House.--Condition of Family.--Death of Mother.--Mary in Asylum.--John
Lamb.--Charles's Means of Living.--His Home.--Despondency.--Alice W.--
Brother and Sister._



On the south side of Fleet Street, near to where it adjoins Temple Bar,
lies the Inner Temple. It extends southward to the Thames, and contains
long ranges of melancholy buildings, in which lawyers (those reputed birds
of prey) and their followers congregate. It is a district very memorable.
About seven hundred years ago, it was the abiding-place of the Knights
Templars, who erected there a church, which still uplifts its round tower
(its sole relic) for the wonder of modern times. Fifty years since, I
remember, you entered the precinct through a lowering archway that opened
into a gloomy passage--Inner Temple Lane. On the east side rose the
church; and on the west was a dark line of chambers, since pulled down and
rebuilt, and now called Johnson's Buildings. At some distance westward was
an open court, in which was a sun-dial, and, in the midst, a solitary
fountain, that sent its silvery voice into the air above, the murmur of
which, descending, seemed to render the place more lonely. Midway, between
the Inner Temple Lane and the Thames, was, and I believe still is, a range
of substantial chambers (overlooking the gardens and the busy river),
called Crown Office Row. In one of these chambers, on the 18th day of
February, 1775, Charles Lamb was born.

He was the son of John and Elizabeth Lamb; and he and his brother John and
his sister Mary (both of whom were considerably older than himself) were
the only children of their parents. John was twelve years, and Mary
(properly Mary Anne) was ten years older than Charles. Their father held
the post of clerk to Mr. Samuel Salt, a barrister, one of the benchers of