Oliver Goldsmith, the most versatile and perhaps the most
unstable of eighteenth century men of letters, was born in
Ireland on November 10, 1728. At Trinity College, Dublin, he
revealed three characteristics that clung to him throughout
his career--high spirits, conversational brilliance, and
inability to keep money in his pocket. After a spell of
"philosophic vagabondage" on the Continent, he settled in
London in 1756, earned money in various ways, and spent it
all. "The Vicar of Wakefield," perhaps the greatest of all
Goldsmith's works, was published on March 27, 1766, after Dr.
Johnson had raised £60 for him on the manuscript of it. The
liveliness and grace of Goldsmith's style were never more
plainly manifested than in this delightful story; and its
faults--it contains many coincidences and improbabilities--are
far more than atoned for by the masterly portrait of the
simple, manly, generous, and wholly lovable vicar who is the
central figure of the story. "It has," says Mitford, "the
truth of Richardson, without his minuteness, and the humour of
Fielding, without his grossness; if it yields to LeSage in the
diversified variety of his views of life, it far excels him in
the description of domestic virtues and the pleasing moral of
the tale." Goldsmith died on April 4, 1774. (See also Vol.
XVII.)
_I.--Family Portraits_
I was ever of opinion that the honest man who married and brought up a
large family did more service than he who continued single and only
talked of population. From this motive, I chose my wife, as she did her
wedding-gown, not for a fine glossy surface, but such qualities as would
wear well. There was nothing that could make us angry with the world or
each other. We had no revolutions to fear, nor fatigues to undergo; all
our adventures were by the fireside, and all our migrations from the
blue bed to the brown.
My children, as they were educated without softness, so they were at
once well-formed and healthy; my four sons hardy and active, my two
daughters beautiful and blooming. Olivia, the elder daughter, was open,
sprightly, and commanding; Sophia's features were not so striking at
first, but often did more certain execution, for they were soft, modest,
and alluring.
The profits of my living I made over to the orphans and widows of the
clergy of our diocese; for, having a sufficient fortune of my own, I was
careless of temporalities, and felt a secret pleasure in doing my duty
without reward.
My eldest son, George, just upon leaving college, fixed his affections
upon Miss Arabella Wilmot, the daughter of a neighbouring clergyman, who
was in circumstances to give her a large fortune. Mr. Wilmot was not
averse to the match, but after the day for the nuptials had been fixed,
I engaged in a dispute with him which threatened to interrupt our
intended alliance. I have always maintained that it is unlawful for a
priest of the Church of England, after the death of his first wife, to
take a second; and I showed Mr. Wilmot a tract which I had written in
defence of this principle. It was not till too late I discovered that he
was violently attached to the contrary opinion, and with good reason;
for he was at that time actually courting a fourth wife.
While the controversy was hottest, a relation, with a face of concern,
called me out.
"The merchant in town," he said, "in whose hands your money was lodged
has gone off, to avoid a statute of bankruptcy. Your fortune is now
almost nothing."
It would be useless to describe the sensations of my family when I
divulged the news. Near a fortnight had passed before I attempted to
restrain their affliction; for premature consolation is but the
remembrance of sorrow. During this interval I determined to send my
eldest son to London, and I accepted a small cure of fifteen pounds a
year in a distant neighbourhood.
The first day's journey brought us within thirty miles of our future
retreat, and we put up at an obscure inn in a village by the way. At the
inn was a gentleman who, the landlord told me, had been so liberal in
his charity that he had no money left to pay his reckoning. I could not
avoid expressing my concern at seeing a gentleman in such circumstances,
and offered the stranger my purse. "I take it with all my heart, sir,"
replied he, "and am glad that my late oversight has shown me that there
are still some men like you." The stranger's conversation was so
pleasing and instructive that we were rejoiced to hear that he was going
the same way as ourselves.
The next morning we all set forward together. Mr. Burchell and I
lightened the fatigues of the road with philosophical disputes, and he
also informed me to whom the different seats belonged that lay in our
view.
"That, Dr. Primrose," he said to me, pointing to a very magnificent
house, "belongs to Mr. Thornhill, a young gentleman who enjoys a large
fortune, though entirely dependent upon the will of his uncle, Sir
William Thornhill."
