who was then engaged in the Karl-theater band, gave a concert of his own works with such success that his first quartet attracted very general attention. Then followed the “Sakuntala” and “Penthesilea” overtures, which show how Wagner’s influence had supervened upon his previous domination by Mendelssohn, and the delightful “Ländliche Hochzeit” symphony, which carried his fame abroad. Goldmark’s reputation was now made, and very largely increased by the production at Vienna in 1875 of his first and best opera, Die Königin von Saba. Over this opera he spent seven years. Its popularity is still almost as great as ever. It was followed in November 1886, also at Vienna, by Merlin, much of which has been rewritten since then. A third opera, a version of Dickens’s Cricket on the Hearth, was given by the Royal Carl Rosa Company in London in 1900. Goldmark’s chamber music has not made much lasting impression, but the overtures “Im Frühling,” “Prometheus Bound,” and “Sapho” are fairly well known. A “programme” seems essential to him. In opera he is most certainly at his best, and as an orchestral colourist he ranks among the very highest.
GOLDONI, CARLO (1707–1793), Italian dramatist, the real
founder of modern Italian comedy, was born at Venice, on the
25th of February 1707, in a fine house near St Thomas’s church.
His father Giulio was a native of Modena. The first playthings
of the future writer were puppets which he made dance; the
first books he read were plays,—among others, the comedies of
the Florentine Cicognini. Later he received a still stronger
impression from the Mandragora of Machiavelli. At eight years
old he had tried to sketch a play. His father, meanwhile, had
taken his degree in medicine at Rome and fixed himself at
Perugia, where he made his son join him; but, having soon
quarrelled with his colleagues in medicine, he departed for
Chioggia, leaving his son to the care of a philosopher, Professor
Caldini of Rimini. The young Goldoni soon grew tired of his
life at Rimini, and ran away with a Venetian company of players.
He began to study law at Venice, then went to continue the
same pursuit at Pavia, but at that time he was studying the
Greek and Latin comic poets much more and much better than
books about law. “I have read over again,” he writes in his
own Memoirs, “the Greek and Latin poets, and I have told to
myself that I should like to imitate them in their style, their
plots, their precision; but I would not be satisfied unless I
succeeded in giving more interest to my works, happier issues
to my plots, better drawn characters and more genuine comedy.”
For a satire entitled Il Colosso, which attacked the honour of
several families of Pavia, he was driven from that town, and
went first to study with the jurisconsult Morelli at Udine, then
to take his degree in law at Modena. After having worked
some time as clerk in the chanceries of Chioggia and Feltre,
his father being dead, he went to Venice, to exercise there his
profession as a lawyer. But the wish to write for the stage
was always strong in him, and he tried to do so; he made,
however, a mistake in his choice, and began with a tragedy,
Amalasunta, which was represented at Milan and proved a failure.
In 1734 he wrote another tragedy, Belisario, which, though not
much better, chanced nevertheless to please the public. This
first success encouraged him to write other tragedies, some of
which were well received; but the author himself saw clearly
that he had not yet found his proper sphere, and that a radical
dramatic reform was absolutely necessary for the stage. He
wished to create a characteristic comedy in Italy, to follow the
example of Molière, and to delineate the realities of social life
in as natural a manner as possible. His first essay of this kind
was Momolo Cortesan (Momolo the Courtier), written in the
Venetian dialect, and based on his own experience. Other
plays followed—some interesting from their subject, others
from the characters; the best of that period are—Le Trentadue Disgrazie d’ Arlecchino, La Notte critica, La Bancarotta, La Donna di Garbo. Having, while consul of Genoa at Venice,
been cheated by a captain of Ragusa, he founded on this his
play L’Impostore. At Leghorn he made the acquaintance of the
comedian Medebac, and followed him to Venice, with his company,
for which he began to write his best plays. Once he promised
to write sixteen comedies in a year, and kept his word; among
the sixteen are some of his very best, such as Il Caffè, Il Bugiardo,
La Pamela. When he left the company of Medebac, he passed
over to that maintained by the patrician Vendramin, continuing
to write with the greatest facility. In 1761 he was called to
Paris, and before leaving Venice he wrote Una delle ultime sere di Carnevale (One of the Last Nights of Carnival), an allegorical
comedy in which he said good-bye to his country. At the end
of the representation of this play, the theatre resounded with
applause, and with shouts expressive of good wishes. Goldoni,
at this proof of public sympathy, wept as a child. At Paris,
during two years, he wrote comedies for the Italian actors; then
he taught Italian to the royal princesses; and for the wedding
of Louis XVI. and of Marie Antoinette he wrote in French one
of his best comedies, Le Bourru bienfaisant, which was a great
success. When he retired from Paris to Versailles, the king
made him a gift of 6000 francs, and fixed on him an annual
pension of 1200 francs. It was at Versailles he wrote his Memoirs,
which occupied him till he reached his eightieth year. The
Revolution deprived him all at once of his modest pension, and
reduced him to extreme misery; he dragged on his unfortunate
existence till 1793, and died on the 6th of February. The day
after, on the proposal of André Chénier, the Convention agreed
to give the pension back to the poet; and as he had already
died, a reduced allowance was granted to his widow.
