and happily shuts up his couples--the gentle
Dr. Primrose with his abominable Deborah; the
excellent Mr. Burchell with the paltry Sophia;
Olivia--but no, Olivia is not so certainly happy
ever after; she has a captured husband ready for
her in a state of ignominy, but she has also a
forgotten farmer somewhere in the background
--the unhappy man whom, with her father's
permission, this sorry heroine had promised to
marry in order that his wooing might pluck
forward the lagging suit of the squire.

Olivia, then, plays her common trick upon
the harmless Williams, her father conniving,
with a provision that he urges with some dem-
onstration of virtue: she shall consent to make
the farmer happy if the proposal of the squire
be not after all forthcoming. But it is so evi-
dent her author knew no better, that this matter
may pass. It involves a point of honour, of
which no one--neither the maker of the book nor
anyone he made--is aware. What is better
worth considering is the fact that Goldsmith was
completely aware of the unredeemed vulgarity
of the ladies of the Idyll, and cheerfully took it
for granted as the thing to be expected from the
mother-in-law of a country gentleman and the
daughters of a scholar. The education of women

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