present--imagine a scraping, fiddling, fidgetting, petit-maitre of a
dancing school advancing into my plain parlour with a coupee and a
sideling bow, and presenting the book as if he had been handing a glass
of lemonade to a young miss--imagine this, and contrast it with the
serious nature of the book presented! Then task your imagination,
reversing this picture, to conceive of quite an opposite messenger, a
lean, straitlocked, wheyfaced methodist, for such was he in reality who
brought it, the Genius (it seems) of the Wesleyan Magazine. Certes,
friend B., thy Widow's tale is too horrible, spite of the lenitives of
Religion, to embody in verse: I hold prose to be the appropriate
expositor of such atrocities! No offence, but it is a cordial that makes
the heart sick. Still thy skill in compounding it I not deny. I turn to
what gave me less mingled pleasure. I find markd with pencil these pages
in thy pretty book, and fear I have been penurious.
page 52, 53 capital.
page 59 6th stanza exquisite simile.
page 61 11th stanza equally good.
page 108 3d stanza, I long to see van Balen.
page 111 a downright good sonnet. _Dixi_.
page 153 Lines at the bottom.
So you see, I read, hear, and _mark_, if I don't learn--In short this
little volume is no discredit to any of your former, and betrays none of
the Senility you fear about. Apropos of Van Balen, an artist who painted
me lately had painted a Blackamoor praying, and not filling his canvas,
stuff'd in his little girl aside of Blacky, gaping at him unmeaningly;
and then didn't know what to call it. Now for a picture to be promoted
to the Exhibition (Suffolk Street) as HISTORICAL, a subject is
requisite. What does me? I but christen it the "Young Catechist" and
furbishd it with Dialogue following, which dubb'd it an Historical
Painting. Nothing to a friend at need.
While this tawny Ethiop prayeth,
Painter, who is She that stayeth
By, with skin of whitest lustre;
Sunny locks, a shining cluster;
Saintlike seeming to direct him
To the Power that must protect him?
Is she of the heav'nborn Three,
Meek Hope, strong Faith, sweet Charity?
Or some Cherub?
They you mention
Far transcend my weak invention.
'Tis a simple Christian child,
Missionary young and mild,
From her store of script'ral knowledge
(Bible-taught without a college)
Which by reading she could gather,
Teaches him to say OUR FATHER
To the common Parent, who
Colour not respects nor hue.
White and Black in him have part,
Who looks not to the skin, but heart.--
When I'd done it, the Artist (who had clapt in Miss merely as a
fill-space) swore I exprest his full meaning, and the damosel bridled up
into a Missionary's vanity. I like verses to explain Pictures: seldom
Pictures to illustrate Poems. Your wood cut is a rueful Lignum Mortis.
By the by, is the widow likely to marry again?
I am giving the fruit of my Old Play reading at the Museum to Hone, who
sets forth a Portion weekly in the Table Book. Do you see it? How is
Mitford?--
I'll just hint that the Pitcher, the Chord and the Bowl are a little too
often repeated (_passim_) in your Book, and that on page 17 last line
but 4 _him_ is put for _he_, but the poor widow I take it had small
leisure for grammatical niceties. Don't you see there's _He, myself_,
and _him_; why not both _him_? likewise _imperviously_ is cruelly spelt
_imperiously_. These are trifles, and I honestly like your [book,] and
you for giving it, tho' I really am ashamed of so many presents.
I can think of no news, therefore I will end with mine and Mary's
kindest remembrances to you and yours. C.L.
[It has been customary to date this letter December, 1827, but I think
that must be too late. Lamb would never have waited till then to tell
Barton that he was contributing the Garrick Plays to Hone's _Table
Book_, especially as the last instalment was printed in that month.
Barton's new volume was _A Widow's Tale and Other Poems_, 1827. The
title poem tells how a missionary and his wife were wrecked, and how
after three nights and days of horror she was saved. The woodcut on the
title-page of Barton's book represented the widow supporting her dead or
dying husband in the midst of the storm.
This is the "exquisite simile" on page 59, from "A Grandsire's Tale":--
Though some might deem her pensive, if not sad,
Yet those who knew her better, best could tell
How calmly happy, and how meekly glad
Her quiet heart in its own depths did dwell:
Like to the waters of some crystal well,
In which the stars of heaven at noon are seen.
Fancy might deem on her young spirit fell
Glimpses of light more glorious and serene
Than that of life's brief day, so heavenly was her mien.
This was the "downright good sonnet":--
TO A GRANDMOTHER
"Old age is dark and unlovely."--Ossian.
