The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb Volume III Part 50

PRINCE

"My Nose, Ma'am!"

FAIRY

"No offence.-- The King your Father was a man of sense, A handsome man (but lived not to be old) And had a Nose cast in the common mould.

Ev'n I myself, that now with age am grey, Was thought to have some beauty in my day, And am the Daughter of a King. Your sire In this poor face saw something to admire-- And I to shew my grat.i.tude made shift-- Have stood his friend--and help'd him at a lift-- 'Twas I that, when his hopes began to fail, Shew'd him the spell that lurk'd in Minon's tail-- Perhaps you have heard--but come, Sir, you don't eat-- That Nose of yours requires both wine and meat-- Fall to, and welcome, without more ado-- You see your fare--what shall I help you to?

This dish the tongues of nightingales contains; This, eyes of peac.o.c.ks; and that, linnets' brains; That next you is a Bird of Paradise-- We fairies in our food are somewhat nice.-- And pray, Sir, while your hunger is supplied, Do lean your Nose a little on one side; The shadow, which it casts upon the meat, Darkens my plate, I see not what I eat "--

The Prince on dainty after dainty feeding, Felt inly shock'd at the old Fairy's breeding; And held it want of manners in the Dame, And did her country education blame.

One thing he only wonder'd at,--what she So very comic in his nose could see.

Hers, it must be confest, was somewhat short, And time and shrinking age accounted for't; But for his own, thank heaven, he could not tell That it was ever thought remarkable; A decent nose, of reasonable size, And handsome thought, rather than otherwise.

But that which most of all his wonder paid, Was to observe the Fairy's waiting Maid; How at each word the aged Dame let fall She courtsied low, and smil'd a.s.sent to all; But chiefly when the rev'rend Grannam told Of conquests, which her beauty made of old.-- He smiled to see how Flattery sway'd the Dame, Nor knew himself was open to the same!

He finds her raillery now increase so fast, That making hasty end of his repast, Glad to escape her tongue, he bids farewell To the old Fairy, and her friendly cell.

But his kind Hostess, who had vainly tried The force of ridicule to cure his pride, Fertile in plans, a surer method chose, To make him see the error of his nose; For till he view'd that feature with remorse, The Enchanter's direful spell must be in force.

Midway the road by which the Prince must pa.s.s, She rais'd by magic art a House of Gla.s.s; No mason's hand appear'd, nor work of wood; Compact of gla.s.s the wondrous fabric stood.

Its stately pillars, glittering in the sun, Conspicuous from afar, like silver, shone.

Here, s.n.a.t.c.h'd and rescued from th' Enchanter's might, She placed the beauteous Claribel in sight.

The admiring Prince the chrystal dome survey'd, And sought access unto his lovely Maid; But, strange to tell, in all that mansion's bound, Nor door, nor cas.e.m.e.nt, was there to be found.

Enrag'd, he took up ma.s.sy stones, and flung With such a force, that all the palace rung; But made no more impression on the gla.s.s, Than if the solid structure had been bra.s.s.

To comfort his despair, the lovely maid Her snowy hand against her window laid; But when with eager haste he thought to kiss, His Nose stood out, and robb'd him of the bliss.

Thrice he essay'd th' impracticable feat; The window and his lips can never meet.

The painful Truth, which Flattery long conceal'd, Rush'd on his mind, and "O!" he cried, "I yield; Wisest of Fairies, thou wert right, I wrong-- _I own, I own, I have a Nose too long_."

The frank confession was no sooner spoke, But into shivers all the palace broke, His Nose of monstrous length, to his surprise Shrunk to the limits of a common size; And Claribel with joy her Lover view'd, Now grown as beautiful as he was good.

The aged Fairy in their presence stands, Confirms their mutual vows, and joins their hands.

The Prince with rapture hails the happy hour, That rescued him from self-delusion's power; And trains of blessings crown the future life Of Dorus, and of Claribel, his wife.

NOTES

CHARLES LAMB AND BOOKS FOR CHILDREN

Charles Lamb's activities as a writer for children seem to have begun and ended in the service of G.o.dwin. The earliest effort in this direction of which we have any knowledge is _The King and Queen of Hearts_, 1805, and the latest _Prince Dorus_, 1810 or 1811, unless we count _Beauty and the Beast_, possibly 1811, which in my opinion he did not write.

Lamb first met William G.o.dwin (1756-1836), the philosopher, probably through the instrumentality of their mutual friend Thomas Holcroft, not long after Gillray had satirised Lamb and Lloyd, in his plate in the first number of _The Anti-Jacobin Review and Magazine_, August, 1798, as a frog and a toad, seated in the vicinity of Coleridge and Southey and reading together a volume labelled "Blank Verse, by Toad and Frog." "Pray, Mr. Lamb," said G.o.dwin when he first made Lamb's acquaintance, "are you toad or frog?" It was feared that trouble might ensue, but Lamb and G.o.dwin were found the next morning at breakfast together and they became good, though never very intimate, friends.

