
 
 <l
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS
 
 
 ^%'?«'/<4S'^?^<!i:;«:fe^(?^-^.4^
 
 CHARLES LAMB 
 ^ THE LLOYDS 
 
 COMPRISING NEWLY-DISCOV- 
 ERED LETTERS OF CHARLES 
 LAMB, SAMUEL TAYLOR COLE- 
 RIDGE, THE LLOYDS, Etc. 
 
 EDITED BY E. V. LUCAS 
 
 WITH PORTRAITS 
 
 J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY 
 PHILADELPHIA MDCCCXCIX
 
 Copyright, 189S 
 
 BY 
 
 J. B. LippiNcoTT Company 
 
 All rights reser-ved
 
 LIBRARY 
 JJI«IVEllSn Y OF CALIFOHiNlA 
 y D SAIS T A B ARjB A KA 
 
 L7 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 This book grew from the discovery, in 1 894, 
 of two masses of correspondence relating to 
 the family of Charles Lloyd (1748-1828), the 
 Quaker philanthropist and banker of Birming- 
 ham. The papers, which are very numerous, 
 contain upwards of twenty new letters of 
 Charles Lamb, some of them worthy to rank 
 with his best, and others, also hitherto un- 
 published, of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Wil- 
 liam Wordsworth, Thomas Manning, Robert 
 Southey, Thomas Clarkson, Anna Seward, 
 Catherine Hutton, Priscilla Lloyd (1781-1815), 
 who married Christopher Wordsworth, Charles 
 Lloyd the poet (1775-1839), Robert Lloyd his 
 brother (1778-1811), and Mr. Lloyd himself 
 With the aid of these letters, and information 
 contained in volumes bearing upon the period, 
 it has been possible to tell, at any rate in out- 
 line, the story of a notable family.
 
 PREFACE 
 
 The Lloyds with whom we have intercourse 
 in these documents, though they were not of 
 remarkable intellectual achievement, possessed 
 very fully that gift of interest for which so 
 many Quakers have been conspicuous. All, 
 in one way or another, were interesting. Mr. 
 Lloyd, the father, had much of Mr. Gladstone's 
 mental vigour and variousness. Publicly he 
 was concerned in large schemes of benevo- 
 lence ; in private he played the scholar to such 
 purpose as to draw praise from that very honest 
 critic, Charles Lamb. Mr. Lloyd's eldest son, 
 Charles, also interested Lamb, lived for a while 
 with Coleridge, and later in life was the friend 
 of " Christopher North," De Quincey, and 
 Macready ; while Robert Lloyd, another son, 
 completely won Lamb's sympathies and en- 
 gaged him in a correspondence which leaves 
 literature the richer. 
 
 Whether any more Lamb letters are forth- 
 coming is a question for the future to answer. 
 The fact that those printed in this volume lay 
 hidden for more than eighty years is indication
 
 PREFACE 
 
 enough that others still may exist, awaiting the 
 moment appointed by fate for their discovery. 
 In Canon Ainger's edition of Lamb's " Letters," 
 for example, Elia's epistolary activity in 1798 
 is represented by but eight letters, and in 1799 
 by the same number ; whereas it is reasonable 
 to assume that in those years he wrote to one 
 friend or another at least once a week. It 
 should be added that in the twenty-three new 
 letters of Lamb which follow occasional modi- 
 fications of punctuation have been made. 
 
 The three Coleridge letters were written 
 while Charles Lloyd was domesticated with 
 Coleridge as pupil in 1 796. They belong to a 
 period when the philosopher was casting about 
 for some definite plan of campaign, and help 
 sensibly towards completing our portrait of 
 that noticeable man. Later, in correspondence 
 passing between the Lloyds, are certain acute 
 observations on the great mind. 
 
 Among the books which have been found 
 most useful in corroborating and fortifying the 
 information contained in these papers must be
 
 PREFACE 
 
 mentioned Canon Ainger's edition of Lamb's 
 " Letters," Mr. Emest Hartley Coleridge's 
 edition of Coleridge's " Letters," the late Mr. 
 Dykes Campbell's edition of Coleridge's 
 " Poems," De Quincey's " Autobiography," the 
 "Dictionary of National Biography," Mrs. 
 Sandford's " Thomas Poole and His Friends," 
 and the late Bishop Charles Wordsworth's 
 " Annals of my Early Life." 
 
 At the time of the discovery of the MSS. a 
 description of a portion of them was printed in 
 the " Birmingham Daily Post" (for February 4, 
 1 895) ; a few weeks later an account of certain 
 others was contributed to the " Athenaeum" 
 (for March 2, 1895), by Dr. James Gow; and 
 two articles telling the story of the friendship 
 of Charles Lamb and Robert Lloyd, and giving 
 certain extracts from their letters, appeared in 
 the " Cornhill" and in " Lippincott's" for May 
 and June of the present year. But the docu- 
 ments that follow are now for the first time 
 made public in their entirety. 
 
 The Coleridge letters are here printed by
 
 PREFACE 
 
 arrangement with the poet's grandson, Mr 
 Ernest Hartley Coleridge, and other letters by 
 permission of Canon Manning, Mr. Gordon 
 Wordsworth, and other representatives of the 
 writers. For the portraits of Charles Lloyd 
 and Sophia Lloyd, now for the first time re- 
 produced, I am indebted to the courtesy of Mr. 
 C. A. Lloyd. They were painted by Constable, 
 who visited Birmingham as the guest of James 
 Lloyd, another son of Bingley Hall, early in 
 the century. Thanks are also due, for infor- 
 mation and help, to Mr. and Mrs. F. H. Steeds, 
 Mr. Henry Crewdson, and Mr. Charles Linnell ; 
 and, for his kindness in reading the proofs and 
 advising thereon, to Mr. W. P. Ker. 
 
 E. V. L. 
 
 London: October iS^i
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I. — The Lloyds 15 
 
 II. — Coleridge and Charles Lloyd .... 27 
 
 III. — Coleridge, Lamb, and Charles Lloyd 51 
 
 IV. — ** Edmund Oliver" and the " Theses" 64 
 
 V. — " The Anti-Jacobin" 85 
 
 VI. — Charles Lamb and Robert Lloyd . . 94 
 
 VII. — Thomas Manning and Robert Lloyd . 118 
 
 VIII. — Charles Lamb as Critic 136 
 
 IX. — Robert Lloyd's Marriage 162 
 
 X. — Robert Lloyd's London Visit .... 170 
 
 XI. — Robert Lloyd's Death 187 
 
 XII. — Mr. Lloyd's "Iliad" 194 
 
 XIII. — Mr. Lloyd's " Odyssey" 229 
 
 XIV. — Mr. Lloyd's " Horace" 245 
 
 XV. — Charles Lloyd at Old Brathay . . . 259 
 
 XVI. — Charles Lloyd in London 275 
 
 XVII — Mr. Lloyd's Later Years 297 
 
 Index 317 
 
 zi
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 Charles Lamb Frontispiece 
 
 From a painting by fVilliam Haxlitt. 
 
 FAGK 
 
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge To face 30 
 
 From a fainting by Peter Vandyke. 
 
 Facsimile of a Letter from Charles 
 
 Lamb to Robert Lloyd " 107 
 
 Charles Lloyd (i 775-1 839) " 260 
 
 From a painting by John Constable. 
 
 Sophia Lloyd and Child (Sophia) . . •* 288 
 
 From a painting by jfohn Constable. 
 
 13
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND 
 THE LLOYDS 
 
 ¥¥¥ 
 
 I 
 
 THE LLOYDS 
 
 The Lloyds, an old and honourable Welsh 
 family, were seated for many generations at 
 Dolobran, in Montgomery. The present mem- 
 bers, who are of unusual numerical strength, 
 trace their descent both to the Kings of Dyfed 
 and — through the marriage of Charles Lloyd of 
 Dolobran (1637-1698) with Ehzabeth Lort — 
 to Edward L 
 
 This Charles Lloyd and his brother Thomas 
 were the first Quakers in the family. Like so 
 many of the warriors for spiritual liberty gath- 
 ered under George Fox's bloodless flag, they did 
 not escape suffering and persecution. Charles 
 Lloyd, indeed, had a full share, for in 1662 he 
 was thrown into prison at Welshpool for refus- 
 
 15
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 ing to take the oaths of allegiance and suprem- 
 acy, and not for ten years was he at large again. 
 Thither his wife accompanied him, and it was 
 under these distressing conditions that their 
 eldest son Charles was born. Although still an 
 offender, Charles Lloyd was allowed by his 
 judge, Lord Herbert, to leave the prison and 
 remain under inspection and restraint in a house 
 at Welshpool, where his second son, Sampson 
 Lloyd, was born in 1664. Eight years later, on 
 the pronouncement of the royal Declaration of 
 Indulgence, Charles Lloyd was again able to 
 return to Dolobran. His spirit was in no re- 
 spect broken, and his after life, which did not 
 terminate until 1 698, was zealous for the brave 
 little sect he had joined. 
 
 His first son, Charles Lloyd (1662-1747), 
 who succeeded him at Dolobran, greatly im- 
 proved the estate, and set up furnaces for the 
 forging of charcoal iron ; while the second son, 
 Sampson Lloyd (1664-1724), moved to Bir- 
 mingham, where he opened an iron warehouse 
 in connection with this new industry, and was 
 able without molestation — for Birmingham was 
 friendly to Nonconformists — to pursue his way 
 
 as a follower of George Fox. 
 
 16
 
 THE LLOYDS 
 
 Sampson Lloyd was married twice : first, in 
 1685, to Elizabeth Good, and secondly, in 
 1695, to Mary Crowley. By the second wife 
 he had two daughters and four sons, one of 
 whom was Sampson Lloyd, of Birmingham 
 and Farm (1699-1779), ironmaster, and the 
 founder of Lloyds Bank. 
 
 This Sampson Lloyd also married twice. 
 He wedded first with Sarah Parks, of Birming- 
 ham, a union from which sprang Sampson 
 Lloyd (1728-1807), and through him the 
 Lloyds of Farm, of whom the history may be 
 read in the little record called " Farm and its 
 Inhabitants," privately printed for the family in 
 1883.' From Sampson Lloyd's second mar- 
 
 * It was this Sampson Lloyd whom Dr. Johnson, who disliked 
 Quakers as a sect, but could be attracted by them individually, visited, 
 with Boswell, in 1776 : " We next," Boswell wrote, " called on Mr. 
 Lloyd, one of the people called Quakers. He too was not at home, 
 but Mrs. Lloyd was, and received us courteously, and asked us to din- 
 ner. Johnson said to me, ' After the uncsA-tainty of all human 
 things at Hector's, this invitation came very well." " At dinner, Mr. 
 Lloyd having returned, the Doctor, addressing his host and hostess 
 (who had many children), remarked : " Marriage is the best state for 
 a man in general ; and every man is a worse man in proportion as he 
 is unfit for the married state." Subsequently both the Doctor and 
 Mr. Lloyd were lured into error during a discussion on Baptism. The 
 only other remark of the great man recorded by Boswell was this : 
 " The church does not superstitiously observe days, merely as days, 
 2 17
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 riage — with Rachel Champion, of Bristol — 
 came the family with which this book is con- 
 cerned, Charles Lloyd, of Bingley, who suc- 
 ceeded to the bank, being the fourth son. 
 
 Charles Lloyd, of Bingley, was born August 
 23, 1 748. He was educated with the thorough- 
 ness common at that time to the children of 
 wealthy Quakers ; and being gifted with a 
 memory of singular power, he learned much. 
 Although, in accordance with his father's prin- 
 ciples, a period at a university could not round 
 otf his boyhood, Charles Lloyd must have en- 
 tered business with a larger store of classical 
 knowledge than many masters of arts can 
 boast. 
 
 He married, in 1774, Mary Farmer, who 
 also was of the Friends, and they had, like 
 most Lloyds, a very large family,^ of whom 
 
 but as memorials of important facts. Christmas might be kept as well 
 upon one day of the year as another ; but there should be a stated 
 day for commemorating the birth of our Saviour, because there is 
 danger that what may be done on any day, will be neglected." Dr. 
 Johnson, it should be noted, was in his youth in love with a Quakeress 
 named Olivia Lloyd (possibly his host's aunt of that name), to whom 
 he wrote a copy of amatory verses, which do not, however, exist. 
 
 ' Yet as to its precise dimensions opinions differ. In " Farm and 
 its Inhabitants" the number is given as 12; Bishop Wordsworth, of 
 St. Andrews, a grandson of Mr. Lloyd, says 15 ; and De Quincey, 17 
 
 iS
 
 THE LLOYDS 
 
 Charles Lloyd, bom in lyy^, the friend of 
 Coleridge and Lamb, was the first, and Robert, 
 born in 1778, Lamb's correspondent in the fol- 
 lowing pages, the third. 
 
 Mrs. Lloyd, who lived until 1821, was a 
 woman of great sweetness of character — " the 
 kindest and tenderest mother," wrote her eldest 
 son after her death. "She was humble," he 
 added in the same memoir, " even to profound 
 self-abasedness : disinterested even to nobility 
 of soul : and self-denying, and devout, to a 
 degree which those who give the preference to 
 the active over the passive virtues, would call 
 ascetic and mystical : but with all this rigidity 
 and austerity as respected herself, she was of all 
 human beings, and in many striking instances 
 she evinced this, the most disposed to extenuate 
 the failings of the inconsistent, to check the 
 despair of the culpable, and to wipe the tear of 
 shame and penitence from the cheek of the 
 victim to ' the Sin which most easily besetteth 
 him.' This, as many can testify, is not pane- 
 gyric, but plain and unvarnished truth." And 
 
 or 18. Foster's " Royal Lineage" enumerates 14, three dying in in- 
 fancy. 
 
 19
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 in a poem inspired by the death of his mother, 
 Charles Lloyd also wrote of her charity of 
 mind and purse : 
 
 In thee it was 
 A fresh, gratuitous, and healthful spring. 
 Like that of living waters. 
 
 And again : 
 
 In that warm bosom there did dwell enshrined 
 A human microcosm, which reflected 
 All the mind's accidents. 
 
 Mr. Lloyd, — as hereafter, for the sake of 
 distinction, her husband may be called, — was 
 of extraordinary intellectual vigour. He con- 
 trived, while neglecting neither his business, 
 which prospered continuously under his care, 
 nor his family, to concern himself intimately 
 in public affairs, both of Birmingham and the 
 country. The following passage from an ex- 
 cellent account of Mr. Lloyd in the Gentleman's 
 Magazine, March, 1828, is illuminative: 
 
 In the pursuit of any object of his attention, he suf- 
 fered no other to interfere with or distract it, and he 
 possessed the power of turning, after laborious investi- 
 gations, with surprising freshness to occupations requiring 
 intellectual exertions of a different nature. Few men, 
 
 20
 
 THE LLOYDS 
 
 perhaps, so rich in resources, had them so much at com- 
 mand. He embraced with promptness, and zealously 
 prosecuted, whatever appeared to his comprehensive 
 mind conducive to the benefit of his species, or the 
 happiness of those connected with him. He was an un- 
 wearied and able member of that body of Philanthropists, 
 to whose persevering efforts Great Britain is indebted for 
 the removal of that foulest stain upon her annals — the 
 Slave Trade. Nor have his efforts ever slackened to aid 
 the plans proposed for the amelioration of the condition 
 of the Negro population of our dominions in the West 
 Indies ; and although he wished for the trial of more 
 moderate measures than those proposed by many of the 
 advocates for emancipation, yet he generally concurred in 
 the principles advocated in Parliament by his nephew, 
 Mr. Buxton [afterwards Sir Thomas Powell Buxton, 
 ( 1 786-1 845)], and he always took the lead on public 
 occasions when this subject was brought forward in 
 Birmingham. A lover of peace and an admirer of the 
 constitution of his country, he deprecated, in common 
 with all the friends of humanity, the unwise measures 
 which the ministry of Lord North in 1775 were con- 
 templating for stifling opposition to its will in the North 
 American colonies. When all negotiation seemed fruitless, 
 and the overbearing conduct of the Minister had determined 
 Dr. Franklin to depart ; when the horrors of civil war 
 and the disunion of the Empire seemed inevitable ; Mr. 
 Lloyd and his brother-in-law, Mr. David Barclay, did 
 not consider affairs so irretrievable as not to warrant an- 
 other attempt at reconciliation. After much persuasion 
 and entreaty. Dr. Franklin yielded, and he told his 
 
 21
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 friends that, though he considered the attempt hopeless, 
 yet he could not resist the desire he felt, in common with 
 them, to preserve peace. Some minor concessions were 
 made by the Colonies at the suggestions of these gentle- 
 men. Lord North, as is known, was inexorable, and the 
 Envoy returned from the conference, the last which a 
 representative from that country had with an English 
 cabinet, until she sent her plenipotentiary to treat as a 
 Sovereign Republic. 
 
 Mr. Lloyd was also a leading figure in the 
 Bible Society, and to his expenditure of money 
 and effort the Birmingham General Hospital 
 owes the beginnings of its large usefulness. 
 
 To quote again from the same biographical 
 notice : " What minds less energetic would 
 have deemed studies of no trifling nature, were 
 allotted for the occupation of those hours 
 which he considered set apart for relaxation. 
 His acquaintance with ancient and modern his- 
 tory was accurate and extensive, and he read 
 in several European languages their works of 
 note. Few men were better versed in the Holy 
 Scriptures, or more complete masters of their 
 contents. He could repeat from memory sev- 
 eral entire Books of the Old Testament and 
 the greatest part of the New, and was well 
 versed in theological learning. But next to
 
 THE LLOYDS 
 
 the Scriptures, the classics were his favourite 
 study. When past sixty he commenced a 
 translation of Homer, and executed a faithful 
 and agreeable version of the whole of the 
 ' Odyssey' and great part of the ' Iliad.' " Mr. 
 Lloyd also turned his attention to Horace, 
 translating several of the Epistles into easy 
 verse ; but to these pleasant tasks we shall refer 
 again. " Virgil," the writer in the Gentleman's 
 Magazine continued, " was very familiar to 
 him ; his extraordinary memory retained to the 
 close of his life the whole of the ' Georgics' 
 and ' Bucolics.' The agreeable picture of farm- 
 ing so beautifully portrayed in those inimitable 
 descriptions of pastoral life, induced Mr. Lloyd 
 to take one of his estates into his own hands, 
 and for thirty years he farmed under his own 
 inspection nearly two hundred acres. [This 
 was at Olton Green, of which more later.] 
 One day in the week was at least devoted to 
 this pursuit, and the relaxation which this in- 
 teresting employment yielded him, contributed, 
 in conjunction with temperance and cheerful- 
 ness, to keep a naturally delicate constitution 
 in health and vigour to a late period of his 
 life." 
 
 23
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 We have glimpses of Mr. Lloyd's domestic 
 thoroughness, his capacity for keeping in touch 
 with every member of his household, in his 
 letters to his sons at school, a few of which 
 have been preserved. Here are typical extracts 
 from one addressed to Robert, Thomas, and 
 Plumstead Lloyd, in 1792 : 
 
 " I have sent you some paper, a spade, pen- 
 cils, and painting brushes, and a ' Virgil' and 
 ' Selecta,' &c., all which you will, I hope, make 
 a good use of, ... I observe your request for 
 fishing rods, but I do not wish you to be too 
 frequent in using them, for it is cruel to the 
 poor worms, who are put to great torture. I 
 have not sent any rods, thinking if your Master 
 approves of your fishing now and then, that 
 long Osier twigs will do as well as any rods. 
 As you have already plenty of books, I would 
 have you be diligent in reading them, for a few 
 books well chosen and frequently read are much 
 better than a great number ill-chosen. . . . 
 Tho' you are very young, yet you are old 
 enough to know and consider that life is very 
 uncertain, and the Youth as well as the Old are 
 often summoned to the Silent Grave ; but these 
 
 reflections, my dear Boys, have no occasion to 
 
 24
 
 THE LLOYDS 
 
 make you sorrowful, for if wc do what is right, 
 Death can never come at an unsuitable time." 
 In another letter we find him dealing with 
 matters usually left to the mother's care : " I 
 think the breeches Robert had on at Warwick 
 were very good ones, but if he wants another 
 pair, let the Shipston Tailor make them ; but be 
 sure, mind, that he makes them long enough." 
 This sufficiently proves Mr. Lloyd's vigilance 
 as a father. From his thoughtful plans for his 
 children's pleasure we learn that he was more 
 than merely vigilant : he possessed the kindly 
 faculty — which may be imaginative sympathy, 
 and may be recollection of one's own childish 
 days — that controls the choice of presents and 
 ensures their congeniality. Mrs. Lloyd, once 
 sending to Robert the latest news (and a cake) 
 said : " Priscilla concludes to omit writing, so I 
 may inform you of the arrival of the Squirrels, 
 who came in their large House, plac'd upon a 
 Waggon drawn by Six Horses, to the no small 
 surprise and amusement of the spectators. We 
 were a little puzzled where to fix them, but they 
 were, after due deliberation^ plac'd below the 
 Terrace, where they seem to enjoy good health 
 and an excellent appetite. I forget whether 
 25
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 your Papa had brought a little open Carriage 
 for Caroline and Agatha before you went — the 
 little girls are much amused with drawing it 
 about the Garden." 
 
 In Mr, Lloyd, in short, all the self-control, 
 the sagacity, the dignity, the kindly benevo- 
 lence, the even temperament, of the old-time 
 Quaker were carried out to their fullest power. 
 
 26
 
 n 
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 1796-1797 
 
 Charles Lloyd, born in 1 775, the eldest of 
 the family, was a contemplative, self-conscious, 
 sensitive youth, continuously afflicted with 
 nervous weakness. He had much of the Lake 
 poets' delight in scenery ; he was a profoundly 
 interested inquirer into ethical questions ; he 
 would examine an emotion with almost more 
 assiduity than his master Rousseau himself; 
 and quite early he ceased to subscribe to the 
 teaching of Friends. Quaker families now and 
 then produce such exotics. 
 
 On leaving school early in the nineties, he 
 followed the natural course of an eldest son 
 and entered his father's business. For a while 
 the work there was congenial, but in 1 794 his 
 health gave way, and he descended from the 
 high stool, never to return to it. On recover- 
 ing, he proceeded to Edinburgh with some idea 
 
 of studying medicine. Edinburgh, however, 
 27
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 held him but a brief space, and we find him 
 next, in 1 795, living with Wordsworth's friend, 
 Thomas Wilkinson — Wilkinson of the spade 
 — at Yanwath. It was there that Lloyd pro- 
 duced his first volume of poems. " He has a 
 poetical turn," wrote Wilkinson of his young 
 friend, " and writes most beautiful verse. His 
 attachment is to a pastoral life, as most natural 
 and consistent with his own feelings. He 
 would prefer life in the country with 100/. a 
 year to 1,000/. in the town." 
 
 Most introspective men, however confident 
 and light-hearted they may afterwards become, 
 are serious in the late teens. Letters from 
 Charles Lloyd to his brother Robert, then ap- 
 prentice at Saffron Walden, show him to have 
 been doubly so. In 1794, the writer being 
 then nineteen and Robert sixteen, Robert was 
 thus adjured : " Do not give way to useless 
 speculation. I advise you particularly to read 
 Rousseau's ' Emilius,' in French if you can, 
 and pray, out of regard to Charles^ who now 
 earnestly entreats^ pay particular attention to the 
 Savoyard vicar's confessions of faith, in the 
 2nd or 3rd vol. Get that book at all events. 
 
 Do not attend to the intricacies of sectarian 
 
 28
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 peculiarities ; be a good man, retain a pure 
 heart, but oh ! avoid alike the Quaker and the 
 Libertine, the Methodist and the Atheist." 
 
 In another letter, dated November 29, 1795, 
 thirteen months later, a more miscellaneous 
 course of reading was prescribed for the Saf- 
 fron Walden apprentice. Charles began thus : 
 " I am convinced that nothing tends so much 
 to narrow the mind as sectarian and confin'd 
 notions of religion and morality. The pure 
 ardour of universal benevolence does not abate 
 at the sight of a Lutheran or a Quaker, a 
 Catholic or an Unbeliever. No I it considers 
 all the petty, paltry distinctions of parties and 
 sects, which would separate man from man 
 and brother from brother, as originating in the 
 weaknesses and prejudices of mankind ; it de- 
 spises them all, and simply seeks by active 
 usefulness, not by unintelligible dogmas, to 
 diffuse good and enlarge the confin'd limit of 
 human felicity." The following volumes were 
 then recommended: Holcroft's "Anna St. Ives," 
 Godwin's "Political Justice," Priestley's "Letters 
 to a Philosophical Unbeliever" and " History 
 of Christianity" (this might be either the " His- 
 tory of the Corruptions of Christianity," or " A 
 
 29
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 General History of the Christian Church," of 
 which only the first two volumes were then 
 in existence), Paley's "Evidence," Lindsey's 
 "Apology" (for Unitarianism), and "Conver- 
 sations" on the same subject. " When you 
 have read these, all of which I am convinc'd 
 it will be to your advantage to peruse, I shall 
 then gladly point out other works." Finally 
 came the advice to read Volney's " Ruins of 
 Empire," but " with caution." 
 
 Is it matter for surprise that the writer of 
 these letters became the enthusiastic disciple 
 of Coleridge, when that prophet, glowing with 
 youth and belief in the power and lustre of 
 his projected " Watchman," visited Birming- 
 ham early in 1 796 *? 
 
 One eloquent man is more, to young in- 
 quirers, than all the books in the Bodleian, 
 and Charles Lloyd had been waiting for years 
 to meet with such a mind as Coleridge's — 
 glowing and confident, tireless and persuasive 
 — and he fell completely under the spell. A 
 few months later Coleridge again stopped in 
 Birmingham, on his return from Derby, where 
 a school was in preparation for him, and the 
 adoration of the young visionary (younger 
 
 30
 
 SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. 
 
 AGED 23. 
 
 By Peter Vandyke. 
 
 From a picture in the National Portrait Galtery.
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 than Coleridge by two years) intensified. 
 Charles Lloyd was then again living at home, 
 building castles in the air which bore as little 
 resemblance as might be to the family bank ; 
 for, as Joseph Cottle wrote in his " Early Rec- 
 ollections," " the tedious and unintellectual oc- 
 cupation of adjusting pounds, shillings and 
 pence" suits those alone who have never, " eagle- 
 like, gazed at the sun or bathed their temples 
 in the dews of Parnassus." 
 
 Charles Lloyd desired with all his soul to 
 lead the exalted existence of a philosopher and 
 poet ; and already having written a number of 
 sonnets of a meditative and melancholy cast, 
 forsworn the paternal creed, and passed through 
 a stage of acute Rousseauism, he was perhaps 
 entitled to his dream. The first step to the 
 consummation of this ambition was domesti- 
 cation with Coleridge as pupil and friend ; and 
 Coleridge, when the plan was suggested to 
 him, seems to have been agreeable. It was, 
 of course, a flattering proposal, likely to please 
 any man, particularly a " Pantisocratist" of 
 twenty-three. He even addressed to Charles 
 Lloyd a poem describing some of the delights 
 of their projected companionship : 
 
 31
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Together thus, the world's vain turmoil left, 
 Stretch'd on the crag, and shadovv'd by the pine. 
 
 And bending o'er the clear delicious fount. 
 Ah! dearest youth ! it were a lot divine 
 To cheat our noons in moralising mood. 
 While west-winds fann'd our temples toil-bedew'd : 
 
 Then downwards slope, oft pausing, from the mount. 
 To some lone mansion, in some woody dale. 
 Where smiling with blue eye, Domestic Bliss 
 Gives this the Husband's, that the Brother's kiss ! 
 
 And thus : — 
 
 We'll smile at wealth, and learn to smile at fame. 
 Our hopes, our knowledge, and our joys the same. 
 
 As neighbouring fountains image each the whole : 
 Then when the mind hath drunk its fill of truth 
 
 We'll discipline the heart to pure delight. 
 Rekindling sober joy's domestic flame. 
 They whom I love shall love thee, honour'd youth ! 
 
 Now may Heaven realise this vision bright ! 
 
 And among Lloyd's poems, in the joint volume 
 by himself, Coleridge and Lamb (1797), is an 
 address to Coleridge, ending 
 
 My Coleridge ! take the wanderer to thy breast. 
 The youth who loves thee, and who, faint, would rest 
 (Oft rack'd by hopes that frenzy and expire) 
 In the long sabbath of subdued desire ! 
 
 32
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 which we may suppose to have been written at 
 the same period. 
 
 In default of banking, for which there can 
 be no doubt Charles Lloyd was peculiarly un- 
 fitted, Mr. Lloyd still thought of the medical 
 profession for his son. But there was no call 
 for haste ; and when Charles mentioned his 
 wish to join Coleridge, it was favourably enter- 
 tained. After further consideration of the proj- 
 ect, Mr. Lloyd invited Coleridge to pay another 
 visit to Birmingham for the purpose of con- 
 ference, and in September, 1796, Coleridge did 
 so. While at the Lloyds' house he was sur- 
 prised by an announcement that on the pre- 
 vious day, September 19, he had become the 
 father of a son. Straightway he hastened 
 home ; and with him went Charles Lloyd, who 
 thus enjoyed the privilege of being one of the 
 first persons to welcome David Hartley Cole- 
 ridge into this world. More : there is good 
 reason to suppose, although another Charles — 
 Charles Lamb — is also a candidate for the 
 honour, that it was Charles Lloyd to whom the 
 father addressed the sonnet inscribed " To a 
 Friend who asked, How I felt when the nurse 
 first presented my infant to me ;" which begins 
 3 33
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Charles ! my slow heart was only sad, when first 
 I scann'd that face of feeble infancy ; 
 
 and ends thus charmingly : — 
 
 So for the Mother's sake the Child was dear. 
 And dearer was the Mother for the Child. 
 
 To reach Coleridge's house when so im- 
 portant an event was happening was to begin 
 the companionship auspiciously, and Charles 
 Lloyd was forthwith at home. " My mother," 
 wrote Sara Coleridge in her notes to the " Bio- 
 graphia Literaria," " has often told me how 
 amiable Mr. Lloyd was as a youth ; how kind 
 to her little Hartley ; how well content with cot- 
 tage accommodation ; how painfully sensitive 
 in all that related to the affections." Coleridge 
 seems to have been genuinely attracted by his 
 pupil. On September 24 we find him writing 
 to his friend Thomas Poole : " Charles Lloyd 
 wins upon me hourly ; his heart is uncom- 
 monly pure, his affections delicate, and his be- 
 nevolence enlivened but not sicklied by sensi- 
 bility. He is assuredly a man of great genius ; 
 but it must be in tite-a-ttte with one whom he 
 loves and esteems that his colloquial powers 
 
 34
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 open. ... I shall write on the other side of 
 the paper two of Charles Lloyd's sonnets, which 
 he wrote in one evening at Birmingham. The 
 latter of them alludes to the conviction of the 
 truth of Christianity, which he had received 
 from me, for he had been, if not a deist, yet 
 quite a sceptic." Thus favourably the experi- 
 ment began. 
 
 Mr. Lloyd, writing to Robert a few days 
 later, informed him of the news in these 
 words : — " Charles is gone to Bristol with in- 
 tention of pursuing his studies under the care 
 of S. T. Coleridge, a very sensible, religious 
 man and an extraordinary poet, who was edu- 
 cated for a clergyman, but for conscience sake 
 declined that office. Thou mayst order Cole- 
 ridge's ' Poems' of the bookseller at S. Walden 
 (a small octavo) and charge them to my ac- 
 count." 
 
 The original arrangement was that Charles 
 was to pay 80/. a year in return for board, 
 lodging, instruction, and the companionship of 
 his friend and mentor. At first it was sup- 
 posed that the household would be located at 
 Derby, where Coleridge, at the instigation of 
 Dr. Crompton, had undertaken to open a 
 
 35
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 school. But the following tremendous — almost 
 Micawberesque — letter from Coleridge to Mr. 
 Lloyd indicated a change of plans : — 
 
 " Dear Sir, — As the father of Charles Lloyd 
 you are of course in some measure interested in 
 any alteration of my schemes of life ; and I 
 feel it a kind of Duty to give you my reasons 
 for any such alteration. I have declined my 
 Derby connection, and determined to retire 
 once for all and utterly from cities and towns : 
 and am about to take a cottage and half a dozen 
 acres of land in an enchanting Situation about 
 eight miles from Bridgewater. My reasons 
 are — that I have cause to believe my Health 
 would be materially impaired by residing in 
 a town, and by the close confinement and 
 anxieties incident to the education of children ; 
 that as my days would be dedicated to Dr. 
 Crompton's children, and my evenings to a 
 course of study with my admirable young 
 friend, I should have scarcely a snatch of time 
 for literary occupation ; and, above all, because 
 I am anxious that my children should be bred 
 up from earliest infancy in the simplicity of 
 peasants, their food, dress, and habits com- 
 pletely rustic. I never shall, and I never will, 
 
 36
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 have any fortune to leave them : I will leave 
 them therefore hearts that desire little, heads 
 that know how little is to be desired, and hands 
 and arms accustomed to earn that little. I am 
 peculiarly delighted with the 2 1 st verse of the 
 4th chapter of Tobit, ' And fear not, my son ! 
 that we are made poor : for thou hast much 
 wealth, if thou fear God, and depart from all 
 sin and do that which is pleasing in His sight.' 
 Indeed, if I live in cities, my children (if it 
 please the All-good to preserve the one I have, 
 and to give me more), my children, I say, will 
 necessarily become acquainted with politicians 
 and politics — a. set of men and a kind of 
 study which I deem highly unfavourable to all 
 Christian graces. I have myself erred greatly 
 in this respect ; but, I trust, I have now seen 
 my error. I have accordingly snapped my 
 squeaking baby-trumpet of sedition, and have 
 hung up its fragments in the chamber of Peni- 
 tences.^ 
 
 "Your son and I are happy in our con- 
 
 * Coleridge was so taken with this trope that he repeated it in a 
 letter to George Coleridge some eighteen months after (" Letters," I., 
 p. 243) : — " But I have snapped my squeaking baby-trumpet of sedi- 
 tion, and the fragments lie scattered in the lumber-room of penitence." 
 
 37
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 nection — our opinions and feelings are as nearly- 
 alike as we can expect : and I rely upon the 
 goodness of the All-good that we shall proceed 
 to make each other better and wiser. Charles 
 Lloyd is greatly averse from the common run 
 of society — and so am I — but in a city I 
 could scarcely avoid it. And this, too, has 
 aided my decision in favour of my rustic 
 scheme. We shall reside near a very dear 
 friend of mine, a man versed from childhood 
 in the toils of the Garden and the Field, and 
 from whom I shall receive every addition to 
 my comfort which an earthly friend and ad- 
 viser can give. 
 
 " My Wife requests to be remembered to 
 you, if the word ' remember' can be properly 
 used. You will mention my respects to your 
 Wife and your children, and believe that I am 
 with no mean esteem and regard 
 " Your Friend, 
 
 " S. T. Coleridge. 
 
 "Saturday, 15th Oct., 1796." 
 
 Coleridge, who at this time, it is instructive 
 to note, was not quite twenty-four, wrote from 
 Kingsdown, Bristol, where he then lived. The 
 
 38
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 cottage glanced at was Nether Stowey, and 
 the friend was Thomas Poole, who dwelt in 
 that village. 
 
 Although the suggestion of this letter is 
 that Coleridge meant to give much time to 
 Charles Lloyd, it is impossible to believe that 
 under any conditions he would have been a 
 satisfactory " coach." Especially at that period 
 was he unfit for such drudgery : his brain was 
 busy with a thousand projects ; he was un- 
 settled ; he was poor ; the arrival of David 
 Hartley Coleridge had disorganised the house ; 
 and by constitution he detested the regular 
 habits which a good instructor must observe. 
 But we may suppose that the two men had 
 continuous, if unsystematic, intercourse. Lloyd, 
 whose mind was always acute, was even able 
 now and then to help his master : " It is 
 strange," wrote Coleridge to Poole, "that in 
 the sonnet to Schiller I should have written, 
 'that hour I would have wished to die — Lest 
 aught more mean might stamp me mortal;^ 
 the bull never struck me until Charles Lloyd 
 mentioned it." 
 
 By Coleridge's conversation, on the other 
 hand, Lloyd was stimulated — though stimula- 
 
 39
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 tion of this kind was at that period ever present 
 with him — to write more poetry. While at 
 Bristol he prepared a handsome folio in memory 
 of his grandmother, entitled " Poems on the 
 Death of Priscilla Farmer," for which Coleridge 
 wrote the introductory sonnet, beginning 
 
 The piteous sobs that choke the virgin's breath, 
 
 and to which Charles Lamb contributed " The 
 Grandam." " The following beautiful frag- 
 ment," wrote Lloyd, by way of introduction to 
 it, " was written by Charles Lamb, of the India 
 House. Its subject being the same with that 
 of my Poems, I was solicitous to have it 
 printed with them : and I am indebted to a 
 Friend of the Author's for the permission." 
 " I can but notice," Lamb wrote, on receiving 
 a copy of the book, " the odd coincidence of 
 two young men, in one age, carolling their 
 grandmothers." And again, referring to the 
 splendour of the volume, " I cannot but smile 
 to see my granny so gaily decked forth." 
 Lloyd's sonnets were marked by very strong 
 affection, but otherwise were not conspicuous. 
 
 The date of Lamb's first letter to Charles 
 40
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 Lloyd cannot be given, but the first mention 
 of Lloyd's name in Lamb's letters to Coleridge 
 occurs on October 24, 1 796. " My kind re- 
 membrances to Lloyd," he wrote ; and hence- 
 forward, for some months, the three men had 
 common interests. 
 
 Another poem written at this time by Cole- 
 ridge, for his young friend's benefit, was the 
 remonstrance entitled " Lines addressed to a 
 young man of fortune who abandoned himself 
 to an indolent and causeless melancholy," in 
 which Lloyd was adjured to cease self-pity, 
 and, rather, to 
 
 Seek some widow^s grave ; whose dearer part 
 
 Was slaughter'd, where o'er his uncofEned limbs 
 
 The flocking flesh-birds scream'd ! Then, while thy 
 heart 
 Groans, and thine eye a fiercer sorrow dims. 
 
 Know (and the truth shall kindle thy young mind) 
 
 What Nature makes thee mourn, she bids thee heal ! ' 
 
 The attack of melancholy that was meant may 
 have been the precursor of the illness which 
 
 ' Mr. E. H. Coleridge suggests that possibly this stern admonition 
 was first levelled by Coleridge against himself and afterwards trans- 
 ferred to Lloyd. 
 
 41
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 prostrated Lloyd in November, 1796. The 
 following letter from Coleridge to Mr. Lloyd, 
 in answer to one that is missing, tells the story. 
 It also tells much that is interesting of Cole- 
 ridge's own programme at that period : — 
 
 "Dear Sir, — I received your letter, and thank 
 you for that interest which you take in my 
 welfare. The reasons which you urge against 
 my present plan are mostly well-founded ; but 
 they would apply equally against any other 
 scheme of life which my Conscience would 
 permit me to adopt. I might have a situation 
 as a Unitarian minister, I might have lucrative 
 offices as an active Politician ; but on both of 
 these the Voice within puts a firm and un- 
 wavering negative. Nothing remains for me 
 but schoolmastership in a large town or my 
 present plan. To the success of both, and 
 indeed even to my subsisting in either, health 
 and the possession of my faculties are necessary 
 Requisites. While I possess these Requisites, 
 / know^ I can maintain myself and family in 
 the COUNTRY ; the task of educating children 
 suits not the activity of my mind, and the 
 
 anxieties and confinement incident to it, added 
 
 42
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 to the living in a town or city, would to a 
 moral certainty ruin that Health and those 
 faculties which, as I said before, are necessary 
 to my gaining my livelihood in any way. Un- 
 doubtedly, without fortune, or trade, or profes- 
 sion it is impossible that I should be in any 
 situation in which I must not be dependent on 
 my own health and exertions for the bread of 
 my family. I do not regret it — it will make 
 me feel my dependence on the Almighty, and 
 it will prevent my affections from being made 
 earthly altogether. I praise God in all things, 
 and feel that to His grace alone it is owing 
 that I am enabled to praise Him in all things. 
 You think my scheme monastic rather than 
 Christian. Can he be deemed monastic who 
 is married, and employed in rearing his chil- 
 dren ? — who -personally preaches the truth to his 
 friends and neighbours, and who endeavours 
 to instruct tho' Absent by the Press *? In what 
 line of Life could I be more actively employed ? 
 and what titles, that are dear and venerable, are 
 there which I shall not possess, God permit my 
 present resolutions to be realised *? Shall I not 
 be an Agriculturist, an Husband, a Father, and 
 a Friest after the order of Peace ? an hireless 
 43
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Priest ? ' Christianity teaches us to let our 
 lights shine before men.' It does so — but it 
 likewise bids us say, Our Father, lead us not 
 [into] temptation I which how can he say 
 with a safe conscience who voluntarily places 
 himself in those circumstances in which, if he 
 believe Christ, he must acknowledge that it 
 would be easier for a Camel to go thro* the eye 
 of a needle than for him to enter into the 
 Kingdom of Heaven *? Does not that man 
 mock God who daily prays against temptations, 
 yet daily places himself in the midst of the 
 most formidable *? I meant to have written a 
 few lines only respecting myself, because I 
 have much and weighty matter to write con- 
 cerning my friend, Charles Lloyd ; but I have 
 been seduced into many words from the im- 
 portance of the general truths on which I build 
 my conduct. 
 
 " While your Son remains with me, he will, 
 of course, be acquiring that knowledge and 
 those powers of Intellect which are necessary 
 as iht foundation of excellence in all profes- 
 sions, rather than the immediate science of any. 
 Languages will engross one or two hours in 
 every day : the elements of Chemistry, Geome- 
 
 44
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 try, Mechanics, and Optics the remaining hours 
 of study. After tolerable proficiency in these, 
 we shall proceed to the study of Man and of 
 Men — I mean, Metaphysics and History — and 
 finally, to a thorough examination of the Jew- 
 ish and Christian Dispensations, their doctrines 
 and evidences : an examination necessary for 
 all men, but peculiarly so to your son, if he 
 be destined for a medical man. A Physician 
 who should be even a Theist, still more a 
 Christian^ would be a rarity indeed. I do not 
 know one — and I know a great many Physi- 
 cians. They are shallow Animals : having al- 
 ways employed their minds about Body and 
 Gut, they imagine that in the whole system of 
 things there is nothing but Gut and Body." 
 
 [Here followed an account of Charles 
 Lloyd's health, which was just then, said 
 Coleridge, so "unsatisfactory" as to shut out 
 anything but amusement. In his anxiety, 
 Coleridge called in Dr. Beddoes, the father of 
 Thomas Lovell Beddoes, the poet, and a man 
 of eminence in his profession : " I chose Dr. 
 Beddoes," Coleridge explained, " because he is 
 a philosopher^ and the knowledge of mind is 
 essentially requisite in order to the well-treating 
 
 45
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 of your Son's distemper." After quoting Dr. 
 Beddoes's remarks Coleridge continued : " Such 
 is Dr. Beddoes's written opinion. But he told 
 me, that your Son's cure must be effected by 
 Sympathy and Calmness — by being in com- 
 pany with some one before whom he thought 
 aloud on all subjects, and by being in situations 
 perfectly according with the tenderness of his 
 Disposition." Other remarks concerning diet 
 and such matters followed, and the letter closed 
 thus] : — 
 
 " I hope your Health is confirmed, and that 
 your Wife and children are well. Present my 
 well-wishes. You are blessed with children 
 who are pure in Heart — add to this Health, 
 Competence, Social Affections, and Employ- 
 ment, and you have a complete idea of Human 
 Happiness. 
 
 " Believe me, 
 " With esteem and friendly-heartedness, 
 " Your obliged 
 
 " S. T. Coleridge. 
 "Monday, November 14th [1796]." 
 
 It is not surprising, with Charles Lloyd in 
 
 such a state and his own movements so im- 
 
 46
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 peded — as his letters to Thomas Poole tell us 
 that they then were — by domestic responsi- 
 bilities and want of money, that Coleridge 
 should wish to free himself from his undertak- 
 ing with regard to his disciple. Hence Mr. 
 Lloyd must have been more or less prepared 
 for the letter — dated December 4, 1796 — that 
 follows : — 
 
 " Dear Sir, — I think it my duty to acquaint 
 you with the nature of my connection with 
 your Son. If he be to stay with me, I can 
 neither be his tutor or fellow-student, nor in 
 any way impart a regular system of knowledge. 
 My days I shall devote to the acquirement of 
 practical husbandry and horticulture, that as ' to 
 beg I am ashamed,' I may at least be able * to 
 dig :' and my evenings will be fully employed 
 in fulfilling my engagements with the ' Critical 
 Review' and 'New Monthly Magazine.' If, 
 therefore, your Son occupy a room in my cot- 
 tage, he will be there merely as a Lodger and 
 Friend; and the only money I shall receive 
 from him will be the sum which his board and 
 lodging will cost me, and which, by an accurate 
 calculation, I find will amount to half a guinea 
 47
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 a week, exclusive of his washing, porter, cyder, 
 spirits, in short any potation beyond table- 
 beer — these he must provide himself with. I 
 shall keep no servant. 
 
 " I must add that Charles Lloyd must furnish 
 his own bedroom. It is not in my power to 
 do it myself without running into debt ; from 
 which may Heaven amid its most angry dis- 
 pensations preserve me I 
 
 " When I mentioned the circumstances which 
 rendered my literary engagement impracticable, 
 when, I say, I first mentioned them to Charles 
 Lloyd, and described the severe process of 
 simplification which I had determined to adopt, 
 I never dreamt that he would have desired to 
 continue with me : and when at length he did 
 manifest such a desire, I dissuaded him from it. 
 But his feelings became vehement, and in the 
 present state of his health it would have been 
 as little prudent as humane in me to have given 
 an absolute refusal. 
 
