letter, in "The Last Peach," a little essay printed in the _London +Magazine_ for April, 1825 (see Vol. I. of this edition); and in +_Memories of old Friends, being Extracts from the Journals and Letters +of Caroline Fox, ... from 1835 to 1871_, 1882, I find the following +entry:-- + +October 25 [l839].--G. Wightwick and others dined with us. He talked +agreeably about capital punishments, greatly doubting their having any +effect in preventing crime. Soon after Fauntleroy was hanged, an +advertisement appeared, "To all good Christians! Pray for the soul of +Fauntleroy." This created a good deal of speculation as to whether he +was a Catholic, and at one of Coleridge's soirees it was discussed for a +considerable time; at length Coleridge, turning to Lamb, asked, "Do you +know anything about this affair?" "I should think I d-d-d-did," said +Elia, "for I paid s-s-s-seven and sixpence for it!" + +Lamb's postscript is written in extremely small characters, and --the +letters of the two lines of verse are in alternate red and black inks. +It was this letter which, Edward FitzGerald tells us, Thackeray pressed +to his forehead, with the remark "Saint Charles!" Hitherto, the +postscript not having been thought worthy of print by previous editors, +it was a little difficult to understand why this particular letter had +been selected for Thackeray's epithet. But when one thinks of the +patience with which, after making gentle fun of her father, Lamb sat +down to amuse Lucy Barton, and, as Thackeray did, thinks also of his +whole life, it becomes more clear. + +Here should come a letter to Alaric A. Watts dated Dec. 28, 1824, in +reply to a request for a contribution to one of this inveterate +album-maker's albums. Lamb acquiesces. Later he came to curse the +things. Given in the Boston Bibliophile edition.] + + + +LETTER 359 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. January II, 1825.] + +My Dear Sir--Pray return my best thanks to your father for his little +volume. It is like all of his I have seen, spirited, good humoured, and +redolent of the wit and humour of a century ago. He should have lived +with Gay and his set. The Chessiad is so clever that I relish'd it in +spite of my total ignorance of the game. I have it not before me, but I +remember a capital simile of the Charwoman letting in her Watchman +husband, which is better than Butler's Lobster turned to Red. Hazard is +a grand Character, Jove in his Chair. When you are disposed to leave +your one room for my six, Colebrooke is where it was, and my sister begs +me to add that as she is disappointed of meeting your sister _your way_, +we shall be most happy to see her _our way_, when you have an even'g to +spare. Do not stand on ceremonies and introductions, but come at once. I +need not say that if you can induce your father to join the party, it +will be so much the pleasanter. Can you name an evening _next week_? I +give you long credit. + +Meantime am as usual yours truly C.L. + +E.I.H. + +11 Jan. 25. + +When I saw the Chessiad advertised by C.D. the Younger, I hoped it +might be yours. What title is left for you-- + +Charles Dibdin _the Younger, Junior_. + +O No, you are Timothy. + + +[Charles Dibdin the Younger wrote a mock-heroic poem, "The Chessiad," +which was published with _Comic Tales_ in 1825. The simile of the +charwoman runs thus:-- + + Now Morning, yawning, rais'd her from her bed, + Slipp'd on her wrapper blue and 'kerchief red, + And took from Night the key of Sleep's abode; + For Night within that mansion had bestow'd + The Hours of day; now, turn and turn about, + Morn takes the key and lets the Day-hours out; + Laughing, they issue from the ebon gate, + And Night walks in. As when, in drowsy state, + Some watchman, wed to one who chars all day, + Takes to his lodging's door his creeping way; + His rib, arising, lets him in to sleep, + While she emerges to scrub, dust, and sweep. + +This is the lobster simile in _Hudibras_, Part II., Canto 2, lines +29-32:-- + + The sun had long since, in the lap + Of Thetis, taken out his nap, + And, like a lobster boiled, the morn + From black to red began to turn. + +Hazard is the chief of the gods in the Chessiad's little drama. + +"You are Timothy." See letter to Dibdin above. + +I have included in Vol. I. of the present edition a review of Dibdin's +book, in the _New Times_, January 27, 1825, which both from internal +evidence and from the quotation of the charwoman passage I take to be by +Lamb, who was writing for that paper at that time.] + + + +LETTER 360 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +Jan. 17, 1825. + +Dear Allsop--I acknowledge with thanks the receipt of a draft on Messrs. +Wms. for L81:11:3 which I haste to cash in the present alarming state of +the money market. Hurst and Robinson gone. I have imagined a chorus of +ill-used authors singing on the occasion: + + What should we when Booksellers break? + We should rejoice + da Capo. + +We regret exceed'ly Mrs. Allsop's being unwell. Mary or both will come +and see her soon. The frost is cruel, and we have both colds. I take +Pills again, which battle with your wine & victory hovers doubtful. By +the bye, tho' not disinclined to presents I remember our bargain to take +a dozen at sale price and must demur. With once again thanks and best +loves to Mrs. A. + + Turn over--Yours, C. LAMB. + + +[Hurst and Robinson were publishers. Lamb took the idea for his chorus +from Davenant's version of "Macbeth" which he described in _The +Spectator_ in 1828 (see Vol. I. of the present edition). It is there a +chorus of witches-- + + We should rejoice when good kings bleed. ] + + + +LETTER 361 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +[P.M. January 20, 1825.] + +The brevity of this is owing to scratching it off at my desk amid +expected interruptions. By habit, I can write Letters only at office. + +Dear Miss H. Thank you for a noble Goose, which wanted only the massive +Encrustation that we used to pick-axe open about this season in old +Gloster Place. When shall we eat another Goosepye together? The pheasant +too must not be forgotten, twice as big and half as good as a partridge. +You ask about the editor of the Lond. I know of none. This first +specimen is flat and pert enough to justify subscribers who grudge at +t'other shilling. De Quincey's Parody was submitted to him before +printed, and had his Probatum. The "Horns" is in a poor taste, +resembling the most laboured papers in the Spectator. I had sign'd it +"Jack Horner:" but Taylor and Hessey said, it would be thought an +offensive article, unless I put my known signature to it; and wrung from +me my slow consent. But did you read the "Memoir of Liston"? and did you +guess whose it was? Of all the Lies I ever put off, I value this most. +It is from top to toe, every paragraph, Pure Invention; and has passed +for Gospel, has been republished in newspapers, and in the penny +play-bills of the Night, as an authentic Account. I shall certainly go +to the Naughty Man some day for my Fibbings. In the next No. I figure as +a Theologian! and have attacked my late brethren, the Unitarians. What +Jack Pudding tricks I shall play next, I know not. I am almost at the +end of my Tether. + +Coleridge is quite blooming; but his Book has not budded yet. I hope I +have spelt Torquay right now, and that this will find you all mending, +and looking forward to a London flight with the Spring. Winter _we_ have +had none, but plenty of foul weather. I have lately pick'd up an Epigram +which pleased me. + + Two noble Earls, whom if I quote, + Some folks might call me Sinner; + The one invented half a coat; + The other half a dinner. + + The plan was good, as some will say + And fitted to console one: + Because, in this poor starving day, + Few can afford a whole one. + +I have made the Lame one still lamer by imperfect memory, but spite of +bald diction, a little done to it might improve it into a good one. You +have nothing else to do at [_"Talk kay" here written and scratched out_] +Torquay. Suppose you try it. Well God bless you all, as wishes Mary, +[most] sincerely, with many thanks for Letter &c. ELIA. + + +[The Monkhouses' house in London was at 34 Gloucester Place. + +Lamb's De Quincey parody was the "Letter to an Old Gentleman, whose +Education has been Neglected." + +"Coleridge's book"--the _Aids to Reflection_, published in May or June, +1825. + +"I have lately pick'd up an Epigram." This is by Henry Man, an old +South-Sea House clerk, whom in his South-Sea House essay Lamb mentions +as a wit. The epigram, which refers to Lord Spencer and Lord Sandwich, +will be found in Man's _Miscellaneous Works_, 1802.] + + + +LETTER 362 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[P.M. Jan. 25, 1825.] + +Dear Corelli, My sister's cold is as obstinate as an old Handelian, whom +a modern amateur is trying to convert to Mozart-ism. As company must & +always does injure it, Emma and I propose to come to you in the evening +of to-morrow, _instead of meeting here_. An early bread-and-cheese +supper at 1/2 past eight will oblige us. +Loves to the Bearer of many Children. C. LAMB. + +Tuesday Colebrooke. + +I sign with a black seal, that you may begin to think, her cold has +killed Mary, which will be an agreeable UNSURPRISE when you read the +Note. + + +[This is the first letter to Novello, who was the peculiar champion of +Mozart and Haydn. Lamb calls him Corelli after Archangelo Corelli +(1653-1713), the violinist and composer. It was part of a joke between +Lamb and Novello that Lamb should affect to know a great deal about +music. See the _Elia_ essay "A Chapter on Ears" for a description of +Novello's playing. Mrs. Novello was the mother of eleven children.] + + + +LETTER 363 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[Dated at end: 10 February, 1825.] + +Dear B.B.--I am vexed that ugly paper should have offended. I kept it +as clear from objectionable phrases as possible, and it was Hessey's +fault, and my weakness, that it did not appear anonymous. No more of it +for God's sake. + +The Spirit of the Age is by Hazlitt. The characters of Coleridge, &c. he +had done better in former publications, the praise and the abuse much +stronger, &c. but the new ones are capitally done. Horne Tooke is a +matchless portrait. My advice is, to borrow it rather than read [? buy] +it. I have it. He has laid on too many colours on my likeness, but I +have had so much injustice done me in my own name, that I make a rule of +accepting as much over-measure to Elia as Gentlemen think proper to +bestow. Lay it on and spare not. + +Your Gentleman Brother sets my mouth a watering after Liberty. O that I +were kicked out of Leadenhall with every mark of indignity, and a +competence in my fob. The birds of the air would not be so free as I +should. How I would prance and curvet it, and pick up cowslips, and +ramble about purposeless as an ideot! The Author-mometer is a good +fancy. I have caused great speculation in the dramatic (not _thy_) world +by a Lying Life of Liston, all pure invention. The Town has swallowed +it, and it is copied into News Papers, Play Bills, etc., as authentic. +You do not know the Droll, and possibly missed reading the article (in +our 1st No., New Series). A life more improbable for him to have lived +would not be easily invented. But your rebuke, coupled with "Dream on J. +Bunyan," checks me. I'd rather do more in my favorite way, but feel dry. +I must laugh sometimes. I am poor Hypochondriacus, and _not_ Liston. + +Our 2'nd N'o is all trash. What are T. and H. about? It is whip +syllabub, "thin sown with aught of profit or delight." Thin sown! not a +germ of fruit or corn. Why did poor Scott die! There was comfort in +writing with such associates as were his little band of Scribblers, some +gone away, some affronted away, and I am left as the solitary widow +looking for water cresses. + +The only clever hand they have is Darley, who has written on the +Dramatists, under name of John Lacy. But his function seems suspended. + +I have been harassed more than usually at office, which has stopt my +correspondence lately. I write with a confused aching head, and you must +accept this apology for a Letter. + +I will do something soon if I can as a peace offering to the Queen of +the East Angles. Something she shan't scold about. + +For the Present, farewell. + + Thine C.L. + +10 Feb. 1825. + +I am fifty years old this day. Drink my health. + + +["That ugly paper" was "A Vision of Horns." + +Hazlitt's _Spirit of the Age_ had just been published, containing +criticisms, among others, of Coleridge, Horne Tooke, and Lamb. Lamb was +very highly praised. Here is a passage from the article:-- + + How admirably he has sketched the former inmates of the South-Sea + House; what "fine fretwork he makes of their double and single + entries!" With what a firm yet subtle pencil he has embodied "Mrs. + Battle's Opinions on Whist!" How notably he embalms a battered + _beau_; how delightfully an amour, that was cold forty years ago, + revives in his pages! With what well-disguised humour he introduces + us to his relations, and how freely he serves up his friends! + Certainly, some of his portraits are _fixtures_, and will do to hang + up as lasting and lively emblems of human infirmity. Then there is + no one who has so sure an ear for "the chimes at midnight," not even + excepting Mr. Justice Shallow; nor could Master Silence himself take + his "cheese and pippins" with a more significant and satisfactory + air. With what a gusto Mr. Lamb describes the Inns and Courts of + law, the Temple and Gray's Inn, as if he had been a student there + for the last two hundred years, and had been as well acquainted with + the person of Sir Francis Bacon as he is with his portrait or + writings! It is hard to say whether St. John's Gate is connected + with more intense and authentic associations in his mind, as a part + of old London Wall, or as the frontispiece (time out of mind) of the + _Gentleman's Magazine_. He hunts Watling Street like a gentle + spirit; the avenues to the play-houses are thick with panting + recollections; and Christ's Hospital still breathes the balmy breath + of infancy in his description of it! + +"Your Gentleman Brother"--John Barton, Bernard's younger half-brother. + +"The Author-mometer." I have not discovered to what Lamb refers. + +"Dream on J. Bunyan." Probably a poem by Barton, but I have not traced +it. + +"T. and H."--Taylor & Hessey. + +"Poor Scott"--John Scott, who founded the _London Magazine_. + +"Darley"--George Darley (1795-1846), author of _Sylvia; or, The May +Queen_, 1827. + +"The Queen of the East Angles." Possibly Lucy Barton, possibly Anne +Knight, a friend of Barton's.] + + + +LETTER 364 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS MANNING + +[Not dated. ? February, 1825.] + +My dear M.,--You might have come inopportunely a week since, when we had +an inmate. At present and for as long as _ever_ you like, our castle is +at your service. I saw Tuthill yesternight, who has done for me what may + + "To all my nights and days to come, + Give solely sovran sway and masterdom." + +But I dare not hope, for fear of disappointment. I cannot be more +explicit at present. But I have it under his own hand, that I am +_non_-capacitated (I cannot write it _in_-) for business. O joyous +imbecility! Not a susurration of this to _anybody!_ + +Mary's love. + +C. LAMB. + +[Lamb had just taken a most momentous step in his career and had +consulted Tuthill as to his health, in the hope of perhaps obtaining +release and a pension from the East India House. We learn more of this +soon. + +Here might come two brief notes to Dibdin, of no importance.] + + + +LETTER 365 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +[Dated at end: March 1, 1825.] + +Dear Miss Hutchinson Your news has made us all very sad. I had my hopes +to the last. I seem as if I were disturbing you at such an awful time +even by a reply. But I must acknowledge your kindness in presuming upon +the interest we shall all feel on the subject. No one will more feel it +than Robinson, to whom I have written. No one more than he and we +acknowleged the nobleness and worth of what we have lost. Words are +perfectly idle. We can only pray for resignation to the Survivors. Our +dearest expressions of condolence to Mrs. M------ at this time in +particular. God bless you both. I have nothing of ourselves to tell you, +and if I had, I could not be so unreverent as to trouble you with it. We +are all well, that is all. Farewell, the departed--and the left. Your's +and his, while memory survives, cordially + +C. LAMB. + +1 Mar. 1825. + + +[The letter refers to the death of Thomas Monkhouse. + +Here should come an undated note from Lamb to Procter, in which Lamb +refers to the same loss: "We shall be most glad to see you, though more +glad to have seen double _you_."] + + + +LETTER 366 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. March 23, 1825.] + +Wednesday. + +Dear B.B.--I have had no impulse to write, or attend to any single +object but myself, for weeks past. My single self. I by myself I. I am +sick of hope deferred. The grand wheel is in agitation that is to turn +up my Fortune, but round it rolls and will turn up nothing. I have a +glimpse of Freedom, of becoming a Gentleman at large, but I am put off +from day to day. I have offered my resignation, and it is neither +accepted nor rejected. Eight weeks am I kept in this fearful suspence. +Guess what an absorbing stake I feel it. I am not conscious of the +existence of friends present or absent. The E.I. Directors alone can be +that thing to me--or not.-- + +I have just learn'd that nothing will be decided this week. Why the +next? Why any week? It has fretted me into an itch of the fingers, I rub +'em against Paper and write to you, rather than not allay this Scorbuta. + +While I can write, let me adjure you to have no doubts of Irving. Let +Mr. Mitford drop his disrespect. Irving has prefixed a dedication (of a +Missionary Subject 1st part) to Coleridge, the most beautiful cordial +and sincere. He there acknowledges his obligation to S.T.C. for his +knowledge of Gospel truths, the nature of a Xtian Church, etc., to the +talk of S.T.C. (at whose Gamaliel feet he sits weekly) [more] than to +that of all the men living. This from him--The great dandled and petted +Sectarian--to a religious character so equivocal in the world's Eye as +that of S.T.C., so foreign to the Kirk's estimate!--Can this man be a +Quack? The language is as affecting as the Spirit of the Dedication. +Some friend told him, "This dedication will do you no Good," _i.e._ not +in the world's repute, or with your own People. "That is a reason for +doing it," quoth Irving. + +I am thoroughly pleased with him. He is firm, outspeaking, intrepid--and +docile as a pupil of Pythagoras. + +You must like him. + +Yours, in tremors of painful hope, + +C. LAMB. + + +[In the first paragraphs Lamb refers to the great question of his +release from the India House. + +In a letter dated February 19, 1825, of Mary Russell Mitford, who looked +upon Irving as quack absolute, we find her discussing the preacher with +Charles Lamb.] + + + +LETTER 367 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[March 29], 1825. + +I have left the d------d India House for Ever! + +Give me great joy. + +C. LAMB. + +[Robinson states in his Reminiscences of Coleridge, Wordsworth and Lamb, +preserved in MS. at Dr. Williams' Library: "A most important incident in +Lamb's life, tho' in the end not so happy for him as he anticipated, was +his obtaining his discharge, with a pension of almost L400 a year, from +the India House. This he announced to me by a note put into my letter +box: 'I have left the India House. D------ Time. I'm all for eternity.' +He was rather more than 50 years of age. I found him and his Sister in +high spirits when I called to wish them joy on the 22 of April. 'I never +saw him so calmly cheerful,' says my journal, 'as he seemed then.'" See +the next letters for Lamb's own account of the event.] + + + +LETTER 368 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +Colebrook Cottage, + +6 April, 1825. + +Dear Wordsworth, I have been several times meditating a letter to you +concerning the good thing which has befallen me, but the thought of poor +Monkhouse came across me. He was one that I had exulted in the prospect +of congratulating me. He and you were to have been the first +participators, for indeed it has been ten weeks since the first motion +of it. + +Here I am then after 33 years slavery, sitting in my own room at 11 +o'Clock this finest of all April mornings a freed man, with L441 a year +for the remainder of my life, live I as long as John Dennis, who +outlived his annuity and starved at 90. L441, i.e. L450, with a +deduction of L9 for a provision secured to my sister, she being +survivor, the Pension guaranteed by Act Georgii Tertii, &c. + +I came home for ever on Tuesday in last week. The incomprehensibleness +of my condition overwhelm'd me. It was like passing from life into +Eternity. Every year to be as long as three, i.e. to have three times as +much real time, time that is my own, in it! I wandered about thinking I +was happy, but feeling I was not. But that tumultuousness is passing +off, and I begin to understand the nature of the gift. Holydays, even +the annual month, were always uneasy joys: their conscious +fugitiveness--the craving after making the most of them. Now, when all +is holyday, there are no holydays. I can sit at home in rain or shine +without a restless impulse for walkings. I am daily steadying, and shall +soon find it as natural to me to be my own master, as it has been +irksome to have had a master. Mary wakes every morning with an obscure +feeling that some good has happened to us. + +Leigh Hunt and Montgomery after their releasements describe the shock of +their emancipation much as I feel mine. But it hurt their frames. I eat, +drink, and sleep sound as ever. I lay no anxious schemes for going +hither and thither, but take things as they occur. Yesterday I +excursioned 20 miles, to day I write a few letters. Pleasuring was for +fugitive play days, mine are fugitive only in the sense that life is +fugitive. Freedom and life co-existent. + +At the foot of such a call upon you for gratulation, I am ashamd to +advert to that melancholy event. Monkhouse was a character I learnd to +love slowly, but it grew upon me, yearly, monthly, daily. What a chasm +has it made in our pleasant parties! His noble friendly face was always +coming before me, till this hurrying event in my life came, and for the +time has absorpt all interests. In fact it has shaken me a little. My +old desk companions with whom I have had such merry hours seem to +reproach me for removing my lot from among them. They were pleasant +creatures, but to the anxieties of business, and a weight of possible +worse ever impending, I was not equal. Tuthill and Gilman gave me my +certificates. I laughed at the friendly lie implied in them, but my +sister shook her head and said it was all true. Indeed this last winter +I was jaded out, winters were always worse than other parts of the year, +because the spirits are worse, and I had no daylight. In summer I had +daylight evenings. The relief was hinted to me from a superior power, +when I poor slave had not a hope but that I must wait another 7 years +with Jacob--and lo! the Rachel which I coveted is bro't to me-- + +Have you read the noble dedication of Irving's "Missionary Orations" to +S.T.C. Who shall call this man a Quack hereafter? What the Kirk will +think of it neither I nor Irving care. When somebody suggested to him +that it would not be likely to do him good, videlicet among his own +people, "That is a reason for doing it" was his noble answer. + +That Irving thinks he has profited mainly by S.T.C., I have no doubt. +The very style of the Ded. shows it. + +Communicate my news to Southey, and beg his pardon for my being so long +acknowledging his kind present of the "Church," which circumstances I do +not wish to explain, but having no reference to himself, prevented at +the time. Assure him of my deep respect and friendliest feelings. + +Divide the same, or rather each take the whole to you, I mean you and +all yours. To Miss Hutchinson I must write separate. What's her address? +I want to know about Mrs. M. + +Farewell! and end at last, long selfish Letter! + +C. LAMB. + + +[Lamb expanded the first portion of this letter into the _Elia_ essay +"The Superannuated Man," which ought to be read in connection with it +(see Vol. II. of the present edition). + +Leigh Hunt and James Montgomery, the poet, had both undergone +imprisonment for libel. + +At a Court of Directors of the India House held on March 29, 1825, it +was resolved "that the resignation of Mr. Charles Lamb of the Accountant +General's Office, on account of certified ill-health, be accepted, and, +it appearing that he has served the Company faithfully for 33 years, and +is now in the receipt of an income of L730 per annum, he be allowed a +pension of L450 (four hundred and fifty pounds) per annum, under the +provisions of the act of the 53 Geo. III., cap. 155, to commence from +this day."] + + + +LETTER 369 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. April 6, 1825.] + +Dear B.B.--My spirits are so tumultuary with the novelty of my recent +emancipation, that I have scarce steadiness of hand, much more mind, to +compose a letter. + +I am free, B.B.--free as air. + + The little bird that wings the sky + Knows no such Liberty! + +I was set free on Tuesday in last week at 4 o'Clock. + + I came home for ever! + +I have been describing my feelings as well as I can to Wordsw'th. in a +long letter, and don't care to repeat. Take it briefly that for a few +days I was painfully oppressed by so mighty a change, but it is becoming +daily more natural to me. + +I went and sat among 'em all at my old 33 years desk yester morning; and +deuce take me if I had not yearnings at leaving all my old pen and ink +fellows, merry sociable lads, at leaving them in the Lurch, fag, fag, +fag. + +The comparison of my own superior felicity gave me any thing but +pleasure. + +B.B., I would not serve another 7 years for seven hundred thousand +pounds! + +I have got L441 net for life, sanctioned by Act of Parliament, with a +provision for Mary if she survives me. + +I will live another 50 years; or, if I live but 10, they will be thirty, +reckoning the quantity of real time in them, _i.e._ the time that is a +man's own. + +Tell me how you like "Barbara S."--will it be received in atonement for +the foolish Vision, I mean by the Lady? + +_Apropos_, I never saw Mrs. Crawford in my life, nevertheless 'tis all +true of Somebody. + +Address me in future Colebrook Cottage, Islington. + +I am really nervous (but that will wear off) so take this brief +announcement. + + Yours truly C.L. + + +["Barbara S----," the _Elia_ essay, was printed in the _London +Magazine_, April, 1825 (see Vol II. of this edition). It purports to be +an incident in the life of Mrs. Crawford, the actress, but had really +happened to Fanny Kelly.] + + + +LETTER 370 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HUTCHINSON + +[P.M. April 18, 1825.] + +Dear Miss Hutchinson--You want to know all about my gaol delivery. Take +it then. About 12 weeks since I had a sort of intimation that a +resignation might be well accepted from me. This was a kind bird's +whisper. On that hint I spake. Gilman and Tuthill furnishd me with +certificates of wasted health and sore spirits--not much more than the +truth, I promise you--and for 9 weeks I was kept in a fright-- I had +gone too far to recede, and they might take advantage and dismiss me +with a much less sum than I had reckoned on. However Liberty came at +last with a liberal provision. I have given up what I could have lived +on in the country, but have enough to live here by managem't and +scribbling occasionally. I would not go back to my prison for seven +years longer for L10000 a year. 7 years after one is 50 is no trifle to +give up. Still I am a young _Pensioner_, and have served but 33 years, +very few I assure you retire before 40, 45, or 50 years' service. + +You will ask how I bear my freedom. Faith, for some days I was +staggered. Could not comprehend the magnitude of my deliverance, was +confused, giddy, knew not whether I was on my head or my heel as they +say. But those giddy feelings have gone away, and my weather glass +stands at a degree or two above + + CONTENT + +I go about quiet, and have none of that restless hunting after +recreation which made holydays formerly uneasy joys. All being holydays, +I feel as if I had none, as they do in heaven, where 'tis all red letter +days. + +I have a kind letter from the Words'wths _congratulatory_ not a little. + +It is a damp, I do assure you, amid all my prospects that I can receive +_none_ from a quarter upon which I had calculated, almost more than from +any, upon receiving congratulations. I had grown to like poor M. more +and more. I do not esteem a soul living or not living more warmly than I +had grown to esteem and value him. But words are vain. We have none of +us to count upon many years. That is the only cure for sad thoughts. If +only some died, and the rest were permanent on earth, what a thing a +friend's death would be then! + +I must take leave, having put off answering [a load] of letters to this +morning, and this, alas! is the 1st. Our kindest remembrances to Mrs. +Monkhouse and believe us + + Yours most Truly, C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 371 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HORNE + +[P.M. May 2, 1825.] + +Dear Hone,--I send you a trifle; you have seen my lines, I suppose, in +the "London." I cannot tell you how much I like the "St. Chad Wells." + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +P.S. Why did you not stay, or come again, yesterday? + + +[These words accompany Lamb's contribution, "Remarkable Correspondent," +to Hone's _Every-Day Book_ (see Vol. I. of this edition). Lamb was +helping Hone in his new venture as much as he was able; and Hone in +return dedicated the first volume to him. "St. Chad's Wells" was an +article by Hone in the number for March 2.] + + + +LETTER 372 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[No date. May, 1825.] + +Dear W. I write post-hoste to ensure a frank. Thanks for your hearty +congratulations. I may now date from the 6th week of my Hegira or Flight +from Leadenhall. I have lived so much in it, that a Summer seems already +past, and 'tis but early May yet with you and other people. How I look +down on the Slaves and drudges of the world! its inhabitants are a vast +cotton-web of spin spin spinners. O the carking cares! O the +money-grubbers-sempiternal muckworms! + +Your Virgil I have lost sight of, but suspect it is in the hands of Sir +G. Beaumont. I think that circumstances made me shy of procuring it +before. Will you write to him about it? and your commands shall be +obeyed to a tittle. + +Coleridge has just finishd his prize Essay, which if it get the Prize +he'll touch an additional L100 I fancy. His Book too (commentary on +Bishop Leighton) is quite finished and _penes_ Taylor and Hessey. + +In the London which is just out (1st May) are 2 papers entitled the +_Superannuated Man_, which I wish you to see, and also 1st Apr. a little +thing called Barbara S------ a story gleaned from Miss Kelly. The L.M. +if you can get it will save my enlargement upon the topic of my +manumission. + +I must scribble to make up my hiatus crumenae, for there are so many +ways, pious and profligate, of getting rid of money in this vast city +and suburbs that I shall miss my third: but couragio. I despair not. +Your kind hint of the Cottage was well thrown out. An anchorage for +_age_ and school of economy when necessity comes. But without this +latter I have an unconquerable terror of changing Place. It does not +agree with us. I say it from conviction. Else--I do sometimes ruralize +in fancy. + +Some d------d people are come in and I must finish abruptly. By +d------d, I only mean _deuced_. 'Tis these suitors of Penelope that make +it necessary to authorise a little for gin and mutton and such trifles. + +Excuse my abortive scribble. + +Yours not in more haste than heart C.L. + +Love and recollects to all the Wms. Doras, Maries round your Wrekin. + +Mary is capitally well. + +Do write to Sir G.B. for I am shyish of applying to him. + + +[Coleridge had been appointed to one of the ten Royal Associateships of +the newly chartered Royal Society of Literature, thus becoming entitled +to an annuity of 100 guineas. An essay was expected from each associate. +Coleridge wrote on the _Prometheus_ of Aeschylus, and read it on May 18. +His book was _Aids to Reflection_. See note on page 734. + +"I shall miss my thirds." Lamb's pension was two-thirds of his stipend. + +"Some d-----d people." A hint for Lamb's Popular Fallacy on Home, soon +to be written. + +"Round your Wrekin." Lamb repeats this phrase twice in the next few +months. He got it from the Dedication to Farquhar's play "The Recruiting +Officer"--"To all friends round the Wrekin." + +Here perhaps should come a letter to Mrs. Norris printed in the Boston +Bibliophile edition containing some very interesting comic verses on +England somewhat in the manner of _Don Juan_-- + + I like the weather when it's not too rainy, + That is, I like two months of every year, + +and so on.] + + + +LETTER 373 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES CHAMBERS + +[Undated. ? May, 1825.] + +With regard to a John-dory, which you desire to be particularly informed +about, I honour the fish, but it is rather on account of Quin who +patronised it, and whose taste (of a _dead_ man) I had as lieve go by as +anybody's (Apicius and Heliogabalus excepted--this latter started +nightingales' tongues and peacocks' brains as a garnish). + +Else in _itself_, and trusting to my own poor single judgment, it hath +not that moist mellow oleaginous gliding smooth descent from the tongue +to the palate, thence to the stomach, &c., that your Brighton Turbot +hath, which I take to be the most friendly and familiar flavor of any +that swims--most genial and at home to the palate. + +Nor has it on the other hand that fine falling off flakiness, that +oleaginous peeling off (as it were, like a sea onion), which endears +your cod's head & shoulders to some appetites; that manly firmness, +combined with a sort of womanish coming-in-pieces, which the same cod's +head & shoulders hath, where the whole is easily separable, pliant to a +knife or a spoon, but each individual flake presents a pleasing +resistance to the opposed tooth. You understand me--these delicate +subjects are necessarily obscure. + +But it has a third flavor of its own, perfectly distinct from Cod or +Turbot, which it must be owned may to some not injudicious palates +render it acceptable--but to my unpractised tooth it presented rather a +crude river-fish-flavor, like your Pike or Carp, and perhaps like them +should have been tamed & corrected by some laborious & well chosen +sauce. Still I always suspect a fish which requires so much of +artificial settings-off. Your choicest relishes (like nature's +loveliness) need not the foreign aid of ornament, but are when unadorned +(that is, with nothing but a little plain anchovy & a squeeze of lemon) +then adorned the most. However, I shall go to Brighton again next +Summer, and shall have an opportunity of correcting my judgment, if it +is not sufficiently informed. I can only say that when Nature was +pleased to make the John Dory so notoriously deficient in outward graces +(as to be sure he is the very Rhinoceros of fishes, the ugliest dog that +swims, except perhaps the Sea Satyr, which I never saw, but which they +say is terrible), when she formed him with so few external advantages, +she might have bestowed a more elaborate finish in his parts internal, & +have given him a relish, a sapor, to recommend him, as she made Pope a +Poet to make up for making him crooked. + +I am sorry to find that you have got a knack of saying things which are +not true to shew your wit. If I had no wit but what I must shew at the +expence of my virtue or my modesty, I had as lieve be as stupid as * * * +at the Tea Warehouse. Depend upon it, my dear Chambers, that an ounce of +integrity at our death-bed will stand us in more avail than all the wit +of Congreve or... For instance, you tell me a fine story about Truss, +and his playing at Leamington, which I know to be false, because I have +advice from Derby that he was whipt through the Town on that very day +you say he appeared in some character or other, for robbing an old woman +at church of a seal ring. And Dr. Parr has been two months dead. So it +won't do to scatter these untrue stories about among people that know +any thing. Besides, your forte is not invention. It is _judgment_, +particularly shown in your choice of dishes. We seem in that instance +born under one star. I like you for liking hare. I esteem you for +disrelishing minced veal. Liking is too cold a word.--I love you for +your noble attachment to the fat unctuous juices of deer's flesh & the +green unspeakable of turtle. I honour you for your endeavours to esteem +and approve of my favorite, which I ventured to recommend to you as a +substitute for hare, bullock's heart, and I am not offended that you +cannot taste it with _my_ palate. A true son of Epicurus should reserve +one taste peculiar to himself. For a long time I kept the secret about +the exceeding deliciousness of the marrow of boiled knuckle of veal, +till my tongue weakly ran riot in its praises, and now it is prostitute +& common.--But I have made one discovery which I will not impart till my +dying scene is over, perhaps it will be my last mouthful in this world: +delicious thought, enough to sweeten (or rather make savoury) the hour +of death. It is a little square bit about this size in or near the +knuckle bone of a fried joint of... fat I can't call it nor lean + +[Illustration: Handrawn sketch] + +neither altogether, it is that beautiful compound, which Nature must +have made in Paradise Park venison, before she separated the two +substances, the dry & the oleaginous, to punish sinful mankind; Adam ate +them entire & inseparate, and this little taste of Eden in the knuckle +bone of a fried... seems the only relique of a Paradisaical state. When +I die, an exact description of its topography shall be left in a +cupboard with a key, inscribed on which these words, "C. Lamb dying +imparts this to C. Chambers as the only worthy depository of such a +secret." You'll drop a tear.... + + +[Charles Chambers was the brother of John Chambers (see above). He had +been at Christ's Hospital with Lamb and subsequently became a surgeon in +the Navy. He retired to Leamington and practised there until his death, +somewhen about 1857, says Mr. Hazlitt. He seems to have inherited some +of the epicure's tastes of his father, the "sensible clergyman in +Warwickshire" who, Lamb tells us in "Thoughts on Presents of Game," +"used to allow a pound of Epping to every hare." + +This letter adds one more to the list of Lamb's gustatory raptures, and +it is remarkable as being his only eulogy of fish. Mr. Hazlitt says that +the date September 1, 1817, has been added by another hand; but if the +remark about Dr. Parr is true (he died March 6, 1825) the time is as I +have stated. Fortunately the date in this particular case is +unimportant. Mr. Hazlitt suggests that the stupid person in the Tea +Warehouse was Bye, whom we met recently. + +Of Truss we know nothing. The name may be a misreading of Twiss (Horace +Twiss, 1787-1849, politician, buffoon, and Mrs. Siddons' nephew), who +was quite a likely person to be lied about in joke at that time. + +Here should come a note to Allsop dated May 29, 1825, changing an +appointment: "I am as mad as the devil." Given in the Boston Bibliophile +edition.] + + + +LETTER 374 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +[? June, 1825.] + +My dear Coleridge,--With pain and grief, I must entreat you to excuse us +on Thursday. My head, though externally correct, has had a severe +concussion in my long illness, and the very idea of an engagement +hanging over for a day or two, forbids my rest; and I get up miserable. +I am not well enough for company. I do assure you, no other thing +prevents my coming. I expect Field and his brothers this or to-morrow +evening, and it worries me to death that I am not ostensibly ill enough +to put 'em off. I will get better, when I shall hope to see your nephew. +He will come again. Mary joins in best love to the Gillmans. Do, I +earnestly entreat you, excuse me. I assure you, again, that I am not fit +to go out yet. + + Yours (though shattered), C. LAMB. +Tuesday. + + +[This letter has previously been dated 1829, but I think wrongly. Lamb +had no long illness then, and Field was then in Gibraltar, where he was +Chief-Justice. Lamb's long illness was in 1825, when Coleridge's +Thursday evenings at Highgate were regular. Coleridge's nephew may have +been one of several. I fancy it was the Rev. Edward Coleridge. Henry +Nelson Coleridge had already left, I think, for the West Indies.] + + + +LETTER 375 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY COLBURN (?) + +[Dated at end: June 14 (? 1825).] + +Dear Sir, + +I am quite ashamed, after your kind letter, of having expressed any +disappointment about my remuneration. It is quite equivalent to the +value of any thing I have yet sent you. I had Twenty Guineas a sheet +from the London; and what I did for them was more worth that sum, than +any thing, I am afraid, I can now produce, would be worth the lesser +sum. I used up all my best thoughts in that publication, and I do not +like to go on writing worse & worse, & feeling that I do so. I want to +try something else. However, if any subject turns up, which I think will +do your Magazine no discredit, you shall have it at _your_ price, or +something between _that_ and my old price. I prefer writing to seeing +you just now, for after such a letter as I have received from you, in +truth I am ashamed to see you. We will never mention the thing again. + +Your obliged friend & Serv't + +C. LAMB. + +June 14. + + +[In the absence of any wrapper I have assumed this note to be addressed +to Colburn, the publisher of the _New Monthly Magazine_. Lamb's first +contribution to that periodical was "The Illustrious Defunct" (see Vol. +I. of this edition) in January, 1825. A year later he began the "Popular +Fallacies," and continued regularly for some months.] + + + +LETTER 376 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +[P.M. July 2, 1825.] + +Dear C.--We are going off to Enfield, to Allsop's, for a day or 2, with +some intention of succeeding them in their lodging for a time, for this +damn'd nervous Fever (vide Lond. Mag. for July) indisposes me for seeing +any friends, and never any poor devil was so befriended as I am. Do you +know any poor solitary human that wants that cordial to life a--true +friend? I can spare him twenty, he shall have 'em good cheap. I have +gallipots of 'em--genuine balm of cares--a going--a going--a going. +Little plagues plague me a 1000 times more than ever. I am like a +disembodied soul--in this my eternity. I feel every thing entirely, all +in all and all in etc. This price I pay for liberty, but am richly +content to pay it. The Odes are 4-5ths done by Hood, a silentish young +man you met at Islinton one day, an invalid. The rest are Reynolds's, +whose sister H. has recently married. I have not had a broken finger in +them. + +They are hearty good-natured things, and I would put my name to 'em +chearfully, if I could as honestly. I complimented them in a Newspaper, +with an abatement for those puns you laud so. They are generally an +excess. A Pun is a thing of too much consequence to be thrown in as a +make-weight. You shall read one of the addresses over, and miss the +puns, and it shall be quite as good and better than when you discover +'em. A Pun is a Noble Thing per se: O never lug it in as an accessory. A +Pun is a sole object for reflection (vide _my_ aids to that recessment +from a savage state)--it is entire, it fills the mind: it is perfect as +a Sonnet, better. It limps asham'd in the train and retinue of Humour: +it knows it should have an establishment of its own. The one, for +instance, I made the other day, I forget what it was. + +Hood will be gratify'd, as much as I am, by your mistake. I liked +'Grimaldi' the best; it is true painting, of abstract Clownery, and that +precious concrete of a Clown: and the rich succession of images, and +words almost such, in the first half of the Mag. Ignotum. Your picture +of the Camel, that would not or could not thread your nice needle-eye of +Subtilisms, was confirm'd by Elton, who perfectly appreciated his abrupt +departure. Elton borrowed the "Aids" from Hessey (by the way what is +your Enigma about Cupid? I am Cytherea's son, if I understand a tittle +of it), and returnd it next day saying that 20 years ago, when he was +pure, he _thought_ as you do now, but that he now thinks as you did 20 +years ago. But E. seems a very honest fellow. Hood has just come in; his +sick eyes sparkled into health when he read your approbation. They had +meditated a copy for you, but postponed it till a neater 2d Edition, +which is at hand. + +Have you heard _the Creature_ at the Opera House--Signor Non-vir sed +VELUTI Vir? + +Like Orpheus, he is said to draw storks &c, _after_ him. A picked raisin +for a sweet banquet of sounds; but I affect not these exotics. Nos DURUM +genus, as mellifluous Ovid hath it. + +Fanny Holcroft is just come in, with her paternal severity of aspect. +She has frozen a bright thought which should have follow'd. She makes us +marble, with too little conceiving. Twas respecting the Signor, whom I +honour on this side idolatry. Well, more of this anon. + +We are setting out to walk to Enfield after our Beans and Bacon, which +are just smoking. + +Kindest remembrances to the G.'s ever. + +From Islinton, + +2d day, 3d month of my Hegira or Flight from Leadenhall. + +C.L. Olim Clericus. + + +["To Allsop's." Allsop says in his _Letters... of Coleridge_ that he and +the Lambs were housemates for a long time. + +"Vide Lond. Mag. for July"--where the _Elia_ essay "The Convalescent" +was printed. + +"The Odes"--_Odes and Addresses to Great People, 1825._ Coleridge after +reading the book had written to Lamb as follows (the letter is printed +by Hood):-- + +MY DEAR CHARLES,--This afternoon, a little, thin, mean-looking sort of a +foolscap, sub-octavo of poems, printed on very dingy outsides, lay on +the table, which the cover informed me was circulating in our book-club, +so very Grub-Streetish in all its appearance, internal as well as +external, that I cannot explain by what accident of impulse (assuredly +there was no _motive_ in play) I came to look into it. Least of all, the +title, Odes and Addresses to Great Men, which connected itself in my +head with Rejected Addresses, and all the Smith and Theodore Hook squad. +But, my dear Charles, it was certainly written by you, or under you, or +_una eum_ you. I know none of your frequent visitors capacious and +assimilative enough of your converse to have reproduced you so honestly, +supposing you had left yourself in pledge in his lock-up house. Gillman, +to whom I read the spirited parody on the introduction to Peter Bell, +the Ode to the Great Unknown, and to Mrs. Fry; he speaks doubtfully of +Reynolds and Hood. But here come Irving and Basil Montagu. + +_Thursday night 10 o'clock_.--No! Charles, it is _you_. I have read them +over again, and I understand why you have _anon'd_ the book. The puns +are nine in ten good--many excellent --the Newgatory transcendent. And +then the _exemplum sine exemplo_ of a volume of personalities, and +contemporaneities, without a single line that could inflict the +infinitesimal of an unpleasance on any man in his senses: saving and +except perhaps in the envy-addled brain of the despiser of your _Lays_. +If not a triumph over him, it is at least an _ovation_. Then, moreover, +and besides, to speak with becoming modesty, excepting my own self, who +is there but you who can write the musical lines and stanzas that are +intermixed? + +Here, Gillman, come up to my Garret, and driven back by the guardian +spirits of four huge flower-holders of omnigenous roses and +honeysuckles--(Lord have mercy on his hysterical olfactories! What will +he do in Paradise? I must have a pair or two of nostril-plugs, or +nose-goggles laid in his coffin)--stands at the door, reading that to +M'Adam, and the washer-woman's letter, and he admits _the facts_. You +are found _in the manner_, as the lawyers say! so, Mr. Charles! hang +yourself up, and send me a line, by way of token and acknowledgment. My +dear love to Mary. God bless you and your Unshamabramizer. + +S.T. COLERIDGE. + +Reynolds was John Hamilton Reynolds. According to a marked copy in the +possession of Mr. Buxton Forman, Reynolds wrote only the odes to Mr. +M'Adam, Mr. Dymoke, Sylvanus Urban, Elliston and the Dean and Chapter of +Westminster. + +The newspaper in which Lamb complimented the book was the _New Times_, +for April 12, 1825. See Vol. I. of the present edition for the review, +where the remarks on puns are repeated. The "Mag. Ignotum" was the ode +to the Great Unknown, the author of the Scotch novels. In the same paper +on January 8, 1825, Lamb had written an essay called "Many Friends" (see +Vol. I.) a little in the manner of this first paragraph. + +"Your picture of the Camel." Probably the story of a caller told by +Coleridge to Lamb in a letter. + +"Your Enigma about Cupid." Possibly referring to the following passage +in the _Aids to Reflection_, 1825, pages 277-278:-- + + From the remote East turn to the mythology of Minor Asia, to the + Descendants of Javan _who dwelt in the tents of Shem, and possessed + the Isles_. Here again, and in the usual form of an historic + Solution, we find the same _Fact_, and as characteristic of the + Human _Race_, stated in that earliest and most venerable Mythus (or + symbolic Parable) of Prometheus--that truly wonderful Fable, in + which the characters of the rebellious Spirit and of the Divine + Friend of Mankind ([Greek: Theos philanthropos]) are united in the + same Person: and thus in the most striking manner noting the forced + amalgamation of the Patriarchal Tradition with the incongruous + Scheme of Pantheism. This and the connected tale of Io, which is but + the sequel of the Prometheus, stand alone in the Greek Mythology, in + which elsewhere both Gods and Men are mere Powers and Products of + Nature. And most noticeable it is, that soon after the promulgation + and spread of the Gospel had awakened the moral sense, and had + opened the eyes even of its wiser Enemies to the necessity of + providing some solution of this great problem of the Moral World, + the beautiful Parable of Cupid and Psyche was brought forward as a + _rival_ FALL OF MAN: and the fact of a moral corruption connatural + with the human race was again recognized. In the assertion of + ORIGINAL SIN the Greek Mythology rose and set. + +"Have you heard _the Creature?_"--Giovanni Battista Velluti (1781-1861), +an Italian soprano singer who first appeared in England on June 30, +1825, in Meyerbeer's "Il Crociato in Egitto." He received L2,500 for +five months' salary.] + + + +LETTER 377 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. July 2, 1825.] + +My dear B.B.--My nervous attack has so unfitted me, that I have not +courage to sit down to a Letter. My poor pittance in the London you will +see is drawn from my sickness. Your Book is very acceptable to me, +because most of it [is] new to me, but your Book itself we cannot thank +you for more sincerely than for the introduction you favoured us with to +Anne Knight. Now cannot I write _Mrs._ Anne Knight for the life of me. +She is a very pleas--, but I won't write all we have said of her so +often to ourselves, because I suspect you would read it to her. Only +give my sister's and my kindest rememb'ces to her, and how glad we are +we can say that word. If ever she come to Southwark again I count upon +another pleasant BRIDGE walk with her. Tell her, I got home, time for a +rubber; but poor Tryphena will not understand that phrase of the +worldlings. + +I am hardly able to appreciate your volume now. But I liked the +dedicat'n much, and the apology for your bald burying grounds. To +Shelly, but _that_ is not new. To the young Vesper-singer, Great +Bealing's, Playford, and what not? + +If there be a cavil it is that the topics of religious consolation, +however beautiful, are repeated till a sort of triteness attends them. +It seems as if you were for ever losing friends' children by death, and +reminding their parents of the Resurrection. Do children die so often, +and so good, in your parts? The topic, taken from the considerat'n that +they are snatch'd away from _possible vanities_, seems hardly sound; for +to an omniscient eye their conditional failings must be one with their +actual; but I am too unwell for Theology. Such as I am, I am yours and +A.K.'s truly + +C. LAMB. + + +["My poor pittance"-"The Convalescent." + +"Your Book"-Barton's _Poems_, 4th edition, 1825. The dedication was to +Barton's sister, Maria Hack. + +"Anne Knight." A Quaker lady, who kept a school at Woodbridge.] + + + +LETTER 378 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN AITKEN + +Colebrooke Cottage, Islington, July 5, 1825. + +DEAR Sir,--With thanks for your last No. of the Cabinet-- as I cannot +arrange with a London publisher to reprint "Rosamund Gray" as a book, it +will be at your service to admit into the Cabinet as soon as you please. +Your h'ble serv't, CH's LAMB. + + EMMA, eldest of your name, + Meekly trusting in her God + Midst the red-hot plough-shares trod, + And unscorch'd preserved her fame. + By that test if _you_ were tried, + Ugly names might be defied; + Though devouring fire's a glutton, + Through the trial you might go + 'On the light fantastic toe,' + Nor for plough-shares care a BUTTON. + + +[Aitken was an Edinburgh bookseller who edited _The Cabinet; or, The +Selected Beauties of Literature_, 1824, 1825 and 1831. The particular +interest of the letter is that it shows Lamb to have wanted to publish +_Rosamund Gray_ a third time in his life. Hitherto we had only his +statement that Hessey said that the world would not bear it. Aitken +printed the story in _The Cabinet_ for 1831. Previously he had printed +"Dream Children" and "The Inconveniences of being Hanged." + +I have been told (but have had no opportunity of verifying the +statement) that the Buttons, for one of whom the appended acrostic was +written, were cousins of the Lambs. + +Here should come an unpublished letter to Miss Kelly thanking her for +tickets and saying that Liston is to produce Lamb's farce "The +Pawnbroker's Daughter," which "will take." + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Hone, dated Enfield, July 25, +1825. Lamb had written some quatrains to the editor of the _Every-Day +Book_, which were printed in the _London Magazine_ for May, 1825. Hone +copied them into his periodical, accompanied by a reply. Lamb began:-- + + I like you, and your book, ingenuous Hone! + +Hone's reply contained the sentiment:-- + + I am "ingenuous": it is all I can + Pretend to; it is all I wish to be. + +See the _Every-Day Book_, Vol. I., July 9. Hone at this time was +occupying Lamb's house at Colebrooke Row, while the Lambs were staying +at the Allsops' lodgings at Enfield. + +Lamb again refers to "The Pawnbroker's Daughter." He says it is at the +theatre now and Harley is there too. This would be John Pritt Harley, +the actor. The play, as it happened, was never acted. + +Here should come three notes to Thomas Allsop in July and August, 1825, +one of which damns the afternoon sun. Given in the Boston Bibliophile +edition.] + + + +LETTER 379 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. August 10, 1825.] + +We shall be soon again at Colebrook. + +Dear B.B.--You must excuse my not writing before, when I tell you we are +on a visit at Enfield, where I do not feel it natural to sit down to a +Letter. It is at all times an exertion. I had rather talk with you, and +Ann Knight, quietly at Colebrook Lodge, over the matter of your last. +You mistake me when you express misgivings about my relishing a series +of scriptural poems. I wrote confusedly. What I meant to say was, that +one or two consolatory poems on deaths would have had a more condensed +effect than many. Scriptural-- devotional topics--admit of infinite +variety. So far from poetry tiring me because religious, I can read, and +I say it seriously, the homely old version of the Psalms in our +Prayer-books for an hour or two together sometimes without sense of +weariness. + +I did not express myself clearly about what I think a false topic +insisted on so frequently in consolatory addresses on the death of +Infants. I know something like it is in Scripture, but I think humanly +spoken. It is a natural thought, a sweet fallacy to the Survivors--but +still a fallacy. If it stands on the doctrine of this being a +probationary state, it is liable to this dilemma. Omniscience, to whom +possibility must be clear as act, must know of the child, what it would +hereafter turn out: if good, then the topic is false to say it is +secured from falling into future wilfulness, vice, &c. If bad, I do not +see how its exemption from certain future overt acts by being snatched +away at all tells in its favor. You stop the arm of a murderer, or +arrest the finger of a pickpurse, but is not the guilt incurred as much +by the intent as if never so much acted? Why children are hurried off, +and old reprobates of a hundred left, whose trial humanly we may think +was complete at fifty, is among the obscurities of providence. The very +notion of a state of probation has darkness in it. The all-knower has no +need of satisfying his eyes by seeing what we will do, when he knows +before what we will do. Methinks we might be condemn'd before +commission. In these things we grope and flounder, and if we can pick up +a little human comfort that the child taken is snatch'd from vice (no +great compliment to it, by the bye), let us take it. And as to where an +untried child goes, whether to join the assembly of its elders who have +borne the heat of the day--fire-purified martyrs, and torment-sifted +confessors--what know we? We promise heaven methinks too cheaply, and +assign large revenues to minors, incompetent to manage them. Epitaphs +run upon this topic of consolation, till the very frequency induces a +cheapness. Tickets for admission into Paradise are sculptured out at a +penny a letter, twopence a syllable, &c. It is all a mystery; and the +more I try to express my meaning (having none that is clear) the more I +flounder. Finally, write what your own conscience, which to you is the +unerring judge, seems best, and be careless about the whimsies of such a +half-baked notionist as I am. We are here in a most pleasant country, +full of walks, and idle to our hearts desire. Taylor has dropt the +London. It was indeed a dead weight. It has got in the Slough of +Despond. I shuffle off my part of the pack, and stand like Xtian with +light and merry shoulders. It had got silly, indecorous, pert, and every +thing that is bad. Both our kind _remembrances_ to Mrs. K. and yourself, +and stranger's-greeting to Lucy--is it Lucy or Ruth?--that gathers wise +sayings in a Book. C. LAMB. + + +[The London Magazine passed into the hands of Henry Southern in +September, 1825. Lamb's last article for it was in the August +number--"Imperfect Dramatic Illusion," reprinted in the _Last Essays of +Elia_ as "Stage Illusion."] + + + +LETTER 380 + +CHARLES LAMB TO ROBERT SOUTHEY + +August 10, 1825. + +Dear Southey,--You'll know who this letter comes from by opening +slap-dash upon the text, as in the good old times. I never could come +into the custom of envelopes; 'tis a modern foppery; the Plinian +correspondence gives no hint of such. In singleness of sheet and meaning +then I thank you for your little book. I am ashamed to add a codicil of +thanks for your "Book of the Church." I scarce feel competent to give an +opinion of the latter; I have not reading enough of that kind to venture +at it. I can only say the fact, that I have read it with attention and +interest. Being, as you know, not quite a Churchman, I felt a jealousy +at the Church taking to herself the whole deserts of Christianity, +Catholic and Protestant, from Druid extirpation downwards. I call all +good Christians the Church, Capillarians and all. But I am in too light +a humour to touch these matters. May all our churches flourish! Two +things staggered me in the poem (and one of them staggered both of us). +I cannot away with a beautiful series of verses, as I protest they are, +commencing "Jenner." 'Tis like a choice banquet opened with a pill or an +electuary-- physic stuff. T'other is, we cannot make out how Edith +should be no more than ten years old. By'r Lady, we had taken her to be +some sixteen or upwards. We suppose you have only chosen the round +number for the metre. Or poem and dedication may be both older than they +pretend to; but then some hint might have been given; for, as it stands, +it may only serve some day to puzzle the parish reckoning. But without +inquiring further (for 'tis ungracious to look into a lady's years), the +dedication is eminently pleasing and tender, and we wish Edith May +Southey joy of it. Something, too, struck us as if we had heard of the +death of John May. A John May's death was a few years since in the +papers. We think the tale one of the quietest, prettiest things we have +seen. You have been temperate in the use of localities, which generally +spoil poems laid in exotic regions. You mostly cannot stir out (in such +things) for humming-birds and fire-flies. A tree is a Magnolia, &c.--Can +I but like the truly Catholic spirit? "Blame as thou mayest the Papist's +erring creed"--which and other passages brought me back to the old +Anthology days and the admonitory lesson to "Dear George" on the "The +Vesper Bell," a little poem which retains its first hold upon me +strangely. + +The compliment to the translatress is daintily conceived. Nothing is +choicer in that sort of writing than to bring in some remote, impossible +parallel,--as between a great empress and the inobtrusive quiet soul who +digged her noiseless way so perseveringly through that rugged Paraguay +mine. How she Dobrizhoffered it all out, it puzzles my slender Latinity +to conjecture. Why do you seem to sanction Lander's unfeeling +allegorising away of honest Quixote! He may as well say Strap is meant +to symbolise the Scottish nation before the Union, and Random since that +act of dubious issue; or that Partridge means the Mystical Man, and Lady +Bellaston typifies the Woman upon Many Waters. Gebir, indeed, may mean +the state of the hop markets last month, for anything I know to the +contrary. That all Spain overflowed with romancical books (as Madge +Newcastle calls them) was no reason that Cervantes should not smile at +the matter of them; nor even a reason that, in another mood, he might +not multiply them, deeply as he was tinctured with the essence of them. +Quixote is the father of gentle ridicule, and at the same time the very +depository and treasury of chivalry and highest notions. Marry, when +somebody persuaded Cervantes that he meant only fun, and put him upon +writing that unfortunate Second Part with the confederacies of that +unworthy duke and most contemptible duchess, Cervantes sacrificed his +instinct to his understanding. + +We got your little book but last night, being at Enfield, to which place +we came about a month since, and are having quiet holydays. Mary walks +her twelve miles a day some days, and I my twenty on others. 'Tis all +holiday with me now, you know. The change works admirably. + +For literary news, in my poor way, I have a one-act farce going to be +acted at the Haymarket; but when? is the question. 'Tis an extravaganza, +and like enough to follow "Mr. H." "The London Magazine" has shifted its +publishers once more, and I shall shift myself out of it. It is fallen. +My ambition is not at present higher than to write nonsense for the +playhouses, to eke out a somewhat contracted income. _Tempus erat_. +There was a time, my dear Cornwallis, when the Muse, &c. But I am now in +MacFleckno's predicament,-- + + "Promised a play, and dwindled to a farce." + +Coleridge is better (was, at least, a few weeks since) than he has been +for years. His accomplishing his book at last has been a source of +vigour to him. We are on a half visit to his friend Allsop, at a Mrs. +Leishman's, Enfield, but expect to be at Colebrooke Cottage in a week or +so, where, or anywhere, I shall be always most happy to receive tidings +from you. G. Dyer is in the height of an uxorious paradise. His +honeymoon will not wane till he wax cold. Never was a more happy pair, +since Acme and Septimius, and longer. Farewell, with many thanks, dear +S. Our loves to all round your Wrekin. + + Your old friend, C. LAMB. + + +[In the letter to Barton of March 20, 1826, Lamb continues or amplifies +his remarks on his own letter-writing habits. + +"Capillarians." The _New English Dictionary_ gives Lamb's word in this +connection as its sole example, meaning without stem. + +"The poem"--Southey's _Tale of Paraguay_, 1825, which begins with an +address to Jenner, the physiologist:-- + + Jenner! for ever shall thy honour'd name, + +and is dedicated to Edith May Southey-- + + Edith! ten years are number'd, since the day. + +Edith Southey was born in 1804. The dedication was dated 1814. + +John May was Southey's friend and correspondent. It was not he that had +died. + +"The Vesper Bell"--"The Chapel Bell," which was not in the _Annual +Anthology_, but in Southey's _Poems_, 1797. Dear George would perhaps be +Burnett, who was at Oxford with Southey when the verses were written. + +"The compliment to the translatress." Southey took his _Tale of +Paraguay_ from Dobrizhoffer's _History of the Abipones_, which his +niece, Sara Coleridge, had translated. Southey remarks in the poem that +could Dobrizhoffer have foreseen by whom his words were to be turned +into English, he would have been as pleased as when he won the ear of +the Empress Queen. + +"Landor's ... allegorising." Landor, in the conversation between "Peter +Leopold and the President du Paty," makes President du Paty say that +Cervantes had deeper purpose than the satirising of knight-errants, Don +Quixote standing for the Emperor Charles V. and Sancho Panza symbolising +the people. Southey quoted the passage in the Notes to the Proem. Lamb's +_Elia_ essay on the "Defect of Imagination" (see Vol. II.) amplifies +this criticism of Don Quixote. + +"A one-act farce." This was, I imagine, "The Pawnbroker's Daughter," +although that is in two acts. It was not, however, acted. + +George Dyer had just been married to the widow of a solicitor who lived +opposite him in Clifford's Inn. + +Here should come three unimportant notes to Hone with reference to the +_Every-Day Book_--adding an invitation to Enfield to be shown "dainty +spots."] + + + +LETTER 381 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. Sept. 9, 1825.] + +My dear Allsop--We are exceedingly grieved for your loss. When your note +came, my sister went to Pall Mall, to find you, and saw Mrs. L. and was +a little comforted to find Mrs. A. had returned to Enfield before the +distresful event. I am very feeble, can scarce move a pen; got home from +Enfield on the Friday, and on Monday follow'g was laid up with a most +violent nervous fever second this summer, have had Leeches to my +Temples, have not had, nor can not get, a night's sleep. So you will +excuse more from Yours truly, C. LAMB. + +Islington, 9 Sept. + +Our most kind rememb'ces to poor Mrs. Allsop. A line to say how you both +are will be most acceptable. + + +[Allsop's loss was, I imagine, the death of one of his children.] + + + +LETTER 382 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[P.M. Sept. 24, 1825.] + +My dear Allsop--Come not near this unfortunate roof yet a while. My +disease is clearly but slowly going. Field is an excellent attendant. +But Mary's anxieties have overturned her. She has her old Miss James +with her, without whom I should not feel a support in the world. We keep +in separate apartments, and must weather it. Let me know all of your +healths. Kindest love to Mrs. Allsop. C. LAMB. + +Saturday. + +Can you call at Mrs. Burney 26 James Street, and _tell her_, & that I +can see no one here in this state. If Martin return-- if well enough, I +will meet him some where, _don't let him come_. + + +[Field was Henry Field, Barren Field's brother. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Hone, dated September 30, 1825, in +which Lamb describes the unhappy state of the house at Colebrooke Row, +with himself and his sister both ill. + +Here also should come a similar note to William Ayrton. "All this summer +almost I have been ill. I have been laid up (the second nervous attack) +now six weeks." + +On October 18 Lamb sends Hone the first "bit of writing" he has done +"these many weeks."] + + + +LETTER 383 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[P.M. Oct. 24, 1825.] + +I send a scrap. Is it worth postage? My friends are fairly surprised +that you should set me down so unequivocally for an ass, as you have +done, Page 1358. + + HERE HE IS + what follows? + THE ASS + +Call you this friendship? + +Mercy! What a dose you have sent me of Burney!--a perfect _opening_* +draught. + +*A Pun here is intended. + + +[This is written on the back of the MS. "In _re_ Squirrels" for Hone's +_Every-Day Book_ (see Vol. I. of this edition). Lamb's previous +contribution had been "The Ass" which Hone had introduced with a few +words.] + + + +LETTER 384 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[Dec. 5, 1825.] + +Dear A.--You will be glad to hear that _we_ are at home to visitors; not +too many or noisy. Some fine day shortly Mary will surprise Mrs. Allsop. +The weather is not seasonable for formal engagements. + +Yours _most ever_, + +C. LAMB. + +Satr'd. + + +[Here should come a note to Manning at Totteridge, signed Charles and +Mary Lamb, and dated December 10, 1825. It indicates that both are well +again, and hoping to see Manning at Colebrooke.] + + + +LETTER 385 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES OLLIER + +[No date. ? Dec., 1825.] + +Dear O.--I leave it _entirely to Mr. Colburn_; but if not too late, I +think the Proverbs had better have L. signd to them and reserve _Elia_ +for Essays _more Eliacal_. May I trouble you to send my Magazine, not to +Norris, but H.C. Robinson Esq. King's bench walks, instead. + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +My friend Hood, a prime genius and hearty fellow, brings this. + + +[Lamb's "Popular Fallacies" began in the _New Monthly Magazine_ in +January, 1826. Henry Colburn was the publisher of that magazine, which +had now obtained Lamb's regular services. The nominal editor was +Campbell, the poet, who was assisted by Cyrus Redding. Ollier seems to +have been a sub-editor.] + + + +LETTER 386 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES OLLIER + +Colebrook Cottage, Colebrook Row, Tuesday [early 1826]. + +Dear Ollier,--I send you two more proverbs, which will be the last of +this batch, unless I send you one more by the post on THURSDAY; none +will come after that day; so do not leave any open room in that case. +Hood sups with me to-night. Can you come and eat grouse? 'Tis not often +I offer at delicacies. + + Yours most kindly, C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 387 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES OLLIER + +January, 1826. + +Dear O.,--We lamented your absence last night. The grouse were piquant, +the backs incomparable. You must come in to cold mutton and oysters some +evening. Name your evening; though I have qualms at the distance. Do you +never leave early? My head is very queerish, and indisposed for much +company; but we will get Hood, that half Hogarth, to meet you. The scrap +I send should come in AFTER the "Rising with the Lark." + +Yours truly. + +Colburn, I take it, pays postages. + + +[The scrap was the Fallacy "That we Should Lie Down with the Lamb," +which has perhaps the rarest quality of the series. + +Here perhaps should come two further notes to Ollier, referring to some +articles on Chinese jests by Manning. + +Here should come a letter to Mr. Hudson dated February 1, 1826, +recommending a nurse for a mental case. Given in the Boston Bibliophile +edition.] + + + +LETTER 388 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. February 7, 1826.] + +My kind remembrances to your daughter and A.K. always. + +Dear B.B.--I got your book not more than five days ago, so am not so +negligent as I must have appeared to you with a fortnight's sin upon my +shoulders. I tell you with sincerity that I think you have completely +succeeded in what you intended to do. What is poetry may be disputed. +These are poetry to me at least. They are concise, pithy, and moving. +Uniform as they are, and unhistorify'd, I read them thro' at two +sittings without one sensation approaching to tedium. I do not know that +among your many kind presents of this nature this is not my favourite +volume. The language is never lax, and there is a unity of design and +feeling, you wrote them _with love_--to avoid the cox-_combical_ phrase, +con amore. I am particularly pleased with the "Spiritual Law," page +34-5. It reminded me of Quarles, and Holy Mr. Herbert, as Izaak Walton +calls him: the two best, if not only, of our devotional poets, tho' some +prefer Watts, and some _Tom Moore_. + +I am far from well or in my right spirits, and shudder at pen and ink +work. I poke out a monthly crudity for Colburn in his magazine, which I +call "Popular Fallacies," and periodically crush a proverb or two, +setting up my folly against the wisdom of nations. Do you see the "New +Monthly"? + +One word I must object to in your little book, and it recurs +more than once--FADELESS is no genuine compound; loveless +is, because love is a noun as well as verb, but what is a +fade?--and I do not quite like whipping the Greek drama upon +the back of "Genesis," page 8. I do not like praise handed +in by disparagement: as I objected to a side censure on Byron, +etc., in the lines on Bloomfield: with these poor cavils excepted, +your verses are without a flaw. C. LAMB. + + +[Barton's new book was _Devotional Verses: founded on, and illustrative +of Select Texts of Scripture_, 1826. See the Appendix for "The Spiritual +Law." + +"Holy Mr. Herbert." Writing to Lady Beaumont in 1826 Coleridge says: "My +dear old friend Charles Lamb and I differ widely (and in point of taste +and moral feeling this is a rare occurrence) in our estimate and liking +of George Herbert's sacred poems. He greatly prefers Quarles--nay, he +dislikes Herbert." + +Barton whipped the Greek drama on the back of Genesis in the following +stanza, referring to Abraham's words before preparing to sacrifice +Isaac:-- + + Brief colloquy, yet more sublime, + To every feeling heart, + Than all the boast of classic time, + Or Drama's proudest art: + Far, far beyond the Grecian stage, + Or Poesy's most glowing page. + +For Lamb's reference to Byron, see above.] + + + +LETTER 389 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES OLLIER + +[P.M. March 16, 1826.] + +D'r Ollier if not too late, pray omit the last paragraph in "Actor's +Religion," which is clumsy. It will then end with the word Mugletonian. +I shall not often trouble you in this manner, but I am suspicious of +this article as lame. + +C. LAMB. + + +["The Religion of Actors" was printed in the _New Monthly Magazine_ for +April, 1826. The essay ends at "Muggletonian." See Vol. I. of this +edition.] + + + +LETTER 390 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. March 20, 1826.] + +Dear B.B.--You may know my letters by the paper and the folding. For the +former, I live on scraps obtained in charity from an old friend whose +stationary is a permanent perquisite; for folding, I shall do it neatly +when I learn to tye my neckcloths. I surprise most of my friends by +writing to them on ruled paper, as if I had not got past pothooks and +hangers. Sealing wax, I have none on my establishment. Wafers of the +coarsest bran supply its place. When my Epistles come to be weighed with +Pliny's, however superior to the Roman in delicate irony, judicious +reflexions, etc., his gilt post will bribe over the judges to him. All +the time I was at the E.I.H. I never mended a pen; I now cut 'em to the +stumps, marring rather than mending the primitive goose quill. I cannot +bear to pay for articles I used to get for nothing. When Adam laid out +his first penny upon nonpareils at some stall in Mesopotamos, I think it +went hard with him, reflecting upon his old goodly orchard, where he had +so many for nothing. When I write to a Great man, at the Court end, he +opens with surprise upon a naked note, such as Whitechapel people +interchange, with no sweet degrees of envelope: I never inclosed one bit +of paper in another, nor understand the rationale of it. Once only I +seald with borrow'd wax, to set Walter Scott a wondering, sign'd with +the imperial quarterd arms of England, which my friend Field gives in +compliment to his descent in the female line from O. Cromwell. It must +have set his antiquarian curiosity upon watering. To your questions upon +the currency, I refer you to Mr. Robinson's last speech, where, if you +can find a solution, I cannot. I think this tho' the best ministry we +ever stumbled upon. Gin reduced four shillings in the gallon, wine 2 +shillings in the quart. This comes home to men's minds and bosoms. My +tirade against visitors was not meant _particularly_ at you or A.K. I +scarce know what I meant, for I do not just now feel the grievance. I +wanted to make an _article_. So in another thing I talkd of somebody's +_insipid wife_, without a correspondent object in my head: and a good +lady, a friend's wife, whom I really _love_ (don't startle, I mean in a +licit way) has looked shyly on me ever since. The blunders of personal +application are ludicrous. I send out a character every now and then, on +purpose to exercise the ingenuity of my friends. "Popular Fallacies" +will go on; that word concluded is an erratum, I suppose, for continued. +I do not know how it got stuff'd in there. A little thing without name +will also be printed on the Religion of the Actors, but it is out of +your way, so I recommend you, with true Author's hypocrisy, to skip it. +We are about to sit down to Roast beef, at which we could wish A.K., +B.B., and B.B.'s pleasant daughter to be humble partakers. So much for +my hint at visitors, which was scarcely calculated for droppers in from +Woodbridge. The sky does not drop such larks every day. + +My very kindest wishes to you all three, with my sister's best love. +C. LAMB. + + +["Mr. Robinson's last speech." Frederick John Robinson, afterwards Earl +of Ripon, then Chancellor of the Exchequer under the Earl of Liverpool. +The Government had decided to check the use of paper-money by stopping +the issue of notes for less than L5; and Robinson had made a speech on +the subject on February 10. The motion was carried, but to some extent +was compromised. It was Robinson who, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, +found the money for building the new British Museum and purchasing +Angerstein's pictures as the beginning of the National Gallery. + +"My tirade against visitors"--the Popular Fallacy "That Home is Home," +in the _New Monthly Magazine_ for March. + +"Somebody's insipid wife." In the Popular Fallacy "That You Must Love Me +and Love My Dog," in the February number, Lamb had spoken of Honorius' +"vapid wife." + +Barton and his daughter visited Lamb at Colebrooke Cottage somewhen +about this time. Mrs. FitzGerald, in 1893, wrote out for me her +recollections of the day. Lamb, who was alone, opened the door himself. +He sent out for a luncheon of oysters. The books on his shelves, Mrs. +FitzGerald remembered, retained the price-labels of the stalls where he +had bought them. She also remembered a portrait over the fireplace. This +would be the Milton. In the _Gem_ for 1831 was a poem by Barton, "To +Milton's Portrait in a Friend's Parlour."] + + + +LETTER 391 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +March 22nd, 1826. + +Dear C.,--We will with great pleasure be with you on Thursday in the +next week early. Your finding out my style in your nephew's pleasant +book is surprising to me. I want eyes to descry it. You are a little too +hard upon his morality, though I confess he has more of Sterne about him +than of Sternhold. But he saddens into excellent sense before the +conclusion. Your query shall be submitted to Miss Kelly, though it is +obvious that the pantomime, when done, will be more easy to decide upon +than in proposal. I say, do it by all means. I have Decker's play by me, +if you can filch anything out of it. Miss Gray, with her kitten eyes, is +an actress, though she shows it not at all, and pupil to the former, +whose gestures she mimics in comedy to the disparagement of her own +natural manner, which is agreeable. It is funny to see her bridling up +her neck, which is native to F.K.; but there is no setting another's +manners upon one's shoulders any more than their head. I am glad you +esteem Manning, though you see but his husk or shrine. He discloses not, +save to select worshippers, and will leave the world without any one +hardly but me knowing how stupendous a creature he is. I am perfecting +myself in the "Ode to Eton College" against Thursday, that I may not +appear unclassic. I have just discovered that it is much better than the +"Elegy." + + In haste, C.L. + +P.S.--I do not know what to say to your _latest_ theory about Nero being +the Messiah, though by all accounts he was a 'nointed one. + + +["Next week early." Canon Ainger's text here has: "May we venture to +bring Emma with us?" + +"Your nephew's pleasant book"--Henry Nelson Coleridge's _Six Months in +the West Indies in 1825_. In the last chapter but one of the book is an +account of the slave question, under the title "Planters and Slaves." + +"Sternhold"--Thomas Sternhold, the coadjutor of Hopkins in paraphrasing +the Psalms. + +"The pantomime." Coleridge seems to have had some project for +modernising Dekker for Fanny Kelly. Mr. Dykes Campbell suggested that +the play to be treated was "Old Fortunatus." + +"Miss Gray." I have found nothing of this lady. + +"Manning." Writing to Robert Lloyd twenty-five years earlier Lamb had +said of Manning: "A man of great Power--an enchanter almost.--Far beyond +Coleridge or any man in power of impressing --when he gets you alone he +can act the wonders of Egypt. Only he is lazy, and does not always put +forth all his strength; if he did, I know no man of genius at all +comparable to him." + +"Against Thursday." Coleridge was "at home" on Thursday evenings. +Possibly on this occasion some one interested in Gray was to be there, +or the allusion may be a punning one to Miss Gray. + +"Your _latest_ theory." I cannot explain this.] + + + +LETTER 392 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +April 3, 1826. + +Dear Sir,--It is whispered me that you will not be unwilling to look +into our doleful hermitage. Without more preface, you will gladden our +cell by accompanying our old chums of the London, Darley and Allan +Cunningham, to Enfield on Wednesday. You shall have hermit's fare, with +talk as seraphical as the novelty of the divine life will permit, with +an innocent retrospect to the world which we have left, when I will +thank you for your hospitable offer at Chiswick, and with plain hermit +reasons evince the necessity of abiding here. + +Without hearing from you, then, you shall give us leave to expect you. I +have long had it on my conscience to invite you, but spirits have been +low; and I am indebted to chance for this awkward but most sincere +invitation. + + Yours, with best love to Mrs. Cary, C. LAMB. + +Darley knows all about the coaches. Oh, for a Museum in the wilderness! + + +[Cary, who had been afternoon lecturer at Chiswick and curate of the +Savoy, this year took up his post as Assistant Keeper of the Printed +Books at the British Museum. George Darley, who wrote some notes to +Gary's _Dante_, we have met. Allan Cunningham was the Scotch poet and +the author of the Lives of the Painters, the "Giant" of the _London +Magazine_. The Lambs seem to have been spending some days at Enfield. