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THE
LETTERS OF CHARLES LAMB

i 8 14-18 25
VOLUME IV

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Tiyy

THE LETTERS OF

CHARLES LAMB

IN WHICH MANYMUTILATED WORDS
AND PASSAGES HAVE BEEN RESTORED JT
TO THEIR ORIGINAL FORM ; WITH |f
LETTERS NEVER BEFORE PUBLISHEltl
AND FACSIMILES OF ORIGINAL AS
LETTERS AND POEMS

WITH AN INTBODUCTION BIT

HENRY H. HARPER

'■.:■':■"■ I5SJXEIJ-BV

HE BIBIjKIFBILE- SOCE'J ' '

FO»*ME»IBERS ONLY

-i// rights reserved

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LETTER CCXXV

CHARLES LAMB TO S. T. COLERIDGE

August 26, 1 8 14.

Let the hungry soul rejoice : there is corn in
Egypt. Whatever thou hast been told to the con-
trary by designing friends, who perhaps inquired
carelessly, or did not inquire at all, in hope of
saving their money, there is a stock of Remorse
on hand, enough, as Pople conjectures, for seven
years' consumption; judging from experience of
the last two years. Methinks it makes for the
benefit of sound literature, that the best books do
not always go off best. Inquire in seven years'
time for the Rokebys and the Laras, and where
shall they be found? — fluttering fragmentally in
some thread-paper; whereas thy Wallenstein and
thy Remorse are safe on Longman's or Pople's
shelves, as in some Bodleian; there they shall
remain ; no need of a chain to hold them fast —
perhaps for ages — tall copies — and people shan't
run about hunting for them as in old Ezra's shriev-
alty they did for a Bible, almost without effect
till the great-great-grandniece (by the mother's
side) of Jeremiah or Ezekiel (which was it?) re-
membered something of a book, with odd read-
ing in it, that used to lie in the green closet in
her aunt Judith's bedchamber.

The caterer Price was at Hamburgh when last
Pople heard of him, laying up for thee, like some
miserly old father for his generous-hearted son
to squander.

Mr. Charles Aders, whose books also pant for
that free circulation which thy custody is sure
to give them, is to be heard of at his kinsmen,
Messrs. Jameson and Aders, No. 7 Laurence
Pountney Lane, London, according to the infor-
mation which Crabius with his parting breath
left me. Crabius is gone to Paris. I prophesy he
and the Parisians will part with mutual contempt.
His head has a twist Allemagne, like thine, dear
mystic.

I have been reading Madame [de] Stael on
Germany. An impudent clever woman. But
if Faust be no better than in her abstract of it,
I counsel thee to let it alone. How canst thou
translate the language of cat-monkeys ? Fie on
such fantasies ! But I will not forget to look for
Proclus. It is a kind of book which, when we
meet with it, we shut up faster than we opened
it. Yet I have some bastard kind of recollection
that somewhere, some time ago, upon some stall
or other, I saw it. It was either that or Plothius,
or Saint Augustine's City of God. So little do some
folks value, what to others, sc. to you, "well used,"
had been the " Pledge of Immortality." Bishop
Bruno I never touched upon. Stuffing too good
for the brains of such a "Hare" [J. C. Hare] as
thou describest. May it burst his pericranium, as

the gobbets of fat and turpentine (a nasty thought
of the seer) did that old dragon in the Apo-
crypha! May he go mad in trying to understand
his author ! May he lend the third volume of
him before he has quite translated the second,
to a friend who shall lose it, and so spoil the
publication ; and may his friend find it and send
it him just as thou or some such less dilatory
spirit shall have announced the whole for the
press; lastly, may he be hunted by Reviewers,
and the devil jug him !

So I think I have answered all the questions
except about Morgan's gos-lettuces. The first
personal peculiarity I ever observed of him (all
worthy souls are subject to 'em) was a particular
kind of rabbit-like delight in munching salads
with oil without vinegar after dinner — a steady
contemplative browsing on them — didst never
take note of it? Canst think of any other queries
in the solution of which I can give thee satisfac-
tion? Do you want any books that I can procure
for you ? Old Jimmy Boyer is dead at last.

Trollope has got his living, worth ^iooo
a-year net. See, thou sluggard, thou heretic-
sluggard, what mightest thou not have arrived
at ! Lay thy animosity against Jimmy in the
grave. Do not entail it on thy posterity.

C. Lamb

i i

CCXXVL — TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

September 19, 18 14.

My dear W., — I have scarce time or quiet to
explain my present situation, how unquiet and
distracted it is. Owing to the absence of some
of my compeers, and to the deficient state of
payments at E. I. H., owing to bad peace specu-
lations in the calico market (I write this to
W. W., Esq., Collector of Stamp duties for the
conjoint northern counties, not to W. W., Poet)
I go back, and have for these many days past, to
evening work, generally at the rate of nine hours
a day. The nature of my work, too, puzzling and
hurrying, has so shaken my spirits, that my sleep
is nothing but a succession of dreams of business
I cannot do, of assistants that give me no assist-
ance, of terrible responsibilities.

I reclaimed your book, which Hazlitt has un-
civilly kept, only two days ago, and have made
shift to read it again with shattered brain. It
does not lose — rather some parts have come out
with a prominence I did not perceive before — -
but such was my aching head yesterday (Sunday)
that the book was like a mountain landscape to
one that should walk on the edge of a precipice.
I perceived beauty dizzily. Now what I would
say is, that I see no prospect of a quiet half-day
or hour even till this week and the next are past.
I then hope to get four weeks' absence, and if
then is time enough to begin I will most gladly

do what you require, tho' I feel my inability,
for my brain is always desultory, and snatches
off hints from things, but can seldom follow
a " work " methodically. But that shall be
no excuse. What I beg you to do is to let me
know from Southey, if that will be time enough
for the Quarterly, i. e. suppose it done in three
weeks from this date (September 19): if not,
it is my bounden duty to express my regret and
decline it.

Mary thanks you and feels highly grateful for
your Patent of Nobility, and acknowledges the
author of Excursion as the legitimate Fountain
of Honour. We both agree, that to our feeling
Ellen is best as she is. To us there would have
been something repugnant in her challenging her
penance as a dowry ! the fact is explicable, but
how few to whom it could have been render'd
explicit !

The unlucky reason of the detention of Ex-
cursion was, Hazlitt and we having a misunder-
standing. He blowed us up about six months
ago, since which the union hath snapt, but M.
Burney borrow'd it for him, and after reiterated
messages I only got it on Friday. His remarks
had some vigour in them, particularly something
about an old ruin being too modern for your pri-
meval nature, and about a lichen, but I forget the
passage ; but the whole wore a slovenly air of
despatch and disrespect. That objection which
M. Burney had imbibed from him about Vol-

taire, I explain'd to M. B. (or tried) exactly on
your principle of its being a characteristic speech.
That it was no settled comparative estimate of
Voltaire with any of his own tribe of buffoons —
no injustice, even if you spoke it, for I dared say
you never could relish Candide. I know I tried
to get thro' it about a twelvemonth since, and
could n't for the dulness. Now, I think I have
a wider range in buffoonery than you. Too much
toleration perhaps.

I finish this after a raw ill-bak'd dinner, fast
gobbled up, to set me off to office again after
working there till near four. O Christ ! how I
wish I were a rich man, even tho' I were squeezed
camel-fashion at getting thro' that needle's eye
that is spoken of in the Written Word. Apropos,
are you a Christian ? or is it the Pedlar and the
Priest that are ?

I find I miscall'd that celestial splendour of
the mist going off, a sunset. That only shews my
inaccuracy of head.

Do pray indulge me by writing an answer
to the point of time mentioned above, or let
Southey. I am asham'd to go bargaining in this
way, but indeed I have no time I can reckon on
till the first week in October. God send I may
not be disappointed in that !

Coleridge swore in letter to me he would
review Excursion in the Quarterly. Therefore,
tho' that shall not stop me, yet if I can do any-
thing, when done, I must know of him if he has

anything ready, or I shall fill the world with
loud exclaims.

I keep writing on, knowing the postage is no
more for much writing, else so fagg'd and dis-
jointed I am with damn'd India House work,
I scarce know what I do. My left arm reposes
on Excursion. I feel what it would be in quiet.
It is now a sealed book.

O happy Paris, seat of idleness and pleasure !
From some return'd English I hear that not such
a thing as a counting-house is to be seen in her
streets, — scarce a desk. Earthquakes swallow
up this mercantile city and its gripple merchants,
as Drayton hath it, " born to be the curse of this
brave isle." I invoke this not on account of any
parsimonious habits the mercantile interest may
have, but, to confess truth, because I am not fit
for an office.

Farewell, in haste, from a head that is ill to
methodize, a stomach to digest, and all out of
tune. Better harmonies await you !

C. Lamb

CCXXVII. — TO ROBERT SOUTHEY

October 20, 18 14.

Dear S., — I have this day deposited with Mr.
G. Bedford the essay you suggested to me. I am
afraid it is wretchedly inadequate. Who can cram
into a strait coop of a review any serious idea of
such a vast and magnificent poem as Excursion ?

I am myself, too, peculiarly unfit from con-
stitutional causes and want of time. However, it
is gone.

I have nine or ten days of my holydays left,
but the rains are come.

Kind remembrances to Mrs. S. and sisters.
Yours truly, C. L.

CCXXVIIL — MARY LAMB TO BARBARA
BETHAM (aged 14)

November 2, 18 14.

It is very long since I have met with such an
agreeable surprise as the sight of your letter, my
kind young friend, afforded me. Such a nice
letter as it is too. And what a pretty hand you
write. I congratulate you on this attainment
with great pleasure, because I have so often felt
the disadvantage of my own wretched hand-
writing.

You wish for London news. I rely upon your
sister Ann for gratifying you in this respect,
yet I have been endeavouring to recollect whom
you might have seen here, and what may have
happened to them since, and this effort has only
brought the image of little Barbara Betham,
unconnected with any other person, so strongly
before my eyes that I seem as if I had no other
subject to write upon. Now I think I see you
with your feet propped upon the fender, your
two hands spread out upon your knees — an atti-

tude you always chose when we were in familiar
confidential conversation together — telling me
long stories of your own home, where now you
say you are " Moping on with the same thing
every day," and which then presented nothing
but pleasant recollections to your mind. How
well I remember your quiet steady face bent
over your book. One day, conscience struck at
having wasted so much of your precious time in
reading, and feeling yourself, as you prettily said,
" quite useless to me," you went to my drawers
and hunted out some unhemmed pocket-hand-
kerchiefs, and by no means could I prevail upon
you to resume your story books till you had
hemmed them all. I remember, too, your teach-
ing my little maid to read — your sitting with
her a whole evening to console her for the death
of her sister ; and that she in her turn endeav-
oured to become a comforter to you, the next
evening, when you wept at the sight of Mrs.
Holcroft, from whose school you had recently
eloped because you were not partial to sitting
in the stocks. Those tears, and a few you once
dropped when my brother teased you about your
supposed fondness for an apple dumpling, were
the only interruptions to the calm contentedness
of your unclouded brow. We still remain the
same as you left us, neither taller nor wiser, or per-
ceptibly older, but three years must have made
a great alteration in you. How very much, dear
Barbara, I should like to see you !

We still live in Temple Lane, but I am now-
sitting in a room you never saw. Soon after you
left us we were distressed by the cries of a cat,
which seemed to proceed from the garrets ad-
joining to ours, and only separated from ours by
a locked door on the farther side of my brother's
bedroom, which you know was the little room
at the top of the kitchen stairs. We had the
lock forced and let poor puss out from behind
a pannel of the wainscot, and she lived with us
from that time, for we were in gratitude bound
to keep her, as she had introduced us to four
untenanted, unowned rooms, and by degrees we
have taken possession of these unclaimed apart-
ments — first putting up lines to dry our clothes,
then moving my brother's bed into one of these,
more commodious than his own room. And last
winter, my brother being unable to pursue a
work he had begun, owing to the kind inter-
ruptions of friends who were more at leisure
than himself, I persuaded him that he might
write at his ease in one of these rooms, as he
could not then hear the door knock, or hear
himself denied to be at home, which was sure
to make him call out and convict the poor maid
in a fib. Here, I said, he might be almost really
not at home. So I put in an old grate, and made
him a fire in the largest of these garrets, and
carried in one table, and one chair, and bid him
write away, and consider himself as much alone
as if he were in a new lodging in the midst of

Salisbury Plain, or any other wide unfrequented
place where he could expect few visitors to break
in upon his solitude. I left him quite delighted
with his new acquisition, but in a few hours he
came down again with a sadly dismal face. He
could do nothing, he said, with those bare white-
washed walls before his eyes. He could not write
in that dull unfurnished prison.

The next day, before he came home. from his
office, I had gathered up various bits of old car-
petting to cover the floor; and, to a little break
the blank look of the bare walls, I hung up a
few old prints that used to ornament the kitchen,
and after dinner, with great boast of what an
improvement I had made, I took Charles once
more into his new study. A week of busy labours
followed, in which I think you would not have
disliked to have been our assistant. My brother
and I almost covered the walls with prints, for
which purpose he cut out every print from every
book in his old library, coming in every now
and then to ask my leave to strip a fresh poor
author — which he might not do, you know,
without my permission, as I am elder sister.
There was such pasting, such consultation where
their portraits, and where the series of pictures
from Ovid, Milton, and Shakespear would show
to most advantage, and in what obscure corner
authors of humbler note might be allowed to
tell their stories. All the books gave up their
stores but one, a translation from Ariosto, a deli-

cious set of four and twenty prints, and for which
I had marked out a conspicuous place ; when
lo ! we found at the moment the scissars were
going to work that a part of the poem was
printed at the back of every picture. What a
cruel disappointment ! To conclude this long
story about nothing, the poor despised garret is
now called the print room, and is become our
most favourite sitting room.

Your sister Ann will tell you that your friend
Louisa is going to France. Miss Skepper is out
of town, Mrs. Reynolds desires to be remem-
bered to you, and so does my neighbour Mrs.
Norris, who was your doctress when you were
unwell, her three little children are grown three
big children. The Lions still live in Exeter
Change. Returning home through the Strand,
I often hear them roar about twelve o'clock at
night. I never hear them without thinking of
you, because you seemed so pleased with the
sight of them, and said your young companions
would stare when you told them you had seen
a Lion.

And now, my dear Barbara, fare well, I have
not written such a long letter a long time, but
I am very sorry I had nothing amusing to write
about. Wishing you may pass happily through
the rest of your school days, and every future
day of your life,

I remain, your affectionate Friend,

M. Lamb
20

My brother sends his love to you, with the
kind remembrance your letter shewed you have
of us as I was. He joins with me in respects to
your good father and mother, and to your brother
John, who, if I do not mistake his name, is
your tall young brother who was in search of a
fair lady with a large fortune. Ask him if he
has found her yet. You say you are not so tall
as Louisa — you must be, you cannot so degen-
erate from the rest of your family. Now you
have begun, I shall hope to have the pleasure of
hearing from [you] again. I shall always receive
a letter from you with very great delight.

CCXXIX. — TO JOHN SCOTT

December 12, 18 14.

Sir, — I am sorry to seem to go off my agree-
ment, but very particular circumstances have
happened to hinder my fulfilment of it at present.
If any single essays ever occur to me in future,
you shall have the refusal of them. Meantime
I beg you to consider the thing as at an end.

Yours, with thanks and acknowledgment,

C. Lamb

CCXXX. — TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

December 28, 18 14.

Dear W., — Your experience about tailors
seems to be in point blank opposition to Burton,

as much as the author of the Excursion does toto
coelo differ in his notion of a country life from the
picture which W. H. has exhibited of the same.
But with a little explanation you and B. may be
reconciled. It is evident that he confined his
observations to the genuine native London tailor.
What freaks tailor-nature may take in the country
is not for him to give account of. And certainly
some of the freaks recorded do give an idea of the
persons in question being beside themselves, rather
than in harmony with the common moderate self-
enjoyment of the rest of mankind. A flying tailor,
I venture to say, is no more in rerum natura than
a flying horse or a gryphon. His wheeling his
airy flight from the precipice you mention had
a parallel in the melancholy Jew who toppled
from the monument. Were his limbs ever found ?
Then, the man who cures diseases by words is evi-
dently an inspired tailor. Burton never affirmed
that the act of sewing disqualified the practiser of
it from being a fit organ for supernatural revela-
tion. He never enters into such subjects. 'T is
the common uninspired tailor which he speaks
of. Again the person who makes his smiles to be
heard, is evidently a man under possession ; a de-
moniac tailor. A greater hell than his own must
have a hand in this. I am not certain that the
cause which you advocate has much reason for
triumph. You seem to me to substitute light-
headedness for light-heartedness by a trick, or
not to know the difference. I confess, a grin-

ning tailor would shock me. — Enough of
tailors.

The " 'scapes " of the great god Pan who ap-
peared among your mountains some dozen years
since, and his narrow chance of being submerged
by the swains, afforded me much pleasure. I can
conceive the water-nymphs pulling for him. He
would have been another Hylas. W. Hylas. In
a mad letter which Capel Lofft wrote to Monthly
M\agazine\ Phillips (now Sir Richard) I remem-
ber his noticing a metaphysical article by Pan,
signed H., and adding " I take your correspondent
to be the same with Hylas." Hylas has put forth
a pastoral just before. How near the unfounded
conjecture of the certainly inspired Lofft (un-
founded as we thought it) was to being realized !
I can conceive him being " good to all that wan-
der in that perilous flood." One J. Scott (I know
no more) is editor of Champion. Where is Cole-
ridge ?

That review you speak of, I am only sorry it
did not appear last month. The circumstances
of haste and peculiar bad spirits under which it
was written, would have excused its slightness and
inadequacy, the full load of which I shall suffer
from its lying by so long as it will seem to have
done from its postponement. I write with great
difficulty and can scarce command my own reso-
lution to sit at writing an hour together. I am
a poor creature, but I am leaving off gin. I hope
you will see good-will in the thing. I had a diffi-

culty to perform not to make it all panegyrick ;
I have attempted to personate a mere stranger to
you ; perhaps with too much strangeness. But you
must bear that in mind when you read it, and not
think that I am in mind distant from you or your
poem, but that both are close to me among the
nearest of persons and things. I do but act the
stranger in the review. Then I was puzzled about
extracts and determined upon not giving one that
had been in the Examiner, for extracts repeated
give an idea that there is a meagre allowance of
good things. By this way, I deprived myself of
Sir Alfred Irthing and the reflections that con-
clude his story, which are the flower of the poem.
H. had given the reflections before me. Then it
is the first review I ever did, and I did not know
how long I might make it. But it must speak for
itself, if Gifford and his crew do not put words in
its mouth, which I expect.

Farewell. Love to all. Mary keeps very bad.

C. Lamb

CCXXXI. — TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

Early January, 1815.

Dear Wordsworth, — I told you my review
was a very imperfect one. But what you will
see in the Quarterly is a spurious one which
Mr. Baviad Gifford has palm'd upon it for mine.
I never felt more vex'd in my life than when I
read it. I cannot give you an idea of what he

has done to it out of spite at me because he once
suffer'd me to be called a lunatic in his Thing.
The language he has alter'd throughout. What-
ever inadequateness it had to its subject, it was in
point of composition the prettiest piece of prose
I ever writ, and so my sister (to whom alone I
read the MS.) said. That charm if it had any
is all gone : more than a third of the substance is
cut away, and that not all from one place, but
passim, so as to make utter nonsense. Every warm
expression is changed for a nasty cold one. I have
not the cursed alteration by me, I shall never look
at it again, but for a specimen I remember I had
said the poet of the Excursion " walks thro' com-
mon forests as thro' some Dodona or enchanted
wood, and every casual bird that flits upon the
boughs, like that miraculous one in Tasso, but
in language more piercing than any articulate
sounds, reveals to him far higher lovelays." It
is now (besides half a dozen alterations in the
same half dozen lines) " but in language more
intelligent reveals to him " — that is one I re-
member. But that would have been little, putting
his damn'd shoemaker phraseology (for he was
a shoemaker) instead of mine, which has been
tinctured with better authors than his ignorance
can comprehend — for I reckon myself a dab
at prose — verse I leave to my betters — God help
them, if they are to be so reviewed by friend
and foe as you have been this quarter.

I have read "It won't do." But worse than

altering words, he has kept a few members only
of the part I had done best, which was to explain
all I could of your " scheme of harmonies," as
I had ventured to call it, between the external
universe and what within us answers to it. To
do this I had accumulated a good many short
passages, rising in length to the end, weaving in
the extracts as if they came in as a part of the
text, naturally, not obtruding them as specimens.
Of this part a little is left, but so as without con-
juration no man could tell what I was driving at.
A proof of it you may see (tho' not judge of
the whole of the injustice) by these words : I
had spoken something about " natural method-
ism," and after follows, " and therefore the tale
of Margaret should have been postponed " (I for-
get my words, or his words): now the reasons for
postponing it are as deducible from what goes
before, as they are from the 104th Psalm. The
passage whence I deduced it has vanished, but
clapping a colon before a therefore is always reason
enough for Mr. Baviad GifFord to allow to a re-
viewer that is not himself.

I assure you my complaints are founded. I
know how sore a word alter'd makes one, but
indeed of this review the whole complexion is
gone. I regret only that I did not keep a copy,
I am sure you would have been pleased with it,
because I have been feeding my fancy for some
months with the notion of pleasing you. Its im-
perfection or inadequateness in size and method

I knew, but for the writing part of it I was fully
satisfied. I hoped it would make more than
atonement. Ten or twelve distinct passages come
to my mind, which are gone, and what is left is
of course the worse for their having been there ;
the eyes are pull'd out and the bleeding sockets
are left. I read it at Arch's shop with my face
burning with vexation secretly, with just such a
feeling as if it had been a review written against
myself, making false quotations from me. But
I am asham'd to say so much about a short
piece. How are you served ! and the labours of
years turn'd into contempt by scoundrels.

But I could not but protest against your taking
that thing as mine. Every pretty expression (I
know there were many), every warm expression,
there was nothing else, is vulgarised and frozen
— but if they catch me in their camps again let
them spitchcock me. They had a right to do it,
as no name appears to it, and Mr. Shoemaker
GifFord I suppose never waived a right he had
since he commenc'd author. God confound him
and all caitiffs. C. L.

CCXXXII. — TO MR. SARGUS

February 23, 1815.

Dear Sargus, — This is to give you notice that
I have parted with the cottage to Mr. Grig, Jr.,
to whom you will pay rent from Michaelmas
last. The rent that was due at Michaelmas I do

not wish you to pay me. I forgive it you as you
may have been at some expenses in repairs.

Yours, Ch. Lamb

CCXXXIII. — TO JOSEPH HUME

" Bis dat qui dat cito."

I hate the pedantry of expressing that in an-
other language which we have sufficient terms for
in our own. So in plain English I very much wish
you to give your vote to-morrow at Clerkenwell,
instead of Saturday. It would clear up the brows
of my favourite candidate, and stagger the hands
of the opposite party. It commences at nine.
How easy, as you come from Kensington (apro-
pos, how is your excellent family ?) to turn down
Bloomsbury, through Leather Lane (avoiding
Lay Stall Street for the disagreeableness of the
name). Why, it brings you in four minutes and
a half to the spot renowned on northern mile-
stones, " where Hicks' Hall formerly stood."
There will be good cheer ready for every inde-
pendent freeholder; where you see a green flag
hang out go boldly in, call for ham, or beef, or
what you please, and a mug of Meux's Best. How
much more gentleman-like to come in the front
of the battle, openly avowing one's sentiments,
than to lag in on the last day, when the adver-
sary is dejected, spiritless, laid low. Have the first
cut at them. By Saturday you '11 cut into the mut-
ton. I 'd go cheerfully myself, but I am no free-

holder [Fuimus Troes,fuit Ilium), but I sold it for
^50. If they 'd accept a copy-holder, we clerks
are naturally «?/>y-holders.

By the way, get Mrs. Hume, or that agreeable
Amelia or Caroline, to stick a bit of green in
your hat. Nothing daunts the adversary more
than to wear the colours of your party. Stick
it in cockade-like. It has a martial and by no
means disagreeable effect.

Go, my dear freeholder, and if any chance calls
you out of this transitory scene earlier than ex-
pected, the coroner shall sit lightly on your corpse.
He shall not too anxiously inquire into the cir-
cumstances of blood found upon your razor. That
might happen to any gentleman in shaving. Nor
into your having been heard to express a contempt
of life, or for scolding Louisa for what Julia did,
and other trifling incoherencies.

Yours sincerely, C. Lamb

CCXXXIV.— TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

April 7, 1815.

The conclusion of this epistle getting gloomy,
I have chosen this part to desire our kindest loves
to Mrs. Wordsworth and to Dorothea. Will none
of you ever be in London again ?

Dear Wordsworth, — You have made me very
proud with your successive book presents. I have
been carefully through the two volumes to see
that nothing was omitted which used to be there.

I think I miss nothing but a character in anti-
thetic manner which I do not know why you left
out ; the moral to the boys building the giant,
the omission whereof leaves it in my mind less
complete; and one admirable line gone (or
something come instead of it) " the stone-chat
and the glancing sand-piper," which was a line
quite alive. I demand these at your hand.

I am glad that you have not sacrificed a verse
to those scoundrels. I would not have had you
offer up the poorest rag that lingered upon the
stript shoulders of little Alice Fell, to have atoned
all their malice. I would not have given 'em a
red cloak to save their souls. I am afraid lest that
substitution of a shell (a flat falsification of the his-
tory) for the household implement as it stood at
first, was a kind of tub thrown out to the beast,
or rather thrown out for him. The tub was a good
honest tub in its place, and nothing could fairly
be said against it. You say you made the altera-
tion for the "friendly reader," but the malicious
will take it to himself. Damn 'em; if you give
'em an inch, &c. The preface is noble, and such
as you should write. I wish I could set my name
to it, Imprimatur, — but you have set it there
yourself, and I thank you. I had rather be a door-
keeper in your margin, than have their proudest
text swelling with my eulogies. The poems in the
volumes which are new to me are so much in the
old tone that I hardly received them as novelties.

Of those of which I had no previous know-

3°

ledge, the Four Yew Trees and the mysterious
company which you have assembled there, most
struck me — Death the Skeleton and Time the
Shadow. It is a sight not for every youthful poet
to dream of; it is one of the last results he must
have gone thinking-on for years for. Laodamia
is a very original poem ; I mean original with
reference to your own manner. You have no-
thing like it. I should have seen it in a strange
place, and greatly admired it, but not suspected
its derivation.

Let me in this place, for I have writ you sev-
eral letters without naming it, mention that my
brother, who is a picture-collector, has picked up
an undoubtable picture of Milton. He gave a
few shillings for it, and could get no history with
it but that some old lady had had it for a great
many years. Its age is ascertainable from the
state of the canvas, and you need only see it to
be sure that it is the original of the heads in the
Tonson editions, with which we are all so well
familiar. Since I saw you I have had a treat in
the reading way which comes not every day, the
Latin Poems of V. Bourne, which were quite
new to me. What a heart that man had, all laid
out upon town scenes, a proper counterpoise to
some people's rural extravaganzas. Why I men-
tion him is that your Power of Music reminded
me of his poem of The Ballad Singer in the Seven
Dials. Do you remember his epigram on the
old woman who taught Newton the ABC,

which, after all, he says, he hesitates not to call
Newton's Principia. I was lately fatiguing my-
self with going thro' a volume of fine words by
Lord Thurlow ; excellent words, and if the
heart could live by words alone, it could desire
no better regale ; but what an aching vacuum
of matter ; I don't stick, at the madness of it, for
that is only a consequence of shutting his eyes
and thinking he is in the age of the old Elisa-
beth poets. From thence I turned to V. Bourne.
What a sweet unpretending pretty-mannered
matter-ful creature, sucking from every flower,
making a flower of everything, his diction all
Latin, and his thoughts all English. Bless him !
Latin was n't good enough for him, why was n't
he content with the language which Gay and
Prior wrote in ?

I am almost sorry that you printed extracts
from those first poems, or that you did not print
them at length. They do not read to me as they
do all together. Besides, they have diminished
the value of the original (which I possess) as a
curiosity. I have hitherto kept them distinct in
my mind as referring to a particular period of
your life. All the rest of your poems are so much
of a piece, they might have been written in the
same week ; these decidedly speak of an earlier
period. They tell more of what you had been
reading.

We were glad to see the poems " by a female
friend." The one of the Wind is masterly, but

not new to us. Being only three, perhaps you
might have clapt a D. at the corner, and let it
have past as a printer's mark to the uninitiated,
as a delightful hint to the better instructed. As
it is, expect a formal criticism on the poems of
your female friend, and she must expect it.

I should have written before, but I am cruelly
engaged and like to be. On Friday I was at
office from ten in the morning (two hours din-
ner except) to eleven at night ; last night till
nine. My business and office business in general
has increased so. I don't mean I am there every
night, but I must expect a great deal of it. I
never leave till four, and do not keep a holyday
now once in ten times, where I used to keep all
red-letter days, and some fine days besides, which
I used to dub Nature's holydays. I have had my
day. I had formerly little to do. So of the little
that is left of life I may reckon two-thirds as
dead, for Time that a man may call his own is
his Life ; and hard work and thinking about it
taints even the leisure hours, — stains Sunday
with workday contemplations. This is Sunday,
and the headache I have is part late hours at work
the two preceding nights, and part later hours
over a consoling pipe afterwards. But I find
stupid acquiescence coming over me. I bend to
the yoke, and it is almost with me and my
household as with the man and his consort, —

To them each evening had its glittering star,
And every Sabbath day its golden sun —

to such straits am I driven for the life of life,
Time ! O that from that superfluity of holyday
leisure my youth wasted, —

Age might but take some hours youth wanted not !

N. B. I have left off spirituous liquors for four
or more months, with a moral certainty of its
lasting. Farewell, dear Wordsworth !

CCXXXV.— TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

April 28, 18 15.

Dear Wordsworth, — The more I read of your
two last volumes, the more I feel it necessary to
make my acknowledgments for them in more
than one short letter. The Night Piece to which
you refer me I meant fully to have noticed ; but
the fact is, I come so fluttering and languid from
business, tired with thoughts of it, frightened
with fears of it, that when I get a few minutes
to sit down to scribble (an action of the hand
now seldom natural to me — I mean voluntary
pen-work) I lose all presential memory of what
I had intended to say, and say what I can, talk
about Vincent Bourne, or any casual image, in-
stead of that which I had meditated — by the
way, I must look out V. B. for you. So I had
meant to have mentioned Yarrow Visited, with
that stanza, " But thou that didst appear so fair; "
than which I think no lovelier stanza can be
found in the wide world of poetry; — yet the

poem, on the whole, seems condemned to leave
behind it a melancholy of imperfect satisfaction,
as if you had wronged the feeling with which,
in what preceded it, you had resolved never to
visit it, and as if the Muse had determined in
the most delicate manner to make you, and scarce
make you, feel it. Else, it is far superior to the
other, which has but one exquisite verse in it,
the last but one, or the two last : this is all fine,
except perhaps that that of "studious ease and
generous cares " has a little tinge of the less ro-
mantic about it.

