Pray's diary for tbe June 1844-August 1845 period mentions his reading the following works for assignments and pleasure:

Edward Bulwer Lytton's, Essays, Paul Clifford, The Student, Pelham, Falkland, Eugene Aram, Rienzi, Zanoni, Disowned and The Last Days of Pompeii. Also: James Mackintosh's General View of the Progress of Ethical Philosophy, poetry of Robert Burns, poetry of Thomas Moore, McIlvain's Evidences of Christianity, Essays of Montaigne, Josephus' Wars of the Jews, poetry of Schiller, Isaac Watts on the mind, The New Testament in German, Thomas Talfourd's The Athenian Captive, Helen by Maria Edgeworth, John Trumbull's The Progress of Dulness: or The Rare Adventures of Tom Brainless, Edward Theller's Canada in 1837-38 about the failed uprising, Washington Irving's Bracebridge Hall and other works, The Student of Salamanca by Jose de Espronceda, Major Jones' Courtship by Joseph Jones, a book about Rosicrucianism and alchemy, John Abercrombie's Inquiry Concerng the lntellectual Powers. Also the works of Chaucer and John Skelton, Thomas Tusser; Spenser's Faerie Queen, poetry of Giles Fletcher, William Habington, and Goethe; Xenophon's Memorabilia, plays of Addison, Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer and other works, Edward Nares's Thinks I to Myself, Pasley's 2nd Book of History, The Prairie-Bird by Charles Augustus Murray, Walk about Zion about the Episcopal Church, and Lorenzo Dow's Thoughts on Various Religious Opinions.

In the same period, at age 19, Pray's book purchases included: D'Auber's History of the Reformation, Cotton Mather's The Christian Philosopher, Isaac Taylor's Saturday Evening, Ralph Gurley's Mission to England about the Afro-American colonization of Liberia, John Mason Good's Book of Nature, Horace's Opera Omnia; Smith's Pastoral, and four works by Cicero, De Officiis, De Oratore, De Senectute and De Amacitia. The authors of two other purchases, Thoughts on the Papacy and Attraction of Law, could not be deterrmined.