504 



GOLDSMITH GONDOLIER. 



His talents, however, were best adapted to pieces in 

 which character and intrigue predominated ; and here 

 it is impossible not to admire the fertility of his inven- 

 tion with respect to the plot, which, notwithstanding 

 the number of his pieces, is always new, and his true 

 delineation of character in every situation. His 

 memoirs, giving the history of his own life, and of 

 the theatre of his time, have been translated into 

 English and German, and copied, somewhat abridged, 

 into the Collection des Memoiret sitr VArt dramatique, 

 published at Paris. Goldoni wrote them in French, 

 in which he also composed two comedies, one of 

 which, Le Bourru bienfaisant, was produced at Fon- 

 tainebleau and Paris, in 1771, with great applause, 

 and has maintained itself on the stage. 



GOLDSMITH, or SILVERSMITH ; an artist 

 who makes vessels, utensils, and ornaments, hi gold 

 and silver. The work is either performed in the 

 mould, or beat out with the hammer, or other engine. 

 All wtrks that have raised figures are cast in a 

 mould, and aftrnvards polished and finished : plates, 

 or dishes, of silver or gold, are beat out from thin, 

 flat plates ; and tankards and other vessels of that 

 kind are formed of plates, soldered together, and 

 their mouldings are beat, not cast. The goldsmith 

 makes his own moulds, and for that reason ought to 

 be a good designer, and have a taste in sculpture : 

 lie also ought to know enough of metallurgy to be 

 able to assay mixed metals and to mix the alloy. 



GOLDSMITH, OLIVER, an eminent poet and mis- 

 cellaneous writer, was born in 1731, at Pallas, in the 

 county of Longford, Ireland. His father, the rever- 

 end Charles Goldsmith, sent him, at an early period, 

 to Dublin college, and afterwards, with a view to the 

 medical profession, to the university of Edinburgh. 

 At both these institutions, the eccentricity and care- 

 lessness of his conduct involved his friends in consi- 

 derable difficulties ; and he was removed to Leyden 

 at the expense of an uncle. After studying at that 

 university for about a year, he left it, with only one 

 clean shirt, and no money in his pocket, to make the 

 tour of Europe on foot, and actually travelled in this 

 way through Flanders, part of France, Germany, 

 Switzerland, and Italy. It was, probably, at Padua 

 that he took a medical degree, as he remained there 

 six months ; but, his uncle dying while he was in 

 Italy, he was again obliged to travel on foot to Eng- 

 land, and reached London with a few pence in his 

 pocket. A fellow collegian, doctor Sleigh, assisted 

 him, and recommended him as an usher to a school. 

 He remained but a short time in this situation, and 

 then took lodgings in London, to follow the profes- 

 sion of an author. He conducted a department in 

 the Monthly Review, wrote essays in the Public 

 Ledger (since published under the title of the Citi- 

 zen of the World), and a weekly pamphlet, entitled 

 the Bee. In 1765, he appeared as a poet, by the 

 publication of his Traveller. The celebrity which 

 this poem procured its author, was the cause of his 

 introduction to the most eminent literary characters 

 of the day. In 1766, appeared his well known Vicar 

 of Wakefield, which at once secured merited applause. 

 He also, about this time, composed one of his most 

 successful works, a History of England, in a series of 

 Letters from a Nobleman to his Son (2 vols. 8vo), 

 which, for its elegance and liberal spirit, was usually 

 attributed to lord Lyttelton. In 1768, his comedy 

 of the Good-natured Man was acted at Covent-gar- 

 den with but indifferent success, and he applied to 

 the more certain labour of a Roman History, and a 

 History of England, in four volumes. His poetical 

 fame was greatly enhanced by the publication of his 

 Deserted Village, in 1770, for which he could hardly 

 be induced to take the proffered recompense of .100, 

 until satisfied that the profits of the bookseller could 



a fiord it. In 1772, he produced his comedy of Sha 

 Stoops to Conquer, which was completely successful. 

 He did not, on this account, neglect compilation, 

 and, besides a Grecian History, he supplied the book- 

 sellers with a History of the Earth and Animated 

 Nature, composed out of BufTon and others, in a 

 manner which was both amusing and instructive, 

 although the scientific acquirements of the author 

 were not sufficient to guard against numerous errors. 

 Such was the confidence he had acquired in his skill 

 in compilation, that he was meditating a universal 

 dictionary of the arts and sciences, when a despond- 

 ency of mind, probably owing to the derangement of 

 his circumstances, brought on a low fever, which 

 terminated his life in April, 1774. He was buried 

 with little attendance in the Temple church, but a 

 monument lias been erected to his memory in West- 

 minster abbey, with a Latin inscription, by doctor 

 Johnson. The manners of Goldsmith were eccentric, 

 even to absurdity ; no writer of his time possessed 

 more genuine humour, or was capable of more 

 poignancy in marking the foibles of individuals, of 

 which faculty his unfinished poem of Retaliation fur- 

 nishes a very happy specimen. As a poet, his Tra- 

 veller and Deserted Village have given him a de- 

 served reputation ; and his Vicar of Wakefield is one 

 of the best known and most esteemed of English 

 novels. His compilations are peculiarly felicitous. 

 It was truly observed in his epitaph, by doctor John- 

 son, that he left no species of writing untouched, and 

 adorned all to which he applied himself. 



GOLGOTHA. See Calvary. 



GOMARUS and GOMARISTS. See Reformed 

 Church. 



GONDAR ; a town in Africa, and the capital of 

 Abyssinia, situated on a hill of considerable height, 

 surrounded on every side by a deep valley; Ion. 37" 

 40' E.; lat. 12 30' N. It contains 10,000 families 

 in time of peace, or 50,000 souls. According to 

 Poncet, who visited Gondar in 1699 it was then three 

 or four leagues in circuit, and contained 100 churches. 

 It exhibited nothing of the splendour of a European 

 city. The houses were of only one story, and there 

 were no shops. The trade, which was extensive, 

 was carried on in a vast open plain, where the goods 

 were daily exposed on mats. The houses are chiefly 

 of clay, the roofs thatched in the form of cones, which 

 is always the construction within the tropical rains. 

 At the west end of the town is the king's house, 

 formerly a structure of considerable consequence ; it 

 was a square building, flanked with square towers ; 

 it was formerly four stories high, and from the top 

 of it had a magnificent view of all the country south- 

 ward to the lake Tzana, A great part of this house 

 is now in ruins. See Bruce's Travels. 



GONDOLA; a sort of barge, curiously orna- 

 mented, and navigated on the canals of Venice. The 

 middle-sized gondolas are upwards of thirty feet 

 long, and four broad ; they always terminate at each 

 end in a very sharp point, which is raised perpendi- 

 cularly to the full height of a man. 



GONDOLIER; the boatman of a gondola. The 

 gondoliers were formerly an interesting part of the 

 Venetian population, but since Venice fell under Ihe 

 dominion of the house of Hapsburg, the spirit of the 

 population has departed ; the lagoons are allowed to 

 be choked, and to corrupt the air. 



In Venice Tasso's echoes are no more. 

 And silent rows the nongless gondolier. 

 The gondoliers formerly sung alternately stanzas of 

 poems, particularly of Tasso's Jerusalem Delivered, 

 though with great changes from the original, to be- 

 guile the time. This was called Canto, alia Barca- 

 riola. See the third note to canto iv. of Childc 

 Harold. 



