only son of the learned Dr. Bentley, and the friend of Walpole; a person of various and elegant acquirements, as well as of very considerable talents. To him Gray addressed a Copy of Verses, highly extolling his powers as a painter. The original drawings in Walpole's possession, Mr. Mason says, are infinitely superior to the prints; but even with this allowance, the praise must be considered rather friendly than just; since their merit consists in the grotesque and quaint fancy which marks the designs; in the whimsical manner in which the painter has embellished the images of the poet; and which, if it were intended to correspond to the style of the 'Long Story,' would not be an unsuccessful effort of the sister-art. The tributes, however, which are paid by Friendship to Genius, ought not to be sparing or scanty: and Gray might remember the example of Dryden and of Pope, in their complimentary eulogies on Kneller.

In March 1753, he lost the mother, whom he had so long and so affectionately loved; and he

plate in the etchings of Bentley; and that his uncle has completely libelled both his poet and his patron without intending to do so." Mr. Cumberland says, at p. 216 of the same volume, that Gray wrote an elaborate critique on a play of Bentley's writing called 'Philodamus,' which was acted at Covent Garden. For an account of R. Bentley see Brydges' Restituta, vol. iv. p. 364. Scott's Lives of the Novelists, vol. ii. p. 235. Boaden's Life of Mrs. Siddons, i. p. 360. R. Bentley died Oct. 1782.

placed over her remains an inscription which strongly marks his piety 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.
She died March xi. MDCCLIII.
Aged LXXII.*

It is usually supposed that Gray's 'Ode on the Progress of Poetry' was written in 1755. From a letter to Walpole it appears that it was then finished, excepting a few lines at the end. He mentions his being so unfortunate as to come too late for Mr. Bentley's edition, and talks of inserting it in Dodsley's Collection. In 1754, it is supposed that he wrote the Fragment of 'An Ode to Vicissitude,' as it is now called. The idea and some of the lines are taken from Gresset's 'Epitre sur ma Convalescence. Another Ode was also sketched, which might be called 'The Liberty of Genius,' though some of Gray's biographers, for what reasons I am ignorant, have called it The Connection between Genius and

* The latter part of Gray's epitaph has a strong resemblance to an inscription on a sepulchral cippus found near the Villa Pelluchi, at Rome, now (I believe) in the British Museum.

-D. M. Dasumiæ. Soteridi. Libertæ. Optimæ. et. Conjugi. Sanctissimæ. bene. mer. fec. L. Dasumius. Callistus. cum. qua. vixit. An xxxv. sine. ulla. querella. optans. ut. ipsa. sibi. potius. superstes. fuisset. quam. se. sibi. superstitem. reliquisset.

Grandeur.' The argument of it, the only part which was ever written, is as follows: "All that men of power can do for men of genius is to leave them at their liberty; compared to birds that, when confined to a cage, do but regret the loss of their freedom in melancholy strains, and lose the luscious wildness and happy luxuriance of their notes, which used to make the woods resound." The supplement to this Poem is very inferior to the original, so that we may unite in opinion with an eminent critic, that it is better to leave the unfinished creations of genius in their imperfect form. Nobis placet exemplum Priscorum, qui Apelleam Venerem imperfectam maluerunt, quam integram manu extraneâ.'* Gray, as Walpole remarked, was indeed "in flower" these last three years. The 'Bard' was commenced, and part of it communicated to Mr. Stonehewer and Dr. Wharton, 1755. In these letters he for the first time complains of listlessness and depression of spirits, which prevented his application to poetry and from this period we may trace the course of that hereditary disease in his constitution, which embittered in a considerable degree the remainder of his days; and the fatal strength of which, not even the temperance and regularity of a whole life could subdue. In his pocket journal for this year, besides a diary of the weather, and a very accurate calendar of observations on

* Vide Gruteri not; ad Plautum, vol. i. p. 295, 4to.

natural history, he kept a regular account of his health in Latin. By this it appears that his constitution was much enfeebled and impaired, that alarming attacks of the gout were perpetually recurring and disordering his frame. He speaks constantly of the sleepless night, and the feverish morning; and seems seldom to have been free from pain, debility, and disease. Expressions similar to the following, are in almost every page: 'Insomnia crebra, atque expergiscenti surdus quidam doloris sensus; frequens etiam in regione sterni oppressio, et cardialgia gravis, fere sempiterna."

"The Bard" was for some time left unfinished; but "the accident of seeing a blind harper (Mr. Parry) perform on a Welsh harp,* again (he says) put his Ode in motion, and brought it at last to a conclusion." This poem appears to have been submitted to the critical opinion of his friends. He mentions a remark upon it by Dr. Hurd; and he had recourse to the judgment of Mr. Mason, "whose cavils (Walpole says) almost induced him to destroy his two beautiful and sublime Odes."

Some time previous to this, Dodsley had published his Collection of Poems, in three volumes,‡

*For an Account of Parry, see Smith's Life of Nollekens, vol. ii. p. 213.

† See Walpoliana, vol. i. p. 46.

+ Dodsley published three volumes of this Collection, in 1752:

d

which Walpole sent to Gray. The observations made by the latter, as they were not published in Mr. Mason's Life, and as it is interesting to read the opinions which he entertained of his poetical contemporaries, I shall extract from the letter to his friend, in as short a compass as I can.

"To begin, (he says,) with Mr. Tickell:-This is not only a state poem (my ancient aversion), but a state poem on the Peace of Utrecht. If Mr. Pope had wrote a panegyric on it, one could hardly have read him with patience. But this is only a poor short-winded imitator of Addison, who had himself not above three or four notes in poetry; sweet enough indeed, like those of a German flute, but such as soon tire and satiate the ear with their frequent return. Tickell has added to this a great poverty of sense, and a string of transitions that hardly become a school-boy. However, I forgive him for the sake of his Ballad, which I always thought the prettiest in the world. All there is of Mr. Green here, has been printed before; there is a profusion of wit every where. Reading would have formed his judgment, and harmonized his verse; for even his wood-notes often break out into strains of real poetry and music. The 'School-Mistress '* is excellent in its kind

the fourth volume was published in 1755; and the fifth and sixth volumes, which completed the Collection, in 1758.

*The School-Mistress is by far the best of Shenstone's poems. The variations from the first edition are very curious.