18 OCTOBER 1884, Page 14

HENRY GREVILLE'S DIARY.

rTo THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR.'

SIR,—Can you spare a few lines to put right Mr. Greville's anecdote of Charles Lamb saying to Mr. Basil Montagu, "Basil, if dirt were trumps, what a hand you would have ?" I was a pupil of Mr. Montagu ; he never played cards, he was scrupulously clean, and Lamb never would have addeessed him as "Basil." It is usually related that Lamb said this to Martin Burney. The fact is that the joke is my father's, William Ayrton. I have more than once heard him complain that the saying was taken from him, and given to one so rich in jokes as Lamb. My father has entered it in his anecdote-book as his. —I am, Sir, &c.,