indicated in the text the position in the _Works_ occupied by all the
poems that in the present volume have been printed earlier.

The chronological order, in so far as it has been followed, emphasises
the dividing line between Lamb's poetry and his verse. As he grew older
his poetry, for the most part, passed into his prose. His best and
truest poems, with few exceptions, belong to the years before, say,
1805, when he was thirty. After this, following a long interval of
silence, came the brief satirical outburst of 1812, in _The Examiner_,
and the longer one, in 1820, in _The Champion_; then, after another
interval, during which he was busy as Elia, came the period of album
verses, which lasted to the end. The impulse to write personal prose,
which was quickened in Lamb by the _London Magazine_ in 1820, seems to
have taken the place of his old ambition to be a poet. In his later and
more mechanical period there were, however, occasional inspirations, as
when he wrote the sonnet on "Work," in 1819; on "Leisure," in 1821; the
lines in his own Album, in 1827, and, pre-eminently, the poem "On an
Infant Dying as Soon as Born," in 1827.

This volume contains, with the exception of the verse for children,
which will be found in Vol. III. of this edition, all the accessible
poetical work of Charles and Mary Lamb that is known to exist and
several poems not to be found in the large edition. There are probably
still many copies of album verses which have not yet seen the light. In
the _London Magazine_, April, 1824, is a story entitled "The Bride of
Modern Italy," which has for motto the following couplet:--

My heart is fixt:
This is the sixt.--_Elia_.