who possessed considerable influence in his day, says of them : 66 'Gray's letters very much resemble what his conversation was. He had none of the airs of either a scholar or a poet; and though on those and all other subjects he spoke to me with the utmost freedom, and without any reserve, he was in general company much more silent than one could have wished."* This want of sociality was a general complaint against him. Even his old friend, Horace Walpole, could not help joining his voice to the rest : "I agree with you most absolutely," he writes, " in your opinion about Gray; he is the worst company in the world. From a melancholy turn, from his living reclusely, and from a little too much dignity, he never converses easily; all his words are measured and chosen, and formed into sentences: his writings are admirable; he himself is not agreeable."† Poor Gray he possessed too many thoughts to have many-words-a very common case with the studious and intellectual. Of the fidelity of the prints that were published of him we are enabled to judge by the opinions of those amongst his friends who knew him best : 66 "Pray," writes Cole, are you satisfied with Mr. Gray's print? I am by no means. It gives him a sharpness, a snappishness, a fierceness that was not his common feature, though it might occasionally be so. The little etching of him by Mr. Mason, since copied by Henshaw, conveys a much stronger idea of him to me."‡ "The print, I agree with you," replies Walpole, "though like, is a very disagreeable likeness of him. It gives the primness he *Forbes'"Life of Beattie." "Walpole Letters." Vol. ii. p. 240. had when under restraint, and there is a blackness in the countenance which was like him only the last time I ever saw him, when I was much struck with it, and though I did not apprehend him in danger, it left an impression on me that was uneasy, and almost prophetic of what I heard but too soon after leaving him. Wilson drew the picture under much such impression, and I could not bear it in my room: Mr. Mason altered it a little, but still it is not well, nor gives any idea of the determined virtues of his heart. It just serves to help the reader to an image of the person whose genius and integrity they must admire, if they are so happy as to have a taste for either."* Gray, judging from his portrait by Echardt, lately at Strawberry Hill, was eminently the poet and the scholar in his appearance. A delicate frame, a pale complexion, an expansive forehead, clear eyes, a a small mouth, and regular features, bearing the general impression of thoughtfulness and melancholy, sur rounded by his own hair, worn long, prepossessed the spectator in his favour, and charmed those who were already his admirers.† This portrait Dodsley desired to see affixed to the quarto edition of his 'Odes," in the publication of which Horace Walpole evinced much interest; but the design came to the ears of the poet, and nothing could exceed the state of excitement into which it threw him. To a man of his extreme modesty and excessive reserve such an exhibition of himself was most offensive. He writes to his schoolfellow : "Sure you are not out of your wits? This I know, if you suffer * 66 Walpole Letters " Vol. v. p. 417. "Gray's Works." Vol. iii. p. 106. VOL. II. N my head to be printed, you will put me out of mine. I conjure you immediately to put a stop to any such design. Who is at the expense of engraving it I know not, but if it be Dodsley, I will make up the loss to him. The thing as it was, I know, will make me ridiculous enough; but to appear in proper person at the head of my works, consisting of half-a-dozen ballads in thirty pages, would be worse than the pillory. I do assure you, if I had received such a book, with such a frontispiece, without any warning, I do believe it would have given me the palsy."* Walpole was obliged to write immediately to pacify him. The idea of giving an engraved portrait was abandoned. The book came out with Bentley's illustrations only. * Some writers accuse him of being somewhat finical in his appearance, and the following stanza is said to have been suppressed from Beattie's "Minstrel," in consequence of alluding too freely to this foible : "Fret not thyself, thou man of modern song, Nor violate the plaster of thine hair; Else how mayest thou to Cæsar's hall repair, For sure no damaged coat may enter there." "Gentleman's Magazine," Dec., 1837. Page 565. "Walpole Letters." Vol. ii. p. 463. CHAPTER V. WALPOLE, AS AUTHOR, PRINTER, AND PUBLISHER. EARLY in the year 1753 commenced Walpole's connection with a new periodical which had just been started under the title of "The World." It was similar in character to the "Guardian," "Idler," "Tatler," and other members of that numerous family of journals that a hundred years ago entertained the town every week with light sketches of society, varied by didactic essays and quizzical attacks upon the follies of the times, without aiming to lead public opinion in literature or politics. His first contribution forms No. VI. of this work, and is a playful description of the arts used by managers of theatres to attract audiences by extraordinary exhibitions that cannot be said to have any connection with the legitimate drama. The writer also alludes to some curious expedients had recourse to in those days for producing the necessary illusions, and this leads to his mentioning other "natural improvements," to wit, landscapegardening and modelling in confectionary, the absurdities of which he hits off with admirable humour, Indeed, for this style of composition there can be no question that the talents of Walpole were peculiarly fitted, and had he chosen to devote himself to its cultivation there can be but little doubt that he would have succeeded to the post that had been left vacant since the death of Addison. A fortnight later he contributed another paper, but it was on a very different theme-this being the "Fortunes of Theodore, King of Corsica," then a prisoner for debt in the King's Bench. It is a curious paper— half pathetic, half humorous: for it was scarcely possible to treat the subject in any other way-the sublime and the ridiculous being always in such close approximation in the history of this unfortunate Sovereign. His name was Theodore Antony Baron Newhoff, and he was born at Metz about 1696; he belonged to a class by no means rare, even at that period, of gentlemen adventurers, who pushed themselves forward whenever they could find an opening, and sometimes attained a very eminent, if not a very enviable, position. Baron Newhoff pushed himself on to various extraordinary elevations, and at last arrived at the distinction of a crown,-becoming Sovereign of the Island of Corsica. King Theodore, however, does not appear to have reigned either very long or very happily, for in a short time afterwards he was a fugitive, and soon reduced to wandering about from kingdom to kingdom, finding his only revenues in his wits |