[I fancy that the last sentence refers to an offer for Miss Isola's hand
which Moxon had just made to Lamb.]
LETTER 571
CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON
[No date. Spring, 1833.]
Dear M. many thanks for the Books; the _Faust_ I will acknowledge to the
Author. But most thanks for one immortal sentence, "If I do not _cheat_
him, never _trust_ me again." I do not know whether to admire most, the
wit or justness of the sentiment. It has my cordial approbation. My
sense of meum and tuum applauds it. I maintain it, the eighth
commandment hath a secret special reservation, by which the reptile is
exempt from any protection from it; as a dog, or a nigger, he is not a
holder of property. Not a ninth of what he detains from the world is his
own. Keep your hands from picking and stealing is no ways referable to
his acquists. I doubt whether bearing false witness against thy neighbor
at all contemplated this possible scrub. Could Moses have seen the speck
in vision? An ex post facto law alone could relieve him, and we are
taught to expect no eleventh commandment. The out-law to the Mosaic
dispensation!--unworthy to have seen Moses' behind--to lay his
desecrating hands upon Elia! Has the irriverent ark-toucher been struck
blind I wonder--? The more I think of him, the less I think of him. His
meanness is invisible with aid of solar microscope, my moral eye smarts
at him. The less flea that bites little fleas! The great Beast! the
beggarly nit!
More when we meet.
Mind, you'll come, two of you--and couldn't you go off in the morning,
that we may have a daylong curse at him, if curses are not dis-hallowed
by descending so low? Amen.
Maledicatur in extremis.
[Abraham Hayward's translation of Faust was published by Moxon in
February, 1833. Lamb's letter of thanks was said by the late Edmund
Yates to be a very odd one. I have not seen it.
We may perhaps assume that Moxon's reply to Lamb's letter stating that
Taylor's claim had been paid contained the "immortal sentence."
"Not a ninth." A tailor (Taylor) is only a ninth of a man.
"The less flea." Remembering Swift's lines in "On Poetry, a Rhapsody":--
So, naturalists observe, a flea
Has smaller fleas that on him prey;
And these have smaller still to bite 'em,
And so proceed _ad infinitum_.]
LETTER 572
CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER
[No date. ? March, 1833.]
Swallow your damn'd dinner and your brandy and water fast--
& come immediately
I want to take Knowles in to Emma's only female friend for 5 minutes
only, and we are free for the even'g.
I'll do a Prologue.
[The prologue was for Sheridan Knowles' play "The Wife." Lamb wrote both
prologue and epilogue (see Vol. IV.).]
LETTER 573
CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON
[No date. ? April 10, 1833.]
Dear M. The first Oak sonnet, and the Nightingale, may show their faces
in any Annual unblushing. Some of the others are very good.
The Sabbath too much what you have written before.
You are destined to shine in Sonnets, I tell you.
Shall we look for you Sunday, we did in vain Good Friday [April 5].
[_A signature was added by Mrs. Moxon for Mr. Frederick Locker-Lampson,
evidently from another letter_:--]
Your truest friend
C. LAMB.
LETTER 574
CHARLES LAMB TO C.W. DILKE
[No date. April, 1833.]
D'r Sir, I read your note in a moment of great perturbation with my
Landlady and chuck'd it in the fire, as I should have done an epistle of
Paul, but as far as my Sister recalls the import of it, I reply. The
Sonnets (36 of them) have never been printed, much less published, till
the other day,* save that a few of 'em have come out in Annuals. Two
vols., of poetry of M.'s, have been publish'd, but they were not these.
The "Nightingale" has been in one of the those gewgaws, the Annuals;
whether the other I sent you has, or not, penitus ignoro. But for
heaven's sake do with 'em what you like.
Yours
C.L.
*The proof sheets only were in my hand about a fortnight ago.
[Moxon's sonnets were reviewed, probably by Lamb, in _The Athenaeum_ for
April 13, 1833. The sonnet to the nightingale (see above) was quoted.
This review will be found in Vol. I. of the present edition.]
LETTER 575
CHARLES LAMB TO MRS. WILLIAM AYRTON
[P.M. April (16), 1833.]
Dear Mrs. Ayrton, I do not know which to admire most, your kindness, or
your patience, in copying out that intolerable rabble of panegryc from
over the Atlantic. By the way, now your hand is in, I wish you would
copy out for me the l3th l7th and 24th of Barrow's sermons in folio, and
all of Tillotson's (folio also) except the first, which I have in
Manuscript, and which, you know, is Ayrton's favorite. Then--but I won't
trouble you any farther just now. Why does not A come and see me? Can't
he and Henry Crabbe concert it? 'Tis as easy as lying is to me. Mary's
kindest love to you both.
