increased in proportion to the expression of our sympathy with the sceneare all vividly impressed upon our memory.

'The churchyard was full, very full,' our guide had said, ' and a wonderful quantity of persons visited it and read the epitaphs, and even scratched their names on the church walls, though it was forbidden, and took away bits of the yew and wild flowers. It was,' he thought, a pleasant churchyard to be buried in. Not too full, but not lonely;' and indeed he said truly, for in those country churchyards-once at least each week-the children's children of the silent dead pass beside their graves; the modest head-stone and the light waving grass seem more akin to humanity and human feeling than the dungeon-like vaults, or huge slabs,' pressing so heavily upon what we loved so well, in the churches or churchyards of our towns. Again we stood beside the Poet's grave, read the epitaph on his mother, and cast many a "longing, lingering look behind," while leaving the churchyard immortalised by the most perfect Elegy in our language.

THE BIRTH-PLACE OF THOMAS CHATTERTON.

HATTERTON-poor Chatterton! We had been brooding sadly over his fragment of a life, ending at seventeen-when ordinary lives begin-and turning page after page of Horace Walpole's literary fooleries, to find his explanations and apologies for want of feeling and sympathy, which his flippant style, and heartless commentaries, illustrate to perfection; and we closed, with an aching heart, the volumes of both the parasite of genius, and him who was its mightiest creation and most miserable victim :

The marvellous boy who perished in his pride.'

It was only natural for us to recal the many instances we have ourselves known, during the past twenty years, or more, of sorrow and distress among those who sought distinction in the thorny labyrinths of literature:--those who

and those who, after a brief struggle with untoward fate, left the battlefield, to die, 'unpitied and unknown!'

H

We have seen the career of a young literary man commenced with the first grand requisite of all excellence worth achieving-ENTHUSIASM; high notions of moral honour, and a warm devotedness to that 'calling' which lifts units to a pinnacle formed of the dry bones of hundreds slain. We have seen that enthusiasm frozen by disappointment—that honour corrupted by the contamination of dissipated men—that devotedness to THE CAUSE fade away before the great want of nature-want of bread-which it had failed to bestow. We have seen, ay, in one little year, the flashing eye dimmedthe round cheek flattened—the bright, hopeful creature, who went forth into the world-rejoicing like the sun to run its course-dragged from the waters of our leaden Thames, a discoloured remnant of mortality— recognised only by the mother who looked to him for all the world could give!

There are

This is horrible-but it is a tragedy soon played out. hundreds at this moment possessed of the consciousness of power without the strength to use it. To such, a little help might lead to a life of successful toil-perhaps the happiest life a man can lead. A heritage of usefulness is one of peace to the last. We knew another youth, of a more patient nature than he of whom we have just spoken. He seemed never weary. We have witnessed his nightly toil; his daily labour; the smiling patience with which he endured the sneers levelled, only in English society, against mere literary men.' We remember when, on the first day of every month, he used to haunt the booksellers' shops to look over the magazines, cast his eyes down the table of contents, just to see if 'his poem' or 'his paper' had been inserted-then lay them down one after another with a pale sickly smile, expressive of disappointment, and turn away with a look of gentle endurance. The insertion of a sonnet, for which perhaps he might receive seven shillings, would set him dreaming again of literary immortality; and at last the dream was realised by an accident, or rather, to speak advisedly, by a good Providence. He became known-known at once-blazed forth : something he had written attracted the town's attention, and ladies in crowded drawing-rooms stood upon chairs to see that poor, worn, pale man of letters and magazines, and grave reviews, and gaily-bound albums, all waited for his contributions-charge what he pleased; and flushed with fame, and weighed down with

money-money paid for the very articles that had been rejected without one civil line of courtesy-the great sustaining hope of his life was realised; he married one as worn and pale with the world's toil as himself— married-and died within a month! The tide was too tardy in turning!

Who shall say how many men of genius have walked, like unhappy Chatterton, through the valley of the shadow of death, and found no guide, no consolation-no hope; if, the one GREAT HOPE had not been most mercifully planted early in their hearts and minds.

It was with melancholy pleasure that, during the past summer, our Pilgrimage was made to the places connected with the boy's memory, in Bristol; first to Colston's school, in which he was educated ;* next to the dull district in which he was either born or passed his boyhood; then to the Institution, where his Will,' a mad document, and other memoranda connected with his memory, are preserved with a degree of care, that seems—or is—a mockery, when contrasted with the worse than indifference of the city to all that concerned him when alive; next to the house of Master Canynge, and next to the monument (Redcliffe Church) with which his name will be associated as long as one of its stones remains upon another chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancies through its long-drawn aisles; pondering sadly in the muniment-room, where the cofres that suggested the forgeries, still lie rotting; and gazing with mingled sorrow and surprise on the Cenotaph to Chatterton,' which now, taken to pieces, occupies the corner of a damp vault—

'A solemn cenotaph to thee,

Sweet Harper of time-shrouded minstrelsy!'

Ah! such books as we have been reading, and such memories as we have been recalling, are, after all, unprofitable-a darkness without light.

* Of Edward Coiston, well and beautifully has William Howitt said, 'You cannot help feeling the grand beneficence of those wealthy merchants, who, like Edward Colston, make their riches do their generous will for ever; who become thereby the actual fathers of their native cities to all generations; who roll off, every year of the world's progress, some huge stone of anxiety from the hearts of poor widows; who clear the way before the unfriended, but active and worthy lad; who put forth their invisible hands from the heaven of their rest, and become the genuine guardian angels of the orphan race for ever and ever: raising from those who would otherwise have been outcasts and ignorant labourers, aspiring and useful

We closed our eyes upon the world, which, in our momentary bitterness, we likened to one great charnel-house, entombing all things glorious and bright. We walked to the window; the rain was descending in torrents -pour, pour; pattens clattered in the areas, a solitary postman made the street echo with his impatient knocks. A poor organ-boy, whom we have long known, was moving, rather than walking, in the centre his hat flapping over his eyes with the rain, yet still he turned the handle, and the damp music crawled forth: he paused opposite our door, turned up the leaf of his hat, and looked upwards: we missed the family of white mice which usually crawled on the top of his organ: poor child, he had sheltered them in his bosom; it was nothing more than natural that he should do so, and the act was common-place enough—but it pleased us— it diminished our gloom. And we thought, if the great ones of the land would but foster the talent that needs, and deserves, protection from the storms of life, as that lonely boy sheltered the creatures entrusted to his care, the world would be all the better. We do not mean to insult the memory of such a genius as Chatterton by saying that he required a PATRON—the very sound is linked with a servility that degrades a noble nature but we do say he sadly wanted a FRIEND-some one who could have understood and appreciated his wonderful intellectual gifts; and whose strength of mind and position in society would have given power to direct and control the over-leaping and indomitable pride which ultimately destroyed the Boy.' His career teaches a lesson of such rare value to all who seek distinction in any sphere of life that we would have it considered well-as a beacon to warn from ruin.

'Oh! what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practise to deceive!'

Despite his marvellous talents, his industry, his knowledge, his magnitude of mind, his glorious imagination, his bold satire, his independence, his

men; tradesmen of substance; merchants, the true enrichers of their country, and fathers of happy families. How glorious is such a lot! how noble is such an appropriation of wealth! how enviable is such a fame! And amongst such men, there were few more truly admirable than Edward Colston! He was worthy to have been lifted by Chatterton to the side of the magnificent Canynge, and one cannot help wondering that he says so little about this great benefactor of his city.'