"Going down Horfe-ftreet, near the fchool, one day, during the fummer of 1764, I accidentally met with Chatterton. Entering into converfation with him, the fubject of which I do not now recollect, he informed me that he was in poffeffion of certain old MSS., which had been found depofited in a cheft in Redcliffe church, and that he had lent fome or one of them to Phillips. Within a day or two after this I faw Phillips, and repeated to him the information I had received from Chatterton. Phillips produced a MS. on parchment or vellum, which, I am confident, was Elenoure and Juga, a kind of paftoral eclogue, afterwards publifhed in the Town and Country Magazine for May 1769. The parchment or vellum appeared to have been clofely pared round the margin, for what purpofe, or by what accident, I know not; but the words were evidently entire and unmutilated. As the writing was yellow and pale, manifeftly (as I conceive) occafioned by age, and confequently difficult to decypher, Phillips had with his pen traced and gone over feveral of the lines (which, as far as my recollection ferves, were written in the manner of profe), labouring to attain the object of his purfuit, an inveftigation of their meaning. I endeavoured to affist him; but, from an almost total ignorance of the characters, manners, language, and orthography of the age in which the lines were written, all our efforts were unprofitably exerted; and although we arrived at an explanation of, and connected many of, the words, still the fenfe was notoriously deficient. For my own part, having little or no tafte for fuch studies, I repined not at the difappointment. Phillips, on the contrary, was to all appearance mortified; indeed much more fo than at that time I thought the object deserved; expreffing his forrow at his want of fuccefs, and repeatedly declaring his intention of refuming the attempt at a future period. Whether he kept his word or not is a circumitance I am entirely unacquainted with, nor do I conceive a determination thereof anyways material at prefent.

"In the year 1765, I was put apprentice to a ftationer at Bristol, at which period my acquaintance and correfpondence with Chatterton and Phillips feem to have undergone a temporary diffolution; however, towards the latter end of 1767, or at the beginning of 1768, being fent to the office of Mr. Lambert, an attorney then refident at Bristol, for fome books which wanted binding, in the execution of that errand I found Chatterton, who was an articled clerk to Mr. Lambert, and who, as I collected from his own converfation, had been adventuring in the fields of Parnaffus, having produced feveral trifles both in profe and verfe, which had then lately made their appearance in the public prints.

"In the courfe of the years 1768 and 1769, wherein I frequently faw and converfed with Chatterton; the excentricity of his mind, and the verfatility of his difpofition, feem to have been fingularly dif played. One day he might be found bufily employed in the study of heraldry and English antiquities, both of which are numbered amongst the favourite of his purfuits; the next difcovered him deeply engaged, confounded, and perplexed, amidst the fubtleties of metaphyfical difquifition, or loft and bewildered in the abitrufe labyrinth of mathematical researches; and these in an inftant again neglected and thrown aside, to make room for aftronomy and mulic, of both which

fciences

fciences his knowledge was entirely confined to theory. Even phyfic was not without a charm to allure his imagination, and he would talk of Galen, Hippocrates, and Paracelfus, with all the confidence and familiarity of a modern empiric.

"To a genius fo fickle and wavering, however comprehenfive the mind may be, no real or folid attainment could reasonably be expected. True it is, that by not confining himself to one science only, he contracted an acquaintance with many, but fuch as, fuperficial in itfelf, neither contributed to his intereft nor his credit.

"During the year 1768, at divers vifits I made him, I found him employed in copying Rowley, from what I then confidered, and do ftill confider, as authentic and undoubted originals. By the affittance he received from the gloffary to Chaucer, he was enabled to read, with great facility, even the moft difficult of them; and, unless my memory very much deceive me, I once faw him confulting the Etymologicon Lingua Anglicana of Skinner,

Amongit others, I perfectly remember to have read feveral ftanzas copied from the Deathe of Syr Charles Bawdin; the original of which then lay before him. The beautiful fimplicity, animation, and pathos, that fo abundantly prevail through the course of that poem, made a lafting impreffion on my memory: I am nevertheless of opinion, that the language, as I then faw it, was much more obsolete than it appears in the edition published by Mr. Tyrwhitt, probably occafioned by certain interpolations of Chatterton; ignorantly made with an intention, as he thought, of improving them.

