Opening
THE WORKS OF CHARLES AND MARY LAMB VI. LETTERS 1821-1842
THE LETTERS
OF
CHARLES AND MARY LAMB
1821-1842
EDITED BY
E.V. LUCAS
WITH A FRONTISPIECE
CONTENTS OF VOLUME VI
Letter 1821
264 Charles Lamb to Dorothy Wordsworth Jan. 8 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
265 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop No date From Harper's Magazine.
266 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop No date From Harper's Magazine.
267 Charles Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton Jan. 23 From the original.
268 Charles Lamb to Miss Humphreys Jan. 27 From the original at Rowfant.
269 Charles Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton. March 15 From the original.
270 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop March 30 From Harper's Magazine.
271 Charles Lamb to Leigh Hunt April 18 From Leigh Hunt's Correspondence.
272 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge May 1 From the Life of Charles Mathews.
273 Charles Lamb to James Gillman May 2 From the Life of Charles Mathews.
274 Charles Lamb to John Payne Collier May 16 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
275 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter ?Summer From facsimile in Mrs. Field's _A Shelf of Old Authors_.
276 Charles Lamb to John Taylor June 8 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
277 Charles Lamb to John Taylor July 21 Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
278 Charles Lamb to C.A. Elton Aug. 17 From the original in the possession of Sir Edmund Elton.
279 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Summer From Recollections of Writers.
280 Mary Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton No date From the original in the possession of Mr. A.M.S. Methuen.
281 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Oct. 21 From the American owner.
282 Charles Lamb to William Ayrton Oct. 27 From the original.
1822.
283 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge March 9 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
284 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth March 20 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
285 Charles Lamb to W. Harrison Ainsworth May 7 Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
286 Charles Lamb to William Godwin May 16 Mr. Kegan Paul's text (_William Godwin: His Friends_, etc.).
287 Charles Lamb to Mrs. John Lamb May 22 From the original in the Bodleian.
288 Charles Lamb to Mary Lamb (fragment) Aug. From Crabb Robinson's Diary.
289 Charles Lamb to John Clare Aug. 31 From the original (British Museum).
290 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 11 From the original (British Museum).
291 Charles Lamb to Barren Field Sept. 22 From the original in the possession of Mr. B.B. Macgeorge.
292 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Autumn From the Century Magazine.
293 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Oct. 9 From the original (British Museum).
294 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon Oct. 9 From _Haydon's Correspondence and Table Talk_.
295 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Oct. 22 From the Century Magazine.
296 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon Oct. 29 From _Haydon's Correspondence and Table Talk_.
297 Charles Lamb to Sir Walter Scott Oct. 29 From Scott's Familiar Letters.
298 Charles Lamb to Thomas Robinson Nov. 11 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
299 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Nov. 13 From the Century Magazine.
300 Mary Lamb to Mrs. James Kenney ?Early Dec. Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
301 Charles Lamb to John Taylor Dec. 7 From Elia (Bell's edition).
302 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Dec. 16 From the original (Bodleian).
303 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 23 From the original (British Museum).
1823.
304 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Jan. From the Century Magazine.
305 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth Jan. From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
306 Charles Lamb to Mr. and Mrs. J.D. Collier Jan. 6 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.B. Adam.
307 Charles Lamb to Charles Aders Jan. 8 From the original (Mr. J. Dunlop).
308 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Jan. 9 From the original (British Museum).
309 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Jan. 23 From the Century Magazine.
310 Charles Lamb to John Howard Payne Feb. 9 From the Century Magazine.
311 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 17 From the original (British Museum).
312 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Feb. 24 From Mr. Hazlitt's text.
313 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 11 From the original (British Museum).
314 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 5 From the original (British Museum).
315 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter April 13 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations.
316 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson April 25 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
317 Charles Lamb to Miss Hutchinson (?) (fragment) No date From Notes and Queries.
318 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin No date From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
319 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton May 3 From the original (British Museum).
320 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin May 6 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
321 Mary Lamb to Mrs. Randal Norris June 18 Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
322 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 10 From the original (British Museum).
323 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop July From Harper's Magazine.
324 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 2 From the original (British Museum).
325 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 6 From Harper's Magazine.
326 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 9 From Harper's Magazine.
327 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 10 From Harper's Magazine.
328 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. From Harper's Magazine.
329 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 17 From the original (British Museum).
330 Charles Lamb to Charles Lloyd (fragment) Autumn From Letters and Poems of Bernard Barton.
331 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Oct. 14 From Memoir of H.F. Cary.
332 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop ?Oct. From Harper's Magazine.
333 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Oct. 28 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
334 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt Early Nov. Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
335 Charles Lamb to Robert Southey Nov. 21 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
336 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Nov. 22 From the original (British Museum).
337 Charles Lamb to W. Harrison Ainsworth Dec. 9 From the original.
338 Charles Lamb to W. Harrison Ainsworth Dec. 29 From the original.
1824.
339 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Jan. 9 From the original (British Museum).
340 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Jan. 23 From the original (British Museum).
341 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 25 From the original (British Museum).
342 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 24 From the original (British Museum).
343 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Early Spring From the original (British Museum).
344 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Thomas Allsop April 13 From Harper's Magazine.
345 Charles Lamb to William Hone April From the original in the possession of Mr. R.A. Potts.
346 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton May 15 From the original in the possession of Mr. B.B. Macgeorge.
347 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 7 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
348 Charles Lamb to W. Marter. July 19 Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
349 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin July 28 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
350 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood (?fragment) Aug. 10 From the original.
351 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 17 From the original (British Museum).
352 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 30 From the original (British Museum).
353 Charles Lamb to Mrs. John Dyer Collier Nov. 2 From the original (South Kensington Museum).
354 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Nov. 11 From Barry Cornwall's Charles Lamb with alterations.
355 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Nov. 20 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
356 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson Nov. 25 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
357 Charles Lamb to Leigh Hunt ?Nov. From Leigh Hunt's Correspondence with alterations.
358 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 1 Charles Lamb to Lucy Barton From the original (British Museum).
1825.
359 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Jan. 11 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
360 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Jan. 17 From Harper's Magazine.
361 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson Jan. 20 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
362 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Jan. 25 From the original (British Museum).
363 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 10 From the original (British Museum).
364 Charles Lamb to Thomas Manning ?Feb. Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
365 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson. March 1 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
366 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 23 From the original (British Museum).
367 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson March 29 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
368 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth April 6 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
369 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 6 From the original (British Museum).
370 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hutchinson April 18 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original. (Last paragraph from original scrap at Welbeck Abbey.)
371 Charles Lamb to William Hone May 2 From the original at Rowfant.
372 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth May From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
373 Charles Lamb to Charles Chambers ?May Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
374 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge ?June Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
375 Charles Lamb to Henry Colburn (?) June 14 From the original (South Kensington).
376 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge July 2 From the original (Morrison Collection).
377 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 2 From the original (British Museum).
378 Charles Lamb to John Aitken July 5
379 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 10 From the original (British Museum).
380 Charles Lamb to Robert Southey Aug. 10 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
381 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 9 From Harper's Magazine.
382 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Sept. 24 From Harper's Magazine.
383 Charles Lamb to William Hone Oct. 24 From the original at Rowfant.
384 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Dec. 5 From Harper's Magazine.
385 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier ?Dec. From the original (South Kensington).
1826.
386 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier Early in year Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
387 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier Jan. Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
388 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 7 From the original (British Museum).
389 Charles Lamb to Charles Oilier March 16 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.A. Potts.
390 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 20 From the original (British Museum).
391 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge March 22 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
392 Charles Lamb to H.F. Gary April 3 Mr. Hazlitt's text.
393 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello May 9 From the original (British Museum).
394 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton May 16 From the original (British Museum).
395 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge June 1 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
396 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin June 30 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
397 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hill No year From the original (British Museum).
398 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin July 14 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
399 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth Sept. 6 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
400 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon (fragment). No date
401 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 9 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
402 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Sept. 26 From the original (British Museum).
403 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Sept. From the original in the possession of Mr. Henry Poulton.
404 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton No date From the original (British Museum).
1827.
405 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. 20 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
406 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. 20 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
407 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. 29 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
408 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Jan. From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
409 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon March From Taylor's Life of Haydon.
410 Charles Lamb to William Hone April From the original at Rowfant.
411 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood May Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
412 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton No date From the original (British Museum).
413 Charles Lamb to William Hone May From the original at Rowfant.
414 Charles Lamb to William Hone June From the original at Rowfant.
415 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton June 11 From the original (British Museum).
416 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson June 26 From the original (British Museum).
417 Charles Lamb to William Hone July From the original at Rowfant.
418 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 17 From the original at Rowfant.
419 Charles Lamb to P.G. Patmore July 19 From Patmore's My Friends and Acquaintances.
420 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Shelley July 26 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
421 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Basil Montagu Summer Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
422 Mary Lamb to Lady Stoddart Aug. 9
423 Charles Lamb to Sir John Stoddart From the original (Messrs. Maggs).
424 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 10 From the original (British Museum).
425 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 28 From the original (British Museum).
426 Charles Lamb to P.G. Patmore Sept. From My Friends and Acquaintances.
427 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 5 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
428 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 13 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
429 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Sept. 18 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
430 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood Sept. 18 From the facsimile in Mrs. Balmanno's Pen and Pencil.
431 Charles Lamb to Henry Colburn Sept. 25 From the original (South Kensington).
432 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Sept. 26 From the original in the possession of Mr. Henry Poulton.
433 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Oct. 1 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
434 Charles Lamb to John Bates Dibdin Oct. 2 From the original in the possession of Mr. R.W. Dibdin.
435 Charles Lamb to Barron Field Oct. 4 From the Memoirs of Charles Matthews.
436 Charles Lamb to William Hone ?Oct. Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
437 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood No date From the National Review.
438 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton No date From the original (British Museum).
439 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 4 From the original (British Museum).
440 Charles Lamb to Leigh Hunt Dec. Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
441 Charles Lamb to William Hone Dec. 15
442 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop ?Dec. From Harper's Magazine.
443 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Dec. 20 From Harper's Magazine.
444 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. 22 From the original at Rowfant.
445 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton End of year From the original (British Museum).
1828.
446 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Jan. 9 From Harper's Magazine with alterations.
447 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Jan. From the original at Rowfant.
448 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. 18 From the original at Rowfant.
449 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Feb. 25 From Reminiscences of Writers.
450 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Feb. 26 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
451 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon March 19 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
452 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 21 From the original (British Museum).
453 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop May 1 From Harper's Magazine.
454 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon May 3 From the original.
455 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson May 17 From the original (British Museum).
456 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd May 20 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
457 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth May From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
458 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Morgan June 17
459 Mary Lamb to the Thomas Hoods ?Summer Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
460 Charles Lamb to B.R. Haydon Aug. From Taylor's Life of Haydon.
461 Charles Lamb to John Rickman (translation) Oct. 3
462 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Oct. 11 From the original (British Museum).
463 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Oct. From Recollections of Writers.
464 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Nov. 6 From Recollections of Writers.
465 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood Late autumn From Hood's Own.
466 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. Text from Mr. Samuel Davey.
467 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 5 From the original (British Museum).
468 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Dec. From Recollections of Writers.
469 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd End of year Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
1829.
470 Charles Lamb to George Dyer ?Jan. From the original (British Museum).
471 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Jan.19 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
472 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Jan. 22 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations.
473 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Jan. 28 From Harper's Magazine.
474 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Jan. 29 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations.
475 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Early in year Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations.
476 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter Feb. 2 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
477 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke Feb. 2 From Recollections of Writers.
478 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson Feb. 27 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
479 Charles Lamb to Samuel Rogers March 22 From Rogers and His Contemporaries.
480 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton March 25 From the original (British Museum).
481 Charles Lamb to Miss Sarah James ?April Text from Mr. Samuel Davey.
482 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson ?April From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
483 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson April 17 From the original (Dr. Williams' Library).
484 Charles Lamb to George Dyer April 29 From The Mirror, 1841.
485 Charles Lamb to Thomas Hood ?May Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
486 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon No date From The Autographic Mirror.
487 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson May 28 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
488 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton June 3 From the original (British Museum).
489 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton July 25 From the original (British Museum).
490 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop Late July From Harper's Magazine.
491 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Sept. 22 From the original at Rowfant.
492 Charles Lamb to James Gillman Oct. 26 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
493 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Nov. 10 From the original (British Museum).
494 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Nov. 15 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
495 Charles Lamb to James Gillman ?Nov. 29 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
496 Charles Lamb to James Gillman Nov. 30 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
497 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Dec. 8 From the original (British Museum).
498 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth 499 Mary Lamb to Dorothy Wordsworth Jan. 22 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
500 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Feb. 25 From the original (British Museum).
501 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams Feb. 26 Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
502 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams March 1 Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
503 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt March 4 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
504 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams March 5 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
505 Charles Lamb to James Gillman March 8 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
506 Charles Lamb to William Ayrton March 14 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
507 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams March 22 Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
508 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams April 2 From the original in the possession of Mr. Yates Thompson.
509 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams April 9 From the original.
510 Charles Lamb to James Gillman ?Spring Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
511 Charles Lamb to Jacob Vale Asbury ?April From The Athenaewn.
512 Charles Lamb to Jacob Vale Asbury No date By permission of Mr. Edward Hartley.
513 Charles Lamb to Mrs. Williams April 21 Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
514 Charles Lamb to Robert Southey May 10 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
515 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon May 12 From the original at Rowfant.
516 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello May 14 From the original (British Museum).
517 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello May 20 From the original (British Museum).
518 Charles Lamb to William Hone May 21 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
519 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt May 24 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
520 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt June 3 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
521 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton June 28 From the original (British Museum).
522 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton Aug. 30 From the original (British Museum).
523 Charles Lamb to Samuel Rogers Oct. 5 From Rogers and His Contemporaries.
524 Charles Lamb to Vincent Novello Nov. 8 From Recollections of Writers.
525 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Nov. 12 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
9526 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Dec. From the original at Rowfant.
527 Charles Lamb to George Dyer Dec. 20 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations.
528 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Christmas From the original (South Kensington).
1831.
529 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. 3 From the original at Rowfant.
530 Charles Lamb to George Dyer Feb. 22 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
531 Charles Lamb to Bernard Barton April 30 From the original (British Museum).
532 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary May 6 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
533 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 14 From the original at Rowfant.
534 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Early Aug. From the original at Rowfant.
535 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Aug. 5 From the original at Rowfant.
536 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Sept. 5 From the original at Rowfant.
537 Charles Lamb to William Hazlitt, junior Sept. 13 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Lamb and Hazlitt).
538 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Oct. 24 From the original at Rowfant.
539 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. 15 From the original at Rowfant.
1832.
540 Charles Lamb to Joseph Hume's daughters No date Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
541 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke March 5 From Sir Charles Dilke's original.
542 Charles Lamb to S.T. Coleridge April 14 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
543 Charles Lamb to James Sheridan Knowles ?April From the original (South Kensington).
544 Charles Lamb to John Forster ?Late April From the original (South Kensington).
545 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon? June 1 From the original (South Kensington).
546 Charles Lamb to Thomas Allsop July 2 From Harper's Magazine.
547 Charles Lamb to Walter Wilson Aug. From the original in the Bodleian.
548 Charles Lamb to Crabb Robinson ?Early Oct. From the original (South Kensington).
549 Charles Lamb to Walter Savage Landor Oct. From the original (South Kensington).
550 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Late in year From the original at Rowfant.
551 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Winter Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bonn).
552 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Dec. From the original (South Kensington).
553 Charles Lamb to John Forster. Dec. 23 From the original (South Kensington).
1833.
554 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. From Sir Charles Dilke's original.
555 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. 3 From the original at Rowfant.
556 Charles Lamb to John Forster No date From the original (South Kensington).
557 Charles Lamb to John Forster No date From the original (South Kensington).
558 Charles Lamb to John Forster No date From the original (South Kensington).
559 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. 24 From the original at Rowfant.
560 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. 11 From the original (South Kensington).
561 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Feb. From the original (South Kensington).
562 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd Feb. Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
563 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon No date From the original in the possession of Mr. Henry Poulton.
564 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke Feb. From Sir Charles Dilke's original.
565 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Early in year From the original at Rowfant.
566 Charles Lamb to B.W. Procter. No date From Procter's Autobiographical Fragment.
567 Charles Lamb to William Hone March 6 From the original (National Portrait Gallery).
568 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon March 19 From the original (South Kensington).
569 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?Spring From the original (South Kensington).
570 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon March 30 From the original at Rowfant.
571 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Spring From the original at Rowfant.
572 Charles Lamb to John Forster ?March From the original (South Kensington).
573 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon ?April 10 From the original at Rowfant.
574 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke April From Sir Charles Dilke's original.
575 Charles Lamb to Mrs. William Ayrton April 16 From the original, lately in the possession of Mr. Edward Ayrton.
576 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon April 25 From the original at Rowfant.
577 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon April 27 From the original at Rowfant.
578 Charles Lamb to the Rev. James Gillman May 7
579 Charles Lamb to John Forster May From the original (South Kensington).
580 Charles Lamb to John Forster May 12 From the original (South Kensington).
581 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth End of May From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
582 Charles Lamb to Sarah Hazlitt May 31 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn) with alterations.
583 Charles Lamb to Mary Betham June 5 From A House of Letters.
584 Charles Lamb to Matilda Betham June 5 From Fraser's Magazine.
585 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 14 From the original at Rowfant.
