"WRAY, whose dear friendship in the dawning years Of undesigning childhood first began,

Through youth's gay morn with even tenour ran,
My noon conducted, and my evening cheers,
Rightly dost thou, in whom combin'd appears
Whate'er for public life completes the man,
With native zeal strike out a larger plan,
No useless friend of Senators and Peers:
Me talents moderate, and small estate,
Fit for retirement's unambitious shade.
Nor envy I who near approach the throne,

But joyful see thee mingle with the great,
And praise thy lot, contented with my own."

The other is a kind of monody upon a disappointment in Love:

"Trust me, dear WRAY, not all these three months' pain, Though tedious seems the time in pain to wear,

Nor all those restless nights, thro' which in vain
I've sought for kindly sleep to lull my care,
Nor all those lonely meals, and meagre fare,
Uncheer'd with converse, and a friendly guest,
This close confinement, barr'd from wholesome air,
And exercise, of medicines the best,

Have sunk my spirits, or my soul oppress'd.—

Light are these woes, and easy to be borne,

If weigh'd with those which rack'd my tortur'd breast, fond heart from Amoret was torn :

When my

So true the word of Solomon to find,

"No shaft so piercing as the wounded mind.”

Mr. Roderick was a particular friend and coadjutor of Mr. Edwards. He was also in habits of intimacy

* Richard Roderick, originally of Queen's College, Cambridge; B. A. 1732; M. A. 1736; afterwards Fellow of Magdalen College. He was elected F. R. S. 1750; F. S. A. 1752; and died July 20, 1756.

with

with Mr. WRAY. In Dodsley's Collection, amongst other Poems by Mr. Roderick, there is a jeu d'esprit addressed by him to Mr. WRAY. It is in the form of a Sonnet, but an excuse for not writing one. The Hudibrastic elisions have infinite humour:

"Capricious WRAY a Sonnet needs must have; I ne'er was so put to 't before :-a Sonnet? Why fourteen verses must be spent upon it,

'Tis good, howe'er, t' have conquer'd the first stave, Yet I shall ne'er find rhimes enough by half, Said I, and found myself i' th' midst of th' second, If twice four verses were but fairly reckon'd,

I should turn back on th' hardest part, and laugh. Thus far with good success, I think, I've scribbled, And of the twice sev'n lines have clean got o'er ten, Courage! another 'll finish the first triplet:

Thanks to thee, Muse, my work begins to shorten ; There's thirteen lines got through, driblet by driblet: 'Tis done, count how you will, I warr'nt there's fourteen *"

I shall have occasion to say a few words upon avarice, or penury, if they deserved the name, as foibles in the character of Mr. WRAY. But here, and in due order of time, I cannot but remark one feature of liberality in his conduct. I have mentioned that he was a Fellow-Commoner, a personage described, when I was at College, as wearing a laced gown, and paying double for every thing. But, after he took his Bachelor's degree in 1722, it is a fact ascertained by himself, that he made the tour of Italy, accompanied (as you tell us) by Lord Morton, and by Mr. King, the son of Lord Chancellor King, who inherited his title.

* This Sonnet is the paraphrase of another by Lopes de Vega. ↑ John Douglas, Earl of Morton, Knight of the Thistle.

This was evidently his own act. His father was dead; and his mother, as he tells us, gave her consent, though in tears.

He was an adept in the Italian language, and read it, as he read every thing worth his notice, with a rapidity of enjoyment peculiar to himself, and yet without prejudice to a most accurate memory. I guess that he could read Spanish, from circumstances that will appear in the sequel.

This Lord Morton, who was a most acute, and shrewd scholar in the book of the world, as well as in old manuscripts, and in printed volumes, continued his intimacy with him to his death. He loved a jest, like his friend. I remember hearing him say, "that Episcopacy was of Greek origin, as a "word, and a thing; that it meant looking-out with "a keen eye from one eminence to another." I remember, too, hearing, that, in a turbulent storm of debate, when he sat in the House of Peers, he said, with his dialect, which no English intercourse had ever tamed," Pine-apple heat, my Lords!" a little thermometer in his hand.

