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—

Ah! such books as we have been reading, and such memories as we have been recalling, are, after all, unprofitable—a darkness without light. 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, and 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 flapped over his eyes by 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 upward; 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 commonplace 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 intrusted 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 overleaping 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.

Despite his marvellous talents, his industry, his knowledge, his magnitude of mind, his glorious imagination, his bold satire, his independence, his devotional love of his mother and sister—if he had lived through a long age of prosperity, Chatterton could never have been trusted, nor esteemed, from his total want of truth. His is the most striking example upon record of the necessity for uprightness in word and deed. Where a great end is to be achieved—there must be consistency, a union between noble daring and noble deeds—there must be Truth! No man has ever deviated from it without losing not only the respect of the thinking, but even the confidence of the unwise. Chatterton's earliest idea seems to have been how to deceive; and, were it possible to laugh at youthful fraud, there would be something irresistibly ludicrous in the lad bewildering the old pewterer, Burgum. Imagine the fair-haired rosy boy, the brightness of his extraordinary eyes increased by the covert mischief which urged him forward—fancy his presenting himself to Master Burgum, who, dull as his own pewter, had the ambition, which the cunning youth fostered, of being thought of an "ancient family"—fancy Chatterton in his poor-school dress presenting himself to this man, whose business, Chatterton's biographer, Mr. Dix, tells us, was carried on in the house now occupied by Messrs. Sander, Bristol Bridge,[2] and informing him that he had made a discovery—presenting to him various documents, with a parchment painting of the De Burgham arms, in proof of his royal descent from the Conqueror.

BRISTOL BRIDGE.

Mr. Dix assures us, "that never once doubting the validity of the record, in which his own honors were so deeply implicated, he presented the poor bluecoat-boy, who had been so fortunate in finding so much, and so assiduous in his endeavors to collect the remainder, with five shillings!" Blush, Bristol, blush at this record of a citizen's meanness; the paltry remuneration could have hardly tempted even so poor a lad as Thomas Chatterton to continue his labors for the love of gain; yet he furnished Burgum with further information, loving the indulgence of his mystifying powers, and secretly satirizing the folly he duped.

It is quite impossible to trace back any circumstance which could, to speak advisedly, have led to such a course of deception as was practised by this boy; born of obscure parents, his father, a man of dissolute habits, was sub-chanter of the Cathedral, and also master of the free school in Pyle-street; this clever, but harsh, and dissolute man died in August, 1752, and the poet was born on the 20th of the following November.[3] Such a parent could not be a loss; he would have been, in all human probability, as careless of his son as he was of his wife; and, at all events, Chatterton had not the misery of early cruelty to complain of, for he had a mother, tender and affectionate, although totally unfit to guide and manage his wayward nature. Her first grief with him arose, strange as it may seem, from his inaptitude for learning—as a child he disdained A B C, and indulged himself with his own thoughts. When nearly seven years old he "fell in love," to use his mother's phrase, "with an illuminated French manuscript," and thus learned his letters from the very sort of thing he spent his early days in counterfeiting. His progress was wonderful, both as to rapidity and extent, and his pride kept pace therewith. A friend, wishing to give the boy and his sister a present of china-ware, asked him what device he would choose to ornament his with. "Paint me," he said, "an angel with wings and a trumpet, to trumpet my name over the world." Here was a proof of innate ambition; if his mother had had an understanding mind, this observation would have taught her to read his character. Such ambition could have been directed,—and directed to noble deeds.

CHATTERTON AS DOORKEEPER.