The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb Volume IV Part 91

First published in 1802 in a slender volume ent.i.tled _John Woodvil: a Tragedy. By C. Lamb. To which are added Fragments of Burton, the author of the Anatomy of Melancholy._ The full contents of the book were:--

John Woodvil; Ballad, From the German (see page 29); Helen (see page 28); Curious Fragments, I., II., III., IV.; The Argument; The Consequence (see Vol. I., page 29, and note; also pages 30 and 35 of the present volume and notes).

_John Woodvil_ was reprinted by Lamb in the _Works_, 1818, the text of which is followed here.

If Mr. Fuller Russell was right in his statement in _Notes and Queries_, April 1, 1882, that Lamb told him he "had lost 25 by his best effort, _John Woodvil_," we must suppose that the book was published wholly or partially at his own cost.

The history of the poem which follows is, with an omission and addition here and there, that compiled by the late Mr. d.y.k.es Campbell and contributed by him to _The Athenaeum_, October 31 and November 14, 1891.

Mr. Campbell had the opportunity of collating the edition of 1802 with a ma.n.u.script copy made by Lamb and his sister for Manning. With that patient thoroughness and discrimination which made his work as an editor so valuable, Mr. Campbell minutely examined this copy and put the results on record; and they are now for the first time, by permission of Mrs. d.y.k.es Campbell and the Editor of _The Athenaum_, incorporated in an edition of Lamb's writings. The copy itself, I may add, when it came into the market, was secured by an American collector. Mr. Campbell's words follow, my own interpolations being within square brackets.

Lamb's first allusion to the future _John Woodvil_ occurs in a letter to Southey (October 29, 1798), at a time when the two young men were exchanging a good many copies of verses for mutual criticism. "Not having anything of my own," writes Lamb, "to send you in return (though, to tell the truth, I am at work upon something which if I were to cut away and garble, perhaps I might send you an extract or two that might not displease you: but I will not do that; and whether it will come to anything I know not, for I am as slow as a Fleming painter, when I compose anything) I will crave leave to put down a few lines of old Christopher Marlowe's." Lamb must soon have got rid of his objections to cutting away and garbling, for before a month had elapsed he had sent Southey two extracts, first the "Dying Lover" [see "Dramatic Fragment,"

page 85], and next (November 28) "The Witch" [see page 199], both of which pa.s.sages were excluded from the printed play. [The letter, which is wrongly dated April 20, 1799, in some editions, concludes (of "The Witch"): "This is the extract I bragged of as superior to that I sent you from Marlowe: perhaps you will smile."]

Charles Lloyd shared with Southey the pains and pleasures of criticising Lamb's verses, for Lamb asks the latter if he agrees with Lloyd in disliking something in "The Witch."

[Thus: "Lloyd objects to 'shutting up the womb of his purse' in my curse (which, for a Christian witch in a Christian country, is not too mild, I hope). Do you object? I think there is a strangeness in the idea, as well as 'shaking the poor little snakes from his door,' which suits the speaker. Witches ill.u.s.trate, as fine ladies do, from their own familiar objects, and snakes and the shutting up of wombs are in their way. I don't know that this last charge has been before brought against 'em nor either the sour milk or the mandrake babe; but I affirm these be things a witch would do if she could."]

Lamb proposes also to adopt an emendation of Southey's in the "Dying Lover"--"though I do not feel the objection against 'Silent Prayer,'"

and in the event he did very sensibly stick to his own opinion, for in the _London Magazine_ the line runs, as first written:--

He put a silent prayer up for the bride.

One wonders what harm Southey can have seen in it. At this time Southey was collecting verses for the first volume of his _Annual Anthology_ (provisionally called the _Kalendar_), and inviting contributions from Lamb. In writing before November 28, 1798, "This ['The Witch'] and the 'Dying Lover' I gave you are the only extracts I can give without mutilation," Lamb may have meant that Southey was at liberty to print them in the _Anthology_. A year later, October 31, 1799, when the second volume was in preparation, Lamb wrote:--"I shall have nothing to communicate, I fear, to the _Anthology_. You shall have some fragments of my play if you desire them; but I think I would rather print it whole."

As a matter of fact, Lamb contributed nothing to the collection except the lines "Living without G.o.d in the World," printed in the first volume [see page 19. To _Recreations in Agriculture, Natural History,_ etc., 1801, edited by Dr. James Anderson, a friend of George Dyer, Lamb, however, sent "Description of a Forest Life," "The General Lover" (What is it you love?) and the "Dying Lover," called "Fragment in Dialogue."

There are slight differences in the text, the chief alteration being in line 3 of the "Description of a Forest Life":--

Bursting the lubbar bonds of sleep that bound him.]

Reverting to the letter of November 28, one learns Lamb's intentions as to the play:--"My Tragedy will be a medley (as I intend it to be a medley) of laughter and tears, prose and verse, and in some places rhyme, songs, wit, pathos, humour, and, if possible, sublimity; at least it is not a fault in my intention if it does not comprehend most of these discordant atoms. Heaven send they dance not the 'Dance of Death'!"