ELIA.
[The letter is accompanied by a note in the writing of William Scrope
Ayrton, the son of William Ayrton, copied from Mrs. Ayrton's Diary:--
"March 17, 1833.--Copied a critique upon Elia's works from the Mirror of
America a sort of news paper."]
LETTER 576
CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON
[P.M. April 25, 1833.]
My dear Moxon, We perfectly agree in your arrangement. _It has quite set
my sister's mind at rest._ She will come with you on Sunday, and return
at eve, and I will make comfortable arrangem'ts with the Buffams. We
desire to have you here dining unWestwooded, and I will try and get you
a bottle of choice port. I have transferr'd the stock I told you to
Emma. The plan of the Buffams steers admirably between two niceties.
Tell Emma we thoroughly approve it. As our damnd Times is a day after
the fair, I am setting off to Enfield Highway to see in a morning paper
(alas! the Publican's) how the play ran. Pray, bring 4 orders for Mr.
Asbury--undated.
In haste (not for neglect)
Yours ever
C. LAMB.
Thursday.
[Lamb evidently refers to Moxon's engagement to Miss Isola being now
settled.
The play was Sheridan Knowles' "The Wife," produced on April 24.
The Buffams were the landladies of the house in Southampton Buildings,
where Lamb lodged in town.]
LETTER 577
CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON
[P.M. April 27, 1833.]
Dear M. Mary and I are very poorly. Asbury says tis nothing but
influenza. Mr. W. appears all but dying, he is delirious. Mrs. W. was
taken so last night, that Mary was obliged at midnight to knock up Mrs.
Waller to come and sit up with her. We have had a sick child, who
sleeping, or not sleeping, next me with a pasteboard partition between,
killed my sleep. The little bastard is gone. My bedfellows are Cough and
cramp, we sleep 3 in a bed. Domestic arrangem'ts (Blue Butcher and all)
devolve on Mary. Don't come yet to this house of pest and age. We
propose when E. and you agree on the time, to come up and meet her at
the Buffams', say a week hence, but do you make the appointm't. The
Lachlans send her their love.
I do sadly want those 2 last Hogarths--and an't I to have the Play?
Mind our spirits are good and we are happy in your happiness_es_.
C.L.
Our old and ever loves to dear Em.
["Mr. W." was Mr. Westwood.--I know nothing of the Lachlans.--The Play
would be "The Wife" probably.--Miss Isola was, I imagine, staying with
the Moxons.]
LETTER 578
CHARLES LAMB TO THE REV. JAMES GILLMAN
May 7, 1833.
By a strange occurrence we have quitted Enfield for ever. Oh! the happy
eternity! Who is Vicar or Lecturer for that detestable place concerns us
not. But Asbury, surgeon and a good fellow, has offered to get you a
Mover and Seconder, and you may use my name freely to him. Except him
and Dr. Creswell, I have no respectable acquaintance in the dreary
village. At least my friends are all in the _public_ line, and it might
not suit to have it moved at a special vestry by John Gage at the Crown
and Horseshoe, licensed victualler, and seconded by Joseph Horner of the
Green Dragon, ditto, that the Rev. J.G. is a fit person to be Lecturer,
&c.
My dear James, I wish you all success, but am too full of my own
emancipation almost to congratulate anyone else. With both our loves to
your father and mother and glorious S.T.C.
Yours,
C. LAMB.
[The Rev. James Gillman was the eldest son of Coleridge's physician and
friend. He was born in 1808 and ordained in 1831. He thought in 1833 of
standing as candidate for the vicarship of Enfield, but did not obtain
it. After acting as Under Master of Highgate Grammar School he became in
1836 Rector of Barfreystone, in Kent. In 1847 he became Vicar of Holy
Trinity, Lambeth. He died in 1877.
Mary Lamb having become ill again had been moved to Edmonton, to a
private home for mental patients. Lamb followed her soon after, and
settled in the same house. It still stands (1912) almost exactly as in
the Lambs' day.]
LETTER 579
CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER
[No date. May, 1833.]
D'r F. Can you oblige me by sending 4 Box orders undated for the Olympic
Theatre? I suppose Knowles can get 'em. It is for the Waldens, with whom
I live. The sooner, the better, that they may not miss the "Wife"--I
meet you at the Talfourds' Saturday week, and if they can't, perhaps you
can, give me a bed.
