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 CORRESPONDENCE AND WORKS 
 
 OF 
 
 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
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 1 //.
 
 THE COMPLETE 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE AND 
 
 WORKS 
 
 OF 
 
 CHARLES LAMB; 
 
 WITH AN ESSAY ON HIS LIFE AND GENIUS BY 
 
 THOMAS PURNELL, 
 
 AIDED BY THE RECOLLECTIONS OF 
 
 THE AUTHOR'S ADOPTED DAUGHTER. 
 
 Vol. I. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 E. MOXON, SON & CO., i, AMEN CORNER, 
 
 PATERNOSTER ROW.
 
 LONDON 
 SWIFT AND CO., REGENT PRESS, KING STREET, 
 REGENT STREET W.
 
 CONTENTS OF VOL. I. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 On Charles Lamb v 
 
 I. 
 Correspondence with Coleridge I 
 
 II. 
 
 Correspondence with Southey 172 
 
 III. 
 Correspondence with the Wordsworths , . . . 233 
 
 IV. 
 Correspondence with Manning 325 
 
 V. 
 Correspondence with the Hazlitts 415 
 
 VI. 
 
 Correspondence with Bernard Barton 454 
 
 &2
 
 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 Death has ripened the fame of Charles Lamb. 
 Many English writers whose utterances filled the ears 
 of their contemporaries, have failed to exercise upon 
 succeeding generations any appreciable influence. 
 Others, on the contrary, whose voices were scarce 
 loud enough while they lived to be audible, be- 
 come more powerful, more understood, more liked, 
 as they themselves recede in point of time. The 
 author of " Elia" is unquestionably to be ranked in 
 the latter class. His sweet tones and witching style 
 are daily becoming more loved ; his meagre figure is 
 gradually growing in its proportions ; the rolling 
 years are widening the area of his renown. 
 
 Lamb comes before us as poet, dramatist, critic, 
 letter-writer, and essayist. His first appearance as 
 an author was in the poetic character, in the year 
 1797, when, conjointly with Coleridge and Charles 
 Lloyd, he issued his sonnets and some specimens 
 of blank verse in a little volume printed at Bristol. 
 Coleridge was editor, and to him Lamb frequently 
 wrote during the progress of the printing. Although 
 obviously anxious as to the success of his first
 
 VI CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 venture he does not seem to have set high value 
 on his blank verse. " As to my blank verse," he 
 says, " I am so dismally slow and sterile of ideas, 
 (I speak from my heart,) that I much question if 
 it will ever come to any issue. I have hitherto 
 only hammered out a few independent, unconnected 
 snatches not in a capacity to be sent." The sonnets 
 he prized more dearly; and in his correspondence 
 with Coleridge, who was curtailing and adding to 
 them, he complains sadly of editorial alterations. 
 " I love my sonnets," he writes, " because they are 
 the reflected images of my own feelings at different 
 times. I charge you, Coleridge, spare my ewe lambs; 
 and though a gentleman may borrow six lines in an 
 epic poem, still, in a sonnet, a personal poem, I do 
 not, ' ask my friend the aiding verse.' When my 
 blank verse is finished, or any long fancy poems, 
 propino tibi alterandum , cut-up -andum, abrigandum, 
 just what you will with it ; but spare my ewe lambs ! " 
 The volume appeared ; but the contributions of 
 Lamb excited little attention. Those who at that 
 time were powerful in the press did not much 
 relish the things ; and criticism generally, unprinted 
 as well as printed, was not very favourable. Nor, 
 indeed, is this neglect to be wondered at or con- 
 demned. Lamb, though highly poetic in tempera- 
 ment, did not possess the vision and faculty divine. 
 Were it not that the enumeration would imply 
 dearth of choice, I would mention the " Farewell to 
 Tobaccn." "The Old Familiar Faces," flecked
 
 CHARLES LAMB. Vll 
 
 throughout by a tone of deepest pathos, and 
 " Hester," as those alone of his poems which give 
 complete satisfaction to the critic, and deserve the 
 praises they have received from readers of widely 
 different tastes. One must hesitate to name others. 
 Lamb's verse pleases less by its specifically poetic 
 merits, than because of the beauty and human value 
 of the sentiment, and the delicacy of the expression 
 in which it is disclosed. 
 
 His dramas have fewer admirers than his poems. 
 In the tragedy of " John Woodvil " there are passages 
 effectively dramatic and full of poetic vigour. But it 
 wants that interest tc be derived only from intense 
 dramatic insight. It was never acted, and probably 
 
 never will be. " Mr. H " was acted, and damned 
 
 on its first representation. Lamb himself hissed 
 most vigorously ; and it must be admitted the farce 
 deserved its fate. The remaining dramatic pieces 
 have the faults inseparable from the compositions of 
 an author to whom set form is an impediment. 
 
 As a critic, whether he casually expresses his 
 opinion or deliberately sets himself to the task, Lamb 
 holds high rank. By nature he lacked one of the 
 cardinal gifts of a critic — an absolute freedom from 
 bias. The very qualities which make him so 
 delightful as a writer interfered with his success 
 in giving judgment. He had prejudices and prepos- 
 sessions innumerable, and occasionally he would 
 allow himself to be captivated and led away by some 
 unimportant fact or latent notion that struck him as
 
 Vlll CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 he wrote. But when his prepossessions concurred 
 with the reality, as they usually did, he was an 
 eloquent and unerring guide. His opinions of the 
 old dramatists, his views of art, as manifested in 
 his manly utterance in favour of Hogarth, that 
 Swift among artists, his judgments concerning books, 
 men, morals, and society, show that he was capable 
 of the most subtle analysis, and had the skill and 
 insight of a supreme critic. 
 
 It is, however, in the Essays and in the Corre- 
 spondence maintained by Lamb with his contem- 
 poraries that we must look for the rich ripe fruit of 
 his nature. Therein are reflected the truest features 
 of his mind. Lines, wrinkles, moles are all veracious. 
 Both in the Letters and the Essays it was the heart 
 and not the head of the writer that dictated the 
 words. His sincerity is of the most absolute kind. 
 Other writers — notably Howell and Montaigne — have 
 bared themselves before us, but each of these 
 coloured his picture with foreign pigment. Montaigne 
 indited his Essays in undress; his confessions are 
 among the most delightful in literature ; what he said 
 of himself and his contemporaries is true and in- 
 valuable. But in Seigneur de Montaigne the man of 
 rank is discernible. He never lifted his eye from the 
 page but it fell upon the Order of St. Michael ; and 
 in the Letters of Howell we are too frequently re- 
 minded of the worldly wisdom and manifold experience 
 of the man who had seen foreign countries and mixed 
 in affairs. Even Rousseau, that grand master of frank
 
 CHARLES LAMB. IX 
 
 confessors, who is supposed to have laid bare the inner 
 workings of his soul more fully than any other, con- 
 ceals from us, I imagine, much that it is requisite we 
 should have before us when pronouncing upon the 
 truth of the likeness. There were dark places in his 
 moral nature which he tried to hide from himself, and 
 the Rousseau of the "Confessions," is the man he 
 wished himself to be thought, and not the man 
 he was. Lamb in his writings photographed his 
 feelings and experiences. He could afford to 
 exhibit himself in his real character. In the 
 revelations he makes precise fact must not, how- 
 ever, be looked for. He belonged to that order 
 of intellects which in its constitution is essentially 
 anti-Caledonian. He does not pretend to speak always 
 as- if he were upon oath, "but must be under- 
 stood, speaking or writing, with some abatement." 
 " Bridget " with him may stand for Mary ; " Blakes- 
 
 moor in H shire," for Gilston in Hertfordshire ; 
 
 the Confessions of a Drunkard must be taken "with 
 a difference." But substantially his candour is so 
 great that what he says of himself and of others may 
 be accepted as correct in essence. He hints at this 
 in the Essay on the South-Sea House, in which he 
 gives a pleasant series of sketches of his quondam 
 colleagues in that establishment. " Peradventure," 
 he concludes, " the very names which I have sum- 
 moned up before thee are fantastic, unsubstantial. 
 Be satisfied that something answering to them has 
 had a being." And to every sketch he penned
 
 X CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 "something answering" had a real being. Occa- 
 sionally he was the deliberate father of "lie-children," 
 such as the " Biographical Memoir of Mr. Liston," 
 which he confessed was " from top to toe, every 
 paragragh, pure invention ;" but this was designed 
 as a hoax — never intended to pass current as fact — 
 and Lamb was justified in priding himself upon the 
 success of his joke, and the republication of the yarn 
 in the newspapers and in the playbills of the night 
 as authentic biography. But, with the exception of 
 such obvious mystifications as this, what he wrote 
 was biographically or historically true. Time, place, 
 degree may be exaggerated, or altered, or represented 
 in a Lambian sense — the main features of the fact 
 recorded are faithful. 
 
 These Essays and the Correspondence are the 
 genuine outcome of a life, and there is little occasion to 
 go beyond them for a true portrait of the writer. Yet 
 to understand their full significance and origin some 
 reference must be made to outside biographical data. 
 
 Lamb's career is one of the most melancholy in 
 literary history. The elements of tragic interest 
 abound in it. His misfortunes were not the mis- 
 fortunes that are too common in the life of a man of 
 letters. Pecuniary embarrassments were never very 
 pressing in his case ; the dread of an indigent old 
 age, or fear of the daily increasing wants of the 
 body remaining unsatisfied never oppressed him ; 
 but there was something deeper and beyond all this. 
 His affliction was of irreparable nature — irreparable
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XI 
 
 even had all terrestrial powers conspired to remedy it. 
 The catastrophe of his life had unusual location. 
 It occurred at the beginning of his career. There 
 was no preparatory signal ; the dark cloud of fate 
 that had brooded over his early years gathered 
 with impetuous force and burst with sudden fury. 
 Something inexpiable happened in the springtime 
 of his life by which energy would, in the case of most 
 men, have been checked, and natural enterprise 
 repressed. His faculties developed under conditions 
 seldom endured. His march through life was a 
 *' Dead March in Saul." 
 
 Lamb was admitted to Christ's Hospital, in October, 
 1782. He was then in the eighth year of his age, hav- 
 ing been born at Crown Office Row, in the Temple, in 
 the month of February, 1775. With what precise view 
 he was entered at the institution, does not appear. 
 A boy so bashful and timid, so reserved in his 
 manner, so slightly equipped by nature for taking a 
 place, or holding his own in the factions and conten- 
 tions of six hundred school-fellows, had seldom 
 donned the blue coat and yellow hose prescribed by the 
 royal founder. Yet the agreeable disposition of the lad 
 preserved him from the perils of the playground and 
 the fiercer perils of the dormitory. " I never heard 
 his name mentioned," said one of his contemporaries, 
 " without the addition of Charles, although as there 
 was no other boy of the name of Lamb, the addition 
 was unnecessary; but there was an implied kindness 
 in it, and it was proof that his gentle manners
 
 Xll CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 excited that kindness." Lamb's associations in 
 childhood had not been of a refining character. 
 His father was attendant upon a Bencher of the 
 Inner Temple, named Salt. " He was at once his 
 clerk, his good servant, his dresser, his friend, his 
 1 flapper,' his guide, stopwatch, auditor, treasurer," 
 writes the son, describing in after years the old 
 Benchers, who, to his childish eyes, made up the 
 mythology of the Temple. Nor were the circum- 
 stances of the family such as to make him greatly 
 lament his absence from home. The forlorn estate 
 of the country boy far from his friends and connec- 
 tions, was never his. In the " Recollections of 
 Christ's Hospital," he passes a magnificent eulogy 
 on the old school, and it is probable that the years 
 he spent among its cloisters, were his happiest. 
 Acquaintanceships he formed among his school- 
 fellows thereafter ripened into friendships, and friend- 
 ships ripened into love. Beyond a fair education, he 
 derived no direct benefit from his connection with 
 the institution. He stammered dreadfully, and so 
 was prevented from gaining an Exhibition in the 
 University and taking Orders, had he been disposed ; 
 his delicate health was an effectual hindrance to his 
 becoming a soldier or a sailor ; for the pursuits of trade 
 he was wholly unsuited. What was he to do ? His 
 brother, several years his senior, occupied a good 
 position as clerk in the South-Sea House, and thither, 
 upon leaving school in 1789, without having tasted 
 the " sweet food of academic institution," Charles
 
 CHARLES LAMB. Xlll 
 
 followed. Afterwards, he received an appointment 
 in the East India House, and for thirty-three years, 
 till the lad of seventeen gradually changed into 
 the man of fifty, he remained at his clerk's desk 
 in Leadenhall Street. More than one writer has 
 described Lamb as engaged in uncongenial toil, 
 and laments that he had not obtained employment 
 more congruous with his nature. He himself in 
 letters frequently complained of his lot, of the dis- 
 quietude and distraction he suffered, of the length of 
 time he was engaged at his duties, and of the weari- 
 ness he often felt upon returning home at nights. 
 I have no doubt, however, that the enforced regularity 
 of attendance and the close application to his duties, 
 were beneficial to him physically and intellectually. 
 A settled income was indispensable to his happiness, 
 and steady work abstracted his mind from gloomy 
 thoughts. His habits were desultory, and had 
 he to depend upon precarious employment for his 
 livelihood, he would have earned but a scant income. 
 The early years he spent over his desk were not all 
 devoted to wearisome labour ; and the rigours of 
 attendance at the office were light, in comparison 
 with those of the family circle. His father was in 
 his dotage ; his mother was bedridden, and completely 
 helpless ; the sister, who endeavoured to add to their 
 slender means by needlework, was subject to nervous 
 illnesses ; and an aunt who lived with them was so 
 infirm as to require continual attention. Here is a 
 family picture. " I am got home at last," writes
 
 XIV CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 Charles ; " and, after repeated games at cribbage, 
 have got my father's leave to write awhile ; with 
 difficulty got it, for when I expostulated about playing 
 any more he very aptly replied, ' If you won't play 
 with me, you might as well not come home at all.' 
 The argument was unanswerable, and I set to afresh." 
 He could not enjoy a meal in peace, or ever feel 
 himself justified in leaving home. " I go nowhere, and 
 have no acquaintance. Slow of speech and reserved of 
 manners, no one seeks or cares for my society ; and 
 I am left alone." This was in Midsummer, 1796. 
 His life had, however, been somewhat diversified. 
 " The six weeks that finished last year and began 
 this," he says: " your very humble servant spent very 
 agreeably in a madhouse, at Hoxton." But he 
 manfully conformed to his situation, and, with youth 
 and hope, anticipated happier days in the future. 
 Poetry was a solace to him. He was in constant 
 communication with his old school-fellow Coleridge, 
 and discussed literary matters personally and by 
 letter with that poet and ex-dragoon. He had him- 
 self visions of poetic fame, and was looking forward 
 to the publication of the volume in which contributions 
 of his own would appear conjointly with those of his 
 earliest friend. Besides, was he not thrall to the 
 
 fair hair and fairer eyes of Alice W n ? absorbed 
 
 in the first raptures of the tender passion ? In those 
 days Beaumont and Fletcher were of more concern 
 to him than ledgers and day-books, and Islington 
 and the fair-haired one displaced in his young
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XV 
 
 imagination Leadenhall and Indigo lists. He was 
 a poet ; he was in love : to what more desirable state 
 could one attain even in one's goldenest years ? But 
 there came a moment when the currents of his life 
 retreated to their source ; when his love had to be 
 sacrificed; when poetry itself must be abandoned. 
 He has described the occasion. The scene was 
 a house in Little Queen Street, Lincoln's-Inn Fields, 
 where the afflicted family resided. The story may 
 be told in a word. On September the 23rd, 1796, 
 Mary Lamb, seized with sudden frenzy of mad- 
 ness, slightly wounded her father, nearly killed her 
 aunt, and stabbed her mother to the heart. " I was 
 at hand only time enough to snatch the knife out of 
 her grasp," writes the distracted brother. After this 
 terrible tragedy, Lamb felt he had something more 
 to do than to regret. " Mention nothing of poetry;" 
 he writes to Coleridge, from whom he is requesting 
 ' as religious a letter as possible.' " I have destroyed 
 every vestige of past vanities of that kind. With 
 me the former things are passed away, and I have 
 something more to do than to feel. God Almighty 
 have us all in his keeping." The event did not 
 jaundice his heart. Even on the dreadful day he 
 preserved a tranquillity, which he feared bystanders 
 may have construed into "a tranquillity not of 
 despair." After the coroner's jury had returned their 
 verdict of lunacy, it was thought the elder brother, 
 John, who had taken his ease in the world, and 
 was a portly, selfish citizen, would insist upon
 
 XVI CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 Mary being sent to Bethlem. So short was the 
 father's memory of events, that while the inquest wa? 
 sitting he, with his head plaistered over from a wound 
 he had received, was playing at cards as if nothing had 
 happened. But Charles would rather have burned 
 than suffered her removal thither. He took charge 
 of his sister for ever. In a short time Mary was 
 temporarily restored to her senses ; but there was 
 always expectation of recurring evil, and as a hero did 
 the brother bear himself under the inevitable. Truly 
 he had something more to do than to feel. Day by 
 day, till he had accomplished the tale of three and 
 thirty years, he marched to the desk in Leadenhall. 
 Day by day, till the youth of twenty had become a man 
 of fifty, did that short, spare form, with the large head 
 and sweet and gentle expression of countenance, 
 emerge from his house at Colebrook Cottage, Isling- 
 ton, or the Temple, or Russell Street, Covent Garden, 
 and thread his way along the streets and alleys he 
 well knew and loved, to place himself in the irksome 
 confinement of a counting-house. At last deliver- 
 ance came. On April the 6th, 1825, he sent the 
 good news to Wordsworth. " Here am I then, after 
 thirty-three years' slavery, sitting in my own room 
 at eleven o'clock, the finest of all April mornings, a 
 freed man, with £441 a year for the remainder of my 
 life. I came home for ever on Tuesday, in last 
 week. It was like passing from life into eternity." 
 Freedom and life thenceforward were co-existent. 
 In 1834 he lived at Edmonton, having migrated thither
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XVli 
 
 from Enfield to be under the same roof with his 
 sister, whose fits of insanity encroached yearly, and 
 made formal restraint advisable. " It was necessary 
 she should no ' longer be fluttered with continued 
 removals," says the brother; "so I have come to 
 live with her, at a Mr. Walden's, and his wife, who 
 take in patients, and have arranged to lodge and 
 board us only. They have had the care of her 
 before. I see little of her : alas ! I too often hear 
 her." And there, under the same roof with his sister, 
 he died, true to the responsibility he had volun- 
 tarily assumed eight-and-thirty years before. Always 
 a great pedestrian, he used to make little excur- 
 sions in the neighbourhood. One afternoon, while 
 taking his usual walk, his foot slipped, and he fell. 
 Erysipelas set in, and two days afterwards, the gentle 
 Elia joined the majority. It was on the 27th of 
 December, 1834. 
 
 It were easy to accumulate biographical details 
 which have been left us by his friends ; but it would 
 be only repainting the faithful and characteristic por- 
 trait he has himself drawn. Lamb's history is to be 
 read in his writings. What he liked, whom he 
 liked, who were his friends, what were his opinions, 
 prejudices, feelings, tastes, joys and sorrows — the 
 whole inner man is as distinctly revealed to us as it is 
 possible for it to be. No one is able adequately to 
 sound the depths of his own soul ; much less can 
 another. But the sketch of Elia, by Elia himself, 
 is as true and impartial as if it had been the pro- 
 
 c
 
 XV111 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 duction of the most observing and independent 
 spectator. He has placed in the hands of the world 
 an accurate key to his own character. Lamb was not 
 a whole man. He was a strange compound of two 
 opposite qualities. In him were blended the weak- 
 nesses of a boy with the full strength of an adult. 
 He was a man before his time — head of a household, 
 guardian of a family ; and yet was one of those who 
 are always young, who do no not lose the feelings of 
 youth with the advent of grey hairs. He has most aptly 
 described himself in a word: he was a "boy-man." 
 This singular union of childishness and judgment, of 
 simplicity and sound intelligence, forms the foundation 
 of his character. Throughout his life jests and 
 boyish freaks alternated with the sedate wisdom of 
 age. He would write a letter one line in black ink 
 and the other in red. " I think it pretty and motley," 
 he says. In conversation he would suddenly diverge 
 from the subject in hand and startle his audience 
 with unexpected paradox. At a funeral he would 
 make a pun, " to the consternation of the rest of the 
 mourners." This habit, exhibited in his life as well 
 as in his writings, was not due, as has been sur- 
 mised, to any madness in his blood, but was simply 
 the growth of that peculiar nature which he possessed 
 in common with other humorists, notably with the 
 greatest of them, Sterne. When his tears changed 
 into laughter, when from some solemn sentiment he 
 suddenly broke out into a sly sally of wit, it was only 
 his youthful nature asserting itself over his serious
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XIX 
 
 manhood. His moods too suddenly alternated ; he was 
 not more mad, except on the occasion to which refer- 
 ence has been made, than a man is under the influ- 
 ence of liquor because, years ago, he was fined five 
 shilling's for being drunk. Even Mary Lamb, in 
 whom the hereditary taint was fully pronounced, was 
 free from all eccentricity of madness, except during 
 well-defined and clearly-anticipated periods. In ordi- 
 nary times she was, according to Hazlitt, the wisest 
 and most rational woman he had ever known ; and 
 Charles was her superior. With all his incongruities, 
 and strange humours, I cannot help regarding his 
 character as complete — complete, not because made 
 up of similars, or because identical in its parts, but 
 because its incongruous parts had equivalents in his 
 mind. The character of many a man is at variance 
 with his intellect. The one is below or above the 
 other. The opinions he professes or the position he 
 occupies is discordant with his nature. He is at 
 war with himself. Charles Lamb was always him- 
 self — and he is himself in his writings. 
 
 In forming an estimate of Lamb and his works 
 there are two essential features in his character to be 
 noticed. In the first place, his love for London was 
 intense. Wordsworth and Southey preferred the 
 Lake country and its solitudes. To Coleridge it was 
 immaterial where he lived ; a tent in the desert or a 
 garret in Pekin would have pleased him indifferently. 
 Le Grice could settle in Cornwall. A library any- 
 where would have supplied the needs of George 
 
 C 2
 
 XX CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 Dyer. Barron Field was ready to become one of our 
 antipodes. London was the only place for Lamb. 
 He had been to the West of England ; he had visited 
 the Westmoreland Fells — his highest Alps ; he had 
 travelled as far as Paris. But he did not much care if 
 he never saw a mountain. He had no attachment for 
 groves and valleys; the scenery of the " Salutation" 
 Tavern was more agreeable to him than the view 
 from any mountain. London was his cherishing 
 mother. " The lighted shops of the Strand and Fleet 
 Street ; the innumerable trades, tradesmen, and cus- 
 tomers, coaches, waggons, play-houses ; all the 
 bustle and wickedness round about Covent Garden ; 
 the very women of the town ; the watchmen, drunken 
 scenes, rattles ; life awake, if you awake, at all hours 
 of the night ; the impossibility of being dull in Fleet 
 Street ; the crowds, the very dirt and mud, the sun 
 shining upon houses and pavements, the print shops, 
 the old book stalls, parsons cheapening books, coffee- 
 houses, steams of soups from kitchens, the panto- 
 mimes — London itself a pantomime and a masque- 
 rade " — all these things, he confessed, worked them- 
 selves into his mind, and fed him, without a power 
 of satiating him. He was a true town-man with 
 town tastes. Only just before his death, upon remov- 
 ing from Enfield to Edmonton, he rejoiced that he 
 was three or four miles nearer London, and had am- 
 bition yet to be a Londoner. He would live in 
 London " shirtless, bookless." To him the town was 
 an appreciable entity.
 
 CHARLES LAMB. Xxi 
 
 His love for the past was equal to his love for 
 London. Although intellectually and politically on 
 the other side, he was essentially a Tory of the 
 Tories in feeling. He was always yearning for the 
 things that had vanished and the old familiar faces that 
 were no more. One of the noblest passages he ever 
 wrote is the literary expression of this feeling, and I 
 cannot refrain from quoting it, as well for the excel- 
 lence of the style as in illustration of the fact. 1 
 
 " New Year's Eve," too, the most charming and 
 characteristic of his essays, is full of touching in- 
 stances. All, indeed, we love in his work is permeated 
 by this feeling. His set work — the plays, even the 
 sonnets— being of a personal, " occasional " nature, 
 bears no traces of it, and, consequently, left little 
 mark on the world. The charming essays, by which 
 he raised himself into popularity, and will retain en- 
 during fame, are altogether founded on it. 
 
 What we most value in the literary legacy left to 
 us by Lamb is due to this sentiment. When the 
 
 1 "Antiquity! Thou wondrous charm, what art thou ? that, being 
 nothing, art everything ! When thou inert, thou wert not antiquity — 
 then thou wert nothing, but hadst a remoter antiquity, as thou 
 calledst it, to look back to with blind veneration ; thou thyself being 
 to thyself flat, jejune, modern ! What mystery lurks in this retrover- 
 sion ? or what half Januses are we, that cannot look forward with the 
 same idolatry with which we for ever revert ! The mighty future is 
 as nothing, being everything ! the past is everything, being nothing ! 
 
 "What were thy dark ages? Surely the sun rose as brightly then 
 as now, and man got him to his work in the morning? Why is it 
 we can never hear mention of them without an accompanying feeling, 
 as though a palpable obscure had dimmed the face of things, and that 
 our ancestors wandered to and fro groping!"
 
 XX11 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 first of the Essays appeared in the pages of the 
 " London Magazine" his character had been formed; 
 he had passed the prime of his life ; he had had 
 manifold experience of men. Happily in the name of 
 Eliahe painted his native qualities as they were. At 
 one time he regretted that the well-known signature 
 was retained, since it prevented him breaking new 
 ground and trying another manner. But fortunately 
 it was continued, and we profit. Instead of Essays 
 that depend for their success on the imagination or 
 invention of the author, they are reflections of his 
 own nature. What life had made him he appears 
 before us, undisguised. The sensibility which lay at 
 the root of his being is everywhere visible. He was 
 haunted by vanished forms, and old tones for ever 
 lingered in his ears. To-morrow he dreaded, and 
 loved only yesterday. He could not let the dead 
 bury their dead. He delighted in retrospective and 
 not prospective fancies. He would scarce have had 
 any of the untoward accidents and events of his life 
 reversed, and would fain lay ineffectual finger upon 
 the spoke of the great wheel. A new state of being 
 staggered him. Any alteration, in diet or in lodging, 
 puzzled and discomposed him. " My household gods," 
 he says, "plant a terrible fixed foot, and are not 
 rooted up without blood." He was constantly 
 lamenting those who in the walk of life dropped from 
 his side. Dreading mortality himself, the death of a 
 friend was irreparable. And not only men but things 
 were valued from association. He deplored the loss of
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XX111 
 
 the ornamental fountains in the metropolis, and was 
 melancholy over the little winged boys that, when he 
 was a child, used to play their virgin fancies, " spout- 
 ing out ever fresh streams from their innocent 
 wanton lips" in the square of Lincoln's Inn. This 
 love for the old familiar faces is, indeed, the source of 
 his humour and pathos. He loved antique works, 
 and his style is antique ; he loved the things and 
 persons of former days, and his writings are a record 
 of his experiences. 
 
 His religion conformed with his idiosyncracy. 
 Dogmas and forms he disregarded. He was " not 
 quite a churchman," but affected to believe himself 
 a Unitarian ; and when some one (was it not George 
 Dyer ?) sent him a tract with the design of con- 
 verting him to Unitarianism, he says : " Dear, 
 blundering soul ! why I am as old a one-Godite as 
 himself." Whatever might have been his professed 
 creed, or no-creed, his practical religion was of the 
 true sort. The humble and meek never claimed his 
 sympathy or assistance in vain. He half liked a 
 fool, and avowed he never made an acquaintance 
 that lasted, or a friendship that answered, with any 
 that had not some tincture of the absurd in their 
 characters. " He who hath not a dram of folly 
 in his mixture, hath pounds of much worse matter 
 in his composition," is an axiom with him. He had 
 more yearnings towards the simple architect spoken 
 of in the Parable, who built his house upon the sand, 
 than f6r his more cautious neighbour. He grudged
 
 XXIV CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 at the hard censure pronounced upon the quiet soul 
 who hid his talent. It was the simplicity of the foolish 
 virgins, and not the more provident and " somewhat 
 unfeminine wariness " of their bepraised competitors, 
 which obtained his sympathy. His charity was so 
 great that he would not pronounce the case of Judas 
 to be desperate. 
 
 Lamb was undoubtedly a Bohemian. I once heard 
 a well-known wit dogmatically declare that no man 
 should be a Bohemian after thirty ; but his saying 
 was capped by one of the company, who maintained 
 that some men are never thirty. In this sense 
 Charles Lamb was never thirty. By nature and 
 habit he was convivial. Odd in his ways, odd in his 
 opinions, odd in his conversation, he would not adapt 
 himself to the usages and observances of fashionable 
 life. He was from home with formal and conven- 
 tional people. The friends he most cherished were 
 men who had some individuality of character. At 
 his Wednesday evening parties the new visitor 
 would look in vain for persons of title or of worldly 
 importance. Needy men, or authors, or old friends 
 who had no name or pretensions he liked best. Just 
 as he preferred tattered books, so also he preferred 
 tattered friends — men of not prosperous fortunes or 
 who had failed to realize in life their early ambitious 
 hopes. With them he was at ease, said his highest 
 things, and, it must be added, took practical liberties — 
 such as when he sent George Dyer to Primrose Hill 
 to see the Persian Ambassador perform his orisons
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XXV 
 
 at sunrise. For this odd regiment he had affection ; 
 and if he had often travelled over their minds, so much 
 the more did he enjoy a renewed journey ; for to 
 him there was a special pleasure in identifying the 
 noted spots and familiar objects he had seen before. 
 Philistines he shrunk from. And yet he was as 
 prudent as if he had occupied apartments in the 
 Fifth Avenue of Ascalon Street, Gath. Of the two 
 distinct races of men into which he divides our 
 species, he belonged to those who lend. The " care- 
 less, even deportment " of a borrower he could never 
 assume with grace. For him there was no Candle- 
 mas or Feast of Holy Michael. He had no tributaries, 
 no feeders of his exchequer, no gentlemen his good 
 friends to whom he was beholden for a loan. He 
 was not of the great race, but belonged to the inferior 
 order of men. It must not, however, be supposed 
 he was rich. He once tried to increase his income 
 by writing lottery puffs, but his attempts being pro- 
 nounced as " done in too severe and terse a style," 
 did not bring money. To Coleridge he apostrophises 
 the root of all evil in these words: " O money, money, 
 how blindly thou hast been worshipped, and how 
 stupidly abused ! Thou art health and liberty and 
 strength ; and he that has thee may rattle his pockets 
 at the Devil." And, by the practice of economy, he 
 had always enough — if not to rattle at the Devil — to 
 suit his occasions. There never was a time when 
 he could not afford himself the pleasure of pur- 
 chasing some rare volume or first edition upon which
 
 XXVI CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 he had set his heart. His friends benefited by his 
 frugal habits. This volume opens with a letter to 
 Coleridge in which the very first words are an assur- 
 ance of his good offices. " Make yourself easy about 
 May," says the writer, " I paid his bill when I sent 
 your clothes. I was flush of money, and am so still 
 to all the purposes of a single life ; so give yourself 
 no further concern about it." He allowed a Mrs. 
 Reynolds, his schoolmistress, a pension which she 
 enjoyed till his death. He was continually pressing 
 timely assistance upon those of his acquaintances 
 who he thought required money. Barry Corn- 
 wall relates how gracefully he would offer a loan — 
 making its acceptance almost a favour to himself — 
 and many of his friends could have written in a 
 similar strain of his kindness. Speaking of himself 
 as of another, he tells us that with his intimates, 
 persons of an uncertain fortune, he passed for a great 
 miser. " But," he adds, " to my knowledge this was 
 a mistake." No hand, indeed, was more open. He 
 feared prospective wants, and, like a wise man, took 
 precaution against fate. When he died, his savings 
 amounted to two thousand pounds. 
 
 None of the biographers of Lamb in describing his 
 life and estimating his character seem to me to have 
 laid sufficient stress upon the dependent position of 
 his father, the poverty of the family, and the other 
 peculiarly painful circumstances of his childhood and 
 youth, which could not fail to have deeply influenced 
 his nature. Early impressions are never wholly
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XXvii 
 
 effaced, and I fancy that Lamb was at no time 
 entirely free from their effect. When his aunt 
 was lying on her death-bed, he acknowledged with 
 sorrow to a friend that he used to be ashamed to see 
 the poor old creature come to Christ's Hospital 
 " and sit herself down on the coalhole steps, and 
 open her apron, and bring out her basin with some 
 nice thing she had caused to be saved " for him. 
 He only despised her for it, he says. And the feel- 
 ing never deserted him. Upon his arrival at the 
 prime of life he found around him a wide circle of 
 friends, within which he loved to re-create himself. 
 They were varied in character and worldly position, 
 comprising, on the one hand, the hard-headed and 
 arrogant Hazlitt, and, on the other, George Dyer, 
 the simplest, most credulous, and absent-minded of 
 men. One of them, Barry Cornwall, has incidentally 
 confirmed this surmise, by revealing that there were 
 gradations in Lamb's manner to his various 
 guests, He had a scale of welcome for his friends. 
 To Wordsworth, we are told, he was " almost 
 respectful." His manner to Coleridge was deferential. 
 Hazlitt, Dyer, Crabb Robinson, Barry Cornwall were 
 all received according to their relative importance. It 
 is true that, under the influence of natural or artificial 
 excitement, he could be bold on occasion and emanci- 
 pate himself from this deferential manner. I have 
 read that once in a fit of gaiety, he shook Words- 
 worth by the nose instead of by the hand, and 
 saluted him with a " How d'ye do old Lake poet ?"
 
 XXV111 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 Yet it is clear that, without the slightest taint of 
 obsequiousness, and probably himself unconscious of 
 the practice, he was not able, except under the con- 
 ditions stated, to free himself from that recognition of 
 social condition he had contracted in his early years. 
 Notwithstanding his gaiety and the reputation 
 he has acquired as a wit, Lamb was essentially a 
 lonely man. In company he liked, he was social, 
 convivial, the best of good fellows. Those who 
 frequented his " at homes," or enjoyed the 
 privilege of his society at more private times, 
 speak of his charming manners and of the frank 
 geniality which increased as the evening wore on, 
 and the cheering glass with its accompanying stock 
 of the great plant was introduced. His friends then 
 seemed to be his intimates. But the cautious 
 biographer will doubt if there was one among his 
 many associates to whom he ever revealed his deepest 
 feelings. There were recesses in his nature which 
 none had explored, and which, to whatever pitch of 
 indiscretion he might be raised by the extravagance 
 of his mirth, he knew by old habit how to conceal 
 from all eyes. His mind was of that cast which has 
 no real counterpart beyond itself. Among all the men 
 he met, there was no double to himself. He was 
 made up of queer points, and "wanted so many 
 answering needles." His brother John had habits 
 and a disposition alien from his. He was formal 
 and pompous, and required the respect due to an 
 elder brother. He affected a taste for pictures, but
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XXIX 
 
 found no delight in poetry, and did not much esteem 
 the tuneful tribe. " It has been his fashion," writes 
 Charles, in a sad letter to Colerige, " to depreciate 
 and cry you down : you were the cause of my mad- 
 ness — you and your damned sensibility and melan- 
 choly," are the terms employed, Even to Mary — 
 mother as she had been to him, and child as she 
 afterwards became — he could not disclose himself. 
 She had kindred tastes and habits ; could participate 
 in his studies — their intellectual natures were alike. 
 But there were well-defined bounds which separated 
 them. He could communicate to her his joys, but 
 was. prevented from acquainting her with his sorrows. 
 There- were thoughts he tried to cover from his own 
 sight. The awful tragedy of their lives made this 
 necessary. She, the sister, did not fully appreciate the 
 sacrifice he had imposed upon himself; those, a few, 
 who did, never even alluded to it. 1 None could 
 praise him for his enduring heroism ; he had not even 
 the grim satisfaction of martyrdom. The lone boy 
 developed into the lone man. 
 
 To this personal reserve and concealment of him- 
 
 1 Mrs. Moxon, the Emma Isola of the correspondence, "whose 
 mirthful spirits were the youth of our house," tells me, that during 
 the whole period of her residence with the Lambs she was completely 
 ignorant of the terrible event. One night, Charles and Mary Lamb 
 and herseh were seated at table. The conversation turned on the 
 elder Lamb, when Miss Isola asked why she never heard mention of 
 the mother. Mary thereupon uttered a sharp, piercing cry, for which 
 Charles playfully and laughingly rebuked her ; but he made no allusion 
 to the cause.
 
 XXX CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 self, we owe the frank confidence of the Essays and 
 Letters. In his public confessions he withheld no- 
 thing. With the pen in hand, his tongue was 
 unbound, and he spoke with that freedom which 
 results from consciousness that he could not be 
 cross-examined, and need not be particular in minute 
 details. He discourses on all sorts of things, and 
 describes with amazing candour the peculiarities of 
 his friends. No man ever painted with such truth. 
 The poor Ettrick Shepherd was wroth with Wilson, 
 for ridiculing him in the Nodes, and he had cause of 
 complaint. He was caricatured. Lamb's friends could 
 not object to their portraits on such ground. They are 
 drawn to the life, and can be recognised by all who 
 knew them. The Elia gallery is a series of speaking 
 portraits, of rarest quality of workmanship, in which 
 the most valuable picture is that of the painter 
 himself. 
 
 As a prose writer, Lamb prized himself highly. 
 Verse, he avowed himself ready to leave to his 
 betters. His exceptional nature produced exceptional 
 work. He had a style of his own. The edifice he 
 planned was gradually built up from a foundation 
 laid not too deep. Touch by touch he added to the 
 structure, every touch increasing its height and 
 symmetry and commodiousness. The style, how- 
 ever, is not instinctive ; was not born in him ; but it 
 grew to be his by adoption, and finally was himself. 
 He worked on his own method. He borrowed antique 
 phrases from favourite writers among his predecessors.
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XXxi 
 
 The Elizabethan dramatists, Sir Thomas Browne, 
 Jeremy Taylor, Wither, were quarries to which he 
 resorted for materials to suit his preconcerted design 
 — not because the form was antique did he select 
 them, but for the better reason that the blocks he 
 borrowed thence were suitable to the structure he had 
 planned, and there was appropriate place for them. 
 There is always a correspondency between the 
 expressions used and the style. His ink had imper- 
 ceptibly caught the colour of the past age, but the 
 writing is in the characters and orthography of his 
 own. I find, that like Jean Paul and Sterne, he is 
 often diffuse — or, rather, too copious in his vocabu- 
 lary. He is not satisfied with a simple epithet ; he 
 must reiterate. With him a Poor Relation is not 
 only " the most irrelevant thing in nature ; " it is, 
 besides, " a piece of impertiment correspondency, an 
 odious approximation, a haunting conscience, a pre- 
 posterous shadow lengthening in the noon-tide of 
 your prosperity, an unwelcome remembrancer, a 
 perpetually recurring mortification, a drain on your 
 purse, a more intolerable dun upon your pride, a 
 drawback upon success, a rebuke to your rising, a 
 stain in your blood, a blot on your 'scutcheon." It 
 would seem that as brevity is the soul of wit, dilation 
 and amplification are essential to humour. For his 
 most surprising effects, the humorist verges on 
 tediousness. Tristram Shandy in relating his life and 
 adventures, never reaches that important event — his 
 birth. Often the matter is nothing. It made little
 
 XXX11 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 difference to Lamb what is the nature of the subject 
 on which he wrote. Old China, Beggars, New Year's 
 Eve, Whist, Chimney Sweepers, a Quakers' Meeting, 
 Roast Pig, Gentle Giantesses, Squirrels — are some 
 of the themes he treats. It is his manner that 
 pleases. He collates quaint and far-fetched terms, 
 capers with grave gaiety among antique phrases ; 
 catches an expression from some one of our elder 
 writers, and then dovetails his own thoughts with 
 those he has borrowed. He delights in unexpected 
 turns in the sentence. Words desuetuded he reclaims; 
 and he has no hesitation in adopting forms of 
 grammar no longer in vogue. The strong expression 
 is usually rejected for the picturesque. " Perad- 
 venture," or such like disused or archaic, but stately 
 and sonorous forms of speech greatly pleased him, 
 and he composes sentences for the sake of the 
 sound. By the use of big words, and the termination 
 " eth," for the modern " s," he attempts to give 
 comic grandeur to mean subjects, but in many of 
 his essays he can hardly be said altogether to 
 succeed. The Widow Blacket of Oxford — his "Gentle 
 Giantess " — he describes as one who " girdeth her 
 waist — or what she is pleased to esteem as such — 
 nearly up to her shoulders ; from beneath which that 
 huge dorsal expanse, in mountainous declivity, 
 emergeth." And in his biographical Memoir of 
 Liston he writes : " He was subject to sights and had 
 visions. Those arid beech-nuts, distilled by a com- 
 plexion naturally adust, mounted into an occiput
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XXX111 
 
 already prepared to kindle by long seclusion and the 
 fervour of strict Calvinistic notions." For the most 
 part, however, his humour was not of this verbal 
 nature, but resided in the treatment he gave his 
 subject or situation. Humour — unlike wit, which, 
 being an exhibition of superior strength, causes 
 pain — is the result of an indirect avowal on the part of 
 the author of weakness, and is most successful when 
 the foible glanced at with lenity is one to which we 
 are ourselves subject. The delight we receive is 
 proportional with the author's power in placing us, 
 contrary to expectation, in a favourable light. Thus 
 Lamb makes himself kin with all by confessing a 
 thousand weaknesses. He looked humorously at 
 himself, played practical jokes with himself, shot sly 
 sallies at himself and was pleased when they reached 
 the mark. In his self-revelations he surveys himself 
 askance, raises a laugh against himself, pats himself 
 on the back, makes dolorous fun at his weaknesses 
 and peculiarities. He really regards himself and 
 his performance as another would — now reprehending 
 himself and now commending himself. Therefore it is 
 that his Essays and Letters find so many admirers. 
 To a young man of ordinary education, trying to get 
 a taste for literature, Charles Lamb, I fancy, would 
 not on first introduction be entertaining. His style 
 would be a bar to intimate acquaintanceship ; his 
 quips and cranks would be misconstrued or dis- 
 relished ; he would appear to have had difficulty in 
 finding the exact words he wanted, and, as a make- 
 
 d
 
 XXXIV CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 shift, took equivalents wide of the mark ; from an 
 over-desire to use expressions out of the common 
 speech, his work would seem out of joint. In time, 
 however, such a reader would come to see that no 
 writer is more fastidious in the choice of words ; 
 would pardon every departure from set forms of 
 speech; would delight in every episodical circum- 
 stance enumerated ; would treat with fond love the 
 very drolleries and peculiarities which formerly stood 
 in the way of due appreciation ; would, in fact, recog- 
 nise in his author a supreme humorist. 
 
 The pathos, too, exhibited by Lamb is affecting. 
 Even the most whimsical passages are tinted and 
 toned by an undercurrent of melancholy. Usually 
 it is not formally or designedly introduced, but 
 seems wrung from him, just as a bitter cry is 
 wrung from a brave man in pain. He does not desire 
 to draw tears, but wishes, on the contrary, to exhibit 
 a gay demeanour under misfortune. His heart, how- 
 ever, is continually sorrowing, and he draws tears 
 unconsciously. So soft and affecting a trope as 
 occurs in one of his letters to Miss Wordsworth I 
 cannot parallel elsewhere. He calls his sister's 
 periodical fits of madness being " from home." 
 " Your long kind letter," he writes, " has not been 
 thrown away ; but poor Mary, to whom it is ad- 
 dressed, cannot yet relish it. She has been attacked 
 by one of her severe illnesses, and is at present from 
 homey And in the indiscreet letter he wrote to 
 Southey, upon that poet's allusion in the Quarterly to
 
 CHARLES LAMB. XXXV 
 
 his essays, there occurs a passage of even higher 
 pathos, inasmuch as it has not personal but patriotic 
 application. He is complaining against Westminster 
 Abbey and St. Paul's being closed to the poor at those 
 times only when they could attend, and the exaction 
 of entrance money. A decently clothed man with his 
 wife and child was bargaining for admittance to 
 St. Paul's. "The price was only twopence each 
 person. The poor man hesitated, desirous to go in ; 
 but there were three of them, and he turned away 
 reluctantly. Perhaps he wished to see the tomb of 
 Nelson." The splendour of the suggestion in the 
 last line is sublime. 
 
 If it is asked what benefit Lamb brings us, it 
 must be answered that, apart from having presented 
 the world with an example of the most heroic self- 
 sacrifice, and of awakening in us generous sympathies 
 with all that should excite them, there is little else. 
 He does not increase our knowledge of things, 
 only inasmuch as by revealing himself he increases 
 the knowledge we possess of ourselves. He was 
 averse from conveying instruction too directly and 
 like a lecture. He does not present us with his 
 thought as an object. We do not even know he 
 is thinking. We know only how a thought affects 
 him. His remarks please us from the fact that the 
 speaker assumes the air, always agreeable to a listener, 
 of speaking simply to please and delight us. He 
 never pretends to instruct, knowing that an intelligent 
 reader finds a sort of insult in being told, " I will 
 
 d 2
 
 XXXVI CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 teach you how to think upon this subject." When 
 he speaks, we are convinced fnore by the force of his 
 sentiment than by any argumentative process he 
 employs. Of the ends and origin of life he does not 
 profess to enlighten us. Abstruse problems pre- 
 sented for solution by modern thought did not vex 
 his mind. The class of facts which most interested 
 him was not that which interests common men. 
 Modes of thought and ways of life, unimportant in 
 the estimation of most persons, or only important 
 from casual circumstances, were to him of great 
 moment, and the high affairs of society of little 
 concern. His works please best those who like him 
 have travelled among books of quaint and curious 
 nature ; whose ways of life have not been in too 
 pleasant places ; who like him have had manifold 
 experience of the inarticulate tones of the soul. At 
 Lamb's table we do not sit down to formal courses. 
 The host does not invite his guests to solid food, but 
 he offers them a feast of nectar.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE 
 
 OF 
 
 CHARLES LAMB. 
 
 i. 
 
 Correspondence with Samuel Taylor Coleridge : 
 
 [1796-1832]. 
 Letter!.] May 27, 1796. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, Make yourself perfectly easy about 
 May. I paid his bill when I sent your clothes. I 
 was flush of money, and am so still to all the purposes 
 of a single life ; so give yourself no further concern 
 about it. 1 The money would be superfluous to me if 
 I had it. 
 
 When Southey becomes as modest as his pre- 
 decessor, Milton, and publishes his Epics in duo- 
 decimo, I will read 'em ; a guinea a book is some- 
 what exorbitant, nor have I the opportunity of 
 borrowing the work. The extracts from it in the 
 Monthly Review, and the short passages in your 
 Watchman, seem to me much superior to any thing in 
 his partnership account with Lovell. Your poems I 
 shall procure forthwith. There were noble lines in 
 
 1 Probably the debt of £15, to which reference will again occur 
 more than once. 
 
 VOL. I. B
 
 2 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 what you inserted in one of your Numbers from 
 Religious Musings ; but I thought them elaborate. 
 I am somewhat glad you have given up that paper : 
 it must have been dry, unprofitable, and of " dissonant 
 mood " to your disposition. I wish you success in all 
 your undertakings, and am glad to hear you are em- 
 ployed about the Evidences of Religion. There is 
 need of multiplying such books a hundredfold in this 
 philosophical age, to prevent converts to atheism, for 
 they seem too tough disputants to meddle with after- 
 wards. 
 
 Le Grice is gone to make puns in Cornwall. He 
 has got a tutorship to a young boy living with his 
 mother, a widow lady. 1 He will, of course, initiate 
 him quickly in " whatsoever things are honest, lovely, 
 and of good report." He has cut Miss Hunt com- 
 pletely : the poor girl is very ill on the occasion ; 
 but he laughs at it, and justifies himself by saying, 
 "she does not see me laugh." 3 Coleridge, I know 
 not what suffering scenes you have gone through at 
 Bristol. My life has been somewhat diversified of 
 late. The six weeks that finished last year and began 
 this, your very humble servant spent very agreeably 
 in a madhouse, at Hoxton. 8 I am got somewhat 
 rational now, and don't bite any one. But mad I was ; 
 and many a vagary my imagination played with me, 
 enough to make a volume, if all were told. My 
 Sonnets I have extended to the number of nine since 
 I saw you, and will some day communicate to you. 
 
 1 C. V. Le Grice, Esq. His tutorship was, it is supposed, at Pen- 
 zance: but at all events he was there in 1837. 
 
 2 He must have been a singular person. He declined to do some 
 exercise at Christ's Hospital.on an occasion, " because he had a lethargy." 
 
 Since demolished.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 3 
 
 I am beginning a poem in blank verse, which, if I 
 finish, I publish. White is on the eve of publishing 
 (he took the hint from Vortigern) " Original letters of 
 Falstaff, Shallow," &c. ; a copy you shall have when 
 it comes out. 1 They are without exception the best 
 imitations I ever saw. Coleridge, it may convince 
 you of my regards for you when I tell you my head 
 ran on you in my madness, as much almost as on 
 another person, who I am inclined to think was the 
 more immediate cause of my temporary frenzy. 
 
 The Sonnet I send you has small merit as poetry; 
 but you will be curious to read it when I tell you it 
 was written in my prison-house in one of my lucid 
 intervals. 
 
 TO MY SISTER. 
 
 If from my lips some angry accents fell, 
 Peevish complaint, or harsh reproof unkind, 
 'Twas but the error of a sickly mind 
 
 And troubled thoughts, clouding the purer well 
 And waters clear of Reason ; and for me, 
 Let this my verse the poor atonement be — 
 My verse, which thou to praise wert e'er inclined 
 Too highly, and with a partial eye to see 
 
 No blemish. Thou to me didst ever show 
 Kindest affection ; and would'st oft-times lend 
 An ear to the desponding love-sick lay, 
 Weeping my sorrows with me, who repay 
 
 But ill the mighty debt of love I owe, 
 Mary, to thee, my sister and my friend. 
 
 With these lines, and with that sister's kindest 
 
 remembrances to C , I conclude. 
 
 Yours sincerely, Lamb. 
 
 1 It was published the same year in i2mo, and was at first thought 
 to be genuine. Those who held the contrary opinion attributed it for 
 some time to Lamb himself. The White referred to as its author was 
 Lamb's early friend, Jem White. 
 
 B 2
 
 4 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Your Condones ad Poptiluin are the most eloquent 
 politics that ever came in my way. 
 
 Write when convenient — not as a task, for here 
 is nothing in this letter to answer. 
 
 We cannot send our remembrances to Mrs. C, 
 not having seen her, but believe me our best good 
 wishes attend you both. 
 
 My civic and poetic compliments to Southey if at 
 Bristol. Why, he is a very Leviathan of Bards ! — the 
 small minnow, I ! 
 
 LETTER II.] [No Month] 1796. 
 
 I am in such violent pain with the headache, 
 that I am fit for nothing but transcribing, scarce for 
 that. When I get your poems, and the Joan of 
 Arc, 1 I will exercise my presumption in giving you 
 my opinion of 'em. The mail does not come in 
 before to-morrow (Wednesday) morning. The fol- 
 lowing Sonnet was composed during a walk down 
 into Hertfordshire early in last Summer : — 
 
 The Lord of Light shakes off his drowsyhed. 8 
 Fresh from his couch up springs the lusty sun, 
 And girds himself his mighty race to run; 
 
 Meantime, by truant love of rambling led, 
 
 I turn my back on thy detested walls, 
 Proud City, and thy sons I leave behind, 
 A selfish, sordid, money-getting kind, 
 
 Who shut their ears when holy Freedom calls. 
 
 1 Not Southey's poem, but one commenced by Coleridge on the 
 same subject. What Coleridge wrote of it, which was not a great deal, 
 was incorporated by Southey. 
 
 2 "Drowsyhed" I have met with, I think, in Spencer. Tis an old 
 thing, but it rhymes with led, and rhyming covers a multitude of 
 licences. — C. Lamb's Manuscripts.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 5 
 
 I pass not thee so lightly, humble spire, 
 That mindest me of many a pleasure gone, 
 Of merrier days, of Love and Islington, 
 
 Kindlirjg anew the flames of past desire ; 
 
 And I shall muse on thee, slow journeying on, 
 
 To the green plains of pleasant Hertfordshire. 
 
 The last line is a copy of Bowles's, "To the 
 green Hamlet in the peaceful Plain." Your ears are 
 not so very fastidious ; many people would not like 
 words so prosaic and familiar in a Sonnet as Isling- 
 ton and Hertfordshire. The next was written within 
 a day or two of the last, on revisiting a spot where 
 the scene was laid of my first Sonnet that " mock'd 
 my step with many a lonely glade." 
 
 When last I roved these winding wood-walks green. 
 
 Green winding walks, and shady pathways sweet, 
 Oft-times would Anna seek the silent scene, 
 
 Shrouding her beauties in the lone retreat. 
 No more I hear her footsteps in the shade ; 
 
 Her image only in these pleasant ways 
 
 Meets me self-wandering, where in happier days 
 I held free converse with my fair-hair'd maid. 
 
 I pass'd the little cottage which she loved, 
 The cottage which did once my all contain : 
 It spake of days that ne'er must come again ; 
 
 Spake to my heart, and much my heart was moved. 
 Now " Fair befall thee, gentle maid," said I ; 
 And from the cottage turn'd me with a sigh. 
 
 The next retains a few lines from a Sonnet of 
 mine which you once remarked had no "body of 
 thought " in it. I agree with you, but have preserved 
 a part of it, and it runs thus. I flatter myself you 
 will like it : — 
 
 A timid grace sits trembling in her eye, 
 As loth to meet the rudeness of men's sight
 
 6 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Yet shedding a delicious lunar light, 
 That steeps in kind oblivious ecstacy 
 The care-crazed mind, like some still melody : 
 
 Speaking most plain the thoughts which do possess 
 
 Her gentle sprite, peace and meek quietness, 
 And innocent loves, 1 and maiden purity : 
 
 A look whereofmight heal the cruel smart 
 Of changed friends, or Fortune's wrongs unkind ; 
 
 Might to sweet deeds of mercy move the heart 
 Of him who hates his brethren of mankind. 
 
 Turn'd are those beams from me, who fondly yet 
 
 Past joys, vain loves, and buried hopes regret. 
 
 The next and last I value most of all. 'Twas 
 composed close upon the heels of the last, in that 
 very wood I had in mind when I wrote " Methinks 
 how dainty sweet." 
 
 We were two pretty babes, the youngest she, 
 The youngest, and the loveliest far, I ween, 
 And Innocence her name. The time has been 
 
 We two did love each other's company ; 
 
 Time was, we two had wept to have been apart : 
 But when, with show of seeming good beguiled, 
 I left the garb and manners of a child, 
 
 And my first love for man's society, 
 
 Defiling with the world my virgin heart, 
 
 My loved companion dropp'd a tear and fled, 
 
 And hid in deepest shades her awful head. 
 Beloved! who can tell me where thou art— 
 
 In what delicious Eden to be found — 
 
 That I may seek thee the wide world around? 
 
 Since writing it, I have found in a poem by Hamil- 
 ton of Bangor, 2 these two lines to " Happiness : " — 
 
 1 Cowley uses this phrase with a somewhat different meaning. I 
 mean loves of relatives, friends, &c. — C. Lamb's Manuscripts. 
 
 2 More properly Bci/i^our. His poems were formerly in esteem, and 
 of late years they have been reprinted in Scotland.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 7 
 
 " Nun, sober and devout, where art thou fled 
 " To hide in shades thy meek, contented head ?" 
 
 Lines eminently beautiful ; but I do not remember 
 having read them previously, for the credit of my 
 tenth and eleventh lines. Parnell has two lines 
 (which probably suggested the above) to " Content- 
 ment:" 
 
 " Whither, ah ! whither art thou fled, 
 "To hide thy meek, contented 1 head ?" 
 
 Cowley's exquisite " Elegy on the death of his 
 friend Harvey," suggested the phrase of " we two." 
 
 " Was there a tree that did not know 
 " The love betwixt us two ?" 
 
 So much for acknowledged plagiarisms, the con- 
 fession of which I know not whether it has more of 
 vanity or modesty in it. As to my blank verse, I am 
 so dismally slow and sterile of ideas (I speak from my 
 heart) that I much question if it will ever come to 
 any issue. I have hitherto only hammered out a few 
 independent, unconnected snatches, not in a capacity 
 to be sent. I am very ill, and will rest till I have 
 read your poems, for which I am very thankful. I 
 have one more favour to beg of you, that you never 
 mention Mr. May's affair in any sort, much less think 
 of repaying. Are we not flocci-nauci-what-d ye-call- 
 'em-ists ? We have just learned that my poor brother 
 has had a sad accident : a large stone, blown down by 
 yesterday's high wind, has bruised his leg in a most 
 shocking manner; he is under the care of Cruikshank. 
 Coleridge, there are io,ooo objections against my 
 paying you a visit at Bristol ; it cannot be else ; but 
 in this world 'tis better not to think too much of 
 
 1 An odd epithet for Contentment in a poet so " poetical" as Parnell. 
 — C. Lamb's Manuscripts.
 
 8 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 pleasant possibles, that we may not be out of humour 
 with present insipids. Should any thing bring you to 
 London, you will recollect No. 7, Little Queen Street, 
 Holborn. 
 
 I shall be too ill to call on Wordsworth myself, 
 but will take care to transmit him his poem, when I 
 have read it. I saw Le Grice the day before his 
 departure, and mentioned incidentally his "teaching 
 the young idea how to shoot." Knowing him and the 
 probability there is of people having a propensity to 
 pun in his company, you will not wonder that we 
 both stumbled on the same pun at once, he eagerly 
 anticipating me, — " he would teach him to shoot ! " 
 Poor le Grice ! if wit alone could entitle a man to re- 
 spect, &c, he has written a very witty little pamphlet 
 lately, satirical upon college declamations. When I 
 send White's book, I will add that. I am sorry there 
 should be any difference between you and Southey. 
 " Between you two there should be peace," tho' I must 
 say I have borne him no good will since he spirited 
 you away from among us. What is become of 
 Moschus ? You sported some of his sublimities, I 
 see, in your Watchman. Very decent things. So 
 much for to-night from your afflicted, headachey, 
 sorethroaty, humble servant, C. Lamb. 
 
 Tuesday Night. — Of your Watchman, the Review 
 of Burke was the best prose. I augured great things 
 from the first Number. There is some exquisite 
 poetry interpersed. I have re-read the extract from 
 the Religious Musings, and retract whatever invi- 
 dious there was in my censure of it as elaborate. 
 There are times when one is not in a disposition 
 thoroughly to relish good writing. I have re-read it
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. Q 
 
 in a more favourable moment, and hesitate not to 
 pronounce it sublime. If there be any thing in it 
 approaching to tumidity, (which I meant not to infer ; 
 by elaborate I meant simply laboured,) it is the 
 gigantic hyperbole by which you describe the evils of 
 existing society : " snakes, lions, hyenas, and behe- 
 moths," is carrying your resentment beyond bounds. 
 The pictures of the " The Simoom," of " Frenzy and 
 Ruin," of " The Whore of Babylon," and "The Cry 
 of the Foul Spirits disherited of Earth," and "the 
 -trange beatitude " which the good man shall recognise 
 .n heaven, as well as the particularizing of the children 
 of wretchedness, (I have unconsciously included every 
 part of it,) form a variety of uniform excellence. I 
 hunger and thirst to read the poem complete. That 
 is a capital line in your sixth Number : 
 
 "This dark, frieze-coated, hoarse, teeth-chattering month.'' 
 
 They are exactly such epithets as Burns would have 
 stumbled on, whose poem on the ploughed-up daisy 
 you seem to have had in mind. Your complaint that 
 some of your readers thought there was too much, 
 some too little original matter in your Numbers, 
 reminds me of poor dead Parsons in the Critic. 
 " Too little incident ! Give me leave to tell you, sir, 
 there is too much incident." I had like to have 
 forgot thanking you for 'that exquisite little morsel, 
 the first Sclavonian Song. The expression in the 
 second, — " more happy to be unhappy in hell :" is it 
 not very quaint ? Accept my thanks, in common 
 with those of all who love good poetry, for "The 
 Braes of Yarrow." 1 I congratulate you on the 
 
 1 Coleridge must have taken the idea of this from Hamilton of 
 Bangour, among whose poems a copy of verses on the subject occupies 
 a prominent place with the same title.
 
 10 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 enemies you must have made by your splendid invec- 
 tive against the barterers in human flesh and sinews. 
 Coleridge, you will rejoice to hear that Cowper is 
 recovered from his lunacy, and is employed on his 
 translation of the Italian, &c, poems of Milton for an 
 edition where Fuseli presides as designer. Coleridge, 
 to an idler like myself, to write and receive letters are 
 both very pleasant ; but I wish not to break in upon 
 your valuable time by expecting to hear very frequently 
 from you. Reserve that obligation for your moments 
 of lassitude, when you have nothing else to do ; for 
 your loco-restive and all your idle propensities, of 
 course, have given way to the duties of providing for 
 a family. The mail is come in, but no parcel ; yet 
 this is Tuesday. Farewell, then, till to-morrow ; for a 
 niche and a nook I must leave for criticisms. By the 
 way, I hope you do not send your only copy of Joan 
 of Arc: I will in that case return it. immediately. 
 
 Your parcel is come : you have been lavish of your 
 presents. 
 
 Wordsworth's poem I have hurried through, not 
 without delight. Poor Lovell ! my heart almost 
 accuses me for the light manner I lately spoke of 
 him, not dreaming of his death. My heart bleeds 
 for your accumulated troubles : God send you through 
 'em with patience. I conjure you dream not that I 
 will ever think of being repaid ; the very word is 
 galling to the ears. I have read all your Religious 
 Musings with uninterrupted feelings of profound 
 admiration. You may safely rest your fame on it. 
 The best remaining things are what I have before 
 read, and they lose nothing by my recollection of 
 your manner of reciting 'em, for I too bear in mind 
 " the voice, the look " of absent friends, and can
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. II 
 
 occasionally mimic their manner for the amusement 
 of those who have seen 'em. Your impassioned 
 manner of recitation I can recall at any time to mine 
 own heart and to the ears of the bystanders. I rather 
 wish you had left the monody on Chatterton con- 
 cluding, as it did, abruptly. It had more of unity. The 
 conclusion of your Religious Musings, I fear, will 
 entitle you to the reproof of your beloved woman, 
 who wisely will not suffer your fancy to run riot, but 
 bids you walk humbly with your God. The last words, 
 
 " I discipline my young and novice thought 
 " In ministeries of heart-stirring song," 
 
 though not now new to me, cannot be enough admired. 
 To speak politely, they are a well-turned compliment to 
 Poetry. I hasten to read Joan of Arc, &c. I have read 
 your lines at the beginning of the second book: they 
 are worthy of Milton ; but in my mind yield to your 
 Religious Musings. I shall read the whole care- 
 fully, and in some future letter take the liberty to 
 particularize my opinions of it. Of what is new to 
 me among your poems next to the " Musings," that 
 beginning " My Pensive Sara " gave me most pleasure : 
 the lines in it I just alluded to are most exquisite ; 
 they made my sister and self smile, as conveying a 
 pleasing picture of Mrs. C. checking your wild 
 wanderings, which we were so fond of hearing 
 you indulge when among us. It has endeared us 
 more than any thing to your good lady; and your 
 own self-reproof that follows, delighted us. 'Tis a 
 charming poem throughout. (You have well remarked 
 that charming, admirable, exquisite are the words 
 expressive of feelings more than conveying of ideas ; 
 else I might plead very well want of room in my 
 paper as excuse for generalising). I want room to
 
 12 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 tell you how we are charmed with your verses in 
 the manner of Spenser, &c., &c., &c, &c, &c. I 
 am glad you resume the Watchman. Change the 
 name : leave out all articles of news, and whatever 
 things are peculiar to newspapers, and confine your- 
 self to ethics, verse, criticism ; or, rather do not 
 confine yourself. Let your plan be as diffuse as the 
 Spectator, and I'll answer for' it the work prospers. 
 If I am vain enough to think I can be a contributor ; 
 rely on my inclinations. Coleridge, in reading 
 your Religious Musings I felt a transient superiority 
 over you. I have seen Priestley. I love to see his 
 name repeated in your writings. I love and honour 
 him, almost profanely. You would be charmed with 
 his Sermons, if you never read 'em. You have 
 doubtless read his books illustrative of the doctrine of 
 Necessity. Prefixed to a late work of his, in answer 
 to Paine, there is a Preface, giving an account of the 
 man, and his services to men, written by Lindsey, 
 his dearest friend, well worth your reading. 
 
 Tuesday Eve. — Forgive my prolixity, which is yet 
 too brief for all I could wish to say. God give you 
 comfort, and all that are of your household ! Our 
 loves and best good wishes to Mrs. C. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter III.] June 10, 1796. 
 
 With Joan of Arc I have been delighted, amazed. 
 I had not presumed to expect any thing of such ex- 
 cellence from Southey. Why, the poem is alone 
 sufficient to redeem the character of the age we live 
 in from the imputation of degenerating in Poetry,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 13 
 
 were there no such beings extant as Burns, and 
 
 Bowles, Cowper, and : fill up the blank how you 
 
 please; I say nothing. The subject is well chosen. 
 It opens well. To become more particular, I will 
 notice in their order a few passages that chiefly 
 struck me on perusal. Page 26, " Fierce and terrible 
 Benevolence!" is a phrase full of grandeur and 
 originality. The whole context made me feel pos- 
 sessed, even like Joan herself. Page 28, " It is most 
 horrible with the keen sword to gore the finely-fibred 
 human frame," and what follows, pleased me mightily. 
 In the 2nd Book, the first forty lines in particular are 
 majestic and high-sounding. Indeed the whole vision 
 of the Palace of Ambition and what follows are 
 supremely excellent. Your simile of the Laplander, 
 
 , "by Niemi lake 
 
 "Or Balda Zhiok, or the mossy stone 
 " Of Solfar-kapper.i 
 
 will bear comparison with any in Milton for fulness 
 of circumstance and lofty pacedness of versification. 
 Southey's similes, though many of 'em are capital, are 
 a!! inferior. In one of his books, the simile of the oak 
 in the storm occurs, I think, four times. To return : 
 the light in which you view the heathen deities is accu- 
 rate and beautiful. Southey's personifications in this 
 book are so many fine and faultless pictures. I was 
 much pleased with your manner of accounting for 
 the reason why monarchs take delight in war. At the 
 447th line you have placed Prophets and Enthusiasts 
 cheek by jowl, on too intimate a footing for the 
 dignity of the former. Necessarian-like-speaking, it 
 is correct. Page 98, " Dead is the Douglas ! cold thy 
 
 1 These lines are in Coleridge's Poem entitled The Destiny of 
 Nations : a Vision.
 
 14 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 warrior frame, illustrious Buchan," &c, are of kindred 
 excellence with Gray's " Cold is Cadvvallo's tongue," 
 &c. How famously the Maid baffles the Doctors, 
 Seraphic and Irrefragable, " with all their trumpery !" 
 Page 126, the procession, the appearances of the 
 Maid, of the Bastard Son of Orleans and of Tre- 
 mouille, are full of fire and fancy, and exquisite 
 melody of versification. The personifications from 
 line 303 to 309, in the heat of the battle, had better 
 been omitted ; they are not very striking, and only 
 encumber. The converse which Joan and Conrade 
 hold on the banks of the Loire is altogether beautiful. 
 Page 313, the conjecture that in dreams " all things 
 are that seem," is one of those conceits which the 
 Poet delights to admit into his creed ; a creed, by the 
 way, more marvellous and mystic than ever Athana- 
 sius dreamed of. Page 315, I need only mention 
 those lines ending with " She saw a serpent gnawing 
 at her heart!" They are good imitative lines, "he 
 toiled and toiled, of toil to reap no end, but endless 
 toil and never-ending woe." Page 347, Cruelty is 
 such as Hogarth might have painted her. Page 361, 
 all the passage about Love (where he seems to con- 
 found conjugal love with creating and preserving 
 love) is very confused, and sickens me with a load of 
 useless personifications ; else that ninth Book is the 
 finest in the volume — an exquisite combination of the 
 ludicrous and the terrible : I have never read either, 
 even in translation, but such I conceive to be the 
 manner of Dante or Ariosto. The tenth Book is the 
 most languid. On the whole, considering the celerity 
 wherewith the poem was finished, I was astonished 
 at the infrequency of weak lines. I had expected to 
 find it verbose. Joan, I think, does too little in
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 15 
 
 battle ; Dunois perhaps the same ; Conrade too much. 
 The anecdotes interspersed among the battles refresh 
 the mind very agreeably, and I am delighted with the 
 very many passages of simple pathos abounding 
 throughout the poem ; passages which the author of 
 " Crazy Kate " might have written. Has not Master 
 Southey, in his Preface, spoke very slightingly, and 
 disparagingly of Cowper's Homer ? What makes 
 him reluctant to give Cowper his fame ? And does 
 not Southey use too often the expletives " did," and 
 "does ?" They have a good effect at times, but are 
 too inconsiderable, or rather become blemishes, when 
 they mark a style. On the whole, I expect Southey 
 one day to rival Milton : I already deem him equal to 
 Cowper, and superior to all living poets besides. 
 What says Coleridge ? The " Monody on Hender- 
 son " is immensely good : the rest of that little volume 
 is readable, and above mediocrity . I proceed to a 
 more pleasant task ; pleasant because the poems are 
 yours ; pleasant because you impose the task on me ; 
 and pleasant, let me add, because it will confer a 
 whimsical importance on me to sit in judgment upon 
 your rhymes. First, though, let me thank you again 
 and again, in my own and my sister's name, for your 
 invitations. Nothing could give us more pleasure 
 than to come, but (were there no other reasons) while 
 my brother's leg is so bad it is out of the question. 
 Poor fellow ! he is very feverish and light-headed ; but 
 Cruikshank has pronounced the symptoms favour- 
 able, and gives us every hope that there will be no 
 need of amputation : God send not ! We are neces- 
 sarily confined with him all the afternoon and evening 
 till very late, so that I am stealing a few minutes to 
 write to you.
 
 l6 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Thank you for your frequent letters : you are the 
 only correspondent, and, I might add, the only friend 
 I have in the world. I go nowhere, and have no 
 acquaintance. Slow of speech, and reserved of man- 
 ners, no one seeks or cares for my society ; and I am 
 left alone. Allen calls only occasionally, as though 
 it were a duty rather, and seldom stays ten minutes. 
 Then judge how thankful I am for your letters ! Do 
 not, however, burthen yourself with the correspond- 
 ence. I trouble you again so soon, only in obedience 
 to your injunctions. Complaints apart, proceed we 
 to our task. I am called away to tea ; thence must 
 wait upon my brother; so must delay till to-morrow. 
 Farewell ! — Wednesday. 
 
 Thursday. — I will first notice what is new to me. 
 Thirteenth page : " The thrilling tones that concen- 
 trate the soul " is a nervous line ; and the first six 
 lines of page 14 are very pretty ; the twenty-first 
 effusion is a perfect thing. That in the manner of 
 Spenser is very sweet, particularly at the close : the 
 thirty-fifth effusion is most exquisite ; that line in 
 particular, " And, tranquil, muse upon tranquillity." 
 It is the very reflex pleasure that distinguishes the 
 tranquillity of a thinking being from that of a shep- 
 herd, a modern one I would be understood to mean, 
 a Damaetas, one that keeps other people's sheep. 
 Certai-nly, Coleridge, your" Lines written at Shurton 
 Bars" have less merit than most things in your volume : 
 personally, they may chime in best with your own 
 feelings, and therefore you love them best. They have 
 however, great merit. In your fourth epistle, that is 
 an exquisite paragraph, and fancy-full, of " A stream 
 there is which rolls in lazy flow," &c, &c. " Mur-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. IJ 
 
 murs sweet undersong 'mid jasmine bowers " is a 
 sweet line ; and so are the three next. The con- 
 cluding simile is far-fetched — "tempest-honoured" is 
 a quaintish phrase. Of the Monody on H [artley] 
 I will here only notice these lines, as superlatively 
 excellent. That energetic one, " Shall I not praise 
 thee, scholar, Christian, friend," like to that beautiful 
 climax of Shakspeare's, " King, Hamlet, Royal Dane, 
 Father ; " " yet memory turns from little men to thee," 
 " And sported careless round their fellow child." The 
 whole, I repeat it, is immensely good. 
 
 Yours is a poetical family. I was much surprised 
 and pleased to see the signature of Sara to that 
 elegant composition, the fifth epistle. I dare not 
 criticise the Religious Musings : I like not to 
 select any part, where all is excellent. I can only 
 admire, and thank you for it in the name of a 
 Christian, as well as a lover of good poetry : only let 
 me ask, Is not that thought and those words in 
 Young, " stands in the sun," — or is it only such as 
 Young, in one of his better moments, might have 
 writ ? — ■ 
 
 '* Believe thou, O my soul, 
 " Life is a vision, shadowy of Truth ; 
 " And vice, and anguish, and the wormy grave, 
 " Shapes of a dream ! " 
 
 I thank you for these lines in the name of a necessa- 
 rian, and for what follows in the next paragraph, in the 
 name of a child of fancy. After all, you cannot, nor 
 ever will, write any thing with which I shall be so de- 
 lighted as what I have heard yourself repeat. You 
 came to town, and I saw you at a time when your 
 heart was yet bleeding with recent wounds. Like 
 vol. i. c
 
 l8 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 yourself, I was sore galled with disappointed hope. 
 You had 
 
 " many an holy lay 
 
 " That, mourning, soothed the mourner on his way." 
 
 I had ears of sympathy to drink them in, and they 
 yet vibrate pleasant on the sense. When I read in 
 your little volume, your nineteenth effusion, or the 
 twenty-eighth or twenty-ninth, or what you call the 
 " Sigh," I think I hear you again. I image to myself 
 the little smoky room at the Salutation and Cat, 1 
 where we have sat together through the winter nights, 
 beguiling the cares of life with Poesy. When you 
 left London I felt a dismal void in my heart. I found 
 myself cut off, at one and the same time, from two 
 most dear to me. " How blest with ye the path could 
 I have trod of quiet life ! ' In your conversation you 
 had blended so many pleasant fancies that they 
 cheated me of my grief. But in your absence the tide 
 of melancholy rushed in again, and did its worst 
 mischief by overwhelming my reason. I have re- 
 covered, but feel a stupor that makes me indifferent 
 to the hopes and fears of this life. I sometimes wish 
 to introduce a religious turn of mind ; but habits are 
 strong things, and my religious fervours are confined, 
 alas ! to some fleeting moments of occasional solitary 
 devotion. A correspondence, opening with you, has 
 roused me a little from my lethargy, and made me 
 conscious of existence. Indulge me in it : I will not 
 be very troublesome. At some future time I will 
 amuse you with an account, as full as my memory 
 
 1 In Newgate Street. The Cat has been eliminated; it is now the 
 Salutation.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. ig 
 
 will permit, of the strange turn my frenzy took. I 
 look back upon it at times with a gloomy kind of 
 envy ; for, while it lasted, I had many, many hours of 
 pure happiness. Dream not, Coleridge, of having 
 tasted all the grandeur and wildness of fancy till you 
 have gone mad ! All now seems to me vapid, com- 
 paratively so. Excuse this selfish digression. Your 
 "Monody" is so superlatively excellent, that I can 
 only wish it perfect, which I can't help feeling it is 
 not quite. Indulge me in a few conjectures. What I 
 am going to propose would make it more compressed, 
 and, I think, more energetic, though I am sensible at 
 the expense of many beautiful lines. Let it begin 
 " Is this the land of song-ennobled line?" and proceed 
 to "Otway's famish'd form;" then, "Thee, Chatter- 
 ton," to " harps of Seraphim ;" then, " clad in Nature's 
 rich array," to "orient day;" then "but soon the 
 scathing lightning," to " blighted land ;" then, " sub- 
 lime of thought," to " his bosom glows ;" then 
 
 " But soon upon thy poor unshelter'd head 
 
 " Did Penury her sickly mildew shed 
 
 " Ah ! where are fled the charms of early Grace, 
 
 "And Joy's wild gleams that lighten'd o'er thy face?" 
 
 Then "youth of tumultuous soul" to " sigh," as before. 
 The rest may all stand down to " gaze upon the waves 
 below." What follows now may come next as de- 
 tached verses, suggested by the Monody, rather than 
 a part of it. They are indeed, in themselves, very 
 sweet : 
 
 " And we, at sober eve, would round thee throng 
 " Would hang, enraptured, on thy stately song, " 
 
 in particular, perhaps. If I am obscure, you may 
 
 C 2
 
 20 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 understand me by counting lines. I have proposed 
 omitting twenty-four lines. I feel that thus com- 
 pressed it would gain energy, but think it most likely 
 you will not agree with me ; for who shall go about 
 to bring opinions to the bed of Procrustes, and intro- 
 duce among the sons of men a monotony of identical 
 feelings ? I only propose with diffidence. Reject, 
 if you please, with as little remorse as you would 
 the colour of a coat or the pattern of a buckle, where 
 our fancies differed. The lines " Friend to the Friend- 
 less," &c, which you may think rudely disbranched 
 from the Chatterton, will patch in with the Man of 
 Ross, where they were at once at home, with two 
 more which I recollect, 
 
 "And o'er the dowried virgin's snowy cheek 
 " Bade bridal Love suffuse his blushes meek," 
 
 very beautiful. 
 
 The "Pixies" is a perfect thing; and so are the 
 " Lines on the Spring," page 28. The " Epitaph on 
 an Infant," like a Jack-o'-lantern, has danced about 
 (or like Dr. Forster's scholars) out of the Morning 
 Chronicle into the Watchman, and thence back into 
 your Collection. It is very pretty, and you seem to 
 think so; but, maybe, have o'erlooked its chief merit, 
 that of filling up a whole page. I had once deemed 
 Sonnets of unrivalled use that way; but your Epitaphs, 
 I find, are the more diffuse. " Edmund " still holds its 
 place among your best verses. " Ah ! fair delights " 
 to " roses round," in your Poem called " Absence," re- 
 call (none more forcibly) to my mind the tones in 
 which you recited it. I will not notice, in this tedious 
 (to you) manner, verses which have been so long de- 
 lightful to me, and which you already know my
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 21 
 
 opinion of. ' Of this kind are Bowles, Priestley, and 
 that most exquisite and most Bowles-like of all, the 
 nineteenth effusion. It would have better ended with 
 " agony of care : " the last two lines are obvious and 
 unnecessary, and you need not now make fourteen 
 lines of it : now it is rechristened from a Sonnet to an 
 Effusion. Schiller might have written the twentieth 
 Effusion : 'tis worthy of him in any sense. I was 
 glad to meet with those lines you sent me, when my 
 sister was so ill : I had lost the copy, and I felt not a 
 little proud at seeing my name in your verse. The 
 " Complaint of Ninathoma" (first stanza in particular) 
 isthebest, or only good imitation, of Ossian I ever saw, 
 your " Restless Gale " excepted. " To an Infant" is 
 most sweet. Is not " foodful," though, very harsh ? 
 Would not " dulcet" fruit be less harsh, or some other 
 friendly bi-syllable ? In " Edmund," " Frenzy, fierce- 
 eyed child," is not so well as " frantic," though that is 
 an epithet adding nothing to the meaning. Slander 
 couching was better than " squatting." In the " Man 
 of Ross " it was a better line thus : 
 
 " If 'neath this roof thy wine-cheer'd moments pass/' 
 
 than as it stands now. Time nor nothing can recon- 
 cile me to the concluding five lines of " Kosciusko : " 
 call it any thing you will but sublime. In my twelfth 
 effusion I would rather have seen what I wrote myself, 
 though they bear no comparison with your exquisite 
 lines — 
 
 " On rose-leaf d beds, amid your faery bowers," &c. 
 
 I love my Sonnets because they are the reflected 
 images of my own feelings at different times. To 
 instance, in the thirteenth — • 
 
 " How reason reel'd," &c,
 
 22 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 are good lines, but must spoil the whole with me, who 
 know it is only a fiction of yours, and that the " rude 
 dashings" did in fact not " rock me to repose." I 
 grant the same objection applies not to the former 
 Sonnet ; but still I love my own feelings : they are 
 dear to memory, though they now and then wake a 
 sigh or a tear. " Thinking on divers things foredone," 
 I charge you, Coleridge, spare my ewe lambs ; and 
 though a gentleman may borrow six lines in an epic 
 poem, (I should have no objection to borrow five 
 hundred, and without acknowledging,) still, in a 
 sonnet, a personal poem, I do not " ask my friend the 
 aiding verse." I would not wrong your feelings, by 
 proposing any improvements (did I think myself 
 capable of suggesting 'em) in such personal poems 
 as " Thou bleedest, my poor heart ! " — 'od so, — I am 
 caught — I have already done it ; but that simile I 
 propose abridging, would not change the feeling or 
 introduce any alien ones. Do you understand me ? 
 In the twenty-eighth, however, and in the " Sigh," and 
 that composed at Clevedon, things that come from 
 the heart direct, not by the medium of the fancy, I 
 would not suggest an alteration. When my blank 
 verse is finished, or any long fancy poems, propino 
 tibi alterandum, cut-up-andum, abridgandum, just 
 what you will with it ; but spare my ewe lambs ! 
 That to " Mrs. Siddons," now, you were welcome to 
 improve, if it had been worth it ; but I say unto you 
 again, Coleridge, spare my ewe lambs ! I must confess 
 were they mine, I should omit, in editione secundd, 
 Effusions two and three, because satiric, and below 
 the dignity of the poet of Religious Musings, fifth, 
 seventh, half of the eighth, that " Written in early
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 23 
 
 youth," as far as " thousand eyes," — though I part 
 not unreluctantiy with that lively line — • 
 
 " Chaste joyance dancing in her bright blue eyes," 
 
 and one or two more just thereabouts. But I would 
 substitute for it that sweet poem called " Recollection," 
 in the fifth Number of the Watchman ; better, I think, 
 than the remainder of this poem, though not differing 
 materially: as the poem now stands it looks altogether 
 confused. And do not omit those lines upon the 
 " Early Blossom," in your sixth Number of the Watch- 
 man : and I would omit the tenth Effusion or, what 
 would do better, alter and improve the last four lines. 
 In fact, I suppose, if they were mine, I should not 
 omit 'em ; but your verse is, for the most part, so ex- 
 quisite, that I like not to see aught of meaner matter 
 mixed with it. Forgive my petulance, and often, I 
 fear, ill-founded criticisms; and forgive me that I have, 
 by this time, made your eyes and head ache with my 
 long letter; but I cannot forego hastily the pleasure 
 and pride of thus conversing with you. You did not 
 tell me whether I was to include the Condones ad 
 Populnm in my remarks on your poems. They are 
 not unfrequently sublime ; and I think you could not 
 do better than to turn 'em into verse, if you have 
 nothing else to do. Allen, I am sorry to say, is a con- 
 firmed Atheist. Stoddart, a cold-hearted, well-bred, 
 conceited disciple of Godwin, does him no good. His 
 wife has several daughters, (one of 'em as old as him- 
 self.) Surely there is something unnatural in such a 
 marriage. 
 
 How I sympathize with you on the dull duty of a re- 
 viewer, and heartily condemn with you Ned Evans and
 
 24 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 the Prosodist. I shall, however, wait impatiently for 
 the articles in the Critical Review, next month, because 
 they are yours. Young Evans (W. Evans, a branch 
 of a family you were once so intimate with) is came 
 into our office, and sends his love to you ! Coleridge, 
 I devoutly wish that Fortune, who has made sport 
 with you so long, may play one freak more, — throw you 
 into London, or some spot near it, and there snug-ify 
 you for life. 'Tis a selfish, but natural wish for me, 
 cast as I am, " on life's wide plain, friendless." Are 
 you acquainted with Bowles ? I see, by his last Elegy, 
 (written at Bath,)you are near neighbours. — Thursday. 
 
 " And I can think I can see the groves again — was 
 it the voice of thee — turns not the voice of thee, my 
 buried friend — who dries with her dark locks the 
 tender tear," are touches as true to Nature as any in 
 his other Elegy, written at the Hot Wells, about poor 
 Kassell, &c. You are doubtless acquainted with it. 
 
 I do not know that I entirely agree with you in 
 your stricture upon my Sonnet " To Innocence." To 
 men whose hearts are not quite deadened by their 
 commerce with the world, innocence (no longer 
 familiar) becomes an awful idea. So I felt when I 
 wrote it. Your other censures (qualified and 
 sweetened, though, with praises somewhat extrava- 
 gant) I perfectly coincide with ; yet I choose to retain 
 the word " lunar." Indulge a "lunatic" in his loyalty 
 to his mistress the Moon ! I have just been reading 
 a most pathetic copy of verses on Sophia Pringle, who 
 was hanged and burnt for coining. One of the strokes 
 of pathos (which are very many, all somewhat 
 obscure,) is " She lifted up her guilty forger to heaven." 
 A note explains, by " forger," her right hand, with 
 which she forged or coined the base metal. For
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 25 
 
 "pathos " read bathos. You have put me out of conceit 
 with my blank verse by your Religious Musings. 
 I think it will come to nothing. I do not like 'em 
 enough to send 'em. I have just been reading a book 
 which I may be too partial to, as it was the delight 
 of my childhood; but I •will recommend it to you: 
 it is Izaak Walton's Complete Angler. All the 
 scientific part you may omit in reading. The dialogue 
 is very simple, full of pastoral beauties, and will charm 
 you. Many pretty old verses are interspersed. This 
 letter, which would be a week's work reading only, I do 
 not wish you to answer it in less than a month. I shall 
 be richly content with a letter from you some day early 
 in July; though, if you get any how settled before 
 then, pray let me know it immediately; 'twould give 
 me so much satisfaction. Concerning the Unitarian 
 chapel, the salary is the only scruple that the most 
 rigid moralist would admit as valid. Concerning the 
 tutorage, is not the salary low, and absence from your 
 family unavoidable ? London is the only fostering 
 soil for genius. Nothing more occurs just now; so I 
 will leave you, in mercy, one small white spot. empty 
 below, to repose your eyes upon, fatigued as they must 
 be with the wilderness of words they have by this 
 time painfully travelled through. God love you, 
 Coleridge, and prosper you through life ; though mine 
 will be loss if your lot is to be cast at Bristol, or at 
 Nottingham, or anywhere but London. 1 Our loves to 
 Mrs. C— . C. L. 
 
 Friday, 10th June, 1796. 
 
 1 Probably Coleridge, was already meditating entrance into the 
 Unitarian ministry ; but he did not carry the purpose into effect till 
 1 798, when he succeeded to the duties of the Rev. A. Rowe, at Shrews- 
 bury.
 
 26 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 LETTER IV.] Monday Night, June 13, 1796. 
 
 Unfurnished at present with any sheet-filling 
 subject, I shall continue my letter gradually and 
 journal-wise. My second thoughts entirely coincide 
 with your comments on Joan of Arc and I can only 
 wonder at my childish judgment which overlooked the 
 1st book, and could prefer the gth : not that I was in- 
 sensible to the soberer beauties of the former; but the 
 latter caught me with its glare of magic : the former, 
 however, left a more pleasing general recollection in 
 my mind. Let me add, the ist book was the favourite 
 of my sister ; and I now, with Joan, often "think on 
 Domremi and the fields of Arc." I must not pass 
 over without acknowledging my obligations to your 
 full and satisfactory account of personifications. I 
 have read it again and again, and it will be a guide to 
 my future taste. Perhaps I had estimated Southey's 
 merits too much by number, weight, and measure. I 
 now agree completely and entirely in your opinion of 
 the genius of Southey. Your own image of Melan- 
 choly is illustrative of what you teach, and in itself 
 masterly. I conjecture it is " disbranched " from one 
 of your embryo " hymns." When they are mature of 
 birth (were I you) I should print 'em, in one separate 
 volume, with Religious Musings and your part of 
 the jfoan of Arc. Birds of the same soaring wing 
 should hold on their flight in company. Once for all, 
 (and by renewing the subject you will only renew in 
 me the condemnation of Tantalus,) I hope to be able' 
 to pay you a visit (if you are then at Bristol) some 
 time in the latter end of August or beginning of 
 September, for a week or fortnight : before that time 
 office business puts an absolute veto on my coming.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 27 
 
 " And if a sigh that speaks regret of happier times appear, 
 
 " A glimpse of joy that we have met shall shine and dry the tear." 
 
 Of the blank verses I spoke of, the following lines are 
 the only tolerably complete ones I have writ out of not 
 more than one hundred and fifty. That I get on so 
 slowly you may fairly impute to want of practice in 
 composition, when I declare to you that (the few 
 verses which you have seen excepted) I have not writ 
 fifty lines since I left school. It may not be amiss to 
 remark that my grandmother (on whom the verses 
 are written) lived housekeeper in a family the fifty 
 or sixty last years of her life — that she was a 
 woman of exemplary piety and goodness — and for 
 many years before her death was terribly afflicted with 
 a cancer in her breast, which she bore with true Chris- 
 tian patience. You may think that I have not kept 
 enough apart the ideas of her heavenly and her 
 earthly master ; but recollect I have designedly given 
 in to her own way of feeling ; and if she had a failing 
 'twas that she respected her master's family too much, 
 not reverenced her Maker too little. The lines begin 
 imperfectly, as I may probably connect 'em if I finish 
 at all : and if I do, Biggs shall print 'em, (in a more 
 economical way than you yours,) for, Sonnets and all, 
 they won't make a thousand lines as I propose com- 
 pleting 'em, and the substance must be wire-drawn. 
 
 LETTER V.l Tuesday Evening, June 14, 1796. 
 
 I am not quite satisfied now with the Chatterton, 
 and, with your leave, will try my hand at it again. A 
 master joiner, you know, may leave a cabinet to be
 
 28 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 finished by his journeyman, when his own hands are 
 full. 
 
 To your list of illustrative personifications, into 
 which a fine imagination enters, I will take leave to 
 add the following from Beaumont and Fletcher's 
 Wife for a Month; 'tis the conclusion of a descrip- 
 tion of a sea fight : — " The game of death was never 
 played so nobly : the meagre thief grew wanton in his 
 mischiefs ; and his shrunk, hollow eyes smiled on his 
 ruins." There is fancy in these of a lower order, 
 from Bonduca; — "Then did I see these valiant men 
 of Britain, like boding owls creep into tods of ivy, 
 and hoot their fears to one another nightly." Not 
 that it is a personification ; only it just caught my 
 eye in a little extract book I keep, which is full of quota- 
 tions from Beaumont and Fletcher in particular, in 
 which authors I can't help thinking there is a greater 
 richness of poetical fancy than in any one, Shakspeare 
 excepted. Are you acquainted with Massinger ? At 
 a hazard I will trouble you with a passage from a play 
 of his called A Very Woman. The lines are spoken 
 by a lover (disguised) to his faithless mistress. You 
 will remark the fine effect of the double endings. You 
 will by your ear distinguish the lines, for I write 'em 
 as prose. " Not far from where my father lives, a lady, 
 a neighbour by, blest with as great a beauty as Nature 
 durst bestow without undoing, dwelt, and most hap- 
 pily, as I thought then, and blest the house a thou- 
 sand times she dwelt in. This beauty, in the blossom 
 of my youth, when my first fire knew no adulterate 
 incense, nor I no way to flatter but my fondness ; in all 
 the bravery my friends could show me, in all the faith 
 my innocence could give me, in the best language my 
 true tongue could tell me, and all the broken sighs my
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 2Q 
 
 sick heart lend me, I sued and served. Long did I 
 serve this lady, long was my travail, long my trade to 
 win her : with all the duty of my soul I served her!" 
 " Then she must love." " She did, but never me : she 
 could not love me ; she would not love, she hated, — 
 more, she scorn 'd me ; and in so poor and base a way 
 abused me for all my services, for all my bounties, so 
 bold neglects flung on me." " What out of love, and 
 worthy love, I gave her, (shame to her most unworthy 
 mind !) to fools, to girls, to fiddlers, and her boys 
 she flung, all in disdain of me." One more pas- 
 sage strikes my eye from Beaumont and Fletcher's 
 Palamon and Arcite. 1 One of 'em complains in 
 prison : 
 
 " This is all our world : 
 " We shall know nothing here but one another ; 
 " Hear nothing but the clock that tells our woes. 
 " The vine shall grow, but we shall never see it." 
 
 Is not the last circumstance exquisite ? I mean 
 not to lay myself open by saying they exceed Milton, 
 and perhaps Collins, in sublimity. But don't you 
 conceive all poets, after Shakspeare, yield to 'em in 
 variety of genius ? Massinger treads close on their 
 heels ; but you are most probably as well acquainted 
 with his writings as your humble servant. My quota- 
 tions, in that case, will only serve to show my barren- 
 ness of matter. Southey, in simplicity and tenderness, 
 
 1 The title of the play here alluded to is The Tzuo Noble Kinsmen, 
 and the most prominent characters in it are Palamon and Arcite. 
 Richard Edwards was the author of Palamon and Arcyte, as will be 
 seen by the following extract from the Companion to the Playhouse, 
 published in 1764: — "Palamon and Arcyte, Com. in two parts, by 
 Richard Edwards. These are very old Pieces, being published together 
 with the Author's Songs, &c.,in 1585. The story of them is professedly 
 taken from Chaucer's celebrated poem of the Knight's Tale."
 
 30 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 is excelled decidedly only, I think, by Beaumont and 
 Fletcher — in his " Maid's Tragedy " and some parts of 
 " Philaster " in particular, and elsewhere occasionally ; 
 and perhaps by Cowper in his " Crazy Kate," and in 
 parts of his translation : such as the speeches of 
 Hecuba and Andromache. I long to know your 
 opinion of that translation. The Odyssey especially 
 is surely very Homeric. What nobler than the ap- 
 pearance of Phoebus at the beginning of the Iliad — 
 the lines ending with " Dread sounding, bounding on 
 the silver bow !" 
 
 I beg you will give me your opinion of the trans- 
 lation ; it afforded me high pleasure. As curious a 
 specimen of translation as ever fell into my hands is 
 a young man's in our office, of a French novel. What 
 in the original was literally " amiable delusions of the 
 fancy," he proposed to render "the fair frauds of the 
 imagination !" I had much trouble in licking the book 
 into any meaning at all. Yet did the knave clear 
 fifty or sixty pounds by subscription and selling the 
 copyright : the book itself not a week's work ! To- 
 day's portion of my journalising epistle has been very 
 dull and poverty-stricken. I will here end. 
 
 Tuesday Night. — - I have been drinking egg-hot 
 and smoking Oronooko, (associated circumstances, 
 which ever forcibly recall to my mind our evenings 
 and nights at the Salutation). My eyes and brain are 
 heavy and asleep, but my heart is awake ; and if 
 words came as ready as ideas, and ideas as feelings, 
 I could say ten hundred kind things. Coleridge, you 
 know not my supreme happiness at having one on 
 earth (though counties separate us) whom I can
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 31 
 
 call a friend. Remember you those tender lines of 
 Logan's? — 
 
 '&*■ 
 
 " Our broken friendships we deplore, 
 " And loves of youth that are no more ; 
 " No after-friendships e'er can raise 
 " Th' endearments of our early days, 
 " And ne'er the heart such fondness prove 
 " As when we first began to love." 
 
 I am writing at random, and half-tipsy, what you 
 may not equally understand, as you will be sober when 
 you read it ; but my sober and my half-tipsy hours 
 you are alike a sharer in. Good night. 
 
 " Then up rose our bard, like a prophet in drink, 
 
 " Craigdoroch, thou'lt soar when creation shall sink." 
 
 Burns. 
 
 Thursday. — I am now in high hopes to be able to 
 visit you, if perfectly convenient on your part, by the 
 end of next month — perhaps the last week or fort- 
 night in July. A change of scene and a change of faces 
 would do me good, even if that scene were not to be 
 Bristol, and those faces Coleridge's and his friends. 
 In the words of Terence, a little altered, Tcedet me 
 liujus quotidiani mundi, I am heartily sick of the 
 every-day scenes of life. I shall half wish you un- 
 married (don't show this to Mrs. C.) for one evening 
 only, to have the pleasure of smoking with you and 
 drinking egg-hot in some little smoky room in a pot- 
 house, for I know not yet how I shall like you in a 
 decent room and looking quite happy. My best love 
 and respects to Sara notwithstanding. 
 
 Yours sincerely, 
 
 Charles Lamb.
 
 32 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Letter VI.] July ist, 1796. 
 
 The first moment I can come I will ; but my 
 hopes of coming yet a while yet hang on a ticklish 
 thread. The coach I come by is immaterial, as I 
 shall so easily,, by your direction, find ye out. My 
 mother is grown so entirely helpless (not having any 
 use of her limbs) that Mary is necessarily confined 
 from ever sleeping out, she being her bed-fellow. She 
 thanks you though, and will accompany me in spirit. 
 Most exquisite are the lines from Withers. Your 
 own lines, introductory to your poem on " Self," run 
 smoothly and pleasurably, and I exhort you to con- 
 tinue 'em. What shall I say to your " Dactyls " ? 
 They are what you would call good per se ; but a 
 parody on some of 'em is just now suggesting itself, 
 and you shall have it rough and unlicked. I mark 
 with figures the lines parodied : — 
 
 4. — Sorely your Dactyls do drag along limp -footed. 
 
 5. — Sad is the measure that hangs a clod round 'em so. 
 
 6. — Meagre and languid, proclaiming its wretchedness. 
 
 1. — Weary, unsatisfied, not a little sick of 'em. 
 11. — Cold is my tired heart, I have no charity. 
 
 2. — Painfully travelling thus over the rugged road. 
 
 7. — O hegone, measure, half Latin, half English, then. 
 12. — Dismal your Dactyls are, God help ye, rhyming ones! 
 
 I possibly may not come this fortnight ; therefore 
 all thou hast to do is not to look for me any particular 
 day, only to write word immediately, if at any time 
 you quit Bristol, lest I come and Taffy be not at 
 home. I hope I can come in a day or two ; but young 
 Savory, of my office, is suddenly taken ill in this very 
 nick of time, and I must officiate for him till he can 
 come to work again. Had the knave gone sick, and 
 died, and putrefied, at any other time, philosophy
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 33 
 
 might have afforded one comfort; but just now I have 
 no patience with him. Quarles I am as great a 
 stranger to as I was to Withers. I wish you would 
 try and do something to bring our elder bards into 
 more general fame. I writhe with indignation when, 
 in books of criticism, where common-place quotation 
 is heaped upon quotation, I find no mention of such 
 men as Massinger, or Beaumont and Fletcher, — men 
 with whom succeeding dramatic writers (Otway alone 
 excepted) can bear no manner of comparison. Stupid 
 Knox hath noticed none of 'em among his extracts. 
 
 Thursday. — Mrs. C can scarce guess how 
 
 she has gratified me by her very kind letter and 
 sweet little poem. I feel that I should thank her in 
 rhyme ; but she must take my acknowledgment, at 
 present, in plain honest prose. The uncertainty in 
 which I yet stand, whether I can come or no, damps 
 my spirits, reduces me a degree below prosaical, and 
 keeps me in a suspense that fluctuates between hope 
 and fear. Hope is a charming, lively, blue-eyed 
 wench, and I am always glad of her company, but 
 could dispense with the visitor she brings with her — 
 her younger sister, Fear, — a white-livered, lily-cheeked, 
 bashful, palpitating, awkward hussy, that hangs, like a 
 green girl, at her sister's apron-strings, and will go with 
 her whithersoever she goes. For the life and soul of 
 me I could not improve those lines in your poem on the 
 Prince and Princess ; so I changed them to what you 
 bid me, and left 'em at Perry's. 1 I think 'em alto- 
 gether good, and do not see why you were solicitous 
 about any alteration. I have not yet seen, but will 
 
 1 Some " occasional " verses of Coleridge's, written to order for the 
 Morning Chronicle, of which paper Mr. Perry was then the proprietor. 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE 
 
 make it my business to see, to-day's Chronicle, for 
 your verses on Home Tooke. Dyer stanza'd him in 
 one of the papers t'other day; but, I think, unsuccess- 
 fully. Tooke's friends' meeting was, I suppose, a 
 dinner of condolence. 1 I am not sorry to find you 
 (for all Sara) immersed in clouds of smoke and meta- 
 physics. You know I had a sneaking kindness for 
 this last noble science, and you taught me some 
 smattering of it. I look to become no mean proficient 
 under your tuition. Coleridge, what do you mean by 
 saying you wrote to me about Plutarch and Porphyry ? 3 
 I received no such letter, nor remember a syllable of 
 the matter, yet am not apt to forget any part of your 
 epistles, least of all, an injunction like that. I will 
 cast about for 'em, tho' I am a sad hand to know 
 what books are worth, and both those worthy gentle- 
 men are alike out of my line. To-morrow I shall be 
 less suspensive, and in better cue to write; so good- 
 bye at present. 
 
 Friday Evening. — That execrable aristocrat and 
 knave, Richardson, has given me an absolute refusal of 
 leave. The poor man cannot guess at my disappoint- 
 ment. Is it not hard, " this dread dependence on the 
 low-bred mind ? " Continue to write to me tho', and I 
 must be content. Our loves and best good wishes 
 attend upon you both. Lamb. 
 
 Savory did return, but there are two or three more 
 
 1 This was just after the Westminster Election, in which Mr. Tooke 
 was defeated. 
 
 2 At a little later date, the Select Works of Porphyry were published 
 in an English garb by Thomas Taylor, the Platonist. There seems to 
 have been no English edition before Taylor's ; he gave to the works of 
 Porphyry, Proetus, Ocellus, Lucanus, &c, such popularity as they 
 were ever capable of having. What Coleridge wanted was the 
 original.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 35 
 
 ill and absent, which was the plea for refusing me. 
 I will never commit my peace of mind by depending 
 on such a wretch for a favour in future, so I shall 
 never have heart to ask for holidays again. The 
 man next him in office, Cartwright, furnished him 
 with the objections. C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter VII.] July 5, 1796. 
 
 TO SARA AND HER SAMUEL. 
 
 Was it so hard a thing? — I did but ask 
 A fleeting holiday. One little week, 
 Or haply two, had bounded my request. 
 
 What, if the jaded steer, who all day long 
 
 Had borne the heat and labour of the plough, 
 
 When evening came, and her sweet cooling hour, 
 
 Should seek to trespass on a neighbour copse, 
 
 Where greener herbage waved, or clearer streams 
 
 Invited him to slake his burning thirst, — 
 
 That man were crabbed, who should say him nay ; 
 
 That man were churlish, who should drive him thence ! 
 
 A blessing light upon your heads, ye good, 
 
 Ye hospitable pair ! I may not come, 
 
 To catch on Clifton's heights the summer gale ; 
 
 I may not come, a pilgrim, to the banks 
 
 Of Avon, lucid stream, to taste the wave 
 
 Which Shakspeare drank,i our British Helicon : 
 
 Or with mine eye intent on RedclifFe towers, 
 
 To muse in tears on that mysterious youth, 
 
 Cruelly slighted, who to London walls, 
 
 In evil hour, shaped his disastrous course. 
 
 1 Lamb must have gone to a different part ot the country to taste 
 this wave. The Avon, which flows through Warwickshire, and on 
 the banks of which is Shakspeare's native town, joins the Severn near 
 Tewkesbury. The Avon which flows through Clifton, rises near 
 Tedbury, in Gloucestershire, and enters the Channel seven miles N.W. 
 of Bristol. 
 
 D 2
 
 36 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Complaint begone! Begone, unkind reproof! 
 Take up, my song, take up a merrier strain ; 
 For yet again, and lo ! from Avon's vales 
 Another "minstrel" cometh! Youth endear' d, 
 God and good angels guide thee on thy way, 
 And gentler fortunes wait the friends I love. C. L. 
 
 Let us prose. 
 
 What can I do till you send word what priced 
 and placed house you should like ? Islington, possibly, 
 you would not like ; to me 'tis classical ground. 
 Knightsbridge is a desirable situation for the air of 
 the parks. St. George's Fields is convenient for its 
 contiguity to the Bench. Choose ! But are you really 
 coming to town ? The hope of it has entirely dis- 
 armed my petty disappointment of its nettles ; yet I 
 rejoice so much on my own account, that I fear I do 
 not feel enough pure satisfaction on yours. Why, 
 surely, the joint editorship of the [Morning] Chronicle 
 must be a very comfortable and secure living for a 
 man. But should not you read French, or do you ? 
 and can you write with sufficient moderation, as 'tis 
 called, when one suppresses the one half of what one 
 feels or could say on a subject, to chime in the better 
 with popular lukewarmness ? White's " Letters " are 
 near publication. Could you review 'em, or get 'em 
 reviewed ? Are you not connected with the Critical 
 Review ? His frontispiece is a good conceit : Sir 
 John learning to dance to please Madame Page, in 
 dress of doublet, &c, forms the upperhalf ; and modern 
 pantaloons, with shoes, &c, of the eighteenth century, 
 form the lower half; and the whole work is full of 
 goodly quips and rare fancies, " all deftly masqued 
 like hoar antiquity " — much superior to Dr. Kenrick's 
 Falstaff's Wedding, which you have seen. Allen
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 37 
 
 sometimes laughs at superstition, and religion, and 
 the like. A living fell vacant lately in the gift of the 
 Hospital : White informed him that he stood a fair 
 chance for it. He scrupled and scrupled about it, and 
 at last, to use his own words, " tampered " with Godwin 
 to know whether the thing was honest or not. Godwin 
 said nay to it, and Allen rejected the living ! Could 
 the blindest poor papist have bowed more servilely to 
 his priest or casuist ? Why sleep the Watchman's 
 answers to that Godwin ? I beg you will not delay to 
 alter, if you mean to keep, those last lines I sent you. 
 Do that, and read these for your pains : — 
 
 TO THE POET COWPER. 
 
 Cowper, I thank my God that thou art heal'd ! 
 Thine was the sorest malady of all ; 
 And I am sad to think that it should light 
 Upon thy worthy head ! But thou art heal'd, 
 And thou art yet, we trust, the destined man, 
 Born to reanimate the lyre, whose chords 
 Have slumber' d, and have idle lain so long ; 
 To the immortal sounding of whose strings 
 Did Milton frame the stately-paced verse ; 
 Among whose wires with light finger playing, 
 Our elder bard, Spenser, a gentle name, 
 The lady Muses' dearest darling child, 
 Elicited the deftest tunes yet heard 
 In hall or bower, taking the delicate ear 
 Of Sidney and his peerless Maiden Queen. 
 
 Thou, then, take up the mighty epic strain, 
 Cowper, of England's Bards, the wisest and the best. 
 
 1796. 
 
 I have read your climax of praises in those three 
 Reviews. These mighty spouters out of panegyric 
 waters have, two of 'em, scattered their spray even 
 upon me, and the waters are cooling and refreshing.
 
 38 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Prosaically, the Monthly reviewers have made indeed 
 a large article of it, and done you justice. The Critical 
 have, in their wisdom, selected not the very best 
 specimens, and notice not, except as one name on 
 the muster-roll, the Religious Musings. I suspect 
 Master Dyer to have been the writer of that article, 
 as the substance of it was the very remarks and the 
 very language he used to me one day. I fear you will 
 not accord entirely with my sentiments of Cowper, as 
 expressed above, (perhaps scarcely just ;) but the poor 
 gentleman has just recovered from his lunacies, and 
 that begets pity, and pity love, and love admiration ; 
 and then it goes hard with people, but they lie ! Have 
 you read the Ballad called " Leonora," in the second 
 Number of the Monthly Magazine ? If you have ! ! ! ! 
 There is another fine song, from the same author 
 (Burger), in the third Number, of scarce inferior 
 merit ; and (vastly below these) there are some happy 
 specimens of English hexameters, in an imitation of 
 Ossian, in the fifth Number. For your Dactyls — I am 
 sorry you are so sore about 'em — a very Sir Fretful ! 
 In good troth, the Dactyls are good Dactyls, but their 
 measure is naught. Be not yourself " half anger, half 
 agony," if I pronounce your darling lines not to be the 
 best you ever wrote — you have written much. 
 
 Have a care, good Master Poet, of the Statute de 
 Contumelid. What do you mean by calling Madame 
 Mara " harlot " and other naughty things ? * The good- 
 
 1 " I detest 
 
 These scented rooms, where, to a gaudy throng, 
 Heaves the proud harlot her distended breast 
 In intricacies of laborious song." 
 
 Lines composed by Coleridge ^ in a Concert Room.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 39 
 
 ness of the verse would not save you in a Court of Jus- 
 tice. But are you really coming to town ? Coleridge, a 
 gentleman called in London lately from Bristol, and 
 inquired whether there were any of the family of a 
 Mr. Chambers living : this Mr. Chambers, he said, 
 had been the making of a friend's fortune, who wished 
 to make some return for it. He went away without 
 seeing her. Now, a Mrs. Reynolds, a very intimate 
 friend of ours, whom you have seen at our house, is 
 the only daughter, and all that survives, of Mr. 
 Chambers ; and a very little supply would be of service 
 to her, for she married very unfortunately, and has 
 parted with her husband. 1 Pray find out this Mr. 
 Pember, (for that was the gentleman's friend's name :) . 
 he is an attorney, and lives at Bristol. Find him out, 
 and acquaint him with the circumstances of the case, 
 and offer to be the medium of supply to Mrs. Reynolds, 
 if he chooses to make her a present. She is in very 
 distressed circumstances. Mr. Pember, attorney, 
 Bristol. Mr. Chambers lived in the Temple ; Mrs. 
 Reynolds, his daughter, was my schoolmistress, and 
 is in the room at this present writing. This last cir- 
 cumstance induced me to write so soon again. I have 
 not further to add. Our loves to Sara. 
 
