I;;;:::::;:::: N .A CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME OF THE SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND GIVEN IN 1 89 1 BY HENRY WILLIAMS SAGE Cornell University Library PR 3343.C61 New lights on Chatterton.A paper read be 3 1924 013 170 513 Cornell University Library The original of this bool< is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924013170513 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. A PAPER READ BEFORE THE BIBLIOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY, DECEMBER 21, 19x4. BY SIR ERNEST CLARKE, M.A., F.S.A., 31, Tavistock Square, London, W.C. LONDON : REPRINTED BY BLADES, EAST & BLADES, FROM tHE SOCIETY'S TRANSACTIONS. 1916. NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. A PAPER READ BEFORE THE BIBLIOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY, DECEMBER 21, 1914. BY SIR ERNEST CLARKE, M.A., F.S.A., 31, Tavistock Square, London, W.C. LONDON : REPRINTED BY BLADES, EAST & BLADES, FROM THE SOCIETY'S TRANSACTIONS. 1916. NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. Bv Sir ERNEST CLARKE, M.A., F.S.A. Utad 3ist December, igi4. /^~^r IT- ■ . HE title given to this paper, "New Lights on Chatterton," is so far a misnomer that I have no fresh information to impart with reference to Chatterton himself. Surely there never was a lad of seventeen of whom so many biographical facts were so industriously searched for and collected so quickly after his departure from this life as was the case with Chatterton. If a hundredth part of the interest taken in him after his death had been taken while he was alive, he might have blossomed into another Shakespeare or Milton. My new lights — you may possibly not think them of more than single candle power — are really upon the works he left behind him, and upon the circumstances under which they appeared before the public. Let me, by way of prelude, give the salient facts of Thomas Chatterton's life and surroundings. He was the posthumous child of the master of a small free school at Bristol, and was bom on November 20th, 1752. At first mistaken for a dunce, he finally learned his letters from an old illuminated manuscript, and at the age of eight he read anything and everything from morning till night. In August, 1760, he was admitted into Colston's Charity School, where he was taught the three R's (and nothing else) and was allowed practically no holidays. 6 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. On the ist July, 1767, when therefore he was less than fifteen years of age, he was apprenticed to an attorney, one Lambert. He received no pay, took his meals with the servants, and slept with the foot-boy. His appointed hours of attendance at the office were from 7 a.m, till 8 p.m., but there seems to have been but little actual work for him to do, and he had accordingly plenty of time to read, which he did voraciously, and to scribble, which he did continuously. On October ist, 1768, he blazed out into local notoriety by contributing to Felix Farley's Journal, under the nom de plume " Dunhelmus Bristoliensis," " A description of the Mayor's first passing over the Old Bridge, taken from an old manuscript.'' This article attracted the attention of (amongst others) Mr. William Barrett, a surgeon then engaged in slowly collecting materials for a history of Bristol, and in this way Chatterton struck up an acquaintance with the credulous Barrett, through an equally credulous and rather more ignorant friend of the latter, George Symes Catcott, then in trade as a pewterer. As a good deal of our knowledge about Chatterton's life at Bristol is derived from this last named gentleman, and as he was sharply challenged about his dates by the Editor of the first collected edition (1777) of the Rowley Poems, the materials for which Catcott himself supplied for publica- tion, a quotation from a contribution he made to a second review of these Poems in the Monthly Review for May, 1777, may be interpolated here. Catcott says (p. 324) : "My acquaintance with Chatterton was accidental. Being one day, in 1768, at Redcliff Church, with a friend of mine, he observed that some ancient pieces of poetry had been found there, and that many specimens of it were in the possession of a youth whom he knew. I was soon after made acquainted with him, and he readily, and without reward, gave me the Bristow Tragedy, Rowley's Epitaph on Mr. Canynge's Grandfather, and one or two other little pieces.^ In two or three days after he brought (i) This must mean Chatterton's transcripts only, not the "original" parch- ments. — E.C. NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 7 me two originals ; I think the Yellow Roll, and the Ode to Ella,i which I immediately put into Mr. Barrett's possession I well recollect his mentioning the names of most of the poems, which have since appeared, as being then in his possession." To these two men — Barrett and Catcott— but chiefly to the former, Chatterton supplied at intervals during the period from October, 1768, to April, 1770, transcripts in his own writing, and both in poetry and prose, of what he said were original documents from an old chest in the tower of St. Mary Redcliff Church. They accepted his story without hesitation and in full belief — at any rate at first — in its truth. They did certainly press him for a sight of the original documents, and every now and then he would produce a parchment which he said had come out of the old chest. In April, 1770, Chatterton, who had been chafing at his environment, induced (by a threat of self-destruction) his employer to release him from his indentures. He came to London with some five guineas in his pocket, confidently expecting to make a name in the metropolis by his writings. The pay he received from the magazines for his contributions on various topics of the day— ^which indeed had no particulai- merit — was, however, not enough to keep body and soul together, and in a fit of despair, he poisoned himself with arsenic at Brook Street, Holbom, on the 24th August, 1770, at the age of 17 years and nine months. It will be understood that the above is the baldest outline in the fewest possible words of the facts of Chatterton's brief and miserable life. He died unwept, unhonoured, and unsung for the moment ; and it was only some time afterwards that the world woke up to find that it had lost a great and unrecognised genius. The first person of any importance in the social world who seems to have interested himself in Chatterton and his works was Dr. Joseph Fry, President of St. John's College, Oxford, himself a native of Bristol and an alumnus of Bristol Grammar School. He made a visit to that city in (i) I refer later on to these " two originals." — E.C. 8 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. September, 1770, and was concerned to hear that the lad was no more. He received from Barrett and Catcott some specimens in Chatterton's writing of what were said to be transcripts of the poems of Thomas Rowley, a priest of the fifteenth century, and confessor of William Canynge, a real personage buried in St. Mary Redcliff Church. Fry took these away to Oxford to study, under a strict promise to return them after making a glossary of the archaic words, and on the understanding that no copies of them, if made, were allowed to be shown about to others. Although Fry does not appear to have completed the glossary, the first promise as to the return of the original documents seems to have been fulfilled, if not by Fry, by his legal representatives, for he died not long after, on the 22nd November, 1772. But the second promise was broken, for Catcott tried vainly to get back after Fry's death, a book in which he found to his dismay, from letters addressed to him by third parties, that Fry had copied out in his own hand and shown about to his friends, all the Rowley poems submitted to him for examination. I tried to ascertain the whereabouts of this book by enquiries of the custodian of the Library at St. John's College, into which I thought it might have drifted. No such book was known. I therefore settled down into the belief that it had for ever disappeared ; when one Saturday this autumn I walked into the late Mr. Bertram Dobell's shop in Charing Cross Road, and asked whether he had any books