O say not so! A bright old age is thine;
Calm as the gentle light of summer eves,
Ere twilight dim her dusky mantle weaves;
Because to thee is given, in strength's decline,
A heart that does not thanklessly repine
At aught of which the hand of God bereaves,
Yet all He sends with gratitude receives;--
May such a quiet, thankful close be mine.
And hence thy fire-side chair appears to me
A peaceful throne--which thou wert form'd to fill;
Thy children--ministers, who do thy will;
And those grand-children, sporting round thy knee,
Thy little subjects, looking up to thee,
As one who claims their fond allegiance still.
And these are the lines at the foot of page 153 in a poem addressed to a
child seven years old:--
There is a holy, blest companionship
In the sweet intercourse thus held with those
Whose tear and smile are guileless; from whose lip
The simple dictate of the heart yet flows;--
Though even in the yet unfolded rose
The worm may lurk, and sin blight blooming youth,
The light born with us long so brightly glows,
That childhood's first deceits seem almost truth,
To life's cold after lie, selfish, and void of ruth.
Van Balen was the painter of the picture of the "Madonna and Child"
which Mrs. FitzGerald (Edward FitzGerald's mother) had given to Barton
and for which he expressed his thanks in a poem.
The artist who painted Lamb recently was Henry Meyer (1782?-1847), the
portrait being that which serves as frontispiece to this volume. I give
in my large edition a reproduction of "The Young Catechist," which Meyer
also engraved, with Lamb's verses attached. In 1910 I saw the original
in a picture shop in the Charing Cross Road, now removed.]
LETTER 413
CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE
[No date. End of May, 1827.]
Dear H. in the forthcoming "New Monthly" are to be verses of mine on a
Picture about Angels. Translate em to the Table-book. I am off for
Enfield.
Yours. C.L.
[Written on the back of the XXI. Garrick Extracts. The poem "Angel Help"
was printed in the _New Monthly Magazine_ for June and copied by Hone in
the _Table-Book_, No. 24, 1827.]
LETTER 414
CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE
[No date. June, 1827.]
Dear Hone, I should like this in your next book. We
are at Enfield, where (when we have solituded awhile)
we shall be glad to see you. Yours,
C. LAMB.
[This was written on the back of the MS. of "Going or Gone" (see Vol.
IV.), a poem of reminiscences of Lamb's early Widford days, printed in
Hone's _Table-Book_, June, 1827, signed Elia.]
LETTER 415
CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON
Enfield, and for some weeks to come, "_June 11, 1827_."
Dear B.B.--One word more of the picture verses, and that for good and
all; pray, with a neat pen alter one line
His learning seems to lay small stress on
to
His learning lays no mighty stress on
to avoid the unseemly recurrence (ungrammatical also) of "seems" in the
next line, besides the nonsence of "but" there, as it now stands. And I
request you, as a personal favor to me, to erase the last line of all,
which I should never have written from myself. The fact is, it was a
silly joke of Hood's, who gave me the frame, (you judg'd rightly it was
not its own) with the remark that you would like it, because it was b--d
b--d,--and I lugg'd it in: but I shall be quite hurt if it stands,
because tho' you and yours have too good sense to object to it, I would
not have a sentence of mine seen, that to any foolish ear might sound
unrespectful to thee. Let it end at appalling; the joke is coarse and
useless, and hurts the tone of the rest. Take your best "ivory-handled"
and scrape it forth.
Your specimen of what you might have written is hardly fair. Had it been
a present to me, I should have taken a more sentimental tone; but of a
trifle from me it was my cue to speak in an underish tone of
commendation. Prudent _givers_ (what a word for such a nothing)
disparage their gifts; 'tis an art we have. So you see you wouldn't have
been so wrong, taking a higher tone. But enough of nothing.
By the bye, I suspected M. of being the disparager of the frame; hence a
_certain line_.
For the frame,'tis as the room is, where it hangs. It hung up fronting
my old cobwebby folios and batter'd furniture (the fruit piece has
resum'd its place) and was much better than a spick and span one. But if
your room be very neat and your _other pictures_ bright with gilt, it
should be so too. I can't judge, not having seen: but my dingy study it
suited.
Martin's Belshazzar (the picture) I have seen. Its architectural effect
is stupendous; but the human figures, the squalling contorted little
antics that are playing at being frightend, like children at a sham
ghost who half know it to be a mask, are detestable. Then the _letters_
are nothing more than a transparency lighted up, such as a Lord might
order to be lit up, on a sudden at a Xmas Gambol, to scare the ladies.
