OLIVER GOLDSMITH S LIFE AND TIMES. [BOOK ill.
1760. slept on a bed of boards in a French prison, but with a
J3UJk warm blanket about him, because, as he remarked, he always
loved to lie well: and to whom, when he came to sum up
and balance his life's adventures, it occurred that had he had
the good fortune to have lost his leg and the use of his hand
on board a king's ship, and not a privateer, he should have
had his sixpence a week for the rest of his clays; but that
was not his chance; one man was born with a silver spoon
in his mouth, and another with a wooden ladle : " however,
" blessed be Grod, I enjoy good health." This was as wise
philosophy as Candide's, at which Europe was then laughing
heartily; and it is worth mention that from the countrymen
of Voltaire this little essay should first have derived its
fame. So popular in France was the " humble optimist," as
his translator called him, that he is not unlikely to have
visited even the halls of Les Delices; to be read there, as
everywhere, with mirth upon the face and tenderness at the
heart; perhaps to reawaken recollections of the ungainly,
wandering scholar.
Of upwards of twenty essays thus contributed to Smollett's
magazine, few were republished by Goldsmith; but from
other causes, certainly, than lack of merit. One was a
criticism of two rival singers, two Polly Peachurns then
dividing Vauxhall, so pleasantly worded that neither could
take offence; but of temporary interest chiefly. Another
was a caution against violent courtships, from a true story in
the family of his uncle Contarine; perhaps thought too
private for reappearance in more permanent form. A third
(not reproduced, it may be, lest the wooden-legged philo-
sopher should lose in popularity by a companion less^popular
than himself) described, as a contrast to the happiness of
the maimed and luckless soldier, the miseries of a healthy