In the spring of 1834, Coleridge's health began to decline. Charles had written to him (in reply) on the 14th April, at which time his friend had been evidently unwell; for Lamb says that he is glad to see that he could write so long a letter. He was indeed very ill; and no further personal intercourse (I believe) took place between Charles and his old schoolfellow. Coleridge lay ill for months; but his faculties seem to have survived his bodily decay. He died on the 25th July, 1834; yet on the 5th of that month he was able to discourse with his nephew on Dryden and Barrow, on Lord Brook, and Fielding, and Richardson, without any apparent diminution of judgment. Even on the 10th (a fortnight only before his death) there was no symptom of speedy dissolution: he then said, "The scenes of my early life have stolen into my mind like breezes blown from the Spice Islands." Charles's sorrow was unceasing. "He was my fifty years' old friend" (he says) "without a dissension. I cannot think without an ineffectual reference to him." Lamb's frequent exclamations, "Coleridge is dead! Coleridge is dead!" have been already noticed. And now the figures of other old friends of Charles Lamb, gradually (one by one), slip out of sight. Still, in his later letters are to be found glimpses of Wordsworth and Southey, of Rogers and Hood, of Cary (with whom his intimacy increases); especially may be noted Miss Isola, whom he tenderly regarded, and after whose marriage (then left more alone) he retreats to his last retreat, in Church Street, Edmonton.