LETTER CCCLXXI.] To MR. HONE. May 21, 1830. Dear Hone-I thought you would be pleased to see this letter. Pray if you have time to call on Novello, No. 66, Great Queen St. I am anxious to learn whether he received his album I sent on Friday by our nine o'clock morning stage. If not, beg him inquire at the Old Bell, Holborn. CHARLES LAMB. Southey will see in the Times all we proposed omitting is omitted. TO MRS. HAZLITT. LETTER CCCLXXII.] May 24, 1830. Mary's love? Yes. Mary Lamb is quite well. Enfield, Saturday. Dear Sarah-I found my way to Northaw on Thursday, and saw a very good woman behind a counter, who says also that you are a very good lady. I did not accept her offered glass of wine (home-made, I take it), but craved a cup of ale, with which I seasoned a slice of cold lamb, from a sandwich box, which I ate in her back parlour, and proceeded for Berkhampstead, etc.; lost myself over a heath, and had a day's pleasure. I wish you could walk as I do, and as you used to do. I am sorry to find you are so poorly; and, now I have found my way, I wish you back at Goody Tomlinson's. What a pretty village 'tis! I should have come sooner, but was waiting a summons to Bury. Well, it came; and I found the good parson's lady (he was from home) exceedingly hospitable. VOL. II. ន Poor Emma, the first moment we were alone, took me into a corner, and said, "Now, pray, don't drink; do check yourself after dinner, for my sake, and when we get home to Enfield you shall drink as much as ever you please, and I won't say a word about it.” How I behaved, you may guess, when I tell you that Mrs. Williams and I have written acrostics on each other, and she hoped that she should have "no reason to regret Miss Isola's recovery, by its depriving her of our begun correspondence." Emma stayed a month with us, and has gone back (in tolerable health) to her long home, for she comes not again for a twelvemonth. I amused Mrs. Williams with an occurrence on our road to Enfield. We travelled with one of those troublesome fellow-passengers in a stage coach, that is called a well-inform'd man. For twenty miles we discoursed about the properties of steam, probabilities of carriage by ditto, till all my science, and more than all, was exhausted, and I was thinking of escaping my torment by getting up on the outside, when, getting into Bishops Stortford, my gentleman, spying some farming land, put an unlucky question to me: "What sort of a crop of turnips do you think we shall have this year?" Emma's eyes turned to me, to know what in the world I could have to say; and she burst into a violent fit of laughter, maugre her pale, serious cheeks, when, with the greatest gravity, I replied, that "it depends, I believe, upon boiled legs of mutton." This clenched our conversation; and my gentleman, with a face half wise, half in scorn, troubled us with no more conversation, scientific or philosophical, for the remainder of our journey. Ayrton was here yesterday, and as learned to the full as my fellow-traveller. What a pity that he will spoil a wit and a devilish pleasant fellow (as he is) by wisdom. He talked on music, and by having read Hawkins and Burney recently, I was enabled to talk of names, and show more knowledge than he had suspected I possessed; and in the end he begged me to shape my thoughts upon paper, which I did after he was gone, and sent him. FREE THOUGHTS ON SOME EMINENT COMPOSERS. Some cry up Haydn, some Mozart, I do not care a farthing candle For either of them, or for Handel, etc. Martin Burney is as good and as odd as ever. We had a dispute about the word "heir," which I contended was pronounced like "air." He said that might be in common parlance; or that we might so use it, speaking of the "Heir at Law," a comedy; but that in the law courts it was necessary to give it a full aspiration, and to say Hayer; he thought it might even vitiate a cause, if a counsel pronounced it otherwise. In conclusion, he "would consult Serjeant Wilde;" who gave it against him. Sometimes he falleth into the water; sometimes into the fire. He came down here, and insisted on reading Virgil's Eneid all through with me (which he did,) because a Counsel must know Latin. Another time he read out all the Gospel of St. John, because Biblical quotations are very emphatic in a Court of Justice. third time he would carve a fowl, which he did very illfavouredly, because we did not know how indispensable it was for a barrister to do all those things well-those little things were of more consequence than we supposed." So he goes on, harassing about the way to prosperity, and losing it; with a long head, but somewhat a wrong oneharum-scarum. Why does not his guardian angel look to him? He deserves one may be, he has tired him out. A I am tired with this long scrawl, but I thought in your exile you might like a letter. Commend me to all the wonders in Derbyshire; and tell the devil I humbly kiss my-hand to him. Yours ever, London, May 24, 1830. Mrs. Hazlitt, Mr. Broomhead's, St. Anne's Square, Buxton. C. LAMB. LETTER CCCLXXIII.] June 3, 1830. Dear Sarah-I named your thought about William to his father, who expressed such horror and aversion to the idea of his singing in public, that I cannot meddle in it directly or indirectly. Ayrton is a kind fellow; and if you chuse to consult him by letter, or otherwise, he will give you the best advice, I am sure, very readily. I have no doubt that M. Burney's objection to interfering was the same with mine. With thanks for your pleasant long letter, which is not that of an invalid, and sympathy for your sad sufferings, I remain, in haste, Yours truly. Mary's kindest love. Mrs. Hazlitt, at Mr. Broomhead's, St. Anne's Square, Buxton. [NO SIGNATURE.] TO WILLIAM HONE. LETTER CCCLXXIV.] Enfield, June 17, 1830. I hereby impower Matilda Hone to superintend daily the putting into the twopenny post the Times newspaper of the day before, directed "Mr. Lamb, Enfield," which shall be held a full and sufficient direction; the said insertion to commence on Monday morning next. And I do engage to pay to William Hone, Coffee and Hotel Man, the quarterly sum of £1, to be paid at the ordinary Quarter days, or thereabout, for the reversion of the said paper, commencing with the 24th inst., or Feast of John the Baptist; the intervening days to be held and considered as nothing. C. LAMB. Vivant Coffee, Coffee-potque ! TO BERNARD BARTON. LETTER CCCLXXV.] June 28, 1830. Dear B. B.-Could you dream of my publishing without sending a copy to you? You will find something new to you in the volume, particularly the translations. Moxon will send to you the moment it is out. He is the young poet of Christmas, whom the Author of the "Pleasures of Memory" has set up in the book-vending business with a volunteer'd loan of £500. Such munificence is rare to an almost stranger; but Rogers, I am told, has done many good-natured things of this kind. I need not say how glad to see A. K. and Lucy we should have been,--and still shall be, if it be practicable. Our direction is Mr. Westwood's, Chase Side, Enfield; but alas I know not theirs. We can give them a bed. Coaches come daily from the Bell, Holborn. You will see that I am worn to the poetical dregs, condescending to acrostics, which are nine fathom beneath album verses; but they were written at the request of the lady where our Emma is, to whom I paid a visit in April to bring home Emma for a change of air after a severe illness, in which she had been treated like a daughter by the good Parson and his whole family. She has since returned to her occupation. I thought on you in Suffolk, but was forty miles from Woodbridge. I heard of you the other day from Mr. Pulham of the India House. Long live King William the IVth! S. T. C. says we have had wicked kings, foolish kings, wise kings, good kings (but few,) but never till now have we had a blackguard king. Charles the Second was profligate, but a gentleman. I have nineteen letters to dispatch this leisure Sabbath for Moxon to send with copies; so you will forgive me short measure, and believe me, Yours ever, C. L. Pray do let us see your Quakeresses if possible. |