 " Will you permit me. Sir ! to write of 
 
 Charles Lloyd with freedom ? I do not think 
 
 he ever will endure, whatever might be the 
 
 consequences, to practise as a physician, or 
 
 to undertake any commercial employment. 
 
 48
 
 COLERIDGE AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 What weight your authority might have, I 
 know not : I doubt not he would struggle to 
 submit to it — but would he succeed in any 
 attempt to which his temper, feelings, and 
 principles are inimical? . . . What then 
 remains'? I know of nothing but agricul- 
 ture. If his attachment to it should prove 
 permanent, and he really acquired the steady 
 dispositions of a practical farmer, I think 
 you could wish nothing better for him than 
 to see him married, and settled near you as 
 a farmer. I love him, and do not think he 
 will be well or happy till he is married and 
 settled. 
 
 '' I have written plainly and decisively, my 
 dear Sir ! I wish to avoid not only evil, but 
 the appearances of evil. This is a world of 
 calumnies ! Yea ! there is an imposthume in 
 the large tongue of this world ever ready to 
 break, and it is well to prevent the contents 
 from being sputtered into one's face. My 
 Wife thanks you for your kind inquiries re- 
 specting her. She and our Infant are well — 
 only the latter has met with a little accident — 
 a burn which is doing well. 
 
 " To Mrs. Lloyd and all your children pre- 
 
 4 49
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 sent my remembrances, and believe me in all 
 esteem and friendliness, 
 
 " Yours sincerely, 
 
 " S. T. Coleridge.* 
 •* Sunday, December 4, 1796." 
 
 It was settled as Charles Lloyed wished. 
 He then left Bristol to spend Christmas at 
 home, and the Coleridges prepared to move to 
 Nether Stowey, a transit which was accom- 
 plished on the last day of 1796. 
 
 * To this letter Mr. Lloyd seems to have returned the question, 
 How could Coleridge live without companions ? The answer came 
 quickly, as we learn from a letter from Coleridge to Poole (" Letters," 
 i. p. 186) in which he mentions Mr. Lloyd's query and quotes his own 
 characteristic reply : " I shall have six companions : My Sara, my 
 babe, my own shaping and disquisitive mind, my books, my beloved 
 friend Thomas Poole, and lastly. Nature looking at me with a thou- 
 sand looks of beauty, and speaking to me in a thousand melodies of 
 love. If I were capable of being tired with all these, I should then 
 detect a vice in my nature, and would fly to habitual solitude to eradi" 
 cate it." Coleridge's letter to Mr. Lloyd, containing this passage, 
 seems to have been lost. 
 
 50
 
 Ill 
 
 COLERIDGE, LAMB, AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 *797 
 
 Charles Lloyd first met Lamb in January, 
 1 797. Quite unexpectedly, while Coleridge and 
 his family were settling into the Stowey cottage, 
 he visited Lamb in London. Lamb was im- 
 pressed by him. " I will not tell you what I 
 think of Lloyd," he wrote to Coleridge, " for 
 he may by chance come to see this letter, and 
 that thought puts a restraint on me ;" but there 
 is no doubt but that Lamb was prepared for 
 eulogy. A few days later, in another letter to 
 Coleridge, Lamb wrote : — " The emotions I 
 felt on his coming so unlocked for, are not ill- 
 expressed in what follows, and what (if you do 
 not object to them as too personal, and to the 
 world obscure, or otherwise wanting in worth) 
 I should wish to make a part of our little 
 volume." The little volume was the joint 
 collection of their poems which Coleridge 
 and Lamb were then projecting, and Lamb's 
 51
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 verses on Lloyd, which duly found a place In 
 that book, ran thus : — 
 
 TO CHARLES LLOYD, AN UNEXPECTED 
 VISITOR. 
 
 Alone, obscure, without a friend. 
 
 A cheerless, solitary thing. 
 Why seeks my Lloyd the stranger out ? 
 
 What offering can the stranger bring ? 
 
 Of social scenes, home-bred delights. 
 That him in ought compensate may 
 
 For Stowey's pleasant winter nights. 
 For loves and friendships far away. 
 
 For brief oblivion to forego 
 
 Friends, such as thine, so justly dear« 
 
 And be awhile with me, content 
 To stay, a kindly loiterer, here ? 
 
 For this a gleam of random joy 
 
 Hath flush'd my unaccustomed cheek ; 
 
 And, with an o'er-charged bursting heart, 
 I feel the thanks I cannot speak. 
 
 O ! sweet are all the Muse's lays. 
 
 And sweet the charm of matin bird — 
 
 *Twas long, since these estranged ears 
 The sweeter voice of friend had heard. 
 52
 
 COLERIDGE, LAMB, AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 The voice hath spoke : the pleasant sounds. 
 
 In memory's ear, in after time. 
 Shall tide, to sometimes rouse a tear. 
 
 And sometimes prompt an honest rhyme. 
 
 For when the transient charm is fled. 
 And when the little week is o'er. 
 
 To cheerless, friendless solitude 
 When I return, as heretofore — 
 
 Long, long, within my aching heart 
 The grateful sense shall cherished be ; 
 
 I'll think less meanly of myself. 
 
 That Lloyd will sometimes think on me. 
 
 Charles Lloyd was not a Coleridge, yet at 
 that time Lamb must have found peculiar 
 pleasure and solace in his company. Lamb, 
 who was much in the shadow of the tragedy 
 of the year before, needed a mind as serious 
 and sympathetic as Charles Lloyd's, and their 
 nearness in age — only two days separated them : 
 both would be two-and-twenty in the following 
 month — was an additional bond. Lloyd's 
 spiritual life, in spite of his youth, had been 
 fully lived, and though he lacked nimbleness, 
 flexibility, fun, he was possessed of rare intel- 
 lectual gifts, which at that time were more to 
 53
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Lamb's taste than humourous quickness. It is 
 probable that the two friends spoke more of 
 conduct than of Hterature. 
 
 Lloyd rejoined Coleridge at Stowey early 
 in February, 1797. Writing to his brother 
 Robert, on March 2, he said, by way of excuse 
 for not having written sooner : " At Stowey 
 (where I have now been nearly three weeks) I 
 have not been settled till yesterday week — 
 having had my rooms to furnish, so that I only 
 began to lodge at Coleridge's a week ago ; in 
 the meantime I was visiting at Mr. Poole's, a 
 friend of Coleridge." Later we come upon a 
 sentence which to us, who accept Lamb, as a 
 matter of course, as one of the great intellects, 
 has an odd ring : " I left Charles Lamb very 
 warmly interested in his favour, and have kept 
 up a regular correspondence with him ever 
 since ; he is a most interesting young man." 
 It is sad that every letter in this correspond- 
 ence has vanished. Saving the one note, dated 
 1823, from Lamb to Lloyd, in Canon Ainger's 
 edition of the " Letters," not a line remains. 
 Charles Lloyd, however, must not be blamed. 
 He seems carefully to have preserved all letters. 
 It was not until after his death, when his son, 
 
 54
 
 COLERIDGE, LAMB, AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 Grosvenor Lloyd, came to examine the col- 
 lection of papers, that the work of destruction 
 set in. 
 
 Lamb seems to have met Robert during 
 Charles's January visit to town, for in the same 
 letter from which quotations have just been 
 made, Charles said : " Charles Lamb desir'd to 
 be remember'd to you whenever I wrote. He 
 took a great liking to you. God bless you, 
 and preserve you virtuous and happy I" 
 
 Meanwhile Lloyd had joined the poetical 
 partnership of his two friends. At first Cole- 
 ridge and Lamb were to make the volume be- 
 tween them ; but when, in March, 1 797, the 
 printing was almost complete, Coleridge wrote 
 to Cottle, the publisher, saying that Charles 
 Lloyd's poems were to be included too ; adding, 
 with more commercial acumen than was usual 
 with him, " Lloyd's connections will take off a 
 great many [copies], more than a hundred." 
 
 A very little while later Lloyd, who, as we 
 have seen, had resumed his studies with Cole- 
 ridge, in spite of Coleridge's statement that 
 such studies must now cease (but Coleridge's 
 statements were rarely absolute) again failed in 
 health. The references to him in Lamb's let- 
 55
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 ters to Coleridge during the spring of 1797 in- 
 dicate that regular employment had become 
 impossible. Unsettlement grew upon him, and 
 in March or April he found it necessary to 
 leave Stowey. Thus his domestication with 
 Coleridge ended. " You will pray with me, I 
 know, for his recovery," wrote Lamb, "for 
 surely, Coleridge, an exquisiteness of feeling 
 like this must border on derangement. But I 
 love him more and more." 
 
 Early in June the volume appeared: — "Poems 
 by S. T. Coleridge, Second Edition. To which 
 are added Poems by Charles Lamb and Charles 
 Lloyd," the title-page bearing the following 
 quotation : " ' Duplex nobis vinculum, et amici- 
 tiffi et similium junctarumque Camcenarum ; 
 quod utinam neque mors solvat neque tem- 
 poris longinquitas !' GroscoU. Epist. ad Car. 
 Utenhov. et Ptol. Lux. Tast." This motto, 
 an invention of Coleridge's, in whose brain 
 Groscollius had his only being, may be trans- 
 lated freely : " Double is the bond which binds 
 us — friendship, and a kindred taste in poetry. 
 Would that neither death nor lapse of time 
 could dissolve it I" To our eyes, accustomed 
 to the taste which publishers now lavish on 
 
 56
 
 COLERIDGE, LAMB, AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 their products, the book is a homely enough 
 little tome ; but Coleridge thought otherwise. 
 " The volume is a most beautiful one," he 
 wrote to Cottle. " You have determined that 
 the three Bards shall walk up Parnassus in their 
 best bib and tucker." 
 
 It is late in the day to speak critically of 
 this book, nor is this the place in which to do 
 so. Coleridge's performances in the few years 
 immediately following were such as to throw 
 these early efforts and " effusions" into ob- 
 scurity, and Lamb and Lloyd were wofully 
 serious. Lloyd, especially, paraded his grief; 
 his motto, from Bowles, being : — 
 
 I wrap me in the mantle of distress. 
 And tell my poor heart this is happiness. 
 
 Altogether, considering what was to happen, we 
 must look upon it as a luckless little volume. 
 
 In June, 1797, we find Thomas Poole writ- 
 ing to Lloyd for support in the fund he was 
 collecting for Coleridge ; and in the same 
 month Lloyd had sufficiently recovered to 
 think of entertaining Lamb at Birmingham. 
 Lamb, however, could not accept the invita- 
 tion ; instead he paid the visit to Stowey which 
 57
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 won for him the friendship of the Words worths 
 (who had just settled at Alfoxden), and led to 
 the composition of Coleridge's poem " This 
 lime-tree bower my prison." Lloyd was not 
 of the party. Two months or so after the 
 Stowey holiday Lamb was able to leave town 
 again, and he then accompanied Lloyd on a 
 visit to Southey at Burton, a village near Christ- 
 church, in Hampshire. 
 
 Southey was then just twenty-three; his 
 " Joan of Arc" had appeared two years before, 
 and he was busily composing new verses and 
 planning the " Annual Anthology" for Cottle. 
 The visit was the beginning of a steady corre- 
 spondence between Lamb and Southey, and 
 possibly between Southey and Lloyd, but of 
 that we have no record. 
 
 In September, 1797, Lamb sent Coleridge 
 his touching poem on the anniversary of his 
 mother's death, and appended to it some lines 
 suggested by Lloyd's mental distress : — " The 
 following I wrote when I had returned from 
 Charles Lloyd, leaving him behind at Burton, 
 with Southey." To understand some of it you 
 must remember that at that time he was very 
 much perplexed in mind. 
 
 58
 
 COLERIDGE, LAMB, AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 A stranger, and alone, I pass'd those scenes 
 
 We pass'd so late together ; and my heart 
 
 Felt something like desertion, as I look'd 
 
 Around me, and the pleasant voice of friend 
 
 Was absent, and the cordial look was there 
 
 No more, to smile on me. I thought on Lloyd — 
 
 All he had been to me ! And now I go 
 
 Again to mingle with a world impure ; 
 
 With men who make a mock of holy things. 
 
 Mistaken, and of man's best hope think scorn. 
 
 The world does much to warp the heart of man ; 
 
 And I may sometimes join its idiot laugh : 
 
 Of this I now complain not. Deal with me. 
 
 Omniscient Father, as Thou judgest best. 
 
 And in Thy season soften Thou my heart. 
 
 I pray not for myself. I pray for him 
 
 Whose soul is sore perplexed. Shine Thou on him. 
 
 Father of lights ! and in the difficult paths 
 
 Make plain his way before him : his own thoughts 
 
 May he not think — his own ends not pursue — 
 
 So shall he best perform Thy will on earth. 
 
 Greatest and best. Thy will be ever ours !" 
 
 *' You use Lloyd very ill," Lamb added, " never 
 writing to him. I tell you again that his is 
 not a mind with which you should play tricks. 
 He deserves more tenderness from you." 
 
 At the end of the same month — September, 
 1797 — in a letter to Robert, Lloyd wrote : — 
 
 " I am at present with Southey at Bath. My 
 
 59
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 principles and feelings remain just the same as 
 when you saw me last. I shall be in London 
 during the winter, and shall hope by some 
 means or other to meet you there, or half way 
 between London and Walden. Lamb often 
 talks of you. I wish you would order from 
 London (they are sold at Robinson's, London) 
 a new edition of Coleridge's ' Poems' — it con- 
 tains all mine and his, and is just come out. 
 What are you reading"? Do write soon. I 
 have been very ill since I last saw you, very ill 
 indeed, so that I thought I never should re- 
 cover ; but, thank God, I am now perfectly well." 
 The fact of his recovery is thus sufficiently 
 demonstrated. From this date — September, 
 1797 — until the following year, we lose sight 
 of Charles Lloyd. All that is known is that 
 he did not again live with Coleridge, but pro- 
 ceeded from Bath, probably by way of Bir- 
 mingham, to London. Whether any cause 
 but ill health had determined him not to re- 
 turn to Stowey cannot be said. Possibly his 
 friendship with Southey may have been an 
 anti-Coleridgean influence, for the brothers-in- 
 law were not on the best terms ; possibly other 
 
 forces were in operation. 
 
 60
 
 COLERIDGE, LAMB, AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 But whatsoever the reason, it is clear that a 
 coolness was growing, and from it probably 
 came Coleridge's impulse to write the parody 
 of himself and his friends' poetical mannerisms 
 which belong to this period. The skit took 
 the form of three " Sonnets in the Manner of 
 Contemporary Writers," signed "Nehemiah 
 Higginbottom," which appeared in the Monthly 
 Magazine for November, 1797. In a letter to 
 Cottle, Coleridge explained their purpose : — 
 
 " I sent to the Monthly Magazine three mock 
 Sonnets in ridicule of my own Poems, and 
 Charles Lloyd's, and Charles Lamb's, &c., 
 &c., exposing that affectation of unaffected- 
 ness, of jumping and misplaced accent, in com- 
 monplace epithets, flat lines forced into poetry 
 by italics (signifying how well and mouthishly 
 the author would read them), puny pathos^ 
 &c., &c. The instances were all taken from 
 myself and Lloyd and Lamb. I signed them 
 * Nehemiah Higginbottom.' I think they may 
 do good to our young Bards." 
 
 Here are two of the " lessons :" — 
 
 Pensive at eve on the hard world I mus'd. 
 And my poor heart was sad ; so at the moon 
 61
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 I gaz'd — and sigh'd and sigh'd ! — for ah ! how soon 
 Eve darkens into night. Mine eye perus'd 
 With tearful vacancy the dampy grass 
 Which wept and glitter'd in the paly ray ; 
 And I did pause me on my lonely way. 
 And mused me on those wretched ones who pass 
 O'er the black heath of Sorrow. But, alas ! 
 Most of Myself I thought : when it befell 
 That the sooth spirit of the breezy wood 
 Breath'd in mine ear — "All this is very well; 
 But much of one thing is for no thing good." 
 Ah ! my poor heart's inexplicable swell ! 
 
 TO SIMPLICITY. 
 
 ! I do love thee, meek Simplicity ! 
 For of thy lays the lulling simpleness 
 
 Goes to my heart and soothes each small distress 
 Distress though small, yet haply great to me ! 
 ' Tis true on Lady Fortune's gentlest pad 
 
 1 amble on; yet, though I know not why. 
 So sad I am ! — but should a friend and I 
 Grow cool and miff, O ! I am very sad ! 
 And then with sonnets and with sympathy 
 My dreamy bosom's mystic woes I pall ; 
 Now of my false friend plaining plaintively. 
 Now raving at mankind in general ; 
 
 But, whether sad or fierce, 'tis simple all. 
 All very simple, meek Simplicity ! ' 
 
 ' One unforeseen result of the skit was Southey's determination to 
 take the sonnet "To Simplicity" as an attack on himself. 
 
 62
 
 COLERIDGE, LAMB, AND CHARLES LLOYD 
 
 Lamb probably only laughed, but Lloyd was 
 made of different stuff. He was, as we have 
 seen, and as Coleridge perfectly well knew, 
 a sensitive, affectionate, unworldly creature, 
 destitute of fun and rich in ideals, who could 
 ill understand an old friend and erstwhile spir- 
 itual guide making a public mock of him and 
 the poetry that had cost so much dear effort, 
 and in which, however tamely, he had tried 
 to give an expression of his best self. Ridi- 
 cule is a medicine to be prescribed with great 
 care: Lloyd certainly was not suited to take 
 it. There can be no question that for the dis- 
 sension which 1 798 was to bring forth, Nehe- 
 miah Higginbottom was much to blame. 
 
 63
 
 IV 
 
 " EDMUND OLIVER " AND THE " THESES " 
 1798 
 
 In London, Charles Lloyd shared lodgings 
 with James White, schoolfellow of Lamb, 
 friend of chimney-sweepers, and the author of 
 " Original Letters, &c., of Sir John Falstaff " 
 (1796). "For hearty, joyous humour, tinged 
 with Shakespearian fancy," says Talfourd, 
 " White was held by Lamb to have no equal." 
 "Among his intimates," says Gutch, a school- 
 fellow of Lamb and White, " he was called 
 * Sir John.' " The picture of this genial neo- 
 Elizabethan presiding over a free supper to 
 chimney-sweepers is one of the glories of" Elia." 
 The passage is a commonplace, yet let a few 
 sentences lend good humour to this book : — 
 
 In those little temporary parlours three tables were spread 
 with napery, not so fine as substantial, and at every board 
 a comely hostess presided with her pan of hissing sausage. 
 The nostrils of the young rogues dilated at the savour. 
 James White, as head waiter, had charge of the first 
 
 64
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER" AND THE "THESES" 
 
 table ; and myself, with our trusty companion Bigod, or- 
 dinarily ministered to the other two. There was clam- 
 bering and jostling, you may be sure, who should get at 
 the first table — for Rochester in his maddest days could 
 not have done the humours of the scene with more spirit 
 than my friend. After some general expression of thanks 
 for the honour the company had done him, his inaugural 
 ceremony was to clasp the greasy waist of old dame Ur- 
 sula (the fattest of the three), that stood frying and fret- 
 ting, half blessing, half cursing " the gentleman," and 
 imprint upon her chaste lips a tender salute, whereat the 
 universal host would set up a shout that tore the concave, 
 while hundreds of grinning teeth startled the night with 
 their brightness. O it was a pleasure to see the sable 
 younkers lick in the unctuous meat, with his more 
 unctuous sayings — how he could fit the tit-bits to the 
 puny mouths, reserving the lengthier links for the seniors 
 — how he would intercept a morsel even in the jaws of 
 some young desperado, declaring it "must to the pan 
 again to be browned, for it was not fit for a gentleman's 
 eating" — how he would recommend this slice of white 
 bread or that piece of kissing-crust to a tender juvenile, 
 advising them all to have a care of cracking their teeth, 
 which were their best patrimony, — how genteelly he 
 would deal about the small ale, as if it were wine, nam- 
 ing the brewer, and protesting, if it were not good, he 
 should lose their custom ; with a special recommendation 
 to wipe the lip before drinking. Then we had our toasts 
 — " The King,"—" The Cloth,"— which, whether they 
 understood or not, was equally diverting and flattering ; — 
 and for a crowning sentiment, which never failed, " May 
 5 65
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 the Brush supersede the Laurel !" All these, and fifty 
 other fancies, which were rather felt than comprehended 
 by his guests, would he utter, standing upon tables, and 
 prefacing every sentiment with a " Gentlemen, give me 
 leave to propose so-and-so," which was a prodigious com- 
 fort to those young orphans ; every now and then stuffing 
 into his mouth (for it did not do to be squeamish on these 
 occasions) indiscriminate pieces of those reeking sausages, 
 which pleased them mightily, and was the savouriest part, 
 you may believe, of the entertainment. 
 
 '* Golden lads and lassies must. 
 As chimney-sweepers, come to dust." 
 
 James White is extinct, and with him these suppers 
 have long ceased. He carried away with him half the 
 fun of the world when he died — of my world at least. 
 
 With such a character, then, was Lloyd liv- 
 ing at the end of 1 797 and beginning of 1 798. 
 " No two men," as Southey said, " could be 
 imagined more unlike each other. Lloyd had 
 no drollery in his nature ; White seemed to 
 have nothing else. You will easily understand 
 how Lamb could sympathise with both." 
 
 It was during Lloyd's domestication with 
 James White that the first signs of ill-feeling 
 between Lloyd and Lamb were visible. In the 
 
 66
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER" AND THE "THESES" 
 
 middle of January, 1 798, Lamb wrote to Cole- 
 ridge : — 
 
 " I had well nigh quarrelled with Charles 
 Lloyd ; and for no other reason, I believe, than 
 that the good creature did all he could to make 
 me happy. The truth is, I thought he tried to 
 force my mind from its natural and proper 
 bent. He continually wished me to be from 
 home ; he was drawing me from the considera- 
 tion of my poor dear Mary's situation, rather 
 than assisting me to gain a proper view of it 
 with religious consolations. I wanted to be 
 left to the tendency of my own mind, in a soli- 
 tary state, which, in times past, I knew had led 
 to quietness and a patient bearing of the yoke. 
 He was hurt that I was not more constantly 
 with him ; but he was living with White, a 
 man to whom I had never been accustomed to 
 impart my dearest feelings^ tho' from long habits 
 of friendliness, and many a social and good 
 quality, I loved him very much. I met com- 
 pany there sometimes — indiscriminate company. 
 Any society almost, when I am in affliction, is 
 sorely painful to me. I seem to breathe more 
 freely, to think more collectedly, to feel more 
 
 properly and calmly, when alone. All these 
 67
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 things the good creature did with the kindest 
 intentions in the world, but they produced in 
 me nothing but soreness and discontent. I 
 became, as he complained, 'jaundiced' towards 
 him . . . but he has forgiven me ; and his 
 smile, I hope, will draw all such humours from 
 me." 
 
 If, in connection with this letter. Lamb's 
 touching elegiacs " The Old Familiar Faces," 
 composed in the same month, are re-considered, 
 one or two references may be made clear. For 
 many years the fourth stanza : 
 
 I have a friend, a kinder friend has no man : 
 Like an ingrate, I left my friend abruptly ; 
 Left him, to muse on the old familiar faces — 
 
 was held to refer to Coleridge. But Canon 
 Ainger, in the notes to his edition of Lamb's 
 " Letters," has conclusively shown that Lloyd 
 was meant ; Coleridge was the friend, " more 
 than a brother," of the sixth stanza. 
 
 Yet although Lamb and Lloyd were again 
 perfectly reconciled, and were busy in preparing 
 their joint volume of " Blank Verse," in which 
 " The Old Familiar Faces" was first printed, 
 more disaster was brewing. The story of the 
 
 68
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER" AND THE "THESES" 
 
 alienation of Coleridge from his two friends 
 may best be told in the late Mr. Dykes Camp- 
 bell's words: "In March [1798] there had 
 been talk of a third edition of Coleridge's 
 ' Poems,' and on hearing of it Lloyd begged 
 Cottle to ' persuade' Coleridge to omit his. 
 This caused Coleridge to reply, smilingly 
 ["Letters," i. p. 238], that no persuasion was 
 needed for the omission of verses published at 
 the earnest request of the author ; and that 
 though circumstances had made the Groscollian 
 motto now look ridiculous, he accepted the 
 punishment of his folly, closing his letter 
 with the characteristically sententious reflection, 
 ' By past experience we build up our moral 
 being.' " 
 
 What happened after that is not clear, but 
 Coleridge seems to have found in Lloyd cause 
 for grief so intense that it led him to retire to 
 the "lonely farmhouse between Porlock and 
 Linton," where, to allay the disturbance of his 
 mind, he had recourse to opium, and under its 
 dire and seductive influence composed " Kubla 
 Khan." (Coleridge himself assigns an earlier date 
 to the poem, but Mr. Dykes Campbell's chron- 
 ology is more trustworthy.) The poet continued 
 
 69
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 to brood over the rupture of a friendship that 
 had begun so auspiciously. In the middle of 
 May, when his second child was born, we find 
 him, in writing to Poole concerning an impend- 
 ing bereavement, telling him that he can the 
 better sympathise by reason of sorrows of his 
 own that have " cut more deeply" into his heart 
 " than they ought to have done ;" which Mr. 
 Dykes Campbell considered a further allusion 
 to Lloyd's attitude, and to the fact that Lamb 
 was also becoming alienated. 
 
 In June, 1 798, the worthy Cottle, hoping to 
 patch up the disagreement, wrote to Lloyd 
 urging him to visit Coleridge. "I cannot," 
 was Lloyd's reply, " think that I have acted 
 with, or from, passion towards him. Even my 
 solitary night thoughts have been easy and 
 calm when they have dwelt on him. ... I 
 love Coleridge, and can forget all that has hap- 
 pened. At present I could not well go to 
 Stowey. I could scarcely excuse so sudden a 
 removal from my parents. Lamb quitted me 
 yesterday, after a fortnight's visit. I have been 
 much interested in his society. I never knew 
 him so happy in my life. I shall write to 
 
 Coleridge to-day." 
 
 70
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER" AND THE "THESES" 
 
 On Coleridge's side there was, however, more 
 to forgive : there was Lloyd's novel " Edmund 
 Oliver." This was the young man's crowning 
 offence, for in it he had made use of Coleridge's 
 own experiences as Private Silas Tomkyn 
 Comberbach. " The incidents," said the author 
 in his preface, " relative to the army were given 
 me by an intimate friend, who was himself eye- 
 witness to one of them, and can produce testi- 
 mony to the truth of the other two." That 
 Coleridge's own story, told to Lloyd at his 
 fireside, had been drawn upon, there can be no 
 doubt. Moreover, the novel contained other 
 passages which Coleridge was quick to apply 
 to himself: Edmund Oliver's love-fits and de- 
 parture from college tallied with his own ex- 
 perience ; the description of him : " His large 
 glistening eye — his dark eyebrows — there was 
 the same bend in the shoulder . . . and the 
 dark hair" — fitted Coleridge too ; and this piece 
 of self-revelation in which Oliver elsewhere in- 
 dulged was painfully applicable to the poet : 
 " I have at all times a strange dreaminess about 
 me, which makes me indifferent to the future, 
 if I can by any means fill the present with sen- 
 sations. With that dreaminess I have gone on 
 
 71
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 here from day to day ; if at any time thought 
 troubled, I have swallowed some spirits, or had 
 recourse to my laudanum." Lloyd's conduct 
 was indefensible, and Coleridge's anger, which 
 was excessive, was not lessened by the circum- 
 stance that the novel was dedicated to Lamb 
 and published by Cottle. The book itself, 
 which to-day would be labelled " psychological 
 romance," is undeniably clever, although often 
 extremely foolish. As a record of the emotions 
 of a last century " sensitive plant" it is remark- 
 able. 
 
 Coleridge, it may be noted here, was not 
 the only person who was troubled by the publi- 
 cation of " Edmund Oliver." Mrs. Lloyd 
 wrote thus to her son Robert on the subject : — 
 
 "I am sorry thou shouldst have inform'd 
 her [Mrs. Day, his employer's wife] that *E. 
 Oliver' was published with our ' approbation 
 and concurrence.' We were never consulted. 
 For my own part I did not comprehend the 
 nature of the Book till I saw it ; and tho' I 
 fully allow there are some fine sentiments in it, 
 thou well know'st it was far from having either 
 thy Father's or my indiscriminate approbation 
 — nay, I am sure there was one passage that 
 
 7*
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER" AND THE "THESES" 
 
 wounded me to the quick, and thou must fre- 
 quently have heard me say I hoped Charles 
 would never be a Novel writer ; I can honestly 
 say I should rather see him engaged in the 
 most humble occupation that I thought con- 
 sistent with Christian simplicity. With respect 
 to these writings in general I most sincerely 
 concur in sentiment with S. D. [Mrs. Day 
 again], and wish it had been in my power to 
 keep my Family as clear of them as she has 
 done. Till I am convinc'd that the Christian 
 Religion is a Fable, I shall never think the im- 
 agination can riot in the delicious luxury of sen- 
 timent and warm descriptions of the passions, 
 and the Heart remain pure. I have studied 
 the New Testament as much as most, but have 
 never yet discover'd, with the philosophers of 
 the present day, that the Christian warfare is 
 accomplished by indulging the mind in every 
 kind of dissipation provided we keep clear 
 of gross vice. If this be the case, surely He 
 who said ' Strait is the gate and narrow is 
 the way,' and those who accounted themselves 
 as ' Pilgrims and Strangers on the Earth,' were 
 greatly mistaken" 
 
 " Edmund Oliver" was Lloyd's unpardonable 
 73
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 offence ; and hard upon it came Lamb's scorn- 
 ful " Theses." Coleridge had written, presum- 
 ably to Lloyd, " Poor Lamb, if he wants any 
 knowledge he may apply to me," and the pas- 
 sage had been brought to Lamb's notice. He 
 replied with a sarcastic letter and this famous 
 series of posers : — 
 
 THESES gU^DAM THEOLOGIC^. 
 
 I. 
 
 " Whether God loves a lying angel better than a true 
 man ?" 
 
 II. 
 
 *' Whether the archangel Uriel could knowingly affirm 
 an untruth, and whether, if he could, he would?'" 
 
 III. 
 " Whether honesty be an angelic virtue, or not rather 
 belonging to that class of qualities which the schoolmen 
 term * virtutes minus splendidae et hominis et terras nimis 
 participes ' ?" 
 
 IV. 
 
 ** Whether the seraphim ardentes do not manifest their 
 goodness by the way of vision and theory ? and whether 
 practice be not a sub-celestial and merely human virtue ?'* 
 
 V. 
 
 " Whether the higher order of seraphim illuminati 
 ever sneer i" 
 
 74
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER" AND THE "THESES" 
 
 VI. 
 
 " Whether pure intelligences can love, or whether they 
 can love anything besides pure intellect ?" 
 
 VII. 
 "Whether the beatific vision be anything more or less 
 than a perpetual representment to each individual angel 
 of his own present attainments, and future capabilities, 
 something in the manner of mortal looking-glasses ?" 
 
 VIII. 
 " Whether an ' immortal and amenable soul' may not 
 come to be damned at last, and the man never suspect it be- 
 forehand?'' 
 
 Coleridge, more in sorrow than in anger, 
 sent Lamb's letter to Cottle, remarking " These 
 young visionaries will do each other no good," 
 and so was snapped the cord binding Coleridge 
 and Lamb. 
 
 Coleridge deeply felt the disagreement. In 
 his " Letters" (p. 249 and onwards) may be 
 found a copy of the long remonstrance which 
 he addressed to Lamb on the subject. Mr. 
 E. H. Coleridge dates it in the spring of 1 798 ; 
 but more probably the time was the summer, 
 after the receipt of Lamb's " Theses." For our 
 purpose the following extract is sufficient : — 
 75
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 "Both you and Lloyd became acquainted 
 with me when your minds were far from being 
 in a composed or natural state, and you clothed 
 my image with a suit of notions and feelings 
 which could belong to nothing human. You 
 are restored to comparative saneness, and are 
 merely wondering what is become of the Cole- 
 ridge with whom you were so passionately in 
 love ; Charles Lloyd's mind has only changed 
 his disease, and he is now arraying his ci-devant 
 angel in a flaming San Benito — the whole 
 ground of the garment a dark brimstone, and 
 plenty of little devils flourished out in black. 
 Oh, me I Lamb, ' even in laughter the heart is 
 sad.' " 
 
 In after years Lamb threw the blame of the 
 
 quarrel on Lloyd ; yet, although, as has been 
 
 said, " Edmund Oliver" is indefensible, a word 
 
 must be said for its author. It is true that 
 
 Lloyd's deplorable habit of showing scraps of 
 
 private letters to the very person above all 
 
 others who should not have seen them was 
 
 reprehensible enough, yet Coleridge, suspecting 
 
 or knowing this habit, might have done better 
 
 than to entrust to Lloyd remarks concerning 
 
 Lamb which he did not wish Lamb to see ; and 
 
 76
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER" AND THE "THESES" 
 
 Lamb might either have forbidden Lloyd to 
 read such remarks, or — coming by them thus 
 iUicitly — have forgotten them. Lloyd, as far 
 as it is possible to estimate his character, was 
 a clean-hearted, unworldly man, innocent of 
 guile. For such bad habits as he had, shrewd 
 and humourous intelligences like Coleridge and 
 Lamb might well have made allowances. But 
 it is noticeable how often the sense of humour 
 is dulled when loss of personal dignity is in- 
 volved. 
 
 Again, say what one can for or against 
 Lloyd, there is no doubt that without his 
 assistance the relations between Lamb and 
 Coleridge were inevitably doomed to a strain. 
 When we remember that they both were very 
 young — in 1798 Coleridge was twenty-six and 
 Lamb twenty-three — and both poets, and both 
 free critics of each other's work, we can under- 
 stand any temporary coolness that may have 
 arisen. Such quarrels always have occurred 
 between young poets, and probably always will. 
 They are regrettable to some extent ; yet " by 
 past experience the moral being is built up," 
 and the " falling out of faithful friends renew- 
 ing is of love." In the case before us the 
 77
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 love of both men was renewed and intensified. 
 Their separation lasted only until the end of 
 1799, and then they came together again, and 
 together remained. 
 
 Here, as a fitting close to a chapter too 
 much occupied with dissension, Lamb's dedi- 
 cation to Coleridge of the first collected edition 
 of his works — issued in 1818 — may well be 
 quoted : — 
 
 It would be a kind of disloyalty^ to offer to anyone but 
 yourself a volume containing the early pieces^ which were 
 first published among your poems, and were fairly deriva- 
 tives from you and them. My friend Lloyd and myself 
 came into our first battle (authorship is a sort of warfare) 
 under the cover of the greater Ajax. How this associa- 
 tion, which shall always be a dear and proud recollection 
 to me, came to be broken — who snapped the threefold 
 cord, — whether yourself (but I know that was not the 
 case) grew ashamed of your former companions, — or 
 whether (which is by much the more probable) some un- 
 gracious bookseller was author of the separation, — I can- 
 not tell ; — but wanting the support of your friendly elm 
 (I speak for myself), my vine has, since that time, put 
 forth few or no fruits ; the sap (if ever it had any) has 
 become, in a manner, dried up and extinct | and you will 
 find your old associate, in his second volume, dwindled 
 into prose and criticism. 
 
 Am I right in assuming this as the cause ? or is it that, 
 as years come upon us, (except with some more healthy, 
 
 78
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER" AND THE "THESES" 
 
 happy spirits,) Life itself loses much of its Poetry for 
 us ? We transcribe but what we read in the great volume 
 of Nature ; and, as the characters grow dim, we turn off, 
 and look another way. You yourself write no Christ- 
 abels, nor Ancient Mariners, now. 
 
 Some of the Sonnets, which shall be carelessly turned 
 over by the general reader, may happily awaken in you 
 remembrances which I should be sorry should be ever 
 totally extinct — the memory 
 
 Of summer days and of delightful years — 
 
 even so far back as to those old suppers at our old » » « 
 ****** Inn — when life was fresh, and topics ex- 
 haustless, — and you first kindled in me, if not the power, 
 yet the love of poetry, and beauty, and kindliness — 
 
 What words have I heard 
 Spoke at the Mermaid ? 
 
 The world has given you many a shrewd nip and gird 
 since that time, but either my eyes are grown dimmer, or 
 my old friend is the same, who " stood before me three- 
 and-twenty year" ago — his hair a little confessing the hand 
 of time, but still shrouding the same capacious brain, — 
 his heart not altered, scarcely where it " alteration finds." 
 
 That is the true and permanent part of Lamb 
 speaking to the true and permanent part of 
 Coleridge. And from the fact that Lloyd is 
 mentioned with kindness in this preface, and 
 the inclusion of Lamb's early verses to him, 
 
 79
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 we may imply that for him also Lamb's heart 
 was again warm/ 
 
 Lamb, in 1818, was not the only member 
 of that company of three whose thoughts were 
 travelling back to the old days. Charles 
 Lloyd, who at that time, as we shall see, was 
 just on the brink of a new period of poetic 
 activity, was beginning his longest and incom- 
 
 * Here it might be Interesting to quote a passage from a letter written 
 by Charles Lloyd to Robert Lloyd some ten years earlier ; — 
 
 "The more I think of the renewal of your intercourse with C. 
 Lamb, the more I am pleased. I divide the quarrels which I may 
 have chance to have had with those persons with whom I have been 
 acquainted into two classes. The one consists of those quarrels where 
 a mere want of sympathy on a given transaction has led to miscon- 
 ception, to altercation, to passion, to separation j but where nothing 
 has occurred to lower your opinion of the moral and intellectual worth 
 of your friend,* of this character has been my refroidhsement with 
 C. Lamb. Indeed, in this case the very excess of tenaciousness that 
 led him to be offended with me has its foundation in a most exalted 
 quality, disinterested, and almost unexampled attachment. The other 
 class of quarrels embraces those which originate in the detection of 
 meanness, duplicity, malevolence on the part of your former acquaint- 
 ance, now converted into an adversary. These quarrels I never sur- 
 mount — I may forgive the transactions that led to them, but I can 
 never, ne-ver forget them." 
 
 * To the word accompanied by an asterisk the note is: "Such a 
 man is a generous foe whom I can esteem — there is even love in the 
 quarrel !'* 
 
 By way of postscript Charles Lloyd adds : " If you do write to 
 Lamb, remember me to him and his sister." This was in 1809. 
 
 80
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER" AND THE "THESES" 
 
 parably best poem, " Desultory Thoughts in 
 London," in which he paid tributes to both his 
 old associates. It is at the present stage that 
 quotations will most fitly come. This is Cole- 
 ridge :— 
 
 How shall I fitly speak on such a theme ? 
 
 He is a treasure by the world neglected, 
 Because he hath not with a prescience dim. 
 
 Like those whose every aim is self-reflected, 
 Pil'd up some fastuous trophy, that of him 
 
 Might tell, what mighty powers the age rejected. 
 But taught his lips the office of a pen — 
 By fools he's deem'd a being lost to men. 
 
 No ! with magnanimous self-sacrifice. 
 
 And lofty inadvertency of fame. 
 He felt there is a bliss in being wise. 
 
 Quite independent of the wise man's name. 
 Who now can say how many a soul may rise 
 
 To a nobility of moral aim 
 It ne'er had known, but for that spirit brave. 
 Which, being freely gifted, freely gave ? 
 
 Sometimes I think that I'm a blossom blighted ; 
 
 But this I ken, that should it not prove so. 
 If I am not inexorably spited 
 
 Of all that dignifies mankind below j 
 By him I speak of, I was so excited. 
 
 While reason's scale was poising to and fro, 
 6 8i
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 "To the better cause;" that him I have to bless 
 For that which it is comfort to possess. 
 
 No ! Those who most have seen me, since the hour 
 When thou and I, in former happier days, 
 
 Frank converse held, though many an adverse power 
 Have sought the memory of those times to raze. 
 
 Can vouch that more it stirs me (thus a tower. 
 Sole remnant of vast castle, still betrays 
 
 Haply its former splendour) to have prov'd 
 
 Thy love, than by fresh friends to have been lov'd. 
 
 And this is Lamb : — 
 
 Oft when steals on the meditative hour. 
 And parlour twilight to repose invites; 
 
 Oft when Imagination's stirring power 
 
 Keeps watch with hollow blasts of winter nights ; 
 
 Thy countenance bright upon his heart doth shower. 
 By Memory trac'd, the exquisite delights. 
 
 Which from thy smile, and from thy every tone. 
 
 And intercourse ennobling, he has known. 
 
 It is a dainty banquet, known to few. 
 
 To thy mind's inner shrine to have access ; 
 
 While choicest stores of intellect endue 
 That sanctuary, in marvellous excess. 
 
 There lambent glories, ever bright and new. 
 Those, privileged to be its inmates, bless ! 
 
 Such as by gods, in tributary rite. 
 
 Were hail'd from earth, e'en on their thrones of light ! 
 
 82
 
 "EDMUND OLIVER*' AND THE "THESES" 
 
 But stop ! — 'tis vain ! — For none will comprehend 
 Though line on line dilate upon the theme : 
 
 He simply wishes to assure his friend. 
 
 How that his image (like a morning beam. 
 
 Dear to the eye, especially if end 
 
 It bring to wicked and portentous dream) 
 
 In transient intercourse, and seldom given. 
 
 Is bless'd to him as visitant from Heaven. 
 
 (Allsop, by the way, in his reminiscences of 
 Coleridge, quotes the following lines on Lamb, 
 which he ascribes to Lloyd : — 
 
 The child of impulse ever to appear. 
 
 And yet through duty's path strictly to steer ! 
 
 Oh, Lamb, thou art a mystery to me ! 
 
 Thou art so prudent, and so mad with wildness. 
 
 Thou art a source of everlasting glee ! 
 
 Yet desolation of the very childless 
 
 Has been thy lot ! Never in one like thee 
 
 Did I see worth majestic from its mildness ; 
 
 So far in thee from being an annoyance 
 
 E'en to the vicious 'tis a source of joyance.) 
 
 One more extract, to prove the completeness 
 
 of the reconciliation of Coleridge and Lamb. 
 
 In his own copy of his " Poetical Works," 
 
 1834, Coleridge wrote in pencil, on his death- 
 
 83
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 bed, against the poem " This Hme-tree bower 
 my prison," the words : — " Ch. and Mary Lamb 
 — dear to my heart, yea, as it were, my heart. — 
 S.T.C. yEt.62,. 1834. 1797-1834=37 j^^rj/" 
 
 84
 
 "the anti- jacobin 
 
 1798 
 
 To return to 1798, from which, for the sake 
 of sentimental symmetry, we have strayed some 
 distance, it happened, by a freak of irony, that 
 while in private life Coleridge and Lamb and 
 Coleridge and Lloyd had drifted apart, they 
 were placed under the public accusation of 
 being bound together not only in firm union, 
 but in a union inimical to society. In the 
 satirical poem entitled " The New Morality," 
 the last brilliant star discharged roman-candle 
 like by The Anti-Jacobin, the Bristol Panti- 
 socratists and their comrades in poetry were 
 thus grouped :- 
 
 And ye five other wandering Bards that move 
 In sweet accord of harmony and love, 
 
 C dge and S — th — y, L — d, and L — be and Co. 
 
 Tune all your mystic harps to praise Lepaux ! 
 
 That was in the number of July 9, 1798. 
 The Anti-Jacobin then disappeared in favour 
 85
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 of The Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine^ the 
 first number of which — published on August 
 1 — was enriched by a coloured cartoon by 
 Gillray, wherein the particular passage of " The 
 New Morality" which described the worship 
 of Lepaux received the emphasis of coloured 
 illustration. In this picture, which is a fair 
 specimen of Gillray's bludgeon-pencil, a crowd 
 of the more prominent English revolutionists 
 press forward to worship Justice, Philanthropy, 
 and Sensibility. Chief of them is the Duke 
 of Bedford as Leviathan. Among the others 
 is Colridge (the spelling is Gillray's) in the 
 guise of a donkey, offering a volume of 
 " Dactylics," and Southey, as another donkey, 
 flourishing a volume of " Saphics." In South- 
 ey's pocket is a copy of " Joan of Arc." 
 Behind, seated side by side, poring over a 
 manuscript entitled " Blank Verse, by Toad 
 and Frog," are a toad and frog. These are 
 marked in the key plan Lloyd and Lamb.* 
 
 » It is told that not long after the appearance of Gillray's picture, 
 Lamb met Godwin for the first time. Lamb was in uproarious spirits, 
 and in spite of the extreme infancy of their acquaintance persisted in 
 chaffing the philosopher. Godwin at last was roused to put the mis- 
 chievous question: "Pray, Mr. Lamb, are you toad or frog?" An 
 
 86
 
 "THE ANTI-JACOBIN'* 
 
 No attempt to depict the portrait of any of 
 the four was made by the artist. 
 
 Coleridge and Southey may have been fair 
 game for the satirist, but Lamb and Lloyd cer- 
 tainly were not. Coleridge and Southey had 
 collaborated in " The Fall of Robespierre" 
 (1794). Coleridge also had lectured at Bristol 
 in 1795 on political questions, and had criticised 
 Pitt with some severity ; and these lectures, on 
 being published under the titles " Conciones ad 
 Populum" and " The Plot Discovered," had an 
 addition by Southey. Coleridge also was a 
 contributor to the Morning Post, and the friend 
 of Citizen Thelwall, who, when he visited 
 Stowey, was watched by a spy sent thither for 
 the purpose by the Government. Lloyd, save 
 for an inoperative sympathy with universal 
 brotherhood, was, however, quite harmless ; 
 while Lamb, who detested the whole business, 
 was practically on the other side. However, a 
 man is judged by the company he keeps. 
 
