could not help dwelling upon afterwards: it gave rise to
meditation, and did you good. This small, half-clerical man
was--Charles Lamb."

His countenance is thus described by Thomas Hood:

"His was no common face, none of those willow-pattern
ones which Nature turns out by thousands at her potteries,
but more like a chance specimen of the Chinese ware,--one
to the set; unique, antique, quaint, you might have sworn to
it piecemeal,--a separate affidavit to each feature."

Mrs. Charles Mathews, wife of the comedian, who met Lamb at a dinner,
gives an amusing account of him:--

"Mr. Lamb's first appearance was not prepossessing. His
figure was small and mean, and no man was certainly ever
less beholden to his tailor. His 'bran' new suit of black
cloth (in which he affected several times during the day to
take great pride, and to cherish as a novelty that he had
looked for and wanted) was drolly contrasted with his very
rusty silk stockings, shown from his knees, and his much too
large, thick shoes, without polish. His shirt rejoiced in a wide,
ill-plaited frill, and his very small, tight, white neckcloth was
hemmed to a fine point at the ends that formed part of a little
bow. His hair was black and sleek, but not formal, and
his face the gravest I ever saw, but indicating great intellect,
and resembling very much the portraits of Charles I."

From this sprightly and not too flattering sketch we may turn to
Serjeant Talfourd's tender and charming portrait,--slightly idealized,
no doubt; for the man of the coif held a brief for his friend, and was a
poet besides:--

"Methinks I see him before me now as he appeared then,
and as he continued without any perceptible alteration to me,
during the twenty years of intimacy which followed, and were
closed by his death. A light frame, so fragile that it seemed
as if a breath would overthrow it, clad in clerk-like black,
was surmounted by a head of form and expression the most
noble and sweet. His black hair curled crisply about an
expanded forehead; his eyes, softly brown, twinkled with
varying expression, though the prevalent expression was
sad; and the nose, slightly curved, and delicately carved at
the nostril, with the lower outline of the face delicately oval,
completed a head which was finely placed upon the shoulders,
and gave importance and even dignity to a diminutive and
shadowy stem. Who shall