G.o.dwin, who had been for a while a minister at Ware, in Hertfordshire, came to London in 1779, and took up literature as a profession seriously in 1783. His _Political Justice_ was published in 1793, _Caleb Williams_ in 1794, and _St. Leon_ in 1799. After loving at a distance Mrs. Opie and Mrs. Inchbald, G.o.dwin married Mary Wollstonecraft in 1797. Their daughter afterwards became Mrs. Sh.e.l.ley, the wife of the poet. Mary Wollstonecraft G.o.dwin died in the year of her marriage, and in 1801 G.o.dwin married again, a Mrs. Clairmont, a widow. Lamb detested her. None the less it was she who took to publishing and who incited him and his sister to write the charming children's books in this volume.

Lamb helped G.o.dwin with other literary ventures before the publishing business was started. In 1800 he wrote an epilogue to his tragedy of "Antonio" (see the essay in Vol. II., "The Old Actors," for a description of the luckless first night), and he advised him in the composition of "Faulkener," another tragedy, which failed in 1807 and which also had a prologue by Lamb. And a letter is extant showing Lamb toiling at a review of G.o.dwin's _Chaucer_ in 1803, but the review itself is not forthcoming.

The publishing business was started in 1805 on Mrs. G.o.dwin's initiative. At first, owing to the undesirability of connecting the name of a political and moral firebrand like G.o.dwin with books for children, it was arranged that the business, which was in Hanway Street, Oxford Street, should bear the name of the manager, Thomas Hodgkins, while the books contributed by G.o.dwin were to be signed Edward Baldwin. In 1806, however, Mrs. G.o.dwin opened a shop at 41 Skinner Street, Snow Hill (now demolished), and published in her own name as M.J. G.o.dwin & Co., at The Children's Library.

For her the Lambs wrote _The King and Queen of Hearts_ (by Charles Lamb), 1805; _Tales from Shakespear_, 1807; _The Adventures of Ulysses_ (by Charles Lamb), 1808; _Mrs. Leicester's School and Poetry for Children_, 1809; and _Prince Dorus_ (by Charles Lamb), 1811. Mrs.

G.o.dwin translated tales from the French, G.o.dwin contributed _Baldwin's Fables_, _Baldwin's Pantheon_, and histories of Greece, England and Rome, and Hazlitt wrote an English Grammar. The princ.i.p.al ill.u.s.trator to the firm was William Mulready.

Although Lamb had the most cordial disliking for Mrs. G.o.dwin, he always stood by his old friend her husband. Between 1811 and 1821 the two men seem to have had little to do with each other; but in 1822 Lamb came to G.o.dwin's a.s.sistance to much purpose. The t.i.tle to G.o.dwin's house in Skinner Street was successfully contested in that year, and G.o.dwin became a bankrupt. A fund was therefore set on foot for him by Lamb and others, Lamb's own contribution being 50.

G.o.dwin, however, never rightly rallied, and thenceforward lived very quietly, wrote the _History of the Commonwealth_ and _Lives of the Necromancers_, and died in 1836. Mrs. G.o.dwin survived him until 1841.

Knowing what we do--from Dowden's _Sh.e.l.ley_ and other sources--it is not possible greatly to admire G.o.dwin's character, nor is the second Mrs. G.o.dwin a subject for enthusiasm; but the part played by them in the Lambs' literary life was extremely valuable. Charles Lamb had, it is true, other stimulus, and without his work for children, sweet though it is, his name would still be a household word; but Mary Lamb might, but for the G.o.dwins, have gone almost silent to the grave. Her writings, with their sweet gravity and tender simplicity, were called forth wholly by the Bad Baby, as Lamb called Mrs. G.o.dwin.

Lamb's views on the literature of the nursery had crystallised long before he began to write children's books himself. In a letter to Coleridge, October 23,1802, he had said:--

"'Goody Two Shoes' is almost out of print. Mrs. Barbauld's stuff has banished all the old cla.s.sics of the nursery; and the shopman at Newberry's hardly deigned to reach them off an old exploded corner of a shelf, when Mary asked for them. Mrs. B.'s and Mrs. Trimmer's nonsense lay in piles about. Knowledge insignificant and vapid as Mrs.

Barbauld's books convey, it seems, must come to a child in the _shape of knowledge_, and his empty noddle must be turned with conceit of his own powers when he has learnt, that a horse is an animal, and Billy is better than a horse, and such like; instead of that beautiful interest in wild tales, which made the child a man, while all the while he suspected himself to be no bigger than a child. Science has succeeded to poetry no less in the little walks of children than with men. Is there no possibility of averting this sore evil? Think what you would have been now, if, instead of being fed with tales and old wives'

fables in childhood, you had been crammed with geography and natural history!"

Hence when the time came Lamb was all ready with a nursery method of his own.

Page 1. TALES FROM SHAKESPEAR.

