SMOLLETT 



without his father's sanction aiul without means 

 to support a ii'e, married Barlmra, daughter of 

 RolH-rt Cunningham of Gilliertfield. a young lady of 

 good family but portionless. Sir James assigned 

 to the imprudent couple I>al<|iihurn, the second 

 house on the estate, and the few MM around it, 

 on which stand now the villages of Alexandria and 

 Kenton. The third child of Archibald and Bar- 

 Kara was Tobias George. Ixirn at Dahiuhurn, 

 Kirllidav not recorded, baptised on Sundny, 

 March 19, 1721. His father died shortly aftr'r, 

 and his (grandfather in 1731. Sir James and 



his sn< s.sor would seem to have behaved with 



reasonable kindness to tin- widow, a clever man- 

 aging woman, and her three orphan children. 

 Smollett went to Dumbarton grammar school, was 

 taught Latin well by John Love, and distinguished 

 him.self by the luxuriance of his boyish satire. He 

 went to Glasgow College, attended arts and medi- 

 cal classes, and while attending them served an 

 apprenticeship to John Gordon, doctor, apothecary, 

 and very worthy man. It was thus he qualified 

 for medical practice. Subsequently, in June 1750, 

 lie obtained the degree of M.I), from Marischal 

 College, Aberdeen. In 1739 he went to London and 

 tried to get The Regicide, a Tragedy, put on the 

 stage. He failed, quarrelled with everybody fcboot it, 

 and published it ten years later with a very foolish 

 preface. He romances about the ill-usage he and 

 it underwent in the story of MeloiMiyn in Roderick 

 Random. Smollett was appointed surgeon's mate 

 on Koard the Citm/ifr/iintf, which sailed in 1740 to 

 join Admiral Vermin's fleet, and took part in the 

 unfortunate expedition to Carthagena in 1741. He 

 describes that expedition in Roderick Random, and 

 also in a Comjn iiiliiuii uf Voyages and Travels he 

 published in 1756. His temper could not brook 

 the service ; he quitted it in the West Indies and 

 tarried a while in Jamaica, where he met Anne 

 Lascelles, the expectant heiress of 'a comfortable, 

 though moderate, estate in the island.' In 1744 

 he set nil hou-e in London, in Downing Street, 

 afterwards in May fair, to look for medical 

 practice. He wrote The Tears of Scotland in a 

 coffee house in 1746. The same year he published 

 Adrii'i'. ii SuHrc his first publication. Next year 

 he published Reproof, a Satire, and married Anne 

 Lascelles. The Adventure* of Roderick Ranilmn. 

 written autohiographically, appeared anonymously 

 in 1748, and was at once a great success; Lady 

 Mary Wort ley Montagu thought the novel was 

 Fielding's. It was heartless to caricature his 

 grandfather as the Old Judge and Mr Gordon as 

 Potion. In 17-10 Smollett visited Paris along with 

 Mr Moore afterwards |)r Moore, novelist, father 

 of Sir John Moore and met Mark Akenside there. 

 In 1751 was published, written hiographically. The 

 AdventuretofJ'i : I/inn /',>//.. ll loo had an instant 

 HKCess Tlie dortor, who ;ji\<'- an entertainment 

 after the manner of the am-ients, is a misrepre- 

 sentation of I)r Akenside, ami the laughable account 

 of the feast is a satire on his pedantic affectation of 

 Athenian manners. Smollett was paid for insert- 

 ing 'The M )irs of a Lady of Quality, Frances 



II .'. I-M, Lady Vane,' which are a blot on the novel, 

 lie now tried to set up in llath as a medical man, 

 publishing An A\v/ mi the. External Use of 

 H'ntrr; it was bis last attempt of the kind, and it 

 'niled. Hemming to London to live by his pen, 

 he fixed his alinde in Chelsea, and published The 

 A'li-rnture* uf l-'mliiinml. I'nnnt h'ii//n>iii in I7">.'<. 

 The robber scene in the lilark Forest, from that 

 story of a gambler and swindler, has been the proto- 

 type of many such, and is a literary masterpiece. 

