are worse," said one of his medical attendants, "than you should
be from the degree of fever which you have. Is your mind at
ease?" "No, it is not," were the last recorded words of Oliver
Goldsmith. He died on the third of April 1774, in his forty-
sixth year. He was laid in the churchyard of the Temple; but the
spot was not marked by any inscription, and is now forgotten.
The coffin was followed by Burke and Reynolds. Both these great
men were sincere mourners. Burke, when he heard of Goldsmith's
death, had burst into a flood of tears. Reynolds had been so
much moved by the news that he had flung aside his brush and
palette for the day.

A short time after Goldsmith's death, a little poem appeared,
which will, as long as our language lasts, associate the names of
his two illustrious friends with his own. It has already been
mentioned that he sometimes felt keenly the sarcasm which his
wild blundering talk brought upon him. He was, not long before
his last illness, provoked into retaliating. He wisely betook
himself to his pen; and at that weapon he proved himself a match
for all his assailants together. Within a small compass he drew
with a singularly easy and vigorous pencil the characters of nine
or ten of his intimate associates. Though this little work did
not receive his last touches, it must always be regarded as a
masterpiece. It is impossible, however, not to wish that four or
five likenesses which have no interest for posterity were wanting
to that noble gallery; and that their places were supplied by
sketches of Johnson and Gibbon, as happy and vivid as the
sketches of Burke and Garrick.

Some of Goldsmith's friends and admirers honoured him with a