. ae ek: pace ba gna ‘ ‘ * sh i : F EG ar : ° S : + Ps 4, 3 a * ‘. ; * # x , ‘ : | 7 ‘ : Em ~“ at POEMS OAV LD GRAY. WITH Pee oth Or Hebe LIE E. BOS FO Nes mee petek “ES” BR O-bebe bh RIS: 1864. PUBLISHERS’ NOTICE. HE brief tragedy of poor David Gray, as unveiled in this volume, cannot fail to make a lasting impression on every unhardened reader. The poems of this ill-fated and winsome young Scotchman, heart-brother of Robert Burns, are marked by rare tenderness and sincerity, and by that fascinating ‘felicity of verbal touch which is one of the choicest characteristics of true genius. Such a pure and_ pathetic story, such lucid and breathing poetry as we have here, are charged with a blessed ministry for a coarse and bustling age, for a reckless utilitarian people. The feelings of love, pity, and grief this little book is calculated | to awaken will exert a salutary influence, soften- ing the heart, nourishing human sympathy and | poetic sentiment. And the publishers are confi- dent that every appreciative reader of the volume, iv PUBLISHERS’ NOTICE. while sighing over the plaintive fate of the author, — will gladly aid in securing for him, on this West- ern continent, that meed of love and fame which just gleamed before his dying vision in the let- ters of generous friends and the first proof-sheet of his darling “ Luaers.”’ The publishers take pleasure in saying, that a generous portion of any profits which may accrue from the sale of this volume shall be sent to the parents of David Gray, who still reside in Merk- land, on the banks of the stream their gifted son has made famous. od map tei ae) touie ‘ x a & LuccIE CONTENTS. popverony Norice, b EMOTR OF THE “AUTHOR, by James Hedderwick INAL MEMORIALS y Lord Houghton (R. M. Milnes) vii e . \ ° ° ° e eae a @ — 2 Vi) > KS My Fix GS AW ‘ SO & P > SS “ali INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. TN the spring of 1860 I received a letter signed I Davin Gray, enclosing some manuscript verses. The writer stated that he was a Scotchman, who had had the ordinary education of the artisans of that country ; that he had written these and other Poems, and desired my advice as to his coming up to London and making his way there in the career of Literature. I was struck with the su- periority of the verses to almost all the produc- tions of self-taught men that had been brought under my observation, and I therefore answered the letter at some length, recognizing the remark- able faculty which Mr. Gray seemed to me to pos- sess ; urging him to cultivate it not exclusively, nor even especially, but to make it part of his general culture and intellectual development; and above all desiring him not to make the peril- viii INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. — ous venture of a London literary life, but, at any rate for some time, to content himself with such opportunities as he had, and to strive to obtain some professional independence, however humble, in which his poetical powers might securely ex- pand and become the solace of his existence instead of the precarious purveyor of his daily bread. A few weeks afterwards I was told a young man wished to see me, and when he came into the room I at once saw it could be no other than the young Scotch Poet. It was a light, well-built, but some- what stooping figure, with a countenance that at once brought strongly to my recollection a cast— of the face of Shelley in his youth, which I had seen at Mr. Leigh Hunt’s. There was the same full brow, out-looking eyes, and sensitive, melan- choly mouth. He told me at once that he had come to London in consequence of my letter, as _ from the tone of it he was sure I should befriend him. pianos ole I was dismayed at this unexpected result of my advice, and could do no more than press him to return home as soon as possible. I painted as darkly as I could the chances and difficulties of a literary struggle in the crowded competition of this great city, and how strong a swimmer it re- INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. ix fs quired to be not to sink in such a sea of tumultuous life. ‘“No—he would not return.”’ I determined in my own mind that he should do so before I » myself left town for the country, but at the same time I believed that he might derive advantage from a short personal experience of hard realities. He had a confidence in his own powers, a simple certainty of his own worth, which I saw would keep him in good heart and preserve him from base temptations. He refused to take money, say- ing he had enough to go on with; but I gave‘him some light literary work, for which he was very grateful. When he came to me again, I went, over some of his verse with him, and I shall not forget the passionate gratification he showed when I told him that, in my judgment, he was an undeniable Poet. After this admission he was ready to sub- mit to my criticism—or correction, though he was sadly depressed at the rejection of one of his Poems, over which he had evidently spent much -labor and care, by the Editor of a distinguished popular periodical, to whom I had sent it with a hearty recommendation. His, indeed, was not a spirit to be seriously injured by a temporary dis- appointment; but when he fell ill so soon after- wards, one had something of the feeling of regret 1* x INTRODUCTORY NOTICE, that the notorious review of Keats inspires in connection with the premature loss of the author of “‘ Endymion.’’ It was only a few weeks after his arrival in London, that the poor boy came to my house ap- parently under the influence of violent fever. He said he had caught cold in the wet weather, hav- ing been insufficiently protected by clothing ; but had delayed coming to me for fear of giving me — unnecessary trouble. I at once sent him back to his lodgings, which were sufficiently comfortable, and put him under good medical superintendence. It soon became apparent that pulmonary disease had set in, but there were good hopes of arrest- ing its progress. I visited him often, and every time with increasing interest. He had somehow found out that his lungs were affected, and the image of the destiny of Keats was ever before him. I leave to his excellent friend Mr. Hedder- wick to tell the rest of this sad story. I never saw him after he left London. I much regret that imperative circumstances did not permit me to take him under my roof, that I at least might have the satisfaction of thinking that all human means of saving his life had been exhausted: for there was in him the making of a great man. ee nt ’ ae ere INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. xi Wi wee: His lyrical faculty, astonishing as it was, might not have outlived the ardor and susceptibilities of youth ;\ but there was that simple persistence of character about him, which is so prominent in the best of his countrymen. I was much struck with seeing how he had hitherto made the best of all his scanty opportunities; how he had got all the good out of the homely virtues of his domestic life, with no sign of reproach at the plain practical people about him for not making much of his poetry and sympathizing with his visions of fame. These, indeed, must have seemed, to say the least, intolerably presumptuous to those about him, and indeed to most of those with whom he came: in contact. I own I heeded them little. It has always appeared to me that if a certain brightness of hope and presumption of genius in young men who have had all the advantages of the best edu- cation in their reach, and whose youth has grown up in careful classical culture, and with the associ- ations of a refined society, be regarded with a compassionate interest and feelings no severer than a gentle ridicule, a far milder condemnation and deeper sympathy should be given to those who, without the ordinary processes of mental progress, without the free interchange of thought, and, above xii INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. . all, without the means of weighing their own with other intelligences) have within themselves the cer- tain conviction of superiority, and the perceptions of an interminable vista of Beauty and of Truth. Such minds feel themselves to be, as it were, ex- ceptional creatures in the moral world in which they happened to be placed; and it is as unreason- able to expect from them a just appreciation of their own powers, as it would be to require an accurate notion of distance from a being freshly gifted with sight. How is he to distinguish the near and commonplace from the distant and rare? How is he to know that such have been the thoughts and such the expressions of thousands before him? How is he to possess the distinctions of taste and discriminations of judgment which a long, even though superficial, literary education confers on So many undistinguished natures and _ uncritical minds ? Therefore, when the mere boy who can write such poems as these in the shadow of death has talked of being buried in Westminster Abbey, let not the feeling be other than that which would meet the aspirations of Stephenson the apprentice, or Nelson the midshipman. It-is also significant that a good deal of the over- confidence which David Gray manifested gave way a: aaa ate Ao INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. xiii as soon as he knew he was really appreciated and ° cared for. His vanity sang forth, as it were, in the night of his discouragement, to give himself fortitude to bear the solitude and the gloom. With all his admiration of his ‘‘ Luggie,’’ he clearly could not help in his mind comparing it with the ‘‘Sea- sons’’; and then he writes, ‘‘ When I read Thom- son, I despair.’”