"I remember," says "The Spectator," "upon Mr. Baxter's death, there was
published a sheet of very good sayings, inscribed, 'The Last Words of
Mr. Baxter.' The title sold so great a number of these papers that about
a week after there came out a second sheet, inscribed, 'More Last Words
of Mr. Baxter.'" And so kindly and gladly did the public--or at least
that portion of the public that read the "Atlantic Monthly"--receive the
specimens of Charles Lamb's uncollected writings, published somewhile
since in these pages, that I am induced to print another paper on the
same pleasant and entertaining subject.
The success of that piece of "ingenious nonsense," that gem of
biographical literature, the unique and veracious "Memoir of Liston,"
over which the lovers of wit and the lovers of Charles Lamb have had
many a good laugh, was so great that Lamb was encouraged to try his hand
at another theatrical memoir, and produced a mock and mirthful
autobiography of his old friend and favorite comedian, Munden, whom he
had previously immortalized in one of the best and most admired of the
"Essays of Elia."
Those who enjoyed the biography of Liston will chuckle over the
autobiography of Munden. It was certainly a happy idea to represent
Munden as writing a sketch of his life,--not to gratify his own vanity,
or for the pleasure and entertainment of the public, but solely and
purposely to prevent the truthful and matter-of-fact biographer of
Liston from making the old player the subject of a biographical work.
The veteran actor's vehement protests against being represented as a
Presbyterian or Anabaptist, and his brief, but pungent comments on
certain passages in the Liston biography, are delightful. Methinks I see
the old man,--
"The gray-haired man of glee,"--
the great and wonderful impersonator of the "Cobbler of Preston" and
"Old Dozey,"--methinks I see this fine actor, this genial and jovial
comedian, and his son, gravely and carefully examining the great map of
Kent in search of Lupton Magna!
Leigh Hunt, in his Autobiography, speaking of some of Elia's
contributions to the "London Magazine," thus mentions these two
"he-children" of Lamb's:--
"He wrote in the same magazine two lives of Liston and Munden, which the
public took for serious, and which exhibit an extraordinary jumble of
imaginary facts and truth of by-painting. Munden he made born at "Stoke
Pogis"; the very sound of which was like the actor speaking and digging
his words."
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