course, claiming that similarity of idea in different
writings necessarily betokens the same authorship, I think the
parallels that are to be found in this little book, with many of the
sentiments in Oliver Goldsmith's acknowledged work--to say nothing of
the almost universally recognized likeness to Goldsmith's style that
is found in "Goody Two Shoes" may fairly be considered as throwing
some light upon the question.

The most striking of these parallels is perhaps that furnished by the
curious little political preface to the work--a preface which is quite
unnecessary to the book, and I think would only have been inserted by
one who was full of the unjustnesses at which he was preparing to aim
a still heavier blow. In describing the parish of Mouldwell, where
little Margery was born, an exact picture is drawn of "The Deserted
Village," where

One only master grasps the whole domain
And half a tillage tints thy smiling plain;

And where

---- the man of wealth and pride
Takes up a space that many a poor supplied:
Space for his lakes his park's extended bounds,
Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds.

And by this and other tyrannies, and being also

Scourged by famine from the smiling land,

for he was "unfortunate in his business" at about the same time, Sir
Timothy accomplishes his aim, and

Indignant spurns the cottage from the green.

Ruined by this oppression, poor Mr Meanwell is turned out of doors,
and flew to another parish for succour.

Where, then, ah! where shall poverty reside
To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride?

Sir Timothy, however, suffers for his injustice and wickedness, for
"great part of the land lay untilled for some years, which was deemed
a just reward for such diabolical proceedings."

Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates and men decay.

Miss Charlotte Yonge, to whom I shall refer again, lays upon this: "If
the conjecture be true which attributes this tale to Oliver Goldsmith,
we have seen the same spirit which prompted his poem of 'The Deserted
Village,' namely, indignation and dismay at the discouragement of
small holdings in the early part of the eighteenth century."[C]
Indeed, it may well be that we have in this preface even a more true
picture of Lissoy than that given in the poem, which, as Mr William
Black says in his monograph on Goldsmith, "is there seen through the
softening and beautifying mist of y