 That Coleridge was singularly distasteful to 
 the Anti-Jacobin mind is proved by a note ap- 
 
 outburst of temper from Lamb was feared, but instead, the joke 
 helped forward the friendship of the two men. 
 87
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 pended to " The New Morality," when it was 
 reprinted in the following year in " The Beau- 
 ties of The Anti-Jacobin.'" It ran thus : — 
 
 " Some of these youths were sadly corrupted 
 in the metropolis, and initiated in the mys- 
 teries of Theophilanthropism, when scholars 
 at that excellent seminary, Christ's Hospital. 
 
 C dge was nominated to an Exhibition at 
 
 Cambridge, and the Vice-Master (soon after his 
 admission) sent to him, on account of his non- 
 attendance at chapel. This illuminated gentle- 
 man affected astonishment that any criminality 
 could attach to him for his non-performance 
 of religious worship, the trickery of Priestcraft, 
 but if his presence was required, pro forma, as 
 at a muster-roll, he had no great objection to 
 attend. To the disgrace of discipline, and a 
 Christian University, this avowed Deist was not 
 expelled for such sin. His equalising spirit 
 and eccentricities have reduced this poetaster 
 occasionally to such difficulties, that almost in 
 want of bread he once addressed a soldier in 
 the Park — ' Are you one of the cutthroats of the 
 despot ?' The man was at first astonished, but 
 he soon found that his distress had determined 
 him to enlist. His friends have frequently 
 
 88
 
 "THE ANTI-JACOBIN" 
 
 extricated him from this and other embarrass- 
 ments. He has since married, had children, 
 and has now quitted the country, become a 
 citizen of the world, left his little ones father- 
 less, and his wife destitute. Ex uno disce his 
 associates Southey and Lambe." Poor New 
 Moralists ! — never were men robbed of their 
 characters more lightheartedly or with less 
 justification. " Lambe" must indeed have been 
 startled by the indictment. Southey, in writing 
 to his friend Wynn on the subject, in August, 
 1 798, said : — " I know not what poor Lamb 
 has done to be croaking there ; and what I 
 think the worst part of The Anti-Jacobin is the 
 lumping together men of such opposite prin- 
 ciples ; this was stupid. We should have all 
 been welcoming the Director^ not the Theophil- 
 anthrope [Lepaux]." 
 
 Lloyd, in a companion foot-note, was thus 
 not unkindly explained : — " Mr. Lloyd was 
 originally of that fraternity which delights in 
 * Meetings for Sufferings.' He is descended 
 from an opulent banker, and connected with 
 the first families oi friends. Like his relation 
 at Norwich, he has adopted the original prin- 
 ciples of George Fox, the founder, relative to 
 
 89
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Priests and Kings. Mr. Gurney was excluded 
 the Society for irregularities, but when a can- 
 didate to represent his native city in Parliament 
 was readmitted into the bond of unity against 
 all constituted authorities. Mr. Lloyd con- 
 tinues estranged from the ' Thou's and Thee's' 
 (the language of ^ercorant, a quondam Chair- 
 man at Versailles, and late President of the 
 Commune of Paris — vide ' Clery's Journal,' p. 
 173), for he has not hypocrisy sufficient for the 
 profession." 
 
 Lloyd took the caricature and the verses 
 with his customary seriousness, going so far as 
 to indite a " Letter to the Anti-Jacobin Re- 
 viewers," which was printed in Birmingham in 
 1799. Therein he defended Lamb with some 
 vigour : " The person you have thus leagued 
 in a partnership of infamy with me is Mr. 
 Charles Lamb, a man who, so far from being a 
 democrat, would be the first person to assent to 
 the opinions contained in the foregoing pages : 
 he is a man too much occupied with real and 
 painful duties — duties of high personal self- 
 denial — to trouble himself about speculative 
 matters." 
 
 Lepaux himself, of whom it is quite probable 
 90
 
 "THE ANTI-JACOBIN" 
 
 that Lamb and Lloyd had never heard, and 
 Coleridge and Southey never thought, except 
 with amusement, was a member of the Direc- 
 tory, and the leader of a sect of Deists who, 
 under the name of the Theophilanthropists, or 
 lovers of God and man, came into being to 
 supply France with some form of natural 
 religion in place of total spiritual anarchy. 
 The Theophilanthropists, although opposed to 
 Christianity, believed in the existence of God 
 and in the immortality of the soul. During 
 their services there was a short pause, in which 
 the congregation might meditate in silence on 
 their conduct since the last meeting. The fol- 
 lowing sentences, which, if strictly observed, 
 could lead no one into trouble, were displayed 
 conspicuously in the place of meeting : — 
 
 Adore God, cherish your fellow creatures, render your- 
 selves useful to your country. 
 
 Good is whatever tends to preserve man or to per- 
 fectionate him. 
 
 Evil is whatever tends to destroy him or to deteriorate 
 him. 
 
 Children, honour your father and mother, obey them 
 with affection, solace their old age. Fathers and mothers, 
 instruct your children. 
 
 9«
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Wives, behold in your husbands the heads of your 
 houses. 
 
 Husbands, love your vvrives, and render yourselves 
 mutually happy. 
 
 The four special holidays of the Theophilan- 
 thropists were in honour of Socrates, St. Vin- 
 cent de Paul, Jean Jacques Rousseau, and 
 George Washington. 
 
 Subsequently, in a piece entitled " The An- 
 archists: an Ode" — an imitation of Collins's 
 "Ode to the Passions" — which also appeared 
 in The Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine^ the 
 luckless quartette were again castigated. Thus 
 (the mighty dam being Anarchy) : — 
 
 See ! faithful to their mighty dam, 
 Coleridge, Southey, Lloyd, and Lamb, 
 In splay-foot madrigals of love. 
 Soft moaning like the widowed dove. 
 Pour side by side their sympathetic notes. 
 Of equal rights and civic feasts 
 And tyrant Kings and knavish Priests. 
 Swift through the land the tuneful mischief floats. 
 And now to softer strains they struck the lyre. 
 They sung the beetle, or the mole. 
 The dying kid, or ass's foal. 
 By cruel men permitted to expire. 
 92
 
 "THE ANTI-JACOBIN" 
 
 And there the Anti-Jacobin attack ended. 
 
 Eleven years later, however, another satirist, 
 the young and spirited author of " EngHsh 
 Bards and Scotch Reviewers" (1809), again 
 grouped them. This time not Lepaux, but 
 Wordsworth, was the alleged object of their 
 adoration : Wordsworth, 
 
 Whose verse, of all but childish prattle void. 
 Seems blessed harmony to Lamb and Lloyd. 
 
 His Lordship added in an explanatory foot- 
 note that "Messrs. Lamb and Lloyd" were 
 "the most ignoble followers of Southey and 
 Co." 
 
 93
 
 VI 
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 I 798-1 799 
 
 In the autumn of 1 798, almost immediately 
 after Charles Lloyd had settled at Cambridge, 
 began Lamb's correspondence with Robert 
 Lloyd, by which our store of Lamb literature 
 is enriched to the extent of some seventeen 
 letters. Robert came third in the Lloyd 
 family. He was born December 10, 1778, 
 and thus was not quite twenty at the time of 
 Lamb's first letter, which was addressed to him 
 at Saffron Walden, in Essex, while he was serv- 
 ing his time as apprentice. Lamb, as we sup- 
 pose, had met Robert early in 1797, during 
 Charles Lloyd's visit to town, and had liked 
 him on sight, and their acquaintance probably 
 was renewed at Birmingham in the summer of 
 
 1798. 
 
 Not, however, until October of 1798 does 
 Lamb seem to have written directly to his 
 
 94
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 young friend. This first letter is undated, but 
 in October of that year Mary Lamb had an 
 attack which, says her brother, writing to 
 Southey, "frightened me a good deal," and 
 we may presume it is that attack to which 
 Lamb here alludes. This is the letter : Lamb, 
 at the time, was approaching his twenty-fourth 
 birthday — 
 
 My dear Robert, — I am a good deal occu- 
 pied with a calamity near home, but not so 
 much as to prevent my thinking about you 
 with the warmest affection — you are among 
 my very dearest friends. I know you will feel 
 deeply when you hear that my poor sister is 
 unwell again ; one of her old disorders, but I 
 trust it will hold no longer than her former ill- 
 nesses have done. Do not imagine, Robert, 
 that I sink under this misfortune, I have been 
 season'd to such events, and think I could bear 
 anything tolerably well. My own health is 
 left me, and my good spirits, and I have some 
 duties to perform — these duties shall be my ob- 
 ject. I wish, Robert, you could find an object. 
 I know the painfulness of vacuity, all its achings 
 and inexplicable longings. I wish to God I 
 
 95
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 could recommend any plan to you. Stock 
 your mind well with religious knowledge ; dis- 
 cipline it to wait with patience for duties that 
 may be your lot in life ; prepare yourself not 
 to expect too much out of yourself; read and 
 think. This is all commonplace advice, I know. 
 I know, too, that it is easy to give advice which 
 in like circumstances we might not follow our- 
 selves. You must depend upon yourself — 
 there will come a time when you will wonder 
 you were not more content. I know you will 
 excuse my saying any more. 
 
 " Be assured of my kindest, warmest af- 
 fection. 
 
 "C. Lamb." 
 
 It is evident, both from this letter and one 
 or two that follow, that Robert Lloyd was in 
 an unhappy mental state. Though by temper- 
 ament unfitted ever to be as seriously unsettled 
 as Charles, he was dissatisfied both with his 
 employment and with the restrictions imposed 
 upon him by his parents. He seems to have 
 chafed continually, and now and then openly 
 to have revolted. A gentle, solicitous letter 
 
 from his mother, belonging to this period, has 
 
 96
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 the following quaint passage : — " I was griev'd 
 to hear of thy appearing in those fantastical 
 trousers in London. I am clear such excen- 
 tricities of dress would only make thee laugh 'd 
 at by the World, whilst thy sincere Friends 
 would be deeply hurt. Canst thou love thy 
 Father and yet do things that sink him as well 
 as thyself in the opinion of our best Friends ! 
 Thou art, my dear Son, form'd to make an 
 amiable Figure in Society, but for once trust 
 to the judgment of thy Mother, neither thy 
 Person or Mind are form'd for excentricities of 
 dress or conduct." And Robert's father was 
 also moved to write on the subject, but with 
 fewer particulars : " Thou wilt please me by 
 observing simplicity in thy dress and manners. 
 Do not let the customs of the world influence 
 thee." Robert, however, was young, and at a 
 certain age it is natural to suspect the counsel 
 of all but contemporaries. Not for his parents 
 but for Lamb did his confidences ripen. 
 
 From the tone of Lamb's next letter we 
 may suppose that Robert Lloyd's reply to the 
 earlier one had been not only unduly adulatory, 
 but a very cry from the depths for sympathy 
 and appreciation. It was in the nature both 
 
 7 97
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 of his brother Charles and himself to be hero- 
 worshippers, and his new friend's kindly interest 
 may naturally have prompted him to a burst 
 of that deprecatory self-revelation to which 
 sensitive youths of warm affections are prone, 
 coupled with an appeal to Lamb to supply the 
 part of mentor. Lamb replied with grave de- 
 liberation : — 
 
 " My dear Robert, — Mary is better, and I 
 trust that she will yet be restored to me. I am 
 in good spirits, so do not be anxious about me. 
 I hope you get reconciled to your situation. 
 The worst in it is that you have no friend to 
 talk to — but wait in patience, and you will in 
 good time make friends. The having a friend 
 is not indispensably necessary to virtue or 
 happiness. Religion removes those barriers of 
 sentiment which partition us from the dis- 
 interested love of our brethren — we are com- 
 manded to love our enemies, to do good to 
 those that hate us ; how much more is it our 
 duty then to cultivate a forbearance and com- 
 placence towards those who only differ from us 
 in dispositions and ways of thinking. There 
 is always, without very unusual care there must 
 
 98
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 always be, something of Self in friendship ; we 
 love our friend because he is like ourselves ; 
 can consequences altogether unmix'd and pure 
 be reasonably expected from such a source — 
 do not even the publicans and sinners the 
 same? Say, that you love a friend for his 
 moral qualities, is it not rather because those 
 qualities resemble what you fancy your own ? 
 This, then, is not without danger. The only 
 true cement of a valuable friendship, the only 
 thing that even makes it not sinful, is when two 
 friends propose to become mutually of benefit 
 to each other in a moral or religious way. But 
 even this friendship is perpetually liable to 
 the mixture of something not pure ; we love 
 our friend, because he is ours — so we do our 
 money, our wit, our knowledge, our virtue ; 
 and wherever this sense of appropriation and 
 PROPERTY enters, so much is to be subtracted 
 from the value of that friendship or that virtue. 
 Our duties are to do good, expecting nothing 
 again ; to bear with contrary dispositions ; to 
 be candid and forgiving, not to crave and long 
 after a communication of sentiment and feel- 
 ing, but rather to avoid dwelling upon those 
 feelings, however good, because they are our 
 
 99
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 own. A man may be intemperate and selfish 
 who indulges in good feelings for the mere 
 pleasure they give him. I do not wish to deter 
 you from making a friend, a true friend, and 
 such a friendship, where the parties are not 
 blind to each other's faults, is very useful and 
 valuable. I perceive a tendency in you to this 
 error, Robert. I know you have chosen to 
 take up an high opinion of my moral worth, 
 but I say it before God, and I do not lie, you 
 are mistaken in me. I could not bear to lay 
 open all my failings to you, for the sentiment 
 of shame would be too pungent. Let this be 
 as an example to you. Robert, friends fall off, 
 friends mistake us, they change, they grow un- 
 like us, they go away, they die ; but God is 
 everlasting and incapable of change, and to Him 
 we may look with cheerful, unpresumptous 
 hope, while we discharge the duties of life in 
 situations more untowardly than yours. You 
 complain of the impossibility of improving 
 yourself, but be assured that the opportunity 
 of improvement lies more in the mind than the 
 situation. Humble yourself before God, cast 
 out the selfish principle, wait in patience, do 
 good in every way you can to all sorts of
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 people, never be easy to neglect a duty tho' a 
 small one, praise God for all, and see His hand 
 in all things, and He will in time raise you up 
 many friends — or be Himself instead an un- 
 changing friend. God bless you. 
 
 " C. Lamb." 
 
 Here we see Charles Lamb in a new and 
 beautiful character. That he was ready to be 
 kind and helpful on occasion we have proof 
 enough ; but there is no letter among all those 
 already published that shows him in the light 
 of the patient, understanding counsellor of a 
 young man in spiritual difficulties. What was 
 the condition of Lamb's own mind at that 
 time cannot clearly be stated. There are, in 
 his correspondence with matured men, signs 
 that it was unsettled, but he was able with un- 
 paralleled clarity and reasonableness to advise 
 a younger and less-experienced acquaintance. 
 Leaving aside the matter of this letter, it must 
 have been no small thing to Lamb to turn from 
 his literary hobbies, social duties and pleasures, 
 to write at such length to a youth as markedly- 
 unformed and intellectually-backward as Robert 
 Lloyd. 
 
 zoi
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 The boy had, however, a very winning way. 
 He was, we may consider, impetuous, frank, 
 affectionate, intolerant of even the semblance 
 of deception, and impatient of all checks upon 
 emotion. His mind was less serious and con- 
 templative than that of his brother Charles, 
 but not less eager for the light by which a man 
 should live. We have seen that Charles was 
 averse from laughter, but one can fancy Robert 
 laughing often and with zest. 
 
 It is hardly to be wondered at that a young 
 man thus equipped should find the strict prac- 
 tices of the Quakers distasteful ; and on leav- 
 ing Saffron Walden, which he did at this time, 
 and returning to home life at Birmingham, 
 Robert came into active conflict with his family 
 on the subject. He was indeed in a position 
 of peculiar discomfort, for his temperament 
 prevented him from accepting their creed, and 
 his honesty disabled him from affecting to do 
 so. This is no place for an inquiry into that 
 creed ; it is here enough to say that the peace- 
 able professions of the Society of Friends are 
 less compatible with youth than with age ; and 
 Robert Lloyd was twenty. His especial dis- 
 like seems to have been the silent meetings.
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 grave and inactive, with no ritual for the or- 
 ganisation of wandering thoughts, no music to 
 allure the soul from a mundane environment. 
 To Lamb he poured out his objections, and 
 received in reply this solemn and touching 
 appeal : — 
 
 " My dear Robert, — I acknowledge I have 
 been sadly remiss of late. If I descend to any 
 excuse (and all excuses that come short of a 
 direct denial of a charge are poor creatures at 
 best), it must be taken from my state of mind 
 for some time past, which has been stupid 
 rather, and unfilled with any object, than occu- 
 pied, as you may imagine, with any favourite 
 idea to the exclusion of friend Robert. You, 
 who are subject to all the varieties of the mind, 
 will give me credit in this. 
 
 " I am sadly sorry that you are relapsing into 
 your old complaining strain. I wish I could 
 adapt my consolations to your disease, but, 
 alas ! I have none to offer which your own 
 mind, and the suggestions of books, cannot 
 better supply. Are you the first whose situa- 
 tion hath not been exactly squar'd to his ideas ? 
 
 or rather, will you find me that man who does 
 103
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 not complain of the one thing wanting ? That 
 thing obtained, another wish will start up. 
 While this eternal craving of the mind keeps 
 up its eternal hunger, no feast that my palate 
 knows of will satisfy that hunger till we come 
 to drink the new wine (whatever it be) in the 
 Kingdom of the Father. See what trifles dis- 
 quiet us. — You are Unhappy because your 
 Parents expect you to attend meetings. I 
 don't know much of Quakers' meetings, but I 
 believe I may moderately reckon them to take 
 up the space of six hours in the week. Six 
 hours to please your parents — and that time 
 not absolutely lost. Your mind remains, you 
 may think, and plan, remember, and foresee, 
 and do all human acts of mind sitting as well 
 as walking. You are quiet at meeting : one 
 likes to be so sometimes ; you may advantage- 
 ously crowd your day's devotions into that 
 space. Nothing you see or hear there can be 
 unfavourable to it — you are for that time at 
 least exempt from the counting-house, and your 
 parents cannot chide you there ; surely at so 
 small expense you cannot grudge to observe 
 the Fifth Commandment. I decidedly con- 
 sider your refusal as a breach of that God- 
 104
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 descended precept — Honour and observe thy 
 parents in all lawful things. Silent worship 
 cannot be C/«lawful ; there is no Idolatry, no 
 invocation of saints, no bowing before the con- 
 secrated wafer in all this, nothing which a wise 
 man would refuse, or a good man fear to do. 
 What is it? Sitting a few hours in a week 
 with certain good people who call that worship. 
 You subscribe to no articles — if your mind 
 wanders, it is no crime in you who do not give 
 credit to these infusions of the spirit. They 
 sit in a temple, you sit as in a room adjoining, 
 only do not disturb their pious work with gab- 
 bling, nor your own necessary peace with heart- 
 burnings at your not ill-meaning parents, nor a 
 silly contempt of the work which is going on 
 before you, I know that if my parents were 
 to live again, I would do more things to please 
 them than merely sitting still six hours in a 
 week. Perhaps I enlarge too much on this 
 affair, but indeed your objection seems to me 
 ridiculous, and involving in it a principle of 
 frivolous and vexatious resistance. 
 
 " You have often borne with my freedoms, 
 bear with me once more in this. If I did not 
 
 love you, I should not trouble myself whether 
 105
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 you went to meeting or not — whether you con- 
 form'd or not [to] the will of your father. 
 
 " I am now called off to dinner before one 
 o'clock ; being a holyday we dine early, for 
 Mary and me to have a long walk afterwards. 
 My kindest remembrance to Charles.^ 
 
 " God give him all joy and quiet. 
 
 " Mary sends her LOVE. 
 
 " C. L." 
 
 Lamb's next communication to Robert — the 
 first to bear a date — seems to have been added 
 as a postscript to a letter to another member 
 of the family at Birmingham, probably Charles, 
 at home on a visit. And with it we come at 
 length to something more in the true manner 
 of the nimble, playful wit and deep-seeing critic 
 who is known to the world as Elia. Only 
 
 ' The message to Charles reminds us that Lamb was occasionally 
 seeing and hearing from his old associate. To Southey he wrote in 
 October: "I have had a letter from Lloyd. The young meta- 
 physician of Caius is well, and is busy recanting the new heresy, 
 metaphysics, for the old dogma, Greek." And again, in November : 
 " I am going to meet Lloyd at Ware on Saturday, to return on 
 Sunday. Have you any commands or commendations to the meta- 
 physician ?" 
 
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 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 Elia could have written this spirited paean of 
 the joy of living. 
 
 " Now 'tis Robert's turn. 
 
 " My dear Robert, — One passage in your 
 Letter a little displeas'd me. The rest was 
 nothing but kindness, which Robert's letters are 
 ever brimful of You say that ' this World to 
 you seems drain'd of all its sweets I' At first 
 I had hoped you only meant to insinuate the 
 high price of Sugar ! but I am afraid you meant 
 more. O Robert, I don't know what you call 
 sweet. Honey and the honeycomb, roses and 
 violets, are yet in the earth. The sun and 
 moon yet reign in Heaven, and the lesser lights 
 keep up their pretty twinklings. Meats and 
 drinks, sweet sights and sweet smells, a country 
 walk, spring and autumn, follies and repentance, 
 quarrels and reconcilements, have all a sweet- 
 ness by turns. Good humour and good nature, 
 friends at home that love you, and friends 
 abroad that miss you, you possess all these 
 things, and more innumerable, and these are all 
 sweet things. . . . You may extract honey 
 from everything ; do not go a gathering after 
 
 gall. The Bees are wiser in their generation 
 107
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 than the race of sonnet writers and complainers, 
 Bowles's and Charlotte Smiths, and all that 
 tribe, who can see no joys but what are past, 
 and fill people's heads with notions of the un- 
 satisfying nature of Earthly comforts. I assure 
 you I find this world a very pretty place. My 
 kind love to all your Sisters and to Thomas — 
 he never writes to me — and tell Susanna I 
 forgive her. 
 
 " C. Lamb. 
 
 "London, the 13th November, 1798.** 
 
 The concluding message suggests that Lamb 
 was on a footing of some intimacy with others 
 of the Lloyd family. Thomas was Robert's 
 younger brother, the next to him in age ; 
 Susanna was probably Susanna Whitehead, 
 whom Thomas afterwards married. 
 
 A week later Lamb hints at a letter which 
 apparently has been lost, and sends the first 
 draft of his dramatic fragment, " The Witch." 
 The letter is undated, but the postmark gives 
 November 20, 1798: — 
 
 " As the little copy of verses I sent gave 
 Priscilla and Robert some pleasure, I now send 
 
 them another little tale, which is all I can send, 
 
 108
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 for my stock will be exhausted. . . . 'Tis a 
 tale of witchcraft, told by an old Steward in 
 the family to Margaret, the ward of Sir Walter 
 Woodvil. fVho Sir Walter is you may come 
 to know bye and bye, when I have finished a 
 Poem, from which this and the other are ex- 
 tracts, and all the extracts I can make without 
 mutilating : — 
 
 Old Steward. One summer night Sir Walter, as it 
 chanc'd. 
 Was pacing to and fro in the avenue 
 That westward fronts our house. 
 Among those aged oaks said to have been planted 
 Three hundred years ago 
 
 By a neighb'ring Prior of the Woodvil name ; 
 But so it was. 
 
 Being o'er task'd in thought he heeded not 
 The importune suit of one who stood by the gate. 
 And begg'd an alms. 
 
 Some say, he shov'd her rudely from the gate 
 With angry chiding ; but I can never think, 
 (Sir Walter's nature hath a sweetness in it,) 
 That he could treat a woman, an old woman. 
 With such discourtesy. 
 
 For old she was who begg'd an alms of him. 
 Well, he refus'd her. 
 (Whether for importunity I know not. 
 Or that she came between his meditations,) 
 But better had he met a Lion in the Streets, 
 109
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Than this old woman that night. 
 
 For she was one who practis'd the black arts. 
 
 And serv'd the Devil, being since burnt for witchcraft. 
 
 She look'd at him like one that meant to blast him 
 
 And with a frightful noise, 
 
 ('Twas partly like a woman's voice. 
 
 And partly like the hissing of a snake,) 
 
 She nothing spake but this : Sir Walter told the words. 
 
 " A mischief, mischief, mischief 
 
 And a nine times killing curse, 
 By day and by night, to the caitive wight, 
 Who shakes the poor, like snakes, from his door. 
 
 And shuts up the womb of his purse : 
 
 And a mischief, mischief, mischief, 
 
 And a ninefold with'ring curse — 
 For that shall come to thee that will undo thee. 
 
 Both all that thou fear'st and worst." 
 
 These words four times repeated, she departed 
 Leaving Sir Walter like a man, beneath 
 Whose feet a scaffolding had suddenly fall'n. 
 
 Margaret. A terrible curse I 
 
 0/J Steward. O Lady I such bad things are said of that 
 old woman. 
 You would be loth to hear them ! 
 As, namely, that the milk she gave was sour. 
 And the babe, who suck'd her, shrivell'd like a mandrake' 
 
 ' ** A mandrake is a root resembling the human form, as sometimes 
 a carrot does, and the old superstition is, that when the mandrake is 
 torn out of the earth a dreadful shriek is heard, which makes all who 
 hear it go mad. 'Tis a fatal poison besides." 
 
 no
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 And things besides, with a bigger horror in them. 
 Almost, I think, unlawful to be told ! 
 
 Margaret. Then I must never hear them. But pro- 
 ceed. 
 And say what follow'd on the witch's curse. 
 
 Old Steward. Nothing immediate ; but some nine months 
 after 
 Young Stephen Woodvil suddenly fell sick. 
 And none could tell what ail'd him ; for he lay. 
 And pin'd, and pin'd, till all his hair came off. 
 And he, that was full flesh'd, became as thin 
 As a two months' babe that has been starv'd in the 
 
 nursing. 
 And sure, I think. 
 
 He bore his illness like a little child. 
 With such rare sweetness, and dumb melancholy. 
 He strove to clothe his agony in smiles. 
 Which he would force up in his poor pale cheeks. 
 Like ill-tim'd guests that had no proper dwelling 
 
 there. 
 And, when they ask'd him his complaint, he laid 
 His hand upon his heart to show the place 
 Where Susan came to him a nights, he said. 
 And prick'd him with a pin. 
 And thereupon Sir Walter call'd to mind 
 The beggar witch who stood in the gatewayi 
 And begg'd an alms. 
 
 Margaret. And so he died? 
 
 Old Steward. *Tis thought so. 
 
 Margaret. But did the witch confess ? 
 
 Old Steward, All this and more at her death. 
 Ill
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Margaret. I do not love to credit tales of magic. 
 Heav'n's music, which is order, seems unstrung. 
 And this brave world. 
 
 Creation's beauteous workmanship, unbeautify'd, 
 Disorder'd, marr'd, where such strange things are 
 acted. 
 
 " I will here conclude my tiny portion of 
 Prose with hoping you may like the story, and 
 my kind remembrances to all. 
 
 "C. Lamb. 
 
 " Write soon, Robert." 
 
 Lamb afterwards changed his mind about 
 this passage, which was not incorporated in 
 "John Woodvil," but stands alone in his 
 works, an independence emphasised by the al- 
 teration of the name of Woodvil to Fairford. 
 A comparison of the poem as it stands, with 
 its form as Robert and Priscilla Lloyd first 
 knew it, illustrates the nicety of its author's 
 artistic conscience.^ 
 
 • To Southey Lamb wrote more than once on the subject of " The 
 Witch." His letter of November, 1798 ("Letters," i. p. 97) makes 
 it clear that Charles Lloyd's opinion also was asked. Thus : " Lloyd 
 objects to ' shutting up the womb of his purse,' in my curse (which, 
 for a christian witch in a Christian country, is not too mild, I hope). 
 Do you object ? I think there is a strangeness in the idea, as well as 
 112
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 And here a word as to Robert's sister Priscilla. 
 Priscilla Lloyd, Mr. Lloyd's sixth child, was at 
 this time — the autumn of 1 798 — -just seventeen. 
 Her future husband, Christopher Wordsworth, 
 the brother of the poet, — who was introduced 
 to the family by Charles Lloyd, his pupil at 
 Cambridge, — thus describes her in a letter be- 
 longing to the period : " My Priscilla is now 
 a little more than seventeen, not under the mid- 
 dle size of women, not slender, not handsome, 
 but what at times you would, I think, call a 
 fine woman." According to Charles she was 
 like Mrs. Siddons. In due course we shall 
 reach Priscilla's marriage ; but as this chapter 
 has already touched upon Quaker revolt, it 
 might here be remarked that subsequently she 
 became the mother of Charles Wordsworth, 
 Bishop of St. Andrews, and Christopher Words- 
 worth, Bishop of Lincoln, and the grandmother 
 
 * shaking the poor like snakes from his door,' which suits the 
 speaker. Witches illustrate, as fine ladies do, from their own familiar 
 objects, and snakes and the shutting-up of wombs are in their way. 
 I don't know that this last charge has been before brought against 'em, 
 nor either the sour milk or the mandrake babe; but I affirm these be 
 things a witch would do if she could." The postscript to this letter 
 is amusing : " When you write to Lloyd, he wishes his Jacobin corres- 
 pondents to address him as Mr. C. L." 
 8 H3
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 of John Wordsworth, Bishop of Salisbury — 
 no bad achievement for a Quaker's daughter. 
 
 To 1798 belong no more letters, but early 
 in the new year — on January 21,1 799 — Lamb, 
 writing to Southey, spoke of a startling occur- 
 rence, which was destined to bring Robert 
 Lloyd nearer to him than any correspondence 
 could : — " I am requested by [Charles] Lloyd 
 to excuse his not replying to a kind letter re- 
 ceived from you. He is at present situated in 
 most distressful family perplexities, which I am 
 not at liberty to explain, but they are such as 
 to demand all the strength of his mind, and 
 quite exclude any attention to foreign objects. 
 His brother Robert (the flower of his family) 
 hath eloped from the persecutions of his father, 
 and has taken shelter with me. What the 
 issue of his adventure will be I know not. He 
 hath the sweetness of an angel in his heart, 
 combined with admirable firmness of purpose, 
 an uncultivated, but very original, and I think 
 superior, genius." 
 
 Precisely what Lamb meant by the word 
 
 " persecutions," or whether he meant it at all, 
 
 but wished merely to suggest Robert's own 
 
 view of the matter, we shall never know. In 
 
 114
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 those letters from Mr. Lloyd to his son which 
 have been preserved there certainly is nothing 
 to which the word could apply. This, for 
 example, is a fair specimen of the paternal 
 reasoning : — " I am sometimes concerned to 
 hear that thou givest way to uncomfortable 
 feelings and repinest at thy situation. Have a 
 little patience, my dear Son, and thou wilt have 
 reason to rejoice that thou passedst the days of 
 thy youth in such a quiet, retired situation. 
 ' It is good for a man to bear the yoke in his 
 youth,' and I am persuaded Charles and James 
 would in many respects have received great 
 advantages had they been apprenticed out in 
 steady families." 
 
 Yet the fact remains that Robert fled. It 
 may, however, have been less because he 
 found Birmingham unbearable than London 
 irresistible. He went straight to the sympa- 
 thetic Lamb, and with him or near him re- 
 mained for some months. Writing on May 
 20, Lamb gave Southey a further account of 
 the embroilment and his own mischievous 
 pleasure therein : — " Lloyd will now be able to 
 give you an account of himself, so to him I 
 leave you for satisfaction. Great part of his 
 "5
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 troubles are lightened by the partial recovery 
 of his sister, who had been alarmingly ill with 
 similar diseases to his own. The other part of 
 the family troubles sleeps for the present, but I 
 fear will awake at some future time to con- 
 found and disunite. He will probably tell you 
 all about it. Robert still continues here with 
 me ; his father has proposed nothing, but would 
 willingly lure him back with fair professions. 
 But Robert is endowed with a wise fortitude, 
 and in this business has acted quite from him- 
 self, and wisely acted. His parents must come 
 forward in the end. I like reducing parents to 
 a sense of undutifulness. I like confounding 
 the relations of life." ' 
 
 What happened at Birmingham after Robert's 
 elopement, or what he did in London, or how 
 Lamb extricated himself — as assuredly he did — 
 from such an embarrassing position as aider and 
 abettor of an unfilial rebel, is not known. 
 
 After Lamb's reports to Southey our next 
 glimpse of Robert is in a letter from Priscilla 
 in June of the same year, in which he is ad- 
 
 * From a letter (printed in full in Mr. W. C. Hazlitt's work, 
 " The Lambs"), a portion only of wliich is used by Canon Ainger^ 
 in Lamb's "Letters." 
 
 ii6
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 dressed at Bath. His sister entered with gentle 
 reasonableness into his difficulties, sympathising 
 with his objections to business and suggesting 
 possible solutions. She wrote : " Lamb would 
 not I think by any means be a person to take 
 up your abode with. He is too much like 
 yourself — he would encourage those feelings 
 which it certainly is your duty to suppress. 
 Your station in life — the duties which are 
 pointed out by that rank in society which 
 you are destined to fulfil — differ widely from 
 his. . . . Charles," Priscilla added, "wishes 
 you to call on Southey at Bristol frequently." 
 
 117
 
 VII 
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 1 799-1 800 
 
 On returning to Birmingham, the storm 
 having subsided, Robert found a new friend. 
 This was Thomas Manning, destined after- 
 wards to inspire some of Lamb's best letters, 
 and therefore some of the best letters in the 
 world, who was then spending a portion of the 
 long vacation with Charles Lloyd, one of his 
 mathematical pupils at Caius. Manning, at 
 that time a man of twenty-seven, was attracted 
 to Robert Lloyd much as Lamb had been, and 
 from a little bundle of eight letters ' written to 
 him by Robert Lloyd in the autumn of 1 799 
 and spring of 1800, we may conclude that 
 Robert found in him the ideal confidant for 
 whom he had been seeking. He seems just 
 then to have needed a friend more poignantly 
 
 ' Now in the possession of Canon Manning, with whose kind per- 
 mission quotations are made here. 
 
 iiS
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 than at any period of his life, and Manning 
 gave him true help. These letters, which it is 
 not profitable to quote entire, are filled with 
 gratitude to a wise and kindly counsellor. " To 
 you,'* Robert says in one, " I fear to tell noth- 
 ing. Lamb is a different cast, he understands 
 not the complex winding of character, so that 
 I keep from him what if I told would give him 
 notions that he could never make meet [word 
 partly illegible]." 
 
 In September Robert visited his uncle, Ne- 
 hemiah Lloyd, at Worcester, and soon after- 
 wards came the following incomplete letter 
 from Lamb : — 
 
 " My dear Robert, — I suppose by this time 
 you have returned from Worcester with Uncle 
 Nehemiah. You neglected to inform me 
 whether Charles is yet at Birm. I have heard 
 here that he is returned to Cambridge. Give 
 him a gentle tap on the shoulder to remind 
 him how truly acceptable a letter from him 
 would be. I have nothing to write about. 
 
 " Thomson remains with me. He is per- 
 petually getting into mental vagaries. He is 
 in LOVE I and tosses and tumbles about in his 
 
 "9
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 bed like a man in a barrel of spikes. He is 
 more sociable, but I am heartily sick of his 
 domesticating with me ; he wants so many 
 sympathies of mine, and I want his, that we 
 are daily declining into civility. I shall be truly 
 glad when he is gone. I find 'tis a dangerous 
 experiment to grow too familiar. Some natures 
 cannot bear it without converting into indiffer- 
 ence. I know but one Being that I could ever 
 consent to live perpetually with, and that is 
 Robert. But Robert must go whither prudence 
 and paternal regulations indicate a way. I shall 
 not soon forget you — do not fear that — nor 
 grow cool towards Robert. My not writing is 
 no proof of these disloyalties. Perhaps I am 
 unwell, or vexed, or spleen'd, or something, 
 when I should otherwise write. 
 
 " Assure Charles of my unalterable affection, 
 and present my warmest wishes for his and 
 Sophia's happiness. How goes on Priscilla? 
 I am much pleased with his Poems in the 
 Anthology — One in Particular. The other is 
 a kind and no doubt just tribute to Robert and 
 Olivia, but I incline to opinion that these do- 
 mestic addresses should not always be made 
 public. I have, I know, more than once ex-
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 posed my own secretest feelings of that nature, 
 but I am sorry that I did. Nine out of ten 
 readers laugh at them. When a man dies leav- 
 ing the name of a great author behind him, 
 any unpublished relicks which let one into his 
 domestic retirements are greedily gathered up, 
 which in his lifetime, and before his fame had 
 ripened, would by many be considered as im- 
 pertinent. But if Robert and his sister were 
 gratify'd with seeing their brother's heart in 
 Print, let the rest of the world go hang. They 
 may prefer the remaining trumpery of the 
 Anthology. All I mean to say is, I think I 
 perceive an indelicacy in thus exposing one's 
 virtuous feelings to criticism. But of delicacy 
 Charles is at least as true a judge as myself 
 
 " Pray request him to let me somehow have 
 a sight of his novel. I declined offering it here 
 for sale, for good reasons as I thought — being 
 unknown to Booksellers, and not made for 
 making bargains ; but for that reason I am not 
 to be punished with not seeing the book. 
 
 " I shall count it a kindness if Chas. will 
 send me the manuscript, which shall certainly 
 be returned. [The remainder of this letter has 
 been torn off.] " 
 
 121
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 The Thomson referred to was a Cambridge 
 curate. The allusion to Charles Lloyd a little 
 later is our first intimation of his intended mar- 
 riage. Sophia was Sophia Pemberton, of Bir- 
 mingham, to whom he was united very shortly 
 after Lamb's congratulations. According to 
 De Quincey, Miss Pemberton's parents were so 
 averse from the match that Lloyd secured the 
 assistance of Southey to carry her off. That, 
 however, probably was not so. One cannot 
 quite see Southey thus engaged. Although 
 married, Charles Lloyd did not leave Cambridge 
 for some months. 
 
 To return to Lamb's letter, the Anthology 
 was the " Annual Anthology" which Southey 
 had been busily preparing for Cottle during the 
 preceding year. As a matter of fact, Charles 
 Lloyd was represented by four contributions : 
 the " Lines to a Brother and Sister" (Robert 
 and Olivia), to which Lamb took exception ; 
 some blank verse " To a Young Man who con- 
 sidered the perfection of human nature as 
 consisting in the vigour and indulgence of the 
 more boisterous passions," and sonnets to a 
 Woodpecker and the Sabbath. Lamb's inter- 
 esting comments upon taste, which are as per- 
 
 122
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 tinent to-day as they were when written, form 
 the first piece of literary criticism in his letters 
 to Robert Lloyd. Charles Lloyd's novel, to 
 which Lamb refers, was " Edmund Oliver," 
 published in 1798, more than a year before. 
 Considering that that ill-starred work was dedi- 
 cated to him, it is particularly odd that Lamb 
 should not have yet seen a copy. But in its 
 author's hypersensitiveness the reason is prob- 
 ably to be sought. 
 
 Lamb and Manning first met late in 1799, 
 during a visit paid by Lamb to Charles Lloyd. 
 In all likelihood the time was early December. 
 Indeed, a letter from Mr. Lloyd to his sons 
 Robert and Thomas, written in London on the 
 fifth of that month, has a passage — " I took 
 Priscilla and Rachel to the India House, but 
 C. Lamb was gone to Cambridge" — which, 
 when taken into association with Lamb's first 
 letter to Manning, dated December, may be 
 said to settle the point. This bringing together 
 of two such complementary natures as Lamb 
 and Manning was Charles Lloyd's most con- 
 spicuous achievement. Had he not done so, 
 by how much good fun and good sense should 
 
 we be the poorer ! — for Lamb was never in 
 123
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 better pin than in his letters to the mathe- 
 matician-traveller. It was Manning who gave 
 him the Chinese story on which the " Disser- 
 tation on Roast Pig" pivots. " He is a man of 
 a thousand," Lamb wrote to Coleridge a week 
 after making this new friend, the reconciliation 
 with Coleridge having been completed almost 
 at the same time that Manning entered Lamb's 
 life. Truly a notable December. 
 
 In another of Mr. Lloyd's letters during his 
 sojourn in town he wrote : " C. Lamb dined 
 here a few days ago, and is to breakfast here 
 on 5th day." Lamb's next letter to Robert 
 gave some account of the banker's hospitality : — 
 
 " Dear Rob, — Thy presents will be most ac- 
 ceptable whenever they come, both for thy 
 sake and for the liquor, which is a beverage I 
 most admire. Wine makes me hot, and brandy 
 makes me drunk, but porter warms without 
 intoxication ; and elevates, yet not too much 
 above the point of tranquillity. But I hope 
 Robert will come himself before the tap is out. 
 He may be assured that his good honest com- 
 pany is the most valuable present, after all, he 
 
 can make us. These cold nights crave some- 
 
 124
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 thing beside Porter — good English mirth and 
 heart's ease. Rob must contrive to pass some 
 of his Christmas with us, or at least drink in 
 the century with a welcome. 
 
 " I have not seen your father or Priscilla 
 since. Your father was in one of his best 
 humours (I have seldom seen him in one not 
 good), and after dinner, while we were sitting 
 comfortably before the parlour fire, after our 
 wine, he beckoned me suddenly out of the 
 room. I, expecting some secrets, followed 
 him, but it was only to go and sit with him in 
 the old forsaken compting house, which he de- 
 clared to be the pleasantest spot in the house 
 to him, and told me how much business used 
 to be done there in former days. Your father 
 whimsically mixes the good man and the man 
 of business in his manners, but he is not 
 less a good man for being a man of business. 
 He has conceived great hopes of thy one day 
 uniting both characters, and I joyfully expect 
 the same. 
 
 " I hope to see Priscilla, for the first time, 
 
 some day the end of this week, but think it at 
 
 least dubious, as she stays in town but one day, 
 
 I think your father said. 
 125
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " I wonder Rob could think I should take 
 his presents in evil part. I am sure from him 
 they are the genuine result of a sincere friend- 
 ship, not immediately knowing how better to 
 express itself I shall enjoy them with tenfold 
 gust, as being his presents. At the same time, 
 I must remind him that such expressions, if too 
 thickly repeated, would be in danger of prov- 
 ing oppressive. 
 
 " I am not fond of presents all on one side, 
 and Rob knows that I have little to present to 
 him, except the assurances of an undiminished 
 and an undiminishable friendship. Rob will 
 take as a hint what his friend does not mean as 
 an affront. I hope our friendship will stand 
 firm, without the help of scaffolding. 
 
 " At the same time I am determined to enjoy 
 Robert's present, and to drink his health in his 
 own porter, and I hope he will be able to par- 
 take with us. Bread and cheese and a hearty 
 sympathy may prove no bad supplement to 
 Robert's good old English beverage. Charles 
 has not written to me since I saw him. I trust 
 he goes on as comfortably as I witness'd. No 
 husband and wife can be happier than Sophia 
 
 and your Brother appear to be in each other's 
 
 126
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 company/ Robert must marry next ; I look 
 to see him get the start of Wordsworth and 
 Priscilla, whom yet I wish to see united. 
 " Farewell, dearest Rob, 
 
 " C. L. 
 
 " Mary joins with me in remembrances to 
 Robert, and in expectation of the coming bev- 
 erage. 
 
 " Do you think you shall be able to come ? 
 
 " Monday night, just Porter time. 
 
 "December 17, 1799." 
 
 The counting-house to which Lamb was 
 taken by his host was David Barclay's, where 
 Mr. Lloyd had learned banking as a youth. 
 
 Robert does not seem to have been able to 
 accept Lamb's invitation and fare to town ; but 
 Manning did, and there, under Lamb's roof, 
 
 • Lamb seems to have been much attracted by Sophia Lloyd. His 
 letters to Manning at this time have several references to her. In one 
 he sends the young couple his "dearest love and remembrances;" in 
 another — March 17, 1800, he indulges in a little affectionate exagger- 
 ation : " My dear love to Lloyd and Sophia, and pray split this thin 
 letter into three parts, and present them with the fwo biggest in my 
 name. They are my oldest friends ; but, ever the new friend driveth 
 out the old, as the ballad sings. God bless you all three ! I would 
 hear from Lloyd if I could." 
 
 127
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 he met Coleridge. Writing to Manning in 
 February, 1800, Robert said : " I find you have 
 been in London. I doubt not but you spent 
 your time very happily when at Lamb's. He 
 sometimes, indeed often, writes to me. I prize 
 his letters as I do yours, and I long to have 
 more of yours to look at. I value them more 
 than books, or any other writings — I quite 
 nurse them up. Do write to me shortly, any- 
 thing from you will prove abundantly accept- 
 able." We may gather that Manning replied 
 at once, although his letter is undated : — 
 
 " Sunday. 
 
 " My very dear Friend, — I have been too 
 negligent of you. I ought to have written be- 
 fore, yet for all that I shall stand excused 
 before you. If I tell you that my negligence 
 has not proceeded from any waning of love, or 
 any unkind impressions, you will believe me. 
 You'll acquit me of all the important part of 
 the charge, and the rest your love will excuse 
 and pardon — for you know me. I am proud, 
 Robert, to be known and beloved by you. 
 
 " There are men here, very good men, who 
 
 do not rightly appreciate my mind and dispo- 
 128
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 sition ; they see something reserv'd in me, and 
 imagine me to be designing in some measure. 
 I thought I had discovered an instance of it 
 just before your letter came. I felt a little 
 damp upon my spirits, and you cannot think 
 how consoling were the assurances you give me 
 of your love and esteem. As I could not bear 
 to think of your being alienated from me, so 
 the assurance (just at that time) of your being 
 still my own, was reviving to my spirit. 
 
