English Literature For Boys And Girls by H.E. Marshall

H >> H.E. Marshall >> English Literature For Boys And Girls

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30 | 31 | 32 | 33 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45

It was with Boswell that Johnson made his most famous journey,
his tour to Scotland. For, like his namesake, Ben, he too
visited Scotland. But he traveled in a more comfortable manner,
and his journey was a much longer one, for he went as far as the
Hebrides. It was a wonderful expedition for a man of sixty-four,
especially in those days when there were no trains and little
ease in the way of traveling, and when much of it had to be done
on rough ponies or in open boats.

On his return Johnson wrote an account of this journey which did
not altogether please some of the Scots. But indeed, although
Johnson did not love the Scots, there is little in his book at
which to take offense.

Johnson's last work was a series of short lives of some of the
English poets from the seventeenth century onwards. It is
generally looked upon as his best. And although some of the
poets of whom he wrote are almost forgotten, and although we may
think that he was wrong in his criticisms of many of the others,
this is the book of Johnson's which is still most read. For it
must be owned that the great Sam is not much read now, although
he is such an important figure in the history of our literature.
It is as a person that we remember him, not as a writer. He
stamped his personality, as it is called, upon his age. Boswell
caught that personality and preserved it for us, so that, for
generation after generation, Johnson lives as no other character
in English literature lives. Boswell gave a new meaning to the
word biographer, that is the writer of a life, and now when a
great man has had no one to write his life well, we say "He lacks
a Boswell."

Boswell after a time joined the famous club at which Johnson and
his friends met together and talked. Johnson loved to argue, and
he made a point of always getting the best of an argument. If he
could not do so by reason, he simply roared his opponent down and
silenced him by sheer rudeness. "There is no arguing with
Johnson," said one of his friends, Oliver Goldsmith, "for when
his pistol misses fire he knocks you down with the butt end of
it." And perhaps Goldy, as Johnson called him, had to suffer
more rudeness from him than any of his friends to save Bozzy.
Yet the three were often to be found together, and it was
Goldsmith who said of Johnson, "No man alive has a more tender
heart. He has nothing of the bear but his skin."

And indeed in Johnson's outward appearance there was much of the
bear. He was a sloven in dress. His clothes were shabby and
thrown on anyhow. "I have no passion for clean linen," he said
himself. At table he made strange noises and ate greedily, yet
in spite of all that, added to his noted temper and rude manners,
men loved him and sought his company more than that of any other
writer of his day, for "within that shaggy exterior of his there
beat a heart warm as a mother's, soft as a little child's."*

*Carlyle.

After Johnson received his pension we may look upon him as a
lumbering vessel which has weathered many a strong sea and has
now safely come to port. His life was henceforth easy. He
received honorary degrees, first from Dublin and then from
Oxford, so that he became Dr. Johnson. For two-and-twenty years
he enjoyed his pension, his freedom and his honors; then, in
1784, surrounded by his friends, he died in London, and was
buried in Westminster Abbey.

BOOKS TO READ

Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia. A Journey to the Western Islands
of Scotland.

Chapter LXX GOLDSMITH--THE VAGABOND

THE kind of book which is most written and read nowadays is
called a novel. But we have not yet spoken much about this kind
of book for until now there were no novels in our meaning of the
word. There were romances such as Havelok the Dane and Morte
d'Arthur, later still tales such as those of Defoe, and the
modern novel is the outcome of such tales and romances. But it
is usually supposed to be more like real life than a romance. In
a romance we may have giants and fairies, things beyond nature
and above nature. A novel is supposed to tell only of what could
happen, without the help of anything outside everyday life. This
is a kind of writing in which the English have become very
clever, and now, as I said, more novels than any other kinds of
book are written. But only a few of these are good enough to
take a place in our literature, and very many are not worth
reading or remembering at all.

The first real novel in the modern sense was written by Samuel
Richardson, and published in 1740. Quickly after that there
arose several other novel writers whose books became famous.
These still stand high in the literature of our land, but as
nothing in them would be interesting to you for many years to
come we need not trouble about them now. There is, however, one
novel of this early time which I feel sure you would like, and of
it and its author I shall tell you something. The book I mean is
called The Vicar of Wakefield, and it was written by Oliver
Goldsmith.

