"  Gray  never  spoke  out,"  said  some  unlucky  friend  at
his  death,  and  Mr.  Arnold  seized  on  these  innocent
words,  undoubtedly  descriptive  of  a  peculiarity  of  the
living  man  in  society,  and  wrought  them  into  a  per-
vading and  overshadowing  scheme  of  Gray's  life  and
literature,  connecting  them  with  a  supposed  radical  in-
compatibility of  man,  time,  and  surroundings.  Now  it
is  quite  true  that  Gray  was,  to  some  and  even  a  con-
siderable extent,  what  Mr.  Arnold  himself  has  called  in
another  context,  a  "  shy  trafficker."  He  wrote  ex-
tremely little  ;  he  had  a  most  unfortunate  habit  of
leaving  what  he  did  write  unfinished ;  and  he  was  un-
doubtedly influenced,  in  the  character  of  his  work,  by  a
singular  conflict  of  traditions,  tastes,  and  the  like,  which
will  be  further  handled  when  we  come  to  deal  with  his
poetry.  But,  as  all  careful  and  impartial  readers  of  his
letters  know,  he  often  "  speaks  out  "  in  them  quite  loud
and  clear.  It  would  be  rather  interesting  to  be  certain
to  what  extent  Mr.  Arnold  knew  them.  It  was  not,  as
we  know  from  a  curious  example  in  regard  to  Heine,  by
any  means  a  necessary  part  of  the  Arnoldian  method
to  acquire  exhaustive  knowledge  of  the  documents  of
your  subject.
We  have,  however,  greater  advantages  than  those
of  which  Mr.  Arnold  did  or  did  not  choose  to  avail
himself,  and  we  can  judge  Gray,  not  indeed  as  a  poet —
that  has  been  open  to  anybody  with  the  necessary
equipment  for  the  best  part  of  two  centuries — but  as
a  man  and  a  letter-writer  accordingly.  He  is  not,
indeed,  an  easy  study.
