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DAVID GRAY (1838-1861)

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Originally appearing in Volume V12, Page 390 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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DAVID See also:GRAY (1838-1861)  , Scottish poet, the son of a See also:hand-See also:loom See also:weaver, was See also:born at Merkland, near See also:Glasgow, on the 29th of See also:January 1838 . His parents resolved to educate him for the See also:church, and through their self-denial and his own exertions as a See also:pupil teacher and private See also:tutor he was able to See also:complete a course of four sessions at the university of Glasgow . He began to write See also:poetry for The Glasgow See also:Citizen and began his idyll on the Luggie, the little stream that ran through Merkland . His most intimate See also:companion at this See also:time was See also:Robert See also:Buchanan, the poet; and in May 186o the two agreed to proceed to See also:London, with the See also:idea of finding See also:literary employment . Shortly after his arrival in London See also:Gray introduced himself to Monckton 1klilnes, after-wards See also:Lord See also:Houghton, with whom he had previously corresponded . Lord Houghton tried to persuade him to return to See also:Scotland, but Gray insisted on staying in London . He was unsuccessful in his efforts to See also:place Gray's poem, " The Luggie," in The Cornhill See also:Magazine, but gave him some See also:light literary See also:work . He also showed him See also:great kindness when a See also:cold which had seized him assumed the serious See also:form of See also:consumption, and sent him to See also:Torquay; but as the disease made rapid progress, an irresistible longing seized Gray to return to Merkland, where he arrived in January 186r, and died on the 3rd of See also:December following, having the See also:day before had the gratification of seeing a printed specimen copy of his poem " The Luggie," published eventually by the exertions of See also:Sydney See also:Dobell . He was buried in the Auld See also:Aisle See also:Churchyard, See also:Kirkintilloch, where in 1865 a See also:monument was erected by " See also:friends far and near " to his memory . " The Luggie," the See also:principal poem of Gray, is a See also:kind of See also:reverie in which the scenes and events of his childhood and his See also:early aspirations are mingled with the See also:music of the stream which he celebrates . The See also:series of sonnets, " In the Shadows," was composed during the latter See also:part of his illness . Most of his poems necessarily See also:bear traces of immaturity, and lines may frequently be found in them which are See also:mere echoes from See also:Thomson, Words-See also:worth or See also:Tennyson, but they possess, nevertheless, distinct individuality, and show a real appreciation of natural beauty .

The Luggie and other Poems, with an introduction by R . Monckton Milnes, and a brief memoir by See also:

James Hedderwick, was published in 1862; and a new and enlarged edition of Gray's Poetical See also:Works, edited by See also:Henry Glassford See also:Bell, appeared in 1874 . See also See also:David Gray and other Essays, by Robert Buchanan (1868), and the same writer's poem on David Gray, in Idyls and Legends of Inverburn .

End of Article: DAVID GRAY (1838-1861)
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