I have thought myself into a settled melancholy, and an utter disgust of all that life brings with it. Whence this romantic turn that all our family are possessed with? Whence this love for every place and every country but that in which we reside-for every occupation but our own? -this desire of fortune, and yet this eagerness to dissipate?

'The reasons you have given me for breeding up your son a scholar, are judicious and convincing; I should, however, be glad to know for what particular profession he is designed. If he be assiduous, and divested of strong passions (for passions in youth always lead to pleasure), he may do very well in your college; for it must be owned, that the industrious poor have good encouragement there, perhaps better than in any other in Europe. But if he has ambition, strong passions, and an exquisite sensibility of contempt, do not send him there, unless you have no other trade for him but your own.

'Above all things let him never touch a romance or novel: these paint beauty in colours more charming than nature, and describe happiness that man never tastes. How delusive, how destructive are those pictures of consummate bliss! They teach the youthful mind to sigh after beauty and happiness which never existed; to despise the little good which fortune has mixed in our cup, by expecting more than she ever gave; and in general, take the word of a man who has seen the world, and has studied human nature more by experience than precept -take my word for it, I say, that books teach us very little of the world. The greatest merit in a state of poverty would only serve to make the possessor ridiculous-may distress but cannot relieve him. Frugality, and even avarice, in the lower orders of mankind, are true ambition. These afford the only ladder for the poor to rise to preferment. Teach then, my dear Sir, to your son, thrift and economy. his poor wandering uncle's example be placed before his eyes.

Let

'My mother, I am informed, is almost blind; even though I had the utmost inclination to return home, under such circumstances I could not, for to behold her in distress without a capacity of relieving her from it would add too much to my splenetic habit. Your last letter was much too short; it should have answered some queries I had made in my former. Just sit down as I do, and write forward until you have filled all your paper. It requires no thought, at least from the ease with which my own sentiments rise when they are addressed to you. For, believe me, my head has no share in all I write; my heart dictates the whole. Pray, give my love to Bob Bryanton, and entreat him from me not to drink. My dear Sir, give me some account about poor Jenny.* Yet her husband loves her; if so, she cannot be unhappy.'-Ibid. p. 301.

About the date of this inimitable letter, he was introduced by Grainger to the Rev. Thomas Percy, afterwards Bishop of Dromore, who soon formed for him a lively affection, which lasted with their lives, but was at this period hardly better provided with worldly goods than himself. Many years afterwards

* Jenny Goldsmith, the younger sister who had eloped with a Mr. Johnston, in very poor circumstances.

the

the bishop thus described to Malone his first visit to Goldsmith at his lodgings in Green-Arbour Court, a little nest of povertystricken tenements, near the Old Bailey.

'The Doctor was employed in writing his Enquiry into Polite Learning, in a wretchedly dirty room, in which there was but one chair; and when, from civility, this was offered to his visitant, he himself was obliged to sit in the window. While they were conversing, some one gently rapped at the door, and on being desired to come in, a poor ragged little girl of very decent behaviour entered, who, dropping a courtesy, said, "My mamma sends her compliments, and begs the favour of you to lend her a chamber-pot full of coals.""-Life, vol. i. p. 325,

Mr. Prior has given some further particulars of Green-Arbour Court from a humbler source. Seeing a few years ago the first edition of Goldsmith's Essays (1765) in the window of a little shop on the Clapham Road, he entered into talk with a fresh old woman who attended at the counter.

