1770. He lost no opportunity of doing it. Not even to his Natural Et. 42. History did he turn, without venting upon this sorrowful theme, in sentences that sounded strangely amid his talk of beasts and birds, what lay so near his heart. "The lower race of animals, when satisfied, for the instant moment, are perfectly happy; but it is otherwise with man. His "mind anticipates distress, and feels the pang of want even "before it arrests him. Thus, the mind being continually "harassed by the situation, it at length influences the constitution, and unfits it for all its functions. Some cruel disorder, but no way like hunger, seizes the unhappy "sufferer; so that almost all those men who have thus long "lived by chance, and whose every day may be considered. "as an happy escape from famine, are known at last to die, 'in reality, of a disorder caused by hunger, but which, in "the common language, is often called a broken heart. "Some of these I have known myself, when very little able "to relieve them; and I have been told, by a very active "and worthy magistrate, that the number of such as die in "London for want, is much greater than one would imagine "I think he talked of two thousand in a year.' "* If this was already written, as from what he afterwards told Langton we may assume these portions of the Animated Nature to have been, Goldsmith little imagined the immortal name 66 very much approved, and that you were highly my friend. The first part of which was now to be added to the melancholy list. The writer of the sanguine letter I have quoted was doomed to be the next victim. He had not been in London many days, at the time when he so supposed he had mastered the booksellers; and in little less than three months after sending those hopeful tidings home, he yielded up his brain to the terrible disorder of which Goldsmith had seen so much-so unlike hunger, though hunger-bred. Gallantly had he worked in these three momentous months:* had projected histories of England, and voluminous histories of London; had written for Magazines, Registers, and Museums endless, the London, The language contains few things more affecting than the brief letters left by Chatterton, though as compositions they have no merit. I subjoin a few extracts. On the 26th April 1770, he writes to his "dear Mother:" "Here I am, safe, "and in high spirits. Got into London about five o'clock in the evening-called upon Mr. Edmunds, Mr. Fell, Mr. Hamilton, and Mr. Dodsley. Great encouragement from them; all approved of my design ;-shall soon be settled." On the 6th May he writes to his "dear Mother" from Shoreditch the letter already quoted (240), to which he adds, "I have some trifling presents for mother, sister, "&c." On the 14th May he writes: "I am invited to treat with a Doctor of 66 66 Music, on the footing of a composer, for Ranelagh and the Gardens. Bravo, hey "boys, up we go! Let my sister improve in copying music, and in drawing," &c. On the 30th of May he writes from "Tom's coffee-house" to his "dear sister." "I will send you two silks this summer; and expect, in answer to this, what "colours you prefer. My mother shall not be forgotten. My employment will be "in writing a voluminous History of London.. as this will not, like writing "political essays, oblige me to go to the coffee-house, I shall be able to serve you "the more by it." On the 19th June he writes to his mother. "I send you in the "box, six cups and saucers with two basins for my sister. If a China tea-pot and cream-pot is in your opinion necessary, I will send them. . Two fans-the "silver one is more grave than the other, which would suit my sister best. But that I leave to you both." He was now lodging at Mrs. Angel's the sack-maker, in Brook-street, Holborn. From that place, on the 20th July, he again writes to his sister. "I am now about an Oratorio, which, when finished, will purchase you "a gown." On the 12th August he writes to Mr. Catcott. "I intend going abroad as a surgeon. Mr. Barrett has it in his power to assist me greatly, by his giving me a physical character. I hope he will. I trouble you with a copy of an Essay I "intend publishing." These were the last thoughts which connected him with life or its hopes, and they were precisely what had visited Goldsmith in an only less sore extremity. He wished to escape as a surgeon to the coast of Africa, and to help himself to go by means of an essay he had written. But it was not to be. Exactly twelve days after the date of this letter he was found dead in his wretched lodging. 66 66 1770. Et. 42. 