Yours ratherish unwell
C. LAMB.
Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton.
Or write immediately to say if you can't get em.
[Knowles' play "The Wife," produced at Covent Garden, was moved to the
Olympic on May 9.]
LETTER 580
CHARLES LAMB TO JOHN FORSTER
[P.M. May 12, 1833.]
Dear Boy, I send you the original Elias, complete. When I am a little
composed, I shall hope to see you and Proctor here; may be, may see you
first in London.
C.L.
[In the Dyce and Forster collection, at South Kensington, are preserved
some of these MSS.
Here should come a letter to Miss Rickman, dated May 23, 1833. "Perhaps,
as Miss Kelly is just now in notoriety, it may amuse you to know that
'Barbara S.' is _all_ of it true of _her_, being all communicated to
me
from her own mouth. The 'wedding' you of course found out to be Sally
Burney's."]
LETTER 581
CHARLES LAMB TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
End of May nearly, [1833].
Dear Wordsworth, Your letter, save in what respects your dear Sister's
health, chear'd 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 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 seem'd 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 lachrymae rerum--and you and I must bear it--
To lay a little more load on it, a circumstance has happen'd, _cujus
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 Aug'st. So "perish the roses and the flowers"--how
is it?
Now to the brighter side, I am emancipated from most _hated_ and
_detestable_ people, the Westwoods. I am with attentive people, and
younger--I am 3 or 4 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 tho' most beloved. But London Streets and faces
cheer me inexpressibly, tho' of the latter not one known one were
remaining.
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
composition it served me as illustrative
I want you in the popular fallacies to like the "Home that is no home"
and "rising with the lark."
I am feeble, but chearful in this my genial hot weather,--walk'd 16
miles yesterd'y. I can't read much in Summer time. With very kindest
love to all and prayers for dear Dorothy,
I remain
most attachedly yours
C. LAMB.
at mr. walden's, church street, _edmonton_, middlesex.
Moxon has introduced Emma to Rogers, and he smiles upon the project. I
have given E. my MILTON--will you pardon me?--in part of a _portion_. It
hangs famously in his Murray-like shop.
[_On the wrapper is written_:--]
D'r M[oxon], inclose this in a better-looking paper, and get it frank'd,
and good by'e till Sund'y. Come early--
C.L.
["The Ariadne." See the essay on "Barrenness of the Imaginative
Faculty," where Titian's "Bacchus and Ariadne" in the National Gallery
is highly praised (see Vol. II.). Wordsworth's favourite essays in this
volume were "The Wedding" and "Old China."
"My Milton." Against the reference to the portrait of Milton, in the
postscript, some one, possibly Wordsworth, has pencilled a note, now
only partially legible. It runs thus: "It had been proposed by L. that
W.W. should be the Possessor of [? this picture] his friend and that
afterwards it was to be bequeathed to Christ's Coll. Cambridge."
Lamb had given Wordsworth in 1820 a copy of _Paradise Regained_, 1671,
with this inscription: "C. Lamb to the best Knower of Milton, and
therefore the worthiest occupant of this pleasant Edition. June 2'd
1820."]
LETTER 582
CHARLES LAMB TO SARAH HAZLITT
[Dated at end:] Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton, May 31, 1833.
Dear Mrs. Hazlitt,--I will assuredly come, and find you out, when I am
better. I am driven from house and home by Mary's illness. I took a
sudden resolution 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 unsteady, so good b'ye till we meet.
Your old
C.L.
LETTER 583
CHARLES LAMB TO MARY BETHAM
June 5, 1833.
Dear Mary Betham,--I remember You all, and tears come out when I think
on the years that have separated us. That dear Anne should so long have
remembered us affects me. My dear Mary, my poor sister is not, nor will
be for two months perhaps capable of appreciating the _kind old long
memory_ of dear Anne.
But not a penny will I take, and I can answer for my Mary when she
recovers, if the sum left can contribute in any way to the comfort of
Matilda.
We will halve it, or we will take a bit of it, as a token, rather than
wrong her. So pray consider it as an amicable arrangement. I write in
great haste, or you won't get it before you go.
_We do not want the money_; but if dear Matilda does not much want it,
why, we will take our thirds. God bless you.
C. LAMB.
[Miss Betham's sister, Anne, who had just died, had left thirty pounds
to Mary Lamb. Mr. Ernest Betham allows me to take this note from _A
House of Letters_.]
LETTER 584
CHARLES LAMB TO MATILDA BETHAM
[June 5, 1833.]
