The Miscellaneous Works of Oliver Goldsmith

was that wretched Hickey, the attorney, who joined the party in Paris, and would make a butt of Goldy even in the presence of the ladies, and came back with the story how, maintaining a certain distance from one of the fountains at Versailles to be within reach of a leap, he made a jump to prove his assertion and his muscular power to the Jessamy, and tumbled into the water. Who could marry a man like that? One comfort is that she did not marry Mr. Hickey. When she was engaged, which was not till a year after Goldsmith's death, it was to a Colonel Gwyn, whose wife she became about three years after that. She was alive as late as 1840, having survived Goldsmith sixty-six years. She talked of him fondly

to the last.

The reader may remember a certain Kenrick, who succeeded Goldsmith as Griffiths's hack on the Monthly Review in 1757, and who had ever since been, for some reason, his deadly enemy. In March 1773, when Goldsmith had reached the very height of his living reputation, and She Stoops to Conquer was winning the plaudits of the town, this envious brute, who was editing the London Packet newspaper, inserted in its columns an anonymous letter of abuse against Goldsmith and all that he had done. Not content with condemning all Goldsmith's writings and especially his last comedy, as worthless, flimsy, and what not, he ventured on such elegancies as this: "Your poetic vanity is as unpardonable as your personal: would man believe it, and will woman bear it, to be told that for hours the great "Goldsmith will stand surveying his grotesque orang-outang figure in a pier-glass? "Was but the lovely H--k as much enamoured, you would not sigh, my gentle "swain, in vain!" When Goldsmith read this, his blood was properly u; and, accompanied by Captain Horneck of the Guards, the brother of the lady whose name had been dragged in, he was off to the bookseller Evans's in Paternoster Row, where the newspaper was published. What passed was described to Mr. Prior, when he was writing his Life of Goldsmith, by Mr. Harris, tae publisher of St. Paul's Churchyard, who had been in Evans's employment at the time in question, and was a witness to the scene. "I have called," said Goldsmith to Evans, "in 'consequence of a scurrilous attack in your paper upon me (my name is Goldsmith), "and an unwarrantable liberty taken with the name of a young lady. As for myself "I care little, but her name must not be sported with." Evans, professing that he knew nothing of the matter, stooped down as if to look for the offensive article in a file of the newspaper, when Goldsmith, unable to resist the sight of the big Welsh back so temptingly exposed, came down upon it with a whack of his cane. Instantly it was big Welshman against little Irishman; a lamp which hung overhead was broken in the scuffle, and they were both drenched with the oil; one of the shopmen ran for a constable, and the sneak Kenrick himself, coming out from his editor's room, helped Captain Horneck to separate the combatants, and send Goldsmith home in a coach. For a week the town was merry over the affray, chiefly at Goldy's expense; who had, moreover, to pay 50l. to a Welsh charity, to avoid an action by Evans. One's wish now is that time could be rolled back to the moment of the scuffle, so that the lamp-oil that was spilt might have been poured down Kenrick's throat.

There is an abundance of stories of Goldsmith in his last years, his ways in society, and his table-talk. They are all to the same effect - what a sensitive, guileless, tender-hearted, and really high-minded, creature he was, so that everybody that knew him liked him; and yet how absurd, blundering, alternately consequential and bashful, so that everybody took liberties with him, and it was only when people remembered what a writer he was, or now and then when his wits did clear in the course of talk, and he flashed out a brilliancy as keen as any in his books, that he was looked at with adequate respect. "Dr. Goldsmith," said some one, "is this sort of man: when he comes into a room, if you have not seen "him before, you look at him with reverence because of his writings; but, before he leaves the room, you may be riding on his back." Again, when the poet Rogers asked Conversation Cooke, as he was called, who had known Goldsmith well and been much with him, what he really was in talk, this was the answer he received, "Sir, he was a fool. The right word never came to him. If you gave "him back a bad shilling, he'd say, 'Why, it is as good a shilling as ever was born.' "You know he ought to have said coined. Coined, Sir, never entered his head. "He was a fool, Sir." Or take Boswell's report of one of his conversations with Johnson. "Of our friend Goldsmith he said, 'Sir, he is so much afraid of being 'unnoticed that he often talks merely lest you should forget that he is in the company.' BOSWELL-'Yes, he stands forward.' JOHNSON-True, Sir; but, “if a man is to stand forward, he should wish to do it not in an awkward posture, not in rags, not so that he shall only be exposed to ridicule.' BOSWELL "For my part, I like very well to hear honest Goldsmith talk away carelessly.' "JOHNSON—Why, yes, Sir; but he should not like to hear himself."" To the same purpose is another conversation of Goldsmith's friends about him, recorded by Boswell. "Goldsmith being mentioned, JOHNSON-'It is amazing how little "Goldsmith knows. He seldom comes where he is not more ignorant than any 66 one else.' SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS-'Yet there is no man whose company is 66 more liked.' JOHNSON To be sure, Sir. When people find a man of the most distinguished abilities as a writer their inferior while he is with them, it must be highly gratifying to them. What Goldsmith comically says of himself very true he always gets the better when he argues alone; meaning that he 'is master of a subject in his study, but, when he comes into company, grows confused, and unable to talk.""