The composition went on slowly and in a very casual way, for on January 21, 1799, he writes again to Southey:--"I have only one slight pa.s.sage to send you, scarce worth the sending, which I want to edge in somewhere into my play, which, by the way, hath not received the addition often lines, besides, since I saw you." The "slight pa.s.sage" is one which, it will be seen, was "edged in" near the end of the second act, but taken out again--that beginning:--

I saw him [John Woodvil] in the day of Worcester fight, Whither he came at twice seven years, Under the discipline of the Lord Falkland (His uncle by the mother's side), etc.

Lamb navely asks Southey, "But did Falkland die before the Worcester fight? In that case I must make bold to unclify some other n.o.bleman." I suppose Southey must have answered that Falkland had been killed at Newbury eight years before Worcester fight, for when the pa.s.sage had been edged into the play, _Naseby_ and _Ashley_ were subst.i.tuted for "Worcester" and "Falkland" respectively. This was as bad a shot as the first, for Sir Anthony Cooper, whether at Naseby or no, did not become Lord Ashley until sixteen years after that fight[31]. Had the pa.s.sage escaped the pruning knife, Lamb's historical research would no doubt have provided a proper battle and a proper uncle for his hero. Again Lloyd appears as a critic, and this time he is obeyed, probably because his objection to "portrayed in his face" was backed by Southey. "I like the line," says Lamb, but he altered it to

Of Valour's beauty in his youthful face

in the Manning MS. Four months later, on May 20, Lamb sends Southey the charming pa.s.sage about forest-life on page 173, and defends his blank verse against Southey's censure of the pauses at the end of the lines; he does it on the model of Shakespeare, he says, in his "endeavour after a colloquial ease and spirit." Talfourd printed the pa.s.sage in full, but some later editors have cut down the twenty-four lines to the six opening ones, to the loss of a point in the letter. Lamb says he "loves to antic.i.p.ate charges of unoriginality," adding--"the first line is almost Shakespeare's:--

"To have my love to bed and to arise.

"'Midsummer-Night's Dream.'

I think there is a sweetness in the versification not unlike some rhymes in that exquisite play, and the last line but three is yours." This line describes how the deer, as they came tripping by,

Then stop and gaze, then turn, they know not why.

Lamb thus gives the line and his reference:--

----An eye That met the gaze, or turn'd it knew not why.

"Rosamund's Epistle."

But, of course, he misquotes both line and t.i.tle--though Southey would feel flattered in finding that his friend's memory had done so well. As the editors have not annotated the pa.s.sage, I will say here that Lamb should have quoted

The modest eye That met the glance, or turn'd, it knew not why.

"Rosamund to Henry."

The poem is one of those in the now scarce volume which Southey and Lovel published jointly at Bath in 1795, _Poems: containing "The Retrospect."_ [It was this forest pa.s.sage which, as Hazlitt tells us in his _Spirit of the Age_, so puzzled G.o.dwin. After looking in vain through the old dramatists for it, he applied to Lamb himself.]

[Footnote 31: Sir Jacob Astley(?), but he too was enn.o.bled _after_ Naseby.]

By the end of October the play had evidently been completed (though not yet named), for on the 31st Southey was asked, "Have you seen it, or shall I lend you a copy? I want your opinion of it." None is recorded here, but more than two years later, when Southey was in London, he gave it to Danvers (_Letters of R.S._, II., 184): "Lamb and his sister see us often: he is printing his play, which will please you by the exquisite beauty of its poetry, and provoke you by the exquisite silliness of its story."

The play must have been baptised as "Pride's Cure" soon after Hallowe'en, for at Christmas it was submitted under that t.i.tle to Kemble, and about the same time (December 28, 1799) we find Lamb defending the t.i.tle (with the vehemence and subtlety of a doubter, as I read) against the adverse criticism of Manning and Mrs. Charles Lloyd.

Lamb had lately been on a visit to these friends at Cambridge, and had doubtless taken a copy of his play with him and received their objections there and then--for his defence does not seem to have been provoked by a letter. [In a letter to Charles Lloyd that has come to light since Mr. d.y.k.es Campbell wrote, belonging to middle December, 1799, Lamb asks for his play to be returned to him, suggesting that Mrs.

Lloyd shall despatch it. It was probably in the letter that accompanied the parcel that the criticism of the t.i.tle was found. Lamb thus defended it:--"By-the-bye, I think you and Sophia both incorrect with regard to the _t.i.tle_ of the _play_. Allowing your objection (which is not necessary, as pride may be, and is in real life often, cured by misfortunes not directly originating from its own acts, as Jeremy Taylor will tell you a naughty desire is sometimes sent to cure it; I know you read these _practical divines_)--but allowing your objection, does not the betraying of his father's secret directly spring from pride?--from the pride of wine, and a full heart, and a proud over-stepping of the ordinary rules of morality, and contempt of the prejudices of mankind, which are not to bind superior souls--'as _trust_ in _the matter of secrets_ all _ties_ of _blood_, etc., etc., keeping of _promises_, the feeble mind's religion, binding our _morning knowledge_ to the performance of what _last night's ignorance spake_'--does he not prate, that '_Great Spirits_' must do more than die for their friend? Does not the pride of wine incite him to display some evidence of friendship, which its own irregularity shall make great? This I know, that I meant his punishment not alone to be a cure for his daily and habitual _pride_, but the direct consequence and appropriate punishment of a particular act of pride.

