anybody's while to read. To begin with, there are all the volumes and
pamphlets concerning themselves with the question whether the Rowley
poems were written by Chatterton or by Rowley, or by both (Chatterton
adding matter of his own to existing poems written in the fifteenth
century), or by neither. It may be said that these problems were not
conclusively and finally solved till Professor Skeat brought out his
edition of Chatterton in 1871.
Then again there are the various lives of the poet; for the most part
mere random aggregations of such facts, true or imagined, as fell
in the editor's way, filled out with pulpit commonplaces and easy
paragraphs beginning 'But it is ever the way of Genius ...' Professor
Wilson's _Chatterton: a Biographical Study_ is as final in its own way
as Professor Skeat's two volumes. It is a scholarly compilation of
all previous accounts, very well digested and arranged. Moreover,
the Professor has for the most part left the facts to tell their
own story; and thus his book is free from such absurdities as the
sentimental regrets of Gregory and Professor Masson that Chatterton
was led into a course of folly ending in suicide through being
deprived of a father's care. Such a father as Chatterton's was!
While premising that any one who wishes to learn the facts of the
boy-poet's life--his circumstances and surroundings--can find them
all set forth in Professor Wilson's book: while equally if he is
interested in the pseudo-Rowley's language, philologically considered,
he will find this elaborately examined in Professor Skeat's second
volume; it has been thought that the following bibliography of books
dealing with various aspects of the poet which were read and valued in
their day may be found of interest to students of literary history.
1598. Speght's edition of Chaucer, the glossary of which Chatterton
used in the compilation of his Rowley Dictionary.
1708. Kersey's _Dictionarium Anglo-Britannicum_, and
1737. Bailey's _Universal Etymological Dictionary_. (8th Enlarged
Edition.) Bailey is largely copied from Kersey, but Chatterton
certainly used both dictionaries in making his antique language.
1777. Tyrwhitt's edition of the Rowley poems. Tyrwhitt was
Chatterton's first editor and in his edition many of the poems
were printed for the first time. 'The only really good edition is
Tyrwhitt's.' 'This exhibits a careful and, I believe, extremely
accurate text ... an excellent account of the MSS. and transcripts
from which it was derived. It is a fortunate circumstance that the
first editor was so thoroughly competent.' (Professor Skeat, Introd.
to Vol. II of his 1871 edition.)
1778. Tyrwhitt's third edition, from which the present edition is
printed. With this was printed for the first time 'An appendix ...
tending to prove that the Rowley poems were written not by any ancient
author but entirely by Thomas Chatterton.' This edition follows the
first nearly page for page; but was reset.
1780. _Love and Madness_ by Sir Herbert Croft. This strange book
deserves a brief description as it is the source of almost all our
knowledge of Chatterton.
A certain Captain Hackman, violently in love with a Miss Reay,
mistress of the Earl of Sandwich, and stung to madness by his jealousy
and the hopelessness of his position, had in 1779 shot her in the
Covent Garden Opera House and afterwards unsuccessfully attempted
to shoot himself. Enormous public interest was excited, and
Croft--baronet, parson, and literary adventurer--got hold of copies
which Hackman had kept of some letters he had sent to the charming
Miss Reay. These he published as a sensational topical novel in
epistolary form, calling it _Love and Madness_. This is quite worth
reading for its own sake, but much more so for its 49th letter,
which purports to have been written by Hackman to satisfy Miss Reay's
curiosity about Chatterton. As a matter of fact Croft, who had been
very interested in the boy-poet and had collected from his relations
and those with whom he had lodged in London all they could
possibly tell him, wrote the letter himself and included it rather
inartistically among the genuine Hackman-Reay correspondence. Amongst
other valuable matter, this letter 49 contains a long account of her
brother by Mary Chatterton.--(See _Love letters of Mr. Hackman and
Miss Reay_, 1775-79, introduction by Gilbert Burgess: Heinemann,
1895.) 1774-81. Warton's _History of English Poetry_, in Volume II of
which there is an account of Chatterton.
1781. Jacob Bryant's _Observations upon the Poems of T. Rowley in
which the authenticity of those poems is ascertained_. Bryant was a
strong Pro-Rowleian and argues cleverly against the possibility of
Chatterton's having written the poems. He shows that Chatterton in his
notes often misses Rowley's meaning and insists that he neglected to
explain obvious difficulties because he could not understand them.
