even wrote comedies in the French language, of which one, "Le Bourru Bienfaisant," first performed on occasion of the marriage of the dauphin with Marie Antoinette, was received with enthusiastic applause. A pension granted to Goldoni by the French crown was revoked during the great Revolution, but at the instance of Chénier was restored one day before the aged author's death. The arrears were paid to his widow, on whom also a pension was settled. Carlo Goldoni was an energetic and most voluminous writer. His autobiography, completed at the age of eighty, bears the stamp of truth, and depicts a man who, with all his faults, was kindly, grateful, not puffed up by success, nor blind to his own literary shortcomings. He elevated Italian comedy from semi-improvised farce to the rank of written drama; and studying his characters from the life, produced works which, though tainted with the grossness that disgraces the stage of every nation, are still read with pleasure. Amongst the celebrated men of his day with whom Goldoni became acquainted may be mentioned Diderot, Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and Count Alfieri.—C. G. R.
GOLDSCHMIDT, Hermann, a German painter and astronomer, was born at Frankfort-on-the-Maine on the 17th of June, 1802. In 1802 he quitted the profession of a merchant to study painting under Schnorr and Cornelius. He established himself as a painter in Paris in 1836, and in that capacity attained a high reputation. In 1850 he began to combine astronomical observation with his pursuits as an artist, and applied himself to the search for asteroids, in which he had extraordinary success; having in the course of about eight years discovered not fewer than thirteen of those bodies, whose dates of discovery, and the numbers and names by which they are designated by astronomers, are as follows—(21) Lutetia, 15th November, 1852; (32) Pomona, 26th October, 1854; (36) Atalanta, 5th October, 1855; (40) Harmonia, 31st March, 1856; (41) Daphne, 22nd May, 1856; (44) Nysa, 27th May, 1857; (45) Eugenia, 28th June, 1857; (48) Doris, and (49) Pales, were discovered on one day, the 19th September, 1857; (52) Europa, 6th February, 1858; (54) Alexandra, 10th September, 1858; (56) (not yet named), 9th September, 1857; and (61) Danäe, discovered on the 9th September, 1860. Daphne (41) has not been seen again since its discovery. The asteroid now numbered (56) was for a time supposed to be Daphne, but was afterwards found to be a distinct planet. He died on the 29th August, 1866 —R.
GOLDSCHMIDT, Madame. See Lind.
GOLDSMITH, Lewis, a Jewish political writer of worthless character, was born in England in 1763. His profession of a notary did not prevent him from writing a seditious work called "The Crimes of Cabinets," for which he was prosecuted in 1803. An adverse judgment compelled him to fly with his family to France, where he unscrupulously offered his pen to the French government, to be used against England. His proposal being accepted, he proceeded to libel the British government in a journal entitled Argus, or London seen from Paris. He took part also in a French journal, Le Memorial Anti-Britannique. His services were rewarded by the post of interpreter to the law courts. He also undertook missions of a questionable character for the police, and generally acquitted himself well in these transactions; but at length was discovered in some double dealing by the French government, who would have given him up to the vengeance of the English but for the intercession of the minister of police. He returned in 1809 to his native country, where he at once endeavoured to atone for his "anti-British" by starting an "anti-Gallican" newspaper. It is said that he received a pension from Louis XVIII. The date of his death is unknown.—R. H.
