It was curious to observe the gradations in Lamb's manner to his various guests, although it was courteous to all. With Hazlitt he talked as though they met the subject in discussion on equal terms; with Leigh Hunt he exchanged repartees; to Wordsworth he was almost respectful; with Coleridge he was sometimes jocose, sometimes deferring; with Martin Burney fraternally familiar; with Manning affectionate; with Godwin merely courteous; or, if friendly, then in a minor degree. The man whom I found at Lamb's house more frequently than any other person was Martin Burney. He is now scarcely known; yet Lamb dedicated his prose works to him, in 1818, and there described him as "no common judge of books and men;" and Southey, corresponding with Rickman, when his "Joan of Arc" was being reprinted, says, "The best omen I have heard of its welldoing is, that Martin Burney likes it." Lamb was very much attached to Martin, who was a sincere and able man, although with a very unprepossessing physiognomy. His face was warped by paralysis, which affected one eye and one side of his mouth. He was plain and unaffected in manner, very diffident and retiring, yet pronouncing his opinions, when asked to do so, without apology or hesitation. He was a barrister, and travelled the western circuit at the same time as Sir Thomas Wild (afterwards Lord Truro), whose briefs he used to read before the other considered them, marking out the principal facts and points for attention. Martin Burney had excellent taste in books; eschewed the showy and artificial, and looked into the sterling qualities of writing. He frequently accompanied Lamb in his visits to friends, and although very familiar with Charles, he always spoke of him, with respect, as _Mr_. Lamb. "He is on the top scale of my friendship ladder," Lamb says, "on which an angel or two is still climbing, and some, alas! descending." The last time I saw Burney was at the corner of a street in London, when he was overflowing on the subject of Raffaelle and Hogarth. After a great and prolonged struggle, he said, he had arrived at the conclusion that Raffaelle was the greater man of the two. Notwithstanding Lamb's somewhat humble description of his friends and familiars, some of them were men well known in literature.