 Thursday. C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER VIII.] September 27th, 1796. 
 
 My dearest Friend, — White, or some of my friends, 
 or the public papers, by this time may have in- 
 
 1 Lamb afterwards allowed this lady a pension, whicff she enjoyed 
 till his death.
 
 40 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 formed you of the terrible calamities that have fallen 
 on our family. I will only give you the outlines : — 
 My poor dear, dearest sister, in a fit of insanity, has 
 been the death of her own mother. 1 I was at hand 
 only time enough to snatch the knife out of her grasp. 
 She is at present in a madhouse, from whence I fear 
 she must be moved to an hospital. God has preserved 
 to me my senses : I eat, and drink, and sleep, and 
 have my judgment, I believe, very sound. My poor 
 father was slightly wounded, and I am left to take 
 care of him and my aunt. Mr. Norris, of the Blue- 
 coat School, has been very kind to us, and we have 
 no other friend ; but, thank God, I am very calm and 
 composed, and able to do the best that remains to do. 
 Write as religious a letter as possible, but no mention 
 of what is gone and done with. With me " the former 
 things are passed away," and I have something more 
 to do than to feel. 
 
 God Almighty have us all in His keeping ! 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Mention nothing of poetry. I have destroyed 
 every vestige of past vanities of that kind. Do as 
 you please, but if you publish, publish mine (I give 
 free leave) without name or initial, and never send 
 me a book, I charge you. 
 
 Your own judgment will convince you not to take 
 any notice of this yet to your dear wife. You look 
 after your family ; I have my reason and strength left 
 
 1 A sufficiently full account of this fearful tragedy is given by Procter. 
 Miss Lamb, in her unpublished correspondence with Mrs. Hazlitt, 
 (before her iparriage,) has thrown much new light on her own sensa- 
 tions in connection with this affair and her subsequent intervals or 
 derangement.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 41 
 
 to take care of mine. I charge you, don't think of 
 coming to see me. Write. I will not see you if you 
 come. God Almighty love you and all of us ! 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER IX.] October 3 rd, 1796. 
 
 My dearest Friend, — Your letter was an ines- 
 timable treasure to me. It will be a comfort to you, 
 I know, no know that our prospects are somewhat 
 brighter. My poor dear, dearest sister, the unhappy 
 and unconscious instrument of the Almighty's judg- 
 ments on our house, is restored to her senses, — to a 
 dreadful sense and recollection of what has past, 
 awful to her mind, and impressive, (as it must be to 
 the end of life,) but tempered with religious resigna- 
 tion and the reasonings of a sound judgment, which, 
 in this early stage, knows how to distinguish between 
 a deed committed in a transient fit of frenzy and the 
 terrible guilt of a mother's murder. I have seen her. 
 I found her, this morning, calm and serene ; far, 
 very far from an indecent forgetful serenity : she has 
 a most affectionate and tender concern for what has 
 happened. Indeed, from the beginning — frightful and 
 hopeless as her disorder seemed — -I had confidence 
 enough in her strength of mind and religious principle, 
 to look forward to a time when even she might recover 
 tranquillity. God be praised, Coleridge ! wonderful 
 as it is to tell, I have never once been otherwise than 
 collected and calm ; even on the dreadful day, and in 
 the midst of the terrible scene, I preserved a tran- 
 quillity which bystanders may have construed into in- 
 difference — a tranquillity not of despair. Is it folly or
 
 42 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 sin in me to say that it was a religious principle that 
 most supported me ? I allow much to other favourable 
 circumstances. I felt that I had something else to do 
 than to regret. On that first evening my aunt was 
 lying insensible — to all appearance like one dying ; 
 my father, with his poor forehead plaistered over from 
 a wound he had received from a daughter, dearly loved 
 by him, and who loved him no less dearly; my mother 
 a dead and murdered corpse in the next room ; yet 
 was I wonderfully supported. I closed not my eyes 
 in sleep that night, but lay without terrors and with- 
 out despair. I have lost no sleep since. I had been 
 long used not to rest in things of sense, — had endea- 
 voured after a comprehension of mind, unsatisfied with 
 the " ignorant present time ;" and this kept me up. 
 I had the whole weight of the family thrown on me ; 
 for my brother, little disposed (I speak not without 
 tenderness for him) at any time to take care of old 
 age and infirmities, had now, with his bad leg, an ex- 
 emption from such duties, and I was now left alone. 
 One little incident may serve to make you understand 
 my way of managing my mind: Within a day or two 
 after the fatal one, we dressed for dinner a tongue, 
 which we had had salted for some weeks in the house. 
 As I sat down, a feeling like remorse struck me : this 
 tongue poor Mary got for me ; and can I partake of it 
 now, when she is far away ? A thought occurred and 
 relieved me : — if I give into this way of feeling, there 
 is not a chair, a room, an object in our rooms, that 
 will not awaken the keenest griefs. I must rise above 
 such weaknesses. I hope this was not want of true 
 feeling. I did not let this carry me, though, too far. 
 On the very second day (I date from the day of hor- 
 rors), as is usual in such cases, there were a matter of
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 43 
 
 twenty people, I do think, supping in our room : they 
 prevailed on me to eat with them (for to eat I never 
 refused). They were all making merry in the room ! 
 Some had come from friendship, some from busy 
 curiosity, and some from interest. I was going to 
 partake with them, when my recollection came that my 
 poor dead mother was lying in the next room — the 
 very next room ; — a mother who, through life, wished 
 nothing but her children's welfare. Indignation, the 
 rage of grief, something like remorse, rushed upon 
 my mind. In an agony of emotion I found my way 
 mechanically to the adjoining room, and fell on my 
 knees by the side of her coffin, asking forgiveness of 
 Heaven, and sometimes of her, for forgetting her so 
 soon. Tranquillity returned, and it was the only vio- 
 lent emotion that mastered me. I think it did me good. 
 I mention these things because I hate conceal- 
 ment, and love to give a faithful journal of what 
 passes within me. Our friends have been very good. 
 Sam Le Grice, who was then in town, was with me 
 the first three or four days, and was as a brother to 
 me ; gave up every hour of his time, to the very hurting 
 of his health and spirits, in constant attendance and 
 humouring my poor father ; talked with him, read to 
 him, played at cribbage with him, (for so short is the 
 old man's recollection, that he was playing at cards, 
 as though nothing had happened, while the coroner's 
 inquest was sitting over the way !) Samuel wept 
 tenderly when he went away, for his mother wrote 
 him a very severe letter on his loitering so long in 
 town, and he was forced to go. Mr. Norris, of 
 Christ's Hospital, has been as a father to me — Mrs. 
 Norris as a mother; though we had few claims on 
 them. A gentleman, brother to my godmother, from
 
 44 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 whom we never had right or reason to expect any 
 such assistance, sent my father twenty pounds ; and 
 to crown all these God's blessings to our family at 
 such a time, an old lady, a cousin of my father and 
 aunt's, a gentlewoman of fortune, is to take my aunt 
 and make her comfortable for the short remainder of 
 her days. My aunt is recovered, and as well as ever, 
 and highly pleased at thoughts of going — and has 
 generously given up the interest of her little money 
 (which was formerly paid my father for her board) 
 wholely and solely to my sister's use. Reckoning 
 this, we have, Daddy and I, for our two selves and an 
 old maid-servant to look after him, when I am out, 
 which will be* necessary, 170Z. (or 1S0I. rather) a-year, 
 out of which we can spare 50^. or 60I. at least for 
 Mary while she stays at Islington, where she must 
 and shall stay during her father's life, for his and her 
 comfort. I know John will make speeches about it, 
 but she shall not go into an hospital. The good lady 
 of the madhouse, and her daughter, an elegant, sweet- 
 behaved young lady, love her, and are taken with her 
 amazingly ; and I know from her own mouth she 
 loves them, and longs to be with them as much. Poor 
 thing, they say she was but the other morning saying, 
 she knew she must go to Bethlem for life ; that one 
 of her brothers would have it so, but the other would 
 wish it not, but be obliged to go with the stream ; 
 that she had often as she passed Bethlem thought it 
 likely, " here it may be my fate to end my days," 
 conscious of a certain flightiness in her poor head 
 oftentimes, and mindful of more than one severe 
 illness of that nature before. A legacy of 100/., which 
 my father will have at Christmas, and this 20I. I men- 
 tioned before, with what is in the house, will much
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 45 
 
 more than set us clear. If my father, an old servant- 
 maid, and I, can't live, and live comfortably, on 130L 
 or 120I. a-year, we ought to burn by slow fires ; and 
 I almost would, that Mary might not go into an 
 hospital. Let me not leave one unfavourable impres- 
 sion on your mind respecting my brother. Since this 
 has happened, he has been very kind and brotherly ; 
 but I fear for his mind : he has taken his ease in the 
 world, and is not fit himself to struggle with difficulties, 
 nor has much accustomed himself to throw himself 
 into their way ; and \ know his language is already, 
 " Charles, you must take care of yourself: you must 
 not abridge yourself of a single pleasure you have 
 been used to," &c, &c, and in that style of talking. 
 But you, a Necessarian, can respect a difference of 
 mind, and love what is amiable in a character not 
 perfect. He has been very good ; but I fear for his 
 mind. Thank God, I can unconnect myself with 
 him, and shall manage all my father's moneys in 
 future myself, if I take charge of Daddy, which poor 
 John has not even hinted a wish, at any future time 
 even, to share with me. The lady at this madhouse 
 assures me that I may dismiss immediately both 
 doctor and apothecary, retaining occasionally a com- 
 posing draught or so for a while ; and there is a less 
 expensive establishment in her house, where she will 
 only not have a room and nurse to herself, for 50/. or 
 guineas a-year — the outside would be 60I. You know, 
 by economy, how much more even I shall be able to 
 spare for her comforts. She will I fancy, if she stays, 
 make one of the family, rather than of the patients; 
 and the old and young ladies I like exceedingly, and 
 she loves them dearly ; and they, as the saying is, take 
 to her very extraordinarily, if it is extraordinary that
 
 46 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 people who see my sister should love her. Of all the 
 people I ever saw in the world, my poor sister was 
 most and thoroughly devoid of the least tincture of 
 selfishness. I will enlarge upon her qualities, poor 
 dear, dearest soul, in a future letter, for my own com- 
 fort, for I understand her thoroughly ; and, if I mis- 
 take not, in the most trying situation that a human 
 being can be found in, she will be found — (I speak not 
 with sufficient humility, I fear,) but, humanly and 
 foolishly speaking, she will be found, I trust, uni- 
 formly great and amiable. God keep her in her 
 present mind ! — to whom be thanks and praise for all 
 His dispensations to mankind. C. Lamb. 
 
 These mentioned good fortunes and change of 
 prospects had almost brought my mind over to the 
 extreme, the very opposite to despair. I was in 
 danger of making myself too happy. Your letter 
 brought me back to a view of things which I had 
 entertained from the beginning. I hope (for Mary I 
 can answer) — but I hope that i" shall through life 
 never have less recollection nor a fainter impression 
 of what has happened than I have now. 'Tis not a 
 light thing, nor meant by the Almighty to be received 
 lightly. I must be serious, circumspect, and deeply 
 religious through life ; and by such means may both 
 of us escape madness in future, if it so please the 
 Almighty. 
 
 Send me word how it fares with Sara. I repeat 
 it, your letter was, and will be, an inestimable treasure 
 to me. You have a view of what my situation demands 
 of me, like my own view, and I trust a just one. 
 
 Coleridge, continue to write ; but do not for ever 
 offend me by talking of sending me cash. Sincerely, 
 and on my soul, we do not want it. God love you 
 both!
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE 47 
 
 I will write again very soon. Do you write 
 directly. 
 
 LETTER X.] October 17th, 1796. 
 
 My dearest Friend, — I grieve from my very soul 
 to observe you, in your plans of life, veering about 
 from this hope to the other, and settling nowhere. 
 Is it an untoward fatality (speaking humanly) that 
 does this for you — a stubborn, irresistible concurrence 
 of events ? or lies the fault, as I fear it does, in your 
 own mind ? You seem to be taking up splendid 
 schemes of fortune only to lay them down again ; and 
 your fortunes are an ignis fatuus that has been con- 
 ducting you, in thought, from Lancaster Court, Strand, 
 to somewhere near Matlock ; then jumping across to 
 Dr. Somebody's, whose son's tutor you were likely to 
 be ; and would to God the dancing demon may con- 
 duct you at last, in peace and comfort, to the " life and 
 labours of a cottager." 1 You see, from the above awk- 
 ward playfulness of fancy, that my spirits are not 
 quite depressed. I should ill deserve God's blessings, 
 which, since the late terrible event, have come down 
 in mercy upon us, if I indulged regret or querulous- 
 ness. Mary continues serene and cheerful. I have 
 not by me a little letter she wrote to me ; for, though 
 I see her almost every day, yet we delight to write to 
 one another, for we can scarce see each other but in 
 company with some of the people of the house. 
 
 I have not the letter by me, but will quote from me- 
 mory what she wrote in it : "I have no bad terrifying 
 
 1 Which it did, for some time at least; Coleridge settled at Nether 
 Stowey, neat Bridgewater.
 
 48 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 dreams. At midnight, when I happen to awake, the 
 nurse sleeping by the side of me, with the noise of the 
 poor mad people around me, I have no fear. The 
 spirit of my mother seems to descend and smile upon 
 me, and bid me live to enjoy the life and reason which 
 the Almighty has given me. I shall see her again in 
 heaven : she will then understand me better. My 
 grandmother, too, will understand me better, and will 
 then say no more, as she used to do, ' Polly, what are 
 those poor crazy moythered brains of yours thinking 
 of always ?' " Poor Mary ! my mother indeed never 
 understood her right. She loved her, as she loved us 
 all, with a mother's love ; but in opinion, in feeling, 
 and sentiment, and disposition, bore so distant a re- 
 semblance to her daughter, that she never understood 
 her right ; never could believe how much she loved 
 her ; but met her caresses, her protestations of filial 
 affection too frequently with coldness and repulse. 
 Still she was a good mother. God forbid I should 
 think of her but most respectfully, most affectionately. 
 Yet she would always love my brother above Mary, 
 who was not worthy of one-tenth of that affection 
 which Mary had a right to claim. But it is my sister's 
 gratifying recollection that every act of duty and of 
 love she could pay, every kindness, (and I speak 
 true, when I say to the hurting of her health, and, 
 most probably, in great part to the derangement of 
 her senses,) through a long course of infirmities and 
 sickness, she could show her, she ever did. I will, 
 some day, as I promised, enlarge to you upon my 
 sister's excellences : 'twill seem like exaggeration ; 
 but I will do it. At present, short letters suit my 
 state of mind best. So take my kindest wishes for 
 your comfort and establishment in life, and for Sara's
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 49 
 
 welfare and comforts with you! God love you ! God 
 love us all ! 
 
 C. Lamb, 
 
 Letter XL] October 24th, 1796. 
 
 Coleridge, I feel myself much your debtor for that 
 spirit of confidence and friendship which dictated 
 your last letter. May your soul find peace at last in 
 your cottage life ! I only wish you were but settled. 
 Do continue to write to me. I read your letters with 
 my sister, and they give us both abundance of delight. 
 Especially they please us when you talk in a re- 
 ligious strain : not but we are offended occasionally 
 with a certain freedom of expression, a certain air of 
 mysticism, more consonant to the conceits of pagan 
 philosophy than consistent with the humility of 
 genuine piety. To instance now, in your last letter 
 you say, " It is by the press that God hath given finite 
 spirits', both evil and good, (I suppose you mean 
 simply bad men and good men,) a portion as it were 
 of His Omnipresence !" Now, high as the human 
 intellect comparatively will soar, and wide as its 
 influence, malign or salutary, can extend, is there not, 
 Coleridge, a distance between the Divine Mind and it, 
 which makes such language blasphemy ? Again, in 
 3'our first fine consolatory epistle, you say, " you are 
 a temporary sharer in human misery, that you may be 
 an eternal partaker of the Divine Nature." What 
 more than this do those men say who are for exalting 
 the man Christ Jesus into the second person of an 
 unknown Trinity ? — men whom you or I scruple not to 
 call idolaters. Man, full of imperfections at best, 
 vol. 1. E
 
 50 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 and subject to wants which momentarily remind him 
 of dependence ; man,, a weak and ignorant being, 
 " servile " from his birth "to all the skiey influences," 
 with eyes sometimes open to discern the right path, 
 but a head generally too dizzy to pursue it ; man, in 
 the pride of speculation, forgetting his nature, and 
 hailing in himself the future God, must make the 
 angels laugh. Be not angry with me Coleridge : I 
 wish not to cavil ; I know I cannot instruct you ; I 
 only wish to remind you of that humility which best 
 becometh the Christian character. God, in the New 
 Testament, (our best guide,) is represented to us in 
 the kind, condescending, amiable, familiar light of a 
 parent ; and in my poor mind 'tis best for us so to 
 consider of him, as our heavenly father, and our best 
 friend, without indulging too bold conceptions of his 
 nature. Let us learn to think humbly of ourselves, 
 and rejoice in the appellation of " dear children," 
 "brethren," and "co-heirs with Christ of the pro- 
 mises," seeking to know no further. 
 
 I am not insensible, indeed I am not, of the value 
 of that first letter of yours, and I shall find reason to 
 thank you for it again and again, long after that blemish 
 in it is forgotten. It will be a fine lesson of comfort 
 to us, whenever we read it ; and read it we often shall, 
 Mary and I. 
 
 Accept our loves and best kind wishes for the 
 welfare of yourself and wife and little one. Nor let 
 me forget to wish you joy on your birth-day, so lately 
 past ;. I thought you had been older. My kind thanks 
 and remembrances to Lloyd. 
 
 God love us all ! — and may He continue to be the 
 father and the friend of the whole human race ! 
 
 Sunday Evening. C. LAMB.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 51 
 
 Letter XII.] Oct. 28, 1796. 
 
 My dear friend, I am not ignorant that to be "a 
 partaker of the Divine Nature" is a phrase to be met 
 with in Scripture : I am only apprehensive, lest we in 
 these latter days, tinctured (some of us perhaps pretty 
 deeply) with mystical notions and the pride of meta- 
 physics, might be apt to affix to such phrases a 
 meaning, which the primitive users of them, the sim- 
 ple fishermen of Galilee for instance, never intended 
 to convey. With that other part of your apology I 
 am not quite so well satisfied. You seem to me to 
 have been straining your comparing faculties to bring 
 together things infinitely distant and unlike, — the 
 feeble narrow-sphered operations of the human in- 
 tellect and the everywhere diffused mind of Deity, the 
 peerless wisdom of Jehovah. Even the expression ap- 
 pears to me inaccurate — " portion of Omnipresence." 
 Omnipresence is an attribute the very essence of which 
 is unlimitedness. How can Omnipresence be affirmed 
 of any thing in part ? But enough of this spirit of 
 disputatiousness. Let us attend to the proper business 
 of human life, and talk a little together respecting our 
 domestic concerns. Do you continue to make me 
 acquainted with what you are doing, and how soon 
 you are likely to be settled, once for all. 
 
 I have satisfaction in being able to bid you rejoice 
 with me in my sister's continued reason, and com- 
 posedness of mind. Let us both be thankful for it. 
 I continue to visit her very frequently, and the people 
 of the house are vastly indulgent to her. She is likely 
 to be as comfortably situated in all respects as those 
 who pay twice or thrice the sum. They love her, and 
 she loves them, and makes herself very useful to them. 
 Benevolence sets out on her journey with a good 
 
 e 2
 
 52 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 heart, and puts a good face on it, but is apt to limp 
 and grow feeble, unless she calls in the aid of self- 
 interest, by way of crutch. In Mary's case, as far as 
 respects those she is with, 'tis well that these prin- 
 ciples are so likely to co-operate. I am rather at a 
 loss sometimes for books for her : our reading is 
 somewhat confined, and we have nearly exhausted 
 our London library. She has her hands too full of 
 work to read much ; but a little she must read, for 
 reading was her daily bread. 
 
 Have you seen Bowles's new poem on " Hope?" 
 What character does it bear? Has he exhausted his 
 stores of tender plaintiveness ? or is he the same in 
 this last as in all his former pieces ? The duties of 
 the day call me off from this pleasant intercourse with 
 my friend : so for the present adieu. 
 
 Now for the truant borrowing of a few minutes from 
 business. Have you met with a new poem called the 
 Pursuits of Literature ? From the extracts in the 
 British Review I judge it to be a very humourous thing. 
 In particular I remember what I thought a very happy 
 character of Dr. Darwin's poetry. Among all your 
 quaint readings did you ever light upon Walton's 
 Complete Angler? I asked you the question once 
 before : it breathes the very spirit of innocence, purity, 
 and simplicity of heart. There are many choice old 
 verses interspersed in it. It would sweeten a man's 
 temper at any time to read it ; it would Christianise 
 every discordant angry passion. Pray make yourself 
 acquainted with it. Have you made it up with 
 Southey yet ? Surely one of you two must have been 
 a very silly fellow, and the other not much better, to 
 fall out like boarding-school misses. Kiss, shake 
 hands, and make it up.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 53 
 
 When will he be delivered of his new epic ? 
 Madoc, I think, is to be the name of it ; though that 
 is a name not familiar to my ears. What progress 
 do you make in your hymns ? What Review are 
 you connected with ? If with any, why do you delay 
 to notice White's book ? You are justly offended at 
 its profaneness ; but surely you have undervalued its 
 wit, or you would have been more loud in its praises. 
 Do not you think that in Slenders death and madness 
 there is most exquisite humour, mingled with tender- 
 ness, that is irresistible, truly Shakspearian ? Be 
 more full in your mention of it. Poor fellow, he has 
 (very undeservedly) lost by it; nor do I see that it is 
 likely ever to reimburse him the charge of printing, &c. 
 Give it a lift, if you can. I suppose you know that 
 Allen's wife is dead, and he, just situated as he was, 
 never the better, as the worldly people say, for her 
 death, her money with her children being taken off 
 his hands. I am just now wondering whether you 
 will ever come to town again, Coleridge ; 'tis among 
 the things I dare not hope, but can't help wishing. 
 For myself, I can live in the midst of town luxury and 
 superfluity, and not long for them, and I can't see 
 why your children might not hereafter do the same. 
 Remember, you are not in Arcadia when you are in 
 the west of England, and they may catch infection 
 from the world without visiting the metropolis. But 
 you seem to have set your heart upon this same 
 cottage plan; and God prosper you in the experiment ! 
 I am at a loss for more to write about ; so 'tis as well 
 that I am arrived at the bottom of my paper. 
 
 God love you, Coleridge ! — Our best loves and 
 tenderest wishes await on you, your Sara, and your 
 little one. C. L.
 
 54 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Letter XIII.] Nov - 8 ' J ^ 6 
 
 My brother, my friend, — I am distress'd for you, 
 believe me I am ; not so much for your painful, 
 troublesome complaint, which, I trust, is only for a 
 time, as for those anxieties which brought it on, and 
 perhaps even now may be nursing its malignity. Tell 
 me, dearest of my friends, is your mind at peace ? or 
 has any thing, yet unknown to me, happened to give 
 you fresh disquiet, and steal from you all the pleasant 
 dreams of future rest ? Are you still (I fear you are) 
 far from being comfortably settled ? Would to God it 
 were in my power to contribute towards the bringing 
 of you into the haven where you would be ! But you 
 are too well skilled in the philosophy of consolation 
 to need my humble tribute of advice. In pain, and in 
 sickness, and in all manner of disappointments, I 
 trust you have that within you which shall speak 
 peace to your mind. Make it, I entreat you, one of 
 your puny comforts, that I feel for you, and share all 
 your griefs with you. I feel as if I were troubling 
 you about little things, now I am going to resume 
 the subject of our last two letters ; but it may divert us 
 both from unpleasanter feelings to make such matters, 
 in a manner, of importance. Without further apology, 
 then, it was not that I did not relish, that I did not in 
 my heart thank you for those little pictures of your 
 feelings which you lately sent me, if I neglected to 
 mention them. You may remember you had said 
 much the same things before to me on the same 
 subject in a former letter, and I considered those last 
 verses as only the identical thoughts better clothed ; 
 either way (in prose or verse) such poetry must be 
 welcome to me. I love them as I love the Confessions
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 55 
 
 of Rousseau, and for the same reason : the same 
 frankness, the same openness of heart, the same dis- 
 closure of all the most hidden and delicate affections 
 of the mind. They make me proud to be thus esteemed 
 worthy of the place of friend-confessor, brother-con- 
 fessor, to a man like Coleridge. This last is, I ac- 
 knowledge, language too high for friendship ; but it is 
 also, I declare, too sincere for flattery. Now, to put 
 on stilts, and talk magnificently about trifles, — I con- 
 descend, then, to your counsel, Coleridge, and allow 
 my first Sonnet (sick to death am I to make mention 
 of my Sonnets, and I blush to be so taken up with 
 them, indeed I do) ; I allow it to run thus : Fairy 
 Land, &c. &c, as I last wrote it. 
 
 The Fragments 1 I now send you, I want printed 
 to get rid of 'em ; for, while they stick burr-like to my 
 memory, they tempt me to go on with the idle trade 
 of versifying, which I long (most sincerely I speak it) 
 I long to leave off, for it is unprofitable to. my soul; 
 I feel it is ; and these questions about words, and de- 
 bates about alterations, take me off, I am conscious, 
 from the properer business of my life. Take my 
 Sonnets, once for all ; and do not propose any re- 
 amendments, or mention them again in any shape to 
 me, I charge you. I blush that my mind can consider 
 them as things of any worth. And, pray, admit or 
 reject these fragments as you like or dislike them, 
 without ceremony. Call 'era Sketches, Fragments, or 
 
 1 These were the Curious Fragments, printed among the Works 
 infra. Burton, author of the Anatomy of Melancholy, was a youthful 
 love of Charles Lamb's ; and his book was one of Elia's early acqui- 
 sitions. It was a copy of the First Edition, printed at Oxford, 1621, 
 4to., and a very bad copy. The binder had sliced the Lamb cruelly 
 away from the title, leaving only the Christian name of the owner.
 
 56 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 what you will ; but do not entitle any of my things 
 Love Sonnets, as I told you to call 'em ; 'twill only 
 make me look little in my own eyes ; for it is a passion 
 of which I retain nothing. 'Twas a weakness, concern- 
 ing which I may say, in the words of Petrarch (whose 
 Life is now open before me), " if it drew me out of 
 some vices, it also prevented the growth of many 
 virtues, filling me with the love of the creature rather 
 than the Creator, which is .the death of the soul." 
 Thank God, the folly has left me for ever. Not even a 
 review of my love verses renews one wayward wish 
 in me ; and if I am at all solicitous to trim 'em out in 
 their best apparel, it is because they are to make their 
 appearance in good company. Now to my fragments. 
 Lest you have lost my " Grandame," she shall be one. 
 'Tis among the few verses I ever wrote : that to Mary 
 is another, which profit me inthe recollection. God love 
 her ! — and may we two never love each other less ! 
 
 These, Coleridge, are the few sketches I have 
 thought worth preserving. How will they relish thus 
 detached ? Will you reject all or any of them ? They 
 are thine: do whatsoever thou listest with them. My 
 eyes ache with writing long and late, and I wax 
 wondrous sleepy. God bless you and yours, me and 
 mine ! Good night. C. Lamb. 
 
 I will keep my eyes open reluctantly a minute 
 longer to tell you that I love you for those simple, 
 tender, heart-flowing lines with which you conclude 
 your last, and in my eyes best, "Sonnet " (so you call 
 'em)— 
 
 r So, for the mother's sake, the child was dear; 
 "And dearer was the mother for the child." 
 
 Cultivate simplicity, Coleridge ; or rather, I should 
 say, banish elaborateness ; for simplicity springs
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 57 
 
 spontaneous from the heart, and carries into daylight 
 its own modest buds, and genuine, sweet, and 
 clear flowers of expression. I allow no hot-beds in 
 the gardens of Parnassus. I am unwilling to go to 
 bed, and leave my sheet unfilled, (a good piece of 
 night-work for an idle body like me,) so will finish 
 with begging you to send me the earliest account of 
 your complaint, its progress, or (as I hope to God you 
 will be able to send me) the tale of your recovery, or 
 at least amendment. My tenderest remembrances to 
 
 your Sara 
 
 Once more, Good night. 
 
 Letter XIV.] Nov. 14, 1796. 
 
 Coleridge, I love you for dedicating your poetry 
 to Bowles. Genius of the sacred fountain of tears, it 
 was he who led you gently by the hand through all 
 this valley of weeping; showed you the dark green 
 yew trees, and the willow shades, where, by the fall 
 of waters, you might indulge an uncomplaining melan- 
 choly, a delicious regret for the past, or weave fine 
 visions of that awful future, 
 
 " When all the vanities of life's brief day 
 
 " Oblivion's hurrying hand hath swept away, 
 
 " And all its sorrows, at the awful blast 
 
 " Of the archangel's trump, are but as shadows past." 
 
 I have another sort of dedication in my head for 
 my few things, which I want to know if you approve 
 of, and can insert. I mean to inscribe them to my 
 sister. It will be unexpected, and it will give her 
 pleasure ; or do you think it will look whimsical at 
 all ? As I have not spoke to her about it, I can easily
 
 58 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 reject the idea. But there is a monotony in the affec- 
 tions, which people living together, or, as we do now, 
 very frequently seeing each other, are apt to give in 
 to ; a sort of indifference in the expression of kindness 
 for each other, which demands that we should some- 
 times call to our aid the trickery of surprise. Do you 
 publish with Lloyd, or without him ? In either case 
 my little portion may come last ; and after the fashion 
 of orders to a country correspondent, I will give direc- 
 tions how I should like to have 'em done. The title- 
 page to stand thus : — 
 
 POEMS, 
 
 CHIEFLY LOVE SONNETS, 
 
 BY 
 
 CHARLES LAMB, OF THE INDIA HOUSE. 
 
 Under this title the following motto, which, for 
 want of room, I put over leaf, and desire you to insert, 
 whether you like it or no. May not a gentleman 
 choose what arms, mottoes, or armorial bearings the 
 Herald will give him leave, without consulting his re- 
 publican friend, who might advise none ? May not a 
 publican put up the sign of the Saracen's Head, even 
 though his undiscerning neighbour should prefer, as 
 more genteel, the Cat and Gridiron ? 
 
 [Motto.] 
 
 " This beauty, in the blossom of my youth, 
 
 " When my first fire knew no adulterate incense, 
 
 " Nor I no way to flatter but my fondness, 
 
 " In the best language my true tongue could tell me, 
 
 " And all the broken sighs my sicK heart lend me, 
 
 " I sued and served. Long did I love this lady." — Massinger.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 59 
 
 THE DEDICATION. 
 
 THE FEW FOLLOWING POEMS, 
 
 CREATURES OF THE FANCY AND THE FEELING 
 
 IN LIFE'S MORE VACANT HOURS, 
 
 PRODUCED, FOR THE MOST PART, BY 
 
 LOVE IN IDLENESS, 
 
 ARE, 
 
 WITH ALL A BROTHER'S FONDNESS, 
 
 INSCRIBED TO 
 
 MARY ANNE LAMB, 
 
 THE AUTHOR'S BEST FRIEND AND SISTER. 
 
 This is the pomp and paraphernalia of parting, 
 with which I take my leave of a passion which has 
 reigned so royally (so long) within me ; thus, with its > 
 trappings of laureatship, I fling it off, pleased and 
 satisfied with myself that the weakness troubles me 
 no longer. I am wedded, Coleridge, to the fortunes 
 of my sister, and my poor old father. Oh, my friend ! 
 I think sometimes, could I recall the days that are 
 past, which among them should I choose ? not those 
 " merrier days," not the " pleasant days of hope," not 
 "those wanderings with a fair-hair'd maid," which I 
 have so" often and so feelingly regretted, but the days, 
 Coleridge, of a mother's fondness for her school-boy. 
 What would I give to call her back to earth for one 
 day ! — on my knees to ask her pardon for all those little 
 asperities of temper which, from time to time, have 
 given her gentle spirit pain !— and the day, my friend, 
 I trust, will come. There will be " time enough " for 
 kind offices of love, if " Heaven's eternal year " be ours. 
 Hereafter, her meek spirit shall not reproach me. Oh, 
 my friend, cultivate the filial feelings ! and let no man
 
 60 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 think himself released from the kind " charities " of re- 
 lationship : these shall give him peace at the last; 
 these are the best foundation for every species of 
 benevolence. I rejoice to hear, by certain channels, 
 that you, my friend, are reconciled with all your rela- 
 tions. 'Tis the most kindly and natural species of 
 love, and we have all the associated train of early 
 feelings to secure its strength and perpetuity. Send 
 me an account of your health : indeed I am solicitous 
 about you. God love you and yours. C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER XV.] December 2, 1796. 
 
 I have delayed writing thus long, not having by 
 me my copy of your poems, which I had- lent. I am 
 not satisfied with all your intended omissions. Why 
 omit 40, 63, 84 ? Above all, let me protest strongly 
 against your rejecting the " Complaint of Ninathoma," 
 86. The words, I acknowledge, are Ossian's, but you 
 have added to them the " music of Caril." If a vica- 
 rious substitute be wanting, sacrifice (and 'twill be a 
 piece of self-denial too), the " Epitaph on an Infant," 
 of which its author seems so proud, so tenacious. 
 Or, if your heart be set on perpetuating the four-line 
 wonder,* I'll tell you what do ; sell the copyright of it 
 at once to a country statuary. Commence in this 
 manner Death's prime poet-laureate; and let your 
 
 1 This is the four-line epitaph which Lamb alludes to : — 
 
 "Ere Sin could blight or Sorrow fade, 
 
 " Death came with friendly care 
 "The opening bud to Heaven convey'd, 
 
 "And bade it blossom there."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE, 6l 
 
 verses be adopted in every village round, instead of 
 those hitherto famous ones : — 
 
 " Afflictions sore long time I bore ; 
 " Physicians were in vain." 
 
 I have seen your last very beautiful poem in the 
 Monthly Magazine : write thus, and you most gene- 
 rally have written thus, and I shall never quarrel with 
 you about simplicity. With regard to my lines — 
 
 " Laugh all that weep," &c, 
 
 I would willingly sacrifice them ; but my portion of the 
 volume is so ridiculously little, that, in honest truth, I 
 can't spare 'em. As things are, I have very slight pre- 
 tensions to participate in the title-page. White's book 
 is at length reviewed in the Monthly ; was it your doing, 
 or Dyer's, to whom I sent him ? — or, rather, do you not 
 write in the Critical ? — for I observed, in an article 
 of this month's, a line quoted out of that Sonnet on 
 Mrs. Siddons, 
 
 " With eager wondering, and perturb'd delight." 
 
 And a line from that Sonnet would not readily have 
 occurred to a stranger. That sonnet, Coleridge, 
 brings afresh to my mind the time when you wrote 
 those on Bowles, Priestley, Burke ; — 'twas two Christ- 
 mases ago, and in that nice little smoky room at the 
 Salutation, which is even now continually presenting 
 itself to my recollection, with all its associated train of 
 pipes, tobacco, egg-hot, welsh-rabbit, metaphysics, 
 and poetry. — Are we never to meet again ? How 
 differently I am circumstanced now ! I have never 
 met with any one — never shall meet with any one — 
 who could or can compensate me for the loss of your
 
 62 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 society. I have no one to talk all these matters about 
 to ; I lack friends. I lack books to supply their ab- 
 sence : but these complaints ill become me. Let me 
 compare my present situation, prospects, and state of 
 mind, with what they were but two months back — 
 Dut two months ! O my friend, I am in danger of 
 forgetting the awful lessons then presented to me ! 
 Remind me of them ; remind me of my duty ! Talk 
 seriously with me when you do write ! I thank you, 
 from my heart I thank you, for your solicitude about 
 my sister. She is quite well, but must not, I fear, 
 come to live with us yet a good while. In the first 
 place, because, at present, it would hurt her, and hurt 
 my father, for them to be together : secondly, from a 
 regard to the world's good report ; for, I fear, tongues 
 will be busy whenever that event takes place. Some 
 have hinted, one man has pressed it on me, that she 
 should be in perpetual confinement : what she hath 
 done to deserve, or the necessity of such an hardship, 
 I see not ; do you ? I am starving at the India 
 House, — near seven o'clock without my dinner ; and 
 so it has been, and will be, almost all the week. I 
 get home at night o'erwearied, quite faint, and then 
 to cards with my father, who will not let me enjoy 
 a meal in peace ; but I must conform to my situa- 
 tion : and I hope I am, for the most part, not un- 
 thankful. 
 
 I am got home at last, and, after repeated games 
 at cribbage, have got my father's leave to write 
 awhile : with difficulty got it, for when I expostulated 
 about playing any more, he very aptly replied, " If you 
 won't play with me, you might as well not come 
 home at all." The argument was unanswerable, and 
 I set to afresh. I told you I do not approve of your
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 63 
 
 omissions ; neither do I quite coincide with you in 
 your arrangements. I have not time to point out a 
 better, and I suppose some self-associations of your 
 own have determined their place as they now stand. 
 Your beginning, indeed, with the Joan of Arc lines 
 I coincide entirely with. I love a splendid outset — 
 a magnificent portico ; and the diapason is grand. 
 When I read the Religious Musings, I think how 
 poor, how unelevated, unoriginal, my blank verse is 
 — "Laugh all that weep," especially, where the subject 
 demanded a grandeur of conception ; and I ask what 
 business they have among yours ? but friendship 
 covereth a multitude of defects. I want some 
 loppings made in the " Chatterton :" it wants but a 
 little to make it rank among the finest irregular lyrics 
 I ever read. Have you time and inclination to go to 
 work upon it ? — or is it too late ? — or do you think it 
 needs none ? Don't reject those verses in your 
 Watchman, "Dear native brook," &c; nor I think 
 those last lines you sent me, in which " all effortless " 
 is without doubt to be preferred to " inactive." If I am 
 writing more than ordinarily dully, 'tis that , I am 
 stupified with a tooth-ache. Hang it ! do not omit 48, 
 52, and 53 : what you do retain, though, call Sonnets, 
 for heaven's sake, and not Effusions. Spite of your 
 ingenious anticipation of ridicule in your Preface, 
 the last five lines of 50 are too good to be lost ; the 
 rest are not much worth. My tooth becomes importu- 
 nate : I must finish. Pray, pray, write to me : if you 
 knew with what an anxiety of joy I open such a long 
 packet as you last sent me, you would not grudge 
 giving a few minutes now and then to this intercourse 
 (the only intercourse I fear we two shall ever have) 
 — this conversation with your friend : such I boast to
 
 64 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 be called. God love you and yours ! Write to me when 
 you move, lest I should direct wrong. Has Sara no 
 poems to publish? Those lines, 129, are probably 
 too light for the volume where the Religious Musings 
 are ; but I remember some very beautiful lines, ad- 
 dressed by somebody at Bristol to somebody in Lon- 
 don. God bless you once more. Thursday Night. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER XVI.] [Fragment.] Dec. 5, 1796.1 
 
 At length I have done with verse-making ; not 
 that I relish other people's poetry less : their's comes 
 from 'em without effort ; mine is the difficult operation 
 of a brain scanty of ideas, made more difficult by dis- 
 use. I have been reading "The Task" with fresh 
 delight. I am glad you love Cowper. I could 
 forgive a man for not enjoying Milton ; but I would 
 not call that man my friend who should be offended 
 with the " divine chit-chat of Cowper." Write to me, 
 God love you and yours ! C. L. 
 
 Letter XVII.] Dec - 10 > H9 6 - 
 
 I had put my letter into the post rather hastily, 
 not expecting to have to acknowledge another from 
 you so soon. This morning's present has made me 
 
 1 With this letter Lamb transmitted to Coleridge two poems for the 
 volume — one a copy of verses "To a Young Lady going out to India," 
 which were not inserted, and are not worthy of preservation ; the other, 
 entitled, "The Tomb of Douglas," which was inserted, and which he 
 chiefly valued as a memorial of his impression of Mrs. Siddons's acting 
 in Lady Randolph.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 65 
 
 alive again. My last night's epistle was childishly 
 querulous ; but you have put a little life into me, and 
 I will thank you for your remembrance of me, while 
 my sense of it is yet warm ; for if I linger a day or 
 two I may use the same phrase of acknowledgment, 
 or similar, but the feeling that dictates it now will be 
 gone. I shall send you a caput mortuiun, not a cor 
 vivens. Thy Watchman's, thy bellman's verses, I do 
 retort upon thee, thou libellous varlet ! Why you cried 
 the hours yourself, and who made you so proud ! 
 But I submit, to show my humility most implicitly to 
 your dogmas. I reject entirely the copy of verses you 
 reject. With regard to my leaving off versifying, you 
 have said so many pretty things, so many fine compli- 
 ments, ingeniously decked out in the garb of sincerity, 
 and undoubtedly springing from a present feeling 
 somewhat like sincerity, that you might melt the most 
 un-muse-ical soul — did you not (now for a Rowland 
 compliment for your profusion of Olivers !) did you 
 not in your very epistle, by the many pretty fancies 
 and profusion of heart displayed in it, dissuade and 
 discourage me from attempting any thing after you. 
 At present I have not leisure to make verses, nor any 
 thing approaching to a fondness for the exercise. In 
 the ignorant present time, who can answer for the 
 future man? "At lovers' perjuries Jove laughs;" 
 and poets have sometimes a disingenuous way of for- 
 swearing their occupation. This though is not my 
 case. The tender cast of soul, sombred with melan- 
 choly and subsiding recollections, is favourable to the 
 Sonnet or the Elegy ; but from 
 
 " The sainted growing woof 
 
 " The teasing troubles keep aloof." 
 
 The music of poesy may charm for a while the im- 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 66 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 portunate teasing cares of life ; but the teased and 
 troubled man is not in a disposition to make that 
 music. 
 
 You sent me some very sweet lines relative to Burns, 
 but it was at a time when in my highly agitated 
 and perhaps somewhat distorted state of mind I 
 thought it a duty to read 'em hastily and burn 'em. 
 I burned all my own verses ; all my book of extracts 
 from Beaumont and Fletcher and a thousand sources : 
 I burned a little journal of my foolish passion which I 
 had a long time kept — 
 
 " Noting ere they past away 
 "The little lines of yesterday." x 
 
 I almost burned all your letters, — I did as bad, I lent 
 'em to a friend to keep out of my brother's sight, 
 should he come and make inquisition into our papers ; 
 for, much as he dwelt upon your conversation while 
 you were among us, and delighted to be with you, it has 
 been his fashion ever since to depreciate and cry you 
 down : you were the cause of my madness — you and 
 your "damned foolish sensibility and melancholy;" 
 and he lamented, with a true brotherly feeling, that 
 we ever met ; even as the sober citizen, when his son 
 went astray upon the mountains of Parnassus, is said 
 to have " cursed Wit and Poetry and Pope." I quote 
 wrong, but no matter. These letters I lent to a friend 
 to be out of the way for a season ; but I have claimed 
 'em in vain, and shall not cease to regret their loss 
 Your packets, posterior to the date of my misfortunes, 
 commencing with that valuable consolatory epistle, 
 
 1 This appears to be the earliest allusion to a topic, of which more 
 hereafter.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 67 
 
 are every day accumulating: they are sacred things 
 with me. 
 
 Publish your Burns when and how you like, itwill 
 be new to me : my memory of it is very confused, 
 and tainted with unpleasant associations. Burns was 
 the god of my idolatry, as Bowles is of yours. I am 
 jealous of your fraternising with Bowles, when I think 
 you relish him more than Burns, or my old favourite, 
 Cowper. But you conciliate matters when you talk 
 of the " divine chit-chat" of the latter: by that ex- 
 pression I see you thoroughly relish him. I love 
 Mrs. Coleridge for her excuses an hundredfold more 
 dearly than if she heaped " line upon line," out- 
 Hannah-ing Hannah More ; and would rather hear you 
 sing " Did a very little baby," by your family fire-side, 
 than listen to you when you were repeating one of 
 Bowles's sweetest sonnets, in your sweet manner, 
 while we two were indulging sympathy, a solitary 
 luxury, by the fire-side at the Salutation. Yet have 
 I no higher ideas of heaven. Your company was one 
 " cordial in this melancholy vale :" the remembrance 
 of it is a blessing partly, and partly a curse. When 
 I can abstract myself from things present, I can enjoy 
 it with a freshness of relish ; but it more constantly 
 operates to an unfavourable comparison with the un- 
 interesting converse I always and only can partake in. 
 Not a soul loves Bowles here ; scarce one has heard 
 of Burns ; few but laugh at me for reading my Testa- 
 ment. They talk a language I understand not. I con- 
 ceal sentiments that would be a puzzle to them. I 
 can only converse with you by letter, and with the 
 dead in their books. My sister, indeed, is all I can 
 wish in a companion ; but our spirits are alike poorly, 
 our reading and knowledge from the self-same sources ; 
 
 F 2
 
 6S CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 our communication with the scenes of the world alike 
 narrow. Never having kept separate company, or any 
 'company' 'together — -never having read separate 
 books, and few books together — what knowledge have 
 we to convey to each other ? In our little range of 
 duties and connexions, how few sentiments can take 
 place, without friends, with few books, with a taste 
 for religion, rather than a strong religious habit ! We 
 need some support, some leading-strings to cheer and 
 direct us. You talk very wisely ; and be not sparing of 
 your advice. Continue to remember us, and to show 
 us you do remember us : we will take as lively an 
 interest in what concerns you and yours. All I can 
 add to your happiness will be sympathy : you can 
 add to mine more ; you can teach me wisdom. 1 am 
 indeed an unreasonable correspondent ; but I was un- 
 willing to let my last night's letter go off without this 
 qualifier : you will perceive by this my mind is easier, 
 and you will rejoice. I do not expect or wish you to 
 write till you are moved ; and, of course, shall not, 
 till you announce to me that event, think of writing 
 myself. Love to Mrs. Coleridge and David Hartley, 
 and my kind remembrance to Lloyd, if he is with you. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 I will get Nature and Art: have not seen it yet, 
 nor any of Jeremy Taylor's works. 
 
 Letter XVIII.] Jan. 2, 1797. 
 
 If the fraternal sentiment conveyed in the follow- 
 ing lines will atone for the total want of any thing like 
 merit or genius in it, I desire you will print it next 
 alter my other Sonnet to my Sister.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 6q 
 
 Friend of my earliest years and childish days, 
 My joys, my sorrows, thou with me hast shared, 
 Companion dear; and we alike have fared, 
 Poor pilgrims we, through life's unequal ways. 
 It were unwisely done, should we refuse 
 To cheer our path, as featly as we may, — 
 Our lonely path to cheer, as travellers use, 
 With merry song, quaint tale, or roundelay. 
 And we will sometimes talk past troubles o'er, 
 Of mercies shown, and all our sickness heal'd, 
 And in his judgments God remembering love: 
 And we will learn to praise God evermore, 
 For those " glad tidings of great joy," reveal'd 
 By that sooth messenger, sent from above. — 1797. 
 
 This has been a sad long letter of business, with 
 no room in it for what honest Bunyan terms heart- 
 work. I have just room left to congratulate you on 
 your removal to Stowey ; to wish success to all your 
 projects ; to " bid fair peace " be to that house ; to send 
 my love and best wishes, breathed warmly, after your 
 dear Sara, and her little David Hartley. If Lloyd be 
 with you, bid him write to me : I feel to whom I am 
 obliged primarily for two very friendly letters I have 
 received already from him. A dainty sweet book that 
 Nature and Art 1 is. I am at present re-re-reading. 
 Priestley's Examination of the Scotch Doctors : how 
 the rogue strings 'em up ! three together ! You have 
 no doubt read that clear, strong, humorous, most en- 
 tertaining piece of reasoning. If not, procure it, and 
 be exquisitely amused. I wish I could get more of 
 Priestley's works. Can you recommend me to any 
 more books, easy of access, such as circulating shops 
 afford ? God bless you and yours. 
 
 Monday Morning, at Office. 
 
 1 Mrs. lnchbald's Novel. It was very popular in its day.
 
 7 o 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Poor Mary is very unwell with a sore throat and 
 a slight species of scarlet fever. God bless her too. 
 
 Letter XIX.] Jan. 5, 1797. 
 
 Sunday Morning.— You cannot surely mean to de- 
 grade the Joan of Arc into a pot-girl. You are not 
 going, I hope, to annex to that most splendid orna- 
 ment of Southey's poem all this cock-and-a-bull story 
 of Joan, the publican's daughter of Neufchatel, with 
 the lamentable episode of a waggoner, his wife, and 
 six children. The texture will be most lamentably 
 disproportionate. The first forty or fifty lines of these 
 addenda are, no doubt, in their way, admirable, too ; 
 but many would prefer the Joan of Southey. 
 
 " On mightiest deeds to brood 
 Of shadowy vastness, such as made my heart 
 Throb fast; anon I paused, and in a state 
 Of half expectance listen'd to the wind ; " 
 
 " They wonder'd at me, who had known me once 
 A cheerful careless damsel ; " 
 
 " The eye, 
 That of the circling throng and of the visible world 
 Unseeing, saw the shapes of holy phantasy ; ' 
 
 I see nothing in your description of the Maid equal to 
 these. There is a line originality certainly in those 
 lines — 
 
 " For she had lived in this bad world 
 As in a place of tombs, 
 And touch'd not the pollutions of the dead ; " 
 
 but your " fierce vivacity " is a faint copy of the " fierce 
 and terrible benevolence" of Southey; added to this, 
 that it will look like rivalship in you, and extort a
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 71 
 
 comparison with Southey, — I think to your disadvan- 
 tage. And the lines, considered in themselves as an 
 addition to what you had before written, (strains of a 
 far higher mood,) are but such as Madame Fancy 
 loves in some of her more familiar moods, at such 
 times as she has met Noll Goldsmith, and walked 
 and talked with him, calling him " old acquaintance." 
 Southey certainly has no pretensions to vie with you 
 in the sublime of poetry ; but he tells a plain tale 
 better than you. I will enumerate some woful 
 blemishes, some of 'em sad deviations from that 
 simplicity which was your aim. " Hail'd who might 
 be near" (the " canvas-coverture moving," by the by, 
 is laughable) ; " a woman and six children " (by the 
 way, — why not nine children ? It would have been 
 just half as pathetic again): ''statues of sleep they 
 seem'd" : " frost-mangled wretch " : " green putridity " : 
 " hail'd him immortal " (rather ludicrous again) : 
 " voiced a sad and simple tale " (abominable !) : " un- 
 provender'd " : " such his tale " : " Ah ! suffering to the 
 height of what was suffer'd " (a most insufferable 
 line) : " amazements of affright " : " the hot sore brain 
 attributes its own hues of ghastliness and torture " 
 (what shocking confusion of ideas) ! 
 
 In these delineations of common and natural feel- 
 ings, in the familiar walks of poetry, you seem to 
 resemble Montauban dancing with Roubigne's tenants 
 " muck of his native loftiness remained in the execution.'' 
 
 I was reading your Religious Musings the other 
 day, and sincerely I think it the noblest poem in the 
 language, next after the Paradise Lost ; and even 
 that was not made the vehicle of such grand truths. 
 " There is one mind," &c, down to " Almighty's 
 throne," are without a rival in the whole compass of 
 my poetical reading.
 
 72 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 " Stands in the sun, and with no partial gaze 
 " Views all creation." 
 
 I wish I could have written those lines. I rejoice 
 that I am able to relish them. The loftier walks of 
 Pindus are your proper region. There you have no 
 compeer in modern times. Leave the lowlands, un- 
 envied, in possession of such men as Cowper and 
 Southey. Thus am I pouring balsam into the 
 wounds I may have been inflicting on my poor 
 friend's vanity. 
 
 In your notice of Southey's new volume you omit 
 to mention the most pleasing of all, the " Miniature '" — 
 
 " There were 
 Who form'd high hopes and flattering ones of thee 
 Young Robert, 
 Spirit of Spenser! — Was the wanderer wrong? " 
 
 Fairfax I have been in quest of a long time. John- 
 son, in his " Life of Waller," gives a most deli- 
 cious specimen of him, and adds, in the true manner 
 *>f that delicate critic, as well as amiable man, " It 
 jnay be presumed that this old version will not be 
 much read after the elegant translation of my friend, 
 Mr. Hoole." I endeavoured — I wished to gain some 
 idea of Tasso from this Mr. Hoole, the great boast and 
 ornament of the India House, but soon desisted. I 
 found him more vapid than smallest small beer " sun- 
 vinegared." Your " Dream," down to that exquisite 
 line — 
 
 " I can't tell half his adventures," 
 
 is a most happy resemblance of Chaucer. The re- 
 mainder is so so. The best line, I think, is, " He 
 belong'd, I believe, to the witch Melancholy." By the
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 73 
 
 way, when will our volume come out ? Don't delay 
 it till you have written a new Joan of Arc. Send 
 what letters you please by me, and in any way you 
 choose, single or double. The India Company is 
 better adapted to answer the cost than the generality 
 of my friend's correspondents, — such poor and honest 
 dogs as John Thelwall, particularly. I cannot say I 
 know Colson, at least intimately. I once supped with 
 him and Allen : I think his manners very pleasing. 
 I will not tell 3 r ou what I think of Lloyd, for he may 
 by chance come to see this letter, and that thought 
 puts a restraint on me. I cannot think what subject 
 would suit your epic genius ; some philosophical sub- 
 ject, I conjecture, in which shall be blended the 
 sublime of poetry and of science. Your proposed 
 " Hymns " will be a fit preparatory study wherewith 
 " to discipline your young noviciate soul." I grow 
 dull ; I'll go walk myself out of my dullness. 
 
 Sunday Night. — You and Sara are very good to 
 think so kindly and so favourably of poor Mary ; I 
 would to God all did so too. But I very much fear 
 she must not think of coming home in my father's 
 lifetime. It is very hard upon her : but our circum- 
 stances are peculiar, and we must submit to them. 
 God be praised she is so well as she is. She bears 
 her situation as one who has no right to complain. 
 My poor old aunt, whom you have seen, the kindest, 
 goodest creature to me when I was at school : who used 
 to toddle there to bring me good things, when I, school- 
 boy like, only despised her for it, and used to be 
 ashamed to see her come and sit herself down on the 
 old coal-hole steps as you went into the old grammar- 
 school, and open her apron, and bring out her bason,
 
 74 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 with some nice thing she had caused to be saved 
 for me ; the good old creature is now lying on her 
 death-bed. I cannot bear to think on her deplorable 
 state. To the shock she received on that our evil 
 clay, from which she never completely recovered, I 
 impute her illness. She says, poor thing, she is glad 
 she is come home to die with me. I was always her 
 favourite : 
 
 " No after friendship e'er can raise 
 The endearments of our early days , 
 Nor e'er the heart sucli fondness prove, 
 As when it first began to love." 
 
 Lloyd has kindly left me, for a keep-sake, John 
 Woolman. You have read it, he says, and like it. 
 Will you excuse one short extract ? I think it could 
 not have escaped you : — " Small treasure to a resigned 
 mind is sufficient. How happy is it to be content 
 with a little, to live in humility, and feel that in us, 
 which breathes out this language — Abba ! Father ! " 
 
 1 am almost ashamed to patch up a letter in this 
 
 miscellaneous sort ; but I please myself in the thought, 
 that any thing from me will be acceptable to you. I 
 am rather impatient, childishly so, to see our names 
 affixed to the same common volume. Send me two, 
 when it does come out; two will be enough — or in- 
 deed one — but two better. I have a dim recollection 
 that, when in town, you were talking of the Origin of 
 Evil as a most prolific subject for a long poem. Why 
 not adopt it, Coleridge? — there would be room for 
 imagination. Or the description (from a Vision or 
 Dream, suppose) of an Utopia in one of the planets 
 (the Moon for instance). Or a Five Days' Dream, 
 which shall illustrate, in sensible imagery, Hartley's
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 75 
 
 five Motives to Conduct: — I. Sensation; 2. Imagina- 
 tion; 3. Ambition; 4. Sympathy; 5. Theopathy : — 
 First. Banquets, music, &c, effeminacy, — and their 
 insufficiency. Second. " Beds of hyacinth and roses, 
 where young Adonis oft reposes ; " " Fortunate Isles ; " 
 " The pagan Elysium," &c. ; poetical pictures ; an- 
 tiquity as pleasing to the fancy ; — their emptiness ; 
 madness, &c. Third. Warriors, Poets ; some famous 
 yet more forgotten ; their fame or oblivion now alike 
 indifferent ; pride, vanity, &c. Fourth. All manner 
 of pitiable stories, in Spenser-like verse ; love ; friend- 
 ship, relationship, &c. Fifth. Hermits ; Christ and 
 his apostles ; martyrs ; heaven, &c. An imagination 
 like yours, from these scanty hints, may expand into 
 a thousand great ideas, if indeed you at all comprehend 
 my scheme, which I scarce do myself. 
 
 Monday Morn. — " A London letter — Ninepence 
 halfpenny ! " Look you, master poet, I have remorse 
 as well as another man, and my bowels can sound 
 upon occasion. But I must put you to this charge, 
 for I cannot keep back my protest, however ineffectual, 
 against the annexing your latter lines to those former 
 — this putting of new wine into old bottles. This my 
 duty done, I will cease from writing till you invent 
 some more reasonable mode of conveyance. Well 
 may the ''ragged followers of the Nine" set up for 
 fiocci-nauci-what-do-you-call-'em-ists ! and I do not 
 wonder that in their splendid visions of Utopias in 
 America they protest against the admission of those 
 y^oif-complexioned, copper-coloured, white-livered 
 gentlemen, who never proved themselves their friends. 
 Don't you think your verses on a " Young Ass " too 
 trivial a companion for the " Religious Musings ?" — 
 " Scoundrel monarch," alter that; and the " Man of
 
 j6 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Ross " is scarce admissible, as it now stands, curtailed 
 of its fairer half: reclaim its property from the " Chat- 
 terton," which it does but encumber, and it will be a 
 rich little poem. I hope you expunge great part of the 
 old notes in the new edition : that, in particular, most 
 barefaced, unfounded, impudent assertion, that Mr. 
 Rogers is indebted for his story to Loch Lomond, a 
 poem by Bruce ! I have read the latter. I scarce 
 think you have. Scarce any thing is common to them 
 both. The poor author of the Pleasures of Memory- 
 was sorely hurt, Dyer says, by the accusation of un- 
 originality. He never saw the poem. I long to read 
 your poem on Burns ; I retain so indistinct a memory 
 of it. In what shape and how does it come into 
 public ? As you leave off writing poetry till you finish 
 your Hymns, I suppose you print, now, all you have 
 got by you. You have scarce enough unprinted to 
 make a second volume with Lloyd. Tell me all about 
 it. What is become of Cowper ? Lloyd told me of 
 some verses on his mother. If you have them by you, 
 pray send 'em me. I do so love him ! Never mind 
 their merit. May be / may like 'em, as your taste and 
 mine do not always exactly identify. Yours. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XX.; Jan. 10, 1797. 
 
 I need not repeat my wishes to have my little son- 
 nets printed verbatim my last way. ' In particular, 
 I fear lest you should prefer printing my first sonnet, 
 as you have done more than once, " Did the wand of 
 Merlin wave ? " It looks so like Mr. Merlin, the in- 
 genious successor of the immortal Merlin, now living 
 in good health and spirits, and flourishing in magical
 
 ■ CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 77 
 
 reputation, in Oxford Street; and, on my life, one half 
 who read it would understand it so. Do put 'em forth, 
 finally, as I have in various letters settled it ; for 
 first a man's self is to be pleased, and then his friends ; 
 and, of course, the greater number of his friends, if 
 they differ inter se. Thus taste may safely be put to 
 the vote. I do long to see our names together ; not 
 for vanity's sake, and naughty pride of heart altogether, 
 for not a living soul I know, or am intimate with, will 
 scarce read the book : so I shall gain nothing, quoad 
 famam ; and yet there is a little vanity mixes in it, I 
 cannot help denying. I am aware of the unpoetical 
 cast of the six last lines of my last sonnet, and think 
 myself unwarranted in smuggling so tame a thing 
 into the book; only the sentiments of those six lines 
 are thoroughly congenial to me in my state of mind, 
 and I wisn to accumulate perpetuating tokens of my 
 affection to poor Mary. That it has no originality in 
 its cast, nor any thing in the feelings but what is 
 common and natural to thousands, nor ought properly 
 to be called poetry, I see ; still it will tend to keep 
 present to my mind a view of things which I ought to 
 indulge. These six lines, too, have not, to a reader, 
 a connectedness with the foregoing. Omit it, if you 
 like. — What a treasure it is to my poor, indolent, and 
 unemployed mind, thus to lay hold on a subject to 
 talk about, though 'tis but a sonnet, and that of the 
 lowest order ! How mournfully inactive I am ! — 'Tis 
 night: Good night. 
 
 My sister, I thank God, is nigh recovered : she 
 was seriously ill. Do, in your next letter, and that 
 right soon, give me some satisfaction respecting your 
 present situation at Stowey. Is it a farm you have 
 got ? And what does your worship know about 
 farming?
 
 78 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Coleridge, I want you to write an epic poem. 
 Nothing short of it can satisfy the vast capacity of 
 true poetic genius. Having one great end to direct 
 all your poetical faculties to, and on which to lay out 
 your hopes, your ambition will show you to what you 
 are equal. By the sacred energies of Milton ! by the 
 dainty, sweet, and soothing phantasies of honey- 
 tongued Spenser! I adjure you to attempt the epic, 
 or do something more ample than writing an oc- 
 casional brief ode or sonnet; something, "to make 
 yourself for ever known, — to make the age to come 
 your own." But I prate ;' doubtless you meditate 
 something. When you are exalted among the lords 
 of epic fame, I shall recall with pleasure, and ex- 
 ultingly, the days of your humility, when you dis- 
 dained not to put forth, in the same volume with mine, 
 your Religions Musings and that other poem from 
 the jfoau of Arc, those promising first-fruits of high 
 renown to come. You have learning, you have fancy, 
 you have enthusiasm, you have strength, and ampli- 
 tude of wing enow for flights like those I recommend. 
 In the vast and unexplored regions of fairy-land there 
 is ground enough unfound and uncultivated : search 
 there, and realise your favourite Susquehannah 
 scheme. In all our comparisons of taste, I do not 
 know whether I have ever heard your opinion of a 
 poet, very dear to me, — the now-out-of-fashion Cowley. 
 Favour me with your judgment of him, and tell me if 
 his prose essays, in particular, as well as no incon- 
 siderable part of his verse, be not delicious. I prefer 
 the graceful rambling of his essays, even to the courtly 
 elegance and ease of Addison ; abstracting from this 
 the latter's exquisite humour. 
 
 When the little volume is printed, send me three
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 79 
 
 or four, at all events not more than six copies, and tell 
 me if I put you to any additional expense, by printing 
 with you. I have no thought of the kind, and in that 
 case must reimburse you. 
 
 Priestley, whom I sin in almost adoring, speaks 
 of " such a choice of company as tends to keep up 
 that right bent and firmness of mind which a neces- 
 sary intercourse with the world would otherwise warp 
 and relax." " Such fellowship is the true balsam of 
 life ; its cement is infinitely more durable than that of 
 the friendships of the world ; and it looks for its proper 
 fruit and complete gratification to the life beyond the 
 grave." Is there a possible chance for such an one as 
 I to realise in this world such friendships ? Where 
 am I to look for 'em ? What testimonials shall I bring 
 of my being worthy of such friendship ? Alas ! the 
 great and good go together in separate herds, and 
 leave such as I to lag far, far behind in all intellectual, 
 and, far more grievous to say, in all moral accomplish- 
 ments. Coleridge, I have not one truly elevated 
 character among my acquaintance : not one Christian : 
 not one but undervalues Christianity. Singly, what 
 am I to do ? Wesley, (have you read his life ?) was 
 he not an elevated character ? Wesley has said, " Re- 
 ligion is not a solitary thing." Alas ! it necessarily is 
 so with me, or next to solitary. 'Tis true you write 
 to me ; but correspondence by letter, and personal 
 intimacy, are very widely different. Do, do write to 
 me, and do some good to my mind, already how much 
 " warped and relaxed " by the world ! 'Tis the conclu- 
 sion of another evening. Good night. God have us 
 all in his keeping ! 
 
 If you are sufficiently at leisure, oblige me with an 
 account of your plan of life at Stowey — your literary
 
 8o CORRESPONDENCE "WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 occupations and prospects ; in short, make me ac 
 quainted with every circumstance which, as relating 
 to you, can be interesting to me. Are you yet a 
 Berkleyan ? Make me one. I rejoice in being, specu- 
 latively, a Necessarian. Would to God, I were habitu- 
 ally a practical one ! Confirm me in the faith of that 
 great and glorious doctrine, and keep me steady in the 
 contemplation of it. You some time since expressed 
 an intention you had of finishing some extensive work 
 on the Evidences of Natural and Revealed Religion. 
 Have you let that intention go ? Or are you doing 
 any thing towards it ? Make to yourself other ten 
 talents. My letter is full of nothingness. I talk of 
 nothing. But I must talk. I love to write to you. 
 I take a pride in it. It makes me think less meanly 
 of myself. It makes me think myself not totally dis- 
 connected from the better part of mankind. I know 
 I am too dissatisfied w*ith the beings around me ; but 
 I cannot help occasionally exclaiming, " Woe is me, 
 that I am constrained to dwell with Meshech, and to 
 have my habitation among the tents of Kedar ! " I 
 know I am noways better in practice than my neigh- 
 bours, but I have a taste for religion, an occasional 
 earnest aspiration after perfection, which they have 
 not. I gain nothing by being with such as myself : 
 we encourage one another in mediocrity. I am always 
 longing to be with men more excellent than myself. 
 All this must sound odd to you ; but these are my pre- 
 dominant feelings when I sit down to write to you, 
 and I should put force upon my mind were I to reject 
 them. Yet I rejoice, and feel my privilege with grati- 
 tude, when I have been reading some wise book, such 
 as I have just been reading, Priestley on Philoso- 
 phical Necessity, in the thought that I enjoy a kind
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 8l 
 
 of communion, a kind of friendship even, with the 
 great and good. Books are to me instead of friends. 
 I wish they did not resemble the latter in their 
 scarceness. 
 
 And how does little David Hartley ? " Ecquid 
 in antiquam virtutem?" Does his mighty name work 
 wonders yet upon his little frame and opening mind ? 
 I did not distinctly understand you : you don't mean 
 to make an actual ploughman of him ! Is Lloyd with 
 you yet ? Are you intimate with Southey ? What 
 poems is he about to publish ? He hath a most pro- 
 lific brain, and is indeed a most sweet poet. But how 
 can you answer all the various mass of interrogation 
 I have put to you in the course of this sheet ? Write 
 back just what you like, only write something, how- 
 ever brief. I have now nigh finished my page, and 
 got to the end of another evening (Monday evening), 
 and my eyes are heavy and sleepy, and my brain 
 unsuggestive. I have just heart enough awake to say 
 good night once more, and God love you, my dear 
 friend ; God love us all ! Mary bears an affectionate 
 remembrance of you. Charles Lamb. 
 
 LETTER XXL] January 1 6, 1797. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — You have learned by this time, 
 with surprise, no doubt, that Lloyd is with me in town. 
 The emotions I felt on his coming so unlooked for, 
 are not ill expressed rh what follows, and what (if you 
 do not object to them as too personal, and to the 
 world obscure, or otherwise wanting in worth,) I should 
 wish to make a part of our little volume. I shall be 
 sorry if that volume comes out, as it necessarily must 
 
 VOL. I. G
 
 82 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 do, unless you print those very schoolboy-ish verses I 
 sent you on not getting leave to come down to Bristol 
 last Summer. I say I shall be sorry that I have 
 addressed you in nothing which can appear in our 
 joint volume ; so frequently, so habitually, as you 
 dwell in my thoughts, 'tis some wonder those thoughts 
 came never yet in contact with a poetical mood. But 
 you dwell in my heart of hearts, and I love you in all 
 the naked honesty of prose. God bless you, and all 
 your little domestic circle ! My tenderest remembrances 
 to your beloved Sara, and a smile and a kiss from me 
 to your dear dear little David Hartley. The verses I 
 refer to above, slightly amended, I have sent (for- 
 getting to ask your leave, tho' indeed I gave them 
 only your initials,) to the Monthly Magazine, where 
 they may possibly appear next month, and where I 
 hope to recognise your poem on Burns. 
 
 TO 
 
 CHARLES LLOYD, AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR. 
 
 Alone, obscure, without a friend, 
 
 A cheerless, solitary thing 
 Why seeks my Lloyd the stranger out? 
 
 What offering can the stranger bring 
 
 Of social scenes, home-bred delights, 
 
 That him in aught compensate may 
 For Stowey's pleasant Winter nights, 
 
 For loves and friendships far away, 
 
 In brief oblivion to forego 
 
 Friends, such as thine, so justly dear, 
 And be awhile with me content 
 
 To stay, a kindly loiterer, here ? 
 
 For this a gleam of random joy 
 
 Hath flush'd my unaccustom'd cheek ; 
 
 And, with an o'er-charged bursting heart, 
 I feel the thanks I cannot speak.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 83 
 
 Oh ! sweet are all the Muse's lays, 
 
 And sweet the charm of matin bird : 
 'Twas long since these estranged ears 
 
 The sweeter voice of friend had heard. 
 
 The voice hath spoke : the pleasant sounds 
 
 In memory's ear in after time 
 Shall live, to sometimes rouse a tear, 
 
 And sometimes prompt an honest rhyme. 
 
 For when the transient charm is fled, 
 
 And when the little week is o'er, 
 To cheerless, friendless solitude 
 
 When I return as heretofore — 
 
 Long, long, within my aching heart 
 
 The grateful sense shall cherish'd be : 
 I'll think less meanly of myself, 
 
 That Lloya will sometimes think on m« 
 
 O Coleridge, would to God you were in London 
 with us, or we two at Stowey with you all ! Lloyd 
 takes up his abode at the Bull and Mouth ; the 
 Cat and Salutation would have had a charm more 
 forcible for me. nodes ccenceque Deum ! Anglice — 
 Welsh rabbit, punch, and poesy. Should you be 
 induced to publish those very schoolboy-ish verses, 
 print 'em as they will occur, if at all, in the Monthly 
 Magazine ; yet I should feel ashamed that to you I 
 wrote nothing better : but they are too personal, and 
 almost trifling and obscure withal. Some lines of 
 mine to Cowper were in the last Monthly Magazine : 
 they have not body of thought enough to plead for the 
 retaining of 'em. My sister's kind love to you all. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER XXII. ] February 13th, 1797. 
 
 Your poem is altogether admirable : parts of it 
 are even exquisite; in particular your personal account 
 
 g 2
 
 84 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 of the Maid far surpasses any thing of the sort in 
 Southey. I perceived all its excellences, on a first 
 reading, as readily as now you have been removing a 
 supposed film from my eyes. I was only struck with 
 a certain faulty disproportion, in the matter and the 
 style, which I still think I perceive, between these 
 lines and the former ones. I had an end in view : I 
 wished to make you reject the poem only as being 
 discordant with the other ; and, in subservience to 
 that end, it was politically done in me to over-pass 
 and make no mention of merit, which, could you 
 think me capable of overlooking, might reasonably 
 damn for ever in your judgment all pretensions, in 
 me, to be critical. There — I will be judged by Lloyd, 
 whether I have not made a very handsome recanta- 
 tion. I was in the case of a man whose friend has 
 asked him his opinion of a certain young lady. The 
 deluded wight gives judgment against her in toto — 
 doesn't like her face, her walk, her manners ; finds 
 fault with her eyebrows ; can see no wit in her. His 
 friend looks blank ; he begins to smell a rat ; wind 
 veers about; he acknowledges her good sense, her 
 judgment in dress, a certain simplicity of manners 
 and honesty of heart, something too in her manners 
 which gains upon you after a short acquaintance ; 
 and then her accurate pronunciation of the French 
 language, and a pretty uncultivated taste in drawing. 
 The reconciled gentleman smiles applause, squeezes 
 him by the hand, and hopes he will do him the honour 
 
 of taking a bit of dinner with Mrs. and him, — a 
 
 plain family dinner, — some day next week ; " for, I 
 suppose, you never heard we were married. I'm glad 
 to see you like my wife, however; you'll come and 
 see her, ha ?" Now am I too proud to retract entirely ?
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 85 
 
 Yet I do perceive I am in some sort straitened. You 
 are manifestly wedded to this poem ; and what fancy 
 has joined let no man separate. I turn me to the 
 jfoan of Arc, second book. 
 
 The solemn openings of it are with sounds which, 
 Lloyd would say, " are silence to the mind." The 
 deep preluding strains are fitted to initiate the mind, 
 with a pleasing awe, into the sublimest mysteries of 
 theory concerning man's nature, and his noblest 
 destination — the philosophy of a first cause — of sub- 
 ordinate agents in creation, superior to man — the 
 subserviency of Pagan worship and Pagan faith to 
 the introduction of a purer and more perfect religion, 
 which you so elegantly describe as winning, with 
 gradual steps, her difficult way northward from Beth- 
 abara. After all this cometh Joan, a publican's 
 daughter, sitting on an ale-house bench, and mark- 
 ing the swingings of the signboard, finding a poor 
 man, his wife, and six children, starved to death with 
 cold, and thence roused into a state of mind proper 
 to receive visions, emblematical of equality ; which 
 what the devil Joan had to do with, I don't know, or 
 indeed with the French and American revolutions ; 
 though that needs no pardon, it is executed so nobly. 
 After all, if you perceive no disproportion, all argu- 
 ment is vain : I do not so much object to parts. 
 Again, when you talk of building your fame on these 
 lines in preference to the Religious Musings, I cannot 
 help conceiving of you, and of the author of that, as 
 two different persons, and I think you a very vain 
 man. 
 
 I have been re-reading your letter. Much of it I 
 could dispute ; but with the latter part of it, in which 
 you compare the two Joans with respect to their pre-
 
 86 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 dispositions for fanaticism, I,- toto corde, coincide ; 
 only I think that Southey's strength rather lies in 
 the description of the emotions of the Maid under 
 the weight of inspiration. These (I see no mighty 
 difference between her describing them or your de- 
 scribing them), these if you only equal, the previous 
 admirers of his poem, as is natural, will prefer his. 
 If you surpass, prejudice will scarcely allow it, and 
 I scarce think you will surpass, though your speci- 
 men at the conclusion (I am in earnest) I think very 
 nigh equals them. And in an account of a fanatic 
 or of a prophet, the description of her emotions is 
 expected to be most highly finished. By the way, 
 I spoke far too disparagingly of your lines, and I am 
 ashamed to say, purposely. I should like you to 
 specify or particularize. The story of the "Tottering 
 Eld," of " his eventful years all come and gone," is 
 too general. Why not make him a soldier, or some 
 character, however, in which he has been witness to 
 frequency of " cruel wrong and strange distress ! " I 
 think I should. When I laughed at the "^miserable 
 man crawling from beneath the coverture," I wonder 
 I did not perceive that it was a laugh of horror — such 
 as I have laughed at Dante's picture of the famished 
 Ugolino. Without falsehood, I perceive an hundred 
 beauties in your narrative. Yet I wonder you do not 
 perceive something out-of-the-way, something un- 
 simple and artificial, in the expression " voiced a sad 
 tale." I hate made-dishes at the muses' banquet. I 
 believe I was wrong in most of my other objections. 
 But surely " hailed him immortal," adds nothing to 
 the terror of the man's death, which it was your busi- 
 ness to heighten, not diminish by a phrase which 
 takes away all terror from it. I like that line, " They 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 87 
 
 closed their eyes in. sleep, nor knew 'twas death." 
 Indeed there is scarce a line I do not like. " Turbid 
 ecstacy," is surely not so good as what you had writ- 
 ten, " troublous." " Turbid " rather suits the muddy 
 kind of inspiration which London porter confers. 
 The versification is, throughout, to my ears unexcep- 
 tionable, with no disparagement to the measure of 
 the Religious Musings, which is exactly fitted to the 
 thoughts. 
 
 You were building your house on a rock when you 
 rested your fame on that poem. I can scarce bring 
 myself to believe that I am admitted to a familiar 
 correspondence, and all the licence of friendship, 
 with a man who writes blank verse like Milton. 
 Now, this is delicate flattery, indirect flattery. Go 
 on with your Maid of Orleans, and be content to be 
 second to yourself. I shall become a convert to it 
 when 'tis finished. 
 
 This afternoon I attend the funeral of my poor old 
 aunt, who died on Thursday. I own I am thankful 
 that the good creature has ended all her days of 
 suffering and infirmity. She was to me the " che- 
 risher of infancy," and one must fall on those occa- 
 sions into reflections, which it would be common- 
 place to enumerate, concerning death, " of chance 
 and change, and fate in human life." Good God, 
 who could have foreseen all this but four months 
 back ! I had reckoned, in particular, on my aunt's 
 living many years ; she was a very hearty old woman. 
 But she was a mere skeleton before she died, looked 
 more like a corpse that had lain weeks in the grave, 
 than one fresh dead. "Truly the light is sweet, and 
 a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun ; 
 but if a man live many years and rejoice in them all,
 
 88 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 yet let him remember the days of darkness, for they 
 shall be many." Coleridge, why are we to live on 
 after all the strength and beauty of existence is 
 gone, when all the life of life is fled, as poor Burns 
 expresses it ? Tell Lloyd I have had thoughts of 
 turning Quaker, and have been reading, or am rather 
 just beginning to read, a most capital book, good 
 thoughts in good language, William Penn's No Cross, 
 no Crown. I like it immensely. Unluckily I went to 
 one of his meetings, tell him, in St. John Street, 
 yesterday, and saw a man under all the agitations 
 and workings of a fanatic, who believed himself 
 under the influence of some " inevitable presence." 
 This cured me of Quakerism. I love it in the books 
 of Penn and Woolman; but I detest the vanity of a 
 man thinking he speaks by the Spirit, when what he 
 says an ordinary man might say without all that 
 quaking and trembling. In the midst of his inspi- 
 ration (and the effects of it were most noisy) was 
 handed into the midst of the meeting a most terrible 
 blackguard Wapping sailor. The poor man, I be- 
 lieve, would rather have been in the hottest part of 
 an engagement, for the congregation of broad-brims, 
 together with the ravings of the prophet, were too 
 much for his gravity, though I saw even he had 
 delicacy enough not to laugh out. And the inspired 
 gentleman, though his manner was so supernatural, 
 yet neither talked nor professed to talk any thing 
 more than good sober sense, common morality, with 
 now and then a declaration of not speaking from 
 himself. Among other things, looking back to his 
 childhood and early youth, he told the meeting what 
 a graceless young dog he had been ; that in his youth 
 he had a good share of wit. Reader, if thou hadst
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 89 
 
 seen the gentleman, thou wouldst have sworn that 
 it must indeed have been many years ago, for his 
 rueful physiognomy would have scared away the 
 playful goddess from the meeting, where he presided, 
 for ever. A wit ; a wit ! what could he mean ? 
 It minded me of Falkland in the Rivals, " Am 
 I full of wit and humour ? No, indeed you are 
 not. Am I the life and soul of every company I 
 come into ? No, it cannot be said you are." That 
 hard-faced gentleman, a wit ! Why, Nature wrote 
 on his fanatic forehead fifty years ago, "Wit never 
 comes, that comes to all." I should be as scan- 
 dalised at a bon mot issuing from his oracle-looking 
 mouth, as to see Cato go down a country dance. 
 God love you all ! You are very good to submit to 
 be pleased with reading my nothings. 'Tis the 
 privilege of friendship to talk nonsense, and to have 
 her nonsense respected. — Yours ever, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XXIII.] April 7 th, i 797 . 
 
 Your last letter was dated the ioth of February; in it 
 you promised to write again the next day. At least, 
 I did not expect so long, so unfriend-like a silence. 
 There was a time, Coleridge, when a remissness of 
 this sort in a dear friend would have lain very heavy 
 on my mind ; but latterly I have been too familiar 
 with neglect to feel much from the semblance of it. 
 Yet, to suspect one's self overlooked, and in the way 
 to oblivion, is a feeling rather humbling; perhaps, as 
 tending to self-mortification, not unfavourable to the 
 spiritual state. Still, as you meant to confer no 
 benefit on the soul of your friend, you do not stand
 
 go CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 quite clear from the imputation of unkindliness, (a 
 word, by which I mean the diminutive of unkindness). 
 Lloyd tells me he has been very ill, and was on the 
 point of leaving you. I addressed a letter to him at 
 Birmingham : perhaps he got it not, and is still with 
 you. I hope his ill-health has not prevented his 
 attending to a request I made in it, that he would 
 write again very soon to let me know how he was. 
 I hope to God poor Lloyd is not very bad, or in a 
 very bad way. Pray satisfy me about these things. 
 
 And then David Hartley was unwell ; and how is 
 the small philosopher, the minute philosopher ? and 
 David's mother ? Coleridge, I am not trifling ; nor 
 are these matter-of-fact questions only. You are all 
 very dear and precious to me. Do what you will, 
 Coleridge, you may hurt me and vex me by your 
 silence, but you cannot estrange my heart from 
 you all. I cannot scatter friendships like chuck- 
 farthings, nor let them drop from mine hand like 
 hour-glass sand. I have but two or three people 
 in the world to whom I am more than indiffer- 
 ent, and I can't afford to whistle them off to the 
 winds. 
 
 By the way, Lloyd may have told you about my 
 sister. I told him. If not, I have taken her out of 
 her confinement, and taken a room for her at Hack- 
 ney, and spend my Sundays, holidays, &c, with her. 
 She boards herself. In a little half-year's illness, 
 and in such an illness, of such a nature, and of such 
 consequences, to get her out into the world again, 
 with a prospect of her never being so ill again, — this 
 is to be ranked not among the common blessings of 
 Providence. May that merciful God make tender my 
 heart, and make me as thankful, as in my distress I
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERTDGE. gi 
 
 was earnest, in my prayers. Congratulate me on an 
 ever-present and never-alienable friend like her. And 
 do, do insert, if you have not lost, my Dedication. 
 It will have lost half its value by coming so late. If 
 you really are going on with that volume, I shall be 
 enabled in a day or two to send you a short poem to 
 insert. Now, do answer this. Friendship, and acts 
 of friendship, should be reciprocal, and free as the 
 air. A friend should never be reduced to beg an alms 
 of his fellow ; yet I will beg an alms : I entreat you 
 to write, and tell me all about poor Lloyd, and all of 
 you. God love and preserve you all ! 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XXIV.] April 15th, 1797. 
 
 The above you will please to print immediately 
 before the blank verse fragments. Tell me if you 
 like it. I fear the latter half is unequal to the former, 
 in parts of which I think you will discover a delicacy 
 of pencilling not quite un-Spenser-like. The latter 
 half aims at the measure, but has failed to attain the 
 poetry of Milton in his Comus, and Fletcher in that 
 exquisite thing ycleped the Faithful Shepherdess, 
 where they both use eight-syllable lines. But this 
 latter half was finished in great haste, and as a task, 
 not from that impulse which affects the name of 
 inspiration. 
 
 By the way, I have lit upon Fairfax's Godfrey of 
 Bullen, for half-a-crown. Rejoice with me. 
 
 Poor dear Lloyd ! I had a letter from him yester- 
 day ; his state of mind is truly alarming. He has, 
 by his own confession, kept a letter of mine unopened
 
 92 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 three weeks; afraid, he says, to open it, lest I should 
 speak upbraidingly to him ; and yet this very letter of 
 mine was in answer to one, wherein he informed me 
 that an alarming illness had alone prevented him 
 from writing. You will pray with me, I know, for 
 his recovery ; for surely, Coleridge, an exquisiteness 
 of feeling like this must border on derangement. But 
 I love him more and more, and will not give up the 
 hope of his speedy recovery, as he tells me he is 
 under Dr. Darwin's regimen.* 
 
 God bless us all, and shield us from insanity, which 
 is "the sorest malady of all." 
 
 My kind love to your wife and child. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Pray write now. 
 
 LETTER XXV.] No date, but about May, 1797. 
 
 I discern a possibility of my paying you a visit 
 next week. May I, can I, shall I, come so soon ? 
 Have you room for me, leisure for me ? and are you 
 pretty well ? Tell me all this honestly — immediately. 
 And by what day coach could I come soonest and 
 nearest to Stowey ? A few months hence may suit 
 
 * Poor Charles Lloyd ! These apprehensions were sadly realized. 
 Delusions of the most melancholy kind thickened over his latter days; 
 yet left his admirable intellect free for the finest processes of severe 
 reasoning. At a time when, like Cowper, he believed himself the 
 especial subject of Divine wrath, he could bear his part in the most 
 subtile disquisition on questions of religion, morals, and poetry, with 
 the nicest accuracy of perception and the most exemplary candour ; 
 and, after an argument of hours, revert, with a faint smile, to his own 
 despair
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 93 
 
 you better ; certainly me, as well. If so, say so. I 
 long, I yearn, with all the longings of a child do I 
 desire to see you, to come among you — to see the 
 young philosopher, to thank Sara for her last year's 
 invitation in person — to read your tragedy — to read 
 over together our little book — to breathe fresh air — to 
 revive in me vivid images of " Salutation scenery." 
 There is a sort of sacrilege in my letting such ideas 
 slip out of my mind and memory. Still that Richard- 
 son remaineth — a thorn in the side of Hope, when 
 she would lean towards Stowey. Here I will leave 
 off, for I dislike to fill up this paper (which involves 
 a question so connected with my heart and soul) with 
 meaner matter, or subjects to me less interesting. I 
 can talk, as I can think, nothing else. 
 
 Thursday. C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XXVI. J June 13th, 1797. 
 
 I stared with wild wondeiment to see thy well- 
 known hand again. It revived many a pleasing re- 
 collection of an epistolary intercourse, of late strangely 
 suspended, once the pride of my life. Before I 
 even opened thy letter I figured to myself a sort of 
 complacency which my little hoard at home would 
 feel at receiving the new-comer into the little drawer 
 where I keep my treasures of this kind. You have 
 done well in writing to me. The little room (was it 
 not a little one •?) at the Salutation was already in the 
 way of becoming a fading idea ! It had begun to be 
 classed in my memory with those "wanderings with 
 a fair hair'd maid," in the recollection of which I feel
 
 94 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 I have no property. You press me, very kindly do 
 you press me, to come to Stowey. Obstacles, strong 
 as death, prevent me at present ; maybe I may be 
 able to come before the year is out. Believe me, I 
 will come as soon as I can ; but I dread naming a 
 probable time. It depends on fifty things, besides 
 the expense, which is not nothing. Lloyd wants me 
 to come to see him ; but, besides that you have a 
 prior claim on me, I should not feel myself so much 
 at home with him, till he gets a house of his own. As 
 to Richardson, caprice may grant what caprice only 
 refused ; and it is no more hardship, rightly con- 
 sidered, to be dependent on him for pleasure, than to 
 lie at the mercy of the rain and sunshine for the 
 enjoyment of a holiday : in either case we are not to 
 look for a suspension of the laws of Nature. "Grill 
 will be grill." Vide Spenser. 
 
 I could not but smile at the compromise you make 
 with me for printing Lloyd's poems first ; but there is 
 in nature, I fear, too many tendencies to envy and 
 jealousy not to justify you in your apology. Yet, if 
 any one is welcome to pre-eminence from me, it is 
 Lloyd, for he would be the last to desire it. So pray, 
 let his name uniformly precede mine, for it would be 
 treating me like a child to suppose it could give me 
 pain. Yet, alas! I am not insusceptible of the bad 
 passions. Thank God, I have the ingenuousness to 
 be ashamed of them. I am dearly fond of Charles 
 Lloyd ; he is all goodness ; and I have too much of 
 the world in my composition to feel myself thoroughly 
 deserving of his friendship. 
 
 Lloyd tells me that Sheridan put you upon writing 
 your tragedy. I hope you are only Coleridgeizing 
 when you talk of finishing it in a few days. Shak- 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. g5 
 
 speare was a more modest man ; but you best know 
 your own power. 
 
 Of my last poem you speak slightingly. Surely the 
 longer stanzas were pretty tolerable : at least there 
 was one good line in it, 
 
 " Thick-shaded trees, with dark green leaf rich clad." 
 
 To adopt your own expression, I call this a " rich " 
 line, a fine full line. And some others I thought even 
 beautiful. Believe me, my little gentleman will feel 
 some repugnance at riding behind in the basket ; 
 though, I confess, in pretty good company. Your 
 picture of idiocy, with the sugar-loaf head, is exquisite ; 
 but are you not too severe upon our more favoured 
 brethren in fatuity ? Lloyd tells me how ill your wife 
 and child have been. I rejoice that they are better. 
 My kindest remembrances, and those of my sister. . I 
 send you a trifling letter ; but you have only to think 
 that I have been skimming the superficies of my 
 mind, and found it only froth. Now, do write again ! 
 You cannot believe how I long and love always to 
 hear about you. Yours most affectionately, 
 
 Charles Lamb. 
 
 Letter XXVII. ] June 24th, 1797. 
 
 Did you seize the grand opportunity of seeing 
 Kosciusko while he was at Bristol ? I never saw a 
 hero; I wonder how they look. I have been reading a 
 most curious romance-like work, called the Life of John
 
 g6 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Bunch, Esq. Tis very interesting, and an extra- 
 ordinary compound of all mannerof subjects, from the 
 depth of the ludicrous to the heights of sublime reli- 
 gious truth. There is much abstruse science in it 
 above my cut, and an infinite fund of pleasantry. 
 John Buncle is a famous fine man, formed in Nature's 
 most eccentric hour. I am ashamed of what I write ; 
 but I have no topic to talk of. I see nobody. I 
 sit and read, or walk alone, and hear nothing. I am 
 quite lost to conversation from disuse ; and out of 
 the sphere of my little family (who I am thankful are 
 dearer and dearer to me every day) I see no face 
 that brightens up at my approach. My friends are at 
 a distance.* Worldly hopes are at a low ebb with me, 
 and unworldly thoughts are familiarised to me, though 
 I occasionally indulge in them. Still I feel a calm 
 not unlike content. I fear it is sometimes more akin 
 to physical stupidity than to a heaven-flowing serenity 
 and peace. What right have I to obtrude all this 
 upon you ? and what is such a letter to you ? and if 
 I come to Stowey, what conversation can I furnish to 
 compensate my friend for those stores of knowledge 
 and of fancy ; those delightful treasures of wisdom, 
 which, I know he will open to me? But it is better 
 to give than to receive ; and I was a very patient 
 hearer, and docile scholar, in our winter evening 
 meetings at Mr. May's; was I not, Coleridge ? What 
 I have owed to thee, my heart can ne'er forget. 
 
 God love you and yours ! C. L. 
 
 They were at Birmingham and Stowey.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 97 
 
 Letter XXVIII.] 
 
 WRITTEN A TWELVEMONTH AFTER THE EVENTS. 
 [Friday next, Coleridge, is the day on which my Mother died.~\ 
 Alas ! how am I changed ! Where be the tears, 
 The sobs, and forced suspensions of the breath, 
 And all the dull desertions of the heart 
 With which I hung o'er my dear mother's corse? 
 Where be the bless'd subsidings of the storm 
 Within ; the sweet resignedness of hope 
 Drawn heavenward, and strength of filial love, 
 In which I bow'd me to my Father's will ? 
 My God and nay Redeemer, keep not thou 
 My heart in brute and sensual thanklessness 
 Seal'd up, oblivious ever of that dear grace, 
 And health restored to my long-loved friend. 
 Long loved and worthy known ! Thou didst not keep 
 Her soul in death. O keep not now, my Lord, 
 Thy servants in far worse — in spiritual death 
 And darkness — blacker than those fear'd shadows 
 Of the valley all must tread ! Lend us thy balms, 
 Thou dear Physician of the sin-sick soul, 
 And heal our cleansed bosoms of the wounds 
 With which the world hath pierced us thro' and thro' ! 
 Give us new flesh, new birth. Elect of heaven 
 May we become, in thine election sure 
 Contain'd, and to one purpose steadfast drawn — 
 Our souls' salvation. 
 
 Thou and I, dear friend, 
 With filial recognition sweet, shall know 
 One day the face of our dear mother in heaven, 
 And her remember'd looks of love shall greet 
 With answering looks of love, her placid smiles 
 Meet with a smile as placid, and her hand 
 With drops of fondness wet, nor fear repulse 
 
 Be witness for me, Lord, I do not ask 
 Those days of vanity to return again, 
 
 1 [Note in the margin of MS.] "This is almost literal from a letter 
 of my sister's — less than a year ago." 
 
 H 
 VOL. I.
 
 gS CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 (Nor fitting me to ask, nor thee to give,) 
 
 Vain loves, and "wanderings with a fair-hair'd maid:" 
 
 (Child of the dust as I am,) who so long 
 
 My foolish heart steep'd in idolatry, 
 
 And creature- loves. Forgive it, O my Maker, 
 
 If, in a mood of grief, I sin almost 
 
 In sometimes brooding on the days long past, 
 
 (And from the grave of time wishing them back,) 
 
 Days of a mother's fondness to her child — 
 
 Her little one ! Oh, where be now those sports 
 
 And infant play-games? Where the joyous troops 
 
 Of children, and the haunts I did so love? 
 
 my companions ! O ye loved names 
 
 Of friend, or playmate dear, gone are ye now. 
 Gone divers ways; to honour and credit some; 
 And some, I fear, to ignominy and shame ! 1 
 
 1 only am left, with unavailing grief 
 
 One parent dead to mourn, and see one live 
 Of all life's joys bereft, and desolate : 
 Am left, with a few friends, and one above 
 The rest, found faithful in a length of years, 
 Contented as I may, to bear me on, 
 To the not unpeaceful evening of a day 
 Made black by morning storms. 
 
 The following I wrote when I had returned from 
 Charles Lloyd, leaving him behind at Burton, with 
 Southey. To understand some of it, you must re- 
 member that at that time he was very much perplexed 
 in mind. 
 
 A stranger, and alone, I pass'd those scenes 
 We pass'd so late together ; and my heart 
 Felt something like desertion, as I look'd 
 Around me, and the pleasant voice of friend 
 
 1 [Note in the margin of MS.] " Alluding to some of my old play- 
 fellows being, literally, -on the town,' and some otherwise wretched."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 99 
 
 Was absent, and the cordial look was there 
 
 No more, to smile on me. I thought on Lloyd — 
 
 All he had been to me ! And now I go 
 
 Again to mingle with a world impure ; 
 
 With men who make a mock of holy things, 
 
 Mistaken, and of man's best hope think scorn. 
 
 The world does much to warp the heart of man ; 
 
 And I may sometimes join its idiot laugh : 
 
 Of this I now complain not. Deal with me, 
 
 Omniscient Father, as thou judgest best. 
 
 And in thy season soften thou my heart. 
 
 I pray not for myself : I pray for him 
 
 Whose soul is sore perplex'd. Shine thou on him 
 
 Father of lights ! and in the difficult paths 
 
 Make plain his way before him. His own thoughts 
 
 May he not think ; his own ends not pursue: 
 
 So shall he best perform thy will on earth. 
 
 Greatest and Best, Thy will be ever ours ! 
 
 The former of these poems I wrote with unusual 
 celerity t'other morning at office. I expect you to 
 like it better than any thing of mine ; Lloyd does, and 
 I do myself. 
 
 You use Lloyd very ill, never writing to him. I 
 tell you again that his is not a mind with which you 
 should play tricks. He deserves more tenderness 
 from you. 
 
 For myself, I must spoil a little passage of Beau- 
 mont and Fletcher's to adapt it to my feelings : — 
 
 "I am prouder 
 That I was once your friend, tho' now forgot, 
 Than to have had another true to me." 
 
 If you don't write to me now, as I told Lloyd, I shall 
 get angry, and call you hard names — Manchineel, and 
 I don't know what else. I wish you would send me 
 my great-coat. The snow and the rain season is at 
 
 H 2
 
 100 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 hand, and I have but a wretched old coat, once my 
 father's, to keep 'em off, and that is transitory. 
 
 "When time drives flocks from field to fold, 
 When ways grow foul and blood gets cold," 
 
 I shall remember where I left my coat. Meet emblem 
 wilt thou be, old Winter, of a friend's neglect — cold, 
 cold, cold ! Remembrance where remembrance is 
 due. C. Lamb. 
 
 Sept. 1797. 
 
 Letter XXIX.] Dec 10th, 1797. 
 
 I am sorry I cannot now relish your poetical pre- 
 sent so thoroughly as I feel it deserves ; but I do not 
 the less thank Lloyd and you for it. 1 
 
 1 The volume containing the poems of Coleridge, Lamb, and Lloyd , 
 Bristol, 1797, izmo. Four of Lamb's Sonnets had previously been 
 inserted in Coleridge's Poems, printed in 1796, i2mo., under this title: 
 " Poems on Various Subjects, by S. T. Coleridge, late of Jesus College, 
 Cambridge." He first appeared as an Author in 1791, when he pub- 
 lished his drama, The Fall of Robespierre ; in 1795 there came from 
 his pen a political diatribe called The Plot Discovered. Another 
 Edition of Lloyd's and Lamb's Verses, without Coleridge'-:, was printed 
 in 1798, nmo. A friend says: "This little book, now very scarce, 
 had the following motto expressive of Coleridge's f< elings towards his 
 associates : — Duplex nobis "vinculum, et amiciti.e et similium junc- 
 tarumque Camanarum ; quod utinam tuque mors so/vat, neqtte 
 temporis longinquitas. Lamb's share of the work consists of eight 
 sonnets; four short fragments of blank verse, of which the Grandame 
 is the principal; a poem, called the "Tomb of Douglas;" some 
 v rses to Charles Lloyd ; and a " Vision of Repentance ; " which are all 
 published in the last edition of his poetical works, except one of the 
 sonnets, which was addressed to Mrs. Siddons, and the " Tomb of 
 Douglas," which was justly omitted as common-place and vapid. They 
 only occupy twenty-eight duodecimo pages, within which space was 
 comprised all that Lamb at this time had written which he deemed 
 worth preserving."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 101 
 
 In truth, Coleridge, I am perplexed, and at times 
 almost cast down. I am beset .with perplexities. 
 The old hag of a wealthy relation who took my aunt 
 off our hands in the beginning of trouble, has found 
 out that she is " indolent and mulish " — I quote her 
 own words, and that her attachment to us is so strong 
 that she can never be happy apart. The lady, with 
 delicate irony, remarks, that if I am not an hypocrite, 
 I shall rejoice to receive her again ; and that it will 
 be a means of making me more fond of home to 
 have so dear a friend to come home to ! The fact is, 
 she is jealous of my aunt's bestowing any kind recol- 
 lections on us while she enjoys the patronage of her 
 roof. She says she finds it inconsistent with her 
 own " ease and tranquillity," to keep her any longer ; 
 and, in fine, summons me to fetch her home. Now 
 much as I should rejoice to transplant the poor old 
 creature from the chilling air of such patronage, yet 
 I know how straitened we are already, how unable 
 already to answer any demand which sickness or any 
 extraordinary expense may make. I know this ; and 
 all unused as I am to struggle with perplexities, I am 
 somewhat nonplussed, to say no worse. This pre- 
 vents me from a thorough relish of what Lloyd's 
 kindness and yours have furnished me with. I 
 thank you though from my heart, and feel myself 
 not quite alone in the earth. 
 
 Before I offer, what alone I have to offer, a few 
 obvious remarks on the poems you sent me, I can 
 but notice the odd coincidence of two young men, in 
 one age, carolling their grandmothers. Love, what 
 L. calls the " feverish and romantic tie," hath too 
 long domineered over all the charities of home : the 
 dear domestic ties of father, brother, husband. The
 
 102 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 amiable and benevolent Cowper has a beautiful pas- 
 sage in his " Task," — some natural and painful 
 reflections on his deceased parents : and Hayley's 
 sweet lines to his mother are notoriously the best 
 things he ever wrote. Cowper's lines, some of them 
 
 are- 
 
 " How gladly would the man recall to life 
 The boy's neglected sire ! a Mother, too. 
 That softer friend, perhaps more gladly still, 
 Might he demand them at the gates of death." 1 
 
 I cannot but smile to see my granny so gaily 
 decked forth : though, I think, whoever altered "thy" 
 praises to "her" praises — "thy" honoured memory 
 to "her" honoured memory, did wrong: they best 
 expresst my feelings. There is a pensive state of 
 recollection in which the mind is disposed to apos- 
 trophise the departed objects of its attachment ; and, 
 breaking loose from grammatical precision, changes 
 from the first to the third, and from the third to the 
 first person, just as the random fancy or the feeling 
 directs. Among Lloyd's sonnets, the 6th, 7th, 8th, 
 gth, and nth, are eminently beautiful. I think him 
 too lavish of his expletives : the do's and did's, when 
 they occur too often, bring a quaintness with them 
 along with their simplicity, or rather air of antiquity, 
 which the patrons of them seem desirous of con- 
 veying. 
 
 Another time, I may notice more particularly 
 Lloyd's, Southey's, Dermody's Sonnets. I shrink 
 from them now : my teasing lot makes me too con- 
 
 1 These lines occur in the " Winter Walk at Noon."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. IO3 
 
 fused for a clear judgment of things, too selfish for 
 sympathy ; and these ill-digested, meaningless re- 
 marks, I have imposed on myself as a task, to lull 
 reflection, as well as to show you I did not neglect 
 reading your valuable present. Return my acknow- 
 ledgments to Lloyd ; you two seem to be about real- 
 ising an Elysium upon earth, and, no doubt, I shall 
 be happier. Take my best wishes. Remember me 
 
 most affectionately to Mrs. C , and give little 
 
 David Hartley (God bless its little heart !) a kiss for 
 me. Bring him up to know the meaning of his 
 Christian name, and what that name (imposed upon 
 him) will demand of him. 
 
 God love you ! C. Lamb. 
 
 I write, for one thing, to say that I shall write no 
 more till you send me word where you are, for you 
 are so soon to move. 
 
 My sister is pretty well, thank God. We think of 
 you very often. God bless you : continue to be my 
 correspondent, and I will strive to fancy that this 
 world is not "all-barrenness." 
 
 LETTER XXX.] January 28th, 1798. 
 
 You have writ me many kind letters, and I have 
 answered none of them. I don't deserve your at- 
 tentions. An unnatural indifference has been creep- 
 ing on me since my last misfortunes, or I should 
 have seized the first opening of a correspondence 
 with yoti. To you I owe much, under God. In my 
 brief acquaintance with you in London, your conver-
 
 104 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 sations won me to the better cause, and rescued me 
 from the polluting spirit of the world. I might have 
 been a worthless character without you ; as it is, I 
 do possess a certain improvable portion of devotional 
 feelings, tho' when I view myself in the light of divine 
 truth, and not according to the common measures of 
 human judgment, I am altogether corrupt and sinful. 
 TV' s is no cant. I am very sincere. 
 
 These last afflictions, Coleridge, have failed to 
 soften and bend my will. They found me unpre- 
 pared. My former calamities produced in me a 
 spirit of humility and a spirit of prayer. I thought 
 they had sufficiently disciplined me ; but the event 
 ought to humble me. If God's judgment now fail 
 to take away from me the heart of stone, what more 
 grievous trials ought I not, to expect ? I have been 
 very querulous, impatient under the rod — full of little 
 jealousies and heart burnings. I had wellnigh quar- 
 relled with Charles Lloyd ; and for no other reason, 
 I believe, than that the good creature did all he could 
 to make me happy. The truth is, I thought he tried 
 to force my mind from its natural and proper bent. 
 He continually wished me to be from home ; he was 
 drawing me from the consideration of my poor dear 
 Mary's situation, rather than assisting me to gain a 
 proper view of it with religious consolations. I 
 wanted to be left to the tendency of my own mind, 
 in a solitary state, which, in times past, I knew had 
 led to quietness and a patient bearing of the yoke. 
 He was hurt that I was not more constantly with 
 him; but he was living with White, a man to 
 whom I had never been accustomed to impart my 
 dearest feelings, tho' from long habits of friendliness, 
 and many a social and good quality, I loved him
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 105 
 
 very much. I met company there sometimes — in- 
 discriminate company. Any society almost, when 
 I am in affliction, is sorely painful to me. I seem to 
 breathe more freely, to think more collectedly, to feel 
 more properly and calmly, when alone. All these 
 things the good creature did with the kindest inten- 
 tions in the world, but they produced in me nothing 
 but soreness and discontent. I became, as he com- 
 plained, '"jaundiced " towards him . . . but he has 
 forgiven me ; and his smile, I hope, will draw all 
 such humours from me. I am recovering, God be 
 praised for it, a healthiness of mind, something like 
 calmness ; but I want more religion. I am jealous 
 of human helps and leaning-places. I rejoice in your 
 good fortunes. May God at the last settle you ! — You 
 have had many and painful trials ; humanly speaking 
 they are going to end ; but we should rather pray 
 that discipline may attend us thro' the whole of our 
 lives .... A careless and a dissolute spirit has 
 advanced upon me with large strides. Pray God 
 that my present afflictions may be sanctified to me ! 
 Mary is recovering ; but I see no opening yet of a 
 situation for her. Your invitation went to my very 
 heart ; but you have a power of exciting interest, of 
 leading all hearts captive, too forcible to admit of 
 Mary's being with you. I consider her as perpetually 
 on the brink of madness. I think you would almost 
 make her dance within an inch of the precipice : she 
 must be with duller fancies, and cooler intellects. I 
 know a young man of this description, who has 
 suited her these twenty years, and may live to do so 
 still, if we are one day restored to each other. In 
 answer to your suggestions of occupation for me, I 
 must say that I do not think my capacity altogether
 
 106 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 suited for disquisitions of that kind I have 
 
 read little, I have a very weak memory, and retain 
 little of what I read ; am unused to compositions in 
 which any methodising is required ; but I thank you 
 sincerely for the hint, and shall receive it as far as I 
 am able ; that is, endeavour to engage my mind in 
 some constant and innocent pursuit. I know my 
 capacities better than you do. 
 
 Accept my kindest love, and believe me yours, as 
 ever. C. L. 
 
 5. T. Coleridge, 
 at the Reverend A. Rowe's, 
 Shrewsbury. 
 
 LETTER XXXI.] No date ; but 1798, or 1799. 
 
 I am scarcely yet so reconciled to the loss of you, 
 or so subsided into my wonted uniformity of feeling, 
 as to sit calmly down to think of you and write to 
 you. But I reason myself into the belief that those 
 few and pleasant holidays shall not have been spent 
 in vain. I feel improvement in the recollection of 
 many a casual conversation. The names of Tom 
 Poole, 1 of Wordsworth and his good sister, with thine 
 and Sara's, are become " familiar in my mouth as 
 household words." You would make me very happy 
 if you think W. has no objection, by transcribing for 
 me that inscription of his. I have some scattered 
 sentences ever floating on my memory, teasing me 
 that I cannot remember more of it. You may believe 
 
 1 Coleridge's kind friend, a resident in the neighbourhood of Nether- 
 Stowey. 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. I07 
 
 1 
 
 I will make no improper use of it. Believe me I can 
 think now of many subjects on which I had planned 
 gaining information from you; but I forgot my "trea- 
 sure's worth " while I possessed it. Your leg is now 
 become to me a matter of much more importance ; 
 and many a little thing, which when I was present 
 with you seemed scarce to indent my notice, now 
 presses painfully on my remembrance. Is the Patriot 
 come? Are Wordsworth and his sister gone yet? I 
 was looking out for John Thelwall all the way from 
 Bridgewater; and had I met him, I think it would 
 have moved almost me to tears. You will oblige me, 
 too, by sending me my great-coat, which I left behind 
 in the oblivious state the mind is thrown into at part- 
 ing. Is it not ridiculous that I sometimes envy that 
 great-coat lingering so cunningly behind ! At present 
 I have none : so send it to me by a Stowey waggon, 
 if there be such a thing, directing for C. L., No. 45, 
 Chapel Street, Pentonville, near London. But above 
 all, that Inscription ! It will recall to me the tones of 
 all your voices, and with them many a remembered 
 kindness to one who could and can repay you all only 
 by the silence of a grateful heart. I could not talk 
 much while I was with you ; but my silence was not 
 sullenness, nor I hope from any bad motive ; but, in 
 truth, disuse has made me awkward at it. I know I 
 behaved myself, particularly at Tom Poole's, and at 
 Cruikshank's, most like a sulky child ; but company 
 and converse are strange to me. It was kind in you 
 all to endure me as you did. 
 
 Are you and your dear Sara — to me also very dear, 
 because very kind — agreed yet about the management 
 of little Hartley ? And how go on the little rogue's 
 teeth ? I will see White to-morrow and he shall send
 
 IOS CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 you information on that matter; but as perhaps I can 
 do it as well, after talking with him, I will keep this 
 letter open. 
 
 My love and thanks to you and all of you. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Wednesday evening. 
 
 Letter XXXI. a.] No date [1798.] 
 
 THESES QILEDAM THEOLOGICE. 
 
 First, Whether God loves a lying angel better than a true man ? 
 
 Second, Whether the Archangel Uriel could affirm an untruth ? and 
 if lie could, whether he would ? 
 
 Third, Whether honesty be an angelic virtue, or no: rather to be 
 reckoned among those qualities which the schoolmen term •virtutes 
 minus splendid^ ? 
 
 Fourth, Whether the higher order of Seraphim illuminati ever 
 sneer ? 
 
 Fifth, Whether pure intelligences can love ? 
 
 Sixth, Whether the Seraphim ardentes do not manifest their virtues 
 by the way of vision and theory ? and whether practice be not a sub- 
 celestial and merely human virtue? 
 
