a small cottage, "where she had to practise the the wings of one of those good old motherly His father was now dead; his mother dwelt in dames, found in every village, who cluck together the whole callow brood of the neighborhood, to teach them their letters and keep them out of harm's way." The name of the old lady, who had the honor of first putting a book into the hands of Goldsmith, was Mistress Elizabeth Delap; but the future poet was a dull boy-in fact, his in-home. structress described him as impenetrably stupid. "At six years of age he passed into the hands of the village schoolmaster, one Thomas (or as he was commonly and irreverently named, Paddy) Byrne," an old soldier, and who was probably the original of the famous sketch in the "Deserted Village": : "It is the sunny time," writes Mr. Forster, A man severe he was, and stern to view, "between two dismal periods of his life. He I knew him well, and every truant knew; has escaped one scene of misery; another is Well had the boding tremblers learned to trace awaiting him; and what possibilities of happiThe day's disasters in his morning face; ness lie in the interval it is his nature to seize Full well they laughed with counterfeited glee and make the most of. He assists his brother At all his jokes, for many a joke had he; Full well the busy whisper, circling round, Henry in the school; runs household errands for Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned: his mother; writes scraps of verses to please Yet he was kind, or, if severe in aught, his uncle Contarine; and, to please himself, gets The love he bore to learning was his fault. cousin Bryanton and Tony Lumpkins of the disEncouraged by some signs of juvenile quick-trict, with wandering bear-leaders of genteeler ness, Oliver's family decided on sending him to sort, to meet at an old inn by his mother's house, the University, and he was accordingly removed and be a club for story-telling, for an occasional to schools of a higher order; but it is admitted game of whist, and for the singing of songs. that even there his proficiency was not very bril-First in these three accomplishments, great at liant. "He was a plant that flowered late," said Latin quotations, as admirer of happy human faces Johnson to Boswell; "there was nothing remark-greatest of all, Oliver presides. Cousin Bryanton able about him when young."-" And this," adds had seen his disgrace in college, and thinks this a Mr. Forster," was probably true. It is said that triumph indeed. Thus the two years the richer a nature is the harder and more slow passed. In the day-time occupied, as I have said, its development is like to be." in the village-school; on the winter's nights at As soon as he had attained the age of sixteen, Conway's; in the evenings of summer strolling on the 11th of June, 1745, he was entered as a up the Inny's banks to fish or play the flute, otter"sizer," or "poor scholar," of Trinity College, hunting by the course of the Shannon, learning Dublin. At that time many menial offices and French from the Irish priests, or winning a prize derogatory duties were imposed upon the sizer; for throwing the sledge-hammer at the fair al he was called on to sweep the courts, carry up Ballymahon. Two sunny years, with sorrowthe dishes from the kitchen to the table where ful affection long remembered; but hardly better the fellows dined, and wait upon them during than his college course to help him through the their repast. Goldsmith keenly felt these indignities. He had, 66 besides, a savage brute for a tutor"-one Wilder-"a man of violent and capricious temper * who abused him in presence of his class-mates as ignorant and stupid; ridiculed him as awkward and ugly; and, at times, in the transports of his temper, indulged in personal violence."* His per When very young poor Oliver had had a severe attack of small-pox, which had shockingly disfigured his originally not very handsome face; his figure was short, thick, and ungainly, and his manners awkward and embarrassed. sonal appearance was, therefore, anything but prepossessing, and, like many men of genius, he was an irregular and immethodical student. His college career was ultimately pronounced "wretched failure." On the 27th of February he took his bachelor's degree and his final leave of the University, and returned home to his friends. * Washington Irving. a world." But when Goldsmith presented himself before the bishop of the diocese for ordination, his usual ill-luck attended him. Whether it was that the bishop was displeased at his unclerical costume, for to do honor to the occasion, the ill-starred candidate had arrayed himself in scarlet inexpressibles; or that he showed himself deficient in theological information, or that reports of his academical irregularities had preceded him-too true it