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Ollier asking for a copy of the +April _New Monthly Magazine_ for himself, and one for his Chinese friend +(Manning) if his jests are in.] + + + +LETTER 393 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[P.M. May 9, 1826.] + +Dear N. You will not expect us to-morrow, I am sure, while these damn'd +North Easters continue. We must wait the Zephyrs' pleasures. By the bye, +I was at Highgate on Wensday, the only one of the Party. + + Yours truly C. LAMB. + +_Summer_, as my friend Coleridge waggishly writes, has set in with its +usual severity. + +Kind rememb'ces to Mrs. Novello &c. + + + +LETTER 394 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. May 16, 1826.] + +Dear B.B.--I have had no spirits lately to begin a letter to you, though +I am under obligations to you (how many!) for your neat little poem, +'Tis just what it professes to be, a simple tribute in chaste verse, +serious and sincere. I do not know how Friends will relish it, but we +out-lyers, Honorary Friends, like it very well. I have had my head and +ears stuff'd up with the East winds. A continual ringing in my brain of +bells jangled, or The Spheres touchd by some raw Angel. It is not George +3 trying the 100th psalm? I get my music for nothing. But the weather +seems to be softening, and will thaw my stunnings. Coleridge writing to +me a week or two since begins his note--"Summer has set in with its +usual Severity." A cold Summer is all I know of disagreeable in cold. I +do not mind the utmost rigour of real Winter, but these smiling +hypocrites of Mays wither me to death. My head has been a ringing Chaos, +like the day the winds were made, before they submitted to the +discipline of a weather-cock, before the Quarters were made. In the +street, with the blended noises of life about me, I hear, and my head is +lightened, but in a room the hubbub comes back, and I am deaf as a +Sinner. Did I tell you of a pleasant sketch Hood has done, which he +calls _Very Deaf Indeed_? It is of a good naturd stupid looking old +gentleman, whom a footpad has stopt, but for his extreme deafness cannot +make him understand what he wants; the unconscious old gentleman is +extending his ear-trumpet very complacently, and the fellow is firing a +pistol into it to make him hear, but the ball will pierce his skull +sooner than the report reach his sensorium. I chuse a very little bit of +paper, for my ear hisses when I bend down to write. I can hardly read a +book, for I miss that small soft voice which the idea of articulated +words raises (almost imperceptibly to you) in a silent reader. I seem +too deaf to see what I read. But with a touch or two of returning Zephyr +my head will melt. What Lyes you Poets tell about the May! It is the +most ungenial part of the Year, cold crocuses, cold primroses, you take +your blossoms in Ice --a painted Sun-- + + Unmeaning joy around appears, + And Nature smiles as if she sneers. + +It is ill with me when I begin to look which way the wind sits. Ten +years ago I literally did not know the point from the broad end of the +Vane, which it was the [?that] indicated the Quarter. I hope these ill +winds have blowd _over_ you, as they do thro' me. Kindest rememb'ces to +you and yours. C.L. + + +["Your neat little poem." It is not possible to trace this poem. +Probably, I think, the "Stanzas written for a blank leaf in Sewell's +History of the Quakers," printed in _A Widow's Tale_, 1827. + +"George 3." Byron's "Vision of Judgment" thus closes:-- + + King George slipp'd into Heaven for one; + And when the tumult dwindled to a calm, + I left him practising the hundredth psalm. + +This is Hood's sketch, in his _Whims and Oddities_:-- + +[Illustration: "Very deaf indeed."] + +"Unmeaning joy around appears..." I have not found this.] + + + +LETTER 395 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +June 1st, 1826. + +Dear Coleridge,--If I know myself, nobody more detests the display of +personal vanity which is implied in the act of sitting for one's picture +than myself. But the fact is, that the likeness which accompanies this +letter was stolen from my person at one of my unguarded moments by some +too partial artist, and my friends are pleased to think that he has not +much flattered me. Whatever its merits may be, you, who have so great an +interest in the original, will have a satisfaction in tracing the +features of one that has so long esteemed you. There are times when in a +friend's absence these graphic representations of him almost seem to +bring back the man himself. The painter, whoever he was, seems to have +taken me in one of those disengaged moments, if I may so term them, when +the native character is so much more honestly displayed than can be +possible in the restraints of an enforced sitting attitude. Perhaps it +rather describes me as a thinking man than a man in the act of thought. +Whatever its pretensions, I know it will be dear to you, towards whom I +should wish my thoughts to flow in a sort of an undress rather than in +the more studied graces of diction. + + I am, dear Coleridge, yours sincerely, C. LAMB. + + +[The portrait to which Lamb refers will be found opposite page 706 in my +large edition. It was etched by Brook Pulham of the India House. It was +this picture which so enraged Procter when he saw it in a printshop +(probably that referred to by Lamb in a later letter) that he +reprimanded the dealer. + +Here should come a charming letter to Louisa Holcroft dated June, +offering her a room at Enfield "pretty cheap, only two smiles a week."] + + + +LETTER 396 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +Friday, someday in June, 1826. [P.M. June 30, 1826.] + +Dear D.--My first impulse upon opening your letter was pleasure at +seeing your old neat hand, nine parts gentlemanly, with a modest dash of +the clerical: my second a Thought, natural enough this hot weather, Am I +to answer all this? why 'tis as long as those to the Ephesians and +Galatians put together--I have counted the words for curiosity. But then +Paul has nothing like the fun which is ebullient all over yours. I don't +remember a good thing (good like yours) from the 1st Romans to the last +of the Hebrews. I remember but one Pun in all the Evangely, and that was +made by his and our master: Thou art Peter (that is Doctor Rock) and +upon this rock will I build &c.; which sanctifies Punning with me +against all gainsayers. I never knew an enemy to puns, who was not an +ill-natured man. + +Your fair critic in the coach reminds me of a Scotchman who assured me +that he did not see much in Shakspeare. I replied, I dare say _not_. He +felt the equivoke, lookd awkward, and reddish, but soon returnd to the +attack, by saying that he thought Burns was as good as Shakspeare: I +said that I had no doubt he was--to a _Scotchman_. We exchangd no more +words that day.--Your account of the fierce faces in the Hanging, with +the presumed interlocution of the Eagle and the Tyger, amused us +greatly. You cannot be so very bad, while you can pick mirth off from +rotten walls. But let me hear you have escaped out of your oven. May the +Form of the Fourth Person who clapt invisible wet blankets about the +shoulders of Shadrach Meshach and Abednego, be with you in the fiery +Trial. But get out of the frying pan. Your business, I take it, is +bathing, not baking. + +Let me hear that you have clamber'd up to Lover's Seat; it is as fine in +that neighbourhood as Juan Fernandez, as lonely too, when the Fishing +boats are not out; I have sat for hours, staring upon a shipless sea. +The salt sea is never so grand as when it is left to itself. One +cock-boat spoils it. A sea-mew or two improves it. And go to the little +church, which is a very protestant Loretto, and seems dropt by some +angel for the use of a hermit, who was at once parishioner and a whole +parish. It is not too big. Go in the night, bring it away in your +portmanteau, and I will plant it in my garden. It must have been erected +in the very infancy of British Christianity, for the two or three first +converts; yet hath it all the appertenances of a church of the first +magnitude, its pulpit, its pews, its baptismal font; a cathedral in a +nutshell. Seven people would crowd it like a Caledonian Chapel. The +minister that divides the word there, must give lumping penny-worths. It +is built to the text of two or three assembled in my name. It reminds me +of the grain of mustard seed. If the glebe land is proportionate, it may +yield two potatoes. Tythes out of it could be no more split than a hair. +Its First fruits must be its Last, for 'twould never produce a couple. +It is truly the strait and narrow way, and few there be (of London +visitants) that find it. The still small voice is surely to be found +there, if any where. A sounding board is merely there for ceremony. It +is secure from earthquakes, not more from sanctity than size, for +'twould feel a mountain thrown upon it no more than a taper-worm would. +Go and see, but not without your spectacles. By the way, there's a +capital farm house two thirds of the way to the Lover's Seat, with +incomparable plum cake, ginger beer, etc. Mary bids me warn you not to +read the Anatomy of Melancholy in your present _low way_. You'll fancy +yourself a pipkin, or a headless bear, as Burton speaks of. You'll be +lost in a maze of remedies for a labyrinth of diseasements, a plethora +of cures. Read Fletcher; above all the Spanish Curate, the Thief or +Little Nightwalker, the Wit Without Money, and the Lover's Pilgrimage. +Laugh and come home fat. Neither do we think Sir T. Browne quite the +thing for you just at present. Fletcher is as light as Soda water. +Browne and Burton are too strong potions for an Invalid. And don't thumb +or dirt the books. Take care of the bindings. Lay a leaf of silver paper +under 'em, as you read them. And don't smoke tobacco over 'em, the +leaves will fall in and burn or dirty their namesakes. If you find any +dusty atoms of the Indian Weed crumbled up in the Beaum't and Fletcher, +they are _mine_. But then, you know, so is the Folio also. A pipe and a +comedy of Fletcher's the last thing of a night is the best recipe for +light dreams and to scatter away Nightmares. Probatum est. But do as you +like about the former. Only cut the Baker's. You will come home else all +crust; Rankings must chip you before you can appear in his counting +house. And my dear Peter Fin Junr., do contrive to see the sea at least +once before you return. You'll be ask'd about it in the Old Jewry. It +will appear singular not to have seen it. And rub up your Muse, the +family Muse, and send us a rhyme or so. Don't waste your wit upon that +damn'd Dry Salter. I never knew but one Dry Salter, who could relish +those mellow effusions, and he broke. You knew Tommy Hill, the wettest +of dry salters. Dry Salters, what a word for this thirsty weather! I +must drink after it. Here's to thee, my dear Dibdin, and to our having +you again snug and well at Colebrooke. But our nearest hopes are to hear +again from you shortly. An epistle only a quarter as agreeable as your +last, would be a treat. + + Yours most truly C. LAMB + +Timothy B. Dibdin, Esq., No. 9, Blucher Row, Priory, Hastings. + + +[Dibdin, who was in delicate health, had gone to Hastings to recruit, +with a parcel of Lamb's books for company. He seems to have been lodged +above the oven at a baker's. This letter contains Lamb's crowning +description of Hollingdon Rural church. + +"A Caledonian Chapel." Referring to the crowds that listened to Irving. + +"Peter Fin." A character in Jones' "Peter Finn's Trip to Brighton," +1822, as played by Liston. + +"Tommy Hill." In the British Museum is preserved the following brief +note addressed to Mr. Thomas Hill--probably the same. The date is +between 1809 and 1817:--] + + + +LETTER 397 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HILL + +D'r Sir It is necessary _I see you sign_, can you step up to me 4 Inner +Temple Lane this evening. I shall wait at home. + +Yours, + +C. LAMB. + + +[I have no notion to what the note refers. It is quite likely, Mr. J.A. +Rutter suggests, that Hill the drysalter, a famous busy-body, and a +friend of Theodore Hook, stood for the portrait of Tom Pry in Lamb's +"Lepus Papers" (see Vol. I.). S.C. Hall, in his _Book of Memories_, says +of Hill that "his peculiar faculty was to find out what everybody did, +from a minister of state to a stableboy."] + + + +LETTER 398 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. July 14, 1826.] + + Because you boast poetic Grandsire, + And rhyming kin, both Uncle and Sire, + Dost think that none but _their_ Descendings + Can tickle folks with double endings? + I had a Dad, that would for half a bet + Have put down thine thro' half the Alphabet. + Thou, who would be Dan Prior the second, + For Dan Posterior must be reckon'd. + In faith, dear Tim, your rhymes are slovenly, + As a man may say, dough-baked and ovenly; + Tedious and long as two Long Acres, + And smell most vilely of the Baker's. + (I have been cursing every limb o' thee, + Because I could not hitch in _Timothy_. + Jack, Will, Tom, Dick's, a serious evil, + But Tim, plain Tim's--the very devil.) + Thou most incorrigible scribbler, + Right Watering place and cockney dribbler, + What _child_, that barely understands _A, + B, C_, would ever dream that Stanza + Would tinkle into rhyme with "Plan, Sir"? + Go, go, you are not worth an answer. + I had a Sire, that at plain Crambo + Had hit you o'er the pate a damn'd blow. + How now? may I die game, and you die brass, + But I have stol'n a quip from Hudibras. + 'Twas thinking on that fine old Suttler, } + That was in faith a second Butler; } + Mad as queer rhymes as he, and subtler. } + He would have put you to 't this weather + For rattling syllables together; + Rhym'd you to death, like "rats in Ireland," + Except that he was born in High'r Land. + His chimes, not crampt like thine, and rung ill, + Had made Job split his sides on dunghill. + There was no limit to his merryings + At christ'nings, weddings, nay at buryings. + No undertaker would live near him, + Those grave practitioners did fear him; + Mutes, at his merry mops, turned "vocal." + And fellows, hired for silence, "spoke all." + No _body_ could be laid in cavity, + Long as he lived, with proper gravity. + His mirth-fraught eye had but to glitter, + And every mourner round must titter. + The Parson, prating of Mount Hermon, + Stood still to laugh, in midst of sermon. + The final Sexton (smile he _must_ for him) + Could hardly get to "dust to dust" for him. + He lost three pall-bearers their livelyhood, + Only with simp'ring at his lively mood: + Provided that they fresh and neat came, + All jests were fish that to his net came. + He'd banter Apostolic castings, + As you jeer fishermen at Hastings. + When the fly bit, _like me_, he leapt-o'er-all, + And stood not much on what was scriptural. + +P.S. + + I had forgot, at Small Bohemia + (Enquire the way of your maid Euphemia) + Are sojourning, of all good fellows + The prince and princess,--the _Novellos_-- + Pray seek 'em out, and give my love to 'em; + You'll find you'll soon be hand and glove to 'em. + +In prose, Little Bohemia, about a mile from Hastings in the Hollington +road, when you can get so far. Dear Dib, I find relief in a word or two +of prose. In truth my rhymes come slow. You have "routh of 'em." It +gives us pleasure to find you keep your good spirits. Your Letter did us +good. Pray heaven you are got out at last. Write quickly. + +This letter will introduce you, if 'tis agreeable. Take a donkey. 'Tis +Novello the Composer and his Wife, our very good friends. + +C.L. + + +[Dibdin must have sent the verses which Lamb asked for in the previous +letter, and this is Lamb's reply. Pride of ancestry seems to have been +the note of Dibdin's effort. Probably there is a certain amount of truth +in Lamb's account of the resolute merriment of his father. It is not +inconsistent with his description of Lovel in the _Elia_ essay "The Old +Benchers of the Inner Temple." + +"I have stol'n a quip." The manner rather than the precise matter, I +think. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to the Rev. Edward Coleridge, +Coleridge's nephew, dated July 19, 1826. It thanks the recipient for his +kindness to the child of a friend of Lamb's, Samuel Anthony Bloxam, +Coleridge having assisted in getting Frederick Bloxam into Eton (where +he was a master) on the foundation. Samuel Bloxam and Lamb were at +Christ's Hospital together.] + + + +LETTER 399 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[P.M. September 6, 1826.] + +My dear Wordsworth, The Bearer of this is my young friend Moxon, a +young lad with a Yorkshire head, and a heart that would do honour to a +more Southern county: no offence to Westmoreland. He is one of Longman's +best hands, and can give you the best account of The Trade as 'tis now +going; or stopping. For my part, the failure of a Bookseller is not the +most unpalatable accident of mortality: + + sad but not saddest + The desolation of a hostile city. + +When Constable fell from heaven, and we all hoped Baldwin was next, I +tuned a slight stave to the words in Macbeth (D'avenant's) to be sung by +a Chorus of Authors, + + What should we do when Booksellers break? + We should rejoyce. + +Moxon is but a tradesman in the bud yet, and retains his virgin Honesty; +Esto perpetua, for he is a friendly serviceable fellow, and thinks +nothing of lugging up a Cargo of the Newest Novels once or twice a week +from the Row to Colebrooke to gratify my Sister's passion for the newest +things. He is her Bodley. He is author besides of a poem which for a +first attempt is promising. It is made up of common images, and yet +contrives to read originally. You see the writer felt all he pours +forth, and has not palmed upon you expressions which he did not believe +at the time to be more his own than adoptive. Rogers has paid him some +proper compliments, with sound advice intermixed, upon a slight +introduction of him by me; for which I feel obliged. Moxon has +petition'd me by letter (for he had not the confidence to ask it in +London) to introduce him to you during his holydays; pray pat him on the +head, ask him a civil question or two about his verses, and favor him +with your genuine autograph. He shall not be further troublesome. I +think I have not sent any one upon a gaping mission to you a good while. +We are all well, and I have at last broke the bonds of business a second +time, never to put 'em on again. I pitch Colburn and his magazine to the +divil. I find I can live without the necessity of writing, tho' last +year I fretted myself to a fever with the hauntings of being starved. +Those vapours are flown. All the difference I find is that I have no +pocket money: that is, I must not pry upon an old book stall, and cull +its contents as heretofore, but shoulders of mutton, Whitbread's entire, +and Booth's best, abound as formerly. + +I don't know whom or how many to send our love to, your household is so +frequently divided, but a general health to all that may be fixed or +wandering; stars, wherever. We read with pleasure some success (I forget +quite what) of one of you at Oxford. Mrs. Monkhouse (... was one of you) +sent us a kind letter some [months back], and we had the pleasure to +[see] her in tolerable spirits, looking well and kind as in by-gone +days. + +Do take pen, or put it into goodnatured hands Dorothean +or Wordsworthian-female, or Hutchinsonian, to inform us of +your present state, or possible proceedings. I am ashamed +that this breaking of the long ice should be a letter of business. +There is none circum praecordia nostra I swear by the honesty +of pedantry, that wil I nil I pushes me upon scraps of Latin. +We are yours cordially: CHAS. & MARY LAMB. + +September. 1826. + + +[In this letter, the first to Wordsworth for many months, we have the +first mention of Edward Moxon, who was to be so closely associated with +Lamb in the years to come. Moxon, a young Yorkshireman, educated at the +Green Coat School, was then nearly twenty-five, and was already author +of _The Prospect and other Poems_, dedicated to Rogers, who was destined +to be a valuable patron. Moxon subsequently became Wordsworth's +publisher. + +"Constable ... Baldwin." Archibald Constable & Co., Scott's publishers, +failed in 1826. Baldwin was the first publisher of the _London +Magazine_. + +"I pitch Colburn and his magazine." Lamb wrote nothing in the _New +Monthly Magazine_ after September, 1826. + +I append portions of what seems to be Lamb's first letter to Edward +Moxon, obviously written before this date, but not out of place here. +The letter seems to have accompanied the proof of an article on Lamb +which he had corrected and was returning to Moxon.] + + + +LETTER 400 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +(_Fragment_) + +Were my own feelings consulted I should print it verbatim, but I won't +hoax you, else I love a Lye. My biography, parentage, place of birth, is +a strange mistake, part founded on some nonsense I wrote about Elia, and +was true of him, the real Elia, whose name I took.... C.L. was born in +Crown Office Row, Inner Temple in 1775. Admitted into Christs Hospital, +1782, where he was contemporary with T.F.M. [Thomas Fanshawe Middleton], +afterwards Bishop of Calcutta, and with S.T.C. with the last of these +two eminent scholars he has enjoyed an intimacy through life. On +quitting this foundation he became a junior clerk in the South Sea House +under his Elder Brother who died accountant there some years since.... I +am not the author of the Opium Eater, &c. + + +[I have not succeeded in finding the article in question.] + + + +LETTER 401 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. September 9, 1826.] + +An answer is requested. + +Saturday. + +Dear D.--I have observed that a Letter is never more acceptable than +when received upon a rainy day, especially a rainy Sunday; which moves +me to send you somewhat, however short. This will find you sitting after +Breakfast, which you will have prolonged as far as you can with +consistency to the poor handmaid that has the reversion of the Tea +Leaves; making two nibbles of your last morsel of _stale_ roll (you +cannot have hot new ones on the Sabbath), and reluctantly coming to an +end, because when that is done, what can you do till dinner? You cannot +go to the Beach, for the rain is drowning the sea, turning rank Thetis +fresh, taking the brine out of Neptune's pickles, while mermaids sit +upon rocks with umbrellas, their ivory combs sheathed for spoiling in +the wet of waters foreign to them. You cannot go to the library, for +it's shut. You are not religious enough to go to church. O it is worth +while to cultivate piety to the gods, to have something to fill the +heart up on a wet Sunday! You cannot cast accounts, for your ledger is +being eaten up with moths in the Ancient Jewry. You cannot play at +draughts, for there is none to play with you, and besides there is not a +draught board in the house. You cannot go to market, for it closed last +night. You cannot look in to the shops, their backs are shut upon you. +You cannot read the Bible, for it is not good reading for the sick and +the hypochondriacal. You cannot while away an hour with a friend, for +you have no friend round that Wrekin. You cannot divert yourself with a +stray acquaintance, for you have picked none up. You cannot bear the +chiming of Bells, for they invite you to a banquet, where you are no +visitant. You cannot cheer yourself with the prospect of a tomorrow's +letter, for none come on Mondays. You cannot count those endless vials +on the mantlepiece with any hope of making a variation in their numbers. +You have counted your spiders: your Bastile is exhausted. You sit and +deliberately curse your hard exile from all familiar sights and sounds. +Old Ranking poking in his head unexpectedly would just now be as good to +you as Grimaldi. Any thing to deliver you from this intolerable weight +of Ennui. You are too ill to shake it off: not ill enough to submit to +it, and to lie down as a lamb under it. The Tyranny of Sickness is +nothing to the Cruelty of Convalescence: 'tis to have Thirty Tyrants for +one. That pattering rain drops on your brain. You'll be worse after +dinner, for you must dine at one to-day, that Betty may go to afternoon +service. She insists upon having her chopped hay. And then when she goes +out, who _was_ something to you, something to speak to--what an +interminable afternoon you'll have to go thro'. You can't break yourself +from your locality: you cannot say "Tomorrow morning I set off for +Banstead, by God": for you are book'd for Wednesday. Foreseeing this, I +thought a _cheerful letter_ would come in opportunely. If any of the +little topics for mirth I have thought upon should serve you in this +utter extinguishment of sunshine, to make you a little merry, I shall +have had my ends. I love to make things comfortable. [_Here is an +erasure._] This, which is scratch'd out was the most material thing I +had to say, but on maturer thoughts I defer it. + +P.S.--We are just sitting down to dinner with a pleasant party, +Coleridge, Reynolds the dramatist, and Sam Bloxam: to-morrow (that is, +to_day_), Liston, and Wyat of the Wells, dine with us. May this find you +as jolly and freakish as we mean to be. + +C. LAMB. + + +[Addressed to "T. Dibdin Esq're. No. 4 Meadow Cottages, Hastings, +Sussex." + +"You have counted your spiders." Referring, I suppose, to Paul +Pellisson-Fontanier, the academician, and a famous prisoner in the +Bastille, who trained a spider to eat flies from his hand. + +"Grimaldi"--Joseph Grimaldi, the clown. Ranking was one of Dibdin's +employers. + +"A pleasant party." Reynolds, the dramatist, would be Frederic Reynolds +(1764-1841); Bloxam we have just met; and Wyat of the Wells was a comic +singer and utility actor at Sadler's Wells. + +Canon Ainger remarks that as a matter of fact Dibdin was a religious +youth.] + + + +LETTER 402 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. September 26, 1826.] + +Dear B.B.--I don't know why I have delay'd so long writing. 'Twas a +fault. The under current of excuse to my mind was that I had heard of +the Vessel in which Mitford's jars were to come; that it had been +obliged to put into Batavia to refit (which accounts for its delay) but +was daily expectated. Days are past, and it comes not, and the mermaids +may be drinking their Tea out of his China for ought I know; but let's +hope not. In the meantime I have paid L28, etc., for the freight and +prime cost, (which I a little expected he would have settled in London.) +But do not mention it. I was enabled to do it by a receipt of L30 from +Colburn, with whom however I have done. I should else have run short. +For I just make ends meet. We will wait the arrival of the Trinkets, and +to ascertain their full expence, and then bring in the bill. (Don't +mention it, for I daresay 'twas mere thoughtlessness.) + +I am sorry you and yours have any plagues about dross matters. I have +been sadly puzzled at the defalcation of more than one third of my +income, out of which when entire I saved nothing. But cropping off wine, +old books, &c. and in short all that can be call'd pocket money, I hope +to be able to go on at the Cottage. Remember, I beg you not to say +anything to Mitford, for if he be honest it will vex him: if not, which +I as little expect as that you should [not] be, I have a hank still upon +the JARS. + +Colburn had something of mine in last month, which he has had in hand +these 7 months, and had lost, or cou'dnt find room for: I was used to +different treatment in the London, and have forsworn Periodicals. + +I am going thro' a course of reading at the Museum: the Garrick plays, +out of part of which I formed my Specimens: I have Two Thousand to go +thro'; and in a few weeks have despatch'd the tythe of 'em. It is a sort +of Office to me; hours, 10 to 4, the same. It does me good. Man must +have regular occupation, that has been used to it. So A.K. keeps a +School! She teaches nothing wrong, I'll answer for't. I have a Dutch +print of a Schoolmistress; little old-fashioned Fleminglings, with only +one face among them. She a Princess of Schoolmistress, wielding a rod +for form more than use; the scene an old monastic chapel, with a Madonna +over her head, looking just as serious, as thoughtful, as pure, as +gentle, as herself. Tis a type of thy friend. + +Will you pardon my neglect? Mind, again I say, don't shew this to M.; +let me wait a little longer to know the event of his Luxuries. (I am +sure he is a good fellow, tho' I made a serious Yorkshire Lad, who met +him, stare when I said he was a Clergyman. He is a pleasant Layman +spoiled.) Heaven send him his jars uncrack'd, and me my---- Yours with +kindest wishes to your daughter and friend, in which Mary joins + +C.L. + + +["I saved nothing." Lamb, however, according to Procter, left L2000 at +his death eight years later. He must have saved L200 a year from his +pension of L441, living at the rate of L241 per annum, plus small +earnings, for the rest of his life, and investing the L200 at 5 per +cent, compound interest. + +"Colburn had something of mine." The Popular Fallacy "That a Deformed +Person is a Lord," not included by Lamb with the others when he +reprinted them. Printed in Vol. I. of this edition. + +"Reading at the Museum." Lamb had begun to visit the Museum every day to +collect extracts from the Garrick plays for Hone's _Table Book_, 1827. + +"A.K."--Anne Knight again. + +The pleasant Yorkshire lad whom Mitford's secular air surprised was +probably Moxon. + +Here might come a business letter, from Lamb to Barton, preserved in the +British Museum, relating to Mitford's jars.] + + + +LETTER 403 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? Sept., 1826.] + +I have had much trouble to find Field to-day. No matter. He was packing +up for out of town. He has writ a handsomest letter, which you will +transmit to Murry with your proof-sheets. Seal it.-- + +Yours C. L----. + +Mrs. Hood will drink tea with us on Thursday at 1/2 past 5 _at Latest_. + +N.B. I have lost my Museum reading today: a day with Titus: owing to +your dam'd bisness.--I am the last to reproach anybody. I scorn it. + +If you shall have the whole book ready soon, it will be best for Murry +to see. + + +[I am not clear as to what proof-sheets of Moxon's Lamb refers. His +second book, _Christmas_, 1829, was issued through Hurst, Chance & Co. + +Barton Field and John Murray were friends. + +"A day with Titus." Can this (a friend suggests) have any connection +with the phrase _Amici! diem perdidi?_ There is no Titus play among the +Garrick Extracts.] + + + +LETTER 404 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[No postmark or date. Soon after preceding letter to Barton. 1826.] + +Dear B.B.--the _Busy Bee_, as Hood after Dr. Watts apostrophises thee, +and well dost thou deserve it for thy labors in the Muses' gardens, +wandering over parterres of Think-on-me's and Forget-me-nots, to a total +impossibility of forgetting thee,--thy letter was acceptable, thy +scruples may be dismissed, thou art Rectus in Curia, not a word more to +be said, Verbum Sapienti and so forth, the matter is decided with a +white stone, Classically, mark me, and the apparitions vanishd which +haunted me, only the Cramp, Caliban's distemper, clawing me in the +calvish part of my nature, makes me ever and anon roar Bullishly, squeak +cowardishly, and limp cripple-ishly. Do I write quakerly and simply, +'tis my most Master Mathew-like intention to do it. See Ben Jonson.--I +think you told me your acquaint'ce with the Drama was confin'd to +Shakspeare and Miss Bailly: some read only Milton and Croly. The gap is +as from an ananas to a Turnip. I have fighting in my head the plots +characters situations and sentiments of 400 old Plays (bran new to me) +which I have been digesting at the Museum, and my appetite sharpens to +twice as many more, which I mean to course over this winter. I can +scarce avoid Dialogue fashion in this letter. I soliloquise my +meditations, and habitually speak dramatic blank verse without meaning +it. Do you see Mitford? he will tell you something of my labors. Tell +him I am sorry to have mist seeing him, to have talk'd over those OLD +TREASURES. I am still more sorry for his missing Pots. But I shall be +sure of the earliest intelligence of the Lost Tribes. His Sacred +Specimens are a thankful addition to my shelves. Marry, I could wish he +had been more careful of corrigenda. I have discover'd certain which +have slipt his Errata. I put 'em in the next page, as perhaps thou canst +transmit them to him. For what purpose, but to grieve him (which yet I +should be sorry to do), but then it shews my learning, and the excuse is +complimentary, as it implies their correction in a future Edition. His +own things in the book are magnificent, and as an old Christ's +Hospitaller I was particularly refreshd with his eulogy on our Edward. +Many of the choice excerpta were new to me. Old Christmas is a coming, +to the confusion of Puritans, Muggletonians, Anabaptists, Quakers, and +that Unwassailing Crew. He cometh not with his wonted gait, he is shrunk +9 inches in the girth, but is yet a Lusty fellow. Hood's book is mighty +clever, and went off 600 copies the 1st day. Sion's Songs do not +disperse so quickly. The next leaf is for Rev'd J.M. In this ADIEU thine +briefly in a tall friendship C. LAMB. + + +[Barton's letter, to which this is an answer, not being preserved, we do +not know what his scruples were. B.B. was a great contributor to +annuals. + +"With a white stone." In trials at law a white stone was cast as a vote +for acquittal, a black stone for condemnation (see Ovid, +_Metamorphoses_, 15, 41). + +"Master Mathew"--in Ben Jonson's "Every Man in His Humour." + +"Croly"--the Rev. George Croly (1780-1860), of the _Literary Gazette_, +author of _The Angel of the World_ and other pretentious poems. + +"Mitford's Sacred Specimens"--_Sacred Specimens Selected from the Early +English Poets_, 1827. The last poem, by Mitford himself, was "Lines +Written under the Portrait of Edward VI." + +"Hood's book"--_Whims and Oddities_, second series, 1827. + +Here should come a note to Allsop stating that Lamb is "near killed with +Christmassing."] + + + +LETTER 405 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +Colebrooke Row, Islington, + +Saturday, 20th Jan., 1827. + +Dear Robinson,--I called upon you this morning, and found that you were +gone to visit a dying friend. I had been upon a like errand. Poor Norris +has been lying dying for now almost a week, such is the penalty we pay +for having enjoyed a strong constitution! Whether he knew me or not, I +know not, or whether he saw me through his poor glazed eyes; but the +group I saw about him I shall not forget. Upon the bed, or about it, +were assembled his wife and two daughters, and poor deaf Richard, his +son, looking doubly stupified. There they were, and seemed to have been +sitting all the week. I could only reach out a hand to Mrs. Norris. +Speaking was impossible in that mute chamber. By this time I hope it is +all over with him. In him I have a loss the world cannot make up. He was +my friend and my father's friend all the life I can remember. I seem to +have made foolish friendships ever since. Those are friendships which +outlive a second generation. Old as I am waxing, in his eyes I was still +the child he first knew me. To the last he called me Charley. I have +none to call me Charley now. He was the last link that bound me to the +Temple. You are but of yesterday. In him seem to have died the old +plainness of manners and singleness of heart. Letters he knew nothing +of, nor did his reading extend beyond the pages of the "Gentleman's +Magazine." Yet there was a pride of literature about him from being +amongst books (he was librarian), and from some scraps of doubtful Latin +which he had picked up in his office of entering students, that gave him +very diverting airs of pedantry. Can I forget the erudite look with +which, when he had been in vain trying to make out a black-letter text +of Chaucer in the Temple Library, he laid it down and told me that--"in +those old books, Charley, there is sometimes a deal of very indifferent +spelling;" and seemed to console himself in the reflection! His jokes, +for he had his jokes, are now ended, but they were old trusty +perennials, staples that pleased after _decies repetita_, and were +always as good as new. One song he had, which was reserved for the night +of Christmas-day, which we always spent in the Temple. It was an old +thing, and spoke of the flat bottoms of our foes and the possibility of +their coming over in darkness, and alluded to threats of an invasion +many years blown over; and when he came to the part + + "We'll still make 'em run, and we'll still make 'em sweat, + In spite of the devil and Brussels Gazette!" + +his eyes would sparkle as with the freshness of an impending event. And +what is the "Brussels Gazette" now? I cry while I enumerate these +trifles. "How shall we tell them in a stranger's ear?" His poor good +girls will now have to receive their afflicted mother in an inaccessible +hovel in an obscure village in Herts, where they have been long +struggling to make a school without effect; and poor deaf Richard--and +the more helpless for being so--is thrown on the wide world. + +My first motive in writing, and, indeed, in calling on you, was to ask +if you were enough acquainted with any of the Benchers, to lay a plain +statement before them of the circumstances of the family. I almost fear +not, for you are of another hall. But if you can oblige me and my poor +friend, who is now insensible to any favours, pray exert yourself. You +cannot say too much good of poor Norris and his poor wife. + + Yours ever, CHARLES LAMB. + + +[This letter, describing the death of Randal Norris, Sub-Treasurer and +Librarian of the Inner Temple, was printed with only very slight +alterations in Hone's _Table Book_, 1827, and again in the _Last Essays +of Elia_, 1833, under the title "A Death-Bed." It was, however, taken +out of the second edition, and "Confessions of a Drunkard" substituted, +in deference to the wishes of Norris's family. Mrs. Norris, as I have +said, was a native of Widford, where she had known Mrs. Field, Lamb's +grandmother. With her son Richard, who was deaf and peculiar, Mrs. +Norris moved to Widford again, where the daughters, Miss Betsy and Miss +Jane, had opened a school--Goddard House; which they retained until a +legacy restored the family prosperity. Soon after that they both +married, each a farmer named Tween. They survived until quite recently. + +Mrs. Coe, an old scholar at the Misses Morris's school in the twenties, +gave me, in 1902, some reminiscences of those days, from which I quote a +passage or so:-- + + When he joined the Norrises' dinner-table he kept every one + laughing. Mr. Richard sat at one end, and some of the school + children would be there too. One day Mr. Lamb gave every one a fancy + name all round the table, and made a verse on each. "You are + so-and-so," he said, "and you are so-and-so," adding the rhyme. + "What's he saying? What are you laughing at?" Mr. Richard asked + testily, for he was short-tempered. Miss Betsy explained the joke to + him, and Mr. Lamb, coming to his turn, said--only he said it in + verse--"Now, Dick, it's your turn. I shall call you Gruborum; + because all you think of is your food and your stomach." Mr. Richard + pushed back his chair in a rage and stamped out of the room. "Now + I've done it," said Mr. Lamb: "I must go and make friends with my + old chum. Give me a large plate of pudding to take to him." When he + came back he said, "It's all right. I thought the pudding would do + it." Mr. Lamb and Mr. Richard never got on very well, and Mr. + Richard didn't like his teasing ways at all; but Mr. Lamb often went + for long walks with him, because no one else would. He did many kind + things like that. + + There used to be a half-holiday when Mr. Lamb came, partly because + he would force his way into the schoolroom and make seriousness + impossible. His head would suddenly appear at the door in the midst + of lessons, with "Well, Betsy! How do, Jane?" "O, Mr. Lamb!" they + would say, and that was the end of work for that day. He was really + rather naughty with the children. One of his tricks was to teach + them a new kind of catechism (Mrs. Coe does not remember it, but we + may rest assured, I fear, that it was secular), and he made a great + fuss with Lizzie Hunt for her skill in saying the Lord's Prayer + backwards, which he had taught her. + +"We'll still make 'em run..." Garrick's "Hearts of Oak," sung in +"Harlequin's Invasion." + +"How shall we tell them in a stranger's ear?" A quotation from Lamb +himself, in the lines "Written soon after the Preceding Poem," in 1798 +(see Vol. IV.).] + + + +LETTER 406 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[No date. Jan. 20, 1827.] + +Dear R.N. is dead. I have writ as nearly as I could to look like a +letter meant for _your eye only_. Will it do? + +Could you distantly hint (do as your own judgment suggests) that if his +son could be got in as Clerk to the new Subtreasurer, it would be all +his father wish'd? But I leave that to you. I don't want to put you upon +anything disagreeable. + +Yours thankfully + +C.L. + + +[The reference at the beginning is to the preceding letter, which was +probably enclosed with this note. + +Here should come a note to Allsop dated Jan. 25, 1827, complaining of +the cold.] + + + +LETTER 407 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[Dated by H.C.R. Jan. 29, 1827.] + +Dear Robinson, If you have not seen Mr. Gurney, leave him quite alone +for the present, I have seen Mr. Jekyll, who is as friendly as heart can +desire, he entirely approves of my formula of petition, and gave your +very reasons for the propriety of the "little village of Hertf'shire." +Now, Mr. G. might not approve of it, and then we should clash. Also, Mr. +J. wishes it to be presented next week, and Mr. G. might fix earlier, +which would be aukward. Mr. J. was so civil to me, that I _think it +would be better NOT for you to show him that letter you intended_. +Nothing can increase his zeal in the cause of poor Mr. Norris. Mr. +Gardiner will see you with this, and learn from you all about it, & +consult, if you have seen Mr. G. & he has fixed a time, how to put it +off. Mr. J. is most friendly to the boy: I think you had better not +teaze the Treasurer any more about _him_, as it may make him less +friendly to the Petition + +Yours Ever + +C.L. + + +[Writing to Dorothy Wordsworth on February 13, 1827, Robinson says: "The +Lambs are well. I have been so busy that I have not lately seen them. +Charles has been occupied about the affair of the widow of his old +friend Norris whose death he has felt. But the health of both is good." + +Gurney would probably be John Gurney (afterwards Baron Gurney), the +counsel and judge. Jekyll was Joseph Jekyll, the wit, mentioned by Lamb +in his essay on "The Old Benchers of the Inner Temple." He was a friend +of George Dyer.] + + + +LETTER 408 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[Dated by H.C. R. Jan., 1827.] + +Dear R. do not say any thing to Mr. G. about the day _or_ Petition, for +Mr. Jekyll wishes it to be next week, and thoroughly approves of my +formula, and Mr. G. might not, and then they will clash. Only speak to +him of Gardner's wish to have the Lad. Mr. Jekyll was excessive +friendly. C.L. + + +[The matter referred to is still the Norrises' welfare. Mr. Hazlitt says +that an annuity of L80 was settled by the Inn on Mrs. Norris. + +Here perhaps should come a letter from Lamb to Allsop, printed by Mr. +Fitzgerald, urging Allsop to go to Highgate to see Coleridge and tell +him of the unhappy state of his, Allsop's, affairs. In Crabb Robinson's +_Diary_ for February 1, 1827, I read: "I went to Lamb. Found him in +trouble about his friend Allsop, who is a ruined man. Allsop is a very +good creature who has been a generous friend to Coleridge." Writing of +his troubles in _Letters, Conversations and Recollections of S.T. +Coleridge_, Allsop says: "Charles Lamb, Charles and Mary Lamb, 'union is +partition,' were never wanting in the hour of need."] + + + +LETTER 409 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON + +[March, 1827.] + +Dear Raffaele Haydon,--Did the maid tell you I came to see your picture, +not on Sunday but the day before? I think the face and bearing of the +Bucephalus-tamer very noble, his flesh too effeminate or painty. The +skin of the female's back kneeling is much more carnous. I had small +time to pick out praise or blame, for two lord-like Bucks came in, upon +whose strictures my presence seemed to impose restraint: I plebeian'd +off therefore. + +I think I have hit on a subject for you, but can't swear it was never +executed,--I never heard of its being,--"Chaucer beating a Franciscan +Friar in Fleet Street." Think of the old dresses, houses, &c. "It +seemeth that both these learned men (Gower and Chaucer) were of the +Inner Temple; for not many years since Master Buckley did see a record +in the same house where Geoffry Chaucer was fined two shillings for +beating a Franciscan Friar in Fleet Street." _Chaucer's Life by T. +Speght, prefixed to the black letter folio of Chaucer_, 1598. + + Yours in haste (salt fish waiting), C. LAMB. + + +[Haydon's picture was his "Alexander and Bucephalus." The two Bucks, he +tells us in his _Diary_, were the Duke of Devonshire and Mr. Agar Ellis. +Haydon did not take up the Chaucer subject.] + + + +LETTER 410 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE [No date. April, 1827.] + +Dear H. Never come to our house and not come in. I was quite vex'd. + +Yours truly. C.L. + +There is in Blackwood this month an article MOST AFFECTING indeed called +Le Revenant, and would do more towards abolishing Capital Punishments +than 400000 Romillies or Montagues. I beg you read it and see if you can +extract any of it. _The Trial scene in particular_. + + +[Written on the fourteenth instalment of the Garrick Play extracts. The +article was in _Blackwood_ for April, 1827. Hone took Lamb's advice, and +the extract from it will be found in the _Table Book_, Vol. I., col. +455. + +Lamb was peculiarly interested in the subject of survival after hanging. +He wrote an early _Reflector_ essay, "On the Inconveniences of Being +Hanged," on the subject, and it is the pivot of his farce "The +Pawnbroker's Daughter." + +"Romillies or Montagues." Two prominent advocates for the abolition of +capital punishment were Sir Samuel Romilly (who died in 1818) and Basil +Montagu.] + + + +LETTER 411 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +[No date. May, 1827.] + +Dearest Hood,--Your news has spoil'd us a merry meeting. Miss Kelly and +we were coming, but your letter elicited a flood of tears from Mary, and +I saw she was not fit for a party. God bless you and the mother (or +should be mother) of your sweet girl that should have been. I have won +sexpence of Moxon by the _sex_ of the dear gone one. + +Yours most truly and hers, + +[C.L.] + + +[This note refers to one of the Hoods' children, which was still-born. +It was upon this occasion that Lamb wrote the beautiful lines "On an +Infant Dying as soon as Born" (see Vol. IV.).] + + + +LETTER 412 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[No date. (1827.)] + +My dear B.B.--A gentleman I never saw before brought me your welcome +present--imagine a scraping, fiddling, fidgetting, petit-maitre of a +dancing school advancing into my plain parlour with a coupee and a +sideling bow, and presenting the book as if he had been handing a glass +of lemonade to a young miss--imagine this, and contrast it with the +serious nature of the book presented! Then task your imagination, +reversing this picture, to conceive of quite an opposite messenger, a +lean, straitlocked, wheyfaced methodist, for such was he in reality who +brought it, the Genius (it seems) of the Wesleyan Magazine. Certes, +friend B., thy Widow's tale is too horrible, spite of the lenitives of +Religion, to embody in verse: I hold prose to be the appropriate +expositor of such atrocities! No offence, but it is a cordial that makes +the heart sick. Still thy skill in compounding it I not deny. I turn to +what gave me less mingled pleasure. I find markd with pencil these pages +in thy pretty book, and fear I have been penurious. + + page 52, 53 capital. + page 59 6th stanza exquisite simile. + page 61 11th stanza equally good. + page 108 3d stanza, I long to see van Balen. + page 111 a downright good sonnet. _Dixi_. + page 153 Lines at the bottom. + +So you see, I read, hear, and _mark_, if I don't learn--In short this +little volume is no discredit to any of your former, and betrays none of +the Senility you fear about. Apropos of Van Balen, an artist who painted +me lately had painted a Blackamoor praying, and not filling his canvas, +stuff'd in his little girl aside of Blacky, gaping at him unmeaningly; +and then didn't know what to call it. Now for a picture to be promoted +to the Exhibition (Suffolk Street) as HISTORICAL, a subject is +requisite. What does me? I but christen it the "Young Catechist" and +furbishd it with Dialogue following, which dubb'd it an Historical +Painting. Nothing to a friend at need. + + While this tawny Ethiop prayeth, + Painter, who is She that stayeth + By, with skin of whitest lustre; + Sunny locks, a shining cluster; + Saintlike seeming to direct him + To the Power that must protect him? + Is she of the heav'nborn Three, + Meek Hope, strong Faith, sweet Charity? + Or some Cherub? + + They you mention + Far transcend my weak invention. + 'Tis a simple Christian child, + Missionary young and mild, + From her store of script'ral knowledge + (Bible-taught without a college) + Which by reading she could gather, + Teaches him to say OUR FATHER + To the common Parent, who + Colour not respects nor hue. + White and Black in him have part, + Who looks not to the skin, but heart.-- + +When I'd done it, the Artist (who had clapt in Miss merely as a +fill-space) swore I exprest his full meaning, and the damosel bridled up +into a Missionary's vanity. I like verses to explain Pictures: seldom +Pictures to illustrate Poems. Your wood cut is a rueful Lignum Mortis. +By the by, is the widow likely to marry again? + +I am giving the fruit of my Old Play reading at the Museum to Hone, who +sets forth a Portion weekly in the Table Book. Do you see it? How is +Mitford?-- + +I'll just hint that the Pitcher, the Chord and the Bowl are a little too +often repeated (_passim_) in your Book, and that on page 17 last line +but 4 _him_ is put for _he_, but the poor widow I take it had small +leisure for grammatical niceties. Don't you see there's _He, myself_, +and _him_; why not both _him_? likewise _imperviously_ is cruelly spelt +_imperiously_. These are trifles, and I honestly like your [book,] and +you for giving it, tho' I really am ashamed of so many presents. + +I can think of no news, therefore I will end with mine and Mary's +kindest remembrances to you and yours. C.L. + + +[It has been customary to date this letter December, 1827, but I think +that must be too late. Lamb would never have waited till then to tell +Barton that he was contributing the Garrick Plays to Hone's _Table +Book_, especially as the last instalment was printed in that month. + +Barton's new volume was _A Widow's Tale and Other Poems_, 1827. The +title poem tells how a missionary and his wife were wrecked, and how +after three nights and days of horror she was saved. The woodcut on the +title-page of Barton's book represented the widow supporting her dead or +dying husband in the midst of the storm. + +This is the "exquisite simile" on page 59, from "A Grandsire's Tale":-- + + Though some might deem her pensive, if not sad, + Yet those who knew her better, best could tell + How calmly happy, and how meekly glad + Her quiet heart in its own depths did dwell: + Like to the waters of some crystal well, + In which the stars of heaven at noon are seen. + Fancy might deem on her young spirit fell + Glimpses of light more glorious and serene + Than that of life's brief day, so heavenly was her mien. + +This was the "downright good sonnet":-- + + TO A GRANDMOTHER + + "Old age is dark and unlovely."--Ossian. + + O say not so! A bright old age is thine; + Calm as the gentle light of summer eves, + Ere twilight dim her dusky mantle weaves; + Because to thee is given, in strength's decline, + A heart that does not thanklessly repine + At aught of which the hand of God bereaves, + Yet all He sends with gratitude receives;-- + May such a quiet, thankful close be mine. + And hence thy fire-side chair appears to me + A peaceful throne--which thou wert form'd to fill; + Thy children--ministers, who do thy will; + And those grand-children, sporting round thy knee, + Thy little subjects, looking up to thee, + As one who claims their fond allegiance still. + +And these are the lines at the foot of page 153 in a poem addressed to a +child seven years old:-- + + There is a holy, blest companionship + In the sweet intercourse thus held with those + Whose tear and smile are guileless; from whose lip + The simple dictate of the heart yet flows;-- + Though even in the yet unfolded rose + The worm may lurk, and sin blight blooming youth, + The light born with us long so brightly glows, + That childhood's first deceits seem almost truth, + To life's cold after lie, selfish, and void of ruth. + +Van Balen was the painter of the picture of the "Madonna and Child" +which Mrs. FitzGerald (Edward FitzGerald's mother) had given to Barton +and for which he expressed his thanks in a poem. + +The artist who painted Lamb recently was Henry Meyer (1782?-1847), the +portrait being that which serves as frontispiece to this volume. I give +in my large edition a reproduction of "The Young Catechist," which Meyer +also engraved, with Lamb's verses attached. In 1910 I saw the original +in a picture shop in the Charing Cross Road, now removed.] + + + +LETTER 413 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[No date. End of May, 1827.] + +Dear H. in the forthcoming "New Monthly" are to be verses of mine on a +Picture about Angels. Translate em to the Table-book. I am off for +Enfield. + + Yours. C.L. + + +[Written on the back of the XXI. Garrick Extracts. The poem "Angel Help" +was printed in the _New Monthly Magazine_ for June and copied by Hone in +the _Table-Book_, No. 24, 1827.] + + + +LETTER 414 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[No date. June, 1827.] + +Dear Hone, I should like this in your next book. We +are at Enfield, where (when we have solituded awhile) +we shall be glad to see you. Yours, + +C. LAMB. + + +[This was written on the back of the MS. of "Going or Gone" (see Vol. +IV.), a poem of reminiscences of Lamb's early Widford days, printed in +Hone's _Table-Book_, June, 1827, signed Elia.] + + + +LETTER 415 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +Enfield, and for some weeks to come, "_June 11, 1827_." + +Dear B.B.--One word more of the picture verses, and that for good and +all; pray, with a neat pen alter one line + + His learning seems to lay small stress on + +to + + His learning lays no mighty stress on + +to avoid the unseemly recurrence (ungrammatical also) of "seems" in the +next line, besides the nonsence of "but" there, as it now stands. And I +request you, as a personal favor to me, to erase the last line of all, +which I should never have written from myself. The fact is, it was a +silly joke of Hood's, who gave me the frame, (you judg'd rightly it was +not its own) with the remark that you would like it, because it was b--d +b--d,--and I lugg'd it in: but I shall be quite hurt if it stands, +because tho' you and yours have too good sense to object to it, I would +not have a sentence of mine seen, that to any foolish ear might sound +unrespectful to thee. Let it end at appalling; the joke is coarse and +useless, and hurts the tone of the rest. Take your best "ivory-handled" +and scrape it forth. + +Your specimen of what you might have written is hardly fair. Had it been +a present to me, I should have taken a more sentimental tone; but of a +trifle from me it was my cue to speak in an underish tone of +commendation. Prudent _givers_ (what a word for such a nothing) +disparage their gifts; 'tis an art we have. So you see you wouldn't have +been so wrong, taking a higher tone. But enough of nothing. + +By the bye, I suspected M. of being the disparager of the frame; hence a +_certain line_. + +For the frame,'tis as the room is, where it hangs. It hung up fronting +my old cobwebby folios and batter'd furniture (the fruit piece has +resum'd its place) and was much better than a spick and span one. But if +your room be very neat and your _other pictures_ bright with gilt, it +should be so too. I can't judge, not having seen: but my dingy study it +suited. + +Martin's Belshazzar (the picture) I have seen. Its architectural effect +is stupendous; but the human figures, the squalling contorted little +antics that are playing at being frightend, like children at a sham +ghost who half know it to be a mask, are detestable. Then the _letters_ +are nothing more than a transparency lighted up, such as a Lord might +order to be lit up, on a sudden at a Xmas Gambol, to scare the ladies. +The _type_ is as plain as Baskervil's--they should have been dim, full +of mystery, letters to the mind rather than the eye.--Rembrandt has +painted only Belshazzar and a courtier or two (taking a part of the +banquet for the whole) not fribbled out a mob of fine folks. Then every +thing is so distinct, to the very necklaces, and that foolish little +prophet. What _one_ point is there of interest? The ideal of such a +subject is, that you the spectator should see nothing but what at the +time you would have seen, the _hand_--and the _King_--not to be at +leisure to make taylor-remarks on the dresses, or Doctor Kitchener-like +to examine the good things at table. + +Just such a confusd piece is his Joshua, fritterd into 1000 fragments, +little armies here, little armies there--you should see only the _Sun_ +and _Joshua_; if I remember, he has not left out that luminary entirely, +but for Joshua, I was ten minutes a finding him out. + +Still he is showy in all that is not the human figure or the +preternatural interest: but the first are below a drawing school girl's +attainment, and the last is a phantasmagoric trick, "Now you shall see +what you shall see, dare is Balshazar and dare is Daniel." You have my +thoughts of M. and so adieu C. LAMB. + + +[Lamb had sent Barton the picture that is reproduced in Vol. V. of my +large edition. Later Lamb had sent the following lines:-- + + When last you left your Woodbridge pretty, + To stare at sights, and see the City, + If I your meaning understood, + You wish'd a Picture, cheap, but good; + The colouring? decent; clear, not muddy; + To suit a Poet's quiet study, + Where Books and Prints for delectation + Hang, rather than vain ostentation. + The subject? what I pleased, if comely; + But something scriptural and homely: + A sober Piece, not gay or wanton, + For winter fire-sides to descant on; + The theme so scrupulously handled, + A Quaker might look on unscandal'd; + Such as might satisfy Ann Knight, + And classic Mitford just not fright. + Just such a one I've found, and send it; + If liked, I give--if not, but lend it. + The moral? nothing can be sounder. + The fable? 'tis its own expounder-- + A Mother teaching to her Chit + Some good book, and explaining it. + He, silly urchin, tired of lesson, + His learning seems to lay small stress on, + But seems to hear not what he hears; + Thrusting his fingers in his ears, + Like Obstinate, that perverse funny one, + In honest parable of Bunyan. + His working Sister, more sedate, + Listens; but in a kind of state, + The painter meant for steadiness; + But has a tinge of sullenness; + And, at first sight, she seems to brook + As ill her needle, as he his book. + This is the Picture. For the Frame-- + 'Tis not ill-suited to the same; + Oak-carved, not gilt, for fear of falling; + Old-fashion'd; plain, yet not appalling; + And broad brimm'd, as the Owner's Calling. + +It was not Obstinate, by the way, who thrust his fingers in his ears, +but Christian. + +"Hence a _certain line_"--line 16, I suppose. + +Martin's "Belshazzar." "Belshazzar's Feast," by John Martin (1789-1854), +had been exhibited for some years and had created an immense impression. +Lamb subjected Martin's work to a minute analysis a few years later (see +the _Elia_ essay on the "Barrenness of the Imaginative Faculty in the +Productions of Modern Art," Vol. II.). Barton did not give up Martin in +consequence of this letter. The frontispiece to his _New Year's Eve_, +1828, is by that painter, and the volume contains eulogistic poems upon +him, one beginning-- + + Boldest painter of our day. + +"Baskervil's"--John Baskerville (1706-1775), the printer, famous for his +folio edition of the Bible, 1763. + +Doctor William Kitchiner--the author of _Apicius Redivious; or, The +Cook's Oracle_, 1817.] + + + +LETTER 416 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. June 26, 1827.] + +Dear H.C. We are at Mrs. Leishman's, Chase, Enfield. Why not come down +by the Green Lanes on Sunday? Picquet all day. Pass the Church, pass the +"Rising Sun," turn sharp round the corner, and we are the 6th or 7th +house on the Chase: tall Elms darken the door. If you set eyes on M. +Burney, bring him. + + Yours truly C. LAMB. + + +[Mrs. Leishman's house, or its successor, is the seventh from the Rising +Sun. It is now on Gentleman's Row, not on Chase Side proper. The house +next it--still, as in Lamb's day, a girl's school--is called Elm House, +but most of the elms which darkened both doors have vanished. It has +been surmised that when later in the year Lamb took an Enfield house in +his own name, he took Mrs. Leishman's; but, as we shall see, his own +house was some little distance from hers.] + + + +LETTER 417 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[No date. Early July, 1827.] + +Dear H., This is Hood's, done from the life, of Mary getting over a +style here. Mary, out of a pleasant revenge, wants you to get it +_engrav'd_ in Table Book to surprise H., who I know will be amus'd with +you so doing. + +Append some observations about the awkwardness of country styles about +Edmonton, and the difficulty of elderly Ladies getting over 'em.---- + +That is to say, if you think the sketch good enough. + +I take on myself the warranty. + +Can you slip down here some day and go a Green-dragoning? C.L. + +Enfield (Mrs. Leishman's, Chase). + +If you do, send Hood the number, No. 2 Robert St., Adelphi, and keep the +sketch for me. + + +["This" was the drawing by Hood. I take it from the _Table-Book_, where +it represents Mrs. Gilpin resting on a stile:-- + +[Illustration] + +Lamb subsequently appended the observations himself. The text of his +little article, changing Mary Lamb into Mrs. Gilpin, was in the late Mr. +Locker-Lampson's collection. The postmark is July 17. 1827.] + + + +LETTER 418 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +Enfield. P.M. July 17, 182[7]. + +Dear M. Thanks for your attentions of every kind. Emma will not fail +Mrs. Hood's kind invitation, but her Aunt is so queer a one, that we +cannot let her go with a single gentleman singly to Vauxhall; she would +withdraw her from us altogether in a fright; but if any of the Hood's +family accompany you, then there can be small objection. + +I have been writing letters till too dark to see the marks. I can just +say we shall be happy to see you any Sunday _after the next_: say, the +Sunday after, and perhaps the Hoods will come too and have a merry other +day, before they go hence. But next Sunday we expect as many as we can +well entertain. + + With ours and Emma's + acknowlgm's + yours + C.L. + + +[The earliest of a long series of letters to Edward Moxon, preserved at +Rowfant by the late Mr. Locker-Lampson, but now in America. Emma Isola's +aunt was Miss Humphreys.] + + + +LETTER 419 + +CHARLES LAMB TO P.G. PATMORE + +[Dated at end: July 19, 1827.] + +Dear P.--I am so poorly! I have been to a funeral, where I made a pun, +to the consternation of the rest of the mourners. And we had wine. I +can't describe to you the howl which the widow set up at proper +intervals. Dash could, for it was not unlike what he makes. + +The letter I sent you was one directed to the care of E. White, India +House, for Mrs. Hazlitt. _Which_ Mrs. Hazlitt I don't yet know, but A. +has taken it to France on speculation. Really it is embarrassing. There +is Mrs. present H., Mrs. late H., and Mrs. John H., and to which of the +three Mrs. Wiggins's it appertains, I don't know. I wanted to open it, +but it's transportation. + +I am sorry you are plagued about your book. I would strongly recommend +you to take for one story Massinger's "Old Law." It is exquisite. I can +think of no other. + +Dash is frightful this morning. He whines and stands up on his hind +legs. He misses Beckey, who is gone to town. I took him to Barnet the +other day, and he couldn't eat his victuals after it. Pray God his +intellectuals be not slipping. + +Mary is gone out for some soles. I suppose 'tis no use to ask you to +come and partake of 'em; else there's a steam-vessel. + +I am doing a tragi-comedy in two acts, and have got on tolerably; but it +will be refused, or worse. I never had luck with anything my name was +put to. + +Oh, I am so poorly! I _waked_ it at my cousin's the bookbinder's, who is +now with God; or, if he is not, it's no fault of mine. + +We hope the Frank wines do not disagree with Mrs. Patmore. By the way, I +like her. + +Did you ever taste frogs? Get them, if you can. They are like little +Lilliput rabbits, only a thought nicer. + +Christ, how sick I am!--not of the world, but of the widow's shrub. +She's sworn under L6000, but I think she perjured herself. She howls in +E _la_, and I comfort her in B flat. You understand music?... + +"No shrimps!" (That's in answer to Mary's question about how the soles +are to be done.) + +I am uncertain where this _wandering_ letter may reach you. What you +mean by Poste Restante, God knows. Do you mean I must pay the postage? +So I do to Dover. + +We had a merry passage with the widow at the Commons. She was +howling--part howling and part giving directions to the proctor--when +crash! down went my sister through a crazy chair, and made the clerks +grin, and I grinned, and the widow tittered--_and then I knew that she +was not inconsolable_. Mary was more frightened than hurt. + +She'd make a good match for anybody (by she, I mean the widow). + + "If he bring but a _relict_ away, + He is happy, nor heard to complain." + +SHENSTONE. + +Procter has got a wen growing out at the nape of his neck, which his +wife wants him to have cut off; but I think it rather an agreeable +excrescence--like his poetry--redundant. Hone has hanged himself for +debt. Godwin was taken up for picking pockets.... Beckey takes to bad +courses. Her father was blown up in a steam machine. The coroner found +it Insanity. I should not like him to sit on my letter. + +Do you observe my direction? Is it Gallic?--Classical? + +Do try and get some frogs. You must ask for "grenouilles" (green-eels). +They don't understand "frogs," though it's a common phrase with us. + +If you go through Bulloign (Boulogne) enquire if old Godfrey is living, +and how he got home from the Crusades. He must be a very old man now. + +If there is anything new in politics or literature in France, keep it +till I see you again, for I'm in no hurry. Chatty-Briant is well I hope. + +I think I have no more news; only give both our loves ("all three," says +Dash) to Mrs. Patmore, and bid her get quite well, as I am at present, +bating qualms, and the grief incident to losing a valuable relation. + +C.L. + +Londres, July 19, 1827. + + +[This is from Patmore's _My Friends and Acquaintances_, 1854; but I have +no confidence in Patmore's transcription. After "picking pockets" should +come, for example, according to other editors, the sentence, "Moxon has +fallen in love with Emma, our nut-brown maid." This is the first we hear +of the circumstance and quite probably Lamb was then exaggerating. As it +happened, however, Moxon and Miss Isola, as we shall see, were married +in 1833. + +We do not know the name of the widow; but her husband was Lamb's cousin, +the bookbinder. + +The doubt about the Hazlitts refers chiefly to William Hazlitt's divorce +from his first wife in 1822, and his remarriage in 1824 with a Mrs. +Bridgewater. + +"Your book." Patmore, in _My Friends and Acquaintances_, writes:-- + +This refers to a series of tales that I was writing, (since published +under the title of _Chatsworth, or the Romance of a Week_.) for the +subject of one of which he had recommended me to take "The Old Law." As +Lamb's critical faculties (as displayed in the celebrated "specimens" +which created an era in the dramatic taste of England) were not +surpassed by those of any writer of his day, the reader may like to see +a few "specimens" of some notes which Lamb took the pains to make on two +of the tales that were shown to him. I give these the rather that there +is occasionally blended with their critical nicety of tact, a drollery +that is very characteristic of the writer. I shall leave these notes and +verbal criticisms to speak for themselves, after merely explaining that +they are written on separate bits of paper, each note having a numerical +reference to that page of the MS. in which occurs the passage commented +on. + +"Besides the words 'riant' and 'Euphrosyne,' the sentence is senseless. +'A sweet sadness' capable of inspiring 'a more _grave joy_'--than +what?--than demonstrations of _mirth_? Odd if it had not been. I had +once a _wry aunt_, which may make me dislike the phrase. + +"'Pleasurable:'--no word is good that is awkward to spell. (Query.) +Welcome or Joyous. + +"'_Steady self-possession_ rather than _undaunted courage_,' etc. The +two things are not opposed enough. You mean, rather than rash fire of +valour in action. + +"'Looking like a heifer,' I fear wont do in prose. (Qy.) 'Like to some +spotless heifer,'--or,'that you might have compared her to some spotless +heifer,' etc.--or 'Like to some sacrificial heifer of old.' I should +prefer, 'garlanded with flowers as for a sacrifice '--and cut the cow +altogether. + +"(Say) 'Like the muttering of some strange spell,'--omitting the +demon,--they are _subject_ to spells, they don't use them. + +"'Feud' here (and before and after) is wrong. (Say) old malice, or, +difference. _Feud_ is of clans. It might be applied to family quarrels, +but is quite improper to individuals falling out. + +"'Apathetic.' Vile word. + +"'Mechanically,' faugh!--insensibly--involuntarily--in-any-thing-ly but +mechanically. + +"Calianax's character should be somewhere briefly _drawn_, not left to +be dramatically inferred. + +"'Surprised and almost vexed while it troubled her.' (Awkward.) Better, +'in a way that while it deeply troubled her, could not but surprise and +vex her to think it should be a source of trouble at all.' + +"'Reaction' is vile slang. 'Physical'--vile word. + +"Decidedly, Dorigen should simply propose to him to remove the rocks as +_ugly_ or _dangerous_, not as affecting her with fears for her husband. +The idea of her husband should be excluded from a promise which is meant +to be _frank_ upon impossible conditions. She cannot promise in one +breath infidelity to him, and make the conditions a good to him. Her +reason for hating the rocks is good, but not to be expressed here. + +"Insert after 'to whatever consequences it might lead,'--'Neither had +Arviragus been disposed to interpose a husband's authority to prevent +the execution of this rash vow, was he unmindful of that older and more +solemn vow which, in the days of their marriage, he had imposed upon +himself, in no instance to control the settled purpose or determination +of his wedded wife;--so that by the chains of a double contract he +seemed bound to abide by her decision in this instance, whatever it +might be.'" + +"A tragi-comedy"--Lamb's dramatic version of Crabbe's "Confidante," +which he called "The Wife's Trial" (see Vol. IV. of this edition). + +"Procter has got a wen." This paragraph must be taken with salt. Poor +Hone, however, had the rules of the King's Bench at the time. Beckey was +the Lambs' servant and tyrant; she had been Hazlitt's. Patmore described +her at some length in his reminiscences of Lamb. + +"Chatty-Briant"--Chateaubriand.] + + + +LETTER 420 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY + +Enfield, July 26th, 1827. + +Dear Mrs. Shelley,--At the risk of throwing away some fine thoughts, I +must write to say how pleased we were with your very kind remembering of +us (who have unkindly run away from all our friends) before you go. +Perhaps you are gone, and then my tropes are wasted. If any piece of +better fortune has lighted upon you than you expected, but less than we +wish you, we are rejoiced. We are here trying to like solitude, but have +scarce enough to justify the experiment. We get some, however. The six +days are our Sabbath; the seventh--why, Cockneys will come for a little +fresh air, and so-- + +But by _your month_, or October at furthest, we hope to see Islington: I +like a giant refreshed with the leaving off of wine, and Mary, pining +for Mr. Moxon's books and Mr. Moxon's society. Then we shall meet. + +I am busy with a farce in two acts, the incidents tragi-comic. I can do +the dialogue _commey fo_: but the damned plot--I believe I must omit it +altogether. The scenes come after one another like geese, not +marshalling like cranes or a Hyde Park review. The story is as simple as +G[eorge] D[yer], and the language plain as his spouse. The characters +are three women to one man; which is one more than laid hold on him in +the "Evangely." I think that prophecy squinted towards my drama. + +I want some Howard Paine to sketch a skeleton of artfully succeeding +scenes through a whole play, as the courses are arranged in a cookery +book: I to find wit, passion, sentiment, character, and the like +trifles: to lay in the dead colours,--I'd Titianesque 'em up: to mark +the channel in a cheek (smooth or furrowed, yours or mine), and where +tears should course I'd draw the waters down: to say where a joke should +come in or a pun be left out: to bring my _personae_ on and off like a +Beau Nash; and I'd Frankenstein them there: to bring three together on +the stage at once; they are so shy with me, that I can get no more than +two; and there they stand till it is the time, without being the season, +to withdraw them. + +I am teaching Emma Latin to qualify her for a superior governess-ship; +which we see no prospect of her getting. 'Tis like feeding a child with +chopped hay from a spoon. Sisyphus--his labours were as nothing to it. + +Actives and passives jostle in her nonsense, till a deponent enters, +like Chaos, more to embroil the fray. Her prepositions are suppositions; +her conjunctions copulative have no connection in them; her concords +disagree; her interjections are purely English "Ah!" and "Oh!" with a +yawn and a gape in the same tongue; and she herself is a lazy, +block-headly supine. As I say to her, ass _in praesenti_ rarely makes a +wise man _in futuro_. + +But I daresay it was so with you when you began Latin, and a good while +after. + +Good-by! Mary's love. + +Yours truly, C. LAMB. + + +[This is the second letter to Mrs. Shelley, _nee_ Mary Wollstonecraft +Godwin, the widow of the poet and the author of _Frankenstein_. She had +been living in England since 1823; and in 1826 had issued anonymously +_The Last Man_. That she kept much in touch with the Lambs' affairs we +know by her letters to Leigh Hunt. + +Major Butterworth has kindly supplied me with a copy of her letter to +Mary Lamb which called forth Lamb's reply. It runs thus:-- + +Kentish Town, 22 July, 1827. + +My dear Miss Lamb, + +You have been long at Enfield--I hardly know yet whether you are +returned--and I quit town so very soon that I have not time to--as I +exceedingly wish--call on you before I go. Nevertheless believe (if such +familiar expression be not unmeet from me) that I love you with all my +heart--gratefully and sincerely--and that when I return I shall seek you +with, I hope, not too much zeal--but it will be with great eagerness. + +You will be glad to hear that I have every reason to believe that the +worst of my pecuniary troubles are over--as I am promised a regular tho' +small income from my father-in-law. I mean to be very industrious _on +other accounts_ this summer, so I hope nothing will go very ill with me +or mine. + +I am afraid Miss Kelly will think me dreadfully rude for not having +availed myself of her kind invitation. Will you present my compliments +to her, and say that my embarassments, harassings and distance from town +are the guilty causes of my omission--for which with her leave I will +apologize in person on my return to London. + +All kind and grateful remembrances to Mr. Lamb, he must not forget me +nor like me one atom less than I delight to flatter myself he does now, +when again I come to seize a dinner perforce at your cottage. Percy is +quite well--and is reading with great extacy (_sic_) the Arabian Nights. +I shall return I suppose some one day in September. God bless you. + +Yours affectionately, + +MARY W. SHELLEY. + +_Commey fo_ is Lamb's _comme il faut_. + +"In the 'Evangely.'" If by Evangely he meant Gospel, Lamb was a little +confused here, I think. Probably Isaiah iv. I was in his mind: "and in +that day seven women shall take hold of one man." But he may also have +half remembered Luke xvii. 35. + +"I am teaching Emma Latin." Mary Lamb contributed to _Blackwood's +Magazine_ for June, 1829, the following little poem describing Emma +Isola's difficulties in these lessons:-- + + TO EMMA, LEARNING LATIN, AND DESPONDING + + Droop not, dear Emma, dry those falling tears, + And call up smiles into thy pallid face, + Pallid and care-worn with thy arduous race: + In few brief months thou hast done the work of years. + To young beginnings natural are these fears. + A right good scholar shalt thou one day be, + And that no distant one; when even she, + Who now to thee a star far off appears, + That most rare Latinist, the Northern Maid-- + The language-loving Sarah[1] of the Lake-- + Shall hail thee Sister Linguist. This will make + Thy friends, who now afford thee careful aid, + A recompense most rich for all their pains, + Counting thy acquisitions their best gains. + + +[Footnote 1: Daughter of S.T. Coleridge, Esq.; an accomplished linguist +in the Greek and Latin tongues, and translatress of a History of the +Abipones.] + +A letter to an anonymous correspondent, in the summer of 1827, has an +amusing passage concerning Emma Isola's Latin. Lamb says that they made +Cary laugh by translating "Blast you" into such elegant verbiage as +"Deus afflet tibi." He adds, "How some parsons would have goggled and +what would Hannah More say? I don't like clergymen, but here and there +one. Cary, the Dante Cary, is a model quite as plain as Parson Primrose, +without a shade of silliness." + +On July 21, 1827, is a letter to Mr. Dillon, whom I do not identify, +saying that Lamb has been teaching Emma Isola Latin for the past seven +weeks. + +"Ass _in praesenti_." This was Boyer's joke, at Christ's Hospital (see +Vol. I. of this edition). + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Edward White, of the India House, +dated August 1, 1827, in which Lamb has some pleasantry about paying +postages, and ends by heartily commending White to mind his ledger, and +keep his eye on Mr. Chambers' balances.] + + + +LETTER 421 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. BASIL MONTAGU + +[Summer, 1827.] + +Dear Madam,--I return your List with my name. I should be sorry that any +respect should be going on towards [Clarkson,] and I be left out of the +conspiracy. Otherwise I frankly own that to pillarize a man's good +feelings in his lifetime is not to my taste. Monuments to goodness, even +after death, are equivocal. I turn away from Howard's, I scarce know +why. Goodness blows no trumpet, nor desires to have it blown. We should +be modest for a modest man--as he is for himself. The vanities of +Life--Art, Poetry, Skill military, are subjects for trophies; not the +silent thoughts arising in a good man's mind in lonely places. Was I +C[larkson,] I should never be able to walk or ride near ------ again. +Instead of bread, we are giving him a stone. Instead of the locality +recalling the noblest moment of his existence, it is a place at which +his friends (that is, himself) blow to the world, "What a good man is +he!" I sat down upon a hillock at Forty Hill yesternight--a fine +contemplative evening,--with a thousand good speculations about mankind. +How I yearned with cheap benevolence! I shall go and inquire of the +stone-cutter, that cuts the tombstones here, what a stone with a short +inscription will cost; just to say--"Here C. Lamb loved his brethren of +mankind." Everybody will come there to love. As I can't well put my own +name, I shall put about a subscription: + + _s. d_. + Mrs. ---- 5 0 + Procter 2 6 + G. Dyer 1 0 + Mr. Godwin 0 0 + Mrs. Godwin 0 0 + Mr. Irving a watch-chain. + Mr. ------- the proceeds of ------ first edition.* + ___ ___ + 8 6 + +I scribble in haste from here, where we shall be some time. Pray request +Mr. M[ontagu] to advance the guinea for me, which shall faithfully be +forthcoming; and pardon me that I don't see the proposal in quite the +light that he may. The kindness of his motives, and his power of +appreciating the noble passage, I thoroughly agree in. + +With most kind regards to him, I conclude, Dear Madam, + + Yours truly, C. LAMB. + +From Mrs. Leishman's, Chase, Enfield. + +*A capital book, by the bye, but not over saleable. + + +[The memorial to Thomas Clarkson stands on a hill above Wade Mill, on +the Buntingford Road, in Hertfordshire. + +Forty Hill is close to Enfield. + +Edward Irving's watch-chain. The explanation of Lamb's joke is to be +found in Carlyle's _Reminiscences_ (quoted also in Froude's _Life_, Vol. +I., page 326). Irving had put down as his contribution to some +subscription list, at a public meeting, "an actual gold watch, which he +said had just arrived to him from his beloved brother lately dead in +India." This rather theatrical action had evidently amused Lamb as it +had disgusted Carlyle. + +The "first edition" of "Mr. -----" was, I suppose, Basil Montagu's work +on Bacon, which Macaulay reviewed.] + + + +LETTER 422 + +MARY LAMB TO LADY STODDART + +[August 9, 1827.] + +My dear Lady-Friend,--My brother called at our empty cottage yesterday, +and found the cards of your son and his friend, Mr. Hine, under the +door; which has brought to my mind that I am in danger of losing this +post, as I did the last, being at that time in a confused state of +mind--for at that time we were talking of leaving, and persuading +ourselves that we were intending to leave town and all our friends, and +sit down for ever, solitary and forgotten, here. Here we are; and we +have locked up our house, and left it to take care of itself; but at +present we do not design to extend our rural life beyond Michaelmas. +Your kind letter was most welcome to me, though the good news contained +in it was already known to me. Accept my warmest congratulations, though +they come a little of the latest. In my next I may probably have to hail +you Grandmama; or to felicitate you on the nuptials of pretty Mary, who, +whatever the beaux of Malta may think of her, I can only remember her +round shining face, and her "O William!"--"dear William!" when we +visited her the other day at school. Present my love and best wishes--a +long and happy married life to dear Isabella--I love to call her +Isabella; but in truth, having left your other letter in town, I +recollect no other name she has. + +The same love and the same wishes--in futuro--to my friend Mary. Tell +her that her "dear William" grows taller, and improves in manly looks +and manlike behaviour every time I see him. What is Henry about? and +what should one wish for him? If he be in search of a wife, I will send +him out Emma Isola. + +You remember Emma, that you were so kind as to invite to your ball? She +is now with us; and I am moving heaven and earth, that is to say, I am +pressing the matter upon all the very few friends I have that are likely +to assist me in such a case, to get her into a family as a governess; +and Charles and I do little else here than teach her something or other +all day long. + +We are striving to put enough Latin into her to enable her to begin to +teach it to young learners. So much for Emma --for you are so fearfully +far away, that I fear it is useless to implore your patronage for her. + +I have not heard from Mrs. Hazlitt a long time. I believe she is still +with Hazlitt's mother in Devonshire. + +I expect a pacquet of manuscript from you: you promised me the office of +negotiating with booksellers, and so forth, for your next work. Is it in +good forwardness? or do you grow rich and indolent now? It is not +surprising that your Maltese story should find its way into Malta; but I +was highly pleased with the idea of your pleasant surprise at the sight +of it. I took a large sheet of paper, in order to leave Charles room to +add something more worth reading than my poor mite. + +May we all meet again once more! + +M. