He now lived on at Peterhouse, very little solicitous what others did or thought, and cultivated his mind and enlarged his views without any other purpose than of improving and amusing himself; when Mr. Mason, being elected fellow of Pembroke hall, brought him a companion who was afterwards to be his editor, and whose fondness and fidelity has kindled in him a zeal of admiration, which cannot be reasonably expected from the neutrality of a stranger, and the coldness of a critick.
In this retirement he wrote, 1747, an ode on the Death of Mr. Walpole’s Cat; and the year afterwards attempted a poem, of more importance, on Government and Education, of which the fragments which remain have many excellent lines.
His next production, 1750, was his far-famed Elegy in the Church-yard, which, finding its way into a magazine, first, I believe, made him known to the publick.
An invitation from lady Cobham, about this time, gave occasion to an odd composition called a Long Story, which adds little to Gray’s character.
Several of his pieces were published, 1753, with designs by Mr. Bentley; and, that they might in some form or other make a book, only one side of each leaf was printed. I believe the poems and the plates recommended each other so well, that the whole impression was soon bought. This year he lost his mother.
Some time afterwards, 1756, some young men of the college, whose chambers were near his, diverted themselves with disturbing him by frequent and troublesome noises, and, as is said, by pranks yet more offensive and contemptuous. This insolence, having endured it awhile, he represented to the governours of the society, among whom, perhaps, he had no friends; and, finding his complaint little regarded, removed himself to Pembroke hall.
In 1757 he published the Progress of Poetry, and the Bard, two compositions at which the readers of poetry were at first content to gaze in mute amazement. Some that tried them confessed their inability to understand them, though Warburton said that they were understood as well as the works of Milton and Shakespeare, which it is the fashion to admire. Garrick wrote a few lines in their praise. Some hardy champions undertook to rescue them from neglect; and, in a short time, many were content to be shown beauties which they could not see.
Gray’s reputation was now so high, that, after the death of Cibber, he had the honour of refusing the laurel, which was then bestowed on Mr. Whitehead.
His curiosity, not long after, drew him away from Cambridge to a lodging near the Museum, where he resided near three years, reading and transcribing; and, so far as can be discovered, very little affected by two odes on Oblivion and Obscurity, in which his lyrick performances were ridiculed with much contempt and much ingenuity.
When the professor of modern history at Cambridge died, he was, as he says, “cockered and spirited up,” till he asked it of lord Bute, who sent him a civil refusal; and the place was given to Mr. Brocket, the tutor of sir James Lowther.