opinion of it was, that it was the best written poem since the time of Pope. Of the booksellers whom styled his friends, Mr. Newbery was one. This person had apartments in Canonbury-house, where Goldsmith often lay concealed from his creditors. Under a pressing necessity he there wrote his Vicar of Wakefield, and for it received of Newbery forty pounds. Of a man named Griffin, a bookseller, in Catherine-street in the Strand, he had borrowed, by two and three guineas at a time, money to the amount of two hundred pounds: to discharge this debt he wrote the Deserted Village, but was two years about it. Soon after its publication, Griffin declared, that it had discharged the whole of his debt. His poems are replete with fine moral sentiment, and bespeak a great dignity of mind; yet he had no sense of the shame, nor dread of the evils, of poverty. In the latter he was at one time so involved, that for the clamours of a woman, to whom he was indebted for lodging, and for bailiffs that waited to arrest him, he was equally unable, till he had made himself drunk, to stay within doors, or go abroad to hawk among the booksellers a piece of his writing, the title whereof my author does not remember. In his distress he sent for Johnson, who immediately went to one of them, and brought back money for his relief. In his dealings with the booksellers, he is said to have acted very dishonestly, never fulfilling his engagements. In one year he got of them, and by his plays, the sum of £1,800, which he dissipated by gaming and extravagance, and died poor, in 1774. He that can account for the inconsistencies of character above noted, otherwise than by showing, that wit and wisdom are seldom found to meet in the same mind, will do more than any of Goldsmith's friends were ever able to do. He was buried in the Temple churchyard. A monument was erected for him.in the Poets' corner, in Westminster Abbey, by a subscription of his friends, and is placed over the entrance into St. Blase's chapel. The inscription thereon was written by Johnson. This I am able to say with certainty, for he showed it to me in manuscript. APPENDIX I. LIFE, AND ADDITIONAL NOTES. Page xxviii. 1. 1. 'Forgot at home, became for hire Vide Swift, Misc. v. 129. Page xxxvii. 1. 14. Mrs. Collier informed me that an acquaintance of hers had mentioned to her that he had been flogged by Goldsmith, when the latter was usher at Peckham. Page xlii. To last line of note, add "There is one in the Athenæum. March, 1832." Page lviii. 1. 30. See Piozzi's Letters, i. 247. Page Ixii. 1. 21. He is, as the variation of the subject requires, alternately ornamented or plain; sublime without rising by painful or constrained effort; simple without descending into vulgarity. In philosophical reflection, in description, or in sentiment, he is always master of his subject,, and consequently moves with ease. Page lxvii. 1. 13. See A. Brown's Sketches, i. 80. Page lxviii. On Johnson's prologue to the 'Good Natured And social sorrow loses half its pain,' The following couplet was inserted, Amidst the toils of this returning year,' These lines were omitted, lest they should give offence, and little' altered to anxious.' Page lxxix. 1. 10. See Tremaine, vol. iii. p. 316--334, sketch by Lord Chesterfield. Page lxxix. 1. 1. of note. Dele from Whether' to 'say. Page lxxx. last line of note. Add, after p. 45: " and yet Hans Carvel not over decent,' See Johnson's Life of Prior, p. 174. Page xcv. Epitaph. Had Goldsmith outlived Johnson, he probably would have written his life. He once asked Mrs. Piozzi Who will be my biographer do you think?' 'Goldsmith, no doubt,' she replied, and he will do it best among us.' The dog would write it best to be sure,' replied he, but his particular malice towards me, and general disregard of truth, would make the book useless to all, and injurious to my character.'-Piozzi's Anecdotes, p. 24.-I find the ladies are rather bitter against poor Goldsmith in their Recollections. These words of Johnson are very strong, and I trust not correctly repeated; besides, it must be considered, that they were thrown off in the heat and hurry of conversation, and might be contrasted with some declarations of a different nature. Ed. Some observations on Goldsmith's character and writings may be seen in Prior's Life of Burke, p. 86. Page xcvi. 1. 