Skip main navigation

Thomas Gray to William Mason, 27 January 1767

Back to Letters page

Dear Mason

Dr Swift says, one never should write to one's Friends but in high health & spirits. by the way it is the last thing people in those circumstances usually think of doing: but it is sure, if I were to wait for them, I never should write at all. at present I have had for these six weeks a something growing in my throat, wch nothing does any service to, & wch will, I suppose, in due time stop up the passage. I go however about, & the pain is very little. you will say perhaps, the malady is as little, & the stoppage is in the imagination. no matter for that! if it is not sufficient to prove want of health (for indeed this is all I ail) it is so much the stronger proof of the want of spirits. so take it as you please, I carry my point, & shew you, that it is very obliging in me to write at all. indeed perhaps on your account, I should not have done it: but after three such weeks of Lapland-weather I can not but enquire after Mrs Mason's health. if she has withstood such a winter & her cough never the worse: she may defy the Doctors & all their works. pray, tell me how she is, for I interest myself for her not merely on your account, but on her own. these three last mornings have been very vernal & mild: has she tasted the air of the new year at least in Hyde-Park?

Mr Brown will wait on her next week, & touch her. he has been confined to lie on a couch, & under the Surgeon's hands eversince the first of January with a broken shin ill-doctor'd. he is just now got abroad, & obliged to come to Town about Monday on particular business.

Stonhewer was so kind as to tell me the mystery now accomplish'd, before I received your letter. I rejoice in all his accessions: I wish, you would persuade him to take unto him a Wife: but don't let her be a fine Lady. Adieu. present my respects & good wishes to Argentile.

I am truly
Yours
T G
Letter ID: letters.0489 (Source: TEI/XML)

Correspondents

Writer: Gray, Thomas, 1716-1771
Writer's age: 50
Addressee: Mason, William, 1724-1797
Addressee's age: 42

Dates

Date of composition: 27 January 1767
Date (on letter): Jan: 27. 1767
Calendar: Gregorian

Places

Place of composition: Cambridge, United Kingdom
Address (on letter): Pemb: Hall

Content

Language: English
Incipit: Dr Swift says, one never should write to one's Friends but in high...
Mentioned: Brown, James, 1709-1784
London
Stonhewer, Richard, 1728-1809
Swift, Jonathan

Holding Institution

Location:
(confirmed)
Henry W. And Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature, Humanities and Social Sciences Library, New York Public Library , New York, NY, USA <https://www.nypl.org/about/divisions/berg-collection-english-and-american-literature>
Availability: The original letter is extant and usually available for academic research purposes

Print Versions

  • The Correspondence of Thomas Gray and William Mason, with Letters to the Rev. James Brown, D.D. Ed. by the Rev. John Mitford. London: Richard Bentley, 1853, letter CII, 369-370
  • The Letters of Thomas Gray, including the correspondence of Gray and Mason, 3 vols. Ed. by Duncan C. Tovey. London: George Bell and Sons, 1900-12, letter no. CCXCIII, vol. iii, 132-133
  • 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. 433, vol. iii, 949