The Best Letters of Charles Lamb

[2] Miss Lamb has amusingly described the progress of their labors on this volume; "You would like to see us, as we often sit writing on one table (but not on one cushion sittin...

A very striking instance of your position might be found in the churchyard of Ditton-upon-Thames, if you know such a place. Ditton-upon-Thames has been blessed by the residence...

Do put 'em forth finally, as I have, in various letters, settled it; for first a man's self is to be pleased, and then his friends,--and of course the greater number of his frie...

Dear Southey,--You'll know whom this letter comes from by opening slap-dash upon the text, as in the good old times. I never could come into the custom of envelopes,--'tis a mod...

My Dear Manning,--The general scope of your letter afforded no indications of insanity, but some particular points raised a scruple. For God's sake, don't think any more of "Ind...

It is hard to discern the oak in the acorn, or a temple like St. Paul's in the first stone which is laid; nor can I quite prefigure what destination the genius of William Minor...

Dear Southey,--I have received from Longman a copy of "Roderick," with the author's compliments, for which I much thank you. I don't know where I shall put all the noble present...

My dear Fellow,--I have been in a lethargy this long while, and forgotten London, Westminster, Marybone, Paddington,--they all went clean out of my head, till happening to go to...

And is it a year since we parted from you at the steps of Edmonton stage? There are not now the years that there used to be. The tale of the dwindled age of men, reported of suc...

"As for myself, I walk abroad o' nights, And kill sick people groaning under walls; Sometimes I go about and poison wells; And now and then, to cherish Christian thieves, I am c...

The sonnet I send you has small merit as poetry; but you will be curious to read it when I tell you it was written in my prison-house in one of my lucid intervals.

The pig was above my feeble praise. It was a dear pigmy. There was some contention as to who should have the ears; but in spite of his obstinacy (deaf as these little creatures...

and one or two just thereabouts. But I would substitute for it that sweet poem called "Recollection," in the fifth number of the "Watchman," better, I think, than the remainder...

At this point it will be well to insert a prefatory word or two as to the character of Mary Lamb; and here the witnesses are in accord. There is no jarring of opinion, as in her...

I am sitting opposite a person who is making strange distortions with the gout, which is not unpleasant pleasant,--to me, at least. What is the reason we do not sympathize with...

My dearest friend,--I grieve from my very soul to observe you in your plans of life veering about from this hope to the other, and settling nowhere. Is it an untoward fatality (...

Dear Manning,--Had you written one week before you did, I certainly should have obeyed your injunction; you should have seen me before my letter. I will explain to you my situat...

I ought before this to have replied to your very kind invitation into Cumberland. With you and your sister I could gang anywhere; but I am afraid whether I shall ever be able to...

Dear Manning,--I am going to ask a favor of you, and am at a loss how to do it in the most delicate mariner. For this purpose I have been looking into Pliny's Letters, who is no...

It may well be that the "Essays of Elia" will be found to have kept their perfume, and the LETTERS OF CHARLES LAMB to retain their old sweet savor, when "Sartor Resartus" has ab...

It is not our intention to abandon Regent Street and West End perambulations (monastic and terrible thought!), but occasionally to breathe the fresher air of the metropolis. We...

For God's sake give Emma no more watches; _one_ has turned her head. She is arrogant and insulting. She said something very unpleasant to our old clock in the passage, as if he...