 About this time an action was raised in the Court 

 of King's lU-iich against Smollett for railing a per- 

 HOII named Gordon. The verdict was in his favour, 

 but the law-costs embarrassed him. In 1755 his 



translation of Don Quixote, which is still read, was 

 favourably received. He became in 17'Mi editor of 

 Thf Critical Review, a High Church and Tory 

 monthly. Countless troubles to the editor cul- 

 minated in 17.1SI, when Admiral Knowles brought 

 an action against tin- Hrrieir, and Smollett was 

 lined 100 and sent three months to the K , 

 Bench Prison. In 1750 he also began a Comjilrte 

 Ilisturi/ of England from the time of Julius 

 Ca-sar's invasion down to 174S. He wrote the four 

 quarto volumes in fourteen months, finishing the 

 work in Decemlwr 17.17. This effort broagat on 

 chest disease and a scorbutic affection ; he never 

 enjoyed good health again. After coming out of 

 prison he wrote a continuation of the history down 

 to 1764, which is letter known than the I'mnplete 

 History; for in Hume and Smollett's llistnrit uf 

 Emjland the narrative of events from 1689 to 1760 

 is Smollett's. From all this labour on history he is 

 'said to have cleared 2000.' In 1757 his faive, 

 Reprisals, or the Tars of Old Einjlinnl, was put on 

 the stage by (iarrick. Smollett toiled at compiling 

 a universal history and translating Voltaire. The 

 Ailrintnrm uf >'/; l.anni'rlut (ircurcx, an English 

 Don Quixote, appeared as a serial, 1760 61, in the 

 BritM Mn<i<i:iiit, a sixpenny monthly, and was 

 published separately in 1762. Like all the novels 

 Smollett wrote, it'is weak in construction, but 

 lacks neither vivacity nor wit. He edited The 

 Briton, 1762-63, a weekly paper in sp|K>rt of Lord 

 Bute's administration, received no reward, and 

 was routed from the newspaper field by the Xnrth, 

 lirituii, the organ of his former friend, John 

 Wilkes. In April 1763 Elizabeth, his only child, 

 died of consumption. He left England in June, 

 sojourned on the Continent more than two years, 

 and published in 1766 the still readable ZrOMtf 

 through France mid Italy. The same year he, 

 broken in health, visited Scotland his second 

 visit since he left as a lad and while in Kdinbiirgh 

 stayed with his mother and widowed sister. His 

 health benefited by this journey, but on his return 

 south it broke down again. He left England in ITlM 

 to seek recovery in a warmer climate. He had 

 i lie year before solicited a consulship at Nice or Leg- 

 horn the only favour he ever asked from govern- 

 mentwas refused it, and went to live in Italy, 

 relying on his wife's small and always uncertain 

 income and on his pen. He wrote the tiilr ti, Inde- 

 pendence about this time. The Jlixlm-// nflhr . I - 

 1n nx of an Atom, a prose satire, in which political 

 leadei> are broadly caricatured under fictitious 

 names, was published in 1769. In a village, called 

 Monte Novo, near Leghorn, Smollett wmte, in 

 weakness and much pain, the hist and best of his 

 novels, The Expedition of Hum/i/in-ii Clinl.ir, 

 wiitten in epistolary' form. The 'Ode to Le\en 

 Water occurs in it. It was published in 1771 : and 

 Smollett just lived to hear the first rumours of its 

 sin-cess. He died, Septemlier 17, 1771, aged fifty- 

 one, and was buried in the English cemetery, Leg- 

 horn. If he had lived four years longer he would 

 have inherited the family estates : , it happened, 

 hi- left his widow quite unprovided for. Her small 

 income from the West Indies by and by failed 

 entirely, and there was a l>encfit performance in 

 the Theatre Royal of Edinburgh in her In-half 

 when she was destitute twelve years after his 

 death. The novels which have Ix-come classics are 

 the three in which Smollett himself is adiimbiate,! 

 as, respectively, the Scottish Roderick Random, 

 the English Peregrine Pickle, and the Welsh 

 Matthew Bramble. 



Playt and Forms, with Memoir (1 vol. 12mo. 1784). 

 Minnllanrotis Wnrlct, flrnt collected by David Ramuy 

 of the Kitialmriih Krtninp Courant ; humorous frontis- 

 piecni by Kowlandiion ; meagre life (6 vols. 8vo. Edin. 

 1"'.K) ; docs not contain Adventures of an Atom), 



