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LETTER 119

CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS POOLE

[Dated at end: Temple, 4th May, 1804.]

EAR Sir-I have no sort of connexion with the Morning Post at present, nor acquaintance with its late Editor (the present Editor of the Courier) to ask a favour of him with propriety; but if it will be of any use, I believe I could get the insertions into the British Press (a Morning Paper) through a friend.—

Yours truly

LETTER 120

C. LAMB.

CHARLES LAMB TO THOMAS POOLE

[Dated at end: Temple, 5 May, 1804.]

DEAR Sir-I can get the insertions into the British Press without any difficulty at all. I am only sorry that I have no interest in the M. Post, having so much greater circulation. If your friend chuses it, you will be so good as to return me the Critique, of which I forgot to take a copy, and I suppose on Monday or Tuesday it will be in. The sooner I have it, the better.

Yours &c.

C. LAMB.

I did formerly assist in the Post, but have no longer any engagement.—

[Stuart, having sold the Morning Post, was now developing the Courier. The notes are interesting only as showing Lamb's attitude to Stuart. Writing to the Gentleman's Magazine in June, 1838, concerning his association as editor with Coleridge, Stuart said: "But as for good Charles Lamb, I never could make any-thing of his writings. Coleridge often and repeatedly pressed me to settle him on a salary, and often and repeatedly did I try ; but it would not do. Of politics he knew nothing; they were out of his line of reading and thought; and his drollery was vapid, when given in short paragraphs fit for a newspaper: yet he has produced some agreeable books, possessing a tone of humour and kind feeling, in a quaint style, which it is amusing to read, and cheering to remember."]

1804

Commissions for Wordsworth 299

LETTER 121

CHARLES LAMB TO DOROTHY WORDSWORTH

[Dated at end: June 2, 1804.]

EAR Miss Wordsworth, the task of letter-writing in my

DEAR Miss thou are the organ of correspond

ence in yours, so I address you rather than your brother. We are all sensibly obliged to you for the little scraps (Arthur's Bower and his brethren) which you sent up; the bookseller has got them and paid Mrs. Fenwick for them. So while some are authors for fame, some for money, you have commenced author for charity. The least we can do, is to see your commissions fulfilled; accordingly I have booked this 2d June 1804 from the Waggon Inn in Cripplegate the watch and books which I got from your brother Richard, together with Purchas's Pilgrimage and Brown's Religio Medici which I desire your brother's acceptance of, with some pens, of which I observed no great frequency when I tarried at Grasmere. (I suppose you have got Coleridge's letter)— These things I have put up in a deal box directed to Mr. Wordsworth, Grasmere, near Ambleside, Kendal, by the Kendal waggon. At the same time I have sent off a parcel by C.'s desire to Mr. T. Hutchinson to the care of Mr. "T. Monkhouse, or T. Markhouse" (for C.'s writing is not very plain) Penrith, by the Penrith waggon this day; which I beg you to apprize them of, lest my direction fail. In your box, you will find a little parcel for Mrs. Coleridge, which she wants as soon as possible; also for yourselves the Cotton, Magnesia, bark and Oil, which come to £2. 3. 4. thus.

I conclude with our kindest remembrances to your brother and Mrs. W.

We hear, the young John is a Giant.

And should you see Charles Lloyd, pray forget to give my love to him.

June 2, 1804.

Yours truly, Dr Miss W.

C. LAMB.

I send you two little copies of verses by Mary L-b:—

DIALOGUE BETWEEN A MOTHER AND CHILD

Child. "O Lady, lay your costly robes aside,
(Sings) No longer may you glory in your pride."

Mother. Wherefore to day art singing in mine ear

Sad songs were made so long ago, my dear?
This day I am to be a bride, you know.
Why sing sad songs were made so long ago?
Child. "O Mother lay your costly robes aside,"
For you may never be another's bride:

Mother.

That line I learnt not in the old sad song.

I pray thee, pretty one, now hold thy tongue;
Play with the bride maids, and be glad, my boy,
For thou shalt be a second father's joy.

Child. One father fondled me upon his knee :
One father is enough alone for me.

Suggested by a print of 2 females after Leo[nardo da] Vinci, called Prudence & Beauty, which hangs up in our ro[om].

O! that you could see the print !!

