of the “fount of tears,” and his characteristic melancholy, except in the few hours when it was indeed black, was not a pitiable state; rather, it was one secret of the charm both of the man and of the poet.
A very complete bibliography of Gray will be found in Dr. Bradshaw’s edition of the poems in the Aldine series. Dodsley published ten of the poems, exclusive of the “Long Story,” in 1768. Mason’s Life of Gray (1778) included the poems and some hitherto unpublished fragments, with a selection from his letters, much garbled. Mathias in 1814 reprinted Mason’s edition and added much from Gray’s MS. commentaries together with some more of his translations. The most exhaustive edition of Gray’s writings was achieved by the Rev. John Mitford, who first did justice to the correspondence with Wharton and Norton Nicholls (5 vols., Pickering, 1836–1843; correspondence of Gray and Mason, Bentley, 1853); see also the edition of the works by Edmund Gosse (4 vols., 1884); the Life by the same in Eng. Men of Letters (2nd ed., 1889); some further relics are given in Gray and His Friends by D. C. Tovey (Cambridge, 1890); and a new edition of the letters copiously annotated by D. C. Tovey is in the Standard Library (1900–1907). Nicholl’s Illustrations, vol. vi. p. 805, quoted by Professor Kittredge in the Nation, Sept. 12th, 1900, gives the true story of Gray’s migration to Pembroke College. Matthew Arnold’s essay on Gray in Ward’s English Poets is one of the minor classics of literary criticism. (D. C. To.)
GRAY (or Grey), WALTER DE (d. 1255), English prelate and
statesman, was a nephew of John de Gray, bishop of Norwich,
and was educated at Oxford. He owed his early and rapid
preferment in church and state to the favour of King John,
becoming the king’s chancellor in 1205, and being chosen bishop
of Lichfield in 1210. He was, however, not allowed to keep this
bishopric, but he became bishop of Worcester in 1214, resigning
his office as chancellor in the same year. Gray was with John
when the king signed Magna Carta in June 1215; soon after
this event he left England on the king’s business, and it was
during his absence that he was forced into the archbishopric
of York, owing his election to the good offices of John and of
Pope Innocent III. He took a leading part in public affairs
during the minority of Henry III., and was regarded with much
favour by this king, who employed him on important errands
to foreign potentates, and left him as guardian of England when
he went to France in 1242. Afterwards the archbishop seems
to have been less favourably disposed towards Henry, and for a
time he absented himself from public business; however, in
1255, he visited London to attend a meeting of parliament, and
died at Fulham on the 1st of May 1255. Gray was always
anxious to assert his archiepiscopal authority over Scotland,
and to maintain it against the archbishop of Canterbury, but
in neither case was he very successful. He built the south
transept of the minster at York and bought for his see the
village, afterwards called Bishopthorpe, which is still the residence
of the archbishop of York. He was also generous to the church
at Ripon. Gray was regarded by his contemporaries as an
avaricious, but patriotic man.
GRAY, a town of eastern France, capital of an arrondissement
in the department of Haute-Saône, situated on the declivity of
a hill on the left bank of the Saône, 36 m. S.W. of Vesoul by the
Eastern railway. Pop. (1906) 5742. The streets of the town are
narrow and steep, but it possesses broad and beautiful quays
and has a busy port. Three bridges, one dating from the 18th
century, unite it to suburbs on the right bank of the river, on
which is the railway-station from which lines branch off to
Auxonne, Dijon, Besançon and Culmont-Chalindrey. The
principal buildings are the Gothic church, restored in the style
of the Renaissance but with a modern portal, and the hôtel de
ville, built by the Spaniards in 1568. The latter building has a
handsome façade decorated with columns of red granite. Gray
is the seat of a subprefect and has tribunals of first instance
and of commerce, a chamber of commerce, a communal college
and a small museum. It has large flour-mills; among the other
industries is the manufacture of machinery and iron goods.