Bryant is the least absurd of the Pro-Rowleians.
1782. Dean Milles' edition of the Rowley poems--a splendid quarto with
a running commentary attempting to vindicate Rowley's authenticity.
Milles was President of the Society of Antiquaries and his commentary
is characterized by Professor Skeat as 'perhaps the most surprising
trash in the way of notes that was ever penned.
1782. Mathias' _Essay on the Evidence ... relating to the poems called
Rowley's_--he is pro-Rowleian and criticizes Tyrwhitt's appendix.
1782. Thomas Warton's _Enquiry ... into the Poems attributed to Thomas
Rowley_--Anti-Rowleian.
1782. Tyrwhitt's _Vindication_ of his Appendix. Tyrwhitt had
discovered Chatterton's use of Bailey's Dictionary and completely
refutes Bryant, Milles, and Mathias. It may be observed in passing
that though Goldsmith upheld Rowley, Dr. Johnson, the two
Wartons, Steevens, Percy, Dr. Farmer, and Sir H. Croft pronounced
unhesitatingly in favour of the poems having been written by
Chatterton: while Malone in a mocking anti-Rowleian pamphlet shows
that the similes from Homer in the _Battle of Hastings_ and elsewhere
have often borrowed their rhymes from Pope!
1798. _Miscellanies in Prose and Verse_ by Edward Gardner (two
volumes). At the end of Volume II there is a short account of the
Rowley controversy and, what is more important, the statement that
Gardner had seen Chatterton antiquate a parchment and had heard him
say that a person who had studied antiquities could with the aid of
certain books (among them Bailey) 'copy the style of our elder poets
so exactly that the most skilful observer should not be able to detect
him. "No," said he, "not Mr. Walpole himself."' But perhaps this
should be taken _cum grano_.
1803. Southey and Cottle's edition in three volumes with an account
of Chatterton by Dr. Gregory which had previously been published as an
independent book. Southey and Cottle's edition is very compendious so
far as matter goes, and contains much that is printed for the first
time. Gregory's life is inaccurate but very pleasantly written.
1837. Dix's life of Chatterton, with a frontispiece portrait of
Chatterton aged 12 which was for a long time believed to be authentic.
No genuine portrait of Chatterton is known to be in existence;
probably none was ever made. Dix's life, not a remarkable work in
itself, has some interesting appendices; one of which contains a
story--extraordinary enough but well supported--that Chatterton's
body, which had received a pauper's burial in London, was secretly
reburied in St. Mary's churchyard by his uncle the Sexton.
1842. Willcox's edition printed at Cambridge; on the whole a slovenly
piece of work with a villainously written introduction.
1854. George Pryce's _Memorials of Canynges Family_; which contains
some notes of the coroner's inquest on Chatterton's body, which would
have been most interesting if authentic, but were in fact forged by
one Gutch.
1856. _Chatterton: a biography_ by Professor Masson--published
originally in a volume of collected essays; re-published and in
part re-written as an independent volume in 1899. The Professor
reconstructs scenes in which Chatterton played a part; but it is
suggested (with diffidence) that his treatment is too sentimental, and
the boy-poet is Georgy-porgied in a way that would have driven him
out of his senses, if he could have foreseen it. The picture is
fundamentally false.
1857. _An Essay on Chatterton_ by S.R. Maitland, D.D., F.R.S., and
F.S.A. A very monument of ignorant perversity. The writer shamelessly
distorts facts to show that Chatterton was an utterly profligate
blackguard and declares finally that neither Rowley nor Chatterton
wrote the poems.
1869. Professor D. Wilson's _Chatterton: a Biographical Study_, and
1871. Professor W.W. Skeat's _Poetical Works of Thomas Chatterton_ (in
modernized English) of which mention has been made above.
1898. A beautifully printed edition of the Rowley poems with decorated
borders, edited by Robert Steele. (Ballantyne Press.)
1905 and 1909. The works of Chatterton, with the Rowley poems in
modernized English, edited with a brief introduction by Sidney Lee.
1910. _The True Chatterton--a new study from original documents_ by
John H. Ingram. (Fisher Unwin.)
Besides all these serious presentations of Chatterton there are a
number of burlesques--such as _Rowley and Chatterton in the Shades_
(1782) and _An Archæological Epistle to Jeremiah Milles_ (1782),
which are clever and amusing, and three plays, two in English, and
one in French by Alfred de Vigny, which represents the love affair of
Chatterton and an apocryphal Mme. Kitty Bell.
