1796 HOPE AND FEAR 33 the knave gone sick and died and putrefied at any other time, philosophy might have afforded one comfort, but just now I have no patience with him. Quarles I am as great a stranger to as I was to Withers. I wish you would try and do something to bring our elder bards into more general fame. I writhe with indignation when in books of Criticism, where common place quotation is heaped upon quotation, I find no mention of such men as Massinger, or B. and Fl, men with whom succeeding Dramatic Writers (Otway alone excepted) can bear no manner of comparison. Stupid Knox hath noticed none of 'em among his extracts. Thursday. Mrs. C. can scarce guess how she has gratified me by her very kind letter and sweet little poem. I feel that I should thank her in rhyme, but she must take my acknowledgment at present in plain honest prose. The uncertainty in which I yet stand whether I can come or no damps my spirits, reduces me a degree below prosaical, and keeps me in a suspense that fluctuates between hope and fear. Hope is a charming, lively, blue-eyed wench, and I am always glad of her company, but could dispense with the visitor she brings with her, her younger sister, Fear, a white-liver'd, lilly-cheeked, bashful, palpitating, awkward hussey, that hangs like a green girl at her sister's apronstrings, and will go with her whithersoever she goes. For the life and soul of me I could not improve those lines in your poem on the Prince and Princess, so I changed them to what you bid me and left 'em at Perry's. I think 'em altogether good, and do not see why you were sollicitous about any alteration. I have not yet seen, but will make it my business to see, to-day's Chronicle, for your verses on Horne Took. Dyer stanza'd him in one of the papers t'other day, but I think unsuccessfully. Tooke's friends' meeting was I suppose a dinner of CONDOLENCE. I am not sorry to find you (for all Sara) immersed in clouds of smoke and metaphysic. You know I had a sneaking kindness for this last noble science, and you taught me some smattering of it. I look to become no mean proficient under your tuition. Coleridge, what do you mean by saying you wrote to me about Plutarch and Porphyry—I received no such letter, nor remember a syllable of the matter, yet am not apt to forget any part of your epistles, least of all an injunction like that. I will cast about for 'em, tho' I am a sad hand to know what books are worth, and both those worthy gentlemen are alike out of my line. To-morrow I shall be less suspensive and in better cue to write, so good bye at present. Friday Evening.-That execrable aristocrat and knave Richardson has given me an absolute refusal of leave! The poor man VOL. VI.-3 cannot guess at my disappointment. Is it not hard, "this dread dependance on the low bred mind?" Continue to write to me tho', and I must be content- - Our loves and best good wishes attend upon you both. LAMB. Savory did return, but there are 2 or 3 more ill and absent, which was the plea for refusing me. I will never commit my peace of mind by depending on such a wretch for a favor in future, so shall never have heart to ask for holidays again. The man next him in office, Cartwright, furnished him with the objections. NOTE C. LAMB. [The Dactyls were Coleridge's only in the third stanza; the remainder were Southey's. The poem is known as "The Soldier's Wife," printed in Southey's Poems, 1797, running thus : Weary way-wanderer languid and sick at heart Cold are thy famish'd babes-God help thee, widow'd One Later Southey revised the verses. following parody of them : The Anti-Jacobin had the THE SOLDIER'S FRIEND Come, little drummer boy, lay down your knapsack here: Here's half-a-crown for you-here are some hand-bills too- [Exit drummer boy, with hand-bills and Liberty's friends thus all learn to amalgamate, Reason, philosophy, "fiddledum piddledum," Et caetera, et caetera, et caetera. 