The nature of Goldsmith's employments at the close of 1769 is indicated in the advertising columns of the papers of the day. His English History occupied him chiefly, his History of Animated Nature occasionally; he had undertaken to write a life of his countryman, Parnell, for a new edition of his poems (this being a subject in which, as he remarks in the biography itself, what he remembered having collected in boyhood "from my father and uncle, who knew him," had doubtless given him a personal interest); and the speedy publication of the Deserted Village was twice announced in the Public Advertiser. But it was not published speedily. Still it was paused over, altered, polished, and refined. Bishop Percy has mentioned' the delightful facility with which his prose flowed forth unblotted with erasure, as a contrast to the labor and pains of his verse interlined with countless alterations; but in prose as in poetry he aimed at the like effects and obtained them. He knew that no picture will stand if the colors are bad, illchosen, or indiscreetly combined; and that not chaos, but order, is creation. It is a pity that men, though of perhaps greater genius, who have lived since his time, should not more carefully have pondered such lessons as his writings bequeath to us. It is a pity that the disposition to rush into print should be so general; for few men have ever repented of publishing too late. Goldsmith, alas! never found himself without the excuse which the successful poet, supreme in his power and mastery over the town, threw out for the instant needs and pressing necessities of less fortunate men. knew Goldsmith early and while he was struggling with his poverty, and always thought as respectfully of his heart as of his talents. 1 Memoir, 113. 'His elegant and enchanting style in prose flowed from him with such facility that in whole quires of his Histories, Animated Nature, etc., he had seldom occasion to correct or alter a single word; but in his verses, especially his two great ethic poems, nothing could exceed the patient and incessant revisal which he bestowed upon them. To save himself the trouble of transcription, he wrote the lines in his first copy very wide, and would so fill up the intermediate space with reiterated corrections that scarcely a word of his first effusions was left unaltered." "Keep your piece nine years.' 'Nine years!' cries he, who, high in Drury Lane, Yet, neither at the request of friends nor at the more urgent call of hunger, did Goldsmith peril his chances of being cherished as a poet by future generations. Pope's own method of sending forth a part of a poem one winter and promising its completion for the winter following, which Mr. Rogers has often enlarged upon to me as the only true method, would be laughed at nowadays; yet extremely few are the thoughts "conceived with rapture and with fire begot," compared with those that may be carefully brought forth, becomingly and charmingly habited, and introduced by the Graces. Men of the more brilliant order of fancy and imagination should be always distrustful of their powers. Spar and stalactite are bad materials for the foundation of solid edifices. The year 1770 opens with a glimpse into the old fireside at Kilmore. The Lawders do not seem to have communicated with him, since his uncle Contarine's death; and a legacy of £15, left him by that generous friend, remained unappropriated in their hands. His brother Maurice, still without calling or employment, and apparently living on such of his relatives as from time to time were willing to afford him a home, probably heard this legacy mentioned while he made one of his self-supporting visits, for he straightway wrote to Oliver. The money would help him to an outfit, if his famous brother could help him to an appointment; and to express his earnest hopes in this direction was the drift of the letter. His sister Johnson wrote soon after, for her husband, in a precisely similar strain; and to these letters Goldsmith's reply has been kept. It shows little change since earlier days. His Irish friends and family are as they then were. They do not seem to have answered many recent communications sent to them; he now learns for the first time that Charles is no longer in Ireland; his brother-in-law Hodson has been as silent as the rest; his sister Hodson he never mentions, some early disagreement remaining still unsettled; and he sends Cousin Jenny his portrait, in memory of an original "almost forgot." The letter is directed to "Mr. Maurice Goldsmith, at James Lawder's, Esq., at Kilmore, near Carrick-on-Shannon," and bears the date of "January, 1770." "DEAR BROTHER,—I should have answered your letter sooner, but, in truth, I am not fond of thinking of the necessities of those I love when it is so very little in my power to help them. I am sorry to find you are still every way unprovided for; and what adds to my uneasiness is, that I have received a letter from my sister Johnson,1 by which I learn that she is pretty much in the same circumstances. As to myself, I believe I could get both you and my poor brother-in-law something like that which you desire, but I am determined never to ask for little things, nor exhaust any little interest I may have until I can serve you, him, and myself more effectually. As yet no opportunity has offered, but I believe you are pretty well convinced that I will not be remiss when it arrives. The King has lately been pleased to make me Professor of Ancient History in a royal Academy of Painting which he has just established, but there is no salary annexed; and I took it rather as a compliment to the institution than any benefit to myself. Honors to one in my situation are something like ruffles to a man that wants a shirt. You tell me that there are fourteen or fifteen pounds left me in the hands of my cousin Lawder, and you ask me what I would have done with them. My dear brother, I would by no means give any directions to my dear worthy relations at Kilmore how to dispose of money which is, properly