9. See Warton's edit. of Pope, i. 105. 1. 18. See Mélanges de Littérature par D'Alembert, v. 198. 6 Page xcvii. 1. 1. After were' add simple and concise. Neatness of arrangement, and chastity of expression were always desired.' Page xcix. 1. 30. See Anecdotes Littér. iii. p. 201. on La Motte's style. Dans Houdart souvent un âne raisonne en Académicien, &c. Page c. 1. 7. See Crabbe's Poems, (Tales.) And he the sweetest poet of the day,' &c. Page cxxx. 1. 3. See Cradock's Memoirs, iv. 336. On Goldsmith's genius, see Payne Knight's "Progress of Civil Society." P. xiv. 119. "How frail, alas, are all human pleasures!" I was witness to an entire separation between Percy and Goldsmith, about Rowley's Poems. Cradock's Mem. i. 206. It ought to be stated that when the great moralist in an evening was giving a serious lecture to the company, no one paid more respect, or was more attentive than Goldsmith.Cradock's Mem. iv. 304. I little thought what I should have to boast, when Goldsmith taught me to play Jack and Gill by two bits of paper on his fingers.-Miss Hawkins' Anecd. ii. 7. A letter to R. Bryanton, Esq. by Goldsmith, in Elegant Extracts, edited by Davenport. Vol. v. p. 252. Whittingham, Chiswick. 18mo. Review of the Traveller, by Dr. Johnson, in Critical Review, 1764. Vol. xviii, p. 458. "Canonbury Castle is an antient brick tower hard by mery Islington, the remains of a hunting-seat of Queen Elizabeth, where she took the pleasure of the country, when the neighbourhood was all woodland. What gave it particular interest in my eyes was the circumstance that it had been the residence of a poet. It was here Goldsmith resided when he wrote his "Deserted Village." I was shewn the very apartment; it was a relique of the original style of the castle, with panneled wainscots, and Gothic windows. I was pleased with its air of antiquity, and with its having been the residence of poor Goldy."-W. Irving's Tales of a Traveller, i. 214. "Poor Goldsmith! what a time must he have had of it, with his quiet disposition and nervous habits, penned up in this den of noise and vulgarity. How strange that while every sight and sound was sufficient to embitter the heart, and fill it with misanthropy, his pen should be dropping the honey of Hybla. Yet it is more than probable, that he drew many of his inimitable pictures of low life from the scenes which surrounded him in this abode. The circumstance of Mrs. Tibbs being obliged to wash her husband's two shirts in a neighbour's house, who refused to lend her wash-tub, may have been no sport of fancy, but a fact passing under his own eye. His landlady may have sate for the picture, and Beau Tibbs' scanty wardrobe have been a fac-simile of his own."-Ditto, p. 200. On Green-Arbour Court, see p. 198, 199. This GreenArbour Court I found to be a small square of tall and miserable houses, the very intestines of which seemed turned inside out, to judge from the old garments and frippery that fluttered from every window. It appeared to be a region of washerwomen, and lines were stretched about the little square on which clothes were dangling to dry. n APPENDIX II. POEMS. ADDITIONAL NOTES. Page 7. 1. 27. TRAVELLER. See also Dryden's Ant. and Cleopatra, Act ii. Sc. 1. 'he still drags a chain along, That needs must clog his flight.' Yet at her board with decent plenty blest, The journeying stranger sate a welcome guest.' Savage's Poems, ii. 210. Page 8. 1. 3. Page 10. 1. 3. Page 12. 1. 26. Page 13. 1. 22. Page 15. 1. 17. See P. Knight's Landscape. p. 89, note, nor the shepherd drive And like a bird, when prying boys molest, Page 18. 1. 18, ii. c. xxi. Page 20. 1. 5. Ad litus adclinata levè A new creation rises to my sight.' Addison's Ep. from Italy. Fired at the thought, methinks on sacred ground I tread.' 'Fir'd with the name.' Addison's Letter from Italy. See Goldsmith's Beauties, i. p. 116, and p. 112. Page 24. 1. 22. Through the deep forest's tangled way.' T. Warton's Ode sent to a friend: and see Warton's Milton, p. 270. Page 25. 1. 13. 1. 29. Page 26. 1. 1. See Gibbon's Roman History. ii. 61. 'Luke's iron crown,' &c. See Steevens's note on Richard III. act iv. sc. 1. note seven, and Gough's Camden, vol. iii. p. 369. |