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　　LETTER 415

　　CHARLES LAMB TO BERNARD BARTON

　　Enfield, and for some weeks to come, "June 11, 1827."

　　Dear B.B.—One word more of the picture verses, and that for good and all; pray, with a neat pen alter one line

　　His learning seems to lay small stress on to His learning lays no mighty stress on to avoid the unseemly recurrence (ungrammatical also) of "seems" in the next line, besides the nonsence of "but" there, as it now stands. And I request you, as a personal favor to me, to erase the last line of all, which I should never have written from myself. The fact is, it was a silly joke of Hood's, who gave me the frame, (you judg'd rightly it was not its own) with the remark that you would like it, because it was b—d b—d,—and I lugg'd it in: but I shall be quite hurt if it stands, because tho' you and yours have too good sense to object to it, I would not have a sentence of mine seen, that to any foolish ear might sound unrespectful to thee. Let it end at appalling; the joke is coarse and useless, and hurts the tone of the rest. Take your best "ivory-handled" and scrape it forth.

　　Your specimen of what you might have written is hardly fair. Had it been a present to me, I should have taken a more sentimental tone; but of a trifle from me it was my cue to speak in an underish tone of commendation. Prudent givers (what a word for such a nothing) disparage their gifts; 'tis an art we have. So you see you wouldn't have been so wrong, taking a higher tone. But enough of nothing.

　　By the bye, I suspected M. of being the disparager of the frame; hence a certain line.

　　For the frame,'tis as the room is, where it hangs. It hung up fronting my old cobwebby folios and batter'd furniture (the fruit piece has resum'd its place) and was much better than a spick and span one. But if your room be very neat and your other pictures bright with gilt, it should be so too. I can't judge, not having seen: but my dingy study it suited.

　　Martin's Belshazzar (the picture) I have seen. Its architectural effect is stupendous; but the human figures, the squalling contorted little antics that are playing at being frightend, like children at a sham ghost who half know it to be a mask, are detestable. Then the letters are nothing more than a transparency lighted up, such as a Lord might order to be lit up, on a sudden at a Xmas Gambol, to scare the ladies. The type is as plain as Baskervil's—they should have been dim, full of mystery, letters to the mind rather than the eye.—Rembrandt has painted only Belshazzar and a courtier or two (taking a part of the banquet for the whole) not fribbled out a mob of fine folks. Then every thing is so distinct, to the very necklaces, and that foolish little prophet. What one point is there of interest? The ideal of such a subject is, that you the spectator should see nothing but what at the time you would have seen, the hand—and the King—not to be at leisure to make taylor-remarks on the dresses, or Doctor Kitchener-like to examine the good things at table.

　　Just such a confusd piece is his Joshua, fritterd into 1000 fragments, little armies here, little armies there—you should see only the Sun and Joshua; if I remember, he has not left out that luminary entirely, but for Joshua, I was ten minutes a finding him out.

　　Still he is showy in all that is not the human figure or the preternatural interest: but the first are below a drawing school girl's attainment, and the last is a phantasmagoric trick, "Now you shall see what you shall see, dare is Balshazar and dare is Daniel." You have my thoughts of M. and so adieu C. LAMB.

　　[Lamb had sent Barton the picture that is reproduced in Vol. V. of my large edition. Later Lamb had sent the following lines:—

　　When last you left your Woodbridge pretty,

　　To stare at sights, and see the City,

　　If I your meaning understood,

　　You wish'd a Picture, cheap, but good;

　　The colouring? decent; clear, not muddy;

　　To suit a Poet's quiet study,

　　Where Books and Prints for delectation

　　Hang, rather than vain ostentation.

　　The subject? what I pleased, if comely;

　　But something scriptural and homely:

　　A sober Piece, not gay or wanton,

　　For winter fire-sides to descant on;

　　The theme so scrupulously handled,

　　A Quaker might look on unscandal'd;

　　Such as might satisfy Ann Knight,

　　And classic Mitford just not fright.

　　Just such a one I've found, and send it;

　　If liked, I give—if not, but lend it.

　　The moral? nothing can be sounder.

　　The fable? 'tis its own expounder—

　　A Mother teaching to her Chit

　　Some good book, and explaining it.

　　He, silly urchin, tired of lesson,

　　His learning seems to lay small stress on,

　　But seems to hear not what he hears;

　　Thrusting his fingers in his ears,

　　Like Obstinate, that perverse funny one,

　　In honest parable of Bunyan.

　　His working Sister, more sedate,

　　Listens; but in a kind of state,

　　The painter meant for steadiness;

　　But has a tinge of sullenness;

　　And, at first sight, she seems to brook

　　As ill her needle, as he his book.

　　This is the Picture. For the Frame—

　　'Tis not ill-suited to the same;

　　Oak-carved, not gilt, for fear of falling;

　　Old-fashion'd; plain, yet not appalling;

　　And broad brimm'd, as the Owner's Calling.

　　It was not Obstinate, by the way, who thrust his fingers in his ears, but Christian.

　　"Hence a certain line"—line 16, I suppose.

　　Martin's "Belshazzar." "Belshazzar's Feast," by John Martin (1789-1854), had been exhibited for some years and had created an immense impression. Lamb subjected Martin's work to a minute analysis a few years later (see the Elia essay on the "Barrenness of the Imaginative Faculty in the Productions of Modern Art," Vol. II.). Barton did not give up Martin in consequence of this letter. The frontispiece to his New Year's Eve, 1828, is by that painter, and the volume contains eulogistic poems upon him, one beginning—

　　Boldest painter of our day.

　　"Baskervil's"—John Baskerville (1706-1775), the printer, famous for his folio edition of the Bible, 1763.

　　Doctor William Kitchiner—the author of Apicius Redivious; or, The Cook's Oracle, 1817.] The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb — Volume 6