1796 THE HOLIDAY DENIED 35 Young Savory was probably a relative of Hester Savory, whom we shall meet on page 261. He entered the East India House on the same day that Lamb did. We do not know what were the lines from Wither which Coleridge had sent to Lamb; but Lamb himself eventually did much to bring him and the elder bards into more general famein the Dramatic Specimens, 1808, and in the essay "On the Poetical Works of George Wither," in the Works, 1818. Stupid Knox was Vicesimus Knox (1752-1821), the editor of Elegant Extracts in many forms. "Her... sweet little poem." Sara Coleridge's verses no longer exist. See Lamb's next letter for his poetical reply. "Like a green girl." See "Hamlet," I., 3, 101. Coleridge's poem on the Prince and Princess, "On a Late Connubial Rupture in High Life," was not accepted by Perry, of the Morning Chronicle. It appeared in the Monthly Magazine, September, 1796. The "Verses addressed to J. Horne Tooke and the company who met on June 28, 1796, to celebrate his poll at the Westminster Election" were were not printed in the Morning Chronicle. Tooke had opposed Charles James Fox, who polled 5,160 votes, and Sir Alan Gardner, who polled 4,814, against his own 2,819. Dyer was George Dyer (1755-1841), an old Christ's Hospitaller (but before Lamb and Coleridge's time), of whom we shall see much-Lamb's famous G. D. William Richardson was Accountant-General of the East India House at that time; Charles Cartwright, his Deputy. "The dread dependance on the low-bred mind." From the first version (1790) of Coleridge's "Monody on Chatterton."] LETTER 6 CHARLES LAMB TO S. T. COLERIDGE The 5th July, 1796. [P.M. Same date.] TO SARA AND HER SAMUEL WAS it so hard a thing? I did but ask A fleeting holy day. One little week, What if the jaded Steer, who all day long When Evening came and her sweet cooling hour, That Man were crabbed, who should say him Nay: A blessing light upon your heads, ye good, Ye hospitable pair. I may not come, To catch on Clifden's heights the summer gale: Complaints, begone; begone, ill-omen'd thoughts— And gentler fortunes wait the friends I love. LETTER 7 CHARLES LAMB TO S. T. COLERIDGE the 6th July C. L. [P.M. July 7, 1796.] that incorrect. Para graph, following the words "disastrous course," these lines Vide 3d page of this epistle. no With better hopes, I trust, from Avon's vales [Lamb has crossed through the above lines.] What can I do you should like? classical ground. of the parks. St. Let us prose. till you send word what priced and placed house 1796 LINES TO COWPER : 37 to the Bench. Chuse! But are you really coming to town? The hope of it has entirely disarmed my petty disappointment of its nettles. Yet I rejoice so much on my own account, that I fear I do not feel enough pure satisfaction on yours. Why, surely, the joint editorship of the Chron: must be a very comfortable & secure living for a man. But should not you read French, or do you? & can you write with sufficient moderation, as 'tis call'd, when one suppresses the one half of what one feels, or could say, on a subject, to chime in the better with popular lukewarmness ?--White's “Letters” are near publication. Could you review 'em, or get 'em reviewed? Are you not connected with the Crit Rev:? His frontispiece is a good conceit: Sir John learning to dance, to please Madame Page, in dress of doublet, etc., from [for] the upper half; & modern pantaloons, with shoes, etc., of the 18th century, from [for] the lower half-& the whole work is full of goodly quips & rare fancies, "all deftly masqued like hoar antiquity "-much superior to Dr. Kenrick's Falstaff's Wedding, which you may have seen. Allen sometimes laughs at Superstition, & Religion, & the like. A living fell vacant lately in the gift of the Hospital. White informed him that he stood a fair chance for it. He scrupled & scrupled about it, and at last (to use his own words) "tampered" with Godwin to know whether the thing was honest or not. Godwin said nay to it, & Allen rejected the living! Could the blindest Poor Papish have bowed more servilely to his Priest or Casuist? Why sleep the Watchman's answers to that Godwin? I beg you will not delay to alter, if you mean to keep, those last lines I sent you. Do that, & read these for your pains:— TO THE POET COWPER Cowper, I thank my God that thou art heal'd! In Hall or Bower, taking the delicate Ear Thou, then, take up the mighty Epic strain, |