 " I was indeed very happy at Lamb's ; I 
 abode there but three days. He is very good. 
 I wish you and He and myself were now sit- 
 ting over a bowl of punch, or a tankard of 
 porter. We often talked of You, and were 
 perfectly agreed ; but I won't tell you what we 
 agreed to about you, lest you should hold up 
 your head too high. You'll be sufficiently vain, 
 I doubt not, Master Robert, at having been 
 made the subject of conversation between such 
 great men as Lamb and / {are likely to be). I 
 was introduced to Coleridge, which was a great 
 gratification to me. I think him a man of very 
 splendid abilities and animated feelings. But 
 let me whisper a word in your ear, Robert, — 
 
 twenty Coleridges could not supply your loss to 
 9 129
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 me, if you were to forsake me. So \{ 2X\y friendly 
 interposer should come and tell you I am not 
 what I seem, and warn you against my friend- 
 ship, beware of listening to him. Let no sur- 
 mises weigh against the decisions derived from 
 our personal intercourse — but I have no fears, 
 I write this with the levity of perfect confi- 
 dence. It is a [kind of] boasting; you may 
 truly set it down as one of the marks of my 
 love and friendship. 
 
 " Is there any chance of my seeing you here, 
 Robert? I shall stay in Cambridge almost 
 uninterruptedly till this time twelvemonth, per- 
 haps longer ; and during that time I hope you'll 
 be necessitated to visit this place. 
 
 " Charles and Sophia (God bless them I) are 
 both well ; they have not heard from Priscilla 
 for a long time — say in your next how she 
 does. Remember me very kindly to all your 
 Family. 
 
 " Faiewell — write soon and believe me, 
 " Your very affectionate Friend, 
 
 " Thomas Manning." 
 
 We may suppose, from Robert's reply, that 
 
 this was just the type of encouraging letter of 
 130
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 which he was in need. " Your kind letter," he 
 wrote, " quite raised me from the ground. . . . 
 I feel more attached to my family," he said 
 later, " and" — here we see the fruit of Lamb's 
 admonishings — " I fully intend going to the 
 Quakers' meeting again. Not that my father 
 has spoken to me of it, for he behaves in the 
 most noble manner to me, but I can no longer 
 withstand his affectionate solicitude without 
 showing some free gift, something which will 
 give him great pleasure and which is his right — 
 my sitting two hours on a Sunday under the same 
 roof in silence " One more quotation : " Every 
 pleasure of my life is derived from my friends, 
 and without them the most exquisite apparent 
 delight would be fruitless and barren. They 
 are like comfortable warm huts in a wilderness 
 of misery, where the soul may rest from its 
 toils and slumber in the dreams of serenity and 
 freshening peace." Lamb, we now perceive, 
 was shrewdly advised in telling Robert that he 
 must be the next to marry. No young man 
 was ever riper for love. 
 
 Lamb's name crops up at the same time in 
 a letter from Mrs. Lloyd to Robert, written in 
 London, where she was staying with her second 
 131
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 daughter, Olivia. The date is March i — that 
 is to say, " Third Month" 1st — 1800, and Mrs. 
 Lloyd, having a busy visiting season before 
 her, remarks : " If C. Lamb pays his respects I 
 wish it might be some morning at Breakfast. . . . 
 I hardly think we shall have one vacant day." 
 A fortnight later Lamb, writing to Manning, 
 gave an account of his call : " Tell Charles I 
 have seen his mamma, and have almost fallen 
 in love with her^ since I mayn't with Olivia. 
 She is so fine and graceful, a complete matron- 
 lady-quaker. She has given me two little 
 books. Olivia grows a charming girl — full of 
 feeling, and thinner than she was ; but I have 
 not time to fall in love." 
 
 With the following letter, which belongs to 
 the spring or summer of 1 800, Thomas Man- 
 ning passes from the correspondence, as we now 
 possess it : — 
 
 " Dear Robert, — You need never apologise 
 for writing such letters as your last ; you there 
 express yourself in a manner that would in- 
 terest and charm even a stranger to you. 
 Your animal frame seems to vibrate to every 
 
 Breeze that passes over it, in all the varieties of 
 
 132
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 interwoven harmony. You are 'tremblingly 
 alive all o'er.' God forbid that you should 
 ever lose the delicacy of your sensibility. God 
 forbid that the rude, harsh gusts of life should 
 ever sweep over your soul without eliciting dis- 
 cordant emotions. But I hope the time will 
 come when your frame will lose some of its pres- 
 ent morbid aptitude to vibrate — when your mind 
 will become stronger and more fixed. You 
 must not despair of seeing many happy days 
 yet. You will have many bright gleams of 
 exquisite lustre in this the morning of your 
 life, and the afternoon will be a settled sun- 
 shine, in which you will enjoy more real 
 happiness than many, who are less prone to 
 sensation, ever experience in all the vigour of 
 their blood. 
 
 " I often picture to myself a contingency, 
 which most likely never will take place, but 
 yet may, and which I contemplate with a 
 strange fondness and delight. 'Tis of you and 
 myself travelling together abroad — in the South 
 of France, or in Italy, or in Switzerland, or in 
 some part of Spain. Tour susceptibility and 
 my mathematical caution combined would 
 form an excellent travelling temperament, I 
 133
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 think. If there was peace over Europe, and 
 you and I had each of us independent fortunes, 
 I am sure I should propose it to you. I should 
 like to know whether this idea pleases you as it 
 does me, but I should guess not, for which I 
 could give most sage reasons ; and if I guessed 
 wrong, I could give most sage reasons again, 
 to account for the erroneousness of my former 
 reasons. In short, if / should guess^ it would be 
 guessing. Your brother Plumstead is coming 
 to-day with Wordsworth to dine with me. The 
 little I saw of him, when he passed through 
 Cambridge before, had given me a very inade- 
 quate idea of him — indeed, I was just then un- 
 tuned to everything new. I now find the resem- 
 blance between him and Charles and you much 
 stronger than I imagined, both in person and 
 manner. He reminds me oi you perpetually, 
 and indeed, Robert, he is not therefore the less 
 welcome ! In truth, I shall be sorry to part 
 with him — he revives a train of ideas in my 
 mind which I would not break off willingly. 
 " Farewell, my dear, my very dear 
 " Friend — yr. 
 " Truly, T. M." 
 
 «34
 
 THOMAS MANNING AND ROBERT LLOYD 
 
 The suggested tour was never accomplished, 
 although Manning himself left England for 
 France two years later in order to study Chi- 
 nese against his intended travels in China. Of 
 his adventures in China and in Thibet this is 
 not the place to tell. 
 
 «35
 
 vni 
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 1800- 1 80 1 
 
 Lamb's next letter to Robert Lloyd was dated 
 July 2, 1800: — 
 
 " Dear Robert, — My mind has been so barren 
 and idle of late, that I have done nothing. I 
 have received many a summons from you, and 
 have repeatedly sat down to write, and broke 
 off from despair of sending you anything 
 worthy your acceptance. I have had such a 
 deadness about me. Man delights not me nor 
 woman neither. I impute it in part, or alto- 
 gether, to the stupefying effect which continued 
 fine weather has upon me. I want some rains, 
 or even snow and intense cold winter nights, to 
 bind me to my habitation, and make me value 
 it as a home — a sacred character which it has 
 not attained with me hitherto. I cannot read 
 or write when the sun shines : I can only walk. 
 
 " I must tell you that, since I wrote last I 
 136
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 have been two days at Oxford on a visit (long 
 put off) to Gutch's family (my landlord). I 
 was much gratified with the Colleges and Li- 
 braries and what else of Oxford I could see in 
 so short a time. In the All Souls' Library is 
 a fine head of Bishop Taylor, which was one 
 great inducement to my Oxford visit. In the 
 Bodleian are many Portraits of illustrious Dead, 
 the only species of painting I value at a farthing. 
 But an indubitable good Portrait of a great man 
 is worth a pilgrimage to go and see. Gutch's 
 family is a very fine one, consisting of well- 
 grown sons and daughters, and all likely and 
 well-favour'd. What is called a Happy family 
 — that is, according to my interpretation, a nu- 
 merous assemblage of young men and women, 
 all fond of each other to a certain degree, and 
 all happy together, but where the very number 
 forbids any two of them to get close enough 
 to each other to share secrets and be friends. 
 That close intercourse can only exist (com- 
 monly, I think,) in a family of two or three. 
 I do not envy large families. The fratemal 
 affection by diffusion and multi-participation is 
 ordinarily thin and weak. They don't get near 
 enough to each other. 
 
 137
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " I expected to have had an account of 
 Sophia's being brought to bed before this time ; 
 but I remain in confidence that you will send 
 me the earliest news. I hope it will be happy. 
 
 " Coleridge is settled at Keswick, so that the 
 probability is that he will be once again united 
 with your Brother. Such men as he and 
 Wordsworth would exclude solitude in the 
 Hebrides or Thule. 
 
 " Pray have you seen the New Edition of 
 Burns, including his posthumous works'? I 
 want very much to get a sight of it, but cannot 
 afford to buy it, my Oxford Journey, though 
 very moderate, having pared away all super- 
 fluities. 
 
 " Will you accept of this short letter, accom- 
 panied with professions of deepest regard for 
 you? 
 
 " Yours unalterably, 
 
 " C. Lamb."^ 
 
 ' It may have been during this visit to Oxford that Lamb met his 
 "Gentle Giantess" — the widow Blacket, " the largest female he ever 
 had the pleasure of beholding." "With more than man's bulk 
 [wrote Elia], her humours and occupations are eminently feminine. 
 She sighs, — being six foot high. She languisheth, — being two feet 
 wide. She worketh slender sprigs upon the delicate muslin, — her 
 fingers being capable of moulding a Colossus. She sippeth her wine 
 138
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 Gutch, by the way, was more than Lamb's 
 landlord; he was his old schoolfellow at Christ's 
 Hospital. At this period Lamb and his sister 
 occupied rooms in Gutch's house in South- 
 ampton Buildings, Chancery Lane. 
 
 The reference to Sophia Lloyd, then living 
 with her husband at Olton Green, Mr. Lloyd's 
 farm, near Birmingham, previous to their de- 
 parture for Ambleside, needs no explanation. 
 Her expectancy was realised a few weeks later, 
 when she gave birth to a boy, whom they 
 named Grosvenor. Lamb wrote thus to Man- 
 ning on the subject : " I suppose you have 
 heard of Sophia Lloyd's good fortune, and 
 paid the customary compliments to the parents. 
 Heaven keep the new-born infant from star 
 blasting and moon blasting, from epilepsy, 
 marasmus, and the devil I May he live to see 
 many days, and they good ones ; some friends, 
 
 out of her glass daintily, — her capacity being that of a tun of Heidel- 
 berg. She goeth mincingly with those feet of her's, whose solidity 
 need not fear the black ox's pressure. Softest and largest of thy sex, 
 adieu ! By what parting attribute may I salute thee, last and best of 
 the Titanesses, — Ogress, fed with milk instead of blood ; not least, or 
 least handsome, among Oxford's stately structures, — Oxford, who, in 
 its deadest time of vacation, can never properly be said to be empty, 
 having thee to fill it."
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 and they pretty regular correspondents ! with as 
 much wit and wisdom as will eat their bread 
 and cheese together under a poor roof without 
 quarrelling ! as much goodness as will earn 
 heaven. Here I must leave off, my bene- 
 dictory powers failing me." 
 
 Lamb's prediction concerning Coleridge and 
 a reconciliation was not immediately realised. 
 Earlier in the year Coleridge had assured 
 Southey that he would not reopen intercourse 
 with Charles Lloyd ; and later, in December, 
 when the Lloyds had settled at Ambleside, we 
 find him writing to Poole that though his old 
 pupil is a neighbour, he " shall not see him." 
 By degrees, however, he was persuaded, possi- 
 bly through the influence of Dorothy Words- 
 worth, to be again friendly, and there is a 
 record of Coleridge spending a night at Old 
 Brathay, whither Charles Lloyd moved from 
 Ambleside, in the summer of 1802. 
 
 Of Lloyd's intimacy with Wordsworth we 
 
 have a hint in a letter from Lamb to Coleridge, 
 
 written in August, 1800, wherein he alludes to 
 
 Wordsworth's tragedy " The Borderers," and 
 
 his desire to see it. " Manning has read it," 
 
 he adds, " so has Lloyd, and all Lloyd's family ; 
 140
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 but I could not get him to betray his trust by 
 giving me a sight of it. Lloyd is sadly deficient 
 in some of those virtuous vices." 
 
 In a letter to Manning, in October, 1800, 
 Lamb wrote : — " Robert Lloyd is come to 
 town. Priscilla meditates going to see * Pi- 
 zarro' at Drury Lane to-night (from her 
 uncle's), under cover of coming to dine with me 
 . . . heu tempora ! heu mores ! — I have barely 
 time to finish, as I expect her and Robin 
 every minute." An account of these London 
 experiences, sent by Robert to his father, con- 
 tains, it is amusing to note, no mention of the 
 play. " My dear Parents," he said, " Priscilla 
 wrote you word of my arrival here. I am 
 well, and so is my sister. At . present I have 
 been in Tower Street, with a few digressions 
 to my friend Lamb. Next second day I shall 
 call on R. Rarclay. I intend going with Pris- 
 cilla to Captain Bevan's ; he spoke very kindly 
 to me at Gracechurch meeting to-day." 
 
 In the following month we find Lamb 
 
 telling Manning of an invitation from Charles 
 
 Lloyd to spend a month at Ambleside, which 
 
 he was disposed to accept. As it happened, 
 
 however, he was unable to do so. Not until 
 141
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 the summer of 1802, when they knocked un- 
 expectedly at Coleridge's door, did Charles and 
 Mary Lamb see the Lakes. 
 
 Lamb's next letter to Robert was a piece of 
 the true Elia, enshrining eulogies of two of his 
 loves — Izaak Walton and London. Thus : — 
 
 " Dear Robert, — I shall expect you to bring 
 me a brimful account of the pleasure which 
 Walton has given you, when you come to 
 town. It must square with your mind. The 
 delightful innocence and healthfulness of the 
 Angler's mind will have blown upon yours like 
 a Zephyr. Don't you already feel your spirit 
 filled with the scenes '? — the banks of rivers — 
 the cowslip beds — the pastoral scenes — the neat 
 alehouses — and hostesses and milkmaids, as far 
 exceeding Virgil and Pope, as the * Holy Liv- 
 ing' is beyond Thomas a Kempis. Are not the 
 eating and drinking joys painted to the Life ? 
 Do they not inspire you with an immortal 
 hunger*? Are not you ambitious of being 
 made an Angler *? What edition have you got ? 
 Is it Hawkins's, with plates of Piscator, &c. *? 
 That sells very dear. I have only been able to 
 
 purchase the last edition without the old Plates 
 142
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 which pleased my childhood ; the plates being 
 worn out, and the old Edition difficult and ex- 
 pensive to procure. The ' Complete Angler' 
 is the only Treatise written in Dialogues that is 
 worth a halfpenny. Many elegant dialogues 
 have been written (such as Bishop Berkeley's 
 ' Minute Philosopher'), but in all of them the 
 Interlocutors are merely abstract arguments 
 personify'd ; not living dramatic characters, as 
 in Walton, where every thing is alive ; the fishes 
 are absolutely charactered ; and birds and ani- 
 mals are as interesting as men and women.^ 
 
 ' Here might be placed a few sentences from a eulogy of Izaak 
 Walton by the late Mr. T. E. Brown (which was printed in the 
 National Obser-ver of October 14, 1 893) as being curiously worthy of 
 standing beside Lamb's praise : — 
 
 " The book is as full of delights as a meadow of cowslips. Who 
 can forget the tenderness and gentle reverence with which Walton 
 speaks of 'old Oliver Henley' (' now with God') ? The otter hunt 
 — what brilliance of atmosphere ! what life ! The dogs are Ring- 
 wood, Kilbuck, Sweetlips. Ringwood does the business. And the 
 Fishing proper begins, as reason would have it, with a chubb. Viator 
 has a try for a chubb. The directions for dressing this chubb are like 
 a passage from Leviticus. 
 
 *' And then they aspire to trout. I suppose the meeting with the 
 milkmaid, and the account of the supper that follows, can hardly be 
 paralleled in our literature. 
 
 " The frog-bait, though, is the locus classicus. Good, kind old soul 
 was Walton ; but could you have trusted him with a baby, for instance, 
 if some one had told him that a bit of a baby was a capital bait for 
 barbel?"
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " I need not be at much pains to get the 
 ' Holy Livings.' We can procure them in ten 
 minutes' search at any stall or shop in London. 
 By your engaging one for Priscilla, it should 
 seem she will be in Town — is that the case *? 
 I thought she was fix'd at the Lakes. 
 
 " I perfectly understand the nature of your 
 solitarines at Birm., and wish I could divide 
 myself, ' like a bribed haunch,' between London 
 and it.^ But courage I you will soon be eman- 
 cipated, and (it may be) have a frequent power 
 of visiting this great place. Let them talk of 
 lakes and mountains and romantic dales — all 
 that fantastic stuff; give me a ramble by night, 
 in the winter nights in London — the Lamps lit 
 — the pavements of the motley Strand crowded 
 with to and fro passengers — the shops all bril- 
 liant, and stuffed with obliging customers and 
 obliged tradesmen — give me the old bookstalls 
 of London — a walk in the bright Piazzas of 
 Covent Garden. I defy a man to be dull in 
 such places — perfect Mahometan paradises 
 upon earth ! I have lent out my heart with 
 
 ' Lamb was remembering, not quite distinctly, FalstafF's remark to 
 Mistress Ford (J'hc Merry JVi-ves of Windior, Act v,, scene 5) : " Di- 
 vide me like a bribe buck, each a haunch." 
 144
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 usury to such scenes from my childhood up, 
 and have cried with fulness of joy at the mul- 
 titudinous scenes of Life in the crowded streets 
 of ever dear London. I wish you could fix 
 here. I don't know if you quite comprehend 
 my low Urban Taste ; but depend upon it that 
 a man of any feeling will have given his heart 
 and his love in childhood and in boyhood to any 
 scenes where he has been bred, as well to dirty 
 streets (and smoky walls as they are called) as to 
 green lanes, ' where live nibbling sheep,' and to 
 the everlasting hills and the Lakes and ocean. 
 A mob of men is better than a flock of sheep, 
 and a crowd of happy faces justling into the 
 playhouse at the hour of six is a more beauti- 
 ful spectacle to man than the shepherd driving 
 his ' silly' sheep to fold. Come to London and 
 learn to sympathise with my unrural notions.' 
 
 * Lamb's " Letters'* contain three variations upon this theme. To 
 Manning he wrote (November 28, 1800) : — "Streets, streets, streets, 
 markets, theatres, churches, Covent Gardens, shops sparkling with 
 pretty faces of industrious milliners, neat sempstresses, ladies cheap- 
 ening, gentlemen behind counters lying, authors in the street with 
 spectacles, George Dyers (you may know them by their gait), lamps lit 
 at night, pastry-cooks' and silversmiths' shops, beautiful (Quakers of 
 Pentonville, noise of coaches, drowsy cry of mechanic watchmen at 
 night, with bucks reeling home drunk ; if you happen to wake at 
 midnight, cries of 'Fire! 'and 'Stop tliief!' j inns of court, with 
 10 145
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " Wordsworth has published a second vol. — 
 * Lyrical Ballads.' Most of them very good, 
 but not so good as first vol. What more can 
 I tell you? I believe I told you I have 
 been to see Manning. He is a dainty chiel. — 
 A man of great Power — an enchanter almost. 
 — Far beyond Coleridge or any man in power 
 
 their learned air, and halls and butteries, just like Cambridge colleges; 
 old bookstalls, ' Jeremy Taylors,' ' Burtons on Melancholy', and ' Re- 
 ligio Medicis,' on every stall. These are thy pleasures, O London ! with 
 thy many sins." To Wordsworth — January 30, 1801 — Lamb wrote 
 to much the same effect, but less piquantly : "The wonder of these 
 sights," he remarked at the end of the catalogue, "impels me into 
 night walks about her crowded streets, and I often shed tears in the 
 motley Strand from fulness of joy at so much life." And again to 
 Manning, at about the time of the letter to Robert: — "By my new 
 plan, I shall be as airy, up four pair of stairs, as in the country ; and 
 in a garden, in the midst of enchanting (more than Mahometan para- 
 dise) London, whose dirtiest drab-frequented alley, and her lowest bow- 
 ing tradesman I would not exchange for Skiddaw, Helvellyn, James, 
 Walter, and the parson into the bargain. O her lamps of a night ! 
 her rich goldsmiths, print-shops, toy-shops, mercers, hardwaremen, 
 pastry-cooks, St. Paul's Churchyard, the Strand, Exeter Change, 
 Charing Cross, with the man upon a black horse ! Where are thy 
 gods, O London ? A'nt you mightily moped on the banks of the Cam ? 
 Had you not better come and set up here ? You can't think what a 
 difference. All the streets and pavements are pure gold, I warrant 
 you. At least, I know an alchemy that turns her mud into that 
 metal, — a mind that loves to be at home in crowds." Of the four 
 London letters it must be conceded that that to Robert Lloyd is the 
 best. 
 
 146
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 of impressing — when he gets you alone, he 
 can act the wonders of Egypt. Only he is 
 lazy, and does not always put forth all his 
 strength ; if he did, I know no man of genius 
 at all comparable to him. 
 
 " Yours as ever, 
 
 " C. L. 
 
 "February 7, 1801." 
 
 It is now that we begin rightly to realise 
 what a truly worthy young man Robert Lloyd 
 was. Lovers of good literature owe him a 
 debt which it would be hard to discharge ; 
 firstly, for having extracted precious words 
 from one of the choicest minds on England's 
 roll, and secondly, for having preserved them. 
 Thus did Robert Lloyd incite Charles Lamb 
 to write of Jeremy Taylor : — 
 
 " Fletcher's Purple Island is a tedious Alle- 
 gory of the Parts of the Human Body. I 
 would not advise you to lay out six pence upon 
 it. It is not the work of Fletcher, the Co- 
 adjutor of Beaumont, but one Phineas, a kins- 
 man of his. 
 
 " If by the work of Bishop Taylor, whose 
 147
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Title you have not given correctly, you mean 
 his Contemplations on the State of Man in 
 this Life and that which is to come, I dare 
 hope you will join with me in believing it to 
 be spurious. The suspicious circumstance of 
 its being a posthumous work, with the total 
 dissimilarity in style to the genuine works, I 
 think evince that it never was the work of 
 Doctor Jeremy Taylor, Late Lord Bishop of 
 Down and Connor in Ireland, and Adminis- 
 trator of the See of Dromore ; such are the 
 titles which his sounding title-pages give him, 
 and I love the man, and I love his para- 
 phernalia, and I like to name him with all his 
 attributions and additions. If you are yet but 
 lightly acquainted with his real manner, take 
 up and read the whole first chapter of the 
 Holy Dying ; in particular turn to the first 
 paragraph of the 2 sect, of that chapter for a 
 simile of a rose, or more truly many similes 
 within simile ; for such were the riches of his 
 fancy, that when a beauteous image offered, 
 before he could stay to expand it into all its 
 capacities, throngs of new coming images came 
 up, and justled out the first, or blended in 
 
 disorder with it, which imitates the order of 
 
 148
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 every rapid mind.' But read all of the first 
 chapter by my advice ; and I know I need not 
 advise you, when you have read it, to read the 
 second. 
 
 " Or for another specimen (where so many 
 beauties crowd, the judgment has yet vanity 
 enough to think it can discern the handsomest, 
 till a second judgment and a third ad infinitum 
 start up to disallow their elder brother's pre- 
 tensions) turn to the Story of the Ephesian 
 Matron in the second section of the 5th chap- 
 ter of the same Holy Dying'' (I still refer to the 
 Dying part, because it contains better matter 
 
 ' This is the simile of a rose : " It is a mighty change that is made 
 by the death of every person, and it is visible to us who are alive. 
 Reckon but from the sprightfulness of youth, and the fair cheeks and 
 full eyes of childhood, from the vigorousness and strong flexure of the 
 joints of five-and-twenty, to the hollowness and dead paleness, to the 
 loathsomeness and horror, of a three days' burial, and we shall perceive 
 the distance to be very great and very strange. But so I have seen a 
 rose newly springing up from the clefts of its hood, and, at first, it was 
 fair as the morning, and full with the dew of heaven, as a lamb's fleece j 
 but when a ruder breath had forced open its virgin modesty, and dis- 
 mantled its too youthful and unripe retirements, it began to put on 
 darkness, and to decline to softness and the symptoms of a sickly age; 
 it bowed the head, and broke its stalk; and, at night, having lost 
 some of its leaves and all its beauty, it fell into the portion of weeds 
 and worn-out faces. The same is the portion of every man and every 
 woman." 
 
 'Lamb was a little in error. The passage is in the eighth section. 
 149
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 than the ' Holy Living,' which deals more in 
 rules than illustrations — I mean in comparison 
 with the other only, else it has more and more 
 beautiful illustrations — than any prose book 
 besides) — read it yourself and show it to Plum- 
 stead (with my Love, and bid him write to 
 me), and ask him if Willy himself has ever 
 told a story with more circumstances of fancy 
 and HUMOUR. 
 
 " The paragraph begins, ' But that which is 
 to be faulted,' and the story not long after 
 follows. Make these references while P. is 
 with you, that you may stir him up to the 
 Love of Jeremy Taylor, and make a convertite 
 of him. Coleridge was the man who first 
 solemnly exhorted me to ' study' the works of 
 Dr. Jeremy Taylor, and I have had reason to 
 bless the hour in which he did it. Read as 
 many of his works as you can get. I will 
 assist you in getting them when we go a stall 
 hunting together in London, and it's odds if we 
 don't get a good Beaumt. and Fletcher cheap. 
 
 " Bp. Taylor has more and more beautiful 
 
 imagery, and (what is more to a Lover of 
 
 Willy) more knowledge and description of 
 
 human life and manners than any prose book 
 
 150
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 in the language : he has more delicacy and 
 sweetness than any mortal, the ' gentle' Shakes- 
 pear hardly excepted, — his similies and allu- 
 sions are taken, as the bees take honey, from 
 all the youngest, greenest, exquisitest parts of 
 nature, from plants, and flowers, and fruit, 
 young boys and virgins, from little children 
 perpetually, from sucking infants, babies' smiles, 
 roses, gardens, — his imagination was a spacious 
 Garden, where no vile insects could crawl in ; 
 his apprehension a ' Court' where no foul 
 thoughts kept ' leets and holydays.' 
 
 Snail and worm give no offence. 
 Newt nor blind worm be not seen. 
 Come not near our fairy queen. 
 
 You must read Bishop Taylor with allow- 
 ances for the subjects on which he wrote, and 
 the age in which. You may skip or patiently 
 endure his tedious discourses on rites and cere- 
 monies, Baptism, and the Eucharist, the Clerical 
 function, and the antiquity of Episcopacy, a 
 good deal of which are inserted in works not 
 purely controversial ; his polemical works you 
 may skip altogether, unless you have a taste 
 for the exertions of vigorous reason and subtle 
 151
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 distinguishing on uninteresting topics. Such 
 of his works as you should begin with, to get 
 a taste for him (after which your Love will 
 lead you to his Polemical and drier works, as 
 Love led Leander ' over boots' knee-deep thro' 
 the Hellespont), but read first the Holy Living 
 and Dying, and his Life of Christ and Ser- 
 mons, both in folio. And, above all, try to 
 get a beautiful little tract on the ' Measures 
 and offices of Friendship,' printed with his 
 opuscula duodecimo, and also at the end of his 
 Polemical Discourses in folio. Another thing 
 you will observe in Bp. Taylor, without which 
 consideration you will do him injustice. He 
 wrote to different classes of people. His Holy 
 Living and Dying and Life of Christ were de- 
 signed and have been used as popular books 
 of family Devotion, and have been thumbed 
 by old women, and laid about in the window 
 seats of old houses in great families, like the 
 Bible, and the ' Queene-like-Closet or rare boke 
 of Recipes in medicine and cookery, fitted to 
 all capacities.' 
 
 " Accordingly in these the fancy is perpetually 
 applied to ; any slight conceit, allusion, or an- 
 alogy, any ' prettiness,' a story true or false, 
 
 »52
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 serves for an argument adapted to women and 
 young persons, and ' incompetent judgments ;' 
 whereas the Liberty of Prophecy (a book in 
 your father's bookcase) is a series of severe 
 and masterly reasoning, fitted to great Clerks and 
 learned Fathers, with no more of Fancy than 
 is subordinate and ornamental. — Such various 
 powers had the Bishop of Down and Connor, 
 Administrator of the See of Dromore I 
 
 " My theme and my story I 
 
 " Farewell, 
 " C. Lamb. 
 
 "April 6, 1 80 1." 
 
 It is magnificent. Lamb never wrote more 
 glowingly. In his next letter, which is un- 
 dated, he returned to the Bishop. Robert seems 
 to have replied to the above letter by asking 
 Lamb why he did not himself make a selection 
 of Jeremy Taylor's "beauties." Lamb was 
 properly indignant : — 
 
 " To your Inquiry respecting a selection 
 
 from Bp. Taylor I answer — it cannot be done, 
 
 and if it could it would not take with John 
 
 Bull. It cannot be done, for who can disen- 
 
 153
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 tangle and unthread the rich texture of Nature 
 and Poetry, sewn so thick into a stout coat 
 of theology, without spoiling both lace and 
 coat? How beggarly and how bald do even 
 Shakespeare's Princely Pieces look when thus 
 violently divorced from connection and circum- 
 stance ! When we meet with To be or not to 
 be, or Jacques' moralisings upon the Deer, or 
 Brutus and Cassius' quarrel and reconciliation^ 
 — in an Enfield Speaker, or in Elegant Extracts, 
 — how we stare, and will scarcely acknowledge 
 to ourselves (what we are conscious we feel) that 
 they are flat and have no power. Something 
 exactly like this have I experienced when I 
 have picked out similes and stars from Holy 
 Dying and shown them per j<?, as you'd show 
 specimens of minerals or pieces of rock. Com- 
 pare the grand effect of the Star-paved firma- 
 ment, and imagine a boy capable of picking out 
 those pretty twinklers one by one and playing 
 at chuck-farthing with them. Everything in 
 heaven and earth, in man and in story, in 
 books and in fancy, acts by Confederacy, by 
 juxtaposition, by circumstance and place. 
 Consider a fine family (if I were not writing 
 to you I might instance your own) of sons and 
 154
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 daughters, with a respectable father and a 
 handsome mother at their heads, all met in one 
 house, and happy round one table. Earth 
 cannot show a more lovely and venerable sight, 
 such as the Angels in heaven might lament 
 that in their country there is no marrying or 
 giving in marriage. Take and split this Body 
 into individuals — show the separate caprices, 
 vagaries, &c., of Charles, Rob, or Plum, one a 
 Quaker, another a Churchman. The eldest 
 daughter seeking a husband out of the pale of 
 parental faith — another warping, perhaps — the 
 father a prudent, circumspective, do-me-good 
 sort of a man blest with children whom no 
 ordinary rules can circumscribe. I have not 
 room for all particulars — but just as this happy 
 and venerable Body of a family loses by split- 
 ting and considering individuals too nicely, so 
 it is when we pick out Best Bits out of a great 
 writer. 'Tis the sum total of his mind which 
 affects us. 
 
 " C. L." 
 
 For the sake of continuity the letter has 
 been transposed. In the original, the two para- 
 graphs that follow came first : — 
 155
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " I am not dead nor asleep. But Manning 
 is in town, and Coleridge is in town, and I am 
 making a thorough alteration in the structure 
 of my play for Publication. My brain is over- 
 wrought with variety of worldly-intercourse. 
 I have neither time nor mind for scribbling. 
 Who shall deliver me from the body of this 
 Death? 
 
 " Only continue to write and to believe that 
 when the Hour comes I shall strike like Jack 
 of the Clock, id esl, I shall once more become 
 a regular correspondent of Robert and Plum- 
 stead. How is the benevolent, loud-talking, 
 Shakspere-loving Brewer V 
 
 The play was " John Woodvil," but the 
 " benevolent, loud-talking, Shakspere-loving 
 Brewer" eludes research. 
 
 Lamb continued critical. His next letter — 
 the last of this little burst of fine enthusiasm — 
 dealt with the acting of George Frederick 
 Cooke, who was just then drawing crowds to 
 Covent Garden : — 
 
 " Cooke in ' Richard the Third' is a perfect 
 
 caricature. He gives you the monster Richard, 
 156
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 but not the man Richard. Shakespear's bloody 
 character impresses you with awe and deep 
 admiration of his witty parts, his consummate 
 hypocrisy, and indefatigable prosecution of pur- 
 pose. You despise, detest, and loathe the cun- 
 ning, vulgar, low and fierce Richard, which 
 Cooke substitutes in his place. He gives you 
 no other idea than of a vulgar villain, rejoycing 
 in his being able to over reach, and not possess- 
 ing that joy in silent consciousness, but be- 
 traying it, like a poor villain, in sneers and dis- 
 tortions of the face, like a droll at a country 
 fair : not to add that cunning so self-betraying 
 and manner so vulgar could never have de- 
 ceived the politic Buckingham nor the soft 
 Lady Anne : both bred in courts, would have 
 turned with disgust from such a fellow. Not 
 but Cooke has -powers; but not of discrimi- 
 nation. His manner is strong, coarse, and vig- 
 ourous, and well adapted to some characters. 
 But the lofty imagery and high sentiments and 
 high passions of Poetry come black and prose- 
 smoked from his prose Lips. I have not seen 
 him in Over Reach, but from what I remember 
 of the character, I think he could not have 
 chosen one more fit. I thought the play a 
 157
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 highly finished one when I read it some time 
 back. I remember a most noble image. Sir 
 Giles, drawing his sword in the last scene, says : 
 
 Some undone widow sits upon mine arm. 
 And takes away the use on't.' 
 
 This is horribly fine, and I am not sure that 
 it did not suggest to me my conclusion of 
 Pride's Cure ;^ but my imitation is miserably 
 inferior. 
 
 This arm was busy in the day of Naseby : 
 
 'Tis paralytic now, and knows no use of weapons. 
 
 Pierre and Jaffier are the best things in Ot- 
 way. Belvidera is a poor Creature, and has 
 had more than her due fame. Monimia is a 
 little better, but she whines. I like Calista in 
 the Fair Penitent better than either of Otway's 
 women. Lee's Massacre of Paris is a noble 
 play, very chastely and finely written. His 
 Alexander is full of that madness ' which 
 rightly should possess a poet's brain.' (Edipus 
 is also a fine play, but less so than these two. 
 
 • See Massinger's " New Way to pay Old Debts." 
 ' "John Woodvil" was at first called " Pride's Cure."
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 It is a joint production of Lee and Dryden. 
 All For Love begins with uncommon Spirit, but 
 soon flags, and is of no worth upon the whole. 
 The last scene of Young's Revenge is sublime : 
 the rest of it not worth \d} 
 
 " I want to have your opinion and Plum- 
 stead's on Cooke's ' Richard the Third.' I am 
 possessed with an admiration of the genuine 
 Richard, his genius, and his mounting spirit, 
 which no consideration of his cruelties can 
 depress. Shakespear has not made Richard so 
 black a Monster as is supposed. Wherever he 
 is monstrous, it was to conform to vulgar 
 opinion. But he is generally a Man. Read his 
 most exquisite address to the Widowed Queen 
 to court her daughter for him — the topics of 
 maternal feeling, of a deep knowledge of the 
 heart, are such as no monster could have sup- 
 plied.^ Richard must have felt before he could 
 
 * Pierre, Jaffier and Belvidera are in Otway's "Venice Preserved," 
 and Monimia is in the same writer's "Orphan." "The Fair Peni- 
 tent" is Rowe's adaptation of "The Fatal Dowry," by Massinger 
 and Field. 
 
 ' Lamb refers to the whole of Scene iv. of Act iv. It will be 
 noticed that he has no prejudice in favour of any particular form of 
 spelling Shakespeare's name. Shakspeare, Shakespear, and Shakspere 
 — he offers all three- 
 
 159
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 feign so well ; tho' ambition choked the good 
 seed. I think it the most finished piece of 
 Eloquence in the world ; of persuasive oratory 
 far above Demosthenes, Burke, or any man, far 
 exceeding the courtship of Lady Anne. Her 
 relenting is barely natural, after all ; the more 
 perhaps S.'s merit to make impossible appear 
 probable^ but the ^een's consent (taking in all 
 the circumstances and topics, private and public, 
 with his angelic address, able to draw the host 
 of [piece cut out of letter] Lucifer), is probable ; 
 and [piece cut out of letter] resisted it. This 
 observation applies to many other parts. All 
 the inconsistency is, that Shakespeare's bet- 
 ter genius was forced to struggle against the 
 prejudices which made a monster of Richard. 
 He set out to paint a monster, but his human 
 sympathies produced a man. 
 
 " Are you not tired with all this ingenious 
 criticism*? I am. 
 
 " Richard itself is totally metamorphosed in 
 the wretched acting play of that name, which you 
 will see : altered by Cibber. 
 
 " God bless you, 
 
 [The signature is cut off.] 
 
 "July 26, 1 801." 
 
 160
 
 CHARLES LAMB AS CRITIC 
 
 And then came a space of some three years, 
 in which Lamb either wrote not at all to his 
 young friend, or wrote nothing that has been 
 preserved. Probably the correspondence ceased, 
 for a partnership in a printing and bookselling 
 business had been found for Robert in Birming- 
 ham, and its cares seem to have been engross- 
 ing. 
 
 I6i
 
 IX 
 
 ROBERT Lloyd's marriage 
 1804 
 
 We may gather from references in Lamb's 
 letters to Manning and others, that during this 
 interval he had occasional news of the Lloyd 
 family; while in the summer of 1802, when his 
 sister and he visited Coleridge at Keswick, they 
 saw Charles Lloyd. But of that meeting there 
 is no record beyond the bare statement. 
 
 Of Robert Lloyd we have no tidings what- 
 ever until March, 1803, when, in writing to 
 Southey, Lamb said : " Robert Lloyd has writ- 
 ten me a masterly letter, containing a character 
 of his father. See how different from Charles 
 he views the old man ! {Literatim) : ' My 
 father smokes, repeats Homer in Greek, and 
 Virgil, and is learning, when from business, 
 with all the vigour of a young man, Italian. 
 He is, really, a wonderful man. He mixes 
 public and private business, the intricacies of 
 
 disordering life, with his religion and devotion. 
 162
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S MARRIAGE 
 
 No one more rationally enjoys the romantic 
 scenes of Nature, and the chit-chat and little 
 vagaries of his children ; and, though sur- 
 rounded with an ocean of affairs, the very neat- 
 ness of his most obscure cupboard in the house 
 passes not unnoticed. I never knew anyone 
 view with such clearness, nor so well satisfied 
 with things as they are, and make such allow- 
 ance for things which must appear perfect 
 Syriac to him.' By the last [says Lamb] he 
 means the Lloydisms of the younger branches. 
 His portrait of Charles (exact as far as he has 
 had opportunities of noting him) is most 
 exquisite : — ' Charles is become steady as a 
 church, and as straightforward as a Roman 
 road. It would distract him to mention any- 
 thing that was not as plain as sense ; he seems 
 to have run the whole scenery of life, and now 
 rests as the formal precision of non-existence,' 
 Here is genius, I think [says Lamb again], and 
 'tis seldom a young man, a Lloyd, looks at a 
 father (so differing) with such good-nature while 
 he is alive." 
 
 And so we come to Lamb's next letter to 
 Robert, and learn something more of the young 
 man's employment during the interval. He had 
 163
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 been falling in love. Lamb wrote (with some 
 forgetfulness of his appreciation of Robert's 
 letter, passages from which he had copied out 
 for Coleridge, as we have just seen) : — 
 
 " Dear Robert, — I received your notes safe, 
 and thank you for them. It seems you are 
 about to be married. Joy to you and uninter- 
 rupted satisfaction in that state. But who is 
 the Lady ? It is the character of your letters 
 that you omit facts, dates, names, and matter, 
 and describe nothing but feelings, in which, as 
 I cannot always partake, as being more intense 
 in degree or different in kind from my own 
 tranquil ones, I cannot always well tell how to 
 reply. Your dishes are too much sauced and 
 spiced and flavoured for me to suppose that 
 you can relish my plain meats and vulgar ali- 
 ment. Still, Robert, if I cannot always send 
 you of the same, they have a smack and a 
 novelty, a Robert-ism about them, that make 
 them a dainty stimulus to my palate at times. 
 I have little to tell you of You are mistaken, 
 I am disengaged from all newspaper connex- 
 ions, and breathe a freer air in consequence. I 
 
 was bound, like Gulliver, in a multitude of 
 
 164
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S MARRIAGE 
 
 little chains, which, by quotidian leasing swelled 
 to a rack and a gibbet in the year's account. I 
 am poorer but happier. Your three pounds 
 came seasonably, but I doubt whether I am 
 fairly entitled to them as a debt. 
 
 " I am obliged to break off here, and would 
 not send this unfinished, but that you might 
 otherwise be uneasy about the moneys. 
 
 " Am I ever to see you ? for it is like letters 
 to the dead, or for a friend to write to his friend 
 in the Fortunate Isles, or the Moon, or at the 
 Antipodes, to address a line to ONE in War- 
 wickshire that I am never to see in London. I 
 shall lose the very face of Robert by disuse, and 
 I question, if I were a painter, if I could now 
 paint it from memory. 
 
 " I could tell you many things, but you are 
 
 so spiritual and abstracted, that I fear to insult 
 
 you with tidings of this world. But may your 
 
 approaching husband-hood humanise you. I 
 
 think I see a dawn. I am sure joy is rising 
 
 upon you, and I stand a tiptoe to see the sun 
 
 ascending till it gets up and up, and * while a 
 
 man tells the story,' shows at last a fair face 
 
 and a full light. God bless you, Robt., 
 
 "Tuesday, March 13, 1804." " C. L. 
 
 165
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 The Lady was Hannah Hart, a Quakeress, 
 the daughter of Francis Hart, banker, of Not- 
 tingham ; and she seems to have been a model 
 wife. From the evidence of a bundle of letters 
 written by Robert Lloyd during his courtship 
 it can be said that he wooed her on a high, 
 almost a transcendental, plane. To read docu- 
 ments so intimate is not a congenial task, but 
 a biographer must take his material wherever 
 he can. The letters in question are distin- 
 guished by none of the acumen and literary 
 skill which Lamb admired in Robert's portraits 
 of the two Charles Lloyds, nor have they any 
 of the pretty endearments and private tender- 
 nesses in which love letters are often so wealthy : 
 rather are they rhapsodic and rhetorical. One 
 interesting fact which they reveal is that Rob- 
 ert had joined the militia, a step suggesting 
 that his break with Quakerism had been com- 
 pleted. The fact is, however, that he returned 
 to the fold. 
 
 Robert was married in the Castle Dunnington 
 
 Meeting-house, in Leicestershire, on August 2, 
 
 1804, and with this marriage in particular and 
 
 marriages in general was Lamb's next letter 
 
 occupied. The date is September 13, 1804, 
 166
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S MARRIAGE 
 
 and it contains a passage in Elia's best manner 
 on the lenitives of the single state : — 
 
 "Dear Robert, — I was startled in a very 
 pleasant manner by the contents of your let- 
 ter. It was like your good self to take so 
 handsome an opportunity of renewing an 
 old friendship. I thank you kindly for your 
 offers to bring me acquainted with Mrs. LI. 
 I cannot come now, but assuredly I will 
 some time or other, to see how this new rela- 
 tion sits upon you. I am naturally shy of 
 new faces ; but the Lady who has chosen 
 my old friend Robert cannot have a repelling 
 one. Assure her of my sincere congratula- 
 tions and friendly feelings. Mary joins in 
 both with me, and considers herself as only 
 left out of your kind invitation by some 
 LAPSUS STYLI. We have already had all 
 the holydays we can have this year. We have 
 been spending our usual summer month at 
 Richmond, from which place we traced the 
 banks of the old Thames for ten and twenty 
 miles, in daily walks or rides, and found beauties 
 which may compare with Ulswater and Win- 
 dermere. We visited Windsor, Hampton, &c., 
 167
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 &c. — but this is a deviation from the subject 
 with which I began my letter. 
 
 " Some day I certainly shall come and see 
 you in your new light ; no longer the restless 
 (but good) [? single] Robert ; but now the 
 staid, sober (and not less good) married Robert. 
 And how does Plumstead, the impetuous, 
 take your getting the start of him*? When 
 will he subside into matrimony? Priscilla has 
 taken a long time indeed to think about it. I 
 will suppose that her first choice is now her 
 final ; though you do not expressly say that she 
 is to be a Wordsworth. I wish her, and dare 
 promise her, all happiness. 
 
 "All these new nuptials do not make me 
 unquiet in the perpetual prospect of celibacy. 
 There is a quiet dignity in old bachelorhood, a 
 leisure from cares, noise, &c., an enthronisation 
 upon the armed-chair of a man's feeling that he 
 may sit, walk, read, unmolested, to none ac- 
 countable — but hush ! or I shall be torn in 
 pieces like a churlish Orpheus by young mar- 
 ried women and bride-maids of Birmingham. 
 The close is this, to every man that way 
 of life, which in his election is best. Be as 
 happy in yours as I am determined to be in 
 
 i6S
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S MARRIAGE 
 
 mine, and we shall strive lovingly who shall 
 sing best the praises of matrimony, and the 
 praises of singleness. 
 
 " Adieu, my old friend in a new character, 
 and believe me that no ' wounds' have pierced 
 our friendship ; only a long want of seeing each 
 other has disfurnished us of topics on which to 
 talk. Is not your new fortunes a topic which 
 may hold us for some months (the honey 
 months at least) *? 
 