"Several pieces, which afterwards made their appearance in the Town and Country Magazine, notwithstanding their more modern date, were written by him during this year 1768; particularly certain pretended tranflations from the Saxon and antient British; very humble, and, in fome inftances, very unfuccessful attempts at the manner and ftile of Offian. Chatterton, whenever asked for the ori ginals of these pieces, hesitated not to confefs, that they existed only in his own imagination, and were merely the offspring and invention of fancy; on the contrary, his declaration, whenever queftioned as to authenticity of the poems attributed to Rowley, was invariably and uniformly in fupport of their antiquity, and the reputation of their author Rowley; inftantly facrificing thereby all the credit he might, without a poffibility of detection, have taken to himfelf, by affuming a character to which he was confcious he had no legal claim; a circumftance which I am affured could not, in its effect, fail of operating upon a mind like his, prone to vanity, and eager of applaufe even to an extreme. With refpect to the first poem of the Battle of Haftings, it has been faid, that Chatterton himself acknowledged it to be a forgery of his own; but let any unprejudiced perfon, of common difcernment, advert only for a moment to the fituation in which Chatterton then flood, and the reason and neceffity of such a declaration will be apparent.

"The very contracted state of his finances, aided by a vain defire of appearing fuperior to what his circumftances afforded, induced him, from time to time, to difpofe of the poems in his poffeffion to thofe from whofe generofity and patronage he expected to derive fome confiderable pecuniary advantages; I will not hesitate to affert,

and

and I fpeak from no lefs authority than Chatterton himfelf, that he was difappointed in this expectation, and thought himself not fuffi ciently rewarded by his Bristol patrons, in proportion to what he thought his communications deferved. From this circumftance, it is eafy to account for the anfwer given to Mr. Barret, on his repeated folicitations for the original, viz. That he himself wrote that poem for a friend,-thinking, perhaps, that if he parted with the original poem, he might not be properly rewarded for the loss of it.

"That vanity, and an inordinate thirit after praife, eminently diftinguished Chatterton, all who knew him will readily admit.— From a long and intimate acquaintance with him, I venture to affert, that, from the date of his firft poetical attempt, until the final period of his departure from Bristol, he never wrote any piece, however trifling in its nature, and even unworthy of himfelf, but he first communicated it to every acquaintance he met, indifcriminately, as wifhing to derive applaufe from productions which, I am affured, were he now living, he would be heartily ashamed of; from a full affurance of the truth of which propofition I conceive my felf at liberty to draw the following inference: That, had Chatterton been the author of the poems imputed to Rowley, fo far from fecre:ing fuch a circumftance, he would have made it his firft, his greatest pride; for to fuppofe him ignorant of the intrinfic beauty of thofe compofitions, would be a most unpardonable prefumption.

"Towards the fpring of 1770, fome differences having previously thereto arisen between Chatterton and his mafter Mr. Lambert, the former publicly expreffed his intention of quitting his fituation, and repairing to the metropolis, which, he flattered himfelf, would afford him a more enlarged field for the fuccefsful exercife and difplay of his abilities; accordingly, in April, he began making the neceffary preparations for his journey: Anxious for his welfare, I interrogated him as to the object of his views and expectations, and what mode of life he intended to purfue on his arrival at London: The anfwer I received was a memorable one: "My first attempt, faid he, fhall be in the literary way; the promises I have received are fufficient to difpel doubt; but fhould I, contrary to my expectations, find myself deceived, I will, in that cafe, turn Methodist preacher-Credulity is as potent a deity as ever, and a new fect may easily be devifed; but if that too fhould fail me, my laft and final refource is a piftol."

"That fpirit of literary Quixotifm which he poffeffed, and which had the immediate afcendency over every other confideration, had been much encreased by correspondence with divers book fellers and printers, who, finding him of advantage to them in their publications, were by no means fparing of their praifes and compliments, adding thereto the moft liberal promifes of afliftance and employment, fhould he choose to make London the place of his refidence.

"Thefe were the hopes upon which he relied; this it was which induced him to quit the place of his nativity, and throw himself, for a precarious fubfiftence upon ftrangers. It is unneceffary to remark how far his expectations were answered. His unfortunatate and untimely exit deplorably fhews the fallacy of his hopes, and the extreme deficiency of his knowledge of the world; who could for a moment idly fuppofe that the molt diftinguifhed talents, unpatronized,

would

would meet with fuccefs, and lift him to that eminence which he flattered himself he merited.

"Thus, Sir, I have attempted, in a hafty and curfory manner, to prefent you with whatever comes within the limits of my own obfervation and knowledge relative to this extraordinary youth, in refpect to whofe memory I beg leave to make one further remark.

"It has been faid, that he was an unprincipled libertine, depraved in his mind, and profligate in his morals; whofe abilities were proftituted to ferve the caufe of vice; and whofe leifure hours were wafted in continued fcenes of debauchery and obscenity.