There is also a considerable transit traffic in goods from the
south of France and the colonies, and trade in iron, corn, provisions,
vegetables, wine, wood, &c., much of which is carried
by river. Gray was founded in the 7th century. Its fortifications
were destroyed by Louis XIV. During the Franco-German War
General von Werder concentrated his army corps in the town
and held it for a month, making it the point d’appui of movements
towards Dijon and Langres, as well as towards Besançon.
Gray gave its name to the distinguished English family of de Gray, Gray or Grey, Anschitel de Gray being mentioned as an Oxfordshire tenant in Domesday.
GRAYLING (Thymallus), fishes belonging to the family
Salmonidae. The best known are the “poisson bleu” of the
Canadian voyageurs, and the European species, Thymallus
vulgaris (the Asch or Äsche of Germany, ombre of France, and
temola of Upper Italy). This latter species is esteemed on
account of its agreeable colours (especially of the dorsal fin), its
well-flavoured flesh, and the sport it affords to anglers. The
grayling differ from the genus Salmo in the smaller mouth with
comparatively feeble dentition, in the larger scales, and especially
in the much greater development of the dorsal fin, which contains
20 to 24 rays. These beautiful fishes, of which five or six species
are known, inhabit the fresh waters of Europe, Siberia and the
northern parts of North America. The European species,
T. vulgaris or vexillifer, attains, though rarely, a length of 2 ft.
The colours during life are remarkably changeable and iridescent;
small dark spots are sometimes present on the body; the very
high dorsal fin is beautifully marked with purplish bands and
ocelli. In England and Scotland the grayling appears to have
had originally a rather irregular distribution, but it has now
been introduced into a great number of rivers; it is not found in
Ireland. It is more generally distributed in Scandinavia and
Russia, and the mountain streams of central Europe southwards
to the Alpine water of Upper Italy. Specimens attaining to a
weight of 4 ℔ are very scarce.
GRAYS THURROCK, or Grays, an urban district in the south-eastern
parliamentary division of Essex, England, on the Thames,
20 m. E. by S. from London by the London, Tilbury & Southend
railway. Pop. (1901) 13,834. The church of St Peter and St
Paul, wholly rebuilt, retains some Norman work. The town
takes its name from a family of Gray who held the manor for
three centuries from 1149. There are an endowed and two
training ship schools. Roman remains have been found in the
vicinity; and the geological formations exhibiting the process
of silting up of a former river channel are exposed in the quarries,
and contain large mammalian remains. The town has trade in
bricks, lime and cement.
GRAZ [Gratz], the capital of the Austrian duchy and crownland of Styria, 140 m. S.W. of Vienna by rail. Pop. (1900) 138,370. It is picturesquely situated on both banks of the Mur, just where this river enters a broad and fertile valley, and the beauty of its position has given rise to the punning French description, La Ville des grâces sur la rivière de l’amour. The main town lies on the left bank of the river at the foot of the Schlossberg (1545 ft.) which dominates the town. The beautiful valley traversed by the Mur, known as the Grazer Feld and bounded by the Wildonerberge, extends to the south; to the S.W. rise the Bacher Gebirge and the Koralpen; to the N. the Schöckel (4745 ft.), and to the N.W. the Alps of Upper Styria. On the Schlossberg, which can be ascended by a cable tramway, beautiful parks have been laid out, and on its top is the bell-tower, 60 ft. high, and the quaint clock-tower, 52 ft. high, which bears a gigantic clock-dial. At the foot of the Schlossberg is the Stadt-Park.
Among the numerous churches of the city the most important is the cathedral of St Aegidius, a Gothic building erected by the emperor Frederick III. in 1450–1462 on the site of a previous church mentioned as early as 1157. It has been several times modified and redecorated, more particularly in 1718. The present copper spire dates from 1663. The interior is richly adorned with stained-glass windows of modern date, costly shrines, paintings and tombs. In the immediate neighbourhood of the cathedral is the mausoleum church erected by the emperor Ferdinand II. Worthy of mention also are the parish church, a Late Gothic building, finished in 1520, and restored in 1875, which possesses an altar piece by Tintoretto; the Augustinian church, appropriated to the service of the university since 1827;