586 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon July 24 From the original at Rowfant.
587 Charles and Mary Lamb to Edward and Emma Moxon ?July 31 From the original at Rowfant.
588 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Sept. 9 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
589 Charles and Mary Lamb to Edward Moxon Sept. 26 From the original at Rowfant.
590 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Oct. 17 From the original at Rowfant.
591 Charles Lamb to Edward and Emma Moxon Nov. 29 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
592 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke Mid. Dec. From Sir Charles Dilke's original.
593 Charles Lamb to Samuel Rogers Dec. 21 From Rogers and His Contemporaries.
594 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke No date From Sir Charles Dilke's original.
595 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke No date From Sir Charles Dilke's original.
1834.
596 Charles Lamb to the printer of The Athenaeum No date From Sir Charles Dilke's original.
597 Charles Lamb to Mary Betham Jan. 24 From the original in the possession of Mr. B.B. Macgeorge.
598 Charles Lamb to Edward Moxon Jan. 28 From the original (South Kensington).
599 Charles Lamb to Miss Fryer Feb. 14 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
600 Charles Lamb to Miss Fryer No date From the original in the possession of Mr. A.M.S. Methuen.
601 Charles Lamb to William Wordsworth Feb. 22 From Mr. Gordon Wordsworth's original.
602 Charles Lamb to T.N. Talfourd No date
603 Charles Lamb to Charles Cowden Clarke (fragment) End of June From the Life and Labours of Vincent Novello.
604 Charles Lamb to John Forster June 25 From the original (South Kensington).
605 Charles Lamb to J. Fuller Russell Summer From Notes and Queries.
606 Charles Lamb to J. Fuller Russell Summer From Notes and Queries.
607 Charles Lamb to C.W. Dilke End of July From Sir Charles Dilke's original.
608 Charles Lamb to the Rev. James Gillman Aug. 5 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
609 Charles and Mary Lamb to H.F. Cary Sept. 12 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
610 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Oct. Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
611 Charles Lamb to H.F. Cary Oct. 18 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
612 Charles Lamb to Mr. Childs ?Dec. Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
613 Charles Lamb to Mr. Childs No date
614 Charles Lamb to Mrs. George Dyer Dec. 22 Mr. Hazlitt's text (Bohn).
615 Mary Lamb to Jane Norris Dec. 25 Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
616 Mary Lamb to Jane Norris Oct. 3 1842. Mr. Hazlitt's text (The Lambs).
Last letter. Miss James to Jane Norris July 25 1843.
Appendix
Barton's "Spiritual Law" Barton's "Translation of Enoch" Talfourd's "Verses in Memory of a Child named after Charles Lamb" FitzGerald's "Meadows in Spring" Montgomery's "The Common Lot" Barry Cornwall's "Epistle to Charles Lamb"
ALPHABETICAL LIST OF LETTERS
INDEX
FRONTISPIECE
CHARLES LAMB (aged 51). From the painting by Henry Meyer at the India Office.
THE LETTERS OF CHARLES AND MARY LAMB
1821-1834
264. CHARLES LAMB TO DOROTHY WORDSWORTH
[P.M. January 8, 1821.]
Mary perfectly approves of the appropriat'n of the feathers, and wishes them Peacocks for your fair niece's sake!
Dear Miss Wordsworth, I had just written the above endearing words when Monkhouse tapped me on the shoulder with an invitation to cold goose pye, which I was not Bird of that sort enough to decline. Mrs. M. I am most happy to say is better. Mary has been tormented with a Rheumatism, which is leaving her. I am suffering from the festivities of the season. I wonder how my misused carcase holds it out. I have play'd the experimental philosopher on it, that's certain. Willy shall be welcome to a mince pye, and a bout at Commerce, whenever he comes. He was in our eye. I am glad you liked my new year's speculations. Everybody likes them, except the Author of the Pleasures of Hope. Disappointment attend him! How I like to be liked, and what I do to be liked! They flatter me in magazines, newspapers, and all the minor reviews. The Quarterlies hold aloof. But they must come into it in time, or their leaves be waste paper. Salute Trinity Library in my name. Two special things are worth seeing at Cambridge, a portrait of Cromwell at Sidney, and a better of Dr. Harvey (who found out that blood was red) at Dr. Davy's. You should see them.
Coleridge is pretty well, I have not seen him, but hear often of him from Alsop, who sends me hares and pheasants twice a week. I can hardly take so fast as he gives. I have almost forgotten Butcher's meat, as Plebeian. Are you not glad the Cold is gone? I find winters not so agreeable as they used to be, when "winter bleak had charms for me." I cannot conjure up a kind similitude for those snowy flakes--Let them keep to Twelfth Cakes.
Mrs. Paris, our Cambridge friend, has been in Town. You do not know the Watfords? in Trumpington Street--they are capital people.
Ask any body you meet, who is the biggest woman in Cambridge--and I'll hold you a wager they'll say Mrs. Smith.
She broke down two benches in Trinity Gardens, one on the confines of St. John's, which occasioned a litigation between the societies as to repairing it. In warm weather she retires into an ice-cellar (literally!) and dates the returns of the years from a hot Thursday some 20 years back. She sits in a room with opposite doors and windows, to let in a thorough draught, which gives her slenderer friends tooth-aches. She is to be seen in the market every morning at 10, cheapening fowls, which I observe the Cambridge Poulterers are not sufficiently careful to stump.
Having now answered most of the points containd in your Letter, let me end with assuring you of our very best kindness, and excuse Mary from not handling the Pen on this occasion, especially as it has fallen into so much better hands! Will Dr. W. accept of my respects at the end of a foolish Letter.
C.L.
[Miss Wordsworth was visiting her brother, Christopher Wordsworth, the Master of Trinity.
Willy was William Wordsworth, junr.
Lamb's New Year speculations were contained in his Elia essay "New Year's Eve," in the London Magazine for January, 1821. There is no evidence that Campbell disapproved of the essay. Canon Ainger suggests that Lamb may have thus alluded playfully to the pessimism of his remarks, so opposed to the pleasures of hope. When the Quarterly did "come in," in 1823, it was with cold words, as we shall see.
"Trinity Library." It is here that are preserved those MSS. of Milton, which Lamb in his essay "Oxford in the Vacation," in the London Magazine for October, 1820, says he regrets to have seen.
"Cromwell at Sidney." See Mary Lamb's letter to Miss Hutchinson, August 20, 1815.
"Harvey ... at Dr. Davy's"--Dr. Martin Davy, Master of Caius.
"Alsop." This is the first mention of Thomas Allsop (1795-1880), Coleridge's friend and disciple, who, meeting Coleridge in 1818, had just come into Lamb's circle. We shall meet him frequently. Allsop's Letters, Conversations and Recollections of Samuel Taylor Coleridge contain much matter concerning Lamb.
"Winter bleak had charms for me." I could not find this for the large edition. It is from Burns' "Epistle to William Simpson," stanza 13.
Mrs. Paris was a sister of William Ayrton and the mother of John Ayrton Paris, the physician. It was at her house at Cambridge that the Lambs met Emma Isola, whom we are soon to meet.
"Mrs. Smith." Lamb worked up this portion of his letter into the little humorous sketch "The Gentle Giantess," printed in the London Magazine for December, 1822 (see Vol. I. of the present edition), wherein Mrs. Smith of Cambridge becomes the Widow Blacket of Oxford.
"Dr. W."--Dr. Christopher Wordsworth.]
265. CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP
[No date. 1821.]
Dear Sir--The hairs of our head are numbered, but those which emanate from your heart defy arithmetic. I would send longer thanks but your young man is blowing his fingers in the Passage.
Yours gratefully C.L.
[The date of this scrap is unimportant; but it comes well here in connection with the reference in the preceding letter.
In Harper's Magazine for December, 1859, were printed fifty of Lamb's notes to Allsop, all of which are reproduced in at least two editions of Lamb's letters. I have selected only those which say anything, as for the most part Lamb was content with the merest message; moreover, the date is often so uncertain as to be only misleading.
Crabb Robinson says of Allsop, "I believe his acquaintance with Lamb originated in his sending Coleridge a present of £100 in admiration of his genius."]
266. CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP
[No date. 1821.]
D'r Sir--Thanks for the Birds and your kindness. It was but yesterd'y. I was contriving with Talf'd to meet you 1/2 way at his chamber. But night don't do so well at present. I shall want to be home at Dalston by Eight.
I will pay an afternoon visit to you when you please. I dine at a chop-house at ONE always, but I can spend an hour with you after that.
Yours truly
C.L.
Would Saturdy serve?
267. CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON
[Dated at end: Jan. 23, 1821.]
Dear Mrs. Ayrton, my sister desires me, as being a more expert penman than herself, to say that she saw Mrs. Paris yesterday, and that she is very much out of spirits, and has expressed a great wish to see your son William, and Fanny--
I like to write that word Fanny. I do not know but it was one reason of taking upon me this pleasing task--
Moreover that if the said William and Frances will go and sit an hour with her at any time, she will engage that no one else shall see them but herself, and the servant who opens the door, she being confined to her private room. I trust you and the Juveniles will comply with this reasonable request.
& am Dear Mrs. Ayrton your's and yours' Truly C. LAMB. Cov. Gar. 23 Jan. 1821.
[Mrs. Ayrton (née Arnold) was the wife of William Ayrton, the musical critic.]
268. CHARLES LAMB TO MISS HUMPHREYS
London 27 Jan'y. 1821.
Dear Madam, Carriages to Cambridge are in such request, owing to the Installation, that we have found it impossible to procure a conveyance for Emma before Wednesday, on which day between the hours of 3 and 4 in the afternoon you will see your little friend, with her bloom somewhat impaired by late hours and dissipation, but her gait, gesture, and general manners (I flatter myself) considerably improved by--somebody that shall be nameless. My sister joins me in love to all true Trumpingtonians, not specifying any, to avoid envy; and begs me to assure you that Emma has been a very good girl, which, with certain limitations, I must myself subscribe to. I wish I could cure her of making dog's ears in books, and pinching them on poor Pompey, who, for one, I dare say, will heartily rejoyce at her departure.
Dear Madam,
Yours truly
foolish C.L.
[Addressed to "Miss Humphreys, with Mrs. Paris, Trumpington Street, Cambridge." Franked by J. Rickman.
This letter contains the first reference in the correspondence to Emma Isola, daughter of Charles Isola, Esquire Bedell of Cambridge University, and granddaughter of Agostino Isola, the Italian critic and teacher, of Cambridge, among whose pupils had been Wordsworth. Miss Humphreys was Emma Isola's aunt. Emma seems to have been brought to London by Mrs. Paris and left with the Lambs.
Pompey seems to have been the Lamb's first dog. Later, as we shall see, they adopted Dash.]
269. CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON
[Dated at end: March 15, 1821.]
Dear Madam, We are out of town of necessity till Wednesday next, when we hope to see one of you at least to a rubber. On some future Saturday we shall most gladly accept your kind offer. When I read your delicate little note, I am ashamed of my great staring letters.
Yours most truly
CHARLES LAMB.
Dalston near Hackney
15 Mar. 1821.
[In my large edition I give a facsimile of this letter.]
270. CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP
30 March, 1821.
My dear Sir--If you can come next Sunday we shall be equally glad to see you, but do not trust to any of Martin's appointments, except on business, in future. He is notoriously faithless in that point, and we did wrong not to have warned you. Leg of Lamb, as before; hot at 4. And the heart of Lamb ever.
Yours truly, C.L.
271. CHARLES LAMB TO LEIGH HUNT
Indifferent Wednesday [April 18], 1821.
Dear Hunt,--There was a sort of side talk at Mr. Novello's about our spending Good Friday at Hampstead, but my sister has got so bad a cold, and we both want rest so much, that you shall excuse our putting off the visit some little time longer. Perhaps, after all, you know nothing of it.--
Believe me, yours truly, C. LAMB.
272. CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE
May 1st [1821],
Mr. Gilman's, Highgate.
Mr. C.--I will not fail you on Friday by six, and Mary, perhaps, earlier. I very much wish to meet "Master Mathew," and am much obliged to the G----s for the opportunity. Our kind respects to them always.--ELIA.
Extract from a MS. note of S.T.C. in my Beaumont and Fletcher, dated April 17th 1807.
Midnight.
"God bless you, dear Charles Lamb, I am dying; I feel I have not many weeks left."
[Master Mathew is in Ben Jonson's "Every Man in His Humour."
Lamb's "Beaumont and Fletcher" is in the British Museum. The note quoted by Lamb is not there, or perhaps it is one that has been crossed out. This still remains: "N.B. I shall not be long here, Charles! I gone, you will not mind my having spoiled a book in order to leave a Relic. S.T.C., Oct. 1811."]
273. CHARLES LAMB TO JAMES GILLMAN
[Dated at end: 2 May, 1821.]
Dear Sir--You dine so late on Friday, it will be impossible for us to go home by the eight o'clock stage. Will you oblige us by securing us beds at some house from which a stage goes to the Bank in the morning? I would write to Coleridge, but cannot think of troubling a dying man with such a request.
Yours truly, C. LAMB.
If the beds in the town are all engaged, in consequence of Mr. Mathews's appearance, a hackney-coach will serve. Wednes'y. 2 May '21.
We shall neither of us come much before the time.
[Mrs. Mathews (who was half-sister of Fanny Kelly) described this evening in her Memoirs of her husband, 1839. Her account of Lamb is interesting:--
Mr. Lamb's first approach was not prepossessing. His figure was small and mean; and no man certainly was ever less beholden to his tailor. His "bran" new suit of black cloth (in which he affected several times during the day to take great pride, and to cherish as a novelty that he had long looked for and wanted) was drolly contrasted with his very rusty silk stockings, shown from his knees, and his much too large thick shoes, without polish. His shirt rejoiced in a wide ill-plaited frill, and his very small, tight, white neckcloth was hemmed to a fine point at the ends that formed part of the little bow. His hair was black and sleek, but not formal, and his face the gravest I ever saw, but indicating great intellect, and resembling very much the portraits of King Charles I. Mr. Coleridge was very anxious about his pet Lamb's first impression upon my husband, which I believe his friend saw; and guessing that he had been extolled, he mischievously resolved to thwart his panegyrist, disappoint the strangers, and altogether to upset the suspected plan of showing him off.
The Mathews' were then living at Ivy Cottage, only a short distance from the Grove, Highgate, where the famous Mathews collection of pictures was to be seen of which Lamb subsequently wrote in the London Magazine.
Here should come a note to Ayrton saying that Madame Noblet is the least graceful dancer that Lamb ever "did not see."]
274. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN PAYNE COLLIER
May 16, 1821.
Dear J.P.C.,--Many thanks for the "Decameron:" I have not such a gentleman's book in my collection: it was a great treat to me, and I got it just as I was wanting something of the sort. I take less pleasure in books than heretofore, but I like books about books. In the second volume, in particular, are treasures--your discoveries about "Twelfth Night," etc. What a Shakespearian essence that speech of Osrades for food!--Shakespeare is coarse to it--beginning "Forbear and eat no more." Osrades warms up to that, but does not set out ruffian-swaggerer. The character of the Ass with those three lines, worthy to be set in gilt vellum, and worn in frontlets by the noble beasts for ever--
"Thou would, perhaps, he should become thy foe, And to that end dost beat him many times: He cares not for himself, much less thy blow."
Cervantes, Sterne, and Coleridge, have said positively nothing for asses compared with this.
I write in haste; but p. 24, vol. i., the line you cannot appropriate is Gray's sonnet, specimenifyed by Wordsworth in first preface to L.B., as mixed of bad and good style: p. 143, 2nd vol., you will find last poem but one of the collection on Sidney's death in Spenser, the line,
"Scipio, Caesar, Petrarch of our time."
This fixes it to be Raleigh's: I had guess'd it to be Daniel's. The last after it, "Silence augmenteth rage," I will be crucified if it be not Lord Brooke's. Hang you, and all meddling researchers, hereafter, that by raking into learned dust may find me out wrong in my conjecture!
Dear J.P.C., I shall take the first opportunity of personally thanking you for my entertainment. We are at Dalston for the most part, but I fully hope for an evening soon with you in Russell or Bouverie Street, to talk over old times and books. Remember us kindly to Mrs. J.P.C. Yours very kindly, CHARLES LAMB. I write in misery.
N.B.--The best pen I could borrow at our butcher's: the ink, I verily believe, came out of the kennel.
[Collier's Poetical Decameron, in two volumes, was published in 1820: a series of imaginary conversations on curious and little-known books. His "Twelfth Night" discoveries will be found in the Eighth Conversation; Collier deduces the play from Barnaby Rich's Farewell to Military Profession, 1606. He also describes Thomas Lodge's "Rosalynde," the forerunner of "As You Like It," in which is the character Rosader, whom Lamb calls Osrades. His speech for food runs thus:--
It hapned that day that Gerismond, the lawfull king of France banished by Torismond, who with a lustie crew of outlawes liued in that Forrest, that day in honour of his birth, made a feast to all his bolde yeomen, and frolickt it with store of wine and venison, sitting all at a long table vnder the shadow of Limon trees: to that place by chance fortune conducted Rosader, who seeing such a crew of braue men, hauing store of that for want of which hee and Adam perished, hee slept boldly to the boords end, and saluted the Company thus.--Whatsoeuer thou be that art maister of these lustie squires, I salute thee as graciously as a man in extreame distresse may: knowe that I and a fellow friend of mine, are here famished in the forrest for want of foode: perish we must, vnlesse relieued by thy fauours. Therefore if thou be a Gentleman, giue meate to men, and such as are euery way worthie of life: let the proudest Squire that sits at thy table rise and encounter with me in any honourable point of activitie whatsoeuer, and if he and thou proue me not a man, send mee away comfortlesse: if thou refuse this, as a niggard of thy cates, I will haue amongst you with my sword, for rather wil I die valiantly, then perish with so cowardly an extreame (Collier's Poetical Decameron, 174, Eighth Conversation).
