i/e^^rr/ UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT LOS ANGELES b »♦» VINDICATION O F T H E APPENDIX TO THE POEMS, CALLED ROWLEY'S, IN REPLY TO THE ANSWERS O F THE DEAN OF EXETER, JACOB BRYANT, ESQJLJIRE, AND A THIRD ANONYMOUS WRITER; ■VVITH SOME FURTHER OBSERVATIONS UPON THOSE POEMS, AND AN EXAMINATION OF THE EVIDENCE WHICH HAS BEEN PRODUCED IN SUPPORTOF THEIR AUTHENTICITY; r BY THOMAS TYRWHITT. 4^ LONDON: PRINTED FOR T. PAYNE AND SON, CASTLE-STREKT, ST. MARTIN'S. . MDCCLXXXII, r\ <-«, O ) i V 9782 7. r. • • * • • • • •. • • • • • • •••• •••• > • • • • I • • • • • ■ • • • • • • • , • • • • •••• *••• . NEQUE EGO SUM OFFENSU.^ DISPUTATIONE VhSiRA, NEC VOS Oil hNDI DECKBIT, SI QUID FORJE AUiitLS VESTRAS PERSTRfNGET, CUM SCIATIS HANC ESSE EJUSMODl SERMONUM LE=. GEM, JU. iC.UM ANIMI CITKA DAMNUM AFFEC- TUS FKOEERiUi, Tacit. Dialog, de Oratoribus, S ■>! [ m ] THE CONTENTS. A Vindication of the arguments drawn from Lan- CUAGE, in the yirw^r par/ of the Appendix, to prove, that the Poems were not written by Rowley, P. 1—76 Se6^. T. Examination of three fuppofition?;, which have been adopted to evade the force of all argunien s from Language; i. That the Poems arc written in a Provincial dia!e£l, p. 3. 2. That there was no ftandard-language in the xv century, p 6. 3. That the Poenis may have been much altered by the tran- fcriber, p. 8. ScvSl. n. Reply to the anfwers, which have been given to the objeftions in the Appendix, under the first t;ENERAL Head of wirds not ufed by my other author. I. Abessie, p. 11. — 2. Aborne, p. 12. — 3. Abre- DYNGE. The obje A'^^^^i ^ filver coin, p. 95. — St. (i'mrelurgusy St. haidwin, and St. Godwin^ three " fiLirtious^a nts, p. 96. Canynge '/c/ fole founder of Kedciiff Church, p. ^8. KoBert Canvnge not gi'cai-f^randtather of VVilliam, p. 99, The name of CONTENTS. » ofCANYNGE's brother «<5r JOHNfE, butTHOMAS, Ibid. Tratifaftions relative to Sir Baldwin Fulford, p. 100. to Canynge's Ordination, to avoid a marriage propofed by K. Edward, p. io5. Ca- nynge's finey p. 1 12. PART THE THIRD. Examination of the external Evidence for the exijlenct of any Poems under the name of Rowley, p. 1 1 6 — 128. No evidence, that any fuch Poems were dcpofited byCANYNGE in Redcliff Church, either in Canynge'j. vjilL p. ii7 — or in any deed of his, p. 118. Improbability, that the works of Rowley ihould have been preferved in a fingle copy, depofited in a church-chcft ; or, if more copies had exifted, that the name of the author {hould have fo long cfcaped all notice, p. 119. The name of Rowley totally unknown for many years after the clicft, in which his works are fuppol'ed to have been depofited, had been broken open, p. 121. never men- tioned by the Attorney, under whofe infpection the cheft was opened in 1727, p. 123. or by any of the pcrfons, v.ha are related to have had accefs to the MIT. which were left at large, from 1727 to 1765, viz. Chattcrton the father, p. 124. — Perrot and 5i';Vr- cliff, p. 127 — and Mirgany p. 127. PART THE FOURTH. Rcafons for believing that the Poems were all written by I'homas Chattertok, by whom they were full produced, p. 129— to the end. Hi. aflcrtion, that he copied them from his father's Mil! coididered and rc- futetl, p. 130. His pretended originals lhe*.vn to have been probsbly forged by himfelf, p. 133. Examina- tion of the argument drawn from his fuppfcd Wiint of vi CONTENTS. of indnccmfnt to fuch a forgery, p. 150. from his fuppofed want of ability^ 1. of natural parts, p. 144.— 2. oi acquired knovjUdge, p. 145. — 3, of time, p. 152. Vindication of the laitn fart of the Appendix, p. 161. Words in the Poems derived from blunder i of older writers : All A boon, Aumeres, Bawsin, p. 163. Brondeous, BaoNDtD, Brondeynge, BURLIE BRONDE, p. 164. BURLKD, p. 165. ByS- MARE, Bysmarelie, Bismarde, Calke, p. l66* Alyse, Blstoiker, p. 167. Blake, ^lakied, Hancellp-D, p. 168. Shap, p. 169. Ccmparifon of the explanations given by ChattertoN of cer- tain words objected to in the former part of the Ap- pendix, with the explanation of the fame or fimdar words in Kersey, p. 171. The praflice in the Poems of prefixing a to words of all forts, arbitrarily, not jufliflable, p. 172. Additional lift of words de- rived from blunders of Kersey. Attenes, Bes- TADDE, p. I7r. BhvylE, BewOPEK, p I76. Cherisaunei, Ele, p. 177. Entyn, Forgard, FoRswAT, p. 178. Gratche, p. 179. Haile^ Hailie, Lere, p. 180. LissF, p. 181. Obaie, Regrate, p. 182. Semlykeeke, Unliart, p. 183. Wychencref, p. 184. Yspende, p. 185. Con- clufion, that Chatterton, having copied the blun- ders ef Kersey, or fome oiler writer, was the author of the Pocm!«, p. 185. Examination of the argu- irients, which have been particularly urged to prove, that he was only the tranfcriber \ his own declaration, p. 187. His mifeonccptions, or mijlakcs in tranfcribing, p. 189. h{\i mifinteypretutions Q^ words. Lordynge, p. 198. Berten, p. 199. HouTON, p.20O. Defs, p. 202. That the Poems contain many things with which he could not pollibly have been acquainted; Uncommon words; Fald^TOLE, FoRTUNIES, Fruc- TUOUS ENTENIJEMENT, p 2O4. GoULF, MaNCA, p. 205. Guek quotation from Gregory Nazi, nzen, p. 206. Latin quotations, p. 208. Hijlorical fa6ls \ Canynge's ordination and yi'/;^, p. 216, The burning 3 of CONTENTS. vli of RedclifF S[)irc, p. 211. The To, pic Churchy p. 213. Tlie mims in the iJattle of Hartlrigs, p. 214 i>pen!er, IV'itworth^ zx\(\ Ph'hpot. Lincoln (.loth. Eftrild , and invalidate, my obfervations upon the Language of the Poems attributed to RoWley. If 1 Ihould be able, as I truft I fhall be, to fliew that thofe obfervations remain unihaken and uncont?adidted in any ma- terial point, I might perhaps faf6*y leave the con- clufion drawn from them to the judgement of the candid and intelligent reader ; but, in the pre- fcnt ftatc of this controverfy, as the advocates for Rowley have at length releafed their opponents from the difadvantageous neceffity of proving a negative ; as they have condefcended to produce' *' as warmly eng.^ged for, as others were agaihTt me; and '* with this feeming advantage on my fide, at which I have *' had frequent occafion to bhifli, that the former were *' men of the beft charafter for candour and probity as well ♦' as learning and parts, and whom, for that reafon, I for- ** bear, as I ought; to name ; their partiality for mc being " the mere eft'edt of too extenfive a charity and genero- " fity, and which only expofed them to the farcalrns and' '■'■ ridicule of my opponents." Memoirs of Pfalm. by him - felf, p.. 221, A<5 [ 3 ] the evidence, external and internal, by which the claim of this new Poet is fupported ; as more Evidence on that fide, or abler advocates, can fcarcely be expcfted ; I hope I fhall be exciifcd, if, after having difpatched the immediate objcdt of this publication, I take the opportunity of go- ine a little more at largcf into the confideratlon of the whole queftion. I. But, before I attempt a particular defence of my Appendix, it is necefTary for me to take ibme notice of the endeavours, which have been iifcd, to evad^ the force of all arguments which caii be drawn from Language in this cafe. For this purpofe three different fuppofitions have been principally adopted. i. Th.it the Poems are written in a provincial dialcift, and therefore are not reducible to the rules of the ftandard-languagc, 2. That there was no fiandard-language in the XV century, by which they can be tried. 3. That hey may have been altered, and corrupted, in their paffage to us, fo that the anomalies now found in them may have been owing to the tran- fcribers, and not to the author. With refpcdt to' the first of thefc fuppofi:jons, I had laid [App. p. 312. n.], '' that nobody would *' contend, that the poems attributed to Rowley " arc written in any provincial dialedV." I now perceive that this was faid! inconfideratcly : for the very learned Mr. Bryant begins thofe " Ob- B 2 " seryation"s/ [ 4 3 " SERVATIONS, IN which" (if wc may believe his title-page,) the authenticity of these Poems is ascertained," with the following words. ^'^ 07ie of the firft pofitioiis, which I miijl lay '* dozvn, is, thai thefc Poems were written in a '' PROVINCIAL Dialect : according to the idiom *' of the -people, in whofe country the author refided, '' and was probably bornT In another place [p. ic,] he tells us, (upon what authority, I Ihall not now enquire,) that " Rowley was of Somlr- *' setshire." One miofht therefore have ex- pedied, that Mr. Bryant would have proceeded immediately to eilablilh this his firft, and very material, pofition, by defining accurately what he calls a provincial dialect ; by ftating authentically the principal peculiarities of the Somerfetfliire dialedt; and by fhevving, from the poems, that the author adhered to thofe*peculiarities in pre- ference to the more polifncd language of the time. I am forry to fay, that, after a very atten- tive perufal of Mr. Ery ant's book, I am Hill unable to guefs what he means by a provincial diakut (2) ; I cannot fee, that he has any where (2) Mr. Bryant gives us firll two extrads from Caxton; io which, he lays, " we have a clear account of the dialeds- 6f thofe times ; and of the variety of terms, that prevailed in the days of Caxton, which were precifely the days of Rowley." ' But all that I can colled from thofe extracts is, that there were dialects in thofe times, as there are now ; and that as hrodc and rude Kngl'ijhe was fpoken in the weald nf Kait (where Caxton was born) as m an\ place. of [ 5 ] flated the pcculiin-'iLlcs. of the Somerfctfliu-e dh- of England. What i\\Q defaute was, which the Lady ?>l?.r. garct found in Caxron's Englljhc^ is not fpccificd. Her Ladyflup might perhaps be ;is n\cG. ^ pur ijf, as the Attic herb-woman, who detedkd Thcophraftiis for a ftranger ; but no modern critic, I believe, will pteter.d to lay down the peculiarities of the Kentifli dialect from the writings of Caxron. With refpert to tlic uncommon words, wliich may be found in the Vlfions of Pierce Ploivman, if Mr. Bryant had thought proper to point any of them out, I apprehend they might in general be proved to be rather orUiquatcd than provincial ; as thofc undoubtedly are v.hich he has pointed out in Shakfpeare; for to what province of England were the words _/?///;;,', mold-ivarpy and U7>r^, ever peculiar ? Spenfcr's provincialities are evidently afFeiled, and not ded'.icible from any nat\iral dialev!!-. The tran/lation of the JEiuis by Gaiv'ni Douglas is indeed, as Mr. Bryaiit fays, mtircly provincial; but can he be ferious, when he adds, " that much of the fame language is to be found in the f)0"ms attributed to Rowley, and therefore that no book can be applied to preferable to this, in order to authenti- care thole poems, either in refpect to orthography or llyle ?" If this were fo, one might be led to conclude, either that the dialecf^s of Scotland and Somerfetfliire were very fimilar, or that Rowley rejided and v:as probably born in the former, rather than in the latter, diftrict ; but, without coming to any conclufion at prefent, I would wiHi the reader to compare part of a ftanza, which Mr. Bryant, in his 434th page, has quoted froift Gawin Douglas, with an equal number of lines in Rowley, and judge himfelf, how the two writers agree in orthography and Ityle. But it is time to ftate my own idea of a provincial dia- led \ which is, infliort, that it confilh not fo much in the ufe of peculiar words, as in the peculiar pronunciation of common words. The following example from Verltegan, p. 213, will explain my meaning. " Inlkad of pro- nouncing, according as one would fay at London, 31 toouiu eat more cfjecfc if 31 |)3t! it^ the Northern UiUn iaith, ag full tat mare tpcefc cm ac I;a^ct, anil the WeUern B 3 man C 6 3 kd from any written, or even oral, authority (3) ; nor do I find, that a fingle phrafe, or word, ' in the Poems has been proved by him, or the other It'arncd writers on the fame fide, to have been more peculiar to Somerfetfliire than to Yorkfliire. The SECOND fcems to be the favourite fuppo- fition of the Dean of Exeter. He contend^ boldly [p. 513"', " that the criterion of antiquity laid dozvn in the Appendix cannot be ad?nitted, ziith regard either to the ufe, fignrjicatiot?, or in- jledion cf words.'