Thomas Gray to Horace Walpole, [16 January 1737]
To
The Honble Horace Walpole Esq,
at the Treasury,
Westminster
CAMBRIDGE 17 1A
I have a tast for the works of Cramputius, & his Scraps; if you can fill twelve baskets with such fragments, I have a stomach for 'em all: one should have had a passion for Simplicia oneself, if one had lived in those days; she is so open & unreserved in her behaviour: the pleasure of having a mistress, that when one made her a compliment, & call'd her Spider; should only cry, ehe! I don't doubt but Portia behaved just s[o] when Brutus made love to her; this was reckon'd a Scene of great Gallantry I suppose at that time, & Q: Crassus Tubero as pretty a fellow with the Women, as the Genie Jonquil: I don't know, whither you have forgot Cambridge, or not; it's plain, you chuse, only to keep it in mind; it seems to be at this time of year, that the humour usually takes you to tell us stories about your coming, but however I would rather be deceived, than hear nothing at all of it; so say something of it pray; every body in Cambridge knows better than I; who remain
For god'sake write often, if it be but two Syllables
Correspondents
Dates
Places
Physical description
Content
Holding Institution
(confirmed)
Class No. LC II, 90, College Library, Pembroke College, Cambridge , Cambridge, UK <http://www.pem.cam.ac.uk/>
Print Versions
- The Correspondence of Gray, Walpole, West and Ashton (1734-1771), 2 vols. Chronologically arranged and edited with introduction, notes, and index by Paget Toynbee. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1915, letter no. 24, vol. i, 59-60
- The Yale Edition of Horace Walpole's Correspondence. Ed. by W. S. Lewis. New Haven, Conn.: Yale UP; London: Oxford UP, 1937-83, vols. 13/14: Horace Walpole's Correspondence with Thomas Gray, Richard West and Thomas Ashton i, 1734-42, Horace Walpole's Correspondence with Thomas Gray ii, 1745-71, ed. by W. S. Lewis, George L. Lam and Charles H. Bennett, 1948, vol. i, 125-126
- Correspondence of Thomas Gray, 3 vols. Ed. by the late Paget Toynbee and Leonard Whibley, with corrections and additions by H. W. Starr. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971 [1st ed. 1935], letter no. 36, vol. i, 60