Lamb compares with that the passage in "As You Like It," II., 7, 88, beginning with Orlando's "Forbear, and eat no more." The character of the ass is quoted by Collier from an old book, The Noblenesse of the Asse, 1595, in the Third Conversation:--
Thou wouldst (perhaps) he should become thy foe, And to that end doost beat him many times; He cares not for himselfe, much lesse thy blowe.
Lamb wrote more fully of this passage in an article on the ass contributed to Hone's Every-Day Book in 1825 (see Vol. I. of the present edition).
The line from Gray's sonnet on the death of Mr. Richard West was this:--
And weep the more because I weep in vain.
"Scipio, Caesar," etc. This line runs, in the epitaph on Sidney, beginning "To praise thy life"--
Scipio, Cicero, and Petrarch of our time!
It is generally supposed to be by Raleigh. The next poem, "Silence Augmenteth Grief," is attributed by Malone to Sir Edward Dyer, and by Hannah to Raleigh.]
275. CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER
[No date. ?Summer, 1821.]
Dear Sir, The Wits (as Clare calls us) assemble at my Cell (20 Russell St. Cov.-Gar.) this evening at 1/4 before 7. Cold meat at 9. Puns at--a little after. Mr. Cary wants to see you, to scold you. I hope you will not fail. Yours &c. &c. &c.
C. LAMB.
Thursday.
I am sorry the London Magazine is going to be given up.
[I assume the date of this note to be summer, 1821, because it was then that Baldwin, Cradock & Joy, the London Magazine's first publishers, gave it up. The reason was the death of John Scott, the editor, and probably to a large extent the originator, of the magazine. It was sold to Taylor & Hessey, their first number being dated July, 1821.
Scott had become involved in a quarrel with Blackwood, which reached such a pitch that a duel was fought, between Scott and Christie, a friend of Lockhart's. The whole story, which is involved, and indeed not wholly clear, need not be told here: it will be found in Mr. Lang's memoir of Lockhart. The meeting was held at Chalk Farm on February 16, 1821. Peter George Patmore, sub-editor of the London, was Scott's second. Scott fell, wounded by a shot which Christie fired purely in self-defence. He died on February 27.
Mr. Cary. Henry Francis Cary the translator of Dante and a contributor to the London Magazine.
The London Magazine had four periods. From 1820 to the middle of 1821, when it was Baldwin, Cradock & Joy's. From 1821 to the end of 1824, when it was Taylor & Hessey's at a shilling. From January, 1825, to August of that year, when it was Taylor & Hessey's at half-a-crown; and from September, l825, to the end, when it was Henry Southern's, and was published by Hunt & Clarke.]
276. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN TAYLOR
Margate, June 8, 1821.
Dear Sir,--I am extremely sorry to be obliged to decline the article proposed, as I should have been flattered with a Plate accompanying it. In the first place, Midsummer day is not a topic I could make anything of--I am so pure a Cockney, and little read, besides, in May games and antiquities; and, in the second, I am here at Margate, spoiling my holydays with a Review I have undertaken for a friend, which I shall barely get through before my return; for that sort of work is a hard task to me. If you will excuse the shortness of my first contribution-and I know I can promise nothing more for July--I will endeavour a longer article for our next. Will you permit me to say that I think Leigh Hunt would do the article you propose in a masterly manner, if he has not outwrit himself already upon the subject. I do not return the proof--to save postage--because it is correct, with ONE EXCEPTION. In the stanza from Wordsworth, you have changed DAY into AIR for rhyme-sake: DAY is the right reading, and I IMPLORE you to restore it.
The other passage, which you have queried, is to my ear correct. Pray let it stand.
D'r S'r, yours truly, C. LAMB.
On second consideration, I do enclose the proof.
[John Taylor (1781-1864), the publisher, with Hessey, of the London Magazine was, in 1813, the first publicly to identify Sir Philip Francis with Junius. Taylor acted as editor of the London Magazine from 1821 to 1824, assisted by Thomas Hood. Later his interests were centred in currency questions.
"I am here at Margate." I do not know what review Lamb was writing. If written and published it has not been reprinted. It was on this visit to Margate that Lamb met Charles Cowden Clarke.
"My first contribution." The first number to bear Taylor & Hessey's name was dated July, but they had presumably acquired the rights in the magazine before then. Lamb's first contribution to the London Magazine had been in August, 1820, "The South-Sea House."
The proof which Lamb returned was that of the Elia, essay on "Mackery End in Hertfordshire," printed in the July number of the London Magazine, in which he quoted a stanza from Wordsworth's "Yarrow Visited":--
But thou, that didst appear so fair To fond imagination, Dost rival in the light of day Her delicate creation.
Here should come a scrap from Lamb to Ayrton, dated July 17, 1821, referring to the Coronation. Lamb says that in consequence of this event he is postponing his Wednesday evening to Friday.]
277. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN TAYLOR
July 21, 1821.
D'r Sir,--The Lond. Mag. is chiefly pleasant to me, because some of my friends write in it. I hope Hazlitt intends to go on with it, we cannot spare Table Talk. For myself I feel almost exhausted, but I will try my hand a little longer, and shall not at all events be written out of it by newspaper paragraphs. Your proofs do not seem to want my helping hand, they are quite correct always. For God's sake change Sisera to Jael. This last paper will be a choke-pear I fear to some people, but as you do not object to it, I can be under little apprehension of your exerting your Censorship too rigidly.
Thanking you for your extract from M'r. E.'s letter,
I remain, D'r Sir,
Your obliged,
C. LAMB.
[Hazlitt continued his Table Talk in the London Magazine until December, 1821.
Lamb seems to have been treated foolishly by some newspaper critic; but I have not traced the paragraphs in question.
The proof was that of the Elia essay "Imperfect Sympathies," which was printed (with a fuller title) in the number for August, 1821. The reference to Jael is in the passage on Braham and the Jewish character.
I do not identify Mr. E. Possibly Elton. See next letter.
Here should come a further letter to Taylor, dated July 30, 1821, in which Lamb refers to some verses addressed to him by "Olen" (Charles Abraham Elton: see note to next letter) in the London Magazine for August, remonstrating with him for the pessimism of the Elia essay "New Year's Eve" (see Vol. II. of this edition).
Lamb also remarks that he borrowed the name Elia (pronounced Ellia) from an old South-Sea House clerk who is now dead.
Elia has recently been identified by Mr. R.W. Goulding, the librarian at Welbeck Abbey, as F. Augustus Elia, author of a French tract entitled Considération sur l'état actuel de la France au mois de Juin 1815. Par une anglais. It is privately reprinted in Letters from the originals at Welbeck Abbey, 1909.]
278. CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES ABRAHAM ELTON
India House
to which place all letters addressed to C.L. commonly come.
[August 17, 1821 (?).]
My dear Sir, You have overwhelmed me with your favours. I have received positively a little library from Baldwyn's. I do not know how I have deserved such a bounty. We have been up to the ear in the classics ever since it came. I have been greatly pleased, but most, I think, with the Hesiod,--the Titan battle quite amazed me. Gad, it was no child's play--and then the homely aphorisms at the end of the works--how adroitly you have turned them! Can he be the same Hesiod who did the Titans? the latter is--
"-----wine Which to madness does incline."
But to read the Days and Works, is like eating nice brown bread, homely sweet and nutritive. Apollonius was new to me. I had confounded him with the conjuror of that name. Medea is glorious; but I cannot give up Dido. She positively is the only Fine Lady of Antiquity: her courtesy to the Trojans is altogether queen-like. Eneas is a most disagreeable person. Ascanius a pretty young master. Mezentius for my money. His dying speech shames Turpin--not the Archbishop I mean, but the roadster of that name.
I have been ashamed to find how many names of classics (and more than their names) you have introduced me to, that before I was ignorant of. Your commendation of Master Chapman arrideth me. Can any one read the pert modern Frenchify'd notes, &c., in Pope's translation, and contrast them with solemn weighty prefaces of Chapman, writing in full faith, as he evidently does, of the plenary inspiration of his author--worshipping his meanest scraps and relics as divine--without one sceptical misgiving of their authenticity, and doubt which was the properest to expound Homer to their countrymen. Reverend Chapman! you have read his hymn to Pan (the Homeric)--why, it is Milton's blank verse clothed with rhyme. Paradise Lost could scarce lose, could it be so accoutred.
I shall die in the belief that he has improved upon Homer, in the Odyssey in particular--the disclosure of Ulysses of himself, to Alcinous, his previous behaviour at the song of the stern strife arising between Achilles and himself (how it raises him above the Iliad Ulysses!) but you know all these things quite as well as I do. But what a deaf ear old C. would have turned to the doubters in Homer's real personality! They might as well have denied the appearance of J.C. in the flesh.--He apparently believed all the fables of H.'s birth, &c.
Those notes of Bryant have caused the greatest disorder in my brain-pan. Well, I will not flatter when I say that we have had two or three long evening's good reading out of your kind present.
I will say nothing of the tenderest parts in your own little volume, at the end of such a slatternly scribble as this, but indeed they cost us some tears. I scrawl away because of interruptions every moment. You guess how it is in a busy office--papers thrust into your hand when your hand is busiest--and every anti-classical disavocation.
[Conclusion cut away.]
[Sir Charles Abraham Elton (1778-1853) seems to have sent Lamb a number of his books, principally his Specimens of the Classical Poets ... from Homer to Tryphiodorus translated into English Verse, Baldwin, 1814, in three volumes. Lamb refers first to the passage from Hesiod's Theogony, and then to his Works and Days (which Chapman translated)--"Dispensation of Providence to the Just and Unjust."
Apollonius Rhodius was the author of The Argonautics. Lamb then passes on to Virgil. For the death of Mezentius see the Aeneid, Book X., at the end. The makers of broadsides had probably credited Dick Turpin with a dying speech.
"Those notes of Bryant." Lamb possibly refers to Jacob Bryant's Essay on the Original Genius and Writings of Homer, 1775, or his pamphlet on the Trojan War, 1795, 1799.
"Your own little volume." Probably The Brothers and Other Poems, by Elton, 1820.]
279. CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES COWDEN CLARKE
[Summer, 1821.]
My dear Sir--Your letter has lain in a drawer of my desk, upbraiding me every time I open the said drawer, but it is almost impossible to answer such a letter in such a place, and I am out of the habit of replying to epistles otherwhere than at office. You express yourself concerning H. like a true friend, and have made me feel that I have somehow neglected him, but without knowing very well how to rectify it. I live so remote from him--by Hackney--that he is almost out of the pale of visitation at Hampstead. And I come but seldom to Cov't Gard'n this summer time--and when I do, am sure to pay for the late hours and pleasant Novello suppers which I incur. I also am an invalid. But I will hit upon some way, that you shall not have cause for your reproof in future. But do not think I take the hint unkindly. When I shall be brought low by any sickness or untoward circumstance, write just such a letter to some tardy friend of mine--or come up yourself with your friendly Henshaw face--and that will be better. I shall not forget in haste our casual day at Margate. May we have many such there or elsewhere! God bless you for your kindness to H., which I will remember. But do not show N. this, for the flouting infidel doth mock when Christians cry God bless us. Yours and his, too, and all our little circle's most affect'e.
C. LAMB.
Mary's love included.
[Charles Cowden Clarke (1787-1877) was the son of a schoolmaster who had served as usher with George Dyer at Northampton. Afterwards he established a school at Enfield, where Keats was one of the scholars. Charles Cowden Clarke, at this time a bookseller, remained one of Keats' friends and was a friend also of Leigh Hunt's, on whose behalf he seems to have written to Lamb. Later he became a partner of Alfred Novello, the musical publisher, son of Vincent Novello. In 1828 he married Mary Victoria Novello.
"Friendly Henshaw face." I cannot explain this.
Leigh Hunt left England for Italy in November, 1821, to join Shelley and Byron.
Here should come a brief note to Allan Cunningham asking him to an evening party of London Magazine contributors at 20 Russell St., given in the Boston Bibliophile edition.]
280. MARY LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON
[No date. ?1821.]
Thursday Morning.
MY dear friend,
The kind interest you took in my perplexities of yesterday makes me feel that you will be well pleased to hear I got through my complicated business far better than I had ventured to hope I should do. In the first place let me thank you, my good friend, for your good advice; for, had I not gone to Martin first he would have sent a senseless letter to Mr. Rickman, and now he is coming here to-day in order to frame one in conjunction with my brother.
What will be Mr. Rickman's final determination I know not, but he and Mrs. Rickman both gave me a most kind reception, and a most patient hearing, and then Mr. R. walked with me as far as Bishopsgate Street, conversing the whole way on the same unhappy subject. I will see you again the very first opportunity till when farewel with grateful thanks.
How senseless I was not to make you go back in that empty coach. I never have but one idea in my poor head at a time.
Yours affectionately
M. LAMB.
at Mr. Coston's
No. 14 Kingsland Row Dalston.
[The explanation of this letter is found in an entry in Crabb Robinson's Diary, the unpublished portion, which tells us that owing to certain irregularities Rickman, who was Clerk Assistant at the table of the House of Commons, had been obliged to discharge Martin Burney, who was one of his clerks.
Here should come another scrap from Lamb to Ayrton, dated August 14, stating that at to-morrow's rubber the windows will be closed on account of Her Majesty's death. Her Majesty was Queen Caroline, whom Lamb had championed. She died on August 7.]
281. CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ALLSOP
Oct. 21, 1819.
My dear Sir, I have to thank you for a fine hare, and unless I am mistaken for two, the first I received a week since, the account given with it was that it came from Mr. Alfourd--I have no friend of that name, but two who come near it
Mr. Talfourd
Mr. Alsop
so my gratitude must be divided between you, till I know the true sender. We are and shall be some time, I fear, at Dalston, a distance which does not improve hares by the circuitous route of Cov't Garden, though for the sweetness of this last I will answer. We dress it to-day. I suppose you know my sister has been & is ill. I do not see much hopes, though there is a glimmer, of her speedy recovery. When we are all well, I hope to come among our town friends, and shall have great pleasure in welcoming you from Beresford Hall.
Yours, & old Mr. Walton's, & honest Mr. Cotton's Piscatorum Amicus, C.L.
India House 19 Oct. 21
282. CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM AYRTON
[Oct. 27, 1821.]
I Come, Grimalkin! Dalston, near Hackney, 27th Oct'r. One thousand 8 hundred and twenty one years and a wee-bit since you and I were redeemed. I doubt if you are done properly yet.
[A further letter to Ayrton, dated from Dalston, October 30, is printed by Mr. Macdonald, in which Lamb speaks of his sister's illness and the death of his brother John, who died on October 26, aged fifty-eight. It is reasonable to suppose that Lamb, when the above note was written, was unaware of his brother's death (see note to Letter 284 on page 610). On October 26, however, he had written to the editor of the London Magazine saying that he was most uncomfortably situated at home and expecting some trouble which might prevent further writing for some time--which may have been an allusion to his brother's illness or to signs of Mary Lamb's approaching malady.
Here should come a note to William Hone, evidently in reply to a comment on Lamb's essay on "Saying Grace."
Here should come a letter from Lamb to Rickman, dated November 20, 1821, referring to Admiral Burney's death. "I have been used to death lately. Poor Jim White's departure last year first broke the spell. I had been so fortunate as to have lost no friends in that way for many long years, and began to think people did not die." He says that Mary Lamb has recovered from a long illness and is pretty well resigned to John Lamb's death.]
283. CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE
March 9th, 1822.
Dear C.,--It gives me great satisfaction to hear that the pig turned out so well--they are interesting creatures at a certain age--what a pity such buds should blow out into the maturity of rank bacon! You had all some of the crackling --and brain sauce--did you remember to rub it with butter, and gently dredge it a little, just before the crisis? Did the eyes come away kindly with no Oedipean avulsion? Was the crackling the colour of the ripe pomegranate? Had you no complement of boiled neck of mutton before it, to blunt the edge of delicate desire? Did you flesh maiden teeth in it? Not that I sent the pig, or can form the remotest guess what part Owen could play in the business. I never knew him give anything away in my life. He would not begin with strangers. I suspect the pig, after all, was meant for me; but at the unlucky juncture of time being absent, the present somehow went round to Highgate. To confess an honest truth, a pig is one of those things I could never think of sending away. Teals, wigeons, snipes, barn-door fowl, ducks, geese--your tame villatic things--Welsh mutton, collars of brawn, sturgeon, fresh or pickled, your potted char, Swiss cheeses, French pies, early grapes, muscadines, I impart as freely unto my friends as to myself. They are but self-extended; but pardon me if I stop somewhere--where the fine feeling of benevolence giveth a higher smack than the sensual rarity--there my friends (or any good man) may command me; but pigs are pigs, and I myself therein am nearest to myself. Nay, I should think it an affront, an undervaluing done to Nature who bestowed such a boon upon me, if in a churlish mood I parted with the precious gift. One of the bitterest pangs of remorse I ever felt was when a child--when my kind old aunt had strained her pocketstrings to bestow a sixpenny whole plum-cake upon me. In my way home through the Borough, I met a venerable old man, not a mendicant, but thereabouts--a look-beggar, not a verbal petitionist; and in the coxcombry of taught-charity I gave away the cake to him. I walked on a little in all the pride of an Evangelical peacock, when of a sudden my old aunt's kindness crossed me--the sum it was to her--the pleasure she had a right to expect that I--not the old impostor --should take in eating her cake--the cursed ingratitude by which, under the colour of a Christian virtue, I had frustrated her cherished purpose. I sobbed, wept, and took it to heart so grievously, that I think I never suffered the like--and I was right. It was a piece of unfeeling hypocrisy, and proved a lesson to me ever after. The cake has long been masticated, consigned to dunghill with the ashes of that unseasonable pauper.