is, that he returned home rejected. After another brief interval, (during which Oliver officiated as tutor in a neighboring family, and, moreover, overcome by his wandering propensity, with thirty pounds in his pocket, made a ridiculous sally in quest of adventures,) his family again took counsel together, and it was resolved that he should make trial of the law. He accordingly started * Goldsmith's most generous relative, who relieved him in all his early straits and difficulties, and who appears to have been the only one of his friends who had any real faith in him. | And haply, though my harsh touch, faltering still, for Dublin, on his way to London, where he was to keep the usual terms common to Irish students, for which purpose his friends had furnished him with 507. But he spent the money in Dublin some say he was stripped of it in a gaming-house On his arrival in England, Goldsmith appears —and after a few weeks, penniless, dejected, dis- to have, found himself worse off than whilst vagheartened, and penitent, trudged back to his abondizing on the continent. But poverty made friends. Physic was the next experiment. For him fertile in shifts and expedients. It is rumored the purpose of studying the healing art he set out that about this time he became a strolling player. for Edinburgh, and arrived there in the autumn Then he went to London; called at the apotheof 1752. "An instance of the habitual thought-caries' shops, and asked for employment to run lessness belonging to his character," we are in- with their medicines, spread their plasters, and, formed by Mr. Prior, “occurred at the moment in the language of advertisements, make himself of first setting foot in the northern metropolis. generally useful. Homeless and friendless, he Having procured a lodging and deposited his lug- wandered about the streets at night with a few gage, he eagerly sallied forth to gratify curiosity by half-pence in his pocket. "Ten or twelve years viewing the city, in which, having occupied the later," writes Mr. Forster, "Goldsmith startled a whole of the day, the approach of night reminded brilliant circle at Sir Joshua's, with an anecdote him that he had neither inquired the name of the of When I lived among the beggars in Axe landlady, nor the street in which she lived. In Lane,' just as Napoleon, fifty years later, appalled this dilemma, having wandered about in a search the party of crowned heads at Dresden, with his which might have been useless, an accidental story of When I was a lieutenant in the regimeeting with the cawdy, or porter, whom he had ment of La Fère !'" At last he became an usher employed in the morning in removing to his new in a school, a miserable, browbeaten, worried, and abode, obviated a difficulty that might have occa- despised drudge; where he was up early and sioned inconvenience." Having passed two win-late," and was the "laughing-stock of the boys." ters at Edinburgh, Goldsmith made up his mind He soon quitted this wretched vocation, and was to finish his medical education on the continent. houseless and penniless again. In his dismal After some of his usual mishaps, he made his way poverty he was found out by an Edinburgh fellowto Leyden, (his good-natured uncle, Contarine, student, who furnished him with funds to comproviding the funds,) where he remained about a mence the practice of medicine, in a small way, year; and attended the lectures of Gaubius on among the poor in Bankside, Southwark. Among Chemistry, and Albinus on Anatomy. From his patients was a journeyman printer, who worked Leyden he is supposed to have set out on his fa- for Mr. Samuel Richardson, the author of "Pamous continental tour, which he commenced in mela," and then a flourishing publisher. The February, 1755, furnished, it has been said, printer introduced him to his master, who offered "with one spare shirt, a flute, and a single him employment, and Goldsmith was enabled to guinea.” make a fresh start as reader and corrector of the He did not probably remain long in this situation. At Edinburgh he had formed an intimacy with the son of a Dr. Milner, who kept a large classical academy at Peckham; and young Milner, having found out his old acquaintance, made him a liberal offer to assist in the management of the school. He was here kindly treated, but his habits were not those of the pedagogue. The scholars We shall not attempt to follow him in his wan-press. derings. He passed an evening in the society of Voltaire at Paris; at Geneva he became travelling tutor to "a mongrel young gentleman, son of a London pawnbroker;" and at length, after a variety of adventures, returned to England in 1756. It seems quite true, that the greater part of his journey was performed on foot, and that he was often indebted to his flute for lodging and a meal. "Countries wear a very different appear-entertained little respect for him; and though ance," he says, in his "Enquiry into Polite Learning," 1759, "to travellers of different circumstances. A man who is whirled through Europe in a post-chaise, and the pilgrim who walks the grand tour on foot, will form very different conclusions. Haud inexpertus loquor." And the well-known lines in the "Traveller," are doubtless as true as they are expressive and beautiful: How often have I led thy sportive choir, *The dates in Washington Irving's biography are frequently incorrect. A little more care in revising the work for the press would have prevented such blunders. + Washington Irving. 