Bunbury invites him down to Barton, to pass
the Christmas holidays.
the Christmas holidays.
Oliver Goldsmith
He was
generous and inconsiderate; money with him had little value. "
To escape from many of the tormentors just alluded to, and to devote
himself without interruption to his task, Goldsmith took lodgings for the
summer at a farmhouse near the six-mile stone on the Edgeware road, and
carried down his books in two return post-chaises. He used to say he
believed the farmer's family thought him an odd character, similar to that
in which the "Spectator" appeared to his landlady and her children: he was
"The Gentleman. " Boswell tells us that he went to visit him at the place in
company with Mickle, translator of the Lusiad. Goldsmith was not at home.
Having a curiosity to see his apartment, however, they went in, and found
curious scraps of descriptions of animals scrawled upon the wall with a
black lead pencil.
The farmhouse in question is still in existence, though much altered. It
stands upon a gentle eminence in Hyde Lane, commanding a pleasant prospect
toward Hendon. The room is still pointed out in which She Stoops to Conquer
was written; a convenient and airy apartment, up one Sight of stairs.
Some matter-of-fact traditions concerning the author were furnished, a few
years since, by a son of the farmer, who was sixteen years of age at the
time Goldsmith resided with his father. Though he had engaged to board with
the family, his meals were generally sent to him in his room, in which he
passed the most of his time, negligently dressed, with his shirt collar
open, busily engaged in writing. Sometimes, probably when in moods of
composition, he would wander into the kitchen, without noticing any one,
stand musing with his back to the fire, and then hurry off again to his
room, no doubt to commit to paper some thought which had struck him.
Sometimes he strolled about the fields, or was to be seen loitering and
reading and musing under the hedges. He was subject to fits of wakefulness
and read much in bed; if not disposed to read, he still kept the candle
burning; if he wished to extinguish it, and it was out of his reach, he
flung his slipper at it, which would be found in the morning near the
overturned candlestick, and daubed with grease. He was noted here, as
everywhere else, for his charitable feelings. No beggar applied to him in
vain, and he evinced on all occasions great commiseration for the poor.
He had the use of the parlor to receive and entertain company, and was
visited by Sir Joshua Reynolds, Hugh Boyd, the reputed author of Junius,
Sir William Chambers, and other distinguished characters. He gave
occasionally, though rarely, a dinner party; and on one occasion, when his
guests were detained by a thunder shower, he got up a dance, and carried
the merriment late into the night.
As usual, he was the promoter of hilarity among the young, and at one time
took the children of the house to see a company of strolling players at
Hendon. The greatest amusement to the party, however, was derived from his
own jokes on the road and his comments on the performance, which produced
infinite laughter among his youthful companions.
Near to his rural retreat at Edgeware, a Mr. Seguin, an Irish merchant, of
literary tastes, had country quarters for his family, where Goldsmith was
always welcome.
In this family he would indulge in playful and even grotesque humor, and
was ready for anything--conversation, music, or a game of romps. He prided
himself upon his dancing, and would walk a minuet with Mrs. Seguin, to the
infinite amusement of herself and the children, whose shouts of laughter he
bore with perfect good-humor. He would sing Irish songs, and the Scotch
ballad of Johnny Armstrong. He took the lead in the children's sports of
blind man's buff, hunt the slipper, etc. , or in their games at cards, and
was the most noisy of the party, affecting to cheat and to be excessively
eager to win; while with children of smaller size he would turn the hind
part of his wig before, and play all kinds of tricks to amuse them.
One word as to his musical skill and his performance on the flute, which
comes up so invariably in all his fireside revels. He really knew nothing
of music scientifically; he had a good ear, and may have played sweetly;
but we are told he could not read a note of music. Roubillac, the statuary,
once played a trick upon him in this respect. He pretended to score down an
air as the poet played it, but put down crotchets and semi-breves at
random. When he had finished, Goldsmith cast his eyes over it and
pronounced it correct! It is possible that his execution in music was like
his style in writing; in sweetness and melody he may have snatched a grace
beyond the reach of art!
He was at all times a capital companion for children, and knew how to fall
in with their humors. "I little thought," said Miss Hawkins, the woman
grown, "what I should have to boast, when Goldsmith taught me to play Jack
and Jill by two bits of paper on his fingers. " He entertained Mrs. Garrick,
we are told, with a whole budget of stories and songs; delivered the
Chimney Sweep with exquisite taste as a solo; and performed a duet with
Garrick of Old Rose and Burn the Bellows.
"I was only five years old," says the late George Colman, "when Goldsmith
one evening, when drinking coffee with my father, took me on his knee and
began to play with me, which amiable act I returned with a very smart slap
in the face; it must have been a tingler, for I left the marks of my little
spiteful paw upon his cheek. This infantile outrage was followed by summary
justice, and I was locked up by my father in an adjoining room, to undergo
solitary imprisonment in the dark. Here I began to howl and scream most
abominably. At length a friend appeared to extricate me from jeopardy; it
was the good-natured doctor himself, with a lighted candle in his hand, and
a smile upon his countenance, which was still partially red from the
effects of my petulance. I sulked and sobbed, and he fondled and soothed
until I began to brighten. He seized the propitious moment, placed three
hats upon the carpet, and a shilling under each; the shillings, he told me,
were England, France, and Spain. 'Hey, presto, cockolorum! ' cried the
doctor, and, lo! on uncovering the shillings, they were all found
congregated under one. I was no politician at the time, and therefore might
not have wondered at the sudden revolution which brought England, France,
and Spain all under one crown; but, as I was also no conjurer, it amazed me
beyond measure. From that time, whenever the doctor came to visit my
father,
"'I pluck'd his gown to share the good man's smile';
a game of romps constantly ensued, and we were always cordial friends and
merry playfellows. "
Although Goldsmith made the Edgeware farmhouse his headquarters for the
summer, he would absent himself for weeks at a time on visits to Mr.
Cradock, Lord Clare, and Mr. Langton, at their country-seats. He would
often visit town, also, to dine and partake of the public amusements. On
one occasion he accompanied Edmund Burke to witness a performance of the
Italian Fantoccini or Puppets, in Panton Street; an exhibition which had
hit the caprice of the town, and was in great vogue. The puppets were set
in motion by wires, so well concealed as to be with difficulty detected.
Boswell, with his usual obtuseness with respect to Goldsmith, accuses him
of being jealous of the puppets! "When Burke," said he, "praised the
dexterity with which one of them tossed a pike, 'Pshaw,' said Goldsmith
_with some warmth_, 'I can do it better myself. '" "The same evening,"
adds Boswell, "when supping at Burke's lodgings, he broke his shin by
attempting to exhibit to the company how much better he could jump over a
stick than the puppets. "
Goldsmith jealous of puppets! This even passes in absurdity Boswell's
charge upon him of being jealous of the beauty of the two Misses Horneck.
The Panton Street puppets were destined to be a source of further amusement
to the town, and of annoyance to the little autocrat of the stage. Foote,
the Aristophanes of the English drama, who was always on the alert to turn
every subject of popular excitement to account, seeing the success of the
Fantoccini, gave out that he should produce a Primitive Puppet-show at the
Haymarket, to be entitled the Handsome Chambermaid, or Piety in Pattens:
intended to burlesque the _sentimental comedy_ which Garrick still
maintained at Drury Lane. The idea of a play to be performed in a regular
theater by puppets excited the curiosity and talk of the town. "Will your
puppets be as large as life, Mr. Foote? " demanded a lady of rank. "Oh, no,
my lady," replied Foote, "_not much larger than Garrick_. "
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
BROKEN HEALTH--DISSIPATION AND DEBTS--THE IRISH WIDOW--PRACTICAL
JOKES--SCRUB--A MISQUOTED PUN--MALAGRIDA--GOLDSMITH PROVED TO BE A
FOOL--DISTRESSED BALLAD SINGERS--THE POET AT RANELAGH
Goldsmith returned to town in the autumn (1772), with his health much
disordered. His close fits of sedentary application, during which he in a
manner tied himself to the mast, had laid the seeds of a lurking malady in
his system, and produced a severe illness in the course of the summer. Town
life was not favorable to the health either of body or mind. He could not
resist the siren voice of temptation, which, now that he had become a
notoriety, assailed him on every side. Accordingly we find him launching
away in a career of social dissipation; dining and supping out; at clubs,
at routs, at theaters; he is a guest with Johnson at the Thrales, and an
object of Mrs. Thrale's lively sallies; he is a lion at Mrs. Vesey's and
Mrs. Montagu's, where some of the high-bred blue-stockings pronounce him a
"wild genius," and others, peradventure, a "wild Irishman. " In the meantime
his pecuniary difficulties are increasing upon him, conflicting with his
proneness to pleasure and expense, and contributing by the harassment of
his mind to the wear and tear of his constitution. His Animated Nature,
though not finished, had been entirely paid for, and the money spent. The
money advanced by Garrick on Newbery's note still hangs over him as a debt.
The tale on which Newbery had loaned from two to three hundred pounds
previous to the excursion to Barton has proved a failure. The bookseller is
urgent for the settlement of his complicated account; the perplexed author
has nothing to offer him in liquidation but the copyright of the comedy
which he has in his portfolio; "Though to tell you the truth, Frank," said
he, "there are great doubts of its success. " The offer was accepted, and,
like bargains wrung from Goldsmith in times of emergency, turned out a
golden speculation to the bookseller.
In this way Goldsmith went on "outrunning the constable," as he termed it;
spending everything in advance; working with an overtasked head and weary
heart to pay for past pleasures and past extravagance, and at the same time
incurring new debts, to perpetuate his struggles and darken his future
prospects. While the excitement of society and the excitement of
composition conspire to keep up a feverishness of the system, he has
incurred an unfortunate habit of quacking himself with James' powders, a
fashionable panacea of the day.