 Seventh, Whether the vision beatific be any thing more or less than 
 a perpetual representment to each individual angel of his own present 
 attainments and future capabilities, somehow in the manner of mortal 
 looking-glasses, reflecting a perpetual complacency and self-satisfac- 
 tion ? 
 
 Eighth, and last, Whether an immortal and amenable soul may not 
 come to be condemned at last, and the man never suspect it before- 
 hand ? 
 
 Learned Sir, my Friend. — Presuming on our long 
 habits of friendship, and emboldened further by your 
 late liberal permission to avail myself of your corre-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. IOQ 
 
 spondence in case I want any knowledge, (which I 
 intend to do when I have no Encyclopaedia or Ladies' 
 Magazine at hand to refer to in any matter of science,) 
 I now submit to your inquiries the above theological 
 propositions, to be by you defended or oppugned, or 
 both, in the schools of Germany ; whither, I am told, 
 you are departing, to the utter dissatisfaction of your 
 native Devonshire, and regret of universal England, 
 but to my own individual consolation, if, through the 
 channel of your wished return, learned sir, my friend, 
 may be transmitted to this our island, from those 
 famous theological wits of Leipsic and Gottingen, 
 any rays of illumination, in vain to be derived from 
 the home growth of our English halls and colleges. 
 Finally wishing, learned sir, that you may see Schiller, 
 and swing in a wood, (vide poems,) and sit upon a 
 tun, and eat fat hams of Westphalia, 
 
 I remain 
 Your friend and docile pupil to instruct, 
 
 Charles Lamb. 1 
 
 Letter XXXII.] l8o °- 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — Soon after I wrote to you last, an 
 offer was made me by Gutch 2 (you must remember 
 him, at Christ's ; 3 you saw him, slightly, one day with 
 
 1 See Letter LIX. of July 28. 1798, addressed to Southey. Lamb (as 
 Mr. Fitzgerald was, I believe, the first to point out) attacks here slyly 
 Coleridge's vulnerable points. 
 
 a The late Mr. John Mathew Gutch, formerly proprietor and editor 
 of Felix Farlefs Journal, a Bristol paper. He afterwards resided at 
 Worcester. 
 
 s Christ's Hospital ; the Blue Coat School.
 
 110 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Thomson at our house), to come and lodge with him, 
 at his house in Southampton Buildings, Chancery 
 Lane. This was a very comfortable offer to me, the 
 rooms being at a reasonable rent, and including the 
 use of an old servant, besides being infinitely prefer- 
 able to ordinary lodgings in our case, as you must 
 perceive. As Gutch knew all our story and the per- 
 petual liability to a recurrence in my sister's disccder, 
 probably to the end of her life, I certainly think the 
 offer very generous and very friendly. I have got 
 three rooms (including servant) under £34 a year. 
 Here I soon found myself at home ; and here, in six 
 weeks after, Mary was well enough to join me. So 
 we are once more settled. I am afraid we are not 
 placed out of the reach of future interruptions. But 
 I am determined to take what snatches of pleasure 
 we can between the acts of our distressful drama. 
 . . . . I have passed two days at Oxford, on a 
 visit which I have long put off, to Gutch's family. 
 The sight of the Bodleian Library, and, above all, a 
 fine bust of Bishop Taylor, at All Souls', were parti- 
 cularly gratifying to me. Unluckily, it was not a 
 family where I could take Mary with me, and I am 
 afraid there is something of dishonesty in any plea- 
 sures I take without her. She never goes anywhere. 
 I do not know what I can add to this letter. I hope 
 you are better by this time ; and I desire to be affec- 
 tionately remembered to Sara and Hartley. 
 
 I expected before this to have had tidings of another 
 little philosopher. Lloyd's wife is on the point of 
 favouring the world. 
 
 Have you seen the new edition of Burns ? his pos- 
 thumous works and letters ? I have only been able 
 to procure the first volume, which contains his life —
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. Ill 
 
 very confusedly and badly written, and interspersed 
 with dull pathological and medical discussions. It is 
 written by a Dr. Currie. Do you know the well- 
 meaning doctor ! Alas, ne sutor ultra crepidam ! 
 
 I hope to hear again from you very soon. Godwin 
 is gone to Ireland on a visit to Grattan. Before he 
 went I passed much time with him, and he has 
 showed me particular attentions : N.B. A thing I 
 much like. Your books are all safe : only I have not 
 thought it necessary to fetch away your last batch, 
 which I understand are at Johnson's, the bookseller, 
 who has got quite as much room, and will take as 
 much care of them as myself; and you can send for 
 them immediately from him. 
 
 I wish you would advert to a letter I sent you at 
 Grassmere about Christabel, and comply with my 
 request contained therein. 
 
 Love to all friends round Skiddaw. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XXXIII.] Jan. "d 1800. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — Now I write, I cannot miss this 
 opportunity of acknowledging the obligations myself, 
 and the readers in general of that luminous paper, 
 the Morning Post, are under to you for the very novel 
 and exquisite manner in which you combined poli- 
 tical with grammatical science in your yesterday's 
 dissertation on Mr. Wyndham's unhappy composi- 
 tion. It must have been the death-blow to that 
 ministry. I expect Pitt and Grenville to resign. 
 More especially the delicate and Cottrellian grace 
 with which you officiated, with a ferula for a white
 
 112 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 wand, as gentleman usher to the word " also," which 
 it seems did not know its place, 
 
 I expect Manning 1 of Cambridge in town to-night. 
 Will you fulfil your promise of meeting him at my 
 house ? He is a man of a thousand. Give me a 
 line to say what day, whether Saturday, Sunday, 
 Monday, &c, and if Sara and the Philosopher can 
 come. I am afraid if I did not at intervals call upon 
 you, I should never see you. But I forget, the affairs 
 of the nation engross your time and your mind. 
 
 Farewell. C. L. 
 
 Letter XXXIV.] May 12th, 1800. 
 
 My dear Coleridge, — I don't know why I write, 
 except from the propensity which misery has to tell 
 her griefs. Hetty died on Friday night, about eleven 
 o'clock, after eight days' illness. Mary, in conse- 
 quence of fatigue and anxiety, is fallen ill again, and 
 I was obliged to remove her yesterday. I am left 
 alone in a house with nothing but Hetty's dead body 
 to keep me company. To-morrow I bury her, and 
 then I shall be quite alone, with nothing but a cat, 
 to remind me that the house has been full of living 
 beings like myself. My heart is quite sunk, and I 
 don't know where to look for relief. Mary will get 
 better again, but her constantly being liable to such 
 relapses is dreadful; nor is it the least of our evils 
 that her case and all our story is so well known 
 
 1 Thomas Manning, mathematical tutor at that University. He 
 continued one of Lamb's correspondents till 1825.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 1 13 
 
 around us. We are in a manner marked. Excuse 
 my troubling you, but I have nobody by me to speak 
 to me. I slept out last night, not being able to 
 endure the change and the stillness ; but I did not 
 sleep well, and I must come back to my own bed. 
 I am going to try and get a friend to come and be 
 with me to-morrow. I am completely shipwrecked. 
 My head is quite bad. I almost wish that Mary were 
 dead. God bless you ! Love to Sara and Hartley. — 
 Monday. C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XXXV.] June ", 1800. 
 
 By some fatality, unusual with me, I have mislaid 
 the list of books which you want. Can you, from 
 memory, easily supply me with another ? 
 
 I confess to Statius, and I detained him wilfully, 
 out of a reverent regard to your style. Statius, they 
 tell me, is turgid. As to that other Latin book, 
 since you know neither its name nor subject, your 
 wants (I crave leave to apprehend) cannot be very 
 urgent. Meanwhile, dream that it is one of the lost 
 Decades of Livy. 
 
 Your partiality to me has led you to form an 
 erroneous opinion as to the measure of delight you 
 suppose me to take in obliging. Pray be careful that 
 it spread no further. 'Tis one of those heresies that 
 is very pregnant. Pray rest more satisfied with the 
 portion of learning which you have got, and disturb 
 my peaceful ignorance as little as possible with such 
 sort of commissions. 
 
 Did you never observe an appearance well known 
 by the name of the man in the moon ? Some scan- 
 
 I
 
 114 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 dalous old maids have set on foot a report, that it is 
 Endymion. 
 
 Your theory about the first awkward step a man 
 makes being the consequence of learning to dance, 
 is not universal. We have known many youths bred 
 up at Christ's, who never learned to dance, yet the 
 world imputes to them no very graceful motions. I 
 remember there was little Hudson, the immortal pre- 
 centor of St. Paul's, to teach us our quavers ; but, to 
 the best of my recollection, there was no master of 
 motions when we were at Christ's. 
 
 Farewell, in haste. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter XXXVI.] Aug. 6th, 1800. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — I have taken to-day, and delivered 
 to L. & Co., Imprimis: your books, viz., three pon- 
 derous German dictionaries, one volume (I can find 
 no more) of German and French ditto, sundry other 
 German books unbound, as you left them, Percy's 
 Ancient Poetry, and one volume of Anderson's Poets. 
 I specify them, that you may not lose any. Sccundo : 
 a dressing gown (value, fivepence) in which you used 
 to sit and look like a conjuror, when you were trans- 
 lating Wallenstein. A case of two razors, and a 
 shaving-box and strap. This it has cost me a severe 
 struggle to part with. They are in a brown-paper 
 parcel, which also contains sundry papers and poems, 
 sermons, some few Epic Poems, — one about Cain and 
 Abel, which came from Poole, &c, &c, and also your
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 115 
 
 tragedy; with one or two small German books, and 
 that drama in which Got-fader performs. Tertio : a 
 small oblong box containing all your letters, collected 
 from all your waste papers, and which fill the said 
 little box. All other waste papers, which I judged 
 worth sending, are in the paper parcel aforesaid. 
 But you will find all your letters in the box by them- 
 selves. Thus have I discharged my conscience and 
 my lumber-room of all your property, save and ex- 
 cept a folio entitled Tyrrell's Bibliotheca Politica, 1 
 which you used to learn your politics out of when you 
 wrote for the Post, mutatis mutandis, i. e., applying 
 past inferences to modern data. I retain that, be- 
 cause I am sensible I am very deficient in the politics 
 myself; and I have torn up (don't be angry, waste 
 paper has risen forty per cent., and I can't afford to 
 buy it) all Buonaparte's Letters, Arthur Young's Trea- 
 tise on Corn, and one or two more light-armed in- 
 fantry, which I thought better suited the flippancy of 
 London discussion than the dignity of Keswick 
 thinking. Mary says you will be in a passion about 
 them, when you come to miss them ; but you must 
 study philosophy. Read Albertus Magnus de Chartis 
 Amissis five times over after phlebotomising, — -'tis 
 Burton's recipe — and then be angry with an absent 
 friend if you can. 
 
 Sara is obscure. Am I to understand by her letter, 
 that she sends a kiss to Eliza Buckingham ? Pray 
 tell your wife that a note of interrogation on the 
 superscription of a letter is highly ungrammatical : 
 
 1 A forgotten work published in parts anonymously, in 4to, in the 
 time of William III. 
 
 I 2
 
 Il6 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 she proposes writing my name Lamb ? Lambe is 
 quite enough. I have had the Anthology, and like 
 only one thing in it, Lewti ; but of that the last stanza 
 is detestable, the rest most exquisite : the epithet 
 enviable would dash the finest poem. For God's sake 
 (I never was more serious) don't make me ridiculous 
 any more by terming me gentle-hearted in print, or 
 do it in better verses. It did well enough five years 
 ago when I came to see you, and was moral coxcomb 
 enough at the time you wrote the lines, to feed upon 
 such epithets ; but, besides that, the meaning of 
 " gentle " is equivocal at best, and almost always means 
 poor-spirited ; the very quality of gentleness is abhor- 
 rent to such vile trumpetings. My sentiment is long 
 since vanished. I hope my virtues have done sticking. 
 I can scarce think but you meant it in joke. I hope 
 you did, for I should be ashamed to believe that you 
 could think to gratify me by such praise, fit only to 
 be a cordial to some green-sick sonneteer. 1 
 
 I have hit off the following in imitation of old English 
 poetry, which, I imagine, I am a dab at. The mea- 
 sure is unmeasurable ; but it most resembles that 
 beautiful ballad, the " Old and Young Courtier ;" and 
 i'n its feature of taking the extremes of two situations 
 
 l This refers to a poem of Co! composed in 1797, and pub- 
 
 lished in the Anthology of the year 1800, under the title of This Lime- 
 Bower my Prison. ed to "Charles Lamb, of the India 
 . London," in which Lamb is thus apostrophised, as taking more 
 pleasure in the country than Coleridge's other visitors ; a compliment 
 which even then he scarcely merited : — 
 
 " But thou, methinks most glad, 
 
 My gentle-hearted Charles ! For thou hast pined 
 And Linger'd after Nature many a year, 
 In the great city pent."— &c.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 1 17 
 
 for just parallel, it resembles the old poetry certainly. 
 If I could but stretch out the circumstances to twelve 
 more verses, i. e., if I had as much genius as the 
 writer of that old song, I think it would be excellent. 
 It was to follow an imitation of Burton in prose, 
 which you have not seen. But fate " and wisest 
 Stewart" say No. 2 
 
 I can send you 200 pens and six quires of paper 
 immediately, if they will answer the carriage by coach. 
 It would be foolish to pack 'em up cum multis libris 
 et cceteris ; they would all spoil. I only wait your 
 commands to coach them. I would pay five-and-forty 
 thousand carriages to read W.'s tragedy, of which I 
 have heard so much and seen so little — only what I 
 saw at Stowey. Pray give me an order in writing on 
 Longman for Lyrical Ballads. I have the first vo- 
 lume, and, truth to tell, six shillings is a broad shot. 
 I cram all I can in, to save a multiplying of letters, — 
 those pretty comets with swinging tails. 
 
 I'll just crowd in, God bless you ! 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XXXVII.] Aug. 14, 1800. 
 
 My head is playing all the tunes in the world, 
 ringing such peals ! It has just finished the " Merry 
 Christ Church Bells," and absolutely is beginning 
 " Turn again Whittington." Buz, buz, buz, bum, bum, 
 bum, wheeze, wheeze, wheeze, fen, fen, fen, tinky, tinky, 
 
 2 The quaint and pathetic poem, entitled "A Ballad, noticing the 
 difference of Rich and Poor, in the ways of a rich noble's palace and a 
 poor workhouse."
 
 Il8 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 tinky, cr'annch. I shall certainly come to be condemned 
 at last. I have been drinking too much for two days 
 running. I find my moral sense in the last stage of a 
 consumption, and my religion getting faint. This is 
 disheartening ; but I trust the devil will not overpower 
 me. In the midst of this infernal larum, Conscience is 
 balking and yelping as loud as any of them. I have 
 sat down to read over again your satire upon me in 
 the Anthology, and I think I do begin to spy out 
 something like beauty and design in it. I perfectly 
 accede to all your alterations, and only desire that 
 you had cut deeper, when your hand was in. 
 
 In sober truth, I cannot see any great truth in the 
 little dialogue called "Blenheim." It is rather novel 
 and pretty, but the thought is very obvious and 
 is but poor prattle, a thing of easy imitation. 
 Pauper vult videri et est. 
 
 In the next edition of the Anthology (which Phcebus 
 avert, and those nine other wandering maids also !) 
 please to blot out " gentle-hearted," and substitute 
 " drunken dog, ragged head, seld-shaven, odd-eyed, 
 stuttering," or any other epithet which truly and pro- 
 perly belongs to the gentleman in question. And for 
 Charles read Tom, or Bob, or Richard for mere 
 delicacy. Hang you, I was beginning to forgive you, 
 and believe in earnest that the lugging in of my proper 
 name was purely unintentional on your part, when 
 looking back for further conviction, stares me in the 
 face, " Charles Lamb of the India House." Now I 
 am convinced it was all done in malice, heaped sack- 
 upon-sack, congregated, studied malice. You dog ! 
 your 141st page shall not save you. I own I was 
 just ready to acknowledge that there is a something 
 not unlike good poetry in that page, if you had not
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. II9 
 
 run into the unintelligible abstraction-fit about the 
 manner of the Deity's making spirits perceive his 
 presence. No created thing alive can receive any 
 honour from such thin show-box attributes. By 
 the by, where did you pick up that scandalous piece 
 of private history about the angel and the Duchess of 
 Devonshire P 1 If it is a fiction of your own, why truly 
 it was a very modest one for you. Now I do affirm, 
 that " Lewti " is a very beautiful poem. I was in 
 earnest when I praised it. It describes a silly species 
 of one not the wisest of passions. Therefore it cannot 
 deeply affect a disenthralled mind. But such imagery, 
 such novelty, such delicacy, and such versification 
 never got into an Anthology before. I am only sorry 
 that the cause of all the passionate complaint is not 
 greater than the trifling circumstance of Lewti being 
 out of temper one day. " Gaulberto " certainly has 
 considerable originality, but sadly wants finishing. It 
 is, as it is, one of the very best in the book. Next to 
 "Lewti" I like the "Raven," which has a good deal of 
 humour. I was pleased to see it again, for you once 
 sent it me, and I have lost the letter which con- 
 tained it. Now I am on the subject of Anthologies, 
 I must say I am sorry the old pastoral way has fallen 
 into disrepute. The gentry which now indite sonnets 
 are certainly the legitimate descendants of the ancient 
 shepherds. The same simpering face of description, 
 the old family face, is visibly continued in the line. 
 Some of their ancestors' labours are yet to be found in 
 
 1 The Duchess, to whom Coleridge addressed the well-known lines 
 
 " O Lady, nursed in pomp and pleasure ! 
 Whence learn'd you that heroic measure ?"
 
 120 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Allan Ramsay's and Jacob Tonson's Miscellanies. 
 But miscellanies decaying, and the old pastoral way 
 dying of mere want, their successors (driven from 
 their paternal acres) now-a-days settle and lie upon 
 Magazines and Anthologies. This race of men are 
 uncommonly addicted to superstition. Some of them 
 are idolators, and worship the moon. Others deify 
 qualities, as Love, Friendship, Sensibility ; or bare 
 accidents, as Solitude. Grief and Melancholy have 
 their respective altars and temples among them, as 
 the heathens builded theirs to Mors, Febris, Pallor, 
 Oris. They all agree in ascribing a peculiar sanctity 
 to the number 14. One of their own legislators 
 afhrmeth, that whatever exceeds that number "en- 
 croacheth upon the province of the elegy" — vice versa, 
 whatever " cometh short of that number abutteth 
 upon the premises of the epigram." I have been able 
 to dicover but few images in their temples, which like 
 the caves of Delphos of old, are famous for giving 
 echoes. They impute a religious importance to the 
 letter O, whether because by its roundness it is 
 thought to typify the moon, their principal goddess, 
 or for its analogies to their own labours, all ending 
 where they began, or for whatever other high and 
 mystical reference, I have never been able to discover, 
 but I observe they never begin their invocations to 
 their gods without it, except indeed one insignificant 
 sect among them, who use the Doric A, pronounced 
 like Ah ! broad, instead. These boast to have re- 
 stored the old Dorian mood. 
 
 Now I am on the subject of poetry, I must announce 
 to you, who doubtless in your remote part of the 
 island have not heard tidings of so great a blessing, 
 that George Dyer hath prepared two ponderous
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. I2T 
 
 volumes full of poetry and criticism. They impend 
 over the town, and are threatened to fall in the 
 Winter. The first volume contains every sort of 
 poetry, except personal satire, which George, in his 
 truly original prospectus, renounceth for ever, whim- 
 sically foisting the intention in between the price of 
 his book and the proposed number of subscribers. 
 (If I can, I will get you a copy of his handbill.) He 
 has tried his vein in every species besides — the Spen- 
 serian, Thomsonian, Masonic, and Akensidish more 
 especially. The second volume is all criticism ; 
 wherein he demonstrates to the entire satisfaction- of 
 the literary world, in a way that must silence all 
 reply for ever, that the Pastoral was introduced by 
 Theocritus, and polished by Virgil and Pope ; that 
 Gray and Mason (who always hunt in couples in 
 George's brain) have a good deal of poetical fire and 
 true lyric genius ; that Cowley was ruined by excess 
 of wit (a warning to all moderns) ; that Charles 
 Lloyd, Charles Lamb, and William Wordsworth, in 
 later days, have struck the true chords of poesy. O 
 George, George ! with a head uniformly wrong, and a 
 heart uniformly right, that I had power and might 
 equal to my wishes : then I would call the gentry of 
 thy native island, and they should come in troops, 
 flocking at the sound of thy prospectus trumpet, and 
 crowding who shall be first to stand in thy list of 
 subscribers ! - 1 can only put twelve shillings into thy 
 pocket (which, I will answer for them, will not stick 
 there long), out of a pocket almost as bare as thine. 
 Is it not a pity so much fine writing should be erased ? 
 But, to tell the truth, I began to scent that I was 
 getting into that sort of style which Longinus and 
 Dionysius Halicarnassus aptly call "the affected." 
 
 C. L.
 
 122 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Letter XXXVIII. ] Aug. 26th, 1800. 
 
 How do you like this little epigram ? It is not my 
 writing, nor had I any finger it. If you concur with 
 me in thinking it very elegant and very original, I 
 shall be tempted to name the author to you. 1 I will 
 just hint that it is almost or quite a first attempt. 
 
 HELEN. 
 
 High-born Helen, round your dwelling 
 These twenty years I've paced in vain: 
 
 Haughty beauty, thy lover's duty 
 Hath been to glory in his pain. 
 
 High-born Helen, proudly telling 
 
 Stories of thy cold disdain ; 
 I starve, I die, now you comply, 
 
 And I no longer can complain. 
 
 These twenty years I've lived on tears, 
 
 Dwelling for ever on a frown ; 
 On sighs I've fed, your scorn my bread ; 
 
 I perish now you kind are grown. 
 
 Can I, who loved my beloved 
 
 But for the scorn "was in her eye," 
 Can I be moved for my beloved, 
 
 When she "returns me sigh for sigh ?" 
 
 In stately pride, by my bed-side, 
 
 High-born Helen's portrait's hung; 
 Deaf to my praise, my mournful lays 
 
 Are nightly to the portrait sung. 
 
 To that I weep, nor ever sleep, 
 
 Complaining all night long to her. 
 Helen, groivn old, no longer cold. 
 
 Said, " You to all men I prefer." 
 
 1 The author was Mary Lamb.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 123 
 
 By the by, I have a sort of recollection that some- 
 bod)', I thinkyou, promised me a sight of Wordsworth's 
 Tragedy. 1 I should be very glad of it just now; for 
 I have got Manning with me, and should like to read 
 it with him. But this, I confess, is a refinement. 
 Under any circumstances, alone, in Cold-Bath prison, 
 or in the desert island, just when Prospero and his 
 crew had set off, with Caliban in a cage, to Milan, it 
 would be a treat to me to read that play. Manning 
 has read it, so has Lloyd, and all Lloyd's family ; but 
 I could not get him to betray his trust by giving me a 
 sight of it. Lloyd is sadly deficient in some of those 
 virtuous vices. I have just lit upon a most beautiful 
 fiction of Hell punishments by the author of Hush- 
 thumbo, a mad farce. The inventor imagines that 
 in Hell there is a great caldron of hot water, in which 
 a man can scarce hold his finger, and an immense 
 sieve over it, into which the probationary souls are 
 put — 
 
 " And all the little souls 
 Pop thro' the riddle holes ! 
 
 George Dyer is the only literary character I am 
 happily acquainted with. The oftener I see him, 
 the more deeply I admire him. He is goodness 
 itself. If I could but calculate the precise date of his 
 death, I would write a novel on purpose to make 
 George the hero. I could hit him off to a hair. 
 
 George brought a Dr. Anderson to see me. The 
 doctor is a very pleasant old man, a great genius for 
 agriculture, one that ties his breeches-knees with 
 
 1 A lost production ; a specimen of it is quoted in one of Hazlitt's 
 
 Essays.
 
 124 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 packthread, and boasts of having had disappoint- 
 ments from ministers. The doctor happened to men- 
 tion an epic poem by oneWilkie, called the Epigonaid, 
 in which he assured us there is not one tolerable line 
 from beginning to end, but that all the characters, 
 incidents, &c, are verbally copied from Homer. 
 George, who had been sitting quite inattentive to the 
 doctor's criticism, no sooner heard the sound of 
 Homo' strike his pericranicks, than up he gets, and 
 declares he must see that poem immediately : where 
 was it to be had ? An epic poem of 8000 lines, and he 
 not hear of it ! There must be some good things in it, 
 and it was necessary he should see it, for he had touched 
 pretty deeply upon that subject in his criticisms on 
 the Epic. George has touched pretty deeply upon 
 the Lyric, I find ; he has also prepared a dissertation 
 on the Drama and the comparison of the English and 
 German theatres. As I rather doubted his com- 
 petency to do the latter, knowing that his peculiar 
 turn lies in the lyric species of composition, I ques- 
 tioned George what English plays he had read. I 
 found that he had read Shakspeare (whom he calls 
 an original, but irregular, genius) : but it was a good 
 while ago ; and he has dipped into Rowe and Otway, 
 I suppose having found their names in Johnson's 
 Lives at full length ; and upon this slender ground 
 he has undertaken the task. He never seemed even 
 to have heard of Fletcher, Ford, Marlowe, Massinger, 
 and the worthies of Dodsley's collection; but he is to 
 read all these, to prepare him for bringing out his 
 " Parallel " in the Winter. I find he is also deter- 
 mined to vindicate poetry from the shackles which 
 Aristotle and some others have imposed upon it, 
 which is very goodnatured of him, and very neces-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 1 25 
 
 sary just now. Now I am touching so deeply upon 
 poetry, can I forget that I have just received from 
 Cottle a magnificent copy of his Guinea Alfred. Four- 
 and-twenty books to read in the dog-days ! I got as 
 far as the Mad Monk the first day, and fainted. Mr. 
 Cottle's genius strongly points him to the Pastoral, 
 but his inclinations divert him perpetually from his 
 calling. He imitates Southey, as Rowe did Shaks- 
 peare, with his " Good morrow to ye ; good master 
 Lieutenant." Instead of a man, a woman, a daughter, 
 he constantly writes one a man, one a woman, one 
 his daughter. Instead of the king, the hero, he con- 
 stantly writes, he the king, he the hero ; two flowers 
 of rhetoric, palpably from the " Joan." But Mr. Cottle 
 soars a higher pitch : and when he is original, it is in 
 a most original way indeed. His terrific scenes are 
 indefatigable. Serpents, asps, spiders, ghosts, dead 
 bodies, staircases made of nothing, with adders' 
 tongues for bannisters. What a brain he must have! 
 He puts as many plums in his pudding as my grand- 
 mother used to do ; — and then his emerging from 
 Hell's horrors into light, .and treading on pure fiats 
 of this earth — for twenty-three books together ! 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter XXXIX.] Oct. 9 th, 1800. 
 
 I suppose you have heard of the death of Amos 
 Cottle. I paid a solemn visit of condolence to his 
 brother, accompanied by George Dyer, of burlesque 
 memory. I went, trembling to see poor Cottle so 
 immediately upon the event. He was in black ; and 
 his younger brother was also in black. Every thing 
 wore an aspect suitable to the respect due to the
 
 126 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 freshly dead. For some time after our entrance, 
 nobody spake till George modestly put in a ques- 
 tion, whether Alfred was likely to sell. This was 
 Lethe to Cottle, and his poor face, wet with tears, and 
 his kind eye brightened up in a moment. Now I felt 
 it was my cue to speak. I had to thank him for a pre- 
 sent of a magnificent copy, and had promised to send 
 him my remarks, — the least thing I could do ; so I 
 ventured to suggest, that I perceived a considerable 
 improvement he had made in his first book since the 
 state in which he first read it to me. Joseph, who 
 till now had sat with his knees cowering in by the fire- 
 place, wheeled about, and with great difficulty of body 
 shifted the same round to the corner of a table where 
 I was sitting, and first stationing one thigh over the 
 other, which is his sedentary mood, and placidly fixing 
 his benevolent face right against mine, waited my 
 observations. At that moment it came strongly into 
 my mind, that I had got Uncle Toby before me, he 
 looked so kind and so good. I could not say an 
 unkind thing of Alfred. So I set my memory to work 
 to recollect what was the name of Alfred's Queen, and 
 with some adroitness recalled the well-known sound 
 to Cottle's ears of Alswitha. At that moment I could 
 perceive that Cottle had forgot his brother was so 
 lately become a blessed spirit. In the language of 
 mathematicians the author was as 9, the brother as 1. 
 I felt my cue, and strong pity working at the root, I 
 went to work, and beslabber'd Alfred with most un- 
 qualified praise, or only qualifying my praise by the 
 occasional politic interposition of an exception taken 
 against trivial faults, slips, and human imperfections, 
 which, by removing the appearance of insincerity, did 
 but in truth heighten the relish. Perhaps I might
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 1 27 
 
 have spared that refinement, for Joseph was in a 
 humour to hope and believe all things. What 
 I said was beautifully supported, corroborated, and 
 confirmed by the stupidity of his brother on my 
 left hand, and by George on my . right, who has 
 an utter incapacity of comprehending that there can 
 be anything bad in poetry. All poems are good poems 
 to George ; all men are fine geniuses. So what with 
 my actual memory, of which I made the most, and 
 Cottle's own helping me out, for I really had forgotten 
 a good deal of Alfred, I made shift to discuss the 
 most essential parts entirely to the satisfaction of its 
 author, who repeatedly declared that he loved nothing 
 better than candid criticism. Was I a candid grey- 
 hound now for all this ? or did I do right ? I believe 
 I did. The effect was luscious to my conscience. 
 For all the rest of the evening Amos was no more 
 heard of, till George revived the subject by inquiring 
 whether some account should not be drawn up by the 
 friends of the deceased to be inserted in Phillips's 
 Monthly Obituary ; adding, that Amos was estimable 
 both for his head and heart, and would have made a 
 fine poet if he had lived. To the expediency of this 
 measure Cottle fully assented, but could not help 
 adding that he always thought that the qualities of 
 his brother's heart exceeded those of' his head. I 
 believe his brother, when living, had formed precisely 
 the same idea of him ; and I apprehend the world will 
 assent to both judgments. I rather guess that the 
 Brothers were poetical rivals. I judged so when I 
 saw them together. Poor Cottle, I must leave him, 
 after his short dream, to muse again upon his poor 
 brother,, for whom I am sure in secret he will yet shed 
 many a tear. Now send me in return some Greta 
 news. C. L.
 
 128 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 LETTER XL.] No date [end of 1800]. 
 
 I send you, in this parcel, my play, 1 which I 
 beg you to present in my name, with my respect and 
 love, to Wordsworth and his sister. You blame us 
 for giving your direction to Miss Wesley. The 
 woman has been ten times after us about it, and we 
 gave it her at last, under the idea that no further 
 harm would ensue ; but she would once write to you, 
 and you would bite your lips and forget to answer it, 
 and so it would end. You read us a dismal homily 
 upon " Realities." We know, quite as well as you 
 do, what are shadows and what are realities. You, 
 for instance, when you are over your fourth or fifth 
 jorum, chirping about old school occurrences, are the 
 best of realities. Shadows are cold, thin things, that 
 have no warmth or grasp in them. Miss Wesley and 
 her friend, and a tribe of authoresses that come after 
 you here daily, and, in defect of you, hive and cluster 
 upon us, are the shadows. You encouraged that 
 mopsey, Miss Wesley, to dance after you, in the hope 
 of having her nonsense put into a nonsensical Antho- 
 logy. We have pretty well shaken her off by that 
 simple expedient of referring her to you ; but there 
 are more burs in the wind. I came home t'other day 
 from business, hungry as a hunter, to dinner, with 
 nothing, I am sure, of the author but hunger about 
 me ; and whom found I closeted with Mary but a 
 friend of this Miss Wesley, one Miss Benjay or Benje ; 
 I don't know how she spells her name. I just came 
 in time enough, I believe, luckily to prevent them 
 from exchanging vows of eternal friendship. It seems 
 
 1 John Wood'vil, printed in 1800, but not published till 1801.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 120, 
 
 she is one of your authoresses, that you first foster, 
 and then upbraid us with. But I forgive you. "The 
 rogue has given me potions to make me love him." 
 Well ; go she would not, nor step a step over our 
 threshold, till we had promised to come and drink 
 tea with her next night. I had never seen her before, 
 and could not tell who the devil it was that was so 
 familiar. We went, however, not to be impolite. 
 Her lodgings are up two pair of stairs in East Street. 
 Tea and coffee, and macaroons — a kind of cake — 
 much love. We sat down. Presently Miss Benjay 
 broke the silence, by declaring herself quite of a 
 different opinion from D'Israeli, who supposes the 
 differences of human intellect to be the mere effect of 
 organisation. She begged to know my opinion. I 
 attempted to carry it off with a pun upon organ, but 
 that went off very fiat. She immediately conceived 
 a very low opinion of my metaphysics ; and, turning 
 round to Mary, put some question to her in French, — 
 possibly having heard that neither Mary nor I under- 
 stood French. The explanation that took place occa- 
 sioned some embarrassment and much wondering. 
 She then fell into an insulting conversation about the 
 comparative genius and merits of all modern lan- 
 guages, and concluded with asserting that the Saxon 
 was esteemed the purest dialect in Germany. From 
 thence she passed into the subject of poetry ; where 
 I, who had hitherto sat mute, and a hearer only, 
 humbly hoped I might now put in a word to some 
 advantage, seeing that it was my own trade in a 
 manner. But I was stopped by a round assertion, 
 that no good poetry had appeared since Dr. Johnson's 
 time. It seems the Doctor has suppressed many 
 hopeful geniuses that way, by the severity of his 
 
 K
 
 130 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 critical strictures in his Lives of the Poets. I here 
 ventured to question the fact, and was beginning to 
 appeal to names, but I was assured " it was certainly 
 the case." Then we discussed Miss More's book on 
 education, which I had never read. It seems Dr. 
 Gregory, another of Miss Benjay's friends, has found 
 fault with one of Miss More's metaphors. Miss More 
 has been at some pains to vindicate herself, — in the 
 opinion of Miss Benjay, not without success. It 
 seems the Doctor is invariably against the use of 
 broken or mixed metaphor, which he reprobates, 
 against the authority of Shakspeare himself. We 
 next discussed the question, whether Pope was a 
 poet ? I find Dr. Gregory is of opinion he was not, 
 though Miss Seward does not at all concur with him 
 in this. We then sat upon the comparative merits of 
 the ten translations of Pizarro, and Miss Benjay or 
 Benje advised Mary to take two of them home; (she 
 thought it might afford her some pleasure to compare 
 them verbatim ;) which we declined. It being now 
 nine o'clock, wine and macaroons were again served 
 round, and we parted, with a promise to go again 
 next week, and meet the Miss Porters, who, it seems, 
 have heard much of Mr. Coleridge, and wish to meet 
 11s, because we are his friends. I have been prepar- 
 ing for the occasion. I crowd cotton in my ears. I 
 read all the reviews and magazines of the past 
 month, against the dreadful meeting, and I hope by 
 these means to cut a tolerable second-rate figure. 
 
 Pray let us have no more complaints about sha- 
 dows. We are in a fair way, through you, to surfeit 
 sick upon them. 
 
 Our loves and respects to your host and hostess. 
 Our dearest love to Coleridge. 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 131 
 
 Take no thought about your proof sheets ; they 
 shall be done as if Woodfall himself did them. Pray 
 send us word of Mrs. Coleridge and little David 
 Hartley, your little reality. 
 
 Farewell, dear Substance. Take no umbrage at 
 any thing I have written. 
 
 C. Lamb, Umbra. 
 
 Land of Shadows, 
 Shadow Month the 16th or 17th, 1800. 
 
 Coleridge, I find loose among your papers a copy 
 of Christabel. It wants about thirty lines ; you will 
 very much oblige me by sending me the beginning as 
 far as that line, — 
 
 " And the spring comes slowly up this way ;" 
 
 and the intermediate lines between — 
 
 "The lady leaps up suddenly, 
 The lovely Lady Christabel ;" 
 
 and the lines, — 
 
 •' She folded her arms beneath her cloak, 
 And stole to the other side of the oak." 
 
 The trouble to you will be small, and the benefit to us 
 very great. A pretty antithesis ! A figure in speech 
 I much applaud. 
 
 Godwin has called upon us. He spent one even- 
 ing here : was very friendly : kept us up till midnight, 
 drank punch, and talked about you. He seems 
 above all men, mortified at your going away. Sup- 
 pose you were to write to that good-natured heathen : 
 or is he a "shadow ?" 
 
 If I do not write, impute it to the long postage, of 
 which you have so much cause to complain. I have 
 
 k 2
 
 I32 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 scribbled over a queer letter, as I find by perusal, but 
 it means no mischief. 
 
 I am, and will be, yours ever, in sober sadness, 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Write your German as plain as sunshine, for that 
 must correct itself. You know I am homo unius 
 Ungues : in English — illiterate, a dunce, a ninny. 
 
 Letter XLI.] Sept. 8th, 1802. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — I thought of not writing till we 
 had performed some of our commissions ; butwe have 
 been hindered from setting about them, which yet 
 shall be done to a tittle. We got home very pleasantly 
 on Sunday. Mary is a good deal fatigued, and finds 
 the difference of going to a place, and coming from 
 it. I feel that I shall remember your mountains to 
 the last day I live. They haunt me perpetually. I 
 am like a man who has been falling in love unknown 
 to himself, which he finds out when he leaves the 
 lady. I do not remember any very strong impression 
 while they were present ; but, being gone, their 
 mementos are shelved in my brain. We passed a 
 very pleasant little time with the Clarksons. The 
 Wordsworths are at Montague's rooms, near neigh- 
 bours to us. 1 They dined with us yesterday, and I 
 was their guide to Bartlemy Fair ! 
 
 1 Basil Montague.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. I33 
 
 Letter XLIL] Oct. 9th, 18.2. 
 
 CAROLUS AGNUS COLERIDGIO SUO S. 
 
 Carissime, — Scribis, ut nummos scilicet epistolarios 
 solvam et postremo in Tartara abeam : immo tu 
 potius Tartaricum (ut aiunt) deprehendisti, qui me 
 vernacula mea lingua pro scriba conductitio per tot 
 annos satis eleganter usem ad Latine impure et canino 
 fere ore latrandum per tuasmet epistolas bene com- 
 positas et concinnatas percellire studueris. Conabor 
 tamen : Attamen vereor, ut ^Edes istas nostri Christi, 
 inter quas tanta diligentia magistri improba bonis 
 literulis, quasi per clysterem quendam injectis, infra 
 supraque olim penitus imbutus fui, Barnesii et Mark- 
 landii doctissimorum virorum nominibus adhuc gau- 
 dentes, barbarismis meis peregrinis et aliunde quae- 
 sitis valde dehonestavero. Sed pergere quocunque 
 placet. Adeste igitur, quotquot estis, conjugationum 
 declinationumve turmae, terribilia spectra, et tu im- 
 primis ades, Umbra et Imago maxima obsoletae (Diis 
 gratiae) Virgae, qua novissime in mentem recepta, 
 horrescunt subito natales, et parum deest quo minus 
 braccas meas ultro usque ad crura demittam, et ipse 
 puer pueriliter ejulem. 
 
 Ista tua Carmina Chamouniana satis grandia esse 
 mihi constat ; sed hoc mihi nonnihil displicet, quod 
 in iis illae montium Grisosonum inter se responsiones 
 totidem roboant anglice, God, God, haud aliter atque 
 temet audivi tuas montes Cumbrianas resonare do- 
 centes, Tod, Tod, nempe Doctorem infelicem : vocem 
 certe haud Deum Sonantem. Pro caeteris plaudo. 
 
 Itidem comparationes istas tuas satis callidas et 
 lepidas certe novi : sed quid hoc ad verum ? cum illi
 
 134 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Consular! viro et mentem irritabilem istum Julianum : 
 et etiam astutias frigidulas quasdem Augusto pro- 
 priores, nequaquam congruenter uno afflatu compara- 
 tionis causa insedisse affirmaveris : necnon nescio 
 quid similitudinis etiam cum Tiberio tertio in loco 
 solicite produxeris. Quid tibi equidem cum uno vel 
 altero Caesare, cum universi Duodecim ad compara- 
 tiones tuas se ultro tulerint ? Praeterea, vetustati 
 adnutans, comparationes iniquas odi. 
 
 Istas Wordsworthianas nuptias (vel potius cujus- 
 dam Edmundii tui) te retulisse mirificum gaudeo. 
 Valeas, Maria, fortunata nimium, et antiquae illas 
 Marias Virgini (comparatione plusquam Caesareana) 
 forsitan comparanda, quoniam ' beata inter mulieres :' 
 et etiam fortasse Wordsworthium ipsum tuum mari- 
 tum Angelo Salutatori aequare fas erit, quoniam e 
 Coelo (ut ille) descendunt et Musae et ipse Musicolas : 
 at Wordsworthium Musarum observantissimum sem- 
 per novi. Necnon te quoque amnitate hac nova, 
 Dorothea, gratulor : et tu certe alterum donum Dei. 
 
 Istum Ludum, quern tu, Coleridgi, Americanum 
 garris, a Ludo (ut Ludi sunt) maxima abhorrentem 
 praetereo : nempe quid ad Ludum attinet, totius illas 
 gentis Columbians, a nostra gente, eadem stirpe ortii, 
 ludi singuli causa voluntatem perperam alienare ? 
 Quasso ego materiam ludi : te Bella ingeris. 
 
 Denique valeas, et quid de Latinitate mea putes, 
 dicas : facias ut opossum ilium nostrum volantem vel 
 (ut tu malis) quendam Piscem errabundum, a me 
 salvum et pulcherrimum esse jubeas. Valeant uxor 
 tUa cum Hartleiio nostro. Soror mea salva est et 
 ego : vos et ipsa salvere jubet. Ulterius progrediri 
 non liquet : homo sum aeratus. 
 
 P.S. Pene mihi exciderat, apud me esse Librorum
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 135 
 
 a Johanno Miltono Latine scriptorum volumina duo, 
 quae (Deo volente) cum caeteris tuis libris ocyiis citius 
 per Maria ad te missura curabo ; x sed me in hoc tali 
 genere rerum nullo modo festinantem novisti : habes 
 confitentem reum. Hoc solum dici restat, praedicta, 
 volumina pulchra esse et omnia opera LatinaJ. JVL 
 in se continere. Circa defensionem istam Pro Pop°. 
 Ang°. acerrimam in praesens ipse praeclaro gaudio 
 moror. 
 Jussa tua Stuartina faciam ut diligenter colam. 
 Iterum iterumque valeas : 
 
 Et facias memor sis nostri. 
 
 Letter XLIII.] Oct. nth, 1802. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — Your offer about the German 
 poems is exceedingly kind ; but I do not think it a 
 wise speculation, because the time it would take you 
 to put them into prose would be nearly as great as if 
 you versified them. Indeed I am sure you could do 
 the one nearly as soon as the other ; so that instead 
 of a division of labour, it would be only a multiplica 
 tion. But I will think of your offer in another light. 
 I dare say I could find many things, of a light nature, 
 to suit that paper, which you would not object to pass 
 upon Stuart as your own, and I should come in for 
 some light profits', and Stuart think the more highly 
 of your assiduity. "Bishop Hall's Characters" 2 I 
 know nothing about, having never seen them. I 
 will reconsider your offer, which is very plausible ; but 
 as to the drudgery of going every day to an editor 
 
 1 This passage led to a mistake on Coleridge's part. See next 
 Letter. 
 
 2 Characters of Vertues and Vices. 1608, 8°.
 
 I36 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 with my scraps, like a pedler, for him to pick out and 
 tumble about my ribbons and posies, and to wait in 
 his lobby, &c, no money could make up for the 
 degradation. You are in too high request with him 
 to have any thing unpleasant of that sort to submit to. 
 It was quite a slip of my pen, in my Latin letter, 
 when I told you I had Milton's Latin Works. I 
 ought to have said his Prose Works, in two volumes, 
 Birck's edition, containing all, both Latin and English, 
 a fuller and better edition than Lloyd's of Toland. It 
 is completely at your service, and you must accept it 
 from me ; at the same time I shall be much obliged 
 to you for your Latin Milton, which you think you 
 have at Howitt's ; it will leave me nothing to wish 
 for but the History of England, 1 which I shall soon 
 pick up for a trifle. But you must write me word 
 whether the Miltons are worth paying carriage for. 
 You have a Milton ; but it is pleasanter to eat one's 
 own pease out of one's own garden, than to buy them 
 by the peck at Covent Garden ; and a book reads the 
 better, which is our own, and has been so long known 
 to us, that we know the topography of its blots, and 
 dog's-ears, and can trace the dirt in it to having read 
 it at tea with buttered muffins, or over a pipe, which 
 I think is the maximum. But, Coleridge, you must 
 accept these little things, and not think of returning 
 money for them, for I do not set up for a factor or 
 general agent. As for the fantastic debt of £15? I'll 
 think you were dreaming, and not trouble myself 
 seriously to attend to you. My bad Latin you pro- 
 perly correct ; but natalcs for nates was an inadver- 
 
 1 Milton's History of Britain. There are later editions. 
 
 2 A sum of J£ 15 , which Colt-ridge owed Lamb.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 137 
 
 tency : I knew better. Progrediri, or progredi, I 
 thought indifferent, my authority being Ainsworth. 
 However, as I have got a fit of Latin, you will now 
 and then indulge me with an epistola. I pay the 
 postage of this, and propose doing it by turns. In 
 that case I can now and then write to you without 
 remorse ; not that you would mind the money, but 
 you have not always ready cash to answer small de- 
 mands, the epistolarii nummi. 
 
 Your " Epigram on the Sun and Moon in Ger- 
 many " is admirable. Take 'em all together, they 
 are as good as Harrington's. 1 I will muster up all. 
 the conceits I can, and you shall have a packet some 
 day. You and I together can answer all demands 
 surely : you, mounted on a terrible charger, (like 
 Homer, in the Battle of the Books,) at the head of 
 the cavalry: I will lead the light horse. I have just 
 heard from Stoddart. Allen and he intend taking 
 Keswick in their way home. Allen wished parti- 
 cularly to have it a secret that he is in Scotland, and 
 wrote to me accordingly very urgently. As luck was, 
 I had told not above three or four; but Mary had told 
 Mrs. Green, of Christ's Hospital ! For the present, 
 farewell : never forgetting love to Pipos 2 and his 
 
 friends. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XLI V.] Oct. 23rd, 1802. 
 
 I read daily your political essays. I was particu- 
 larly pleased with " Once a Jacobin :" though the 
 argument is obvious enough, the style was less swel- 
 
 1 Sir John Harrington. 2 Hartley Coleridge.
 
 I38 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 ling than your things sometimes are, and it was 
 plausible ad popuhun. A vessel has just arrived from 
 Jamaica with the news of poor Sam Le Grice's death. 
 He died at Jamaica of the yellow fever. His course 
 was rapid, and he had been very foolish ; but I believe 
 there was more of kindness and warmth in him than 
 in almost any other of our schoolfellows. The annual 
 meeting of the Blues is to-morrow, at the London 
 Tavern, where poor Sammy dined with them two 
 years ago, and attracted the notice of all by the 
 singular foppishness of his dress. When men go off 
 the stage so early, it scarce seems a noticeable thing 
 in their epitaphs', whether they had been wise or silly 
 in their lifetime. 
 
 I am glad the snuff and Pi-pos's books please. 
 " Goody Two Shoes " is almost out of print. Mrs. 
 Barbauld's stuff has banished all the old classics of 
 the nursery ; and the shopman at Newberry's hardly 
 deigned to reach them off an old exploded corner of a 
 shelf, when Mary asked for them. Mrs. Barbauld's, 
 and Mrs. Trimmer's nonsense, lay in piles about. 
 Knowledge insignificant and vapid as Mrs. Barbauld's 
 books convey, it seems, must come to a child in the 
 shape of knowledge ; and his empty noddle must be 
 turned with conceit of his own powers when he has 
 learnt that a horse is an animal, and Billy is better 
 than a horse, and such like ; instead of that beautiful 
 interest in wild tales, which made the child a man, 
 while all the time he suspected himself to be no bigger 
 than a child. Science has succeeded to poetry no 
 less in the little walks of children than with men. Is 
 there no possibility of averting this sore evil ? Think 
 what you would have been now, if instead of being 
 fed with tales and old wives' fables in childhood, you
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 139 
 
 had been crammed with geography and natural 
 history ! 
 
 Hang them ! — I mean the cursed Barbauld crew, 
 those blights and blasts of all that is human in man 
 and child. 
 
 As to the translations, let me do two or three hun- 
 dred lines, and then do you try the nostrums upon 
 Stuart in any way you please. If they go down I will 
 bray more. In fact, if I got or could but get £50 a 
 year only, in addition to what I have, I should live in 
 affluence. 
 
 Have you anticipated it, or could you not give a 
 parallel of Buonaparte with Cromwell, particularly 
 as to the contrast in their deeds affecting foreign 
 States ? Cromwell's interference for the Albigenses, 
 Buonaparte's against the Swiss. Then religion would 
 come in ; and Milton and you could rant about our 
 countrymen of that period. This is a hasty sugges- 
 tion, the more hasty because I want my supper. I 
 have just finished Chapman's Homer. 1 Did you ever 
 read it ? it has the continuous power of interesting you 
 all along, like a rapid original, more than any ; and 
 in the uncommon excellence of the more finished 
 parts goes beyond Fairfax or any of 'em. The metre 
 is fourteen syllables, and capable of all sweetness and 
 grandeur. Cowper's blank verse detains you every 
 step with some heavy Miltonism ; Chapman gallops 
 
 1 This is the translation which opened Keats's eyes to the beauties 
 of Homer. He wrote a sonnet on the subject, which pleased Leigh 
 Hunt so much that he spoke highly of it in the Examiner, and in- 
 troduced Keats to the public as a young poet deserving to be classed 
 with Shelley. This was in the year 1819, or about that time, when 
 the Examiner was the property of Mr. Leigh Hunt and his brother 
 John.
 
 140 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 off with you his own free pace. Take a simile for 
 example. The council breaks up — 
 
 " Being abroad, the earth was overlaid 
 With flockers to them, that came forth ; as when of frequent bees 
 Swarms rise out of a hollow rock, repairing the degrees 
 Of their egression endlessly, with ever rising new 
 From forth their sweet nest; as their store, still as it faded, grew. 
 And never would cease sending forth clusters to the spring, 
 They still crowd out so ; this flock here, that there, belabouring 
 The loaded flowers. So," &c., &c, 
 
 What endless egression of phrases the dog com- 
 mands ! 
 
 Take another, Agamemnon wounded, bearing his 
 wound heroically for the sake of the army (look below) 
 to a woman in labour. 
 
 " He, with his lance, sword, mighty stones, pour'd his heroic wreak 
 Oh other squadrons of the foe, whiles yet warm bloom did break 
 Thro' his cleft veins ; but when the wound was quite exhaust and 
 
 crude, 
 The eager anguish did approve his princely fortitude. 
 As when most sharp and bitter pangs distract a labouring dame, 
 Which the divine Hi thias, that rule the painful frame 
 Of human childbirth, pour on her ; the Ilithia» that are 
 The daughters of Saturnia ; with whose extreme repair 
 The woman strives to take the worst it gives ; 
 With thought, it must be, 'tis love's fruit, the end for which she 
 
 lives ; 
 The mean to make herself nevj born, ivhat comforts will redound : 
 So," &c. 
 
 I will tell you more about Chapman and his pecu- 
 liarities in my next. I am much interested in him. 
 Yours ever affectionately, and Pi-Pos's. 
 
 C. L. 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 14I 
 
 LETTER XLV.] Nov. 4 th, 1802. 
 
 Observe, there comes to you, by the Kendal waggon 
 to-morrow, the illustrious 5th of November, a box, 
 containing the Miltons, the strange American Bible, 
 with White's brief note, to which you will attend : 
 Baxter's Holy Commonwealth, for which you stand 
 indebted to me 3s. 6d. ; an odd volume of Montaigne, 
 being of no use to me, I having the whole ; certain 
 books belonging to Wordsworth, as do also the 
 strange thick-hoofed shoes, which are very much ad- 
 mired in London. All these sundries I commend 
 to your most strenuous looking after. If you find the 
 Miltons in certain parts dirtied and soiled with a 
 crumb of right Gloucester, blacked in the candle, (my 
 usual supper,) or peradventure a stray ash of tobacco 
 wafted into the crevices, look to that passage more 
 especially : depend upon it, it contains good matter. 
 I have got your little Milton, which, as it contains 
 " Salmasius," and I make a rule of never hearing 
 but one side of the question, (why should I distract 
 myself?) I shall return to you when I pickup the 
 Latina opera. The first Defence is the greatest work 
 among them, because it is uniformly great, and such 
 as is befitting the \exy mouth of a great nation, 
 speaking for itself. But the second Defence, which 
 is but a succession of splendid episodes, slightly tied 
 together, has one passage, which, if you have not 
 read, I conjure you to lose no time, but read it : it is 
 his consolations in his blindness, which had been 
 made a reproach to him. It begins whimsically, with 
 poetical flourishes about Tiresias and other blind 
 worthies, (which still are mainly interesting as dis- 
 playing his singular mind, and in what degree poetry 
 entered into his daily soul, not by fits and impulses,
 
 142 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 but engrained and innate,) but the concluding page, 
 i.e. of this passage, (not of the Defensio,) which you 
 will- easily find, divested of all brags and flourishes, 
 gives so rational, so true an enumeration of his com- 
 forts, so human, that it cannot be read without the 
 deepest interest. Take one touch of the religious 
 part; — " Et sane haud ultima Dei cura caeci — we 
 blind folks, I understand it ; not nos for ego) — 
 sumus ; qui nos, quominus quicquam aliud praeter 
 ipsum cernere valemus, eo clementius atque benig- 
 nius respicere dignatur. Vse qui illudit nos, vae qui 
 lsedit, execratione publica devovendo ; nos ab injuriis 
 hominum non modo incolumes, sed pene sacros 
 divina lex reddidit, divinus favor : nee tarn oculoritm 
 hebetudine quam ccelestium alarum umbrd has nobis 
 fecisse tenebras videtur, factas illustrare rursus in- 
 teriore ac longe prsestabiliore lumine haud raro solet. 
 Hue refero, quod et amici officiosius nunc etiam 
 quam solebant, colunt, observant, adsunt ; quod et 
 nonnulli sunt, quibuscum Pyladeas atque Theseas 
 alternare voces verorum amicorum liceat, 
 
 " Vade gubernaculum mei pedis. 
 Da manum ministro amico 
 Da collo manum tuam, ductor.autem viae ero tibi ego." 
 
 All this, and much more, is highly pleasing to know. 
 But you may easily find it ; and I don't know why I 
 put down so many words about it but for the pleasure 
 of writing to you, and the want of another topic. 
 
 Yours ever, C. Lamp,. 
 
 To-morrow I expect with anxiety S. T. C.'s letter 
 to Mr. Fox.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 143 
 
 Letter XLVI.] March 20, 1803. 
 
 Mary sends love from home. 
 Dear Coleridge, — I do confess that I have not sent 
 your books as I ought to have done ; but you know 
 how the human, free will is tethered, and that we 
 perform promises to ourselves no better than to our 
 friends. A watch is come for you. Do you want it 
 soon, or shall I wait till some one travels your way? 
 You, like me, I suppose, reckon the lapse of time 
 from the waste thereof, as boys let a cock run to 
 waste ; too idle to stop it, and rather amused with 
 seeing it dribble. Your poems have begun printing ; 
 Longman sent to me to arrange them, the old and 
 the new together. It seems you have left it to him ; 
 so I classed them, as nearly as I could, according to 
 dates. First, after the Dedication, (which must 
 march first,) and which I have transplanted from 
 before the Preface, (which stood like a dead wall of 
 prose between,) to be the first poem ; then comes 
 " The Pixies," and the things most juvenile ; then 
 on "To Chatterton," &c, — on, lastly, to the "Ode 
 on the Departing Year," and " Musings," — which 
 finish. Longman wanted the Ode first, but the 
 arrangement I have made is precisely that marked 
 out in the Dedication, following the order of time. I 
 told Lnogman I was sure that you would omit a good 
 portion of the first edition. I instanced several 
 sonnets, &c. ; but that was not his plan, and, as you 
 have done nothing in it, all I could do was to arrange 
 'em on the supposition that all were to be retained. 
 A few I positively rejected ; such as that of " The 
 Thimble," and that of " Flicker and Flicker's wife," 
 •and that not in the manner of Spenser, which you
 
 144 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 yourself had stigmatised — and the " Man of Ross," 
 • — I doubt whether I should this last. It is not too 
 late to save it. The first proof is only just come. I 
 have been forced to call that Cupid's Elixir, " Kisses." 
 It stands in your first volume, as an Effusion, so that, 
 instead of prefixing The Kiss to that of " One Kiss, 
 dear Maid," &c, I have ventured to entitle it " To 
 Sara." I am aware of the nicety of changing even 
 so mere a trifle as a title to so short a piece, and sub- 
 verting old associations; but two called "Kisses" 
 would have been absolutely ludicrous, and " Effusion " 
 is no name, and these poems come close together. I 
 promise you not to alter one word in any poem what- 
 ever, but to take your last text, where two are. Can 
 you send any wishes about the book ? Longman, I 
 think, should have settled with you ; but it seems 
 you have left it to him. Write as soon as you 
 possibly can ; for, without making myself respon- 
 sible, I feel myself, in some sort, accessory to the 
 selection, which I am to proof-correct ; but I deci- 
 dedly said to Biggs that I was sure you would omit 
 more. Those I have positively rubbed off, I can 
 swear to individually, (except the " Man of Ross," 
 which is too familiar in Pope,) but no others — you 
 have your cue. For my part, I would rather all the 
 Juvenilia were kept — memories causa. 
 
 Robert Lloyd 1 has written me a masterly letter, 
 containing a character of his father. See how differ- 
 ent from Charles he views the old man ! (Literatim) : 
 " My father smokes, repeats Homer in Greek, and 
 Virgil, and is learning, when from business, with all 
 
 l Brother of Charles Lloyd. 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. I45 
 
 the vigour of a young man, Italian. He is, really, a 
 wonderful man. He mixes public and private busi- 
 ness, the intricacies of disordering life with his 
 religion and devotion. No one more rationally 
 enjoys the romantic scenes of Nature, and the chit- 
 chat and little vagaries of his children ; and, though 
 surrounded with an ocean of affairs, the very neat- 
 ness of his most obscure cupboard in the house 
 passes not unnoticed. I never knew any one view 
 with such clearness, nor so well satisfied with things 
 as they are, and make such allowance for things 
 which must appear perfect Syriac to him." By the 
 last he means the Lloydisms of the younger branches. 
 His portrait of Charles (exact as far as he has had 
 opportunities of noting him) is most exquisite: — 
 " Charles is become steady as a church, and as 
 straightforward as a Roman road. It would distract 
 him to mention any thing that was not as plain as 
 sense ; he seems to have run the whole scenery of 
 life, and now rests as the formal precision of non- 
 existence." Here is genius I think, and 'tis seldom 
 a young man, a Lloyd, looks at a father (so differing) 
 with such good nature while he is alive. Write — 
 I am in post-haste, C. Lamb 
 
 Love, &c, to Sara, P., and H. 
 
 Letter XLVIL] April 13th, 1803. 
 
 My dear Coleridge, — Things have gone on better 
 
 with me since you left me. I expect to have my old 
 
 housekeeper home again in a week or two. She has 
 
 mended most rapidly. My health too has been better 
 
 since you took away that Montero cap. I have left 
 
 L 
 VOL. I.
 
 146 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 off cayenned eggs and such bolsters to discomfort. 
 There was death in that cap. I mischievously wished 
 that by some inauspicious jolt the whole contents 
 might be shaken, and the coach set on fire; for you 
 said they had that property. How the old gentle- 
 man, who joined you at Grantham, would have clapp'd 
 his hands to his knees, and not knowing but it was 
 an immediate visitation of God that burnt him, how 
 pious it would have made him ! — him. I mean, that 
 brought the influenza with him, and only took places 
 for one — an old sinner ; he must have known what 
 he had got with him ! However, I wish the cap 
 no harm for the sake of the head it fits, and could be 
 content to see it disfigure my healthy sideboard 
 again. 
 
 What do you think of smoking ? I want your 
 sober, average, noon opinion of it. I generally am 
 eating my dinner about the time I should deter- 
 mine it. 
 
 Morning is a girl, and can't smoke — she's no 
 evidence one way or the other ; and Night is so 
 evidently bought over, that he can't be a very upright 
 judge. May be the truth is, that one pipe is whole- 
 some ; two pipes toothsome; three pipes noisome; 
 four pipes fulsome : five pipes quarrelsome, and that's 
 the sum on't. But that is deciding rather upon 
 rhyme than reason. . . . After all, our instincts may 
 be best. Wine, I am sure, good mellow, generous 
 Port, can hurt nobody, unless those who take it to 
 excess, which they may easily avoid if they observe 
 the rules of temperance. 
 
 Bless you, old sophist, who next to human nature 
 taught me all the corruption I was capable of know- 
 ing I And bless your Montero cap, and your trail,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 147 
 
 (which shall come after you whenever you appoint,) 
 and your wife and children — Pipos especially. 
 
 When shall we two smoke again ? Last night I 
 had been in a sad quandary of spirits, in what they 
 call the evening; but a pipe, and some generous 
 Port, and King Lear, (being alone, ) had their effects 
 as solacers. I went to bed pot-valiant. By the way, 
 may not the Ogles of Somersetshire be remotely de- 
 scended from King Lear ? C. L. 
 
 Letter XLVIII.] May 27th, 1803. 
 
 My dear Coleridge. — The date of my last was one day 
 prior to the receipt of your letter, full of foul omens. 
 I explain this lest you should have thought mine 
 too light a reply to such a sad matter. I seriously 
 hope by this time you have given up all thoughts of 
 journeying to the green Islands of the Bless'd, — 
 (voyages in time of war are very precarious) — or at 
 least, that you will take them in your way to the 
 Azores. Pray be careful of this letter till it has done 
 its duty, for it is to inform you that I have booked off 
 your watch, (laid in cotton like an untimely fruit,) 
 and with it Condillac,and all other books of yours which 
 were left here. These will set out on Monday next, 
 the 29th May, by Kendal waggon, from White Horse, 
 Cripplegate. You will make seasonable inquiries, for 
 a watch mayn't come your way again in a hurry. I 
 have been repeatedly after Tobin, and now hear that 
 he is in the country, not to return till the middle of 
 June. I will take care and see him with the earliest. 
 But cannot you write pathetically to him, enforcing a 
 speeding mission of your books for literary purposes ? 
 
 L 2
 
 148 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 He is too good a retainer to Literature to let her in- 
 terests suffer through his default. And why, in the 
 name of Beelzebub, are your books to travel from 
 Barnard's Inn to the Temple, and thence circuitously 
 to Cripplegate, when their business is to take a short 
 cut down Holborn Hill, up Snow ditto, on to Wood 
 Street, &c. ? The former mode seems a sad super- 
 stitious subdivision of labour. Well! the "■Man of 
 Ross " is to stand ; Longman begs for it ; the printer 
 stands with a wet sheet in one hand, and a useless 
 Pica in the other, in tears, pleading for it ; I relent. 
 Besides, it was a Salutation poem, and has the mark 
 of the beast "Tobacco " upon it. Thus much I have 
 done ; I have swept off the lines about widows and 
 orphans in the second edition, which (if you remem- 
 ber) you most awkwardly and illogically caused to be 
 inserted between two Ifs, to the great breach and 
 disunion of said Ifs, which now meet again, (as in 
 the first edition,) like two clever lawyers arguing a 
 case. Another reason for subtracting the pathos 
 was, that the " Man of Ross " is too familiar to need 
 telling what he did, especially in worse lines than 
 Pope told it, and it now stands simply as " Reflec- 
 tions at an Inn about a known Character," and suck- 
 ing an old story into an accommodation with present 
 feelings. Here is no breaking spears with Pope, but 
 a new, independent, and really a very pretty poem. 
 In fact 'tis as I used to admire it in the first volume, 
 and I have even dared to restore 
 
 " If neath this roof thy ivine cheer" d moments pass/' 
 
 for 
 
 " Beneath this roof if thy cheer'd moments pass." 
 
 " Cheer'd" is a sad general word, " wine-cheer 'd" I'm 
 sure you'd give me, if I had a speaking trumpet to
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 149 
 
 sound to you 300 miles. But I am your factotum ; 
 and that, (save in this instance, which is a single 
 case, and I can't get at you,) shall be next to a fac- 
 nihil — at most a facsimile. I have ordered "Imita- 
 tion of Spenser" to be restored on Wordsworth's 
 authority ; and now, all that you will miss will be 
 "Flicker and Flicker's Wife," "The Thimble," 
 " Breathe dear harmonist,'" and / believe, " The Child 
 that was fed with Manna." Another volume will 
 clear off all your Anthologic Morning-Postian Epis- 
 tolary Miscellanies ; but pray don't put " Christabel " 
 therein ; don't let that sweet maid come forth attended 
 with Lady Holland's mob at her heels. Let there be 
 a separate volume of Tales, Choice Tales, "Ancient 
 Mariners," &c. A word of your health will be richly 
 acceptable. C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XLIX.] June 7th, 1809. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — I congratulate you on the appear- 
 ance of the Friend. 1 Your first Number promises 
 well, and I have no doubt the succeeding Numbers 
 will fulfil the promise. I had a kind letter from you 
 some time since, which I have left unanswered. I 
 am also obliged to you, I« believe, for a review in the 
 Annual, am I not ? The Monthly Review sneers at 
 me, and asks "if Counts is not good enough for 
 Mr. Lamb ?" because I have said no good serious 
 
 1 The Friend now appeared in Numbers, of which there were twenty- 
 seven between 1809 and 1812. It is included in Coleridge's Works, 
 but with many variations.
 
 150 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 dramas have been written since the death of Charles 
 the First, except Samson Agonistes. So because they 
 do not know, or won't remember, that Comus was 
 written long before, I am to be set down as an under- 
 valuer of Milton ! O Coleridge, do kill those reviews, 
 or they will kill us ; kill all we like. Be a friend to 
 all else, but their foe. I have been turned out of my 
 chambers in the Temple by a landlord who wanted 
 them for himself, but I have got other at No. 4, Inner 
 Temple Lane, far more commodious and roomy. I 
 have two rooms on the third floor and five rooms 
 above, with an inner staircase to myself, and all new 
 painted, &c, and all for £30 a year ! I came into 
 them on Saturday week ; and on Monday following 
 Mary was taken ill with the fatigue of moving ; and 
 affected, I believe, by the novelty of the home she 
 could not sleep, and I am left alone with a maid quite 
 a stranger to me, and she has a month or two's sad 
 distraction to go through. What sad large pieces it 
 cuts out of life ! — out of her life, who is getting rather 
 old ; and we may not have many years to live together. 
 I am weaker, and bear it worse than I ever did. 
 But I hope we shall be comfortable by-and-by. The 
 rooms are delicious, and the best look backwards into 
 Hare Court, where there is a pump always going. 
 Just now it is dry. Hare Court' trees come in at the 
 window, so that 'tis like living in a garden. I try to 
 persuade myself it is much pleasanter than Mitre 
 Court ; but, alas ! the household gods are slow to 
 come in a new mansion. They are in their infancy 
 to me ; I do not feel them yet ; no hearth has blazed 
 to them yet. How I hate and dread new places ! 
 
 I was very glad to see Wordsworth's book adver- 
 tised : I am to have it to-morrow lent me, and if 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 151 
 
 Wordsworth don't send me an order for one upon 
 Longman, I will buy it. It is greatly extolled and 
 liked by all who have seen it. Let me hear from some 
 of you, for I am desolate. I shall have to send you, 
 in a week or two, two volumes of Juvenile Poetry, 
 done by Mary and me within the last six months, and 
 that tale in prose which Wordsworth so much liked, 
 which was published at Christmas, with nine others, 
 by us, and has reached a second edition. There's for 
 you ! We have almost worked ourselves out of child's 
 work, and I don't know what to do. Sometimes I 
 think of a drama, but I have no head for play-making; 
 I can do the dialogue, and that's all. I am quite 
 aground for a plan ; but I must do something for 
 money. Not that I have immediate wants, but I have 
 prospective ones. O money, money, how blindly thou 
 hast been worshipped, and how stupidly abused ! 
 Thou art health and liberty and strength ; and he 
 that has thee may rattle his pockets at the Devil. 
 
 Nevertheless, do not understand by this that I have 
 not quite enough for my occasions for a year or two to 
 come. While I think on it, Coleridge, I fetch'd away 
 my books which you had at the Courier Office, and 
 found all but a third volume of the old plays, con- 
 taining the White Devil, Green's Tu Quoque, and the 
 Honest Whore, perhaps the most valuable volume of 
 them all — that I could not find. Pray, if you can, 
 remember what you did with it, or where you took it 
 out with you a walking perhaps ; send me word, for, 
 to use the old plea, it spoils a set. I found two other 
 volumes (you had three), the Arcadia, and Daniel, 
 enriched with manuscript notes. I wish every book 
 I have were so noted. They have thoroughly con- 
 verted me to relish Daniel, or to say I relish him, for
 
 I52 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 after all, I believe I did relish him. You well call him 
 sober-minded. Your notes are excellent. Perhaps 
 you've forgot them. I have read a review in the 
 Quarterly, by Southey, on the Missionaries, which is 
 most masterly. I only grudge its being there. It is 
 quite beautiful. Do remember my Dodsley ; and, 
 pray, do write, or let some of you write. Clarkson 
 tells me you are in a smoky house. Have you cured 
 it ? It is hard to cure any thing of smoking. Our 
 little poems are but humble, but they have no name. 
 You must read them, remembering they were task 
 work ; and perhaps you will admire the number of 
 subjects, all of children, picked out by an old Bachelor 
 and an old Maid. Many parents would not have 
 found so many. Have you read Ccelebs ? It has 
 reached eight editions in so many weeks, yet literally 
 it is one of the very poorest sort of common novels, 
 with the draw-back of dull religion in it. Had the 
 religion been high and flavoured, it would have been 
 something. I borrowed this Calebs in Search of a 
 Wife, of a very careful, neat lady, and returned it with 
 this stuff written in the beginning: — 
 
 " If ever I marry a wife 
 
 " I'll marry a landlord's daughter, 
 " For then I may sit in the bar, 
 
 " And drink cold brandy and water." 
 
 I don't expect you can find time from your Friend 
 to write to me much ; but write something, for there 
 has been a long silence. You know Holcroft is dead. 
 Godwin is well. He has written a very pretty, absurd 
 book about sepulchres. He was affronted because I 
 told him it was better than Hervey, but not so good 
 as Sir T. Browne. This letter is all about books ;
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 153 
 
 but my head aches, and I hardly know what I write , 
 but I could not let the Friend pass without a con- 
 gratulatory epistle. I won't criticise till it comes to a 
 volume. Tell me how I shall send my packet to you ? 
 — by what conveyance ? — by Longman, Short-man, 
 or how ? Give my kindest remembrances to 
 Wordsworth. Tell him he must give me a book. 
 My kind love to Mrs. W. and to Dorothy separately 
 and conjointly. I wish you could all come and see 
 me in my new rooms. God bless you all. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 LETTER L.j Monday, Oct. 30th, 1809. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — I have but this moment received 
 your letter, dated the gth instant, having just come 
 off a journey from Wiltshire, where I have been with 
 Mary on a visit to Hazlitt. The journey has been of 
 infinite service to her. We have had nothing but 
 sunshiny days, and daily walks from eight to twenty 
 miles a-day ; have seen Wilton, Salisbury, Stone- 
 henge, &c. Her illness lasted but six weeks ; it left 
 her weak, but the country has made us whole. We 
 came back to our Hogarth Room. I have made 
 several acquisitions since you saw them, — and found 
 Nos. 8, 9, 10 of the Friend. The account of Luther 
 in the Warteburg is as fine as any thing I ever read. 1 
 
 1 The Warteburg is a Castle, standing on a lofty rock, about two 
 miles from the city of Eisenach, in which Luther was confined, under 
 the friendly arrest of the Elector of Saxony, after Charles V. had pro- 
 nounced against him the Ban in the Imperial Diet ; where he composed 
 some of his greatest works, and translated the New Testament ; and 
 where he is recorded as engaged in the personal conflict with the Prince
 
 154 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 God forbid that a man who has such things to say 
 should be silenced for want of £100. This Custom- 
 and-Duty Age would have made the Preacher on the 
 Mount take out a licence, and St. Paul's Epistles 
 would not have been missible without a stamp. O 
 that you may find means to go on ! But alas ! where 
 is Sir G. Beaumont ? — Sotheby ? What is become 
 
 of Darkness, of which the vestiges are still shown in a black stain on 
 the wall, from the inkstand hurled at the Enemy. In the Essay referred 
 to, Coleridge accounts for the stoiy, depicting the state of the gnat 
 prisoner's mind in most vivid colours, and then presenting the follow- 
 ing picture, which so nobly justifies Lamb's eulogy, that I venture to 
 gratify myself by inserting it here : — 
 
 " Methinks I see him sitting, the heroic student, in his chamber in 
 the Warteburg, with his midnight lamp before him, seen by the late 
 traveller in the distant plain of Bischofsroda, as a star on the moun- 
 tain! Below it lies the Hebrew Bible open, on which he gazes ; his 
 brow pressing on his palm, brooding over some obscure text, which he 
 desires to make plain to the simple boor and to the humble artizan, and 
 to transfer its whole force into their own natural and living tongue. 
 And he himself does not understand it! Thick darkness lies on the 
 original text; he counts the letters, he calls up the roots of each sepa- 
 rate word, and questions them as the familiar Spirits of an Oracle. In 
 vain ; thick darkness continues to cover it ; not a ray of meaning 
 dawns through it. With sullen and angry hope he reaches for the 
 Vulgate, his old and sworn enemy, the treacherous confederate of the 
 Roman Antichrist, which he so gladly, when he can, rebukes for idola- 
 trous falsehood, that had dared place 
 
 ■ Within the sanctuary itself their shrines, 
 ' .Abominations — ' 
 
 Now (O thought of humiliation !) he must entreat its aid. See ! there 
 has the sly spirit of apostacy worked in a phrase, which favours the 
 doctrine of purgatory, the intercession of saints, or the efficacy of 
 prayers for the dead: and what is worst of all, the interpretation is 
 plausible. The original Hebrew might be forced into this meaning ; 
 and no other meaning seems to lie /';/ it. none to hover above it in the 
 heights of allegory, none to lurk beneath it even in the depths of 
 Cabala ! This is the work of the Tempter ; it is a cloud of darkness 
 conjured up between the truth of the sacred letters and the eyes of his 
 understanding, by the malice of the Evil One, and for a trial of his 
 faith ! Must he then at length confess, must he subscribe the n 
 Luther to an exposition which consecrates a weapon for the hand of 
 the idolatrous Hierarchy ? Never! Never!
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 155 
 
 of the rich Auditors in Albemarle Street ? Your 
 letter has saddened me. 
 
 I am so tired with my journey, being up all night, 
 that I have neither things nor words in my power. I 
 believe I expressed my admiration of the pamphlet. 
 Its power over me was like that which Milton's 
 pamphlets must have had on his contemporaries, 
 
 " There still remains one auxiliary in reserve, the translation of the 
 Seventy. The Alexandrine Greeks, anterior to the Church itself, could 
 intend no support to its corruptions. The Septuagint will have pro- 
 faned the Author of Truth with no incense for the nostrils of the uni- 
 versal Bishop to snuff up. And here again his hopes are baffled ! 
 Exactly at this perplexed passage had the Greek translator given his 
 understanding a holiday, and made his pen supply its place. O 
 honoured Luther ! as easily mightest thou convert the whole City of 
 Rome, with the Pope and the conclave of Cardinals inclusively, as 
 strike a spark of light from the words, and nothing but ivords, of the 
 Alexandrine version. Disappointed, despondent, enraged, ceasing to 
 think, yet continuing his brain on the stretch in solicitation of a 
 thought ; and gradually giving himself up to angry fancies, to recollec- 
 tions of past persecutions, to uneasy fears, and inward defiances, and 
 floating images of the Evil Being, their supposed personal author, he 
 sinks, without perceiving it, into a trance of slumber ; during which his 
 brain retains its waking energies, excepting that what would have 
 been mere thoughts before, now (the action and counterweight of his 
 senses and of their impressions being withdrawn) shape and condense 
 themselves into things, into realities ! Repeatedly half-wakening, and 
 his eye-lids as often reclosing, the objects which really surround him 
 form the place and scenery of his dream. All at once he sees the arch- 
 fiend coming forth on the wall of the room, from the very spot, per- 
 haps, on which his eyes had been fixed vacantly, during the perplexed 
 moments of his former meditation. The inkstand which he had at the 
 same time been using, becomes associated with it ; and in that struggle 
 of rage, which in these distempered dreams almost constantly precedes 
 the helpless terror by the pain of which we are finally awakened, he 
 imagines that he hurls it at the intruder ; or not improbably in the 
 first instant of awakening, while yet both his imagination and his eyes 
 are possessed by the dream, he actually hurls it. Some weeks after 
 perhaps, during which interval he had often mused on the incident, 
 undetermined whether to deem it a visitation of Satan to him in the 
 body or out of the body, he discovers for the first time the dark spot 
 on his wall, and receives it as a sign and pledge vouchsafed to him of 
 the event having actually taken place."
 
 I56 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 who were tuned to them. What a piece of prose ! 
 Do you hear if it is read at all ? I am out of the 
 world of readers. I hate all that do read, for they 
 read nothing but reviews and new books. I gather 
 myself up unto the old things. 
 
 I have put up shelves. You never saw a book-case 
 in more true harmony with the contents than what 
 I've nailed up in a room, which, though new, has 
 more aptitudes for growing old than you shall often 
 see — as one sometimes gets a friend in the middle of 
 life, who becomes an old friend in a short time. My 
 rooms are luxurious ; one is for prints and one for 
 books ; a Summer and a Winter parlour. When 
 shall I ever see you in them ? 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter LI.] 13th Aug., 18 14. 
 
 Dear Resuscitate, — There comes to you by the 
 vehicle from Lad Lane this day a volume of Gerrran ; 
 what it is I cannot justly say, the characters of tiose 
 northern nations having been always singularly harsh 
 and unpleasant to me. It is a contribution o* Dr. 
 Southey's towards your wants, and you would lave 
 had it sooner but for an odd accident. I vrote 
 for it three days ago, and the Doctor, a: he 
 thought, sent it me. A book of like exteric" he 
 did send, but being disclosed, how far unlikei It 
 was the Well-bred Scholar, — a book with wbch it 
 seems the Doctor laudably fills up those hourswhich 
 he can steal from his medical avocations. Oester- 
 field, Blair, Beattie, portions from the Life of ,avage, 
 make up a prettyish system of morality and th belles-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. I57 
 
 lettres, which Mr. Mylne, a schoolmaster, has pro- 
 perly brought together, and calls the collection by the 
 denomination above mentioned. The Doctor had no 
 sooner discovered his error, than he dispatched man 
 and horse to rectify the mistake, and with a pretty 
 kind of ingenuous modesty in his note, seemeth to 
 deny any knowledge of the Well-bred Scholar; false 
 modesty surely, and a blush misplaced : for what 
 more pleasing than the consideration of professional 
 austerity thus relaxing, thus improving ! But so, 
 when a child, I remember blushing, being caught on 
 my knees to my Maker, or doing otherwise some 
 pious and praiseworthy action : now I rather love 
 such things to be seen. Henry Crabb Robinson 
 is out upon h-is circuit, and his books are inaccessible 
 without his leave and key. He is attending the 
 Norfolk Circuit, — a short term, but to him, as to 
 many young lawyers, a long vacation, sufficiently 
 dreary. 1 I thought I could do no better than trans- 
 mit to him, not extracts, but your very letter itself, 
 than which I think I never read any thing more 
 moving, more pathetic, or more conducive to the pur- 
 pose of persuasion. The Crab is a sour Crab if it 
 does not sweeten him. I think it would draw another 
 third volume of Dodsley out of me ; but you say you 
 don't want any English books. Perhaps, after all, 
 that's as well ; one's romantic credulity is for ever 
 misleading one into misplaced acts of foolery. Crab 
 might have answered by this time : his juices take a 
 long time supplying, but they'll run at last — I know 
 
 1 A mistake of Lamb's which he also made in a letter to 
 Wordsworth. He corrects himself in a letter to Southey, dated 
 August 9, 1 815.
 
 I58 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 they will — pure golden pippin. A fearful rumour has 
 since reached me that the Crab is on the eve of setting 
 out for France. If he is in England your letter will 
 reach him, and I flatter myself a touch of the per- 
 suasive of my own, which accompanies it, will not be 
 thrown away ; if it be, he is a sloe, and no true- 
 hearted Crab, and there's an end. For that life of the 
 German conjuror which you speak of, Colerus de Vita 
 Doctoris vix-Intelligibilis, I perfectly remember the 
 last evening we spent with Mrs. Morgan and Miss 
 Brent, in London Street, — (by that token we had raw 
 rabbits for supper, and Miss B. prevailed upon me to 
 take a glass of brandy and water, which is not my 
 habit,) — I perfectly remember reading portions of that 
 life in their parlour, and I think it must be among 
 their packages. It was the very last evening we 
 were at that house. What is gone of that frank- 
 hearted circle, Morgan, and his cos-lettuces ? He ate 
 walnuts better than any man I ever knew. Friend- 
 ships in these parts stagnate. 
 
 ****** 
 I am going to eat turbot, turtle, venison, marrow 
 pudding, — cold punch, claret, Madeira, — at our 
 annual feast, at half-past four this day. They keep 
 bothering me, (I'm at office,) and my ideas are con- 
 fused. Let me know if I can be of any service as to 
 books. God forbid the Architectonican should be 
 sacrificed to a foolish scruple of some book proprietor, 
 as if books did not belong with the highest propriety 
 to those that understand 'em best. 
 
 C. Lamb.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 159 
 
 Letter LIL] 26th August, i 814. 
 
 Let the hungry soul rejoice, there is corn in Egypt. 
 Whatever thou hast been told to the contrary by 
 designing friends, who perhaps inquired carelessly, 
 or did not inquire at all, in hope of saving their 
 money, there is a stock of " Remorse " on hand, 
 enough, as Pople conjectures, for seven years* con- 
 sumption ; judging from experience of the last two 
 years. Methinks it makes for the benefit of sound 
 literature, that the best books do not always go, off 
 best. Inquire in seven years' time for the Rokebys 
 and the Laras, and where shall they be found ? — 
 fluttering fragmentary in some thread-paper ; whereas 
 thy Wallenstein and thy Remorse are safe on Long- 
 man's or Pople's shelves, as in some Bodleian ; there 
 they shall remain ; no need of a chain to hold them 
 fast — perhaps for ages — tall copies — and people shan't 
 run about hunting for them as in old Ezra's 
 shrievalty they did for a Bible, almost without effect 
 till the great-great-grand-niece (by the mother's side) 
 of Jeremiah or Ezekiel (which was it?) remembered 
 something of a book, with odd reading in it, that 
 used to lie in the green closet in her aunt Judith's 
 bedchamber. 
 
 Thy caterer, Price, was at Hamburgh when last 
 Pople heard of him, laying up for thee like some 
 miserly old father for his generous-hearted son to 
 squander. 
 
 Mr. Charles Aders, whose books also pant for that 
 free circulation which thy custody is sure to give 
 them, is to be heard of at his kinsmen, Messrs. 
 Jameson and Aders, No. 7, Laurence Pountney 
 Lane, London, according to the information which
 
 l6o CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Crabius with his parting breath left me. Crabius is 
 gone to Paris. I prophesy he and the Parisians will 
 part with mutual contempt. His head has a twist 
 Allemagne, like thine, dear mystic. 
 
 I have been reading Madame Stael on Germany : 
 an impudent clever woman. But if Faust be no 
 better than in her abstract of it, I counsel thee to let 
 it alone. How canst thou translate the language of 
 cat-monkeys ? Fie on such fantasies ! But I will 
 not forget to look for Proclus. It is a kind of book 
 which, when we meet with it, we shut up faster than 
 we opened it. Yet I have some bastard kind of re- 
 collection that somewhere, sometime ago, upon some 
 stall or other, I saw it. It was either that or Plotinus, 
 or Saint Augustine's City of God. So little do some 
 folks value, what to others, sc. to you, "well used," 
 had been the " Pledge of Immortality." Bishop 
 Bruno I never touched upon. Stuffing too good for 
 the brains of such a " Hare " as thou describest. 
 May it burst his pericranium, as the gobbets of fat 
 and turpentine (a nasty thought of the seer) did that 
 old dragon in the Apocrypha ! May he go mad in 
 trying to understand his author ! May he lend the 
 third volume of him before he has quite translated 
 the second, to a friend who shall lose it, and so spoil 
 the publication, and may his friend find it and send it 
 him just as thou or some such less dilatory spirit 
 shall have announced the whole for the press. So 
 I think I have answered all thy questions except 
 about Morgan's cos-lettuce. The first personal pecu- 
 liarity I ever observed of him (all worthy souls are 
 subject to 'em) was a particular kind of rabbit-like 
 delight in munching salads with oil without vinegar 
 after dinner — a steady contemplative browsing on
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. l6l 
 
 them — didst never take note of it ? Canst think of 
 any other queries in the solution of which I can give 
 thee satisfaction ? Do you want any books that I 
 can procure for you ? Old Jimmy Boyer is dead at 
 last. Trollope has got his living, worth £1000 
 a-year net. See, thou sluggard, thou heretic- 
 sluggard, what mightest thou not have arrived at ! 
 Lay thy animosity against Jimmy in the grave. Do 
 not entail it on thy posterity. 
 
 Charles Lamb. 
 
 Letter LI 1 1.] Dec. 24th, 1818. 
 
 My dear Coleridge, — I have been in a state of in- 
 cessant hurry ever since the receipt of your ticket. 
 It found me incapable of attending you, it being the 
 night of Kenney's new comedy, which has utterly 
 failed. You know my local aptitudes at such a time ; 
 I have been a thorough rendezvous for all consulta- 
 tions. My head begins to clear up a little, but it has 
 had bells in it. Thank you kindly for your ticket, 
 though the mournful prognostic which accompanies 
 it certainly renders its permanent pretensions less 
 marketable ; but I trust to hear many a course yet. 
 You excepted Christmas week, by which I understood 
 next week ; I thought Christmas week was that which 
 Christmas Sunday ushered in. We are sorry it never 
 lies in your way to come to us ; but, dear Mahomet, 
 we will come to you. Will it be convenient to all the 
 good people at Highgate, if we take a stage up, not 
 next Sunday, but the following, viz., 3rd January, 
 1819 ? Shall we be too late to catch a skirt of the 
 old out-goer ? How the years crumble from under 
 
 vol. 1. M
 
 l62 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 us! We shall hope to see you before then; but, if 
 not, let us know if then will be convenient. Can we 
 secure a coach home ? 
 
 Believe me ever yours, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 I have but one holiday, which is Christmas Day 
 itself nakedly : no pretty garnish and fringes of St. 
 John's Day, Holy Innocents, &c, that used to bestud 
 it all around in the calendar. Improbe labor ! I 
 write six hours every day in this candle-light fog-den 
 at Leadenhall. 
 
 LETTER LIV.] January io, 1820. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — A letter written in the blood of 
 your poor friend would indeed be of a nature to startle 
 you; but this is nought but harmless red ink, or, as 
 the witty mercantile phrase hath it, clerk's blood. 
 Hang 'em ! my brain, skin, flesh, bone, carcase, soul, 
 time is all theirs. The Royal Exchange, Gresham's 
 Folly, hath me body and spirit. I admire some of 
 Lloyd's lines on you, and I admire your postponing 
 reading them. He is a sad tattler; but this is under 
 the rose. Twenty years ago he estranged one friend 
 from me quite, whom I have been regretting, but 
 never could regain since. He almost alienated you 
 also from me, or me from you, I don't know which ; 
 but that breach is closed. The " dreary sea nl is filled 
 up. He has lately been at work "telling again, - ' as 
 they call it, a most gratuitous piece of mischief, and 
 
 a When Lamb wrote this he had in view the passage in Christabtl 
 commencing, "Alas! they had been friends in youth."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 163 
 
 has caused a coolness betwixt me and (not a friend 
 exactly, but) an intimate acquaintance. I suspect 
 also he saps Manning's faith in me, who am to 
 Manning more than an acquaintance. Still I like his 
 writing verses about you. Will your kind host and 
 hostess give us a dinner next Sunday ; and, better 
 still, not expect ns if the weather is very bad. Why 
 you should refuse twenty guineas per sheet for Black- 
 wood's, or any other magazine, passes my poor com- 
 prehension. But, as Strap says, " you know best." 
 I have no quarrel with you about praeprandial avoca- 
 tions ; so don't imagine one. That Manchester 
 sonnet 1 I think very likely is Capel Lofft's. Another 
 sonnet appeared with the same initials in the same 
 paper, which turned out to be Procter's. What do 
 the rascals mean ? Am I to have the fathering of 
 what idle rhymes every beggarly poetaster pours 
 forth ! Who put your marine sonnet " about 
 Browne " into Blackwood ! I did not. So no more, 
 till we meet. 
 
 Ever yours, C. L. 
 
 Letter LV.] March 9th, 1822. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — It gives me great satisfaction to 
 hear that the pig turned out so well : they are interest- 
 ing 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 
 
 1 A sonnet in Blackwood's Magazine, dated Manchester, and 
 signed C. L. 
 
 M 2
 
 164 • CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 dredge it a little, just before the crisis ? Did the eyes 
 come away kindly with no (Edipean 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 fhat / sent the pig, or can 
 form the remotest guess what part Owen could play in 
 the business. I never knew him give any thing away 
 in my life. He would not begin with strangers. I sus- 
 pect 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 which I could 
 never think of sending away. Teal, widgeon, snipes, 
 barn-door fowls, ducks, geese — your tame villatic 
 things — Welsh mutton, collars of brawn, sturgeon, 
 fresh or pickled, your potted char, Swiss cheeses, 
 French pies, early grapes, muscadines, I impart as 
 freely unto my friends as to myself. They are but 
 self-extended ; but pardon me if I stop somewhere. 
 Where the fine feeling of benevolence giveth a higher 
 smack than the sensual rarity, there my friends (or 
 any good man) may command me ; but pigs are pigs, 
 and I myself therein am nearest to myself. Nay, I 
 should think it an affront, an undervaluing done to 
 Nature who bestowed such a boon upon me. if in a 
 churlish mood I parted with the precious gift. One 
 of the bitterest pangs of remorse I ever felt was when 
 a child — when my kind old aunt had strained her 
 pocket-strings to bestow a sixpenny whole plum-cake 
 upon me. In my way home through the Borough I 
 met a venerable old man, not a mendicant, but there- 
 abouts ; a look-beggar, not a verbal petitionist ; and 
 Lithe coxcombry of t.iugh t charity I gave away the 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 165 
 
 cake to him. I walked on a little in all the pride of 
 an Evangelical peacock, when of a sudden my old 
 aunt's kindness crossed me ; the sum it was to her ; 
 the pleasure she had a right to expect that I — not the 
 old imposter — should take in eating her cake ; the 
 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 it proved 
 a lesson to me ever after. The cake has long been 
 masticated, consigned to the 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 tempta- 
 tion and my fall, I shall endeavour to act towards it 
 more in the spirit of the donor's purpose. 
 
 Yours (short of pig) to command in every thing. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter LVL] 1824. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — Why will you make your visits, 
 which should give pleasure, matter of regret to your 
 friends ? You never come but you take away some 
 folio, that is part of my existence. With a great deal 
 of difficulty I was made to comprehend the extent of 
 my loss. My maid, Becky, brought me a dirty bit ot 
 paper, which contained her description of some book 
 which Mr. Coleridge had taken away. It was 
 " Luster's Tables," which, for some time, I could not 
 make out. " What ! has he carried away any of the 
 tables, Becky ?" " No, it wasn't any tables, but it
 
 l66 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 was a book that he called Luster's Tables." I was 
 obliged to search personally among my shelves, and 
 a huge fissure suddenly disclosed to me the true 
 nature of the damage I had sustained. That book, 
 Coleridge, you should not have taken away, for it is 
 not mine ; it is the property of a friend, who does not 
 know its value, nor indeed have I been very sedulous 
 in explaining to him the estimate of it ; but was 
 rather contented in giving a sort of corroboration to a 
 hint that he let fall, as to its being suspected to be 
 not genuine, so that in all probability it would have 
 fallen to me as a deodand ; not but I am as sure it is 
 Luther's 1 as I am sure that Jack Bunyan wrote the 
 Pilgrim's Progress ; but it was not for me to pronounce 
 upon the validity of testimony that had been disputed 
 by learneder clerks than I ; so I quietly let it occupy 
 the place it had usurped upon my shelves, and should 
 never have thought of issuing an ejectment against 
 it ; for why should I be so bigoted as to allow rites 
 of hospitality to none but my own books, children, 
 &c. ? — a species of egotism I abhor from my heart. 
 No ; let 'em all snug together, Hebrews and Pros- 
 elytes of the gate ; no selfish partiality of mine shall 
 make distinction between them, I charge no ware- 
 house room for my friends' commodities ; they are 
 welcome to come and stay as long as they like, with- 
 out paying rent. I have several such strangers that 
 I treat with more than Arabian courtesy. There's 
 a copy of More's fine poem, which is none of mine, 
 but I cherish it as my own. I am none of those 
 churlish landlords that advertise the goods to be 
 
 i Probably Luther's Colloqaia Mars alia, translated by Captain 
 Henry Bell, 1652, folio.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 167 
 
 taken away in ten days' time, or then to be sold to 
 pay expenses. So you see I had no right to lend you 
 that book. I may lend you my own books, because it 
 is at my own hazard ; but it is not honest to hazard a 
 friend's property; I always make that distinction. 
 I hope you will bring it with you, or send it by Hart- 
 ley ; or he can bring that, and you the Polemical 
 Discourses, and come and eat some atoning mutton 
 with us one of these days shortly. We are engaged 
 two or three Sundays deep, but always dine at home 
 on week-days at half-past four. So come all four — 
 men and books I mean. My third shelf (northern 
 compartment) from the top has two devilish gaps, 
 where you have knocked out its two eye-teeth. 
 
 Your wronged friend, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LVII.] March 22, 1826. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — We will with great pleasure be 
 with you on Thursday in the next week early. May 
 we venture to bring Emma with us ? Your finding 
 out my style in your nephew's pleasant book is sur- 
 prising to me. I want eyes to descry it. You are a 
 little too hard upon his morality, though I confess he 
 has more of Sterne about him than of Sternhold. 
 But he saddens into excellent sense before the con- 
 clusion. Your query shall be submitted to Miss 
 Kelly, though it is obvious that the pantomime, 
 when done, will be more easy to decide upon than in 
 proposal. I say, do it by all means. I have Decker's 
 play by me, if you can filch anything out of it. Miss
 
 l68 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Gray, with her kitten eyes, is an actress, though she 
 shows it not at all ; and pupil to the former, whose 
 gestures she mimics in comedy to the disparagement 
 of her own natural manner, which is agreeable. It is 
 funny to see her bridling up her neck, which is native 
 to F. K. ; but there is no setting the manners of others 
 upon one's shoulders any more than their head. I 
 am glad you esteem Manning, though you see but his 
 husk or shrine. He discloses not, save to select wor- 
 shippers, and will leave the world without any one 
 hardly but me knowing how stupendous a creature he 
 is. I am perfecting myself in the " Ode to Eton Col- 
 lege " against Thursday, that I may not appear un- 
 classic. I have just discovered that it is much better 
 than the " Elegy." 
 
 In haste, C. L. 
 
 P.S. — I do not know what to say to your latest 
 theory about Nero being the Messiah, though by all 
 accounts he was a 'nointed one. 
 
 Letter LVIII.] June ist, 1826. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — If I know myself, nobody more 
 detests the display of personal vanity, which is im- 
 plied in the act of sitting for one's picture, than 
 myself. But the fact is, that the likeness which 
 accompanies this letter was stolen from my person at 
 one of my unguarded moments by some too partial 
 artist, and my friends are pleased to think that he 
 has not much flattered me. Whatever its merits may 
 be, you, who have so great an interest in the original, 
 will have a satisfaction in tracing the features of one
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. l6g 
 
 that has so long esteemed you. There are times 
 when in a friend's absence these graphic representa- 
 tions of him almost seem to bring back the man him- 
 self. The painter, whoever he was, seems to have 
 taken me in one of those disengaged moments, if 
 I may so term them, when the native character is so 
 much more honestly displayed than can be possible 
 in the restraints of an enforced sitting attitude. Per- 
 haps it rather describes me as a thinking man, than 
 a man in the act of thought. Whatever its preten- 
 sions, I know it will be dear to you, towards whom I 
 should wish my thoughts to flow in a sort of an un- 
 dress rather than in the more studied graces of 
 diction. 
 
 I am, dear Coleridge, yours sincerely, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LIX.] 1829. 
 
 Dear Coleridge, — Your sonnet is capital. The 
 paper is ingenious, only that it split into four parts 
 (besides a side splinter) in the carriage. I have 
 transferred it to the common English paper, manu- 
 factured of rags, for better preservation. I never 
 knew before how the Iliad and Odyssey were written. 
 'Tis strikingly corroborated by observations on Cats. 
 These domestic animals, put 'em on a rug before the 
 fire, wink their eyes up, and listen to the kettle, and 
 then purr, which is their poetry. 
 
 On Sunday week we kiss your hands (if they are 
 clean). This next Sunday I have been engaged for 
 some time. 
 
 With remembrances to your good host and hostess, 
 
 Yours ever, C. Lamb.
 
 170 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 
 
 Letter LX.] 1829. 
 
 My dear Coleridge, — With pain and grief, I must 
 entreat you to excuse us on Thursday. My head, 
 though externally correct, has had a severe concus- 
 sion in my long illness, and the very idea of an 
 engagement hanging over for a day or two, forbids 
 my rest, and I get up miserable. I am not well 
 enough for company. I do assure you. no other 
 thing prevents my coming. I expect Field and his 
 brothers this or to-morrow evening, and it worries me 
 to death that I am not ostensibly ill enough to put 
 'em off. I will get better, when I shall hope to see 
 your nephew. He will come again. Mary joins in 
 best love to the Gilmans. Do, I earnestly entreat 
 you, excuse me. I assure you, again, that I am not 
 fit to go out yet. 
 
 Yours (though shattered), 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Tuesday. 
 
 Letter LXL] April 14th, 1832. 
 
 My dear Coleridge, — Not an unkind thought has 
 passed in my brain about you ; but I have been 
 wofully neglectful of you ; so that I do not deserve to 
 announce to you, that if I do not hear from you before 
 then, I will set out on Wednesday morning to take 
 you by the hand. I would do it this moment, but an 
 unexpected visit might flurry you. I shall take 
 silence for acquiescence, and come. I am glad you 
 could write so long a letter. Old loves to, and hope 
 of kind looks from, the Gilmans when I come. 
 
 Yours, semper idem, C. L.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH COLERIDGE. 171 
 
 If you ever thought an offence, much more wrote 
 it, against me, it must have been in the times of 
 Noah, and the great waters swept it away. Mary's 
 most kind love, and maybe a wrong prophet of your 
 bodings ! — here she is crying for mere love over your 
 letter. I wring out less, but not sincerer showers. 
 
 My direction is simply, Enfield.
 
 172 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 II. 
 
 Correspondence with Robert Southey. 
 [1798-1830.] 
 
 Letter LXIL] My 28th, 1798. 
 
 Dear Southey, — I am ashamed that I have not 
 thanked you before this for the Joan of Arc, but I 
 did not know your address, and it did not occur to me 
 to write through Cottle. The poem delighted me, 
 and the notes amused me ; but methinks she of Neuf- 
 chatel, in the print, holds her sword too " like a 
 dancer." I sent your notice to Phillips, particularly 
 requesting an immediate insertion, but I suppose it 
 came too late. I am sometimes curious to know 
 what progress you make in that same "Calendar:" 
 whether you insert the nine worthies and Whitting- 
 ton ? what you do or how you can manage when two 
 Saints meet and quarrel for precedency ? Martlemas, 
 and Candlemas, and Christmas, are glorious themes 
 for a writer like you, antiquity-bitten, smit with the 
 love of boars' heads and rosemary : but how you can 
 ennoble the 1st of April I know not. By the way, I 
 had a thing to say, but a certain false modesty has 
 hitherto prevented me : perhaps I can best communi- 
 cate my wish by a hint. My birthday is on the 10th 
 of February, New Style ; but if it interferes with any 
 remarkable event, why rather than my country should 
 lose her fame, I care not if I put my nativity back 
 eleven days. Fine family patronage for your " Ca-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 173 
 
 lendar," if that old lady of prolific memory were 
 living, who lies (or lyes) in some church in London, 
 (saints forgive me, but I have forgot what church,) 
 attesting that enormous legend of as many children as 
 days in the year. I marvel her impudence did not 
 grasp at a leap-year. Three hundred and sixty-five 
 dedications, and all in a family ! You might spit in 
 spirit, on the oneness of Maecenas's patronage ! 
 
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, to the eternal regret of 
 his native Devonshire, emigrates to Westphalia : 
 " Poor Lamb," (these were his last words,) " if he 
 wants any knowledge, he may apply to me." In ordi- 
 nary cases I thanked him. I have an " Encyclo- 
 paedia " at hand ; but on such an occasion as going 
 over to a German university, I could not refrain from 
 sending him the following propositions, to be by him 
 defended or oppugned (or both) at Leipsic or Got- 
 tingen. 
 
 THESES QILEDAM THEOLOGICiE. 
 
 "Whether God loves a lying angel better than a 
 true man ?" 
 
 11. 
 
 " Whether the archangel Uriel could knowingly 
 affirm an untruth, and whether, if he could, he 
 would ?" 
 
 in. 
 
 " Whether honesty be an angelic virtue, or not 
 rather belonging to that class of qualities which the 
 schoolmen term ' virtutes minus splendidae et hominis 
 et terrae nimis participes ?' "
 
 174 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 IV. 
 
 " Whether the seraphim ardentes do not manifest 
 their goodness by the way of vision and theory ? and 
 whether practice be not a sub-celestial, and merely 
 human virtue ?" 
 
 v. 
 
 " Whether the higher order of seraphim illuminati 
 ever sneer ?" 
 
 VI. 
 
 " Whether pure intelligence can love, or whether 
 they can love any thing besides pure intellect ?" 
 
 VII. 
 
 " Whether the beatific vision be any thing more or 
 less than a perpetual representment to each indivi- 
 dual angel of his own present attainments, and future 
 capabilities, something in the manner of mortal look- 
 ing glasses ?" 
 
 VIII. 
 
 " Whether an ' immortal and amenable soul ' may 
 not come to be damned at last, and the man never 
 suspect it beforehand ?" 
 
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge hath not deigned an an- 
 swer. 1 Was it impertinent of me to avail myself of 
 that offered source of knowledge ? 
 
 Wishing Madoc may be born into the world with as 
 splendid promise as the second birth, or purification, 
 of the Maid of Neufchatel, — I remain yours sincerely, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 I hope Edith 2 is better; my kindest remembrances 
 
 1 See Letter No. XXXI. to Coleridge on the subject. According to 
 Cottle's account, Coleridge was at first much oliended at it. 
 
 2 Mrs. bouthey.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. I75 
 
 to her. You have a good deal of trifling to forgive 
 in this letter." 
 
 Letter LXIII.] Oct. 18th, 1798. 
 
 Dear Southey, — I have at last been so fortunate as 
 to pick up Wither's Emblems for you, that " old book 
 and quaint," as the brief author of Rosamund Gray 
 hath it ; it is in a most detestable state of preserva- 
 tion, and the cuts are of a fainter impression than I 
 have seen. Some child, the curse of antiquaries and 
 bane of bibliopical rarities, hath been dabbling in 
 some of them with its paint and dirty fingers ; and, 
 in particular, hath a little sullied the author's own 
 portraiture, which I think valuable, as the poem that 
 accompanies it is no common one ; this last excepted, 
 the Emblems are far inferior to old Quarles. I once 
 told you otherwise, but I had not then read old 
 Quarles with attention. I have picked up, too, 
 another copy of Quarles for ninepence ! ! ! O tem- 
 pora ! O lectores ! so that if you have lost or parted 
 with your own copy, say so, and I can furnish you, 
 for you prize these things more than I do. You will 
 be amused, I think, with honest Wither's " Super- 
 sedeas to all them whose custom it is, without any 
 deserving, to importune authors to give unto them 
 their books." I am sorry 'tis imperfect, as the lottery 
 board annexed to it also is. Methinks you might 
 modernise and elegantise this Supersedeas, and place 
 it in front of your Joan of Arc, as a gentle hint to 
 Messrs. Parke, &c. One of the happiest emblems, 
 and comicalest cuts, is the owl and little chirpers, 
 page 63.
 
 I76 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 Wishing you all amusement, which your true 
 emblem-fancier can scarce fail to find in even bad 
 emblems, I remain your caterer to command, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Love and respects to Edith. I hope she is well. 
 How does your Calendar prosper ? 
 
 Letter LXI V.] 
 
 Dear Southey, — I thank you heartily 'for the 
 Eclogue ; it pleases me mightily, being so full of 
 picture work and circumstances. I find no fault in 
 it, unless perhaps that Joanna's ruin is a catastrophe 
 too trite ; and this is not the first or second time you 
 have clothed your indignation, in verse, in a tale of 
 ruined innocence. The old lady, spinning in the sun, 
 I hope would not disdain to claim some kindred with 
 old Margaret. 1 I could almost wish you to vary some 
 circumstances in the conclusion. A gentleman 
 seducer has so often been described in prose and 
 verse. What if you had accomplished Joanna's ruin 
 by the clumsy arts and rustic gifts of some country- 
 fellow ? I am thinking, I believe, of the song — 
 
 " An old woman clothed in gray, 
 
 Whose daughter was charming and young, 
 And she was deluded away 
 
 By Roger's false flattering tongue." 
 
 A Roger-Lothario would be a novel character; I think 
 you might paint him very well. You may think this 
 
 1 The " old Margaret," of course, of Lamb's Rosamund Gray. 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 177 
 
 a very silly suggestion, and so indeed it is ; but, in 
 good truth, nothing else but the first words of that 
 foolish ballad put me upon scribbling my Rosamund. 
 But I thank you heartily for the poem. Not having 
 any thing of my own to send you in return, (though, 
 to tell truth, I am at work upon something, which, if 
 I were to cut away and garble, perhaps I might send 
 you an extract or two that might not displease you ; 
 but I will not do that ; and whether it will come to 
 any thing I know not, for I am as slow as a 
 Fleming painter, when I compose any thing.) I will 
 crave leave to put down a few lines of old Chris- 
 topher Marlow's ; I take them from his tragedy, 
 Jew of Malta. The Jew is a famous character, 
 quite out of nature ; but, when we consider the 
 terrible idea our simple ancestors had of a Jew, 
 not more to be discommended for a certain discolour- 
 ing (I think Addison calls it) than the witches and 
 fairies of Marlow's mighty successor. The scene is 
 betwixt Barabbas, the Jew, and Ithamore, a Turkish 
 captive, exposed to sale for a slave. 
 
 BARABBAS. 
 (A precious rascal. J 
 
 " As for myself, I walk abroad a-nights, 
 And kill sick people groaning under walls 
 Sometimes I go about, and poison wells ; 
 And now and then, to cherish Christian thieves, 
 I am content to lose some of my crowns, 
 That I may, walking in my gallery, 
 See 'm go pinion'd along by my door. 
 Being young, I studied physic, and began 
 To practise first upon the Italian : 
 There I enrich'd the priests with burials, 
 And always kept the sexton's arms in use 
 With digging graves, and ringing dead men's knells : 
 VOL. I. N
 
 I78 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 And after that was I an engineer, 
 
 And in the wars 'twixt France and Germany, 
 
 Under pretence of serving Charles the Fifth, 
 
 Slew friends and enemy with my stratagems. 
 
 Then after that was I an usurer. 
 
 And with extorting, cozening, forfeiting, 
 
 And tricks belonging unto brokery, 
 
 I fill'd the jails with bankrupts in a year, 
 
 And with young orphans planted hospitals, 
 
 And every moon made some or other mad, 
 
 And now and then one hang himself for grief, 
 
 Pinning upon his breast a long great scroll, 
 
 How I with interest had tormented him." 
 
 (Now hear Ithamore, the other gentle nature.) 
 
 ITHAMORE. 
 
 (A comical dog.) 
 " Faith, master, and I have spent my time 
 In setting Christian villages on fire, 
 Chaining of eunuchs, binding galley slaves. 
 One time I was an hostler at an inn, 
 And in the night time secretly would I steal 
 To travellers' chambers, and there cut their throats. 
 Once at Jerusalem, where the pilgrims kneel'd, 
 I strew'd powder on the marble stones, 
 And therewithal their knees would rankle so, 
 That I have laugh'd a good to see the cripples 
 Go limping home to Christendom on stilts." 
 
 BARABBAS. 
 Why, this is something. 
 
 There is a mixture of the ludicrous and the terrible 
 in these lines, brimful of genius and antique inven- 
 tion, that at first reminded me of your old description 
 of cruelty in hell, which was in the true Hogarthian 
 style. I need not tell you that Marlow was author of 
 that pretty madrigal, " Come live with me and be my 
 Love,'' 2 and of the tragedy of Edward II., in which 
 are certain Vines unequalled in our English tongue. 
 