 " C. Lamb." 
 
 Priscilla Lloyd — who had definitely left the 
 Friends, although, as her son, the Bishop of St. 
 Andrews, in his " Annals of My Early Life," 
 with some glee tells us, she was not baptized 
 until after her marriage — became Mrs. Chris- 
 topher Wordsworth within a short time of 
 Lamb's question. Her husband was then a 
 Norfolk rector, but a little while later he be- 
 came vicar of St. Mary's, Lambeth, where 
 most of Priscilla's married life was spent. Of 
 that more will be said in another place. 
 
 169
 
 ROBERT Lloyd's london visit 
 
 1S09 
 
 One result of Robert Lloyd's marriage was 
 to interrupt his correspondence with Lamb. 
 This it did so completely that between Lamb's 
 last letter — of September, 1804 — and the one 
 that followed it, more than four years elapsed. 
 Nothing is much easier than to allow a corre- 
 spondence, even of the most familiar nature, to 
 fail, and among received means of causing a 
 break none has more vogue than marriage. 
 Marriage in itself is sufficient, but Robert Lloyd 
 was also partner in a business which demanded 
 a large share of his energies, and the cares of 
 a young family were thickening upon him. 
 Moreover, Lamb's letters had always been re- 
 plies to his friend's, and therefore when the 
 friend ceased to write. Lamb ceased too.^ 
 
 ' Mr. W. P. James, writing in the "St. James's Gazette," at the 
 time when certain extracts from Lamb's letters to Robert Lloyd were 
 appearing in the " Cornhill Magazine" (May and June, 1898), treated 
 170
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S LONDON VISIT 
 
 Early in 1809, however, Robert Lloyd had 
 occasion to visit London on business. He 
 wrote to Lamb forewarning him of his ap- 
 proach. Lamb replied at once : — 
 
 " Dear Robert, — A great gap has been filled 
 up since our intercourse was broken off. We 
 shall at least have some things to talk over 
 when we meet. That you should never have 
 been in London since I saw you last is a fact 
 which I cannot account for on the principles 
 of my own mental formation. You are worthy 
 
 Robert with severity. Thus : " Robert Lloyd may have had all the 
 gifts and graces Charles Lamb said he had ; but this grace apparently 
 vjras not given him, to appreciate at its real worth his rare privilege in 
 being Charles Lamb's Correspondent. Imagine receiving such letters 
 as those printed ... in ' Cornhill,' the one on Isaak Walton, the 
 one on Jeremy Taylor, the one on London, and then deliberately fore- 
 going the chance of receiving more of the same kind for lack of an 
 occasional line of his own. He married a mere mortal wife, and 
 therefore he could not write ! And so for three whole years there 
 were no more letters from Lamb. People said the King of Bavaria was 
 mad because he had performances of ' Lohengrin' in an empty 
 theatre for his own private delectation. What is one to say of the 
 man who might have gone on receiving the most perfect little essays 
 of Elia by post all for his sole self, and lightly threw away the privi- 
 lege ?" What, indeed ? With every desire in the world to appear 
 for Robert Lloyd's defence (as his biographer naturally has), it is im- 
 possible to find anything to say. 
 
 171
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 to be mentioned with Claudian's Old Man of 
 Verona.' I forbear to ask you any questions 
 concerning your family : who are dead, and who 
 married ; I will not anticipate our meeting. I 
 have been in total darkness respecting you all 
 these years. I am just up ; and have heard, 
 without being able to confirm the fact, that 
 Drury Lane Theatre is burnt to the ground. 
 Of Walton's ' Angler' a new edition is just 
 published with the original plates revived. I 
 think of buying it. The old editions are two 
 guineas, and two guineas and a half I have 
 not forgotten our ride from Saffron Walden, 
 and the madness of young parson Thomson 
 of Cambridge, that I took your brother to see. 
 He is gone as a missionary to the East. 
 
 "I live at present at No. 16 Mitre Court 
 Buildings, Inner Temple. I shall move at Lady 
 Day, or a little later : if you don't find me in 
 M.C.B., I shall be at No. ^ or \ Inner Temple 
 Lane, at either of which places I shall be 
 
 ' " De Sene Veronensi, qui suburbium nunquam egressus est;" or, 
 as Cowley translated it, in his essay "On the Dangers of an Honest 
 Man in Much Company : " 
 
 '* Happy the man, who his whole time doth bound 
 
 Within th' inclosure of his little ground " — and so on. 
 172
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S LONDON VISIT 
 
 happy to shake my old friend Robert by the 
 hand. 
 
 "C. L. 
 
 "Saturday, Feb. 25, 1809." 
 
 There has been a previous allusion to the 
 young parson Thomson in an earlier letter, 
 (see page 119). The story of the ride from 
 Saffron Walden will now never be known. Of 
 the accuracy of the rumour of the burning of 
 Drury Lane the "Rejected Addresses" are 
 testimony enough. 
 
 Robert Lloyd reached London late in March, 
 and forthwith plunged into excitement. The 
 story of this momentous visit is told in a series 
 of sprightly letters to his wife — letters of greater 
 interest far than those which he penned as a 
 wooer. The first ran thus : 
 
 "March, 1809. 
 " My dearest Hannah, — My head has been 
 in a perpetual whirl since I came here, and in 
 two days I have lived many weeks. I would 
 fain have written to you by to-day's post, but 
 it was scarcely practicable. The first thing 
 after breakfast we went to the Horse Guards 
 173
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 to hear the band play while they mounted 
 guard. We afterwards went to Mr. Millar's, 
 bookseller, in Albemarle Street, where we had a 
 complete treat. For instance, we saw a copy 
 of the ' Shipwreck,' printed on velvet [*? vel- 
 lum], and the price thirty guineas — indeed, I 
 never saw such splendour in the furniture of 
 Books before. Mr. Millar was not in the shop, 
 but in a book room fitted up in the first style 
 of Elegance. From thence we went to the 
 London Institution, where I was completely 
 delighted. The House of Commons after- 
 wards attracted our notice — the place where 
 Fox and Pitt sat occasioned most lively emo- 
 tions. I should have gone to-night in the gal- 
 lery, but a circumstance, as follows, prevented 
 me. Having called at the India House and 
 met with my old friend Lamb, who asked me 
 to dinner, which I, of course, accepted, neces- 
 sarily prevented my attending the House of 
 Commons. Lamb, and his sister especially, re- 
 ceived me in a very kind manner ; we supped 
 with Godwin, and from him I am this moment 
 returned — (twelve o'clock). You would, I 
 know, my dear love, have been delighted in 
 beholding his family ; he appears to keep no 
 174
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S LONDON VISIT 
 
 servants, and his children to occupy their 
 places. I was much gratified in seeing the 
 three children of Mrs. WoUstone craft, two 
 girls and a son. One of the girls, the eldest, 
 is a sweet, unaffected creature about fourteen. 
 She handed me porter, and attracted much of 
 my attention. Mrs. Godwin is not a pleasant 
 woman, a wife far different from the one you 
 would suppose such a man would have selected. 
 I dine out again to-morrow, and shall sup with 
 Lamb. Godwin is a bookseller I ! ! ! ! ! I I 
 " I am your sincerely affecte. Husband, 
 
 "R. Lloyd." 
 
 The phalanx of notes of exclamation may 
 be taken to signify Robert's excitement on find- 
 ing that Godwin was a bookseller ioo : that is 
 to say, in Robert's own line of business. His 
 old friend. Lamb, shared his opinion concerning 
 Mrs. Godwin. Lamb called her the Bad Baby, 
 
 and, in one letter, " that d d Mrs. Godwin." 
 
 The Bad Baby, however, viewed Robert more 
 leniently. " I must not, it seems," wrote God- 
 win at the end of one of his subsequent com- 
 mercial letters to Robert's firm, " close my 
 letter without some kind message from Mrs. 
 175
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Godwin to Mr. Lloyd, who has become, I know 
 not how, strangely a favourite with her." And 
 again, in another, he remarked : " Mrs. Godwin 
 is just now from home, or I am sure that she 
 would add messages to this letter that I should 
 prove myself a mere bungler if I endeavoured 
 to supply." 
 
 Robert was mistaken in crediting Mary 
 WoUstonecraft with three children. He must 
 not, however, be blamed, for Godwin's was a 
 confusing household. Mary WoUstonecraft 
 had but two children : the ill-starred Fanny 
 Imlay, born in 1794, and Mary, in 1797. In 
 1809, therefore, Fanny would be fifteen and 
 Mary twelve ; so that it probably was Fanny 
 and not the future Mrs. Shelley, who plied the 
 young visitor with porter. 
 
 Charles Lloyd would, of course, be known to 
 Godwin, at any rate by name, for he had pub- 
 licly interested himself in the philosopher's 
 theories. The preface to " Edmund Oliver" tells 
 us that it was written to confute Godwin's views 
 on free love, while among Charles Lloyd's poems 
 is an address to Mary WoUstonecraft. 
 
 Here is Robert's second letter : 
 
 176
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S LONDON VISIT 
 
 " Thursday Morning, half-past 8. 
 
 " My dearest Hannah, — I still go on enjoy- 
 ing myself exceedingly. Yesterday I attended 
 the meeting in Westminster Hall for the pur- 
 pose of thanking Colonel Wardle. I was nearly 
 squeezed to death. ... I dined with a Book- 
 seller, and then adjourned to my old friend 
 Lamb. Mr. Rickman, secretary to the Speaker, 
 Capt. Burney, Bro. of Miss Burney the novelist, 
 and Mr. Dyer the poet [G.D.] were of the 
 party. We had nothing but cold pork and a 
 cheese and no other beveridge than porter. 
 Pipes were introduced. I did not return till 
 half-past twelve. 
 
 " I shall call upon my Uncle John to-day, 
 and intend sleeping at his House on Friday and 
 Saturday. Of course you will continue to direct 
 to me here ; though, much to my disgrace, a 
 letter from you has not appeared ; however, I 
 confidently look for one this morning. I write 
 thus early having innumerable engagements, 
 and doubting whether a spare hour will occur 
 during the day. Much to my surprise, I found 
 your Brother's card on our table this morning. 
 Of course I shall call upon him, and congratu- 
 late them on the festival. The Shakspeare 
 » 177
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Gallery, Miss Linwood's Exhibition, and Co- 
 vent Garden new Theatre, the Opera, and the 
 play remain to be seen. Drury Lane Theatre 
 still smoaks. What a sad ruin does it exhibit ! 
 " How is little Mary ? and how are you ? 
 Pray write frequent and believe me 
 
 " Most sincerely your friend, 
 
 " R. Lloyd." 
 
 In a postscript, appended at 1 1 o'clock, Rob- 
 ert says that he has engaged to accompany 
 some friends to the Theatre on Monday " to 
 see Mrs. Siddons, and to the Opera on Tues- 
 day." He adds : " Pray dispatch me from the 
 Dog Inn at seven O'clock in the Evening 2 pair 
 of White silk stockings. I must go smart to 
 the Opera, — I have ordered a pair of dress- 
 clothes in London." 
 
 Easter, 1809, brought Hannah Lloyd a let- 
 ter, written on Good Friday, telling of further 
 adventures : — 
 
 " I drank tea in company with Mr. Godwin 
 last night ; he is a most delightful Man — the 
 modulation of his voice was beautiful, and his 
 language uncommonly correct. I shall call 
 upon [him] again to-morrow, to give him an 
 
 178
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S LONDON VISIT 
 
 order ; poor Man, he is much to be felt for. I 
 shall tell you all on my return, a volume would 
 scarcely contain what I have seen, felt, and 
 heard. . . . Lamb was quite delighted with 
 the * Walton' I brought with me. I go with 
 him to Captain Burney's to-morrow Evening, 
 and most of Sunday I shall pass with my old 
 friend. I met Wordsworth by accident yester- 
 day. He looked very well, but he gave an 
 unpleasant account of Priscilla, she has had 
 something of a relapse, and her ague has re- 
 turned again." 
 
 Robert seems to have intercepted Lamb in 
 his purpose of buying the new "Walton." 
 The next communication from London, dated 
 April 3, 1809, offers a pleasant glimpse of 
 Charles and Mary Lamb at home : — 
 
 " I spent Saturday Evening with Mr. God- 
 win. He is a delightful man, and mild as a 
 child — his accents are most fascinating. The 
 Picture of Mrs. WoUstonecraft [*? hangs] over 
 the fireplace. Yes, my love^ I shall have vol- 
 umes to tell you, and an infinite store for my 
 Mind to dwell upon. Oh, that you were with 
 me I how delicious then would be my delight I 
 
 The time I hope will come when we shall visit 
 179
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 London together ; it is indeed a place rich with 
 the stores of amusement and interest. I spent 
 yesterday with Lamb and his sister — it is 
 sweetly gratifying to see them. They were 
 not up when I went. Mary (his sister) the 
 moment I entered the Room, calling from her 
 chamber, said — ' Robert, I am coming.' They 
 appear to sleep in Rooms by each other. 
 
 " If we may use the expression, their Union 
 of affection is what we conceive of marriage in 
 Heaven. They are the World one to the other. 
 They are writing a Book of Poetry for chil- 
 dren together. Lamb and I amused ourselves 
 in the afternoon in reading the manuscripts — I 
 shall send one or two of the pieces in my next. 
 Lamb is the most original being you can con- 
 ceive, and suited to me, in some of his habits, or 
 ways of thinking, to a tee." [Several lines are 
 unfortunately here cut away. Apparently they 
 formed part of a character sketch of Lamb, for 
 the letter continues] " Sun rises and where it 
 sets he is perfectly indifferent about, and is 
 ignorant which way the wind blows." 
 
 On the next day Robert wrote again. This 
 is a passage : — 
 
 " We saw the Opera dancing last night, so 
 
 i8o
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S LONDON VISIT 
 
 we shall not miss much ; girls from nine to fif- 
 teen, of sorted sizes and proportions, danced ; 
 it had a pretty effect. I was much delighted 
 with the Opera House, it quite eclipses Drury 
 Lane. Mrs. Siddons's voice filled the immense 
 expanse ; the Boxes have crimson curtains on 
 each side which give a grand appearance. 
 
 " I was delighted with the meeting at Guild- 
 hall on Saturday. I dined with our brother 
 and sister to-day — we decline going to the 
 Opera ; I prefer Lamb's company, which I shall 
 enjoy to-night. I shall endeavour to see Mrs. 
 Siddons and Kemble in ' Macbeth.' Paper 
 won't allow of more, I am glad chickies are 
 well." 
 
 Four pieces from Charles and Mary Lamb's 
 " Poetry for Children" were then copied : — 
 " Choosing a Name" (" I have got a new-born 
 sister"), " Breakfast" (" A dinner-party — coffee, 
 tea"), " Choosing a Profession" (" A Creole 
 Boy from the West Indies brought"), and 
 " Summer Friends" (" The Swallow is a sum- 
 mer bird"), the first signed " C. L.," and the 
 three others " M. L." In his next letter, the 
 last of the series, Robert referred to them 
 
 again : — 
 
 i8i
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " I sent you on Tuesday a few verses, written 
 2 p 3] of them by Mary Lamb and the other 
 by C. Lamb. It is task work to them, they 
 are writing for money, and a Book of Poetry 
 for Children being Hkely to sell has induced 
 them to compose one ; the verses I sent you 
 were part of the collection. . . . 
 
 " I was much pleased with Kemble and Mrs. 
 Siddons in ' Macbeth' on Tuesday. I spend 
 this evening with Lamb — my spirits were 
 pare] uncommonly flat. I dined yesterday 
 with Charles's Old friend [James] White. By- 
 the-by, I saw Mrs. Clarke yesterday — she was 
 walking in Cheapside with a Mr. Sullivan, who 
 is now reported to live with her. She has very 
 fine large Eyes, and [is] very much like a 
 picture in the shops, where she is represented as 
 lying almost at length on a sofa. I have not 
 seen it in Birmingham, the one I saw there is 
 not at all like.' 
 
 * Mrs. Clarke was, of course, the notorious adventuress, the mis- 
 tress of the Duke of York. The Duke had resigned his position as 
 Commander-in-Chief on the 20th of March, 1809, a few days before 
 Robert reached London, in consequence of the scandals caused by this 
 liaison. On the 28th of the same month Lamb wrote to Manning ; — 
 
 '* If you see newspapers you will read about Mrs. Clarke. The 
 sensation in London about this nonsensical business is marvellous. I 
 182
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S LONDON VISIT 
 
 " This morning I saw the London Institution, 
 the European Gallery (a most splendid col- 
 lection of pictures and paintings), Miss Lin- 
 wood's needlework (grand indeed), and the 
 Panorama of Grand Cairo, with which I was 
 much pleased — the Pyramids were a fine object. 
 This evening I intend calling upon Lamb and 
 Godwin. My time is fully filled up. I did 
 not dine yesterday till near six. I long to 
 come home and rest my weary feet by my own 
 fireside ... I love the employment of writing 
 to you. You see my letters through a false 
 medium ; it is something like the beauty which 
 the sun gives to inanimate objects. If I had 
 written this morning, a greater tide of affection 
 would have flowed. That we cannot always 
 
 remember nothing in my life like it : thousands of ballads, caricatures, 
 lives of Mrs. Clarke, in every blind alley. Yet in the midst of this 
 stir [he adds], a sublime dancing-master, wrho attends a family we 
 know at Kensington, being asked a question about the progress of the 
 examinations in the House, inquired who Mrs. Clarke was. He had 
 heard nothing of it. He had evaded this omnipresence by utter insig- 
 nificancy ! The Duke [of York] should make that man his confi- 
 dential valet. I proposed locking him up, barring him the use of his 
 fiddle and red pumps until he had minutely perused and committed to 
 memory the whole body of the examinations, which employed the 
 House of Commons a fortnight, to teach him to be more attentive to 
 what concerns the public." 
 
 183
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 command. Accept of my dearest love, and 
 believe me, 
 
 " Your sincerely afFecte. Husband, 
 
 "Robert Lloyd." 
 
 And so ended the London visit. 
 
 Lamb's next letter to Robert Lloyd was 
 dated January i, 1810. Robert, falling into 
 line with other of Lamb's friends, seems to 
 have presented him with a bird. The reply 
 ran: — 
 
 " Dear Robert, — In great haste I write. The 
 Turkey is down at the fire, and some pleasant 
 friends are come in to partake of it. The 
 Sender's Health shall not be forgot. What 
 you tell me of your Father's perseverance in 
 his honourable task gives me great pleasure. 
 Seven Books are a serious earnest of the whole, 
 which I hope to see finish'd. 
 
 " We had a delightful month in Wiltshire, 
 
 four weeks of uniform fine weather, the only 
 
 fine days which had been all the summer. Saw 
 
 Salisbury Cathedral, Stonehenge, Wilton, &c., 
 
 &c. Mary is in excellent health, and sends her 
 184
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S LONDON VISIT 
 
 Love. Accept of mine, with my kind respects 
 to Mrs. LI and to your father and mother. 
 
 " Coleridge's Friend is occasionally sublime. 
 What do you think of that Description of 
 Luther in his Study in one of the earlier num- 
 bers ? ^ The worst is, he is always promising 
 something which never comes ; it is now 1 8th 
 Number, and continues introductory ; the i yth 
 (that stupid long letter) was nothing better than 
 a Prospectus, and ought to have preceded the 
 1st Number. But I rejoice that it lives. 
 
 " When you come to London, you will find 
 us at No. 4 Inner Temple Lane, with a few old 
 Books, a few old Hogarth's round the room, 
 and the Household Gods at last establish'd. 
 The feeling of Home, which has been slow to 
 come, has come at last. May I never move 
 again, but may my next Lodging be my 
 Coffin." 
 
 " Yours truly, 
 " C. Lamb." 
 
 ' In the revised edition of " The Friend," this description is in the 
 Second Section, Essay z^ ''The First Landing Stage." 
 
 " On the 2nd of January, 1810, the day after supplying Robert 
 Lloyd with this brief description of his new lodging, Lamb, in writing 
 to Manning, thus amplified it : — 
 
 " In my best room is a choice collection of the works of Hogarth, an 
 
 i8s
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 The remark concerning Mr. Lloyd's perse- 
 verance is an allusion to the translation of the 
 "Odyssey," upon which, as we shall see later, he 
 was then engaged. The Wiltshire holiday was 
 a visit to Hazlitt. To Coleridge Lamb had 
 already written praise of the account of Luther 
 in the Warteburg, in " The Friend :" " It is as 
 fine as anything I ever read. God forbid that 
 a man who has such things to say should be 
 silenced for want of i oo/." " The Friend" 
 lived only ten months, dying in March, 1810, 
 before there was time to fulfil many of the 
 promises to which Lamb referred. 
 
 English painter of some humour. In my next best are shelves con- 
 taining a small but well-chosen library. My best room commands a 
 court, in which there are trees and a pump, the water of which is ex- 
 cellent cold, with brandy, and not very insipid without. Here I hope 
 to set up my rest, and not quit till Mr. Powell, the undertaker, gives 
 me notice that I may have possession of my last lodging. He lets 
 lodgings for single gentlemen." 
 
 186
 
 XI 
 
 ROBERT LLOYD S DEATH 
 1811 
 
 Robert Lloyd can never have been strong. 
 He came of a delicate family, and he did not 
 spare himself Impulsive, sensitive, sympa- 
 thetic, and enthusiastic, he flung himself into 
 whatever interested him with reckless abandon 
 and wholeheartedness, and passed through the 
 emotions of half a score of ordinary persons. 
 Hence, when financial trouble came, or, if it 
 did not actually come, loomed threateningly 
 ahead, his panic was so complete as seriously to 
 undermine his strength. 
 
 Immediately upon this worry came the ill- 
 ness of his brother Thomas, which he felt pro- 
 foundly. Natures of such sensibility suffer in 
 a degree inconceivable to those who are blessed 
 with apathy, and under the combined assault 
 Robert's constitution, at its best never qualified 
 to support much strain, gave way. 
 187
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 The autumn of 1811 was indeed a terrible 
 season for the Lloyd family. Thomas Lloyd 
 died on September 1 2, in his thirty-second year, 
 Caroline on October 15, in her twenty-second 
 year, and Robert on the 26th of the same month, 
 in his thirty-third year. 
 
 The testimony of Hannah Lloyd, in an ac- 
 count of her husband's death which she wrote, 
 a few months afterwards, to be preserved for 
 their children, shows that Robert, although he 
 clung fondly to life, met death courageously 
 and with confidence. The description of the 
 course of his illness is too sad a story, but 
 this little glimpse of his character is of shining 
 beauty : " He possessed a disposition of engag- 
 ing simplicity ... his habits and pleasures were 
 domestic, and when unclouded by nervous de- 
 pression, exceedingly cheerful. Kindness and 
 generosity were characteristic of his nature. 
 When he entered his house, it might truly be 
 said that he diffused a feeling of pleasure. You, 
 my children, were accustomed to run to meet 
 him with animated joy. His tasks led him to 
 works of imagination and sentiment, and also 
 to those of a devotional cast. Such was your 
 
 lovely Father — to him I imparted every feeling 
 188
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S DEATH] 
 
 of my heart ; he was uniformly the tenderest 
 of friends — the sweetest companion." 
 
 That Charles Lamb felt the death of his 
 friend we know from the grave and affectionate 
 tribute to his memory which he composed for 
 the Gentleman's Magazine. The following letter 
 from Charles Lloyd to Robert's widow gives 
 the memoir in full. " Such," he wrote, " is the 
 beautiful and appropriate account sent to the 
 Gentleman's Magazine., by dear Charles Lamb, 
 who, if I lov'd him for nothing else, I should 
 now love for the affecting interest that he has 
 taken in the memory of my dearest Brother 
 and Friend. C. Lamb sent me the written 
 copy himself: — 
 
 " ' To dilate in many words upon the char- 
 acter of R. LI. would be to violate the modest 
 regard due to his memory, who, in his lifetime, 
 shrunk so anxiously from every species of 
 notice. His constitutional misfortune was an 
 excess of nervous sensibility which, in the 
 purest of hearts, produced rather too great a 
 spirit of self-abasement, a perpetual apprehen- 
 sion of not doing what was right. Yet beyond 
 this tenderness he seemed absolutely to have 
 
 no self-regards at all. His eye was single, and 
 189
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 ever fixed upon that form of goodness which 
 he worshipped wherever he found it, except in 
 himself. What he was to his parents and in his 
 family the newness of their sorrow may make 
 it unseasonable to touch at ; his loss, alas ! was 
 but one in a complication of afflictions which 
 have fallen so heavy of late upon a worthy 
 house. But as a Friend, the writer of this me- 
 morial can witness, that what he once esteemed 
 and loved, it was an unalterable law of his nature 
 to continue to esteem and love. 
 
 " * Absences of years, the discontinuance of 
 correspondence, from whatever cause, for ever 
 so great a length of time, made no difference. 
 It seemed as if the affectionate part of his nature 
 could suffer no abatement. The display of 
 what the world calls shining talents would 
 have been incompatible with a character like 
 his ; but he oftentimes let fall, in his familiar 
 conversation, and in his letters, bright and 
 original illustrations of feeling which might 
 have been mistaken for genius, if his own 
 watchful modest spirit had not constantly in- 
 terposed to recall and substitute for them some 
 of the ordinary forms of observation which 
 
 lay less out of the circle of common sympa- 
 190
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S DEATH 
 
 thy, within which his kind nature deHghted 
 to move. 
 
 " ' To conclude : 
 
 Love, Sweetness, Goodness, in his countenance shin'd 
 So clear, as in no face with more delight. 
 
 But now he is gone, he has left his earthly com- 
 panions ; yet his departure had this in it to 
 make us less sorrowful, that it was but as a 
 gentle removing of the veil, which while he 
 walked upon earth, seemed scarcely to separate 
 his spirit from that world of heavenly and re- 
 fined essences with which it is now indissolubly 
 connected.' " ^ 
 
 " I contemplate his character," wrote Charles 
 Lloyd of Robert, " as the most sweet and af- 
 fecting that I ever knew." Further testimony 
 came from Charles in the shape of four sonnets 
 which he sent to Hannah Lloyd a few days 
 after Robert's death. This is the first and 
 simplest : — 
 
 * The article appeared in the Obituary of the Gentleman' i Magazine 
 — unsigned — in November, 1811. A comparison of Lamb's copy, as 
 sent to Charles Lloyd, with the printed version discloses certain textual 
 changes which may have been made in proof by himself, or by the 
 editor. In the Gentleman s Magazine the little memoir ended at the 
 words "within which his kind nature delighted to move." 
 191
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 My friend, my Brother, no more shall I see 
 
 That face affectionate, that face benign. 
 
 Those eyes where tenderness did always shine 
 Whene'er they turn'd their gentle beams on me ! 
 If ever Faith, and Generosity, 
 
 Love and benevolence almost divine 
 Forgetfulness of self. Humility, 
 
 Blest Human-nature, — Robert, they were thine ! 
 Thy smile — I see it now — was kind and sweet 
 
 As the first dawnings of a vernal morn : 
 Thy warm solicitude each wish to meet 
 
 And catch the struggling meaning e'er 'twas born. 
 Ne'er shall I see again ! Who o'er thy Urn, 
 Lov'd friend, like Him who lov'd thee most, should 
 
 mourn ? 
 
 Another brother — James — in sending Han- 
 nah Lloyd a bundle of Robert's letters added 
 this note : — " You will see, my dear Sister, by 
 these letters written by Beloved Robert before 
 you knew him that he was the dear affectionate 
 and truly sincere Brother and friend as you 
 have since proved him to be in the character 
 of a Husband. No time can obliterate the 
 sweet fragrance of his person.'" 
 
 Robert Lloyd left four children, three girls 
 
 and a boy named after his father. To end this 
 
 chapter on a gayer note, it may be remarked 
 192
 
 ROBERT LLOYD'S DEATH 
 
 that among the Lloyd correspondence is one 
 letter written to the young Robert by his 
 mother in 1824, when he was a schoolboy of 
 twelve. " I hope [it begins] my dearest boy 
 will like the cake which accompanies this." 
 Then follow home news and a few maternal 
 counsels, and at the end is a further reference 
 to the cake : " I am extremely mortified at the 
 cake being so much less than I ordered." 
 Little Robert Lloyd probably was mortified 
 too. His answer is concise : " It came durin 
 our Easter Holidays. We were both at Gate- 
 acre at the time. 3 of us eat it one day." 
 
 13 193
 
 XII 
 
 MR. Lloyd's "iliad" 
 
 1807-1809 
 
 Of Mr. Lloyd's love of classics and his un- 
 usual powers of memory something has already 
 been said. But his interest in Greek and Latin 
 did not stop at reading and repeating his favour- 
 ite poems in these languages : he passed on to 
 make versions of them in English. Mr. Lloyd 
 was always a very busy man, yet in direct 
 defiance of Cowper's sentiment — 
 
 It is a maxim of much weight. 
 Worth conning o'er and o'er. 
 
 He who has Homer to translate. 
 Had need do nothing more. — 
 
 he turned the whole of the " Odyssey" into 
 verse, a portion, if not all, of the " Iliad," and 
 the Epistles of Horace. 
 
 Mr. Lloyd's object was amusement and self- 
 instruction, yet the desire for print, which al- 
 most always accompanies authorship, coming 
 194
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 upon him, he instructed Robert, in 1807, to 
 strike off a few copies of the twenty-fourth 
 book of the " IHad ;" and these were distributed 
 among his friends. 
 
 The decasyllabic couplet was the form 
 adopted, and Mr. Lloyd stated in the preface 
 that he had " endeavoured to keep near to 
 Homer's meaning, though not so literally as 
 Cowper has done in his translation, which has 
 preserved much of the grandeur and simplicity 
 of the original." 
 
 In due course criticisms flowed in. 
 
 Charles Lloyd the younger, after showing 
 the version to Coleridge, sent his father the 
 following message : " Coleridge told me that he 
 was very much pleased indeed with thy transla- 
 tion, and I have no doubt but that these were 
 his undisguised sentiments, as he introduced 
 the subject himself — he said that there was a 
 naturalness (if one may be allowed to coin a 
 word) and ease about the translation that very 
 much delighted him, and much regretted that 
 more perplexing avocations should interfere 
 with thy ardour in the pursuit." 
 
 That was brief and pertinent. From Anna 
 Seward, however, who then stood in the same 
 X95
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 relation to Lichfield as Shakespeare to Strat- 
 ford-on-Avon — as "Swan" — came three lengthy 
 and florid communications. Mr. Lloyd seems 
 to have sent her not only the printed volume, 
 but also a manuscript version of the Sixth Book: 
 for it is with the Sixth Book that her first and 
 second letters deal. Her third bears upon the 
 Twenty-fourth. The letters are inordinately 
 long, but they are so splendidly pontifical that 
 they are here given in full : — 
 
 "Lichfield, Sept. 30, 1807. 
 
 " I thank you, Sir, for having allowed me to 
 peruse your translation of the 6th book of 
 Homer's ' Iliad.' If our language were not 
 already enriched with the noblest translation 
 Europe has produced of that great Work [i.e. 
 Pope's], I should expect you to finish and to 
 publish yours : — but who may hope, especially 
 on the same model of verse, to approach thai 
 which seldom-equalled genius, never-excelled 
 taste, and the most unwearied care to polish 
 and correct, have combined to render perfect as 
 a Poem ? 
 
 " I know it is attacked by some of the Greek 
 
 Scholiasts, for being in rhyme: — but thai ob- 
 196
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 jection would lie against yours. They are 
 angry also that Pope chose to throw a veil of 
 poetic light over a great number of the original 
 passages, which have the duskiness of low and 
 prosaic language. 
 
 " Cowper stood forth professing to show 
 Homer as he is. What has been the result *? — 
 a few of the old Bard's Idolators, who not con- 
 tent with adoring his sublimity and his beauty, 
 like his faults better than excellence from any 
 other pen, find in Cowper's undeviating fidelity 
 expiation for the extreme poetic inferiority to 
 the established Translation. 
 
 " By that vast majority of Readers, who do 
 not understand the Original, Pope and Cowper's 
 Version will be judged merely by the respective 
 poetry which each contains. The fiat of these 
 has already proved that the Painter's axiom ex- 
 tends also to Poets — ' It is better to sin against 
 truth than beauty !' 
 
 " The best blank Verse is unquestionably a 
 
 more majestic vehicle for Epic Poetry than 
 
 rhyme. Could we see a translation of Homer, 
 
 free and judicious as Pope's, in such verse as 
 
 that of the * Paradise Lost,' or even as the best 
 
 parts of the ' Task,' I should not, with all my 
 197
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 long admiration of Pope's, hesitate to prefer 
 the rival translation — but Cowper's Homer, 
 excepting a few noble passages, is wretched 
 blank verse, no grace, no flow, no harmony, 
 and frequently falls into the construction of the 
 rhyming couplet, and even with terminations 
 which jingle on ear, like bad rhymes ; and yet 
 mine is the 2nd Edition, which his letters tell us 
 he had so carefully corrected, and so largely 
 altered as almost to render it a new version. 
 See opening of the 6th book, four immediately 
 successive lines : 
 
 With various fortune on the middle plain 
 By Simois laved, and Xanthus' gulphy stream. 
 First, Ajax, bulwark of the Grecians, broke 
 A Trojan phalanx and illumed with i>o/)e 
 The mind of all his followers, — ' 
 
 He stole the picturesque epithet, gulphy, from 
 Pope, 
 
 And gulphy Xanthus foams along the field, 
 
 ^ Miss Seward was unfortunate in her edition of " Cowper." The 
 passage, in Southey's edition — the first — runs thus : — 
 
 On the champain spread 
 The Xanthus and the Simois between 
 
 First Telamonian Ajax, bulwark firm 
 Of the Achaians, broke the Trojan ranks, 
 And kindled for the Greeks a gleam of hope, 
 Slaying the bravest of the Thracian band. 
 iq8
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 than which a more poetic line was never 
 written. 
 
 " I am sure you will forgive the sincerity you 
 have injoined when I confess, that I do not think 
 it possible to transcend in rhyme Pope's trans- 
 lation of Homer, nor probable that it will ever 
 be equalled. The images are so bold, and strik- 
 ing, the numbers so full, free, and sonorous ! 
 
 Now Heav'n forsakes the fight : th' Immortals yield 
 To human force and human skill, the field : 
 Dark showers of javelins fly from foes to foes ; 
 Now here, now there, the tide of combat flows ; 
 While Troy's fam'd streams, that bound the deathful plain. 
 On either side run purple to the main. 
 
 Great Ajax first to conquest led the way. 
 Broke the thick ranks, and turn'd the doubtful day. 
 
 Here all is poetic strength, picture and har- 
 mony. If Homer has expressed the sense 
 differently he cannot have expressed it better. 
 In all likelihood not near so well. A Translator 
 to rise upon such an Original is poetic merit of 
 the first order. 
 
 " It has always been agreed that, for who- 
 ever takes a subject which has been previously 
 
 taken and worked upon to the full satisfaction 
 199
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 of the Public in general, it is not enough that he 
 should even succeed as well as his Predecessor : 
 he must transcend him, or the rival attempts 
 will instantly perish, neglected, and forgotten. 
 
 " Were you not here so magnificently pre- 
 occupied on the field of fame, and were to 
 compleat your work, I should venture to point 
 out several places where it would be necessary 
 to dignify the expression : ' Between where Si- 
 mois,' etc. ; ' To face about and meet the Grecian 
 Foe ;' ' I go to Troy, a special Messenger^ which 
 makes Hector an errand-boy. Pope says : 
 
 One hour demands me in the Trojan Wall 
 To bid our altars flame and victims fall. 
 
 [Miss Seward continues to point out Mr. Lloyd's 
 blemishes] : 
 
 Like other young men who have dar*d my dart 
 No Man can send me to the shades below 
 Till my appointed time be come, to go. 
 That thou art brave there's no man can deny. 
 
 One of these prosaicisms recalls the burlesque 
 song : 
 
 But to come for to go 
 
 For to frighten one so. 
 
 200
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 They may be Horner^ but if so, how vast the 
 Greek Poet's debt to Pope for having spread 
 over them and their brethren 
 
 That beauteous veil, of brightness made. 
 At once their lustre and their shade.' 
 
 If I could have procured time for the exami- 
 nation of your MS., and for its comparison 
 with the 6th book of Pope's Homer, you had 
 earlier received it back. 
 
 " Pray be so good as to remember me kindly 
 to your accomplished and amiable Son when 
 next you write to him, and to believe me. Sir, 
 " Your obliged Friend, 
 
 " Anna Seward." 
 
 The accomplished and amiable son was 
 Charles Lloyd the younger. 
 
 The translator seems not unnaturally to have 
 replied to the foregoing missive, and in due 
 course the Oracle spoke again. This is her 
 second letter : 
 
 ' Miss Seward was adapting Samuel Butler on Moonlight ('* Hudi- 
 braa," part ii., canto I, 907-8) : 
 
 Mysterious veil, of brightness made, 
 
 Thai's both her lustre and her shade. 
 
 201
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 "Lichfield, Nov. 25, 1807. 
 
 "Sir, — I meant earlier to have acknowledged 
 your reply to my last letter, but a series of ill- 
 health, and a press of business for my pen, 
 produced this involuntary procrastination. 
 
 " The eminent Scholars whose high appro- 
 bation your translation of Homer has obtained 
 may well weigh with you in decided prepon- 
 derance against my unscholastic opinion. By 
 those who understand the Original the most 
 faithful English version will be likely to be 
 most esteemed, yet with fidelity to Homer 
 rhymes are scarcely compatible. 
 
 " You are sensible, however, that none who 
 can drink the Homeric Song from the foun- 
 tain head will do more than, from curiosity, sip 
 and taste occasionally from any under current. 
 They will examine a new version and compare 
 particular passages both with the Original, and 
 with the other translations, and probably like 
 those best, which have the most scrupulous 
 fidelity ; as we had rather contemplate an exact, 
 tho' hard resemblance of a dear old Friend, 
 than one which softens and melts down every 
 defect, substituting grace and beauty for imi- 
 tative precision.
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 " Those who will read the work thro' and 
 value it for itself, to whom Greek is a dead let- 
 ter, form a prodigious majority among poetic 
 Readers ; and they of that class, who have the 
 keenest sensibility of poetic beauty, will never 
 be induced to read an English Homer which is 
 poetically inferior to Pope's. Their opinion 
 will bias those who have less power of judging 
 for themselves, and leave the Rivals of that 
 immortal work only the barren and mortify- 
 ing consciousness of wasted time and fruitless 
 labour. 
 
 " Mr. Day, who was a grounded Greek 
 scholar, and a fine Poet himself, always main- 
 tained that Pope's Homer was, as poetry, very 
 superior to its Original, by exalting all that 
 there is low, animating what is tedious, and 
 equalling in strength as well as beauty almost 
 all the noblest passages of the old Bard ; so as 
 to leave him no transcendency except what re- 
 sults from the grander intonation of the Greek 
 language, and from the absence of rhyme. 
 Milton and Pope's numbers, however, always 
 render our language sufficiently grand and har- 
 monious to satisfy and to charm every ear, the 
 
 delicacy of which is not become morbid. 
 203
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " To the admired simile with which the 
 latter closes the 8th book of the ' Iliad,' I have 
 considerable objection — not because it adds to, 
 and extends the ideas of the Greek passage, not 
 because it is finer poetry, but because it uses 
 epithets too gorgeous for just delineation, and 
 is therefore not faithful to Nature — ' Refulgent 
 lamp of Night ;' 
 
 Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise, 
 KJlood of glor^ brightens all the skies ; — 
 
 and before these lines he says : 
 
 Around her throne the vivid planets roll 
 And stars unnumbered gild the glowing Pole. 
 
 The vales gleam but they do not shine beneath 
 the clearest moon-light ; and for the most re- 
 splendent Sun-rise no expression can be found 
 stronger than 2, flood of glory. 
 
 " The original and the Translation are alike 
 unfaithful to nature in representing the stellar 
 fires as in full lustre when that of the moon is 
 in consummate brightness. A few stars are 
 then sometimes visible, but their light is dim 
 and indistinct. In Milton's lunar evening he 
 says the firmament glowed with living sapphires 
 
 till the moon unveiled her peerless light, (peer- 
 204
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 less by that of any Star) and threw her silver 
 mantle over the dark. The lines of Pope's 
 Homer which the simile introduces are exquisite 
 and faultless ; the war-fires on Xanthus' brink 
 illuminating his waters ; — their long-cast reflec- 
 tion gleaming on the walls, and trembling on 
 the spires of Troy ; — their gilding the dusky 
 horrors and shooting a shady lustre over the 
 fields I — if all this be not Homer, it is first-rate 
 poetry. Paraphrastic license in translation gives 
 it the raciness of original composition. 
 
 " I am tempted to the egotism of inserting a 
 moon-light landscape of my own from an un- 
 finished Epic Poem, built in wide paraphrase 
 upon Fenelon's ' Telemachus,' which in itself 
 contains few poetic essentials. It forms but 
 the mere outline of my attempt, which has lain 
 many years unprogressive, and as yet consists 
 of only 3 books : 
 
 Soft as he ' sleeps, the now consummate moon 
 Sheds lambent glories on the night's still noon. 
 Where the horizon's limitary line 
 Meets the gloom'd sea, and seems its last confine. 
 Serene, she stands, diffusing thro' hush'd waves 
 Her lunar morning in the Ocean caves ; 
 
 ' TtUmachus. 
 205
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 And, as from sportive Boy, descending prone. 
 Sinks in the glassy pool the heavy stone. 
 Wave gains on wave, while the smooth lake divides 
 Widening, in convex spheres, the lucid tides. 
 So in the sky, divergent from her orb. 
 The skirts of milky light the dusk absorb ; 
 Flush round and round, and softly flush again. 
 Kindling alike th' horizon and the main ; 
 While a gemm'd path the darksome waters o'er. 
 Streams from her silver circlet to the shore. 
 
 Sleepless Calypso roves and feels the stings 
 That doubtful hope to new-born passion brings ; 
 She roves, what time, ascending from the Deep, 
 Climbs the fair Moon the dusk ethereal steep. 
 Her beams the summits of the rocks illume. 
 Hills, glens, and fields steal faintly thro' the gloom ; 
 Blue gleam the brooks, irriguous vales among. 
 Their mists slow curling as they wind along. 
 And dew-sprent meadows, more distinctly seen 
 Tho' lost the floral hues and lively green 
 Which drank the lustre of the gaudy day. 
 Now glistening, whiten in the milder ray ; 
 More light and more th' emergent landscape gains, 
 Till all the scene in pale distinctness reigns. 
 
 " I remain, Sir, your obliged Servant, 
 
 " Anna Seward." 
 
 Mr. Day was Thomas Day, the author of 
 *' Sandford and Merton," of whom Miss Sew- 
 ard wrote a short biography. 
 206
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 It was then that Mr. Lloyd sent the 
 Twenty-fourth Book. In April, 1808, Miss 
 Seward replied, almost to the length of the 
 poem : — 
 
 " Tardy, as to my esteemed Correspondent 
 this acknowledgement of his obliging present 
 must appear, it is yet the earliest which, from 
 a heavy press of engagements, and literary in- 
 tercourse by pen, it has been in my power to 
 make. 
 
 " Whatever I may think concerning waste 
 of ability in any present attempt to translate 
 Homer since Cowper has shown us what he /V, 
 and Pope what, as a complete Poet, he should 
 have been, still I confess the exertion and the 
 execution very extraordinary, and very ingen- 
 ious, considering it as made in advanced life, 
 and by a Gentleman whose attention and whose 
 labours were, thro' his youth and middle life, 
 thrown into paths widely distant from the 
 classic and poetic haunts. 
 
 " When you observe that after a first read- 
 ing of Homer, abreast with his consummate 
 Translator, a man of taste and genius would 
 
 prefer the English to the Greek Poem, you say 
 207
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 everything for Pope ; and when you add but 
 let that same man read Homer ten times, and 
 he will find Homer rise and Pope sink, it is 
 in fact only that prejudice prevails over fair 
 comparison. The ear becomes so seduced, so 
 fascinated by the charms of a language, much 
 more sonorous than our own, that the flattest 
 and coarsest passages, passing thro' that har- 
 monious medium, delight the beguiled fancy 
 more than the purest poetry in our own less 
 magnificent tongue. We all know how fond 
 even the mere Editor becomes of the Author 
 whose works he studies and gives to the 
 World. Upon the Translator that partiality 
 comes with treble force and accumulation, till, 
 like the passionate Lover, he either becomes 
 blind to the defects of his Idol, or fancies them 
 excellencies. 
 
 " Pope separates the dross from the gold of 
 Homer, and for the dross substitutes intrinsic 
 gems. Of this Homer's Idolators complain ; 
 but if these gems be of the purest^ as well as of 
 the brightest lustre ; if they be pearls and dia- 
 monds, and not tinsel and glass ; if they con- 
 vey picture and imagery, life and motion, in 
 
 the place of plain narrative, or perhaps unin- 
 208
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 teresting mention, then surely it must be par- 
 Hal taste which hkes the poetry best which is 
 least poetic. Why then read it in Enghsh verse 
 at all '? Why not prefer the literal prose trans- 
 lation? That is the plain food. All poetry, 
 which deserves its name, is certainly, to pursue 
 your figure, a made dish, composed of various 
 ingredients — of allegory, metaphor, simile, por- 
 traiture, scenery, bold and grand thoughts and 
 sentiments, hyperbole, within proper bounds, 
 and all conveyed in the " high-enwoven har- 
 monies" of verse, blank, or in rhyme. 
 