* The criterion laid down in mnn faith. c|juti tit more tf)tttt an t?ja'D it»" Agrees ably to tbefe Ipecimcns, it will be found, I believe, that the fame noun<; and verln are in ufe in moft dia!c«,Ts, and that their principal differences arife from a cr>rnipr propimciation and commixture oi perfonal pro- rouns, nuxiliary verbs, and fiich prrpojitions, conjunfiions'^ and ad'vciln^ as occxir moft frequently. At leaft it mull be allowed, that many inllances of fuch mifpronunciation-, "find irregular combinations of the laft mentioned pares ot ipeech, would probably appear in every page of an author, v.ho'.vrore in a provincial dialeft; whereas all the inftances, v.-hich r\Ir. Bryant has produced in proof of the provin- ciality of Rowley, ^v& Jingle words, which he is pleafed to call provincial ; though many of then) are common words, iifed by Chaucer and other writers, eiiher with or without a fmall variation in orthograj.ihy ; and many of them, for aught that has appeared, were never uled by any body but the writer of thefe Poems, (3) 1 Uiould except the quotation in p. lo, from Alexan- der Gill, where we are told that theWcficrn diale^'^, efpe- eially in Somerfetfliire, was the moft barbarous of any. Of. the two inlhnces tliere given of worils peculiar to Somer- Ijstfliire, viz. lax (or part, nnd toit {or Jcat^ it iij obfervable tiiut neither occurs in the Poerfis. I the C 7 ] the Appendix is the practice of other ivr iters of the fame age ; a criterion, which, I believe, was never before rejcftcd in trying the language of any author (4). If it is now to be rejcdlcd, it muft be upon the fuppofition, that no writers of autho- rity ar-e to be found in the age of the pretended Rowley, with whom he can be compared. But this, one Ihould think, would hardly be main- tained by aiiy one who recollcdtcd, that a century of years, reckoned backwards froi-ji 1474, ^^'^^^ include the mod conijderablc compolitions of Chaucer and Gower, and the whole works of OccLEyE and Lydgate; four aijthors, from whom, I will venture to fay, the ftandard-language of England in their time may be as perfed:ly alcertained, as it can be by any equal number of poets for any fubfequent period of the fame du- ration (5). (d) I miut obferve, that theDcnn hinuclf ieems to have made ufe of this criterion, or one very like it, in p. 4-63, where he pronouiaces the language of two fongs to he too mcdcrnfor the thirteenth centtny. I fliould be glad to know y^, by what criterion he formed this judgement, if not by the '|^' pratl'icc of other writers of that age; aad to what he chiefly attended in examiuiug their language, if not to the uje^ JignlHcatlon^ and injie^ion of words. If by thefe means the Dean was enabled to difcover, that the language of the fongs was too modern for the thnteenlh century^ why may not the fame means enable others to prove, that the Ian- guagc of the Poems attributed to Rowley is too modern for the fifteenth century P (5) The Dean of Exeter has objei^ed [p. 465], " that, inlleatl of adhering to the llandard which I had mvfelf ella- '* ''• B 4 ' ' h\\{\\ti. C 8 ] The THIRD fuppofuion has been occafionally adopted by every defender of Rowley, In order blifiicd, nnd tryinij the biig-iinse of Rowley bv that of his ^ CD 7 ] within another. But this llioukl rather convince us that CoTGRAVK, at Icaft, knew of no fuch Engliih Word as Adcfitc. If he had known of it, he would probably have ufcd it to cxphiin the Freneh, as, a little below, he explains Adherer^ To adhere; Adjiiger^ To adjudge; Adjurer^ TcJ jidjurc, &:c. N6r has he inferted Adente in the Englilh part of his Dl(ftionary ; {q that I am pcr- fuaded he had never heard of fuch an Engliili word. Skinner, many years after Core rave, has inferted Adenty in his clafs of old and obfolete words, upon the fingle authority of one, whom he quotes by the title of Author Diet, Angl, (6) ; (6) From a cortipaiifon of fcveral articles I am per- ftiacled, that tliis Anther DUl. A)igl: whom Skinner hai quoted fo frequently, was no other than Mr. Edwakd I'mi.i.irs, whofe General Engli/h DiLtlonary, entitled. The Nfzv IFotld of IVords^ was firll: pul)liflied foori after the Reftoration. This article in Phillips ftands thus: *' To adent (old word), to fallen or join." To which •Skinnkr refers thus: " atJCnt, Authori Diol. Angl. apud /^uem lolum occurrd^ exp. Co:ifigere, coiijungere, &c.'* What opinion Sicinner had of the authenticity of fome of PhiLli^ses words, will appear from what he has faid on tlic firrt article of this clafs: " ?(fiarCiC&, v')x qux mihi in Ida Diff. Aiigl: occurrit, inter vetcres Anglitas voces re- cenfita, aliotjui nuiujuam vel lefta vel audita ; exponitur autem infatlai'dls^ nefcio an ab &:c. Seu ita me Deus amet, vereor ne infanti nondimi nato calceos parcin," The article in Phillips is '■'■ Abuijiick (old word), iniatial le.'* While I am upon this fubje(ft, it may be hot iaipertincnt to oblervc, that where Skinner adds fimplv fxp. to any word, he refers to the cxpofit'ion of that word in Spcgf.t'' i idofj'ary to Chaucer. See his fecond article: " flbatofU, exp. Pcrtcrrituii, mc.u cor.fteriiatus Sec." The jrri'.lc uoi-i-cnT C r C -s ] and upon the fame authority expounds it conjigcre, conjimgere^ i. c. To faftcn, To join together. B' therefore it fliould not Hem probable, that this Author D'lB. Angl. firfl enriched our language with the word Adent, he muft at leaf! ht allowed lo have been the firft writer, who is known to have affixed to it that general, metaphorical fenfe, in which it muft be underftood in the Paems. The inference, in either cafe, is equally ftrongy that the Poems were not written in the XVth century. Mr. Bryant has not attempted to produce any authority for the ufe of the word Adente, His dep- rivation of it [p* 1 50] from the Saxoii' noun Dynty is " abStoCtJ, b, daunted, abaflied." See alfo the articles accog and atCOgeD, afatc, affrar, aj^ifej, &c. This laft word is formed from a mirtaken reaoing in a Ballad of Lydgate's^ as the compiler of Gloff. Ur. has obferved. The true reading is A G'llevy or rather G'llour, a deceiver. In the fame manner afase has been erroneoufly inferted by Speght in his Glolfary for fare ; abcnt for hent ; a0ipp for gipc ; ali •which words have been copied from hiiii by Smnner, ■without exprefling the kail: doubt of their authenticity. And yet thefe are the two authorities, to \vhich my learned ar>tagoniil;s generally appeal, as to tlire court of the lail jefort ! I will jull add, that, as SKI^f^7ER appeai*s to have takes naoft of his o/^/ words from Speght and Phillips, fo the later Di<^ionary-m.akers, Kersey, Coles, Bailey, &c. feem to have attempted nothing more (in that part of their "frorks) than to hand down to us the words of that defcrip- tion, which they found in Skinner, or in any other of their predeceflbrs. Unutn nons, omncs noris. The autho- rity of one is as good as that of all ; and the authority of all no better than that of the firft.' 01^ C -9 ] or Dent; iolus ; a forcible Imprcfiion ; feems to me lefs admiffible than the Dean's from the French verb Adeiiter. I believe, few people, who know what an hidenture is, will be of opinion with him, that our " current verb, 'To indent-, to make a bargain ; to contradt ; fhould be derived from the Saxon Dynt, rather than from the French endcnter." 7. Adramf.s. Ep. 27. Loughe loudlic dynneth from the dolte adrames. This word Mr. Bryant has paffcd over. — Ano- N YMus, in vindication of it, produces " Adraming. O. word, churlifh. Cocker. See alfo Bailey." He might have added Coles, Kersey, and Phil- lips. — The Dean of Exeter fays boldly, " that we have the authority of Shakespeare for this word, and for the fenfe in which it is ufed." But, furely, he cannot fcrioufly mean that John a- dreams in Shakespeare gives any countenance to AdrameSj as ufed here. John a dreams, i. e. of dreams, is no more likely to have given rife to fuch a noun as Adrames, than ^ack a'lent and Jack a'lantern are to have produced new families of Aleuts and Alantertis, Had the phrafe been drame adolts (as it might, and probably would, have been, if a rime in cits had been required), it might have been, as well defended. C:i i 8. Alatche. ^.117. Leave me fvvythe or I'llc alatche. This word is alfo palTcd over by Mr. Bryant*— ♦ Anonymus cites from Lye, " Gc-lathian, cicre, arcefTere, advocare;" and from Ray, " Lathing, Entreaty or Invitation ;" and concludes, that '* Vile a\aiche'' fignifies " Vll call out for bclpeJ' That this was the meaning of the author, I have little doubt ; but the queilion is, whether the word ex- pielfes it. The fame meaning, I apprehend, would have been drav/n from abatcbe^ or any other word of no real fignification. That Alatche is not ca- pable of it, I conclude from the condudt of the Dean of Exkter •, w^ho would never have taken the pains to fuggeft four or five unfatlsfa<5tory ex- planations of a word, when he had it in his power to eftabiilli one fo fuitable to the context, 9. Almer. Ch. 20. 77. Where from the hail-ftone coulde the aimer fl^it} Mr. Bryant and Anonymus both fuppofe, that Aimer has been put by miflake of the tranfcriber fox Palmer. Air. BrVant obfcrves very judiciouf- ly [p. 102], " It is not impofTibic, but that there :Ttight have been fuch a word to denote an ci/J:er of Alms; but it is contrary to analogy, and I think improbable." The Dean however contends, that no alteration is neceflary. He aiks, " Why may not this w*ord be applied to the receivfr as well as. to C " 1 to J^he giver of alms?" I anfwer; The applica- tion of it to the giver of alms would, in my opi- nion, have been as unwarrantable as to the re- ceiver. The former, in our language, is called ai) Almoner, the latter an Alms-man, But he goes on ; " At leaft, fuch an application of the word in Latin is juftified by Canning's will, who leaves legacies to the alms-men of Weflbury College, under the title oi Eleemofynariiy or Aimer j." What; is meant by an " application of the word (Aimers) in Latin," I do not underfland ; and in what folr lows I fufpe(ft a little inaccuracy: but if Canning's will really mentions the alms -men of \Vcilbury under the title of Aimers, I fhall certainly no longer difpure the authenticity of the word, Till this is made clear, I muft be allowed to obferye, that, in a quotation from Canning's will, p. 421 of the Dean's book, thcfe fame legacies, I prefume, ap- pear to have been \th Jcx pauperibus eleemofMuiriis de IVeJlbur^ — without the explanatory addition — or aimers^ 10. Aluste. H. I. 88, That Alured coulde not hymfelf aluj^. Mr. Bryant agrees with me [p. 79], that Alu/tc has been put by a miftake of Cuatterton's for Ajujle. We may differ perhaps hereafter about the inference to be drawn from this miftakc ; but I am happy to have him with mc, though for ever C3 fo C " ] fo fliort a time, — Anonym us fuppofes Alujle to bs only another form of the verb ah/an, and to fig- nify in this palTage To releafe ox free. The Dean agrees with him as to the fignification of the word ; but, not being able to find Alujlan among the A. S. verbs, fuppofes Alujle to be a participle formed from Alyfan ; and adds, '^ that it is not uncommon with our ancient poets to ufe the par- j ticiple inftead of the infinitive mode." It was in-s cumbent therefore on the Dean to iht\Y, in the firil: place (at leaft by fqme analogical reafoning), that fuch a participle as Alujle could be formed from Alyfan ; and fecondly, that either the parti- ciple fo formed, or even the verb itfelf, remained in ufe in the XVth century. Till both thefe points ■were efiiablifiied, it was rather unncccfTary for him to hazard his laft affertion, ^' that it is not uncommon with our ancient poets to ufe the participle inflead of the infinitive mode.'