This ode first appeared in Dodsley's _Collection_, vol. ii. p. 274,
with some variations noticed below. Walpole, after the death of Gray,
placed the china vase on a pedestal at Strawberry Hill, with a few
lines of the ode for an inscription.
In a letter to Walpole, dated March 1, 1747, Gray refers to the
subject of the ode in the following jocose strain: "As one ought to
be particularly careful to avoid blunders in a compliment of
condolence, it would be a sensible satisfaction to me (before I
testify my sorrow, and the sincere part I take in your misfortune) to
know for certain who it is I lament. I knew Zara and Selima (Selima,
was it? or Fatima?), or rather I knew them both together; for I
cannot justly say which was which. Then as to your handsome Cat, the
name you distinguish her by, I am no less at a loss, as well knowing
one's handsome cat is always the cat one likes best; or if one be
alive and the other dead, it is usually the latter that is the
handsomest. Besides, if the point were never so clear, I hope you do
not think me so ill-bred or so imprudent as to forfeit all my
interest in the survivor; oh no! I would rather seem to mistake, and
imagine to be sure it must be the tabby one that had met with this
sad accident. Till this affair is a little better determined, you
will excuse me if I do not begin to cry,
Tempus inane peto, requiem spatiumque doloris.
"... Heigh ho! I feel (as you to be sure have done long since) that I
have very little to say, at least in prose. Somebody will be the
better for it; I do not mean you, but your Cat, feuë Mademoiselle
Selime, whom I am about to immortalize for one week or fortnight, as
follows: [the Ode follows, which we need not reprint here].
"There's a poem for you, it is rather too long for an Epitaph."