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26 To his Mother. The Appenines; Florence and its gallery,

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i From Mr. West. Complains of his friend's silence,
2 To Mr. West. Answer to the former; a translation of
some lines from Statius,

3 From Mr. West. Approbation of the version; ridicule
on the Cambridge Collection of Verses on the Mar-
riage of the Prince of Wales,

2 27 To Mr. West. Journey from Genoa to Florence; elegiac verses occasioned by the sight of the plains where the battle of Trebia was fought,

4 To Mr. West. On the little encouragement which he finds given to classical learning at Cambridge; his aversion to metaphysical and mathematical studies, ib. 28 To his Mother. Death of the pope; intended departure for Rome; first and pleasing appearance of an Italian spring,

5 From Mr. West. Answer to the former; advises his correspondent not to give up poetry when he ap plies himself to the law,

6 To Mr. Walpole. Excuse for not writing to him, &c. 7 From Mr. West. A poetical epistle addressed to his Cambridge friend, taken in part from Tibullus, and a prose letter of Mr. Pope,

8 To Mr. West. Thanks him for his poetical epistle; complains of low spirits; Lady Walpole's death, and his concern for Mr. H. Walpole,

9 To Mr. Walpole. How he spends his own time in the country; meets with Mr. Southern, the dramatic poet,

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ib. 29 To his Mother. Cathedral of Sienna; Viterbo; distant sight of Rome; the Tiber; entrance into the city; St. Peter's; introduction of the Cardinal d'Auvergne into the conclave,

ib. 30 To his Mother. Illumination of St. Peter's on Good Friday, &c.

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10 To Mr. Walpole. Supposed manner in which Mr.
Walpole spends his time in the country,
11 To Mr. Walpole. Congratulates him on his new place;
whimsical description of the quadrangle of Peter-
House.

ib.

12 To Mr. West. On his own leaving the University,
13 To his Mother. His voyage from Dover; description
of Calais; Abbeville; Amiens; face of the country,
and dress of the people,

ib.

it.

17

ib.

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31 To Mr. West. Comic account of the Palace of the duke of Modena at Tivoli; the Anio; its cascade; situation of the town; villas of Horace and Mæcenas, and other remains of antiquity; modern aqueducts, and grand Roman ball, ib.

32 To Mr. West. Ludicrous allusion to ancient customs; Albano and its lake; Castel Gondolfo, prospect from the palace; an observation of Mr. Walpole's on the views in that part of Italy; Latin inscriptions, ancient and modern,

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6 ib. 33 To his Mother. Road to Naples; beautiful situation of that city; its bay; of Baia, and several other antiquities; some account of the first discovery of an ancient town not known to be Herculaneum, 21 34 To his Father. Departure from Rome, and return to Florence; no likelihood of the conclave's rising; some of the cardinals dead; description of the Pretender, his sons, and court; procession at Naples; sight of the king and queen; mildness of the air at Florence,

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14 To Mr. West. Monuments of the kings of France at St.
Dennis, &c.; French opera and music; actors, &c.
15 To Mr. West. Palace of Versailles; its garden and
waterworks; installation of the Knights du St. Esprit, 8
16 To his Mother. Rheims; its Cathedral; disposition
and amusements of its inhabitants,

17 To his Father. Face of the country between Rheims
and Dijolin; description of the latter; monastery
of the Carthusians and Cistercians,
18 To Mr. West. Lyons; beauty of its environs; Roman
antiquities,

19 From Mr. West. His wishes to accompany his friend;
his retired life in London; address to his Lyre, in
Latin Sapphics, on the prospect of Mr. Gray's
return,

20 To his Mother. Lyons; excursion to the Grande Chartreuse; solemn and romantic approach to it; his reception there, and commendation of the monas tery,

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24 11 38 To his Father. Uncertainty of the route he shall take in his return to England; magnificence of the Ita lians in their reception of strangers; and parsimony when alone; the great applause which the new pope ineets with; one of his bon mots, ib. 39 To his Father. Total want of amusement at Florence, occasioned by the late emperor's funeral not being public; a procession to avert the ill effects of a late inundation; intention of going to Venice; an invasion from the Neapolitans apprehended; the inha. bitants of Tuscany dissatisfied with the govern. ment,

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determined; alteration in his temper and spirits; difference between an Italian fair and an English one; a farewell to Florence and its prospects in La. tin hexameters; imitation, in the same language, of an Italian sonnet, 41 From Mr. West. His spirits not as yet improved by country air; has begun to read Tacitus, but not to relish him,

42 To Mr. West. Earnest hopes for his friend's better health, as the warm weather comes on; defence of Tacitus, and his character; of the new Dunciad; sends him a speech from the first scene of his Agrippina,

44 To Dr. Wharton. Ridicule on university laziness; of Dr. Akenside's poem on the Pleasures of Imagination,

45 To Mr. Walpole. Ludicrous description of the Scottish army's approach to the capital; animadver sions on Pope,

Page.

