The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4

Charles Lamb

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• Publié par: irge
• Publié le: 08 décembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 38
• Langue: English

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The Project Gutenberg eBook, The
Works of Charles Lamb in Four
Volumes, Volume 4, by Charles
Lamb, et al
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Title: The Works of Charles Lamb in Four Volumes, Volume 4
Author: Charles Lamb
Release Date: November 23, 2004 [eBook #14129]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE WORKS OF
CHARLES LAMB IN FOUR VOLUMES, VOLUME 4***
E-text prepared by Charles Aldarondo, Keren Vergon, Leonard Johnson,
and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
THE
WORKS
OF
CHARLES LAMB.
IN FOUR VOLUMES.
VOL. IV.A NEW EDITION.
BOSTON
Crosby, Nichols, Lee and Company.
117 Washington Street.
1860
Riverside, Cambridge:
Stereotyped and Printed by
H. O. Houghton.
CONTENTS.
ROSAMUND GRAY, ESSAYS, ETC.
ROSAMUND GRAY
ESSAYS:—
RECOLLECTIONS OF CHRIST'S HOSPITAL
ON THE TRAGEDIES OF SHAKSPEARE, CONSIDERED WITH
REFERENCE TO THEIR FITNESS FOR STAGE-
REPRESENTATION
CHARACTERS OF DRAMATIC WRITERS, CONTEMPORARY
WITH SHAKSPEARE
SPECIMENS FROM THE WRITINGS OF FULLER, THE CHURCH
HISTORIAN
ON THE GENIUS AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH; WITH
SOME REMARKS ON A PASSAGE IN THE WRITINGS OF THE
LATE MR. BARRY
ON THE POETICAL WORKS OF GEORGE WITHER
LETTERS UNDER ASSUMED SIGNATURES, PUBLISHED IN "THE
REFLECTOR":—
THE LONDONERON BURIAL SOCIETIES; AND THE CHARACTER OF AN
UNDERTAKER
ON THE DANGER OF CONFOUNDING MORAL WITH PERSONAL
DEFORMITY; WITH A HINT TO THOSE WHO HAVE THE FRAMING OF
ADVERTISEMENTS FOR APPREHENDING OFFENDERS
ON THE INCONVENIENCES RESULTING FROM BEING HANGED
ON THE MELANCHOLY OF TAILORS
HOSPITA ON THE IMMODERATE INDULGENCE OF THE
PLEASURES OF THE PALATE
EDAX ON APPETITE
CURIOUS FRAGMENTS, EXTRACTED FROM A COMMONPLACE
BOOK WHICH BELONGED TO ROBERT BURTON, THE FAMOUS
AUTHOR OF THE ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY
MR. H——, A FARCE, IN TWO ACTS
POEMS.
[Those marked with an asterisk are by the Author's Sister.]
HESTER
TO CHARLES LLOYD, AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR
THE THREE FRIENDS
TO A RIVER IN WHICH A CHILD WAS DROWNED
THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES
*HELEN
A VISION OF REPENTANCE
*DIALOGUE BETWEEN A MOTHER AND CHILD
QUEEN ORIANA'S DREAM
A BALLAD, NOTING THE DIFFERENCE OF RICH AND POOR, IN THE
WAYS OF A RICH NOBLE'S PALACE AND A POOR WORKHOUSE
HYPOCHONDRIACUS
A FAREWELL TO TOBACCO
TO T. L. H., A CHILD
BALLAD, FROM THE GERMAN
*DAVID IN THE CAVE OF ADULLAM
*SALOME
*LINES SUGGESTED BY A PICTURE OF TWO FEMALES, BY
LIONARDO DA VINCI
*LINES ON THE SAME PICTURE BEING REMOVED TO MAKE PLACE
FOR A PORTRAIT OF A LADY BY TITIAN
*LINES ON THE CELEBRATED PICTURE BY LIONARDO DA VINCI,
CALLED THE VIRGIN OF THE ROCKS
*ON THE SAME
SONNETS:—
I. TO MISS KELLY
II. ON THE SIGHT OF SWANS IN KENSINGTON GARDEN.
III.
IV.
V.
VI. THE FAMILY NAME
VII.
VIII.IX. TO JOHN LAMB, ESQ., OF THE SOUTH-SEA-HOUSE
X.
XI.
BLANK VERSE:—
CHILDHOOD
THE GRANDAME
THE SABBATH BELLS
FANCY EMPLOYED ON DIVINE SUBJECTS
COMPOSED AT MIDNIGHT
JOHN WOODVIL; A TRAGEDY
THE WITCH, A DRAMATIC SKETCH OP THE SEVENTEENTH
CENTURY
ALBUM VERSES, WITH A FEW OTHERS.
IN THE AUTOGRAPH BOOK OF MRS. SERGEANT W——
TO DORA W——, ON BEING ASKED BY HER FATHER TO WRITE IN
HER ALBUM
IN THE ALBUM OF A CLERGYMAN'S LADY
IN THE ALBUM OF EDITH S——
IN THE ALBUM OF ROTHA Q——
IN THE ALBUM OF CATHERINE ORKNEY
IN THE ALBUM OF LUCY BARTON
IN THE ALBUM OF MRS. JANE TOWERS
IN THE ALBUM OF MISS——
IN MY OWN ALBUM
MISCELLANEOUS:—
ANGEL HELP
ON AN INFANT DYING AS SOON AS BORN
THE CHRISTENING
THE YOUNG CATECHIST
TO A YOUNG FRIEND ON HER TWENTY-FIRST BIRTHDAY
SHE IS GOING
SONNETS:—
HARMONY IN UNLIKENESS
WRITTEN AT CAMBRIDGE
TO A CELEBRATED FEMALE PERFORMER IN THE "BLIND BOY"
WORK
LEISURE
TO SAMUEL ROGERS, ESQ.
THE GYPSY'S MALISON
COMMENDATORY VERSES, ETC.:—
TO J. S. KNOWLES, ESQ., ON HIS TRAGEDY OF VIRGINlUS
TO THE AUTHOR OF POEMS PUBLISHED UNDER THE NAME OF
BARRY CORNWALL
TO THE EDITOR OF THE "EVERY-DAY BOOK"
TO T. STOTHARD, ESQ., ON HIS ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE POEMSOF MR. ROGERS
TO A FRIEND ON HIS MARRIAGE
"O LIFT WITH REVERENT HAND"
THE SELF-ENCHANTED
TO LOUISA M——, WHOM I USED TO CALL "MONKEY"