?” Soon after an almost bombastic estimate of his own mental progress, he becomes thoroughly ashamed of himself, and says, ‘‘ that being bare of all recommendations,” he had “lied to his own conscience,”’ deeming that ‘‘if he called himself a great man, others would be bound to believe him.’”’ Surely this was a spirit to which knowledge would have given a just humility, and for which praise and love were especially necessary, for they would have brought with them modesty and truth. I would recommend the readers of these Poems to keep in mind how deeply they are based on the few phenomena of nature that came within the Poet’s observation. He revels in the frost and snow until the winter of his own sorrow and sick- ness becomes too hard for him to bear, and then he only asks for «One clear day, a snowdrop, and sweet air.” xiv INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. The lost illusion of the cuckoo, when it was trans-— formed into « A slender bird of modest brown,” is missed, as something he cannot afford to spare in his scanty store of natural delights. The ‘‘ Lug- gie’’ itself ever remains the simple stream that it really is, and is not decked-out in any fantastic or inharmonious coloring. He described in a let- ter to me the rapturous emotions with which the rich hues and picturesque forms of the coast of South Devonshire filled his breast; and I believe that these very feelings would have prolonged his life, had circumstances permitted him to enjoy them. . I will not here assume the position of a poetical critic, both because I know such Criticism to be dreary and unsatisfactory, and because I am con- scious that the personal interest I took in David Gray is likely in some degree to influence my judg- ment. There is in truth no critic of poetry but the man who enjoys it, and the amount of gratifi- cation felt is the only just measure of criticism. I believe, however, that I should have found much pleasure in these Poems if I had met with them accidentally, and if I had been unaware of the AES Pee INTRODUCTORY NOTICE. XV strange and pathetic incidents of their production. But the public mind will not separate the intrinsic merits of the verses from the story of the writer, -any more than the works and fate of Keats or of Chatterton ; we value all connected with the being of every true Poet, because it is the highest form of nature that man is permitted: to study and enjoy. R. M. MILNES, 1 neh se Se RR “int oN RAP oo hp MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. | T is unusual, I fear, to produce a Memoir of. if a mere literary aspirant, —of one whose place ~ In the world of letters remains to be ascertained, -—and concerning whom but little interest can be felt. Yet, whatever may be the ultimate verdict on the Poems contained in this volume, there is something in the short, ambitious, and melancholy career of their author which may perhaps assist the reader to judge accurately of their merits. There are poets of a high, although not perhaps of the highest order of intellect, whose writings are a continual reflex of their own inner selves, —who lay bare their hearts in their works, — and without some knowledge of whom, in their per- sonal character and relations,.it would be difi- cult to form any generous, or even fair estimate of their productions. © 7 B 18 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. Of this intensely subjective class of bards was Davip Gray, the author of ‘‘ The Luggie, and other Poems.’ His life, which embraced only his pas- sionate youth-time, was tremulously, almost mor- bidly, fanciful. It is necessary to know this, not in order that his effusions may be judged charitably, but in order that they may be judged truly. What might have been weakness or affectation in a mature man was with him a natural instinct of tenderness. Had he lived to watch the fate of his book, he would probably have been as sensitive as Keats to the shafts of criticism. Consumption, ending fatally, has saved him from that ordeal. He is gone where no censure can wound, where no de- traction can affect him; but a life as strangely bright and beautiful as it was unhappily brief seems to suggest a memory that should be guarded by loving hands. David Gray was born on the 29th of January, 1838, on the banks of the Luggie, about eight miles distant from the city of Glasgow. His precise place of birth was Duntiblae, a little row of houses on the south side of the stream; but, while he was a mere child, his parents removed to Merkland, on the north side, where they still continue to dwell. All his associations, therefore, clustered about Merk- MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 19. land, which is situated within a mile of the town of Kirkintilloch, on the Gartshore road. It has neither the dignity of a village nor the primitive rudeness of a-clachan, but is simply a group of roadside cottages, some half-dozen in number, hum- ble, but with slated roofs, having pleasant patches of garden in front and behind, and wholly oceu- pied by handloom weavers and their families, who receive their webs and their inadequate remunera- tion from the manufacturing warehouses of the great city. His parents are both living, —an in- dustrious and exemplary couple, with the constant click of the shuttle in one division of their cot- tage, and with doubtless the occasional squall of juvenile voices in the other. David was the eldest of eight children, there being four boys and three girls now left. The Luggie flows past Merkland at the foot of a precipitous bank, and shortly afterwards loses itself among the shadows of Ox- gang, with its fine old mansion-house and rookery, and debouches at Kirkintilloch into the Kelvin, one of the tributaries of the Clyde, celebrated in Scottish song. It is a mere unpretending rivulet, yet sufficient to turn the wheel of an old meal-mill at the straggling village of Waterside, a little way up the stream, though in a lower level of the 20 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. valley. Neither, except at one or two points, is it of a character to attract a lover of the pictu- resque. But although not particularly fitted for a painter’s eye, it sufficed for a poet’s love. The little bright-eyed first-born of the Merkland hand- loom weaver had the more accessible nooks of it’ by heart long before his ambitious feet could carry him to more beautiful regions; and although, in later years, he extended the radius of his rambles, and made intimate acquaintance with the magnifi- cent glens and cascades in the recesses of the Campsie fells, his tiny ‘“‘ natal stream,”’ at the foot of the familiar ‘‘brae,’’ so associated in his heart with the recollections of childhood and the en- dearments of home, never lost its freshness or its charm. , Other appeals to his imagination were not want- ing. At a distance of some miles to the north was the noble outline of the Campsie range; villa- ges of smoking industry dotted the valley and plain; to the southwest Glasgow toiled all the week under its cloud, and consecrated the listen- ing Sabbath with the faint clang of its bells; while nightly to the south the country was ablaze, and the sky reddened, with the numerous blast-furnaces to which the west of Scotland chiefly owes iis MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. Dit preponderating wealth. Nor was the locality, in other respects, deficient in interest. Close to Kirk- intilloch the Roman invasion had left its tide- mark in the shape of certain easily distinguishable remains of the famous wall of Antoninus; there, too, was the Forth and Clyde Canal, with its