Oliver Goldsmith was born in 1728 in Pallas, a little out-of-the-
way Irish village. His father was a clergyman and farmer, with a
large family and very little money. He was a dear, simple,
kindly man.

"A man he was to all the country dear,
And passing rich with forty pounds a year."

Two years after Oliver was born his father moved to Lissoy,
another and better parish. Little Oliver began to learn very
early, but his first teacher thought him stupid: "Never was
there such a dull boy," she said. She managed, however, to teach
him the alphabet, and at six he went to the village school of
Lissoy. Paddy Byrne, the master there, was an old soldier. He
had fought under Marlborough, he had wandered the world seeking
and finding adventures. His head was full of tales of wild
exploits, of battles, of ghosts and fairies too, for he was an
Irishman and knew and loved the Celtic lore. Besides all this he
wrote poetry.

To his schoolmaster's stories little Oliver listened eagerly. He
listened, too, to the ballads sung by Peggy, the dairymaid, and
to the wild music of the blind harper, Turlogh O'Carolan, the
last Irish minstrel. All these things sank into the heart of the
shy, little, ugly boy who seemed so stupid to his schoolfellows.
He learned to read, and devoured all the romances and tales of
adventure upon which he could lay hands, and in imitation of his
schoolmaster he began to write poetry.

For three years Oliver remained under the care of his vagabond
teacher. He looked up to him with a kind of awed wonder, and
many years afterwards he drew a picture of him in his poem The
Deserted Village.

"There, in his noisy mansion, skilled to rule,
The village master taught his little school.
A man severe he was, and stern to view;
I knew him well, and every truant knew:
Well had the boding tremblers learn'd to trace
The day's disasters in his morning face;
Full well they laugh'd, with counterfeited glee
At all his jokes, for many a joke had he;
Full well the busy whisper circlin round
Convey'd the dismal tidings when he frown'd.
Yet he was kind, or, if severe in aught,
The love he bore to learning was in fault;
The village all declared how much he knew:
'Twas certain he could write, and cypher too;
Lands he could measure, terms and tides presage,
And ev'n the story ran--that he could gauge:
In arguing, too, the parson own'd his skill;
For ev'n though vanquish'd, he could argue still;
While words of learned length and thund'ring sound,
Amazed the gazing rustics ranged around;
And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew,
That one small head should carry all he knew."

But after three years of school under wonderful Paddy Byrne,
Goldsmith became very ill with smallpox. He nearly died of it,
and when he grew better he was plainer than ever, for his face
was scarred and pitted by the disease. Goldsmith had been shy
before his illness, and now when people laughed at his pock-
marked face he grew more shy and sensitive still. For the next
seven years he was moved about from school to school, always
looked upon by his fellows as dull of wit, but good at games, and
always in the forefront in mischief.

At length, when Goldsmith was nearly seventeen, he went to
Trinity College, Dublin, as a sizar. As you know, in those days
sizars had to wear a different dress from the commoners.
Oliver's elder brother had gone as a commoner and Oliver had
hoped to do the same. But as his father could not afford the
money he was obliged, much against his will, to go as a sizar.
Indeed had it not been for the kindness of an uncle he could not
have gone to college at all.

Awkward and shy, keen to feel insults whether intended or not,
Goldsmith hated his position as sizar. He did not like his tutor
either, who was a coarse, rough man, so his life at college was
not altogether happy. He was constantly in want of money, for
when he had any his purse was always open to others. At times
when he was much in need he wrote street ballads for five
shillings each, and would steal out at night to have the joy of
hearing them sung in the street.

Goldsmith was idle and wild, and at the end of two years he
quarreled with his tutor, sold his books, and ran away to Cork.
He meant to go on board a ship, and sail away for ever from a
land where he had been so unhappy. But he had little money, and
what he had was soon spent, and at last, almost starving, having
lived for three days on a shilling, he turned homewards again.
Peace was made with his tutor, and Goldsmith went back to
college, and stayed there until two years later when he took his
degree.

His father was now dead and it was necessary for Oliver to earn
his own living. All his family wished him to be a clergyman, but
he "did not deem himself good enough for it." However, he
yielded to their persuasions, and presented himself to his
bishop. But the bishop would not ordain him--why is not known,
but it was said that he was offended with Goldsmith for coming to
be ordained dressed in scarlet breeches.

