ch hee and Adam
perished, hee slept boldly to the boords end, and saluted the
Company thus.--Whatsoeuer thou be that art maister of these lustie
squires, I salute thee as graciously as a man in extreame distresse
may: knowe that I and a fellow friend of mine, are here famished in
the forrest for want of foode: perish we must, vnlesse relieued by
thy fauours. Therefore if thou be a Gentleman, giue meate to men,
and such as are euery way worthie of life: let the proudest Squire
that sits at thy table rise and encounter with me in any honourable
point of activitie whatsoeuer, and if he and thou proue me not a
man, send mee away comfortlesse: if thou refuse this, as a niggard
of thy cates, I will haue amongst you with my sword, for rather wil
I die valiantly, then perish with so cowardly an extreame (Collier's
_Poetical Decameron_, 174, Eighth Conversation).

Lamb compares with that the passage in "As You Like It," II., 7, 88,
beginning with Orlando's "Forbear, and eat no more." The character of
the ass is quoted by Collier from an old book, _The Noblenesse of the
Asse_, 1595, in the Third Conversation:--

Thou wouldst (perhaps) he should become thy foe,
And to that end doost beat him many times;
He cares not for himselfe, much lesse thy blowe.

Lamb wrote more fully of this passage in an article on the ass
contributed to Hone's _Every-Day Book_ in 1825 (see Vol. I. of the
present edition).

The line from Gray's sonnet on the death of Mr. Richard West was this:--

And weep the more because I weep in vain.

"Scipio, Caesar," etc. This line runs, in the epitaph on Sidney,
beginning "To praise thy life"--

Scipio, Cicero, and Petrarch of our time!

It is generally supposed to be by Raleigh. The next poem, "Silence
Augmenteth Grief," is attributed by Malone to Sir Edward Dyer, and by
Hannah to Raleigh.]

LETTER 275

CHARLES LAMB TO B.W. PROCTER

[No date. ?Summer, 1821.]

Dear Sir, The _Wits_ (as Clare calls us) assemble at my Cell (20 Russell
St. Cov.-Gar.) this evening at 1/4 before 7. Cold meat at 9. Puns at--a
little after. Mr. Cary wants to see you, to scold you. I hope you will
not fail. Yours &c. &c. &c.

C. LAMB.

Thursday.

I am sorry the London Magazine is going to be given up.

[I assume the date of this note to be summer, 1821, because it was then
that Baldwin, Cradock & Joy, the _London Magazine's_ first