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 423 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SIR JOHN STODDART + +(_Same letter: Lamb's share_) + +Dear Knight--Old Acquaintance--'Tis with a violence to the _pure +imagination_ (_vide_ the "Excursion" _passim_) that I can bring myself +to believe I am writing to Dr. Stoddart once again, at Malta. But the +deductions of severe reason warrant the proceeding. I write from +Enfield, where we are seriously weighing the advantages of dulness over +the over-excitement of too much company, but have not yet come to a +conclusion. What is the news? for we see no paper here; perhaps you can +send us an old one from Malta. Only, I heard a butcher in the +market-place whisper something about a change of ministry. I don't know +who's in or out, or care, only as it might affect _you_. For domestic +doings, I have only to tell, with extreme regret, that poor Elisa +Fenwick (that was)--Mrs. Rutherford--is dead; and that we have received +a most heart-broken letter from her mother--left with four +grandchildren, orphans of a living scoundrel lurking about the pothouses +of Little Russell Street, London: they and she--God help 'em!--at New +York. I have just received Godwin's third volume of the _Republic_, +which only reaches to the commencement of the Protectorate. I think he +means to spin it out to his life's thread. Have you seen Fearn's +_Anti-Tooke_? I am no judge of such things--you are; but I think it very +clever indeed. If I knew your bookseller, I'd order it for you at a +venture: 'tis two octavos, Longman and Co. Or do you read now? Tell it +not in the Admiralty Court, but my head aches _hesterno vino_. I can +scarce pump up words, much less ideas, congruous to be sent so far. But +your son must have this by to-night's post.[_Here came a passage +relating to an escapade of young Stoddart, then at the Charterhouse, +which, probably through Lamb's intervention, was treated leniently. Lamb +helped him--with his imposition-- Gray's "Elegy" into Greek elegiacs_.] +Manning is gone to Rome, Naples, etc., probably to touch at Sicily, +Malta, Guernsey, etc.; but I don't know the map. Hazlitt is resident at +Paris, whence he pours his lampoons in safety at his friends in England. +He has his boy with him. I am teaching Emma Latin. By the time you can +answer this, she will be qualified to instruct young ladies: she is a +capital English reader: and S.T.C. acknowledges that a part of a passage +in Milton she read better than he, and part he read best, her part being +the shorter. But, seriously, if Lady St------ (oblivious pen, that was +about to write _Mrs._!) could hear of such a young person wanted (she +smatters of French, some Italian, music of course), we'd send our loves +by her. My congratulations and assurances of old esteem. C.L. + + +[Stoddart had been appointed in 1826 Chief-Justice and Justice of the +Vice-Admiralty Court in Malta and had been knighted in the same year. +His daughter Isabella had just married. Lady Stoddart's literary efforts +did not, I think, reach print. + +"The deductions of severe reason." See the quotation from Cottle in the +letter to Manning of November, 1802. + +"A change of ministry." On Liverpool's resignation early in 1827 Canning +had been called in to form a new Ministry, which he effected by an +alliance with the Whigs. + +"Godwin's _Republic_"--_History of the Commonwealth of England_, in +four volumes, 1824-1828. + +"Fearn's _Anti-Tooke_"--_Anti-Tooke; or, An Analysis of the Principles +and Structure of Language Exemplified in the English Tongue_, 1824. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Hone, dated August 10, 1827, in +which Lamb expresses regret for Matilda Hone's illness.] + + + +LETTER 424 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 10 August, 1827.] + +Dear B.B.--I have not been able to: answer you, for we have had, and +are having (I just snatch a moment), our poor quiet retreat, to which we +fled from society, full of company, some staying with us, and this +moment as I write almost a heavy importation of two old Ladies has come +in. Whither can I take wing from the oppression of human faces? Would I +were in a wilderness of Apes, tossing cocoa nuts about, grinning and +grinned at! + +Mitford was hoaxing you surely about my Engraving, 'tis a little +sixpenny thing, too like by half, in which the draughtsman has done his +best to avoid flattery. There have been 2 editions of it, which I think +are all gone, as they have vanish'd from the window where they hung, a +print shop, corner of Great and Little Queen Streets, Lincolns Inn +fields, where any London friend of yours may inquire for it; for I am +(tho' you _won't understand_ it) at Enfield (Mrs. Leishman's, Chase). We +have been here near 3 months, and shall stay 2 or more, if people will +let us alone, but they persecute us from village to village. So don't +direct to _Islington_ again, till further notice. + +I am trying my hand at a Drama, in 2 acts, founded on Crabbe's +"Confidant," mutatis mutandis. + +You like the Odyssey. Did you ever read my "Adventures of Ulysses," +founded on Chapman's old translation of it? for children or _men_. Ch. +is divine, and my abridgment has not quite emptied him of his divinity. +When you come to town I'll show it you. + +You have well described your old fashioned Grand-paternall Hall. Is it +not odd that every one's earliest recollections are of some such place. +I had my Blakesware (Blakesmoor in the "London"). Nothing fills a childs +mind like a large old Mansion [_one or two words wafered over_]; better +if un-or-partially-occupied; peopled with the spirits of deceased +members of [for] the County and Justices of the Quorum. Would I were +buried in the peopled solitude of one, with my feelings at 7 years old. + +Those marble busts of the Emperors, they seem'd as if they were to stand +for ever, as they had stood from the living days of Rome, in that old +Marble Hall, and I to partake of their permanency; Eternity was, while I +thought not of Time. But he thought of me, and they are toppled down, +and corn covers the spot of the noble old Dwelling and its princely +gardens. I feel like a grasshopper that chirping about the grounds +escaped his scythe only by my littleness. Ev'n now he is whetting one of +his smallest razors to clean wipe me out, perhaps. Well! + + +["My Engraving"--Brook Pulham's caricature. + +"You have well described your ... Grand-paternall Hall." Barton wrote +the following account of this house, the home of his step-grandfather at +Tottenham; but I do not know whether it is the same that Lamb saw:-- + + My most delightful recollections of boyhood are connected with the + fine old country-house in a green lane diverging from the high road + which runs through Tottenham. I would give seven years of life as it + now is, for a week of that which I then led. It was a large old + house, with an iron palisade and a pair of iron gates in front, and + a huge stone eagle on each pier. Leading up to the steps by which + you went up to the hall door, was a wide gravel walk, bordered in + summer time by huge tubs, in which were orange and lemon trees, and + in the centre of the grass-plot stood a tub yet huger, holding an + enormous aloe, The hall itself, to my fancy then lofty and wide as a + cathedral would seem now, was a famous place for battledore and + shuttlecock; and behind was a garden, equal to that of old Alcinous + himself. My favourite walk was one of turf by a long straight pond, + bordered with lime-trees. But the whole demesne was the fairy ground + of my childhood; and its presiding genius was grandpapa. He must + have been a very handsome man in his youth, for I remember him at + nearly eighty, a very fine-looking one, even in the decay of mind + and body. In the morning a velvet cap; by dinner, a flaxen wig; his + features always expressive of benignity and placid cheerfulness. + When he walked out into the garden, his cocked hat and amber-headed + cane completed his costume. To the recollection of this delightful + personage, I am, I think, indebted for many soothing and pleasing + associations, with old age. + +"Those marble busts of the Emperors." See the _Elia_ essay "Blakesmoor +in H----shire," in Vol. II, of this edition.] + + + +LETTER 425 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +28th of Aug., 1827. + +I have left a place for a wafer, but can't find it again. + +Dear B.B.--I am thankful to you for your ready compliance with my +wishes. Emma is delighted with your verses, to which I have appended +this notice "The 6th line refers to the child of a dear friend of the +author's, named Emma," without which it must be obscure; and have sent +it with four Album poems of my own (your daughter's with _your_ heading, +requesting it a place next mine) to a Mr. Fraser, who is to be editor of +a more superb Pocket book than has yet appeared by far! the property of +some wealthy booksellers, but whom, or what its name, I forgot to ask. +It is actually to have in it schoolboy exercises by his present Majesty +and the late Duke of York, so Lucy will come to Court; how she will be +stared at! Wordsworth is named as a Contributor. Frazer, whom I have +slightly seen, is Editor of a forth-come or coming Review of foreign +books, and is intimately connected with Lockhart, &c. so I take it that +this is a concern of Murray's. Walter Scott also contributes mainly. I +have stood off a long time from these Annuals, which are ostentatious +trumpery, but could not withstand the request of Jameson, a particular +friend of mine and Coleridge. + +I shall hate myself in frippery, strutting along, and vying finery with +Beaux and Belles + + with "Future Lord Byrons and sweet L.E.L.'s."-- + +Your taste I see is less simple than mine, which the difference of our +persuasions has doubtless effected. In fact, of late you have so +frenchify'd your style, larding it with hors de combats, and au +desopoirs, that o' my conscience the Foxian blood is quite dried out of +you, and the skipping Monsieur spirit has been infused. Doth Lucy go to +Balls? I must remodel my lines, which I write for her. I hope A.K. keeps +to her Primitives. If you have any thing you'd like to send further, I +don't know Frazer's address, but I sent mine thro' Mr. Jameson, 19 or 90 +Cheyne Street, Totnam Court road. I dare say an honourable place wou'd +be given to them; but I have not heard from Frazer since I sent mine, +nor shall probably again, and therefore I do not solicit it as from him. + +Yesterday I sent off my tragi comedy to Mr. Kemble. Wish it luck. I made +it all ('tis blank verse, and I think, of the true old dramatic cut) or +most of it, in the green lanes about Enfield, where I am and mean to +remain, in spite of your peremptory doubts on that head. + +Your refusal to lend your poetical sanction to my Icon, and your reasons +to Evans, are most sensible. May be I may hit on a line or two of my own +jocular. May be not. + +Do you never Londonize again? I should like to talk over old poetry with +you, of which I have much, and you I think little. Do your Drummonds +allow no holydays? I would willingly come and w[ork] for you a three +weeks or so, to let you loose. Would I could sell or give you some of my +Leisure! Positively, the best thing a man can have to do is nothing, and +next to that perhaps--good works. + +I am but poorlyish, and feel myself writing a dull letter; poorlyish +from Company, not generally, for I never was better, nor took more +walks, 14 miles a day on an average, with a sporting dog--Dash--you +would not know the plain Poet, any more than he doth recognize James +Naylor trick'd out au deserpoy (how do you spell it.) En Passant, J'aime +entendre da mon bon homme sur surveillance de croix, ma pas l'homme +figuratif--do you understand me? + + +[The verses with which Emma was delighted were probably written for her +album. I have not seen them. That album was cut up for the value of its +autographs and exists now only in a mutilated state: where, I cannot +discover. The pocket-book was _The Bijou_, 1828, edited by William +Fraser for Pickering. Only one of Lamb's contributions was included: his +verses for his own album (see Vol. IV. of this edition). + +Jameson was Robert Jameson, to whom Hartley Coleridge addressed the +sonnets in the _London Magazine_ to which Lamb alludes in a previous +letter. He was the husband of Mrs. Jameson, author of _Sacred and +Legendary Art_, but the marriage was not happy. He lived in Chenies +Street. + +"Future Lord Byrons and sweet L.E.L.'s." A line from some verses written +by Lamb in more than one album. Probably originally intended for Emma +Isola's album. The passage runs, answering the question, "What is an +Album?"-- + + 'Tis a Book kept by modern Young Ladies for show, + Of which their plain grandmothers nothing did know. + 'Tis a medley of scraps, fine verse, and fine prose, + And some things not very like either, God knows. + The soft First Effusions of Beaux and of Belles, + Of future Lord Byrons and sweet L.E.L.'s. + +L.E.L. was, of course, the unhappy Letitia Landon, a famous contributor +to the published albums. + +"My tragi comedy." Still "The Wife's Trial." Kemble was Charles Kemble, +manager of Covent Garden Theatre. The play was never acted. + +"Your refusal to lend your poetical sanction." This is not clear, but I +think the meaning to be deducible. The Icon was Pulham's etching of +Lamb. Evans was William Evans, who had grangerised Byron's _English +Bards and Scotch Reviewers_. I take it that he was now making another +collection of portraits of poets and was asking other poets, their +friends, to write verses upon them. In this way he had applied through +Lamb to Barton for verses on Pulham's Elia, and had been refused. This +is, of course, only conjecture. + +"Your Drummonds"--your bankers. Barton's bankers were the Alexanders, a +Quaker firm. + +"James Naylor." Barton had paraphrased Nayler's "Testimony." + +Following this letter, under the date August 29, 1827, should come a +letter from Lamb to Robert Jameson (husband of Mrs. Jameson) asking him +to interest himself in Miss Isola's career. "Our friend Coleridge will +bear witness to the very excellent manner in which she read to him some +of the most difficult passages in the Paradise Lost."] + + + +LETTER 426 + +CHARLES LAMB TO P.G. PATMORE + +Mrs. Leishman's, Chace, Enfield, + +September, 1827. + +Dear Patmore--Excuse my anxiety--but how is Dash? (I should have asked +if Mrs. Patmore kept her rules, and was improving--but Dash came +uppermost. The order of our thoughts should be the order of our +writing.) Goes he muzzled, or _aperto ore_? Are his intellects sound, or +does he wander a little in _his_ conversation? You cannot be too careful +to watch the first symptoms of incoherence. The first illogical snarl he +makes, to St. Luke's with him! All the dogs here are going mad, if you +believe the overseers; but I protest they seem to me very rational and +collected. But nothing is so deceitful as mad people to those who are +not used to them. Try him with hot water. If he won't lick it up, it is +a sign he does not like it. Does his tail wag horizontally or +perpendicularly? That has decided the fate of many dogs in Enfield. Is +his general deportment cheerful? I mean when he is pleased--for +otherwise there is no judging. You can't be too careful. Has he bit any +of the children yet? If he has, have them shot, and keep _him_ for +curiosity, to see if it was the hydrophobia. They say all our army in +India had it at one time--but that was in _Hyder_-Ally's time. Do you +get paunch for him? Take care the sheep was sane. You might pull out his +teeth (if he would let you), and then you need not mind if he were as +mad as a Bedlamite. It would be rather fun to see his odd ways. It might +amuse Mrs. Patmore and the children. They'd have more sense than he! +He'd be like a Fool kept in the family, to keep the household in good +humour with their own understanding. You might teach him the mad dance +set to the mad howl. _Madge Owl-et_ would be nothing to him. "My, how he +capers!" [_In the margin is written_:] One of the children speaks this. + +[_Three lines here are erased_.] What I scratch out is a German +quotation from Lessing on the bite of rabid animals; but, I remember, +you don't read German. But Mrs. Patmore may, so I wish I had let it +stand. The meaning in English is--"Avoid to approach an animal suspected +of madness, as you would avoid fire or a precipice:--" which I think is +a sensible observation. The Germans are certainly profounder than we. + +If the slightest suspicion arises in your breast, that all is not right +with him (Dash), muzzle him, and lead him in a string (common +pack-thread will do; he don't care for twist) to Hood's, his quondam +master, and he'll take him in at any time. You may mention your +suspicion or not, as you like, or as you think it may wound or not Mr. +H.'s feelings. Hood, I know, will wink at a few follies in Dash, in +consideration of his former sense. Besides, Hood is deaf, and if you +hinted anything, ten to one he would not hear you. Besides, you will +have discharged your conscience, and laid the child at the right door, +as they say. + +We are dawdling our time away very idly and pleasantly, at a Mrs. +Leishman's, Chace, Enfield, where, if you come a-hunting, we can give +you cold meat and a tankard. Her husband is a tailor; but that, you +know, does not make her one. I knew a jailor (which rhymes), but his +wife was a fine lady. + +Let us hear from you respecting Mrs. Patmore's regimen. I send my love +in a ------ to Dash. C. LAMB. + +[_On the outside of the letter was written_:--] + +Seriously, I wish you would call upon Hood when you are that way. He's a +capital fellow. I sent him a couple of poems --one ordered by his wife, +and written to order; and 'tis a week since, and I've not heard from +him. I fear something is the matter. + +_Omitted within_ + +Our kindest remembrance to Mrs. P. + + +[This is from Patmore's _My Friends and Acquaintances_, 1854; but again +I have no confidence in Patmore's transcription. + +Dash had been Hood's dog, and afterwards was Lamb's; while at one time +Moxon seems to have had the care of it. Patmore possibly was taking Dash +while the Lambs were at Mrs. Leishman's. One of the children who might +be amused by the dog's mad ways was Coventry Patmore, afterwards the +poet, then nearly four years old.] + + + +LETTER 427 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. September 5, 1827.] + +Dear Dib,--Emma Isola, who is with us, has opened an ALBUM: bring some +verses with you for it on Sat'y evening. Any _fun_ will do. I am +teaching her Latin; you may make something of that. Don't be modest. For +in it you shall appear, if I rummage out some of your old pleasant +letters for rhymes. But an original is better. + +Has your pa[1] any scrap? C.L. + +We shall be MOST glad to see your sister or sisters with you. Can't you +contrive it? Write in that case. + + +[Footnote 1: the infantile word for father.] + + +[On the blank pages inside the letter Dibdin seems to have jotted down +ideas for his contribution to the album. Unfortunately, as I have said, +the album is not forthcoming.] + + + +LETTER 428 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. September 13, 1827.] + +Dear _John_--Your verses are very pleasant, and have been adopted into +the splendid Emmatic constellation, where they are not of the least +magnitude. She is delighted with their merit and readiness. They are +just the thing. The 14th line is found. We advertised it. Hell is +cooling for want of company. We shall make it up along with our kitchen +fire to roast you into our new House, where I hope you will find us in a +few Sundays. We have actually taken it, and a compact thing it will be. + +Kemble does not return till the month's end. My heart sometimes is good, +sometimes bad, about it, as the day turns out wet or walky. + +Emma has just died, choak'd with a Gerund in dum. On opening her we +found a Participle in rus in the pericordium. The king never dies, which +may be the reason that it always REIGNS here. + +We join in loves. C.L. his orthograph. + +what a pen! + +the Umberella is cum bak. + + + +LETTER 429 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. September 18, 1827.] + +My dear, and now more so, JOHN-- + +How that name smacks! what an honest, full, English, +and yet withal holy and apostolic sound it bears, above the +methodistical priggish Bishoppy name of Timothy, under +which I had obscured your merits! + +What I think of the paternal verses, you shall read within, +which I assure you is not pen praise but heart praise. + +It is the gem of the Dibdin Muses. + +I have got all my books into my new house, and their +readers in a fortnight will follow, to whose joint converse nobody +shall be more welcome than you, and _any of yours_. + +The house is perfection to our use and comfort. + +Milton is come. I wish Wordsworth were here to meet him. +The next importation is of pots and saucepans, window curtains, +crockery and such base ware. + +The pleasure of moving, when Becky moves for you. O +the moving Becky! + +I hope you will come and _warm_ the house with the first. + +From my temporary domicile, Enfield. + +ELIA, that "is to go."-- + + +[The paternal verses were probably a contribution by Charles +Dibdin the Younger for Emma Isola's album. The Lambs were +just moving to Enfield for good, as they hoped (see next letter), +Milton was the portrait.] + + + +LETTER 430 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +Tuesday [September 18, 1827], + +Dear Hood, + +If I have any thing in my head, I will send it to Mr. +Watts. Strictly speaking he should have had my Album +verses, but a very intimate friend importund me for the trifles, +and I believe I forgot Mr. Watts, or lost sight at the time of his +similar Souvenir. Jamieson conveyed the farce from me to +Mrs. C. Kemble, _he_ will not be in town before the 27th. Give +our kind loves to all at Highgate, and tell them that we have +finally torn ourselves out right away from Colebrooke, where I +had no health, and are about to domiciliate for good at Enfield, +where I have experienced _good_. + + Lord what good hours do we keep! + How quietly we sleep! + +See the rest in the Complete Angler. We have got our books into our new +house. I am a drayhorse if I was not asham'd of the indigested dirty +lumber, as I toppled 'em out of the cart, and blest Becky that came with +'em for her having an unstuffd brain with such rubbish. We shall get in +by Michael's mass. Twas with some pain we were evuls'd from Colebrook. +You may find some of our flesh sticking to the door posts. To change +habitations is to die to them, and in my time I have died seven deaths. +But I don't know whether every such change does not bring with it a +rejuvenescence. Tis an enterprise, and shoves back the sense of death's +approximating, which tho' not terrible to me, is at all times +particularly distasteful. My house-deaths have generally been +periodical, recurring after seven years, but this last is premature by +half that time. Cut off in the flower of Colebrook. The Middletonian +stream and all its echoes mourn. Even minnows dwindle. A parvis fiunt +MINIMI. I fear to invite Mrs. Hood to our new mansion, lest she envy it, +& rote [? rout] us. But when we are fairly in, I hope she will come & +try it. I heard she & you were made uncomfortable by some unworthy to be +cared for attacks, and have tried to set up a feeble counteraction thro' +the Table Book of last Saturday. Has it not reach'd you, that you are +silent about it? Our new domicile is no manor house, but new, & +externally not inviting, but furnish'd within with every convenience. +Capital new locks to every door, capital grates in every room, with +nothing to pay for incoming & the rent L10 less than the Islington one. +It was built a few years since at L1100 expence, they tell me, & I +perfectly believe it. And I get it for L35 exclusive of moderate taxes. +We think ourselves most lucky. It is not our intention to abandon Regent +Street, & West End perambulations (monastic & terrible thought!), but +occasionally to breathe the FRESHER AIR of the metropolis. We shall put +up a bedroom or two (all we want) for occasional ex-rustication, where +we shall visit, not be visited. Plays too we'll see,--perhaps our own. +Urban! Sylvani, & Sylvan Urbanuses in turns. Courtiers for a spurt, then +philosophers. Old homely tell-truths and learn-truths in the virtuous +shades of Enfield, Liars again and mocking gibers in the coffee houses & +resorts of London. What can a mortal desire more for his bi-parted +nature? + +O the curds & cream you shall eat with us here! + +O the turtle soup and lobster sallads we shall devour with you there! + +O the old books we shall peruse here! + +O the new nonsense we shall trifle over there! + +O Sir T. Browne!--here. + +O Mr. Hood & Mr. Jerdan there, + +thine, + +C (urbanus) L (sylvanus) (ELIA ambo)-- + +Inclos'd are verses which Emma sat down to write, her first, on the eve +after your departure. Of course they are only for Mrs. H.'s perusal. +They will shew at least, that one of our party is not willing to cut old +friends. What to call 'em I don't know. Blank verse they are not, +because of the rhymes--Rhimes they are not, because of the blank verse. +Heroics they are not, because they are lyric, lyric they are not, +because of the Heroic measure. They must be call'd EMMAICS.------ + + +[Mr. Watts was Alaric A. Watts. + +"Thro' the _Table Book_." Lamb contributed to Hone's _Table Book_ a +prose paraphrase of Hood's _Plea, of the Midsummer Fairies_, just +published, which had been dedicated to him, under the title "The Defeat +of Time." In a previous number Moxon had addressed to Hood a eulogistic +sonnet on the same subject. The attacks on Hood I have not sought. + +"We shall put up a bedroom." This project was very imperfectly carried +out. Indeed Lamb practically lost London from this date, his subsequent +visits there being as a rule not fortunate. + +"Mr. Jerdan"--William Jerdan, editor of the _Literary Gazette_. + +"Emmaics." These verses are no longer forthcoming. + +Here should come a letter to Allsop dated September 25, 1827, saying +that Mary Lamb has her nurse Miss James and the house is melancholy. +Given in the Boston Bibliophile edition.] + + + +LETTER 431 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY COLBURN + +[Dated at end: September 25, 1827.] + +Dear Sir--I beg leave in the warmest manner to recommend to your notice +Mr. Moxon, the Bearer of this, if by any chance yourself should want a +steady hand in your business, or know of any Publisher that may want +such a one. He is at present in the house of Messrs. Longman and Co., +where he has been established for more than six years, and has the +conduct of one of the four departments of the Country line. A difference +respecting Salary, which he expected to be a little raised on his last +promotion, makes him wish to try to better himself. I believe him to be +a young man of the highest integrity, and a thorough man of business; +and should not have taken the liberty of recommending him, if I had not +thought him capable of being highly useful. + + I am, + Sir, + with great respect, + your hble Serv't + CHARLES LAMB. + +Enfield, Chace Side, 25th Sep. 1827. + + +[Moxon did not go to Colburn, but to Hurst & Co. in St. Paul's +Churchyard.] + + + +LETTER 432 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ?Sept. 26, 1827.] + +Pray, send me the Table Book. + +Dear M. Our pleasant meeting[s] for some time are suspended. My sister +was taken very ill in a few hours after you left us (I had suspected +it),--and I must wait eight or nine weeks in slow hope of her recovery. +It is her old complaint. You will say as much to the Hoods, and to Mrs. +Lovekin, and Mrs. Hazlitt, with my kind love. + +We are in the House, that is all. I hope one day we shall both enjoy it, +and see our friends again. But till then I must be a solitary nurse. + +I am trying Becky's sister to be with her, so don't say anything to Miss +James. + +Yours truly + +CH. LAMB. + +Monday. I will send your books soon. + + +[Miss James was, as we have seen, Mary Lamb's regular nurse. She had +subsequently to be sent for. I do not identify Mrs. Lovekin.] + + + +LETTER 433 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[Dated at end: October 1 (1827).] + +Dear R.--I am settled for life I hope, at Enfield. I have taken the +prettiest compactest house I ever saw, near to Antony Robinson's, but +alas! at the expence of poor Mary, who was taken ill of her old +complaint the night before we got into it. So I must suspend the +pleasure I expected in the surprise you would have had in coming down +and finding us householders. + +Farewell, till we can all meet comfortable. Pray, apprise Martin Burney. +Him I longed to have seen with you, but our house is too small to meet +either of you without her knowledge. + +God bless you. + +C. LAMB. + +Chase Side 1st Oct'r + + +[Antony Robinson, a prominent Unitarian, a friend but no relation of +Crabb Robinson's, had died in the previous January. His widow still +lived at Enfield.] + + + +LETTER 434 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN + +[P.M. October 2, 1827.] + +My dear Dibdin, It gives me great pain to have to say that I cannot have +the pleasure of seeing you for some time. We are in our house, but Mary +has been seized with one of her periodical disorders--a temporary +derangement--which commonly lasts for two months. You shall have the +first notice of her convalescence. Can you not send your manuscript by +the Coach? directed to Chase Side, next to Mr. Westwood's Insurance +office. I will take great care of it. + + Yours most Truly C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 435 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BARRON FIELD + +Oct. 4th, 1827. + +I am not in humour to return a fit reply to your pleasant letter. We are +fairly housed at Enfield, and an angel shall not persuade me to wicked +London again. We have now six sabbath days in a week for--_none_! The +change has worked on my sister's mind, to make her ill; and I must wait +a tedious time before we can hope to enjoy this place in unison. Enjoy +it, when she recovers, I know we shall. I see no shadow, but in her +illness, for repenting the step! For Mathews --I know my own utter +unfitness for such a task. I am no hand at describing costumes, a great +requisite in an account of mannered pictures. I have not the slightest +acquaintance with pictorial language even. An imitator of me, or rather +pretender to be _me_, in his Rejected Articles, has made me minutely +describe the dresses of the poissardes at Calais!--I could as soon +resolve Euclid. I have no eye for forms and fashions. I substitute +analysis, and get rid of the phenomenon by slurring in for it its +impression. I am sure you must have observed this defect, or +peculiarity, in my writings; else the delight would be incalculable in +doing such a thing for Mathews, whom I greatly like--and Mrs. Mathews, +whom I almost greatlier like. What a feast 'twould be to be sitting at +the pictures painting 'em into words; but I could almost as soon make +words into pictures. I speak this deliberately, and not out of modesty. +I pretty well know what I can't do. + +My sister's verses are homely, but just what they should be; I send +them, not for the poetry, but the good sense and good-will of them. I +was beginning to transcribe; but Emma is sadly jealous of its getting +into more hands, and I won't spoil it in her eyes by divulging it. Come +to Enfield, and _read it_. As my poor cousin, the bookbinder, now with +God, told me, most sentimentally, that having purchased a picture of +fish at a dead man's sale, his heart ached to see how the widow grieved +to part with it, being her dear husband's favourite; and he almost +apologised for his generosity by saying he could not help telling the +widow she was "welcome to come and look at it"--e.g. at _his house_--"as +often as she pleased." There was the germ of generosity in an uneducated +mind. He had just _reading_ enough from the backs of books for the "_nec +sinit esse feros_"--had he read inside, the same impulse would have led +him to give back the two-guinea thing--with a request to see it, now and +then, at _her_ house. We are parroted into delicacy.--Thus you have a +tale for a Sonnet. + +Adieu! with (imagine both) our loves. C. LAMB. + + +[The suggestion had been made to Lamb, through Barron Field, that he +should write a descriptive catalogue of Charles Mathews' collection of +theatrical portraits; Lamb having already touched upon them in his "Old +Actors" articles in the _London Magazine_ (see Vol. II. of this +edition). When they were exhibited, after Mathews' death, at the +Pantheon in Oxford Street, Lamb's remarks were appended to the catalogue +_raisonne_. They are now at the Garrick Club. + +"An imitator of me." P.G. Patmore's _Rejected Articles_, 1826, leads off +with "An Unsentimental Journey" by Elia which is, except for a fitful +superficial imitation of some of Lamb's mannerisms, as unlike him as +could well be. The description of the butterwomen's dress, to which Lamb +refers, will illustrate the divergence between Elia and his parodist:-- + + Her attire is fashioned as follows: and it differs from all her + tribe only in the relative arrangement of its colours. On the body a + crimson jacket, of a thick, solid texture, and tight to the shape; + but without any pretence at ornament. This is met at the waist + (which is neither long, nor short, but exactly where nature placed + it) by a dark blue petticoat, of a still thicker texture, so that it + hangs in large plaits where it is gathered in behind. Over this, in + front, is tied tightly round the waist, so as to keep all trim and + compact, a dark apron, the string of which passes over the little + fulled skirt of the jacket behind, and makes it stick out smartly + and tastily, while it clips the waist in. The head-gear consists of + a sort of mob cap, nothing of which but the edge round the face can + be seen, on account of the kerchief (of flowered cotton) which is + passed over it, hood fashion, and half tied under the chin. This + head-kerchief is in place of the bonnet--a thing not to be seen + among the whole five hundred females who make up this pleasant show. + Indeed, varying the colours of the different articles, this + description applies to every dress of the whole assembly; except + that in some the fineness of the day has dispensed with the + kerchief, and left the snow-white cap exposed; and in others, the + whole figure (except the head) is coyishly covered and concealed by + a large hooded cloak of black cloth, daintily lined with silk, and + confined close up to the throat by an embossed silver clasp, but + hanging loosely down to the heels, in thick, full folds. The + petticoat is very short; the trim ancles are cased in close-fit hose + of dark, sober, slate colour; and the shoes, though thick and + serviceable like all the rest of the costume, fit the foot as neatly + as those which are not made to walk in. + +Patmore tells us that his first meeting with the Lambs was immediately +after they had first seen his book; and they left the house intent upon +reading it. + +"My sister's verses." I think these would probably be the lines on Emma +learning Latin which I have quoted above. + +Here should come a very pleasant letter from Lamb to Dodwell, of the +India House, dated October 7, 1827. Lamb thanks Dodwell, to whom there +is an earlier letter extant, for a pig. He first describes his new house +at Enfield, and then breaks off about the cooking of the pig, bidding +Becky do it "nice and _crips_." The rest is chaff concerning the India +House and Dodwell's fellow-clerks.] + + + +LETTER 436 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[No date. ? Oct., 1827.] + +Dear Hone,--having occasion to write to Clarke I put in a bit to you. I +see no Extracts in this N'o. You should have three sets in hand, one +long one in particular from Atreus and Thyestes, terribly fine. Don't +spare 'em; with fragments, divided as you please, they'll hold out to +Xmas. What I have to say is enjoined me most seriously to say to you by +Moxon. Their country customers grieve at getting the Table Book so late. +It is indispensable it should appear on Friday. Do it but _once_, & +you'll never know the difference. + +FABLE + +A boy at my school, a cunning fox, for one penny ensured himself a hot +roll & butter every morning for ever. Some favor'd ones were allowed a +roll & butter to their breakfasts. He had none. But he bought one one +morning. What did he do? He did not eat it, but cutting it in two, sold +each one of the halves to a half-breakfasted Blue Boy for _his_ whole +roll to-morrow. The next day he had a whole roll to eat, and two halves +to swap with other two boys, who had eat their cake & were still not +satiated, for whole ones to-morrow. So on ad infinitum. By one morning's +abstinence he feasted seven years after. + +APPLICATION + +Bring out the next N'o. on Friday, for country correspondents' sake. +I[t] will be one piece of exertion, and you will go right ever after, +for you will have just the time you had before, to bring it out ever +after by the Friday. + +You don't know the difference in getting a thing early. Your +correspondents are your authors. You don't know how an author frets to +know the world has got his contribution, when he finds it not on his +breakfast table. + +ONCE in this case is EVER without a grain of trouble afterw'ds. + +I won't like you or speak to you if you don't try it once. + +Yours, on that condition, + +C. LAMB. + + +[This letter is dated by Mr. Hazlitt conjecturally 1826, but I think it +more probably October, 1827, as the extracts (passages from Crowne's +"Thyestes") contributed by Lamb to Hone's _Table Book_ were printed late +in 1827. + +In Lamb's next note to Hone he says how glad he was to receive the +_Table Book_ early on Friday: the result of the fable.] + + + +LETTER 437 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +[No date. ? 1827.] + +Dear H.,--Emma has a favour, besides a bed, to ask of Mrs. Hood. Your +parcel was gratifying. We have all been pleased with Mrs. Leslie; I +speak it most sincerely. There is much manly sense with a feminine +expression, which is my definition of ladies' writing. + +[_Mrs. Leslie and Her Grandchildren_, 1827, was the title of a book for +children by Mrs. Reynolds, mother of John Hamilton Reynolds and Mrs. +Hood, and wife of the Writing Master at Christ's Hospital.] + + + +LETTER 438 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[No date. Late 1827.] + +My dear B.B.--You will understand my silence when I tell you that my +sister, on the very eve of entering into a new house we have taken at +Enfield, was surprised with an attack of one of her sad long illnesses, +which deprive me of her society, tho' not of her domestication, for +eight or nine weeks together. I see her, but it does her no good. But +for this, we have the snuggest, most comfortable house, with every thing +most compact and desirable. Colebrook is a wilderness. The Books, +prints, etc., are come here, and the New River came down with us. The +familiar Prints, the Bust, the Milton, seem scarce to have changed their +rooms. One of her last observations was "how frightfully like this room +is to our room in Islington"--our up-stairs room, she meant. How I hope +you will come some better day, and judge of it! We have tried quiet here +for four months, and I will answer for the comfort of it enduring. + +On emptying my bookshelves I found an Ulysses, which I will send to A.K. +when I go to town, for her acceptance-- unless the Book be out of print. +One likes to have one copy of every thing one does. I neglected to keep +one of "Poetry for Children," the joint production of Mary and me, and +it is not to be had for love or money. It had in the title-page "by the +author of Mrs. Lester's School." Know you any one that has it, and would +exchange it? + +Strolling to Waltham Cross the other day, I hit off these lines. It is +one of the Crosses which Edw'd 1st caused to be built for his wife at +every town where her corpse rested between Northamptonsh'r and London. + + A stately Cross each sad spot doth attest, + Whereat the corpse of Elinor did rest, + From Herdby fetch'd--her Spouse so honour'd her-- + To sleep with royal dust at Westminster. + And, if less pompous obsequies were thine, + Duke Brunswick's daughter, princely Caroline, + Grudge not, great ghost, nor count thy funeral losses: + Thou in thy life-time had'st thy share of crosses. + +My dear B.B.--My head akes with this little excursion. Pray accept 2 +sides for 3 for once. + + And believe me + Yours sadly C.L. + +Chace side Enfield. + + +["An Ulysses"--Lamb's book for children, _The Adventures of Ulysses_, +1808. + +_The Poetry for Children_. The known copies of the first edition of this +work can be counted on the fingers. + +"A stately Cross..." These verses were printed in the _Englishman's +Magazine_ in September, 1831. Lamb's sympathies were wholly with +Caroline of Brunswick, as his epigrams in _The Champion_ show (see Vol. +IV. of this edition).] + + + +LETTER 439 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. December 4, 1827.] + +My dear B.B.--I have scarce spirits to write, yet am harass'd with not +writing. Nine weeks are completed, and Mary does not get any better. It +is perfectly exhausting. Enfield and every thing is very gloomy. But for +long experience, I should fear her ever getting well. + +I feel most thankful for the spinsterly attentions of your sister. Thank +the kind "knitter in the sun." + +What nonsense seems verse, when one is seriously out of hope and +spirits! I mean that at this time I have some nonsense to write, pain of +incivility. Would to the fifth heaven no coxcombess had invented Albums. + +I have not had a Bijoux, nor the slightest notice from Pickering about +omitting 4 out of 5 of my things. The best thing is never to hear of +such a thing as a bookseller again, or to think there are publishers: +second hand Stationers and Old Book Stalls for me. Authorship should be +an idea of the Past. + +Old Kings, old Bishops, are venerable. All present is hollow. + +I cannot make a Letter. I have no straw, not a pennyworth of chaff, only +this may stop your kind importunity to know about us. + +Here is a comfortable house, but no tenants. One does not make a +household. + +Do not think I am quite in despair, but in addition to hope protracted, +I have a stupifying cold and obstructing headache, and the sun is dead. + +I will not fail to apprise you of the revival of a Beam. + +Meantime accept this, rather than think I have forgotten you all. + +Best rememb + + & Yours and theirs truly, C.L. + + + +LETTER 440 + +CHARLES LAMB TO LEIGH HUNT + +[No date. December, 1827.] + +Dear H.,--I am here almost in the eleventh week of the longest illness +my sister ever had, and no symptoms of amendment. Some had begun, but +relapsed with a change of nurse. If she ever gets well, you will like my +house, and I shall be happy to show you Enfield country. + +As to my head, it is perfectly at your or any one's service; either +M[e]yers' or Hazlitt's, which last (done fifteen or twenty years since) +White, of the Accountant's office, India House, has; he lives in Kentish +Town: I forget where, but is to be found in Leadenhall daily. Take your +choice. I should be proud to hang up as an alehouse sign even; or, +rather, I care not about my head or anything, but how we are to get well +again, for I am tired out. + +God bless you and yours from the worst calamity.--Yours truly, C.L. + +Kindest remembrances to Mrs. Hunt. H.'s is in a queer dress. M.'s would +be preferable _ad populum_. + + +[Leigh Hunt had asked Lamb for his portrait to accompany his _Lord Byron +and Some of His Contemporaries_. Lamb had been painted by Hazlitt in +1804, and by Henry Meyer, full size, in May, 1826, as well as by others. +Hunt chose Meyer's picture, which was beautifully engraved, for his +book, in the large paper edition. The original is now in the India +Office; a reproduction serves as the frontispiece to this volume. The +Hazlitt portrait, representing Lamb in the garb of a Venetian senator, +is now in the National Portrait Gallery; a reproduction serves as the +frontispiece to Vol. I. of this edition.] + + + +LETTER 441 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[P.M. Dec. 15, 1827.] + +My dear Hone, I read the sad accident with a careless eye, the newspaper +giving a wrong name to the poor Sufferer, but learn'd the truth from +Clarke. God send him ease, and you comfort in your thick misfortunes. I +am in a sorry state. Tis the eleventh week of the illness, and I cannot +get her well. To add to the calamity, Miss James is obliged to leave us +in a day or two. We had an Enfield Nurse for seven weeks, and just as +she seem'd mending, _she_ was call'd away. Miss J.'s coming seem'd to +put her back, and now she is going. I do not compare my sufferings to +yours, but you see the world is full of troubles. I wish I could say a +word to comfort you. You must cling to all that is left. I fear to ask +you whether the Book is to be discontinued. What a pity, when it must +have delighted so many! Let me hear about you and it, and believe me +with deepest fellow feeling + +Your friend C. LAMB. Friday eveng. + + +[Hone's son Alfred, who had met with an accident, was a sculptor. The +_Table Book_ was to close with the year.] + + + +LETTER 442 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. ? Middle Dec., 1827.] + +My dear Allsop--Thanks for the Birds. Your announcement puzzles me sadly +as nothing came. I send you back a word in your letter, which I can +positively make nothing [of] and therefore return to you as useless. It +means to refer to the birds, but gives me no information. They are at +the fire, however. + +My sister's illness is the most obstinate she ever had. It will not go +away, and I am afraid Miss James will not be able to stay above a day or +two longer. I am desperate to think of it sometimes. 'Tis eleven weeks! + +The day is sad as my prospects. + +With kindest love to Mrs. A. and the children, + + Yours, C.L. + +No Atlas this week. Poor Hone's good boy Alfred has fractured his skull, +another son is returned "dead" from the Navy office, & his Book is going +to be given up, not having answered. What a world of troubles this is! + + +[The _Atlas_ was the paper which Allsop sent to Lamb every week.] + + + +LETTER 443 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[December 20, 1827.] + +My dear Allsop--I have writ to say to you that I hope to have a +comfortable Xmas-day with Mary, and I can not bring myself to go from +home at present. Your kind offer, and the kind consent of the young Lady +to come, we feel as we should do; pray accept all of you our kindest +thanks: at present I think a visitor (good & excellent as we remember +her to be) might a little put us out of our way. Emma is with us, and +our small house just holds us, without obliging Mary to sleep with +Becky, &c. + +We are going on extremely comfortably, & shall soon be in +capacity of seeing our friends. Much weakness is left still. +With thanks and old rememb'rs, Yours, C.L. + + + +LETTER 444 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Dec. 22, 1827.] + +My dear Moxon, I am at length able to tell you that we are all doing +well, and shall be able soon to see our friends as usual. If you will +venture a winter walk to Enfield tomorrow week (Sunday 3Oth) you will +find us much as usual; we intend a delicious quiet Christmas day, dull +and friendless, for we have not spirits for festivities. Pray +communicate the good news to the Hoods, and say I hope he is better. I +should be thankful for any of the books you mention, but I am so +apprehensive of their miscarriage by the stage,--at all events I want +none just now. Pray call and see Mrs. Lovekin, I heard she was ill; say +we shall be glad to see them some fine day after a week or so. + +May I beg you to call upon Miss James, and say that we are quite well, +and that Mary hopes she will excuse her writing herself yet; she knows +that it is rather troublesome to her to write. We have rec'd her letter. +Farewell, till we meet. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Enfield. + + + +LETTER 445 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[No date. End of 1827.] + +My dear B.--We are all pretty well again and comfortable, and I take a +first opportunity of sending the Adventures of Ulysses, hoping that +among us--Homer, Chapman, and _C'o_.--we shall afford you some pleasure. +I fear, it is out of print, if not, A.K. will accept it, with wishes it +were bigger; if another copy is not to be had, it reverts to me and my +heirs _for ever_. With it I send a trumpery book; to which, without my +knowledge, the Editor of the Bijoux has contributed Lucy's verses: I am +asham'd to ask her acceptance of the trash accompanying it. Adieu to +Albums--for a great while, I said when I came here, and had not been +fixed two days but my Landlord's daughter (not at the Pot house) +requested me to write in her female friend's, and in her own; if I go to +[blank space: something seems to be missing] thou art there also, O all +pervading ALBUM! All over the Leeward Islands, in Newfoundland, and the +Back Settlements, I understand there is no other reading. They haunt me. +I die of Albo-phobia! + + +["A trumpery book." I have not found it. Writing in the _Englishman's +Magazine_ in 1831, in a review of his own _Album Verses_, Lamb amplifies +his sentiments on albums (see Vol. I.).] + + + +LETTER 446 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[January 9, 1828.] + +Dear Allsop--I have been very poorly and nervous lately, but am +recovering sleep, &c. I do not invite or make engagements for particular +days; but I need not say how pleasant your dropping in _any_ Sunday +morn'g would be. Perhaps Jameson would accompany you. Pray beg him to +keep an accurate record of the warning I sent by him to old Pan, for I +dread lest he should at the 12 months' end deny the warning. The house +is his daughter's, but we took it through him, and have paid the rent to +his receipts for his daughter's. Consult J. if he thinks the warning +sufficient. I am very nervous, or have been, about the house; lost my +sleep, & expected to be ill; but slumbered gloriously last night golden +slumbers. I shall not relapse. You fright me with your inserted slips in +the most welcome Atlas. They begin to charge double for it, & call it +two sheets. How can I confute them by opening it, when a note of yours +might slip out, & we get in a hobble? When you write, write real +letters. Mary's best love & mine to Mrs. A. + + Yours ever, C. LAMB. + + +[I cannot explain the business part of this letter.] + + + +LETTER 447 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. (? January, Sunday) 1828.] + +Dear Moxon I have to thank you for despatching so much business for me. +I am uneasy respecting the enclosed receipts which you sent me and are +dated Jan. 1827. Pray get them chang'd by Mr. Henshall to 182_8_. I have +been in a very nervous way since I saw you. Pray excuse me to the Hoods +for not answering his very pleasant letter. I am very poorly. The +"Keepsake" I hope is return'd. I sent it back by Mrs. Hazlitt on +Thursday. 'Twas blotted outside when it came. The rest I think are mine. +My heart bleeds about poor Hone, that such an agreeable book, and a Book +there seem'd no reason should not go on for ever, should be given up, +and a thing substituted which in its Nature cannot last. Don't send me +any more "Companions," for it only vexes me about the Table Book. This +is not weather to hope to see any body _to day_, but without any +particular invitations, pray consider that we are _at any time_ most +glad to see you, You (with Hunt's "Lord Byron" or Hazlitt's "Napoleon" +in your hand) or You simply with your switch &c. The night was damnable +and the morning is not too bless-able. If you get my dates changed, I +will not trouble you with business for some time. Best of all rememb'ces +to the Hoods, with a malicious congratulation on their friend Rice's +advancem't. + + Yours truly C. LAMB. + + +[Hone's _Table Book_ ceased with 1827: it was succeeded by a reprint, in +monthly parts, of Strutt's _Sports and Pastimes_. + +_The Companion_ would be the periodical started by Leigh Hunt in 1828. + +"Hazlitt's 'Napoleon.'" Of this work the first two volumes appeared in +1828, and the next two in 1830. + +"Their friend Rice's advancement." I cannot say to what this would +refer. Rice was Edward Rice.] + + + +LETTER 448 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Feb. 18, 1828.] + +Dear M. I had rather thought to have seen you yesterday, +or I should have written to thank you for your attentions +in the Book way &c. Hone's address is, _22_ Belvidere Place, +Southwark. 'Tis near the Obelisk. I can only say we shall +be most glad to see you, when weather suits, and that it will +be a joyful surprisal to see the Hoods. I should write to +them, but am poorly and nervous. Emma is very proud of +her Valentine. Mary does not immediately want Books, +having a damn'd consignment of Novels in MS. from Malta: +which I wish the Mediterranean had in its guts. Believe me +yours truly C.L. + +Monday. + + +[Emma's valentine probably came from Moxon, who, I feel sure, in spite +of Lamb's utterance in a previous letter, had not yet told his love, if +it had really budded. + +"Novels in MS."--Lady Stoddart's, we may suppose (see letter above).] + + + +LETTER 449 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +Enfield, 25 Feb. [1828]. + +My dear Clarke,--You have been accumulating on me such a heap of +pleasant obligations that I feel uneasy in writing as to a Benefactor. +Your smaller contributions, the little weekly rills, are refreshments in +the Desart, but your large books were feasts. I hope Mrs. Hazlitt, to +whom I encharged it, has taken Hunt's Lord B. to the Novellos. His +picture of Literary Lordship is as pleasant as a disagreeable subject +can be made, his own poor man's Education at dear Christ's is as good +and hearty as the subject. Hazlitt's speculative episodes are capital; I +skip the Battles. But how did I deserve to have the Book? The +_Companion_ has too much of Madam Pasta. Theatricals have ceased to be +popular attractions. His walk home after the Play is as good as the best +of the old Indicators. The watchmen are emboxed in a niche of fame, save +the skaiting one that must be still fugitive. I wish I could send a +scrap for good will. But I have been most seriously unwell and nervous a +long long time. I have scarce mustered courage to begin this short note, +but conscience duns me. + +I had a pleasant letter from your sister, greatly over-acknowledging my +poor sonnet. I think I should have replied to it, but tell her I think +so. Alas for sonnetting, 'tis as the nerves are; all the summer I was +dawdling among green lanes, and verses came as thick as fancies. I am +sunk winterly below prose and zero. + +But I trust the vital principle is only as under snow. That I shall yet +laugh again. + +I suppose the great change of place affects me, but I could not have +lived in Town, I could not bear company. + +I see Novello flourishes in the Del Capo line, and dedications are not +forgotten. I read the _Atlas_. When I pitched on the Ded'n I looked for +the Broom of "_Cowden_ knows" to be harmonized, but 'twas summat of +Rossini's. + +I want to hear about Hone, does he stand above water, how is his son? I +have delay'd writing to him, till it seems impossible. Break the ice for +me. + +The wet ground here is intolerable, the sky above clear and delusive, +but under foot quagmires from night showers, and I am cold-footed and +moisture-abhorring as a cat; nevertheless I yesterday tramped to Waltham +Cross; perhaps the poor bit of exertion necessary to scribble this was +owing to that unusual bracing. + +If I get out, I shall get stout, and then something will out --I mean +for the _Companion_--you see I rhyme insensibly. + +Traditions are rife here of one Clarke a schoolmaster, and a runaway +pickle named Holmes, but much obscurity hangs over it. Is it possible +they can be any relations? + +'Tis worth the research, when you can find a sunny day, with ground +firm, &c. Master Sexton is intelligent, and for half-a-crown he'll pick +you up a Father. + +In truth we shall be most glad to see any of the Novellian circle, +middle of the week such as can come, or Sunday, as can't. But Spring +will burgeon out quickly, and then, we'll talk more. + +You'd like to see the improvements on the Chase, the new Cross in the +market-place, the Chandler's shop from whence the rods were fetch'd. +They are raised a farthing since the spread of Education. But perhaps +you don't care to be reminded of the Holofernes' days, and nothing +remains of the old laudable profession, but the clear, firm, +impossible-to-be-mistaken schoolmaster text hand with which is +subscribed the ever-welcome name of Chas. Cowden C. Let me crowd in +both our loves to all. C.L. + +Let me never be forgotten to include in my rememb'ces my good friend and +whilom correspondent Master Stephen. + +How, especially, is Victoria? + +I try to remember all I used to meet at Shacklewell. The little +household, cake-producing, wine-bringing out Emma--the old servant, that +didn't stay, and ought to have staid, and was always very dirty and +friendly, and Miss H., the counter-tenor with a fine voice, whose sister +married Thurtell. They all live in my mind's eye, and Mr. N.'s and +Holmes's walks with us half back after supper. Troja fuit! + + +["_The Companion_." Leigh Hunt's paper lasted only for seven months. +Madame Pasta, of whom too much was written, was Giudetta Pasta +(1798-1865), a singer of unusual compass, for whom Bellini wrote "La +Somnambula." + +The following is the account of the Sliding Watchman in the essay, +"Walks Home by Night in Bad Weather. Watchmen":-- + + But the oddest of all was the _Sliding_ Watchman. Think of walking + up a street in the depth of a frosty winter, with long ice in the + gutters, and sleet over head, and then figure to yourself a sort of + bale of a man in white, coming towards you with a lantern in one + hand, and an umbrella over his head. It was the oddest mixture of + luxury and hardship, of juvenility and old age! But this looked + agreeable. Animal spirits carry everything before them; and our + invincible friend seemed a watchman for Rabelais. Time was run at + and butted by him like a goat. The slide seemed to bear him half + through the night at once; he slipped from out of his box and his + common-places at one rush of a merry thought, and seemed to say, + "Everything's in imagination;--here goes the whole weight of my + office." + +"Your sister"--Mrs. Isabella Jane Towers, author of _The Children's +Fireside_, 1828, and other books for children, to whom Lamb had sent a +sonnet (see Vol. IV.). + +"Novello... dedications... I read the _Atlas_." In _The Atlas_ for +February 17 was reviewed _Select Airs from Spohr's celebrated Opera of +Faust, arranged as duetts for the Pianoforte and inscribed to his friend +Charles Cowden Clarke by Vincent Novello_. Holmes was musical critic for +_The Atlas_. + +"One Clarke a schoolmaster." See note to the letter to Clarke in the +summer of 1821. + +"Holofernes' days"--Holofernes, the schoolmaster, in "Love's Labour's +Lost." Cowden Clarke had assisted his father. + +"Master Stephen." I do not identify Stephen. + +"Victoria"--Mary Victoria Novello, afterwards Mrs. Charles Cowden +Clarke. + +"At Shacklewell"--the Novellos' old home. They now lived in Bedford +Street, Covent Garden. + +"Whose sister married Thurtell." Thurtell, the murderer of Mr. Weare, I +suppose. + +In the Boston Bibliophile edition there is also a brief note to Clarke.] + + + +LETTER 450 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. Feb. 26, 1828.] + +My dear Robinson, It will be a very painful thing to us indeed, if you +give up coming to see us, as we fear, on account of the nearness of the +poor Lady you inquire after. It is true that on the occasion she +mentions, which was on her return from last seeing her daughter, she was +very heated and feverish, but there seems to be a great amendment in her +since, and she has within a day or two passed a quiet evening with us. +At the same time I dare not advise any thing one way or another +respecting her daughter coming to live with her. I entirely disclaim the +least opinion about it. If we named any thing before her, it was +erroneously, on the notion that _she_ was the obstacle to the plan which +had been suggested of placing her daughter in a Private Family, _which +seem'd your wish_. But I have quite done with the subject. If we can be +of any amusement to the poor Lady, without self disturbance, we will. +But come and see us after Circuit, as if she were not. You have no more +affect'te friends than C. AND M. LAMB. + + +["The poor Lady" was, I imagine, the widow of Antony Robinson.] + + + +LETTER 451 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +March 19th, 1828. + +My dear M.--It is my firm determination to have nothing to do with +"Forget-me-Nots"--pray excuse me as civilly as you can to Mr. Hurst. I +will take care to refuse any other applications. The things which +Pickering has, if to be had again, I have promised absolutely, you know, +to poor Hood, from whom I had a melancholy epistle yesterday; besides +that, Emma has decided objections to her own and her friend's Album +verses being published; but if she gets over that, they are decidedly +Hood's. + +Till we meet, farewell. Loves to Dash. C.L. + + +[Moxon seems to have asked Lamb for a contribution for one of Hurst's +annuals, probably the _Keepsake_. + +Hood was to edit _The Gem_ for 1829. + +"Dash."--Moxon seems to have been the present master of the dog. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Edward Irving, introducing Hone, +who in later life became devout and preached at the Weigh House Chapel +in Eastcheap.] + + + +LETTER 452 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. April 21, 1828.] + +DEAR B.B.--You must excuse my silence. I have been in very poor health +and spirits, and cannot write letters. I only write to assure you, as +you wish'd, of my existence. All that which Mitford tells you of H.'s +book is rhodomontade, only H. has written unguardedly about me, and +nothing makes a man more foolish than his own foolish panegyric. But I +am pretty well cased to flattery, or its contrary. Neither affect[s] me +a turnip's worth. Do you see the Author of May you Like it? Do you write +to him? Will you give my present plea to him of ill health for not +acknowledge a pretty Book with a pretty frontispiece he sent me. He is +most esteem'd by me. As for subscribing to Books, in plain truth I am a +man of reduced income, and don't allow myself 12 shillings a-year to buy +OLD BOOKS with, which must be my Excuse. I am truly sorry for Murray's +demur, but I wash my hands of all booksellers, and hope to know them no +more. I am sick and poorly and must leave off, with our joint kind +remembrances to your daughter and friend A.K. C.L. + + +["H.'s book." In Hunt's _Lord Byron and Some of His Contemporaries_ Lamb +was praised very warmly. + +"The Author of May you Like it"--the Rev. C.B. Tayler. The book with a +pretty frontispiece was _A Fireside Book_, 1828, with a frontispiece by +George Cruikshank. + +"Murray's demur"-an unfavourable reply, possibly to a suggestion of +Barton's concerning a new volume.] + + + +LETTER 453 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[May 1st, 1828.] + +Dear A.--I am better. Mary quite well. We expected to see you before. I +can't write long letters. So a friendly love to you all. + +Yours ever, + +C.L. + +Enfield. + +This sunshine is healing. + + + +LETTER 454 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. May 3rd, 1828.] + +Dear M.,--My friend Patmore, author of the "Months," a very pretty +publication, [and] of sundry Essays in the "London," "New Monthly," &c., +wants to dispose of a volume or two of "Tales." Perhaps they might +Chance to suit Hurst; but be that as it may, he will call upon you, +_under favor of my recommendation_; and as he is returning to France, +where he lives, if you can do anything for him in the Treaty line, to +save him dancing over the Channel every week, I am sure you will. I said +I'd never trouble you again; but how vain are the resolves of mortal +man! P. is a very hearty friendly fellow, and was poor John Scott's +second, as I will be yours when you want one. May you never be mine! + + Yours truly, C.L. + +Enfield. + + +[Patmore was the author of _The Mirror of the Months_, 1826.] + + + +LETTER 455 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +[Dated at end: 17 May (1828).] + +Dear Walter, The sight of your old name again was like a resurrection. +It had passed away into the dimness of a dead friend. We shall be most +joyful to see you here next week,--if I understand you right--for your +note dated the 10th arrived only yesterday, Friday the _16th_. Suppose I +name _Thursday_ next. If that don't suit, write to say so. A morning +coach comes from the Bell or Bell & Crown by Leather Lane Holborn, and +sets you down at our house on the Chase Side, next door to Mr. +Westwood's, whom all the coachmen know. + +I have four more notes to write, so dispatch this with again assuring +you how happy we shall be to see you, & to discuss Defoe & old matters. + +Yours truly + +C. LAMB. + +Enf'd. Satur'dy. 17th May. + + +[The last letter to Wilson was on Feb. 24, 1823. Lamb wrote to Hone a +few days later: "Valter Vilson dines with us to-morrow. Vell! How I +should like to see Hone!"] + + + +LETTER 456 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS NOON TALFOURD + +[P.M. May 20, 1828.] + +My dear Talfourd, we propose being with you on Wednesday not unearly, +Mary to take a bed with you, and I with Crabbe, if, as I understand, he +be of the party. + +Yours ever, + +CH. LAMB. + + +[Lamb's future biographer was then living at 26 Henrietta Street, +Brunswick Square. He had married in 1822. Crabb Robinson's _Diary_ for +May 21 tells us that Talfourd's party consisted of the Lambs, +Wordsworth, Miss Anne Rutt, three barristers and himself. Lamb was in +excellent spirits. He slept at Robinson's that night.] + + + +LETTER 457 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[No date. May, 1828.] + +Dear Wordsworth, we had meant to have tried to see Mrs. Wordsworth and +Dora next Wednesday, but we are intercepted by a violent toothache which +Mary has got by getting up next morning after parting with you, to be +with my going off at 1/2 past 8 Holborn. We are poor travellers, and +moreover we have company (damn 'em) good people, Mr. Hone and an old +crony not seen for 20 years, coming here on Tuesday, one stays night +with us, and Mary doubts my power to get up time enough, and comfort +enough, to be so far as you are. Will you name a day in the same or +coming week that we can come to you in the morning, for it would plague +us not to see the other two of you, whom we cannot individualize from +you, before you go. It is bad enough not to see your Sister Dorothy. + +God bless you sincerely + +C. LAMB. + + +[Robinson dates this letter 1810, but this is clearly wrong. It was +obviously written after Lamb's liberation from the India House. If, as I +suppose, the old crony is Walter Wilson, we get the date from Lamb's +letters to him and to Hone, mentioned above. + +By "the other two of you" Lamb means Dora Wordsworth and Johnny +Wordsworth. Lamb had already seen William. The address of the present +letter is W. Wordsworth, Esq., 12 Bryanstone Street, Portman Square. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Cary, dated June 10, 1828, +declining on account of ill-health an invitation to dinner, to meet +Wordsworth. Instead he asks Cary to Enfield with Darley and Procter.] + + + +LETTER 458 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. MORGAN + +Enfield, 17 June, 1828. + +The gentleman who brings this to you has been 12 years principal +assistant at the first School in Enfield, and bears the highest +character for carefulness and scholarship. He is about opening an +Establishment of his own, a Classical and _Commercial_ Academy at +Peckham. He has just married a very notable and amiable young person, +our next neighbour's daughter, and I do not doubt of their final +success, but everything must have a beginning and he wants pupils. It +strikes me, that one or two of Mr. Thompson's sons may be about leaving +you,--in that case, if you can recommend my friend's school, you will +much oblige me. I can answer for the very excellent manner in which he +has conducted himself here as an assistant, for I have talked it over +with Dr. May's brother and I _know_ him to be very learned. He will +explain to you the situation of our cottage, where we hope to see you +soon--with Mary's kind love. + + +[The gentleman was a Mr. Sugden.] + + + +LETTER 459 + +MARY LAMB TO THE THOMAS HOODS + +[No date. ? Summer, 1828.] + +My dear Friends,--My brother and Emma are to send you a partnership +letter, but as I have a great dislike to my stupid scrap at the fag end +of a dull letter, and, as I am left alone, I will say my say first; and +in the first place thank you for your kind letter; it was a mighty +comfort to me. Ever since you left me, I have been thinking I know not +what, but every possible thing that I could invent, why you should be +angry with me for something I had done or left undone during your +uncomfortable sojourn with us, and now I read your letter and think and +feel all is well again. Emma and her sister Harriet are gone to +Theobalds Park, and Charles is gone to Barnet to cure his headache, +which a good old lady has talked him into. She came on Thursday and left +us yesterday evening. I mean she was Mrs. Paris, with whom Emma's aunt +lived at Cambridge, and she had so much to [tell] her about Cambridge +friends, and to [tell] us about London ditto, that her tongue was never +at rest through the whole day, and at night she took Hood's Whims and +Oddities to bed with her and laught all night. Bless her spirits! I wish +I had them and she were as mopey as I am. Emma came on Monday, and the +week has passed away I know not how. But we have promised all the week +that we should go and see the Picture friday or saturday, and stay a +night or so with you. Friday came and we could not turn Mrs. Paris out +so soon, and on friday evening the thing was wholly given up. Saturday +morning brought fresh hopes; Mrs. Paris agreed to go to see the picture +with us, and we were to walk to Edmonton. My Hat and my _new gown_ were +put on in great haste, and his honor, who decides all things here, would +have it that we could not get to Edmonton in time; and there was an end +of all things. Expecting to see you, I did not write. + +Monday evening. + +Charles and Emma are taking a second walk. Harriet is gone home. Charles +wishes to know more about the Widow. Is it to be made to match a +drawing? If you could throw a little more light on the subject, I think +he would do it, when Emma is gone; but his time will be quite taken up +with her; for, besides refreshing her Latin, he gives her long lessons +in arithmetic, which she is sadly deficient in. She leaves in a week, +unless she receives a renewal of her holydays, which Mrs. Williams has +half promised to send her. I do verily believe that I may hope to pass +the last one, or two, or three nights with you, as she is to go from +London to Bury. We will write to you the instant we receive Mrs. W.'s +letter. As to my poor sonnet--and it is a very poor sonnet, only [it] +answered very well the purpose it was written for--Emma left it behind +her, and nobody remembers more than one line of it, which is, I think, +sufficient to convince you it would make no great impression in an +Annual. So pray let it rest in peace, and I will make Charles write a +better one instead. + +This shall go to the Post to-night. If any [one] chooses to add anything +to it they may. It will glad my heart to see you again. + +Yours (both yours) truly and affectionately, M. LAMB. + +Becky is going by the Post office, so I will send it away. I mean to +commence letter-writer to the family. + + +[Mr. Hazlitt dates this letter April, 1828. The reference to the Widow, +towards the end, shows that Hood was preparing _The Gem_, and, what is +not generally known, that Lamb had been asked to write on that subject. +As it happened, Hood wrote the essay for him and signed it Elia (see +note below). Mrs. Paris we have met. Harriet, Emma Isola's sister, we do +not hear of again. I was recently shown a copy of Lamb's _Works_, 1818, +inscribed in his hand to Miss Isola: this would be Harriet Isola. Emma +had just begun her duties at Fornham, in Suffolk, where she taught the +children of a Mr. Williams, a clergyman. I cannot say what the Picture +was. The sonnet was probably that printed in the note to the letter to +Mrs. Shelley of July 26, 1827. Charles Lamb's and Emma's joint letter has +not been preserved.] + + + +LETTER 460 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON + +August, 1828. + +Dear Haydon,--I have been tardy in telling you that your Chairing the +Member gave me great pleasure;--'tis true broad Hogarthian fun, the High +Sheriff capital. Considering, too, that you had the materials imposed +upon you, and that you did not select them from the rude world as H. +did, I hope to see many more such from your hand. If the former picture +went beyond this I have had a loss, and the King a bargain. I longed to +rub the back of my hand across the hearty canvas that two senses might +be gratified. Perhaps the subject is a little discordantly placed +opposite to another act of Chairing, where the huzzas were +Hosannahs,--but I was pleased to see so many of my old acquaintances +brought together notwithstanding. + +Believe me, yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Haydon's "Chairing the Member" was exhibited in Bond Street this year, +together with "Christ's Entry into Jerusalem," and other of his works. +"The former picture" was his "Mock Election," which the King had bought +for 500 guineas. For "Chairing the Member" Haydon received only half +that price. + +Here should come a letter to Rickman, dated September 11, 1828, in which +Lamb thanks him for a present of nuts and apples, but is surprised that +apples should be offered to the owner of a "whole tree, almost an +orchard," and "an apple chamber redolent" to boot. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Louisa Holcroft, dated October 2, +1828, in which, so soon after Mary Lamb's determination to be the letter +writer of the family, he says, "Mary Lamb has written her last letter in +this world," adding that he has been left her _writing legatee_. He +calls geese "those pretty birds that look like snow in summer, and +cackle like ice breaking up." + +Here should come a long Latin letter to Rickman, dated October 4, 1828. +Canon Ainger prints the Latin. I append an English version:--] + + + +LETTER 461 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN RICKMAN + +(_Translation_) + +[Postmark Oct. 3, 1828.] + +I have been thinking of sending some kind of an answer in Latin to your +very elaborate letter, but something has arisen every day to hinder me. +To begin with our awkward friend M.B. has been with us for a while, and +every day and all day we have had such a lecture, you know how he +stutters, on legal, mind, nothing but legal notices, that I have been +afraid the Latin I want to write might prove rather barbaro-forensic +than Ciceronian. He is swallowed up, body and soul, in law; he eats, +drinks, plays (at the card table) Law, nothing but Law. He acts +Ignoramus in the play so thoroughly, that you w'd swear that in the +inmost marrow of his head (is not this the proper anatomical term?) +there have housed themselves not devils but pettifoggers, to bemuddle +with their noisy chatter his own and his friends' wits. He brought here, +'twas all his luggage, a book, Fearn on Contingent Remainders. This book +he has read so hard, and taken such infinite pains to understand, that +the reader's brain has few or no Remainders to continge. Enough, +however, of M.B. and his luggage. To come back to your claims upon me. +Your return journey, with notes, I read again and again, nor have I done +with them yet. You always make something fresh out of a hackneyed theme. +Our milestones, you say, bristle with blunders, but I must shortly +explain why I cannot comply with your directions herein. + +Suppose I were to consult the local magnates about a matter of this +kind.--Ha! says one of our waywardens or parish overseers,--What +business is this of _yours_? Do you want to drop the Lodger and come out +as a Householder?--Now you must know that I took this house of mine at +Enfield, by an obvious domiciliary fiction, in my Sister's name, to +avoid the bother and trouble of parish and vestry meetings, and to +escape finding myself one day an overseer or big-wig of some sort. What +then w'd be my reply to the above question? + +Leisure I have secured: but of dignity, not a tittle. Besides, to tell +you the truth, the aforesaid irregularities are, to my thinking, most +entertaining, and in fact very touching indeed. Here am I, quit of +worldly affairs of every kind; for if superannuation does not mean that, +what does it mean? The world then, being, as the saying is, beyond my +ken, and being myself entirely removed from any accurate distinctions of +space or time, these mistakes in road-measure do not seriously offend +me. For in the infinite space of the heavens above (which in this +contracted sphere of mine I desire to imitate so far as may be) what +need is there of milestones? Local distance has to do with mortal +affairs. In my walks abroad, limited though they must be, I am quite at +my own disposal, and on that account I have a good word for our Enfield +clocks too. Their hands generally point without any servile reference to +this Sun of our World, in his _sub_-Empyrean position. They strike too +just as it happens, according to their own sweet +wiles,--one--two--three--anything they like, and thus to me, a more +fortunate Whittington, they pleasantly announce, that Time, so far as I +am concerned, is no more. Here you have my reasons for not attending in +this matter to the requests of a busy subsolar such as you are. + +Furthermore, when I reach the milestone that counts from the Hicks-Hall +that stands now, I own at once the Aulic dignity, and, were I a +gaol-bird, I should shake in my shoes. When I reach the next which +counts from the site of the old Hall, my thoughts turn to the fallen +grandeur of the pile, and I reflect upon the perishable condition of the +most imposing of human structures. Thus I banish from my soul all pride +and arrogance, and with such meditations purify my heart from day to +day. A wayfarer such as I am, may learn from Vincent Bourne, in words +terser and neater than any of mine, the advantages of milestones +properly arranged. The lines are at the end of a little poem of his, +called Milestones--(Do you remember it or shall I write it all out?) + + How well the Milestones' use doth this express, + Which make the miles [seem] more and way seem less. + +What do you mean by this--I am borrowing hand and style from this +youngster of mine--your son, I take it. The style looks, nay on careful +inspection by these old eyes, is most clearly your very own, and the +writing too. Either R's or the Devil's. I will defer your explanation +till our next meeting--may it be soon. + +My Latin failing me, as you may infer from erasures above, there is only +this to add. Farewell, and be sure to give Mrs. Rickman my kind +remembrances. + +C. LAMB. + +Enfield, Chase Side, 4th Oct., 1828. I can't put this properly into +Latin. Dabam--what is it? + + + +LETTER 462 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. October 11, 1828.] + +A splendid edition of Bunyan's Pilgrim--why, the thought is enough to +turn one's moral stomach. His cockle hat and staff transformed to a +smart cockd beaver and a jemmy cane, his amice gray to the last Regent +Street cut, and his painful Palmer's pace to the modern swagger. Stop +thy friend's sacriligious hand. Nothing can be done for B. but to +reprint the old cuts in as homely but good a style as possible. The +Vanity Fair, and the pilgrims there--the silly soothness in his setting +out countenance--the Christian idiocy (in a good sense) of his +admiration of the Shepherds on the Delectable Mountains--the Lions so +truly Allegorical and remote from any similitude to Pidcock's. The great +head (the author's) capacious of dreams and similitudes dreaming in the +dungeon. Perhaps you don't know _my_ edition, what I had when a child: +if you do, can you bear new designs from--Martin, enameld into copper or +silver plate by--Heath, accompanied with verses from Mrs. Heman's pen O +how unlike his own-- + + Wouldst thou divert thyself from melancholy? + Wouldst thou be pleasant, yet be far from folly? + Wouldst thou read riddles and their explanation? + Or else be drowned in thy contemplation? + Dost thou love picking meat? or wouldst thou see + A man i' th' clouds, and hear him speak to thee? + Wouldst thou be in a dream, and yet not sleep? + Or wouldst thou in a moment laugh and weep? + Or wouldst thou lose thyself, and catch no harm, + And find thyself again without a charm? + Wouldst read _thyself_, and read thou knowst not what, + And yet know whether thou art blest or not + By reading the same lines? O then come hither, + And lay my book, thy head and heart together. + + JOHN BUNYAN. + +Shew me such poetry in any of the 15 forthcoming combinations of show +and emptiness, yclept Annuals. Let me whisper in your ear that wholesome +sacramental bread is not more nutritious than papistical wafer stuff, +than these (to head and heart) exceed the visual frippery of Mitford's +Salamander God, baking himself up to the work of creation in a solar +oven, not yet by the terms of the context itself existing. Blake's +ravings made genteel. So there's verses for thy verses; and now let me +tell you that the sight of your hand gladdend me. I have been daily +trying to write to you, but paralysed. You have spurd me on this tiny +effort, and at intervals I hope to hear from and talk to you. But my +spirits have been in a deprest way for a long long time, and they are +things which must be to you of faith, for who can explain depression? +Yes I am hooked into the Gem, but only for some lines written on a dead +infant of the Editor's, which being as it were his property, I could not +refuse their appearing, but I hate the paper, the type, the gloss, the +dandy plates, the names of contributors poked up into your eyes in 1st +page, and whistled thro' all the covers of magazines, the barefaced sort +of emulation, the unmodest candidateship, bro't into so little space--in +those old Londons a signature was lost in the wood of matter--the paper +coarse (till latterly, which spoil'd them)--in short I detest to appear +in an Annual. What a fertile genius (an[d] a quiet good soul withal) is +Hood. He has 50 things in hand, farces to supply the Adelphi for the +season, a comedy for one of the great theatres, just ready, a whole +entertainment by himself for Mathews and Yates to figure in, a meditated +Comic Annual for next year, to be nearly done by himself.-- You'd like +him very much. Wordsworth I see has a good many pieces announced in one +of em, not our Gem. W. Scott has distributed himself like a bribe haunch +among 'em. Of all the poets, Cary has had the good sense to keep quite +clear of 'em, with Clergy-gentle-manly right notions. Don't think I set +up for being proud in this point, I like a bit of flattery tickling my +vanity as well as any one. But these pompous masquerades without masks +(naked names or faces) I hate. So there's a bit of my mind. Besides they +infallibly cheat you, I mean the booksellers. If I get but a copy, I +only expect it from Hood's being my friend. Coleridge has lately been +here. He too is deep among the Prophets--the Yearservers--the mob of +Gentlemen Annuals. But they'll cheat him, I know. + +And now, dear B.B., the Sun shining out merrily, and the dirty clouds +we had yesterday having washd their own faces clean with their own rain, +tempts me to wander up Winchmore Hill, or into some of the delightful +vicinages of Enfield, which I hope to show you at some time when you can +get a few days up to the great Town. Believe me it would give both of us +great pleasure to show you all three (we can lodge you) our pleasant +farms and villages.