probable that, if I am absolutely unable to go abroad (and I am now making a last effort by an application to Mr John King respecting his house at S. Lewis, and the means of living there), I may perhaps come up to London and maintain myself as before by writing for the Morning Post. Here it will be imprudent for me to stay, from the wet and the cold. My darling Hartley has this evening had an attack of fever, but my medical man thinks it will pass off. I think of your children not unfrequently. God love them. He has been on the Scotch hills with Montagu and his new father, William Lush.-Yours, S. T. COLERIDGE." The Same to the Same. "25 BRIDGE Street, Westminster, Nov. 19, 1801. "DEAR GODWIN,-I arrived here late on Sunday evening, and how long I shall stay depends much on my health. If I were to judge from my feelings of yesterday and to-day, it will be a very short time indeed, for I am miserably uncomfortable. By your letter to Southey, I understand that you are particularly anxious to see me. To-day I am engaged for two hours in the morning with a person in the city, after which I shall be at Lamb's till past seven at least. I had assuredly planned a walk to Somerstown, but I saw so many people on Monday, and walked to and fro so much, that I have ever since been like a Fish in air, who, as perhaps you know, lies pantingly dying from excess of oxygen. A great change from the society of W. and his sister—for though we were three persons, there was but one God-whereas I have the excited feelings of a polytheist, meeting Lords many and Gods many-some of them very Egyptian physiognomies, dog-faced gentry, crocodiles, ibises, &c., though more odd fish than rare ones. However, as to the business of seeing you, it is possible that you may meet me this evening. If not, and if I am well enough, I will call on you; and if you breakfast at ten, breakfast with you to-morrow morning. It will be hard indeed if I cannot afford a half-crown coach fare to annihilate the sense at least of the space. I write like a valetudinarian: but I assure you that "S. T. COLERIDGE." Lamb's letters are so like himself that it were sin to omit any of those which follow, though they have lost much of their point, since it is now impossible to discover the work of which Godwin had sent him a plan. It is only mentioned in the diary as "Sketch," and no draft of any work which corresponds to the expressions in the letters is to be found among the papers. C. Lamb to William Godwin. "June 29, 1801. “Dear Sir,—Doctor Christy's Brother and Sister are come to town, and have shown me great civilities. I in return wish to requite them, having, by God's grace, principles of generosity implanted (as the moralists say) in my nature, which have been duly cultivated and watered by good and religious friends, and a pious education. They have picked up in the northern parts of the island an astonishing admiration of the great author of the New Philosophy in England, and I have ventured to promise their taste an evening's gratification by seeing Mr Godwin face to face!!!!! Will you do them and me in them the pleasure of drinking tea and supping with me at the old number 16 on Friday or Saturday next? An early nomination of the day will very much oblige yours sincerely, CH. LAMB." The Same to the Same. Sep. 9, 1801. "DEAR SIR,-Nothing runs in my head when I think of your story, but that you should make it as like the life of Savage as possible. That is a known and familiar tale, and its effect on the public mind has been very great. Many of the incidents in the true history are readily made dramatical. For instance, Savage used to walk backwards and forwards o' nights to his mother's window, to catch a glimpse of her, as she passed with a candle. With some such situation the play might happily open. I would plunge my Hero, exactly like Savage, into difficulties and embarrassments, the consequences of an unsettled mind: out of which he may be extricated by the unknown interference of his mother. He should be attended from the beginning by a friend, who should stand in much the same relation towards him as Horatio to Altamont in the play of the Fair Penitent. A character of this sort seems indispensable. This friend might gain interviews with the mother, when the son was refused sight of her. Like Horatio with Calista, he might wring his soul. Like Horatio, he might learn the secret first. He might be exactly in the same perplexing situation, when he had learned it, whether to tell it or conceal it from the Ton (I have still Savage in my head) might kill a man (as he did) in an affray—he should receive a pardon, as Savage did—and the mother might interfere to have him banished. This should provoke the Friend to demand an interview with her husband, and disclose the whole secret. The husband, refusing to believe anything to her dishonour, should fight with him. The husband repents before he dies. The mother explains and confesses everything in his presence. The son is admitted to an interview with his now acknowledged mother. Instead of embraces, she resolves to abstract herself from all pleasure, even