66 he spent his money in buying them sweetmeats, played all sorts of tricks upon him. "His small supplies," says Mr. Prior, were thus exhausted, frequently before the stated salary became due, when Mrs. Milner would say to him with a smile, upon application for an advance, 'You had better, Mr. Goldsmith, let me take care of your money, as I do for some of the young gentlemen;' to which he would reply, in the same spirit of goodhumor, In truth, madam, there is equal need.'" At the table of Dr. Milner, he frequently met with one Griffiths, the proprietor of the "Monthly Review." Griffiths, a shrewd, hard man of business, saw that Goldsmith was clever and very poor, that he was just the animal for hack authorship, and might be had cheap. He accordingly offered him a permanent engagement as a contrib 2 ator to the Review, with board and lodging, and sively occupied. He tenanted at first a mean a small fixed salary. Poor Oliver suffered the apartment "somewhere in the vicinity of Salisbookseller to make his own terms, and, " in his bury Square, Fleet Street;" but, in order to aptwenty-ninth year," in the words of Mr. Forster, pear more like a gentleman, he directed his letters sat down to the precarious task-work of author (or "hailed," as it is termed) from the "Temby profession." This literary vassalage lasted ple Exchange Coffee-house, near Temple Bar." five months. Even to poor spirit-broken Gold- He probably at this time adopted the notable smith it was too humiliating to be long endured. expedient of a poor countryman, in going abroad Mr. and Mrs. Griffiths both exerted the privilege to pay visits on clean-shirt-days only, but on other of patching, altering, and (in their own eyes) occasions wisely keeping within doors. His next amending his reviews. They kept him constantly place of residence was "on the first floor of the at the desk, and when he tried to assume a spirit house, No. 12, Green Arbor Court, between the of independence, they accused him of being above Old Bailey, and what was lately Fleet Market."* his situation. The connection with Griffiths was Washington Irving, who many years since dissolved, but Oliver was now fairly embarked in visited this locality on a literary pilgrimage, says, the profession of authorship. He had become a that "It then existed in its pristine state, and book-seller's hack and a Grub-street scribe; and was a small square of tall and miserable houses, for many years to come, he was destined to the the very intestines of which seemed turned inside hardest species of garret-toil and mental drudgery. out, to judge from the old garments and frippery We have hitherto traced his fortunes somewhat that fluttered from every window. It appeared to minutely; but we cannot pretend to follow him be a region of washerwomen, and lines were in every stage of his literary career. That career stretched about the little square, on which clothes is now commemorated as one of the world's great facts. It commenced in poverty and obscurity, and terminated in triumph and celebrity. privations at first were great, but his ultimate success was splendid. Though he had fallen upon days when literature had to fight its own battles, and the man of letters was left to struggle for himself, he indulged in no repinings or regrets. He did not lament that the age of patronage had passed away, and that guineas were no longer given for dedications and birth-day odes. On the The present Green Arbor Court in the Old contrary, like a good and sensible man, he rejoiced Bailey must not, therefore, be confounded with at the change which, by insuring the independ- the locality tenanted by Goldsmith. It was ence, raised the character of the literary man. whilst residing here that abject poverty betrayed When he had obtained some degree of considera-him into an act of indiscretion for which he aftertion, and while the memory of his early struggles was yet fresh in his recollection, he calmly and truly observed in one of his "Chinese Letters,"* "At present, the few poets in England no longer depended on the great for subsistence; they have now no other patrons but the public; and the public, collectively