was inspired by "the wish to please" this lady. The fact is, however, that it was produced (and probably about this time) on a request she made to the poet one day, when he was in company with Mr. Walpole, that she might possess something from his pen, written on the subject of love. We collect from the Memoirs by Mason, that the society of neighbourhood between the lady and the poet must have closed about the year 1758, at which time the death of his aunt, Mrs. Rogers, determined the final departure of the latter from Stoke. A circumstance connected with that occasion contributes some evidence of the general activity of his mind. The Rev. Mr. Duckworth, who held the living of Stoke until his death in the year 1794, remarked that the difficulty experienced by Gray in relinquishing the tenure of the premises to which he had succeeded, and from the concern of which he was anxious to relieve himself, was finally surmounted by means of his own knowledge of law. The local poems by which Gray has impressed a classical stamp upon Stoke are, The Elegy written in a Country Churchyard, The Long Story, both written in 1750, and his Ode to Eton College, written before, in the year 1742; in which year were also written the Ode to Spring, the Hymn to Adversity, and the Sonnet on the Death of Mr. West, (the first certainly, and the two last probably) at Stoke. It was in the year 1780 that (Miss Speed, now) Countess de Viry enabled the lover of poetry to see in print the Rondeau, and another small amatory poem of Gray, called Thyrsis, by presenting them to the Rev. Mr. Leman, of Suffolk, while on a visit at her castle in Savoy. She died there in 1783. POSTHUMOUS POEMS AND FRAGMENTS. ODE ON THE PLEASURE ARISING FROM VICISSITUDE. Left unfinished by Mr. Gray. With additions by Mr. Mason, distinguished by inverted commas. Now the golden morn aloft Waves her dew-bespangled wing, The sleeping fragrance from the ground; New-born flocks, in rustic dance, But chief, the sky-lark warbles high And, lessening from the dazzled sight, Rise, my soul! on wings of fire, "With health, with harmony, and love." Yesterday the sullen year Saw the snowy whirlwind fly; Smiles on past misfortune's brow Still, where rosy pleasure leads, See a kindred grief pursue; Behind the steps that misery treads, The hues of bliss more brightly glow, See the wretch, that long has toss'd Humble quiet builds her cell, Near the source whence pleasure flows; She eyes the clear crystalline well, And tastes it as it goes. 'While' far below the 'madding' crowd 'Rush headlong to the dangerous flood,' Where broad and turbulent it sweeps, 'And' perish in the boundless deeps. Mark where indolence, and pride, Their dull but daily round: E |