The Characters of the Christ-Cross Row, By a Critic, To Mrs ---

"Walpole preserved the following fragment of a letter from Gray, in which the verses were introduced:—
    "When I received the testimonial of so many considerable personages to adorn the second page of my next edition, and (adding them to the Testimonium Autoris de seipso) do relish and enjoy all the conscious pleasure resulting from six pennyworths of glory, I cannot but close my satisfaction with a sigh for the fate of my fellow-labourer in poetry, the unfortunate Mr. Golding, cut off in the flower or rather the bud of his honours, who had he survived but a fortnight more, might have been by your kind offices as much delighted with himself, as I. Windsor and Eton might have gone down to posterity together, perhaps appeared in the same volume, like Philips and Smith, and we might have sent at once to Mr. Pond for the frontispiece, but these, alas! are vain reflections. To return to myself. Nay! but you are such a wit! sure the gentlemen an't so good, are they? and don't you play upon the word. I promise you, few take to it here at all, which is a good sign (for I never knew anything liked here, that ever proved to be so any where else); it is said to be mine, but I strenuously deny it, and so do all that are in the secret, so that nobody knows what to think; a few only of King's College gave me the lie, but I hope to demolish them; for if I don't know, who should? Tell Mr. Chute, I would not have served him so, for any brother in Christendom, and am very angry. To make my peace with the noble youth you mention, I send you a Poem that I am sure they will read (as well as they can) a masterpiece—it is said, being an admirable improvement on that beautiful piece called Pugna Porcorum, which begins

Plangite porcelli Porcorum pigra propago;

but that is in Latin, and not for their reading, but indeed, this is worth a thousand of it, and unfortunately it is not perfect, and it is not mine.
    "When you and Mr. Chute can get the remainder of 'Marianne,' [footnote: 'In July, 1742, Gray sent "3 Parts of Marianne, a novel by Marivaux," to Chute.'] I shall be much obliged to you for it,—I am terribly impatient.""

The Poetical Works of Thomas Gray: English and Latin. Edited with an introduction, life, notes and a bibliography by John Bradshaw. The Aldine edition of the British poets series. London: George Bell and sons, 1891, 278-279.