GRAY, DAVID (1838-1861), Scottish poet, son of a hand loom weaver, was born at Merkland, near Glasgow. He went to London in 1860 with Robert Buchanan with the idea of finding literary work. Monckton Milnes (Lord Houghton) befriended him, and tried in vain to persuade him to return home. The poet was attacked by tuberculosis, and Milnes sent him to Torquay; there he was seized by a longing for his old home, and went home to die. "The Luggie," Gray's best poem, published event ually (1862) through the efforts of Sydney Dobell, is a reverie in which the scenes and events of his childhood and his early aspirations are mingled with the music of the stream which he celebrates. The series of sonnets, "In the Shadows," was com posed during the latter part of his illness.