Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1892-10-22
wAKEMAN,S WANDERINGs.

wAKEMAN,S wANDERINGS.
At the Shrine aud Haunts of the Poet
Gray-Stoke Poges, Where the Acei-
dent of Rural Retirement Gave Our
Tongue its Most Matchless Elegy-
william Penn's Descendants as
Lords of the Ancient Manor-Sylvan
Scenes With Splendid Historic En-
virOnment.
STOKE PoGEs, England, Oct. 10.
To the Editor of the JOURNAL AND COURIER:
once knew little old book-worm who
manner, ways and character bore most
striking resemblance to that poet who
wrote the mos: perfect elegy in the Eng
lish tongue, Thomas Gray.
He was little, dainty man with silvered
hair and rounded paunch-his most
striking physical characteristic if his fine,
pensive blue eyes were not beaming upon
you. His clothing was faultless. His
manners were courtly. His very pensive-
ness was benignsnt and restful. He
seemed to exhale an aroma of musk and
mignonette; and, as 1 used to look at him
for an eighteenth century remainder, the
grotesque notion always came that his
melancholy sighs of pleasure or disappro-
val, as he fed upon the musty tones be-
fore him, could they be given physical as
pect, would conform to the pearly laven-
der of his ample stock and spotless trous-
ers.
By and by 1 missed him. His little
paunch had gone riot and overcome his
stomach with gout or something, and the
dainty and learned little old book-worm
had turned from the tones of the Astor
and Mercantile to the endless tome OF
eternity. was sure that here was anoth-
er Gray. Yes, he had been, I found, sup
ported in academy, college, university and
in travel by the thrift and trade of two
women who blindly believed that in time
he would astonish the world with the pro
duct of his genius. Like Gray ne never
earned penny; his unconscious winsome-
ness conquered ALL his learning was vast:
and his Incidence was astounding. He
had spent a lifetime in exhausting the his
toric, scientific and philosophic researches
and product of others. He left tons of
beginnings of great endesvors. If he had
been forced into country environment, as
was Gray at Stoke Poges, he might have
given the world an idyl or an elegy, and
then the likeness would have been COM
plete.
The very accident of rural retiracy COM
PEELED or induced Thomas Gray to create
| the one bit of verse which gave him place
| among the immortals. From 1927, at the
age of ten, when his mother placed him in
Eton, and where, tradition has it, he at
once began to versify, until he expired of
| inertia and gout in the arms of DR.. James
| Brown, master of picturesque old Penn
broke college. Cambridge, on the Both of
| July, 1771, period of forty-four years, he
| was as continuously in an atmosphere of
| books as any man who ever lived. For
his day and time he was the most various
| ly and penetratingly learned man in Eu'
| rope.
He was practically mad for and from
book knowledge. His devotion to research
seemed an endless intoxication Of &C.
| quirement for the thing or fact encom-
passed, rather than that healthful acqui.
sition of knowledge for the uses to
which it may be wisely put.
Precisely as with thousands of so-cslled
scholars in our own time, he allowed
study and learning g-getting to become g
disease, instead of making it subservient
| to wise living and noble accomplishment
You could fill score of volumes with
his erudite notes, his wonderful indices,
his exact and beautiful commentaries
upon the works of others less learned
and consequently more creative minds,
fragments of stately tragedies, disserta
tions upon art and painting, Alcaic fIag
ments, Latin ''lines," Greek epigrams
Pindaric odes, brilliant dead age 'imita
tions" and finished whatnots. But you
could not make one thin little volume OF
one hundred pages comfortably filled
with what Thomas Gray's great genius
left to posterity for its own monument.
The thirty-two stanzss of the "Elegy,'
the brief Morse poem called "The Fatal
Sisters" ssThe Bard" "On a Distant
Prospect of Eton College" and perhaps 6
half dozen sonnets, altogether not one
thousand lines, comprise all that would
have ever interested the world at large
which after all ia the final arbiter oi
either true poetry or prose, except fol
Gray's lovable, interesting, erratic and
often curious personality.
1t is no doubt also true that had hs
not written the "Elegy" his place in the
biographies would have been no more
than 'Thomas Gray, erudite annotator
accomplished translator and sometime
companion of Horace Wslpole." Becsus,
his SURPRISING genius, through thu
blessed incident of rural inspiration, fo
once burst the fetters of sodden bookisl
snslavement and its consequent physica
Incidence, he attained fame and left u
our most perfect revelation of tenderes
emotions and introspections to the uni
versal human heart. The malignancy o
! johnson Is quite forgiven for the one hon
est sentence he ever wrote about Gray
"Had Gray written often thus" said tn
cantankerous master Of words, sit hs'
been vain to blame and useless to prais
: him."
For these and other reasons the one plsc
} in all the world, Stoke Poges, whie
prompted a single Incompatible exsmpl
> of what Gray might have been to literatur
/ had he been shut away from the desdenin
influence of Cambridge books, and perhap
, compelled to earn his own living, become
q doubly interesting. Besides the poet n
sided here for frequent intervals from 174
4 to 1859. His grave is here. A stupendou
monument stands almost within sight G
his old home. The very church in whic
he worshipped aud the church yard rer
, dered dear to the hearts of all men by hi
melodious, mournful elegy, remain to ds
Just as he saw and knew them In life. Th
place, too, has some historic Importance
Q and the manor of Stoke Park was once th
;. home of the descendants Of William Penn
|, many of whom are buried In the famil
r vault in the nave of the mossy old church
But better than all else, you will find th
y place Q marvellous revelation of the eleg,
y % you Aavs alsssdy felt the slesy 10 !