decidedly to this opinion. Though the claim of the church-yard of Stoke Pogeis to be the actual scene of the elegy is disputed with a neighboring village, “I cannot question," he says, "that the one which was nearest to his place of residence, answering adequately as it does to all the touches in his description, and which has since received his mother's remains and his own, was the real theatre of inspiration."

As a proof of the undiminished interest which still attaches to it, we may mention that at a sale in London, in 1845, of books and manuscripts which had belonged to the poet, a copy of the elegy in his own hand-writing, upon two small half-sheets of paper, in a mutilated condition, was sold for one hundred pounds sterling. It was purchased by Mr. Penn, of Stoke Pogeis, though he had Eton College for a competitor. The same gentleman bought a large portion of the collection, which he offered for sale again at auction in London in August, 1854, when the elegy brought an advance of thirtyone pounds on its previous price.

Gray's poetical reputation had attracted the attention of Lady Cobham, who occupied the mansion-house at Stoke Pogeis, in his neighborhood, and led to one of the few friendships which Gray seems to have cultivated with the other sex. Desirous of making his acquaintance, her ladyship one morning despatched two friends who were visiting her to make a call upon the poet. These were Lady Schaub and Miss Harriot Speed, both persons of no little wit and vivacity. Not finding him at home, they entered the house, called for ink and paper, and left an invitation for him from Lady Cobham to dine with her the next day. He accepted the invitation; and this incident was not only the origin of "The Long Story," but of a very agreeable acquaintance. From this time, when he was in the country Gray was continually at Stoke House. Miss Speed afterwards married Count Very, of Savoy; and we are indebted to her not merely for this humorous effort, but for Gray's only love-song, which was written at her request. Gray used to say that the Long Story was never intended for the public, and was only suffered to appear in "that pompous edition" of Dodsley's because of Mr. Bentley's designs, which were not intelligible without it.

At the suggestion of Walpole, Mr. Bentley, the son of the "slashing doctor," employed his pencil in the illustration of Gray's poems

which at that time consisted of four little odes, the Elegy, and the Long Story. With his keen sensitiveness to ridicule, Gray was afraid that he might seem to give too much importance to these pieces by publishing them with designs in illustration, and he therefore insisted that the title of "Poems" should be dropped, and that the book should be styled "Designs by Mr. R. Bentley for Six Poems by Mr. 1. Gray." On this point he was very solicitous, and one of his most characteristic letters was written to Dodsley in regard to it. He was willing that his plain Christian and surname should appear, without a Mr. before them, though this was bad enough; but he would not give up the question of the title, which was finally arranged as he desired.

In connection with this volume, he narrowly escaped a shock that would have been more serious than the surreptitious appearance of the elegy, or than seeing his plain name without the Mr. He learned that his portrait had been engraved for the frontispiece. He was horror-struck. “Sure you are not out of your wits!" he wrote to Walpole. "This I know, if you suffer my head to be printed, you will infallibly put me out of mine. I conjure you immediately to put a stop to any such design. Who is at the expense of engraving, I know not; but if it be Dodsley, I will make up the loss to him. The thing as it was, I know, will make me ridiculous enough; but, to appear in proper person at the head of my works, consisting of half-a-dozen ballads in thirty pages, would be worse than the pillory. I do assure you, if I had received such a book, with such a frontispiece, without any warning, I believe it would have given me a palsy."

The volume made a quarto of four-and-thirty pages; thin enough, though the paper was nearly as thick as pasteboard, and printed only on one side. This was probably for the sake of the engravings, but Dr. Johnson says it was that the poems might, in some form or other, make a book. The designs are as grotesque and tasteless as can well be imagined. Cumberland, in his memoirs, speaks the truth for once at least, when he says that the artist had "completely libelled both his poet and his patron" in these etchings; for grosser libels on the taste of both their worst enemy could hardly have invented. And yet Gray, with all his fastidiousness, was pleased

with them, and addressed some complimentary verses to Mr. Bentley on his success.

A proof of one of these engravings which represented a village funeral, was sent to Gray at Stoke. His aunts saw him taking it from a letter, and, supposing it to be a burying-ticket, asked him if anybody had left him a ring. "Heaven forbid," he said, "they should suspect it to belong to any verses of mine; they would burn me for a poet." At this time his mother was ill in bed, and, in March, 1753, she died, "after a long and painful struggle for life,” at the age of sixty-seven. The poet placed over her remains an inscription which aptly expresses his affection and sorrow:

BESIDE HER FRIEND AND SISTER,

HERE SLEEP THE REMAINS OF

Dorothy Gray,

WIDOW, THE CAREFUL, TENDER MOTHER

OF MANY CHILDREN, ONE OF WHOM ALONE

HAD THE MISFORTUNE TO SURVIVE HER.