 2 Printed in England's Helicon, 1600, 4to.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 179 
 
 Honest Walton mentions the said madrigal under 
 the denomination of " certain smooth verses made 
 long since by Kit Marlow." 
 
 I am glad you have put me on the scent after old 
 Quarles. If I do not put up those eclogues, and that 
 shortly, say I am no true-nosed hound. I have had 
 a letter from Lloyd ; the young metaphysician of 
 Caius is well, and is busy recanting the new heresy, 
 metaphysics, for the old dogma, Greek. My sister, I 
 thank you, is quite well. She had a slight attack the 
 other day, which frightened me a good deal, but it 
 went off unaccountably. Love and respects to Edith. 
 Yours sincerely, C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LXV.] Nov. 3, 1798. 
 
 I have read your Eclogue repeatedly, and cannot 
 call it bald, or without interest ; the cast of it and the 
 design are completely original, and may set people 
 upon thinking. It is as poetical as the subject requires, 
 which asks no poetry ; but it is defective in pathos. 
 The woman's own story is the tamest part of it ; I 
 should like you to remould that : it too much re- 
 sembles the young maid's history ; both had been in 
 service. Even the omission would not injure the 
 poem : after the words " growing wants," you might, 
 not unconnectedly, introduce " look at that little chub" 
 down to " welcome one." And, decidedly, I would 
 have you end it somehow thus, — 
 
 " Give them at least this evening a good meal. 
 
 [Gives her money. 
 Now, fare thee well ; hereafter you have taught me 
 To give sad meaning to the village bells," &c. 
 
 which would leave a stronger impression (as well as 
 
 N 2
 
 l80 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 more pleasingly recall the beginning of the Eclogue) 
 than the present commonplace reference to a better 
 world, which the woman " must have heard at church." 
 I should like you too a good deal to enlarge the most 
 striking part, as it might have been, of the poem — 
 " Is it idleness ?" &c. : that affords a good field for 
 dwelling on sickness, and inabilities, and old age. 
 And you might also a good deal enrich the piece with 
 a picture of a country wedding. The woman might 
 very well, in a transient fit of oblivion, dwell upon the 
 ceremony and circumstances of her own nuptials six 
 years ago, the snugness of the bridegroom, the feast- 
 ings, the cheap merriment, the welcomings, and the 
 secret envyings of the maidens ; then dropping all 
 this, recur to her present lot. I do not know that I 
 can suggest any thing else, or that I have suggested 
 any thing new or material. I do not much prefer 
 this Eclogue to the last. Both are inferior to the 
 former. 
 
 " And when he came to shake me by the hand, 
 And spake as kindly to me as he used, 
 I hardly knew his voice — " 
 
 is the only passage that affected me. When servants 
 speak their language ought to be plain, and not much 
 raised above the common else I should find fault with 
 the bathos of this passage, — 
 
 " And when I heard the bell strike out, 
 I thought (what ?) that I had never heard it toll 
 So dismally before." 
 
 I like the destruction of the martens' old nests 
 hugely, having just such a circumstance in my me- 
 mory. I shall be very glad to see your remaining 
 Ecologue, if not too much trouble, as you give me
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. l8l 
 
 reason to expect it will be the second best. I shall be 
 very glad to see some more poetry ; though, I fear, 
 your trouble in transcribing will be greater than the 
 service my remarks may do them. 
 
 Yours affectionately, C. Lamb. 
 
 I cut my letter short because I am called off to 
 business. 
 
 Letter LXVL] Nov. 8th, 1798. 
 
 I perfectly accord with your opinion of old Wither ; 
 Quarles is a wittier writer, but Wither lays more hold 
 of the heart. Quarles thinks of his audience when 
 he lectures ; Wither soliloquizes in company from a full 
 heart. What wretched stuff are the " Divine Fancies" 
 of Quarles ! Religion appears to him no longer valu- 
 able than it furnishes matter for quibbles and riddles ; 
 he turns God's grace into wantonness. Wither is 
 like an old friend, whose warm-heartedness and esti- 
 mable qualities make us wish he possessed more 
 genius, but at the same time make us willing to dis- 
 pense with that want. I always love Wither, and 
 sometimes admire Quarles. Still that portrait poem 
 is a fine one ; and the extract from " Shepherds' 
 Hunting" places him in a starry height far above 
 Quarles. If you wrote that review in the Critical 
 Review, I am sorry you are so sparing of praise to the 
 Ancient Marinere. So far from calling it as you do, 
 with some wit, but more severity, a " Dutch Attempt," 
 &c, I call it a right English attempt, and a successful 
 one, to dethrone German sublimity. You have se- 
 lected a passage fertile in unmeaning miracles, but 
 have passed by fifty passages as miraculous as the
 
 l82 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 miracles they celebrate. I never so deeply felt the 
 pathetic as in that part, 
 
 " A spring of love gush'd from my heart, 
 And I bless'd them unaware." 
 
 It stung me into high pleasure through sufferings. 
 Lloyd does not like it ; his head is too metaphysical, 
 and your taste too correct ; at least I must allege 
 something against you both, to excuse my own 
 dotage — 
 
 " So lonely 'twas, that God himself 
 Scarce seem'd there to be!" — &c, &c. 
 
 But you allow some elaborate beauties : you should 
 have extracted 'em. The Ancient Marinere plays more 
 tricks with the mind than that last poem, which is 
 yet one of the finest written. But I am getting too 
 dogmatical ; and before I degenerate into abuse, I will 
 conclude with assuring you that I am 
 
 Sincerely yours, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 I am going to meet Lloyd at Ware on Saturday, to 
 return on Sunday. Have you any commands or 
 commendations to the metaphysician ? I shall be 
 very happy if you will dine or spend any time with 
 me in your way through the great ugly city ; but I 
 know you have other ties upon you in these parts. 
 
 Love and respects to Edith, and friendly remem- 
 brances to Cottle. 
 
 Letter LXVII.] Nov. 28th, 1798.1 
 
 I can have no objection to your printing " Mystery 
 
 1 In this year Mr. Cottle proposed to publish an annual volume of
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 183 
 
 of God" with my name, and all due acknowledgments 
 
 for the honour and favour of the communication ; 
 
 indeed, 'tis a poem that can dishonour no name, 
 
 Now, that is in the true strain of modern modesto- 
 
 vanitas. . . . But for the sonnet, I heartily wish it, 
 
 as I thought it was, dead and forgotten. If the exact 
 
 circumstances under which I wrote could be known 
 
 or told, it would be an interesting sonnet ; but to an 
 
 indifferent and stranger reader it must appear a very 
 
 bald thing, certainly inadmissible in a compilation. 
 
 I wish you could affix a different name to the volume. 
 
 There is a contemptible book, a wretched assortment 
 
 of vapid feelings, entitled Pratt's Gleanings, which 
 
 hath damned and impropriated the title for ever. 
 
 Pray think of some other. The gentleman is better 
 
 known (better had he remained unknown) by an Ode 
 
 to Benevolence, written and spoken for and at the 
 
 annual dinner of the Humane Society, who walk in 
 
 procession once a year, with all the objects of their 
 
 charity before them, to return God thanks for giving 
 
 them such benevolent hearts. 
 
 I like " Bishop Brunn," but not so abundantly as 
 your " Witch Ballad," which is an exquisite thing of 
 its kind. 
 
 I showed my "Witch" and "Dying Lover" to 
 
 fugitive poetry by various hands, under the title of the Annual 
 Anthology ; to which Coleridge and Southey were principal contri- 
 butors, the first volume of which was published in the following year. 
 To this little work Lamb contributed a short religious effusion in blank 
 verse, entitled " Living without God in the World." The fol- 
 lowing letter refers to this poem by its first words, " Mystery of 
 God," and recurs to the rejected sonnet to his sister; and alludes to an 
 intention, afterwards changed, of entitling the proposed collection 
 " Gleanings."
 
 184 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 Dyer last night ; but George could not comprehend 
 how that could be poetry which did not go upon ten 
 feet, as George and his predecessor had taught it to 
 do ; so George read me some lectures on the distin- 
 guishing qualities of the Ode, the Epigram, and the 
 Epic, and went home to illustrate his doctrine, by 
 correcting a proof sheet of his own Lyrics. George 
 writes odes where the rhymes, like fashionable man 
 and wife, keep a comfortable distance of six or eight 
 lines apart, and calls that "observing the laws of 
 verse !" George tells you, before he recites, that you 
 must listen with great attention, or you'll miss the 
 rhymes, I did so, and found them pretty exact. 
 George, speaking of the dead Ossian, exclaimeth, 
 " Dark are the poet's eyes ! " I humbly represented 
 to him that his own eyes were dark, and many a living 
 bard's besides, and recommended " Closed are the 
 poet's eyes." But that would not do. I found there 
 was an antithesis between the darkness of his eyes 
 and the splendour of his genius ; and I acquiesced. 
 
 Your recipe for a Turk's poison is invaluable, and 
 truly Marlowish. . . . Lloyd objects to " shutting 
 up the womb of his purse" in my curse ; (which, for a 
 Christian witch in a Christian country, is not too mild, 
 I hope.) Do you object ? I think there is a strangeness 
 in the idea, as well as " shaking the poor like snakes 
 from his door," which suits the speaker. Witches 
 illustrate, as fine ladies do, from their own familiar 
 objects, and snakes and the shutting up of wombs 
 are in their way. I don't know that this last charge 
 has been before brought against 'em, nor either the 
 sour milk or the mandrake babe ; but I affirm these 
 be things a witch would do if she could. 
 
 My Tragedy will be a medley (as I intend it to be
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 185 
 
 a medley) of laughter and tears, prose and verse, and 
 in some places rhyme, songs, wit, pathos, humour, 
 and, if possible, sublimity ; at least it is not a fault in 
 my intention if it does not comprehend most of these 
 discordant atoms. Heaven send they dance not the 
 '• Dance of Death !" I hear that the Two Noble 
 Englishmen have parted no sooner than they set foot 
 on German earth; but I have not heard the reason. 
 Possibly to give moralists an handle to exclaim, 
 " Ah me ! what things are perfect?" I think I shall 
 adopt your emendation in the " Dying Lover," though 
 I do not myself feel the objection against "Silent 
 Prayer." 
 
 My tailor has brought me home a new coat lapelled, 
 with a velvet collar. He assures me every body wears 
 velvet collars now. Some are born fashionable, some 
 achieve fashion, and others, like your humble servant, 
 have fashion thrust upon them. The rogue has been 
 making inroads hitherto by modest degrees, foisting 
 upon me an additional button, recommending gaiters ; 
 but to come upon me thus, in a full tide of luxury, 
 neither becomes him as a tailor nor the ninth of a man. 
 My meek gentleman was robbed the other day, coming 
 with his wife and "family in a one-horse shay from 
 Hampstead. The villains rifled him of four guineas, 
 some shillings and half-pence, and a bundle of cus- 
 tomers' measures, which they swore were bank notes. 
 They did not shoot him, and when they rode off he 
 addrest them with profound gratitude, making a con- 
 gee : " Gentlemen, I wish you good night, and we 
 are very much obliged to you that you have not used 
 us ill !" And this is the cuckoo that has had the 
 audacity to foist upon me ten buttons on a side, and 
 a black velvet collar ! A cursed ninth of a scoundrel !
 
 l86 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 When you write to Lloyd, he wishes his Jacobin 
 correspondents to address him as Mr. C. L. Love 
 and respects to Edith. I hope she is well. 
 
 Yours sincerely, C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LXVIIL] Dec. 27, 1798. 
 
 Dear Southey, — Your friend John May has formerly 
 made kind offers to Lloyd of serving me in the India 
 House, by the interest of his friend Sir Francis Baring. 
 It is not likely that I shall ever put his goodness to 
 the test on my own account, for my prospects are 
 very comfortable ; but I know a man, a young man, 
 whom he could serve through the same channel, and, 
 I think, would be disposed to serve if he were ac- 
 quainted with his case. This poor fellow (whom I 
 know just enough of to vouch for his strict integrity 
 and worth) has lost two or three employments from 
 illness, which he cannot regain ; he was once insane, 
 and, from the distressful uncertainty of his livelihood, 
 has reason to apprehend a return of that malady. He 
 has been for some time dependent on a woman 
 whose lodger he formerly was, but who can ill afford 
 to maintain him ; and I know that on Christmas 
 night last he actually walked about the streets all 
 night, rather than accept of her bed, which she offered 
 him, and offered herself to sleep in the kitchen ; and 
 that, in consequence of that severe cold, he is labour- 
 ing under a bilious disorder, besides a depression of 
 spirits, which incapacitates him from exertion when 
 he most needs it. For God's sake, Southey, if it does 
 not go against you to ask favours, do it now ; ask it 
 as for me ; but do not do a violence to your feelings,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 187 
 
 because he does not know of this application, and 
 will suffer no disappointment. What I meant to say- 
 was this, — there are in the India House what are 
 called extra clerks, not on the establishment, like me, 
 but employed in extra business, by-jobs ; these get 
 about £50 a year, or rather more, but never rise. A 
 director can put in at any time a young man in this 
 office, and it is by no means considered so great a 
 favour as making an established clerk. He would 
 think himself as rich as an emperor if he could get 
 such a certain situation, and be relieved from those 
 disquietudes which, I do fear, may one day bring back 
 his distemper. 
 
 You know John May better than I do, but I know 
 enough to believe that he is a good man. He did make 
 me that offer I have mentioned, but you will perceive 
 that such an offer cannot authorize me in applying 
 for another person. 
 
 But I cannot help writing to you on the subject, 
 for the young man is perpetually before my eyes, and 
 I shall feel it a crime not to strain all my petty 
 interest to do him service, though I put my own deli- 
 cacy to the question by so doing. I have made one 
 other unsuccessful attempt already. At all events I 
 will thank you to write, for I am tormented with 
 anxiety. C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LXIX.] Jan. 21st, 1799. 
 
 I am requested by Lloyd to excuse his not replying 
 to a kind letter received from you. He is at present 
 situated in most distressful family perplexities, which 
 I am not at liberty to explain, but they are such as to
 
 l88 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 demand all the strength of his mind, and quite exclude 
 any attention to foreign objects. His brother Robert 
 (the flower of his family) hath eloped from the perse- 
 cutions of his father, and has taken shelter with me. 
 What the issue of his adventure will be, I know not. 
 He hath the sweetness of an angel in his heart, com- 
 bined with admirable firmness of purpose ; an uncul- 
 tivated, but very original, and I think superior, genius. 
 But this step of his is but a small part of their family 
 troubles. 
 
 I am to blame for not writing to you before on my 
 own account ; but I know you can dispense with the 
 expressions of gratitude, or I should have thanked 
 you before for all May's kindness. He has liberally 
 supplied the person I spoke to you of with money, 
 and had procured him a situation just after himself 
 had lighted upon a similar one, and engaged too far 
 to recede. But May's kindness was the same, and 
 my thanks to you and him are the same. May went 
 about on this business as if it had been his own. But 
 you knew John May before this, so I will be silent. 
 
 I shall be very glad to hear from you when con- 
 venient. I do not know how your Calendar and 
 other affairs thrive ; but above all, I have not heard 
 a great while of your " Madoc " — the opus magnum. I 
 would willingly send you something to give a value 
 to this letter ; but I have only one slight passage to 
 send you, scarce worth the sending, which I want to 
 edge in somewhere into my play, which, by the way, 
 hath not received the addition of ten lines, besides, 
 since I saw you. A father, old Walter Woodvil, (the 
 witch's protege,) relates this of his son John, who 
 " fought in adverse armies," being a royalist, and his 
 father a parliamentary man : —
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. l8g 
 
 " I saw him in the day of Worcester fight, 
 Whither he came at twice seven years. 
 Under the discipline of the Lord Falkland, 
 (His uncle by the mother's side, 
 Who gave his youthful politics a bent 
 Quite from the principles of his father's house ;) 
 There did I see this valiant Lamb of Mars, 
 This sprig of honour, this unbearded John, 
 This veteran in green years, this sprout, this Woodvil, 
 (With dreadless ease guiding a fire-hot steed, 
 Which seem'd to scorn the manage of a boy,) 
 Prick forth with such a mirth into the field, 
 To mingle rivalship and acts of war 
 Even with the sinewy masters of the art. 
 You would have thought the work of blood had been 
 A play-game merely, and the rabid Mars 
 Had put his harmful hostile nature off, 
 To instruct raw youth in images of war, 
 And practice of the unedged players' foils. 
 The rough fanatic and blood-practised soldiery 
 Seeing such hope and virtue in the boy, 
 Disclosed their ranks to let him pass unhurt, 
 Checking their swords' uncivil injuries, 
 As loth to mar that curious workmanship 
 Of Valour's beauty portray'd in his face." 
 
 Lloyd objects to " portrayed in his face," do you ? I 
 like the line. 
 
 I shall clap this in somewhere. I think there is a 
 spirit through the lines ; perhaps the 7th, 8th, and 
 gth owe their origin to Shakspeare, though no image 
 is borrowed. 
 
 He says in Henry the Fourth — 
 
 " This infant Hotspur, 
 Mars in swathing clothes." 
 
 But pray did Lord Falkland die before Worcester
 
 igO CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 fight ? In that case I must make bold to unclify 
 some other nobleman. 
 
 Kind love and respects to Edith. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LXX.] March 15th, 1799. 
 
 Dear Southey, — I have received your little volume, 
 for which I thank you, though I do not entirely ap- 
 prove of this sort of intercourse, where the presents 
 are all one side. I have read the last Eclogue again 
 with great pleasure. It hath gained considerably by 
 abridgment, and now I think it wants nothing but 
 enlargement. You will call this one of tyrant Pro- 
 crustes's criticisms, to cut and pull so to his own 
 standard ; but the old lady is so great a favourite with 
 me, I want to hear more of her; and of "Joanna" 
 you have given us still less. But the picture of the 
 rustics leaning over the bridge, and the old lady 
 travelling abroad on summer evening to see her gar- 
 den watered, are images so new and true, that I 
 decidedly prefer this " Ruin'd Cottage" to any poem 
 in the book. Indeed I think it the only one that will 
 bear comparison with your " Hymn to the Penates," 
 in a former volume. 
 
 I compare dissimilar things, as one would a rose 
 and a star, for the pleasure they give us, or as a child 
 soon learns to choose between a cake and a rattle ; 
 for dissimilars have mostly some points of comparison. 
 
 The next best poem, I think, is the first Eclogue 
 'tis very complete, and abounding in little pictures 
 and realities. The remainder Eclogues, excepting 
 only the " Funeral," I do not greatly admire. I miss
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. igi 
 
 one, which had at least as good a title to publication 
 as the " Witch," or the " Sailor's Mother." You 
 call'd it the " Last of the Family." The " Old Woman 
 of Berkeley" comes next ; in some humours I would 
 give it the preference above any. But who the devil 
 is Matthew of Westminster ? You are as familiar 
 with these antiquated monastics, as Swedenborg, or, 
 as his followers affect to call him, the Baron, with his 
 invisibles. But you have raised a very comic effect 
 out of the true narrative of Matthew of Westminster. 
 'Tis surprising with how little addition you have been 
 able to convert, with so little alteration, his incidents, 
 meant for terror, into circumstances and food for the 
 spleen. The Parody is not so successful ; it has one 
 famous line, indeed, which conveys the finest death- 
 bed image I ever met with : — 
 
 " The doctor whisper'd the nurse, and the surgeon knew what he 
 said." 
 
 But the offering the bride three times bears not the 
 slightest analogy or proportion to the fiendish noises 
 three times heard! In "Jaspar," the circumstance 
 of the great light is very affecting. But I had heard 
 you mention it before. The "Rose" is the only 
 insipid piece in the volume ; it hath neither thorns 
 nor sweetness ; and, besides, sets all chronology and 
 probability at defiance. 
 
 " Cousin Margaret," you know, I like. The allu- 
 sions to the Pilgrim's Progress are particularly happy, 
 and harmonize tacitly and delicately with old cousins 
 and aunts. To familiar faces we do associate familiar 
 scenes and accustomed objects : but what hath Apol- 
 lidon and his sea-nymphs to do in these affairs ? 
 Apollyon I could have borne, though he stands for
 
 ig2 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 the devil ; but who is Apollidon ? I think you are too 
 apt to conclude faintly, with some cold moral, as in 
 the end of the poem called " The Victory" — 
 
 " Be thou her comforter, who art the widow's friend ;" 
 
 a single common-place line of comfort, which bears 
 no proportion in weight or number to the many lines 
 which describe suffering. This is to convert religion 
 into mediocre feelings, which should burn, and glow, 
 and tremble. A moral should be wrought, into the 
 body and soul, the matter and tendency of a poem, 
 not tagged to the end, like a " God send the good 
 ship into harbour," at the conclusion of our bills of 
 lading. The finishing of the " Sailor" is also imper- 
 fect. Any dissenting minister may say and do as 
 much. 
 
 These remarks, I know, are crude and unwrought, 
 but I do not lay much claim to accurate thinking. I 
 never judge system-wise of things, but fasten upon 
 particulars. After all, there is a great deal in the 
 book that I must, for time, leave unmentioned, to 
 deserve my thanks for its own sake, as well as for the 
 friendly remembrances implied in the gift. I again 
 return you my thanks. 
 
 Pray present my love to Edith. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter LXXI.] March 20th, i 799 . 
 
 I am hugely pleased with your " Spider," " your old 
 freemason," as you call him. The first three stanzas 
 are delicious ; they seem to me a compound of Burns 
 and Old Quarles, the kind of home-strokes, where
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. I93 
 
 more is felt than strikes the ear; a terseness, a 
 jocular pathos, which makes one feel in laughter. 
 The measure, too, is novel and pleasing. I could 
 almost wonder Robert Burns in his lifetime never 
 stumbled upon it. The fourth stanza is less 
 striking, as being less original. The fifth falls off. 
 It has no felicity of phrase, no old-fashioned phrase 
 or feeling. 
 
 '&■ 
 
 " Young hopes, and love's delightful dreams," 
 
 savour neither of Burns nor Quarles ; they seem 
 more like shreds of many a modern sentimental 
 sonnet. The last stanza hath nothing striking in it, 
 if I except the two concluding lines, which are Burns 
 all over. I wish, if you concur with me, these things 
 could be looked to. I am sure this is a kind of 
 writing, which comes ten-fold better recommended to 
 the heart, comes there more like a neighbour or fami- 
 liar, than thousands of Hamnels, and Zillahs, and 
 Madelons. I beg you will send me the " Holly 
 Tree," if it at all resemble this, for it must please 
 me. I have never seen it. I love this sort of 
 poems, that open a new intercourse with the most 
 despised of the animal and insect race. I think this 
 vein may be further opened. Peter Pindar hath very 
 prettily apostrophized a fly ; Burns hath his mouse 
 and his louse ; Coleridge less successfully hath made 
 overtures of intimacy to a jackass, therein only fol- 
 lowing, at unresembling distance, Sterne, and greater 
 Cervantes. Besides these, I know of no other 
 examples of breaking down the partition between us 
 and our " poor earth-born companions." It is some- 
 times revolting to be put in a track of feeling by other 
 vol. 1. o
 
 194 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 people, not one's own immediate thoughts, else I 
 would persuade you, if I could, (I am in earnest,) to 
 commence a series of these animals' poems, which 
 might have a tendency to rescue some poor crea- 
 tures from the antipathy of mankind. Some thoughts 
 came across me : for instance — to a rat, to a toad, 
 to a cockchafer, to a mole. People bake moles alive 
 by a slow oven fire to cure consumption. Rats are, 
 indeed, the most despised and contemptible parts of 
 God's earth. I killed a rat the other day by punch- 
 ing him to pieces, and feel a weight of blood upon 
 me to this hour. Toads you know are made to fly, 
 and tumble down and crush all to pieces. Cock- 
 chafers are old sport. Then -again to a worm, with an 
 apostrophe to anglers, those patient tyrants, meek in- 
 flictors of pangs intolerable, cool devils ; to an owl ; 
 to all snakes, with an apology for their poison ; to a 
 cat in boots or bladders. Your own fancy, if it takes 
 a fancy to these hints, will suggest many more. A 
 series of such poems, suppose them accompanied 
 with plates descriptive of animal torments, cooks 
 roasting lobsters, fishmongers crimping skates, &c, 
 &c. would take excessively. I will willingly enter 
 into a partnership in the plan with you : I think my 
 heart and soul would go with it too — at least, give it 
 a thought. My plan is but this minute come into my 
 head ; but it strikes me instantaneously as something 
 new, good, and useful, full of pleasure, and full of 
 moral. If old Quarles and Wither could live again, 
 we would invite them into our firm. Burns hath 
 done his part. 
 
 Poor Sam. Le Grice ! I am afraid the world, and 
 the camp, and the university, have spoilt him among 
 them. 'Tis certain he had at one time a strong
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 195 
 
 capacity of turning out something; better. 1 I knew 
 him, and that not long since, when he had a most 
 warm heart. I am ashamed of the indifference I 
 have sometimes felt towards him. I think the devil 
 is in one's heart. I am under obligations to that 
 man for the warmest friendship, and heartiest sym- 
 pathy exprest both by word and deed and tears for 
 me, when I was in my greatest distress. But I have 
 forgot that ! as, I fear, he has nigh forgot the awful 
 scenes which were before his eyes when he served 
 the office of a comforter to me. No service was too 
 mean or troublesome for him to perform. I can't 
 think what but the devil, "that old spider," could 
 have suck'd my heart so dry of its sense of all grati- 
 tude. If he does come in your way, Southey, fail not 
 to tell him that I retain a most affectionate remem- 
 brance of his old friendliness, and an earnest wish to 
 resume our intercourse. In this I am serious. I 
 cannot recommend him to your society, because I am 
 afraid whether he be quite worthy of it ; but I have 
 no right to dismiss him from my regard. He was at 
 one time, and in the worst of times, my own familiar 
 friend, and great comfort to me then. I have known 
 him to play at cards with my father, meal-times ex- 
 cepted, literally all day long, in long days too, to save 
 me from being teased by the old man, when I was 
 not able to bear it. 
 
 God bless him for it, and God bless you, Southey. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 1 In a letter to Coleridge, about the same date there is an account 
 of Mr Le Grice's death in the West Indies from yellow fever. 
 
 O 2
 
 10,6 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 Letter LXXIL] April zo, 1799. 
 
 The following is a second extract 1 from my tragedy 
 — that is to be. 'Tis narrated by an old Steward to 
 Margaret, orphan ward of Sir Walter Woodvil. . 
 This and the Dying Lord I gave you are the only 
 extracts I can give without mutilation. . . I ex- 
 pect you to like the old woman's curse : — 
 
 • 
 
 Old Steward. — One summer night, Sir Walter, as it chanced 
 Was pacing to and fro in the avenue 
 That westward fronts our house, 
 Among those aged oaks, said to have been planted 
 Three hundred years ago 
 
 By a neighbouring Prior of the Woo.ivil name. 
 But so it was, 
 
 Being overtask'd in thought, he heeded not 
 The important suit of one who stood by the gate, 
 And begg'd an alms ; 
 
 Some say he shov'd her rudely from the gate 
 With angry chiding ; but I can never think 
 (Sir Walter's nature hath a sweetness in it) 
 That he would use a woman, an old woman, 
 With rude discourtesy — 
 For old she was who begg'd an alms of him. 
 Well, he refused her, 
 Whether for importunity, I know not, 
 Or that she came between his meditations. 
 But better had he met a lion in the streets 
 Than this old woman that night, 
 For she was one who practised the black arts, 
 And served the devil, being since burn'd for witchcraft. 
 She look'd at him like one that meant to blast him, 
 And with a frightful noise 
 
 1 What follows is poor stuff indeed, but it was thought desirable to 
 insert the letter as it stands. The passage was not printed in the play, 
 when it eventually appeared. Southey probably advised its omission, 
 as Lamb, upon second thoughts, cancelled it.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 197 
 
 fTwas partly like a woman's voice, 
 
 And partly like the hissing of a snake), 
 
 She nothing said but this — Sir Walter told the words — 
 " A mischief, mischief, mischief, 
 And a nine times killing curse, 
 By day and by night, to the caitiff wight, 
 Who shakes the poor like snakes from his door, 
 And shuts up the womb of his purse. 
 And a mischief, mischief, mischief, 
 And a ninefold withering curse, 
 For that shall come to thee, that will undo thee, 
 Both all that thou fearest, and worse!" 
 
 These words four times repeated, she departed, 
 
 Leaving Sir Walter, like a man beneath 
 
 Whose feet a scaffolding had suddenly fall'n. 
 Margaret. — A terrible curse. 
 Old Steward. — O Lady, such bad things are told of that old woman, 
 
 As, namely, that the milk she gave was sour, 
 
 And the babe who suck'd hershrivell'd like a mandrake; 
 
 And things besides, with a bigger horror in them, 
 
 Almost, I think, unlawful to be told ! 
 Margaret. — Then I must never hear them. But proceed, 
 
 And say what follow'd on the witch's curse. 
 Old Steward. — Nothing immediate, but some. nine months after 
 
 Young Stephen Woodvil suddenly fell sick, 
 
 And none could tell what ail'd him, for he lay 
 
 And pined, and pined, till all his hair came off; 
 
 And he that was full-flesh'd became as thin 
 
 As a two months' babe that hath been starv'd in the nursing, — 
 
 And sure I think 
 
 He bore his illness like a little child ; 
 
 With such rare sweetness of dumb melancholy 
 
 He strove to clothe his agony in smiles, 
 
 ■Which he would force up in his poor, pale cheeks, 
 
 Like ill-timed guests that had no proper business there. 
 
 And when they ask'd him his complaint, he laid 
 
 His hand upon his heart, to show the place 
 
 Where Susan came to him a nights, he said, 
 
 And prick'd him with a pin. 
 
 And hereupon Sir Walter call'd to mind
 
 igS CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 The beggar witch that stood in the gateway, 
 And begg'd an alms. 
 Margaret.^-l do not love to credit tales of magic. 
 Heaven's music, which is order, seems unstrung ; 
 And this brave world, 
 
 Creation's beauteous workmanship, unbeautified, 
 Disorder'd, marr'd, where such strange things are acted. 
 
 This is the extract I bragged of as superior to that I 
 sent you from Marlow : perhaps you will smile. But 
 I should like your remarks on the above, as you are 
 deeper witch-read than I. 
 
 Yours ever, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Rob. Soutbey, Esq., 
 
 Mr. Cottle's, Bookseller, 
 
 High Street, Bristol. 
 
 Letter LXXIIL] May 20, 1799. 
 
 Dear Southey, — I thank you heartily for your in- 
 tended presents, but do by no means see the necessity 
 you are under of burthening yourself thereby. You 
 have read old Wither's Supersedeas to small purpose. 
 You object to my pauses being at the end of my lines ; 
 I do not know any great difficulty I should find in 
 diversifying or changing my blank verse ; but I go 
 upon the model of Shakspeare in my Play, 1 and en- 
 deavour after a colloquial ease and spirit, something 
 like him. I could as easily imitate Milton's versifica- 
 tion, but my ear and feeling would reject it, or any 
 
 1 " John Woodvil.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. I99 
 
 approaches to it, in the drama. I do not know whe- 
 ther to be glad or sorry that witches have been de- 
 tected aforetimes in the shutting up of wombs. I cer- 
 tainly invented that conceit, and its coincidence 
 with fact is accidental, for I never heard it. I have 
 not seen those verses on Colonel Despard : I do not 
 read any newspapers. Are they short to copy without 
 much trouble ? I should like to see' them. 
 
 I just send you a few rhymes from my play, the 
 only rhymes in it. A forest liver giving an account 
 of his amusements: — 
 
 What sports have you in the forest ? 
 
 Not many, — some few, — as thus : 
 
 To see the sun to bed, and see him rise, 
 
 Like some hot amourist with glowing eyes, 
 
 Bursting the lazy bands of sleep that bound him : 
 
 With all his fires and travelling glories round him ; 
 
 Sometimes the moon on soft night-clouds to rest, 
 
 Like beauty nestling in a young man's breast, 
 
 And all the winking stars, her handmaids, keep 
 
 Admiring silence, while those lovers sleep : 
 
 Sometimes outstretch'd in very idleness, 
 
 Nought doing, saying little, thinking less, 
 
 To view the leaves, thin dancers upon air, 
 
 Go eddying round ; and small birds how they fare, 
 
 When mother Autumn fills their beaks with corn, 
 
 Filch'd from the careless Amalthea's horn ; 
 
 And how the woods berries and worms provide, 
 
 Without their pains, when earth hath nought beside 
 
 To answer their small wants ; 
 
 To view the graceful deer come trooping by, 
 
 Then pause, and gaze, then turn they know not why, 
 
 Like bashful younkers in society ; 
 
 To mark the structure of a plant or tree ; 
 
 And all fair things of earth, how fair they be ! — &c. 
 
 I love to anticipate charges of unoriginality : the 
 first line is almost Shakspeare's : —
 
 200 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 " To have my love to bed and to arise." 
 
 A Midsummer Night" s Dream. 
 
 I think there is a sweetness in the versification not 
 unlike some rhymes in that exquisite play, and the 
 last line but three is yours : 
 
 " An eye 
 
 " That met the gaze, or turn'd it knew not why." 
 
 Rosamund's Epistle. 
 
 I shall anticipate all my play, and have nothing to 
 show you. An idea for Leviathan : Commentators on 
 Job have been puzzled to find out a meaning for 
 Leviathan. 'Tis a whale, say some ; a crocodile, say 
 others. In my simple conjecture, Leviathan is neithei 
 more nor less than the Lord Mayor of London for the 
 time being. 
 
 Rosamund 1 sells well in London, malgre the non- 
 revival of it. I sincerely wish you better health, and 
 better health to Edith. Kind remembrances to her. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 My sister Mary was never in better health or spirits 
 than now. 
 
 Letter LXXIV.] Oct. 31st, i 799 . 
 
 Dear Southey, — I have but just got your letter, 
 being returned from Herts, where I have passed a 
 few red-letter days with much pleasure. I would 
 describe the county to you, as you have done by 
 Devonshire ; but alas ! I am a poor pen at that same. 
 
 1 < 
 
 Rosamund Gray," published in 1798.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 201 
 
 I could tell you of an old house with a tapestry bed- 
 room, the "Judgment of Solomon" composing one 
 pannel, and " Actaeon spying Diana naked" the other. 
 I could tell of an old marble hall, with Hogarth's 
 prints, and the Roman Caesars in marble hung round. 
 I could tell of a wilderness, and of a village church, 
 and where the bones of my honoured grandam lie ; 
 but there are feelings which refuse to be translated, 
 sulky aborigines, which will not be naturalized in 
 another soil. Of this nature are old family faces, and 
 scenes of infancy. 
 
 I have given your address, and the books you want, 
 to the Arches ; they will send them as soon as they 
 can get them, but they do not seem quite familiar to 
 their names. I have seen Gebor ! Gebor aptly so 
 denominated from Geborish, quasi Gibberish. But 
 Gebor hath some lucid intervals. I remember darkly 
 one beautiful simile veiled in uncouth phrases about 
 the youngest daughter of the Ark. I shall have 
 nothing to communicate, I fear, to the Anthology. 
 You shall have some fragments of my play, if you 
 desire them ; but I think I would rather print it whole. 
 Have you seen it, or shall I lend you a copy ? I 
 want your opinion of it. 
 
 I must get to business ; so farewell. My kind remem- 
 brances to Edith. C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LXXV.] 
 
 Dear Southey, — You were the last person from 
 whom we heard of Dyer, and if you know where to 
 forward to him the news I now send I shall be 
 obliged to you to lose no time. Dyer's sister-in-law,
 
 202 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 who lives in St. Dunstan's Court, wrote to him about 
 three weeks ago to the Hope Inn, Cambridge, to in- 
 form him that Squire Houlbert, or some such name, 
 of Denmark Hill, has died, and left her husband a 
 thousand pounds, and two or three hundred to Dyer. 
 Her letter got no answer, and she does not know 
 where to direct to him ; so she came to me, who am 
 equally in the dark. Her story is, that Dyer's imme- 
 diately coming to town now, and signing some papers, 
 will save him a considerable sum of money ; how, I 
 don't understand ; but it is very right he should hear 
 of this. She has left me barely time for the post; so 
 I conclude with love to all at Keswick. 
 
 Dyer's brother, who by his wife's account has got 
 £1000 left him, is father of the little dirty girl, Dyer's 
 niece and factotum. — In haste, 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 If you send George this, cut off the last paragraph. 
 Nov. 7, 1804.! 
 
 D.'s laundress had a letter a few days since ; but 
 George never dates. 
 
 
 Letter LXXVL] 
 
 Dear Southey, — I have received from Longman a 
 copy of Roderick, with the Author's Compliments, for 
 which I much thank you. I don't know where I shall 
 put all the noble presents I have lately received in that 
 way: the Excursion, Wordsworth's two last vols., and 
 now Roderick, have come pouring in upon me like 
 
 1 This is the only letter of 1804 which has hitherto been found.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 203 
 
 some irruption from Helicon. The story of the brave 
 Maccabee was already, you may be sure, familiar to 
 me in all its parts. I have, since the receipt of your 
 present, read it quite through again, and with no 
 diminished pleasure. I don't know whether I ought 
 to say that it has given me more pleasure than any of 
 your long poems. Kehama is doubtless more power- 
 ful, but I don't feel that firm footing in it that I do in 
 Roderick : my imagination goes sinking and flounder- 
 ing in the vast spaces of unopened-before systems and 
 faiths ; I am put out of the pale of my old sym- 
 pathies ; my moral sense is almost outraged ; I can't 
 believe, or with horror am made to believe, such des- 
 perate chances against Omnipotence, such disturb- 
 ances of faith to the centre ; the more potent the more 
 painful the spell. Jove, and his brotherhood of gods, 
 tottering with the giant assailings, I can bear, for the 
 soul's hopes are not struck at in such contests ; but 
 your Oriental almighties are too much types of the 
 intangible prototype to be meddled with without shud- 
 dering. One never connects what are called the 
 attributes with Jupiter. — I mention only what di- 
 minishes my delight at the wonder-workings of Ke- 
 hama, not what impeaches its power, which I confess 
 with trembling; but Roderick is a comfortable poem. 
 It reminds me of the delight I took in the first reading 
 of the Joan of Arc. It is maturer and better than 
 that, though not better to me now than that was then. 
 It suits me better than Madoc. I am at home in 
 Spain and Christendom. I have a timid imagination, 
 I am afraid. I do not willingly admit of strange 
 beliefs, or out-of-the-way creeds or places. I never 
 read books of travels, at least not farther than Paris 
 or Rome. I can just endure Moors, because of their
 
 204 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 connection as foes with Christians ; but Abyssinians, 
 Ethiops, Esquimaux, Dervises, and all that tribe, 
 hate. I believe I fear them in some manner. A 
 Mahometan turban on the stage, though enveloping 
 some well-known face (Mr. Cook or Mr. Maddox, 
 whom I see another day good Christian and English 
 waiters, innkeepers, &c), does not give me pleasure 
 unalloyed. I am a Christian, Englishman, Londoner, 
 Templar. God help me when I come to put off these 
 snug relations, and to get abroad into the world to 
 come ! I shall be like the crow on the sand, as Words- 
 worth has it ; but I won't think on it : no need, I 
 hope, yet. 
 
 The parts I have been most pleased with, both on 
 first and second readings, perhaps, are Florinda's 
 palliation of Roderick's crime, confessed to him in 
 his disguise — the retreat of the Palayos family first 
 discovered — his being made king — " For acclamation 
 one form must serve more solemn for the breach of 
 old observances" Roderick's vow is extremely fine, 
 and his blessing on the vow of Alphonso: 
 
 " Towards the troop he spread his arms, 
 As if the expanded soul diffused itself, 
 And carried to all spirits ivitb the act 
 Its affluent inspiration." 
 
 It struck me forcibly that the feeling of these last 
 lines might have been suggested to you by the 
 Cartoon of Paul at Athens. Certain it is that a 
 Detter motto or guide to that famous attitude can no- 
 where be found. I shall adopt it as explanatory of 
 that violent but dignified motion. 
 
 I must read again Landor's Jidian. I have not 
 read it some time. I think he must have failed in
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 205 
 
 Roderick, for I remember nothing of him, nor of any 
 distinct character as a character — only fine-sounding 
 passages. I remember thinking also he had chosen a 
 point of time after the event, as it were, for Roderick 
 survives to no use ; but my memory is weak, and I 
 will not wrong a fine poem by trusting to it. 
 
 The notes to your poem I have not read again : 
 but it will be a take-downable book on my shelf, and 
 they will serve sometimes at breakfast, or times too 
 light for the text to be duly appreciated. Though 
 some of 'em — one of the serpent penance — is serious 
 enough, now I think on't. Of Coleridge I hear 
 nothing, nor of the Morgans. I hope to have him 
 like a re-appearing star, standing up before me some 
 time when least expected in London, as has been the 
 case whilere. 
 
 I am doing nothing (as the phrase is) but reading 
 presents, and walk away what of the day hours I can 
 get from hard occupation. Pray accept once more 
 my hearty thanks, and expression of pleasure for 
 •your remembrance of me. My sister desires her 
 kind respects to Mrs. S. and to all at Keswick. 
 
 Yours truly, C. Lamb. 
 
 London, 6th May, 1815. 
 
 The next present I look for is the White Doe. 
 
 Have you seen Mat. Betham's Lay of Marie ? I 
 think it very delicately pretty as to sentiment, &c. 
 
 R. Southey, Esq., 
 
 Keswick, near Penrith, 
 Cumberland.
 
 206 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 Letter LXXVII.] Aug. 9 th, 181-, 
 
 Dear Southey, — Robinson is not on the circuit, as 
 I erroneously stated in a letter to W. W., which 
 travels with this, 1 but is gone to Brussels, Ostend, 
 Ghent, &c. But his friends, the Colliers, .whom I 
 consulted respecting your friend's fate, remember to 
 have heard him say, that Father Pardo had effected 
 his escape, (the cunning greasy rogue !) and to the 
 best of their belief is at present in Paris. To my 
 thinking, it is a small matter whether there be one 
 fat friar more or less in the world. I have rather a 
 taste for clerical executions, imbibed from early recol- 
 lections of the fate of the excellent Dodd. I hear 
 Buonaparte has sued his habeas corpus, and the twelve 
 judges are now sitting upon it at the Rolls. 
 
 Your boute-feu (bonfire) must be excellent of its 
 kind. Poet Settle presided at the last great thing of 
 the kind in London, when the pope was burnt in form. 
 Do you provide any verses on this occasion ? Your 
 fear for Hartley's intellectuals is just and rational. 
 Could not the Chancellor be petitioned to remove him ? 
 His lordship took Mr. Betty from under the paternal 
 wing. I think at least he should go through a course 
 of matter-of-fact with some sober man after the mys- 
 teries. Could not he spend a week at Poole's before 
 he goes back to Oxford ? Tobin is dead. But there 
 is a man in my office, a Mr. Hedges, who proses it 
 away from morning to night, and never gets beyond 
 corporal and material verities. He'd get these crack- 
 brain metaphysics out of the young gentleman's head 
 as soon as any one I know. When I can't sleep o' 
 
 1 And in a letter to Coleridge, too : see No. 51.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 207 
 
 nights, I imagine a dialogue with Mr. Hedges, upon 
 any given subject, and go prosing on in fancy with 
 him, till I either laugh or fall asleep. I have literally 
 found it answer. I am going to stand godfather ; I 
 don't like the business ; I cannot muster up decorum 
 for these occasions ; I shall certainly disgrace the 
 font. I was at Hazlitt's marriage, 1 and had like to 
 have been turned out several times during the cere- 
 mony. Any thing awful makes me laugh. I misbe- 
 haved once at a funeral. Yet I can read about these 
 ceremonies with pious and proper feelings. The 
 realities of life only seem the mockeries. I fear I 
 must get cured along with Hartley, if not too invete- 
 rate. Don't you think Louis the Desirable is in a 
 sort of quandary ? 
 
 After all, Buonaparte is a fine fellow, as my barber 
 says, and I should not mind standing bareheaded at 
 his table to do him service in his fall. They should 
 have given him Hampton Court or Kensington, with 
 a tether extending forty miles round London. Qu. 
 Would not the people have ejected the Brunswicks 
 some day in his favour ? Well, we shall see. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER LXXVIIL] Monday, Oct. 26th, 1818. 
 
 Dear Southey, — I am pleased with your friendly 
 remembrances of my little things. I do not know 
 whether I have done a silly thing or a wise one, but 
 it is of no great consequence. I run no risk, and care 
 
 1 May 1, 1808, at St. Andrew's Church, Holboin.
 
 208 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 for no censures. My bread and cheese is stable as 
 the foundations of Leadenhall Street, and if it hold 
 out as long as the " foundations of our empire in the 
 East," I shall do pretty well. You and W. W. should 
 have had your presentation copies more ceremoniously 
 sent, but I had no copies when I was leaving town 
 for my holidays, and rather than delay, commissioned 
 my bookseller to send them thus nakedly, By not 
 hearing from W. W. or you, I began to be afraid 
 Murray had not sent them. I do not see S. T. C. so 
 often as I could wish. He never comes to me ; and 
 though his host and hostess are very friendly, it puts 
 me out of my way to go see one person at another 
 person's house. It was the same when he resided at 
 Morgan's. Not but they also were more than civil ; 
 but, after all, one feels so welcome at one's own house. 
 Have you seen poor Miss Betham's " Vignettes ?" 
 Some of them, the second particularly, "To Lucy," 
 are sweet and good as herself, while she was herself. 
 She is in some measure abroad again. I am better 
 than I deserve to be. The hot weather has been such 
 a treat ! Mary joins in this little corner in kindest 
 remembrances to you all. C. L. 
 
 Letter LXXIX. 
 
 LETTER OF ELIA TO ROBERT SOUTHEV, ESQ. 1 
 
 Sir, — You have done me an unfriendly office, with- 
 out perhaps much considering what you were doing. 
 
 i London Magazine for Oct., 1823. Lamb had been turning it 
 over in his mind for some months, and it was probably written with 
 tare and deliberation. Southey was prodigal afterwards of his decla- 
 rations of regret, and even offered to write a quasi apology in the 
 next Quarterly Review.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 200, 
 
 You have given an ill name to my poor lucubrations. 
 In a recent paper on Infidelity, you usher in a con- 
 ditional commendation of them with an exception : 
 which, preceding the encomium, and taking up nearly 
 the same space with it, must impress your readers 
 with the notion that the objectionable parts in them 
 are at least equal in quantity to the pardonable. The 
 censure is in fact the criticism ; the praise — a conces- 
 sion merely. Exceptions usually follow, to qualify 
 praise or blame. But there stands your reproof, in 
 the very front of your notice, in ugly characters, like 
 some bugbear, to frighten all good Christians from 
 purchasing. Through you I become an object of 
 suspicion to preceptors of youth and fathers of fami- 
 lies. " A book, which wants only a sounder religious 
 feeling to be as delightful as it is original." With no 
 • further explanation, what must your readers conjecture 
 but that my little volume is some vehicle for heresy 
 or infidelity ? The quotation, which you honour me 
 by subjoining, oddly enough, is of a character which 
 bespeaks a temperament in the writer the very reverse 
 of that your reproof goes to insinuate. Had you been 
 taxing me with superstition, the passage would have 
 been pertinent to the censure. Was it worth your 
 while to go so far out of your way to affront the feel- 
 ings of an old friend, and commit yourself by an irre- 
 levant quotation, for the pleasure of reflecting upon 
 a poor child, an exile at Genoa ! 
 
 I am at a loss what particular essay you had in 
 view (if my poor ramblings amount to that appella- 
 tion) when you were in such a hurry to thrust in your 
 objection, like bad news, foremost. Perhaps the paper 
 on " Saying Graces" was the obnoxious feature. I 
 have endeavoured there to rescue a voluntary duty 
 
 VOL. I. p
 
 210 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 — good in place, but never, as I remember, literally 
 commanded — from the charge of an undecent forma- 
 lity. Rightly taken, sir, that paper was not against 
 graces, but want of grace ; not against the ceremony, 
 but the carelessness and slovenliness so often observed 
 in the performance of it. 
 
 Or was it that on the " New Year" — in which I 
 have described the feelings of the merely natural man, 
 on a consideration of the amazing change which is 
 supposable to take place on our removal from this 
 fleshly scene ? If men would honestly confess their 
 misgivings (which few men will) there are times 
 when the strongest Christian of us, I believe, has 
 reeled under questionings of such obscurity. I do 
 not accuse you of this weakness. There are some 
 who tremblingly reach out shaking hands to the 
 guidance of Faith — others who stoutly venture into 
 the dark (their Human Confidence their leader, which 
 they mistake for Faith) ; and, investing themselves 
 beforehand with cherubic wings, as they fancy, find 
 their new robes as familiar, and fitting to their sup- 
 posed growth and stature in godliness, as the coat 
 they left off yesterday — some whose hope totters 
 upon crutches — others who stalk into futurity upon 
 stilts. 
 
 The contemplation of a Spiritual World, — which, 
 without the addition of a misgiving conscience, is 
 enough to shake some natures to their foundation — 
 is smoothly got over by others, who shall float over 
 the black billows in their little boat of No-Distrust, 
 as unconcernedly as over a summer sea. The differ- 
 ence is chiefly constitutional. 
 
 One man shall love his friends and his friends' 
 faces ; and, under the uncertainty of conversing with
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 211 
 
 them again, in the same manner and familiar circum- 
 stances of sight, speech, &c. as upon earth — in a 
 moment of no irreverent weakness — for a dream- 
 while — no more — would be almost content, for a 
 reward of a life of virtue (if he could ascribe such 
 acceptance to his lame performances), to take up his 
 portion with those he loved, and was made to love, 
 in this good world, which he knows — which was 
 created so lovely, beyond his deservings. Another, 
 embracing a more exalted vision — so that he might 
 receive indefinite additaments of power, knowledge, 
 beauty, glory, &c. — is ready to foiego the recognition 
 of humbler individualities of earth and the old 
 familiar faces. The shapings of our heavens are 
 the modifications of our constitution ; and Mr. Feeble 
 Mind, or Mr. Great Heart, is born in every one of 
 us. 
 
 Some (and such have been accounted the safest 
 divines) have shrunk from pronouncing upon the 
 final state of any man ; nor dare they pronounce the 
 case of Judas to be desperate. Others (with stronger 
 optics), as plainly as with the eye of flesh, shall 
 behold a given king in bliss, and a given chamberlain 
 in torment ; even to the eternizing of a cast of the 
 eye in the latter, his own self-mocked and good- 
 humouredly-borne deformity on earth, but supposed 
 to aggravate the uncouth and hideous expression of 
 his pangs in the other place. That one man can 
 presume so far, and that another would with shudder- 
 ing disclaim such confidences, is, I believe, an effect 
 of the nerves purely. 
 
 If in either of these papers, or elsewhere, I have 
 been betrayed into some levities — not affronting the 
 sanctuary, but glancing perhaps at some of the out- 
 
 P 2
 
 212 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 skirts and extreme edges, the debateable land 
 between the holy and profane regions — (for the 
 admixture of man's inventions, twisting themselves 
 with the name of the religion itself, has artfully made 
 it difficult to touch even the alloy, without, in some 
 men's estimation, soiling the fine gold) — if I have 
 sported within the purlieus of serious matter — it was, 
 I dare say, a humour (be not startled, sir,) which I 
 have unwittingly derived from yourself. You have 
 all your life been making a jest of the Devil ; not of 
 the scriptural meaning of the dark essence — personal 
 or allegorical ; for the nature is nowhere plainly 
 delivered. I acquit you of intentional irreverence ; 
 but indeed you have made wonderfully free with, and 
 been mighty pleasant upon, the popular idea and 
 attributes of him. A Noble Lord, your brother 
 Visionary, has scarcely taken greater liberties with 
 the material keys and merely Catholic notion of 
 St. Peter. — You have flattered him in prose : you 
 have chanted him in goodly odes. You have been 
 his Jester ; volunteer Laureat and self-elected Court 
 Poet to Beelzebub. 
 
 You have never ridiculed, I believe, what you 
 thought to be religion, but you are always girding 
 at what some pious, but perhaps mistaken, folks 
 think to be so. For this reason I am sorry to hear, 
 that you are engaged upon a life of George Fox. I 
 know you will fall into the error of intermixing some 
 comic stuff with your seriousness. The Quakers 
 tremble at the subject in your hands. The Methodists 
 are shy of you, upon account of their founder. But, 
 above all, our Popish brethren are' most in your debt. 
 The errors of that Church have proved a fruitful 
 source to your scoffing vein. Their Legend has been
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 213 
 
 a Golden one to you. And here your friends, sir, 
 have noticed a notable inconsistency. To the im- 
 posing rites, the solemn penances, devout austerities 
 of that communion ; the affecting though erring piety 
 of their hermits ; the silence and solitude of the 
 Chartreux — their crossings, their holy waters — their 
 Virgin, and their saints — to these, they say, you have 
 been indebted for the best feelings and the richest 
 imagery of your Epic poetry. You have drawn 
 copious drafts upon Loretto. We thought at one 
 time you were going post to Rome — but that in the 
 facetious commentaries, which it is your custom to 
 append so plentifully, and (some say) injudiciously, 
 to your loftiest performances in this kind, you spurn 
 the uplifted toe, which you but just now seemed to 
 court ; leave his holiness in the lurch ; and show him 
 a fair pair of Protestant heels under your Romish 
 vestment. When we think you already at the 
 wicket, suddenly a violent cross wind blows you 
 transverse ■ 
 
 " Ten thousand leagues awry 
 
 Then might we see 
 
 Cowls, hoods, and habits, with their wearers, tost 
 And flutter'd into rags ; then reliques, beads, 
 Indulgences, dispenses, pardons, bulls, 
 The sport of winds." 
 
 You pick up pence by showing the hallowed bones, 
 shrine, and crucifix ; and you take money a second 
 time by exposing the trick of them afterwards. You 
 carry your verse to Castle Angelo for sale in a morn- 
 ing ; and swifter than a pedler can transmute his 
 pack, you are at Canterbury with your prose ware 
 before night. 
 
 Sir, is it that I dislike you in this merry vein ? The
 
 214 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 very reverse. No countenance becomes an intelligent 
 jest better than your own. It is your grave aspect, 
 when you look awful upon your poor friends, which I 
 would deprecate. 
 
 In more than one place, if I mistake not, you have 
 been pleased to compliment me at the expense of my 
 companions. I cannot accept your compliment at 
 such a price. The upbraiding a man's poverty 
 naturally makes him look about him, to see whether 
 he be so poor indeed as he is presumed to be. You 
 have put me upon counting my riches. Really, sir, I 
 did not know I was so wealthy in the article of friend- 
 ships. There is , and , whom you never heard 
 
 of, but exemplary characters both, and excellent church- 
 goers ; and N[orris], mine and my father's friend 
 for nearly half a century ; and the enthusiast for 
 
 Wordsworth's poetry, , a little tainted with 
 
 Socinianism, it is to be feared, but constant in his 
 
 attachments, and a capital critic ; and , a sturdy 
 
 old Athanasian, so that sets all to rights again ; and 
 W[ain\vright], the light, and warm as light-hearted, 
 Janus of the London ; and the translator of Dante, 
 still a curate; modest and amiable C[ary] ; and Allan 
 C[unningham], the large-hearted Scot; and P[rocter], 
 candid and affectionate as his own poetry ; and 
 A[lsop], Coleridge's friend; and G[ilman], his more 
 than friend ; and Coleridge himself, the same to me 
 still, as in those old evenings, when we used to sit 
 and speculate, (do you remember them, sir ?) at our 
 old Salutation tavern, upon Pantisocracy and golden 
 days to come on earth ; and W[ordsworth] (why. sir, 
 I might drop my rent-roll here ; such goodly farms 
 and manors have I reckoned up already. In what 
 possession has not this last name alone estated me !
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 215 
 
 — but I will go on) — and M[onkhouse], the noble- 
 minded kinsman, by wedlock, of W[ordsworth] ; and 
 H. C. R[obinson], unwearied in the offices of a friend ; 
 and Clarkson, almost above the narrowness of that 
 relation, yet condescending not seldom heretofore 
 from the labours of his world-embracing charity to 
 bless my humble roof : and the gall-less and single- 
 minded Dyer ; and the high-minded associate of 
 Cook, the veteran Colonel, with his lusty heart still 
 sending cartels of defiance to old Time ; and, not 
 least, W. A[lsager], the last and steadiest left to me 
 of that little knot of whist-players, that used to as- 
 semble weekly, for so many years, at the Queen's 
 Gate (you remember them, sir?) and called Admiral 
 Burney friend. 
 
 I will come to the point at once. I believe you will 
 not make many exceptions to my associates so far. 
 But I have purposely omitted some intimacies, which 
 I do not yet repent of having contracted, with two 
 gentlemen, diametrically opposed to yourself in prin- 
 ciples. You will understand me to allude to the 
 authors of Rimini and of the Table Talk. And first 
 
 « 
 
 of the former : — 
 
 It is an error more particularly incident to persons 
 of the correctest principles and habits, to seclude 
 themselves from the rest of mankind, as from another 
 species,, and form into knots and clubs. The best 
 people herding thus exclusively, are in danger of 
 contracting a narrowness. Heat and cold, dryness 
 and moisture, in the natural world, do not fly asunder, 
 to split the globe into sectarian parts and separations ; 
 but mingling, as best they may, correct the malignity 
 of any single predominance. The analogy holds, I
 
 2l6 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 suppose, in the moral world. If all the good people 
 were to ship themselves off to Terra Incognita, what, 
 in humanity's name is to become of the refuse? If 
 the persons, whom I have chiefly in view, have not 
 pushed matters to this extremity yet, they carry them 
 as far as they can go. Instead of mixing with the 
 infidel and the free-thinker — in the room of opening a 
 negociation, to try at least to find out at which gate 
 the error entered — they huddle close together, in a 
 weak fear of infection, like that pusillanimous under- 
 ling in Spenser — 
 
 " This is the wandering wood, this Error's den ; 
 A monster vile, whom God and man does hate : 
 Therefore, I reed, beware. Fly, fly, quoth then 
 The fearful Dwarf." 
 
 And, if they be writers in orthodox journals — addressing 
 themselves only to the irritable passions of the un- 
 believer — they proceed in a safe system of strengthen- 
 ing the strong hands, and confirming the valiant 
 knees ; of converting the already converted, and pro- 
 selyting their own party. I am the more convinced 
 of this from a passage in the very treatise which 
 occasioned this letter. It is where, having recom- 
 mended to the doubter the writings of Michaelis 
 and Lardner, you ride triumphant over the necks of 
 all infidels, sceptics, and dissenters, from this time 
 to the world's end, upon the wheels of two unanswer- 
 able deductions. I do not hold it meet to set down, 
 in a miscellaneous compilation like this, such religious 
 words as you have thought fit to introduce into the pages 
 of a petulant literary journal. I therefore beg leave to 
 substitute numerals, and refer to the Quarterly Review 
 (for January) for filling them up. "Here," say you,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 217 
 
 '•as in the history of 7, if these books are authentic, the 
 events which they relate must be true ; if they are written 
 by 8, g is 10 and 11." Your first deduction, if it 
 means honestly, rests upon two identical proposi- 
 tions ; though I suspect an unfairness in one of the 
 terms, which this would not be quite the proper place 
 for explicating. At all events, you have no cause to 
 triumph ; you have not been proving the premises, 
 but refer for satisfaction therein to very long and 
 laborious works, which may well employ the sceptic 
 a twelvemonth or two to digest, before he can possibly 
 be ripe for your conclusion. When he has satisfied 
 himself about the premises, he will concede to you 
 the inference, I dare say, most readily. — But your 
 latter deduction, viz. that because 8 has written a 
 book concerning 9, therefore 10 and 11 was certainly 
 his meaning, is one of the most extraordinary con- 
 clusions per saltwn, that I have had the good fortune 
 to meet with. As far as 10 is verbally asserted in 
 the writings, all sects must agree with you ; but you 
 cannot be ignorant of the many various ways in 
 which the doctrine of the Trinity has been under- 
 stood, from a low figurative expression (with the 
 Unitarians) up to the most mysterious actuality ; in 
 which highest sense alone you and your Church take 
 it. And for 11, that there is no other possible con- 
 clusion — to hazard this in the face of so many thou- 
 sands of Arians and Socinians, &c, who have drawn 
 so opposite a one, is such a piece of theological 
 hardihood, as, I think, warrants me in concluding 
 that, when you sit down to pen theology, you do 
 not at all consider your opponents ; but have in your 
 eye, merely and exclusively, readers of the same 
 way of thinking with yourself, and therefore have no
 
 2l8 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 occasion to trouble yourself with the quality of the 
 logic to which you treat them. 
 
 ' Neither can I think, if you had had the welfare of 
 the poor child — over whose hopeless condition you 
 whine so lamentably and (I must think) unreason- 
 ably — seriously at heart, that you could have taken 
 the step of sticking him up by name — T. H. is as good 
 as naming him — to perpetuate an outrage upon the 
 parental feelings, as long as the Quarterly Review 
 shall last. Was it necessary to specify an indi- 
 vidual case, and give to Christian compassion the 
 appearance of personal attack ? Is this the way to 
 conciliate unbelievers, or not rather to widen the 
 breach irreparably ? 
 
 I own I could never think so considerably of 
 myself as to decline the society of an agreeable or 
 worthy man upon difference of opinion only. The 
 impediments and the facilitations to a sound belief 
 are various and inscrutable as the heart of man. 
 Some believe upon weak principles. Others cannot 
 feel the efficacy of the strongest. One of the most 
 candid, most upright, and single-meaning men I ever 
 knew was the late Thomas Holcroft. I believe he 
 never said one thing and meant another, in his life ; 
 and, as near as I can guess, he never acted otherwise 
 than with the most scrupulous attention to conscience. 
 Ought we to wish the character false, for the sake of a 
 hollow compliment to Christianity ? 
 
 Accident introduced me to the acquaintance of 
 Mr. Leigh Hunt ; and the experience of his many 
 friendly qualities confirmed a friendship between 
 us. You, who have been misrepresented yourself, 
 I should hope, have not lent an idle ear to the 
 calumnies which have been spread abroad respecting
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 2IO, 
 
 this gentleman. I was admitted to his household 
 for some years, and do most solemnly aver that I 
 believe him to be in his domestic relations as correct 
 as any man. He chose an ill-judged subject for a 
 poem, the peccant humours of which have been 
 visited on him tenfold by the artful use which his 
 adversaries have made of an equivocal term. The 
 subject itself was started by Dante, but better 
 because brieflier treated of. But the crime 01 
 the lovers in the Italian and the English poet, 
 with its aggravated enormity of circumstance, 
 is not of a kind (as the critics of the latter well 
 knew) with those conjunctions, for which Nature her- 
 self has provided no excuse, because no temptation. — 
 It has nothing in common with the black horrors, sung 
 by Ford and Massinger. The familiarizing of it in 
 tale or fable may be for that reason incidentally more 
 contagious. In spite of Rimini, I must look upon its 
 author as a man of taste, and a poet. He is better 
 than so ; he is one of the most cordial-minded men I 
 ever knew, and matchless as a fire-side companion. 
 I mean not to affront or wound your feelings when I 
 say that, in his more genial moods, he has often re- 
 minded me of you. There is the same air of mild 
 dogmatism — the same condescending to a boyish 
 sportiveness — in both your conversations. His hand- 
 writing is so much the same with your own, that I 
 have opened more than one letter of his, hoping, nay, 
 not doubting, that it was from you, and have been 
 disappointed (he will bear with my saying so) at the 
 discovery of my error. Leigh Hunt is unfortunate in 
 holding some loose and not very definite speculations 
 (for at times I think he hardly knows whither his pre- 
 mises would carry him) on marriage : the tenets, I
 
 220 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 conceive, of the Political Justice carried a little fur- 
 ther. For any thing I could discover in his practice, 
 they have reference, like those, to some future possible 
 condition of society, and not to the present times. 
 But neither for these obliquities of thinking, (upon 
 which my own conclusions are as distant as the poles 
 asunder,) nor for his political asperities and petulan- 
 cies, which are wearing out with the heats and vani- 
 ties of youth, did I select him for a friend, but for 
 qualities which fitted him for that relation. I do not 
 know whether I flatter myself with being the occasion, 
 but certain it is, that, touched with some misgivings 
 for sundry harsh things which he had written afore- 
 time against our friend C, — before he left this country 
 he sought a reconciliation with that gentleman, (him- 
 self being his own introducer,) and found it. 
 
 Leigh Hunt is now in Italy ; on his departure to 
 which land with much regret I took my leave of him 
 and of his little family — seven of them, sir, with their 
 mother — and as a kind a set of little people (Thornton 
 Hunt and all), as affectionate children as ever blessed 
 a parent. Had you seen them, sir, I think you could 
 not have looked upon them as so many little Jonases, 
 but rather as pledges of the vessel's safety, that was 
 to bear such a freight of love. 
 
 I wish you would read Mr. Hunt's lines to that 
 same Thornton Hunt, " six years" old, during a sick- 
 ness : — 
 
 " Sleep breathes at last from out thee, 
 My little patient hoy" — 
 
 (they are to be found in the 47th page of Foliage) 1 and 
 
 1 The Quarterly Review spoxe highly of these lines, and asked 
 " Why does not Mr. Hunt always write like this, that we might 
 read him ?"
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 221 
 
 ask yourself how far they are out of the spirit of Chris- 
 tianity. I have a letter from Italy, received but the 
 other day, into which Leigh Hunt has put as much 
 heart, and as many friendly yearnings after old asso- 
 ciates, and native country, as, I think, paper can well 
 hold. It would do you no hurt to give that the peru- 
 sal also. 
 
 From the other gentleman I neither expect nor 
 desire (as he is well assured) any such concessions as 
 Leigh Hunt made to C. What hath soured him, and 
 made him to suspect his friends of infidelity towards 
 him, when there was no such matter, I know not. I 
 stood well with him for fifteen years (the proudest of 
 my life), and have ever spoken my full mind of him to 
 some, to whom his panegyric must naturally be least 
 tasteful. I never in thought swerved from him, I 
 never betrayed him, I never slackened in my admira- 
 tion of him ; I was the same to him (neither better 
 nor worse), though he could not see it, as in the days 
 when he thought fit to trust me. At this instant he 
 may be preparing for me some compliment above my 
 deserts, as he has sprinkled many such among his 
 admirable books, for which I rest his debtor ; or, for 
 any thing I know, or can guess to the contrary, he 
 may be about to read a lecture on my weaknesses. 
 He is welcome to them (as he was to my humble 
 hearth), if they can divert a spleen, or ventilate a fit 
 of sullenness. I wish he would not quarrel with the 
 world at the rate he does ; but the reconciliation must 
 be effected by himself, and I despair of living to see 
 that day. But, protesting against much that he has 
 written, and some things which he chooses to do ; 
 judging him by his conversation which I enjoyed so 
 long, and relished so deeply ; or by his books, in those
 
 222 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 places where no clouding passion intervenes — I should 
 belie my own conscience if I said less than that I 
 think W. H. to be, in his natural and healthy state, 
 one of the wisest and finest spirits breathing. So far 
 from being ashamed of that intimacy, which was 
 betwixt us, it is my boast that I was able for so many 
 years to preserve it entire ; and I think I shall go 
 to my grave without finding, or expecting to find, such 
 another companion. But I forget my manners ; (you 
 will pardon me, sir:) I return to the correspondence. 
 
 Sir, you were pleased (you know where) to invite 
 me to a compliance with the wholesome forms and 
 doctrines of the Church of England. I take your 
 advice with as much kindness as it was meant; but 
 I must think the invitation rather more kind than 
 seasonable. I am a Dissenter. The last sect, with 
 which you can remember me to have made common 
 profession, were the Unitarians. You would think 
 it not very pertinent if (fearing that all was not well 
 with you) I were gravely to invite you (for a remedy) 
 to attend with me a course of Mr. Belsham's Lectures 
 at Hackney. Perhaps I have scruples to some of 
 your forms and doctrines. But if I come, am I 
 secure of civil treatment ? — The last time I was in 
 any of your places of worship was on Easter Sunday 
 last. I had the satisfaction of listening to a very 
 sensible sermon of an argumentative turn, delivered 
 with great propriety, by one of your bishops. The 
 place was Westminster Abbey. As such religion, as 
 I have, has always acted on me more by way of senti- 
 ment than argumentative process, I was not un- 
 willing, after sermon ended, by no unbecoming 
 transition, to pass over to some serious feelings, 
 impossible to be disconnected from the sight of those
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 223 
 
 old tombs, &c. But, by whose order I know not, I 
 was debarred that privilege even for so short a space 
 as a few minutes ; and turned, like a dog or some 
 profane person, out into the common street ; with feel- 
 ings which I could not help, but not very congenial to 
 the day or the discourse. I do not know that I shall 
 ever venture myself again into one of your churches. 
 You had your education at Westminster ; and, 
 doubtless, among those dim aisles and cloisters, you 
 must have gathered much of that devotional feeling 
 in those young years, on which your purest mind feeds 
 still — and may it feed ! The antiquarian spirit, 
 strong in you, and gracefully blending ever with the 
 religious, may have been sown in you among those 
 wrecks of splendid mortality. You owe it to the place of 
 your education ; you owe it to your learned fondness for 
 the architecture of your ancestors; you owe it to the 
 venerableness of your ecclesiastical establishment, 
 which is daily lessened and called in question through 
 these practices — to speak aloud your sense of them ; 
 never to desist raising your voice against them, till 
 they be totally done away with and abolished ; till the 
 doors of Westminster Abbey be no longer closed 
 against the decent, though low-in-purse, enthusiast, 
 or blameless devotee, who must commit an injury 
 against his family economy if he would be indulged 
 with a bare admission within its walls. You owe it 
 to the decencies, which you wish to see maintained 
 in its impressive services, that our Cathedral be no 
 longer an object of inspection to the poor at those 
 times only, in which they must rob from their atten- 
 dance on the worship every minute which they can 
 bestow upon the fabric. In vain the public prints 
 have taken up this subject, in vain such poor name-
 
 224 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 less writers as myself express their indignation. A 
 word from you, sir — a hint in your journal — would 
 be sufficient to fling open the doors of the beautiful 
 temple again, as we can remember them when we 
 were boys. At that time of life, what would the 
 imaginative faculty (such as it is) in both of us have 
 suffered if the entrance to so much reflection had 
 been obstructed by the demand of so much silver ! 
 — If we had scraped it up to gain an occasional 
 admission, (as we certainly should have done,) would 
 the sight of those old tombs have been as impres- 
 sive to us (while we have been weighing anxiously 
 prudence against sentiment) as when the gates 
 stood open as those of the adjacent Park ; when we 
 could walk in at any time, as the mood brought us, 
 for a shorter or longer time, as that lasted ? Is the 
 being shown over a place the same as silently for 
 ourselves detecting the genius of it ? In no part of 
 our beloved Abbey now can a person find entrance 
 (out of service time) under the sum of two shillings. 
 The rich and the great will smile at the anti-climax, 
 presumed to lie in these two short words. But you 
 can tell them, sir, how much quiet worth, how much 
 capacity for enlarged feeling, how much taste and 
 genius, may co-exist, especially in youth, with a 
 purse incompetent to this demand. — A respected 
 friend of ours, during his late visit to the metropolis, 
 presented himself for admission to Saint Paul's. At 
 the same time a decently-clothed man, with as 
 decent a wife and child, were bargaining for the 
 same indulgence. The price was only twopence 
 each person. The poor but decent man hesitated, 
 desirous to go in: but there were three of them, and 
 he turned away reluctantly. Perhaps he wished to
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 225 
 
 see the tomb of Nelson. Perhaps the interior of 
 the cathedral was his object ; but, in the state of his 
 finances, even sixpence might reasonably seem too 
 much. Tell the aristocracy of the country (no man 
 can do it more impressively) ; instruct them of what 
 value these insignificant pieces of money, these 
 minims to their sight, may be to their humbler 
 brethren. Shame these sellers out of the Temple ! 
 Show the poor, that you can sometimes think of 
 them in some other light than as mutineers and mal- 
 contents. Conciliate them by such kind methods to 
 their superiors, civil and ecclesiastical. Stop the 
 mouths of the railers ; and suffer your old friends, 
 upon the old terms, again to honour and admire 
 you. Stifle not the suggestions of your better nature 
 with the stale evasion, that an indiscriminate admis- 
 sion would expose the tombs to violation. Remember 
 your boy-days. Did you ever see or hear of a mob 
 in the Abbey while it was free to all ? Do the rabble 
 come there, or trouble their heads about such specu- 
 lations ? It is all that you can do to drive them into 
 your churches ; they do not voluntarily offer them- 
 selves. They have, alas ! no passion for antiquities; 
 for tomb of king or prelate, sage or poet. If they 
 had, they would be no longer the rabble. 
 
 For forty years that I have known the fabric, 
 the only well-attested charge of violation adduced, 
 has been — a ridiculous dismemberment committed 
 upon the effigy of that amiable spy, Major Andre. 
 And is it for this — the wanton mischief of some 
 school-boy, fired perhaps with raw notions of 
 trans-Atlantic freedom — or the remote possibility of 
 such a mischief occurring again, so easily to be 
 prevented by stationing a constable within the 
 
 vol. 1. Q
 
 226 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 walls, if the vergers are incompetent to the duty — is 
 it upon such wretched pretences, that the people of 
 England are made to pay a new Peter's pence, so 
 long abrogated ; or must content themselves with 
 contemplating the ragged exterior of their Cathedral ? 
 The mischief was done about the time that you were 
 a scholar there. Do you know any thing about the 
 unfortunate relic? Can you help us in this emer- 
 gency to find the nose ? — or can you give Chantrey a 
 notion (from memory) of its pristine life and vigour? 
 I am willing for peace' sake to subscribe my guinea 
 towards a restoration of the lamented feature. 
 I am, sir, your humble servant, 
 
 Elia. 
 
 LETTER LXXX.] P. I. H., 21st November, 1823. 
 
 Dear Southey, — The kindness of your note has 
 melted away the mist which was upon me. I have 
 been fighting against a shadow. That accursed Q.R. 
 had vexed me by a gratuitous speaking, of its own 
 
 knowledge, that the Confessions of a D d was a 
 
 genuine description of the state of the writer. Little 
 things, that are not ill-meant, may produce much 
 ill. That might have injured me alive and dead. I 
 am in a public office, and my life is insured. I was 
 prepared for anger, and I thought I saw, in a few 
 obnoxious words, a hard case of repetition directed 
 against me. I wished both magazine and review at the 
 bottom of the sea. I shall be ashamed to see you, and 
 my sister (though innocent) will be still more so ; for 
 the folly was done without her knowledge, and has 
 made her uneasy ever since. My guardian angel was 
 absent at that time.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 227 
 
 I will muster up courage to see you, however, any 
 day next week (Wednesday excepted). We shall 
 hope that you will bring Edith with you. That will 
 be a second mortification. She will hate to see us ; 
 but come and heap embers. We deserve it ; I for 
 what I've done, and she for being my sister. 
 
 Do come early in the day, by sun-light, that you 
 may see my Milton. 
 
 I am at Colebrook Cottage, Colebrook Row, Isling- 
 ton : a detached whitish house, close to the New 
 River end of Colebrook Terrace, left hand from 
 Sadler's Wells. 1 
 
 Will you let me know the day before ? 
 
 Your penitent, C. Lamb. 
 
 P.S. — I do not think your hand-writing at all like 
 ****' s> 1 d no t think many things I did think. 
 
 Letter LXXXI.] August 19th, 1825. 
 
 Dear Southey, — You'll know who this letter comes 
 from by opening slap-dash upon the text, as in the. 
 good old times. I never could come into the custom 
 of envelopes ; 'tis a modern foppery ; the Plinian 
 correspondence gives no hint of such. In single- 
 ness of sheet and meaning, then, I thank you for 
 your little book. I am ashamed to add a codicil of 
 thanks for your " Book of the Church." I scarce feel 
 competent to give an opinion of the latter ; I have 
 not reading enough of that kind to venture at it. I 
 
 1 Southey came, and the quarrel was made up. The best account 
 of Lamb on his first settlement at Colebrook Cottage [this year] is 
 in Daniel's Recollections of C. Lamb. 
 
 Q2
 
 228 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTIIEY. 
 
 can only say the fact, that I have read it with atten- 
 tion and interest. Being, as you know, not quite a 
 Churchman, I felt a jealousy at the Church taking 
 to herself the whole deserts of Christianity, Catholic 
 and Protestant, from Druid extirpation downwards. 
 I call all good Christians the Church, Capillarians 
 and all. But I am in too light a humour to touch 
 these matters. May all our churches flourish ! Two 
 things staggered me in the poem, (and one of them 
 staggered both of us). I cannot away with a beauti- 
 ful series of verses, as I protest they are, commencing 
 "Jenner." 'Tis like a choice banquet opened with a 
 pill or an electuary — physic stuff. T'other is, we 
 cannot make out how Edith should be no more than 
 ten years old. By'r Lady, we had taken her to be 
 some sixteen or upwards. We suppose you have 
 only chosen the round number for the metre. Or 
 poem and dedication may be both older than they 
 pretend to ; but then some hint might have been 
 given ; for, as it stands, it may only serve some day 
 to puzzle the parish reckoning. But without inquir- 
 ing further, (for 'tis ungracious to look into a lady's 
 years, )the dedication is eminently pleasing and tender, 
 and we wish Edith May Southey joy of it. Some- 
 thing, too, struck us as if we had heard of the death 
 of John May. A John May's death was a few years 
 since in the papers. We think the tale one of the 
 quietest, prettiest things we have seen. You have 
 been temperate in the use of localities, which generally 
 spoil poems laid in exotic regions. You mostlycannot 
 stir out (in such things) for humming-birds and fire- 
 flies. A tree is a Magnolia, &c. — Can I but like the 
 truly Catholic spirit ? " Blame as thou mayest the 
 Papist's erring creed" — which, and other passages,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 220, 
 
 brought me back to the old Anthology days, and the 
 admonitory lesson to " Dear George" on " The Vesper 
 Bell," a little poem which retains its first hold upon 
 me strangely. 
 
 The compliment to the translatress is daintily con- 
 ceived. Nothing is choicer in that sort of writing 
 than to bring in some remote, impossible parallel, — 
 as between a great empress and the mobtrusive quiet 
 soul who digged her noiseless way so perseveringly 
 through that rugged Paraguay mine. How she 
 Dobrizhoffered it all out, it puzzles my slender 
 Latinity to conjecture. Why do you seem to sanc- 
 tion Landor's unfeeling allegorizing away of honest 
 Quixote ! He may as well say Strap is meant to 
 symbolize the Scottish nation before the Union, and 
 Random since that act of dubious issue ; or that 
 Partridge means the Mystical Man, and Lady 
 Bellaston typifies the Woman upon Many Waters. 
 Gebir, indeed, may mean the state of the hop 
 markets last month, for any thing I know to the 
 contrary. That all Spain overflowed with romancical 
 books (as Madge Newcastle calls them) was no 
 reason that Cervantes should not smile at the mattei 
 of them ; nor even a reason that, in another mood, 
 he might not multiply them, deeply as he was tinc- 
 tured with the essence of them. Quixote is the father 
 of gentle ridicule, and at the same time the very 
 depository and treasury of chivalry and highest 
 notions. Marry, when somebody persuaded Cer- 
 vantes that he meant only fun, and put him upon 
 writing that unfortunate Second Part with the con- 
 federacies of that unworthy duke and most con- 
 temptible duchess, Cervantes sacrificed his instinct to 
 his understanding,
 
 23O CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 We got your little book but last night, being at 
 Enfield, to which place we came about a month since, 
 and are having quiet holydays. Mary walks her 
 twelve miles a day some days, and I my twenty on 
 others. "lis all holyday with me now, you know. 
 The change works' admirably. 
 
 For literary news, in my poor way, I have a one- 
 act farce going to be acted at the Haymarket ; but 
 when ? is the question. 'Tis an extravaganza, and like 
 enough to follow Mr. H. The London Magazine has 
 shifted its publishers once more, and I shall shift 
 myself out of it. It is fallen. My ambition is not at 
 present higher than to write nonsense for the play- 
 houses, to eke out a somewhat contracted income. 
 Tempns erat. There was a time, my dear Cornwallis, 
 when the Muse, &c. But I am now in Mac Fleckno's 
 predicament, — 
 
 " Promised a play, and dwindled to a farce." 
 
 Coleridge is better (was, at least, a few weeks 
 since) than he has been for years. His accomplish- 
 ing his book at last has been a source of vigour to 
 him. We are on a half visit to his friend Allsop, at 
 a Mrs. Leishman's, Enfield, but expect to be at Cole- 
 brook Cottage in a week or so, where, or anywhere, 
 I shall be always most happy to receive tidings from 
 you. G. Dyer is in the height of an uxorious 
 paradise. His honeymoon will not wane till he wax 
 cold. Never was a more happy pair since Acme and 
 Septimius, and longer. Farewell, with many thanks, 
 dear S. Our loves to all round your Wrekin. 
 
 Your old friend, 
 
 C. Lamb.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 23I 
 
 Letter LXXXIL] May ioth, 1830. 
 
 Dear Southey, — My friend Hone, whom you would 
 like for a friend, I found deeply impressed with your 
 generous notice of him in your beautiful Life of 
 Bunyan, which I am just now full of. He has 
 written to you for leave to publish a certain good- 
 natured letter. I write not this to enforce his request, 
 for we are fully aware that the refusal of such publica- 
 tion would be quite consistent with all that is good 
 in your character. Neither he nor I expect it from 
 you, nor exact it ; but if you would consent to it, 
 you would oblige me by it, as well as him. He is 
 just now in a critical situation : kind friends have 
 opened a coffee-house for him in the City, but their 
 means have not extended to the purchase of coffee- 
 pots, credit for Reviews, newspapers, and other 
 paraphernalia. So I am sitting in the skeleton of a 
 possible divan. What right I have to interfere, you 
 best know. Look on me as a dog who went once 
 temporarily insane, and bit you, and now begs for a 
 crust. Will you set your wits to a dog ? 
 
 Our object is to open a subscription, which my 
 friends of the Times are most willing to forward for 
 him, but think that a leave from you to publish 
 would aid it. 
 
 But not an atom of respect or kindness will or shall 
 it abate in either of us if you decline it. Have this 
 strongly in your mind. 
 
 Those Every-Day and Table Books will be a treasure 
 a hundred years hence, but they have failed to make 
 Hone's fortune. 
 
 Here his wife and all his children are about me,
 
 232 CORRESPONDENCE WITH SOUTHEY. 
 
 gaping for coffee customers ; but how should they 
 come in, seeing no pot boiling ! * 
 
 Enough of Hone. I saw Coleridge a day or two 
 since. He has had some severe attack, not paralytic ; 
 but if I had not heard of it I should not have found 
 it out. He looks, and especially speaks, strong. 
 How are all the Wordsworths and all the Southeys ? 
 whom I am obliged to you if you have not brought 
 up haters of the name of 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 P.S. — I have gone lately into the acrostic line. I 
 find genius (such as I had) declines with me, but I 
 get clever. Do you know any body that wants 
 charades, or such things, for Albums ? I do 'em at 
 so much a sheet. Perhaps an epigram (not a very 
 happy-gram) I did for a school-boy yesterday may 
 amuse. I pray Jove he may not get a flogging for 
 any false quantity; but 'tis, with one exception, the 
 only Latin verses I have made for forty years ; and I 
 did it "to order." 
 
 CUIQUE SUUM. 
 
 Adsciscit sibi divitias et opes alienas 
 
 Fur, rapiens, spolians, quod mihi, quod-que tibi, 
 
 Proprium erat, temnens hie verba, meum-que, tuum-que 
 Omne suum est : tandem Cui-que Suum tribuit. 
 
 Dat resti collum : restes, vah ! carnifici dat ; 
 Sese Diabolo, sic bene ; Cuique Suum. 
 
 I write from Hone's ; therefore Mary cannot send 
 her love to Mrs. Southey, but I do. 
 
 Yours ever, C. L. 
 
 1 Compare the correspondence with Hone, and see a letter to the 
 Rev. Edward Irving.
 
 ( 233 ) 
 
 III. 
 
 Correspondence with the Wordsworths. 
 [1800-34]. 
 
 Letter LXXXIII.] Oct, 13th, 1800. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — I have not forgot your com- 
 missions. But the truth is, (and why should I not 
 confess it?) I am not plethorically abounding in 
 cash at this present. Merit, God knows, is very 
 little rewarded ; but it does not become me to speak 
 of myself. My motto is " contented with little, yet 
 wishing for more." Now, the books you wish for 
 would require some pounds, which, I am sorry to 
 say, I have not by me ; so I will say at once, if you 
 will give me a draft upon your town banker for any 
 sum you propose to lay out, I will dispose of it to the 
 very best of my skill in choice old books, such as my 
 own soul loveth. In fact, I have been waiting for 
 the liquidation of a debt to enable myself to set about 
 your commission handsomely ; for it is a scurvy 
 thing to cry, " Give me the money first," and I am 
 the first of the family of the Lambs that have done it 
 for many centuries ; but the debt remains as it was, 
 and my old friend that I accommodated has gene- 
 rously forgot it ! The books which you want, I 
 calculate at about £8. Ben Jonson is a guinea book. 
 Beaumont and Fletcher, in folio, the right folio not 
 now to be met with ; the octavos are about £3. As 
 to any other dramatists, I do not know where to find 
 them, except what are in Dodsley's Old Plays, which 
 are about £3 also. Massinger I never saw but at
 
 234 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSVVORTHS. 
 
 one shop, and it is now gone ; but one of the editions 
 of Dodsley contains about a fourth (the best) of his 
 plays. Congreve, and the rest of King Charles's 
 moralists, are cheap and accessible. The works on 
 Ireland I will inquire after; but I fear Spenser's is 
 not to be had apart from his poems ; I never saw it. 
 But you may depend upon my sparing no pains to 
 furnish you as complete a library of old poets and 
 dramatists as will be prudent to buy ; for, I suppose 
 you do not include the £zo edition of Hamlet, single 
 play, which Kemble has. 1 Marlowe's plays and 
 poems are totally vanished ; only one edition of 
 Dodsley retains one, and the other two of his plays : 
 but John Ford is the man after Shakspeare. Let me 
 know your will and pleasure soon, for I have observed, 
 next to the pleasure of buying a bargain for one's self, 
 is the pleasure of persuading a friend to buy it. It 
 tickles one with the image of an imprudency, without 
 the penalty usually annexed. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LXXXIV.] J«». 3°*, 1801. 
 
 I ought before this to have replied to your very 
 kind invitation into Cumberland. With you and your 
 sister I could gang anywhere ; but I am afraid whether 
 I shall ever be able to afford so desperate a journey. 
 Separate from the pleasure of your company, I don't 
 much care if I never see a mountain in my life. I 
 
 1 Lamb does not here refer to the first edition of Hamlet, 1603, for 
 that edition was not added to the collection till after its purchase by 
 the late" Duke of Devonshire. Wordsworth collected a very excellent 
 library, which was not dispersed till some years after his death.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 235 
 
 have passed all my days in London, until I have 
 formed as many and intense local attachments as 
 any of you mountaineers can have done with dead 
 Nature. The lighted shops of the Strand and Fleet 
 Street ; the innumerable trades, tradesmen, and 
 customers, coaches, waggons, playhouses ; all the 
 bustle and wickedness round about Covent Garden ; 
 the very women of the Town ; the watchmen, drunken 
 scenes, rattles ; life awake, if you awake, at all hours 
 of the night ; the impossibility of being dull in Fleet 
 Street ; the crowds, the very dirt and mud, the sun 
 shining upon houses and pavements, the print-shops, 
 the old-book stalls, parsons cheapening books, coffee- 
 houses, steams of soups from kitchens, the panto- 
 mimes — London itself a pantomime and a masquerade 
 — all these things work themselves into my mind, and 
 feed me, without a power of satiating me. The wonder 
 of these sights impels me into night- walks about her 
 crowded streets, and I often shed tears in the motley 
 Strand from fulness of joy at so much life. All these 
 emotions must be strange to you ; so are your rural 
 emotions to me. But consider, what must I have 
 been doing all my life, not to have lent great portions 
 of my heart with usury to such scenes ? 
 
 My attachments are all local, purely local. I have 
 no passion (or have had none since I was in love, and 
 then it was the spurious engendering of poetry and 
 books,) for groves and valleys. The rooms where I 
 was born, the furniture which has been before my 
 eyes all my life, a book-case which has followed me 
 about like a faithful dog, (only exceeding him in 
 knowledge,) wherever I have moved, old chairs, old 
 tables, streets, squares, where I have sunned myself, 
 my old school, — these are my mistresses. Have I not
 
 236 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 enough, without your mountains ? I do not envy 
 you. I should pity you, did I not know that the 
 mind will make friends of any thing. Your sun, and 
 moon, and skies, and hills, and lakes, affect me no 
 more, or scarcely come to me in more venerable 
 characters, than as a gilded room with tapestry and 
 tapers, where I might live with handsome visible 
 objects. I consider the clouds above me but as a roof 
 beautifully painted, but unable to satisfy the mind : 
 and at last, like the pictures of the apartment of a 
 connoisseur, unable to afford him any longer a pleasure. 
 So fading upon me, from disuse, have been the beau- 
 ties of Nature, as they have been confinedly called ; 
 so ever fresh, and green, and warm are all the inven- 
 tions of men, and assemblies of men in this great 
 city. I should certainly have laughed with dear 
 Joanna. 1 
 
 Give my kindest love, and my sister's, to D. and 
 yourself ; and a kiss from me to little Barbara 
 Lewthwaite. 2 Thank you for liking my play. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter LXXXV.] About i8o 3 . s 
 
 Thanks for your letter and present. I had already 
 borrowed your second volume. What most pleases 
 me is, " The Song of Lucy." Simon's sickly daughter, 
 in " The Sexton," made me cry. Next to these are 
 
 1 Alluding to the Inscription of Wordsworth's, entitled "Joanna," 
 containing a magnificent description of the effect of laughter echoing 
 amidst the great mountains of Westmoreland. 
 
 - Alluding to Wordsworth's poem, The Pet Lamb. 
 
 8 Part of this letter has been lost.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 237 
 
 the description of these continuous echoes in the 
 story of "Joanna's Laugh," where the mountains, 
 and all the scenery absolutely seem alive ; and that 
 fine Shakspearian character of the " happy man," in 
 the "Brothers," 
 
 " that creeps about the fields, 
 
 Following his fancies by the hour, to bring 
 Tears down his cheek, or solitary smiles 
 Into his face, until the setting sun 
 Write Fool upon his forehead!" 
 
 I will mention one more — the delicate and curious 
 feeling in the wish for the " Cumberland Beggar," 
 that he may have about him the melody of birds, 
 although he hear them not. Here the mind knowingly 
 passes a fiction upon herself, first substituting her own 
 feeling for the Beggar's, and in the same breath 
 detecting the fallacy, will not part with the wish. 
 The " Poet's Epitaph" is disfigured, to my taste, by 
 the common satire upon parsons and lawyers in the 
 beginning, and the coarse epithet of " pin-point," in 
 the sixth stanza. All the rest is eminently good, and 
 your own. I will just add that it appears to me a 
 fault in the " Beggar," that the instructions conveyed 
 in it are too direct, and like a lecture : they don't 
 slide into the mind of the reader while he is imagin- 
 ing no such matter. An intelligent reader finds a 
 sort of insult in being told, " I will teach you how to 
 think upon this subject." This fault, if I am right, is 
 in a ten-thousandth worse degree to be found in Sterne, 
 and in many novelists and modern poets, who con- 
 tinually put a sign-post up to show where you are 
 to feel. They set out with assuming their readers to 
 be stupid ; very different from Robinson Crusoe, the
 
 238 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 Vicar of Wakefield, Roderick Random, and other 
 beautiful, bare narratives. There is implied an un- 
 written compact between author and reader ; " I will 
 tell you a story, and I suppose you will understand 
 it." Modern novels, St. Leons and the like, are full 
 of such flowers as these — " Let not my reader suppose," 
 " Imagine, if you can, modest !" &c. I will here 
 have done with praise and blame. I have written so 
 much, only that you may not think I have passed 
 
 over your book without observation 
 
 I am sorry that Coleridge has christened his Ancient 
 Marincre, a Poet's Reverie ; it is as bad as Bottom 
 the Weaver's declaration that he is not a lion, but only 
 the scenical representation of a lion. What new 
 idea is gained by this title but one subversive of all 
 credit — which the tale should force upon us — of its 
 truth ! 
 
 For me, I was never so affected with any human 
 tale. After first reading it, I was totally possessed 
 with it for many days. I dislike all the miraculous 
 part of it ; but the feelings of the man under the opera- 
 tion of such scenery, dragged me along like Tom 
 Pipe's magic whistle. I totally differ from your idea 
 that the Marincre should have had a character and 
 profession. This is a beauty in Gulliver's Travels, 
 where the mind is kept in a placid state of little 
 wonderments; but the Ancient Marincre undergoes 
 such trials as overwhelm and bury all individuality or 
 memory of what he was — like the state of a man in a 
 bad dream, one terrible peculiarity of which is, that 
 all consciousness of personality is gone. Your other 
 observation is, I think as well, a little unfounded : 
 the " Marinere," from being conversant in super- 
 natural events, has acquired a supernatural and
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 239 
 
 strange cast of phrase, eye, appearance, &c, which 
 frighten the " wedding guest." You will excuse 
 my remarks, because I am hurt and vexed that 
 you should think it necessary, with a prose apology, 
 to open the eyes of dead men that cannot see. 
 
 To sum up a general opinion of the second volume, 
 I do not feel any one poem in it so forcibly as the 
 Ancient Marinere, and the " Mad Mother," and the 
 " Lines at Tintern Abbey" in the first. 
 
 Letter LXXXVI.] 14th June, 1805. 
 
 My dear Miss Wordsworth, — Your long kind letter 
 has not been thrown away (for it has given me great 
 pleasure to find you are all resuming your old occupa- 
 tions, and are better) ; but poor Mary, to whom it is 
 addressed, cannot yet relish it. She has been attacked 
 by one of her severe illnesses, and is at present from 
 home. Last Monday week was the day she left me, 
 and I hope I may calculate upon having her again in 
 a month or little more. I am rather afraid late hours 
 have in this case contributed to her indisposition. 
 But when she discovers symptoms of approaching 
 illness, it is not easy to say what is best to do. 
 Being by ourselves is bad, and going out is bad. I 
 get so irritable and wretched with fear, that I con- 
 stantly hasten on the disorder. You cannot conceive 
 the misery of such a foresight. I am sure that, for the 
 week before she left me, I was little better than light- 
 headed. I now am calm, but sadly taken down and flat. 
 I have every reason to suppose that this illness, like all 
 her former ones, will be but temporary; but I cannot
 
 24O CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 always feel so. Meantime she is dead to me, and I 
 miss a prop. All my strength is gone, and I am like 
 a fool, bereft of her co-operation. I dare not think, 
 lest I should think wrong ; so used am I to look up 
 to her in the least and the biggest perplexity. To 
 say all that I know of her would be more than I think 
 any body could believe, or even understand ; and when 
 I hope to have her well again with me, it would be 
 sinning against her feelings to go about to praise 
 her; for I can conceal nothing that I do from her. 
 She is older and wiser and better than I, and all 
 my wretched imperfections I cover to myself by 
 resolutely thinking on her goodness. She would 
 share life and death, heaven and hell, with me. She 
 lives but for me ; and I know I have been wasting 
 and teasing her life for five years past incessantly 
 with my cursed drinking and ways of going 
 on. But even in this upbraiding of myself, I 
 am offending against her, for I know that she has 
 cleaved to me for better, for worse ; and if the balance 
 has been against her hitherto, it was a noble trade. 
 I am stupid, and lose myself in what I write. I write 
 rather what answers to my feelings (which are some- 
 times sharp enough) than express my present ones, 
 for J am only flat and stupid. I am sure you will 
 excuse my writing any more, I am so very poorly. 
 
 I cannot resist transcribing three or four lines 
 which poor Mary made upon a picture (a Holy 
 Family) which we saw at an auction only one week 
 before she left home. She was then beginning to 
 show signs of ill boding. They are sweet lines and 
 upon a sweet picture ; but I send them only as the 
 last memorial of her.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 241 
 
 " VIRGIN AND CHILD, L. DA VINCI. 
 
 " Maternal Lady, with thy virgin grace, 
 Heaven-born, thy Jesus seemeth sure, 
 And thou a virgin pure. 
 Lady most perfect, when thy angel face 
 Men look, upon, they wish to be 
 A Catholic, Madonna fair, to worship thee.'' 
 
 You had her lines about the " Lady Blanch." You 
 have not had some which she wrote upon a copy of a 
 girl from Titian, which I had hung up where that 
 print of Blanch and the Abbess (as she beautifully 
 interpreted two female figures from L. da Vinci) had 
 hung in our room. 'Tis light and pretty : — 
 
 "Who art thou, fair one, who usurp'st the place 
 Of Blanch, the lady of the matchless grace ? 
 Come, fair and pretty, tell to me 
 Who in thy lifetime thou mightst be ? 
 Thou pretty art and fair, 
 
 But with the Lady Blanch thou never must compare. 
 No need for Blanch her history to tell, 
 Whoever saw her face, they there did read it well ; 
 But when I look on thee, I only know 
 There lived a pretty maid some hundred years ago.'' 
 
 This is a little unfair, to tell so much about our- 
 selves, and to advert so little to your letter, so full of 
 comfortable tidings of you all. But my own cares 
 press pretty close upon me, and you can make allow- 
 ance. That you may go on gathering strength and 
 peace is my next wish to Mary's recovery. 
 
 I had almost forgot your repeated invitation. Sup- 
 posing that Mary will be well and able, there is another 
 ability which you may guess at, which I cannot pro- 
 mise myself. In prudence we ought not to come. 
 This illness will make it still more prudential to wait. 
 
 VOL. I. R
 
 242 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 It is not a balance of this way of spending our money 
 against another way, but an absolute question of 
 whether we shall stop now, or go on wasting away 
 the little we have got beforehand, which my wise 
 conduct has already encroach'd upon one half. My 
 best love, however, to you all ; and to that most 
 friendly creature, Mrs. Clarkson, and better health to 
 her, when you see or write to her. 
 
 Charles Lamb. 
 
 Letter LXXXVIL] June 26th, 1805. 
 
 Mary is just stuck fast in " All's Well that Ends 
 Well." 1 She complains of having to set forth so 
 many female characters in boys' clothes. She begins 
 to think Shakspeare must have wanted imagina- 
 tion ! I, to encourage her, (for she often faints in the 
 prosecution of her great work,) flatter her with telling 
 ' her how well such a play and such a play is done. 
 
 1 Miss Lamb was now engaged on the "Tales from Shakespeare," 
 which were published in 1807. She contributed the Comic portion, 
 and Lamb himself adapted the Tragedies. 
 
 It was advertised as by Charles Lamb alone, at the end of a little 
 volume printed in 1810: — 
 
 " Written by Charles Lamb, 
 "Tales from Shakespear, with 20 Engravings, 2 vols., 8j." 
 In the same place are the following Notices : — 
 
 "Adventures of Ulysses. With a superb Frontispiece, and Title- 
 page, 4J." 
 
 " Mrs. Leicester's School, or the History of Several Young Ladies, 
 Related by Themselves. The Third Edition. With a beau- 
 tiful Frontispiece. Price 3J. 6d. 
 
 "Poetry for Children, Entirely Original. By the Author of Mrs. 
 Leicester's School. 'With Frontispieces, 2 vols, price 3J. 
 
 " N.B. — Each volume may be had separate."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 243 
 
 But she is stuck fast, and I have been obliged to 
 promise to assist her. To do this, it will be neces- 
 sary to leave off tobacco. But I had some thoughts 
 of doing that before, for I sometimes think it does 
 not agree with me. Wm. Hazlitt is in town. I took 
 him to see a very pretty girl, professedly, where there 
 were two young girls ; (the very head and sum of the 
 girlery was two young girls ;) they neither laughed, 
 nor sneered, nor giggled, nor whispered — but they 
 were young girls — and he sat and frowned blacker 
 and blacker, indignant that there should be such a 
 thing as youth and beauty, till he tore me away 
 before supper, in perfect misery, and owned he could 
 not bear young girls ; they drove him mad. So I 
 took him home to my old nurse, where he recovered 
 perfect tranquillity. Independent of this, and as I am 
 not a young girl myself, he is a great acquisition to 
 us. He is, rather imprudently I think, printing a 
 political pamphlet on his own account, and will have 
 to pay for the paper, &c. The first duty of an author, 
 I take it, is never to pay any thing. But non cuivis 
 contigit adire Corinthian. The managers, I thank my 
 stars, have settled that question for me. 
 
 Yours truly, C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LXXXVIIL] 
 
 My dear Wordsworth, (or Dorothy rather, for to you 
 appertains the biggest part of this answer by right,) 
 I will not again deserve reproach by so long a silence. 
 I have kept deluding myself with the idea that Mary 
 would write to you, but she is so lazy, (or, which I be- 
 lieve is the true state of the case, so diffident,) that it 
 
 R 2
 
 244 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 must revert to me as usual. Though she writes a pretty 
 good style, and has some notion of the force of words, 
 she is not always so certain of the true orthography of 
 them : and that, and a poor handwriting (in this age 
 of female calligraphy), often deters her, where no 
 other reason does. 1 
 
 We have neither of us been very well for some 
 weeks past. I am very nervous, and she most so at 
 those times when I am ; so that a merry friend, ad- 
 verting to the noble consolation we were able to 
 afford each other, denominated us, not unaptly, Gum- 
 Boil and Tooth-Ache, for they used to say that a 
 gum-boil is a great relief to a tooth-ache. 
 
 We have been two tiny excursions this Summer, for 
 three or four days each, to a place near Harrow, and 
 to Egham, where Cooper's Hill is : and that is the 
 total history of our rustications this year. Alas ! how 
 poor a round to Skiddaw and Helvellyn, and Borrow- 
 dale, and the magnificent sesquipedalia of the year 
 1802 ! Poor old Molly ! to have lost her pride, that 
 " last infirmity of noble minds," and her cow. Fate 
 need not have set her wits to such an old Molly. 
 I am heartily sorry for her. Remember us lovingly 
 to her; and in particular remember us to Mrs. Clarkson 
 in the most kind manner. 
 
 I hope, by " southwards," you mean that she will 
 be at or near London, for she is a great favourite of 
 both of us, and we feel for her health as much as 
 possible for any one to do. She is one of the friend- 
 liest, comfortablest women we know, and made our 
 little stay at your cottage one of the pleasantest times 
 
 1 This is mere banter; Miss Lamb wrote a very good hand.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 245 
 
 we ever past. We were quite strangers to her. Mr. 
 C. is with you too ; our kindest separate remem- 
 brances to him. As to our special affairs, I am look- 
 ing about me. I have done nothing since the 
 beginning of last year, when I lost my newspaper 
 job ; and having had a long idleness, I must do some- 
 thing, or we shall get very poor. Sometimes I think 
 of a farce, but hitherto all schemes have gone off ; an 
 idle brag or two of an evening, vapouring out of a 
 pipe, and going off in the morning ; but now I have 
 bid farewell to my " sweet enemy," Tobacco, I shall 
 perhaps set nobly to work. Hang work ! 
 
 I wish that all the year were holiday ; I am sure 
 that indolence — indefeasible indolence — is the true 
 state of man, and business the invention of the old 
 Teazer, whose interference doomed Adam to an 
 apron and set him a hoeing. Pen and ink, and 
 clerks and desks, were the refinements of this old 
 torturer some thousand years after, under pretence of 
 " Commerce allying distant shores, promoting and 
 diffusing knowledge, good," &c. &c. 
 
 I wish you may think this a handsome farewell to 
 my " Friendly Traitress." Tobacco has been my 
 evening comfort and my morning curse for these five 
 years ; and you know how difficult it is from refrain- 
 ing to pick one's lips even, when it has become a 
 habit. This poem is the only one which I have 
 finished since so long as when I wrote " Hester 
 Savory." I have had it in my head to do it these 
 two years, but tobacco stood in its own light when it 
 gave me headaches that prevented my singing its 
 .praises. Now you have got it, you have got all my 
 store, for I have absolutely not another line. No 
 more has Mary. We have nobody about us that
 
 246 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 cares for poetry ; and who will rear grapes when he 
 shall be the sole eater ? Perhaps if you encourage 
 us to show you what we may write, we may do 
 something now and then before we absolutely forget 
 the quantity of an English line for want of practice. 
 The " Tobacco," being a little in the way of Withers 
 (whom Southey so much likes), perhaps you will 
 somehow convey it to him with my kind remem- 
 brances. Then, every body will have seen it that I 
 wish to see it, I having sent it to Malta. 1 
 I remain, dear W. and D., yours truly, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter LXXXIX.] June, 1806. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — We are pleased, you may be 
 
 sure, with the good news of Mrs. W . Hope all 
 
 is well over by this time. " A fine boy. Have you 
 any more ? — one more and a girl — poor copies of 
 me !" vide Mr. H., a farce which the proprietors have 
 
 done me the honour ; but I will set down Mr. 
 
 Wroughton's own words. N. B. The ensuing letter 
 was sent in answer to one which I wrote, begging to 
 know if my piece had any chance, as I might make 
 alterations, &c. I writing on Monday, there comes 
 this letter on the Wednesday. Attend ! 
 
 [Copy of a Letter from Mr. R. Wroughton.] 
 " Sir, — Your piece of Mr. H., I am desired to say, 
 
 1 To Coleridge, who was then staying in the Island. During part 
 of his time he officiated as Secretary to the Governor, Sir Alexander 
 Ball ; but he went there on a visit to Dr. Stoddart.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 247 
 
 is accepted at Drury Lane Theatre, by the proprietors, 
 and, if agreeable to you, will be brought forwards 
 when the proper opportunity serves. The piece 
 shall be sent to you, for your alterations, in the 
 course of a few days, as the same is not in my hands, 
 but with the proprietors. 
 
 " I am, sir, your obedient servant, 
 
 " Richard Wroughton. 
 
 [Dated] 
 " 66, Gower Street, 
 
 "Wednesday, June 11, 1806." 
 
 On the following Sunday Mr. Tobin comes. The 
 scent of a manager's letter brought him. He would 
 have gone further any day on such a business. I 
 read the letter to him. He deems it authentic and 
 peremptory. Our conversation naturally fell upon 
 pieces, different sorts of pieces ; what is the best way 
 of offering a piece, how far the caprice of managers 
 is an obstacle in the way of a piece, how to judge 
 of the merits of a piece, how long a piece may remain 
 in the hands of the managers before it is acted ; and 
 my piece, and your piece, and my poor brother's 
 piece — my poor brother was all his life endeavour- 
 ing to get a piece accepted. I am not sure that, 
 when my poor brother bequeathed the care of his 
 pieces to Mr. Tobin, he did not therein convey a 
 legacy which in some measure mollified the other- 
 wise first stupefactions of grief. It cannot be ex- 
 pected that the present Earl Nelson passes all his 
 time in watering the laurels of the admiral with 
 Right-Reverend Tears. Certainly he steals a fine 
 day now and then to plot how to lay out the grounds 
 and mansion at Burnham most suitable to the late 
 Earl's taste, if he had lived, and how to spend the
 
 248 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTIIS 
 
 hundred thousand pounds which Parliament has given x 
 him in erecting some little neat monument to his 
 memory. 
 
 I wrote Mr. H. in mere wantonness of triumph. 
 Have nothing more to say about it. The managers, 
 I thank my stars, have decided its merits for ever. 
 They are the best judges of pieces, and it would be 
 insensible in me to affect a false modesty after the 
 very flattering letter which I have received. 
 
 
 
 ADMIT 
 
 
 
 TO 
 
 
 
 BOXES. 
 
 Ninth 
 
 Night 
 
 Mr. H. 
 
 Charles Lamb. 
 
 I think this will be as good a pattern for orders 
 as I can think on. A little thin flowery borde'r, 
 round, neat, not gaudy, and the Drury Lane Apollo, 
 with the harp at the top. Or shall I have no Apollo ? 
 — simply nothing ? Or perhaps the comic muse ? 
 
 The same form, only I think without the Apollo, 
 will serve for the pit and galleries. I think it will be 
 best to write my name at full length ; but then if I 
 give away a great many, that will be tedious. Per- 
 haps Ch. Lamb will do. 
 
 BOXES, now I think on it, I'll have in capitals. 
 The rest, in a neat Italian hand. Or better, perhaps 
 33orcfi, in old English characters, like " Madoc" or 
 "Thalaba?" C. L. 
 
 Feb. 1st, 1806. 
 
 A-propos of Spenser, (you will find him mentioned a 
 page or two before, near enough for an a-propos,) I
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 249 
 
 was discoursing on poetry (as one's apt to deceive 
 one's self, and when a person is willing to talk of what 
 one likes, to believe that he also likes the same, as 
 lovers do) with a young gentleman of my office, who 
 is deep read in Anacreon Moore, Lord Strangford, 
 and the principal modern poets, and I happened to 
 mention Epithalamiums, and that I could show him 
 a very fine one of Spenser's. At the mention of this, 
 my gentleman, who is a very fine gentleman, and is 
 brother to the Miss Evans whom Coleridge so nar- 
 rowly escaped marrying, pricked up his ears and 
 expressed great pleasure, and begged that I would 
 give him leave to copy it : he did not care how long 
 it was (for I objected the length), he should be very 
 happy to see any thing by him. Then pausing, and 
 looking sad, he ejaculated " Poor Spencer ! " I 
 begged to know the reason of his ejaculation, thinking 
 that time had by this time softened down any calami- 
 ties which the bard might have endured. " Why, 
 poor fellow," said he, " he has lost his wife ! " 
 " Lost his wife ! " said I, " whom are you talking of ? " 
 "Why, Spencer," said he; "I've read the Monody 
 he wrote on the occasion, and a very pretty thing it 
 ?'s." This led to an explanation (it could be delayed 
 no longer), that the sound Spenser, which, when 
 poetry is talked of, generally excites an image of an 
 old bard in a ruff, and sometimes with it dim notions 
 of Sir P. Sydney, and' perhaps Lord Burleigh, had 
 raised in my gentleman a quite contrary image of the 
 Honourable William Spencer, who has translated 
 some things from the German very prettily, which 
 are published with Lady Di. Beauclerk's designs. 
 Nothing like defining of terms when we talk. What
 
 25O CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 blunders might I have fallen into of quite inapplicable 
 criticism, but for this timely explanation ! 
 