considered, is a good and generous master. It is indeed too frequently mistaken as to the merits of every candidate for favor, but to make amends it is never mistaken long." And again—“ A life of independence is generally a life of virtue. It is that which fits the soul for every generous flight of humanity, freedom, and friendship. Serenity, health, and affluence, attend the desire of rising by labor; misery, repentance, and disrespect, that of succeeding by extorted benevolence. The man who can thank himself alone for the happiness he enjoys is truly blest; and lovely, far more lovely, the sturdy gloom of laborious indigence, than the fawning simper of thriving adulation." were dangling to dry." It may be as well to add, that all traces of this singular shrine of povHis erty-stricken genius have long since disappeared. "Green Arbor Court," says Mr. Forster, "is now gone forever; its miserable wretchedness was replaced by the decent comfort of a stable. The houses, crumbling and tumbling in Goldsmith's day, were fairly rotted down some twelve or fifteen years since; and it became necessary, for safety sake, to remove what time had spared." It is not uninteresting to trace the gradual change in Goldsmith's circumstances, as shown in the character of the habitations which he succes * These letters were afterwards remodelled and published under the title of the "Citizen of the World." wards bitterly suffered. Before leaving his old lodgings, Dr. Milner had procured him an appointment as physician to one of the factories on the coast of Coromandel; and the poet was suddenly dazzled with visions of Oriental splendor. But it appears that he failed to take the necessary steps to secure the magnificent prize, and it was transferred to another. Disappointed in his Indian scheme, he turned his attention to the navy, and probably, as Mr. Prior observes, “induced by the example of several acquaintances, and the remembrance of Grainger and Smollett, who, in the spirit of adventure, or for a more extensive observation of mankind, pursued a similar course in early life," he resolved to present himself to be examined at the College of Surgeons for the humble situation of an 'hospital mate." His difficulty was to procure a decent suit of clothes for the occasion, and in this dilemma he applied to Griffiths, who, on being furnished with four articles for the "Monthly Review," undertook to become his security to a tailor. In the books of the College of Surgeons there is an entry which we quote without remark, for it is too expressive to require comment. "At a court of examiners 66 * Prior's Life of Goldsmith, vol. I. held at the theatre, 21st December, 1759 * James Bernard, mate to an hospital. Goldsmith found not qualified for ditto." In *Goldsmith's poverty was never accompanied by Oliver that guardian pride which kept Johnson from falling into the degrading shifts of poverty. GoldThe hack author returned to his drudgery, and smith had an unfortunate facility at borrowing, four days afterwards-on a Christmas day!- and helping himself along by the contributions of pawned the clothes in which he had stood his his friends, no doubt trusting, in his own hopeful examination, for the immediate purpose of paying way, of one day making retribution. Johnson some small arrears of rent to his landlady, whose never hoped, and therefore never borrowed. husband had been arrested for debt. He was now his sternest trials he proudly bore the ills he in the hands of Griffiths, who peremptorily de- could not master. * Though, like manded the return of the unlucky suit. When it Goldsmith, an immethodical student, he had imwas not forthcoming he accused Goldsmith of dis- bibed deeper draughts of knowledge, and made honesty. There is something touching in the himself a riper scholar. While Goldsmith's unhappy man's reply: "Had I been a sharper-happy constitution and genial humor carried him had I been possessed of less good-nature, and native generosity, I might surely now have been in better circumstances. I am guilty, I own, of meanness, which poverty unavoidably brings with it; my reflections are filled with repentance for my imprudence, but not with any remorse for being a villain.” abroad into sunshine and enjoyment, Johnson's physical infirmities and mental gloom drove him upon himself, to the resources of reading and meditation; threw a deeper, though darker enthusiasm into his mind, and stored a retentive memory with all kinds of knowledge." We might add, that in the buoyant temper of Goldsmith, and But better days were now in store for him. In the sturdy spirit of Johnson, we discern someMarch, 1759, he published his "Enquiry into the thing of the inherited and inherent peculiarities present state of Polite Learning in Europe," and of race. The patient Saxon and quick-blooded his reputation among the booksellers being now Celt appear in striking contrast; their virtues and established, and his circumstances now continuing failings were marked and prominent; upon each to improve, "about the middle of 1760," says of them the stamp of the national character was Washington Irving, "he emerged from his dis- firmly impressed. But they were attracted tomal abode in Green Arbor Court, and took re-gether by strong sympathies, and difference of spectable apartments in Wine Office Court, Fleet temper served, as it has done in many other street." instances, to attach them more closely to each other. 