The Farmer of Tils bury Vale is a charming
counterpart to Poor Susan, with the addition of
that delicacy towards aberrations from the strict
path, which is so fine in the Old Thief and the Boy
by his Side, which always brings water into my
eyes. Perhaps it is the worse for being a repeti-
tion. Susan stood for the representative of poor
rus in urbe. There was quite enough to stamp the
moral of the thing never to be forgotten. " Fast
volumes of vapour," &c. The last verse of Susan
was to be got rid of at all events. It threw a kind
of dubiety upon Susan's moral conduct. Susan is
a servant-maid. I see her trundling her mop, and
contemplating the whirling phenomenon thro'
blurred optics; but to term her "a poor outcast"
seems as much as to say that poor Susan was no
better than she should be, which I trust was not
what you meant to express.

Robin Goodfellow supports himself without

that stick of a moral which you have thrown away ;
but how I can be brought in felo de omittendo for
that ending to \h.eBoy-builders is a mystery. I can't
say positively now — I only know that no line
oftener or readier occurs than that " Light-hearted
boys, I will build up a giant with you." It comes
naturally with a warm holyday and the freshness
of the blood. It is a perfect summer amulet that
I tie round my legs to quicken their motion when
I go out a-Maying. (N. B.) I don't often go out
a.-maying. Must is the tense with me now. Do
you take the pun?

Young Romilly is divine, the reasons of his
mother's grief being remediless. I never saw
parental love carried up so high, towering above
the other loves. Shakspeare had done something
for the filial in Cordelia, and by implication for
the fatherly, too, in Lear's resentment ; he left it
for you to explore the depths of the maternal
heart. I get stupid and flat and flattering: what's
the use of telling you what good things you have
written, or — I hope I may add — that I know
them to be good. Apropos — when I first opened
upon the just-mentioned poem, in a careless tone
I said to Mary as if putting a riddle " What is
good for a bootless bean?" to which with infinite
presence of mind (as the jest book has it) she
answered, a "shoeless pea." It was the first joke
she ever made. Joke the second I make. You
distinguish well in your old preface between the
verses of Dr. Johnson of the Man in the Strand,

and that from The Babes in the Wood. I was think-
ing whether taking your own glorious lines, —

And from the love which was in her soul
For her youthful Romilly,

which, by the love I bear my own soul, I think
have no parallel in any of the best old ballads,
and just altering it to —

And from the great respect she felt
For Sir Samuel Romilly,

would not have explained the boundaries of prose
expression and poetic feeling nearly as well. Ex-
cuse my levity on such an occasion. I never felt
deeply in my life, if that poem did not make me,
both lately and when I read it in MS. No alder-
man ever longed after a haunch of buck venison
more than I for a spiritual taste of that White Doe
you promise. I am sure it is superlative, or will
be when drest, i. e. printed. All things read raw
to me in MS. ; to compare magna parvis, I can-
not endure my own writings in that state. The
only one which I think would not very much
win upon me in print is Peter Bell. But I am not
certain.

You ask me about your preface. I like both
that and the supplement without an exception.
The account of what you mean by imagination
is very valuable to me. It will help me to like
some things in poetry better, which is a little
humiliating in me to confess. I thought I could
not be instructed in that science (I mean the crit-
ical), as I once heard old obscene, beastly Peter

Pindar, in a dispute on Milton, say he thought
that if he had reason to value himself upon one
thing more than another, it was in knowing what
good verse was. Who look'd over your proof-
sheets, and left ordebo in that line of Virgil ?

My brother's picture of Milton is very finely
painted ; that is, it might have been done by a
hand next to Vandyke's. It is the genuine Milton,
and an object of quiet gaze for the half-hour at
a time. Yet tho' I am confident there is no better
one of him, the face does not quite answer to
Milton. There is a tinge of petit (or petite, how
do you spell it) querulousness about. Yet hang
it, now I remember better, there is not : it is calm,
melancholy, and poetical.

One of the copies you sent had precisely the
same pleasant blending of a sheet of second vol-
ume with a sheet of first. I think it was page
245 ; but I sent it and had it rectified. It gave
me in the first impetus of cutting the leaves,
just such a cold squelch as going down a plaus-
ible turning and suddenly reading "no thorough-
fare." Robinson's is entire ; he is gone to bury
his father.

I wish you would write more criticism about
Spenser, &c. I think I could saysomething about
him myself; but Lord bless me! these "mer-
chants and their spicy drugs " which are so har-
monious to sing of, they lime-twig up my poor
soul and body, till I shall forget I ever thought
myself a bit of a genius ! I can't even put a few

thoughts on paper for a newspaper. I " engross,"
when I should pen a paragraph. Confusion blast
all mercantile transactions, all traffic, exchange
of commodities, intercourse between nations, all
the consequent civilization and wealth and amity
and link of society, and getting rid of prejudices,
and knowledge of the face of the globe ; and rot
the very firs of the forest, that look so romantic
alive, and die into desks. Vale.

Yours, dear W., and all yours, C. Lamb

Excuse this maddish letter : I am too tired to
write in forma.

N. B. Don't read that Q. Review — I will
never look into another.

CCXXXVI.— TO MISS MATILDA

BETHAM

[No date.]

Dear Miss B., — Mr. Hunter has this morn-
ing put into a parcel all I have received from you
at various times, including a sheet of notes from
the printer and two fair sheets of Mary [The Lay
of Marie]. I hope you will receive them safe.
The poem I will continue to look over, but must
request you to provide for the rest. I cannot attend
to anything but the most simple things. I am very
much unhinged indeed. Tell K. I saw Mrs. J.
yesterday and she was well. You must write to
Hunter if you are in a hurry for the notes, &c.
Yours sincerely, C. Lamb

CCXXXVII. — TO ROBERT SOUTHEY

London, May 6, 1815.

Dear Southey, — I have received from Long-
man a copy of Roderick, with the author's com-
pliments, for which I much thank you. I don't
know where I shall put all the noble presents I
have lately received in that way ; the Excursion,
Wordsworth's two last volumes and now Roder-
ick, have come pouring in upon me like some
irruption from Helicon. The story of the brave
Maccabee was already, you may be sure, familiar
to me in all its parts. I have, since the receipt
of your present, read it quite through again, and
with no diminished pleasure. I don't know
whether I ought to say that it has given me more
pleasure than any of your long poems. Kehama
is doubtless more powerful, but I don't feel that
firm footing in it that I do in Roderick ; my
imagination goes sinking and floundering in the
vast spaces of unopened-before systems and faiths;
I am put out of the pale of my old sympathies ;
my moral sense is almost outraged ; I can't
believe, or with horror am made to believe, such
desperate chances against omnipotences, such
disturbances of faith to the centre. The more
potent the more painful the spell. Jove and his
brotherhood of gods, tottering with the giant
assailings, I can bear, for the soul's hopes are not
struck at in such contests; but your Oriental
almighties are too much types of the intangible

prototype to be meddled with without shudder-
ing. One never connects what are called the
attributes with Jupiter. I mention only what
diminishes my delight at the wonder-workings
of Kebama, not what impeaches its power, which
I confess with trembling.

But Roderick is a comfortable poem. It re-
minds me of the delight I took in the first read-
ing of the Joan of Arc. It is maturer and better
than that, though not better to me now than
that was then. It suits me better than Madoc.
I am at home in Spain and Christendom. I have
a timid imagination ; I am afraid. I do not will-
ingly admit of strange beliefs or out-of-the-way
creeds or places. I never read books of travel, at
least not farther than Paris or Rome. I can just
endure Moors, because of their connection as foes
with Christians ; but Abyssinians, Ethiops, Esqui-
maux, Dervises, and all that tribe, I hate. I be-
lieve I fear them in some manner. A Mahom-
etan turban on the stage, though enveloping some
well-known face (Mr. Cook or Mr. Maddox,
whom I see another day good Christian and
English waiters, innkeepers, &c), does not give
me pleasure unalloyed. I am a Christian, Eng-
lishman, Londoner, Templar. God help me
when I come to put off these snug relations, and
to get abroad into the world to come ! I shall
be like the crow on the sand, as Wordsworth has
it ; but I won't think on it — no need, I hope,
yet.

The parts I have been most pleased with, both
on first and second readings, perhaps, are Flo-
rinda's palliation of Roderick's crime, confessed
to him in his disguise — the retreat of Palayo's
family first discovered, — his being made king
— " For acclamation one form must serve, more
solemn for the breach of old observances." Roder-
ick's vow is extremely fine, and his blessing on
the vow of Alphonso, —

Towards the troop he spread his arms,
And carried to all spirits with the act,
As if the expanded soul diffused itself,
Its affluent inspiration.

It struck me forcibly that the feeling of these
last lines might have been suggested to you by
the cartoon of Paul at Athens. Certain it is that
a better motto or guide to that famous attitude
can nowhere be found. I shall adopt it as ex-
planatory of that violent but dignified motion.

I must read again Y^zridor's Julian. I have not
read it some time. I think he must have failed
in Roderick, for I remember nothing of him,
nor of any distinct character as a character —
only fine-sounding passages. I remember think-
ing also he had chosen a point of time after the
event, as it were, for Roderick survives to no use ;
but my memory is weak, and I will not wrong
a fine poem by trusting to it.

The notes to your poem I have not read again;
but it will be a take-downable book on my shelf,
and they will serve sometimes at breakfast, or

times too light for the text to be duly appre-
ciated. Though some of 'em, one of the serpent
Penance, is serious enough, now I think on 't.

Of Coleridge I hear nothing, nor of the Mor-
gans. I hope to have him like a re-appear-
ing star, standing up before me some time when
least expected in London, as has been the case
whilere.

I am doing nothing (as the phrase is) but read-
ing presents, and walk away what of the day-
hours I can get from hard occupation. Pray
accept once more my hearty thanks, and ex-
pression of pleasure for your remembrance of
me. My sister desires her kind respects to
Mrs. S. and to all at Keswick.

Yours truly, C. Lamb

The next Present I look for is the White
Doe. Have you seen Matilda Betham's Lay of
Marie? I think it very delicately pretty as to
sentiment, &c.

CCXXXVIII. — TO ROBERT SOUTHEY

August 9, 1815.

Dear Southey, — Robinson is not on the cir-
cuit, as I erroneously stated in a letter to W. W.,
which travels with this, but is gone to Brussels,
Ostend, Ghent, &c. But his friends the Colliers,
whom I consulted respecting your friend's fate,
remember to have heard him say that Father

Pardo had effected his escape (the cunning greasy
rogue), and to the best of their belief is at present
in Paris. To my thinking, it is a small matter
whether there be one fat friar more or less in the
world. I have rather a taste for clerical execu-
tions, imbibed from early recollections of the fate
of the excellent Dodd. I hear Buonaparte has
sued his habeas corpus, and the twelve judges are
now sitting upon it at the Rolls.

Your boute-feu (bonfire) must be excellent of
its kind. Poet Settle presided at the last great
thing of the kind in London, when the pope was
burnt in form. Do you provide any verses on this
occasion ? Your fear for Hartley's intellectuals
is just and rational. Could not the Chancellor be
petitioned to remove him ? His lordship took Mr.
Betty from under the paternal wing. I think at
least he should go through a course of matter-
of-fact with some sober man after the mysteries.
Could not he spend a week at Poole's before he
goes back to Oxford ? Tobin is dead. But there
is a man in my office, a Mr. Hedges, who proses
it away from morning to night, and never gets
beyond corporal and material verities. He 'd get
these crack-brain metaphysics out of the young
gentleman's head as soon as any one I know.
When I can't sleep o' nights, I imagine a dia-
logue with Mr. H. upon any given subject, and
go prosing on in fancy with him, till I either
laugh or fall asleep. I have literally found it
answer. I am going to stand godfather ; I don't

like the business ; I cannot muster up decorum
for these occasions; I shall certainly disgrace
the font. I was at Hazlitt's marriage, and had
like to have been turned out several times during
the ceremony. Anything awful makes me
laugh. I misbehaved once at a funeral. Yet I
can read about these ceremonies with pious and
proper feelings. The realities of life only seem
the mockeries. I fear I must get cured along with
Hartley, if not too inveterate. Don't you think
Louis the Desirable is in a sort of quandary ?

After all, Buonaparte is a fine fellow, as my
barber says, and I should not mind standing bare-
headed at his table to do him service in his fall.
They should have given him Hampton Court or
Kensington, with a tether extending forty miles
round London. Qu. Would not the people have
ejected the Brunswicks some day in his favour ?
Well, we shall see. C. Lamb

CCXXXIX.— TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

August 9, 1 8 15.

Dear Wordsworth, — We acknowledge with
pride the receipt of both your handwritings, and
desire to be ever had in kindly remembrance by
you both and by Dorothy. Miss Hutchinson has
just transmitted us a letter containing, among
other chearful matter, the annunciation of a child
born. Nothing of consequence has turned up in
our parts since your departure. Mary and I felt

quite queer after your taking leave (you W. W.)
of us in St. Giles's. We wish'd we had seen more
of you, but felt we had scarce been sufficiently
acknowledging for the share we had enjoyed of
your company. We felt as if we had been not
enough expressive of our pleasure. But our man-
ners both are a little too much on this side of too-
much-cordiality. We want presence of mind
and presence of heart. What we feel comes too
late, like an afterthought impromptu. But per-
haps you observed nothing of that which we
have been painfully conscious of, and are, every
day, in our intercourse with those we stand af-
fected to through all the degrees of love.

Robinson is on the circuit. Our panegyrist
I thought had forgotten one of the objects of
his youthful admiration, but I was agreeably re-
moved from that scruple by the laundress knock-
ing at my door this morning almost before I was
up, with a present of fruit from my young friend,
&c. — There is something inexpressibly pleasant
to me in these presents. Be it fruit, or fowl, or
brawn, or what not. Books are a legitimate cause
of acceptance. If presents be not the soul of
friendship, undoubtedly they are the most spirit-
ual part of the body of that intercourse. There
is too much narrowness of thinking in this point.
The punctilio of acceptance methinks is too con-
fined and straitlaced. I could be content to re-
ceive money, or clothes, or a joint of meat from
a friend ; why should he not send me a dinner

as well as a desert ? I would taste him in the
beasts of the field, and thro' all creation. There-
fore did the basket of fruit of the juvenile Tal-
fourd not displease me. Not that I have any
thoughts of bartering or reciprocating these
things. To send him anything in return would
be to reflect suspicion of mercenariness upon
what I knew he meant a freewill offering. Let
him overcome me in bounty. In this strife a gen-
erous nature loves to be overcome.

Alsager (whom you call Alsinger — and in-
deed he is rather singer than sager, no reflection
upon his naturals neither) is well and in harmony
with himself and the world. I don't know how
he and those of his constitution keep their nerves
so nicely balanced as they do. Or have they any?
or are they made of packthread ? He is proof
against weather, ingratitude, meat underdone,
every weapon of fate. I have just now a jagged
end of a tooth pricking against my tongue, which
meets it halfway in a wantonness of provocation,
and there they go at it, the tongue pricking itself
like the viper against the file, and the tooth gall-
ing all the gum inside and out to torture, tongue
and tooth, tooth and tongue, hard at it, and I to
pay the reckoning, till all my mouth is as hot as
brimstone, and I 'd venture the roof of my mouth
that at this moment, at which I conjecture my
full-happinessed friend is picking his crackers, not
one of the double rows of ivory in his privileged
mouth has as much as a flaw in it, but all per-

form their functions, and having performed it,
expect to be picked (luxurious steeds !) and
rubbed down. I don't think, he could be robbed,
or could have his house set on fire, or ever want
money. I have heard him express a similar opin-
ion of his own impassibility.

I keep acting here Heautontimorumenos. M.
Burney has been to Calais and has come home
a travell'd Monsieur. He speaks nothing but the
Gallic idiom. Field is on circuit. So now I be-
lieve I have given account of most that you saw
at our cabin. Have you seen a curious letter in
Morning Chronicle, by C[apel] L[orft], the genius
of absurdity, respecting Bonaparte's suing out his
habeas corpus. That man is his own moon. He
has no need of ascending into that gentle planet
for mild influences. You wish me some of your
leisure. I have a glimmering aspect, a chink-
light of liberty before me, which I pray God may
prove not fallacious. My remonstrances have
stirred up others to remonstrate, and altogether,
there is a plan for separating certain parts of
business from our department, which if it take
place will produce me more time, /. e. my even-
ings free. It may be a means of placing me in
a more conspicuous situation which will knock
at my nerves another way, but I wait the issue
in submission. If I can but begin my own day
at four o'clock in the afternoon, I shall think
myself to have Eden days of peace and liberty
to what I have had.

As you say, how a man can fill three volumes
up with an essay on the drama is wonderful. I
am sure a very few sheets would hold all I had
to say on the subject. Did you ever read Char-
ron On Wisdom? or Patrick's Pilgrim? if neither,
you have two great pleasures to come. I mean
some day to attack Caryl On Job, six folios. What
any man can write, surely I may read. If I do but
get rid of auditing warehousekeepers' accounts
and get no worse-harassing task in the place of
it, what a lord of liberty I shall be. I shall dance
and skip, and make mouths at the invisible event,
and pick the thorns out of my pillow, and throw
'em at rich men's nightcaps, and talk blank verse,
hoity-toity, and sing "A clerk I was in London
gay," "Ban, ban, Ca-Caliban," like the emanci-
pated monster, and go where I like, up this street
or down that ally. Adieu, and pray that it may
be my luck. Good be to you all. C. Lamb

CCXL.— MARY AND CHARLES LAMB TO
SARAH HUTCHINSON

August 20, 1815.

My dear friend, — I am going to do a queer
thing. I have wearied myself with writing a long
letter to Mrs. Morgan, a part of which is an in-
coherent, rambling account of a jaunt we have
just been taking. I want to tell you all about it, for
we so seldom do such things that it runs strangely
in my head, and I feel too tired to give you other

than the mere copy of the nonsense I have just
been writing.

" Last Saturday was the grand feast day of the
India House clerks. I think you must have heard
Charles talk of his yearly turtle feast. He has
been lately much wearied with work, and, glad
to get rid of all connected with it, he used Satur-
day, the feast day being a holiday, borrowed the
Monday following, and we set off on the outside
of the Cambridge coach from Fetter Lane at eight
o'clock, and were driven into Cambridge in great
triumph by hell-fire Dick five minutes before
three. Richard is in high reputation, he is pri-
vate tutor to the Whip Club. Journeys used to
be tedious torments to me, but seated out in the
open air I enjoyed every mile of the way; the
first twenty miles was particularly pleasing to me,
having been accustomed to go so far on that road
in the Ware stage-coach to visit my grandmother
in the days of other times.

" In my life I never spent so many pleasant
hours together as I did at Cambridge. We were
walking the whole time — out of one college
into another. If you ask me which I like best
I must make the children's traditionary unoffend-
ing reply to all curious inquirers — ' Both.' I
liked them all best. The little gloomy ones, be-
cause they were little gloomy ones. I felt as if
I could live and die in them and never wish to
speak again. And the fine grand Trinity College,
oh how fine it was ! And King's College Chapel,

5°

what a place ! I heard the Cathedral service there,
and having been no great church-goer of late
years, that and the painted windows and the
general effect of the whole thing affected me
wonderfully.

" I certainly like St. John's College best. I
had seen least of it, having only been over it once,
so, on the morning we returned, I got up at six
o'clock and wandered into it by myself — by my-
self indeed, for there was nothing alive to be seen
but one cat, who followed me about like a dog.
Then I went over Trinity, but nothing hailed me
there, not even a cat.

" On the Sunday we met with a pleasant thing.
We had been congratulating each other that we
had come alone to enjoy, as the miser his feast,
all our sights greedily to ourselves, but having
seen all we began to grow flat and wish for this
and t'other body with us, when we were accosted
by a young gownsman whose face we knew, but
where or how we had seen him we could not tell,
and were obliged to ask his name. He proved to
be a young man we had seen twice at Alsager's.
He turned out a very pleasant fellow — shewed
us the insides of places ; we took him to our inn
to dinner, and drank tea with him in such a de-
licious college room, and then again he supped
with us. We made our meals as short as possible,
to lose no time, and walked our young conductor
almost off his legs. Even when the fried eels were
ready for supper and coming up, having a mess-

age from a man whom we had bribed for the pur-
pose, that then we might see Oliver Cromwell,
who was not at home when we called to see him,
we sallied out again and made him a visit by
candlelight ; and so ended our sights. When we
were setting out in the morning our new friend
came to bid us good-bye, and rode with us as far
as Trompington. I never saw a creature so happy
as he was the whole time he was with us, he said
we had put him in such good spirits that [he]
should certainly pass an examination well that he
is to go through in six weeks, in order to qualify
himself to obtain a fellowship.

" Returning home down old Fetter Lane I
could hardly keep from crying to think it was
all over. With what pleasure [Charles] shewed
me Jesus College where Coleridge was, the bar-
be [r's shop] where Manning was, the house where
Lloyd lived, Franklin's rooms, a young school-
fellow with whom Charles was the first time he
went to Cambridge: I peeped in at his window ;
the room looked quite deserted, old chairs stand-
ing about in disorder that seemed to have stood
there ever since they had sate in them. I write
sad nonsense about these things ; but I wish you
had heard Charles talk his nonsense over and over
again about his visit to Franklin, and how he
then first felt himself commencing gentleman
and had eggs for his breakfast." Charles Lamb
commencing gentleman !

A lady who is sitting by me, seeing what I am

doing, says I remind her of her husband, who
acknowledged that the first love letter he wrote
to her was a copy of one he had made use of
on a former occasion.

This is no letter, but if you give me any en-
couragement to write again you shall have one
entirely to yourself: a little encouragement will
do, a few lines to say you are well and remember
us. I will keep this to-morrow, maybe Charles
will put a few lines to it ; I always send off a hum-
drum letter of mine with great satisfaction if
I can get him to freshen it up a little at the end.
Let me beg my love to your sister Johanna with
many thanks. I have much pleasure in looking
forward to her nice bacon, the maker of which
I long have had a great desire to see.

God bless you, my dear Miss Hutchinson, I
remain ever

Your affectionate friend, M. Lamb

[C harks Lamb adds:}
Dear Miss Hutchinson, — I subscribe most
willingly to all my sister says of her enjoyment
at Cambridge. She was in silent raptures all the
while there, and came home riding thro' the air
(her first long outside journey) triumphing as if
she had been graduated. I remember one foolish-
pretty expression she made use of, " Bless the little
churches, how pretty they are ! " as those symbols
of civilized life opened upon her view one after
the other on this side Cambridge. You cannot

proceed a mile without starting a steeple, with
its little patch of villagery round it, enverduring
the waste. I don't know how you will pardon
part of her letter being a transcript, but writing
to another lady first (probably as the easiest task ")
it was unnatural not to give you an account of
what had so freshly delighted her, and would
have been a piece of transcendant rhetorick (above
her modesty) to have given two different accounts
of a simple and univocal pleasure. Bless me how
learned I write ! but I always forget myself when
I write to ladies. One cannot tame one's erudi-
tion down to their merely English apprehensions.
But this and all other faults you will excuse from
yours truly, C. Lamb

Our kindest loves to Joanna, if she will accept
it from us who are merely nominal to her, and
to the child and child's parent. Yours again,

C. L.

\Mary Lamb adds this footnote :]
' " Easiest task" Not the true reason, but
Charles had so connected Coleridge and Cam-
bridge in my mind, by talking so much of him
there, and a letter coming so fresh from him, in
a manner that was the reason I wrote to them first.
I make this apology perhaps quite unnecessarily,
but I am of a very jealous temper myself, and
more than once recollect having been offended
at seeing kind expressions which had particularly

pleased me in a friend's letter repeated word for
word to another. Farewell once more.

CCXLI. — MARY LAMB TO MATILDA
BETHAM

[? 1815.]

My dear Miss Betham,- — My brother and my-
self return you a thousand thanks for your kind
communication. We have read your poem many
times over with increased interest, and very much
wish to see you to tell you how highly we have
been pleased with it. May we beg one favour ?
— I keep the manuscript in the hope that you
will grant it.. It is that, either now or when the
whole poem is completed you will read it over
with us. When I say with us, of course I mean
Charles. I know that you have many judicious
friends, but I have so often known my brother
spy out errors in a manuscript which has passed
through many judicious hands, that I shall not
be easy if you do not permit him to look yours
carefully through with you; and also you must
allow him to correct the press for you.

If I knew where to find you I would call
upon you. Should you feel nervous at the idea
of meeting Charles in the capacity of a severe
censor, give me a line, and I will come to you
anywhere, and convince you in five minutes that
he is even timid, stammers, and can scarcely speak
for modesty and fear of giving pain when he
finds himself placed in that kind of office. Shall

I appoint a time to see you here when he is from
home ? I will send him out any time you will
name ; indeed, I am always naturally alone till
four o'clock. If you are nervous about coming,
remember I am equally so about the liberty I
have taken, and shall be till we meet and laugh
off our mutual fears.

Yours most affectionately, M. Lamb

CCXLII. — TO MATILDA BETHAM

September 30, 1815.

Dear Miss Betham, — Your letter has found
me in such a distress'd state of mind, owing partly
to my situation at home and partly to perplex-
ities at my office, that I am constrain'd to re-
linquish any further revision of Marie.

The blunders I have already overlooked have
weighed upon me almost insufferably. I have
sent the printer your copy so far as it is clear to
106 page. "Happiness too great for me" is the
last line of that page. The rest, which I am not
in any power to look over, being wretchedly ill,
I send you back. I never was more ashamed of
anything, but my head has a weight in it that
forces me to give it up. Pray forgive me and
write to the printer where you would have it
sent in future. Yours truly, C. Lamb

I have return'd the printer all the copy of
the first sheets.

I have alt'd that line to

That magic laugh bespeaks thee prest (?)

You had better consult Rogers about the expense
of reprinting that sheet. An erratum there must
be about kill.

CCXLIII. — TO MATILDA BETHAM

Dear Miss Betham, — All this while I have
been tormenting myself with the thought of
having been ungracious to you, and you have
been all the while accusing yourself. Let us
absolve one another, and be quits. My head is in
such a state from incapacity for business that
I certainly know it to be my duty not to under-
take the veriest trifle in addition. I hardly know
how I can go on. I have tried to get some re-
dress by explaining my health, but with no great
success. No one can tell how ill I am, because
it does not come out to the exterior of my face,
but lies in my scull deep and invisible. I wish
I was leprous and black jaundiced skin-over, and
that all was as well within as my cursed looks.
You must not think me worse than I am. I am
determined not to be overset, but to give up busi-
ness rather and get 'em to allow me a trifle for
services past. O that I had been a shoemaker or
a baker, or a man of large independent fortune.
O darling laziness ! heaven of Epicurus ! Saint's
Everlasting Rest ! that I could drink vast pota-

tions of thee thro' unmeasured Eternity. Otium
cum vel sine dignitate. Scandalous, dishonorable,
any-kind-of repose. I stand not upon the digni-
fied sort. Accursed, damned desks, trade, com-
merce, business. Inventions of that old original
busybody brainworking Satan, Sabbathless, rest-
less Satan. A curse relieves ; do you ever try it ?
A strange letter this to write to a lady, but
mere honey'd sentences will not distill. I dare
not ask who revises in my stead. I have drawn
you into a scrape. I am ashamed, but I know
no remedy. My unwellness must be my apo-
logy. God bless you (tho' he curse the India
House and fire it to the ground) and may no
unkind error creep into Marie, may all its read-
ers like it as well as I do and everybody about
you like its kind author no worse. Why the
devil am I never to have a chance of scribbling
my own free thoughts, verse or prose, again ?
Why must I write of tea and drugs and price
goods and bales of indigo — farewell.

C. Lamb

^Written at head of Letter on margin the following :]
Mary goes to her place on Sunday — I mean
your maid, foolish Mary. She wants a very little
brains only to be an excellent servant. She is
excellently calculated for the country, where
nobody has brains.

CCXLIV. — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

October 4, 18 15.

Dear Ayrton, — I am confident that the word
air in your sense does not occur in Spenser or
Shakspeare, much less in older writers. The first
trace I remember of it is in Milton's sonnet to
Lawrence, " Warble immortal verse and Tuscan
air ; " where, if the word had not been very
newly familiarized, he would doubtless have used
airs in the plural.

Yours in haste, C. L.

CCXLV. — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

October 14, 1815.

Dear A., — Concerning " Air " — Shakspeare's
'Twelfth Night has "light airs and giddy recol-
lections ; " I am sure I forget whereabouts. Also
you will see another use of it in the Tempest
(same sense) in Johnson's Dictionary. Spenser
I still persist in, has it not, much less Chaucer.
I have turned to all their places about music.

C. L.

No doubt we had it from the Italian aria, —
now aria is not the Latin aera modernized, but
aer, is it not ?

CCXLVI. — TO SARAH HUTCHINSON

October 19, 1815.

My brother is gone to Paris.

Dear Miss H., — I am forced to be the replier
to your letter, for Mary has been ill and gone
from home these five weeks yesterday. She has
left me very lonely and very miserable. I stroll
about, but there is no rest but at one's own fire-
side, and there is no rest for me there now. I
look forward to the worse half being past, and
keep up as well as I can. She has begun to show
some favourable symptoms. The return of her
disorder has been frightfully soon this time, with
scarce a six months' interval. I am almost afraid
my worry of spirits about the East India House
was partly the cause of her illness, but one always
imputes it to the cause next at hand ; more prob-
ably it comes from some cause we have no con-
trol over or conjecture of. It cuts sad great slices
out of the time, the little time we shall have to
live together. I don't know but the recurrence
of these illnesses might help me to sustain her
death better than if we had had no partial separ-
ations. But I won't talk of death. I will imag-
ine us immortal, or forget that we are otherwise ;
by God's blessing in a few weeks we may be
making our meal together, or sitting in the front
row of the pit at Drury Lane, or taking our
evening walk past the theatres, to look at the

outside of them at least, if not to be tempted in.
Then we forget we are assailable : we are strong
for the time as rocks ; the wind is tempered to
the shorn Lambs.

Poor C. Lloyd, and poor Priscilla, I feel I
hardly feel enough for him, my own calamities
press about me and involve me in a thick in-
tegument not to be reached at by other folks'
misfortunes. But I feel all I can, and all the
kindness I can towards you all. God bless you.
I hear nothing from Coleridge.

Yours truly, C. Lamb

CCXLVII. — TO THOMAS MANNING

December 25, 18 15.

Dear old friend and absentee, — This is Christ-
mas-day 1 8 1 5 with us ; what it may be with
you I don't know, the 1 2th of June next year
perhaps ; and if it should be the consecrated
season with you, I don't see how you can keep it.
You have no turkeys ; you would not desecrate
the festival by offering up a withered Chinese
bantam, instead of the savoury grand Norfolcian
holocaust, that smokes all around my nostrils at
this moment from a thousand firesides. Then
what puddings have you ? Where will you get
holly to stick in your churches, or churches to
stick your dried tea-leaves (that must be the sub-
stitute) in ? What memorials you can have of
the holy time, I see not. A chopped missionary

or two may keep up the thin idea of Lent and
the wilderness ; but what standing evidence have
you of the Nativity? — 'tis our rosy-cheeked,
homestalled divines, whose faces shine to the tune
of unto us a child; faces fragrant with the mince-
pies of half a century, that alone can authen-
ticate the cheerful mystery — I feel.

