Summary: Written probably as a school exercise at Eton between 1725 and 1734, possibly Gray's earliest composition in English. First published in Toynbee (ed.), Correspondence (1915), vol. ii, 299-300 with a facsimile.
Alternate Form:
Microfilm copy available in Poetic Commonplace Books and Manuscripts of Thomas Gray, 1716-1771, from Pembroke College, Cambridge (1999), reel two. Facsimile in Toynbee (ed.), Correspondence (1915), vol. ii, following p. 298
References: Smith (ed.), Index (1989), item GrT 141, 93; Poetic C. B., Pembroke College (1999), 33; Starr/Hendrickson (eds.), Complete Poems (1966), 57n
Contents: Autograph draft of ll. 1-13, here untitled, together with MS 0170.
Alternate Form:
Microfilm copy available in Poetic Commonplace Books and Manuscripts of Thomas Gray, 1716-1771, from Pembroke College, Cambridge (1999), reel two
References: Smith (ed.), Index (1989), item GrT 142, 93; Poetic C. B., Pembroke College (1999), 33
Contents: Autograph (ll. 1-13 fair copy, ll. 14-16 revised), here untitled, including a transcript of the Latin original between ll. 13 and 14, annotated in the hand of Horace Walpole "This written when he was very young", together with MS 0169.