But when Providence, who is better to us all than our aunts, gives me a pig, remembering my temptation and my fall, I shall endeavour to act towards it more in the spirit of the donor's purpose.
Yours (short of pig) to command in everything. C.L.
[This letter probably led to the immediate composition of the Elia essay "A Dissertation on Roast Pig" (see Vol. II. of the present edition), which was printed in the London Magazine for September, 1822. See also "Thoughts on Presents of Game," Vol. I. of this edition.
"Owen." Lamb's landlord in Russell Street.
"My kind old aunt... the Borough." This is rather perplexing. Lamb, to the best of our knowledge, never as a child lived anywhere but in the Temple. His only aunt of whom we know anything lived with the family also in the Temple. But John Lamb's will proves Lamb to have had two aunts. The reference to the Borough suggests therefore that the aunt in question was not Sarah Lamb (Aunt Hetty) but her sister.]
284. CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
20th March, 1822.
My dear Wordsworth--A letter from you is very grateful, I have not seen a Kendal postmark so long! We are pretty well save colds and rheumatics, and a certain deadness to every thing, which I think I may date from poor John's Loss, and another accident or two at the same time, that has made me almost bury myself at Dalston, where yet I see more faces than I could wish. Deaths over-set one and put one out long after the recent grief. Two or three have died within this last two twelvem'ths, and so many parts of me have been numbed. One sees a picture, reads an anecdote, starts a casual fancy, and thinks to tell of it to this person in preference to every other--the person is gone whom it would have peculiarly suited. It won't do for another. Every departure destroys a class of sympathies. There's Capt. Burney gone!--what fun has whist now? what matters it what you lead, if you can no longer fancy him looking over you? One never hears any thing, but the image of the particular person occurs with whom alone almost you would care to share the intelligence. Thus one distributes oneself about--and now for so many parts of me I have lost the market. Common natures do not suffice me. Good people, as they are called, won't serve. I want individuals. I am made up of queer points and I want so many answering needles. The going away of friends does not make the remainder more precious. It takes so much from them as there was a common link. A. B. and C. make a party. A. dies. B. not only loses A. but all A.'s part in C. C. loses A.'s part in B., and so the alphabet sickens by subtraction of interchangeables. I express myself muddily, capite dolente. I have a dulling cold. My theory is to enjoy life, but the practice is against it. I grow ominously tired of official confinement. Thirty years have I served the Philistines, and my neck is not subdued to the yoke. You don't know how wearisome it is to breathe the air of four pent walls without relief day after day, all the golden hours of the day between 10 and 4 without ease or interposition. Taedet me harum quotidianarum formarum, these pestilential clerk faces always in one's dish. O for a few years between the grave and the desk! they are the same, save that at the latter you are outside the machine. The foul enchanter--letters four do form his name--Busirane is his name in hell--that has curtailed you of some domestic comforts, hath laid a heavier hand on me, not in present infliction, but in taking away the hope of enfranchisement. I dare not whisper to myself a Pension on this side of absolute incapacitation and infirmity, till years have sucked me dry. Otium cum indignitate. I had thought in a green old age (O green thought!) to have retired to Ponder's End--emblematic name how beautiful! in the Ware road, there to have made up my accounts with Heaven and the Company, toddling about between it and Cheshunt, anon stretching on some fine Izaac Walton morning to Hoddesdon or Amwell, careless as a Beggar, but walking, walking ever, till I fairly walkd myself off my legs, dying walking!
The hope is gone. I sit like Philomel all day (but not singing) with my breast against this thorn of a Desk, with the only hope that some Pulmonary affliction may relieve me. Vide Lord Palmerston's report of the Clerks in the war office (Debates, this morning's Times) by which it appears in 20 years, as many Clerks have been coughd and catarrhd out of it into their freer graves.
Thank you for asking about the Pictures. Milton hangs over my fire side in Covt. Card, (when I am there), the rest have been sold for an old song, wanting the eloquent tongue that should have set them off!
You have gratifyd me with liking my meeting with Dodd. For the Malvolio story--the thing is become in verity a sad task and I eke it out with any thing. If I could slip out of it I sh'd be happy, but our chief reputed assistants have forsaken us. The opium eater crossed us once with a dazzling path, and hath as suddenly left us darkling; and in short I shall go on from dull to worse, because I cannot resist the Bookseller's importunity--the old plea you know of authors, but I believe on my part sincere.
Hartley I do not so often see, but I never see him in unwelcome hour. I thoroughly love and honor him.
I send you a frozen Epistle, but it is winter and dead time of the year with me. May heaven keep something like spring and summer up with you, strengthen your eyes and make mine a little lighter to encounter with them, as I hope they shall yet and again, before all are closed.
Yours, with every kind rem'be.
C.L.
I had almost forgot to say, I think you thoroughly right about presentation copies. I should like to see you print a book I should grudge to purchase for its size. D----n me, but I would have it though!
[John Lamb's will left everything to his brother. We must suppose that his widow was independently provided for. I doubt if the brothers had seen each other except casually for some time. The Elia essay "My Relations" contains John Lamb's full-length portrait under the name of James Elia.
Captain Burney died on November 17, 1821,
"The foul enchanter--letters four do form his name." From Coleridge's war eclogue, "Fire, Famine and Slaughter," where the letters form the name of Pitt. Here they stand for Joseph Hume, not Lamb's friend, but Joseph Hume, M.P. (1777-1855), who had attacked with success abuses in the East India Company; had revised economically the system of collecting the revenue, thus touching Wordsworth as Distributor of Stamps; and had opposed Vansittart's scheme for the reduction of pension charges.
"Vide Lord Palmerston's report." In the Times of March 21 is the report of a debate on the estimates. Palmerston proved a certain amount of reduction of salary in the War Office. Incidentally he remarked that "since 1810 not fewer than twenty-six clerks had died of pulmonary complaints, and disorders arising from sedentary habits."
Milton was the portrait, already described, which had been left to Lamb. Lamb gave it as a dowry to Emma Isola when she became Mrs. Moxon.
"My meeting with Dodd ... Malvolio story." In the essay "The Old Actors," in the London Magazine for February, 1822 (see Vol. II. of this edition).
"Our chief reputed assistants." Hazlitt had left the London Magazine; Scott, the original editor, was dead.
De Quincey, whose Confessions of an Opium-Eater were appearing in its pages, has left a record of a visit to the Lambs about this time. See his "London Reminiscences."
"Hartley." Hartley Coleridge, then a young man of twenty-five, was living in London after the unhappy sudden termination of his Oxford career.
Here should come a brief note to Mrs. Norris, dated March 26, 1822, given in the Boston Bibliophile edition.
Here should come a letter from Lamb to William Godwin, dated April 13, in which Lamb remarks that he cannot think how Godwin, who in his writings never expresses himself disrespectfully of any one but his Maker, can have given offence to Rickman. This reminds one of Godwin's remark about Coleridge, "God bless him--to use a vulgar expression," as recorded by Coleridge in one of his letters. Lamb also said of Godwin (and to him) that he had read more books that were not worth reading than any man in England.]
285. CHARLES LAMB TO W. HARRISON AINSWORTH
[Dated at end: May 7, 1822.]
Dear Sir,--I have read your poetry with pleasure. The tales are pretty and prettily told, the language often finely poetical. It is only sometimes a little careless, I mean as to redundancy. I have marked certain passages (in pencil only, which will easily obliterate) for your consideration. Excuse this liberty. For the distinction you offer me of a dedication, I feel the honor of it, but I do not think it would advantage the publication. I am hardly on an eminence enough to warrant it. The Reviewers, who are no friends of mine--the two big ones especially who make a point of taking no notice of anything I bring out--may take occasion by it to decry us both. But I leave you to your own judgment. Perhaps, if you wish to give me a kind word, it will be more appropriate before your republication of Tourneur.
The "Specimens" would give a handle to it, which the poems might seem to want. But I submit it to yourself with the old recollection that "beggars should not be chusers" and remain with great respect and wishing success to both your publications
Your obe't. Ser't.
C. LAMB.
No hurry at all for Tourneur.
Tuesday 7 May '22.
[William Harrison Ainsworth (1805-1882), afterwards known as a novelist, was then articled to a Manchester solicitor, but had begun his literary career. The book to which Lamb refers was called The Works of Cheviot Tichburn, 1822, and was dedicated to him in the following terms:--"To my friend Charles Lamb, as a slight mark of gratitude for his kindness and admiration of his character, these poems are inscribed."
Ainsworth was meditating an edition of the works of Cyril Tourneur, author of "The Atheist's Tragedy," to whom Lamb had drawn attention in the Dramatic Specimens, 1808. The book was never published.]
286. CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM GODWIN
May 16, 1822.
Dear Godwin--I sincerely feel for all your trouble. Pray use the enclosed £50, and pay me when you can. I shall make it my business to see you very shortly.
Yours truly
C. LAMB.
[Owing largely to a flaw in the title-deed of his house at 41 Skinner Street, which he had to forfeit, Godwin had come upon poverty greater than any he had previously suffered, although he had been always more or less necessitous. Lamb now lent him £50. In the following year, after being mainly instrumental in putting on foot a fund for Godwin's benefit, he transformed this loan into a gift. An appeal was issued in 1823 asking for; £600, the following postscript to which, in Lamb's hand, is preserved at the South Kensington Museum:--
"There are few circumstances belonging to the case which are not sufficiently adverted to in the above letter.
"Mr. Godwin's opponent declares himself determined to act against him with the last degree of hostility: the law gives him the power the first week in November to seize upon Mr. Godwin's property, furniture, books, &c. together with all his present sources of income for the support of himself and his family. Mr. Godwin has at this time made considerable progress in a work of great research, and requiring all the powers of his mind, to the completion of which he had lookd for future pecuniary advantage. His mind is at this moment so entirely occupied in this work, that he feels within himself the firmness and resolution that no prospect of evil or calamity shall draw him off from it or suspend his labours. But the calamity itself, if permitted to arrive, will produce the physical impossibility for him to proceed. His books and the materials of his work, as well as his present sources of income, will be taken from him. Those materials have been the collection of several years, and it would require a long time to replace them, if they could ever be replaced.
"The favour of an early answer is particularly requested, that the extent of the funds supplied may as soon as possible be ascertained, particularly as any aid, however kindly intended, will, after the lapse of a very few weeks, become useless to the purpose in view."
The signatories to the appeal were: Crabb Robinson (£30), William Ayrton (£10), John Murray (£10 10s.), Charles Lamb (£50), Lord Francis Leveson-Gower (£10), Lord Dudley (£50), the Hon. W. Lamb (£20) and Sir James Macintosh (£10). Other contributions were: Lord Byron, £26 5s.; T.M. Alsager, £10; and "A B C, by Charles Lamb," £10. A B C was Sir Walter Scott.
The work on which Godwin was then labouring was his History of the Commonwealth, 1824-1828. His new home was in the Strand. In 1833 he received the post of Yeoman Usher of the Exchequer, which he held till his death in 1836, although its duties had vanished ere then.]
287. CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. JOHN LAMB
22 May 1822.
Dear Mrs. Lamb, A letter has come to Arnold for Mrs. Phillips, and, as I have not her address, I take this method of sending it to you. That old rogue's name is Sherwood, as you guessed, but as I named the shirts to him, I think he must have them. Your character of him made me almost repent of the bounty.
You must consider this letter as Mary's--for writing letters is such a trouble and puts her to such twitters (family modesty, you know; it is the way with me, but I try to get over it) that in pity I offer to do it for her.--
We hold our intention of seeing France, but expect to see you here first, as we do not go till the 20th of next month. A steam boat goes to Dieppe, I see.--
Christie has not sent to me, and I suppose is in no hurry to settle the account. I think in a day or two (if I do not hear from you to the contrary) I shall refresh his memory.
I am sorry I made you pay for two Letters. I Peated it, and re-peated it.
Miss Wright is married, and I am a hamper in her debt, which I hope will now not be remembered. She is in great good humour, I hear, and yet out of spirits.
Where shall I get such full flavor'd Geneva again?
Old Mr. Henshaw died last night precisely at 1/2 past 11.--He has been open'd by desire of Mrs. McKenna; and, where his heart should have been, was found a stone. Poor Arnold is inconsolable; and, not having shaved since, looks deplorable.
With our kind remembrances to Caroline and your friends
We remain yours affectionaly C.L. AND M. LAMB.
[Occupying the entire margin up the left-hand side of the letter is, in Mary Lamb's hand:--]
I thank you for your kind letter, and owe you one in return, but Charles is in such a hurry to send this to be franked.
Your affectionate sister
M. LAMB.
[On the right-hand margin, beside the paragraph about Mr. Henshaw, is written in the same hand, underlined:--]
He is not dead.
[John Lamb's widow had been a Mrs. Dowden, with an unmarried daughter, probably the Caroline referred to. The letter treats of family matters which could not now be explained even if it were worth while. The Lambs were arranging a visit to Versailles, to the Kenneys. Mr. Henshaw was Lamb's godfather, a gunsmith.]
Letter 288
(Fragment)
CHARLES LAMB TO MARY LAMB (in Paris).
[August, 1822.]
Then you must walk all along the Borough side of the Seine facing the Tuileries. There is a mile and a half of print shops and book stalls. If the latter were but English. Then there is a place where the Paris people put all their dead people and bring em flowers and dolls and ginger bread nuts and sonnets and such trifles. And that is all I think worth seeing as sights, except that the streets and shops of Paris are themselves the best sight.
[The Lambs had left England for France in June. While they were there Mary Lamb was taken ill again--in a diligence, according to Moore--and Lamb had to return home alone, leaving a letter, of which this is the only portion that has been preserved, for her guidance on her recovery. It is also the only writing from Lamb to his sister that exists. Mary Lamb, who had taken her nurse with her in case of trouble, was soon well again, and in August had the company of Crabb Robinson in Paris. Mrs. Aders was also there, and Foss, the bookseller in Pall Mall, and his brother. And it was on this visit that the Lambs met John Howard Payne, whom we shall shortly see.]
289. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN CLARE
India House, 31 Aug., 1822.
Dear Clare--I thank you heartily for your present. I am an inveterate old Londoner, but while I am among your choice collections, I seem to be native to them, and free of the country. The quantity of your observation has astonished me. What have most pleased me have been Recollections after a Ramble, and those Grongar Hill kind of pieces in eight syllable lines, my favourite measure, such as Cowper Hill and Solitude. In some of your story-telling Ballads the provincial phrases sometimes startle me. I think you are too profuse with them. In poetry slang of every kind is to be avoided. There is a rustick Cockneyism, as little pleasing as ours of London. Transplant Arcadia to Helpstone. The true rustic style, the Arcadian English, I think is to be found in Shenstone. Would his Schoolmistress, the prettiest of poems, have been better, if he had used quite the Goody's own language? Now and then a home rusticism is fresh and startling, but where nothing is gained in expression, it is out of tenor. It may make folks smile and stare, but the ungenial coalition of barbarous with refined phrases will prevent you in the end from being so generally tasted, as you deserve to be. Excuse my freedom, and take the same liberty with my puns.
I send you two little volumes of my spare hours. They are of all sorts, there is a methodist hymn for Sundays, and a farce for Saturday night. Pray give them a place on your shelf. Pray accept a little volume, of which I have [a] duplicate, that I may return in equal number to your welcome presents.
I think I am indebted to you for a sonnet in the London for August.
Since I saw you I have been in France, and have eaten frogs. The nicest little rabbity things you ever tasted. Do look about for them. Make Mrs. Clare pick off the hind quarters, boil them plain, with parsley and butter. The fore quarters are not so good. She may let them hop off by themselves.
Yours sincerely,
CHAS. LAMB.
[John Clare (1793-1864) was the Northamptonshire poet whom the London Magazine had introduced to fame. Octavius Gilchrist had played to him the same part that Capell Lofft had to Bloomfield. His first volume, Poems Descriptive of Rural Life and Scenery, was published in January, 1820; his next, The Village Minstrel, in September of the next year. These he had probably sent to Lamb. Helpstone was Clare's birthplace. Lamb's two little return volumes were his Works. The sonnet in the August London Magazine was not signed by Clare. It runs thus:--
TO ELlA
ELIA, thy reveries and vision'd themes To Care's lorn heart a luscious pleasure prove; Wild as the mystery of delightful dreams, Soft as the anguish of remember'd love: Like records of past days their memory dances Mid the cool feelings Manhood's reason brings, As the unearthly visions of romances Peopled with sweet and uncreated things;-- And yet thy themes thy gentle worth enhances! Then wake again thy wild harp's tenderest strings, Sing on, sweet Bard, let fairy loves again Smile in thy dreams, with angel ecstacies; Bright o'er our souls will break the heavenly strain Through the dull gloom of earth's realities.
