Ayrton was here yesterday, and as learned to the full as my fellow-traveller. What a pity that he will spoil a wit and a devilish pleasant fellow (as he is) by wisdom! He talked on Music; and by having read Hawkins and Burney recently I was enabled to talk of names, and show more knowledge than he had suspected I possessed; and in the end he begged me to shape my thoughts upon paper, which I did after he was gone, and sent him "Free Thoughts on Some Eminent Composers."
"Some cry up Haydn, some Mozart,
Just as the whim bites. For my part,
I do not care a farthing candle
For either of them, or for Handel," etc.
Martin Burney [1] is as odd as ever. We had a dispute about the word "heir," which I contended was pronounced like "air." He said that might be in common parlance, or that we might so use it speaking of the "Heir-at-Law," a comedy; but that in the law-courts it was necessary to give it a full aspiration, and to say Hayer; he thought it might even vitiate a cause if a counsel pronounced it otherwise. In conclusion, he "would consult Serjeant Wilde," who gave it against him. Sometimes he falleth into the water, sometimes into the fire. He came down here, and insisted on reading Virgil's "Æneid" all through with me (which he did), because a counsel must know Latin. Another time he read out all the Gospel of St. John, because Biblical quotations are very emphatic in a court of justice. A third time he would carve a fowl, which he did very ill favoredly, because we did not know how indispensable it was for a barrister to do all those sort of things well. Those little things were of more consequence than we supposed. So he goes on, harassing about the way to prosperity, and losing it. With a long head, but somewhat a wrong one,—harum-scarum. Why does not his guardian angel look to him? He deserves one,—maybe he has tired him out.
I am tired with this long scrawl; but I thought in your exile you might like a letter. Commend me to all the wonders in Derbyshire, and tell the devil I humbly kiss my hand to him.
Yours ever,
C. LAMB.
[1] Martin Burney, originally a solicitor, had lately been called to the Bar.
CIV.
TO GEORGE DYER.
December 20, 1830.