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 GOLDSMITH 93 imbridge, Mass. He made his discoveries with an ordinary spyglass from his studio in an attic. The academy of sciences bestowed on him its grand astronomical prize. GOLDSMITH, Oliver, an English author, born in the hamlet of Pallas or Pallasmore, county Longford, Ireland, Nov. 10, 1728, died in Lon- don, April 4, 1774. His father was a clergy- man of the established church, and at the birth of his son was very poor. Oliver's childhood gave no special indications of his future great- ness. An attack of smallpox from which he suffered while a child left its marks upon his naturally plain face, which, with a generally uninviting exterior, made his personal appear- ance especially unprepossessing. His elder brother Henry was a student at the university, and several relatives contributed to send Oli- ver there; and in 1744 he entered Trinity col- lege, Dublin, as a sizar or poor scholar. At that time the position of that class of students was highly disagreeable. Their dress was pe- culiar and designed to indicate their poverty, and they were required to perform many of the menial services of the institution. It was with the utmost reluctance that Goldsmith submitted to these humbling conditions, and while subject to them he was "moody and de- sponding." He was often reduced to great straits, but by borrowing, pawning his books, and writing ballads he contrived to keep his place. In 1749 he was admitted to the degree of bachelor of arts, and took his final leave of the university. He now returned home, and after some months had been spent in aimless loiter- ings was persuaded to prepare for the church. The two years of his probation were spent at Lissoy and Ballymahon, among the idlers at the village inns or in desultory reading. In due time he presented himself, arrayed in a fashionable dress, part of which consisted of a pair of scarlet breeches, to the bishop of Elphin for ordination, and was rejected. He now ob- tained employment as tutor in a gentleman's family, where he remained a few months, when he quarrelled with the family, and so found himself once more a free man with more money than he had ever before possessed. He bought a horse, and, with 30 in his pocket, sallied out upon the world. A few weeks after he returned home as destitute as he had been six months before. A large part of his money had been paid for a passage to America, but when the ship sailed he was enjoying himself with some friends in the country. It was next de- termined that he should try the legal profes- sion, and an uncle affording him the means, he set out for London with 50, which he lost in gaming in Dublin ; and after remaining se- creted for some time, he again returned to his friends. He was next, toward the end of 1752, sent to Edinburgh to study medicine. Two winters were devoted to hearing lectures ; but near the end of his second term, burdened with debts and hunted by bailiffs, he escaped from Edinburgh and fled to the continent. He passed nearly a year at Leyden, ostensibly hearing lec- tures, but really devoting most of his time to pleasure, and then, after selling his books and borrowing money from his friends, he set out for Paris, where he attended chemical lectures. After remaining there, but a little while, he set out to make the tour of the continent. Taking parts of Germany and Switzerland in his way, he passed to Marseilles, and thence into Italy. How he supported himself in these wanderings is told by,himself, though his accounts of this part of his life must be received with caution. He says in the story of the "Philosophical Vagabond " in the " Vicar of Wakefield " : "I had some knowledge of music, with a tolerable voice, and now turned what was my amuse- ment into a present means of subsistence Whenever I approached a peasant's house to- ward nightfall, I played one of my most merry tunes, and that procured me not only a lodg- ing, but subsistence for the next day." In Italy his musical powers no longer availed him, for, he said, every peasant was a better musician than himself; but he had acquired a habit of living by expedients, and here a new one pre- sented itself. "In all the foreign universities and convents," he continues, "there are upon certain days philosophical theses maintained against any adventitious disputant, for which, if the champion maintain with any degree of dexterity, he can claim a gratuity in money, a dinner, and a bed for the night. In this man- ner, therefore, I fought my way toward Eng- land, walked along from city to city, examined mankind more nearly, and, if I may so express it, saw both sides of the picture." At Padua, where he remained some months, he took his medical degree. After two years had been spent in vagrant rambles, early in 1756 he landed at Dover, friendless and penniless. How he made his way thence to the metropolis is uncertain ; it is only known that "in the middle of February he was wandering without friend or acquaint- ance, without the knowledge or comfort of one kind face, in the lonely, terrible London streets." For two or three years after his coming to London his history is very obscure. He was for some time an assistant to a chemist, and at another he practised medicine in South wark, acting at the same time as reader and corrector of the press for the novelist and publisher Samuel Eichardson. He was also for a while an usher in a school at Peckham, a business which he seems to have especially hated. It was while thus engaged that he accidentally met with the publisher of the " Monthly Re- view," by whom his services were engaged in the preparation of that publication. * His daily employment was to write for the review under the direction of his employer. The pages of the magazine very soon gave evidence of the acquisition that had been made to its contribu- tors, and even the writer himself began to hope that his better days were at hand. But his path was still a rough one. A daily drudgery was required of him, alike irksome to his indo-