AT length George Dyer’s phrenesis has come to a crisis; he is raging and furiously mad. I waited upon the heathen, Thursday was a se’nnight; the first symptom which struck my eye and gave me incontrovertible proof of the fatal truth was a pair of nankeen pantaloons four times too big for him, which the said Heathen did pertinaciously affirm to be new.
They were absolutely ingrained with the accumulated dirt of
ages; but he affirmed them to be clean. He was going to visit a lady that was
nice about those things, and that’s the reason he wore nankeen that day.
And then he danced, and capered, and fidgeted, and pulled up his pantaloons,
and hugged his intolerable flannel vestment closer about his poetic loins; anon
he gave it loose to the zephyrs which plentifully insinuate their tiny bodies
through every crevice, door, window or wainscot, expressly formed for the
exclusion of such impertinents. Then he caught at a proof sheet, and catched up
a laundress’s bill instead—made a dart at Blom-
| 1800 | LAMB’S PLAN FOR CAMBRIDGE | 207 |
As for the other Professor, he has actually begun to dive into Tavernier and Chardin’s Persian Travels for a story, to form a new drama for the sweet tooth of this fastidious age. Hath not Bethlehem College a fair action for non-residence against such professors? Are poets so few in this age, that He must write poetry? Is morals a subject so exhausted, that he must quit that line? Is the metaphysic well (without a bottom) drained dry?
If I can guess at the wicked pride of the Professor’s heart, I would take a shrewd wager that he disdains ever again to dip his pen in Prose. Adieu, ye splendid theories! Farewell, dreams of political justice! Lawsuits, where I was counsel for Archbishop Fenelon versus my own mother, in the famous fire cause!
Vanish from my mind, professors, one and all! I have metal more attractive on foot.
Man of many snipes,—I will sup with thee, Deo volente et diabolo nolente, on Monday night the 5th of January, in the new year, and crush a cup to the infant century.
A word or two of my progress. Embark at six o’clock
in the morning, with a fresh gale, on a Cambridge one-decker; very cold till
eight at night; land at St. Mary’s light-house, muffins and coffee upon
table (or any other curious production of Turkey or both Indies), snipes
exactly at nine, punch to commence at ten, with argument; difference of opinion is expected to take place about
eleven; perfect unanimity, with some haziness and dimness, before twelve.—N.B.
My single affection is not so singly wedded to snipes; but the curious and
epicurean eye would also take a pleasure in beholding a delicate and
well-chosen assortment of teals, ortolans, the unctuous and palate-soothing
flesh of geese wild and tame, nightingales’ brains, the sensorium of a
young sucking-pig,
| 208 | LETTERS OF C. AND M. LAMB | Jan. |
