have the record of that harmless and patient, that brave and sorely tried life. We should still see infinite mirth and infinite pathos interwoven upon every page. We should catch the echo of that clear, kind laughter which never hardens into scorn. Lamb laughs at so many people, and never once wrongs any one. We should see the flashes of a wit which carries no venom in its sting. We should feel that atmosphere of wonderful, whimsical humor illuminating all the trivial details of existence. We should recognize in the turning of every sentence, the conscious choice of every word, the fine and distinctive qualities of a genius that has no parallel.
It matters little at what page we read. Here is the sad story of Henry Robinson's waistcoat, which Mary Lamb tried to bring over from France, but which was seized at the Custom House, "for the use of the king," says Charles dryly. "He will probably appear in it at the next levee." Here is the never-to-be-forgotten tea-party at Miss Benjay's, where that tenth-rate little upstart of a woman—type of a genus that survives to-day—alternately patronized and snubbed her guest;
