Showing 16 results

Quoting letter from Carlyle to her husband Bryan Waller Procter from 1866.

Woolsthorpe Rectory, Grantham. - Has left his copy of [Meredith's] "The Egoist" in the bedroom he had at Wallington; asks Trevy to bring it to Cambridge. It is a wet Sunday, and he does not want to 'read any more Thicker for the present'. Has 'never enjoyed sightseeing so much' as on his trip to Edinburgh. Asks if Trevy has read [Robert] Louis Stevenson's book about the town ["Edinburgh: Picturesque Notes"]: 'quite astonishing how many things' Stevenson can do: he is 'Charles Lamb, as well as the writer of the "Wrecker"]. Asks if Trevy likes [Sir Walter Scott's] "Heart of Midlothian"; he himself has read it twice before but 'never liked it half so much' as he did in Edinburgh; also read an 'idolatrous life of Queen Mary' [Mary, Queen of Scots?]; notes that it is 'harder to fall in love with women the more real they are', moving from fictional characters 'such as Beatrice Esmond or Balzac's duchesses', through women from history, 'an actress in a part', and finally to 'actual women in real life'. Tells an anecdote as 'the strongest possible argument for the Return to Nature': a boy of three and a half staying with them in Yorkshire happened to come into Marsh's room when he had no clothes on and 'professed great pleasure at the sight'; next day at lunch the boy asked loudly 'why don't you come down naked? (he pronounced it nackéd) you really must not wear clothes'.

Seems he 'compromised [Arthur] Longhurst rather by relating this anecdote', as his mother asked him what was so funny in the letter. Longhurst 'passed in his [Sandhurst] exam, 3rd of the Varsity Candidate'; Marsh is proud of his coaching, as Longhurst got 90 percent in Latin and Greek. Is going to [Bertrand] Russell on 'Monday week'.

Thanks him for 'Letters of William Cowper' but objects to the phrase 'Warren Hastings and his enemy Impey'; also tells the history of one of letters attributed to Cowper that is not his; clarifies where Charles Lamb's 'divine chitchat of Cowper' appears; was annoyed to see Cowper's house had been pulled down in Dereham; mourns [Arthur] Verrall.

London Road. Dated 23 June, 1912 - Thanks him for 'Letters of William Cowper' but objects to the phrase 'Warren Hastings and his enemy Impey'; also tells the history of one of letters attributed to Cowper that is not his; clarifies where Charles Lamb's 'divine chitchat of Cowper' appears; was annoyed to see Cowper's house had been pulled down in Dereham; mourns [Arthur] Verrall.

Temple. - Surprised and delighted by Houghton's dedication of the Monographs to him. Charles Lamb told Wordsworth 'he preferred the dedication of one of his poems to any other part of the book'; Venables will relish the whole.

(Unsigned.)

Re memorial to Charles Lamb.

Re memorial to Charles Lamb.

Thanks Bob for sending "Windfalls" as a gift: the essays are 'delightful' and have the 'intimacy and the graciousness of [Charles Lamb's?] Elia'. Has increasingly enjoyed Bob's later work, which he thinks has 'grown in humanity steadily'. Very grateful for the criticism, such as that on 'the movement of Shelley', which he has always appreciated; believes timing to be 'the secret of humour and drama' and 'greatness of acting or of wit'. Imitated R[obert] L[ouis] S[tevenson]'s 'admirable' technique in his own mountain stories. They [he and his wife] move to London in October '[w]orn out by Camb[ridge] climate', and hope to see Bob and Bessie there at 12 Holland Street. Postscript saying that George's great book ["English Social History"] has 'put the cap-stone on his reputation and unique position'.