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43 From Mr. West. Criticisms on his friend's tragic style; Latin hexameters on his own cough, ib. *43 To Dr. Wharton. On taking his degree of Bachelor of Civil Law,

. ib.

IV. To Adversity,

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V. The progress of Poesy,

36

VI. The Bard,

37

VII. The Fatal Sisters,

39

ib.

VIII. The descent of Odin,

IX. The triumph of Owen,

X. The death of Hoel,

42

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46 To Dr. Wharton. His amusements in town; reflec tions on riches; character of Aristotle, 47 To Mr. Walpole. Observations on his tragedy of Agrippina; admirable picture of true Philosophy, 43 To Mr. Walpole. Ludicrous compliment of condolence on the death of his favourite cat, enclosing an ode on that subject,

XI. For Music, on the installation of the duke of Grafton, Chancellor of the University,

ib.

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49 To Dr. Wharton. Loss by fire of a house in Cornhill;

Gray of himself,

The Life of Thomas Gray.

THOMAS GRAY was born in Cornhill, in the city | liberality, took upon himself the blame of the quarof London, on the 26th of December, 1716. His rel; though, if we consider the matter coolly and father, Philip Gray, was a money-scrivener, but impartially, we may be induced to conclude that being of an indolent and profuse disposition, he Gray, from a conscious superiority of ability, might rather diminished than improved his paternal for- have claimed a deference to his opinion and judgtune. Our author received his classical education ment, which his honourable friend was not at that at Eton school, under Mr. Antrobus, his mother's time disposed to admit: the rupture, however, was brother, a man of sound learning and refined taste, very unpleasant to both parties. who directed his nephew to those pursuits which laid the foundation of his future literary fame.

During his continuance at Eton, he contracted a friendship with Mr. Horace Walpole, well known for his knowledge in the fine arts; and Mr. Richard West, son of the lord Chancellor of Ireland, a youth of very promising talents.

Gray pursued his journey to Venice on an eco|nomical plan, suitable to the circumscribed state of his finances, and having continued there some weeks, returned to England in September, 1741. He appears, from his letters, published by Mr. Mason, to have paid the minutest attention to every object, worthy of notice, throughout the course of When he left Eton school in 1734, he went to his travels. His descriptions are lively and picCambridge, and entered a pensioner at Peterhouse, turesque, and bear particular marks of his genius at the recommendation of his uncle Antrobus, who and disposition. We adinire the sublimity of his had been a fellow of that college. It is said that, ideas when he ascends the stupendous heights of from his effeminacy and fair complexion, he ac- the Alps, and are charmed with his display of naquired, among his fellow students, the appellation ture, decked in all the beauties of vegetation. Inof Miss Gray, to which the delicacy of his man-deed, abundant information, as well as entertainners seems not a little to have contributed. Mr. ment, may be derived from his casual letters. Walpole was at that time a fellow commoner of King's College, in the same university; a fortunate circumstance, which afforded Gray frequent opportunities of intercourse with his honourable friend.

In about two months after his arrival in England, he lost his father, who, by an indiscreet profusion, had so impaired his fortune, as not to admit of his son's prosecuting the study of the law with that degree of respectability which the nature Mr. West went from Eton to Christ Church, of the profession requires, without becoming burOxford; and in this state of separation, these two densome to his mother and aunt. To obviate, votaries of the muses, whose dispositions were con- therefore, their importunities on the subject, he genial, commenced an epistolary correspondence, went to Cambridge, and took his bachelor's depart of which is published by Mr. Mason, a gen-gree in civil law. tleman whose character stands high in the republic of letters.

But the inconveniences and distress attached to a scanty fortune, were not the only ills our poet Gray, having imbibed a taste for poetry, did not had to encounter at this time: he had not only lost relish those abstruse studies which generally oc- the friendship of Mr. Walpole abroad, but poor cupy the minds of students at college; and there- West, the partner of his heart, fell a victim to comfore, as he found very little gratification from aca- plicated maladies, brought on by family misfordemical pursuits, he left Cambridge in 1738, and tunes, on the first of June, 1742, at Popes, a vilreturned to London, intending to apply himself to lage in Hertfordshire, where he went for the benefit the study of the law; but this intention was soon of the air. laid aside, upon an invitation given him by Mr. Walpole, to accompany him in his travels abroad; a situation highly preferable, in Gray's opinion, to the dry study of the law.