leis- urely craft looking picturesque in the landscape, as if sitting for artistic effect, or rejoicing in the land-rest between the Peal of two oceans; while the occasional rush of some railway train along its geological groove, — now hidden, -anon revealed, and soon wholly out of sight, and out of hearing, —marked the advent of a new and more active era. All these things the “‘ marvellous boy ”’? must have daily noted; but still it was mainly the music of his own little Luggie which murmured melodi- ously in- his verse, and which he began at length fondly to dream of linking immortally with his name. Perhaps in no other country save Scotland could ‘a lad in Gray’s position—the son of a handloom weaver, burdened with a large family, and living in the outlying suburb of a common country town —have attained the advantage of a classical edu- cation. His first teacher was Mr. Adams, who still conducts, with efficiency, the Kirkintilloch 99 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. parish school. While under this excellent precep- tor, his literary. bias became strikingly apparent. Zealous at his tasks, bright with precocious intel- lect, an unconscionable devourer of books, and personally ambitious of distinction, it was early in- | tended that he should devote himself to the office . of the Christian ministry in connection with the | Free Church of Scotland, to which his parents belonged. When about fourteen years of age he was accordingly sent to Glasgow, where, support- ing himself to a considerable extent by laborious tuition, first as pupil-teacher in a public school in Bridgeton, and afterwards as Queen’s scholar in the Free Church Normal Seminary, he contrived to attend the Humanity, Greek, and other classes’ in the University during four successive sessions. Having likewise obtained some employment as a private tutor, he found it necessary to add French ~ to his lingual acquisitions. But whatever progress he may have made in his more severe studies, it soon became evident. that the bent of his mind was poetical rather than theological. His imagina- tion became much more possessed with the beau- ties of Greek mythology than with the dogmas of Calvinistic faith. In place of composing sermons, he betook himself to writing verses. Many of MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 28 these, bearing the nom de plume of ‘‘ Will Gurney,”’ were published, from time to time, in the columns of the ‘‘Glasgow Citizen,’?—a journal in which, some years before, Alexander Smith, the author of the ‘‘ Life-Drama,”’ had made his first appearance in print; and abandoning the idea of the pulpit, and detesting the drudgery of the ferule, the de- termination seems gradually to have taken root in his mind of adopting literature as a profession. His letters at this time betray an extraordinary and altogether unhealthy degree of excitement, as of one setting out on some adventurous path, and uncertain whether he was a genius or a dreamer. In one of these, addressed to myself, he says: “This is the third note with which I have at- tempted to preface the lines I have enclosed. I know not what to say about them. They are the faint but true expressions of my imagination, though deficient — alas! how deficient to symbolize the beauty of the cloudland I have visited, or the ideal love of my soul. Perhaps you may deem - this the raving of a restless spirit, — the spasmodic mawkishness of a ‘metre-balladmonger’: but do not, for God’s sake, do not. If you knew how often I have halted in the middle of the lobby of your office with a bundle of manuscripts, —if you 24 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. i knew the wild dreams of literary ambition I am ever framing, yet all the time conscious of my — own utter insignificance, my dear sir, you would pity me.’”’ These hectic sentences, accidentally preserved, are characteristic of the kind of desper- ate frenzy with which he was accustomed to com- pensate for, and avenge, on paper, the shrinking physical bashfulness of his nature. Shortly after- wards, when I had met him in society, I fancied I detected, in the restless yet timid twinkle of his dark eye, a lack of philosophic balance, a keen and vivid intellect united with a cértain nervous incapacity of self-reliance, an irrepressible impulse to lofty literary enterprise, shaken with maddening apprehensions of failure. But neither his circumstances nor his tempera- ment permitted him to rest. My acquaintance with him was too slight and casual, irrespectively of difference of age, to invite or win his confidence. He had, however, several companions to whom he had been attracted by kindred sympathies and tastes, and with whom he often drew glowing and extravagant pictures of the future, and as often obliterated them as vain. Among these was Arthur - Sutherland, a colleague of his own in the Free Church Normal Seminary, and now a respectable le ge oe MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 25 teacher at Maryburgh, near Dingwall. His letters _ to Sutherland, written early in 1860, when he had attained the age of twenty-two, are full of fan- tastic schemes to be undertaken by them jointly, one of which was to gather what money they could, meet on a certain day in Edinburgh, make their way to London on foot, and of course take ° the literary world by storm! These brave and foolish notions originated, probably in a state of mind which he confesses. ‘‘ Solitude,’ he says, ‘‘and an utter want of all physical exercise,: are working deplorable ravages in my nervous sys- tem. The crow’s-feet are blackening about my “eyes; and I cannot think to face the sunlight. When I ponder alone over my own inability to move the world, —to move one heart in it, —no wonder that my ‘face gathers blackness.’ Tenny- son beautifully, and (so far) truly says, that the face is ‘the form and color of the mind and life.’ If you saw me!’ Another congenial spirit was. William Freeland, a native of Kirkintilloch, some- what older in years, and now filling, with honor, a responsible position in connection with the Glas-- gow press. Many a ramble did he enjoy with the latter among the scenes of their common boy- hood, and many a dream did they both dream of. 9 - 26 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. how greatness was to be attained, and how fame was to be conquered. In Freeland he found a prudent, as well as a sympathetic adviser, who took every opportunity of curbing his too impetu- — ous enthusiasm, and saving him from immolation on the critical slights and antagonisms which liter- ary precocity and assumption are certain to pro- voke, unless when under the sanctity of a last illness, or the shelter of a premature grave. The beginning of 1860 was a feverish and criti- eal period in the life of ‘our young author. His — term of service in the Free Normal Seminary had expired. He was idle, —that is, he was bringing in no money; and prompted by his parents to find work, and impelled by his own ambition to seek fame, his case dilated, in his own eyes, into one of singular and desperate urgency. But was he really idle for a day,—for an hour? I venture to suppose that there were few busier brains and fingers im existence than his. Only twenty-two! and yet with sundry languages mastered, with whole libraries read, and with many a goodly quire of paper covered with matter which men high in the world of letters regarded as at least remark- able for his years! Knowing that unaided he was powerless for instant action, and that he could. MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. Dy not afford to wait for the tardy rewards of modest merit, he seems to have taken to letter-writing on a large and bold scale, assuming the claims of genius for the favors which fortune had denied. He had completed a poem of a thousand lines. _ Would no one help him to get it published? Writ- ing to Sutherland, he says, ‘‘I sent to G. H. Lewes, to Professor Masson, to Professor Aytoun, to Dis- raeli; but no one will read. it. They swear they have no time. For my part, I think the poem will live, and so I care not whether I were drowned to-morrow.’’ Again he says: ‘‘I spoke to you of the refusals which had been unfairly given my poem. Better to have a poem refused than a poem unwritten.’’ But I have evidence before me that he received considerate and kindly replies to some, at least, of his appeals, no doubt blended with wholesome advice, though, on the whole, most creditable to the courtesy and generosity of men having enormous demands on their time, address- ing a youth, an utter stranger to them, who wrote as if fancying he had a mission to electrify the world. His first influential friend was Mr. Sydney Do- bell, whose genius as a poet is not greater than his thorough kindliness as a man. To that gentle- 28 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. man he introduced himself by means of a short | note, dated November, 1859. It was addressed. to him at Cleeve Tower, Cheltenham, and began as follows :— “«< First: Cleeve Tower I take to be a pleasant place, clothed with ivy, and shaded by ancestral beeches: at all events, it is mightily different from my mother’s home. Let that be under- stood distinctly. «Second: I am a poet. Let that also be understood dis- tinctly. «“ Third: Having at the present time only 8s. a week, I wish to improve my position, for the sake of gratifying and assisting a mother whom I love beyond the conception of the vulgar. «These, then, are my premises, and the inference takes the form of this request. Will you,—a poet,—as far as. you can, assist another, a younger poet (of twenty) in a way not to wound his feelings, or hurt his independency of spirit ?” The quaint confidence with which he enclosed his certificates of character, and asked his influ- ence, probably excited, in the mind of Mr, Dobell, a curiosity, if not an interest, regarding the writer. At all events, a correspondence ensued, at times very wild and melodramatic on the one side, and full of stern counsel and substantial kindness on the other. This correspondence, extending, at intervals, over the remainder of poor Gray’s life, MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 29 I have not before me in any complete form. But from a confusion of documents kindly placed in my hands, a few: characteristic passages may in the course of this Memoir be culled. Dobell’s first answer to Gray does not appear to have been preserved; but it elicited a pcetical response, of which the following is the opening passage. « O, for the vowelled flow of knightly Spenser, Whose soul rained fragrance, like a golden censer Chain-swung in Grecian temple, that I might To your fine soul aread my love aright. With kind forbearance, birth of native feeling, A heart of mould celestial revealing, — You bore the vagaries of one, consuming His inner spirit with divine illuming ; You bore the vagaries of one, who dreams, — What time his spirit, mid the streaky gleams Of autumn sunset wanders, finding there Heaven’s ante-chamber, vermeil-flushed, and fair In feathery purples, fringed with orange-dun, — The porch of bliss, the threshold of the sun. O had I known thee when the Auroral birth Of poesy o’erwhelmed me, and this earth Became an angel-fingered lyre dim-sounding, To souls like thine in echoes sweet abounding ! Then would thy presence, brother, have fulfilled A yearning of my spirit, and instilled 30 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. An inspiration in me, like a star Luminous, tremulous, and oracular ! But far away, with all my hopes and fears, I wrung a blessing from the flowing years, And nursed what my good God had given me, The birthright of great souls, — dear poesy. Now have I found thee, but, dear heart! the golden Dream to which my soul is so beholden Is circumscribed and shorn, because I am A beggar of thy bounty. Is the balm Of thy dear converse all in this to end, And shall the beggar never be the FRIEND ?” We have here, with some imperfections, an audi- ble echo of the earlier style of Keats, as well as a sample of the varied means which Gray employed to wrest from men of distinction, not merely their recognition, but their friendship. Writing in plain prose to Mr. Dobell, I find him thus foolishly va- ticinating: ‘I tell you that, if I live, my name and fame shall be second to few of any age, and to none of my own. I speak thus because I feel power. Nor is this feeling an artificial disease, as it was in Rousseau, but a feeling which has grown with me since ever I could think.” That this ex- travagance must have been promptly and sharply rebuked, I learn by a subsequent letter from Gray, ‘MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. ol dated December, 1859. ‘You were pretty heavy on me,” he says, ‘‘and my egotism, as you called it. If you knew me a little better, and my aims, and how I have struggled to gain the little knowl- edge I have, you would account me modest. Mark: it is not what I have done, or can now do, but what I feel myself able and born to do, that makes me seem so selfishly stupid. Yon sentence, thrown back to me for reconsideration, would cer- tainly seem strange to anybody but myself; but the thought that I had so written to you only made me the more resolute in my actions, and the wilder in my visions. What if I sent the same sentence back to you again, with the quiet, stern answer, that it is my intention to be the ‘first poet of my own age, and second only to a very few of any age.’ Would you think me ‘mad,’ ‘drunk,’ or_an ‘idiot’ . or my ‘self-confidence’ one of the ‘saddest paroxysms’? When my biography falls to be written, will not this same ‘ self-confidence ’ be one of the most striking features of ‘my intel- lectual development? Might not a‘ poet of twen- ty’ feel great things? In all the stories of mental warfare that I have ever read, that mind which became of celestial clearness and godlike power, did nothing for twenty years but feel. And I am 32 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. so accustomed to compare my own mental progress _ with that of such men as Shakespeare, Goethe, and — Wordsworth, (examples of this last proposition,) that the dream of my youth will not be fulfilled, if my fame equal not, at least that of the latter of these three.’’ In another letter, written in another mood, he says: ‘‘I am ashamed of what I wrote to you before. I was an actor then, not myself: for, being bare of all recommendations, I lied with my own conscience, deeming that if I called myself a great man you were bound to be- lieve me.’’ This sudden and unwonted modesty was probably the mere expression of a casual fit of despondency, — entirely sincere while it con-- tinued, yet not more sincere than the arrogance which it recanted, and which, as the master im- pulse of his being, was certain to reassert its su- premacy. However this might be, Mr. Dobell appears to have become favorably impressed by the fearless candor of the young enthusiast, as I find him writing to Gray, who had been talking of going to Edinburgh, penniless, to try his fortune: “The tone of your last letter is, to me, a better evidence that you are born to do something noble than any number of confident oracles, or any flatu- lent ‘consciousness of power’ that ever distended MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. one the figure of dyspeptic youth; nay, even than any genuine ‘consciousness of power’ that is sufficient- ly objective and shapely to be seen, known, and named by its owner. I think so highly of that letter as a diagnostic, that if you carry out your intention of going to Edinburgh, it will much gratify me if you will accept one or two notes of introduction to friends of) mine there, whose good opinion, if you win it, may be.of-use to you. ..°s. 2). Let me know how things fare with you, and. be sure of the increased interest and good will— which I hope that further knowledge may ripen into friendship — of yours faithfully, Sydney Dobell.”’ _ When relieved from his duties as a teacher in Glasgow, young Gray —now engaged on a play — after the model of Shakespeare, anon upon a descrip- tive poem after a manner of his own, and filling up every interval of time with a correspondence as. voluminous as that conducted by a Minister of State —must have been both an enigma and an annoyance _ to the humble household at Merkland. oa Sek at F ‘ ; ae Ps - : * . MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 51 offers £5 towards its publication. I shall have it ready for you by Saturday first. You must ask ~ Hedderwick if he will read it; and perhaps Sheriff Bell and other Glasgow critics would look at it. Do Idream?’”’ To Freeland likewise, who was one of bis most regular and welcome visitors, he had scrawled out a high-flown dedication ending with these words: ‘‘ Before I enter that nebulous uncer- tain land of shadowy notions and tremulous wonder- ings, — standing on the threshold of the sun and looking back, —I cry thee, O Beloved! a last fare- well, lingeringly, passionately, without tears.”’ Although seeing much to admire in the poem of “The Luggie,’’ I hesitated to gaurantee it such a reception as would render its publication profitable. Some other opinions which were obtained in Glas- gow were more adverse. Moreover, circumstances prevented me, at the time, from taking any active initiative. Delay after delay occurred; but there was no delay on the part of the insidious foe with which the young poet contended. September came, and he wrote despairingly to Logan: “If my book be not immediately gone on with, I fear I may never see it. Disease presses closely on me. Reasons innumerable I could urge for the lawful sweetness of my desire, but your goodness will suggest them. 52 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. fe Ree. The merit of my MSS. is very little, — mere hints of better things, — crude notions harshly lan- guaged: but that must be overlooked. They are left not to the world (wild thought!) but as the simple, possible, sad, only legacy I can leave to — those who have loved and love me.” It was a hard task to resist such appeals. Nor were they wholly resisted. There was much dis- cussion, and even some movement, but the matter hung fire. Glasgow was a bad field for the publica- tion of poetry. The result to the emaciated and feeble author might be failure and disappointment, hastening the .mexorable change. November with its: gloom arrived, and Gray, obviously feeling his end very near, made a final appeal to Mr. Dobell, — the stanch friend whom he had never seen, and was destined never to see. ‘‘Surely,’”? he wrote, ‘he to whom the poem —the old, incomplete, de- spised, beloved poem —is dedicated, shall read it. Dear Mr. Dobell, will you read ‘The Luggie,’ and see whether or not it is worthy of your favor or ac- ceptance? I have inscribed it to you, after the ancient manner of Thomson. God knows it is not much; but, as*I said to you a year ago, @ is all I have.’’ The tender bribe of the dedication was modestly declined for reasons deemed satisfactory, MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 53 but with the aid of his lady friends at Hampstead, and the ready co-operation of Mr. Macmillan, pub- lisher, Cambridge, the poem was, without loss of time, put into the hands of the printer. By a fortu- nate accident, a specimen page beginning, ‘‘ How beautiful! ’’ reached Merkland on the very day pre- ceding his death. It was accompanied by the fol- lowing note from the accomplished hand of the authoress of ‘‘ Ethel”? : — “ Upper-Terrace Lodge, Nov. 29. «« My dear Mr. Gray, —I have heard from Mr. Macmillan this morning. He says the MS. will form a volume like ‘Edwin of Deira’; and the enclosed is a specimen page sent, with the print- er’s estimate. I cannot resist the impulse to send it on to you, because I think it will give you so much pleasure to see even this small portion of your work already in the form in which I hope before long we may see it published. After Mr. Dobell’s praise of your poetry, you will hardly care for mine; yet I will say briefly that those sonnets which I found time to read before send- ing off the MS. to Cambridge, impressed me deeply with their truth and beauty, and rare excellence and simplicity of pathos. It seems to me, too, that in your poetry, even the most mournful, there is a shining forth of that hopeful, loving faith in God’s love, which it is indeed a good thing for poets to teach, and which I earnestly trust is the abiding solace and rest of your own spirit. I can only write these few lines now; but believe that I am always, with much sympathy, sincerely your friend, ‘¢MARIAN JAMES.” 54 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. As he gazed upon the neatly-printed page, he seemed to feel that the dream of his life was about to be fulfilled. He read its clear type as if by the reflection of a light caught from the spiritual world. That it was ‘‘ good news,” he said; that he might now subside tranquilly —‘‘ without tears ”’ —into his eternal rest, he probably felt. Next day, the 3d of December, 1861, the shadow of utter blackness came down upon the humble house- hold at Merkland, blinding all eyes. David Gray was no more. His spirit had been borne gently away on the wings of the strong and beautiful promises breathed from the Book of Life, — almost his last words being, ‘‘God has love, and I have faith.’”? He was in his twenty-fourth year. Among his papers the following memorial was found, writ- ten in his own clear hand :— MY EPITAPH. Below lies one whose name was traced in sand, — He died not knowing what it was to live: | Died while the first sweet consciousness of manhood And maiden thought electrified his soul: Faint beatings in the calyx of the rose. Bewildered reader, pass without a sigh In a proud sorrow! There is life with God, In other kingdom of a sweeter air : In Eden every flower is blown. Amen. Davip GRAY. Sept. 27, 1861. MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. BB Whether these lines will yet be inscribed on any stone, I know not. At all events, it will not be among the congregated tombs of the great ones of all time. Westminster Abbey was not for him. If, in any possible future, there arose before him a vision of its solemn arches, its silent yet elo- quent sculptures, and, its groups of pilgrim wor- shippers, it was only at the end of a term of years “which he was fated never to reach. But not the less peacefully will his spirit rest in the near neighborhood of that home from which his affec- tions were never weaned, and of that stream whose low murmur he labored, through years of passion- ate yearning, to exalt into an eternal melody. Not far from Merkland, on an elevation a short distance from the highway, there is situated a lonely place of sepulture, surrounded by a low, rude wall of stone, with a little’ watch-tower over the entrance-gate, useful for shelter and observa- tion during nights, long since bygone, when grave- yards were broken into and plundered, but now occupied with the few implements necessary for the performance of the last mortal rites. It has neither church nor house attached, and is known as the ‘‘ Auld Aisle Burying-ground.’”’ With the poet it had been a favorite place of resort and 56 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. . meditation. He could see from it the Luggie, the Bothlin burn, the Woodilee farm, all the localities” which he most loved. There, as appeared from the dates on the gravestones, had the bones of. his ancestors reposed for above two hundred years ; and thither, on the Saturday after his death, were his own remains carried,—on hand-spokes, after the old Scotch fashion, — followed by about thirty mourners. The wintry day had been lowering, but the hour of the funeral was brightened with gleams of clear sunshine, and in the midst of many ‘regrets, yet of some soothings, all that was mortal of David Gray was laid deep in the mould, near a solitary ash-tree,—the only tree in the place, —now bare and disconsolate, but erelong to break into foliage, and be an aviary for the songs of, summer. In person, the ‘deceased poet was tall, with a - slight stoop. His head was not large, but his temperament was of the keenest and brightest edge. With black curling hair, eyes dark, large, and lustrous, and a complexion of almost feminine delicacy, his appearance never failed to make a favorable impression on strangers. Yet with some of his fastest friends—such as Dobell and Mrs. Nichol—he never became personally acquainted. MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. 5Y That he was gifted with poetic genius there is enough, I think, in his brief life-story, apart alto- gether from his lyrical achievements, to prove. No mere flash of vanity could so have shaped itself into the nimbus of a genuine inspiration. What further evidence of supreme endowment he - might have furnished to the world, had he lived, we can only of course guess. Morally, he was, as far as I can discover, singularly pure, and worthy of the kindly interest which he awakened in so many quarters. One overmastering passion — an ever-burning desire for fame — had apparently swal- lowed up every other in his bosom. The simple love of poetry he may have been too apt to in- terpret as the essential and celestial gift. He may have been too, apt to mistake the whisperings of ambition and conceit for the authentic oracles of prophecy. But, on the other hand, is not a strong, irrepressible, deeply-inherent impulse but the quick- ening, in many cases, of veritable power? At all events, looking at the superlative struggle of this son of a Scotch handloom weaver, and at its sad, unsatisfied end, generous readers—and readers who are not generous can never be wholly just — will recognize in him a spirit freeing itself, at the very outset of life, from all grovelling con- 3 * 58 MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR. tagion, shaping