was afterward imperfectly adjusted, and it would appear that the clothes were paid for by a short compilation advertised by Griffiths in the course of the following month; but the parties were never really friends afterward, and the writings of Goldsmith were harshly and unjustly treated in the Monthly Review.

Yet, after all this self-abasement on the part of poor Goldsmith, this self-accusation of the "meannesses which poverty unavoidably brings with it,” the reader will be surprised to learn that the act which excited the indignation of the wealthy man of trade, the pawning of the clothes, almost admitted by Goldsmith as a crime, resulted from a tenderness of heart and a generosity of hand in which another man would have gloried. He was living at the time in miserable lodgings, and hard pressed for the means of subsistence. In the midst of his own troubles, he was surprised by the entrance into his room of the poor woman from whom he hired his lodgings, and to whom he owed some small arrears of rent. She had a piteous tale of distress: her husband had been arrested for debt and thrown into prison. This was too much for the quick feelings of Goldsmith. He had no money in his pocket, it is true, but there was the new suit of clothes in which he had stood his unlucky examination at Surgeons' Hall. Without giving himself time for reflection, he sent it off to the pawnbroker's, and raised thereon a sufficient sum to pay off his own debt and to release his landlord from prison. Such was one of the many instances of inconsiderate generosity which involved poor Goldsmith in scrapes, and drew on him the censures of the prudent and the selfish.

And now let us be indulged in a few particulars about these lodgings in which Goldsmith was guilty of this thoughtless act of benevolence. They were in a very shabby house, No. 12 Green Arbour Court, between the Old Bailey and Fleet Market. An old woman was still living in 1820 who was a relative of the identical landlady whom Goldsmith relieved by the money received from the pawnbroker. She was a child about seven years of age at the time that the poet rented his apartment of her relative, and used frequently to be at the house in Green Arbour Court. She was drawn there, in a great measure, by the good-humoured kindness of Goldsmith, who was always exceedingly fond of the society of children. He used to assemble those of the family in his room, give them cakes and sweetmeats, and set them dancing to the sound of his flute. He was very friendly to those around him, and cultivated a kind of intimacy with a watchmaker in the Court, who possessed much native wit and humour. He passed most of the day, however, in his room, and only went out in the evenings. His days were no doubt devoted to the drudgery of the pen, and it would appear that he occasionally found the booksellers urgent task-masters. On one occasion a visiter was shown up to his room, and immediately their voices were heard in high altercation, and the key was turned with in the lock. The landlady, at first, was disposed t go to the assistance of her lodger; but a calm succeeding, she forbore to interfere.

Late in the evening the door was unlocked; a supper ordered by the visiter from a neighbouring tavern, and Goldsmith and his intrusive guest fin.

It was

ished the evening in great good-humour supposed to be some impatient publisher, whose press was waiting, and who found no other mode of getting a stipulated task from Goldsmith than by locking him in, and staying by him until it was finished.

But we have a more particular account of these lodgings in Green Arbour Court from the Rev. Thomas Percy, afterward Bishop of Dromore, and celebrated for his relics of ancient poetry, his beautiful ballads, and other works. During an occasional visit to London, he was introduced to Goldsmith by Grainger, and ever after continued one of his most steadfast and valued friends. The following is his description of the poet's squalid apartment: "I called on Goldsmith at his lodgings in March, 1759, and found him writing his Inquiry,' in a miserable, dirty-looking room, in which there was but one chair; and when, from civility, he resigned it to me, he himself was obliged to sit in the window. While we were conversing together some one tapped gently at the door, and, being desired to come in, a poor, ragged little girl, of a very becoming demeanour, entered the room, and, drop. ping a courtesy, said, ' My mamma sends her com. pliments, and begs the favour of you to lend her a chamber-pot full of coals.""

We are reminded in this anecdote of Goldsmith's picture of the lodgings of Beau Tibbs, and of the peep into the secrets of a make-shift establishment given to a visiter by the blundering old Scotch woman.

66

By this time we were arrived as high as the stairs would permit us to ascend, till we came to

what he was facetiously pleased to call the first floor over the chimney; and, knocking at the door, a voice from within demanded who's there?' My conductor answered that it was him. But this not satisfying the querist, the voice again repeated the demand, to which he answered louder than before; and now the door was opened by an old woman with cautious reluctance.

"When we got in he welcomed me to his house with great ceremony; and, turning to the old woman, asked where was her lady. Good troth,' replied she, in a peculiar dialect, 'she's washing your twa shirts at the next door, because they have taken an oath against lending the tub any longer.' My two shirts,' cried he, in a tone that faltered with confusion; what does the idiot mean?' 'I ken what I mean weel enough,' replied the other; 'she's washing your twa shirts at the next door, because Fire and fury! no more of this stu pid explanation,' cried he; 'go and inform her we have company. Were that Scotch hag to be for ever in my family, she would never learn politeness, nor forget that absurd poisonous accent of hers, or testify the smallest specimen of breeding or high life; and yet it is very surprising too, as had her from a Parliament man, a friend of mine from the Highlands, one of the politest men in the world; but that's a secret.'"*

Let us linger a little in Green Arbour Court, a place consecrated by the genius and the poverty of Goldsmith, but recently obliterated in the course of modern improvements. The writer of this me. moir visited it not many years since on a literary * Citizen of the World, letter lv.

pilgrimage, and may be excused for repeating a description of it which he has heretofore inserted in another publication. "It then existed in its pristine state, and was 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.

"Just as we entered the square, a scuffle took place between two viragoes about a disputed right to a washtub, and immediately the whole community was in a hubbub. Heads in mob caps peeped out of every window, and such a clamour of tongues ensued that I was fain to stop my ears. Every amazon took part with one or other of the disputants, and brandished her arms, dripping with soapsuds, and fired away from her window as from the embrasure of a fortress; while the screams of children, nestled and cradled in every procreant chamber of this hive, waking with the noise, set up their shrill pipes to swell the general concert."*

While in these forlorn quarters, suffering under extreme depression of spirits, caused by his failure at Surgeons' Hall, the disappointment of his hopes, and his harsh collisions with Griffiths, Goldsmith wrote the following letter to his brother Henry, some parts of which are most touchingly mournful.

"DEAR SIR,

"Your punctuality in answering a man whose trade is writing, is more than I had reason to ex

Tales of a Traveller, vol. i.