OLIVER GOLDSMITH.

OLIVER GOLDSMITH was born in 1728, in a little Irish hamlet called Pallas. His father was a clergyman, who found it hard to provide for his large family of eight children. When Oliver was two years old, his father

Byrne, who used to shoulder a crutch and show the boys "how fields were won." He told the children Irish folkstories and wild legends and sang them many a song.

While at this school, Oliver was taken ill with 25 smallpox, and was sent, on recovering, to the Griffin school at Roscommon. The pale-faced little fellow learned very slowly and was looked upon as a dunce.

The boys laughed at him and imposed upon him, although they all regarded him as kind-hearted and affectionate.

Oliver was no dunce, though he seemed so stupid and awkward. After he became famous, these very 5 playmates remembered bright answers he had given when they had roused him beyond endurance. While attending school at Roscommon, Oliver stayed with his Uncle John. A country dance was once given at the house. The gay music led Oliver to forget his shyness, 10 and he began to dance the hornpipe. The fiddler laughed and called him "Ugly Æsop." Oliver quickly turned to him and said:

"Heralds, proclaim aloud! all saying,

See Æsop dancing and his monkey playing."

In spite of these flashes of wit, his playmates continued. to laugh at him and cheat him into buying their worthless toys, and he was thought to be the dullest boy in the village.

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At the age of eleven he was sent to a school at Athlone, 20 about five miles away, and two years later attended a school at Edgeworthstown. The master, Rev. Patrick Hughes, took an interest in the lad, and was the only teacher who recognized his good qualities.

The story is told that Oliver was returning to school 25 after a holiday, riding a horse and carrying a guinea in his pocket. He loitered along the way, enjoying the scenes, and at nightfall found himself several miles from school,

The guinea gave him such a sense of wealth that he inquired the way to the best house in the village, meaning the best inn. The man of whom he inquired was amused at the boy's importance, and directed him to the 5 home of Squire Featherstone. Oliver rang at the gate, gave his orders to the servant, and called for a supper and the best room in the house. The squire, seeing his mistake, carried on the joke, and it was not until Oliver produced the guinea to settle his account that 10 he learned the truth.

He afterwards wrote a play, which has such an incident for its foundation.

In his seventeenth year Oliver went to Trinity College, Dublin, entering as a "sizar," a name given to 15 those students who were educated at little expense but were obliged to act as servants. He swept the courts and waited on the table. He had a room in a garret, and after he became famous it was found that he had scrawled his name upon one of the windows.

20 The unhappy sizar little thought that some day this pane of glass would be given a place of honor in the College Library.

Poor Oliver led an unhappy life. He cared little for study and had a brutal tutor. A year and a half after 25 he entered college his father died and he was in want.

Music afforded him his only delight, and he loved to play upon his flute and sing. He wrote street ballads to keep himself from starving and sold them for five shillings apiece. The happiest hours he spent

were those when he crept out after dark to listen to the singing of these ballads by the street beggars.

He was so kind-hearted that he seldom reached home with the whole of his five shillings. Each beggar's cry would touch his tender heart, and he often robbed him- 5 self of his clothing that he might cover some shivering form.

When he was twenty-one, Goldsmith received the degree of Bachelor of Arts and returned to his home. There he spent a happy period of two years, helping 10 his brother, who taught the village school, and assisting his widowed mother.

After trying a number of professions without success, Goldsmith decided to emigrate to America. He started with thirty pounds and mounted on a good horse. In 15 six weeks he returned, riding a forlorn-looking beast. He said that he had reached a seaport and paid his passage to America, but that the winds were unfavorable, and while waiting he had taken a little trip into the country. During his absence a fair wind had arisen 20 and the ship had sailed without him.

Goldsmith then decided to study law. Mr. Contarine, an uncle, lent him fifty pounds, and he set out for London. Stopping at Dublin, he met an old schoolmate who persuaded him to try his luck at doubling his 25 money at a card table, and he lost it all.

Mr. Contarine did not entirely lose faith in his wayward nephew, and, learning that he had some taste for chemistry, gave him the means to start the study of

medicine. Goldsmith went to Edinburgh and spent eighteen months there. He then continued his medical studies at Leyden. He left Leyden in his twentyseventh year. The day before his departure he had seen 5 some rare plants in a florist's window. Remembering that his uncle had expressed a desire for these varieties, he purchased them with the little money he had and sent them to Ireland.

The next year was spent in journeying on foot 10 through Flanders, France, and Switzerland. He had little or no money, and slept in barns and even under hedges. When he came to a convent or a monastery, he found shelter for the night; and his flute often earned him a supper and a lodging, for the peasants, 15 as well as the little children, enjoyed and rewarded him for the merry strains which set them to dancing.

The wanderer landed at Dover, friendless and penniless. He turned strolling player, but his face and figure were not received with favor. He reached Lon20 don, but led a hard life there. Unable to find suitable employment, he pounded drugs and ran errands for a chemist, served as usher in a school, and was even reduced to a life among the beggars.

He

His medical education was of little use to him. 25 tried to open a practice in London, but had few patients, and while at their bedsides was obliged to hold his hat over his coat to hide the worn places.

Goldsmith now began to toil with his pen, lodging in a garret at the top of a flight of stairs called "Break