They set out together for France, and visited most of the places worthy of notice in that country; from thence they proceeded to Italy, where an unfortunate dispute taking place between them, a separation ensued upon their arrival at Florence. Mr. Walpole, afterwards, with great candour and

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The excessive degree in which his mind was agitated for the loss of his friend, will best appear from the following beautiful little sonnet:

"In vain to me the smiling mornings shine,

And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire:
The birds in vain their amorous descant join,

Or cheerful fields resume their green attire;
These ears, alas! for other notes repine:
A different object do these eyes require;

My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine,
And in my breast the imperfect joys expire;
Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer,
And new-born pleasure brings to happier men;
The fields to all their wonted tribute bear;
To warm their little loves the birds complain;
fruitless mourn to him that can not hear;
And weep the more, because I weep in vain."

ignorance and dulness with which he was surrounded, though situated in the centre of learning.

In 1744 he seems to have given up his attention to the Muses, Mr. Walpole, desirous of preserving what he had already written, as well as perpetuating the merit of their deceased friend, West, endeavoured to prevail with Gray, to whom he had previously become reconciled, to publish his own poems, together with those of West; but Gray declined it, conceiving their productions united would not suffice to fill even a small volume.

In 1747 Gray became acquainted with Mr. Mason, then a scholar of St. John's College, and af

Mr. Gray now seems to have applied his mind very sedulously to poetical composition; his Ode to Spring was written early in June, to his friend Mr. West, before he received the melancholy news of his death: how our poet's susceptible mind was afterwards fellow of Pembroke-hall. Mr. Mason, fected by that melancholy incident, is evidently who was a man of great learning and ingenuity, demonstrated by the lines quoted above; the im- had written the year before, his " Monody on the pression, indeed, appears to have been too deep to Death of Pope," and his "Il Bellicoso," and "Il be soon effaced; and the tenor of the subjects which Pacifico:" and Gray revised these pieces at the recalled for the exertions of his poetical talents sub- quest of a friend. This laid the foundation of a sequent to the production of this Ode, corroborates friendship that terminated but with life: and Mr. that observation; these were his Prospect of Eton, Mason, after the death of Gray, testified his regard and his Ode to Adversity. It is also supposed, for him, by superintending the publication of his and with great probability, that he began his Elegy in a Country Churchyard about the same time. The same year he wrote a little ode on the Death He passed some weeks at Stoke, near Windsor, of a favourite cat of Mr. Walpole's, in which huwhere his mother and aunt resided, and in that mour and instruction are happily blended; but the pleasing retirement finished several of his most celebrated poems.

works.

following year he produced an effort of much more importance; the fragment of an Essay on the Alliance of Education and Government. Its tendency was to demonstrate the necessary concurrence of both to form great and useful men.

In 1750, he put the finishing stroke to his Elegy written in a Country Church-yard, which was

From thence he returned to Cambridge, which, from this period, was his chief residence during the remainder of his life. The conveniences with which a college life was attended, to a person of his narrow fortune, and studious turn of mind, were more than a compensation for the dislike which, for communicated first to his friend Mr. Walpole, and several reasons, he bore to the place: but he was by him to many persons of rank and distinction. perfectly reconciled to his situation, on Mr. Ma- This beautiful production introduced the author son's being elected a fellow of Pembroke-Hall; a to the favour of Lady Cobham, and gave occasion circumstance which brought him a companion, to a singular composition, called A Long Story; who, during life retained for him the highest de- in which various effusions of wit and humour are gree of friendship and esteem. very happily interspersed.

In 1742 he was admitted to the degree of bache-gazine of Magazines," the author wrote to Mr. The Elegy having found its way into the "Malor in the civil law, as appears from a letter writ- Walpole, requesting that he would put it into the ten to his particular friend Dr. Wharton, of Old hands of Mr. Dodsley, and order him to print it Park, near Durham, formerly fellow of Pembroke immediately, in order to rescue it from the disgrace Hall, Cambridge, in which he ridicules, with much it might have incurred by its appearance in a point and humour, the follies and foibles, and the dulness and formality, which prevailed in the university.

In order to enrich his mind with the ideas of others, he devoted a considerable portion of his time to the study of the best Greek authors; so that in the course of six years, there were hardly any writers of eminence in that language whose works he had not only read but thoroughly digested.

all our author's productions; it ran through eleven magazine. The Elegy was the most popular of editions, and was translated into Latin by Anstey and Roberts; and in the same year a version of it was published by Lloyd. Mr. Bently, an eminent artist of that time, wishing to decorate this elegant composition with every ornament of which it is so highly deserving, drew for it a set of designs, as he also did for the rest of Gray's productions, for which the artist was liberally repaid by the author His attention, however, to the Greek classics, in some beautiful stanzas, but unfortunately no did not wholly engross his time; for he found lei-perfect copy of them remains. The following, sure to advert, in a new sarcastical manner, to the however, are given as a specimen.

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