THE HERMIT.

A BALLAD.

MDCCLXIV.

"for

[Written 1764, and privately printed the same year, the amusement of the Countess of Northumberland." It was first published in 1766, in the Vicar of Wakefield. Though this poem is generally known as "The Hermit," Goldsmith himself printed it with the title of "Edwin and Angelina"].

S there is nothing I dislike so much as newspaper controversy, particularly upon trifles, permit me to be as concise

as possible in informing a correspondent of yours, that I recommended Blainville's Travels, because I thought the book was a good one; and I think so still. I said, I was told by the bookseller that it was then first published; but in that, it seems, I was misinformed, and my reading was not extensive enough to set me right.

Another correspondent of yours accuses me of having taken a ballad, I published some time ago, from one1 by the ingenious Mr. Percy. I do not think there is any great resemblance between the two pieces in question. If there be any, his ballad is taken from mine. I read it to Mr. Percy

1 "The Friar of Orders Gray."-Reliq. of Anc. Poetry, vol.i. p. 243.

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some years ago; and he (as we both considered these things as trifles at best) told me, with his usual good humour, the next time I saw him, that he had taken my plan to form the fragments of Shakespeare into a ballad of his own. He then read me his little Cento, if I may so call it, and I highly approved it. Such petty anecdotes as these are scarce worth printing: and, were it not for the busy disposition of some of your correspondents, the public should never have known that he owes me the hint of his ballad, or that I am obliged to his friendship and learning for communications of a much more important nature.

I am, Sir, yours, &c.

OLIVER GOLDSMITH.

THE HERMIT.'

I.

URN, gentle Hermit of the dale,
And guide my lonely way,

To where yon taper cheers the vale
With hospitable ray.a

II.

"For here, forlorn and lost I tread,
With fainting steps and slow;
Where wilds, immeasurably spread,
Seem lengthening as I go."

III.

"Forbear, my son," the Hermit cries,
"To tempt the dangerous gloom;
For yonder faithless phantom flies
To lure thee to thy doom.

10

1 See the Vicar of Wakefield, 1766, chap. viii, from which the text is taken, but as this differs considerably from the first edition [1764], the variations are also given.

VARIATION.

a "Deign, saint-like tenant of the dale,
To guide my nightly way,

To yonder fire, that cheers the vale
With hospitable ray.