at Stoke Court, however, a still more interesting

GRAY'S BEDROOM

relic of the poet, in the summer-house in which he used to sit and muse." It is a substantial stone-built structure, embowered in trees, and commanding from the rising ground on which

it stands a far-reaching view of the surrounding country. Than this peaceful retreat it would be difficult to imagine a spot more in harmony with the pensive muse of Gray. As in the case of Wordsworth, it may well have been that while the poet's books were to be found indoors, this summer-house was his study. Here,

GRAY'S STUDY

doubtless, the poet penned many of those lines which were to attain an unfailing immortality. The outlook is still as calm and remote from the busy stir as when Gray described him

situated at West End, in the northern part of the parish, where the present mansion of Stoke Court now stands.

It is described as having

been a simple farmhouse of two stories, with a rustic porch before the door, but the only apartments which survive from the old building are the poet's bedroom, the study, and the window above at which he used to sit. There yet exists

self as "still at Stoke, hearing, seeing, doing

absolutely nothing."

As death was instrumental in deepening Gray's intimacy with Stoke Poges, so also was the king of terrors responsible for creating in him that spirit of melancholy out of which the "Elegy" grew. One of the poet's dearest friends at Eton had been Richard West, who was denied any considerable span of life in which to ripen his undoubted genius. While on a visit to Stoke, Gray heard suddenly of the death of this early friend, and the loss tinged all his after life with sadness. The immediate issue of that loss may be traced in the poems written while his sorrow was still heavy upon him. One of these is the sonnet specially dedicated to West's memory.

"In vain to me the smiling mornings shine,

And reddening Phœbus lifts his golden fire ;
The birds in vain their amorous descant join ;
Or cheerful fields resume their green attire ;
These ears, alas! for other notes repine,

A different object do these eyes require;
My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine;
And in my breast the imperfect joys expire.
Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer,
And new-born pleasure brings to happier men;
The fields to all their wonted tribute bear;

To warm their little loves the birds complain;
I fruitless mourn to him that cannot hear,
And weep the more because I weep in vain."

Then there is the "Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College," the whole of which is suffused with that retrospective tenderness which is the dominant mood of the human mind under the influence of death. On the southern horizon seen from Stoke Poges the embattled outline of the Royal Castle of Windsor and the "antique towers" of Eton are plainly visible, and as Gray gazed upon these familiar objects while still in the throes of his lonely anguish, what was more natural than that his mind should revert to those lost days of his boyhood which he had spent there in the company of West?

"Ah happy hills! ah pleasing shade!

Ah fields beloved in vain !

Where once my careless childhood stray'd,
A stranger yet to pain!

I feel the gales that from ye blow
A momentary bliss bestow,

As waving fresh their gladsome wing
My weary soul they seem to soothe,
And, redolent of joy and youth,
To breath a second spring."

Verses such as these are sufficient evidence of the sombre mood of Gray's spirit during that sad autumn of 1742; his muse was surely ripening towards the full harvest of the "Elegy." One other event helping towards that fruition was to