Among the best stories of Goldsmith are certainly those preserved by Boswell. The young Scotchman, it is to be understood, whom Johnson had seen off at Harwich on his way to Utrecht, had returned from abroad in February 1766, with his head full of a new enthusiasm for Corsica and Paoli. He at once renewed his intimacy with Dr. Johnson, whom he found now residing in Johnson's Court, Fleet Street; and, as during his absence Goldsmith had published his Traveller and other things, he no longer wondered at finding Johnson and Goldsmith so much together. The three again supped at the Mitre, and met once or twice at Johnson's, before Boswell's return to Edinburgh to begin the practice of law. But

in 1768 Boswell was again in London for a considerable time; again in 1769; again in 1772, having in the meantime married; and again in 1773, when he had the honour of being elected a member of the Gerrard Street Club, already reinforced since its commencement by some other new members, among whom were Percy, Chambers, Colman, and Garrick. In Boswell's pages, accordingly, and chiefly in the form of his own recollections of those visits to London, we have a pretty continuous history, from 1768 to 1774, of that Johnsonian world which so fascinated him. It was the time, in general politics, of the continued fame of Wilkes and Liberty—the time of Chatham's obscuration, of the Grafton and other unpopular ministries, of the Letters of Junius, and of those discontents in the American colonies which led to the War of American Independence. Nor, amid these public events, were matters stationary in private with the members of the Johnsonian group. Burke's political career as a Rockingham Whig had begun in 1766, and his voice was now powerful in the House of Commons. Johnson had added his edition of Shakespeare to his many previous publications, had had his famous interview with young George III. in the royal library, had begun his intimacy with the Thrales, and had entered on his sixties. The Royal Academy having been founded in 1768, Reynolds had become its first President, and received his knighthood. What Goldsmith had been doing has been already told-save that we have yet to advert to an honour that came to him, in association with Johnson, in consequence of this last-mentioned fact of the foundation of the Royal Academy. "Dr. Johnson," says the Public Advertiser of December 22, 1769, "is appointed Professor of Ancient Literature, and Dr. Goldsmith Professor of History, to the Royal Academy. These titles are merely honorary, no salary being annexed to them." It was Reynolds who had arranged these distinctions for his friends in connexion with the new institution. About the same time he painted his well-known portrait of Goldsmith, engravings from which were to be seen in 1770 in the windows of all the print-shops. Its only fault is that it represents Goldsmith without a wig, whereas he invariably wore one. Reynolds, doubtless, foresaw that posterity would like to know the real shape of the head.

And now, with these preliminaries, let Boswell tell some of his stories of Goldsmith's ridiculous ways. - -Goldy's Envy of Johnson on account of his Interview with the King:-" During all the time in which Dr. Johnson was employed in relating to the circle at Sir Joshua Reynolds's the particulars of what passed between the King and him, Dr. Goldsmith remained unmoved upon a sofa at some distance, affecting not to join in the least in the eager ' curiosity of the company. He assigned as a reason for his gloom and seeming inattention that he apprehended Johnson had relinquished his purpose of furnishing him with a Prologue to his play, with the hopes of which he had "been flattered; but it was strongly suspected that he was fretting with chagrin "and envy at the singular honour Dr. Johnson had lately enjoyed. At length,

"the frankness and simplicity of his natural character prevailed. He sprung from "the sofa, advanced to Johnson, and, in a kind of flutter, from imagining himself

"in the situation which he had just been hearing described, exclaimed, 'Well, you acquitted yourself in this conversation better than I should have done; for "I should have bowed and stammered through the whole of it.'”- -Goldy's Bloom-Coloured Coat:-" He (Dr. Johnson) honoured me with his company at dinner on the 16th of October (1769) at my lodgings in Old Bond Street, with 'Sir Joshua Reynolds, Mr. Garrick, Dr. Goldsmith, Mr. Murphy, Mr. Bickerstaff, "and Mr. Thomas Davies. . . One of the company not being come at the appointed hour, I proposed, as usual on such occasions, to order dinner to 'be served; adding, 'Ought six people to be kept waiting for one?' 'Why, yes,' answered Johnson, with a delicate humanity, 'if the one will suffer more by your sitting down than the six will do by waiting.' Goldsmith, to divert the tedious minutes, strutted about, bragging of his dress, and I believe was "seriously vain of it, for his mind was wonderfully prone to such impressions. 'Come, come,' said Garrick, 'talk no more of that. You are perhaps the 'worst-eh, eh!' Goldsmith was eagerly attempting to interrupt him, when "Garrick went on, laughing ironically, Nay, you will always look like a gentleman; but I am talking of being well or ill drest.' 'Well, let me tell you,' said Goldsmith, 'when my tailor brought home my bloom-coloured coat, he said, "Sir, I have a favour to beg of you. When anybody asks you who made your clothes, be pleased to mention John Filby, at the Harrow, in Water Lane." JOHNSON' Why, Sir, that was because he knew the strange colour "would attract crowds to gaze at it, and thus they might hear of him, and see 999 how well he could make a coat even of so absurd a colour.'