"What!" cried I, "is my young landlord, then, the nephew of one who is
represented as a man of consummate benevolence?"
At this point we were alarmed by the cries of my family, and I perceived
my youngest daughter in the midst of a rapid stream, and struggling with
the torrent; she must have certainly perished had not my companion
instantly plunged in to her relief. Her gratitude may be more readily
imagined than described; she thanked her deliverer more with looks than
words. Soon afterwards Mr. Burchell took leave of us, and we pursued our
journey to the place of our retreat.
_II.--The Squire_
At a small distance from our habitation was a seat overshaded by a hedge
of hawthorn and honeysuckle. Here, when the weather was fine, and our
labour soon finished, we usually sat together to enjoy an extensive
landscape in the calm of the evening. On an afternoon about the
beginning of autumn, when I had drawn out my family to the seat, dogs
and horsemen swept past us with great swiftness. After them a young
gentleman, of a more genteel appearance than the rest, came forward,
and, instead of pursuing the chase, stopped short, and approached us
with a careless, superior air. He let us know that his name was
Thornhill, and that he was the owner of the estate that lay around us.
As his address, though confident, was easy, we soon became more
familiar; and the whole family seemed earnest to please him.
As soon as he was gone, my wife gave the opinion that it was a most
fortunate hit, and hoped again to see the day in which we might hold up
our heads with the best of them.
"For my part," cried Olivia, "I don't like him, he is so extremely
impudent and familiar." I interpreted this speech by contrary, and found
that Olivia secretly admired him.
"To confess the truth," said I, "he has not prepossessed me in his
favour. I had heard that he was particularly remarkable for
faithlessness to the fair sex."
A few days afterwards we entertained our young landlord at dinner, and
it may be easily supposed what provisions were exhausted to make an
appearance. As he directed his looks and conversation to Olivia, it was
no longer doubted but that she was the object that induced him to be our
visitor; and my wife exulted in her daughter's victory as if it were her
own.
On one evening Mr. Thornhill came with two young ladies, richly dressed,
whom he introduced as women of very great distinction and fashion from
town. The two ladies threw my girls quite into the shade, for they would
talk of nothing but high life and high-lived company. 'Tis true, they
once or twice mortified us sensibly by slipping out an oath; their
finery, however, threw a veil over any grossness in their conversation.
I now began to find that all my long and painful lectures upon
temperance, simplicity, and contentment were entirely disregarded. The
distinctions lately paid us by our betters awakened that pride which I
had laid asleep, but not removed. When the two ladies of quality showed
a willingness to take our girls to town with them as companions, my wife
was overjoyed at our good fortune. But Mr. Burchell, who had at first
been a welcome guest at our house, but had become less welcome since we
had been favoured with the company of persons of superior station,
dissuaded her with great ardour, and so angered her that she ended by
asking him to stay away.
Returning home one day, I found my wife and girls all in tears, Mr.
Thornhill having been there to inform them that their journey to town
was entirely over. The two ladies, having heard reports of us from some
malicious person, were that day set out for London. We were not long in
finding who it was that had been so base as to asperse the character of
a family so harmless as ours. One of our boys found a letter-case which
we knew to belong to Mr. Burchell. Within it was a sealed note,
superscribed, "The copy of a letter to be sent to the two ladies at
Thornhill Castle." At the joint solicitation of the family, I opened it,
and read as follows:
"Ladies,--I am informed that you have some intention of bringing two
young ladies to town, whom I have some knowledge of, under the character
of companions. As I would neither have simplicity imposed upon nor
virtue contaminated, I must offer it as my opinion that the impropriety
of such a step will be attended with dangerous consequences. Take
therefore, the admonition of a friend, and seriously reflect on the
consequences of introducing infamy and vice into retreats where peace
and innocence have hitherto resided."
Our doubts were now at an end. It appeared to me one of the vilest
instances of unprovoked ingratitude I had ever met with. As we set
ruminating upon schemes of vengeance, Mr. Burchell himself entered and
sat down.
"Do you know this, sir--this pocket-book?" said I.
"Yes, sir," returned he, with a face of impenetrable assurance.
"And do you know this letter?"
"Yes; it was I that wrote that letter."
