this, partaking of some of the best characteristics of both-whose first poem sparkled in the closing darkness of the last century "like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear," and who was advancing from a youth which had anticipated memory, to an age of kindness and hope; and Moore, who paused in the which adorned the “Edinburgh Review," just after

Lord Holland's death.

fluttering expression of graceful trifles, to whisper some deep-toned thought of Ireland's wrongs and sorrows.

Literature and Art supplied the favourite topics to each of these assemblies,—both discussed with earnest admiration, but surveyed in different aspects. The conversation at Lord Holland's was wont to mirror the happiest aspects of the living mind; to cele"The time is coming when, perhaps a few old men, brate the latest discoveries in science; to the last survivors of our generation, will in vain seek, echo the quarterly decisions of imperial amidst new streets, and squares, and railway stations, for the site of that dwelling which was in their youth criticism; to reflect the modest glow of the favourite resort of wits and beauties-of painters and poets of scholars, philosophers, and statesmen. young reputations;—all was gay, graceful, They will then remember, with strange tenderness, decisive, as if the pen of Jeffrey could have many objects once familiar to them-the avenue and spoken; or, if it reverted to old times, it rethe terrace, the busts and the paintings; the carving, the grotesque gilding, and the enigmatical mottoes. joiced in those classical associations which With peculiar fondness, they will recal that venerable are always young. At Lamb's, on the other chamber, in which all the antique gravity of a college hand, the topics were chiefly sought among library was so singularly blended with all that female grace and wit could devise to embellish a drawing-room. the obscure and remote; the odd, the quaint, They will recollect, not unmoved, those shelves loaded the fantastic were drawn out from their with the varied learning of many lands and many ages; those portraits in which were preserved the features of dusty recesses; nothing could be more the best and wisest Englishmen of two generations. foreign to its embrace than the modern They will recollect how many men who have guided the circulating library, even when it teemed with politics of Europe-who have moved great assemblies the Scotch novels. Whatever the subject was, however, in the more aristocratic, or the humbler sphere, it was always discussed by those best entitled to talk on it; no others had a chance of being heard. This remarkable freedom from bores was produced in Lamb's circle by the authoritative texture of its commanding minds; in Lord Holland's, by the more direct, and more genial influence of the hostess, which checked that tenacity of subject and opinion which soinetimes broke the charm of Lamb's parties by "a duel in the form of a debate." Perhaps beyond any other hostess,-certainly far beyond any host, Lady Holland possessed the tact of perceiving, and the power of evoking the various capacities which lurked in every part of the brilliant circles over which she presided, and restrained each to its appropriate sphere, and portion of the evening. To enkindle the enthusiasm of an artist on the theme over which he had achieved the most facile mastery; to set loose the heart of the rustic poet, and imbue his speech with the freedom of his native hills; to draw from the adventurous traveller a breathing picture of his most imminent danger; or to embolden the bashful soldier to disclose his own share in the perils and glories of some famous

by reason and eloquence-who have put life into bronze and canvas, or who have left to posterity things so written as it shall not willingly let them die were there mixed with all that was loveliest and gayest in the society of the most splendid of capitals. They will remember the singular character which belonged to that circle, in which every talent and accomplishment, every art and science, had its place. They will remember how the last debate was discussed in one corner, and the last comedy of Scribe in another; while Wilkie gazed with modest admiration on Reynolds' Baretti; while Mackintosh turned over Thomas Aquinas to verify a quotation; while Talleyrand related his conversations with Barras at the Luxemburg, or his ride with Lannes over the field of Austerlitz. They will remember, above all, the grace and the kindness, far more admirable than grace with which the princely hospitality of that ancient mansion was dispensed. They will remember the venerable and benignant countenance, and the cordial voice of him who bade them welcome. They

