The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb Volume II Part 49

"All its beauty, all its pomp, decays Like _Courts removing_, or like _ending plays_."

On February 7, 1804, was printed Lamb's "Epitaph on a young Lady who Lived Neglected and Died Obscure" (see Vol. IV.), and now and then we find a paragraph likely to be his; but, as we know from a letter from Mary Lamb to Sarah Stoddart, he had left the _Post_ in the early spring, 1804. I think this was the end of his journalism, until he began to write a little for _The Examiner_ in 1812.

In 1838 Stuart was drawn into a correspondence with Henry Coleridge in the _Gentleman's Magazine_ (May, June, July and August) concerning some statements about Coleridge's connection with the _Morning Post_ and _The Courier_ which were made in Gillman's _Life_, Stuart, in the course of straightening out his relations with Coleridge, referred thus to Lamb:--

But as for good Charles Lamb, I never could make anything out 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.

For further remarks concerning Lamb's journalism see below when we come to _The Albion_ and his connection with it.

Page 250, line 6. _Perry, of the Morning Chronicle._ James Perry (1756-1821) the editor of the _Morning Chronicle_--the leading Whig paper, for many years--from about 1789. Perry was a noted talker and the friend of many brilliant men, among them Porson. Southey's letters inform us that Lamb was contributing to the _Chronicle_ in the summer of 1801, and I fancy I see his hand now and then; but his identifiable contributions to the paper came much later than the period under notice. Coleridge contributed to it a series of sonnets to eminent persons in 1794, in one of which, addressed to Mrs. Siddons, he collaborated with Lamb (see Vol. IV.).

Page 250, line 14. _The Abyssinian Pilgrim_. For notes to this pa.s.sage about the New River see the essay "Amicus Redivivus."

Page 250, foot. _In those days ..._ This paragraph began, in the _Englishman's Magazine_, with the following sentence:--

"We ourself--PETER--in whose inevitable NET already Managers and R.A.s lie caught and floundering--and more peradventure shall flounder--were, in the humble times to which we have been recurring, small Fishermen indeed, essaying upon minnows; angling for quirks, not _men_."

The phrase "Managers and R.A.s" refers to the papers on Elliston and George Dawe which had preceded this essay, although the Elliston essay had not been ranged under the heading "Peter's Net." The George Dawe paper is in Vol. I. of this edition.

Page 252, line 25. _Basilian water-sponges._ The Basilian order of monks were pledged to austerity; but probably Lamb intended merely a joke upon his friend Basil Montagu's teetotalism (see note in Vol.

I. to "Confessions of a Drunkard," a paper quoted in Montagu's _Some Enquiries into the Effects of Fermented Liquors_). In John Forster's copy of the _Last Essays of Elia_, in the South Kensington Museum, a legacy from Elia, there is written "Basil Montagu!" against this pa.s.sage. Moreover the context runs, "we were right toping Capulets"--as opposed to the (Basil) Montagus.

Page 253, line 23. _Bob Allen._ See the essay on "Christ's Hospital"

and note.

Page 253, line 24. _The "Oracle."_ This daily paper was started in the 1780's by Peter Stuart, Daniel Stuart's brother, as a rival to _The World_ (see below).

Page 253, line 31. _Mr. Deputy Humphreys._ I am disappointed to have been able to find nothing more about this Common Council b.u.t.t.

Page 254, lines 11 and 12. _The "True Briton_," _the "Star_," _the "Traveller_." _The True Briton_, a government organ in the 1790's, which afterwards a.s.similated Cobbett's Porcupine. _The Star_ was founded by Peter Stuart, Daniel Stuart's brother, in 1788. It was the first London evening paper to appear regularly. _The Traveller_, founded about 1803, still flourishes under the better-known t.i.tle of _The Globe_.

Page 254, lines 24-26. _Este ... Topham ... Boaden_. Edward Topham (1751-1820), author of the _Life of John Elwes_, the miser, founded _The World_, a daily paper, in 1787. Parson Este, the Rev. Charles Este, was one of his helpers. James Boaden (1762-1839), dramatist, biographer and journalist, and editor of _The Oracle_ for some years, wrote the _Life of Mrs. Siddons_, 1827.

Page 254, foot. _The Albion_. Lamb's memory of his connection with _The Albion_ was at fault. His statement is that he joined it on the sale of the _Morning Post_ by Stuart, which occurred in 1803; but as a matter of fact his a.s.sociation with it was in 1801. This we know from his letters to Manning in August of that year, quoting the epigram on Mackintosh (see below) and announcing the paper's death. Mackintosh, says Lamb, was on the eve of departing to India to reap the fruits of his apostasy--referring to his acceptance of the post of Recorders.h.i.+p of Bombay offered to him by Addington. But this was a slip of memory.

