Poems and Letters.

Pp. xvi, 415 + 4 Albumen photographs, some marginal foxing. Original full leather with gilt-tooled roll frame. Spine in six compartments with elaborate gilt-tooled devices, upper spine leather split, slight marks, holding firm. Thomas Gray (1716 ? 1771) was an English poet, classical scholar and professor at Cambridge University. Gray spent most of his life as a scholar in Cambridge, and only later in his life did he begin travelling . Although he was one of the least productive poets (his collected works published during his lifetime amount to fewer than 1,000 lines), he is regarded as the predominant poetic figure of the mid-18th century. In 1757, he was offered the post of Poet Laureate, which he refused.