speaking, more theirs than mine. All that I can say is, that I entirely-and this letter will serve to witness-give up any right and title to it; and I am sure they will dispose of it to the best advantage. To them I entirely leave it: whether they or you may think the whole necessary to fit you out, or whether our poor sister Johnson may not want the half, I leave entirely to their and your discretion. The kindness of that good couple to our poor shattered family demands our sincerest gratitude, and though they have almost forgot me, yet, if The "Jenny" of a former letter; see vol. i. 164. He uses the same comparison in one of his essays, and again introduces it in the Haunch of Venison. Yet it belongs to Tom Brown, who, in his Laconics (pointed out to me by Mr. Peter Cunningham), says that "to treat a poor wretch with a bottle of Burgundy, or fill his snuff-box, is like giving a pair of lace ruffles to a man that has never a shirt on his back. Put something into his pocket."— Works (Ed. 1709), iv. 14. good things at last arrive, I hope one day to return and increase their good-humor by adding to my own. I have sent my cousin Jenny a miniature picture of myself, as I believe it is the most acceptable present I can offer. I have ordered it to be left for her at George Faulkenor's, folded in a letter. The face, you well know, is ugly enough, but it is finely painted. I will shortly also send my friends over the Shannon some mezzotinto prints of myself, and some more of my friends here, such as Burke, Johnson, Reynolds, and Colman. I believe I have written an hundred letters to different friends in your country, and never received an answer from any of them. I do not know how to account for this, or why they are unwilling to keep up for me those regards which I must ever retain for them. If, then, you have a mind to oblige me, you will write often, whether I answer you or not. Let me particularly have the news of our family and old acquaintances. For instance, you may begin by telling me about the family where you reside, how they spend their time, and whether they ever make mention of me. Tell me about my mother, my brother Hodson, and his son; my brother Harry's son and daughter, my sister Johnson, the family of Ballyoughter, what is become of them, where they live, and how they do. You talked of being my only brother; I don't understand you-where is Charles? A sheet of paper occasionally filled with news of this kind would make me very happy, and would keep you nearer my mind. As it is, my dear brother, believe me to be yours, most affectionately, OLIVER GOLDSMITH." 1 The writer's weakness is here, too, as of old. He believes he could get, for his poor, idle, thriftless petitioners, exactly what they want; though ruffles, minus the shirt, are the sum of his own acquisitions. But he will wait; and they must wait; and good things are sure to arrive; and they will one day be all in good-humor again. The old, hopeful, sanguine, unreflecting story! Nevertheless, Maurice soon tired of waiting, as his wealthier relatives tired of helping him to wait; and he is shortly afterwards discovered again complaining to his brother that really he finds it difficult to live like a gentleman. Oliver replies upon this in somewhat plainer fashion, recommending him by all means to quit the unprofitable calling, and betake himself to some handicraft employment, if no better can be found; whereupon Maurice bound himself to a cabinet-maker in 1 Percy Memoir, 86-89. To the original is annexed a receipt which shows that the sum of £15 was paid to Maurice Goldsmith for a legacy bequeathed to Oliver Goldsmith by the late Rev. Thomas Contarine. Dated 4th February, 1770. Drumsna, in the county of Leitrim, in which calling, several years after his brother's death, he kept a shop in Dublin. Meanwhile Oliver's inquiry after brother-in-law Hodson's son had the effect, soon after his letter reached Athlone, of bringing back to London a very unsettled and somewhat eccentric youth, who had formerly visited Goldsmith, after abruptly quitting Dublin University, leaving at that time obscure traces of the extent to which his celebrated relative had befriended him, and who now, having occupied the interval chiefly in foreign travel, during which he had turned to account certain half-finished medical studies, lived for the most part in London, until his uncle Oliver's death, as a pensioner on his scanty resources. He resembled Oliver in some thoughtless peculiarities of character and in his odd vicissitudes of good and evil fortune, for he once paid a small debt with an undrawn lottery ticket which turned out a prize of £20,000. During his residence in London he practised occasionally, without any regular qualification, as an apothecary in Newman Street; but he ultimately ended his days as a prosperous Irish gentleman, farming a patrimonial estate. When Goldsmith died half the unpaid bill he owed to Mr. William Filby, and which amounted in all to only £79, was for clothes supplied to this nephew Hodson. Yet it does not appear that the bill was paid by this very genuine young branch of the old, careless, idle, improvident Goldsmith stock.' 1 His son, Oliver Goldsmith Hodson, when Dr. Annesley Strean was writing to Mr. Mangin from Athlone at the close of 1807, had inherited and was living "on an estate of about £700 a year, eight miles from this town."-Mangin's Essay, 148. I have to add that one of the descendants of these connections of Goldsmith, who has resumed the original spelling of the name, is my solicitor and valued friend, Mr. G. F. Hudson, of Bucklersbury, in whose genial literary tastes, enjoyment of doing good, and a turn for humorous observation applied to the kindliest use, the good-hearted poet himself might have acknowledged no unworthy kins man. 2 I here give, from Mr. Filby's ledger, that account with the worthy citizen during the last three years of Goldsmith's life which was the last ever delivered to him. The balance will be given hereafter, as it stood at the period of his death: |