Clare addressed to Lamb a sonnet on his Dramatic Specimens which was printed in Hone's Year Book in 1831.
Here should come a letter from Lamb to Ayrton dated Sept. 5, 1822, referring to the writer's "drunken caput" and loss of memory.
Here should come a letter from Lamb to Mrs. James Kenney, dated Sept. 11, 1822, in which Lamb says that Mary Lamb had reached home safely from France, and that she failed to smuggle Crabb Robinson's waistcoat. He adds that the Custom House people could not comprehend how a waistcoat, marked Henry Robinson, could be a part of Miss Lamb's wearing apparel. At the end of the letter is a charming note to Mrs. Kenney's little girl, Sophy, whom Lamb calls his dear wife. He assures her that the few short days of connubial felicity which he passed with her among the pears and apricots of Versailles were some of the happiest of his life.]
290. CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON
India House, 11 Sept. 1822.
Dear Sir--You have misapprehended me sadly, if you suppose that I meant to impute any inconsistency (in your writing poetry) with your religious profession. I do not remember what I said, but it was spoken sportively, I am sure. One of my levities, which you are not so used to as my older friends. I probably was thinking of the light in which your so indulging yourself would appear to Quakers, and put their objection in my own foolish mouth. I would eat my words (provided they should be written on not very coarse paper) rather than I would throw cold water upon your, and my once, harmless occupation. I have read Napoleon and the rest with delight. I like them for what they are, and for what they are not. I have sickened on the modern rhodomontade & Byronism, and your plain Quakerish Beauty has captivated me. It is all wholesome cates, aye, and toothsome too, and withal Quakerish. If I were George Fox, and George Fox Licenser of the Press, they should have my absolute IMPRIMATUR. I hope I have removed the impression.
I am, like you, a prisoner to the desk. I have been chained to that gally thirty years, a long shot. I have almost grown to the wood. If no imaginative poet, I am sure I am a figurative one. Do "Friends" allow puns? verbal equivocations?--they are unjustly accused of it, and I did my little best in the "imperfect Sympathies" to vindicate them.
I am very tired of clerking it, but have no remedy. Did you see a sonnet to this purpose in the Examiner?--
"Who first invented Work--and tied the free And holy-day rejoycing spirit down To the ever-haunting importunity Of business, in the green fields, and the town-- To plough--loom--anvil--spade--&, oh, most sad, To this dry drudgery of the desk's dead wood? Who but the Being Unblest, alien from good, Sabbathless Satan! he who his unglad Task ever plies 'mid rotatory burnings, That round and round incalculably reel-- For wrath Divine hath made him like a wheel-- In that red realm from whence are no returnings; Where toiling and turmoiling ever and aye He, and his Thoughts, keep pensive worky-day."
C.L.
I fancy the sentiment exprest above will be nearly your own, the expression of it probably would not so well suit with a follower of John Woolman. But I do not know whether diabolism is a part of your creed, or where indeed to find an exposition of your creed at all. In feelings and matters not dogmatical, I hope I am half a Quaker. Believe me, with great respect, yours
C. LAMB.
I shall always be happy to see, or hear from you.--
[This is the first of the letters to Bernard Barton (1784-1849), a clerk in a bank at Woodbridge, in Suffolk, who was known as the Quaker poet. Lamb had met him at a London Magazine dinner at 13 Waterloo Place, and had apparently said something about Quakers and poetry which Barton, on thinking it over, had taken too seriously. Bernard Barton was already the author of four volumes of poetry, of which Napoleon and other Poems was the latest, published in 1822. Lamb's essay on "Imperfect Sympathies" had been printed in the London Magazine for August, 1821. For John Woolman, see note on page 93. The sonnet "Work" had been printed in the Examiner, August 29, 1819.]
291. CHARLES LAMB TO BARRON FIELD
Sept. 22, 1822.
My dear F.,--I scribble hastily at office. Frank wants my letter presently. I & sister are just returned from Paris!! We have eaten frogs. It has been such a treat! You know our monotonous general Tenor. Frogs are the nicest little delicate things--rabbity-flavoured. Imagine a Lilliputian rabbit! They fricassee them; but in my mind, drest seethed, plain, with parsley and butter, would have been the decision of Apicius. Shelley the great Atheist has gone down by water to eternal fire! Hunt and his young fry are left stranded at Pisa, to be adopted by the remaining duumvir, Lord Byron--his wife and 6 children & their maid. What a cargo of Jonases, if they had foundered too! The only use I can find of friends, is that they do to borrow money of you. Henceforth I will consort with none but rich rogues. Paris is a glorious picturesque old City. London looks mean and New to it, as the town of Washington would, seen after it. But they have no St. Paul's or Westminster Abbey. The Seine, so much despised by Cockneys, is exactly the size to run thro' a magnificent street; palaces a mile long on one side, lofty Edinbro' stone (O the glorious antiques!): houses on the other. The Thames disunites London & Southwark. I had Talma to supper with me. He has picked up, as I believe, an authentic portrait of Shakspere. He paid a broker about £40 English for it. It is painted on the one half of a pair of bellows--a lovely picture, corresponding with the Folio head. The bellows has old carved wings round it, and round the visnomy is inscribed, near as I remember, not divided into rhyme--I found out the rhyme--
"Whom have we here, Stuck on this bellows, But the Prince of good fellows, Willy Shakspere?"
At top--
"O base and coward luck! To be here stuck.--POINS."
At bottom--
"Nay! rather a glorious lot is to him assign'd, Who, like the Almighty, rides upon the wind.--PISTOL."
This is all in old carved wooden letters. The countenance smiling, sweet, and intellectual beyond measure, even as He was immeasurable. It may be a forgery. They laugh at me and tell me Ireland is in Paris, and has been putting off a portrait of the Black Prince. How far old wood may be imitated I cannot say. Ireland was not found out by his parchments, but by his poetry. I am confident no painter on either side the Channel could have painted any thing near like the face I saw. Again, would such a painter and forger have expected £40 for a thing, if authentic, worth £4000? Talma is not in the secret, for he had not even found out the rhymes in the first inscription. He is coming over with it, and, my life to Southey's Thalaba, it will gain universal faith.
The letter is wanted, and I am wanted. Imagine the blank filled up with all kind things.
Our joint hearty remembrances to both of you. Yours as ever,
C. LAMB.
[Frank was Francis John Field, Barron Field's brother, in the India House.
Shelley was drowned on July 8, 1822.
Talma was François Joseph Talma (1763-1826), the great French tragedian. Lamb, introduced by John Howard Payne, saw him in "Regulus," but not understanding French was but mildly interested. "Ah," said Talma in the account by James Kenney printed in Henry Angelo's Pic Nic, "I was not very happy to-night; you must see me in 'Scylla.'" "Incidit in Scyllam," said Lamb, "qui vult vitare Charybdiro." "Ah, you are a rogue; you are a great rogue," was Talma's reply. Talma had bought a pair of bellows with Shakespeare's head on it. Lamb's belief in the authenticity of this portrait was misplaced, as the following account from Chambers' Journal for September 27, 1856, will show:--
About the latter part of the last century, one Zincke, an artist of little note, but grandson of the celebrated enameller of that name, manufactured fictitious Shakespeares by the score.... The most famous of Zincke's productions is the well-known Talma Shakespeare, which gentle Charles Lamb made a pilgrimage to Paris to see; and when he did see, knelt down and kissed with idolatrous veneration. Zincke painted it on a larger panel than was necessary for the size of the picture, and then cut away the superfluous wood, so as to leave the remainder in the shape of a pair of bellows.... Zincke probably was thinking of "a muse of fire" when he adopted this strange method of raising the wind; but he made little by it, for the dealer into whose hands the picture passed, sold it as a curiosity, not an original portrait, for £5. The buyer, being a person of ingenuity, and fonder of money than curiosities, fabricated a series of letters to and from Sir Kenelm Digby, and, passing over to France, planted--the slang term used among the less honest of the curiosity-dealing fraternity--the picture and the letters in an old château near Paris. Of course a confederate managed to discover the plant, in the presence of witnesses, and great was the excitement that ensued. Sir Kenelm Digby had been in France in the reign of Charles I., and the fictitious correspondence proved that the picture was an original, and had been painted by Queen Elizabeth's command, on the lid of her favourite pair of bellows!
It really would seem that the more absurd a deception is, the better it succeeds. All Paris was in delight at possessing an original Shakespeare, while the London amateurs were in despair at such a treasure being lost to England. The ingenious person soon found a purchaser, and a high price recompensed him for his trouble. But more remains to be told. The happy purchaser took his treasure to Ribet, the first Parisian picture-cleaner of the day, to be cleaned. Ribet set to work; but we may fancy his surprise as the superficial impasto of Zincke washed off beneath the sponge, and Shakespeare became a female in a lofty headgear adorned with blue ribbons.
In a furious passion the purchaser ran to the seller. "Let us talk over the affair quietly," said the latter; "I have been cheated as well as you: let us keep the matter secret; if we let the public know it, all Paris and even London too, will be laughing at us. I will return you your money, and take back the picture, if you will employ Ribet to restore it to the same condition as it was in when you received it." This fair proposition was acceded to, and Ribet restored the picture; but as he was a superior artist to Zincke, he greatly improved it, and this improvement was attributed to his skill as a cleaner. The secret being kept, and the picture, improved by cleaning, being again in the market, Talma, the great Tragedian, purchased it at even a higher price than that given by the first buyer. Talma valued it highly, enclosed it in a case of morocco and gold, and subsequently refused 1000 Napoleons for it; and even when at last its whole history was disclosed, he still cherished it as a genuine memorial of the great bard.
By kind permission of Mr. B.B. MacGeorge, the owner both of the letter and bellows, I was enabled to give a reproduction of the portrait in my large edition.
Ireland was the author of "Vortigern," the forged play attributed to Shakespeare.]
292. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE
[Autumn, 1822.]
Dear Payne--A friend and fellow-clerk of mine, Mr. White (a good fellow) coming to your parts, I would fain have accompanied him, but am forced instead to send a part of me, verse and prose, most of it from 20 to 30 years old, such as I then was, and I am not much altered.
Paris, which I hardly knew whether I liked when I was in it, is an object of no small magnitude with me now. I want to be going, to the Jardin des Plantes (is that right, Louisa?) with you to Pere de la Chaise, La Morgue, and all the sentimentalities. How is Talma, and his (my) dear Shakspeare?
N.B.--My friend White knows Paris thoroughly, and does not want a guide. We did, and had one. We both join in thanks. Do you remember a Blue-Silk Girl (English) at the Luxembourg, that did not much seem to attend to the Pictures, who fell in love with you, and whom I fell in love with--an inquisitive, prying, curious Beauty--where is she?
Votre Très Humble Serviteur,
CHARLOIS AGNEAU,
alias C. LAMB.
Guichy is well, and much as usual. He seems blind to all the distinctions of life, except to those of sex. Remembrance to Kenny and Poole.
[John Howard Payne (1792-1852) was born in New York. He began life as an actor in 1809 as Young Norval in "Douglas," and made his English début in 1813 in the same part. For several years he lived either in London or Paris, where among his friends were Washington Irving and Talma. He wrote a number of plays, and in one of them, "Clari, or the Maid of Milan," is the song "Home, Sweet Home," with Bishop's music, on which his immortality rests. Payne died in Tunis, where he was American Consul, in 1852, and when in 1883 he was reinterred at Washington, it was as the author of "Home, Sweet Home." He seems to have been a charming but ill-starred man, whom to know was to love.
Mr. White was Edward White of the India House, by whom Lamb probably sent a copy of the 1818 edition of his Works. Louisa was Louisa Holcroft. Guichy was possibly the Frenchman, mentioned by Crabb Robinson, with whom the Lambs had travelled to France. Poole was, I imagine, John Poole, the dramatist, author of burlesque plays in the London Magazine and later of "Paul Pry," which, it is quite likely, he based on Lamb's sketch "Tom Pry."]
293. CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON
[Dated at end: 9 October 1822.]
Dear Sir--I am asham'd not sooner to have acknowledged your letter and poem. I think the latter very temperate, very serious and very seasonable. I do not think it will convert the club at Pisa, neither do I think it will satisfy the bigots on our side the water. Something like a parody on the song of Ariel would please them better.
Full fathom five the Atheist lies, Of his bones are hell-dice made.--
I want time, or fancy, to fill up the rest. I sincerely sympathise with you on your doleful confinement. Of Time, Health, and Riches, the first in order is not last in excellence. Riches are chiefly good, because they give us Time. What a weight of wearisome prison hours have [I] to look back and forward to, as quite cut out [of] life--and the sting of the thing is, that for six hours every day I have no business which I could not contract into two, if they would let me work Task-work. I shall be glad to hear that your grievance is mitigated.
Shelly I saw once. His voice was the most obnoxious squeak I ever was tormented with, ten thousand times worse than the Laureat's, whose voice is the worst part about him, except his Laureatcy. Lord Byron opens upon him on Monday in a Parody (I suppose) of the "Vision of Judgment," in which latter the Poet I think did not much show his. To award his Heaven and his Hell in the presumptuous manner he has done, was a piece of immodesty as bad as Shelleyism.
I am returning a poor letter. I was formerly a great Scribbler in that way, but my hand is out of order. If I said my head too, I should not be very much out, but I will tell no tales of myself. I will therefore end (after my best thanks, with a hope to see you again some time in London), begging you to accept this Letteret for a Letter--a Leveret makes a better present than a grown hare, and short troubles (as the old excuse goes) are best.
I hear that C. Lloyd is well, and has returned to his family. I think this will give you pleasure to hear.
I remain, dear Sir, yours truly
C. LAMB.
E.I.H.
9 Oct. 22.
[Barton had just published his Verses on the Death of P.B. Shelley, a lament for misapplied genius. The club at Pisa referred particularly to Byron, Leigh Hunt, and Trelawney. Trelawney placed three lines from Ariel's song in "The Tempest" on Shelley's monument; but whether Lamb knew this, or his choice of rival lines is a coincidence, I do not know. Trelawney chose the lines:--
Nothing of him that doth fade But doth suffer a sea-change Into something rich and strange.
There is no other record of Lamb's meeting with Shelley, who, by the way, admired Lamb's writings warmly, particularly Mrs. Leicester's School (see the letter to Barton, August 17, 1824).
Byron's Vision of Judgment, a burlesque of Southey's poem of the same name, was printed in The Liberal for 1822.]
294. CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON
India House, 9th October, 1822.
Dear Haydon, Poor Godwin has been turned out of his house and business in Skinner Street, and if he does not pay two years' arrears of rent, he will have the whole stock, furniture, &c., of his new house (in the Strand) seized when term begins. We are trying to raise a subscription for him. My object in writing this is simply to ask you, if this is a kind of case which would be likely to interest Mrs. Coutts in his behalf; and who in your opinion is the best person to speak with her on his behalf. Without the aid of from £300 to £400 by that time, early in November, he must be ruined. You are the only person I can think of, of her acquaintance, and can, perhaps, if not yourself, recommend the person most likely to influence her. Shelley had engaged to clear him of all demands, and he has gone down to the deep insolvent.
Yours truly,
C. LAMB.
Is Sir Walter to be applied to, and by what channel?
[Mrs. Coutts was probably Harriot Mellon, the actress, widow of the banker, Thomas Coutts, and afterwards Duchess of St. Albans. She had played the part of the heroine Melesinda in "Mr. H."]
295. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE
Thursday [Oct. 22], 1822.
"Ali Pacha" will do. I sent my sister the first night, not having been able to go myself, and her report of its effect was most favourable. I saw it last night--the third night--and it was most satisfactorily received. I have been sadly disappointed in Talfourd, who does the critiques in the "Times," and who promised his strenuous services; but by some damn'd arrangement he was sent to the wrong house, and a most iniquitous account of Ali substituted for his, which I am sure would have been a kind one. The "Morning Herald" did it ample justice, without appearing to puff it. It is an abominable misrepresentation of the "Times," that Farren played Ali like Lord Ogilby. He acted infirmity of body, but not of voice or purpose. His manner was even grand. A grand old gentleman. His falling to the earth when his son's death was announced was fine as anything I ever saw. It was as if he had been blasted. Miss Foote looked helpless and beautiful, and greatly helped the piece. It is going on steadily, I am sure, for many nights. Marry, I was a little disappointed with Hassan, who tells us he subsists by cracking court jests before Hali, but he made none. In all the rest, scenery and machinery, it was faultless. I hope it will bring you here. I should be most glad of that. I have a room for you, and you shall order your own dinner three days in the week. I must retain my own authority for the rest. As far as magazines go, I can answer for Talfourd in the "New Monthly." He cannot be put out there. But it is established as a favourite, and can do without these expletives. I long to talk over with you the Shakspeare Picture. My doubts of its being a forgery mainly rest upon the goodness of the picture. The bellows might be trumped up, but where did the painter spring from? Is Ireland a consummate artist--or any of Ireland's accomplices?--but we shall confer upon it, I hope. The "New Times," I understand was favorable to "Ali," but I have not seen it. I am sensible of the want of method in this letter, but I have been deprived of the connecting organ, by a practice I have fallen into since I left Paris, of taking too much strong spirits of a night. I must return to the Hotel de l'Europe and Macon.
How is Kenney? Have you seen my friend White? What is Poole about, &c.? Do not write, but come and answer me.
The weather is charming, and there is a mermaid to be seen in London. You may not have the opportunity of inspecting such a Poisarde once again in ten centuries.
My sister joins me in the hope of seeing you.