Mackintosh's name had been mentioned in connection with at least two posts before this--a judges.h.i.+p in Trinidad and the office of Advocate-General in Bengal, and Lamb's epigram may have had reference to one or the other. In the absence of a file of _The Albion_, which I have been unable to find, it is impossible to give exact dates or to reproduce any of Lamb's other contributions.

Page 255, line 6. _John Fenwick_. See the essay "The Two Races of Men," and note. Writing to Manning on September 24, 1802, Lamb describes Fenwick as a ruined man hiding from his creditors. In January, 1806, he tells Stoddart that Fenwick is "coming to town on Monday (if no kind angel intervene) to surrender himself to prison."

And we meet him again as late as 1817, in a letter to Barron Field, on August 31, where his editors.h.i.+p of The Statesman is mentioned. In Mary Lamb's letters to Sarah Stoddart there are indications that Mrs.

Fenwick and family were mindful of the Lambs' charitable impulses.

After "Fenwick," in the _Englishman's Magazine_, Lamb wrote: "Of him, under favour of the public, something may be told hereafter." It is sad that the sudden discontinuance of the magazine with this number for ever deprived us of further news of this man.

Page 255, line 11. _Lovell_. Daniel Lovell, subsequently owner and editor of _The Statesman_, which was founded by John Hunt, Leigh Hunt's brother, in 1806. He had a stormy career, much chequered by imprisonment and other punishment for freedom of speech. He died in 1818.

Page 255, line 20. _Daily demands of the Stamp Office._ The newspaper stamp in those days was threepence-halfpenny, raised in 1815 to fourpence. In 1836 it was reduced to a penny, and in 1855 abolished.

Page 255, line 28. _Accounted very good men now._ A hit, I imagine, particularly at Southey (see note to "The Tombs in the Abbey"). Also at Wordsworth and Mackintosh himself.

Page 256, line 3. _Sir J----s M----h_. Sir James Mackintosh (1765-1832), the philosopher, whose apostasy consisted in his public recantation of the opinions in favour of the French Revolution expressed in his _Vindiciae Gallicae_, published in 1791. In 1803 he accepted the offer of the Recorders.h.i.+p of Bombay. Lamb's epigram, which, as has been stated above, cannot have had reference to this particular appointment, runs thus in the version quoted in the letter to Manning of August, 1801:--

Though thou'rt like Judas, an apostate black, In the resemblance one thing thou dost lack: When he had gotten his ill-purchased pelf, He went away, and wisely hang'd himself: This thou may'st do at last; yet much I doubt, If thou hash any bowels to gush out.

Page 256, line 6. _Lord ... Stanhope_. This was Charles, third earl (1753-1816), whose sympathies were with the French Revolution. His motion in the House of Lords against interfering with France's internal affairs was supported by himself alone, which led to a medal being struck in his honour with the motto, "The Minority of One, 1795;" and he was thenceforward named "Minority," or "Citizen,"

Stanhope. George Dyer, who had acted as tutor to his children, was one of Stanhope's residuary legatees.

Page 256, line 10. _It was about this time ..._ With this sentence Lamb brought back his essay to its original t.i.tle, and paved the way for the second part--now printed under that heading.

At the end of this paper, in the _Englishman's Magazine_, were the words, "To be continued." For the further history of the essay see the notes that follow.

Page 256. BARRENNESS OF THE IMAGINATIVE FACULTY IN THE PRODUCTIONS OF MODERN ART.

_Athenaeum_, January 12, 19, 26, and February 2, 1833, where it was thus ent.i.tled: "On the Total Defects of the Quality of Imagination, observable in the Works of Modern British Artists." By the Author of the Essays signed "Elia."

The following editorial note was prefixed to the first instalment:--"This Series of Papers was intended for a new periodical, which has been suddenly discontinued. The distinguished writer having kindly offered them to the ATHENaeUM, we think it advisable to perfect the Series by this reprint; and, from the limited sale of the work in which it originally appeared, it is not likely to have been read by one in a thousand of our subscribers."

The explanation of this pa.s.sage has been made simple by the researches of the late Mr. d.y.k.es Campbell. Lamb intended the essay originally for the _Englishman's Magazine_, November number, to follow the excursus on newspapers. But that magazine came to an end with the October number. In the letter from Lamb to Moxon dated October 24, 1831, Lamb says, referring to Moxon's announcement that the periodical would cease:--"Will it please, or plague, you, to say that when your Parcel came I d.a.m.ned it, for my pen was warming in my hand at a ludicrous description of a Landscape of an R.A., which I calculated upon sending you to morrow, the last day you gave me."