 " I do not understand what is meant by 
 Modern Poetry, as degradingly spoken. If the 
 best of our Poets' composition since Dryden 
 and Pope to the present hour, they are a Host 
 in strength, beauty, and number, and have writ- 
 ten in all manner of styles. For the magnifi- 
 cent, we have Akenside, Thomson, Collins, Dr. 
 Johnson. Mason, Gray, Chatterton, Darwin — 
 and the sublime Joanna Baillie ; in the simpler 
 style, Shenstone, Beattie, Cowper, Crowe, 
 Bowles, Burns, Bloomfield, Walter Scott, and 
 his school ; Coleridge, Southey, and their 
 school. Poetry can have no nobler models 
 than these supply to her various styles. Modern 
 14 209
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Poetry In all ages, must, in justice, be so termed 
 beneath the consideration of its greatest ex- 
 amples ; not by the herd of Poetasters, who 
 pour their trash from the Press, with and with- 
 out rhyme, and have so poured it from Chaucer's 
 day to our own. 
 
 " 111 betide the Dealers in metre who, after 
 the manner of the English Della-Cruscans, 
 Merry, and his Imitators, exhibit ideas of labo- 
 rious inflation, unnatural conceits, incongruous 
 metaphors, and violent hyperbole, and, dressing 
 them up in well-sounding numbers, called the 
 trash Poetry. 
 
 " Pope was not of that Tribe, neither any of 
 his brother-Bards whom I have mentioned. 
 Of him^ and of them^ it may be justly said, that 
 however they may differ from each other in 
 their preference of the magnificent or the plainer 
 diction, their works glow with the strong light 
 of Genius, such as is able to pierce the clouds 
 of Time, and of contemporary jealousy, and to 
 make their fame go bright'ning on its course 
 to distant ages. 
 
 " You give Pope involuntary acquittal for 
 making Homer's prose poetry^ at least respect- 
 ing his catalogue of the Grecian ships, when
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 you say you found the impossibility of trans- 
 lating it without following his example. Why 
 then reflect on him for setting it ? Certainly 
 his local enumeration is one of the most beauti- 
 ful parts of his version. It shows what genius 
 and judgment can do with the most barren 
 materials. Do you blame him for ransacking 
 dictionaries, as you term it, to acquire an accu- 
 rate knowledge of the situation and properties 
 of the places he must mention, that so truth 
 might support his landscape-painting^ 
 
 " Their mere calling over, as in Homer, must 
 have made fine Bell-man's verses, truly, in Eng- 
 lish ; as it is managed in Pope's Homer, the 
 Reader must be an owl, if he does not see the 
 Country, or City mentioned, rise before him, 
 and feel himself, not only entertained, but in- 
 structed concerning the situation and produce 
 for which it is most remarkable. We are thus 
 spared the trouble of ransacking dictionaries^ if 
 we were disposed to take it. Pope was obliged 
 to translate this catalogue, and since you allow 
 there is no possibility of doing it in plain 
 rhythm, pray pardon him that he bowed to the 
 necessity of making it poetry. 
 
 "My criticisms on your 24th Iliad would 
 
 311
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 only waste your time and mine in fruitless 
 consideration, since we should investigate on an 
 entirely different principle. That which appears 
 to me defect in all verse, viz. that it is not poetry^ 
 appears to you a plainness which is desirable. 
 I am very far indeed from considering stilted 
 language, unsupported by the essentials of 
 poetry, as admirable ; poverty of ideas " gaily 
 tricked out in gaudy raggedness" is no reading 
 for me while affluence of imagination, in the 
 simplest language, charms me. No verse was 
 ever more enchanting to me than Southey's 
 * Madoc' Pope's Homer is not so dear. Every 
 page of the former presents to me some noble 
 sentiment, some vivid image, that while it 
 tempts the pencil transcends its power ; some 
 impassioned tenderness that sinks into the 
 heart. 
 
 " In the 24th Iliad of yours one of the coup- 
 lets is highly poetic. 
 
 But when Aurora, bright with rosy dyes. 
 Rose \n full glory up the vaulted skies, 
 
 yet it seems the description of the consummate 
 day rather than of that early morning, so dis-
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 criminated in Pope's translation of the same 
 lines : 
 
 Soon as Aurora, daughter of the dawn. 
 With rosy lustre streak' d the dewy lawn. 
 
 Your couplet has all the harmony and the 
 brilliance, but not the temporal appropriation 
 of Pope's. The words streak! d and dewy mark 
 the hour immediately succeeding the dawn of 
 twilight. That happy precision is one of the 
 principal excellencies of Pope's poetry. So is 
 it of Southey's, whose style is so different from 
 his. Of mere style^ so it be not coarse or mean, 
 I make little point. If the poetic essentials 
 exist, I am indifferent whether I meet them in 
 the simple robe, which folds round a statue, 
 like the dress of Southey's muse, or in the 
 floating, purple, and gemm'd tiara which invests 
 that of Pope. 
 
 " Amongst his many landscapes, I know of 
 only one which wants appropriation, nay abso- 
 lutely violates it, and that, as I mentioned to 
 you before, is his celebrated close of the 8th 
 * Iliad.' 
 
 " By its recollection I was induced to send 
 you a moon-light view of mine, flattering my- 
 self that it possesses that truth to nature which 
 213
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Pope's wants. You tell me you think the 
 lines ' too poetic, too highly polished, which 
 tends to obscure their meaning.' How de- 
 scriptive poetry can be too poetic, I have no 
 idea. Obscurity of meaning is certainly one 
 of the worst faults verse can have. [Four lines 
 of the letter are here cut away. They seem to 
 have consisted of a defence of the directness 
 and accuracy of the description previously 
 quoted, on p. 205, of the lunar evening on the 
 sea shore.] No circumstance is in my scene, 
 which I had not literally beheld on the preced- 
 ing night. 
 
 " Upon reading your objections, I reex- 
 amined the passage with deep attention, and 
 put it to the ordeal, which I long since insti- 
 tuted for the detection of ambiguous meaning 
 in poetry, viz. throwing it into prose. Be it, 
 however, remembered, that verbal transposition 
 is an allowed poetic license, and is asserted to 
 produce a fine classical effect in English poetry. 
 The French language will not bear it, and 
 hence its poetry never rises above the pretty ^ and 
 the elegant. 
 
 " Whoever fancies that verbal transposition 
 
 obscures the sense in our verse, must possess 
 214
 
 MR. LLOYD'S « ILIAD" 
 
 the lynx's beam if he can discern it in the 
 Greek and Latin, where that habit of style is 
 perpetual and in an infinitely greater latitude 
 than is ever ventured upon by our Poets, even 
 by Milton, the boldest and most extensive of 
 all his Brethren in the use of that privilege. I 
 might have excepted Spenser ; but as I am not 
 one of that Poet's indiscriminate admirers, I 
 would not follow him as an example nor cite 
 him as authority. 
 
 " It appears to me that my lines are acquitted 
 of the imputed obscurity by the experiment 
 made upon them. I inclose it for your perusal, 
 and remain. Sir, with much respect and regard 
 
 [Signature cut away.] 
 
 " Lichfield, April ii, 1808." 
 
 On the following page is the paraphrase, intro- 
 duced thus : — 
 
 "A passage in Anna Seward's unpublished 
 and unfinished Poem, ' Telemachus,' put into 
 Prose, as a criterion whether or not the descrip- 
 tion be obscure. All the verbal variations are 
 synonisms, substituted to take it out of rhyme 
 and measure :" — 
 
 215
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 The moon, now consummate, sheds her lambent glories 
 over the still noon of Midnight. Where the limitary- 
 line of the horizon meets the gloomed sea, and appears 
 its last boundary, she stands serene, diffusing thro* the 
 hush'd billows her lunar morning into the caverns of the 
 Deep. And, as, from sportive Boy, prone descending 
 sinks into the glassy pool the ponderous stone, wave gains 
 upon wave, while the lake separates, widening the lucid 
 tides ' into convex spheres, so in the sky, divergent on all 
 sides from her orbit, skirts of milky light absorb the sur- 
 rounding darkness, flush round and round, then again 
 gently flush, kindling at once the horizon and the ocean, 
 while over the darksome waters, a gemmed path streams 
 from her silvery circlet to the edge of the shore. 
 
 Sleepless Calypso wanders, and feels the stings which 
 doubtful hope brings to new-born passion. She wanders, 
 what time, ascending from the billows, the fair Moon 
 •climbs the dusky ethereal steep. Her beams illuminate 
 the summits of the rocks and hills. Glens and fields steal 
 faintly thro' the dusk. The brooks gleam blue amid 
 irriguous vallies, their mists curling slowly as they wind 
 away ; and dew-sprent meadows, yet more clearly dis- 
 cerned, tho* lost the lively green, and floral tints which 
 drank the light of the gaudy day, now glistening, whiten 
 in the milder effulgence. More and yet more light the 
 emergent landscape receives, till the whole scene reigns in 
 pale distinctness. 
 
 '" There is no obscurity or contradiction [wrote Miss Seward] in 
 giving the name of tides to smooth and currentless waters, because the 
 Poets have united to apply that term to water of every description — 
 calm tide, glassy tide, smooth tide, &c." 
 2l6
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 This, surely, is word-painting. One leaves 
 Miss Seward with a fuller sense of Scott's em- 
 barrassments as her literary executor. 
 
 In another kind was Southey's practical and 
 characteristic reply to Mr. Lloyd : — 
 
 "Keswick, June 15, 1808. 
 
 " I am much obliged to you, Sir, for your 
 translation of the last Book of the ' Iliad.' It 
 would be a highly respectable version from any 
 hand, and must be considered as a very extra- 
 ordinary one for one who has not been long 
 practised in the art of versifying. 
 
 " In writing verse myself I seldom or never 
 elongate a word to three syllables which is 
 commonly and naturally pronounced as two. 
 It appears to me that any such attenuation of 
 sound weakens the rhythm of the line — for in- 
 stance, you have written, 
 
 How brave he was, how generous and true : 
 
 this line is far less sonorous than another in 
 which the same word is used as a dissyllable — 
 
 Thy form, thy countenance and generous mind. 
 
 So also 
 
 Pelides satiate at length with grief: 
 217
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 the sound of the Hne would be strengthened if 
 the word ' satisfied' were substituted. 
 
 " On the other hand, such a word as askest 
 cannot be made into a monosyllable (tho' 
 certainly it is often done) without producing 
 a harsh and unpleasant effect. You have 
 authority enough in both cases, but the ear is 
 the best and only sure criterion, and whenever 
 that is disappointed of the full sound which it 
 expects, or is jarred by a harsh one which it 
 does not expect, unless the passage itself affords 
 an especial reason for the variety, the line may 
 be pronounced faulty. 
 
 " The couplet is to me a wearying measure, 
 
 and I have sometimes found that the terza rima 
 
 of the Italians might with great advantage be 
 
 used in its stead, in the translation of Homer, 
 
 Virgil, or any of the classical narrative poets. 
 
 Stanzas cannot be used, because they require a 
 
 regular length of period not to be found in the 
 
 original : the terza rima would have all the 
 
 charm of rhyme, with the advantage of con- 
 
 tinuousness. The common quatrain might also 
 
 be written continuously, after the example of 
 
 Mason, and it was the opinion of Dryden that 
 
 this was the noblest English metre. I differ 
 
 218
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 from him — but the opinion of Dryden on such 
 a subject is a weighty one. 
 
 " It has often been doubted whether literature 
 be the worthy occupation of a man's life. I 
 believe it is, and have acted accordingly. But 
 it can never be doubted that it is the worthiest 
 amusement of leisure, after the business of life 
 is done. 
 
 " Believe me, 
 
 " Yours with respect, 
 
 " Robert Southey." 
 
 Among other persons to whom a copy of the 
 translation was sent was Thomas Clarkson, the 
 abolitionist, who, working with William Wil- 
 berforce, found a strong ally in Mr. Lloyd. 
 Clarkson differed from Miss Seward : " I have 
 read your Homer," he wrote, " with much 
 pleasure, liking it better than that of either Pope 
 or of Cowper." 
 
 Lamb did not see the translation until 1809, 
 
 after Robert's visit to town ; but when it did 
 
 reach him it interested him greatly, and he 
 
 plunged with kindly energy into criticism. His 
 
 first letter to Mr. Lloyd on the subject, dated 
 
 June 1 3, 1 809, began thus : — 
 219
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " Dear Sir, — I received with great pleasure 
 the mark of your remembrance which you 
 were pleased to send me, the Translation from 
 Homer. You desire my opinion of it. I think 
 it is plainer and more to the purpose than 
 Pope's, though it may want some of his 
 Splendour and some of his Sound. Yet I do 
 not remember in any part of his translation a 
 series of more manly versification than the 
 conference of Priam with Hermes in your 
 translation (Lines 499 to 530), or than that 
 part of the reply of Achilles to Priam, begin- 
 ning with the fable of the Two Urns (in page 
 24) ; or than the Story of Niobe which follows 
 a little after. I do not retain enough of my 
 Greek (to my shame I say it) to venture at an 
 opinion of the correctness of your version. 
 What I seem to miss, and what certainly every- 
 body misses in Pope, is a certain savage-like 
 plainness of speaking in Achilles — a sort of 
 indelicacy — the heroes in Homer are not half 
 civilized, they utter all the cruel, all the selfish, 
 all the mean thoughts even of their nature, which 
 it is the fashion of our great men to keep in. 
 I cannot, in lack of Greek, point to any one 
 place — but I remember the general feature as I
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 read him at school. But your principles and 
 turn of mind would, I have no doubt, lead you 
 to civilize his phrases, and sometimes to half 
 christen them." 
 
 [Here Lamb's letter, which then comes to 
 particulars, might be interrupted to quote one 
 of the passages he best liked, the conference of 
 Priam with Hermes : — 
 
 The old man answer'd — " If thou truly art 
 
 Of fierce Achilles' family a part. 
 
 Tell me, oh tell, if noble Hector lies 
 
 Still in the tent, depriv'd of obsequies ; 
 
 Or has Achilles in an evil hour. 
 
 Thrown him to dogs in piece-meal to devour ?" 
 
 The swift-wing'd messenger replied and said, 
 
 ** Neither the vultures nor the dogs have made 
 
 A prey of Hector's corpse, which lies yet sound 
 
 Within the tent, neglected on the ground. 
 
 Twelve mornings now are past since he was slain. 
 
 But still the skin its freshness doth retain ; 
 
 The worms, which make of warriors dead a prey. 
 
 From this dead body have been kept away ; 
 
 Our chief, when morning brightens up the skies. 
 
 The noble Hector to his chariot ties. 
 
 And drags him round his dear Patroclus' tomb ; 
 
 But still the dead retains his youthful bloom : 
 
 The blood all washed away, no stains appear. 
 
 The numerous wounds are clos'd, the skin is clear ; 
 
 221
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Thus round thy son, the care of heaven is spread. 
 It loved him living, and it guards him dead." 
 These words reviv'd the aged king, who said, 
 " 'Tis right that sacrifice and gifts be paid 
 To the immortals, and the pious mind 
 Of noble Hector ever was inclin'd 
 To honour them, while here he drew his breath } 
 And hence have they remember'd him in death. 
 Accept for all the kindness thou hast shown. 
 This golden cup, and keep it as thine own. 
 And if it please thee, with the gods' consent. 
 Conduct me safely to Achilles' tent." 
 
 The letter continued] : " I have marked a few 
 verbal slips, the doing of which cannot be 
 called criticism, or it is as if a Reviewer being 
 taken ill, his printer's Compositor or Reader 
 were called to supply his place." 
 
 Many of the suggestions that follow are too 
 slight to bear reproduction ; but many, again, 
 have life, and vigourous life, of their own. 
 Textual criticism was an art in which Lamb 
 pre-eminently shone. Thus : — " Lines 243, 
 244, 245 are the flattest lines in the whole : 
 
 But now be open, and declare thy mindy 
 For I confess I feel myself inclined, 
 222
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 Indeed impelPd by Jove's command to go. 
 And face the man the cause of all our woe — "' 
 
 is the cool language of a Man and his Wife 
 upon ordinary occurrences over a peaceable 
 fireside — not the waverings of a divinely-im- 
 pelled, humanly-shrinking, Priam striving to 
 bolster up his own half-doubting inspirations 
 by infusing a courage which he does not feel 
 into the aged partner of his throne, that she 
 may give it back to him. I should not have 
 exprest myself thus petulantly, if there were 
 many more, or indeed any more such Lines in 
 the Translation, but they stopt the current of 
 my feeling in the place, and I hope you will 
 pardon my expressions." 
 
 Here are other comments referring to 
 naiho^ovoLO in the line (506) 
 
 d.v8p6q Ttaidofpovoto izori aToixa x^^P^ Spiyeffdac. 
 
 Lamb wrote : " I don't know Homer's word, 
 not having my books about me, but surely in 
 English, Priam would have said the Slayer of 
 
 ' Iliad xxiv, 196-9 : 
 'A^X aye fioi rdde eItce, t'i toi (ppealv elSsTat elvai ; 
 a'lvug yap fi' avrdv ye fihvog kol 6vfibg avuyei 
 Keld" levai eirt v^ag iau arpaTov evpvv 'Axaiuv. 
 223
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 my Son^ not call'd Achilles murderer^ at such a 
 time. That is rather too plain for the homely- 
 speaking Homeric Heroes." Again, Mr. Lloyd 
 had translated rvfijSov in the line (666) 
 
 ivdexdrrj di ze ruji^uv in aurtu noiTjffai/xev, 
 
 and anua in lines 799 and 801, "tumulus." 
 Lamb objected : " Tumulus is too much like 
 making Homer talk Latin. Tumulus is always 
 spoken by an English mouth with a conscious- 
 ness of scientific attainment. Priam and his Peo- 
 ple were no scholars — plain downright fighting 
 men." 
 
 And of Mr. Lloyd's use of the word " min- 
 strels" for Homer's aoihovq (singers), in the line 
 (720) 
 
 rprjTolq iv Xs'j^eiaai diaav^ izapa S'tiaav ioidouq 
 
 his critic said : " Minstrels, I suspect to be a 
 
 word bringing merely English or English ballad 
 
 feelings to the Mind. It expresses the thing 
 
 and something more, as to say Sarpedon was a 
 
 Gentleman, or as somebody translated Paul's 
 
 address ' Ye men of Athens,' ' Gentlemen of 
 
 Athens.' " 
 
 Lamb concluded : " I am sure I ought to 
 224
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 make many apologies for the freedom I have 
 taken, but it will at least convince you that I 
 have read the Book — which I have twice, and 
 the last time with more pleasure, because more 
 at leisure. I wish you Joy of an Amusement 
 which I somehow seem to have done with. 
 Excepting some Things for Children, I have 
 scarce chimed ten couplets in the last as many 
 years. Be pleased to give my most kind re- 
 membrances to Mrs. Lloyd ; and please to tell 
 Robert that my Sister is getting well, and I 
 hope will soon be able to take pleasure in his 
 affectionate Epistle. My Love also to Charles, 
 when you write. 
 
 " I am. Sir, with the greatest [the last 
 few words, including signature, have been cut 
 away.] 
 
 " 13 June, 09, Temple 
 
 " Robert will have told you how pleased I 
 was with your truly Horatian Epistle in the 
 Gent. Mag" 
 
 The truly Horatian Epistle was a translation 
 
 of the first Epistle of the First Book, "To 
 
 Maecenas," contributed by Mr. Lloyd, as part 
 
 of a series, to the Gentletnati's Magazine for 
 
 15 225
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 March, 1 809. To his Horatian experiments we 
 come, however, later. 
 
 To the foregoing letter the translator seems 
 to have replied, taking exception to some of 
 his critic's remarks ; but asking him for similar 
 advice in the future. Lamb's answer came 
 quickly : — 
 
 " Dear Sir, — I can only say that I shall be 
 most happy to see anything that you can send 
 me at any time that has reference to your newly 
 taken up pursuits. I will faithfully return the 
 Manuscript with such observations as a mere 
 acquaintance with English, and with English 
 Poetry, may suggest. I dare not dictate in 
 Greek. I am Homo unius lingua — your vindi- 
 cation of the Lines which I had objected to 
 makes me ashamed of the unimportance of my 
 remarks : they were not worth confuting. Only 
 on Line 33, Page 4, I still retain my opinion 
 that it should be ' were made.' 
 
 All seem'd to wish that such attempt were made. 
 Save Juno, Neptune, and the blue-ey'd maid.' 
 
 * Mr. Lloyd had written : 
 
 All seem'd to wish that such attempt be made, 
 
 Sdve Juno, Neptune, and the blue-eye'd maid. 
 
 226
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ILIAD" 
 
 1 am glad to see you venture made and maia 
 for rhymes ' Tis true their sound is the same. 
 But the mind occupied in revolving the dif- 
 ferent meaning of two words so literally the 
 same, is diverted from the objection which the 
 mere Ear would make, and to the mind it is 
 rhyme enough I had not noticed it till 
 this moment of transcribing the couplet. A 
 timidity of Rhyming, whether of bringing to- 
 gether sounds too near, or too remote to each 
 other, is a fault of the present day. The old 
 English poets were richer in their diction, as 
 they were less scrupulous.* I shall expect your 
 MS. with curiosity 
 " I am. Sir, 
 
 " Yours with great respect, 
 
 « C. Lamb." 
 
 ' Christopher Wordsworth thought otherwise concerning loose rhym- 
 ing. In a letter to Robert Mr. Lloyd wrote : " Wordsworth thinks 
 my translation of the 24th book of the • Iliad' does me credit, and is 
 very faithful to the original ; but he is too nice about rhymes — he 
 thinks * steal' and ' prevail' do not quite suit. I believe the Londoners 
 pronounce 'steal' 'steel,' but we pronounce it 'stale' — however there 
 are very few rhymes of this kind. What would he say to Pope, who 
 uses * prepare' 
 
 'ear,' &c. &c. ? 
 
 But there is more nicety in verse now than there was 50 years ago." 
 227
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 *' My kind remembrances to Robert. I shall 
 soon have a little parcel to send him. I am 
 very sorry to hear of the ill-health of Sophia. 
 
 ** Temple, 19 June, 09." 
 
 228
 
 XIII 
 
 MR. Lloyd's "odyssey" 
 1 809-1810 
 
 The little parcel to which Lamb referred in 
 his postscript came in due course — the " Poetry 
 for Children" — and with it the following note, 
 which tells us that Mr. Lloyd, taking his critic 
 at his word, had sent the manuscript of his 
 version of the first two books of the " Odyssey" 
 for Lamb's consideration. Lamb's note, which 
 is undated but belongs to 1 809, ran : — 
 
 " Dear Robert, — Make my apologies to your 
 
 father for not returning his ' Odyssey' sooner, 
 
 but I lent it to a friend who is a better Grecian 
 
 than me, to make remarks on, and he has been 
 
 so busied (he is a Doctor of Laws) that I have 
 
 rescued the MSS. from him at last by force. 
 
 He has written a few observations. I send you 
 
 our poems. All mine are marked -\/ in the 
 
 contents. The rest are Mary's, all but the 
 
 ' Beggar Man,' which is my brother's. The 
 229
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 farce is not at home, but you shall have it ere 
 long. — What follows is for your Father to see. 
 — Mary desires her remembrances." 
 
 Lamb then introduced his little sheaf of 
 suggestions with this modest note to Mr. 
 Lloyd : — 
 
 " Dear Sir, — A friend who has kept your MS. 
 unreasonably long has ventured a few remarks 
 on the first Book. And I have twice read thro* 
 both with care, and can only reprehend a few 
 trifling expressions with my scanty knowledge 
 of Greek. I thank you for the reading of them, 
 and assure you they read to me beautifully 
 simple and in the manner of the original as far 
 as I understand it. 
 
 " Yours truly, 
 
 " C. L. 
 
 " My kind respects to Mrs. Lloyd." 
 
 A few of Lamb's emendations follow, most 
 of which Mr. Lloyd adopted when he came to 
 print. 
 
 Mr. Lloyd at first had rendered (Book L line 
 8) ^ovg 'E8?aoLO " Bullocks of the Sun." Thus
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ODYSSEY" 
 
 Lamb : — " Oxen of the Sun, I conjure. Bul- 
 locks is too Smithfield and sublunary a Word. 
 Oxen of the Sun, or of Apollo, but in any 
 case not Bullocks." Again, Mr. Lloyd had 
 written (Book I. line 69) : — 
 
 The Cyclops' Eye still rankles in his breast. 
 
 Lamb remarked : " * The Cyclops' Eye still 
 rankles in his Breast.' Here is an unlucky 
 confusion of literal with figurative language. 
 One Man's Eye rankles in another Breast. 
 * Cyclops' wrongs' would do better." 
 
 For Homer's ^atrpo^ and xn^v^ (Book L 
 lines 141, 143) Mr. Lloyd offered Cook and 
 Butler. " These sound," said Lamb, " too 
 modern-kitchenish. One might be called an 
 officer or servitor, the other a server. Milton 
 speaks of these things as the office mean ' of 
 sewer and seneschall.'" Perhaps sewer is too 
 old. But Cook and Butler are too like mod- 
 ern Establishments." 
 
 Passing over several minor corrections, we 
 come to this sound objection to Mr. Lloyd's 
 
 » «« Paradise Lost," Book IX., 37 t — 
 
 Marshall'd feast, 
 Serv'd up in hall with sewers and seneschals. 
 231
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 employment of a flagrant modernism : " Un- 
 affected Grace. Is there any word in Homer 
 to express affectation? I think not. Then 
 certainly he has no such idea as unaffected.'' 
 
 The " friend's" remarks, which accompany 
 Lamb's, are less piquantly expressed. 
 
 A few days later, probably on the receipt of 
 a reply from Mr. Lloyd, Lamb wrote more 
 fully concerning this particular translation, and 
 translations of Homer in general : — 
 
 "July 31, 1809. 
 " Dear Sir, — The general impression made 
 by your Translation on the mind of my friend, 
 who kept your MS. so unreasonably long, as 
 well as on another friend who read over a 
 good part of it with me, was that it gave a 
 great deal more of the sense of Homer than 
 either of his two great modern Translators have 
 done. In several expressions which they at 
 first objected to, on turning to the Greek they 
 found it completely warranted you in the use 
 of them ; and they were even surprised that 
 you could combine so much fidelity with so 
 much of the turn of the best modern improve- 
 ments in the Couplet versification. I think of 
 232
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ODYSSEY" 
 
 the two, I rather prefer the Book of the Iliad 
 which you sent me, for the sound of the verse ; 
 but the difference of subject almost involun- 
 tarily modifies verse. I find Cowper is a fav- 
 ourite with nobody. His injudicious use of 
 the stately slow Miltonic verse in a subject so 
 very different has given a distaste. Nothing 
 can be more unlike to my fancy than Homer 
 and Milton. Homer is perfect prattle, tho' ex- 
 quisite prattle, compared to the deep oracular 
 voice of Milton. In Milton you love to stop, 
 and saturate your mind with every great image 
 or sentiment ; in Homer you want to go on, 
 to have more of his agreeable narrative. 
 Cowper delays you as much, walking over a 
 Bowling Green, as the other does, travelling 
 over steep Alpine heights, where the labour 
 enters into and makes a part of the pleasure. 
 From what I have seen, I would certainly be 
 glad to hear that you continued your employ- 
 ment quite through the Poem : that is, for an 
 agreeable and honourable recreation to your- 
 self; though I should scarce think that (Pope 
 having got the ground) a translation in Pope's 
 Couplet versification would ever supersede his 
 to the public, however faithfuller or in some 
 233
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 respects better. Pitt's Virgil is not much read, 
 I believe, though nearer to the Original than 
 Dryden's. Perhaps it is, that people do not 
 like two Homers or Virgils — there is a sort of 
 confusion in it to an English reader, who has 
 not a centre of reference in the Original : when 
 Tate and Brady's Psalms came out in our 
 Churches, many pious people would not sub- 
 stitute them in the room of David's, as they 
 call'd Sternhold and Hopkins's. But if you 
 write for a relaxation from other sort of occu- 
 pations I can only congratulate you, Sir, on 
 the noble choice, as it seems to me, which you 
 have made, and express my wonder at the 
 facility which you suddenly have arrived at, if 
 (as I suspect) these are indeed the first speci- 
 mens of this sort which you have produced. 
 But I cannot help thinking that you betray a 
 more practiced gait than a late beginner could 
 so soon acquire. Perhaps you have only re- 
 sumed, what you had formerly laid aside as in- 
 terrupting more necessary avocations. 
 
 " I need not add how happy I shall be to see 
 
 at any time what you may please to send me. 
 
 In particular, I should be glad to see that you 
 
 had taken up Horace, which I think you enter 
 
 234
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ODYSSEY" 
 
 into as much as any man that was not born in 
 his days, and in the Via Longa or F/aminia, or 
 near the Forum. 
 
 " With many apologies for keeping your MS. 
 so long, which my friend's engagements in busi- 
 ness must excuse, 
 
 " I remain, 
 
 " Dear Sir, yours truly, 
 
 " C. L. 
 
 " My kind respects to Mrs. LL, and my 
 remembrances to Robert, &c., &c." 
 
 A few months later, early in 1810, Mr. Lloyd 
 had the first seven books of the " Odyssey" 
 printed as a companion to his version of the 
 " Iliad." The title-page of the little book bore 
 no name, but in a prefatory note it was stated 
 that " This attempt to preserve in English 
 rhyme, with little or no embellishment, the 
 noble simplicity of the original, has engaged 
 some of the leisure hours of a man of business, 
 who, till near his sixtieth year, had written a 
 few trifles only in verse, and this circumstance, 
 he hopes, will plead in his excuse for the 
 deficiencies which a critical eye will observe 
 in this volume." 
 
 2ZS
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 A copy of the translation was speedily 
 despatched to the Temple, and Lamb replied 
 with a further list of suggestions and the fol- 
 lowing letter : — 
 
 " My dear Sir, — The above are all the faults 
 I, who profess myself to be a mere English 
 Reader, could find after a scrupulous perusal 
 twice over of your neat little Book. I assure 
 you it gave me great pleasure in the perusal, 
 much more in this shape than in the Manu- 
 script, and I should be very sorry you should 
 give up the finishing of it on so poor pretence 
 as your Age [sixty-two], which is not so much 
 by ten years as Dryden's when he wrote his 
 fables, which are his best works allowed, and 
 not more than Milton's when he had scarce en- 
 tered upon his original Epic Poem. You have 
 done nearly a third ; persevere and let us see 
 the whole. I am sure I should prize it for its 
 Homeric plainness and truth above the confed- 
 erate jumble of Pope, Broome and Fenton 
 which goes under Pope's name, and is far in- 
 ferior to his ILIAD. I have picked out what 
 I think blemishes, but they are but a score of 
 
 words (I am a mere word pecker) in six times 
 236
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ODYSSEY" 
 
 as many pages. The rest all gave me pleasure, 
 and most of all the Book [the Sixth] in which 
 Ulysses and Nausicaa meet. You have in- 
 fused a kind of biblical patriarchal manner 
 into it, it reads like some story of Jacob and 
 Rachel, or some of those primitive manners. 
 I am ashamed to carp at words, but I did it in 
 obedience to your desires, and the plain reason 
 why I did not acknowledge your kind present 
 sooner was that I had no criticisms of value to 
 make. I shall certainly beg the opinion of my 
 friend who read the two first Books on this 
 enlarged Performance. But he is so very much 
 engaged that I cannot at present get at him, 
 and besides him I have no acquaintance that 
 takes much interest in Poetry, Greek or Eng- 
 lish. But I hope and adjure you to go on and 
 do not make excuses of Age till you have 
 completed the Odyssey, and done a great part 
 of Horace besides. Then you will be entitled 
 to hang up your Harp. 
 
 " I am, dear Sir, with Love to all your 
 family, 
 
 " Your hble. Serv., 
 
 "C. Lamb. 
 
 *' lo Mar. 1810, E. L Ho." 
 237
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 In Mr. Lloyd's translation of the Sixth 
 Book, Nausicaa thus addressed her maidens : — 
 
 Why do ye fly, my maids ? why should the sight 
 
 Of this poor man thus fill you with affright ? 
 
 He is not like a fierce invading foe. 
 
 Whose savage spirits vigorously flow ; 
 
 And we are dear to heaven — the ocean roars 
 
 Around our happy and sequester'd shores : 
 
 With other states no intercourse we hold ; 
 
 But can we from this wanderer withhold 
 
 Our friendly aid ? The stranger and the poor 
 
 Jove sends for succour to the rich man's door; 
 
 The smallest gift which charity imparts. 
 
 Is like a cordial to their drooping hearts. 
 
 Now wine and food to this poor mortal bring. 
 
 And wash his body in the flowing spring ; 
 
 But to some shelter'd, quiet nook repair. 
 
 And guard his shivering limbs from chilling air. 
 
 The passage illustrates Lamb's comment. 
 Mr. Lloyd, one might say, Quakerised Homer. 
 
 A few of Lamb's suggestions are picked 
 from the list. Mr. Lloyd rendered (Book L, 
 lines 163-5) : — 
 
 Ei xeTvov y* 'I0dx7]v8e iSoiaTO voffTTJffavra, 
 Ttdvreq x' Apr^aaiaT^ iXa<pp6Tspoi ToSaq elvat 
 ^ d-cpvetoTspoi XpuffoTo re iffOr/Toq re. 
 238
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ODYSSEY" 
 
 Should he return, their feet would soon express 
 How much swift feet excelled parade of dress. 
 
 The comment was : — " ' Parade of dress' 
 strikes the ear as too modern ; though in 
 reality the modernest English is not more re- 
 moved from Greek than the ancientest, yet the 
 imagination is unwilling to receive a word in 
 a Translation of Homer which has not the 
 sanction of years." 
 
 Again, Mr. Lloyd employed "whelming 
 tide" as an equivalent for (Book I., line 183) 
 oivoTta novrov . Said Lamb : — " ' Whelming 
 tide.' A bad Epithet. We may speak of 
 Vessels sunk beneath the whelming tide, but 
 hardly of vessels sailing over it. It is a prop- 
 erty of the sea to overwhelm, but ships riding 
 over it do not naturally remind one of that 
 property." 
 
 Mr. Lloyd used "patriotic." Lamb ob- 
 jected : " Patriotic strikes my ears also as too 
 modern. Besides that in English few words 
 of more than three syllables chime well into a 
 verse ;" and a similar nicety of feeling for 
 words informed his objection to the phrase 
 
 " express his sentiments." Lamb called it 
 239
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " modern and novel phraseology. I mean the 
 phrase of novels. The word sentiment was 
 scarcely Anglicised before the time of Steme." 
 And when " sentiment" occurred again Lamb 
 wrote : " Sentiments — I would root this word 
 out of a translation of Homer. It came in 
 with Sterne, and was a child he had by Affec- 
 tation." 
 
 In the third Book (lines 199-200) Mr. Lloyd 
 rendered : — 
 
 xai ffh, (piloi; — [idXa yap a 6p6io xaXov re fiiyav re — 
 cikxtfjioq eW, 'iva Tt^ ffe xai 6(^>iy6vojv eu ef;rjj, 
 
 And thou, my friend, of whom I augur well. 
 Be brave, and strive in virtue to excel. 
 That thy good deeds may live in future days. 
 And be reported with deserved praise. 
 
 Lamb remarked : — " I doubt if Homer had any 
 such an idea as we have when we talk of striv- 
 ing to excel in virtue. I am afraid the phrase 
 is more correspondent to the Telemachus of 
 Fenelon than of Homer. Orestes' revengeful 
 slaughter of yEgisthus is the model to which 
 Nestor directs Telemachus, something different 
 from what we mean by virtue." 
 
 The use of " exit " called forth this rebuke : — 
 240
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ODYSSEY" 
 
 ^^ Exit is a sad tombstone-word. It is thrice 
 bad : bad as being Latin ; as being a word of 
 stage-direction ; and as being inscribed on half 
 the tombstones in the Kingdom." Again, 
 when Mr. Lloyd wrote : — 
 
 Envy will pine at such a happy sight 
 Benevolence surveys it with delight, 
 
 — -KoX}^ aXyea dufffievieffffiv, 
 ^dpfiara 5' su/xsvirrjfft ' jidXiffTa 3i t k'xXuov abroi^ 
 
 Lamb was severe : — 
 
 " ' Envy will pine, &c. 
 Benevolence survey it with delight.' 
 
 I should suspect these personifications are the 
 Translator's. They sound ^^j/-Homeric.'* 
 
 Finally there is this objection to the use of 
 the word " uncle :" — " Uncle — rather a hazard- 
 ous word ; would you call Pallas his niece '? I 
 cannot conceive of such relationships as Uncles 
 and Nieces and Cousins (at least the names of 
 them) among the Gods." 
 
 Among other critics of the " Odyssey," 
 Catherine Hutton, the daughter of William 
 Hutton, the antiquary and historian of Bir- 
 i6 241
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 mingham, and the neighbour of Mr. Lloyd, 
 wrote with enthusiasm : — 
 
 ''Bennett's Hill, June 25 [1810]. 
 " Dear Sir, — I have read your seven Books 
 of the ' Odyssey' with great pleasure, and re- 
 turn you my sincere thanks for the present. I 
 can only repeat my astonishment that a man 
 of your business, public and private, a man 
 with your numerous family and family con- 
 cerns, could possibly have found time to attain 
 such a knowledge of Greek as was necessary 
 to give us a faithful picture of Homer. As 
 things are, it would be selfish to say I am sorry 
 to leave Ulysses at the court of Alcinous ; but 
 if you would allow us to contribute to his 
 travelling expenses, I should be very happy if 
 you would set him down at Ithaca. You give 
 us every minuti^ and no circumlocution." 
 (The end of the letter has been cut away.') 
 
 ' Here in spite of its irrelevance, might be quoted a passage from 
 another of Catherine Hutton's infrequent letters to Mr. Lloyd. With 
 reference to Clarkson's "History of the Quakers," a work in which 
 Mr. Lloyd naturally took great interest, she wrote wittily, in 1808 : " I 
 have read Clarkson through with great pleasure. Almost he per- 
 suades me — not to be a Quaker, but to wish I had been born and bred 
 one." For much interesting matter concerning Catherine Hutton, 
 242
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "ODYSSEY" 
 Southey expressed himself as follows : — 
 
 "Keswick, December 14, 1810. 
 
 " Dear Sir, — I ought long ago to have 
 thanked you for your little volume. Without 
 comparing the versification to Pope's in point 
 of high finishing, I can truly say that I think 
 it a versification of a better kind — flowing 
 more naturally, less monotonous and therefore 
 less wearying. Charles [Lloyd] I perceive has 
 marked several passages in my copy as imper- 
 fect rhymes, — I cannot consider them as blem- 
 ishes; it is from the French that our critics 
 have learnt to condemn them, and a com- 
 parison of their theory of verse with that of 
 other countries would prove that the objection 
 proceeds rather from obtuseness of ear than 
 from delicacy. The only thing I should ob- 
 ject to in your lines is when you occasionally 
 pronounce what use has made a mute syllable, 
 for instance : — 
 
 Not unobserv^</ by the noble maid. 
 
 There is a license which of late years I have 
 never allowed myself 
 
 the reader is referred to two books by Mrs. C. H. Beale : — " Remi- 
 niscences of a Gentlewoman of the Last Century," and "Catherine 
 Hutton and Her Friends." 
 
 243
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " I hope you will find leisure to complete 
 what you have begun. The Odyssey is a 
 delightful poem, and the most delightful parts 
 of it are yet to come. And tho' there is a 
 richness and fulness in the Greek hexameter 
 which no English metre can imitate (and least 
 of all the couplet, which I hold to be the very 
 worst possible metre for narration) yet your 
 version represents Homer more faithfully than 
 either Pope or Cowper : the stiffness of the 
 latter is as unlike the original, as the finery of 
 the former. . . . 
 
 " Believe me, Sir, 
 
 " Yrs. with true respect, 
 " Robert Southey." 
 
 Mr. Lloyd completed the translation of the 
 "Odyssey" in 1816; but only the first seven 
 books were printed. At the beginning of the 
 manuscript volume which contains the transla- 
 tion the date on which each of the twenty-four 
 books was finished has been recorded by the 
 author. The composition of the 14,591 lines 
 of which they consist extended over a period 
 of eight years. 
 
 244
 
 XIV 
 
 MR. Lloyd's "Horace" 
 1812-1813 
 
 Although intent upon Homer, Mr. Lloyd 
 had dallied also with Horace, and in 1812 he 
 issued, for private circulation, a slender volume 
 in boards : " The Epistles of Horace : Trans- 
 lated into English Verse." Six of these ren- 
 derings had appeared from time to time in the 
 Gentleman's Magazine^ and Lamb, it will be re- 
 membered, had complimented Mr. Lloyd upon 
 one of them (see p. 234), and had urged him to 
 continue his Horatian studies. 
 
 Hence Mr. Lloyd's volume, when ready, was 
 instantly despatched to London for Lamb's 
 opinion. Lamb replied forthwith : — 
 
 "India House, Tuesday, 8 Sep., 181 2. 
 
 " Dear Sir, — I return you thanks for your 
 
 little Book. I am no great Latinist, but you 
 
 appear to me to have very happily caught the 
 24s
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Horatian manner. Some of them I had seen 
 before. What gave me most satisfaction has 
 been the 14th Epistle (its easy and Gentleman- 
 Hke beginning, particularly), and perhaps next 
 to that, the Epistle to Augustus, which reads 
 well even after Pope's delightful Imitation of 
 it. What I think the least finish'd is the 18th 
 Epistle. It is a metre which never gave me 
 much pleasure.^ I like your eight syllable 
 verses very much. They suit the Epistolary 
 style quite as well as the ten. I am only sorry 
 not to find the Satires in the same volume. I 
 hope we may expect them. I proceed to find 
 some few oversights, if you will indulge me, 
 or what seem so to me, for I have neglected 
 my Latin (and quite lost my Greek) since I 
 left construing it at School. I will take them 
 as I find them mark'd in order." 
 
 But here, before turning to the textual com- 
 ments, may be quoted the Epistle which best 
 pleased the critic — the Fourteenth : — 
 
 ' This is the metre : — 
 
 If rightly I know thee, thou wilt not offend, 
 
 My Lollius, by flattery, the ears of a friend, 
 
 246
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "HORACE" 
 
 TO MY STEWARD 
 Steward of my woods and self-restoring farm, 
 (Despised by thee) which formerly was warm 
 With five bright fires — a place of some renown. 
 Which sent five Senators to Varia's town ; 
 Let us contend, who is the most inclined, 
 I to pluck up the thorns which choak the mind. 
 Or thou the thorns which my estate molest ; 
 And whether Horace or his farm thrive best. 
 Lamia has lost his brother, and my grief 
 For him who mourns, despairing of relief. 
 Detains me here, tho' there my heart and soul 
 Bear me impatient of undue controul. 
 I call the country, thou the town-man blest ; 
 He hates his own, who others' lots likes best : 
 The place is blamed unjustly, for we find 
 That change of place can never change the mind ; 
 At Rome by others hurried here and there. 
 Thou for the country didst prefer thy prayer; 
 My steward now, thy fickle heart resorts 
 Again to Rome, its bagnios, and its sports ; 
 While I, consistent with myself, pursue 
 One steady plan, and this thou know'st is true ; 
 And when by hateful business forced to move 
 To Rome, I leave with grief the farm I love : 
 Our inclinations differ — hence we see 
 That I and thou must ever disagree ; 
 For what thou call'st a wild deserted waste. 
 Exactly suits my own and others' taste. 
 Who hate what thou applaudest ; — filthy stews 
 And greasy taverns, suit thy low life views 
 247
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Of city happiness. — A rural scene. 
 
 Where spices grow, not grapes, thou thinkest 
 
 mean ; 
 No tavern near which can its wine supply ; 
 No dancing songsters to allure the eye 
 And charm the ear ; yet, if thy tale be true. 
 Thou dost not fail thy business to pursue ; 
 To plough my fallows overrun with weeds. 
 And strip the leaves on which my bullock feeds ; 
 To watch the river when the showers descend. 
 And currents rippling thro' the fields to tend. 
 Come now; I'll tell thee why we disagree ; 
 Fine clothes and hair perfumed delighted me. 
 Rapacious Cynara I once could please 
 Without a fee, with pleasantry and ease ; 
 In rich Falernian wine I took delight. 
 And often sat till very late at night ; 
 Now I eat little and but little drink, 
 I sleep delighted near the river's brink. 
 On the soft grass. — I can't recall the past. 
 But I should blush, did youthful follies last. 
 Safe in the country, there no envious spy 
 Views my possessions with a jaundiced eye ; 
 No biting slander and no secret hate 
 Approach the confines of my small estate ; 
 The clods and stones I carry from my ground. 
 My neighbours see me, and the smile goes round. 
 To sit with slaves is thy delight and pride. 
 At a large city table well supplied ; 
 With them thou wishest thy abode to fix. 
 And in their meals and merriment to mix; 
 248
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "HORACE" 
 
 While my more active footboy longs to change 
 
 Places with thee, and o'er my fields to range ; 
 
 The flocks, the garden, and the wood heap'd fire. 
 
 Despised by thee, excite his fond desire ; 
 
 The lazy ox, the horse's trappings saw 
 
 With longing eye — the horse the plough would draw ; 
 
 But as in difil:rent stations they excel. 
 
 Each cheerfully should act his own part well. 
 
 The first of Lamb's criticisms refers to a 
 passage in the Sixth Epistle (Book I.) " To 
 Numicus :" — 
 
 Virtutem verba putas et 
 Lucum ligna? 
 
 which Mr. Lloyd had rendered thus : — 
 
 Think'st thou that virtue is composed of words. 
 As some men think a grove composed of boards ? 
 