I feel my bowels refreshed with the holy tide ;
my zeal is great against the unedified heathen.
Down with the pagodas — down with the idols
— Ching-chong-fo — and his foolish priesthood !
Come out of Babylon, O my friend ! for her time
is come, and the child that is native, and the
proselyte of her gates, shall kindle and smoke
together ! And in sober sense what makes you
so long from among us, Manning ? You must
not expect to see the same England again which
you left.

Empires have been overturned, crowns trod-
den into dust, the face of the western world quite
changed : your friends have all got old — those
you left blooming — myself (who am one of
the few that remember you), those golden hairs
which you recollect my taking a pride in, turned
to silvery and grey. Mary has been dead and
buried many years ; she desired to be buried in
the silk gown you sent her. Rickman, that you
remember active and strong, now walks out
supported by a servant-maid and a stick. Martin
Burney is a very old man.

The other day an aged woman knocked at my

door, and pretended to my acquaintance ; it was
long before I had the most distant cognition of
her ; but at last together we made her out to be
Louisa, the daughter of Mrs. Topham, formerly
Mrs. Morton, who had been Mrs. Reynolds,
formerly Mrs. Kenney, whose first husband was
Holcroft, the dramatic writer of the last century.
St. Paul's Church is a heap of ruins ; the Monu-
ment is n't half so high as you knew it, divers
parts being successively taken down which the
ravages of time had rendered dangerous ; the
horse at Charing Cross is gone, no one knows
whither, — and all this has taken place while you
have been settling whether Ho-hing-tong should

be spelt with a or a . For aught I see,

you had almost as well remain where you are,
and not come like a Struldbrug into a world
where few were born when you went away.
Scarce here and there one will be able to make
out your face ; all your opinions will be out of
date, your jokes obsolete, your puns rejected with
fastidiousness as wit of the last age. Your way
of mathematics has already given way to a new
method, which after all is I believe the old doc-
trine of Maclaurin, new-vamped up with what
he borrowed of the negative quantity of fluxions
from Euler.

Poor Godwin ! I was passing his tomb the
other day in Cripplegate churchyard. There
are some verses upon it written by Miss Hayes,
which if I thought good enough I would send

you. He was one of those who would have
hailed your return, not with boisterous shouts
and clamours, but with the complacent gratu-
lations of a philosopher anxious to promote
knowledge as leading to happiness — but his
systems and his theories are ten feet deep in
Cripplegate mould.

Coleridge is just dead, having lived just long
enough to close the eyes of Wordsworth, who
paid the debt to nature but a week or two before.
Poor Col., but two days before he died he wrote
to a bookseller proposing an epic poem on the
Wanderings of Cain, in twenty-four books. It is
said he has left behind him more than forty thou-
sand treatises in criticism and metaphysics, but
few of them in a state of completion. They are
now destined, perhaps, to wrap up spices. You
see what mutations the busy hand of Time has
produced, while you have consumed in foolish
voluntary exile that time which might have
gladdened your friends — benefited your coun-
try; but reproaches are useless. Gather up the
wretched reliques, my friend, as fast as you can,
and come to your old home. I will rub my eyes
and try to recognise you. We will shake with-
ered hands together, and talk of old things — of
St. Mary's Church and the barber's opposite,
where the young students in mathematics used
to assemble. Poor Crisp, that kept it afterwards,
set up a fruiterer's shop in Trumpington Street,
and for aught I know, resides there still, for I saw

the name up in the last journey I took there with
my sister just before she died.

I suppose you heard that I had left the India
House, and gone into the Fishmongers' Alms-
houses over the bridge. I have a little cabin
there, small and homely ; but you shall be wel-
come to it. You like oysters, and to open them
yourself; I '11 get you some if you come in
oyster time. Marshall, Godwin's old friend, is
still alive, and talks of the faces you used to
make.

Come as soon as you can. C. Lamb

CCXLVIII. — TO THOMAS MANNING1

December 26, 18 15.

Dear Manning, — Following your brother's
example, I have just ventured one letter to Can-
ton, and am now hazarding another (not exactly
a duplicate) to St. Helena. The first was full of
improbable romantic fictions, fitting the remote-
ness of the mission it goes upon ; in the present
I mean to confine myself nearer to truth as you
come nearer home. A correspondence with the
uttermost parts of the earth necessarily involves in
it some heat of fancy; it sets the brain a-going;
but I can think on the half-way house tranquilly.
Your friends, then, are not all dead or grown
forgetful of you thro' old age, as that lying letter

1 An autograph facsimile of this letter appears, in its chronological
order, in Vol. I.

asserted, anticipating rather what must happen
if you kept tarrying on for ever on the skirts of
creation, as there seemed a danger of your doing
— but they are all tolerably well and in full
and perfect comprehension of what is meant by
Manning's coming home again. Mrs. Kenney
[ci-devant Holcroft ) never let her tongue [run] riot
more than in remembrances of you. Fanny ex-
pends herself in phrases that can only be justify'd
by her romantic nature. Mary reserves a portion
of your silk, not to be buried in (as the false
nuncio asserts), but to make up spick and span
into a new-bran gown to wear when you come.
I am the same as when you knew me, almost to
a surfeiting identity. This very night I am going
to leave off tobacco ! Surely there must be some
other world in which this unconquerable pur-
pose shall be realised. The soul hath not her
generous aspirings implanted in her in vain.

One that you knew, and I think the only one
of those friends we knew much of in common,
has died in earnest. Poor Priscilla, wife of Kit
Wordsworth ! Her brother Robert is also dead,
and several of the grown-up brothers and sisters,
in the compass of a very few years. Death has
not otherwise meddled much in families that I
know. Not but he has his damn'd eye upon us,
and is whetting his infernal feathered dart every
instant, as you see him truly pictured in that
impressive moral picture, "The Good Man at
the hour of death."

I have in trust to put in the post four letters
from Diss, and one from Lynn, to St. Helena,
which I hope will accompany this safe, and one
from Lynn, and the one before spoken of from
me, to Canton. But we all hope that these
latter may be waste paper. I don't know why
I have forborne writing so long. But it is such
a forlorn hope to send a scrap of paper straggling
over wide oceans. And yet I know when you
come home, I shall have you sitting before me
at our fire-side just as if you had never been
away. In such an instant does the return of
a person dissipate all the weight of imaginary
perplexity from distance of time and space !

I '11 promise you good oysters. Cory is dead,
that kept the shop opposite St. Dunstan's, but
the tougher materials of the shop survive the
perishing frame of its keeper. Oysters continue
to flourish there under as good auspices. Poor
Cory ! But if you will absent yourself twenty
years together, you must not expect numerically
the same population to congratulate your return
which wetted the sea-beach with their tears when
you went away.

Have you recovered the breathless stone-
staring astonishment into which you must have
been thrown upon learning at landing that an
Emperor of France was living in St. Helena?
What an event in the solitude of the seas ! like
finding a fish's bone at the top of Plinlimmon ;
but these things are nothing in our western world.

Novelties cease to affect. Come and try what
your presence can. God bless you.

Your old friend, C. Lamb

CCXLIX. — TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

April 9, 1816.

Dear Wordsworth, — Thanks for the books
you have given me and for all the books you mean
to give me. I will bind up the Political Sonnets
and Ode according to your suggestion. I have
not bound the poems yet. I wait till people have
done borrowing them. I think I shall get a chain,
and chain them to my shelves more Bodleiano, and
people may come and read them at chain's length.
For of those who borrow, some read slow, some
mean to read but don't read, and some neither
read nor meant to read, but borrow to leave you
an opinion of their sagacity. I must do my
money-borrowing friends the justice to say that
there is nothing of this caprice or wantonness
of alienation in them. When they borrow my
money, they never fail to make use of it. Cole-
ridge has been here about a fortnight. His health
is tolerable at present, though beset with tempt-
ations. In the first place, the Covent Garden
Manager has declined accepting his tragedy, tho'
(having read it) I see no reason upon earth why
it might not have run a very fair chance, tho' it
certainly wants a prominent part for a MissO'Neil
or a Mr. Kean. However he is going to-day to

write to Lord Byron to get it to Drury. Should
you see Mrs. C, who has just written to C. a let-
ter which I have given him, it will be as well
to say nothing about its fate till some answer is
shaped from Drury. He has two volumes print-
ing together at Bristol, both finished as far as the
composition goes ; the latter containing his fugi-
tive poems, the former his Literary Life. Nature,
who conducts every creature by instinct to its
best end, has skilfully directed C. to take up his
abode at a chemist's laboratory in Norfolk Street.
She might as well have sent a helluo librorum for
cure to the Vatican. God keep him inviolate
among the traps and pitfalls. He has done pretty
well as yet.

Tell Miss H [utchinson] my sister is every day
wishing to be quietly sitting down to answer her
very kind letter, but while C. stays she can hardly
find a quiet time ; God bless him !

Tell Mrs. W. her postscripts are always agree-
able. They are so legible too. Your manual-
graphy is terrible, dark as Lycophron. " Likeli-
hood" for instance is thus typified [here Lamb
makes an illegible scribble].

I should not wonder if the constant making out
of such paragraphs is the cause of that weakness
in Mrs. W.'s eyes as she is tenderly pleased to
express it. Dorothy I hear has mounted spectacles ;
so you have deoculated two of your dearest rela-
tions in life. Well, God bless you and continue
to give you power to write with a finger of power

upon our hearts what you fail to impress in cor-
responding lucidness upon our outward eyesight.

Mary's love to all; she is quite well.

I am call'd off to do the deposits on Cotton
Wool ; but why do I relate this to you who want
faculties to comprehend the great mystery of
deposits, of interest, of warehouse rent, and con-
tingent fund? Adieu. C.Lamb

A longer letter when C. is gone back into the
country, relating his success, &c. — my judgment
of your new books, &c, &c. — I am scarce quiet
enough while he stays.

Yours again, C. L.

CCL.— TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

April 26, 1 816.

Dear W., — I have just finished the pleasing
task of correcting the revise of the Poems and
letter. I hope they will come out faultless. One
blunder I saw and shuddered at. The halluci-
nating rascal had printed battered for battened, this
last not conveying any distinct sense to his gap-
ing soul. The Reader (as they call 'em) had dis-
covered it and given it the marginal brand, but
the substitutory n had not yet appeared. I accom-
panied his notice with a most pathetic address to
the printer not to neglect the correction. I know
how such a blunder would " batter at your peace."
With regard to the works, the Letter I read with

7°

unabated satisfaction. Such a thing was wanted ;
called for. The parallel of Cotton with Burns
I heartily approve; Izaak Walton hallows any
page in which his reverend name appears. " Duty
archly bending to purposes of general benevo-
lence" is exquisite. The Poems I endeavoured
not to understand, but to read them with my eye
alone, and I think I succeeded (some people will
do that when they come out, you '11 say). As if
I were to luxuriate to-morrow at some picture
gallery I was never at before, and going by
to-day by chance, found the door open, had but
five minutes to look about me, peeped in, just
such a chastised peep I took with my mind at the
lines my luxuriating eye was coursing over unre-
strained, — not to anticipate another day's fuller
satisfaction.

Coleridge is printing Christabel, by Lord By-
ron's recommendation to Murray, with what he
calls a vision, Kubla Khan — which said vision
he repeats so enchantingly that it irradiates and
brings heaven and Elysian bowers into my parlour
while he sings or says it, but there is an observa-
tion " Never tell thy dreams," and I am almost
afraid that Kubla Khan is an owl that won't bear
daylight, I fear lest it should be discovered, by
the lantern of typography and clear reducting
to letters, no better than nonsense or no sense.
When I was young I used to chant with extasy
Mild Arcadians ever blooming, till somebody told
me it was meant to be nonsense. Even yet I have

a lingering attachment to it, and think it better
than Windsor Forest, Dying Christian's Address, Sec.
— C. has sent his Tragedy to Drury Lane The-
atre. It cannot be acted this season, and by their
manner of receiving it, I hope he will be able to
alter it to make them accept it for next. He is
at present under the medical care of a Mr. Gil-
man (Killman?) a Highgate apothecary, where
he plays at leaving off laudanum. I think his
essentials not touched : he is very bad, but then
he wonderfully picks up another day, and his face
when he repeats his verses hath its ancient glory,
an Archangel a little damaged.

Will Miss H. pardon our not replying at
length to her kind letter ? We are not quiet
enough. Morgan is with us every day, going
betwixt Highgate and the Temple. Coleridge
is absent but four miles, and the neighbourhood
of such a man is as exciting as the presence of
fifty ordinary persons. 'T is enough to be within
the whiff and wind of his genius, for us not to
possess our souls in quiet. If I lived with him
or the author of the Excursion, I should in a very
little time lose my own identity, and be dragged
along in the current of other people's thoughts,
hampered in a net.

How cool I sit in this office, with no possible
interruption further than what I may term mate-
rial ; there is not as much metaphysics in thirty-
six of the people here as there is in the first page
of Locke's Treatise on the Human Understanding,

or as much poetry as in any ten lines of the Pleas-
ures of Hope or more natural Beggar's Petition.
I never entangle myself in any of their specula-
tions. Interruptions, if I try to write a letter
even, I have dreadful. Just now within four lines
I was call'd off for ten minutes to consult dusty
old books for the settlement of obsolete errors.
I hold you a guinea you don't find the chasm
where I left off, so excellently the wounded sense
closed again and was healed.

N. B. Nothing said above to the contrary
but that I hold the personal presence of the two
mentioned potent spirits at a rate as high as any :
but I pay dearer ; what amuses others robs me of
myself; my mind is positively discharged into
their greater currents, but flows with a willing
violence. As to your question about work, it is far
less oppressive to me than it was, from circum-
stances ; it takes all the golden part of the day
away, a solid lump from ten to four, but it does
not kill my peace as before. Some day or other
I shall be in a taking again. My head akes and
you have had enough. God bless you.

C. Lamb

CCLI. — TO LEIGH HUNT

May 13, 1816.

Dear Sir, — I thank you much for the curious
volume of Southey, which I return, together with

Falstaff's Letters, Elgin Stone Report, and a little
work of my own, of which perhaps you have no
copy and I have a great many.

Yours truly, C. Lamb

CCLII. — TO MATILDA BETHAM

June i, 1816.

Dear Miss Betham, — I have sent your very
pretty lines to Southey in a frank as you requested.
Poor S., what a grievous loss he must have had !
Mary and I rejoice in the prospect of seeing you
soon in town. Let us be among the very first per-
sons you come to see. Believe me that you can
have no friends who respect and love you more
than ourselves. Pray present our kind remem-
brances to Barbara, and to all to whom you may
think they will be acceptable.

Yours very sincerely, C. Lamb

Have you seen Christabel since its publica-
tion ?

CCLIII. — TO H. BODWELL

July, 1816.

My dear fellow, — I have been in a lethargy
this long while, and forgotten London, Westmin-
ster, Marybone, Paddington — they all went clean
out of my head, till happening to go to a neigh-
bour's in this good borough of Calne, for want of

whist players, we fell upon Commerce : the word
awoke me to a remembrance of my professional
avocations and the long-continued strife which
I have been these twenty-four years endeavouring
to compose between those grand Irreconcileables
Cash and Commerce ; I instantly called for an
almanack, which with some difficulty was pro-
cured at a fortune-teller's in the vicinity (for the
happy holyday people here having nothing to do,
keep no account of time), and found that by dint
of duty I must attend in Leadenhall onWednes'y
morning next, and shall attend accordingly.

Does Master Hannah give macaroons still, and
does he fetch the Cobbetts from my attic ? Per-
haps it would n't be too much trouble for him to
drop the inclosed up at my aforesaid chamber,
and any letters, &c, with it; but the inclosed
should go without delay.

N. B. — He is n't to fetch Monday's Cobbett,
but it is to wait my reading when I come back.
Heigh Ho ! Lord have mercy upon me, how
many does two and two make ? I am afraid I
shall make a poor clerk in future, I am spoiled
with rambling among haycocks and cows and
pigs. Bless me ! I had like to have forgot (the
air is so temperate and oblivious here) to say I
have seen your brother, and hope he is doing well
in the finest spot of the world. More of these
things when I return. Remember me to the gen-
tlemen, — I forget names. Shall I find all my
letters at my rooms on Tuesday ? If you forgot

to send 'em never mind, for I don't much care
for reading and writing now ; I shall come back
again by degrees, I suppose, into my former habits.
How is Bruce de Ponthieu, and Porcherand Co.?
— the tears come into my eyes when I think
how long I have neglected .

Adieu ! ye fields, ye shepherds and — herd-
esses, and dairies and cream-pots, and fairies and
dances upon the green.

I come, I come. Don't drag me so hard by
the hair of my head, Genius of British India !
I know my hour is come, Faustus must give up
his soul, O Lucifer, O Mephistopheles ! Can you
make out what all this letter is about ? I am
afraid to look it over. Ch. Lamb

Calne, Wilts, Friday,
July something, old style, 1816.

No new style here, all the styles are old, and
some of the gates too for that matter.

CCLIV. — TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

September 23, 18 16.

My dear Wordsworth, — It seems an age since
we have corresponded, but indeed the interim
has been stufF'd out with more variety than usually
checquers my same-seeming existence. Mercy
on me, what a traveller have I been since I wrote
you last! what foreign wonders have been ex-
plored ! I have seen Bath, King Bladud's ancient
well, fair Bristol, seed-plot of suicidal Chatterton,

Marlbro', Chippenham, Calne, famous for no-
thing in particular that I know of — but such a
vertigo of locomotion has not seized us for years.
We spent a month with the Morgans at the last
named Borough — August — and such a change
has the change wrought in us that we could not
stomach wholesome Temple air, but are abso-
lutely rusticating (O the gentility of it !) at Dal-
ston, about one mischievous boy's stone's throw
off Kingsland turnpike, one mile from Shoreditch
church, — thence we emanate in various direc-
tions to Hackney, Clapton, Totnam, and such like
romantic country. That my lungs should ever
prove so dainty as to fancy they perceive differ-
ences of air ! but so it is, tho' I am almost ashamed
of it, like Milton's devil (turn'd truant to his old
brimstone) I am purging off the foul air of my
once darling tobacco in this Eden, absolutely
snuffing up pure gales, like old worn-out Sin
playing at being innocent, which never comes
again, for in spite of good books and good
thoughts there is something in a pipe that virtue
cannot give, tho' she give her unendowed person
for a dowry.

Have you read the review of Coleridge's char-
acter, person, physiognomy, &c, in the Exam-
iner— his features even to his nose — O horrible
license beyond the old Comedy. He is himself
gone to the seaside with his favourite apothecary,
having left for publication as I hear a prodigious
mass of composition for a sermon to the middling

ranks of people to persuade them they are not so
distressed as is commonly supposed. Methinks he
should recite it to a congregation of Bilston col-
liers, — the fate of Cinna the poet would instan-
taneously be his. God bless him, but certain that
rogue Examiner has beset him in most unman-
nerly strains. Yet there is a kind of respect shines
thro' the disrespect that to those who know the
rare compound (that is the subject of it) almost
balances the reproof, but then those who know
him but partially or at a distance are so extremely
apt to drop the qualifying part thro' their fingers.
The "after all, Mr. Wordsworth is a man of
great talents, if he did not abuse them " comes
so dim upon the eyes of an Edinbro' Review
reader, that have been gloating-open chuckle-
wide upon the preceding detail of abuses, it scarce
strikes the pupil with any consciousness of the
letters being there, like letters writ in lemon.
There was a cut at me a few months back by the
same hand, but my agnomen or agni-nomen not
being calculated to strike the popular ear, it dropt
anonymous, but it was a pretty compendium of
observation, which the author has collected in
my disparagement, from some hundreds of social
evenings which we had spent together, — how-
ever in spite of all, there is something tough in
my attachment to H[azlitt], which these violent
strainings cannot quite dislocate or sever asunder.
I get no conversation in London that is abso-
lutely worth attending to but his. There is mon-

strous little sense in the world, or I am monstrous
clever, or squeamish or something, but there is
nobody to talk to — to talk with I should say
— and to go talking to one's self all day long is
too much of a good thing, besides subjecting one
to the imputation of being out of one's senses,
which does no good to one's temporal interest
at all.

By the way, I have seen Coleridge but once
these three or four months. He is an odd person,
when he first comes to town he is quite hot upon
visiting, and then he turns off and absolutely
never comes at all, but seems to forget there are
any such people in the world. I made one at-
tempt to visit him (a morning call) at Highgate,
but there was something in him or his apothe-
cary which I found so unattractively-repulsing
from any temptation to call again, that I stay
away as naturally as a lover visits. The rogue
gives you love powders, and then a strong horse
drench to bring 'em off your stomach that they
may n't hurt you.

I was very sorry the printing of your letter
was not quite to your mind, but I surely did
not think but you had arranged the manner of
breaking the paragraphs from some principle
known to your own mind, and for some of the
errors, I am confident that note of admiration in
the middle of two words did not stand so when
I had it, it must have dropt out and been replaced
wrong, so odious a blotch could not have escaped

me. Gifford (whom God curse) has persuaded
squinting Murray (whom may God not bless)
not to accede to an offer Field made for me
to print two volumes of Essays, to include the
one on Hogarth and one or two more, but most
of the matter to be new, but I dare say I should
never have found time to make them; M. would
have had 'em, but shewed specimens from the

Reflector to G , as he acknowledged to Field,

and Crispin did for me. " Not on his soal [sole],
but on his soul, damn'd Jew," may the maledic-
tion of my eternal antipathy light. We desire
much to hear from you, and of you all, includ-
ing Miss Hutchinson, for not writing to whom
Mary feels a weekly (and did for a long time
feel a daily) pang. How is Southey ? I hope his
pen will continue to move many years smoothly
and continuously for all the rubs of the rogue
Examiner. A pertinacious foul-mouthed villain
it is !

This is written for a rarity at the seat of busi-
ness : it is but little time I can generally com-
mand from secular calligraphy, — the pen seems
to know as much and makes letters like figures
— an obstinate clerkish thing. It shall make
a couplet in spite of its nib before I have done
with it,

and so I end,
Commending me to your love, my dearest friend.

From Leaden Hall, September something, 1816,

C. Lamb
80

CCLV. — MARY LAMB TO SARAH
HUTCHINSON

Middle of November, 1816.

Mary has barely left me room to say How
d' ye. I have received back the Examiner con-
taining the delicate inquiry into certain infirm
parts of S. T. C.'s character. What is the gen-
eral opinion of it ? Farewell. My love to all.

C. Lamb

My dear friend, — I have just been reading
your kind letter over again and find you had some
doubt whether we had left the Temple entirely.
It was merely a lodging we took to recruit our
health and spirits. From the time we left Calne,
Charles drooped sadly, company became quite
irksome, and his anxious desire to leave off smok-
ing, and his utter inability to perform his daily
resolutions against it, became quite a torment to
him, so I prevailed with him to try the experi-
ment of change of scene, and set out in one of
the short stage-coaches from Bishopsgate Street,
Miss Brent and I, and we looked over all the
little places within three miles, and fixed on one
quite countrified and not two miles from Shore-
ditch church, and entered upon it the next day.
I thought if we stayed but a week it would be
a little rest and respite from our troubles, and we
made a ten weeks' stay, and very comfortable
we were, so much so that if ever Charles is super-

annuated on a small pension, which is the great
object of his ambition, and we felt our income
straitened, I do think I could live in the country
entirely ; at least I thought so while I was there,
but since I have been at home I wish to live and
die in the Temple, where I was born. We left
the trees so green it looked like early autumn,
and can see but one leaf " The last of its clan "
on our poor old Hare Court trees.

What a rainy summer ! — and yet I have been
so much out of town and have made so much
use of every fine day that I can hardly help think-
ing it has been a fine summer. We calculated
we walked three hundred and fifty miles while we
were in our country lodging. One thing I must
tell you, Charles came round every morning
to a shop near the Temple to get shaved. Last
Sunday we had such a pleasant day, I must tell
you of it. We went to Kew and saw the old
palace where the King was brought up, it was
the pleasantest sight I ever saw, I can scarcely
tell you why, but a charming old woman shewed
it to us. She had lived twenty-six years there and
spoke with such a hearty love of our good old
King, whom all the world seems to have forgot-
ten, that it did me good to hear her. She was
as proud in pointing out the plain furniture (and
I am sure you are now sitting in a larger and
better furnished room) of a small room in which
the King always dined, nay more proud of the
simplicity of her royal master's taste, than any

shower of Carlton House can be in showing the
fine things there, and so she was when she made
us remark the smallness of one of the Princess's
bedrooms, and said she slept and also dressed in
that little room. There are a great many good
pictures, but I was most pleased with one of the
King when he was about two years old, such a
pretty little white-headed boy.

I cannot express how much pleasure a letter
from you gives us. If I could promise myself
I should be always as well as I am now, I would
say I will be a better correspondent in future. If
Charles has time to add a line I shall be less
ashamed to send this hasty scrawl. Love to all
and every one. How much I should like once
more to see Miss Wordsworth's handwriting, if
she would but write a postscript to your next,
which I look to receive in a few days.

Yours affectionately, M. Lamb

For a postscript see the beginning.

CCLVI.— TO MISS BETHAM

[No date.]

Dear Miss Betham, — That accursed word
"trill" has vexed me excessively. I have referred
to the MS. and certainly the printer is exoner-
ated; it is much more like a tr than a k. But what
shall I say of myself ?

If you can trust me hereafter, I will be more
83

careful. I will go thro' the poem, unless you should
feel more safe by doing ityourself. Infact, a second
person looking over a proof is liable to let pass
anything that sounds plausible. The act of look-
ing it over seeming to require only an attention
to the words — that they have the proper com-
ponent letters, one scarce thinks then (or but half )
of the sense. You will find one line I have
ventured to alter in third sheet. You had made
" hope ' ' and " yoke ' ' rhime, which is intolerable.
Everybody can see and carp at a bad rhime, or no
rhime. It strikes as slovenly like bad spelling.

I found out another sung, but I could not alter
it, and I would not delay the time by writing
to you. Besides, it is not at all conspicuous — it
comes in, by the bye, " the strains I sung." The
other obnoxious word was in an eminent place,
at the beginning of " Her lay, when all ears are
upon her."

I must conclude hastily, dear M. B.,

Yours, C. L.

CCLVII. — MARY LAMB TO SARAH

HUTCHINSON

[Late 1816.]

My dear Miss Hutchinson, — I had intended
to write you a long letter, but as my frank is
dated I must send it off with a bare acknowledg-
ment of the receipt of your kind letter. One
question I must hastily ask you. Do you think
Mr. Wordsworth would have any reluctance to

write (strongly recommending to their patron-
age) to any of his rich friends in London to so-
licit employment for Miss Betham as a miniature
painter ? If you give me hopes that he will not
be averse to do this, I will write to you more
fully stating the infinite good he would do by
performing so irksome a task as I know asking
favours to be. In brief, she has contracted debts
for printing her beautiful poem of Marie, which
like all things of original excellence does not sell
at all.

These debts have led to little accidents unbe-
coming a woman and a poetess to suffer. Re-
tirement with such should be voluntary.

{Charles Lamb adds :]
The bell rings. I just snatch the pen out of
my sister's hand to finish rapidly. Wordsworth
may tell De Quincey that Miss Betham's price
for a Virgin and Child is three guineas.

Yours (all of you) ever, C. L.

CCLVIII.— TO JOHN RICKMAN

December 30, 1816.

Dear R., — Your goose found her way into our
larder with infinite discretion. Judging by her
giblets which we have sacrificed first, she is a most
sensible bird. Mary bids me say, first, that she
thanks you for your remembrance, next that Mr.
Norris and his family are no less indebted to you

as the cause of his reverend and amiable visage
being perpetuated when his soul is flown. Find-
ing nothing like a subscription going on for the
unhappy lady, and not knowing how to press an
actual sum upon her, she hit upon the expedient
of making believe that Mr. N. wanted his min-
iature (which his chops did seem to water after,
I must confess, when 'twas first proposed, though
with a Nolo Pingier for modesty), and the likeness
being completed, your ^5 is to go as from him.
This I must confess is robbing Peter, or like
the equitable distribution in Alexander s Feast,
" Love was crowned " though somebody else
"won the cause." And Love himself, smiling
Love, he might have sat for, so complacent he
sat as he used to sit when in his days of courtship
he ogled thro' his spectacles. I have a shrewd
suspicion he has an eye upon his spouse's pic-
ture after this, and probably some collateral
branches may follow of the Norris or Faint
Stock, so that your forerunner may prove a not-
able decoy duck. The Colliers are going to sit.
Item, her knightly brother in Ireland is soon
coming over, apprized of her difficulties, and I
confidently hope an emergence for her.

But G. Dyer executor to a nobleman ! G. D.
residuary legatee ! What whirligig of fortune is
this ? Valet ima Summis. Strange world, strange
kings, strange composition ! — I can't enjoy it
sufficiently till I get a more active belief in it.
You've seen the will of Lord Stanhope. Conceive

his old floor strew 'd with disiecta me?nbra Poeseos,
now loaden with codicils, deeds of trust, letters
of attorney, bonds, obligations, forfeitures, ex-
chequer bills, noverint universis. " Mr. Serjeant
Best, pray take my arm-chair. My Lord Hol-
land sit here. Lord Grantly, will your Lordship
take the other? Mr. Jekyll, excuse my offer-
ing you the window-seat. We'll now have that
clause read over again."

B. and Fletcher describe a little French lawyer
spoilt by an accidental duel he got thrust into,
from a notable counsellor turned into a bravo.
Here is G. D. more contra-naturally metamor-
phosed. My life on it, henceforth he explodes his
old hobby horses. No more poring into Cam-
bridge records ; here are other title-deeds to
be looked into — now can he make any Joan
a Lady. And if he don't get too proud to marry,
that long unsolved problem of G. D. is in danger
of being quickly melted. They can't choose but
come and make offer of their coy wares. I see
Miss H. prim up her chin, Miss B-n-j-o cock
her nose.

He throws his dirty glove. G. D., Iratis Ven-
eribus, marries, for my life on 't.

And 'tis odds in that case but he leaves off
making love and verses.

Indeed I look upon our friend as dead, dead
to all his desperate fancies, pleasures, — he has lost
the dignity of verse, the dignity of poverty, the
dignity of digging on in desperation through mines

of literature that yielded nothing. Adieu ! the

wrinkled brow, the chin half shaved, the ruined

arm-chair, the wind-admitting and expelling

screen, the fluttering pamphlets, the lost letters,

the documents never to be found when wanting,

the unserviceable comfortable landress.

G. D.'s occupation 's o'er !
Demptus per vim mentis gratissimus error !

Haec pauca de amico nostro antiquo accipe pro
naeniis exequiis, et eiusdem generis a/us. Vale nos-
ier G. D.

From yours as he was, unchanged by Fortune.

C. L.

CCLIX. — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

April 1 8, 1817.

Dear A., — I am in your debt for a very de-
lightful evening — I should say two — but Don
Giovanni in particular was exquisite, and I am
almost inclined to allow music to be one of the
liberal arts; which before I doubted. Could you
let me have three gallery tickets — don't be
startled — they shall positively be the last —
or two or one — for the same, for to-morrow or
Tuesday. They will be of no use for to-morrow
if not put in the post this day addrest to me, Mr.
Lamb, India House; if for any other evening,
your usual blundering direction, No. 3 Middle
Temple instead of 4 Inner Temple Lane will do.
Yours, Ch. Lamb

CCLX. — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

May 12, 1817.
My dear friend, —
Before I end,
Have you any
More orders for Don Giovanni
• To give

Him that doth live
Your faithful Zany ?
Without raillery
I mean Gallery
Ones :
For I am a person that shuns
All ostentation
And being at the top of the fashion :
And seldom go to operas
But in forma Pauperis.