"And how could you so basely presume to write this letter?"
"And how came you," replied he, with looks of unparalleled effrontery,
"so basely to presume to open this letter?"
I could scarcely govern my passion. "Ungrateful wretch!" I cried.
"Begone, and no longer pollute my dwelling with thy baseness!"
So saying, I threw him his pocket-book, which he took up with a smile,
and left us astonished at the serenity of his assurance.
_III.--The Elopement_
The visits of Mr. Thornhill now became more frequent and longer; but all
the schemes of Olivia and her mother to bring him to a declaration came
to nothing. And although Olivia considered his fine sentiments as
instances of the most exalted passion, it seemed to me plain that they
had more of love than matrimony in them.
One evening as I sat by the fireside, thanking Heaven for tranquillity,
health, and competence, and thinking myself happier than the greatest
monarch upon earth, I noticed that Olivia was absent.
"Where is my darling Olivia?" I asked. Just as I spoke, my boy Dick came
running in.
"Oh, papa, papa, she is gone from us; she is gone from us for ever!"
"Gone, child?"
"Yes; she is gone off with two gentlemen in a postchaise, and one of
them kissed her. And she cried very much, but he persuaded her, and she
went into the chaise."
"Now, then," cried I, "may Heaven's everlasting fury light upon him and
his! Thus to rob me of my child! Bring me my pistols; I'll pursue the
traitor. Old as I am, he shall find I can sting him yet--the perfidious
villain!"
My poor wife caught me in her arms.
"Indeed, sir," said my son Moses, "your rage is too violent."
"I did not curse him, child, did I?"
"Indeed, sir, you did."
"Then may Heaven forgive me and him. But it is not--it is not a small
distress that can wring tears from these old eyes. My child--to undo my
darling! May confusion seize--Heaven forgive me! What am I about to say?
Had she but died! My son, bring hither my Bible and my staff. I will
pursue her; and though I cannot save her from shame, I may prevent the
continuance of her iniquity."
My suspicions fell entirely upon our young landlord, whose character for
such intrigues was but too well known. I therefore directed my steps
towards Thornhill Castle. He soon appeared, with the most open, familiar
air, and seemed perfectly amazed at my daughter's elopement, protesting
upon his honour that he was quite a stranger to it. A man, however,
averred that my daughter and Mr. Burchell had been seen driving very
fast towards the Wells, about thirty miles distant.
I walked towards the Wells with earnestness, and on entering the town I
was met by a person on horseback, whom I remembered to have seen at the
squire's, and he assured me that if I followed them to the races, which
were but thirty miles further, I might depend upon overtaking them.
Early the next day I walked forward to the races, but saw nothing of my
daughter or of Mr. Burchell.
The agitations of my mind, and the fatigues I had undergone, now threw
me into a fever. I retired to a little ale-house by the roadside, and
here I languished for nearly three weeks.
The night coming on as I was twenty miles from home on my return
journey, I put up at a little public-house, and asked for the landlord's
company over a pint of wine. I could hear the landlady upstairs bitterly
reproaching a lodger who could not pay.
"Out, I say," she cried; "pack out this moment!"
"Oh, dear madame," replied the stranger, "pity a poor, abandoned
creature for one night and death will soon do the rest!"
I instantly knew the voice of my poor ruined child, Olivia, and flew to
her rescue.
"Welcome, anyway welcome, my dearest lost one, to your poor old father's
bosom!"
"Oh, my own dear"--for minutes she could say no more--"my own dearest,
good papa! You can't forgive me--I know you cannot!"
"Yes, my child, from my heart I do forgive thee." After we had talked
ourselves into some tranquillity, I said, "It surprises me how a person
of Mr. Burchell's seeming honour could be guilty of such deliberate
baseness."
"My dear papa," returned my daughter, "you labour under a strange
mistake. It is Mr. Thornhill who has ruined me; who employed the two
ladies, as he called them, but who, in fact, were abandoned women of the
town, to decoy us up to London. Their artifices would certainly have
succeeded but for Mr. Burchell's letter, who directed those reproaches
at them which we all applied to ourselves."
"You amaze me, my dear!" cried I. "But tell me, what temptation was it
that could thus obliterate your virtue?"
