Add MS 38511

INSTRUCTI0NS by Thomas Gray to [James Dodsley] his publisher for a new edition of his poems, introducing short prefatory mottoes and explanatory notes. Holograph. The poems to be included in this [l768] edition, with the title of "Poems by Mr. Gray," were: (1) Ode [on the Spring] ; (2) Ode on the death of a favourite cat; (3) Ode on a distant prospect of Eton College; (4) Ode to Adversity; (5) The Progress of Poësy, a Pindaric Ode; (6) The Bard, a Pindaric Ode; (7) The Fatal Sisters; (8) The Descent of Odin; (9) The Triumphs of Owen, a fragment; (10) Elegy written in a Country Churchyard. The first four and the last were to be printed from Dodsley's "large edition (first published with Mr. B's plates)" i.e., Designs by Mr. R. Dentley for six poems by Mr. T. Gray. Printed for J. Dodsley in 1753. (The one now to be omitted was "A Long Story.") The fifth and sixth were to follow the Strawberry Hill edition (1757). The seventh, eighth and ninth, now to be printed for the first time, are given in full. Paper; ff. 7. Folio. On the fly-leaf at the beginning is written "Isaac Reed, 1801. This is the original copy of Mr. Gray's Poems in his own handwriting. I. R.", and, below it, "Bought at the sale of Mr. Reed's Library Dec^r 16th 1807. No. 8699 the last Day price 1. 1. 0. J. B. "In a notice of this MS. in the Athenæum 18 Mar. 1899, "J. B." is identified as James Bindley, the bookcollector (d. 1818), at whose sale the MS. was bought by Samuel Rogers, the poet, for eighteen guineas (cf. The Works of Thomas Gray, ed. E. Gosse, 1884, ii, p. 344, footnote). The engraved portrait of the poet (f. 1 b), perhaps unpublished, is from the picture by J. G. Eckhardt now in the National Portrait Gallery, of which an engraving serves as frontispiece to vol. ii of the Works (as above). Presented by Miss Lætitia Sharpe, of Highgate, grand-niece of Samuel Rogers.