forth its own magnificent destiny, and pursuing its divine ideal with the steadfast- ness of an angelic will. How far his posthumous writings may win for him the laurels for which, through every accident of fortune, he incessantly sighed and toiled, I hesitate to predict. Inasmuch, <2 , : eae j ; Ee eae = . if. =A ; + elie g Ab satel ve = — ae or however, as there are many who knew and loved him, and will dwell often and fondly on his pages, —the unfinished columns of a temple suddenly ar- rested in the building, —the words of the mighty master may be fairly, not foolishly or falsely ap- plied : — «‘ Death makes no conquest of this conqueror ; For now he lives in Fame, though not in life.” GLASGOW. PINAL MEMORIAL S. A, Bo ent (Navee \ Viooen ae in a by-road, about a mile from the small town of Kirkintilloch, and eight miles from the city of Glasgow, stands a cottage one story high, roofed with slate, and surrounded by a little kitchen-garden. A whitewashed lobby, leading from the front to the back door, divides this cottage into two sections: to the right is a room fitted up as a handloom-weaver’s workshop ; to the left is a kitchen paved with stone, and open- ing into a tiny carpeted bedroom. In the workshop, a father, daughter, and sons work all day long at the loom. In the kitchen, a handsome, cheery Scottish matron busies herself like a thrifty housewife, and brings the rest of the family about her at meals. All day long the soft hum of the loom is heard in the workshop; but when night comes, mysterious doors are thrown 60 FINAL MEMORIALS. open, and the family retires to sleep in extraor- dinary mural recesses. | . In this humble home David Gray, the handloom- weaver, has resided for upwards of twenty years, and managed to rear a family of eight children, — five boys and three girls. His eldest son, David, author of The Luggie and other Poems, is the hero of the present true history. : David was born on the 29th of January, 1838. He alone, of all the little household, was destined to receive a decent education. From early child- hood the dark-eyed little fellow was noted for his wit and cleverness; and it became the dream of his father’s life that he should become a scholar. At the parish-school of Kirkintilloch he learned to read, write, and cast up accounts, and was, more- over, iustructed in the Latin rudiments. Partly through the hard struggles of his parents, and partly through his own severe labors as a pupil- teacher and private tutor, he was afterwards en- abled to attend the classes at the Glasgow Uni- versity. In common with other rough country lads, who live up dark alleys, subsist chiefly on oatmeal and butter, forwarded from home, and eventually distinguish themselves in the class- room, he had to fight his way onward amid poy- FINAL MEMORIALS. 61 erty and privation; but in his brave pursuit of knowledge nothing daunted him. It had been set- tled at home that he should become a minister of the Free Church of Scotland. Unfortunately, how- ever, he had no love for the pulpit. Early in life . he had begun to hanker after the delights of poet- ical composition. He had devoured the poets from Chaucer to Tennyson.- The yearnings thus awak- ened in him had begun to express themselves in many wild fragments, — contributions, for the most part, to the poet’s-corner of a local newspaper, — The Glasgow Citizen. Up to this point there was nothing extraordinary in the career or character of David Gray. Taken at his best, he was an average specimen of the persevering young Scottish student. But his soul contained wells of emotion which had not yet been stirred to their depths. When, at fourteen years of age, he began to study in Glasgow, it was his custom to go home every Saturday night, in order to pass the Sunday with his parents. These Sun- days at home were chiefly occupied with rambles in the neighborhood. of Kirkintilloch ; wanderings on the sylvan banks of the Luggie, the beloved little river which flowed close to his father’s door. In Luggieside awakened one day the dream which 62 FINAL MEMORIALS. developed all the hidden beauty of his character, and eventually kindled all the faculties of his in- tellect. Had he been asked to explain the nature of this dream, David would have answered vaguely enough, but he would have said something to the following effect: ‘‘I’m thinking none of us are quite contented; there’s a climbing impulse to heaven in us all that won’t let us rest for a mo- ment. Just now I’d be happy if I knew a little more. I’d give ten years of life to see Rome, and Florence, and Venice, and the grand places of old; and to feel that I wasn’t a burden on the old folks. I’ll be a great man yet! and the old home — the Luggie and Lartshore Wood —shall be famous for my sake.’”’ He could only have measured his am- bition by the love he bore his home. ‘‘I was — born, bred, and cared for here, and my folk are buried here. I know every nook and dell for. miles around, and they’re all dear to me. My own mother and father dwell here, and in my own wee room (the tiny carpeted bedrdom above al- luded to) I first learned to read poetry. I love my home; and it’s for my home’s sake that I love fame.”’ . At twenty-one years of age, when this dream was strongest in him, David was a tall young man, - FINAL MEMORIALS. 63 : slightly but firmly built, and with a stoop at the a shoulders. His head was small, fringed with black curly hair. Want of candor was not his fault, ’ though he seldom looked one in the face; his eyes, however, were large and dark, full of intelligence and humor, harmonizing well with the long thin nose and nervous lips. The great black eyes and woman’s mouth betrayed the creature of impulse; one whose reasoning faculties were small, but whose tempera- ment was like red-hot coal. He sympathized with much that was lofty, noble, and true in poetry, and with much that was absurd and suicidal in the poet. He carried sympathy to the highest pitch of enthu- siasm ; he shed tears over the memories of Keats and Burns, and he was corybantic in his execution of a Scotch:‘‘reel.’’ i lle gre Ge FINAL MEMORIALS. q1 in welcome; and how was he to make his trem- bling voice heard above the roar and tumult of | those streets? The very policemen seemed to look suspiciously at the stranger. To his sensi- tively Scottish ear the language spoken seemed quite strange and foreign; it had a painful, home- less sound about it, that sank nervously on the heart-strings. As he wandered about the streets, he glanced into coffee-shop after coffee-shop, see- ing “beds” ticketed in each fly-blown window. His pocket contained a sovereign and a few. shil- lings, but he would need every penny. Would not a bed be useless extravagance? he asked him- self. Certainly. Where, then, should he pass the night? In Hyde Park! He had heard so much about this part of London that the name was quite familiar to him. Yes, he would pass the night in the Park. Such a proceeding would save money, and be exceedingly romantic; it would be just the right sort of beginning for a poet’s struggle in London! So he strolled into the great Park, and wandered about its purlieus till morning. In re- marking upon this foolish conduct, one must reflect that David was strong, heartsome, full of healthy youth. It was a frequent boast of his that he scarcely ever had a day’s illness. 12 FINAL MEMORIALS. Whether or not his fatal complaint was caught during this his first night in London is uncertain, but some few days afterwards David wrote thus to his father: ‘‘By the by, I have had the worst cold I ever had in my life. ‘I cannot get it away properly, but I feel a great deal better to-day.’ Alas! violent cold had settled down upon his lungs, and insidious death was already slowly ap- proaching him. So little conscious was he of his danger, however, that we find him writing to a friend: ‘‘ What brought me here? God knows, for I don’t. Alone in such a place is a horrible ting Ae is. People don’t seem to understand me. .... Westminster Abbey; I was there all day yesterday. If I:live.I shall be buried there eee help me God! A completely defined consciousness of great. poetical genius is my only antidote against utter despair and despicable failure.”’ — What were David’s qualifications for a struggle in which, year after year, hundreds miserably per- ish? Considerable knowledge of Greek, Latin, and French, great miscellaneous reading, a clerkly hand- writing, and a bold purpose; these were slender ‘qualifications, but, while health lasted, there was hope. ! David and Blank did not meet until upwards of FINAL MEMORIALS. 