Other “adventures” of things:
The Adventures of a Silver Penny. Price 6d. E. Newbery. (Advertised in the London Chronicle, Dec. 21-29, 1787, “just published”); The Adventures of a Doll, by Mary Mister, 1816; Memoirs of a Peg Top, by S. S. Author of The Adventures of a Pincushion. Marshall’s list, c. 1788.
VII
In the preface to The Adventures of Ulysses, Lamb says: “This work is designed as a supplement to the Adventures of Telemachus”; and in a letter to Manning (1808) he says it is “intended as an introduction to the reading of Telemachus”.
Fénélon’s Télémaque (1699) which, like his Fables and Dialogues des Morts, was written for his pupil, the grandson of Louis XIV, was translated into English in 1742. It is a kind of sequel to the fourth book of the Odyssey, describing the further adventures of Telemachus in search of his father. Fénélon turned his “adventures” into a moral tale, and Lamb, in his preface, also lays stress on the moral of his book.
At the back of the third edition of Mrs. Leicester’s School is a list of “new books for children”, published by M. J. Godwin, at the Juvenile Library, Skinner Street. Many of these are school texts, some by Godwin, writing under his pseudonym of “Edward Baldwin”. Others include the Tales from Shakespear; the Adventures of Ulysses; Poetry for Children; Stories of Old Daniel; Dramas for Children, from the French of L. F. Jauffret; Mrs. Fenwick’s Lessons for Children (a sequel to Mrs. Barbauld’s); and Lamb’s Prince Dorus.
Stories of Old Daniel, which has been attributed to Lamb, has the alternative title “or Tales of Wonder and Delight”. It contains “Narratives of Foreign Countries and Manners”, and was “designed as an Introduction to the study of Voyages, Travels and History in General”: a sufficient proof that Lamb had nothing to do with it.