The _type_ is as plain as Baskervil's--they should have been dim, full
of mystery, letters to the mind rather than the eye.--Rembrandt has
painted only Belshazzar and a courtier or two (taking a part of the
banquet for the whole) not fribbled out a mob of fine folks. Then every
thing is so distinct, to the very necklaces, and that foolish little
prophet. What _one_ point is there of interest? The ideal of such a
subject is, that you the spectator should see nothing but what at the
time you would have seen, the _hand_--and the _King_--not to be at
leisure to make taylor-remarks on the dresses, or Doctor Kitchener-like
to examine the good things at table.
Just such a confusd piece is his Joshua, fritterd into 1000 fragments,
little armies here, little armies there--you should see only the _Sun_
and _Joshua_; if I remember, he has not left out that luminary entirely,
but for Joshua, I was ten minutes a finding him out.
Still he is showy in all that is not the human figure or the
preternatural interest: but the first are below a drawing school girl's
attainment, and the last is a phantasmagoric trick, "Now you shall see
what you shall see, dare is Balshazar and dare is Daniel." You have my
thoughts of M. and so adieu C. LAMB.
[Lamb had sent Barton the picture that is reproduced in Vol. V. of my
large edition. Later Lamb had sent the following lines:--
When last you left your Woodbridge pretty,
To stare at sights, and see the City,
If I your meaning understood,
You wish'd a Picture, cheap, but good;
The colouring? decent; clear, not muddy;
To suit a Poet's quiet study,
Where Books and Prints for delectation
Hang, rather than vain ostentation.
The subject? what I pleased, if comely;
But something scriptural and homely:
A sober Piece, not gay or wanton,
For winter fire-sides to descant on;
The theme so scrupulously handled,
A Quaker might look on unscandal'd;
Such as might satisfy Ann Knight,
And classic Mitford just not fright.
Just such a one I've found, and send it;
If liked, I give--if not, but lend it.
The moral? nothing can be sounder.
The fable? 'tis its own expounder--
A Mother teaching to her Chit
Some good book, and explaining it.
He, silly urchin, tired of lesson,
His learning seems to lay small stress on,
But seems to hear not what he hears;
Thrusting his fingers in his ears,
Like Obstinate, that perverse funny one,
In honest parable of Bunyan.
His working Sister, more sedate,
Listens; but in a kind of state,
The painter meant for steadiness;
But has a tinge of sullenness;
And, at first sight, she seems to brook
As ill her needle, as he his book.
This is the Picture. For the Frame--
'Tis not ill-suited to the same;
Oak-carved, not gilt, for fear of falling;
Old-fashion'd; plain, yet not appalling;
And broad brimm'd, as the Owner's Calling.
It was not Obstinate, by the way, who thrust his fingers in his ears,
but Christian.
"Hence a _certain line_"--line 16, I suppose.
Martin's "Belshazzar." "Belshazzar's Feast," by John Martin (1789-1854),
had been exhibited for some years and had created an immense impression.
Lamb subjected Martin's work to a minute analysis a few years later (see
the _Elia_ essay on the "Barrenness of the Imaginative Faculty in the
Productions of Modern Art," Vol. II.). Barton did not give up Martin in
consequence of this letter. The frontispiece to his _New Year's Eve_,
1828, is by that painter, and the volume contains eulogistic poems upon
him, one beginning--
Boldest painter of our day.
"Baskervil's"--John Baskerville (1706-1775), the printer, famous for his
folio edition of the Bible, 1763.
Doctor William Kitchiner--the author of _Apicius Redivious; or, The
Cook's Oracle_, 1817.]
LETTER 416
CHARLES LAMB TO HENRY CRABB ROBINSON
[P.M. June 26, 1827.]
Dear H.C. We are at Mrs. Leishman's, Chase, Enfield. Why not come down
by the Green Lanes on Sunday? Picquet all day. Pass the Church, pass the
"Rising Sun," turn sharp round the corner, and we are the 6th or 7th
house on the Chase: tall Elms darken the door. If you set eyes on M.
Burney, bring him.
Yours truly C. LAMB.
[Mrs. Leishman's house, or its successor, is the seventh from the Rising
Sun. It is now on Gentleman's Row, not on Chase Side proper. The house
next it--still, as in Lamb's day, a girl's school--is called Elm House,
but most of the elms which darkened both doors have vanished. It has
been surmised that when later in the year Lamb took an Enfield house in
his own name, he took Mrs. Leishman's; but, as we shall see, his own
house was some little distance from hers.]
LETTER 417
CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM HONE
[No date. Early July, 1827.]
Dear H., This is Hood's, done from the life, of Mary getting over a
style here. Mary, out of a pleasant revenge, wants you to get it
_engrav'd_ in Table Book to surprise H., who I know will be amus'd with
you so doing.
