great ancestor, travelled there before you. Take from me the same horse that was given him by the good Bishop Jewel, this staff, and take this book too; it will be your comfort on the way." This was suggested by one of his early adventures in Ireland. The story, which is in Goldsmith's own words, is too delightful a piece of character to be omitted. He had quitted home on an expedition no one knew whither, with some thirty pounds and a good horse; and at the end of six weeks had returned penniless, with a broken nag he termed Fiddleback. When his mother received him with coolness, he is related to have said, "And now, my dear mother, after having struggled so hard to come home to you, I wonder you are not more rejoiced to see me." The following letter, he penned at the time, must have removed all her vexation.

"MY DEAR MOTHER,

"If you will sit down and calmly listen to what I say, you shall be fully resolved in every one of those many questions you have asked me. I went to Cork, and converted my horse, which you prize so much higher than Fiddleback, into cash, took my passage in a ship bound for America, and at the same time paid the captain for my freight and all the other expenses of my voyage. But it so happened that the wind did not answer for three weeks; and you know, mother, I could not command the elements. My misfortune was, that when the wind served I happened to be with a party in the country, and my friend the captain never inquired after me, but set sail with as much indifference as if I had been on board. The remainder of my time I employed in the city and its environs, view. ing every thing curious; and you know no one can starve while he has money in his pocket.

"Reduced, however, to my last two guineas, I began to think of my dear mother and friends whom I had left behind me, and so bought that generous beast Fiddleback, and bade adieu to Cork with only five shillings in my pocket. This, to be sure, was but a scanty allowance for man and horse towards a journey of above a hundred miles; but I did not despair, for I knew I must find friends on the road.

"I recollected particularly an old and faithful acquaintance I made at college, who had often and earnestly pressed me to spend a summer with him, and he lived but eight miles from Cork. This circumstance of vicinity he would expatiate on to me with particular emphasis. We shall,' says he, enjoy the delights of both city and country, and you shall command my stable and my purse.'

"However, upon the way I met a poor woman all in tears, who told me her husband had been arrested for a debt he was not able to pay, and that his eight children must now starve, bereaved as they were of his industry, which had been their only support. I

thought myself at home, being not far from my good friend's house, and therefore parted with a moiety of all my store; and pray, mo. ther, ought I not to have given her the other half-crown, for what she got would be of little use to her? However, I soon arrived at the mansion of my affectionate friend, guarded by the vigilance of a huge mastiff, who flew at me, and would have torn me to pieces but for the assistance of a woman whose countenance was not less grim than that of the dog; yet she with great humanity relieved me from the jaws of this Cerberus, and was prevailed on to carry up my name to her master.

"Without suffering me to wait long, my old friend, who was then recovering from a severe fit of sickness, came down in his night. cap, night-gown, and slippers, and embraced me with the most cordial welcome; showed me in, and after giving me a history of his indisposition, assured me that he considered himself peculiarly for. tunate in having under his roof the man he most loved on the earth, and whose stay with him must, above all things, contribute to perfect his recovery. I now repented sorely I had not given the poor woman the other half-crown, as I thought all my bills of humanity would be punctually answered by this worthy man. I revealed to him my whole soul; I opened to him all my distresses; and freely owned that I had but one half-crown in my pocket; but that now, like a ship after weathering out the storm, I considered myself se cure in a safe and hospitable harbour. He made no answer, but walked about the room, rubbing his hands as one in deep study. This I imputed to the sympathetic feelings of a tender heart, which increased my esteem for him; and as that increased, I gave the most favourably interpretation to his silence. I construed it into delicacy of sentiment, as if he dreaded to wound my pride by expressing his commiseration in words, leaving his generous conduct to speak for itself.

"It now approached six o'clock in the evening, and as I had eaten no breakfast, and as my spirits were raised, my appetite for dinner grew uncommonly keen. At length the old woman came into the room, with two plates, one spoon, and a dirty cloth, which she laid upon the table. This appearance, without increasing my spirits, did not diminish my appetite. My protectress soon returned with a small bowl of sago, a small porringer of sour milk, a loaf of stale brown bread, and the heel of an old cheese all over crawl. ing with mites. My friend apologised that his illness obliged him to live on slops, and that better fare was not in the house; observing, at the same time, that a milk diet was certainly the most healthful; and at eight o'clock he again recommended a regular life, declaring that for his part he would lie down with the lamb and rise with the lark. My hunger was at this time so exceedingly sharp that I wished for another slice of the loaf, but was obliged to go to bed without even that refreshment.

6

"The lenten entertainment I had received made me resolve to depart as soon as possible; accordingly next morning, when I spoke of going, he did not oppose my resolution; he rather commended my design, adding some very sage counsel upon the occasion. To be sure,' said he, the longer you stay away from your mother, the more you will grieve her and your other friends; and possibly they are already afflicted at hearing of this foolish expedition you have made.' Notwithstanding all this, and without any hope of softening such a sordid heart, I again renewed the tale of my distress, and asking how he thought I could travel above a hundred miles upon one half-crown!' I begged to borrow a single guinea, which I assured him should be repaid with thanks. And you know, Sir,' said I, it is no more than I have often done for you.' To which he firmly answered, Why, look you, Mr. Goldsmith, that is neither here nor there. I have paid you all you ever lent me, and this sickness of mine has left me bare of cash. But I have bethought myself of a conveyance for you; sell your horse, and I will furnish you a much better one to ride on.' I readily grasped at his proposal, and begged to see the nag, on which he led me to his bedchamber, and from under the bed he pulled out a stout oak stick. Here he is,' said he; take this in your hand, and it will carry you to your mother's with more safety than such a horse as you ride.' I was in doubt, when I got it into my hand, whether I should not, in the first place, apply it to his pate; but a rap at the street door made the wretch fly to it, and when I returned to the parlor, he introduced me, as if nothing of the kind had happened, to the gentleman who entered, as Mr. Goldsmith, his most ingenious and worthy friend, of whom he had so often heard him speak with rapture. I could scarcely compose myself; and must have betrayed indignation in my mien to the stranger, who was a counsellor at law in the neighborhood, a man of engaging aspect and polite address.

