OLIVER GOLDSMITH'S LIFE AND TIMES. [BOOK m.
1765. admits that lie is himself not over diligent. " Dyer, Doctor
jEt.87. « Nugent, Doctor Goldsmith, and Mr. Eeynolds," he adds,
" are very constant."*
Without its dignified doctorial prefix, Goldsmith's name is
now seldom mentioned; even Newbery is careful to preserve
it in his memoranda of books lent for the purposes of com-
pilation ; and he does not seem, himself, to have again laid
it wholly aside. Indeed he now made a brief effort, at the
suggestion of Eeynolds, to make positive professional use of
it. It was much to have a regular calling, said the successful
painter; it gave a man social rank, and consideration in the
world. Advantage should be taken of the growing popularity
of the Traveller. To be at once physician and man of
letters, was the most natural thing possible : there were the
Arbuthnots and Garths, to say nothing of Cowley himself,
among the dead; there were the Akensides, Graingers,
Armstrongs, and Smolletts, still among the living; and where
was the degree in medicine belonging to any of them, to
which the degree in poetry or wit had not given more glad
acceptance ? Out came Goldsmith accordingly (in the June of
this year, according to the account books of Mr. William Filby
the tailor),i- in purple silk small-clothes, a handsome scarlet
roquelaure buttoned close under the chin, and with all the
additional importance derivable from a full dress professional
wig, a sword, and a gold-headed cane. The style of the coat
and small-clothes may be presumed from the " four guineas
"and a half" paid for them; and, as a child with its toy
* Boswett, ii, 321. In the same letter he writes "Mr. Lye is printing Ida Saxon
"and Gothic dictionary : all The Ohib subscribes."
t These account books were communicated to Mr. Prior by the son of William
Filby (miscalled John in JBoswett), Mr. John Filby, " a respectable member of the
" Corporation, of London," and will hereafter be quoted in detail. They complete
the picture of which I furnish the beginning on a previous page (534), in the
extracts there first printed from the Edinburgh tailor's ledger.