The whole of Chatterton's writings--Rowley, acknowledged poems, and
private letters, have been translated into French prose. _Oeuvres
complètes de Thomas Chatterton traduites par Javelin Pagnon, précédées
d'une Vie de Chatterton par A. Callet_ (1839). Callet's treatment of
Chatterton is very sympathetic and interesting.
Finally for further works on Chatterton the reader is referred to
Bohn's Edition of Lowndes' _Bibliographer's Manual_--but the most
important have been enumerated above.
IV. NOTE ON THE TEXT.
This edition is a reprint of Tyrwhitt's third (1778) edition, which it
follows page for page (except the glossary; see note on p. 291). The
reference numbers in text and glossary, which are often wrong in 1778,
have been corrected; line-numbers have been corrected when wrong, and
added to one or two poems which are without them in 1778, and the text
has been collated throughout with that of 1777 and corrected from it
in many places where the 1778 printer was at fault. These corrections
have been made silently; all other corrections and additions are
indicated by footnotes enclosed in square brackets.
V. NOTES.
1. _The Tournament_, lines 7-10.
Wythe straunge depyctures, Nature maie nott yeelde, &c.
'This is neither sense nor grammar as it stands' says Professor Skeat.
But Chatterton is frequently ungrammatical, and the sense of the
passage is quite clear if either of the two following possible
meanings is attributed to _unryghte_.
(1)=to present an intelligible significance otherwise than by
writing--as 'rebus'd shields' do (un-write);
or (2) = to misrepresent (un-right).
With pictures of strange beasts that have no counterpart in Nature and
appear to be purely fantastic ('unseemly to all order') yet none the
less make known to men good at guessing riddles ('who thyncke and
have a spryte') what the strange heraldic forms
express-without-use-of-written-words ('unryghte')--or (taking
the second meaning of unryghte--misrepresent)
present-with-a-disregard-of-truth-to-nature.
2. _Letter to the Dygne Mastre Canynge_, line 15.
Seldomm, or never, are armes vyrtues mede, (that is to say, coats of arms)
Shee nillynge to take myckle aie dothe hede
i.e. 'She unwilling to take much aye doth heed'; 'which is nonsense'
says Prof. Skeat. But the sentence is an example of ellipse, a figure
which Chatterton affected a good deal, and fully expressed would run
'She--not willing to take much, ever doth heed not to take
much', which would of course be intolerably clumsy but perfectly
intelligible.
3. _Ælla_, line 467.
Certis thie wordes maie, thou motest have sayne &c.
Prof. Skeat 'can make nothing of this' and reads 'Certes thy wordes
mightest thou have sayn'.
A simple emendation of _maie_ to _meynte_ would give very good sense.
4. _Ælla_, line 489.
Tyrwhitt has _sphere_--evidently a mistake in the MS. for _spere_
which he overlooked. It is not included in his errata. In the 1842
edition the meaning 'spear' is given in a footnote.
5. _Englysh Metamorphosis_.
Prof. Skeat was the first to point out that this piece is an imitation
of _The Faerie Queene_, Bk. ii, Canto X, stanzas 5-19.
6. _Battle of Hastings_, II, line 578.
To the ourt arraie of the thight Saxonnes came
Prof. Skeat explains _ourt_ as 'overt' and observes that it
contradicts _thight_, which he renders 'tight'. But really there is
not even an antithesis. _Ourt arraie_ is what a military handbook
calls 'open order' and _thight_ is 'well-built', well put together
(Bailey's Dictionary). The Saxons were well-built men marching in open
order.
VI. APPENDIX.
BRIEF SYNOPSIS OF THE ARGUMENTS USED IN THE ROWLEY CONTROVERSY.
(Taken mainly from Gregory's _Life of Chatterton_.)
_Against Rowley_.
1. So few originals produced--not more than 124 verses.
2. Chatterton had shown (by his article on Christmas games, &c.) that
he had a strong turn for antiquities. He had also written poetry. Why
then should he not have written Rowley's poems?
3. His declaration that the _Battle of Hastings_ I was his own.
4. Rudhall's testimony.
5. Chatterton first exhibited the _Songe to Ælla_ in his own
handwriting, then gave Barrett the parchment, which contained strange
textual variations.
