1763. " that of being the representative of Westminster or Surrey.

H&$5. " The electors are certainly more disinterested; and I should
" say they were much better judges of merit, if they had not
" rejected Lord Camden and chosen me."* The Bishop of
St. Asaph had just been elected, and on the very night when
Lord Caniden and the Bishop of Chester were blackballed/!- •
Shall we wonder if distinction in a society such as this,
should open a new life to Goldsmith ?

His claim to enter it would seem to have been somewhat
canvassed, at first, by at least one of the members. " As he
" wrote for the booksellers," says Hawkins, " we at the club
" looked on him as a mere literary drudge, equal to the task
" of compiling and translating, but little capable of original,
" and still less of poetical composition: he had, nevertheless,
" unknown to us "I ... I need not anticipate what it was
that so startled Hawkins with its unknown progress : the
reader has already intimation of it. It is however more
than probable, whatever may have been thought of Gold-
smith's drudgery, that this extremely low estimate of his
capacity was limited to Mr. Hawkins, whose opinions were
seldom, popular with the other members of the club. Early
associations clung hard to Johnson, and, for the sake of these,
Hawkins was borne with to the last; but, in the newly-formed
society, even Johnson admitted him. to be out of place.
Neither in habits nor opinions did he harmonise with the
rest. He had been an attorney for many years, affecting
literary tastes, and dabbling in music at the Madrigal-club ;

* Teignmouth's Life and Correspondence of Sir William Jones, i. 347.
+ " "When bishops and chancellors," says Jones, commenting on this fact,
"honour us with offering to dine at a tavern, it seems very extraordinary that we
"should ever reject such an offer ; but there is no reasoning on the caprice of
" men. Of our club I will only say that there is no branch of human knowledge
"on which some of our members are not capable of giving information." Teign-
mouth's Life, i. 345.

$ Life of Johnson, 420,o Baxter's, which subsequently