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its fusc envelope. Some said, 'tis a viol da Gamba, others pronounced it a fiddle; I, myself, hoped it a liqueur case, pregnant with eau-de-vie and such odd nectar. When midwifed into daylight, the gossips were at a loss to pronounce upon its species. Most took it for a marrow spoon, an apple scoop, a banker's guinea shovel; at length its true scope appeared, its drift, to save the back-bone of my sister stooping to scuttles: a philanthropic intent; borrowed, no doubt, from some of the Colliers. You save people's backs one way, and break 'em again by loads of obligation. The spectacles are delicate and Vulcanian. No lighter texture than their steel did the cuckoldy blacksmith frame to catch Mrs. Vulcan and the Captain in. For ungalled forehead, as for back unbursten, you have Mary's thanks. Marry, for my own peculium of obligation, 'twas supererogatory. A second part of Pamela was enough in conscience. Two Pamelas in a house are too much, without two Mr. B.'s to reward 'em.

Mary, who is handselling her new aerial perspectives upon a pair of old worsted stockings trod out in Cheshunt lanes, sends her love: I, great good-liking. Bid us a personal farewell before you see the Vatican.

CHARLES LAMB.

TO BERNARD BARTON.

LETTER CCCXLIII.]

March 25, 1829.

Dear B. B.-I send you by desire Darley's very poetical poem. You will like, I think, the novel headings of each scene. Scenical directions in verse are novelties. With it I send a few duplicates, which are therefore of no value to me; and may amuse an idle hour. Read "Christmas": 'tis the production of a young author, who reads all your writings. A good word from you about his little book would be as balm to him. It has no pretensions, and makes none.

But parts are

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pretty. In Field's Appendix turn to a poem called the Kangaroo. It is in the best way of our old poets, if I mistake not. I have just come from town, where I have been to get my bit of quarterly pension; and have brought home, from stalls in Barbican, the old "Pilgrim's Progress" with the prints-Vanity Fair, etc.-now scarce. Four shillings. Cheap. And also one of whom I have oft heard and had dreams, but never saw in the fleshthat is in sheepskin-"The whole theologic works of THOMAS AQUINAS."

My arms ached with lugging it a mile to the stage; but the burden was a pleasure, such as old Anchises was to the shoulders of Æneas, or the Lady to the Lover in old romance, who having to carry her to the top of a high mountain (the price of obtaining her,) clambered with her to the top, and fell dead with fatigue.

"Oh the glorious old Schoolmen !"

There must be something in him. Such great names imply greatness. Who hath seen Michael Angelo's things-of us that never pilgrimaged to Rome-and yet which of us disbelieves his greatness? How I will revel in his cobwebs and subtleties, till my brain spins!

N.B. I have writ in the old Hamlet: offer it to Mitford in my name, if he have not seen it. "Tis woefully below our editions of it. But keep it, if you like. (What is M. to me?)

I do not mean this to go for a letter, only to apprise you that the parcel is booked for you this 25th March, 1829, from the Four Swans, Bishopsgate. With both our loves to Lucy and A. K.

Yours ever,

To H. C. ROBINSON.

LETTER CCCXLIV.]

C. L.

April 10, 1829.

Dear Robinson-We are afraid you will slip from us from England without again seeing us. It would be

charity to come and see me. I have these three days been laid up with strong rheumatic pains, in loins, back, shoulders. I shriek sometimes from the violence of

them. I get scarce any sleep, and the consequence is, I am restless, and want to change sides as I lie, and I cannot turn without resting on my hands, and so turning all my body all at once, like a log with a lever. While this rainy weather lasts, I have no hope of alleviation. I have tried flannels and embrocation in vain. Just at the hip joint the pangs sometimes are so excruciating, that I cry out. It is as violent as the cramp, and far more continuous. I am ashamed to whine about these complaints to you, who can ill enter into them; but indeed they are sharp. You go about, in rain or fine, at all hours, without discommodity. I envy you your

immunity at a time of life not much removed from my own. But you owe your exemption to temperance, which it is too late for me to pursue. I, in my lifetime, have had my good things. Hence my frame is brittle— yours strong as brass. I never knew any ailment you had. You can go out at night in all weathers, sit up all hours. Well, I don't want to moralise; I only wish to say that if you are inclined to a game at double-dumby, I would try and bolster myself in a chair for a rubber or so. My days are tedious, but less so, and less painful than my nights. May you never know the pain and difficulty I have in writing so much! Mary, who is most kind, joins in the wish.

C. LAMB.

LETTER CCCXLV.]

April 17, 1829.

I do confess to mischief. It was the subtlest diabolical piece of malice heart of man has contrived. I have no more rheumatism than that poker. Never was freer from all pains and aches. Every joint sound, to the tip of the ear from the extremity of the lesser toe. The report of thy torments was blown circuitously here

His

from Bury. I could not resist the jeer. I conceived you writhing when you should just receive my congratulations. How mad you'd be! Well, it is not in my method to inflict pangs. I leave that to Heaven: but in the existing pangs of a friend I have a share. disquietude crowns my exemption. I imagine you howling, and pace across the room, shooting out my free arms, legs, etc., this way and that way, with an assurance of not kindling a spark of pain from them. I deny that Nature meant us to sympathise with agonies. Those face-contortions, retortions, distortions have the merriness of antics. Nature meant them for farce-not so pleasant to the actor, indeed; but Grimaldi cries when we laugh, and 'tis but one that suffers to make thousands rejoice.

You say that shampooing is ineffectual; but, per se, it is good, to show the introvolutions, extravolutions, of which the animal frame is capable—to show what the creature is receptible of, short of dissolution.

You are worst of nights, an't you? You never was rack'd, was you? I should like an authentic map of those feelings.

You can scarcely

You seem to have the flying gout. screw a smile out of your face, can you? I sit at

immunity and sneer ad libitum. 'Tis now the time for you to make good resolutions. I may go on breaking 'em for anything the worse I find myself. Your doctor seems to keep you on the long cure. Precipitate healings are never good. Don't come while you are so bad; I shan't be able to attend to your throes and the dumby at once. I should like to know how slowly the pain goes off. But don't write, unless the motion will be likely to make your sensibility more exquisite.

Your affectionate and truly healthy friend,

C. LAMB.

Mary thought a letter from me might amuse you in your torment.

VOL. II.

To WALTER WILSON.

LETTER CCCXLVI.]

May 28, 1829.

Dear W.-Introduce this, or omit it, as you like. I think I wrote better about it in a letter to you from India H. If you have that, perhaps out of the two I could patch up a better thing, if you'd return both. But I am very poorly, and have been harassed with an illness of my sister's.

The Ode was printed in the New Times nearly the end of 1825, and I have only omitted some silly lines, call it a corrected copy.

Yours ever,

C. LAMB.

Put my name to either, or both, as you like.

Walter Wilson, Esq.,

Burnett House,

Near Bath, Somersetshire.

To THOMAS ALLSOP.

LETTER CCCXLVII.]

[Summer 1829].

At midsummer, or soon after (I will let you know the previous day), I will take a day with you in the purlieus of my old haunts. No offence has been taken, any more than meant. My house is full at present, but empty of its chief pride. She is dead to me for many months. But when I see you, then I will say, Come and see me. With undiminished friendship to you both.

Your faithful, but queer,

C. L.

How you frighted me! Never write again, "Coleridge is dead," at the end of a line, and tamely come in with," to his friends" at the beginning of another. Love is quicker, and fear from love, than the transition ocular from line to line.

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