A farce, produced this year by Garrick, and entitled The Irish Widow,
perpetuates the memory of practical jokes played off a year or two
previously upon the alleged vanity of poor, simple-hearted Goldsmith. He
was one evening at the house of his friend Burke, when he was beset by a
tenth muse, an Irish widow and authoress, just arrived from Ireland, full
of brogue and blunders, and poetic fire and rantipole gentility. She was
soliciting subscriptions for her poems; and assailed Goldsmith for his
patronage; the great Goldsmith--her countryman, and of course her friend.
She overpowered him with eulogiums on his own poems, and then read some of
her own, with vehemence of tone and gesture, appealing continually to the
great Goldsmith to know how he relished them.
Poor Goldsmith did all that a kind-hearted and gallant gentleman could do
hi such a case; he praised her poems as far as the stomach of his sense
would permit: perhaps a little further; he offered her his subscription,
and it was not until she had retired with many parting compliments to the
great Goldsmith that he pronounced the poetry which had been inflicted on
him execrable. The whole scene had been a hoax got up by Burke for the
amusement of his company, and the Irish widow, so admirably performed, had
been personated by a Mrs. Balfour, a lady of his connection, of great
sprightliness and talent.
We see nothing in the story to establish the alleged vanity of Goldsmith,
but we think it tells rather to the disadvantage of Burke; being
unwarrantable under their relations of friendship, and a species of waggery
quite beneath his genius. Croker, in his notes to Boswell, gives another of
these practical jokes perpetrated by Burke at the expense of Goldsmith's
credulity. It was related to Croker by Colonel O'Moore, of Cloghan Castle,
in Ireland, who was a party concerned. The colonel and Burke, walking one
day through Leicester Square on their way to Sir Joshua Reynolds', with
whom they were to dine, observed Goldsmith, who was likewise to be a guest,
standing and regarding a crowd which was staring and shouting at some
foreign ladies in the window of a hotel. "Observe Goldsmith," said Burke to
O'Moore, "and mark what passes between us at Sir Joshua's. " They passed on
and reached there before him. Burke received Goldsmith with affected
reserve and coldness; being pressed to explain the reason. "Really," said
he, "I am ashamed to keep company with a person who could act as you have
just done in the Square. " Goldsmith protested he was ignorant of what was
meant. "Why," said Burke, "did you not exclaim as you were looking up at
those women, what stupid beasts the crowd must be for staring with such
admiration at those _painted Jezebels_, while a man of your talents
passed by unnoticed? " "Surely, surely, my dear friend," cried Goldsmith,
with alarm, "surely I did not say so? " "Nay," replied Burke, "if you had
not said so, how should I have known it? " "That's true," answered
Goldsmith, "I am very sorry--it was very foolish: _I do recollect that
something thing of the kind passed through my mind, but I did not think I
had uttered it_. "
It is proper to observe that these jokes were played off by Burke before he
had attained the full eminence of his social position, and that he may have
felt privileged to take liberties with Goldsmith as his countryman and
college associate. It is evident, however, that the peculiarities of the
latter, and his guileless simplicity, made him a butt for the broad waggery
of some of his associates; while others more polished, though equally
perfidious, are on the watch to give currency to his bulls and blunders.
The Stratford jubilee, in honor of Shakespeare, where Boswell had made a
fool of himself, was still in every one's mind. It was sportively suggested
that a fete should be held at Lichfield in honor of Johnson and Garrick,
and that the Beaux' Stratagem should be played by the members of the
Literary Club. "Then," exclaimed Goldsmith, "I shall certainly play Scrub.
I should like of all things to try my hand at that character. " The unwary
speech, which any one else might have made without comment, has been
thought worthy of record as whimsically characteristic. Beauclerc was
extremely apt to circulate anecdotes at his expense, founded perhaps on
some trivial incident, but dressed up with the embellishments of his
sarcastic brain. One relates to a venerable dish of peas, served up at Sir
Joshua's table, which should have been green, but were any other color. A
wag suggested to Goldsmith, in a whisper, that they should be sent to
Hammersmith, as that was the way to _turn-em-green_ (Turnham-Green).
Goldsmith, delighted with the pun, endeavored to repeat it at Burke's
table, but missed the point. "That is the way to _make_ 'em green,"
said he. Nobody laughed. He perceived he was at fault. "I mean that is the
_road_ to turn 'em green. " A dead pause and a stare; "whereupon," adds
Beauclerc, "he started up disconcerted and abruptly left the table. " This
is evidently one of Beauclerc's caricatures.
On another occasion the poet and Beauclerc were seated at the theater next
to Lord Shelburne, the minister, whom political writers thought proper to
nickname Malagrida. "Do you know," said Goldsmith to his lordship, in the
course of conversation, "that I never could conceive why they called you
Malagrida, _for_ Malagrida was a very good sort of man. " This was too
good a trip of the tongue for Beauclerc to let pass: he serves it up in his
next letter to Lord Charlemont, as a specimen of a mode of turning a
thought the wrong way, peculiar to the poet; he makes merry over it with
his witty and sarcastic compeer, Horace Walpole, who pronounces it "a
picture of Goldsmith's whole life. " Dr. Johnson alone, when he hears it
bandied about as Goldsmith's last blunder, growls forth a friendly defense:
"Sir," said he, "it was a mere blunder in emphasis. He meant to say, I
wonder they should use Malagrida as a term of reproach. " Poor Goldsmith! On
such points he was ever doomed to be misinterpreted. Rogers, the poet,
meeting in times long subsequent with a survivor of those days, asked him
what Goldsmith really was in conversation. The old conversational character
was too deeply stamped in the memory of the veteran to be effaced. "Sir,"
replied the old wiseacre, "_he was a fool_. The right word never came
to him. If you gave him back a bad shilling, he'd say, Why, it's as good a
shilling as ever was _born_. You know he ought to have said
_coined_. _Coined_, sir, never entered his head. _He was a
fool, sir_. "
We have so many anecdotes in which Goldsmith's simplicity is played upon
that it is quite a treat to meet with one in which he is represented
playing upon the simplicity of others, especially when the victim of his
joke is the "Great Cham" himself, whom all others are disposed to hold so
much in awe. Goldsmith and Johnson were supping cozily together at a tavern
in Dean Street, Soho, kept by Jack Roberts, a singer at Drury Lane, and a
protege of Garrick's. Johnson delighted in these gastronomical
tete-a-tetes, and was expatiating in high good-humor on rumps and kidneys,
the veins of his forehead swelling with the ardor of mastication. "These,"
said he, "are pretty little things; but a man must eat a great many of them
before he is filled. " "Ay; but how many of them," asked Goldsmith, with
affected simplicity, "would reach to the moon? " "To the moon! Ah, sir,
that, I fear, exceeds your calculation. " "Not at all, sir; I think I could
tell. " "Pray, then, sir, let us hear. " "Why, sir, one, _if it were long
enough_! " Johnson growled for a time at finding himself caught in such a
trite schoolboy trap. "Well, sir," cried he at length, "I have deserved it.
I should not have provoked so foolish an answer by so foolish a question. "
Among the many incidents related as illustrative of Goldsmith's vanity and
envy is one which occurred one evening when he was in a drawing-room with a
party of ladies, and a ballad-singer under the window struck up his
favorite song of Sally Salisbury. "How miserably this woman sings! "
exclaimed he. "Pray, doctor," said the lady of the house, "could you do it
better? " "Yes, madam, and the company shall be judges. " The company, of
course, prepared to be entertained by an absurdity; but their smiles were
wellnigh turned to tears, for he acquitted himself with a skill and pathos
that drew universal applause. He had, in fact, a delicate ear for music,
which had been jarred by the false notes of the ballad-singer; and there
were certain pathetic ballads, associated with recollections of his
childhood, which were sure to touch the springs of his heart. We have
another story of him, connected with ballad-singing, which is still more
characteristic. He was one evening at the house of Sir William Chambers, in
Berners Street, seated at a whist table with Sir William, Lady Chambers,
and Baretti, when all at once he threw down his cards, hurried out of the
room and into the street. He returned in an instant, resumed his seat, and
the game went on. Sir William, after a little hesitation, ventured to ask
the cause of his retreat, fearing he had been overcome by the heat of the
room. "Not at all," replied Goldsmith; "but in truth I could not bear to
hear that unfortunate woman in the street, half singing, half sobbing, for
such tones could only arise from the extremity of distress; her voice
grated painfully on my ear and jarred my frame, so that I could not rest
until I had sent her away. " It was in fact a poor ballad-singer, whose
cracked voice had been heard by others of the party, but without having the
same effect on their sensibilities. It was the reality of his fictitious
scene in the story of the "Man in Black"; wherein he describes a woman in
rags with one child in her arms and another on her back, attempting to sing
ballads, but with such a mournful voice that it was difficult to determine
whether she was singing or crying. "A wretch," he adds, "who, in the
deepest distress, still aimed at good-humor, was an object my friend was by
no means capable of withstanding. " The Man in Black gave the poor woman all
that he had--a bundle of matches. Goldsmith, it is probable, sent his
ballad-singer away rejoicing with all the money in his pocket.
Ranelagh was at that time greatly in vogue as a place of public
entertainment. It was situated near Chelsea; the principal room was a
rotunda of great dimensions, with an orchestra in the center and tiers of
boxes all round. It was a place to which Johnson resorted occasionally. "I
am a great friend to public amusements," said he, "for they keep people
from vice. " [Footnote: "Alas, sir! " said Johnson, speaking, when in another
mood, of grand houses, fine gardens, and splendid places of public
amusement; "alas, sir! these are only struggles for happiness. When I first
entered Ranelagh it gave an expansion and gay sensation to my mind, such as
I never experienced anywhere else. But, as Xerxes wept when he viewed his
immense army, and considered that not one of that great multitude would be
alive a hundred years afterward, so it went to my heart to consider that
there was not one in all that brilliant circle that was not afraid to go
home and think. "] Goldsmith was equally a friend to them, though perhaps
not altogether on such moral grounds. He was particularly fond of
masquerades, which were then exceedingly popular, and got up at Ranelagh
with great expense and magnificence. Sir Joshua Reynolds, who had likewise
a taste for such amusements, was sometimes his companion, at other times he
went alone; his peculiarities of person and manner would soon betray him,
whatever might be his disguise, and he would be singled out by wags,
acquainted with his foibles, and more successful than himself in
maintaining their incognito, as a capital subject to be played upon. Some,
pretending not to know him, would decry his writings, and praise those of
his contemporaries; others would laud his verses to the skies, but
purposely misquote and burlesque them; others would annoy him with
parodies; while one young lady, whom he was teasing, as he supposed, with
great success and infinite humor, silenced his rather boisterous laughter
by quoting his own line about "the loud laugh that speaks the vacant mind. "
On one occasion he was absolutely driven out of the house by the
persevering jokes of a wag, whose complete disguise gave him no means of
retaliation.