will remember that temper which years of pain, of sickness, of lameness, of confinement, seemed only to make sweeter and sweeter; and that frank politeness, which at once relieved all the embarrassment of the youngest and most timid writer or artist, who found himself for the first time among Ambassadors and Earls. They will so animated, so various, so rich with observation and anecdote; that wit which never gave a wound; that exquisite mimicry which ennobled, instead of degrading; that goodness of heart which appeared in every look and accent, and gave additional value to every talent and acquirement. They will remember, too, that he whose name they hold in reverence was not less distinguished by the inflexible uprightness of his political conduct, than by his loving disposition and his winning manners. They will remember that, in the last lines which he traced, he expressed his joy that he had done nothing unworthy of the friend of Fox and Grey; and they will have reason to feel similar joy, if, in looking back on many troubled years, they cannot accuse them

remember that constant flow of conversation, so natural,

selves of having done anything unworthy of men who battle-field; to encourage the generous praise were distinguished by the friendship of Lord Holland." of friendship when the speaker and the

subject reflected interest on each other; or win topics of alliances, and marriages, and profrom an awkward man of science the secret motions; and there was not a hopeful enhistory of a discovery which had astonished gagement, or a happy wedding, or a promothe world; to conduct these brilliant deve- tion of a friend's son, or a new intellectual lopments to the height of satisfaction, and triumph of any youth with whose name and then to shift the scene by the magic of a history she was familiar, but became an event word, were among her nightly successes. on which she expected and required congraAnd if this extraordinary power over the tulation as on a part of her own fortune. elements of social enjoyment was sometimes Although there was necessarily a preponderwielded without the entire concealment of ance in her society of the sentiment of its despotism; if a decisive check sometimes popular progress, which once was cherished rebuked a speaker who might intercept the almost exclusively by the party to whom variegated beauty of Jeffrey's indulgent Lord Holland was united by sacred ties, no criticism, or the jest announced and self-expression of triumph in success, no virurewarded in Sydney Smith's cordial and lence in sudden disappointment, was ever triumphant laugh, the authority was too permitted to wound the most sensitive ears clearly exerted for the evening's prosperity, of her conservative guests. It might be that and too manifestly impelled by an urgent some placid comparison of recent with former consciousness of the value of these golden times, spoke a sense of freedom's peaceful hours which were fleeting within its confines, victory; or that, on the giddy edge of some to sadden the enforced silence with more than great party struggle, the festivities of the a momentary regret. If ever her prohibition evening might take a more serious cast, as - clear, abrupt, and decisive, -indicated news arrived from the scene of contest, and more than a preferable regard for livelier dis- the pleasure might be deepened by the peril ; course, it was when a depreciatory tone was but the feeling was always restrained by the adopted towards genius, or goodness, or supremacy given to those permanent solaces honest endeavour, or when some friend, per- for the mind, in the beautiful and the great, sonal or intellectual, was mentioned in which no political changes disturb. Although slighting phrase. Habituated to a generous the death of the noble master of the venerated partisanship, by strong sympathy with a mansion closed its portals for ever on the great political cause, she carried the fidelity exquisite enjoyments to which they had been of her devotion to that cause into her social so generously expanded, the art of conversarelations, and was ever the truest and the tion lived a little longer in the smaller circle fastest of friends. The tendency, often more which Lady Holland still drew almost daily idle than malicious, to soften down the in- around her; honouring his memory by foltellectual claims of the absent, which so lowing his example, and struggling against insidiously besets literary conversation, and the perpetual sense of unutterable bereaveteaches a superficial insincerity, even to sub-ment, by rendering to literature that honour stantial esteem and regard, and which was sometimes insinuated into the conversation of Lamb's friends, though never into his own, found no favour in her presence; and hence the conversations over which she presided, perhaps beyond all that ever flashed with a kindred splendour, were marked by that integrity of good nature which might admit of their exact repetition to every living individual whose merits were discussed, without the danger of inflicting pain. Under her auspices, not only all critical, but all personal talk was tinged with kindness; the strong interest which she took in the happiness of her friends, shed a peculiar sunniness over the aspects of life presented by the common

and those reliefs, which English aristocracy has too often denied it; and seeking consolation in making others proud and happy. That lingering happiness is extinct now; Lamb's kindred circle-kindred, though so different dispersed almost before he died; the "thoughts that wandered through eternity," are no longer expressed in time; the fancies and conceits, "gay creatures of the element" of social delight, "that in the colours of the rainbow lived, and played in the plighted clouds," flicker only in the backward perspective of waning years; and for the survivors, I may venture to affirm, no such conversation as they have shared in either circle will ever be theirs again in this world!