Yours truly,
C. LAMB.
[Lamb had met John Howard Payne, the American dramatist, at Kenney's, in France. "Ali Pacha," a melodrama in two acts, was produced at Covent Garden on October 19, 1822. It ran altogether sixteen nights. William Farren played the hero. Lord Ogleby, an antiquated fop, is a character in "The Clandestine Marriage" by Colman and Garrick. Miss Foote played Helena. See notes to the letter above for other references.]
296. CHARLES LAMB TO B.R. HAYDON
Tuesday, 29th [October, 1822].
Dear H., I have written a very respectful letter to Sir W.S. Godwin did not write, because he leaves all to his committee, as I will explain to you. If this rascally weather holds, you will see but one of us on that day.
Yours, with many thanks,
C. LAMB.
297. CHARLES LAMB TO SIR WALTER SCOTT
East India House, London,
29th October 1822.
Dear Sir,--I have to acknowledge your kind attention to my application to Mr. Haydon. I have transmitted your draft to Mr. G[odwin]'s committee as an anonymous contribution through me. Mr. Haydon desires his thanks and best respects to you, but was desirous that I should write to you on this occasion. I cannot pass over your kind expressions as to myself. It is not likely that I shall ever find myself in Scotland, but should the event ever happen, I should be proud to pay my respects to you in your own land. My disparagement of heaths and highlands--if I said any such thing in half earnest,--you must put down as a piece of the old Vulpine policy. I must make the most of the spot I am chained to, and console myself for my flat destiny as well as I am able. I know very well our mole-hills are not mountains, but I must cocker them up and make them look as big and as handsome as I can, that we may both be satisfied. Allow me to express the pleasure I feel on an occasion given me of writing to you, and to subscribe myself, dear sir, your obliged and respectful servant,
CHARLES LAMB.
[See note to the letter to Godwin above. Lamb and Scott never met. Talfourd, however, tells us that "he used to speak with gratitude and pleasure of the circumstances under which he saw him once in Fleet-street. A man, in the dress of a mechanic, stopped him just at Inner Temple-gate, and said, touching his hat, 'I beg your pardon, sir, but perhaps you would like to see Sir Walter Scott; that is he just crossing the road;' and Lamb stammered out his hearty thanks to his truly humane informer."
Mr. Lang has recently discovered that also in 1818 or thereabouts Sir Walter invited Lamb to Abbotsford.]
298. CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS ROBINSON
[Dated at end: Nov. 11, 1822.]
Dear Sir, We have to thank you, or Mrs. Robinson-- for I think her name was on the direction--for the best pig, which myself, the warmest of pig-lovers, ever tasted. The dressing and the sauce were pronounced incomparable by two friends, who had the good fortune to drop in to dinner yesterday, but I must not mix up my cook's praises with my acknowledgments; let me but have leave to say that she and we did your pig justice. I should dilate on the crackling--done to a turn--but I am afraid Mrs. Clarkson, who, I hear, is with you, will set me down as an Epicure. Let it suffice, that you have spoil'd my appetite for boiled mutton for some time to come. Your brother Henry partook of the cold relics--by which he might give a good guess at what it had been hot.
With our thanks, pray convey our kind respects to Mrs. Robinson, and the Lady before mentioned.
Your obliged Ser't
CHARLES LAMB.
India House
11 Nov. 22.
[This letter is addressed to R. Robinson, Esq., Bury, Suffolk, but I think there is no doubt that Thomas Robinson was the recipient.
Thomas Robinson of Bury St. Edmunds was Henry Crabb Robinson's brother. Lamb's "Dissertation on Roast Pig" had been printed in the London Magazine in September, 1822, and this pig was one of the first of many such gifts that came to him.]
299. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE
Wednesday, 13 November, '22.
Dear P.--Owing to the inconvenience of having two lodgings, I did not get your letter quite so soon as I should. The India House is my proper address, where I am sure for the fore part of every day. The instant I got it, I addressed a letter, for Kemble to see, to my friend Henry Robertson, the Treasurer of Covent Garden Theatre. He had a conference with Kemble, and the result is, that Robertson, in the name of the management, recognized to me the full ratifying of your bargain: £250 for Ali, the Slaves, and another piece which they had not received. He assures me the whole will be paid you, or the proportion for the two former, as soon as ever the Treasury will permit it. He offered to write the same to you, if I pleased. He thinks in a month or so they will be able to liquidate it. He is positive no trick could be meant you, as Mr. Planche's alterations, which were trifling, were not at all considered as affecting your bargain. With respect to the copyright of Ali, he was of opinion no money would be given for it, as Ali is quite laid aside. This explanation being given, you would not think of printing the two copies together by way of recrimination. He told me the secret of the two Galley Slaves at Drury Lane. Elliston, if he is informed right, engaged Poole to translate it, but before Poole's translation arrived, finding it coming out at Cov. Gar., he procured copies of two several translations of it in London. So you see here are four translations, reckoning yours. I fear no copyright would be got for it, for anybody may print it and anybody has. Your's has run seven nights, and R. is of opinion it will not exceed in number of nights the nights of Ali,--about thirteen. But your full right to your bargain with the management is in the fullest manner recognized by him officially. He gave me every hope the money will be spared as soon as they can spare it. He said a month or two, but seemed to me to mean about a month. A new lady is coming out in Juliet, to whom they look very confidently for replenishing their treasury. Robertson is a very good fellow and I can rely upon his statement. Should you have any more pieces, and want to get a copyright for them, I am the worst person to negotiate with any bookseller, having been cheated by all I have had to do with (except Taylor and Hessey,--but they do not publish theatrical pieces), and I know not how to go about it, or who to apply to. But if you had no better negotiator, I should know the minimum you expect, for I should not like to make a bargain out of my own head, being (after the Duke of Wellington) the worst of all negotiators. I find from Robertson you have written to Bishop on the subject. Have you named anything of the copyright of the Slaves. R. thinks no publisher would pay for it, and you would not risque it on your own account. This is a mere business letter, so I will just send my love to my little wife at Versailles, to her dear mother, etc.
Believe me, yours truly, C.L.
[Payne's translation of the French play was produced at Covent Garden on November 6, 1822, under the title "The Soldier's Daughter." On the same night appeared a rival version at Drury Lane entitled "Two Galley Slaves." Payne's was played eleven times. The new lady as Juliet was the other Fanny Kelly not Lamb's: Fanny H. Kelly, from Dublin. The revival began on November 14. Planché was James Robinson Planché (1796-1880), the most prolific of librettists. Robert William Elliston, of whom Lamb later wrote so finely, was then managing Drury Lane.
"Having been cheated." Lamb's particular reference was to Baldwin (see the letter to Barton, Jan. 9, 1823).
"The Duke of Wellington." A reference to the Duke's failure in representing England at the Congress of Powers in Vienna and Verona.
Lamb's "dear little wife" was Sophy Kenney.]
300. MARY LAMB TO MRS. JAMES KENNEY
[No date. ?Early December, 1822.]
My dear Friend,--How do you like Harwood? Is he not a noble boy? I congratulate you most heartily on this happy meeting, and only wish I were present to witness it. Come back with Harwood, I am dying to see you--we will talk, that is, you shall talk and I will listen from ten in the morning till twelve at night. My thoughts are often with you, and your children's dear faces are perpetually before me. Give them all one additional kiss every morning for me. Remember there's one for Louisa, one to Ellen, one to Betsy, one to Sophia, one to James, one to Teresa, one to Virginia, and one to Charles. Bless them all! When shall I ever see them again? Thank you a thousand times for all your kindness to me. I know you will make light of the trouble my illness gave you; but the recollection of it often sits heavy on my heart. If I could ensure my health, how happy should I be to spend a month with you every summer!
When I met Mr. Kenney there, I sadly repented that I had not dragged you on to Dieppe with me. What a pleasant time we should have spent there!
You shall not be jealous of Mr. Payne. Remember he did Charles and I good service without grudge or grumbling. Say to him how much I regret that we owe him unreturnable obligations; for I still have my old fear that we shall never see him again. I received great pleasure from seeing his two successful pieces. My love to your boy Kenney, my boy James, and all my dear girls, and also to Rose; I hope she still drinks wine with you. Thank Lou-Lou for her little bit of letter. I am in a fearful hurry, or I would write to her. Tell my friend the Poetess that I expect some French verses from her shortly. I have shewn Betsy's and Sophy's letters to all who came near me, and they have been very much admired. Dear Fanny brought me the bag. Good soul you are to think of me! Manning has promised to make Fanny a visit this morning, happy girl! Miss James I often see, I think never without talking of you. Oh the dear long dreary Boulevards! how I do wish to be just now stepping out of a Cuckoo into them!
Farewel, old tried friend, may we meet again! Would you could bring your house with all its noisy inmates, and plant it, garden, gables and all, in the midst of Covent Garden.
Yours ever most affectionately,
M. LAMB.
My best respects to your good neighbours.
[Harwood was Harwood Holcroft.
"Louisa," etc. Mrs. Kenney's children by her first marriage were Louisa, Ellen, Betsy and Sophia. By her second, with Kenney, the others. Charles was named Charles Lamb Kenney.
"Payne's two successful pieces"--"Ali Pacha" and "The Soldier's Daughter."
Fanny was Fanny Holcroft, Mrs. Kenney's stepdaughter.
Miss Kelly has added to this letter a few words of affection to Mrs. Kenney from "the real old original Fanny Kelly."
Charles Lamb also contributed to this letter a few lines to James Kenney, expressing his readiness to meet Moore the poet. He adds that he made a hit at him as Little in the London Magazine, which though no reason for not meeting him was a reason for not volunteering a visit to him. The reference is to the sonnet to Barry Cornwall in the London Magazine for September, 1820, beginning--
Let hate, or grosser heats, their foulness mask Neath riddling Junius, or in L----e's name.
The second line was altered in Lamb's Album Verses, 1830, to--
Under the vizor of a borrowed name.]
301. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN TAYLOR
[Dated: Dec. 7, 1822.]
Dear Sir,--I should like the enclosed Dedication to be printed, unless you dislike it. I like it. It is in the olden style. But if you object to it, put forth the book as it is. Only pray don't let the Printer mistake the word curt for curst.
C.L.
Dec. 7, 1822.
Dedication
TO THE FRIENDLY AND JUDICIOUS READER,
Who will take these Papers, as they were meant; not understanding every thing perversely in the absolute and literal sense, but giving fair construction as to an after-dinner conversation; allowing for the rashness and necessary incompleteness of first thoughts; and not remembering, for the purpose of an after taunt, words spoken peradventure after the fourth glass. The Author wishes (what he would will for himself) plenty of good friends to stand by him, good books to solace him, prosperous events to all his honest undertakings, and a candid interpretation to his most hasty words and actions. The other sort (and he hopes many of them will purchase his book too) he greets with the curt invitation of Timon, "Uncover, dogs, and lap:" or he dismisses them with the confident security of the philosopher, "you beat but on the case of ELIA."
C.L.
Dec. 7, 1822.
[Elia. Essays which have appeared under that signature in the London Magazine was just about to be published. The book came out with no preface.
"You beat but on the case." When Anaxarchus, the philosopher, was being pounded to death in a mortar, by command of Alexander the Great, he made use of this phrase. After these words, in Canon Ainger's transcript, Lamb remarks:--"On better consideration, pray omit that Dedication. The Essays want no Preface: they are all Preface. A Preface is nothing but a talk with the reader; and they do nothing else. Pray omit it.
"There will be a sort of Preface in the next Magazine, which may act as an advertisement, but not proper for the volume.
"Let ELIA come forth bare as he was born."
The sort of Preface in the next magazine (January, 1823) was the "Character of the Late Elia," used as a preface to the Last Essays in 1833.]
302. CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON
E.I.H. 16 dec. 22.
Dear Wilson
Lightening I was going to call you--
You must have thought me negligent in not answering your letter sooner. But I have a habit of never writing letters, but at the office--'tis so much time cribbed out of the Company--and I am but just got out of the thick of a Tea Sale, in which most of the Entry of Notes, deposits &c. usually falls to my share. Dodwell is willing, but alas! slow. To compare a pile of my notes with his little hillock (which has been as long a building), what is it but to compare Olympus with a mole-hill. Then Wadd is a sad shuffler.--
I have nothing of Defoe's but two or three Novels, and the Plague History. I can give you no information about him. As a slight general character of what I remember of them (for I have not look'd into them latterly) I would say that "in the appearance of truth in all the incidents and conversations that occur in them they exceed any works of fiction I am acquainted with. It is perfect illusion. The Author never appears in these self-narratives (for so they ought to be called or rather Autobiographies) but the narrator chains us down to an implicet belief in every thing he says. There is all the minute detail of a log-book in it. Dates are painfully pressed upon the memory. Facts are repeated over and over in varying phrases, till you cannot chuse but believe them. It is like reading Evidence given in a Court of Justice. So anxious the story-teller seems, that the truth should be clearly comprehended, that when he has told us a matter of fact, or a motive, in a line or two farther down he repeats it with his favorite figure of speech, 'I say' so and so,--though he had made it abundantly plain before. This is in imitation of the common people's way of speaking, or rather of the way in which they are addressed by a master or mistress, who wishes to impress something upon their memories; and has a wonderful effect upon matter-of-fact readers. Indeed it is to such principally that he writes. His style is elsewhere beautiful, but plain & homely. Robinson Crusoe is delightful to all ranks and classes, but it is easy to see that it is written in phraseology peculiarly adapted to the lower conditions of readers: hence it is an especial favorite with seafaring men, poor boys, servant maids &c. His novels are capital kitchen-reading, while they are worthy from their deep interest to find a shelf in the Libraries of the wealthiest, and the most learned. His passion for matter of fact narrative sometimes betrayed him into a long relation of common incidents which might happen to any man, and have no interest but the intense appearance of truth in them, to recommend them. The whole latter half, or two thirds, of Colonel Jack is of this description. The beginning of Colonel Jack is the most affecting natural picture of a young thief that was ever drawn. His losing the stolen money in the hollow of a tree, and finding it again when he was in despair, and then being in equal distress at not knowing how to dispose of it, and several similar touches in the early history of the Colonel, evince a deep knowledge of human nature; and, putting out of question the superior romantic interest of the latter, in my mind very much exceed Crusoe. Roxana (1st Edition) is the next in Interest, though he left out the best part of it**in** subsequent Editions from a foolish hypercriticism of his friend, Southerne. But Moll Flanders, the account of the Plague &c. &c. are all of one family, and have the same stamp of character."--
[At the top of the first page is added:--]
Omitted at the end ... believe me with friendly recollections, Brother (as I used to call you) Yours C. LAMB.
[Below the "Dear Wilson" is added in smaller writing:--]
The review was not mine, nor have I seen it.
[Lamb's friend Walter Wilson was beginning his Memoirs of the Life and Times of Daniel Defoe, 1830. The passage sent to him in this letter by Lamb he printed in Vol. III., page 428. Some years later Lamb sent Wilson a further criticism. See also letter below for the reference to Roxana.
Dodwell we have met. Of Wadd we have no information, except, according to Crabb Robinson's Diary, that he once accidentally discharged a pen full of ink into Lamb's eye and that Lamb wrote this epigram upon him:--
What Wadd knows, God knows, But God knows what Wadd knows.]
303. CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON
[Dated at end: 23 December 1822.]
Dear Sir--I have been so distracted with business and one thing or other, I have not had a quiet quarter of an hour for epistolary purposes. Christmas too is come, which always puts a rattle into my morning scull. It is a visiting unquiet un-Quakerish season. I get more and more in love with solitude, and proportionately hampered with company. I hope you have some holydays at this period. I have one day, Christmas day, alas! too few to commemorate the season. All work and no play dulls me. Company is not play, but many times hard work. To play, is for a man to do what he pleases, or to do nothing--to go about soothing his particular fancies. I have lived to a time of life, to have outlived the good hours, the nine o'Clock suppers, with a bright hour or two to clear up in afterwards. Now you cannot get tea before that hour, and then sit gaping, music-bothered perhaps, till half-past 12 brings up the tray, and what you steal of convivial enjoyment after, is heavily paid for in the disquiet of to-morrow's head.
I am pleased with your liking John Woodvil, and amused with your knowledge of our drama being confined to Shakspeare and Miss Bailly. What a world of fine territory between Land's End and Johnny Grots have you missed traversing. I almost envy you to have so much to read. I feel as if I had read all the Books I want to read. O to forget Fielding, Steele, &c., and read 'em new.
Can you tell me a likely place where I could pick up, cheap, Fox's Journal? There are no Quaker Circulating Libraries? Ellwood, too, I must have. I rather grudge that S[outhe]y has taken up the history of your People. I am afraid he will put in some Levity. I am afraid I am not quite exempt from that fault in certain magazine Articles, where I have introduced mention of them. Were they to do again, I would reform them.
Why should not you write a poetical Account of your old Worthies, deducing them from Fox to Woolman?--but I remember you did talk of something in that kind, as a counterpart to the Ecclesiastical Sketches. But would not a Poem be more consecutive than a string of Sonnets? You have no Martyrs quite to the Fire, I think, among you. But plenty of Heroic Confessors, Spirit-Martyrs--Lamb-Lions.--Think of it.
It would be better than a series of Sonnets on "Eminent Bankers."--I like a hit at our way of life, tho' it does well for me, better than anything short of all one's time to one's self, for which alone I rankle with envy at the rich. Books are good, and Pictures are good, and Money to buy them therefore good, but to buy TIME! in other words, LIFE--
The "compliments of the time to you" should end my letter; to a Friend I suppose I must say the "sincerity of the season;" I hope they both mean the same. With excuses for this hastily penn'd note, believe me with great respect--
C. LAMB.
23 dec. 22.
