On two Prussians of the same name being accused of the same crime, it was
remarked as curious that they were not in any way related to each other.
"A mistake," said he; "they are cozens german."

An old lady, fond of her dissenting minister, wearied Lamb by the length
of her praises. "I speak, because I _know_ him well," said she.

"Well, I don't;" replied Lamb; "I don't; but d--n him, at a 'venture.'"

The Scotch, whom he did not like, ought, he said, to have double
punishment; and to have fire without brimstone.

Southey, in 1799, showed him a dull poem on a rose. Lamb's criticism was,
"Your rose is insipid: it has neither thorns nor sweetness."

A person sending an unnecessarily large sum with a lawyer's brief, Lamb
said "it was 'a fee simple.'"

Mr. H. C. Robinson, just called to the bar, tells him, exultingly, that he
is retained in a cause in the King's Bench. "Ah" (said Lamb), "the great
first cause, least understood."

Of a pun, Lamb says it is a "noble thing _per se_. It is entire. It fills
the mind; it is as perfect as a sonnet; better. It limps ashamed, in the
train and retinue of humor." [2]

Lamb's puns, as far as I recollect, were not frequent; and, except in the
case of a pun, it is difficult to divest a good saying of the facts
surrounding it without impoverishing the saying itself. Lamb's humor is
generally imbedded in the surrounding sense, and cannot often be