 Lamb objected : — " I do not quite like render- 
 ing ligna, boards. I take the passage to allude 
 to the religious character of their groves, and 
 that Horace means to say, If you are one who 
 think virtue to be mere words, and account 
 no more of a grove (that is, of a consecrated 
 place) than of so much timber. — As I should 
 
 say, if you look upon a Church as only so 
 249
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 much brick and mortar, i.e. divested of its 
 sacred character. I don't know if I am right 
 — but boards sound awkward to me : timber I 
 think should be the word. Timber is a word 
 we apply to wood dead or alive. Boards only 
 to the dead wood." 
 
 The next reference is to the Seventh Epistle 
 (Book I.) " To Maecenas." Mr. Lloyd had 
 converted Horace's 
 
 Dum pueris omnis pater et matercula pallet, 
 Officiosaque sedulitas et opella forensis 
 Adducit febres et testamenta resignat 
 
 to 
 
 Now fathers and mothers are pale for their boys. 
 And the forum's engagements, its bustle and noise. 
 And officious attention, together combine 
 To bring fevers, which cause us our wills to resign. 
 
 Lamb wrote : — " Our wills to resign is literally 
 
 the rendering of testamenta resignare — and 
 
 would it not also as aptly apply to voluntates 
 
 deponere? The resignation of the will in an 
 
 hour of sickness gives one a Christian idea. 
 
 At all events, resign should have been written 
 
 re-sign, which would have precluded the 
 
 Ambiguity." 
 
 250
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "HORACE" 
 
 Again, Mr. Lloyd thus opened the Epistle 
 to Aristius Fuscus (Book I., lo) : — 
 
 We who a country life enjoy. 
 Whom rural pleasures never cloy. 
 Wish health and peace may always crown 
 Our Fuscus, who prefers the town ; 
 For tho' in this we disagree. 
 We feel like twins a sympathy 
 In other things ; — what one refuses. 
 The other does, and so he chooses ; 
 Of the old Dove thou keep'st the nest 
 While I (and think myself more blest) 
 Extol the scenes which nature yields. 
 Rivers which flow thro' verdant fields, 
 
 and so on. Lamb commented : — " ' Of the old 
 
 dove thou keep'st the nest.' Turning to the 
 
 original, I find it ' vetuli notique columbi. Tu 
 
 nidum servas, ego,' &c., which I have always 
 
 translated a pair of old and well acquainted 
 
 Doves, one of us (you) keep to your nest, the 
 
 other (I) praise the Country. I have always 
 
 taken columbi to be plural and to refer to Tu 
 
 et ego. Referring to Creech, I find he translates 
 
 it as I would." 
 
 In translating " Libertino natum patre" in the 
 
 Epistle "To His Book" (Book I., 20), Mr. 
 251
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Lloyd had written " From a father libertine de- 
 scended." Lamb demurred to this : — " I don't 
 know whether libertine in our unhappy perver- 
 sion of the meaning would be any great compli- 
 ment to the memory of a parent. In English 
 it always means a person of loose morals, 
 though by transposing the order of the words 
 you have perhaps obviated the objection. A 
 libertine father would have shock'd the ear. 
 The transposition leads us to the Latin mean- 
 ing, by making us pause a little. I believe 
 this is a foolish objection." Horace's own 
 meaning for the word was, of course, a 
 " freed man." 
 
 Lamb continued : — " You have two or three 
 times translated ' solennis' by ' solemn.' Has 
 not the English word acquired a gravity and 
 religion, which the Latin did not intend?" 
 Lamb then cited two instances. One was in 
 the Epistle "To Maecenas" (Book L, i), where 
 the translator rendered " Insanire putas solemnia 
 me," " Thou think'st me then quite solemnly 
 unsound." Lamb commented thus* — '"Sol- 
 emnly unsound' — does ' solemnia insanire' mean 
 anything more than to be mad with leave of 
 
 custom — to be orderly or warrantably mad*?" 
 252
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "HORACE" 
 
 The other instance was in the Epistle " To 
 Augustus" (Book II., i), where 
 
 Romas dulce diu fuit et soUemne reclusa 
 Mane domo vigilare 
 
 became 
 
 'Twas long a custom sanctioned at Rome, 
 To spend the morning solemnly at home. 
 
 Lamb remarked : — " ' To spend the morning 
 solemnly at home.' Does ' solenne fuit' mean 
 anything more than that it was customary or 
 habitual with them to stay at home? Our 
 solemn is applied only directly to forms of relig- 
 ious or grave occasions, as a solemn hymn or 
 funeral; and indirectly or ironically to grave 
 stupid people — as a solemn coxcomb — which 
 latter I am afraid you will think me for being 
 so verbose on a trifling objection." 
 
 One other correction. Mr. Lloyd, in the 
 same Epistle, had rendered " socco" " buskins." 
 Lamb pointed out : — " It should have been 
 rendered by the word sock^ which refers to 
 Comedy. The Cothurnus or Buskin was the 
 high-rais'd shoe of the tragic actor." 
 
 The letter concluded : — " Let me only add 
 253
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 that I hope you will continue an employment 
 which must have been so delightful to you. 
 That it may have the power of stealing you 
 occasionally from some sad thoughts is my 
 fervent wish and hope. Pray, Dear Sir, give 
 my kindest remembrances to Mrs. Lloyd, and 
 to Plumstead — I am afraid I can add no more 
 who are likely to remember me. Charles and I 
 sometimes correspond. He is a letter in my 
 debt." (The remainder of the letter is torn 
 away.) 
 
 Two other letters referring to the " Horace" 
 are worthy of quotation. This, from Catherine 
 Hutton, is terse and sensible : — • 
 
 Bennett's Hill, Nov. io [1812]. 
 
 " Dear Sir, — I beg you will accept my sin- 
 cere thanks for your book. I own I felt disap- 
 pointed that it was not Homer ; but I am now 
 glad it is Horace. I have read it to my Father, 
 who is much pleased with it, and says he owes 
 his first acquaintance with Horace to you. 
 He repeated the saying of Voltaire with regard 
 to Hudibras, ' There are more thoughts than 
 words.* 
 
 254
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "HORACE" 
 
 " If a man chooses to make a paraphrase, let 
 him ; only I would not choose to read it : for I 
 do not think a story or a subject improved by 
 being wire-drawn. But if he professes to make 
 a translation, it seems to me that he should 
 keep as close to his author as possible. He 
 who does this, and in a pleasing manner, is the 
 best translator. 
 
 " Your Horace gives me an exact idea of 
 the manners of the Romans. 
 " I am, dear Sir, 
 
 " Your very obliged, 
 
 " Catherine Hutton." 
 
 The other letter is from Southey, and thereby 
 hangs a tale. In the spring of 1809 Charles 
 Lloyd the younger, who had been supplied with 
 manuscript copies of his father's translations to 
 show to his friends the Lake poets, wrote thus 
 from Old Brathay : — 
 
 " I have not shown these translations to my 
 friends, for the omission of which in each par- 
 ticular case I have a separate reason to give. 
 Both Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Southey pro- 
 fess to admire thy translation of Homer very 
 much, and often voluntarily introduce the sub- 
 255
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 ject in order to express their commendations — 
 but, as a reason for my omitting to obey thy 
 injunction which applies equally to all three, I 
 must inform thee that I know they have next 
 to a contempt for Horace : and the best trans- 
 lations that could possibly be conceived of his 
 verses would not, I believe, give them any 
 pleasure. Now I will give the reason for my 
 omission, which applies to each of these per- 
 sonages distinctly. Wordsworth is so much 
 occupied with political subjects just now, and 
 with a pamphlet which he has in the press on 
 the Portuguese Convention, &c., that I am sure 
 it would be impossible to draw his attention to 
 any other subject — besides, even at best he is 
 proverbially indifferent to the literary efforts of 
 others. Coleridge is so miserable in mind and 
 body that he pays no attention to the most 
 urgent [of his] own affairs. It is true I did 
 me[ntion these] translations of thine to him, 
 and [asked him] to look at them when he had 
 [ar-] ranged the publication of The Fri[end. 
 But] The Friend is now as far from being 
 arranged as it was 6 months ago. In fact he 
 attends to nothing but dreamy reading and still 
 
 more dreamy feelings. This I would not upon 
 256
 
 MR. LLOYD'S "HORACE" 
 
 any account have communicated out of the 
 family. Southey has such an invincible dislike 
 to Horace that I would not show a translation 
 by Pope himself of that author to him. . . . 
 In spite of what I have now urged, if I have a 
 convenient opening, I will put thy translations 
 into the hands of my friends — but poets, I 
 fancy, ever were, and ever will be an intractable 
 race. — If thou hadst any more of Homer to 
 send me I would put that into their hands with 
 pleasure." 
 
 The foregoing remarks apply to the manu- 
 script versions. When printed, a copy of 
 the Horace was, none the less, despatched to 
 Southey by the undaunted translator ; and this 
 was Southey's diplomatic acknowledgment : — 
 
 Keswick, April ii, 1813. 
 
 " My dear Sir, — I received yesterday from 
 Old Brathay, your Epistles of Horace, and am 
 much obliged to you for the book. You have 
 attempted a task of great difficulty, and you 
 have performed it respectably everywhere, and 
 in some parts with singular success. 
 17 257
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " Charles writes to me in healthy spirits. I 
 am glad to find that he has amused himself 
 with ' Alfieri,' an occupation which I suggested 
 to him last year. If he completes the trans- 
 lation (as seems likely) it will be an acquisition 
 to our literature, and may at least be expected 
 to repay him with credit. I hope we shall soon 
 see him here, now that we are enjoying long 
 evenings and fine weather. 
 
 " Believe me, my dear Sir [the signature has 
 been cut away]." 
 
 And here, save for one other slight experi- 
 ment to be mentioned later, we leave Mr. 
 Lloyd as translator. 
 
 258
 
 XV 
 
 CHARLES LLOYD AT OLD BRATHAY 
 
 1808-1815 
 
 Of Charles Lloyd's life at Old Brathay the 
 records are meagre. He spent the years in al- 
 ternations of light and shadow, the light never 
 very radiant, the shadow gloomy beyond de- 
 scription. As he grew older, his fits of melan- 
 choly depression became increasingly serious, 
 and, as Dr. Garnett points out in the " Diction- 
 ary of National Biography," bore a curious 
 likeness to those which afflicted Cowper. 
 
 But during his serene, or less troubled periods, 
 Lloyd's conditions had little resemblance to 
 those of the recluse of Olney. His house was 
 noisy with children, to whom he seems to have 
 been a loving and solicitous parent ; his wife 
 was ever at his side ; members of his family 
 continually paid him visits, and in the neigh- 
 bourhood he had many friends. 
 
 Lloyd's tastes were simple. Walking, with 
 259
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 long pauses for the contemplation of scenery, 
 gardening, reading, and conversation at high 
 pressure — these were his favourite beguile ments. 
 According to De Quincey, Lloyd's house was 
 at one time a centre of gaiety. Many dinner 
 parties were given, at which Lloyd was an ad- 
 mirable host, and there were even dances, in 
 which, though he took no part, he found much 
 pleasure. The Old Brathay cottage numbered 
 among its visitors the Wordsworths, the Cole- 
 ridges, the Southeys, " Christopher North" and 
 Miss Penny (afterwards his wife). Dr. Watson, 
 the Bishop of LlandafF, Miss Watson, his 
 daughter, with whom Charles Lloyd corre- 
 sponded in French, and De Ouincey. 
 
 It is to the account of Lloyd which forms a 
 chapter in De Quincey's " Autobiography" that 
 we are indebted for much that is known of 
 him at this time. De Quincey, it is true, is not 
 always to be relied upon, but we must take 
 what we can. He wrote thus of Lloyd's ap- 
 pearance : — " He was tall and somewhat clumsy 
 — not intellectual so much as benign and con- 
 ciliatory in his expression of face. His features 
 were not striking, but they expressed great 
 
 goodness of heart ; and latterly wore a depre- 
 260
 
 CHARLES LLOYD (177a-Ls;i9) 
 By John Constable, R.A. 
 
 From (I pii'linr in Ihc poKscssion of C. A. Uoijd, Esq.
 
 CHARLES LLOYD AT OLD BRATHAY 
 
 catory expression that was peculiarly touching 
 to those who knew its cause." 
 
 Of Lloyd's conversational powers De Quincey 
 left this record : — " It was really a delightful 
 luxury to hear him giving free scope to his 
 powers for investigating subtle combinations 
 of character ; for distinguishing all the shades 
 and affinities of some presiding qualities, dis- 
 entangling, their intricacies, and balancing, 
 antithetically, one combination of qualities 
 against another. But," added the historian, 
 " let but one person enter the room of whose 
 sympathy he did not feel secure, and his powers 
 forsook him as suddenly as the buoyancy of a 
 bird that has received a mortal shot in its wing. 
 Accordingly, it is a fact that neither Words- 
 worth nor Coleridge ever suspected the amount 
 of power which was latent in Lloyd ; for he 
 firmly believed that both of them despised him. 
 Mrs. Lloyd thought the same thing." ' 
 
 Whether or not Coleridge and Wordsworth 
 entertained that feeling for Lloyd cannot be said. 
 We know at any rate that some years before 
 
 ' Mrs. Lloyd, whom De Quincey admired and respected — she was 
 "unsurpassed," he declared, "as wife and mother" — reminded him 
 in appearance of Mrs. Jordan, the actress. 
 261
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Coleridge had believed Lloyd to possess genius. 
 Hypersensitive natures are apt to misconstrue, 
 and Lloyd may have magnified into contempt 
 the antipathy which the two poets would natu- 
 rally feel for a morbid mind. Be that as it may, 
 both men were occasionally in his society. 
 
 On the other hand the younger Coleridges 
 would seem positively to have courted it. " I 
 remember," wrote Hartley Coleridge among his 
 reminiscences, " dear Charles Lloyd reading 
 Pope's ' Translation of Statins' in the little 
 drawing-room at Old Brathay. The room, the 
 furniture, the little 1 2^0 Pope, are all before me. 
 He highly commended the following lines : — 
 
 Yet who, before, more popularly bow'd ? 
 Who more propitious to the suppliant crowd ? 
 Patient of right, familiar in the throne. 
 What wonder then ? He was not then alone. 
 
 Lloyd appreciated Pope as rightly as any 
 man I ever knew, which I ascribe partly to his 
 intelligent enjoyment of French writers, tem- 
 pered as it was with reverent admiration of the 
 greater English." And Derwent Coleridge, in 
 his memoir of his brother Hartley, says of their 
 earlier life : " We were lodged at Clappersgate, 
 
 a small hamlet beautifully situated at the dis- 
 262
 
 CHARLES LLOYD AT OLD BRATHAY 
 
 tance of a mile from the town, this place having 
 been selected on account of its neamess to Old 
 Brathay, the residence of my father's literary 
 friend Charles Lloyd. . . . His sons, four noble 
 lads, were our schoolfellows, and their admir- 
 able mother, had we needed it, would have been 
 a mother to us." 
 
 In Lloyd's Old Brathay letters to his brother 
 Robert, there are interesting passages concerning 
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Here is one from a 
 letter at the end of 1 808 : — 
 
 " Coleridge has made us several visits lately. 
 We are very much interested with his society — 
 indeed I can set no bounds to my astonishment 
 at his talents. Coleridge is talking of publish- 
 ing a weekly paper which he calls The Friend 
 — it is to resemble in its plan the Spectator, 
 Guardian, &c. — The prospectus of the work is 
 now printing at Kendal. — It is to treat of sub- 
 jects moral, and in connection with taste and 
 general literature — and indeed it is to extend to 
 all topics except those of politics and religion. 
 — If the work comes out he would be much 
 obliged to you to promote its sale by procuring 
 subscriptions for him — when the prospectus is 
 
 printed I will send you some copies. 
 263
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 " I have translated about half of Ovid's 
 ' Metamorphoses,' and there I remain : the ap- 
 petite for this employment has not seized me 
 lately — and if I have not an appetite to begin 
 with I never succeed." (He did not complete 
 the task.) 
 
 In the following January, 1809, Coleridge 
 spent a few days with the Lloyds at Old Brathay. 
 Fortunately Agatha Lloyd, Charles's sister, was 
 a guest at the same time, and hence the follow- 
 ing description in a letter to Robert's wife : — 
 
 " Coleridge has been our guest since sixth 
 day ; he intends going to Grasmere to-day. 
 He is too interesting a man to live comfortably 
 with a long time — he has very strong affec- 
 tions, but in his domestic habits I do not 
 wonder at his being a very trying husband, 
 unless his wife could be so entirely absorbed in 
 his mind as not to think of the inconvenience 
 of being put out of her way in every day oc- 
 currences, which after all make up the great 
 sum of our lives ; and I believe little inatten- 
 tions of that sort are and must be felt. He is 
 truly a wonderful man — his powers of conver- 
 sation and the richness and extent of his mind 
 
 are indeed extraordinary, and I only wish, by a 
 264
 
 CHARLES LLOYD AT OLD BRATHAY 
 
 little more attention to system than to impulse^ 
 he were more calculated to shine as a domestic 
 character. He has two interesting boys for 
 whom he has a most fatherly affection. Hart- 
 ley is a child to me ■painfully out of the com- 
 mon way both in mind and constitution — 
 should he live, poor fellow, he will be a most 
 interesting character, and I wish, as related his 
 parents^ he were in more happy circumstances. 
 I have been going on without appearing to con- 
 sider thee, but thou must excuse me. Southey 
 was here for an hour on sixth day, and Words- 
 worth called ; so the three northern poets were 
 all here that day. This seems the land of 
 genius, but I shall be very well contented to 
 leave the genii of the mountains for my dear 
 friends at home, who after all are my only true 
 friends. — I feel confident of this, and wish more 
 and more to cherish a disposition to love and 
 be loved by my own fireside, amongst those of 
 my own family." ^ 
 
 « It was Agatha Lloyd (1791-1838), the writer of this letter, who 
 transmitted the poetical instinct of the family. By her marriage with 
 James Pearson she had several children. Among them was Mary 
 Caroline, who married Robert Benson Dockray. One of their daugh- 
 ters, Mary, married the Rev. Frederick Binyon, and became the 
 mother of Mr. Laurence Binyon, the author of " A Book of London 
 265
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 On February 7, 1 809, Charles wrote : — " We 
 see nothing of Coleridge at present, in conse- 
 quence of several individuals of Wordsworth's 
 family not having had the measles ; but I re- 
 ceived a line from him the day before yester- 
 day, written on Saturday. Of ' The Friend' he 
 writes as follows : ' Wordsworth and myself 
 went to Kendal on Tuesday last to propose to 
 Pennington (the bookseller there) the printing 
 and publishing of ' The Friend,' stamped, &c., 
 as a newspaper, but we could settle nothing.' 
 He went to Kendal on Sunday a second time, 
 on the same business." 
 
 The following remarks on Coleridge, called 
 forth by the first number of ' The Friend,' are 
 interesting. They occur in a letter from 
 Charles to Robert, dated June 1 2, 1 809 : — 
 
 " I shall be much obliged to you for the 
 Beaumont and Fletcher and Massinger on the 
 terms you mention — also for Lamb's specimens 
 of ancient dramatic writers and Mrs. Leicester's 
 School. We have the tales from Shakspeare. 
 I certainly think the first number of ' The 
 
 Visions," and " Porphyrion, and other Poems;" another, Agatha 
 
 Sophia, married the Rev. Stephen Phillips, and became the mother of 
 
 Mr. Stephen Phillips, the author of " Christ in Hades," and " Poems." 
 
 266
 
 CHARLES LLOYD AT OLD BRATHAY 
 
 Friend' abstruse and laboured in the style — it 
 is evidently written with great difficulty. I 
 cannot say that I am more pleased with the 
 second. Coleridge has such a lamentable want 
 of voluntary power. If he is excited by a 
 remark in company, he will pour forth, in an 
 evening, without the least apparent effort, what 
 would furnish matter for a hundred essays — 
 but the moment that he is to write — not from 
 present impulse but from preordained delibera- 
 tion — his powers fail him ; and I believe that 
 there are times when he could not pen the com- 
 monest notes. He is one of those minds who, 
 except in inspired moods, can do nothing — and 
 his inspirations are all oral, and not scriptural. 
 And when he is inspired he surpasses, in my 
 opinion, all that could be thought or imagined 
 of a human being. . . . But I have more 
 fears than hopes about this publication." 
 
 Here, from another letter, is a hint of Lloyd's 
 taste in literature at that time : — " When my 
 Mother comes I should be glad to have Rollin, 
 Barrow, and Marcus Antoninus sent, also the 
 plate of my arms, and the half-boots which are 
 to wear with the pantaloons and the ordering 
 
 of which I leave entirely to you ; order for 
 267
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 me what you would order for yourself, only let 
 the boots be made rather stronger than your 
 town beaux would choose to wear. I shall 
 also thank you to send the inhaler. Please to 
 put these things under the care of Caroline in 
 preference to that of my Mother, who, though 
 quite disposed to perform an act of kindness, is 
 most philosophically indifferent to the common 
 affairs of life." Lloyd added, as if in proof 
 that such indifference was not also his : — " If 
 Hessian boots would do to wear with panta- 
 loons, or small clothes indiscriminately, I should 
 prefer them — but not without." 
 
 The rest of the letter, and one or two that 
 followed it, dealt with " Isabel," a novel written 
 by Charles Lloyd some years previously, and 
 now being revised and transcribed for the bene- 
 fit of Miss Watson. " There is," he wrote, 
 *'an accurate delineation of passion in it, but 
 the story is incurably defective." " Isabel" was 
 a piece of Rousseauism, the product of an un- 
 healthy mind. After toying with its revision 
 for some months the author had a few copies 
 printed for private distribution ; but almost im- 
 mediately afterwards, in accordance, presumably, 
 
 with the strongly-expressed views of his father, 
 268
 
 CHARLES LLOYD AT OLD BRATHAY 
 
 he ordered its suppression. In the letter con- 
 taining the instructions for this suppression is a 
 passage of arms between the two brothers. 
 Robert seems to have disapproved with some 
 vigour of the " accurate deUneation of passion" ; 
 Charles replied : — 
 
 " I cannot agree with you that ' Isabel' is a 
 dangerous book. The proper answer to the 
 following query of yours, ' Why should minds 
 who feel the tyranny of love be, by any coinci- 
 dence, confirmed that it can only be released 
 from its thraldom by death T arises from what 
 I have said in the preface on the nature of the 
 passions — viz., taking for granted, that even in 
 their most perilous degree Ihey must exist in some 
 characters, it is better to provide intellectual as- 
 sociations for them even in this perilous degree. 
 An Isabel would no more die of love than she 
 otherwise would,, because she had somewhere 
 read in a novel of a heroine that died of Love. 
 We are governed by the law of our own nature, 
 and not by the law which we read of in others 
 — and the law of another mind no further 
 affects mine than as far as it coincides with 
 mine — therefore if the law of my mind be 
 
 death from Love, I shall die whether I read 
 269
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 books that inculcate the omnipotence of love 
 or not ; if the law of my mind be not death 
 from Love, I shall not die tho' I read of Paphian 
 victims from morning till night. Farewell ! 
 my dear Robert, I hope that when this arrives 
 you will not be immersed in the ' quagmire of 
 morbidity.' I was very much amused by the 
 phrase, and think that there is a considerable 
 Hudibrastic felicity in it." 
 
 The year of the letter just quoted was 1811, 
 when another season of affliction was imminent. 
 The following passage, written to Robert a 
 month or so after, contains a piece of searching 
 self-revelation : — 
 
 " I often wish that I had some one entirely 
 sympathizing friend, but this is a chimerical 
 wish ; a person to feel entire sympathy with 
 one must have suffered as much, and, in the 
 way that I have done, and then he would be 
 as full of his sufferings as I am of mine, and 
 therefore rather calculated to wish to act upon 
 another than to be acted upon himself: added 
 to this that I doubt whether, all things con- 
 sidered, morbid persons are edifying com- 
 panions for each other. I fully believe that 
 
 the secret why persons of extreme sensibility 
 270
 
 CHARLES LLOYD AT OLD BRATHAY 
 
 seldom or never agree long together is, that 
 there are few of that temperament, perhaps 
 none, such is the constitution of the world, 
 that do not suffer very much — and, as I said 
 before, they rather want to impress than to be 
 impressed. Now they cannot excite an entire 
 sympathy except where they meet with a sen- 
 sibility equals and an experience similar^ to their 
 own ; but here in all probability, tho' the charm 
 will be great at first, the want on both sides will 
 be alike, i.e.^ an impatience to act upon rather 
 than be acted upon, and these fine minds will 
 quarrel very vulgarly. Such is in my opinion 
 the sketch of the history of almost all senti- 
 mental friendships, especially when they are 
 founded on the wish, selfish at bottom, rather 
 to pour out your own feelings than to be im- 
 pressed by the feelings of others. Indeed, in 
 almost all people of sensibility, I believe that 
 there is an impatience and an irritation when 
 they are long acted upon. What must be then 
 their fate *? Why, they must live in constant 
 irritation, or they must sit down content with 
 the joyless gloom of unparticipated feeling — 
 except indeed they have religion, which seems 
 
 to me the grand panacea for minds of this cast." 
 271
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Only a man gifted in no common degree with 
 introspection could have written that. Such a 
 passage justifies Talfourd's opinion of Charles 
 Lloyd : " His mind was chiefly remarkable for 
 a fine power of analysis. In this power of dis- 
 criminating and distinguishing, carried almost 
 to a pitch of painfulness, Lloyd has scarcely 
 been equalled. At a time when," Talfourd 
 added, " like Cowper, he believed himself the 
 especial subject of Divine wrath, he could bear 
 his part in the most subtle disquisitidhs on 
 questions of religion, morals, and poetry, with 
 the nicest accuracy of perception and the most 
 exemplary candour." 
 
 Among other admirers of Charles Lloyd's 
 swift and sure vision in metaphysical questions 
 was Shelley. During a visit to the Lakes, 
 Shelley borrowed, through Southey, Lloyd's 
 copy of Berkeley's works. " I remember," he 
 wrote to Leigh Hunt in 1819, " observing some 
 pencil notes in it, probably written by Lloyd, 
 which I thought particularly acute. One es- 
 pecially struck me as being the assertion of a 
 doctrine of which even then I had long been 
 persuaded, and on which I had founded much 
 
 of my persuasions as regarded the imagined 
 272
 
 CHARLES LLOYD AT OLD BRATHAY 
 
 cause of the universe — ' Mind cannot create, 
 it can only perceive.' " Shelley refers particu- 
 larly to the " Three Dialogues between Hylas 
 and Philonous in opposition to Sceptics and 
 Atheists." ' 
 
 In October, 1811, came Robert's sudden 
 death, a blow which fell on Charles Lloyd with 
 grievous force. In losing this brother, he lost 
 the one relative to whom he could unburden 
 his mind without hesitation. Henceforward, 
 for several years, he was in the clutch of despair, 
 with only occasional periods of alleviation, part 
 of which he employed in the somewhat gloomy 
 task, of translating the tragedies of Alfieri.'' His 
 
 * The book in question (the two-volume edition of 1784) is now in 
 the possession of Mr. C. A. Lloyd. 
 
 ' A translation of Alfieri was naturally not much to the taste of 
 Charles Lloyd's family. No record of Mr. Lloyd's opinion has come 
 down, but Priscilla Wordsworth, writing to Robert's wife a few days 
 before Waterloo, thus expressed her feelings : — 
 
 *• What an eventful period this is ! I never felt so depressed by the 
 outward state of things as at this moment. The external face of the 
 world seems to me full of discouragement. Have you read W.'s 
 " Excursion" ? I hope you have. It is a noble work — and cannot, I 
 think, be read without profit. I am sorry that I cannot either like or 
 approve Alfieri. The stories are so atrocious, as rather to disgust than 
 to excite sympathy — and the style is so inharmonious as by no means 
 to add to its attractions. I much regret that Charles should have 
 made choice of so unprepossessing an Author. Sir G. Beaumont — 
 18 273
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 version, in three volumes, was published in 1815, 
 just before his condition reached its first climax 
 of gravity. 
 
 The year 1815 brought more grief to the 
 Lloyd family ; for Charles's affliction was fol- 
 lowed by the death of Priscilla Wordsworth, 
 in October, at the age of only thirty-three. She 
 left three children. Well might Lamb write 
 to Miss Hutchinson, William Wordsworth's 
 sister-in-law : " Poor C. Lloyd and poor Pris- 
 cilla I" 
 
 who paid us a visit a few days ago — was at Rome when Alfieri acted 
 his own Tragedies. He spoke of them as pedantic, and uninteresting. 
 He observed that he saw him act, on the very days on which, accord- 
 ing to Alfieri's dates, some of his plays were written." 
 
 274
 
 XVI 
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 1818-1823 
 
 In 1818, however, came an unmistakable re- 
 newal of intellectual clearness and activity, and 
 with it Charles Lloyd's removal to London and 
 his re-entry into that literary life for which he 
 had once so longed. Mrs. Lloyd and his chil- 
 dren did not follow him thither until later. 
 
 Our first glimpse of him is in Macready's 
 " Reminiscences." In the spring of 1818, when 
 Macready was playing "Rob Roy McGregor; 
 or, Auld Lang Syne" at Covent Garden, he re- 
 ceived one morning an unsigned letter and a 
 sonnet, the writer of which set forth that the 
 actor's performance as the Highlander on the 
 previous night had caused the first gush of tears 
 — and consequent relief of mental tension — 
 that had come to him for years. Macready 
 had at the time no clue to the identity of the 
 sufferer whom he had thus been the means of 
 assisting, but a year or so after came to him a 
 275
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 presentation volume of poetry, in which the 
 sonnets figured, and he then learned that Charles 
 Lloyd was the author. 
 
 A friendship [wrote Macready] which lasted through 
 his life, speedily grew out of the acquaintance which this 
 compliment induced. I was a frequent visitor at his lodg- 
 ings, spending many evenings in delightful intercourse 
 with him and his most amiable and accomplished wife. 
 Under his roof I first became acquainted with Lamb, and 
 that sister to whom his brotherly devotion made his life 
 one course of self-denying heroism. She was most intel- 
 ligent and gentle in manners. Here, too, took place my 
 introduction to Talfourd, who has so eloquently told the 
 story of their woes. It was from Lloyd himself that I 
 received the melancholy account of his suiFerings. For 
 upwards of four years he had been afflicted with a most 
 extraordinary malady, a torpor of feeling, and, as it were, 
 a numbness of his faculties, that all the medical advice to 
 which he had resorted had been unable to relax or to dis- 
 pel. He was impenetrable to the efforts of skill or the 
 blandishments of affection. All intellectual pursuits had 
 been discontinued, and, as his sonnet intimates, life itself 
 had become wearisome. By some inexplicable chance he 
 strayed one night, he scarce knew why, into the pit of 
 Covent Garden Theatre, where the drama of *' Rob Roy" 
 was being acted. He became absorbed in the interest of 
 Scott's romantic story, and, in the scene where the out- 
 lawed chief dashes away the tears from his eyes, poor 
 Lloyd felt his own fast trickling down his cheeks. The 
 276
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 rock was struck, and the gushing stream was a new spring 
 of life to him. So he felt it, and testified to me, as the 
 instrument of his restoration, the most affectionate regard. 
 
 Thus relieved and re-invigorated, Charles 
 Lloyd had plunged into literary labours. From 
 London he addressed to Hannah Lloyd, Rob- 
 ert's widow, in whom he found a vein of sym- 
 pathy kindred to that which marked Robert as 
 his most congenial correspondent, several letters 
 which enable us to follow his actions and 
 thoughts with some closeness. Here are in- 
 teresting passages from a long communication, 
 dated July 28, 1819, in which, presumably 
 with the intention of preparing a new volume 
 for the press, he asked for copies of certain 
 sonnets that, from time to time, he had sent to 
 Hannah : — 
 
 " The constant succession of artificial im- 
 pressions, particularly that portion of them 
 which is addressed to the sense of hearing, 
 peculiar to a residence in London, produces all 
 the effect which I anticipated. Elsewhere I felt 
 literally alone in the world. Here I feel alone 
 as respects individual sympathy, but on all sides 
 a wall, a fortification of life, and human life, 
 
 seems to surround and protect me. Before I 
 277
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 came here, it was a phenomenon if I were em- 
 ployed ; and a still greater one if I were interested 
 in that employment. Here I am always doing 
 something, and the perpetual noise that I hear 
 from every quarter ; the perpetual, involuntary, 
 and unsought-for remindings of life with which, 
 on every side, the surrounding atmosphere is 
 impregnated, keep up an external counterpoise 
 to the restless agony ever busy within : and 
 tho' I must know that, in a religious sense, I 
 am no more protected here than I should be 
 among the Lybian deserts, since God is ever 
 present, 
 
 ever felt. 
 In the void waste, as in the city full. 
 And where He vital reigns, there must be joy.^ 
 
 yet the insensible influence of this " hum" and 
 bustle " of man" is considerable, and, as far as 
 
 ' From the Hymn at the end of Thomson's "Seasons' 
 should fate command me to the farthest verge 
 Of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes, 
 Rivers unknown to song ; where first the sun 
 Gilds Indian mountains, or his setting beam 
 Flames on th' Atlantic isles; 'tis nought to mej 
 Since God is ever present, ever felt. 
 In the void waste, as in the city full ; 
 And where He vital breathes, there must be joy. 
 278
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 it goes, operates in the most soothing, and 
 alleviating manner. I would not surrender the 
 mere effects of the noise of London for any 
 consideration in life : and what is most extra- 
 ordinary is, though it has had no effect towards 
 producing the least change in my ideas, and 
 impressions with regard to my ultimate and 
 final destination, yet it holds such an ascend- 
 ency over my momently sensations, that it has 
 enabled me for the last ten weeks to change 
 almost uninterrupted sleeplessness at nights for a 
 repose during the nocturnal hours as uninter- 
 rupted. . . . 
 
 " I have seen a number of literary characters, 
 with whom I was not previously acquainted, 
 since I came here. Mr. Hazlitt, Mr. Hunt, 
 Mr. Procter ' (who has published a most beau- 
 tiful and exquisite collection of poems called 
 
 * Barry Cornwall wrote, in his memoir of Lamb :— 
 
 " The last time I saw Charles Lloyd was in company with Hazlitt. 
 We heard that he had taken lodgings at a working brazier's shop, in 
 Fetter Lane, and we visited him there and found him in bed, much 
 depressed, but very willing to discuss certain problems with Hazlitt, 
 who carried on the greater part of the conversation. We understood 
 that he had selected these noisy apartments in order that they might 
 distract his mind from the fears and melancholy thoughts which at 
 that time distressed him." 
 
 279
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Dramatic Sketches under the feigned name of 
 Barry Cornwall — get the book if you can — it 
 is a small volume, and not expensive), Mr. 
 Godwin, Miss Joanna Baillie (the authoress of 
 the plays on the passions), Mrs. Barbauld, and 
 Miss Aikin, &c., &c. I might be in society 
 every day if I liked, and have often been en- 
 gaged to two places the same evening, and have 
 received three or four invitations for the same 
 day ; yet for one invitation that I accept, I 
 decline half a dozen. This keeps me in motion, 
 and, if I am not employed in visiting, at least 
 my attention is forced out of myself by the 
 calls, or the notes which I am obliged to write 
 and often receive, from those who seem dis- 
 posed to notice me. I have written several 
 poems since I have been here — an effort which 
 it never came into my thought to make in any 
 situation in which I have been for the last four 
 years." 
 
 In 1819 appeared " Nugs Canorse," a vol- 
 ume of poems containing certain new pieces, 
 and most of Lloyd's early work with Coleridge 
 and Lamb reprinted. The book, which was 
 dedicated to Sophia Lloyd, reflected an affec- 
 tionate and foreboding temperament. It was 
 280
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 not remarkable, yet was well reviewed, notably 
 by "Christopher North," in "Blackwood." 
 Thirty years later, however, in 1849, ^^ ^ ^^" 
 view of Serjeant Talfourd's " Final Memorials 
 of Charles Lamb," a writer in " Maga" undid 
 Christopher's praise with merciless directness. 
 In the British Museum is Coleridge's copy of 
 " Nugse Canorae," distinguished by a few pen- 
 ciled marginalia. These neither display the 
 critic in too favourable a light, nor add, as do 
 so many of his comments, to the book's value.^ 
 
 * Thus when Lloyd wrote : — 
 
 "Oh, Liberty, 
 I ask for thee alone ; — with thee to weave 
 
 Quaint rhymes, to breath the air, were heaven to me ; 
 To dream myself the only living thing, save Thee !'* 
 
 Coleridge added in pencil : — 
 
 " To think myself the only Being alive, 
 
 Remorse.*^ 
 
 And when in the Advertisement to the Translations from Ovid, Lloyd 
 said that he had adopted " smooth versification," Coleridge marked 
 the word "smooth," and appended the note: "Verily, rather too 
 good a joke !" Coleridge, however, was not entirely without apprec- 
 iation for the work. A stanza in one poem began with the line : — 
 
 " When first, I say — I've played the truant long." 
 
 Coleridge remarked (the italics are added) : — "These are not lyrical 
 transitions, but the mere orange-sucking of bewildered garrulity — 
 really vexatious in a poem of so much merit." 
 281
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 In December, 1819, writing to Hannah Lloyd 
 from rooms in Fleet Street, Lloyd foreshadowed 
 his next book, " Desultory Thoughts in Lon- 
 don" : — " My friend Manning has been with 
 me since last Friday, and I expect stays till the 
 next — the 31st. But whether he be here or 
 not there is a spare bed for James [Lloyd]. I 
 am much more comfortable than I was at Bir- 
 mingham ; but that I entirely attribute to the 
 greater variety of external impressions made 
 upon me. At times still I suffer a great deal : 
 tho' much less than I did. I have written a 
 poem of between three and four thousand lines 
 called ' London ' : it embraces every topic of 
 reflection which such a place may be supposed 
 to suggest to a contemplative man." 
 
 So far Lloyd had been alone ; but early in 
 
 1820, Sophia and some or all of the children 
 
 joined him, and they took a furnished house at 
 
 Kensington. He wrote thus to Hannah : — " I 
 
 have another volume of poems ready for the 
 
 press — a bookseller has offered to print it at 
 
 his own risk, and to share the profits with me. 
 
 I have also a tale in five volumes, for which I 
 
 have been offered £20 per vol. At all events, 
 
 I hope to be able to avail myself of such an 
 282
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 opportunity of near neighbourhood of pub- 
 lishers as I may never have again, to try, if 
 health be afforded me, to form some respect- 
 able connection in that way, which may afford 
 a prospect of sale to, and profit from, my future 
 literary labours." The novel alluded to was 
 never published, possibly never finished. 
 
 Lamb's name occurred in Macready's refer- 
 ence to Lloyd. In a letter to Barron Field, 
 dated August 16, 1820,' we find Lamb men- 
 tioning Lloyd : " We received your ' Australian 
 First Fruits,' of which I shall say nothing here, 
 but refer you to^ * * * P Hunt] of the ' Ex- 
 aminer,' who speaks our mind on all public 
 subjects. I can only assure you that both 
 Coleridge and Wordsworth, and also C. Lloyd, 
 who has lately reappeared in the poetical hor- 
 izon, were hugely taken with your Kangaroo." 
 " Australian First Fruits" was the poetical vol- 
 ume by Barron Field which Lamb reviewed 
 in the " Examiner" with so light a touch, " The 
 Kangaroo" being the title of the second poem. 
 
 In 1820 intense excitement was caused by 
 the determination of Caroline, George the 
 
 ' Printed in "The Lambs" by Mr. W. C. Hazlitt, 
 283
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Fourth's consort, to be recognised as Queen. 
 Here is a spirited account of Lloyd's feelings 
 in the matter : — 
 
 " I hope that you, like ourselves, are hearty 
 in the Queen's cause. In my opinion, as an 
 affair of Justice, it matters not whether she be 
 innocent or guilty. Who ever heard that there 
 was a sex in crime *? It is infamous for such 
 a man as our king to throw the first stone in 
 such a business, and as infamous in the nobles 
 of the Land, under an hypocritical pretence of 
 regard for the religion and morals of the country, 
 to be the tools of his malice and hatred. — 
 If she be judged guilty, it is not because 
 she is frail, but because the king hates her. 
 Were power in her hands, these very men that 
 now sit in judgment upon her, even if she 
 were as bad as Catherine of Russia, would be 
 at her feet. Where is all that ' proud obedience 
 to rank and sex' of which Burke boasted so 
 much, gone ? — I blush for Englishmen." 
 
 In 1821 the " Desultory Thoughts in Lon- 
 don," Lloyd's best work, from which quotations 
 have already been made, was issued. This, 
 again, was dedicated to his wife Sophia. One 
 
 more passage may be added to those given earlier 
 
 284
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 in this volume ; four stanzas which show us the 
 point which Lloyd's own development had 
 reached. The influence of Wordsworth is very 
 perceptible. 
 
 Give me the man who, for thy sake alone — 
 
 Not for his hortus siccus ; cabinet 
 Of fossil, spar, shell, coral, mineral, stone ; 
 
 Or for his pencil's sake, doth contemplate 
 Thee, Nature ! Give the man who oft has known 
 
 Himself, when he saw thee, self to forget j 
 And in a depth of ravishment transfused. 
 On thee, with silent meditation, mused ! 
 
 And let this meditation heightened be. 
 Religion ! by thy flame, to adoration ! 
 
 And then for things of earth what careth he ? 
 For what distress hath he not consolation ? 
 
 He who in Solitude his God can see 
 
 Mid Nature's loftiest scenes, has found salvation. 
 
 From all the petty miseries of life ; 
 
 A balm has gain'd for prejudice and strife. 
 
 A tree, a cottage, or a child at play. 
 
 And where the earth is destitute, the sky. 
 
 Fantastic clouds, when on them the sun's ray 
 Confers e'en supernatural imagery ! 
 
 The speechless lustre of the new-born day ! 
 
 The solemn pageant when night broods on high ! 
 
 In these, and thousand more such forms as these. 
 
 His moisten'd eye, his Maker's goodness sees ! 
 28s
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 In the same year, 1821, came " Personal Es- 
 says on the Character of Pope as a Poet and 
 Moralist, and on the Language and Objects 
 most fit for Poetry," a rather tedious piece of 
 argument in ten-syllabled couplets, dedicated to 
 the author's father. Then, in 1822, "The 
 Duke d'Ormond," a tragedy written many years 
 earlier, was published ; and, in 1823, " Poems." 
 These " Poems," which were introduced by a 
 quotation from Byron — 
 
 Sorrow is knowledge : they who know the most 
 Must mourn the deepest o'er the fatal truth. 
 The tree of knowledge is not that of life — 
 
 included some interesting but abstruse stanzas 
 *'on the difficulty with which, in youth, we 
 bring home to our habitual consciousness the 
 idea of death." At the beginning of this piece 
 Lloyd had placed a passage from Elia's essay 
 on " New Year's Eve" in a recent " London 
 Magazine." On receiving a copy of the book, 
 Lamb wrote (" Letters" ii. 79) with heroic 
 kindness : — 
 
 " Your lines are not to be understood read- 
 ing on one leg. They are sinuous, and to be 
 
 won with wrestling. I do assure you in sin- 
 286
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 cerity that nothing you have done has given 
 me greater satisfaction. Your obscurity, where 
 you are dark, which is seldom, is that of too 
 much meaning, not the painful obscurity which 
 no toil of the reader can dissipate ; not the dead 
 vacuum and floundering place in which imagi- 
 nation finds no footing : it is not the dimness 
 of positive darkness, but of distance ; and he 
 that reads and not discerns must get a better 
 pair of spectacles. I admire every piece in the 
 collection. I cannot say the first is best : when 
 I do so, the last read rises up in judgment. To 
 your Mother, to your Sister, to Mary dead, 
 they are all weighty with thought and tender 
 with sentiment. Your poetry is like no other. 
 Those cursed dryads and pagan trumperies of 
 modern verse have put me out of conceit of 
 the very name of poetry. Your verses are as 
 good and as wholesome as prose, and I have 
 made a sad blunder if I do not leave you 
 with an impression that your present is rarely 
 valued." From the poem written on the death 
 of Mary Lloyd, Charles Lloyd's mother, an 
 extract has already been made (page 20). 
 With the volume of 1823 Lloyd's literary 
 
 career ended. The shadows then closed around 
 287
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 him again and he moved with his family to 
 France, where he died near Versailles, on Jan- 
 uary 16, 1839, a month before his sixty-fourth 
 birthday. He thus outlived by a few years 
 Coleridge and Lamb, who both passed away in 
 
 1834. 
 
 Among the papers is a long account of 
 Charles Lloyd's children written by Sophia 
 Lloyd, their mother, at some time probably in 
 the first decade of the century. This chapter 
 may well conclude with extracts from these 
 loving notes : — 
 
 " I expect few more delightful recollections 
 than those connected with the infancy and 
 childhood of my children, and to perpetuate 
 these I have often thought I would make 
 memoranda of those almost nameless circum- 
 stances, which nevertheless are of daily recur- 
 rence, and nearly as frequently the occasion of 
 interesting remark, from children who have 
 been encouraged but not taught to think. This 
 resolution I at length begin to execute after 
 having read with them the first Chapter of 
 Genesis this morning. I can be tolerably ac- 
 curate in what is so recent, and must afterwards 
 288
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 endeavour to recall what has most impressed 
 me on other occasions. At the 3rd verse, 
 ' God said, Let there be light, &:c.,' I remarked 
 that whatever God thought proper to be done, 
 would take place, if He gave only an order for 
 it to be so. Gros^ [Charles Grosvenor, born 
 1800] replied: ' I should think that the light 
 would not have come at His speaking if He 
 had not made it beside.' — At the 7th verse, 
 * And God made the firmament and divided the 
 waters from the waters,' Gros^ said : ' It seems 
 as if God did not make the world, but only- 
 altered it.' At the 20th verse, ' And God said. 
 Let us make man,' James [James Farmer, born 
 1801] said: ' Why then, there must be more 
 than one God, or else why does it say let us T 
 31st verse : ' And God saw everything that He 
 had made, &c.' — Gros^ and James : ' How 
 much faster God can work than we can ; now 
 if we want to make a tree, we must set a stone 
 or an acorn, or something, and then it gets a 
 little bigger, and a little bigger, and still per- 
 haps when we are even quite men, any body 
 would think it was but just a young tree. I 
 cannot think how God could do so much ; He 
 musi have been very tired, though to be sure it 
 X9 289
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 was God, and that is different from us.' G^os^ : 
 * Mama, was it you ? some one told me that 
 God was not any shape — but / think He must 
 be all shapes ; however, He must if He is 
 everywhere. Now suppose I dig a round hole, 
 if God is there. He must be round ; and if 
 there was a very long place, and He was all 
 about there, then He must be long — I cannot 
 think how it is.' 
 