-- + +We both join in kindest loves to you and yours.-- + +CH. LAMB REDIVIVUS. + +Saturday. + + +[The edition of Bunyan was that published for Barton's friend, John +Major, and John Murray in 1830, with a life of Bunyan by Southey, and +illustrations by John Martin and W. Harvey, and a prefatory poem not by +Mrs. Hemans but by Bernard Barton immediately before Bunyan's "Author's +Apology for his Book," from which Lamb quotes. + +"Pidcock's." Pidcock showed his lions at Bartholomew Fair; he was +succeeded by Polito of Exeter Change. + +"Heath." This was Charles Heath (1785-1848), son of James Heath, a great +engraver of steel plates for the Annuals. + +"Mitford's Salamander God." I cannot explain this, except by Mr. +Macdonald's supposition that Lamb meant to write "Martin's." + +"The Gem." See note below, p. 839. + +Hood's entertainment for Mathews and Frederick Yates, then +joint-managers of the Adelphi, I have not identified. Authors' names on +play-bills were, in those days, unimportant. The play was the thing. + +Cary. The Rev. H.F. Cary, translator of Dante. + +Coleridge and the Annuals. For example, Coleridge's "Names" was in the +_Keepsake_ for 1829; his "Lines written in the Album at Elbingerode" in +part in the _Amulet_ for 1829. He had also contributed previously to the +_Literary Souvenir_, the _Amulet_ and the _Bijou_. + +Here should come an unprinted note from Lamb to Charles Mathews, dated +October 27, 1828, referring to the farce "The Pawnbroker's Daughter," +which Lamb offered to Mathews for the Adelphi. As I have said, this +farce was never acted.] + + + +LETTER 463 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +[Enfield, October, 1828.] + +Dear Clarke,--We did expect to see you with Victoria and the Novellos +before this, and do not quite understand why we have not. Mrs. N. and V. +[Vincent] promised us after the York expedition; a day being named +before, which fail'd. 'Tis not too late. The autumn leaves drop gold, +and Enfield is beautifuller--to a common eye--than when you lurked at +the Greyhound. Benedicks are close, but how I so totally missed you at +that time, going for my morning cup of ale duly, is a mystery. 'Twas +stealing a match before one's face in earnest. But certainly we had not +a dream of your appropinquity. I instantly prepared an Epithalamium, in +the form of a Sonata--which I was sending to Novello to compose--but +Mary forbid it me, as too light for the occasion--as if the subject +required anything heavy-- so in a tiff with her I sent no congratulation +at all. Tho' I promise you the wedding was very pleasant news to me +indeed. Let your reply name a day this next week, when you will come as +many as a coach will hold; such a day as we had at Dulwich. My very +kindest love and Mary's to Victoria and the Novellos. The enclosed is +from a friend nameless, but highish in office, and a man whose accuracy +of statement may be relied on with implicit confidence. He wants the +_expose_ to appear in a newspaper as the "greatest piece of legal and +Parliamentary villainy he ever rememb'd," and he has had experience in +both; and thinks it would answer afterwards in a cheap pamphlet printed +at Lambeth in 8'o sheet, as 16,000 families in that parish are +interested. I know not whether the present _Examiner_ keeps up the +character of exposing abuses, for I scarce see a paper now. If so, you +may ascertain Mr. Hunt of the strictest truth of the statement, at the +peril of my head. But if this won't do, transmit it me back, I beg, per +coach, or better, bring it with you. Yours unaltered, C. LAMB. + + +[Clarke had married Mary Victoria Novello on July 5, 1828, and they had +spent their honeymoon at the Greyhound, Enfield, unknown to the Lambs. +See the next letter. + +"The enclosed." This has vanished. Hunt was Leigh Hunt.] + + + +LETTER 464 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[Enfield, November 6, 1828.] + +My dear Novello,--I am afraid I shall appear rather tardy in offering my +congratulations, however sincere, upon your daughter's marriage. The +truth is, I had put together a little Serenata upon the occasion, but +was prevented from sending it by my sister, to whose judgment I am apt +to defer too much in these kind of things; so that, now I have her +consent, the offering, I am afraid, will have lost the grace of +seasonableness. Such as it is, I send it. She thinks it a little too +old-fashioned in the manner, too much like what they wrote a century +back. But I cannot write in the modern style, if I try ever so hard. I +have attended to the proper divisions for the music, and you will have +little difficulty in composing it. If I may advise, make Pepusch your +model, or Blow. It will be necessary to have a good second voice, as the +stress of the melody lies there:-- + + SERENATA, FOR TWO VOICES, + + _On the Marriage of Charles Cowden Clarke, Esqre., to Victoria, + eldest daughter of Vincent Novello, Esqre._ + + DUETTO + + Wake th' harmonious voice and string, + Love and Hymen's triumph sing, + Sounds with secret charms combining, + In melodious union joining, + Best the wondrous joys can tell, + That in hearts united dwell. + + RECITATIVE + + _First Voice_.--To young Victoria's happy fame + Well may the Arts a trophy raise, + Music grows sweeter in her praise. + And, own'd by her, with rapture speaks her name. + To touch the brave Cowdenio's heart, + The Graces all in her conspire; + Love arms her with his surest dart, + Apollo with his lyre. + + AIR + + The list'ning Muses all around her + Think 'tis Phoebus' strain they hear; + And Cupid, drawing near to wound her, + Drops his bow, and stands to hear. + + RECITATIVE + + _Second Voice_.--While crowds of rivals with despair + Silent admire, or vainly court the Fair, + Behold the happy conquest of her eyes, + A Hero is the glorious prize! + In courts, in camps, thro' distant realms renown'd, + Cowdenio comes!--Victoria, see, + He comes with British honour crown'd, + Love leads his eager steps to thee. + + AIR + + In tender sighs he silence breaks, + The Fair his flame approves, + Consenting blushes warm her cheeks, + She smiles, she yields, she loves. + + RECITATIVE + + _First Voice_.--Now Hymen at the altar stands, + And while he joins their faithful hands, + Behold! by ardent vows brought down, + Immortal Concord, heavenly bright, + Array'd in robes of purest light, + Descends, th' auspicious rites to crown. + Her golden harp the goddess brings; + Its magic sound + Commands a sudden silence all around, + And strains prophetic thus attune the strings. + + DUETTO + + _First Voice_.-- The Swain his Nymph possessing, + _Second Voice_.-- The Nymph her swain caressing, + _First and Second_.-- Shall still improve the blessing, + For ever kind and true. + _Both_.-- While rolling years are flying, + Love, Hymen's lamp supplying, + With fuel never dying, + Shall still the flame renew. + +To so great a master as yourself I have no need to suggest that the +peculiar tone of the composition demands sprightliness, occasionally +checked by tenderness, as in the second air,-- + +She smiles,--she yields,--she loves. + +Again, you need not be told that each fifth line of the two first +recitatives requires a crescendo. + +And your exquisite taste will prevent your falling into the error of +Purcell, who at a passage similar to _that_ in my first air, + +Drops his bow, and stands to hear, + +directed the first violin thus:-- + +Here the first violin must drop his _bow_. + +But, besides the absurdity of disarming his principal performer of so +necessary an adjunct to his instrument, in such an emphatic part of the +composition too, which must have had a droll effect at the time, all +such minutiae of adaptation are at this time of day very properly +exploded, and Jackson of Exeter very fairly ranks them under the head of +puns. + +Should you succeed in the setting of it, we propose having it performed +(we have one very tolerable second voice here, and Mr. Holmes, I dare +say, would supply the minor parts) at the Greyhound. But it must be a +secret to the young couple till we can get the band in readiness. + +Believe me, dear Novello, + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Enfield, 6 Nov., '28. + + +[Mrs. Cowden Clarke remarks in her notes on this letter that the +references to Purcell and to Jackson of Exeter are inventions. For Mr. +Holmes see note above. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Laman Blanchard, dated Enfield, +November 9, 1828, thanking him for a book and dedication. Samuel Laman +Blanchard (1804-1845), afterwards known as a journalist, had just +published, through Harrison Ainsworth, a little volume entitled _Lyric +Offerings_, which was dedicated to Lamb. After Lamb's death Blanchard +contributed to the _New Monthly Magazine_ some additional Popular +Fallacies.] + + + +LETTER 465 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +Late autumn, 1828. + +Enfield. + +Dear Lamb--You are an impudent varlet; but I will keep your secret. We +dine at Ayrton's on Thursday, and shall try to find Sarah and her two +spare beds for that night only. Miss M. and her tragedy may be dished: +so may not you and your rib. Health attend you. + +Yours, T. HOOD, ESQ. + +Miss Bridget Hood sends love. + + +[In _The Gem_, 1829, in addition to his poem, "On an Infant Dying as +Soon as Born," Lamb was credited with the following piece of prose, +entitled "A Widow," which was really the work of Hood (see letter +above):-- + + A WIDOW + + Hath always been a mark for mockery:--a standing butt for wit to + level at. Jest after jest hath been huddled upon her close cap, and + stuck, like burrs, upon her weeds. Her sables are a perpetual "Black + Joke." + + Satirists--prose and verse--have made merry with her bereavements. + She is a stock character on the stage. Farce bottleth up her + crocodile tears, or labelleth her empty lachrymatories. Comedy + mocketh her precocious flirtations--Tragedy even girdeth at her + frailty, and twitteth her with "the funeral baked meats coldly + furnishing forth the marriage tables." + + I confess when I called the other day on my kinswoman G.--then in + the second week of her widowhood--and saw her sitting, her young boy + by her side, in her recent sables, I felt unable to reconcile her + estate with any risible associations. The Lady with a skeleton + moiety--in the old print, in Bowles' old shop window--seemed but a + type of her condition. Her husband,--a whole hemisphere in love's + world--was deficient. One complete side--her left--was + death-stricken. It was a matrimonial paralysis, unprovocative of + laughter. I could as soon have tittered at one of those melancholy + objects that drag their poor dead-alive bodies about the streets. + + It seems difficult to account for the popular prejudice against lone + women. There is a majority, I trust, of such honest, decorous + mourners as my kinswoman: yet are Widows, like the Hebrew, a proverb + and a byeword amongst nations. From the first putting on of the + sooty garments, they become a stock joke--chimney-sweep or + blackamoor is not surer--by mere virtue of their nigritude. + + Are the wanton amatory glances of a few pairs of graceless eyes, + twinkling through their cunning waters, to reflect so evil a light + on a whole community? Verily the sad benighted orbs of that noble + relict--the Lady Rachel Russell--blinded through unserene drops for + her dead Lord,--might atone for such oglings! + + Are the traditional freaks of a Dame of Ephesus, or a Wife of Bath, + or a Queen of Denmark, to cast so broad a shadow over + a whole sisterhood. There must be, methinks, some more general + infirmity--common, probably, to all Eve-kind--to justify so sweeping + a stigma. + + Does the satiric spirit, perhaps, institute splenetic comparisons + between the lofty poetical pretensions of posthumous tenderness and + their fulfilment? The sentiments of Love especially affect a high + heroical pitch, of which the human performance can present, at best, + but a burlesque parody. A widow, that hath lived only for her + husband, should die with him. She is flesh of his flesh, and bone of + his bone; and it is not seemly for a mere rib to be his survivor. + The prose of her practice accords not with the poetry of her + professions. She hath done with the world,--and you meet her in + Regent Street. Earth hath now nothing left for her--but she swears + and administers. She cannot survive him--and invests in the _Long_ + Annuities. + + The romantic fancy resents, and the satiric spirit records, these + discrepancies. By the conjugal theory itself there ought to be no + Widows; and, accordingly, a class, that by our milder manners is + merely ridiculed, on the ruder banks of the Ganges is literally + _roasted_. C. LAMB. + +"Miss M. and her tragedy." I fancy Miss M. would be Miss Mitford, and +her tragedy "Rienzi," produced at Drury Lane October 9, 1828. It was a +success. Hood's rib would probably be the play I have not identified. +See letter to Barton of October 11. + +Here, a little out of its order, might come a letter from Lamb to Hood, +December 17, 1828, which is facsimiled in a privately-printed American +bibliography of Lamb, the owner of which declines to let not only me but +the Boston Bibliophile Society include it with the correspondence. In it +Lamb expresses regret, not so much that Hood had signed "The Widow" with +Lamb's name, but that an unfortunately ambiguous jest, pointed out to +him by certain friends, had crept into it. He asks that the subject may +never be referred to again. + +Here perhaps should come a note to Miss Reynolds, Hood's sister-in-law, +accompanying Lamb's Essay on Hogarth.] + + + +LETTER 466 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Dec., 1828.] + +Dear M.,--As I see no blood-marks on the Green Lanes Road, I conclude +you got in safe skins home. Have you thought of inquiring Miss Wilson's +change of abode? Of the 2 copies of my drama I want one sent to +Wordsworth, together with a complete copy of Hone's "Table Book," for +which I shall be your debtor till we meet. Perhaps Longman will take +charge of this parcel. The other is for Coleridge at Mr. Gilman's, +Grove, Highgate, which may be sent, or, if you have a curiosity to see +him you will make an errand with it to him, & tell him we mean very soon +to come & see him, if the Gilmans can give or get us a bed. I am ashamed +to be so troublesome. Pray let Hood see the "Ecclectic Review"--a rogue! +The 2'd parts of the Blackwood you may make waste paper of. Yours truly, + +C.L. + + +[I do not identify Miss Wilson. Lamb's drama was "A Wife's Trial" in +_Blackwood_ for December, 1828. The same number of the _Eclectic Review_ +referred to Hood's parody of Lamb, "The Widow," as profaning Leslie's +picture of the widow by its "heartless ribaldry." By the 2d parts of +_Blackwood_ Lamb referred, I imagine, to the pages on which his play was +not printed.] + + + +LETTER 467 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. December 5, 1828.] + +Dear B.B.--I am ashamed to receive so many nice Books from you, and to +have none to send you in return; You are always sending me some fruits +or wholesome pot-herbs, and mine is the garden of the Sluggard, nothing +but weeds or scarce they. Nevertheless if I knew how to transmit it, I +would send you Blackwood's of this month, which contains a little Drama, +to have your opinion of it, and how far I have improved, or otherwise, +upon its prototype. Thank you for your kind Sonnet. It does me good to +see the Dedication to a Christian Bishop. I am for a Comprehension, as +Divines call it, but so as that the Church shall go a good deal more +than halfway over to the Silent Meeting house. I have ever said that the +Quakers are the only _Professors_ of Christianity as I read it in the +Evangiles; I say _Professors_--marry, as to practice, with their gaudy +hot types and poetical vanities, they are much at one with the sinful. +Martin's frontispiece is a very fine thing, let C.L. say what he please +to the contrary. Of the Poems, I like them as a volume better than any +one of the preceding; particularly, Power and Gentleness; The Present; +Lady Russell--with the exception that I do not like the noble act of +Curtius, true or false, one of the grand foundations of old Roman +patriotism, to be sacrificed to Lady R.'s taking notes on her husband's +trial. If a thing is good, why invidiously bring it into light with +something better? There are too few heroic things in this world to admit +of our marshalling them in anxious etiquettes of precedence. Would you +make a poetn on the Story of Ruth (pretty Story!) and then say, Aye, but +how much better is the story of Joseph and his Brethren! To go on, the +Stanzas to "Chalon" want the _name_ of Clarkson in the body of them; it +is left to inference. The Battle of Gibeon is spirited again--but you +sacrifice it in last stanza to the Song at Bethlehem. Is it quite +orthodox to do so. The first was good, you suppose, for that +dispensation. Why set the word against the word? It puzzles a weak +Christian. So Watts's Psalms are an implied censure on David's. But as +long as the Bible is supposed to be an equally divine Emanation with the +Testament, so long it will stagger weaklings to have them set in +opposition. Godiva is delicately touch'd. I have always thought it a +beautiful story characteristic of old English times. But I could not +help amusing myself with the thought--if Martin had chosen this subject +for a frontispiece, there would have been in some dark corner a white +Lady, white as the Walker on the waves--riding upon some mystical +quadruped --and high above would have risen "tower above tower a massy +structure high" the Tenterden steeples of Coventry, till the poor Cross +would scarce have known itself among the clouds, and far above them all, +the distant Clint hills peering over chimney pots, piled up, +Ossa-on-Olympus fashion, till the admiring Spectator (admirer of a noble +deed) might have gone look for the Lady, as you must hunt for the other +in the Lobster. But M. should be made Royal Architect. What palaces he +would pile--but then what parliamentary grants to make them good! +ne'ertheless I like the frontispiece. The Elephant is pleasant; and I am +glad you are getting into a wider scope of subjects. There may be too +much, not religion, but too many _good words_ into a book, till it +becomes, as Sh. says of religion, a rhapsody of words. I will just name +that you have brought in the Song to the Shepherds in four or five if +not six places. Now this is not good economy. The Enoch is fine; and +here I can sacrifice Elijah to it, because 'tis illustrative only, and +not disparaging of the latter prophet's departure. I like this best in +the Book. Lastly, I much like the Heron, 'tis exquisite: know you Lord +Thurlow's Sonnet to a Bird of that sort on Lacken water? If not, 'tis +indispensable I send it you, with my Blackwood, if you tell me how best +to send them. Fludyer is pleasant. You are getting gay and Hood-ish. +What is the Enigma? money--if not, I fairly confess I am foiled--and +sphynx must [_here are words crossed through_] 4 times I've tried to +write eat--eat me--and the blotting pen turns it into cat me. And now I +will take my leave with saying I esteem thy verses, like thy present, +honour thy frontispicer, and right-reverence thy Patron and Dedicatee, +and am, dear B.B. + + Yours heartily, C.L. + +Our joint kindest Loves to A.K. and your Daughter. + + +[Barton's new book was _A New Year's Eve and other Poems_, 1828, +dedicated to Charles Richard Sumner, Bishop of Winchester. This volume +contains Barton's "Fireside Quatrains to Charles Lamb" (quoted in Vol. +IV.) and also the following "Sonnet to a Nameless Friend," whom I take +to be Lamb:-- + + SONNET TO A NAMELESS FRIEND + + In each successive tome that bears _my_ name + Hast thou, though veiled _thy own_ from public eyes, + Won from my muse that willing sacrifice + Which worth and talents such as thine should claim: + And I should close my minstrel task with shame, + Could I forget the indissoluble ties + Which every grateful thought of thee supplies + To one who deems thy friendship more than fame. + Accept then, thus imperfectly, once more, + The homage of thy poet and thy friend; + And should thy partial praise my lays commend, + Versed as thou art in all the gentle lore + Of English poesy's exhaustless store, + Whom I most love they never can offend. + +Martin's frontispiece represented Christ walking on the water. Lamb +recalls his remarks in a previous letter about this painter, who though +he never became Royal Architect was the originator of the present Thames +Embankment. Macaulay, in his essay on Southey's edition of the +_Pilgrim's Progress_, in the _Edinburgh_ for December, 1831, makes some +very similar remarks about Martin and the way in which he would probably +paint Lear. + +In the poem "Lady Rachel Russell; or, A Roman Hero and an English +Heroine Compared," Barton compared the act of Curtius, who leaped into +the gulf in the Forum, with Lady Russell standing beside her lord. + +Chalon was the painter of a portrait of Thomas Clarkson. + +The "Battle of Gibeon" is a poem inspired by Martin's picture of Joshua; +the last stanza runs thus:-- + + Made known by marvels awfully sublime! + Yet far more glorious in the Christian's sight + Than these stern terrors of the olden time, + The gentler splendours of that peaceful night, + When opening clouds displayed, in vision bright, + The heavenly host to Bethlehem's shepherd train, + Shedding around them more than cloudless light! + "Glory to God on high!" their opening strain, + Its chorus, "Peace on Earth!" its theme Messiah's reign! + +"In the Lobster." Referring to that part of a lobster which is called +Eve. + +"The Elephant." Some mildly humorous verses "To an Elephant." + +"As Sh. says of religion"--Shakespeare, I assume, in "Hamlet," III., 4, +47, 48:-- + + And sweet Religion makes + A rhapsody of words. + +I quote in the Appendix the poem which Lamb liked best. Barton had +written a poem called "Syr Heron." This is Lord Thurlow's sonnet, of +which Lamb was very fond. He quoted it in a note to his _Elia_ essay on +the sonnets of Sidney in the _London Magazine_, and copied it into his +album:-- + + TO A BIRD, THAT HAUNTED THE WATERS OF LACKEN, IN THE WINTER + + O melancholy Bird, a winter's day, + Thou standest by the margin of the pool, + And, taught by God, dost thy whole being school + To Patience, which all evil can allay. + God has appointed thee the fish thy prey; + And giv'n thyself a lesson to the fool + Unthrifty, to submit to moral rule, + And his unthinking course by thee to weigh. + There need not schools, nor the professor's chair, + Though these be good, true wisdom to impart: + He, who has not enough, for these, to spare, + Of time, or gold, may yet amend his heart, + And teach his soul, by brooks, and rivers fair: + Nature is always wise in every part. + +"Fludyer" was a poem to Sir Charles Fludyer on the devastation effected +on his marine villa at Felixstowe by the encroachments of the sea. The +answer to the enigma, Mrs. FitzGerald (Lucy Barton) told Canon Ainger, +was not money but an auctioneer's hammer. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Louisa Holcroft, dated December +5, 1828. Louisa Holcroft was a daughter of Thomas Holcroft, Lamb's +friend, whose widow married Kenney. A good letter with some excellent +nonsense about measles in it.] + + + +LETTER 468 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +[December, 1828.] + +My dear three C.'s--The way from Southgate to Colney Hatch thro' the +unfrequentedest Blackberry paths that ever concealed their coy bunches +from a truant Citizen, we have accidentally fallen upon--the giant Tree +by Cheshunt we have missed, but keep your chart to go by, unless you +will be our conduct--at present I am disabled from further flights than +just to skirt round Clay Hill, with a peep at the fine back woods, by +strained tendons, got by skipping a skipping-rope at 53--heu mihi non +sum qualis. But do you know, now you come to talk of walks, a ramble of +four hours or so--there and back--to the willow and lavender plantations +at the south corner of Northaw Church by a well dedicated to Saint +Claridge, with the clumps of finest moss rising hillock fashion, which I +counted to the number of two hundred and sixty, and are called +"Claridge's covers"--the tradition being that that saint entertained so +many angels or hermits there, upon occasion of blessing the waters? The +legends have set down the fruits spread upon that occasion, and in the +Black Book of St. Albans some are named which are not supposed to have +been introduced into this island till a century later. But waiving the +miracle, a sweeter spot is not in ten counties round; you are knee deep +in clover, that is to say, if you are not above a middling man's height; +from this paradise, making a day of it, you go to see the ruins of an +old convent at March Hall, where some of the painted glass is yet whole +and fresh. + +If you do not know this, you do not know the capabilities of this +country, you may be said to be a stranger to Enfield. I found it out one +morning in October, and so delighted was I that I did not get home +before dark, well a-paid. + +I shall long to show you the clump meadows, as they are called; we might +do that, without reaching March Hall. When the days are longer, we might +take both, and come home by Forest Cross, so skirt over Pennington and +the cheerful little village of Churchley to Forty Hill. + +But these are dreams till summer; meanwhile we should be most glad to +see you for a lesser excursion--say, Sunday next, you and _another_, or +if more, best on a weekday with a notice, but o' Sundays, as far as a +leg of mutton goes, most welcome. We can squeeze out a bed. Edmonton +coaches run every hour, and my pen has run out its quarter. Heartily +farewell. + + +[Much of the "Lamb country" touched upon in this letter is now built on. +In my large edition I give a map of Lamb's favourite walking region. + +"The giant Tree by Cheshunt" is Goff's Oak. + +"The Black Book of St. Albans." The Black Books exposed abuses in the +church.] + + + +LETTER 469 + +CHARLES LAMB TO T.N. TALFOURD + +[No date. End of 1828.] + +Dear Talfourd,--You could not have told me of a more friendly thing than +you have been doing. I am proud of my namesake. I shall take care never +to do any dirty action, pick pockets, or anyhow get myself hanged, for +fear of reflecting ignominy upon your young Chrisom. I have now a motive +to be good. I shall not _omnis moriar_;--my name borne down the black +gulf of oblivion. + +I shall survive in eleven letters, five more than Caesar. Possibly I +shall come to be knighted, or more: Sir C.L. Talfourd, Bart.! + +Yet hath it an authorish twang with it, which will wear out my name for +poetry. Give him a smile from me till I see him. If you do not drop down +before, some day in the _week after next_ I will come and take one +night's lodging with you, if convenient, before you go hence. You shall +name it. We are in town to-morrow _speciali gratia_, but by no +arrangement can get up near you. + +Believe us both, with greatest regards, yours and Mrs. Talfourd's. + +CHARLES LAMB-PHILO-TALFOURD + +I come as near it as I can. + + +[This may be incorrectly dated, but I place it here because in that to +Hood of December 17, summarised above, Lamb speaks of his godson at +Brighton. + +Talfourd (who himself dates this letter 1829) had named his latest child +Charles Lamb Talfourd. The boy lived only until 1835. I quote in the +Appendix the verses which Talfourd wrote on his death. Another of Lamb's +name children, Charles Lamb Kenney, grew to man's estate and became a +ready writer.] + + + +LETTER 470 + +CHARLES LAMB TO GEORGE DYER + +[No date. ? January, 1829.] + +Dear Dyer, My very good friend, and Charles Clarke's father in law, +Vincent Novello, wishes to shake hands with you. Make him play you a +tune. He is a damn'd fine musician, and what is better, a good man and +true. He will tell you how glad we should be to have Mrs. Dyer and you +here for a few days. Our young friend, Miss Isola, has been here +holydaymaking, but leaves us tomorrow. + + Yours Ever CH. LAMB. + +Enfield. + +[_Added in a feminine hand_:] Emma's love to Mr. and Mrs. Dyer. + + +[The date of this note is pure conjecture on my part, but is +unimportant. Novello had become Charles Clarke's father-in-law in 1828, +and Emma Isola, who was now teaching the children of a clergyman named +Williams, at Fornham, in Suffolk, spent her Christmas holidays with the +Lambs that year. + +Here, perhaps, should come an undated letter from Lamb to Louisa Martin. +Lamb begins "Dear Monkey," and refers to his "niece," Mrs. Dowden, and +some business which she requires him to transact, Mrs. Dowden being Mrs. +John Lamb's daughter-in-law. Lamb describes himself as "a sick cat that +loves to be alone on housetops or at cellar bottoms."] + + + +LETTER 471 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[19th Jan., 1829.] + +My dear Procter,--I am ashamed to have not taken the drift of your +pleasant letter, which I find to have been pure invention. But jokes are +not suspected in Boeotian Enfield. We are plain people; and our talk is +of corn, and cattle, and Waltham markets. Besides, I was a little out of +sorts when I received it. The fact is, I am involved in a case which has +fretted me to death; and I have no reliance, except on you, to extricate +me. I am sure you will give me your best legal advice, having no +professional friend besides but Robinson and Talfourd, with neither of +whom at present I am on the best terms. My brother's widow left a will, +made during the lifetime of my brother, in which I am named sole +executor, by which she bequeaths forty acres of arable property, which +it seems she held under Covert Baron, unknown to my brother, to the +heirs of the body of Elizabeth Dowden, her married daughter by a first +husband, in fee-simple, recoverable by fine--_invested_ property, mind; +for there is the difficulty--subject to leet and quit-rent; in short, +worded in the most guarded terms, to shut out the property from Isaac +Dowden, the husband. Intelligence has just come of the death of this +person in India, where he made a will, entailing this property (which +seem'd entangled enough already) to the heirs of his body, that should +not be born of his wife; for it seems by the law in India, natural +children can recover. They have put the cause into Exchequer process, +here removed by Certiorari from the native Courts; and the question is, +whether I should, as executor, try the cause here, or again re-remove it +to the Supreme Sessions at Bangalore? (which I understand I can, or +plead a hearing before the Privy Council here). As it involves all the +little property of Elizabeth Dowden, I am anxious to take the fittest +steps, and what may be least expensive. Pray assist me, for the case is +so embarrassed, that it deprives me of sleep and appetite. M. Burney +thinks there is a case like it in Chapt. 170, sect. 5, in Fearne's +Contingent Remainders. Pray read it over with him dispassionately, and +let me have the result. The complexity lies in the questionable power of +the husband to alienate.... + +I had another favour to beg, which is the beggarliest of beggings. + +A few lines of verse for a young friend's Album (six will be enough). M. +Burney will tell you who she is I want 'em for. A girl of gold. Six +lines--make 'em eight--signed Barry C----. They need not be very good, +as I chiefly want 'em as a foil to mine. But I shall be seriously +obliged by any refuse scrap. We are in the last ages of the world, when +St. Paul prophesied that women should be "headstrong, lovers of their +own wills, having Albums." I fled hither to escape the Albumean +persecution, and had not been in my new house twenty-four hours, when +the daughter of the next house came in with a friend's Album to beg a +contribution, and the following day intimated she had one of her own. +Two more have sprung up since. If I take the wings of the morning and +fly unto the uttermost parts of the earth, there will Albums be. New +Holland has Albums. But the age is to be complied with. M.B. will tell +you the sort of girl I request the ten lines for. Somewhat of a pensive +cast, what you admire. The lines may come before the Law question, as +that can not be determined before Hilary Term, and I wish your +deliberate judgment on that. The other may be flimsy and superficial. +And if you have not burnt your returned letter, pray re-send it me, as a +monumental token of my stupidity. 'Twas a little unthinking of you to +touch upon a sore subject. Why, by dabbling in those accursed Albums, I +have become a byword of infamy all over the kingdom. I have sicken'd +decent women for asking me to write in Albums. There be "dark jests" +abroad, Master Cornwall; and some riddles may live to be clear'd up. And +'tis not every saddle is put on the right steed; and forgeries and false +Gospels are not peculiar to the Age following the Apostles. And some +tubs don't stand on their right bottoms. Which is all I wish to say in +these ticklish Times--and so your Servant, + +CHS. LAMB. + + +[We do not know the nature of the "bite" that Procter had put upon Lamb; +but Lamb quickly retaliated with the first paragraph of this letter, +which is mainly invention. In his _Old Acquaintance_ Mr. Fields wrote: +"He [Procter] told me that the law question raised in this epistle was a +sheer fabrication of Lamb's, gotten up by him to puzzle his young +correspondent, the conveyancer. The coolness referred to between himself +and Robinson and Talfourd, Procter said, was also a fiction invented by +Lamb to carry out his legal mystification." + +At the end of the first paragraph came some words in another hand: "_in +usum_ enfeoffments whereof he was only collaterally seized, &c.," +beneath which Lamb wrote: "The above is some of M. Burney's memoranda +which he has left me, and you may cut out and give him." + +Procter's verses for Emma Isola's album I have not seen, but Canon +Ainger says that they refer to "Isola Bella, whom all poets love," the +island in Lago di Maggiore. + +This is a list of the contents of Emma Isola's Album, all autographs +(from Quaritch's catalogue, September, 1886):-- + +CHARLES LAMB. "What is an Album?" a poem addressed to + Miss Emma Isola. + + "To Emma on her Twenty-first Birthday," May 25, 1830. + + "Harmony in Unlikeness." Without date. + +JOHN KEATS. "To my Brother," a sonnet on the birthday of his + brother Tom, dated Nov. 18 (? 1814 or 1815). + +WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. "She dwelt among the untrodden + ways," three verses of his poem on Lucy, copied in his + own hand on March 18, 1837. + + "Blessings be with them, and enduring praise," five lines of + a sonnet dated Rydal, 1838. + +ALFRED TENNYSON. "When Lazarus left his charnel-cave," four + stanzas, undated. + +THOMAS MOORE. "Woman gleans but sorrow," and note to + Moxon, June, 1844. + +LEIGH HUNT. "Apollo's Autograph," from an unpublished poem + called "The Feast of the Violets." Undated, _circa_ 1838. + +THOMAS HOOD. "Dreams," a prose fragment, without date, _circa_ + 1840. + +JAMES HOGG. "I'm a' gaen wrang," a song by the Ettrick Shepherd, + _circa_ 1830. + +JOANNA BAILLIE. "Up! quit thy bower," a song, undated, _circa_ + 1830. + +ROBERT SOUTHEY. Epitaph on himself, in verse, Feb. 18, 1837. + +THOMAS CAMPBELL. "Victoria's sceptre o'er the waves," _circa_ + 1837. + +ALLAN CUNNINGHAM. "The Pirate's Song," _circa_ 1838. + +CHARLES DIBDIN. "An Album's like the Dream of Hope," _circa_ + 1827. + +BERNARD BARTON. "To Emma," with a note by Charles Lamb + at foot, 1827. + +WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR. "To Emma Isola," _circa_ 1827. + +BARRY CORNWALL. "To the Spirit of Italy," _circa_ 1827. + +SAMUEL ROGERS. Two letters, and a poem, "My Last," 1829-36. + +FREDERICK LOCKER (afterwards Locker-Lampson). A quatrain, + dated July, 1873. + +George Dyer, J.B. Dibdin, George Darley, Matilda Betham, H.F. + Cary, Mrs. Piozzi, Edward Moxon, T.N. Talfourd, are + the other writers.] + + + +LETTER 472 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +Jan. 22nd, 1829. + +Don't trouble yourself about the verses. Take 'em coolly as they come. +Any day between this and Midsummer will do. Ten lines the extreme. There +is no mystery in my incognita. She has often seen you, though you may +not have observed a silent brown girl, who for the last twelve years has +run wild about our house in her Christmas holidays. She is Italian by +name and extraction. Ten lines about the blue sky of her country will +do, as it's her foible to be proud of it. But they must not be over +courtly or Lady-fied as she is with a Lady who says to her "go and she +goeth; come and she cometh." Item, I have made her a tolerable Latinist. +The verses should be moral too, as for a Clergyman's family. She is +called Emma Isola. I approve heartily of your turning your four vols. +into a lesser compass. 'Twill Sybillise the gold left. I shall, I think, +be in town in a few weeks, when I will assuredly see you. I will put in +here loves to Mrs. Procter and the Anti-Capulets, because Mary tells me +I omitted them in my last. I like to see my friends here. I have put my +lawsuit into the hands of an Enfield practitioner--a plain man, who +seems perfectly to understand it, and gives me hopes of a favourable +result. + +Rumour tells us that Miss Holcroft is married; though the varlet has not +had the grace to make any communication to us on the subject. Who is +Badman, or Bed'em? Have I seen him at Montacute's? I hear he is a great +chymist. I am sometimes chymical myself. A thought strikes me with +horror. Pray heaven he may not have done it for the sake of trying +chymical experiments upon her,--young female subjects are so scarce! +Louisa would make a capital shot. An't you glad about Burke's case? We +may set off the Scotch murders against the Scotch novels--Hare, the +Great Un-hanged. + +Martin Burney is richly worth your knowing. He is on the top scale of my +friendship ladder, on which an angel or two is still climbing, and some, +alas! descending. I am out of the literary world at present. Pray, is +there anything new from the admired pen of the author of the _Pleasures +of Hope_? Has Mrs. He-mans (double masculine) done anything pretty +lately? Why sleeps the lyre of Hervey, and of Alaric Watts? Is the muse +of L.E.L. silent? Did you see a sonnet of mine in Blackwood's last? +Curious construction! _Elaborata facilitas_! And now I'll tell. 'Twas +written for the "_Gem_;" but the editors declined it, on the plea that +it would _shock all mothers_; so they published "The Widow" instead. I +am born out of time. I have no conjecture about what the present world +calls delicacy. I thought "Rosamund Gray" was a pretty modest thing. +Hessey assures me that the world would not bear it. I have lived to grow +into an indecent character. When my sonnet was rejected, I exclaimed, +"Damn the age; I will write for Antiquity!" + +_Erratum_ in sonnet:--Last line but something, for _tender_, read +_tend_. The Scotch do not know our law terms; but I find some remains of +honest, plain, old writing lurking there still. They were not so +mealy-mouthed as to refuse my verses. Maybe, 'tis their oatmeal. + +Blackwood sent me L20 for the drama. Somebody cheated me out of it next +day; and my new pair of breeches, just sent home, cracking at first +putting on, I exclaimed, in my wrath, "All tailors are cheats, and all +men are tailors." Then I was better. [_Rest lost_.] + + +["Your four vols." Procter's poetical works, in three volumes, were +published in 1822. Since then he had issued _The Flood of Thessaly_, +1823. He was perhaps meditating a new one-volume selection. + +"Anti-Capulets"--the Basil Montagus (Montacutes). + +"Badman." Louisa Holcroft married Carlyle's friend Badams, a +manufacturer and scientific experimentalist of Birmingham, with whom the +philosopher spent some weeks in 1827 in attempting a cure for dyspepsia +(see the _Early Recollections_). + +"Burke's case." William Burke and William Hare, the body-snatchers and +murderers of Edinburgh, who killed persons to sell their corpses to +Knox's school of anatomy. Burke was hanged a week later than this +letter, on January 28. Hare turned King's evidence and disappeared. A +"shot" was a subject in these men's vocabulary. The author of the +Waverley novels--the Great Unknown-- had, of course, become known long +before this. + +"M.B."--Martin Burney. In 1818 Lamb had dedicated the prose volume of +his _Works_ to Burney, in a sonnet ending with the lines:-- + + Free from self-seeking, envy, low design, + I have not found a whiter soul than thine. + +Hervey was Thomas Kibble Hervey (1799-1859), a great album poet. + +"A sonnet of mine in Blackwood"--in the number for January, 1829 (see +below). + +"Hessey"--of the firm of Taylor & Hessey, the late publishers of the +_London Magazine_. + +Another letter from Lamb to Procter, repeating the request for verses, +was referred to by Canon Ainger in the preface to his edition of the +correspondence. Canon Ainger printed a delightful passage. It is +disappointing not to find it among the letters proper in his latest +edition. + +Here (had I permission from its American owner to print it, which I have +not) I should place Lamb's instructions as to playing whist drawn up for +Mrs. Badams' use and as an introduction to Captain Burney's treatise on +the game. It is a very interesting document and England has never seen +it yet. + +The Boston Bibliophile edition also gives a letter from Lamb to Badams +apologising for his heatedness yesterday and explaining it by saying +that he had been for some hours dissuading a friend from settling at +Enfield "which friend would have attracted down crowds of literary men, +which men would have driven me wild."] + + + +LETTER 473 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +Jan. 28, 1829. + +Dear Allsop--Old Star is setting. Take him and cut him into Little +Stars. Nevertheless the extinction of the greater light is not by the +lesser light (Stella, or Mrs. Star) apprehended so nigh, but that she +will be thankful if you can let young Scintillation (Master Star) +twinkle down by the coach on Sunday, to catch the last glimmer of the +decaying parental light. No news is good news; so we conclude Mrs. A. +and little a are doing well. Our kindest loves, C.L. + + +[I cannot explain the mystery of these Stars.] + + + +LETTER 474 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[? Jan. 29th, 1829.] + +When Miss Ouldcroft (who is now Mrs. Beddome, and Bed--dom'd to her!) +was at Enfield, which she was in summertime, and owed her health to its +sun and genial influences, she wisited (with young lady-like +impertinence) a poor man's cottage that had a pretty baby (O the +yearnling!), and gave it fine caps and sweetmeats. On a day, broke into +the parlour our two maids uproarious. "O ma'am, who do you think Miss +Ouldcroft (they pronounce it Holcroft) has been working a cap for?" "A +child," answered Mary, in true Shandean female simplicity. "It's the +man's child as was taken up for sheep-stealing." Miss Ouldcroft was +staggered, and would have cut the connection; but by main force I made +her go and take her leave of her _protegee_ (which I only spell with a g +because I can't make a pretty j). I thought, if she went no more, the +Abactor or Abactor's wife (vide Ainsworth) would suppose she had heard +something; and I have delicacy for a sheep-stealer. The overseers +actually overhauled a mutton-pie at the baker's (his first, last, and +only hope of mutton-pie), which he never came to eat, and thence +inferred his guilt. _Per occasionem cujus_ I framed the sonnet; observe +its elaborate construction. I was four days about it. + + THE GYPSY'S MALISON + + Suck, baby, suck, Mother's love grows by giving, + Drain the sweet founts that only thrive by wasting; + Black Manhood comes, when riotous guilty living + Hands thee the cup that shall be death in tasting. + Kiss, baby, kiss, Mother's lips shine by kisses, + Choke the warm breath that else would fall in blessings; + Black Manhood comes, when turbulent guilty blisses + Tend thee the kiss that poisons 'mid caressings. + Hang, baby, hang, mother's love loves such forces, + Choke the fond neck that bends still to thy clinging; + Black Manhood comes, when violent lawless courses + Leave thee a spectacle in rude air swinging. + So sang a wither'd Sibyl energetical, + And bann'd the ungiving door with lips prophetical. + +Barry, study that sonnet. It is curiously and perversely elaborate. 'Tis +a choking subject, and therefore the reader is directed to the structure +of it. See you? and was this a fourteener to be rejected by a trumpery +annual? forsooth, 'twould shock all mothers; and may all mothers, who +would so be shocked, bed dom'd! as if mothers were such sort of +logicians as to infer the future hanging of _their_ child from the +theoretical hangibility (or capacity of being hanged, if the judge +pleases) of every infant born with a neck on. Oh B.C., my whole heart is +faint, and my whole head is sick (how is it?) at this damned, canting, +unmasculine unbawdy (I had almost said) age! Don't show this to your +child's mother or I shall be Orpheusized, scattered into Hebras. Damn +the King, lords, commons, and _specially_ (as I said on Muswell Hill on +a Sunday when I could get no beer a quarter before one) all Bishops, +Priests and Curates. Vale. + + +["Ainsworth." Referring to Robert Ainsworth's _Thesaurus_, 1736. +_Abactor_ (see Forcellini), a stealer or driver away of cattle. +Ainsworth gives only _abactus_--to drive away by force. + +"The Gypsy's Malison." This is the sonnet in _Blackwood_ for January, +1829.] + + + +LETTER 475 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +[No date. Early 1829.] + +The comings in of an incipient conveyancer are not adequate to the +receipt of three twopenny post non-paids in a week. Therefore, after +this, I condemn my stub to long and deep silence, or shall awaken it to +write to lords. Lest those raptures in this honeymoon of my +correspondence, which you avow for the gentle person of my Nuncio, after +passing through certain natural grades, as Love, Love and Water, Love +with the chill off, then subsiding to that point which the heroic suitor +of his wedded dame, the noble-spirited Lord Randolph in the play, +declares to be the ambition of his passion, a reciprocation of +"complacent kindness,"--should suddenly plump down (scarce staying to +bait at the mid point of indifference, so hungry it is for distaste) to +a loathing and blank aversion, to the rendering probable such counter +expressions as this,--"Damn that infernal twopenny postman" (words which +make the not yet glutted inamorato "lift up his hands and wonder who can +use them.") While, then, you are not ruined, let me assure thee, O thou +above the painter, and next only under Giraldus Cambrensis, the most +immortal and worthy to be immortal Barry, thy most ingenious and golden +cadences do take my fancy mightily. They are at this identical moment +under the snip and the paste of the fairest hands (bating chilblains) in +Cambridge, soon to be transplanted to Suffolk, to the envy of half of +the young ladies in Bury. But tell me, and tell me truly, gentle Swain, +is that Isola Bella a true spot in geographical denomination, or a +floating Delos in thy brain? Lurks that fair island in verity in the +bosom of Lake Maggiore, or some other with less poetic name, which thou +hast Cornwallized for the occasion? And what if Maggiore itself be but a +coinage of adaptation? Of this pray resolve me immediately, for my +albumess will be catechised on this subject; and how can I prompt her? +Lake Leman, I know, and Lemon Lake (in a punch bowl) I have swum in, +though those lymphs be long since dry. But Maggiore may be in the moon. +Unsphinx this riddle for me, for my shelves have no gazetteer. And +mayest thou never murder thy father-in-law in the Trivia of Lincoln's +Inn New Square Passage, where Searl Street and the Street of Portugal +embrace, nor afterwards make absurd proposals to the Widow M. But I know +you abhor any such notions. Nevertheless so did O-Edipus (as Admiral +Burney used to call him, splitting the diphthong in spite or ignorance) +for that matter. C.L. + + +["Above the painter"--James Barry, R.A., but I do not understand the +allusion here. + +"Giraldus Cambrensis"--the historian, Giraldus de Barri. + +Procter's poem for Emma Isola's album, as we have seen, mentions Isola +Bella, the island in Lago de Maggiore. Delos was the floating island +which Neptune fixed in order that Latona might rest there and Apollo and +Diana be born. + +Oedipus, who solved the riddle of the Sphinx, was the murderer of his +father. Basil Montagu was Procter's father-in-law. Procter's address was +10 Lincolns Inn, New Square. + +At the end of the letter came a passage which for family reasons cannot +be printed.] + + + +LETTER 476 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +February 2, 1829. + +Facundissime Poeta! quanquam istiusmodi epitheta oratoribus potius quam +poetis attinere facile scio--tamen, facundissime! + +Commoratur nobiscum jamdiu, in agro Enfeldiense, scilicet, leguleius +futurus, illustrissimus Martinus Burneius, otium agens, negotia +nominalia, et officinam clientum vacuam, paululum fugiens. Orat, +implorat te--nempe, Martinus--ut si (quod Dii faciant) forte fortuna, +absente ipso, advenerit tardus cliens, eum certiorem feceris per literas +huc missas. Intelligisne? an me Anglice et barbarice ad te hominem +perdoctum scribere oportet? + +Si status de franco tenemento datur avo, et in codem facto si mediate +vel immediate datur _haeredibus vel haeredibus corporis dicti avi_, +postrema, haec verba sunt Limitations, non Perquisitionis. + +Dixi. + +CARLAGNULUS. + + +[Mr. Stephen Gwynn has made the following translation for me:-- + +"Most eloquent Poet: though I know well such epithet befits orators +rather than poets--and yet, Most eloquent! + +"There has been staying with us this while past at our country seat of +Enfield to wit, the future attorney, the illustrious Martin Burney, +taking his leisure, flying for a space from his nominal occupations, and +his office empty of clients. He--that is, Martin--begs and entreats of +you that if (heaven send it so!) by some stroke of fortune, in his +absence there should arrive a belated client, you would inform him by +letter here. Do you understand? or must I write in barbarous English to +a scholar like you? + +"If an estate in freehold is given to an ancestor, and if in the same +deed directly or indirectly the gift is made to the heir or heirs of the +body of the said ancestor, these last words have the force of Limitation +not of Purchase. + +"I have spoken. + +CHARLES LAMB." + +The last passage was copied probably direct from some law book of +Burney's, and is unintelligible except to students of law-Latin.] + + + +LETTER 477 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +Edmonton, Feb. 2, 1829. + +Dear Cowden,--Your books are as the gushing of streams in a desert. By +the way, you have sent no autobiographies. Your letter seems to imply +you had. Nor do I want any. Cowden, they are of the books which I give +away. What damn'd Unitarian skewer-soul'd things the general biographies +turn out. Rank and Talent you shall have when Mrs. May has done with +'em. Mary likes Mrs. Bedinfield much. For me I read nothing but +Astrea--it has turn'd my brain--I go about with a switch turn'd up at +the end for a crook; and Lambs being too old, the butcher tells me, my +cat follows me in a green ribband. Becky and her cousin are getting +pastoral dresses, and then we shall all four go about Arcadizing. O +cruel Shepherdess! Inconstant yet fair, and more inconstant for being +fair! Her gold ringlets fell in a disorder superior to order! + +Come and join us. + +I am called the Black Shepherd--you shall be Cowden with the Tuft. + +Prosaically, we shall be glad to have you both,--or any two of you--drop +in by surprise some Saturday night. This must go off. + +Loves to Vittoria. C.L. + + +["Rank and Talent"-a novel by W.P. Scargill, 1829. + +Mrs. Bedinfield wrote _Longhollow: a Country Tale_, 1829. + +"Astrea." Probably the romance by Honore D'Urfe. + +"Cowden with the Tuft." So called from his hair, and from _Riquet with +the Tuft_, the fairy tale. We read in the Cowden Clarkes' _Recollections +of Writers:_ "The latter name ('Cowden with the Tuft') slyly implies the +smooth baldness with scant curly hair distinguishing the head of the +friend addressed, and which seemed to strike Charles Lamb so forcibly, +that one evening, after gazing at it for some time, he suddenly broke +forth with the exclamation, ''Gad, Clarke! what whiskers you have behind +your head!'"] + + + +LETTER 478 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. February 27, 1829.] + +Dear R.--Expectation was alert on the receit of your strange-shaped +present, while yet undisclosed from its fuse envelope. Some said,'tis a +viol da Gamba, others pronounced it a fiddle. I myself hoped it a Liquer +case pregnant with Eau de Vie and such odd Nectar. When midwifed into +daylight, the gossips were at loss to pronounce upon its species. Most +took it for a marrow spoon, an apple scoop, a banker's guinea shovel. At +length its true scope appeared, its drift-- to save the backbone of my +sister stooping to scuttles. A philanthropic intent, borrowed no doubt +from some of the Colliers. You save people's backs one way, and break +'em again by loads of obligation. The spectacles are delicate and +Vulcanian. No lighter texture than their steel did the cuckoldy +blacksmith frame to catch Mrs. Vulcan and the Captain in. For ungalled +forehead, as for back unbursten, you have Mary's thanks. Marry, for my +own peculium of obligation, 'twas supererogatory. A second part of +Pamela was enough in conscience. Two Pamelas in a house is too much +without two Mr. B.'s to reward 'em. + +Mary, who is handselling her new aerial perspectives upon a pair of old +worsted stockings trod out in Cheshunt lanes, sends love. I, great good +liking. Bid us a personal farewell before you see the Vatican. + +Chas. Lamb, Enfield. + + +[Crabb Robinson, just starting for Rome, had sent Lamb a copy of +_Pamela_ under the impression that he had borrowed one. + +"Two Mr. B.'s." In Richardson's novel Pamela marries the young Squire B. +and reforms him.] + + + +LETTER 479 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SAMUEL ROGERS + +Chase, Enfield: 22nd Mar., 1829. + +My dear Sir,--I have but lately learned, by letter from Mr. Moxon, the +death of your brother. For the little I had seen of him, I greatly +respected him. I do not even know how recent your loss may have been, +and hope that I do not unseasonably present you with a few lines +suggested to me this morning by the thought of him. I beg to be most +kindly remembered to your remaining brother, and to Miss Rogers. + +Your's truly, CHARLES LAMB. + + Rogers, of all the men that I have known + But slightly, who have died, your brother's loss + Touched me most sensibly. There came across + My mind an image of the cordial tone + Of your fraternal meetings, where a guest + I more than once have sate; and grieve to think, + That of that threefold cord one precious link + By Death's rude hand is sever'd from the rest. + Of our old gentry he appear'd a stem; + A magistrate who, while the evil-doer + He kept in terror, could respect the poor, + And not for every trifle harass them-- + As some, divine and laic, too oft do. + This man's a private loss and public too. + + +[Daniel Rogers, the banker's elder brother, had just died.] + + + +LETTER 480 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. March 25, 1829.] + +Dear B.B.--I send you by desire Barley's very poetical poem. You will +like, I think, the novel headings of each scene. Scenical directions in +verse are novelties. With it I send a few _duplicates_, which are +_therefore_ no value to me, and may amuse an idle hour. Read +"Christmas," 'tis the production of a young author, who reads all your +writings. A good word from you about his little book would be as balm to +him. It has no pretensions, and makes none. But parts are pretty. In +"Field's Appendix" turn to a Poem called the Kangaroo. It is in the best +way of our old poets, if I mistake not. I have just come from Town, +where I have been to get my bit of quarterly pension. And have brought +home, from stalls in Barbican, the old Pilgrim's Progress with the +prints--Vanity Fair, &c.--now scarce. Four shillings. Cheap. And also +one of whom I have oft heard and had dreams, but never saw in the +flesh--that is, in sheepskin--The whole theologic works of-- + + THOMAS AQUINAS! + +My arms aked with lugging it a mile to the stage, but the burden was a +pleasure, such as old Anchises was to the shoulders of Aeneas--or the +Lady to the Lover in old romance, who having to carry her to the top of +a high mountain--the price of obtaining her--clamber'd with her to the +top, and fell dead with fatigue. + +O the glorious old Schoolmen! + +There must be something in him. Such great names imply greatness. Who +hath seen Michael Angelo's things--of us that never pilgrimaged to +Rome--and yet which of us disbelieves his greatness. How I will revel in +his cobwebs and subtleties, till my brain spins! + +N.B. I have writ in the old Hamlet, offer it to Mitford in my name, if +he have not seen it. Tis woefully below our editions of it. But keep it, +if you like. (What is M. to me?) + +I do not mean this to go for a letter, only to apprize you, that the +parcel is booked for you this 25 March 1829 from the Four Swans +Bishopsgate. + +With both our loves to Lucy and A.K. Yours Ever + +C.L. + + +["Darley's... poem"--_Sylvia; or, The May Queen_, by George Darley. + +"Christmas"--a poem by Edward Moxon, dedicated to Lamb. + +"Field's Appendix"--_Geographical Memoirs on New South Wales_, edited by +Barron Field, with his _First-Fruits of Australian Poetry_ as Appendix. + +The old romance, Dr. Paget Toynbee points out, is _Les Dous Amanz_ of +Marie of France, which Lamb had read in Miss Betham's metrical +translation, _The Lay of Marie_.] + + + +LETTER 481 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MISS SARAH JAMES + +[No date. ? April, 1829.] + +We have just got your letter. I think Mother Reynolds will go on +quietly, Mrs. Scrimpshaw having kittened. The name of the late Laureat +was Henry James Pye, and when his 1st Birthday Ode came out, which was +very poor, somebody being asked his opinion of it, said:-- + + And when the Pye was open'd + The birds began to sing, + And was not this a dainty dish + To set before the King! + +Pye was brother to old Major Pye, and father to Mrs. Arnold, and uncle +to a General Pye, all friends of Miss Kelly. Pye succeeded Thos. Warton, +Warton succeeded Wm. Whitehead, Whitehead succeeded Colley Cibber, +Cibber succeeded Eusden, Eusden succeeded Thos. Shadwell, Shadwell +succeeded Dryden, Dryden succeeded Davenant, Davenant God knows whom. +There never was a Rogers a Poet Laureat; there is an old living Poet of +that name, a Banker as you know, Author of the "Pleasures of Memory," +where Moxon goes to breakfast in a fine house in the green Park, but he +was never Laureat. Southey is the present one, and for anything I know +or care, Moxon may succeed him. We have a copy of "Xmas" for you, so you +may give your own to Mary as soon as you please. We think you need not +have exhibited your mountain shyness before M.B. He is neither shy +himself, nor patronizes it in others.--So with many thanks, good-bye. +Emma comes on Thursday. C.L. + +The Poet Laureat, whom Davenant succeeded was Rare 'Ben Jonson,' who I +believe was the first regular Laureat with the appointment of L100 a +year and a Butt of Sack or Canary--so add that to my little list.--C.L. + + +[Mr. Macdonald dates this letter December 31, 1828, perhaps rightly. I +have dated it at a venture April, 1829, because Moxon's _Christmas_ was +published in March of that year. It is the only letter to Mary Lamb's +nurse, Miss James, that exists. Mrs. Reynolds was Lamb's aged pensioner, +whom we have met. Pye died in 1813 and was succeeded by Southey. The +author of the witticism on his first ode was George Steevens, the +critic. The comment gained point from the circumstance that Pye had +drawn largely on images from bird life in his verses.] + + + +LETTER 482 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H. CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. April ? 1829.] + +Dear Robinson, we are afraid you will slip from us from England without +again seeing us. It would be charity to come and see me. I have these +three days been laid up with strong rheumatic pains, in loins, back, +shoulders. I shriek sometimes from the violence of them. I get scarce +any sleep, and the consequence is, I am restless, and want to change +sides as I lie, and I cannot turn without resting on my hands, and so +turning all my body all at once like a log with a lever. While this +rainy weather lasts, I have no hope of alleviation. I have tried +flannels and embrocation in vain. Just at the hip joint the pangs +sometimes are so excruciating, that I cry out. It is as violent as the +cramp, and far more continuous. I am ashamed to whine about these +complaints to you, who can ill enter into them. But indeed they are +sharp. You go about, in rain or fine at all hours without discommodity. +I envy you your immunity at a time of life not much removed from my own. +But you owe your exemption to temperance, which it is too late for me to +pursue. I in my life time have had my good things. Hence my frame is +brittle--yours strong as brass. I never knew any ailment you had. You +can go out at night in all weathers, sit up all hours. Well, I don't +want to moralise. I only wish to say that if you are enclined to a game +at Doubly Dumby, I would try and bolster up myself in a chair for a +rubber or so. My days are tedious, but less so and less painful than my +nights. May you never know the pain and difficulty I have in writing so +much. Mary, who is most kind, joins in the wish. + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 483 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[P.M. April 17, 1829.] + +I do confess to mischief. It was the subtlest diabolical piece of +malice, heart of man has contrived. I have no more rheumatism than that +poker. Never was freer from all pains and aches. Every joint sound, to +the tip of the ear from the extremity of the lesser toe. The report of +thy torments was blown circuitously here from Bury. I could not resist +the jeer. I conceived you writhing, when you should just receive my +congratulations. How mad you'd be. Well, it is not in my method to +inflict pangs. I leave that to heaven. But in the existing pangs of a +friend, I have a share. His disquietude crowns my exemption. I imagine +you howling, and pace across the room, shooting out my free arms legs +&c. + +[Illustration: Handrawn lines] + +this way and that way, with an assurance of not kindling a spark of pain +from them. I deny that Nature meant us to sympathise with agonies. Those +face-contortions, retortions, distortions, have the merriness of antics. +Nature meant them for farce--not so pleasant to the actor indeed, but +Grimaldi cries when we laugh, and 'tis but one that suffers to make +thousands rejoyce. + +You say that Shampooing is ineffectual. But _per se_ it is good, to show +the introv[ol]utions, extravolutions, of which the animal frame is +capable. To show what the creature is receptible of, short of +dissolution. + +You are worst of nights, a'nt you? + +Twill be as good as a Sermon to you to lie abed all this night, and +meditate the subject of the day. 'Tis Good Friday. How appropriate! + +Think when but your little finger pains you, what endured to white-wash +you and the rest of us. + +Nobody will be the more justified for your endurance. You won't save the +soul of a mouse. 'Tis a pure selfish pleasure. + +You never was rack'd, was you? I should like an authentic map of those +feelings. + +You seem to have the flying gout. + +You can scarcely scrue a smile out of your face--can you? I sit at +immunity, and sneer _ad libitum._ + +'Tis now the time for you to make good resolutions. I may go on breaking +'em, for any thing the worse I find myself. + +Your Doctor seems to keep you on the long cure. Precipitate healings are +never good. + +Don't come while you are so bad. I shan't be able to attend to your +throes and the dumbee at once. + +I should like to know how slowly the pain goes off. But don't write, +unless the motion will be likely to make your sensibility more +exquisite. + +Your affectionate and truly healthy friend C. LAMB. + +Mary thought a Letter from me might amuse you in your torment-- + + +[Robinson was the victim of a sudden attack of acute rheumatism. He had +a course of Turkish baths at Brighton to cure him.] + + + +LETTER 484 + +CHARLES LAMB TO GEORGE DYER + +Enfield, April 29, 1829. + +Dear Dyer--As well as a bad pen can do it, I must thank you for your +friendly attention to the wishes of our young friend Emma, who was +packing up for Bury when your sonnet arrived, and was too hurried to +express her sense of its merits. I know she will treasure up that and +your second communication among her choicest rarities, as from her +_grandfather's_ friend, whom not having seen, she loves to hear talked +of. The second letter shall be sent after her, with our first parcel to +Suffolk, where she is, to us, alas dead and Bury'd; we solely miss her. +Should you at any hour think of four or six lines, to send her, +addressed to herself simply, naming her grandsire, and to wish she may +pass through life as much respected, with your own G. Dyer at the end, +she would feel rich indeed, for the nature of an Album asks for verses +that have not been in print before; but this quite at your convenience: +and to be less trouble to yourself, four lines would be sufficient. +Enfield has come out in summer beauty. Come when you will and we will +give you a bed. Emma has left hers, you know. I remain, my dear Dyer, +your affectionate friend, + +CHARLES LAMB. + + +[From _The Mirror_, 1841. Lamb made the same pun--Bury'd--to George Dyer +in his letter of December 5, 1808. His Album verses for Miss Isola I +have not seen.] + + + +LETTER 485 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS HOOD + +[No date. ? May, 1829.] + +Dear Hood,--We will look out for you on Wednesday, be sure, tho' we have +not eyes like Emma, who, when I made her sit with her back to the window +to keep her to her Latin, literally saw round backwards every one that +past, and, O, [that] she were here to jump up and shriek out "There are +the Hoods!" We have had two pretty letters from her, which I long to +show you--together with Enfield in her May beauty. + +Loves to Jane. + +[_Here follow rough caricatures of Charles and his sister, and_] "I +can't draw no better." + + +[I have dated this letter May, 1829, because Miss Isola had just gone to +Fornham, in Suffolk, whence presumably the two letters had come.] + + + +LETTER 486 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date.] + +Calamy is _good reading_. Mary is always thankful for Books in her way. +I won't trouble you for any in _my way_ yet, having enough to read. +Young Hazlitt lives, at least his father does, at _3_ or _36_ [36 I have +it down, with the _6_ scratch'd out] Bouverie Street, Fleet Street. If +not to be found, his mother's address is, Mrs. Hazlitt, Mrs. +Tomlinson's, Potters Bar. At one or other he must be heard of. We shall +expect you with the full moon. Meantime, our thanks. + +C.L. + +We go on very quietly &c. + + +["Calamy" would be Edmund Calamy (1671-1732), the historian of +Nonconformity. + +Mr. W.C. Hazlitt in his _Memoir of Hazlitt_ says that his grandfather +moved in 1829 to 3 Bouverie Street, and in the beginning of 1830 to 6 +Frith Street, Soho. Young Hazlitt was William junior, afterwards Mr. +Registrar Hazlitt and then seventeen years of age.] + + + +LETTER 487 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +May 28, 1829. + +Dear W.,--Introduce this, or omit it, as you like. I think I wrote +better about it in a letter to you from India H. If you have that, +perhaps out of the two I could patch up a better thing, if you'd return +both. But I am very poorly, and have been harassed with an illness of my +sister's. + +The Ode was printed in the "New Times" nearly the end of 1825, and I +have only omitted some silly lines. Call it a corrected copy. + +Yours ever, C. LAMB. + +Put my name to either or both, as you like. + + +[This letter contains Lamb's remarks on the Secondary Novels of Defoe, +printed in Wilson's _Life and Times of De Foe_, Chapter XVII. of Vol. +III., and also his "Ode to the Treadmill," which Wilson omitted from +that work. See Vols. I. and IV. of the present edition for both pieces.] + + +LETTER 488 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. June 3, 1829.] + +Dear B.B.--I am very much grieved indeed for the indisposition of poor +Lucy. Your letter found me in domestic troubles. My sister is again +taken ill, and I am obliged to remove her out of the house for many +weeks, I fear, before I can hope to have her again. I have been very +desolate indeed. My loneliness is a little abated by our young friend +Emma having just come here for her holydays, and a schoolfellow of hers +that was, with her. Still the house is not the same, tho' she is the +same. Mary had been pleasing herself with the prospect of seeing her at +this time; and with all their company, the house feels at times a +frightful solitude. May you and I in no very long time have a more +cheerful theme to write about, and congratulate upon a daughter's and a +Sister's perfect recovery. Do not be long without telling me how Lucy +goes on. I have a right to call her by her quaker-name, you know. + +Emma knows that I am writing to you, and begs to be remembered to you +with thankfulness for your ready contribution. Her album is filling +apace. But of her contributors one, almost the flower of it, a most +amiable young man and late acquaintance of mine, has been carried off by +consumption, on return from one of the Azores islands, to which he went +with hopes of mastering the disease, came back improved, went back to a +most close and confined counting house, and relapsed. His name was +Dibdin, Grandson of the Songster. You will be glad to hear that Emma, +tho' unknown to you, has given the highest satisfaction in her little +place of Governante in a Clergyman's family, which you may believe by +the Parson and his Lady drinking poor Mary's health on her birthday, +tho' they never saw her, merely because she was a friend of Emma's, and +the Vicar also sent me a brace of partridges. To get out of home themes, +have you seen Southey's Dialogues? His lake descriptions, and the +account of his Library at Keswick, are very fine. But he needed not have +called up the Ghost of More to hold the conversations with, which might +as well have pass'd between A and B, or Caius and Lucius. It is making +too free with a defunct Chancellor and Martyr. + +I feel as if I had nothing farther to write about--O! I forget the +prettiest letter I ever read, that I have received from "Pleasures of +Memory" Rogers, in acknowledgment of a Sonnet I sent him on the Loss of +his Brother. It is too long to transcribe, but I hope to shew it you +some day, as I hope sometime again to see you, when all of us are well. +Only it ends thus "We were nearly of an age (he was the elder). He was +the only person in the world in whose eyes I always appeared young."-- + +I will now take my leave with assuring you that I am most interested in +hoping to hear favorable accounts from you.-- + +With kindest regards to A.K. and you + +Yours truly, C.L. + + +["Lucy"--Lucy Barton. + +"Your ready contribution." I do not find that Barton ever printed his +lines for Emma Isola's album. + +"Dibdin"-John Bates Dibdin died in May, 1828. + +Southey's _Sir Thomas More; or, Colloquies on the Progress and Prospects +of Society_, had just been published. + +This was Rogers' letter:-- + + Many, many thanks. The verses are beautiful. I need not say with + what feelings they were read. Pray accept the grateful + acknowledgments of us all, and believe me when I say that nothing + could have been a greater cordial to us in our affliction than such + a testimony from such a quarter. He was --for none knew him so + well--we were born within a year or two of each other--a man of a + very high mind, and with less disguise than perhaps any that ever + lived. Whatever he was, _that_ we saw. He stood before his fellow + beings (if I may be forgiven for saying so) almost as before his + Maker: and God grant that we may all bear as severe an examination. + He was an admirable scholar. His Dante and his Homer were as + familiar to him as his Alphabets: and he had the tenderest heart. + When a flock of turkies was stolen from his farm, the indignation of + the poor far and wide was great and loud. To me he is the greatest + loss, for we were nearly of an age; and there is now no human being + alive in whose eyes I have always been young. + +Under the date June 10, 1829, Mr. Macdonald prints a note from Lamb to +Ayrton, which states that he has two young friends in the house. Here, +therefore, I think, should come a letter from Lamb to William Hazlitt, +Junior, in which Lamb says that he cannot see Mrs. Hazlitt this time. He +adds that the ladies are very pleasant. Emma Isola adds a letter which +tells us that the ladies are herself and her friend Maria. This would be +the Maria of Lamb's sonnet "Harmony in Unlikeness," evidently written at +this time (see Vol. IV.).] + + + +LETTER 489 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +Enfield Chase Side + +Saturday 25 July A.D. 1829.--11 A.M. + +There--a fuller plumper juiceier date never dropt from Idumean palm. Am +I in the dateive case now? if not, a fig for dates, which is more than a +date is worth. I never stood much affected to these limitary +specialities. Least of all since the date of my superannuation. + + What have I with Time to do? } Dear B.B.--Your hand writing has + Slaves of desks, twas meant for you.} conveyed much pleasure to me + +in report of Lucy's restoration. Would I could send you as good news of +my poor Lucy. But some wearisome weeks I must remain lonely yet. I have +had the loneliest time near 10 weeks, broken by a short apparition of +Emma for her holydays, whose departure only deepend the returning +solitude, and by 10 days I have past in Town. But Town, with all my +native hankering after it, is not what it was. The streets, the shops +are left, but all old friends are gone. And in London I was frightfully +convinced of this as I past houses and places--empty caskets now. I have +ceased to care almost about any body. The bodies I cared for are in +graves, or dispersed. My old Clubs, that lived so long and flourish'd so +steadily, are crumbled away. When I took leave of our adopted young +friend at Charing Cross, 'twas heavy unfeeling rain, and I had no where +to go. Home have I none--and not a sympathising house to turn to in the +great city. Never did the waters of the heaven pour down on a forlorner +head. Yet I tried 10 days at a sort of a friend's house, but it was +large and straggling--one of the individuals of my old long knot of +friends, card players, pleasant companions--that have tumbled to pieces +into dust and other things--and I got home on Thursday, convinced that I +was better to get home to my hole at Enfield, and hide like a sick cat +in my corner. Less than a month I hope will bring home Mary. She is at +Fulham, looking better in her health than ever, but sadly rambling, and +scarce showing any pleasure in seeing me, or curiosity when I should +come again. But the old feelings will come back again, and we shall +drown old sorrows over a game at Picquet again. But 'tis a tedious cut +out of a life of sixty four, to lose twelve or thirteen weeks every year +or two. And to make me more alone, our illtemperd maid is gone, who with +all her airs, was yet a home piece of furniture, a record of better +days; the young thing that has succeeded her is good and attentive, but +she is nothing--and I have no one here to talk over old matters with. +Scolding and quarreling have something of familiarity and a community of +interest--they imply acquaintance--they are of resentment, which is of +the family of dearness. I can neither scold nor quarrel at this +insignificant implement of household services; she is less than a cat, +and just better than a deal Dresser. What I can do, and do overdo, is to +walk, but deadly long are the days--these summer all-day days, with but +a half hour's candlelight and no firelight. I do not write, tell your +kind inquisitive Eliza, and can hardly read. In the ensuing Blackwood +will be an old rejected farce of mine, which may be new to you, if you +see that same dull Medley. What things are all the Magazines now! I +contrive studiously not to see them. The popular New Monthly is perfect +trash. Poor Hessey, I suppose you see, has failed. Hunt and Clarke too. +Your "Vulgar truths" will be a good name--and I think your prose must +please--me at least--but 'tis useless to write poetry with no +purchasers. 'Tis cold work Authorship without something to puff one into +fashion. Could you not write something on Quakerism--for Quakers to +read--but nominally addrest to Non Quakers? explaining your +dogmas--waiting on the Spirit--by the analogy of human calmness and +patient waiting on the judgment? I scarcely know what I mean, but to +make Non Quakers reconciled to your doctrines, by shewing something like +them in mere human operations--but I hardly understand myself, so let it +pass for nothing. I pity you for over-work, but I assure you no-work is +worse. The mind preys on itself, the most unwholesome food. I brag'd +formerly that I could not have too much time. I have a surfeit. With few +years to come, the days are wearisome. But weariness is not eternal. +Something will shine out to take the load off, that flags me, which is +at present intolerable. I have killed an hour or two in this poor +scrawl. I am a sanguinary murderer of time, and would kill him inchmeal +just now. But the snake is vital. Well, I shall write merrier +anon.--'Tis the present copy of my countenance I send--and to complain +is a little to alleviate.--May you enjoy yourself as far as the wicked +wood will let you--and think that you are not quite alone, as I am. +Health to Lucia and to Anna and kind rememb'ces. + +Yours forlorn. + +C.L. + + +["Out of a life of sixty-four." Mary Lamb was born December 3, 1764. + +"Your kind ... Eliza"--Eliza Barton, Bernard's sister. + +"Rejected farce." "The Pawnbroker's Daughter" was printed in +_Blackwood_, January, 1830. + +"I brag'd formerly." Referring I think to his sonnet "Leisure."] + + + +LETTER 490 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +[No date. Late July, 1829.] + +My dear Allsop--I thank you for thinking of my recreation. But I am best +here, I feel I am. I have tried town lately, but came back worse. Here I +must wait till my loneliness has its natural cure. Besides that, though +I am not very sanguine, yet I live in hopes of better news from Fulham, +and can not be out of the way. 'Tis ten weeks to-morrow.--I saw Mary a +week since, she was in excellent bodily health, but otherwise far from +well. But a week or so may give a turn. Love to Mrs. A. and children, +and fair weather accomp'y you. + +C.L. + +Tuesday. + + + +LETTER 491 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Sept. 22, 1829.] + +Dear Moxon, If you can oblige me with the Garrick Papers or Ann of +Gierstien, I shall be thankful. I am almost fearful whether my Sister +will be able to enjoy any reading at present for since her coming home, +after 12 weeks, she has had an unusual relapse into the saddest low +spirits that ever poor creature had, and has been some weeks under +medical care. She is unable to see any yet. When she is better I shall +be very glad to talk over your ramble with you. Have you done any +sonnets, can you send me any to overlook? I am almost in despair, Mary's +case seems so hopeless. + +Believe me + +Yours + +C.L. + +I do not want Mr. Jameson or Lady Morgan. + +Enfield + +Wedn'y + + +["The Garrick Papers." Lamb refers, I suppose, to the _Private +Correspondence of David Garrick_, in some form previous to its +publication in 1832. + +"Anne of Geierstein." Scott's novel was published this year. + +"Mr. Jameson." I cannot find any book by a Mr. Jameson likely to have +been offered to Lamb; but Mrs. Jameson's _Loves of the Poets_ was +published this year. Probably he meant to write Mrs. Jameson. Lady +Morgan was the author of _The Wild Irish Girl_ and other novels. Her +1829 book was _The Book of the Boudoir_.] + + + +LETTER 492 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +Chase-Side, Enfield, 26th Oct., 1829. + +Dear Gillman,--Allsop brought me your kind message yesterday. How can I +account for having not visited Highgate this long time? Change of place +seemed to have changed me. How grieved I was to hear in what indifferent +health Coleridge has been, and I not to know of it! A little school +divinity, well applied, may be healing. I send him honest Tom of Aquin; +that was always an obscure great idea to me: I never thought or dreamed +to see him in the flesh, but t'other day I rescued him from a stall in +Barbican, and brought him off in triumph. He comes to greet Coleridge's +acceptance, for his shoe-latchets I am unworthy to unloose. Yet there +are pretty pro's and con's, and such unsatisfactory learning in him. +Commend me to the question of etiquette-- "_utrum annunciatio debuerit +fieri per angelum_"--_Quaest. 30, Articilus 2_. I protest, till now I +had thought Gabriel a fellow of some mark and livelihood, not a simple +esquire, as I find him. Well, do not break your lay brains, nor I +neither, with these curious nothings. They are nuts to our dear friend, +whom hoping to see at your first friendly hint that it will be +convenient, I end with begging our very kindest loves to Mrs. Gillman. +We have had a sorry house of it here. Our spirits have been reduced till +we were at hope's end what to do-- obliged to quit this house, and +afraid to engage another, till in extremity I took the desperate resolve +of kicking house and all down, like Bunyan's pack; and here we are in a +new life at board and lodging, with an honest couple our neighbours. We +have ridded ourselves of the cares of dirty acres; and the change, +though of less than a week, has had the most beneficial effects on Mary +already. She looks two years and a half younger for it. But we have had +sore trials. + +God send us one happy meeting!