That was the present essay. Subsequently--at the end of 1832--Moxon started a weekly paper ent.i.tled _The Reflector_, edited by John Forster, in which the printing of Lamb's essay was begun. It lasted only a short time, and on its cessation Lamb sent the ill-fated ma.n.u.script to _The Athenaeum_, where it at last saw publication completed. Of _The Reflector_ all trace seems to have vanished, and with it possibly other writings of Lamb's.

In _The Athenaeum_ of December 22, 1832, the current _Reflector_ (No.

2) is advertised as containing "An Essay on Painters and Painting by Elia."

Page 256, line 1 of essay. _Hogarth_. Compare Lamb's criticism of Hogarth, Vol. I.

Page 256, foot. _t.i.tian's "Ariadne."_ This picture is now No. 35 in the National Gallery. Writing to Wordsworth in May, 1833, it is amusing to note, Lamb says: "Inter nos the Ariadne is not a darling with me, several incongruous things are in it, but in the composition it served me as ill.u.s.trative." The legend of Ariadne tells that after being abandoned by Theseus, whom she loved with intense pa.s.sion, she was wooed by Bacchus.

Page 258, line 2. _Somerset House._ See note above to the essay on "Newspapers."

Page 258, line 14. _Neoteric ... Mr. ----_. Probably J.M.W. Turner and his "Garden of the Hesperides," now in the National Gallery. It is true it was painted in 1806, but Lamb does not describe it as a picture of the year and Turner was certainly the most notable neoteric, or innovator, of that time.

Page 259, line 1. _Of a modern artist._ In _The Athenaeum_ this had been printed "of M----," meaning John Martin (1789-1854). His "Belshazzar's Feast," which Lamb a.n.a.lyses below, was painted in 1821, and made him famous. It was awarded a 200 premium, and was copied on gla.s.s and exhibited with great success as an illuminated transparency in the Strand. Lord Lytton said of Martin that "he was more original, more self-dependent, than Raphael or Michael Angelo." Lamb had previously expressed his opinion of Martin, in a letter to Bernard Barton, dated June 11, 1827, in a pa.s.sage which contains the germ of this essay:--"Martin's Belshazzar (the picture) I have seen.

Its architectural effect is stupendous; but the human figures, the squalling, contorted little antics that are playing at being frightened, like children at a sham ghost who half know it to be a mask, are detestable. Then the _letters_ are nothing more than a transparency lighted up, such as a Lord might order to be lit up on a sudden at a Christmas Gambol, to scare the ladies. The _type_ is as plain as Baskervil--they should have been dim, full of mystery, letters to the mind rather than the eye."

Page 259, line 13. _The late King_. George IV., who built, when Prince of Wales, the Brighton Pavilion. As I cannot find this incident in any memoirs of the Regency, I a.s.sume Lamb to have invented it, after his wont, when in need of a good parallel. "Mrs. Fitz-what's-her-name"

stands of course for Mrs. Fitzherbert.

Page 259, line 33. _The ingenious Mr. Farley_. Charles Farley (1771-1859), who controlled the pantomimes at Covent Garden from 1806 to 1834, and invented a number of mechanical devices for them. He also acted, and had been the instructor of the great Grimaldi. Lamb alludes to him in the essay on "The Acting of Munden."

Page 262, line 10. "_Sun, stand thou still ..._" See Joshua x. 12.

Martin's picture of "Joshua commanding the Sun to stand still" was painted in 1816. Writing to Barton, in the letter quoted from above, Lamb says: "Just such a confus'd piece is his Joshua, fritter'd into 1000 fragments, little armies here, little armies there--you should see only the _Sun_ and _Joshua_ ... for Joshua, I was ten minutes finding him out."

Page 262, line 29. _The great picture at Angerstein's_. This picture is "The Resurrection of Lazarus," by Fra Sebastiano del Piombo, with the a.s.sistance, it is conjectured, of Michael Angelo. The picture is now No. 1 in the National Gallery, the nucleus of which collection was once the property of John Julius Angerstein (1735-1823). Angerstein's art treasures were to be seen until his death in his house in Pall Mall, where the Reform Club now stands.

Page 263, line 35. _The Frenchmen, of whom Coleridge's friend_. See the _Biographia Literaria_, 1847 ed., Vol. II., pp. 126-127.

Page 265, line 5. "_Truly, fairest Lady ..._" The pa.s.sage quoted by Lamb is from Skeltoa's translation of _Don Quixote_, Part II., Chapter LVIII. The first sentence runs: "Truly, fairest Lady, Actaeon was not more astonished or in suspense when on the sodaine he saw Diana," and so forth.