In December, 1754, Gray completed his ode on "The Progress of Poetry." It was commenced two or three years before, but was arrested by a remark of Mason, who told him that it was not of a nature to suit the public taste. Whenever Mason afterwards urged him to complete it, he answered, "You have thrown cold water on it.' Indeed, we are informed by Walpole that Mason's cavils" on his two beautiful and sublime odes " almost induced the poet to destroy them. In 1755 the first part of The Bard was communicated to Mr Stonhewer and Dr. Wharton; but it remained unfinished for twe years, when the accident of hearing a blind Welshman perform on the harp at Cambridge led to its completion. "Odicle" for a long time did not “grow a bit," though it was “fine mild open weather;" but, under the genial glow which the old harper inspired, it started, flourished, and bloomed, a consummate flower. His friend, Mr. Nicholls, asked him how he felt while composing it. He replied, Why, I felt myself the bard."

In 1756 Gray left Peter-house, where he had resided above twenty years; and this he says was an "era in a life so barren of events.' The apartments adjoining his own were occupied by riotous undergraduates. Gray was very apprehensive of fire; and we find him

requesting Dr. Wharton to bespeak for him a rope-ladder, thirty feet long, light and manageable, "easy to unroll, and not likely to entangle ;" and this he kept by him, affixed to two iron bars, which he placed there for the purpose, and which are still shown at the window of the chamber he occupied. The story got wind, and some of the collegians were determined to "have him out," and observe the practical working of the machine. They raised the cry of "Fire," one morning, and brought Gray to the window in a "delicate white night-cap; " but, finding it a false alarm, he returned to his couch.

Gray was not so much amused at this practical joke as the reverend gentleman seems to have been who records it, and he made complaint to the college authorities. They treated it as a "boyish frolic; "and the poet, indignant that his remonstrance was disregarded, removed to Pembroke College, where his principal friends resided. Here, some years afterwards, the chambers opposite his own were burned; and, in describing the occurrence, he says, "I assure you, it is not amusing to be waked between two and three in the morning, and to hear, 'Don't be frightened, sir, but the college is all of a fire." "

In July, 1757, Gray went to London with his two great odes, and sold them to Dodsley for forty guineas; the poet's receipt for which is now in the possession of Mr. Samuel Rogers. Walpole was on the alert, however, and “snatched them out of Dodsley's hands," that they might be the first fruits of his press at Strawberry Hill, where an edition was printed of one thousand copies. These were speedily sold; but the odes, Dr. Wharton tells us, were not liked by twenty persons in England. Garrick called them the best in our own or any other language. Shenstone and Lyttleton admired, but wished they were clearer. Mr. Fox, afterwards Lord Holland, thought that Edward I. would not have understood the song or a single hearing. When this was told to Gray, he said, "If he had recited it twenty times, Edward would not have been a bit wiser; but that was no reason why Mr. Fox should not." Owen Cambridge told Walpole that Lord Chesterfield heard one Stanley read the odes, and thought he was the author. Walpole suggested that his lordship's deafness probably led him into the mistake. "Perhaps," rejoined Cambridge, “they are Stanley's, and, not caring to own them, he gave them to Gray." Lord Barrington believed that the last stanza of

The Bard related to Charles I. and Oliver Cromwell. "Mr. Beddington," the poet wrote to Dr. Wharton, “in a golden shower of panegyric, writes me word that, at York Races, he overheard three people, whom by their dress and manner he takes for lords, say that I was impenetrable and inexplicable, and they wished I had told them in prose what I meant in verse; and then they bought me (which was what most displeased him) and put me in their pocket. Dr. Warburton is come to town, and likes them extremely. He says the world never passed so just an opinion upon anything as upon them; for that in other things they have affected to like or dislike, whereas here they own they do not understand, which he looks upon to be very true; but yet thinks they understand them as well as they do Milton or Shakspeare, whom they are obliged by fashion to admire. Mr. Garrick's compliment you have seen; I am told it was printed in the Chronicle of last Saturday. The Review I have read, and admire it, particularly that observation that The Bard is taken from Pastor cum traheret. And the advice, to be more original, and in order to be so the way is (he says) to cultivate the native flowers of the soil, and not introduce the exotics of another climate."

The critique at which Gray sneers was written by an obscure adventurer in London, performing task-work in the service of R. Griffiths, in Paternoster Row, the publisher of The Monthly Review, or Literary Journal, conducted, as we learn from the title-page," by several hands." One of these hands was Goldsmith, then and for some years afterwards far removed from any circle where he could by chance become acquainted with the friend of Horace Walpole, the learned scholar of Pembroke Hall. But his works he regarded in no ungenial or ungentle spirit; and we know of nothing ever written on Gray's poetry more philosophical, more true, or more sincere, than the article to which we refer. Not that Gray could, under any circumstances, have profited by its advice, for you cannot train a sensitive plant to become a pine-tree; but it points out Gray's real weakness, and shows why he failed to become as popular as he became eminent.

It is now nearly one hundred years since Griffiths handed the handsome shilling quarto from Strawberry Hill, with Dodsley's imprint, and the title, "Odes, by Mr. Gray," to his literary apprentice. Goldsmith was prompt in attending to them. The odes