--Yours faithfully, + +C. LAMB. + + +["The question of etiquette." See the _Summa Theologies_, Pars Tertia, +Quest. XXX., Articulus II. It would be interesting to know whether Lamb +remembered an earlier letter in which he had set Coleridge some similar +"nuts." + +"In a new life." The Lambs moved next door, to the Westwoods. The house, +altered externally, still stands (1912) and is known as "Westwood +Cottage."] + + + +LETTER 493 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[P.M. Probably Nov. 10, 1829.] + +Dear FUGUE-IST, + +or hear'st thou rather + +CONTRAPUNTIST--? + +We expect you four (as many as the Table will hold without squeeging) at +Mrs. Westwood's Table D'Hote on Thursday. You will find the White House +shut up, and us moved under the wing of the Phoenix, which gives us +friendly refuge. Beds for guests, marry, we have none, but cleanly +accomodings at the Crown & Horseshoe. + +Yours harmonically, + +C.L. + +[Addressed: Vincentio (what Ho!) Novello, a Squire, 66, Great Queen +Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields.] + + +["The Phoenix." Mr. Westwood was agent for the Phoenix Insurance +Company, and the badge of that office was probably on the house.] + + + +LETTER 494 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +Enfield, 15th November, 1829. + +My dear Wilson,--I have not opened a packet of unknown contents for many +years, that gave me so much pleasure as when I disclosed your three +volumes. I have given them a careful perusal, and they have taken their +degree of classical books upon my shelves. De Foe was always my darling; +but what darkness was I in as to far the larger part of his writings! I +have now an epitome of them all. I think the way in which you have done +the "Life" the most judicious you could have pitched upon. You have made +him tell his own story, and your comments are in keeping with the tale. +Why, I never heard of such a work as "the Review." Strange that in my +stall-hunting days I never so much as lit upon an odd volume of it. This +circumstance looks as if they were never of any great circulation. But I +may have met with 'em, and not knowing the prize, overpast 'em. I was +almost a stranger to the whole history of Dissenters in those reigns, +and picked my way through that strange book the "Consolidator" at +random. How affecting are some of his personal appeals! what a machine +of projects he set on foot! and following writers have picked his pocket +of the patents. I do not understand where-abouts in _Roxana_ he himself +left off. I always thought the complete-tourist-sort of description of +the town she passes through on her last embarkation miserably +unseasonable and out of place. I knew not they were spurious. Enlighten +me as to where the apocryphal matter commences. I, by accident, can +correct one A.D. "Family Instructor," vol. ii. 1718; you say his first +volume had then reached the fourth edition; now I have a fifth, printed +for Eman. Matthews, 1717. So have I plucked one rotten date, or rather +picked it up where it had inadvertently fallen, from your flourishing +date tree, the Palm of Engaddi. I may take it for my pains. I think +yours a book which every public library must have, and every English +scholar should have. I am sure it has enriched my meagre stock of the +author's works. I seem to be twice as opulent. Mary is by my side just +finishing the second volume. It must have interest to divert her away so +long from her modern novels. Colburn will be quite jealous. I was a +little disappointed at my "Ode to the Treadmill" not finding a place; +but it came out of time. The two papers of mine will puzzle the reader, +being so akin. Odd that, never keeping a scrap of my own letters, with +some fifteen years' interval I should nearly have said the same things. +But I shall always feel happy in having my name go down any how with De +Foe's, and that of his historiographer. I promise myself, if not +immortality, yet diuternity of being read in consequence. We have both +had much illness this year; and feeling infirmities and fretfulness grow +upon us, we have cast off the cares of housekeeping, sold off our goods, +and commenced boarding and lodging with a very comfortable old couple +next door to where you found us. We use a sort of common table. +Nevertheless, we have reserved a private one for an old friend; and when +Mrs. Wilson and you revisit Babylon, we shall pray you to make it yours +for a season. Our very kindest remembrances to you both. From your old +friend and _fellow-journalist_, now in _two instances_, + +C. LAMB. + +Hazlitt is going to make your book a basis for a review of De Foe's +Novels in the "Edinbro'." I wish I had health and spirits to do it. Hone +I have not seen, but I doubt not he will be much pleased with your +performance. I very much hope you will give us an account of Dunton, &c. +But what I should more like to see would be a Life and Times of Bunyan. +Wishing health to you and long life to your healthy book, again I +subscribe me, + +Yours in verity, + +C.L. + + +[Wilson's _Memoirs of the Life and Times of Daniel De Foe_ had just been +published in three volumes, with the date 1830. + +Defoe's _Review_ was started in February, 1704, under the title, _A +Review of the Affairs of France.... purged from the Errors and +Partiality of News-writers, and Petty-Statesmen, of all sides_. It +continued until May, 1713. _The Consolidator; or, Memoirs of sundry +Transactions from the world in the moon. Translated from the Lunar +Language_, was published in 1765, a political satire, which, it has been +thought, gave hints to Swift for Gulliver. + +Lamb had sent Wilson his "Ode to the Treadmill." The substance of his +letter of December 16, 1822, was printed by Wilson in Chapter XXII. of +Vol. III.; the new material which he wrote especially for the book, was +printed in Chapter XVII. of the same volume. The space dividing them was +not fifteen years but seven. + +"Diuternity." Spelt "diuturnity." A rare word signifying long duration. + +"_Fellow-journalist_." The other instance would be in connection with +the journals of the India House, where Wilson had once been a clerk with +Lamb. + +Hazlitt's review of Wilson's book is in the _Edinburgh_ for January, +1830, with this reference to Lamb's criticisms: "_Captain Singleton_ is +a hardened, brutal desperado, without one redeeming trait, or almost +human feeling; and, in spite of what Mr. Lamb says of his lonely musings +and agonies of a conscience-stricken repentance, we find nothing of this +in the text." + +"Dunton." This would be John Dunton (1659-1733), the bookseller, and +author of _The Athenian Gazette, Dunton's Whipping-Post_, and scores of +pamphlets and satires.] + + + +LETTER 495 + +(_? Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +[No date. ? November 29, 1829.] + +Pray trust me with the "Church History," as well as the "Worthies." A +moon shall restore both. Also give me back Him of Aquinum. In return you +have the _light of my countenance_. Adieu. + +P.S.--A sister also of mine comes with it. A son of Nimshi drives her. +Their driving will have been furious, impassioned. Pray God they have +not toppled over the tunnel! I promise you I fear their steed, bred out +of the wind without father, semi-Melchisedecish, hot, phaetontic. From +my country lodgings at Enfield. + +C.L. + + +[The _Church History_ and the _Worthies_ are by Fuller. + +"Light of my countenance." Mr. Hazlitt says that this was a copy of +Brook Pulham's etching. + +"The tunnel"--the Highgate Archway.] + + + +LETTER 496 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +30 Nov., 1829. + +Dear G.,--The excursionists reached home, and the good town of Enfield a +little after four, without slip or dislocation. Little has transpired +concerning the events of the back-journey, save that on passing the +house of 'Squire Mellish, situate a stone-bow's cast from the hamlet, +Father Westwood, with a good-natured wonderment, exclaimed, "I cannot +think what is gone of Mr. Mellish's rooks. I fancy they have taken +flight somewhere; but I have missed them two or three years past." All +this while, according to his fellow-traveller's report, the rookery was +darkening the air above with undiminished population, and deafening all +ears but his with their cawings. But nature has been gently withdrawing +such phenomena from the notice of Thomas Westwood's senses, from the +time he began to miss the rooks. T. Westwood has passed a retired life +in this hamlet of thirty or forty years, living upon the minimum which +is consistent with gentility, yet a star among the minor gentry, +receiving the bows of the tradespeople and courtesies of the alms' women +daily. Children venerate him not less for his external show of gentry, +than they wonder at him for a gentle rising endorsation of the person, +not amounting to a hump, or if a hump, innocuous as the hump of the +buffalo, and coronative of as mild qualities. 'Tis a throne on which +patience seems to sit--the proud perch of a self-respecting humility, +stooping with condescension. Thereupon the cares of life have sate, and +rid him easily. For he has thrid the _angustiae domus_ with dexterity. +Life opened upon him with comparative brilliancy. He set out as a rider +or traveller for a wholesale house, in which capacity he tells of many +hair-breadth escapes that befell him; one especially, how he rode a mad +horse into the town of Devizes; how horse and rider arrived in a foam, +to the utter consternation of the expostulating hostlers, inn-keepers, +&c. It seems it was sultry weather, piping hot; the steed tormented into +frenzy with gad-flies, long past being roadworthy; but safety and the +interest of the house he rode for were incompatible things; a fall in +serge cloth was expected; and a mad entrance they made of it. Whether +the exploit was purely voluntary, or partially; or whether a certain +personal defiguration in the man part of this extraordinary centaur +(non-assistive to partition of natures) might not enforce the +conjunction, I stand not to inquire. I look not with 'skew eyes into the +deeds of heroes. The hosier that was burnt with his shop, in Field-lane, +on Tuesday night, shall have past to heaven for me like a Marian Martyr, +provided always, that he consecrated the fortuitous incremation with a +short ejaculation in the exit, as much as if he had taken his state +degrees of martyrdom _in forma_ in the market vicinage. There is +adoptive as well as acquisitive sacrifice. Be the animus what it might, +the fact is indisputable, that this composition was seen flying all +abroad, and mine host of Daintry may yet remember its passing through +his town, if his scores are not more faithful than his memory. After +this exploit (enough for one man), Thomas Westwood seems to have +subsided into a less hazardous occupation; and in the twenty-fifth year +of his age we find him a haberdasher in Bow Lane: yet still retentive of +his early riding (though leaving it to rawer stomachs), and Christmasly +at night sithence to this last, and shall to his latest Christmas, hath +he, doth he, and shall he, tell after supper the story of the insane +steed and the desperate rider. Save for Bedlam or Luke's no eye could +have guessed that melting day what house he rid for. But he reposes on +his bridles, and after the ups and downs (metaphoric only) of a life +behind the counter--hard riding sometimes, I fear, for poor T.W.--with +the scrapings together of the shop, and _one anecdote_, he hath finally +settled at Enfield; by hard economising, gardening, building for +himself, hath reared a mansion, married a daughter, qualified a son for +a counting-house, gotten the respect of high and low, served for self or +substitute the greater parish offices: hath a special voice at vestries; +and, domiciliating us, hath reflected a portion of his house-keeping +respectability upon your humble servants. We are greater, being his +lodgers, than when we were substantial renters. His name is a passport +to take off the sneers of the native Enfielders against obnoxious +foreigners. We are endenizened. Thus much of T. Westwood have I thought +fit to acquaint you, that you may see the exemplary reliance upon +Providence with which I entrusted so dear a charge as my own sister to +the guidance of a man that rode the mad horse into Devizes. To come from +his heroic character, all the amiable qualities of domestic life +concentre in this tamed Bellerophon. He is excellent over a glass of +grog; just as pleasant without it; laughs when he hears a joke, and when +(which is much oftener) he hears it not; sings glorious old sea songs on +festival nights; and but upon a slight acquaintance of two years, +Coleridge, is as dear a deaf old man to us, as old Norris, rest his +soul! was after fifty. To him and his scanty literature (what there is +of it, _sound_) have we flown from the metropolis and its cursed +annualists, reviewers, authors, and the whole muddy ink press of that +stagnant pool. + +Now, Gillman again, you do not know the treasure of the Fullers. I +calculate on having massy reading till Christmas. All I want here, is +books of the true sort, not those things in boards that moderns mistake +for books--what they club for at book clubs. + +I did not mean to cheat you with a blank side; but my eye smarts, for +which I am taking medicine, and abstain, this day at least, from any +aliments but milk-porridge, the innocent taste of which I am anxious to +renew after a half-century's dis-acquaintance. If a blot fall here like +a tear, it is not pathos, but an angry eye. + +Farewell, while my _specilla_ are sound. + +Yours and yours, + +C. LAMB. + + +[This letter records the safe return of Mary Lamb with the Fullers. + +"Squire Mellish." William Mellish, M.P. for Middlesex for some years. + +Thomas Westwood's son, for whom Lamb found an appointment, wrote some +excellent articles in _Notes and Queries_ many years later describing +the Lambs' life at his father's. + +"Old Norris." See letter to Crabb Robinson, Jan. 20, 1827. + +_Specilla_ is probably a slip for _Conspicilla_.] + + + +LETTER 497 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. December 8, 1829.] + +My dear B.B.--You are very good to have been uneasy +about us, and I have the satisfaction to tell you, that we +are both in better health and spirits than we have been for a year +or two past; I may say, than we have been since we have been +at Enfield. The cause may not appear quite adequate, when +I tell you, that a course of ill health and spirits brought us to the +determination of giving up our house here, and we are boarding +and lodging with a worthy old couple, long inhabitants +of Enfield, where everything is done for us without our trouble, +further than a reasonable weekly payment. We should have +done so before, but it is not easy to flesh and blood to give up an +ancient establishment, to discard old Penates, and from house +keepers to turn house-sharers. (N.B. We are not in the Work-house.) +Dioclesian in his garden found more repose than +on the imperial seat of Rome, and the nob of Charles the Fifth +aked seldomer under a monk's cowl than under the diadem. +With such shadows of assimilation we countenance our degradation. +With such a load of dignifyd cares just removed from +our shoulders, we can the more understand and pity the accession +to yours, by the advancement to an Assigneeship. I will +tell you honestly B.B. that it has been long my deliberate judgment, +that all Bankrupts, of what denomination civil or religious +whatever, ought to be hang'd. The pity of mankind has for +ages run in a wrong channel, and has been diverted from poor +Creditors (how many I have known sufferers! Hazlitt has just +been defrauded of L100 by his Bookseller-friend's breaking) +to scoundrel Debtors. I know all the topics, that distress may +come upon an honest man without his fault, that the failure of +one that he trusted was his calamity &c. &c. Then let _both_ be +hang'd. O how careful it would make traders! These are +my deliberate thoughts after many years' experience in matters +of trade. What a world of trouble it would save you, if Friend +* * * * * had been immediately hangd, without benefit of +clergy, which (being a Quaker I presume) he could not +reasonably insist upon. Why, after slaving twelve months +in your assign-business, you will be enabled to declare seven +pence in the Pound in all human probabilty. B.B., he should +be _hanged_. Trade will never re-flourish in this land till such +a Law is establish'd. I write big not to save ink but eyes, +mine having been troubled with reading thro' three folios of +old Fuller in almost as few days, and I went to bed last +night in agony, and am writing with a vial of eye water before +me, alternately dipping in vial and inkstand. This may enflame +my zeal against Bankrupts--but it was my speculation when +I could see better. Half the world's misery (Eden else) is +owing to want of money, and all that want is owing to Bankrupts. +I declare I would, if the State wanted Practitioners, +turn Hangman myself, and should have great pleasure in +hanging the first after my salutary law should be establish'd. +I have seen no annuals and wish to see none. I like your +fun upon them, and was quite pleased with Bowles's sonnet. +Hood is or was at Brighton, but a note, prose or rhime, to him, +Robert Street, Adelphi, I am sure would extract a copy of +_his_, which also I have not seen. Wishing you and yours all +Health, I conclude while these frail glasses are to me--eyes. + +C.L. + + +["Dioclesian." The Emperor Diocletian abdicated the throne after +twenty-one years' reign, and retired to his garden. Charles V. of +Germany imitated the Roman Emperor, and after thirty-six years took the +cowl. + +"Hazlitt has just been defrauded." The failure of Hunt & Clarke, the +publishers of the _Life of Napoleon_, cost Hazlitt L500. He had received +only L140 towards this, in a bill which on their insolvency became +worthless. + +"Friend * * * * *." Not identifiable.] + + + +LETTER 498 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +[P.M. January 22, 1830.] + +And is it a year since we parted from you at the steps of Edmonton +Stage? There are not now the years that there used to be. The tale of +the dwindled age of men, reported of successional mankind, is true of +the same man only. We do not live a year in a year now. 'Tis a punctum +stans. The seasons pass us with indifference. Spring cheers not, nor +winter heightens our gloom, Autumn hath foregone its moralities, they +are hey-pass re-pass [as] in a show-box. Yet as far as last year occurs +back, for they scarce shew a reflex now, they make no memory as +heretofore--'twas sufficiently gloomy. Let the sullen nothing pass. + +Suffice it that after sad spirits prolonged thro' many of its months, as +it called them, we have cast our skins, have taken a farewell of the +pompous troublesome trifle calld housekeeping, and are settled down into +poor boarders and lodgers at next door with an old couple, the Baucis +and Baucida of dull Enfield. Here we have nothing to do with our +victuals but to eat them, with the garden but to see it grow, with the +tax gatherer but to hear him knock, with the maid but to hear her +scolded. Scot and lot, butcher, baker, are things unknown to us save as +spectators of the pageant. We are fed we know not how, quietists, +confiding ravens. We have the otium pro dignitate, a respectable +insignificance. Yet in the self condemned obliviousness, in the +stagnation, some molesting yearnings of life, not quite kill'd, rise, +prompting me that there was a London, and that I was of that old +Jerusalem. In dreams I am in Fleetmarket, but I wake and cry to sleep +again. I die hard, a stubborn Eloisa in this detestable Paraclete. What +have I gained by health? intolerable dulness. What by early hours and +moderate meals?--a total blank. O never let the lying poets be believed, +who 'tice men from the chearful haunts of streets--or think they mean it +not of a country village. In the ruins of Palmyra I could gird myself up +to solitude, or muse to the snorings of the Seven Sleepers, but to have +a little teazing image of a town about one, country folks that do not +look like country folks, shops two yards square, half a dozen apples and +two penn'orth of overlookd gingerbread for the lofty fruiterers of +Oxford Street--and, for the immortal book and print stalls, a +circulating library that stands still, where the shew-picture is a last +year's Valentine, and whither the fame of the last ten Scotch novels has +not yet travel'd (marry, they just begin to be conscious of the Red +Gauntlet), to have a new plasterd flat church, and to be wishing that it +was but a Cathedral. The very blackguards here are degenerate. The +topping gentry, stock brokers. The passengers too many to ensure your +quiet, or let you go about whistling, or gaping--too few to be the fine +indifferent pageants of Fleet Street. Confining, room-keeping thickest +winter is yet more bearable here than the gaudy months. Among one's +books at one's fire by candle one is soothed into an oblivion that one +is not in the country, but with the light the green fields return, till +I gaze, and in a calenture can plunge myself into Saint Giles's. O let +no native Londoner imagine that health, and rest, and innocent +occupation, interchange of converse sweet and recreative study, can make +the country any thing better than altogether odious and detestable. A +garden was the primitive prison till man with promethean felicity and +boldness luckily sinn'd himself out of it. Thence followd Babylon, +Nineveh, Venice, London, haberdashers, goldsmiths, taverns, playhouses, +satires, epigrams, puns--these all came in on the town part, and the +thither side of innocence. Man found out inventions. + +From my den I return you condolence for your decaying sight, not for any +thing there is to see in the country, but for the miss of the pleasure +of reading a London newspaper. The poets are as well to listen to, any +thing high may, nay must, be read out--you read it to yourself with an +imaginary auditor--but the light paragraphs must be glid over by the +proper eye, mouthing mumbles their gossamery substance. 'Tis these +trifles I should mourn in fading sight. A newspaper is the single gleam +of comfort I receive here, it comes from rich Cathay with tidings of +mankind. Yet I could not attend to it read out by the most beloved +voice. But your eyes do not get worse, I gather. O for the collyrium of +Tobias inclosed in a whiting's liver to send you with no apocryphal good +wishes! The last long time I heard from you, you had knock'd your head +against something. Do not do so. For your head (I do not flatter) is not +a nob, or the top of a brass nail, or the end of a nine pin--unless a +Vulcanian hammer could fairly batter a Recluse out of it, then would I +bid the smirch'd god knock and knock lustily, the two-handed skinker. +What a nice long letter Dorothy has written! Mary must squeeze out a +line propria manu, but indeed her fingers have been incorrigibly nervous +to letter writing for a long interval. 'Twill please you all to hear +that, tho' I fret like a lion in a net, her present health and spirits +are better than they have been for some time past: she is absolutely +three years and a half younger, as I tell her, since we have adopted +this boarding plan. Our providers are an honest pair, dame Westwood and +her husband--he, when the light of prosperity shined on them, a +moderately thriving haberdasher within Bow Bells, retired since with +something under a competence, writes himself parcel gentleman, hath +borne parish offices, sings fine old sea songs at threescore and ten, +sighs only now and then when he thinks that he has a son on his hands +about 15, whom he finds a difficulty in getting out into the world, and +then checks a sigh with muttering, as I once heard him prettily, not +meaning to be heard, "I have married my daughter however,"--takes the +weather as it comes, outsides it to town in severest season, and a' +winter nights tells old stories not tending to literature, how +comfortable to author-rid folks! and has _one anecdote_, upon which and +about forty pounds a year he seems to have retired in green old age. It +was how he was a _rider_ in his youth, travelling for shops, and once +(not to baulk his employer's bargain) on a sweltering day in August, +rode foaming into Dunstable upon a _mad horse_ to the dismay and +expostulary wonderment of innkeepers, ostlers &c. who declared they +would not have bestrid the beast to win the Darby. Understand the +creature gall'd to death and desperation by gad flies, cormorants +winged, worse than beset Inachus' daughter. This he tells, this he +brindles and burnishes on a' winter's eves, 'tis his star of set glory, +his rejuvenescence to descant upon. Far from me be it (dii avertant) to +look a gift story in the mouth, or cruelly to surmise (as those who +doubt the plunge of Curtius) that the inseparate conjuncture of man and +beast, the centaur-phenomenon that staggerd all Dunstable, might have +been the effect of unromantic necessity, that the horse-part carried the +reasoning, willy nilly, that needs must when such a devil drove, that +certain spiral configurations in the frame of Thomas Westwood unfriendly +to alighting, made the alliance more forcible than voluntary. Let him +enjoy his fame for me, nor let me hint a whisper that shall dismount +Bellerophon. Put case he was an involuntary martyr, yet if in the fiery +conflict he buckled the soul of a constant haberdasher to him, and +adopted his flames, let Accident and He share the glory! You would all +like Thomas Westwood. + +[Illustration: Hand drawn sketch] + +How weak is painting to describe a man! Say that he stands four feet and +a nail high by his own yard measure, which like the Sceptre of Agamemnon +shall never sprout again, still you have no adequate idea, nor when I +tell you that his dear hump, which I have favord in the picture, seems +to me of the buffalo--indicative and repository of mild qualities, a +budget of kindnesses, still you have not the man. Knew you old Norris of +the Temple, 60 years ours and our father's friend, he was not more +natural to us than this old W. the acquaintance of scarce more weeks. +Under his roof now ought I to take my rest, but that back-looking +ambition tells me I might yet be a Londoner. Well, if we ever do move, +we have encumbrances the less to impede us: all our furniture has faded +under the auctioneer's hammer, going for nothing like the tarnishd +frippery of the prodigal, and we have only a spoon or two left to bless +us. Clothed we came into Enfield, and naked we must go out of it. I +would live in London shirtless, bookless. Henry Crabb is at Rome, +advices to that effect have reach'd Bury. But by solemn legacy he +bequeath'd at parting (whether he should live or die) a Turkey of +Suffolk to be sent every succeeding Xmas to us and divers other friends. +What a genuine old Bachelor's action! I fear he will find the air of +Italy too classic. His station is in the Hartz forest, his soul is +_Bego'ethed_. Miss Kelly we never see; Talfourd not this half-year; the +latter flourishes, but the exact number of his children, God forgive me, +I have utterly forgotten, we single people are often out in our count +there. Shall I say two? One darling I know they have lost within a +twelvemonth, but scarce known to me by sight, and that was a second +child lost. We see scarce anybody. We have just now Emma with us for her +holydays; you remember her playing at brag with Mr. Quillinan at poor +Monkhouse's! She is grown an agreeable young woman; she sees what I +write, so you may understand me with limitations. She was our inmate for +a twelvemonth, grew natural to us, and then they told us it was best for +her to go out as a Governess, and so she went out, and we were only two +of us, and our pleasant house-mate is changed to an occasional visitor. +If they want my sister to go out (as they call it) there will be only +one of us. Heaven keep us all from this acceding to Unity! + +Can I cram loves enough to you all in this little O? Excuse +particularizing. + +C.L. + + + +LETTER 499 + +MARY LAMB TO DOROTHY WORDSWORTH + +(_Same letter_) + +My dear Miss Wordsworth, Charles has left me space to fill up with my +own poor scribble; which I must do as well as I can, being quite out of +practise, and after he has been reading his queer letter out to us I can +hardly put down in a plain style all I had to tell you, how pleasant +your handwriting was to me. He has lumped you all together in one rude +remembrance at the end, but I beg to send my love individually and by +name to Mr. and Mrs. Wordsworth, to Miss Hutchinson, whom we often talk +of, and think of as being with you always, to the dutiful good daughter +and patient amanuensis Dora, and even to Johanna, whom we have not seen, +if she will accept it. Charles has told you of my long illness and our +present settlement, which I assure you is very quiet and comfortable to +me, and to him too, if he would own it. I am very sorry we shall not see +John, but I never go to town, nor my brother but at his quarterly visits +at the India House, and when he does, he finds it melancholy, so many of +our old friends being dead or dispersed, and the very streets, he says +altering every day. Many thanks for your Letter and the nice news in it, +which I should have replied to more at large than I see he has done. I +am sure it deserved it. He has not said a word about your intentions for +Rome, which I sincerely wish you health one day to accomplish. In that +case we may meet by the way. We are so glad to hear dear _little_ +William is doing well. If you knew how happy your letters made us you +would write I know more frequently. Pray think of this. How chearfully +should we pay the postage _every week_. + +Your affectionate + +MARY LAMB. + + +["Baucis and Baucida." A slip, I suppose, for Philemon and Baucis (Ovid, +_Metamorphoses_). + +_Redgauntlet_ dated from 1824. + +"In a calenture." A calenture is a form of fever at sea in which the +sufferer believes himself to be surrounded by green fields, and often +leaps overboard. Wordsworth describes one in "The Brothers." + +"A Recluse"--Wordsworth's promised poem, that was never completed. First +printed in 1888. + +Inachus' daughter was Io, persecuted by a malignant insect sent by Juno. + +"Henry Crabb." Crabb Robinson was a personal friend of Goethe's. He had +spent some days with him at Weimar in the summer of 1829. Goethe told +Robinson that he admired Lamb's sonnet "The Family Name." + +"Mr. Quillinan"--Edward Quillinan, afterwards Wordsworth's son-in-law. + +"Johanna." Joanna Hutchinson, Mrs. Wordsworth's sister. Joanna of the +laugh. + +"John." John Wordsworth, Wordsworth's eldest son, was now twenty-six; +William, Wordsworth's second son, no longer little, was nineteen.] + + + +LETTER 500 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 25 February, 1830.] + +Dear B.B.--To reply to you by return of post, I must gobble up my +dinner, and dispatch this in propria Persona to the office, to be in +time. So take it from me hastily, that you are perfectly welcome to +furnish A.C. with the scrap, which I had almost forgotten writing. The +more my character comes to be known, the less my veracity will come to +be suspected. Time every day clears up some suspected narrative of +Herodotus, Bruce, and others of us great Travellers. Why, that Joseph +Paice was as real a person as Joseph Hume, and a great deal pleasanter. +A careful observer of life, Bernard, has no need to invent. Nature +romances it for him. Dinner plates rattle, and I positively shall incur +indigestion by carrying it half concocted to the Post House. Let me +congratulate you on the Spring coming in, and do you in return condole +with me for the Winter going out. When the old one goes, seldome comes a +better. I dread the prospect of Summer, with his all day long days. No +need of his assistance to make country places dull. With fire and candle +light, I can dream myself in Holborn. With lightsome skies shining in to +bed time, I can not. This Meseck, and these tents of Kedar--I would +dwell in the skirts of Jericho rather, and think every blast of the +coming in Mail a Ram's Horn. Give me old London at Fire and Plague +times, rather than these tepid gales, healthy country air, and +purposeless exercise. Leg of mutton absolutely on the table. + +Take our hasty loves and short farewell. + +C.L. + + +[A.C. was Allan Cunningham, who wanted Lamb's letter on Blake (see +above) for his _Lives of the Painters_. It was not, however, used there +until included in Mrs. Charles Heaton's edition in Bohn's Library. + +"Bruce"--the Abyssinian explorer, whom the Christ's Hospital boys used +to emulate, as Lamb tells us in the _Elia_ essay on Newspapers. + +"Joseph Paice"--a Director of the South-Sea Company and Lamb's first +employer, of whom he writes in the _Elia_ essay on "Modern Gallantry" +(see notes to Vol. II.). + +Here should come a letter to Moxon, February 21, 1830, saying that a +letter has just arrived from Mrs. Williams indicating that Miss Isola +was not well and must have a long holiday. The illness increased very +rapidly, becoming a serious attack of brain fever.] + + + +LETTER 501 + +CHARLCHARLES TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +[February 26, 1830.] + +Dear Madam,--May God bless you for your attention to our poor Emma! I am +so shaken with your sad news I can scarce write. She is too ill to be +removed at present; but we can only say that if she is spared, when that +can be practicable, we have always a home for her. Speak to her of it, +when she is capable of understanding, and let me conjure you to let us +know from day to day, the state she is in. But one line is all we crave. +Nothing we can do for her, that shall not be done. We shall be in the +terriblest suspense. We had no notion she was going to be ill. A line +from anybody in your house will much oblige us. I feel for the situation +this trouble places you in. + +Can I go to her aunt, or do anything? I do not know what to offer. We +are in great distress. Pray relieve us, if you can, by somehow letting +us know. I will fetch her here, or anything. Your kindness can never be +forgot. Pray excuse my abruptness. I hardly know what I write. And take +our warmest thanks. Hoping to hear something, I remain, dear Madam, + +Yours most faithfully, + +C. LAMB. + +Our grateful respects to Mr. Williams. + + + +LETTER 502 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, 1 March, 1830. + +Dear Madam,--We cannot thank you enough. Your two words "much better" +were so considerate and good. The good news affected my sister to an +agony of tears; but they have relieved us from such a weight. We were +ready to expect the worst, and were hardly able to bear the good +hearing. You speak so kindly of her, too, and think she may be able to +resume her duties. We were prepared, as far as our humble means would +have enabled us, to have taken her from all duties. But, far better for +the dear girl it is that she should have a prospect of being useful. + +I am sure you will pardon my writing again; for my heart is so full, +that it was impossible to refrain. Many thanks for your offer to write +again, should any change take place. I dare not yet be quite out of +fear, the alteration has been so sudden. But I will hope you will have a +respite from the trouble of writing again. I know no expression to +convey a sense of your kindness. We were in such a state expecting the +post. I had almost resolved to come as near you as Bury; but my sister's +health does not permit my absence on melancholy occasions. But, O, how +happy will she be to part with me, when I shall hear the agreeable news +that I may come and fetch her. She shall be as quiet as possible. No +restorative means shall be wanting to restore her back to you well and +comfortable. + +She will make up for this sad interruption of her young friend's +studies. I am sure she will--she must--after you have spared her for a +little time. Change of scene may do very much for her. I think this last +proof of your kindness to her in her desolate state can hardly make her +love and respect you more than she has ever done. O, how glad shall we +be to return her fit for her occupation. Madam, I trouble you with my +nonsense; but you would forgive me, if you knew how light-hearted you +have made two poor souls at Enfield, that were gasping for news of their +poor friend. I will pray for you and Mr. Williams. Give our very best +respects to him, and accept our thanks. We are happier than we hardly +know how to bear. God bless you! My very kindest congratulations to Miss +Humphreys. + +Believe me, dear Madam, + +Your ever obliged servant, + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 503 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +March 4th, 1830. + +Dear Sarah,--I was meditating to come and see you, but I am unable for +the walk. We are both very unwell, and under affliction for poor Emma, +who has had a very dangerous brain fever, and is lying very ill at Bury, +from whence I expect a summons to fetch her. We are very sorry for your +confinement. Any books I have are at your service. I am almost, I may +say _quite_, sure that letters to India pay no postage, and may go by +the regular Post Office, now in St. Martin's le Grand. I think any +receiving house would take them-- + +I wish I could confirm your hopes about Dick Norris. But it is quite a +dream. Some old Bencher of his surname is made _Treasurer_ for the year, +I suppose, which is an annual office. Norris was Sub-Treasurer, quite a +different thing. They were pretty well in the Summer, since when we have +heard nothing of them. Mrs. Reynolds is better than she has been for +years; she is with a disagreeable woman that she has taken a mighty +fancy to out of spite to a rival woman she used to live and quarrel +with; she grows quite _fat_, they tell me, and may live as long as I do, +to be a tormenting rent-charge to my diminish'd income. We go on pretty +comfortably in our new plan. I will come and have a talk with you when +poor Emma's affair is settled, and will bring books. At present I am +weak, and could hardly bring my legs home yesterday after a much shorter +stroll than to Northaw. Mary has got her bonnet on for a short +expedition. May you get better, as the Spring comes on. She sends her +best love with mine. + +C.L. + + +[Addressed to "Mrs. Hazlitt, Mrs. Tomlinson's, Northaw, near Potter's +Bar, Herts." + +Mrs. Hazlitt was in later years a sufferer from rheumatism. Dick Norris +was the son of Randal Norris. He had retired to Widford. Mrs. Reynolds, +Lamb's old schoolmistress and dependant, we have met.] + + + +LETTER 504 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, 5 Mar., 1830. + +Dear Madam,--I feel greatly obliged by your letter of Tuesday, and +should not have troubled you again so soon, but that you express a wish +to hear that our anxiety was relieved by the assurances in it. You have +indeed given us much comfort respecting our young friend, but +considerable uneasiness respecting your own health and spirits, which +must have suffered under such attention. Pray believe me that we shall +wait in quiet hope for the time when I shall receive the welcome summons +to come and relieve you from a charge, which you have executed with such +tenderness. We desire nothing so much as to exchange it with you. +Nothing shall be wanting on my part to remove her with the best judgment +I can, without (I hope) any necessity for depriving you of the services +of your valuable housekeeper. Until the day comes, we entreat that you +will spare yourself the trouble of writing, which we should be ashamed +to impose upon you in your present weak state. Not hearing from you, we +shall be satisfied in believing that there has been no relapse. +Therefore we beg that you will not add to your troubles by unnecessary, +though _most kind_, correspondence. Till I have the pleasure of thanking +you personally, I beg you to accept these written acknowledgments of all +your kindness. With respects to Mr. Williams and sincere prayers for +both your healths, I remain, + +Your ever obliged servant, + +C. LAMB. + +My sister joins me in respects and thanks. + + + +LETTER 505 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +March 8th, 1830. + +My dear G.,--Your friend Battin (for I knew him immediately by the +smooth satinity of his style) must excuse me for advocating the cause of +his friends in Spitalfields. The fact is, I am retained by the Norwich +people, and have already appeared in their paper under the signatures of +"Lucius Sergius," "Bluff," "Broad-Cloth," +"No-Trade-to-the-Woollen-Trade," "Anti-plush," &c., in defence of +druggets and long camblets. And without this pre-engagement, I feel I +should naturally have chosen a side opposite to ----, for in the silken +seemingness of his nature there is that which offends me. My flesh +tingles at such caterpillars. He shall not crawl me over. Let him and +his workmen sing the old burthen, + + "Heigh ho, ye weavers!" + +for any aid I shall offer them in this emergency. I was over Saint +Luke's the other day with my friend Tuthill, and mightily pleased with +one of his contrivances for the comfort and amelioration of the +students. They have double cells, in which a pair may lie feet to feet +horizontally, and chat the time away as rationally as they can. It must +certainly be more sociable for them these warm raving nights. The +right-hand truckle in one of these friendly recesses, at present vacant, +was preparing, I understood, for Mr. Irving. Poor fellow! it is time he +removed from Pentonville. I followed him as far as to Highbury the other +day, with a mob at his heels, calling out upon Ermigiddon, who I suppose +is some Scotch moderator. He squinted out his favourite eye last Friday, +in the fury of possession, upon a poor woman's shoulders that was crying +matches, and has not missed it. The companion truck, as far as I could +measure it with my eye, would conveniently fit a person about the length +of Coleridge, allowing for a reasonable drawing up of the feet, not at +all painful. Does he talk of moving this quarter? You and I have too +much sense to trouble ourselves with revelations; marry, to the same in +Greek you may have something professionally to say. Tell C. that he was +to come and see us some fine day. Let it be before he moves, for in his +new quarters he will necessarily be confined in his conversation to his +brother prophet. Conceive the two Rabbis foot to foot, for there are no +Gamaliels there to affect a humbler posture! All are masters in that +Patmos, where the law is perfect equality--Latmos, I should rather say, +for they will be Luna's twin darlings; her affection will be ever at the +full. Well; keep _your_ brains moist with gooseberry this mad March, for +the devil of exposition seeketh dry places. + +C.L. + + +[The letter is assigned to the Rev. James Gillman by some editors; but I +think that a mistake. See the reference below to a medical matter. +Battin was interested in the Spitalfields weavers to the detriment of +the Norwich. + +Major Butterworth in a letter to _Notes and Queries_, March 24, 1906, +thus explains the reference to Battin:-- + + "In lately going over the pages of _The New Monthly Magazine_ for + 1826 I came across a paragraph in the June number, extracted from a + daily newspaper, in which the following occurs: 'Great merit is due + to Mr. Lamb junior for his exertions to relieve the weavers of + Norwich.'... + + "As his 'Reminiscences of Juke Judkins, Esq.,' was printed in the + same number of the _Magazine_, Lamb's attention would no doubt be + arrested by the remarks about his namesake, which would probably be + retained in his memory, to be used subsequently, as occasion served, + in mystifying his friend." + +Tuthill, whom we have met, was one of the physicians at St. Luke's +Hospital for the insane. + +"He squinted out...." Irving had sight only in one eye, an obliquity +caused, it is suggested, by lying when a baby in a wooden cradle, the +sides of which prevented the other from gathering light. + +"To the same in Greek." An atrocious pun, which I leave to the reader to +discover. Gillman was a doctor.] + + + +LETTER 506 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM AYRTON + +Mr. Westwood's, Chase Side, Enfield, + +14th March, 1830. + +My dear Ayrton,--Your letter, which was only not so pleasant as your +appearance would have been, has revived some old images; Phillips (not +the Colonel), with his few hairs bristling up at the charge of a revoke, +which he declares impossible; the old Captain's significant nod over the +right shoulder (was it not?); Mrs. Burney's determined questioning of +the score, after the game was absolutely gone to the devil, the plain +but hospitable cold boiled-beef suppers at sideboard; all which fancies, +redolent of middle age and strengthful spirits, come across us ever and +anon in this vale of deliberate senectitude, ycleped Enfield. + +You imagine a deep gulf between you and us; and there is a pitiable +hiatus in _kind_ between St. James's Park and this extremity of +Middlesex. But the mere distance in turnpike roads is a trifle. The roof +of a coach swings you down in an hour or two. We have a sure hot joint +on a Sunday, and when had we better? I suppose you know that ill health +has obliged us to give up housekeeping; but we have an asylum at the +very next door--only twenty-four inches further from town, which is not +material in a country expedition--where a _table d'hote_ is kept for us, +without trouble on our parts, and we adjourn after dinner, when one of +the old world (old friends) drops casually down among us. Come and find +us out, and seal our judicious change with your approbation, whenever +the whim bites, or the sun prompts. No need of announcement, for we are +sure to be at home. + +I keep putting off the subject of my answer. In truth I am not in +spirits at present to see Mr. Murray on such a business; but pray offer +him my acknowledgments and an assurance that I should like at least one +of his propositions, as I have so much additional matter for the +SPECIMENS, as might make two volumes in all, or ONE (new edition) +omitting such better known authors as Beaumont and Fletcher, Jonson, &c. + +But we are both in trouble at present. A very dear young friend of ours, +who passed her Christmas holidays here, has been taken dangerously ill +with a fever, from which she is very precariously recovering, and I +expect a summons to fetch her when she is well enough to bear the +journey from Bury. It is Emma Isola, with whom we got acquainted at our +first visit to your sister at Cambridge, and she has been an occasional +inmate with us--and of late years much more frequently--ever since. +While she is in this danger, and till she is out of it and here in a +probable way to recovery, I feel that I have no spirits for an +engagement of any kind. It has been a terrible shock to us; therefore I +beg that you will make my handsomest excuses to Mr. Murray. + +Our very kindest loves to Mrs. A. and the younger A.'s. + +Your unforgotten, + +C. LAMB. + + +["Phillips." This would be Edward Phillips, who, I think, succeeded +Rickman as secretary to Abbot (afterwards Lord Colchester), the Speaker. +Colonel Erasmus Phillips we have also met. The Captain was Captain +Burney. + +Mr. Murray's propositions. I presume that Murray had, through Ayrton, +suggested either the republication of the _Dramatic Specimens_, 1808, in +one volume, or in two volumes, with the Garrick Extracts added. The plan +came to nothing. Moxon published them in the two volume style in 1835. +Murray had refused Lamb's "Works" some twelve years before. For the +_Dramatic Specimens_ see Vol. IV. of my large edition.] + + + +LETTER 507 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +[Dated at end: March 22 (1830).] + +Dear Madam,--Once more I have to return you thanks for a very kind +letter. It has gladdened us very much to hear that we may have hope to +see our young friend so soon, and through your kind nursing so well +recovered. I sincerely hope that your own health and spirits will not +have been shaken: you have had a sore trial indeed, and greatly do we +feel indebted to you for all which you have undergone. If I hear nothing +from you in the mean time, I shall secure myself a place in the +Cornwallis Coach for Monday. It will not be at all necessary that I +shall be met at Bury, as I can well find my way to the Rectory, and I +beg that you will not inconvenience yourselves by such attention. +Accordingly as I find Miss Isola able to bear the journey, I intend to +take the care of her by the same stage or by chaises perhaps, dividing +the journey; but exactly as you shall judge fit. It is our misfortune +that long journeys do not agree with my sister, who would else have +taken this care upon herself, perhaps more properly. It is quite out of +the question to rob you of the services of any of your domestics. I +cannot think of it. But if in your opinion a female attendant would be +requisite on the journey, and if you or Mr. Williams would feel _more +comfortable_ by her being in charge of two, I will most gladly engage +one of her nurses or any young person near you, that you can recommend; +for my object is to remove her in the way that shall be most +satisfactory to yourselves. + +On the subject of the young people that you are interesting yourselves +about, I will have the pleasure to talk to you, when I shall see you. I +live almost out of the world and out of the sphere of being useful; but +no pains of mine shall be spared, if but a prospect opens of doing a +service. Could I do all I wish, and I indeed have grown helpless to +myself and others, it must not satisfy the arrears of obligation I owe +to Mr. Williams and yourself for all your kindness. + +I beg you will turn in your mind and consider in what most comfortable +way Miss Isola can leave your house, and I will implicitly follow your +suggestions. What you have done for her can never be effaced from our +memories, and I would have you part with her in the way that would best +satisfy yourselves. + +I am afraid of impertinently extending my letter, else I feel I have not +said half what I would say. So, dear madam, till I have the pleasure of +seeing you both, of whose kindness I have heard so much before, I +respectfully take my leave with our kindest love to your poor patient +and most sincere regards for the health and happiness of Mr. Williams +and yourself. + +May God bless you. CH. LAMB. + +Enfield, Monday, 22 March. + + + +LETTER 508 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, 2 Apr., 1830. + +Dear Madam + +I have great pleasure in letting you know that Miss Isola has suffered +very little from fatigue on her long journey. I am ashamed to say that I +came home rather the more tired of the two. But I am a very unpractised +traveller. She has had two tolerable nights' sleeps since, and is +decidedly not worse than when we left you. I remembered the Magnesia +according to your directions, and promise that she shall be kept very +quiet, never forgetting that she is still an invalid. We found my Sister +very well in health, only a little impatient to see her; and, after a +few hysterical tears for gladness, all was comfortable again. We arrived +here from Epping between five and six. The incidents of our journey were +trifling, but you bade me tell them. We had then in the coach a rather +talkative Gentleman, but very civil, all the way, and took up a servant +maid at Stamford, going to a sick mistress. To the _latter_, a +participation in the hospitalities of your nice rusks and sandwiches +proved agreeable, as it did to my companion, who took merely a sip of +the weakest wine and water with them. The _former_ engaged me in a +discourse for full twenty miles on the probable advantages of Steam +Carriages, which being merely problematical, I bore my part in with some +credit, in spite of my totally un-engineer-like faculties. But when +somewhere about Stanstead he put an unfortunate question to me as to the +"probability of its turning out a good turnip season;" and when I, who +am still less of an agriculturist than a steam-philosopher, not knowing +a turnip from a potato ground, innocently made answer that I believed it +depended very much upon boiled legs of mutton, my unlucky reply set Miss +Isola a laughing to a degree that disturbed her tranquility for the only +moment in our journey. I am afraid my credit sank very low with my other +fellow-traveller, who had thought he had met with a _well-informed +passenger_, which is an accident so desirable in a Stage Coach. We were +rather less communicative, but still friendly, the rest of the way. How +I employed myself between Epping and Enfield the poor verses in the +front of my paper may inform you which you may please to Christen an +Acrostic in a Cross Road, and which I wish were worthier of the Lady +they refer to. But I trust you will plead my pardon to her on a subject +so delicate as a Lady's good _name_. Your candour must acknowledge that +they are written _strait_. And now dear Madam, I have left myself hardly +space to express my sense of the friendly reception I found at Fornham. +Mr. Williams will tell you that we had the pleasure of a slight meeting +with him on the road, where I could almost have told him, but that it +seemed ungracious, that such had been your hospitality, that I scarcely +missed the good Master of the Family at Fornham, though heartily I +should [have] rejoiced to have made a little longer acquaintance with +him. I will say nothing of our deeper obligations to both of you, +because I think we agreed at Fornham, that gratitude may be over-exacted +on the part of the obliging, and over-expressed on the part of the +obliged, person. My Sister and Miss Isola join in respects to Mr. +Williams and yourself, and I beg to be remembered kindly to the Miss +Hammonds and the two gentlemen whom I had the good fortune to meet at +your house. I have not forgotten the Election in which you are +interesting yourself, and the little that I can, I will do immediately. +Miss Isola will have the pleasure of writing to you next week, and we +shall hope, at your leisure, to hear of your own health, etc. I am, Dear +Madam, with great respect, + +your obliged + +CHARLES LAMB. + +[_Added in Miss Isola's hand:_] I must just add a line to beg you will +let us hear from you, my dear Mrs. Williams. I have just received the +forwarded letter. Fornham we have talked about constantly, and I felt +quite strange at this home the first day. I will attend to all you said, +my dear Madam. + + +[I do not know which of Lamb's acrostics was the one in question. +Possibly this, on Mrs. Williams' youngest daughter, Louisa Clare +Williams:-- + + Least Daughter, but not least beloved, of _Grace_! + O frown not on a stranger, who from place + Unknown and distant these few lines hath penn'd. + I but report what thy Instructress Friend + So oft hath told us of thy gentle heart. + A pupil most affectionate thou art, + + Careful to learn what elder years impart. + _Louisa_--_Clare_--by which name shall I call thee? + A prettier pair of names sure ne'er was found, + Resembling thy own sweetness in sweet sound. + Ever calm peace and innocence befal thee! + +See Vol. IV. of this edition.] + + + +LETTER 509 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, Good Friday [April 9, 1830]. + +P.S.--I am the worst folder-up of a letter in the world, except certain +Hottentots, in the land of Caffre, who never fold up their letters at +all, writing very badly upon skins, &c. + +Dear Madam,--I do assure you that your verses gratified me very much, +and my sister is quite _proud_ of them. For the first time in my life I +congratulated myself upon the shortness and meanness of my name. Had it +been Schwartzenberg or Esterhazy, it would have put you to some puzzle. +I am afraid I shall sicken you of acrostics; but this last was written +_to order_. I beg you to have inserted in your county paper something +like this advertisement. "To the nobility, gentry, and others, about +Bury.--C. Lamb respectfully informs his friends and the public in +general, that he is leaving off business in the acrostic line, as he is +going into an entirely new line. Rebuses and charades done as usual, and +upon the old terms. Also, Epitaphs to suit the memory of any person +deceased." I thought I had adroitly escaped the rather unpliable name of +"Williams," curtailing your poor daughters to their proper surnames; but +it seems you would not let me off so easily. If these trifles amuse you, +I am paid. Tho really 'tis an operation too much like--"A, apple-pye; B, +bit it." To make amends, I request leave to lend you the "Excursion," +and to recommend, in particular, the "Churchyard Stories," in the +seventh book, I think. They will strengthen the tone of your mind after +its weak diet on acrostics. Miss Isola is writing, and will tell you +that we are going on very comfortably. Her sister is just come. She +blames my last verses, as being more written on _Mr._ Williams than on +yourself; but how should I have parted whom a Superior Power has brought +together? I beg you will jointly accept of our best respects, and pardon +your obsequious if not troublesome Correspondent, C.L. + + +[Mr. Cecil Turner, a grandson of Mrs. Williams, tells me that her +acrostic on Lamb ran thus:-- + +TO CHARLES LAMB + + _Answer to Acrostics on the Names of Two Friends_ + + Charmed with the lines thy hand has sent, + Honour I feel the compliment, + Amongst thy products that have won the ear, + Ranged in thy verse two friends most dear. + Lay not thy winning pen away, + Each line thou writest we bid thee stay, + Still ask to charm us with another lay. + + Long liked, long lived by public Fame + A friend to misery, whate'er its claim. + Marvel I must if e'er we find + Bestowed by heaven a kindlier mind. + +The two friends were probably Edward Hogg and Cecilia Catherine Lawton, +on whose names Lamb wrote acrostics (see Vol. IV.). + +This was Lamb's effort:-- + + Go little Poem, and present + Respectful terms of compliment; + A gentle lady bids thee speak! + Courteous is she, tho' thou be weak-- + Evoke from Heaven as thick as manna + + Joy after joy on Grace Joanna: + On Fornham's Glebe and Pasture land + A blessing pray. Long, long may stand, + Not touched by Time, the Rectory blithe; + No grudging churl dispute his Tithe; + At Easter be the offerings due + + With cheerful spirit paid; each pew + In decent order filled; no noise + Loud intervene to drown the voice, + Learning, or wisdom of the Teacher; + Impressive be the Sacred Preacher, + And strict his notes on holy page; + May young and old from age to age + Salute, and still point out, "The good man's Parsonage!"] + + + +LETTER 510 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN + +[? Early Spring, 1830.] + +Dear Gillman,--Pray do you, or S.T.C., immediately write to say you have +received back the golden works of the dear, fine, silly old angel, which +I part from, bleeding, and to say how the Winter has used you all. + +It is our intention soon, weather permitting, to come over for a day at +Highgate; for beds we will trust to the Gate-House, should you be full: +tell me if we may come casually, for in this change of climate there is +no naming a day for walking. With best loves to Mrs. Gillman, &c. + +Yours, mopish, but in health, + +C. LAMB. + +I shall be uneasy till I hear of Fuller's safe arrival. + + +[See letter to Gillman above. The "dear, fine, silly old angel" was +Thomas Fuller.] + + + +LETTER 511 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JACOB VALE ASBURY + +[? April, 1830.] + +Dear Sir--Some draughts and boluses have been brought here which we +conjecture were meant for the young lady whom you saw this morning, +though they are labelled for + +MISS ISOLA LAMB. + +No such person is known on the Chase Side, and she is fearful of taking +medicines which may have been made up for another patient. She begs me +to say that she was born an _Isola_ and christened _Emma_. Moreover that +she is Italian by birth, and that her ancestors were from Isola Bella +(Fair Island) in the kingdom of Naples. She has never changed her name +and rather mournfully adds that she has no prospect at present of doing +so. She is literally I. SOLA, or single, at present. Therefore she begs +that the obnoxious monosyllable may be omitted on future Phials,--an +innocent syllable enough, you'll say, but she has no claim to it. It is +the bitterest pill of the seven you have sent her. When a lady loses her +good _name_, what is to become of her? Well she must swallow it as well +as she can, but begs the dose may not be repeated. + +Yours faithfully, + +CHARLES LAMB (not Isola). + + +[Asbury was a doctor at Enfield. I append another letter to him, without +date:--] + + + +LETTER 512 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JACOB VALE ASBURY + +Dear Sir, It is an observation of a wise man that "moderation is best in +all things." I cannot agree with him "in liquor." There is a smoothness +and oiliness in wine that makes it go down by a natural channel, which I +am positive was made for that descending. Else, why does not wine choke +us? could Nature have made that sloping lane, not to facilitate the +down-going? She does nothing in vain. You know that better than I. You +know how often she has helped you at a dead lift, and how much better +entitled she is to a fee than yourself sometimes, when you carry off the +credit. Still there is something due to manners and customs, and I +should apologise to you and Mrs. Asbury for being absolutely carried +home upon a man's shoulders thro' Silver Street, up Parson's Lane, by +the Chapels (which might have taught me better), and then to be +deposited like a dead log at Gaffar Westwood's, who it seems does not +"insure" against intoxication. Not that the mode of conveyance is +objectionable. On the contrary, it is more easy than a one-horse chaise. +Ariel in the "Tempest" says + + "On a Bat's back do I fly, + After sunset merrily." + +Now I take it that Ariel must sometimes have stayed out late of nights. +Indeed, he pretends that "where the bee sucks, there lurks he," as much +as to say that his suction is as innocent as that little innocent (but +damnably stinging when he is provok'd) winged creature. But I take it, +that Ariel was fond of metheglin, of which the Bees are notorious +Brewers. But then you will say: What a shocking sight to see a +middle-aged gentleman-and-a-half riding upon a Gentleman's back up +Parson's Lane at midnight. Exactly the time for that sort of conveyance, +when nobody can see him, nobody but Heaven and his own conscience; now +Heaven makes fools, and don't expect much from her own creation; and as +for conscience, She and I have long since come to a compromise. I have +given up false modesty, and she allows me to abate a little of the true. +I like to be liked, but I don't care about being respected. I don't +respect myself. But, as I was saying, I thought he would have let me +down just as we got to Lieutenant Barker's Coal-shed (or emporium) but +by a cunning jerk I eased myself, and righted my posture. I protest, I +thought myself in a palanquin, and never felt myself so grandly carried. +It was a slave under me. There was I, all but my reason. And what is +reason? and what is the loss of it? and how often in a day do we do +without it, just as well? Reason is only counting, two and two makes +four. And if on my passage home, I thought it made five, what matter? +Two and two will just make four, as it always did, before I took the +finishing glass that did my business. My sister has begged me to write +an apology to Mrs. A. and you for disgracing your party; now it does +seem to me, that I rather honoured your party, for every one that was +not drunk (and one or two of the ladies, I am sure, were not) must have +been set off greatly in the contrast to me. I was the scapegoat. The +soberer they seemed. By the way is magnesia good on these occasions? +_iii_ pol: med: sum: ante noct: in rub: can:. I am no licentiate, but +know enough of simples to beg you to send me a draught after this model. +But still you'll say (or the men and maids at your house will say) that +it is not a seemly sight for an old gentleman to go home pick-a-back. +Well, may be it is not. But I have never studied grace. I take it to be +a mere superficial accomplishment. I regard more the internal +acquisitions. The great object after supper is to get home, and whether +that is obtained in a horizontal posture or perpendicular (as foolish +men and apes affect for dignity) I think is little to the purpose. The +end is always greater than the means. Here I am, able to compose a +sensible rational apology, and what signifies how I got here? I have +just sense enough to remember I was very happy last night, and to thank +our kind host and hostess, and that's sense enough, I hope. + +CHARLES LAMB. + +N.B.--What is good for a desperate head-ache? Why, Patience, and a +determination not to mind being miserable all day long. And that I have +made my mind up to. + +So, here goes. It is better than not being alive at all, which I might +have been, had your man toppled me down at Lieut. Barker's Coal-shed. My +sister sends her sober compliments to Mrs. A. She is not much the worse. + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + + +["Ariel." In two other of his letters, Lamb confesses similarly to a +similar escapade. And in his _Elia_ essay "Rejoicings on the New Year's +Coming of Age," he sends Ash Wednesday home in the same manner. + +Lieut. John Barker, R.N., was a local character, a coal merchant and a +man with a grievance. He had thirteen children, some of whose names +probably greatly amused Lamb--John Thomas, William Charles, Frederick +Alexander, Marius Collins, Caius Marcius, Marcus Aurelius Antonius, +Coriolanus Aurelius, Horatius Tertius Decimus, Elizabeth Mary, +Concordia, Lousia Clarissa, Caroline Maria Quiroja and Volumnia +Hortensia.] + + + +LETTER 513 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAMS + +Enfield, Tuesday [April 21, 1830]. + +Dear Madam,--I have ventured upon some lines, which combine my old +acrostic talent (which you first found out) with my new profession of +epitaph-monger. As you did not please to say, when you would die, I have +left a blank space for the date. May kind heaven be a long time in +filling it up. At least you cannot say that these lines are not about +you, though not much to the purpose. We were very sorry to hear that you +have not been very well, and hope that a little excursion may revive +you. Miss Isola is thankful for her added day; but I verily think she +longs to see her young friends once more, and will regret less than ever +the end of her holydays. She cannot be going on more quietly than she is +doing here, and you will perceive amendment. + +I hope all her little commissions will all be brought home to your +satisfaction. When she returns, we purpose seeing her to Epping on her +journey. We have had our proportion of fine weather and some pleasant +walks, and she is stronger, her appetite good, but less wolfish than at +first, which we hold a good sign. I hope Mr. Wing will approve of its +abatement. She desires her very kindest respects to Mr. Williams and +yourself, and wishes to rejoin you. My sister and myself join in +respect, and pray tell Mr. Donne, with our compliments, that we shall be +disappointed, if we do not see him. This letter being very neatly +written, I am very unwilling that Emma should club any of her +disproportionate scrawl to deface it. + +Your obliged servant, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Addressed to "Mrs. Williams, W.B. Donne, Esq., Matteshall, East +Dereham, Norfolk." + +Mr. Wing was probably Miss Isola's doctor. Mr. Donne was William Bodham +Donne (1807-1882), the friend of Edward FitzGerald, and Examiner of +Plays. + +This was Lamb's acrostic-epitaph on Mrs. Williams:-- + + Grace Joanna here doth lie: + Reader, wonder not that I + Ante-date her hour of rest. + Can I thwart her wish exprest, + Ev'n unseemly though the laugh + + Jesting with an Epitaph? + On her bones the turf lie lightly, + And her rise again be brightly! + No dark stain be found upon her-- + No, there will not, on mine honour-- + Answer that at least I can. + + Would that I, thrice happy man, + In as spotless garb might rise, + Light as she will climb the skies, + Leaving the dull earth behind, + In a car more swift than wind. + All her errors, all her failings, + (Many they were not) and ailings, + Sleep secure from Envy's railings. + +Here should come an undated note from Lamb to Basil Montagu, in which +Lamb asks for help for Hone in his Coffee-House. "If you can help a +worthy man you will have _two worthy men_ obliged to you." Hone, having +fallen upon bad times, Lamb helped in the scheme to establish him in the +Grasshopper Coffee-House, at 13 Gracechurch Street (see next letter).] + + + +LETTER 514 + +CHARLES LAMB TO ROBERT SOUTHEY + +May 10, 1830. + +Dear Southey,--My friend Hone, whom you would like _for a friend_, I +found deeply impressed with your generous notice of him in your +beautiful "Life of Bunyan," which I am just now full of. He has written +to you for leave to publish a certain good-natured letter. I write not +this to enforce his request, for we are fully aware that the refusal of +such publication would be quite consistent with all that is good in your +character. Neither he nor I expect it from you, nor exact it; but if you +would consent to it, you would have me obliged by it, as well as him. He +is just now in a critical situation: kind friends have opened a +coffee-house for him in the City, but their means have not extended to +the purchase of coffee-pots, credit for Reviews, newspapers, and other +paraphernalia. So I am sitting in the skeleton of a possible divan. What +right I have to interfere, you best know. Look on me as a dog who went +once temporarily insane, and bit you, and now begs for a crust. Will you +set your wits to a dog? + +Our object is to open a subscription, which my friends of the "Times" +are most willing to forward for him, but think that a leave from you to +publish would aid it. + +But not an atom of respect or kindness will or shall it abate in either +of us if you decline it. Have this strongly in your mind. + +Those "Every-Day" and "Table" Books will be a treasure a hundred years +hence; but they have failed to make Hone's fortune. + +Here his wife and all his children are about me, gaping for coffee +customers; but how should they come in, seeing no pot boiling! + +Enough of Hone. I saw Coleridge a day or two since. He has had some +severe attack, not paralytic; but, if I had not heard of it, I should +not have found it out. He looks, and especially speaks, strong. How are +all the Wordsworths and all the Southeys? whom I am obliged to you if +you have not brought up haters of the name of + +C. LAMB. + +P.S.--I have gone lately into the acrostic line. I find genius (such as +I had) declines with me, but I get clever. Do you know anybody that +wants charades, or such things, for Albums? I do 'em at so much a sheet. +Perhaps an epigram (not a very happy-gram) I did for a school-boy +yesterday may amuse. I pray Jove he may not get a flogging for any false +quantity; but 'tis, with one exception, the only Latin verses I have +made for forty years, and I did it "to order." + +SUUM CUIQUE + + Adsciscit sibi divitias et opes alienas + Fur, rapiens, spolians, quod mihi, quod-que tibi, + Proprium erat, temnens haec verba, Meum-que, Suum-que; + Omne suum est: tandem Cui-que Suum tribuit. + Dat laqueo collum; vestes, vah! carnifici dat; + Sese Diabolo: sic bene: Cuique Suum. + +I write from Hone's, therefore Mary cannot send her love to Mrs. +Southey, but I do. + + Yours ever, C.L. + + +[Major's edition of _The Pilgrim's Progress_, mentioned in a letter to +Barton above, was issued in 1830 with a memoir of Bunyan by Southey. It +was reviewed in _The Times_ for May 7, 1830, I think probably by Lamb, +in the following terms:-- + + The public is aware that the unexhausted diligence and unwearied pen + of Mr. Southey have produced a new and excellent edition of the + celebrated _Pilgrim's Progress_, with the Life of the Author + prefixed. This Life is, no doubt, an interesting work, though we + wish the author, both in that and in the account, which is + attributed to him, of the founder of the Jesuits, contained in a + recent periodical work, had taken more time. The narrative in both + is hasty and tumultuary, if we may use the latter expression: there + is no time or room for reflection; and when a reflection comes, it + is so mixed and jambed in with the story, or with quotations from + the works or words of the respective heroes of the history, that it + escapes unobserved. Could we, without grievous offence, recommend, + both to Mr. Southey and Sir Walter Scott, to recollect the man + spoken of by Horace?-- + +quem fama est esse librisque Ambustum propriis."--_Sat_, i., 61. + + Yet still, as we said above, the Life of Bunyan is an interesting + work. How different the origin of all the sects and their founders, + from that of our sober, staid, and, we trust, permanent + establishment, and the learned and pious reformers from whom it + sprang! + + But that for which we chiefly notice this work of Mr. Southey, is + the very last sentence in it, wherein is contained his frank and + honourable recommendation (though not more than they deserve) of the + works of one whom the iron hand of oppression would have levelled + with the dust:-- + + "In one of the volumes collected from various quarters, which were + sent to me for this purpose, I observe the name of W. Hone, and + notice it that I may take the opportunity of recommending his + _Every-Day Book_ and _Table Book_ to those who are interested in the + preservation of our national and local customs. By these very + curious publications their compiler has rendered good service in an + important department of literature; and he may render yet more, if + he obtain the encouragement which he well deserves." + + Not only we, and the person mentioned in this paragraph, but all the + friends of pure English literature,--all the curious in old English + customs,--in short, all intelligent men, with the hearts of + Englishmen in them,--owe Mr. Southey their gratitude for this + recommendation: it springs from a just taste and right feeling + united. + +Hone wrote to _The Times_ at once to thank both the paper and Southey +for the compliment. A few days later, on May 21, appeared an article in +_The Times_ containing correspondence between Hone and Southey. I quote +the introduction, again probably the work of Lamb, and Southey's letter +(see Lamb's letter to Hone below):-- + + We alluded some days ago to the handsome notice of Mr. Hone in Mr. + Southey's _Life of Bunyan_. The following correspondence has since + been sent to us: it displays in an advantageous light the modesty of + Mr. Hone and the amiable and candid disposition of Mr. Southey. The + business, wholly foreign to Mr. Hone's former pursuits, which is + alluded to in the letter, is explained in an advertisement in this + day's paper. + + * * * * * + + "To Mr. Hone, 13, Gracechurch-Street, + + "Keswick, April 26. + + "Sir,--Your letter has given me both pain and pleasure. I am sorry + to learn that you are still, in the worldly sense of the word, an + unfortunate man,--that you are withdrawn from pursuits which were + consonant to your habits and inclinations, and that a public + expression of respect and good-will, made in the hope that it might + have been serviceable to you, can have no such effect. + + "When I observed your autograph in the little book, I wrote to + inquire of Mr. Major whether it had come to his hands from you, + directly or indirectly, for my use, that, in that case, I might + thank you for it. It proved otherwise, but I would not lose an + opportunity which I had wished for. + + "Judging of you (as I would myself be judged) by your works, I saw + in the editor of the _Every-Day_ and _Table Books_ a man who had + applied himself with great diligence to useful and meritorious + pursuits. I thought that time, and reflection, and affliction, (of + which it was there seen that he had had his share,) had contributed + to lead him into this direction, which was also that of his better + mind. What alteration had been produced in his opinions it concerned + not me to inquire; here there were none but what were + unexceptionable,--no feelings but what were to be approved. From all + that appeared, I supposed he had become 'a sadder and a wiser man:' + I therefore wished him success in his literary undertakings. + + "The little parcel which you mention I shall receive with pleasure. + + "I wish you success in your present undertaking, whatever it be, and + that you may one day, under happier circumstances, resume a pen + which has, of late years, been so meritoriously employed. If your + new attempt prosper, you will yet find leisure for intellectual + gratification, and for that self-improvement which may be carried on + even in the busiest concerns of life. + + "I remain, Sir, yours with sincere good will, + + "ROBERT SOUTHEY." + +In the advertisement columns of the same issue of _The Times_ (May 21) +was the following notice, drawn up, I assume, by Lamb:-- + + THE FAMILY OF WILLIAM HONE, in the course of last winter, were + kindly assisted by private friends to take and alter the premises + they now reside in, No. 13, Gracechurch-street, for the purpose of a + coffeehouse, to be managed by Mrs. Hone and her elder daughters; but + they are in a painful exigency which increases hourly, and renders a + public appeal indispensable. The wellwishers to Mr. Hone throughout + the kingdom, especially the gratified readers of his literary + productions (in all of which he has long ceased to have an interest, + and from none of which can he derive advantage), are earnestly + solicited to afford the means of completing the fittings and opening + the house in a manner suited to its proposed respectability. If this + aid be yielded without loss of time, it will be of indescribable + benefit, inasmuch as it will put an end to many grievous anxieties + and expenses, inseparable from the lengthened delay which has + hitherto been inevitable, and will enable the family to immediately + commence the business, which alone they look forward to for support. + Subscriptions will be received by the following bankers:--Messrs. + Ransom and Co., Pall-mall east; Messrs. Dixon, Sons, and Brookes, + Chancery-lane; Messrs. Ladbroke and Co., Bank-buildings, Cornhill; + and by Mr. Clowes, printer, 14, Charing-cross; Mr. Thomas Rodd, + bookseller, 2, Great Newport-street; Mr. Griffiths, bookseller, 13, + Wellington-street, Strand; Mr. Effingham Wilson, bookseller, Royal + Exchange; and Messrs. Fisher and Moxhay, biscuit-bakers, 55, + Threadneedle-street. + +The first list of subscriptions, headed by "Charles Lamb, Esq., Enfield, +L10," came to L103. This was Monday, May 31. The next list was published +on June 10, accompanied by the following note in the body of the +paper:-- + + The subscriptions for Mr. Hone, it will be perceived, are going on + favourably. In the list now published is the name of the Duke of + Bedford, who has sent 20_l_. His cause has been warmly espoused by + the provincial journals, more than 20 of which have inserted his + appeal gratuitously, with offers to receive and remit subscriptions. + The aphorism, "he gives twice who gives quickly," could not receive + a more cogent application than in the present instance, for the + funds are required to enable Mr. Hone to commence business in his + new undertaking, where he is already placed with his family, liable + to rent and taxes, and other claims, but gaining nothing until his + outfit is completed. + + Hone, however, did not prosper, in spite of his friends, who were + not sufficiently numerous to find the requisite capital. + + "Suum Cuique." The boy for whom this epigram was composed was a son + of Hessey, the publisher, afterwards Archdeacon Hessey. He was at + the Merchant Taylors' School, where it was a custom to compose Latin + and English epigrams for speech day, the boys being permitted to get + help. Archdeacon Hessey wrote as follows in the Taylorian a few + years ago:-- + + The subjects for 1830 were _Suum Cuique_ and _Brevis esse laboro_. + After some three or four exercise nights I confess that I was + literally "at my wits' end." But a brilliant idea struck me. I had + frequently, boy as I was, seen Charles Lamb at my father's house, + and once, in 1825 or 1826, I had been taken to have tea with him and + his sister, Mary Lamb, at their little house, Colebrook Cottage, a + whitish-brown tenement, standing by itself, close to the New River, + at Islington. He was very kind, as he always was to young people, + and very quaint. I told him that I had devoured his "Roast Pig"; he + congratulated me on possessing a thorough schoolboy's appetite. And + he was pleased when I mentioned my having seen the boys at Christ's + Hospital at their public suppers, which then took place on the + Sunday evenings in Lent. "Could this good-natured and humorous old + gentleman be prevailed upon to give me an Epigram?" "I don't know," + said my father, to whom I put the question, "but I will ask him at + any rate, and send him the mottoes." In a day or two there arrived + from Enfield, to which Lamb had removed some time in 1827, not one, + but two epigrams, one on each subject. That on _Suum Cuique_ was in + Latin, and was suggested by the grim satisfaction which had recently + been expressed by the public at the capture and execution of some + notorious highwayman. + +See also Vol. IV. of this edition for a slightly differing version. Lamb +had many years before, he says in a letter to Godwin, written similar +epigrams. + +"With one exception." Perhaps the Latin verses on Haydon's picture. See +Vol. IV.] + + + +LETTER 515 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +Enfield, Tuesday. [P.M. May 12, 1830.] + +Dear M. I dined with your and my Rogers at Mr. Gary's yesterday. Gary +consulted me on the proper bookseller to offer a Lady's MS novel to. I +said I would write to you. But I wish you would call on the Translator +of Dante at the British Museum, and talk with him. He is the pleasantest +of clergymen. I told him of all Rogers's handsome behaviour to you, and +you are already no stranger. Go. I made Rogers laugh about your +Nightingale sonnet, not having heard one. 'Tis a good sonnet +notwithstanding. You shall have the books shortly. + +C.L. + + +[Samuel Rogers had just lent Moxon L500 on which to commence publisher. + +Moxon had dedicated his first book to Rogers. This is Moxon's "Sonnet to +the Nightingale," but I cannot explain why Rogers laughed:-- + + Lone midnight-soothing melancholy bird, + That send'st such music to my sleepless soul, + Chaining her faculties in fast controul, + Few listen to thy song; yet I have heard, + When Man and Nature slept, nor aspen stirred, + Thy mournful voice, sweet vigil of the sleeping + And liken'd thee to some angelic mind, + That sits and mourns for erring mortals weeping. + The genius, not of groves, but of mankind, + Watch at this solemn hour o'er millions keeping. + In Eden's bowers, as mighty poets tell, + Did'st thou repeat, as now that wailing call-- + Those sorrowing notes might seem, sad Philomel, + Prophetic to have mourned of _man_ the _fall_.] + + + +LETTER 516 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +Friday. [P.M. May 14, 1830.] + +Dear Novello, Mary hopes you have not forgot you are to spend a day with +us on Wednesday. That it may be a long one, cannot you secure places now +for Mrs. Novello yourself and the Clarkes? We have just table room for +four. Five make my good Landlady fidgetty; six, to begin to fret; seven, +to approximate to fever point. But seriously we shall prefer four to two +or three; we shall have from 1/2 past 10 to six, when the coach goes +off, to scent the country. And pray write _now_, to say you do so come, +for dear Mrs. Westwood else will be on the tenters of incertitude. + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 517 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[May 20, 1830.] + +Dear N.