 N.B. At the beginning of Edm. Spenser (to prevent 
 mistakes), I have copied from my own copy, and pri- 
 marily from a book of Chalmers's on Shakspeare, a 
 sonnet of Spenser's never printed among his poems. 
 It is curious, as being manly, and rather Miltonic, 
 and as a sonnet of Spenser's with nothing in it about 
 love or knighthood. I have no room for remem- 
 brances; but I hope our doing your commission will 
 prove we do not quite forget you. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 LETTER XC] December nth, 1806. 
 
 Mary's love to all of you — I wouldn't let her 
 write. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — Mr. H. came out last night, 
 and failed. 1 I had many fears ; the subject was not 
 substantial enough. John Bull must have solider fare 
 than a letter. We are pretty stout about it ; have 
 had plenty of condoling friends ; but, after all, we had 
 rather it should have succeeded. You will see the 
 prologue in most of the morning papers. It was re- 
 ceived with such shouts as I never witnessed to a 
 prologue. It was attempted to be encored. How 
 hard ! — a thing I did merely as a task, because it was 
 wanted, and set no great store by; and Mr.H.ll 
 The number of friends we had in the house — my 
 brother and I being in public offices, &c. — was 
 astonishing, but they yielded at length to a few hisses. 
 
 Lamb communicated this intelligence to some other intimate 
 friends.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 251 
 
 A hundred hisses ! (Damn the word, I write it 
 like kisses — how different !) — a hundred hisses out- 
 weigh a thousand claps. The former come more 
 directly from the heart. Well, 'tis withdrawn, and 
 there is an end. 
 
 Better luck to us. C. Lamb. 
 
 [Turn over.] 
 
 P.S. Pray, when any of you write to the Clarksons, 
 give our kind loves, and say we shall not be able to 
 come and see them at Christmas, as I shall have but 
 a day or two, and tell them we bear our mortification 
 pretty well. 
 
 Letter XCL] 
 
 Dear Wordsworth — We have book'd off from Swan 
 and Two Necks, Lad Lane, this day (per Coach) the 
 Tales from Shakespear. 1 You will forgive the plates, 
 when I tell you they were left to the direction of 
 Godwin, who left the choice of subjects to the bad 
 baby, who from mischief (I suppose) has chosen one 
 from damn'd beastly vulgarity (vide Merck. Venice) 
 where no atom of authority was in the tale to justify 
 it ; to another has given a name which exists not in 
 the tale, Nic Bottom, and which she thought would 
 be funny, though in this I suspect his hand, for I 
 guess her reading does not reach far enough to know 
 Bottom's christian name ; and one of Hamlet and 
 grave digging, a scene which is not hinted at in the 
 
 This work, had been in hand for about two years ; Miss Lamb was 
 probably unable to apply herself continuously to her portion. A second 
 edition appeared in 1808, 2 vols. 8vo., a third in 1809, &c.
 
 252 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 story, and you might as well have put King Canute 
 the Great reproving his courtiers. The rest are giants 
 and giantesses. Suffice it, to save our taste and damn 
 our folly, that we left it all to a friend, W. G., who 
 in the first place cheated me into putting a name to 
 them, which I did not mean, but do not repent, and 
 then wrote a puff about their simplicity, &c. to go 
 with the advertisement as in my name ! Enough of 
 this egregious dupery. I will try to abstract the load 
 of teazing circumstances from the stories and tell you 
 that I am answerable for Lear, Macbeth, Timon, 
 Romeo, Hamlet, Othello, for occasionally a tail-piece 
 or correction of grammar, for none of the cuts and all 
 
 of the spelling. The rest is my Sister's. We think 
 
 Pericles of hers the best, and Othello of mine ; but I 
 hope all have some good. As you like It, we like 
 least. So much, only begging you to tear out the 
 cuts and give them to Johnny, as " Mrs. Godwin's 
 fancy"! !— 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Thursday, 29th Jan. 1807, 
 
 Our love to all. 
 
 I had almost forgot, My part of the Preface begins in 
 the middle of a sentence, in last but one page, after 
 a colon, thus — 
 
 : — <which if they he happily so done, &c. 
 
 the former part hath a more feminine turn and does 
 hold me up something as an instructor to young 
 ladies : but upon my modesty's honour I wrote it 
 not. 
 
 Godwin told my Sister that the Baby chose the 
 subjects : a fact in taste.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 253 
 LETTER XCIL] Friday, 19th Oct. 1810. E.I. Ho. 
 
 Dear W., — Mary has been very ill, which you have 
 heard, I suppose, from the Montagues. She is very 
 weak and low-spirited now. I was much pleased 
 with your continuation of the Essay on Epitaphs. It 
 is the only sensible thing which has been written on 
 that subject, and it goes to the bottom. In particular 
 I was pleased with your translation of that turgid 
 epitaph into the plain feeling under it. It is perfectly 
 a test. But what is the reason we have no good 
 epitaphs after all ? 
 
 A very striking instance of your position might be 
 found in the churchyard of Ditton-upon-Thames, * if 
 you know such a place. Ditton-upon-Thames has 
 been blessed by the residence of a poet, who for love 
 or money, I do not well know which, has dignified 
 every grave-stone, for the last few years, with bran- 
 new verses, all different, and all ingenious, with the 
 author's name at the bottom of each. This sweet 
 Swan of Thames has so artfully diversified his strains 
 and his rhymes, that the same thought never occurs 
 twice ; more justly, perhaps, as no thought ever 
 occurs at all, there was a physical impossibility that 
 the same thought should recur. It is long since I 
 saw and read these inscriptions, but I remember the 
 impression was of a smug usher at his desk in the 
 intervals of instruction, levelling his pen. Of death, 
 as it consists of dust and worms, and mourners and 
 uncertainty, he had never thought ; but the word 
 " death " he had often seen separate and conjunct with 
 ether words, till he had learned to speak of all its 
 
 1 More usually called Thames-Ditton.
 
 254 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 attributes as glibly as Unitarian Belsham will discuss 
 you the attributes of the word " God " in a pulpit ; 
 and will talk of infinity with a tongue that dangles 
 from a skull that never reached in thought and tho- 
 rough imagination two inches, or further than from 
 his hand to his mouth, or from the vestry to the 
 sounding-board of the pulpit. 
 
 But the epitaphs were trim, and sprag, and patent, 
 and pleased the survivors of Thames-Ditton above 
 the old mumpsimus of " Afflictions Sore." . . . . 
 To do justice though, it must be owned that even the 
 excellent feeling which dictated this dirge when new 
 must have suffered something in passing through so 
 many thousand applications, many of them no doubt 
 quite misplaced, as I have seen in Islington church- 
 yard (I think) an Epitaph to an infant who died 
 " AZtatis four months," with this seasonable inscrip- 
 tion appended, " Honour thy father and thy mother ; 
 that thy days may be long in the land," &c. Sin- 
 cerely wishing your children long life to honour, &c, 
 I remain, C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XCIIL] Nov. 23, 1810. 
 
 We are in a pickle. Mary, from her affectation of 
 physiognomy, has hired a stupid big country wench, 
 who looked honest, as she thought, and has been 
 doing her work some days, but without eating — eats 
 no butter, nor meat, but prefers cheese with her tea 
 for breakfast j 1 and now it comes out that she was 
 
 1 There was nothing unusual about this in a rustic wench. It is 
 still the way in the country among the poorer sort.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 255 
 
 ill when she came, with lifting her mother about 
 (who is now with God) when she was dying, and with 
 riding up from Norfolk, four days and nights in the 
 waggon. She got advice yesterday, and took some- 
 thing which has made her bring up a quart of blood, 
 and she now lies in her bed, a dead weight upon our 
 humanity, incapable of getting up, refusing to go 
 into an hospital, having nobody in town but a poor 
 asthmatic uncle whose son lately married a drab who 
 fills his house, and there is nowhere she can go, 
 and she seems to have made up her mind to take her 
 flight to heaven from our bed. Oh for the little wheel- 
 barrow which trundled the hunchback from door 
 to door to try the various charities of different profes- 
 sions of mankind ! Here's her uncle just crawled up. 
 He is far liker Death than she. Oh the Parish, the 
 Parish, the hospital, the infirmary, the charnel-house ! 
 — these are places meet for such guests, not our quiet 
 mansion, where nothing but affluent plenty and lite- 
 rary ease should abound. — Howard's House, Howard's 
 House, or where the Paralytic descended through the 
 sky-light (what a God's gift !) to get at our Saviour. 
 In this perplexity such topics as Spanish papers and 
 Monkhouses sink into comparative insignificance. 
 What shall we do ? If she died, it were something : 
 gladly would I pay the coffin-maker, and the bell-man 
 and searchers. C. L. 
 
 To Miss Wordsworth, 
 Grasmere, 
 
 near Kendal, 
 
 Westmoreland.
 
 256 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 Letter XCIV.] 1814. 
 
 My dear W. — I have scarce time or quiet to explain 
 my present situation, how unquiet and distracted it 
 is, owing to the absence of some of my compeers, 
 and to the deficient state of payments at E. I. H., 
 owing to bad peace speculations in the calico market. 
 (I write this to W. W., Esq., Collector of Stamp 
 Duties for the conjoint Northern Counties, not to 
 W. W., Poet.) I go back, and have for many days 
 past, to evening work, generally at the rate of nine 
 hours a day. The nature of my work, too, puzzling 
 and hurrying, has so shaken my spirits, that my 
 sleep is nothing but a succession of dreams of 
 business I cannot do, of assistants that give 
 me no assistance, of terrible responsibilities. I 
 reclaimed your book, 1 which Hazlitt has uncivilly 
 kept, only two days ago, and have made shift to read 
 it again with shattered brain. It does not lose — 
 rather some parts have come out with a prominence I 
 did not perceive before — but such was my aching 
 head yesterday (Sunday), that the book was like a 
 mountain landscape to one that should walk on the edge 
 of a precipice ; I perceive beauty dizzily. Now, what 
 I would say is, that I see no prospect of a quiet half- 
 day, or hour even, till this week and the next are past. 
 I then hope to get four weeks' absence, and if thai is 
 time enough to begin, I will most gladly do what is 
 required, though I feel my inability, for my brain is 
 always desultory, and snatches off hints from things, 
 but can seldom follow a "work" methodically. But 
 that shall be no excuse. What I beg you to do is, to 
 let me know from Southey, if that will be time enough 
 
 1 The Excursion.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 257 
 
 for the Quarterly, i. e. suppose it done in three weeks 
 from this date (19th Sept.) : if not, it is my bounden 
 duty to express my regret, and decline it. Mary 
 thanks you, and feels highly grateful for your " Patent 
 of Nobility," and acknowledges the author of the 
 Excursion as the legitimate Fountain of Honour. We 
 both agree that, to our feeling, Ellen is best as she 
 is. To us there would have been something repug- 
 nant in her challenging her Penance as a Dowry : 
 the fact is explicable ; but how few are those to 
 whom it would have been rendered explicit ! The 
 unlucky reason of the detention of the Excursion 
 was Hazlitt and we having a misunderstanding. 
 He blowed us up about six months ago, since 
 which the union hath snapt ; but M. Burney bor- 
 rowed it for him, and after reiterated messages I only 
 got it on Friday. His remarks had some vigour in 
 them ; 1 particularly something about an old ruin being 
 too modern for your Primeval Nature, and about a 
 lichen. I forget the passage, but the whole wore a 
 slovenly air of despatch. That objection which M. 
 Burney had imbibed from him about Voltaire I ex- 
 plained to M. B. (or tried) exactly on your principle 
 of its being a characteristic speech. 2 That it was no 
 settled comparative estimate of Voltaire with any of 
 
 1 This refers to an article of Hazlitt's on the Excursion in the Ex- 
 aminer, very fine in passages, but more characteristic of the critic than 
 descriptive of the poem. 
 
 2 The passage in which the copy of Candide, found in the apart- 
 ment of the Recluse, is described as " the dull production of a scoffer's 
 brain," which had excited Hazlitt to energetic vindication of Voltaire 
 from the charge of dulness. Whether the work, written to mockery 
 of human hopes, be dull, I will not venture to determine ; but I do not 
 hesitate, at any risk, to avow a conviction that no book in the world is 
 more adapted to make a good man wretched. 
 
 VOL. I. S
 
 258 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTH S. 
 
 his own tribe of buffoons — no injustice, even if you 
 spoke it, for I dared say you never could relish Can- 
 dide. I know I tried to get through it about a twelve- 
 month since, and couldn't for the dulness. Now I 
 think I have a wider range in buffoonery than you. 
 Too much toleration perhaps. 
 
 I finish this after a raw ill-baked dinner fast gobbled 
 up to set me off to office again, after working there 
 till near four. Oh how I wish I were a rich man ! 
 even though I were squeezed camel-fashion at getting 
 through that needle's eye that is spoken of in the 
 Written Word. Apropos ; are you a Christian ? or is 
 it the Pedler and the Priest 'that are ? 
 
 I find I miscalled that celestial splendour of the 
 mist going off, a sunset. That only shows my inac- 
 curacy of head. 
 
 Do, pray, indulge me by writing an answer to the 
 point of time mentioned above, or let Southey. I am 
 ashamed to go bargaining in this way, but indeed I 
 have no time I can reckon on till the first week in 
 October. God send I may not be disappointed in 
 that ! Coleridge swore in a letter to me he would 
 review the Excursion in the Quarterly. Therefore, 
 though that shall not stop me, yet if I can do any 
 thing when done, I must know of him if he has 
 any thing ready, or I shall fill the world with loud 
 exclaims. 
 
 I keep writing on, knowing the postage is no more 
 for much writing, else so fagged and dispirited I 
 am with cursed India House work, I scarce know 
 what I do. My left arm reposes on the Excursion. 
 I feel what it would be in quiet. It is now a sealed 
 book 
 
 C. Lamb.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 259 
 
 Letter XCV.] 1814. 
 
 Dear W. — Your experience about tailors seems to 
 be in point blank opposition to Burton, as much as 
 the author of the Excursion does, toto ccelo, differ in 
 his notion of a country life from the picture which 
 W. H. has exhibited of the same. But, with a little 
 explanation, you and B. may be reconciled. It is 
 evident that he confined his observations to the 
 genuine native London tailor. What freaks tailor- 
 nature may take in the country is not for him to give 
 account of. And certainly some of the freaks recorded 
 do give an idea of the persons in question being beside 
 themselves, rather than in harmony with the common, 
 moderate, self-enjoyment of the rest of mankind. A 
 flying tailor, I venture to say, is no more in rerum 
 natura than a flying horse or a gryphon. His wheel- 
 ing his airy flight from the precipice you mention 
 had a parallel in the melancholy Jew who toppled 
 from the monument. Were his limbs ever found i 
 Then, the man who cures diseases by words is evi- 
 dently an inspired tailor. Burton never affirmed that 
 the art of sewing disqualified the practiser of it from 
 being a fit organ for supernatural revelation. He 
 never enters into such subjects. "Tis the common, 
 uninspired tailor which he speaks of. Again, the 
 person who makes his smiles to be heard is evidently 
 a man under possession ; a demoniac tailor. A 
 greater hell than his own must have a hand in this. 
 I am not certain that the cause which you advocate 
 has much reason for triumph. You seem to me to 
 substitute light-headedness for light-heartedness by 
 a trick, or not to know the difference. I confess, a 
 grinning tailor would shock me. Enough of tailors ! 
 
 s 2
 
 26o CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 The " 'scapes" of the great god Pan, who appeared 
 among your mountains some dozen years since, and 
 his narrow chance of being submerged by the swains, 
 afforded me much pleasure. I can conceive the 
 water-nymphs pulling for him. He would have been 
 another Hylas — W. Hylas. In a mad letter which 
 Capel Lofft wrote to M[onthly] M[agazine] Philips, 
 (now Sir Richard,) I remember his noticing a meta- 
 physical article of Pan, signed H., and adding, " I 
 take your correspondent to be the same with Hylas." 
 Hylas had put forth a pastoral just before. How near 
 the unfounded conjecture of the certainly inspired 
 Lofft (unfounded as we thought it) was to being 
 realised ! I can conceive him being " good to all 
 that wander in that perilous flood." One J. Scott, 1 (I 
 know no more) is editor of the Champion. Where is 
 Coleridge ? 
 
 That Review you speak of, I am only sorry it did 
 not appear last month. The circumstances of haste 
 and peculiar bad spirits under which it was written 
 would have excused its slightness and inadequacy, 
 the full load of which I shall suffer from its lying by so 
 long, as it will seem to have done, from its postpone- 
 ment. I write with great difficulty, and can scarce 
 command my own resolution to sit at writing an hour 
 
 1 'Tis strange that Lamb knew so little of John Scott, who wil 
 afterwards the editor of Baldwin's London Magazine. On the 16th 
 February, 1821, he received a mortal wound in a duel with Christie, 
 (one of Blackwood's staff,) and he died at Chalk Farm, on Tuesday 
 the 27th of that month, aged 37. His death was a great loss to the 
 London Magazine. He was the author of Paris Visited and Re- 
 "vixited, the House of Mourning, a poem ; of a posthumous work 
 entitled Sketches of Manners, life, in France, Switzerland, and 
 Italy ; and of an Essay on French Literature, printed with the last- 
 mentioned work.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 26l 
 
 together. I am a poor creature, but I am leaving off 
 gin. I hope you will see good-will in the thing. I 
 had a difficulty to perform not to make it all panegyric ; 
 I have attempted to personate a mere stranger to you ; 
 perhaps with too much strangeness. But you must 
 bear that in mind when you read it, and not think 
 that I am, in mind, distant from you or your poem, 
 but that both are close to me, among the nearest of 
 persons and things. I do but act the stranger in the 
 Review. Then, I was puzzled about extracts, and 
 determined upon not giving one that had been in the 
 Examiner ; for extracts repeated give an idea that 
 there is a meagre allowance of good things. By this 
 way, I deprived myself of Sir Alfred Irthing, and the 
 reflections that conclude his story, which are the 
 flower of the poem. Hazlitt had given the reflections 
 before me. Then it is the first review I ever did, and 
 I did not know how long I might make it. But it 
 must speak for itself, if Gifford and his crew do not 
 put words in its mouth, which I expect. Farewell. 
 Love to all. Mary keeps very bad. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XCVL] 1814. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth — I told you my Review was a 
 very imperfect one. 1 But what you will see in the 
 Quarterly is a spurious one, which Mr. Baviad Gifford 
 has palmed upon it for mine. I never felt more 
 
 1 So much so, that it was not thought worth while to include it in 
 this edition of the works. Gifford took most unwarrantable liberties 
 with the text, as Jeffrey was sometimes accustomed to do with the 
 *' Edinburgh " writers.
 
 262 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 vexed in my life than when I read it. I cannot give 
 you an idea of what he has done to it, out of spite at 
 me, because he once suffered me to be called a lunatic 
 in his Review. 1 The language he has altered through- 
 out. Whatever inadequateness it had to its subject, 
 it was, in point of composition, the prettiest piece of 
 prose I ever writ : and so my sister (to whom alone I 
 read the MS.) said. That charm, if it had any, is all 
 gone : more than a third of the substance is cut away, 
 and that not all from one place, but passim, so as to 
 make utter nonsense. Every warm expression is 
 changed for a nasty cold one. 
 
 I have not the cursed alteration by me ; I shall 
 never look at it again ; but for a specimen, I remem- 
 ber I had said the poet of the Excursion " walks 
 through common forests as through some Dodona or 
 enchanted wood, and every casual bird that flits upon 
 the boughs, like that miraculous one in Tasso, but in 
 language more piercing than any articulate sounds, 
 reveals to him far higher love-lays." It is now 
 (besides half-a-dozen alterations in the same half- 
 dozen lines) " but in language more intelligent reveals 
 to him ;" — that is one I remember. 
 
 But that would have been little, putting his damn'd 
 shoemaker phraseology (for he was a shoemaker) 
 instead of mine, which has been tinctured with better 
 authors than his ignorance can comprehend ; — for I 
 reckon myself a dab at prose ; — verse I leave to my 
 
 1 In alluding to Lamb's note on the great scene of the Broken 
 Heart, where Calantha dances on, after hearing at every pause of 
 some terrible calamity, a writer in the Quarterly Review had affected 
 to excuse the writer as a "maniac;" a suggestion which circumstances 
 rendered most cruel.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 263 
 
 betters : God help them, if they are to be so reviewed 
 by friend and foe as you have been this quarter ! I 
 have read " It won't do." 1 But worse than altering 
 words : he has kept a few members only of the part 
 I had done best, which was to explain all I could of 
 your '• Scheme of Harmonies," as I had ventured to 
 call it, between the external universe and what within 
 us answers to it. To do this I had accumulated a 
 good many short passages, rising in length to the 
 end, weaving in the extracts as if they came in as a 
 part of the text naturally, not obtruding them as 
 specimens. Of this part a little is left, but so as, 
 without conjuration, no man could tell what I was 
 driving at. A proof of it you may see (though not 
 judge of the whole of the injustice) by these words. 
 I had spoken something about " natural methodism ;" 
 and after follows, " and therefore the tale of Margaret 
 should have been postponed" (I forget my words, or 
 his words) ; now the reasons for postponing it are as 
 deducible from what goes before as they are from 
 the 104th Psalm. The passage whence I deduced it 
 has vanished, but clapping a colon before a therefore 
 is always reason enough for Mr. Baviad Gifford to 
 allow to a reviewer that is not himself. I assure you 
 my complaints are well founded. I know how sore a 
 word altered makes one ; but, indeed, of this review the 
 whole complexion is gone. I regret only that I did 
 not keep a copy. I am sure you would have been 
 pleased with it, because I have been feeding my fancy 
 
 1 Though the article on the Excursion, in the Edinburgh Review, 
 commenced "This will never do!" it contained ample illustrations of 
 the author's genius, and helped the world to disprove its oracular begin- 
 ning.
 
 264 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 for some months with the notion of pleasing you. 
 Its imperfection or inadequateness in size and method 
 I knew ; but for the writing part of it I was fully 
 satisfied ; I hoped it would make more than atone- 
 ment. Ten or twelve distinct passages come to my 
 mind, which are gone; and what is left is, of course, 
 the worse for their having been there ; the eyes are 
 pulled out, and the bleeding sockets are left. 
 
 I read it at Arch's shop with my face burning with 
 vexation secretly, with just such a feeling as if it had 
 been a review written against myself, making false 
 quotations from me. But I am ashamed to say so 
 much about a short piece. How are you served ! 
 and the labours of years turned into contempt by 
 scoundrels ! 
 
 But I could not but protest against your taking 
 that thing as mine. Every pretty expression, (I 
 know there were many,) every warm expression, 
 (there was nothing else,) is vulgarised and frozen. 
 But if they catch me in their camps again, let them 
 spitchcock me ! They had a right to do it, as no 
 name appears to it ; and Mr. Shoemaker Gifford, I 
 suppose, never waived a right he had since he com- 
 menced author. God confound him and all caitiffs ! 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter XCVIL] Aug. 14, 1814. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — I cannot tell you how pleased 
 I was at the receipt of the great armful of poetry 
 which you have sent me ; and to get it before the rest 
 of the world too ! I have gone quite through with it, 
 and was thinking to have accomplished that pleasure 
 a second time before I wrote to thank you, but M.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 265 
 
 Burney came in the night (while we were out) and 
 made holy theft of it, but we expect restitution in a 
 day or two. It is the noblest conversational poem I 
 ever read — a day in Heaven. The part (or rather 
 main body) which has left the sweetest odour on my 
 memory (a bad term for the remains of an impression 
 so recent) is the Tales of the Churchyard ; — the only 
 girl among seven brethren, born out of due time, and 
 not duly taken away again, 1 — the deaf man and the 
 blind man ; — the Jacobite and the Hanoverian, whom 
 antipathies reconcile ; the Scarron-entry of the rusti- 
 cating parson upon his solitude ; — these were all new 
 to me too. My having known the story of Margaret 
 (at the beginning), a very old acquaintance, even as 
 long back as when I saw you first at Stowey, did not 
 make her reappearance less fresh. I don't know what 
 to pick out of this best of books upon the best subjects 
 for partial naming. That gorgeous sunset is famous ; 2 
 I think it must have been the identical one we saw 
 on Salisbury Plain five years ago, that drew Phillips 
 from the card-table, where he had sat from rise of that 
 luminary to its unequalled set ; but neither he nor I 
 had gifted eyes to see those symbols of common 
 things glorified, such as the prophets saw them in 
 that sunset — the wheel, the potter's clay, the wash- 
 pot, the wine-press, the almond-tree rod, the baskets 
 of figs, the fourfold visaged head, the throne, and 
 Him that sat thereon. 3 
 
 1 The sweet poem, "We are Seven." 
 
 2 The passage to which the allusion applies does not picture a sunset, 
 but the effect of sunlight on a receding mist among the mountains, in 
 the second book of the Excursion. 
 
 3 " Fix'd resemblances were seen 
 To implements of ordinary use, But
 
 266 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 One feeling I was particularly struck with, as what 
 I recognised so very lately at Harrow Church on enter- 
 ing in it after a hot and secular day's pleasure, the 
 instantaneous coolness and calming, almost trans- 
 forming properties of a country church 'just entered; 
 a certain fragrance which it has, either from its holi- 
 ness, or being kept shut all the week, or the air that 
 is let in being pure country, exactly what you have 
 reduced into words ; but I am feeling that which 
 I cannot express. Reading your lines about it fixed 
 me for a time, a monument in Harrow Church. Do 
 you know it ? with its fine long spire, white as washed 
 marble, to be seen, by vantage of its high site, as far 
 as Salisbury spire itself almost. 
 
 I shall select a day or two, very shortly, when I 
 am coolest in brain, to have a steady second reading, 
 which I feel will lead to many more, for it will be a 
 stock book with me while eyes or spectacles shall be 
 lent me. There is a great deal of noble matter about 
 mountain scenery, yet not so much as to overpower 
 and discountenance a poor Londoner or south-coun- 
 tryman entirely, though Mary seems to have felt it 
 occasionally a little too powerfully, for it was her re- 
 mark during reading it, that by your system it was 
 doubtful whether a liver in towns had a soul to be 
 saved. She almost trembled for that invisible part of 
 us in her. 
 
 Save for a late excursion to Harrow, and a day or 
 two on the banks of the Thames this Summer, rural 
 
 But vast in size, in substance glorified; 
 Such as by Hebrew Prophets were beheld 
 In vision— forms uncouth <>f mightiest powers, 
 For admiration and mysterious awe."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 267 
 
 images were fast fading from my mind, and by the 
 wise provision of the Regent, all that was country-fy'd 
 in the Parks is all but obliterated. The very colour 
 of green is vanished ; the whole surface of Hyde 
 Park is dry crumbling sand (Arabia Arenosa), not a 
 vestige or hint of grass ever having grown there. 
 Booths and drinking-places go all round it for a mile 
 and half, I am confident — I might say two miles in 
 circuit. The stench of liquors, bad tobacco, dirty 
 people and provisions, conquers the air, and we are 
 stifled and suffocated in Hyde Park. 
 
 Order after order has been issued by Lord Sid- 
 mouth in the name of the Regent (acting in behalf of 
 his Royal father) for the dispersion of the varlets, but 
 in vain. The vis unita of all the publicans in London, 
 Westminster, Marylebone, and miles round, is too 
 powerful a force to put down. The Regent has raised 
 a phantom which he cannot lay. There they'll stay 
 probably for ever. The whole beauty of the place is 
 gone — that lake-look of the Serpentine — it has got 
 foolish ships upon it ; but something whispers to have 
 confidence in Nature and its revival — 
 
 At the coming of the milder day, 
 These monuments shall all be overgrown. 
 
 Meantime I confess to have smoked one delicious pipe 
 in one of the cleanliest and goodliest of the booths ; 
 a tent rather — 
 
 " Oh call it not a booth !" 
 
 erected by the public spirit of Watson, who keeps the 
 Adam and Eve at Pancras, (the ale-houses have all 
 emigrated, with their train of bottles, mugs, cork- 
 screws, waiters, into Hyde Park — whole ale-houses, 
 with all their ale!) in company with some of the
 
 268 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 Guards that had been in France, and a fine French 
 girl, habited like a princess of banditti, which one of 
 the dogs had transported from the Garonne to the 
 Serpentine. The unusual scene in Hyde Park, by 
 candle-light, in open air, — good tobacco, bottled stout, 
 — made it look like an interval in a campaign, a re- 
 pose after battle. I almost fancied scars smarting, 
 and was ready to club a story with my comrades of 
 some of my lying deeds. After all, the fireworks 
 were splendid ; the rockets in clusters, in trees and 
 all shapes, spreading about like young stars in the 
 making, floundering about in space (like unbroke 
 horses,) till some of Newton's calculations should fix 
 them ; but then they went out. Any one who could 
 see 'em, and the still finer showers of gloomy rain-fire 
 that fell sulkily and angrily from 'em, and could go to 
 bed without dreaming of the last day, must be as har- 
 dened an atheist as ... . 
 
 The conclusion of this epistle getting gloomy, I 
 have chosen this part to desire our kindest loves to 
 Mrs. Wordsworth and to Dorothea. Will none of 
 you ever be in London again ? 
 
 Again let me thank you for your present, and assure 
 you that fireworks and triumphs have not distracted 
 me from receiving a calm and noble enjoyment from 
 it, (which I trust I shall often,) and I sincerely congra- 
 tulate you on its appearance. 
 
 With kindest remembrances to you and your house- 
 hold, we remain, yours sincerely, 
 
 C. Lamb and Sister.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 269 
 
 Letter XCVIII.] [i8i5- -, 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — You have made me very proud 
 with your successive book presents. I have been care- 
 fully through the two volumes, to see that nothing was 
 omitted which used to be there. I think I miss nothing 
 but a character in the antithetic manner, which I do 
 not know why you left out, — the moral to the boys 
 building the giant, the omission whereof leaves it, in 
 my mind, less complete, — and one admirable line 
 gone (or something come instead of it), "the stone- 
 chat, and the glancing sand-piper," which was a line 
 quite alive. I "demand these at your hand. I am 
 glad that you have not sacrificed a verse to those 
 scoundrels. I would not have had you offer up the 
 poorest rag that lingered upon the stript shoulders of 
 little Alice Fell, to have atoned all their malice ; I 
 would not have given 'em a red cloak to save their 
 souls. I am afraid lest that substitution of a shell 
 (a flat falsification of the history) for the household 
 implement, as it stood at first, was a kind of tub 
 thrown out to the beast, or rather thrown out for him. 
 The tub was a good honest tub in its place, and 
 nothing could fairly be said against it. You say you 
 made the alteration for the "friendly reader," but the 
 " malicious " will take it to himself. Damn 'em, if 
 you give 'em an inch, &c. The Preface is noble, and 
 such as you should write. I wish I could set my 
 name to it, Imprimatur, — but you have set it there 
 yourself, and I thank you. I would rather be a door- 
 keeper in your margin, than have their proudest text 
 swelling with my eulogies. The poems in the volumes 
 which are new to me are so much in the old tone 
 that I hardly received them as novelties. Of those 
 of which I had no previous knowledge, the " Four
 
 27O CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 Yew Trees," 1 and the mysterious company which you 
 have assembled there, most struck me — " Death the 
 Skeleton and Time the Shadow." It is a sight not 
 for every youthful poet to dream of; it is one of the 
 last results he must have gone thinking on for years 
 for. " Laodamia " is a very original poem ; I mean 
 original with reference to your own manner. You 
 have nothing like it. I should have seen it in a 
 strange place, and greatly admired it, but not sus- 
 pected its derivation. 
 
 Let me in this place, for I have writ you several 
 letters naming it, mention that my brother, who is a 
 picture-collector, has picked up an undoubtable picture 
 of Milton. He gave a few shillings for it, and could 
 get no history with it, but that some old lady had had 
 it for a great many years. Its age is ascertainable 
 from the state of the canvas, and you need only see 
 it to be sure that it is the original of the heads in the 
 Tonson editions, with which we are all so well fami- 
 liar. Since I saw you I have had a treat in the 
 reading way, which comes not every day, 2 the Latin 
 Poems of V. Bourne, which were quite new to me. 
 What a heart that man had ! all laid out upon town 
 schemes, a proper counterpoise to some people's rural 
 extravaganzas. Why I mention him is, that your 
 " Power of Music " reminded me of his poem of " The 
 Ballad Singer in the Seven Dials." Do you remember 
 
 1 The poem on the four great yew trees of Borrowdale, which the 
 poet has, by the most potent magic of the imagination, converted into 
 a temple for the ghastly forms of Death and Time " to meet at noon- 
 tide," — a passage surely not surpassed in any English poetry written 
 since the days of Milton. 
 
 -2 The following litde passage about Vincent Bourne has been pre- 
 viously printed.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 27 1 
 
 his epigram on the old woman who taught Newton the 
 ABC? which, after all, he says, he hesitates not to call 
 Newton's " Principia." I was lately fatiguing my- 
 self with going through a volume of fine words by 
 Lord Thurlow ; excellent words ; and if the heart 
 could live by words alone, it could desire no better 
 regales ; but what an aching vacuum of matter ! I 
 don't stick at the madness of it, for that is only a 
 consequence of shutting his eyes and thinking he is 
 in the age of the old Elizabeth poets. From thence I 
 turned to Bourne. What a sweet, unpretending, 
 pretty-mannered, matter-fid creature ! sucking from 
 every flower, making a flower of every thing, his dic- 
 tion all Latin, and his thoughts all English. Bless 
 him ! Latin wasn't good enough for him. Why 
 wasn't he content with the language which Gay and 
 Prior wrote in ? 
 
 I am almost sorry that you printed extracts from 
 those first poems, 1 or that you did not print them 
 at length. They do not read to me as they do alto- 
 gether. Besides, they have diminished the value of 
 the original, which I possess as a curiosity. I have 
 hitherto kept them distinct in my mind as referring to 
 a particular period of your life. All the rest of your 
 poems are so much of a piece, they might have been 
 written in the same week ; these decidedly speak of 
 an earlier period. They tell more of what you had 
 been reading. We were glad to see the poems " by 
 a female friend." 2 The one of the Wind is masterly, but 
 
 1 The "Evening- Walk," and "Descriptive Sketches among the 
 Alps" — Wordsworth's earliest poems — now happily restored in their 
 entirety to their proper places in the poets collected works. 
 
 2 By Miss Dorothea Wordsworth.
 
 272 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 not new to us. Being only three, perhaps you might 
 have clapt a D. at the corner, and let it have past as 
 a printer's mark to the uninitiated, as a delightful 
 hint to the better instructed. As it is, expect a formal 
 criticism on the poems of your female friend, and she 
 must expect it. I should have written before, but I 
 am cruelly engaged, and like to be. On Friday I was 
 at office from ten in the morning (two hours dinner 
 except) to eleven at night; last night till nine. My 
 business and office business in general have increased 
 so ; I don't mean I am there every night, but I must 
 expect a great deal of it. I never leave till four, and 
 do not keep a holiday now once in ten times, where I 
 used to keep all red-letter days, and some five days 
 besides, which I used to dub Nature's holidays. I 
 have had my day. I had formerly little to do. So 
 of the little that is left of life, I may reckon two-thirds 
 as dead, for time that a man may call his own is his 
 life ; and hard work and thinking about it taints even 
 the leisure hours, — stains Sunday with work-day con- 
 templations. This is Sunday: and the head-ache I 
 have is part late hours at work the two preceding 
 nights, and part later hours over a consoling pipe 
 afterwards. But I find stupid acquiescence coming 
 over me. I bend to the yoke, and it is almost with 
 me and my household as with the man and his 
 consort — 
 
 " To them each evening had its glittering star, 
 And every Sabbath Day its golden sun " — 
 
 to such straits am I driven for the life of life, Time ! O 
 that from that superfluity of holiday leisure my youth 
 wasted, "Age might but take some hours youth 
 wanted not !" N.B. — I have left off spirituous liquors
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 273 
 
 for four or more months, with a moral certainty of its 
 lasting. 1 Farewell, dear Wordsworth ! 
 
 O happy Paris, seat of idleness and pleasure ! from 
 some returned English I hear that not such a thing 
 as a counting-house is to be seen in her streets, — 
 scarce a desk. Earthquakes swallow up this mercan- 
 tile city and its " gripple merchants," as Drayton 
 hath it — " born to be the curse of this brave isle ! " 
 I invoke this, not on account of any parsimonious 
 habits the mercantile interest may have, but, to con- 
 fess truth, because I am 'not fit for an office. 
 
 Farewell, in haste, from a head that is too ill to 
 methodize, a stomach too weak to digest, and all out 
 of tune. Better harmonies await you ! 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter XCIX. 
 
 Excuse this maddish letter : I am too tired to write 
 
 in forma. 
 
 1815 
 Dear Wordsworth, — The more I read of your last 
 two volumes, the more I feel it necessary to make my 
 acknowledgments for them in more than one short 
 letter. The " Night Piece," to which you refer me, I 
 meant fully to have noticed ; but, the fact is, I come 
 so fluttering and languid from business, tired with 
 thoughts of it, frightened with the fears of it, that 
 
 1 Alas for moral certainty in this moral but mortal world ! Lamb's 
 resolution to leave off spirituous liquors was a brave one , but he 
 strengthened and rewarded it by such copious libations of porter, that 
 his sister, for whose sake mainly he attempted the sacrifice, entreated 
 him to "live like himself," and in a few weeks after this assurance he 
 obeyed her. 
 
 VOL. I. T
 
 274 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 when I get a few minutes to sit down to scribble (an 
 action of the hand now seldom natural to me — I mean 
 voluntary pen-work) I lose all presential memory of 
 what I had intended to say, and say what I can, talk 
 about Vincent Bourne, or any casual image, instead 
 of that which I had meditated, (by the way, I must 
 look out V. B. for you). So 1 meant to mention 
 " Yarrow Visited," with that stanza, " But thou that 
 didst appear so fair ; " 1 than which I think no lovelier 
 stanza can be found in the wide world of poetry ; — 
 yet the poem, on the whole, seems condemned to 
 leave behind it a melancholy of imperfect satisfaction, 
 as if you had wronged the feeling with which, in what 
 preceded it, you had resolved never to visit it, and as 
 if the Muse had determined, in the most delicate 
 manner, to make you, and scarce make you, feel it. 
 Else, it is far superior to the other, which has but one 
 exquisite verse in it, the last but one, or the last 
 two : this is all fine, except perhaps that that of 
 " studious ease and generous cares " has a little tinge 
 of the less romantic about it. " The Farmer of Tils- 
 bury Vale " is a charming counterpart to " Poor 
 Susan," with the addition of that delicacy towards 
 aberrations from the strict path, which is so fine in 
 the "Old Thief and the Boy by his side," which 
 always brings water into my eyes. Perhaps it 
 is the worse for being a repetition ; " Susan " stood 
 for the representative of poor Rus in Urbe. There 
 was quite enough to stamp the moral of the thing 
 never to be forgotten ; " bright volumes of vapour," 
 
 But thou, that didst appear so fair 
 
 To fond imagination, 
 Dost rival in the light of day 
 
 Her delicate creation."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 275 
 
 &c. The last verse of Susan was to be got rid of, at 
 all events. It threw a kind of dubiety upon Susan's 
 moral conduct. Susan is a servant maid. I see her 
 trundling her mop, and contemplating the whirling 
 phenomenon through blurred optics ; but to term her 
 " a poor outcast " seems as much as to say that poor 
 Susan was no better than she should be, which I trust 
 was not what you meant to express. Robin Good- 
 fellow supports himself without that stick of a moral 
 which you have thrown away ; but how I can be 
 brought in felo de omittendo for that ending to the 
 Boy-builders is a mystery. I can't say positively 
 now, — I only know that no line oftener or readier occurs 
 than that " Light-hearted boys, I will build up a Giant 
 with you." It comes naturally, with a warm holiday, 
 and the freshness of the blood. It is a perfect sum- 
 mer amulet, that I tie round my legs to quicken their 
 motion when I go out a maying. (N.B.) I don't often 
 go out a maying ; — must is the tense with me now. 
 Do you take the pun? Young Romilly is divine; 1 
 
 1 The admirable little poem, entitled "The Force of Prayer," de- 
 veloping the depths of a widowed mother's grief, whose only son has 
 been drowned in attempting to leap over the precipice of the " Wharf" 
 at Bolton Abbey. The first line, printed in old English characters, 
 from some old English ballad, 
 
 "What is good for a bootless bene?" 
 
 suggests Miss Lamb's single pun. The following are the profoundest 
 stanzas among those which excite her brother's most just admira- 
 tion : — 
 
 " If for a lover the lady wept, 
 A solace she might borrow 
 From death and from the passion of deaths- 
 Old Wharf might heal her sorrow. 
 
 She weeps not for the wedding day, 
 
 Which was to be to-morrow : 
 Her hope was a further-looking hope, 
 
 And hers is a mother's sorrow." 
 
 T 2
 
 276 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 the reasons of his mother's grief being remediless. I 
 never saw parental love carried up so high, towering 
 above the other loves. Shakspeare had done some- 
 thing for the filial, in Cordelia, and, by implication, 
 for the fatherly too, in Lear's resentment ; he left it 
 for you to explore the depths of the maternal heart. I 
 get stupid, and flat, and flattering. What's the use of 
 telling you what good things you have written, or — I 
 hope I may add — that I know them to be good? 
 Apropos — when I first opened upon the just men- 
 tioned poem, in a careless tone, I said to Mary, as if 
 putting a riddle, " What is good for a bootless bene ?" 
 To which, with infinite presence of mind, (as the jest- 
 book has it,) she answered, " a shoeless pea." It 
 was the first joke she ever made. Joke the second I 
 make. You distinguish well, in your old preface, be- 
 tween the verses of Dr. Johnson, of the " Man in the 
 Strand," and those from " The Babes in the Wood." 
 I was thinking, whether taking your own glorious 
 lines — 
 
 "And from the love which was in her soul 
 For her youthful Romilly," 
 
 which, by the love I bear my own soul, I think 
 have no parallel in any of the best old ballads, and 
 just altering them to — 
 
 " And from the great respect she felt 
 For Sir Samuel Romilly," 
 
 would not have explained the boundaries of prose 
 expression, and poetic feeling, nearly as well. Excuse 
 my levity on such an occasion. I never felt deeply in 
 my life if that poem did not make me feel, both lately 
 and when I read it in MS. No alderman ever longed 
 after a haunch of buck venison more than I for a
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 277 
 
 spiritual taste of that "White Doe" you promise. 
 I am sure it is superlative, or will be when drest, i.e. 
 printed. All things read raw to me in MS. ; to com- 
 pare magna parvis, I cannot endure my own writings 
 in that state. The only one which I think would 
 not very much win upon me in print is " Peter Bell." 
 But I am not certain. You ask me about your pre- 
 face. I like both that and the supplement, without an 
 exception. The account of what you mean by imagi- 
 nation is very valuable to me. It will help me to like 
 some things in poetry better, which is a little humilia- 
 ting in me to confess. I thought I could not be 
 instructed in that science (I mean the critical), as I 
 once heard old obscene, beastly Peter Pindar, in a 
 dispute on Milton, say he thought that if he had 
 reason to value himself upon one thing more than 
 another, it was in knowing what good verse was. 
 Who looked over your proof sheets and left ordebo in 
 that line of Virgil ? 
 
 My brother's picture of Milton 1 is very finely 
 painted ; that is, it might have been done by a hand 
 next to Vandyke's. It is the genuine Milton, and an 
 object of quiet gaze for the half-hour at a time. 
 Yet though I am confident there is no better one of 
 him, the face does not quite answer to Milton. There 
 is a tinge of petit (or petite, how do you spell it ?) 
 querulousness about it ; yet, hang it ! now I remem- 
 ber better, there is not ; it is calm, melancholy, and 
 poetical. One of the copies of the poems you sent 
 has precisely the same pleasant blending of a sheet of 
 second volume with a sheet of first. I think it was 
 page 245 ; but I sent it and had it rectified. It gave 
 
 1 Now in the possession of Mrs, Moxon.
 
 278 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 me in the first impetus of cutting the leaves, just such 
 a cold squelch as going down a plausible turning and 
 suddenly reading " No thoroughfare !" Robinson's is 
 entire : I wish you would write more criticism about 
 Spenser, &c. I think I could say something about 
 him myself; but, Lord bless me! these "merchants 
 and their spicy drugs," which are so harmonious to 
 sing of, they lime-twig up my poor soul and body, till 
 I shall forget I ever thought myself a bit of a genius ! 
 I can't even put a few thoughts on paper for a news- 
 paper. I "engross" when I should "pen" a para- 
 graph. Confusion blast all mercantile transactions, 
 all traffic, exchange of commodities, intercourse be- 
 tween nations, all the consequent civilization, and 
 wealth, and amity, and link of society, and getting rid 
 of prejudices, and getting a knowledge of the face of the 
 globe ; and rotting the very firs of the forest, that look 
 so romantic alive, and die into desks ! Vale. 
 Yours, dear W., and all yours, 
 
 C. Lamb, 
 
 Letter C. August 9th, 1815. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — We acknowledge with pride 
 the receipt of both your handwritings, and desire to 
 be ever had in kindly remembrance by you both and 
 by Dorothy. Alsager, whom you call Alsinger, (and 
 indeed he is rather singer than sager, no reflection 
 upon his naturals neither,) is well, and in harmony 
 with himself and the world. I don't know how he, 
 and those of his constitution, keep their nerves so 
 nicely balanced as they do. Or, have they any ? Or, 
 are they made of packthread ? He is proof against
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 279 
 
 weather, ingratitude, meat underdone, every weapon 
 of fate. I have just now a jagged end of a tooth 
 pricking against my tongue, which meets it half way, 
 in a wantonness of provocation ; and there they go 
 at it, the tongue pricking itself, like the viper against 
 the file, and the tooth galling all the gum inside and out 
 to torture ; tongue and tooth, tooth and tongue, hard 
 at it ; and I to pay the reckoning, till all my mouth 
 is as hot as brimstone ; and I'd venture the roof of 
 my mouth, that at this moment, at which I conjecture 
 my full-happiness'd friend is picking his crackers, 
 that not one of the double rows of ivory in his privileged 
 mouth has as much as a flaw in it, but all perform 
 their functions, and, having performed them, expect 
 to be picked, (luxurious steeds !) and rubbed down. 
 I don't think he could be robbed, or have the house 
 set on fire, or ever want money. I have heard him 
 express a similar opinion of his own impassibility. I 
 keep acting here Heautontimorumenos. 
 
 Mr. Burney has been to Calais, and has come a 
 travelled Monsieur. He speaks nothing but the 
 Gallic Idiom. Field is on circuit. So now I believe 
 I have given account of most that you saw at our 
 Cabin. 
 
 Have you seen a curious letter in the Morning 
 Chronicle, by C. L. [Capell Lofft,] the genius of 
 absurdity, respecting Bonaparte's suing out his Habeas 
 Corpus ? That man is his own moon. He has no 
 need of ascending into that gentle planet for mild 
 influences. 
 
 Mary and I felt quite queer after your taking leave 
 (you W. W.) of us in St. Giles's. We wish we had 
 seen more of you, but felt we had scarce been suffi- 
 ciently acknowledging for the share we had enjoyed
 
 280 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 of your company. We felt as if we had been not 
 enough expressive of our pleasure. But our manners 
 both are a little too much on this side of too-much- 
 cordiality. We want presence of mind and presence 
 of heart. What we feel comes too late, like an after- 
 thought impromptu. But perhaps you observed 
 nothing of that which we have been painfully con- 
 scious of, and are every day in our intercourse with 
 those we stand affected to through all the degrees of 
 love. Robinson is on the circuit. Our panegyrist I 
 thought had forgotten one of the objects of his youth- 
 ful admiration, but I was agreeably removed from 
 that scruple by the laundress knocking at my door 
 this morning, almost before I was up, with a present 
 of fruit from my young friend, &c. There is 
 something inexpressibly pleasant to me in these 
 presents, be it fruit, or fowl, or brawn, or what not. 
 Books are a legitimate cause of acceptance. If 
 presents be not the soul of friendship, undoubtedly 
 they are the most spiritual part of the body of that 
 intercourse. There is too much narrowness of think- 
 ing in this point. The punctilio of acceptance, 
 methinks, is too confined and strait-laced. I could 
 be content to receive money, or clothes, or a joint of 
 meat from a friend. Why should he not send me a 
 dinner as well as a dessert ? I would taste him in 
 the beasts of the field, and through all creation. 
 Therefore did the basket of fruit of the juvenile Tal- 
 fourd not displease me; not that I have any thoughts 
 of bartering or reciprocating these things. To send 
 him anything in return, would be to reflect suspicion 
 of mercenariness upon what I know he meant a free- 
 will offering. Let him overcome me in bounty. In 
 this strife a generous nature loves to be overcome.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 28l 
 
 You wish me some of your leisure. I have a glim- 
 mering" aspect, a chink-light of liberty before me, 
 which I pray God may prove not fallacious. My re- 
 monstrances have stirred up others to remonstrate, and 
 altogether, there is a plan for separating certain parts 
 of business from our department ; which, if it take 
 place, will produce me more time, i. e. my evenings 
 free. It may be a means of placing me in a more 
 conspicuous situation, which will knock at my nerves 
 another way, but I wait the issue in submission. If 
 I can but begin my own day at four o'clock in the 
 afternoon, I shall think myself to have Eden days of 
 peace and liberty to what I have had. As you say, 
 how a man can fill three volumes up with an essay 
 on the drama is wonderful ; I am sure a very few 
 sheets would hold all I had to say on the subject. 
 
 Did you ever read " Charron on Wisdom ?" or 
 " Patrick's Pilgrim ?" If neither, you have two great 
 pleasures to come. I mean some day to attack Caryl 
 on Job, six folios. What any man can write, surely 
 I may read. If I do but get rid of auditing ware- 
 housekeepers' accounts and get no worse-harassing 
 task in the place of it, what a lord of liberty I shall 
 be ! I shall dance and skip, and make mouths at the 
 invisible event, and pick the thorns out of my pillow, 
 and throw 'em at rich men's night-caps, and talk 
 blank verse, hoity-toity, and sing — " A clerk I was in 
 London gay," "Ban, ban, Ca-Caliban," like the eman- 
 cipated monster, and go where I like, up this street 
 or down that alley. Adieu, and pray that it may be 
 my luck. 
 Good bye to you all. 
 
 C. Lamb.
 
 282 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 Letter CI. April 9th, 1816. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — Thanks for the books you 
 have given me and for all the books you mean 
 to give me. I will bind up the Political Sonnets 
 and Ode according to your suggestion. I have not 
 bound the poems yet. I wait till people have done 
 borrowing them. I think I shall get a chain and 
 chain them to my shelves, more Bodleiano, and people 
 may come and read them at chain's length. For of 
 those who borrow, some read slow ; some mean to 
 read but don't read ; and some neither read nor meant 
 to read, but borrow to leave you an opinion of their 
 sagacity. I must do my money-borrowing friends 
 the justice to say that there is nothing of this caprice 
 or wantonness of alienation in them. When they 
 borrow my money they never fail to make use of it. 
 Coleridge has been here about a fortnight. His 
 health is tolerable at present, though beset with 
 temptations. In the first place, the Covent Garden 
 Manager has declined accepting his Tragedy, though 
 (having read it) I see no reason upon earth why it 
 might not have run a very fair chance, though it 
 certainly wants a prominent part for a Miss O'Neil or 
 a Mr. Kean. However, he is going to-day to write to 
 Lord Byron to get it to Drury. Should you see Mrs. C, 
 who has just written to C. a letter, which I have 
 given him, it will be as well to say nothing about its 
 fate, till some answer is shaped from Drury. He has 
 two volumes printing together at Bristol, both finished 
 as far as the composition goes ; the latter containing his 
 fugitive poems, the former his Literary Life. Nature, 
 who conducts every creature, by instinct, to its best 
 end, has skilfully directed C. to take up his abode at 
 a Chemist's Laboratory in Norfolk Street. She might
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 283 
 
 as well have sent a Helluo Librorum for cure to the 
 Vatican. God keep him inviolate among the traps 
 and pitfalls ! He has done pretty well as yet. 
 
 Tell Miss Hfutchinson] 1 my sister is every day 
 wishing to be quietly sitting down to answer her very 
 kind letter, but while C. stays she can hardly find a 
 quiet time ; God bless him ! 
 
 Tell Mrs. W. her postscripts are always agreeable. 
 They are so legible too. Your manual-graphy is 
 terrible, dark as Lycophron. " Likelihood," for 
 instance, is thus typified .... I should not 
 wonder if the constant making out of such paragraphs 
 is the cause of that weakness in Mrs. W.'s eyes, as 
 she is tenderly pleased to express it. Dorothy, I 
 hear, has mounted spectacles ; so you have deocu- 
 lated two of your dearest relations in life. Well, God 
 bless you, and continue to give you power to write 
 with a finger of power upon our hearts what you fail 
 to impress, in corresponding lucidness, upon our 
 outward eye-sight ! 
 
 Mary's love to all ; she is quite well. 
 
 I am called off to do the deposits on Cotton Wool ; 
 but why do I relate this to you, who want faculties 
 to comprehend the great mystery of deposits, of 
 interests, of warehouse rent, and contingent fund? 
 Adieu ! 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 A longer letter when C. is gone back into the 
 country, relating his success, &c. — my judgment of 
 your new books, &c, &c. — I am scarce quiet enough 
 while he stays. Yours again, C. L. 
 
 1 Mrs. Wordsworth's sister. Lamb's correspondence with her (such 
 of it as has been found) is printed post.
 
 284 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 Letter CIL] 1817. 
 
 My dear Miss Wordsworth, — Your kind letter has 
 given us very great pleasure ; the sight of your hand- 
 writing was a most welcome surprise to us. We 
 have heard good tidings of you by all our friends 
 who were so fortunate as to visit you this Sum- 
 mer, and rejoice to see it confirmed by yourself. 
 You have quite the advantage, in volunteering a 
 letter ; there is no merit in replying to so welcome a 
 stranger. 
 
 We have left the Temple. I think you will be 
 sorry to hear this. I know I have never been so well 
 satisfied with thinking of you at Rydal Mount, as 
 when I could connect the idea of you with your own 
 Grasmere Cottage. Our rooms were dirty and out of 
 repair, and the inconveniences of living in chambers 
 became every year more irksome, and so, at last, we 
 mustered up resolution enough to leave the good old 
 place, that so long had sheltered us, and here we are, 
 living at a brazier's shop, No. 20, in Russell Street, 
 Covent Garden, a place all alive with noise and bustle; 
 Drury Lane Theatre in sight from our front, and Covent 
 Garden from our back windows. The hubbub of the 
 carriages returning from the play does not annoy me 
 in the least ; strange that it does not, for it is quite 
 tremendous. I quite enjoy looking out of the window, 
 and listening to the calling up of the carriages, and 
 the squabbles of the coachmen and linkboys. It is 
 the oddest scene to look down upon ; I am sure you 
 would be amused with it. It is well I am in a cheer- 
 ful place, or I should have many misgivings about 
 leaving the Temple. I look forward with great 
 pleasure to the prospect of seeing my good friend,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 285 
 
 Miss Hutchinson. I wish Rydal Mount, with all its 
 inhabitants enclosed, were to be transplanted with 
 her, and to remain stationary in the midst of Covent 
 Garden. 
 
 I passed through the street lately where Mr. and 
 Mrs. Wordsworth lodged ; several fine new houses, 
 which were then just rising out of the ground, are 
 quite finished, and a noble entrance made that way 
 into Portland Place. I am very sorry for Mr. De 
 Quincey. What a blunder the poor man made when 
 he took up his dwelling among the mountains ! I 
 long to see my friend Pypos. 1 Coleridge is still at 
 Little Hampton with Mrs. Gilman ; he has been so 
 ill as to be confined to his room almost the whole 
 time he has been there. 
 
 Charles has had all his Hogarths bound in a book ; 
 they were sent home yesterday, and now that I have 
 them altogether, and perceive the advantage of peep- 
 ing close at them through my spectacles, I am recon- 
 ciled to the loss of them hanging round the room, 
 which has been a great mortification to me — in vain 
 I tried to console myself with looking at our new 
 chairs and carpets, for we have got new chairs, and 
 carpets covering all over our two sitting-rooms ; I 
 missed my old friends and could not be comforted^ — then 
 I would resolve to learn to look out of the window, a 
 habit I never could attain in my life, and I have given 
 it up as a thing quite impracticable — yet when I was 
 at Brighton, last Summer, the first week I never took 
 my eyes off from the sea, not even to look in a book: 
 I had not seen the sea for sixteen years. Mrs. Mor- 
 gan, who was with us, kept her liking, and continued. 
 
 l Hartley Coleridge.
 
 286 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 her seat in the window till the very last, while Charles 
 and I played truants, and wandered among the hills, 
 which we magnified into little mountains, and almost 
 as good as Westmoreland scenery : certainly we made 
 discoveries of many pleasant walks, which few of the 
 Brighton visitors have ever dreamed of — for, like as is 
 the case in the neighbourhood of London, after the 
 first two or three miles we were sure to find ourselves 
 in a perfect solitude. I hope we shall meet before the 
 walking faculties of either of us fail ; you say you can 
 walk fifteen miles with ease ; that is exactly my stint, 
 and more fatigues me ; four or five miles every third 
 or fourth day, keeping very quiet between, was all 
 Mrs. Morgan could accomplish. 
 
 God bless you and yours. Love to all and each 
 one. 
 
 I am ever yours most affectionately, 
 
 M. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CIII.] Nov. 21st, 1 817. 
 
 Dear Miss Wordsworth, — Here we are, trans- 
 planted from our native soil. I thought we never 
 could have been torn up from the Temple. Indeed it 
 was art ugly wrench, but like a tooth, now 'tis out, 
 and I am easy. We never can strike root so deep in 
 any other ground. This, where we are, is a light bit 
 of gardener's mould, and if they take us up from it, it 
 will cost no blood and groan's, like man-drakes pulled 
 up. We are in the individual spot I like best, in all 
 this great city. The theatres, with all their noises. 
 Covent Garden, dearer to me than any gardens of 
 Alcinoiis, where we are morally sure of the earliest
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 287 
 
 peas and 'sparagus. Bow Street, where the thieves 
 are examined, within a few yards of us. Mary had 
 not been here four-and-twenty hours before she saw a 
 thief. She sits at the window working ; and casually 
 throwing out her eyes, she sees a concourse of people 
 coming this way, with a constable to conduct the 
 solemnity. These little incidents agreeably diversify 
 a female life. 
 
 Mary has brought her part of this letter to an or- 
 thodox and loving conclusion, which is very well, for 
 I have no room for pansies and remembrances. 
 What a nice holyday I got on Wednesday by favour 
 of a princess dying ! C. L. 
 
 LETTER CIV.] East-India House, 18th Feb., 181 8. 
 
 My dear Mrs. Wordsworth, — I have repeatedly 
 taken pen in hand to answer your kind letter. My 
 sister should more properly have done it, but she 
 having failed, I consider myself answerable for her 
 debts. I am now trying to do it in the midst of com- 
 mercial noises, and with a quill which seems more 
 ready to glide into arithmetical figures and names of 
 gourds, cassia, cardamoms, aloes, ginger, or tea, than 
 into kindly responses and friendly recollections. The 
 reason why I cannot write letters at home, is, that I 
 am never alone. Plato's — (I write to W. W. now) — 
 Plato's double-animal parted never longed more to be 
 reciprocally re-united in the system of its first creation 
 than I sometimes do to be but for a moment single 
 and separate. Except my morning's walk to the 
 office, which is like treading on sands of gold for that
 
 288 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 reason, I am never so. I cannot walk home from 
 office but some officious friend offers his unwelcome 
 courtesies to accompany me. All the morning I am 
 pestered. I could sit and gravely cast up sums in 
 great books, or compare sum with sum, and write 
 "paid" against this, and "unpaid" against t'other, 
 and yet reserve in some corner of my mind " some 
 darling thoughts all my own," — faint memory of some 
 passage in a book, or the tone of an absent friend's 
 voiced — a snatch of Miss Burrell's singing, or a gleam 
 of Fanny Kelly's divine plain face. The two opera- 
 tions might be going on at the same time without 
 thwarting, as the sun's two motions, (earth's I mean,) 
 or as I sometimes turn round till I am giddy, in my 
 back parlour, while my sister is walking longitudinally 
 in the front ; or as the shoulder of veal twists round 
 with the spit, while the smoke wreathes up the 
 chimney. But there are a set of amateurs of the 
 Belles Lettres — the gay science — who come to me as 
 a sort of rendezvous, putting questions of criticism, 
 of British Institutions, Lalla Rookhs, &c. — what 
 Coleridge said at the lecture last night — who have 
 the form of reading men, but, for any possible use 
 reading can be to them, but to talk of, might as well 
 have been Ante-Cadmeans born, or have lain sucking 
 out the sense of an Egyptian hieroglyph as long as 
 the pyramids will last, before they should find it. 
 These pests worrit me at business, and in all its 
 intervals, perplexing my accounts, poisoning my little 
 salutary warming-time at the fire, puzzling my para- 
 graphs if I take a newspaper, cramming in between 
 my own free thoughts and a column of figures, which 
 had come to an amicable compromise but for them. 
 Their noise ended, one of them, as I said, accom-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 289 
 
 panies me home, lest I should be solitary for 
 moment ; he at length takes his welcome leave at 
 the door; up I go, mutton on table, hungry as hunter, 
 hope to forget my cares, and bury them in the agree- 
 able abstraction of mastication ; knock at the door, in 
 comes Mr. Hazlitt, or Mr. Martin Burney, or Morgan 
 Demi-gorgon, or my brother, or somebody, to prevent 
 my eating alone — a process absolutely necessary to 
 my poor wretched digestion. O the pleasure of 
 eating alone ! — eating my dinner alone ! let me think 
 of it. But in they come, and make it absolutely 
 necessary that I should open a bottle of orange ; for 
 my meat turns into stone when any one dines with 
 me, if I have not wine. Wine can mollify stones ; 
 then that wine turns into acidity, acerbity, misan- 
 thropy, a hatred of my interrupters — (God bless 'em ! 
 I love some of 'em dearly), and with the hatred, a still 
 greater aversion to their going away. Bad is the 
 dead sea they bring upon me, choking and deadening, 
 but worse is the deader dry sand they leave me on, if 
 they go before bed-time. Come never, I would say 
 to these spoilers of my dinner ; but if you come, never 
 go ! The fact is, this interruption does not happen 
 very often ; but every time it comes by surprise, that 
 present bane of my life, orange wine, with all its dreary 
 stifling consequences, follows. Evening company I 
 should always like had I any mornings, but I am 
 saturated with human faces (divine forsooth !) and 
 voices all the golden morning ; and five evenings in 
 a week would be as much as I should covet to be in 
 company ; but I assure you that is a wonderful week 
 in which I can get two, or one to myself. I am never 
 C. L., but always C. L. & Co. He who thought it 
 not good for man to be alone, preserve me from the 
 vol. 1. u
 
 20,0 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 more prodigious monstrosity of being never by my- 
 self! I forget bed-time, but even there these sociable 
 frogs clamber up to annoy me. Once a week, gene- 
 rally some singular evening that, being alone, I go to 
 bed at the hour I ought always to be a-bed; just close 
 to my bed-room window is the club-room of a public- 
 house, where a set of singers, I take them to be chorus 
 singers of the two theatres, (it must be both of them,) 
 begin their orgies. They are a set of fellows (as I 
 conceive) who, being limited by their talents to the 
 burthen of the song at the play-houses, in revenge 
 have got the common popular airs by Bishop, or some 
 cheap composer, arranged for choruses ; that is, to be 
 sung all in chorus. At least I never can catch any of 
 the text of the plain song, nothing but the Babylonish 
 choral howl at the tail on't. " That fury being 
 quenched " — the howl I mean — a burden succeeds of 
 shouts and clapping, and knocking of the table. At 
 length overtasked nature drops under it, and escapes 
 for a few hours into the society of the sweet silent 
 creatures of dreams, which go away with mocks and 
 mows at cockcrow. And then I think of the words 
 Christabel's father used (bless me, I have dipt in the 
 wrong ink !) to say every morning by way of variety 
 when he awoke : 
 
 "Every knell, the Baron saith. 
 Wakes us up to a world of death" — 
 
 or something like it. All I mean by this senseless 
 interrupted tale, is, that by my central situation I am 
 a little over-companied. Not that I have any 
 animosity against the good creatures that are so 
 anxious to drive away the harpy solitude from me. I 
 like 'em, and cards, and a cheerful glass ; but I mean
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 2gi 
 
 merely to give you an idea, between office confinement 
 and after-office society, how little time I can call my 
 own. I mean only to draw a picture, not to make an 
 inference. I would not that I know of have it other- 
 wise. I only wish sometimes I could exchange some 
 of my faces and voices for the faces and voices which 
 a late visitation brought most welcome, and carried 
 away, leaving regret, but more pleasure, even a kind 
 of gratitude, at being so often favoured with that kind 
 northern visitation. My London faces and noises 
 don't hear me — I mean no disrespect, or I should 
 explain myself, that instead of their return 220 times 
 a year, and the return of W. W., &c, seven times in 
 104 weeks, some more equal distribution might be 
 found. I have scarce room to put in Mary's kind 
 love, and my poor name, C. Lamb. 
 
 W. H. 1 goes on lecturing against W. W. and 
 making copious use of quotations from said W. W. 
 to give a zest to said lectures. S. T. C. is lecturing 
 with success. I have not heard either him or H., 
 but I dined with S. T. C. at Gilman's a Sunday or 
 two since, and he was well and in good spirits. I 
 mean to hear some of the course ; but lectures are not 
 much to my taste, whatever the lecturer may be. If 
 read, they are dismal fiat, and you can't think why 
 you are brought together to hear a man read his 
 works, which you could read so much better at 
 leisure yourself. If delivered extempore, I am always 
 in pain, lest the gift of utterance should suddenly 
 
 1 Wiliiam Hazlitt. His Lectures on the English Poets, published in 
 181 8, are here referred to. He said of Wordsworth, "Mr. Words- 
 worth is the most original poet now living."
 
 292 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 fail the orator in the middle, as it did me at the dinner 
 given in honour of me at the London Tavern. 
 " Gentlemen," said I, and there I stopped ; the rest 
 my feelings were under the necessity of supplying. 
 Mrs. Wordsworth will go on, kindly haunting us with 
 visions of seeing the lakes once more, which never 
 can be realised. Between us there is a great gulf, 
 not of inexplicable moral antipathies and distances, 
 I hope, as there seemed to be between me and that 
 gentleman concerned in the Stamp Office, that I so 
 strangely recoiled from at Haydon's. I think I had 
 an instinct that he was the head of an office. I hate 
 all such people — accountants' deputy accountants. 
 The dear abstract notion of the East India Company, 
 as long as she is unseen, is pretty, rather poetical ; 
 but as she makes herself manifest by the persons of 
 such beasts, I loathe and detest her as the scarlet 
 what-do-you-call-her of Babylon. I thought, after 
 abridging us of all our red-letter days, they had done 
 their worst ; but I was deceived in the length to which 
 heads of offices, those true liberty-haters, can go. 
 They are the tyrants ; not Ferdinand, nor Nero. By 
 a decree passed this week, they have abridged us of 
 the immemorially-observed custom of going at one 
 o'clock of a Saturday, the little shadow of a holiday 
 left us. Dear VV. W., be thankful for liberty.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 20,3 
 
 LETTER CV. 1 Accountant's Office, 26th April, 1818. 
 
 Dear W., — I have just finished the pleasing task 
 of correcting the revise of the poems and letter. I 
 hope they will come out faultless. One blunder I 
 saw and shuddered at. The hallucinating rascal had 
 printed battered for battened, this last not conveying 
 any distinct sense to his gaping soul. The Reader 
 (as they call 'em) had discovered it, and given it the 
 marginal brand, but the substitutory n had not yet 
 appeared. I accompanied his notice with a most 
 pathetic address to the printer not to neglect the cor- 
 rection. I know how such a blunder would " batter 
 at your peace." With regard to the works, the Letter 
 I read with unabated satisfaction. Such a thing was 
 wanted ; called for. The parallel of Cotton with 
 Burns I heartily approve. Izaak Walton hallows any 
 page in which his reverend name appears. " Duty 
 archly bending to purposes of general benevolence " 
 is exquisite. The poems I endeavoured not to under- 
 stand, but to read them with my eye alone, and I 
 think I succeeded. (Some people will do that when 
 they come out, you'll say.) As if I were to luxuriate 
 to-morrow at some picture gallery I was never at be- 
 fore, and going by to-day by chance, found the door 
 open, and had but five minutes to look about me, 
 peeped in ; just such a chastised peep I took with my 
 
 1 This letter is fantastically written beneath a regular official order, 
 the words in italics being printed. 
 
 " Sir, — Please to state the weights and amounts of the Jo I hiving 
 Lots of sold Sale, 181 for 
 
 " Tour obedient Servant, 
 
 Chas. Lamb."
 
 294 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 mind at the lines my luxuriating eye was coursing 
 over unrestrained, not to anticipate another day's 
 fuller satisfaction. Coleridge is printing " Christabel," 
 by Lord Byron's recommendation to Murray, with 
 what he calls a vision, " Kubla Khan," which said 
 vision he repeats so enchantingly that it irradiates 
 and brings heaven and elysian bowers into my parlour 
 while he sings or says it ; but there is an observation, 
 " Never tell thy dreams," and I am almost afraid that 
 " Kubla Khan" is an owl that won't bear day-light. I 
 fear lest it should be discovered by the lantern of 
 typography and clear reducting to letters no better 
 than nonsense or no sense. When I was young I 
 used to chant with ecstasy " Mild Arcadians ever 
 blooming," till somebody told me it was meant to be 
 nonsense. Even yet I have a lingering attachment 
 to it, and I think it better than " Windsor Forest," 
 " Dying Christian's Address," &c. Coleridge has 
 sent his tragedy to D[rury] L[ane] T[heatreJ, It 
 cannot be acted this season ; and by their manner of 
 receiving, I hope he will be able to alter it to make 
 them accept it for next. He is, at present, under the 
 medical care of a Mr. Gilman, (Killman ?) a Highgate 
 apothecary, where he plays at leaving off laud — m. I 
 think his essentials not touched : he is very bad ; but 
 then he wonderfully picks up another day, and his 
 face, when he repeats his verses, hath its ancient 
 glory; an archangel a little damaged. Will Miss H. 
 pardon our not replying at length to her kind letter ? 
 We are not quiet enough ; Morgan is with us every 
 day, going betwixt Highgate and the Temple. Cole- 
 ridge is absent but four miles, and the neighbourhood 
 of such a man is as exciting as the presence of fifty 
 ordinary persons. Tis enough to be within the whiff
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 295 
 
 and wind of his genius for us not to possess our souls 
 in quiet. If I lived with him or the Author of the 
 Excursion, I should, in a very little time, lose my 
 own identity, and be dragged along in the current of 
 other people's thoughts, hampered in a net. How 
 cool I sit in this office, with no possible interruption 
 further than what I may term material ! There is 
 not as much metaphysics in thirty-six of the people 
 here as there is in the first page of Locke's "Treatise 
 on the Human Understanding," or as much poetry 
 as in any ten lines of the " Pleasures of Hope," or 
 more natural " Beggar's Petition." I never entangle 
 myself in any of their speculations. Interruptions, if 
 I try to write a letter even, I have dreadful. Just 
 now, within four lines, I was called off for ten minutes 
 to consult dusty old books for the settlement of obso- 
 lete errors. I hold you a guinea you don't find the 
 chasm where I left off, so excellently the wounded 
 sense closed again and was healed. 
 
 N.B. — Nothing said above to the contrary, but that 
 I hold the personal presence of the two mentioned 
 potent spirits at a rate as high as any ; but I pay 
 dearer. What amuses others robs me of myself : my 
 mind is positively discharged into their greater cur- 
 rents, but flows with a willing violence. As to your 
 question about work ; it is far less oppressive to me 
 than it was, from circumstances. It takes all the 
 golden part of the day away, a solid lump, from ten to 
 four; but it does not kill my peace as before. Some 
 day or other I shall be in a taking again. My head 
 aches, and you have had enough. God bless you ! 
 
 C. Lamb.
 
 20,6 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 Letter CVI.] 1819. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, —I received a copy of " Peter 
 Bell " a week ago, and I hope the author will not be 
 offended if I say I do not much relish it. The 
 humour, if it is meant for humour, is forced ; and 
 then the price ! — sixpence would have been dear for 
 it. Mind, I do not mean your " Peter Bell," but a 
 " Peter Bell " which preceded it about a week, and is 
 in every bookseller's shop window in London, the 
 type and paper nothing differing from the true one, 
 the preface signed VV. W., and the supplementary 
 preface quoting as the author's words an extract from 
 the supplementary preface to the " Lyrical Ballads." 
 Is there no law against these rascals ? I would have 
 this Lambert Simnel whipt at the cart's tail. Then 
 there is Rogers ! He has been re-writing your Poem of 
 the Strid, and publishing it at the end of his " Human 
 Life." Tie him up to the cart, hangman, while you are 
 about it. Who started the spurious " P. B." I have 
 not heard. I should guess, one of the sneering 
 brothers, the vile Smiths j 1 but I have heard no name 
 mentioned. "Peter Bell" (not the mock one) is 
 excellent; for its matter I mean. I cannot say that 
 the style of it quite satisfies me. It is too lyrical. 
 The auditors to whom it is feigned to be told, do not 
 arride me. I would rather it had been told me, the 
 reader, at once. " Hartleap Well " is the tale for me : 
 in matter as good as this ; in manner infinitely before 
 it, in my poor judgment. Why did you not add 
 " The Waggoner ?" — Have I thanked you, though, 
 yet, for " Peter Bell ?" I would not nut liave it for a 
 
 1 Authors of the Rejected Addresses.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 297 
 
 good deal of money. C is very foolish to scribble 
 
 about books. Neither his tongue nor fingers are very 
 retentive. But I shall not say any thing to him about 
 it. He would only begin a very long story, with a 
 very long face ; and I see him far too seldom to teaze 
 him with affairs of business or conscience when I do 
 see him. He never comes near our house ; and when 
 we go to see him he is generally writing, or think- 
 ing. He is writing in his study till the dinner comes, 
 and that is scarce over before the stage summons us 
 away. The mock " P. B." had only this effect on 
 me, that after twice reading it over in hopes to find 
 something diverting in it, I reached your two books 
 off the shelf, and set into a steady reading of them, 
 till I had nearly finished both before I went to bed : 
 the two of your last edition, of course, I mean : and 
 in the morning I awoke determining to take down the 
 Excursion. I wish the scoundrel imitator could 
 know this. But why waste a wish on him ? I do 
 not believe that paddling about with a stick in a 
 pond, and fishing up a dead author, whom his in- 
 tolerable wrongs had driven to that, deed of despera- 
 tion, would turn the heart of one of these obtuse 
 literary Bells. There is no Cock for such Peters ; — 
 — damn 'em ! I am glad this aspiration came upon 
 the red ink line. It is more of a bloody curse. I 
 have delivered over your other presents to Alsager 
 and G. D. A., I am sure, will value it, and be proud 
 of the hand from which it came. To G. D. a poem is 
 a poem. His own as good as anybody's, and (God 
 bless him !) any body's as good as his own ; for I do 
 not think he has the most distant guess of the possi- 
 bility of one poem being better than another. The 
 gods, by denying him the very faculty itself of dis-
 
 2g8 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSVVORTHS. 
 
 crimination, have effectually cut off every seed of 
 envy in his bosom. But with envy, they excited 
 curiosity also; and if you wish the copy again, which 
 you destined for him, I think I shall be able to find it 
 again for you, on his third shelf, where he stuffs his 
 presentation copies, uncut, in shape and matter re- 
 sembling a lump of dry dust ; but on carefully re- 
 moving that stratum, a thing like a pamphlet will 
 emerge. I have tried this with fifty different poetical 
 works that have been given G. D. in return for as 
 many of his own performances ; and I confess I never 
 had any scruple in taking my own again, wherever I 
 found it, shaking the adherences off; and by this 
 means one copy of " my works " served for G. D., 
 and, with a little dusting, was made over to my good 
 
 friend Dr. G , who little thought whose leavings 
 
 he was taking when he made that graceful bow. By 
 the way, the Doctor is the only one of my acquaint- 
 ance who bows gracefully; my town acquaintance, I 
 mean. How do you like my way of writing with 
 two inks? I think it is pretty and motley. Suppose 
 Mrs. W. adopts it, the next time she holds the pen 
 for you. My dinner waits. I have no time to indulge 
 any longer in these laborious curiosities. God bless 
 you, and cause to thrive and burgeon whatsoever you 
 write, and fear no inks of miserable poetasters. 
 
 Yours truly, Charles Lamb. 
 
 Marv's love. 
 
 Letter CVIL] June 7th, 1819. 
 
 My Dear Wordsworth, — You cannot imagine how 
 proud we are here of the dedication. We read it 
 twice for once that we do the poem. I mean all
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 299 
 
 through; yet " Benjamin" is no common favourite; 
 there is a spirit of beautiful tolerance in it. It is as 
 good as it was in 1806; and it will be as good in 
 1829, if our dim eyes shall be awake to peruse it. 
 Methinks there is a kind of shadowing affinity between 
 the subject of the narrative and the subject of the 
 dedication ; but I will not enter into personal themes ; 
 else, substituting * * * * * * for Ben, and 
 the Honourable United Company of Merchants 
 trading to the East Indies, for the master of the mis- 
 used team, it might seem, by no far-fetched analogy, 
 to point its dim warnings hitherward ; but I reject 
 the omen, especially as its import seems to have been 
 diverted to another victim. 
 
 I will never write another letter with alternate inks. 
 You cannot imagine how it cramps the flow of the 
 style. I can conceive Pindar, (I do not mean to com- 
 pare myself to him,) by the command of Hiero, the 
 Sicilian tyrant, (was not he the tyrant of some place ? 
 fie on my neglect of history!) I can conceive him by 
 command of Hiero or Perillus set down to pen an 
 Isthmian or Nemean panegyric in lines, alternate red 
 and black. I maintain he couldn't have done it ; it 
 would have been a strait-laced torture to his muse ; he 
 would have call'd for the bull for a relief. Neither 
 could Lycidas, nor the Chorics (how do you like the 
 word ?) of Samson Agonistes, have been written with 
 two inks. Your couplets, with points, epilogues to 
 Mr. H.'s, &c, might be even benefited by the twy- 
 fount, where one line (the second) is for point, and 
 the first for rhyme. I think the alteration would 
 assist, like a mould. I maintain it, you could not 
 have written your stanzas on pre-existence with two 
 inks. Try another; and Rogers, with his silver
 
 300 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 standish. having one ink only, I will bet my " Ode on 
 Tobacco," against the " Pleasures of Memory," — 
 and " Hope," too, shall put more fervour of enthusiasm 
 into the same subject than you can with your two ; 
 he shall do it stcuis pede in uno, as it were. 
 
 The " Waggoner" is very ill put up in boards ; at 
 least it seems to me always to open at the dedica- 
 tion ; but that is a mechanical fault. I re-read the 
 " White Doe of Rylstone ;" the title should be always 
 written at length, as Mary Sabilla Novello, a very 
 nice woman of our acquaintance, always signs hers 
 at the bottom of the shortest note. Mary told her, if 
 her name had been Mary Ann, she would have signed 
 M. A. Novello, or M. only, dropping the A. ; which 
 makes me think, with some other trifles, that she 
 understands something of human nature. My pen 
 goes galloping on most rhapsodically, glad to have 
 escaped the bondage of two inks. 
 
 Manning had just sent it home, and it came as fresh 
 to me as the immortal creature it speaks of. M. sent it 
 home with a note, having this passage in it : "I 
 cannot help writing to you while I am reading Words- 
 worth's poem. I am got into the third canto, and 
 say that it raises my opinion of him very much 
 indeed. 1 'Tis broad, noble, poetical, with a masterly 
 scanningof human actions, absolutely above common 
 readers. What a manly (implied) interpretation of 
 (bad) party-actions, as trampling the Bible, &c. !" and 
 so he goes on. 
 
 I do not know which I like best, — the prologue (the 
 latter part especially) to " P. Bell," or the epilogue to 
 
 1 " N.B. — M., from his preregrinations, is twelve or fourteen years 
 behind in his knowledge of who has or has not written good verse <>t 
 late.''
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 30I 
 
 "Benjamin." Yes, I tell stories ; I do know I like the 
 last best ; and the " Waggoner" altogether is a plea- 
 santer remembrance to me than the " Itinerant." If 
 it were not, the page before the first page would and 
 ought to make it so. The sonnets are not all new to 
 me ; of those which are new, the ninth I like best. 
 Thank you for that to Walton. 1 I take it as a favour 
 done to me, that, being so old a darling of mine, you 
 should bear testimony to his worth in a book contain- 
 ing a dedic : I cannot write the vain word at full 
 
 length any longer. 
 
 If, as you say, the " Waggoner," in some sort, 
 came at my call, oh for a potent voice to call forth 
 the " Recluse" from his profound dormitory, where he 
 sleeps forgetful of his foolish charge — the world ! 
 
 Had I three inks, I would invoke him ! Talfourd 
 has written a most kind review of J. Woodvil, &c, in 
 the Champion. He is your most zealous admirer, in 
 solitude and in crowds. H. Crabb Robinson gives 
 me any dear prints that I happen to admire ; and I 
 love him for it and for other things. Alsager shall 
 have his copy; but at present I have lent it for a day 
 only, not choosing to part with my own. Mary's love. 
 How do you all do, amanuenses both — marital and 
 sororal ? 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CVIII. [Nov. 25th, 1 819.] 
 
 Dear Miss Wordsworth, — You Will think me negli- 
 gent : but I wanted to see more of Willy before I ventured 
 
 1 Izaak Walton.
 
 302 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 to express a prediction. Till yesterday I had barely 
 seen him — Virgiliiim tantum vidi — but yesterday he 
 gave us his small company to a bullock's heart, and I 
 can pronounce him a lad of promise. He is no 
 pedant, nor bookworm; so-far I can answer. Perhaps 
 he has hitherto paid too little attention to other men's 
 inventions, preferring, like Lord Foppington, the 
 " natural sprouts of his own." But he has observa- 
 tion, and seems thoroughly awake. I am ill at re- 
 membering other people's bon mots, but the following 
 are a few : — Being taken over Waterloo Bridge, he 
 remarked, that if we had no mountains, we had a fine 
 river at least ; which was a touch of the comparative : 
 but then he added, in a strain which augured less for 
 his future abilities as a political economist, that he 
 supposed they must take at least a pound a week 
 toll. Like a curious naturalist, he inquired if the tide 
 did not come up a little salty. This being satisfac- 
 torily answered, he put another question, as to the 
 flux and reflux ; which being rather cunningly evaded 
 than artfully solved by that she-Aristotle, Mary, — who 
 muttered something about its getting up an hour 
 sooner and sooner every day, — he sagely replied, 
 "Then it must come to the same thing at. last;" 
 which was a speech worthy of an infant Halley ! The 
 lion in the 'Change by no means came up to his ideal 
 standard ; so impossible is it for Nature, in any of her 
 works, to come up to the standard of a child's imagi- 
 nation ! The whelps (lionets) he was sorry to find 
 were dead ; and on particular inquiry, his old friend 
 the ourang-outang had gone the way of all flesh also. 
 The grand tiger was also sick, and expected in no 
 short time to exchange this transitory world for 
 another, or none. But again, there was a golden
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 303 
 
 eagle (I do not mean that of Charing) which did 
 much arride and console him. William's genius, I 
 take it, leans a little to the figurative ; for, being at 
 play at tricktrack (a kind of minor billiard-table which 
 we keep for smaller wights, and sometimes refresh our 
 own mature fatigues with taking a hand at), not being 
 able to hit a ball he had iterate aimed at, he cried out, 
 " I cannot hit that beast !" Now the balls are usually 
 called men, but he felicitously hit upon a middle term ; 
 a term of approximation and imaginative reconcilia- 
 tion ; a something where the two ends of the brute 
 matter (ivory), and their human and rather violent 
 personification into men, might meet, as I take it : 
 illustrative of that excellent remark, in a certain pre- 
 face about imagination, explaining " Like a sea-beast 
 that had crawled forth to sun himself! " Not that I 
 accuse William Minor of hereditary plagiary, or con- 
 ceive the image to have come ex traduce. Rather he 
 seemeth to keep aloof from any source of imitation, 
 and purposely to remain ignorant of what mighty 
 poets have done in this kind before him ; for, being 
 asked if his father had ever been on Westminster 
 Bridge, he answered that he did not know ! 
 
 It is hard to discern the oak in the acorn, or a 
 temple like St. Paul's in the first stone which is laid ; 
 nor can I quite prefigure what destination the genius 
 of William Minor hath to take. Some few hints I 
 have set down, to guide my future observations. He 
 hath the power of calculation, in rio ordinary degree 
 for a chit. He combineth figures, after the first 
 boggle, rapidly ; as in the tricktrack board, where the 
 hits are figured. At first he did not perceive that 15 
 and 7 made 22 ; but by a little use he could combine 8 
 with 25, and 33 again with 16, which approacheth
 
 304 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 something in kind (far let me be from flattering him by 
 saying in degree) to that of the famous American 
 boy. I am sometimes inclined to think I perceive 
 the future satirist in him, for he hath a subsardonic 
 smile which bursteth out upon occasion ; as when 
 he was asked if London were as big as Ambleside ; 
 and indeed no other answer was given, or proper to 
 be given, to so ensnaring and provoking a question. 
 In the contour of the skull, certainly I discern some- 
 thing paternal. But whether in all respects the future 
 man shall transcend his father's fame, Time, the 
 trier of Geniuses, must decide. Be it pronounced 
 peremptorily at present, that Willy 1 is a well- 
 mannered child, and though no great student, hath yet 
 a lively eye for things that lie before him. 
 Given in haste from my desk at Leadenhall. 
 Yours, and yours most sincerely, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CIX.] March 20th, 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 have made me almost bury 
 myself at Dalston, where yet I see more faces than I 
 could wish. Deaths overset one, and put one out 
 long after the recent grief. Two or three have died 
 within the last two twelvemonths, and so many parts 
 
 1 Mr. Wordsworth's second son, then a scholar at the Charter- 
 House.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 305 
 
 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 -Captain 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 par- 
 ticular person occurs with whom alone almost you 
 would care to share the intelligence. Thus one distri- 
 butes 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 my 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 weari- 
 some it is to breathe the air of four pent walls without 
 relief, day after day, all the golden hours of the day 
 between ten and four, without ease or interposition. 
 Tcedet me harum quotidianarum formarum, these pes- 
 tilential clerk-faces always in one's dish. Oh for a 
 few years between the grave and the desk ! — they are 
 the same, save that at the latter you are the outside 
 vol. 1. x
 
 306 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 machine. The foul enchanter , (" letters four do 
 
 form his name" — Busirare 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 (Oh green thought!) to 
 have retired to Ponder's End, (emblematic name, how 
 beautiful !) in the Ware Road, there to have made up 
 my accounts with Heaven and the company, toddling 
 about between it and Cheshunt ; anon stretching, on 
 some fine Izaak Walton morning, to Hoddesdon or 
 Amwell, careless as a beggar; but walking, walking 
 ever till I fairly walked 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 pul- 
 monary affliction may relieve me. Vide Lord Pal- 
 merston's report of the clerks in the War Office, (De- 
 bates in this morning's Times,) by which it appears, 
 in twenty years as many clerks have been coughed 
 and catarrhed out of it into their freer graves. Thank 
 you for asking about the pictures. Milton hangs 
 over my fire-side in Covent Garden, (when I am 
 there,) the rest have been sold for an old song, want- 
 ing the eloquent tongue that should have set them 
 off! You have gratified me with liking my meeting 
 with Dodd. 1 For the Malvolio story — the thing is 
 become in verity a sad task, and I eke it out with 
 
 1 See the account of the meeting between Dodd and Jem White, in 
 Elia's Essay " On some of the Old Actors."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 307 
 
 any thing. If I could slip out of it I should be happy, 
 but our chief-reputed assistants have forsaken us. 
 The Opium-Eater crossed us once with a dazzling 
 path, and hath as suddenly left us darkling ; and, in 
 short, I shall go on from dull to worse, because I 
 cannot resist the booksellers' importunity — the old 
 plea you know of authors, but I believe on my part 
 sincere. Hartley I do not so often see ; but I never 
 see' him in unwelcome hour. I thoroughly love and 
 honour him. I send you a frozen epistle, but it is 
 Winter and dead time of the year with me. May 
 heaven keep something like Spring and Summer up 
 with you, strengthen your eyes, and make mine a 
 little lighter to encounter with them, as I hope they 
 shall yet and again, before all are closed. 
 
 Yours, with every kind remembrance. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 I had almost forgot to say, I think you thoroughly 
 right about presentation copies. I should like to 
 see you print a book I should grudge to purchase for 
 its size. Hang me, but I would have it though ! 
 
 Mary perfectly approves of the appropriation of the 
 feathers, and wishes them peacock's for your fair 
 niece's sake. 
 
 Letter CX.] 
 
 1822. 
 
 Dear Miss Wordsworth, — I had just written the 
 
 above endearing words when Monkhouse 1 tapped me 
 
 1 Mrs. Wordsworth's brother-in-law. He and Wordsworth married 
 two Misses Hutchinson ; a third remained unmarried. He appears 
 from Lamb's letter to Southey, 1823, to have been of substantial service 
 to the poet. 
 
 X 2
 
 308 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 on the shoulder with an invitation to cold goose pie, 
 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 rheumatism, which 
 is leaving her. I am suffering from the festivities of 
 the season. I wonder how my misused carcass holds 
 it out. I have played the experimental philosopher 
 on it, that's certain. Willy shall be welcome to a 
 mince-pie, and a bout at commerce whenever he 
 comes. He was in our eye. I am glad you liked 
 my new year's speculations : every body likes them, 
 except the author of the Pleasures of Hope. Dis- 
 appointment attend him ! How I like to be liked, 
 and what I do to be liked ! They flatter me in maga- 
 zines, 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 Crom- 
 well, at Sydney, and a better of Dr. Harvey (who 
 found out that blood was red), at Dr. Davy's ; you 
 should see them. Coleridge is pretty well. I have 
 not seen him, but hear often of him from Allsop, who 
 sends me hares and pheasants twice a week ; I can 
 hardly take so fast as he gives. I have almost for- 
 gotten butcher's meat, as plebeian. Are you not glad 
 the cold is gone ? I find Winters not so 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, 2 has been in 
 
 2 The family, probably, whom Lamb visited, when he went, on two 
 or three occasions, to the University town. The copy oljobn H r oodi'il,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 309 
 
 town. You do not know the Watfords in Trump- 
 ington Street. They are capital people. Ask any 
 body you meet who is the biggest woman in Cam- 
 bridge, 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 twenty 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 ten, cheapening fowls, 
 which I observe the Cambridge poulterers are not 
 sufficiently careful to stump. 
 
 Having now answered most of the points con- 
 tained 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. 
 
 LETTER CXI.] Colebrook Cottage, 6th April, 1825. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — I have been several times 
 meditating a letter to you concerning the good thing 
 which has befallen me, but the thought of poor 
 Monkhouse came across me. He was one that I had 
 exulted in the prospect of congratulating me. He 
 
 1 801, which Lamb presented to this lady, is still in good preservation, 
 with the inscription, " Mrs. Paris, with the Author's best respects."
 
 310 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 and you were to have been the first participators, for 
 indeed it has been ten weeks since the first motion of 
 it. Here am I then, after thirty-three years' slavery, 
 sitting in my own room at eleven o'clock this finest 
 of all April mornings, a freed man, with £"441 a year 
 for the remainder of my life, live I as long as John 
 Dennis, who outlived his annuity and starved at 
 ninety : £441, i.e. £"450, with a deduction of £9 for 
 a provision secured to my sister, she being survivor, 
 the pension guaranteed by Act Georgii Tertii, &c. 
 
 I came home for ever on Tuesday in last week. 
 The incomprehensibleness of my condition over- 
 whelmed me. It was like passing from life into 
 eternity. Every year to be as long as three, i. e. to 
 have three times as much real time (time that is my 
 own) in it ! I wandered about thinking I was happy, 
 but feeling I was not. But that tumultuousness is 
 passing off, and I begin to. understand the nature of 
 the gift. Holydays, even the annual month, were 
 always uneasy joys ; their conscious fugitiveness ; 
 the craving after making the most of them. Now, 
 when all is holyday, there are no holydays. I can 
 sit at home, in rain or shine, without a restless 
 impulse for walkings. I am daily steadying, and 
 shall soon find it as natural to me to be my own 
 master, as it has been irksome to have had a master. 
 Mary wakes every morning with an obscure feeling 
 that some good has happened to us. 
 
 Leigh Hunt and Montgomery, 1 after their release- 
 ments, describe the shock of their emancipation much 
 
 1 James Montgomery, the poet, who was imprisoned for a consider- 
 able time on account of having printed the Duke of Richmond's Litter 
 on the People's Rights to Universal Suffrage, 181 7, 8vo.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 3II 
 
 as I feel mine. But it hurt their frames. I eat, 
 drink, and sleep as sound as ever. I lay no anxious 
 schemes for going hither and thither, but take things 
 as they occur. Yesterday I excursioned twenty 
 miles ; to-day I write a few letters. Pleasuring was 
 for fugitive play-days ; mine are fugitive only in the 
 sense that life is fugitive. Freedom and life co- 
 existent ! 
 
 At the foot of such a call upon you for gratulation, 
 I am ashamed to advert to that melancholy event. 
 Monkhouse was a character I learned to love slowly, 
 but it grew upon me, yearly, monthly, daily. What 
 a chasm has it made in our pleasant parties ! His 
 noble friendly face was always coming before me, 
 till this hurrying event in my life came, and for the 
 time has absorbed all interest ; in fact it has shaken 
 me a little. My old desk companions, with whom I 
 have had such merry hours, seem to reproach me for 
 removing my lot from among them. They were 
 pleasant creatures ; but to the anxieties of business, 
 and a weight of possible worse ever impending, I was 
 not equal. Tuthill and Gilman give me my certi- 
 cates. 1 I laughed at the friendly lie implied in them ; 
 but my sister shook her head, and said it was all 
 true. Indeed, this last Winter I was jaded out : 
 Winters were always worse than other parts of the 
 year, because the spirits are worse, and I had no day- 
 light. In Summer I had day-light evenings. The 
 relief was hinted to me from a superior Power, when 
 I, poor slave, had not a hope but that I must wait 
 another seven years with Jacob : and lo ! the Rachel 
 which I coveted is brought to me ! 
 
 1 As proofs of his unfitness for further duty at the East India House.
 
 312 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 Have you read the noble dedication of Irving's 
 " Missionary Orations" to S. T. C. ? Who shall call 
 this man a quack hereafter ? What the Kirk will 
 think of it neither I nor Irving care. When some- 
 body suggested to him that it would not be likely to 
 do him good, videlicet, among his own people," That 
 is a reason for doing it," was his noble answer. 
 That Irving thinks he has profited mainly by S. T. C, 
 I have no doubt. The very style of the Dedication 
 shows it. 
 
 Communicate my news to Southey, and beg his 
 pardon for my being so long acknowledging his kind 
 present of the " Church, " which circumstances, 
 having no reference to himself, prevented at the 
 time. Assure him of my deep respect and friendliest 
 feelings. 
 
 Divide the same, or rather each take the whole to 
 you — I mean you and all yours. To Miss Hutchin- 
 son I must write separate. 
 
 Farewell ! and end at last, long selfish letter. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXIL] [1825.] 
 
 Dear W., — I write post-haste to ensure a frank. 
 Thanks for your hearty congratulations. I may now 
 date from the sixth week of my " Hegira, or Flight 
 from Leadenhall." I have lived so much in it, that 
 a Summer seems already past ; and 'tis but early May 
 yet with you and other people. How I look down on 
 the slaves and drudges of the world ! Its inhabitants 
 are a vast cotton-web of spin-spin-spinners ! O the
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 313 
 
 carking cares ! O the money-grubbers ! Sempiternal 
 muckworms ! 
 
 Your Virgil I have lost sight of, but suspect it is in 
 the hands of Sir G. Beaumont ; I think that circum- 
 stances made me shy of procuring it before. Will 
 you write to him about it ? — and your commands 
 shall be obeyed to a tittle. 
 
 Coleridge has just finished his prize Essay, [by] 
 which, if it get the prize, he'll touch an additional 
 £100 I fancy. His book, too, (" Commentary on 
 Bishop Leighton,") is quite finished, and penes Taylor 
 and Hessey. 
 
 In the London Magazine, which is just out, (ist 
 of May,) are two papers entitled the " Superannuated 
 Man," which I wish you to see ; and also, ist of 
 
 April, a little thing called " Barbara S ," a story 
 
 gleaned from Miss Kelly. 1 The London- Magazine, if 
 you can get it, will save my enlargement upon the 
 topic of my manumission. 
 
 I must scribble to make up my hiatus eminence; 
 for there are so many ways, pious and profligate, of 
 getting rid of money in this vast city and suburbs, 
 that I shall miss my thirds. But couragio I I 
 despair not. Your kind hint of the cottage was well 
 thrown out ; an anchorage for age and school of 
 economy, when necessity comes ; but without this 
 latter, I have an unconquerable terror of changing 
 place. It does not agree with us. I say it from 
 conviction ; else I do sometimes ruralize in fancy. 
 
 Some d — d people are come in, and I must finish 
 abruptly. By d — d, I only mean deuced. 'Tis these 
 
 1 In point of fact, Barbara S. is Miss' Kelly.
 
 314 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 suitors of Penelope that make it necessary to authorize 
 a little for gin and mutton, and such trifles. 
 
 Excuse my abortive scribble. 
 
 Yours, not in more haste than heart, 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Love and recollects to all the Wms., Doras, Marys 
 round your Wrekin. 
 
 Mary is capitally well. Do write to Sir G. B., for 
 I am shyish of applying to him. 
 
 Letter CXIII. Jan. 22nd, 1830. 
 
 And is it a year since we parted from you at the 
 steps of Edmonton stage ? There are not now the 
 years that there used to be. The tale of the dwindled 
 age of men, reported of successional mankind, is true 
 of the same man only. We do not live a year in a 
 year now. 'Tis a punctum stans. The seasons pass 
 us with indifference. Spring cheers not, nor Winter 
 heightens our gloom ; Autumn hath foregone its 
 moralities, — they are " hey-pass repass," as in a 
 show-box. Yet, as far as last year occurs back, — for 
 they scarce show a reflex now, they make no memory 
 as heretofore, — 'twas sufficiently gloomy. Let the 
 sullen nothing pass. Suffice it, that after sad spirits, 
 prolonged through many of its months, as it called 
 them, we have cast our skins ; have taken a farewell 
 of the pompous, troublesome trifle, called house- 
 keeping, and are settled down into poor boarders and 
 lodgers at next door with an old couple, the Baucis 
 and Baucida of dull Enfield. Here we have nothing 
 to do with our victuals but to eat them ; with the 
 garden but to see it grow ; with the tax-gatherer but
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 315 
 
 to hear him knock ; with the maid but to hear hqr 
 scolded. Scot and lot, butcher, baker, are things 
 unknown to us, save as spectators of the pageant. 
 We are fed we know not how; quietists — confiding 
 ravens. We have otinm pro dignitate, a respectable 
 insignificance. Yet in the self-condemned oblivious- 
 ness, in the stagnation, some molesting yearnings of 
 life, not quite killed, rise, prompting me that there 
 was a London, and that I was of that old Jerusalem. 
 In dreams I am in Fleet Market, but I wake and cry 
 to sleep again. I die hard, a stubborn Eloisa in this 
 detestable Paraclete. What have I gained by health ? 
 Intolerable dulness. What by early hours and mode- 
 rate meals ? A total blank. O never let the lying 
 poets be believed, who 'tice men from the cheerful 
 haunts of streets, or think they mean it not of a 
 country village. In the ruins of Palmyra I could gird 
 myself up to solitude, or muse to the snorings of the 
 Seven Sleepers ; but to have a little teazing image of 
 a town about one ; country folks that do not look like 
 country folks; shops two yards square, half-a-dozen 
 apples, and two penn'orth of overlooked ginger-bread 
 for the lofty fruiterers of Oxford Street ; and, for the 
 immortal book and print stalls, a circulating library 
 that stands still, where the show-picture is a last 
 year's Valentine, and whither the fame of the last ten 
 Scotch novels has not yet travelled, — (marry, they 
 just begin to be conscious of the Redgauntlet :) — to 
 have a new plastered flat church, and to be wishing 
 that it was but a cathedral ! The very blackguards 
 here are degenerate ; the topping gentry stock-brokers; 
 the passengers too many to insure your quiet, or let 
 you go about whistling or gaping, too few to be the 
 fine indifferent pageants of Fleet Street. Confining,
 
 
 316 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 room-keeping, thickest Winter, is yet more bearable 
 here than the gaudy months. Among one's books at 
 one's fire by candle, one is soothed into an oblivion 
 that one is not in the country ; but with the light the 
 green fields return, till I gaze, and in a calenture can 
 plunge myself into St. Giles's. O let no native 
 Londoner imagine that health, and rest, and innocent 
 occupation, interchange of converse sweet, and recrea- 
 tive study, can make the country any thing better than 
 altogether odious and detestable! A garden was the 
 primitive prison, till man, with Promethean felicity 
 and boldness, luckily sinned himself out of it. Thence 
 followed Babylon, Nineveh, Venice, London, haber- 
 dashers, goldsmiths, taverns, playhouses, satires, 
 epigrams, puns, — these all came in on the town part, 
 and the thither side of innocence. Man found out in- 
 ventions. From my den I return you condolence for 
 your decaying sight ; not for any thing there is to see 
 in the country, but for the miss of the pleasure of 
 reading a London newspaper. The poets are as well 
 to listen to ; any thing high may, nay must, be read 
 out ; you read it to yourself with an imaginary 
 auditor ; but the light paragraphs must be glid over by 
 the proper eye ; mouthing mumbles their gossamery 
 substance. 'Tis these trifles I should mourn in 
 fading sight. A newspaper is the single gleam of 
 comfort I receive here ; it comes from rich Cathay 
 with tidings of mankind. Yet I could not attend to 
 it, read out by the most beloved voice. But your 
 eyes do not get worse, I gather. O for the collyrium 
 of Tobias inclosed in a whiting's liver, to send you 
 with no apocryphal good wishes ! The last long 
 time I heard from you, you had knocked your head 
 against something. Do not do so; for your head (I
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 317 
 
 do not flatter) is not a knob, or the top of a brass nail, 
 or the end of a nine pin, — unless a Vulcanian hammer 
 could fairly batter a " Recluse " out of it ; then would 
 I bid the smirched god knock and knock lustily, the 
 two-handed skinker. Mary must squeeze out a line 
 propria manu, but indeed her fingers have been incor- 
 rigibly nervous to letter writing for a long interval. 
 'Twill please you all to hear, that though I fret like a 
 lion in a net, her present health and spirits are better 
 than they have been for some time past. She is abso- 
 lutely three years and a half younger, as I tell her, 
 since we have adopted this boarding plan. 
 
 Our providers are an honest pair, Dame W[est- 
 wood] and her husband. He, when the light of pros- 
 perity shined on them, a moderately thriving haber- 
 dasher within Bow bells, retired since with something 
 under a competence ; writes himself parcel gentle- 
 man ; hath borne parish offices ; sings fine old sea 
 songs at threescore and ten ; sighs only now and 
 then when he thinks that he has a son on his hands, 
 about fifteen, whom he finds a difficulty in getting out 
 into the world, and then checks a sigh with muttering, 
 as I once heard him prettily, not meaning to be heard, 
 " I have married my daughter, however ; " takes the 
 weather as it comes ; outsides it to town in severest 
 season ; and o' winter nights tells old stories not 
 tending to literature, (how comfortable to author-rid 
 folks !) and has one anecdote, upon which and about 
 forty pounds a year he seems to have retired in green 
 old age. It was how he was a rider in his youth, 
 travelling for shops, and once (not to balk his 
 employer's bargain) on a sweltering day in August, 
 rode foaming into Dunstable upon a mad horse, to 
 the dismay and expostulatory wonderment of inn-
 
 318 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 keepers, ostlers, &c, who declared they would not 
 have bestrid the beast to win the Derby. Understand, 
 the creature galled to death and desperation by gad- 
 flies, cormorant-winged, worse than beset Inachus's 
 daughter. This he tells, this he brindles and bur- 
 nishes on a Winter's eve; 'tis his star of set glory, his 
 rejuvenescence, to descant upon. Far from me be it 
 [dii avertant) to look a gift story in the mouth, or 
 cruelly to surmise (as those who doubt the plunge of 
 Curtius) that the inseparate conjuncture of man and 
 beast, the centaur-phenomenon that staggered al 
 Dunstable, might have been the effect of unromantic 
 necessity ; that the horse-part carried the reasoning, 
 willy nilly ; that needs must when such a devil drove; 
 that certain spiral configurations in the frame of 
 T[homas] W[estwood] unfriendly to alighting, 
 made the alliance more forcible than voluntary. Let 
 him enjoy his fame for me, nor let me hint a whispei 
 that shall dismount Bellerophon. But in case he 
 was an involuntary martyr, yet if in the fiery conflict 
 he buckled the soul of a constant haberdasher to him, 
 and adopted his flames, let accident and him share 
 the glory. You would all like Thomas Westwood. 
 How weak is painting to describe a man ! Say that 
 he stands four feet and a nail high by his own yarc 
 measure, which, like the sceptre of Agamemnon, 
 shall never sprout again, still you have no adequate 
 idea ; nor when I tell you that his dear hump, whicl 
 I have favoured in the picture, seems to me of the 
 buffalo — indicative and repository of mild qualities, 
 budget of kindnesses — still you have not the man. 
 Knew you old Norris of the Temple ? sixty years ours 
 and our fathers' friend ? He was not more natura 
 to us than this old W., the acquaintance of scarce
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 319 
 
 more weeks. Under his roof now ought I to take my 
 rest, but that back-looking ambition tells me I might 
 yet be a Londoner ! Well, if we ever do move, we 
 have incumbrances the less to impede us ; all our 
 furniture has faded under the auctioneer's hammer, 
 going for nothing, like the tarnished frippery of the 
 prodigal, and we have only a spoon or two left to 
 bless us. Clothed we came into Enfield, and naked 
 we must go out of it. I would live in London shirt- 
 less, bookless. Henry Crabb 1 is at Rome ; advices 
 to that effect have reached Bury. But by solemn 
 legacy he bequeathed at parting (whether he should 
 live or die) a turkey of Suffolk to be sent every suc- 
 ceeding Christmas to us and divers other friends. 
 What a genuine old bachelor's action ! L fear he will 
 find the air of Italy too classic. His station is in the 
 Harz forest ; his soul is be-Goethed. Miss Kelly we 
 never see ; Talfourd not this half-year : the latter 
 flourishes, but the exact number of his children (God 
 forgive me !) I have utterly forgotten. We single people 
 are often out in our count there. Shall I say two ? 
 We see scarce any body. Can I cram loves enough 
 to you all in this little O ? Excuse particularizing. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 LETTER CXIV.] End of May nearly [1833.] 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — Your letter, save in what 
 respects your dear sister's health, cheered me in my 
 new solitude. Mary is ill again. Her illnesses 
 encroach yearly. The last was three months, followed 
 by two of depression most dreadful. I look back 
 
 l Mr. H. C. Robinson.
 
 320 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 upon her earlier attacks with longing : nice little 
 durations of six weeks or so, followed by complete 
 restoration, — shocking as they were to me then. In 
 short, half her life she is dead to me, and the other 
 half is made anxious with fears and lookings forward 
 to the next shock. With such prospects, it seemed 
 to me necessary that she should no longer live with 
 me, and be fluttered with continual removals ; so I 
 am come to live with her, at a Mr. Walden's, and his 
 wife, who take in patients, and have arranged to 
 lodge and board us only. They have had the care 
 of her before. I see little of her : alas ! I too often 
 hear her. Sunt lachrymce rerum ! and you and I 
 must bear it. 
 
 To lay a little more load on it, a circumstance has 
 happened, aijus pars magna fui, and which, at 
 another crisis, I should have more rejoiced in. I am 
 about to lose my old and only walk-companion, whose 
 mirthful spirits were the "youth of our house," 
 Emma Isola. I have her here now for a little while, 
 but she is too nervous, properly to be under such a 
 roof, so she will make short visits, — be no more an 
 inmate. With my perfect approval, and more than 
 concurrence, she is to be wedded to Moxon, at the 
 end of August — so "perish the roses and the- flowers" 
 — how is it ? 
 