on Chatterton. He had. He brought them up from the cellar for my inspection, and amongst them was a MS. book, which I at once recognised as in the handwriting of Dr. Fry, with whose script I had become familiar through my examination of a big volume of original and unpublished letters addressed to Catcott by various personages of distinction, which is preserved at the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery. Into the book which had drifted into Mr. Bertram Dobell's possession Dr. Fry had (I fear surreptitiously) copied out a number of the Rowley poems, and had made on the opposite pages, a beginning of the glossary which he never completed. I bought the book. Here it is, and it is the first of my New Lights. NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 9 What I chiefly desired to ascertain from this book of transcripts made by Dr. Fry was, whether it threw any light on a point which had been troubling me ever since I began the study of the new documents which I shall describe in the course of this paper, viz., the chronological sequence of Chatterton's production of the Rowley "originals." The first poem transcribed in the book is the "Song to Aella," and at the end of it Dr. Fry appends this note : "Mr. Rowlie's original MS. of this Poem is still remaining in the possession of Mr. Barrett, a gentleman at Bristol : it is upon vellom : y= characters in general are very fair and legible, but w' is something remarkable, y* verses are not distinguished from each other, as in y"= Transcript above, but follow with' interruption, like y^ sentences in a Prose-Composition." It is possible that Dr. Fry was shown this piece of parchment by Mr. Barrett when at Bristol ; but Barrett set great store by it, and only parted with it reluctantly at a date after Fry's death, on loan to a patron — perhaps a patient— Lord Dacre. This nobleman, being cruelly tortured with gout, spent a good deal of time at the then fashionable English spas — Buxton, Bath, and the Hot-Wells at Bristol. There was a practising physician at Bath, Dr. Francis Woodward, who was a member of Fry's college (St. John's, Oxford), and was a friend of George Catcott. Woodward took a lively interest in the Rowley Poems, and chatted about them to his aristocratic patients like Lords Camden, Charlemont, and Dacre, letters from all of whom ajypear in the Bristol volume of Catcott's correspondence, which I have been exploring so diligently. Lord Dacre goes to Bristol, sees Catcott and Barrett, and is permitted by the latter, rather to Catcott's disgust, to borrow, for expert examination, two Rowley original manuscripts in parchment — the one containing the •' Songe to ^lla," and another known later as the " Yellow Roll." Lord Dacre consults on the subject his acquaintance Dr. Thomas Percy, who 10 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. had achieved a considerable reputation from the publication in 1765 of his Reliques of Ancient English Poetry. Percy, who was then Domestic Chaplain of the Duke of Northumber- land, studies them at Alnwick Castle, makes his report by letter to Lord Dacre, but fearing to entrust to the post these precious documents, sends them South by the hands of Professor Robert Chambers, just returning to London on his way to take up a judgeship in India, and — Chambers loses them. The horror-stricken Percy is afraid to go and see Lord Dacre again till his Lordship reassures him as to his reception ; they agree that Barrett must be told the awful news ; and the finger of scorn is thenceforth pointed at poor Percy as the loser — if not something worse —of priceless manuscripts. Chambers is unrepentant ; but Percy is not, and he excuses himself in many letters to his contemporaries. From a descendant of Sir Robert Chambers, I obtained a few days ago the loan of a letter — exhibited this afternoon — written by Percy to his friend in India, on 9 March, 1778 (four and a-half years after the disappearance of the manuscripts) : " I should be particularly happy if accidentally dipping into some of your books you should have found the two pieces of parchment attributed to Rowley (the supposed Bristoll-Poet). His pretended poems have run through two editions, and are received as genuine by a large party of pseudo antiquaries and critics : who make a great clamour about the disappearance of these two parchments : and it would be a most fortunate circumstance, if they could at last be produced, with all the evidence they carry of fraud and imposture. At no distance of time would they be the less valuable or decisive." Prophetic words ! At the distance of one hundred and forty years from their disappearance, they are for the first time shown in public, at this meeting of the Bibliographical Society. Here they are : New Lights on Chatierton, Nos. 2 and J, NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. ii You will naturally want to know where they have lain hidden all this long time. Sir Robert Chambers took over eleven years to answer the plaintive appeal of Percy, who had meanwhile become Bishop of Dromore, and in a reply which I have here, dated 9 November, 1789, he suggested — • from his safe seclusion at Calcutta — a variety of ways in which he might have lost the manuscripts. Lost however they were, and obviously Sir Robert didn't care. When he died at Paris in 1802, his papers were pre- sumably looked through : and in the month of October of this present year, I was permitted by Mr. William Rose Smith, C.B., Clerk of the Council of the Duchy of Lancaster, whom we have the pleasure of welcoming amongst us to-day, to examine two parchment documents in his possession (having come to him through Archdeacon Nares) enclosed in a paper wrapper sealed with black wax, and thus inscribed : " About the Bristol Parchments. " Song of Ella. "Chatterton. " N.B. I found these Parchments & letters at different times lately among letters to Sir Robert Chambers. „ ^ ^, , " Frances Chambers. The fact that these documents were in existence was made known to the literary world by Mr. C. G. Crump of the Public Record Office, in a letter he wrote to the Aihenmum of 8 June, 1889, which does not seem to have received the public attention it deserved. With the indications that Mr. Crump gave me recently, I placed myself in communication with Mr. W. R. Smith, and through his kindness, the two Rowley manuscripts have been allowed to be photographed and reproduced in collotype in our Transactions. Not much of help in the elucidation of the Chatterton problem is to be derived from the study of the first of these two documents (the smaller of the two). It professes to contain a rhyrhed letter addressed by Thomas Rowlie to the poet Lydgate, the famous " Monke of Bury " (my native place), with a specimen of his (Rowlie's) skill in versifying, viz., B 2 12 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. the "Song to ^Ua," and Lydgate's response, in five verses of four lines each, ending thus : — Nowe Rowlie ynne these mokie days, Lendes owte hys shynynge lytes, And Turgotus and Chaucer lyves Ynne every thynge he wrytes. As printed by Tyrwhitt in his edition of the Rowley Poems issued in 1777 (copied of course, in the absence of the ''original" parchment, in every subsequent edition of Chatterton's Works), these three poems are said to be " printed from a copy in Mr. Catcott's handwriting." Tyrwhitt gives, however, on his pages xvi-xvii some instructive variants from "a copy made by Mr. Barrett from the piece of vellum, which Chatterton formerly gave to him as the original MS.," together with some others from a copy of the Poems made for Barrett by Chatterton himself, differing from that which he "afterwards produced as the original." Neither the transcript made by Catcott, nor that made by Barrett, nor that made by Chatterton himself for Barrett (which is no doubt the first " original ") being now available, we have to rely on the parchment recently re-discovered under the circumstances explained above. Through the kindness of Mr. Herbert Milne of the British Museum, who has brought his paleeographical skill to bear on the photographic facsimile of the crabbed and much rubbed manuscript, I am enabled to print, as an Appendix to this paper, the nearest approach to the correct text of the three short poems in question that can now be hoped for. (See pages 31 to 33.) We know that in the case of other poems, Chatterton made copies which do not altogether correspond. There are, for instance, two separate versions in his own writing of "The Death of Sir Charles Bawdin." I shall, however, have no time on the present occasion to develop this part of my theme : so I proceed to a short study of the famous " Yellow Roll " — No. 3 of my New Lights. I cannot do better than describe this in the words of Percy himself in his report to Lord Dacre dated "Alnwick Castle September 6. 