I go to the Play
In a very economical sort of a way,
Rather to see
Than be seen.
Though I 'm no ill sight
Neither,
By candle-light,
And in some kinds of weather.
You might pit me

For height
Against Kean ;
But in a grand tragic scene
I 'm nothing.
It would create a kind of loathing
To see me act Hamlet.
There 'd be many a damn let
Fly

At my presumption
If I should try,
Being a fellow of no gumption.

By the way, tell me candidly how you relish
This, which they call the lapidary
Style?
Opinions vary.
The late Mr. Mellish
Could never abide it.
He thought it vile,
And coxcombical.
My friend the Poet Laureat,
Who is a great lawyer at

Anything comical,
Was the first who tried it ;
But Mellish could never abide it.
But it signifies very little what Mellish said,
Because he is dead.
For who can confute
A body that 's mute ?
Or who would fight
With a senseless sprite ?
Or think of troubling
An impenetrable old goblin
That 's dead and gone,
And stiff as a stone,
To convince him with arguments pro and con,
As if he were some live logician
Bred up at Merton,
Or Mr. Hazlitt, the Metaphysician —
Ha ! Mr. Ayrton !
With all your rare tone.

For tell me how should an apparition
List to your call,
90

Though you talk'd for ever,
Ever so clever,
When his ear itself,
By which he must hear, or not hear at all,
Is laid on the shelf?
Or put the case
(For more grace)
It were a female spectre —
How could you expect her
To take much gust
In long speeches,
With her tongue as dry as dust,
In a sandy place,
Where no peaches,
Nor lemons, nor limes, nor oranges hang,
To drop on the drought of an arid harangue,
Or quench,
With their sweet drench,
The fiery pangs which the worms inflict,
With their endless nibblings,
Like quibblings,
Which the corpse may dislike, but can ne'er contra-
dict—

Ha ! Mr. Ayrton
With all your rare tone —

I am, C. Lamb

CCLXL— TO BARRON FIELD

August 31, 18 1 7.

My dear Barron, — The bearer of this letter
so far across the seas is Mr. Lawrey, who comes
out to you as a missionary, and whom I have been
strongly importuned to recommend to you as a
most worthy creature by Mr. Fenwick, a very old,

honest friend of mine, of whom, if my memory
does not deceive me, you have had some know-
ledge heretofore as editor of the Statesman — a
man of talent, and patriotic. If you can show him
any facilities in his arduous undertaking, you will
oblige us much.

Well, and how does the land of thieves use
you ? and how do you pass your time in your
extra-judicial intervals ? Going about the streets
with a lantern, like Diogenes, looking for an hon-
est man ? You may look long enough, I fancy.
Do give me some notion of the manners of the
inhabitants where you are. They don't thieve
all day long, do they ? No human property could
stand such continuous battery. And what do they
do when they an't stealing ?

Have you got a theatre ? What pieces are per-
formed ? Shakespear's, I suppose — not so much
for the poetry, as for his having once been in
danger of leaving his country on account of cer-
tain "small deer."

Have you poets among you ? Damn'd pla-
giarists, I fancy, if you have any. I would not
trust an idea or a pocket-handkerchief of mine
among 'em. You are almost competent to an-
swer Lord Bacon's problem, whether a nation
of atheists can subsist together. You are prac-
tically in one, —

So thievish 't is, that the eighth commandment itself
Scarce seemeth there to be.

Our old honest world goes on with little per-

ceptible variation. Of course you have heard of
poor Mitchell's death, and that G. Dyer is one
of Lord Stanhope's residuaries. I am afraid he
has not touched much of the residue yet. He is
positively as lean as Cassius. Barnes is going to
Demerara or Essequibo, I am not quite certain
which. Alsager is turned actor. He came out
in genteel comedy at Cheltenham this season,
and has hopes of a London engagement.

For my own history, I am just in the same
spot, doing the same thing (videlicet, little or
nothing) as when you left me; only I have pos-
itive hopes that I shall be able to conquer that
inveterate habit of smoking which you may re-
member I indulged in. I think of making a be-
ginning this evening, viz., Sunday 31st August,
1 8 17, not Wednesday, 2nd Feb., 1818, as it
will be perhaps when you read this for the first
time. There is the difficulty of writing from
one end of the globe (hemispheres I call 'em)
to another ! Why, half the truths I have sent
you in this letter will become lies before they
reach you, and some of the lies (which I have
mixed for variety's sake, and to exercise your
judgment in the finding of them out) may be
turned into sad realities before you shall be called
upon to detect them. Such are the defects of
going by different chronologies. Your now is not
my now; and again, your then is not my then;
but my now may be your then, and vice versa.
Whose head is competent to these things ?

How does Mrs. Field get on in her geo-
graphy? Does she know where she is by this
time ? I am not sure sometimes you are not in
another planet; but then I don't like to ask Capt.
Burney, or any of those that know anything
about it, for fear of exposing my ignorance.

Our kindest remembrances, however, to Mrs.
F., if she will accept of reminiscences from
another planet, or at least another hemisphere.

C. L.

CCLXII. — TO JAMES AND LOUISA
KENNEY

Londres, October, 1817.

Dear Friends, — It is with infinite regret I
inform you that the pleasing privilege of receiv-
ing letters, by which I have for these twenty
years gratified my friends and abused the liber-
ality of the Company trading to the Orient, is
now at an end. A cruel edict of the Directors
has swept it away altogether. The devil sweep
away their patronage also. Rascals who think
nothing of sponging upon their employers for
their venison and turtle and burgundy five days
in a week, to the tune of five thousand pounds
in a year, now find out that the profits of trade
will not allow the innocent communication
of thought between their underlings and their
friends in distant provinces to proceed untaxed,
thus withering up the heart of friendship and

making the news of a friend's good health worse
than indifferent, as tidings to be deprecated as
bringing with it ungracious expenses. Adieu,
gentle correspondence, kindly conveyance of soul,
interchange of love, of opinions, of puns and
what not ! Henceforth a friend that does not
stand in visible or palpable distance to me, is
nothing to me. They have not left to the bosom
of friendship even that cheap intercourse of
sentiment the twopenny medium.

The upshot is, you must not direct any more
letters through me. To me you may annually,
or biennially, transmit a brief account of your
goings-on [on] a single sheet, from which after
I have deducted as much as the postage comes
to, the remainder will be pure pleasure. But no
more of those pretty commissions and counter
commissions, orders and revoking of orders, ob-
scure messages and obscurer explanations, by
which the intellects of Marshall and Fanny used
to be kept in a pleasing perplexity, at the mod-
erate rate of six or seven shillings a week. In
short, you must use me no longer as a go-be-
tween. Henceforth I write up No Thoroughfare.

Well, and how far is Saint Valery from Paris;
and do you get wine and walnuts tolerable ; and
the vintage, does it suffer from the wet ? I take
it, the wine of this season will be all wine and
water ; and have you any plays and green rooms,
and Fanny Kellies to chat with of an evening ;
and is the air purer than the old gravel pits, and

the bread so much whiter, as they say? Lord,
what things you see that travel ! I dare say the
people are all French wherever you go. What
an overwhelming effect that must have ! I have
stood one of 'em at a time, but two I generally
found overpowering, I used to cut and run ; but,
then, in their own vineyards maybe they are
endurable enough. They say marmosets in Sene-
gambia are so pleasant as the day 's long, jumping
and chattering in the orange twigs ; but trans-
port 'em, one by one, over here into England,
they turn into monkeys, some with tails, some
without, and are obliged to be kept in cages.

I suppose you know we 've left the Temple
pro tempore. By the way, this conduct has caused
strange surmises in a good lady of our acquaint-
ance. She lately sent for a young gentleman
of the India House, who lives opposite her, at
Monroe's, the flute shop in Skinner Street, Snow
Hill, — I mention no name, you shall never get
out of me what lady I mean, — on purpose to
ask all he knew about us. I had previously
introduced him to her whist-table. Her inquiries
embraced every possible thing that could be
known of me, how I stood in the India House,
what was the amount of my salary, what it was
likely to be hereafter, whether I was thought to
be clever in business, why I had taken country
lodgings, why at Kingsland in particular, had
I friends in that road, was anybody expected to
visit me, did I wish for visitors, would an un-

expected call be gratifying or not, would it be
better if she sent beforehand, did anybody come
to see me, was n't there a gentleman of the name
of Morgan, did he know him, did n't he come
to see me, did he know how Mr. Morgan lived;
she never could make out how they were main-
tained, was it true that he lived out of the pro-
fits of a linendraper's shop in Bishopsgate Street
(there she was a little right, and a little wrong
— M. is a gentleman tobacconist) ; in short, she
multiplied demands upon him till my friend,
who is neither over-modest nor nervous, declared
he quite shuddered. After laying as bare to her
curiosity as an anatomy he trembled to think
what she would ask next. My pursuits, inclin-
ations, aversions, attachments (some, my dear
friends, of a most delicate nature), she lugged
'em out of him, or would, had he been privy
to them, as you pluck a horse-bean from its
iron stem, not as such tender rosebuds should
be pulled. The fact is I am come to Kingsland,
and that is the real truth of the matter, and
nobody but yourselves should have extorted such
a confession from me.

I suppose you have seen by the papers that
Manning is arrived in England. He expressed
some mortifications at not finding Mrs. Kenney
in England. He looks a good deal sunburnt,
and is got a little reserved, but I hope it will
wear off. You will see by the papers also that
Dawe is knighted. He has been painting the

Princess of Coborg and her husband. This is all
the news I could think of. Write to us, but not
by us, for I have near ten correspondents of this
latter description, and one or other comes pour-
ing in every day, till my purse strings and heart
strings crack. Bad habits are not broken at once.
I am sure you will excuse the apparent indeli-
cacy of mentioning this, but dear is my shirt,
but dearer is my skin, and it 's too late when the
steed is stole, to shut the door.

Well, and does Louisa grow a fine girl, is she
likely to have her mother's complexion, and does
Tom polish in French air — Henry I mean —
and Kenney is not so fidgety, and you sit down
sometimes for a quiet half-hour or so, and all is
comfortable, no bills (that you call writs) nor
anything else (that you are equally sure to mis-
call) to annoy you ? Vive la gaite de coeur et la
bell pastime, vive la beau France et revive ma
cher Empreur. C. Lamb

CCLX1I1. — MARY LAMB TO DOROTHY
WORDSWORTH

November 21, 1817.

My dear Miss Wordsworth, — Your kind let-
ter has given us very great pleasure, — the sight
of your handwriting was a most welcome surprise
to us. We have heard good tidings of you by all
our friends who were so fortunate as to visit you
this summer, and rejoice to see it confirmed by

yourself. You have quite the advantage in volun-
teering a letter. There is no merit in replying to
so welcome a stranger.

We have left the Temple. I think you will
be sorry to hear this. I know I have never been
so well satisfied with thinking of you at Rydal
Mount as when I could connect the idea of you
with your own Grasmere Cottage. Our rooms
were dirty and out of repair, and the inconven-
iences of living in chambers became every year
more irksome, and so at last we mustered up re-
solution enough to leave the good old place that
so long had sheltered us ; and here we are, living
at a brazier's shop, No. 20, in Russell Street,
Covent Garden, a place all alive with noise and
bustle, Drury Lane Theatre in sight from our
front and Covent Garden from our back windows.
The hubbub of the carriages returning from the
play does not annoy me in the least — strange
that it does not, for it is quite tremendous. I
quite enjoy looking out of the window and lis-
tening to the calling up of the carriages and the
squabbles of the coachmen and linkboys. It is
the oddest scene to look down upon ; I am sure
you would be amused with it. It is well I am in
a chearful place or I should have many misgiv-
ings about leaving the Temple.

I look forward with great pleasure to the pro-
spect of seeing my good friend Miss Hutchinson.
I wish Rydal Mount with all its inhabitants
enclosed were to be transplanted with her and to

remain stationary in the midst of Covent Gar-
den. I passed through the street lately where
Mr. and Mrs. Wordsworth lodged ; several fine
new houses, which were then just rising out of
the ground, are quite finished and a noble entrance
made that way into Portland Place.

I am very sorry for Mr. De Quincey ; what
a blunder the poor man made when he took up
his dwelling among the mountains ! I long to
see my friend Pypos. Coleridge is still at Little
Hampton with Mrs. Gilman ; he has been so ill
as to be confined to his room almost the whole
time he has been there.

Charles has had all his Hogarths bound in a
book ; they were sent home yesterday, and now
that I have them all together, and perceive the
advantage of peeping close at them through my
spectacles, I am reconciled to the loss of them
hanging round the room, which has been a great
mortification to me. In vain I tried to console
myself with looking at our new chairs and car-
pets, for we have got new chairs, and carpets
covering all over our two sitting-rooms; I missed
my old friends and could not be comforted; then
I would resolve to learn to look out of the win-
dow, a habit I never could attain in my life, and
I have given it up as a thing quite impracticable;
yet when I was at Brighton last summer, the first
week I never took my eyes off from the sea, not
even to look in a book. I had not seen the sea
for sixteen years. Mrs. Morgan, who was with

ioo

us, kept her liking, and continued her seat in the
window till the very last, while Charles and I
played truant and wandered among the hills,
which we magnified into little mountains and
almost as good as Westmoreland scenery. Cer-
tainly we made discoveries of many pleasant
walks which few of the Brighton visitors have
ever dreamed of; for like as is the case in the
neighbourhood of London, after the first two
or three miles we were sure to find ourselves in
a perfect solitude. I hope we shall meet before
the walking faculties of either of us fail. You
say you can walk fifteen miles with ease, — that
is exactly my stint, and more fatigues me ; four
or five miles every third or fourth day, keeping
very quiet between, was all Mrs. Morgan could
accomplish.

God bless you and yours. Love to all and each
one. I am ever yours most affectionately,

M. Lamb

[Charles Lamb adds the following note :]
Dear Miss Wordsworth, — Here we are, trans-
planted from our native soil. I thought we never
could have been torn up from the Temple. In-
deed it was an ugly wrench, but like a tooth,
now 'tis out and I am easy. We never can strike
root so deep in any other ground. This, where
we are, is a light bit of gardener's mold, and if
they take us up from it, it will cost no blood and
groans like mandrakes pull'd up. We are in the

IOI

individual spot I like best in all this great city.
The theatres with all their noises, — Covent
Garden, dearer to me than any gardens of Alci-
noiis, where we are morally sure of the earliest
peas and 'sparagus. Bow Street, where the thieves
are examined, within a few yards of us. Mary
had not been here four-and-twenty hours before
she saw a thief. She sits at the window work-
ing ; and casually throwing out her eyes, she sees
a concourse of people coming this way, with
a constable to conduct the solemnity. These
little incidents agreeably diversify a female life.
It is a delicate subject, but is Mr. * * * really
married ? and has he found a gargle to his mind ?
Oh how funny he did talk to me about her, in
terms of such mild quiet whispering speculative
profligacy. But did the animalcule and she crawl
over the rubric together, or did they not ?

Mary has brought her part of this letter to an
orthodox and loving conclusion, which is very
well, for I have no room for pansies and remem-
brances. What a nice holyday I got on Wednes-
day by favour of a princess dying. \A line and
signature cut away.]

CCLXIV. — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

November 25, 181 7.

Dear A., — We keep our Thursday (which is
become a moveable feast) this evening, viz.,
Tuesday. We need not say that your company

102

will be most acceptable. If you can persuade
Mrs. A. to accompany you, my sister begs me to
say we shall consider the obligation double.
Yours truly, C. L.

N. B. Is not the above rather neatly worded ?
above my usual cut, I mean. It strikes me so.

CCLXV.— TO JOHN PAYNE COLLIER

December 10, 1817.

Dear J. P. C, — I know how zealously you feel
for our friend S. T. Coleridge ; and I know that
you and your family attended his lectures four
or five years ago. He is in bad health and worse
mind : and unless something is done to lighten
his mind he will soon be reduced to his extrem-
ities; and even these are not in the best con-
dition. I am sure that you will do for him what
you can ; but at present he seems in a mood to
do for himself. He projects a new course, not of
physic, nor of metaphysic, nor a new course
of life, but a new course of lectures on Shakspear
and Poetry. There is no man better qualified
(always excepting number one) ; but I am pre-
engaged for a series of dissertations on India and
India-pendence, to be completed at the expense
of the Company, in I know not (yet) how many
volumes foolscap folio.

I am busy getting up my Hindoo mythology ;
and for the purpose I am once more enduring

103

Southey's Curse \ofKehamd\ . To be serious, Cole-
ridge's state and affairs make me so ; and there
are particular reasons just now, and have been
any time for the last twenty years, why he should
succeed. He will do so with a little encourage-
ment. I have not seen him lately; and he does
not know that I am writing.

Yours (for Coleridge's sake) in haste,

C. Lamb

CCLXVI. — TO BENJAMIN ROBERT
HAYDON

December [26], 1817.

My dear Haydon, — I will come with pleas-
ure to 22 Lisson Grove North, at Rossi's, half-
way up, right-hand side — if I can find it.

Yours, C. Lamb

CCLXVII.— TO MRS. WILLIAM WORDS-
WORTH

February 18, 18 18.

My dear Mrs. Wordsworth, — I have repeat-
edly taken pen in hand to answer your kind letter.
My sister should more properly have done it, but
she having failed, I consider myself answerable
for her debts. I am now trying to do it in the
midst of commercial noises, and with a quill
which seems more ready to glide into arithmet-
ical figures and names of goods, cassia, carda-

104

moms, aloes, ginger, tea, than into kindly re-
sponses and friendly recollections.

The reason why I cannot write letters at home
is, that I am never alone. Plato's (I write to W.
W. now) — Plato's double animal parted never
longed more to be reciprocally reunited in the
system of its first creation, than I sometimes do
to be but for a moment single and separate. Ex-
cept my morning's walk to the office, — which
is like treading on sands of gold for that reason,
— I am never so. I cannot walk home from office
but some officious friend offers his damn'd un-
welcome courtesies to accompany me. All the
morning I am pestered. I could sit and gravely
cast up sums in great books, or compare sum
with sum, and write " paid " against this and
"unpaid" against t'other, and yet reserve in some
" corner of my mind " some darling thoughts
all my own ; faint memory of some passage in
a book, or the tone of an absent friend's voice ;
a snatch of Miss Burrell's singing ; a gleam of
Fanny Kelly's divine plain face. The two oper-
ations might be going on at the same time with-
out thwarting, as the sun's two motions (earth's
I mean), or as I sometimes turn round till I am
giddy, in my back parlour, while my sister is
walking longitudinally in the front — or as the
shoulder of veal twists round with the spit, while
the smoke wreathes up the chimney ; but there
are a set of amateurs of the Belles Lettres — the
gay science — who come to me as a sort of ren-

i°5

dezvous, putting questions of criticism, of British
Institutions, Lalla Rookhs, &c, what Coleridge
said at the lecture last night — who have the
form of reading men, but, for any possible use
reading can be to them but to talk of, might as
well have been Ante-Cadmeans born, or have
lain sucking out the sense of an Egyptian hiero-
glyph as long as the pyramids will last before
they should find it. These pests worrit me at
business and in all its intervals, perplexing my
accounts, poisoning my little salutary warming-
time at the fire, puzzling my paragraphs if I take
a newspaper, cramming in between my own
free thoughts and a column of figures which had
come to an amicable compromise but for therm
Their noise ended, one of them, as I said, ac-
companys me home lest I should be solitary for
a moment ; he at length takes his welcome leave
at the door, up I go, mutton on table, hungry
as hunter, hope to forget my cares and bury them
in the agreeable abstraction of mastication, —
knock at the door, in comes Mrs. Hazlitt, or M.
Burney, or Morgan, or Demogorgon, or my bro-
ther, or somebody, to prevent my eating alone, a
process absolutely necessary to my poor wretched
digestion. O the pleasure of eating alone ! —
eating my dinner alone ! let me think of it. But
in they come, and make it absolutely necessary
that I should open a bottle of orange — for my
meat turns into stone when any one dines with
me, if I have not wine — wine can mollify stones.

106

Then that wine turns into acidity, acerbity, mis-
anthropy, a hatred of my interrupters (God bless
'em! I love some of 'em dearly), and with the
hatred a still greater aversion to their going away.
Bad is the dead sea they bring upon me, choaking
and death-doing, but worse is the deader dry
sand they leave me on if they go before bedtime.
Come never, I would say to these spoilers of my
dinner; but if you come, never go. The fact is,
this interruption does not happen very often, but
every time it comes by surprise that present bane
of my life, orange wine, with all its dreary stifling
consequences, follows. Evening company I should
always like had I any mornings, but I am satur-
ated with human faces [divine forsooth !) and
voices all the golden morning, and five evenings
in a week would be as much as I should covet
to be in company, but I assure you that is a won-
derful week in which I can get two, or one, to
myself. I am never C. L. but always C. L. and
Co.

He, who thought it not good for man to be
alone, preserve me from the more prodigious
monstrosity of being never by myself. I forget
bedtime, but even there these sociable frogs clam-
ber up to annoy me. Once a week, generally
some singular evening that, being alone, I go to
bed at the hour I ought always to be abed, just
close to my bedroom window is the club room
of a public house, where a set of singers, I take
them to be chorus-singers of the two theatres (it

107

must be both of thetn), begin their orgies. They

are a set of fellows (as I conceive) who being

limited by their talents to the burthen of the

song at the play-houses, in revenge have got the

common popular airs by Bishop or some cheap

composer arranged for choruses, that is, to be

sung all in chorus. At least I never can catch

any of the text of the plain song, nothing but

the Babylonish choral howl at the tail on 't.

" That fury being quench'd" — the howl I mean

— a curseder burden succeeds, of shouts and

clapping and knocking of the table. At length

overtasked nature drops under it, and escapes for

a few hours into the society of the sweet silent

creatures of dreams, which go away with mocks

and mows at cockcrow. And then I think of

the words Christabel's father used (bless me, I

have dipt in the wrong ink) to say every morning

by way of variety when he awoke, —

Every knell, the Baron saith,
Wakes us up to a world of death, —

or something like it.

All I mean by this senseless interrupted tale
is, that by my central situation I am a little over
companied. Not that I have any animosity against
the good creatures that are so anxious to drive
away the harpy solitude from me. I like 'em,
and cards, and a chearful glass, but I mean merely
to give you an idea between office confinement
and after-office society, — how little time I can
call my own. I mean only to draw a picture, not

1 08

to make an inference. I would not that I know
of have it otherwise. I only wish sometimes I
could exchange some of my faces and voices for
the faces and voices which a late visitation brought
most welcome and carried away leaving regret,
but more pleasure, even a kind of gratitude, at
being so often favoured with that kind northern
visitation. My London faces and noises don't
hear me — I mean no disrespect — or I should
explain myself that instead of their return 220
times a year and the return of W. W. &c. seven
times in 1 04 weeks, some more equal distribu-
tion might be found. I have scarce room to put
in Mary's kind love and my poor name,

Ch. Lamb

This to be read last : W. H. goes on lectur-
ing against W. W. and making copious use of
quotations from said W. W. to give a zest to
said lectures. S. T. C. is lecturing with success.
I have not heard either him or H., but I dined
with S. T. C. at Gilman's a Sunday or two since
and he was well and in good spirits. I mean to
hear some of the course, but lectures are not much
to my taste, whatever the lecturer may be. If
read, they are dismal flat, and you can't think
why you are brought together to hear a man read
his works which you could read so much better
at leisure yourself; if delivered extempore, I am
always in pain lest the gift of utterance should
suddenly fail the orator in the middle, as it did

109

me at the dinner given in honour of me at the
London Tavern. " Gentlemen," said I, and there
I stopt, — the rest my feelings were under the
necessity of supplying. Mrs. Wordsworth will
go on, kindly haunting us with visions of seeing
the lakes once more which never can be realized.
Between us there is a great gulf — not of inex-
plicable moral antipathies and distances, I hope
(as there seem'd to be between me and that gen-
tleman concern'd in the Stamp Office that I so
strangely coiled up from at Hay don's). I think
I had an instinct that he was the head of an office.
I hate all such people — accountants, deputy ac-
countants. The dear abstract notion of the East
India Company, as long as she is unseen, is pretty,
rather poetical ; but as she makes herself manifest
by the persons of such beasts, I loathe and detest
her as the scarlet what-do-you-call-her of Baby-
lon. I thought, after abridging us of all our red-
letter days, they had done their worst, but I was
deceived in the length to which heads of offices,
those true liberty-haters, can go. They are the
tyrants, not Ferdinand, nor Nero — by a decree
past this week, they have abridged us of the
immemorially-observed custom of going at one
o'clock of a Saturday, the little shadow of a
holiday left us. Blast them. I speak it soberly.
Dear W. W., be thankful for your liberty.

We have spent two very pleasant evenings
lately with Mr. Monkhouse.

1 10

CCLXVIIL — TO CHARLES AND JAMES
OLLIER

May 28, 1818.

Dear Sir, — The last sheet is finished. All
that remains is the Title page and the Contents,
which should be uniform with volume one.
Will you be kind enough to see it? There is a
sonnet to come in by way of dedication. I have
not the sheet, so I cannot make out the Table
of Contents, but it may be done from the vari-
ous essays, letters, &c, by you, or the printer,
as thus. \Here follows a rough sketch of the 'writer s
plan.] Yours in haste, C. Lamb

Let me see the last proof, sonnet, &c.

CCLXIX. — TO CHARLES AND JAMES
OLLIER

June 18, 1818.

Dear Sir (whichever opens it), — I am going
off to Birmingham. I find my books, whatever
faculty of selling they may have (I wish they
had more for \'°"\ sake), are admirably adapted
for giving away. You have been bounteous. Six
more and I shall have satisfied all just claims.
Am I taking too great a liberty in begging you
to send four as follows, and reserve two for me
when I come home? That will make thirty-one.
Thirty-one times twelve is 372 shillings —

1 1 1

eighteen pounds twelve shillings ! ! ! — but here
are my friends, to whom, if you could transmit
them, as I shall be away a month, you will
greatly oblige the obliged,

C. Lamb

Mr. Ayrton, James Street, Buckingham Gate ;

Mr. Alsager, Suffolk Street East, Southwark,
by Horsemonger Lane;

and in one parcel directed to R. Southey, Esq.
Keswick, Cumberland;

one for R. S. ; and one for Wm. Wordsworth,
Esqr.
If you will be kind enough simply to write
"from the Author" in all four, you will still
further, etc. —

Either Longman or Murray is in the frequent
habit of sending books to Southey, and will take
charge of the parcel. It will be as well to write
in at the beginning thus :

R. Southey, Esq., from the Author.

W. Wordsworth, Esq., from the Author.
Then, if I can find the remaining two, left for
me at Russell Street when I return, rather than
encroach any more on the heap, I will engage
to make no more new friends ad infinitum, your-
selves being the last.

Yours truly, C. L.

I think Southey will give us a lift in that
damn'd Quarterly. I meditate an attack upon

I 12

that Cobbler GifFord, which shall appear im-
mediately after any favourable mention which S.
may make in the Quarterly. It can't, in decent
gratitude, appear before.

CCLXX. — TO ROBERT SOUTHEY

October 26, 18 18.

Dear Southey, — I am pleased with your
friendly remembrances of my little things. I do
not know whether I have done a silly thing or
a wise one ; but it is of no great consequence. I
run no risk, and care for no censures. My bread
and cheese is stable as the foundations of Lead-
enhall Street, and if it hold out as long as the
" foundations of our empire in the East," I shall
do pretty well. You and W. W. should have
had your presentation copies more ceremoniously
sent ; but I had no copies when I was leaving
town for my holidays, and rather than delay,
commissioned my bookseller to send them thus
nakedly. By not hearing from W. W. or you, I
began to be afraid Murray had not sent them.

I do not see S. T. C. so often as I could wish.
He never comes to me ; and though his host and
hostess are very friendly, it puts me out of my
way to go see one person at another person's
house. It was the same when he resided at
Morgan's. Not but they also were more than
civil ; but after all one feels so welcome at one's
own house.

Have you seen poor Miss Betham's Vignettes ?
Some of them, the second particularly, To Lucy,
are sweet and good as herself, while she was her-
self. She is in some measure abroad again. I am
better than I deserve to be. The hot weather has
been such a treat ! Mary joins in this little cor-
ner in kindest remembrances to you all.

C. L.

CCLXXI. — TO S. T COLERIDGE

December 24, 1818.

My dear Coleridge, — I have been in a state
of incessant hurry ever since the receipt of your
ticket. It found me incapable of attending you,
it being the night of Kenney's new comedy,
which has utterly failed. You know my local
aptitudes at such a time ; I have been a thorough
rendezvous for all consultations. My head begins
to clear up a little ; but it has had bells in it.
Thank you kindly for your ticket, though the
mournful prognostic which accompanies it
certainly renders its permanent pretensions less
marketable ; but I trust to hear many a course
yet. You excepted Christmas week, by which
I understood next week ; I thought Christmas
week was that which Christmas Sunday ushered
in.

We are sorry it never lies in your way to come
to us ; but, dear Mahomet, we will come to you.
Will it be convenient to all the good people at

114

Highgate, if we take a stage up, not next Sunday,
but the following, viz., 3rd January, 1 8 1 9 ; shall
we be too late to catch a skirt of the old out-
goer ? How the years crumble from under us !
We shall hope to see you before then ; but, if not,
let us know if then will be convenient. Can we
secure a coach home ?

Believe me ever yours, C. Lamb

I have but one holiday, which is Christmas-
day itself nakedly : no pretty garnish and fringes
of St. John's day, Holy Innocents &c, that used
to bestud it all around in the calendar. Improbe
labor ! I write six hours every day in the candle-
light fog-den at Leadheall.

CCLXXIL — TO JOHN CHAMBERS

1818.

Dear C, — I steal a few minutes from a pain-
ful and laborious avocation, aggravated by the
absence of some that should assist me, to say how
extremely happy we should be to see you return
clean as the cripple out of the pool ofBethesda.
That damn'd scorbutic — how came you by it ?
You are now fairly a damaged lot ; as Venn
would say, One Scratched. You might play Scrub
in the Beaux' Stratagem. The best post your
friends could promote you to would be a scrub-
bing post. " Aye, there 's the rub." I generally
get tired after the third rubber. But you, I sup-

pose, tire twice the number every day. First,
there 's your mother, she begins after breakfast ;
then your little sister takes it up about luncheon-
time, till her bones crack, and some kind neigh-
bour comes in to lend a hand, scrub, scrub, scrub,
and nothing will get the intolerable itch (for I
am persuaded it is the itch) out of your penance-
doing bones. A cursed thing just at this time,
when everybody wants to get out of town as well
as yourself. Of course, I don't mean to reproach
you. You can't help it, the whoreson tingling in
your blood. I dare say you would if you could.
But don't you think you could do a little work,

if you came ? as much as D does before

twelve o'clock. Hang him, there he sits at that
cursed Times — and latterly he has had the Berk-
shire Chronicle sent him every Tuesday and Fri-
day to get at the county news. Why, that letter
which you favoured him with, appears to me to
be very well and clearly written. The man that
wrote that might make out warrants, or write
committees. There was as much in quantity
written as would have filled four volumes of the
indigo appendix; and when we are so busy as we
are, every little helps. But I throw out these
observations merely as innuendos. By the way
there 's a Doctor Lamert in Leadenhall Street,
who sells a mixture to purify the blood. No. 114
Leadenhall Street, near the market. But it is
necessary that his patients should be on the spot,
that he may see them every day.

