All through his working life as man of letters Lamb was engaged in
manifesting that side of his genius which whilst known to but few
persons during his lifetime was to be one of those most widely and
most lovingly known afterwards. He was of the greatest of our
letter-writers. It was perhaps but another aspect of the essayist--or
rather we might say that his work as essayist was the crowning
development of his sedulous habit of being himself when communing on
paper with his intimate friends. It has been suggested that such
finished works as are many of Lamb's letters were, so to speak, built
up bit by bit, and then copied as completed wholes before being
despatched to those for whom they were designed. Whether written with
a running pen, as a large proportion of them undoubtedly were, or
written with the patience of the essayist ponderingly in search of the
_mot juste_, they are always true Lamb, individual expressions far
removed from the ordinary letters of ordinary folk; they are at once
informing revelations of the writer in his relations with his fellows,
and they are always marked by essentially literary qualities. In his
letters will be found not infrequently--both in idea and in
expression--the germs of his essays.
Lamb was first revealed to the reading public as a great letter-writer
in Talfourd's "Memorials of Charles Lamb" nearly seventy years ago.
Since that time each further publication of the letters has brought
fresh material to light which has but gone to strengthen Lamb's
position as one of the first two or three letter-writers whose
epistles have taken their places in English literature. If we must
"place" our great men, there are not wanting critics who would accord
Lamb a position at the very head of those in this particular branch.
"To an idler like myself, to write and receive letters are both very
pleasant;" thus Lamb in one of his earliest letters to Coleridge, and
there can be little doubt that in this occupation he frequently found
the truth of the statement that the labour we delight in physics pain.
In communion with men of kindred tastes he must often have lost the
sense of his haunting troubles in intellectual and external interests.
Two or three scraps from the letters have been quoted in the first
chapter but as their peculiarly rich wit and humour, using that
much-abused word in its fullest significance, can best be shown by
example, we may here give a couple more. The first is from a letter
written in 1810, and addressed to Manning, the correspondent with whom
Lamb was most entertainingly whimsical. The second letter, given in
its entirety, was addressed in 1827 to Thomas Hood.
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
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, 1, Mr. C. Lamb; 2, C. Lamb, Esq.; 3, Sir C. Lamb,
Bart,; 4, Baron Lamb of Stamford; 5, Viscount Lamb; 6, Earl
Lamb; 7, Marquis Lamb; 8, Duke Lamb. It would look like
quibbling to carry it on further, and especially 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
9th, King Lamb; 10th, Emperor Lamb; 11th, Pope Innocent,
higher than which is nothing but the Lamb of God. Puns I
have not made many (nor punch much), since the day of my
last; one I cannot help relating. A constable in Salisbury
Cathedral was telling me that eight people dined at the top
of the spire of the cathedral, 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. Do you
know Kate * * *. I am so stuffed out 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 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. Have
you trampled on the Cross yet? The Persian ambassador's name
is Shaw Ali 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 gentleman whose name I forget. Will they,
have they, did they, come safe? The distance you are at cuts
up tenses by the root.
DEAR HOOD,--If I have anything in my head I will
send it to Mr. Watts. Strictly speaking he should have had
my Album verses, but a very intimate friend importuned me
for the trifles, and I believe I forgot Mr. Watts, or lost
sight at the time of his similar Souvenir. Jamieson conveyed
the farce from me to Mrs. C. Kemble, _he_ will not be in
town before the 27th. Give our kind loves to all at
Highgate, and tell them that we have finally torn ourselves
out right away from Colebrooke, where I had _no_ health, and
are about to domiciliate for good at Enfield, where I have
experienced _good_.
"Lord what good hours do we keep!
How quietly we sleep!"
See the rest in the Complete Angler. We have got our books
into our new house. I am a drayhorse if I was not asham'd of
the indigested dirty lumber as I toppled 'em out of the
cart, and blest Becky that came with 'em for her having an
unstuff'd brain with such rubbish. We shall get in by
Michael's mass. 'Twas with some pain we were evuls'd from
Colebrook. You may find some of our flesh sticking to the
door posts. To change habitations is to die to them, and in
my time I have died seven deaths. But I don't know whether
every such change does not bring with it a rejuvenescence.
'Tis an enterprise, and shoves back the sense of death's
approximating, which tho' not terrible to me, is at all
times particular distasteful. My house-deaths have generally
been periodical, recurring after seven years, but this last
is premature by half that time. Cut off in the flower of
Colebrook. The Middletonian stream and all its echoes mourn.
Even minnows dwindle. _A parvis fiunt MINIMI._ I fear to
invite Mrs. Hood to our new mansion, lest she envy it and
rote us. But when we are fairly in, I hope she will come and
try it. I heard she and you were made uncomfortable by some
unworthy to be cared for attacks, and have tried to set up
a feeble counter-action through the Table Book of last
Saturday. Has it not reach'd you, that you are silent about
it? Our new domicile is no manor house, but new, and
externally not inviting, but furnish'd within with every
convenience. Capital new locks to every door, capital grates
in every room, with nothing to pay for incoming and the rent
£10 less than the Islington one. It was built a few years
since at £1,100 expense, they tell me, and I perfectly
believe it. And I get it for £35 exclusive of moderate
taxes. We think ourselves most lucky. It is not our
intention to abandon Regent Street, and West End
perambulations (monastic and terrible thought!) but
occasionally to breathe the FRESHER AIR of the
metropolis. We shall put up a bedroom or two (all we want)
for occasional ex-rustication, where we shall visit, not be
visited. Plays too we'll see--perhaps our own. Urbani
Sylvani, and Sylvan Urbanuses in turns. Courtiers for a
spurt, then philosophers. Old homely tell-truths and
learn-truths in the virtuous shades of Enfield. Liars again
and mocking gibers in the coffee-houses and resorts of
London. What can a mortal desire more for his bi-parted
nature?
O the curds and cream you shall eat with us here!
O the turtle soup and lobster sallads we shall devour with you there!
O the old books we shall peruse here!
O the new nonsense we shall trifle with over there!
O Sir T. Browne!--here.
O Mr. Hood and Mr. Jerdan there! thine, C(urbanus) L(sylvanus)
(ELIA ambo)--
Inclos'd are verses which Emma sat down to write, her first,
on the eve after your departure. Of course they are only for
Mrs. H.'s perusal. They will shew you at least that one of
our party is not willing to cut old friends. What to call
'em I don't know. Blank verse they are not, because of the
rhymes.--Rhimes they are not, because of the blank verse.
Heroics they are not, because they are lyric, lyric they are
not, because of the Heroic measure. They must be called EMMAICS.--
* * * * *
The full charm of the long early letters, with their pleasant
expatiations on literary themes can scarcely be sampled without doing
violence. The various editions in which the letters are obtainable
will be found referred to in the bibliographical list at the end of
this little book. In illustration of their continued appreciation it
may be mentioned that three editions have been published during the
past year or so, each of which contains letters denied to the others.
The latest edition--that of Mr. E. V. Lucas--is also the fullest, both
in the number of letters included and in the elaboration of its
annotatory matter.
* * * * *
[Illustration: Holograph letter to John Clare, "the Peasant Poet."
Reduced facsimile from the original in the British Museum.]
[Transcript of the Handwritten Letter To John Clare.]