Before closing these last Memorials of Charles and Mary Lamb, it may be permitted me to glance separately at some of the friends who are grouped around them in memory, and who, like them, live only in recollection, and in the works they have left behind them.

" as a public writer," ought to be possessed of the great fact with which George is laden! Or shall I endeavour to revive the bewildered look with which, just after he had been announced as one of Lord Stanhope's executors and residuary legatees, he received Lamb's grave inquiry, "Whether it was true, as GEORGE DYER was one of the first objects commonly reported, that he was to be made of Lamb's youthful reverence, for he had a Lord?" "O dear no! Mr. Lamb," reattained the stately rank of Grecian in the sponded he with earnest seriousness, but not venerable school of Christ's Hospital, when without a moment's quivering vanity, "I Charles entered it, a little, timid, affectionate | could not think of such a thing; it is not child; but this boyish respect, once amount- true, I assure you." "I thought not," said ing to awe, gave place to a familiar habit of Lamb, " and I contradict it wherever I go; loving banter, which, springing from the but the government will not ask your condepths of old regard, approximated to school- sent; they may raise you to the peerage boy roguery, and, now and then, though very without your even knowing it." "I hope rarely, gleamed on the consciousness of the not, Mr. Lamb; indeed, indeed, I hope not; ripe scholar. No contrast could be more it would not suit me at all," responded Dyer, vivid than that presented by the relations of and went his way, musing on the possibility each to the literature they both loved; one of a strange honour descending on his redivining its inmost essences, plucking out luctant brow. Or shall I recall the visible the heart of its mysteries, shedding light on presentment of his bland unconsciousness of its dimmest recesses; the other devoted, evil when his sportive friend taxed it to the with equal assiduity, to its externals. Books, utmost, by suddenly asking what he thought to Dyer, "were a real world, both pure and of the murderer Williams, who, after de good;" among them he passed, unconscious stroying two families in Ratcliffe Highway, of time, from youth to extreme age, vege- had broken prison by suicide, and whose tating on their dates and forms, and "trivial body had just before been conveyed, in shock. fond records," in the learned air of great ing procession, to its cross-road grave! The libraries, or the dusty confusion of his own, desperate attempt to compel the gentle with the least possible apprehension of any optimist to speak ill of a mortal creature human interest vital in their pages, or of any produced no happier success than the answer, spirit of wit or fancy glancing across them. "Why, I should think, Mr. Lamb, he must His life was an Academic pastoral. Me- have been rather an eccentric character.” thinks I see his gaunt, awkward form, set This simplicity of a nature not only unspotted off by trousers too short, like those outgrown by the world, but almost abstracted from it, by a gawky lad, and a rusty coat as much will seem the more remarkable, when it is too large for the wearer, hanging about him known that it was subjected, at the entrance like those garments which the aristocratic of life, to a hard battle with fortune. Dyer Milesian peasantry prefer to the most com- was the son of very poor parents, residing fortable rustic dress; his long head silvered in an eastern suburb of London, Stepney or over with short yet straggling hair, and his Bethnal-greenward, where he attracted the dark grey eyes glistening with faith and attention of two elderly ladies as a serious wonder, as Lamb satisfies the curiosity child, with an extraordinary love for books. which has gently disturbed his studies as to They obtained for him a presentation to the authorship of the Waverley Novels, by Christ's Hospital, which he entered at seven telling him, in the strictest confidence, that years of age; fought his way through its they are the works of Lord Castlereagh, just sturdy ranks to its head; and, at nineteen, returned from the Congress of Sovereigns at quitted it for Cambridge, with only an exVienna! Off he runs, with animated stride hibition and his scholarly accomplishments and shambling enthusiasm, nor stops till he to help him. On he went, however, placid, reaches Maida Hill, and breathes his news if not rejoicing, through the difficulties into the startled ear of Leigh Hunt, who, of a life illustrated only by scholarship;

encountering tremendous labours; unresting others elicited the wildest denunciations of yet serene; until at eighty-five he breathed visionary terror. out the most blameless of lives, which began in a struggle to end in a learned dream!