His name appearing in the newspapers among the distinguished persons
present at one of these amusements, his old enemy, Kenrick, immediately
addressed to him a copy of anonymous verses, to the following purport.
TO DR. GOLDSMITH
ON SEEING HIS NAME IN THE LIST OF MUMMERS AT THE LATE MASQUERADE
"How widely different, Goldsmith, are the ways
Of doctors now, and those of ancient days!
Theirs taught the truth in academic shades,
Ours in lewd hops and midnight masquerades.
So changed the times! say, philosophic sage,
Whose genius suits so well this tasteful age,
Is the Pantheon, late a sink obscene,
Become the fountain of chaste Hippocrene?
Or do thy moral numbers quaintly flow,
Inspired by th' _Aganippe_ of Soho?
Do wisdom's sons gorge cates and vermicelli,
Like beastly Bickerstaffe or bothering Kelly?
Or art thou tired of th' undeserved applause
Bestowed on bards affecting Virtue's cause?
Is this the good that makes the humble vain,
The good philosophy should not disdain?
If so, let pride dissemble all it can,
A modern sage is still much less than man. "
Goldsmith was keenly sensitive to attacks of the kind, and meeting Kenrick
at the Chapter Coffee-house, called him to sharp account for taking such a
liberty with his name, and calling his morals in question, merely on
account of his being seen at a place of general resort and amusement.
Kenrick shuffled and sneaked, protesting that he meant nothing derogatory
to his private character. Goldsmith let him know, however, that he was
aware of his having more than once indulged in attacks of this dastard
kind, and intimated that another such outrage would be followed by personal
chastisement.
Kenrick having played the craven in his presence, avenged himself as soon
as he was gone by complaining of his having made a wanton attack upon him,
and by making coarse comments upon his writings, conversation and person.
The scurrilous satire of Kenrick, however unmerited, may have checked
Goldsmith's taste for masquerades. Sir Joshua Reynolds, calling on the poet
one morning, found him walking about his room in somewhat of a reverie,
kicking a bundle of clothes before him like a football. It proved to be an
expensive masquerade dress, which he said he had been fool enough to
purchase, and as there was no other way of getting the worth of his money,
he was trying to take it out in exercise.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
INVITATION TO CHRISTMAS--THE SPRING VELVET COAT--THE HAYMAKING WIG--THE
MISCHANCES OF LOO--THE FAIR CULPRIT--A DANCE WITH THE JESSAMY BRIDE
From the feverish dissipations of town, Goldsmith is summoned away to
partake of the genial dissipations of the country. In the month of
December, a letter from Mrs.
Bunbury invites him down to Barton, to pass
the Christmas holidays. The letter is written in the usual playful vein
which marks his intercourse with this charming family. He is to come in his
"smart spring-velvet coat," to bring a new wig to dance with the haymakers
in, and, above all, to follow the advice of herself and her sister (the
Jessamy Bride), in playing loo. This letter, which plays so archly, yet
kindly, with some of poor Goldsmith's peculiarities, and bespeaks such real
ladylike regard for him, requires a word or two of annotation. The
spring-velvet suit alluded to appears to have been a gallant adornment
(somewhat in the style of the famous bloom-colored coat) in which Goldsmith
had figured in the preceding month of May--the season of blossoms--for, on
the 21st of that month we find the following entry in the chronicle of Mr.
William Filby, tailor: _To your blue velvet suit_, £21 10s. 9d. Also,
about the same time, a suit of livery and a crimson collar for the serving
man. Again we hold the Jessamy Bride responsible for this gorgeous splendor
of wardrobe.
The new wig no doubt is a bag-wig and solitaire, still highly the mode, and
in which Goldsmith is represented as figuring when in full dress, equipped
with his sword.
As to the dancing with the haymakers, we presume it alludes to some gambol
of the poet, in the course of his former visit to Barton; when he ranged
the fields and lawns a chartered libertine, and tumbled into the
fish-ponds.
As to the suggestions about loo, they are in sportive allusion to the
doctor's mode of playing that game in their merry evening parties;
affecting the desperate gambler and easy dupe; running counter to all rule;
making extravagant ventures; reproaching all others with cowardice; dashing
at all hazards at the pool, and getting himself completely loo'd, to the
great amusement of the company. The drift of the fair sisters' advice was
most probably to tempt him on, and then leave him in the lurch.
With these comments we subjoin Goldsmith's reply to Mrs. Bunbury, a fine
piece of off-hand, humorous writing, which has but in late years been given
to the public, and which throws a familiar light on the social circle at
Barton.
"Madam--I read your letter with all that allowance which critical candor
could require, but after all find so much to object to, and so much to
raise my indignation, that I cannot help giving it a serious answer. I am
not so ignorant, madam, as not to see there are many sarcasms contained in
it, and solecisms also. (Solecism is a word that comes from the town of
Soleis in Attica, among the Greeks, built by Solon, and applied as we use
the word Kidderminster for curtains from a town also of that name--but this
is learning you have no taste for! )--I say, madam, there are many sarcasms
in it, and solecisms also. But not to seem an ill-natured critic, I'll take
leave to quote your own words, and give you my remarks upon them as they
occur. You begin as follows:
"'I hope, my good doctor, you soon will be here,
And your spring-velvet coat very smart will appear,
To open our ball the first day of the year. '
"Pray, madam, where did you ever find the epithet 'good,' applied to the
title of doctor? Had you called me 'learned doctor,' or 'grave doctor,' or
'noble doctor,' it might be allowable, because they belong to the
profession. But, not to cavil at trifles, you talk of 'my spring-velvet
coat,' and advise me to wear it the first day in the year, that is, in the
middle of winter! --a spring-velvet coat in the middle of winter! ! ! That
would be a solecism indeed! and yet to increase the inconsistence, in
another part of your letter you call me a beau. Now, on one side or other
you must be wrong. If I am a beau, I can never think of wearing a
spring-velvet in winter; and if I am not a beau, why then, that explains
itself. But let me go on to your two next strange lines:
"'And bring with you a wig, that is modish and gay,
To dance with the girls that are makers of hay. '
"The absurdity of making hay at Christmas you yourself seem sensible of:
you say your sister will laugh; and so indeed she well may! The Latins have
an expression for a contemptuous kind of laughter, 'naso contemnere
adunco'; that is, to laugh with a crooked nose. She may laugh at you in the
manner of the ancients if she thinks fit. But now I come to the most
extraordinary of all extraordinary propositions, which is, to take your and
your sister's advice in playing at loo. The presumption of the offer raises
my indignation beyond the bounds of prose; it inspires me at once with
verse and resentment. I take advice! and from whom? You shall hear.
"First let me suppose, what may shortly be true,
The company set, and the word to be Loo:
All smirking, and pleasant, and big with adventure,
And ogling the stake which is fix'd in the center.
Round and round go the cards, while I inwardly damn
At never once finding a visit from Pam.
I lay down my stake, apparently cool,
While the harpies about me all pocket the pool.
I fret in my gizzard, yet, cautious and sly,
I wish all my friends may be bolder than I:
Yet still they sit snug, not a creature will aim
By losing their money to venture at fame.
'Tis in vain that at niggardly caution I scold,
'Tis in vain that I flatter the brave and the bold:
All play their own way, and they think me an ass,. . .
'What does Mrs. Bunbury? ' . . . 'I, Sir? I pass. '
'Pray what does Miss Horneck? take courage, come do,'. . .
'Who, I? let me see, sir, why I must pass too. '
Mr. Bunbury frets, and I fret like the devil,
To see them so cowardly, lucky, and civil.
Yet still I sit snug, and continue to sigh on,
Till, made by my losses as bold as a lion,
I venture at all, while my avarice regards
The whole pool as my own. . . 'Come, give me five cards. '
'Well done! ' cry the ladies; 'Ah, doctor, that's good!
The pool's very rich,. . . ah! the doctor is loo'd! '
Thus foil'd in my courage, on all sides perplext,
I ask for advice from the lady that's next:
'Pray, ma'am, be so good as to give your advice;
Don't you think the best way is to venture for't twice! '
'I advise,' cries the lady, 'to try it, I own. . . .
Ah! the doctor is loo'd! Come, doctor, put down. '
Thus, playing, and playing, I still grow more eager,
And so bold, and so bold, I'm at last a bold beggar.
Now, ladies, I ask, if law-matters you're skill'd in,
Whether crimes such as yours should not come before Fielding:
For giving advice that is not worth a straw,
May well be call'd picking of pockets in law;
And picking of pockets, with which I now charge ye,
Is, by quinto Elizabeth, Death without Clergy.
What justice, when both to the Old Bailey brought!
By the gods, I'll enjoy it, tho' 'tis but in thought!
Both are plac'd at the bar, with all proper decorum,
With bunches of fennel, and nosegays before 'em;
Both cover their faces with mobs and all that,
But the judge bids them, angrily, take off their hat.
When uncover'd, a buzz of inquiry runs round,
'Pray what are their crimes? '. . . 'They've been pilfering found. '
'But, pray, who have they pilfer'd? '. . . 'A doctor, I hear. '
_'What, yon solemn-faced, odd-looking man that stands near? '_
'The same. '. . . 'What a pity! how does it surprise one,
_Two handsomer culprits I never set eyes on! '_
Then their friends all come round me with cringing and leering,
To melt me to pity, and soften my swearing.
