In the course of a short time it appeared that he was unable to enjoy, so
perfectly as he had anticipated, his golden time of "Nothing to do," his
Liberia. He therefore took long walks into the country. He also acquired
the companionship of the large dog Dash, much given to wandering, to whose
erratic propensities (Lamb walking at the rate of fourteen miles a day) he
eventually became a slave. The rambling, inconstant dog rendered the
clear, serene day of leisure almost turbid; and he was ultimately (in
order to preserve for Charles some little remaining enjoyment) bestowed
upon another master. Lamb was always (as I have said) fond of walking, and
he had some vague liking, I suppose, for free air and green pastures;
although he had no great relish specially for the flowers and ornaments of
the country. I have often walked with him in the neighborhood of our great
city; and I do not think that he ever treasured up in his memory the
violets (or other flowers), the songs of birds, or the pictures of sheep
or kine dotting the meadows. Neither his conversation nor writings
afforded evidence that he had done so. It is not easy, therefore, to
determine what the special attractions were that drew him out of London,
which he loved, into the adjoining country, where his walks oftenest lay.
At the time of Lamb's deliverance from office labor, he was living in
Colebrook Row. It was there that George Dyer, whose blindness and absence
of mind rendered it almost dangerous for him to wander unaccompanied about
the suburbs of London, came to visit him on one occasion. By accident,
instead of entering the house door, Dyer's aqueous instincts led him
towards the water, and in a moment he had plunged overhead in the New
River. I happened to go to Lamb's house, about an hour after his rescue
and restoration to dry land, and met Miss Lamb in the passage, in a state
of great alarm: she was whimpering, and could only utter, "Poor Mr. Dyer!
Poor Mr. Dyer!" in tremulous tones. I went up stairs, aghast, and found
that the involuntary diver had been placed in bed, and that Miss Lamb had
administered brandy and water, as a well-established preventive against
cold. Dyer, unaccustomed to anything stronger than the "crystal spring,"
was sitting upright in the bed, perfectly delirious. His hair had been
rubbed up, and stood out like so many needles of iron gray. He did not
(like Falstaff) "babble of green fields," but of the "watery Neptune." "I
soon found out where I was," he cried out to me, laughing; and then he
went wandering on, his words taking flight into regions where no one could
follow. Charles Lamb has commemorated this immersion of his old friend, in
his (Elia) essay of "Amicus Redivivus."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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