[Miss Bailly would be Joanna Baillie (1762-1851), author of Plays on the Passions.
The copy of Fox's Journal, 1694, which was lent to Lamb is now in the possession of the Society of Friends. In it is written:
"This copy of George Fox's Journal, being the earliest edition of that work, the property of John T. Shewell of Ipswich, is lent for six months to Charles Lamb, at the request of Sam'l Alexander of Needham, Ipswich, 1st mo. 4 1823." Lamb has added: "Returned by Charles Lamb, within the period, with many thanks to the Lender for the very great satisfaction which he has derived from the perusal of it."
Southey was meditating a Life of George Fox and corresponded with Barton on the subject. He did not write the book.
Barton had a plan to provide Wordsworth's Ecclesiastical Sonnets with a Quaker pendant. He did not carry it out.
Here might come an undated and unpublished letter from Lamb to Basil Montagu, which is of little interest except as referring to Miss James, Mary Lamb's nurse. Lamb says that she was one of four sisters, daughters of a Welsh clergyman, who all became nurses at Mrs. Warburton's, Hoxton, whither, I imagine, Mary Lamb had often retired. Mrs. Parsons, one of the sisters, became Mary Lamb's nurse when, some time after Lamb's death, she moved to 41 Alpha Road, Mrs. Parsons' house. The late John Hollingshead, great-nephew of these ladies, says in his interesting book, My Lifetime, that their father was rector of Beguildy, in Shropshire.]
304. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE
[January, 1823.]
Dear Payne--Your little books are most acceptable. 'Tis a delicate edition. They are gone to the binder's. When they come home I shall have two--the "Camp" and "Patrick's Day"--to read for the first time. I may say three, for I never read the "School for Scandal." "Seen it I have, and in its happier days." With the books Harwood left a truncheon or mathematical instrument, of which we have not yet ascertained the use. It is like a telescope, but unglazed. Or a ruler, but not smooth enough. It opens like a fan, and discovers a frame such as they weave lace upon at Lyons and Chambery. Possibly it is from those parts. I do not value the present the less, for not being quite able to detect its purport. When I can find any one coming your way I have a volume for you, my Elias collected. Tell Poole, his Cockney in the Lon. Mag. tickled me exceedingly. Harwood is to be with us this evening with Fanny, who comes to introduce a literary lady, who wants to see me,--and whose portentous name is Plura, in English "many things." Now, of all God's creatures, I detest letters-affecting, authors-hunting ladies. But Fanny "will have it so." So Miss Many Things and I are to have a conference, of which you shall have the result. I dare say she does not play at whist. Treasurer Robertson, whose coffers are absolutely swelling with pantomimic receipts, called on me yesterday to say he is going to write to you, but if I were also, I might as well say that your last bill is at the Banker's, and will be honored on the instant receipt of the third Piece, which you have stipulated for. If you have any such in readiness, strike while the iron is hot, before the Clown cools. Tell Mrs. Kenney, that the Miss F.H. (or H.F.) Kelly, who has begun so splendidly in Juliet, is the identical little Fanny Kelly who used to play on their green before their great Lying-Inn Lodgings at Bayswater. Her career has stopt short by the injudicious bringing her out in a vile new Tragedy, and for a third character in a stupid old one,--the Earl of Essex. This is Macready's doing, who taught her. Her recitation, &c. (not her voice or person), is masculine. It is so clever, it seemed a male Debut. But cleverness is the bane of Female Tragedy especially. Passions uttered logically, &c. It is bad enough in men-actors. Could you do nothing for little Clara Fisher? Are there no French Pieces with a Child in them? By Pieces I mean here dramas, to prevent male-constructions. Did not the Blue Girl remind you of some of Congreve's women? Angelica or Millamant? To me she was a vision of Genteel Comedy realized. Those kind of people never come to see one. N'import--havn't I Miss Many Things coming? Will you ask Horace Smith to----[The remainder of this letter has been lost.]
[Payne seems to have sent Lamb an edition of Sheridan. "The Camp" and "St. Patrick's Day" are among Sheridan's less known plays.
Poole was writing articles on France in the London Magazine. Lamb refers to "A Cockney's Rural Sports," in the number for December, 1822.
Fanny was Fanny Holcroft. Plura I do not identify.
The new tragedy in which Miss Kelly had to play was probably "The Huguenot," produced December 11, 1822. "The Earl of Essex" was revived December 30, 1822. Macready played in both.
"Cleverness is the bane." See Lamb's little article on "The New Acting" in Vol. I.
The Blue Girl seems to refer to the lady mentioned at the end of the first letter to Payne.
Angelica is in Congreve's "Love for Love"; Millamant in his "Way of the World."]
305. CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
[No date. January, 1823.]
Dear Wordsworth, I beg your acceptance of ELIA, detached from any of its old companions which might have been less agreeable to you. I hope your eyes are better, but if you must spare them, there is nothing in my pages which a Lady may not read aloud without indecorum, which is more than can be said of Shakspeare.
What a nut this last sentence would be for Blackwood!
You will find I availed myself of your suggestion, in curtailing the dissertation on Malvolio.
I have been on the Continent since I saw you.
I have eaten frogs.
I saw Monkhouse tother day, and Mrs. M. being too poorly to admit of company, the annual goosepye was sent to Russell Street, and with its capacity has fed "A hundred head" (not of Aristotle's) but "of Elia's friends."
Mrs. Monkhouse is sadly confined, but chearful.--
This packet is going off, and I have neither time, place nor solitude for a longer Letter.
Will you do me the favor to forward the other volume to Southey?
Mary is perfectly well, and joins me in kindest rememb'ces to you all.
[Signature cut away.]
["What a nut... for Blackwood." To help on Maga's great cause against Cockney arrogance.
"The dissertation on Malvolio." In Elia the essays on the Old Actors were much changed and rearranged (see Appendix to Vol. II. in this edition).]
306. CHARLES LAMB TO MR. AND MRS. J.D. COLLIER
Twelfth Day [January 6], 1823.
THE pig was above my feeble praise. It was a dear pigmy. There was some contention as to who should have the ears, but in spite of his obstinacy (deaf as these little creatures are to advice) I contrived to get at one of them.
It came in boots too, which I took as a favor. Generally those petty toes, pretty toes! are missing. But I suppose he wore them, to look taller.
He must have been the least of his race. His little foots would have gone into the silver slipper. I take him to have been Chinese, and a female.--
If Evelyn could have seen him, he would never have farrowed two such prodigious volumes, seeing how much good can be contained in--how small a compass!
He crackled delicately.
John Collier Jun has sent me a Poem which (without the smallest bias from the aforesaid present, believe me) I pronounce sterling.
I set about Evelyn, and finished the first volume in the course of a natural day. To-day I attack the second--Parts are very interesting.--
I left a blank at top of my letter, not being determined which to address it to, so Farmer and Farmer's wife will please to divide our thanks. May your granaries be full, and your rats empty, and your chickens plump, and your envious neighbors lean, and your labourers busy, and you as idle and as happy as the day is long!
VIVE L'AGRICULTURE!
Frank Field's marriage of course you have seen in the papers, and that his brother Barron is expected home.
How do you make your pigs so little? They are vastly engaging at that age. I was so myself. Now I am a disagreeable old hog-- A middle-aged-gentleman-and-a-half.
My faculties, thank God, are not much impaired. I have my sight, hearing, taste, pretty perfect; and can read the Lord's Prayer in the common type, by the help of a candle, without making many mistakes.
Believe me, while my faculties last, a proper appreciator of your many kindnesses in this way; and that the last lingering relish of past flavors upon my dying memory will be the smack of that little Ear. It was the left ear, which is lucky. Many happy returns (not of the Pig) but of the New Year to both.--
Mary for her share of the Pig and the memoirs desires to send the same--
D'r. M'r. C. and M'rs. C.--
Yours truly
C. LAMB.
[This letter is usually supposed to have been addressed by Lamb to Mr. and Mrs. Bruton of Mackery End. The address is, however, Mrs. Collier, Smallfield Place, East Grinstead, Sussex.
"If Evelyn could have seen him." John Evelyn's Diary had recently been published, in 1818 and 1819, in two large quarto volumes.]
307. CHARLES LAMB TO CHARLES ADERS
[Jan. 8, 1823.]
Dear Sir--We shall have great pleasure in surprising Mrs. Aders on her Birthday--You will perceive how cunningly I have contrived the direction of this note, to evade postage.
Yours truly
C. LAMB.
8 Jan. '23.
[This note is sent to me by Mr. G. Dunlop of Kilmarnock. It is the only note to Aders, a friend of Crabb Robinson, to whose house Lamb often went for talk and whist. Aders had a fine collection of German pictures. See the verses to him in Vol. IV. The cunning in the address consisted apparently in obtaining the signature of an India House colleague to certify that it was "official."]
308. CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON
9 Jan., 1823.
"Throw yourself on the world without any rational plan of support, beyond what the chance employ of Booksellers would afford you"!!!
Throw yourself rather, my dear Sir, from the steep Tarpeian rock, slap-dash headlong upon iron spikes. If you had but five consolatory minutes between the desk and the bed, make much of them, and live a century in them, rather than turn slave to the Booksellers. They are Turks and Tartars, when they have poor Authors at their beck. Hitherto you have been at arm's length from them. Come not within their grasp. I have known many authors for bread, some repining, others envying the blessed security of a Counting House, all agreeing they had rather have been Taylors, Weavers, what not? rather than the things they were. I have known some starved, some to go mad, one clear friend literally dying in a workhouse. You know not what a rapacious, dishonest set those booksellers are. Ask even Southey, who (a single case almost) has made a fortune by book drudgery, what he has found them. O you know not, may you never know! the miseries of subsisting by authorship. 'Tis a pretty appendage to a situation like yours or mine, but a slavery worse than all slavery to be a book-seller's dependent, to drudge your brains for pots of ale and breasts of mutton, to change your free thoughts and voluntary numbers for ungracious TASK-WORK. Those fellows hate us. The reason I take to be, that, contrary to other trades, in which the Master gets all the credit (a Jeweller or Silversmith for instance), and the Journeyman, who really does the fine work, is in the background, in our work the world gives all the credit to Us, whom they consider as their Journeymen, and therefore do they hate us, and cheat us, and oppress us, and would wring the blood of us out, to put another sixpence in their mechanic pouches. I contend, that a Bookseller has a relative honesty towards Authors, not like his honesty to the rest of the world. B[aldwin], who first engag'd me as Elia, has not paid me up yet (nor any of us without repeated mortifying applials), yet how the Knave fawned while I was of service to him! Yet I dare say the fellow is punctual in settling his milk-score, &c. Keep to your Bank, and the Bank will keep you. Trust not to the Public, you may hang, starve, drown yourself, for anything that worthy Personage cares. I bless every star that Providence, not seeing good to make me independent, has seen it next good to settle me upon the stable foundation of Leadenhall. Sit down, good B.B., in the Banking Office; what, is there not from six to Eleven P.M. 6 days in the week, and is there not all Sunday? Fie, what a superfluity of man's time,--if you could think so! Enough for relaxation, mirth, converse, poetry, good thoughts, quiet thoughts. O the corroding torturing tormenting thoughts, that disturb the Brain of the unlucky wight, who must draw upon it for daily sustenance. Henceforth I retract all my fond complaints of mercantile employment, look upon them as Lovers' quarrels. I was but half in earnest. Welcome, dead timber of a desk, that makes me live. A little grumbling is a wholesome medicine for the spleen; but in my inner heart do I approve and embrace this our close but unharassing way of life. I am quite serious. If you can send me Fox, I will not keep it six weeks, and will return it, with warm thanks to yourself and friend, without blot or dog's ear. You much oblige me by this kindness.
Yours truly,
C. LAMB.
Please to direct to me at India Ho. in future. [? I am] not always at Russell St.
[Barton had long been meditating the advisability of giving up his place in the bank at Woodbridge and depending upon his pen. Lamb's letter of dissuasion is not the only one which he received. Byron had written to him in 1812: "You deserve success; but we knew, before Addison wrote his Cato, that desert does not always command it. But suppose it attained--
'You know what ills the author's life assail-- Toil, envy, want, the patron, and the jail.'
Do not renounce writing, but never trust entirely to authorship. If you have a profession, retain it; it will be like Prior's fellowship, a last and sure resource." Barton had now broken again into dissatisfaction with his life. He did not, however, leave the bank.
Southey made no "fortune" by his pen. He almost always had to forestall his new works.]
309. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE
23 January, '23.
Dear Payne--I have no mornings (my day begins at 5 P.M.) to transact business in, or talents for it, so I employ Mary, who has seen Robertson, who says that the Piece which is to be Operafied was sent to you six weeks since by a Mr. Hunter, whose journey has been delayed, but he supposes you have it by this time. On receiving it back properly done, the rest of your dues will be forthcoming. You have received £30 from Harwood, I hope? Bishop was at the theatre when Mary called, and he has put your other piece into C. Kemble's hands (the piece you talk of offering Elliston) and C.K. sent down word that he had not yet had time to read it. So stand your affairs at present. Glossop has got the Murderer. Will you address him on the subject, or shall I--that is, Mary? She says you must write more showable letters about these matters, for, with all our trouble of crossing out this word, and giving a cleaner turn to th' other, and folding down at this part, and squeezing an obnoxious epithet into a corner, she can hardly communicate their contents without offence. What, man, put less gall in your ink, or write me a biting tragedy!
C. LAMB.
[Here should come a letter from Lamb to Ayrton asking him to meet the Burneys and Paynes on Wednesday at half-past four.]
310. CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN HOWARD PAYNE
February [9], 1823.
My dear Miss Lamb--I have enclosed for you Mr. Payne's piece called Grandpapa, which I regret to say is not thought to be of the nature that will suit this theatre; but as there appears to be much merit in it, Mr. Kemble strongly recommends that you should send it to the English Opera House, for which it seems to be excellently adapted. As you have already been kind enough to be our medium of communication with Mr. Payne, I have imposed this trouble upon you; but if you do not like to act for Mr. Payne in the business, and have no means of disposing of the piece, I will forward it to Paris or elsewhere as you think he may prefer.
Very truly yours,
HENRY ROBERTSON.
T.R.C.G., 8 Feb. 1823.
Dear P---- We have just received the above, and want your instructions. It strikes me as a very merry little piece, that should be played by very young actors. It strikes me that Miss Clara Fisher would play the boy exactly. She is just such a forward chit. No young man would do it without its appearing absurd, but in a girl's hands it would have just all the reality that a short dream of an act requires. Then for the sister, if Miss Stevenson that was, were Miss Stevenson and younger, they two would carry it off. I do not know who they have got in that young line, besides Miss C.F., at Drury, nor how you would like Elliston to have it--has he not had it? I am thick with Arnold, but I have always heard that the very slender profits of the English Opera House do not admit of his giving above a trifle, or next to none, for a piece of this kind. Write me what I should do, what you would ask, &c. The music (printed) is returned with the piece, and the French original. Tell Mr. Grattan I thank him for his book, which as far as I have read it is a very companionable one. I have but just received it. It came the same hour with your packet from Cov. Gar., i.e. yester-night late, to my summer residence, where, tell Kenney, the cow is quiet. Love to all at Versailles. Write quickly.
C.L.
I have no acquaintance with Kemble at all, having only met him once or twice; but any information, &c., I can get from R., who is a good fellow, you may command. I am sorry the rogues are so dilitory, but I distinctly believe they mean to fulfill their engagement. I am sorry you are not here to see to these things. I am a poor man of business, but command me to the short extent of my tether. My sister's kind remembrance ever.
C.L.
[The "Grandpapa" was eventually produced at Drury Lane, May 25, 1825, and played thrice. Miss Stevenson was an actress praised by Lamb in The Examiner (see Vol. I. of this edition). C.F. was Clara Fisher, mentioned above.
Samuel James Arnold was manager of the Lyceum, then known as the English Opera House; he was the brother of Mrs. William Ayrton, Lamb's friend.
Mr. Grattan was Thomas Colley Grattan (1792-1864), who was then living in Paris. His book would be Highways and Byways, first series, 1823.
There is one other note to Payne in the Century Magazine, unimportant and undated, suggesting a walk one Sunday.]
311. CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON
[P.M. February 17, 1823.]