1773." NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 13 The whereabouts of the original of this Report I have not been able yet to trace, but Catcott was fair-minded enough (indeed he plumes himself on this fact) to transcribe it in a Volume in which he copied out, when his pewterer's business failed, all the correspondence he had held with the great ones of the day. This Volume was bequeathed by Catcott's nephew, Richard Smith, to the Bristol Public Library, the authorities of which kindly allowed me prolonged access to it by depositing it for a time at the British Museum. This volume is a mine of information on points connected with the Rowley Poems, and I am greatly surprised that it has been so little studied by previous students of the subject. This is what Percy says, according to a transcript of his letter— then in the possession of Barrett — made by Catcott in 1777, and written on page 59 of the manuscript book in question : — "Alnwick Castle September 6. 1773. " My Lord, " By good fortune I had with me at this place a Friend, who is one of the best judges in England of old writings, having had for many years, the Custody of all the ancient Records and Charters of the Northumberland Family, and having been all his life conversant with English Manuscripts &c. of every Age, who is critically exact in distinguishing the peculiar modes of writing, & the several Alphabets which prevail'd in every ^ra ; and who having never heard of this Controversy concerning the Bristol Poetry, was quite impartial. This Gentlem" is Tho^ Butler Esq"' Clerk of the Peace for the County of Middlesex, and principal Agent to the Duke of Northumberland. To him I showed the two specimens your Lordship sent me ; and he immediately pronounced them spurious, in which I can- not but entirely agree with him. For the Characters uniformly resemble the writing of no .iEra whatever, nor are in any Degree consistent with themselves ; but are evidently written by a modern pen, which has endeavour'd to render the letters as uncouth & obscure as possible ; and it is even diverting to observe, how in the larger MSS., as the Writer went 14 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. on, he alter'd & changed the form of his Letters, so that the Lines towards the bottom, are tenfold more uncouth, & obscure, than those towards the top ; and are not reducible to the same Alphabet. Even the smaller Manuscript tho' infinitely more uncouth & more obscurely written than the larger, does not come nearer the genuine old Alphabets, in proportion as it differs from the modem Characters : it is merely render'd obscure, by a fanciful uncouth Alphabet of the Writer's own invention, reducible to no principal of the genuine ancient writing. Upon the whole, I must again repeat, that as far as depends upon the evidence of these Parchments the writing attributed to Mr. Thomas Rowley, may finally be pronounc'd to be forged and spurious. " I have the honour to be with the greatest respect, My Lord " Your Lordship's most oblig'd hum Serv' " Thomas Piercy. " P.S. Mr. Justice Chambers (lately appointed one of the judges to the East Indies) also was much interested in the question respecting the genuineness of the Bristol Poetry, & gave with me a second very minute Examination of the Parchm"'*, the result of which was a full conviction of their being spurious. " With regard to Mr. Barrett, I leave your Lordship to communicate to him in whatever manner you think proper, the above Sentence passed upon these Parchments. As he seems a man of a liberal ingenious Mind, and open to conviction, I flatter myself that upon recollection, he will be glad to have the forgery detected before he had reposed too securely upon those writings. Yet still they may be highly deserving publication, not only on ace' of the Poetical Merit of the Poems, but also to shew what human invention is capable of performing. And I am persuaded, that if all the undoubted Pieces of Chatterton's were collected into a Volume, they would prove him not only capable of writing these Poems attributed to Rowley,^ but considering his early youth, and the dis- advantages of his Education, to have been one of the greatest Geniuses (i) I would ask attention to these words, which I refer to again later in my paper. — E.C. NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. IS that ever existed in the World. For my part I would subscribe to such a Publication with as much pleasure as if the Pieces could be proved to be Rowley's own, and would lend all the assistance in my power to promote the Sale & formation of such a work." When you examine " the Yellow Roll " yourselves, you will see that it is in a bastard sort of scrivener's hand of the eighteenth century, and that — to take a single instance of solecisms — a remark said to have been made by Canynge is put in quotation marks : this in a document professedly of the fifteenth century, before the discovery of printing. Its particular interest from my point of view is, that it is a forgery to bolster up other forgeries. The great ledger of Canynge is said therein to contain Rowlie's " Volume of Verses, wyth letters toe ande from lohne Lydgate," his " Hystorye of Monees,'' his continuation of Turgot's history, and a variety of other documents that Chatterton had invented for the delec- tation of his friend Barrett, in the compilation of his History of Bristol. It is amazing that in this History, which did not appear till 1789, when the Rowley myth was pretty well exploded, these forgeries were gravely reproduced in print by Barrett, as authentic contributions to the history of the fifteenth century. Barrett, before he parted to Lord Dacre with the original parchment of the " Yellow Roll," had no doubt made a copy of it for his own use ; and he printed from this copy the " Auntiaunt Forme of Monies " and " England's Glorye revyved in Maystre Canynge," which appeared on pp. 37 «/ seq. of his History of Bristol. From Barrett's book of 1789 the two articles were reprinted in Vol. Ill of Southey and Cottle's edition of 1803 of Chatterton's Works, and they have since been copied in other editions. The parchment, as will be seen from the collo- type, was much easier to read than the " Songe to Aella," and Mr. Herbert Milne has not found much of substance to correct in Barrett's print of it, beyond an immense number of changes of spelling, the substitution of "uncouthe" for "unnoticed" at the end of line 2 of the manuscript, the i6 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. addition of the names of two omitted kings, Ethylwach and Sledda, in the middle, and the winding up of the " Auntiaunt Forme of Monies " with the actual words : " No Doubte (sayd Maystre Canynge) but you dyspende Heavenne to gette Goulde but I dyspende Goulde to gette Heaven. Thus much for coynes." The transcript of the "Yellow Roll" given in the Appendix, on pages 34-37, must, therefore, for the future be regarded as the accurate text from which quotations are to be made. Perhaps it was in view of the awkward figure Percy was made to cut, by the disappearance of the two documents we have just been discussing, that he did not appear in public as one of the protagonists in the storm of controversy that broke forth when Tyrwhitt's first edition of the Rowley Poems was published in 1777. But it happens that the great grand- daughter of the Bishop of Dromore has lately permitted me to make a detailed examination of her ancestor's materials for a life of Oliver Goldsmith, which he contemplated writing before blindness befell him, and he could not get his way with the publishers ; and in a miscellaneous bundle marked in his writing, " Chatterton & Rowley MS. Adversaria &c. carefully to be preserved T. D.," I found four documents