116

There 's a sale of indigo advertised for July,
forty thousand lots — 1 0,000 chests only, but they
sell them in quarter chests which makes 40,000.
By the bye a droll accident happened here on
Thursday. Wadd and Plumley got quarrelling
about a kneebuckle of Hyde's which the latter
affirmed not to be standard ; Wadd was nettled at
this, and said something reflecting on tradesmen
and shopkeepers, and Plumley struck him. Friend
is married ; he has married a Roman Catholic,
which has offended his family, but they have
come to an agreement, that the boys (if they
have children) shall be bred up in the father's
religion, and the girls in the mother's, which I
think equitable enough. I am determined my
children shall be brought up in their father's
religion, if they can find out what it is. Bye is
about publishing a volume of poems which
he means to dedicate to Matthie. Methinks he
might have found a better Mecasnas. They
are chiefly amatory, others of them stupid, the
greater part very far below mediocrity ; but
they discover much tender feeling ; they are
most like Petrarch of any foreign poet, or what
we might have supposed Petrarch would have
written if Petrarch had been born a fool !

Grinwallows is made master of the cere-
monies at Dandelion, near Margate ; of course he
gives up the office. " My Harry" makes so many
faces that it is impossible to sit opposite him with-
out smiling. Dowley danced a quadrille at Court

117

on the Queen's birthday with Lady Thynne,
Lady Desbrow, and Lady Louisa Manners. It is
said his performance was graceful and airy. Cabel
has taken an unaccountable fancy into his head
that he is Fuller, member for Sussex. He imi-
tates his blunt way of speaking. I remain much
the same as you remember, very universally be-
loved and esteemed, possessing everybody's good-
will, and trying at least to deserve it ; the same
steady adherence to principle, and correct regard
for truth, which always marked my conduct,
marks it still. If I am singular in anything it is
in too great a squeamishness to anything that
remotely looks like a falsehood. I am call'd Old
Honesty ; sometimes Upright Telltruth, Esq.,
and I own it tickles my vanity a little. The
committee have formally abolish'd all holydays
whatsoever — for which may the devil, who
keeps no holydays, have them in his eternal burn-
ing workshop. When I say holydays, I mean
calendar holydays, for at Medley's instigation
they have agreed to a sort of scale by which the
chief has power to give leave of absence, viz. :
Those who have been 50 years and upwards

to be absent 4 days in the year, but not

without leave of the chief.

35 years and upward, 3 days,
25 years and upward, 2 days,
1 8 years and upward, 1 day,
which I think very liberal. We are also to sign
our name when we go as well as when we come,

118

and every quarter of an hour we sign, to show
that we are here. Mins and Gardner take it in
turn to bring round the book — O here is Mins
with the Book — no, it 's Gardner — " What 's
that, G. ? " " The appearance book, Sir " (with
a gentle inclination of his head, and smiling).
" What the devil, is the quarter come again ? "
It annoys Dodwell amazingly; he sometimes has
to sign six or seven times while he is reading the
newspaper — [Unfinished.]

CCLXXIII. — TO W. WORDSWORTH

April 26, 1 819.

Dear Wordsworth, — I received a copy of
Peter Bell a week ago, and I hope the author
will not be offended if I say I do not much rel-
ish it. The humour, if it is meant for humour,
is forced, and then the price. Sixpence would
have been dear for it. Mind, I do not mean your
" Peter Bell," but a " Peter Bell " which pre-
ceded it about a week, and is in every booksell-
er's shop window in London, the type and paper
nothing differing from the true one, the preface
signed W. W., and the supplementary preface
quoting as the author's words an extract from
supplementary preface to the Lyrical Ballads. Is
there no law against these rascals ? I would have
this Lambert Simnel whipt at the cart's tail.
Then there is Rogers ! he has been re-writing
your Poem of the Strid, and publishing it at the

119

end of his Human Life. Tie him up to the cart,
hangman, while you are about it. Who started
the spurious P. B., I have not heard. I should
guess, one of the sneering brothers — the vile
Smiths — but I have heard no name mentioned.
Peter Bell (not the mock one) is excellent. For
its matter, I mean. I cannot say that the style
of it quite satisfies me. It is too lyrical. The
auditors to whom it is feigned to be told, do
not arride me. I had rather it had been told me,
the reader, at once.

Heartleap Well is the tale for me, in matter
as good as this, in manner infinitely before it, in
my poor judgment. Why did you not add The
Waggoner ? Have I thanked you, though, yet, for
Peter Bell? I would not not have it for a good deal

of money. C is very foolish to scribble

about books. Neither his tongue nor fingers are
very retentive. But I shall not say anything to
him about it. He would only begin a very long
story, with a very long face, and I see him far too
seldom to tease him with affairs of business or
conscience when I do see him. He never comes
near our house, and when we go to see him, he
is generally writing, or thinking he is writing, in
his study till the dinner comes, and that is scarce
over before the stage summons us away.

The mock P. B. had only this effect on me,
that after twice reading it over in hopes to find
something diverting in it, I reach'd your two
books off the shelf and set into a steady reading

120

of them, till I had nearly finished both before
I went to bed. The two of your last edition, of
course, I mean. And in the morning I awoke
determining to take down the Excursion. I wish
the scoundrel imitator could know this. But why
waste a wish on him ? I do not believe that pad-
dling about with a stick in a pond and fishing
up a dead author whom his intolerable wrongs
had driven to that deed of desperation, would turn
the heart of one of these obtuse literary Bells.
There is no Cock for such Peters. Damn 'em. I
am glad this aspiration came upon the red ink line.
[This letter is written in red and black ink, alternat-
ing with' each line.] It is more of a bloody curse.
I have delivered over your other presents to
Alsager and G. D. — A. I am sure will value it
and be proud of the hand from which it came.
To G. D. a poem is a poem. His own as good
as any bodie's, and God bless him, any bodie 's as
good as his own, for I do not think he has the
most distant guess of the possibility of one poem
being better than another. The gods by deny-
ing him the very faculty itself of discrimination
have effectually cut off every seed of envy in his
bosom. But with envy, they excided curiosity
also, and if you wish the copy again, which you
destined for him, I think I shall be able to find
it again for you — on his third shelf, where he
stuffs his presentation copies, uncut, in shape
and matter resembling a lump of dry dust, but
on carefully removing that stratum, a thing like

121

a pamphlet will emerge. I have tried this with
fifty different poetical works that have been given
G. D. in return for as many of his own perform-
ances, and I confess I never had any scruple in
taking my own again wherever I found it, shaking
the adherences off — and by this means one copy
of" my works " served for G. D. and with a little
dusting was made over to my good friend Dr.
Stoddart, who little thought whose leavings he
was taking when he made me that graceful bow.
By the way, the Doctor is the only one of my
acquaintance who bows gracefully, my town ac-
quaintance I mean.

How do you like my way of writing with two
inks ? I think it is pretty and motley. Suppose
Mrs. W. adopts it, the next time she holds the
pen for you.

My dinner waits. I have no time to indulge
any longer in these laborious curiosities. God
bless you and cause to thrive and to burgeon
whatsoever you write, and fear no inks of miser-
able poetasters. Yours truly,

Charles Lamb

Mary's love.

CCLXXIV. — TO JOHN RICKMAN

May 21, 1819.

Dear Rickman, — The gentleman who will
present this letter holds a situation of considerable
importance in the East India House, and is my

122

very good friend. He is desirous of knowing
whether it is too late to amend a mere error in
figures which he has just discovered in an account
made out by him and laid before the house yes-
terday. He will best explain to you what he
means, and I am sure you will help him to the
best of your power. Phillips is too ill for me to
think of applying to him.

Why did we not see you last night ?

Yours truly, Charles Lamb

CCLXXV.— TO THOMAS MANNING

May 28, 1819.

My dear M., — I want to know how your
brother is, if you have heard lately. I want to
know about you. I wish you were nearer. C.
Lloyd is in town with Mrs. Ll[oyd], anxious of
course to see you. She is come for a few days,
and projects leaving him here in the care of a
man. I fear he will launch out, and heartily wish
the scene of his possible exploits were at a remoter
distance. But she does not know what to do with
him. He run away the other day to come to
London alone, but was intercepted, and now she
has brought him. I wish people wouldn't be
mad. Could you take a run up to look at him ?
Would you like to see him? or isn't it better to
lean over a style [stile] in a sort of careless, easy,
half astronomical position, eyeing the blue ex-
panse ? How are my cousins, the Gladmans of

123

Wheathamstead, and farmer Bruton ? Mrs. Bru-
ton is a glorious woman.

Hail, Mackeray End —

This is a fragment of a blank verse poem which
I once meditated, but got no further. The E.
I. H. has been thrown into a quandary by the
strange phenomenon of poor Tommy Bye, whom
I have known man and madman twenty-seven
years, he being elder here than myself by nine
years and more. He was always a pleasant, gos-
siping, half-headed, muzzy, dozing, dreaming,
walk-about, inoffensive chap ; a little too fond of
the creature — who isn't at times ? but Tommy
had not brains to work off an over-night's surfeit
by ten o'clock next morning, and unfortunately,
in he wandered the other morning drunk with
last night, and with a superfoetation of drink
taken in since he set out from bed. He came
staggering under his double burthen, like trees
in Java, bearing at once blossom, fruit, and falling
fruit, as I have heard you or some other traveller
tell, with his face literally as blue as the bluest
firmament; some wretched calico that he had
mopped his poor oozy front with had rendered
up its native dye, and the devil a bit would he
consent to wash it, but swore it was characteristic,
for he was going to the sale of indigo, and set up
a laugh which I did not think the lungs of mortal
man were competent to. It was like a thousand
people laughing, or the goblin page. He imag-

124

ined afterwards that the whole office had been
laughing at him, so strange did his own sounds
strike upon his nonsensorium. But Tommy has
laughed his last laugh, and awoke the next day
to find himself reduced from an abused income
of j£6oo per annum to one-sixth of the sum,
after thirty-six years' tolerable good service.
The quality of mercy was not strain'd in his be-
half; the gentle dews dropt not on him from
heaven.

It just came across me that I was writing to

Canton. How is Ball ? " Mr. B. is a P ."

Will you drop in to-morrow night ? Fanny
K[elly] is coming, if she does not cheat us. Mrs.
Gold is well, but proves "uncoined" as the lovers
about Wheathampstead would say.

O hard-hearted Burrel
With teeth like a squirrell —

I have not had such a quiet half hour to sit
down to a quiet letter for many years. I have
not been interrupted above four times. I wrote
a letter the other day in alternate lines, black ink
and red, and you cannot think how it chilled the
flow of ideas. Next Monday is Whitmonday.
What a reflexion ! Twelve years ago, and I
should have kept that and the following holy-
day in the fields a-Maying. All of those pretty
pastoral delights are over. This dead, everlasting
dead desk — how it weighs the spirit of a gen-
tleman down ! This dead wood of the desk
instead of your living trees ! But then, again,

I25

I hate the Joskins, a name for Hertfordshire bump-
kins. Each state of life has its inconvenience ;
but then, again, mine has more than one. Not
that I repine, or grudge, or murmur at my de-
stiny. I have meat and drink, and decent apparel ;
I shall, at least, when I get a new hat.

A red-haired man just interrupted me. He
has broke the current of my thoughts. I have n't
a word to add. I don't know why I send this
letter, but I have had a hankering to hear about
you some days. Perhaps it will go off, before
your reply comes. If it don't, I assure you no
letter was ever welcomer from you, from Paris
or Macao. C. Lamb

CCLXXVI. — TO W. WORDSWORTH

June 7, 1819.

My dear Wordsworth, — You cannot imagine
how proud we are here of the dedication. We
read it twice for once that we do the poem. I
mean all through ; yet Benjamin is no common
favourite ; there is a spirit of beautiful tolerance
in it. It is as good as it was in 1806; and will
be as good in 1829, if our dim eyes shall be
awake to peruse it.

Methinks there is a kind of shadowing affinity
between the subject of the narrative and the sub-
ject of the dedication ; but I will not enter into
personal themes ; else, substituting *******
• [Charles Lamb] for Ben, and the Honour-
126

able United Company of Merchants trading to
the East Indies, for the master of the misused
team, it might seem by no far-fetched analogy
to point its dim warnings hitherward ; but I re-
ject the omen, especially as its import seems to
have been diverted to another victim.

Poor Tommy Bye, whom I have known (as
I express'd it in a letter to Manning), man and
madman twenty-seven years — he was my gossip
in Leadenhall Street — but too much addicted
to turn in at a red lattice — came wandering
into his and my common scene of business — you
have seen the orderly place — reeling drunk at
nine o'clock — with his face of a deep blue, con-
tracted by a filthy dowlas muckinger which had
given up its dye to his poor oozy visnomy — and
short to tell, after playing various pranks, laugh-
ing loud laughters three — mad explosions they
were — in the following morning the " tear stood
in his ee" — for he found his abused income of
clear j[6oo inexorably reduced to ^ioo — he
was my dear gossip — alas ! Benjamin !

I will never write another letter with alternate
inks. You cannot imagine how it cramps the
flow of the style. I can conceive Pindar (I do
not mean to compare myself to him), by the
command of Hiero, the Sicilian tyrant (was not
he the tyrant of some place ? fie on my neglect
of history !) I can conceive him by command of
Hiero, or Perillus, set down to pen an Isthmian
or Nemean Panegyre in lines alternate red and

127

black. I maintain he could n't have done it ; it
would have been a strait-laced torture to his
muse, he would have call'd for the bull for a
relief. Neither could Lycidas, or the Chorics
(how do you like the word ?) of Samson Ago-
nistes, have been written with two inks.

Your couplets with points, epilogues to Mr.
H.'s, &c, might be even benefited by the twy-
fount, where one line (the second) is for point,
and the first for rhyme, I think the alternation
would assist, like a mould. I maintain it, you
could not have written your stanzas on pre-exist-
ence with two inks. Try another, and Rogers
the banker, with his silver standish having one
ink only, I will bet my Ode on Tobacco, against
the Pleasures of Memory — and Hope too — shall
put more fervour of enthusiasm into the same
subject than you can with your two ; he shall
do it stans pede in uno, as it were.

The Waggoner is very ill put up in boards, at
least it seems to me always to open at the dedi-
cation ; but that is a mechanical fault.

I re-read the White Doe of Rylston — the title
should be always written at length, as Mary
Sabilla Novello, a very nice woman of our ac-
quaintance, always signs hers at the bottom of
the shortest note. Mary told her, if her name
had been Mary Ann, she would have signed M.
A. Novello, or M. only, dropping the A.; which
makes me think, with some other triflings, that
she understands something of human nature.

128

My pen goes galloping on most rhapsodically,
glad to have escaped the bondage of two inks.

Manning had just sent it home and it came as
fresh to me as the immortal creature it speaks of.
M. sent it home with a note, having this passage
in it, " I cannot help writing to you while I am
reading Wordsworth's poem. I am got into the
third canto, and say that it raises my opinion
of him very much indeed.* 'T is broad, noble,
poetical, with a masterly scanning of human
actions, absolutely above common readers. What
a manly (implied) interpretation of (bad) party-
actions, as trampling the Bible, &c." — and so
he goes on.

* N. B. M from his peregrinations is

twelve or fourteen years behind in his know-
ledge of who has or has not written good verse
of late.

I do not know which I like best, the prologue
(the latter part specially) to P. Bell, or the epi-
logue to Benjamin. Yes, I tell stories, I do know.
I like the last best, and the Waggoner altogether
as a pleasanter remembrance to me than the
Itinerant. If it were not, the page before the first
page would and ought to make it so.

The sonnets are not all new to me. Of what
are, the ninth I like best. Thank you for that
to Walton. I take it as a favour done to me,
that, being so old a darling of mine, you should
bear testimony to his worth in a book containing

a dedi

129

I cannot write the vain word at full length
any longer.

If, as you say, the Waggoner in some sort came
at my call, O for a potent voice to call forth the
Recluse from his profound dormitory, where he
sleeps forgetful of his foolish charge — the world!

Had I three inks I would invoke him !

Talfourd has written a most kind review of
J. Woodvil, &c, in the Champion. He is your
most zealous admirer, in solitude and in crowds.
H. Crabbe Robinson gives me any dear prints
that I happen to admire, and I love him for it
and for other things. Alsager shall have his
copy, but at present I have lent it for a day only,
not chusing to part with my own. Mary's love.
How do you all do, amanuenses both — marital
and sororal ? C. Lamb

note

[Wordsworth had just brought out The Waggoner, which
was dedicated to Lamb. — Ed.]

CCLXXVII. — TO FANNY KELLY

July 20, 1 819.

Dear Miss Kelly, — We had the pleasure (pain,
I might better call it) of seeing you last night in
the new play. It was a most consummate piece
of acting, but what a task for you to undergo !
at a time when your heart is sore from real sor-
row ! it has given rise to a train of thinking, which
I cannot suppress.

130

Would to God you were released from this
way of life ; that you could bring your mind to
consent to take your lot with us, and throw off
for ever the whole burden of your profession. I
neither expect or wish you to take notice of this
which lam writing, in your present over-occupied
and hurried state; but to think of itat your leisure.
I have quite income enough, if that were all, to
justify me for making such a proposal, with what
I may call even a handsome provision for my sur-
vivor. What you possess of your own would nat-
urally be appropriated to those for whose sakes
chiefly you have made so many hard sacrifices.
I am not so foolish as not to know that I am a
most unworthy match for such a one as you, but
you have for years been a principal object in my
mind. In many a sweet assumed character I have
learned to love you, but simply as F. M. Kelly
I love you better than them all. Can you quit
these shadows of existence, and come and be a
reality to us ? can you leave off harassing your-
self to please a thankless multitude, who know
nothing of you, and begin at last to live to your-
self and your friends ?

As plainly and frankly as I have seen you give
or refuse assent in some feigned scene, so frankly
do me the justice to answer me. It is impossible
I should feel injured or aggrieved by your telling
me at once, that the proposal does not suit you. It
is impossible that I should ever think of molest-
ing you with idle importunity and persecution

l3*

after your mind [was] once firmly spoken — but
happier, far happier, could I have leave to hope
a time might come, when our friends might be
your friends; our interests yours; our book-know-
ledge, if in that inconsiderable particular we have
any little advantage, might impart something to
you, which you would every day have it in your
power ten thousandfold to repay by the added
cheerfulness and joy which you could not fail to
bring as a dowry into whatever family should have
the honour and happiness of receiving you, the
most welcome accession that could be made to it.
In haste, but with entire respect and deepest
affection, I subscribe myself, C. Lamb

note

[This was Miss Kelly's reply :

Henrietta Street, July 20, 1819.

An early and deeply rooted attachment has fixed my heart on one from
whom no worldly prospect can well induce me to withdraw it, but while
I thus frankly and decidedly decline your proposal, believe me, I am not
insensible to the high honour which the preference of such a mind as yours
confers upon me — let me, however, hope that all thought upon this
subject will end with this letter, and that you will henceforth encourage
no other sentiment towards me than esteem in my private character and
a continuance of that approbation of my humble talents which you have
already expressed so much and so often to my advantage and gratification.

Believe me I feel proud to acknowledge myself,

Your obliged friend, F. M. Kelly.]

CCLXXVIII. — TO FANNY KELLY

July 20, 1819.

Dear Miss Kelly, — Your injunctions shall be
obeyed to a tittle. I feel myself in a lackadaisacal

132

no-how-ish kind of a humour. I believe it is the
rain, or something. I had thought to have writ-
ten seriously, but I fancy I succeed best in epistles
of mere fun ; puns and that nonsense. You will
be good friends with us, will you not ? let what
has past " break no bones " between us. You
will not refuse us them next time we send for
them ? Yours very truly, C. L.

Do you observe the delicacy of not signing
my full name ? N. B. Do not paste that last let-
ter of mine into your book.

NOTE

[Writing again of Miss Kelly, in the Hypocrite, in The
Examiner of August i and 2, Lamb says : " She is in truth
not framed to tease or torment even in jest, but to utter a
hearty Yes or No ; to yield or refuse assent with a noble sin-
cerity. We have not the pleasure of being acquainted with
her, but we have been told that she carries the same cordial
manners into private life."

Miss Kelly died unmarried at the age of ninety-two.

"Break no bones." Here Lamb makes one of his puns.
By " bones " he meant also the little ivory discs which were
given to friends of the management, entitling them to free
entry to the theatre. With this explanation the next sentence
of the letter becomes clear.]

CCLXXIX.— TO SAMUEL JAMES ARNOLD

No date. (?) 1819.

Dear Sir, — We beg to convey our kindest
acknowledgements to Mr. Arnold for the very

!33

pleasant privilege he has favoured us with. My
yearly holidays end with next week, during
which we shall be mostly in the country, and
afterwards avail ourselves fully of the privilege.
Sincerely wishing you crowded houses, &c, we
remain,

Yours truly, Ch. & M. Lamb

NOTE

[Arnold, brother-in-law of Ayrton, was the lessee of the
Lyceum, where Miss Kelly was acting when Lamb proposed
to her in 1819. This letter may belong to that time. — E. V.
Lucas.]

CCLXXX. — TO S. T. COLERIDGE

Summer, 1819.

Dear C, — Your sonnet is capital. The paper
ingenious, only that it split into four parts (besides
a side splinter) in the carriage. I have transferred
it to the common English paper, manufactured
of rags, for better preservation. I never knew
before how the Iliad and Odyssey were written.
'T is strikingly corroborated by observations on
cats. These domestic animals, put 'em on a rug
before the fire, wink their eyes up and listen to
the kettle, and then purr, which is their poetry.

On Sunday week we kiss your hands (if they
are clean). This next Sunday I have been en-
gaged for some time.

With rememb'ces to your good host and host-
ess. Yours ever, C. Lamb

J34

CCLXXXI. — TO THOMAS HOLCROFT, Jr.

Autumn, 1819.

Dear Tom, — Do not come to us on Thurs-
day, for we are moved into country lodgings, tho'
I am still at the India House in the mornings.
See Marshall and Captain Betham as soon as ever
you can. I fear leave cannot be obtained at the
India House for your going to India. If you go
it must be as captain's clerk, if such a thing could
be obtain'd.

For God's sake keep your present place and do
not give it up, or neglect it; as you perhaps will
not be able to go to India, and you see how dif-
ficult of attainment situations are.

Yours truly, C. Lamb

CCLXXXII.— TO JOSEPH COTTLE

November 5, 18 19.

Dear Sir, — It is so long since I have seen or
heard from you, that I fear that you will con-
sider a request I have to make as impertinent.
About three years since, when I was one day at
Bristol, I made an effort to see you, but you were
from home. The request I have to make is, that
you would very much oblige me, if you have any
small portrait of yourself, by allowing me to have
it copied, to accompany a selection of Likenesses
of Living Bards which a most particular friend
of mine is making. If you have no objections,

135

and could oblige me by transmitting such por-
trait to me at No. 44 Russell Street, Covent
Garden, I will answer for taking the greatest
care of it, and returning it safely the instant the
copier has done with it. I hope you will pardon
the liberty.

From an old friend, and well-wisher,

Charles Lamb

CCLXXXIII. — TO JOSEPH COTTLE

Late 18 1 9.

Dear Sir, — My friend whom you have
obliged by the loan of your picture, having had it
very exactly copied (and a very spirited drawing
it is, as every one thinks that has seen it — the
copy is not much inferior, done by a daughter
of Josephs, R. A.), he purposes sending you
back the original, which I must accompany
with my warm thanks, both for that, and your
better favour, the Messiah, which, I assure you,
I have read thro' with great pleasure ; the verses
have great sweetness and a New Testament-
plainness about them which affected me very
much.

I could just wish that in page 63 you had

omitted the lines 71 and 72, and had ended the

period with, —

The willowy brook was there, but that sweet sound —
When to be heard again on earthly ground ?

Two very sweet lines, and the sense perfect.

136

And in page 154, line 68, —

He spake, I come, ordain'd a world to save,
To be baptized by thee in Jordan's wave.

These words are hardly borne out by the story,
and seem scarce accordant with the modesty with
which our Lord came to take his common por-
tion among the baptismal candidates. They also
anticipate the beauty of John's recognition of the
Messiah, and the subsequent confirmation from
the Voice and Dove.

You will excuse the remarks of an old brother
bard, whose career, though long since pretty well
stopt, was coeval in its beginning with your own,
and who is sorry his lot has been always to be so
distant from you. It is not likely that C. L. will
ever see Bristol again; but, if J. C. should ever
visit London, he will be a most welcome visitor
to C. L.

My sister joins in cordial remembrances, and
I request the favour of knowing, at your earliest
opportunity, whether the portrait arrives safe,
glass unbroken, &c. Your glass broke in its com-
ing.

Morgan is a little better — can read a little,
&c. ; but cannot join Mrs. M. till the Insolvent
Act (or whatever it is called) takes place. Then,
I hope, he will stand clear of all debts. Mean-
time, he has a most exemplary nurse and kind
companion in Miss Brent.

Once more, dear sir, yours truly,

C. Lamb

137

CCLXXXIV.— TO DOROTHY WORDS-
WORTH

November 25, 1819.

Dear Miss Wordsworth, — You will think me
negligent, but I wanted to see more of Willy,
before I ventured to express a prediction. Till
yesterday I had barely seen him — Virgilium
tantum vidi — but yesterday he gave us his small
company to a bullock's heart — and I can pro-
nounce him a lad of promise. He is no pedant
nor bookworm, so far I can answer. Perhaps
he has hitherto paid too little attention to other
men's inventions, preferring, like Lord Fopping-
ton, the " natural sprouts of his own." But he
has observation, and seems thoroughly awake. I
am ill at remembering other people's bon mots,
but the following are a few. Being taken over
Waterloo Bridge, he remarked that if we had no
mountains, we had a fine river at least, which was
a touch of the comparative, but then he added,
in a strain which augured less for his future abili-
ties as apolitical economist, that he supposed they
must take at least a pound a week toll. Like a
curious naturalist he inquired if the tide did not
come up a little salty. This being satisfactorily
answered, he put another question as to the flux
and reflux, which being rather cunningly evaded
than artfully solved by that she-Aristotle Mary,
who muttered something about its getting up
an hour sooner and sooner every day, he sagely

138

replied, " Then it must come to the same thing
at last," which was a speech worthy of an infant
Halley !

The lion in the 'Change by no means came up
to his ideal standard. So impossible it is for Na-
ture in any of her works to come up to the stand-
ard of a child's imagination. The whelps (lion-
ets) he was sorry to find were dead, and on par-
ticular inquiry his old friend the ouran-outang
had gone the way of all flesh also. The grand
tiger was also sick, and expected in no short time
to exchange this transitory world for another, or
none. But again, there was a golden eagle (I do
not mean that of Charing) which did much ar-
ride and console him. William's genius, I take it,
leans a little to the figurative, for being at play at
tricktrack (a kind of minor billiard-table which
we keep for smaller wights, and sometimes re-
fresh our own mature fatigues with taking a hand
at), not being able to hit a ball he had iterate
aimed at, he cried out, " I cannot hit that beast."
Now the balls are usually called men, but he
felicitously hit upon a middle term, a term of
approximation and imaginative reconciliation, a
something where the two ends, of the brute mat-
ter (ivory) and their human and rather violent
personification into men, might meet, as I take it
illustrative of that excellent remark in a certain
preface about imagination, explaining, "like a
sea-beast that had crawled forth to sun himself."
Not that I accuse William Minor of hereditary

139

plagiary, or conceive the image to have come ex
traduce. Rather he seemeth to keep aloof from
any source of imitation, and purposely to remain
ignorant of what mighty poets have done in this
kind before' him. For being asked if his father
had ever been on Westminster Bridge, he an-
swer'd that he did not know.

It is hard to discern the oak in the acorn, or
a temple like St. Paul's in the first stone which
is laid, nor can I quite prefigure what destination
the genius of William Minor hath to take. Some
few hints I have set down, to guide my future
observations. He hath the power of calculation
in no ordinary degree for a chit. He combineth
figures, after the first boggle, rapidly. As in the
tricktrack board, where the hits are figured, at
first he did not perceive that 15 and 7 made 22,
but by a little use he could combine 8 with 25 —
and 33 again with 16, which approacheth some-
thing in kind (far let me be from flattering him
by saying in degree) to that of the famous Amer-
ican boy. I am sometimes inclined to think
I perceive the future satirist in him, for he hath
a sub-sardonic smile which bursteth out upon
occasion, as when he was asked if London were
as big as Ambleside, and indeed no other answer
was given, or proper to be given, to so ensnaring
and provoking a question. In the contour of
scull certainly I discern something paternal. But
whether in all respects the future man shall
transcend his father's fame, Time, the trier of

140

geniuses, must decide. Be it pronounced peremp-
torily at present, that Willy is a well-manner'd
child, and though no great student, hath yet a
lively eye for things that lie before him.

Given in haste from my desk at Leadenhall.
Yours and yours most sincerely, C. Lamb

note

[This letter, which refers to a visit paid to the Lambs in
Great Russell Street by Wordsworth's son, William, then
nine years old, is remarkable, apart from its charm and hu-
mour, for containing more of the absolute method of certain
of Lamb's Elia passages than anything he had yet written. —
E. V. Lucas.]

CCLXXXV. — TO S. T. COLERIDGE

January 10, 1820.

Dear Coleridge, — A letter written in the
blood ' of your poor friend would indeed be of
a nature to startle you ; but this is nought but
harmless red ink, or, as the witty mercantile
phrase hath it, clerk's blood. Damn 'em ! my brain,
guts, skin, flesh, bone, carcase, soul, Time, is all
theirs. The Royal Exchange, Gresham's Folly,
hath me body and spirit.

I admire some of Lloyd's lines on you, and
I admire your postponing reading them. He is
a sad Tattler, but this is under the rose. Twenty
years ago he estranged one friend from me quite,
whom I have been regretting but never could

1 This letter was written in red ink. — Ed.
141

regain since ; he almost alienated you (also) from
me, or me from you, I don't know which. But
that breach is closed. The dreary sea is filled up.
He has lately been at work " telling again," as
they call it, a most gratuitous piece of mischief,
and has caused a coolness betwixt me and (not
friend exactly, but) intimate acquaintance. I
suspect, also, he saps Manning's faith in me, who
am to Manning more than an acquaintance. Still
I like his writing verses about you. Will your
kind host and hostess give us a dinner next Sun-
day, and better still, not expect us if the weather
is very bad ? Why you should refuse twenty
g[uinea]s per sheet for Blackwood's or any other
magazine passes my poor comprehension. But,
as Strap says, you know best. I have no quarrel
with you about praeprandial avocations — so don't
imagine one. That Manchester sonnet I think
very likely is Capel [LofFt's]. Another sonnet
appeared with the same initials in the same paper,
which turned out to be Procter's. What do the
rascals mean ? Am I to have the fathering of
what idle rhymes every beggarly poetaster pours
forth ! Who put your marine sonnet and " about
Browne" into Blackwood's} I did not. [Line
obliterated by author.] So no more, till we meet.
Ever yours, C. L.

