ny "will have
it so." So Miss Many Things and I are to have a conference, of which you
shall have the result. I dare say she does not play at whist. Treasurer
Robertson, whose coffers are absolutely swelling with pantomimic
receipts, called on me yesterday to say he is going to write to you, but
if I were also, I might as well say that your last bill is at the
Banker's, and will be honored on the instant receipt of the third Piece,
which you have stipulated for. If you have any such in readiness, strike
while the iron is hot, before the Clown cools. Tell Mrs. Kenney, that
the Miss F.H. (or H.F.) Kelly, who has begun so splendidly in Juliet, is
the identical little Fanny Kelly who used to play on their green before
their great Lying-Inn Lodgings at Bayswater. Her career has stopt short
by the injudicious bringing her out in a vile new Tragedy, and for a
third character in a stupid old one,--the Earl of Essex. This is
Macready's doing, who taught her. Her recitation, &c. (_not her voice or
person_), is masculine. It is so clever, it seemed a male _Debut_. But
cleverness is the bane of Female Tragedy especially. Passions uttered
logically, &c. It is bad enough in men-actors. Could you do nothing for
little Clara Fisher? Are there no French Pieces with a Child in them? By
Pieces I mean here dramas, to prevent male-constructions. Did not the
Blue Girl remind you of some of Congreve's women? Angelica or Millamant?
To me she was a vision of Genteel Comedy realized. Those kind of people
never come to see one. _N'import_--havn't I Miss Many Things coming?
Will you ask Horace Smith to----[_The remainder of this letter has been
lost_.]

[Payne seems to have sent Lamb an edition of Sheridan. "The Camp" and
"St. Patrick's Day" are among Sheridan's less known plays.

Poole was writing articles on France in the _London Magazine_. Lamb
refers to "A Cockney's Rural Sports," in the number for December, 1822.

Fanny was Fanny Holcroft. Plura I do not identify.

The new tragedy in which Miss Kelly had to play was probably "The
Huguenot," produced December 11, 1822. "The Earl of Essex" was revived
December 30, 1822. Macready played in both.

"Cleverness is the bane." See Lamb's little article on "The New Acting"
in Vol. I.

The Blue Girl seems to refer to the lady mentioned at the end of the
first letter to Payne.

Angelica is in Congreve's "Love for Love"; Millamant in his "Way of the
World."]

LETTER 305

CHARLES LAMB TO