for Stage-Representation." Reprinted in the Works, 1818.
At the close of the Reflector article Lamb wrote: "I have hitherto confined my observation to the Tragic parts of Shakespeare; in some future Number I propose to extend this inquiry to the Comedies." The Reflector ending with the fourth number, the project was not carried out. From time to time, however, throughout his life, Lamb returned incidentally to Shakespearian criticism, as in several essays in the present volume, and the Elia essay "The Old Actors," with its masterly analysis of the character of Malvolio. David Garrick died in 1779, just before Lamb's fourth birthday. Lamb's father often talked of him.
Page 113, line 6. "To paint fair Nature," etc. These lines on Garrick's monument, which have been corrected from the stone, were by Samuel Jackson Pratt (1749–1814), the same author whose Gleanings Lamb described in a letter to Southey in 1798 as "a contemptible book, a wretched assortment of vapid feelings." Pratt's lines on Garrick were chosen in place of a prose epitaph written by Edmund Burke.
Page 114, line 23. Mr. K. John Philip Kemble (1757–1823), who first appeared as Hamlet in London at Drury Lane, September 30, 1783.
Page 114, line 24. Mrs. S. Mrs. Siddons, John Philip Kemble's sister (1755–1831). Her regular stage career ended on June 29, 1812, when she played Lady Macbeth. Her first part in London was Portia on December 29, 1775. Lamb admired her greatly. As early as 1794 he wrote, with Coleridge's collaboration, a sonnet on the impression which Mrs. Siddons made upon him.
Page 118, line 4. Banks and Lillo. John Banks, a very inferior Restoration melodramatist. George Lillo (1693–1739), the author among other plays of "George Barnwell—The London Merchant; or The History of George Barnwell," 1731 (mentioned a little later), which held the stage for a century. The story, the original of which is to be found in the Percy Reliques, tells how George, an apprentice, robs his master and kills his uncle at the instigation of Millwood, an adventuress. Lamb's footnote (page 118) refers to the custom, which was of long endurance, of playing "George Barnwell" in the Christmas and Easter holidays as an object-lesson to apprentices.
Page 121, line 25. The Hills and the Murphys and the Browns. Dr. John Hill (1716?-1775), the herbalist, controversialist, and miscellaneous writer, who quarrelled with Garrick. In The Reflector Lamb had written the Hooles. It was changed to Hills afterwards. Hoole would be John Hoole (1727–1803), translator of Tasso and the author of some turgid tragedies, who had been in his time an India House clerk. Arthur Murphy (1727–1805), actor and author, who wrote, in addition to many plays and books, a Life of Garrick (1801). The Rev. John Brown (1715–1766), the author of "Barbarossa" and "Athelstane," in both of which Garrick acted.
Page 122, line 8 from foot. Mr. C. G. F. Cooke. See above.
Page 123, line 25. Glenalvon. In Home's "Douglas." Lamb wrote an early poem on this tragedy, which seems to have so dominated his youthful imagination that when in 1795–1796 he was for a while in confinement he believed himself at times to be young Norval.
Page 127, line 12. A ghost by chandelier light … It should perhaps be borne in mind that in 1811, and for many years after, the stage was still lighted by candles, so that the regulation of light, which can be effected with such nicety on the modern stage, was then impossible. This is especially to be remembered with regard to such details as the presentation of the Witches in "Macbeth." It would be simple enough, with our electric switchboard, to frighten a nervous child in that scene to-day.
Page 129, line 3. Webb. Webb was a theatrical robemaker at 98 Chancery Lane.
Page 130. Specimens from the Writings of Fuller.
The Reflector, No. IV., 1812. Works, 1818. In The Reflector the signature Y was appended to the introductory paragraphs.
Thomas Fuller (1608–1661), the divine and historian. The passages selected by Lamb are identified in the notes to my large edition, the references being to The Holy State, 1642; The History of the Worthies of England, 1662; A Pisgah-sight of Palestine and the Confines thereof, with the Histories of the Old and New Testaments acted thereon, 1650; and The Church History of Britain from the Birth of Jesus Christ until the year MDCXLVIII., 1655. Lamb's transcriptions are, of course, not exact.
Page 135. Footnote. Fuller's bird. Lamb's friend Procter (Barry Cornwall) was also greatly impressed by this legend. His English Songs, 1832, contains a poem on the subject.
Page 137. Footnote. Wickliffe's ashes. Landor has a passage on this subject in his poem "On Swift joining Avon near Rugby." Wordsworth's fine sonnet, in the Ecclesiastical Sketches, Part II., may have been suggested by this very quotation in Lamb's essay:—
WICLIFFE
Once more the Church is seized with sudden fear,
And at her call is Wicliffe disinhumed;
Yea, his dry bones to ashes are consumed,
And flung into the brook that travels near;
Forthwith that ancient Voice which streams can hear,
Thus speaks (that Voice which walks upon the wind,
Though seldom heard by busy human kind)—
"As thou these ashes, little Brook! wilt bear
Into the Avon, Avon to the tide
Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas,
Into main Ocean they, this deed accurst
An emblem yields to friends and enemies
How the bold Teacher's Doctrine, sanctified
By truth, shall spread, throughout the world dispersed."
When printed in The Reflector, in 1812, Lamb's footnote continued thus:—
"We are too apt to indemnify ourselves for some characteristic excellence we are kind enough to concede to a great author, by denying him every thing else. Thus Donne and Cowley, by happening to possess more wit and faculty of illustration than other men, are supposed to have been incapable of nature or feeling; they are usually opposed to such writers as Shenstone and Parnel; whereas in the very thickest of their conceits—in the bewildering maze of their tropes and figures, a warmth of soul and generous feeling shines through, the 'sum' of which 'forty thousand' of those natural poets, as they are called, 'with all their quantity, could not make up.'—Without any intention of setting Fuller on a level with Donne or Cowley, I think the injustice which has been done