6

"After spending an hour, he asked my friend and me to dine with him at his house. This I declined at first, as I wished to have no further communication with my old hospitable friend; but at the solicitation of both I at last consented, determined as I was by two motives; one, that I was prejudiced in favour of the looks and manner of the counsellor; and the other, that I stood in need of a com. fortable dinner. And there, indeed, I found every thing that I could wish, abundance without profusion and elegance without affectation. In the evening, when my old friend, who had eaten very plentifully at his neighbour's table, but talked again of lying down with the lamb, made a motion to me for retiring, our generous host requested I should take a bed with him; upon which I plainly told my old friend that he might go home and take care of the horse he had given me, but that I should never re-enter his doors. He went away with a laugh, leaving me to add this to the other little things the counsellor already knew of his plausible neighbour. 38

VOL. I.-NO. II.

"And now, my dear Mother, I found sufficient to reconcile me to all my follies; for here I spent three whole days. The counsellor had two sweet girls to his daughters, who played enchantingly on the harpsichord; and yet it was but a melancholy pleasure I felt the first time I heard them; for that being the first time also that either of them had touched the instrument since their mother's death, I saw the tears in silence trickle down their father's checks. I every day endeavoured to go away, but every day was pressed and obliged to stay. On my going, the counsellor offered me his purse, with a horse and servant to convey me home; but the latter I declined, and only took a guinea to bear my necessary expenses on the road.

“OLIVER GOLDSMITH.”

"To Mrs. Anne Goldsmith, Ballymahon."

No reader of the Traveller would imagine to what little incident he is indebted for that line in the description of the Italians:

By sports like these are all their cares beguiled,
The sports of children satisfy the child.

The anecdote is recovered by Mr. Prior. Reynolds, or one of his friends, one day visiting Oliver in his chamber, caught him "teaching a favourite dog to sit upright on its haunches, or, as is commonly said, to beg;" and while "he occasionally shook his finger at the unwilling pupil in order to make him retain his position, the page before him was wet with the second line of the couplet." The Poet admitted that he derived the idea from his sport. This is to become intimate with the author.

Another is characteristic of "poor Goldy." One Pilkington, an odd though not very honest adventurer in London, came to the poet with a pitiful tale of a capital piece of luck being likely to slip through his fingers for the want of a couple of guineas. Want of money is a rare sharpener of invention, at least it appeared so with Pilkington, who related that a friend in India had sent him two white mice, which, if he had money for a cage and a proper suit of clothes, he could sell to the Duchess of Manchester, a lady of virtù in such matters, to great advantage. Goldsmith had but one guinea, when "He begged to suggest, with much diffidence and deference-the emergency was pressing, and might form some apology for the liberty, that the money might be raised from a neighbouring pawnbroker by the deposit of his friend's watch; the inconvenience would not be great, and at most of only a few hours' continuance; it would rescue a sincere friend from enthralment, and confer an eternal obligation." Was the Poet

ever known to resist the tithe of such good eloquence? Goldsmith lost his watch, but the world gained the ingenious and well-told tale of Prince Bonbennin Bonbobbinet and the White Mouse in the Citizen of the World.

Mr. Prior, too, has an honest zeal for his subject. He has a prompt sympathy to enter into and meet the feelings of the Poet: he is not startled by a seeming act of affectation or a slight display of vanity, nor does he mistake a harmless ebullition of temperament for deliberate envy. The biographer of a man of genius, to appreciate his employment should have the feelings of a man of genius himself. Surely no other than a little or illiberal mind would accuse Goldsmith of envy or ill-nature.

The

Perhaps had Mr. Prior thrown his materials into a more condensed form, his work would have become more popular with the general reader. Few have the leisure to devote to the perusal of an octavo volume of upwards of five hundred pages on a single author, though he be a favourite one. age is practical; after the business of the day, and the attention demanded by the immediate topics of the times-the columns of the newspaper and the last political pamphlet-there is little opportunity left for the cultivation of literature. Except with the favoured few, letters must yield to merchandize, to politics, to science. The modern author, if he would be read, must not write in folios. Mr. Prior's Life of Goldsmith is rather an accumulation of facts and criticism than, properly speaking, a classic biography. It belongs more to the rank of Memoirs. The sketch prefixed to the Paris edition of Goldsmith's works edited by Washington Irving, approaches (for it is in many respects imperfect) what the life of the Poet should be,-a just and elegant narrative of facts, with occasional reflection, where we gather the cream of the whole story without the trouble of the tedious process of investigation.*

The character of Goldsmith, as it may now be established from the fullest materials, is worthy of consideration. Its master feature was benevolence. He was in every fibre the Man of Feeling;

Before dismissing Mr. Prior's Life, we have it in our power to correct a mis-statement that appears in the work. In the notice of Goldsmith's relatives, allusion is made to the family of his brother Charles, who visited the Poet from Ireland, and shortly left London for the West Indies, where he remained during his brother's life. He had four children, two sons and two daughters; one of the latter is made to be now resident in England, "the other," Mr. Prior says, "is supposed to have died unmarried;" and in a note an old letter is quoted from a popular periodical, where his daughter is stated to be "buried in the Churchyard of St. Pancras." This lady was married, and is now a widow living among us; and is said, with a close family resemblance, to possess many of the kind virtues of the Poet.