First Sir Charles advances with phrases wellstrung,
'Consider, dear doctor, the girls are but young. '
'The younger the worse,' I return him again,
'It shows that their habits are all dyed in grain. '
'But then they're so handsome, one's bosom it grieves.
'What signifies _handsome_, when people are thieves? '
'But where is your justice? their cases are hard. '
'What signifies _justice_? I want the _reward_.
"'There's the parish of Edmonton offers forty pounds; there's the parish of
St. Leonard Shoreditch offers forty pounds; there's the parish of Tyburn,
from the Hog-in-the-pound to St. Giles' watch-house, offers forty pounds--I
shall have all that if I convict them! '--
"'But consider their case,. . . it may yet be your own!
And see how they kneel! Is your heart made of stone! '
This moves! . . . so at last I agree to relent,
For ten pounds in hand, and ten pounds to be spent. '
"I challenge you all to answer this: I tell you, you cannot. It cuts deep.
But now for the rest of the letter: and next--but I want room--so I believe
I shall battle the rest out at Barton some day next week. I don't value you
all!
"O. G. "
We regret that we have no record of this Christmas visit to Barton; that
the poet had no Boswell to follow at his heels, and take note of all his
sayings and doings. We can only picture him in our minds, casting off all
care; enacting the lord of misrule; presiding at the Christmas revels;
providing all kinds of merriment; keeping the card-table in an uproar, and
finally opening the ball on the first day of the year in his spring-velvet
suit, with the Jessamy Bride for a partner.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
THEATRICAL DELAYS--NEGOTIATIONS WITH COLMAN--LETTER TO GARRICK--CROAKING OF
THE MANAGER--NAMING OF THE PLAY--SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER--FOOTE'S PRIMITIVE
PUPPET-SHOW, PIETY ON PATTENS--FIRST PERFORMANCE OF THE COMEDY--AGITATION
OF THE AUTHOR--SUCCESS--COLMAN SQUIBBED OUT OF TOWN
The gay life depicted in the two last chapters, while it kept Goldsmith in
a state of continual excitement, aggravated the malady which was impairing
his constitution; yet his increasing perplexities in money matters drove
him to the dissipation of society as a relief from solitary care. The
delays of the theater added to those perplexities. He had long since
finished his new comedy, yet the year 1772 passed away without his being
able to get it on the stage. No one, uninitiated in the interior of a
theater, that little world of traps and trickery, can have any idea of the
obstacles and perplexities multiplied in the way of the most eminent and
successful author by the mismanagement of managers, the jealousies and
intrigues of rival authors, and the fantastic and impertinent caprices of
actors. A long and baffling negotiation was carried on between Goldsmith
and Colman, the manager of Covent Garden; who retained the play in his
hands until the middle of January (1773), without coming to a decision. The
theatrical season was rapidly passing away, and Goldsmith's pecuniary
difficulties were augmenting and pressing on him. We may judge of his
anxiety by the following letter:
"_To George Colman, Esq. _
"DEAR SIR--I entreat you'll relieve me from that state of suspense in which
I have been kept for a long time. Whatever objections you have made or
shall make to my play, I will endeavor to remove and not argue about them.
To bring in any new judges, either of its merits or faults, I can never
submit to. Upon a former occasion, when my other play was before Mr.
Garrick, he offered to bring me before Mr. Whitehead's tribunal, but I
refused the proposal with indignation: I hope I shall not experience as
harsh treatment from you as from him. I have, as you know, a large sum of
money to make up shortly; by accepting my play, I can readily satisfy my
creditor that way; at any rate, I must look about to some certainty to be
prepared. For God's sake take the play, and let us make the best of it, and
let me have the same measure, at least, which you have given as bad plays
as mine. I am your friend and servant,
"OLIVER GOLDSMITH. "
Colman returned the manuscript with the blank sides of the leaves scored
with disparaging comments and suggested alterations, but with the
intimation that the faith of the theater should be kept, and the play acted
notwithstanding. Goldsmith submitted the criticisms to some of his friends,
who pronounced them trivial, unfair, and contemptible, and intimated that
Colman, being a dramatic writer himself, might be actuated by jealousy. The
play was then sent, with Colman's comments written on it, to Garrick; but
he had scarce sent it when Johnson interfered, represented the evil that
might result from an apparent rejection of it by Covent Garden, and
undertook to go forthwith to Colman, and have a talk with him on the
subject. Goldsmith, therefore, penned the following note to Garrick:
"DEAR SIR--I ask many pardons for the trouble I gave you yesterday. Upon
more mature deliberation, and the advice of a sensible friend, I began to
think it indelicate in me to throw upon you the odium of confirming Mr.
Colman's sentence. I therefore request you will send my play back by my
servant; for, having been assured of having it acted at the other house,
though I confess yours in every respect more to my wish, yet it would be
folly in me to forego an advantage which lies in my power of appealing from
Mr. Colman's opinion to the judgment of the town. I entreat, if not too
late, you will keep this affair a secret for some time.
"I am, dear sir, your very humble servant,
"OLIVER GOLDSMITH. "
The negotiation of Johnson with the manager of Covent Garden was effective.
"Colman," he says, "was prevailed on at last, by much solicitation, nay, a
kind of force," to bring forward the comedy. Still the manager was
ungenerous; or, at least, indiscreet enough to express his opinion, that it
would not reach a second representation. The plot, he said, was bad, and
the interest not sustained; "it dwindled, and dwindled, and at last went
out like the snuff of a candle. " The effect of his croaking was soon
apparent within the walls of the theater. Two of the most popular actors,
Woodward and Gentleman Smith, to whom the parts of Tony Lumpkin and Young
Marlow were assigned, refused to act them; one of them alleging, in excuse,
the evil predictions of the manager. Goldsmith was advised to postpone the
performance of his play until he could get these important parts well
supplied. "No," said he, "I would sooner that my play were damned by bad
players than merely saved by good acting. "
Quick was substituted for Woodward in Tony Lumpkin, and Lee Lewis, the
harlequin of the theater, for Gentleman Smith in Young Marlow; and both did
justice to their parts.
Great interest was taken by Goldsmith's friends in the success of his
piece. The rehearsals were attended by Johnson, Cradock, Murphy, Reynolds
and his sister, and the whole Horneck connection, including, of course, the
"Jessamy Bride," whose presence may have contributed to flutter the anxious
heart of the author. The rehearsals went off with great applause, but that
Colman attributed to the partiality of friends. He continued to croak, and
refused to risk any expense in new scenery or dresses on a play which he
was sure would prove a failure.
The time was at hand for the first representation, and as yet the comedy
was without a title. "We are all in labor for a name for Goldy's play,"
said Johnson, who, as usual, took a kind of fatherly protecting interest in
poor Goldsmith's affairs. The Old House a New Inn was thought of for a
time, but still did not please. Sir Joshua Reynolds proposed The Belle's
Stratagem, an elegant title, but not considered applicable, the
perplexities of the comedy being produced by the mistake of the hero, not
the stratagem of the heroine. The name was afterward adopted by Mrs. Cowley
for one of her comedies. The Mistakes of a Night was the title at length
fixed upon, to which Goldsmith prefixed the words She Stoops to Conquer.
The evil bodings of Colman still continued; they were even communicated in
the box office to the servant of the Duke of Gloucester, who was sent to
engage a box. Never did the play of a popular writer struggle into
existence through more difficulties.
In the meantime Foote's Primitive Puppet-show, entitled the Handsome
Housemaid, or Piety on Pattens, had been brought out at the Haymarket on
the 15th of February. All the world, fashionable and unfashionable, had
crowded to the theater. The street was thronged with equipages--the doors
were stormed by the mob. The burlesque was completely successful, and
sentimental comedy received its quietus. Even Garrick, who had recently
befriended it, now gave it a kick, as he saw it going down hill, and sent
Goldsmith a humorous prologue to help his comedy of the opposite school.
Garrick and Goldsmith, however, were now on very cordial terms, to which
the social meetings in the circle of the Hornecks and Bunburys may have
contributed.
On the 15th of March the new comedy was to be performed. Those who had
stood up for its merits, and been irritated and disgusted by the treatment
it had received from the manager, determined to muster their forces, and
aid in giving it a good launch upon the town. The particulars of this
confederation, and of its triumphant success, are amusingly told by
Cumberland in his memoirs.
"We were not over-sanguine of success, but perfectly determined to struggle
hard for our author. We accordingly assembled our strength at the
Shakespeare Tavern, in a considerable body, for an early dinner, where
Samuel Johnson took the chair at the head of a long table, and was the life
and soul of the corps: the poet took post silently by his side, with the
Burkes, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Fitzherbert, Caleb Whitefoord, and a phalanx
of North British, predetermined applauders, under the banner of Major
Mills, all good men and true. Our illustrious president was in inimitable
glee; and poor Goldsmith that day took all his raillery as patiently and
complacently as my friend Boswell would have done any day or every day of
his life. In the meantime, we did not forget our duty; and though we had a
better comedy going, in which Johnson was chief actor, we betook ourselves
in good time to our separate and allotted posts, and waited the awful
drawing up of the curtain. As our stations were preconcerted, so were our
signals for plaudits arranged and determined upon in a manner that gave
every one his cue where to look for them, and how to follow them up.
"We had among us a very worthy and efficient member, long since lost to his
friends and the world at large, Adam Drummond, of amiable memory, who was
gifted by nature with the most sonorous, and, at the same time, the most
contagious laugh that ever echoed from the human lungs. The neighing of the
horse of the son of Hystaspes was a whisper to it; the whole thunder of the
theater could not drown it. This kind and ingenious friend fairly
forewarned us that he knew no more when to give his fire than the cannon
did that was planted on a battery. He desired, therefore, to have a flapper
at his elbow, and I had the honor to be deputed to that office. I planted
him in an upper box, pretty nearly over the stage, in full view of the pit
and galleries, and perfectly well situated to give the echo all its play
through the hollows and recesses of the theater.
generous and inconsiderate; money with him had little value. "
To escape from many of the tormentors just alluded to, and to devote
himself without interruption to his task, Goldsmith took lodgings for the
summer at a farmhouse near the six-mile stone on the Edgeware road, and
carried down his books in two return post-chaises. He used to say he
believed the farmer's family thought him an odd character, similar to that
in which the "Spectator" appeared to his landlady and her children: he was
"The Gentleman. " Boswell tells us that he went to visit him at the place in
company with Mickle, translator of the Lusiad. Goldsmith was not at home.
