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Pronounce Ardagh, Ar'da (the final a like a in far). Do not say respex for re-spects'. Give the ew in knew the y sound of long u.

1. THERE are few writers for whom the reader feels such personal kindness as for Oliver Goldsmith; for few have so eminently possessed the magic gift of identifying themselves with their writings. We read his character in every page, and grow into familiar intimacy with him as we read.

2. The artless benevolence that beams throughout his works; the whimsical, yet amiable views of human life and human nature; the unforced humor, blending so happily with good feeling and good sense, and singularly dashed at times with a pleasing melancholy✦ even the very nature of his mellow, and flowing, and softly tinted style, all seem to bespeak his moral as well as his intellectual qualities, and make us love the man at the same time that we admire the author.

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3. While the productions of writers of loftier pretension and more sounding names are suffered to moulder on our shelves, those of Goldsmith are cherished and laid in our bosoms. We do not quote them with ostentation, but they mingle with our minds, sweeten our tempers, and harmonize our thoughts; they put us in good humor with ourselves and with the world, and in so doing they make us happier and better men.

4. Oliver Goldsmith was born on the 10th of November, 1728, at the hamlet of Pallas, or Pallasmore, county of Longford, in Ireland. Let us draw from his own writings one or two of those pictures which, under feigned names, represent his father and his family, and the happy fireside of his childish days.

5. "My father" says the Man in Black, who, in some respects, is a counterpart of Goldsmith himself"my father, the younger son of a good family, was possessed of a small living in the church. His education was above his fortune, and his generosity greater than his education. Poor as he was, he had his flatterers poorer than himself. For every dinner he gave them, they returned him an equivalent in praise; and this was all he wanted.

6. "The same ambition that actuates a monarch at the head of his army, influenced my father at the head of his table. He told the story of the ivy-tree, and that was laughed at; he repeated the jest of the two scholars, and the company laughed at that; but the story of Taffy in the sedan-chair was sure to set the table in a roar. Thus his pleasure increased in proportion to the pleasure he gave. He loved all the world, and he fancied all the world loved him.

7. "As his fortune was but small, he lived up to the very extent of it. He had no intention of leaving his children money, for that was dross; he resolved that they should have learning, for learning, he used to observe, was better than silver or gold. For this purpose he undertook to instruct us himself, and took as much care to form our morals as to improve our understanding.

8. "We were told that universal benevolence was what first ce-ment'ed society. We were taught to consider all the wants of mankind as our own; to re

rd the human face divine with affection and esteem.

He wound us up to be mere machines of pity, and rendered us incapable of withstanding the slightest impulse, made either by real or fictitious distress. In a word, we were perfectly instructed in the art of giving away thousands before we were taught the necessary qualifications of getting a farthing."

9. In Goldsmith's "Deserted Village" we have another picture of his father and his father's fireside :

"His house was known to all the vagrant train,—
He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain;
The long-remembered beggar was his guest,
Whose beard descending swept his aged breast;
The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud,
Claimed kindred there, and had his claims allowed;
The broken soldier, kindly både to stay,
Sat by his fire, and talked the night away,

Wept o'er his wounds, or, tales of sorrow done,

Shouldered his crutch, and showed how fields were won.
Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to glow,
And quite forgot their vices in their woe;

'Careless their merits or their faults to scan,

His pity gave ere charity began."

10. Oliver's education commenced when he was about three years old; that is to say, he was gathered under the wings of one of those good old motherly dames, found in every village, who cluck together the whole callow brood of the neighborhood, to teach them their letters and keep them out of harm's way. At six years of age he passed into the hands of the village schoolmaster, one Thomas Byrne, or, as he was commonly and irreverently named, Paddy Byrne, a capital tutor for a poet.

11. Goldsmith is supposed to have had him and his school in view in the following sketch in the "Deserted Village":

"Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way,

With blossomed furze unprofitably gay,

There, in his noisy mansion, skilled to rule,
The village master taught his little school.
A man severe he was, and stern to view, -
I knew him well, and every truant knew ;
Well had the bōding tremblers learned to trace
The day's disasters in his morning face ;
Full well they laughed with counterfeited glee
At all his jokes, for many a joke had he ;
Full well the busy whisper, circling round,

Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned."

12. Byrne had brought with him from the wars a world of campaigning stories, of which he was gener ally the hero, and which he would deal forth to his wondering scholars, when he ought to have been teaching them their lessons. These stories had a powerful effect upon the vivid imagination of Goldsmith, and awakened an unconquerable passion for wandering and seeking adventure.

13. An amusing incident is related as occurring to Goldsmith, while yet a lad, in one of his journeys. He had procured a horse, and a friend had furnished him with a guinea for traveling expenses. He was but a stripling of sixteen, and being thus suddenly mounted on horseback, with money in his pocket, it is no wonder that his head was turned. He determined to play the man, and to spend his money in independent traveler's style.

14. Accordingly, instead of pushing directly for home, he halted for the night at the little town of Ardagh, and, accosting the first person he met, inquired, with somewhat of a consequential air, for the best house in the place. Unluckily, the person he had accosted was one Kelly, a notorious wag, who was -quartered in the family of one Mr. Featherstone, a gentleman of fortune. Amused with the self-consequence of the stripling, and willing to play off a practical joke at his expense, Kelly directed him to

what was literally "the best house in the place," namely, the family mansion of Mr. Featherstone.

15. Goldsmith accordingly rode up to what he sup-posed was an inn, ordered his horse to be taken to the stable, walked into the parlor, seated himself by the fire, and demanded what he could have for supper. On ordinary occasions he was diffident and even awkward in his manners, but here he was "at ease in his inn," and felt called upon to show his manhood and enact the experienced traveler.

16. His person was by no means calculated to play off his pretensions; for he was short and thick, with a pock-marked face, and an air and carriage by no means of a distinguished cast. The owner of the house, however, soon discovered his whimsical mistake, and, being a man of humor, determined to indulge it, especially as he accidentally learned that this intruding guest was the son of an old acquaintance. Accordingly Goldsmith was "fooled to the top of his bent," and permitted to have full sway throughout the evening. Never was schoolboy more elated.

17. When supper was served, he most condescendingly insisted that the landlord, his wife and daughter, should partake, and ordered a bottle of wine to crown the repast and benefit the house. His last flourish was on going to bed, when he gave especial order to have a hot cake at breakfast. His confusion and dismay, on discovering the next morning that he had been swaggering in this free and easy way in the house of a private gentleman, may be readily conceived. True to his habit of turning the events of his life to literary account, he dramatized this chapter of ludicrous blunders and cross purposes, many years afterward, in his comedy of "She Stoops to Conquer; or, the Mistakes of a Night."

WASHINGTON IRVING. (1783-1860.)

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