The best comedies of Goldoni are: La Donna di Garbo, La Bottega di Caffè, Pamela nubile, Le Baruffe chiozzotte, I Rusteghi, Todero Brontolon, Gli Innamorati, Il Ventaglio, Il Bugiardo, La Casa nova, Il Burbero benefico, La Locandiera. A collected edition (Venice, 1788) was republished at Florence in 1827. See P. G. Molmenti, Carlo Goldoni (Venice, 1875); Rabany, Carlo Goldoni (Paris, 1896). The Memoirs were translated into English by John Black (Boston, 1877), with preface by W. D. Howells.
GOLDS, a Mongolo-Tatar people, living on the Lower Amur
in south-eastern Siberia. Their chief settlements are on the right
bank of the Amur and along the Sungari and Usuri rivers. In
physique they are typically Mongolic. Like the Chinese they
wear a pigtail, and from them, too, have learnt the art of silk
embroidery. The Golds live almost entirely on fish, and are
excellent boatmen. They keep large herds of swine and dogs,
which live, like themselves, on fish. Geese, wild duck, eagles,
bears, wolves and foxes are also kept in menageries. There is
much reverence paid to the eagles, and hence the Manchus call
the Golds “Eaglets.” Their religion is Shamanism.
See L. Schrenck, Die Völker des Amurlandes (St Petersburg, 1891); Laufer, “The Amoor Tribes,” in American Anthropologist (New York, 1900); E. G. Ravenstein, The Russians on the Amur (1861).
GOLDSBORO, a city and the county-seat of Wayne county,
North Carolina, U.S.A., on the Neuse river, about 50 m. S.E.
of Raleigh. Pop. (1890) 4017; (1900) 5877 (2520 negroes); (1910)
6107. It is served by the Southern, the Atlantic Coast Line
and the Norfolk & Southern railways. The surrounding country
produces large quantities of tobacco, cotton and grain, and
trucking is an important industry, the city being a distributing
point for strawberries and various kinds of vegetables. The
city’s manufactures include cotton goods, knit goods, cotton-seed
oil, agricultural implements, lumber and furniture. Goldsboro
is the seat of the Eastern insane asylum (for negroes) and
of an Odd Fellows’ orphan home. The municipality owns and
operates its water-works and electric-lighting plant. Goldsboro
was settled in 1838, and was first incorporated in 1841. In the
campaign of 1865 Goldsboro was the point of junction of the
Union armies under generals Sherman and Schofield, previous
to the final advance to Greensboro.
GOLDSCHMIDT, HERMANN (1802–1866), German painter and astronomer, was the son of a Jewish merchant, and was born at Frankfort on the 17th of June 1802. He for ten years assisted his father in his business; but, his love of art having been awakened while journeying in Holland, he in 1832 began the study of painting at Munich under Cornelius and Schnorr, and in 1836 established himself at Paris, where he painted a number of pictures of more than average merit, among which may be mentioned the “Cumaean Sibyl” (1844); an “Offering to