Dear Miss Betham,--I sit down, very poorly, to write to you, being come
to _Mr. Walden's, Church Street, Edmonton_, to be altogether with poor
Mary, who is very ill, as usual, only that her illnesses are now as many
months as they used to be weeks in duration--the reason your letter only
just found me. I am saddened with the havoc death has made in your
family. I do not know how to appreciate the kind regard of dear Anne;
Mary will understand it two months hence, I hope; but neither she nor I
would rob you, if the legacy will be of use to, or comfort to you. My
hand shakes so I can hardly write. On Saturday week I must come to town,
and will call on you in the morning before one o'clock. Till when I take
kindest leave.
Your old Friend,
C. LAMB.
[Here should come a note from Lamb to Mrs. Randal Norris, postmarked
July 10, 1833, which encloses a note from Joseph Jekyll, the Old
Bencher, thanking Lamb for a presentation copy of the _Last Essays of
Elia_ ("I hope not the last Essays of Elia") and asking him to accompany
Mrs. Norris and her daughters on a visit to him. Jekyll adds that "poor
George Dyer, blind, but as usual chearful and content, often gives ...
good accounts of you."
Here should come notes to Allsop, declining an invitation to Highgate,
and to a Mr. Tuff, warning him to be quick to use some theatre tickets
which Lamb had sent him.]
LETTER 585
CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON
[P.M. July 14, 1833.]
Dear M. the Hogarths are _delicate_. Perhaps it will amuse Emma to tell
her, that, a day or two since, Miss Norris (Betsy) call'd to me on the
road from London from a gig conveying her to Widford, and engaged me to
come down this afternoon. I think I shall stay only one night; she would
have been glad of E's accompaniment, but I would not disturb her, and
Mrs. N. is coming to town on Monday, so it would not have suited. Also,
C.V. Le Grice gave me a dinner at Johnny Gilpin's yesterday, where we
talk'd of what old friends were taken or left in the 30 years since we
had met.
I shall hope to see her on Tuesd'y.
To Bless you both
C.L.
Friday.
[Le Grice we have met. "Johnny Gilpin's" was The Bell at Edmonton.
Here should come another note from Lamb to Mrs. Randal Norris, in which
Lamb says that he reached home safely and thanks her for three agreeable
days. Also he sends some little books, which were, I take it, copies of
Moxon's private reissue of _Poetry for Children_.
Mr. W.C. Hazlitt records that a letter from Lamb to Miss Norris was in
existence in which the writer gave "minute and humorous instructions for
his own funeral, even specifying the number of nails which he desired to
be inserted in his coffin."]
LETTER 586
CHARLES LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON
[P.M. July 24, 1833.]
For god's sake, give Emma no more watches. _One_ has turn'd her head.
She is arrogant, and insulting. She said something very unpleasant to
our old Clock in the passage, as if he did not keep time, and yet he had
made her no appointment. She takes it out every instant to look at the
moment-hand. She lugs us out into the fields, because there the
bird-boys ask you "Pray, Sir, can you tell us what's a Clock," and she
answers them punctually. She loses all her time looking "what the time
is." I overheard her whispering, "Just so many hours, minutes &c. to
Tuesday--I think St. George's goes too slow"--This little present of
Time, why, 'tis Eternity to her--
What can make her so fond of a gingerbread watch?
She has spoil'd some of the movements. Between ourselves, she has kissed
away "half past 12," which I suppose to be the canonical hour in Hanover
Sq.
Well, if "love me, love my watch," answers, she will keep time to you--
It goes right by the Horse Guards--
[_On the next page_:--]
Emma hast kist this yellow wafer--a hint.
DEAREST M.
Never mind opposite nonsense. She does not love you for the watch, but
the watch for you.
I will be at the wedding, and keep the 30 July as long as my poor months
last me, as a festival gloriously.
Your _ever
ELIA._
We have not heard from Cambridge. I will write the moment we do.
Edmonton, 24th July, 3.20 post mer. minutes 4 instants by Emma's watch.
[There used to be preserved at Rowfant (it is now in America) a letter
from Lamb to Moxon, postmarked July 28, 1833, mentioning Lamb's anxiety
about Martin Burney. It is unnecessary to print this.]
LETTER 587
CHARLES AND MARY LAMB TO EDWARD AND EMMA MOXON
[No date. ? July 31, 1833.]
Dear Mr. and Mrs. Moxon--
Time very short. I wrote to Miss Fryer, and had the sweetest letter
about you, Emma, that ever friendship dictated. "I am full of good
wishes, I am crying with good wishes," she says; but you shall see it.--
Dear Moxon, I take your writing most kindly and shall most kindly your
writing from Paris--
I want to crowd another letter to Miss Fry[er] into the little time
after dinner before Post time.
