"
"Lamb," as Mr. John Foster says, in his beautiful tribute to his memory,
"never fairly recovered the death of Coleridge. He thought of little
else (his sister was but another portion of himself) until his own great
spirit joined his friend. He had a habit of venting his melancholy in a
sort of mirth. He would, with nothing graver than a pun, 'cleanse his
bosom of the perilous stuff that weighed' upon it. In a jest, or a few
light phrases, he would lay open the last recesses of his heart. So in
respect of the death of Coleridge. Some old friends of his saw him two
or three weeks ago and remarked the constant turning and reference of
his mind. He interrupted-himself and them almost every instant with some
play of affected wonder, or astonishment, or humorous melancholy, on the
words, '_Coleridge is dead_.' Nothing could divert him from that, for
the thought of it never left him. About the same time, we had written
to him to request a few lines for the literary album of a gentleman who
entertained a fitting admiration of his genius. It was the last request
we were destined to make, the last kindness we were allowed to receive.
He wrote in Mr. Keymer's volume,--and wrote of Coleridge."
And this is what he said of his friend: it would be, as Mr. Foster says,
impertinence to offer one remark on it:--
"When I heard of the death of Coleridge, it was without grief.
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