Charles Lamb - The Collected Works of Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb

Page 349.I.—Remarkable Correspondent.

Hone's Every-Day Book , Vol. I., May 1, 1825. Not reprinted by Lamb.

Hone's Every-Day Book , which purported to take account of every day in the year, had passed without a word from February 28 to March 1. Hence this protest.

Page 350,line 13. An antique scroll . On February 28 Hone printed these lines:—

Old Memorandum of the Months

Thirty days hath September,

April, June, and November,

All the rest have thirty and one,

Except February, which hath twenty-eight alone.

The omitted couplet runs:—

Except in Leap Year, at which time

February's days are twenty-nine.

To Lamb's protests Hone replied as follows, on May 1:—

To this correspondent it may be demurred and given in proof, that neither in February, nor at any other time in the year 1825, had he, or could he, have had existence; and that whenever he is seen, he is only an impertinence and an interpolation upon his betters. To his "floral honours" he is welcome; in the year 992, he slew St. Oswald, archbishop of York, in the midst of his monks, to whom the greater periwinkle, Vinca Major , is dedicated. For this honour our correspondent should have waited till his turn arrived for distinction. His ignorant impatience of notoriety is a mark of weakness, and indeed it is only in compassion to his infirmity that he has been condescended to; his brothers have seen more of the world, and he should have been satisfied by having been allowed to be in their company at stated times, and like all little ones, he ought to have kept respectful silence. Besides, he forgets his origin; he is illegitimate; and as a burthen to "the family," and an upstart, it has been long in contemplation to disown him, and then what will become of him? If he has done any good in the world he may have some claim upon it, but whenever he appears, he seems to throw things into confusion. His desire to alter the title of this work excites a smile—however, when he calls upon the editor he shall have justice, and be compelled to own that it is calumny to call this the Every-Day—but—one—Book .

In Vol. II. of the Every-Day Book February 29 was again omitted. He did not come to his own until the Year Book in 1831.

Page 351.II.—Captain Starkey.

Hone's Every-Day Book , Vol. I., July 21, 1825. Signed "C. L." Not reprinted by Lamb.

On July 9 Hone gave extracts from a small pamphlet entitled Memoirs of the Life of Benj. Starkey, late of London, but now an inmate of the Freemen's Hospital, in Newcastle. Written by himself. With a portrait of the Author and a Facsimile of his handwriting . William Hall, Newcastle, 1818. This pamphlet is not interesting, except in calling forth Lamb's reminiscences.

Page 351,line 9. My sister. Mary Lamb, who was born in 1764, would probably have been at Bird's school at the time of her brother's birth. Her period there may have been 1774–1778.

Page 351,line 25. Fetter Lane. In a directory for 1773 I find William Bird, Academy, 3 Bond Stables, Fetter Lane. Bond Stables have now disappeared, although there is still the passage joining Fetter Lane and Bartlett's Buildings.

Page 354.III.—Twelfth of August.

Hone's Every-Day Book , Vol. I., August 12, 1825. Not reprinted by Lamb.

While George IV., who was born on August 12, 1762, was Prince of Wales, a very long period, his birthday was kept on its true date. But after his accession to the throne in 1820 his birthday was kept on April 23, St. George's Day. Hence Lamb's protest. This is probably the only kind reference to George IV. in all Lamb's writings.

Lamb already ( Morning Post , 1802, see page 44, and London Magazine , 1823) had rehearsed the theme both of this letter and of that on the "Twenty-ninth of February." In his "Rejoicings upon the New Year's Coming of Age" the forlorn condition of February 29 is more than once mentioned, while the grievance of August 12 against April 23 is thus described:—

"The King's health being called for after this, a notable dispute arose between the Twelfth of August (a jealous old Whig gentlewoman) and the Twenty-Third of April (a new-fangled lady of the Tory stamp) as to which of them should have the honour to propose it. August grew hot upon the matter, affirming time out of mind the prescriptive right to have lain with her, till her rival had basely supplanted her; whom she represented as little better than a kept mistress, who went about in fine clothes , while she (the legitimate Birthday) had scarcely a rag, &c."

Page 354,line 4 of letter. Poor relative of ours. February 29 (see page 349).

Page 355,line 11. George of Cappadocia, etc. George of Cappadocia was a Bishop of Alexandria in the fourth century, murdered by the populace. There was once a tendency to confuse him with St. George of England. George of Leyden was probably a slip of the pen for John of Leyden, the Anabaptist of Münster. George-a-Green, the hero of the History of George-a-Green, the Pindar of Wakefield , the stoutest opponent that Robin Hood ever met. The story was dramatised in a play attributed to Robert Green. George Dyer was Lamb's friend.

Page 355,line 15. Dismission of a set of men. Referring to the King's overthrow of the Whigs in the Caroline of Brunswick ferment.

To Lamb's letter Hone printed a clever reply.

Page 356.IV.—The Ass.

Hone's Every-Day Book , Vol. I., October 5, 1825. Signed "C. L." Not reprinted by Lamb.

The germ of this paper is found in a letter from Lamb to John Payne Collier in 1821 thanking him for the gift of his Poetical Decameron . After quoting the three lines also quoted in this essay, Lamb remarks, in the letter, "Cervantes, Sterne, and Coleridge, have said positively nothing for asses compared with this."

The immediate cause of the communication to the Every-Day Book was a previous article in praise of asses. Hone prefixed to Lamb's paper the following remarks: "The cantering of Tim Tims [who had written of asses on September 19] startles him who told of his 'youthful days,' at the school wherein poor 'Starkey' cyphered part of his little life. C. L., 'getting well, but weak' from painful and severe indisposition, is 'off and away' for a short discursion. Better health to him, and good be to him all his life. Here he is."

Lamb wrote to Hone in humorous protest against the implication of the phrase "Here he is," immediately above the title "The Ass." "My friends are fairly surprised [he said] that you should set me down so unequivocally for an ass. … Call you that friendship?"

Page 356,foot. " Between the years 1790 and 1800. " This passage refers to an article in a previous issue of the Every-Day Book (see Vol. I., September 19) on cruelty to animals, where we read:—

Legislative discussion and interference have raised a feeling of kindness towards the brute creation which slumbered and slept in our forefathers. Formerly, the costermonger was accustomed to make wounds for the express purpose of producing torture. He prepared to drive an ass, that had not been driven, with his knife. On each side of the back bone, at the lower end, just above the tail, he made an incision of two or three inches in length through the skin, and beat into these incisions with his stick till they became open wounds, and so remained, while the ass lived to be driven to and from market, or through the streets of the metropolis. A costermonger, now, would shrink from this, which was a common practice between the years 1790 and 1800.

Page 357,line 9. " Lay on," etc. Anaxarchus, the philosopher, having offended Alexander the Great, was pounded in a stone mortar. During the process he exclaimed: "Pound the body of Anaxarchus; thou dost not pound the soul." Lamb proposed to use the phrase "You beat but on the case of Elia" in the preface to the Essays of Elia as a monition to adverse critics, but he changed his mind.