So with 20000 congratulations,
Yours,
C.L.
I am calm, sober, happy. Turn over for the reason.
I got home from Dover St., by Evens, _half as sober as a judge_. I am
turning over a new leaf, as I hope you will now.
[_On the next leaf Mary Lamb wrote_:--]
MY DEAR EMMA AND EDWARD MOXON,
Accept my sincere congratulations, and imagine more good wishes than my
weak nerves will let me put into good set words. The dreary blank of
_unanswered questions_ which I ventured to ask in vain was cleared up on
the wedding-day by Mrs. W. taking a glass of wine, and, with a total
change of countenance, begged leave to drink Mr. and Mrs. Moxon's
health. It restored me, from that moment: as if by an electrical stroke:
to the entire possession of my senses--I never felt so calm and quiet
after a similar illness as I do now. I feel as if all tears were wiped
from my eyes, and all care from my heart.
MARY LAMB.
[_At the foot of this letter Charles Lamb added_:--]
Wednesday.
DEARS AGAIN
Your letter interrupted a seventh game at Picquet which _we_ were
having, after walking to _Wright's_ and purchasing shoes. We pass our
time in cards, walks, and reading. We attack Tasso soon.
C.L.
Never was such a calm, or such a recovery. 'Tis her own words,
undictated.
[The marriage of Edward Moxon and Emma Isola was celebrated on July 30.
They afterwards went to Paris.
"Mrs. W."--Mrs. Walden, I imagine.
Here should come an amusing but brief account of the wedding sent by
Lamb to Louisa Badams on August 20 (printed by Canon Ainger). "I am not
fit for weddings or burials. Both incite a chuckle:" a sentiment which
Lamb more than once expresses.
Here should come a note thanking Matilda Betham for some bridal verses
written for the wedding of Edward Moxon and Emma Isola. "In haste and
headake."]
LETTER 588
CHARLES LAMB TO H.F. CARY
Sept. 9th, 1833.
Dear Sir,--Your packet I have only just received, owing, I suppose, to
the absence of Moxon, who is flaunting it about _à la Parisienne_ with
his new bride, our Emma, much to his satisfaction and not a little to
our dulness. We shall be quite well by the time you return from
Worcestershire and most most (observe the repetition) glad to see you
here or anywhere.
I will take my time with Darley's act. I wish poets would write a little
plainer; he begins some of his words with a letter which is unknown to
the English typography.
Yours, most truly,
C. LAMB.
P.S.--Pray let me know when you return. We are at Mr. Walden's,
Church-street, Edmonton; no longer at Enfield. You will be amused to
hear that my sister and I have, with the aid of Emma, scrambled through
the "Inferno" by the blessed furtherance of your polar-star translation.
I think we scarce left anything unmadeout. But our partner has left us,
and we have not yet resumed. Mary's chief pride in it was that she
should some day brag of it to you. Your Dante and Sandys' Ovid are the
only helpmates of translations. Neither of you shirk a word.
Fairfax's Tasso is no translation at all. It's better in some places;
but it merely observes the number of stanzas; as for images, similes,
&c., he finds 'em himself, and never "troubles Peter for the matter."
In haste, dear Gary, yours ever,
C. LAMB.
Has Moxon sent you "Elia," second volume? if not, he shall. Taylor and
we are at law about it.
["Darley's act." Not now identifiable, I think.
"Taylor and we." The case had apparently not been settled by Procter. I
have not found any report of a law-suit.]
LETTER 589
CHARLES AND MARY LAMB TO EDWARD MOXON
[P.M. Sept. 26, 1833.]
Thursday.
We shall be most happy to see Emma, dear to every body. Mary's spirits
are much better, and she longs to see again our twelve years' friend.
You shall afternoon sip with me a bottle of superexcellent Port, after
deducting a dinner-glass for them. We rejoyce to have E. come, the
_first Visit_, without Miss ----, who, I trust, will yet behave well;
but she might perplex Mary with questions. Pindar sadly wants Preface
and notes. Pray, E., get to Snow Hill before 12, for we dine before 2.
We will make it 2. By mistake I gave you Miss Betham's letter, with the
exquisite verses, which pray return to me, or if it be an improved copy,
give me the other, and Albumize mine, keeping the signature. It is too
pretty a family portrait, for you not to cherish.
Your loving friends
C. LAMB.
M. LAMB.