After this failure Oliver tried teaching and became a tutor, but
in a very short time he gave that up. Next his uncle, thinking
that he would make a lawyer of him, gave him 50 pounds and sent
him off to London to study law there. Goldsmith lost the money
in Dublin, and came home penniless. Some time after this a
gentleman remarked that he would make an excellent medical man,
and again his uncle gave him money and sent him off to Edinburgh,
this time as a medical student. So he said his last good-by to
home and Ireland and set out.

In Scotland Goldsmith lived for a year and a half traveling
about, enjoying life, and, it may be, studying. Then, in his
happy-go-lucky way, he decided it would be well to go to Holland
to finish his medical studies there. Off he started with little
money in his pocket, and many debts behind him. After not a few
adventures he arrived at length in Leyden. Here passing a
florist's shop he saw some bulbs which he knew his uncle wanted.
So in he ran to the shop, bought them, and sent them off to
Ireland. The money with which he bought the bulbs was borrowed,
and now he left Leyden to make the tour of Europe burdened
already with debt, with one guinea in his pocket, and one clean
shirt and a flute as his luggage.

Thus on foot he wandered through Belgium, Germany, Switzerland,
Italy, and France. In the villages he played upon his flute to
pay for his food and his night's lodging.

"Yet would the village praise my wondrous power,
And dance, forgetful of the noon-tide hour.
Alike all ages. Dames of ancient days
Have led their children through the mirthful maze,
And the gay grandsire, skill'd in gestic lore,
Has frisk'd beneath the burthen of threescore."*

*The Traveller.

In the towns where no one listened to his flute, and in Italy
where almost every peasant played better than he, he entered the
colleges and disputed. For in those days many of the colleges
and monasteries on the Continent kept certain days for arguments
upon subjects of philosophy "for which, if the champion opposes
with any dexterity, he can gain a gratuity in money, a dinner,
and a bed for one night."

Thus, from town to town, from village to village, Goldsmith
wandered, until at the end of a year he found himself back among
his countrymen, penniless and alone in London streets.

Here we have glimpses of him, a sorry figure in rusty black and
tarnished gold, his pockets stuffed with papers, now assisting in
a chemist's shop, now practicing as a doctor among those as poor
as himself, now struggling to get a footing in the realm of
literature, now passing his days miserably as an usher in a
school. At length he gained more or less constant work in
writing magazine articles, reviews, and children's books. By
slow degrees his name became known. He met Johnson and became a
member of his famous club. It is said that the first time those
two great men met Johnson took special care in dressing himself.
He put on a new suit of clothes and a newly powdered wig. When
asked by a friend why he was so particular he replied, "Why, sir,
I hear that Goldsmith is a very great sloven, and justifies his
disregard for cleanliness and decency by quoting my example. I
wish this night to show him a better example." But although
Goldsmith was now beginning to be well known, he still lived in
poor lodgings. He had only one chair, and when a visitor came he
was given the chair while Oliver sat on the window ledge. When
he had money he led an idle, easy life until it was spent. He
was always generous. His hand was always open to help others,
but he often forgot to pay his just debts. At length one day his
landlady, finding he could not pay his rent, arrested him for
debt.

In great distress Goldsmith wrote to Johnson begging him to come
to his aid. Johnson sent him a guinea, promising to come to him
as soon as possible. When Johnson arrived at Goldsmith's
lodging, "I perceived," he says, "that he had already changed my
guinea, and had got a bottle of Madeira and a glass before him.
I put the cork into the bottle, desired him to be calm, and began
to talk to him of the means by which he might be extricated. He
then told me that he had a novel ready for the press, which he
produced to me. I looked into it, and saw its merits, told the
landlady I should soon return, and having gone to a bookseller
sold it for sixty pounds. I brought Goldsmith the money, and he
discharged his rent, not without rating his landlady in high tone
for having used him so ill."

The novel which thus set Goldsmith free for the moment was the
famous Vicar of Wakefield. "There are an hundred faults in this
thing," says Goldsmith himself, and if we agree with him there we
also agree with him when he goes on to say, "and an hundred
things might be said to prove them beauties. But it is needless.
A book may be amusing with numerous errors, or it may be very
dull without a single absurdity. The hero of this piece unites
in himself the three greatest characters upon earth: he is a
priest, an husbandman, and the father of a family. He is drawn
as ready to teach, and ready to obey: as simple in affluence,
and majestic in adversity." When we have made the acquaintance
of the Vicar we find ourselves the richer for a lifelong friend.
His gentle dignity, his simple faith, his sly and tender humor,
all make us love him.