"If you do not understand it so, it is my fault in not explaining my meaning."]

Manning seems to have begged for a copy--or reconsideration, perhaps--for Lamb, on February 13, 1800, promised him a copy "of my play and the _Falstaff Letters_ in a day or two." There is no trace of the former having been sent, but the latter certainly was, for on March 1 he presses Manning for his opinion of it--hopes he is "prepared to call it a bundle of the sharpest, queerest, profoundest humours," etc., as he was accustomed to hope when that book was in question. The next mention of the play occurs in an undated letter to Coleridge [accompanying a MS.

copy of the play for the Wordsworths], dated by Talfourd and other editors "end of 1800," which must have been written in March or April, 1800 [since Coleridge was then staying with Wordsworth, engaged in completing the translation of _Wallenstein,_ the last of the MS. being sent to the printer in April]. Talfourd's mistake in dating it perhaps led him to suppose that the copy sent through Coleridge to Wordsworth was a printed copy, and that Lamb had printed _John Woodvil_ a year before he published it. If any other proof were needed that Talfourd guessed wrongly, it is supplied by this sentence in the letter to Manning of February 15, 1801:--"I lately received from Wordsworth a copy of the second volume [of the _Lyrical Ballads_] accompanied by an acknowledgment of having received from me _many months since_ a copy of a certain Tragedy, with excuses for not having made any acknowledgment sooner."

Lamb's reply to Wordsworth (January 30, 1801) is so very dry--"Thank you for Liking my Play!!"--that we may suppose that Wordsworth's expression of "liking" was not very enthusiastic.

Things become clearer when we reach November 3, 1800, on which day Lamb thus addressed Manning (I quote verbatim from the original letter):--"At last I have written to Kemble to know the event of my play, which was presented last Christmas. As I suspected, came an answer back that the copy was lost ... with a courteous (reasonable!) request of another copy (if I had one by me), and a promise of a definite answer in a week. I could not resist so facile and moderate demand: so scribbled out another, omitting sundry things, such as the witch story, about half the forest scene (which is too leisurely for _story_), and transposing that d.a.m.n'd soliloquy about England getting drunk, which like its reciter stupidly stood alone nothing prevenient, or antevenient, and cleared away a good deal besides ... I sent it last night, and am in weekly expectation of the Tolling Bell and death warrant."

It will be observed that that second copy sent to Kemble must have differed essentially from the one sent to Manning, for the latter includes the witch story, and retains in its original place the soliloquy about England getting drunk.

To this copy sent to Manning we now come in chronological order, but the exact date of its despatch must remain uncertain. Clearly it was subsequent, but probably not long subsequent, to Kemble's rejection of the play, which took place soon after All Souls' Day, for Kemble must have made up his mind within half an hour of taking up the ma.n.u.script. I venture to a.s.sume that the argosy which bore all the treasures recounted in the following bill of lading sailed about Christmas, 1800. It is sad to think that the bill of lading itself and the MS. of "Pride's Cure"

are the only salvage.

"I send you all of Coleridge's letters to me which I have preserved; some of them are upon the subject of my play. I also send you Kemble's two letters, and the prompter's courteous epistle, with a curious critique on 'Pride's Cure' by a young Physician from EDINBORO', who modestly suggests quite another kind of plot. These are monuments of my disappointments which I like to preserve ...You will carefully keep all (except the Scotch Doctor's, _which burn_) _in statu quo_ till I come to claim mine own."

On the reverse of the half-sheet is written: "For Mister Manning | Teacher of the Mathematics | and the Black Arts, | There is another letter in the inside cover of the book opposite the blank leaf that _was_."

[This is the other letter, written inside the board cover of the copy of the play, in Charles Lamb's hand:--

"Mind this goes for a letter. (Acknowledge it directly, if only in ten words.)

"DEAR MANNING:

"(I shall want to hear this comes safe.)

"I have scratched out a good deal, as you will see. Generally, what I have rejected was either _false_ in _feeling_, or a violation of character, mostly of the first sort. I will here just instance in the concluding few lines of the dying Lover's story, which completely contradicted his character of _violent_ and _unreproachful_. I hesitated a good while what copy to send you, and at last resolved to send the _worst_, because you are familiar with it and can make it out; a stranger would find so much difficulty in doing it, that it would give him more pain than pleasure. This is compounded precisely of the two persons' hands you requested it should be.

"Yours sincerely,