"solicit with the warmest ardour, and in which I cannot bear a "refusal. I mean, dear Madam, that I may be allowed to subscribe "myself,

"Your ever affectionate and obliged kinsman,

"OLIVER GOLDSMITH.

"Now see how I blot and blunder, when I am asking a favour."

In none of these letters, it will be observed, is allusion made to the expected appointment. To make jesting boast of a visionary influence with two hundred of the best wits in Europe, was pleasanter than to make grave confession of himself as a wit taking sudden flight from the scene of defeat and failure. It was the old besetting weakness. But shortly after the date of the last letter, the appointment was received. It was that of medical officer to one of the factories on the coast of Coromandel; was forwarded by Doctor Milner's friend Mr. Jones, the East India director; and the worthy schoolmaster did not outlive more than a few weeks this honest redemption of his promise. The desired escape was at last effected, and the booksellers might look around them for another drudge more patient and obedient than Oliver Goldsmith.

1758.

Æt. 30.

CHAPTER IV.

1758.

Æt. 30.

ESCAPE PREVENTED.

1758.

It was now absolutely necessary that the proposed change in Goldsmith's life should be broken to his Irish friends; and he wrote to his brother Henry. The letter (which contained also the design of a heroi-comical poem at which he had been occasionally working), is lost; but some passages of one of nearly the same date to Mr. Hodson, have had a better fortune.

"Dear Sir," it began, in obvious allusion to some staid and rather gratuitous reproach from the prosperous brother-inlaw, “You cannot expect regularity in one who is regular in 'nothing. Nay, were I forced to love you by rule, I dare "venture to say that I could never do it sincerely.

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me, then, with all my faults.

"for you see I say what I

Take

Let me write when I please,

please, and am only thinking

"aloud when writing to you. I suppose you have heard of

66

my intention of going to the East Indies. The place of "my destination is one of the factories on the coast of Coromandel, and I go in quality of physician and surgeon; "for which the company has signed my warrant, which has already cost me ten pounds. I must also pay 501. for my

66

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passage, and ten pounds for my sea stores and the other

"incidental expenses of my equipment will amount to 601.

1758.

"or 701. more. The salary is but trifling, namely 100l. per Et. 30. "annum; but the other advantages, if a person be prudent,

are considerable. The practice of the place, if I am rightly "informed, generally amounts to not less than one thousand "pounds per annum, for which the appointed physician has "an exclusive privilege. This, with the advantages resulting "from trade, and the high interest which money bears, "viz. 201. per cent, are the inducements which persuade me to undergo the fatigues of sea, the dangers of war, and the "still greater dangers of the climate; which induce me "to leave a place where I am every day gaining friends "and esteem; and where I might enjoy all the conveniences "of life."*

The same weakness which indulged itself with fine clothes when the opportunity offered, is that which prompts these fine words in even such an hour of dire extremity. Of the "friends and esteem" he was gaining, of the "con"veniences of life" that were awaiting him to enjoy, these pages have told, and have more to tell. But why, in the confident hope of brighter days, dwell on the darkness of the past? or show the squalor that still surrounded him? Of already sufficiently low esteem were wit and intellect in Ireland, to give purse-fed ignorance another triumph over them, or again needlessly invite to himself the contempts and sneers of old. Yet, though the sadness he almost wholly suppressed while the appointment was but in expectation, there was at this moment less reason to indulge,to seem other than he was, even thus, was an effort far from successful; and it marked with a somewhat painful distraction of feeling and phrase this letter to Mr. Hodson.

* Percy Memoir, 46-7.

1758. Æt. 30.

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"I am certainly wrong," he continues, "not to be contented with "what I already possess, trifling as it is; for should I ask myself one "serious question,-What is it I want?-What can I answer? My "desires are as capricious as the big-bellied Woman's, who longed for a piece of her husband's nose. I have no certainty, it is true; but why cannot I do as some men of more merit, who have lived on more "precarious terms? Scarron used jestingly to call himself the marquis "of Quenault, which was the name of the bookseller that employed "him; and why may not I assert my privilege and quality on the same pretensions? Yet, upon deliberation, whatever airs I give "myself on this side of the water, my dignity, I fancy, would be evapo"rated before I reached the other. I know you have in Ireland a 66 very indifferent idea of a man who writes for bread; though Swift "and Steele did so in the earliest part of their lives. You imagine, I suppose, that every author, by profession, lives in a garret, wears "shabby cloaths, and converses with the meanest company. Yet I do "not believe there is one single writer, who has abilities to translate a "French novel, that does not keep better company, wear finer cloaths, "and live more genteelly, than many who pride themselves for nothing "else in Ireland. I confess it again, my dear Dan, that nothing but "the wildest ambition could prevail on me to leave the enjoyment of "the refined conversation which I am sometimes admitted to partake "in, for uncertain fortune, and paltry shew. You cannot conceive how "I am sometimes divided: to leave all that is dear to me gives me “pain; but when I consider, I may possibly acquire a genteel indepen"dance for life: when I think of that dignity which philosophy claims, "to raise itself above contempt and ridicule; when I think thus, I "eagerly long to embrace every opportunity of separating myself from "the vulgar, as much in my circumstances, as I am already in my "sentiments. I am going to publish a book, for an account of which "I refer you to a letter which I wrote to my brother Goldsmith. "Circulate for me among your acquaintances a hundred proposals, "which I have given orders may be sent to you: and if, in pursuance "of such circulation, you should receive any subscriptions, let them, "when collected, be transmitted to Mr. Bradley, who will give a "receipt for the same." [Omitting here, says the Percy Memoir, what relates to private family affairs, he then adds :] "I know not how my "desire of seeing Ireland, which had so long slept, has again revived "with so much ardour. So weak is my temper, and so unsteady, that "I am frequently tempted, particularly when low-spirited, to return "home and leave my fortune, though just beginning to look kinder.

"But it shall not be. In five or six years I hope to indulge these 1758.

transports. I find I want constitution, and a strong steady disposi- Æt. 30. ❝tion, which alone makes men great. I will however correct my faults, "since I am conscious of them."

With such professions weakness continues to indulge itself, and faults are perpetuated. But some allowances are due. Of the Irish society he knew so well, and so often sarcastically painted, these Irish friends were clearly very notable specimens, with whom small indeed was his chance of decent consideration, if a garret, shabby clothes, and conversation with the meanest company, were set hopelessly forth as his inextricable doom. The error lay in giving faith of any kind to such external aid, and so weakening the help that rested in himself. When the claim of ten pounds for his appointmentwarrant came upon him, it found him less prepared because of vague expectations raised on these letters to Mills and the Lawders. But any delay might be fatal; and in that condition of extremity, whose "wants," alas, are anything but "capricious," he bethought him of the Critical Review, and went to its proprietor, Mr. Archibald Hamilton.

Soon after he left Griffiths he had written an article for his rival, which appeared in November 1757; and as his contributions then stopped where they began, I am disposed to connect both his joining at that time so suddenly, and as suddenly quitting, the Critical Review, with a letter which Smollett published in that same November number "To "the Old Gentlewoman who directs the Monthly." For though Goldsmith might not object to avenge some part of his own quarrel under cover of that of Smollett, he would hardly have relished the too broad allusion in which "goody" and " gammer Griffiths were reminded that

* Percy Memoir, 48-49.