My dear Sir--I have read quite through the ponderous folio of G.F. I think Sewell has been judicious in omitting certain parts, as for instance where G.F. has revealed to him the natures of all the creatures in their names, as Adam had. He luckily turns aside from that compendious study of natural history, which might have superseded Buffon, to his proper spiritual pursuits, only just hinting what a philosopher he might have been. The ominous passage is near the beginning of the Book. It is clear he means a physical knowledge, without trope or figure. Also, pretences to miraculous healing and the like are more frequent than I should have suspected from the epitome in Sewell. He is nevertheless a great spiritual man, and I feel very much obliged by your procuring me the Loan of it. How I like the Quaker phrases--though I think they were hardly completed till Woolman. A pretty little manual of Quaker language (with an endeavour to explain them) might be gathered out of his Book. Could not you do it? I have read through G.F. without finding any explanation of the term first volume in the title page. It takes in all, both his life and his death. Are there more Last words of him? Pray, how may I venture to return it to Mr. Shewell at Ipswich? I fear to send such a Treasure by a Stage Coach. Not that I am afraid of the Coachman or the Guard reading it. But it might be lost. Can you put me in a way of sending it in safety? The kind hearted owner trusted it to me for six months. I think I was about as many days in getting through it, and I do not think that I skipt a word of it. I have quoted G.F. in my Quaker's meeting, as having said he was "lifted up in spirit" (which I felt at the time to be not a Quaker phrase), "and the Judge and Jury were as dead men under his feet." I find no such words in his Journal, and I did not get them from Sewell, and the latter sentence I am sure I did not mean to invent. I must have put some other Quaker's words into his mouth. Is it a fatality in me, that every thing I touch turns into a Lye? I once quoted two Lines from a translation of Dante, which Hazlitt very greatly admired, and quoted in a Book as proof of the stupendous power of that poet, but no such lines are to be found in the translation, which has been searched for the purpose. I must have dreamed them, for I am quite certain I did not forge them knowingly. What a misfortune to have a Lying memory.--Yes, I have seen Miss Coleridge, and wish I had just such a--daughter. God love her--to think that she should have had to toil thro' five octavos of that cursed (I forget I write to a Quaker) Abbeypony History, and then to abridge them to 3, and all for £113. At her years, to be doing stupid Jesuits' Latin into English, when she should be reading or writing Romances. Heaven send her Uncle do not breed her up a Quarterly Reviewer!--which reminds me, that he has spoken very respectfully of you in the last number, which is the next thing to having a Review all to one's self. Your description of Mr. Mitford's place makes me long for a pippin and some carraways and a cup of sack in his orchard, when the sweets of the night come in.
Farewell.
C. LAMB.
[In the 1694 folio of George Fox's Journal the revelation of the names of creatures occurs twice, once under Notts in 1647 and again under Mansfield in 1648.
"Sewell." The History of the Rise, Increase and Progress of the Christian People called Quakers, 1722. By William Sewell (1654-1720).
"In my Quaker's meeting"--the Elia essay (see Vol. II.).
"I once quoted two Lines." Possibly, Mr. A.R. Waller suggests to me, the lines:--
Because on earth their names In Fame's eternal volume shine for aye,
quoted by Hazlitt in his Round Table essay "On Posthumous Fame," and again in one of his Edinburgh Review articles. They are presumably based upon the Inferno, Canto IV. (see Haselfoot's translation, second edition, 1899, page 21, lines 74-78). But the "manufacturer" of them must have had Spenser's line in his mind, "On Fame's eternall bead-roll worthie to be fyled" (Faerie Queene, Bk. IV., Canto II., Stanza 32). They have not yet been found in any translation of Dante. This explanation would satisfy Lamb's words "quoted in a book," i.e., The Round Table, published in 1817.
"Miss Coleridge"--Coleridge's daughter Sara, born in 1802, who had been brought up by her uncle, Southey. She had translated Martin Dobrizhoffer's Latin history of the Abipones in order to gain funds for her brother Derwent's college expenses. Her father considered the translation "unsurpassed for pure mother English by anything I have read for a long time." Sara Coleridge married her cousin, Henry Nelson Coleridge, in 1829. She edited her father's works and died in 1852. At the present time she and her mother were visiting the Gillmans.
Mr. Mitford was John Mitford (1781-1859), rector of Benhall, in Suffolk, and editor of old poets. Later he became editor of the Gentleman's Magazine. He was a cousin of Mary Russell Mitford. In the Gentleman's Magazine for May, 1838, is a review of Talfourd's edition of Lamb's Letters, probably from his pen, in which he records a visit to the Lambs in 1827.]
312. CHARLES LAMB TO WALTER WILSON
[Dated at end: February 24, 1823.]
Dear W.--I write that you may not think me neglectful, not that I have any thing to say. In answer to your questions, it was at your house I saw an edition of Roxana, the preface to which stated that the author had left out that part of it which related to Roxana's daughter persisting in imagining herself to be so, in spite of the mother's denial, from certain hints she had picked up, and throwing herself continually in her mother's way (as Savage is said to have done in his, prying in at windows to get a glimpse of her), and that it was by advice of Southern, who objected to the circumstances as being untrue, when the rest of the story was founded on fact; which shows S. to have been a stupid-ish fellow. The incidents so resemble Savage's story, that I taxed Godwin with taking Falconer from his life by Dr. Johnson. You should have the edition (if you have not parted with it), for I saw it never but at your place at the Mews' Gate, nor did I then read it to compare it with my own; only I know the daughter's curiosity is the best part of my Roxana. The prologue you speak of was mine, so named, but not worth much. You ask me for 2 or 3 pages of verse. I have not written so much since you knew me. I am altogether prosaic. May be I may touch off a sonnet in time. I do not prefer Col. Jack to either Rob. Cr. or Roxana. I only spoke of the beginning of it, his childish history. The rest is poor. I do not know anywhere any good character of De Foe besides what you mention. I do not know that Swift mentions him. Pope does. I forget if D'Israeli has. Dunlop I think has nothing of him. He is quite new ground, and scarce known beyond Crusoe. I do not know who wrote Quarll. I never thought of Quarll as having an author. It is a poor imitation; the monkey is the best in it, and his pretty dishes made of shells. Do you know the Paper in the Englishman by Sir Rd. Steele, giving an account of Selkirk? It is admirable, and has all the germs of Crusoe. You must quote it entire. Captain G. Carleton wrote his own Memoirs; they are about Lord Peterborough's campaign in Spain, & a good Book. Puzzelli puzzles me, and I am in a cloud about Donald M'Leod. I never heard of them; so you see, my dear Wilson, what poor assistances I can give in the way of information. I wish your Book out, for I shall like to see any thing about De Foe or from you.
Your old friend,
C. LAMB.
From my and your old compound. 24 Feb. '23.
[With this letter compare the letter on September 9, 1801, to Godwin, and the letter on December 16, 1822, to Wilson.
Defoe's Roxana, first edition, does not, as a matter of fact, contain the episode of the daughter which Lamb so much admired. Later editions have it. Godwin says in his Preface to "Faulkener," 1807, the play to which Lamb wrote a prologue in praise of Defoe (see Vol. IV.), that the only accessible edition of Roxana in which the story of Susannah is fully told is that of 1745.
Richard Savage was considered to be the natural son of the Countess of Macclesfield and Earl Rivers. His mother at first disowned him, but afterwards, when this became impossible, repulsed him. Johnson says in his "Life of Savage," that it was his hero's "practice to walk in the dark evenings for several hours before her door in hopes of seeing her as she might come by accident to the window or cross her apartment with a candle in her hand."
Swift and Defoe were steady enemies, although I do not find that either mentions the other by name. But Swift in The Examiner often had Defoe in mind, and Defoe in one of his political writings refers to Swift, apropos Wood's halfpence, as "the copper farthing author."
Pope referred to Defoe twice in the Dunciad: once as standing high, fearless and unabashed in the pillory, and once, libellously, as the father of Norton, of the Flying Post.
Philip Quarll was the first imitation of Robinson Crusoe. It was published in 1727, purporting to be the narrative of one Dorrington, a merchant, and Quarll's discoverer. The title begins, The Hermit; or, The Unparalleled Sufferings and Surprising Adventures of Mr. Philip Quarll, an Englishman ... Lamb says in his essay on Christ's Hospital that the Blue-Coat boys used to read the book. The authorship of the book is still unknown.
Steele's account of Selkirk is in The Englishman, No. 26, Dec. 1, 1713. Wilson quoted it.
Defoe's fictitious Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton was published in 1728.
I cannot explain Puzzelli or Donald M'Leod. Later Lamb sent Wilson, who seems to have asked for some verse about Defoe, the "Ode to the Treadmill," but Wilson did not use it.
"My old compound." Robinson's Diary (Vol. I., page 333) has this: "The large room in the accountant's office at the East India House is divided into boxes or compartments, in each of which sit six clerks, Charles Lamb himself in one. They are called Compounds. The meaning of the word was asked one day, and Lamb said it was 'a collection of simples.'"]
313. CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON
[Dated at end: March 11, 1823.]
Dear Sir--The approbation of my little book by your sister is very pleasing to me. The Quaker incident did not happen to me, but to Carlisle the surgeon, from whose mouth I have twice heard it, at an interval of ten or twelve years, with little or no variation, and have given it as exactly as I could remember it. The gloss which your sister, or you, have put upon it does not strike me as correct. Carlisle drew no inference from it against the honesty of the Quakers, but only in favour of their surprising coolness--that they should be capable of committing a good joke, with an utter insensibility to its being any jest at all. I have reason to believe in the truth of it, because, as I have said, I heard him repeat it without variation at such an interval. The story loses sadly in print, for Carlisle is the best story teller I ever heard. The idea of the discovery of roasting pigs, I also borrowed, from my friend Manning, and am willing to confess both my plagiarisms.
Should fate ever so order it that you shall be in town with your sister, mine bids me say that she shall have great pleasure in being introduced to her. I think I must give up the cause of the Bank--from nine to nine is galley-slavery, but I hope it is but temporary. Your endeavour at explaining Fox's insight into the natures of animals must fail, as I shall transcribe the passage. It appears to me that he stopt short in time, and was on the brink of falling with his friend Naylor, my favourite.--The book shall be forthcoming whenever your friend can make convenient to call for it.
They have dragged me again into the Magazine, but I feel the spirit of the thing in my own mind quite gone. "Some brains" (I think Ben Jonson says it) "will endure but one skimming." We are about to have an inundation of poetry from the Lakes, Wordsworth and Southey are coming up strong from the North. The she Coleridges have taken flight, to my regret. With Sara's own-made acquisitions, her unaffectedness and no-pretensions are beautiful. You might pass an age with her without suspecting that she knew any thing but her mother's tongue. I don't mean any reflection on Mrs. Coleridge here. I had better have said her vernacular idiom. Poor C. I wish he had a home to receive his daughter in. But he is but as a stranger or a visitor in this world. How did you like Hartley's sonnets? The first, at least, is vastly fine. Lloyd has been in town a day or two on business, and is perfectly well. I am ashamed of the shabby letters I send, but I am by nature anything but neat. Therein my mother bore me no Quaker. I never could seal a letter without dropping the wax on one side, besides scalding my fingers. I never had a seal too of my own. Writing to a great man lately, who is moreover very Heraldic, I borrowed a seal of a friend, who by the female side quarters the Protectorial Arms of Cromwell. How they must have puzzled my correspondent!--My letters are generally charged as double at the Post office, from their inveterate clumsiness of foldure. So you must not take it disrespectful to your self if I send you such ungainly scraps. I think I lose £100 a year at the India House, owing solely to my want of neatness in making up Accounts. How I puzzle 'em out at last is the wonder. I have to do with millions. I?
It is time to have done my incoherences.
Believe me Yours Truly
C. LAMB.
Tuesd 11 Ma 23.
[Lamb had sent Elia to Woodbridge. Bernard Barton's sister was Maria Hack, author of many books for children. The Quaker incident is in the essay "Imperfect Sympathies." Carlisle was Sir Anthony Carlisle.
"Your endeavour at explaining Fox's insight." See letter above. James Nayler (1617?-1660), an early Quaker who permitted his admirers to look upon him as a new Christ. He went to extremes totally foreign to the spirit of the Society. Barton made a paraphrase of Nayler's "Last Testimony."
"They have dragged me again." Lamb had been quite ready to give up Elia with the first essays. "Old China," one of his most charming papers, was in the March London Magazine.
"Some brains ..." I had to give this up in my large edition. I now find that Swift says it, not Ben Jonson. "There is a brain that will endure but one scumming." Preface to Battle of the Books.
"Hartley's sonnets." Four sonnets by Hartley Coleridge were printed in the London Magazine for February, 1823, addressed to R.S. Jameson.
"Writing to a great man lately." This was Sir Walter Scott (see page 626). Barron Field would be the friend with the seal.
Here should come a letter from Lamb to Ayrton saying that there will be cards and cold mutton in Russell St. from 8 to 9 and gin and jokes from 9.30 to 12.]
314. CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON
[P.M. 5 April 1823.]
Dear Sir--You must think me ill mannered not to have replied to your first letter sooner, but I have an ugly habit of aversion from letter writing, which makes me an unworthy correspondent. I have had no spring, or cordial call to the occupation of late. I have been not well lately, which must be my lame excuse. Your poem, which I consider very affecting, found me engaged about a humorous Paper for the London, which I had called a "Letter to an Old Gentleman whose Education had been neglected"--and when it was done Taylor and Hessey would not print it, and it discouraged me from doing any thing else, so I took up Scott, where I had scribbled some petulant remarks, and for a make shift father'd them on Ritson. It is obvious I could not make your Poem a part of them, and as I did not know whether I should ever be able to do to my mind what you suggested, I thought it not fair to keep back the verses for the chance. Mr. Mitford's sonnet I like very well; but as I also have my reasons against interfering at all with the Editorial arrangement of the London, I transmitted it (not in my own hand-writing) to them, who I doubt not will be glad to insert it. What eventual benefit it can be to you (otherwise than that a kind man's wish is a benefit) I cannot conjecture. Your Society are eminently men of Business, and will probably regard you as an idle fellow, possibly disown you, that is to say, if you had put your own name to a sonnet of that sort, but they cannot excommunicate Mr. Mitford, therefore I thoroughly approve of printing the said verses. When I see any Quaker names to the Concert of Antient Music, or as Directors of the British Institution, or bequeathing medals to Oxford for the best classical themes, etc.--then I shall begin to hope they will emancipate you. But what as a Society can they do for you? you would not accept a Commission in the Army, nor they be likely to procure it; Posts in Church or State have they none in their giving; and then if they disown you--think--you must live "a man forbid."
I wishd for you yesterday. I dined in Parnassus, with Wordsworth, Coleridge, Rogers, and Tom Moore--half the Poetry of England constellated and clustered in Gloster Place! It was a delightful Even! Coleridge was in his finest vein of talk, had all the talk, and let 'em talk as evilly as they do of the envy of Poets, I am sure not one there but was content to be nothing but a listener. The Muses were dumb, while Apollo lectured on his and their fine Art. It is a lie that Poets are envious, I have known the best of them, and can speak to it, that they give each other their merits, and are the kindest critics as well as best authors. I am scribbling a muddy epistle with an aking head, for we did not quaff Hippocrene last night. Many, it was Hippocras rather. Pray accept this as a letter in the mean time, and do me the favor to mention my respects to Mr. Mitford, who is so good as to entertain good thoughts of Elia, but don't show this almost impertinent scrawl. I will write more respectfully next time, for believe me, if not in words, in feelings, yours most so.
["Your poem." Barton's poem was entitled "A Poet's Thanks," and was printed in the London Magazine for April, 1823, the same number that contained Lamb's article on Ritson and Scott. It is one of his best poems, an expression of contentment in simplicity. The "Letter to an Old Gentleman," a parody of De Quincey's series of "Letters to a Young Gentleman" in the London Magazine, was not published until January, 1825. Scott was John Scott of Amwell (Barton's predecessor as the Quaker poet), who had written a rather foolish book of prose, Critical Essays on the English Poets. Ritson was Joseph Ritson, the critic and antiquarian. See Vol. I. of the present edition for the essay. Barton seems to have suggested to Lamb that he should write an essay around the poem "A Poet's Thanks." Mitford's sonnet, which was printed in the London Magazine for June, 1823, was addressed commiseratingly to Bernard Barton. It began:--
What to thy broken Spirit can atone, Unhappy victim of the Tyrant's fears;
and continued in the same strain, the point being that Barton was the victim of his Quaker employers, who made him "prisoner at once and slave." Lamb's previous letter shows us that Barton was being worked from nine till nine, and we must suppose also that an objection to his poetical exercises had been lodged or suggested. The matter righted itself in time.
"I dined in Parnassus." This dinner, at Thomas Monkhouse's, No. 34 Gloucester Place, is described both by Moore and by Crabb Robinson, who was present. Moore wrote in his Journal:--
"Dined at Mr. Monkhouse's (a gentleman I had never seen before) on Wordsworth's invitation, who lives there whenever he comes to town. A singular party. Coleridge, Rogers, Wordsworth and wife, Charles Lamb (the hero at present of the London Magazine), and his sister (the poor woman who went mad in a diligence on the way to Paris), and a Mr. Robinson, one of the minora sidera of this constellation of the Lakes; the host himself, a Maecenas of the school, contributing nothing but good dinners and silence. Charles Lamb, a clever fellow, certainly, but full of villainous and abortive puns, which he miscarries of every minute. Some excellent things, however, have come from him."
Lamb told Moore that he had hitherto always felt an antipathy to him, but henceforward should like him.
Crabb Robinson writes:--
"April 4th.--Dined at Monkhouse's. Our party consisted of Wordsworth, Coleridge, Lamb, Moore, and Rogers. Five poets of very unequal worth and most disproportionate popularity, whom the public probably would arrange in the very inverse order, except that it would place Moore above Rogers. During this afternoon, Coleridge alone displayed any of his peculiar talent. He talked much and well. I have not for years seen him in such excellent health and spirits. His subjects metaphysical criticism--Wordsworth he chiefly talked to. Rogers occasionally let fall a remark. Moore seemed conscious of his inferiority. He was very attentive to Coleridge, but seemed to relish Lamb, whom he sat next. L. was in a good frame--kept himself within bounds and was only cheerful at last.... I was at the bottom of the table, where I very ill performed my part.... I walked home late with Lamb."
Many years later Robinson sent to The Athenaeum (June 25, 1853) a further and fuller account of the evening.]