ables together;
Rhym'd you to death, like "rats in Ireland,"
Except that he was born in High'r Land.
His chimes, not crampt like thine, and rung ill,
Had made Job split his sides on dunghill.
There was no limit to his merryings
At christ'nings, weddings, nay at buryings.
No undertaker would live near him,
Those grave practitioners did fear him;
Mutes, at his merry mops, turned "vocal."
And fellows, hired for silence, "spoke all."
No _body_ could be laid in cavity,
Long as he lived, with proper gravity.
His mirth-fraught eye had but to glitter,
And every mourner round must titter.
The Parson, prating of Mount Hermon,
Stood still to laugh, in midst of sermon.
The final Sexton (smile he _must_ for him)
Could hardly get to "dust to dust" for him.
He lost three pall-bearers their livelyhood,
Only with simp'ring at his lively mood:
Provided that they fresh and neat came,
All jests were fish that to his net came.
He'd banter Apostolic castings,
As you jeer fishermen at Hastings.
When the fly bit, _like me_, he leapt-o'er-all,
And stood not much on what was scriptural.

P.S.

I had forgot, at Small Bohemia
(Enquire the way of your maid Euphemia)
Are sojourning, of all good fellows
The prince and princess,--the _Novellos_--
Pray seek 'em out, and give my love to 'em;
You'll find you'll soon be hand and glove to 'em.

In prose, Little Bohemia, about a mile from Hastings in the Hollington
road, when you can get so far. Dear Dib, I find relief in a word or two
of prose. In truth my rhymes come slow. You have "routh of 'em." It
gives us pleasure to find you keep your good spirits. Your Letter did us
good. Pray heaven you are got out at last. Write quickly.

This letter will introduce you, if 'tis agreeable. Take a donkey. 'Tis
Novello the Composer and his Wife, our very good friends.

C.L.

[Dibdin must have sent the verses which Lamb asked for in the previous
letter, and this is Lamb's reply. Pride of ancestry seems to have been
the note of Dibdin's effort. Probably there is a certain amount of truth
in Lamb's account of the resolute merriment of his father. It is not
inconsistent with his description of Lovel in the _Elia_ essay "The Old
Benchers of the Inner Te