GOLDSMITH, Oliver. A high name in the annals of English literature, was born at Pallas, a little hamlet in the county of Longford in Ireland, not far from Ballymahon. It was in the old parsonage house there that Oliver, the sixth of nine children, first saw the light, on the 10th of November, 1728. His father, the Rev. Charles Goldsmith, the clergyman of the place, had little wealth save this heritage of children, with a wretched stipend of forty pounds a year, which his simplicity and moderation made sufficient, with virtues which the pious love of his son has made enduringly beautiful, and foibles that, while they detract not from our reverence, almost increase our love. Little Oliver was only two years old when his father's fortunes mended. He succeeded to the rectory of Kilkenny West, in the neighbouring county of Westmeath, with nearly £200 a year, and thereupon took up his abode on the confines of the village of Lishoy, in a farmhouse whoso crumbling and roofless walls are still shown to the tourist. There are memories still lingering about the spot of the "dull boy" who seemed so "impenetrably stupid" to good dame Delap, the village schoolmistress. From her hands he passed in his sixth year under the ferula of Thomas Byrne, a veteran who, after fighting under Marlborough, took to the severer work of a country pedagogue. If the boy learned little book-lore, he filled his mind with poetic seed which, though late to germinate, was destined to bear fruit and flower that never should perish. The legends of the country were all familiar to him, and the harp of Carolan often delighted his ears. In his eighth year he was seized with smallpox in its most virulent form; he had a hard struggle for life, and retained deep and terrible marks of the conflict. No sooner had he recovered than he went to reside with his uncle, John Goldsmith, in order to attend a school at Elphin. A sad life he had of it at school. Ill-favoured, ungainly, eccentric, slow at his books, heavy in his manners, and simple as a child, he was looked on as a fool and made the butt for every cowardly and ill-natured bully; but he knew how at times to avenge himself with a smart repartee or a flash of wit, or to vanquish his tormentors with an exhibition of good-humour and kindly nature. In three years more he was sent to a school at Athlone, whence in two years after he passed to one in Edgeworth's town, and many interesting anecdotes of him have been collected during his sojourn there of three years, by the industry of Mr. Prior. It was now decided that he should enter college, but his father was too poor to pay his charges, and so by the advice and encouragement of his uncle Contarine he stood for and obtained a sizarship in Trinity college, Dublin, on the 11th of June, 1745. The menial duties which sizars had then to perform (now happily dispensed with) were aggravated to his shy, sensitive nature, by the harshness of his tutor, who persecuted the poor friendless lad with a mean enmity that was never relaxed during his college course. In the beginning of 1747 his father died. Scanty as his means had heretofore been, they were now diminished, and but for occasional loans and gifts from his best of friends, his uncle Contarine, it would have gone hard with him to sustain life; and Mr. Prior tells us that he would write street ballads to save himself from starving, sell them for five shillings each, and steal out of college at night to hear them sung. But reckless, improvident, and ever ready to yield to impulse, he spent the money the moment he got it—sometimes foolishly, sometimes nobly; giving to even a poorer man than himself—and when the money was gone his clothes would go after them at the call of charity. To one starving creature with five crying children, a fellow-student declares, he gave the blankets off his bed and crept into the ticking for shelter from the cold. In 1747 an event occurred that was near terminating his collegiate life: a bailiff had dared to invade the sanctuary of the college and arrest a student. The collegians sallied into the town, seized the bailiff, put him under the college pump, and then attempted to break open the gaol; a fray ensued and lives were lost. Goldsmith was amongst the offenders, and was publicly admonished, while others were expelled. He now applied himself more diligently to his studies, and though he failed in gaining a scholarship he was awarded an exhibition; thereupon he gave a dance in his rooms. Wilder, his tyrannical tutor, burst in upon the festivity, abused Oliver, who retorted and was knocked down by Wilder. The young man's indignation was so strong that he sold his books and left the college with the intention of leaving the kingdom; but the money vanished in a few days. His brother Henry found him starving, and, having supplied his necessities, induced him to return to college and apply to his studies; the result of which was that he obtained a premium in 1748. The following February, Goldsmith took his degree of bachelor of arts, and returned to his mother, who was then living at Ballymahon. His friends now wished him to prepare for the church. For this he had no relish, and so he passed his time idly—writing verses, frequenting the tavern club, singing songs, playing the flute, and rambling through the country, and sometimes assisting his brother Henry, who was now curate of Lishoy, in the drudgery of teaching his scholars. When two years were thus passed he was three-and-twenty. He applied to be admitted into holy orders, but was refused. Next he got a tutorship, which he threw up in a year. Then he started for Cork to go to America, but spent all his