* I had pointed out tu-o inflances of this inaccuracy in Chaucer (in a paflage, which the Dean has done me the honour to quote, p. 497), but I conceived it to. have been 'uery uncommon ; and I am confirmed in that opi- nion by the few in fiances, with which the Dean has attempted to corroborate his afl"crtion. The pafifjgcs from the Tragedy of JEUa can only have, been alledged in joke. The line of Occleve, which he has auoted fromWARTON, [Hifi. of Eng. Poetry, vol. ii. p. \^,'\ is mifprintcd. An ex- cellent C ^3 ] ccllcnt Mr. in the Mukum, Bib. Reg, 17D. vi. inftead of '* to hope him fro mifchance** reads right- ly " to kepe him" And in the line of Gower, " As thou haft herd me fayd tofore," I have little doubt, that we fhould r<.^ad, either herd ?nc fdyn, or her de fayd. 1 1. Alyne. T. 79. Wythe murther tyred he flynges hys bovve alyfie, Mr. Bryant has fftid nothing for this word. — Anonymus quotes " Alynian and Alynnan, Sax. liberare. " Hence alyne. — He flings his bow u?i- bent.'* — The Dean fuppofes ^/)72Y any writer in or near the XVth century, in the fenfe o^ Allow \ in which fenfe, Mr.BRYANi^ obferves, " the word is interpreted very truly" in both thefe paflages ; and the Dean pf Exe;ter. concurs with him. How Chatter ton came to affix the fenfe of Allow to the obfolete verb Alyfe^ will be more properly confidered in another place, when we proceed to determine the fliare which he probably had in thefe Poems. At prefent I thin^ it fufficicnt to obferve, that thefe tvyo learned per- fons have by no means proved that this word ever bore fuch a fenfe. Their arguments feem all tq refl upon miflaken interpretations of fomc equi- vocal words. Alyfan is rendered in the Di£l. Sax. liberare, fohere. This the Dean calls a double f.gnification, im.plying both deliverance and pay" ment. But every one knows, that folvo, though it fometimcs iignifics To pay^ has generally the fame fignification vvith Libcro ; To loof:^ oxJetfrce\ and the very inflance, which he has quoted, foU vere jejuniuUy docs not convey the lead idea of payment* [ ^5 ] payment. Again ; as Dclrjcr with us is an cqui, vocal word, which may be Qiadc to fignify either T^o deliver from^ or T^o deliver to ; the Dean choofes ro interpret Libcro in the latter fenfc, and to de- duce from it Deliver'^, F C 45 ] When I faid, that I knew no inflancc of coUcne ufed as a verb, I fliould have laid as a "jcrb aBive, and in ikefenfe required in tbcj'e pnjfoges ; though the latter circumflance, without being formally ftatcd, mull be confidered as making a necefiary part of every objcftion under this second ge- neral Head. If I had been provident enough to ftate my objecftion fo fully, I conceive that the Dean of Exeter would hardly have thought it *' a fufficient anfwcr, to quote Robert of Glou- cester for the word conteked, which hisGloITarift explains contejled^ or contended.^^ He would ar leaft, I prefumc, have thought it proper to quote the palTage at large, in which the v>ord conteked occurs. Till we fee the contrary, vxc have a right to fuppofe, from the explanation of the GlofTariil:, that it occurs only as a i-erb neuter^ and not as a 'cerb a£iive. For the two words, by v;hich he explains it, conlefted, con/ejided, are only fyno- nymous, when they are ufed as verh iieiiter. In- deed, lo contend is never properly ufed as a -jerh atlive ; though To contcjl is frequently as a i-erb r.eiiter. We might b.y. To contejl the 'u:ay ; and To contcji, or contendy iviih any one for the way ; but not To conUnd the 'way. if therefore contejled is truly explained by the Glofl'ciriftj it was ufed by RuBERT of Gloucester as a 'verb neuter^ and gives no countenance to the ufe of conlcke in either of thefc palfagcs. But if it Ihould even appear to 2 C 46 ] to have been ufcd by him as a verb acl'i've, yet flill the ohjeftion to the ufe of it in the latter paflagc will remain in full force ; for who ever heard of fuch an exprcffion as to contckcy or contejl^ the dinning air ? Mr. Bryant has faid nothing to this or the preceding word, and Anonymus what may be conlidered as nothing. 15. Derne. M.. 582. Dernie. E. I. 19.. El. 8. M. 106. " When thou didft boaftc foe moche of adtyon derne^ Oh Raufe, comme lyfle and hear mie dernie talc. O gentle Juga, heare mie derrde plainte. He wrythdc arounde yn drearie deniie paync. Anonym us fays, '' It is at leaft very doubtful, whether derne is ever iifed by Chaucer in the fenfe'* (which I had affigned to it) " of fecrcf, pri'vatc.'^ For a folution of his doubt I muft refer him to the two paliages cited in the Glossary to the Canterbury Tales. Ele adds, *' Neither Benson, nor Lye, give any fuch Saxon adjcdlive aS derne.^' They both give dyrn, and interpret it occullus ; and in Lye's Junius it is fpelt derne, and interpre'ted occultiis, fccrelus. So iiiuch for the original of this word; with which Ray's account of the ufe of it in the North pcrfcdly agrees. " Dearn, tor lonely, folitary, far fro?n neighbours." And perhaps, if theDzAx had thought fie to pro- duce [ ^7 ] ducc that paffage of Robert of GLOuc::sTr.n, Li which his Glofllirift has interpreted derne to mean difnial, fad, it would have been found not incii- pable of the fame fenfe. It is highly probable, I think, that Speght not only mlfiook the meaning of dcrne in Chaucer, but alfo milled Skimnf.u to render it dirus^ crudclis; and dernly, in Spen- ser, quoted by the Dean, is interpreted by UpTo>f to mean only eagerly, earnejlly. To difcufs all thefe matters minutely is unncccliary ; fincc, even if derne fliould be allowed to fignity cruel as well as fecret, the ufe of dcrnie and adcrne in thefe Poems would form an infurmountable objection to their authenticity. i6. DROoniE. Ep. 47. Botte lette ne wordes, which droorl: mote ne heare, Wc placed in the fame. I had faid, that the common fenfe of dnieric^ which is courtjlnb, gallantry^ would not fuit with' this paiiage. To tins Anonymus anfwers, *•' that it is doubtful whether druerie ever convcvs anv fuch idea." It may be doubtful to him, who fecms rarely to have looked beyond his Saxon, Di<5tionary and Bailey for the meaning of any word. Upon this occafion Irowever he quotes Verstec-^n, as fayin;^, " drezv, drczurie is fpoken of fadn-rfs, melancholy ^ "" ov; all that I can find in V£Rsr£CAN to this purpofe is in hisIXth cluq- tcr. C 4* 3 ter, where he gives an account of the fuppofcd derivaiions of many fiirnames. There he fays, ** Drew or Drewrie, o^ fadnefs',^' i« e. the fur- name of Drew or Drezvrie is derived hom. fadnefs. How very different is this from what Anonymus would make him fay? Drew, va Vekstegan, is a noun (the Saxon dreog), and drewrie an adjec- tive (our dreary), and both names may be pro- perly faid to be derived from dreog, fignifying fcidnefs ; whereas Anonymus reprcfents him. as proving that Drewrie, as well as Drew, is a nouD> fign if y ing fadnefs , But all this is trifling; for druerie is un- doubtedly a French word ; and the iignification affigned to it in the ApPE^3DlX is fully cftablifhed by the paffages cited in the Glossary to the Canterbury T^les, v. DRUERiEi [See alfo the Supplement, p. 260, for an elegant defcription of a drut, or lonjcr, by a Provencal poet.] It is ufed in the fame fenfe by Robert of Glouces- ter, in a paffage, quoted by Mr. Bryant upon another ocGaficn [p. i33l> which probably induced him to be filent upon this. " Wymmen ne kept of no knygt, as in drueryJ' If wt conftrue this, that ihiy took no notice, or care-ij of any knight, as in modcjly, what a pretty idea will it give us of the delicacy and good-breeding of the ladies of King Arthur's court, of v^'hich, as Mr.BRYAKT obfervcs, the author is fpeak'.ng ? In C 49 1 la the fame fcnfe it is ufcd by GowEr, in a paf- fage quoted by the Dean of Exeter. He is fpeaking of a lazy lover — — " that for no druerie He vvol not leave his fluo-orardie.'* DO And yet the Dean infifls, that droorie fignlfieS mcde/Iyi and attempts to prove it by afking, " Is not the language of court Jlnp the language of modefiyV One might certainly anfvver, " Not always^ or nc- ccffarily^' to this qiieftion, and fo flop the whole argumentation at once. But to let it go on. What is the inference ? Becaufe the language of courtfljip is the language of 7nodcfly, therefore courtfhip {ind modejly arc fynonyjnous terms ; and druerie, which fignifies courtfjipy lignlfics alfo modcfly 1 Bcfidcs this argument, fuch as it is, the Dean has heaped to- gether feveral quotations, which I ihall pafs over. Except that fromGowER, jull: mentioned, which makes againll him, they are all inflances of fomc fecondary fenfes of the word druerie y not one of which is in the Icaft applicable to the prelcnt paflage. 17. FoNNFs. E. II. 14. ^.421. FONS. T. 4. Decern with/o;2«£'j rare — On of \}iiz fomils whych the clcrche have made, Quay nty fled fjns dcpidtedd on eche Iheclde. The queil:lon is, whether there be fuch a noun plural T.'ifonnesy which has any fenfe fuitablc to £ th^^lf. so I thcfe paflliges. Axonyml's quotes his Dldlionary for *' fofi, a Saxon verb, caperc, accipcre, reci- pcre ;" but that furcly is nothing to the purpofe. Then he lays ; " In Wicliff, '' thefe fonnyd lords and people'* lignifies lords and people deluded (I might fay made fools of) by the tricks of the priclls." This rather confirms my interpret;ation oi Jonnes^ He adds, what he calls, two examples of this wordf in different tranflations of the Lord's Prayer, preferved in Cameden's remains (p. 32),, v^htvt founding and/o;2 J/V/jo- iland for what is now ex- prelfed temptation. But furely thefe cannot be called examples o^ foiines, nor will the fenfe of tempta- tion fuit thefe paffages. Bailey's word, ^^fonnes, devices^' rcfls ultimately upon the authority of SPEGHT. Mr. Bryant (p. 4-4) promifes to fpeak more par- iiadarly concerjiing this word hereafter ; but I can- not find that he has rCfumed the fubjed:. In this- placc, he is confidering only the firfl of the paf- fages above flated ; and he fays, that " fonne is the fame as the Saxon fan ; and fignifies any cu- rious device: but particularly vexillimiy a flandard or cnfign.'* Upon what he founds his affertion,, " that the Saxon /^?2 fignifies a7iy curious device"! cannot conceive ; that it fignifies vexilhrni, I allow ;- but, allowing alfo t\\z.t fonne is put io\- fan, how will that fignification oi fan fuit with all thefe paffages ? or indeed with any one of them, unlefs in r 5' 1 Sn that one we adopt a new idea of Mr. Bryant's, that the, word oare fignifics, not an oar, but a wherry ? The Bean of Exeter fays, xhdX foniies is the fame word with fownes, in Chaucer's Troilus, I. 466, and ufed in the fame fenfe; but that ** Rowley with a more accurate orthography (bc- caufe nearer to the original fubflantivc /o/?, and to the verb /i?W^«) calls ihQvn fonnes.'^ This orio-i- nal fubllantive fon he afterwards explains to be the fame with out fun ; which "Dr. Joiinsom (we are told) had no reafon to call a low cani word, it being of great antiquity and eftabliHied fignifi- caiion, as well as the v^rh Jhiden, which Is formed from it." To this verb fonden [fandian, Sax.] (from which /o/;^/;?