from his sight, in voluntary penance all her days after. This is crude indeed!! but I am totally unable to suggest a better. I am the worst hand in the world at a plot. But I understand enough of passion to predict that your story, with some of Savage's, which has no repugnance, but a natural alliance with it, cannot fail. The mystery of the suspected relationship-the suspicion, generated from slight and forgotten circumstances, coming at last to act as Instinct, and so to be mistaken for Instinct-the son's unceasing pursuit and throwing of himself in his mother's way, something like Falkland's eternal persecution of Williams-the high and intricate passion in the mother, the being obliged to shun and keep at a distance the thing nearest to her heart—to be cruel, where her heart yearns to be kind, without a possibility of explanation. You have the power of life and death and the hearts of your auditors in your hands—still Harris will want a skeleton, and he must have it. I can only put in some sorry hints. The discovery to the son's friend may take place not before the 3d act-in some such way as this. The mother may cross the street-he may point her out to some gay companion of his as the Beauty of Leghorn-the pattern for wives, &c. &c. His companion, who is an Englishman, laughs at his mistake, and knows her to have been the famous Nancy Dawson, or any one else, who captivated the English king. Some such way seems dramatic, and speaks to the Eye. The audience will enter into the Friend's surprise, and into the perplexity of his situation. These Ocular Scenes are so many great landmarks, rememberable headlands and lighthouses in the voyage. Macbeth's witch has a good advice to a magic writer, what to do with his spectator. 'Show his eyes, and grieve his heart.' The most difficult thing seems to be, What to do with the husband? You will not make him jealous of his own son? that is a stale and an unpleasant trick in Douglas, &c. Can't you keep him out of the way till you want him, as the husband of Isabella is conveniently sent off till his cue comes? There will be story enough without him, and he will only puzzle all. Catastrophes are worst of all. Mine is most stupid. I only propose it to fulfil my engagement, not in hopes to convert you. "It is always difficult to get rid of a woman at the end of a tragedy. Men may fight and die. A woman must either take poison, which is a nasty trick, or go mad, which is not fit to be shown, or retire, which is poor, only retiring is most reputable. "I am sorry I can furnish you no better: but I find it extremely difficult to settle my thoughts upon anything but the scene before me, when I am from home, I am from home so seldom. If any, the least hint crosses me, I will write again, and I very much wish to read your plan, if you could abridge and send it. In this little scrawl you must take the will for the deed, for I most sincerely wish success to your play,—Farewell, C. L." Fragment of letter from the Same to the Same. [The second sheet, endorsed by C. Lamb himself on the address as only double."] "MARGATE, Sept. 17, 1801. "I shall be glad to come home and talk these matters with you. I have read your scheme very attentively. That Arabella has been mistress to King Charles, is sufficient to all the purposes of the story. It can only diminish that respect we feel for her to make her turn whore to one of the Lords of his Bedchamber. Her son must not know that she has been a whore: it matters not that she has been whore to a King: equally in both cases, it is against decorum and against the delicacy of a son's respect that he should be privy to it. No doubt, many sons might feel a wayward pleasure in the honourable guilt of their mothers, but is it a true feeling? Is it the best sort of feeling? Is it a feeling to be exposed on theatres to mothers and daughters? Your conclusion (or rather Defoe's) comes far short of the tragic ending, which is always expected, and it is not safe to disappoint. A tragic auditory wants blood. They care but little about a man and his wife parting. Besides, what will you do with the son, after all his pursuits and adventures? Even quietly leave him to take guineaand-a-half lodgings with mama in Leghorn! O impotent and pacific measures! . . . I am certain that you must mix up some strong ingredients of distress to give a savour to your pottage. I still think that you may, and must, graft the story of Savage upon Defoe. Your hero must kill a man or do some thing. Can't you bring him to the gallows or some great mischief, out of which she must have recourse to an explanation with her husband to save him. Think on this. The husband, for instance, has great friends in Court at Leghorn. The son is condemned to death. She cannot teaze him for a stranger. She must tell the whole truth. Or she may teaze him, as for a stranger, till (like Othello in Cassio's case) he begins to suspect her for her importunity. Or, being pardoned, can she not teaze her husband to get him banished? Something of this I suggested before. Both is best. The murder and the pardon will make business for the fourth act, and |