--pray write immediately to say "The book has come safe." I am +anxious, not so much for the autographs, as for that bit of the hair +brush. I enclose a cinder, which belonged to _Shield_, when he was poor, +and lit his own fires. Any memorial of a great Musical Genius, I know, +is acceptable; and Shield has his merits, though Clementi, in my +opinion, is far above him in the Sostenuto. Mr. Westwood desires his +compliments, and begs to present you with a nail that came out of +Jomelli's coffin, who is buried at Naples. + + +[Vincent Novello writes on this: "A very characteristic note from Dear +Charles Lamb, who always pretended to Rate all kinds of memorials and +_Relics_, and assumed a look of fright and horror whenever he reproached +me with being a _Papist_, instead of a _Quaker_, which sect he pretended +to doat upon." The book would be Novello's album, with Lamb's "Free +Thoughts on Eminent Composers" in it (see next letter but one). + +Shield was William Shield (1748-1829), the composer. He was buried in +Westminster Abbey in the same grave as Clementi. Nicolo Jomelli +(1714-1774) was a Neapolitan composer.] + + + +LETTER 518 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +May 21, 1830. + +Dear Hone--I thought you would be pleased to see this letter. Pray if +you have time to, call on Novello, No. 66, Great Queen St. I am anxious +to learn whether he received his album I sent on Friday by our nine +o'clock morning stage. If not, beg inquire at the _Old Bell_, Holborn. + +CHARLES LAMB. + +Southey will see in the _Times_ all we proposed omitting is omitted. + + +[See notes to the letter to Southey above.] + + + +LETTER 519 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +[Enfield, Saturday, May 24th, 1830.] + +Mary's love? Yes. Mary Lamb quite well. + +Dear Sarah,--I found my way to Northaw on Thursday and a very good woman +behind a counter, who says also that you are a very good lady but that +the woman who was with you was naught. These things may be so or not. I +did not accept her offered glass of wine (home-made, I take it) but +craved a cup of ale, with which I seasoned a slice of cold Lamb from a +sandwich box, which I ate in her back parlour, and proceeded for +Berkhampstead, &c.; lost myself over a heath, and had a day's pleasure. +I wish you could walk as I do, and as you used to do. I am sorry to find +you are so poorly; and, now I have found my way, I wish you back at +Goody Tomlinson's. What a pretty village 'tis! I should have come +sooner, but was waiting a summons to Bury. Well, it came, and I found +the good parson's lady (he was from home) exceedingly hospitable. + +Poor Emma, the first moment we were alone, took me into a corner, and +said, "Now, pray, don't _drink_; do check yourself after dinner, for my +sake, and when we get home to Enfield, you shall drink as much as ever +you please, and I won't say a word about it." How I behaved, you may +guess, when I tell you that Mrs. Williams and I have written acrostics +on each other, and she hoped that she should have "no reason to regret +Miss Isola's recovery, by its depriving _her_ of our begun +correspondence." Emma stayed a month with us, and has gone back (in +tolerable health) to her long home, for _she_ comes not again for a +twelvemonth. I amused Mrs. Williams with an occurrence on our road to +Enfield. We travelled with one of those troublesome fellow-passengers in +a stage-coach, that is called a well-informed man. For twenty miles we +discoursed about the properties of steam, probabilities of carriages by +ditto, till all my science, and more than all, was exhausted, and I was +thinking of escaping my torment by getting up on the outside, when, +getting into Bishops Stortford, my gentleman, spying some farming land, +put an unlucky question to me: "What sort of a crop of turnips I thought +we should have this year?" Emma's eyes turned to me, to know what in the +world I could have to say; and she burst into a violent fit of laughter, +maugre her pale, serious cheeks, when, with the greatest gravity, I +replied, that "it depended, I believed, upon boiled legs of mutton." +This clench'd our conversation; and my Gentleman, with a face half wise, +half in scorn, troubled us with no more conversation, scientific or +philosophical, for the remainder of the journey. Ayrton was here +yesterday, and as _learned_ to the full as my fellow-traveller. What a +pity that he will spoil a wit and a devilish pleasant fellow (as he is) +by wisdom! He talk'd on Music; and by having read Hawkins and Burney +recently I was enabled to talk of Names, and show more knowledge than he +had suspected I possessed; and in the end he begg'd me to shape my +thoughts upon paper, which I did after he was gone, and sent him. + + FREE THOUGHTS ON SOME EMINENT COMPOSERS + + Some cry up Haydn, some Mozart, + Just as the whim bites. For my part, + I do not care a farthing candle + For either of them, or for Handel. + Cannot a man live free and easy, + Without admiring Pergolesi! + Or thro' the world with comfort go + That never heard of Doctor Blow! + So help me God, I hardly have; + And yet I eat, and drink, and shave, + Like other people, (if you watch it,) + And know no more of stave and crotchet + Than did the un-Spaniardised Peruvians; + Or those old ante-queer-Diluvians + That lived in the unwash'd world with Jubal, + Before that dirty Blacksmith Tubal, + By stroke on anvil, or by summ'at, + Found out, to his great surprise, the gamut. + I care no more for Cimerosa + Than he did for Salvator Rosa, + Being no Painter; and bad luck + Be mine, if I can bear that Gluck! + Old Tycho Brahe and modern Herschel + Had something in them; but who's Purcel? + The devil, with his foot so cloven, + For aught I care, may take Beethoven; + And, if the bargain does not suit, + I'll throw him Weber in to boot! + There's not the splitting of a splinter + To chuse 'twixt _him last named_, and Winter. + Of Doctor Pepusch old queen Dido + Knew just as much, God knows, as I do. + I would not go four miles to visit + Sebastian Bach-or Batch-which is it? + No more I would for Bononcini. + As for Novello and Rossini, + I shall not say a word about [to grieve] 'em, + Because they're living. So I leave 'em. + + +Martin Burney is as odd as ever. We had a dispute about the word "heir," +which I contended was pronounced like "air;" he said that might be in +common parlance; or that we might so use it, speaking of the +"Heir-at-Law," a comedy; but that in the Law Courts it was necessary to +give it a full aspiration, and to say _Hayer_; he thought it might even +vitiate a cause, if a Counsel pronounced it otherwise. In conclusion, he +"would consult Serjeant Wilde;" who gave it against him. Sometimes he +falleth into the water, sometimes into the fire. He came down here, and +insisted on reading Virgil's "Eneid" all through with me (which he did,) +because a Counsel must know Latin. Another time he read out all the +Gospel of St. John, because Biblical quotations are very emphatic in a +Court of Justice. A third time, he would carve a fowl, which he did very +ill-favoredly, because "we did not know how indispensable it was for a +Barrister to do all those sort of things well. Those little things were +of more consequence than we supposed." So he goes on, harassing about +the way to prosperity, and losing it. With a long head, but somewhat a +wrong one--harum-scarum. Why does not his guardian angel look to him? He +deserves one--: may be, he has tired him out. + +I am----with this long scrawl, but I thought in your exile, you might +like a letter. Commend me to all the wonders in Derbyshire, and tell the +devil I humbly kiss--my hand to him. Yours ever, + +C. LAMB. + + +["Free Thoughts." The version in Ayrton's album differs a little from +this, the principal difference being in line 13, "primitive" for +"un-Spaniardised." Lamb's story of the origin of the verses is not +necessarily correct. I fancy that he had written them for Novello before +he produced them in reply to Ayrton's challenge. When sending the poem +to Ayrton in a letter at this time, not available for this edition +(written apparently just after Novello had paid the visit, referred to +above), Lamb wrote that it was written to gratify Novello. + +Mary Lamb (or Charles Lamb, personating her) appended the following +postscript to the verses in Novello's album:-- + + The reason why my brother's so severe, + Vincentio is--my brother has no ear: + And Caradori her mellifluous throat + Might stretch in vain to make him learn a note. + Of common tunes he knows not anything, + Nor "Rule, Britannia" from "God save the King." + He rail at Handel! He the gamut quiz! + I'd lay my life he knows not what it is. + His spite at music is a pretty whim-- + He loves not it, because it loves not him. + +M. LAMB. + +"Serjeant Wilde"-Thomas Wilde (1782-1855), afterwards Lord Truro, a +friend of Lamb's, who is said to have helped him with squibs in the +Newark election in 1829, when Martin Burney was among his supporters +(see Vol. V. of my large edition, page 341). + +Here had I permission, I would print Lamb's letter to Ayrton, given in +the Boston Bibliophile edition, incorporating the same poem.] + + + +LETTER 520 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +June 3, 1830. + +Dear Sarah,--I named your thought about William to his father, who +expressed such horror and aversion to the idea of his singing in public, +that I cannot meddle in it directly or indirectly. Ayrton is a kind +fellow, and if you chuse to consult him by Letter, or otherwise, he will +give you the best advice, I am sure, very readily. _I have no doubt that +M. Burney's objection to interfering was the same--with mine._ With +thanks for your pleasant long letter, which is not that of an Invalid, +and sympathy for your sad sufferings, I remain, in haste, + +Yours Truly, + +Mary's kindest Love. + + +[There was some talk of William Hazlitt Junr. becoming a pupil of Braham +and taking up music seriously. He did not do so. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Hone, dated Enfield, June 17, 1830, +in which Lamb offers Hone L1 per quarter for yesterday's Times, after +the Coffee-House customers have done with it. He ends with the wish, +"Vivant Coffee, Coffee-potque!"] + + + +LETTER 521 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. June 28, 1830.] + +DEAR B.B.--Could you dream of my publishing without sending a copy to +you? You will find something new to you in the vol. particularly the +Translations. Moxon will send to you the moment it is out. He is the +young poet of Xmas, whom the Author of the Pleasures of Memory has set +up in the bookvending business with a volunteer'd loan of L500--such +munificence is rare to an almost stranger. But Rogers, I am told, has +done many goodnatured things of this nature. I need not say how glad to +see A.K. and Lucy we should have been,--and still shall be, if it be +practicable. Our direction is Mr. Westwood's, Chase Side Enfield, but +alas I know not theirs. We can give them a bed. Coaches come daily from +the Bell, Holborn. + +You will see that I am worn to the poetical dregs, condescending to +Acrostics, which are nine fathom beneath Album verses--but they were +written at the request of the Lady where our Emma is, to whom I paid a +visit in April to bring home Emma for a change of air after a severe +illness, in which she had been treated like a daughter by the good +Parson and his whole family. She has since return'd to her occupation. I +thought on you in Suffolk, but was 40 miles from Woodbridge. I heard of +you the other day from Mr. Pulham of the India House. + +Long live King William the 4th. + +S.T.C. says, we have had wicked kings, foolish kings, wise kings, good +kings (but few) but never till now have we had a Blackguard King-- + +Charles 2d was profligate, but a Gentleman. + +I have nineteen Letters to dispatch this leisure Sabbath for Moxon to +send about with Copies-so you will forgive me short measure--and believe +me + +Yours ever + +C.L. + +Pray do let us see your Quakeresses if possible. + + +[Lamb's _Album Verses_ was almost ready. The translations were those +from Vincent Bourne. + +William IV. came to the throne on June 26, 1830. + +"I have nineteen Letters." The fact that none of these is forthcoming +helps to illustrate the imperfect state of Lamb's correspondence as +(even among so many differing editions) we now have it. But of course +the number may have been an exaggeration. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Hone, dated July 1, 1830, in which +Lamb asks that the newspaper be kept as he is meditating a town +residence (see next letter). + +Here probably should come an undated letter to Mrs. John Rickman, +accompanying a gift of _Album Verses_. Lamb says: "Will you re-give, or +_lend_ me, by the bearer, the one Volume of juvenile Poetry? I have +tidings of a second at Brighton." He proposes that he and Mrs. Rickman +shall some day play old whist for the two.] + + + +LETTER 522 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +[P.M. 30 August, 1830.] + +Dear B.B.--my address is 34 Southampton Buildings, Holborn. For God's +sake do not let me [be] pester'd with Annuals. They are all rogues who +edit them, and something else who write in them. I am still alone, and +very much out of sorts, and cannot spur up my mind to writing. The sight +of one of those Year Books makes me sick. I get nothing by any of 'em, +not even a Copy-- + +Thank you for your warm interest about my little volume, for the critics +on which I care [? not] the 5 hundred thousandth part of the tythe of a +half-farthing. I am too old a Militant for that. How noble, tho', in +R.S. to come forward for an old friend, who had treated him so +unworthily. Moxon has a shop without customers, I a Book without +readers. But what a clamour against a poor collection of album verses, +as if we had put forth an Epic. I cannot scribble a long Letter--I am, +when not at foot, very desolate, and take no interest in any thing, +scarce hate any thing, but annuals. I am in an interregnum of thought +and feeling-- + +What a beautiful Autumn morning this is, if it was but with me as in +times past when the candle of the Lord shined round me-- + +I cannot even muster enthusiasm to admire the French heroism. + +In better times I hope we may some day meet, and discuss an old poem or +two. But if you'd have me not sick no more of Annuals. + +C.L. Ex-Elia. + +Love to Lucy and A.K. always. + + +[_The Literary Gazette_, Jerdan's paper, had written offensively of +_Album Verses_ and its author's vanity in the number for July 10, 1830. +Southey published in _The Times_ of August 6 some lines in praise of +Lamb and against Jerdan. It was Southey's first public utterance on Lamb +since the famous letter by Elia to himself, and is the more noble in +consequence. The lines ran thus:-- + + TO CHARLES LAMB + + On the Reviewal of his _Album Verses_ in the _Literary Gazette_ + + + Charles Lamb, to those who know thee justly dear + For rarest genius, and for sterling worth, + Unchanging friendship, warmth of heart sincere, + And wit that never gave an ill thought birth, + Nor ever in its sport infix'd a sting; + To us who have admired and loved thee long, + It is a proud as well as pleasant thing + To hear thy good report, now borne along + Upon the honest breath of public praise: + We know that with the elder sons of song + In honouring whom thou hast delighted still, + Thy name shall keep its course to after days. + The empty pertness, and the vulgar wrong, + The flippant folly, the malicious will, + Which have assailed thee, now, or heretofore, + Find, soon or late, their proper meed of shame; + The more thy triumph, and our pride the more, + When witling critics to the world proclaim, + In lead, their own dolt incapacity. + Matter it is of mirthful memory + To think, when thou wert early in the field, + How doughtily small Jeffrey ran at thee + A-tilt, and broke a bulrush on thy shield. + And now, a veteran in the lists of fame, + I ween, old Friend! thou art not worse bested + When with a maudlin eye and drunken aim, + Dulness hath thrown a _jerdan_ at thy head. + + SOUTHEY. + +Leigh Hunt attacked Jerdan in the _Examiner_ in a number of "Rejected +Epigrams" signed T.A. See later. He also took up the matter in the +Tatler, in the first number of which the following "Inquest +Extraordinary" was printed:-- + + Last week a porter died beneath his burden; + Verdict: Found carrying a _Gazette_ from Jerdan. + +Moxon's shop without customers was at 64 New Bond Street. "The candle of +the Lord." In my large edition I gave this reference very thoughtlessly +to Proverbs xx. 27. It is really to Job. xxix. 3. + +"The French heroism." The July Revolution, in which the Bourbons were +routed and Louis Philippe placed on the throne.] + + + +LETTER 523 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SAMUEL ROGERS + +[Dated at end: Oct. 5, 1830.] + +Dear Sir,--I know not what hath bewitch'd me that I have delayed +acknowledging your beautiful present. But I have been very unwell and +nervous of late. The poem was not new to me, tho' I have renewed +acquaintance with it. Its metre is none of the least of its +excellencies. 'Tis so far from the stiffness of blank verse--it gallops +like a traveller, as it should do--no crude Miltonisms in [it]. Dare I +pick out what most pleases me? It is the middle paragraph in page +thirty-four. It is most tasty. Though I look on every impression as a +_proof_ of your kindness, I am jealous of the ornaments, and should have +prized the verses naked on whitybrown paper. + +I am, Sir, yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + +Oct. 5th. + + +[Rogers had sent Lamb a copy of his Italy, with illustrations by Turner +and Stothard, which was published by Moxon with other firms in 183O. +This is the middle paragraph on page 34:-- + + Here I received from thee, Basilico, + One of those _courtesies so sweet, so rare!_ + When, as I rambled thro' thy vineyard-ground + On the hill-side, thou sent'st thy little son, + Charged with a bunch almost as big as he, + To press it on the stranger. May thy vats + O'erflow, and he, thy willing gift-bearer, + Live to become a giver; and, at length, + When thou art full of honour and wouldst rest, + The staff of thine old age!] + + + +LETTER 524 + +CHARLES LAMB TO VINCENT NOVELLO + +[P.M. November 8, 1830.] + + Tears are for lighter griefs. Man weeps the doom + That seals a single victim to the tomb. + But when Death riots, when with whelming sway + Destruction sweeps a family away; + When Infancy and Youth, a huddled mass, + All in an instant to oblivion pass, + And Parent's hopes are crush'd; what lamentation + Can reach the depth of such a desolation? + Look upward, Feeble Ones! look up, and trust + That He, who lays this mortal frame in dust, + Still hath the immortal Spirit in His keeping. + In Jesus' sight they are not dead, but sleeping. + +Dear N., will these lines do? I despair of better. Poor Mary is in a +deplorable state here at Enfield. + +Love to all, + +C. LAMB. + + +[The four sons and two daughters of John and Ann Rigg, of York, had been +drowned in the Ouse. A number of poets were asked for verses, the best +to be inscribed on a monument in York Minster. Those of James Montgomery +were chosen. + +It was possibly the death of Hazlitt, on September 18, while the Lambs +were in their London lodgings, that brought on Mary Lamb's attack.] + + + +LETTER 525 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +November 12, 1830. + +Dear Moxon,--I have brought my sister to Enfield, being sure that she +had no hope of recovery in London. Her state of mind is deplorable +beyond any example. I almost fear whether she has strength at her time +of life ever to get out of it. Here she must be nursed, and neither see +nor hear of anything in the world out of her sick chamber. The mere +hearing that Southey had called at our lodgings totally upset her. Pray +see him, or hear of him at Mr. Rickman's, and excuse my not writing to +him. I dare not write or receive a letter in her presence; every little +task so agitates her. Westwood will receive any letter for me, and give +it me privately. Pray assure Southey of my kindliest feelings towards +him; and, if you do not see him, send this to him. + +Kindest remembrances to your sister, and believe me ever yours, C. LAMB. + +Remember me kindly to the Allsops. + + +[Southey was visiting Rickman, then Clerk Assistant to the House of +Commons, where he lived.] + + + +LETTER 526 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? Dec., 1830.] + +Dear M. Something like this was what I meant. But on reading it over, I +see no great fun or use in it. It will only stuff up and encroach upon +the sheet you propose. Do as, and _what_, you please. Send Proof, or +not, as you like. If you send, send me a copy or 2 of the Album Verses, +and the Juvenile Poetry if _bound_. + +I am happy to say Mary is mending, but not enough to give me hopes of +being able to leave her. I sadly regret that I shall possibly not see +Southey or Wordsworth, but I dare not invite either of them here, for +fear of exciting my sister, whose only chance is quiet. You don't know +in what a sad state we have been. + +I think the Devil may come out without prefaces, but use your +discretion. + +Make my kindest remembces to Southey, with my heart's thanks for his +kind intent. I am a little easier about my Will, and as Ryle is +Executor, and will do all a friend can do at the Office, and what little +I leave will buy an annuity to piece out tolerably, I am much easier. + +Yours ever + +C.L. + +To 64 New Bond St. + + +[I cannot say to what the opening sentences refer: probably an +advertisement for _Satan in Search of a Wife_ ("the Devil"), which Lamb +had just written and Moxon was publishing. + +The reference to the Juvenile Poetry suggests that Moxon had procured +some of the sheets of the _Poetry for Children_ which Godwin brought out +in 1809, and was binding up a few. This theory is borne out by the +statement in the letter to Mrs. Norris, later, that the book was not to +be had for love or money, and the circumstance that in 1833 Lamb seems +to send her a copy. Ryle was Charles Ryle. an India House clerk, and +Lamb's executor with Talfourd.] + + + +LETTER 527 + +CHARLES LAMB TO GEORGE DYER + +Dec. 20, 1830. + +Dear Dyer,--I would have written before to thank you for your kind +letter, written with your own hand. It glads us to see your writing. It +will give you pleasure to hear that, after so much illness, we are in +tolerable health and spirits once more. Miss Isola intended to call upon +you after her night's lodging at Miss Buffam's, but found she was too +late for the stage. If she comes to town before she goes home, she will +not miss paying her respects to Mrs. Dyer and you, to whom she desires +best love. Poor Enfield, that has been so peaceable hitherto, has caught +the inflammatory fever, the tokens are upon her! and a great fire was +blazing last night in the barns and haystacks of a farmer, about half a +mile from us. Where will these things end? There is no doubt of its +being the work of some ill-disposed rustic; but how is he to be +discovered? They go to work in the dark with strange chemical +preparations unknown to our forefathers. There is not even a dark +lantern to have a chance of detecting these Guy Fauxes. We are past the +iron age, and are got into the fiery age, undream'd of by Ovid. You are +lucky in Clifford's Inn where, I think, you have few ricks or stacks +worth the burning. Pray keep as little corn by you as you can, for fear +of the worst. + +It was never good times in England since the poor began to speculate +upon their condition. Formerly, they jogged on with as little reflection +as horses: the whistling ploughman went cheek by jowl with his brother +that neighed. Now the biped carries a box of phosphorus in his +leather-breeches; and in the dead of night the half-illuminated beast +steals his magic potion into a cleft in a barn, and half a country is +grinning with new fires. Farmer Graystock said something to the touchy +rustic that he did not relish, and he writes his distaste in flames. +What a power to intoxicate his crude brains, just muddlingly awake, to +perceive that something is wrong in the social system!-what a hellish +faculty above gunpowder! + +Now the rich and poor are fairly pitted; we shall see who can hang or +burn fastest. It is not always revenge that stimulates these kindlings. +There is a love of exerting mischief. Think of a disrespected clod that +was trod into earth, that was nothing, on a sudden by damned arts +refined into an exterminating angel, devouring the fruits of the earth +and their growers in a mass of fire! What a new existence!--what a +temptation above Lucifer's! Would clod be any thing but a clod, if he +could resist it? Why, here was a spectacle last night for a whole +country!--a Bonfire visible to London, alarming her guilty towers, and +shaking the Monument with an ague fit--all done by a little vial of +phosphor in a Clown's fob! How he must grin, and shake his empty noddle +in clouds, the Vulcanian Epicure! Can we ring the bells backward? Can we +unlearn the arts that pretend to civilize, and then burn the world? +There is a march of Science; but who shall beat the drums for its +retreat? Who shall persuade the boor that phosphor will not ignite? + +Seven goodly stacks of hay, with corn-barns proportionable, lie smoking +ashes and chaff, which man and beast would sputter out and reject like +those apples of Asphaltes and bitumen. The food for the inhabitants of +earth will quickly disappear. Hot rolls may say: "Fuimus panes, fuit +quartern-loaf, et ingens gloria Apple-pasty-orum." That the good old +munching system may last thy time and mine, good un-incendiary George, +is the devout prayer of thine, + +To the last crust, + +CH. LAMB. + + +[Incendiarism, the result of agricultural distress and in opposition to +the competition of the new machinery, was rife in the country at this +time.] + + + +LETTER 528 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? Christmas, 1830.] + +Dear M. A thousand thanks for your punctualities. What a cheap Book is +the last Hogarth you sent me! I am pleased now that Hunt _diddled_ me +out of the old one. Speaking of this, only think of the new farmer with +his 30 acres. There is a portion of land in Lambeth parish called Knaves +Acre. I wonder he overlook'd it. Don't show this to the firm of Dilk & +C'o. I next want one copy of Leicester School, and wish you to pay +Leishman, Taylor, 2 Blandford Place, Pall Mall, opposite the British +Institution, L6. 10. for coat waistcoat &c. And I vehemently thirst for +the 4th No. of Nichols's Hogarth, to bind 'em up (the 2 books) as +"Hogarth, and Supplement." But as you know the price, don't stay for its +appearance; but come as soon as ever you can with your bill of all +demands in full, and, as I have none but L5 notes, bring with you +sufficient change. Weather is beautiful. I grieve sadly for Miss +Wordsworth. We are all well again. Emma is with us, and we all shall be +glad of a sight of you. COME ON Sunday, if you _can_; better, if you +come before. Perhaps Rogers would smile at this.--A pert half chemist +half apothecary, in our town, who smatters of literature and is +immeasurable unletterd, said to me "Pray, Sir, may not Hood (he of the +acres) be reckon'd the Prince of wits in the present day?" to which I +assenting, he adds "I had always thought that Rogers had been reckon'd +the Prince of Wits, but I suppose that now Mr. Hood has the better title +to that appellation." To which I replied that Mr. R. had wit with much +better qualities, but did not aspire to the principality. He had taken +all the puns manufactured in John Bull for our friend, in sad and stupid +earnest. One more Album verses, please. + +Adieu. + +C.L. + + +["Hunt." This would, I think, be not Leigh Hunt but his nephew, Hunt of +Hunt & Clarke. The diddling I cannot explain. Leishman was the husband +of Mrs. Leishman, the Lambs' old landlady at Enfield. + +"Miss Wordsworth"--Dorothy Wordsworth, who was ill. + +"Perhaps Rogers would smile at this." I take the following passage from +the _Maclise Portrait Gallery:_-- + + In the early days of the _John Bull_ it was the fashion to lay every + foundling witticism at the door of Sam Rogers; and thus the refined + poet and man of letters became known as a sorry jester. + +_John Bull_ was Theodore Hook's paper. Maginn wrote in _Fraser's +Magazine:_-- + + Joe Miller vails his bonnet to Sam Rogers; in all the newspapers, + not only of the kingdom but its dependencies,--Hindostan, Canada, + the West Indies, the Cape, from the tropics,--nay, from the + Antipodes to the Orkneys, Sam is godfather-- general to all the bad + jokes in existence. The Yankees have caught the fancy, and from New + Orleans to New York it is the same,--Rogers is synonymous with a + pun. All British-born or descended people,--yea the very negro and + the Hindoo--father their calembourgs on Rogers. Quashee, or + Ramee-Samee, who knows nothing of Sir Isaac Newton, John Milton, or + _Fraser's Magazine_, grins from ear to ear at the name of the + illustrious banker, and with gratified voice exclaims, "Him dam + funny, dat Sam!"] + + + +LETTER 529 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. February 3, 1831.] + +Dear Moxon, The snows are ancle deep slush and mire, that 'tis hard to +get to the post office, and cruel to send the maid out. 'Tis a slough of +despair, or I should sooner have thankd you for your offer of the +_Life_, which we shall very much like to have, and will return duly. I +do not know when I shall be in town, but in a week or two at farthest, +when I will come as far as you if I can. We are moped to death with +confinement within doors. I send you a curiosity of G. Dyer's +tender-conscience. Between 30 and 40 years since, G. published the +Poet's Fate, in which were two very harmless lines about Mr. Rogers, but +Mr. R. not quite approving of them, they were left out in a subsequent +edition 1801. But G. has been worryting about them ever since; if I have +heard him once, I have heard him a hundred times express a remorse +proportiond to a consciousness of having been guilty of an atrocious +libel. As the devil would have it, a fool they call _Barker_, in his +Parriana has quoted the identical two lines as they stood in some +obscure edition anterior to 1801, and the withers of poor G. are again +wrung. His letter is a gem--with his poor blind eyes it has been +laboured out at six sittings. The history of the couplet is in page 3 of +this irregular production, in which every variety of shape and size that +Letters can be twisted into, is to be found. Do _shew_ his part of it to +Mr. R. some day. If he has bowels, they must melt at the contrition so +queerly character'd of a contrite sinner. G. was born I verily think +without original sin, but chuses to have a conscience, as every +Christian Gentleman should have. His dear old face is insusceptible of +the twist they call a sneer, yet he is apprehensive of being suspected +of that ugly appearance. When he makes a compliment, he thinks he has +given an affront. A name is personality. But shew (no hurry) this unique +recantation to Mr. R. 'Tis like a dirty pocket handkerchief muck'd with +tears of some indigent Magdalen. There is the impress of sincerity in +every pot-hook and hanger. And then the gilt frame to such a pauper +picture! It should go into the Museum. I am heartily sorry my Devil does +not answer. We must try it a little longer, and after all I think I must +insist on taking a portion of the loss upon myself. It is too much you +should lose by two adventures. You do not say how your general business +goes on, and I should very much like to talk over it with you here. Come +when the weather will possibly let you. I want to see the Wordsworths, +but I do not much like to be all night away. It is dull enough to be +here together, but it is duller to leave Mary; in short it is painful, +and in a flying visit I should hardly catch them. I have no beds for +them, if they came down, and but a sort of a house to receive them in, +yet I shall regret their departure unseen. I feel cramped and straiten'd +every way. Where are they? + +We have heard from Emma but once, and that a month ago, and are very +anxious for another letter. + +You say we have forgot your powers of being serviceable to us. _That_ we +never shall. I do not know what I should do without you when I want a +little commission. Now then. There are left at Miss Buffam's, the Tales +of the Castle, and certain vols. Retrospective Review. The first should +be conveyd to Novello's, and the Reviews should be taken to Talfourd's +office, ground floor, East side, Elm Court, Middle Temple, to whom I +should have written, but my spirits are wretched. It is quite an effort +to write this. So, with the _Life_, I have cut you out 3 Pieces of +service. What can I do for you here, but hope to see you very soon, and +think of you with most kindness. I fear tomorrow, between rains and +snows, it would be impossible to expect you, but do not let a +practicable Sunday pass. We are always at home! + +Mary joins in remembrances to your sister, whom we hope to see in any +fine-ish weather, when she'll venture. + +Remember us to Allsop, and all the dead people--to whom, and to London, +we seem dead. + + +["The _Life_." The Life which every one was then reading was Moore's +_Life of Byron_. + +"George Dyer's." The explanation is that years before, in his _Poems_, +1801, Dyer had written in a piece called "The Poet's Fate"-- + + And Rogers, if he shares the town's regard, + Was first a banker ere he rose a bard. + +In the second edition Dyer altered this to-- + + And Darwin, if he share the town's regard, + Was first a doctor ere he rose a bard. + +Lamb notes the alteration in his copy of the second edition, now in the +British Museum. In 1828-1829 appeared _Parriana_, by Edmund Henry +Barker, which quoted the couplet in its original form, to Dyer's +distress. + +_Tales of the Castle_. By the Countess de Genlis. Translated by Thomas +Holcroft] + + + +LETTER 530 + +CHARLES LAMB TO GEORGE DYER + +Feb. 22nd, 1831. + +Dear Dyer,--Mr. Rogers, and Mr. Rogers's friends, are perfectly assured, +that you never intended any harm by an innocent couplet, and that in the +revivification of it by blundering Barker you had no hand whatever. To +imagine that, at this time of day, Rogers broods over a fantastic +expression of more than thirty years' standing, would be to suppose him +indulging his "Pleasures of Memory" with a vengeance. You never penned a +line which for its own sake you need (dying) wish to blot. You mistake +your heart if you think you _can_ write a lampoon. Your whips are rods +of roses. Your spleen has ever had for its objects vices, not the +vicious-abstract offences, not the concrete sinner. But you are +sensitive, and wince as much at the consciousness of having committed a +compliment, as another man would at the perpetration of an affront. But +do not lug me into the same soreness of conscience with yourself. I +maintain, and will to the last hour, that I never writ of you but _con +amore_. That if any allusion was made to your near-sightedness, it was +not for the purpose of mocking an infirmity, but of connecting it with +scholar-like habits: for is it not erudite and scholarly to be somewhat +near of sight, before age naturally brings on the malady? You could not +then plead the _obrepens senectus_. Did I not moreover make it an +apology for a certain _absence_, which some of your friends may have +experienced, when you have not on a sudden made recognition of them in a +casual street-meeting, and did I not strengthen your excuse for this +slowness of recognition, by further accounting morally for the present +engagement of your mind in worthy objects? Did I not, in your person, +make the handsomest apology for absent-of-mind people that was ever +made? If these things be not so, I never knew what I wrote or meant by +my writing, and have been penning libels all my life without being aware +of it. Does it follow that I should have exprest myself exactly in the +same way of those dear old eyes of yours _now_--now that Father Time has +conspired with a hard task-master to put a last extinguisher upon them? +I should as soon have insulted the Answerer of Salmasius, when he awoke +up from his ended task, and saw no more with mortal vision. But you are +many films removed yet from Milton's calamity. You write perfectly +intelligibly. Marry, the letters are not all of the same size or +tallness; but that only shows your proficiency in the _hands_--text, +german-hand, court-hand, sometimes law-hand, and affords variety. You +pen better than you did a twelvemonth ago; and if you continue to +improve, you bid fair to win the golden pen which is the prize at your +young gentlemen's academy. But you must beware of Valpy, and his +printing-house, that hazy cave of Trophonius, out of which it was a +mercy that you escaped with a glimmer. Beware of MSS. and Variae +Lectiones. Settle the text for once in your mind, and stick to it. You +have some years' good sight in you yet, if you do not tamper with it. It +is not for you (for _us_ I should say) to go poring into Greek +contractions, and star-gazing upon slim Hebrew points. We have yet the +sight + + Of sun, and moon, and star, throughout the year, + And man and woman. + +You have vision enough to discern Mrs. Dyer from the other comely +gentlewoman who lives up at staircase No. 5; or, if you should make a +blunder in the twilight, Mrs. Dyer has too much good sense to be jealous +for a mere effect of imperfect optics. But don't try to write the Lord's +Prayer, Creed, and Ten Commandments, in the compass of a halfpenny; nor +run after a midge or a mote to catch it; and leave off hunting for +needles in bushels of hay, for all these things strain the eyes. The +snow is six feet deep in some parts here. I must put on jack-boots to +get at the post-office with this. It is not good for weak eyes to pore +upon snow too much. It lies in drifts. I wonder what its drift is; only +that it makes good pancakes, remind Mrs. Dyer. It turns a pretty green +world into a white one. It glares too much for an innocent colour, +methinks. I wonder why you think I dislike gilt edges. They set off a +letter marvellously. Yours, for instance, looks for all the world like a +tablet of curious _hieroglyphics_ in a gold frame. But don't go and lay +this to your eyes. You always wrote hieroglyphically, yet not to come up +to the mystical notations and conjuring characters of Dr. Parr. You +never wrote what I call a schoolmaster's hand, like Clarke; nor a +woman's hand, like Southey; nor a missal hand, like Porson; nor an +all-of-the-wrong-side-sloping hand, like Miss Hayes; nor a dogmatic, +Mede-and-Persian, peremptory hand, like Rickman; but you ever wrote what +I call a Grecian's hand; what the Grecians write (or used) at Christ's +Hospital; such as Whalley would have admired, and Boyer have applauded, +but Smith or Atwood (writing-masters) would have horsed you for. Your +boy-of-genius hand and your mercantile hand are various. By your +flourishes, I should think you never learned to make eagles or +corkscrews, or flourish the governors' names in the writing-school; and +by the tenor and cut of your letters I suspect you were never in it at +all. By the length of this scrawl you will think I have a design upon +your optics; but I have writ as large as I could out of respect to +them--too large, indeed, for beauty. Mine is a sort of deputy Grecian's +hand; a little better, and more of a worldly hand, than a Grecian's, but +still remote from the mercantile. I don't know how it is, but I keep my +rank in fancy still since school-days. I can never forget I was a deputy +Grecian! And writing to you, or to Coleridge, besides affection, I feel +a reverential deference as to Grecians still. I keep my soaring way +above the Great Erasmians, yet far beneath the other. Alas! what am I +now? what is a Leadenhall clerk or India pensioner to a deputy Grecian? +How art thou fallen, O Lucifer! Just room for our loves to Mrs. D., &c. + +C. LAMB. + + +["I never writ of you but _con amore_." Lamb refers particularly to the +_Elia_ essay "Oxford in the Vacation" in the _London Magazine_, where +G.D.'s absence of mind and simplicity of character were dwelt upon more +intimately than Dyer liked (see Vol. II.). + +Dyer was gradually going blind. + +"The Answerer of Salmasius"--Milton. + +"Comely" Mrs. Dyer. But in the letter to Mrs. Shelley, Mrs. D. had been +"plain"! + +Dyer had been a Grecian before Lamb was born. Clarke would be Charles +Cowden Clarke, with whose father Dyer had been an usher. Miss Hayes we +have met. The Rev. Peter Whalley was Upper Grammar Master in Dyer's day; +Boyer, Lamb and Coleridge's master, succeeded him in 1776. Smith was +Writing Master at the end of the seventeenth century. + +Lamb had never become a Grecian, having an impediment in his speech +which made it impossible that he should take orders, the natural fate of +Grecians, with profit. Great Erasmus and Little Erasmus are still the +names of classes in the Blue-Coat School. Grecians were the Little +Erasmians. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to P.G. Patmore, dated April 10, +1831, in which Lamb says of the publisher of the _New Monthly Magazine_: +"Nature never wrote Knave upon a face more legible than upon that +fellow's--'Coal-burn him in Beelzebub's deepest pit.' I can promise +little help if you mean literary, when I reflect that for 5 years I have +been feeling the necessity of scribbling but have never found the +power.... _Moxon_ is my go between, call on _him_, 63 New Bond St., he +is a very good fellow and the bookseller is not yet burn'd into him." +Patmore was seeking a publisher for, I imagine, his _Chatsworth_. + +Here should come a letter from Lamb, dated April 13, 1831, which Canon +Ainger considers was written to Gary and Mr. Hazlitt to Coleridge. It +states that Lamb is daily expecting Wordsworth.] + + + +LETTER 531 + +CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON + +April 30, 1831. + +Vir Bone!--Recepi literas tuas amicissimas, et in mentem venit +responsuro mihi, vel raro, vel nunquam, inter nos intercedisse Latinam +linguam, organum rescribendi, loquendive. Epistolae tuae, Plinianis +elegantiis (supra quod TREMULO deceat) refertae, tam a verbis Plinianis +adeo abhorrent, ut ne vocem quamquam (Romanam scilicet) habere videaris, +quam "ad canem," ut aiunt, "rejectare possis." Forsan desuetudo +Latinissandi ad vernaculam linguam usitandam, plusquam opus sit, coegit. +Per adagia quaedam nota, et in ore omnium pervulgata, ad Latinitatis +perditae recuperationem revocare te institui. + +Felis in abaco est, et aegre videt. Omne quod splendet nequaquam aurum +putes. Imponas equo mendicum, equitabit idem ad diabolum. Fur commode a +fure prenditur. O MARIA, MARIA, valde CONTRARIA, quomodo crescit +hortulus tuus? Nunc majora canamus. Thomas, Thomas, de Islington, uxorem +duxit die nupera Dominica. Reduxit domum postera. Succedenti baculum +emit. Postridie ferit illam. Aegrescit ilia subsequenti. Proxima (nempe +Veneris) est Mortua. Plurimum gestiit Thomas, quod appropinquanti +Sabbato efferenda sit. + +Horner quidam Johannulus in angulo sedebat, artocreas quasdam +deglutiens. Inseruit pollices, pruna nana evellens, et magna voce +exclamavit "Dii boni, quam bonus puer fio!" + +Diddle-diddle-dumkins! meus unicus filius Johannes cubitum ivit, +integris braccis, caliga una tantum, indutus. Diddle-diddle, etc. DA +CAPO. + +Hie adsum saltans Joannula. Cum nemo adsit mihi, semper resto sola. + +Aenigma mihi hoc solvas, et Oedipus fies. + +Qua ratione assimulandus sit equus TREMULO? + +Quippe cui tota communicatio sit per HAY et NEIGH, juxta consilium illud +Dominicum, "Fiat omnis communicatio vestra YEA et NAY." + +In his nugis caram diem consume, dum invigilo valetudini carioris +nostras Emmae, quae apud nos jamdudum aegrotat. Salvere vos jubet mecum +Maria mea, ipsa integra valetudine. + +ELIA. + +Ab agro Enfeldiense datum, Aprilis nescio quibus Calendis-- Davus sum, +non Calendarius. + +P.S.--Perdita in toto est Billa Reformatura. + + [Mr. Stephen Gwynn gives me the following translation:-- + + Good Sir, I have received your most kind letter, and it has entered + my mind as I began to reply, that the Latin tongue has seldom or + never been used between us as the instrument of converse or + correspondence. Your letters, filled with Plinian elegancies (more + than becomes a Quaker), are so alien to Pliny's language, that you + seem not to have a word (that is, a Roman word) to throw, as the + saying is, at a dog. Perchance the disuse of Latinising had + constrained you more than is right to the use of the vernacular. I + have determined to recall you to the recovery of your lost Latinity + by certain well-known adages common in all mouths. + + The cat's in the cupboard and she can't see. + All that glitters is not gold. + Set a beggar on horseback and he'll ride to the Devil. + Set a thief to catch a thief. + Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow? + Now let us sing of weightier matters. + + Tom, Tom, of Islington, wed a wife on Sunday. He brought her home on + Monday. Bought a stick on Tuesday. Beat her well on Wednesday. She + was sick on Thursday. Dead on Friday. Tom was glad on Saturday night + to bury his wife on Sunday. + + Little Jack Homer sat in a corner, eating his Christmas pie. He put + in his thumb and drew out a plum, and cried "Good Heavens, what a + good boy am I!" + + Diddle, diddle, dumkins! my son John Went to bed with his breeches + on; One shoe off and the other shoe on, Diddle, diddle, etc. (Da + Capo.) + + Here am I, jumping Joan. When no one's by, I'm all alone. + + Solve me this enigma, you shall be an Oedipus. + + Why is a horse like a Quaker? + + Because all his communication is by Hay and Neigh, after the Lord's + counsel, "Let all your communication be Yea and Nay." + + In these trifles I waste the precious day, while watching over the + health of our more precious Emma, who has been sick in our house + this long time. My Mary sends you greeting with me, she herself in + sound health. + + Given from the Enfield country seat, on I know not what Calends of + April--I am Davus not an Almanac.[l] + + P.S.--The Reform Bill is lost altogether. + +The Reform Bill was introduced on March 1, 1831, by Lord John Russell; +the second reading was carried on March 22 by a majority of 1. On its +commitment on April 19 there was a majority of 8 against the Government. +Four days later the Government was again defeated by 22 and Parliament +was dissolved. But later, of course, the Reform Bill was passed.] + + +[Footnote 1: Allusion to the phrase of Davus the servant in +Plautus--"Davus sum non Oedipus."] + + + +LETTER 532 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +[Dated at end:] Datum ab agro Enfeldiensi, Maii die sexta, 1831. + +Assidens est mihi bona soror, Euripiden evolvens, donum vestrum, +carissime Cary, pro quo gratias agimus, lecturi atque iterum lecturi +idem. Pergratus est liber ambobus, nempe "Sacerdotis Commiserationis," +sacrum opus a te ipso Humanissimae Religionis Sacerdote dono datum. +Lachrymantes gavisuri sumus; est ubi dolor fiat voluptas; nee semper +dulce mihi est ridere; aliquando commutandum est he! he! he! cum heu! +heu! heu! + +A Musis Tragicis me non penitus abhorruisse lestis sit Carmen +Calamitosum, nescio quo autore lingua prius vernaculi scriptum, et +nuperrime a me ipso Latine versum, scilicet, "Tom Tom of Islington." +Tenuistine? + + "Thomas Thomas de Islington, + Uxorem duxit Die quadam Solis, + Abduxit domum sequenti die, + Emit baculum subsequenti, + Vapulat ilia postera, + Aegrotat succedenti, Mortua fit crastina." + +Et miro gaudio afficitur Thomas luce postera quod subsequenti (nempe, +Dominica) uxor sit efferenda. + + "En Iliades Domesticas! + En circulum calamitatum! + Plane hebdomadalem tragoediam." + +I nunc et confer Euripiden vestrum his luctibus, hac morte uxoria; +confer Alcesten! Hecuben! quasnon antiquas Heroinas Dolorosas. + +Suffundor genas lachrymis, tantas strages revolvens. Quid restat nisi +quod Tecum Tuam Caram salutamus ambosque valere jubeamus, nosmet ipsi +bene valentes. ELIA. + + +[Mr. Stephen Gwynn gives me the following translation:-- + + Sitting by me is my good sister, turning over Euripides, your gift, + dear Cary [a pun here, "carissime care"], for which we thank you, + and will read and re-read it. Most acceptable to both of us is this + book of "Pity's Priest," a sacred work of your bestowing, yourself a + priest of the most humane Religion. We shall take our pleasure + weeping; there are times when pain turns pleasure, and I would not + always be laughing: sometimes there should be a change--_heu heu!_ + for _he! he!_ + + That I have not shrunk from the Tragic Muses, witness this + Lamentable Ballad, first written in the vernacular by I know not + what author and lately by myself put into Latin T. T. of Islington. + Have you heard it? (_See translation of preceding letter_.) + + And Thomas is possessed with a wondrous joy on the following + morning, because on the next day, that is, Sunday, his wife must be + buried. + + Lo, your domestic Iliads! + Lo, the wheel of Calamities + The true tragedy of a week. + + Go to now, compare your Euripides with these sorrows, this death of + a wife! Compare Alcestis! Hecuba! or what not other sorrowing + Heroines of antiquity. + + My cheeks are tear-bedewed as I revolve such slaughter. What more to + say, but to salute you Cary and your Cara, and wish you health, + ourselves enjoying it. + +In _Mary and Charles Lamb_, 1874, by W.C. Hazlitt, in the Catalogue of +Charles Lamb's Library, for sale by Bartlett and Welford, New York, is +this item:--"_Euripidis Tragediae, interp. Lat_. 8vo. Oxonii, 1821". "C. +and M. Lamb, from H.F. Cary," on flyleaf. This must be the book +referred to. Euripides has been called the priest of pity.] + + + +LETTER 533 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. July 14, 1831.] + +Collier's Book would be right acceptable. And also a sixth vol. just +publish'd of Nichols's Illustrations of the Literary History of 18th +Century. I agree with you, and do yet _not disagree_ with W.W., as to +H. It rejoyced my heart to read his friendly spirited mention of your +publications. It might be a drawback to my pleasure, that he has tried +to decry my "Nicky," but on deliberate re- and reperusal of his censure +I cannot in the remotest degree understand what he means to say. He and +I used to dispute about Hell Eternities, I taking the affirmative. I +love to puzzle atheists, and--parsons. I fancy it runs in his head, +that I meant to rivet the idea of a personal devil. Then about the +glorious three days! there was never a year or day in my past life, +since I was pen-worthy, that I should not have written precisely as I +have. Logic and modesty are not among H.'s virtues. Talfourd flatters me +upon a poem which "nobody but I could have written," but which I have +neither seen nor heard of--"The Banquet," or "Banqueting Something," +that has appeared in The Tatler. Know you of it? How capitally the +Frenchman has analysed Satan! I was hinder'd, or I was about doing the +same thing in English, for him to put into French, as I prosified Hood's +midsummer fairies. The garden of _cabbage_ escap'd him, he turns it into +a garden of pot herbs. So local allusions perish in translation. About 8 +days before you told me of R.'s interview with the Premier, I, at the +desire of Badams, wrote a letter to him (Badams) in the most moving +terms setting forth the age, infirmities &c. of Coleridge. This letter +was convey'd to [by] B. to his friend Mr. Ellice of the Treasury, +Brother in Law to Lord Grey, who immediately pass'd it on [to] Lord +Grey, who assured him of immediate relief by a grant on the King's +Bounty, which news E. communicated to B. with a desire to confer with me +on the subject, on which I went up to THE Treasury (yesterday fortnight) +and was received by the Great Man with the utmost cordiality, (shook +hands with me coming and going) a fine hearty Gentleman, and, as seeming +willing to relieve any anxiety from me, promised me an answer thro' +Badams in 2 or 3 days at furthest. Meantime Gilman's extraordinary +insolent letter comes out in the Times! As to _my_ acquiescing in this +strange step, I told Mr. Ellice (who expressly said that the thing was +renewable three-yearly) that I consider'd such a grant as almost +equivalent to the lost pension, as from C.'s appearance and the +representations of the Gilmans, I scarce could think C.'s life worth 2 +years' purchase. I did not know that the Chancellor had been previously +applied to. Well, after seeing Ellice I wrote in the most urgent manner +to the Gilmans, insisting on an immediate letter of acknowledgment from +Coleridge, or them _in his name_ to Badams, who not knowing C. had come +forward so disinterestedly amidst his complicated illnesses and +embarrassments, to _use up_ an interest, which he may so well need, in +favor of a stranger; and from that day not a letter has B. or even +myself, received from Highgate, unless _that publish'd one in the Times +is meant as a general answer to all the friends who have stirr'd to do +C. service_! Poor C. is not to blame, for he is in leading strings.--I +particularly wish you would read this part of my note to Mr. Rogers. Now +for home matters--Our next 2 Sundays will be choked up with all the +Sugdens. The third will be free, when we hope you will show your sister +the way to Enfield and leave her with us for a few days. In the mean +while, could you not run down some week day (afternoon, say) and sleep +at the Horse Shoe? I want to have my 2d vol. Elias bound Specimen +fashion, and to consult you about 'em. Kenney has just assured me, that +he has just touch'd L100 from the theatre; you are a damn'd fool if you +don't exact your Tythe of him, and with that assurance I rest + +Your Brother fool C.L. + + +[Collier's book would be his _History of English Dramatic Poetry_, 1831. +Nichols's _Illustrations_ had been begun by John Nichols, and six +volumes were published between 1817 and 1831. It was completed in two +more volumes by his son, John Bowyer Nichols, in 1848 and 1858. + +"H."--Leigh Hunt. We do not know what W.W., presumably Wordsworth, had +to say of him; but this is how Hunt had referred to Moxon's publications +and Lamb's _Satan in Search of a Wife_ in _The Tatler_ for June 4, 1831, +the occasion being a review of "Selections from Wordsworth" for +schools:-- + + Mr. Moxon has begun his career as a bookseller in singularly high + taste. He has no connection but with the select of the earth. The + least thing he does, is to give us a dandy poem, suitable to Bond + street, and not without wit. We allude to the Byronian brochure, + entitled "_Mischief_." But this is a mere condescension to the + elegance of the street he lives in. Mr. Moxon commenced with some of + the primaeval delicacies of _Charles Lamb_. He then astonished us + with Mr. Rogers' poems on _Italy_.... Of some of these publications + we have already spoken,--Mr. Lamb's _Album Verses_ among them. And + why (the reader may ask) not have noticed his _Satan in Search of a + Wife_? Because, to say the truth, we did not think it worthy of him. + We rejoice in Mr. Lamb's accession to the good cause advocated by + Sterne and Burns, refreshed by the wholesome mirth of Mr. Moncrieff, + and finally carried (like a number of other astonished humanities, + who little thought of the matter, and are not all sensible of it + now) on the triumphant shoulders of the Glorious Three Days. But Mr. + Lamb, in the extreme sympathy of his delight, has taken for granted, + that everything that can be uttered on the subject will be held to + be worth uttering, purely for its own sake, and because it could not + well have been said twelve months ago. He merges himself, out of the + pure transport of his good will, into the joyous common-places of + others; just as if he had joined a great set of children in tossing + over some mighty bowl of snap-dragon, too scalding to bear; and + thought that nothing could be so good as to echo their "hurras!" + Furthermore, we fear that some of his old friends, on the wrong side + of the _House_, would think a little of his merriment profane: + though for our parts, if we are certain of anything in this world, + it is that nothing can be more Christian. + +"The Banquet." I cannot find this poem. It is, I think, not in _The +Tatler_. + +"How capitally the Frenchman ..." I cannot find any French paraphrase of +_Satan in Search of a Wife_, nor has a search at the Bibliotheque +Nationale in Paris revealed one. + +"R.'s interview with the Premier." R. would be Rogers. Perhaps the best +explanation of this portion of Lamb's letter is the following passage +from Mr. Dykes Campbell's memoir of Coleridge:-- + +On June 26, 1830, died George IV., and with him died the pensions of the +Royal Associates. Apparently they did not find this out until the +following year. In the _Englishman's Magazine_ for June, 1831, attention +was directed to the fact that "intimation had been given to Mr. +Coleridge and his brother Associates that they must expect their +allowances 'very shortly' to cease"--the allowances having been a +personal bounty of the late King. On June 3, 1831, Gillman wrote a +letter to the _Times_, "in consequence of a paragraph which appeared in +the _Times_ of this day." He states that on the sudden suppression of +the honorarium, representations on Coleridge's behalf were made to Lord +Brougham, with the result that the Treasury (Lord Grey) offered a +private grant of L200, which Coleridge "had felt it his duty most +respectfully to decline." Stuart, however, wrote to King William's son, +the Earl of Munster, pointing out the hardship entailed on Coleridge, +"who is old and infirm, and without other means of subsistence." He begs +the Earl to lay the matter before his royal father. To this a reply +came, excusing the King on account of his "very reduced income," but +promising that the matter shall be laid before His Majesty. To these +letters, which are printed in _Letters from the Lake Poets_ (pages +319-322), the following note is appended: "The annuity ... was not +renewed, but a sum of L300 was ultimately handed over to Coleridge by +the Treasury." Even apart from this bounty, Coleridge was not a sufferer +by the withdrawal of the King's pension, for Frere made it up to him +annually. + +It is interesting to know that Lamb played so useful and characteristic +a part in this matter. + +"The Sugdens." I do not identify these friends. + +"2d vol. Elias." This would refer, I think, to the American volume, +published without authority, in 1828, under the title _Elia; or, Second +Series_, which Lamb told N.P. Willis he liked. It contained three pieces +not by Lamb; the rest made up from the _Works_ and the _London +Magazine_ (see Vol. II., notes).] + + + +LETTER 534 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +Pray forward the enclosed, or put it in the post. + +[No date. Early August, 1831.] + +Dear M.--The _R.A_. here memorised was George Dawe, whom I knew well and +heard many anecdotes of, from DANIELS and WESTALL, at H. Rogers's--_to +each of them_ it will be well to send a Mag. in my name. It will fly +like wild fire among the R. Academicians and artists. Could you get hold +of Proctor--his chambers are in Lincoln's Inn at Montagu's--or of Janus +Weathercock?--both of their _prose_ is capital. Don't encourage poetry. +The Peter's Net does not intend funny things only. All is fish. And +leave out the sickening Elia at the end. Then it may comprise letters +and characters addrest to Peter--but a signature forces it to be all +characteristic of the one man Elia, or the one man Peter, which cramped +me formerly. I have agreed _not_ for my sister to know the subjects I +chuse till the Mag. comes out; so beware of speaking of 'em, or writing +about 'em, save generally. Be particular about this warning. Can't you +drop in some afternoon, and take a bed? + +The _Athenaeum_ has been hoaxed with some exquisite poetry that was 2 or +3 months ago in Hone's Book. I like your 1st No. capitally. But is it +not small? Come and see us, week day if possible. C.L. + + +[Moxon had just acquired _The Englishman's Magazine_ and Lamb +contributed to the September number his "Recollections of a Late Royal +Academician," George Dawe (see Vol. I. of this edition), under the +general title "Peter's Net." Daniels may have been Thomas or William +Daniell, both landscape painters. Westall may have been Richard Westall, +the historical painter, or William Westall, the topographical painter. +H. Rogers was Henry Rogers, brother of the poet. + +"The _Athenaeum_ has been hoaxed." The exquisite poetry was FitzGerald's +"Meadows in Spring" (see next letter).] + + + +LETTER 535 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Aug. 5, 1831.] + +Send, or bring me, Hone's No. for August. + +Hunt is a fool, and his critics----The anecdotes of E. and of G.D. are +substantially true. What does Elia (or Peter) care for dates? + +That _is_ the poem I mean. I do not know who wrote it, but is in Hone's +book as far back as April. + +Tis a poem I envy--_that_ & Montgomery's Last Man (nothing else of his). +I envy the writers, because I feel I could have done something like it. +S---- is a coxcomb. W---- is a ---- & a great Poet. L. + + +[Hone was now editing his _Year Book_. Under the date April 30 had +appeared Edward FitzGerald's poem, "The Meadows in Spring," with the +following introduction:-- + +These verses are in the old style; rather homely in expression; but I +honestly profess to stick more to the simplicity of the old poets than +the moderns, and to love the philosophical good humor of our old writers +more than the sickly melancholy of the Byronian wits. If my verses be +not good, they are good humored, and that is something. + +The editor of _The Athenaeum_, in reprinting the poem, suggested +delicately that it was by Lamb. There is no such poem by James +Montgomery as "The Last Man." Campbell wrote a "Last Man," and so did +Hood, but I agree with Canon Ainger that what Lamb meant was +Montgomery's "Common Lot." I give the two poems in the Appendix as +illustrations of what Lamb envied. + +"Hunt is a fool." In _The Tatler_ for August 1 Leigh Hunt had quoted +much of Lamb's essay on Elliston. I do not, however, find any adverse +criticism. + +"E. and G.D." Lamb had written in the August number of _The Englishman's +Magazine_ his "Reminiscences of Elliston." Lamb's article on George Dawe +did not appear till the September number, but perhaps Moxon already had +the copy.] + + + +LETTER 536 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Sept. 5, 1831.] + +Dear M., Your Letter's contents pleased me. I am only afraid of taxing +you, yet I want a stimulus, or I think I should drag sadly. I shall keep +the monies in trust till I see you fairly over the next 1 January. Then +I shall look upon 'em as earned. Colburn shall be written to. No part of +yours gave me more pleasure (no, not the L,10, tho' you may grin) than +that you will revisit old Enfield, which I hope will be always a +pleasant idea to you. + +Yours very faithfully + +C.L. + + +[The letter's contents was presumably payment for Lamb's contribution to +_The Englishman's Magazine_.] + + + +LETTER 537 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HAZLITT, JR. + +[P.M. Sept. 13, 1831.] + +Dear Wm--We have a sick house, Mrs. Westw'ds daughter in a fever, & +Grandaughter in the meazles, & it is better to see no company just now, +but in a week or two we shall be very glad to see you; come at a hazard +then, on a week day if you can, because Sundays are stuffd up with +friends on both parts of this great ill-mix'd family. Your second +letter, dated 3d Sept'r, came not till Sund'y & we staid at home in +even'g in expectation of seeing you. I have turned & twisted what you +ask'd me to do in my head, & am obliged to say I can not undertake +it--but as a composition for declining it, will you accept some verses +which I meditate to be addrest to you on your father, & prefixable to +your Life? Write me word that I may have 'em ready against I see you +some 10 days hence, when I calculate the House will be uninfected. Send +your mother's address. + +If you are likely to be again at Cheshunt before that time, on second +thoughts, drop in here, & consult-- + +Yours, + +C.L. + +Not a line is yet written--so say, if I shall do 'em. + + +[This is the only letter extant to the younger Hazlitt, who was then +nearly twenty. William Hazlitt, the essayist, had died September 18, +1830. Lamb was at his bedside. The memoir of him, by his son, was +prefixed to the _Literary Remains_ in 1836, but no verses by Lamb +accompanied it. When this letter was last sold at Sotheby's in June, +1902, a copy of verses was attached beginning-- + + There lives at Winterslow a man of such + Rare talents and deep learning ... + +in the handwriting of William Hazlitt. They bear more traces of being +Mary Lamb's work than her brother's.] + + + +LETTER 538 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. October 24, 1831.] + +To address an abdicated monarch is a nice point of breeding. To give him +his lost titles is to mock him; to withhold 'em is to wound him. But his +Minister who falls with him may be gracefully sympathetic. I do honestly +feel for your diminution of honors, and regret even the pleasing cares +which are part and parcel of greatness. Your magnanimous submission, and +the cheerful tone of your renunciation, in a Letter which, without +flattery, would have made an "ARTICLE," and which, rarely as I keep +letters, shall be preserved, comfort me a little. Will it please, or +plague you, to say that when your Parcel came I damned it, for my pen +was warming in my hand at a ludicrous description of a Landscape of an +R.A., which I calculated upon sending you to morrow, the last day you +gave me. Now any one calling in, or a letter coming, puts an end to my +writing for the day. Little did I think that the mandate had gone out, +so destructive to my occupation, so relieving to the apprehensions of +the whole body of R.A.'s. So you see I had not quitted the ship while a +plank was remaining. + +To drop metaphors, I am sure you have done wisely. The +very spirit of your epistle speaks that you have a weight off +your mind. I have one on mine. The cash in hand, which, +as * * * * * * less truly says, burns in my pocket. I feel queer +at returning it (who does not?). You feel awkward at re-taking +it (who ought not?) Is there no middle way of adjusting this +fine embarrassment? I think I have hit upon a medium to +skin the sore place over, if not quite to heal it. You hinted +that there might be something under L10 by and by accruing +to me _Devil's Money_. You are sanguine--say L7: 10s.--that +I entirely renounce and abjure all future interest in, I insist +upon it, and "by Him I will not name" I won't touch a penny +of it. That will split your Loss one half--and leave me conscientious +possessor of what I hold. Less than your assent to this, no proposal +will I accept of. + +The Rev. Mr.------, whose name you have left illegible (is it +_Sea-gull_?) never sent me any book on Christ's Hospit. by which I could +dream that I was indebted to him for a dedication. Did G.D. send his +penny tract to me to convert me to Unitarianism? Dear blundering soul! +why I am as old a one-Goddite as himself. Or did he think his cheap +publication would bring over the Methodists over the way here? However +I'll give it to the pew-opener (in whom I have a little interest,) to +hand over to the Clerk, whose wife she sometimes drinks tea with, for +him to lay before the Deacon, who exchanges the civility of the hat with +him, for him to transmit to the Minister, who shakes hand with him out +of Chapel, and he, in all odds, will ---- with it. + +I wish very much to see you. I leave it to you to come how you will. We +shall be very glad (we need not repeat) to see your sister, or sisters, +with you--but for you individually I will just hint that a dropping in +to Tea unlook'd for about 5, stopping bread-n-cheese and gin-and-water, +is worth a thousand Sundays. I am naturally miserable on a Sunday, but a +week day evening and Supper is like old times. Set out _now_, and give +no time to deliberation-- + +_P.S_.--The 2d vol. of Elia is delightful(-ly bound, I mean) and quite +cheap. Why, man, 'tis a Unique-- + +If I write much more I shall expand into an article, which I cannot +afford to let you have so cheap. + +By the by, to shew the perverseness of human will--while I thought I +_must_ furnish one of those accursed things monthly, it seemed a Labour +above Hercules's "Twelve" in a year, which were evidently Monthly +Contributions. Now I am emancipated, I feel as if I had a thousand +Essays swelling within me. False feelings both. + +I have lost Mr. Aitken's Town address--do you know it? Is he there? + +Your ex-Lampoonist, or Lamb-punnist--from Enfield, Oct. 24, or "last day +but one for receiving articles that can be inserted." + + +[Moxon, finding _The Englishman's Magazine_ unsuccessful, gave it up +suddenly after the October number, the third under his direction. His +letter to Lamb on the subject is not now forthcoming. The ludicrous +description of a landscape by an R.A. is, I imagine, that of the garden +of the Hesperides in the _Elia_ essay on the "Barrenness of the +Imaginative Faculty in the Production of Modern Art" (see Vol. II.). +Probably Turner's "Garden of the Hesperides" in the National Gallery. + +By "Devil's Money" Lamb means money due for _Satan in +Search of a Wife_. I do not identify * * * * * *. + +"The Rev. Mr. ----." I have not identified this gentleman. + +"G.D.... penny tract." I have not found Dyer's tract. + +"Mr. Aitken." John Aitken, editor of _Constable's Miscellany_, whom +Moxon would have known at Hurst & Co.'s.] + + + +LETTER 539 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Dec. 15, 1831.] + +Dear M. +S. I know, has an aversion, amounting almost to horror, of H. +He _would not_ lend his name. The other I might wring a guinea from, but +he is _very properly_ shy of his guineas. It would be improper in me to +apply to him, and impertinent to the other. I hope this will satisfy +you, but don't give my reason to H.'s friend, simply, say I decline it. + +I am very much obliged to you for thinking of Gary. Put me down seven +shillings (wasn't it?) in your books, and I set you down for more in my +good ones. One Copy will go down to immortality _now_, the more lasting +as the less its leaves are disturbed. This Letter will cost you 3d.--but +I did not like to be silent on the above +. + +Nothing with my name will sell, a blast is upon it. Do not think of such +a thing, unless ever you become rich enough to speculate. + +Being praised, and being bought, are different things to a Book. Fancy +books sell from fashion, not from the number of their real likers. Do +not come at so long intervals. Here we are sure to be. + + +[S. and H. I do not identify--perhaps Southey and Hunt. Hunt's need of +guineas was chronic. The reference to Gary is not very clear. Lamb seems +to suggest that he is giving Gary a copy of a book that Gary will not +read, but will preserve. + +"Nothing with my name." Moxon may perhaps have just suggested publishing +a second series of _Elia_.] + + + +LETTER 540 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOSEPH HUME'S DAUGHTERS + +[No date. 1832.] + +Many thanks for the wrap-rascal, but how delicate the insinuating in, +into the pocket, of that 3-1/2d., in paper too! Who was it? Amelia, +Caroline, Julia, Augusta, or "Scots who have"? + +As a set-off to the very handsome present, which I shall lay out in a +pot of ale certainly to _her_ health, I have paid sixpence for the mend +of two button-holes of the coat now return'd. She shall not have to say, +"I don't care a button for her." + +Adieu, tres aimables! + + Buttons 6d. + Gift 3-1/2 + + Due from ---- 2-1/2 + +which pray accept ... from your foolish coatforgetting + +C.L. + + +[Joseph Hume we have met. Mr. Hazlitt writes: "Amelia Hume became Mrs. +Bennett, Julia Mrs. Todhunter. The latter personally informed me in 1888 +that her Aunt Augusta perfectly recollected all the circumstances [of +the present note]. The incident seems to have taken place at the +residence of Mr. Hume, in Percy Street, Bloomsbury, and it was Amelia +who found the three-pence-halfpenny in the coat which Lamb left behind +him, and who repaired the button-holes. The sister who is described as +'Scots wha ha'e' was Louisa Hume; it was a favourite song with her." +Mrs. Todhunter supplied the date, 1832.] + + + +LETTER 541 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[P.M. March 5, 1832.] + +D'r Sir, My friend Aders, a German merchant, German born, has opend to +the public at the Suffolk St. Gallery his glorious Collection of old +Dutch and German Pictures. Pray see them. You have only to name my name, +and have a ticket--if you have not received one already. You will +possibly notice 'em, and might lug in the inclosed, which I wrote for +Hone's Year Book, and has appear'd only there, when the Pictures were at +home in Euston Sq. The fault of this matchless set of pictures is, _the +admitting a few Italian pictures with 'em_, which I would turn out to +make the Collection unique and pure. Those old Albert Durers have not +had their fame. I have tried to illustrate 'em. If you print my verses, +a Copy, please, for me. + + +[The first letter to Charles Wentworth Dilke (1789-1864), a friend of +Keats, Hunt and Hood, editor of Dodsley and at this time editor of _The +Athenaeum_. Lamb's verses ran thus:-- + + TO C. ADERS, ESQ. + +_On his Collection of Paintings by the old German Masters_ + + Friendliest of men, Aders, I never come + Within the precincts of this sacred Room, + But I am struck with a religious fear, + Which says "Let no profane eye enter here." + With imagery from Heav'n the walls are clothed, + Making the things of Time seem vile and loathed. + Spare Saints, whose bodies seem sustain'd by Love + With Martyrs old in meek procession move. + Here kneels a weeping Magdalen, less bright + To human sense for her blurr'd cheeks; in sight + Of eyes, new-touch'd by Heaven, more winning fair + Than when her beauty was her only care. + A Hermit here strange mysteries doth unlock + In desart sole, his knees worn by the rock. + There Angel harps are sounding, while below + Palm-bearing Virgins in white order go. + Madonnas, varied with so chaste design. + While all are different, each seems genuine, + And hers the only Jesus: hard outline, + And rigid form, by Duerer's hand subdued + To matchless grace, and sacro-sanctitude; + Duerer, who makes thy slighted Germany + Vie with the praise of paint-proud Italy. + + Whoever enter'st here, no more presume + To name a Parlour, or a Drawing Room; + But, bending lowly to each, holy Story, + Make this thy Chapel, and thine Oratory.] + + + +LETTER 542 + +CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE + +April 14th, 1832. + +My dear Coleridge,--Not an unkind thought has passed in my brain about +you. But I have been wofully neglectful of you, so that I do not deserve +to announce to you, that if I do not hear from you before then, I will +set out on Wednesday morning to take you by the hand. I would do it this +moment, but an unexpected visit might flurry you. I shall take silence +for acquiescence, and come. I am glad you could write so long a letter. +Old loves to, and hope of kind looks from, the Gilmans, when I come. + +Yours _semper idem_ C.L. + +If you ever thought an offence, much more wrote it, against me, it must +have been in the times of Noah; and the great waters swept it away. +Mary's most kind love, and maybe a wrong prophet of your bodings!--here +she is crying for mere love over your letter. I wring out less, but not +sincerer, showers. + +My direction is simply, Enfield. + + +[Mr. Dykes Campbell's comment upon this note is that it was written to +remove some mistaken sick-man's fancy.] + + + +LETTER 543 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES SHERIDAN KNOWLES + +[No date. ? April, 1832.] + +Dear Kn.--I will not see London again without seeing your pleasant Play. +In meanwhile, pray, send three or four orders to a Lady who can't afford +to pay: Miss James, No. 1 Grove Road, Lisson Grove, Paddington, a day or +two before--and come and see us some _Evening_ with my hitherto +uncorrupted and honest bookseller + +Moxon. C. LAMB. + + +[I have dated this April, 1832, because it may refer to Knowles' play +"The Hunchback," produced April 5, 1832. It might also possibly refer to +"The Wife" of a year later, but I think not.] + + + +LETTER 544 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[? Late April, 1832.] + + One day in my life + Do come. C.L. + +I have placed poor Mary at Edmonton-- + +I shall be very glad to see the Hunch Back and Straitback the 1st Even'g +they can come. I am very poorly indeed. I have been cruelly thrown out. +Come and don't let me drink too much. I drank more yesterday than I ever +did any one day in my life. + +C.L. + +Do come. + +Cannot your Sister come and take a half bed--or a whole one? Which, +alas, we have to spare. + + +[Mary Lamb would have been taken to Walden House, Edmonton, where mental +patients were received. A year later the Lambs moved there altogether. + +The Hunchback would be Knowles; the Straitback I do not recognise. + +John Forster (1812-1876), whom we now meet for the first time, one of +Lamb's last new friends, was the author, later, of _Lives of the +Statesmen of the Commonwealth_ and the Lives also of Goldsmith and of +Landor and Dickens, whose close friend he was. His _Life of Pym_, which +was in Vol. II. of the _Statesman_, did not appear until 1837, but I +assume that he had ridden the hobby for some years.] + + + +LETTER 545 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON (?) + +[P.M. June 1, 1832.] + + I am a little more than half alive-- + I was more than half dead-- + the Ladies are very agreeable-- + I flatter myself I am less than disagreeable-- + Convey this to Mr. Forster-- + Whom, with you, I shall just be able to see some 10 days + hence and believe me ever yours C.L. + + I take Forster's name to be John, + But you know whom I mean, + the Pym-praiser + not pimp-raiser. + + +[This letter possibly is not to Moxon at all, as the wrapper (on which +is the postmark) may belong to another letter.] + + + +LETTER 546 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP + +July 2, 1832. + +AT midsummer or soon after (I will let you know the previous day), I +will take a day with you in the purlieus of my old haunts. No offence +has been taken, any more than meant. My house is full at present, but +empty of its chief pride. She is dead to me for many months. But when I +see you, then I will say, Come and see me. With undiminished friendship +to you both, + +Your faithful but queer C.L. + +How you frighted me! Never write again, "Coleridge is dead," at the end +of a line, and tamely come in with "to his friends" at the beginning of +another. Love is quicker, and fear from love, than the transition ocular +from Line to Line. + + + +LETTER 547 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON + +[Dated at end: Aug., 1832.] + +My dear Wilson, I cannot let my old friend Mrs. Hazlitt (Sister in Law +to poor Wm. Hazlitt) leave Enfield, without endeavouring to introduce +her to you, and to Mrs. Wilson. Her daughter has a School in your +neighbourhood, and for her talents and by [for] her merits I can +_answer_. If it lies in your power to be useful to them in any way, the +obligation to your old office-fellow will be great. I have not forgotten +Mrs. Wilson's Album, and if you, or she, will be the means of procuring +but one pupil for Miss Hazlitt, I will rub up my poor poetic faculty to +the best. But you and she will one day, I hope, bring the Album with you +to Enfield-- Poor Mary is ill, or would send her love-- + +Yours very Truly + +C. LAMB. + +News.--Collet is dead, Du Puy is dead. I am _not_.--Hone! is turned +Believer in Irving and his unknown Tongues. + +In the name of dear Defoe which alone might be a Bond of Union between +us, Adieu! + + +[Mrs. Hazlitt was the wife of John Hazlitt, the miniature painter, who +died in 1837. I have been unable to trace her daughter's history. + +Collet I do not recognise. Probably an old fellow-clerk at the India +House, as was Du Puy. It is true that Hone was converted by Irving, and +became himself a preacher.] + + + +LETTER 548 + +CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON + +[No date. ? Early October, 1832.] + +For Lander's kindness I have just esteem. I shall tip him a Letter, when +you tell me how to address him. + +Give Emma's kindest regrets that I could not entice her good friend, +your Nephew, here. + +Her warmest love to the Bury Robinsons--our all three to + +H. Crab. C.L. + + +[Mr. Macdonald's transcript adds: "Accompanying copy of Lander's verses +to Emma Isola, and others, contributed to Miss Wordsworth's Album, and +poem written at Wast-water. C.L." + +The Bury Robinsons were Crabb Robinson's brother and other relatives, +whom Miss Isola had met when at Fornham.] + + + +LETTER 549 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR + +[No date. October, 1832.] + +Dear Sir, pray accept a little volume. 'Tis a legacy from Elia, you'll +see. Silver and Gold had he none, but such as he had, left he you. I do +not know how to thank you for attending to my request about the Album. I +thought you would never remember it. Are not you proud and thankful, +Emma? + +Yes, _very, both_-- EMMA ISOLA. + +Many things I had to say to you, which there was not time for. _One_ why +should I forget? 'tis for Rose Aylmer, which has a charm I cannot +explain. I lived upon it for weeks.-- + +Next I forgot to tell you I knew all your Welch annoyancers, the +measureless Beethams. I knew a quarter of a mile of them. 17 brothers +and 16 sisters, as they appear to me in memory. There was one of them +that used to fix his long legs on my fender, and tell a story of a +shark, every night, endless, immortal. How have I grudged the salt sea +ravener not having had his gorge of him! + +The shortest of the daughters measured 5 foot eleven without her shoes. +Well, some day we may confer about them. But they were tall. Surely I +have discover'd the longitude-- + +Sir, If you can spare a moment, I should be happy to hear from you--that +rogue Robinson detained your verses, till I call'd for them. Don't +entrust a bit of prose to the rogue, but believe me + +Your obliged C.L. + +My Sister sends her kind regards. + + +[Crabb Robinson took Landor to see Lamb on September 28, 1832. The +following passage in Forster's _Life of Landor_ describes the visit and +explains this letter:-- + +The hour he passed with Lamb was one of unalloyed enjoyment. A letter +from Crabb Robinson before he came over had filled him with affection +for that most lovable of men, who had not an infirmity to which his +sweetness of nature did not give something of kinship to a virtue. "I +have just seen Charles and Mary Lamb," Crabb Robinson had written (20th +October, 1831), "living in absolute solitude at Enfield. I find your +poems lying open before Lamb. Both tipsy and sober he is ever muttering +_Rose Aylmer_. But it is not those lines only that have a curious +fascination for him. He is always turning to _Gebir_ for things that +haunt him in the same way." Their first and last hour was now passed +together, and before they parted they were old friends. I visited Lamb +myself (with Barry Cornwall) the following month, and remember the +boyish delight with which he read to us the verses which Landor has +written in the album of Emma Isola. He had just received them through +Robinson, and had lost little time in making rich return by sending +Landor his Last Essays of Elia. + +These were Landor's verses:-- + + TO EMMA ISOLA + + Etrurian domes, Pelasgian walls, + Live fountains, with their nymphs around + Terraced and citron-scented halls, + Skies smiling upon sacred ground-- + + The giant Alps, averse to France, + Point with impatient pride to those, + Calling the Briton to advance, + Amid eternal rocks and snows-- + + I dare not bid him stay behind, + I dare not tell him where to see + The fairest form, the purest mind, + Ausonia! that e'er sprang from thee, + +and this is "Rose Aylmer";-- + + Ah what avails the sceptred race! + Ah what the form divine! + What every virtue, every grace! + Rose Aylmer, all were thine. + Rose Aylmer, whom these wakeful eyes + May weep, but never see, + A night of memories and of sighs + I consecrate to thee. + +Of the measureless Bethams Lamb wrote in similar terms, but more fully, +in an article in the _New Times_ in 1825, entitled "Many Friends" (see +Vol. I.). + +On April 9, 1834, Landor wrote to Lady Blessington:-- + +I do not think that you ever knew Charles Lamb, who is lately dead. +Robinson took me to see him. + + "Once, and once only, have I seen thy face, + Elia! once only has thy tripping tongue + Run o'er my heart, yet never has been left + Impression on it stronger or more sweet. + Cordial old man! what youth was in thy years, + What wisdom in thy levity, what soul + In every utterance of thy purest breast! + Of all that ever wore man's form,'tis thee + I first would spring to at the gate of Heaven." + +I say _tripping_ tongue, for Charles Lamb stammered and spoke hurriedly. +He did not think it worth while to put on a fine new coat to come down +and see me in, as poor Coleridge did, but met me as if I had been a +friend of twenty years' standing; indeed, he told me I had been so, and +shewed me some things I had written much longer ago, and had utterly +forgotten. The world will never see again two such delightful volumes as +"The Essays of Elia;" no man living is capable of writing the worst +twenty pages of them. The Continent has Zadig and Gil Bias, we have Elia +and Sir Roger de Coverly. + +Mrs. Fields, writing in the _Atlantic Monthly_ for April, 1866, on +Landor, says that Landor told her of his visit to Lamb and said that +Lamb read to him some poetry and asked his opinion of it. Landor said it +was very good, whereupon Lamb laughed and called Landor the vainest of +men, for it was his own. + +In a letter to Southey the lines differed, ending thus: + + Few are the spirits of the glorified + I'd spring to earlier at the gate of Heaven.] + + + +LETTER 550 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[Late 1832.] + +A poor mad usher (and schoolfellow of mine) has been pestering me +_through you_ with poetry and petitions. I have desired him to call upon +you for a half sovereign, which place to my account. + +I have buried Mrs. Reynolds at last, who has _virtually at least_ +bequeath'd me a legacy of L32 per Ann., to which add that my other +pensioner is safe housed in the workhouse, which gets me L10. + +Richer by both legacies L42 per Ann. + +For a loss of a loss is as good as a gain of a gain. + +But let this be _between ourselves_, specially keep it from A----- or I +shall speedily have candidates for the Pensions. + +Mary is laid up with a cold. + +Will you convey the inclosed by hand? + +When you come, if you ever do, bring me one _Devil's Visit_, I mean +_Southey's_; also the Hogarth which is complete, Noble's I think. Six +more letters to do. Bring my bill also. C.L. + +[I do not identify the usher. Mrs. Reynolds, Lamb's first +schoolmistress, we have met. The other pensioner I do not positively +identify; presumably it was Morgan, Coleridge's old friend, to whom Lamb +and Southey had each given ten pounds annually from 1819. + +A----- I cannot positively identify. Perhaps the philanthropic Allsop. + +Southey's "Devil's Visit" was a new edition of _The Devil's Walk_ +illustrated by Thomas Landseer. + +Noble's "Hogarth." Noble was the engraver.] + + + +LETTER 551 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Winter, 1832.] + +Thank you for the books. I am ashamed to take tythe thus of your press. +I am worse to a publisher than the two Universities and the Brit. Mus. +A[llan] C[unningham] I will forthwith read. B[arry] C[ornwall] (I can't +get out of the A, B, C) I have more than read. Taken altogether, 'tis +too Lovey; but what delicacies! I like most "King Death;" glorious 'bove +all, "The Lady with the Hundred Rings;" "The Owl;" "Epistle to What's +his Name" (here may be I'm partial); "Sit down, Sad Soul;" "The Pauper's +Jubilee" (but that's old, and yet 'tis never old); "The Falcon;" +"Felon's Wife;" damn "Madame Pasty" (but that is borrowed); + + Apple-pie is very good, + And so is apple-pasty; + But-- + O Lard! 