^^ quoted by Anonymus from Cambden is derived, and which properly lignifics to try or attempt) the Dean has afcribcd a great Variety of fignificatlons, which really belono- to two other verbs, ToJind\ and Tofcnne^ or hefcolij}:. He has alfo confirmed the fignification of fod, which I had attributed to the fubftantive fonne in Chaucer ; but I cannot fee, that he has produced any fitisfad:ory authority for the antiquity, or firr- nitication, of his original fubftantive fcn^ ox fun. He allows, that in the firft edition of Speght's Gloflary the word, which he would make to be the fame with /oww^j, Is written /«::c77fj; as it is, 1 believe, in the text of all the older editions of E 2 CiiAu- [ 5^ ] Chaucer's Troilus; where only, as far as I ani informed, the word occurs. The Dean has rC'* proachcd me very juflly for not having taken no- tice of this word in Chaucer. If I had not by fome accident overlooked it, I lliould certainly have inferred it among the Words and Phrases NOT understood [vol. Vw p. 285]; for I am ftill unable to explain it. The explanation of it to inc2in devices, bySpECHT, feems to have been a mere conjcfturc, though it has been adopted by Junius, and other later Lexicographers. It muft appear the more dubious, becaufe the very exif- tence of the word, of which it pretends to be an explanation, is doubtful. The line of Chaucer, in which only, I believe, it is to be found, is thus cited by the Dean,' from Troilus, b. i. v. 466. Ne in defire none other fo:v?ies bred. But in Mf Bodl. 3354, it is thus written : Nyn fmn dejire none oxhtrjowms brcdde. Ibid. 3444. No he defyred none other /o«/?] tenfe in en, even in thole verbs of which he alfo ufes the participle in ed ; Vis -Majbcn^ faretiy iox ivajhcd^ j'ared. (vol. iii. p. 317.)" I mull go through all thefe inftances feverally, in order to ftiew that 1 am not lb inconjifteyity as the Dean would re- j>rcfent me, in believing the Canterbury Tales of Chaucer ro be a genuine work, and the Poems attributed to Rowley ipiirious. To take off the force gf inftance i, which bears hnrdeil upon mc, it will be only neceirary to cite at length the note, which the Dean has thought proper to abridge. I had ob- lerved, that Chaucer feemed to have given his Northern clerks [in the Miller's Tale] a Northern dialed ; and among other particulars, in which their language appeared to mc to ditfcr from th-it ufed in the reft of his work, I mention the following : *' If I am not miftakcn, he has drfgiu'dly given them a vulgar, iingcainmatical phralcology. / do not y:nwnbcr [r 58 J But unluckily the word occurs again in the fame poem, ver. 510, where the il^.me remedy cannot be applied : " The thunder fhafts in a torn clevis file." rememher in any othsr part of his zuri tings fuch a line as^ ver. 4043. I is as ill a miller as zj.ye. See alio ver. 40S4. I is. ver. 4087. Thou is.''* ■ The reader muft fee, th:tt lam io far from having charged Qhv.wccx with thefe grammatical inaccuracies, that 1 fuppofe him to have introduced them in this place by dejign, contrary to his practice in the reft of Jiio v.-orks. Inftance 2 flioiild have been quoted fiom vol. iii. p. 296; but here too 1 am obliged to vindicate myfslf by citing my note ai length. " Ver. 15783. And we alfoj It fhould iiave been us. I take notice of this, becaufe Chaucer is very rare" ly guilty of fuch an offence againfj grammar." One mutt fuppofe, that the Dean had overlooked the latter part of this note. Inilances 3 and 4 are not to the purpofe ; becaufe the life of perfonal pronouns redundantly, and the omilfion of them and relative pronouns, though offences againft Gram- mar, were authorifed by cuftom in the age of Chaucer. Inftance 5 , is of an abbreviation commonly ufed by other writers. The Dean indeed has mif-ftated it ; for the ufage was, as I have faid, to put hit and rit (not bid [\ud rid) fox biddcih and rideth : and he has been pleafed ta ::dd an obfervation, luhJch is intirely his ovjHy upon the in- com^enience of this abbreviation, viz. that the words fo ab- breviated may eajily be miftaken for the pafl tenfe. \ always, thought, that the pail: tenfes of bid and ride, in the time of Ciiaucer, were bade and rode, as they are now, Inftance 6 has been fpoken to already, p. zz; and In- flance 7 is improperly ftated as a charge of inaccuracy. It is very probable, that, in the verbs alleged, both termina- tions of the participle pafr were in ufe at the fame time. Thefe are ail tiie inilances of grammatical errors, with which I am faid to have charged the Father of our Englijo poetry. I have fliev.n, I hope, that tlve greateft part are no, charges C 59 1 ,Tlie Dean of Exeter wifhcs to perfuade us, that clevis might have been ufed as a nouji Jin^ giilar. In the paffiige of Chaucer (L. W- 1366), to which I had referred, he fays, it may be cithe^: fingular or pluraL The reader fhall judge ; " Hipfiphile was gone in her playing And roming on the clevis by the fee.'* It is furely moft natural to iinderfland the word here pliirally, as there is not the leafl reafon to fup- pofe that it relates to any one particular clift. I add, that in a very good Mf. in the Bodleian Li- brary, from which this poem of Chaucer might be corredted in a hundred places, the word is written dives, in the regular plural form. The authority of the Gloss arist to Bifhop Douglas, which the Dean quotes next, is not precifc cnouo-h to be of anv weight without the orio;inal pafl'age. In the Golden Targe of Dunbar, flan, xxvii. ver. 9, I find cleiuis ufed as a pIwaL ^' Amancrs the cidzvis." — The Dean concludes with an argument, which he might as well have begun with, and omitted all others. *' Not that this authority is neccilary for the poet's juftifica- char(i;es at nil, and the others fo few and fo trifling, as not to aftbrd the leall reafon for doubtino- the authenticity ot a work of more than twenty-four thoufand lines, through which they are difperfed. How very different in number and quality are thoie, of which the Pseudo-Rowley Hands convicted wjthin the compal's of lefs than three thoufand vcrfes ? tlon : [ 6o ] tion : it would be fufficient to fay, that the mea- fure of his verfc required the word to be length- eped into a dilTyllablc." Eyne. E. II. 79. T. 169. See alfoiE. 681. In everich eyne arcdynge nete of wyere. Wythe fyke an eym ihee fvvotelie hymm dydd view. That epie is the plural number of eje, I find, is not contefled ; but various reafons are ailigned, why the plural in thefc paffages may Itand for the fmgular. Anonymus fays, that qne is put for a fiin'ijicaat look, in which both eyes are equally concerned, and the fenfe of the paffages would remain the fame, were the term look fubflituted for that of e-piel — The Dean of Exeter has a number of expedients, as ufual. He fays, '* that everie eyiie may be underflood colledtively, as, equivalent to all eyes ;;" and " th^itfykc an eyne may fignify fuch eyes ;" but he has not attempted any proof thd.^ everie, ox fyke an, was ever joined with a noun plural. Or, fays he, " in the latter paffage, we might read Jyken eyne;' i.e. we might ex-, change a solecism for a barbarism. He urges further, that the word eye, though Jin^^ii/ar, has frequently a plural ftgn'iji cat ion, implying both eyes, or a pair of eyes ; and this he proves by two quo- tations from GowER ; but the point to be proved -"^^-j that eyne, though plural, had 2ifiijgul:irfignifi- cation^ f 6t ] cation: To this he has only produced one pal* iage from the Testament of Creseide, a Scot- tifli compofition, where c\7ie is ufed with a verb fingular, for the fake of the rime ; as it is alfoj for the fame reofon^ in a palTage of Gawin Douglas, produced by Mr, Bryant. That our old poets often facrificcd fyntax to rime cannot be difputcd. But Mr. Bryant adds [p. 411] " The following line occurs in a very ancient poem : Nis no tonge an crthe, nc no even — i. e. no tongue, nor no eye. Vita Sandtir Mar- garetiE. Hickes Thefaurus, vol. i. p. 228." It not appearing clearly from this quotation whe- ther cycn was ufed fingularly or plurallv, I had re- courfe to the book quoted, and there I found the whole line to ftand thus : Nis no tonge an erthe, nc non eycn ////. i. e. light. Where, if light be not mif- written for fight, at leafl it nuift be joined with eycn in con- (Irudtion, like eyen-fight, (ycn-brozv, Sec. in all which eyen is the genitive cafe phiraL This iii- flancc therefore is not to Mr. Bryant's purpofe, any more than the preceding. His fuj)pofirioii " that thcfe may have been the millakes of the tranfcriber " was furely never lefs admiffible than upon the prcfent occafion. The moil natural millakes ot a tranfcriber are to leave out letters, and to change uncommon words into fuch as arc familiar to him. In this cafe the reverie muft have t «2 3 have been pradlifed. A fuperfluous letter has becit repeatedly inferted, and a common word has bccit changed mto one which Is obfolete. Heie. E. ii»i5. T. 123. Lc. 5. 9. Eht* 2- ^- 355^ 1 had objcdled, that heie, the old plural of he, was obfolete, as I apprehended, in the time of the fuppofed Rowley. This objedion nothing has been brought to invalidate. The Dean of Exe- ter indeed obferves, " that I o?iIy conje^nire that this word was obfolete in the time of Rowley; but conjefture ought not to have the force of proof." That I allow; but furelyj if my conjec- ture had been wrong, it would riot have been dif- ficult for him in all this time to refute it. When- ever it fliall be proved, that heie was in ufe in the XVth century, my conjedure mufl fall to the ground. Till then, I fhould hope it will be ad* mittcd as at kail very probable* Thyssex. li. 1 1. 87. Lette thyffen men who haveth fprite of love, Mr. Bryant, who has faid nothing for hcic, comes forward in defence of this word. He con- felfcs " that he had fome doubts about the pro- priety of it;" — " but he found it to be the fame as the word thefne, which occurs in Robert of Gloucefler ; the fame alfo as the term thiffhe^ thijfum. t 63 ] thiffum, and ihijfon of the Saxons. JEfter thiffhm^ poll ha?c. JEfter tbiffbn, after thcfc things. Bcclc, p. 504. and Gen. ch. xlv. 15. See Lye and Manning. Thijhe laff- — this bread. Th'ifnefian— this ilonc. Of thyffon klafe — of this bread. Saxon vcrfion of the Gofpels." 