of varying degrees of bibliographical interest. The first document from the Percy Collection which I am able to exhibit to you this afternoon is the very long letter — already mentioned — by Sir Robert Chambers, the Indian judge, written from Calcutta in 1789, acknowledging that he received from Percy, at Alnwick Castle, the two documents that Barrett had confided to Lord Dacre and that Lord Dacre had sent to Percy for examination and report, and confessing that he must have lost them. The second document is a copy in George Catcott's handwriting — with which I have become very familiar during the last few months from the laborious perusal of the two volumes containing his correspondence with the great ones of the earth — of Chatterton's original contribution to Felix Farley's Journal, about the opening of the Old Bridge at Bristol in the fifteenth century. NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 17 It is worth a passing mention that in this story of the Mayor first passing over the old Bristol Bridge, only one personage is indicated by name, " Master Greggorie Dalbenye mounted on a fergreyne [iron-grey] horse," who at 10 o'clock told His Worship all things were prepared. Plenty of priests and friars are stated to have been in the procession, and I have no doubt Thomas Rowlie was as much in evidence there as anyone else. But the first actual mention of Rowley as an individual seems to have been made by his creator in a letter Chatterton addressed to James Dodsley, the bookseller of Pall Mall, on December 21st, 1768, after he had come into touch with Barrett and Catcott. It does not appear that Barrett wanted more than historical, genea- logical, and architectural particulars for his slow-moving History of Bristol, and these Chatterton supplied to him in plenty. The antique poetry that Chatterton produced did not so much appeal to Barrett : and it is note- worthy that of all the Rowley parchments that Barrett preserved so religiously during his life, and bequeathed at his death to Dr. Glynn of Cambridge, who in turn left them to the British Museum, only four contained any poetry whatever. What has happened to the parchment containing the Epitaph of ten lines on Robert Canynge, ancestor of Rowley's great patron, beginning "Thys mornynge starre of Radcleves rysynge raie," which Tyrwhitt said in 1777 (p. xxi) "is one of the fragments of Vellum given by Chatterton to Barrett, as part of his original MSS.," I do not know and no one can tell me. The first 34 lines of "The Storie of William Canynge" (which consists of 150 lines in all), commencing "Anent a brooklette as I laie reclynd," and the twelve lines of " The Accounte of W. Canynge's Feast," are on pieces of parchment now at the British Museum : and the " Ode to Lydgate," the "Song to ^lla"and "Lydgate's Reply," are on the long-lost parchment which I am exhibiting to you this afternoon. Notwithstanding his preference for the prose memorials of Rowley as to the history of Bristol, I think it likely that Barrett may have encouraged iS NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. his young friend with the wonderful kindling eyes to utilise his poetical trouvailles in some way, and may have even advised him to address the following letter 1 to James Dodsley exactly 146 years ago to-day : — "Bristol, December 21. 1768. " Sir, " I take this method to acquaint you that I can procure copies of several ancient poems ; and an interlude, perhaps the oldest dramatic piece extant, wrote by one Rowley, a priest of Bristol, who lived in the reigns of Henry the VI* and Edward the IV". If these pieces will be of service to you, at your command, copies shall be sent to you by " Your most obedient servant, "D. B. " Please to direct to D. B., to be left with " Mr. Thomas Chatterton, Redcliffe Hill, Bristol. " For Mr. J. Dodsley, bookseller. Pall Mall, London." The astute Dodsley was too much accustomed to this kind of anonymous application to pay any attention to it : but Chatterton wrote again over his own signature on February 15th, 1769, that "having intelligence that the tragedy of ^Ila, was in being, after a long and laborious search, I was so happy as to attain a sight of it." A copy of it could be obtained for a guinea. " Unwilling such a beauteous piece should be lost, I have made bold to apply to you An immediate answer will oblige. I shall not receive your favour as for myself, but as your agent." ^ It seems clear from this that " The Tragedy of ^lla," which consists of 1,245 lii^^s of verse, was already in existence at the beginning of 1769, when Chatterton had only just turned sixteen years of age. It was said at the beginning to have been "plaiedd before Mastre Canynge, atte his howse nempte the Rodde Lodge:" The principal parts were taken "bie (i) This letter is printed in Wilcox's Edition of the Rowley Poems, 1842, p. Ixxxiii. NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 19 Thomas Rowleie, Preeste, the Aucthoure (^Ua) ; Johan Iscamm, Preeste (Celmonde); Syrr Thybotte Gorges Knyghte (Hurra); and Mastre Edward Canynge (Birtha the Heroine)." Notwithstanding Chatterton's estimate of this work (his own), that "it is a perfect tragedy : the plot clear, the language spirited, and the songs (inter- spersed in it) are flowing, poetical and elegantly simple," Dodsley did not rise to the tempting bait : and therefore, after a short interval, Chatterton — ■ inspired or assisted, as I must believe, by his older friends — tried Horace Walpole with a sample of the treatise on the " Ryse of Peyncteyne in Englande, wroten by T. Rowlie, 1469, for Mastre Canynge," to which I can only refer in the briefest manner in a later portion of this paper. The third document which I exhibit from the Percy Collection is the Rowley Poem "Elinour and Juga" written on quarto paper, and is — I am assured on the authority of a modem Bristol expert — in Chatterton's own writing. It differs in some minor details from the poem as printed, and it has some bits of writing on it in another handwriting, which I am pretty positive is that of Barrett. He corrects on page i a note about the battle of St. Albans, adds at the foot of page 3 the words " D.B. May 1769," and endorses the sheet on the back " Elinour and Juga." Now how did these documents 2 and 3 come into Percy's possession ? My theory is that they may have been handed over by Barrett at a personal interview with Lord Dacre, who, until converted by Percy, was inclined to be a believer. There was no special importance attaching at the time to the copy of " Elinour and Juga." It was merely regarded as a copy by Chatterton of Rowley's poem, and it had already appeared in print, having indeed been published on pp. 273-4 of Hamilton's Town and Country Magazine for May, 1769, under the title "Elinoure and Juga. Written three hundred years ago by T. Rowley, a secular priest," and it was subscribed "Bristol, May 1769. D.B." It is worth while to consider this poem a little further, as it supplies, I think, a clue to Chatterton's method of composition. In the next 20 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. succeeding number of the Town and Country Magazine (June, 1769) appeared on page 328, a version of the same poem in modem English, headed "Eleanora and Juga," with these words beneath "(See p. 273 of our last). By W.S.A., aged 16." This young gentleman of sixteen was, I suggest, Chatterton himself, for he was then sixteen years of age. I am inclined to think that he must have sent the two versions to the Editor of the Magazine at the same time, the modern rendering by way of interpretation of the " Rowley " style of verse : and that the Editor thought them good enough to insert both in successive numbers. Of the fourth document of the Percy Collection, — the original manuscript Vindication by Horace Walpole of his conduct towards Chat- terton — I forbear for the moment to speak ; but in that document Walpole says distinctly, that Chatterton in his second letter (dated 30 March, 1769) asking for Walpole's assistance, had "aflSrmed that great treasures of ancient poetry had been discovered in his native city, and were in the hands of a person who had lent him those he had transmitted to me ; for he now sent me others, amongst which was an absolute modem pastoral in dialogue, thinly sprinkled with old