"He offered me marriage," replied she. "We were indeed married secretly
by a popish priest, whose name I was sworn to conceal."
"What!" interrupted I. "And were you indeed married?"
"Alas!" she said, "he has been married already by the same priest to six
or eight wives more, whom, like me, he has deceived and abandoned."
"Have patience, my child," cried I, "and I hope things will yet be
better. To-morrow I'll carry you home to your mother. Poor woman, this
has gone to her heart; but she loves you still, Olivia, and will forget
it."
_IV.--Fresh Calamities_
It was late the next night when I approached my own home. I had left
Olivia at an inn five miles away, intending to prepare my family for her
reception. To my amazement, I saw the house bursting out into a blaze of
fire, and every aperture red with conflagration! I gave a loud
convulsive outcry, which alarmed my son, and all my family ran out, wild
with apprehension. Our neighbours came running to our assistance; but
the flames had taken too strong a hold to be extinguished, and all the
neighbours could do was to stand spectators of the calamity. They
brought us clothes and furnished one of our outhouses with kitchen
utensils; so that by daylight we had another, though a wretched,
dwelling to retire to.
In the midst of this affliction our poor lost one returned to us. "Ah,
madam," cried her mother, "this is but a poor place to come to after so
much finery! I can afford but little entertainment to persons who have
kept company only with persons of distinction; but I hope Heaven will
forgive you."
The unhappy victim stood pale and trembling, unable to weep or to reply.
"I entreat, woman," I said to my wife, with severity in my voice and
manner, "that my words may be now marked once for all. I have here
brought you back a poor deluded wanderer--her return to duty demands the
revival of our tenderness. The real hardships of life are now coming
fast upon us; let us not increase them by dissensions among each other.
The kindness of Heaven is promised to the penitent, and let ours be
directed by the example."
My daughter's grief, however, seemed formed for continuing, and her
wretchedness was increased by the news that Mr. Thornhill was going to
be married to the rich Miss Wilmot, who had formerly been betrothed to
my eldest son.
On a morning of peculiar warmth for the season, when we were
breakfasting out of doors, Mr. Thornhill drove up in his chariot,
alighted, and inquired after my health with his usual air of
familiarity.
"Sir," replied I, "your present assurance only serves to aggravate your
baseness."
"My dear sir," returned he, "I cannot understand what this means!"
"Go!" cried I. "Thou art a poor, pitiful wretch, and every way a liar;
but your meanness secures you from my anger!"
"I find," he said, "you are bent upon obliging me to talk in a harsher
manner than I intended. My steward talks of driving for the rent, and it
is certain he knows his duty. Yet, still, I could wish to serve you, and
even to have you and your daughter present at my marriage."
"Mr. Thornhill," replied I, "as to your marriage with any but my
daughter, that I never will consent to! And though your friendship could
raise me to a throne, or your resentment sink me to the grave, yet would
I despise both."
"Depend upon it," returned he, "you shall feel the effects of this
insolence," and departed abruptly.
On the very next morning his steward came to demand my annual rent,
which, by reason of the accidents already related, I was unable to pay.
On the following day two officers of justice took me to the county gaol.
There is no situation, however wretched it seems, but has some sort of
comfort attending it; and I found mine in the help and kindness of a
fellow-prisoner, Mr. Jenkinson by name, who was awaiting trial for
several acts of cheating and roguery. I myself, indeed, had been one of
his victims.
The fortune of my family, who were lodged in the town, was wholly and
distressingly adverse. Olivia was ill, and longed for me to make my
submission to Mr. Thornhill by approving his marriage with Miss Wilmot.
When I had been confined a fortnight, Mr. Jenkinson brought me dreadful
news--Olivia was dead! And while yet my grief was fresh upon me my wife
came weeping to tell me that Sophia had been seized by ruffians and
carried off.
The sum of my miseries, thought, I, is now made up; nor is it in the
power of anything on earth to give me another pang. Yet another awaited
me. My eldest son, George, to whom I had written, went to Thornhill
Castle to punish our betrayer; he was attacked by the coward's servants,
injured one of them, and was brought into the very prison where I was
confined.
