did me the honour to write to me), and say I give her joy very sincerely of your return.

London, October. To T. G. of Peterhouse, Cambridge.

To John Chute, Esq.

at Mr. Whithead's, of Southwick,

near Farnham, Hampshire.

LXXVI. TO JOHN CHUTE.

MY DEAR SIR-You have not then forgot me, and I shall see you soon again. It suffices, and there needed no other excuse. I loved you too well not to forgive you, without a reason: but I could not but be sorry for myself.

You are lazy (you say) and listless, and gouty, and old, and vexed, and perplexed: I am all that (the gout excepted) and many things more, that I hope you never will be: so that what you tell me on that head, est trop flateur pour moi. Our imperfections may at least excuse, and perhaps recommend us to one another; methinks I can readily pardon sickness, and age, and vexation, for all the depredations they make within and without, when I think they make us better friends, and better men, which I am persuaded is often the case. I am very sure, I have seen the best tempered, generous, tender young creatures in the world, that would have been very glad to be sorry for people they liked, when under any pain, and died prematurely, in 1751, of a chill taken in the huntingfield.-[Ed.]

could not, merely for want of knowing rightly, what it was themselves.

I find Mr. Walpole then made some mention of me to you; yes, we are together again. It is about a year, I believe, since he wrote to me, to offer it, and there has been (particularly of late), in appearance, the same kindness and confidence almost as of old. What were his motives, I cannot yet guess. What were mine, you will imagine and perhaps blame me. However as yet I neither repent, nor rejoice overmuch, but I am pleased. He is full, I assure you, of your Panegyric. Never anybody had half so much wit, as Mr. Chute (which is saying everything with him, you know) and Mr. Whd. is the finest young man that ever was imported. I hope to embrace this fine man (if I can), and thank him heartily for being my advocate, tho' in vain. He is a good creature, and I am not sure but I shall be tempted to eat a wing of him with Sellery-Sauce.

I am interrupted. Whenever I know of your time, I will be in town presently. I cannot but make Mrs. Chute my best acknowledgments for taking my part. Heaven keep you all.—I am, my best Mr. Chute, very faithfully yours,

Cambridge, October 12, Sunday, 1750.

T. G.

LXXVII. TO DOROTHY GRAY.

Cambridge, November 7, 1749.

THE unhappy news I have just received from you equally surprises and afflicts me.1 I have lost a person I loved very much, and have been used to from my infancy; but am much more concerned for your loss, the circumstances of which I forbear to dwell upon, as you must be too sensible of them yourself; and will, I fear, more and more need a consolation that no one can give, except He who has preserved her to you so many years, and at last, when it was His pleasure, has taken her from us to Himself: and perhaps, if we reflect upon what she felt in this life, we may look upon this as an instance of His goodness both to her, and to those that loved her. She might have languished many years before our eyes in a continual increase of pain, and totally helpless; she might have long wished to end her misery without being able to attain it; or perhaps even lost all sense, and yet continued to breathe; a sad spectacle to such as must have felt more for her than she could have done for herself. However you may deplore your own loss, yet think that she is at last easy and happy; and has now more occasion to pity us than we her. I hope, and beg, you will support yourself

1 The death of his aunt, Mrs. Mary Antrobus, who died the 5th of November, and was buried in a vault in Stoke churchyard near the chancel door, in which also his mother and himself (according to the direction in his will) were afterwards buried. [Mason.]

with that resignation we owe to Him, who gave us our being for our good, and who deprives us of it for the same reason. I would have come to you directly, but you do not say whether you desire I should or not; if you do, I beg I may know it, for there is nothing to hinder me, and I am in very good health.

LXXVIII. TO HORACE WALPOLE.

Stoke, June 12, 1750.

DEAR SIR-AS I live in a place, where even the ordinary tattle of the town arrives not till it is stale, and which produces no events of its own, you will not desire any excuse from me for writing so seldom, especially as of all people living I know you are the least a friend to letters spun out of one's own brains, with all the toil and constraint that accompanies sentimental productions. I have been here at Stoke, a few days (where I shall continue good part of the summer); and having put an end to a thing, whose beginning you have seen long ago, I immediately send it you. You will, I hope, look upon it in the light of a thing with an end to it: a merit that most of my writings have wanted, and are like to want, but which this epistle I am determined shall not want, when it tells you that I am ever yours, T. GRAY.

1

Not that I have done yet; but who could avoid the temptation of finishing so roundly and so cleverly, in the manner of good Queen Anne's days?

1 This was the "Elegy in a Country Church-yard." VOL. II.

Р

Now I have talked of writings, I have seen a book which is by this time in the press, against Middleton (though without naming him), by Asheton. As far as I can judge from a very hasty reading, there are things in it new and ingenious, but rather too prolix, and the style here and there savouring too strongly of sermon. I imagine it will do him credit. So much for other people, now to self again. You are desired to tell me your opinion, if you can take the pains, of these lines.—I am, once more, ever yours.

LXXIX.-TO HORACE WALPOLE.

Cambridge, February 11, 1751. As you have brought me into a little sort of distress, you must assist me, I believe, to get out of it as well as I can. Yesterday I had the misfortune of receiving a letter from certain gentlemen (as their bookseller expresses it), who have taken the Magazine of Magazines into their hands. They tell me that an ingenious Poem, called reflections in a Country Church-yard, has been communicated to them, which they are printing forthwith; that they are informed that the excellent author of it is I by name, and that they beg not only his indulgence, but the honour of his correspondence, etc. As I am not at all disposed to be either so indulgent, or so correspondent, as they desire, I have but one bad way left to escape the honour they would inflict upon me; and therefore am obliged to desire you would make Dodsley