"Mr. Warton tells us, that he was an bireling in the trade of literature, unprincipled, and compelled to fubfift by expedients.' (See biş Emendations to the second volume of the Hiftory of Poetry.) And another gentleman tells us, that his death was of no great confequence fince be could not long have escaped being hanged. (See Love and Madness, p. 132.) Whether any or all of thefe epithets are meant as arguments to prove that Chatterton is the author of Rowley's Poems, abounding, as they do, with piety and morality, and the most refined fentiment, I know not; but I cannot help obferving, that fuch expreffions (unfupported, as they appear to be, by truth and reafon) neither do credit to the heads or to the hearts of thofe who fo uncharitably below them.

"I admit, that amongst Chatterton's papers may be found many paffages not only immoral, but bordering upon a libertinifm grofs and unpardonable. It is not my intention to attempt a vindication of those paffages, which, for the regard bear his memory, I wish he had never written, but which I nevertheless believe to have originated rather from a warmth of imagination, aided by a vain affectation of fingu. Jarity, than from any natural depravity, or from a heart vitiated by evil example.

"The opportunities which a long acquaintance with him afforded me, juftify me in saying, that, whilst he lived in Bristol, he was not the debauched character reprefented. Temperate in his living, moderate in his pleasures, and regular in his exercifes; he was undeferving of the afperfion. What change London might have effected in him I know not; but from the rain of his letters to his mother and fifter, and his conduct towards them after he quitted Bristol, and alfo from the tellimony of thofe with whom he lodged. I have no doubt but the intemperances and irregularities laid to his charge did either not exist at all, or, at the worst, are confiderably aggravated beyond what candour can approve.

4th April, 1781.

I am, Sir,

with the utmost respect,

your most humble fervant,
JAS. THISTLETHWAITE.”

What inferences our Readers may draw from this letter we would not take upon us to determine. Let every man judge for

himself.

In the firft part of this Article, we have freely given our opinion refpecting the other teftimonics adduced by the Dean in defence of his hypothefis; and in the prefent cafe we take the liberty of

obferving,

obferving, that Mr. Thiftlethwaite's letter, fo far from altering, hath, on the contrary, confirmed our fentiments with respect to the genius of this wonderful and enterprizing youth. We by no means allow the companions and play-mates of Chatterton to be the proper judges of his merit. We know the effect of familiarity: "Rowley was venerable; but what was Tommy Chatterton ?” The influence of a prepoffeffion like this is very powerful; and perfons of more experience than Mr. Cary, and Mr. Smith, and Mr. Thiftlethwaite, and more wifdom too (we mean no offence to thefe gentlemen), might not eafily get rid of fo partial and fo unfavourable an impreffion.-There was a brilliance in Chatterton's genius that could not but be difcerned by the dulleft and moft ignorant of his fchool-fellows. It is for their credit to acknowledge, that it was not loft on them. It is even acknowledged by the Dean. But the vanity which pretends to have feen and felt the genius of Chatterton in its more obvious exertions, is unwilling to confefs how much their fagacity was baffled by its more fecret and difguifed operations. And yet it was in thefe deep and hidden recefles that this wonderful genius was proud to work. But because all his intimates were not entrufted with his fchemes, are we to fuppofe he planned and executed none? Their vanity would fay-" Yes." But-Chatterton knew them-and knew HIMSELF.

The other part of the Appendix contains an answer to Mr. Tyrwhitt, who had attempted to prove the Poems of Rowley to be modern, by the mifapplication and misconstruction of a variety of antient words, as well as by the introduction of others totally unknown to the writers of the fifteenth century. We must acknowledge, that fome of Mr. Tyrwhitt's objections are fatisfactorily anfwered by the Dean. But there are others which, with all his ingenuity, he is unable to furmount. We shall not point out a variety of inftances (Mr. Tyrwhitt will do this himfelf); but we cannot avoid remarking, that the Dean's account of the word Calke, ufed twice in the Poems of Rowley, is equally forced and unfatisfactory. We will give our Readers Mr. Tyrwhitt's remark, and the Dean's anfwer, in their own words.

"CALKE. (Tragedy of Goodwin, L. 25.) Caft. Chatterton. CALKED. (Eclogue 1. L. 49.) caft out, ejected. Chatterton. [N. B. Chatterton gives thofe explanations of the word in his gloffary.] This word appears to have been formed upon a mifapprehenfion of the following article in Skinner: "Talked exp. Caft. credo Call up." Chatterton did not attend to the difference between cafting out and cafting up; i. e. cafting up Figures in calculation. That the latter was Skinner's meaning may be collected from the next article. "Talked for Calculated; Chaucer in the Frankeleyne's Tale." It is probable too, I think, that in both

articles