Having a curiosity to see his apartment, however, they went in, and found
curious scraps of descriptions of animals scrawled upon the wall with a
black lead pencil.
The farmhouse in question is still in existence, though much altered. It
stands upon a gentle eminence in Hyde Lane, commanding a pleasant prospect
toward Hendon. The room is still pointed out in which She Stoops to Conquer
was written; a convenient and airy apartment, up one Sight of stairs.
Some matter-of-fact traditions concerning the author were furnished, a few
years since, by a son of the farmer, who was sixteen years of age at the
time Goldsmith resided with his father. Though he had engaged to board with
the family, his meals were generally sent to him in his room, in which he
passed the most of his time, negligently dressed, with his shirt collar
open, busily engaged in writing. Sometimes, probably when in moods of
composition, he would wander into the kitchen, without noticing any one,
stand musing with his back to the fire, and then hurry off again to his
room, no doubt to commit to paper some thought which had struck him.
Sometimes he strolled about the fields, or was to be seen loitering and
reading and musing under the hedges. He was subject to fits of wakefulness
and read much in bed; if not disposed to read, he still kept the candle
burning; if he wished to extinguish it, and it was out of his reach, he
flung his slipper at it, which would be found in the morning near the
overturned candlestick, and daubed with grease. He was noted here, as
everywhere else, for his charitable feelings. No beggar applied to him in
vain, and he evinced on all occasions great commiseration for the poor.
He had the use of the parlor to receive and entertain company, and was
visited by Sir Joshua Reynolds, Hugh Boyd, the reputed author of Junius,
Sir William Chambers, and other distinguished characters. He gave
occasionally, though rarely, a dinner party; and on one occasion, when his
guests were detained by a thunder shower, he got up a dance, and carried
the merriment late into the night.
As usual, he was the promoter of hilarity among the young, and at one time
took the children of the house to see a company of strolling players at
Hendon. The greatest amusement to the party, however, was derived from his
own jokes on the road and his comments on the performance, which produced
infinite laughter among his youthful companions.
Near to his rural retreat at Edgeware, a Mr. Seguin, an Irish merchant, of
literary tastes, had country quarters for his family, where Goldsmith was
always welcome.
In this family he would indulge in playful and even grotesque humor, and
was ready for anything--conversation, music, or a game of romps. He prided
himself upon his dancing, and would walk a minuet with Mrs. Seguin, to the
infinite amusement of herself and the children, whose shouts of laughter he
bore with perfect good-humor. He would sing Irish songs, and the Scotch
ballad of Johnny Armstrong. He took the lead in the children's sports of
blind man's buff, hunt the slipper, etc. , or in their games at cards, and
was the most noisy of the party, affecting to cheat and to be excessively
eager to win; while with children of smaller size he would turn the hind
part of his wig before, and play all kinds of tricks to amuse them.
One word as to his musical skill and his performance on the flute, which
comes up so invariably in all his fireside revels. He really knew nothing
of music scientifically; he had a good ear, and may have played sweetly;
but we are told he could not read a note of music. Roubillac, the statuary,
once played a trick upon him in this respect. He pretended to score down an
air as the poet played it, but put down crotchets and semi-breves at
random. When he had finished, Goldsmith cast his eyes over it and
pronounced it correct! It is possible that his execution in music was like
his style in writing; in sweetness and melody he may have snatched a grace
beyond the reach of art!
He was at all times a capital companion for children, and knew how to fall
in with their humors. "I little thought," said Miss Hawkins, the woman
grown, "what I should have to boast, when Goldsmith taught me to play Jack
and Jill by two bits of paper on his fingers. " He entertained Mrs. Garrick,
we are told, with a whole budget of stories and songs; delivered the
Chimney Sweep with exquisite taste as a solo; and performed a duet with
Garrick of Old Rose and Burn the Bellows.
"I was only five years old," says the late George Colman, "when Goldsmith
one evening, when drinking coffee with my father, took me on his knee and
began to play with me, which amiable act I returned with a very smart slap
in the face; it must have been a tingler, for I left the marks of my little
spiteful paw upon his cheek. This infantile outrage was followed by summary
justice, and I was locked up by my father in an adjoining room, to undergo
solitary imprisonment in the dark. Here I began to howl and scream most
abominably. At length a friend appeared to extricate me from jeopardy; it
was the good-natured doctor himself, with a lighted candle in his hand, and
a smile upon his countenance, which was still partially red from the
effects of my petulance. I sulked and sobbed, and he fondled and soothed
until I began to brighten. He seized the propitious moment, placed three
hats upon the carpet, and a shilling under each; the shillings, he told me,
were England, France, and Spain. 'Hey, presto, cockolorum! ' cried the
doctor, and, lo! on uncovering the shillings, they were all found
congregated under one. I was no politician at the time, and therefore might
not have wondered at the sudden revolution which brought England, France,
and Spain all under one crown; but, as I was also no conjurer, it amazed me
beyond measure. From that time, whenever the doctor came to visit my
father,
"'I pluck'd his gown to share the good man's smile';
a game of romps constantly ensued, and we were always cordial friends and
merry playfellows. "
Although Goldsmith made the Edgeware farmhouse his headquarters for the
summer, he would absent himself for weeks at a time on visits to Mr.
Cradock, Lord Clare, and Mr. Langton, at their country-seats. He would
often visit town, also, to dine and partake of the public amusements. On
one occasion he accompanied Edmund Burke to witness a performance of the
Italian Fantoccini or Puppets, in Panton Street; an exhibition which had
hit the caprice of the town, and was in great vogue. The puppets were set
in motion by wires, so well concealed as to be with difficulty detected.
Boswell, with his usual obtuseness with respect to Goldsmith, accuses him
of being jealous of the puppets! "When Burke," said he, "praised the
dexterity with which one of them tossed a pike, 'Pshaw,' said Goldsmith
_with some warmth_, 'I can do it better myself. '" "The same evening,"
adds Boswell, "when supping at Burke's lodgings, he broke his shin by
attempting to exhibit to the company how much better he could jump over a
stick than the puppets. "
Goldsmith jealous of puppets! This even passes in absurdity Boswell's
charge upon him of being jealous of the beauty of the two Misses Horneck.
The Panton Street puppets were destined to be a source of further amusement
to the town, and of annoyance to the little autocrat of the stage. Foote,
the Aristophanes of the English drama, who was always on the alert to turn
every subject of popular excitement to account, seeing the success of the
Fantoccini, gave out that he should produce a Primitive Puppet-show at the
Haymarket, to be entitled the Handsome Chambermaid, or Piety in Pattens:
intended to burlesque the _sentimental comedy_ which Garrick still
maintained at Drury Lane. The idea of a play to be performed in a regular
theater by puppets excited the curiosity and talk of the town. "Will your
puppets be as large as life, Mr. Foote? " demanded a lady of rank. "Oh, no,
my lady," replied Foote, "_not much larger than Garrick_. "
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
BROKEN HEALTH--DISSIPATION AND DEBTS--THE IRISH WIDOW--PRACTICAL
JOKES--SCRUB--A MISQUOTED PUN--MALAGRIDA--GOLDSMITH PROVED TO BE A
FOOL--DISTRESSED BALLAD SINGERS--THE POET AT RANELAGH
Goldsmith returned to town in the autumn (1772), with his health much
disordered. His close fits of sedentary application, during which he in a
manner tied himself to the mast, had laid the seeds of a lurking malady in
his system, and produced a severe illness in the course of the summer. Town
life was not favorable to the health either of body or mind. He could not
resist the siren voice of temptation, which, now that he had become a
notoriety, assailed him on every side. Accordingly we find him launching
away in a career of social dissipation; dining and supping out; at clubs,
at routs, at theaters; he is a guest with Johnson at the Thrales, and an
object of Mrs. Thrale's lively sallies; he is a lion at Mrs. Vesey's and
Mrs. Montagu's, where some of the high-bred blue-stockings pronounce him a
"wild genius," and others, peradventure, a "wild Irishman. " In the meantime
his pecuniary difficulties are increasing upon him, conflicting with his
proneness to pleasure and expense, and contributing by the harassment of
his mind to the wear and tear of his constitution. His Animated Nature,
though not finished, had been entirely paid for, and the money spent. The
money advanced by Garrick on Newbery's note still hangs over him as a debt.
The tale on which Newbery had loaned from two to three hundred pounds
previous to the excursion to Barton has proved a failure. The bookseller is
urgent for the settlement of his complicated account; the perplexed author
has nothing to offer him in liquidation but the copyright of the comedy
which he has in his portfolio; "Though to tell you the truth, Frank," said
he, "there are great doubts of its success. " The offer was accepted, and,
like bargains wrung from Goldsmith in times of emergency, turned out a
golden speculation to the bookseller.
In this way Goldsmith went on "outrunning the constable," as he termed it;
spending everything in advance; working with an overtasked head and weary
heart to pay for past pleasures and past extravagance, and at the same time
incurring new debts, to perpetuate his struggles and darken his future
prospects. While the excitement of society and the excitement of
composition conspire to keep up a feverishness of the system, he has
incurred an unfortunate habit of quacking himself with James' powders, a
fashionable panacea of the day.