1770. Æt. 42. the Town and Country, the Middlesex Freeholders', the Court and City; had composed a musical burlesque burletta; had launched into politics on both sides; had contributed sixteen songs for ten and sixpence; had received gladly two shillings for an article; had lived on a halfpenny roll, or a penny tart and a glass of water a-day, enjoying now and then a sheep's tongue; had invented all the while brave letters about his happiness and success to the only creatures that loved him, his grandmother, mother, and sister at Bristol; had even sent them, out of his so many daily pence, bits of china, fans, and a gown; and then, one fatal morning, after many bitter disappointments (one of them precisely what Goldsmith had himself undergone in as desperate distress, just as one of his expedients for escape, by "going abroad as a surgeon," had been also what Goldsmith tried), having passed some three days without food, and refused his poor landlady's invitation to dinner, he was found dead in his miserable room, the floor thickly strewn with scraps of the manuscripts he had destroyed, a pocket-book memorandum lying near him to the effect that the booksellers owed him eleven pounds, and the cup which had held arsenic and water still grasped in his hand. It was in a wretched little street out of Holborn; the body was taken to the bone-house of St. Andrew's, but no one came to claim it; and in due time the pauper-burial-ground of Shoe-lane received what remained of Chatterton. "The "marvellous boy! The sleepless soul who perished in his pride!" He was not eighteen. The tragedy had all been acted out before Goldsmith heard of any of its incidents. I am even glad to think, that, during the whole of the month which preceded the catastrophe, he was absent from England. CHAPTER VIII. A VISIT TO PARIS. 1770. 1770. GOLDSMITH had quitted London on a visit to Paris in the middle of July. "The Professor of History," writes Mary Et. 42. Moser, the daughter of the keeper of the Academy,―telling Fuseli, at Rome, how disappointed the literary people connected with the new institution had been, not to receive diplomas of membership like the painters," is comforted by the success of his Deserted Village, which is a very pretty poem, and has lately put himself under the conduct of Mrs. "Horneck and her fair daughters, and is gone to France; "and Doctor Johnson sips his tea, and cares not for the "vanity of the world."* Goldsmith himself, with most pleasant humour, has described, in a letter to Sir Joshua Reynolds, what happened to the party up to their lodgment in Calais, at the Hôtel d'Angleterre. They had not arrived many hours when he sent over this fragment of a dispatch, to satisfy Reynolds merely of the safe arrival of Mrs. Horneck, the young ladies, and himself; "My dear Friend,” he wrote, "we had a very quick passage from Dover to Calais, which we performed in three hours and twenty minutes, all of us * Knowles's Life of Fuseli, i. 36. 1770. Et. 42. extremely sea-sick, which must necessarily have happened, as my machine to prevent sea-sickness was not completed. "We were glad to leave Dover, because we hated to be im"posed upon; so were in high spirits at coming to Calais, "where we were told, that a little money would go a great way. 66 66 66 66 Upon landing two little trunks, which was all we carried "with us, we were surprised to see fourteen or fifteen fellows "all running down to the ship to lay their hands upon them; four got under each trunk, the rest surrounded, and held "the hasps; and in this manner our little baggage was "conducted, with a kind of funeral solemnity, till it was safely lodged at the custom-house. We were well enough pleased with the people's civility till they came to be paid: "when every creature that had the happiness of but touching "our trunks with their finger, expected sixpence; and had so pretty, civil a manner of demanding it, that there was no refusing them. When we had done with the porters, we "had next to speak with the custom-house officers, who had "their pretty civil way too. We were directed to the Hôtel d'Angleterre, where a valet de place came to offer his service; and spoke to me ten minutes before I once found "out that he was speaking English. We had no occasion "for his service, so we gave him a little money because he spoke English, and because he wanted it. I cannot help mentioning another circumstance. I bought a new " ribbon for my wig at Canterbury, and the barber at Calais "broke it in order to gain sixpence by buying me a 66 new one." * 66 66 66 This was not a very promising beginning; but the party, continuing to carry with them the national enjoyment of * This delightful fragment of a letter was first printed in the Percy Memoir, 90-91. |