53 - To the Daily Advertiser, London, 31 March 1773

Summary

Goldsmith attempted to draw a dignified line under an unfortunate public incident with a letter to this newspaper. The London Packet had printed a damning indictment of his talents and appearance by William Kenrick (see Letter 25) on 24 March 1773. Goldsmith was described in the article as having a ‘grotesque Oranhotan's figure’; The Deserted Village was dismissed as ‘a pretty poem, of easy numbers, without fancy, dignity, genius or fire’, while the recent She Stoops to Conquer was jeered as a ‘speaking pantomime […] an incoherent piece of stuff ‘. The article also scoffed at Goldsmith's unsuitability as a companion for the Jessamy Bride, Mary Horneck, to whom Goldsmith was very attached and of whom he was, like many of his peers, genuinely admiring. The offending piece can be found in full in Percy's biography; Percy also felt obliged to relegate the attack from the main text: ‘We would not defile our page with this scurrilous production, so shall insert it in the margin.’ As a result of the article, Goldsmith had tried to administer a beating to Thomas Evans (1738/9–1803), a Welsh bookseller in Paternoster Row and the publisher of the London Packet. Evans feigned ignorance of the matter but Goldsmith sought to give him a beating anyway, though Evans was, by all accounts, more than his physical match. According to one account, Evans defended himself ‘in a true pugilistic style’, and soon Goldsmith ‘was disarmed, and extended on the floor, to the no small diversion of the by-standers’. Kenrick himself, in a neighbouring room at the time, intervened to put an end to the skirmish which his own writing had brought about. Goldsmith left the scene, well beaten, and would eventually pay ￡50 to a Welsh charity to settle with Evans, who threatened a suit.

The copy-text is the Daily Advertiser (31 March 1773), where it was first published. It also appeared in the London Chronicle (1–3 April 1773).