ng: "So far from this being true, the greatest wits
will ever be found to be the sanest writers..." and so forth. Compare
the essay "On the Tragedies of Shakespeare," Vol. I. Lamb's thesis is
borrowed from Dryden's couplet (in _Absalom and Achitophel_, Part I.,
lines 163, 164):--

Great wits are sure to madness near allied,
And thin partitions do their bounds divide.

Page 213, line 14. _Kent ... Flavius_. Lamb was always greatly
impressed by the character of Kent (see his essay on "Hogarth," Vol.
I.; his "Table Talk," Vol. I.; and his versions, in the _Tales from
Shakespear_, of "King Lear" and "Timon," Vol. III.).

* * * * *

Page 215. CAPTAIN JACKSON.

_London Magazine_, November, 1824.

No one has yet been able to identify Captain Jackson. The suggestion
has been made that Randal Norris sat for the picture; but the
circumstance that Lamb, in the first edition of the _Last Essays_,
included "A Death-Bed," with a differing portrait of Randal Norris
therein, is, I think, good evidence against this theory. Perhaps the
captain was one of the imaginary characters which Lamb sent out every
now and then, as he told Bernard Barton (in the letter of March 20,
1826), "to exercise the ingenuity of his friends;" although his
reality seems overpowering.

Apart from his own interest, the captain is noteworthy in
constituting, with Ralph Bigod (see page 27), a sketch (possibly
unknown to Dickens) for Wilkins Micawber.

Page 217, line 22. _Glover ... Leonidas_. Richard Glover (1712-1785),
the poet, author of _Leonidas_, 1737. I cannot find that he ever lived
at Westbourne Green.

Page 218, foot. _The old ballad_. The old ballad "Waly, Waly." This
was among the poems copied by Lamb into Miss Isola's Extract Book.

Page 219, line 8. _Tibbs, and Bobadil_. Beau Tibbs in Goldsmith's
"Citizen of the World," and Bobadil in Ben Jonson's "Every Man in His
Humour."

* * * * *

Page 219. THE SUPERANNUATED MAN.

_London Magazine_, May, 1825.

Except that Lamb has disguised his real employment, this essay is
practically a record of fact. After thirty-three years of service at
the East India House he went home "for ever" on Tuesday, March 29,
1825, with a pension of L441, or two-thirds of his regular salary,
less a small annual deduction as a provision for his sister. At
a Court of Directors held on that day this minute was drawn up:
"Resolved that the resignati