words." ^ If what Thistlewaite, a schoolboy friend of the poet, told Dean Milles in his letter of 4 April, 1781,^ was correct, "Elinoure and Juga" was an early effort of Chatterton's muse ; and I see no reason for questioning Sir Daniel Wilson's judgment (p. 178) that it was "Eleanoure and Juga" that Chatterton forwarded to Walpole on the 30th March, 1769, and failing success in that direction, sent off immediately for publication to the Town and Country Magazine. There is documentary evidence at the British Museum amongst the Chatterton manuscripts preserved by Barrett, that the latter had collaborated with Chatterton in drawing up the reply to Walpole's frosty answer ; and my suggestion is, that the paper I hold in my hand was the self-same (i) Works of Lord Orford, Vol. IV (1798), p. 22. (2) Dean Milles' Rowley Poems, p. 455. NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 21 document sent to Walpole, returned by him to Chatterton with a reply, brought by Chatterton to Barrett for his advice, left with him (as Walpole's reply also was), considered by Barrett as of no special importance when Lord Dacre came to see him in 1773, the poem having already appeared in the Magazine of 1769, handed to his Lordship as an additional piice justificative, and not returned by Percy. Pray note that in 1773, when Percy wrote his letter to Lord Dacre that I read out a while ago, the only Rowley poems that had been put into print were "Elinoure and Juga'' (in a Magazine of 1769) and " The Death of Sir Charles Bawdin'' (in a pamphlet of 1772). Percy's estimate of Chatterton as " one of the greatest geniuses that ever existed in the world " must, therefore, one would think, be mainly based upon manuscript copies submitted to his judgment. Otherwise I find it difficult to account for Percy retaining in his possession an original Chatterton manuscript with Barrett's endorsement on it. It is significant that Tyrwhitt, the first Editor of the Rowley Poems, all of which — except the " Death of Sir Charles Bawdin " and " Elinoure and Juga" — were put into type for the first time in 1777, asked Catcott on April 4th, 1776, this pertinent question: " Was ' Elinoure and Juga ' transcribed from the printed copy in the " Magazine, or from any copy produc'd by Chatterton prior to its publica- "tion in the Magazine?" And the answer of Catcott, who had begun to be a little restive under Tyrwhitt's catechism, was : " From the printed copy in the Magazine : I don't recollect I ever saw " the MS. : Chatterton told me 'twas Rowley's, and that he inserted it." I got several New Lights, though they are not important enough to mention specifically on this occasion, from a comparison I have been able to make at the British Museum of the two volumes of Catcott's corres- pondence now deposited at two different libraries at Bristol. Dr. Percy . has always been supposed to have had a hand in the editing of the first 22 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. Rowley poem, "The Death of Sir Charles Bawdin," published separately. This was in 1772, and the dedication of the pamphlet to Elizabeth Duchess of Northumberland (wife of Percy's patron) gives colour to the attribution. Horace Walpole, writing to his friend Mason, fell into the same error, saying : " Somebody, I fancy Dr. Percy, has produced a dismal dull ballad, "called 'The Execution of Sir Charles Bawdin,' and given it out for one "of the Bristol Poems, called Rowley's." Our member, Mr. T. J. Wise, is the fortunate possessor of a copy of this pamphlet, with two title-pages, one stating it to be printed for WilUam Goldsmith, and the other for Francis Newbery. This he is kindly ex- hibiting this afternoon for our delectation. A similar copy is in the Haslewood Collection at the British Museum. There is a MS. version of this poem in Chatterton's writing in the British Museum. Another, slightly different, but also in Chatterton's writing, was in 1904 the subject of a pamphlet by Mr. G. Spencer Perceval, of Clifton, in whose possession it is believed still to be, though the state of Mr. Perceval's health does not permit of its being searched for, at present, amongst his belongings. At any rate, Percy had nothing to do with the publication in 1772 of " The Death of Sir Charles Bawdin." This, as the two Bristol volumes of letters clearly show, was the venture of Catcott, who appears to have lost money by it, and to have been discouraged thereby from further efforts in the same direction. There came a time, however, when the public demand for the text of the Poems to which Barrett and Catcott were so coy of giving publicity, and the promise of fifty guineas from Payne, the London bookseller, could no longer be resisted, and the eminent scholar, Thomas Tyrwhitt, was entrusted by Payne with the duty of editing them. Tyrwhitt's challenges of some of the information with which Catcott sup- plied him, were a little incisive, and each left off dissatisfied with the other. NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 23 Tyrwhitt's first edition appeared in 1777, the second in the same year, and the third in 1778, the last named being followed shortly after by an Appendix, in which Tyrwhitt (at first a Rowleian) adduced evidence " tending to prove that they were written not by any ancient author, but entirely by Thomas Chatterton." I incline to the belief that Catcott, though he professed to stick out bravely to the last in defence of the authenticity of the Poems as the work of Rowley (mainly, I think, because he and others could not bring them- selves to believe that Chatterton was capable of writing them), got a little sceptical himself at last. At any rate, I found in one of the Bristol MS. volumes (both bequeathed to the City by Catcott's nephew) elaborate instructions in draft, for the binding up together of a great many of the magazine articles and criticisms that the Rowley controversy inspired. I did not take much account of these instructions until on a second visit to Mr. Bertram Dobell, I found a volume which seemed to comply with them. So I bought it, and here it is — Light No. V. — Catcott's own book, with some of his writing in it, including- — what I had not seen elsewhere at the time — the description by Rowley {i.e. Chatterton) of his master, William Canynge's personal appearance : [P. lo.J "Hee ys talle and statelie, his Eyes and Hayre are Jette Blacke, his aspecte sweete, and skynne Blaunche, hann he notte soe moche noblinesse yn hys fygure he woulde bee wommanysh, or ne soe moche swotiness, proude and dyscourteouse ynn looke, his Lyppes are redde and hys Lymbes albeyte large and longe ne lyke a Strong Pole. Maisterr Canynge's childrenn do agree lyke hymselfe.'' There is a great deal more of interest to be gleaned from the copious correspondence left in original, or in copy, by George Catcott, and I commend its perusal very earnestly to any new editor or biographer of Chatterton. We all know, of course, how these things are done : how one man copies from another, and errors get reproduced and stereotyped by repetition. Our motto in these matters should be Lord Rosebery's 24 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. "Always wind up your watch, and verify your quotations." I have tried to do both during my study of this question, with the somewhat surprising results that I have indicated to you. There is one final matter that I must deal with before I conclude, not that I have any positively new information to adduce, but because another document, which I have brought with me, cannot be impugned on the score of genuineness, however much it may be sneered at as the calculated effort of a callous patrician. The latest writer on Chatterton, whose book was published in 19 lo, pours contempt on Horace Walpole as one of the meanest of men and an inveterate liar (p. 167). This attack is chiefly based upon his assumed cruel and heartless treatment of Chatterton. Now I have here (New Light No. VI and last) the original manuscript of Walpole's own Vindication of his conduct towards the poet, sent by him to Dr. Percy for criticism and comment when the newspaper attacks upon him began to be extra virulent, given to Percy afterwards by the author, and happily preserved for our examination this evening. As soon as Tyrwhitt's first edition of the Rowley