LETTERS.

I. TO RICHARD WEST.1

Cantabr. May 8, 1736.

MY DEAR WEST-My letter enjoys itself before it is opened, in imagining the confusion you will be in when you hear that a coach and six is just stopped at Christ Church gates, and desires to speak with you, with a huddle of things in it, as different as ever met together in Noah's Ark; a fat one and a lean one, and one that can say a little with his mouth and a great deal with his pen, and one that can neither speak nor write. But you will see them; joy be with you! I hope too I shall shortly see you, at least in congratulatione Oxoniensi.

1 Richard West (1717-1742), was the only son of a Lord Chancellor of Ireland, of the same name, who died in 1726. His poems were collected by Gray, but not printed until after that writer's death. West possessed a tender elegiac vein of no great depth, but was a sound scholar. He, Gray, Walpole, and Ashton formed a "quadruple alliance" of friendship at Eton, whence West proceeded to Oxford and the other three to Cambridge.-[Ed.]

VOL. II.

B

My dear West, I more than ever regret you: it would be the greatest of pleasure to me to know what you do, what you read, how you spend your time, etc., and to tell you what I do not do, not read, and how I do not, for almost all the employment of my hours may be best explained by negatives. Take my word and experience upon it, doing nothing is a most amusing business, and yet neither something nor nothing give me any pleasure. For this little while last past I have been playing with Statius; we yesterday had a game at quoits together. You will easily forgive me for having broke his head,1 as you have a little pique to him.

I will not plague you too much, and so break the affair in the middle, and give you leave to resume your Aristotle instead of your friend and servant,

T. GRAY.

II. TO RICHARD WEST.

my days, you have they go round and

WHEN you have seen one of seen a whole year of my life; round like the blind horse in the mill, only he has the satisfaction of fancying he makes a progress and gets some ground; my eyes are open enough to see the same dull prospect, and to know that having

1 West replied: "I agree with you that you have broke Statius' head, but it is in like manner as Apollo broke Hyacinth's, you have foiled him infinitely at his own weapon."-[Ed.]

made four-and-twenty steps more, I shall be just where I was; I may, better than most people, say my life is but a span, were I not afraid lest you should not believe that a person so short-lived could write even so long a letter as this; in short, I believe I must not send you the history of my own time, till I can send you that also of the reformation. However, as the most undeserving people in the world must sure have the vanity to wish somebody had a regard for them, so I need not wonder at my own, in being pleased that you care about me. You need not doubt, therefore, of having a first row in the front box of my little heart, and I believe you are not in danger of being crowded there; it is asking you to an old play, indeed, but you will be candid enough to excuse the whole piece for the sake of a few tolerable lines.

Cambridge, May 8, 1736.

III. TO THE REV. GEORGE BIRKETT.

October 8 [1736 ?].

SIR-As I shall stay only a fortnight longer in town, I'll beg you to give yourself the trouble of writing out my Bills, and sending 'em, that I may put myself out of your Debt, as soon as I come down: if Piazza1 should come to you, you'll be so good as to satisfie him: I protest, I forget what I owe him, but

1 Hieronimo Bartolomeo Piazza, a renegade Dominican friar, Gray's Italian master at Cambridge.—[Ed.]

he is honest enough to tell you right. My father and mother desires me to send their compliments, and I beg you'd believe me,-S", your most obedt. humble servt., T. GRAY.

IV. TO RICHARD WEST.

You must know that I do not take degrees, and, after this term, shall have nothing more of college impertinences to undergo,1 which I trust will be some pleasure to you, as it is a great one to me. I have endured lectures daily and hourly since I came last, supported by the hopes of being shortly at full liberty to give myself up to my friends and classical companions, who, poor souls! though I see them fallen into great contempt with most people here, yet I cannot help sticking to them, and out of a spirit of obstinacy (I think) love them the better for it; and indeed, what can I do else? Must I plunge into metaphysics? Alas, I cannot see in the dark; nature has not furnished me with the optics of a cat. I pore upon mathematics? Alas, I cannot see in too much light; I am no eagle. It is very possible that two and two make four, but I would not give four farthings to demonstrate this ever so clearly; and if

Must

1 "In December 1736 there was an attempt at rebellion; he declined to take degrees, and announced his intention of quitting college; but as we hear no more of this, and as he stayed two years longer at Cambridge, we may believe that this was overruled."-Gosse, Life of Gray, pp. 19, 20. Gray took no degree till the winter of 1742.

these be the profits of life, give me the amusements of it. The people I behold all around me, it seems, know all this and more, and yet I do not know one of them who inspires me with any ambition of being like him. Surely it was of this place, now Cambridge,1 but formerly known by the name of Babylon, that the prophet spoke when he said, "The wild beasts of the desert shall dwell there, and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures, and owls shall build there, and satyrs shall dance there; their forts and towers shall be a den for ever, a joy of wild asses; there shall the great owl make her nest, and lay and hatch and gather under her shadow; it shall be a court of dragons; the screech owl also shall rest there, and find for herself a place of rest." You see here is a pretty collection of desolate animals, which is verified in this town to a tittle, and perhaps it may also allude to your habitation, for you know all types may be taken by abundance of handles; however, I defy your owls to match mine.

If the default of your spirits and nerves be nothing but the effect of the hyp, I have no more to say. We all must submit to that wayward queen; I too in no small degree own her sway,

I feel her influence while I speak her power.

But if it be a real distemper, pray take more care of your health, if not for your own at least for our sakes,

1 Gray was of the same opinion in 1742, when he wrote his splenetic Hymn to Ignorance.-[Ed.]