The Lady Blanch, regardless of all her lovers' fears,

To the Urseline Convent hastens, and long the Abbess hears :
O Blanch, my child, repent thee of the courtly life ye lead."
Blanch looked on a rose-bud, and little seem'd to heed;
She looked on the rose-bud, she looked round, and thought
On all her heart had whisper'd, and all the Nun had taught.
"I am worshipped by lovers, and brightly shines my fame,
All Christendom resoundeth the noble Blanch's name;
Nor shall I quickly wither like the rose-bud from the tree,
My Queen-like graces shining when my beauty's gone from me.
But when the sculptur'd marble is raised o'er my head,
And the matchless Blanch lies lifeless among the noble dead,
This saintly Lady Abbess has made me justly fear,

It nothing will avail me that I were worshipt here."

I wish they may please you: we in these parts are not a little proud of them.

C. L.

1804

Coleridge Reaches Malta

301

["The little scraps." Professor Knight informed me that the scraps were not written but only copied by Miss Wordsworth. Arthur's Bower ran thus:

Arthur's bower has broke his band,

He comes riding up the land,

The King of Scots with all his power
Cannot build up Arthur's bower.

"Your brother Richard "- -Wordsworth's eldest brother.

"Purchas's Pilgrimage." Samuel Purchas (1575?-1626) was the author of Purchas His Pilgrimage, 1613; Purchas His Pilgrim, 1619; and Hakluytus Posthumus, or Purchas his Pilgrimes, 1625. This last is Purchas's best work, and is probably that which Lamb sent to Grasmere.

Mary Lamb's two poems, her earliest that we know, with the exception of "Helen," were printed in the Works, 1818.]

LETTER 122

MARY LAMB TO SARAH STODDART

[Late July, 1804.]

Y dearest Sarah,-Your letter, which contained the

for we had begun to entertain very unpleasant apprehensions for his safety; and your kind reception of the forlorn wanderer gave me the greatest pleasure, and I thank you for it in my own and my brother's name. I shall depend upon you for hearing of his welfare; for he does not write himself; but, as long as we know he is safe, and in such kind friends' hands, we do not mind. Your letters, my dear Sarah, are to me very, very precious ones. They are the kindest, best, most natural ones I ever received. The one containing the news of the arrival of Coleridge perhaps the best I ever saw; and your old friend Charles is of my opinion. We sent it off to Mrs. Coleridge and the Wordsworths-as well because we thought it our duty to give them the first notice we had of our dear friend's safety, as that we were proud of shewing our Sarah's pretty letter.

The letters we received a few days after from you and your brother were far less welcome ones. sister is well; but I grieved for the and I am sorry to find your brother is at first expected to be; and yet I am

I rejoiced to hear your loss of the dear baby; not so successful as he almost tempted to wish

his ill fortune may send him over [to] us again. He has a friend, I understand, who is now at the head of the Admiralty ; why may he not return, and make a fortune here?

I cannot condole with you very sincerely upon your little failure in the fortune-making way. If you regret it, so do I. But I hope to see you a comfortable English wife; and the forsaken, forgotten William, of English-partridge memory, I have still a hankering after. However, I thank you for your frank communication, and I beg you will continue it in future; and if I do not agree with a good grace to your having a Maltese husband, I will wish you happy, provided you make it a part of your marriage articles that your husband shall allow you to come over sea and make me one visit ; else may neglect and overlookedness be your portion while you stay there.

I would condole with you when the misfortune has fallen your poor leg; but such is the blessed distance we are at from each other, that I hope, before you receive this, that you forgot it ever happened.

Our compliments [to] the high ton at the Maltese court. Your brother is so profuse of them to me, that being, as you know, so unused to them, they perplex me sadly; in future, I beg they may be discontinued. They always remind me of the free, and, I believe, very improper, letter I wrote to you while you were at the Isle of Wight. The more kindly you and your brother and sister took the impertinent advice contained in it, the more certain I feel that it was unnecessary, and therefore highly improper. Do not let your brother compliment me into the memory of it again.

My brother has had a letter from your Mother, which has distressed him sadly-about the postage of some letters being paid by my brother. Your silly brother, it seems, has informed your Mother (I did not think your brother could have been so silly) that Charles had grumbled at paying the said postage. The fact was, just at that time we were very poor, having lost the Morning Post, and we were beginning to practise a strict economy. My brother, who never makes up his mind whether he will be a Miser or a Spendthrift, is at all times a strange mixture of both of this failing, the even economy of your correct brother's temper makes him an ill judge. The miserly part of Charles, at that time smarting under his recent loss, then happened to reign triumphant;