Poems was published, there appeared in the Monthly Review of April, 1777, a notice of it in which the reviewer said (p. 259) : — "Hitherto it appears that the personal evidence of the autljenticity of these poems rests entirely on the faith of Chatterton, on the faith of a vagrant, living by expedients, and equally destitute of property and of principle. We have been credibly informed that this young man carried his MSS. to Mr. Horace Walpole, and that he met with no encouragement from that learned and ingenious gentleman, who suspected his veracity : a circumstance which certainly does not speak in favour of the originality of these productions." In the following (May) number there was a long account of the discovery of the Poems sent to the Review by "Mr George Catcott, a learned antiquary of Bristol," who observed (p. 323) ; NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 25 "In 1770 Chatterton went to London, and carried all this treasure with him, in hopes, as we may very reasonably suppose, of disposing of it to his advantage : he accordingly applied, as I have been informed, to that learned antiquary, Mr. Horace Walpole, but met with little or no encouragement from him ; soon after which, in a fit of despair, as it is supposed, he put an end to his unhappy life, having first cut to pieces and destroyed all the MSS. he had in his possession." Walpole, thus directly attacked, felt it incumbent on him to write a narrative of his associations with Chatterton to "Mr. W. Bewley, apothe- cary at Great Massingham, Norfolk, and one of the authors of the Monthly Review.'' This was not published at the time, but (as will appear later) was subsequently put into print at Strawberry Hill. Many allusions to this accusation appear in Walpole's letters to his friends of this period, but the matter was brought to a head by another reference to him in a later Chattertonian publication. In the summer of 1778 appeared a work called Miscellanies in Prose and Verse, by Thomas Chatterton, the preface of which is signed " J. B. Bristol June 20. 1778." The identity of J.B. has been the subject of some speculation, some absurdly assuming the editor to have been Barrett the surgeon, whose christian name was Wijliam. The real compiler was John Broughton, a Bristol attorney and brother of the Revd. A. Broughton, Vicar of St. Mary Redcliff Church. At page xviii of his Preface, J. B., no doubt crystallising current local gossip, says : "Although he [Chatterton] was of a profession that might be said to accelerate his pursuits in antiquities, yet so averse was he to that profession, that he could never overcome it. One of his first efforts to emerge from a situation so irksome to him, was an application to a gentleman well known in the republic of letters : which unfortunately for the public, and himself, met with a very cold reception : and which the disappointed author always spoke of with a high degree of acrimony, whenever it was mentioned to him. Perhaps he [the reader] may feel 26 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. some indignation against the person to whom his first application was made, and by whom he was treated with neglect and contempt. It were to be wished the public was fully informed of all the circumstances attending that unhappy application : the event of which deprived the world of works which might have contributed to the honour of the nation, as well as the comfort and happiness of their unfortunate author.'' To this Walpole penned an elaborate reply to the editor dated from Strawberry Hill on May 23rd, 1778, which wound up thus: — "I shall certainly never write a word more about Chatterton. You are my confessor : I have unburdened my soul to you, and I trust you will not enjoin me a public penance." It might have been well for Walpole if he had adhered to his resolution : but the literary world was apparently agog about the accusation, and a good many people were predisposed to believe it. After much indecision, Walpole printed off at Strawberry Hill in 1779, 200 copies of a pamphlet entitled "A Letter to the Editor of the Miscellanies of Thomas Chatterton," which contained his reply of 23 May, 1778 (referred to above), and as an Appendix an "Extract from a Letter from Mr. H. W. to Mr W. B." It has again been assumed that this W. B. was William Barrett ; but Thomas Kirkgate, Walpole's private printer, annotated a copy of the pamphlet which was seen by Joseph Haslewood the antiquary, who copied the notes in his own copy, now in the British Museum. "W. B." was, as already stated, W. Bewley, and "Dr. P. and Mr. L.," also referred to in the pamphlet, are interpreted by Kirkgate as Dr. Percy and the Revd. Michael .Lort. Walpole sent copies of this pamphlet round to his friends, and it was reprinted with added matter in Vol. IV of his Works, published in 1798 after his death. At irregular intervals, since, however, the accusation of having neglected Chatterton and thus contributed to his untimely end has been brought against Walpole, and by none more virulently than the latest writer on the subject, who professes to set forth " The True Chatterton." He alleges NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 27 that " Walpole and his toadies flooded the periodicals with attacks on the dead boy's character, with sneers at the meanness of his talents and warnings of the mischief which would arise from publishing a life of such a scoundrel " : and in another place that " what renders Walpole's conduct fairly loathsome is the cruel, heartless way in which to palliate his own behaviour towards him [Chatterton], he did all he could after the lad's death to misrepresent his actions, defame his character and belittle the value of his works," This philippic of 1910 is an absolute travesty of the real facts, as Walpole's Vindication and the original letters now preserved at the British Museum abundantly show. Walpole never saw Chatterton : the latter's application to him was made over a year before the lad came to London, and 1 7 months before his death : and there is no justification for the words of this modern writer, with all the facts before him, however much excuse may be made for the magazine attacks on Walpole at the time of the Rowley controversy itself. Perhaps some other opportunity may arise for my setting forth in detail the grounds for my championship of Walpole in this matter, however much I may sympathise with Chatterton's disappointment at the result of his advances to him, lament the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune that subsequently befell the poor lad, and excuse his sarcastic verses on the incident: " Had I the Gifts of Wealth and Luxury shared Not poor and mean — Walpole ! thou hadst not dared Thus to insult. But I shall live and stand By Rowley's side — when Thou art dead and damned." Are we then, as the outcome of all this, to think of Chatterton merely as a forger? Was he one of that class of artists whose skill lies, as Horace Walpole snarled in his Vindication, "in those more facile imitations of prose, promissory notes," or do these Rowley Poems show the vitahsing power that genius alone can give, and if they do, was Chatterton's impulse to use that power the impulse of a true dramatic poet? As Theodore Watts-Dunton said in his illuminating criticism of Chatterton in Vol. Ill of Mr. Humphrey Ward's English Poets (1889) : c 2. 