Send me word, how it fares with Sara. I repeat it, your letter was and
will be an inestimable treasure to me; you have a view of what my
situation demands of me like my own view; and I trust a just one.

[A word perhaps on Lamb's salary might be fitting here. For the first
three years, from joining the East India House on April 5, 1792, he
received nothing. This probationary period over, he was given L40 for
the year 1795-1796. This, however, was raised to L70 in 1796 and there
were means of adding to it a little, by extra work and by a small
holiday grant. In 1797 it was L80, in 1799 L90, and from that time until
1814 it rose by L10 every second year.

Samuel Le Grice was the younger brother of Valentine Le Grice. Both were
at Christ's Hospital with Lamb and Coleridge and are mentioned in the
_Elia_ essay on the school. Sam Le Grice afterwards had a commission in
the 60th Foot, and died in Jamaica in 1802, as we shall see.]




LETTER 10


CHARLES LAMB TO S.T. COLERIDGE

[P.M. October 17, 1796.]

My dearest friend, I grieve from my very soul to observe you in your
plans of life veering about from this hope to the other, and settling no
where. Is it an untoward fatality (speaking humanly) that does this for