372 



" is, with great taste and felicity, modelled on that of Addison, 

 Goldsmith, Sterne, or McKenzie, but the thoughts and sentiments 

 are taken at the rebound, and, as they are brought forward at the 

 present period, want both freshness and probability." 



This is unjust; but it furnishes us with a clue to the determina- 

 tion of Irving's literary resemblance to Goldsmith. He is truly of 

 that school, j-M?- inter primos. 



Mr. Br^^ant, in an affectionate spirit of generous eulogy, can scarcely 

 find words to express his pleasure in perusing and re-perusing the 

 biography of Goldsmith. Charming as it really is, it is a work of 

 supererogation. Goldsmith's beautiful poems are his best, and should 

 be his only eulogy ; for Goldsmith's life and character, apart from 

 these, entirely destroy the ideal which his genius has raised in our 

 minds. Time cannot impair the clustering beauties of the "Deserted 

 Village :" but Oliver Goldsmith is scarcely worth a biography. The 

 chaplet of Irving, the glowing tribute of Macaulay, cannot make his 

 tomb a pilgrim-shrine. 



Mr. Irving, after seventeen years of varied and delightful expe- 

 rience of merited honors abroad, returned at length to the banks of 

 the Hudson in February, 1832, and there settled himself for an 

 enviable life ; a life of domestic retirement and social comfort, but 

 of unremitting literary labor. He bought a little farm, the modesty 

 of which claimed the admiration of Mr. Thackeray, in that beautiful 

 eulogy, ^^ Nil Nisi Bonum.^' He made his own home, its gables, 

 its walks, and its lawns, and its immortal memories. Its literary 

 name was "Wolfert's Roost;" its popular and characteristic cogno- 

 men was " Sunnyside." 



His retirement was interrupted by his appointment as Minister to 

 Spain, which post he held from 1842 to 1816. This was not his 

 first diplomatic experience ; he had been Secretary of Legation at 

 London in 1829. In 1810 he returned to Sunnyside. There loved 

 and reverenced by his relations — the younger being to him like chil- 

 dren — distinguished by his friends, as the one most worthy of atten- 

 tion and respect, — cherished by his country, honored by the civilized 

 world, — in a region of which he was the idol — for he had rendered 

 it illustrious — he journeyed calmly to the end of his years, with one 

 wish unfulfilled. At length there came a period when he might 

 attempt the desired task. Measuring his remaining span of days, 

 and testing the remnant of his strength, — finding his intellect unin- 

 jured, and his fine fancy undimmed, — the biographer of Columbus 

 determined to write the life of Washington. It was a noble and 