28 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. " Either Chatterton was a born forger, having as useful additional endowments, poetry and dramatic imagination almost unmatched among his contemporaries, or he was a born artist, who before mature vision had come to show him the power and the sacredness of moral conscience in art, was so dominated by the artistic conscience — by the artist's yearning to represent — that if perfect representation seemed to him to demand forgery, he needs must forge." (pp. 404-5.) In my own view, the untimely fate of poor Chatterton lies at the door of his middle-aged friends and bad advisers Barrett and Catcott. His original contribution to Felix Farley's Journal was in fact his undoing. He told a lie about it to Barrett and Catcott, and — encouraged by them to produce more antique lore of the same kind from the stores which he affected to possess — he visualised the whole of the fifteenth century company who were the familiars of his day-dreams. He regretted this too late. Has anyone ever appreciated the wail that he uttered in the so-called "Will" of the 14th April, 1770, that frightened his employer Lambert the attorney, into releasing him from his indentures ? Apostrophising Catcott,^ the unhappy lad said : " If ever obligated to thy purse Rowley discharges all : my first chief curse ; For had I never known the antique lore I ne'er had ventured firom my peaceful shore To be the wreck of promises and hopes, A Boy of learning, and a Bard of Tropes." His soul, whilst he remained at Bristol under the aesthetic influence of the grand old church of St. Mary Redcliff, was so steeped in romance (I) Catcott at a later date, when his pewtering business had failed, and he was struggling with adversity, seems to have arrived at the same conclusion as to his having mixed himself up with Rowley matters. Writing to his sardonic friend Dr. Glynn, of King's College, Cambridge, on the loth November, 1783, Catcott said: " I have frequently heard Chatterton say, Rowley was his ruin, and no person in the world, I think, may more justly repeat it after him than Myself : for I can truly say that had I taken half the pains to detect my late Partner's villany as in endeavouring to authenti- cate -old MSS, my situation in life would have been very different from what it is at present, or probably ever will," NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 29 that his imagination seems never to have been really alive save when in the dramatic masquerade of the monk of Bristol. We have Pope's own authority (whatever that may be worth) for the statement that " As yet a child, nor yet a fool to fame I lisped in numbers, for the numbers came." ' and if it be true that Pope's "Ode to Solitude" was written at the age of twelve, that is another illustration of how early the lyrical impulse may begin to stir. The ooy Chatterton would, on a summer day, lie down for hours and gaze upon the church that had such fascinations for him, in order to reproduce in his waking thoughts the picturesque mediaeval life that he imagined to have once moved there; and Chatterton "lisped in numbers" too. To quote Mr. Watts-Dunton again : " As a youthful poet showing that power of artistic self-effacement which is generally found to be incompatible with the eager energies of poetic youth — as a producer that is to say of work purely artistic and in its highest reaches unadulterated by lyric egotism — the author of the Rowley Poems, however inferior to Keats in point of sheer beauty, stands alongside him in our literature, and stands with him alone" (p. 403). As has been well said, " Strange and occult things happen now and again in the building up of men of genius " ( H. Buxton Forman's Keats, Vol. I, 1883, p. xxix); and of the three youthful poets of the first rank who flourished in the period we have been discussing, it is difficult to say which one of them was the most wonderful : John Keats, son of an ostler at the sign of the Swan and Hoop in Moorfields, and of the daughter of a livery stable keeper, in whom were clear emanations from the spirit of Greek mythology; Percy Bysshe Shelley, the scion of a long line of Sussex squires, into whose veins was transfused the sublimated essence of the French Revolution ; or Thomas Chatterton, the charity schoolboy, descendant of a line of Bristol sextons, who displayed the most perfect intuition of the mediaeval life of romance. (i) Prologue to the Satires, 1. 119. 30 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. Chatterton was a great favourite of Shelley, as of Keats, and one of Shelley's earliest effusions was a fragment almost taken from the pseudo Rowley. In Adonais (Stanza xlv) the earliest mentioned of " the inheritors of unfulfilled renown [who] rose from their thrones, built beyond mortal thought," was "Chatterton: his solemn agony had not yet faded from him." As to Keats, Mr. Francis Turner Palgrave, the compiler of "The Golden Treasury,'' was of opinion that he deserved the title "marvellous boy" in a much higher sense than Chatterton, and he thought that Shakespeare, Milton, and Wordsworth would have left " poems of less excellence and hope " than Keats, " had their lives been closed at twenty- five." But the prodigious mass of work left by Chatterton was all done before the age of eighteen ; and Jjt is only fair to ask, on behalf of Chatterton, what Keats would have left had he failed to attain eighteen instead of twenty-six years. J The original dedication to Chatterton of Keats' beautiful poem of " Endymion " (dated Teignmouth, 19 March, 1 8 18) was in these words, which do not seem to me to be over-strained, and with which I conclude : " Inscribed, with every feeling of Pride and Regret, and with a bowed mind, to the Memory of the most English of Poets except Shakespeare — Thomas Chatterton." NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 31 TRANSCRIPTS OF THE RECOVERED "ROWLEY" MSS. (See pages 10 to 16. ) I.— "SONGE TO JEhLA." To JOHNE LYDGATE. Welle then, goode Johne, sythe ytte muste needes be soe, Ande I ande thou a boutynge matche muste have, Lette ytt ne breakynge of oulde friendshyppe goe, Thys ys the onelie all-a-boone I crave. Remember Stowe, a Brystowe Carmalyte, Who whanne Johne Clarkynge, one of myckle lore, Dydd throwe hys gauntlette-penne, wyth hym to fyghte, Hee shewed smalle witte, and showd hys weaknesse more. This ys mie formaunce, whyche I nowe have wrytte, The best performance of mie lyttel wytte. SONGE to ^LLA.i Oh thou, orr what remaynes of thee, JELl.A, the darlynge of futurity, Lett thys mie songe as thie courage be. As everlastynge to posteritye. Whanne Dacya's sonnes, whose hayres of bloude redde hue Lyche kynge-cuppes brastynge wythe the morning due, Arraung'd ynne dreare arraie, , Upponne the lethale daie, (i) Ac the foot of the manuscript are written the words : " Lord of the castel of Brystowe ynne daies of yore." 32 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. Spredde farre and wyde onne Watchets shore ; Than dyddst thou furiouse stande, And bie thie valyante hande Beesprengedd all the mees wythe gore. Drawne bie thyne anlace felle, Downe to the depthe of helle Thousandes of Dacyanns went ; Brystowannes, menne of myghte Ydar'd the bloudie fyghte, And actedd deeds full quent. Oh thou, whereer (thie bones at reste) Thye Spryte to haunte delyghteth beste, Whetherr upponne the bloude-embrewedd pleyne, Or whare thou kennst fromm farre The dysmall crye of warre, Orr seest somme mountayne made of corse of slayne ; Orr seest the hatchedd stede, Ypraunceynge o'er the mede, And neighe to be amenged the pojnictedd Speeres ; Orr ynne blacke armoure staulke arounde Embattel'd Brystowe, once thie grounde, And glowe ardurous onn the Castle steeres ; Orr fierye round the mynsterr glare ; Stylle lette Brystowe be made thie care ; Guarde ytt fromme foemenne & consumynge fyre ; Lyche Avones streme ensyrke ytte rounde, Ne lette a flame enharme the grounde, Tylle ynne one flame all the whole worlde expyre. NEW LIGHTS OM CHATTERTON. 33 The underwritten Lines were composed by JOHN LYDGATE, a Priest in London, and sent to Rowlie, as an Answer to the preceding Songe to ^Ua. JOHN LYDGATES ANSWER. Havynge wythe mouche attentyonn reade Whatt youe dydd to mee sende, Admyre the varses mouche I dydd, And thus an answer lende. Amonge the Greeces Homer was A Poet mouche renownde, Amonge the Latyns Vyrgilius Was beste of Poets founde. The Brytishe Merlyn oftenne hanne The gyfte of inspyratyone, And Afled to the Saxonne menne Dydd synge wythe elocatyone. In Norman tymes, Turgottus ande Good Chaucer dydd excelle, Then Stowe, the Bryghtstowe Carmelyte, Dydd beare awaie the belle. Nowe Rowlie ynne these mokie dayes Lendes owte hys shynynge lytes. And Turgotus and Chaucer lyves Ynne every thynge he wrytes. 34 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. II.