142

CCLXXXVI. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

January 10, 1820.

Dear Sir, — We expected you here to-night ;
but as you have invited us to-morrow evening, we
shall dispose of this evening as we intended to
have done of to-morrow. We shall be with you
by eight, and shall have taken tea.
Your (not obliging but obliged)

C. and M. Lamb

CCLXXXVII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

February 15, 1820.

Dear Sir, — I have brought you Rosamund,
Bp. of Landaff's daughter's novel. We shall have
a small party, on Thursday evening, if you will
do us the favour to join it.

Yours truly, C. Lamb

CCLXXXVIII. — TO DOROTHY WORDS-
WORTH

May 25, 1820.

Dear Miss W., — I have volunteered to reply
to your note because of a mistake I am desirous
of rectifying on the spot. There can be none to
whom the last volume of W. W. has come more
welcome than to me. I have traced the Duddon
in thought and with repetition along the banks
(alas !) of the Lea — (unpoetical name) : it is

143

always flowing and murmuring in my ears. The
story of Dion is divine — the genius of Plato fall-
ing on him like moonlight — the finest thing
ever expressed.

Then there is Elidure and Kirkstone Pass —
the last not new to me — and let me add one of
the sweetest of all to me, The Longest Day. Lov-
ing all these as much as I can love poetry, new
to me, what could I wish or desire or extrava-
gantly desiderate in a new volume ? That I did
not write to W. W. was simply that he was to
come so soon, and that flattens letters.

I admired your averted looks on Saturday.
You did not observe M. Burney's averted look
also ? You might have been supposed two an-
tipathies, or quarrelled lovers. The fact was, M.
B. had a black eye he was desirous of concealing
— an artificial one I mean, not of nature's mak-
ing, but of art's reflecting, for nobody quarrels
with the black eyes the former gives — but it
was curious to see you both ashamed of such
panegyrical objects as black eyes and white teeth
have always been considered. * * * Mary is not
here to see the stuff I write, else she would snatch
the pen out of my hand and conclude with some
sober kind messages.

We sincerely wish your brother better.
Yours, both of us kindly,

C. L. and M. L.

144

CCLXXXIX. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

[No date.]

Dear Sir, — We expect Wordsworth to-
morrow evening. Will you look in ? C. L.

CCXC — TO JOSEPH COTTLE

May 26, 1820.

My dear Sir, — I am quite ashamed of not
having acknowledged your kind present earlier,
but that unknown something, which was never
yet discovered, though so often speculated upon,
which stands in the way of lazy folks answering
letters, has presented its usual obstacle. It is not
forgetfulness, nor disrespect, nor incivility, but
terribly like all these bad things.

I have been in my time a great epistolary scrib-
bler; but the passion, and with it the facility, at
length wears out ; and it must be pumped up
again by the heavy machinery of duty or grati-
tude, when it should run free.

I have read your Fall of Cambria with as much
pleasure as I did your Messiah. Your Cambrian
poem I shall be tempted to repeat oftenest, as
Human poems takemeina mood more frequently
congenial than Divine. The character of Llewel-
lyn pleases me more than anything else, perhaps ;
and then some of the lyrical pieces are fine
varieties.

It was quite a mistake that I could dislike any-

145

thing you should write against Lord Byron, for
I have a thorough aversion to his character and
a very moderate admiration of his genius ; he is
great in so little a way. To be a poet is to be
the man — not a petty portion of occasional low
passion worked up into a permanent form of
humanity. Shakespear has thrust such rubbishy
feelings into a corner — the dark, dusky heart of
Don John, in the Much Ado about Nothing. The
fact is, I have not seen your Expostulatory Epistle
to him. I was not aware, till your question, that
it was out. I shall inquire, and get it forthwith.

Southey is in town, whom I have seen slightly ;
Wordsworth expected, whom I hope to see much
of. I write with accelerated motion ; for I have
two or three bothering clerks and brokers about
me, who always press in proportion as you seem
to be doing something that is not business. I
could exclaim a little profanely, but I think you
do not like swearing.

I conclude, begging you to consider that I feel
myself much obliged by your kindness, and shall
be most happy at any and at all times to hear from
you. Dear Sir, yours truly, Charles Lamb

CCXCI. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

June, 1820.

Dear Sir, — Wordsworth is with us this even.
Can you come ? We leave Covent Garden on
Thursday for some time. C. L.

146

CCXCII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

July 13, 1820.

Dear Sir, — I do not know whose fault it is
we have not met so long. We are almost always
out of town. You must come and beat up our
quarters there, when we return from Cambridge.
It is not in our power to accept your invitation.
To-day we dine out ; and set out for Cambridge
on Saturday morning. Friday of course will be
past in packing, &c, moreover we go from Dal-
ston. We return from Cambridge in four weeks,
and will contrive an early meeting. Meantime
believe us,

Sincerely yours, C. L., &c.

CCXCIIL — TO BARRON FIELD

August 16, 1820.

Dear Field, — Captain Ogilvie, who conveys
this note to you, and is now paying for the first
time a visit to your remote shores, is the brother
of a gentleman intimately connected with the
family of the Whites, I mean of Bishopsgate
Street — and you will much oblige them and
myself by any service or civilities you can shew
him.

I do not mean this for an answer to your warm-
hearted epistle, which demands and shall have a
much fuller return. We received your Australian
First Fruits, of which I shall say nothing here,

147

but refer you to * * * * [see explanatory note] of
the Examiner, who speaks our mind on all public
subjects. I can only assure you that both Cole-
ridge and Wordsworth, and also C. Lloyd, who
has lately reappeared in the poetical horizon, were
hugely taken with your Kangaroo.

When do you come back full of riches and
renown, with the regret of all the honest, and all
the other part of the colony ? Mary swears she
shall live to see it.

Pray are you King's or Queen's men in Syd-
ney? Or have thieves no politics? Man, don't
let this lie about your room for your bed sweeper
or Major Domo to see, he may n't like the last
paragraph.

This is a dull and lifeless scroll. You shall
have soon a tissue of truth and fiction impossible
to be extricated, the interleavings shall be so
delicate, the partitions perfectly invisible, it shall
puzzle you till you return, and I will not explain
it. Till then a • • * adieu, with kind remem-
brances of me both to you. * * * [Signature and
a few words torn off^\

NOTE

[Barron Field, who was still in New South Wales, had
published his poems under the title First-Fruits of Australian
Poetry, and Lamb had reviewed them in The Examiner for
January 16, 1820, over his usual signature in that paper,
" * * * *." " The Kangaroo " is quoted in that review. —
E. V. Lucas.]

148

CCXCIV. — TO JOHN SCOTT

August 24, 1820.

Dear Sir, — I sent you yesterday by the second
post two small copies of verses directed by mis-
take to N. 8 York Street. If you have not re-
ceived them, pray favour me with a line. From
your not writing, I shall conclude you have got
them. Yours respectfully, C. Lamb

CCXCV. — TO S. T. COLERIDGE

Autumn, 1820.

Dear C, — Why will you make your visits,
which should give pleasure, matter of regret to
your friends ? You never come but you take away
some folio that is part of my existence. With a
great deal of difficulty I was made to comprehend
the extent of my loss. My maid Becky brought
me a dirty bit of paper, which contained her de-
scription of some book which Mr. Coleridge had
taken away. It was Luster s Tables, which, for
some time, I could not make out. " What ! has
he carried away any of the tables, Becky ? " " No,
it was n't any tables, but it was a book that he
called Luster s Tables." I was obliged to search
personally among my shelves, and a huge fissure
suddenly disclosed to me the true nature of the
damage I had sustained. That book, C, you
should not have taken away, for it is not mine ;
it is the property of a friend, who does not know

149

its value, nor indeed have I been very sedulous in
explaining to him the estimate of it ; but was
rather contented in giving a sort of corroboration
to a hint that he let fall, as to its being suspected
to be not genuine, so that in all probability it
would have fallen to me as a deodand ; not but
I am as sure it is Luther's as I am sure that Jack
Bunyan wrote the Pilgrim's Progress ; but it was
not for me to pronounce upon the validity of
testimony that had been disputed by learneder
clerks than I. So I quietly let it occupy the place
it had usurped upon my shelves, and should never
have thought of issuing an ejectment against it ;
for why should I be so bigoted as to allow rites of
hospitality to none but my own books, children,
&c. ? — a species of egotism I abhor from my
heart. No ; let 'em all snug together, Hebrews
and Proselytes of the gate ; no selfish partiality
of mine shall make distinction between them ; I
charge no warehouse-room for my friends' com-
modities ; they are welcome to come and stay as
long as they like, without paying rent. I have
several such strangers that I treat with more than
Arabian courtesy ; there 's a copy of More's fine
poem, which is none of mine. But I cherish it
as my own ; I am none of those churlish landlords
that advertise the goods to be taken away in ten
days' time, or then to be sold to pay expenses.
So you see I had no right to lend you that book ;
I may lend you my own books, because it is at
my own hazard, but it is not honest to hazard a

150

friend's property ; I always make that distinction.
I hope you will bring it with you, or send it
by Hartley ; or he can bring that, and you the
Polemical Discourses, and come and eat some
atoning mutton with us one of these days shortly.
We are engaged two or three Sundays deep, but
always dine at home on week-days at half-past
four. So come all four — men and books I mean
— my third shelf (northern compartment) from
the top has two devilish gaps, where you have
knocked out its two eye-teeth.

Your wronged friend, C. Lamb

CCXCVI. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

1820.

Dear Sir, — We had arranged to be in coun-
try Saturday and Sunday, having made an en-
gagement to that effect. Pray let us see you on
Thursday at Russell House.

With regrets and all proper feelings,

Yours truly, C. L.

CCXCVII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

Dear Sir, — You shall see us on Thursday,
with M. B., if possible, about eight. We shall
have teaed. Yours truly, C. L.

M. B.'s direction is 26 James Street, West-
minster— James, not St. James, Street.

CCXCVIII. — TO DOROTHY WORDS-
WORTH

January 8, 1821.

Mary perfectly approves of the appropriation
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,

152

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 Allsop, who sends
me hares and pheasants twice a week. I can
hardly take so fast as he gives. I have almost for-
gotten butcher's meat, as plebeian. Are you not
glad the cold is gone ? I find winters not so agree-
able as they used to be, when " winter bleak had
charms for me." I cannot conjure up a kind si-
militude 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 anybody you meet, who is the biggest wo-
man in Cambridge — and I '11 hold you a wager
they '11 say Mrs. Smith. She broke down two
benches in Trinity Gardens, one on the confines
of St. John's, which occasioned a litigation be-
tween 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 twenty years back. She sits in
a room with opposite doors and windows, to let
in a thorough draught, which gives her slenderer
friends toothaches. She is to be seen in the
market every morning at ten, cheapening fowls,
which I observe the Cambridge poulterers are
not sufficiently careful to stump.

Having now answered most of the points con-
tain'd 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.

CCXCIX.— TO THOMAS ALLSOP

? 1821.

Dear Sir, — The hairs of our head are num-
bered, 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.

CCC. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

? 1821.

Dear Sir, — Thanks for the birds and your
kindness. It was but yesterday I was contriving
with Talfourd to meet you halfway 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 Saturday serve ?
*54

CCCI. — TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON

January 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 pleas-
ing 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 reason-
able request, and am, dear Mrs. Ayrton,

Yours and yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCII. — TO MISS HUMPHREYS

January 27, 1821.

Dear Madam, — Carriages to Cambridge are
in such request, owing to the installation, that
we have found it impossible to procure a con-
veyance for Emma [Emma Isola] before Wednes-
day, on which day between the hours of three
and four 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) consider-
ably improved by — somebody that shall be name-
less.

My sister joins me in love to all true Trump-
ingtonians, 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.

CCCIII. — TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON

March 15, 1821.

Dear Madam, — We are out of town of ne-
cessity 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

CCCIV.— TO THOMAS ALLSOP

March 30, 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

156

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 four. And
the heart of Lamb ever,

Yours truly, C. L.

CCCV. — TO LEIGH HUNT

Indifferent Wednesday, April 1 8, 1 82 1.

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

CCCVI. — TO S. T. COLERIDGE

May 1, 1821.

Dear 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."

*S7

CCCVII. — TO JAMES GILLMAN

May 2, 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 Cole-
ridge, 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 con-
sequence of Mr. Mathew's appearance, a hackney-
coach will serve.

We shall neither of us come much before the
time.

NOTE

[We have the following interesting account of this evening,
by Mrs. Mathews, who was half-sister of Fanny Kelly : "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 pol-
ish. 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 indi-
cating 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

I58

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 show-
ing him off."]

CCCVTIL — TO JOHN PAYNE COLLIER

May 16, 1821.

Dear J. P. C, — Many thanks for the De-
cameron : 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, &c. What a Shakespearian
essence that speech of Osrades for food ! Shake-
speare 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 posi-
tively nothing for asses compared with this.

I write in haste ; but p. 24, vol. i., the line
you cannot appropriate is Gray's sonnet, speci-
menifyed by Wordsworth in first preface to L.
B., as mixed of bad and good style : p. 143, 2nd

i$9

vol., you will find last poem but one of the col-
lection 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 augment-
ed! rage," I will be crucified if it be not Lord
Brooke's. Hang you, and all meddling research-
ers, hereafter, that by raking into learned dust
may find me out wrong in my conjecture !

Dear J. P. C, I shall take the first oppor-
tunity of personally thanking you for my enter-
tainment. 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.

CCCIX. — TO B. W. PROCTER

Summer, 1821.

Dear Sir, — The Wits (as Clare calls us) as-
semble at my cell (20 Russell St. Covent Garden)
this evening at quarter before seven. Cold meat
at nine. Puns at —a little after. Mr. Cary wants

160

to see you, to scold you. I hope you will not
fail.

Yours &c. &c. &c. C. Lamb

I am sorry the London Magazine is going to be
given up.

CCCX.— TO JOHN TAYLOR

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 anti-
quities ; and, in the second, I am here at Mar-
gate, 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 mas-
terly manner, if he has not outwrit himself al-
ready upon the subject. I do not return the
proof — to save postage — because it is correct,
with one exception. In the stanza from Words-
worth, you have changed day into air for rhyme-

161

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.

Dear Sir, yours truly, C. Lamb

On second consideration, I do enclose the
proof.

CCCXI.— TO WILLIAM AYRTON

July 17, 1821.

Dear Ayrton, — In consequence of the August
Coronation we propose postponing (I wonder if
these words ever met so close before — mark the
elegancy) our Wensday this week to Friday,
when a grand rural fete champetre will be given
at Russell House. The back garden to be illu-
minated in honour of the late ceremony,

Vivat Regina : moriatur. C. L.

CCCXII. — TO JOHN TAYLOR

July 21, 1821.

Dear Sir, — The London Magazine 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

162

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 Mr. E.'s
letter, I remain, dear sir, your obliged,

C. Lamb

CCCXIII. — TO JOHN TAYLOR

July 30, 1821.

Dear Sir, — You will do me injustice if you do
not convey to the writer of the beautiful lines,
which I now return you, my sense of the extreme
kindness which dictated them. Poor Elia (call
him Ellia) does not pretend to so very clear reve-
lations of a future state of being as Olen seems
gifted with. He stumbles about dark mountains
at best ; but he knows at least how to be thank-
ful for this life, and is too thankful indeed for
certain relationships lent him here, not to trem-
ble for a possible resumption of the gift. He is
too apt to express himself lightly, and cannot be
sorry for the present occasion, as it has called
forth a reproof so Christian-like. His animus at
least (whatever become of it in the female ter-
mination) hath always been cum Christianis.

Pray make my gratefullest respects to the
poet (do I natter myself when I hope it may be

163

M y ?) and say how happy I should feel my-
self in an acquaintance with him. I will just
mention that in the middle of the second column,
where I have affixed a cross, the line, —

One in a skeleton's ribb'd hollow cooped, —

is undoubtedly wrong. Should it not be, —

A skeleton's rib or ribs ?
or, —

In a skeleton ribb'd, hollow-coop'd ?

I perfectly remember the plate in Quarles. In
the first page exoteric is pronounced exoteric.
It should be (if that is the word) exoteric. The
false accent may be corrected by omitting the
word old. Pray, for certain reasons, give me to
the i 8 th at furthest extremity for my next.

Poor Elia, the real (for I am but a counterfeit),
is dead. The fact is, a person of that name, an
Italian, was a fellow-clerk of mine at the South
Sea House, thirty (not forty) years ago, when the
characters I described there existed, but had left
it like myself many years ; and I having a brother
now there, and doubting how he might relish
certain descriptions in it, I clapt down the name
of Elia to it, which passed off pretty well, for
Elia himself added the function of an author to
that of a scrivener, like myself.

I went the other day (not having seen him for
a year) to laugh over with him at my usurpation
of his name, and found him, alas! no more than

164

a name, for he died of consumption eleven months
ago, and I knew not of it.

So the name has fairly devolved to me, I think ;
and 't is all he has left me.

Dear sir, yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCXIV. — TO C. A. ELTON

August 12, 1 82 1.

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 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 pos-
itively is the only fine lady of antiquity: her
courtesy to the Trojans is altogether queen-like.
Eneas is a most disagreeable person ; Ascanius,

165

a pretty young master ; Mezentius for my money

— his dying speech shames Turpin — not the
archbishop, but the roadster of that name, I
mean. 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 ar-
rideth me. Can any one read the pert, modern,
Frenchified 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, wor-
shipping his meanest scraps and relics as divine,

— without one sceptical misgiving of their au-
thenticity, and doubt which was the properest to
expound Homer to his 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 Alcinoiis; his previous be-
haviour at the song of the stern strife arising
between Achilles and himself (how it raised 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 ! He apparently be-
lieved all the fables of Homer's birth, &c, &c.

166

Those notes of Bryant have caused the greatest
disorder in my brain-pan. Well, I will not flat-
ter when I say that we have had two or three long
evenings' 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 slat-
ternly scribble as this, but indeed they cost us
some tears. I scrawl on 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 disavoca-
tion.

CCCXV. — TO CHARLES C. 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 know-
ing 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 Covent Garden this sum-
mer 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

167

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 affectionate C. Lamb

Mary's love included.

CCCXVI. — TO ALLEN CUNNINGHAM

1821.

Dear Sir, — Our friends of the London Maga-
zine meet at 20 Russell St., Covent Garden, this
evening at a quarter before seven. I shall be
disappointed if you are not among them.

Yours, with perfect sympathy, C. Lamb

CCCXVIL — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

August 14, 1821.

A rubber to-morrow evening at eight. Closed
windows on account of the demise of her Maj-
esty. C. Lamb

168

CCCXVIII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

October 19, 1821.

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 to it, — Mr. ¥ alfourd. 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 Covent Garden, though
for the sweetness of this last I will answer. We
dress it to-day. I suppose you know my sister has
been and 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 welcom-
ing you from Beresford Hall. Yours and old
Mr. Walton's, and Honest Mr. Cotton's,

Piscatorum Amicus, C. L.

CCCXIX. — TO MR. HESSEY OR MR.
TAYLOR

October 26, 1821.

Dear Sir, — I send these slips, because I find
them done, and want to get rid of them. I am
most uneasily situated at home, and if what I ex-

169

pect takes place, it may be long before I shall
have any communications of the sort to send. I
beg you will accept this brief token of good will,
and leave me to myself and time to recover into
a state for writing.

I am with best wishes for the London Maga-
zine, C. Lamb

CCCXX. — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

October 27, 1821.

I come, Grimalkin ! Dalston, near Hackney,
27th Octr. 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.

CCCXXI. — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

October 30, 1821.

My dear Ayrton, — I take your kindness very
thankfully. — A bit of kindness at such times is
precious. I am indeed in an uneasy state. But I
think it well that the death of poor John should
have happened at a time that my sister can be but
half sensible to it. She is with me at Dalston, and
I ventured on my own advice to acquaint her, as
she was, with the worst, for what a communica-
tion should I have had to make upon her recov-
ery ! It does not seem much to have altered the
state of her mind, and now she will gradually
come to herself with nothing new to tell. Her

170

illness has been very obstinate, but I am in no
hurry for her to recover, that the idea may be in
her mind as long as it can, before she is able to
comprehend its weight. I am in a state of trial,
but I do not lose myself. The funeral over, I
must return to business. I understand your friend-
ship in inviting me to join you, but it would do
me no good just now. I hope to meet you again
with comparative chearfulness in some few weeks.
Believe me, very sincerely yours,

Chas. Lamb

Kind love to Mrs. A. and God bless you all.

CCCXXIL — TO WILLIAM HONE

November 9, 1821.

Dear Sir, — I was not very well nor in spirits
when your pleasant note reached me, or should
have noticed it sooner. Our Hebrew brethren
seem to appreciate the good things of this life in
more liberal latitude than we, to judge from their
frequent graces. One, I think, you must have
omitted : " After concluding a bargain." Their
distinction of " Fruits growing upon trees," and
" upon the ground," I can understand. A sow
makes quite a different grunt [her grace) over
chesnuts and pignuts. The last is a little above
Elia.

With thanks, and wishing grace be with you.
Yours, C. Lamb

171

CCCXXIIL— TO JOHN RICKMAN

November 20, 1821.

Dear Rickman, — The poor admiral's death
would have been a greater shock to me, but that
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 friend
in that way for many long years, and began to
think people did not die. But they have since
gone off thickly. My brother's death happened
when my sister was incapable of feeling it, but the
knowledge of it was communicated to her at the
time, and she had not to receive it as a shock
when she came back to reason. I have reason to
think this circumstance a great alleviation. She
is now perfectly recovered after a very long ill-
ness, and pretty well resigned. We are come to
town this day and shall be glad to receive a visit
from you or to pay you one.

M. C. B. I have neither seen nor heard from
for these two months. I hope your hopes will be
justified in him. I am, dear R., yours faithfully,

C. Lamb

CCCXXIV. — UNDATED NOTES TO
THOMAS ALLSOP,— 1821

Ecce iterum:

Dear Sir, — I fear I was obscure. I wasplaguily
busy when those tempting birds came. I meant

172

to say I could not come this evening ; but any
other, if I can know a day before, I can come for
two or three afternoon hours, from a quarter to
four to half-past six. At present I cannot com-
mand more furlough. I have nam'd Saturday. I
will come, if you don't countermand. I shall have
dined. I have been wanting not not to see you.

C. L.

CCCXXV

Dear Sir, — I hear that you have called in
Russell Street. I cannot say when I shall be in
town. When I am, I must see you; I had hoped
to have seen you at Dalston, but my sister is taken
ill, — I am afraid will not be able to see any of
her friends for a long time.

Believe me, yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCXXVI

Dear Allsop, — We are going to Dalston on
Wednesday. Will you come see the last of us
to-morrow night — you and Mrs. Allsop ?

Yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCXXVII

Dear Allsop, — Your pheasant is glittering,
but your company will be more acceptable this
evening. Wordsworth is not with us, but the
next things to him are. C. Lamb

173

CCCXXVIII

D. A., — I expect Procter and Wainwright
(Janus W.) this evening : will you come ? I sup-
pose it is but a compliment to ask Mrs. Allsop ?
but it is none to say that we should be glad to
see her. Yours ever, C. L.

How vexed I am at your Dalston expedition.

CCCXXIX. — TO S. T. COLERIDGE

March 9, 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 be-
fore the crisis ? Did the eyes come away kindly
with no CEdipean 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 wkh strangers. I suspect the pig, after all,
was meant for me; but at the unlucky juncture

174

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, barndoor
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 pocket-strings to bestow a six-
penny 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 imposter — should

l75

take in eating her cake — the cursed ingrati-
tude by which, under the colour of a Christian
virtue, I had frustrated her cherished purpose.
I sobbed, wept, and took it to heart so griev-
ously, 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 every-
thing, C. L.

NOTE

[This letter probably led to the immediate composition of
the Elia essay, A Dissertation on Roast Pig, which was printed
in the London Magazine for September, 1822. — E. V. Lu-
cas.]

CCCXXX. — TO W. WORDSWORTH

March 20, 1822.

My dear Wordsworth, — A letter from you
is very grateful, I have not seen a Kendal post-
mark so long ! We are pretty well save colds and
rheumatics, and a certain deadness to everything,
which I think I may date from poor John's loss,

176

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 overset one and put one out long after
the recent grief. Two or three have died within
this last two twelvemonths, 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 anything, but the image of the particular
person occurs with whom alone almost you would
care to share the intelligence. Thus one distrib-
utes 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
177

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 re-
lief day after day, all the golden hours of the day
between ten and four without ease or interpo-
sition. Taedet ?)ie 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 en-
chanter— letters four do form his name — Busi-
rane is his name in hell — that has curtailed
you of some domestic comforts, hath laid a heav-
ier 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 Izaak
Walton morning to Hoddesdon or Amwell,
careless as a beggar, but walking, walking ever,
till I fairly walk'd myself off my legs, dying
walking !

178

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 pulmon-
ary affliction may relieve me. Vide Lord Palm-
erston's report of the clerks in the war office
(Debates, this morning's Times') by which it ap-
pears in twenty years, as many clerks have been
cough' d and catarrh' d out of it into their freer
graves.

Thank you for asking about the pictures. Mil-
ton hangs over my fireside in Covent Garden
(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 gratify'd 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 anything. If I could slip out of it I should
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
honour 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

179

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 remembrance, C. L.

I had almost forgot to say, I think you thor-
oughly 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 !

CCCXXXI. — TO MRS. NORRIS

March 26, 1822.

Dear Mrs. N., — Mary will be in town this

evening or to-morrow morning, as she wants to

see you about another business. She will in the

meantime enquire respecting the young woman.

Yours sincerely, C. Lamb

CCCXXXII. — TO WILLIAM GODWIN

April 13, 1822.

Dear Godwin, — I cannot imagine how you,
who never in your writings have expressed your-
self disrespectfully of any one but your Maker,
can have given offence to Rickman.

I have written to the numberer of the people
to ask when it will be convenient to him to be
at home to Mr. Booth. I think it probable he
may be out of town in the Parliamentary recess,

180

but doubt not of a speedy answer. Pray return
my recognition to Mr. Booth, from whose ex-
cellent Tables of Interest I daily receive inex-
pressible official facilities.

Yours ever, C. Lamb

CCCXXXIII. — TO W. H. AINSWORTH

May 7, 1822.

Dear Sir, — I have read your poetry with pleas-
ure. The tales are pretty and prettily told, the
language often finely poetical. It is only some-
times a little careless, I mean as to redundancy.
I have marked certain passages (in pencil only,
which will easily obliterate) for your consider-
ation. Excuse this liberty. For the distinction
you offer me of a dedication, I feel the honour of
it, but I do not think it would advantage the pub-
lication. 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 ofTour-
neur.

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 " beg-
gars should not be chusers," and remain with

181

great respect and wishing success to both your
publications,

Your obedient Servant, C. Lamb

No hurry at all for Tourneur.

CCCXXXIV. — 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

CCCXXXV. — TO MRS. JOHN LAMB

May 22, 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

182

the 20th of next month. A steamboat 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 remem-
bered. She is in great good humour, I hear, and
yet out of spirits.

Where shall I get such full-flavour' d Geneva
again ?

Old Mr. Henshaw1 died last night, precisely at
half-past eleven. 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 affectionately,

C. L. and M. Lamb

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

1 On the right-hand margin is written, —

"He is not dead."
183

CCCXXXVL— TO MARY LAMB

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 gin-
gerbread 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.

CCCXXXVIL— TO JOHN CLARE

August 31, 1822.

Dear Clare, — I thank you heartily for your
present. I am an inverate 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 Re-
collections after a Ramble, and those Grongar Hill
kind of pieces in eight syllable lines, my favour-
ite 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 Cock-
neyism,as little pleasing as ours of London. Trans-

184

plant Arcadia to Helpstone. The true rustic style,
the Arcadian English, I think is to be found in
Shenstone. Would his Schoolmistress, the pretti-
est 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 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

i8S

NOTE
[The following is the sonnet referred to by Lamb :
TO ELIA

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 ecstasies;
Bright o'er our souls will break the heavenly strain

Through the dull gloom of earth's realities.]

CCCXXXVIII. — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

September 5, 1822.

Dear A., — A dim notion dawns upon my
drunken caput, that last night you made an en-
gagement for me at your house on Monday ; it
may be all a fiction ; but if you did, pray change
it for some Evening between that day and Satur-
day — not Saturday.

It is impossible for me to come on Monday.

If it is all delusion, forgive the harmless vanity.

I want that magazine you took away, if you
took it.

This is a mere hypothetical epistle.

C. Lamb
186

CCCXXXIX. — TO MRS. KENNEY

September n, 1822.

Dear Mrs. K., — Mary got home safe bn Fri-
day night. She has suffered only a common fa-
tigue, but as she is weakly, begs me to thank you
in both our names for all the trouble she has been
to you. She did not succeed in saving Robinson's
fine waistcoat. They could not comprehend how
a waistcoat, marked Henry Robinson, could be
a part of Miss Lamb's wearing apparel. So they
seized it for the king, who will probably appear
in it at the next levee. Next to yourself, our best
thanks to H. Payne. I was disappointed he came
not with her. Tell Kenney the cow has got out,
by composition, paying so much in the pound.

The canary bird continues her sleep-persuad-
ing strains. Pray say to Ellen that I think the
verses very pretty which she slipt into my pocket
on the last day of my being at Versailles. The
stanzas on Ambition are fine, allowing for the age
of the writer. The thought that the present King
of Spain whom I suppose she means by the
"brown monarch," sitting in state among his
grandees, is like

A sparrow lonely on the house's top,

is perhaps a little forced. The next line is better,

Too high to stoop, though not afraid to drop.

Pray deliver what follows to my dear wife
Sophy.

187

My dear Sophy, — The few short days of con-
nubial felicity which I passed with you among
the pears and apricots of Versailles were some of
the happiest of my life. But they are flown !

And your other half — your dear co-twin —
that she-you — that almost equal sharer of my
affections : you and she are my better half, a quar-
ter a-piece. She and you are my pretty sixpence
— you the head, and she the tail. Sure, Heaven
that made you so alike must pardon the error of
an inconsiderate moment, should I for love of
you, love her too well. Do you think laws were
made for lovers ? I think not.

Adieu, amiable pair, Yours and yours,

C. Lamb

P. S. — I enclose half a dear kiss a-piece for
you.

NOTE

[This charming note is to Mrs. Kenney's little girl, Sophy,
whom Lamb calls his dear wife. — E. V. Lucas.]

CCCXL.— TO BERNARD BARTON

September u, 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

188

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 (pro-
vided 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 and
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 galley 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 —
189

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 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 Wool-
man. 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 Qua-
ker. Believe me, with great respect, yours,

C. Lamb

I shall always be happy to see, or hear from
you.

CCCXLL— TO BARRON FIELD

September 22, 1822.

My dear F., — I scribble hastily at office.
Frank wants my letter presently. I and sister are
just returned from Paris ! ! We have eaten frogs.
It has been such a treat ! You know our mono-
tonous general tenor. Frogs are the nicest little
delicate things — rabbity-flavoured. Imagine a

190

Lilliputian rabbit ! They fricassee them ; but in
my mind, drest seethed, plain, with parsley and
butter, would have been the decision of Api-
cius.