1 might certainly difmifs all this learning with a iingle obfervation ; that a Saxon term, unfap- ported by any writer later than Robert of Glou- cester, would have been as extraordinary a phie- nomcnon in the XVth century, as in the prefcnt ; but refpc(ft to Mr. Bryant, and a jufl: apprehen- fion of the weight of his authority, oblige me to enter into a minute examination of whatever aro-u- ments he is pleafcd to advance. I fhould wifli to know, in the fiifl: place, how he found thy (fen to be the fame word as thefne, which occurs in Ro- BKRT of Gloucester, as he has not produced, or referred to, the pallage ; and the Gloffar)', ^vhich I have con fulted, interprets thesne, this^ in the singular number; whereas thyffen here, being joined to men ^ mufl be plural. For the fame reafon thyfjlu cannot be the fame as the Saxon thijjhe and thyff(i7i, in the inflances quoted ; ihi f tie laff \ ihifne flan\ ofthyffonhlafe; they being all in t)ic SINGULAR number. In the two other inftances, thiffumy and its corruption thfjon, are PLURAL, but give no countenance to the ufe of sb}iffl?i in the text; Lette tijyjjen vien. For thiffumj when C H .1 tvhen PLURAL, is only ufed In the dative cl* Ablative cafe; but thyjpn in the text, being governed of lette and joined to Jiwiy muft be con* lidered as ufed in the accusative cafe plural, which, as far as I can find, was never exprelTed in the Saxon language by any other word than thas^ the original of our ibefe. The Dean of Exeter indeed afferts, '' it is obferved by Lye, in his Saxon grammar prefixed to Juniuses Etymolo* gicon, that the dative and acaifative cafes -plural of the Saxon pronoun tkes, hic^ are thisum and poet ice this on." Had this been fo, the only proper inference would have been, that Lye had made a mlftake ; but, upon looking into his gram- mar, I find, that he makes the dative and ablatiie cafes plural to be thifu?n, and the accusative ihas. And fo does Mr. Manning. The Dean's appeal to the German language I pafs over, as he does not even pretend to any authority there for the ufe of thief en in the accusative cafe plural; and I lliall leave him in full polTeJGjon of his other argument from the pronunciation of the vulgar in many parts of England. Enough has been faid, I fhould hope, to enable the reader to judge, whether it be credible, that a word, which was originally thas^ and has continued in our language with fo little variation to the prefent day, was metamorphofed Into thyjjcn by any writer of the XVth century. After C 65 ] After all, the Dean feems inclined to fuppofc, that the termination in en might be added for the fake of the rime [rather metre\, ^^ additions cr abbre- viations of this kind being occafi07ially ufed by our ancient poets,** But this is the point in difpute, which he ought not to aflimie. Till he proves that additions of this kind were ufed by our an- cient poets, there is rcafon to think, that the addi- tion of en in this inftance lo^s owing to the authors ignorance concerning the propriety of fuch additions. I had pointed out two other words, coyen, M. 125. and SOTHF.N, ^.227. as terminated in the fame unfi-cilful manner in en, contrary to all ufage or analogy. To thefe neither the Dean nor Anonymus have faid any thing; but Mr. Bryant has undertaken the defence of coyen i which, he fays [p. 90], is a participle from the verb. To coy. Why he fays lb, I know not. I will venture to fay, that there are very few inllanccs, if any, of participles from verbs of French origi- nal, fuch as To coy is, terminated in cn-^ Qi coyen in particular no inftance is produced, except in this palTage; and here it has certainly nothing /(tTr- ticipial in its fignification. " Come and do not coven be" means neither more nor lefs than — Come and do not be coy, in the mofl: modern accep- tation of the word. Whether cuyen in E. I. 2>S- be the fame word with coyen, I leave Mr. Bryant to fettle with the Dean of Exeter, who, I think F more C 66 1 more probably, confiders cuyen as the plural of cv, a cow ; though I do not fee how, upon that fuppofition, it could be joined with kine, which is the fame word a little corrupted. The qu, which I had put after coycn in the IndeXy was not in- fended to exprcfs my doubt about the fignificatioii of the word, as the Dean fuppofes [p. 206. n.]y but about the propriety of the termination in en» We are now come to what I have called " the CAPITAL Blunder, which runs through all thefe Poems, and- would alone be fufficicnt to deftroy their credit ;■ that i-s-, the termination of verbs in thefinguhir number in «.'* My three learned an- tagonifts feem fully fenfible of the decifivc Weight of this objection, and" have therefore applied themfelvcs to the combat of it with- more than ordinary zeal and obflinacy. I had fet down, or referred to, tzventy-Jix inftanees, in which ba7i is ufed in the Poems for the present, or past, time INGULAR of the verb have -^ with this obferva- tion, that ha)t, being an abbreviation o-f havetiy is never ufed by any ancient writer except in the present time plural, and the infinitive MODE* in opposition to this. Anonym us has produced iivelve paffages from different authors ; but (what mull: feem very ftrange) not one of them is in the Icall to his purpofc, except an old rime of nobody knows whom, iu which there is thisphrafe; Icb ban C «7 ] hiin bitten this ivax. Leaving him therefore in pofTcflion of this for the prefcnt, I fhall briefly go through his other inftances. *' Wicliff fays. We believe as Chrift and his apottolus Ihm taught us — the Pope and the Cardynals by falfc laws that chcy hnn made." Thcfe examples, fays Anonymus, arc contrary to the rule. Not at all ; for in both ban is the present time plural. '' Verstegan fays, ban was anciently ufed for have; and to this day they fay in fome parts of England, bun you any ? for, bai-e you any r" This too is agreeable to the rule ; for, I fuppofe, no- body but Anonyml's will difpute, ihii you and^'e', however applied to a lingle pcrfon, arc pronouns plural. In the firft of the following inftances fi'om Chaucer — " She wcndc never ban come" — ban is the infinitive Mode. In the tbree next — *' Ye ban hcrde" — " Yc bar taken — and ban de- nied" — it is the PRESENT time plural, as before in the inftancc from Verstkoan. " On the very fame page, fays Anonvmus, ban is ufed ioi had : Our Lorde God of Hcven ne wolde, neyther ban wrought hem." But he is miftaken. Han is there the INFINITIVE MODE. Thc conftrudtioH is: Our Lord, &c. would net neither have 7nade tbem. In his remaining three inftances — *' The birdcs that ban left"—'* Whyle they hari fuffcrcd"— " Jul- rync and his brother ban take" — ban is the prh- F 2 SENT C 68 ] SENT time PLURAL, agreeable to the rule. And fo much for Anonymus* Mr. Bryant allows, that bail ox hane in the fmgular number is contrary to the common ufage of the times; and he allows, that it ocQViXS fome- times in that manner in the Poems. This he would impute, as ufual, to the fault of the tranfcriber, or to a provincial way of fpeaking ; but at laft he comes to the point, and fays, that " after all, there is authority for the ufage of this word in the Jingular, by w^hich the reading in Rowley may be countenanced." He then produces fve examples. 7bree are from an ancient book called the Pylgrimage of the Souk, printed by Caxton, with his cuflomary incorrednefs. The firlt — He that bane Jhffered—l find upon infpedtion to be mifquoted for— 21? that ba?ie fuffered. This there- fore is not to his purpofc. To the two others I anfwer, once for ail, that u and n are fo frequent- ly confounded at. the prefs, that I confider all ap- peals to printed books, of which no Mff. exift, as nugatory, and calculated rather to perplex than to decide the quel^ion. If our objed is truth, why fhould we depart from thofe works of Chau- ci:r, GowtR, OccLEVE, and Lydgate, of which the rcadinprs may be eflablifhed from authentic o Mir. to colled perhaps the miftakes of ignorant copyifts, or the blunders of negligent printers? It would alfo furely mu;h conduce to the fhortcn- 4 i"g [ % ] ing of thefe dlfcuflions, if, befidcs confining our citations to witneffes of the bcft credit, we were careful to cite them for nothing, but what they have really laid, and is appofite to the point in difpute. In Mr. Bryant's fourth example from Pierce Plowman, p. 8i. 1. 24. what he cites as bnney is have in my copy ; and in hhjiftb exam- ple fromOccLEVE, as quoted by Mr. Warton, vol. ii. p. 43, " Of which I wont was ban counfel and rede,'* han is the infinitive mode, and is ufed quite regularly. To Mr. Bryant's affcrtion, that " in Robert of Gloucester and Robert Brunne, the terms bmt and hane occur for had and have,'* I can fay nothing, till the parages arc produced. I cannot find in either of the GlofTaries, that han, or hanSy is ever interpreted bad. It is indeed interpreted have in both ; but that proves nothing; for ba^, when ufed regularly in the present time PLURAL or the infinitive mode, is properly in- terpreted have. Mr. Bryant fliould havcfhcwn, that ban is ufed, by cither of thefe writers, in the PRESENT and PAST times singular, as it is in the Poems. The Dean of Exeter has been very fparing of inflances in fupport of Z'^v, ufed fingularly. He has produced, I think, ot\\)' three \ two from the Prologue to Chaucer's Testament of Love, and a third from the Testament itfelf at large, Y 7^ with- L 70 ] witliout referring to page or leaf. This laft h« niight reafonably fuppofe, we ihould in any cafe rather admit than attempt to verify ; but indeed I except, for the reafons already afiigned, to aU inllanccs which are taken from the Testameijt OF Love, or any other books, of which printed copies only are extant. His final argument to this point is, that ^* in fad han is ufed in thefe Foems as a contradion of the pafl tcnfe had, and not of the prefent tenfe h-avai ;" as if that mended the matter, or as if my objedion had not origi- nally been, that it was ufed for the prefrnt^ or PAST, time ftngular. The latter ufe of it w^ould be, if poffible, lefs jqllifiable than the former. It certainly is not in the Icaft countenanced by the quotation from Chaucer's R, R, 71. Rut if the Dean has been fparing of bis exer- tions in defence of the word ban, he fcems to have put forth all his ilrcngth to prove (in contradic- tion to my general objcdion) " that the termina- tion of verbs in thf^ fmgular number in n was not ■•.inurual ;" and (as a work of fiipercrogation) " th?.t the ancient; authors a[)pcar to have made an arbi- trary ufe of the en final, annexing it to almofl every fpccies of words into which fpeech has been, ox ;'an be, dift-inguiilicd/' To this lafl point I Ihail fpcak prefcnily. With rcfpeft to the former, with which I ar.i uvn-e immediately concerned, I muft 'ibhrve thai Mr, Bryant, by his fiicncc, has left [ 7' ] jny objection in. full force; and that Anonymus fccms rather inclined to evade than to combat it. Thus, in my two firft inftances of fclleriy E. i. lo. and H. 2. 675. he would, by a very forced and unnatural conllrudlon, make fclkn a participle ; •but he forgets, that the participle of /«// is falUn. Jn the next inftanoe, p. 287.. ver. 17. he propofcs, with fome ingenuity^ to change / ^oiltn into ygottcri, a participle. But the conilruction of goi^ ten, as a verb, is very plain, though he is puzzled about it. For thee J gotten — means — Fx)r I got thee, fo my other in-ftanccs of font en, H. i. 252. Jliooken, YL 2. 349,. Jhoulden, H. 2. 344. though- ienne, J£*. 172. and thoughten, JE. 1136. Ch. 54. fhezcn^ Qh. 54. he has not offered any oppofition or fubtorfugc.. He fjys indeed, that " he has a nunaber pf examples, taken from the XlVtli and XVth .centuries, of verbs plural ufcd in the fuigular number, aiid of verbs plural ufed inftcad uf participles ;" (to whg.t purpofe are the latter ?) but he has produced only a mifpriiit of Chaucer .