Mary Lamb was asked to write the _Tales from Shakespear_, with help from her brother, in the spring of 1806 or the winter of 1805. I have seen the statement that this was at the instigation of Hazlitt, but Lamb does not say so. The first mention of the work is in Lamb's letter to Manning, May 10, 1806:--

"She [Mary] says you saw her writings about the other day, and she wishes you should know what they are. She is doing for G.o.dwin's bookseller twenty of Shakspeare's plays, to be made into children's tales. Six are already done by her, to wit, 'The Tempest,' 'Winter's Tale,' 'Midsummer Night,' 'Much Ado,' 'Two Gentlemen of Verona,' and 'Cymbeline'; and the 'Merchant of Venice' is in forwardness. I have done 'Oth.e.l.lo' and 'Macbeth,' and mean to do all the tragedies. I think it will be popular among the little people, besides money. It's to bring in sixty guineas. Mary has done them capitally, I think, you'd think. These are the humble amus.e.m.e.nts we propose, while you are gone to plant the cross of Christ among barbarous pagan anthropophagi.

Quam h.o.m.o homini praestat! but then, perhaps, you'll get murdered, and we shall die in our beds with a fair literary reputation."

Mary Lamb's letters to Sarah Stoddart (afterwards Sarah Hazlitt), continue the story. This is on June 2, 1806:--

My _Tales_ are to be published in separate story-books; I mean, in single stories, like the children's little shilling books. I cannot send you them in Ma.n.u.script, because they are all in the G.o.dwins'

hands; but one will be published very soon, and then you shall have it _all in print_. I go on very well, and have no doubt but I shall always be able to hit upon some such kind of job to keep going on. I think I shall get fifty pounds a year at the lowest calculation; but as I have not yet seen any _money_ of my own earning, for we do not expect to be paid till Christmas, I do not feel the good fortune, that has so unexpectedly befallen me, half so much as I ought to do. But another year, no doubt, I shall perceive it.

When I write again, you will hear tidings of the farce, for Charles is to go in a few days to the Managers to inquire about it. But that must now be a next-year's business too, even if it does succeed; so it's all looking forward, and no prospect of present gain. But that's better than no hopes at all, either for present or future times.

Charles has written Macbeth, Oth.e.l.lo, King Lear, and has begun Hamlet; you would like to see us, as we often sit writing on one table (but not on one cushion sitting), like Hermia and Helena in the Midsummer Night's Dream; or, rather, like an old literary Darby and Joan: I taking snuff; and he groaning all the while, and saying he can make nothing of it, which he always says till he has finished, and then he finds out he has made something of it....

Martin [Burney] has just been here. My Tales (_again_) and Charles's Farce has made the boy mad to turn Author; and he has written a Farce, and he has made the Winter's Tale into a story; but what Charles says of himself is really true of Martin, for _he can make nothing at all of it_; and I have been talking very eloquently this morning, to convince him that n.o.body can write farces, &c., under thirty years of age. And so I suppose he will go home and new model his farce.

A little later, June 26, Lamb writes to Wordsworth:--

"Mary is just stuck fast in All's Well that Ends Well. She complains of having to set forth so many female characters in boy's clothes. She begins to think Shakspear must have wanted Imagination. I to encourage her, for she often faints in the prosecution of her great work, flatter her with telling how well such and such a play is done. But she is stuck fast and I have been obliged to promise to a.s.sist her."

Then we have Mary Lamb to Sarah Stoddart again (early in July, 1806): "I am in good spirits just at this present time, for Charles has been reading over the _Tale_ I told you plagued me so much, and he thinks it one of the very best: it is 'All's Well that Ends Well.'"

The work was finished in the autumn of 1806 and published at the end of the year, dated 1807. Lamb sent Wordsworth a copy on January 29, 1807, with the following letter:--

"We have book'd off from Swan and Two Necks, Lad Lane, this day (per Coach) the Tales from Shakespear. You will forgive the plates, when I tell you they were left to the direction of G.o.dwin, who left the choice of subjects to the bad baby, who from mischief (I suppose) has chosen one from d.a.m.n'd beastly vulgarity (vide 'Merch. Venice'), where no atom of authority was in the tale to justify it--to another has given a name which exists not in the tale, Nic Bottom, and which she thought would be funny, though in this I suspect _his_ hand, for I guess her reading does not reach far enough to know Bottom's Christian name--and one of Hamlet, and Grave digging, a scene which is not hinted at in the story, and you might as well have put King Canute the Great reproving his courtiers--the rest are Giants and Giantesses. Suffice it, to save our taste and d.a.m.n our folly, that we left it all to a friend W.G.

who in the first place cheated me into putting a name to them, which I did not mean, but do not repent, and then wrote a puff about their _simplicity_, &c., to go with the advertis.e.m.e.nt as in my name! Enough of this egregious dupery. I will try to abstract the load of teazing circ.u.mstances from the Stories and tell you that I am answerable for Lear, Macbeth, Timon, Romeo, Hamlet, Oth.e.l.lo, for occasionally a tail piece or correction of grammar, for none of the cuts and all of the spelling. The rest is my Sister's.--We think Pericles of hers the best, and Oth.e.l.lo of mine--but I hope all have some good. As You Like It, we like least.

"So much, only begging you to tear out the cuts and give them to Johnny, as 'Mrs. G.o.dwin's fancy'.

"C.L.