room was a Rotunda of great dimensions, with an orchestra in the centre, 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.”1 5 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 10 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 15 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, 20 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 25 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. alas, 1 "Alas, sir!" said Johnson, speaking, when in another mood, of grand houses, fine gardens, and splendid places of public amusement; 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 afterwards, 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." TO DR. GOLDSMITH; ON SEEING HIS NAME IN THE LIST OF MUMMERS AT THE LATE "How widely different, Goldsmith, are the ways A modern sage is still much less than man.' 10 15 Goldsmith was keenly sensitive to attacks of the kind, and meeting Kenrick at the Chapter Coffee-House, called him to 20 sharp account for taking such liberty with his name, and calling nis 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 25 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 30 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 35 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 XXXVI 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 sum5 moned 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 10"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 15 him, requires a word or two of annotation. This 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 20 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 servingman. Again we hold the Jessamy Bride responsible for this gorgeous splendor of wardrobe. 25 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 10 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. 15 "MADAME, 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, 20 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, that there are many sarcasms 25 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: 66 "I hope, my good Doctor, you soon will be here, 30 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 35 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 6 10 winter! a spring-velvet coat in the middle of winter!!! That would be a solecism indeed! and yet to increase the inconsistency, 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, 5 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, "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 man15 ner 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 20 take advice! and from whom? You shall hear. "First let me suppose, what may shortly be true, All smirking, and pleasant, and big with adventure, Round and round go the cards, while I inwardly damn 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: |