Gray's admiration for wild nature comes out in his
prose, especially in his letters, and in his _Journal in the Lakes_
written in 1769; but later writers, Wordsworth above all, have
expressed the same feeling in delightful verse.
As a poet Gray stands for beauty of form rather than for depth of
thought or breadth of sympathy. He is first of all an artist, and his
poems are among the most perfect in the English language.
ELEGY
WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD
The curfew[1] tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight, 5
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;
Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r
The moping owl does to the moon complain 10
Of such, as wand'ring near her secret bow'r,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid, 15
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.
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