66 66 It was here, on the 31st of May, 1761, he received his first visit from Dr. Samuel Johnson. Goldsmith had long felt the want of a monitor The commencement of their acquaintance was and guide. His yielding, gentle nature needed most characteristic. Goldsmith had invited a support, and in his weakness he felt that it was large party to a literary supper, and he requested good for him to lean in confidence and reliance on Dr. Percy, as a mutual friend, to bring Johnson the strong-minded Englishman. A memorable with him to the repast. On calling for the great scene occurred one morning at Wine Office Court, literary potentate, Dr. Percy was surprised at his which forcibly illustrates the characters and posiextraordinary smartness, and could not help in- tion of the two men. The story is well known, quiring the reason of his paying such unwonted and has been made the subject of a graphic paintregard to his persona! appearance. Why, sir," ing by a modern artist. We cannot do better replied Johnson, "I hear that Goldsmith, who is than give it in Dr. Johnson's own words. "I a very great sloven, justifies his disregard of received one morning," he says, a message from cleanliness and decency by quoting my practice, poor Goldsmith that he was in great distress, and, and I am desirous this night to show him a better as it was not in his power to come to me, begging example." that I would come to him as soon as possible. I It is almost impossible to avoid making a com- sent him a guinea, and promised to come to him parison between the literary career of Goldsmith directly. I accordingly went as soon as I was and Johnson;—and by the eloquent pen of Wash-dressed, and found that his landlady had arrested ington Irving that comparison has been admirably him for rent, at which he was in a violent pasdrawn. "Both had struggled from early life sion; I perceived that he had already changed with poverty," says the American biographer, my guinea, and had a bottle of Madeira and a "but had struggled in different ways. Goldsmith, buoyant, heedless, sanguine, tolerant of evils, and easily pleased, had shifted along by any temporary expedient; cast down at every turn, but rising again with indomitable good humor, and still carried forward by his talent at hoping. Johnson, melancholy and hypochondriacal, and prone to apprehend the worst, yet sternly resolute to battle with and conquer it, had made his way doggedly and gloomily, but with a noble spirit of self-reliance, and a disregard of foreign aid. glass before him. I put the cork into the bottle, desired he would be calm, and began to talk to him of the means by which he might be extricated. He then told me he had a novel ready for the press, which he produced to me. I looked into it and saw its merit; told the landlady I should soon return; and, having gone to a bookseller, sold it for sixty pounds. I brought Goldsmith the money, and he discharged his rent, not without rating his landlady in a high tone for having used him so ill." 66 made by a man whose deficiencies in all the graces of person and manner seemed to mark him out for a cynical disparager of the sex." The novel was the "Vicar of Wakefield," and Apart from its moral teachings, the "Vicar of the bookseller to whom it was sold was Mr. Wakefield" is also valued as the most delightful Francis Newbury. Strange to relate, the pur-picture of English domestic life in the language. chaser kept the manuscript by him more than a All the tendernesses, virtues, and endearments of year and a half before he ventured to publish it. home-its pure enjoyments and tranquil pleasures But the work was destined to an extensive and -are beautifully set forth. It is a picture that enduring popularity, of which the fortunate book- could only have been drawn by one who himself seller never dreamed. "It came out," says deeply appreciated the ties of family affection. Washington Irving, "on the 27th of March," And yet," observes Washington Irving, "how 1766; before the end of May a second edition contradictory it seems that this, one of the most was called for; in three months more a third; delightful pictures of home and homefelt happiness, and so it went on, widening