And hope may surely chase desponding fears
or
Let hope encouraged chase desponding fears.
Lamb, however, had already amended the fifth line (as in Blackwood's
Magazine) to—
To young beginnings natural are these fears.
Page 93. Lines addressed to Lieut. R.W.H. Hardy, R.N.
First printed in The Athenaeum, January 10, 1846, contributed by an anonymous correspondent (probably Thomas Westwood the Younger) who sent also "The First Leaf of Spring" (page 105). Travels in the Interior of Mexico in 1825 … 1828, by Robert William Hale Hardy, was published in 1829. Lamb made an exception in favour of Hardy's book. Writing to Dilke for something to read from The Athenaum office, in 1833, he particularly desired that "no natural history or useful learning, such as Pyramids, Catacombs, Giraffes, or Adventures in Southern Africa" might be sent.
* * * * *
Page 94. Lines for a Monument….
First printed in The Athenaeum, November 5, 1831, and again in The Tatler, Hunt's paper, December 31, 1831. In August, 1830, four sons and two daughters of John and Ann Rigg, of York, were drowned in the Ouse. Several literary persons were asked for inscriptions for the monument, erected at York in 1831, and that by James Montgomery, of Sheffield, was chosen. Lamb sent his verses to Vincent Novello, through whom he seems to have been approached in the matter, on November 8, 1830, adding: "Will these lines do? I despair of better. Poor Mary is in a deplorable state here at Enfield."