6. Rowley's very existence doubtful.
William of Worcester, who lived at his time and was himself of
Bristol, makes no mention of him, though he frequently alludes to
Canynge. Neither Bale, Leland, Pitts nor Turner mentions Rowley.
7. Improbability of there being poems in a muniment chest. 8. Style
unlike other fifteenth century writings.
9. No mediæval learning or citation of authority to be found in
Rowley; no references to the Round Table and stories of chivalry.
10. Stockings were not knitted in the fifteenth century (_Ælla_). MSS.
are referred to as if they were rarities and printed books common.
11. Metres and imitation of Pindar absurdly modern.
12. Mistakes cited which are derived from modern dictionaries
(Tyrwhitt).
13. Existence of undoubted plagiarisms from Shakespeare, Gray, &c.
_For Rowley_.
1. Chatterton's assertion that they were Rowley's, his sister having
represented him as a 'lover of truth from the earliest dawn of
reason.'
2. Catcott's assertion that Chatterton on their first acquaintance had
mentioned by name almost all the poems which have since appeared in
print (Bryant).
3. Smith had seen parchments in the possession of Chatterton, some as
broad as the bottom of a large-sized chair. (Bryant.)
4. Even Mr. Clayfield and Rudhall believed Chatterton incapable of
composing Rowley's poems.
5. Undoubtedly there were ancient MSS. in the 'cofre'.
6. Chatterton would never have had time to write so much. He did not
neglect his work in the attorney's office and he read enormously.
7. Chatterton made many mistakes in his transcription of Rowley and in
his notes to the poems. (Bryant's main contention.)
8. If Leland never mentioned Rowley it is equally true he says nothing
of Canynge, Lydgate, or Occleve.
_For Rowley_.
1. The poems contain much historical allusion at once true and
inaccessible to Chatterton.
2. The admitted poems are much below the standard of Rowley.
3. The old octave stanza is not far removed from the usual stanza of
Rowley.
4. If Rowley's language differs from that of other fifteenth
century writers, the difference lies in provincialisms natural to an
inhabitant of Bristol.
5. Plagiarisms from modern authors may in some cases have been
introduced by Chatterton but in others they are the commonplaces of
poetry.
_Against Rowley_.
1. No writings or chest deposited in Redcliffe Church are mentioned in
Canynge's Will.
2. The Bristol library was in Chatterton's time of general access, and
Chatterton was introduced to it by Rev. A. Catcott (Warton).
3. Facts about Canynge may be found in his epitaph in Redcliffe
Church; and the account of Redcliffe steeple--(which had been
destroyed by fire before Chatterton's time) came from the bottom of an
old print published in 1746.
4. The parchments were taken from the bottom of old deeds where a
small blank space was usually left--hence their small size.
POEMS,
SUPPOSED TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN AT BRISTOL,
BY THOMAS ROWLEY, AND OTHERS, IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.
POEMS,
SUPPOSED TO HAVE BEEN WRITTEN AT BRISTOL, BY THOMAS ROWLEY,
AND OTHERS, IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY. THE THIRD EDITION; TO
WHICH IS ADDED AN APPENDIX, CONTAINING SOME OBSERVATIONS UPON
THE LANGUAGE OF THESE POEMS; TENDING TO PROVE, THAT THEY WERE
WRITTEN, NOT BY ANY ANCIENT AUTHOR, BUT ENTIRELY BY THOMAS
CHATTERTON.
THE CONTENTS OF THIS VOLUME.
The Preface
Introductory Account of the Several Pieces
Advertisement
Eclogue the First
Eclogue the Second
Eclogue the Third
Elinoure and Juga
Verses to Lydgate
Songe to Ælla
Lydgate's Answer
The Tournament
The Dethe of Syr Charles Bawdin
Epistle to Mastre Canynge on Ælla
Letter to the dygne M. Canynge
Entroductionne
Ælla; a Tragycal Enterlude
Goddwyn; a Tragedie. (A Fragment.)
Englysh Metamorphosis, B.I.
Balade of Charitie
Battle of Hastings, No. 1.
Battle of Hastings, No. 2.
Onn oure Ladies Chyrche
On the same
Epitaph on Robert Canynge
The Storie of William Canynge
On Happienesse, by William Canynge
Onn Johne a Dalbenie, by the same
The Gouler's Requiem, by the same
The Accounte of W. Canynge's Feast
GLOSSARY
PREFACE.