in a popularity that should be drawn by a homeless man; that the has never flagged. Rogers, the Nestor of British most amiable picture of domestic virtue, and all literature, whose refined purity of taste, and the endearments of the married state, should be exquisite mental organization, rendered him emi- drawn by a bachelor, who had been severed from nently calculated to appreciate a work of the domestic life almost from boyhood; that one of 'kind, declared that of all the books, which, the most tender, touching, and affecting appeals through the fitful changes of three generations, he in behalf of female loveliness, should have been had seen rise and fall, the charm of the Vicar of Wakefield' had alone continued as at first; and could he revisit the world after an interval of many more generations, he should as surely look Before the "Vicar of Wakefield," however, to find it undiminished." We shall not attempt had made its appearance, Goldsmith established to inquire into the secret of this wonderful popu- his reputation as a poet by the publication of the larity. It is enough to say, that the work has "Traveller." With many misgivings, on the been a blessed instrument in disseminating prin- part of its author, this charming poem was ciples of mercy, tolerance, and kindness. The ushered into the world, and its success was most loving disposition and winning gentleness of spirit triumphant. Goldsmith now felt that he was which characterized its author shine forth in every rising in the world, and "accordingly," says page. Simple to very baldness," says Mr. Washington Irving, "emerged from Wine Office Forster, are the materials employed. But Gold- Court, and took chambers in the Temple." It is smith threw into the midst of them his own true they were but of humble pretensions, situated nature; his actual experience; the suffering, dis-on what was then the library staircase, and it cipline, and sweet emotion of his own chequered would appear that he was a kind of inmate with life; and so made them a lesson and delight to Jeffs, the butler of the society. Still he was in all men." Who will not recognize, in the com- the Temple, that classic region rendered famous mon qualities of mind attributed to the pastor's by the Spectator and other essayists, as the abode family, the leading peculiarities of the gifted of gay wits and thoughtful men of letters; and writer? "In short," he says, at the conclusion which, with its retired courts and embowered of the first chapter, a family likeness prevailed gardens, in the very heart of a noisy metropolis, through all; and, properly speaking, they had but is, to the quiet-seeking student and author, an one character, that of being all equally generous, oasis freshening with verdure in the midst of a credulous, simple, and inoffensive." The scope desert. Johnson, who had become a sort of and objects of the tale have been eloquently growling supervisor of the poet's affairs, paid him summed up by Mr. Forster, in a few terse and a visit soon after he had installed himself in his expressive sentences, which we transfer with new quarters, and went prying about the apartpleasure to our pages. "Good predominant over ment, in his near-sighted manner, examining evil is briefly the purpose and moral of the little everything minutely. Goldsmith was fidgeted by story. It is designed to show us that patience in this curious scrutiny, and apprehending a disposisuffering, that persevering reliance on the provi- tion to find fault, exclaimed, with the air of a dence of God, that quiet labor, cheerful endeavor, man who had money in both pockets, "I shall and an indulgent forgiveness of the faults and in- soon be in better chambers than these." firmities of others, are the easy and certain means harmless bravado drew a reply from Johnson of pleasure in this world, and of turning pain to which touched the chord of proper pride. "Nay, noble uses. It is designed to show us that the sir," said he, "never mind that. Nil te quasiheroism and self-denial needed for the duties of | veris extra,”—implying that his reputation renlife, are not of the superhuman sort; that they may coexist with many follies, with some simple weaknesses, with many harmless vanities; and that, in the improvement of mankind, near and remote, in its progress through worldly content to final happiness, the humblest of men have their places assigned them, and their parts allotted them to play." 66 The dered him independent of outward show. Το this anecdote of Johnson and Goldsmith we must add another equally characteristic of the two men. At the Literary Club, of which both were members, the merits of the "Traveller" were warmly discussed-many of the members could scarcely believe that a man like Goldsmith could have written such a poem. Some of them suspected |