A farce, produced this year by Garrick, and entitled The Irish Widow,
perpetuates the memory of practical jokes played off a year or two
previously upon the alleged vanity of poor, simple-hearted Goldsmith. He
was one evening at the house of his friend Burke, when he was beset by a
tenth muse, an Irish widow and authoress, just arrived from Ireland, full
of brogue and blunders, and poetic fire and rantipole gentility. She was
soliciting subscriptions for her poems; and assailed Goldsmith for his
patronage; the great Goldsmith--her countryman, and of course her friend.
She overpowered him with eulogiums on his own poems, and then read some of
her own, with vehemence of tone and gesture, appealing continually to the
great Goldsmith to know how he relished them.
Poor Goldsmith did all that a kind-hearted and gallant gentleman could do
hi such a case; he praised her poems as far as the stomach of his sense
would permit: perhaps a little further; he offered her his subscription,
and it was not until she had retired with many parting compliments to the
great Goldsmith that he pronounced the poetry which had been inflicted on
him execrable. The whole scene had been a hoax got up by Burke for the
amusement of his company, and the Irish widow, so admirably performed, had
been personated by a Mrs. Balfour, a lady of his connection, of great
sprightliness and talent.
We see nothing in the story to establish the alleged vanity of Goldsmith,
but we think it tells rather to the disadvantage of Burke; being
unwarrantable under their relations of friendship, and a species of waggery
quite beneath his genius. Croker, in his notes to Boswell, gives another of
these practical jokes perpetrated by Burke at the expense of Goldsmith's
credulity. It was related to Croker by Colonel O'Moore, of Cloghan Castle,
in Ireland, who was a party concerned. The colonel and Burke, walking one
day through Leicester Square on their way to Sir Joshua Reynolds', with
whom they were to dine, observed Goldsmith, who was likewise to be a guest,
standing and regarding a crowd which was staring and shouting at some
foreign ladies in the window of a hotel. "Observe Goldsmith," said Burke to
O'Moore, "and mark what passes between us at Sir Joshua's. " They passed on
and reached there before him. Burke received Goldsmith with affected
reserve and coldness; being pressed to explain the reason. "Really," said
he, "I am ashamed to keep company with a person who could act as you have
just done in the Square. " Goldsmith protested he was ignorant of what was
meant. "Why," said Burke, "did you not exclaim as you were looking up at
those women, what stupid beasts the crowd must be for staring with such
admiration at those _painted Jezebels_, while a man of your talents
passed by unnoticed? " "Surely, surely, my dear friend," cried Goldsmith,
with alarm, "surely I did not say so? " "Nay," replied Burke, "if you had
not said so, how should I have known it? " "That's true," answered
Goldsmith, "I am very sorry--it was very foolish: _I do recollect that
something thing of the kind passed through my mind, but I did not think I
had uttered it_. "
It is proper to observe that these jokes were played off by Burke before he
had attained the full eminence of his social position, and that he may have
felt privileged to take liberties with Goldsmith as his countryman and
college associate. It is evident, however, that the peculiarities of the
latter, and his guileless simplicity, made him a butt for the broad waggery
of some of his associates; while others more polished, though equally
perfidious, are on the watch to give currency to his bulls and blunders.
The Stratford jubilee, in honor of Shakespeare, where Boswell had made a
fool of himself, was still in every one's mind. It was sportively suggested
that a fete should be held at Lichfield in honor of Johnson and Garrick,
and that the Beaux' Stratagem should be played by the members of the
Literary Club. "Then," exclaimed Goldsmith, "I shall certainly play Scrub.
I should like of all things to try my hand at that character. " The unwary
speech, which any one else might have made without comment, has been
thought worthy of record as whimsically characteristic. Beauclerc was
extremely apt to circulate anecdotes at his expense, founded perhaps on
some trivial incident, but dressed up with the embellishments of his
sarcastic brain. One relates to a venerable dish of peas, served up at Sir
Joshua's table, which should have been green, but were any other color. A
wag suggested to Goldsmith, in a whisper, that they should be sent to
Hammersmith, as that was the way to _turn-em-green_ (Turnham-Green).
Goldsmith, delighted with the pun, endeavored to repeat it at Burke's
table, but missed the point. "That is the way to _make_ 'em green,"
said he. Nobody laughed. He perceived he was at fault. "I mean that is the
_road_ to turn 'em green. " A dead pause and a stare; "whereupon," adds
Beauclerc, "he started up disconcerted and abruptly left the table. " This
is evidently one of Beauclerc's caricatures.
On another occasion the poet and Beauclerc were seated at the theater next
to Lord Shelburne, the minister, whom political writers thought proper to
nickname Malagrida. "Do you know," said Goldsmith to his lordship, in the
course of conversation, "that I never could conceive why they called you
Malagrida, _for_ Malagrida was a very good sort of man. " This was too
good a trip of the tongue for Beauclerc to let pass: he serves it up in his
next letter to Lord Charlemont, as a specimen of a mode of turning a
thought the wrong way, peculiar to the poet; he makes merry over it with
his witty and sarcastic compeer, Horace Walpole, who pronounces it "a
picture of Goldsmith's whole life. " Dr. Johnson alone, when he hears it
bandied about as Goldsmith's last blunder, growls forth a friendly defense:
"Sir," said he, "it was a mere blunder in emphasis. He meant to say, I
wonder they should use Malagrida as a term of reproach. " Poor Goldsmith! On
such points he was ever doomed to be misinterpreted. Rogers, the poet,
meeting in times long subsequent with a survivor of those days, asked him
what Goldsmith really was in conversation. The old conversational character
was too deeply stamped in the memory of the veteran to be effaced. "Sir,"
replied the old wiseacre, "_he was a fool_. The right word never came
to him. If you gave him back a bad shilling, he'd say, Why, it's as good a
shilling as ever was _born_. You know he ought to have said
_coined_. _Coined_, sir, never entered his head. _He was a
fool, sir_. "
We have so many anecdotes in which Goldsmith's simplicity is played upon
that it is quite a treat to meet with one in which he is represented
playing upon the simplicity of others, especially when the victim of his
joke is the "Great Cham" himself, whom all others are disposed to hold so
much in awe. Goldsmith and Johnson were supping cozily together at a tavern
in Dean Street, Soho, kept by Jack Roberts, a singer at Drury Lane, and a
protege of Garrick's. Johnson delighted in these gastronomical
tete-a-tetes, and was expatiating in high good-humor on rumps and kidneys,
the veins of his forehead swelling with the ardor of mastication. "These,"
said he, "are pretty little things; but a man must eat a great many of them
before he is filled. " "Ay; but how many of them," asked Goldsmith, with
affected simplicity, "would reach to the moon? " "To the moon! Ah, sir,
that, I fear, exceeds your calculation. " "Not at all, sir; I think I could
tell. " "Pray, then, sir, let us hear. " "Why, sir, one, _if it were long
enough_! " Johnson growled for a time at finding himself caught in such a
trite schoolboy trap. "Well, sir," cried he at length, "I have deserved it.
I should not have provoked so foolish an answer by so foolish a question. "
Among the many incidents related as illustrative of Goldsmith's vanity and
envy is one which occurred one evening when he was in a drawing-room with a
party of ladies, and a ballad-singer under the window struck up his
favorite song of Sally Salisbury. "How miserably this woman sings! "
exclaimed he. "Pray, doctor," said the lady of the house, "could you do it
better? " "Yes, madam, and the company shall be judges. " The company, of
course, prepared to be entertained by an absurdity; but their smiles were
wellnigh turned to tears, for he acquitted himself with a skill and pathos
that drew universal applause. He had, in fact, a delicate ear for music,
which had been jarred by the false notes of the ballad-singer; and there
were certain pathetic ballads, associated with recollections of his
childhood, which were sure to touch the springs of his heart. We have
another story of him, connected with ballad-singing, which is still more
characteristic. He was one evening at the house of Sir William Chambers, in
Berners Street, seated at a whist table with Sir William, Lady Chambers,
and Baretti, when all at once he threw down his cards, hurried out of the
room and into the street. He returned in an instant, resumed his seat, and
the game went on. Sir William, after a little hesitation, ventured to ask
the cause of his retreat, fearing he had been overcome by the heat of the
room. "Not at all," replied Goldsmith; "but in truth I could not bear to
hear that unfortunate woman in the street, half singing, half sobbing, for
such tones could only arise from the extremity of distress; her voice
grated painfully on my ear and jarred my frame, so that I could not rest
until I had sent her away. " It was in fact a poor ballad-singer, whose
cracked voice had been heard by others of the party, but without having the
same effect on their sensibilities. It was the reality of his fictitious
scene in the story of the "Man in Black"; wherein he describes a woman in
rags with one child in her arms and another on her back, attempting to sing
ballads, but with such a mournful voice that it was difficult to determine
whether she was singing or crying. "A wretch," he adds, "who, in the
deepest distress, still aimed at good-humor, was an object my friend was by
no means capable of withstanding. " The Man in Black gave the poor woman all
that he had--a bundle of matches. Goldsmith, it is probable, sent his
ballad-singer away rejoicing with all the money in his pocket.
Ranelagh was at that time greatly in vogue as a place of public
entertainment. It was situated near Chelsea; the principal room was a
rotunda of great dimensions, with an orchestra in the center and tiers of
boxes all round. It was a place to which Johnson resorted occasionally. "I
am a great friend to public amusements," said he, "for they keep people
from vice. " [Footnote: "Alas, sir! " said Johnson, speaking, when in another
mood, of grand houses, fine gardens, and splendid places of public
amusement; "alas, sir! these are only struggles for happiness. When I first
entered Ranelagh it gave an expansion and gay sensation to my mind, such as
I never experienced anywhere else. But, as Xerxes wept when he viewed his
immense army, and considered that not one of that great multitude would be
alive a hundred years afterward, so it went to my heart to consider that
there was not one in all that brilliant circle that was not afraid to go
home and think. "] Goldsmith was equally a friend to them, though perhaps
not altogether on such moral grounds. He was particularly fond of
masquerades, which were then exceedingly popular, and got up at Ranelagh
with great expense and magnificence. Sir Joshua Reynolds, who had likewise
a taste for such amusements, was sometimes his companion, at other times he
went alone; his peculiarities of person and manner would soon betray him,
whatever might be his disguise, and he would be singled out by wags,
acquainted with his foibles, and more successful than himself in
maintaining their incognito, as a capital subject to be played upon. Some,
pretending not to know him, would decry his writings, and praise those of
his contemporaries; others would laud his verses to the skies, but
purposely misquote and burlesque them; others would annoy him with
parodies; while one young lady, whom he was teasing, as he supposed, with
great success and infinite humor, silenced his rather boisterous laughter
by quoting his own line about "the loud laugh that speaks the vacant mind. "
On one occasion he was absolutely driven out of the house by the
persevering jokes of a wag, whose complete disguise gave him no means of
retaliation.