The Poems, which make the principal part of this Collection, have
for some time excited much curiosity, as the supposed productions of
THOMAS ROWLEY, a priest of Bristol, in the reigns of Henry VI. and
Edward IV. They are here faithfully printed from the most authentic
MSS that could be procured; of which a particular description is given
in the _Introductory account of the several pieces contained in this
volume_, subjoined to this Preface. Nothing more therefore seems
necessary at present, than to inform the Reader shortly of the manner
in which these Poems were first brought to light, and of the authority
upon which they are ascribed to the persons whose names they bear.
This cannot be done so satisfactorily as in the words of Mr. George
Catcott of Bristol, to whose very laudable zeal the Publick is
indebted for the most considerable part of the following collection.
His account of the matter is this: "The first discovery of certain MSS
having been deposited in Redclift church, above three centuries ago,
was made in the year 1768, at the time of opening the new bridge at
Bristol, and was owing to a publication in _Farley's Weekly Journal_,
1 October 1768, containing an _Account of the ceremonies observed at
the opening of the old bridge_, taken, as it was said, from a very
antient MS. This excited the curiosity of some persons to enquire
after the original. The printer, Mr. Farley, could give no account of
it, or of the person who brought the copy; but after much enquiry
it was discovered, that the person who brought the copy was a youth,
between 15 and 16 years of age, whose name was Thomas Chatterton, and
whose family had been sextons of Redclift church for near 150 years.
His father, who was now dead, had also been master of the free-school
in Pile-street. The young man was at first very unwilling to discover
from whence he had the original; but, after many promises made to him,
he was at last prevailed on to acknowledge, that he had received this,
_together with many other MSS_, from his father, who had found them
in a large chest in an upper room over the chapel on the north side of
Redclift church."
Soon after this Mr. Catcott commenced his acquaintance with young
Chatterton[1], and, partly as presents partly as purchases, procured
from him copies of many of his MSS. in in prose and verse. Other
copies were disposed of, in the same way, to Mr. William Barrett, an
eminent surgeon at Bristol, who has long been engaged in writing
the history of that city. Mr. Barrett also procured from him several
fragments, some of a considerable length, written upon vellum[2],
which he asserted to be part of his original MSS. In short, in the
space of about eighteen months, from October 1768 to April 1770,
besides the Poems now published, he produced as many compositions,
in prose and verse, under the names of Rowley, Canynge, &c. as would
nearly fill such another volume.
In April 1770 Chatterton went to London, and died there in the August
following; so that the whole history of this very extraordinary
transaction cannot now probably be known with any certainty. Whatever
may have been his part in it; whether he was the author, or only
the copier (as he constantly asserted) of all these productions; he
appears to have kept the secret entirely to himself, and not to have
put it in the power of any other person, to bear certain testimony
either to his fraud or to his veracity.
The question therefore concerning the authenticity of these Poems must
now be decided by an examination of the fragments upon vellum, which
Mr. Barrett received from Chatterton as part of his original MSS.,
and by the internal evidence which the several pieces afford. If the
Fragments shall be judged to be genuine, it will still remain to be
determined, how far their genuineness should serve to authenticate the
rest of the collection, of which no copies, older than those made by
Chatterton, have ever been produced. On the other hand, if the writing
of the Fragments shall be judged to be counterfeit and forged by
Chatterton, it will not of necessity follow, that the matter of
them was also forged by him, and still less, that all the other
compositions, which he professed to have copied from antient MSS.,
were merely inventions of his own. In either case, the decision must
finally depend upon the internal evidence.
It may be expected perhaps, that the Editor should give an opinion
upon this important question; but he rather chooses, for many reasons,
to leave it to the determination of the unprejudiced and intelligent
Reader. He had long been desirous that these Poems should be printed;
and therefore readily undertook the charge of superintending the
edition. This he has executed in the manner, which seemed to him best
suited to such a publication; and here he means that his task should
end. Whether the Poems be really antient, or modern; the compositions
of Rowley, or the forgeries of Chatterton; they must always be
considered as a most singular literary curiosity.
[Footnote 1: The history of this youth is so intimately connected with
that of the poems now published, that the Reader cannot be too early
apprized of the principal circumstances of his short life. He was born
on the 20th of November 1752, and educated at a charity-school on St.
Augustin's Back, where nothing more was taught than reading, writing,
and accounts. At the age of fourteen, he was articled clerk to an
attorney, with whom he continued till he left Bristol in April 1770.