rence, and Rome; whence he addressed his elegant Alcaic, Mater Rosarum,' &c. immediately after a visit to Frescati and the cascades of Tivoli, to Mr. West, or as he classically calls him Ad Favonium Zephyrinum. After spending some time at Naples, in July, 1740, they returned to Florence; and during a residence in that city of eight or nine months, the poet wrote the first book of his didactic Latin poem, entitled 'De Principiis Cogitandi,' which, however, he unfortunately never completed. In April 1741, the fellow-travellers left Florence for Venice; when an unhappy feud, occasioned by a difference of their tempers, separated them for the remainder of their stay abroad. Gray, as may be collected from his valuable letters written during his tour, was curious, pensive, and philosophical; architecture, both of Gothic and Grecian origin, painting, and music engaging his attention, as well as the manners and the customs of realms which they traversed: while Walpole was gay, lively, and inconsiderate. The latter, in con animalia inanimaque omnia rigentia gelu; omnia confragosa, præruptaque. The creatures that inhabit them are, in all respects, below humanity; and most of them, especially women, have the tumidum guttur, which they call 'goscia.' Mont Cenis, I confess, carries the permission mountains have of being frightful rather too far; and it's horrors were accompanied with too much danger, to give me time to reflect upon their beauties. There is a family of the Alpine monsters I have mentioned upon it's very top, that in the middle of winter calmly lay in their stock of provisions and firing, and so are buried in their hut for a month or two under the snow. When we were down, and got a little way into Piedmont, we began to find apricos quosdam colles rivosque prope sylvas, et jam humano cultu digniora loca? I read Silvius Italicus, too, for the first time; and wished for you, according to custom." sequence, injoined Mason to charge him with the chief blame in their quarrel; candidly confessing, that 'more attention and complaisance, more deference to a warm friendship and to superior judgement and prudence, might have prevented a rupture that gave much uneasiness to them both, and a lasting concern to the survivor;' though, in the year 1744, a reconciliation was effected between them, by a lady who wished well to both parties. Upon their separation, Gray continued his journey in a manner adapted to his own limited circumstances, with only an occasional servant; and by Padua, Verona, Milan, Turin, and nearly his old route through France, reached Rome in September, 1741. About two months after his return, he lost his father. The old gentleman, by his injudicious expenditure of money upon a new house, had so much lessened his fortune, that his son thought his circumstances too narrow to enable him to prosecute the study of the law without burthening his mother and aunt,* who had for many years kept an India warehouse in Cornhill under the joint names of Gray and Antrobus. He, therefore, retired to Cambridge, where he soon afterward afterward became LL. B.; and where, as Dr. Johnson expresses it," without liking the place or it's inhabitants, or pretending to like them, he passed (except a short residence in London) the rest of his life." On June 1, 1742, weighed down by sickness and family misfortunes, died his friend West; and under the On the death of Mr. Philip Gray, they retired with a moderate competency to the house of their widowed sister Mrs. Rogers, at Stoke near Windsor, where the poet's Long Story' and several of his more finished compositions were subsequently written. His mother died in 1753. 1 melancholy impression of this event he is supposed to have begun, if not completed in it's original form, his Elegy written in a Country Church-Yard.'* To * The first impulse of his sorrow gave birth to a very tender sonnet in English; and also to a sublime apostrophe in Latin hexameters, written in the genuine strain of classical majesty, with which he intended to have opened his fourth book De Principiis Cogitandi, commenced in 1742. They are both subjoined: • In vain to me the smiling mornings shine, A different object do these eyes require: To warm their little loves the birds complain: And weep the more, because I weep in vain.' Hactenus haud segnis Naturæ arcana retexi Cum Tu opere in medio, spes tanti et causa laboris, this, he put the last hand in 1750; and through Mr. Walpole, to whom it was communicated, and whose good taste would not suffer him to withhold the sight of it from his acquaintance, it was shown about for some time in manuscript with great applause. At last the publisher of a periodical work having obtained a surreptitious copy of it, Walpole by Gray's desire placed a genuine one in the hands of Dodsley. It's manuscript simple title, Stanzas,' Mason persuaded him to exchange for that of An Elegy.' It ran rapidly through eleven editions; was translated into Latin by Messrs. Anstey and Roberts, and soon At Tu, sancta anima, et nostri non indiga luctûs, Unde orta es, fruere; atque ô si secura, nec ultrà Respectes, tenuesque vacet cognoscere curas; I cannot withhold from the reader an elegant version of the above lines by a Lady, whose name (now all that remains of her, upon earth) if I were authorised to introduce it, would diffuse a lustre over these pages. ''Erst did my Muse adventurous dare explore Thought's secret springs 'mid Nature's boundless store, VOL. VI. afterward by Mr. Lloyd;* and has recently exercised the talents of some of our modern Greek poets, Cooke, Norbury, Coote, Tew, and Weston. Yes, I was doom'd that feeling breast to know, Once from some signs his treacherous illness wore, } read;} Ah cheerless days, with deepening gloom o'erspread; Rapt in the full fruition of thy God! And oh! if yet, secure of endless joy, Our trifling cares or pains thy thoughts employ; * It has, also, exercised other Latin pens, and among the rest that of the late learned Gilbert Wakefield. Of the Greek competition the reader will find an amusing account in the Pur suits of Literature.' |