Note 678 — CANTO THE THIRTEENTH.[653]
Reading edition
[See Gray's omitted stanza—
"'Here scatter'd oft, the earliest of the year, By hands unseen, are showers of violets found; The red-breast loves to build and warble here, And little footsteps lightly print the ground.'
As fine ... as any in his Elegy. I wonder that he could have the heart to omit it."—"Extracts from a Diary," February 27, 1821, Letters, 1901, v. 210. The stanza originally preceded the Epitaph.]