 " I have had very little opportunity for ob- 
 serving other children free of that restraint 
 which the consciousness of observation neces- 
 sarily occasions, and of course there is then 
 nothing natural or spontaneous in their re- 
 marks. Hence I often ask myself whether all 
 infant minds dwell apparently with peculiar in- 
 terest on serious or even religious subjects'? I 
 am pursuaded that it would be easy to render 
 such subjects more than any other interesting 
 to them — that which cannot be fully explained 
 excites perpetual curiosity, and the constant 
 necessity one finds of illustration by the analo- 
 gies of ordinary and infinitely inferior concerns, 
 keeps up in the mind of children a constant 
 idea of the comparative dignity of the Deity 
 
 and his operations. I think too that children 
 290
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 who do not associate promiscuously with others, 
 provided there be a family large enough for com* 
 panionship, are in a situation most favourable 
 to simplicity of character, and habits of reflec- 
 tion — or rather, upon reconsidering this opinion, 
 such children are in circumstances most favour- 
 able for receiving any impression which their 
 parents may wish to make upon them, and this 
 simplicity of character, this habit of reflection, 
 are the points at which I have aimed ; but cer- 
 tainly this comparative solitude is more likely 
 to produce great men, than great scholars. I 
 find that my children are what is called more 
 backward than most others, that is, they would 
 be longer in reading you a given quantity, but 
 every sentence would suggest to them some 
 inquiry. 
 
 " 2^rd May. — To-day James asked me if we 
 were to be very wicked in this world, whether 
 God would make us suffer more than Jesus did 
 when He was crucified *? 
 
 " James : ' Mama, would it not be as easy 
 for God to stop us just before we do wrong 
 things, as to punish us for them afterwards ?' 
 
 " Grof. : ' Mama, it seems very wonderful 
 
 that God was never made, and yet it would be 
 291
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 quite as wonderful if He was made, because 
 somebody else must have made those that made 
 God, and so still we could not have told how 
 the first was made.' 
 
 " Owen [born 1 803] : ' Could God kill Him- 
 self? If He was to try, how do you think 
 He would do it V 
 
 " Grof. : * Perhaps He'd take the flaming 
 sword that drove Adam and Eve out of Para- 
 dise.' 
 
 " Gr^/. ; ' Mama, does worlJ without end 
 mean that because the world is round there is 
 no end to it *?' 
 
 *' Going to church one very wet Sunday, 
 Grosvenor said : ' Suppose nobody should be 
 there beside ourselves, then, I suppose, the 
 parson will go away.' 
 
 " I answered, ' No, if there are three people 
 there, I believe he would be obliged to read 
 the prayers.' 
 
 " Owen : ' I suppose that is because there are 
 three persons in the God-head.' 
 
 " Gros\ :■ ' Who I wonder lighted the first 
 firer 
 
 " James : I suppose it was lighted at the sun.' 
 
 " Gros" : ' No, that could not be, because 
 
 2(J2
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 then there must have been that kind of Glass 
 which Mama told us of, and Glass cannot be 
 made without fire.' 
 
 " I remarked one cold morning, ' How thank- 
 ful you should be who have fire and clothing 
 this cold weather. Many poor children have 
 not either.' 
 
 " James : * Well, then, Adam and Eve did 
 some good, for if they had never been naughty 
 we should have been as badly off.' 
 
 " * If God does not love wicked people, and 
 He can do everything, why does He not make 
 everybody good *?' 
 
 "'Does God live in the ceiling of the 
 Garden V 
 
 " ' Is there a Prince of Wales now ? I 
 thought there never had been but one.' ' And 
 who was that*?' 'Jonah.' 
 
 " ' Look, James, at those beautiful clouds I 
 they are almost like Gold.' A ftw minutes 
 after : ' Why, all those beautiful clouds are 
 gone ! I suppose God has taken them to make 
 rainbows of. . . .' 
 
 " Gros^. : ' What a great many things this 
 sunshine will make glad I It makes us very 
 glad. Mama, because you can take us this nice 
 
 293
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 walk, and the birds will be glad because it will 
 make the ground soft for them to find worms, 
 and it will make the cows glad because all the 
 snow will go off the grass, so almost everything 
 will be glad.' During this walk we saw many- 
 trees that seemed to have, as it were, a foliage 
 of ice. Gros^ said, ' Mama, how beautiful it 
 looks,' and ran on, but soon returning he said, 
 ' Do you think this would do for a tale about 
 it, " Upon the branches of the trees, the falling 
 drops do freeze'"?' Just afterwards we ob- 
 served a hawthorn covered with moss. Gros^ 
 said : ' I don't know whether that is more beau- 
 tiful even in summer than it is in winter, " the 
 hawthorn tree where moss doth grow, the 
 hawthorn tree where flowers do blow." * I 
 shall very long remember this walk : we gath- 
 ered moss and lichens, cracked the ice upon 
 every runner that crossed our way, knocked off 
 the icicles that loaded every weed or plant which 
 grew within reach, and spent four hours in 
 walking as many miles, seldom in silence, and, 
 I believe, when we reached home, that each of 
 us thought the morning had been well spent. 
 " I had long promised the children that I 
 
 would ask D. W. [Dorothy Wordsworth] to 
 294
 
 CHARLES LLOYD IN LONDON 
 
 spend a week with them, and on the of 
 
 April I went to Grasmere for her ; on my re- 
 turn, as I entered, I passed all the children, 
 who, seeing me with a small bundle of D's. 
 clothes in my hand, cried out : ' Oh, she's come, 
 she's come I' and away they ran without staying 
 to see even if they were guessing right ; in a 
 minute or two they all came back with a flower, 
 the treasured produce of their own gardens ; 
 this gave me a pleasure which one naturally 
 feels in any involuntary proof of disinterested 
 kindness. But the day before I heard them 
 comparing the beauty and size of their flowers, 
 and how long they would probably live, &c. 
 1 knew they had watched them day after day, 
 and thought ' they never would be flowers.' 
 But poor little Eddy [Edward, born 1804] had 
 watched in vain ! When his brothers gave 
 Dora their full blown polyanthus, he had only 
 a just budding primrose to offer. He joined 
 in with the circle which they formed round her, 
 and with them thrust forward his hand, but 
 turned away his head, looking as tho' he could 
 not bear to withhold what he, notwithstanding, 
 was ashamed to give. The recollection brings 
 tears into my eyes, as the sight did into James's, 
 295
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 who, when he saw Edward's confusion, said : 
 ' It's the best Eddy's got, Dorothy, he's such a 
 little boy.' And Owen, tho' it stript his border 
 of its only beauty, fetched a polyanthus saying, 
 * Well, Eddy may give mine, and that's a very 
 fine one.' " ' 
 
 ' It might be added that Grosvenor died in 1840, James in 188 1, 
 Owen in 1838, and Edward in 1865. The other children were 
 Arthur, Mary, Sophia, Priscilla, Agatha and Louisa. 
 
 296
 
 XVII 
 
 MR. Lloyd's later years 
 1817-1828 
 
 Mr. Lloyd grew old with the deliberation 
 and serenity of which Quakers hold the secret. 
 Although he reached a great age his powers 
 never deserted him. In his business, in public 
 affairs both national and local, in his farm at 
 Olton Green, and in his books, his mind found 
 that continuous yet changeful occupation which 
 is its best preservative. 
 
 Among the miscellaneous letters in our bun- 
 dle is one from William Wordsworth to Mr. 
 Lloyd, the publication of which is commanded 
 by the Spirit of Mischief. Herein we find the 
 poet of primitive simplicity (who some years 
 later was to write the " Proud were ye. Moun- 
 tains," sonnet, suggested by the projected Ken- 
 dal and Windermere line), asking Mr. Lloyd's 
 advice concerning the best railway company in 
 which to invest five hundred pounds. This is 
 
 the sonnet : — 
 
 297
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Proud were ye. Mountains, when, in times of old. 
 
 Your patriot sons, to stem invasive war. 
 
 Intrenched your brows ; ye gloried in each scar : 
 Now, for your shame, a Power, the Thirst of Gold. 
 
 That rules o'er Britain like a baneful star. 
 Wills that your peace, your beauty, shall be sold. 
 
 And clearway made for her triumphal car 
 Through the beloved retreats your arms enfold ! 
 Heard ye that Whistle ? As her long-linked Train 
 
 Swept onwards, did the vision cross your view? 
 
 Yes, ye were startled ; — and, in balance true. 
 Weighing the mischief with the promised gain. 
 
 Mountains, and Vales, and Floods, I call on you 
 To share the passion of a just disdain. 
 
 This is the letter : — • 
 
 " My dear Sir, — You will be surprised with 
 the matter which this letter will turn upon — 
 viz., something like money business, and I feel 
 chat I ought not to approach you, without pre- 
 viously resting my apology on your known 
 friendly disposition. To come to the point at 
 once, I have been led to consider Birmingham 
 as the point from which the railway companies 
 now forming receive their principal impulse, and 
 I feel disposed to risk a sum — not more than 
 
 500/. — in purchasing Shares in some promising 
 298
 
 MR. LLOYD'S LATER YEARS 
 
 Company or Companies. I do not wish to in- 
 volve you in the responsibihty of advising an 
 Investment of this kind, but I hope I do not 
 presume too much when I request that you 
 would have the kindness to point out to me, 
 what Companies are thought the most eligible, 
 adding directions as to the mode of proceeding 
 in case I determine upon purchasing. 
 
 " We heard from Dr. Wordsworth about 3 
 weeks ago ; as he does not mention Owen, we 
 infer that his health is improved. He speaks 
 of his Son John being much benefited by 
 Horse exercise, I hope you receive good tid- 
 ings from France. We are all very well here, 
 and with our united best regards to you and 
 your numerous Family, believe me to be, dear 
 Sir, very sincerely yours, 
 
 "Wm. Wordsworth.^ 
 
 " Rydal Mount, January 6, 1825." 
 
 ' This letter lends point to the late J. K. Stephen's diverting parody 
 of Wordsworth in " Lapsus Calami." " Poetic Lamentation" — such 
 is the title — "on the Insufficiency of Steam Locomotion in the Lake 
 District" : — 
 
 Bright Summer spreads his various hue 
 
 O'er nestling vales and mountains steep, 
 Glad birds are singing in the blue, 
 In joyous chorus bleat the sheep. 
 299
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Dr. Wordsworth was Christopher, the poet's 
 brother, and Mr. Lloyd's son-in-law. The pas- 
 sage concerning news from France refers to 
 Charles Lloyd, then living in that country. 
 
 Southey also was among Mr. Lloyd's corre- 
 spondents, with reference to a history of the 
 Society of Friends, which he contemplated but 
 unfortunately did not write. He found Mr. 
 Lloyd's knowledge of great assistance in his 
 
 But men are walking to and fro, 
 
 Are riding, driving, far and near, 
 And nobody as yet can go 
 
 By train to Buttermere. 
 
 Wake, England, wake ! 'tis now the hour 
 
 To sweep away this black disgrace — 
 The want of locomotive power 
 
 In so enjoyable a place. 
 Nature has done her part, and why 
 
 Is mightier man in his to fail ? 
 I want to hear the porters cry 
 
 " Change here for Ennerdale !'* 
 
 Presumptuous nature, do not rate 
 
 Unduly high thy humble lot. 
 Nor vainly strive to emulate 
 
 The fame of Stephenson and Watt. 
 The beauties which thy lavish pride 
 
 Has scattered through the smiling land 
 Are little worth till sanctified 
 
 By man's completing hand. 
 300
 
 MR. LLOYD'S LATER YEARS 
 
 preliminary studies. The following is the most 
 interesting of Southey's letters on this sub- 
 ject :— 
 
 *' Keswick, Nov. 25, 1820. 
 
 " My dear Sir, — I have just received your 
 parcel of books, with your letter of the 20th. 
 I received also G. Whitehead's Journal and the 
 epistles of the Yearly Meeting. For these 
 favours I am much obliged, and not less so for 
 the friendly solicitude which you express, lest 
 I should write erroneously or unadvisedly, and 
 thereby give offence. 
 
 " I am not so ignorant of mankind, or so in- 
 experienced in the world as to suppose it pos- 
 sible that such a work can be written without 
 offending some of the Society to whom it re- 
 lates, unless it were composed with the direct 
 object of pleasing them. But I am sure that 
 no just and even-minded member of the Society 
 ought to be offended with what I shall write, 
 no person who will allow to me the same 
 freedom of opinion (always exercised within 
 the hmits of charity) which he claims for him- 
 self. The errors of the early Quakers were 
 those of their age, their virtues were their own. 
 I will do the amplest justice to their virtues.
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 but I shall neither conceal their faults nor those 
 of their opponents and persecutors. If I did, 
 the lesson of charity, which the book is de- 
 signed to enforce, would be weakened and in- 
 compleat. These things are matter of history. 
 The life of George Fox must be written as 
 that of Luther, of Calvin, and of our own 
 Cranmer, without setting down anything in 
 malice, or withholding anything in favour. 
 After all subtractions that may be made, he, 
 like them, will remain a good, an eminent, an 
 influential man — a great and chosen agent in 
 the moral and religious world. The members of 
 the Church Establishment will not be offended 
 when I shall speak of the severity which was ex- 
 ercised against the Quakers in the strongest terms 
 of condemnation. The members of your So- 
 ciety will have as little reason to be offended, 
 because I do not dissemble the provocation 
 which their predecessors gave. Perhaps no 
 person understands the temper of those times 
 better than myself, because no person has 
 studied their history more. 
 
 " With regard to facts then, my intention is 
 and must be to compose a full and faithful 
 
 history, and that history could not be faithful 
 302
 
 MR. LLOYD'S LATER YEARS 
 
 unless it were full. With regard to the manner 
 of relating them, I can only say that there will 
 be no intention to offend, and that I verily be- 
 lieve no person will be offended whom I could 
 possibly be desirous of pleasing. 
 
 " Touching the tenets and discipline of the 
 Society, tho' I am under no apprehension of 
 committing any material error (seeing how 
 ample the materials are from which the account 
 must be derived) I repeat that it will give me 
 great pleasure to submit the chapters which 
 relate to them to your perusal before they are 
 printed. 
 
 " Farewell, my dear Sir, and believe me, 
 " Yours, with sincere respect, 
 
 " Robert Southey." 
 
 Mr. Lloyd knew of an influence for sweet- 
 ness and alertness better even than these multi- 
 tudinous interests ; and that was the constant 
 companionship of young people. He delighted 
 to sun himself in his grandchildren's society, to 
 devise amusements for them, to hear their ad- 
 ventures, and to tell them his own. And so 
 fruitful were the Lloyds that it was a joy easily 
 gratified. 
 
 303
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Mr. Lloyd had the pleasant habit of ad- 
 dressing from time to time to certain of his 
 grandchildren long rhyming letters filled with 
 family news and kindly counsel. Among 
 those that have been handed down, one dated 
 September lo, 1817, a few days before his 
 seventieth birthday, is interesting for the tale 
 of grandchildren which it presents. Thus : — 
 
 Mary, your Aunt, has children five. 
 
 Who all 1 hope will prove 
 A comfort to their Parents dear. 
 
 And join the general love. 
 Anna, your Aunt, has also five. 
 
 All very fond of play. 
 All these I knovi' vv^ould much enjoy. 
 
 With you a holiday ; 
 And I should very much delight 
 
 Could you w^ith them be seen. 
 Running about the pleasant lane 
 
 Which is at Olton Green, 
 Your cousins also from the Lakes 
 
 Three boys, four girls, would be 
 With Grosvenor in addition too 
 
 Such pretty company : 
 Your uncle Plumstead's children five 
 
 Should also be invited. 
 And your Aunt Susan's children three 
 
 I think would be delighted 
 304
 
 MR. LLOYD'S LATER YEARS 
 
 To join the party in the lane. 
 
 Where blackberries abound. 
 And where in hedges round the field. 
 
 In plenty nuts are found. 
 The nurse might carry in her arms 
 
 Aunt Agatha's great treasure. 
 And then the sight of such a group 
 
 Would give me heartfelt pleasure : 
 For if you all were there, I think 
 
 If rightly I can count. 
 My very dear Grandchildren would 
 
 To forty-one amount.' 
 
 In 1821, when Mrs. Lloyd, who long had 
 been in ill-health, passed away, the number of 
 grandchildren had been increased to forty-seven. 
 Had all lived the total would have been ten 
 more. 
 
 In another of Mr. Lloyd's familiar epistles, 
 written in 1823, a few of these grandchildren 
 were described more particularly. Thus, in the 
 account of a holiday party : — 
 
 ' Mary, who is the first mentioned in this list, became the wife of 
 George Braithwaite ; and Anna, of Isaac Braithwaite. The cousins 
 from the Lakes were the children of Charles and Sophia Lloyd. Plum- 
 stead Lloyd married Frances Batcnson. Susan was Susanna White- 
 head, the widow of Thomas Lloyd. Agatha was the wife of James 
 Pearson. The two families unrepresented were those of Robert and 
 James, to whom the verses were inscribed. 
 ao 305
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 My Grandson John Wordsworth attempted 
 
 A prize golden medal to gain. 
 He wrote a long poem in rhyme. 
 
 But alas his attempt proved in vain ! 
 The subject, the death of Jane Grey 
 
 On which he dilated with spirit. 
 And tho' he obtained not the prize. 
 
 His verses have very much merit. 
 Fanny looks fresh as a rose, 
 
 But is too fond of curling her hair, 
 I wish her to dress very neat. 
 
 But as simple, as now she is fair; 
 But alas, all my Granddaughters seem 
 
 Too much to launch out in their dress. 
 And the more they do this (may I say 
 
 Without hurting) they please me the less. 
 For neatness, and simple attire. 
 
 Enliven the feminine graces. 
 And give a most exquisite charm. 
 
 To young and to innocent faces. 
 Grosvenor reads a few verses in Greek, 
 
 Every morning, when breakfast is done. 
 But I cannot prevail on him yet. 
 
 Nor on Fanny, to rise with the Sun, 
 And Emma is fond of her bed. 
 
 And I think would be apt to rise late. 
 But she knows very well that she must 
 
 Be ready for breakfast at eight. 
 
 Fanny and Emma, who liked folding of the 
 
 hands to sleep, were the daughters of James 
 306
 
 MR. LLOYD'S LATER YEARS 
 
 Lloyd. We have another ghmpse of Fanny 
 in the admirable stanza from an amusing 
 description of his cousins written by Owen 
 Lloyd : — 
 
 But Fanny owns but Nature's laws : 
 
 Concealment's surely sin ! 
 And so she told her love because 
 
 She could not keep it in. 
 
 Grosvenor was the eldest son of Charles Lloyd. 
 John Wordsworth, who was eighteen at the 
 time of this poem, subsequently distinguished 
 himself at Cambridge, and seemed about to 
 fulfil his promise of brilliant scholarship with 
 an edition of " ^Eschylus," when he died at the 
 early age of thirty-four. It may here be men- 
 tioned that Charles Wordsworth, John's brother, 
 who was then eighteen, spent part of the fol- 
 lowing Christmas holidays, 1823-24, in com- 
 posing a poetical letter, in English and Latin, 
 to his grandfather. The introduction, which 
 is the English portion, began thus : — 
 
 My dear Grandfather, tho' I've nought to tell. 
 And all that nought I fear told o'er and o'er. 
 
 You'll see by this sheet that, remembering well 
 My former third reception, I've once more 
 307
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 Ventured in Pindus Street to ring the bell. 
 And Proebus civilly hath oped the door : 
 Forthwith I've sent my card up to inquire 
 For a short interview with Miss Thalia. 
 
 I fency now I see you by the fire 
 
 Sitting in your own dressing-room ; a cousin 
 
 Or two perhaps attending on their sire. 
 
 Or as 'tis Christmas time, say half a dozen : — 
 
 Your guest, too, near the door, whom I desire 
 Kindly to be remembered to, is dozing 
 
 Just now, perhaps, with head from out his nook, who 
 
 Sings hourly — like a veritable cuckoo. 
 
 The door now opens ; my epistle enters ; 
 
 The seal is broken ; on my wretched lay 
 All the attention of the party centres : — 
 
 *' Who is it from ?" the cousins whisper, " hey ? — 
 From Cousin Charles ? I wonder if he's sent us 
 
 Another verse epistle. I dare say, 
 'Tis precious stuff." Amazed you eye the stanzas. 
 And fear my case is worse than Sancho Panza's. 
 
 The Latin followed. The whole poem is 
 printed in the late Bishop of St. Andrews' 
 " Annals of my Early Life," where may be 
 found also Mr. Lloyd's translation, made in 
 his seventy-seventh year, of the Latin poem 
 with which this grandson gained the prize at 
 
 Harrow in 1825. The Bishop had pleasant 
 
 .S08
 
 MR. LLOYD'S LATER YEARS 
 
 memories of his grandfather sitting of an 
 evening with a long clay pipe. 
 
 Of the future Bishop of St. Andrews, and 
 his brother, Priscilla Wordsworth, writing in 
 1815, a few weeks before her death, had said : — 
 
 " With regard to reading, we pursue exactly 
 an opposite method with Charles, to that which 
 we did with John — in endeavouring to tempt 
 him to read, by putting in his hands the most 
 attractive books ; adapted to his years and ca- 
 pacity — but as yet we have not been able to 
 give him a taste for his book. He is remark- 
 ably backward, and will never, I fear, have any 
 taste for learning. John has read all the usual 
 routine of books for children. Miss Edgeworth, 
 &c. &c., but they never have seemed any food 
 for his mind. He reads thro' a volume at a 
 sitting, so that it would be in vain to attempt 
 furnishing him with small books. He is just 
 now extremely wrapped up in Shakspear's his- 
 torical plays, which, together with a collection 
 of voyages which his Father has lent him, 
 employ all his leisure time." 
 
 The prophecy concerning Charles — " he will 
 never have any taste for learning" — was 
 strangely falsified ; for, although sufficiently 
 309
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 "keen" on athletics to play, in 1827, in the 
 first Inter-University cricket match — he made 
 8 in the only innings Cambridge had, and took 
 (left-hand, with a ' twist from the off') seven of 
 Oxford's wickets for 25 runs — and to row in 
 the first Inter-University boat-race, he became 
 subsequently the tutor of Mr. Gladstone, and 
 one of the revisers of the New Testament. 
 
 Another of the grandsons, Owen Lloyd, 
 Charles Lloyd's third son, also engaged in 
 verse for his grandfather's entertainment. His 
 ballad of " The Stranger at Bingley" holds an 
 agreeable character-sketch of the old man : 
 
 Here seated in his elbow chair. 
 
 On good terms with the fire, 
 A man there sat whom none that saw 
 
 Could see but to admire. 
 
 And frequent still the smile serene 
 
 On his calm visage play'd. 
 Which, mirror of his soul, his soul's 
 
 Benevolence display'd. 
 
 Youth lov'd his age, he lov'd their cares. 
 And while their joys he view'd 
 
 He seem'd like Jason's sire to have 
 His youth again renew'd. 
 ^10
 
 MR. LLOYD'S LATER YEARS 
 
 From another of Owen Lloyd's family-pieces 
 quotation may be made : a long and innocently 
 Bacchanalian letter in rhyme, despatched from 
 Cambridge, with a present of Trinity Audit 
 ale, to his grandfather, as a propitiation. The 
 first part of the letter describes the young 
 diplomatist's mock grief at being in Bingley's 
 bad books ; the rest of it shows the success of 
 his ruse. Thus : — 
 
 First William will the bottles hear 
 
 In th' hamper make a racket. 
 And then will tell my Grandfather, 
 
 " Sir, here's of wine a packet." 
 ** Come, Libby," dear grandfather'll say, 
 
 ** Come let us go and see, 
 I never wrote to Friend Beaufoy, 
 
 For Wine : what can it be ? 
 A cheese from James ? The carriage has 
 
 Cost more than such a curd's worth. 
 From Cambridge 'tis. Ah now I see. 
 
 It comes from my son Wordsworth." 
 But while the hamper he unpacks, 
 
 A note he'll lay his hands on. 
 And read ** Dear Grandfather, I hope 
 
 You'll find it good — Your Grandson." 
 He'll smile and say, " I never thought, 
 
 Owen was really bad. 
 Do what he would I ne'er could help 
 
 Somehow to love the lad."
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 ** Why that's exactly as I feel," 
 
 Sweet smiling Lib will say. 
 ** That ne'er in this sad world may be 
 
 A worse, is all I pray." 
 ** That's right, my dear, I like to see 
 
 Thee speak up for thy cousin." 
 ** Yes, Grandpapa, and I am sure there's not 
 
 Like him another dozen." 
 
 Later Libby speaks again : — 
 
 " Of cousin Owen always I 
 
 Both did and shall approve. 
 And (is there any harm. Grandpa, 
 
 To love men cousins ?) love." 
 
 And the verses end : — 
 
 Ale is the liquor then to pour 
 
 To pouting friends libation. 
 For as I said before, it soon 
 
 Brings reconciliation. 
 
 Owen Lloyd became incumbent of Langdale 
 and died there in 1841, in his forty-ninth year. 
 Wordsworth's tender Hnes on this beloved pas- 
 tor — " Lile Owey," as his parishioners called 
 him — are well-known : — 
 
 By playful smiles, alas too oft, 
 A sad heart's sunshine, by a soft 
 312
 
 MR. LLOYD'S LATER YEARS 
 
 And gentle nature, and a free 
 
 Yet modest hand of charity. 
 
 Through life was Owen Lloyd endeared 
 
 To young and old ; and how revered 
 
 Had been that pious spirit a tide 
 
 Of humble mourners testified. 
 
 Owen Lloyd and Hartley Coleridge were also 
 firm friends. When Owen Lloyd died this was 
 the beautiful epitaph that Hartley wrote for 
 him : — 
 
 Could love devout, or longing sighs, or tears. 
 
 From God obtain a grant of lengthened years. 
 
 Then wandering reader, thou had'st never stood 
 
 Beside the grave of one so young and good. 
 
 Still in the small, but consecrated place 
 
 He spake of judgment and he spake of grace ; 
 
 Of judgment dread, and merciful delay : 
 
 And latest spake of that, the latest day. 
 
 When those — how few — that may compare with him. 
 
 Shall mount on high with brightest seraphim ! 
 
 It is good to think that that perfect trust in 
 each other, and mutual understanding, which 
 were never to be possible between Samuel 
 Taylor Coleridge and Charles Lloyd should 
 have subsisted between their sons. 
 313
 
 CHARLES LAMB AND THE LLOYDS 
 
 This passage, from another of Mr. Lloyd's 
 rhyming letters, written at Malvern on October 
 15, 1825, proves his activity in his old age : — 
 
 I took my Grand-daughters 
 
 This morning a ramble 
 But up the steep hills 
 
 They could not well scramble. 
 So 76 years 
 
 Might at this time be seen 
 More able to climb 
 
 Than blooming eighteen. 
 
 And here, from the next of the series, written 
 five days later, is further testimony to the 
 Lloyds' determination to multiply : — 
 
 I have with Grandchildren been blest ; 
 
 A numerous race indeed ! 
 Already if I count them o'er. 
 
 They do threescore exceed ; 
 Of some of these, I have alas ! 
 
 By illness been bereft. 
 But still to crowning closing years 
 
 Full fifty now are left ; 
 Of these the eldest has attained 
 
 The age of twenty-five. 
 The youngest in the world has been 
 
 Not yet two months alive. 
 314
 
 MR. LLOYD'S LATER YEARS 
 
 An old man thus hedged about by descend- 
 ants cannot be called other than happy in his 
 declining days. 
 
 Mr. Lloyd died on January ii, 1828, in his 
 eightieth year. 
 
 315
 
 INDEX 
 
 Alfizri, 173 
 
 "Annual Anthology," Lloyd's 
 
 contributions, 120, 122 
 Anti-Jacobiny The, 85 
 jinti-yacobin Revie-w and Maga- 
 
 zinty TAty 86-93 
 
 Beaumont, Sir G., and Alfieri, 
 273 
 
 Binyon, Laurence, 265 
 
 Brown, T. E., and the "Com- 
 plete ^ngler," 143 
 
 Byron, Lord, and Lloyd and 
 Lamb, 92, 93 
 
 Campbell, J. Dykes, on the 
 quarrel between Coleridge and 
 Lloyd, 69 
 Clarke, Mrs., Mistress of the 
 
 Duke of York, 182, 183 
 Clarkson, Thomas, on Mr. 
 
 Lloyd's " Iliad," 219 
 Coleridge, Derwent, on the old 
 
 Brathay family, 262 
 Coleridge, Hartley, his birth, 33 
 Lloyd's kindness to him, 34 
 and Lloyd, 262 
 and Owen Lloyd, 312, 313 
 
 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, visits 
 Birmingham, 30 
 addresses poems to Lloyd, 
 
 3»> 41 
 
 accepts Lloyd as a pupil, 
 
 33 
 
 verses on Hartley's birth, 
 
 34 
 
 letter concerning his future 
 to Mr. Lloyd, 36 
 
 letter to Mr. Lloyd con- 
 cerning Charles Lloyd's 
 health, 42 
 
 letter to Mr, Lloyd con- 
 cerning Charles Lloyd's 
 future, 47 
 
 reply to Mr. Lloyd's ques- 
 tion, — How would he 
 live without compan- 
 ions .'50 
 
 admits Lloyd to the poeti- 
 cal partnership, 55 
 
 the second edition of the 
 " Poems," 56 
 
 The Higginbottom Son- 
 nets, 61-63 
 
 and "The Old Familiar 
 Faces," 68 
 
 3x7
 
 INDEX 
 
 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, quar- 
 rel with Lloyd, 69 
 
 composes "Kubla Khan," 
 69 
 
 and " Edmund Oliver," 
 
 71 
 
 and Lamb's " Theses," 
 
 7+ 
 letter to Lamb concerning 
 
 the quarrel, 75, 76 
 verses by Lloyd, 81 
 inscription in 1834 edition 
 
 of his " Poems," 84 
 and The Anti-yacobiiif 
 
 85-89 
 
 reconciliation with Lloyd, 
 
 140 
 criticism of Mr. Lloyd's 
 
 '« Iliad," 195 
 and "The Friend," 263 
 his character by Agatha 
 
 Lloyd, 264 
 his character by Lloyd, 
 
 266 
 and Lloyd's " Nugas Ca- 
 
 norae," 281 
 "Complete Angler, The," 142, 
 
 »43 
 Cornwall, Barry, and Lloyd, 279 
 Cottle, Joseph, on Charles Lloyd, 
 
 letter from Coleridge on the 
 Higginbottom Sonnets, 61 
 
 letter from Lloyd concerning 
 his friendship for Cole- 
 ridge, 70 
 
 Cowper's "Homer," criticism 
 by Mr. Lloyd, 195 
 See Seward, Anna 
 See Lamb, Charles 
 See Southey, Robert 
 
 De guiNCEY, Thomas, on Charles 
 Lloyd 260 
 
 " Desultory Thoughts in Lon- 
 don," 81, 83, 284 
 
 "Edmund Oliver," 71 
 and Mrs. Lloyd, 72 
 " English Bards and Scotch Re- 
 viewers," 93 
 
 Gentleman's Magazine, Me- 
 moir of Mr. Lloyd, 
 20-23 
 
 Memoir of Robert Lloyd by 
 Lamb, 189-191 
 
 Mr. Lloyd's "Epistles of 
 Horace," 245 
 Godwin, William, first meeting 
 with Lamb, 86 
 
 entertains Robert Lloyd, 
 
 174. 178, 179 
 Godwin, Mrs., and Robert Lloyd, 
 
 175 
 
 " Holy Dying," — the simile of 
 
 a rose, 148 
 
 See Jeremy Taylor 
 Homer, see Lloyd, Charles (1748- 
 1828) 
 
 See Seward Anna 
 
 318
 
 INDEX 
 
 Homer, see Lamb, Charles 
 
 See Southey, Robert 
 Horace, see Lamb, Charles 
 
 See Lloyd, Charles (1748- 
 
 1828) 
 
 Hutton, Catherine, on Mr. 
 
 Lloyd's "Odyssey," 241, 
 
 242 
 
 on the advantages of being 
 
 born a Quaker, 242 
 on Mr. Lloyd's " Horace," 
 254 
 
 James, Mr. W. P., on Robert 
 
 Lloyd, 170 
 Johnson, Dr., at Birmingham, 
 
 17 
 
 Lamb, Charles, contributes to 
 Lloyd's poems, 40 
 his meeting with Lloyd, 51 
 his poem to Lloyd, 52 
 his meeting with Robert 
 
 Lloyd, 55 
 "Poems" by Coleridge, 
 
 Lamb, and Lloyd, 56 
 visits Southey with Lloyd, 
 
 poem on Lloyd, 58, 59 
 and James White, 64 
 coolness with Lloyd, 66 
 "The Old Familiar Faces," 
 
 68 
 the " Theses Quaedam Theo- 
 
 logicae," 74 
 
 Lamb, Charles, preface to i8i8 
 edition of his works, 78 
 verses by Lloyd, 82, 83 
 and TAe Anti-yacobin, 85 
 and Godwin — " Toad or 
 
 Frog?" 86 
 defended by Lloyd, 90 
 first letter to Robert Lloyd, 
 
 95 
 admonished Robert Lloyd 
 
 on his conduct, 98 
 on Quaker observances, 104 
 on the sweets of life, 107 
 his poem " The Witch," 
 
 108-113 
 harbours Robert Lloyd in 
 
 London, 114 
 on literary indiscretions, 120 
 his meeting with Manning, 
 
 123 
 his susceptibility to beve- 
 rages, 124 
 is entertained by Mr. Lloyd, 
 
 125 
 on portraits, 137 
 and his " Gentle Giantess," 
 
 138 
 on the " Complete Angler," 
 
 142 
 on the delights of town, 144, 
 
 145 
 on Manning, 146 
 on Fletcher's " Purple 
 
 Island," 147 
 on Jeremy Taylor, 147- 
 
 15s 
 
 319
 
 INDEX 
 
 Lamb, Charles, on "selections" 
 
 from authors, 153-lSS 
 on Cooke's acting in " Rich- 
 ard III.," 156-160 
 on certain old playwrights, 
 
 158, IS9 
 on Robert's engagement, 
 
 164 
 on the blessedness of the 
 
 single state, 168 
 "Poetry for Children," 181 
 on Mrs. Clarke's notoriety, 
 
 l8z 
 on Coleridge's " Friend," 
 
 185 
 moves to Inner Temple 
 
 Lane, 185 
 his memoir of Robert Lloyd, 
 
 189 
 on Mr. Lloyd's " Iliad," 
 
 419-227 
 on nicety of rhyme, 227 
 on Mr. Lloyd's " Odyssey," 
 
 229-241 
 on Cowper's " Homer," 233 
 on Homer and Milton, 
 
 133 
 on Mr. Lloyd's " Horace," 
 
 245-254 
 on Barron Field's poems, 
 
 283 
 on Lloyd's " Poems," 286 
 facsimile of letter to Robert 
 
 Lloyd , to face p. 107 
 Lepaux and the Theophilanthrop- 
 ists, 90, 91 
 
 Letters : S. T. Coleridge to Mr. 
 
 Lloyd, 36, 42, 47 
 Catherine Hutton to Mr. 
 
 Lloyd, 231, 241, 254 
 Letters, Charles Lamb to Robert 
 
 Lloyd, 95, 98, 103, 107, 
 
 108, 121, 124, 136, 142, 
 
 •47, 153. 156, 164, 167, 
 
 171, 184, 229 
 Charles Lamb to Mr. Lloyd, 
 
 219, 226, 230, 232, 236, 
 
 245 
 Agatha Lloyd to Hannah 
 
 Lloyd, 264 
 Charles Lloyd to Robert, 28, 
 
 29, 80, 266, 267, 269, 270 
 Charles Lloyd to Hannah 
 
 Lloyd, 189, 277, 284 
 Charles Lloyd to Mr. Lloyd, 
 
 255 
 Robert Lloyd to Hannah 
 
 Lloyd, 173, 177, 178, 179, 
 
 180, 182 
 Thomas Manning to Robert 
 
 Lloyd, 128, 132 
 Anna Seward to Mr. Lloyd, 
 
 196, 202, 207 
 Robert Southey to Mr. Lloyd, 
 
 217, 243, 257, 300 
 Priscilla Wordsworth to Han- 
 nah Lloyd, 273 
 William Wordsworth to Mr. 
 Lloyd, 298 
 Lloyd, Agatha, her opinion of 
 Coleridge, 264 
 her poetical descendants, 265 
 
 320
 
 INDEX 
 
 Lloyd, Charles, (1637-1698), 15 
 (1662-1747), 16 
 (1748-1828), the extent of 
 
 his family, 18 
 his character (from the Gen- 
 tleman's Magazine,") 20 
 letter to Robert about Cole- 
 ridge, 35 
 letter from Coleridge about 
 
 his future, 36 
 letter from Coleridge, about 
 
 Lloyd's health, 42 
 (1748-1828), letter from 
 
 Coleridge about Lloyd's 
 
 future, 47 
 reasons with Robert, 115 
 entertains Lamb, 125 
 his character by Robert, 
 
 162 
 his translation of the 
 
 "Iliad," 194-228 
 his translation of the 
 
 " Odyssey," 229-244 
 his translation of Horace's 
 
 Epistles, 245-258 
 letter from W. Wordsworth, 
 
 298 
 and Southey's history of 
 
 Quakers, 300 
 and his grandchildren, 303- 
 
 315 
 his death, 315 
 (1775-1839), his character, 
 
 17 
 joins Wilkinson at Yan- 
 wath, 28 
 
 Lloyd, Charles, letters to Robert, 
 
 recommending a course of 
 
 reading, 28, 29 
 meets S. T. Coleridge, 30 
 domesticates with S. T. 
 
 Coleridge, 33 
 his character by Coleridge, 34 
 as critic of Coleridge, 39 
 " Poems on the death of 
 
 Priscilla Farmer," 40 
 his health at Bristol, 45 
 his future as Coleridge saw 
 
 it, 48 
 his meeting with Lamb, 51 
 Lamb addresses a poem to 
 
 him, 52 
 letters to Robert about Lamb, 
 
 54 
 leaves Stowey, 56 
 (1775-1839), " Poems" by 
 
 Coleridge, Lamb and 
 
 Lloyd, 56 
 letter to Robert about the 
 
 " Poems," 59 
 and Nehemiah Higginbot- 
 
 tom, 61 
 lives in London with White, 
 
 64 
 his alienation from Cole- 
 ridge, 69 
 " Edmund Oliver" and 
 
 Coleridge, 71 
 letter to Robert on quarrels , 80 
 verses on Coleridge, 81 
 verses on Lamb, 82, 83 
 and The Ant'i- Jacobin, 85-90 
 
 321
 
 INDEX 
 
 Lloyd, Charles, replies to The 
 Anti-yacobin satire, 90 
 moves to Cambridge, 94 
 and Lamb's poem " The 
 
 Witch," 112 
 his poems in the '• Annual 
 
 Anthology," 120, 122 
 his marriage, 122 
 introduces Lamb to Man- 
 ning, 123 
 reconciliation with Cole- 
 ridge, 140 
 character by Robert, 163 
 on Robert's death, 191 
 and Mr. Lloyd's " Horace," 
 
 his life at Old Brathay, 259- 
 
 274 
 his conversational powers, 
 
 261 
 his appreciation of Pope, 262 
 his account of Coleridge and 
 
 "The Friend," 263 
 a character of Coleridge, 267 
 his novel "Isabel," 268- 
 
 270 
 (1775-1839), on sympa- 
 thetic relations, 270 
 his character by Talfourd, 
 
 272 
 and Shelley, 272 
 his translation of Alfieri, 273 
 life in London, 275-287 
 and Macready, 275-277 
 on London impressions, 277 
 and Barry Cornwall, 279 
 
 Lloyd, Charles, his " Nugae Ca- 
 
 norae," 280 
 and Queen Caroline, 283 
 his " Desultory Thoughts in 
 
 London" and later works, 
 
 284-287 
 criticism by Lamb, 286 
 his death, 288 
 his family, 295 
 Lloyd, Mrs. (Mary Farmer), wife 
 
 of Charles Lloyd (1748- 
 
 1828), 18 
 her character by her son, 19 
 on " Edmund Oliver" and 
 
 novelists, 72 
 on Robert's taste in dress, 97 
 her character by Lamb, 132 
 her death, 305 
 Lloyd, Owen, a stanza on his 
 
 cousin, 307 
 a portrait of Mr. Lloyd, 310 
 verses to Mr. Lloyd, 311 
 his epitaph by Wordsworth, 
 
 and by Hartley Coleridge, 
 
 312, 313 
 Lloyd, Priscilla, set Wordsworth, 
 
 Priscilla 
 Lloyd, Robert, apprentice at Saf- 
 fron Walden, 28 
 first meeting with Lamb, 55 
 first letter from Lamb, 95 
 is reasoned with by Lamb 
 
 on his conduct, 98 
 and Quaker observances, loz 
 runs away, 1 14 
 meets with Manning 1 18 
 
 322
 
 INDEX 
 
 Lloyd, Robert, letters from Man- 
 ning, 128, 132 
 in town with Priscilla, 141 
 his character sketch of Mr- 
 Lloyd, i6z 
 his character sketch of 
 
 Charles Lloyd, 163 
 his marriage, 166 
 visits London, 173-184 
 and the Godwins, 174, 175, 
 
 178, 179 
 visits Charles and Mary 
 
 Lamb, 180 
 a character sketch of Lamb, 
 
 180 
 his death, 188 
 testimony of his wife, 188 
 memoir by Lamb, 189—192 
 testimony of his brother 
 
 Charles, 191 
 testimony of his brother 
 
 James, 192 
 the younger and the cake, 
 193 
 Lloyd, Sampson (i 664-1 724) 16 
 Lloyd, Sampson (i 699-1 779) 
 
 and Dr. Johnson, 17 
 Lloyd, Sophia, her first child, 139 
 estimate by De Quincey, 261 
 and the young Coleridges, 
 
 263 
 and her children, 288-296 
 
 Manning, Thomas, as Robert 
 Lloyd's counsellor, 1 18 
 meets Lamb, 123 
 
 Manning, Thomas, letters to 
 Robert Lloyd, 128, 132 
 his character by Lamb, 146 
 Milton John, tee Lamb, Charles 
 
 " New Morality, The," 85 
 
 Phillips, Stephen, 266 
 Poole, Thomas, 39, 57 
 Pope's " Homer,'' see Seward, 
 Anna 
 See Lamb, Charles 
 See Southey, Robert 
 Portraits, Charles Lamb, by Haz- 
 litt, frontispiece. 
 S. T. Coleridge, by P. Van- 
 dyke, to face p. 30 
 Charles Lloyd, by Constable, to 
 
 face p. 260 
 Sophia Lloyd, by Constable, to 
 face p. 288 
 
 Seward, Anna, disquisitions on 
 translations of the "Il- 
 iad," 196, 201, 207 
 her "Moonlight land- 
 scape," 205, 216 
 Shelley, P. B., and Charles 
 
 Lloyd, 272 
 Southey, Robert, at Burton, 58 
 and Nehemiah Higginbot- 
 
 tom, 63 
 and The Anti-yacobin, 89 
 on Mr. Lloyd's "Iliad," 
 
 217 
 on metres for translators, 
 217, 244 
 
 323
 
 INDEX 
 
 Southey, Robert, on literature as 
 a profession and a hobby, 
 219 
 on Mr. Lloyd's " Odyssey," 
 
 his attitude to Horace, 257 
 on Mr. Lloyd's " Horace," 
 
 257 
 on Quakers, 300 
 Stephen, J. K., his parody of 
 Wordsworth justified, 299 
 
 Talfourd, Serjeant, on Charles 
 
 Lloyd, 272 
 Taylor, Jeremy, 147-155 
 
 Walton, Izaak, see ** Complete 
 
 Angler" 
 White, James, Lloyd's com- 
 panion, 64 
 his supper to chimney- 
 sweepers, 64 
 Wilkinson, Thomas, his opinion 
 
 of Lloyd, 28 
 Witch, The, 108-II3 
 
 Wollstonecraft, Mary, her two 
 
 daughters, 176 
 Wordsworth, Charles (Bishop of 
 St. Andrews), verses to 
 Mr. Lloyd, 307 
 his childhood, 309 
 Wordsworth, Chistopher, and 
 Priscilla Lloyd, 113 
 on loose rhyming, 227 
 Wordsworth, John, 307 
 Wordsworth, Priscilla [nit 
 Lloyd), her appearance at 
 seventeen, 113 
 the mother of Bishops, 113 
 her opinion of Lamb, 1 17 
 her marriage, 169 
 on Alfieri, 273 
 her death, 274 
 on her sons, Charles and 
 John, 309 
 Wordsworth, William, and Hor- 
 ace, 256 
 and railways, 296—300 
 and Owen Lloyd, 312 
 
 THE END. 
 
 324
 
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