Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 6.djvu/107

 9* s. vi. A™. 4, i9«>.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 85 Rupert and Fairfax Correspondence, 1852, June 14 and 6 days. S. Russell, Rev. J. Fuller, Part I., 1885, June 26 and 4 days. 8.-Part II., 1886, Feb. 1-4. S. W. ROBERTS. 47, Lansdowne Gardens, S. W. (To be continued.) CH AELES LAMB'S HOAXES.—The well-beloved Elia has much to answer for in two parti- culars at least. His habit of neglecting to date his letters has given his editors many a headache, and his hoaxes continue to this day to mislead the wariest and most ex- perienced. Mr. Carew Hazlitt, whose experience no one can deny, is well known to take the celebrated letter to Barry Cornwall about the family lawsuit (19 Jan., 1829) most seriously. It is rumoured that he is prepared with biblio- graphical details of the edition of ' Fearn's Contingent Remainders' (with the 170 chapters) used by Lamb, and that on his first visit to India he intends to search the records of the Supreme Sessions at Bangalore to see whether the case was re-removed thither. Talfourd and Procter at the time declared it all a hoax ; Canon Ainger is of the same mind ; but Mr. Hazlitt knows better. The immortal quizzer catches the Master (of the Temple and of all Lambites) in another way. (1) He tells Barry Cornwall an anecdote of Simonides; the canon recognizes it for "droll and wonderful imagination"; but I find it in Freeman's ' History of Sicily' (ii. 261), and Mr. Round has not yet accused his victim of going to Elia for his authorities. (2) Lamb speaks in his'Roast Pig'of crossing London Bridge on his way to school; the canon sees "audacious indifference to fact"; but surely he forgets that Lamb says prac- tically the same (" through the Borough ") in the letter to Coleridge (9 March, 1822) which was the germ of the' Essay,' and in which he had no motive for fibbing. (3) Lamb play- fully writes in verse of " the fair Maria and Emma brown," and the canon supposes "Maria" must be meant for Mary Lamb— because that would be a joke, and Lamb is so jocular. Surely it was Maria Fryer, Emma Isola's girl companion. (4) Lamb (without the slightest literary motive for invention) speaks in ' My First Play' of a small landed property as bequeathed to him ; the canon calmly dismissed this (1883) as "a piece of humorous fabrication, as usual." In nis last (1899) luxurious edition (wherewith he has laid a mickle geld on his poorer subjects) the Master has, however, owned that Lamb really meant what he said here. (5) Again, Lamb writes a puzzling letter (placed under 1811) to Godwin. On the surface it refers to a political election. Not at all, says Canon Ainger ; it deals with an election to the post of physician to St. Luke's Hospital. Lamb was qualified to vote at the expense of Basil Montagu ; he tells Godwin that he cannot vote because he has sold his qualification for 501. Surely that would be beyond even his notions of a jest. (6) Lamb writes to Hazlitt (28 Nov., 1810) that he has seen his corre- spondent's letter in Cobbett's 'Register'; in a note the editor says this was a pamphlet of Hunt's on ' Reform.' But as he does not allude to quizzing here, it may be the joke is his own. The letter, as a reference to Gobbet* easily shows, was by Hazlitt on the Mal- thusian controversy. (7) Lamb sends to Mrs. Badams (31 Dec., 1832) a circumstantial and most plausible-looking account of a queer accident which connected him for a moment with the murder of Danby at Enfield "Another of Lamb's elaborate fictions, chuckles the editor. But, according to Mr. Carew Hazlitt, the same story was told by a lady who had visited the Lambs on the very day of the occurrence. (See 'Mary and Charles Lamb,' 1874, p. 209.) Here one hesitates. " More authority, dear boy, name more ; and, sweet my child, let them be — ahem ! , A somewhat similar case to Canon Ainger s is the effect produced on Dykes Campbell by Coleridge's imaginative sallies. He came to doubt every assertion of Coleridge s about his work for which he had not evidence at hand, and had in consequence to recant in several instances in a new edition which very shortly followed his first. J- A. RUTTEK. ENIGMA ON THE LETTER H.—The First, Third, Fourth, Fifth, and Seventh benes of 'N. & Q.' each contained articles on the authorship of the poem originally com- mencing '"Twas in heaven pronounced, &c., but probably better known as Twas whispered in heaven, 'twas muttered in hell. Some of your correspondents were of opinion that Lord Byron was the author, while others attributed it to Miss Catherine Maria *an- shawe. The discussion has recently been renewed in the Hampstead and Ihghgate &x- m-ess, which brought the following letter from Mr. Murray, the publisher of all Lord Byron s works. In order to settle the question for all time, I trust you will find space for Mr. Murray's letter, which appeared in the Express on 30 June:— SIR —A copy of your paper of June 9th has just been sent to me to call my attention to the re