_coll._ as _The Works of Charles Lamb_, and the favour with which they were received led to his being asked to contribute to the _London Magazine_ the essays on which his fame chiefly rests. The name "Elia" under which they were written was that of a fellow-clerk in the India House. They appeared from 1820-25. The first series was printed in 1823, the second, _The Last Essays of Elia_, in 1833. In 1823 the L.'s had left London and taken a cottage at Islington, and had practically adopted Emma Isola, a young orphan, whose presence brightened their lives until her marriage in 1833 to E. Moxon, the publisher. In 1825 L. retired, and lived at Enfield and Edmonton. But his health was impaired, and his sister's attacks of mental alienation were ever becoming more frequent and of longer duration. During one of his walks he fell, slightly hurting his face. The wound developed into erysipelas, and he _d._ on December 29, 1834. His sister survived until 1847. The place of L. as an essayist and critic is the very highest. His only rival in the former department is Addison, but in depth and tenderness of feeling, and richness of fancy L. is the superior. In the realms of criticism there can be no comparison between the two. L. is here at once profound and subtle, and his work led as much as any other influence to the revival of interest in and appreciation of our older poetry. His own writings, which are self-revealing in a quite unusual and always charming way, and the recollections of his friends, have made the personality of Lamb more familiar to us than any other in our literature, except that of Johnson. His weaknesses, his oddities, his charm, his humour, his stutter, are all as familiar to his readers as if they had known him, and the tragedy and noble self-sacrifice of his life add a feeling of reverence for a character we already love. Life and Letters and Final Memorials by Talfourd, also Memoir by B.W. Proctor and A. Ainger prefixed to ed. of _Works_ (1883-88). Life, Works, and Letters of Charles and Mary Lamb, in 9 vols., E.V. Lucas, and 12 vols. ed. W. Macdonald.