'By her account she was a near relative of the woman who kept the house in Green-Arbour Court, and at the age of seven or eight years went frequently thither, one of the inducements to which was the cakes and sweetmeats given to her and other children of the family, by the gentleman who lodged there; these they duly valued at the moment, but when afterwards considered as the gifts of one so eminent, the recollection became a source of pride and boast. Another of his amusements consisted in assembling these children in his room, and inducing them to dance to the music of his flute. He was usually, as she heard when older and induced to inquire about him, shut up during the day, went out in the evenings, and preserved regular hours. His habits otherwise were sociable, and he had several visiters. One of the companions, whose society gave him particular pleasure, was a respectable watchmaker residing in the same court, celebrated for the possession of much wit and humour; qualities which, as they distinguish his own writings, he professes to have sought and cultivated wherever they were to be found. His benevolence, as usual, flowed freely, according to my informant, whenever he had anything to bestow, and even when he had not, the stream could not always be checked in its current; an instance of which tells highly to his honour. The landlord of the house having fallen into difficulties, was at length arrested; and Goldsmith, who owed a small sum for rent, being applied to by his wife to assist in the release of her husband, found that, although without money, he did not want resources; a new suit of clothes was consigned to the pawnbroker, and the amount raised, proving much more than sufficient to discharge his own debt, was handed over for the release of the prisoner. It would be a singular though not an improbable coincidence, if this story, repeated to the writer by the descendant of a person who afterwards became his tailor, and who knew not that it had been previously told, should apply to that identical suit of apparel for which he incurred so much odium and abuse from Griffiths; and that an effort of active benevolence to relieve a debtor from gaol, should have given rise to a charge against him resembling dishonesty.'Ibid. p. 328.

The Enquiry, though he had taken too wide a field, and betrayed, of course, incompetent resources as to fact, and considerable crudeness here and there of speculation, was still a performance exhibiting such easy strength both of thought and expression, that it might well have excited curiosity. It can hardly be said to have done so; but in the same humble lodgings Goldsmith wrote various pieces which fared considerably better. Those miscellaneous Essays, now classed with the happiest even of Addison's and Steele's, began to appear about the close of 1759 in sundry vehicles, particularly in a weekly sheet entitled The Bee, the Lady's Magazine, the Literary Magazine, and the British Magazine-this last a speculation of Smollett's, in which the chapters of his Sir Lancelot Greaves were originally published. Goldsmith's contributions to these works were plundered liberally by others of the same class, and by newspapers, but though the ability of the hand was thus recognised, the author's name still remained obscure; and there are several circumstances which lead us to agree with Mr. Prior, that Goldsmith painted himself at this period when he put the following words into the mouth of his George Primrose. After mentioning the old but by no means exploded trick of soliciting subscriptions for books never meant to be printed, this adventurer is made to say

'Having a mind too proud to stoop to such indignities, and yet a fortune too humble to hazard a second attempt for fame, I was now obliged to take a middle course, and write for bread. But I was unqualified for a profession where mere industry alone was to insure success. I could not suppress my lurking passion for applause, but usually consumed that time in efforts after excellence which takes up but little room, when it should have been more advantageously employed in the diffusive productions of fruitful mediocrity. My little piece would therefore come forth in the midst of periodical publications, unnoticed and unknown. The public were more importantly employed, than to observe the easy simplicity of my style, or the harmony of my periods. Sheet after sheet was thrown off to oblivion. My essays were buried among essays upon liberty, eastern tales, and cures for the bite of a mad dog; while Philautos, Philalethes, Philelutheros, and Philanthropos, all wrote better, because they wrote faster than I.'

Next year, however, one series of Essays, to which a regular plan gave unity and cohesion, by degrees fixed general attention; and before the close of 1760 the Chinese Philosopher-the Citizen of the World-had greatly enlarged the estimate of his friends, and not less excited the curiosity of strangers. Goldsmith now found himself courted by several of the men of letters who enjoyed established reputation; and Johnson above the rest was eager to show

his admiration of his talents, and to cultivate his friendship. Through him the access to Reynolds, Burke, Garrick, and the rest of that memorable society was easy, and, though Goldsmith's pecuniary difficulties never ceased, he was thenceforth cheered by the confidence of minds stronger than his own. Doomed still to earn the bread of the passing day by compilations to which even his genius could rarely give any dignity, his self-respect was sustained by their approbation and authority; and he gallantly rescued from repose and relaxation sufficient time to produce at intervals the various original works in prose and verse to which, after and above the Chinese Letters, he owes his station among our classics.