'tis very nasty: + +but chiefly the dramatic fragments,--scarce three of which should have +escaped my Specimens, had an antique name been prefixed. They exceed his +first. So much for the nonsense of poetry; now to the serious business +of life. Up a court (Blandford Court) in Pall Mall (exactly at the back +of Marlbro' House), with iron gate in front, and containing two houses, +at No. 2 did lately live Leishman my taylor. He is moved somewhere in +the neighbourhood, devil knows where. Pray find him out, and give him +the opposite. I am so much better, tho' my hand shakes in writing it, +that, after next Sunday, I can well see F[orster] and you. Can you throw +B.C. in? Why tarry the wheels of my Hogarth? + +CHARLES LAMB. + + +["I am worse to a publisher." There is a rule by which a publisher must +present copies of every book to the Stationers' Hall, to be distributed +to the British Museum, the Bodleian, and Cambridge University Library. + +"A.C.... B.C." Allan Cunningham's _Maid of Elvar_ and Barry Cornwall's +_English Songs_, both published by Moxon. This is Barry Cornwall's "King +Death":-- + + KING DEATH + + King Death was a rare old fellow! + He sate where no sun could shine; + And he lifted his hand so yellow, + And poured out his coal-black wine. + _Hurrah! for the coal-black Wine!_ + + There came to him many a Maiden, + Whose eyes had forgot to shine; + And Widows, with grief o'erladen, + For a draught of his sleepy wine. + _Hurrah! for the coal-black Wine!_ + + The Scholar left all his learning; + The Poet his fancied woes; + And the Beauty her bloom returning, + Like life to the fading rose. + _Hurrah! for the coal-black Wine!_ + + All came to the royal old fellow, + Who laugh'd till his eyes dropped brine, + As he gave them his hand so yellow, + And pledged them in Death's black wine. + _Hurrah!--Hurrah!_ + _Hurrah! for the coal-black Wine!_ + +By the "Epistle to What's his Name" Lamb refers to some lines to himself +which had been printed first in the _London Magazine_ in 1825, entitled +"The Epistle to Charles Lamb." See in the Appendix. + +"Madame Pasty." Procter had some lines on Madame Pasta. + +"My Specimens." Lamb's _Dramatic Specimens_, which very likely suggested +to Procter the idea of "Dramatic Fragments." + +Under the date November 30, 1832, an unsigned letter endorsed "From +Charles Lamb to Professor Wilson" is printed in Mrs. Gordon's +_"Christopher North:" A Memoir of John Wilson_. Although in its first +paragraph it might be Lamb's, there is evidence to the contrary in the +remainder, and I have no doubt that the endorsement was a mistake. It is +therefore not printed here.] + + + +LETTER 552 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[Dated by Forster at end: Dec., 1832.] + +This is my notion. Wait till you are able to throw away a round sum (say +L1500) upon a speculation, and then --don't do it. For all your loving +encouragem'ts--till this final damp came in the shape of your letter, +thanks--for Books also--greet the Fosters and Proctors--and come singly +or conjunctively as soon as you can. Johnson and Fare's sheets have been +wash'd--unless you prefer Danby's _last_ bed--at the Horseshoe. + + +[I assume Lamb's advice to refer to Moxon's intention of founding a +paper called _The Reflector_, which Forster was to edit. All trace of +this periodical has vanished, but it existed in December, 1832, for +three numbers, and was then withdrawn. Lamb contributed to it. + +Johnson and Fare had just murdered--on December l9--a Mr. Danby, at +Enfield. They had met him in the Crown and Horseshoes (see note to next +Letter). + +Mr. W.C. Hazlitt prints a note to Moxon in his Bohn edition in which +Lamb advises the withdrawal of _The Reflector_ at once. This would be +December, 1832.] + + + +LETTER 553 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +To Messrs. Bradbury & Evans, 14 Bouverie Street, Fleet Street. For the +Editor of the Reflector from C. Lamb. + +[P.M. Dec. 23, 1832.] + +I am very sorry the poor Reflector is abortive. Twas a child of good +promise for its _weeks_. But if the chances are so much against it, +withdraw immediately. It is idle up hill waste of money to spend another +stamp on it. + + +[Around the seal of this note are the words in Lamb's hand: "Obiit +Edwardus Reflector Armiger, 31 Dec., 1832. Natus tres hebdomidas. Pax +animae ejus." + +The newspaper stamp at that time was fourpence (less 25 per cent.). + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Louisa Badams (_nee_ Holcroft), +dated December 31, 1832, not available for this edition, in which, after +some plain speaking about the Westwoods, Lamb refers to the murder of +Mr. Danby at Enfield by Fare and two other men on the night of December +19, and says that he had been in their company at the inn a little +before, and the next morning was asked to give his evidence. Canon +Ainger says that Lamb's story is a hoax, but it reads reasonably enough +and might as easily have happened as not.] + + + +LETTER 554 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Jan., 1833.] + +I have a proof from Dilke. _That_ serves for next Saturday. What Forster +had, will serve a second. I sent you a _third_ concluding article for +_him_ and _us_ (a capital hit, I think, about Cervantes) of which I +leave you to judge whether we shall not want it to print _before_ a +third or even second week. In that case beg D. to clap them in all at +once; and keep the Atheneums to print from. What I send is the +concluding Article of the painters. + +Soften down the Title in the Book to + +"Defect of the Imaginative Faculty in Artists." + +Consult Dilke. + + +[Lamb's _Elia_ essay "Barrenness of the Imaginative Faculty in the +Production of Modern Art," intended originally for _The Englishman's +Magazine_, was partly printed by Forster in _The Reflector_ and finally +printed in full in _The Athenaeum_ in January and February, 1833. The +reference to Don Quixote is at the end. Moxon was already printing the +_Last Essays of Elia_. + +"Consult Dilke" was a favourite phrase with Lamb and Hood and, long +before, with Keats.] + + + +LETTER 555 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Jan. 3(1833).] + +Be sure and let me have the Atheneum--or, if they don't appear, the Copy +back again. I have no other. + +I am glad you are introduced to Rickman, _cultivate the introduction_. I +will not forget to write to him. + +I want to see Blackwood, but _not without you_. + +We are yet Emma-less. + +And so that is all I can remember. + +This is a corkscrew. + +[_Here is a florid corkscrew._] + + C. Lamb, born 1775 + flourished about + the year 1832. + + C.L. Fecit.-- + + +[Lamb refers still to the "Barrenness of Imagination" series. + +There are several scraps addressed by Lamb to Forster in the South +Kensington Museum; but they are undated and of little importance. I +append one or two here:--] + + + +LETTER 556 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date.] + +Orders. + +Go to Dilke's, or Let Mockson, and ax him to add this to what I sent him +a few days since, or to continue it the week after. The Plantas &c. are +capital. + +Requests. + +Come down with M. and _Dante_ and L.E.L. on Sunday. + +ELIA. + +I don't mean at his House, but the Atheneum office. Send it there. Hand +shakes. + + +[The Plantas would probably be a reference to the family of Joseph +Plantas of the British Museum. M. and Dante and L.E.L. would be Moxon, +Cary and Letitia Landon, the poetess, to whom Forster was for a while +engaged. + +This letter, up to a certain point, was repeated as follows. It also is +at South Kensington:--] + + + +LETTER 557 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date.] + +I wish youd go to Dilke's, or let Mockson, and ax him to add this to +what I sent him a few days since, or to continue it the week after. The +Plantas &c. are capital. Come down with Procter and Dante on Sunday. I +send you the last proof--not of my friendship. I knew you would like the +title. I do thoroughly. The Last Essays of Elia keeps out any notion of +its being a second volume. + + + +LETTER 558 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date.] + +There was a talk of Richmond on Sunday but we were hampered with an +unavoidable engagement that day, besides that I wish to show it you when +the woods are in full leaf. Can you have a quiet evening here to night +or tomorrow night? We are certainly at home. + +Yours C. LAMB. + +Friday. + + + +LETTER 559 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Jan. 24, 1833.] + +Dear Murray! _Moxon_ I mean.--I am not to be making you pay postage +every day, but cannot let pass the congratulations of sister, brother, +and "Silk Cloak," _all most cordial_ on your change of place. Rogers +approving, who can demur? Tell me when you get into Dover St. and what +the _No_. is--that I may change foolscap for gilt, and plain Mr. for +Esqr. I shall _Mister_ you while you stay-- + +If you are not too great to attend to it, I wish us to do without the +Sonnets of Sydney: 12 will take up as many pages, and be too palpable a +fill up. Perhaps we may leave them out, retaining the article, but that +is not worth saving. I hope you liked my Cervantes Article which I sent +you yesterday. + +Not an inapt quotation, for your fallen predecessor in Albemarle Street, +to whom you must give the _coup du main_-- + + Murray, long enough his country's pride. + +_Pope._ + + +[_Then, written at the bottom of the page_] there's [_and written on the +next page_] there's nothing over here. + + +[Moxon was moving from 64 New Bond Street to 33 Dover Street. + +"Silk Cloak" would, I imagine, probably be a name for Emma Isola. + +"The Sonnets of Sydney"--Lamb's _Elia_ essay on this subject. It was not +omitted from the _Last Essay_, which Moxon was to publish, and eleven +sonnets were quoted. + +"Your fallen predecessor." It is hardly needful to say that Moxon made +very little difference to Murray's business. The line is from Pope's +Sixth Epistle of the First Book of Horace. To Mr. Murray, who afterwards +was Earl of Mansfield.] + + + +LETTER 560 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[Feb. 10. P.M. Feby. 11, 1833.] + +I wish you would omit "by the author of Elia," _now_, in advertising +that damn'd "Devil's Wedding." + +I had sneaking hopes you would have dropt in today--tis my poor +birthday. Don't stay away so. Give Forster a hint--you are to bring your +brother some day--_sisters_ in better weather. + +Pray give me one line to say if you receiv'd and forwarded Emma's +pacquet to Miss Adams, + +and how Dover St. looks. + +Adieu. + +Is there no Blackwood this month? + +[_Added on cover_:--] + +What separation will there be between the friend's preface, and THE +ESSAYS? Should not "Last Essays &c." head them? If 'tis too late, don't +mind. I don't care a farthing about it. + + +["What separation"--the _Last Essays of Elia_ were preceded by "A +Character of the Late Elia." + +Here should come a letter from Lamb to Louisa Badams, dated February 15, +1833. Lamb begins with a further reference to the Enfield murder. He +says that his sister and himself have got through the _Inferno_ with the +help of Cary, and Mary is beginning Tasso.] + + + +LETTER 561 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Feb., 1833.] + +My dear M.--I send you the last proof--not of my friendship-- pray see +to the finish. + +I think you will see the necessity of adding those words after +"Preface"--and "Preface" should be in the "contents-table"-- + +I take for granted you approve the title. I do thoroughly-- Perhaps if +you advertise it in full, as it now stands, the title page might have +simply the Last Essays of Elia, to keep out any notion of its being a +second vol.-- + +Well, I wish us luck heartily for your sake who have smarted by me.-- + + + +LETTER 562 + +CHARLES LAMB TO T.N. TALFOURD + +February, 1833. + +My dear T.,--Now cannot I call him _Serjeant_; what is there in a coif? +Those canvas-sleeves protective from ink, when he was a law-chit--a +_Chitty_ling, (let the leathern apron be apocryphal) do more 'specially +plead to the Jury Court of old memory. The costume (will he agnize it?) +was as of a desk-fellow or Socius Plutei. Methought I spied a brother! + +That familiarity is extinct for ever. Curse me if I can call him Mr. +Serjeant--except, mark me, in _company_. Honour where honour is due; but +should he ever visit us, (do you think he ever will, Mary?) what a +distinction should I keep up between him and our less fortunate friend, +H.C.R.! Decent respect shall always be the Crabb's--but, somehow, short +of reverence. + +Well, of my old friends, I have lived to see two knighted: one made a +judge, another in a fair way to it. Why am I restive? why stands my sun +upon Gibeah? + +Variously, my dear Mrs. Talfourd, (I can be more familiar with her!) +_Mrs. Serjeant Talfourd_,--my sister prompts me--(these ladies stand +upon ceremonies)--has the congratulable news affected the members of our +small community. Mary comprehended it at once, and entered into it +heartily. Mrs. W---- was, as usual, perverse--wouldn't, or couldn't, +understand it. A Serjeant? She thought Mr. T. was in the law. Didn't +know that he ever 'listed. + +Emma alone truly sympathised. _She_ had a silk gown come home that very +day, and has precedence before her learned sisters accordingly. + +We are going to drink the health of Mr. and Mrs. Serjeant, with all the +young serjeantry--and that is all that I can see that I shall get by the +promotion. + +Valete, et mementote amici quondam vestri humillimi. + +C.L. + + +[Talfourd, who had been pupil of Joseph Chitty, had just become a +serjeant. + +"H.C.R."--Crabb Robinson. + +"My old friends." Stoddart and Tuthill were knighted; Barron Field was a +judge; Talfourd was to become both a knight and a judge. + +"Mrs. W----." Mrs. Westwood, I suppose.] + + + +LETTER 563 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. 1833.] + +D'r M. let us see you & your Brother on Sunday--The Elias are +beautifully got up. Be cautious how you name the _probability_ of +bringing 'em ever out complete--till these are gone off. Everybody'd say +"O I'll wait then." + +An't we to have a copy of the Sonnets-- + +Mind, I shall _insist_ upon having no more copies: only I shall take 3 +or 4 more of you at trade price. I am resolute about this. Yours ever-- + + + +LETTER 564 + +CHARLES LAMB TO C.W. DILKE + +[P.M. Feb., 1833.] + + CHRISTIAN NAMES OF WOMEN + + (TO EDITH S-----) + + In Christian world MARY the garland wears! + REBECCA sweetens on a Hebrew's ear; + Quakers for pure PRISCILLA are more clear; + And the light Gaul by amorous NINON swears. + Among the lesser lights how LUCY shines! + What air of fragrance ROSAMUND throws round! + How like a hymn doth sweet CECILIA sound! + Of MARTHAS, and of ABIGAILS, few lines + Have bragg'd in verse. Of coarsest household stuff + Should homely JOAN be fashioned. But can + You BARBARA resist, or MARIAN? + And is not CLARE for love excuse enough? + Yet, by my faith in numbers, I profess, + These all, than Saxon EDITH, please me less. + +Many thanks for the life you have given us--I am perfectly satisfied. +But if you advert to it again, I give you a delicate hint. Barbara S---- +shadows under that name Miss Kelly's early life, and I had the Anecdote +beautifully from her. + + +[The sonnet, addressed to Edith Southey, was printed in _The Athenaeum_ +for March 9, 1833. + +For "Barbara S----" see Vol. II. of the present edition.] + + + +LETTER 565 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Early 1833.] + +No _writing_, and no _word_, ever passed between Taylor, or Hessey, and +me, respecting copy right. This I can swear. They made a volume at their +own will, and volunteerd me a third of profits, which came to L30, which +came to _Bilk_, and never came back to me. Proctor has acted a friendly +part--when did he otherwise? I am very sorry to hear Mrs. P---- _as I +suppose_ is not so well. I meditated a rallying epistle to him on his +Gemini--his two Sosias, accusing him of having acted a notable piece of +duplicity. But if his partner in the double dealing suffers--it would be +unseasonable. You cannot rememb'r me to him too kindly. Your chearful +letter has relieved us from the dumps; all may be well. I rejoice at +your letting your house so magnificently. Talfourd's letter may be +directed to him "On the Western Circuit."* That is the way, send it. +With Blackwood pray send Piozziana and a Literary Gazette if you have +one. The Piozzi and that shall be immed'tly return'd, and I keep Mad. +Darblay for you eventually, a longwinded reader at present having use of +it. + +The weather is so queer that I will not say I _expect_ you &c.--but am +prepared for the pleasure of seeing you when you can come. + +We had given you up (the post man being late) and Emma and I have 20 +times this morning been to the door in the rain to spy for him coming. + +Well, I know it is not all settled, but your letter is chearful and +cheer-making. + +We join in triple love to you. + +ELIA & Co. + +I am settled _in any case_ to take at Bookseller's price any copies I +have more. Therefore oblige me by sending a copy of Elia to Coleridge +and B. Barton, and enquire (at your leisure of course) how I can send +one, with a letter, to Walter Savage Landor. These 3 put in your next +bill on me. I am peremptory that it shall be so. These are all I can +want. + +*Is it the Western? he goes to Reading &c. + + +[John Taylor, representing the firm of Taylor & Hessey, seems to have +set up a claim of copyright in those essays in the _Last Essays of Elia_ +that were printed in the _London Magazine_. For Procter's part, see next +letter. + +_Piozziana; or, Recollections of the late Mrs. Piozzi_ (Johnson's Mrs. +Thrale), was published in 1833. It was by the Rev. E. Mangin. + +Mad. Darblay would be _The Memoirs of Dr. Burney_, 1832, by his daughter +Madame d'Arblay (Admiral Burney's niece). The book was severely handled +in the _Quarterly_ for April, 1833. + +The following letter, which is undated, seems to refer to the difficulty +mentioned above:--] + + + +LETTER 566 + +CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER + +Enfield, Monday. + +Dear P----, I have more than L30 in my house, and am independent of +quarter-day, not having received my pension. + +Pray settle, I beg of you, the matter with Mr. Taylor. I know nothing of +bills, but most gladly will I forward to you that sum for him, for Mary +is very anxious that M[oxon] may not get into any litigation. The money +is literally rotting in my desk for want of use. I should not interfere +with M----, tell M---- when you see him, but Mary is really uneasy; so +lay it to that account, not mine. + +Yours ever and two evers, + +C.L. + +Do it smack at once, and I will explain to M---- why I did it. It is +simply done to ease her mind. When you have settled, write, and I'll +send the bank notes to you twice, in halves. + +Deduct from it your share in broken bottles, which, you being capital in +your lists, I take to be two shillings. Do it as you love Mary and me. +Then Elia's himself again. + + + +LETTER 567 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE + +[March 6, 1833.] + +Dear Friend--Thee hast sent a Christian epistle to me, and I should not +feel clear if I neglected to reply to it, which would have been sooner +if that vain young man, to whom thou didst intrust it, had not kept it +back. We should rejoice to see thy outward man here, especially on a day +which should not be a first day, being liable to worldly callers in on +that day. Our little book is delayed by a heathenish injunction, +threatened by the man Taylor. Canst thou copy and send, or bring with +thee, a vanity in verse which in my younger days I wrote on friend +Aders' pictures? Thou wilt find it in the book called the Table Book. + +Tryphena and Tryphosa, whom the world calleth Mary and Emma, greet you +with me. + +CH. LAMB. + +6th of 3d month 4th day. + + +[On this letter is written by Hone in pencil: "This acknowledges a note +from me to C.L. written in January preceding and sent by young Will +Hazlitt. Received in my paralysis. March, 1833." + +On this day Lamb gave Hone two books with the same inscription in +each--very tipsily written.] + + + +LETTER 568 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. March 19, 1833.] + +I shall _expect_ Forster and two Moxons on Sunday, and _hope_ for +Procter. + +I am obliged to be in town next Monday. Could we contrive to make a +party (paying or not is immaterial) for Miss Kelly's that night, and can +you shelter us after the play, I mean Emma and me? I fear, I cannot +persuade Mary to join us. + +N.B. _I can sleep at a public house._ + +Send an Elia (mind, I _insist_ on buying it) to T. Manning Esq. at Sir +G. Tuthill's Cavendish Square. + +DO WRITE. + + +[Miss Kelly was then giving an entertainment called "Dramatic +Recollections" at the Strand Theatre.] + + + +LETTER 569 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? Spring, 1833.] + +One o Clock. + +This instant receiv'd, this instant I answer your's--Dr. Cresswell has +one copy, which I cannot just now re-demand, because at his desire I +have sent a "Satan" to him, which when he ask'd for, I frankly told him, +was imputed a lampoon on HIM!!! I have sent it him, and cannot, till we +come to explanation, go to him or send-- + +But on the faith of a Gentleman, you shall have it back some day _for +another_. The 3 I send. I think 2 of the blunders perfectly immaterial. +But your feelings, and I fear _pocket_, is every thing. I have just time +to pack this off by the 2 o Clock stage. Yours till me meet + +At all events I behave more gentlemanlike than Emma did, in returning +the copies. + +Yours till we meet--DO COME. + +Bring the Sonnets-- + +Why not publish 'em?--or let another Bookseller? + + +[Dr. Cresswell was vicar of Edmonton. Having married the daughter of a +tailor--or so Mr. Fuller Russell states in his account of a conversation +with Lamb in _Notes and Queries_--he was in danger of being ribaldly +associated with Satan's matrimonial adventures in Lamb's ballad. I +cannot explain to what book Lamb refers: possibly to the _Last Essays of +Elia_, which Moxon, having found errors in, wished to withdraw, +substituting another. The point probably cannot be cleared up. The +sonnets would be Moxon's own, which he had printed privately (see a +later letter).] + + + +LETTER 570 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. March 30, 1833.] + +D'r M. Emma and we are _delighted_ with the Sonnets, and she with her +nice Walton. Mary is deep in the novel. Come as early as you can. I +stupidly overlookd your proposal to meet you in Green Lanes, for in some +strange way I _burnt my leg_, shin-quarter, at Forster's;* it is laid up +on a stool, and Asbury attends. You'll see us all as usual, about +Taylor, when you come. + +Yours ever + +C.L. + +*Or the night I came home, for I felt it not bad till yesterday. But I +scarce can hobble across the room. + +I have secured 4 places for night: in haste. + +Mary and E. do not dream of any thing we have discussed. + + +[I fancy that the last sentence refers to an offer for Miss Isola's hand +which Moxon had just made to Lamb.] + + + +LETTER 571 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. Spring, 1833.] + +Dear M. many thanks for the Books; the _Faust_ I will acknowledge to the +Author. But most thanks for one immortal sentence, "If I do not _cheat_ +him, never _trust_ me again." I do not know whether to admire most, the +wit or justness of the sentiment. It has my cordial approbation. My +sense of meum and tuum applauds it. I maintain it, the eighth +commandment hath a secret special reservation, by which the reptile is +exempt from any protection from it; as a dog, or a nigger, he is not a +holder of property. Not a ninth of what he detains from the world is his +own. Keep your hands from picking and stealing is no ways referable to +his acquists. I doubt whether bearing false witness against thy neighbor +at all contemplated this possible scrub. Could Moses have seen the speck +in vision? An ex post facto law alone could relieve him, and we are +taught to expect no eleventh commandment. The out-law to the Mosaic +dispensation!--unworthy to have seen Moses' behind--to lay his +desecrating hands upon Elia! Has the irriverent ark-toucher been struck +blind I wonder--? The more I think of him, the less I think of him. His +meanness is invisible with aid of solar microscope, my moral eye smarts +at him. The less flea that bites little fleas! The great Beast! the +beggarly nit! + +More when we meet. + +Mind, you'll come, two of you--and couldn't you go off in the morning, +that we may have a daylong curse at him, if curses are not dis-hallowed +by descending so low? Amen. + +Maledicatur in extremis. + + +[Abraham Hayward's translation of Faust was published by Moxon in +February, 1833. Lamb's letter of thanks was said by the late Edmund +Yates to be a very odd one. I have not seen it. + +We may perhaps assume that Moxon's reply to Lamb's letter stating that +Taylor's claim had been paid contained the "immortal sentence." + +"Not a ninth." A tailor (Taylor) is only a ninth of a man. + +"The less flea." Remembering Swift's lines in "On Poetry, a Rhapsody":-- + + So, naturalists observe, a flea + Has smaller fleas that on him prey; + And these have smaller still to bite 'em, + And so proceed _ad infinitum_.] + + + +LETTER 572 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date. ? March, 1833.] + +Swallow your damn'd dinner and your brandy and water fast-- + +& come immediately + +I want to take Knowles in to Emma's only female friend for 5 minutes +only, and we are free for the even'g. + +I'll do a Prologue. + + +[The prologue was for Sheridan Knowles' play "The Wife." Lamb wrote both +prologue and epilogue (see Vol. IV.).] + + + +LETTER 573 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[No date. ? April 10, 1833.] + +Dear M. The first Oak sonnet, and the Nightingale, may show their faces +in any Annual unblushing. Some of the others are very good. + +The Sabbath too much what you have written before. + +You are destined to shine in Sonnets, I tell you. + +Shall we look for you Sunday, we did in vain Good Friday [April 5]. + +[_A signature was added by Mrs. Moxon for Mr. Frederick Locker-Lampson, +evidently from another letter_:--] + +Your truest friend + +C. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 574 + +CHARLES LAMB TO C.W. DILKE + +[No date. April, 1833.] + +D'r Sir, I read your note in a moment of great perturbation with my +Landlady and chuck'd it in the fire, as I should have done an epistle of +Paul, but as far as my Sister recalls the import of it, I reply. The +Sonnets (36 of them) have never been printed, much less published, till +the other day,* save that a few of 'em have come out in Annuals. Two +vols., of poetry of M.'s, have been publish'd, but they were not these. +The "Nightingale" has been in one of the those gewgaws, the Annuals; +whether the other I sent you has, or not, penitus ignoro. But for +heaven's sake do with 'em what you like. + +Yours + +C.L. + +*The proof sheets only were in my hand about a fortnight ago. + + +[Moxon's sonnets were reviewed, probably by Lamb, in _The Athenaeum_ for +April 13, 1833. The sonnet to the nightingale (see above) was quoted. +This review will be found in Vol. I. of the present edition.] + + + +LETTER 575 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON + +[P.M. April (16), 1833.] + +Dear Mrs. Ayrton, I do not know which to admire most, your kindness, or +your patience, in copying out that intolerable rabble of panegryc from +over the Atlantic. By the way, now your hand is in, I wish you would +copy out for me the l3th l7th and 24th of Barrow's sermons in folio, and +all of Tillotson's (folio also) except the first, which I have in +Manuscript, and which, you know, is Ayrton's favorite. Then--but I won't +trouble you any farther just now. Why does not A come and see me? Can't +he and Henry Crabbe concert it? 'Tis as easy as lying is to me. Mary's +kindest love to you both. + +ELIA. + + +[The letter is accompanied by a note in the writing of William Scrope +Ayrton, the son of William Ayrton, copied from Mrs. Ayrton's Diary:-- + +"March 17, 1833.--Copied a critique upon Elia's works from the Mirror of +America a sort of news paper."] + + + +LETTER 576 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. April 25, 1833.] + +My dear Moxon, We perfectly agree in your arrangement. _It has quite set +my sister's mind at rest._ She will come with you on Sunday, and return +at eve, and I will make comfortable arrangem'ts with the Buffams. We +desire to have you here dining unWestwooded, and I will try and get you +a bottle of choice port. I have transferr'd the stock I told you to +Emma. The plan of the Buffams steers admirably between two niceties. +Tell Emma we thoroughly approve it. As our damnd Times is a day after +the fair, I am setting off to Enfield Highway to see in a morning paper +(alas! the Publican's) how the play ran. Pray, bring 4 orders for Mr. +Asbury--undated. + +In haste (not for neglect) + +Yours ever + +C. LAMB. + +Thursday. + + +[Lamb evidently refers to Moxon's engagement to Miss Isola being now +settled. + +The play was Sheridan Knowles' "The Wife," produced on April 24. + +The Buffams were the landladies of the house in Southampton Buildings, +where Lamb lodged in town.] + + + +LETTER 577 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. April 27, 1833.] + +Dear M. Mary and I are very poorly. Asbury says tis nothing but +influenza. Mr. W. appears all but dying, he is delirious. Mrs. W. was +taken so last night, that Mary was obliged at midnight to knock up Mrs. +Waller to come and sit up with her. We have had a sick child, who +sleeping, or not sleeping, next me with a pasteboard partition between, +killed my sleep. The little bastard is gone. My bedfellows are Cough and +cramp, we sleep 3 in a bed. Domestic arrangem'ts (Blue Butcher and all) +devolve on Mary. Don't come yet to this house of pest and age. We +propose when E. and you agree on the time, to come up and meet her at +the Buffams', say a week hence, but do you make the appointm't. The +Lachlans send her their love. + +I do sadly want those 2 last Hogarths--and an't I to have the Play? + +Mind our spirits are good and we are happy in your happiness_es_. + +C.L. + +Our old and ever loves to dear Em. + + +["Mr. W." was Mr. Westwood.--I know nothing of the Lachlans.--The Play +would be "The Wife" probably.--Miss Isola was, I imagine, staying with +the Moxons.] + + + +LETTER 578 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THE REV. JAMES GILLMAN + +May 7, 1833. + +By a strange occurrence we have quitted Enfield for ever. Oh! the happy +eternity! Who is Vicar or Lecturer for that detestable place concerns us +not. But Asbury, surgeon and a good fellow, has offered to get you a +Mover and Seconder, and you may use my name freely to him. Except him +and Dr. Creswell, I have no respectable acquaintance in the dreary +village. At least my friends are all in the _public_ line, and it might +not suit to have it moved at a special vestry by John Gage at the Crown +and Horseshoe, licensed victualler, and seconded by Joseph Horner of the +Green Dragon, ditto, that the Rev. J.G. is a fit person to be Lecturer, +&c. + +My dear James, I wish you all success, but am too full of my own +emancipation almost to congratulate anyone else. With both our loves to +your father and mother and glorious S.T.C. + +Yours, + +C. LAMB. + + +[The Rev. James Gillman was the eldest son of Coleridge's physician and +friend. He was born in 1808 and ordained in 1831. He thought in 1833 of +standing as candidate for the vicarship of Enfield, but did not obtain +it. After acting as Under Master of Highgate Grammar School he became in +1836 Rector of Barfreystone, in Kent. In 1847 he became Vicar of Holy +Trinity, Lambeth. He died in 1877. + +Mary Lamb having become ill again had been moved to Edmonton, to a +private home for mental patients. Lamb followed her soon after, and +settled in the same house. It still stands (1912) almost exactly as in +the Lambs' day.] + + + +LETTER 579 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[No date. May, 1833.] + +D'r F. Can you oblige me by sending 4 Box orders undated for the Olympic +Theatre? I suppose Knowles can get 'em. It is for the Waldens, with whom +I live. The sooner, the better, that they may not miss the "Wife"--I +meet you at the Talfourds' Saturday week, and if they can't, perhaps you +can, give me a bed. + +Yours ratherish unwell + +C. LAMB. + +Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton. + +Or write immediately to say if you can't get em. + + +[Knowles' play "The Wife," produced at Covent Garden, was moved to the +Olympic on May 9.] + + + +LETTER 580 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[P.M. May 12, 1833.] + +Dear Boy, I send you the original Elias, complete. When I am a little +composed, I shall hope to see you and Proctor here; may be, may see you +first in London. + +C.L. + + +[In the Dyce and Forster collection, at South Kensington, are preserved +some of these MSS. + +Here should come a letter to Miss Rickman, dated May 23, 1833. "Perhaps, +as Miss Kelly is just now in notoriety, it may amuse you to know that +'Barbara S.' is _all_ of it true of _her_, being all communicated to +me +from her own mouth. The 'wedding' you of course found out to be Sally +Burney's."] + + + +LETTER 581 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +End of May nearly, [1833]. + +Dear Wordsworth, Your letter, save in what respects your dear Sister's +health, chear'd me in my new solitude. Mary is ill again. Her illnesses +encroach yearly. The last was three months, followed by two of +depression most dreadful. I look back upon her earlier attacks with +longing. Nice little durations of six weeks or so, followed by complete +restoration--shocking as they were to me then. In short, half her life +she is dead to me, and the other half is made anxious with fears and +lookings forward to the next shock. With such prospects, it seem'd to me +necessary that she should no longer live with me, and be fluttered with +continual removals, so I am come to live with her, at a Mr. Walden's and +his wife, who take in patients, and have arranged to lodge and board us +only. They have had the care of her before. I see little of her; alas! I +too often hear her. Sunt lachrymae rerum--and you and I must bear it-- + +To lay a little more load on it, a circumstance has happen'd, _cujus +pars magna fui_, and which at another crisis I should have more rejoiced +in. I am about to lose my old and only walk-companion, whose mirthful +spirits were the "youth of our house," Emma Isola. I have her here now +for a little while, but she is too nervous properly to be under such a +roof, so she will make short visits, be no more an inmate. With my +perfect approval, and more than concurrence, she is to be wedded to +Moxon at the end of Aug'st. So "perish the roses and the flowers"--how +is it? + +Now to the brighter side, I am emancipated from most _hated_ and +_detestable_ people, the Westwoods. I am with attentive people, and +younger--I am 3 or 4 miles nearer the Great City, Coaches half-price +less, and going always, of which I will avail myself. I have few friends +left there, one or two tho' most beloved. But London Streets and faces +cheer me inexpressibly, tho' of the latter not one known one were +remaining. + +Thank you for your cordial reception of Elia. Inter nos the Ariadne is +not a darling with me, several incongruous things are in it, but in the +composition it served me as illustrative + +I want you in the popular fallacies to like the "Home that is no home" +and "rising with the lark." + +I am feeble, but chearful in this my genial hot weather,--walk'd 16 +miles yesterd'y. I can't read much in Summer time. With very kindest +love to all and prayers for dear Dorothy, + +I remain + +most attachedly yours + +C. LAMB. + +at mr. walden's, church street, _edmonton_, middlesex. + +Moxon has introduced Emma to Rogers, and he smiles upon the project. I +have given E. my MILTON--will you pardon me?--in part of a _portion_. It +hangs famously in his Murray-like shop. + +[_On the wrapper is written_:--] + +D'r M[oxon], inclose this in a better-looking paper, and get it frank'd, +and good by'e till Sund'y. Come early-- + +C.L. + + +["The Ariadne." See the essay on "Barrenness of the Imaginative +Faculty," where Titian's "Bacchus and Ariadne" in the National Gallery +is highly praised (see Vol. II.). Wordsworth's favourite essays in this +volume were "The Wedding" and "Old China." + +"My Milton." Against the reference to the portrait of Milton, in the +postscript, some one, possibly Wordsworth, has pencilled a note, now +only partially legible. It runs thus: "It had been proposed by L. that +W.W. should be the Possessor of [? this picture] his friend and that +afterwards it was to be bequeathed to Christ's Coll. Cambridge." + +Lamb had given Wordsworth in 1820 a copy of _Paradise Regained_, 1671, +with this inscription: "C. Lamb to the best Knower of Milton, and +therefore the worthiest occupant of this pleasant Edition. June 2'd +1820."] + + + +LETTER 582 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT + +[Dated at end:] Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton, May 31, 1833. + +Dear Mrs. Hazlitt,--I will assuredly come, and find you out, when I am +better. I am driven from house and home by Mary's illness. I took a +sudden resolution to take my sister to Edmonton, where she was under +medical treatment last time, and have arranged to board and lodge with +the people. Thank God, I have repudiated Enfield. I have got out of +hell, despair of heaven, and must sit down contented in a half-way +purgatory. Thus ends this strange eventful history-- + +But I am nearer town, and will get up to you somehow before long-- + +I repent not of my resolution. + +'Tis late, and my hand unsteady, so good b'ye till we meet. + +Your old + +C.L. + + + +LETTER 583 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MARY BETHAM + +June 5, 1833. + +Dear Mary Betham,--I remember You all, and tears come out when I think +on the years that have separated us. That dear Anne should so long have +remembered us affects me. My dear Mary, my poor sister is not, nor will +be for two months perhaps capable of appreciating the _kind old long +memory_ of dear Anne. + +But not a penny will I take, and I can answer for my Mary when she +recovers, if the sum left can contribute in any way to the comfort of +Matilda. + +We will halve it, or we will take a bit of it, as a token, rather than +wrong her. So pray consider it as an amicable arrangement. I write in +great haste, or you won't get it before you go. + +_We do not want the money_; but if dear Matilda does not much want it, +why, we will take our thirds. God bless you. + +C. LAMB. + + +[Miss Betham's sister, Anne, who had just died, had left thirty pounds +to Mary Lamb. Mr. Ernest Betham allows me to take this note from _A +House of Letters_.] + + + +LETTER 584 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MATILDA BETHAM + +[June 5, 1833.] + +Dear Miss Betham,--I sit down, very poorly, to write to you, being come +to _Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton_, to be altogether with poor +Mary, who is very ill, as usual, only that her illnesses are now as many +months as they used to be weeks in duration--the reason your letter only +just found me. I am saddened with the havoc death has made in your +family. I do not know how to appreciate the kind regard of dear Anne; +Mary will understand it two months hence, I hope; but neither she nor I +would rob you, if the legacy will be of use to, or comfort to you. My +hand shakes so I can hardly write. On Saturday week I must come to town, +and will call on you in the morning before one o'clock. Till when I take +kindest leave. + +Your old Friend, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Here should come a note from Lamb to Mrs. Randal Norris, postmarked +July 10, 1833, which encloses a note from Joseph Jekyll, the Old +Bencher, thanking Lamb for a presentation copy of the _Last Essays of +Elia_ ("I hope not the last Essays of Elia") and asking him to accompany +Mrs. Norris and her daughters on a visit to him. Jekyll adds that "poor +George Dyer, blind, but as usual chearful and content, often gives ... +good accounts of you." + +Here should come notes to Allsop, declining an invitation to Highgate, +and to a Mr. Tuff, warning him to be quick to use some theatre tickets +which Lamb had sent him.] + + + +LETTER 585 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. July 14, 1833.] + +Dear M. the Hogarths are _delicate_. Perhaps it will amuse Emma to tell +her, that, a day or two since, Miss Norris (Betsy) call'd to me on the +road from London from a gig conveying her to Widford, and engaged me to +come down this afternoon. I think I shall stay only one night; she would +have been glad of E's accompaniment, but I would not disturb her, and +Mrs. N. is coming to town on Monday, so it would not have suited. Also, +C.V. Le Grice gave me a dinner at Johnny Gilpin's yesterday, where we +talk'd of what old friends were taken or left in the 30 years since we +had met. + +I shall hope to see her on Tuesd'y. + +To Bless you both + +C.L. + +Friday. + + +[Le Grice we have met. "Johnny Gilpin's" was The Bell at Edmonton. + +Here should come another note from Lamb to Mrs. Randal Norris, in which +Lamb says that he reached home safely and thanks her for three agreeable +days. Also he sends some little books, which were, I take it, copies of +Moxon's private reissue of _Poetry for Children_. + +Mr. W.C. Hazlitt records that a letter from Lamb to Miss Norris was in +existence in which the writer gave "minute and humorous instructions for +his own funeral, even specifying the number of nails which he desired to +be inserted in his coffin."] + + + +LETTER 586 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. July 24, 1833.] + +For god's sake, give Emma no more watches. _One_ has turn'd her head. +She is arrogant, and insulting. She said something very unpleasant to +our old Clock in the passage, as if he did not keep time, and yet he had +made her no appointment. She takes it out every instant to look at the +moment-hand. She lugs us out into the fields, because there the +bird-boys ask you "Pray, Sir, can you tell us what's a Clock," and she +answers them punctually. She loses all her time looking "what the time +is." I overheard her whispering, "Just so many hours, minutes &c. to +Tuesday--I think St. George's goes too slow"--This little present of +Time, why, 'tis Eternity to her-- + +What can make her so fond of a gingerbread watch? + +She has spoil'd some of the movements. Between ourselves, she has kissed +away "half past 12," which I suppose to be the canonical hour in Hanover +Sq. + +Well, if "love me, love my watch," answers, she will keep time to you-- + +It goes right by the Horse Guards-- + +[_On the next page_:--] + +Emma hast kist this yellow wafer--a hint. + +DEAREST M. + +Never mind opposite nonsense. She does not love you for the watch, but +the watch for you. + +I will be at the wedding, and keep the 30 July as long as my poor months +last me, as a festival gloriously. + +Your _ever + +ELIA._ + +We have not heard from Cambridge. I will write the moment we do. + +Edmonton, 24th July, 3.20 post mer. minutes 4 instants by Emma's watch. + + +[There used to be preserved at Rowfant (it is now in America) a letter +from Lamb to Moxon, postmarked July 28, 1833, mentioning Lamb's anxiety +about Martin Burney. It is unnecessary to print this.] + + + +LETTER 587 + +CHARLES AND MARY LAMB TO EDWARD AND EMMA MOXON + +[No date. ? July 31, 1833.] + +Dear Mr. and Mrs. Moxon-- + +Time very short. I wrote to Miss Fryer, and had the sweetest letter +about you, Emma, that ever friendship dictated. "I am full of good +wishes, I am crying with good wishes," she says; but you shall see it.-- + +Dear Moxon, I take your writing most kindly and shall most kindly your +writing from Paris-- + +I want to crowd another letter to Miss Fry[er] into the little time +after dinner before Post time. + +So with 20000 congratulations, + +Yours, + +C.L. + +I am calm, sober, happy. Turn over for the reason. + +I got home from Dover St., by Evens, _half as sober as a judge_. I am +turning over a new leaf, as I hope you will now. + +[_On the next leaf Mary Lamb wrote_:--] + +MY DEAR EMMA AND EDWARD MOXON, + +Accept my sincere congratulations, and imagine more good wishes than my +weak nerves will let me put into good set words. The dreary blank of +_unanswered questions_ which I ventured to ask in vain was cleared up on +the wedding-day by Mrs. W. taking a glass of wine, and, with a total +change of countenance, begged leave to drink Mr. and Mrs. Moxon's +health. It restored me, from that moment: as if by an electrical stroke: +to the entire possession of my senses--I never felt so calm and quiet +after a similar illness as I do now. I feel as if all tears were wiped +from my eyes, and all care from my heart. + +MARY LAMB. + +[_At the foot of this letter Charles Lamb added_:--] + +Wednesday. + +DEARS AGAIN + +Your letter interrupted a seventh game at Picquet which _we_ were +having, after walking to _Wright's_ and purchasing shoes. We pass our +time in cards, walks, and reading. We attack Tasso soon. + +C.L. + +Never was such a calm, or such a recovery. 'Tis her own words, +undictated. + + +[The marriage of Edward Moxon and Emma Isola was celebrated on July 30. +They afterwards went to Paris. + +"Mrs. W."--Mrs. Walden, I imagine. + +Here should come an amusing but brief account of the wedding sent by +Lamb to Louisa Badams on August 20 (printed by Canon Ainger). "I am not +fit for weddings or burials. Both incite a chuckle:" a sentiment which +Lamb more than once expresses. + +Here should come a note thanking Matilda Betham for some bridal verses +written for the wedding of Edward Moxon and Emma Isola. "In haste and +headake."] + + + +LETTER 588 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +Sept. 9th, 1833. + +Dear Sir,--Your packet I have only just received, owing, I suppose, to +the absence of Moxon, who is flaunting it about _a la Parisienne_ with +his new bride, our Emma, much to his satisfaction and not a little to +our dulness. We shall be quite well by the time you return from +Worcestershire and most most (observe the repetition) glad to see you +here or anywhere. + +I will take my time with Darley's act. I wish poets would write a little +plainer; he begins some of his words with a letter which is unknown to +the English typography. + +Yours, most truly, + +C. LAMB. + +P.S.--Pray let me know when you return. We are at Mr. Walden's, +Church-street, Edmonton; no longer at Enfield. You will be amused to +hear that my sister and I have, with the aid of Emma, scrambled through +the "Inferno" by the blessed furtherance of your polar-star translation. +I think we scarce left anything unmadeout. But our partner has left us, +and we have not yet resumed. Mary's chief pride in it was that she +should some day brag of it to you. Your Dante and Sandys' Ovid are the +only helpmates of translations. Neither of you shirk a word. + +Fairfax's Tasso is no translation at all. It's better in some places; +but it merely observes the number of stanzas; as for images, similes, +&c., he finds 'em himself, and never "troubles Peter for the matter." + +In haste, dear Gary, yours ever, + +C. LAMB. + +Has Moxon sent you "Elia," second volume? if not, he shall. Taylor and +we are at law about it. + + +["Darley's act." Not now identifiable, I think. + +"Taylor and we." The case had apparently not been settled by Procter. I +have not found any report of a law-suit.] + + + +LETTER 589 + +CHARLES AND MARY LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Sept. 26, 1833.] + +Thursday. + +We shall be most happy to see Emma, dear to every body. Mary's spirits +are much better, and she longs to see again our twelve years' friend. +You shall afternoon sip with me a bottle of superexcellent Port, after +deducting a dinner-glass for them. We rejoyce to have E. come, the +_first Visit_, without Miss ----, who, I trust, will yet behave well; +but she might perplex Mary with questions. Pindar sadly wants Preface +and notes. Pray, E., get to Snow Hill before 12, for we dine before 2. +We will make it 2. By mistake I gave you Miss Betham's letter, with the +exquisite verses, which pray return to me, or if it be an improved copy, +give me the other, and Albumize mine, keeping the signature. It is too +pretty a family portrait, for you not to cherish. + +Your loving friends + +C. LAMB. + +M. LAMB. + + +[Pindar was Cary's edition, which Moxon had just published. Miss +Betham's verses I am sorry not to be able to give; but the following +poem was addressed to Moxon by Lamb and printed in _The Athenaeum_ for +December 7, 1833:-- + + TO A FRIEND ON HIS MARRIAGE + + What makes a happy wedlock? What has fate + Not given to thee in thy well-chosen mate? + Good sense--good humour;--these are trivial things, + Dear M-----, that each trite encomiast sings. + But she hath these, and more. A mind exempt + From every low-bred passion, where contempt, + Nor envy, nor detraction, ever found + A harbour yet; an understanding sound; + Just views of right and wrong; perception full + Of the deformed, and of the beautiful, + In life and manners; wit above her sex, + Which, as a gem, her sprightly converse decks; + Exuberant fancies, prodigal of mirth, + To gladden woodland walk, or winter hearth; + A noble nature, conqueror in the strife + Of conflict with a hard discouraging life, + Strengthening the veins of virtue, past the power + Of those whose days have been one silken hour, + Spoil'd fortune's pamper'd offspring; a keen sense + Alike of benefit, and of offence, + With reconcilement quick, that instant springs + From the charged heart with nimble angel wings; + While grateful feelings, like a signet sign'd + By a strong hand, seem burnt into her mind. + If these, dear friend, a dowry can confer + Richer than land, thou hast them all in her; + And beauty, which some hold the chiefest boon, + Is in thy bargain for a make-weight thrown.] + + + +LETTER 590 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Oct. 17, 1833.] + +Dear M.--Get me Shirley (there's a dear fellow) and send it soon. We +sadly want books, and this will be readable again and again, and pay +itself. Tell Emma I grieve for the poor self-punishing self-baffling +Lady; with all our hearts we grieve for the pain and vexation she has +encounterd; but we do not swerve a pin's-thought from the propriety of +your measures. God comfort her, and there's an end of a painful +necessity. But I am glad she goes to see her. Let her keep up all the +kindness she can between them. In a week or two I hope Mary will be +stout enough to come among ye, but she is not now, and I have scruples +of coming alone, as she has no pleasant friend to sit with her in my +absence. We are lonely. I fear the visits must be mostly from you. By +the way omnibuses are 1's/3'd and coach _insides_ sunk to l/6--a hint. +Without disturbance to yourselves, or upsetting the economy of the dear +new mistress of a family, come and see us as often as ever you can. We +are so out of the world, that a letter from either of you now and then, +detailing any thing, Book or Town news, is as good as a newspaper. I +have desperate colds, cramps, megrims &c., but do not despond. My +fingers are numb'd, as you see by my writing. Tell E. I am _very good_ +also. But we are poor devils, that's the truth of it. I won't apply to +Dilke-- just now at least--I sincerely hope the pastoral air of Dover +St. will recruit poor Harriet. With best loves to all. + +Yours ever + +C.L. + +Ryle and Lowe dined here on Sunday; the manners of the latter, so +gentlemanly! have attracted the special admiration of our Landlady. She +guest R. to be nearly of my age. He always had an old head on young +shoulders. I fear I shall always have the opposite. Tell me any thing of +Foster [Forster] or any body. Write any thing you think will amuse me. I +do dearly hope in a week or two to surprise you with our appearance in +Dover St.... + + +[Shirley would be Dyce's edition of James Shirley, the dramatist, in six +volumes, 1833. + +Harriet was Harriet Isola. + +"Ryle and Lowe." Ryle we have met, but I do not identify Lowe. + +I have omitted some lines about family matters at the end of the +letter.] + + + +LETTER 591 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD AND EMMA MOXON + +Nov. 29th, 1833. + +Mary is of opinion with me, that two of these Sonnets are of a higher +grade than any poetry you have done yet. The one to Emma is so pretty! I +have only allowed myself to transpose a word in the third line. Sacred +shall it be for any intermeddling of mine. But we jointly beg that you +will make four lines in the room of the four last. Read "Darby and +Joan," in Mrs. Moxon's first album. There you'll see how beautiful in +age the looking back to youthful years in an old couple is. But it is a +violence to the feelings to anticipate that time in youth. I hope you +and Emma will have many a quarrel and many a make-up (and she is +beautiful in reconciliation!) before the dark days shall come, in which +ye shall say "there is small comfort in them." You have begun a sort of +character of Emma in them very sweetly; carry it on, if you can, through +the last lines. + +I love the sonnet to my heart, and you _shall_ finish it, and I'll be +damn'd if I furnish a line towards it. So much for that. The next best +is + + TO THE OCEAN + + "Ye gallant winds, if e'er your LUSTY CHEEKS + Blew longing lover to his mistress' side, + O, puff your loudest, spread the canvas wide," + +is spirited. The last line I altered, and have re-altered it as it +stood. It is closer. These two are your best. But take a good deal of +time in finishing the first. How proud should Emma be of her poets! + +Perhaps "O Ocean" (though I like it) is too much of the open vowels, +which Pope objects to. "Great Ocean!" is obvious. "To save sad thoughts" +I think is better (though not good) than for the mind to save herself. +But 'tis a noble Sonnet. "St. Cloud" I have no fault to find with. + +If I return the Sonnets, think it no disrespect; for I look for a +printed copy. You have done better than ever. And now for a reason I did +not notice 'em earlier. On Wednesday they came, and on Wednesday I was +a-gadding. Mary gave me a holiday, and I set off to Snow Hill. From Snow +Hill I deliberately was marching down, with noble Holborn before me, +framing in mental cogitation a map of the dear London in prospect, +thinking to traverse Wardour-street, &c., when diabolically I was +interrupted by + + Heigh-ho! + Little Barrow!-- + +Emma knows him,--and prevailed on to spend the day at his sister's, +where was an album, and (O march of intellect!) plenty of literary +conversation, and more acquaintance with the state of modern poetry than +I could keep up with. I was positively distanced. Knowles' play, which, +epilogued by me, lay on the PIANO, alone made me hold up my head. When I +came home I read your letter, and glimpsed at your beautiful sonnet, + +"Fair art them as the morning, my young bride," + +and dwelt upon it in a confused brain, but determined not to open them +till next day, being in a state not to be told of at Chatteris. Tell it +not in Gath, Emma, lest the daughters triumph! I am at the end of my +tether. I wish you could come on Tuesday with your fair bride. Why can't +you! Do. We are thankful to your sister for being of the party. Come, +and _bring_ a sonnet on Mary's birthday. Love to the whole Moxonry, and +tell E. I every day love her more, and miss her less. Tell her so from +her loving uncle, as she has let me call myself. I bought a fine +embossed card yesterday, and wrote for the Pawnbrokeress's album. She is +a Miss Brown, engaged to a Mr. White. One of the lines was (I forget the +rest--but she had them at twenty-four hours' notice; she is going out to +India with her husband):-- + + "May your fame +And fortune, Frances, WHITEN with your name!" + +Not bad as a pun. I _wil_ expect you before two on Tuesday. I am well +and happy, tell E. + + +[Moxon subsequently published his _Sonnets_, in two parts, one of which +was dedicated to his brother and one to Wordsworth. There are several to +his wife, so that it is difficult to identify that in which the last +lines were to be altered. Mrs. Moxon's first album was an extract book +in which Lamb had copied a number of old ballads and other poems. + +I quote one of Moxon's many sonnets to Emma Moxon:-- + + Fair art thou as the morning, my young Bride! + Her freshness is about thee; like a river + To the sea gliding with sweet murmur ever + Thou sportest; and, wherever thou dost glide, + Humanity a livelier aspect wears. + Fair art thou as the morning of that land + Where Tuscan breezes in his youth have fanned + Thy grandsire oft. Thou hast not many tears, + Save such as pity from the heart will wring, + And then there is a smile in thy distress! + Meeker thou art than lily of the spring, + Yet is thy nature full of nobleness! + And gentle ways, that soothe and raise me so, + That henceforth I no worldly sorrow know! + +"Heigh-ho! Little Barrow!" I cannot identify this acquaintance. + +"Knowles's play"--"The Wife." Prologued by Lamb too. + +"At Chatteris." I cannot say who were the teetotal, or abstinent, +Philistines. + +"Mary's birthday." Mary Lamb would be sixty-nine on December 3, 1833. + +Lamb's verses to Miss Brown seem to be no longer preserved. Mr. Hazlitt +prints a letter to a Miss Frances Brown, wherein Lamb offers the verses, +adding "I hope your sweetheart's name is WHITE. Else it would spoil all. +May be 'tis BLACK. Then we must alter it. And may your fortunes BLACKEN +with your name."] + + + +LETTER 592 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[No date. Middle Dec., 1833.] + +I hoped R. would like his Sonnet, but I fear'd S. that _fine old man_, +might not quite like the turn of it. This last was penn'd almost +literally extempore. + +YOUR LAUREAT. + +Is S.'s Christian name Thomas? if not, correct it. + + +["R."--Rogers; "S."--Stothard. See next letter.] + + + +LETTER 593 + +CHARLES LAMB TO SAMUEL ROGERS + +[No date. Probably Saturday, December 21, 1833.] + +My dear Sir,--Your book, by the unremitting punctuality of your +publisher, has reached me thus early. I have not opened it, nor will +till to-morrow, when I promise myself a thorough reading of it. "The +Pleasures of Memory" was the first school present I made to Mrs. Moxon, +it had those nice wood-cuts; and I believe she keeps it still. Believe +me, that all the kindness you have shown to the husband of that +excellent person seems done unto myself. I have tried my hand at a +sonnet in "The Times." But the turn I gave it, though I hoped it would +not displease you, I thought might not be equally agreeable to your +artist. I met that dear old man at poor Henry's--with you--and again at +Cary's--and it was sublime to see him sit deaf and enjoy all that was +going on in mirth with the company. He reposed upon the many graceful, +many fantastic images he had created; with them he dined and took wine. + +I have ventured at an antagonist copy of verses in "The Athenaeum" to +_him_, in which he is as everything and you as nothing. He is no lawyer +who cannot take two sides. But I am jealous of the combination of the +sister arts. Let them sparkle apart. What injury (short of the theatres) +did not Boydell's "Shakespeare Gallery" do me with Shakespeare?--to have +Opie's Shakespeare, Northcote's Shakespeare, light-headed Fuseli's +Shakespeare, heavy-headed Romney's Shakespeare, wooden-headed West's +Shakespeare (though he did the best in "Lear"), deaf-headed Reynolds's +Shakespeare, instead of my, and everybody's Shakespeare. To be tied down +to an authentic face of Juliet! To have Imogen's portrait! To confine +the illimitable! I like you and Stothard (you best), but "out upon this +half-faced fellowship." Sir, when I have read the book I may trouble +you, through Moxon, with some faint criticisms. It is not the +flatteringest compliment, in a letter to an author, to say you have not +read his book yet. But the devil of a reader he must be who prances +through it in five minutes, and no longer have I received the parcel. It +was a little tantalizing to me to receive a letter from Landor, _Gebir_ +Landor, from Florence, to say he was just sitting down to read my +"Elia," just received, but the letter was to go out before the reading. +There are calamities in authorship which only authors know. I am going +to call on Moxon on Monday, if the throng of carriages in Dover Street +on the morn of publication do not barricade me out. + +With many thanks, and most respectful remembrances to your sister, + +Yours, + +C. LAMB. + +Have you seen Coleridge's happy exemplification in English of the +Ovidian elegiac metre?-- + + In the Hexameter rises the fountain's silvery current, + In the Pentameter aye falling in melody down. + +My sister is papering up the book--careful soul! + + +[Moxon published a superb edition of Rogers' _Poems_ illustrated by +Turner and Stothard. Lamb had received an advance copy. The sonnet to +Rogers in _The Times_ was printed on December 13, 1833. It ran thus:-- + + TO SAMUEL ROGERS, ESQ., ON THE NEW EDITION OF + HIS "PLEASURES OF MEMORY" + + When thy gay book hath paid its proud devoirs, + Poetic friend, and fed with luxury + The eye of pampered aristocracy + In glittering drawing-rooms and gilt boudoirs, + O'erlaid with comments of pictorial art, + However rich and rare, yet nothing leaving + Of healthful action to the soul-conceiving + Of the true reader--yet a nobler part + Awaits thy work, already classic styled. + Cheap-clad, accessible, in homeliest show + The modest beauty through the land shall go + From year to year, and render life more mild; + Refinement to the poor man's hearth shall give, + And in the moral heart of England live. + +C. LAMB. + +Thomas Stothard, then in his seventy-ninth year, Lamb had met at Henry +Rogers', who had died at Christmas, 1832. The following was the copy of +verses printed in _The Athenaeum_, December 21, 1833 ("that most +romantic tale" was _Peter Wilkins_):-- + + TO T. STOTHARD, ESQ. + + _On his Illustrations of the Poems of Mr. Rogers_ + + Consummate Artist, whose undying name + With classic Rogers shall go down to fame, + Be this thy crowning work! In my young days + How often have I with a child's fond gaze + Pored on the pictured wonders thou hadst done: + Clarissa mournful, and prim Grandison! + All Fielding's, Smollett's heroes, rose to view; + I saw, and I believed the phantoms true. + But, above all, that most romantic tale + Did o'er my raw credulity prevail, + Where Glums and Gawries wear mysterious things, + That serve at once for jackets and for wings. + Age, that enfeebles other men's designs, + But heightens thine, and thy free draught refines. + In several ways distinct you make us feel-- + _Graceful_ as Raphael, as Watteau _genteel_. + Your lights and shades, as Titianesque, we praise; + And warmly wish you Titian's length of days. + +"Short of the theatres." The injury done by the theatres is of course +the subject of Lamb's _Reflector_ essay on Shakespeare's Tragedies (see +Vol. I.). + +"Boydell's 'Shakespeare Gallery'"--the series of 170 illustrations to +Shakespeare by leading artists of the day projected by Alderman Boydell +in 1786. + +"Coleridge's... exemplification." Lamb quoted incorrectly. The lines had +just appeared in _Friendship's Offering_ for 1834:-- + + In the hexameter rises the fountain's silvery column; + In the pentameter aye falling in melody back. + +Coleridge took the lines from Schiller. + +At Dr. Williams' Library is a note from Thos. Robinson to Crabb +Robinson, dated December 22, 1833, concerning Lamb's Christmas turkey, +which went first to Crabb Robinson at the Temple and was then sent on to +Lamb, presumably with the note in the hamper. Lamb adds at the foot of +the note:-- + +"The parcel coming thro' _you_, I open'd this note, but find no treason +in it. + +With thanks + +C. LAMB." + +I give here three other notes to Dilke, belonging probably to the early +days of 1834. The first refers to the proof of one of Lamb's +contributions to The Athenaeum.] + + + +LETTER 594 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[No date.] + +May I now claim of you the benefit of the loan of some books. Do not +fear sending too many. But do not if it be irksome to yourself,--such as +shall make you say, 'damn it, here's Lamb's box come again.' Dog's +leaves ensured! Any light stuff: no natural, history or useful learning, +such as Pyramids, Catacombs, Giraffes, Adventures in Southern Africa, +&c. &c. + +With our joint compliments, yours, + +C. LAMB. + +Church Street, Edmonton. + +Novels for the last two years, or further back-nonsense of any period. + + + +LETTER 595 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[No date. Spring, 1834.] + +Dear Sir, I return 44 volumes by Tate. If they are not all your own, and +some of mine have slipt in, I do not think you will lose much. Shall I +go on with the Table talk? I will, if you like it, when the Culinary +article has appear'd. + +_Robins_, the Carrier, from the _Swan_, Snow Hill, will bring any more +contributions, thankfully to be receiv'd--I pay backwards and forwards. + +C. LAMB. + + +["Table Talk by the late Elia" appeared in _The Athenaeum_ on January 4, +May 31, June 7 and July 19, 1834. The Culinary article is the paragraph +that now closes the "Table Talk" (see Vol. I.).] + + + +LETTER 596 + +CHARLES LAMB TO THE PRINTER OF THE _ATHENAEUM_ + +[No date.] + +I have read the enclosed five and forty times over. I have submitted it +to my Edmonton friends; at last (O Argus' penetration), I have +discovered a dash that might be dispensed with. Pray don't trouble +yourself with such useless courtesies. I can well trust your editor, +when I don't use queer phrases which prove themselves wrong by creating +a distrust in the sober compositor. + + + +LETTER 597 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MARY BETHAM + +January 24, 1834, + +Church Street, Edmonton. + +Dear Mary Betham--I received the Bill, and when it is payable, some ten +or twelve days hence, will punctually do with the overplus as you +direct: I thought you would like to know it came to hand, so I have not +waited for the uncertainty of when your nephew sets out. I suppose my +receipt will serve, for poor Mary is not in a capacity to sign it. After +being well from the end of July to the end of December, she was taken +ill almost on the first day of the New Year, and is as bad as poor +creature can be. I expect her fever to last 14 or 15 weeks--if she gets +well at all, which every successive illness puts me in fear of. She has +less and less strength to throw it off, and they leave a dreadful +depression after them. She was quite comfortable a few weeks since, when +Matilda came down here to see us. + +You shall excuse a short letter, for my hand is unsteady. Indeed, the +situation I am in with her shakes me sadly. She was quite able to +appreciate the kind legacy while she was well. Imagine her kindest love +to you, which is but buried awhile, and believe all the good wishes for +your restoration to health from + +C. LAMB. + + +[This letter refers to the legacy mentioned above. It had now been +paid.] + + + +LETTER 598 + +CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON + +[P.M. Jan. 28, 1834.] + +I met with a man at my half way house, who told me many anecdotes of +Kean's younger life. He knew him thoroughly. His name is Wyatt, living +near the Bell, Edmonton. Also he referred me to West, a publican, +opposite St. Georges Church, Southwark, who knew him _more_ intimately. +Is it worth Forster's while to enquire after them? + +C.L. + + +[Edmund Kean had died in the previous May. Forster, who was at this time +theatrical critic of _The Examiner_, was probably at work upon a +biographical article. + +Here should come a note from Lamb to Matilda Betham, dated January 29, +1834. "My poor Mary is terribly ill again." + +Here also, dated February 7, should come a letter to William Hone, in +which Lamb, after mentioning his sister's illness, urges upon Hone the +advisability of applying to the Literary Fund for some relief, and +offers to support him in his appeal.] + + + +LETTER 599 + +CHARLES LAMB TO Miss FRYER + +Feb. 14, 1834. + +Dear Miss Fryer,--Your letter found me just returned from keeping my +birthday (pretty innocent!) at Dover-street. I see them pretty often. I +have since had letters of business to write, or should have replied +earlier. In one word, be less uneasy about me; I bear my privations very +well; I am not in the depths of desolation, as heretofore. Your +admonitions are not lost upon me. Your kindness has sunk into my heart. +Have faith in me! It is no new thing for me to be left to my sister. +When she is not violent, her rambling chat is better to me than the +sense and sanity of this world. Her heart is obscured, not buried; it +breaks out occasionally; and one can discern a strong mind struggling +with the billows that have gone over it. I could be nowhere happier than +under the same roof with her. Her memory is unnaturally strong; and from +ages past, if we may so call the earliest records of our poor life, she +fetches thousands of names and things that never would have dawned upon +me again, and thousands from the ten years she lived before me. What +took place from early girlhood to her coming of age principally lives +again (every important thing and every trifle) in her brain with the +vividness of real presence. For twelve hours incessantly she will pour +out without intermission all her past life, forgetting nothing, pouring +out name after name to the Waldens as a dream; sense and nonsense; +truths and errors huddled together; a medley between inspiration and +possession. What things we are! I know you will bear with me, talking of +these things. It seems to ease me; for I have nobody to tell these +things to now. Emma, I see, has got a harp! and is learning to play. She +has framed her three Walton pictures, and pretty they look. That is a +book you should read; such sweet religion in it--next to Woolman's! +though the subject be baits and hooks, and worms, and fishes. She has my +copy at present to do two more from. + +Very, very tired, I began this epistle, having been epistolising all the +morning, and very kindly would I end it, could I find adequate +expressions to your kindness. We did set our minds on seeing you in +spring. One of us will indubitably. But I am not skilled in almanac +learning, to know when spring precisely begins and ends. Pardon my +blots; I am glad you like your book. I wish it had been half as worthy +of your acceptance as "John Woolman." But 'tis a good-natured book. + + +[Miss Fryer was a school-fellow of Mrs. Moxon's. + +I append another letter, undated, to the same lady. It belongs obviously +to an earlier period, but the exact position is unimportant:--] + + + +LETTER 600 + +CHARLES LAMB TO Miss FRYER + +[No date.] + +My dear Miss Fryer, By desire of Emma I have attempted new words to the +old nonsense of Tartar Drum; but _with_ the nonsense the sound and +spirit of the tune are unaccountably gone, and _we_ have agreed to +discard the new version altogether. As _you_ may be more fastidious in +singing mere silliness, and a string of well-sounding images without +sense or coherence--Drums of Tartars, who use _none_, and Tulip trees +ten foot high, not to mention Spirits in Sunbeams &c,--than we are, so +you are at liberty to sacrifice an enspiriting movement to a little +sense, tho' I like LITTLE-SENSE less than his vagarying younger sister +NO-SENSE--so I send them---- + +The 4th line of 1st stanza is from an old Ballad. + +Emma is looking weller and handsomer (as you say) than ever. Really, if +she goes on thus improving, by the time she is nine and thirty she will +be a tolerable comely person. But I may not live to see it.--I take +Beauty to be _catching_-- a Cholera sort of thing--Now, whether the +constant presence of a handsome object--for there's only two of us--may +not have the effect------but the subject is delicate, and as my old +great Ant* used to say--"Andsome is as andsome duzz"--that was my +great Ant's way of spelling---- + +Most and best kind things say to yourself and dear Mother for all your +kindnesses to our Em., tho' in truth I am a little tired with her +everlasting repetition of 'em. Yours very Truly, + +CHS LAMB. + +* Emma's way of spelling Miss _Umfris_, as I spell her +_Aunt_. + + LOVE WILL COME + + _Tune: "The Tartar Drum"_ + + I + + Guard thy feelings, pretty Vestal, + From the smooth Intruder free; + Cage thine heart in bars of chrystal, + Lock it with a golden key; + Thro' the bars demurely stealing-- + Noiseless footstep, accent dumb, + His approach to none revealing-- + Watch, or watch not, LOVE WILL COME. + His approach to none revealing-- + Watch, or watch not, Love will come--Love, + Watch, or watch not, Love will come. + + II + + Scornful Beauty may deny him-- + He hath spells to charm disdain; + Homely Features may defy him-- + Both at length must wear the chain. + Haughty Youth in Courts of Princes-- + Hermit poor with age oercome-- + His soft plea at last convinces; + Sooner, later, LOVE WILL COME-- + + His soft plea at length convinces; + Sooner, later, Love will come--Love, + Sooner, later, Love will come. + + + +LETTER 601 + +CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH + +Church S't, Edmonton, + +22 feb. [1834]. + +Dear Wordsworth, I write from a house of mourning. The oldest and best +friends I have left, are in trouble. A branch of them (and they of the +best stock of God's creatures, I believe) is establishing a school at +Carlisle. Her name is Louisa Martin, her address 75 Castle Street, +Carlisle; her qualities (and her motives for this exertion) are the most +amiable, most upright. For thirty years she has been tried by me, and on +her behaviour I would stake my soul. O if you can recommend her, how +would I love you--if I could love you better. Pray, pray, recommend her. +She is as good a human creature,--next to my Sister, perhaps the most +exemplary female I ever knew. Moxon tells me, you would like a Letter +from me. You shall have one. _This_ I cannot mingle up with any nonsense +which you usually tolerate from, C. LAMB. Need he add loves to Wife, +Sister, and all? Poor Mary is ill again, after a short lucid interval of +4 or 5 months. In short, I may call her half dead to me. + +Good you are to me. Yours with fervor of friendship; for ever + +turn over + +If you want references, the Bishop of Carlisle may be one. Louisa's +Sister, (as good as she, she cannot be better tho' she tries,) educated +the daughters of the late Earl of Carnarvon, and he settled a handsome +Annuity on her for life. In short all the family are a sound rock. The +present Lord Carnarvon married Howard of Graystock's Sister. + + +[Wordsworth has written on the wrapper, "Lamb's last letter." + +We met the Martins in the early correspondence. It was Louisa whom, many +years, before, Lamb used to call "Monkey." + +Here should come Lamb's last letter to Thomas Manning, dated May 10, +1834. Mary has, he says, been ill for nigh twenty weeks; "she is, I +hope, recovering." "I struggle to town rarely, and then to see London, +with little other motive--for what is left there hardly? The streets and +shops entertaining ever, else I feel as in a desert, and get me home to +my cave." Once a month, he adds, he passes a day with Cary at the +Museum. When Mary was getting better in the previous year she would read +all the auctioneers' advertisements on the walk. "These are _my_ +Play-bills," she said. "I walk 9 or 10 miles a day, always up the road, +dear Londonwards." Addressed to Manning at Puckeridge. + +Manning lived on, an eccentric recluse, until 1840. + +Here perhaps should come the following melancholy letter to Talfourd, +which Mr. Dobell permits me to print:--] + + + +LETTER 602 + +CHARLES LAMB TO T.N. TALFOURD + +[No date. Early 1834?] + +D'r T.--[1]Moxon & Knowles are coming to Enfield on Sunday _afternoon_. +My poor shaken head cannot at present let me ask any dinner company; for +two drinkings in a day, which must ensue, would incapacity me. I am very +poorly. They can only get an Edmont'n stage, from which village 'tis but +a 2 miles walk, & I have only _inn beds_ to offer. _Pray_, join 'em if +you can. Our first morning stage to London is 1/2 past 8. If that won't +suit your avocations, arrange with Ryle (or without him)--but how can I +separate him morally?--logically and legally, poetically and critically +I can,--from you? No disparagement (for a better Christian exists +not)--well arrange _cum_ or _absque illo_--this is latin-- the first +Sunday you can, _morning_. + +I am poorly, but I always am on these occasions, a week or two. Then I +get sober,--I mean less insober. Yours till death; you are mine _after_. +Don't mind a touch of pathos. Love to Mrs. Talfourd. + +The Edmonton stages come almost every hour from Snow Hill. + + +[Footnote 1: Erratum, for M. & K. read K. & M. Booksellers _after_ +Authors.] + + +[Ryle, as I have already said, was Lamb's executor, with Talfourd. Hence +the phrase to Talfourd, "you are mine after."] + + + +LETTER 603 + +(_Fragment_) + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE + +[No date. End of June, 1834.] + +We heard the Music in the Abbey at Winchmore Hill! and the notes were +incomparably soften'd by the distance. Novello's chromatics were +distinctly audible. Clara was faulty in B flat. Otherwise she sang like +an angel. The trombone, and Beethoven's walzes, were the best. Who +played the oboe? + + +[The letter refers to the performance of Handel's "Creation" at the +Musical Festival in Westminster Abbey on June 24, 1834, when Novello and +Atwood were the organists, and Clara Novello one of the singers.] + + + +LETTER 604 + +CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER + +[P.M. June 25, 1834.] + +D'r F.--I simply sent for the Miltons because Alsop has some Books of +mine, and I thought they might travel with them. But keep 'em as much +longer as you like. I never trouble my head with other people's +quarrels, I do not always understand my own. I seldom see them in Dover +Street. I know as little as the Man in the Moon about your joint +transactions, and care as little. If you have lost a little portion of +my "good will," it is that you do not come and see me. Arrange with +Procter, when you have done with your moving accidents. + +Yours, ambulaturus, + +C.L. + + + +LETTER 605 + +CHARLES LAMB TO J. FULLER RUSSELL + +[Summer, 1834.] + +M'r Lamb's compt's and shall be happy to look over the lines as soon as +ever Mr. Russell shall send them. He is at Mr. Walden's, Church, _not +Bury_--St, Edm'd. + +_Line_ 10. "Ween," and "wist," and "wot," and "eke" are antiquated +frippery, and unmodernize a poem rather than give it an antique air, as +some strong old words may do. "I guess," "I know," "I knew," are quite +as significant. + +31. Why "ee"--barbarous Scoticism!