l coast. It was in the hope of obtaining this appointment,
that he set about composing that _Enquiry into the Present State of
Polite Learning in Europe_, which is now interesting to us as the
first of his more ambitious works. As the book grew under his hands,
he began to cast about for subscribers; and from the Fleet-Street
coffee-house--he had again left the Peckham school--he addressed to
his friends and relatives a series of letters of the most charming
humour, which might have drawn subscriptions from a millstone. To his
brother-in-law, Mr. Hodson, he sent a glowing account of the great
fortune in store for him on the Coromandel coast. "The salary is but
trifling," he writes, "namely L100 per annum, but the other
advantages, if a person be prudent, are considerable. The practice of
the place, if I am rightly informed, generally amounts to not less
than L1,000 per annum, for which the appointed physician has an
exclusive privilege. This, with the advantages resulting from trade,
and the high interest which money bears, viz. 20 per cent., are the
inducements which persuade me to undergo the fatigues of sea, the
dangers of war, and the still greater dangers of the climate; which
induce me to leave a place where I am every day gaining friends and
esteem, and where I might enjoy all the conveniences of life."

The surprising part of this episode in Goldsmith's life is that he did
really receive the appointment; in fact he was called upon to pay L10
for the appointment-warrant. In this emergency he went to the
proprietor of the _Critical Review_, the rival of the _Monthly_, and
obtained some money for certain anonymous work which need not be
mentioned in detail here. He also moved into another garret, this time
in Green-Arbour Court, Fleet Street, in a wilderness of slums. The
Coromandel project, however, on which so many hopes had been built,
fell through. No explanation of the collapse could be got from either
Goldsmith himself, or from Dr. Milner. Mr. Forster suggests that
Goldsmith's inability to raise money for his outfit may have been made
the excuse for transferring the appointment to another; and that is
probable enough; but it is also probable that the need for such an
excuse was based on the discovery that Goldsmith was not properly
qualified for the post. And this seems the more likely, that Goldsmith
immediately afterwards resolved to challenge examination at Surgeons'
Hall. He undertook to write four articl