The Irish standard., 1891-02-14
Oliver Goldsmith S Home.

OllV6T dOlQSmlLl S home.
Mary Banim in Dublin Freeman: In
from the high road some one hundred
and fifty Yards stands the rum, once the
home of that father 80 beautifully
painted by his son IN the character Of
the Vicar Of Wakefield-the early home,
too, of the truest and nOblest poem OF
his age. Yes. even now the site OF that
home Is just as Goldsmith saw it, when,
in his lonely London room, he closed
his eyes and recalled each loved spot
NEAR yorder corpse, where once the garden
smiled
And still where many garden flowers grows
wild,
There, where a few torn shrubs the place
disclose,
The village preachers modest mansion rose.
A man he was to all the country dear,
And passing rich With forty pounds d year.
His house was known to ali the yagrant train,
He Child their wanderings, but relieved their
peiE:
The long remembered beggar was his guest,
Whose beard descended swept his aged breast
The ruined spendthrlft, now no longer proud,
Clain'd kindred there, and had his claims al
lowed,
The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay,
Sat by his fire and talk d the night away.
Wept Ger his wounds Or tales Of sorrow done,
Shoulder'd his crutch, and shOW'd how fields
vere won.
Pleased with his guests, the good man learr'd to
glow,
And quite forget their vices in their woe;
Careless their merits Or their faults to SCAN,
His pity gave ere charity began
This picture is said to have been ex-
activ painted from tins Rev. Henry
Goldsmith, the poets brother, who suc-
ceeded his father as Curats of Palias;
one of the boys who played here with
little Oliver and grew to early manhood
in this modest mansion" OF the Vicar,
then Rector of Kilkenny West, and in
the enjoyment of~in those times--coml-
Portable income of se200 year. Even
now there is a charm about the place
that enables one to fancy what Il com"
Portable and pretty home that modest
mansion was in it's palmv DAYS. The
Old~fashloned, straight avenue in the
center OF the lawn is now only marked
bY the track of wheels ON the short.
green sward, which, each time we Wis.,
tied it was flooded by the warm sum
light that streams right upon the front
OF the ruined house. How CHEEKY it
must have made the rooms, so neatly
furnished and daintlly Kept by the
wears thrifty wife, On either hand
Of the avenue. n row of trees from the
boundary between the lawn and the
fields, and before the house the square
Widens Out to the right, leaving room
for magnificent lime tree, beside
which the present owner OF the place
"a fisrmer-has his cosy house.
The old house itself must have been
a good one; the words modest man
sion' exactly fit it; we'll built, two.
stored stone house. the main build
ing five windows in length, which
would have given good MANY rooms
of moderate size. The wallis are thick
with curious square aperture. as if
for air, running the entire length OF
the front wall. At the back is the
old garden, whose apple trees bend over
the broken house .WalI--that old gar
den where, perhaps. the Vicar planted
with his own hand that very apple
tree from which one Of the little chill
dren OF the farm broke us branch,
chat we might carry it away with some
Of the linden blossoms.
How we tried TO re-people the old
house; The gentle, le.hearted
Vicar, his bustling wife; the bows and
girls, playing in and out from lawn to
parlour, then away through the trim
garden. with its box edges, its espalier
fruit trees, and bordering flower knots;
and little Oliver, he who. though dull
1t lessons, would sing aud dance and
grow wild with the joy Of life. and
earned each day in the sunny country |
around lessons from nobler book than
my written BY the hand Of man; lessons |
never to bs forgotten, no more than !!
such a heart could or eyer did forget |
hose scenes Of happy childhood
L still had hopes, my long vexatious past.
Iere to return-and die at home at last.