vetus. That "the mighty Dr. Hill, who was not a very delicate feeder, could not make a dinner out of the press till by a happy transformation into Hannah Glass he turned himself into a cook, and sold receipts for made dishes to all the savory readers in the kingdom-the press then acknowledging him second in favor only to John Bunyan; his feasts kept pace in sale with Nelson's fasts, and when his own name was fairly written out of credit, he wrote himself into immortality under an alias." That Madame de Montespan, who found it "for her interest and vanity to live in habitual violation of the seventh commandment," should have been so rigorous in her devotions as to weigh her bread in Lent. That Cardinal Bernis, "the most worthless of abbés," who owed his advancement in the church to Madame de Pompadour, the most worthless of women, should have refused "to communicate in the dignity of the purple with a woman of so unsanctimonious a character." That Rousseau, "whose preaching made it fashionable for women of rank to nurse their own children," should have "sent his own, as soon as born, to the foundling hospital." That Coleridge and Goldsmith should have written The House that Jack Built and Goody Two Shoes: more than all it is curious, and wonderful, that these two simple trifles seem destined to outlive their more elaborate productions - the Ancient Mariner and the Vicar of Wakefield. Christabel and the Deserted Village may hardly be preserved amongst the curiosities of literature, when the famous nursery rhymes-joyously ringing upon the tongues of silver-voiced children-will be immortally fresh and new.

X.

CONTRASTS.

THE world will never be tired reading and talking of the peculiarities and struggles of some of its literary worthies, they seem so incredible. Poor Goldsmith, for example: every incident relating to him is interesting, even if colored by envy-as most of the contemporaneous gossip about him was. "I first met Goldsmith," says Cumberland, "at the British Coffee House. He dined with us as a visitor, introduced by Sir Joshua Reynolds, and we held a consultation upon the naming of his comedy, which some of the company had read, and which he detailed to the rest after his manner with a great deal of good-humor. Somebody suggested She Stoops to Conquer, and that title was agreed upon. 'You and I,' said he, 'have very different motives for resorting to the stage. I write for money, and care little about fame.' The whole company pledged themselves to the support of the poet, and faithfully kept their promise to him. In fact, he needed all that could be done for him, as Mr. Colman, then manager of Covent Garden Theatre, protested against the comedy, when as yet he had not struck upon a name for it. Johnson at length stood forth in all his terror, as champion for the piece, and backed by us, his

clients and retainers, demanded a fair trial.

Colman

again protested, but, with that salvo for his own reputation, liberally lent his stage to one of the most eccentric productions that ever found its way to it, and She Stoops to Conquer was put into rehearsal. We were not over-sanguine of success, but perfectly determined to struggle hard for our author; we accordingly assembled our strength at the Shakespeare Tavern in a considerable body for an early dinner, where Samuel Johnson took the chair at the head of a long table, and was the life and soul of the corps: the poet took post silently by his side, with the Burkes, Sir Joshua Reynolds, Fitzherbert, Caleb Whitefoord, and a phalanx of North British predetermined applauders, under the banner of Major Mills, all good men and true. Our illustrious president was in inimitable glee, and poor Goldsmith that day took all his raillery as patiently and complacently as my friend Boswell would have done any day or every day of his life. In the mean time, we did not forget our duty, and though we had a better comedy going, in which Johnson was chief actor, we betook ourselves in good time to our separate and allotted posts, and waited the awful drawing up of the curtain. As our stations were preconcerted, so were our signals for plaudits arranged and determined upon in a manner that gave every one his cue where to look for them and how to follow them up. We had amongst us a very worthy and sufficient member, long since lost to his friends and the world. at large, Adam Drummond, of amiable memory, who was gifted by nature with the most sonorous, and, at

the same time, the most contagious, laugh that ever echoed from the human lungs. The neighing of the horse of the son of Hystaspes was a whisper to it; the whole thunder of the theatre could not drown it. This kind and ingenuous friend fairly forewarned us that he knew no more when to give his fire than the cannon did that was planted on a battery. He desired, therefore, to have a flapper at his elbow, and I had the honor to be deputed to that office. I planted him in an upper box, pretty nearly over the stage, in full view of the pit and galleries, and perfectly well situated to give the echo all its play through the hollows and recesses of the theatre. The success of our manœuvres was complete. All eyes were upon Johnson, who sat in a front row of a side box, and when he laughed everybody thought themselves warranted to roar. In the mean time, my friend followed signals with a rattle so irresistibly comic that, when he had repeated it several times, the attention of the spectators was so engrossed by his person and performances that the progress of the play seemed likely to become a secondary object, and I found it prudent to insinuate to him that he might halt his music without any prejudice to the author; but, alas, it was now too late to rein him in; he had laughed upon my signal where he found no joke, and now unluckily he fancied that he found a joke in almost everything that was said; so that nothing in nature could be more malapropos than some of his bursts every now and then were. These were dangerous moments, for the pit began to take umbrage; but we carried our play through, and triumphed not only over Colman's

judgment, but our own." It is related that Goldsmith, during the performance of the comedy, walked all the time in St. James's Park, in great uneasiness; and when he thought it must be over, he hastened to the theatre. His ears were assailed with hisses as he entered the green-room, when he eagerly inquired of Mr. Colman the cause. "Psha! psha!" said Colman, "don't be afraid of squibs, when we have been sitting on a barrel of gunpowder these two hours." The fact was, that the comedy had been completely successful, and that it was the farce which had excited those sounds so terrific to Goldsmith.

A scene very different from that occurred at another "first acting as remarkable if not as fa

mous.

It was on the occasion of the first presentation of Lamb's farce of Mr. H., thirty years later, at Drury Lane. That acute dramatic scholar and critic had written a tragedy, -John Woodvil, — the fate of which his friend Procter has pleasantly narrated: "It had been in Mr. Kemble's hands for about a year, and Lamb naturally became urgent to hear his decision upon it. Upon applying for this he found that his play was lost! This was at once acknowledged, and a courteous request made for another copy, if I had one by me.' Luckily, another copy existed. The first runnings' of a genius were not, therefore, altogether lost, by having been cast, without a care, into the dusty limbo of the theatre. The other copy was at once supplied, and the play very speedily rejected. It was afterwards facetiously brought forward in one of the early numbers of the Edinburgh Review, and there noticed as a rude.

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