— The "Yellow Roll." Of the AUNTIAUNT FORME of MONIES, carefuUie gottene for Mayster W"" Canynge by mee Tho^ Rowleie. Greete was the wysdom of him who sayde ' The whole Worlde is to no one Creature, whereof every Manne ande Beaste is a Member ; ne Mane lyveth therefore for hymself but for his fellowe creeture.' Excellent ande pythey was the saying of Mr. Canynges ' Trade is the Soule of the Worlde, but Moneie the Soule of Trade' Ande alas Moneie is nowe the Soule of Manie — The Age when Metalles fyrste passed for moneie is uncouthe as Oxen ande Sheepe is thought to have beene the moste erlie Moneie or Change. Butte itte is stylle more dyffycyle to fyx the fyrst tyme of starapeynge ytte as Abrahame is sayde toe have yeven Sheikylls bie wayghte An Ebrewe wryter sayethe that in the Dales of Joshua the Ebrewes enstamped theyre Moneie wythe Symboles of the Tabernacles Vessylles, butte I thynke the fyrste enstampyes came from Heathenn Ammulets, whyche were marked wythe the Image of theyre IdoUe, and Preestes dyd carrie frome House to House begginge or ratherre demandeynge , ofTeryngs to theyre Idolle — The Ebrewes who scomyde notte to learne Inyquytye frome theyre Captyves, ande vaynlie thynkeynge as in otherre thynges toe Coppie other Natyons myghte take up thys ensample ande enstamped theyre Moneie in the oulde [tyme] of Joshua beeynge male happe one of the Idolatries mentyoned in Holye Texte. — Examyne ynto Antiquytie & you wylle fynde the folke of Athens stamped an Owlette the Byrde of Athenae, the Sycylyans Fyre the Symbole of theyre Godde Volcanne, theie of Egypt a Couchaunt Creeture wythe a Lyones Boddy and Hawkes Heade Symbol of theyre Godde Osyrys Butte to come to owre Countrie : Oure Fyrste Fathers the Brytones used Yron & Brasse Rynges Some round and some shaped Like an Egge. Eleven of these were founde in the Gardenne of Galfrydus Coombe on Sayncte Mychaels Hylle, bie theyre dysposytyonne in the Grounde seemed NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 35 toe have [been] strunge onne a Strynge, ande were alle Marqued on the Insyde thus M. Lykewyse is in Maystre Canynges Cabynet an Amulett of Brytyshe Characters peerced at the Toppe. — Julyus Caesars Coynes were the fyrst enstamped Moneies usede ynne Englande After whom the Brytonnes coyned as followes. Tenantius at Caer Brytoe Belgar ande Cunobelynus at sundrie places butte notte at Caer Brytoe. Arvyragus at Caer Brytoe, Maryus at Caer Brytoe, Bassianus at Caer Brytoe. Syke was the multy- tude of Moneies bie coynes upon Vyctoryes and sykelyke that neyther anie Kynge tyll Arthurres tyme coyned Quantytye of Metalle for anie Use nor dyd Arthurre make Moneie butte a peece of Silverre toe bee worne rounde of those who had wonne Honour in Battles — Edelbarte Kynge of Kente was the fyrste Chrystened Kynge ande Coyner in Kente — Cheulyne or Ceawlynus of the Weste Saxonnes, Ethylwach of the Suthe Sexonnes Sledda of the Easte Sexonnes ^rpenwaldus of the Easte Angles Adelfryde of the Northe Humbers, ande Wulverus of the Mercians. The Pieces coyned bie the Saxonnes were cleped Pennyes ande thryce the Value of our Penyes. Inne Adelstanes reygne two Coyners were inne Brystowe ande one at Wyckwarre at which two Places was made a peece clepen Twae Pennyes. Golde was not coynede tylle the tyme of Edwardus but Byzantes of Constantinople was inne use, some whereof contayned Fowre Markas alias Mancas some two some one ande some lesse and more. Robert Rouse earle of Gloucester erected Hys Mynte at Brystowe ande coined the best Moneie of anie of the Baronnes. Henrie Secundus graunted to the Lorde of Brystowe Castle the Ryghte of Coynynge, ande the Coynynge of the Lorde wente currante untoe the Reygne of Henricus the thyrde the Coyne was on one Syde a Ram- paunte Lyonne with ynne a Strooke or bende Synister ande on the other the Armes of Brystowe. Eke had the Maiere Lybertie of coynynge ande did coyne several coynes, manie of whyche are inne mie seconde Rolle of Moneies — Kynge Henrycus Sex. offered Maystre Canynge the Ryghte of coynynge whyche he refused wherupon Galfrydus Ocamlus who was wyth Maystre Canynge 36 NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. and mieself concerninge the aforesayde Kjmges sayde, Naie bie Saynte polls Crosse had I such an offer, I woulde coyne Lead & make mie Law makeynge Hyndes take ytte. No Doubte (sayd Maystre Canynge) but you dyspende Heavenne to gette Goulde but I dyspende Goulde to gette Heaven. Thus much for coynes. ENGLANDES GLORYE revyved in Maystre Canynge. Being some Accomte of hys Cabynet of Auntiaunte Monumentes. To prayse thys auntyant Reposytorye male not be befyttynge in mee Seeynge I gotten it moste but I am almoste the onlye Manne acquaynted wyth all of ytte ande moste it is the most pretyous performaunce in Englande. The fyrst thynge at youre Entrance is a Stonen Bedde, whyche was manie Yeeres kepte in Tower Errys, ande belonged to Erie Bythryck. Rounde the Cabynette are Coynes on greete Shelfes fetyvelie payncted. The Coynes are of Greece Venyce Rome France ande Englande from the daies of Julyus Cassar to thys present, consystynge of Denaryy Penys Ores Mancas Bayzantynes Holly Land Moneie of whych Penys Denaryy ande Twapennyes there are coyned ynne Brystowe fowretie ande Nyne of dyffraunte Sortes; Baronness Moneie Citie Moneie Abbye Moneie to decryde the Coynes ande Moneie woulde fylle a redde RoUe. Goe wee thenne to the other thynges. The Greete Ledger is a Gemme wordye the Crowne of a Kynge. It contayneth the Workes of Turgotte, a Saxonne Monke, as foUowes. Battle of Hastynge, ynne Anglo-Saxonne, donne moe playne bie mee for Maystre Canynge. Hystorie of Bryghtstowe inne Saxonnes Latynne translated for W"" C. bie Mee — Auntyaunte Coynes withe the Hystoryee of [the] fyrste coyninge by the Saxonne done from Sexonne into Englyshe. Hystorie of S . . . . Churche of Durham. Alle these ynne Latynne. Lyfe of Byghtrycrus, Kynge of the Weste Saxones, and Annalles from him to NEW LIGHTS ON CHATTERTON. 37 Byghtrickus the Erie. AUe thys ynne Englyshe. — Neere is mie unworthie Roules, beeynge a fynyshinge of Turgotte to the Reygne of Edwarde the — . My Volume of Verses wyth Letters toe ande from Johne Lydgate. My owne Hystorye of Moneies Collectyon of Monyments, &c. Lykewyse the verie Lettre sent bie the Lordes Rycharde of York Warwyck ande Sarysburye, to Kynge Henrie. Inne one Corner of the Cabynet is a Syghte moste terryble beynge alia Instruements of Warre raunged in suche arraie that in the I-yghte of the Sunne or comeynge of a Lycandle, it shyneth most marivellous to behoulde ytte ys of Brytysh Swordes and Sheeldes, whych prove the auntyquytye of Armoureye beeynge marqued some wythe an Ivie Leefe, some an Oke Leafe some wyth a Hare or Hounde ande such lyke. Roman Speeres ande Bucklers, Lykewyse Blazonede, but alle of the same Charge. Saxonne Swordes or Seaxes and Sheeldes, blazonde wythe a Crosse patee. Danyshe Battle Axes and Sheeldes, blazoned wyth a Rafen. The Armor and laste Testamente of Robert Rouse, Consul of Gloucester, The Gauntlette of Roberte, Sonne of W"" the Conquerour, whych he lefte behynde hym in Brystowe Castle. Syrre Charles Bawdwynne a Fullforde commonlie cleped Baudynne Fullforde his Bonde toe the Kynge Henrye to take the Erie of Warwyckes Lyfe or lose hys heade, whych he dyd not perform, but lost his head to Kynge Edwarde. Thus muche for the Cabinette. ^^ ^■^\Xox.. .t'ly •(V'l**^ . / 1 ^'i c^^-i V -i«a^'/ '■ &■;♦'! 7?i :*m;2 «w?iij^-is >i>!^vM;iA^ •r.imcwjto^ '^iiu.^F^?^\tr.r ^' 5> t'iSt^ ^^*ir;.^' lis:. !i4'9l^!< ?yt« ^ PARCHMENT FORGED BY CHATTERTON containing Rowley's Verses to- Lydgate, the Song to JE\h, and Lydgate's answer, Reproduced from the original «oiv in the possession of Mr. William T^ose Sfnith, C.B. V **»^. >**M. A»»i4#^ 4A.-^k. ^ V^« ^j^^ ^.-c.^fefe.^«.:6...>>^-.,....:^. Z^^T^'*''^'^^ »*ite^-:JTi;.u^, oiai ,>M«U>« i«*^^(^ eiiu ivtfu£u». tfeWUo^^ •o(V^^«=^^i*«Jfe^^5g* V Jllgy^ JUl SfiH^-- «?Lt4^ut^ i^O^ekJU-'s^ ScXL^t*^ "•f CilSi^Ca; ^^^S-tti^ tAsaCtoCtM^P^J CHATTERTON'S "YELLOW ROLL" containing "The Auntiaunt Forme of Monies," and " Englandes Glorye revyve 'Reproduced from the original "T^yv/ey" parchment novr in the possession of Mr. Wi ■•rijp? ■^'"*"^-*''*.x-*» ■*t*twv,.w.». "SrW*^T'**^-*T' ..^-^^uA, ;:^,^.„..^6..^ ^, ?re.j,^.^. t&.?^.„ ^;^,. .^^ #wp,>^*,.„;..,^,<-,a,.<,«i^-. ^iAi»&'»uu^<«»^ws*»i6, " ^'^»-'-s^^^^iV'«tuit:s>4^^4H.<,a> t^^^i.ij-.Vt>u,*)^(^t,^ c^oui^^^ ;i)«,; D iSstuia^a" uu-iidi;^^ *3hfe i?><»aK^ oj^a.- i.\^\ji.ia,s> ^Z" C(J^tKmtu}>-fefe tta(r, c*.-' t^A \TTERTON'S "YELLOW ROLL" irme of Monies," and " Englandes Glorye revived in Maystre Canynge." ^'l{oypley" parchment noyv in the possession of Mr. William T{ose Smith., Q.B.