THOMAS, a highly-gifted but ill-starred poet, was born at Bristol, November 20, 1752. His father, who had been originally an usher in a classical academy, and ultimately became master of the free school of Bristol, died three months before his son was born. At the early age of five the future poet was sent to the school in which his father had latterly taught; but so far was he from giving any indication of talent, that he was regarded alike by his teachers and his fellow pupils as an incorrigible dunce. At the end of a year and a half he was withdrawn from school, without having mastered the letters of the alphabet. Upon his mother now devolved the care of educating him. She happened to have in her possession an old black-letter manuscript, from which she proceeded to teach him the alphabet. His progress now became as rapid as it had formerly been slow. He very soon learned to read, and he had hardly mastered this accomplishment when he was visited by dreams of future distinction. When asked by a manufacturer, who had given him a small present of china-ware, what device he would like to have painted on it, he replied, "Paint me an angel with wings, and a trumpet to trumpet my name over the world." In 1760, before he had quite attained his eighth year, he became a pupil of Colston's charity school, at which he remained till 1767. During this period he made rapid progress in the branches taught at that institution, and distinguished himself besides by his poetical attempts, which were generally of a satiric tendency. By far the most remarkable of these youthful productions is the Hymn for Christmas Day. If we contrast the harmony and ease of expression displayed in this poem with the boyhood and inexperience of the author, we must pronounce it astonishing. During these seven years of his life, he was for the most part thoughtful and reserved, took no interest or share in boisterous sports, was subject to fits of melancholy, and spent all his spare time in miscellaneous reading.

On leaving Colston's school, he was apprenticed to a scrivener in his native city. Though he was now compelled to perform the most menial offices, and was kept hard at work for twelve hours of the day, he nevertheless found time to amass great stores of knowledge in his favourite pursuits of heraldry and antiquities. The results of these studies he next year turned to account, by beginning a series of literary impositions, unparalleled in the history of letters. In 1768, a new bridge was opened at Bristol. Chatterton sent to the editor of a local newspaper a minute account of the ceremonies which had inaugurated the opening of the old bridge, as described in an ancient manuscript, which he said he had found in an old coffer in the church of St Mary Redcliffe. To a pewterer of the town, by name Burgum, who was ambitious of heraldic honours, he gave a long pedigree, tracing his genealogy from the times of the Norman Conquest, and his connexion with the noble family of De Ber-Chatterton. To a theologian of Bristol he gave a fragment of a sermon on the divinity of the Holy Spirit, written by Thomas Rowley a monk of the 15th century; and to the historian of the city he supplied an account of all the churches of Bristol as they existed three hundred years before, with a minute description and plans of the castle, likewise purporting to be the work of Rowley. To Horace Walpole, who was at that time writing the history of British painters, he sent an account of the eminent "carvellers and peyncters who once flourished in Bristol." The skill with which all these forgeries were conducted was such, that not one of the Bristol literati entertained a suspicion of their genuineness, and Walpole himself was for a time deceived. To this must be attributed the coldness with which he regarded Chatterton during his life, and the bitterness with which he treated his memory after he was dead. Walpole's own forgeries, ingenious as they were, had been far too easily detected and too bitterly exposed for him not to view with distrust the similar attempts of any one else. Accordingly, when he received from the scrivener's apprentice of Bristol a roll of manuscript purporting to have been found in "Canyng's coffer" in the tower of St Mary Redcliffe, his suspicions were awakened; but, finding himself unable to pronounce a verdict on the matter, he called in the assistance of the poets Gray and Mason. After a careful scrutiny, Gray decided that the Rowley poems were forgeries, and in this decision he was completely borne out by Mason. Walpole had given a promise to assist the unknown and unbefriended antiquarian of Bristol; but his vanity had been wounded, and from this time he turned a deaf ear to all Chatterton's solicitations. He even refused to return the young poet his manuscripts, and it was only after the threat of an action at law that he restored them without a word of comment or encouragement. This silence provoked Chatterton, who avenged himself by a bitterly satirical attack on the cowardice and unworthiness of Walpole's conduct. The controversy soon began to attract considerable attention in London; and many persons, strongly convinced of the genuineness of the Rowley poems, undertook their defence, though with more zeal than success. Evidence, however, stronger than any of the moral evidence adduced on either side, was brought forward some years after Chatterton's death by Warton, Tyrwhit, Malone, and others of the more acute antiquarians of the day, which ought to have set the question at rest for ever. As late as 1834, however, a "Vindication" of Chatterton appeared, which the most partial of critics were obliged to pronounce completely unsuccessful. Meanwhile, without entering at all into the question of the moral guilt which has been imputed to Chatterton, we can only regret that he so sadly misdirected a genius that might have made his name respected as a benefactor of the human race, and earned for him a high place among the poets of England.

In the meantime the poet was working busily at his Rowley manuscripts. He slept little and wrote much during the night, especially if the moon were up; for he believed that the influence of that planet inspired him for his work. His eccentricities, combined with his sceptical views on religious matters, induced his master to break his indentures; and in 1770, Chatterton, without friends or introductions, set off to seek his fortune in London. His prospects at first were sufficiently bright, and he used laughingly to observe, that if all other means of subsistence failed, he would become a Methodist preacher. He began his literary career in the metropolis by contributing to various magazines and reviews. He likewise wrote political letters which gained for him both money and repute, besides sermons for dull clergymen, and burlettas for Vauxhall. By these and such means he was enabled for a while not only to maintain himself, but to re- mit small sums to his mother and sister in his native town. But persecution followed him wherever he went, and his unconquerable pride would never allow him to vindicate himself in the manner that his better judgment might have suggested. For five months he maintained the desperate struggle, confiding to no one the history of his wrongs and sufferings. At the end of that period, finding himself utterly destitute, and without the prospect either of present relief or future success, he tore into shreds all his manuscripts, and after spending three days without food, bought with his last penny a little arsenic. On the following morning he was found dead in his miserable garret, and that same night was interred in the pauper burying-ground of Shoe-Lane.

Though Chatterton was below the middle height, his bearing was proud and manly. His eyes, like Lord Byron's, were gray; and, as was also the case with that poet, one of them was more brilliant than the other. Posterity has granted to him the meed of honour which his own generation withheld from him. Byron has praised him; Shelley has acknowledged his "solemn agency;" Wordsworth has thought of him as "the marvellous boy, the sleepless soul that perished in his pride;" Coleridge has apostrophized him in a pathetic monody; Keats has dedicated Endymion to his memory; and Alfred de Vigny has made his history and character the subject of one of his most interesting dramas.

(J.C.—L.)