(corredted i,ia th.e laft edition, C. T. ver. 9135), and a Hngle paliage «f Wicliff, where co?nen is put fjQr come ; by a miftake, as it fhould feem, of the tranfcribcr, whofc eye was caught by the fanje word occurring in the next line. Forgctlen was the old participle of f 07 get, m its firft llagc of variation from the regular pall tcnle /o;> f 4. I am L 7- ] I am now to examine the inflances which the Dlan has collected of 'verbs fmgular terminated in )/, They are in all, I think, tzventy-nine. Of thefe f.ve are taken from the Testament of Love, and are therefore liable to the exception above ftated, in the cafe of hati. Seven are taken from the Court of Love, one from the tranfla- tion of BoETHius, and another from the Plow- man's Tale ; three books, of which the text is as iinfettled as that of the Testament of Love. Six more are taken from the Canterbury Tales, of Spcght's edition, 1602; though everyone of them has been corrected from Mil', in the late edition. If the Dean has any objed:ions to make to the authority of the MfT. which I confulted, or to the ufe which I have made of them, I iliall always be glad to hear him ; but in the mean time 1 cannot think it very polite to me, or very fair to his readers, to quote Speght's edition in con- tradid:ion to mine. Of the remaining tiine in- ftances, the firft is quoted from Adam Davie, by a miftaken reference to War ton, vol. L p. 22. which I Ihall not attempt to verify, as all the works of Adam Davie, that I have feen, are in too incorred: a ftate to furnifh any authority for language. Ihe fecond is from Gower, p. 73. b. " Thou 'wilten [a querele of truth]." But here the mifprint is fo obvious, that I had actually corrcftcd it in my copy to — Thou wilt [ 73 ] IN a q. — and two MIL which I have infpcdVcd fince, have it— Thou wolt in. The third is from GowER, p. 67. b. *' The har/n thdt fallen:* But in my copy, edit. 1532. to which the re- ference agrees, it is — " The harmes — thcit fa lien:* The fourth quotation from Gower, p. 73. b, V. 32. does not appear in that place; but I have found it in fol. 107. b. When the Dlan caa make any fenfe of it, I will allow its authority. The fifth quotation from La belle dame sans MtRCiii, in Speght's edition of Chaucer, 1602. p. 242. a. col. I . ** From /jim thztfelen no fore nor fickncfTe" — is printed in my copy of that fame edition thus ; *' From HEM th:itfelen &c." In the fixth quo- tation from the Cuckow and Nightingale, p. 317. b. col. 2. befoiighten may be properly cor- rcftcd from the Bodleian MIT. to hefoii'^hte \ and fo may fhouldcn in the eighth quotation, upon the fame authority, to fJioulde. The only two quo- tations, which remain to be confidcred, are from the House of Fame. The latter — iyghen — I had fet down among the ivorcls ami pbrflfes not under- fiood; but any one may fee, that it is net a 'vcrh^ and therefore not to the Dean's purpofe. The other — couden, H. F. iii. 724. is a mere mifprint. The line is written rightly in Mf. Bodl. Xhat any hcrtc ccuthe gclie. Having [ 74 ] Having thus flicwn upon what very flight grounds the Dean has attempted to cftablifh the propriety of terminating verbs in t\\c Jiyigidar num- |)er in ;/, I mnfl take a little notice of that moft extraordinary a^ertion, with which he concludes his argumentation upon this point. He aflerts fp. 503], *' that, in fad:, the ancient authors ap- pear to have made an arbitrary ufe of the en final, annexing it to ahnoft every fpecies of words, into which fpeech has been or can be diftinguilhed." Such an aifertion ought furcly to have been better fupported than by a firing of words, without re- ference to the places where they are to be found. Sut let us take them as he has been pleafed to give them. The cafe of verbs has juft been con- -idered ; to v;hich the Dean now adds another quotation from his beil: authority, the Testament 0¥ Ldve. Of NcuNS fingular as well as plural, which have received this arbitrary addition, his inflances are, " Grceccn {qx Greece, Jokn for lole, Joh-yn for fole ; himfeken, hirfehen, and theirfeheriy in almof^ every page of Gower and Chaucer." That proper names of perfons and places were itiangely disfigured by our ancient writers cannot be difputcdj and therefore I can believe, that Creeccn and lolai may have been ufed, though I should wifh to have been told where, and by -/-hom, Soleyti ig a regular adjedive, ufed by Oi/.f;r5R in xht i<:.u(c. oi ftngk^ ^ndfillcn [Gloss. CT, [ 75 ] C T. in v.] Whether it came to us frorn an ob. fgletc Fr. adj. feulein^ or from the IrAL.foHngo, there is no pretence for confidcring the final ;/ as having been added arbitrarily. Ilimfehcn and Hirfelven are perfectly regular. The arbitr.irhiefs of our authors has been fhewn in throwing away the final «, and changing them into htiufelf and herfclf. Tbeirfclvcn is a barbarifm, of which \ believe the Dean would be puzzled to produce a fingle inftance from either Chaucer orGowEK. To his ADJECTIVES, bothiii znd fa/nin, I will fpeak whenever he produces the paiiages in which they are ufed ; but I am really furprifcd that he ihould {late fuch words as outin, aboven, aboulen^ aforeytie^ atwixcn, befiden^ fitheny as inftances of ADVERBr, TREPOSiTioNS, and CONJUNCTIONS, to which the filial n has been arbitrarily annexed. He mufc icnow, that the cafe has been diretlly the reverfe. He mull know that the Saxon originals of thefe words all terminated in n ; that they retained the fame termination in the Engliih language for k- veral centuries ; that they loft it gradually, fome fooner, fome later ; and that, while they continued to be ufed indiflerentlv with it or without it, the arbitrarinefs of WTitcrs (as has been faid bciore) was rather exerted to fupprefs it than to annex it. In ail fuch inflances therefore, in order to deter- mine which is the regular and which the licen- tious u(age» we mult have recourfc to the original word. [ 76 ] word. In our own language, and, I believe, in moft others, the prefumption is always ftrong that the variation has been made by the rejection, rather than by the addition, of a final confonant ; and it is remarkable, that the Saxon adverbs &c. juft mentioned, which originally terminated in n, from the time that they had intirely loft that ter- mination, have never refumed it. But in the cafe of ban, and other verbs singular terminated in n, (to which all this argumentation of the Dean is meant to be applied,) if we believe the Poems to be genuine, we muft fuppofe, that the author in the XVth century arbitrarily annexed a final « to a fpccies of words, which neither io the original Saxon, nor in the derivative Englifh, at any period from the time of Hengist to the prcfent, ever had any fuch termination. The lup- pofition is abfolutely incredible ; and therefore we muft neceflarilv recur to the contrary fuppofition, that the Poems are not oENtaNE. When the Dean denies, that this anomaly can be made a jnfjicient criterion of antiquity, he rrifappre- hends the tendency of my argument. I never thought of making a pradice, which I believe to be quite lingular and unexampled in any age, a criterion of the greater or lefs antiquity of the writer. It is, I think, a criterion of his ictXO- ranck; fuch an ignorance as is inconceivable in a genuine author, but might very eafily tall to the fharc of an impoftor. PART [ 77 ] PART THE SECOND. HAVING thus replied (I truft, fatlsfadorily) to the feveral anfwcrs, which have been given l>y my three learned antagonills to thofe objcdtions, rtated in ihe former part of my Appendix, which tended to prove, from the internal evidence of the Language only, that thefe Poems were not WRITTEN IN THE XVth Century, I fliould re- gularly proceed to the vindication of the laltcr part, in which I endeavoured to prove, from the fame internal eindence^ that they were written by Thomas Chatterton. But as the reafons, which originally induced me to treat thefe two queflions feparately, flill fubfift, I fhall defer whatever I may have to fay upon the fccond, till 1 have completely difpatched the firft. When the reader (hall have attained a clear and f^eady convidion, that the Poems are not of the antiquity to which they pre- tend, and are confcquently a forgery, he will find himfelf much better prepared to form a. deci- five opinion, at what time and by whom they were forg ed. I Ihall therefore in this place infert fome ob- fcrvations upon the othvr parts of the internal evi- Jcuce, which, I think, will corroborate the proof already C 78 I already given, that the Poems attributed to Row- tiLY were not written in the XVth century; and I Ihall alio examine the whole of the external c-ci- denccy which has hitherto been produced in fup- port of their authenticity, I. Next to the confideration of words, taken fingly, with refpcft to their fignifications and in- flexions (which has been the fubjedt of our former enquiry), we fhould naturally proceed to confidcr them as combined one with another in what arc called PHRASES. However difficult it may be to determine with prccifion, when two or more words were firft combined together, and applied in a particular fenfe, there can be no doubt that many Inch combinations prevail and are familiar in one •jge, which in a former were entirely unknown. It is impoffiblc to read a page of the Poems, with- out obfcrving a number of phrafcs, which, when divcfted of their hard words and uncouth fpelling, are plainly modern, and of which no examples can be produced from any writer of the XVth century. I forbear to quote particular infianccs. The fadt has been fufficiently evinced by various pailages of modern authors, which even the ad- vocates for Rowley have allov/ed to be coinci- dences of thought and expreffion. They would pe puzzled to find a fmall proportion of fuch co- incidences in all his fuppofed contemporaries. One C 79 ] One fet of phrases, which is very frequentlf ufed in the Poems, is formed upon an idea, which, I am perfuadcd, did not exift in the time of the fuppofcd Rowley. I obfcrvcd in my Efay on tU Language &c. of Chaucer [vol. IV. p. 36], that HE was not acquainted with ** the mctaphyfical fubllantivcyt//, of which our more modern phi- iofophers and poets have made fo much wic" h\ix. Rowley plays with this idea through all its changes. St. C. 134. Hys dame, hys fecondeye'^6', gyve uppclier breth^. M. 286. Yette I wylle bee viiefclfc. 299. Yett I mwlle bee miefdf, 368. Thic mynde ys now thiefelfe, 386. I'm flvynge from miefclfe } n flying thoe. 551. I Plurra amme miefd and aie wylle bee. G. 140. They re volundcs arc ydorven Kofdfenucs. This lail phrafe, like felf-lffvc^ fcif-intcrefi^ &:c. is evidently formed upon 2. fuhfiantivc ligniiication of jdf^ of which I have never been able to fiiui any traces in our language before the XVIth cen- tury, when it probably was firft introduced, to cxprefs the power of the Greek ocj-:'^' in coinj.iO' fition. There is another phrase, fo contrary to all ufagc and analogy, that, I apprehend, It could never have been eoined by any writer, except fcr the C So ] the puipofc of departing from the eflablifhed mode of exprcffion. What I mean is the ufe of did be for was or ivercy in the following paflagcs : J£m. 966. Albeytte unwears dyd the welkynn rende, Rcyne, alycke fallyngeryvers,(i)'^ferfe bee. 1 104. Whanne you, as cay tyfned, yn fielde dyd bee. Such a combination of do, as an auxiliary verb, with the verb be, I believe to be quite unexam- pled in any age ; and therefore perhaps it is not fo properly produced here, to fhew that the Poems were not written in the XVth century, as it may be urged hereafter, to prove that the author of them was an unfkilful imitator of ancient lan- guage. But the argument may fairly be applied to both queftions. See before, p. 76. II. Another circumllance, which calls for our attention, is the profufion of figures in thefe Poems. There can be fcarce any writing without metaphors; but similies are very thinly feat- tered in our really ancient authors, and what they have are generally Ihort and confined to a fingle point of refcmblancc. I much doubt whether an inftance can be produced, from any poet older than Spenser, of a fimdlie fo extended, fo varie- gated, fo turned and rounded, as many of thofe which occur in the Poems ; though it is notorious that the art of fimilic-making has been fo im- proved of late years, that boys and girls can deco- rate [ 8. ] rate their comparlfons with all the graces of Pope and Drydi:n. In like manner Personifications are not unfrcqucnt in our oldcfl poets ; but in which of them can wc find a groupe of fuch ima- ginary pcrfons adting together in one conHllent Allegory [T. V. i6i], and fet forth with that exuberant pomp of didion, which has not till very lately been introduced even into our Lyric poetry ? In