s
duties. He died in 1770, on the 3d of July, of gout in the stomach. His
habits were those of a recluse; and whether we agree or not, with Adam
Smith, in saying that nothing is wanting to render him perhaps the first
poet in the English language, but to have written a little more, it is
astonishing that so great and permanent a reputation should have been
founded on so very little as he wrote. Gray has been properly called the
finest lyric poet in the language; and his lyric power strikes us as
intuitive and original; yet he himself, adhering strongly to the
artificial school, declared, if there was any excellence in his own
numbers, he had learned it wholly from Dryden. His archaeological tastes
are further shown by his enthusiastic study of heraldry, and by his
surrounding himself with old armor and other curious relics of the past.
Mr. Mitford, in a curious dissection of the _Elegy_, has found numerous
errors of rhetoric, and even of grammar.

His _Bard_ is founded on a tradition that Edward I., when he conquered
Wales, ordered all the bards to be put to death, that they might not, by
their songs, excite the Welsh people to revolt. The last one who figures
in his story, sings a lament for his brethren, prophesies the downfall of
the usurper, and then throws himself over the cliff:

"Be thine despair and sceptered care,
To triumph and to die are mine!"
He spoke, and headlong from the mountain's height,
Deep in the roaring tide, he plunged to endless night.

WILLIAM COWPER.--Next in the catalogue of the transition school occurs the
name of one who, like Gray, was a recluse, but with a better reason and a
sadder one. He was a gentle hypochondriac, and, at intervals, a maniac,
who literally turned to poetry, like Saul to the harper, for relief from
his sufferings. William Cowper, the eldest son of the Rector of
Berkhampsted in Hertfordshire, was born on the 15th of November, 1731. He
was a delicate and sensitive child, and was seriously affected by the loss
of his mother when he was six years old. At school, he was cruelly treated
by an older boy, which led to his decided views against public schools,
expressed in his poem called _Tirocinium_. His morbid sensitiveness
increased upon him as he grew older, and interfered with his legal studies
and advancement. His depression of spirits took a religious turn; and we
are glad to think that religion itself brought the balm which gave him
twelve years of