In May, 1761, he exchanged his garret in Green-Arbour Court for lodgings of a better description in Fleet Street, and it seems that the first visit Johnson paid him was at a supper which he gave on taking possession of them. Percy, as their chief mutual acquaintance, conducted Johnson, and was struck with the then unusual trimness of his attire :

'He had on, said the Bishop, a new suit of clothes, a new wig nicely powdered, and everything so dissimilar from his usual habits, that I could not resist the impulse of inquiring the cause of such rigid regard in him to exterior appearance. "Why, Sir," said he, "I hear that Goldsmith, who is a very great sloven, justifies his disregard of cleanliness and decency by quoting my practice, and I am desirous this night to show him a better example." "-Life, vol. i. p. 377.

In the course of that year Goldsmith formed his first connection with Mr. Newbery, a kind-hearted bookseller of St. Paul's Church-yard, now chiefly remembered for the multiplicity of his little publications for children. Setting up the newspaper which still exists under its original name of The Public Ledger, he applied to Goldsmith for occasional literary contributions, and found him so adroit and withal so diligent, that he charged himself thenceforth for several years with providing occupation for his pen. In the course of 1762, Goldsmith produced for him a pamphlet on the Cock Lane Ghost, for which he received three guineas; a History of Mecklenburg, 8vo. (suggested by the marriage of good Queen Charlotte,) 20l.; seven volumes, 12mo., of an English Plutarch, 45l.; an abridgment of the History of England (the first and tiniest of four such abridgments from this pen), two guineas; a Life of Beau Nash, 8vo., fourteen guineas ; and miscellaneous papers sufficient to raise his revenue, from St. Paul's Church-yard, in all to 120l. These items would prove this to have been a year of severe exertion: yet there seems good reason to believe that they do not exhaust the list of its performances; and we have plentiful evidence that all its industry

VOL. LVII. NO. CXIV.

X

had

had not relieved him from the most tangible degradations of penury. We need not repeat the story of Johnson's finding him in a spunging-house for a petty debt, and releasing him by the sale of his Vicar of Wakefield for 60l. to Newbery. Boswell fixes the incident in the spring of 1763. That delicious little novel had been no hasty effort. Every version of the anecdote shows that he had kept it by him to be taken up as his Labour of Love,' whenever he could shift off the yoke of translation or compilation for an evening during the preceding year-perhaps during 1761 also.

Newbery had probably been offered the tale before, and when he did give 60l. for a copyright which must have put thousands into his pocket or that of his heirs, did so in deference merely to the favourable opinion of the Dictator Johnson. And he still clung to his own doubts for the novel lay near two years in his desk, and was not published until after the poem of the Traveller, put forth with the author's name in 1765, had been crowned with universal applause, and there was a rush among what is called the trade to collect his fugitive essays, and partake per fas aut nefas in the lucre of a new celebrity. However, Newbery was also the publisher of the poem, and the sum he gave for it was twenty guineas! to which Goldsmith stooped not to solicit any addition in the then usual shape of a dedication fee, for he inscribed it to his affectionate brother, the obscure curate contented with his obscurity

'And passing rich with forty pounds a year.'

We extract, as a favourable specimen of Mr. Prior's manner, part of the chapter which he devotes to the Vicar of Wakefield

'The Vicar secured friends among every description of readers; with the old by the purity of its moral lessons, and with the young by the interest of the story. With the popular productions before him of Fielding and Smollett, he studiously avoided their track by excluding variety of adventures, immoral scenes, and licentious intrigues, which, under the plausible plea of exhibiting human nature, almost necessarily corrupt the minds of youth by familiarizing what it is never prudent wantonly to display. He was equally regardless of the example of Richardson, of his prolixity and sentimental refinements, however he may have honoured his morality. But its great charm, as of all the productions of Goldsmith, is close adherence to nature-nature in its commendable, not vicious, points of view. The Primrose family is a great creation of genius; such a picture of warm-hearted simplicity, mingled with the little foibles and weaknesses common to the best specimens of humanity, that we find nothing like it in the whole range of fiction. Each of the individuals is nicely discriminated without apparent art or effort; we can anticipate what either will do, and almost will say, on any given occasion. The unwearied benevolence