 Now to the brighter side. I am emancipated from 
 the Westwoods, and I am with attentive people, and 
 younger. I am three or four miles nearer the great 
 city ; coaches half-price less, and going always, of 
 which I will avail myself. I have few friends left 
 there, one or two though, most beloved. But London 
 streets and faces cheer me inexpressibly, though not 
 one known of the latter were remaining,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 32I 
 
 Thank you for your cordial reception of " Elia." 
 Inter nos, the " Ariadne" is not a darling with me; 
 several incongruous things are in it, but in the com- 
 position it served me as illustrative. 
 
 I want you in the " Popular Fallacies" 1 to like the 
 " Home that is no home," and " Rising with the 
 lark." 
 
 I am feeble, but cheerful in this my genial hot 
 weather. Walked sixteen miles yesterday. I can't 
 read much in summer time. 
 
 With my kindest love to all, and prayers for dear 
 Dorothy, 
 
 I remain most affectionately yours, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 At Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton, Mid- 
 dlesex. 
 
 Moxon has introduced Emma to Rogers, and he 
 smiles upon the project. I have given E. my Milton, 
 (will you pardon me ? 2 ) in part of a portion. It hangs 
 famously in his Murray-like shop. 
 
 Church Street, Edmonton, 
 LETTER CXV.] February 22, 1834. 
 
 Dear Wordsworth, — I write from a house of 
 mourning. The oldest and best friends I have left 
 are in trouble. A branch of them (and they of the 
 best stock of God's creatures, I believe,) is establishing 
 a school at Carlisle ; her name is Louisa Martin ; her 
 
 1 A series of articles contributed, under this title, by Lamb, to the 
 New Monthly Magazine. 
 
 2 It had been proposed by Lamb that Mr. W. should be the possessor 
 of the portrait if he outlived his friend, and that afterwards it was to be 
 beq" --' ■* - Christ's College, Cambridge. 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 322 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 address, 75, Castle Street, Carlisle ; her qualities 
 (and her motives for this exertion) are the most 
 amiable, most upright. For thirty years she has 
 been tried by me, and on her behaviour I would stake 
 my soul. O, if you can recommend her, how would 
 I love you — if I could love you better ! Pray, pray, 
 recommend her. She is as good a human creature, — 
 next to my sister, perhaps, the most exemplary female 
 I ever knew. Moxon tells me you would like a letter 
 from me ; you shall have one. This I cannot mingle 
 up with any nonsense which you usually tolerate from 
 C. Lamb. Need he add loves to wife, sister, and all? 
 Poor Mary is ill again, after a short lucid interval of 
 four or five months. In short, I may call her half 
 dead to me. Good you are to me. Yours with fer- 
 vour of friendship, for ever. C. L. 
 
 If you want references, the Bishop of Carlisle may 
 be one. Louisa's sister (as good as she, she cannot 
 be better, though she tries,) educated the daughters of 
 the late Earl of Carnarvon, and he settled a handsome 
 annuity on her for life. In short, all the family are a 
 sound rock. 
 
 Letter CXVL] [No date.] 
 
 [From Miss Lamb to Miss Wordsworth.] 
 
 My dear Miss Wordsworth, — I thank you, my kind 
 friend, for your most comfortable letter. Till I saw 
 your own handwriting I could not persuade myself 
 that I should do well to write to you, though I have 
 often attempted it ; but I always left off dissatisfied 
 with what I had written, and feeling that I was doing 
 an improper thing to intrude upon your sorrow. I
 
 1 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 323 
 
 wished to tell you that you would one day feel the 
 kind of peaceful state of mind and sweet memory of 
 the dead, which you so happily describe as now 
 almost begun ; but I felt that it was improper, and 
 most grating to the feelings of the afflicted, to say to 
 them that the memory of their affection would in time 
 become a constant part, not only of their dream, but 
 of their most wakeful sense of happiness. That you 
 would see every object with and through your lost 
 brother, and that that would at last become a real and 
 everlasting source of comfort to you, I felt, and well 
 knew, from my own experience in sorrow ; but till 
 you yourself began to feel this I did not dare tell you 
 so ; but I send you some poor lines which I wrote 
 under this conviction of mind, and before I heard 
 Coleridge was returning home. I will transcribe 
 them now, before I finish my letter, lest a false shame 
 prevent me then, for I know they are much worse 
 than they ought to be, written, as they were, with 
 strong feeling, and on such a subject. Every line 
 seems to me to be borrowed ; but I had no better way 
 Of expressing my thoughts, and I never have the 
 power of altering or amending any thing I have once 
 laid aside with dissatisfaction. 
 
 Why is he wandering on the sea ? — 
 Coleridge should now with Wordsworth be. 
 By slow degrees he'd steal away 
 Their woe, and gently bring a ray 
 (So happily he'd time relief,) 
 Of comfort from their very grief. 
 He'd tell them that their brother dead, 
 When years have passed o'er their head, 
 Will be remember'd with such holy, 
 True, and perfect melancholy, 
 That ever this lost brother John 
 Will be their heart's companion. 
 
 Y 2
 
 3 l\ CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE WORDSWORTHS. 
 
 His voice they'll always hear ; 
 
 His face they'll always see. 
 There's nought in life so sweet 
 
 As such a memory. 
 
 Letter CXVIL] 
 
 [Postscript by Charles Lamb to a letter from Mary- 
 Lamb to Miss Wordsworth. About 1822. J 
 
 Mary has left a little space for me to fill up with 
 nonsense, as the geographers used to cram monsters 
 in the voids of the maps, and call it Terra Incognita. 
 She has fold you how she has taken to water like a 
 hungry otter. I too limp after her in lame imitation, 1 
 but it goes against me a little at first. I have been 
 acquaintance with it now for full four days, and it 
 seems a moon. I am full of cramps, and rheuma- 
 tisms, and cold internally, so that fire won't warm me ; 
 yet I bear all for virtue's sake. Must I then leave 
 you, gin, rum. brandy, aqua-vitae, pleasant jolly 
 fellows ? Hang temperance, and he that first in- 
 vented it ! — some Anti-Noahite. C has pow- 
 dered his head, and looks like Bacchus, Bacchus ever 
 sleek and young. He is going to turn sober, but his 
 clock has not struck yet ; meantime he pours down 
 goblet after goblet, the second to see where the first 
 is gone, the third to see no harm happens to the 
 second, a fourth to say there is another coming, and 
 a fifth to say he is not sure he is the last. 
 
 1 The writer had in his recollection, probably, the passage in 
 Richard II. .— 
 
 fashions of proud Italy, 
 
 Whose manners still our tardy apish nation 
 
 Limps after in base imitation 
 
 (Act ii. sc. 1.)
 
 ( 325 ) 
 
 IV. 
 
 Correspondence with Thomas Manning. 1 
 [1799-1825]. 
 
 Letter CXVIII.] Dec. 28th, 1799. 
 
 Dear Manning, — Having suspended my correspon- 
 dence a decent interval, as knowing that even good 
 things may be taken to satiety, a wish cannot but 
 recur to learn whether you be still well and happy. 
 Do all things ' continue in the state I left them in 
 Cambridge ? 
 
 Do your night parties still flourish ? and do you 
 continue to bewilder your company with your thou- 
 sand faces, running down through all the keys of 
 idiotism (like Lloyd over his perpetual harpsichord), 
 from the smile and the glimmer of half-sense and 
 ' quarter-sense, to the grin and hanging lip of Betty 
 Foy's own Johnny ? And does the face-dissolving 
 curfew sound at twelve ? How unlike the great 
 originals were your petty terrors in the postscript ! not 
 fearful enough to make a fairy shudder, or a Lillipu- 
 tian fine lady, eight months full of child, miscarry. 
 Yet one of them, which had more beast than the 
 rest, I thought faintly resembled one of your bonifica- 
 tions. But, seriously, I long to see your own honest 
 Manning-face again. I did not mean a pun, — your 
 man's face, you will be apt to say, I know your wicked 
 
 1 In the Autumn of this year Lamb's choice list of friends received a 
 most important addition in Mr. Thomas Manning, then a mathematical 
 tutor at Cambridge ; of whom he became a frequent correspondent, 
 and to whom he remained strongly attached through life. Lloyd had 
 become a graduate of the university, and to his introduction Lamb was 
 indebted for Manning's friendship. The following letters will show 
 how earnestly, yet how modestly, Lamb sought it. — Tai.fourd.
 
 326 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 will to pun. I cannot now write to Lloyd and you 
 too ; so you must convey as much interesting intelli- 
 gence as this may contain, or be thought to contain, 
 to him and Sophia, with my dearest love and remem- 
 brances. 
 
 By the by, I think you and Sophia both incorrect 
 with regard to the title of the play} Allowing your ob- 
 jection, (which is not necessary, as pride may be, and 
 is in real life often, cured by misfortunes not directly 
 originating from its own acts, as Jeremy Taylor will 
 tell you a naughty desire is sometimes sent to cure it ; 
 I know you read these practical divines-}) — but allow- 
 ing your objection, does not the betraying of his 
 father's secret directly spring from pride ? — from the 
 pride of wine, and a full heart, and a proud over-step- 
 ping of the ordinary rules of morality, and contempt of 
 the prejudices of mankind, which are not to bind 
 superior souls — " as trust in the matter of secrets all 
 ties of blood, &c, &c, keeping of promises, the feeble 
 mind's religion, binding our morning knowledge to 
 the performance of what last night's ignorance spake" 
 — does he not prate, that " Great Spirits" must do 
 more than die for their friend ? Does not the pride of 
 wine incite him to display some evidence of friend- 
 ship, which its own irregularity shall make great ? 
 This I know, that I meant his punishment not alone 
 to be a cure for his daily and habitual pride, but the 
 direct consequence and appropriate punishment of a 
 particular act of pride. 
 
 If you do not understand it so, it is my fault in not 
 explaining my meaning. 
 
 I have not seen Coleridge since, and scarcely 
 
 1 Pride's Cure, the original title of John IVoodvil.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 327 
 
 expect to see him, — perhaps he has been at Cam- 
 bridge. 
 
 Need I turn over to blot a fresh clean half-sheet, 
 merely to say, what I hope you are sure of without 
 my repeating it, that I would have you consider me, 
 dear Manning, 
 
 Your sincere friend, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXIX.] Dec, 1799. 
 
 Dear Manning, — The particular kindness, even up 
 to a degree of attachment, which I have experienced 
 from you, seems to claim some distinct acknowledg- 
 ment on my part. I could not content myself with a 
 bare remembrance to you, conveyed in some letter to 
 Lloyd. 
 
 Will it be agreeable to you, if I occasionally recruit 
 your memory of me, which must else soon fade, if 
 you consider the brief intercourse we have had. I am 
 not likely to prove a troublesome correspondent. My 
 scribbling days are past. I shall have no sentiments 
 to communicate, but as they spring up from some 
 living and worthy occasion. 
 
 I look forward with great pleasure to the perform- 
 ance of your promise, that we should meet in London 
 early in the ensuing year. The century must needs 
 commence auspiciously for me, that brings with it 
 Manning's friendship, as an earnest of its after 
 gifts. 
 
 I should have written before, but for a troublesome 
 inflammation in one of my eyes, brought on by 
 night travelling with the coach windows sometimes 
 up.
 
 328 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 What more I have to say shall be reserved for a 
 letter to Lloyd. I must not prove tedious to you 
 in my first outset, lest I should affright you by my 
 ill-judged loquacity. 
 
 I am, yours most sincerely, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXX.] 1800. 
 
 George Dyer is an Archimedes, and an Archi- 
 magus, and a Tycho Brahe, and a Corpernicus ; and 
 thou art the darling of the Nine, and midwife to 
 their wandering babe also ! We take tea with that 
 learned poet and critic on Tuesday night, at half- 
 past five, in his neat library. 1 The repast will be light 
 and Attic, with criticism. If thou couldst contrive 
 to wheel up thy dear carcass on the Monday, and 
 after dining with us on tripe, calves' kidneys, or 
 whatever else the Cornucopia of St. Clare may be 
 willing to pour out on the occasion, might we not 
 adjourn together to the Heathen's — thou with thy 
 Black Backs, and I with some innocent volume of 
 the Bell Letters, Shenstone, or the like : it would 
 make him wash his old flannel gown (that has not 
 been washed to my knowledge since it has been his 
 — Oh the long time !) with tears of joy. Thou 
 shouldst settle his scruples and unravel his cobwebs, 
 and sponge off the sad stuff that weighs upon his 
 dear wounded pia mater. Thou shouldst restore light 
 
 1 There is a story of Miss Lamb and Mrs. Hazlitt going once to 
 Dyer's lodgings, and sewing up lii^ easy chair, which was full of holes. 
 They imagined they were performing a service; but it turned out that 
 George kept his books there, and he was dreadfully disconcerted.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 329 
 
 to his eyes, and him to his friends and the public. 
 Parnassus should shower her civic crowns upon thee 
 for saving the wits of a citizen ! I thought I saw a 
 lucid interval in George the other night ; he broke 
 in upon my studies just at tea-time, and brought 
 with him Dr. Anderson, an old gentleman who ties 
 his breeches' knees with packthread, and boasts 
 that he has been disappointed by ministers. The 
 Doctor wanted to see me; for I being a Poet, he 
 thought I might furnish him with a copy of verses 
 to suit his Agricultural Magazine. The Doctor, in 
 the course of the conversation, mentioned a poem 
 called the " Epigoniad," by one Wilkie, 1 an epic poem, 
 in which there is not one tolerable good line all 
 through, but every incident and speech borrowed from 
 Homer. George had been sitting inattentive, 
 seemingly, to what was going on — hatching of 
 negative quantities — when, suddenly, the name of 
 his old friend Homer stung his pericranicks, and, 
 jumping up, he begged to know where he could 
 meet with Wilkie s works. It was a curious fact, 
 he said, that there should be such an epic poem 
 and he not know of it and he must get a copy of 
 it, as he was going to touch pretty deeply upon the 
 subject of the Epic — and he was sure there must be 
 some things good in a poem of 8,000 lines ! I was 
 pleased with this transient return of his reason and 
 recurrence to his old ways of thinking : it gave me 
 great hopes of a recovery, which nothing but your 
 book can completely insure. Pray come on Monday, 
 if you can, and stay your own time. I have a good 
 
 1 W. Wilkie. He wrote other things. There is a memoir of him 
 prefixed to some of his poems, printed in Anderson's Collectioir
 
 330 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 large room, with two beds in it, in the handsomest 
 of which thou shalt repose a-nights, and dream of 
 Spheroides. I hope you will understand by the non- 
 sense of this letter that I am not melancholy at the 
 thoughts of thy coming : I thought it necessary to 
 add this, because you love precision. Take notice 
 that our stay at Dyer's will not exceed eight o'clock ; 
 after which our pursuits will be our own. But 
 indeed I think a little recreation among the Bell 
 Letters and poetry will do you some service in the 
 interval of severer studies. I hope we shall fully 
 discuss with George Dyer what I have never yet 
 heard done to my satisfaction, the reason of Dr. 
 Johnson's malevolent strictures on the higher species 
 of the Ode. 
 
 Letter CXXL] 1800. 
 
 Dear Manning, — I am going to ask a favour of 
 you, and am at a loss how to do it in the most 
 delicate manner. For this purpose I have been 
 looking into Pliny's Letters, who is noted to have 
 had the best grace in begging of all the ancients, (I 
 read him in the elegant translation of Mr. Melmoth,) 
 but not finding any case there exactly similar with 
 mine, I am constrained to beg in my own barbarian 
 way. To come to the point then, and hasten into 
 the middle of things : have you a copy of your 
 Algebra to give away? I do not ask it for myself; 
 I have too much reverence for the Black Arts ever 
 to approach thy circle, illustrious Trismegist ! But 
 that worthy man, and excellent Poet, George Dyer, 
 made me a visit yesternight, on purpose to borrow
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 33I 
 
 one ; supposing, rationally enough, I must say, that 
 you had made me a present of one before this ; the 
 omission of which I take to have proceeded only from 
 negligence ; but it is a fault. I could lend him no assist- 
 ance. You must know he is just now diverted from 
 the pursuit of the Bell Letters by a paradox, which 
 he has heard his friend Frend, 1 (that learned mathema- 
 tician) maintain, that the negative quantities of mathe- 
 maticians were merce migce, things scarcely in rerum 
 natures, and smacking too much of mystery for gentle- 
 men of Mr. Frend's clear Unitarian capacity. How- 
 ever, the dispute once set a-going, has seized violently 
 on George's pericranick ; and it is necessary for his 
 health that he should speedily come to a resolution 
 of his doubts. He goes about teasing his friends 
 with his new mathematics ; he even frantically talks 
 of purchasing Manning's Algebra, which shows him 
 far gone ; for, to my knowledge, he has not been 
 master of seven shillings a good time. George's 
 pockets and — — 's brains are two things in nature 
 which do not abhor a vacuum .... Now, if 
 you could step in, in this trembling suspense of his 
 reason, and he should find on Saturday morning, 
 lying for him at the Porter's Lodge, Clifford's Inn, 
 (his safest address,) Manning's Algebra, with a neat 
 manuscription in the blank leaf, running thus " From 
 the Author," it might save his wits, and restore the 
 unhappy author to those studies of poetry and 
 criticism which are at present suspended, to the 
 infinite regret of the whole literary world. N.B. — 
 
 1 Mr. Frend, many years the Actuary of the Rock Insurance Office, 
 in early life the champion of Unitarianism at Cambridge ; the object 
 of a great University's displeasure ; in short, the " village Hampden. " 
 of the day.
 
 332 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Dirty backs, smeared leaves, and dogs' ears, will be 
 rather a recommendation than otherwise. N.B. — He 
 must have the book as soon as possible, or nothing 
 can withhold him from madly purchasing the book on 
 tick. . . . Then shall we see him sweetly restored 
 to the chair of Longinus — to dictate in smooth and 
 modest phrase the laws of verse ; to prove that Theo- 
 critus first introduced the Pastoral, and Virgil and 
 Pope brought it to its perfection ; that Gray and 
 Mason (who always hunt in couples in George's 
 brain) have shown a great deal of poetical fire in their 
 lyric poetry ; that Aristotle's rules are not to be ser- 
 vilely followed, which George has shown to have 
 imposed great shackles upon modern genius. His 
 poems, I find, are to consist of two vols. — reasonable 
 octavo ; and a third book will exclusively contain 
 criticisms, in which he asserts he has gone pretty 
 deeply into the laws of blank verse and rhyme — epic 
 poetry, dramatic and pastoral ditto — all which is to 
 come out before Christmas. But above all, he has 
 touched most deeply upon the Drama, comparing the 
 English with the modern German stage, their merits 
 and defects. Apprehending that his studies (not to 
 mention his turn, which I take to be chiefly towards 
 the lyrical poetry) hardly qualified him for these dis- 
 quisitions, I modestly inquired what plays he had 
 read ? I found by George's reply that he had read 
 Shakspeare, but that was a good while since: he calls 
 him a great but irregular genius, which I think to 
 be an original and just remark. Beaumont and 
 Fletcher, Massinger, Ben Jonson, Shirley, Marlowe, 
 Ford, and the worthies of Dodsley's Collection — he 
 confessed he had read none of them, but professed 
 his intention of looking through them all, so as to be
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. ' 333 
 
 able to touch upon them in his book. So Shakspeare, 
 Otway, and I believe Rowe, to whom he was naturally 
 directed by Johnson's Lives, and these not read lately, 
 are to stand him in stead of a general knowledge of 
 the subject. God bless his dear absurd head ! 
 
 By the by, did I not write you a letter with some- 
 thing about an invitation in it ? But let that pass ; I 
 suppose it is not agreeable. 
 
 N.B. — It would not be amiss if you were to accom- 
 pany your present with a dissertation on negative 
 quantities. C. L. 
 
 Letter CXX1L] 1800. 
 
 Dear Manning, — Olivia is a good girl, and if you 
 turn to my letter you will find that this very plea you 
 set up to vindicate Lloyd, I had made use of as a 
 reason why he should never have employed Olivia to 
 make a copy of such a letter ! — a letter I could not 
 
 have sent to my Enemy's B , if she had thought 
 
 proper to seek me in the way of marriage. But you 
 see it in one view, I in another. Rest you merry in 
 your opinion ! Opinion is a species of property ; 
 and though I am always desirous to share with my 
 friend to a certain extent, I shall ever like to keep 
 some tenets, and some property, properly my own. 
 Some day, Manning, when we meet, substituting 
 Corydon and fair Amaryllis, for Charles Lloyd and 
 Mary Hayes, we will discuss together this question 
 of moral feeling, " In what cases, and how far, sin- 
 cerity is a virtue ?" I do not mean Truth, a good 
 Olivia-like creature, God bless her, who, meaning no 
 offence, is always ready to give an answer when she
 
 334 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 is asked why she did so and so ; but a certain forward- 
 talking half-brother, of hers, Sincerity, that amphibious 
 gentleman, who is so ready to perk up his obnoxious 
 sentiments unasked into your notice, as Midas would 
 his ears into your face, uncalled for. But I despair of 
 doing any thing by a letter in the way of explaining 
 or coming to explanations. A good wish, or a pun, 
 or a piece of secret history, may be well enough 
 that way conveyed ; nay, it has been known, that 
 intelligence of a turkey hath been conveyed by that 
 medium, without much ambiguity. Godwin I am a 
 good deal pleased with. He is a very well-behaved, 
 decent man ; nothing very brilliant about him or im- 
 posing, as you may suppose ; quite another guess 
 sort of gentleman from what your Anti-jacobin Chris- 
 tians imagine him. I was well pleased to find he has 
 neither horns nor claws ; quite a tame creature, I 
 assure you : a middle-sized man, both in stature 
 and in understanding ; whereas, from his noisy fame, 
 you would expect to find a Briareus Centimanus, or 
 a Tityus tall enough to pull Jupiter from his heavens. 
 I begin to think you atheists not quite so tall a spe- 
 cies ! Coleridge inquires after you pretty often. I 
 wish to be the Pandar to bring you together again 
 once before I die. When we die, you and I must 
 part ; the sheep, you know, take the right-hand sign- 
 post, and the goats the left. Stript of its allegory, 
 you must know the sheep are — I, the Apostles, and 
 the martyrs, and the Popes, and Bishop Taylor, and 
 Bishop Horsley, and Coleridge, &c. &c. The goats 
 are the atheists, and adulterers, and fornicators, and 
 
 dumb dogs, and Godwin, and M g, and that 
 
 Thyestaean crew ! Egad, how my saintship sickens 
 at the idea ! You shall have my play and the Fal-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 335 
 
 staffs Letters in a day or two. I will write to 
 Ll[oyd] by this day's Post. 
 
 Pray, is it a part of your sincerity to show my 
 letters to Lloyd ? for, really, gentlemen ought to 
 explain their virtues upon a first acquaintance, to 
 prevent mistakes. 
 
 God bless you, Manning. Take my trifling as 
 trifling ; and believe me, seriously and deeply, 
 
 Your well-wisher and friend, 
 
 C. L. 
 
 500. 
 
 Letter CXXIIL] i8c 
 
 Dear Manning, — I feel myself unable to thank you 
 sufficiently for your kind letter. It was doubly accept- 
 able to me, both for the choice poetry and the kind 
 honest prose which it contained. It was just such a 
 letter as I should have expected from Manning. 
 
 I am in much better spirits than when I wrote last. 
 I have had a very eligible offer to lodge with a friend 
 in town. He will have rooms to let at Midsummer; 
 by which time I hope my sister will be well enough 
 to join me. It is a great object to me to live in town, 
 where we shall be much more private, and to quit a 
 house and a neighbourhood where poor Mary's dis- 
 order, so frequently recurring, has made us a sort of 
 marked people. We can be nowhere private except 
 in the midst of London. We shall be in a family 
 where we visit very frequently ; only my landlord and 
 I have not yet come to a conclusion. He has a 
 partner to consult. I am still on the tremble, for I 
 do not know where we could go into lodgings that 
 would not be, in many respects, highly exceptionable.
 
 336 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Only God send Mary well again, and I hope all will 
 be well ! The prospect, such as it is, has made me 
 quite happy. I have just time to tell you of it, as I 
 know it will give you pleasure. — Farewell. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXXIV.] [1800.] 
 
 You masters of logic ought to know (logic is 
 nothing more than a knowledge of words, as the 
 Greek etymon implies,) that all words are no more 
 to be taken in a literal sense at all times than a 
 promise given to a tailor. When I exprest an appre- 
 hension that you were mortally offended, I meant no 
 more than by the application of a certain formula of 
 efficacious sounds, which had done in similar cases 
 before, to rouse a sense of decency in you, and a 
 remembrance of what was due to me ! You masters 
 of logic should advert to this phenomenon in human 
 speech, before you arraign the usage of us dramatic 
 geniuses. Imagination is a good blood mare, and 
 goes well : but the misfortune is, she has too many 
 paths before her. 'Tis true I might have imagined 
 to myself, that you had trundled your frail carcass 
 to Norfolk. I might also, and did imagine, that you 
 had not, but that you were lazy, or inventing new 
 properties in a triangle, and for that purpose moulding 
 and squeezing Landlord Crisp's three-cornered beaver 
 into fantastic experimental forms ; or, that Archimedes 
 was meditating to repulse the French, in case of a 
 Cambridge invasion, by a geometric hurling of folios 
 on their red caps ; or, peradventure, that you were in 
 extremities, in great wants, and just set out for
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 337 
 
 Trinity Bogs when my letters came. In short, my 
 genius (which is a short word, now-a-days, for what- 
 a-great-man-am-I !) was absolutely stifled and over- 
 laid with its own riches. Truth is one and poor, like 
 the cruse of Elijah's widow. Imagination is the bold 
 face that multiplies its oil ; and thou, the old cracked 
 pipkin, that could not believe it could be put to such 
 purposes. Dull pipkin, to have Elijah for thy cook ! 
 Imbecile recipient of so fat a miracle ! I send you 
 George Dyer's Poems, the richest production of the 
 lyrical muse this century can justly boast : for Words- 
 worth's L. B. were published, or at least written, 
 before Christmas. 
 
 Please to advert to pages 291 to 296 for the most 
 astonishing account of where Shakspeare's muse has 
 been all this while. I thought she had been dead, 
 and buried in Stratford Church, with the young man 
 that kept her company, — 
 
 " But it seems, like the Devil, 
 Buried in Cole Harbour, 
 Some say she's risen again, 
 'Gone prentice to a barber." 
 
 N.B. — I don't charge any thing for the additional 
 manuscript notes, which are the joint productions of 
 myself and a learned translator of Schiller, [John] 
 Stoddart, Esq. 1 
 
 1 Mr., afterwards Dr., and eventually Sir John Stoddart was at first a 
 Radical; afterwards, like Coleridge and Southey, he ratted over to the 
 Tories, became editor of the Times, and subsequently started the Neiv 
 Times in opposition, because he was too violent for his friends, and 
 lost his appointment. The late Dr. Charles Richardson, the lexi- 
 cographer, recollected Dr. Stoddart when he was the hottest of Jacobins, 
 and said that he thought he had seen him wear, at the private political 
 unions, the Phrygian cap. He was the son of Captaia John Stoddart. 
 His sister Sarah married Hazlitt. 
 
 VOL. I. z
 
 338 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING 
 
 N.B. the 2nd. — I should not have blotted your 
 book, but I had sent my own out to be bound, as I 
 was in duty bound. A liberal criticism upon the 
 several pieces, lyrical, heroical, amatory, and satirical, 
 would be acceptable. So, you don't think there's a 
 Word's — worth of good poetry in the great L. B. ! I 
 daren't put the dreaded syllables at their just length, 
 for my back tingles from the northern castigation. I 
 send you the three letters, which I beg you to return 
 along with those former letters (which I hope you are 
 not going to print, by your detention). But don't be 
 in a hurry to send them. When you come to town 
 will do. Apropos of coming to town : Last Sunday 
 was a fortnight, as I was coming to town from the 
 Professor's, inspired with new rum, I tumbled down 
 and broke my nose. I drink nothing stronger than 
 malt liquors. 
 
 I am going to change my lodgings, having received 
 a hint that it would be agreeable, at our Lady's next 
 feast. I have partly fixed upon most delectable 
 rooms, which look out (when you stand a tip-toe) over 
 the Thames and Surrey Hills ; at the upper end of 
 King's Bench Walks, in the Temple. There I shall 
 have all the privacy of a house without the en- 
 cumbrance, and shall be able to lock my friends out 
 as often as I desire to hold free converse with my 
 immortal mind ; for my present lodgings resemble a 
 minister's levee, I have so increased my acquaintance 
 (as they call 'em) since I have resided in town. Like 
 the country mouse, that had tasted a little of urbane 
 manners, I long to be nibbling my own cheese by my 
 dear self, without mouse-traps and time-traps. By 
 my new plan, I shall be as airy, up four pair of stairs, 
 as in the country ; and in a garden, in the midst of
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 339 
 
 enchanting (more than Mahometan paradise) London, 
 whose dirtiest drab-frequented alley, and her lowest 
 bowing tradesman, I would not exchange for Skid- 
 daw, Helvellyn, James, Walter, and the parson into 
 the bargain. O her lamps of a night ! her rich gold- 
 smiths, print-shops, toy-shops, mercers, hardware- 
 men, pastry-cooks, St. Paul's Churchyard, the Strand, 
 Exeter Change, Charing Cross, with the man upon 
 a black horse! These are thy gods, O London! A'nt 
 you mightily moped on the banks of the Cam ? Had 
 you not better come and set up here ? You can't 
 think what a difference. All the streets and pavements 
 are pure gold, I warrant you. At least, I know an 
 alchemy that turns her mud into that metal, — a mind 
 that loves to be at home in crowds. 
 
 'Tis half-past twelve o'clock, and all sober people 
 ought to be a-bed. Between you and me the L. 
 Ballads are but drowsy performances. 
 
 C. Lamb (as you may guess). 
 
 Letter CXXV.] [March i, 1800.] 
 
 I hope by this time you are prepared to say, the 
 " Falstaff's letters" are a bundle of the sharpest, 
 queerest, profoundest humours, of any these juice- 
 drained latter times have spawned. I should have 
 advertised you, that the meaning is frequently hard 
 to be got at ; and so are the future guineas, that now 
 lie ripening and aurifying in the womb of some un- 
 discovered Potosi ; but dig, dig, dig, dig, Manning ! 
 I set to, with an unconquerable propulsion to write, 
 with a lamentable want of what to write. My private 
 goings on are orderly as the movements of the 
 
 z 2
 
 340 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING 
 
 spheres, and stale as their music to angels' ears. 
 Public affairs — except as they touch upon me, and so 
 turn into private, — I cannot whip up my mind to feel 
 any interest in. I grieve, indeed, that War, and 
 Nature, and Mr. Pitt, that hangs up in Lloyd's best 
 parlour, should have conspired to call up three neces- 
 saries, simple commoners as our fathers knew them, 
 into the upper house of luxuries ; bread, and beer, 
 and coals, Manning. But as to France and French- 
 men, and the Abbe Sieyes and his constitutions, I 
 cannot make these present times present to me. I 
 read histories of the past, and I live in them ; 
 although, to abstract senses, they are far less 
 momentous than the noises which keep Europe 
 awake. I am reading Burnet's History of his own 
 Times. Did you ever read that garrulous, pleasant 
 history ? He tells his story like an old man past 
 political service, bragging to his sons on winter 
 evenings of the part he took in public transactions, 
 when his " old cap was new." Full of scandal, which 
 all true history is. No palliatives ; but all the stark 
 wickedness, that actually gives the momentum to 
 national actors. Quite the prattle of age, and out- 
 lived importance. Truth and sincerity staring out 
 upon you perpetually in alto relievo. Himself a party 
 man — he makes you a party man. None of the 
 cursed philosophical Humeian indifference, so cold, 
 and unnatural, and inhuman ! None of the cursed 
 Gibbonian fine writing, so fine and composite ! None 
 of Dr. Robertson's periods with three members. 
 None of Mr. Roscoe's sage remarks, all so apposite, 
 and coming in so clever, lest the reader should have 
 had the trouble of drawing an inference. Burnet's 
 good old prattle I can bring present to my mind ; I
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 34I 
 
 can make the revolution present to me : the French 
 revolution, by a converse perversity in my nature, 
 I fling as tax from me. To quit this tiresome subject, 
 and to relieve you from two or three dismal yawns, 
 which I hear in spirit, I here conclude my more than 
 commonly obtuse letter ; dull, up to the dulness of a 
 Dutch commentator on Shakspeare. 
 My love to Lloyd and to Sophia. 1 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CXXVL] March i 7 th, 1800. 
 
 Dear Manning, — I am living in a continuous feast. 
 Coleridge has been with me now for nigh three 
 weeks, and the more I see of him in the quotidian 
 undress and relaxation of his mind, the more cause 
 I see to love him, and believe him a very good man, 
 and all those foolish impressions to the contrary fly 
 off like morning slumbers. He is engaged in trans- 
 lations, which I hope will keep him this month to 
 come. He is uncommonly kind and friendly to me. 
 He ferrets me day and night to do something. He 
 tends me, amidst all his own worrying and heart- 
 oppressing occupations, as a gardener tends his 
 young tulip. Marry come up ; what a pretty simili- 
 tude, and how like your humble servant ! He has 
 lugged me to the brink of engaging to a newspaper, 
 and has suggested to me, for a first plan, the forgery 
 of a supposed manuscript of Burton, the anatomist of 
 melancholy. I have even written the introductory 
 letter ; and, if J can pick up a few guineas this way, 
 I feel they will be most refreshing, bread being so 
 
 1 Mrs. Lloyd.
 
 342 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 dear. If I go on with it, I will apprise you of it, as 
 you may like to see my things ! and the tulip, of all 
 flowers, loves to be admired most. 
 
 Pray pardon me, if my letters do not come very 
 thick. I am so taken up with one thing or other, 
 that I cannot pick out (I will not say time, but) 
 fitting times to write to you. My dear love to Lloyd 
 and Sophia, and pray split this thin letter into three 
 parts, and present them with the two biggest in my 
 name. 
 
 They are my oldest friends ; but, ever the new 
 friend driveth out the old, as the ballad sings ! God 
 bless you all three ! I would hear from Ll[oyd] if I 
 could. C. L. 
 
 Flour has just fallen nine shillings a sack : we shall 
 be all too rich. 
 
 Tell Charles 1 I have seen his mamma, and have 
 almost fallen in love with her, since I mayn't with 
 Olivia. She is so fine and graceful, a complete 
 matron-lady-quaker. She has given me two little 
 books. Olivia grows a charming girl — full of feeling, 
 and thinner than she was ; but I have not time to fall 
 in love. 
 
 Mary presents her general compliments. She keeps 
 in fine health. 
 
 Huzza boys ! and down with the Atheists ! 
 
 Letter CXXVIL] [August 9 , 1800.] 
 
 Dear Manning, — I suppose you have heard of 
 Sophia Lloyd's good fortune, and paid the customary 
 compliments to the parents. Heaven keep the new- 
 
 1 Charles Lloyd.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 343 
 
 born infant from star blasting and moon blasting, 
 from epilepsy, marasmus, and the devil! May he 
 live to see many days, and they good ones ; some 
 friends, and they pretty regular correspondents ! with 
 as much wit and wisdom as will eat their bread and 
 cheese together under a poor roof without quarrel- 
 ling ! as much goodness as will earn heaven. Here I 
 must leave off, my benedictory powers failing me. 
 
 And now, when shall I catch a glimpse of your 
 honest face-to-face countenance again ? — your fine 
 dogmatical sceptical face by punch-light ? Oh ! one 
 glimpse of the human face, and shake of the human 
 hand, is better than whole reams of this cold, thin 
 correspondence ; yea, of more worth than all the 
 letters that have sweated the fingers of sensibility, 
 from Madame Sevigne and Balzac to Sterne and 
 Shenstone. 
 
 Coleridge is settled with his wife and the young 
 philosopher at Keswick, with the Wordsworths. 
 They have contrived to spawn a new volume of 
 lyrical ballads, which is to see the light in about a 
 month, and causes no little excitement in the literary 
 world. George Dyer too, that good-natured heathen, 
 is more than nine months gone with his twin 
 volumes of ode, pastoral, sonnet, elegy, Spenserian, 
 Horatian, Akensidish, and Masonic verse. Clio 
 prosper the birth ! it will be twelve shillings out of 
 somebody's pocket. I find he means to exclude 
 " personal satire," so it appears by his truly original 
 advertisement. Well, God put it into the hearts of 
 the English gentry to come in shoals and subscribe 
 to his poems, for He never put a kinder heart into 
 flesh of man than George Dyer's ! 
 
 Now farewell, for dinner is at hand. C. L.
 
 344 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Letter CXXVIIL] August nth, 1800. 
 
 My dear fellow, (N.B. mighty familiar of late !) for 
 me to come to Cambridge now is one of heaven's 
 impossibilities. Metaphysicians tell us, even it can 
 work nothing which impljes a contradiction. I can 
 explain this by telling you that I am engaged to do 
 double duty (this hot weather !) for a man who has 
 taken advantage of this very weather to go and 
 cool himself in " green retreats" all the month of 
 August. 
 
 But for you to come to London instead ! — muse 
 upon it, revolve it, cast it about in your mind. I 
 have a bed at your command. You shall drink rum, 
 brandy, gin, aqua-vitae, usquebaugh, or whiskey 
 a' nights ; and for the after-dinner trick, I have eight 
 bottles of genuine port, which, mathematically 
 divided, gives i| for every day you stay, provided 
 you stay a week. Hear John Milton sing, 
 
 " Let Euclid rest and Archimedes pause." 
 
 Tiventj-Jirsi Sonnet. 
 
 And elsewhere, — 
 
 " What neat repast shall feast us, light and choice, 
 Of Attic taste, with wine, whence we may rise 
 To hear the lute well touch 'd, or artful voice 
 Warble immortal notes and Tuscan air ?" 
 
 Indeed the poets are full of this pleasing morality, — 
 
 " Veni cito, Domine Manning!" 
 
 Think upon it. Excuse the paper ; it is all I 
 have. 
 
 C. Lamb.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 345 
 
 Letter CXXIX.] August 22nd, 1800. 
 
 Dear Manning, — You needed not imagine any 
 apology necessary. Your fine hare and fine birds 
 (which are just now dangling by our kitchen blaze) 
 discourse most eloquent music in your justification. 
 You just nicked my palate. For with all due 
 decorum and leave may it be spoken, my worship 
 hath taken physic to-day, and being low and puling, 
 requireth to be pampered. Foh ! how beautiful and 
 strong those buttered onions come to my nose ! For 
 you know we extract a divine spirit of gravy from 
 those materials, which, duly compounded with a con- 
 sistence of bread and cream (y'clept bread-sauce), 
 each to each giving double grace, do mutually 
 illustrate and set off (as skilful gold foils 'to rare 
 jewels) your partridge, pheasant, woodcock, snipe, 
 teal, widgeon, and the other lesser daughters of the 
 ark. My friendship, struggling with my carnal and 
 fleshly prudence, (which suggests that a bird a man 
 is the proper allotment in such cases,) yearneth 
 sometimes to have thee here to pick a wing or so. 
 I question if your Norfolk sauces match our London 
 culinaric. 
 
 George Dyer has introduced me to the table of an 
 agreeable old gentleman, Dr. Anderson, who gives 
 hot legs of mutton and grape pies at his sylvan lodge 
 at Isleworth ; where, in the middle of a street, he 
 has shot up a wall most preposterously before his 
 small dwelling, which, with the circumstance of his 
 taking several panes of glass out of bed-room win- 
 dows (for air), causeth his neighbours to speculate 
 strangely on the state of the good man's pericranicks. 
 Plainly, he lives under the reputation of being de- 
 ranged. George does not mind this circumstance;
 
 346 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 he rather likes him the better for it. The Doctor, in 
 his pursuits, joins agricultural to poetical science, and 
 has set George's brains mad about the old Scotch 
 writers, Barbour, Douglas's iEneid, Blind Harry, &c. 
 We returned home in a return postchaise, (having 
 dined with the Doctor,) and George kept wondering 
 and wondering, for eight or nine turnpike miles, what 
 was the name, and striving to recollect the name, of 
 a poet anterior to Barbour. I begged to know what 
 was remaining of his works. " There is nothing 
 extant of his works, Sir ; but by all accounts he seems 
 to have been a fine genius !" This fine genius, with- 
 out any thing to show for it, or any title beyond 
 George's courtesy, without even a name ; and Bar- 
 bour, and Douglas, and Blind Harry, now are the 
 predominant sounds in George's pia mater, and their 
 buzzings exclude politics, criticism, and algebra — 
 the late lords of that illustrious lumber-room. Mark, 
 he has never read any of these books, but is impatient 
 till he reads them all at the Doctor's suggestion. 
 Poor Dyer ! his friends should be careful what 
 sparks they let fall into such inflammable matter. 
 
 Could I have my will of the heathen, I would 
 lock him up from all access of new ideas; I would 
 exclude all critics that would not swear me first (upon 
 their Virgil) that they would feed him with nothing 
 but the old, safe, familiar notions and sounds, (the 
 rightful aborigines of his brain) — Gray, Akenside, and 
 Mason. In these sounds, reiterated as often as 
 possible, there could be nothing painful, nothing 
 distracting. 
 
 God bless me, here are the birds, smoking hot ! 
 All that is gross and unspiritual in me rises at the 
 sight !
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 347 
 
 Avaunt friendship, and all memory of absent 
 friends ! C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXXX.] Oct. 5, 1800. 
 
 C. L.'s moral sense presents her compliments to 
 Doctor Manning, is very thankful for his medical 
 advice, but is happy to add that her disorder has died 
 of itself. 
 
 Dr. Manning, Coleridge has left us, to go into the 
 North, on a visit to Wordsworth. With him have 
 flown all my splendid prospects of engagement with 
 the Morning Post, all my visionary guineas, the 
 deceitful wages of unborn scandal. In truth, I 
 wonder you took it up so seriously. All my inten- 
 tion was but to make a little sport with such public 
 and fair game as Mr. Pitt, Mr. Wilberforce, Mrs. 
 Fitzherbert, the Devil, &c. — gentry dipped in Styx all' 
 over, whom no paper javelin-lings can touch. To 
 have made free with these cattle, where was the 
 harm ? 'twould have been but giving a polish to 
 lamp-black, not nigrifying a negro primarily. After 
 all, I cannot but regret my involuntary virtue. Damn 
 virtue that's thrust upon us ; it behaves itself with 
 such constraint, till conscience opens the window and 
 lets out the goose. I had struck off two imitations 
 of Burton, quite abstracted from any modern allusions, 
 which it was my intent only to lug in from time to 
 time to make 'em popular. 
 
 Stuart has got these, with an introductory letter ; 
 but, not hearing from him, I have ceased from my 
 labours, but I write to him to-day to get a final 
 answer. I am afraid they won't do for a paper.
 
 348 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Burton is a scarce gentleman, not much known, else 
 I had done 'em pretty well. 
 
 I have also hit off a few lines in the name of 
 Burton, being a "Conceit of Diabolic Possession." 1 
 Burton was a man often assailed by deepest melan- 
 choly, and at other times much given to laughing 
 and jesting, as is the way with melancholy men. I 
 will send them to you : they were almost extempore, 
 and no great things ; but you will indulge them. 
 Robert Lloyd is come to town. Priscilla meditates 
 going to see Pizarro at Drury Lane to-night, 2 (from 
 her uncle's,) under cover of coming to dine with me 
 ...heu temporal lieu mores! — I have barely time to 
 finish, as I expect her and Robin every minute. — 
 Yours as usual 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CXXXL] Oct. 16th, 1800. 
 
 Dear Manning, — Had you written one week before 
 you did, I certainly should have obeyed your injunc- 
 tion ; you should have seen me before my letter. I 
 will explain to you my situation. There are six of 
 us in one department. Two of us (within these four 
 days) are confined with severe fevers ; and two more, 
 who belong to the Tower Militia, expect to have 
 marching orders on Friday. Now six are absolutely 
 necessary. I have already asked and obtained two 
 young hands to supply the loss of the feverites. And, 
 with the other prospect before me, you may believe 
 
 1 The Curious Fragments, which occur in the Miscellaneous Sec- 
 tion of the Essays. This was one of Lamb's hoaxes. 
 
 2 Pizarro had a great run.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 349 
 
 1 cannot decently ask leave of absence for myself. 
 All I can promise (and I do promise, with the s- 
 cerity of St. Peter, and the contrition of sinner Peter 
 if I fail) that I will come the very first spare week, 
 and go nowhere till I have been at Cambridge. No 
 matter if you are in a state of pupilage when I come ; 
 for I can employ myself in Cambridge very pleasantly 
 in the mornings. Are there not libraries, halls, col- 
 leges, books, pictures, statues ? I wish you had 
 made London in your way. There is an exhibition 
 quite uncommon in Europe, which could not have 
 escaped your genius, — a live rattlesnake, ten feet in 
 length, and the thickness of a big leg. I went to see 
 it last night by candlelight. We were ushered into 
 a room very little bigger than ours at Pentonville. 
 A man and woman and four boys live in this room, 
 joint tenants with nine snakes, most of them such 
 as no remedy has been discovered for their bite. 
 We walked into the middle, which is formed by a 
 half-moon of wired boxes, all mansions of snakes — 
 whip-snakes, thunder-snakes, pig-nose-snakes, Ameri- 
 can vipers, and this monster. He lies curled up in 
 folds. Immediately a stranger entered (for he is 
 used to the family, and sees them play at cards,) 
 he set up a rattle like a watchman's in London, or 
 near as loud, and reared up a head, from the midst 
 of these folds, like a toad, and shook his head, and 
 showed every sign a snake can show of irritation. 
 I had the foolish curiosity to strike the wires with 
 my finger, and the devil flew at me with his toad- 
 mouth wide open; the inside of his mouth is quite 
 white. I had got my finger away, nor could he 
 well have bit me with his big mouth, which would 
 have been certain death in five minutes. But it
 
 35© CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 frightened me so much, that I did not recover my 
 voice for a minute's space. I forgot, in my fear, 
 that he was secured. You would have forgot too, 
 for 'tis incredible how such a monster can be con- 
 fined in small gauzy-looking wires. I dreamed of 
 snakes in the night. I wish to heaven you could 
 see it. He absolutely swelled with passion to the 
 bigness of a large thigh. I could not retreat with- 
 out infringing on another box ; and just behind, a 
 little devil not an inch from my back had got his 
 nose out, with some difficulty and pain, quite through 
 the bars ! He v/as soon taught better manners. 
 All the snakes were curious, and objects of terror : 
 but this monster, like Aaron's serpent, swallowed up 
 the impression of the rest. He opened his cursed 
 mouth, when he made at me, as wide as his head 
 was broad. I hallooed out quite loud, and felt pains 
 all over my body with the fright. 
 
 I have had the felicity of hearing George Dyer 
 read out one book of the Farmer's Boy. I thought 
 it rather childish. No doubt, there is originality in 
 it, (which, in your self-taught geniuses, is a most 
 rare quality, they generally getting hold of some 
 bad models, in a scarcity of books, and forming 
 their taste on them,) but no selection. All is de- 
 scribed. 
 
 Mind, I have only heard read one book. 
 
 Yours sincerely, 
 
 Philo-Snake, 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CXXXIL] 1800. 
 
 I was not aware that you owed me any thing beside 
 that guinea ; but I dare say you are right. I live
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 35 1 
 
 at No. 16, Mitre Court Buildings, a pistol-shot off 
 Baron Maseres'. You must introduce me to the 
 Baron. I think we should suit one another mainly. 
 He lives on the ground floor, for convenience of the 
 gout ; I prefer the attic story, for the air. He keeps 
 three footmen and two maids ; I have neither maid 
 nor laundress, not caring to be troubled with them. 
 His forte, I understand, is the higher mathematics ; 
 my turn, I confess, is more to poetry and the belles 
 lettres. The very antithesis of our characters would 
 make up a harmony. You must bring the Baron 
 and me together. — N.B. when you come to see me, 
 mount up to the top of the stairs — I hope you are not 
 astbmatical — and come in flannel, for 'tis pure airy 
 up there. And bring your glass, and I will show you 
 the Surrey Hills. My bed faces the river, so as by 
 perking up upon my haunches, and supporting my 
 carcass with my elbows, without much wrying my 
 neck, I can see the white sails glide by the bottom of 
 the King's Bench Walks as I lie in my bed. An 
 excellent tiptoe prospect in the best room : — case- 
 ment windows, with small panes, to look more like a 
 cottage. Mind, I have got no bed for you, that's flat ; 
 sold it to pay expenses of moving, — the very bed on 
 which Manning lay ; the friendly, the mathematical 
 Manning ! How forcibly does it remind me of the 
 interesting Otway ! "The very bed which on thy 
 marriage night gave thee into the arms of Belvidera, 
 by the coarse hands of ruffians — " (upholsterers' 
 men,) &c. My tears will not give me leave to go on. 
 But a bed I will get you, Manning, on condition you 
 will be my day-guest. 
 
 I have been ill more than month, with a bad cold, 
 which comes upon me (like a murderer's conscience)
 
 352 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 about midnight, and vexes me for many hours. I 
 have successively been drugged with Spanish licorice, 
 opium, ipecacuanha, paregoric, and tincture of fox- 
 glove (tinctura purpuras digitalis of the ancients). I 
 am afraid I must leave off drinking. 
 
 LETTER CXXXIII.] November 3rd, 1800. 
 
 Ecqnid mcditatur Archimedes ? What is Euclid 
 doing ? What hath happened to learned Trisme- 
 gist ? Doth he take it in ill part, that his humble 
 friend did not comply with his courteous invitation ? 
 Let it suffice, I could not come. Are impossibilities 
 nothing ? — be they abstractions of the intellect ? — or 
 not (rather) most sharp and mortifying realities ? 
 nuts in the Will's mouth too hard for her to crack ? 
 brick and stone walls in her way, which she can by 
 no means eat through ? sore lets, impedimenta viarum 
 no thoroughfares ? racemi nimium alte pendente s ? 
 Is the phrase classic ? I allude to the grapes in 
 jEsop, which cost the fox a strain, and gained the 
 world an aphorism. Observe the superscription of 
 this letter. In adapting the size of the letters, which 
 constitute your name and Mr. Crisp's name respec- 
 tively, I had an eye to your different stations in life. 
 'Tis truly curious, and must be soothing to an aristo- 
 crat. I wonder it has never been hit on before my time. 
 I have made an acquisition latterly of a pleasant hand, 
 one Rickman, to whom I was introduced by George 
 Dyer, not the most flattering auspices under which 
 one man can be introduced to another. George brings 
 all sorts of people together, setting up a sort of 
 agrarian law, or common property, in matter of
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 353 
 
 society ; but for once he has done me a great plea- 
 sure, while he was only pursuing a principle, as ignes 
 fatui may light you home. This Rickman lives in 
 our Buildings, immediately opposite our house ; 
 the finest fellow to drop in a' nights, about nine or 
 ten o'clock — cold bread-and-cheese time — just in the 
 wishing time of the night, when you wish for some 
 body to come in, without a distinct idea of a probable 
 any body. Just in the nick, neither too early to be 
 tedious, nor too late to sit a reasonable time. He is a 
 most pleasant hand ; a fine rattling fellow, has gone 
 through life laughing at solemn apes ; — himself 
 hugely literate, oppressively full of information in all 
 stuff of conversation, from matter of fact to Xenophon 
 and Plato — can talk Greek with Porson, politics with 
 Thelwall, 1 conjecture with George Dyer, nonsense 
 with me, and anything with anybody ; a great farmer, 
 somewhat concerned in an agricultural magazine ; 
 reads no poetry but Shakspeare ; very intimate with 
 Southey, but never reads his poetry ; relishes George 
 Dyer ; thoroughly penetrates into the ridiculous wher- 
 ever found ; understands the first time, (a great desi- 
 deratum in common minds) — you need never twice 
 speak to him ; does not want explanations, transla- 
 tions, limitations, as Professor Godwin does when 
 you make an assertion ; up to any thing ; down to 
 every thing ; whatever sapit hominem. A perfect man. 
 All this farrago, which must perplex you to read, and 
 has put me to a little trouble to select, only proves 
 how impossible it is to describe a pleasant hand. You 
 
 1 John Thelwall, Citizen Thelwall, the early friend of Coleridge and 
 Southey in the days of their Radicalism. 
 
 VOL. I. 2 A
 
 354 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 must see Rickman 1 to know him, for he is a species 
 in one ; a new class ; an exotic ; any slip of which I 
 am proud to put in my garden-pot ; the clearest 
 headed fellow ; fullest of matter, with least ver- 
 bosity. If there be any alloy in my fortune to have 
 met with such a man, it is that he commonly divides 
 his time between town and country, having some 
 foolish family ties at Christchurch, by which means 
 he can only gladden our London hemisphere with 
 returns of light. He is now going for six weeks. 
 
 At last I have written to Kemble, to know the 
 event of my play, which was presented last Christ- 
 mas. As I suspected, came an answer back that the 
 copy was lost, and could not be found — no hint that 
 any body had to this day ever looked into it — with a 
 courteous (reasonable !) request of another copy (if I 
 had one by me), and a promise of a definitive answer 
 in a week. I could not resist so facile and moderate 
 a demand ; so scribbled out another, omitting sundry 
 things, such as the witch story, about half of the 
 forest scene, (which is too leisurely for story,) and 
 transposing that soliloquy about England getting 
 drunk, which, like its reciter, stupidly stood alone, 
 nothing prevenient or antevenient ; and cleared away 
 a good deal besides ; and sent this copy, written all 
 out (with alterations, &c. requiring judgment) in one 
 day and a half! I sent it last night, and am in weekly 
 expectation of the tolling bell and death-warrant. 
 
 This is all my London news. Send me some from 
 the banks of Cam, as the poets delight to speak, 
 especially George Dyer, who has no other name nor 
 
 1 John Rickman, Esq., Clerk of the House of Commons. Lamb 
 knew him as early as 1800, perhaps earlier, but no letters between them 
 have been found prior to i!So2. — See Correspondence post.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 355 
 
 idea nor definition of Cambridge. Its being a market 
 town, sending members to Parliament, never entered 
 into his definition. It was and is simply the banks 
 of the Cam, or the fair Cam, as Oxford is the banks 
 of the Isis, or the fair Isis. Yours in all humility, 
 most illustrious Trismegist, C. Lamb. 
 
 (Read on ; there's more at the bottom.) 
 
 You ask me about the Farmer's Boy. Don't you 
 think the fellow who wrote it (who is a shoemaker) 
 has a poor mind ? Don't you find he is always silly 
 about poor Giles, and those abject kind of phrases, 
 which mark a man that looks up to wealth ? None 
 of Burns's poet dignity. What do you think ? I 
 have just opened him ; but he makes me sick. 
 
 Dyer knows the shoemaker, a damn'd stupid hound 
 in company ; but George promises to introduce him 
 indiscriminately to all friends. 
 
 Letter CXXXIV.] [Nov. 28th, 1800.] 
 
 Dear Manning, — I have received a very kind invi- 
 tation from Lloyd and Sophia, to go and spend a 
 month with them at the Lakes. Now it fortunately 
 happens (which is so seldom the case) that I have 
 spare cash by me, enough to answer the expenses of 
 so long a journey; and I am determined to get away 
 from the office by some means. The purpose of this 
 letter is to request of you (my dear friend), that you 
 will not take it unkind if I decline my proposed visit 
 to Cambridge for the present. Perhaps I shall be 
 able to take Cambridge in my way, going or coming. 
 I need not describe to you the expectations which 
 such an one as myself, pent up all my life in a dirty 
 
 2 A 2
 
 356 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 city, have formed of, a tour to the Lakes. Consider 
 Grasmere ! Ambleside ! Wordsworth ! Coleridge ! 
 I hope you will. Hills, woods, lakes, and mountains, 
 to the devil. I will eat snipes with thee, Thomas 
 Manning. Only confess, confess, a bite. 
 
 P.S. I think you named the 16th ; but was it not 
 modest of Lloyd to send such an invitation ! It 
 shows his knowledge of money and time. I should be 
 loth to think he meant 
 
 " Ironic satire sidelong sklented 
 
 On my poor pursie." — Burns, 
 
 For my part, with reference to my friends northward, 
 I must confess that I am not romance-bit about 
 Nature. The earth, and sea, and sky, (when all is 
 said,) is but as a house to dwell in. If the inmates 
 be courteous, and good liquors flow like the conduits 
 at an old coronation, if they can talk sensibly, and 
 feel properly, I have no need to stand staring upon 
 the gilded looking-glass (that strained my friend's 
 purse-strings in the purchase) nor his five-shilling 
 print, over the mantel-piece, of old Nabbs the carrier, 
 (which only betrays his false taste). Just as im- 
 portant to me (in a sense) is all the furniture of my 
 world; eye-pampering, but satisfies no heart. Streets, 
 streets, streets, markets, theatres, churches, Covent 
 Gardens, shops sparkling with pretty faces of in- 
 dustrious milliners, neat sempstresses, ladies cheap- 
 ening, gentlemen behind counters lying, authors in 
 the street with spectacles, George Dyers, (you may 
 know them by their gait,) lamps lit at night, pastry- 
 cooks' and silversmiths' shops, beautiful Quakers 
 of Pentonville, noise of coaches, drowsy cry of 
 mechanic watchmen at night, with bucks reeling
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 357 
 
 home drunk; if you happen to wake at midnight, 
 cries of " Fire !" and " Stop thief !" inns of court, with 
 their learned air, and halls, and butteries, just like 
 Cambridge colleges; old book-stalls, "Jeremy Tay- 
 lors," " Burtons on Melancholy," and " Religio 
 Medicis," on every stall. These are thy pleasures, 
 O London ! with thy many sins. O City, abounding 
 
 in w , for these may Keswick and her giant 
 
 brood go hang! C. L. 
 
 Letter CXXXV.] Dec. 13th, 1800. 
 
 I have received your letter this moment, not having 
 been at the office. I have just time to scribble down 
 the epilogue. To your epistle I will just reply, that 
 I will certainly come to Cambridge before January 
 is out ; I'll come when I can. You shall have an 
 amended copy of my play early next week. Mary 
 thanks you ; but her handwriting is too feminine to 
 be exposed to a Cambridge gentleman, though I 
 endeavour to persuade her that you understand 
 algebra, and must understand her hand. The play 
 is the man's you wot of; but for Heaven's sake do 
 not mention it : it is to come out in a feigned name, 
 as one Tobin's. I will omit the introductory lines 
 which connect it with the play, and give you the con- 
 cluding tale, which is the mass and bulk of the 
 epilogue. The name is Jack Incident. It is all 
 about promise-breaking : you will see it all, if you 
 read the papers. 
 
 Jack, of dramatic genius justly vain, 
 Purchased a renter's share at Drury Lane ; 
 A prudent man in every other matter, 
 Known at his club-room for an honest hatter ;
 
 358 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Humane and courteous, led a civil life, 
 And has been seldom known to beat his wife ; 
 But Jack is now grown quite another man, 
 Frequents the green-room, knows the plot and plan 
 
 Of each new piece, 1 
 
 And has been seen to talk with Sheridan 1 
 In at the play-house just at six he pops, 
 And never quits it till the curtain drops ; 
 Is never absent on the author's night, 
 
 Knows actresses and actors too by sight ; 
 
 So humble, that with Suett he'll confer, 
 
 Or take a pipe with plain Jack Bannister; 
 
 Nay, with an author has been known so free, 
 
 He once suggested a catastrophe. 
 
 In short, John dabbled till his head was turn'd : 
 
 His wife remonstrated, his neighbours mourn'd, 
 
 His customers were dropping off apace, 
 
 And Jack's affairs began to wear a piteous face. 
 
 One night his wife began a curtain lecture : 
 " My dearest Johnny, husband, spouse, protector, 
 Take pity on your helpless babes and me, 
 Save us from ruin, you from bankruptcy : 
 Look to your business, leave these cursed plays, 
 And try again your old industrious ways." 
 
 Jack, who was always scared at the Gazette, 
 And had some bits of scull uninjured yet, 
 Promised amendment, vow'd his wife spake reason, 
 " He would not see another play that season." 
 
 Three stubborn fortnights Jack his promise kept, 
 Was late and early in his shop, ate, slept, 
 And walk'd and talk'd, like ordinary men ; 
 No <wlt, but John the hatter once again — 
 Visits his club : when lo ! one fatal night 
 His wife with horror view'd the well-known sight — 
 John's hat, ivig, snujf-box — well she knew his tricks — 
 And Jack decamping at the hour of six. 
 Just at the counter's edge a playbill lay, 
 Announcing that Pizarro was the play. 
 " O Johnny, Johnny, this is your old doing! 
 Quoth Jack, " Why what the devil storm's a-brewing ?
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 359 
 
 About a harmless play why all this fright ? 
 
 I'll go and see it, if 'tis but for spite — 
 
 Zounds, woman ! Nelson's to be there to-night. "1 
 
 N.B. — This was intended for Jack Bannister to 
 speak ; but the sage managers have chosen Miss 
 Heard, except Miss Tidswell, the worst actress ever 
 seen or heard. Now I remember I have promised 
 the loan of my play. I will lend it instantly, and 
 you shall get it ('pon honour !) by this day week. 
 
 I must go and dress for the boxes ! First night ! 
 Finding I have time, I transcribe the rest. Observe, 
 you have read the last first ; it begins thus : — (The 
 names I took from a little outline G. gave me. I 
 have not read the play.) 
 
 " Ladies, ye've seen how Guzman's consort died, 
 Poor victim of a Spaniard brother's pride, 
 When Spanish honour through the world was blown, 
 And Spanish beauty for the best was known, 
 In that romantic, unenlighten'd time, 
 A breach of promise was a sort of crime : 
 Which of you handsome English ladies here, 
 But deems the penance bloody and severe? 
 A whimsical old Saragossa fashion, 
 That a dead father's dying inclination 
 Should live to thwart a living daughter's passion. 
 Unjustly on the sex <we men exclaim, 
 Rail at jour * * vices, — and commit the same. 
 Man is a promise-breaker from the womb, 
 And goes a promise-breaker to the tomb. 
 What need we instance here the lover's vow, 
 The sick man's purpose, or the great man's bow ? 
 1'he truth by few examples best is shown : 
 Instead of many which are better known, 
 Take poor Jack Incident's, that's dead and gone. 
 Jack, &c. &c. &c." 
 
 1 A good clap-trap.
 
 360 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Now you have it all — how do you like it ? I am 
 going to hear it recited ! ! ! 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CXXXVI.] Dec. 16th, 1800. 
 
 We are damn'd ! — Not the facetious epilogue 
 itself could save us ; for, as the editor of the 
 Morning Post (quick-sighted gentleman !) hath this 
 morning truly observed, (I beg pardon if I falsify his 
 words ; their profound sense I am sure I retain ;) both 
 prologue and epilogue were worthy of accompanying 
 such a piece ; and indeed (mark the profundity, Mr. 
 Manning !) were received with proper indignation by 
 such of the audience only as thought either worth 
 attending to. Professor, 1 thy glories wax dim ! 
 Again, the incomparable author of the True Briton 
 declareth in his paper (bearing same date) that the 
 epilogue was an indifferent attempt at humour and 
 character, and failed in both. I forbear to mention 
 the other papers, because I have not read them. O 
 Professor, how different thy feelings now {quantum 
 mutatus ab illo professore, qui in agris philosophic 
 tantas victorias acquisivisti), — how different thy 
 proud feelings but one little week ago — thy anticipa- 
 tions of thy nine nights — those visionary claps, 
 which have soothed thy soul by day and thy dreams 
 by night ! Calling in accidentally on the Professor 
 while he was out, I was ushered into the study ; and 
 my nose quickly (most sagacious always) pointed 
 
 1 Lamb proceeds to apostrophize himself under this title, showing 
 what he was to have achieved in the way of book-purchases, &C if Mr. 
 H. had succeeded. But elsewhere Godwin is called The Professor, 
 and Mrs. Godwin Mrs. Professor.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 361 
 
 me to four tokens lying loose upon thy table, Pro- 
 fessor, which indicated thy violent and satanical 
 pride of heart. Imprimis, there caught mine eye a 
 list of six persons, thy friends, whom thou didst 
 meditate inviting to a sumptuous dinner on the 
 Thursday, anticipating the profits of thy Saturday's 
 play to answer charges : I was in the honoured file ! 
 Next (a stronger evidence of thy violent and almost 
 satanical pride) lay a list of all the morning papers, 
 (from the Morning Chronicle downwards to the Porcu- 
 pine,) with the places of their respective offices, where 
 thou wast meditating to insert, and didst insert, an 
 elaborate sketch of the story of thy play ; stones in thy 
 enemy's hand to bruise thee with, and severely wast 
 thou bruised, O Professor ! nor do I know what oil 
 to pour into thy wounds. Next (which convinced me 
 to a dead conviction of thy pride, violent and almost 
 satanical pride !) lay a list of books which thy un- 
 tragedy-favoured pocket could never answer : Dods- 
 ley's Old Plays, Malone's Shakspeare, (still harping 
 upon thy play, thy philosophy abandoned meanwhile 
 to Christians and superstitious minds) ; nay, I be- 
 lieve (if I can believe my memory) that the 
 ambitious Encyclopaedia itself was part of thy medi- 
 tated acquisitions ; but many a playbook was there. 
 All these visions are damned; and thou, Professor, 
 must read Shakspeare in future out of a common 
 edition ; and, hark ye ! pray read him to a little better 
 purpose. Last and strongest against thee (in 
 colours manifest as the hand upon Belshazzar's 
 wall) lay a volume of poems by C. Lloyd and 
 C. Lamb. 1 Thy heart misgave thee, that thy 
 
 l The little volume of blank verse was published in 1798.
 
 362 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 assistant might possibly not have talent enough to 
 furnish thee an epilogue ! Manning, all these things 
 came over my mind ; all the gratulations that would 
 have thickened upon him, and even some have glanced 
 aside upon his humble friend ; the vanity, and the fame, 
 and the profits, (the Professor is £500 ideal money 
 out of pocket by this failure, besides £200 he would 
 have got for the copyright, and the Professor is never 
 much beforehand with the world ; what he gets is all 
 by the sweat of his brow and dint of brain, for the 
 Professor, though a sure man, is also a slow); and 
 now to muse upon thy altered physiognomy, thy pale 
 and squalid appearance, (a kind of blue sickness about 
 the eyelids,) and thy crest fallen, and thy proud 
 demand of £"200 from thy bookseller changed to an 
 uncertainty of his taking it at all, or giving thee full 
 £50. The Professor has won my heart by this Jiis 
 mournful catastrophe. You remember Marshall, who 
 dined with him at my house ; I met him in the 
 lobby immediately after the damnation of the Pro- 
 fessor's play, and he looked to me like an angel ; 
 his face was lengthened, and all over perspiration. 
 I never saw such a care-fraught visage ; I could have 
 hugged him, I loved him so intensely. " From 
 every pore of him a perfume fell." I have seen 
 that man in many situations, and, from my soul, 
 I think that a more god-like honest soul exists not 
 in this world. The Professor's poor nerves trem- 
 bling with the recent shock, he hurried him away to 
 my house to supper, and there we comforted him 
 as well as we could. He came to consult me about 
 a change of catastrophe ; but alas ! the piece was 
 condemned long before that crisis. I at first 
 humoured him with a specious proposition, but have
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 363 
 
 since joined his true friends in advising him to give 
 it up. He did it with a pang, and is to print it as 
 his. L. 
 
 LETTER CXXXVII.] December 27th, 1800. 
 
 At length George Dyer's phrenitis has come to a 
 crisis ; he is raging and furiously mad. I waited 
 upon the Heathen, Thursday was a se'nnight. The 
 first symptom which struck my eye, and gave me in- 
 controvertible proof of the fatal truth, was a pair of 
 nankeen pantaloons four times too big for him, 
 which the said Heathen did pertinaciously affirm to 
 be new. 
 
 They were absolutely ingrained with the accumu- 
 lated dirt of ages ; but he affirmed them to be clean. 
 He was going to visit a lady that was nice about 
 those things, and that's the reason he wore nankeen 
 that day. And then he danced, and capered, and 
 fidgeted, and pulled up his pantaloons, and hugged 
 his intolerable flannel vestment closer about his 
 poetic loins. Anon he gave it loose to the zephyrs 
 which plentifully insinuate their tiny bodies through 
 every crevice, door, window, or wainscot, expressly 
 formed for the exclusion of such impertinents. Then 
 he caught at a proof sheet, and catched up a 
 laundress's bill instead — made a dart at Bloomfield's 
 Poems, and threw them in agony aside. I could not 
 bring him to one direct reply ; he could not maintain 
 his jumping mind in a right line for the tithe of a 
 moment by Clifford's Inn clock. He must go to the 
 printer's immediately: (the most unlucky accident!) 
 he had struck off five hundred impressions of his
 
 364 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Poems, which were ready for delivery to subscribers, 
 and the Preface must all be expunged. There were 
 eighty pages of Preface, and not till that morning 
 had he discovered that in the very first page of said 
 Preface he had set out with a principle of Criticism 
 fundamentally wrong, which vitiated all his following 
 reasoning. The Preface must be expunged, although 
 it cost him £30, the lowest calculation, taking in 
 paper and printing ! In vain have his real friends 
 remonstrated against this Midsummer madness. 
 George is as obstinate as a Primitive Christian, 
 and wards and parries off all our thrusts with one un- 
 answerable fence : — " Sir, 'tis of great consequence 
 that the world is not misled J" 
 
 As for the other Professor, he has actually begun 
 to dive into Tavernier and Chardin's Persian Travels 
 for a story, to form a new drama for the sweet tooth 
 of this fastidious age. Hath not Bethlehem College 
 a fair action for non-residence against such pro- 
 fessors ? Are poets so few in this age, that He must 
 write poetry ? is morals a subject so exhausted, that 
 he must quit that line ? Is the metaphysic well 
 (without a bottom) drained dry? 
 
 If I can guess at the wicked pride of the Professor's 
 heart, I would take a shrewd wager that he disdains 
 ever again to dip his pen in Prose. Adieu, ye 
 splendid theories ! Farewell, dreams of political 
 justice ! Lawsuits, where I was council for Arch- 
 bishop Fenelon versus my own mother, in the famous 
 fire cause ! 
 
 Vanish from my mind, professors, one and all ! I 
 have metal more attractive on foot. 
 
 Man of many snipes, — I will sup with thee (Deo 
 volente, et diaboio nolente,) on Monday night, the
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 365 
 
 5th of January, in the new year, and crush a cup to 
 the infant century. 
 
 A word or two of my progress : Embark at six 
 o'clock in the morning, with a fresh gale, on a 
 Cambridge one-decker ; very cold till eight at night ; 
 land at St. Mary's light-house, muffins and coffee 
 upon table, (or any other curious production of 
 Turkey, or both Indies,) snipes exactly at nine, punch 
 to commence at ten, with argument; difference of 
 opinion is expected to take place about eleven ; per- 
 fect unanimity, with some haziness and dimness, 
 before twelve. — N.B. My single affection is not so 
 singly wedded to snipes ; but the curious and epi- 
 curean eye would also take a pleasure in beholding a 
 delicate and well-chosen assortment of teals, ortolans, 
 the unctuous and palate-soothing flesh of geese, wild 
 and tame, nightingales' brains, the sensorium of a 
 young sucking pig, or any other Christmas dish, 
 which I leave to the judgment of you and the cook of 
 Gonville. 1 
 
 C. Lame. 
 
 LETTER CXXXVIII.] No date. [About 1800.] 
 
 Dear Manning, — I sent to Brown's immediately. 
 Mr. Brown (or Pijou, as he is called by the moderns) 
 denied having received a letter from you. The one 
 for you he remembered receiving, and remitting to 
 Leadenhall Street ; whither I immediately posted (it 
 being the middle of dinner), my teeth unpicked. 
 There I learned that if you want a letter set right, 
 you must apply at the first door on the left hand 
 
 1 Gonville College, Cambridge.
 
 366 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 
 before one o'clock. I returned and picked my teeth. 
 And this morning I made my application in form, and 
 have seen the vagabond letter, which most likely 
 accompanies this. If it does not, I will get Rickman 
 to name it to the Speaker, 1 who will not fail to lay the 
 matter before Parliament the next sessions, when you 
 may be sure to have all abuses in the Post Depart- 
 ment rectified. 
 
 N.B. — There seems to be some informality epi- 
 demical. You direct your letters to me in Mitre Court : 
 my true address is Mitre Court Buildings. By the 
 pleasantries of Fortune, who likes a joke or a double 
 entendre as well as the best of us her children, there 
 happens to be another Mr. Lamb (that there should 
 be two ! !) in Mitre Court. His duns and girls 
 frequently stumble up to me, and I am obliged to 
 satisfy both in the best way I am able. 
 
 Farewell, and think upon it. C. L. 
 
 Letter CXXXIX.] 1801. 
 
 Dear Manning, — I have forborne writing so long, 
 (and so have you for the matter of that,) until I am 
 almost ashamed either to write or to forbear any 
 longer. But as your silence may proceed from some 
 worse cause than neglect — from illness, or some 
 mishap which may have befallen you, I begin to be 
 anxious. You may have been burnt out, or you may 
 
 1 Rickman was clerk, of the House of Commons. Lamb had lately 
 made his acquaintance-. He at one time endeavoured, but without 
 success, to procure through Rickman a situation in the House for 
 Martin Burney.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 367 
 
 have married, or you may have broken a limb, or 
 turned country parson : any of these would be excuse 
 sufficient for not coming to my supper. I am not so 
 unforgiving as the nobleman in Saint Mark. Forme, 
 nothing new has happened to me, unless that the 
 poor Albion died last Saturday of the world's neglect, 
 and with it the fountain of my puns is choked up for 
 ever. 
 
 All the Lloyds wonder that you do not write to 
 them. They apply to me for the cause. Relieve me 
 from this weight of ignorance, and enable me to give 
 a truly oracular response. 
 
 I have been confined some days with swelled cheek 
 and rheumatism : they divide and govern me with a 
 viceroy-headache in the middle. I can neither write 
 nor read without great pain. It must be something 
 like obstinacy that I choose this time to write to you 
 in after many months' interruption. 
 
 I will close my letter of simple inquiry with an 
 epigram on Mackintosh, the Vindicice Gallicce-man — 
 who has got a place at last — one of the last I did for 
 the Albion : — 
 
 " Though thou'rt like Judas, an apostate black, 
 In the resemblance one thing thou dost lack: 
 When he had gotten his ill-purchased pelf, 
 He went away, and wisely hang'd himself: 
 This thou mayst do at last ; yet much I doubt, 
 If thou hast any bowels to gush out !" 
 
 Yours, as ever, C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXL.] [1801.] 
 
 My dear Manning, — I must positively write, or I 
 shall miss you at Toulouse. I sit here like a decayed
 
 368 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 minute-hand; (I lie: that does not 5/7 ;) and being 
 myself the exponent of no time, take no heed how 
 the clocks about me are going. You possibly by this 
 time may have explored all Italy, and toppled, 
 unawares, into Etna, while you went too near those 
 rotten-jawed, gap-toothed, old worn-out chaps of hell, 
 — while I am meditating a quiescent letter to the 
 honest post-master of Toulouse. But in case you 
 should not have been fclo de se, this is to tell you, 
 that your letter was quite to my palate : in particular 
 your just remarks upon Industry, cursed Industry, 
 (though indeed you left me to explore the reason,) 
 were highly relishing. I have often wished I had lived 
 in the golden age, when shepherds lay stretched upon 
 flowers, and roused themselves at their leisure, — 
 the genius there is in a man's natural idle face, that 
 has not learned his multiplication table ! before 
 doubt, and propositions, and corollaries, got into the 
 world ! 
 
 Now, as Joseph Cottle, a Bard of Nature, sings, 
 going up Malvern Hills, 
 
 "How steep ! how painful the ascent ! 
 It needs the evidence of close deduction 
 To know that ever I shall gain the top." 
 
 You must know that Joe is lame, so that he had some 
 reason for so singing. These two lines, I assure 
 you, are taken totidem Uteris from a very popular 
 poem. Joe is also an Epic Poet as well as a Descrip- 
 tive, and has written a tragedy, though both his 
 drama and epopoiea are strictly descriptive, and 
 chiefly of the Beauties of Nature, for Joe thinks man 
 with all his passions and frailties not a proper subject 
 of the Drama. Joe's tragedy hath the following 
 surpassing speech in it. Some king is told that his
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 369 
 
 enemy has engaged twelve archers to come over in a 
 boat from an enemy's country and way-lay him ; he 
 thereupon pathetically exclaims — 
 
 " Twelve, dost thou say ? Curse on those dozen villains !" 
 
 Cottle read two or three acts out to us, very gravely 
 on both sides till he came to this heroic touch, — and 
 then he asked what we laughed at ? I had no more 
 muscles that day. A poet that chooses to read out 
 his own verses has but a limited power over you. 
 There is a bound where his authority ceases. 
 
 Letter CXLL] Aug. 31, 1801. 
 
 I heard that you were going to China, 1 with a com- 
 mission from the Wedgwoods to collect hints for 
 their pottery, and to teach the Chinese perspective; 
 but I did not know that London lay in your way to 
 Pekin. I am seriously glad of it, for I shall trouble 
 you with a small present for the Emperor of Usbeck 
 Tartary, as you go by his territories : it is a fragment 
 of a " Dissertation on the state of political parties in 
 England at the end of the eighteenth century," which 
 will no doubt be very interesting to his Imperial 
 Majesty. It was written originally in English for the 
 use of the two and twenty readers of the Albion ; (this 
 calculation includes a printer, four pressmen, and a 
 devil;) but becoming of no use, when the Albion 
 stopped, I got it translated into Usbeck Tartar by 
 my good friend Tibet Kulm, who is to come to 
 
 Mr. Manning had begun to be haunted with the idea of China' 
 and to talk of going thither, which he accomplished some years after- 
 wards, without any motive but a desire to see that great nation. 
 VOL. I. 2 B
 
 370 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 London with a civil invitation from the Cham to the 
 English nation to go over to the worship of the 
 Lama. 
 
 The Albion is dead — dead as nail in door — and my 
 revenues have died with it ; but I am not as a man 
 without hope. I have got a sort of opening to the 
 Morning Chronicle, by means of that common dis- 
 penser of benevolence, Mister Dyer. I have not 
 seen Perry, the editor, yet : but I am preparing a 
 specimen. I shall have a difficult job to manage, for 
 you must know that Mr. Perry, in common with the 
 great body of the Whigs, thinks the Albion very low. 
 I find I must rise a peg or so, be a little more decent, 
 and less abusive ; for, to confess the truth, I had 
 arrived to an abominable pitch ; I spared neither age 
 nor sex when my cue was given me. N'importe, (as 
 they say in French,) any climate will suit me. So 
 you are about to bring your old face-making face to 
 London. You could not come in a better time for 
 my purposes ; for I have just lost Rickman, a faint 
 idea of whose character I sent you. He is gone to 
 Ireland for a year or two, to make his fortune ; and 
 I have lost by his going what seems to me I can 
 never recover — a finished man. His memory will be 
 to me as the brazen serpent to the Israelites, — I shall 
 look up to it, to keep me upright and honest. But 
 he may yet bring back his honest face to England 
 one day. I wish your affairs with the Emperor of 
 China had not been so urgent, that you might have 
 stayed in Great Britain a year or two longer, to have 
 seen him ; for, judging from my own experience, I 
 almost dare pronounce you never saw his equal. I 
 never saw a man that could be at all a second or 
 substitute for him in any sort.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MAN.NING. 37 1 
 
 Imagine that what is here erased was an apology 
 and explanation, perfectly satisfactory you may be 
 sure for rating this man so highly at the expense of 
 
 , and , and , and M , and ■ , 
 
 and , and . But Mr. Burke has explained 
 
 this phenomenon of our nature very prettily in his 
 letter to a Member of the National Assembly, or else 
 in Appeal to the old Whigs, I forget which. Do you 
 remember an instance from Homer, (who understood 
 these matters tolerably well,) of Priam driving away 
 his other sons with expressions of wrath and bitter 
 reproach, when Hector was just dead ? 
 
 I live where I did, in a private manner, because I 
 don't like state. Nothing is so disagreeable to me as 
 the clamours and applauses of the mob. For this 
 reason I live in an obscure situation in one of the 
 courts of the Temple. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 I send you all of Coleridge's letters 1 to me, which 
 I have preserved : some of them are upon the subject 
 of my play. I also send you Kemble's two letters, 
 and the prompter's courteous epistle, with a curious 
 critique on " Pride's Cure," 2 by a young physician from 
 Edinbro', who modestly suggests quite another kind 
 of a plot. These are monuments of my disappoint- 
 ment which I like to preserve. 
 
 In Coleridge's letters you will find a good deal of 
 amusement, to see genuine talent struggling against 
 a pompous display of it. I also send you the Pro- 
 fessor's letter to me (careful Professor ! to conceal his 
 
 1 Lamb afterwards, in some melancholy mood, destroyed all Cole- 
 ridge's Letters, and was so vexed with what he had done, that he never 
 preserved any letters which he received afterwards. 
 
 2 The title was afterwards altered to John Wood'v'il.
 
 372 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 name even from his correspondent), ere yet the Pro- 
 fessor's pride was cured. Oh monstrous and almost 
 satanical pride ! 
 
 You will carefully keep all (except the Scotch 
 Doctor's, which burn) in statu quo, till I come to 
 claim mine own. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXLII.] Feb. 15th, 1802. 
 
 Apropos, I think you wrong about my play. All 
 the omissions are right. And the supplementary 
 scene, in which Sandford narrates the manner in 
 which his master is affected, is the best in the book. 
 It stands where a hodge-podge of German puerilities 
 used to stand. I insist upon it that you like that 
 scene. Love me, love that scene. I will now tran- 
 scribe the "Londoner" (No. 1), and wind up all 
 with affection and humble servant at the end. 
 
 [Here was transcribed the essay called "The 
 Londoner," which was published some years after- 
 wards in the Reflector, and which forms part of 
 Lamb's collected works. He then proceeds] : — 
 
 "What is all this about?" said Mrs. Shandy. 
 " A story of a cock and a bull," said Yorick : and so 
 it is ; but Manning will take good-naturedly what 
 God will send him across the water: only I hope he 
 won't shut his eyes, and open his mouth, as the 
 children say, for that is the way to gape, and not to 
 read. Manning, continue your laudible purpose of 
 making me your register. I will render you back all 
 your remarks ; and /, not you, shall have received 
 usury by having read them. In the mean time, may
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 373 
 
 the great Spirit have you in his keeping, and pre- 
 serve our Englishmen from the inoculation of frivolity 
 and sin upon French earth. 
 
 Allons — or what is it you say, instead of good- 
 bye ? 
 
 Mary sends her kind remembrance, and covets the 
 remarks equally with me. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER CXLIII.] 24th Sept. 1802, London. 
 
 My dear Manning, — Since the date of my last 
 letter I have been a traveller. A strong desire 
 seized me of visiting remote regions. My first im- 
 pulse was to go and see Paris. It was a trivial 
 objection to my aspiring mind, that I did not under- 
 stand a word of the language, since I certainly intend 
 some time in my life to see Paris, and equally cer- 
 tainly intend never to learn the language ; therefore 
 that could be no objection. However, I am very glad 
 I did not go, because you had left Paris (I see) before 
 I could have set out. I believe, Stoddart promising 
 to go with me another year, prevented that plan. 
 My next scheme (for to my restless, ambitious mind 
 London was become a bed of thorns) was to visit the 
 far-famed peak in Derbyshire, where the Devil sits, 
 they say, without breeches. This my purer mind 
 rejected as indelicate. And my final resolve was, a 
 tour to the Lakes. I set out with Mary to Keswick, 
 without giving Coleridge any notice, for my time, 
 being precious, did not admit of it. He received us 
 with all the hospitality in the world, and gave up his 
 time to show us all the wonders of the country. He
 
 374 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 dwells upon a small hill by the side of Keswick, in a 
 comfortable house/, quite enveloped on all sides by a 
 net of mountains : great floundering bears and mon- 
 sters they seemed, all couchant and asleep. We got 
 in in the evening, travelling in a post-chaise from 
 Penrith, in the midst of a gorgeous sunshine, which 
 transmuted all the mountains into colours, purple, 
 &c, &c. We thought we had got into fairy-land. 
 But that went off, (as it never came again ; while we 
 stayed we had no more fine sunsets ;) and we entered 
 Coleridge's comfortable study just in the dusk, when 
 the mountains were all dark with clouds upon their 
 heads. Such an impression I never received from 
 objects of sight before, nor do I suppose I can ever 
 again. Glorious creatures, fine old fellows, Skid- 
 daw, &c. I never shall forget ye, how ye lay about 
 that night, like an intrenchment ; gone to bed, as it 
 seemed for the night, but promising that ye were to 
 be seen in the morning. Coleridge had got a blazing 
 fire in his study ; which is a large antique, ill-shaped 
 room, with an old-fashioned organ, never played 
 upon, big enough for a church, shelves of scattered 
 folios, an /Eolian harp, and an old sofa, half bed, &c. 
 And all looking out upon the last fading view of 
 Skiddaw, and his broad-breasted brethren : what a 
 night ! Here we stayed three full weeks, in which 
 time I visited Wordsworth's cottage, where we 
 stayed a day or two with the Clarksons, (good people, 
 and most hospitable, at whose house we tarried one 
 day and night,) and saw Lloyd. The Wordsworths 
 were gone to Calais. They have since been in 
 London, and past much time with us: he is now 
 gone into Yorkshire to be married. So we have seen 
 Keswick, Grasmere, Ambleside, Ulswater, (where the
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 375 
 
 Clarksons live,) and a place at the other end of Uls- 
 water; I forget the name; 1 to which we travelled on a 
 very sultry day, over the middle of Helvellyn. We 
 have clambered up to the top of Skiddaw, and I have 
 waded up the bed of Lodore. In fine, I have satis- 
 fied myself that there is such a thing as that which 
 tourists call romantic, which I very much suspected 
 before : they make such a spluttering about it, and 
 toss their splendid epithets around them, till they 
 give as dim a light as at four o'clock next morning 
 the lamps do after an illumination. Mary was exces- 
 sively tired when she got about half-way up Skiddaw, 
 but we came to a cold rill, (than which nothing can 
 be imagined more cold, running over cold stones,) 
 and with the reinforcement of a draught of cold 
 water she surmounted it most manfully. Oh, its fine 
 black head, and the bleak air atop of it, with a pros- 
 pect of mountains all about and about, making you 
 giddy ; and then Scotland afar off, and the border 
 countries so famous in song and ballad ! It was a 
 day that will stand out, like a mountain, I am sure, 
 in my life. But I am returned, (I have now been 
 come home near three weeks; I was a month out,) 
 and you cannot conceive the degradation I felt at 
 first, from being accustomed to wander free as air 
 among mountains, and bathe in rivers without being 
 controlled by any one, to come home and work. I 
 felt very little. I had been dreaming I was a very 
 great man. But that is going off, and I find I shall 
 conform in time to that state of life to which it has 
 pleased God to call me. Besides, after all, Fleet 
 Street and the Strand are better places to live in for 
 
 1 Patterdale.
 
 376 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 good and all than amidst Skiddaw. Still, I turn 
 back to those great places where I wandered about, 
 participating in their greatness. After all, I could 
 not live in Skiddaw. I could spend a year, two, 
 three years among them, but I must have a prospect 
 of seeing Fleet Street at the end of that time, or I 
 should mope and pine away, I know. Still, Skiddaw 
 is a fine creature. My habits are changing, I think, 
 i. e. from drunk to sober. Whether I shall be happier 
 or not remains to be proved. I shall certainly be 
 more happy in a morning ; but whether I shall not 
 sacrifice the fat, and the marrow, and the kidneys, 
 i.e. the night, glorious care-drowning night, that 
 heals all our wrongs, pours wine into our morti- 
 fications, changes the scene from indifferent and fiat 
 to bright and brilliant ! O Manning, if I should 
 have formed a diabolical resolution, by the time you 
 come to England, of not admitting any spirituous 
 liquors into my house, will you be my guest on such 
 shameworthy terms ? Is life, with such limitations, 
 worth trying ? The truth is, that my liquors bring 
 a nest of friendly harpies about my house, who con- 
 sume me. This is a pitiful tale to be read at St. 
 Gothard, but it is just now nearest my heart. Fen- 
 wick is a ruined man. He is hiding himself from his 
 creditors, and has sent his wife and children into the 
 country. Fell, my other drunken companion, (that 
 has been : nam hie cevstus artemque rcpono,) is 
 turned editor of a Naval Chronicle. Godwin con- 
 tinues a steady friend, though the same facility does 
 
 not remain of visiting him often. That has 
 
 detached Marshall from his house ; Marshall, the 
 man who went to sleep when the "Ancient Mariner" 
 was reading ; the old, steady, unalterable friend of the
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 377 
 
 Professor. Holcroft is not yet come to tuwn. I 
 expect to see him, and will deliver your message. 
 Things come crowding in to say, and no room for 
 'em. Some things are too little to be told, i. e. to 
 have a preference ; some are too big and circumstan- 
 tial. Thanks for yours, which was most delicious. 
 Would I had been with you, benighted, &c. ! I fear 
 my head is turned with wandering. I shall never 
 be the same acquiescent being. Farewell. Write 
 again quickly, for I shall not like to hazard a letter, 
 not knowing where the fates have carried you. Fare- 
 well, my dear fellow. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXLIV.] Feb. i 9 th, 1803. 
 
 My dear Manning, — The general scope of your 
 letter afforded no indications of insanity, but some 
 particular points raised a scruple. For God's sake 
 don't think any more of " Independent Tartary." 
 What are you to do among such Ethiopians ? Is 
 there no lineal descendant of Prester John ? Is the 
 chair empty ? Is the sword unswayed ? Depend 
 upon it they'll never make you their king, as long as 
 any branch of that great stock is remaining. I 
 tremble for your Christianity. They will certainly 
 circumcise you. Read Sir John Mandeville's travels 
 to cure you, or come over to England. There is a 
 Tartar-man now exhibiting at Exeter Change. Come 
 and talk with him, and hear what he says first. 
 Indeed he is no very favourable specimen of his 
 countrymen ! But perhaps the best thing you can 
 do is to try to get the idea out of your head. For
 
 37S CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 this purpose repeat to yourself every night, after you 
 have said your prayers, the words Independent Tar- 
 tary, Independent Tartary, two or three times, and 
 associate with them the idea of oblivion, ('tis Hartley's 
 method with obstinate memories,) or say, Inde- 
 pendent, Independent, have I not already got an 
 independence ? That was a clever way of the old 
 puritans, pun-divinity. My dear friend, think what a 
 sad pity it would be to bury such parts in heathen 
 countries, among nasty, unconversable, horse-belch- 
 ing, Tartar-people ! Some say, they are Cannibals ; 
 and then, conceive a Tartar-fellow eating my friend, 
 and adding the cool malignity of mustard and vinegar! 
 I am afraid 'tis the reading of Chaucer has misled 
 you ; his foolish stories about Cambuscan, and the 
 ring, and the horse of brass. Believe me, there are 
 no such things, 'tis all the poet's invention ; but if 
 there were such darling things as old Chaucer sings, 
 I would up behind you on the horse of brass, and 
 frisk off for Prester John's country. But these are 
 all tales ; a horse of brass never flew, and a king's 
 daughter never talked with birds ! The Tartars, 
 really, are a cold, insipid, smouchy set. You'll be 
 sadly moped (if you are not eaten) among them. 
 Pray try and cure yourself. Take hellebore (the 
 counsel is Horace's, 'twas none of my thought origin- 
 ally.) Shave yourself oftener. Eat no saffron, for 
 saffron-eaters contract a terrible Tartar-like yellow. 
 Pray, to avoid the fiend. Eat nothing that gives the 
 heart-burn. Shave the upper lip. Go about like an 
 European. Read no books of voyages (they are 
 nothing but lies), only now and then a romance, to 
 keep the fancy under. Above all, don't go to any 
 sights of wild beasts. That has been your ruin.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 379 
 
 Accustom yourself to write familiar letters, on com- 
 mon subjects, to your friends in England, such as are 
 of a moderate understanding. And think about 
 common things more. There's your friend Holcroft, 
 now, has written a Play. 1 You used to be fond of 
 the drama. Nobody went to see it. Notwithstanding 
 this, with an audacity perfectly original, he faces the 
 town down in a preface that they did like it very 
 much. I have heard a waspish punster say, "Sir, 
 why did you not laugh at my jest ?" But for a man 
 boldly to face one out with " Sir, I maintain it, you 
 did laugh at my jest," is a little too much. I have 
 seen H. but once. He spoke of you to me in honour- 
 able terms. H. seems to me to be drearily dull. 
 G[odwin?] is dull, then he has a dash of affectation, 
 which smacks of the coxcomb, and your coxcombs 
 are always agreeable. I supped last night with 
 Rickman, and met a merry natural captain, 2 who 
 pleases himself vastly with once having made a pun 
 at Otaheite in the O. language. "Tis the same man 
 who said Shakspeare he liked, because he was so 
 much of the gentleman. Rickman is a man "absolute 
 in all numbers." I think I may one day bring you 
 acquainted, if you do not go to Tartary first ; for 
 you'll never come back. Have a care, my dear 
 friend, of Anthropophagi ! their stomachs are always 
 craving. 'Tis terrible to be weighed out at fivepence 
 a-pound ; to sit at table (the reverse of fishes in 
 Holland) not as a guest, but as a meat. 
 
 God bless you : do come to England. Air and 
 
 . 1 The Vindictive Man. See a letter to Manning of Dec. 8, 1806. 
 
 2 Captain, afterwards Admiral, Burney, who became one of the most 
 constant attendants at Lamb's parties, and to whose son, Martin, Lamb 
 dedicated the second volume of his works.
 
 380 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 exercise may do great things. Talk with some 
 minister. Why not your father ? 
 
 God dispose all for the best. I have discharged 
 my duty. 
 
 Your sincere friend, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXLV.] [1803.] 
 
 Not a sentence, not a syllable of Trismegistus 
 shall be lost through my neglect. I am his word- 
 banker, his storekeeper of puns and syllogisms. 
 You cannot conceive (and if Trismegistus cannot, no 
 man can) the strange joy which I felt at the receipt 
 of a letter from Paris. It seemed to give me a 
 learned importance, which placed me above all who 
 had not Parisian correspondents. Believe that I 
 shall carefully husband every scrap, which will save 
 you the trouble of memory, when you come back. 
 You cannot write things so trifling, let them only be 
 about Paris, which I shall not treasure. In parti- 
 cular, I must have parallels of actors and actresses. 
 I must be told if any building in Paris is at all com- 
 parable to St. Paul's, which, contrary to the usual 
 mode of that part of our nature called admiration, I 
 have looked up to with unfading wonder, every 
 morning at ten o'clock, ever since it has lain in my 
 way to business. At noon I casually glance upon it, 
 being hungry; and hunger has not much taste for 
 the fine arts. Is any night-walk comparable to a 
 walk from St. Paul's to Charing Cross, for lighting 
 and paving, crowds going and coming without 
 respite, the rattle of coaches, and the cheerfulness of
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 381 
 
 shops ? Have you seen a man guillotined yet ? Is it 
 as good as hanging ? Are the women all painted, and 
 the men all monkeys ? or are there not a few that 
 look like rational of both sexes ? Are you and the 
 first consul thick ? All this expense of ink I may 
 fairly put you to, as your letters will not be solely for 
 my proper pleasure ; but are to serve as memoranda 
 and notices, helps for short memory, a kind of Rum- 
 fordising recollection, for yourself on your return. 
 Your letter was just what a letter should be, crammed, 
 and very funny. Every part of it pleased me till 
 you came to Paris ; then your philosophical indolence, 
 or indifference, stung me. You cannot stir from your 
 rooms till you know the language ! What the devil 
 are men nothing but word-trumpets? Are men all 
 tongue and ear? Have these creatures, that you and 
 I profess to know something about, no faces, gestures, 
 gabble, no folly, no absurdity, no induction of French 
 education upon the abstract idea of men and women, 
 no similitude nor dissimilitude to English ! Why, 
 thou cursed Smellfungus ! your account of your 
 landing and reception, and Bullen, (I forget how you 
 spell it, it was spelt my way in Harry the Eighth's 
 time,) was exactly in that minute style which strong 
 impressions inspire, (writing to a Frenchman, I 
 write as a Frenchman would.) It appears to me as- 
 if I should die with joy at the first landing in a 
 foreign country. It is the nearest pleasure which a 
 grown man can substitute for that unknown one, 
 which he can never know, the pleasure of the first 
 entrance into life from the womb. I dare say, in a 
 short time, my habits would come back like a 
 "stronger man" armed, and drive out that new 
 pleasure ; and I should soon sicken for known ob-
 
 382 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 jects. Nothing has transpired here that seems to 
 me of sufficient importance to send dry-shod over 
 the water : but I suppose you will want to be told 
 some news. The best and the worst to me is, that I 
 have given up two guineas a-week at the Post, and 
 regained my health and spirits, which were upon the 
 wane. I grew sick, and Stuart unsatisfied. Ludisti 
 satis, tempus abire est ; I must cut closer, that's all. 
 Mister Fell, or as you, with your usual facetiousness 
 and drollery, call him, Mr. F + 11, has stopped short 
 in the middle of his play. Some friend has told him 
 that it has not the least merit in it. Oh that I had 
 the rectifying of the Litany ! I would put in a libera 
 nos (Scriptores videlicet) ab amicis ! That's all the 
 news. Apropos: is it pedantry, writing to a French- 
 man, to express myself sometimes by a French word, 
 when an English one would not do as well? Me- 
 thinks my thoughts fall naturally into it. 
 
 In all this time I have done but one thing, which 
 I reckon tolerable, and that I will transcribe, because 
 it may give you pleasure, being a picture of my 
 humours. You will find it in my last page. It 
 absurdly is a first Number of a series, thus strangled 
 in embryo. 
 
 More news ! The Professor's Rib has come out to 
 be a disagreeable woman, so much so as to drive me 
 and some more old cronies from his house. He 
 must not wonder if people are shy of coming to see 
 him because of the " snakes." C. L. 
 
 Letter CXLVI.] [March, 1803.] 
 
 Dear Manning, — I send you some verses I have 
 made on the death of a young Quaker you may have
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 383 
 
 heard me speak of as being in love with for some 
 years while I lived at Pentonville, though I had 
 never spoken to her in my life. She died about a 
 month since. If you have interest with the Abbe de 
 Lisle, you may get 'em translated ; he has done as 
 much for the Georgics. 1 
 
 Letter CXLVIL] [1803.] 
 
 My dear Manning, — Although something of the 
 latest, and after two months' waiting, your letter 
 was highly gratifying. Some parts want a little ex- 
 plication ; for example, ' the god-like face of the first 
 consul.' What god does he most resemble, Mars, 
 Bacchus, or Apollo ? or the god Serapis, who, flying 
 (as Egpytian chronicles deliver) from the fury of the 
 dog Anubis (the hieroglyph of an English mastiff), 
 lighted upon Monomotapa (or the land of apes), by 
 some thought to be Old France, and there set up a 
 tyranny, &c. Our London prints of him represent 
 him gloomy and sulky, like an angry Jupiter. I hear 
 that he is very small, even less than I. I envy you 
 your access to this great man, much more than )'our 
 seances and conversaziones, which I have a shrewd 
 suspicion must be something dull. What you assert 
 concerning the actors of Paris, that they exceed our 
 comedians, bad as ours are, is impossible. In one 
 sense it may be true, that their fine gentlemen, in 
 what is called genteel comedy, may possibly be more 
 brisk and degage than Mr. Caulfield, or Mr. Whit- 
 
 1 Lamb refers to his pretty little poem called Hester, upon the death 
 of Hester Savory, the young Quaker lady. — See Poems.
 
 384 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 field ; but have any of them the power to move 
 laughter in excess? or can a Frenchman laugh? 
 Can they batter at your judicious ribs till they shake, 
 nothing loth to be so shaken ? This is John Bull's 
 criterion, and it shall be mine. You are Frenchified. 
 Both your taste and morals are corrupt and perverted. 
 By and by you will come to assert that Buonaparte 
 is as great a general as the old Duke of Cumber- 
 land, and deny that one Englishman can beat three 
 Frenchmen. Read Henry the Fifth to restore your 
 orthodoxy. 
 
 All things continue at a stay- still in London. 
 I cannot repay your new novelties with my stale 
 reminiscences. Like the prodigal, I have spent 
 my patrimony, and feed upon the superannuated 
 chaff and dry husks of repentance ; yet sometimes I 
 remember with pleasure the hounds and horses, 
 which I kept in the days of my prodigality. I find 
 nothing new, nor any thing that has so much of the 
 gloss and dazzle of novelty as may rebound in narra- 
 tive, and cast a reflective glimmer across the channel. 
 Something I will say about people that you and I 
 know. Fenwick is still in debt, and the Professor 
 has not done making love to his new spouse. I 
 think he never looks into an almanack, or he would 
 have found by the calendar that the honeymoon was 
 extinct a moon ago. Southey is Secretary to the 
 Chancellor of the Irish Exchequer ; £"400 a year. 
 Stoddart is turned Doctor of Civil Law, and dwells in 
 Doctors' Commons. I fear his commons are short, as 
 they say. Did I send you an epitaph I scribbled 
 upon a poor girl who died at nineteen ? — a good girl, 
 and a pretty girl, aud a clever girl, but strangely neg- 
 lected by all her friends and kin.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 385 
 
 " Under this cold marble stone 
 Sleep the sad remains of one 
 Who, when alive, by few or none 
 Was loved, as loved she might have been, 
 If she prosperous days had seen, 
 Or had thriving been, I ween. 
 Only this cold funeral stone 
 Tells she was beloved by one, 
 Who on the marble graves his moan." 
 
 Brief, and pretty, and tender, is it not ? I send 
 you this, being the only piece of poetry I have done 
 since the Muses all went with T. M. to Paris. I 
 have neither stuff in my brain, nor paper in my 
 drawer, to write you a longer letter. ' Liquor and com- 
 pany and wicked tobacco, a'nights, have quite dis- 
 pericraniated me, as one may say ; but you, who 
 spiritualise upon Champagne, may continue to write 
 long letters, and stuff 'em with amusement to the 
 end. Too long they cannot be, any more than a 
 codicil to a will, which leaves me sundry parks and 
 manors not specified in the deed. But don't be two 
 months before you write again. These from merry 
 old England, on the day of her valiant patron St. 
 
 George. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 _ .... ttttt , 16, Mitre Court Buildings, 
 
 Letter CXLVIII.l „ A .. ~ £ „ „ 
 
 J Saturday, 24th Feb. 1805. 
 
 Dear Manning, — I have been very unwell since I 
 saw you : a sad depression of spirits, a most un- 
 accountable nervousness ; from which I have been 
 partially relieved by an odd accident. You knew 
 Dick Hopkins, the swearing scullion of Caius? This 
 fellow, by industry and agility, has thrust himself 
 vol. 1. 2 c
 
 386 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 into the important situations (no sinecures, believe 
 me) of cook to Trinity Hall and Caius College : and 
 the generous creature has contrived, with the greatest 
 delicacy imaginable, to send me a present of Cam- 
 bridge brawn. What makes it the more extraordinary 
 is, that the man never saw me in his life that I know 
 of. I suppose he has heard of me. I did not imme- 
 diately recognise the donor ; but one of Richard's 
 cards, which had accidentally fallen into the straw, 
 detected him in a moment. Dick, you know, was 
 always remarkable for flourishing. His card imports, 
 that " orders (to wit, for brawn) from any part of 
 England, Scotland, or Ireland, will be duly executed," 
 &c. At first, I thought of declining the present ; but 
 Richard knew my blind side when he pitched upon 
 brawn. 'Tis of all my hobbies the supreme in the 
 eating way. He might have sent sops from the pan, 
 skimmings, crumpets, chips, hog's lard, the tender 
 brown judiciously scalped from a fillet of veal (dexter- 
 ously replaced by a salamander), the tops of aspa- 
 ragus, fugitive livers, runaway gizzards of fowls, the 
 eyes of martyred pigs, tender effusions of laxative 
 woodcocks, the red spawn of lobsters, leverets' ears, 
 and such pretty filchings common to cooks ; but 
 these had been ordinary presents, the every-day 
 courtesies of dish-washers to their sweethearts. 
 Brawn was a noble thought. It is not every 
 common gullet -fancier that can properly esteem 
 it. It is like a picture of one of the choice old 
 Italian masters. Its gusto is of that hidden sort. 
 As Wordsworth sings of a modest poet, — " you must 
 love him, ere to you he will seem worthy of your 
 love ;" so brawn, you must taste it ere to you it will 
 seem to have any taste at all. But 'tis nuts to the
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 387 
 
 adept : those that will send out their tongue and 
 feelers to find it out. It will be wooed, and not un- 
 sought be won. Now, ham-essence, lobsters, turtle, 
 such popular minions, absolutely court you, lay them- 
 selves out to strike you at first smack, like one of 
 David's pictures (they call him Darveed) compared 
 with the plain russet-coated wealth of a Titian 
 or a Correggio, as I illustrated above. Such are the 
 obvious glaring heathen virtues of a corporation 
 dinner, compared with the reserved collegiate worth 
 of brawn. Do me the favour to leave off the busi- 
 ness which you may be at present upon, and go 
 immediately to the kitchens of Trinity and Caius, 
 and make my most respectful compliments to Mr. 
 Richard Hopkins, and assure him that his brawn is 
 most excellent ; and that I am moreover obliged to 
 him for his innuendo about salt water and bran, 
 which I shall not fail to improve. I leave it to you 
 whether you shall choose to pay him the civility of 
 asking him to dinner while you stay in Cambridge, or 
 in whatever other way you may best like to show 
 your gratitude to my friend. Richard Hopkins, con- 
 sidered in many points of view, is a very extraordinary 
 character. Adieu. I hope to see you to supper in 
 London soon, where we will taste Richard's brawn, 
 and drink his health in a cheerful but moderate cup. 
 We have not many such men in any rank of life as 
 Mr. R. Hopkins. Crisp, the barber, of St. Mary's, 
 was just such another. I wonder he never sent me 
 any little token, some chestnuts, or a puff, or two 
 pound of hair : just to remember him by. Gifts are 
 like nails. Prcesens ut absens ; that is, your present 
 makes amends for your absence. 
 
 Yours, C. Lamb. 
 
 2 c 2
 
 388 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Letter CXLIX.] [July 27th, 1805.] 
 
 Dear Archimedes, — Things have gone on badly 
 with thy ungeometrical friend ; but they are on the 
 turn. My old housekeeper has shown signs of con- 
 valescence, and will shortly resume the power of the 
 keys, so I sha'n't be cheated of my tea and liquors. 
 Wind in the West, which promotes tranquillity. Have 
 leisure now to anticipate seeing thee again. Have 
 been taking leave of tobacco in a rhyming address. 
 Had thought that vein had long since closed up. 
 Find I can rhyme and reason too. Think of study- 
 ing mathematics, to restrain the fire of my genius, 
 which G. D. recommends. Have frequent bleedings 
 at the nose, which shows plethoric. Maybe shall 
 try the sea myself, that great scene of wonders. Got 
 incredibly sober and regular ; shave oftener, and 
 hum a tune, to signify cheerfulness and gallantry. 
 
 Suddenly disposed to sleep, having taken a quart 
 of pease with bacon and stout. Will not refuse 
 Nature, who has done such things for me ! 
 
 Nurse ! don't call me unless Mr. Manning comes. 
 ■ — What ! the gentleman in spectacles ? — Yes. 
 
 Dormit. C. L. 
 
 Saturday, 
 
 Hot Noon. 
 
 Letter CL.] [Nov. 15, 1805.] 
 
 Dear Manning, — Certainly you could not have 
 called at all hours from two till ten, for we have been 
 only out of an evening Monday and Tuesday in this 
 week. But if you think you have, your thought shall 
 go for the deed. We did pray for you on Wednesday 
 night. Oysters unusually luscious ; pearls of extra-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 389 
 
 ordinary magnitude found in them. I have made 
 bracelets of them ; given them in clusters to ladies. 
 Last night we went out in despite, because you were 
 not come at your hour. 
 
 This night we shall be at home ; so shall we cer- 
 tainly, both, on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wed- 
 nesday. Take your choice, mind I don't say of one : 
 but choose which evening you will not come, and come 
 the other four. Doors open at five o'clock. Shells 
 forced about nine. Every gentleman smokes or not 
 as he pleases. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CLI.] May ioth, 1806. 
 
 My dear Manning, — I didn't know what your going 
 was till I shook a last fist with you, and then 'twas 
 just like having shaken hands with a wretch on the 
 fatal scaffold, for when you are down the ladder you 
 can never stretch out to him again. Mary says you 
 are dead, and there's nothing to do but to leave 
 it to time to do for us in the end what it always 
 does for those who mourn for people in such a case. 
 But she'll see by your letter you are not quite dead. 
 
