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Thomas Gray to Horace Walpole, [29 December 1736]

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To
The Honrble Horace Walpole Esq,
at the Treasury,
Westminster
CAMBRIDGE 29 DE

My Dear Horace

I think this is the first time, I have had any Occasion to find fault with Sr R:s Male-Administration, and if he should keep you in town another Week, I don't know whether I shan't change my Side, & write a Craftsman; I am extreme Sorry, I could not dine with you last Sunday, but I really was engaged at Peter-house, & did not know of the honour you intended me, till night; if it had not been for a great cold I had got, I certainly should have come post to Supper: I engage myself to drink Tea with you at King's the day after to morrow, for then we expect you; I mean me, for Ashton is to try not to expect you then: I believe I shall stay here till February, so pray, come hither, if that can be any part of a reason for it: the Moderatour has asked me to make the Tripos-Verses this year; they say the University has sent a Letter by the Post to thank my Lord Townsend for the Statue! I have had a Letter from West with an Elegy of Tibullus translated in it, thus long; I have wrote you a letter with 50 I's in it, besides me's and we's, and I am,

Ever Yours
T: GRAY
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Letter ID: letters.0038 (Source: TEI/XML)

Correspondents

Writer: Gray, Thomas, 1716-1771
Writer's age: 20
Addressee: Walpole, Horace, 1717-1797
Addressee's age: 19

Dates

Date of composition: [29 December 1736]
Date (on letter): Wednesday-
Calendar: Julian

Places

Place of composition: Cambridge, United Kingdom
Address (on letter): Cambridge
Place of addressee: [London, United Kingdom]

Physical description

Addressed: To / The Honrble Horace Walpole Esq, / at the Treasury, / Westminster (postmark: CAMBRIDGE 29 DE)

Content

Language: English
Incipit: I think this is the first time, I have had any Occasion to find fault...
Mentioned: Craftsman
Ashton, Thomas, 1715-1775
Cambridge
Tibullus
West, Richard, 1716-1742
[Latin verses at Eton]

Holding Institution

Location:
(confirmed)
GBR/1058/GRA/3/4/28, College Library, Pembroke College, Cambridge , Cambridge, UK <http://www.pem.cam.ac.uk/>
Availability: The original letter is extant and usually available for academic research purposes

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. 50, vol. i, 116-117
  • 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, 119-120
  • 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. 35, vol. i, 58-59