66 6

Facts in Natural History:-" On Thursday, April 29 (1773), I dined with him ‘(Johnson) at General Oglethorpe's, where were Sir Joshua Reynolds, Mr. Langton, "Dr. Goldsmith, and Mr. Thrale. . . . GOLDSMITH-There is a general abhorrence in animals at the signs of massacre. If you put a tub full of blood into a stable, the horses are like to go mad.' JOHNSON-‘I doubt that.' GOLDSMITH'Nay, it is a fact well authenticated.' THRALE-‘You had better prove it before 'you put it into your book on Natural History. You may do it in my stable 66 if you will.' JOHNSON-'Nay, Sir, I would not have him prove it. If he is content to take his information from others, he may get through his book with "little trouble, and without much endangering his reputation. But, if he makes experiments for so comprehensive a book as his, there would be no end to them; "his erroneous assertions would then fall upon himself.’”. -Goldy trying to shine, and resenting familiarity :—“ Goldsmith's incessant desire of being conspicuous "in company was the occasion of his sometimes appearing to such disadvantage as one should hardly have supposed possible in a man of his genius. (Once)

"when (he was) talking in a company with fluent vivacity, and, as he flattered himself, to the admiration of all who were present, a German who sat next

him, and perceived Johnson rolling himself, as if about to speak, suddenly stopped

him, saying, 'Stay, stay-Toctor Shonson is going to say something.' This

was, no doubt, very provoking, especially to one so irritable as Goldsmith, who

frequently mentioned it with strong expressions of indignation. It may also be “observed that Goldsmith was sometimes content to be treated with an easy familiarity, but upon occasions would be consequential and important. An "instance of this occurred in a small particular. Johnson had a way of contracting "the names of his friends: as Beauclerk, Beau; Boswell, Bozzy; Langton, Lanky; Murphy, Mur; Sheridan, Sherry. I remember, one day when Tom Davies was telling that Dr. Johnson said, 'We are all in labour for a name to Goldy's play,' "Goldsmith seemed much displeased that such a liberty should be taken with "his name. 'I have often desired him not to call me Goldy."

The foregoing are from Boswell's "Life of Johnson," where there is more of the same sort; but other stories, as good, have come down by other channels of tradition. One or two of these may be added to the string.- ·Gibbon making game of Goldy :While Goldsmith was busy with his 'Grecian History,' Gibbon is said to have called upon him at his chambers in Brick Court. "You are the very person I wanted to see," said Goldsmith, "for I can't remember the name of that Indian king who gave Alexander the Great so much trouble. "Montezuma," said Gibbon mischievously; till, perceiving that Goldsmith took the information in good faith, and was making a note of it, he thought the jest might go too far, and added, "No, I mistake: it was not Montezuma; it was Porus.". --Burke making game of Goldy:-Burke, and his friend Mr. (afterwards Colonel) O'Moore, were walking together to Sir Joshua Reynolds's to dine, when they saw Goldsmith, who was also going there, standing near a crowd that had gathered to stare and shout at some foreign women who were looking out from the windows of a house in Leicester Square. "Observe Goldsmith," said Burke to his companion, "and mark what passes between him and me at Sir Joshua's." They arrived at Sir Joshua's before Goldsmith; and, when he appeared, Burke received him with a grave face, as if seriously offended. When Goldsmith had pressed some time for an explanation, Burke, with seeming reluctance, said it was really too much to expect that one could continue to be intimate with him after the indiscreet way in which he had been behaving in the square. With great earnestness Goldsmith professed his ignorance of having done anything wrong, and asked what it was. "Why," said Burke, "did you not exclaim, as you were looking up at those women, what stupid beasts the people must be for staring with such admiration at those painted Jezebels while a man of your talents passed by unnoticed!" "Surely I did not say that," said the astonished Goldsmith. "Nay, if you had not said so," replied Burke, "how should I have known it?" "That's true," said Goldsmith humbly; "I am very sorry-it was very foolish; I do recollect that something of the kind passed through my mind, but I did not think I had uttered it." --Goldy and the Pig-Butcher :—At the humble Wednesday's Club at the Globe in Fleet Street, according to Mr. Forster, no less than at the Gerrard Street Club and the parties at Sir Joshua's, Goldsmith was the subject of practical jokes. Mr. Forster tells some of these and adds this story: A frequent attendant at the Club was 66 a certain Mr. B., described as a good sort of man and an eminent pig"butcher, who piqued himself very much on his good fellowship with the author of the

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