lanced at
the manuscript, saw that there were good things in it, took it to a
bookseller, sold it for 60 pounds, and soon returned with the money.
The rent was paid; and the sheriff's officer withdrew. According to one
story, Goldsmith gave his landlady a sharp reprimand for her treatment
of him; according to another, he insisted on her joining him in a bowl
of punch. Both stories are probably true. The novel which was thus
ushered into the world was the "Vicar of Wakefield."

But, before the "Vicar of Wakefield" appeared in print, came the
great crisis of Goldsmith's literary life. In Christmas week, 1764, he
published a poem, entitled the "Traveller." It was the first work to
which he had put his name; and it at once raised him to the rank of a
legitimate English classic. The opinion of the most skilful critics was,
that nothing finer had appeared in verse since the fourth book of the
"Dunciad." In one respect the "Traveller" differs from all Goldsmith's
other writings. In general his designs were bad, and his execution good.
In the "Traveller," the execution, though deserving of much praise, is
far inferior to the design. No philosophical poem, ancient or modern,
has a plan so noble, and at the same time so simple. An English
wanderer, seated on a crag among the Alps, near the point where three
great countries meet, looks down on the boundless prospect, reviews
his long pilgrimage, recalls the varieties of scenery, of climate, of
government, of religion, of national character, which he has observed,
and comes to the conclusion just or unjust, that our happiness depends
little on political institutions, and much on the temper and regulation
of our own minds.

While the fourth edition of the "Traveller" was on the counters of the
booksellers, the "Vicar of Wakefield" appeared, and rapidly obtained a
popularity which has lasted down to our own time, and which is likely to
last as long as our language. The fable is indeed one of the worst that
ever was constructed. It wants, not merely that probability which ought
to be found in a tale of common English life, but that consistency which
ought to be found even in the wildest fiction about witches, giants,
and fairies. But the earlier chapters have all the sweetness of
pastoral poetry, together with all the vivacity of comedy. Moses and his
spectacles, the vicar and his monogamy, the sharper and his cosmogony,
the squire proving from Aristotle that relatives are related, O