historian of English poetry, accorded to that monk in 1778 a distinct place among the poets of the fifteenth century; while Dean Milles, the president of the Society of Antiquaries, published in 1782 his superb edition in 4to of the ‘Rowley Poems,’ with elaborate commentaries in proof of their authenticity. Arguments one way or the other, however, have long since ceased. By internal and external evidence alike Chatterton is now known to have been the one sole author of these productions. The proofs are abundant. The Rowleyan dialect is of no age, but rather, as Mathias expresses it, ‘a faetitious ancient diction at once obsolete and heterogeneous.' In the mere penmanship of the so-called originals there is a more than suspicious absence of the old contractions, with a super-abundance of capitals, rare in antique manuscripts. The poems swarm with anachronisms in statements of fact. and in style and metre. There are many plagiarisms, besides, from later writers.
Neale, the author of the ‘Romance of History,' truly says (Lectures, ii. 75): ‘Perhaps there never was a more slender veil of forgery woven than that which he threw around his pretended ancient productions.` Yet forgery is hardly the word; for, after all, the most heinous charge directed against Chatterton can only in fairness be thus summed up now, as it was in 1782, by Henry Maty’s ‘New Review’ (pp. 218-33): ‘Gentlemen of the jury, the prisoner at the bar is indicted for the uttering certain poems composed by himself, purporting them to be the poems of Thomas Rowley, a priest of the fifteenth century, against. the so frequently disturbed peace of Parnassus, to the great disturbance and confusion of the Antiquary Society, and likewise notoriously to the prejudice of the literary fame of the said Thomas Chatterton.’ Southey’s letter in the ‘Monthly Magazine' for November 1799, announcing the subscription edition of Chatterton’s works, which was eventually published in 1803 for the benefit of his family, secured comfort at last to his surviving relatives, whose only pecuniary benefit from his poems until then had amounted to seventeen guineas. Lewis, a Bristol artist, painted a well-known picture of Chatterton in the lumber-room, which, though a mezzo-tinto, passed eventually into a wide circulation. Two dramas, each entitled ‘Chatterton,’ have been produced; one in France by Alfred de Vigny, and one in England by Messrs. Jones and Herman in collaboration, which was first performed at the Princess's Theatre on 22 May 1884. A cenotaph was erected, by public subscription, in his native place in 1840, and afterwards re-erected in 1857 (see Bristol Past and Present, iii. 348), near the north-east angle of Redcliffe churchyard. Shelley celebrates Chatterton in ‘Adonais.’ Coleridge dedicates to his memory his most impassioned ‘Monody.' Keats inscribes to him lovingly his maiden poem ‘Endymion.' Horace Walpole says of Chatterton, ‘I do not believe there ever existed so masterly a genius.’ Joseph Warton declares that he was ‘a prodigy of genius, and would have proved the first. of English poets had he reached a mature age.' Dr. Johnson said of him, ‘This is the most extraordinary young man that has encountered my knowledge.' Malone declared him to be ‘the greatest genius that England has produced since the days of Shakespeare.’ Britton, Southey, Wordsworth, Byron, Moore, Scott, Campbell, have all spoken of him in the highest terms, and Dante Gabriel Rossetti, besides inditing in his honour one of the noblest sonnets in the language (see Hall Caine, Recollections of Rossetti, p. 186), speaks of him elsewhere (ib. chap. vi.) as ‘the absolutely miraculous Chatterton, and declares him to be, without any reservation, ‘as great as any English poet whatever.'
Chatterton’s appearance has been described by those who were familiar with it. According to them all he was well grown and manly, having a proud air and a stately bearing. Whenever he cared to ingratiate himself, he is said to have been exceedingly repossessing; though as a rule he bore himself as a conscious and acknowledged superior. His eyes, which were grey and very brilliant, were evidently his most remarkable feature. One was brighter than the other (Gent. Mag. new ser. x. 133), appearing even larger than the other when flashing under strong excitement. George Catcott describes it as ‘a kind of hawk’s eye,’ adding that ‘one could see his soul through it.’ Barrett, who had observed him keenly as an anatomist, said ‘he never saw such eyes—fire rolling at the bottom of them.' He acknowledged to Sir Herbert Croft (Love and Madness, p. 272) that he had often purposely differed in opinion from Chatterton ‘to see how wonderfully his eye would strike fire, kindle, and blaze up!’
Eight reputed portraits of Chatterton are said to be in existence. But of these one alone is of indisputable authenticity.
- ‘Hogarth’s Portrait of Chatterton,’ so entitled, was on view in 1867 at the second special exhibition of national portraits in South Kensington. It was lent by the Salford Royal Museum. To that institution it had been presented a few years previously by Alderman Thomas Agnew, the picture dealer. But it is most certainly not a portrait of Chatterton.