In the Vicar of Wakefield Goldsmith drew for us a picture of
quiet, fireside family life such as no one before, or perhaps
since, has drawn. Yet he himself was a homeless man. Since a
boy of sixteen he had been a wanderer, a lonely vagabond,
dwelling beneath strange roofs. But it was the memory of his
childish days that made it possible for him to write such a book,
and in learning to know and love gentle Dr. Primrose we learn to
know Oliver's father, Charles Goldsmith.

Chapter LXXI GOLDSMITH--"THE VICAR OF WAKEFIELD"

"I CHOSE my wife," says Dr. Primrose in the beginning of the
book, "as she did her wedding gown, not for a fine, glossy
surface, but such qualities as would wear well. To do her
justice, she was a good-natured, notable woman; and as for
breeding, there were few county ladies who could show more. She
could read any English book without much spelling; but for
pickling, preserving, and cooking, none could excel her. She
prided herself also upon being an excellent contriver in
housekeeping; though I could never find that we grew richer with
her contrivances."

Of his children he says, "Our eldest son was named George, after
his uncle, who left us ten thousand pounds. Our second child, a
girl, I intended to call, after her aunt, Grissel; but my wife,
who had been reading romances, insisted upon her being called
Olivia. In less than another year we had another daughter, and
now I was determined that Grissel should be her name; but a rich
relation taking a fancy to stand god-mother, the girl was by her
direction called Sophia; so that we had two romantic names in the
family; but I solemnly protest I had no hand in it. Moses was
our next; and, after an interval of twelve years, we had two sons
more." These two youngest boys were called Dick and Bill.

This is the family we learn to know in the "Vicar." When the
story opens Olivia is just eighteen, Sophia seventeen, and they
are both very beautiful girls. At first Dr. Primrose is well off
and lives comfortably in a fine house, but before the story goes
far he loses all his money, and is obliged to go with his family
to a poor living in another part of the country. Here, instead
of their handsome house, they have a tiny four-roomed cottage,
with whitewashed walls and thatched roof, for a home. It is a
very quiet country life which they have now to live, and yet when
you come to read the book you will find that quite a number of
exciting things happen to them.

The dear doctor soon settles down to his changed life, but his
wife and her beautiful daughters try hard to be as fine as they
were before, and as grand, if not grander, than their neighbors.
This desire leads to not a few of their adventures. Among other
things they decide to have their portraits painted. This is how
Dr. Primrose tells of it: "My wife and daughters happening to
return a visit to neighbour Flamborough's, found that family had
lately got their pictures drawn by a limner, who travelled the
country, and took likenesses for fifteen shillings a-head. As
this family and ours had long a sort of rivalry in point of
taste, our spirit took the alarm at this stolen march upon us;
and, notwithstanding all I could say, and I said much, it was
resolved that we should have our pictures done too.

"Having therefore engaged the limner (for what could I do?) our
next deliberation was, to show the superiority of our taste in
the attitudes. As for our neighbour's family, there were seven
of them; and they were drawn with seven oranges, a thing quite
out of taste, no variety in life, no composition in the world.
We desired to have something in a higher style, and after many
debates, at length came to a unanimous resolution, of being drawn
together, in one large historical familypiece. This would be
cheaper, since one frame would serve for all, and it would be
infinitely more genteel; for all families of any taste were now
drawn in the same manner.

"As we did not immediately recollect an historical subject to hit
us, we were contented each with being drawn as independent
historical figures. My wife desired to be represented as Venus,
and the painter was instructed not to be too frugal of his
diamonds in her stomacher and hair. Her two little ones were to
be as cupids by her side; while I in my gown and band, was to
present her with my books on the Whistonian controversy. Olivia
would be drawn as an amazon, sitting upon a bank of flowers,
dressed in a green Joseph,* richly laced with gold, and a whip in
her hand. Sophia was to be a shepherdess, with as many sheep as
the painter could put in for nothing; and Moses was to be dressed
out with a hat and white feather.

*A coat with capes worn by ladies in the eighteenth century for
riding.

