Thomas Gray to Horace Walpole (8 December 1734) Alexander Huber Editor Thomas Gray Archive
info@thomasgray.org https://www.thomasgray.org/
Oxford

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

 UK Cambridge Pembroke College, Cambridge College Library GBR/1058/GRA/3/4/4

The original letter is extant and usually available for academic research purposes

 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. 4, vol. i, 9-11 http://www.e-enlightenment.com/search/letters/print/?printref_sourceedition=graythOU0084&printref_docnumber=4 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. 4, vol. i, 12-15 https://www.thomasgray.org/texts/diglib/primary/TyP_1915i/1/12 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, 65-67 https://libsvcs-1.its.yale.edu/hwcorrespondence/page.asp?vol=13&page=65 Gray, Thomas, 1716-1771 Cambridge, United Kingdom Walpole, Horace, 1717-1797 London, United Kingdom

Julian

 English [Lines Spoken by the Ghost of John Dennis at the Devil Tavern] Dennis, John

This letter is part of the Primary Texts section of the Thomas Gray Archive.

XML created for the Thomas Gray Archive.

This letter is part of the correspondence calendar of the complete correspondence of Thomas Gray. The calendar contains detailed bibliographic records for all known original, copied, or published letters written by or to the poet as well as the full-text, where available. Each record is accompanied by digitised images of the manuscript, where available, or digitised images of the first printed edition.

 Library of Congress Name Authority File (LCNAF)

To The Honble Horatio Walpole Esq at the house of the right honble Sr Robert Walpole in St James's Square London
CAMBRIDGE 9 DE

[           ]

I (tho' I say it) had too much modesty to venture answering your dear, diverting Letter, in the Poetical Strain myself: but, when I was last at the DEVIL, meeting by chance with the deceased Mr Dennis there, he offer'd his Service, &, being tip'd with a Tester, wrought, what follows–

From purling Streams & the Elysian Scene, From Groves, that smile with never-fading Green I reascend; in Atropos' despight Restored to Celadon, & upper light: Ye gods, that sway the Regions under ground, Reveal to mortal View your realms profound; At his command admit the eye of Day; When Celadon commands, what God can disobey? Nor seeks he your Tartarean fires to know, The house of Torture, & th' Abyss of Woe; But happy fields & Mansions free from Pain, Gay Meads, & springing flowers best please ye gentle Swain:

That little, naked, melancholy thing My Soul, when first she tryed her flight to wing; Began with speed new Regions to explore, And blunder'd thro' a narrow Postern door; First most devoutly having said its Prayers, It tumbled down a thousand pair of [Stairs], Thro' Entries long, thro' Cellars vast & deep, Where ghostly Rats their habitations keep, Where Spiders spread their Webs, & owlish Goblins sleep. After so many Chances had befell, It came into a mead of Asphodel: Betwixt the Confines of ye light & dark It lies, of 'Lyzium ye St James's park: Here Spirit-Beaux flutter along the Mall, And shadows in disguise scate o'er ye Iced Canal: Here groves embower'd, & more sequester'd Shades, Frequented by ye Ghosts of Ancient Maids, Are seen to rise: the melancholy Scene With gloomy haunts, & twilight walks between Conceals the wayward band: here spend their time Greensickness Girls, that died in youthful prime, Virgins forlorn, all drest in Willow-green-i With Queen Elizabeth and Nicolini.

More to reveal, or many words to use Would tire alike your patience & my muse. Believe, that never was so faithful found Queen Proserpine to Pluto under ground, Or Cleopatra to her Marc-Antony As Orozmades to his Celadony.

P:S: Lucrece for half a crown will shew you fun, But Mrs Oldfield is become a Nun. Nobles & Cits, Prince Pluto & his Spouse Flock to the Ghost of Covent-Garden house: Plays, which were hiss'd above, below revive; When dead applauded, that were damn'd alive: The People, as in life, still keep their Passions, But differ something from the world in Fashions. Queen Artemisia breakfasts on Bohea. And Alexander wears a Ramilie.