The enemy of my family had now triumphed completely. My only hope was in
a letter I had written to Sir William Thornhill, telling him of the
misdeeds of his nephew. I was by this time myself extremely ill. I
sought to break from my heart all ties that bound it to earth, and to
fit myself for eternity.
_V.--The Rescue_
On parting from my unhappy son, who was removed to a stronger cell, I
laid me down in bed, when Mr. Jenkinson, entering, informed me that
there was news of my daughter. He had scarcely delivered his message
when my dearest girl entered with Mr. Burchell.
"Here, papa," she cried, "here is the brave man to whom I owe my
delivery; to this gentleman's intrepidity--"
A kiss from Mr. Burchell interrupted what she was going to add.
"Ah, Mr. Burchell," said I, "you were ever our friend. We have long
discovered our errors with regard to you, and repented our ingratitude.
And now, as you have delivered my girl, if you think her a recompense,
she is yours."
"But I suppose, sir," he replied, "you are apprised of my incapacity to
support her as she deserves?"
"I know no man," I returned, "so worthy to deserve her as you."
Without the least reply to my offer, he ordered from the next inn the
best dinner that could be provided. While we were at dinner, the gaoler
brought a message from Mr. Thornhill, desiring permission to appear
before his uncle in order to vindicate his innocence and honour. The
poor, harmless Mr. Burchell, then, was in reality the celebrated Sir
William Thornhill!
Mr. Thornhill entered with a smile, and was going to embrace his uncle.
"No fawning, sir, at present," cried the baronet. "The only way to my
heart is by the road of honour; but here I only see complicated
instances of falsehood, cowardice, and oppression."
At this moment Jenkinson and the gaoler's two servants entered, hauling
in a tall man very genteelly dressed. As soon as Mr. Thornhill perceived
the prisoner and Mr. Jenkinson, he seemed to shrink backward with
terror, for this was the man whom he had put upon the carrying off of
Sophia.
"Heavens," cried Sir William, "what a viper have I been fostering in my
bosom!"
"As Mr. Thornhill and I have been old fellow-sporters," said Jenkinson,
"I have a friendship for him; and I hope he will show a proper return of
friendship to his own honest Jenkinson, who brings him a wife."
So saying, he went off and left us.
"I am surprised," said the baronet, "what he can intend by this?"
"When we reflect," I replied, "on the various schemes--Amazement! Do I
see my lost daughter? It is--it is my Olivia!"
"As for you, squire," said Jenkinson, "this young lady is your lawful
wedded wife. Here is the licence to prove it. He commissioned me,
gentlemen," he continued, "to procure him a false licence and a false
priest in order to deceive this young lady. What did I do, but went and
got a true licence and a true priest. To my shame, I confess it, my only
design was to keep the licence and let the squire know that I could
prove it upon him whenever I wanted money."
"How could you," I cried, "add to my miseries by the story of her
death?"
"That," replied Jenkinson, "is easily answered. I thought the only
probable means of freeing you from prison was by submitting to the
squire, and consenting to his marriage with the other young lady. But
this you had vowed never to grant while your daughter was living, so I
had to join with your wife in persuading you that she was dead."
Mr. Thornhill's assurance had now entirely forsaken him. He fell on his
knees before his uncle, and implored compassion.
"Thy vices, crimes, and ingratitude," said the baronet, "deserve no
compassion; but a bare competence shall be supplied thee, and thy wife
shall possess a third part of that fortune which once was thine." Then,
turning to Sophia, he caught her to his breast with ardour. "I have
sought," he cried, "for a woman who, a stranger to my fortune, could
think I had merit as a man. How great must be my rapture to have made a
conquest over such sense and such heavenly beauty!"
On the next day Sophia was wedded to Sir William Thornhill; and my son
George, now freed from justice, as the person supposed to be wounded by
him was detected to be an impostor, led Miss Wilmot to the altar. As
soon as I had awakened that morning, I had heard that my merchant had
been arrested at Antwerp, and that my fortune had been restored to me.
It may not be improper to observe, with respect to Mr. Thornhill, that
he now resides as companion at a relation's house. My eldest daughter
has told me that when he reforms she may be brought to relent.
I had now nothing on this side of the grave to wish for. All my cares
were over. It only remained that my gratitude in good fortune should
exceed my submission in adversity.
* * * * *