 A little kicking and agony, and then . Martin 
 
 Burney took me out a walking that evening, and we 
 talked of Manning ; and then I came home and 
 smoked for you ; and at twelve o'clock came home 
 Mary and Monkey Louisa from the play, and there 
 was more talk and more smoking, and they all seemed 
 first-rate characters, because they knew a certain 
 person. But what's the use of talking about 'em ? 
 By the time you'll have made your escape from the 
 Kalmuks, you'll have stayed so long I shall never be
 
 390 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 able to bring to your mind who Mary was, who will 
 have died about a year before, nor who the Holcrofts 
 were ! Me perhaps you will mistake for Phillips, or 
 confound me with Mr. Dawe, because you saw us 
 together. Mary (whom you seem to remember yet) 
 is not quite easy that she had not a formal parting 
 from you. I wish it had so happened. But you 
 must bring her a token, a shawl or something, and 
 remember a sprightly little mandarin for our mantel- 
 piece, as a companion to the child I am going to pur- 
 chase at the museum. She says you saw her writings 
 about the other day, and she wishes you should know 
 what they are. She is doing for Godwin's bookseller 
 twenty of Shakspeare's plays, to be made into chil- 
 dren's tales. Six are already done by her ; to wit, 
 the Tempest, the Winter's Tale, Midsummer Night's 
 Dream, Much Ado about Nothing, the Two Gentlemen 
 of Verona, and Cymbcline. The Merchant of Venice 
 is in forwardness. I have done Othello and Macbeth, 
 and mean to do all the tragedies. I think it will be 
 popular among the little people, besides money. It 
 is to bring in sixty guineas. Mary has done them 
 capitally, I think you'd think. These are the humble 
 amusements we propose, while you are gone to plant 
 the cross of Christ among barbarous pagan anthropo- 
 phagi. Quam homo homini praestat ! but then, per- 
 haps, you'll get murdered, and we shall die in our 
 beds with a fair literary reputation. Be sure, if you 
 see any of those people whose heads do grow beneath 
 their shoulders, that you make a draught of them. It 
 will be very curious. Oh Manning, I am serious to 
 sinking almost, when I think that all those evenings 
 which you have made so pleasant, are gone perhaps 
 for ever. Four years, you talk of, may be ten, and
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 391 
 
 you may come back and find such alterations ! Some 
 circumstances may grow up to you or to me, that 
 may be a bar to the return of any such intimacy. I 
 dare say all this is hum ! and that all will come back ; 
 but indeed we die many deaths before we die, and I 
 am almost sick when I think that such a hold as I 
 had of you is gone. I have friends, but some of 'em 
 are changed. Marriage, or some circumstance, rises 
 up to make them not the same. But I felt sure of 
 you. And that last token you gave me of expressing 
 a wish to have my name joined with yours, you know 
 not how it affected me : like a legacy. 
 
 God bless you in every way you can form a wish. 
 May He give you health, and safety, and the accom- 
 plishment of all your objects, and return you again to 
 us, to gladden some fireside or other (I suppose we 
 shall be moved from the Temple). I will nurse the 
 remembrance of your steadiness and quiet, which 
 used to infuse something like itself into our nervous 
 minds. Mary called you our ventilator. Farewell, 
 and take her best wishes and mine. 
 
 Good bye, C. L. 
 
 LETTER CLII.] December 5th, 1806. 
 
 Manning, your letter dated Hottentots, 1 August (the 
 what-was-it ?) came to hand. I can scarce hope that 
 mine will have the same luck. China ! Canton ! Bless 
 us — how it strains the imagination and makes it ache ! 
 I write under another uncertainty, whether it can go 
 
 1 Manning had at last gone to China.
 
 392 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 to-morrow by a ship which I have just learned is 
 going off direct to your part of the world, or whether 
 the despatches may not be sealed up and this have 
 to wait, for if it is detained here, it will grow staler 
 in a fortnight than in a five months' voyage coming 
 to you. It will be a point of conscience to send you 
 none but bran-new news (the latest edition), which, 
 like oranges, will but grow the better for a sea voyage. 
 Oh that you should be so many hemispheres off! 
 (If I speak incorrectly you can correct me.) Why 
 the simplest death or marriage that takes place here 
 must be important to you as news in the old Bastile. 
 There's your friend Tuthill has got away from France. 
 You remember France ? and Tuthill ? Ten to one 
 but he writes by this post, if he don't get my note in 
 time, apprising him of the vessel's sailing. Know 
 then that he has found means to obtain leave from 
 Buonaparte (without making use of any incredible ro- 
 mantic pretences as some have done, who never meant 
 to fulfil them,) to come home, and I have seen him 
 here and at Holcroft's. Ar'n't you glad about Tuthill? 
 Now then be sorry for Holcroft, whose new play, 
 called the Vindictive Man, was damned about a fort- 
 night since. It died in part of its own weakness, and 
 in part for being choked up with bad actors. The 
 two principal parts were destined to Mrs. Jordan and 
 Mr. Bannister, but Mrs. J. has not come to terms with 
 the managers ; they have had some squabble ; and 
 Bannister shot some of his fingers off by the going off 
 of a gun. So Miss Duncan had her part, and Mr. De 
 Camp took his. His part, the principal comic hope 
 of the play, was most unluckily Goldfinch, taken out 
 of the Road to Ruin, not only the same character, but 
 the identical Goldfinch — the same as Falstajf is in
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 393 
 
 two plays of Shakspeare's. As the devil of ill-luck 
 would have it, half the audience did not know that 
 Holcroft had written it, but were displeased at his 
 stealing from the Road to Ruin ; and those who might 
 have borne a gentlemanly coxcomb with his " That's 
 your sort," " Go it " — such as Lewis is — did not relish 
 the intolerable vulgarity and inanity of the idea stript 
 of his manner. De Camp was hooted, more than 
 hist, hooted and bellowed off the stage before the 
 second act was finished ; so that the remainder of 
 his part was forced to be, with some violence to the 
 play, omitted. In addition to this, aw.... was 
 another principal character — a most unfortunate 
 choice in this moral day. The audience were as 
 scandalised as if you were to introduce such a per- 
 sonage to their private tea-tables. Besides, her action 
 in. the play was gross — wheedling an old man into 
 marriage. But the mortal blunder of the play was 
 that which, oddly enough, Holcroft took pride in, and 
 exultingly told me of the night before it came out, 
 that there were no less than eleven principal charac- 
 ters in it, and I believe he meant of the men only, for 
 the play-bill expressed as much, not reckoning one 
 woman, and one w . . . . ; and true it was, for Mr. 
 Powell, Mr. Raymond, Mr. Bartlett, Mr. H. Siddons, 
 Mr. Barrymore, &c, &c, to the number of eleven, 
 had all parts equally prominent, and there was as 
 much of them in quantity and rank as of the hero 
 and heroine — and most of them gentlemen who 
 seldom appear but as the hero's friend in a farce, for 
 a minute or two; and here they all had their ten- 
 minute speeches, and one of them gave the audience 
 a serious account of how he was now a lawyer but 
 had been a poet, and then a long enumeration of the
 
 394 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 inconveniences of authorship, rascally booksellers, 
 reviewers, &c. ; which first set the audience a gaping; 
 but I have said enough. You will be so sorry, that 
 you will not think the best of me for my detail ; but 
 news is news at Canton. Poor Holcroft I fear will 
 feel the disappointment very seriously in a pecuniary 
 light. From what I can learn he has saved nothing. 
 You and I were hoping one day that he had, but I 
 fear he has nothing but his pictures and books, and 
 a no very flourishing business, and to be obliged to 
 part with his long-necked Guido that hangs opposite 
 as you enter, and the game-piece that hangs in the 
 back drawing-room, and all those Vandykes, &c. 
 God should temper the wind to the shorn connoisseur. 
 I hope I need not say to you, that I feel for the 
 weather-beaten author, and for all his household. I 
 assure you his fate has soured a good deal the 
 pleasure I should have otherwise taken in my own 
 little farce being accepted, and I hope about to be 
 acted : it is in rehearsal actually, and I expect it to 
 come out next week. It is kept a sort of secret, and the 
 rehearsals have gone on privately, lest by many folks 
 knowing it, the story should come out, which would 
 infallibly damn it. You remember I had sent it be- 
 fore you went. Wroughton read it, and was much 
 pleased with it. I speedily got an answer. I took it 
 to make alterations, and lazily kept it some months, 
 then took courage and furbished it up in a day or two 
 and took it. In less than a fortnight I heard the 
 principal part was given to Elliston, who liked it and 
 only wanted a prologue, which I have since done 
 and sent, and I had a note the day before yesterday 
 from the manager, Wroughton, (bless his fat face ! 
 he is not a bad actor in some things,) to say that I
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 395 
 
 should be summoned to the rehearsal after the next, 
 which next was to be yesterday. I had no idea it 
 was so forward. I have had no trouble, attended no 
 reading or rehearsal, made no interest. What a con- 
 trast to the usual parade of authors ! But it is 
 peculiar to modesty to do all things without noise or 
 pomp. I have some suspicion it will appear in public 
 on Wednesday next, for Wroughton says in his note, 
 it is so forward that if wanted it may come out next 
 week, and a new melodrame is announced for every 
 day till then ; and " a new farce is in rehearsal," is 
 put up in the bills. Now you'd like to know the sub- 
 ject. The title is Mr. H., no more. How simple, 
 how taking ! A great H. sprawling over the play-bill 
 and attracting eyes at every corner. The story is a 
 coxcomb appearing at Bath, vastly rich — all the 
 ladies dying for him — all bursting to know who he 
 is ; but he goes by no other name than Mr. H. — a 
 curiosity like that of the dames of Strasburg about 
 the man with the great nose. But I won't tell you 
 any more about it. Yes, I will ; but I can't give you 
 an idea how I have done it. I'll just tell you that 
 after much vehement admiration, when his true name 
 comes out, " Hogsflesh," all the women shun him, 
 avoid him, and not one can be found to change their 
 name for him. That's the idea. How flat it is here — 
 but how whimsical in the farce ! And only think how 
 hard upon me it is that the ship is despatched to-mor- 
 row, and my triumph cannot be ascertained till the 
 Wednesday after ; but all China will ring of it by and 
 by. N.B. (But this is a secret.) The Professor has got 
 a tragedy coming out, with the young Roscius in it, in 
 January next, as we say — January last it will be with 
 you — and though it is a profound secret now, as all
 
 396 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 his affairs are, it cannot be much of one by the time 
 you read this. However, don't let it go any further. 
 I understand there are dramatic exhibitions in China. 
 One would not like to be forestalled. Do you find in 
 all this stuff I have written anything like those feelings 
 which one should send my old adventuring friend, that 
 is gone to wander among Tartars and may never come 
 again ? I don't ; but your going away, and all about 
 you, is a threadbare topic. I have worn it out with 
 thinking : it has come to me when I have been dull 
 with any thing, till my sadness has seemed more to 
 have come from it than to have introduced it. I 
 want you, you don't know how much ; but if I had 
 you here in my European garret, we should but talk 
 over such stuff as I have written — so. Those Tales 
 from Shakspeare are near coming out, and Mary has 
 begun a new work. 1 Mr. Dawe is turned author ; he 
 has been in such a way lately — Dawe, the painter, I 
 mean — he sits and stands about at Holcroft's and 
 says nothing ; then sighs and leans his head on his 
 hand. I took him to be in love ; but it seems he was 
 only meditating a work, — " The Life of Moreland." 
 The young man is not used to composition. Rickman 
 and Captain Burney are well ; they assemble at my 
 house pretty regularly of a Wednesday — a new 
 institution. Like other great men I have a public 
 day, cribbage and pipes, with Phillips 2 and noisy 
 Martin. 
 
 Good God ! what a bit only I've got left ! How 
 shall I squeeze all I know into this morsel ! Coleridge 
 is come home, and is going to turn lecturer on taste 
 
 J.The Adventures of Ulysses. 
 
 2 Colonel Phillips, an intimate at Lamb's, and one of the " Card- 
 Boys."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 397 
 
 at the Royal Institution. I shall get £200 from the 
 theatre if Mr. H. has a good run, and I hope £100 
 for the copyright. Nothing if it fails ; and there 
 never was a more ticklish thing. The whole depends 
 on the manner in which the name is brought out, 
 which I value myself on, as a chef-d'oeuvre. How 
 the paper grows less and less ! In less than two 
 minutes I shall cease to talk to you, and you may 
 rave to the great wall of China. N.B. Is there such 
 a wall ? Is it as big as Old London Wall, by 
 Bedlam ? Have you met with a friend of mine, 
 named Ball, at Canton ? If you are acquainted, 
 remember me kindly to him. May be you'll think 
 I have not said enough of Tuthill and the Holcrofts. 
 Tuthill is a noble fellow, as far as I can judge. The 
 H.'s bear their disappointment pretty well, but indeed 
 they are sadly mortified. Mrs. H. is cast down. It 
 was well, if it were but on this account, that T. is come 
 home. N.B. If my little thing don't succeed I shall 
 easily survive, having, as it were, compared to H.'s 
 venture, but a sixteenth in the lottery. Mary and 
 I are to sit next the orchestra in the pit, next the 
 tweedledees. She remembers you. You are more 
 to us than five hundred farces, clappings, &c. 
 
 Come back one day. C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CLIIL] '26th Feb. 1808. 
 
 Dear Missionary, — Your letters from the farthest 
 ends of the world have arrived safe. Mary is very 
 thankful for your remembrance of her ; and with the 
 less suspicion of mercenariness, as the silk, the 
 symbolum materiale of your friendship, has not yet
 
 398 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 appeared. I think Horace says somewhere, nox 
 longa. I would not impute negligence or unhand- 
 some delays to a person whom you have honoured 
 with your confidence, but I have not heard of the 
 silk, or of Mr. Knox, save by your letter. Maybe he 
 expects the first advances ! or it maybe that he has 
 not succeeded in getting the article on shore, for it is 
 among the res prohibitce et non nisi smuggle -ationis 
 via frucndce. But so it is, in the friendships between 
 •wicked men the very expressions of their good-will 
 cannot but be sinful. I suppose you know my farce 
 was damned. The noise still rings in my ears. Were 
 you ever in the pillory ? — being damned is something 
 like that. A treaty of marriage is on foot between 
 William Hazlitt and Miss Stoddart. Something 
 about settlements only retards it. She has somewhere 
 about £80 a-year, to be £"120 when her mother dies. 
 He has no settlement except what he can claim from 
 the Parish. Pauper est tamen, sed amat. The thing 
 is therefore in abeyance. But there is love a-both 
 sides. Little Fenwick (you don't see the connection 
 of ideas here ; how the devil should you ?) is in the 
 rules of the Fleet. Cruel creditors ! operation of 
 iniquitous laws. Is Magna Charta then a mockery ? 
 Why, in general (here I suppose you to ask a 
 question) my spirits are pretty good ; but I have my 
 depressions, black as a smith's beard, Vulcanic, 
 Stygian. At such times I have recourse to a pipe, 
 which is like not being at home to a dun : he comes 
 again with tenfold bitterness the next day. — (Mind, I 
 am not in debt ; I only borrow a similitude from 
 others ; it shows imagination.) I have done two 
 books since the failure of my farce ; they will both be 
 out this Summer. The one is a juvenile book — the
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 399 
 
 Adventures of Ulysses, 1 intended to be an introduction 
 to the reading of Telemachus ! It is done out of the 
 Odyssey, not from the Greek, (I would not mislead 
 you,) nor yet from Pope's Odyssey, but from an older 
 translation of one Chapman. 2 The Shakspeare Tales 
 suggested the doing of it. Godwin is in both those 
 cases my bookseller. The other is done for Long- 
 man, and is Specimens of English Dramatic Poets 
 contemporary with Shakspeare. Specimens are be- 
 coming fashionable. We have " Specimens of 
 Ancient English Poets," " Specimens of Modern 
 English Poets," " Specimens of Ancient English 
 Prose Writers," without end. They used to be called 
 " Beauties." You have seen " Beauties of Shak- 
 speare :" so have many people that never saw any 
 beauties in Shakspeare. Longman is to print it, 
 and be at all the expense and risk, and I am to share 
 the profits after all deductions ; i.e. a year or two 
 hence I must pocket what they please to tell me is 
 due to me. But the book is such as I am glad there 
 should be. It is done out of old plays at the 
 Museum, and out of Dodsley's collection, &c. It is 
 to have notes. So I go creeping on since I was 
 lamed with that cursed fall from off the top of Drury 
 Lane Theatre into the pit, something more than a 
 year ago. However, I have been free of the house 
 ever since, and the house was pretty free with me 
 upon that occasion. Damn 'em, how they hissed ! 
 It was not a hiss neither, but a sort of a frantic yell, 
 like a congregation of mad geese, with roaring some- 
 times, like bears, mows and mops like apes, sometimes 
 
 1 Incorporated with the present Edition of the Works. 
 
 2 Lamb was a great admirer of Chapman's genius. In another place 
 he hopes that he had not "quite emptied him of his divinity."
 
 400 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 snakes, that hiss'd me into madness. 'Twas like 
 St. Anthony's temptations. Mercy on- us, that God 
 should give his favourite children, men, mouths to 
 speak with, to discourse rationally, to promise 
 smoothly, to flatter agreeably, to encourage warmly, 
 to counsel wisely, to sing with, to drink with, and to 
 kiss with, and that they should turn them into mouths 
 of adders, bears, wolves, hyenas, and whistle like 
 tempests, and emit breath through them like distilla- 
 tions of aspic poison, to asperse and villify the inno- 
 cent labours of their fellow-creatures who are desirous 
 to please them ! Heaven be pleased therefore to 
 make the breath stink and teeth rot out of them all : 
 make them a reproach, and all that pass by them to 
 loll out their tongue at them ! Blind mouths ! as 
 Milton somewhere calls them. Do you like Braham's 
 singing? The little Jew has bewitched me. I follow 
 him like as the boys followed Tom the Piper. He 
 cures me of melancholy as David cured Saul : but I 
 don't throw stones at him as Saul did at David in 
 payment. I was insensible to music till he gave me 
 a new sense. Oh that you could go to the new opera 
 of Kais to-night ! 'Tis all about Eastern manners ; 
 it would just suit you. It describes the wild Arabs, 
 wandering Egyptians, lying dervises, and all that sort 
 of people, to a hair. You needn't ha' gone so far to 
 see what you see, if you saw it as I do every night at 
 Drury Lane Theatre. Braham's singing, when it is 
 impassioned, is finer than Mrs. Siddons's or Mr. 
 Kemble's acting! and when it is not impassioned, it 
 is as good as hearing a person of fine sense talking. 
 The brave little Jew ! Old Serjeant Hill is dead. 
 Mrs. Rickman is in the family way. It is thought 
 that Hazlitt will have children if he marries Miss
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 4OI 
 
 Stoddart. I made a pun the other day, and palmed 
 it upon Holcroft, who grinned like a Cheshire cat. 
 (Why do cats grin in Cheshire ? — Because it was 
 once a county palatine, and the cats cannot help 
 laughing whenever they think of it, though I see no. 
 great joke in it.) I said that Holcroft, on being asked 
 who were the best dramatic writers of the day, 
 replied, " Hook and I." Mr. Hook is author of 
 several pieces, Tekeli, &c. You know what hooks 
 and eyes are, don't you ? They are what little boys 
 do up their breeches with. Your letter had many 
 things in it hard to be understood : the puns were 
 ready and Swift-like ; but don't you begin to be 
 melancholy in the midst of Eastern customs ! " The 
 mind does not easily conform to foreign usages, even 
 in trifles : it requires something that it has been 
 familiar with." That begins one of Dr. Hawkes- 
 worth's papers in the Adventurer, and is, I think, as 
 sensible a remark as ever fell from the Doctor's 
 mouth. White is at Christ's Hospital, a wit of the 
 first magnitude, but would rather be thought a 
 gentleman, like Congreve. You know Congreve's 
 repulse which he gave to Voltaire, when he came to 
 visit him as a literary man, that he wished to be 
 considered only in the light of a private gentleman. 
 I think the impertinent Frenchman was properly 
 answered. I should just serve any member of the 
 French Institute in the same manner, that wished to 
 be introduced to me. Buonaparte has voted 5000 
 livres to Davy, the great young English Chemist ! 
 but it has not arrived. Coleridge has delivered two 
 lectures at the Royal Institution ; two more intended, 
 but he did not come. It is thought he has gone sick 
 vol. I. 2D
 
 402 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 upon them. He isn't well, that's certain. 1 Words- 
 worth is coming to see him. He sits up in a two 
 pair of stairs room at the Courier office, and receives 
 
 visitors on his c . . . . s 
 
 Does any one read at Canton ? Lord Moira is 
 President of the Westminster Library. I suppose 
 you might have interest with Sir Joseph Banks to 
 get to be president of any similar institution that 
 should be set up at Canton. I think public reading- 
 rooms the best mode of educating young men. 
 Solitary reading is apt to give the headache. Be- 
 sides, who knows that you do read ? There are ten 
 thousand institutions similar to the Royal Institution 
 which have sprung up from it. There is the London 
 Institution, the Southwark Institution, the Russell 
 Square Rooms Institution, &c. — College quasi Con- 
 lege, a place where people read together. Words- 
 worth, the great poet, is coming to town ; he is to 
 have apartments in the Mansion House. He says 
 he does not see much difficulty in writing like 
 Shakspeare, if he had a mind to try it. It is clear 
 that nothing is wanting but the mind. Even Cole- 
 ridge was a little checked at this hardihood of assertion. 
 Dyer came to me the other evening at n o'clock, 
 when there was a large room full of company, which 
 I usually get together on a Wednesday evening, (all 
 great men have public days,) to propose to me to have 
 my face done by a Miss Beetham, (or Betham,) a 
 miniature painter, some relation to Mrs. Beetham 
 the Profilist or Pattern Mangle woman opposite 
 
 1 Coleridge was, in fact, very ill ; for in a letter to Lamb, dated Feb. 
 10, 1808, he says "O Charles! I am very, very ill. Vixi."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 403 
 
 St. Dunstan's, to put before my book of Extracts. 1 
 I declined it. 
 
 Well, my dear Manning, talking cannot be infinite. 
 I have said all I have to say ; the rest is but remem- 
 brances of you, which we shall bear in our heads 
 while we have heads. Here is a packet of trifles 
 nothing worth ; but it is a trifling part of the world 
 where I live : emptiness abounds. But in fulness ol 
 affection, we remain yours, C. L. 
 
 Southampton Buildings, 
 
 Letter CLIV.] 28th March, 1809. 
 
 Dear Manning, — I sent you a long letter by the 
 ships which sailed the beginning of last month, ac- 
 companied with books, &c. Since I last wrote Hol- 
 croft is dead. He died on Thursday last. So there 
 is one of your friends whom you will never see again ! 
 Perhaps the next fleet may bring you a letter from 
 Martin Burney, to say that he writes by desire of 
 Miss Lamb, who is not well enough to write herself, 
 to inform you that her brother died on Thursday last, 
 14th June, &c. But I hope not. I should be sorry 
 .to give occasion to open a correspondence between 
 Martin and you. This letter must be short, for I 
 have driven it off to the very moment of doing up the 
 packets ; and besides, that which I refer to above is 
 a very long one ; and if you have received my books, 
 you will have enough to do to read them. While I 
 think on it, let me tell you, we are moved. Don't 
 come any more to Mitre-Court Buildings. We are 
 at 34, Southampton Buildings, Chancery Lane, and 
 
 1 The Dramatic Specimens. 
 
 2 D 2
 
 404 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 shall be here till about the end of May ; then we re- 
 move to No. 4, Inner Temple Lane, where I mean to 
 live and die ; for I have such horror of moving, that 
 I would not take a benefice from the King if I was 
 not indulged with non-residence. What a disloca- 
 tion of comfort is comprised in that word " moving !" 
 Such a heap of little nasty things, after you think 
 all is got into the cart : old dredging-boxes, worn- 
 out brushes, gallipots, vials, things that it is impos- 
 sible the most necessitous person can ever want, • 
 but which the women, who preside on these occa- 
 sions, will not leave behind if it was to save your 
 soul. They'd keep the cart ten minutes to stow in 
 dirty pipes and broken matches, to show their 
 economy. Then you can find nothing you want for 
 many days after you get into your new lodgings. 
 You must comb your hair with your fingers, wash 
 your hands without soap, go about in dirty gaiters. 
 Were I Diogenes, I would not move out of a kilderkin 
 into a hogshead, though the first had had nothing but 
 small beer in it, and the second reeked claret. Our 
 place of final destination, — I don't mean the grave, 
 but No. 4, Inner Temple Lane, — looks out upon a 
 gloomy churchyard-like court, called Hare Court, 
 with three trees and a pump in it. Do you knew it ? 
 I was born near it, and used to drink at that pump 
 when I was a Rechabite of six years old. If you see 
 newspapers you will read about Mrs. Clarke. The 
 sensation in London about this nonsensical business 
 is marvellous. I remember nothing in my life like 
 it : thousands of ballads, caricatures, lives of Mrs. 
 Clarke, in every blind alley. Yet in the midst of this 
 stir, a sublime abstracted dancing-master, who attends 
 a family we know at Kensington, being asked a ques-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 405 
 
 tion about the progress of the examinations in the 
 House, inquired who Mrs. Clarke was ? He had heard 
 nothing of it. He had evaded this omnipresence by- 
 utter insignificancy ! The Duke should make that 
 man his confidential valet. I proposed locking him 
 up, barring him the use 'of his fiddle and red pumps, 
 until he had minutely perused and committed to 
 memory the whole body of the examinations, which 
 employed the House of Commons a fortnight, to 
 teach him to be more attentive to what concerns the 
 public. I think I told you of Godwin's little book, 
 and of Coleridge's prospectus, in my last ; if I did 
 not, remind me of it, and I will send you them, or an 
 account of them, next fleet. I have no conveniency 
 
 of doing it by this. Mrs. grows every day in 
 
 disfavour with me. I will be buried with this in- 
 scription over me : — " Here lies C. L., the woman- 
 hater:" I mean that hated one woman : for the rest, 
 God bless them ! How do you like the Mandarin- 
 esses ? Are you on some little footing with any of 
 them ? This is Wednesday. On Wednesdays is 
 my levee. The Captain, Martin, Phillips, (not the 
 Sheriff,) Rickman, and some more, are constant at- 
 tendants, besides stray visitors. We play at whist, 
 eat cold meat and hot potatoes, and any gentleman 
 that chooses smokes. Why do you never drop in ? 
 You'll come some day, won't you ? 
 
 C. Lamb, &c. 
 
 LETTER CLV.] [Temple,] Jan. 2nd, 1810. 
 
 Dear Manning, — When I last wrote to you I was in 
 lodgings. I am now in chambers, No. 4, Inner Temple 
 Lane, where I should be happy to see you any even-
 
 406 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 ing. Bring any of your friends, the Mandarins, with 
 you. I have two sitting-rooms : I call them so par ex- 
 cellence, for you may stand, or loll, or lean, or try any 
 posture in them, but they are best for sitting ; not squat- 
 ting down Japanese fashion, but the more decorous use 
 
 of the which European usage has consecrated. I 
 
 have two of these rooms on the third floor, and five 
 sleeping, cooking, &c. rooms, on the fourth floor. In 
 my best room is a choice collection of the works of 
 Hogarth, an English painter of some humour. In 
 my next best are shelves containing a small but well- 
 chosen library. My best room commands a court, in 
 which there are trees and a pump, the water of which 
 is excellent cold, with brandy, and not very insipid 
 without. Here "I hope to set up my rest, and not 
 quit till Mr. Powell, the undertaker, gives me notice 
 that I may have possession of my last lodging. He 
 lets lodgings for single gentlemen. I sent you a 
 parcel of books by my last, to give you some idea of 
 the state of European literature. There comes with 
 this two volumes, done up as letters, of minor poetry, 
 a sequel to " Mrs. Leicester;" 1 the best you may sup- 
 pose mine ; the next best are my coadjutor's. You 
 may amuse yourself in guessing them out; but I 
 must tell you mine are but one-third in quantity of 
 the whole. So much for a very delicate subject. It 
 is hard to speak of one's self, &c. Holcroft had 
 finished his life when I wrote to you, and Hazlitt has 
 since finished his life ; I do not mean his own life, 
 but he has finished a life of Holcroft, which is going 
 
 1 " Poetry for Children." By the Author of "Mrs. Leicester's 
 School," 2 vols. i2mo., 1807. This was so scarce even in Lamb's time, 
 that, having given away all the copies, he could not hear of another 
 for him elf.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 407 
 
 to press. Tuthill is Dr. Tuthill. I continue Mr. 
 Lamb. I have published a little book for children on 
 titles of honour ; and to give them some idea of the 
 difference of rank and gradual rising, I have made a 
 little scale, supposing myself to receive the following 
 various accessions of dignity from the king, who is 
 the fountain of honour — As at first, i, Mr. C. Lamb ; 
 2, C. Lamb, Esq.; 3, Sir C. Lamb, Bart.; 4, Baron 
 Lamb, of Stamford j 1 5, Viscount Lamb ; 6, Earl 
 Lamb ; 7, Marquis Lamb ; 8, Duke Lamb. It would 
 look like quibbling to carry it on further, and espe- 
 cially as it is not necessary for children to go beyond 
 the ordinary titles of sub-regal dignity in our own 
 country ; otherwise I have sometimes in my dreams 
 imagined myself still advancing, as gth, King Lamb ; 
 10th, Emperor Lamb; nth, Pope Innocent; higher 
 than which is nothing upon earth. Puns I have 
 not made many, (nor punch much,) since the date 
 of my last ; one I cannot help relating. A con- 
 stable in Salisbury Cathedral was telling me that 
 eight people dined at the top of the spire of the cathe- 
 dral ; upon which I remarked, that they-must be very 
 sharp set. But in general I cultivate the reasoning 
 part of my mind more than the imaginative. I am 
 stuffed out so with eating turkey for dinner, and 
 another turkey for supper yesterday, (Turkey in 
 Europe and Turkey in Asia,) that I can't jog on. It 
 is New Year here ; that is, it was New Year half a- 
 year back, when I was writing this. Nothing puzzles 
 me more than time and space ; and yet nothing 
 puzzles me less, for I never think about them. The 
 
 1 Where'my family came from. I should choose that, if ever I should 
 have my choice.
 
 40S 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Persian ambassador is the principal thing talked of 
 now. I sent some people to see him worship the 
 sun on Primrose Hill, at half-past six in the morning, 
 28th November ; but he did not come, which makes 
 me think the old fire-worshippers are a sect almost 
 extinct in Persia. The Persian ambassador's name 
 is Shaw AH Mirza. The common people call him 
 Shaw Nonsense. While I think of it, I have put 
 three letters, besides my own three, into the India 
 post for you, from your brother, sister, and some gen- 
 tleman whose name I forget. Will they, have they, 
 did they come safe ? The distance you are at, cuts 
 up tenses by the root. I think you said you did not 
 know Kate *********. I express her by 
 nine stars, though she is but one. You must have 
 seen her at her father's. Try and remember her. 
 Coleridge is bringing out a paper in weekly Numbers, 
 called the Friend, which I would send if I could ; 
 but the difficulty I had in getting the packets of books 
 out to you before, deters me ; and you'll want some 
 thing new to read when you come home. It is chiefly 
 intended to puff off Wordsworth's poetry ; but there 
 are some noble things in it by the by. Except Kate, 
 I have had no vision of excellence this year, and she 
 passed by like the Queen on her coronation day ; you 
 don't know whether you saw her or not. Kate is 
 fifteen : I go about moping, and sing the old pathetic 
 ballad I used to like in my youth — 
 
 " She's sweet fifteen, 
 I'm one year more." 
 
 Mrs. Bland sang it in boy's clothes the first time I 
 heard it. I sometimes think the lower notes in my 
 voice are like Mrs. Bland's. That glorious singer,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 409 
 
 Braham, one of my lights, is fled. He was for a 
 season. He was a rare composition of the Jew, the 
 gentleman, and the angel ; yet all these elements 
 mixed up so kindly in him, that you could not tell 
 which preponderated ; but he is gone, and one Phillips 
 
 is engaged instead. Kate is vanished, but Miss B 
 
 is always to be met with ! 
 
 " Queens drop away, while blue-legg'd Maukin thrives; 
 And courtly Mildred dies while country Madge survives." 
 
 That is not my poetry, but Quarles's ; but haven't 
 you observed that the rarest things are the least 
 obvious ? Don't show any body the names in this 
 letter. I write confidentially, and wish this letter to 
 be considered as private. Hazlitt has written a 
 grammar for Godwin. Godwin sells it bound up with 
 a treatise of his own on language ; but the grey mare 
 is the better horse. 1 I don't allude to Mrs. [Godwin], 
 but to the word grammar, which comes near to grey 
 mare, if you observe, in sound. That figure is called 
 paronomasia in Greek. I am sometimes happy in it. 
 An old woman begged of me for charity. " Ah ! sir," 
 said she, " I have seen better days." " So have I, 
 good woman," I replied ; but I meant, literally, days 
 not so rainy and overcast as that on which she 
 begged : she meant more prosperous days. Mr. 
 Dawe 2 is made associate of the Royal Academy. By 
 
 ! Godwin published under the nnm de plume of " Edward Baldwin, 
 Esq." His portion is called "A New Guide to the English Tongue, 
 in A Letter to Mr. W. F. Mylins, Author of the School Dictionary." 
 In the same year, Godwin, under the same pseudonym, published 
 " Outlines of English Grammar, chiefly abridged from Mr. Hazlitt's 
 New and Improved Grammar of the English Language." 
 
 2 He afterwards accepted an offer to go to Russia, where he was 
 very successful. John Hazlitt had first the offer ; but he refused it.
 
 410 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 what law of association I can't guess, Mrs. Holcroft, 
 Miss Holcroft, Mr. and Mrs. Godwin, Mr. and Mrs. 
 Hazlitt, Mrs. Martin and Louisa, Mrs. Lum, Capt. 
 Burney, Mrs. Burney, Martin Burney, Mr. Rickman, 
 Mrs. Rickman, Dr. Stoddart, William Dollin, Mr. 
 Thompson, Mr. and Mrs. Norris, Mr. Fenwick, Mrs. 
 Fenwick, Miss Fenwick, a man that saw you at our 
 house one day, and a lady that heard me speak of 
 you ; Mrs. Buffam 1 that heard Hazlitt mention you, 
 Dr. Tuthill, Mrs. Tuthill, Colonel Harwood, Mrs. 
 Harwood, Mr. Collier, Mrs. Collier, Mr. Sutton, 
 Nurse, Mr. Fell, Mrs. Fell, Mr. Marshall, are very 
 well, and occasionally inquire after you. 
 I remain yours ever, 
 
 Ch. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CLVI. 2 ] Dec 25th, 1815. 
 
 Dear old friend and absentee, — This is Christmas 
 Day 1815 with us ; what it may be with you I don't 
 know, the 12th of June next year perhaps; and if it 
 should be the consecrated season with you, I don't 
 see how you can keep it. You have no turkeys ; you 
 would not desecrate the festival by offering up a 
 withered Chinese bantam, instead of the savoury 
 grand Norfolcian holocaust, that smokes all around 
 my nostrils at this moment from a thousand fire- 
 sides. Then what puddings have you ? Where will 
 you get holly to stick in your churches, or churches 
 to stick your dried tea-leaves (that must be the sub- 
 
 1 The landlady at No. 9, Southampton Buildings. 
 
 2 A letter full of fun. Many of the statements in it are playful ex- 
 travagances.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 4II 
 
 stitute) in ? What memorials you can have of the 
 holy time, I see not. A chopped missionary or 
 two may keep up the thin idea of Lent and the wil- 
 derness ; but what standing evidence have you of 
 the Nativity ? "lis our rosy-cheeked, homestalled 
 divines, whose faces shine to the tune of " Unto us a 
 child was born," faces fragrant with the mince-pies of 
 half a century, that alone can authenticate the cheer- 
 ful mystery. I feel my bowels refreshed with the 
 holy tide ; my zeal is great against the unedified 
 heathen. Down with the Pagodas— down with the 
 idols — Ching-chong-fo — and his foolish priesthood ! 
 Come out of Babylon, O my friend ! for her time is 
 come ; and the child that is native, and the Proselyte 
 of her gates, shall kindle and smoke together ! And 
 in sober sense what makes you so long from among 
 us, Manning ? You must not expect to see the same 
 England again which you left. 
 
 Empires have been overturned, crowns trodden 
 into dust, the face of the western world quite 
 changed. Your friends have all got old — those you 
 left blooming; myself, (who am one of the few that 
 remember you,) those golden hairs which you recollect 
 my taking a pride in, turned to silvery and grey. 
 Mary has been dead and buried many years : she 
 desired to be buried in- the silk gown you sent her. 
 Rickman, that you remember active and strong, now 
 walks out supported by a servant maid and a stick. 
 Martin Burney is a very old man. The other day an 
 aged woman knocked at my door, and pretended to 
 my acquaintance. It was long before I had the most 
 distant cognition of her; but at last, together, we 
 made her out to be Louisa, the daughter of Mrs. 
 Topham, formerly Mrs. Morton, who had been Mrs.
 
 412 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Reynolds, formerly Mrs. Kenney. whose first husband 
 was Holcroft, the dramatic writer of the last century. 
 St. Paul's church is a heap of ruins ; the Monument 
 isn't half so high as you knew it, divers parts being 
 successively taken down which the ravages of time 
 had rendered dangerous ; the horse at Charing Cross 
 is gone, no one knows whither ; and all this has 
 taken place while you have been settling whether 
 
 Ho-hing-tong should be spelt with a , or a . 
 
 For aught I see you might almost as well remain where 
 you are, and not come like a Struldbrug into a world 
 were few were born when you went away. Scarce 
 here and there one will be able to make out your 
 face. All your opinions will be out of date, your jokes 
 obsolete, your puns rejected with fastidiousness as 
 wit of the last age. Your way of mathematics has 
 already given way to a new method, which after all 
 is I believe the old doctrine of Maclaurin, new- 
 vamped up with what he borrowed of the negative 
 quantity of fluxions from Euler. 
 
 Poor Godwin ! I was passing his tomb the other 
 day in Cripplegate churchyard. .There are some 
 
 verses upon it written by Miss , which if I 
 
 thought good enough I would send you. He was 
 one of those who would have hailed your return, not 
 with boisterous shouts and clamours, but with the 
 complacent gratulations of a philosopher anxious to 
 promote knowledge as leading to happiness ; but his 
 systems and his theories are ten feet deep in Cripple- 
 gate mould. Coleridge is just dead, having lived just 
 long enough to close the eyes of Wordsworth, who 
 paid the debt to Nature but a week or two before. 
 Poor Col., but two days before he died he wrote to a 
 bookseller, proposing an epic poem on the " Wander-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 413 
 
 ings of Cain," in twenty-four books. It is said he 
 has left behind him more than forty thousand 
 treatises in criticism, metaphysics, and divinity, but 
 few of them in a state of completion. They are now 
 destined, perhaps, to wrap up spices. You see what 
 mutations the busy hand of Time has produced, 
 while you have consumed in foolish voluntary exile 
 that time which might have gladdened your friends — 
 benefited your country ; but reproaches are useless. 
 Gather up the wretched reliques, my friend, as fast 
 as you can, and come to your old home. I will rub 
 my eyes and try to recognise you. We will shake 
 withered hands together, and talk of old things — of 
 St. Mary's Church and the barber's opposite, where 
 the young students in mathematics used to assemble. 
 Poor Crips, that kept it afterwards, set up a fruiterer's 
 shop in Trumpington Street, and for aught I know 
 resides there still, for I saw the name up in the last 
 journey I took there with my sister just before she 
 died. I suppose you heard that I had left the India 
 House, and gone into the Fishmongers' Almshouses 
 over the bridge. I have a little cabin there, small 
 and homely, but you shall be welcome to it. You 
 like oysters, and to open them yourself; I'll get you 
 some if you come in oyster time. Marshall, God- 
 win's old friend, is still alive, and talks of the faces 
 you used to make. 
 
 Come as soon as you can. C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CLVIL] Dec 26th, 1815. 
 
 Dear Manning, — Following your brother's example, 
 I have just ventured one letter to Canton, and am
 
 414 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 now hazarding another (not exactly a duplicate) to 
 St. Helena. The first was full of unprobable romantic 
 fictions, fitting the remoteness of the mission it goes 
 upon ; in the present I mean to confine myself nearer 
 to truth as ycu come nearer home. A correspondence 
 with the uttermost parts of the earth necessarily in- 
 volves in it some heat of fancy, it sets the brain 
 agoing, but I can think on the half-way house tran- 
 quilly. Your friends then are not all dead or grown 
 forgetful of you through old age, as that lying letter 
 asserted, anticipating rather what must happen if you 
 kept tarrying on for -ever on the skirts of creation, as 
 there seemed a danger of your doing ; but they are 
 all tolerably well and in full and perfect comprehen- 
 sion of what is meant by Manning's coming home 
 again. Mrs. Kenney 1 never lets her tongue run riot 
 more than in remembrances of you. Fanny expends 
 herself in phrases that can only be justified by her 
 romantic nature. Mary reserves a portion of your 
 silk, not to be buried in, (as the false nuncio asserts,) 
 but to make up spick and span into a bran-new gown 
 to wear when you come. I am the same as when 
 you knew me, almost to a surfeiting identity. This 
 very night I am going to leave off tobacco ! Surely 
 there must be some other world in which this un- 
 conquerable purpose shall be realised. The soul hath 
 not her generous aspirings implanted in her in vain. 
 One that you knew, and I think the only one of those 
 friends we knew much of in common, has died in 
 earnest. Poor Priscilla ! 2 Her brother Robert is 
 also dead, and several of the grown-up brothers and 
 
 1 Wife of Mr. James Kenney, the dramatist. She had been pre- 
 viously the fourth wife of Holcroft. She was a Mdlle. Merrier. 
 - \\"iiv of Kit Wordsworth.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 415 
 
 sisters, in the compass of a very few years. Death 
 has not otherwise meddled much in families that I 
 know. Not but he has his eye upon us, and is 
 whetting his feathered dart every instant, as you see 
 him truly pictured in that impressive moral picture, 
 "The good man at the hour of death." I have in 
 trust to put in the post four letters from Diss, and 
 one from Lynn, to St. Helena, which I hope will 
 accompany this safe, and one from Lynn, and the 
 one before spoken of from me, to Canton. But we 
 all hope that these letters may be waste paper. I 
 don't know why I have forborne writing so long ; but 
 it is such a forlorn hope to send a scrap of paper 
 straggling over wide oceans ! And yet I know, when 
 you come home, I shall have you sitting before me 
 at our fire-side just as if you had never been away. 
 In such an instant does the return of a person dis- 
 sipate all the weight of imaginary perplexity from 
 distance of time and space ! I'll promise you good 
 oysters. Cory is dead that kept the shop opposite 
 St. Dunstan's ; but the tougher materials of the shop 
 survive the perishing frame of its keeper. Oysters 
 continue to flourish there under as good auspices. 
 Poor Cory! But if you will absent yourself twenty 
 years together, you must not expect numerically 
 the same population to congratulate your return 
 which wetted the sea-beach with their tears when 
 you went away. Have you recovered the breath- 
 less stone-staring astonishment into which you must 
 have been thrown upon learning at landing that 
 an Emperor of France was living in St. Helena? 
 What an event in the solitude of the seas ! like find- 
 ing a fish's bone at the top of Plinlimmon ; but these 
 things are nothing in our western world. Novelties
 
 416 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 cease to affect. Come and try what your presence 
 can. 
 
 God bless you. — Your old friend, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CLVIII.] [May 28th, 1 819.] 
 
 My dear M., — I want to know how your brother is, 
 if you have heard lately. I want to know about you. 
 I wish you were nearer. How are my cousins, the 
 Gladmans of Wheathamstead, and farmer Bruton ? 
 Mrs. Bruton is a glorious woman. 
 
 " Hail, Mackery End "— 
 
 This is a fragment of a blank verse poem which I 
 once meditated, but got no further. 1 The E. I. H. 
 has been thrown into a quandary by the strange 
 phenomenon of poor Tommy Bye, whom I have 
 known man and mad-man twenty-seven years, he 
 being elder here than myself by nine years and more. 
 He was always a pleasant, gossiping, half-headed, 
 muzzy, dozing, dreaming, walk-about, inoffensive 
 chap ; a little too fond of the creature — (who isn't at 
 times ?) ; but Tommy had not brains to work off an 
 over-night's surfeit by ten o'clock next morning ; and 
 unfortunately, in he wandered the other morning 
 drunk with last night, and with a superfcetation of 
 drink taken in since he set out from bed. He came 
 staggering under his double burthen, like trees in 
 Java, bearing at once blossom, fruit, and falling fruit, 
 as I have heard you or some other traveller tell, with 
 
 1 See "Mackery End, in Hertfordshire," — Essays of Ella, p. ioo — 
 for a charming- account of a visit to their cousin in the country with 
 Mr. Barron Field.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 417 
 
 his face literally as blue as the bluest firmament ; 
 some wretched calico, that he had mopped his poor 
 oozy front with, had rendered up its native dye ; and 
 the devil a bit would he consent to wash it, but swore 
 it was characteristic, for he was going to the sale of 
 indigo, and set up a laugh which I did not think the 
 lungs of mortal man were competent to. It was like 
 a thousand people laughing, or the Goblin Page. He 
 imagined afterwards that the whole office had been 
 laughing at him, so strange did his own sounds strike 
 upon his wcwsensorium ! But Tommy has laughed 
 his last laugh, and awoke the next day to find himself 
 reduced from an abused income of £600 per annum 
 to one-sixth of the sum, after thirty-six years' tolerably 
 good service. The quality of mercy was not strained 
 in his behalf: the gentle dews dropt not on him from 
 heaven. It just came across me that I was writing 
 to Canton. Will you drop in to-morrow night ? 
 Fanny Kelly is coming, if she does not cheat us. 
 Mrs. Gold is well, but proves " uncoined," as the 
 lovers about Wheathamstead would say. 
 
 I have not had such a quiet half hour to sit down 
 to a quiet. letter for many years. I have not been 
 interrupted above four times. I wrote a letter the 
 other day, in alternate lines, black ink and red, and 
 you cannot think how it chilled the flow of ideas. 
 Next Monday is Whit-Monday. What a reflection ! 
 Twelve years ago, and I should have kept that and 
 the following holidays in the fields a Maying. All of 
 those pretty pastoral delights are over. This dead, 
 everlasting dead desk, — how it weighs the spirit of a 
 gentleman down ! This dead wood of the desk, in- 
 stead of your living trees, ! But then again, I hate 
 the Joskins, a name for Hertfordshire bumpkins. 
 
 vol. 1. 2 E
 
 4-l8 CORRESPONDENCE WITH MANNING. 
 
 Each state of life has its inconvenience ; but then 
 again, mine has more than one. Not that I repine, 
 or grudge, or murmur at my destiny. I have meat 
 and drink, and decent apparel ; I shall, at least, when 
 I get a new hat. 
 
 A red-haired man has just interrupted me. He has 
 broke the current of my thoughts. I haven't a word 
 to add. I don't know why I send this letter, but I 
 have had a hankering to hear about you some days. 
 Perhaps it will go off before your reply comes. If it 
 don't, I assure you no letter was ever welcomer from 
 you, from Paris or Macao. C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER CLIX.] No date. [Beginning of 1825.] 
 
 My dear M. — You might have come inopportunely 
 a week since, when we had an inmate. At present 
 and for as long as ever you like, our castle is at your 
 service. I saw T[uthill] yesternight, who has done 
 for me what may 
 
 "To all my nights and days to come, 
 Give solely sovran sway and masterdom." 
 
 But I dare not hope, for fear of disappointment. I 
 cannot be more explicit at present. But I have it 
 under his own hand, that I am «o«-capacitated, (I 
 cannot write it in-) for business. joyous imbecility ! 
 Not a susurration of this to any body ! 
 
 Mary's love. C. Lamb.
 
 ( 4i9 ) 
 
 V. 
 
 Correspondence with the Hazlitts. 
 [1805-33]. 
 
 Letter CLX. [Nov. 10, 1805.] 
 
 Dear Hazlitt, — I was very glad to hear from you, 
 and that your journey was so picturesque. We miss 
 you, as we foretold we should. One or two things 
 have happened, which are beneath the dignity of 
 epistolary communication, but which, seated about 
 our fireside at night, (the winter hands of pork have 
 begun,) gesture and emphasis might have talked 
 into some importance. Something about Rickman's 
 wife ; for instance, how tall she is, and that she visits 
 pranked up like a Queen of the May, with green 
 streamers : a good-natured woman though, which is 
 as much as you can expect from a friend's wife, 
 whom you got acquainted with a bachelor. Some 
 things too about Monkey, which can't so well be 
 written : how it set up for a fine lady, and thought it 
 had got lovers, and was obliged to be convinced of its 
 age from the parish register, where it was proved to 
 be only twelve ; and an edict issued, that it should 
 not give itself airs yet these four years ; and how it 
 got leave to be called Miss, by grace : these, and such 
 like hows, were in my head to tell you ; but who can 
 write ? Also how Manning is come to town in 
 spectacles, and studies physic ; is melancholy, and 
 seems to have something in his head, which he don't 
 impart. Then, how I am going to leave off smoking. 
 O la ! your Leonardos of Oxford made my mouth 
 water. I was hurried through the gallery, and they 
 
 2 e 2
 
 420 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 escaped me. What do I say ? I was a Goth then, 
 and should not have noticed them. I had not settled 
 my notions of beauty : I have now for ever ! — the 
 small head, the long eye, — that sort of peering curve, 
 — the wicked Italian mischief; the stick-at-nothing, 
 Herodias's daughter kind of grace. You understand 
 me ? But you disappoint me in passing over in 
 absolute silence the Blenheim Leonardo. Didn't you 
 see it ? Excuse a lover's curiosity. I have seen no 
 pictures of note since, except Mr. Dawe's gallery. It 
 is curious to see how differently two great men treat 
 the same subject, yet both excellent in their way. 
 For instance, Milton and Mr. Dawe. Mr. D. has 
 chosen to illustrate the story of Samson exactly in 
 the point of view in which Milton has been most 
 happy : the interview between the Jewish hero, blind 
 and captive, and Dalilah. Milton has imagined his 
 locks grown again, strong as horse-hair or porcupine's 
 bristles ; doubtless shaggy and black, as being hairs 
 " which, of a nation armed, contained the strength." 
 I don't remember he says black ; but could Milton 
 imagine them to be yellow ? Do you ? Mr. Dawe, 
 with striking originality of conception, has crowned 
 him with a thin yellow wig, in colour precisely like 
 Dyson's ; in curl and quantity, resembling Mrs. Pro- 
 fessor's ; his limbs rather stout, — about such a man 
 as my brother or Rickman, — but no Atlas nor Her- 
 cules, nor yet so long as Dubois, the clown of Sadler's 
 Wells. This was judicious, taking the spirit of the 
 story rather than the fact; for doubtless God could 
 communicate national salvation to the trust of flax 
 and tow as well as hemp and cordage, and could 
 draw down a temple with a golden tress as soon as 
 with all the cables of the British navy.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 42I 
 
 Wasn't you sorry for Lord Nelson ? I have fol- 
 lowed him in fancy ever since I saw him walking in 
 Pall Mall, (I was prejudiced against him before,) 
 looking just as a hero should look; and I have been 
 very much cut about it indeed. He was the only 
 pretence of a great man we had. Nobody is left of 
 any name at all. His secretary died by his side. I 
 imagined him a Mr. Scott, to be the man you 
 met at Hume's ; x but I learnt from Mrs. Hume that 
 it is not the same. I met Mis. H. one day, and 
 agreed to go on the Sunday to tea, but the rain pre- 
 vented us, and the distance. I have been to 
 apologize, and we are to dine there the first fine 
 Sunday. Strange perverseness ! I never went while 
 you stayed here ; and now I go to find you ! What 
 other news is there, Mary ? What puns have I 
 made in the last fortnight ? You never remember 
 them. You have no relish for the comic. " Oh ! tell 
 Hazlitt not to forget to send the American Farmer. I 
 dare say it is not so good as he fancies ; but a book's 
 a book." I have not heard from Wordsworth or 
 from Malta since. Charles Kemble, it seems, enters 
 into possession to-morrow. 2 We sup at 109, Russell 
 Street, this evening. 3 I wish your brother would not 
 drink. 'Tis a blemish in the greatest characters. 
 You send me a modern quotation poetical. How do 
 you like this in an old play ? Vittoria Corombona, 
 a spunky Italian lady, a Leonardo one, nick-named 
 
 1 Mr. Hume, of Bayswater. He was a friend of Hazlitt's and Lamb's, 
 and kept open house on Sundays for some time. He had a numerous 
 family ; his daughter Matilda sang well. He was a clerk in one of the 
 Government offices. 
 
 2 At Covent Garden. 
 
 3 John Hazlitt's.
 
 422 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HA2LITTS. 
 
 the White Devil, 1 being on her trial for murder, &c. 
 — and questioned about seducing a duke from his 
 wife and the state, makes answer : — 
 
 " Condemn you me for that the Duke did love me? 
 So may you blame some fair and crystal river, 
 For that some melancholic distracted man 
 Hath drown'd himself in it." 
 
 N.B. I shall expect a line from you, if but a bare 
 line, whenever you write to Russell Street, and a 
 letter often when you do not. I pay no postage; 
 but I will have consideration for you until Parlia- 
 ment time and franks. Luck to Ned Search, 2 and 
 the new art of colouring. Monkey 3 sends her love ; 
 and Mary especially. 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CLXI.] Jan. 15th, 1806. 
 
 Dear Hazlitt, — Godwin went to Johnson's yester- 
 day about your business. Johnson would not come 
 down, or give any answer, but has promised to open 
 the manuscript, 4 and to give you an answer in one 
 month. Godwin will punctually go again (Wednes- 
 day is Johnson's open day) yesterday four weeks 
 next: i.e. in one lunar month from this time: till 
 when, Johnson positively declines giving any answer. 
 I wish you joy on ending your Search. Mrs. H. was 
 
 1 Webster's play, a great favourite with Lamb and Hazlitt. 
 
 a 1 he nom de plume of Abraham Tucker, whose Light of Nature 
 Hazlitt was then engaged in abridging. 
 
 3 Louisa Martin. See some lines to her among the Miscellaneous 
 Poems. 
 
 -1 Probably, the abridgment of Tucker, published in 1807, 8vo.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 423 
 
 naming something about a " Life of Fawcett," 1 to be 
 by you undertaken : the great Fawcett, as she ex- 
 plained to Manning, when he asked, " What Faw- 
 cett ?" He innocently thought Fawcett the Player. 
 But Fawcett the divine is known to many people, 
 albeit unknown to the Chinese inquirer. I should 
 think, if you liked it, and Johnson declined it, that 
 Phillips 2 is. the man. He 'is perpetually bringing out 
 biographies, — Richardson, Wilks, Foot, Lee Lewis, — 
 without number : little trim things in two easy 
 volumes, price 125. the two, made up of letters to 
 and from, scraps, posthumous trifles, anecdotes, and 
 about forty pages of hard biography. You might dish 
 up a Fawcettiad in three months, and ask £60 or 
 £80 for it. I should dare say that Phillips would 
 catch at it. I wrote to you the other day in a great 
 hurry. Did you get it ? This is merely a letter of 
 business at Godwin's request. Lord Nelson is quiet 
 at last. His ghost only keeps a slight fluttering in 
 odes and elegies in newspapers, and impromptus, 
 which could not be got ready before the funeral. 
 
 As for news, Fenwick is coming to town on Mon- 
 day (if no kind angel intervene) to surrender himself 
 to prison. He hopes to get the rules of the Fleet. 
 On the same, or nearly the same day, Fell, my other 
 quondam co-friend and drinker, will go to Newgate, 
 and his wife and four children, I suppose, to the 
 parish. Plenty of reflection and motives of gratitude 
 to the wise Disposer of all things in us, whose 
 'prudent conduct has hitherto ensured us a warm fire 
 and snug roof over our heads. Nullum numen abest 
 
 1 Joseph Fawcett, Esq., one of Hazlitt's earliest friends. 
 
 2 Richard Phillips, publisher, 71, St. Paul's Churchyard.
 
 JJ24 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 si sit Prudentia. Alas ! Prudentia is in the last 
 quarter of her tutelary shining over me. A little 
 
 time and I ; but maybe I may, at last, hit upon 
 
 some mode of collecting some of the vast superfluities 
 of this money-voiding town. Much is to be got, and 
 I do not want much. All I ask is time and leisure ; 
 and I am cruelly off for them. When you have the 
 inclination, I shall be very glad to have a letter from 
 you. Your brother and Mrs. H., I am afraid, think 
 hardly of us for not coming oftener to see them; but 
 we are distracted beyond what they can conceive with 
 visitors and visitings. I never have an hour for my 
 head to work quietly its own workings ; which you 
 know is as necessary to the human system as sleep. 
 Sleep, too, I can't get for these winds of a night : 
 and without sleep and rest what should ensue ? 
 Lunacy. But I trust it won't. 
 
 Yours, deai H., C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CLXIL] Feb. i 9 th, 1806. 
 
 Dear H., — Godwin has just been here in his way 
 from Johnson's. Johnson has had a fire in his 
 house ; this happened about five weeks ago ; it was 
 in the day time, so it did not burn the house down, 
 but it did so much damage that the house must come 
 down, to be repaired. His nephew that we met on 
 Hampstead Hill put it out. Well, this fire has put 
 him so back, that he craves one more month before 
 he gives you an answer. I will certainly goad God- 
 win (if necessary) to go again this very day four weeks ; 
 but I am confident he will want no goading. Three 
 or four most capital auctions of pictures are adver-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 425 
 
 tised : in May, Wellbore Ellis Agafs, the first private 
 collection in England, so Holcroft says ; in March, 
 Sir George Young's in Stratford Place, (where Cosway 
 lives,) and a Mr. Hulse's at Blackheath, both very 
 capital collections, and have been announced for 
 some months. Also the Marquis of Lansdowne's 
 pictures in March ; and though inferior to mention, 
 lastly, the Tructhsessian Gallery. Don't your mouth 
 water to be here? T'other night Loftus 1 called, 
 whom we have not seen since you went before. We 
 meditate a stroll next Wednesday, fast-day. He 
 happened to light upon Mr. Holcroft, wife, and 
 daughter, their first visit at our house. Your brother 
 called last night. We keep up our intimacy. He is 
 going to begin a large Madonna and child from Mrs. 
 H. and baby. I fear he goes astray after ignes fatui. 
 He is a clever man. By the by, I saw a miniature 
 of his as far excelling any in his show cupboard (that 
 of your sister not excepted) as that show cupboard 
 excels the show things you see in windows — an old 
 woman, (d . . n her name !) but most superlative; he 
 has it to clean — I'll ask him the name — but the best 
 miniature I ever saw. But for oil pictures ! — what 
 has he to do with Madonnas ? If the Virgin Mary 
 were alive and visitable, he would not hazard himself 
 in a Covent Garden pit-door crowd to see her. It 
 isn't his style of beauty, is it ? But he will go on 
 painting things he ought not to paint, and not 
 painting things he ought to paint. Manning is not 
 gone to China, but talks of going this Spring. God 
 forbid ! Coleridge not heard of. I am going to leave 
 
 1 Mr. Hazlitt's cousin. The Rev. W. Hazlitt married Miss Loftus, 
 of Wisbeach, and this gentleman was her brother's child.
 
 426 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 off smoke. In the meantime I am so smoky with 
 last night's ten pipes, that I must leave off. Mary 
 begs her kind remembrances. Pray write to us. 
 This is no letter ; but I supposed you grew anxious 
 about Johnson. 
 
 N.B. — Have taken a room at three shillings a-week, 
 to be in between five and eight at night, to avoid my 
 nocturnal, alias knock-eternal, visitors. The first- 
 fruits of my retirement has been a farce, which goes 
 to manager to-morrow. Wish my ticket luck. God 
 bless you ; and do write. — Yours, fumosissimus, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CLXIIL] March 15th, 1806. 
 
 Dear H., — I am a little surprised at no letter from 
 you. This day week, to wit, Saturday, the 8th of 
 March, 1S06, I booked off by the Wem coach, Bull 
 and Mouth Inn, directed to you, at the Rev. Mr. 
 Hazlitt's, Wem, Shropshire, a parcel containing, be- 
 sides a book, &c, a rare print, which I take to be a 
 Titian j 1 begging the said W. H. to acknowledge the 
 receipt thereof; which he not having done, I con- 
 clude the said parcel to be lying at the inn, and may 
 be lost ; for which reason, lest you may be a Wales- 
 hunting at this instant, I have authorized any of your 
 family, whosoever first gets this, to open it, that so 
 precious a parcel may not moulder away for want of 
 looking after. 
 
 What do you in Shropshire when so many fine 
 
 1 A mistake of Lamb's. Lamb took it to he a print of Titian's 
 Mistress; but Mr. Hazlitt showed him a copy he had made at the 
 Louvre of the picture, and Lamb saw that his print was not genuine.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 427 
 
 pictures are a-going a-going every day in London ? 
 Monday I visit the Marquis of Lansdowne's, in 
 Berkeley Square. Catalogue 25. 6d. Leonardos in 
 plenty. Some other day this week I go to see Sir 
 Wm. Young's, in Stratford Place. Hulse's, of Black- 
 heath, are also to be sold this month ; and in May, 
 the first private collection in Europe, Welbore Ellis 
 Agar's. And there are you, perverting Nature in 
 lying landscapes, filched from old rusty Titians, such 
 as I can scrape up here to send you, with an addita- 
 ment from Shropshire Nature thrown in to make the 
 whole look unnatural. I am afraid of your mouth 
 watering when I tell you that Manning and I got 
 into Angerstein's on Wednesday. MonDieu! Such 
 Claudes ! Four Claudes bought for more than 
 £10,000 ; (those who talk of Wilson being equal to 
 Claude are either mainly ignorant or stupid;) one 
 of these was perfectly miraculous. What colours 
 short of bond fide sunbeams it could be painted in, I 
 am not earthly colourman enough to say ; but I did 
 not think it had been in the possibility of things. 
 Then, a music piece by Titian, a thousand-pound 
 picture, five figures standing behind a piano, the 
 sixth playing — none of the heads, as M. observed, in- 
 dicating great men, or affecting it, but so sweetly dis- 
 posed—all leaning separate ways, but so easy — like 
 a flock of some divine shepherd ; the colouring, like 
 the economy of the picture, so sweet and harmonious 
 — as good as Shakspeare's Twelfth Night, almost, 
 that is. It will give you a love of order, and cure 
 you of restless, fidgety passions for a week after — 
 more musical than the music which it would, but 
 cannot, yet in a manner does, show. I have no room 
 for the rest. Let me say, Angerstein sits in a room
 
 428 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 
 — his study (only that and the library are shown), 
 when he writes a common letter, as I am doing, 
 surrounded with twenty pictures worth £60,000. 
 What a luxury! Apicius and Heliogabalus, hide 
 your dimished heads ! 
 
 Yours, my dear painter, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Mr. Wm. Hazlitt, 
 
 Wem, Shropshire. 
 In his absence, to be opened immediately. 
 
 Letter CLXIV.] nth Dec, [1806.] 
 
 TO MRS. HAZLITT. 
 
 Don't mind this being a queer letter. I am in 
 haste, and taken up by visitors, condolers, &c. 
 
 God bless you. 
 
 Dear Sarah, — Mary is a little cut at the ill success 
 of Mr. H., which came out last night and failed. I 
 know you'll be sorry, but never mind. We are deter- 
 mined not to be cast down. I am going to leave off 
 tobacco, and then we must thrive. A smoking man 
 must write smoky farces. 
 
 Mary is pretty well, but I persuaded her to let me 
 write. We did not apprise you of the coming out of 
 Mr. H. for fear of ill luck. You were much better out 
 of the house. If it had taken, your partaking of our 
 good luck would have been one of our greatest joys. As 
 it is, we shall expect you at the time you mentioned. 
 But whenever you come you shall be most welcome. 
 God bless you, dear Sarah, 
 
 Yours most truly, C. L. 
 
 Mary is by no means unwell, but I made her let 
 me write.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 429 
 
 LETTER CLXV.] [No date; about 1801.] 
 
 My dear Miss Stoddart, 1 — Mary has written so fully 
 to you that I have nothing to add but that in all 
 the kindness she has exprest, and loving desire to 
 see you again, I bear my full part. You will per- 
 haps like to tear this half from the sheet, and give 
 your brother only his strict due, the remainder. So 
 I will just repay your late kind letter with this short 
 postscript 2 to hers. Come over here, and let us all 
 be merry again. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER CLXVL] Temple, 1 8th February, 1808. 
 
 Sir, — I am truly concerned that any mistake of 
 mine should have caused you uneasiness, but I hope 
 we have got a clue to William's absence, which may 
 clear up all apprehensions. The people where he 
 lodges in town have received direction from him to 
 forward some linen to a place called Winterslow, in 
 the county of Wilts, (not far from Salisbury,) where 
 the lady 3 lives, whose cottage, pictured upon a card, 
 if you opened my letter you have doubtless seen ; and 
 though we have had no explanation of the mystery 
 since, we shrewdly suspect that at the time of writing 
 that letter which has given you all this trouble, a 
 certain son of yours (who is both painter and author) 
 was at her elbow, and did assist in framing that very 
 cartoon which was sent to amuse and mislead us in 
 
 1 Miss Stoddart was now staying with her brother at Malta. 
 
 2 This is a postscript to a long letter from Miss Lamb to Miss 
 Stoddart. 
 
 3 Miss Stoddart, afterwards Mrs. Hazlitt.
 
 430 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 town, as to the real place of his destination. And 
 some words at the back of the said cartoon, which 
 we had not marked so narrowly before, by the simi- 
 larity of the handwriting to William's, do very much 
 confirm the suspicion. If our theory be right, they 
 have had the pleasure of their jest, and I am afraid 
 you have paid for it in anxiety. But I hope your un- 
 easiness will now be removed, and you will pardon a 
 suspense occasioned by Love, who does so many 
 worse mischiefs every day. 
 
 The letter to the people where William lodges 
 says, moreover, that he shall be in town in a fort- 
 night. 
 
 My sister joins in respects to you and Mrs. Hazlitt, 
 and in our kindest remembrances and wishes for the 
 restoration of Peggy's health, 
 
 I am, Sir, your humble servant, 
 
 Ch. Lamb. 
 
 Rev. W. Hazlitt, 
 
 Wem, Shropshire. 
 
 LETTER CLXV1L] December ioth, 1808. 
 
 My dear Sarah, — I hear of you from your brother, 
 but you do not write yourself, nor does Hazlitt. I 
 beg that one or both of you will amend this fault as 
 speedily as possible, for I am very anxious to hear of 
 your health. I hope, as you say nothing about your 
 fall to your brother, you are perfectly recovered from 
 the effects of it. 
 
 You cannot think how very much we miss you and 
 II . of a Wednesday evening : all the glory of the
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 43 1 
 
 night, I may say, is at an end. Phillips makes his 
 jokes, and there is no one to applaud him ; Rickman 
 argues, and there is no one to oppose him. 
 
 The worst miss of all to me is, that when we are 
 in the dismals there is now no hope of relief from 
 any quarter whatsoever. Hazlitt was most brilliant, 
 most ornamental, as a Wednesday-man, but he was a 
 more useful one on common days, when he dropt in 
 after a quarrel or a fit of the glooms. The Sherring- 
 ton is quite out now, my brother having got merry 
 with claret and Tom Sheridan. This visit, and the 
 occasion of it, is a profound secret, and therefore I 
 tell it to nobody but you and Mrs. Reynolds. Through 
 the medium of Wroughton, there came an invitation 
 and proposal from T. S., that C. L. should write some 
 scenes in a speaking pantomime, the other parts of 
 which Tom now, and his father formerly, have manu- 
 factured between them. So in the Christmas holy- 
 days my brother and his two great associates, we 
 expect, will be all three damned together ; that is, I 
 mean, if Charles's share, which is done and sent in, is 
 accepted. 1 
 
 I left this unfinished yesterday, in the hope that 
 my brother would have done it for me. His reason 
 for refusing me was " no exquisite reason," for it was 
 because he must write a letter to Manning in three 
 or four weeks, and therefore " he could not be always 
 writing letters," he said. I wanted him to tell your 
 husband about a great work which Godwin is going 
 to publish to enlighten the world once more, and I 
 
 1 This performance is not now known ; but a similar one has been 
 printed from the original MS. in the British Museum among Lamb's 
 dramatic works.
 
 432 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 shall not be able to make out what it is. He (Godwin) 
 took his usual walk one evening, a fortnight since, to 
 the end of Katton Garden and back again. During 
 that walk a thought came into his mind, which he 
 instantly sate down and improved upon till he 
 brought it, in seven or eight days, into the compass 
 of a reasonable sized pamphlet : To propose a 
 subscription to all well-disposed people to raise a 
 certain sum of money, to be expended in the care of 
 a cheap monument for the former and the future great 
 dead men ; the monument to be a white cross, with 
 a wooden slab at the end, telling their names and 
 qualifications. This wooden slab and white cross to 
 be perpetuated to the end of time ; to survive the fall 
 of empires, and the destruction of cities, by means of 
 a map, which, in case of an insurrection among the 
 people, or any other cause by which a city or country 
 may be destroyed, was to be carefully preserved ; and 
 then, when things got again into their usual order, 
 the white-cross-wooden-slab-makers were to go to 
 work again, and set the wooden slabs in their former 
 places. This, as nearly as I can tell you, is the sum 
 and substance of it ; but it is written remarkably well 
 — in his very best manner — for the proposal (which 
 seems to me very like throwing salt on a sparrow's 
 tail to catch him) occupies but half a page, which is 
 followed by very fine .writing on the benefits he con- 
 jectures would follow if it were done ; very excellent 
 thoughts on death, and our feelings concerning dead 
 friends, and the advantages an old country has over 
 a new one, even in the slender memorials we have of 
 great men who once flourished. 
 
 Charles is come home and wants his dinner, and 
 so the dead men must be no more thought on. Tell
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 433 
 
 us how you go on, and how you like Winterslow and 
 winter evenings. 
 
 Knowles has not yet got back again, but he is in 
 better spirits. John Hazlitt was here on Wednesday, 
 very sober. 
 
 Our love to Hazlitt. 
 
 Yours affectionately, 
 
 M. Lamb. 
 Saturday. 
 
 There came this morning a printed Prospectus 
 from " S. T. Coleridge, Grasmere," of a Weekly 
 Paper, to be called The Friend ; a flaming Pro- 
 spectus. I have no time to give the heads of it. To 
 commence the first Saturday in January. There 
 came also notice of a turkey from Mr. Clarkson, 
 which I am more sanguine in expecting the accom- 
 plishment of than I am of Coleridge's prophecy. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 Mrs. Haz/itt, 
 Winterslo^w, 
 
 near Sarum, 
 Wilts. 
 
 LETTER CLXVIIL] November 7th, 1809. 
 
 My dear Sarah, — The dear, quiet, lazy, delicious 
 month we spent with you is remembered by me with 
 such regret that I feel quite discontented and Winter- 
 slow sick. I assure you I never passed such a 
 pleasant time in the country in my life, both in the 
 house and out of it — the card-playing quarrels, and a 
 few gaspings for breath, after your swift footsteps up 
 the high hills, excepted ; and those drawbacks are 
 
 vol. 1. 2 F
 
 434 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 not unpleasant in the recollection. We have got 
 some salt butter, to make our toast seem like yours ; 
 and we have tried to eat meat suppers, but that 
 would not do, for we left our appetites behind us ; and 
 the dry loaf, which offended you, now comes in at 
 night unaccompanied ; but, sorry am I to add, it is 
 soon followed by the pipe and the gin bottle. We 
 smoked the very first night of our arrival. 
 
 Great news ! I have just been interrupted by Mr. 
 Daw, who came to tell me he was yesterday elected 
 a Royal Academician. He said none of his own 
 friends voted for him ; he got it by strangers, who were 
 pleased with his picture of Mrs. White. Charles says 
 he does not believe Northcote ever voted for the 
 admission of any one. Though a very cold day, 
 Daw was in a prodigious sweat, for joy at his good 
 fortune. 
 
 More great news ! My beautiful green curtains 
 were put up yesterday, and all the doors listed with 
 green baize, and four new boards put to the coal-hole, 
 and fastening hasps put to the windows, and my dyed 
 Manning-silk cut out. Yesterday was an eventful 
 day, for yesterday too Martin Burney was to be 
 examined by Lord Eldon, previous to his being 
 admitted as an attorney ; but he has not yet been here 
 to announce his success. 
 
 I carried the baby-caps to Mrs. Hazlitt r 1 she was 
 much pleased, and vastly thankful. Mr. H. 2 got 
 fifty-four guineas at Rochester, and has now several 
 pictures in hand. He has been very disorderly lately. 
 
 1 Mrs. John Hazlitt, wife of the painter. The caps were probably 
 for lit-r son William. 
 a John Hazlitt.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 435 
 
 I am going to tell you a secret, for Mrs. H. says he 
 would be sorry to have it talked of. One night he 
 came home from the alehouse, bringing with him a 
 great rough ill-looking fellow, whom he introduced to 
 Mrs. Hazlitt as Mr. Brown, a gentleman he had hired 
 as a mad keeper to take care of him at forty pounds 
 a year, being ten pounds under the market price for 
 keepers, which sum Mr. Brown had agreed to remit 
 out of pure friendship. It was with great difficulty, 
 and by threatening to call in the aid of watchmen 
 and constables, that she could prevail on Mr. Brown 
 to leave the house. 
 
 We had a good cheerful meeting on Wednesday, 
 much talk of Winterslow, its woods and its sun- 
 flowers. I did not so much like Phillips at Winter- 
 slow as I now like him for having been with us at 
 Winterslow. We roasted the last of his Beech of 
 oily nut prolific on Friday at the Captain's. Nurse 
 is now established in Paradise, alias the incurable 
 ward of Westminster Hospital. I have seen her 
 sitting in most superb state, surrounded by her seven 
 incurable companions. They call each other ladies. 
 Nurse looks as if she would be considered as the first 
 lady in the ward ; only one seemed at all likely to 
 rival her in dignity. 
 
 A man in the India House has resigned, by which 
 Charles will get twenty pounds a year, and White 
 has prevailed on him to write some more lottery 
 puffs. If that ends in smoke the twenty pounds is a 
 sure card, and has made us very joyful. 
 
 I continue very well, and return you very sincere 
 thanks for my good health and improved looks, 
 which have almost made Mrs. Godwin die with envy. 
 She longs to come to Winterslow as much as the spite- 
 
 2 f 2
 
 436 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 ful elder sister did to go to the well for a gift to spit 
 diamonds. 
 
 Jane and I have agreed to boil a round of beef for 
 your suppers when you come to town again. She 
 (Jane) broke two of the Hogarth glasses while we 
 were away, whereat I made a great noise. 
 
 Farewell. Love to William, and Charles's love 
 and good wishes for the speedy arrival of the Life of 
 Holcroft, 1 and the bearer thereof. 
 
 Yours, most affectionately, 
 
 M. Lamb. 
 Tuesday. 
 
 Charles told Mrs. Godwin that Hazlitt had found a 
 well in his garden, which, water being scarce in your 
 county, would bring him in two hundred a year; 2 and 
 she came, in great haste, the next morning, to ask 
 me if it were true. 
 
 Your brother and sister are quite well. 
 Mrs. Hazlitt. 
 
 Wintersloiv, 
 
 near Salisbury. 
 
 Letter CLXIX.] [August 9th, 1810]. 
 
 Dear H., — Epistemon 3 is not well. Our pleasant 
 excursion has ended sadly for one of us. You will 
 guess I mean my sister. She got home very well, (I 
 was very ill on the journey,) and continued so till 
 
 1 The Memoirs of Holcroft were edited and completed by Mr. Haz- 
 litt in 1810, but were not published till 1816, 3 vols. nmo. A fourth 
 volume is in MS. 
 
 2 It never did. But it is worth notice that it was behind this well 
 that Mr Hazlitt was fond of hiding, that he might hear the conversation 
 of the villagers. 
 
 a Lamb himself.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 437 
 
 Monday night, when her complaint came on, and she 
 is now absent from home. 
 
 I am glad to hear you are all well. I think I 
 shall be mad if I take any more journeys, with two 
 experiences against it. I found all well here. 
 Kind remembrances to Sarah, — have just got her 
 letter. 
 
 H. Robinson has been to Blenheim. He says you 
 will be sorry to hear that we should not have asked 
 for the Titian Gallery there. One of his friends 
 knew of it, and asked to see it. It is never shown 
 but to those who inquire for it. 
 
 The pictures are all Titians, Jupiter and Ledas, 
 Mars and Venuses, &c, all naked pictures, which 
 may be a reason they don't show them to females. 
 But he says they are very fine ; and perhaps they are 
 shown separately to put another fee into the shower's 
 pocket. Well, I shall never see it. 
 
 I have lost all wish for sights. God bless you. I 
 shall be glad to see you in London. 
 
 Yours truly, C. Lamb. 
 
 Thursday. 
 
 Mr. Hazlitt, 
 
 f-Vintersloiv, near Salisbury. 
 
 Letter CLXX.] 
 
 Dear Hazlitt, — I sent you on Saturday a Cobbett, 1 
 containing your reply to the Edinburgh Review, 
 which I thought you would be glad to receive as an 
 example of attention on the part of Mr. Cobbett to 
 
 1 Cobbett's Weekly Register. The article referred to does not appear 
 to have been reprinted.
 
 438 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 insert it so speedily. Did you get it ? We have 
 received your pig, and return you thanks ; it will be 
 dressed in due form, with appropriate sauce, this day. 
 Mary has been very ill indeed since you saw her ; 
 that is, as ill as she can be to remain at home. But 
 she is a good deal better now, owing to a very careful 
 regimen. She drinks nothing but water, and never 
 goes out; she does not even go to the Captain's. 1 
 Her indisposition has been ever since that night you 
 left town; the night Miss W[ordsworth] came. 
 
 Her coming, and that d d Mrs. Godwin coming 
 
 and staying so late that night, so overset her that 
 she lay broad awake all that night, and it was by a 
 miracle that she escaped a very bad illness, which 
 I thoroughly expected. I have made up my mind that 
 she shall never have any one in the house again with 
 her, and that no one shall sleep with her, not even 
 for a night; for it is a very serious thing to be always 
 living with a kind of fever upon her ; and therefore I 
 am sure you will take it in good part if I say that if 
 Mrs. Hazlitt comes to town at any time, however 
 glad we shall be to see her in the day-time, I cannot 
 ask her to spend a night under our roof. Some 
 decision we must come to, for the harassing fever 
 that we have both been in, owing to Miss Words- 
 worth's coming, is not to be borne ; and I would rather 
 be dead than so alive. However, at present, owing to 
 a regimen and medicines which Tuthill has given 
 her, who very kindly volunteer'd the care of her, she 
 is a great deal quieter, though too much harassed by 
 company, who cannot or will not see how late hours 
 and society teaze her. 
 
 2 Captain James Burney, afterwards Admiral.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 439 
 
 Poor Phillips had the cup dash'd out of his lips 
 as it were. He had every prospect of the situation, 
 when about ten days since one of the council of the 
 
 R Society started for the place himself, being a 
 
 rich merchant who lately failed, and he will certainly 
 be elected on Friday next. P. is very sore and 
 miserable about it. 
 
 Coleridge is in town, or at least at Hammersmith. 
 He is writing or going to write in the Courier against 
 Cobbett, and in favour of paper money. 
 
 No news. Remember me kindly to Sarah. I write 
 from the office. 
 
 Yours ever, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Wednesday, 2%th Nov. 18 10. 
 
 I just open'd it to say the pig, upon proof, hath 
 turned out as good as I predicted. My fauces yet 
 retain the sweet porcine odour. I find you have 
 received the Cobbett. I think your paper complete. 
 
 Mrs. Reynolds, who is a sage woman, approves of 
 he pig. 
 
 Mr. Hazlitt, 
 
 Winterslonv, near Salisbury, Wilts. 
 
 Letter CLXXI.] andOct. 1811.1 
 
 Dear Hazlitt,— I cannot help accompanying my 
 
 sister's congratulations to Sarah with some of my 
 
 own to you on this happy occasion of a man child 
 
 being born. 2 
 
 Delighted fancy already sees him some future 
 
 1 This occupied the third and fourth pages of a quarto sheet. The 
 first page contains Miss Lamb's letter to Mrs. Hazlitt. 
 
 2 On the 26th of Sept., 181 1.
 
 44-0 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 rich alderman or opulent merchant, painting perhaps 
 a little in his leisure hours, for amusement, like the 
 late H. Bunbury, Esq. 
 
 Pray, are the Winterslow estates entailed? I am 
 afraid lest the young dog when he grows up should 
 cut down the woods, and leave no groves for widows 
 to take their lonesome solace in. The Wem estate of 
 course can only devolve on him in case of your 
 brother's 1 leaving no male issue. 
 
 Well, my blessing and heaven's be upon him, and 
 make him like his father, with something a better 
 temper, and a smoother head of hair; and then all 
 the men and women must love him. 
 
 Martin 2 and the card-boys join in congratulations. 
 Love to Sarah. Sorry we are not within candle- 
 shot. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 If the widow be assistant on this notable occasion, 
 give our due respects and kind remembrances to 
 her. 
 
 Mr. Hazlitt, Winterslow, 
 near Sarum, Wilts. 
 
 Letter CLXXIL] 27th August. 
 
 Dear Knight, Old Acquaintance, — Tis with a 
 violence to the pure imagination (vide the " Excur- 
 sion " passim) that I can bring myself to believe I am 
 writing to Dr. Stoddart once again at Malta ; but the 
 deductions of severe reason warrant the proceeding. 
 I wrote from Enfield, where we are seriously weighing 
 the advantages of dulness over the over-excitement 
 
 1 Sir John Stoddart. 2 Master Burney.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 44I 
 
 of too much company, but have not yet come to a 
 conclusion. What is the news ? for we see no paper 
 here ; perhaps you can send us an old one from 
 Malta. Only I heard a butcher in the market-place 
 whisper something about a change of ministry. I 
 don't know who's in or out, nor do I care, only as it 
 might affect you. For domestic tidings, I have only 
 to tell you with extreme regret that poor Eliza Fen- 
 wick (that was), Mrs. Rutherford, is dead, and that 
 we have received a most heart-broken letter from her 
 mother, left with four grandchildren, orphans of a 
 living scoundrel, lurking about the pot-houses of 
 Little Russell Street, London: they and she (God 
 help 'em !) at New York. I have just received God- 
 win's 3rd volume of the Republic, which only reaches 
 to the commencement of the Protectorate. I think 
 he means to spin it out to his life's thread. 
 
 Have you seen Fearn's Anti-Tooke ? I am no 
 judge of such things ; you are ; but I think it very 
 clever indeed. If I knew your bookseller, I'd order 
 it for you at a venture ; 2 octavos, Longman & Co. 
 Or do you read now ? Tell it not in the Admiralty 
 Court, but my head aches histemo vino. I can scarce 
 pump up words, much less ideas, congruous to be 
 sent so far, but your son must have this by to-night's 
 post. I am sorry to say that he does not conduct 
 himself so well as we could wish. He absented him- 
 self four days this week (this is Thursday) from the 
 Charter House, and was found tippling at an obscure 
 public-house at Barnet with a chorus singer of the 
 Coburg Theatre. Mr. Hine and I with difficulty got 
 him away: but Dr. Raine, the head master, hushed 
 it up with a slight imposition, viz. the translation of 
 Gray's Elegy into Greek Elegiacs, which I partly
 
 44^ CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS.' 
 
 did for him. I write this with reluctance to offend 
 the feelings of a father ; I might a' been one, if * * 
 * * * had let me. 1 Manning is gone to Rome, 
 Naples, &c, probably to touch at Sicily, Malta, 
 Guernsey, &c. ; but I don't know the map. Hazlitt 
 is resident at Paris, whence he issues his lampoons 
 in safety at his friends in England. He has his boy 
 with him. I am teaching Emma Latin. By the 
 time you can answer this, she will be qualified to 
 instruct young ladies. She is a capital English 
 reader, and S. T. C. acknowledges that part of a 
 passage in Milton she read better than he, and part 
 he read best : her part being the shortest. But 
 seriously, if Lady St[oddart] (oblivious pen, that 
 was about to write Mrs.) could hear of such a young 
 person wanted, (she smatters French, some Italian, 
 music, of course,) we'd send our loves by her. My 
 congratulations and assurance of old esteem. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Sir J Stoddart. K?iigbt, 
 H. M. Chief Justice, 
 Malta. 
 
 LETTER CLXXIIL] [November, 1823.] 
 
 Dear Mrs. H., — Sitting down to write a letter is 
 such a painful operation to Mary, that you must 
 accept me as her proxy. You have seen our house. 
 What I now tell you is literally true. Yesterday 
 week George Dyer called upon us, at one o'clock, 
 
 1 He here seems to allude to Miss Alice W . . n, who afterwards 
 married Mr. Bartrum, pawnbroker, Princes Street, Coventry Street. 
 Lamb used to walk up and down outside the shop, even after she 
 bc-came Mrs. Bartrum.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 443 
 
 (bright noonday,) on his way to dine with Mrs. Bar- 
 bauld at Newington. He sat with Mary about half 
 an hour, and took leave. The maid saw him go out, 
 from her kitchen window, but suddenly losing sight 
 of him, ran up in a fright to Mary. G. D., instead 
 of keeping the slip that leads to the gate, had 
 deliberately, staff in hand, in broad open day, 
 marched into the New River. He had not his spec- 
 tacles on, and you know his absence. Who helped 
 him out they can hardly tell, but between 'em they 
 got him out, drenched thro' and thro'. A mob 
 collected by that time, and accompanied him in. 
 " Send for the Doctor," they said : and a one-eyed 
 fellow, dirty and. drunk, was fetched from the public 
 house at the end, where it seems he lurks, for the 
 sake of picking up water practice ; having formerly 
 had a medal from the Humane Society for some 
 rescue. By his advice the patient was put between 
 blankets ; and when I came home at 4 to dinner, I 
 found G. D. a-bed, and raving, light-headed, with the 
 brandy and water which the doctor had administered. 
 He sang, laughed, whimpered, screamed, babbled 
 of guardian angels, would get up and go home ; but 
 we kept him there by force ; and by next morning he 
 departed sober, and seems to have received no injury. 
 All my friends are open-mouth'd about having paling 
 before the river; but I cannot see, that because a 
 lunatic chooses to walk into a river with his eyes 
 open at mid day, I am any the more likely to be 
 drowned in it, coming home at midnight. 
 
 I had the honour of dining at the Mansion 
 House on Thursday last by special card from the 
 Lord Mayor, who never saw my face, nor I his ; and 
 all from being a writer in a magazine. The dinner
 
 444 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 costly, served on massy plate ; champagne, pines, 
 &c. ; 47 present, among whom the Chairman and 
 two other directors of the India Company. 
 
 There's for you ! and got away pretty sober. Quite 
 saved my credit. 
 
 We continue to like our house prodigiously. 
 
 Does Mary Hazlitt 1 go on with her novel ? or has 
 she begun another ? I would not discourage her, 
 though we continue to think it (so far) in its present 
 state not saleable. Our kind remembrances to her 
 and hers, and you and yours. 
 
 Yours truly, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 I am pleased that H. liked my letter to the 
 Laureat. 
 
 Mrs. Hazlitt, 
 
 Alphington, near Exeter. 
 
 Letter CLXXI V.] [March 4, 1830.] 
 
 Dear Sarah, — I was meditating to come and see 
 you, but I am unable for the walk. We are both very 
 unwell, and under affliction for poor Emma, who has 
 had a very dangerous brain fever, and is lying very 
 ill at Bury, from whence I expect a summons to 
 fetch her. We are very sorry for your confinement. 
 Any books I have are at your service. I am almost, 
 I may say quite sure, that letters to India pay no 
 postage, and may go by the regular Post Office, now 
 in St. Martin' les Grand. I think any receiving 
 house would take them. I wish I could confirm your 
 
 1 Second daughter of Mr. John Hazlitt. — See Correspondence with 
 Hone.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 445 
 
 hopes about Dick Norris. But it is quite a dream. 
 Some old Bencher of his surname is made Treasurer 
 for the year, I suppose, which is an annual office. 
 Norris was Sub-Treasurer, quite a different thing. 
 They were pretty well in the Summer ; since when 
 we have heard nothing of them. 
 
 Mrs. Reynolds is better than she has been for 
 years. She is with a disagreeable woman that she 
 has taken a mighty fancy to, out of spite to a rival 
 woman she used to live and quarrel with. She grows 
 quite fat, they tell me, and may live as long as I do, 
 to be a tormenting rent-charge to my diminished in- 
 come. 1 We go on pretty comfortably in our new 
 place. I will come and have a talk with you when 
 poor Emma's affair is settled, and will bring books. 
 At present I am weak, and could hardly bring my 
 legs home yesterday after a much shorter stroll than 
 to Northaw. Mary has got her bonnet on for a short 
 expedition. May you get better, as the Spring comes 
 on. She sends her best love 
 
 With mine, C. L. 
 
 Mrs. Hazlitt, 
 
 Mrs. Tom/inson's,"* 
 
 Northaw, near Potter's Bar, Herts. 
 
 Letter CLXXV.] May 24th, 1830. 
 
 Mary's love ? Yes. Mary Lamb is quite well. 
 
 Enfield, Saturday. 
 
 Dear Sarah, — I found my way to Northaw on 
 
 1 Lamb allowed Mrs. Reynolds a pension of small amount. 
 
 2 An imposing dame; of whom Leigh Hunt, in a letter to Hazlitt, 
 sa-s, " Nunc scio quod sit majestas."
 
 446 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 Thursday, and saw a very good woman behind a 
 counter, who says also that you are a very good lady. 
 I did not accept her offered glass of wine, (home- 
 made, I take it,) but craved a cup of ale, with which I 
 seasoned a slice of cold lamb, from a sandwich box, 
 which I ate in her back parlour, and proceeded for 
 Berkhampstead, &c. ; lost myself over a heath, and 
 had a day's pleasure. I wish you could walk as I do, 
 and as you used to do. I am sorry to find you are so 
 poorly ; and, now I have found my way, I wish you 
 back at Goody Tomlinson's. 1 What a pretty village 
 'tis ! I should have come sooner, but was waiting a 
 summons to Bury. Well, it came ; and I found the 
 good parson's lady (he was from home) exceedingly 
 hospitable. 
 
 Poor Emma, the first moment we were alone, took 
 me into a corner, and said, " Now, pray, don't drink ; 
 do check yourself after dinner, for my sake, and when 
 we get home to Enfield you shall drink as much as 
 ever you please, and I won't say a word about it." 
 How I behaved, you may guess, when I tell you that 
 Mrs. Williams and I have written acrostics on each 
 other, and she hoped that she should have " no reason 
 to regret Miss Isola's recovery, by its depriving her 
 of our begun correspondence." Emma stayed a 
 month with us, and has gone back (in tolerable 
 health) to her long home, for site comes not again 
 for a twelvemonth. I amused Mrs. Williams with 
 an occurrence on our road to Enfield. We travelled 
 with one of those troublesome fellow-passengers in a 
 stage coach, that is called a well-inform'd man. For 
 twenty miles we discoursed about the properties of 
 
 1 At Northaw, near Potter's Bar.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 447 
 
 steam, probabilities of carriage by ditto, till all my 
 science, and more than all, was exhausted, and I was 
 thinking of escaping my torment by getting up on 
 the outside, when, getting into Bishops Stortford, my 
 gentleman, spying some farming land, put an unlucky 
 question to me: "What sort of a crop of turnips do 
 you think we shall have this year ?" Emma's eyes 
 turned to me, to know what in the world I could have 
 to say ; and she burst into a violent fit of laughter, 
 maugre her pale, serious cheeks, when, with the 
 greatest gravity, I replied, that " it depends, I 
 believe, upon boiled legs of mutton." This clenched 
 our conversation ; and my gentleman, with a face 
 half wise, half in scorn, troubled us with no more 
 conversation, scientific or philosophical, for the re- 
 mainder of our journey. Ayrton was here yesterday, 
 and as learned to the full as my fellow-traveller. 
 What a pity that he will spoil a wit and a devilish 
 pleasant fellow (as he is) by wisdom. He talked on 
 music, and by having read Hawkins and Burney 
 recently, I was enabled to talk of names, and show 
 more knowledge than he had suspected I possessed; 
 and in the end he begged me to shape my thoughts 
 upon paper, which I did after he was gone, and sent 
 him 
 
 FREE THOUGHTS ON SOME EMINENT COMPOSERS. 
 
 Some cry up Haydn, some Mozart, 
 Just as the whim bites. For my part, 
 I do not care a farthing candle 
 For either of them, or for Handel. 
 Cannot a man live free and easy, 
 Without admiring Pergolesi ! 
 Or through the world with comfort go, 
 That never heard of Doctor Blow !
 
 44-8 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 So help me God, I hardly have ; 
 
 And yet I eat, and drink, and shave, 
 
 Like other people, (if you watch it,) 
 
 And know no more of stave or crotchet 
 
 Than did the un-Spaniardised Peruvians; 
 
 Or those old ante-queer-Diluvians 
 
 That lived in the unwash'd world with Jubal, 
 
 Before that dirty blacksmith Tubal 
 
 By stroke on anvil, or by summ'at, 
 
 Found out, to his great surprise, the gamut. 
 
 I care no more for Cimarosa 
 
 Than he did for SalvatorRosa, 
 
 Being no painter; and bad luck 
 
 Be mine, if I can bear that Gluck ! 
 
 Old Tycho Brahe and modern Herschel 
 
 Had something in them; but who's Purcel ? 
 
 The devil, with his foot so cloven, 
 
 For aught I care, may take Beethoven ; 
 
 And, if the bargain does not suit, 
 
 I'll throw him Weber in to boot. 
 
 There's not the splitting of a splinter 
 
 To choose 'twixt him last named, and Winter. 
 
 Of Doctor Pepusch old queen Dido 
 
 Knew just as much, God knows, as I do. 
 
 I would not go four miles to visit 
 
 Sebastian Bach ; (or Batch, which is it ?) 
 
 No more I would for Bononcini. 
 
 As for Novello, or Rossini, 
 
 I shall not say a word to grieve 'em, 
 
 Because they're living: so I leave 'em. 
 
 Martin Burney is as good and as odd as ever. 
 We had a dispute about the word "heir," which I 
 contended was pronounced like " air." He said that 
 might be in common parlance ; or that we might so 
 use it, speaking of the " Heir at Law," a comedy • 
 but that in the law courts it was necessary to give it a 
 full aspiration, and to say Hayer: he thought it might 
 even vitiate a cause, if a counsel pronounced it other-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 449 
 
 wise. In conclusion, he "would consult Serjeant 
 Wilde ; " who gave it against him. Sometimes he 
 falleth into the water; sometimes into the fire. He 
 came down here, and insisted on reading Virgil's 
 " Eneid " all through with me, (which he did,) 
 because a Counsel must know Latin. Another time 
 he read out all the Gospel of St. John, because 
 Biblical quotations are very emphatic in a Court of 
 Justice. A third time he would carve a fowl, which 
 he did very ill-favouredly, because " we did not know 
 how indispensable it was for a barrister to do all 
 those things well ? Those little things were of more 
 consequence than we supposed." So he goes on, 
 harassing about the way to prosperity, and losing it ; 
 with a long head, but somewhat a wrong one — 
 harum-scarum. Why does not his guardian angel 
 look to him ? He deserves one : may be he has tired 
 him out. 
 
 I am tired with this long scrawl, but I thought in 
 your exile you might like a letter. Commend me to 
 all the wonders in Derbyshire ; and tell the devil I 
 humbly kiss my — hand to him. 
 
 Yours ever, C. Lamb. 
 
 London, May 24th, 1830. 
 Mrs. Haz/itt, 
 
 Mr. Broomhead's, 
 
 St. Anne's Square, Buxton. 
 Fr. T. H. Ley. 
 
 Letter CLXXVL] June 3, 1830. 
 
 Dear Sarah, — I named your thought about William 1 
 
 1 A suggestion of Mrs. Hazlitt's that her son should be placed with 
 Bra ham, the singer. 
 
 VOL. I. 2 G
 
 450 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 
 
 to his father, who expressed such horror and aver- 
 sion to the idea of his singing in public, that I 
 cannot meddle in it directly or indirectly. Ayrton is a 
 kind fellow ; and if you chuse to consult him by letter, 
 or otherwise, he will give you the best advice, I am 
 sure, very readily. / have no doubt that M. Bumey's 
 objection to interfering ivas the same with mine. With 
 thanks for your pleasant long letter, which is not that 
 of an invalid, and sympathy for your sad sufferings, 
 I remain, in haste, 
 
 Yours truly, 
 Mary's kindest love. [No Signature.] 
 
 Mrs. Hazlitt, at Mr. Broomheacts, 
 St. Anne's Square, Buxton. 
 
 Letter CLXXVIL] May 3 ist, 1833. 
 
 Dear Mrs. Hazlitt, — I will assuredly come and find 
 you out when I am better. I am driven from house 
 to house by Mary's illness. I took a sudden resolu- 
 tion to take my sister to Edmonton, where she was 
 under medical treatment last time, and have arranged 
 to board and lodge with the people. Thank God, I 
 have repudiated Enfield. I have got out of hell, 
 despair of heaven, and must sit down contented in a 
 half-way purgatory. Thus ends this strange eventful 
 history. But I am nearer town, and will get up to 
 you somehow before long. 
 
 I repent not of my resolution. 'Tis late, and my 
 
 hand is unsteady; so good bye till we meet, 
 
 Your old C. L. 
 
 Mr. Walden's, 
 
 Church Street, Edmonton. 
 
 Mrs. Hazlitt, No. 4, Palace Street, Plmlico.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE HAZLITTS. 451 
 
 Letter CLXXVIIL] . [1833.] 
 
 My dear William, — I am very uncomfortable, and 
 when Emma leaves me I shall wish to be quite 
 alone ; therefore pray tell your mother I regret that 
 I cannot see her here this time, but hope to see her 
 when times are better with me. The young ladies 
 are very pleasant, but my spirits have much ado to 
 keep pace with theirs. I decidedly wish to be alone, 
 or I know of none I should rather see than your 
 mother. Make my best excuse. Emma will explain 
 to you the state of my wretched spirits. 
 
 Yours, C. Lamb. 
 
 When I am wretched, company makes me tenfold 
 more so. 
 
 Mr. Wm. Hazlitt, jun., 
 
 36, Southampton Buildings, Holborn ; 
 
 Or at the Southampton Arms. 
 
 2 G 2
 
 ( 452 ) 
 
 VI. 
 
 Correspondence with Bernard Barton. 
 
 [1822 — 1831]. 
 
 LETTER CLXXIX.] India House, nth Sept. 1822. 
 
 Dear Sir, — You have misapprehended me sadly, if 
 you suppose that I meant to impute any incon- 
 sistency 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. 1 
 I like them for what they are, and for what they are 
 not. I have sickened on the modern rhodomontade 
 and Byronism, and your plain Quakerish beauty has 
 captivated me. It is all wholesome cates ; ay, and 
 toothsome too ; and withal Quakerish. If I were 
 George Fox, and George Fox licenser of the press, 
 they should have my absolute imprimatur. I hope I 
 have removed the impression. 
 
 I am, like you, a prisoner to the desk. I have been 
 chained to that galley thirty years, — a long shot. I 
 have almost grown to the wood. If no imaginative 
 
 1 Alluding to some of Barton's Poems.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 453 
 
 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 "Im- 
 perfect 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 bound the free 
 And holy-day rejoicing spirit down 
 To the ever-haunting importunity 
 Of business, in the green fields and the town, 
 To plough, loom, anvil, spade; and oh, most sad, 
 To that dry drudgery at 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 which are no returnings ; 
 Where, toiling and turmoiling, ever and aye, 
 He and his thoughts keep pensive working-day." 
 
 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. 
 
 LETTER CLXXX.] East India House, 9th Oct., 1812. 
 
 Dear Sir, — I am ashamed not sooner to have ac- 
 knowledged your letter and poem. I think the latter 
 very temperate, very serious, and very seasonable. I
 
 454 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 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 
 sympathize 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. Shelley I saw once. His voice was the 
 most obnoxious squeak I ever was tormented with, 
 ten thousand times worse than the Laureat's, whose 
 voice is the worst part about him, except his Laureat- 
 ship. 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 presump- 
 tuous 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
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 455 
 
 present than a grown hare, and short troubles (as the 
 
 old excuse goes) are best. 
 
 I hear that Lloyd 1 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. 
 
 Letter CLXXXL] Dec. 23rd, 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 
 skull. It is a visiting, unquiet, unquakerish season. 
 I get more and more in love with solitude, and pro- 
 portionately hampered with company. I hope you 
 have some holidays 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 twelve brings up the tray; and 
 
 1 Charles Lloyd, who married one of the Misses Fricker, Mrs. Sou- 
 they's sister. He was the early literary associate of Coleridge and 
 Lamb. He died at Versailles in 1839, in an unsound state of mind. 
 There is a good deal about him in the correspondence with Coleridge, 
 and an unpublished letter to him from Lamb is printed among the 
 miscellaneous correspondence.
 
 45^ CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 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 Baillie. What a 
 world of fine territory between Land's End and 
 Johnny Groat's have you missed traversing! I could 
 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 ? Elwood, 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 intro- 
 duced 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 of 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, though it does well for me, better 
 than any thing short of all ones 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!
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 457 
 
 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-penned note, 
 believe me, with great respect, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER CLXXXIL] January 9th, 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 book- 
 sellers. 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 want for 
 bread, some repining, others envying the blessed 
 security of a counting house, all agreeing they would 
 rather have been tailors, weavers,- — what not, rather 
 than the things they were. I have known some 
 starved, some to go mad, one dear friend literally 
 dying in a workhouse. You know not what a 
 rapacious, dishonest set these booksellers are. Ask 
 even Southey, who (a single case almost) has made 
 a fortune by book drudgery, what he has found them. 
 Oh, 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
 
 458 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 slavery, worse than all slavery, to be a bookseller's 
 dependant, 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 con- 
 trary 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 back-ground, — 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 op- 
 press us, and would wring the blood of us out, to put 
 another sixpence in their mechanic pouches ! I con- 
 tend that a bookseller has a relative honesty towards 
 authors, not like his honesty to the rest of the world. 
 B[aldwin P] 1 who first engaged me as " Elia," has 
 not paid me up yet, (nor any of us without repeated 
 mortifying appeals,) yet how the knave fawned 
 when 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 any thing 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. 
 six days in the week, and is there not all Sunday ? 
 Fie, what a superfluity of man's time, if you could 
 think so ! — enough for relaxation, mirth, converse, 
 
 1 Mr. Robert Baldwin, the publisher, afterwards in partnership with 
 Mr. Cradock. and Mr. Joy.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 459 
 
 poetry, good thoughts, quiet thoughts. Oh the cor- 
 roding, 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 will much oblige me by this kindness. 
 Yours truly, C. Lamb. 
 
 LETTER CLXXXIII.] February 17th, 1823. 
 
 My dear Sir, — I have read quite through the pon- 
 derous folio of George Fox. 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.
 
 460 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 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 return it to Mr. Sewell at Ipswich ? 
 I fear to send such a treasure by a stage coach ; not 
 that I am afraid of the coachman or the guard's read- 
 ing 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 skipped a word of it. I have quoted 
 G. F. in my " Quakers' 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 lie?" 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 J
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 461 
 
 To think she should have had to toil through five 
 octavos of that cussed (I forget I write to a Quaker) 
 Abbeypony History, and then to abridge them to 
 three, and all for £113 I 1 — 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 respect- 
 fully 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 2 place makes me long for 
 a pippin and some caraways, and a cup of sack in his 
 orchard, when the sweets of the night come in. 
 
 Farewell, C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CLXXXIV.] March S th, 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 " — 
 
 1 Sara Coleridge's work, to which Lamb refers, was entitled "An 
 Account of the Abipones, from the Latin of Martin DobrizhofFer," 
 1822, 3 vols. 8vo. It was edited by Southey. The Abipones are a 
 warlike tribe of Indians, inhabiting the country along the banks of 
 La Plata. 
 
 2 The Rev. John Mitford, of Benhall, Suffolk, ob. i860. He was a 
 slovenly editor of old poets, and could not write English (prose), but 
 was an elegant sonneteer for all that.
 
 462 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 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, 1 where I had scribbled some 
 petulant remarks, and for a make-shift father'd them 
 on Ritson. 3 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 
 Ancient Music, or as Directors of the British Institu- 
 tion, or bequeathing medals to Oxford for the best 
 classical themes, &c, then I shall begin to hope they 
 will emancipate you. But what as a Society can 
 they do for you ? You would not accept a commis- 
 sion in the army, nor they be likely to procure it. 
 Posts in Church or State have they none in their 
 
 1 Scott's Critical Essays on some of the Poems of several English 
 Poets. 
 
 2 This literary hoax is inserted among the Miscellaneous Pieces in 
 the present edition.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 463 
 
 giving; and then, if they disown you, — think — you 
 must live " a man forbid." 
 
 I wished for you yesterday. I dined in Parnassus, 
 with Wordsworth, Coleridge, Rogers, and Tom 
 Moore, — half the poetry of England constellated and 
 clustered in Gloucester Place ! It was a delightful 
 evening. Coleridge was in his finest vein of talk — 
 had all the talk ; and let 'em talk as evilly as they do 
 of the envy of poets, I am sure not one there but was 
 content to be nothing but a listener. The Muses 
 were dumb while Apollo lectured on his and their 
 fine art. It is a lie that poets are envious. I have 
 known the best of them, and can speak to it, that 
 they give each other their merits, and are the kindest 
 critics as well as best authors. I am scribbling a 
 muddy epistle with an aching head, for we did not 
 quaff Hippocrene last night ; marry, it was hippocrass 
 rather. Pray accept this as a letter in the meantime, 
 and do me the favour to mention my respects to Mr. 
 Mitford, who is so good as to entertain good thoughts 
 of Elia, but don't show this almost impertinent 
 scrawl. I will write more respectfully next time, for 
 believe me, if not in words, in feelings yours most 
 so. C. L. 
 
 Letter CLXXXV.] March nth, 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 von
 
 464 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 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 surpassing 
 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 Man- 
 ning, 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 
 g to g 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. 1 "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 
 
 1 Nor does there appear to have been any large pecuniary inducement. 
 From an anecdote quoted by Mr. Fitzgerald, it seems that for two years' 
 contributions to the London Magazine, Lamb received only £170.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 465 
 
 flight, to my regret. With Sara's own-made acquisi- 
 tions, 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 reflections on Mrs. Cole- 
 ridge 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. I am ashamed of the shabby 
 letters I send, but I am by nature any thing 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 Protectoral 
 arms of Cromwell. 1 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 disre- 
 spectful to yourself 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 ! ! 
 
 It is time to have done my incoherences. 
 Believe me, yours truly, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 l Mr. Barron Field. 
 
 VOL. I. 2 H
 
 466 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Letter CLXXXVL] May 3rd, 1823. 
 
 Dear Sir, — I am vexed to be two letters in your 
 debt, but I have been quite out of the vein lately. A 
 philosophical treatise is wanting, of the causes of the 
 backwardness with which persons after a certain time 
 of life set about writing a letter. I always feel as 
 if I had nothing to say, and the performance gene- 
 rally justifies the presentiment. Taylor and Hessey 
 did foolishly in not admitting the sonnet. Surely it 
 might have followed the B. B. I agree with you in 
 thinking Bowring's paper better than the former. I 
 will inquire about my letter to the old gentleman, 
 but I expect it to go in, after those to the young 
 gentleman are completed. 
 
 I do not exactly see why the goose and little 
 goslings should emblematize a Quaker poet that has 
 no children. But, after all, perhaps it is a pelican. 
 The " Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin " around it I 
 cannot decipher. The songster of the night pouring 
 out her effusions amid a silent meeting of madge- 
 owlets, would be at least intelligible. A full pause 
 here comes upon me, as if I had not a word more 
 left. I will shake my brain, Once ! Twice ! — nothing 
 comes up. George Fox recommends waiting on 
 these occasions. I wait. Nothing comes. G. Fox 
 — that sets me off again. I have finished the "Jour- 
 nal," and 400 more pages of the " Doctrinah" which 
 I picked up for 7s. 6d. If I get on at this rate, the 
 society will be in danger of having two Quaker poets 
 to patronise. I am at Dalston now ; but if when I 
 go back to Covent Garden I find thy friend has not 
 called for the "Journal," thee must put me in a way 
 of sending it ; and if it should happen the lender of
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 467 
 
 it, knowing that volume has not the other, I shall be 
 most happy in his accepting the " Doctrinals," which 
 I shall read but once certainly. It is not a splendid 
 copy, but perfect, save a leaf of Index. 
 
 I cannot but think that the London drags heavily. 
 I miss Janus. 1 And oh how it misses Hazlitt ! 
 Procter too is affronted. 
 
 Believe me cordially yours, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CLXXXVIL] July ioth, 1823. 
 
 Dear Sir, — I shall be happy to read the MS. and 
 to forward it; but T[aylor] and H[essey] must 
 judge for themselves of publication. If it prove 
 interesting (as I doubt not) I shall not spare to say 
 so, you may depend upon it. Suppose you direct 
 it to Accountant's Office, India House. I am glad 
 you have met with some sweetening circumstances 
 to your unpalatable draught. 2 I have just returned 
 from Hastings, where are exquisite views and walks, 
 and where I have given up my soul to walking, and 
 I am now suffering sedentary contrasts. I am a 
 long time reconciling to town after one of these 
 excursions. Home is become strange, and will 
 remain so yet a while ; home is the most unforgiving 
 of friends, and always resents absence ; I know its 
 old cordial looks will return, but they are slow in 
 
 1 Wainwright. 
 
 2 Barton's drudgery at the Bank. In his unpublished Correspondence 
 with the late Mr. Fitch, of Ipswich, the Quaker poet complains bitterly 
 of his forlorn situation and of his pecuniary distress. He had a taste 
 for pictures, which he had to part with in exchange for the more 
 substantial. 
 