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 remain-
ing duumvir, Lord Byron — his wife and six chil-
dren and 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 glori-
ous antiques ! ) : houses on the other. The Thames
disunites London and 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 £\o English for it. It is painted on the one
half of a pair of bellows — a lovely picture, cor-
responding 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,

I9I

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 be-
yond 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 por-
trait 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 anything 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 uni-
versal faith.

The letter is wanted, and I am wanted. Imag-
ine the blank filled up with all kind things.

Our joint hearty remembrances to both of you.
Yours as ever, C. Lamb

192

NOTE

[Lamb's belief in the authenticity of this portrait was mis-
placed ; see the following account from Chambers's Journal
for September 27, 1856 :

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 super-
fluous wood, so as to leave the remainder in the shape of a pair of bel-
lows. . . . 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 £$. 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 man-
aged 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 Shake-
speare 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 condi-
tion 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

T93

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.]

CCCXLII. — 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 twenty to thirty 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 magni-
tude with me now. I want to be going, to the Jar-
din 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 thor-
oughlv, 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, pry-
ing, 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

194

to those of sex. Remembrance to Kenny and
Poole.

NOTE

[John Howard Payne (1792-1852) was born in New York.
He began life as an actor in 1809 as Young Norval in Doug-
las, 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. — E. V. Lucas.]

CCCXLIII. — TO BERNARD BARTON

October 9, 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 seas-
onable. 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 sin-
cerely sympathise with you on your doleful con-
finement. Of Time, Health, and Riches, the
first in order is not last in excellence. Riches are
chiefly good, because they give us Time. What

IQ5

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.

Shelley 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 Mon-
day in a parody (I suppose) of the Vision of "Judg-
ment, in which latter the poet I think did not
much show bis. 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
196

CCCXLIV. — TO B. R. HAYDON

October 9, 1822.

Dear Hay don, — 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 ?

CCCXLV. — TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE

No date.

Dear J. H. P., — Thank you. I shall cer-
tainly attend your Farce, if in town ; but as 't is
possible I shall ruralize this week, I will have no

197

orders of you till next week. All Sundays I am
ready to ambulate with you, but will make no
engagement for this week, — to leave the poor
residue of my holidays unembarrassed.

Yours truly, C. L.

CCCXLVI. — TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE

October 22, 1822.

AH 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 ^// substituted for his, which I am sure
would have been a kind one. The Morning Her-
ald 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 any-
thing 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

198

disappointed with Hassan, who tells us he sub-
sists by cracking court jests before Hali, but he
made none. In all the rest, scenery and machin-
ery, 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 Tal-
fourd 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 favourable to AH, 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 1' Europe and Ma-
con.

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 mer-
maid to be seen in London. You may not have

199

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

CCCXLVII. — TO B. R. HAYDON

October 29, 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

CCCXLVIII. — TO SIR WALTER SCOTT

October 29, 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 dis-
paragement of heaths and highlands — if I said
any such thing in half earnest, — you must put

200

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

CCCXLIX. — TO THOMAS ROBINSON

November n, 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 —

201

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 Servant, Charles Lamb

note

[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. — E. V. Lucas.]

CCCL. — TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE

November 13, 1822.

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 AH, 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 posi-

202

tive no trick could be meant you, as Mr. Planche's
alterations, which were trifling, were not at all
considered as affecting your bargain. With re-
spect to the copyright of AH, he was of opinion
no money would be given for it, as AH is quite
laid aside. This explanation being given, you
would not think of printing the two copies to-
gether 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 ar-
rived, finding it coming out at Covent Garden,
he procured copies of two several translations of
it in London. So you see here are four transla-
tions, reckoning yours. I fear no copyright would
be got for it, for anybody may print it and any-
body has. Your's has run seven nights, and R. is
of opinion it will not exceed in number of nights
the nights of AH, — 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

203

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, &c.

Believe me, yours truly, C. L.

note «

[Lamb's " little wife " is explained in note to letter to Mrs.
Kenney of September n, 1822. — Ed.]

CCCLI. — TO JOHN TAYLOR

December 7, 1822.

Dear Sir, — I should like the enclosed Dedi-
cation 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.
204

On better consideration, pray omit that Dedi-
cation. 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.

N. B. No Preface. C. L.

CCCLII. — TO WALTER WILSON

December 16, 1822.

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 ;
't is 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, de-
posits, &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

205

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 implicit belief in everything he
says. There is all the minute detail of a log-book
in it. Dates are painfully pressed upon the mem-
ory. 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 favourite 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 mis-
tress, who wishes to impress something upon their
memories ; and has a wonderful effect upon mat-
ter-of-fact readers. Indeed it is to such prin-
cipally that he writes. His style is elsewhere
beautiful, but plain and homely. Robinson Crusoe
is delightful to all ranks and classes, but it is
easy to see that it is written in phraseology pecu-
liarly adapted to the lower conditions of readers :
hence it is an especial favourite with sea-faring

206

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 (first edition) is the
next in interest, though he left out the best part
of it in subsequent editions from a foolish hyper-
criticism 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.

Believe me with friendly recollections, Brother
(as I used to call you), yours, C. Lamb

The review was not mine, nor have I seen it.
207

CCCLIII. — TO BERNARD BARTON

December 23, 1822.

Dear Sir, — I have been so distracted with busi-
ness and one thing or other, I have not had a
quiet quarter of an hour for epistolatory pur-
poses. Christmas too is come, which always puts
a rattle into my morning skull. 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, Christ-
mas-day, alas ! too few to commemorate the
season. All work and no play dulls me. Com-
pany 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 sup-
pers, 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 twelve 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 [John O'Groat's] have

208

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 Southey 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 mag-
azine 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.

209

The " compliments of the time to you " should
end my letter; to a Friend I must say the "sincer-
ity 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

CCCLIV. — TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE

January, 1823.

Dear Payne, — Your little books are most ac-
ceptable. 'T is 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 Har-
wood left a truncheon or mathematical instru-
ment, 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 Ellas collected. Tell
Poole, his Cockney in the London Magazine
tickled me exceedingly. Harwood is to be with
us this evening with Fanny, who comes to intro-
duce a literary lady, who wants to see me, —
and whose portentous name is Plura, in English

210

"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 abso-
lutely 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 hon-
oured 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-

21 I

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'itnporte — havn't I Miss Many
Things coming ? Will you ask Horace Smith to
[the remainder of letter /ost.]

CCCLV. — TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

January, 1823.

Dear Wordsworth, — I beg your acceptance
of Eli a, 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 sugges-
tion, in curtailing the dissertation on Malvolio.

I have been on the Continent since I saw you.

I have eaten frogs.

I saw Monkhouse t'other day, and Mrs. M.
being too poorly to admit of company, the annual
goosepie was sent to Russell Street, and with its
capacity has fed "a hundred head" (not of Aris-
totle's) but " of Elia's friends."

Mrs. Monkhouse is sadly confined, but chear-
ful.

212

This packet is going off, and I have neither
time, place nor solitude for a longer letter.

Will you do me the favour to forward the other
volume to Southey?

Mary is perfectly well, and joins me in kind-
est remembrances to you all.

[Signature cut away.]

CCCLVI.— TO MR. AND MRS. J. D.
COLLIER

Twelfth Day, 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 favour.
Generally those petty toes, pretty toes ! are miss-
ing. 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, see-
ing how much good can be contained in — how
small a compass !

He crackled delicately.

John Collier, Junior, has sent me a pcem
which (without the smallest bias from the afore-
said present, believe me) I pronounce sterling.

213

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 neigh-
bours 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 common type, by the
help of a candle, without making many mistakes.
Believe me, that while my faculties last, I shall
ever cherish a proper appreciation of your many
kindnesses in this way ; and that the last lingering
relish of past flavours 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.

214

Mary for her share of the pig and the memoirs
desires to send the same.

Dear Mr. C. and Mrs. C, yours truly,

C. Lamb

CCCLVII. — TO BERNARD BARTON

January 9, 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 min-
utes 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 dear 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

215

never know ! the miseries of subsisting by au-
thorship. 'Tisa pretty appendage to a situation
like yours or mine, but a slavery worse than
all slavery to be a bookseller'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 mas-
ter 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 rela-
tive honesty towards authors, not like his honesty
to the rest of the world. B[aldwin], who first en-
gag'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 Leaden-

216

hall. Sit down, good B. B., in the banking-office;
what, is there not from six to eleven p. m. six
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, con-
verse, 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 ? Hence-
forth I retract all my fond complaints of mer-
cantile 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 unharrassing 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, with-
out blot or dog's ear. You much oblige me by
this kindness. Yours truly, C. Lamb

Please to direct to me at India House in future.
[I am] not always at Russell St.

CCCLVIII.— TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE

January 23, 1823.

Dear Payne, — I have no mornings (my day
begins at 5 p. m.) to transact business in, or tal-
ents for it, so I employ Mary, who has seen Rob-

217

ertson, who says that the piece which is to be op-
erafied 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 Har-
wood, 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 thisword, and giving acleaner 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

CCCLIX. — TO WILLIAM AYRTON

February 2, 1823.

Dear Ayrton, — The Burneys and Paynes dine
with us on Wednesday at half-past four. It will
give us great pleasure (what a canting phrase !)
In short, lad, will Mrs. A. and your harmonious
self join them ? Get pen and ink forthwith and
say so. Yours truly, C. Lamb

218

CCCLX.— 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 dis-
posing of the piece, I will forward it to Paris or elsewhere as you
think he may prefer.

Very truly yours, Henry Robertson

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

219

of this kind. Write me what I should do, what
you would ask, &c. The music (printed) is re-
turned 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 Covent Garden, /'. e.
yesternight late, to my summer residence, where,
tell Kenney, the cow is quiet. Love to all at Ver-
sailles. Write quickly. C. L.

I have no acquaintance with Kemble at all,
having only met him once or twice; but any in-
formation, Sec, I can get from R., who is a good
fellow, you may command. I am sorry the rogues
are so dilatory, but I distinctly believe they mean
to fulfil 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.

CCCLXI. — TO BERNARD BARTON

February 17, 1823.

My dear Sir, — I have read quite through the
ponderous folio of Gfeorge] F[ox]. I think Sewell
has been judicious in omitting certain parts, as
for instance where G.Y.has revealed to him the
natures of all the creatures in their names, as
Adam had. He luckily turns aside from that com-

220

pendious 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 sus-
pected 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 Wool-
man. 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 Ips-
wich ? 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

221

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 everything I touch turns into
a lye? I once quoted two lines from a trans-
lation 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 forgot I write to a
Quaker) Abbeypony History, and then to abridge
them to three, and all for ^113. At her years,
to be doing stupid Jesuit's 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 re-
view all to one's self. Your description of Mr.
Mitford's place makes me long for a pippin and

222

some caraways and a cup of sack in his orchard,
when the sweets of the night come in.

Farewell. C. Lamb

CCCLXII. — TO WALTER WILSON

February 24, 1823.

Dear W., — I write that you may not think
me neglectful, not that I have anything 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 mo-
ther'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 ob-
jected 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

223

two or three pages of verse. I have not written
so much since you knew me. I am altogether
prosaic. Maybe I may touch offa sonnet in time.
I do not prefer Colonel Jack to either Robinson
Crusoe 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 no-
thing of him. He is quite new ground, and scarce
known beyond Crusoe. I do not know who wrote
Quarll. I never thought of ^uarll 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
Richard 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, and 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 anything
about De Foe or from you.

Your old friend, C. Lamb

From my and your old compound.

224

CCCLXIII. — TO BERNARD BARTON

March n, 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 cor-
rect. 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 rea-
son 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 bor-
rowed, 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 explain-
ing Fox's insight into the natures of animals must
fail, as I shall transcribe the passage. It appears

225

to me that he stopt short in time, and was on the
brink of falling with his friend Naylor, my fav-
ourite. The book shall be forthcoming whenever
your friend can make convenient to call for it.

They have dragged me again into the Maga-
zine, 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 Cole-
ridges 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 [Sir Walter Scott]
lately, who is moreover very heraldic, I borrowed
a seal of a friend, who by the female side quarters

226

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 yourself if
I send you such ungainly scraps. I think I lose
^iooa 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 incoherencies. Be-
lieve me, yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCLXIV.— TO WILLIAM AYRTON

Cards and cold mutton in Russell Street on
Friday at eight and nine.

Gin and jokes from half-past that time to
twelve.

Pass this on to Mr. Paine; and apprize Mar-
tin thereof.

CCCLXV. — TO BERNARD BARTON

April 5, 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 writ-
ing, which makes me an unworthy correspondent.
I have had no spring, or cordial call to the occu-
pation of late. I have been not well lately, which

227

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 Edu-
cation had been neglected ;" and when it was
done Taylor and Hessey would not print it, and
it discouraged me from doing anything else, so I
took up Scott, where I had scribbled some petu-
lant 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 handwriting) 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

228

the best classical themes, &c. — 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 wish'd for you yesterday. I dined in Par-
nassus, with Wordsworth, Coleridge, Rogers, and
Tom Moore — half the Poetry of England con-
stellated 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 aching
head, for we did not quaff Hippocrene last night.
Marry, it was Hippocras rather. Pray accept this
as a letter in the meantime, and do me the favour
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.

229

NOTE

[Moore wrote in his 'Journal: " Dined at Mr. Monkhouse's
(a gentleman I had never seen before) on Wordsworth's invi-
tation, 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 sideraof this constellation
of the Lakes ; the host himself, a Maecenas of the school, con-
tributing 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."

Crabb Robinson writes: "April 4th. — Dined at Monk-
house's. Our party consisted of Wordsworth, Coleridge,
Lamb, Moore, and Rogers. Five poets of very unequal worth
and most disproportionate popularity, whom the public prob-
ably 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 excel-
lent 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. Lamb 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."]

CCCLXVI. — TO B. W. PROCTER

April 13, 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

230

am none of those shocking things, but have ar-
rived 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 jfervis, between gay and tender, —

And other beauties envy Wortley's eyes.

I '11 be damn'd if that is n'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's sake to wish him gone :

231

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 everybody
does, and none with so much reason as your

C. L.

CCCLXVII. — TO SARAH HUTCHINSON

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 pimp-
ing, mean, detestable hand, that she is ashamed
of the formation of her letters. There is an es-
sential poverty and abjectnessin the frame of them.
They look like begging letters. And then she is
sure to omit a most substantial word in the sec-
ond 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. 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

232

better when she rules her paper, her lines are
" not less erring " than her words — a sort of un-
natural parallel lines, that are perpetually threat-
ening to meet, which you know is quite contrary
to Euclid. 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 oper-
ation) to dot her z's, and cross her t's. I don't
think she can make a corkscrew, 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 be-
gins) 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 neighbour. Pray present our
kindest wishes to her, and all. (That sentence
should properly have come in the Postscript, 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

233

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 fervour to recall them —
only Peter left his key — the iron one of the two,
that shuts amain — and that 's the reason I am
lock'd 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 euphoniously to Mr. Gnwellegan.
That Lee Priory must be a dainty bower, is it
built of flints, and does it stand at Kingsgate ?

CCCLXVI1I.— TO MISS HUTCHINSON (?)

No date.

Apropos of birds, — the other day at a large
dinner, being call'd upon for a toast, I gave, as
the best toast I knew, "Woodcock toast," which
was drunk with three cheers.

Yours affectionately, C. Lamb

CCCLXIX. — TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN

1823.

It is hard when a gentleman cannot remain
concealed, who affecteth obscurity with greater

234

avidity than most do seek to have their good deeds
brought to light ; to have 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 wilder-
ness 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 — Mas-
ter Daniels — a contemplative Hebrew — to the
which guess I was the rather led, by the consid-
eration that most of his nation are great readers.

Nothing is so common as to see them in the

235

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 recollect 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 mis-
take thee not. I think I should shake hands with
thee, if I met thee.

NOTE

[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 ship-
ping office in the city. I borrow from Canon Ainger an inter-
esting 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 prefer-
ence to the other clerks. At that time the Elia Essays were
appearing in print. No one had the slightest conception who
1 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

236

again in conversation, something dropped from Lamb's lips
which convinced his hearer, beyond a doubt, that his sus-
picions were correct. He therefore wrote some more lines
(anonymously, as before), beginning, —

I 've found thee out, O Elia !

and sent them to Colbrook 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. — E. V. Lucas.]

CCCLXX. — TO BERNARD BARTON

May 3, 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 per-
sons 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 pre-
sentiment. 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 Gentleman 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

237

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 four hundred
more pages of the Doctrinals, which I picked up
for js. td. 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 Covent Garden 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

238

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 apo-
logy 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

CCCLXXI. — TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN

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, Covent Garden. If
you can come, do not trouble yourself to write.
We are old fashion'd people who drink tea at six,
or not much later, and give cold mutton and

239

pickle at nine, the good old hour. I assure you
(if it suit you) we shall be glad to see you.

My love to Mr. Railton. The same to Mr.
Rankin, to the whole Firm indeed.

Yours, &c, C. Lamb

CCCLXXIL— TO WILLIAM HONE

May 19, 1823

Dear Sir, — I have been very agreeably en-
tertained with your present, which I found very
curious and amusing. What wiseacres our fore-
fathers appear to have been ! It should make
us thankful, who are grown so rational and polite.
I should call to thank you for the book, but go
home to Dalston at present. I shall beg your
acceptance (when I see you) of my little book.
I have Ray's Collections of English Words not gener-
ally Used, 1 69 1 ; and in page 60 ("North Coun-
try words ") occurs " Rynt ye" — " by your
leave," " stand handsomely." As, " Rynt you,
witch," quoth Besse Locket to her mother ;
Proverb, Cheshire. — Doubtless this is the
"Aroint" of Shakspeare.

In the same collection I find several Shaksper-
isms. "Rooky" wood: a Northern word for
" reeky," " misty," &c. " Shandy," a North
Country word for "wild." Sterne was York.
Your obliged, C. Lamb

I am at 14 Kingsland Row, Dalston. Will

240

you take a walk over on Sunday ? We dine
exactly at four, and shall be most glad to see you.
If I don't hear from you (by note to East India
House) I will expect you.

CCCLXXIII. — MARY LAMB TO MRS.
RANDAL NORRIS

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 re-
mained 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

241

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 post-
chaise, 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 excur-
sion. 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, there-
fore 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

242

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 par-
ticular upstairs and downstairs.

Yours most affectionately, M. Lamb

CCCLXX1V. — TO BERNARD BARTON

July 10, 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 inter-
esting (as I doubt not) I shall not spare to say so,
you may depend upon it. Suppose you direct it
to Accountant's Office, India House.

I am glad you have met with some sweeten-
ing 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 suf-
fering sedentary contrasts. I am a long time re-
conciling 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

243

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, &c, 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 hab-
itation 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 In-
fidels {Infidelity}. I had not, nor have, seen
the Monthly. He might have spared an old friend

244

such a construction of a few careless flights, that
meant no harm to religion. If all his un-
guarded 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 re-
viewer.

The hint he has dropp'd 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 some-
thing besides being writers, thank God.

Yours truly, C. L.

NOTE

[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 hon-
est enough thus to express their real feelings ; but this we know
concerning them, that when they have renounced their birth-
right of hope, they have not been able to divest themselves of
fear. From the nature of the human mind this might be pre-
sumed, and in fact it is so. They may deaden the heart and
stupefy 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."

" 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 1 836. There are now several new editions every year. —
E. V. Lucas.]

245

CCCLXXV. — TO BERNARD BARTON

September 2, 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 Covent Garden. I have a cottage, in Colebrook
Row, Islington. A cottage, for it is detach'd ; a
white house, with six 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, par-
snips, leeks, carrots, cabbages, to delight the heart
of old Alcinoiis. You enter without passage into
a cheerful dining-room, all studded over and rough
with old books, and above is a lightsome draw-
ing-room, three 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.

246

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 occu-
pation to me. I have gather'd my jargonels, but
my Windsor pears are backward. The former

247

were of exquisite raciness. I do now sit under my
own vine, and contemplate the growth of vege-
table 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 neigh-
bour'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.

248

CCCLXXVI. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

September 6, 1823.

Dear Allsop, — I am snugly seated at the cot-
tage ; 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 half-past four to-morrow ? Ayrton
and Mr. Burney are coming.

Colebrook Cottage, left hand side, end of Cole-
brook 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

I call'd on you on Sunday. Respects to Mrs.
A. and boy.

CCCLXXVII.— TO THOMAS ALLSOP

September 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 un-
pleasant for you to be named for one? The other
two I shall beg the same favour 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

249

CCCLXXVIII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

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 executors survive to
remember us with kindness many years. God
bless you.

I will set Proctor about the will forthwith.

C. Lamb

CCCLXXIX. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

September 16, 1823.

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 cannot be out of the way. 'T is 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
accompany you. C. L.

250

CCCLXXX. — 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
rainbow-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.

CCCLXXXI. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

Dear Allsop, — Send me our account ; at all
events be sure and send me your bill against the
Westwoods; I wish to have both, but specially
the latter. Show me you can be punctual.

With best loves to Mrs. Allsop, and hopes that
you got home comfortably, yours, C. L.

I want the account that when you come again
we may have no business (pronounced bissnis) to
do.

251

CCCLXXXIL — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

Dear A., — To-morrow, if you please, at four.
I walk all the morning, but come home hungry
to dinner, as I hope to find you both.

Yours ever, C. L.

CCCLXXXIII.— TO THOMAS ALLSOP

Dear Allsop, — You left me, as you thought,
divers prospectuses, but all of them except one
(which I have parted with) — I mean the small
or general prospectus on the quarter of a sheet —
have only the last six lines, and what goes before
is unprinted paper.

So send me by post some real ones, and I '11
forward it with Stoddart as warmly as I can.

C. L.

Send me of both sorts, tho' I have one of the
larger (the detailed) left.

CCCLXXXIV. — TO BERNARD BARTON

September 17, 1823.

Dear Sir, — I have again been reading your
stanzas on Bloomfield, which are the most ap-
propriate that can be imagined, sweet with Doric
delicacy. I like that, —

Our more chaste Theocritus, —
252

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 alter-
ation is wanting in the beginning of the next.
You see, I use freedom. How happily (I flatter
not!) you have brought in his subjects; and (7
suppose), his favourite 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 lodg-
er ! My garden thrives (I am told) tho' I have
yet reaped nothing but some tiny salad, and

253

withered carrots. But a garden 's a garden any-
where, and twice a garden in London.

Somehow I cannot relish that word Horkey.
Cannot you supply it by circumlocution, and di-
rect 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 everything, 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.
[The letter was published the following October^

Excuse my brevity, for I write painfully at
office, liable to a hundred 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 fourpence,
seeing it is but half a one. Believe me, tho',
entirely yours, C. L.

254

CCCLXXXV. — TO CHARLES LLOYD

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 po-
etry 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

255

CCCLXXXVI. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

October 4, 1823.

Dear Sir, — Will Mrs. A. and you dine with
us to-morrow at half-past three ? Do not think
of troubling yourself to send (if you cannot come),
as we shall provide only a goose (which is in the
house), and your not coming will make no dif-
ference in our arrangements.

Your obliged, C. Lamb

CCCLXXXVII. — TO REV. H. F. CARY

October 14, 1823.

Dear Sir, — If convenient, will you give us
house room on Saturday next ? I can sleep any-
where. 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 pre-
scribe to the hospitalities of mine host. With
respects to Mrs. C, yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCLXXXVIII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

October, 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 November
early) it is our intention to surprise you early
some evening.

Believe me, most truly yours, C. L.

256

Mary regrets very much Mrs. Allsop's fruitless
visit. It made her swear ! She was gone to visit
Miss Hutchinson, whom she found out.

CCCLXXXIX. — TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN

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 satin. 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 ab-
solutely 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 consist-
ency 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
257 "

see us at our poor cottage of Colebrook to tea
to-morrow 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

CCCXC — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

November 7.

Dear Allsop, — Our dinner hour on Sundays
is four, at which we shall be most happy to see
Mrs. A. and yourself — I mean next Sunday, but
I also mean any Sunday. Pray come. I am up
to my very ears in business, but pray come.
Yours most sincerely, C. L.

CCCXCL — TO SARAH HAZLITT

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 noonday\ 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

258

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 de-
parted 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 ;

259

and all from being a writer in a magazine ! The
dinner costly, served on massy plate, cham-
pagne, 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.

CCCXCII. — TO MRS. PERCY BYSSHE
SHELLEY

November 12, 1823.

Dear Mrs. S., — Our friends from Shacklewell
drink tea on Saturday at six ; we shall have much
pleasure in your joining them.

Yours truly, [Signature cut off.}

G. Dyer walk'd into the New River on Sun-
day week at one o'clock in the daytime ! with
his eyes open. Mind how you come.

26c

CCCXCIII. — TO ROBERT SOUTHEY

November 21, 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 de-
scription 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 di-
rected 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 inno-
cent) 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 sunlight, that
you may see my Milton.

261

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.

NOTE

[The following is Southey's letter which had " melted away
the mist : "

My dear Lamb, — On Monday I saw your letter in the London Maga-
zine 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 appre-
hension 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 read-
ily 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

Thus the matter closed and no hostility remained on either
side. — Ed.]

262

CCCXCIV. — TO BERNARD BARTON

November 22, 1823.

Dear B. B., — I am ashamed at not acknow-
ledging 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 miscar-
ried ? Did you get one in which I sent you an ex-
tract 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-in-
vitation to come and shake hands with me. This
is truly handsome and noble. 'T is worthy of my
old idea of Southey. Shall not I, think you, be cov-
ered with a red suffusion ?

You are too much apprehensive of your com-
plaint. 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 med-
ical 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 construc-
tion 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

263

whereabout the gall grows — to account the cir-
culation 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 med-
ical 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 fel-
low-sufferer this bright November, C. L.

264

CCCXCV. — TO W. H. AINSWORTH

December 9, 1823.

(If I had time I would go over this letter again,
and dot all my z'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 receipt
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 anything of the kind. I
have not a black-letter book among mine, old
Chaucer excepted, and am not bibliomanist
enough to like black-letter. It is painful to read.
Therefore I must insist on returning it at oppor-
tunity, 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 mag-
azines 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. 'T is
a disagreeable canting tale of seduction, which
has nothing to do with the spirit of Faustus —

265

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 in-
vitation. 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 obliged servant, C. Lamb
266

CCCXCVI. — TO W. H. AINSWORTH

December 29, 1823.

My dear Sir, — You talk of months at a time
and I know not what inducements to visit Man-
chester, heaven knows how gratifying ! but I have
had my little month of 1823 already. It is all
over, and without incurring a disagreeable favour
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 twelfth. My aking and confused head warns
me to leave off. With a muddled sense of grate-
fulness, which I shall apprehend more clearly to-
morrow, I remain, your friend unseen, C. L.

Will your occasions or inclination bring you
to London ? It will give me great pleasure to
show you everything 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 fifty is a fool indeed.
267

CCCXCVII. — TO WILLIAM HONE

December, 1823.

Dear Sir, — Miss Hazlitt is anxious about her
MS. novel. Would you be so kind as to transmit
it some way or other to Mr. Hardy, 30 Queen's
Row, or Queen's Square, Pimlico, if he has not
already got it ? I am afraid I have not duly ac-
knowledged the present of your excellent pam-
phlet, for which much thanks and approbation,
tho' late.

I remain, yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCXCVIII. — 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 indis-
position to do anything, or to be anything —
a total deadness and distaste — a suspension of
vitality — an indifference to locality — a numb,
soporifical good-for-nothingness — an ossification
all over — an oyster-like insensibility to the pass-
ing 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 irre-
solution 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 fur-

268

longs 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 coun-
try stage when the actors are off it — a cypher

— an 0 — 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 — 't is twelve
o'clock and Thurtell is just now coming out
upon the New Drop — Jack Ketch alertly tuck-
ing 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 to-morrow, I should just say, "Will it?"

— I have not volition enough to dot my z'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 skull is
a Grub street attic, to let — not so much as a
joint-stool or a crack'd 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, toothache — an ear-

269

wig 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' un-
intermitting chill and suspension of hope, fear,
conscience, and everything — 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 fifteen minutes after twelve. Thurtell
is by this time a good way on his journey, bait-
ing 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.

CCCXCIX. — TO BERNARD BARTON

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

270

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, and not tease 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.

271

Your account of my black-balling amused me.
/ 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, and 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 con-
fident 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

272

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, and will be !
Keep your good spirits up, dear B. B.; mine
will return ; they are at present in abeyance. But
I am rather lethargic than miserable. I don't
know but a good horsewhip 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 let-
ter 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) and assure you
that it gives me pleasure to hear from you.

Yours truly, C. L.

CCCC — TO CHARLES OLLIER

January 27, 1824.

Dear Oilier, — Many thanks from both of
us for Inesilla. I wished myself younger, that
I might have more enjoyed the terror of that
desolate city, and the damned palace. I think it
is as fine as anything in its way, and wish you
joy of success, &c.

With better weather, I shall hope to see you
at Islington.

Meantime, believe me, yours truly,

C. Lamb

Scribbled 'midst official flurry.
273

CCCCL — TO BERNARD BARTON

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 lucu-
brations 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 Vigils 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 vin-
dication of yourself from the presumption of
authorship. The first title was liable to this ob-
jection, that if you were disposed to enlarge it,
and the bookseller insisted on its appearance in
two tomes, how oddly it would sound, —

274

A Volume of Verse
In Two Volumes
Second Edition, &c.

You see thro' my wicked intention of curtail-
ing 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 can-
dour 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 kit-
ten's 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

*7S

will return with sunshine. Till when, pardon
my neglects and impute it to the wintry solstice.

C. Lamb

CCCCII. — TO BERNARD BARTON

March 24, 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 prin-
cipal 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, —

12 12

Make my dark heavy poem, light and light,
276

where the two senses of light are opposed to dif-
ferent 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
nine hundred 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 two thousand.
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.

CCCCIII.— TO BERNARD BARTON

Early Spring, 1824.

I am sure I cannot fill a letter, though I should
disfurnish my skull to fill it. But you expect
something, and shall have a notelet. Is Sunday,

277

not divinely speaking, but humanly and holyday-
sically, 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 sixth day ? Solve me this
problem. If we are to go three times a day to
church, why has Sunday slipped into the notion
of a Ho/iday ? A Holyday I grant it. The Puri-
tans, I have read in Southey's Book [of the Church],
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 holiday from all sorts of work every second
Tuesday. This was giving to the Two Cassars
that which was his respective. Wise, beautiful,
thoughtful, generous legislators ! Would Wilber-
force give us our Tuesdays ? No, d — n him. He
would turn the six days into sevenths, —

And those three 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

278

of self-attention. We pity poverty, loss of friends,
&c, more complex things, in which the suffer-
er's 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 anything 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 lucu-
brations. What do you think of (for a Title), —
Religio Tremuli
or Tremebundi
There is Religio-Medici and Laid. 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

CCCCIV. — TO MRS. THOMAS ALLSOP

April 13, 1824.

Dear Mrs. A., — Mary begs me to say how
much she regrets we cannot join you to Reigate.
Our reasons are — 1st, I have but one holyday,

279

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 re-
turning 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 anywhere. In the meantime,
with many acknowledgments, &c, &c, I remain
yours (both) truly, C. Lamb

Remember Sundays.

CCCCV. — TO WILLIAM HONE

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 Christian,
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

280

CCCCVI. — TO THOMAS HARDY

April 24, 1824.