what old poet can we find fuch a pcrfonage as Freedom, political Freedom? [G. V. I 84] One may venture to fay, that the idea of Liberty, ibeGoddcfs heavenly bright, was as un- known in this country in the XVth century, as it is perhaps at this day in Turkey. Where can we find fuch a climax, as[^lla, v. 16] " It cannot, muft not, rav, it fhail not be " ? or fuch EXCLAMATIONS and interrogatories (mere tricks of modern play-wrights) as are in almoft every fcene of the ^lla ? It may be faid perhaps, that, as we have no other tragedy of thole times, it is not furprifmg, that we fhouid not be able to meet with any other examples of a ityle peculiarly fuited to theatrical exhibitions ; but furely it muft be allowed to be exceedingly im- probable, that the author of our firft drama ihould at once hit upon thofe little artifices of compofition, which were loft again with him, and never (it I may ufe the expreffion) re-invented, till a long courfe of pracftice had taught our adors, G and C 8- 3 and through them onr authors, the eafieft mcthoda of entrapping an audience. IIL From the Language, I might go on td examine the Versification of thefe Poems ; but I think it fufficient to refer the reader, who may have any doubts upon this point, to the fpecimens of really ancient poetry, with which the verfes of the pretended Rowley have ktcly been veryjudi- cioufly contrafted (8}. Whoever reads thofc fpe- cimens, if he has an ear, mufl be convinced, that the authors of them and of the Poems did not live within the fame period. Mr. Bryant indeed (p. 426) has taken fome pains to make us believe, that " the arguments founded on the rythm and harmony of the verfes are very precarious;" and they mull be allowed to be fo, when they are drawn from fmall detached portions ; a few lines, or even ftanzas ; and from the compolitions of writers who lived very near to each other ; but I apprehend he might be fafely challenged, cither to produce three thoufand lines written within the laft hundred years in the ordinary verfification of the XVth century ; or (what would be ftill more to his purpofe) to fliew us an et^ual number of lines, written in the XVth century, with that exadnefs of metre and accent which has been fo (8) In a pnmphlet, intitletl, Cursory Oeseryations t>n the Puems attributed toTnoMAS Ro\m.ey, Sic. comm.on [ Sj ] common of late, and appears in a remarkable de- gree in the Poems. The comparilbns, bv which Mr. Br vast has attempted to prove the precarioufnefs of our judgements on this fLibjcct, are mofi: of them, in my opinion, inapplicable to his piir])ofe. The full inftancc (p. 427) from VirgH*s Ciiat^ bv Si-kn- SKR, proves only, that fome lines may be Icfs har- monious than others in the fame Poem. The firll line indeed of the ilanza, as quoted by Mr. IjKYANT, " There be x.\\o {lout fons of ^Eacus," — is evidently defedtive in its metre; but the fvllable wanting may be fupplled from the editions ; " There be the two fiout fons of ^Eacus ;" — and when that is done (and fome other little inac- curacies in the quotation corrected}, I fee no ground for fuppofing, from the language or rcrfiji, dlion of the flanza, that it was not the worl-: of the fimc writer who com])ofed the other famplcs ; much lefs, that there was a ce,it:n-y and an l.alf (oi ycfirs, or even of hours) between theiii. In the fecond inllance [p. 429], Mr. Bmmnt has contralled (as die calls it) fome vcrfes of SpENSKR With fome others of Sir Joux CiiEKr, written in 1553, and of Sir Hlnrv Lea in 1 ^o' > with a view of fliewing, that both thofe compo-- litions, from their fmccthnefs^ rxthm^ and ian^mn-c-^ G z Ihould [ 84 ]• ihould be deemed of a pofterior age to that of Spenser. And I mud confcfs, that, if our judge- ments were neccffarily to be formed upon the fpe- cimens produced by Mr. Bryant, there would be fome ground for agreeing with him in his con- clufion. But from what work of Spenser does the reader imagine that Mr. Bryant has feledted the fpecimen, from which we arc to determine the chara6ter and age of the Poet ? Not from the' l"*oem juft cited of Viygjl^s Gnat ; or from the Faery £Qiecr:e ; or from any other of the numerous com- politicns which he has left us- in the regular heroic metre; but from the y^^^;?^ of his Pastorals, in which, belidcs the ftudied affectation of obfolete language which runs through ail the Paftorals, he has designedly made the metre roua;h and halt- ing, by curtailing each verfc, in one part or other,, of a fyllable. By this mode of contrail, not only Sir JoHM Cheke, but Chaucer himfelf, might be made to appear a fmoothcr and more improved verGfier than Spender. ' The contraft, which Mr. Bryant has form.ed between the two Scottifh poets, Blind Harry and Bp. Douglas [p. 43 3 1, is liable to fimilar and equal objections. Allowing Blind Harry to have been the older writer, '* it is evident," (fays the learned editor of Ancient Scotiiflj Foems, p. 272) '' that his work, however antiquated it may now appear, has been much altered and amended." Such- I 85 ) $nch a work mud furcly be a very exceptionable autiiority tor langungc. But in refpedt of njerfi- f cation, the contraft is ilill more improper. The verfes of Blind Harry, which, though mean and hobbling enough, are in the regular heroic metre, arc compared, not with the Bifliop's /rr/^t?- t'lon of the JEncis, which is alfo in the regular hc- •roic metre, but with his Prologue to the eighth book, which is a fort of Ballad, written va ftanzas of thirteen lines each ; of which the nine firji are in an irregular, imperje6l rythm, moft Tcremblln^ that of Pierce Plowman, with the addition of rime. Wx. Bryant has cited the nine frfi lines •only of one of thefe ftanzas ; but to give a clearer idea of the nature of the compofitlon which be has chofen to contraft with Blind Harry's heroic verfes, Ilhall take leave to add here the/oz/r con- •cluding lines of the flanza, repeating the tzvo lajl ■of the lines cited by Mr. Bryant, for the f^ike of rendering the example more pcrfpicuous. Sche wyl not wyrk thocht fche want, bet waiftis hir tyme In thigging, as it thryft war, and uthir vane thewis, And ilcpis quhen fche fuld fjiyn, With na wyl the warld to v.\n, This cuntre is ful of Ca_\ nes l:yn. And fvc fchirc fchrcwis. G 3 The [ 8« ] The only p.ioper inQance (9) for comparifon, which Mr. Bryant has produced, confifls of about (9) I cannor however impute Mr. Bryant's choice of the other inllances to any untairnefs, as, in his next fec- tion (p. 441), he h,;is qiiored at length more than fixty lines from Pierce Plowman, in which (he %s, p. 443) " we may ohierve, that the r\ thm is as jtift, and the lines flow as iinooihly, as any v, hcie in Rowley." I have Oated mv notion of the verfification of Pierce Plowman' in another place [/t//^'j on the Inn^uagc, Sic. of Chauceb, n 57] ; and Mr. Bryant himfelf allows (p. 440% that " his lines are often extended to tiftecn Syllables: but gtnerallv" are fewer; and the metre is a kind of imperlect an.ipaiilic meafurc." It flionld fcem, that Mr. Bryant nuUl have a peculiar taile or fyftem oi verfificarion, if he really thinks that fuch lines as thefe, in which the number of fyllabies is indeterminate, and the accents irregularly difpofed, can be compared to the verfes of Rowlly for fnioothneis of flow and jufcnefs of rythm. When he goes on to aflert (p. 44^), that, in thefe extrai^fs, — " the true accent is generally preferved upon the terminating fyl- lable," I am ftill lefs able to follow him, as, according to my notion, h:ilf the lines, which he has ijuoted, have no recent upon their terminating fyllablc. 1 will fet down a few here, as he has quoted them, that the raader may fee how fmoothly they flow, and how well the accent is pre- fi.rved upon the terminating (yllable : *' And cry we to kind, that he come and defend us : A;id crv we to all the cnmnuinc, that thevcomc to unirve. And tliere nbvde and biker againft Belial's children. Kind confcitnce this heard, and came out of the pUmettt?, And fcnt :jith his forriours, fevers and fluxes, C'oiighcs and cartiiacle.?, crampes and toth-achcs ; Retimes and radgondes, and raynous fcalles, ]-}ic3 anu ]:)oi:ches, and burnynge agneb." 1 am as mugh at a lofs to guels upon what principles Mr. 'Bryant has formed his judgement, when he contends ^•■. ^;c), tiiat Ko-.vl:,y m:glu have had bcttci pntttrus of verfi- [ 8? ] forty lines, extraftcd from certain hymns in the Pilgrimage op the Soule, printed by Caxton in 1^83, which, Mr, Bryant tells us [p. 438', " arc written in the fame kind of (lanza as the Elinowc and juga c/Rowlky, and the Z!,\v<:^//f«/^ Ballade of Charitc ;" and I have no fort of objec- tion to let the whole controvcrfy be determined by the fimintude, or diffimilitude, which thole forty lines Ihall be judged to have to the fame number of lines taken from any part of thole two pocrns. I muft obferve however, that, when Mr. Bryant ftates thefe flaiizas to be of the fame kind, he for- NTrfiiicarion to follow tlian Lydgath, Gower, and C 'au- rER. 1 cannot fee that his T-xtrafts from Robeut of (ir.oucESTER, or from the ano>iymoui rimers quored by Mr. Warton, or even from the Romance of the Squire of low degree, G\h.'\h\t any fuch patterns. By the way, I miiil c=>bferve, that the antitiuity afcribed by Mr. Bryant to rlic Sfju/re of low di'^rcc, though countenanced by JMr. Wal- ton* [Hift. of Engiifli Poetry, vol. i. p. 175], is very dif- putable. The oijly fcwindatioH for it, 1 apprehend, is 1 notion, that Chaucer hds alluded to tliis romance in his Rime of Sir To pas-, and for proof of this notion i^h•.^VAU- lON has referred us to his Ohfervutlons on Spoi/cr, vol. i, p. 139. But the note oj an ingenious correlpondcnt. to which, I fuppofe, he refers, fays only, 1 tlnnk, th.it the Sqiiicr of lovje degree has impertinent dig;cnions, fimilar to thofe ridiculed by Chaucer ; not that the Squ'icr of lo-jce degree was itfclf the objecl of Chaucer's ridicule. Mr. Warton informs us, tliat he liad never ften any manu- fcript of this romance ; anioofs, that i-iis Poet was not [ 9' ] not only the inventor of Tragedy among us, but alio of the metro In which Tragedy fliould be vritten, though, for fomc reafon or other, he has thought proper to write the greatcll part of his own in ftanzas. IV. That a genius, who was capable of making all thefe improvements in LanguAv^^e andVEi^sw Fi CATION, fliould alfo invent new Forms of Com- rosiTiON', unknown to his predeccflbrs and con- temporaries, is quite natural. Accordingly wc iind, among thefe Poems, Odes in irregular me- tres. Eclogues of the Pafloral kind, and Dis- coRSiNG Tragedies, compofitlons, for not one of w^hich any example could be found in England in the XV'ch century. Even in thofe compofi- tions, of which the fpecies was not entirely un- known, it is impofTible not to obfervc a ftriking difference from the other compofitions of that age, w ith rcfpcct to the manner in which they are con- ftrudtcd, and the fubjccis to which they are ap- plied. Inllcad of tedious chronicles we have here interefting poiiions of hiftory, felecVcd and em- bellished with all the graces ot epic poctrr ; in- llcad of devotional hvmns, lentcmporary,witli Caniiinge, whole accounts and nieafure- mcnt& [ 99 J friend upon a fadt, which he and all the woild mull have known to be falfc ? A like Contradiction to History appears in the Epitaph on Robert Canynoe^ who is reprc- fcnted as the great grandfather of William. [See the Dean's note, p. 427.] But allowing (what can fcarccly have been poffible) that Rowley might have been miftukcn in fuch a point as this, how fliall we account lor his havins; called that brother of William, who was Lord Mayor of London, Johne, when fo many records prove that his name was Tbojuas {id)? ments of that building are fo precife and accurate, who mentions Canning's trade and riches, his houfe and college of priefts at Redcliff, does not Ipeak of him either as the fole or even princijial benefac'^or to the work ;" and he al- Icdges a palfage of Canning^ Ji'ill^ in which he orders hini- fclf to be buried in loco quern conjlrui feci in parte aufirali ejufdcm ecchfiee, with this \inanlwerable comment upon it ; *' Would Canning have defined the place of his interment by the words locum qucm conjlrui fcci^ if he had been the tbie bnilder of the church ?