73 _aweek after their’ arrival in London, but each had _ soon been apprised of the other’s presence in the city. Finally, they came together. David’s first - impulse was to describe his lodgings, situated in a by-street in the Borough. ‘‘A cold, cheerless bedroom, Bob: nothing but a blanket to cover me. For God’s sake, get me out of it!’? The friends were walking side by side in the neighbor- hood of the New Cut, looking about them with curious, puzzled eyes, and now and then drawing each other’s attention to sundry objects of interest. ‘‘ Have you been well?” inquired Blank. ‘‘ First- rate,’’? answered David, looking as merry as possi- * ble. Nor did he show any indications whatever of illness. He seemed hopeful, energetic, full of health and spirits; his sole desire was to change his lodging. It was not without qualms that he surveyed the dingy, smoky neighborhood where Blank resided. The sun was shedding dismal crim- son light on the chimney-pots, and the twilight was slowly thickening. The two climbed up three flights of stairs to Blank’s bedroom. Dingy as it was, this appartment seemed, in David’s eyes, quite a palatial sanctum ; and it was arranged that the friends should take up their residence together. As speedily as possible, Blank procured David’s 4 x 74 FINAL MEMORIALS. little stock of luggage; then, settled face to face as in old times, both made very merry. Blank’s first idea, on questioning David about his prospects, was that his friend had had the best of luck. You see, the picture drawn on either side was a golden one; but the brightness soon melted away. It turned out that David, on arriving in London, had sought out certain gentle- men whom he had formerly favored with his cor-— respondence, — among others, Mr. Richard Monck- ton Milnes, now Lord Houghton. Though not a little astonished at the appearance of the boy-poet, ' Mr. Milnes had received him kindly, assisted him to the best of his power, and made some work for him in the shape of manuscript-copying. The same gentleman had also used his influence with literary people, —to very little purpose, however. The real truth turned out to be that David was disappointed and low-spirited. ‘It’s weary work, Bob; they don’t understand me; I wish I was back in Glasgow.’’ It was now that David told his friend all about that first day and night in London, and how he had already begun a poem about ‘‘ Hyde Park,’’ how Mr. Milnes had been good to him, had said that he was ‘‘a poet,” but had insisted on his going back to Scotland, and a os : d ipl eam a Ay ae Bity 7 e hes FINAL MEMORIALS. © 75 : becoming a minister. David did not at all like the notion of returning home. He thought he had every chance of making his way in London. About this time he was bitterly disappointed by the rejec- tion of “The Luggie’’ by Mr. Thackeray, to whom Mr. Milnes had sent it, with a recommendation that it should be inserted in the Cornhill Magazine. The poem, however, for half a dozen reasons, was utterly “unsuited to the pages of a popular periodical. — Mr. Milnes was the first to perceive that the young adventurer was seriously ill. After a hur- ried call on his patron one day in May, David re- joined Blank in the near neighborhood. ‘‘ Milnes says I’m to go home and keep warmy and he ’ll send his own doctor to me.’’ This was done. The doctor came, examined David’s chest, said very little, and went away, leaving strict orders that the invalid should keep within doors, and take great care of himself. Neither David nor Blank liked the expression of the doctor’s face at all. It soon became evident that David’s illness was of a most serious character. Pulmonary disease had set in ; medicine, blistering, all the remedies employed in the early stages of his complaint, seemed of little avail. Just then David read the Life of John Keats, a book which impressed him with a nervous fear of 76 . FINAL MEMORIALS. impending dissolution. He began to be filled with conceits droller than any he had imagined in health. “‘ Tf I were to meet Keats in heaven,’’ he said one day, ‘‘ I wonder if I should know his face from his pictures?’’ Most frequently his. talk was of labor uncompleted, hope deferred; and he began to pant for free country air. ‘‘If I die,’’ he said, on a ' certain occasion, ‘‘I shall have one consolation, — Milnes will write an introduction to the poems.’’ At another time, with tears in his eyes, he re- peated Burns’s epitaph. Now and then, too, he had his fits of frolic and humor, and would laugh and joke over his unfortunate position. It cannot be said that Mr. Milnes and his friends were at all lukewarm about the case of their young friend ; on the contrary, they gave him every practical as- sistance. Mr. Milnes himself, full of the most del- icate sympathy, trudged to and fro between his own house and the invalid’s lodging ; his pockets laden with jelly and beef-tea, and his tongue tipped with kindly comfort. Had circumstances permitted, he-— would have taken the invalid into his own house. Unfortunately, however, David was compelled to re- main, in company with Blank, in a chamber which seemed to have been constructed peculiarly for the - purpose of making the occupants as uncomfortable FINAL MEMORIALS. mt ag possible. There were draughts everywhere : through the chinks of the door, through the win- dows, down the chimney, and up through the floor- ing. When the wind blew, the whole tenement seemed on the point of crumbling to atoms; when the rain fell, the walls exuded moisture ; when the | sun shone, the sunshine only served to increase the characteristic dinginess of the furniture. Occasional visitors, however, could not be fully aware of these inconveniences. It was in the night-time, and in bad weather, that they were chiefly felt; and it required a few days’ experience to test the super- lative discomfort of what David (in a letter written afterwards) styled ‘‘ the dear old ghastly bankrupt garret.””? His stay in these quarters was destined to be brief. Gradually, the invalid grew homesick. Nothing would content him but a speedy return to Scotland. He was carefully sent off by train, and , arrived safely in his little cottage home far north. | Great, meanwhile, had been the commotion in the handloom weaver’s cottage, after the receipt of this bulletin, ‘‘I start off to-night at five o’clock by the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway, right on to Lon- don, in good health and spirits.”” A great cry arose in the household. He was fairly ‘‘ daft” ; he was throwing away all his chances in the world; the * mg FINAL MEMORIALS. verse-writing had turned his head. Father and mother mourned together. The former, though in- competent to judge literary merit of any kind, per- ceived that David was hot-headed, only halfeducat- ed, and was going to a place where thousands of people were starving daily. But the suspense was not to last long. The. darling son, the secret hope and pride, came back to the old people sick to death. All rebuke died away before the pale, sad face, and the feeble, tottering body ; and David was welcomed to the cottage hearth with silent prayers. They set him in the old place beside the fire, and hushed the house. The mother went about her work with a heavy heart; the father, when “the day’s toil was over, sat down before the kitchen fire, smoking his pipe, speaking very little, and looking sternly at the castles that crumbled away in the blazing coal. : It was’ now placed beyond a doubt that the dis- ease was one of mortal danger; yet David, sur- rounded again by his old Lares, busied himself with many bright and delusive dreams of ultimate re- covery. Pictures of a pleasant, dreamy convales- cence in a foreign clime floated before him morn and night, and the fairest and dearest oe the dreams was Italy. Previous to his departure for London, he FINAL MEMORIALS. "9 had concocted a wildischeme for visiting Florence, and throwing himself on the poetical sympathy of Robert Browning. He had even thought of enlist- ing in the English Garibaldian Corps, and by that means gaining his cherished wish. ‘‘ How about Italy?’ he wrote to Blank, after returning home. - Do you still entertain its delusive motions? Pour out your soul before me: I am asachild.” All at once a new dream burst upon him. A local doctor insisted that the invalid should be removed to a milder climate, and recommended Natal. In a letter full of coaxing tenderness, David besought Blank, for the sake of old days, to accompany him thither. Blank answered indecisively, but immediately made all endeavors to grant his friend’s wish. Meantime, he received the following, which we give as a fair specimen of David’s epistolary style : — ** Merkland, Kirkintilloch, 10th November, 1860. «« Ever dear Bob, — Your letter causes me some uneasiness ; not but that your numerous objections are numerous and vital enough, but they convey the sad and firm intelligence that you cannot come with me. I.