--when "eye" is much better and chimes +to "cavalry"? A sprinkling of dis-used words where all the style else is +after the approved recent fashion teases and puzzles. + +37. [Anon the storm begins to slake, The sullen clouds to melt +away, The moon becalmed in a blue lake Looks down with melancholy ray.] + +The moon becalmed in a blue lake would be more apt to _look up_. I see +my error--the sky is the lake--and beg you to laugh at it. + +59. What is a maiden's "een," south of the Tweed? You may as well call +her prettily turned ears her "lugs." + + "On the maiden's lugs they fall" (verse 79). + +144. "A coy young Miss" will never do. For though you are presumed to be +a modern, writing only of days of old, yet you should not write a word +purely unintelligible to your heroine. Some understanding should be kept +up between you. "Miss" is a nickname not two centuries old; came in at +about the Restoration. The "King's Misses" is the oldest use of it I can +remember. It is Mistress Anne Page, not Miss Page. Modern names and +usages should be kept out of sight in an old subject. W. Scott was sadly +faulty in this respect. + +208. [Tear of sympathy.] Pity's sacred dew. Sympathy is a young lady's +word, rife in modern novels, and is almost always wrongly applied. To +sympathize is to feel--_with_, not simply _for_ another. I write +verses and _sympathize_ with you. You have the tooth ache, I have not; +I feel for you, I cannot sympathize. + +243. What is "sheen"? Has it more significance than "bright"? Richmond +in its old name was Shene. Would you call an omnibus to take you to +Shene? How the "all's right" man would stare! + +363. [The violet nestled in the shade, + Which fills with perfume all the glade, + Yet bashful as a timid maid + Thinks to elude the searching eye + Of every stranger passing by, + Might well compare with Emily.] + +A strangely involved simile. The maiden is likend [_sic_] to a _violet_ +which has been just before likened to a _maid_. Yet it reads prettily, +and I would not have it alter'd. + +420. "Een" come again? In line 407 you speak it out "eye," bravely like +an Englishman. + +468. Sorceresses do not entice by wrinkles, but, being essentially aged, +appear in assumed beauty. + + +[This communication and that which follows (with trifling omissions) +were sent to _Notes and Queries_ by the late Mr. J. Fuller Russell, +F.S.A., with this explanation: "I was residing at Enfield in the +Cambridge Long Vacation, 1834, and--perhaps to the neglect of more +improving pursuits--composed a metrical novel, named 'Emily de Wilton,' +in three parts. When the first of them was completed, I ventured to +introduce myself to Charles Lamb (who was living at Edmonton at the +time), and telling him what I had done, and that I had 'scarcely heart +to proceed until I had obtained the opinion of a competent judge +respecting my verses,' I asked him to 'while away an idle hour in their +perusal,' adding, 'I fear you will think me very rude and very +intrusive, but I am one of the most nervous souls in Christendom.' +Moved, possibly, by this diffident (not to say unusual) confession, Elia +speedily gave his consent." + +The poem was never printed. Lamb's pains in this matter serve to show +how kindly disposed he was in these later years to all young men; and +how exact a sense of words he had. + +In the British Museum is preserved a sheet of similar comments made by +Lamb upon a manuscript of P.G. Patmore's, from which I have quoted a few +passages above. In _Charles Lamb and the Lloyds_ will also be found a +number of interesting criticisms on a translation of Homer.] + + + +LETTER 606 + +CHARLES LAMB TO J. FULLER RUSSELL + +[Summer, 1834.] + +Sir,--I hope you will finish "Emily." The story I cannot at this stage +anticipate. Some looseness of diction I have taken liberty to advert to. +It wants a little more severity of style. There are too many +prettinesses, but parts of the Poem are better than pretty, and I thank +you for the perusal. + +Your humble Servt. + +C. LAMB. + +Perhaps you will favour me with a call while you stay. + +Line 42. "The old abbaye" (if abbey _was_ so spelt) I do not object to, +because it does not seem your own language, but humoursomely adapted to +the "how folks called it in those times." + +82. "Flares"! Think of the vulgarism "flare up;" let it be "burns." + +112. [In her pale countenance is blent + The majesty of high intent + With meekness by devotion lent, + And when she bends in prayer + Before the Virgin's awful shrine,-- + The rapt enthusiast might deem + The seraph of his brightest dream, + Were meekly kneeling there.] + +"Was" decidedly, not "were." The deeming or supposition, is of a +reality, not a contingency. The enthusiast does not deem that a thing +may be, but that it _is_. + +118. [When first young Vernon's flight she knew, + The lady deemed the tale untrue.] + +"Deemed"! This word is just repeated above; say "thought" or "held." +"Deem" is half-cousin to "ween" and "wot." + +143. [By pure intent and soul sincere + Sustained and nerved, I will not fear + Reproach, shame, scorn, the taunting jeer, + And worse than all, a father's sneer.] + +A father's "sneer"? Would a high-born man in those days _sneer_ at a +daughter's disgrace--would he _only_ sneer? + + Reproach, and biting shame, and--worse + Than all--the estranged father's curse. + +I only throw this hint out in a hurry. + +177. "Stern and _sear_"? I see a meaning in it, but no word is good that +startles one at first, and then you have to make it out: "drear," +perhaps. Then why "to minstrel's glance"? "To fancy's eye," you would +say, not "to fiddler's eye." + +422. A knight thinks, he don't "trow." + +424. "Mayhap" is vulgarish. Perchance. + +464. "Sensation" is a philosophic prose word. Feeling. + +27. [The hill, where ne'er rang woodman's stroke, + Was clothed with elm and spreading oak, + Through whose black boughs the moon's mild ray + As hardly strove to win a way, + As pity to a miser's heart.] + +Natural illustrations come more naturally when by _them_ we expound +mental operations than when we deduce from natural objects similes of +the mind's workings. The miser's struggle thus compared is a beautiful +image. But the storm and clouds do not inversely so readily suggest the +miser. + +160. [Havock and Wrath, his maniac bride, + Wheel o'er the conflict, &c.] + +These personified gentry I think are not in taste. Besides, Fear has +been pallid any time these 2,000 years. It is mixing the style of +Aeschylus and the _Last Minstrel_. + +175. Bracy is a good rough vocative. No better suggests itself, unless +Grim, Baron Grimm, or Grimoald, which is Saxon, or Grimbald! Tracy would +obviate your objection [that the name Bracy occurs in _Ivanhoe_] but +Bracy is stronger. + +231. [The frown of night + Conceals him, and bewrays their sight.] + +Betrays. The other has an _unlucky association_. + +243. [The glinting moon's half-shrouded ray.] + +Why "glinting," Scotch, when "glancing" is English? + +421. [Then solemnly the monk did say, + (The Abbot of Saint Mary's gray,) + The leman of a wanton youth + Perhaps may gain her father's _ruth_, + But _never_ on his injured breast + May lie, caressing and caressed. + Bethink you of the vow you made + When your light daughter, all distraught, + From yonder slaughter-plain was brought, + That if in some secluded cell + She might till death securely dwell, + The house of God should share her wealth.] + +Holy abbots surely never so undisguisedly blurted out their secular +aims. + +I think there is so much of this kind of poetry, that it would not be +_very taking_, but it is well worthy of pleasing a private circle. One +blemish runs thro', the perpetual accompaniment of natural images. +Seasons of the year, times of day, phases of the moon, phenomena of +flowers, are quite as much your _dramatis personae_ as the warriors and +the ladies. This last part is as good as what precedes. + + + +LETTER 607 + +CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES WENTWORTH DILKE + +[No date. End of July, 1834.] + +Dear Sir, I am totally incapable of doing what you suggest at present, +and think it right to tell you so _without delay_. It would shock me, +who am shocked enough already, to sit down to _write_ about it. I have +no letters of poor C. By and bye what scraps I have shall be yours. Pray +excuse me. It is not for want of obliging you, I assure you. For your +Box we most cordially feel thankful. I shall be your debtor in my poor +way. I do assure you I am incapable. + +Again, excuse me + +Yours sincerely + +C.L. + + +[Coleridge's death had occurred on July 25, in his sixty-second year; +and Dilke had written to Lamb asking for some words on that event, for +_The Athenaeum_. A little while later a request was made by John Forster +that Lamb would write something for the album of a Mr. Keymer. It was +then that Lamb wrote the few words that stand under the title "On the +Death of Coleridge" (see Vol. I.). Forster wrote thus of the effect of +Coleridge's death upon Lamb:-- + + He thought of little else (his sister was but another portion of + himself) until his own great spirit joined his friend. He had a + habit of venting his melancholy in a sort of mirth. He would, with + nothing graver than a pun, "cleanse his bosom of the perilous stuff + that weighed" upon it. In a jest, or a few light phrases, he would + lay open the last recesses of his heart. So in respect of the death + of Coleridge. Some old friends of his saw him two or three weeks + ago, and remarked the constant turning and reference of his mind. He + interrupted himself and them almost every instant with some play of + affected wonder, or astonishment, or humorous melancholy, on the + words, "_Coleridge is dead_." Nothing could divert him from that, + for the thought of it never left him. + +Wordsworth said that Coleridge's death hastened Lamb's.] + + + +LETTER 608 + +CHARLES LAMB TO REV. JAMES GILLMAN + +Mr. Walden's, Church Street, + +Edmonton, August 5, 1834. + +My dear Sir,--The sad week being over, I must write to you to say, that +I was glad of being spared from attending; I have no words to express my +feeling with you all. I can only say that when you think a short visit +from me would be acceptable, when your father and mother shall be able +to see me _with comfort_, I will come to the bereaved house. Express to +them my tenderest regards and hopes that they will continue our friends +still. We both love and respect them as much as a human being can, and +finally thank them with our hearts for what they have been to the poor +departed. + +God bless you all, + +C. LAMB. + + +[Talfourd writes: "Shortly after, assured that his presence would be +welcome, Lamb went to Highgate. There he asked leave to see the nurse +who had attended upon Coleridge; and being struck and affected by the +feeling she manifested towards his friend, insisted on her receiving +five guineas from him." + +Here should come a letter to J.H. Green dated August 26, 1834, thanking +him for a copy of Coleridge's will and offering to send all letters, +etc., and "fragments of handwriting from leaves of good old books."] + + + +LETTER 609 + +CHARLES AND MARY LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +Sept. 12, 1834. + +"By Cot's plessing we will not be absence at the grace." + +DEAR C.,--We long to see you, and hear account of your peregrinations, +of the Tun at Heidelburg, the Clock at Strasburg, the statue at +Rotterdam, the dainty Rhenish and poignant Moselle wines, Westphalian +hams, and Botargoes of Altona. But perhaps you have seen nor tasted any +of these things. + +Yours, very glad to claim you back again to your proper centre, books +and Bibliothecae, + +C. AND M. LAMB. + +I have only got your note just now _per negligentiam per iniqui Moxoni_. + + +[Charles and Mary Lamb at this time were supposed to dine at Cary's on +the third Wednesday in every month. When the plan was suggested by Cary, +Lamb was for declining, but Mary Lamb said, "Ah, when we went to +Edmonton, I told Charles that something would turn up, and so it did, +you see."] + + + +LETTER 610 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +Oct., 1834. + +I protest I know not in what words to invest my sense of the shameful +violation of hospitality, which I was guilty of on that fatal Wednesday. +Let it be blotted from the calendar. Had it been committed at a layman's +house, say a merchant's or manufacturer's, a cheesemonger's' or +greengrocer's, or, to go higher, a barrister's, a member of +Parliament's, a rich banker's, I should have felt alleviation, a drop of +self-pity. But to be seen deliberately to go out of the house of a +clergyman drunk! a clergyman of the Church of England too! not that +alone, but of an expounder of that dark Italian Hierophant, an +exposition little short of _his_ who dared unfold the Apocalypse: divine +riddles both and (without supernal grace vouchsafed) Arks not to be +fingered without present blasting to the touchers. And, then, from what +house! Not a common glebe or vicarage (which yet had been shameful), but +from a kingly repository of sciences, human and divine, with the primate +of England for its guardian, arrayed in public majesty, from which the +profane vulgar are bid fly. Could all those volumes have taught me +nothing better! With feverish eyes on the succeeding dawn I opened upon +the faint light, enough to distinguish, in a strange chamber not +immediately to be recognised, garters, hose, waistcoat, neckerchief, +arranged in dreadful order and proportion, which I knew was not mine +own. 'Tis the common symptom, on awaking, I judge my last night's +condition from. A tolerable scattering on the floor I hail as being too +probably my own, and if the candlestick be not removed, I assoil myself. +But this finical arrangement, this finding everything in the morning in +exact diametrical rectitude, torments me. By whom was I divested? +Burning blushes! not by the fair hands of nymphs, the Buffam Graces? +Remote whispers suggested that I _coached_ it home in triumph--far be +that from working pride in me, for I was unconscious of the locomotion; +that a young Mentor accompanied a reprobate old Telemachus; that, the +Trojan like, he bore his charge upon his shoulders, while the wretched +incubus, in glimmering sense, hiccuped drunken snatches of flying on the +bats' wings after sunset. An aged servitor was also hinted at, to make +disgrace more complete: one, to whom my ignominy may offer further +occasions of revolt (to which he was before too fondly inclining) from +the true faith; for, at a sight of my helplessness, what more was needed +to drive him to the advocacy of independency? Occasion led me through +Great Russell Street yesterday. I gazed at the great knocker. My feeble +hands in vain essayed to lift it. I dreaded that Argus Portitor, who +doubtless lanterned me out on that prodigious night. I called the +Elginian marbles. They were cold to my suit. I shall never again, I +said, on the wide gates unfolding, say without fear of thrusting back, +in a light but a peremptory air, "I am going to Mr. Cary's." I passed by +the walls of Balclutha. I had imaged to myself a zodiac of third +Wednesdays irradiating by glimpses the Edmonton dulness. I dreamed of +Highmore! I am de-vited to come on Wednesdays. Villanous old age that, +with second childhood, brings linked hand in hand her inseparable twin, +new inexperience, which knows not effects of liquor. Where I was to have +sate for a sober, middle-aged-and-a-half gentleman, literary too, the +neat-fingered artist can educe no notions but of a dissolute Silenus, +lecturing natural philosophy to a jeering Chromius or a Mnasilus. Pudet. +From the context gather the lost name of ----. + + +["The Buffam Graces." Lamb's landladies at Southampton Buildings. + +"I passed by the walls of Balclutha." From Ossian. Lamb uses this +quotation in his _Elia_ essay on the South-Sea House. + +"Highmore." I cannot explain this reference. + +Not long before Mrs. Procter's death a letter from Charles Lamb to Mrs. +Basil Montagu was sold, in which Lamb apologised for having become +intoxicated while visiting her the night before. Some one mentioned the +letter in Mrs. Procter's presence. "Ah," she said, "but they haven't +seen the second letter, which I have upstairs, written next day, in +which he said that my mother might ask him again with safety as he never +got drunk twice in the same house." Unhappily, a large number of Lamb's +and other letters were burned by Mrs. Procter.] + + + +LETTER 611 + +CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY + +[Oct. 18, 1834.] + +Dear Sir,--The unbounded range of munificence presented to my choice +staggers me. What can twenty votes do for one hundred and two widows? I +cast my eyes hopeless among the viduage. N.B.--Southey might be ashamed +of himself to let his aged mother stand at the top of the list, with his +L100 a year and butt of sack. Sometimes I sigh over No. 12, Mrs. +Carve-ill, some poor relation of mine, no doubt. No. 15 has my wishes; +but then she is a Welsh one. I have Ruth upon No. 21. I'd tug hard for +No. 24. No. 25 is an anomaly: there can be no Mrs. Hogg. No. 34 ensnares +me. No. 73 should not have met so foolish a person. No. 92 may bob it as +she likes; but she catches no cherry of me. So I have even fixed at +hap-hazard, as you'll see. + +Yours, every third Wednesday, + +C.L. + + +[Talfourd states that the note is in answer to a letter enclosing a list +of candidates for a Widow's Fund Society, for which he was entitled to +vote. A Mrs. Southey headed the list. + +Here, according to Mr. Hazlitt's dating, should come a note from Lamb to +Mrs. Randal Norris, belonging to November, in which Lamb says that he +found Mary on his return no worse and she is now no better. He sends all +his nonsense that he can scrape together and hopes the young ladies will +like "Amwell" (_Mrs. Leicester's School_).] + + + +LETTER 612 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MR. CHILDS + +Monday. Church Street, EDMONTON (not Enfield, as you erroneously direct +yours). [? Dec., 1834.] + +Dear Sir,--The volume which you seem to want, is not to be had for love +or money. I with difficulty procured a copy for myself. Yours is gone to +enlighten the tawny Hindoos. What a supreme felicity to the author (only +he is no traveller) on the Ganges or Hydaspes (Indian streams) to meet a +smutty Gentoo ready to burst with laughing at the tale of Bo-Bo! for +doubtless it hath been translated into all the dialects of the East. I +grieve the less, that Europe should want it. I cannot gather from your +letter, whether you are aware that a second series of the Essays is +published by Moxon, in Dover-street, Piccadilly, called "The Last Essays +of Elia," and, I am told, is not inferior to the former. Shall I order a +copy for you, and will you accept it? Shall I _lend_ you, at the same +time, my sole copy of the former volume (Oh! return it) for a month or +two? In return, you shall favour me with the loan of one of those +Norfolk-bred grunters that you laud so highly; I promise not to keep it +above a day. What a funny name Bungay is! I never dreamt of a +correspondent thence. I used to think of it as some Utopian town or +borough in Gotham land. I now believe in its existence, as part of merry +England! + +[_Some lines scratched out._] + +The part I have scratched out is the best of the letter. Let me have +your commands. + +CH. LAMB, _alias_ ELIA. + + +[Talfourd thus explains this letter: "In December, 1834, Mr. Lamb +received a letter from a gentleman, a stranger to him--Mr. Childs of +Bungay, whose copy of _Elia_ had been sent on an Oriental voyage, and +who, in order to replace it, applied to Mr. Lamb." Mr. Childs was a +printer. His business subsequently became that of Messrs. R.&R. Clark, +which still flourishes. + +This letter practically disposes of the statement made by more than one +bibliographer that a second edition of Elia was published in 1833. The +tale of Bo-Bo is in the "Dissertation on Roast Pig." + +Lamb sent Mr. Childs a copy of _John Woodvil_, in which he wrote:--] + + + +LETTER 613 + +FROM THE AUTHOR + +In great haste, the Pig was _faultless_,--we got decently merry after it +and chirpt and sang "Heigh! Bessy Bungay!" in honour of the Sender. Pray +let me have a line to say you got the Books; keep the _1st vol._--two or +three months, so long as it comes home at last. + + + +LETTER 614 + +CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. GEORGE DYER + +Dec. 22nd, 1834. + +Dear Mrs. Dyer,--I am very uneasy about a _Book_ which I either have +lost or left at your house on Thursday. It was the book I went out to +fetch from Miss Buffam's, while the tripe was frying. It is called +Phillip's Theatrum Poetarum; but it is an English book. I think I left +it in the parlour. It is Mr. Cary's book, and I would not lose it for +the world. Pray, if you find it, book it at the Swan, Snow Hill, by an +Edmonton stage immediately, directed to Mr. Lamb, Church-street, +Edmonton, or write to say you cannot find it. I am quite anxious about +it. If it is lost, I shall never like tripe again. + +With kindest love to Mr. Dyer and all, + +Yours truly, + +C. LAMB. + + +[In the life of H.F. Cary by his son we read: "He [Lamb] had borrowed of +my father Phillips's _Theatrum Poetarum Anglicanorum_, which was +returned by Lamb's friend, Mr. Moxon, with the leaf folded down at the +account of Sir Philip Sydney." Mr. Cary acknowledged the receipt of the +book by the following + + LINES TO THE MEMORY OF CHARLES LAMB + + So should it be, my gentle friend; + Thy leaf last closed at Sydney's end. + Thou too, like Sydney, wouldst have given + The water, thirsting and near heaven; + Nay were it wine, fill'd to the brim, + Thou hadst look'd hard, but given, like him. + + And art thou mingled then among + Those famous sons of ancient song? + And do they gather round, and praise + Thy relish Of their nobler lays? + Waxing in mirth to hear thee tell + With what strange mortals thou didst dwell! + At thy quaint sallies more delighted, + Than any's long among them lighted! + + 'Tis done: and thou hast join'd a crew, + To whom thy soul was justly due; + And yet I think, where'er thou be, + They'll scarcely love thee more than we. + +This is the last letter of Charles Lamb, who tripped and fell in Church +Street, Edmonton, on December 22, and died of erysipelas on December 27. + +At the time of his death Lamb was very nearly sixty. His birthday was +February 10. + +Mary Lamb, with occasional lapses into sound health, survived him until +May 20, 1847. At first she continued to live at Edmonton, but a few +years later moved to the house of Mrs. Parsons, sister of her old nurse, +Miss James, in St. John's Wood. I append three letters, two written and +one inspired, by her, to Miss Jane Norris, one of the daughters of +Randal Norris. Of the friends mentioned therein I might add that Edward +Moxon lived until 1858; Mrs. Edward Moxon until 1891; James Kenney until +1849; Thomas Hood until 1845; and Barron Field until 1846.] + + + +LETTER 615 + +MARY LAMB TO JANE NORRIS + +[41 Alpha Road, Regent's Park] + +Christmas Day [1841]. + +My dear Jane,--Many thanks for your kind presents--your Michalmas goose. +I thought Mr. Moxon had written to thank you--the turkeys and nice +apples came yesterday. + +Give my love to your dear Mother. I was unhappy to find your note in the +basket, for I am always thinking of you all, and wondering when I shall +ever see any of you again. I long to shew you what a nice snug place I +have got into--in the midst of a pleasant little garden. I have a room +for myself and my old books on the ground floor, and a little bedroom up +two pairs of stairs. When you come to town, if you have not time to go +[to] the Moxons, an Omnibus from the Bell and Crown in Holborn would +[bring] you to our door in [a] quarter of an hour. If your dear Mother +does not venture so far, I will contrive to pop down to see [her]. Love +and all seasonable wishes to your sister and Mary, &c. I am in the midst +of many friends--Mr. & Mrs. Kenney, Mr. & Mrs. Hood, Bar[r]on Field & +his brother Frank, & their wives &c., all within a short walk. + +If the lodger is gone, I shall have a bedroom will hold two! Heaven +bless & preserve you all in health and happiness many a long year. + +Yours affectionately, + +M.A. LAMB. + + + +LETTER 616 + +MARY LAMB TO JANE NORRIS + +Oct. 3, 1842. + +My dear Jane Norris,--Thanks, many thanks, my dear friend, for your kind +remembrances. What a nice Goose! That, and all its accompaniments in the +basket, we all devoured; the two legs fell to my share!!! + +Your chearful [letter,] my Jane, made me feel "almost as good as new." + +Your Mother and I _must meet again_. Do not be surprized if I pop in +again for a half-hour's call some fine frosty morning. + +Thank you, dear Jane, for the happy tidings that my _old_ friend Miss +Bangham is alive, an[d] that Mary is still with you, unmarried. Heaven +bless you all. + +Love to Mother, _Betsey_, Mary, &c. How I do long to see you. + +I am always your affecately grateful friend, + +MARY ANN LAMB. + + + +LAST LETTER + +Miss JAMES TO JANE NORRIS + +41 Alpha Road, Regent's Park, + +London, July 25, 1843. + +Madam,--Miss Lamb, having seen the Death of your dear Mother in the +Times News Paper, is most anxious to hear from or to see one of you, as +she wishes to know how you intend settling yourselves, and to have a +full account of your dear Mother's last illness. She was much shocked on +reading of her death, and appeared very vexed that she had not been to +see her, [and] wanted very much to come down and see you both; but we +were really afraid to let her take the journey. If either of you are +coming up to town, she would be glad if you would call upon her, but +should you not be likely to come soon, she would be very much pleased if +one of you would have the goodness to write a few lines to her, as she +is most anxious about you. She begs you to excuse her writing to you +herself, as she don't feel equal to it; she asked me yesterday to write +for her. I am happy to say she is at present pretty well, although your +dear Mother's death appears to dwell much upon her mind. She desires her +kindest love to you both, and hopes to hear from you very soon, if you +are equal to writing. I sincerely hope you will oblige her, and am, + +Madam, + +Your obedient, &c., + +SARAH JAMES. + +Pray don't invite her to come down to see you. + + + + +APPENDIX + + +CONSISTING OF THE LONGER PASSAGES FROM BOOKS REFERRED TO BY LAMB IN HIS +LETTERS + +BERNARD BARTON'S "THE SPIRITUAL LAW" + + +FROM DEVOTIONAL VERSES, 1826 (_See_ Letter 388, _page_ 746) + +"But the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy mouth, and in thy heart, +that them mayest do it."--Deut. xxx. 14. + + Say not The law divine + Is hidden from thee, or far remov'd: + That law within would shine, + If there its glorious light were sought and lov'd. + + Soar not on high, + Nor ask who thence shall bring it down to earth; + That vaulted sky + Hath no such star, didst thou but know its worth. + + Nor launch thy bark + In search thereof upon a shoreless sea, + Which has no ark, + No dove to bring this olive-branch to thee. + + Then do not roam + In search of that which wandering cannot win; + At home! At home! + That word is plac'd, thy mouth, thy heart within. + + Oh! seek it there, + Turn to its teachings with devoted will; + Watch unto prayer, + And in the power of faith this law fulfil. + + +BARTON'S "THE TRANSLATION OF ENOCH" + +FROM _NEW YEAR'S EVE_, 1828 + +(_See Letter_ 467, _page_ 841) + +"And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him." + +Genesis. + + Through proudly through the vaulted sky + Was borne Elisha's sire, + And dazzling unto mortal eye + His car and steeds of fire: + + To me as glorious seems the change + Accorded to thy worth; + As instantaneous and as strange + Thy exit from this earth. + + Something which wakes a deeper thrill, + These few brief words unfold, + Than all description's proudest skill + Could of that hour have told. + + Fancy's keen eye may trace the course + Elijah held on high: + The car of flame, each fiery horse, + Her visions may supply;-- + + But THY transition mocks each dream + Framed by her wildest power, + Nor can her mastery supreme + _Conceive_ thy parting hour. + + Were angels, with expanded wings, + As guides and guardians given? + Or did sweet sounds from seraphs' strings + Waft thee from earth to heaven? + + 'Twere vain to ask: we know but this-- + Thy path from grief and time + Unto eternity and bliss, + Mysterious and sublime! + + With God thou walkedst: and wast not! + And thought and fancy fail + Further than this to paint thy lot, + Or tell thy wondrous tale. + + +TALFOURD'S "VERSES IN MEMORY OF A CHILD NAMED AFTER CHARLES LAMB" + +FROM THE FINAL MEMORIALS OF CHARLES LAMB + +(_See_ Letter 469, _page_ 846) + + Our gentle Charles has pass'd away + From Earth's short bondage free, + And left to us its leaden day + And mist-enshrouded sea. + + Here, by the restless ocean's side, + Sweet hours of hope have flown, + When first the triumph of its tide + Seem'd omen of our own. + + That eager joy the sea-breeze gave, + When first it raised his hair, + Sunk with each day's retiring wave, + Beyond the reach of prayer. + + The sun-blink that through drizzling mist, + To flickering hope akin, + Lone waves with feeble fondness kiss'd, + No smile as faint can win; + + Yet not in vain, with radiance weak, + The heavenly stranger gleams-- + Not of the world it lights to speak, + But that from whence it streams. + + That world our patient sufferer sought, + Serene with pitying eyes, + As if his mounting Spirit caught + The wisdom of the skies. + + With boundless love it look'd abroad + For one bright moment given; + Shone with a loveliness that aw'd, + And quiver'd into Heaven. + + A year made slow by care and toil + Has paced its weary round, + Since Death enrich'd with kindred spoil + The snow-clad, frost-ribb'd ground. + + Then LAMB, with whose endearing name + Our boy we proudly graced, + Shrank from the warmth of sweeter fame + Than mightier Bards embraced. + + Still 'twas a mournful joy to think + Our darling might supply + For years to us, a living link, + To name that cannot die. + + And though such fancy gleam no more + On earthly sorrow's night, + Truth's nobler torch unveils the shore + Which lends to both its light. + + The nurseling there that hand may take, + None ever grasp'd in vain, + And smiles of well-known sweetness wake, + Without their tinge of pain. + + Though,'twixt the Child and child-like Bard, + Late seemed distinction wide. + They now may trace in Heaven's regard, + How near they were allied. + + Within the infant's ample brow + Blythe fancies lay unfurl'd, + Which, all uncrush'd, may open now, + To charm a sinless world. + + Though the soft spirit of those eyes + Might ne'er with LAMB'S compete-- + Ne'er sparkle with a wit as wise, + Or melt in tears, as sweet; + + That calm and unforgotten look + A kindred love reveals, + With his who never friend forsook, + Or hurt a thing that feels. + + In thought profound, in wildest glee, + In sorrows dark and strange, + The soul of Lamb's bright infancy + Endured no spot or change. + + From traits of each our love receives + For comfort, nobler scope; + While light, which child-like genius leaves. + Confirms the infant's hope; + + And in that hope with sweetness fraught + Be aching hearts beguiled, + To blend in one delightful thought + The POET and the CHILD! + + + EDWARD FITZGERALD'S "THE MEADOWS IN SPRING" + + FROM HONE'S _YEAR BOOK_ + + (_See Letter_ 535, _page_ 938) + + 'Tis a sad sight + To see the year dying; + When autumn's last wind + Sets the yellow wood sighing; + Sighing, oh sighing! + + When such a time cometh, + I do retire + Into an old room, + Beside a bright fire; + Oh! pile a bright fire! + + And there I sit + Reading old things + Of knights and ladies, + While the wind sings: + Oh! drearily sings! + + I never look out, + Nor attend to the blast; + For, all to be seen, + Is the leaves falling fast: + Falling, falling! + + But, close at the hearth, + Like a cricket, sit I; + Reading of summer + And chivalry: + Gallant chivalry! + + Then, with an old friend, + I talk of our youth; + How 'twas gladsome, but often + Foolish, forsooth, + But gladsome, gladsome. + + Or, to get merry, + We sing an old rhyme + That made the wood ring again + In summer time: + Sweet summer time! + + Then take we to smoking, + Silent and snug: + Naught passes between us, + Save a brown jug; + Sometimes! sometimes! + + And sometimes a tear + Will rise in each eye, + Seeing the two old friends, + So merrily; + So merrily! + + And ere to bed + Go we, go we, + Down by the ashes + We kneel on the knee; + Praying, praying! + + Thus then live I, + Till, breaking the gloom + Of winter, the bold sun + Is with me in the room! + Shining, shining! + + Then the clouds part, + Swallows soaring between: + The spring is awake, + And the meadows are green,-- + + I jump up like mad; + Break the old pipe in twain; + And away to the meadows, + The meadows again! + + EPSILON. + + +JAMES MONTGOMERY'S "THE COMMON LOT" + +(_See Letter_ 535, _page_ 938) + +A Birth-day Meditation, during a solitary winter walk of seven miles, +between a village in Derbyshire and Sheffield, when the ground was +covered with snow, the sky serene, and the morning air intensely pure. + + Once in the flight of ages past, + There lived a man:--and WHO was HE? + --Mortal! howe'er thy lot be cast, + That man resembled Thee. + + Unknown the region of his birth, + The land in which he died unknown: + His name has perish'd from the earth; + This truth survives alone:-- + + That joy and grief, and hope and fear, + Alternate triumph'd in his breast; + His bliss and woe,--a smile, a tear!-- + Oblivion hides the rest. + + The bounding pulse, the languid limb, + The changing spirits' rise and fall; + We know that these were felt by him, + For these are felt by all. + + He suffer'd,--but his pangs are o'er; + Enjoy'd,--but his delights are fled; + Had friends,--his friends are now no more; + And foes,--his foes are dead. + + He loved,--but whom he loved, the grave + Hath lost in its unconscious womb: + O. she was fair!--but nought could save + Her beauty from the tomb. + + He saw whatever thou hast seen; + Encounter'd all that troubles thee: + He was--whatever thou hast been; + He is--what thou shalt be. + + The rolling seasons, day and night, + Sun, moon, and stars, the earth and main, + Erewhile his portion, life and light, + To him exist in vain. + + The clouds and sunbeams, o'er his eye + That once their shades and glory threw, + Have left in yonder silent sky + No vestige where they flew. + + The annals of the human race, + Their ruins, since the world began, + Of HIM afford no other trace + Than this,--THERE LIVED A MAN! + + +November 4, 1805. BARRY CORNWALL'S "EPISTLE TO CHARLES LAMB; + +ON HIS EMANCIPATION FROM CLERKSHIP" + +(WRITTEN OVER A FLASK OF SHERRIS) + +FROM _ENGLISH SONGS_ + +(_See Letter_ 551, _page_ 952) + + Dear Lamb! I drink to thee,--to _thee_ + Married to sweet Liberty! + + What, old friend, and art thou freed + From the bondage of the pen? + Free from care and toil indeed? + Free to wander amongst men + When and howsoe'er thou wilt? + _All_ thy drops of labour spilt, + On those huge and figured pages, + Which will sleep unclasp'd for ages, + Little knowing who did wield + The quill that traversed their white field? + + Come,--another mighty health! + Thou hast earn'd thy sum of wealth,-- + Countless ease,--immortal leisure,-- + Days and nights of boundless pleasure, + Checquer'd by no dreams of pain, + Such as hangs on clerk-like brain + Like a night-mare, and doth press + The happy soul from happiness. + + Oh! happy thou,--whose all of time + (Day and eve, and morning prime) + Is fill'd with talk on pleasant themes,-- + Or visions quaint, which come in dreams + Such as panther'd Bacchus rules, + When his rod is on "the schools," + Mixing wisdom with their wine;-- + Or, perhaps, thy wit so fine + Strayeth in some elder book, + Whereon our modern Solons look + With severe ungifted eyes, + Wondering what thou seest to prize. + Happy thou, whose skill can take + Pleasure at each turn, and slake + Thy thirst by every fountain's brink, + Where less wise men would pause to shrink: + Sometimes, 'mid stately avenues + With Cowley thou, or Marvel's muse, + Dost walk; or Gray, by Eton's towers; + Or Pope, in Hampton's chesnut bowers; + Or Walton, by his loved Lea stream: + Or dost thou with our Milton dream, + Of Eden and the Apocalypse, + And hear the words from his great lips? + + Speak,--in what grove or hazel shade, + For "musing meditation made," + Dost wander?--or on Penshurst Lawn, + Where Sidney's fame had time to dawn + And die, ere yet the hate of Men + Could envy at his perfect pen? + Or, dost thou, in some London street, + (With voices fill'd and thronging feet,) + Loiter, with mien 'twixt grave and gay?-- + Or take along some pathway sweet, + Thy calm suburban way? + + Happy beyond that man of Ross, + Whom mere content could ne'er engross, + Art thou,--with hope, health, "learned leisure;" + Friends, books, thy thoughts, an endless pleasure! + --Yet--yet,--(for when was pleasure made + Sunshine all without a shade?) + Thou, perhaps, as now thou rovest + Through the busy scenes thou lovest, + With an Idler's careless look, + Turning some moth-pierced book, + Feel'st a sharp and sudden woe + For visions vanished long ago! + And then thou think'st how time has fled + Over thy unsilvered head, + Snatching many a fellow mind + Away, and leaving--what?--behind! + Nought, alas! save joy and pain + Mingled ever, like a strain + Of music where the discords vie + With the truer harmony. + So, perhaps, with thee the vein + Is sullied ever,--so the chain + Of habits and affections old, + Like a weight of solid gold, + Presseth on thy gentle breast, + Till sorrow rob thee of thy rest. + + Ay: so't must be!--Ev'n I, (whose lot + The fairy Love so long forgot,) + Seated beside this Sherris wine, + And near to books and shapes divine, + Which poets, and the painters past + Have wrought in lines that aye shall last,-- + Ev'n I, with Shakspeare's self beside me, + And one whose tender talk can guide me + Through fears, and pains, and troublous themes, + Whose smile doth fall upon my dreams + Like sunshine on a stormy sea,-- + Want _something_--when I think of thee! + + + + + LIST OF LETTERS + + ALPHABETICALLY ARRANGED + + Aders, Charles, to Jan. 8, 1823 + Ainsworth, W. Harrison, to May 7, 1822 + Dec. 9, 1823 + Dec. 29, -- + Aitken, J., to July 5, 1825 + Allsop, Thomas, to July 13, 1820 + ? 1821 + ? -- + March 30, -- + Oct. 21, -- + July, 1823 + Sept. 6, -- + Sept. 9, -- + Sept. 10, -- + Sept. -- + ? Oct. -- + Jan. 17, 1825 + Sept. 9, -- + Sept. 24, -- + Dec. 5, -- + ? Middle + Dec., 1827 + Dec. 20, -- + Jan. 9, 1828 + May 1, -- + Jan. 28, 1829 + Late July, -- + July 2, 1832 + Mrs. Thomas, to April 13, 1824 + Arnold, S.J., to (from Charles and Mary Lamb) No date. + Asbury, Jacob Vale, to ? April, 1830 + No date. + _Athenaeum_, printer of, to No date. 1834 + + Ayrton, William, to May 12, 1817 + Oct. 27, 1821 + March 14, 1830 + Mrs. William, to Jan. 23, 1821 + March 15, -- + (from Mary Lamb) No date. + April 16, 1833 + + Barton, Bernard, to Sept. 11, 1822 + Oct. 9, -- + Dec. 23, -- + Jan. 9, 1823 + Feb. 17, -- + March 11, -- + April 5, -- + May 3, -- + July 10, -- + Sept. 2, -- + Sept. 17, -- + Nov. 22, -- + Jan. 9, 1824 + Jan. 23, -- + Feb. 25, -- + March 24, -- + Early + Spring, -- + May 15, -- + July 7, -- + Aug. 17, -- + Sept. 30, -- + Dec. 1, -- + Feb. 10, 1825 + March 23, -- + April 6, -- + July 2, -- + Aug. 10, -- + Feb. 7, 1826 + March 20, -- + May 16, -- + Sept. 26, -- + No date. -- + No date. 1827 + June 11, -- + Aug. 10, -- + Aug. 28, -- + Late -- + Dec. 4, -- + End of -- + April 21, 1828 + Oct. 11, -- + Dec. 5, -- + March 25, 1829 + June 3, -- + July 25, -- + Dec. 8, -- + Feb. 25, 1830 + June 28, -- + Aug. 30, -- + April 30, 1831 + Lucy, to (P.S. to letter to B.B.) Dec. 1, 1824 + Betham, Barbara, to (from Mary Lamb) Nov. 2, 1814 + Mary, to June 5, 1833 + June 5, -- + Jan. 24, 1834 + Matilda, to No date. 1808 + No date. -- + (from Mary Lamb) ? 1811 + ? Late + Summer, 1815 + No date. -- + No date. -- + June 1, 1816 + June, 1833 + + Cary, Rev. H.F., to Oct. 14, 1823 + April 3, 1826 + May 6, 1831 + Sept. 9, 1833 + (from Charles and Mary Lamb) Sept. 12, 1834 + Oct. -- + Oct. 18, -- + Chambers, Charles, to ? May, 1825 + Childs, Mr., to ? Dec., 1834 + No date. -- + Clare, John, to Aug. 31, 1822 + Clarke, Charles Cowden, to Summer, 1821 + Feb. 25, 1828 + Oct., -- + Dec., -- + Feb. 2, 1829 + End of + June, 1834 + Clarkson, Thomas and Catherine, to June, 1807 + Clarkson, Mrs. Thomas, to (from Mary Lamb) Dec. 10, 1808 + Dec. 10, -- + Colburn (?), Henry, to June 14, (?1825) + Sept. 25, 1837 + Coleridge, S.T., to May 27, 1796 + End of May -- + June 10, -- + June 13, -- + July 1, -- + July 5, -- + July 6, -- + Sept. 27, -- + Oct. 3, -- + Oct. 17, -- + Oct. 24, -- + Oct. 28, -- + Nov. 8, -- + Nov. 14, -- + Dec. 2, -- + Dec. 5, -- + Dec. 9, -- + Dec. 10, -- + Jan. 2, 1797 + Jan. 10, -- + Jan. 18, -- + Feb. 5, -- + Feb. 13, -- + April 7, -- + April 15, -- + June 13, -- + June 24, -- + ? June 29, -- + Late July -- + Aug. 24, -- + About + Sept. 20, -- + Jan. 28, 1798 + Early + Summer, -- + ? Jan. 23, 1800 + ? April + 16 or 17, -- + ? Spring, -- + May 12, -- + Coleridge, S.T., to ? Late + July, -- + Aug. 6, -- + Aug. 14, -- + Aug. 26, -- + Sept. 8, 1802 + Oct. 9, -- + Oct. 11, -- + Oct. 23, -- + Nov. 4, -- + April 13, 1803 + May 27, -- + March 10, 1804 + April 5, -- + (from Mary Lamb) No date. + June 7, 1809 + Oct. 30, -- + Aug. 13, 1814 + Aug. 26, -- + Dec. 24, 1818 + ? Summer, 1819 + Jan 10, 1820 + ? Autumn, -- + May 1, 1821 + March 9, 1822 + ? June, 1825 + July 2, -- + March 22, 1826 + June 1, -- + April 14, 1832 + Mrs. S.T., to (from Mary Lamb) Oct. 13, 1804 + Collier, John Dyer, to No date. 1812 + Mr. and Mrs. J.D., to Jan. 6, 1823 + Mrs. J.D., to (from Mary Lamb) No date. + Nov. 2, 1824 + John Payne, to Dec 10, 1817 + May 16, 1821 + Cottle, Joseph, to Nov. 5, 1819 + ? Late -- + ? May 26, 1820 + Dibdin, John Bates, to ? 1823 + May 6, -- + Oct 28, -- + July 28, 1824 + Jan. 11, 1825 + June 30, 1826 + July 14, -- + Sept. 9, -- + Sept. 5, 1827 + Sept. 13, -- + Sept. 18 -- + Oct. 2, -- + Dilke, Charles Wentworth, to March 5, 1832 + Feb., 1833 + April, -- + Middle Dec -- + No date. ? 1834 + No date. -- + End of July -- + Dyer, George, to Dec. 5, 1808 + ? Jan., 1829 + April 29, -- + Dec. 20, 1830 + Feb. 22, 1831 + Mrs. George, to Dec. 22, 1834 + + Elton, C.A., to Aug. 17, 1821 + + Field, Barren, to Aug. 31, 1817 + Aug. 16, 1820 + Sept. 22, 1822 + Oct. 4, 1827 + Forster, John, to ? Late + April, 1832 + Dec. 23, -- + No date. + No date. + No date. + ? March, 1833 + May, -- + May 12, -- + June 25, 1834 + Fryer, Miss, to Feb. 14, -- + No date. + + Gillman, James, to May 2, 1821 + Oct. 26, 1829 + ? Nov. 29, -- + Nov. 30 -- + March 8, 1830 + ? Early + Spring, -- + Gillman, Rev. James, to May 7, 1833 + Aug. 5, 1834 + Godwin, William, to Dec. 4, 1800 + No date. + Autumn, -- + Dec. 10, -- + Dec. 14, -- + June 29, 1801 + Sept. 9, -- + Sept. 17, -- + Nov. 8, 1803 + Nov. 10, -- + ? 1806 + March 11, 1808 + ? 1810 + May 16, 1822 + Mrs., to No date. + Gutch, John Mathew, to No date. 1800 + April 9, 1810 + + Haydon, Benjamin Robert, to Dec. 26, 1817 + Oct. 9, 1822 + Oct. 29, -- + March, 1827 + Aug., 1828 + Hazlitt, William, to Nov. 10, 1805 + Jan. 15, 1806 + Feb. 19, -- + March 15, -- + Aug. 9, 1810 + Nov. 28, -- + Oct. 2, 1811 + Mrs. W. _See_ Stoddart, Sarah + jr., William, to Sept. 13, 1831 + Rev. W., to Feb. 18, 1808 + Hill, Thomas, to No date. + Holcroft, jr., Thomas, to Autumn, 1819 + Hone, William, to April, 1824 + May 2, 1825 + Oct. 24, -- + April, 1827 + End of May, -- + June, -- + Early July, -- + Oct., -- + Dec. 15, -- + May 21, 1830 + March 6, 1833 + Hood, Thomas, to Aug. 10, 1824 + May, 1827 + Sept. 18, -- + No date. ?-- + Late + Autumn, 1828? + ? May, 1829? + Hoods, the Thomas, to (from Mary Lamb) ? Summer, 1828 + Hume, Joseph, to No date. + his daughters, to No date. 1832 + Mrs., to No date. + Humphreys, Miss, to Jan. 27 1821 + Hunt, Leigh, to April 18, -- + ? Nov., 1824 + Dec., 1827 + Hutchinson, Sarah, to (from Mary Lamb) Aug. 29 1815 + Aug. 20, -- + Oct. 19, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Middle of + Nov., 1816 + ? Late -- + April 25, 1823 + (?) No date. + Nov. 25, 1824 + Jan. 20, 1825 + March 1, -- + April 18, -- + + James, Miss Sarah, to ? April, 1829 + Kelly, Fanny, to July 20, 1819 + July 20, -- + Kenny, James and Louisa, to Oct., 1817 + Mrs. James, to (from Mary Lamb) ? Early + Dec., 1822 + Knowles, James Sheridan, to ? April, 1832 + Lamb, Mrs. John, to May 22, 1822 + Mary, to August, -- + Landor, Walter Savage, to Oct., 1832 + Lloyd, Charles, to Autumn, 1823 + Manning, Thomas, to Dec., 1799 + Dec. 28, -- + Feb. 13, 1800 + March 1, -- + March 17, -- + April 5, -- + May 20, -- + ? May 25, -- + Aug. 9, -- + Aug. 11, -- + Aug. 24, -- + Aug. 28, -- + Sept. 22, -- + Oct. 16, -- + Nov. 3, -- + Nov. 28, -- + Dec. 13, -- + Dec. 16, -- + End of Dec.,-- + Dec. 27, -- + Feb. 15, 1801 + Late Feb., -- + April, -- + ? April, -- + Aug., -- + Aug. 31, -- + ? Feb. 15, 1802 + ? April, -- + Sept. 24, -- + Nov., -- + Feb. 19, 1803 + March, -- + Feb. 23, 1805 + July 27, -- + Nov. 15, -- + May 10, 1806 + Dec. 5, -- + Feb. 26, 1808 + March 28, 1809 + Jan. 2, 1810 + Dec. 25, 1815 + Dec. 26, -- + May 28, 1819 + ? Feb 1825 + Marter, W., to July 19, 1824 + Montagu, Basil, to July 12, 1810 + Mrs. Basil, to Summer, 1827 + Morgan, John, to March 8, 1811 + Mrs., to June 17, 1828 + Moxon, Edward, to No date. 1826 + ? Sept., -- + July 17, 1827 + ? Sept. 26, -- + Dec. 22, -- + ? Jan., 1828 + Feb. 18, -- + March 19, -- + May 3, -- + Dec., -- + No date. 1829 + Sept. 22, -- + May 12, 1830 + Nov. 12, -- + ? Dec., -- + ? Dec. 25, -- + Feb. 3, 1831 + July 14, -- + Early + August, -- + Aug. 5, -- + Sept. 5, -- + Oct. 24, -- + Dec. 15, -- + June 1, 1832 + Late -- + Winter, -- + Dec., -- + Jan., 1833 + Jan. 3, -- + Jan. 24, -- + Feb. 11, -- + Feb., -- + No date. -- + Early -- + March 19, -- + ? Spring, -- + March 30, -- + Spring, -- + ? April 10, -- + April 25, -- + April 27, -- + July 14, -- + July 24, -- + and Emma (from Mary and Charles Lamb) ? July 31, -- + (from Mary and Charles Lamb) Sept. 26, -- + Oct. 17, -- + Nov. 29, -- + Jan. 28, 1834 + Norris, Jane, to (from Mary Lamb) Dec. 25, 1841 + Oct. 3, 1842 + (from Miss James) July 25, 1843 + Mrs. Randal, to (from Mary Lamb) June 18, 1823 + Novello, Vincent, to Jan. 25, 1825 + May 9, 1826 + Nov. 6, 1828 + ? Nov. 10, 1829 + May 14, 1830 + Nov. 8, -- + Mrs. Vincent, to (from Mary Lamb) Spring, 1820 + + Ollier, Charles, to ? Dec., 1825 + Early 1826 + March 16, -- + Charles and James, to June 18, 1818 + + Patmore, P.G., to July 19, 1827 + Sept., -- + Payne, J.H., to Autumn, 1822 + Oct. 22, -- + Nov. 13, -- + Jan., 1823 + Jan. 23, -- + Feb. [9], -- + Poole, Thomas, to Feb. 14, 1804 + May 4, -- + May 5, -- + Proctor, B.W., to ? Summer, 1821 + April 13, 1823 + Nov. 11, 1824 + Jan. 19, 1829 + Jan. 22, -- + ? Jan 29, -- + No date. -- + Feb. 2, -- + No date. 1833 + + Rickman, John, to ? Nov., 1801 + April 10, 1802 + July 16, 1803 + Jan. 25, 1806 + March, -- + Oct. 3, 1828 + Robinson, H.C., to March 12, 1808 + May, 1809 + Feb. 7, 1810 + Nov. 20, 1824 + March 29, 1825 + Jan. 20, 1827 + Jan. 20, -- + Jan. 29, -- + Jan., -- + June 26, -- + Oct. 1, -- + Feb. 26, 1828 + Feb. 27, 1829 + ? April, -- + April 17, -- + ? Early + Oct., 1832 + Thomas, to Nov. 11, 1822 + Rogers, Samuel, to March 22, 1829 + Oct. 5, 1830 + ? Dec. 21, 1833 + Russell, J. Fuller, to Summer, 1834 + + Sargus, Mr., to Feb. 23, 1815 + Scott, John, to ? Feb., 1814 + Dec. 12, -- + Sir Walter, to Oct. 29, 1822 + Shelley, Mrs. Percy Bysshe, to July 26, 1827 + Southey, Robert, to July 28, 1798 + Oct. 18, -- + Oct. 29, -- + Nov. 3, -- + Nov. 8, -- + ? Nov., -- + Nov. 28, -- + Dec. 27, -- + Jan. 21, 1799 + Late Jan. + or early + Feb., -- + March 15, -- + March 20, -- + Oct. 31, -- + Nov. 7, 1804 + May 6, 1815 + Aug. 9, -- + Oct. 26, 1818 + Nov. 21, 1823 + Aug. 10, 1825 + May 10, 1830 + Stoddart, Sir John, to Aug. 9, -- + Lady, to (from Mary Lamb) Aug. 9, 1827 + Sarah (later Mrs. Hazlitt), to + (from Mary Lamb) Sept. 21, 1803 + (from Mary Lamb) ? March, 1804 + Late July, -- + Late July, -- + (from Mary Lamb) ? Sept.18, 1805 + Early Nov., -- + Nov. 9 + and 14, -- + ? Feb. 20, 21 + and 22, 1806 + March, -- + June 2, -- + ? July 4, -- + Oct 23, -- + Dec. 11, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Oct., 1807 + Dec. 21, -- + Feb. 12, 1808 + March 16, -- + Dec. 10, -- + Dec. 10, -- + (from Mary Lamb) June 2, 1809 + Nov. 7, -- + ? End of 1810 + Oct. 2, 1811 + Early + Nov., 1823 + March 4, 1830 + May 24, -- + June 3, -- + May 31, 1833 + + Talfourd, T.N., to Aug., 1819 + May 20, 1828 + End of -- + Feb., 1833 + No date. 1834 + Taylor, John, to June 8, 1821 + July 21, -- + Dec. 7, 1822 + + Williams, Mrs., to Feb. 26, 1830 + March 1, -- + March 5, -- + March 22, -- + April 2, -- + April 9, -- + April 21, -- + Wilson, Walter, to Aug. 14, 1801 + Dec. 16, 1822 + Feb. 24, 1823 + May 17, 1828 + May 28, 1829 + Nov. 15, -- + Aug., 1832 + Wordsworth, Dorothy, to (from Mary Lamb) July 9, 1803 + June 2, 1804 + (from Mary Lamb) Oct. 13, -- + May 7, 1805 + June 14, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Aug. 29, 1806 + Nov. 13, 1810 + Nov. 13, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Nov. 23, -- + Nov. 23, -- + (from Mary Lamb) Nov. 21, 1817 + Nov. 21, -- + Nov. 25, 1819 + May 25, 1820 + Jan. 8, 1821 + (from Mary Lamb) Jan. 22, 1830 + Mrs., to Feb. 18, 1818 + William, to Jan. 30, 1801 + March 5, 1803 + Oct. 13, 1804 + Feb. 18, 1805 + Feb. 19, -- + March 5, -- + March 21, -- + April 5, -- + (and Dorothy) Sept. 28, -- + Feb. 1, 1806 + June 26, -- + Dec. 11, -- + Wordsworth, William, to Jan. 29, 1807 + Oct. 19, 1810 + Aug. 9, 1814 + Sept. 19, -- + Dec. 28, -- + ? Early + Jan., 1815 + April 7, -- + April 28, -- + Aug. 9, -- + April 9, 1816 + April 26, -- + Sept. 23, -- + April 26, 1819 + June 7, -- + March 20, 1822 + Jan., 1823 + April 6, 1825 + May, -- + Sept. 6, 1826 + May, 1828 + Jan. 22, 1830 + End of + May, 1833 + Feb. 27, 1834 + + + + + INDEX + + + A + + Acrostics + + Aders, Charles + his pictures, + Lamb's poem to + + _Adventures of Ulysses_ + + "After Blenheim," by Southey + + Agricultural Depression, Lamb on + + Ainsworth, W.H. _See_ Letters. + his dedication to Lamb + his gift of _Syrinx_ + and "Faust" + + Aitken, John. _See_ Letters. + his _Cabinet_ + + _Albion_, Lamb and the + + Albums, Lamb on + + _Album Verses_ + + "Ali Pacha," by Howard Payne + + Allen, Robert + + Allsop, Thomas. _See_ Letters. + + Alsager, T.M. + + "Amicus Redivivus" + + "Ancient Mariner, The" + + Anderson, Dr. + + "Angel Help" + + Angerstein, John Julius + + Angling, Lamb and + + Animal poetry + + "Anna." _See_ Simmons. + + _Annual Anthology, The_ + + _Anti-Jacobin, The_ + + "Antonio," by Godwin + + Appendix: Passages from Books referred to by Lamb + + Aquinas, Thomas + + "Ariadne," by Titian + + Ariel, Lamb as + + Arnold, Samuel James. _See_ Letters. + + "Arthur's Bower" + + Asbury, J.V. _See_ Letters. + and Emma Isola + and Lamb as Ariel + + Asses, old poem on + + _Astrea_ + + Australia, Lamb on + + Authors and Publishers, Lamb on + + Ayrton, William. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. _See_ Letters. + + + B + + Badams, Carlyle's friend + + Mrs., _nee_ Louisa Holcroft. _See_ Letters. + + Baldwin the publisher + + Ball, Sir Alexander + + "Ballad," by Lamb + + Bankrupts, Lamb on + + "Barbara S." + + Barbauld, Mrs. + + Barker, Lieut. John + + Barnes, Thomas + + Bartholomew Fair + + Barton, Bernard. _See_ Letters. + first mention + his suggested retirement from the bank + his testimonial + Lamb on his poems + _Poetic Vigils_ + "Sonnet to Elia" + _Poems_, 4th edition + his _Devotional Verses_ + his _Widow's Tale_ + extracts from his poems + Lamb sends him a picture + his step-grandfather + his _New Year's Eve_ + sonnet to Lamb + his "Spiritual Law" + his "Translation of Enoch" + Lucy, verses to + note to + at Islington + + Baskerville, John + + Battle, Mrs. + + Beaumont and Fletcher + + Beaumont, Sir George + + Bellows Shakespeare + + "Belshazzar's Feast" + + Benger, Miss + + Berkleyans + + Betham, Anne, her legacy + + Barbara. _See_ Letters. + + Mary Matilda. _See_ Letters. + + Bethams, the, their tallness + + Betty, Master + + _Bijou, The_ + + Binding, the perfect + + "Bites," Lamb's + + Blake, William + + Blakesware + + Blanchard, Laman + + Bland, Mrs. + + _Blank Verse_, by Lamb and Lloyd + + Blenheim, its pictures + + Bloomfield, his _Farmer's Boy_ + + Bloxam, Samuel + + Blue-stockings, Lamb among + + Bodleian Library + + Book-binder, Lamb's poor relation + + Book-borrowing, Lamb on + + "Borderers, The," by Wordsworth + + Bourne, Vincent + + Bowles, William Lisle + his allegory, "Hope" + his "Elegiac Stanzas" + + Boyer, James + + Braham, John + + Brawn, Lamb on + + Brighton, the Lambs at + + British Museum, Lamb at + + Brown, Miss, her album verses + + Brutons, the Lambs' cousins + + Buchan, the Earl of + + _Buncle, John_ + + Bungay, Lamb on + + Bunyan + + Burke and Hare + + Burke, Edmund + + Burnet, Bishop, his _Own Times_ + + Burnett, George + and Dyer + + Burney, Captain + + Martin + + Sarah + + Burns, Robert + + Burrell, Miss + + Burton, Lamb's imitations of + + Butterworth, Major + + Button, Emma, Lamb's acrostic + + Button Snap, Lamb's cottage + + Bye, Thomas + + Byron, Lord + + + C + + _Cabinet, The_ + + Callers, Lamb on + + Calne, the Lambs at + + Cambridge, the Lambs' visit in + Lamb at + + "Cambridge Brawn" + + Campbell, J. Dykes + on Coleridge in 1806 + on Coleridge's pension + + Capital Punishment, Lamb on + + Carlisle, Sir Antony + + Caroline of Brunswick + + Cary, H.F. _See_ Letters. + a model parson + his career + at the Museum + and Miss Isola's Latin + and Moxon + his _Euripides_ + his translation of Dante + at the Museum + his verses on Lamb + + Catalani and Coleridge + + Cellini, his autobiography + + Chambers, Charles. _See_ Letters. + and Lamb's praise of fish + his family + + John. _See_ Letters. + + _Champion, The_ + + "Chapel Bell, The," by Southey + + Chapman's _Homer_ + + _Chatsworth_, by Patmore + + Chaucer, Godwin's _Life_ + + Cheshire cats + + _Chessiad, The_ + + Children's books, Lamb on + + Childs, Mr. _See_ Letters. + + Chimney-sweepers + + China, Manning's intentions + Lamb on + + _Christabel_ + + "Christian Names of Women" + + Christ's Hospital + + Christy, Dr. + + Clare, John. _See_ Letters. + + Clarke, Charles Cowden. _See_ Letters. + his career + and Novello + his marriage + his tuft + + Mary Anne + + Mary Victoria (_nee_ Novello) + + Clarkson, Thomas and Catherine. _See_ Letters. + + Coe, Mrs. Elizabeth + + _Caelebs in Search of a Wife_ + + Colburn, Henry. _See_ Letters. + Lamb on + + Zerah + + Cold in the head, Lamb on + + Colebrooke Cottage + + Coleridge, Derwent + + Rev. Edward. _See_ Letters. + + Hartley + + Henry Nelson, his _Six Months in the West Indies_ + + Samuel Taylor. _See_ Letters. + and religion, I + in 1796 + and Southey + his Poems + his share of _Joan of Arc_ + alters Lamb's sonnets + his letter of consolation + and opium + and the 1797 volume + and John Lamb, jr. + his baby song + his Ode on the Departing Year + as a husbandman + his Joan of Arc verses + and Rogers + on Lamb + his refusal to write + his "Osorio" + and the Stowey visit + his "Lime-tree Bower" + and Lamb's greatcoat + and C. Lloyd + the Wedgwood annuity + and Lamb's "Theses Qusaedam Theologicae" + the quarrel with Lamb and Lloyd + his letter of remonstrance to Lamb + with Wordsworth in Germany + in Buckingham Street + his articles in the Morning Post + with Lamb in 1800 + his translation of Schiller + his books + his affection for the Lambs + his Anthology poems + on Wordsworth + at Keswick + his Chamounix Hymn + suggests collaboration with Lamb + on Mary Lamb's illness + his Poems, 3rd edition + his Malta plans + at Malta, + and the Wordsworths + in Italy + returns home + and his wife, + The Friend + neglects the Lambs + his potations + his difference with Wordsworth + and Catalani + in 1814 + his "Remorse" + and the translation of "Faust" + his Biographia Literaria + his Sibylline Leaves + a characteristic end + his "Zapolya" + at a chemist's + recites "Kubla Khan" + puts himself under Gillman + attacked by Hazlitt + at Highgate + his Statesman's Manual + his lectures + at Gillman's + on Peter Bell the Third + his "Fancy in Nubibus" + in Lloyd's poem + his book-borrowing + and Allsop + his dying message in 1807 + at Monkhouse's dinner + and Mrs. Gillman + and Irving + and the Prize Essay + and Hood's _Odes_ + his _Aids to Reflection_ + on Lamb and Herbert + his joke on summer + and the Albums + for St. Luke's + on William IV. + and the pension + imagines an affront + his death + + Sara + the younger + + Collier, John Dyer. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. John Dyer. _See_ Letters. + + John Payne. _See_ Letters. + + _Colonel Jack_ + + "Common Lot, The," by Montgomery + + _Companion, The_ + + _Conciones ad Populum_ + + "Confessions of a Drunkard" + + Congreve and Voltaire + + Cooke, G.F. + + Cooper, Samuel + + Cornwall, Barry. _See also_ B.W. Procter. + his _English Songs_ + his "King Death," + his "Epistle to Charles Lamb" + + Cottle, Joseph. _See_ Letters. + his "Monody on Henderson," + his epic + his brother's death + his _Malvern Hills_ + his _Alfred_ + his portrait + his _Messiah_ + his _Fall of Cambria_ + + Cotton on "Winter" + on "Old Age" + + Coulson, Walter + + Country, Lamb on the + + Coutts, Mrs. + + Covent Garden, Lamb's love for + + Cowes, the Lambs and Burneys there + + Cowper, William + and Milton + _The Royal George_ + + Cresswell, Dr., vicar of Edmonton + + Croly, Rev. George + + Cromwell and Napoleon + + Cromwell, Cooper's portrait of + + Cruelty to animals, John Lamb's pamphlet + + Cunningham, Allan + + _Curse of Kehama_ + + Curtis, Alderman + + + D + + Dalston, the Lambs at + + Danby, the murder of + + Daniel, George + + Samuel + + Darley, George + + Dash, Lamb's dog + + Dawe, George + + "Deathbed, A" + + "Decay of Imagination," Lamb's essay on + + Dedications to Lamb + + Defoe, Daniel + + De Quincey, Thomas + + Dermody, Thomas + + Despard, Colonel + + De Stael, Madame, on Germany + + _Desultory Thoughts in London_ + + "Dialogue between a Mother and Child" + + Dibdin, Charles + + John Bates. _See_ Letters. + his meeting with Lamb + his death + + "Dick Strype" + + Dilke, Charles Wentworth. _See_ Letters + + "Dissertation on Roast Pig" + + Dobell, Mr. Bertram + + Dodd, Dr. + + Dodwell, H., Lamb's letters to + + "Don Giovanni" + + "Douglas," by Home + + Dowden, Mrs. _See_ Mrs. John Lamb. + + _Dramatic Specimens_ + + Drink, Lamb on + + Druitt, Mary + + Duddon Sonnets + + Duncan, Miss + + Dupuy, P.S., his translation + + Dyer, George. _See_ Letters + and Horne Tooke + his poetry + his twin volumes + his many "veins" + his critical preface + and the epic + on Shakespeare + his phrenesis + his fallacy + his _Poems_ + and Burnett + his hunger-madness + as the hero of a novel + and the Earl of Buchan + his autobiography + his annuity + his disappearance + and Earl Stanhope + and Lord Stanhope + on other people's poetry + his "Poetic Sympathies" + his immersion + his novel way with dead books + his marriage + and Novello + and Emma Isola's album + and Rogers + his Unitarian tract + his blindness + + Mrs. George. _See_ Letters + + "Dying Lover, The" + + + E + + _Earl of Abergavenny_ + + East India House + + _Edinburgh Review_ and Wordsworth + + Edmonton, the Lambs' home there + + _Edmund Oliver_ + + "Edward, Edward" + + Elia, F. Augustus + death of the original + + "Elia, Sonnet to" + + _Elia_, dedication of + the American second series + _Last Essays of_ + + Elton, Sir C.A. + + Enfield, Lamb at + Lamb settles there + Lamb's house there + and neighbourhood + + _English Bards and Scotch Reviewers_ + + _English Songs_, by Procter + + _Englishman's Magazine_ + + "Enviable," Lamb on + + Epic poetry and George Dyer + + "Epitaph on Ensign Peacock" + + "--on Mary Druitt" + + "--on the Rigg Children" + + Epitaphs, Lamb on + Wordsworth on + + Evans, William + + Examiner, The, references to Miss Kelly + and Lamb's _Album Verses_ + + _Excursion_, the + + Exeter Change + + + F + + Fairfax's _Tasso_ + + _Falstaffs Letters_ + + "Fancy in Nubibus" + + "Farewell to Tobacco" + + Farmer, Priscilla, Lloyd's grandmother + + "Faulkener," Godwin's play + + Fauntleroy, the forger + + "Faust," by Goethe + + Fawcetts, the two + + Fell, Lamb's friend + + Fenelon + + Fenwick, John + + Field, Barron. _See_ Letters. + + Mary, Lamb's grandmother + + Fireworks, Lamb on + + First-fruits of Australian Poetry + + FitzGerald, Edward, his "Meadows in Spring" + his memoir of Barton + + FitzGerald, Mrs., at Islington + + Fleet Prison + + Fletcher, John, Lamb on + + Ford, John + + Fornham + + Forster, John. _See_ Letters. + + Fox, George, his Journal + + Franklin, Marmaduke + + _Fraser's Magazine_ + + "Free Thoughts on Some Eminent Composers" + + Frenchmen, Lamb on + + Frend, William + + _Friend, The_ + + Fryer, Miss. _See_ Letters. + Lamb's song for + + Fuller, Thomas + + + G + + Gardener, Lamb as a + + _Garrick Extracts_ + + _Gebir_, by Landor + + _Gem, The_ + + "Gentle Giantess, The" + + "Gentle-hearted Charles" + + George III. + + Ghoul, the + + Gilford, William + + Gigliucci, Countess. _See_ Novello, Clara. + + Gillman, James. _See_ Letters. + and Coleridge + + Rev. James. _See_ Letters. + + Gilray, his caricature of Coleridge and Co. + + Goddard House School, Lamb at + + Godiva, Lady, and John Martin + + Godwin, William. _See_ Letters. + and Allen + first meeting + and Coleridge + in Ireland + and Mary Lamb's appetite + his "Antonio" + his pride + his Persian play + his courtship, Lamb on + his "Faulkener" + his dulness + his _Chaucer_ + and Hazlitt + Lamb's apology to + and the _Tales from Shakespear_ + his shop + and the Adventures of Ulysses + his letter of criticism to Lamb + on sepulchres + and Mrs. Godwin + his "tomb" + his disrespect + his difficulties + + Mrs. _See_ Letters. + + Goethe, Lamb on + + Gould, Mrs. _See_ Miss Burrell. + + "Grandame, The" + + "Grandpapa," the, by J. Howard Payne + + Great Russell Street, Lamb's home in + + Grecians, Lamb on + + Green, J.H. + + Greg, Mr., Lamb's tenant + + Gregory, Dr. + + Grenville, Lord, and Coleridge + + Gum-boil and Tooth-ache + + Gutch, John Mathew + + Gwynn, Mr. Stephen, his translations of Lamb's Latin letters + + "Gypsy's Malison, The" + + + H + + Hancock, his drawing of Lamb + + Handwriting, Lamb on + + Harley, J.P. + + Harrow Church, Lamb in + + Hastings, the Lambs at + Hood at, + Lamb on, + Dibdin at + + Haydon, B.R. _See_ Letters. + his career + his party + and Godwin's difficulties + subjects for pictures + his "Chairing the Member" + + Hayes, Mary, and Charles Lloyd + + Hayward, A., his _Faust_ + + Hazlitt, John + + Mrs. John + + Mary + + Sarah. _See_ Sarah Stoddart + + Rev. W. _See_ Letters. + + William. _See_ Letters. + on Lamb + his portrait of Lamb + his first meeting with Lamb + and Ned Search + the misogynist + and Lamb scolded + woos Sarah Stoddart + his love affair + the joke of his death + plans for his wedding + his wedding + missed in London + his _Grammar_ + and the _Political Register_ + his son born + his post on the _Chronicle_ + misunderstanding with Lamb + his review of the _Excursion_ + his Lake Country "scapes" + on Coleridge + his conversation + his borrowings from Lamb + knocked down by John Lamb + his lectures in 1818 + his "Conversation of Authors" + on Lamb's Letter to Southey + on bodily pain + on Shelley + on Lamb + his _Spirit of the Age_ + his second marriage + in Paris + his portrait of Lamb + on Defoe and Lamb + his losses + his death + jr. _See_ Letters. + + "Helen Repentant too Late" + + Hell-fire Dick + + Hemans, Mrs. + + Henderson, Cottle's Monody on + + Henshaw, William, Lamb's godfather + + Herbert, George, Lamb on + + Hesiod, Lamb on + + "Hester" + + Hetty, the Lambs' servant + + Hicks' Hall + + Higginbottom Sonnet + + Hill, Thomas. _See_ Letters. + + Hissing, Lamb on + + Holcroft, Fanny + + Harwood + + Louisa + + Thomas + + Mrs. Thomas. _See_ Mrs. Kenney. + + Tom. _See_ Letter. + + Hollingdon Rural Church + + Hollingshead, Mr. John + + Holmes, Edward + + Homer, Lamb on + + Hone, Alfred + + Matilda + + William. _See_ Letters. + first letter to + _Every-Day Book_ + Lamb's lines to + and the Garrick plays + his _Table Book_ stops + and his difficulties + and the _Times_ + + Hood, Thomas. _See_ Letters. + his _Odes and Addresses_ + Lamb on + his "Very Deaf Indeed" + his still-born child + frames picture with Lamb + his picture of Mary Lamb + and Dash + his _Plea of the Midsummer Fairies_ + his genius + his parody of Lamb + + Hoole, John + + Hopkins, Dick, the swearing scullion + + Howell, James, his _Familiar Letters_ quoted + + Mrs. + + _Hudibras_ quoted + + Hudson, Mr. + + Hugo, Victor, and Lamb + + Hume, Joseph, M.P. + _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. + + the Misses + + Humphreys, Miss. _See_ Letters. + + Hunt, John + + Hunt, Leigh. _See_ Letters. + on Lamb's books + and the Lambs + a lost letter to + his need of friends + in Italy + and freethinking + his handwriting + his _Lord Byron_ + his _Companion_ + and Lamb's _Album Verses_ + and Lamb's _Satan_ + + Hunt, Thornton + + Hurst and Robinson's failure + + Hyde Park, the jubilation in 1814 + + + I + + Imagination, Lamb on + + Imlay, Fanny + + Incendiarism at Enfield + + India, Lamb on + + Inner Temple Lane + + "Innocence," Lamb's sonnet + + Irving, Edward, and Coleridge + his watch chain + with Coleridge at St. Luke's + his squint + + Isle of Wight, the Lambs in + + Isola, Emma + her Latin + to become a governess + her reading of Milton + her album + her engagement at Pornham + her illness + and her physic + and her watch + her marriage + a sonnet to + her appearance + + Harriet + + Italian, the Lambs read + + + J + + James, Sarah, _See_ Letters. + + Jameson, R.S., Hartley Coleridge's sonnets + + Jameson, R.S., and Miss Isola + + "Janus Weathercock," _See also_ Wainewright, T.G. + + Jekyll, Joseph + + Jerdan, William, and Lamb + + _Joan of Arc_, + and Coleridge + + _John Bull_ and Rogers + + _John Buncle_ + + John-Dory, Lamb on + + _John Woodvil_ + + Johnson, Dr. + + Joshua, Martin's picture + + + K + + "Kais," the opera + + Keats, John, at Haydon's + + Kelly, Fanny H. + + Maria. _See_ Letters. + her divine plain face + Lamb's proposal to her + Lamb's sonnet to + her letter to Lamb + learns Latin from Mary Lamb + and "Barbara S." + at the Strand Theatre + + Kenney family + + Mrs. James. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. Louisa (afterwards Mrs. Badams). _See_ Letters. + + Sophy, Lamb's wife + + Keymer, Mr., his album + + Kew Palace, the Lambs at + + "King Death," by Barry Cornwall + + _King and Queen of Hearts, The_ + + "Kirkstone Pass" + + Kitchener, Doctor + + Knight, Anne + + Knowles, J.S. + + Kosciusko, Thaddeus + + "Kubla Khan" + + + L + + "Lady Blanche," verses by Mary Lamb + + Lakes, the Lambs among the + + Lamb family in + + Charles, his temporary madness + his love sonnets + on Priestley + and Coleridge in + on his sonnets + on old plays + on Hope and Fear + and the Bristol holiday + on the tragedy of Sept. 22 + on his sister's virtues + his salary + on his love + his share of Coleridge's _Poems_, 1797 + on simplicity + on Bowles + and his mother + on Coleridge's 2nd edition + his "Tomb of Douglas" + on Cowper and Milton + on Burns + his second sonnet to his sister + on his share of the 1797 _Poems_ + he exhorts Coleridge to attempt an epic + on friendship + his first poem to Lloyd + on a subject for Coleridge + on Cowper + on Quakerism + his "Vision of Repentance" + on the 1797 _Poems_ + at Stowey + leaves Little Queen Street + at Southey's + his lines on his mother's death + his second poem to C. Lloyd + and Lloyd and White + his sarcastic propositions for Coleridge + the quarrel with Coleridge + on Wither and Quarles + on _Rosamund Gray_ + on Southey's "Eclogues" + on Marlowe + on the "Ancient Mariner" + and his tailor + his appeal for a poor friend + on his mind + on poems on dumb creatures + his epitaph on Ensign Peacock + on Blakesware + on alcoholic beverages + and mathematics + on Lloyd and Mary Hayes + on Bishop Burnet + on _Falstaff's Letters_ + among the Blue-stockings + as a linguist + on Hetty's death + on Lake society + on narrow means + on Oxford + his joke against Gutch + on the "Gentle Charles" + the use of the final "e" + by punch-light + as a consoler + and the snakes + his praise of London + he takes in Manning + and Godwin's supper + his Epilogue for "Antonio" + on the failure of "Antonio" + on his Cambridge plans + on the _Lyrical Ballads_ + his move to Mitre Court Buildings + his namesake + on his religious state in 1801 + at Margate + on Godwin's courtship + his dramatic suggestions + on Napoleon + his spare figure + at the Lakes + his project for collaborating with Coleridge + on children's books + on Napoleon and Cromwell + on Chapman's _Homer_ + on Milton's prose + on Cellini + on Independent Tartary + on Coleridge's _Poems_, 3rd edition + his 1803 holiday + his adventure at sea + his difficulties as a reviewer + ceases to be a journalist + his miserliness + on old books + his motto + his portrait by Hazlitt + on John Wordsworth's death + on brawn + on his sister + his portrait by Hancock + on pictures + on Nelson + in unsettled state + on Manning's departure for China + on "Mr. H." + and Hazlitt scolded + reconciled to Godwin + and Hazlitt's "death" + his difference with Godwin + at Hazlitt's wedding + on painter-authors + and the Sheridans + on moving + on critics + on the choice of a wife + criticises Mr. Lloyd's _Homer_ + visits Hazlitt + his books + on titles of honour + a list of friends + on Wither + on epitaphs + his aquavorousness + a servant difficulty + and Hazlitt's _Chronicle_ appointment + on the _Excursion_ + and _The Champion_ + blown up by Hazlitt + his new book room + and Gifford + a landed proprietor + on Wordsworth's 1815 poems + on Vincent Bourne + his office work + on presents + on the India House shackles + his diffidence as a critic + on his sister's illnesses + he lies to Manning + on Coleridge and Wordsworth + on _Christabel_ + his borrowed good things + on Australia + on distant correspondents + as matter-of-lie man + his Hogarths + on the plague of friends + his after-dinner speeches + on _Peter Bell_ + on Mackery End + on _The Waggoner_ + on two inks + his proposal to Miss Kelly + at Cambridge + on William Wordsworth + on other C L.'s + on Lord Byron + on book-borrowing + at Haydon's + and Leigh Hunt + and his aunt's cake + in praise of pig + on death + his efforts for Godwin + his directions for seeing Paris + and his child-wife + on India House + on Shelley + on Godwin's case + and Scott + on Moore + on Defoe + his epigram on Wadd + on George Fox + as _Elia_ + on the advantages of routine + on publishers + his propensity to lie + on Fox + on Quakers + on India House + in Parnassus, 651 + his after-dinner speeches + on Fox + on Colebrooke Cottage + makes his will + at the Mansion House + on Physiology + on Marlowe and Goethe + his cold + not a good man + on monetary gifts + and Thackeray + on booksellers breaking + Hazlitt on + resignation + his release + his pension + on fish + ill + on magazine payment + on puns + on Hood's _Odes_ + on Signor Velluti + on the death of children + lines to Hone + his last _London_ article + on Hood + on Quarles and Herbert + on stationery + on Manning + on a cold + on Brook Pulham's etching + on Hastings + on Fletcher's play + on publishers + his autobiography + on Sunday + his savings + on Randal Norris + at Goddard House School + and Mrs. Norris's pension + his criticism of Patmores Chatsworth + his difficulties with the drama + on Cary + on memorials + on Albums + on mad dogs + his house at Enfield + and Mathew's picture + his epigram on the Edward crosses + portraits of him + on milestones + on the Pilgrim's Progress + his serenata for Cowden Clarke's marriage + his favourite walk + his namesake + will write for antiquity + his "Gypsy's Malison" + his sonnet on Daniel Rogers + on Thomas Aquinas + on the Laureates + his joke upon Robinson + in London in 1829 + and Mary Lamb's absence + and the burden of leisure + moves to the Westwoods + on Defoe + on Thomas Westwood + on bankrupts + on town and country + asked to collect his _Specimens_ + the journey from Fornham + his turnip joke + his skill at acrostics + on an escapade + and Merchant Taylors' boys + and the Hone subscription + on Music + on Martin Burney + visits London in 1830 + on his critics + and his will + on incendiarism + on Dyer's blindness + on Christ's Hospital days + on Coleridge's pension + on Montgomery's "Common Lot" + and the _Englishman's Magazine_ + on FitzGerald's "Meadows in Spring" + on Unitarians + on his unsaleability + on Coleridge's imagined affront + on "Rose Aylmer" + his pensioners + his advice on speculation + spurious letter of + mistaken for a murderer + his sonnet on women's names + and the _Elia_ lawsuit + injury to his leg + on John Taylor, 966. + leaves Enfield for Edmonton + on the _Last Essays of Elia_ + his gift of Milton to Wordsworth + at Widford + his coffin nails + on Emma Isola's marriage + reads the _Inferno_ + his London holiday + his request for books + on Mr. Fuller Russell's poetry + on Coleridge's death + on his excesses at Gary's + his jokes on widows + his name child + Procter's "Epistle" to + + Elizabeth, her death + and her daughter + and John Lamb, jr. + and her sister-in-law + + John, his querulousness + his death + the younger, his accident + and the tragedy + on Coleridge + his pamphlet + his portrait of Milton + knocks down Hazlitt + death of + + Mrs. John. _See_ Letters. + + Mary. _See_ Letters. + her frenzy + and her mother + her recovery + dedication to + Lamb's second sonnet to + removed from confinement, + her 1798 relapse + invited to Stowey + her first poem + her appetite + taken ill + on her brother + on secrecy + on her mother and her aunt + two poems + on John Wordsworth's death + two other poems by + her calligraphy + projecting literary work + on marriage + plans for new books + on Coleridge in 1806 + her silk dress + on presents + on Coleridge + her water cure + on marriage + appeals for Miss Fricker + her letter to a child + discovers a room + her article on Needlework + her first joke + on the Cambridge excursion + on roadside churches + at the window + on the death of a child + teaches Miss Kelly Latin and learns French + ill in France + as a smuggler + her illness + drawn by Hood + her sonnet to Emma Isola + her 1827 illness + her 1829 illness + her verses on her brother + moved to Edmonton + and Emma Isola's marriage + Lamb's praise of + her death + on Mrs. Norris's death + + Sarah (Aunt Hetty) + and the rich relative + her death + her funeral + and her sister-in-law + + Landon, Letitia E. + + Landor, Walter Savage. _See_ Letters. + his _Julian_ + his _Imaginary Conversations_ + and _Elia_ + his visit to Lamb + his verses for Emma Isola + his "Rose Aylmer" + his verses on Lamb + + _Last Essays of Elia_ + + Latin letters by Lamb + + Laureates, Lamb on the + + _Lay of Marie, The + + Legal joke, a + + Le Grice, C.V. + + Samuel + + Leishman, Mrs. + + Leonardo da Vinci + + "Leonora," by Buerger + + Letters in verse + + "Letter to an Old Gentleman" + + "Lewti," by Coleridge + + Lies + + "Lime-tree Bower," Coleridge's poem + + Lincolnshire and the Lambs + + Liston, John + + _Literary Gazette, The_ + + "Living without God in the World" + + Livingston, Mr. Luther S. + + Lloyd, Charles, the elder, described by Robert Lloyd + the elder, Lamb's letters to + + the younger. _See_ Letters. + his career to 1796 + his sonnets on "Priscilla Farmer" + Lamb's lines to + on Lamb + his illness + and Coleridge + at Southey's + and Sophia Pemberton + Lamb's lines on + a quarrel averted + the quarrel with Coleridge + letter to Cottle + and _The Anti-Jacobin_ + and Mary Hayes + his first-born + an "American" + described by Robert Lloyd + a lost letter to + his illness in 1815 + in London, in 1819 + his _Desultory Thoughts in London_ + his _Poems_, 1823 + + Olivia + + Priscilla + + Robert, Lamb's first letter to + with Lamb + advice from his sister + advice from Lamb + in London, 1800 + Lamb's letters to + on his father + his marriage + in London + his death + + Sophia + + Lockhart, J.G. + + Lofft, Capell + + Logan quoted + + London, Lamb's praise of + + _London Magazine, The_ + + London Tavern dinner + + "Londoner, The," by Lamb + + Lord Chief Justice, Lamb on + + Lord Mayor of London and Leviathan + + Lottery puffs + tickets + + "Love will Come," by Lamb + + Love sonnets, Lamb's + + Lovell, Robert + + Luther in the Warteburg + + lyrical Ballads + + + M + + Mackery End, Lamb on + + Mackintosh, Sir James, Lamb's epigram + + Macready and Lamb + + Magazines, Lamb on + + Man, Henry, his epigram + + "Man of Ross" + + Manning, Thomas. _See_ Letters. + his career to 1799 + his grimaces + his letters to Lamb + unpublished Setters from Lamb + first news of China + in Paris + and Napoleon + his Chinese project + he leaves for China + Thibet and China + his return to England + on Wordsworth + and Fanny Holcroft + at the Lambs + Lamb on + his last days + + Mansion House, Lamb at + + Marlowe, Christopher + + Marriage, Lamb on + + Mary Lamb on + + Marshall, Godwin's friend + + Marter, William. _See_ Letters. + + Martin, John + + Louisa, viii. + + Marvell quoted + + Mary of Buttermere + + Maseres, Baron + + Massinger, Philip + + Mathematics and Lamb + + Mathews, Charles, his picture + + Mrs. Charles, and the Lambs + + Mathias' _Pursuits of Literature_ + + "Matter-of-lie man," Lamb as + + May, John + + William, I. + + "Meadows in Spring," by FitzGerald + + Mellish, Mr. + + Mellon, Harriet + + Merchant Taylors' epigrams + + Meyer, Henry, "The Young Catechist" + his portrait of Lamb + + Milestones, Lamb on + + Milton, John, and Cowper + + Milton, John, his Defence + John Lamb's portrait + Lamb's gift to Wordsworth + + Mitchell, Thomas + + Mitford, Rev. John + + Mary Russell + + Monkhouse, Thomas + + "Monody on Chatterton" + + Montagu, Basil. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. Basil. _See_ Letters. + + Montgomery, James, and chimney-sweepers + his "Common Lot" + + Moore, Thomas, and Lamb + + Morgan, John + + Mrs. John + + _Morning Chronicle_ + + _Morning Post_ + + Moving, Lamb on + + Moxon, Edward. _See_ Letters. + first mention + his career to 1826 + Lamb's first letter to + his early poems + his _Christmas_ + his Nightingale sonnet + and Rogers + his _Reflector_ + small commissions for Lamb + and Murray + his proposal to Miss Isola + his Oak sonnet + his marriage + his sonnets + + "Mr. H." + + _Mrs. Leicester's School_ + + _Mrs. Leslie and Her Grandchildren_ + + Murray, John + + Music, Lamb on + + + N + + Napoleon + and Manning + and Cromwell + his height + + Nayler, James + + Necessarianism + + Nelson, his death + + _New Monthly Magazine_ + + New River, Lamb on + + "New Year's Eve" + + _New Year's Eve, A_, by Barton + + "Newspapers," Lamb's essay on + + Norris, Miss Jane. _See_ Letters. + + Randal + + Mrs. Randal. _See_ Letters. + + Richard + + Nott, Dr. John + + Novello, Clara (Countess Gigliucci) + + Vincent. _See_ Letters. + + Mrs. Vincent. _See_ Letters. + + Novellos, the + + + O + + _Ode on the Departing Year_ + + "Ode to the Treadmill" + + _Odes and Addresses_, by Hood and Reynolds + + Office work, Lamb on + + "Old Actors, The" + + "Old Familiar Faces, The" + + Oilier, C. and J. _See_ Letters. + + "On an Infant Dying as soon as Born" + + "Osorio," Coleridge's drama + + Oxford, Lamb at + + + P + + Paice, Joseph + + Palmerston, Lord + + Pantisocracy, II. + + Pardo, Father + + Paris, Lamb on + + Mrs. + + Park, Judge + + Parr, Dr., and Lamb + + Parsons, Mrs. + + Pasta, Madame + + Patmore, Coventry + + P.G. _See_ Letters. + John Scott's second + a nonsense letter to + his _Chatsworth_ + his imitation of Lamb + seeking a publisher + + Paul, C. Kegan, and the "Theses" + + "Pawnbroker's Daughter, The" + + Payne, John Howard. _See_ Letters. + + Peacock, Ensign + + Pemberton, Sophia + + Penn, William, his _No Cross, No Crown_ + + Persian ambassador + + _Peter Bell_, by Wordsworth + + _Peter Bell the Third_ + + "Peter's Net" + + _Philip Quarll_ + + Phillips, Colonel + + Ned + + Sir Richard + + Phillips's _Theatrum Poetarum_ + + Physiology, Lamb on + + Pictures, Lamb on + + Pig, Lamb's praise of + + _Pilgrims Progress_ + + Pindar, Peter + + "Pipos." _See_ Derwent Coleridge + + "Pizarro," Sheridan's play + + Plantus, Joseph + + _Plea of the Midsummer Fairies_ + + Plumer family + + Plura, a mysterious woman + + "Poetic Sympathies," by George Dyer + + _Poetry for Children_ + + Poets' dinner party + + "Poet's Epitaph," by Wordsworth + + _Political Decameron, The_ + + Pompey, Lamb's dog + + Poole, John + + Thomas. _See_ Letters. + + "Poor Susan, Reverie of" + + Pope, Alexander + + "Popular Fallacies" + + Postage rates in 1797 + + Presentation copies, Lamb on + + Presents, Lamb on + + "Pride's Cure." _See John Woodvil._ + + Priestley, Joseph + + Procter, B.W. _See_ Letters. + _See also_ Barry Cornwall. + in 1823 + his marriage + and Lamb's will + and Pulham's etching + + Mrs., and Lamb + + _Prometheus Unbound_ story + + Pry, Tom + + Publishers, Lamb on + + Pulham, Brook, his etching of Lamb + + Pun at Salisbury + + Puns, Lamb on + + _Purchas, His Pilgrimage_ + + Pye, Henry James + + + Q + + Quakers + + Quarles, Lamb on + + _Quarterly Review_, Lamb's review for + and Lamb + + Quillinan, Edward + + + R + + _Recreations in Agriculture_, etc. + + _Reflector, The_, Moxon's paper + + Reform Bill + + _Rejected Addresses_ + + _Rejected Articles_ + + "Religion of Actors" + + "Religious Musings" + + Rembrandt + + "Remorse," by Coleridge + + Reynolds, John Hamilton + + Miss + + Mrs., Lamb's schoolmistress + + Rheumatism, Lamb on + + "Richard II.," Lamb's epilogue to + + Richmond, the Lambs at + + Rickman, John. _See_ Letters. + + Miss + + Mrs. + + Rigg children, Lamb's verses on + + _Rimini_, Leigh Hunt's poem + + "Road to Ruin, The" + + _Robinson Crusoe_ + + Robinson, Anthony + + Mrs. Anthony + + Henry Crabb. _See_ Letters. + he meets Lamb + Lamb on + and "Peter Bell," + his admiration of Wordsworth + his presents to Lamb + at Monkhouse's dinner + his present to Mary Lamb + his rheumatism. + + Thomas. _See_ Letters. + + _Roderick_, by Southey + + Rogers, Daniel, Lamb's sonnet on + + Rogers, Samuel. _See_ Letters. + and Coleridge + and Wordsworth's "Force of Prayer" + at Monkhouse's dinner + his letter to Lamb + and Moxon + his _Italy_ + and _John Bull_ + and G. Dyer + Lamb's sonnet to + + Romilly, Sir Samuel + + _Rosamund Gray_ + + "Rose Aylmer," by Landor + + _Roxana_ + + Russell, J. Fuller. _See_ Letters. + and _Satan in Search of a Wife_ + his poem criticised + + Ryle, Charles + + + S + + Sadler's Wells + + "Saint Charles" + + "St. Crispin to Mr. Gifford" + + St. Luke's Hospital + + Salisbury, Lamb's pun at + + Salt-water soap + + Salutation and Cat + + Sargus, Mr. _See_ Letters. + Lamb's tenant + + _Satan in Search of a Wife_ + + Savage, Richard + + Savory, Hester + + Scott, John. _See_ Letters. + + Sir Walter. _See_ Letters. + + Sentiment, Lamb on + + Settle, Elkanah + + Shakespeare, George Dyer on + the Bellows portrait + and _Elia_ + his illustrations + + "She dwelt among the untrodden ways" + + Sheep-stealing, Lamb on + + Shelley, P.B. + death of + Lamb on + Hazlitt on, + "Lines to a Reviewer" + + Mrs. P.B. _See_ Letters. + + Sheridan and Lamb + + Simmons, Ann + + Simonds, the ghoul + + _Six Months in the West Indies_ + + Skeffington, Sir Lumley + + Skiddaw, Lamb on + + Smith, Charlotte + + Mrs. + + Smoking, Lamb on + + Snakes, Lamb visits + + "Soldier's Daughter, The," by J. Howard Payne + + Sonnet to Elia + on "Work" + + "Sonnet to a Nameless Friend" + + Southampton Buildings + + Southey, Edith + sonnet to + + Dr. + + Robert, his _Joan of Arc_ + 1796 + and Cowper + his daetyl + and Coleridge + his _Madoc_ + entertains Lamb and Lloyd + and the "Sonnet to Simplicity" + his _Joan of Arc_ + his "Eclogues" + on "The Ancient Mariner" + his _Poems_, 2nd edition + his description of Manning + in Dublin + on the perfect household + his _Curse of Kehama_ + his _Roderick_ + death of his son + the lapidary style + his fortune + his criticism of _Elia_ + Lamb's Letter to + his reply to Lamb + his _Tale of Paraguay_ + his _Book of the Church_ + his "Vesper Bell" + his "Chapel Bell" + his _Life of Bunyan_ + and Hone + his defence of Lamb + + Spenser, Edmund, and Mr. Spencer + his sonnet to Harvey + + _Spirit of the Age, The_ + + "Spiritual Law," by Barton + + Stamps, Comptroller of + + Stationery, Lamb on + + Stoddart, John. _See_ Letters. + + Lady. _See_ Letters. + + Sarah (afterwards Sarah Hazlitt). _See_ Letters. + her love affairs + her mother's illness + plans for her wedding + her wedding + + Stoke Newington, the Lambs at + + Stothard, Thomas, Lamb's lines to + + Stowey, Lamb at + + Stuart, Daniel, on Lamb + + Sunday, Lamb on + + "Superannuated Man" + + "Supersedeas," by Wither + + "Suum Cuique," by Lamb + + Swift, Dean + + Swinburne, A.C., and Lamb, and + + Hugo + on Lamb's dramatic suggestions + + Sydney, Sir Philip, and Lamb + + _Sylvia_, by George Darley + + + T + + _Table Book_, Lamb's fable + + Tailors, Lamb on + + _Tales from Shakespear_ + + Talfourd, Thomas Noon. _See_ Letters. + made a serjeant + his "Verses in Memory of a Child" + + Talma and Lamb + + "Tartar Drum," Lamb's version + + Tartary, Lamb on + + _Tatler, The_, and Jerdan + + Tayler, C.B. + + Taylor, Jeremy + John. _See_ Letters. + editor of the _London Magazine_ + and the _Elia_ lawsuit + + Temple finally left + + Thackeray and Lamb + + _Thanksgiving Ode_, by Wordsworth + + Thekla's song in "Wallenstein" + + Thelwall, John + + "Theses Quaedam Theologicae" + + Thievery in Australia + + Thurlow, Lord + + Thurtell the murderer + + Titian, Mary Lamb's verses + the Music Piece + + Titles of honour, Lamb on + + "To a Bird that Haunted the Waters of Lacken" + + "To Emma Learning Latin and Desponding" + + "To a Friend on his Marriage" + + "To the Poet Cowper" + + "To Sarah and her Samuel" + + "To my Sister," sonnet + + "To a Young Lady going out to India" + + Tobin, James Webbe + + John + + "Tomb of Douglas, The" + + "Tooth-ache and Gum-boil" + + Towers, Mrs., Lamb's sonnet to + + Town and country, Lamb on + + Toynbee, Dr. Paget + + "Translation of Enoch," by Barton + + Travels, Lamb on + + Trelawney, E.J. + + Trimmer, Mrs. + + Tunbridge Wells, the Lambs at + + Turbot, Lamb on + + Turnips and legs of mutton + + Tuthill, Sir George + + Twiss, Horace + + + U + + Unitarianism + + + V + + Velluti, Signer + + "Vindictive Man, The" + + Virgin and Child, Mary Lamb's verses + + "Vision of Horns" + + "Vision of Judgment," by Byron + + "Vision of Repentance, A" + + Voltaire and Congreve + + Voltaire and Wordsworth + Lamb on + + + W + + Wadd, Lamb's colleague + + Waggoner, The + + Wainewright, T.G., _See also_ "Janus Weathercock" + + Walton, Isaak + + Warner's _Syrinx_ + + Watch, Emma Isola's + + _Watchman, The_ + + Webster, his "Vittoria Corombona" + + Wednesdays, Lamb's evening + + Wesley, Miss + + Westwood, Thomas + Cottage + + Wharry, Dr. + + Whist + + "White Devil, The" + + _White Doe of Rylstone_ + + White, Edward + James + + Widford + + "Widow, The" + + _Widow's Tale, The_, by Barton + + Widows, a list of + + "Wife, The," by Sheridan Knowles + + "Wife's Trial, The," by Lamb + + Wilde, Serjeant + + William IV. + + Williams, Mrs. _See_ Letters + and Emma Isola + and the acrostics + + Wilson, John, his biography + + Wilson, Walter. _See_ Letters. + and Lamb's apology + Lamb's fellow-clerk + visits Lamb + his _Life of Defoe_ + + Windham, William + + Winterslow + the Lambs at + + "Witch, The," by Lamb + + Wither, George, and Quarles + Lamb on + his "Supersedeas" + + Woolman, John + + Wordsworth, Dorothy. _See_ Letters. + at Stowey + a letter from + her poems + + Wordsworth, William, _See_ Letters. + at Stowey + and Coleridge in Germany + his economy + _Lyrical Ballads_, 2nd edition + at Bartholomew Fair + his marriage + his L8 worth of books + and Shakespeare + his difference with Coleridge + _The Excursion_ + and Voltaire + his _Poems_, 1815 edition + his illegible hand + on Burns + and _Peter Bell the Third_ + _The Waggoner_ + his Duddon sonnets + at Haydon's + + Wordsworth, William, at Monkhouse's dinner + in London + his Milton, a gift from Lamb + + John, his death + William, jr. + + "Work," Lamb's sonnet + + _Works_, Lamb's + + Worsley, Lady Frances + + Wortley, Lady Mary + + Wroughton, Richard, his letter about "Mr. H." + + + Y + + "Yarrow Visited" + + "Yew Trees," Wordsworth's poem + + "Young Catechist, The" + + + Z + + "Zapolya" + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb +(Vol. 6), by Charles and Mary Lamb + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WORKS OF C. & M. LAMB, V6 *** + +***** This file should be named 10851.txt or 10851.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/8/5/10851/ + +Produced by Keren Vergon, Virginia Paque and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. 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