refer to her literary abilities. She wrote "Mrs. Leicester's School",
which Mr. C. used warmly to praise for delicacy of taste and tenderness
of feeling.

Miss Lamb still survives, in the words of Mr. Talfourd, "to mourn the
severance of a life-long association, as free from every alloy of
selfishness, as remarkable for moral beauty, as this world ever
witnessed in brother and sister. "I have felt desirous to place in
relief, as far as might be, such an interesting union--to show how blest
a fraternal marriage may be, and what sufficient helpmates a brother and
sister have been to each other. Marriages of this kind would perhaps be
more frequent but for the want of some pledge or solid warranty of
continuance equivalent to that which rivets wedlock between husband and
wife. Without the vow and the bond, formal or virtual, no society, from
the least to the greatest, will hold together. Many persons are so
constituted that they cannot feel rest or satisfaction of spirit without
a single supreme object of tender affection, in whose heart they are
conscious of holding a like supremacy,--who has common hopes, loves, and
interests with themselves. Without this the breezes do not refresh nor
the sunbeams gladden them. A "share" in ever so many kind hearts does
not suffice to their happiness; they must have the whole of one, as no
one else has any part of it, whatever love of another kind that heart
may still reserve for others. There is no reason why a brother and
sister might not be to each other this second-self--this dearer
half--though such an attachment is beyond mere fraternal love, and must
have something in it "of choice and election," superadded to the natural
tie: but it is seldom found to exist, because the durable cement is
wanting--the sense of security and permanence, without which the body of
affection cannot be consolidated, nor the heart commit itself to its
whole capacity of emotion. I believe that many a brother and sister