 2 H 2
 
 468 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 clearing up. That is one of the features of this our 
 galley slavery; that peregrination ended makes things 
 worse. I felt out of water (with all the sea about 
 me) at Hastings ; and just as I had learned to domi- 
 ciliate there, I must come back to find a home which 
 is no home. I abused Hastings, but learned its 
 value. There are spots, inland bays, &c, which 
 realise the notions of Juan Fernandez. The best 
 thing I lit upon by accident was a small country 
 church, (by whom or when built unknown,) standing 
 bare and single in the midst of a grove, with no 
 house or appearance of habitation within a quarter 
 of a mile, only passages diverging from it through 
 beautiful woods to so many farm-houses. There it 
 stands like the first idea of a church, before parish- 
 ioners were thought of, nothing but birds for its 
 congregation ; or like a hermit's oratory (the hermit 
 dead), or a mausoleum ; its effect singularly impres- 
 sive, like a church found in a desert isle to startle 
 Crusoe with a home image. You must make out a 
 vicar and a congregation from fancy, for surely none 
 come there ; yet it wants not its pulpit, and its font, 
 and all the seemly additaments of our worship. 
 
 Southey has attacked " Elia " on the score of 
 infidelity, in the Quarterly article, " Progress of Infi- 
 delity." I had not, nor have seen the Monthly. He 
 might have spared an old friend such a construction of 
 a few careless flights, that meant no harm to religion, 
 if all his unguarded expressions on the subject were 
 
 to be collected ! But I love and respect Southey, 
 
 and will not retort. I hate his review, and his being 
 a reviewer. The hint he has dropped will knock the 
 sale of the book on the head, which was almost at a 
 stop before. Let it stop, — there is corn in Egypt,
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 469 
 
 while there is cash at Leadenhall. You and I are 
 something besides being writers, thank God ! 
 
 Yours truly, C. L. 
 
 Letter CLXXXVIIL] September 2nd, 1823. 
 
 Dear B. B., — What will you say to my not writing ? 
 You cannot say I do not write now. Hessey has not 
 used your kind sonnet, nor have I seen it. Pray send 
 me a copy. Neither have I heard any more of your 
 friend's MS., which I will reclaim whenever you 
 please. When you come London-ward you will find 
 me no longer in Covent Garden. I have a cottage in 
 Colebrook Row, Islington ; a cottage, for it is de- 
 tached ; a white house, with six good rooms ; the 
 New River (rather elderly by this time) runs (if a 
 moderate walking pace may be so termed) close to 
 the foot of the house ; and behind is a spacious garden 
 with vines, (I assure you,) pears, strawberries, par- 
 snips, leeks, carrots, cabbages, to delight the heart of 
 old Alcinous. You enter without passage into a 
 cheerful dining-room, all studded over and rough 
 with old books : and above is a lightsome drawing- 
 room, three windows, full of choice prints. I feel 
 like a great lord, never having had a house before. 
 
 The London, I fear, falls off. I linger among its 
 creaking rafters, like the last rat ; it will topple down 
 if they don't get some buttresses. They have pulled 
 down three : Hazlitt, Procter, and their best stay, 
 kind, light-hearted Wainwright, their Janus. The 
 best is, neither of our fortunes is concerned in it. 
 
 I heard of you from Mr. Pulham 1 this morning, and 
 
 1 The late James Brook Pulham, Esq., a gentleman who formed 
 Lamb's acquaintance about this time, and was the author of the carica-
 
 470 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 that gave a fillip to my laziness, which has been in- 
 tolerable ; but I am so taken up with pruning and 
 gardening, quite a new sort of occupation to me. I 
 have gathered my jargonels, but my Windsor pears 
 are backward. The former were of exquisite raci- 
 ness. I do now sit under my own vine, and contem- 
 plate the growth of vegetable nature. I can now 
 understand in what sense they speak of father Adam. 
 I recognise the paternity while I watch my tulips. 
 I almost fell with him, for the first day I turned a 
 drunken gardener (as he let in the serpent) into my 
 Eden, and he laid about him, lopping off some choice 
 boughs, &c, which hung over from a neighbour's 
 garden, and in his blind zeal laid waste a shade, which 
 had sheltered their window from the gaze of passers- 
 by. The old gentlewoman (fury made her not hand- 
 some) could scarcely be reconciled by all my fine 
 words. There was no buttering her parsnips. She 
 talked of the law. What a lapse to commit on the 
 first day of my happy " garden-state !" 
 
 I hope you transmitted the Fox-Journal to its 
 owner, with suitable thanks. Mr. Cary, the Dante- 
 man, dines with me to-day. He is a model of a 
 country parson, lean, (as a curate ought to be,) 
 modest, sensible, no obtruder of church dogmas, 
 quite a different man from Southey. 1 You would like 
 him. Pray accept this for a letter, and believe me, 
 with sincere regards, Yours, C. L. 
 
 ture sketch of Lamb, scratched upon copper, full length. Mr. Pulhani 
 was an enthusiast about the writings 'of George Wither, and it was 
 probably through him that Lamb was induced to put down, in an inter- 
 leaved copy of Mr. Gutch's Bristol edition, a few remarks upon that 
 poet and his commentators. 
 
 i In a letter to Southey, Lamb tells him that he would like Barton 
 " for a friend."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 471 
 
 Letter CLXXXIX.] September 17th, 1823 
 
 Dear Sir, — I have again been reading your " Stanzas 
 on Bloomfield," which are the most appropriate that 
 can be imagined,^sweet with Doric delicacy. I like 
 that,— 
 
 " Our own more chaste Theocritus " — 
 
 just hinting at the fault of the Grecian. I love that 
 stanza ending with, 
 
 " Words, phrases, fashions, pass away ; 
 But truth and nature live through all." 
 
 But I shall omit in my own copy the one stanza 
 which alludes to Lord B. I suppose. It spoils the 
 sweetness and oneness of the feeling. Cannot we 
 think of Burns, or Thomson, without sullying the 
 thought with a reflection out of place upon Lord 
 Rochester ? These verses might have been inscribed 
 upon a tomb ; are in fact an epitaph ; satire does not 
 look pretty upon a tombstone. Besides, there is a 
 quotation in it, always bad in verse, seldom advisable 
 in prose. I doubt if their having been in a paper will 
 not prevent T. and H. from insertion ; but I shall 
 have a thing to send in a day or two, and shall 
 try them. Omitting that stanza, a very little altera- 
 tion is wanting in the beginning of the next. You 
 see, I use freedom. How happily (I flatter not) you 
 have brought in his subjects; and (I suppose) his 
 favourite measure, though I am not acquainted 
 with any of his writings but the Farmer's Boy. He 
 dined with me once, and his manners took me ex- 
 ceedingly. 
 
 I rejoice that you forgive my long silence. I con- 
 tinue to estimate my own-roof comforts highly. How 
 could I remain all my life a lodger ! My garden
 
 472 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 thrives, (I am told,) though I have yet reaped nothing 
 but some tiny salad and withered carrots. But a 
 garden's a garden anywhere, and twice a garden in 
 London. 
 
 Somehow I cannot relish that word " Hockey." 
 Cannot you supply it by circumlocution, and direct 
 the reader by a note to explain that it means the 
 Hockey. But Hockey choaks me in the text. It 
 raises crowds of mean associations, hawking and 
 
 S p g, gawky, stalky, mawkish ! The sound is every 
 
 thing, in such dulcet modulations 'specially. I like 
 
 " Gilbert Meldrum's sterner tones," 
 
 without knowing who Gilbert Meldrum is. You have 
 slipt in your rhymes as if they grew there, so natu- 
 ral-artificially, or artificial-naturally. There's a vile 
 phrase ! 
 
 Do you go on with your" Quaker Sonnets ?" Have 
 'em ready with " Southey's Book of the Church." I 
 meditate a letter to S. in the London, which perhaps 
 will meet the fate of the Sonnet. 1 
 
 Excuse my brevity, for I write painfully at office, 
 liable to a hundred callings off; and I can never sit 
 down to an epistle elsewhere. I read or walk. If 
 you return this letter to the Post Office, I think they 
 will return fourpence, seeing it is but half a one. 
 Believe me, though, 
 
 Entirely yours, C. L. 
 
 Letter CXC] [Nov. 22, 1823.] 
 
 Dear B. B., — I am ashamed at not acknowledging 
 your kind little poem, which I must needs like much; 
 
 1 Of course I.amb intimates here his famous epistle printed in the 
 London Magazine for October, 1823.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 473 
 
 but I protest I thought I had done it at the moment. 
 Is it possible a letter has miscarried ? Did you get 
 one in which I sent you an extract from the poems of 
 Lord Stirling P 1 I should wonder if you did, for I 
 sent you none such. There was an incipient lie 
 strangled in the birth. Some people's conscience is 
 so tender! But, in plain truth, I thank you very 
 much for the verses. I have a very kind letter from 
 the Laureat, with a self-invitation to come and shake 
 hands with me. This is truly handsome and noble. 
 'Tis worthy of my old idea of Southey. Shall not I, 
 think you, be covered with a red suffusion ? 
 
 You are too much apprehensive of your complaint : 
 I know many that are always ailing of it, and live on 
 to a good old age. I know a merry fellow (you partly 
 know him) who, when his medical adviser told him 
 he had drunk away all that part, congratulated him- 
 self (now his liver was gone) that he should be the 
 longest liver of the two. 
 
 The best way in these cases is to keep yourself as 
 ignorant as you can, as ignorant as the world was 
 before Galen, of the entire inner construction of the 
 animal man; not to be conscious of a midriff; to 
 hold kidneys (save of sheep and swine) to be an agree- 
 able fiction ; not to know whereabout the gall grows ; 
 to account the circulation of the blood an idle whimsey 
 of Harvey's ; to acknowledge no mechanism not 
 visible. For, once fix the seat of your disorder, and 
 your fancies flux into it like bad humours. Those 
 medical gentries choose each his favourite part ; one 
 takes the lungs, another the aforesaid liver, and refer 
 
 1 The Works of Sir William Alexander, Earl of Stirling, 1637, folio. 
 They were once admired, and Lamb seems to have had an affection for 
 this writer ; but he is now almost forgotten.
 
 474 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 to that whatever in the animal economy is amiss. 
 Above all, use exercise, take a little more spirituous 
 liquors, learn to smoke, continue to keep a good con- 
 science, and avoid tampering with hard terms of art 
 — viscosity, scirrhosity, and those bugbears by which 
 simple patients are scared into their graves. Believe 
 the general sense of the mercantile world, which holds 
 that desks are not deadly. It is the mind, good B. B., 
 and not the limbs, that taints by long sitting. Think 
 of the patience of tailors ! Think how long the Lord 
 Chancellor sits ! Think of the brooding hen ! I protest 
 I cannot answer thy sister's kind inquiry ; but I judge, 
 I shall put forth no second volume. More praise than 
 buy ; and T. and H. are not particularly disposed for 
 martyrs. Thou wilt see a funny passage, and yet a 
 true history, of George Dyer's aquatic incursion in 
 the next London. Beware his fate, when thou comest 
 to see me at my Colebrook Cottage. I have filled my 
 little space with my little thoughts. I wish thee ease 
 on thy sofa ; but not too much indulgence on it. 
 From my poor desk, thy fellow-sufferer, this bright 
 November, C. L. 
 
 Letter CXCI.] Jan. 9th, 1824. 
 
 Dear B. B., — Do you know what it is to succumb 
 under an insurmountable day-mare, — " a whoreson 
 lethargy," Falstaff calls it, — an indisposition to do 
 any thing, or to be any thing, — a total deadness and 
 distaste, a suspension of vitality, — an indifference to 
 locality,— a numb, soporifical, good-for-nothingness, 
 —an ossification all over, — an oyster-like insensi- 
 bility to the passing events, — a mind-stupor, — a 
 brawny defiance to the needles of a thrusting-in con-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 475 
 
 science ? Did you ever have a very bad cold, with a 
 total irresolution to submit to water-gruel processes ? 
 This has been for many weeks my lot and my excuse. 
 My fingers drag heavily over this paper, and to my 
 thinking it is three-and-twenty furlongs from here to 
 the end of this demi-sheet. I have not a thing to 
 say ; no thing is of a more importance than another ; 
 I am flatter than a denial or a pancake ; emptier than 
 Judge Park's wig when the head is in it ; duller than 
 a country stage when the actors are off it ; a cipher, 
 an ! I acknowledge life at all, only by an occa- 
 sional convulsional cough, and a permanent phleg- 
 matic pain in the chest. I am weary of the world ; 
 life is weary of me. My day is gone into twilight, 
 and I don't think it worth the expense of candles. 
 My wick hath a thief in it, but I can't muster courage 
 to snuff it. I inhale suffocation ; I can't distin- 
 guish veal from mutton ; nothing interests me. 'Tis 
 twelve o'clock, and Thurtell is just now coming out 
 upon the New Drop, Jack Ketch alertly tucking up 
 his greasy sleeves to do the last office of mortality ; 
 yet cannot I elicit a groan or a moral reflection. If 
 you told me the world will be at an end to-morrow, I 
 should just say, "Will it?" I have not volition 
 enough left to dot my Vs, much less to comb my eye- 
 brows ; my eyes are set in my head ;. my brains are 
 gone out to see a poor relation in Moorfields, and they 
 did not say when they'd come back again ; my skull is 
 a Grub Street attic, to let — not so much as a joint- 
 stool or a crack'd Jordan left in it ; my hand writes, 
 not I, from habit, as chickens run about a little 
 when their heads are off. O for a vigorous fit of gout, 
 cholic, toothache, — an earwig in my auditory, a fly 
 in my visual organs ! Pain is life — the sharper, the
 
 47^ CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 more evidence of life ; but this apathy, this death ! 
 Did you ever have an obstinate cold, — a six or seven 
 weeks' unintermitting chill and suspension of hope, 
 fear, conscience, and every thing? Yet do I try all I 
 can to cure it; I try wine, and spirits, and smoking, 
 and snuff in unsparing quantities ; but they all only 
 seem to make me worse, instead of better. I sleep 
 in a damp room, but it does me no good ; I come 
 home late o' nights, but do not find any visible 
 amendment ! Who shall deliver me from the body 
 of this death ? 
 
 It is just fifteen minutes after twelve. Thurtell 1 is 
 by this time a good way on his journey, baiting at 
 Scorpion perhaps ; Ketch is bargaining for his cast 
 coat and waistcoat. The Jew demurs at first at three 
 half-crowns ; but, on consideration that he may get 
 somewhat by showing 'em in the town, finally closes. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CXCIL] Jan. 23rd, 1824. 
 
 My dear sir, — That peevish letter of mine, which 
 was meant to convey an apology for my incapacity 
 to write, seems to have been taken by you in too 
 serious a light ; it was only my way of telling you I 
 had a severe cold. The fact is, I have been insuper- 
 ably dull and lethargic for many weeks, and cannot 
 rise to the vigour of a letter, much less an essay. 
 The London must do without me for a time, for I 
 have lost all interest about it ; and whether I shall 
 recover it again I know not. I will bridle my pen 
 another time, and not teaze and puzzle you with my 
 
 1 John Thurtell was executed at Hertford on the 9th of January, 
 1824, for the murder of Mr. Weare.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 477 
 
 aridities. I shall begin to feel a little more alive with 
 the Spring. Winter is to me (mild or harsh) always 
 a great trial of the spirits. I am ashamed not to have 
 noticed your tribute to Woolman, whom we love so 
 much. It is done in your good manner. Your friend 
 Taylor called upon me some time since, and seems a 
 very amiable man. His last story is painfully fine. 
 His book I " like ;" it is only too stuffed with Scrip- 
 ture, too parsonish. The best thing in it is the boy's 
 own story. When I say it is too full of Scripture, I 
 mean it is too full of direct quotations. No book can 
 have too much of silent Scripture in it ; but the na- 
 tural power of a story is diminished when the upper- 
 most purpose in the writer seems to be to recommend 
 something else, viz., Religion. You know what 
 Horace says of the Deus intersit. I am not able to 
 explain myself, — you must do it for me. My sister's 
 part in the "Leicester School" (about two-thirds) 
 was purely her own ; as it was (to the same quantity) 
 in the " Shakspeare Tales " which bear my name. I 
 wrote only the "Witch Aunt;" the "First Going to 
 Church;" and the final story, about "A little Indian 
 girl," in a ship. Your account of my black-balling 
 amused me. / think, as Quakers, they did right. 
 There are some things hard to be understood. The 
 more I think, the more I am vexed at having puzzled 
 you with that letter ; but I have been so out of letter- 
 writing of late years, that it is a sore effort to sit down 
 to it ; and I felt in your debt, and sat down way- 
 wardly to pay you in bad money. Never mind my 
 dulness ; I am used to long intervals of it. The 
 heavens seem brass to me ; then again comes the 
 refreshing shower — 
 
 " 1 have been merry once or twice ere now."
 
 47§ CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 You said something about Mr. Mitford in a late 
 letter, which I believe I did not advert to. I shall be 
 happy to show him my Milton 1 (it is all the show 
 things I have) at any time he will take the trouble of 
 a jaunt to Islington. I do also hope to see Mr. 
 Taylor there some day. Pray say so to both. Cole- 
 ridge's book is in good part printed, but sticks a little 
 for more copy. It bears an unsaleable title, " Extracts 
 from Bishop Leighton ;" but I am confident there will 
 be plenty of good notes in it, more of Bishop Cole- 
 ridge than Leighton, I hope ; for what is Leighton ? 
 Do you trouble yourself about libel cases ? The 
 decision against Hunt for the " Vision of Judgment " 
 made me sick. What is to become of the good old 
 talk about our good old King ? — his personal virtues 
 saving us from a revolution, &c. &c. ! Why, none 
 that think can utter it now. It must stink. And the 
 " vision " is really, as to him-ward, such a tolerant, 
 good-humoured thing. What a wretched thing a 
 Lord Chief Justice is, always was, and will be ! 
 
 Keep your good spirits up, dear B. B. ; mine will 
 return ; they are at present in abeyance ; but I am 
 rather lethargic than miserable. I don't know but a 
 good horsewhip would be more beneficial to me than 
 physic. My head, without aching, will teach yours 
 to ache. It is well I am getting to the conclusion. 
 I will send a better letter when I am a better man. 
 Let me thank you for your kind concern for me, 
 (which I trust will have reason soon to be dissipated,) 
 and assure you that it gives me pleasure to hear from 
 you. Yours truly, C. L. 
 
 1 The portrait of Milton, which was to have been left to Words- 
 worth, but was eventually made a marriage present to Miss Isola.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 479 
 
 LETTER CXCIIL] February 25th, 1824. 
 
 My dear sir, — Your title of " Poetic Vigils " 
 arrides me much more than a volume of verse, which 
 has no meaning. The motto says nothing, but I 
 cannot suggest a better. I do not like mottoes but 
 where they are singularly felicitous ; there is foppery 
 in them ; they are un-plain, un-Quakerish; they are 
 good only where they flow from the title, and are a 
 kind of justification of it. There is nothing about 
 watchings or lucubrations in the one you suggest ; no 
 commentary on vigils. By the way, a wag would 
 recommend you to the line of Pope, 
 
 " Sleepless himself — to give his readers sleep." 
 
 I by no means wish it ; but it may explain what I 
 mean, — that a neat motto is child of the title. I 
 think " Poetic Vigils " as short and sweet as can 
 be desired ; only have an eye on the proof, that the 
 printer do not substitute Virgils, which would ill 
 accord with your modesty or meaning. Your sug- 
 gested motto is antique enough in spelling, and 
 modern enough in phrases, — a good modern antique ; 
 but the matter of it is germain to the purpose, only 
 supposing the title proposed a vindication of yourself 
 from the presumption of authorship. The first title 
 was liable to this objection — that if you were dis- 
 posed to enlarge it, and the bookseller insisted on its 
 appearance in two tomes, how oddly it would sound, 
 " A Volume of Verse in two Volumes, Second 
 Edition," &c. You see through my wicked inten- 
 tion of curtailing this epistolet by the above device of 
 large margin. But in truth the idea of letterizing 
 has been oppressive to me of late above your candour 
 to give me credit for. There is Southey, whom I
 
 480 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 ought to have thanked a fortnight ago for a present 
 of the "Church Book:" I have never had courage 
 to buckle myself in earnest even to acknowledge it by 
 six words ; and yet I am accounted by some people 
 a good man ! How cheap that character is acquired ! 
 Pay your debts, don't borrow money, nor twist your 
 kitten's neck off, nor disturb a congregation, &c.,your 
 business is done. I know things (thoughts or things, 
 thoughts are things) of myself, which would make 
 every friend I have fly me as a plague patient. I 
 once * * *, and set a dog upon a crab's leg that was 
 shoved out under a mass of sea-weeds, — a pretty 
 little feeler. Oh pah ! how sick I am of that ! and 
 a lie, a mean one, I once told ! I stink in the midst 
 of respect. I am much hypt. The fact is, my head 
 is heavy, but there is hope ; or if not, I am better 
 than a poor shell-fish ; not morally, when I set the 
 whelp upon it, but have more blood and spirits. 
 Things may turn up, and I may creep again into a 
 decent opinion of myself. Vanity will return with 
 sunshine. Till when, pardon my neglects, and im- 
 pute it to the wintry solstice. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXCIV.] March 24th, 1824. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I hasten to say that if my opinion 
 can strengthen you in your choice, it is decisive for 
 your acceptance of what has been so handsomely 
 offered. I can see nothing injurious to your most 
 honourable sense. Think that you are called to a 
 poetical Ministry — nothing worse : the Minister is 
 worthy of the hire. The only objection I feel is 
 founded on a fear that the acceptance may be a temp-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 481 
 
 tation to you to let fall the bone (hard as it is) which 
 is in your mouth, and must afford tolerable pickings, 
 for the shadow of independence. You cannot pro- 
 pose to become independent on what the low state of 
 interest could afford you from such a principal as you 
 mention ; and the most graceful excuse for the 
 acceptance would be, that it left you free to your 
 voluntary functions. That is the less light part of 
 the scruple. It has no darker shade. I put in darker 
 because of the ambiguity of the word "light," which 
 Donne, in his admirable poem on the Metempsy- 
 chosis, has so ingeniously illustrated in his invo- 
 cation — 
 
 12 1 2 
 
 " Make my dark heavy poem, light and light" 
 
 where the two senses of light are opposed to different 
 opposites. A trifling criticism. I can see no reason 
 for any scruple then but what arises from your own 
 interest ; which is in your own power of course to 
 solve. If you still have doubts, read over Sander- 
 son's Cases of Conscience, and Jeremy Taylor's 
 Ductor Dubitantium; the first a moderate octavo, the 
 latter a folio of goo close pages ; and when you have 
 thoroughly digested the admirable reasons pro and 
 con which they give for every possible case, you will 
 
 be just as wise as when you began. Every man 
 
 is his own best casuist ; and after all, as Ephraim 
 Smooth, in the pleasant comedy of Wild Oats, has it, 
 " there is no harm in a Guinea." A fortiori there is 
 less in 2000. 
 
 I therefore most sincerely congratulate with you, 
 excepting so far as excepted above. If you have fair 
 prospects of adding to the principal, cut the Bank ; 
 but in either case do not refuse an honest service. 
 
 vol. 1. 21
 
 482 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Your heart tells you it is not offered to bribe you from 
 any duty, but to a duty which you feel to be your 
 vocation. Farewell heartily. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CXCV.] July 7th, 1824. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I have been suffering under a severe 
 inflammation of the eyes, notwithstanding which I 
 resolutely went through your very pretty volume at 
 once, which I dare pronounce in no ways inferior to 
 former lucubrations. "Abroad" 1 and "lord" are vile 
 rhymes notwithstanding, and if you count you will 
 wonder how many times you have repeated the word 
 unearthly ; thrice in one poem. It is become a slang 
 word with the bards ; avoid it in future lustily. 
 "Time" is fine; but there are better a good deal, 
 I think. The volume does not lie by me ; and after 
 a long day's smarting fatigue, which has almost put 
 out my eyes, (not blind however to your merits,) I 
 dare not trust myself with long writing. The verses 
 to Bloomfield are the sweetest in the collection. 
 Religion is sometimes lugged in, as if it did not 
 come naturally. I will go over carefully when I get 
 my seeing, and exemplify. You have also too much 
 of singing metre, such as requires no deep ear to 
 make ; lilting measure, in which you have done 
 Woolman injustice. Strike at less superficial melo- 
 dies. The piece on Nayler 1 is more to my fancy. 
 
 My eye runs waters. But I will give you a fuller 
 account some day. The book is a very pretty one 
 
 1 James Nayler, an enthusiast in the time of the Commonwealth.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 483 
 
 in more than one sense. The decorative harp, per- 
 haps, too ostentatious ; a simple pipe preferable. 
 Farewell, and many thanks. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CXCVL] August, 1824. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I congratulate you on getting a 
 house over your head. I find the comfort of it I am 
 sure. At my town lodgings the mistress was always 
 quarrelling with our maid, and at my place of rustica- 
 tion the whole family were always beating one 
 another, brothers beating sisters, (one, a most beau- 
 tiful girl, lamed for life,) father beating sons and 
 daughters, and son again beating his father, knocking ' 
 him fairly down, a scene I never before witnessed, 
 but was called out of bed by the unnatural blows, the 
 parricidal colour of which, though my morals could 
 not but condemn, yet my reason did heartily approve, 
 and in the issue the house was quieter for a day or 
 so than I had ever known. I am now all harmony 
 and quiet, even to the sometimes wishing back again 
 some of the old rufnings. There is something stirring 
 in these civil broils. 
 
 The album shall be attended to. If I can light 
 upon a few appropriate rhymes (but rhymes come 
 with difficulty from me now) I shall beg a place in 
 the neat margin of your young housekeeper. 
 
 The " Prometheus," unbound, is a capital story. 
 The literal rogue ! What if you had ordered 
 " Elfrida " in sheets ! she'd have been sent up I 
 warrant you. Or bid him clasp his Bible, {i.e. to 
 his bosom), he'd have clapt on a brass clasp, no 
 doubt. 
 
 2 1 2
 
 4 8 4 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 I can no more understand Shelley than you can. 
 His poetry is " thin sown with profit or delight." 
 Yet I must point to your notice a sonnet conceived 
 and expressed with a witty delicacy. It is that 
 addressed to one who hated him, but who could not 
 persuade him to hate him again. His coyness to the 
 other's passion — (for hate demands a return as much 
 as love, and starves without it) — is most arch and 
 pleasant. Pray, like it very much. For his theories 
 and nostrums, they are oracular enough ; but I either 
 comprehend 'em not, or there is " miching malice " 
 and mischief in 'em, but, for the most part, ringing 
 with their own emptiness. Hazlitt said well of 'em 
 — " Many are the wiser and better for reading Shaks- 
 peare, but nobody was ever wiser or better for 
 reading Shelley." 1 I wonder you will sow your cor- 
 respondence on so barren a ground as I am, that 
 make such poor returns. But my head aches at 
 the bare thought of letter-writing. I wish all the ink 
 in the ocean dried up, and would listen to the quills 
 shivering up in the candle flame, like parching 
 martyrs. The same indisposition to write has 
 stopped my " Elias ;" but you will see a futile effort 
 in the next Number, " wrung from me with slow 
 pain." The fact is, my head is seldom cool enough. 
 I am dreadfully indolent. To have to do any 
 thing — to order me a new coat, for instance, though 
 my old buttons are shelled like beans — is an effort. 
 My pen stammers like my tongue. What cool 
 
 1 How could Hazlitt know this? There is unquestionably much 
 that is objectionable in what Shelley has written, but there is also 
 much that is exceedingly beautiful, especially his "Hymn to Intellectual 
 Beauty," which will stand comparison with any thing that the best of 
 our modern poets have written. 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 485 
 
 craniums those old inditers of folios must have had ! — 
 what a mortified pulse ! Well ; once more I throw 
 myself on your mercy. Wishing peace in thy new 
 dwelling, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 [Mr. Barton having requested of Lamb some verses 
 for his daughter's album, received the following, with 
 the accompanying letter beneath, on the 30th of 
 September in this year (1824). The neat loveliness 
 of female Quakerism never perhaps before received 
 so delicate a compliment.] 
 
 Little book, surnamed of ivbite, 
 Clean as yet, and fair to sight, 
 Keep thy attribution right. 
 
 Never disproportion'd scrawl, 
 Ugly, old, (that's worse than all,) 
 On thy maiden clearness fall ! 
 
 In each letter here desien'd. 
 Let the reader emblem find, 
 Neatness of the owner's mind. 
 
 Gilded margins count a sin ; 
 Let thy leaves attraction win 
 By the golden rules within ; 
 
 Sayings fetch'd from sages old, 
 Laws which Holy Writ unfold, 
 Worthy to be graved in gold : 
 
 Lighter fancies ; not excluding 
 Blameless wit, with nothing rude in, 
 Sometimes mildly interluding 
 
 Amid strains of graver measure ; 
 Virtue's self hath oft her pleasure 
 In sweet Muses' groves of leisure.
 
 486 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Riddles dark, perplexing sense, 
 
 Darker meanings of offence, 
 
 (What but shades,) be banish'd hence ! 
 
 Whitest thoughts in whitest dress, 
 Candid meanings best express 
 Mind of quiet Quakeress. 
 
 Letter CXCVIL] 
 
 Dear B. B.,— " I am ill at these numbers ;" but if 
 the above be not too mean to have a place in thy 
 daughter's sanctum, take them with pleasure. I 
 assume that her name is Hannah, 1 because it is a 
 pretty scriptural cognomen. 
 
 I began on another sheet of paper, and just as I 
 had penned the second line of stanza two, an ugly 
 blot fell, to illustrate my counsel. I am sadly given 
 to blot, and modern blotting-paper gives no redress ; 
 it only smears, and makes it worse. The only 
 remedy is scratching out, which gives it a clerkish 
 look. The most innocent blots are made with red 
 ink, and are rather ornamental. Marry, they are not 
 always to be distinguished from the effusions of a cut 
 finger. Well, I hope and trust thy tick-doleru, or 
 however you spell it, is vanished, for I have frightful 
 impressions of that tick, and do altogether hate it, as 
 an unpaid score, or the tick of a death-watch. I take 
 it to be a species of Vitus's dance. (I omit the 
 sanctity, writing to " one of the men called friends.") 
 I knew a young lady who could dance no other ; she 
 danced it through life, and very queer and fantastic 
 were her steps. 
 
 1 Lamb's assumption was wrong. Her name was Lucy.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 487 
 
 Heaven bless thee from such measures, and keep 
 thee from the foul fiend, who delights to lead after 
 false fires in the night, Flibbertigibbet, that gives the 
 web, and I forget what else. 
 
 From my den, as Bunyan has it, 30th Sep. 1824. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 LETTER CXCVIIL] December 1st, 1824. 
 
 Dear B. B., — If Mr. Mitford will send me a full 
 and circumstantial description of his desired vases, I 
 will transmit the same to a gentleman resident at 
 Canton, whom I think I have interest enough in to 
 take the proper care for their execution. But Mr. M. 
 must have patience. China is a great way off, further 
 perhaps than he thinks ; and his next year's roses 
 must be content to wither in a Wedgwood pot. He 
 will please to say whether he should like his Arms 
 upon them, &c. I send herewith some patterns 
 which suggest themselves to me at the first blush of 
 the subject, but he will probably consult his own 
 taste after all. 
 
 The last pattern is obviously fitted for ranunculuses 
 only. The two former may indifferently hold daisies, 
 marjoram, sweet-williams, and that sort. My friend 
 in Canton is Inspector of Teas; his name is Ball : 
 and I can think of no better tunnel. I shall expect 
 Mr. M.'s decision.
 
 488 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Taylor and Hessey finding their magazine goes off 
 very heavily at 25. 6d. are prudently going to raise 
 their price another shilling ; and having already more 
 authors than they want, intend to increase the number 
 of them. If they set up against the New Monthly, 
 they must change their present hands. It is not 
 tying the dead carcase of a Review to a half-dead 
 Magazine will do their business. It is like George 
 Dyer multiplying his volumes to make 'em sell better. 
 When he finds one will not go off, he publishes two ; 
 two stick, he tries three ; three hang fire, he is con- 
 fident that four will have a better chance. 
 
 And now, my dear sir, trifling apart, the gloomy 
 catastrophe of yesterday morning prompts a sadder 
 vein. The fate of the unfortunate Fauntleroy makes 
 me, whether I will or no, to cast reflecting eyes 
 around on such of my friends as, by a parity of situa- 
 tion, are exposed to a similarity of temptation. My 
 very style seems to myself to become more impres- 
 sive than usual, with the change of theme. Who 
 that standeth, knoweth but he may yet fall ? Your 
 hands as yet, I am most willing to believe, have 
 never deviated into other's property. You think it 
 impossible that you could ever commit so heinous an 
 offence ; but so thought Fauntleroy once ; so have 
 thought many besides him, who at last have expiated 
 as he hath done. You are as yet upright ; but you 
 are a banker, at least the next thing to it. I feel the 
 delicacy of the subject ; but cash must pass through 
 your hands, sometimes to a great amount. If in an 
 unguarded hour but I will hope better. Con- 
 sider the scandal it will bring upon those of your 
 persuasion. Thousands would go to see a Quaker 
 hanged, that would be indiflerent to the fate of a 

 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 489 
 
 Presbyterian or an Anabaptist. Think of the effect it 
 would have on the sale of your poems alone, not to 
 mention higher considerations ! I tremble, 1 am 
 sure, at myself, when I think that so many poor 
 victims of the law, at one time of their life, made as 
 sure of never being hanged, as I in my presumption 
 am too ready to do myself. What are we better than 
 they ? Do we come into the world with different 
 necks ? Is there any distinctive mark under our left 
 ears ? Are we unstrangleable, I ask you ? Think of 
 these things. I am shocked sometimes at the shape 
 of my own fingers, not for their resemblance to the 
 ape tribe (which is something), but for the exquisite 
 adaptation of them to the purposes of picking, finger- 
 ing, &c. No one that is so framed, I maintain it, but 
 should tremble. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 LETTER CXCIX.] February loth, 1825. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I am vexed that ugly paper should 
 have offended. I kept it as clear from objectionable 
 phrases as possible, and it was Hessey's fault, and 
 my weakness, that it did not appear anonymous. No 
 more of it, for God's sake. The " Spirit of the Age " 
 is by Hazlitt. The characters of Coleridge, &c. he 
 had done better in former publications, the praise and 
 the abuse much stronger, &c; but the new ones are 
 capitally done. Home Tooke is a matchless portrait. 
 My advice is, to borrow it rather than buy it. I have 
 it. He has laid too many colours on my likeness ; 
 but r have had so much injustice done me in my own 
 name, that I make a rule of accepting as much over- 
 measure to Elia as gentlemen think proper to bestow.
 
 490 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Lay it on and spare not. Your gentleman brother 
 sets my mouth a-watering after liberty. Oh that I 
 were kicked out of Leadenhall with every mark of 
 indignity, and a competence in my fob ! The birds 
 of the air would not be so free as I should. How 
 I would prance and curvet it, and pick up cowslips, 
 and ramble about purposeless, as an idiot ! The 
 author-mometer is a good fancy. I have caused 
 great speculation in the dramatic (not thy) world by 
 a lying " Life of Liston," all pure invention. The 
 town has swallowed it, and it is copied into news- 
 papers, play-bills, &c, as authentic. You do not 
 know the Droll, and possibly missed reading the 
 article (in our first Number, new series). A life more 
 improbable for him to have lived would not be easily 
 invented. But your rebuke, coupled with " Dream 
 on J. Bunyan," checks me. I'd rather do more in 
 my favourite way, but feel dry. I must laugh some- 
 times. I am poor Hypochondriacus, and not Liston. 
 The second Number is all trash. What are T. and 
 H. about ? Why did poor Scott 1 die ? There was 
 comfort in writing with such associates as were his 
 little band of scribblers ; some gone away, some 
 affronted away, and I am left as the solitary widow 
 looking for water-cresses. The only clever hand they 
 have is Darley, 2 who has written on the Dramatists 
 under the name of John Lacy. But his function 
 seems suspended. 
 
 I have been harassed more than usually at office, 
 which has stopt my correspondence lately. I write 
 with a confused aching head, and you must accept 
 this apology for a letter. 
 
 1 Mr. John Scott, editor of the London Magazine. 
 
 2 Mr. George Darley, editor of Beaumont and Fletcher's Works.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 491 
 
 I will do something soon, if I can, as a peace- 
 offering to the queen of the East Angles — something 
 she shan't scold about. For the present farewell. 
 Thine, C. L. 
 
 I am fifty years old this day. Drink my health. 
 
 Letter CC] March 23rd, 1825. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I have had no impulse to write, or 
 attend to any single object but myself for weeks past 
 — my single self, I by myself — I. I am sick of hope 
 deferred. The grand wheel is in agitation, that is to 
 turn up my fortune ; but round it rolls, and will turn 
 up nothing. I have a glimpse of freedom, of be- 
 coming a gentleman at large ; but I am put off from 
 day to day. I have offered my resignation, and it is 
 neither accepted nor rejected. Eight weeks am I 
 kept in this fearful suspense. Guess what an absorb- 
 ing stake I feel it. I am not conscious of the exist- 
 ence of friends present or absent. The East India 
 Directors alone can be that thing to me or not. I 
 have just learned that nothing will be decided this 
 week. Why the next? Why any week? It has 
 fretted me into an itch of the fingers ; I rub 'em 
 against paper, and write to you, rather than not allay 
 this scorbuta. 
 
 While I can write, let me abjure you to have no 
 doubts of Irving. Let Mr. Mitford drop his dis- 
 respect. Irving has prefixed a dedication (of a 
 missionary subject, first part) to Coleridge, the most 
 beautiful, cordial, and sincere. He there acknow- 
 ledges his obligation to S. T. C. for his knowledge of 
 Gospel truths, the nature of a Christian Church, &c,
 
 492 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 to the talk of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (at whose 
 Gamaliel feet he sits weekly), rather than to that of 
 all the men living. This from him, the great dandled 
 and petted sectarian — to a religious character so 
 equivocal in the world's eye as that of S. T. C, so 
 foreign to the Kirk's estimate — can this man be a 
 quack? The language is as affecting as the spirit of 
 the dedication. Some friend told him, "This dedica- 
 tion will do you no good," i.e. not in the world's 
 repute, or with your own people. " That is a reason 
 for doing it," quoth Irving. 
 
 I am thoroughly pleased with him. He is firm, 
 out-speaking, intrepid, and docile as a pupil of Pytha- 
 goras. You must like him. 
 
 Yours, in tremors of painful hope, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CCL] April, 1825. 
 
 Dear B. B., — My spirits are so tumultuary with the 
 novelty of my recent emancipation, that I have scarce 
 steadiness of hand, much more mind, to compose a 
 letter. I am free, B. B. — free as air ! 
 
 "The little bird that wings the sky 
 Knows no such liberty." 
 
 I was set free on Tuesday in last week at four o'clock. 
 I came home for ever ! 
 
 I have been describing my feelings as well as I can 
 to Wordsworth in a long letter, and don't care to 
 repeat. Take it briefly, that for a few days I was 
 painfully oppressed by so mighty a change, but it is 
 becoming daily more natural to me. I went and sat 
 among 'em all at my old thirty-three years' desk
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 493 
 
 yester morning; and, deuce take me, if I had not 
 yearnings at leaving all my old pen-and-ink fellows, 
 merry, sociable lads, at leaving them in the lurch, 
 fag, fag, fag ! — The comparison of my own superior 
 felicity gave me any thing but pleasure. 
 
 B. B., I would not serve another seven years for 
 seven hundred thousand pounds ! I have got £441 
 net for life, sanctioned by Act of Parliament, with a 
 provision for Mary if she survives me. I will live 
 another fifty years ; or, if I live but ten, they will be 
 thirty, reckoning the quantity of real time in them, 
 i. e. the time that is a man's own. Tell me how you 
 like " Barbara S." Will it be received in atonement 
 for the foolish " Vision ? " — I mean by the lady. 
 A-propos, I never saw Mrs. Crawford in my life; 
 nevertheless 'tis all true of somebody. 
 
 Address me, in future, Colebrook Cottage, Islington. 
 I am really nervous, (but that will wear off,) so take 
 this brief announcement. 
 
 Yours truly, C. L. 
 
 Letter CCII.] July 2nd, 1825. 
 
 My dear B. B., — My nervous attack has so unfitted 
 me that I have not courage to sit down to a letter. 
 My poor pittance in the London you will see is drawn 
 from my sickness. Your book is very acceptable to 
 me, because most of it is new to me ; but your book 
 itself we cannot thank you for more sincerely than 
 for the introduction you favoured us with to Anne 
 Knight. Now cannot I write Mrs. Anne Knight for 
 
 the life of me. She is a very pleas , but I won't 
 
 write all we have said of her so often to ourselves,
 
 494 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 because I suspect you would read it to her. Only- 
 give my sister's and my kindest remembrances to her, 
 and how glad we are we can say that word. If ever 
 she come to Southwark again, I count upon another 
 pleasant Bridge walk with her. Tell her, I got home, 
 time for a rubber; but poor Tryphena will not under- 
 stand that phrase of the worldlings. 
 
 I am hardly able to appreciate your volume now : 
 but I liked the dedication much, and the apology for 
 your bald burying grounds. To §helley ; but that is 
 not new. To the young vesper-singer, Great Beal- 
 ings, Playford, and what not. 
 
 If there be a cavil, it is that the topics of religious 
 consolation, however beautiful, are repeated till a sort 
 of triteness attends them. It seems as if you were 
 for ever losing friends' children by death, and re- 
 minding their parents of the Resurrection. Do 
 children die so often, and so good, in your parts ? 
 The topic taken from the consideration that they are 
 snatched away from possible vanities, seems hardly 
 sound ; for to an Omniscient eye their conditional 
 failings must be one with their actual ; but I am too 
 unwell for theology. 
 
 Such as I am, 
 I am yours and A[nne] K[night's] truly, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CCIIL] August ioth, 1825. 
 
 We shall be soon again at Colebrook. 
 
 Dear B. B., — You must excuse my not writing be- 
 fore, when I tell you we are on a visit at Enfield, 
 where I do not feel it natural to sit down to a letter. 
 Jt is at all times an exertion. I would rather talk with
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 495 
 
 you and Anne Knight quietly at Colebrook Lodge, 
 over the matter of your last. You mistake me when 
 you express misgivings about my relishing a series 
 of scriptural poems. I wrote confusedly. What I 
 meant to say was, that one or two consolatory poems 
 on deaths would have had a more condensed effect 
 than many. Scriptural, devotional topics admit of 
 infinite variety. So far from poetry tiring me because 
 religious, I can read, and I say it seriously, the homely 
 old version of the Psalms in our Prayer Books for an 
 hour or two together sometimes without sense of 
 weariness. 
 
 I did not express myself clearly about what I think 
 a false topic insisted on so frequently in consolatory 
 addresses on the death of infants. I know something 
 like it is in Scripture, but I think humanly spoken. 
 It is a natural thought, a sweet fallacy to the survi- 
 vors, but still a fallacy. If it stands on the doctrine 
 of this being a probationary state, it is liable to this 
 dilemma. Omniscience, to whom possibility must 
 be clear as act, must know of the child, what it would 
 hereafter turn out : if good, then the topic is false to 
 say it is secured from falling into future wilfulness, 
 vice, &c. If bad, I do not see how its exemption 
 from certain future overt acts, by being snatched 
 away, at all tells in its favour. You stop the arm of 
 a murderer, or arrest the finger of a pickpurse ; but is 
 not the guilt incurred as much by the intent as if 
 never so much acted ? Why children are hurried off, 
 and old reprobates of a hundred left, whose trial 
 humanly we may think was complete at fifty, is 
 among the obscurities of Providence. The very 
 notion of a state of probation has darkness in it. 
 The All-knower has no need of satisfying His eyes by
 
 496 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 seeing what we will do, when He knows before what 
 we will do. Methinks we might be condemned be- 
 fore commission. In these things we grope and 
 flounder, and if we can pick up a little human com- 
 fort that the child taken is snatched from vice, (no 
 great compliment to it, by the by,) let us take it. And 
 as to where an untried child goes, whether to join the 
 assembly of its elders who have borne the heat of the 
 day — fire-purified martyrs, and torment-sifted confes- 
 sors — what know we? We promise heaven, me- 
 thinks, too cheaply, and assign large revenues to 
 minors, incompetent to manage them. Epitaphs 
 run upon this topic of consolation, till the very fre- 
 quency induces a cheapness. Tickets for admission 
 into Paradise are sculptured out at a penny a letter, 
 twopence a syllable, &c. It is all a mystery ; and the 
 more I try to express my meaning (having none that 
 is clear), the more I founder. Finally, write what 
 your own conscience, which to you is the unerring 
 judge, seems best, and be careless about the whimsies 
 of such a half-baked notionist as I am. We are here 
 in a most pleasant country, full of walks, and idle to 
 our hearts' desire. Taylor has dropt the London. It 
 was indeed a dead weight. It has got in the Slough 
 of Despond. I shuffle off my part of the pack, and 
 stand like Christian with light and merry shoulders. 
 It had got silly, indecorous, pert, and everything that 
 is bad. Both our kind remembrances to Mrs. K. and 
 yourself, and strangers'-greeting to Lucy (is it Lucy 
 or Ruth ?) that gathers wise sayings in a Book. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CCIV.] Feb. 7th, 1826. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I got your book not more than five
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 497 
 
 days ago, so am not so negligent as I must have ap- 
 peared to you with a fortnight's sin upon my shoul- 
 ders. I tell you with sincerity, that I think you have 
 completely succeeded in what you intended to do. 
 What is poetry may be disputed. These are poetry, 
 to me at least. They are concise, pithy, and moving. 
 Uniform as they are, and untristorify'd, I read them 
 through at two sittings, without one sensation ap- 
 proaching to tedium. I do not know that among 
 your many kind presents of this nature, this is not 
 my favourite volume. The language is never lax, 
 and there is a unity of design and feeling. You wrote 
 them with love — to avoid the coxcombical phrase, con 
 amove. I am particularly pleased with the " Spiritual 
 Law," pages 34 and 35. It reminded me of Quarles, 
 and " holy Mr. Herbert," as Izaak Walton calls him ; 
 the two best, if not only, of our devotional poets, 
 though some prefer Watts, and some Tom Moore. I 
 am far from well, or in my right spirits, and shudder 
 at pen-and-ink work. I poke out a monthly crudity 
 for Colburn in his magazine, which I call " Popular 
 Fallacies," and periodically crush a proverb or two, 
 setting up my folly against the wisdom of nations. 
 Do you see the New Monthly ? 
 
 One word I must object to in your little book, and 
 it recurs more than once — fadeless is no genuine com- 
 pound ; loveless is, because love is a noun as well as 
 verb ; but what is a fade ? And I do not quite like 
 whipping the Greek drama upon the back of " Genesis/' 
 page 8. I do not like praise handed in by disparage- 
 ment ; as I objected to a side censure on Byron, &c. 
 in the " Lines on Bloomfield." With these poor 
 cavils excepted, your verses are without a flaw. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 VOL. I. 2 K
 
 498 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Letter CCV.] March 20th, 1826. 
 
 Dear B. B., — You may know my letters by the 
 paper and the folding. -For the former, I live on 
 scraps obtained in charity from an old friend, whose 
 stationery is a permanent perquisite ; for folding, 
 I shall do it neatly when I learn to tie my neck- 
 cloths. I surprise most of my friends by writing 
 to them on ruled paper, as if I had not got past 
 pot-hooks and hangers. Sealing-wax, I have none 
 on my establishment ; wafers of the coarsest bran 
 supply its place. When my epistles come to be 
 weighed with Pliny's, however superior to the Roman 
 in delicate irony, judicious reflections, &c, his gilt 
 post will bribe over the judges to him. All the time 
 I was at the E. I. H. I never mended a pen; I now 
 cut 'em to the stumps, marring rather than mending 
 the primitive goose-quill. I cannot bear to pay for 
 articles I used to get for nothing. When Adam laid 
 out his first penny upon nonpareils at some stall in 
 Mesopotamos, I think it went hard with him, reflect- 
 ing upon his old goodly orchard, where he had so 
 many for nothing. When I write to a great man at 
 the Court end, he opens with surprise upon a naked 
 note, such as Whitechapel people interchange, with 
 no sweet degrees of envelope. I ne^er enclosed one 
 bit of paper in another, nor understood the rationale 
 of it. Once only I sealed with borrowed wax, to set 
 Walter Scott a wondering, signed with the imperial 
 quartered arms of England, which my friend Field 
 gives in compliment to his descent, in the female 
 line, from Oliver Cromwell. It must have set his 
 antiquarian curiosity upon watering. To your ques- 
 tions upon the currency, I refer you to Mr. Robin- 
 son's last speech, where, if you can find a solution, I
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 499 
 
 can not. I think this, though, the best ministry we 
 ever stumbled upon ; — gin reduced four shillings in 
 the gallon, wine two shillings in the quart ! This 
 comes home to men's minds and bosoms. My tirade 
 against visitors was not meant particularly at you or 
 
 A. K . I scarce know what I meant, for I do not 
 
 just now feel the grievance. I wanted to make an 
 article. So in another thing I talked of somebody's 
 insipid wife, without a correspondent object in my 
 head : and a good lady, a friend's wife, whom I really 
 love, (don't startle, I mean in a licit way,) has looked 
 shyly on me ever since. The blunders of personal 
 application are ludicrous. I send out a character 
 every now and then, on purpose to exercise the inge- 
 nuity of my friends. " Popular Fallacies" will go on; 
 that word " concluded" is an erratum, T suppose for 
 " continued." I do not know how it got stuffed in there. 
 A little thing without name will also be printed on 
 the Religion of the Actors, but it is out of your way, 
 so I recommend you, with true author's hypocrisy, 
 to skip it. We are about to sit down to roast beef, 
 at which we could wish A. K., B. B., and B. B.'? 
 pleasant daughter to be humble partakers. So much 
 for my hint at visitors, which was scarcely calculated 
 for droppers-in from Woodbridge ; the sky does not 
 drop such larks every day. My very kindest wishes 
 to you all three, with my sister's best love. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CCVL] May 16th, i8z6. 
 
 Dear B. B.,— I have had no spirits lately to begin 
 a letter to you, though I am under obligations to you 
 (how many !) for your neat little poem. 'Tis just 
 
 2 K 2
 
 500 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 what it professes to be, a simple tribute, in chaste 
 verse, serious and sincere. 
 
 I do not know how friends will relish it, but we 
 outlyers, honorary friends, like it very well. I have 
 had my head and ears stuffed up with the East winds : 
 a continual ringing in my brain of bells jangled, or 
 the spheres touched by some raw angel. Is it not 
 George the Third trying the Hundredth Psalm ? I 
 get my music for nothing. But the weather seems 
 to be softening, and will thaw my stunnings. Cole- 
 ridge, writing to me a week or two since, begins his 
 note — " Summer has set in with its usual severity." 
 A cold Summer is all I know of disagreeable in cold. 
 I do not mind the utmost rigour of real Winter, but 
 these smiling hypocrites of Mays wither me to 
 death. My head has been a ringing chaos, like the 
 day the winds were made, before they submitted to 
 the discipline of a weathercock, before the quarters 
 were made. In the street, with the blended noises 
 of life about me, I hear, and my head is lightened ; 
 but in a room the hubbub comes back, and I am deaf 
 as a sinner. Did I tell you of a pleasant sketch 
 Hood has done, which he calls — " Very deaf indeed "? 
 It is of a good-natured stupid-looking old gentleman, 
 whom a footpad has stopped, but for his extreme 
 deafness cannot make him understand what he 
 wants. The unconscious old gentleman is extending 
 his ear-trumpet very complacently, and the fellow is 
 firing a pistol into it to make him hear, but the ball 
 will pierce his skull sooner than the report will reach 
 his sensorium. I choose a very little bit of paper, for 
 my ear hisses when I bend down to write. I can 
 hardly read a book, for I miss that small soft voice 
 which the idea of articulated words raises (almost
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 501 
 
 imperceptibly to you) in a silent reader. I seem too 
 deaf to see what I read. But with a touch or two of 
 returning zephyr my head will melt. What lies you 
 poets tell about the May ! It is the most ungenial 
 part of the year. Cold crocuses, cold primroses, you 
 take your blossoms in ice — a painted sun. 
 
 " Unmeaning joy around appears, 
 And Nature smiles as if she sneers." 
 
 It is ill with me when I begin to look which way 
 the wind sets. Ten years ago, I literally did not 
 know the point from the broad end of the vane, 
 which it was that indicated the quarter. I hope 
 these ill winds have blown over you as they do 
 through me. 
 
 Kindest remembrances to you and yours. C. L. 
 
 So A. K. keeps a school ; she teaches nothing 
 wrong, I'll answer for 't. I have a Dutch print of a 
 school-mistress ; little old-fashioned Fleminglings, 
 with only one face among them. She a princess of 
 a school-mistress, wielding a rod for form more than 
 use ; the scene, an old monastic chapel, with a 
 Madonna over her head, looking just as serious, as 
 thoughtful, as pure, as gentle as herself. Tis a type 
 of thy friend. 
 
 Yours, with kindest wishes to your daughter and 
 friend, in which Mary joins, C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CCVIL] i826 . 
 
 Dear B. B., — I don't know why I have delayed so 
 long writing. 'Twas a fault. The under-current of 
 excuse to my mind was that I had heard of the vessel 
 in which Mitford's jars were to come ; that it had
 
 502 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 been obliged to put into Batavia to refit (which 
 accounts for its delay), but was daily expected. Days 
 are past, and it comes not, and the mermaids may be 
 drinking their tea out of his china for aught I know ; 
 but let's hope not. In the meantime I have paid 
 £"28, &c. for the freight and prime cost, which I a 
 little expected he would have settled in London. But 
 do not mention it. I was enabled to do it by a receipt 
 of £30 from Colburn, with whom, however, I have 
 done. I should else have run short ; for I only just 
 make ends meet. We will wait the arrival of the 
 trinkets, and to ascertain their full expense, and then 
 bring in the bill. Don't mention it, for I dare say 
 'twas mere thoughtlessness. I am sorry you and 
 yours have any plagues about dress matters. I have 
 been sadly puzzled at the defalcation of more than 
 one third of my income, out of which when entire 
 I saved nothing. 1 But cropping of wine, old books, 
 &c. &c, in short, all that can be called pocket-money, 
 I hope to be able to go on at the cottage. Remember, 
 I beg of you not to say any thing to Mitford, for if he 
 be honest it will vex him : if not, which I as little 
 expect as that you should be, I have a hank still 
 upon the jars. 
 
 Colburn .had something of mine in last month, 
 which he has had in hand these seven months, and 
 had lost, or couldn't find room for : I was used to 
 different treatment in the London, and have forsworn 
 periodicals. I am going thro' a course of reading at 
 the Museum : the Garrick plays, out of part of which 
 I formed my specimens. I have two thousand to go 
 
 1 Iamb's income, when he retired, was somewhere about £600. His 
 pension was £450. He was probably not a first-rate manager.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 503 
 
 thro' ; and in a few weeks have despatched the tythe 
 of 'em. It is a sort of office to me ; hours, ten to 
 four, the same. It does me good. Man must have 
 regular occupation, that has been used to it. 
 
 Will you pardon my neglect? Mind, again I say, 
 don't show this to M. ; let me wait a little longer to 
 know the event of his luxuries. I am sure he is a 
 good fellow, tho' I made a serious Yorkshire lad 
 stare when I said he was a clergyman. He is a 
 pleasant layman spoiled. Heaven send him his jars 
 uncrack'd, and me my 
 
 Yours, with kindest wishes to your daughter and 
 friend, in which Mary joins, 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CCVIII. 1826. 
 
 Dear B. B., (the Busy Bee, as Hood after Dr. 
 Watts apostrophizes thee, and well dost thou deserve 
 it for thy labours in the Muses' gardens, wandering 
 over parterres of Think-on-mes and Forget-me-nots, 
 to a total impossibility of forgetting thee,) thy letter 
 was acceptable, thy scruples may be dismissed, thou 
 art rectus in curia, not a word more to be said, verbum 
 sapienti, and so forth, the matter is decided with a 
 white stone, classically, mark me, and the apparitions 
 vanish'd which haunted me, only the cramp, Caliban's 
 distemper, clawing me in the calvish part of my 
 nature, makes me ever and anon roar bullishly, 
 squeak cowardishly, and limp cripple-ishly. Do I 
 write quakerly and simply, 'tis my most Master 
 Mathews's like intention to do it. See Ben Jonson. 
 — I think 5'ou told me your acquaintance with the 
 Drama was confin'd to Shakspeare and Miss Baillie :
 
 504 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 some read only Milton and Croly. The gap is as 
 from an ananas to a turnip. I have fighting in my 
 head the plots, characters, situations, and sentiments 
 of 400 old plays (bran new to me) which I have been 
 digesting at the Museum, and my appetite sharpens 
 to twice as many more, which I mean to course over 
 this Winter. I can scarce avoid dialogue fashion in 
 this letter. I soliloquize my meditations, and habi- 
 tually speak dramatic blank verse without meaning it. 
 Do you see Mitford ? He will tell you something of 
 my labours. Tell him I am sorry to have missed 
 seeing him, to have talked over those old Treasures. 
 I am still more sorry for his missing Pots. But I 
 shall be sure of the earliest intelligence of the Lost 
 Tribes. His Sacred Specimens 1 are a thankful addi- 
 tion to my shelves. Marry, I could wish he had been 
 more careful of corrigenda. I have discover'd certain 
 which have slipt his errata. I put 'em in the next 
 page, as perhaps thou canst transmit them to him ; 
 for what purpose but to grieve him, (which yet I 
 should be sorry to do,) but then it shows my learning, 
 and the excuse is complimentary, as it implies their 
 correction in a future edition. His own things in the 
 book are magnificent, and as an old Christ's Hospi- 
 taller I was particularly refresh'd with his eulogy on 
 our Edward. Many of the choice excerpta were new 
 to me. Old Christmas is a coming, to the confusion 
 of Puritans, Muggletonians, Anabaptists, Quakers, 
 and that unwassailing crew. He cometh not with 
 his wonted gait; he is shrunk nine inches in his 
 girth, but is yet a lusty fellow. Hood's book- is 
 
 1 Sacred Specimens selected from the early English Poets, 1827, 8vo. 
 
 2 The Comic Annual.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 505 
 
 mighty clever, and went off 600 copies the first day. 
 Sion's Songs do not disperse so quickly. The next 
 leaf is for Rev. J. M. In this adieu, thine briefly, in 
 a tall friendship, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CCIX.] June nth, 1827. 
 
 Dear B. B., —Martin's "Belshazzar" 1 (the picture) 
 I have seen. Its architectural effect is stupendous ; 
 but the human figures, the squalling contorted little 
 antics that are playing at being frightened, like 
 children at a sham ghost, who half know it to be 
 a mask, are detestable. Then the letters are nothing 
 more than a transparency lighted up, such as a Lord 
 might order to be lit up on a sudden at a Christmas 
 gambol, to scare the ladies. The type is as plain as 
 Baskerville's : they should have been dim, full of 
 mystery, letters to the mind rather than the eye. 
 
 Rembrandt has painted only Belshazzar and a 
 courtier or two, (taking a part of the banquet for the 
 whole,) not fribbled out a mob of fine folks. Then 
 every thing is so distinct, to the very necklaces, and 
 that foolish little prophet. What one point is there 
 of interest ? The ideal of such a subject is, that you 
 the spectator should see nothing but what at the 
 time you would have seen, — the hand, and the King, 
 — not to be at leisure to make tailor-remarks on the 
 dresses, or, Dr. Kitchener-like, to examine the good 
 things at table. 
 
 1 One of the grand Scripture History subjects, by John Martin, 
 K. L., of Chelsea, illustrator of Milton, &c. He wrote, but did not 
 publish, Treatises on the Drainage of the Thames, on Defences, and 
 on the Copyright Law.
 
 506 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Just such a confused piece is his "Joshua," frit- 
 tered into a thousand fragments, little armies here, 
 little armies there — you should see only the Sun and 
 Joshua. If I remember, he has not left out that 
 luminary entirely ; but for Joshua, I was ten minutes 
 a finding him out. Still he is showy in all that is 
 not the human figure or the preternatural interest : 
 but the first are below a drawing-school girl's attain- 
 ment, and the last is a phantasmagoric trick,— -" Now 
 you shall see what you shall see, dare is Balshazar 
 and dare is Daniel." 
 
 You have my thoughts of M., and so adieu ! 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CCX.] • August 10, 1817. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I have not been able to answer you, 
 for we have had and are having (I just snatch a 
 moment) our poor quiet retreat, to which we fled 
 from society, full of company — some staying with us ; 
 and this moment, as I write, almost, a heavy impor- 
 tation of two old ladies has come in. Whither can I 
 take wing from the oppression of human faces ? 
 Would I were in a wilderness of apes, tossing cocoa- 
 nuts about, grinning and grinned at ! 
 
 Mitford was hoaxing you, surely, about my en- 
 graving ; 'tis a little sixpenny thing, 1 too like by half, 
 
 1 " There was a caricature of him (Lamb) sold in the shops, which 
 pretended to be a likeness. Procter went into the shop in a passion, 
 and. asked the man what he meant by putting forth such a libel. The 
 man apologized, and said that the artist meant no offence." — Leigh 
 Hunt's Autobiography, ed. i860, p. 274. Lamb was 5 feet 5 inches 
 high. This portrait was not unfaithful as regarded the general like- 
 ness and the dress, but the proportions were bad ; and besides, the copy 
 was very inferior to the original drawing on copper, and possessed by 
 Mr. A. C. Swinburne.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 507 
 
 in which the draughtsman has done his best to avoid 
 flattery. There have been two editions of it, which 
 I think are all gone, as they have vanished from the 
 window where they hung— a print-shop, corner of 
 Great and Little Queen Streets, Lincoln's Inn Fields, 
 where any London friend of yours may inquire for 
 it ; for I am (though you won't understand it) at 
 Enfield Chase, (Mrs. Leishman's). We have been 
 here near three months, and shall stay two more, if 
 people will let us alone ; but they persecute us from 
 village to village. So, don't direct to Islington again, 
 till further notice. I am trying my hand at a drama, 
 in two acts, founded on Crabbe's "Confidant." 
 mutatis mutandis. You like the Odyssey. Did you 
 ever read my " Adventures of Ulysses," founded on 
 Chapman's old translation of it ? For children or men 
 Chapman is divine, and my abridgment has not 
 quite emptied him of his divinity. When you come 
 to town I'll show it to you. You have well described 
 your old-fashioned grand paternal hall. Is it not odd 
 that every one's earliest recollections are of some 
 such place ! I had my Blakesware (Blakesmoor in 
 the London). Nothing fills a child's mind like a 
 large old mansion ; better if un — or partially — occu- 
 pied ; peopled with the spirits of deceased members 
 of the county and justices of the quorum. Would I 
 were buried in the peopled solitudes of one, with my 
 feelings at seven years old ! Those marble busts of 
 the emperors, they seemed as if they were to stand for 
 ever, as they had stood from the living days of Rome, 
 in that old marble hall, and I to partake of their per- 
 manency. Eternity was, while I thought not of 
 Time. But he thought of me, and they are toppled 
 down, and corn covers the spot of the noble old
 
 508 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 dwelling and its princely gardens. I feel like a 
 grasshopper that, chirping about the grounds, escaped 
 his scythe only by my littleness. Even now he is 
 whetting one of his smallest razors to clean wipe me 
 out, perhaps. Well ! 
 
 Letter CCXI.] August 24th, 1827. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I am thankful to you for your ready 
 compliance with my wishes. Emma is delighted 
 with your verses, to which I have appended this 
 notice, "The sixth line refers to the child of a dear 
 friend of the author's, named Emma," without which 
 it must be obscure, and have sent it with four album 
 poems of my own (your daughter's with your heading, 
 requesting it a place next mine,) to a Mr. Fraser, who 
 is to be editor of a more superb pocket-book than has 
 yet appeared, by far! the property of some wealthy 
 booksellers ; but whom, or what its name, I forgot to 
 ask. It is actually to have in it schoolboy exercises 
 by his present Majesty and the late Duke of York. 
 So Lucy will come to Court ; how she will be stared 
 at .! Wordsworth is named as a contributor. Fraser, 
 whom I have slightly seen, is editor of a forthcome 
 or coming review of foreign books, and is intimately 
 connected with Lockhart, &c. So I take it that this 
 is a concern of Murray's. Walter Scott also con- 
 tributes mainly. I have stood off a long time from 
 these annuals, which are ostentatious trumpery, but 
 could not withstand the request of Jameson, a par- 
 ticular friend of mine and Coleridge. 
 
 I shall hate myself in frippery, strutting along, and 
 vying finery with beaux and belles, with " future
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 509 
 
 Lord Byrons and sweet L. E. Ls." Your taste, I see, 
 is less simple than mine, which the difference in our 
 persuasions has doubtless effected. In fact, of late 
 you have so Frenchified your style, larding it with 
 hors de combat, and au desopoirs, that o' my conscience 
 the Foxian blood is quite dried out of you, and the 
 skipping Monsieur spirit has been infused. Doth 
 Lucy go to balls ? I must remodel my lines, which 
 I wrote for her. I hope A. K. keeps to her 
 primitives. 
 
 If you have any thing you'd like to send further, 
 I dare say an honourable place would be given to it ; 
 but I have not heard from Fraser since I sent mine, 
 nor shall probably again, and therefore I do not 
 solicit it as from him. Yesterday I sent off my 
 tragi-comedy to Mr. Kemble. Wish it luck. I made 
 it all ('tis blank verse, and I think of the true old 
 dramatic cut) or most of it in the green lanes about 
 Enfield, where I am, and mean to remain, in spite of 
 your peremptory doubts on that head. Your refusal 
 to lend your poetical sanction to my " Icon," and 
 your reasons to Evans, are most sensible. Maybe I 
 may hit on a line or two of my own jocular ; maybe 
 not. Do you never Londonize again ? I should like 
 to talk over old poetry with you, of which I have 
 much, and you, I think, little. Do your Drummonds 1 
 allow no holidays ? I would willingly come and 
 work for you a three weeks or so, to let you loose. 
 Would I could sell or give you some of my leisure ! 
 Positively, the best thing a man can have to do is 
 nothing, and next to that perhaps — good works. I 
 am but poorlyish, and feel myself writing a dull 
 
 1 Barton was clerk in a London Bank.
 
 510 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 letter ; poorlyish from company ; not generally, for 
 I never was better, nor took more walks, fourteen 
 miles a day on an average, with a sporting dog, 
 Dash. You would not know the plain poet, any 
 more than he doth recognise James Nayler trick'd 
 out au deserpoy 1 (how do you spell it ?) En passant, 
 jf ai me entendre de mon bon homme sur surveillance 
 de croix, ma pas Vhomme figuratif. Do you under- 
 stand me ? 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CCXIL] Dec. 4th, 1827. 
 
 My dear B. B., — I have scarce spirits to write, yet 
 am harassed with not writing. Nine weeks are com- 
 pleted, and Mary does not get any better. It is per- 
 fectly exhausting. Enfield, and everything, is very 
 gloomy. But for long experience I should fear her 
 ever getting well. I feel most thankful for the spin- 
 sterly attentions of your sister. Thank the kind 
 "knitter in the sun !" What nonsense seems verse, 
 when one is seriously out of hope and spirits ! I 
 mean, that at this time I have some nonsense to 
 write, under pain of incivility. Would to the fifth 
 heaven no coxcombess had invented Albums ! 
 
 I have not had a Bijoux, nor the slightest notice 
 from Pickering 2 about omitting four out of five of my 
 things. The best thing is never to hear of such a 
 thing as a bookseller again, or to think there are 
 publishers. Second-hand stationers and old book-stalls 
 for me. Authorship should be an idea of the past. 
 Old kings, old bishops, are venerable ; all present is 
 
 Desespoir. The publisher of that name.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 51 1 
 
 hollow. I cannot make a letter. I have no straw, 
 not a pennyworth of chaff, only this may stop your 
 kind importunity to know about us. Here is a com- 
 fortable house, but no tenants. One does not make a 
 household. Do not think I am quite in despair ; but, in 
 addition to hope protracted, I have a stupifying cold 
 and obstructing headache, and the sun is dead. 
 
 I will not fail to apprise you of the revival of a. 
 beam. Meantime accept this, rather than, think I 
 have forgotten you all. Best remembrances. 
 
 Yours and theirs truly, C. Lamb. 
 
 Letter CCXIIL] 1827. 
 
 My dear B. B., — You will understand my silence 
 when I tell you that my sister, on the very eve of 
 entering into a new house we have taken at Enfield, 
 was surprised with an attack of one of her sad long 
 illnesses, which deprive me of her society, though 
 not of her domestication, for eight or nine weeks 
 together. I see her, but it does her no good. But 
 for this, we have the snuggest, most comfortable 
 house, with every thing most compact and desirable. 
 Colebrook is a wilderness. The books, prints, &c, 
 are come here, and the New River came down with 
 us. The familiar prints, the bust, the Milton, seem 
 scarce to have changed their rooms. One of her last 
 observations was " How frightfully like this room is 
 to our room in Islington !" — our up-stairs room, she 
 meant. How I hope you will come some better day, 
 and judge of it ! We have tried quiet here for four 
 months, and I will answer for the comfort of it 
 enduring.
 
 512 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 On emptying my bookshelves I found an Ulysses, 
 which I will send to A. K. when I go to town, for her 
 acceptance — unless the book be out of print. One 
 likes to have one copy of every thing one does. I 
 neglected to keep one of " Poetry for Children," the 
 joint production of Mary and me, and it is not to be 
 had for love or money. It had in the title-page " by 
 the Author of Mrs. Lester's School." Know you any 
 one that has it, and would exchange it ? 
 
 Strolling to Waltham Cross the other day, I hit off 
 these lines. It is one of the crosses which Edward 
 I. caused to be built for his wife at every town 
 where her corpse rested between Northamptonshire 
 and London : — 
 
 A stately cross each sad spot doth attest, 
 
 Whereat the corpse of Eleanor did rest, 
 
 From Herdby fetch'd — her spouse so honour'd her — 
 
 To sleep with royal dust at Westminster. 
 
 And, if less pompous obsequies were thine, 
 
 Duke Brunswick's daughter, princely Caroline, 
 
 Grudge not, great ghost, nor count thy funeral losses : 
 
 Thou in thy life-time had'st thy share of crosses. 
 
 My dear B., — My head aches with this little ex- 
 cursion. Pray accept two sides for three for once, 
 and believe me yours sadly, C. L. 
 
 Chase Side, Enfield. 
 
 Letter CCXIV.] 1827. 
 
 My dear B., — We are all pretty well again and 
 comfortable, and I take a first opportunity of sending 
 the "Adventures of Ulysses," hoping that among us — 
 Homer, Chapman, and Co. — we shall afford you some 
 pleasure. I fear it is out of print; if not, A. K. will
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 513 
 
 accept it, with wishes it were bigger ; if another copy 
 is not to be had, it reverts to me and my heirs for 
 ever. With it I send a trumpery book ; to which, 
 without my knowledge the editor of the Bijoux has 
 contributed Lucy's verses : I am ashamed to ask her 
 acceptance of the trash accompanying it. Adieu to 
 Albums — for a great while — I said when I came here, 
 and had not been fixed for two days ; but my land- 
 lord's daughter (not at the Pot house) requested me 
 to write in her female friends' and in her own. If I go 
 
 to thou art there also, O all pervading Album ! 
 
 All over the Leeward Islands, in Newfoundland, and 
 the Back Settlements, I understand there is no other 
 reading. They haunt me. I die of Albophobia ! 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CCXV.] 1827. 
 
 My dear B. B., — A gentleman I never saw before 
 brought me your welcome present. Imagine a 
 scraping, fiddling, fidgeting, petit-maitre of a dancing 
 school advancing into my plain parlour with a coupee 
 and a sideling bow, and presenting the book as if he 
 had been handing a glass of lemonade to a young 
 miss : imagine this, and contrast it with the serious 
 nature of the book presented ! Then task your 
 imagination, reversing this picture, to conceive of 
 quite an opposite messenger, a lean, strait-locked, 
 whey-faced Methodist, for such was he in reality 
 who brought it, the Genius (it seems) of the 
 Wesleyan Magazine. Certes, friend B., thy Widow's 
 Tale is too horrible, spite of the lenitives of Religion, 
 to embody in verse; I hold prose to be the appropriate 
 expositor of such atrocities ! No offence, but it is a 
 
 vol. 1. 2 L
 
 514 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 cordial that makes the heart sick. Still thy skill in 
 compounding it I do not deny. I turn to what gave 
 me less mingled pleasure. I find mark'd with pencil 
 these pages in thy pretty book, and fear I have been 
 penurious : — 
 
 Page 52, 53— Capital. 
 
 5g — 6th stanza, exquisite simile. 
 61 — nth stanza, equally good. 
 108 — 3rd stanza, I long to see Van Balen. 
 in — A downright good sonnet. Dixi. 
 153 — Lines at the bottom. 
 
 So you see, I read, hear, and mark, if I don't learn. 
 In short, this little volume is no discredit to any of 
 your former, and betrays none of the senility you 
 fear about. Apropos of Van Balen, an artist who 
 painted me lately, had painted a blackamoor praying, 
 and not filling his canvas, stuffed in his little girl 
 aside of blackey, gaping at him unmeaningly ; and 
 then didn't know what to call it. Now for a picture 
 to be promoted to the Exhibition (Suffolk Street) as 
 Historical, a subject is requisite. What does me ? 
 I but christened it the " Young Catechist " and fur- 
 bish'd it with dialogue following, which dubb'd it an 
 Historical Painting. Nothing to a friend at need. 
 
 "While this tawny Ethiop prayeth, 
 Painter, who is she that stayeth 
 By, with skin of whitest lustre; 
 Sunny locks, a shining cluster; 
 Saint-like seeming to direct him 
 To the Power that must protect him ? 
 Is she of the heav'n-born Three, 
 Meek Hope, strong Faith, sweet Charity? 
 Or some Cherub ?
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 515 
 
 They you mention 
 Far transcend my weak invention. 
 'Tis a simple Christian child, 
 Missionary young and mild, 
 From her store of Script'ral knowledge, 
 (Bible-taught, without a college,) 
 Which by reading she could gather, 
 Teaches him to say Our Father 
 To the common Parent, who 
 Colour not respects, nor hue. 
 White and black in Him have part, 
 Who looks not to the skin, but heart." 
 
 When I'd done it, the artist (who had clapt in Miss 
 merely as a fill-space) swore I exprest his full mean- 
 ing, and the damosel bridled up into a missionary's 
 vanity. I like verses to explain pictures ; seldom 
 pictures to illustrate poems. Your woodcut is a 
 rueful lignum mortis. By the by, is the widow 
 likely to marry again ? 
 
 I am giving the fruit of my old play reading at the 
 Museum to Hone, 1 who sets forth a portion weekly 
 in the Table Book. Do you see it ? How is Mitford ? 
 — I'll just hint that the pitcher, the chord, and the 
 bowl are a little too often repeated (passim) in your 
 book, and that in page 17, last line but 4, him is put 
 for he ; but the poor widow I take it had small leisure 
 for grammatical niceties. Don't you see there's he, 
 myself, and him; why not both him? likewise imper- 
 viously is cruelly spelt imperiously . These are trifles, 
 and I honestly like your book, and you for giving it, 
 though I really am ashamed of so many presents. I 
 can think of no news ; therefore I will end with 
 mine and Mary's kindest remembrances to you and 
 yours. C. L. 
 
 1 The Extracts from the Garrick plays, published in the Table 
 Book. 
 
 2 L 2
 
 516 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Letter CCXVL] [April 21st, 1828.] 
 
 Dear B. B., — You must excuse my silence. I have 
 been in very poor health and spirits, and cannot write 
 letters. I only write to assure you, as you wish'd, of 
 my existence. All that which Mitford tells you of 
 His book 1 is rhodomontade, only H. has written un- 
 guardedly about me, and nothing makes a man more 
 foolish than his own foolish panegyric. But I am 
 pretty well used to flattery, and its contrary. Neither 
 affects me a turnip's worth. Do you see the author 
 of " May you like it ?" Do you write to him ? Will 
 you give my present plea to him of ill health for not 
 acknowledging a pretty book with a pretty frontispiece 
 he sent me. He is most esteemed by me. As for 
 subscribing to books, in plain truth I am a man of 
 reduced income, and don't allow myself 12 shillings 
 a-year to buy old books with ; which must be my 
 excuse. I am truly sorry for Murray's demur ; but I 
 wash my hands of all booksellers, and hope to know 
 them no more. I am sick and poorly, and must leave 
 off with our joint kind remembrances to your daughter 
 and friend A. K. 
 
 [No Signature.] 
 
 Letter CCXVII.] Oct. nth, 1828. 
 
 A splendid edition of " Bunyan's Pilgrim !" Why, 
 the thought is enough to turn one's moral stomach. 
 His cockle-hat and staff transformed to a smart cock'd 
 beaver and a jemmy cane ; his amice grey, to the 
 last Regent Street cut ; and his painful palmer's pace 
 
 1 The notice of Lamb in Hone's Table Book.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 517 
 
 to the modern swagger. Stop thy friend's sacrilegious 
 hand. Nothing can be done for B. but to reprint the 
 old cuts in as homely but good a style as possible. 
 The Vanity Fair, and the Pilgrims there — the Silly- 
 soothness in his setting-out countenance — the Chris- 
 tian Idiocy (in a good sense) of his admiration of the 
 shepherds on the Delectable Mountains ; the lions, 
 so truly allegorical, and remote from any similitude 
 to Pidcock's ; the great head (the author's), capacious 
 of dreams and similitudes, dreaming in the dungeon. 
 Perhaps you don't know my edition, what I had when 
 a child. If you do, can you bear new designs from 
 Martin, enamelled into copper or silver plate by 
 Heath, accompanied with verses from Mrs. Hemans's 
 pen, O how unlike his own ! 
 
 " Wouldst thou divert thyself from melancholy ? 
 Wouldst thou be pleasant, yet be far from folly ? 
 Wouldst thou read riddles, and their explanation ? 
 Or else be drown'd in thy contemplation ? 
 Dost thou love picking meat ? or wouldst thou see 
 A man in the clouds, and hear him speak to thee? 
 Wouldst thou be in a dream, and yet not sleep ? 
 Or wouldst thou in a moment laugh and weep ?• 
 Or wouldst thou lose thyself, and catch no harm, 
 And find thyself again without a charm ? 
 Wouldst read thyself, and read thou knowest not what, 
 And yet know whether thou art blest or not 
 By reading the same lines ? O then come hither, 
 And lay my book, thy head, and heart together. 
 
 "John Bunyan." 
 
 Show me such poetry in any one of the fifteen forth- 
 coming combinations of show and emptiness, yclept 
 " Annuals." So there's verses for thy verses ; and 
 now let me tell you, that the sight of your hand glad- 
 dened me. I have been daily trying to write to you,
 
 518 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 but paralysed. You have spurred me on this tiny 
 effort, and at intervals I hope to hear from and talk 
 to you. But my spirits have been in an opprest way 
 for a long long time, and they are things which must 
 be to you of faith, for who can explain depression ? 
 Yes, I am hooked into the " Gem," but only for some 
 lines written on a dead infant of the Editor's, which 
 being, as it were, his property, I could not refuse 
 their appearing ; but I hate the paper, the type, the 
 gloss, the dandy plates, the names of contributors 
 poked up into your eyes in first page, and whistled 
 through all the covers of magazines, the barefaced 
 sort of emulation, the immodest candidateship. 
 Brought into so little space— in those old " Lon- 
 dons," a signature was lost in the wood of matter, 
 the paper coarse (till latterly, which spoiled them) ; 
 in short, I detest to appear in an Annual. What a 
 fertile genius (and a quiet good soul withal) is Hood ! 
 He has fifty things in hand : farces to supply the 
 Adelphi for the season ; a comedy for one of the 
 great theatres, just ready ; a whole entertainment, 
 by himself, for Mathews and Yates to figure in ; a 
 meditated Comic Annual for next year, to oe nearly 
 done by himself. You'd like him very much. 
 
 Wordsworth, I see, has a good many pieces an- 
 nounced in one of 'em, not our Gem. W. Scott has 
 distributed himself like a bribe haunch among 'em. 
 Of all the poets, Cary has had the good sense to keep 
 quite clear of 'em, with clergy-gentlemanly right 
 notions. Don't think I set up for being proud on this 
 point ; I like a bit of flattery, tickling my vanity, as 
 well as any one. But these pompous masquerades 
 without masks (naked names or faces) I hate. So 
 there's a bit of my mind. Besides, they infallibly cheat
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 519 
 
 you ; I mean the booksellers. If I get but a copy, I 
 only expect it from Hood's being my friend. Coleridge 
 has lately been here. He too is deep among the pro- 
 phets, the year-servers, — the mob of gentlemen an- 
 nuals. But they'll cheat him, I know. And now, 
 dear B. B., the sun shining out merrily, and the 
 dirty clouds we had yesterday having washed their 
 own faces clean with their own rain, tempts me to 
 wander up Winchmore Hill, or into some of the de- 
 lightful vicinages of Enfield, which I hope to show 
 you at some time when you can get a few days up to 
 the great town. Believe me, it would give both of us 
 great pleasure to show you all three (we can lodge 
 you) our pleasant farms and villages. 
 
 We both join in kindest loves to you and yours. 
 
 C. Lamb, redivivus. 
 
 Letter CCXVIIL] Dec 5th, 1828. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I am ashamed to receive so many 
 nice books from you, and to have none to send you 
 in return. You are always sending me some fruits 
 or wholesome potherbs, and mine is the garden of 
 the Sluggard, nothing but weeds, or scarce they. 
 Nevertheless, if I knew how to transmit it, I would 
 send you Blackwood's of this month, which contains 
 a little drama, to have your opinion of it, and how 
 far I have improved, or otherwise, upon its proto- 
 type. Thank you for your kind sonnet. It does me 
 good to see the Dedication to a Christian Bishop. I 
 am for a comprehension, as divines call it; but so as 
 that the Church shall go a good deal more than half 
 way over to the silent Meeting-house. I have ever
 
 520 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 said that the Quakers are the only professors of 
 Christianity as I read it in the Evangiles. I say pro- 
 fessors : marry, as to practice, with their gaudy hot 
 types and poetical vanities, they are much as one 
 with the sinful. Martin's Frontispiece is a very fine 
 thing, let C. L. say what he pleases to the contrary. 
 Of the Poems, I like them as a volume, better than 
 any one of the preceding ; particularly, " Power and 
 Gentleness " — " The Present " — " Lady Russell ; " 
 with the exception that I do not like the noble act of 
 Curtius, true or false — one of the grand foundations 
 of the old Roman patriotism — to be sacrificed to 
 Lady R.'s taking notes on her husband's trial. If a 
 thing is good, why invidiously bring it into light 
 with something better ? There are too few heroic 
 things in this world, to admit of our marshalling 
 them in anxious etiquettes of precedence. Would 
 you make a poem on the story of Ruth, (pretty 
 story !) and then say — Ay, but how much better is 
 the story of Joseph and his brethren ! To go on, the 
 stanzas to " Chalon " want the name of Clarkson in 
 the body of them ; it is left to inference. The 
 " Battle of Gibeon" is spirited, again ; but you sacrifice 
 it in the last stanza to the song at Bethlehem. Is it 
 quite orthodox to do so ? The first was good, you sup- 
 pose, for that dispensation. Why set the word against 
 the word ? It puzzles a weak Christian. So Watts's 
 Psalms are an implied censure on David's. But as 
 long as the Old Testament is supposed to be an equally 
 divine emanation with the New Testament, so long it 
 will stagger weaklings to have them set in opposition. 
 " Gbdiva " is delicately touched. I have always 
 thought it a beautiful story, characteristic of the old 
 English times. But I could not help amusing myself
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 52I 
 
 with the thought— if Martin had chosen this subject 
 for a frontispiece — there would have been in some 
 dark corner a white lady, white as the walker on the 
 waves, riding upon some mystical quadruped ; and 
 high above would have risen " tower above tower a 
 massy structure high " — the Tenterden steeples of 
 Coventry, till the poor cross would scarce have 
 known itself among the clouds ; and far above them 
 all the distant Clint hills peering over chimney-pots, 
 piled up, Ossa-on-Olympus fashion, till the admiring 
 spectator (admirer of a noble deed) might have gone 
 look for the lady, as you must hunt for the other in 
 the lobster. But M[artin] should be made royal 
 architect. What palaces he would pile ! But then, 
 what parliamentary grants to make them good ! 
 Nevertheless, I like the frontispiece. " The Ele- 
 phant " is pleasant ; and I am glad you are getting 
 into a wider scope of subjects. There may be too 
 much, not religion, but too many good words in a 
 book, till it becomes, as Sh[elley] says of Religion, 
 a rhapsody of words. I will just name, that you 
 have brought in the " Song to the Shepherds " in 
 four or five, if not six places. Now this is not good 
 economy. The " Enoch " is fine ; and here I can 
 sacrifice " Elijah " to it, because 'tis illustrative only, 
 and not disparaging of the latter prophet's departure. 
 I like this best in the book. Lastly, I much like the 
 " Heron ;" 'tis exquisite. Know you Lord Thurlow's 
 Sonnet to a bird of that sort on Lacken water ? If 
 not, 'tis indispensable I send it you, with my Black- 
 wood, if you tell me how best to send them. 
 " Fludyer " is pleasant, — you are getting gay and 
 Hoodish. What is the enigma? Money? If not, 
 I fairly confess I am foiled, and sphynx must
 
 522 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 eat me. Four times I've tried to write eat me, and 
 the blotting pen turns it into cat me. And now I 
 will take my leave with saying, I esteem thy verses, 
 like thy present, honour thy frontispicer, and right 
 reverence thy patron and dedicatee, and am, 
 dear B. B., 
 
 Yours heartily, 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 Our joint kindest loves to A. K. and your daughter. 
 
 Letter CCXIX.] March 25th, 1829. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I send you by desire Darley's very 
 poetical poem. You will like, I think, the novel head- 
 ings of each scene. Scenical directions in verse are 
 novelties. With it I send a few duplicates, which 
 are therefore of no value to me ; and may amuse an 
 idle hour. Read " Christmas :" 'tis the production of 
 a young author, who reads all your writings. A good 
 word from you about his little book would be as balm 
 to him. It has no pretensions, and makes none. But 
 parts are pretty. In Field's Appendix turn to a poem 
 called the Kangaroo. 1 It is in the best way of our 
 old poets, if I mistake not. I have just come from 
 town, where I have been to get my bit of quarterly 
 pension ; and have brought home, from stalls in 
 Barbican, the old " Pilgrim's Progress " with the 
 prints — Vanity Fair, &c. — now scarce. Four shil- 
 lings. Cheap. And also one of whom I have oft 
 heard and had dreams, but never saw in the flesh — 
 
 1 Mr. Barron Field's residence in New South Wales probably sug- 
 gested the subject.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 523 
 
 that is in sheepskin — " The whole theologic works of 
 Thomas Aquinas." 
 
 My arms ached with lugging it a mile to the stage; 
 but the burden was a pleasure, such as old Anchises 
 was to the shoulders of i^Eneas, or the Lady to the 
 Lover in old romance, who having to carry her to the 
 top of a high mountain, (the price of obtaining her,) 
 clambered with her to the top, and fell dead with 
 fatigue. 
 
 "Oh the glorious old Schoolmen !" 
 
 There must be something in him. Such great names 
 imply greatness. Who hath seen Michael Angelo's 
 things — of us that never pilgrimaged to Rome — and 
 yet which of us disbelieves his greatness ? How I 
 will revel in his cobwebs and subtleties, till my brain 
 spins ! 
 
 N.B. I have writ in the old Hamlet : offer it to 
 Mitford in my name, if he have not seen it. 'Tis 
 woefully below our editions of it. But keep it, if you 
 like. (What is M. to me ?) 
 
 I do not mean this to go for a letter, only to apprise 
 you that the parcel is booked for you this 25th March, 
 1829, from the Four Swans, Bishopsgate. With both 
 our loves to Lucy and A. K. Yours ever, C. L. 
 
 Letter CCXX.] June 3rd, 1829. 
 
 Dear B. B., — To get out of home themes, have you 
 seen Southey's Dialogues P 1 His lake descriptions, 
 and the account of his library at Keswick, are very 
 
 1 Sir Thomas More, or Colloquies on the Progress and Prospects of 
 Society, 2 vols. 8vo. 1829. Criticized (not favourably) by Macaulay 
 in the Edinburgh Review.
 
 524 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 fine. But he needed not to have called up the ghost 
 of More to hold the conversations with ; which might 
 as well have passed between A. and B, or Caius and 
 Lucius. It is making too free with a defunct Chan- 
 cellor and Martyr. 
 
 I feel as if I had nothing farther to write about. O 
 I forget the prettiest letter I ever read, that I have 
 received from " Pleasures of Memory" Rogers, in 
 acknowledgment of a sonnet I sent him on the loss 
 of his brother. 
 
 It is too long to transcribe, but I hope to show it 
 you some day, as I hope some time again to see you, 
 when all of us are well. Only it ends thus: "We 
 were nearly of an age ; he was the elder. He was 
 the only person in the world in whose eyes I always 
 appeared young." I will now take my leave with as- 
 suring you that I am most interested in hoping to 
 hear favourable accounts from you. With kindest 
 regards to A. K. and you, Yours truly, C. L. 
 
 Letter CCXXL] July 3rd, 1829. 
 
 Dear B. B., — I am very much grieved indeed for 
 the indisposition of poor Lucy. Your letter found 
 me in domestic troubles. My sister is again taken 
 ill, and I am obliged to remove her out of the house 
 for many weeks, I fear, before I can hope to have 
 her again. I have been very desolate indeed. My 
 loneliness is a little abated by our young friend 
 Emma having just come here for her holidays, and 
 a schoolfellow of hers that was, with her. Still the 
 house is not the same, though she is the same. 
 Mary had been pleasing herself with the prospect of
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 525 
 
 seeing her at this time ; and with all their company, 
 the house feels at times a frightful solitude. May 
 you and I in no very long time have a more cheerful 
 theme to write about, and congratulate upon a 
 daughter's and a sister's perfect recovery. Do not 
 be long without telling me how Lucy goes on. I 
 have a right to call her by her quaker-name, you 
 know. Emma knows that I am writing to you, and 
 begs to be remembered to you with thankfulness 
 for your ready contribution. Her album is filling 
 apace. But of her contributors, one, almost the 
 flower of it, a most amiable young man and late 
 acquaintance of mine, has been carried off by con- 
 sumption, on return from one of the Azores islands, 
 to which he went with hopes of mastering the 
 disease, came back improved, went back to a most 
 close and confined counting-house, and relapsed. 
 His name was Dibdin, grandson of the songster. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Enfield Chase Side, Saturday 25th July, 
 
 Letter CCXXIL] a.d. 1829, n a.m. 
 
 There ! — a fuller, plumper, juicier date never dropt 
 from Idumean palm. Am I in the date-ive case now? 
 If not, a fig for dates, which is more than a date is 
 worth. I never stood much affected to these limitary 
 specialities ; least of all, since the date of my super- 
 annuation. 
 
 " What have I with time to do ? 
 Slaves of desks, 'twas meant for you." 
 
 Dear B. B., — Your handwriting has conveyed much 
 pleasure to me in respects of Lucy's restoration.
 
 526 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Would I could send you as good news of my poor 
 Lucy. 1 But some wearisome weeks I must remain 
 lonely yet. I have had the loneliest time, near ten 
 weeks, broken by a short apparition of Emma for her 
 holidays, whose departure only deepened the return- 
 ing solitude, and by ten days I have past in town. 
 But town, with all my native hankering after it, is 
 not what it was. The streets, the shops are left; but 
 all old friends are gone ! And in London I was 
 frightfully convinced of this as I passed houses and 
 places, empty caskets now. I have ceased to care 
 almost about any body. The bodies I cared for are 
 in graves, or dispersed. My old clubs, that lived so 
 long and flourished so steadily, are crumbled away. 
 When I took leave of our adopted young friend at 
 Charing Cross, 'twas heavy unfeeling rain, and I had 
 no where to go. Home have I none, and not a sym- 
 pathizing house to turn to in the great city. Never 
 did the waters of heaven pour down on a forlorner 
 head. Yet I tried ten days at a sort of friend's house, 
 but it was large and straggling, — one of the individuals 
 of my old long knot of friends, card-players, pleasant 
 companions, that have tumbled to pieces, into dust and 
 other things ; and I got home on Thursday, convinced 
 that I was better to get home to my hole at Enfield, 
 and hide like a sick cat in my corner. Less than a 
 month I hope will bring home Mary. She is at Fulham, 
 looking better in her health than ever, but sadly ram- 
 bling, and scarce showing any pleasure in seeing me, 
 or curiosity when I should come again. But the 
 old feelings will come back again, and we shall 
 drown old sorrows over a game of picquet again. 
 
 1 Of course he refers to his sister Mary.
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 527 
 
 But 'tis a tedious cut out of a life of 54, to lose 12 or 
 13 weeks every year or two. And to make me 
 more alone, our ill-tempered maid is gone, who, 
 with all her airs, was yet a home-piece of furniture, 
 a record of better days. The young thing that has 
 succeeded her is good and attentive, but she is no- 
 thing. And I have no one here to talk over old 
 matters with. Scolding and quarrelling have some 
 thing of familiarity, and a community of interest ; 
 they imply acquaintance ; they are of resentment, 
 which is of the family of dearness. 
 
 I can neither scold nor quarrel at this insignifi- 
 cant implement of household services ; she is less 
 than a cat, and just better than a deal dresser. 
 What I can do, and do over-do, is to walk ; but 
 deadly long are the days, these Summer all-day 
 days, with but a half hour's candle-light, and no fire- 
 light. I do not write, tell your kind inquisitive Eliza, 
 and can hardly read. In the ensuing Blackwood will 
 be an old rejected farce of mine, which may be new 
 to you, if you see that same medley. 1 What things 
 are all the magazines now! I contrive studiously not 
 to see them. The popular New Monthly is perfect 
 trash. Poor Hessey, I suppose you see, has failed ; 
 Hunt and Clarke too. Your "Vulgar Truths" will be 
 a good name ; and I think your prose must please — 
 me at least. But 'tis useless to write poetry with no 
 purchasers. 'Tis cold work authorship, without some 
 thing to puff one into fashion. Could you not write 
 something on Quakerism, for Quakers to read, but 
 nominally addressed to Non-Quakers, explaining your 
 
 1 The Pawnbroker's Daughter, printed (from Blackwood's Maga- 
 zine for 1830) in the ensuing pages. It is given, not too correctly, in 
 Eliana, 1864.
 
 528 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 dogmas — waiting on the Spirit — by the analogy of 
 human calmness and patient waiting on the judg- 
 ment? I scarcely know what I mean, but to make 
 Non-Quakers reconciled to your doctrines, by show- 
 ing something like them in mere human operations ; 
 but I hardly understand myself; so let it pass for no- 
 thing. I pity you for over- work; but I assure you, no 
 work is worse. The mind preys on itself, the most 
 unwholesome food. I bragged formerly that I could 
 not have too much time. I have now a surfeit. With 
 few years to come, the days are wearisome. But 
 weariness is not eternal. Something will shine out 
 to take the load off that flags me, which is at present 
 intolerable. I have killed an hour or two in this poor 
 scrawl. I am a sanguinary murderer of time, and 
 would kill him inch-meal just now. But the snake is 
 vital. Well : I shall write merrier anon. 'Tis the pre- 
 sent copy of my countenance I send, and to complain 
 is a little to alleviate. May you enjoy yourself as far 
 as the wicked world will let you, and think that you 
 are not quite alone as I am ! Health to Lucia, and 
 to Anna, and kind remembrances. 
 
 Your forlorn, C. L. 
 
 LETTER CCXXIIL] December 8th, 1829. 
 
 My dear B. B., — You are very good to have been 
 uneasy about us, and I have the satisfaction to tell 
 you that we are both in better health and spirits than 
 we have been for a year or two past ; I may say than 
 we have been since we have been at Enfield. The 
 cause may not appear quite adequate, when I tell 
 you that a course of ill-health and spirits brought us 
 to the determination of giving up our house here, 
 and we are boarding and lodging with a worthy old
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 529 
 
 couple, long inhabitants of Enfield, where every thing 
 is done for us without trouble, further than a reason- 
 able weekly payment. We should have done so 
 before, but it is not easy to flesh and blood to give 
 up an ancient establishment, to discard old Penates, 
 and from house keepers to turn house sharers. 
 (N.B. We are not in the workhouse.) Diocletian, in 
 his garden, found more repose than on the imperial 
 seat of Rome ; and the nob of Charles the" Fifth ached 
 seldomer under a monk's cowl than under the diadem. 
 With such shadows of assimilation we countenance 
 our degradation. With such a load of dignified cares 
 just removed from our shoulders, we can the more 
 understand and pity the accession to yours, by the 
 advancement to an assigneeship. I will tell you 
 honestly, B. B., that it has been long my deliberate 
 judgment that all bankrupts, of whatsoever de- 
 nomination, civil or religious, ought to be hanged. 
 The pity of mankind has for ages run in a wrong 
 channel, and has been diverted from poor creditors — 
 (how many I have known sufferers ! Hazlitt has 
 just been defrauded of £100 by his bookseller-friends 
 breaking 1 ) — to scoundrel debtors. I know all the 
 topics— that distress may come upon an honest man 
 without his fault ; that the failure of one that he 
 trusted was his calamity, &c. Then let both be 
 hanged. O how careful this would make traders ! 
 These are my deliberate thoughts, after many 
 years' experience in matters of trade. What a world 
 of trouble it would have saved you, if Friend 
 * * * * had been immediately hanged, without 
 
 1 Messrs. Hunt and Clarke. The sum was £$oo, ■which Mr. Hazlitt 
 was to have received for his Life of Napoleon. He took bills, which 
 were dishonoured. 
 
 2 M
 
 530 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 benefit of clergy, which (being a Quaker I presume) 
 he could not reasonably insist upon. Why, after 
 slaving twelve months in your assign-business, you 
 will be enabled to declare yd. in the pound in all 
 human probability. B. B., he should be hanged. 
 Trade will never re-flourish in this land till such 
 a law is established. I write big, not to save ink 
 but eyes, mine having been troubled with reading 
 through three folios of old Fuller in almost as few 
 days, and I went to bed last night in agony, and 
 am writing with a vial of eye-water before me, alter- 
 nately dipping in vial and inkstand. This may in- 
 flame my zeal against bankrupts, but it was my 
 speculation when I could see better. Half the world's 
 misery (Eden else) is owing to want of money, and 
 all that want is owing to bankrupts. I declare I 
 would, if the state wanted practitioners, turn hangman 
 myself, and should have great pleasure in hanging 
 the first bankrupt after my salutary law had been 
 established. I have seen no Annuals, and wish to see 
 none. I like your fun upon them, and was quite 
 pleased with Bowles's sonnet. Hood is, or was, at 
 Brighton; but a note (prose or rhyme) to him, Robert 
 Street, Adelphi, I am sure, would extract a copy of 
 his, which also I have not seen. Wishing you and 
 yours all health, I conclude while these frail glasses 
 
 are to me — eyes. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CCXXIV.] June 28, 1830. 
 
 Dear B. B., — Could you dream of my publishing 
 without sending a copy to you ? You will find some- 
 thing new to you in the volume, particularly the trans-
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 53I 
 
 lations. Moxon will send to you the moment it is 
 out. He is the young poet of Christmas, whom the 
 Author of the " Pleasures of Memory" has set up in 
 the book-vending business with a volunteer'd loan of 
 £500. Such munificence is rare to an almost 
 stranger; but Rogers, I am told, has done many good- 
 natured things of this kind. 
 
 I need not say how glad to see A. K. and Lucy we 
 should have been, — and still shall be, if it be practi- 
 cable. Our direction is Mr. Westwood's, Chase Side 
 Enfield ; but alas I know not theirs. We can give 
 them a bed. Coaches come daily from the Bell, Hol- 
 born. 
 
 You will see that I am worn to the poetical dregs, 
 condescending to acrostics, which are nine fathom 
 beneath album verses ; but they were written at the 
 request of the lady where our Emma is, to whom I 
 paid a visit in April to bring home Emma for a 
 change of air after a severe illness, in which she had 
 been treated like a daughter by the good Parson and 
 his whole family. She has since returned to her 
 occupation. I thought on you in Suffolk, but was 
 forty miles from Woodbridge. I heard of you the 
 other day from Mr. Pulham of the India House. 
 
 Long live King William the IVth ! 
 
 S. T. C. says we have had wicked kings, foolish 
 kings, wise kings, (but few,) but never till now have 
 we had a blackguard king. 
 
 Charles the Second was profligate, but a gentleman. 
 
 I have nineteen letters to dispatch this leisure Sab- 
 bath for Moxon to send with copies ; so you will for- 
 give me short measure, and believe me, 
 
 Yours ever, C. L. 
 
 Pray do let us see your Quakeresses if possible. 
 
 2 M 2
 
 532 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Letter CCXXV.] Feb. 25, 1830. 
 
 Dear B. B., — To reply to you by return of post, I 
 must gobble up my dinner and despatch this in pro- 
 pria persona to the office, to be in time. So take it 
 from me hastily, that you are perfectly welcome to 
 furnish A. C. with the scrap, which I had almost for- 
 gotten writing. The more my character comes to be 
 known, the less my veracity will come to be sus- 
 pected. Time every day clears up some suspected 
 narrative of Herodotus, Bruce, and others of us great 
 travellers. Why, that Joseph Pake 1 was as real a 
 person as Joseph Hume, and a great deal pleasanter. 
 A careful observer of life, Bernard, has no need to 
 invent. Nature romances it for him. Dinner plates 
 rattle, and I positively shall incur indigestion by 
 carrying it half concocted to the post-house. Let me 
 congratulate you on the Spring coming in, and do you 
 in return condole with me on the Winter going out. 
 When the old one goes, seldom comes a better. I 
 dread the prospect of Summer, with his all-day-long 
 days. No need of his assistance to make country 
 places dull. With fire and candle-light I can dream 
 myself in Holborn. With lightsome skies shining in 
 to bed-time I can not. This Mesech, and these tents 
 of Kedar — I would dwell in the skirts of Jericho rather, 
 and think every blast of the coming in mail a ram's 
 horn. Give me old London at fire and plague times, 
 rather than these tepid gales, healthy country air, and 
 purposeless exercise. 
 
 1 Mr. Paice was a merchant on Bread Street Hill, and a Director of 
 the South Sea Company. He was an acquaintance and Correspondent 
 ot John Wilkes. Lamb has introduced him into the Essay "On Modern 
 Gallantry."
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 533 
 
 Leg of mutton absolutely on the table. 
 Take our hasty loves and short farewell. 
 
 C. L. 
 
 Letter CCXXVI.] August 30th, 1830. 
 
 Dear B. B., — My address is 34, Southampton 
 Buildings, Holborn. For God's sake do not let me 
 be pester'd with Annuals. They are all rogues who 
 edit them, and something else who write in them. I 
 am still alone, and very much out of sorts, and cannot 
 spur up my mind to writing. The sight of one of 
 those year books makes me sick. I get nothing by 
 any of 'em, not even a copy. 
 
 Thank you for your warm interest about my little 
 volume, for the critics on which I care the five hun- 
 dred thousandth part of the tythe of a half-farthing. 
 I am too old a Militant for that. How noble, tho', in 
 Robert Southey to come forward for an old friend, 
 who had treated him so unworthily ! 
 
 Moxon has a shop without customers, I a book 
 without readers. But what a clamour against a poor 
 collection of Album verses, as if we had put forth art 
 Epic ! I cannot scribble a long letter : I am, when 
 not at foot, very desolate, and take no interest in any 
 thing, scarce hate any thing but Annuals. I am in 
 an interregnum of thought and feeling. What a 
 beautiful Autumn morning this is, if it was but with 
 me as in times past when the candle of the Lord 
 shined round me ! I cannot even muster enthusiasm 
 to admire the French heroism. In better times I 
 hope we may some day meet, and discuss an old
 
 534 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 poem or two. But if you'd have me not sick, no 
 more of Annuals. 
 
 C. L., Ex-Elia. 
 Love to Lucy and A. K. always. 
 
 Letter CCXXVIL] April, 1*51. 
 
 Vir Bone ! — Recepi literas tuas amicissimas, et in 
 mentem venit responsuro mihi, vel raro, vel nun- 
 quam, inter nos intercedisse Latinam linguam, 
 organum rescribendi, loquendive. Epistolae tuae, 
 Plinianis elegantiis (supra quod Tremulo deceat) 
 refertae, tarn a verbis Plinianis adeo abhorrent, ut ne 
 vocem quamquam (Romanam scilicet) habere vide- 
 aris, quam "ad canem," ut aiunt, " rejectare possis." 
 Forsan desuetudo Latinissandi ad vernaculam lin- 
 guam usitandam, plusquam opus sit, coegit. Per 
 adagia quaedam nota, et in ore omnium pervulgata, 
 ad Latinitatis perditae recuperationem revocare te 
 institui. 
 
 Felis in abaco est, et aegre videt. 
 
 Omne quod splendet nequaquam aurum putes. 
 
 Imponas equo mendicum, equitabit idem ad dia- 
 bolum. 
 
 Fur commode a fure prenditur. 
 
 O Maria, Maria, valde contraria, quomodo crescit 
 hortulus tuus ? 
 
 Nunc majora canamus. 
 
 Thomas, Thomas, de Islington, uxorem duxit die 
 nupera Dominica. Reduxit domum postera. Suc- 
 cedenti baculum emit. Postridie ferit illam. JEgre- 
 scit ilia subsequent. Proxima (nempe Veneris) est
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 535 
 
 mortua. Plurimum gestiit Thomas, quod appropin- 
 quanti Sabbato efferenda sit. 
 
 Horner quidam Johannulus in angulo sedebat, 
 artocreas quasdam deglutiens. Inseruit pollices, 
 pruna nana evellens, et magna voce exclamavit " Dii 
 boni, quam bonus puer fio ! 
 
 Diddle-diddle-dumkins ! meus unicus filius Johannes 
 cubitum ivit, integris braccis, caliga una tantum, 
 indutus. Diddle-diddle, &c. Da Capo. 
 
 Hie adsum saltans Joannula. Cum nemo adsit 
 mihi, semper resto sola. 
 
 ^Enigma mihi hoc solvas, et QEdipus fies. 
 
 Qua ratione assimulandus sit equus Tremulo ? 
 
 Quippe cui tota communicatio sit per Hay et 
 Neigh, juxta consilium illud Dominicum. " Fiat 
 omnis communicatio vestra Yea et Nay." 
 
 In his nugis caram diem consumo, dum invigilo 
 valetudini carioris nostras Emmas, quae apud nos 
 jamdudum aegrotat. Salvere vos jubet mecum Maria 
 mea, ipsa integra valetudine. Elia. 
 
 Ab agro Enfeldiense datum, Aprilis nescio quibus 
 Calendis — Davus .sum, non Calendarius. 
 
 P.S. — Perdita in toto est Billa Reformatura. 1 
 
 Letter CCXXVIIL] No date.] 
 
 Dear B. B., — I am sure I cannot fill a letter, 
 though I should disfurnish my skull to fill it ; but 
 you expect something, and shall have a notelet. Is 
 
 1 A premature assertion.
 
 536 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 
 
 Sunday, not divinely speaking, but humanly and 
 holidaysically, a blessing? Without its institution, 
 would our rugged taskmasters have given us a leisure 
 day, so often, think you, as once in a month ? or ; if 
 it had not been instituted, might they not have given 
 us every sixth day ? Solve me this problem. If we 
 are to go three times a-day to church, why has 
 Sunday slipt into the notion of a hollidsiy ? A Holy- 
 day I grant it. The Puritans, I have read in 
 Southey's book, knew the distinction. They made 
 people observe Sunday rigorously, would not let a 
 nursery-maid walk out in the fields with children for 
 recreation on that day. But then — they gave the 
 people a holiday from all sorts of work every second 
 Tuesday. This was giving to the two Caesars that 
 which was his respective. Wise, beautiful, thought- 
 ful, generous legislators ! Would Wilberforce give 
 us our Tuesdays ? No : (d — n him !) — he would turn 
 the six days into sevenths, 
 
 " And those three smiling seasons of the year 
 Into a Russian Winter." — Old Play. 
 
 I am sitting opposite a person who is making 
 strange distortions with the gout, which is not un- 
 pleasant — to me at least. What is the reason we do 
 not sympathize with pain, short of some terrible sur- 
 gical operation ? Hazlitt, who boldly says all he 
 feels, avows that not only he does not pity sick 
 people, but he hates them. I obscurely recognise 
 his meaning. Pain is probably too selfish a con- 
 sideration, too simply a consideration of self-atten- 
 tion. We pity poverty, loss of friends, &c. — more 
 complex things, in which the sufferer's feelings are 
 associated with others. This is a rough thought
 
 CORRESPONDENCE WITH BARTON. 537 
 
 suggested by the presence of gout ; I want head to 
 extricate it and plane it. What is all this to your 
 letter ? I felt it to be a good one, but my turn, when 
 I write at all, is perversely to travel out of the record, 
 so that my letters are any thing but answers. So you 
 still want a motto ! You must not take my ironical 
 one, because your book, I take it, is too serious 
 for it. Bickerstaff might have used it for his lucu- 
 brations. What do you think of (for a title) Religio 
 Tremuli ? or Tremebundi ? There is Religio -Me did 
 and Laid. But perhaps the volume is not quite 
 Quakerish enough, or exclusively so, for it. Your 
 own "Vigils" is perhaps the best. While I have 
 space, let me congratulate with you the return of 
 Spring : what a summery Spring too ! all those 
 qualms about the dog and cray-fish melt before it. 
 I am going to be happy and vain again. 
 
 A hasty farewell. 
 
 C. Lamb. 
 
 London : Swift & Co., 55, King Street, W.
 
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