good! as if inspirations were made up of parts, and those
fluctuating, successive, indifferent! I will never go into the
work-shop of any great artist again, nor desire a sight of his
picture, till it is fairly off the easel; no, not if Raphael were
to be alive again, and painting another Galatea."

In the Appendix to Vol. I., page 428, I have printed a passage from
the original MS. of _Comus_, which there is reason to believe was
contributed to the _London Magazine_ by Lamb.

Page 11, line 9 from foot. _G.D._ George Dyer (1755-1841), Lamb's
friend for many years. This is the first mention of him in the essays;
but we shall meet him again, particularly in "Amicus Redivivus."
George Dyer was educated at Christ's Hospital long before Lamb's
time there, and, becoming a Grecian, had entered Emmanuel College,
Cambridge. He became at first an usher in Essex, then a private tutor
to the children of Robert Robinson, the Unitarian, whose life he
afterwards excellently wrote, then an usher again, at Northampton, one
of his colleagues being John Clarke, father of Lamb's friend, Charles
Cowden Clarke. In 1792 he settled in Clifford's Inn as a hack; wrote
poems, made indexes, examined libraries for a great bibliographical
work (never published), and contributed "all that was original" to
Valpy's classics in 141 volumes. Under this work his sight gave way;
and he once showed Hazlitt two fingers the use of which he had lost
in copying out MSS. of Procrus and Plotinus in a fine Greek hand.
Fortunately a good woman took him under her wing; they were married in
1825; and Dyer's last days were happy. His best books were his _Life
of Robert Robinson_ and his _History of the University and Colleges
of Cambridge_. Lamb and his friends laughed at him and loved him. In
addition to the stories told by Lamb in his letters and essays, there
are amusing characteristics of Dyer in Crabb Robinson's diary, in
Leigh Hunt, in Hazlitt, in Talfourd, and in other places. All bear
upon his gentleness, his untidiness and his want of humour. One of
the most famous stories tells of Dyer's criticism of Williams, the
terrible Ratcliffe Highway murderer. Dyer, who would never say an ill
word of any one, was asked his opinion of this cold-blooded assassin
of two families. "He must," he replied after due thought, "be rather
an eccentric character."

Page 12, line 10. _Injustice to him._ In the _London Magazine_ the
following footnote came here,