His name appearing in the newspapers among the distinguished persons
present at one of these amusements, his old enemy, Kenrick, immediately
addressed to him a copy of anonymous verses, to the following purport.
TO DR. GOLDSMITH
ON SEEING HIS NAME IN THE LIST OF MUMMERS AT THE LATE MASQUERADE
"How widely different, Goldsmith, are the ways
Of doctors now, and those of ancient days!
Theirs taught the truth in academic shades,
Ours in lewd hops and midnight masquerades.
So changed the times! say, philosophic sage,
Whose genius suits so well this tasteful age,
Is the Pantheon, late a sink obscene,
Become the fountain of chaste Hippocrene?
Or do thy moral numbers quaintly flow,
Inspired by th' _Aganippe_ of Soho?
Do wisdom's sons gorge cates and vermicelli,
Like beastly Bickerstaffe or bothering Kelly?
Or art thou tired of th' undeserved applause
Bestowed on bards affecting Virtue's cause?
Is this the good that makes the humble vain,
The good philosophy should not disdain?
If so, let pride dissemble all it can,
A modern sage is still much less than man. "
Goldsmith was keenly sensitive to attacks of the kind, and meeting Kenrick
at the Chapter Coffee-house, called him to sharp account for taking such a
liberty with his name, and calling his morals in question, merely on
account of his being seen at a place of general resort and amusement.
Kenrick shuffled and sneaked, protesting that he meant nothing derogatory
to his private character. Goldsmith let him know, however, that he was
aware of his having more than once indulged in attacks of this dastard
kind, and intimated that another such outrage would be followed by personal
chastisement.
Kenrick having played the craven in his presence, avenged himself as soon
as he was gone by complaining of his having made a wanton attack upon him,
and by making coarse comments upon his writings, conversation and person.
The scurrilous satire of Kenrick, however unmerited, may have checked
Goldsmith's taste for masquerades. Sir Joshua Reynolds, calling on the poet
one morning, found him walking about his room in somewhat of a reverie,
kicking a bundle of clothes before him like a football. It proved to be an
expensive masquerade dress, which he said he had been fool enough to
purchase, and as there was no other way of getting the worth of his money,
he was trying to take it out in exercise.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
INVITATION TO CHRISTMAS--THE SPRING VELVET COAT--THE HAYMAKING WIG--THE
MISCHANCES OF LOO--THE FAIR CULPRIT--A DANCE WITH THE JESSAMY BRIDE
From the feverish dissipations of town, Goldsmith is summoned away to
partake of the genial dissipations of the country. In the month of
December, a letter from Mrs.
Bunbury invites him down to Barton, to pass
the Christmas holidays. The letter is written in the usual playful vein
which marks his intercourse with this charming family. He is to come in his
"smart spring-velvet coat," to bring a new wig to dance with the haymakers
in, and, above all, to follow the advice of herself and her sister (the
Jessamy Bride), in playing loo. This letter, which plays so archly, yet
kindly, with some of poor Goldsmith's peculiarities, and bespeaks such real
ladylike regard for him, requires a word or two of annotation. The
spring-velvet suit alluded to appears to have been a gallant adornment
(somewhat in the style of the famous bloom-colored coat) in which Goldsmith
had figured in the preceding month of May--the season of blossoms--for, on
the 21st of that month we find the following entry in the chronicle of Mr.
William Filby, tailor: _To your blue velvet suit_, £21 10s. 9d. Also,
about the same time, a suit of livery and a crimson collar for the serving
man. Again we hold the Jessamy Bride responsible for this gorgeous splendor
of wardrobe.
The new wig no doubt is a bag-wig and solitaire, still highly the mode, and
in which Goldsmith is represented as figuring when in full dress, equipped
with his sword.
As to the dancing with the haymakers, we presume it alludes to some gambol
of the poet, in the course of his former visit to Barton; when he ranged
the fields and lawns a chartered libertine, and tumbled into the
fish-ponds.
As to the suggestions about loo, they are in sportive allusion to the
doctor's mode of playing that game in their merry evening parties;
affecting the desperate gambler and easy dupe; running counter to all rule;
making extravagant ventures; reproaching all others with cowardice; dashing
at all hazards at the pool, and getting himself completely loo'd, to the
great amusement of the company. The drift of the fair sisters' advice was
most probably to tempt him on, and then leave him in the lurch.
With these comments we subjoin Goldsmith's reply to Mrs. Bunbury, a fine
piece of off-hand, humorous writing, which has but in late years been given
to the public, and which throws a familiar light on the social circle at
Barton.
"Madam--I read your letter with all that allowance which critical candor
could require, but after all find so much to object to, and so much to
raise my indignation, that I cannot help giving it a serious answer. I am
not so ignorant, madam, as not to see there are many sarcasms contained in
it, and solecisms also. (Solecism is a word that comes from the town of
Soleis in Attica, among the Greeks, built by Solon, and applied as we use
the word Kidderminster for curtains from a town also of that name--but this
is learning you have no taste for! )--I say, madam, there are many sarcasms
in it, and solecisms also. But not to seem an ill-natured critic, I'll take
leave to quote your own words, and give you my remarks upon them as they
occur. You begin as follows:
"'I hope, my good doctor, you soon will be here,
And your spring-velvet coat very smart will appear,
To open our ball the first day of the year. '
"Pray, madam, where did you ever find the epithet 'good,' applied to the
title of doctor? Had you called me 'learned doctor,' or 'grave doctor,' or
'noble doctor,' it might be allowable, because they belong to the
profession. But, not to cavil at trifles, you talk of 'my spring-velvet
coat,' and advise me to wear it the first day in the year, that is, in the
middle of winter! --a spring-velvet coat in the middle of winter! ! ! That
would be a solecism indeed! and yet to increase the inconsistence, in
another part of your letter you call me a beau. Now, on one side or other
you must be wrong. If I am a beau, I can never think of wearing a
spring-velvet in winter; and if I am not a beau, why then, that explains
itself. But let me go on to your two next strange lines:
"'And bring with you a wig, that is modish and gay,
To dance with the girls that are makers of hay. '
"The absurdity of making hay at Christmas you yourself seem sensible of:
you say your sister will laugh; and so indeed she well may! The Latins have
an expression for a contemptuous kind of laughter, 'naso contemnere
adunco'; that is, to laugh with a crooked nose. She may laugh at you in the
manner of the ancients if she thinks fit. But now I come to the most
extraordinary of all extraordinary propositions, which is, to take your and
your sister's advice in playing at loo. The presumption of the offer raises
my indignation beyond the bounds of prose; it inspires me at once with
verse and resentment. I take advice! and from whom? You shall hear.
"First let me suppose, what may shortly be true,
The company set, and the word to be Loo:
All smirking, and pleasant, and big with adventure,
And ogling the stake which is fix'd in the center.
Round and round go the cards, while I inwardly damn
At never once finding a visit from Pam.
I lay down my stake, apparently cool,
While the harpies about me all pocket the pool.
I fret in my gizzard, yet, cautious and sly,
I wish all my friends may be bolder than I:
Yet still they sit snug, not a creature will aim
By losing their money to venture at fame.
'Tis in vain that at niggardly caution I scold,
'Tis in vain that I flatter the brave and the bold:
All play their own way, and they think me an ass,. . .
'What does Mrs. Bunbury? ' . . . 'I, Sir? I pass. '
'Pray what does Miss Horneck? take courage, come do,'. . .
'Who, I? let me see, sir, why I must pass too. '
Mr. Bunbury frets, and I fret like the devil,
To see them so cowardly, lucky, and civil.
Yet still I sit snug, and continue to sigh on,
Till, made by my losses as bold as a lion,
I venture at all, while my avarice regards
The whole pool as my own. . . 'Come, give me five cards. '
'Well done! ' cry the ladies; 'Ah, doctor, that's good!
The pool's very rich,. . . ah! the doctor is loo'd! '
Thus foil'd in my courage, on all sides perplext,
I ask for advice from the lady that's next:
'Pray, ma'am, be so good as to give your advice;
Don't you think the best way is to venture for't twice! '
'I advise,' cries the lady, 'to try it, I own. . . .
Ah! the doctor is loo'd! Come, doctor, put down. '
Thus, playing, and playing, I still grow more eager,
And so bold, and so bold, I'm at last a bold beggar.
Now, ladies, I ask, if law-matters you're skill'd in,
Whether crimes such as yours should not come before Fielding:
For giving advice that is not worth a straw,
May well be call'd picking of pockets in law;
And picking of pockets, with which I now charge ye,
Is, by quinto Elizabeth, Death without Clergy.
What justice, when both to the Old Bailey brought!
By the gods, I'll enjoy it, tho' 'tis but in thought!
Both are plac'd at the bar, with all proper decorum,
With bunches of fennel, and nosegays before 'em;
Both cover their faces with mobs and all that,
But the judge bids them, angrily, take off their hat.
When uncover'd, a buzz of inquiry runs round,
'Pray what are their crimes? '. . . 'They've been pilfering found. '
'But, pray, who have they pilfer'd? '. . . 'A doctor, I hear. '
_'What, yon solemn-faced, odd-looking man that stands near? '_
'The same. '. . . 'What a pity! how does it surprise one,
_Two handsomer culprits I never set eyes on! '_
Then their friends all come round me with cringing and leering,
To melt me to pity, and soften my swearing.