"Our taste so much pleased the Squire that he insisted on being
put in as one of the family, in the character of Alexander the
Great, at Olivia's feet. This was considered by us all as an
indication of his desire to be introduced into the family; nor
could we refuse his request. The painter was therefore set to
work; and as he wrought with assiduity and expedition, in less
than four days the whole was completed. The piece was large; and
it must be owned he did not spare his colours; for which my wife
gave him great encomiums.

"We were all perfectly satisfied with his performance; but an
unfortunate circumstance had not occurred until the picture was
finished, which now struck us with dismay. It was so very large,
that we had no place in the house to fix it. How we all came to
disregard so material a point is inconceivable; but certain it
is, we had been all greatly remiss. The picture, therefore,
instead of gratifying our vanity, as we hoped, leaned, in a most
mortifying manner, against the kitchen wall, where the canvas was
stretched and painted, much too large to be got through any of
the doors, and the jest of all our neighbours. One compared it
to Robinson Crusoe's long-boat, too large to be removed; another
thought it more resembled a reel in a bottle; some wondered how
it could be got out, but still more were amazed how it ever got
in."

For the rest of the troubles and adventures of the good Vicar and
his family you must go to the book itself. In the end all comes
right, and we leave the Vicar surrounded by his family with Dick
and Bill sitting on his knee. "I had nothing now this side the
grave to wait for," he says; "all my cares were over; my pleasure
was unspeakable." Even if you do not at first understand all of
this book I think it will repay you to read it, for on almost
every page you will find touches of gentle humor. We feel that
no one but a man of simple childlike heart could have written
such a book, and when we have closed it we feel better and
happier for having read it.

But delightful though we find the Vicar of Wakefield, the
bookseller who bought it did not think highly enough of it to
publish it at once. Meanwhile Goldsmith published a poem called
The Traveller. His own wanderings on the Continent gave him the
subject for this poem, for Goldsmith, like Milton, put something
of himself into all his best works. The Traveller was such a
success that the bookseller though it worth while to publish the
Vicar of Wakefield.

Goldsmith was now famous, but he was still poor. He lived in a
miserable garret doing all manner of literary work for bread.
Among the things he wrote was a play called The Good Natured Man.
It was a success, and brought him in 500 pounds.

Goldsmith now left his garret, took a fine set of rooms,
furnished them grandly, and gave dinner-parties and card-parties
to his friends. These were the days of Goldy's splendor. He no
longer footed it in the great world in rust black and tarnished
gold, but in blue silk breeches, and coat with silken linings and
golden buttons. He dined with great people; he strutted in
innocent vanity, delighted to shine in the world, to see and be
seen, although in Johnson's company he could never really shine.
Sam was a great talker, and it was said Goldsmith "wrote like an
angel and spoke like poor Poll." His friends called him Doctor,
although where he took his medical degree no one knows, and he
certainly had no other degree given to him as an honor as Johnson
had. So Johnson was Dr. major, Goldsmith only Dr. minor.

But soon these days of wealth were over; soon Goldsmith's money
was all spent, and once again he had to sit down to grinding
work. He wrote many things, but the next great work he published
was another poem, The Deserted Village.

The Deserted Village, like The Traveller, is written in the
heroic couplet which, since the days of Dryden, had held its
ground as the best form of English poetry. In these poems the
couplet has reached its very highest level, for although his
rimes are smooth and polished Goldsmith has wrought into them
something of tender grace and pathos which sets them above the
diamond-like glitter of Pope's lines. His couplets are
transformed by the Celtic touch.

The poem tells the story of a village which had once been happy
and flourishing, but which is now quite deserted and fallen to
ruins. The village is thought by some people to have been
Lissoy, where Oliver had lived as a boy, but others think this
cannot be, for they say no Irish village was ever so peaceful and
industrious as Goldsmith pictures his village to have been. But
we must remember that the poet had not seen his home since
childhood, and that he looked back upon it through the golden
haze of memory. It is in this poem that we have the picture of
Oliver's old schoolmaster which I have already given you. Here,
too, we have a picture of the kindly village parson who may be
taken both from Oliver's father and from his brother Henry.
Probably he had his brother most in mind, for Henry Goldsmith had
but lately died, "and I loved him better than most other men,"
said the poet sadly in the dedication of this poem--