Append some observations about the awkwardness of country styles about
Edmonton, and the difficulty of elderly Ladies getting over 'em.----
That is to say, if you think the sketch good enough.
I take on myself the warranty.
Can you slip down here some day and go a Green-dragoning? C.L.
Enfield (Mrs. Leishman's, Chase).
If you do, send Hood the number, No. 2 Robert St., Adelphi, and keep the
sketch for me.
["This" was the drawing by Hood. I take it from the _Table-Book_, where
it represents Mrs. Gilpin resting on a stile:--
[Illustration]
Lamb subsequently appended the observations himself. The text of his
little article, changing Mary Lamb into Mrs. Gilpin, was in the late Mr.
Locker-Lampson's collection. The postmark is July 17. 1827.]
LETTER 418
CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON
Enfield. P.M. July 17, 182[7].
Dear M. Thanks for your attentions of every kind. Emma will not fail
Mrs. Hood's kind invitation, but her Aunt is so queer a one, that we
cannot let her go with a single gentleman singly to Vauxhall; she would
withdraw her from us altogether in a fright; but if any of the Hood's
family accompany you, then there can be small objection.
I have been writing letters till too dark to see the marks. I can just
say we shall be happy to see you any Sunday _after the next_: say, the
Sunday after, and perhaps the Hoods will come too and have a merry other
day, before they go hence. But next Sunday we expect as many as we can
well entertain.
With ours and Emma's
acknowlgm's
yours
C.L.
[The earliest of a long series of letters to Edward Moxon, preserved at
Rowfant by the late Mr. Locker-Lampson, but now in America. Emma Isola's
aunt was Miss Humphreys.]
LETTER 419
CHARLES LAMB TO P.G. PATMORE
[Dated at end: July 19, 1827.]
Dear P.--I am so poorly! I have been to a funeral, where I made a pun,
to the consternation of the rest of the mourners. And we had wine. I
can't describe to you the howl which the widow set up at proper
intervals. Dash could, for it was not unlike what he makes.
The letter I sent you was one directed to the care of E. White, India
House, for Mrs. Hazlitt. _Which_ Mrs. Hazlitt I don't yet know, but A.
has taken it to France on speculation. Really it is embarrassing. There
is Mrs. present H., Mrs. late H., and Mrs. John H., and to which of the
three Mrs. Wiggins's it appertains, I don't know. I wanted to open it,
but it's transportation.
I am sorry you are plagued about your book. I would strongly recommend
you to take for one story Massinger's "Old Law." It is exquisite. I can
think of no other.
Dash is frightful this morning. He whines and stands up on his hind
legs. He misses Beckey, who is gone to town. I took him to Barnet the
other day, and he couldn't eat his victuals after it. Pray God his
intellectuals be not slipping.
Mary is gone out for some soles. I suppose 'tis no use to ask you to
come and partake of 'em; else there's a steam-vessel.
I am doing a tragi-comedy in two acts, and have got on tolerably; but it
will be refused, or worse. I never had luck with anything my name was
put to.
Oh, I am so poorly! I _waked_ it at my cousin's the bookbinder's, who is
now with God; or, if he is not, it's no fault of mine.
We hope the Frank wines do not disagree with Mrs. Patmore. By the way, I
like her.
Did you ever taste frogs? Get them, if you can. They are like little
Lilliput rabbits, only a thought nicer.
Christ, how sick I am!--not of the world, but of the widow's shrub.
She's sworn under £6000, but I think she perjured herself. She howls in
E _la_, and I comfort her in B flat. You understand music?...
"No shrimps!" (That's in answer to Mary's question about how the soles
are to be done.)
I am uncertain where this _wandering_ letter may reach you. What you
mean by Poste Restante, God knows. Do you mean I must pay the postage?
So I do to Dover.
We had a merry passage with the widow at the Commons. She was
howling--part howling and part giving directions to the proctor--when
crash! down went my sister through a crazy chair, and made the clerks
grin, and I grinned, and the widow tittered--_and then I knew that she
was not inconsolable_. Mary was more frightened than hurt.
She'd make a good match for anybody (by she, I mean the widow).
"If he bring but a _relict_ away,
He is happy, nor heard to complain."
SHENSTONE.
Procter has got a wen growing out at the nape of his neck, which his
wife wants him to have cut off; but I think it rather an agreeable
excrescence--like his poetry--redundant. Hone has hanged himself for
debt. Godwin was taken up for picking pockets.... Beckey takes to bad
courses. Her father was blown up in a steam machine. The coroner found
it Insanity. I should not like him to sit on my letter.
Do you observe my direction? Is it Gallic?--Classical?
Do try and get some frogs. You must ask for "grenouilles" (green-eels).