First Sir Charles advances with phrases wellstrung,
'Consider, dear doctor, the girls are but young. '
'The younger the worse,' I return him again,
'It shows that their habits are all dyed in grain. '
'But then they're so handsome, one's bosom it grieves.
'What signifies _handsome_, when people are thieves? '
'But where is your justice? their cases are hard. '
'What signifies _justice_? I want the _reward_.
"'There's the parish of Edmonton offers forty pounds; there's the parish of
St. Leonard Shoreditch offers forty pounds; there's the parish of Tyburn,
from the Hog-in-the-pound to St. Giles' watch-house, offers forty pounds--I
shall have all that if I convict them! '--
"'But consider their case,. . . it may yet be your own!
And see how they kneel! Is your heart made of stone! '
This moves! . . . so at last I agree to relent,
For ten pounds in hand, and ten pounds to be spent. '
"I challenge you all to answer this: I tell you, you cannot. It cuts deep.
But now for the rest of the letter: and next--but I want room--so I believe
I shall battle the rest out at Barton some day next week. I don't value you
all!
"O. G. "
We regret that we have no record of this Christmas visit to Barton; that
the poet had no Boswell to follow at his heels, and take note of all his
sayings and doings. We can only picture him in our minds, casting off all
care; enacting the lord of misrule; presiding at the Christmas revels;
providing all kinds of merriment; keeping the card-table in an uproar, and
finally opening the ball on the first day of the year in his spring-velvet
suit, with the Jessamy Bride for a partner.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
THEATRICAL DELAYS--NEGOTIATIONS WITH COLMAN--LETTER TO GARRICK--CROAKING OF
THE MANAGER--NAMING OF THE PLAY--SHE STOOPS TO CONQUER--FOOTE'S PRIMITIVE
PUPPET-SHOW, PIETY ON PATTENS--FIRST PERFORMANCE OF THE COMEDY--AGITATION
OF THE AUTHOR--SUCCESS--COLMAN SQUIBBED OUT OF TOWN
The gay life depicted in the two last chapters, while it kept Goldsmith in
a state of continual excitement, aggravated the malady which was impairing
his constitution; yet his increasing perplexities in money matters drove
him to the dissipation of society as a relief from solitary care. The
delays of the theater added to those perplexities. He had long since
finished his new comedy, yet the year 1772 passed away without his being
able to get it on the stage. No one, uninitiated in the interior of a
theater, that little world of traps and trickery, can have any idea of the
obstacles and perplexities multiplied in the way of the most eminent and
successful author by the mismanagement of managers, the jealousies and
intrigues of rival authors, and the fantastic and impertinent caprices of
actors. A long and baffling negotiation was carried on between Goldsmith
and Colman, the manager of Covent Garden; who retained the play in his
hands until the middle of January (1773), without coming to a decision. The
theatrical season was rapidly passing away, and Goldsmith's pecuniary
difficulties were augmenting and pressing on him. We may judge of his
anxiety by the following letter:
"_To George Colman, Esq. _
"DEAR SIR--I entreat you'll relieve me from that state of suspense in which
I have been kept for a long time. Whatever objections you have made or
shall make to my play, I will endeavor to remove and not argue about them.
To bring in any new judges, either of its merits or faults, I can never
submit to. Upon a former occasion, when my other play was before Mr.
Garrick, he offered to bring me before Mr. Whitehead's tribunal, but I
refused the proposal with indignation: I hope I shall not experience as
harsh treatment from you as from him. I have, as you know, a large sum of
money to make up shortly; by accepting my play, I can readily satisfy my
creditor that way; at any rate, I must look about to some certainty to be
prepared. For God's sake take the play, and let us make the best of it, and
let me have the same measure, at least, which you have given as bad plays
as mine. I am your friend and servant,
"OLIVER GOLDSMITH. "
Colman returned the manuscript with the blank sides of the leaves scored
with disparaging comments and suggested alterations, but with the
intimation that the faith of the theater should be kept, and the play acted
notwithstanding. Goldsmith submitted the criticisms to some of his friends,
who pronounced them trivial, unfair, and contemptible, and intimated that
Colman, being a dramatic writer himself, might be actuated by jealousy. The
play was then sent, with Colman's comments written on it, to Garrick; but
he had scarce sent it when Johnson interfered, represented the evil that
might result from an apparent rejection of it by Covent Garden, and
undertook to go forthwith to Colman, and have a talk with him on the
subject. Goldsmith, therefore, penned the following note to Garrick:
"DEAR SIR--I ask many pardons for the trouble I gave you yesterday. Upon
more mature deliberation, and the advice of a sensible friend, I began to
think it indelicate in me to throw upon you the odium of confirming Mr.
Colman's sentence. I therefore request you will send my play back by my
servant; for, having been assured of having it acted at the other house,
though I confess yours in every respect more to my wish, yet it would be
folly in me to forego an advantage which lies in my power of appealing from
Mr. Colman's opinion to the judgment of the town. I entreat, if not too
late, you will keep this affair a secret for some time.
"I am, dear sir, your very humble servant,
"OLIVER GOLDSMITH. "
The negotiation of Johnson with the manager of Covent Garden was effective.
"Colman," he says, "was prevailed on at last, by much solicitation, nay, a
kind of force," to bring forward the comedy. Still the manager was
ungenerous; or, at least, indiscreet enough to express his opinion, that it
would not reach a second representation. The plot, he said, was bad, and
the interest not sustained; "it dwindled, and dwindled, and at last went
out like the snuff of a candle. " The effect of his croaking was soon
apparent within the walls of the theater. Two of the most popular actors,
Woodward and Gentleman Smith, to whom the parts of Tony Lumpkin and Young
Marlow were assigned, refused to act them; one of them alleging, in excuse,
the evil predictions of the manager. Goldsmith was advised to postpone the
performance of his play until he could get these important parts well
supplied. "No," said he, "I would sooner that my play were damned by bad
players than merely saved by good acting. "
Quick was substituted for Woodward in Tony Lumpkin, and Lee Lewis, the
harlequin of the theater, for Gentleman Smith in Young Marlow; and both did
justice to their parts.
Great interest was taken by Goldsmith's friends in the success of his
piece. The rehearsals were attended by Johnson, Cradock, Murphy, Reynolds
and his sister, and the whole Horneck connection, including, of course, the
"Jessamy Bride," whose presence may have contributed to flutter the anxious
heart of the author. The rehearsals went off with great applause, but that
Colman attributed to the partiality of friends. He continued to croak, and
refused to risk any expense in new scenery or dresses on a play which he
was sure would prove a failure.
The time was at hand for the first representation, and as yet the comedy
was without a title. "We are all in labor for a name for Goldy's play,"
said Johnson, who, as usual, took a kind of fatherly protecting interest in
poor Goldsmith's affairs. The Old House a New Inn was thought of for a
time, but still did not please. Sir Joshua Reynolds proposed The Belle's
Stratagem, an elegant title, but not considered applicable, the
perplexities of the comedy being produced by the mistake of the hero, not
the stratagem of the heroine. The name was afterward adopted by Mrs. Cowley
for one of her comedies. The Mistakes of a Night was the title at length
fixed upon, to which Goldsmith prefixed the words She Stoops to Conquer.
The evil bodings of Colman still continued; they were even communicated in
the box office to the servant of the Duke of Gloucester, who was sent to
engage a box. Never did the play of a popular writer struggle into
existence through more difficulties.
In the meantime Foote's Primitive Puppet-show, entitled the Handsome
Housemaid, or Piety on Pattens, had been brought out at the Haymarket on
the 15th of February. All the world, fashionable and unfashionable, had
crowded to the theater. The street was thronged with equipages--the doors
were stormed by the mob. The burlesque was completely successful, and
sentimental comedy received its quietus. Even Garrick, who had recently
befriended it, now gave it a kick, as he saw it going down hill, and sent
Goldsmith a humorous prologue to help his comedy of the opposite school.
Garrick and Goldsmith, however, were now on very cordial terms, to which
the social meetings in the circle of the Hornecks and Bunburys may have
contributed.
On the 15th of March the new comedy was to be performed. Those who had
stood up for its merits, and been irritated and disgusted by the treatment
it had received from the manager, determined to muster their forces, and
aid in giving it a good launch upon the town. The particulars of this
confederation, and of its triumphant success, are amusingly told by
Cumberland in his memoirs.
"We were not over-sanguine of success, but perfectly determined to struggle
hard for our author. We accordingly assembled our strength at the
Shakespeare Tavern, in a considerable body, for an early dinner, where
Samuel Johnson took the chair at the head of a long table, and was the life
and soul of the corps: the poet took post silently by his side, with the
Burkes, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Fitzherbert, Caleb Whitefoord, and a phalanx
of North British, predetermined applauders, under the banner of Major
Mills, all good men and true. Our illustrious president was in inimitable
glee; and poor Goldsmith that day took all his raillery as patiently and
complacently as my friend Boswell would have done any day or every day of
his life. In the meantime, we did not forget our duty; and though we had a
better comedy going, in which Johnson was chief actor, we betook ourselves
in good time to our separate and allotted posts, and waited the awful
drawing up of the curtain. As our stations were preconcerted, so were our
signals for plaudits arranged and determined upon in a manner that gave
every one his cue where to look for them, and how to follow them up.
"We had among us a very worthy and efficient member, long since lost to his
friends and the world at large, Adam Drummond, of amiable memory, who was
gifted by nature with the most sonorous, and, at the same time, the most
contagious laugh that ever echoed from the human lungs. The neighing of the
horse of the son of Hystaspes was a whisper to it; the whole thunder of the
theater could not drown it. This kind and ingenious friend fairly
forewarned us that he knew no more when to give his fire than the cannon
did that was planted on a battery. He desired, therefore, to have a flapper
at his elbow, and I had the honor to be deputed to that office. I planted
him in an upper box, pretty nearly over the stage, in full view of the pit
and galleries, and perfectly well situated to give the echo all its play
through the hollows and recesses of the theater.