Dear Sir, — Miss Hazlitt has begged me to
say to you that the novel, which you kindly
promised to introduce to Mr. Ridgway, is lying
for that purpose at Mr. Hone's, Ludgate Street,
where you will perhaps be so kind as to send for
it. She is going on 10th May as governess into
the family of Mrs. Brookes, Dawlish, where she
shall be thankful to receive any communications
respecting the novel. She is now at 14 Queen's
Square, Bristol.

I am, Sir, with great respect,

Yours, &c, Ch. Lamb

CCCCVII. — 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

281

of soul and body by a solid mass of human form
floating off, God knows how, from a lumpish
mass (facsimile 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
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 ill 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 re-
cited, beginning, —

Tiger, tiger, burning bright,
Thro' the desarts of the night,
282

which is glorious, but, alas ! I have not the book ;
for the man is flown, whither I know not — to
Hades or a madhouse. 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 twenty 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, &c, 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 <z) 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
six 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

283

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 1 0,000 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.

CCCCVIII.— TO BERNARD BARTON

July 7, 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

284

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 col-
lection. 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 decora-
tive harp, perhaps, too ostentatious ; a simple
pipe preferable.

Farewell, and many thanks. C. Lamb

CCCCIX. — TO W. MARTER

July 19, 1824.

Dear Marter, — I have just received your let-
ter, having returned from a month's holydays.
My exertions for the London are, tho' not dead,
in a deep sleep for the present. If your club like
scanda\,Blackivood' s is your magazine ; if you pre-
fer 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

285

recommend any others, as not knowing them, or
knowing them to their disadvantage. Of Reviews,
beside what you mention, I know of none ex-
cept 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 swear-
ing, &cc. The desk enters into my soul.

See my thoughts on business next page. [Lamb's
lines appear in letter of September u, 1822, to Ber-
nard Barton .]

With many recollections of pleasanter times,
my old compeer, happily released before me,
adieu.

C. Lamb

CCCCX. — TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN

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 pleas-
ant travelling, one scarce cares whither it leads

286

us. Pray express our pleasure to your father with
my best thanks.

I am involved in a routine of visiting among
the family of Barron Field, just returned from
Botany Bay. I shall hardly have an open even-
ing before Tuesday next. Will you come to us
then ? Yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCCXI. — TO THOMAS HOOD

August 10, 1824.

And what dost thou at the Priory? Cucullus
nonfacit Monachum. English me that, and chal-
lenge old Lignum Janua to make a better.

My old New River has presented no extraor-
dinary 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 mote-
lings, — little things 000 like that, that perish
untimely, and never taste the brook. You do not
tell me of those romantic land bays that be as thou
goestto Lover's Seat : neither of that little church-
ling in the midst of a wood (in the opposite di-
rection, 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,

287

and see my little Protestant Loretto. It stands
apart from trace of human habitation ; yet hath
it pulpit, reading-desk, and trim font 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. i 3 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 re-
member) 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.

288

CCCCXII. — TO BERNARD BARTON

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 parri-
cidal colour of which, tho' my morals could not
but condemn, yet my reason did heartily ap-
prove, 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 house-
keeper.

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 (/. e. to his bosom) —
he 'd have clapt on a brass clasp, no doubt. I can

289

no more understand Shelley than you can. His
poetry is "thin sown with profit or delight." Yet
I must point to your notice a sonnet conceiv'd
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 orac-
ular 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 no-
body 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 shrivelling up in the candle flame, like
parching martyrs. The same indisposition to
write it is has stopt my Elias, but you will see
a futile effort in the next Number, "wrung from
me with slow pain."

The fact is, my head is seldom cool enough.
I am dreadfully indolent. To have to do any-
thing — to order me a new coat, for instance,
tho' my old buttons are shelled like beans —
is an effort.

290

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

note

[Shelley's poem which Lamb refers to :

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
Than 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.]

CCCCXIII. — TO THE REV. H. F. CARY

August 19, 1824.

Dear Sir, — I shall have much pleasure in dining
with you on Wednesday next, with much shame
that I have not noticed your kind present of the
Birds, which I found very chirping and whimsi-
cal. I believe at the time I was daily thinking
of paying you a visit, and put it off — till I should
come. Somehow it slipt, and [I] must crave
your pardon. Yours truly, C. Lamb

291

CCCCXIV. — TO BERNARD BARTON

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 the 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

292

in thy daughter's sanctum, take them with pleas-
ure. 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 two an ugly blot [here
is a bloi\ 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 in-
nocent 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 alto-
gether 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.

293

CCCCXV.— TO MRS. JOHN D. COLLIER

November 2, 1824.

Dear Mrs. Collier, — We receive so much
pig from your kindness, that I really have not
phrase enough to vary successive acknowledge-
ments.

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, and 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 four walls, and writ-
ing by candle-light, most melancholy. Never see
the light of the sun six hours in the day, and am

294

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 and sunshine. Such
a pedestrian as I am, to be tied by the legs, like
a Fauntleroy, without the pleasure of his exac-
tions. 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 and both
our kindest remembrances to Mr. Collier and
yourself, I conclude in haste.

Yours and his sincerely, C. Lamb

On further enquiry Alsager is not dead; but
Mrs. A. is brought to bed.

NOTE

[Henry Fauntleroy was the banker, who had just been found
guilty of forgery and on the day that Lamb wrote was sen-
tenced to death. — E. V. Lucas.]

CCCCXVL — TO B. W. PROCTER

November u, 1824.

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

295

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 Southamp-
ton 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 can-
not 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 cannot 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 peep-
ing 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

296

CCCCXVII. — TO H. C. ROBINSON

November 20, 1824.

Dear R., — Barron 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 some-
times come. I think we shall be out on Tuesday.
Yours ever, C. Lamb

CCCCXVIIL — TO SARAH HUTCHINSON

November 25, 1824.

My dear Miss Hutchinson, — Mary bids me
thank you for your kind letter. We are a little
puzzled about your whereabouts : Miss Words-
worth 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.

297

We had promised our dear friends the Monk-
houses, 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 holydays. 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 headquarters, 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

298

known that C. "at that very moment was living
in a state of open adultery with Mrs. ******
[GillmanJ 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 appear-
ance 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.

CCCCXIX. — TO LEIGH HUNT

November, 1824.

Illustrezzimo Signor, — I have obeyed your
mandate to a tittle. I accompany this with a vol-
ume. But what have you done with the first I sent
you ? — have you swapt it with some lazzaroni

299

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. 'T is 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 't is 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 trot-
ters — are at length apparent. Mary Isabella
attributes it to a lightness induced by his head-
aches. 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 Salis-
bury 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

300

have laid out ys. 8d. in Watts' s Hymns for Christ-
mas 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 strong-
holds 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 comple-
ment 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 nourishing 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

301

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

CCCCXX. — TO BERNARD BARTON

December i, 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 exe-
cution. 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,

302

jj_sa-

&c. I send herewith some patterns which sug-
gest themselves to me at the first blush of the
subject, but he will probably consult his own
taste after all.

Y i ■ 7

The last pattern is obviously fitted for ranuncu-
luses 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 tun-
nel. 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. multiply-
ing 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

3°3

a sadder vein. The fate of the unfortunate Faun-
tleroy 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 indiffer-
ent to the fate of a Presbyterian or an Anabap-
tist. 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

3°4

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 re-
semblance 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 hand-
writing. 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 lawn — -

which I think has an agreeable variety to the
eye. Which I recommend to your notice, with
friend Elia's best wishes.

NOTE

[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 se-
lected for Thackeray's epithet. But when one thinks of the
patience with which, after making gentle fun of her father,

3°5

Lamb sat down to amuse Lucy Barton, and, as Thackeray
did, thinks also of his whole life, it becomes more clear. —
E. V. Lucas.]

CCCCXXI. — TO ALARIC A. WATTS

December 28, 1824.

Dear Sir, — Thanks for your volume. If any
verse is forthcoming next year, you shall have it,
but I do not make two lines on an average any
year now. My poor prose, which is near ex-
hausted, is the London's, and my dry spring is not
likely to overflow to a second reservoir. I saw
S. T. C. on Sunday, who expressed his high
satisfaction at the contents as well as the exterior
of the Souvenir.

You will oblige me by not thinking of sending
me a second superior copy. This already out-
shines and puts to shame my old dusty library.

With much respect, yours, C. Lamb

CCCCXXII. — TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN

January 11, 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 char-

306

woman letting in her watchman husband, which
is better than Butler's lobster turned to red. Haz-
ard 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
evening 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.

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.

CCCCXXIII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

January 17, 1825.

Dear Allsop, — I acknowledge with thanks
the receipt of a draft on Messrs. Wms. for £8 1 .
1 1. 3., which I haste to cash in the present alarm-
ing state of the money market. Hurst and Rob-
inson gone ! I have imagined a chorus of ill-used
authors singing on the occasion, —

3°7

What should we do when booksellers break ?
We should rejoice. Da capo.

We regret exceedingly 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;
and victory hovers doubtful. By the by, 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

CCCCXXIV. — TO SARAH HUTCHINSON

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 goose-
pye together ? The pheasant, too, must not be
forgotten, twice as big and half as good as a par-
tridge.

You ask about the editor of the London; 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 sub-
mitted to him before printed, and had his Pro-
batum. The Horns is in a poor taste, resembling

308

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, un-
less 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 ac-
count. I shall certainly go to the Naughty Man
some day for my fibbings. In the next Number
I figure as a Theologian ! and have attacked my
late brethren, the Unitarians. What Jack-Pud-
ding 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 mend-
ing, 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 epi-
gram 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.

3°9

I have made the lame one still lamer by im-
perfect 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

CCCCXXV. — TO VINCENT NOVELLO

January 25, 1825.

Dear Corelli, — My sister's cold is as obstinate
as an old Handelian, whom a modern amateur
is trying to convert to Mozartism. As company
must and always does injure it, Emma and I pro-
pose to come to you in the evening of to-mor-
row, instead of meeting here. An early bread-and-
cheese supper at half-past eight will oblige us.
Loves to the bearer of many children.

C. Lamb

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.

CCCCXXVI. — TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN

January, 1825.

Dear D., — My sister's cold continues strong
and obstinate. We therefore propose to see you,

310

&c, sometime in the latter end of next week,
instead of this. But come you must.

Believe us, with apologies to your sister,

Yours sincerely, C. Lamb

CCCCXXVII.— TO JOHN BATES DIBDIN

February 8, 1825.

Dear Sir, — We expect you of course to-mor-
row. As to the time, six is pleasanter to us than
seven, and seven than eight. But at any hour we
shall be most glad to see you and sisters.

Yours, &c, C. L.

CCCCXXVIIL — TO BERNARD BARTON

February 10, 1825.

Dear B., — I am vexed that ugly paper should
have offended. I kept it as clear from objection-
able phrases as possible, and it was Hessey's fault,
and my weakness, that it did not appear anony-
mous. No more of it, for God's sake.

The Spirit of the Age is by Hazlitt. The char-
acters 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.
Home 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 like-
ness, but I have had so much injustice done me
in my own name that I make a rule of accepting

311

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 idiot ! 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 first Number, 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 favourite way, but feel dry. I must
laugh sometimes. I am poor Hypochondriacus,
and not Liston.

Our second Number 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.

312

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. Some-
thing she sha'n't scold about.

For the present, farewell. Thine, C. L.

I am fifty years old this day. Drink my health.
CCCCXXIX. — TO THOMAS MANNING

February, 1825.

My dear M., — You might have come inop-
portunely 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 yester-
night, 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 w«-capacitated
(I cannot write it in-\ for business. O joyous im-
becility ! Not a susurration of this to anybody !
Mary's love. C. Lamb

3*3

CCCCXXX. — TO SARAH HUTCHINSON

March i, 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 acknowledged the
nobleness and worth of what we have lost. Words
are perfectly idle. We can only pray for resigna-
tion to the survivors. Our dearest expressions of
condolence to Mrs. Monkhouse 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. Yours and his, while memory
survives, cordially, C. Lamb

CCCCXXXI.— TO B. W. PROCTER

Dear P., — We shall be most glad to see you,
though more glad to have seen double you, but we
will expect finer walking-weather. Bring my
Congreve, second volume, in your hand. I have
two books of yours lock'd up, but how shall I tell
it — horresco referens — that I miss, and can't pos-
sibly account for it, Hollis on Johnson s Milton !

I will march the town thro', but I will repair the
loss. You will be sorry to hear that poor Monk-
house died on Saturday at Clifton. C. L.

CCCCXXXII. — TO BERNARD BARTON

March 23, 1825.

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. lam
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
suspense. Guess what an absorbing stake I feel
it. I am not conscious of the existence of friends
present or absent. The East India 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 first part) to Coleridge, the
most beautiful, cordial, and sincere. He there

3l5

acknowledges his obligation to S. T. C. for his
knowledge of Gospel truths, the nature of a Xtian
Church, &c, 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," /'. 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

CCCCXXXIII. — TO H. C. ROBINSON

March 29, 1825.

I have left the d d India House for ever !

Give me great joy. C. Lamb

CCCCXXXIV. — TO W. WORDSWORTH

April 6, 1825.

Dear Wordsworth, — I have been several times
meditating a letter to you concerning the good
thing which has befallen me, but the thought

316

of poor Monkhouse came across me. He was
one that I had exulted in the prospect of con-
gratulating 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 thirty-three years' slavery,
sitting in my own room at eleven 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 an-
nuity and starved at ninety. £441, i. e. ^450,
with a deduction of £9 for a provision secured
to my sister, she being survivor, the pension guar-
anteed by Act Georgii Tertii, &c.

I came home for ever on Tuesday in last week.
The incomprehensibleness of my condition over-
whelm'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 tu-
multuousness is passing off, and I begin to under-
stand 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

3J7

every morning with an obscure feeling that some
good has happened to us.

Leigh Hunt and Montgomery after their
releasements \they had been imprisoned for libel]
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 anx-
ious schemes for going hither and thither, but
take things as they occur. Yesterday I excur-
sioned twenty 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 gratu-
lation, I am asham'd to advert to that melancholy
event. Monkhouse was a character I learn'd 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 com-
ing 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

318

were always worse than other parts of the year,
because the spirits are worse, and I had no day-
light. 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 seven years with Jacob — and lo !
the Rachel which I coveted is brought 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 some-
body 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
Dedication shows it.

Communicate my news to Southey, and beg
his pardon for my being so long acknowledging
his kind present of the Church, which circum-
stances 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

310

NOTE

[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 £"]T,o 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."]

CCCCXXXV. — TO BERNARD BARTON

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 four
o'clock. I came home forever !

I have been describing my feelings as well as
I can to Wordsworth 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 thirty-
three 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 leav-
ing them in the lurch, fag, fag, fag.

320

The comparison of my own superior felicity
gave me anything but pleasure.

B. B., I would not serve another seven years
for seven hundred thousand pounds ! I have got
^44 1 net for life, sanctioned by Act of Parlia-
ment, with a provision for Mary if she survives
me. I will live another fifty years ; or, if I live
but ten, they will be thirty, reckoning the quan-
tity 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.
Crauford in my life, nevertheless 't is 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.

CCCCXXXVI.— TO MISS HUTCHINSON

April 1 8, 1825.

Dear Miss Hutchinson, — You want to know
all about my gaol delivery. Take it then. About
twelve 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 furnish'd me
with certificates of wasted health and sore spirits
— not much more than the truth, I promise

321

you — and for nine 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 coun-
try, but have enough to live here by management
and scribbling occasionally. I would not go back
to my prison for seven years longer for ^"10,000
a year ; seven years after one is fifty is no trifle to
give up. Still I am a young pensioner, and have
served but thirty-three years, very few I assure
you retire before forty, forty-five, or fifty 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 't is
all red-letter days.

I have a kind letter from the Wordsworths
congratulatory not a little.

It is a damp, I do assure you, amid all my pro-
spects that I can receive none from a quarter upon
which I had calculated, almost more than from

322

any, upon receiving congratulations. I had grown
to like poor Monkhouse 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 first. Our kindest remembrances to Mrs.
Monkhouse and believe us,

Yours most truly, C. Lamb

CCCCXXXVII. — TO WILLIAM HONE

May 2, 1825.

Dear Hone, — I send you a trifle ; you have
seen my lines, I suppose, in the London. I can-
not 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 ?

CCCCXXXVIIL — TO W. WORDSWORTH

May, 1825.

DearW., — I write post-haste to ensure a frank.
Thanks for your hearty congratulations. I may

323

now date from the sixth 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 !

0 the money-grubbers — sempiternal muck-
worms !

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 hasjustfinish'dhisprize Essay, which
if it get the prize he'll touch an additional ^100

1 fancy. His book, too (commentary on Bishop
Leighton), is quite finished and penes Taylor and
Hessey.

In the London which is just out ( ist May) are
two papers entitled the Superannuated Man, which
I wish you to see, and also ist April a little thing

called Barbara S , a story gleaned from Miss

Kelly. The London Magazine, 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 sub-
urbs that I shall miss my thirds : but couragio.
I despair not. Your kind hint of the cottage was

324

well thrown out. An anchorage for age and
school of economy when necessity comes. But
without this latter I have an unconquerable ter-
ror 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.

'T is 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.

CCCCXXXIX. — TO MISS NORRIS

1825.

Hypochondriac. We can't reckon avec any
certainty for une heure * * * as follows :

ENGLAND

I like the taxes when they 're not too many,
I like a sea-coal fire when not too dear ;

I like a beafsteak, too, as well as any,
Have no objection to a pot of beer ;

I like the weather when it 's not too rainy,
That is, I like two months of every year.

325

ITALY

I also like to dine on becaficas,

To see the sun set, sure he '11 rise to-morrow,
Not through a misty morning twinkling weak as

A drunken man's dead eye in maudlin sorrow.
But with all heaven t' himself; that day will break as

Beauteous as cloudless, nor be forced to borrow
That sort of farthing candlelight which glimmers
Where reeking London's smoky cauldron simmers.

Kind regards to Mama and remembrances to
Frere Richard. Dieu remercie mon frere can't
lizer Fransay. I have written this letter with
a most villainous pen — called a patent one.

En finis je remarque I was not offense a votre
fransay et I was not embarrasse to make it out.
Adieu.

I have not quite done that instead of

your company in Miss Norris ; epistle has deter-
mined me to come if heaven, earth, and myself
can compass it. Amen. [No Signature.]

CCCCXL. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

May 29, 1825.

Dear A., — I am as mad as the devil — but
I had engaged myself and Mary to accompany
Mrs. Kenny to Kentish-Town to dinner at a com-
mon friend's on Friday, before I knew of Mary's
engaging you.

Can you and Mrs. A. exchange the day for
Sunday, or what other. Write.

Success to the gnomes ! C. Lamb

326

CCCCXLI. — TO CHARLES CHAMBERS

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 mel-
low 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 flavour
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 and shoulders to some appetites ; that
manly firmness, combined with a sort of woman-
ish coming-in-pieces, which the same cod's
head and shoulders hath, where the whole is
easily separable, pliant to a knife or a spoon,
but each individual flake presents a pleasing re-
sistance to the opposed tooth. You understand
me — these delicate subjects are necessarily ob-
scure.

327

But it has a third flavour of its own, perfectly
distinct from cod or turbot, which it must be
owned may to some not injudicious palates ren-
der it acceptable — but to my unpractised tooth
it presented rather a crude river-fish-flavour, like
your pike or carp, and perhaps like them should
have been tamed and corrected by some labori-
ous and well-chosen sauce. Still I always sus-
pect 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 and 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, and
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

328

the expence of my virtue or my modesty, I had
as lieve be as stupid as * * * at the tea ware-
house. 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 Con-
greve or * * * For instance, you tell me a fine
story about Truss, and his playing at Leaming-
ton, 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 anything. 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. Lik-
ing is too cold a word. — I love you for your
noble attachment to the fat unctuous juices of
deer's flesh and the green unspeakable of turtle.
I honour you for your endeavours to esteem and
approve of my favourite, which I ventured to
recommend to you as a substitute for hare, bul-
lock'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

329

ran riot in its praises, and now it is prostitute and
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 \Here Lamb
makes a square about i x Yz inches^ in or near the
knuckle-bone of a fried joint of * * * fat I can't
call it nor lean neither altogether, it is that
beautiful compound, which Nature must have
made in Paradise Park venison, before she sep-
arated the two substances, the dry and the
oleaginous, to punish sinful mankind ; Adam ate
them entire and 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 topo-
graphy 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 '11
drop a tear.

CCCCXLII. — 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

33°

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 even-
ing, 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 (tho' shattered), C. Lamb

CCCCXLIII. — TO HENRY COLBURN

June 14, 1825.

Dear Sir, — I am quite ashamed, after your
kind letter, of having expressed any disappoint-
ment about my remuneration. It is quite equiva-
lent to the value of anything 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 anything, I am afraid, I can now pro-
duce, 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 and worse,
and 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 see-

331

ing 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 and servant, C. Lamb

CCCCXLIV. — TO S. T. COLERIDGE

July 2, 1825.

Dear C, — We are going off to Enfield, to
Allsop's, for a day or two, with some intention
of succeeding them in their lodging for a time,
for this damn'd nervous fever (vide London Mag-
azine for July) indisposes me for seeing any
friends, and never any poor devil was so be-
friended as I am. Do you know any poor soli-
tary 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 thousand
times more than ever. I am like a disembodied
soul — in this my eternity. I feel everything en-
tirely, all in all and all in etc. This price I pay
for liberty, but am richly content to pay it.

The Odes are four-fifths done by Hood, a
silentish young man. you met at Islington 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

332

as honestly. I complimented them in a news-
paper, 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
return'd it next day saying that twenty years ago,
when he was pure, he thought as you do now,
but that he now thinks as you did twenty years

333

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 second edition, which is at hand.

Have you heard the Creature at the Opera
House — Signor Nonvir 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 pa-
ternal severity of aspect. She has frozen a bright
thought which should have follow'd. She makes
us marble, with too little conceiving. 'T was
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.

Second day, third month of my Hegira or
Flight from Leadenhall.

C. L. Olim Clericus

CCCCXLV. — TO BERNARD BARTON

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

334

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 can-
not 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 remembrances 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 Try-
phena will not understand that phrase of the
worldlings.

I am hardly able to appreciate your volume
now. But I liked the dedication much, and the
apology for your bald burying-grounds. To
Shelley, but that is not new. To the young Ves-
per-singer, Great Bealing's, Playford, and what
not ?

If there be a cavil it is that the topics of relig-
ious 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
consideration that they are snatch'd away from
possible vanities, seems hardly sound; for to an
omniscient eye their conditional failings must be

335

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

CCCCXLVI. — TO JOHN AITKEN

July 5, 1825.

Dear Sir, — With thanks for your last Number
of the Cabinet ; as I cannot arrange with a Lon-
don 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 humble servant,

Charles 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 flames 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.'

CCCCXLVII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

July, 1825.

Dear Allsop, — We are bent upon coming here
to-morrow for a few weeks. Despatch a porter

[' It is said that the Buttons, for one of whom this acrostic was
written, were cousins of the Lambs. — E. V. Lucas.]

336

to me this evening, or by nine to-morrow morn-
ing, to say how far it will interfere with your
proposed coming down on Saturday. If the house
will hold us, we can be together while we stay.
Yours, C. Lamb

After a hot walk.

CCCCXLVIII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

July 20, 1825.

Dear Allsop, — It is too hot to write. Here
we are, having turned you out of your beds, but
willing to resign in your favour, or make any
shifts with you. Our best loves to Mrs. Allsop,
from Mrs. Leishman's, this warm Saturday.
Yours truly, C. Lamb

This damned afternoon sun ! Thanks for your
note, which came in more than good time.

CCCCXLIX. — TO WILLIAM HONE

July 25, 1825.

Dear H., — The Quotidian came in as pleas-
antly as it was looked for at breakfast time yes-
terday. You have repaid my poor stanzas with
interest. This last interlineation is one of those
instances of affectation rightly applied. Read the
sentence without it, how bald it is ! Your idea
of " worsted in the dog-days " was capital.

337

We are here so comfortable that I am con-
fident we shall stay one month, from this date,
most probably longer ; so if you please, you can
cut your out-of-town room for that time. I have
sent up my petit farce altered ; and Harley is at
the theatre now. It cannot come out for some
weeks. When it does, we think not of leaving
here, but to borrow a bed of you for the night.

I write principally to say that the fourth of
August is coming, — Dogget's Coat and Badge
Day on the water. You will find a good deal
about him in Cibbers Apology, octavo, facing the
window ; and something haply in a thin blackish
quarto among the plays, facing the fireside.

You have done with mad dogs ; else there is a
print of Rowlandson's, or somebody's, of people
in pursuit of one in a village, which might have
come in : also Goldsmith's verses.

Mary's kind remembrance. C. Lamb

CCCCL. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

August, 1825.

Dear A., — Mary is afraid lest the calico and
handkerchiefs have miscarried which you were
to send. Have you sent 'em ?

Item a bill with 'em including the former silks,
and balance struck in a tradesman-like way.
Yours truly, C. L,

338

CCCCLL — TO BERNARD BARTON

August 10, 1825.

Dear B. B., — You must excuse my not writ-
ing 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 some-
times 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 proba-
tionary state, it is liable to this dilemma. Omni-
science, to whom possibility must be clear as
act, must know of the child, what it would here-
after turn out : if good, then the topic is false to

339

say it is secured from falling into future wilful-
ness, vice, &c. If bad, I do not see how its ex-
emption from certain future overt acts by being
snatched away at all tells in its favour. 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 floun-
der, 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, in-
competent 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

340

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. Tay-
lor 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
Christian with light and merry shoulders. It had
got silly, indecorous, pert, and everything 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

We shall be soon again at Colebrook.

CCCCLII. — TO ROBERT SOUTHEY

August 10, 1825.

Dear Southey, — You '11 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 fop-
pery ; 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

34i

Church. I scarce feel competent to give an opin-
ion 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 inter-
est. 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, Capilla-
rians 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 electu-
ary — 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 't is ungracious to
look into a lady's years), the dedication is emi-
nently 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.

342

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 gener-
ally spoil poems laid in exotic regions. You
mostly cannot stir out (in such things) for hum-
ming-birds and fire-flies. A tree is a magnolia,
&c. — Can I but like the truly catholic spirit ?
" Blame as thou may est 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 Vesper Bell, a little
poem which retains its first hold upon me
strangely.

The compliment to the transla tress 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 Para-
guay mine. How she DobrizhofFered it all out,
it puzzles my slender Latinity to conjecture.
Why do you seem to sanction Landor'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.

343

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 chiv-
alry and highest notions. Marry, when some-
body 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 under-
standing.

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. 'T is 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 Haymar-
ket ; but when ? is the question. 'T is an extrav-
aganza, 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 play-houses, to
eke out a somewhat contracted income. Tempus
erat. There was a time, my dear Cornwallis,

344

when the Muse, &c. But I am now in Mac
Fleckno'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 accom-
plishing 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 a uxorious para-
dise. 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

CCCCLIII.— TO WILLIAM HONE

August 10, 1825.

Dear H., — Will you direct these from Miss
Hazlitt to Mr. Thelwall, whose address I know
not?

I have returned the Shakspeare errata, finding
much nonsense ; good principles of correction,
but sad wildness in the application of them. No
magazine, as magazines go, would pay for the
inclosed. Thelwall may take them for friend-
ship's sake. Yours, as before, C. L.

345

CCCCLIV.— TO C. C. CLARKE

Dear C, — I shall do very well. The sunshine
is medicinal, as you will find when you venture
hither some fine day. Enfield is beautiful.

Yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCCLV. — TO WILLIAM HONE

August 12, 1825.

Dear Hone, — Your books are right accept-
able. I did not enter farther about Dogget, be-
cause on second thoughts the book I mean does
not refer to him. A coach from the " Bell," or
" Bell and Crown," sets off" to Enfield at half-
past four. Put yourself in it to-morrow afternoon
and come to us ; take a bed at an inn, and waste
all Sunday with us. We desire to show you the
country here. If we are out when you come, the
maid is instructed to keep you upon tea and pro-
per bread and butter till we come home. Pray
secure me the last number of the Every Day Book,
that which has S. R[ay] in it, which by mistake
has never come. Did our newsman not bring it on
Monday ? Don't send home for it, for if I get
it hereafter (so I have it at last), it is all I want.
Mind, we shall expect you Saturday night or
Sunday morning. There are Edmonton coaches
from Bishopsgate every half hour. The walk
thence to Enfield easy across the fields ; a mile
and half. Yours truly, C. Lamb

346

This invitation is "ingenuous." I assure you
we want to see you here. Or will Sunday night
and all day Monday suit you better ? The coach
sets you down at Mrs. Leishman's.

CCCCLVL — TO WILLIAM HONE

August, 1825.

Dear Hone, — I sent you a note by post to-
day, but this comes sooner by a friend. Put your-
self in the coach (" Bell," Holborn) to-morrow
(Saturday) afternoon, half-past four. Come and
take a bed at an inn, and waste Sunday with us
gloriously. We have dainty spots to show you.
If you can't come, come Sunday and stay Mon-
day. Coaches to Edmonton go hourly from Bish-
opgate, but we shall hope for you on Saturday
(to-morrow) evening. C. Lamb

Pray send the inclosed, and burn what comes
inclosed in the post letter. Put last week's Every
Day in your pocket, which we have missed ; that
which has S. R[ay].

CCCCLVIL — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

My dear Allsop, — Mrs. Leishman gives us
hopes of seeing you all on Sunday. We shall
provide a bit of beef or something on that day,
so you need not market. We are very comfort-
able here. Our kindest remembrances to Mrs.

347

Allsop and the chits. We lying-in people go out
on Saturday, Mrs. L. bids me say, and that you
may come that evening and find beds, &c.

Yours truly, C. Lamb

CCCCLVIII. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

September 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 distressful event.
I am very feeble, can scarce move a pen; got
home from Enfield on the Friday ; and on
Monday following was laid up with a most vio-
lent nervous fever, second this summer, have had
leeches to my temples, have not had, nor cannot
get yet, a night's sleep. So you will excuse more
from Yours truly, C. Lamb

Our most kind remembrances to poor Mrs.
Allsop. A line to say how you both are will be
most acceptable.

CCCCLIX. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

September 24, 1825.

My dear Allsop, — Come not near this unfor-
tunate roof yet a while. My disease is clearly
but slowly going. Field is an excellent attend-

348

ant. 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

Can you call at Mrs. Burney, 26 James Street,
and tell her, and that I can see no one here in
this state. If Martin return — if well enough,
I will meet him somewhere ; don't let him come.

CCCCLX. — TO THOMAS ALLSOP

Dear Allsop, — My injunctions about not
calling here had solely reference to your being
unwell, &c, at home. I am most glad to see
you on my own account. I dine at three on
either Sunday ; come then, or earlier or later ;
only before dinner I generally walk. Your
dining here will be quite convenient. I of course
have a joint that day. I owe you for newspapers,
Cobbetts, pheasants, what not ?

Yours most obliged, C. L.

P. S. I am so well (except rheumatism, which
forbids my being out on evenings) that I forgot
to mention my health in the above. Mary is
very poorly yet. Love to Mrs. Allsop.

PRINTED BY H. O. HOUGHTON & CO.
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS, U. S. A.

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Full text of "The letters of Charles Lamb, in which many mutilated words and passages have been restored to their original form; with letters never before published and facsimiles of original ms. letters and poems;"

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