* * * * *
Delightful as the essays of Elia are, Lamb did not spend all the "riches
of his wit" in their production. His letters--so full are they of "the
salt and fineness of wit,"--so richly humorous and so deliciously
droll,--so rammed and crammed with the oddest conceits and the wildest
fancies, and the quaintest, queerest thoughts, ideas, and
speculations--are scarcely inferior to his essays. Indeed, some of the
best and most admired of the essays are but extended letters. The germ
of the immortal dissertation on "Roast Pig" is contained in a letter to
Coleridge; the essay entitled "Distant Correspondents" is hardly more
than a transcript of a private letter to Barron Field; and the original
sketch of "The Gentle Giantess" was given in a letter to Miss
Wordsworth.
In the following letter--which is not included in Talfourd's "Life and
Letters of Charles Lamb," and will therefore be new to most
readers--Lamb writes very much in the manner in which Shakspeare's fools
and jesters--in some respects the wisest and thoughtfullest characters
in his works--talk. If his words be "light as air," they vent "truths
deep as the centre." If the Fool in "Lear" had written letters to his
friends and acquaintances, I think they would have marvellously
resembled this epistle to Patmore; and if, in saying this, I compliment
the Fool, I hope I do not derogate from the genius of Elia. Jaques, it
will be remembered, after hearing the "motley fool" moral on the time,
declared that "motley's the only wear"; and I opine that Lamb would
consider it no small praise to be likened, in wit, wisdom, and
eloquence, to Touchstone, or to the Clown in "Twelfth Night."