He worked for his firm
friend, Professor Meiklejohn, he undertook some teaching, and he
wrote a little. It was at this time that his biographer made
Murray's acquaintance. I had been delighted with his verses in
College Echoes, and I asked him to bring me some of his more serious
work. But he never brought them: his old enemy, reserve, overcame
him. A few of his pieces were published `At the Sign of the Ship'
in Longman's Magazine, to which he contributed occasionally.
From this point there is little in Murray's life to be chronicled.
In 1890 his health broke down entirely, and consumption declared
itself. Very early in 1891 he visited Egypt, where it was thought
that some educational work might be found for him. But he found
Egypt cold, wet, and windy; of Alexandria and the Mediterranean he
says little: indeed he was almost too weak and ill to see what is
delightful either in nature or art.
`To aching eyes each landscape lowers,
To feverish pulse each gale blows chill,
And Araby's or Eden's bowers
Were barren as this moorland hill,'
says the least self-conscious of poets.
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