In Mr. Godwin's mind, the faculty of abstract reason so predominated over all Mr. GODWIN, who during the happiest others, as practically to extinguish them; period of Lamb's weekly parties, was a con- and his taste, akin to this faculty, sought stant assistant at his whist-table, resembled only for its development through the medium Dyer in simplicity of manner and devotion of composition for the press. He had no to letters; but the simplicity was more imagination, no fancy, no wit, no humour; superficial, and the devotion more profound or if he possessed any of those faculties, they than the kindred qualities in the guileless were obscured by that of pure reason; and scholar; and, instead of forming the entire being wholly devoid of the quick sensibility being, only marked the surface of a nature which irritates speech into eloquence, and beneath which extraordinary power lay of the passion for immediate excitement and hidden. As the absence of worldly wisdom applause, which tends to its presentment subjected Dyer to the sportive sallies of before admiring assemblies, he desired no Lamb, so a like deficiency in Godwin ex- other audience than that which he could posed him to the coarser mirth of Mr. Horne silently address, and learned to regard all Tooke, who was sometimes inclined to seek things through a contemplative medium. In relaxation for the iron muscles of his imper- this sense, far more than in the extravagant turbable mind in trying to make a philosopher application of his wildest theories, he levelled look foolish. To a stranger's gaze the author all around him; admitted no greatness but of the "Political Justice" and "Caleb that of literature; and neither desired nor Williams," as he appeared in the Temple, revered any triumphs but those of thought. always an object of curiosity except to his If such a reasoning faculty, guided by such a familiars, presented none of those charac- disposition, had been applied to abstract teristics with which fancy had invested the sciences, no effect remarkable beyond that daring speculator and relentless novelist; of rare excellence, would have been produced; nor, when he broke silence, did his language but the apparent anomalies of Mr. Godwin's tend to reconcile the reality with the expec- intellectual history arose from the applicatation. The disproportion of a frame which, tion of his power to the passions, the low of stature, was surmounted by a massive interests, and the hopes of mankind, at a head which might befit a presentable giant, time when they enkindled into frightful was rendered almost imperceptible, not by action, and when he calmly worked out his any vivacity of expression, (for his coun- problems among their burning elements with tenance was rarely lighted up by the the "ice-brook's temper," and the severest deep-seated genius within,) but by a logic. And if some extreme conclusions were gracious suavity of manner which many inconsistent with the faith and the duty which "a fine old English gentleman" might envy. alone can sustain and regulate our nature, His voice was small; the topics of his there was no small compensation in the ordinary conversation trivial, and discussed severity of the process to which the student with a delicacy and precision which might was impelled, for the slender peril which almost be mistaken for finical; and the pre- might remain lest the results should be sence of the most interesting persons in practically adopted. A system founded on literary society, of which he had enjoyed pure reason, which rejected the impulses of the best, would not prevent him from falling natural affection, the delights of gratitude, after dinner into the most profound sleep. the influences of prejudice, the bondage of This gentle, drowsy, spiritless demeanour, custom, the animation of personal hope; presents a striking contrast to a reputation which appealed to no passion which which once filled Europe with its echoes; suggested no luxury-which excited no but it was, in truth, when rightly under- animosities-and which offered no prize for stood, perfectly consistent with those intellectual elements which in some raised the most enthusiastic admiration, and from

the observance of its laws, except a participation in the expanding glories of progressive humanity, was little calculated to allure