TRANSLATIONS FROM THE LATIN OF VINCENT BOURNE:—
THE BALLAD-SINGERS
TO DAVID COOK, OF THE PARISH OF ST. MARGARET'S,
WESTMINSTER, WATCHMAN
ON A SEPULCHRAL STATUE OF AN INFANT SLEEPING
EPITAPH ON A DOG
THE RIVAL BELLS
NEWTON'S PRINCIPIA
THE HOUSEKEEPER
ON A DEAF AND DUMB ARTIST
THE FEMALE ORATORS
PINDARIC ODE TO THE TREAD-MILL
GOING OR GONE
FREE THOUGHTS ON SEVERAL EMINENT COMPOSERS
THE WIFE'S TRIAL; OR, THE INTRUDING WIDOW. A DRAMATIC
POEM
ROSAMUND GRAY, ESSAYS,
ETC.
TO
MARTIN CHARLES BURNEY, ESQ.
Forgive me, BURNEY, if to thee these late
And hasty products of a critic pen,
Thyself no common judge of books and men,
In feeling of thy worth I dedicate.
My verse was offered to an older friend;
The humbler prose has fallen to thy share:
Nor could I miss the occasion to declare,
What spoken in thy presence must offend—
That, set aside some few caprices wild,
Those humorous clouds that flit o'er brightest days,In all my threadings of this worldly maze,
(And I have watched thee almost from a child),
Free from self-seeking, envy, low design,
I have not found a whiter soul than thine.
ROSAMUND GRAY.
CHAPTER I.
It was noontide. The sun was very hot. An old gentlewoman sat spinning in a
little arbor at the door of her cottage. She was blind; and her granddaughter
was reading the Bible to her. The old lady had just left her work, to attend to the
story of Ruth.
"Orpah kissed her mother-in-law; but Ruth clave unto her." It was a passage
she could not let pass without a comment. The moral she drew from it was not
very new, to be sure. The girl had heard it a hundred times before—and a
hundred times more she could have heard it, without suspecting it to be
tedious. Rosamund loved her grandmother.
The old lady loved Rosamund too; and she had reason for so doing.
Rosamund was to her at once a child and a servant. She had only her left in the
world. They two lived together.
They had once known better days. The story of Rosamund's parents, their
failure, their folly, and distresses, may be told another time. Our tale hath grief
enough in it.
It was now about a year and a half since old Margaret Gray had sold off all her
effects, to pay the debts of Rosamund's father—just after the mother had died of
a broken heart; for her husband had fled his country to hide his shame in a
foreign land. At that period the old lady retired to a small cottage in the village of
Widford in Hertfordshire.
Rosamund, in her thirteenth year, was left destitute, without fortune or friends:
she went with her grandmother. In all this time she had served her faithfully and
lovingly.
Old Margaret Gray, when she first came into these parts, had eyes, and could
see. The neighbors said, they had been dimmed by weeping: be that as it may,
she was latterly grown quite blind. "God is very good to us, child; I can feel you
yet." This she would sometimes say; and we need not wonder to hear, that
Rosamund clave unto her grandmother.
Margaret retained a spirit unbroken by calamity. There was a principle within,which it seemed as if no outward circumstances could reach. It was a religious
principle, and she had taught it to Rosamund; for the girl had mostly resided
with her grandmother from her earliest years. Indeed she had taught her all that
she knew herself; and the old lady's knowledge did not extend a vast way.
Margaret had drawn her maxims from observation; and a pretty long experience
in life had contributed to make her, at times, a little positive: but Rosamund
never argued with her grandmother.
Their library consisted chiefly in a large family Bible, with notes and expositions
by various learned expositors, from Bishop Jewell downwards.
This might never be suffered to lie about like other books, but was kept
constantly wrapt up in a handsome case of green velvet, with gold tassels—the
only relic of departed grandeur they had brought with them to the cottage—
everything else of value had been sold off for the purpose above mentioned.
This Bible Rosamund, when a child, had never dared to open without
permission; and even yet, from habit, continued the custom. Margaret had
parted with none of her authority; indeed it was never exerted with much
harshness; and happy was Rosamund, though a girl grown, when she could
obtain leave to read her Bible. It was a treasure too valuable for an
indiscriminate use; and Margaret still pointed out to her grand-daughter where
to read.
Besides th