and at eleven o'clock at night a very benevolent as well as skilful surgeon-apothecary, named Hawes, who lived in the Strand, whom Goldsmith was in the habit of consulting, and to whose efforts to establish a humane society he had given active sympathy and assistance, was sent for. He found Goldsmith complaining of violent pain, extending over all the fore-part of his head; his tongue moist, his pulse at ninety, and his mind made up that he should be cured by James's fever-powders. He had derived such benefit from this fashionable medicine in previous attacks, that it seems to have left him with as obstinate a sense of its universal efficacy as Horace Walpole had, who swore he should take it if the house were on fire. Mr. Hawes saw at once, however, that, his complaint being more a nervous affection than a febrile disease, such a remedy would be dangerous; that it would force too large and sudden an exhaustion of the vital powers, to enable him to cope with the disease; and he implored him not to think of it. For more than half an hour, he says, he sat by the bedside, urging its probable danger; 'vehemently entreating' his difficult patient; but unable to prevail upon him to say he would not resort to it. Hawes then, after formal protest, said he had one request' to make of him. He very warmly asked me what that was.' It was that he would permit his friend Doctor Fordyce, who had formerly attended him, to be called in at once. He held out against this for some time; endeavoured to raise an obstacle by saying Fordyce was gone to spend the evening in Gerrard

Street (where,' poor Goldsmith added, I should also have been if I had not been indisposed'); and at last reluctantly consented. Hawes dispatched the note to Gerrard Street; and Fordyce, arriving soon after Hawes had left, seems to have given Goldsmith as strong a warning against the fever-medicine: but as unavailingly. Hawes sent medicine and leeches soon after twelve; and in the hope that Fordyce would have succeeded where he had failed, did not send the fever-powders ordered: but Goldsmith continued obstinate. The leeches were applied, the medicine rejected, and the lad who brought them was sent back for a packet of the powders.

So far, in substance, is the narrative of Hawes; which there is no ground for disputing. (I omit everything which is not strictly descriptive of the illness; but the good surgeon had evidently a strong regard for his patient. 'His humanity and generosity,' he says, and this was experience he had proved in many humane projects, 'greatly 'exceeded the narrow limits of his fortune; and those who

were no judges of the literary merit of the author, could 'not but love the man for that benevolence by which he was so strongly characterised.') Other facts, in what remains to be told, appeared in formal statements subsequently published by Newbery, the proprietor of the feverpowders, to vindicate the fame of his medicine. These were made and signed by Goldsmith's servant, John Eyles; his laundress, Mary Ginger; and a night nurse, Sarah Smith, called in on the second day of the illness. As soon as

Goldsmith took the powder sent him from the Strand, he protested it was the wrong powder; was very angry with Hawes; threatened to pay his bill next day, and have done with him; and certainly dispatched Eyles, in the afternoon of that day, for a fresh packet from Newbery's: sending at the same time for his laundress (she was wife of the head porter of the Temple), to come and sit by him until John returned;' describing himself, when she arrived, as worse; and damning Hawes (those were his very words') for the mistake he had made. In the afternoon and night of Saturday, two of these fresh powders were administered, one by the servant, the other by the nurse; the latter was also sent for another apothecary, named Maxwell, living near St. Dunstan's Church, who came, but declined to act as matters then stood: and from that time 'the patient followed the advice of his physicians.' He was too ill to make further resistance. Such is the substance of the evidence of the servants; in which a somewhat exaggerated form was given to what might in itself be substantially true, yet no way affect the veracity of Mr. Hawes. If Goldsmith asserted that a wrong powder had been sent, the sudden impulse to think so was not perhaps unnatural, after the course he had himself unwisely persisted in; but that Hawes really made the mistake, is not credible. Reynolds and Burke made later investigation, and wholly acquitted him; a recent inquirer and intelligent practitioner (Mr. White Cooper) confirms strongly the opinion on which he seems to have acted; nor did

poor Goldsmith himself very long adhere to the charge he had made.

Hawes (the substance of whose brief narrative I resume, with such illustrations as other sources have supplied) did not see his patient when he called on Saturday morning. 'His master was dozing, he lay very quiet,' was the announcement of Eyles. He called again at night; when, 'with great appearance of concern,' the man told him that everything was worse. Hawes went in, and found Goldsmith extremely exhausted and reduced, his pulse very quick and small; and on inquiring how he did, 'he sighed deeply, and in a very low voice said he wished he had 'taken my friendly advice last night.' To other questions he made no answer. He was so weak and low that he had neither strength nor spirit to speak. There was now, clearly, danger of the worst; and Fordyce next day proposed to call another physician, naming Doctor Turton, into consultation. Goldsmith's consent was obtained to this step at eight o'clock on Monday morning, and Hawes retired altogether from attendance. The patient had again passed a very bad night, 'and lay absolutely sunk with weakness.' Fordyce and Turton met that day; and continued their consultations twice daily, till all was over.

A week passed. The symptoms so fluctuating in the course of it, and the evidence of active disease so manifestly declining, that even sanguine expectations of recovery would appear to have been at one time entertained. But Goldsmith could not sleep. His reason seemed clear, what he

said was always perfectly sensible, he was at times even cheerful;' but sleep had deserted him, his appetite was gone, and it became obvious, in the state of weakness to which he had been reduced, that want of sleep might in itself be fatal. It then occurred to Doctor Turton to put a very pregnant question to his patient. Your pulse,' he said, 'is in greater disorder than it should be, from the degree ' of fever which you have. Is your mind at ease?' 'No, it is not,' was Goldsmith's melancholy answer. They are the last words we are to hear him utter in this world. The end arrived suddenly and unexpectedly. He lay in the sound and calm sleep which so anxiously had been looked for, at midnight on Sunday the 3rd of April; his respiration was easy and natural, his skin warm and moist, and the favourable turn was thought to have come. But at four o'clock in the morning, the apothecary Maxwell was called up in haste, and found him in strong convulsions. These continued without intermission; he sank rapidly; and at a quarter before five o'clock on the morning of Monday the 4th of April 1774, having then lived five months beyond his forty-fifth year, Oliver Goldsmith died.

When Burke was told, he burst into tears. Reynolds was in his painting-room when the messenger went to him: but at once he laid his pencil aside, which in times of great family distress he had not been known to do; left his painting