—It is absolutely impossible for you to raise a sum sufficient! . Now you know it is not necessary that I should go to Natal; nay, I have, in very fear, given up the thought of it; but we — or I—could go to Italy or Jamaica, — this latter, as I learn, being the more preferable. Nor has there been any ‘crisis’ a 80 FINAL MEMORIALS. come, as you say, I would n’t cause you, much trouble (forgive me for hinting this), but I believe we could be happy as in the dear old times. Dr. (whose address I don’t know), supposes that I shall be able to work (?) when I reach a more genial climate; and if that should prove the result, why, it is a consummation devoutly to be wished. But the matter of money bothers me. What I wrote to you was all hypothetical, —i. e. things have been carried so far, but I have not heard whether or not the subscription had been gone on with. And, supposing for one instant the utterly preposterous supposition that I had money to carry us both, then comes the II. objection, — your dear mother! I am not so far gone, though I fear far enough, to ignore that blessed feeling. But if it were for your good? Before God, if I thought it would in any way harm your health (that cannot be) or your hopes, I would never have mooted the proposal. On the contrary, I feel from my heart that it would benefit you; and how much would it not benefit me. But Iam baking without flour. The cash is ae in my hand, and I fear never will be; the amount I would require is not so easily gathered. ae ‘« Dobell * is again laid up. He is at the Isle of Wight, at some * Sydney Dobell, author of Balder, The Roman, &c. This gentle- man’s kindness to David, whom he never saw, is beyond all praise. Nor was the invalid ungrateful. “Poor, kind, half-immortal spirit here below,’’ wrote David, alluding to Dobell, “shall I know thee when we meet new-born into eternal existence? .. . . Dear friend Bob, did you ever know a nobler? I cannot get him out of my mind. I would write to him daily, would it not pest him. Yet, as you and I know, nothing can pest him. What he has done for me is enormous; almost as much as what you have done; almost as much as I long to do for both of you.” Again and again, in much the same words, did he repeat this affectionate plaint. ; * * FINAL MEMORIALS. 81 establishment called the Victoria Bake Iam told that his friends deem his life in constant danger. He asks for your address. I shall send it only to-day ; wait until you hear what he has got to say. He would prefer me to go to Brompton Hospital. J would go anywhere for a change. If I don’t get money somehow or some- where, I shall die of ennui. A weary desire for change, life, ex- citement, of every, any kind, possesses me, and without you what am 12 There is no other person in the world whom I could spend a week with, and thoroughly enjoy it. O how I desire to smoke a cigar, and have a pint and a chat with you. «By the way, how are you getting on? Have you lots to do? and well paid for it? Or is life a lottery with you? and the tea-caddy a vacuum ? and —— a snare? and —— a night- mare? Do you dream yet on your old rickety sofa in the dear old ghastly bankrupt garret at No. 66% Write to yours eternally, «Davin Gray.” The proposal to go abroad was soon abandoned, partly because the invalid began to evince a ner- vous homesickness, but chiefly because it was im- possible to raise a sum of money sufficient. But a residence in Kirkintilloch throughout the winter was, on all accounts, to be avoided. A friend, therefore, subscribed to the Brompton Hospital for chest complaints, for the express purpose of pro- curing David admission. One bleak wintry day, not long after the receipt of the above letter, Blank was gazing out of his lofty lodging-window, when 4% F 82 FINAL MEMORIALS. a startling vision presented itself, in the shape of David himself, seated with quite a gay look in an open Hansom cab. In a minute the friends were side by side, and one of Blank’s first impulses was to rebuke David for the folly of exposing himself, during such weather, in such a vehicle. This folly, however, was on a parallel with David’s general habits of thought. Sometimes, indeed, the poor boy became unusually thoughtful, as when, during his illness, he wrote thus to Blank: ‘‘ Are you | remembering that you will need clothes? These. are things you take no concern about, and so you may be seedy without knowing it. By all means hoard a few pounds if you can (I require none) for any emergency like this. _ Brush your excellent — topcoat, —it is the best and warmest I ever had on my back. Mind, you have to pay ready money - for any new coat. A seedy man will not ‘ get on’ if he requires, like you, to call personally on his employers.’’ The mother of a family might have written the foregoing. ; David had come to London in order to go either to Brompton or to Torquay, —the hospital’ at which last-named place was thrown open to him by Mr. Milnes. Perceiving his dislike for the Temperance Hotel, to which he had been conducted, Blank con- 3 FINAL MEMORIALS. 83 sented that he should stay in the ‘“ ghastly bank- rupt garret ”’ until he should depart to one or other of the hospitals. It was finally arranged that he should accept a temporary invitation to a hydro- pathic establishment at Sudbrook Park, Richmond. Thither Blank at once conveyed him. Meanwhile, his prospects were diligently canvassed by his nu- merous friends. His own feelings at this time were well expressed in a letter home. ‘‘I am dreadfully afraid of Brompton: living among sallow, dolorous, dying consumptives is enough to kill me.. Here Iam as comfortable as can be: a fire in my room all day, plenty of meat, and good society, — nobody so ill as myself; but there, perhaps hundreds far worse (the hospital holds 218 in all stages of the disease, — 90 of them died last report), dying be- side me, perhaps— it frightens me.’’ All at once David began,.with a delicacy peculiar to him, to consider himself an unwarrantable intruder at Sud- brook Park. In the face of all persuasion, there- fore, he joined Blank in London, — whence he shortly afterwards departed for Torquay. He left Blank in good spirits, — full of pleasant Bntisipations of Devonshire scenery. But the sec- ond day after his departure he addressed to Blank a wild epistle, dated from one of the Torquay hotels. 84 FINAL MEMORIALS. - He had arrived safe and sound, he said, and had been kindly received by a friend of Mr. Milnes. — He had at first been delighted with the town, and everything init. He had gone to the hospital, had been received by ‘‘ a nurse of death’’ (as he phrased it), and had been inducted into the privileges of — the place ; but on seeing his fellow-patients, some in the last stages of disease, he had fainted away. On coming to himself, he obtained an interview with the matron. To his request for a private apartment, she had answered, that to favor him in that way would be to break written rules, and that he must content himself with the common privi- leges of the establishment. On leaving the ma- tron, he had furtively stolen from the place, and made his way through the night to the hotel. Be- fore Blank had time to comprehend the state of affairs, there came a second letter, stating that David was on the point of starting for London. ‘Every ring at the hotel-bell makes me tremble, fancying they are coming to take me away by force. Had you seen the nurse! O that I were back again at home, — mother! mother! mother! ”’ A few hours after Blank had read these lines in miserable fear, arrived Gray himself, pale, anxious, and trembling. He flung himself into Blank’s \ . ‘FINAL MEMORIALS. "85 arms, with a smile of sad relief. ‘‘ Thank God!”’ he cried; ‘ that’s over, and I] am here!’’ Then his cry was for home; he would die if he remained longer adrift; he must depart at once. Blank per- suaded him to wait for a few days, and in the mean time saw some of his influential friends. The - skill and regimen of a medical establishment being necessary to him at this stage, it was naturally concluded that he should go to Brompton; but David, in a high state of nervous excitement, scouted the idea. Disease had sapped the foun- ‘dations of the once strong spirit. ‘‘ Home —home —home!” was his hourly cry. To resist these frantic appeals would have been to hasten the end of all. In the midst of winter, Blank saw him into the train at Euston Square.