When Mr. WRAY took his Bachelor's degree, he was fourth in the list; but what powers he displayed in his examination cannot, it seems, be ascertained, as there is no record of University honours conferred upon the Bachelor of that period as due to his merit; a desideratum in those days, which is now admirably filled up in the police, if I may use that phrase, of literary encouragement.

How long he remained abroad between 1722 and 1728, is not precisely ascertained, except by the fact that a cast in bronze, by Pozzo, was taken of his profile in 1726, at Rome. It had this inscription upon the reverse:

"Nil actum reputans, si quid superesset agendum.” That line was a portrait of his character. With all his vivacity of manner he was an absolute prodigy of diligence: he could not leave a subject be

C 2

fore

fore he had made himself a complete, and profound master of it. An impression taken from this cast is hung in the library at the Charter-house; as is also a copy of his portrait from the original at Queen's College, Cambridge, by Dance.

After his return from his travels, he became a Master of Arts in 1728, and so distinguished by philosophical attainments, that he was chosen a Fellow of the Royal Society in March 1728-9. He resided, however, generally at Cambridge, though emigrating occasionally to London, till 1739 or 1740, in which latter year (January 1740-41) he was elected Fellow of the Antiquaries, and was more habitually

a resident in town.

Another prominent circumstance in Mr. WRAY'S literary career is, that he was appointed one of the elected Trustees of the British Museum on its first establishment; a distinguished honour then, as well as in later periods.

It is from you that I first learnt his humourous forgery of an altar inscription at Rome, which made very excellent Greek, though formed of Engtish words expressed by Greek letters.

This banter upon the Inscription-fanciers of the day made, I dare say, a very good laugh at their expence. You have sent me the words, from a facsimile of them in the Gentleman's Magazine; but, as I have not the key to them, and cannot obtain it, I wave the insertion of them. Such badinage was characteristic of his humour. It was always innocent, like this.

In 1737 the second Earl of Hardwicke, then Mr. Yorke, arrived at Bene't College in the University of Cambridge. His Tutor was Dr. Salter, the late Master of the Charter-house, then of that College, and recommended by Bishop Mawson, to the Chancellor.

As Dr. Salter was from the Charter-house, though junior to Mr. WRAY, and almost as young as the

pupil, there is reason to believe, that, if he did not introduce, he at least recommended him, as a valuable guide, and friend. We have remarked, how fond of young people, well disposed, this amiable man proved himself to be.

It is generally understood, and is the opinion of Lord Hardwicke, the nephew, as intimated by him to me, that in that scene his uncle's friendship with Mr. WRAY originated.

There is nothing upon which the mind can dwell with such delight, as upon connexions like these, when they have been so permanent.

Alas! they are too singular to be overlooked, or treated as the common incidents of human life.How many at school,-in the university,-and even at an early period of their step on the public theatre, have sworn indissoluble attachment!-how few have kept their word!-A feather disunites them; a second feather converts them into enemies. It is, in a subordinate, and a temporal sense, the good seed of the parable-but especially in a difference of rank, fortune, connexions, and ceremonies. By these, alas! how disconcerted are projects the most ingenuous, of high spirit, and of honour in youthful attachment! How soon are the Pylades, and the Orestes no more! Sometimes party interferes ;-professional duties, - ambition, avarice, pleasure, corrupt, and poison the root of that sacred union.

But was it so in this friendship? Not a shade, or a mist, was thrown over it from these happy days of its origin till 1783, almost half a century, when it closed by the death of Mr. WRAY. They were not only assimilated in their zeal for literature in general, and for history in particular, but in a more congenial passion for curious books, or manuscripts. Mr. Yorke was most intent upon the latter, and Mr. WRAY upon the former. Both had wonderful powers of memory.

Mr.