They don't understand "frogs," though it's a common phrase with us.
If you go through Bulloign (Boulogne) enquire if old Godfrey is living,
and how he got home from the Crusades. He must be a very old man now.
If there is anything new in politics or literature in France, keep it
till I see you again, for I'm in no hurry. Chatty-Briant is well I hope.
I think I have no more news; only give both our loves ("all three," says
Dash) to Mrs. Patmore, and bid her get quite well, as I am at present,
bating qualms, and the grief incident to losing a valuable relation.
C.L.
Londres, July 19, 1827.
[This is from Patmore's _My Friends and Acquaintances_, 1854; but I have
no confidence in Patmore's transcription. After "picking pockets" should
come, for example, according to other editors, the sentence, "Moxon has
fallen in love with Emma, our nut-brown maid." This is the first we hear
of the circumstance and quite probably Lamb was then exaggerating. As it
happened, however, Moxon and Miss Isola, as we shall see, were married
in 1833.
We do not know the name of the widow; but her husband was Lamb's cousin,
the bookbinder.
The doubt about the Hazlitts refers chiefly to William Hazlitt's divorce
from his first wife in 1822, and his remarriage in 1824 with a Mrs.
Bridgewater.
"Your book." Patmore, in _My Friends and Acquaintances_, writes:--
This refers to a series of tales that I was writing, (since published
under the title of _Chatsworth, or the Romance of a Week_.) for the
subject of one of which he had recommended me to take "The Old Law." As
Lamb's critical faculties (as displayed in the celebrated "specimens"
which created an era in the dramatic taste of England) were not
surpassed by those of any writer of his day, the reader may like to see
a few "specimens" of some notes which Lamb took the pains to make on two
of the tales that were shown to him. I give these the rather that there
is occasionally blended with their critical nicety of tact, a drollery
that is very characteristic of the writer. I shall leave these notes and
verbal criticisms to speak for themselves, after merely explaining that
they are written on separate bits of paper, each note having a numerical
reference to that page of the MS. in which occurs the passage commented
on.
"Besides the words 'riant' and 'Euphrosyne,' the sentence is senseless.
'A sweet sadness' capable of inspiring 'a more _grave joy_'--than
what?--than demonstrations of _mirth_? Odd if it had not been. I had
once a _wry aunt_, which may make me dislike the phrase.
"'Pleasurable:'--no word is good that is awkward to spell. (Query.)
Welcome or Joyous.
"'_Steady self-possession_ rather than _undaunted courage_,' etc. The
two things are not opposed enough. You mean, rather than rash fire of
valour in action.
"'Looking like a heifer,' I fear wont do in prose. (Qy.) 'Like to some
spotless heifer,'--or,'that you might have compared her to some spotless
heifer,' etc.--or 'Like to some sacrificial heifer of old.' I should
prefer, 'garlanded with flowers as for a sacrifice '--and cut the cow
altogether.
"(Say) 'Like the muttering of some strange spell,'--omitting the
demon,--they are _subject_ to spells, they don't use them.
"'Feud' here (and before and after) is wrong. (Say) old malice, or,
difference. _Feud_ is of clans. It might be applied to family quarrels,
but is quite improper to individuals falling out.
"'Apathetic.' Vile word.
"'Mechanically,' faugh!--insensibly--involuntarily--in-any-thing-ly but
mechanically.
"Calianax's character should be somewhere briefly _drawn_, not left to
be dramatically inferred.
"'Surprised and almost vexed while it troubled her.' (Awkward.) Better,
'in a way that while it deeply troubled her, could not but surprise and
vex her to think it should be a source of trouble at all.'
"'Reaction' is vile slang. 'Physical'--vile word.
"Decidedly, Dorigen should simply propose to him to remove the rocks as
_ugly_ or _dangerous_, not as affecting her with fears for her husband.
The idea of her husband should be excluded from a promise which is meant
to be _frank_ upon impossible conditions. She cannot promise in one
breath infidelity to him, and make the conditions a good to him. Her
reason for hating the rocks is good, but not to be expressed here.
"Insert after 'to whatever consequences it might lead,'--'Neither had
Arviragus been disposed to interpose a husband's authority to prevent
the execution of this rash vow, was he unmindful of that older and more
solemn vow which, in the days of their marriage, he had imposed upon
himself, in no instance to control the settled purpose or determination
of his wedded wife;--so that by the chains of a double contract he
seemed bound to abide by her decision in this instance, whatever it
might be.'"
"A tragi-comedy"--Lamb's dramatic version of Crabbe's "Confidante,"
which he called "The Wife's Trial" (see Vol. IV. of this edition).