* However undecided there- fore the quetlion may have been formerly, the Dean has proved incontrovcrtibly, thatCanynge was not fole founder or builder of Rcdclift" Church. When he adds, that " the acknowledgement of this point is not more in favour of Chatterton's than of Rowley's claim to thefe Poems," I mult differ totally from him. The tradition which he men- tions to have given the credit to Canvn£[c, miH'.t eafilv have miflcd Chatterton 5 but it is impoiTible that Rowley lliould have been miihiken in a fact which palled before his own eyes. (j6) ^toric of fVilUam Canyngc^ ver. 129 — 134. ^Tr. Bryant [p. 315] lavs, that this ciicumftance [of Canynge's krotlicr ^'■hn havin:: been Lord IMavor of LoMdonl is I'cri- H 2 iud [ 100 ] In the tranfacflions relative to Sir Baldwin FuLFORD, who is fuppofcd to be celebrated un- der the name of Sir Charles Bawdin, I have proved from a record [Introd. Account, p. xix.], that Canynge was Mayor of Briftol, and fat in the commiffion which tried and condemned Sir Baldwin Fulford in 1461, i Edw. IV. One mufl therefore be jullly furprifed, that fo mate- rial a eircumilance fliould be totally unnoticed in the poem on the Dethe of Sir Charles Bazvdin (17). fied by the lifts of Mayors in Fabian, Stowe, 8tc. though, in his note, he allows, " that there is great reafon to think that the Mayor's name was not John, bnt Thomas;" and that Fabian ftyles him fo. But the Dean of Exeter, [n. on ver. 91, p. 443] is fo far from confidering this circumftance as verified, that he chooles rather to fuppofe (contrary to the plain import of the words in the Poem) that yohn was not the brother — whom Canynge put in fuch a trade, That he Lord Mayor of Londonne town was made ; for (foys he) the perfon who held that high office anno 1457, 36 Henry Vlth, was called Thomas. He uippofes therefore '* that this ftanza may allude to two different per- ibns ; Ca7tyv^c might fupply the wants of his brother 'John, arid even fettle hun in London ; but Thomas had probably an earlier eftabliihment in trade, bv the fucccfs of which be was advanced to the higheft city honours." At the fame time, the De;m is candid enough to confefs, that *•' neither the Poem, nor thcfe Memorials [viz. 7/;^ unpnb- lifhcd h'lje of Cannings and [fitters of Canning to Rowley, in Ml-. Barrett's hands] meuLion any other brother befides 'John:' {I'j) Mr. Bryant indeed fn\^, " In the Poem it is faid, tluit at the time of iriii, event William Canynge was Mayor." But 1 cannot find any pailige in whiL'h this eircumilance is f--(id, or even implied, ii the poet luul been aware or it, he When Canvnge appears as InterccfTor for Sir Charlf.s to the King, vcr. 45 — 100, or in his fubfequcnt convcrfation with Sir Charles, vcr. 1 01 — 112, not the Icaft intimation is given of his being Mayor, and having fittcn in judgement upon him ; nor, on the other hand, when the Mayor is introduced in the proccflion, vcr. 293, have we any rcalbn to fufpcd:, that he !<= the Canyn'ge, whom we had juft feen acting fo friend- ly a part towards the criminal. The Dean of Exeter has obferved on vcr. 265, " that the proccffion here defcribed was probably real, at leafl it was fo orderly in point of form, that no modern pen could have difpofcd it with fo much propriety." I am forry to differ from fo great a mafter of antient forms and ufagcs ; but it fecms to mc rjithcr improbable, that fuch a proccflion il-'ould have attended the execution of a rebel of no hii^h rank, in thofe times efpecially, when Peers of the realm were fo frequently brought to the fcaffold, and, as far us appears, without any fuch ceremony. With rcfpccl to the propriety of the dcfcription, I am inclined to think, that rione but a modern pen would have called the Canons of St. Augulline, and the TvIoNKS of St. James, by the name of Freer s. he would certainly liave made fome ufe of fo interefring a lituation, as that of a niagidratc interceding for tlie lire •f a fiicnd whom he had luiufelf judicially condeinncd. H 3 While [ 102 ] While thofc feveral orders fubfiflcd, the difluiG* tion of frercs from Monks^ and of Canons from both, was too well underftood to be overlooked, or voluntarily confounded (i8.) It may be objected, fays the Dean [p. 3 s 7], ^^ that the poet has not given either to Sir Bald- win or his WIFE their true Chrif:ia}i names •" and the objedion certainly requires a better anfvver than he has made to it. " i^^lo^^'y (S^y^ he), both Dames were affumed by him, as more harmonious (18) That fiich a flip might eafily be made by a modern pen^ the Dean himfelf has proved in !;is note on this paf- fage, where he has given the title of AugujVinian Fryers to • the Augiirtinians founded by Robert Firzharding in 1148, who arc called by Leland (cited by the Dean in his note on vcr. 293) St. Augujiine's Black Cancns'^ which was un- doubtedly their proper tide. In the note on ver. 271, the Dean has thought himfelf obliged to fay fomething to another impropriety, with winch his poet had been charged, for dreffing the Aiigulti- nians in I't^JJi-'i ivceds^ when the habit of their order was black. After a good deal oi difculnon, to fhew that the idea of ruflet might be affixed rather to the fubftance than to tl;e colour of the garment, he concludes: " In faft, rufjct ivccds, being the drefs of hermits, were conliderecl as tokens of humility and mortification, and as fuch were vvorn by the Knights of the Bath on the eve of their crea- tion [fee .Aniiij's F,Jay, Appendix, p. 42]; they were therefore, with great propriety, aliiuued in this melan- choly ceremonial.'' If the Dean wifiics us to believe, that, in this tne'ancholy ceremonial, the Auguilinians ajfuvicd (ac- cordi.ig to the plain import of his words) a drcfs which they did not lifualiy v.€ar^ he fliould flieu- that it was cullo- mary for them, or any other religious order, to change their habits on fuch occaiions, to [ 103 ] to his numbers." Allowing this to have been pqfiblc, 1 would afk how he came to think of Charles, a name, which, in the XVth century, if not abfolutely unufed in England, was, I am pcrfuadcd, mod exceedingly rare, and therefore, from its llrangcncfs, not likely to have been adopted by a poet (19) ? It is alfo fcarce con- ceivable, that a contemporary writer Ihould have omitted to make Sir Baldwin Ihew fome atten- tion to his two daughters, as well as to his tiuo fonSj whom he mentions repeatedly. But it is plain, that this writer did not know that he had any daughters ; for he is fpoken of more than once (rg) I muft not conceal, thaf, in tnrning over the 5th and 6th volumes of the Parliament Rolls with a view to this point, I found one perfon of the name of Charla % viz. Charles Nowcll, vol. 5. p. 594, ann. 7 & 8 Edward IV. I fliould imagine that he was of French or Burgundian ex- traction, la thefe two volumes, which contain the Rolls from about the 20th Henry VI. to the end of Henry VII. I counted near a thoufand names without one Charles, The name of Florence, which he has given to Sir Baldwin's wife inftcad of Elizabclh, which, according to the Dean, was her true name, is lefs exceptionable ; but one cannot help being a little furprifed to fee a ballad-maker of the XVth century fo refined, as to rejeft the proper names of his contemporaries for others of a more poetical found. The Dean informs us (with feeming difapprobation) that this lady, notvulthJhoid'nig her great affeHlon for her huPoaud and excejf.ve grief at his execution, was mitrricd again in lefs than three years. He appears to be fearful (but furcly without reafon) that the fliortnefs of her widowhood may be deemed inconfiilent with that affeftion and grief de- fcribcd in the Toem. I do not believe, that he had any ©tiicr authority for either, H 4 i« [ 104 ] •as having only two children^ vcr. 24, and 57. The latter is part of Canynge's fpeech to the King : *' Hee has a fpouie and children twcine ;" where it is impoffible to fiippofe, that the fpeaker fhould cither have been ignorant of the true num- ber of Sir Baldwin's children, or lliould wilfully have diminiilied it. That King Edv^^ard was at Briftol ahoiit the time of Sir Baldwin's execution, and might ■pfffibly have been prefent at it, I fee no reafon to difpute (20) ; but we may be certain, that the fpeech fuppofcd to be made to him by Sir Bald- win is entirely fictitious, and fuch as no contem- porary writer v;ould have dared to invent. Befidcs Canynge in the poem is reprefentcd as a Yorkilt; (20) The firfl: point is clear enough; the fecond is very problematical. I had inadvertently given more weight to the entry in the books of St. Evvin's church than it de- serves, by adding (from the account which I had received of that entry) that St. Ewin's church %uas then the mivflcr, J^ut this is nonfenfe. [Who has not, at one time or other, talked nonfenfe upon the fnbjeft of Rowley?] Without dif- cufiing minutely the feveral appropriations of the word ivirijicr, we may be certain, that a fmall parilh-church, as .St. Ewin's was, could never have acquiied the title of the I^.liNSTER in a town in which there were feveral monallic churches, and one fo confiderable as afterwards to become a catliedral. We have therefore in reality no ground to believe from this entry, that the King was a fpciiatoi of the execution from the M infer voindovj^ as defer ibecl in the Potm ; or even Irom the window of St. Ewin's church. If be had come thither for that purpofe, wc fliould probably hnve feen other charges for fcaft'olding, &c. befides that/or ihujlnn^ the ehurch-^nivcmtnt, and [ i°5 ] and therefore it is inconceivable thatRowLEY, what- ever his private fentiments might have been, Ihould have indulged himfclf in a compofition, which mnft have given fo much offence to his friend and patron. To get rid of the firft of thefe difficulties, the Dkan has an ingenious fuppofi- tion, that the poem was written, not at the time of the tranfatlion, but ** late in King Edward's reign, when fortune took a turn in King Henry's favour ;" and I am ready to allow, that there were Q\iO\itf£ven months, from September 1470 to April 147 1, in which a zealous Lancaftrian might have vented his paffion in this manner, without an ap- prchenfion of immediate punifhment. But the other difficulty mufl remain in full force, nnlefs we admit another fuppofition of the Dean's [p. 331], that Canynge, at this latter period, had changed his party ; and " that this change might have been occafioncd by King Edward's impoling on him a heavy line of 3000 marks, and endea- vouring to force him into a marriage with a lady of the Widdeville famil)', which he avoided by taking refuge in the orders of the church." This lall circumflance, as I have obfcrvcd [In- trod. Account, p. xxiii.], is alluded to in the Storie of William Canynge ; and the Dean tells us [in his note on ver. 91, p. 445], " that the menace of Kintr Edward to force a dau2;htcr pf Woodviie, Loril Rivers, upon Can\nge for a wife, [ .06 ] wife, and bis {heltering himlclf under the pro- te<-tion of holv orders, is a fadt eftabliflied by the MOST AUXLIJiN^'IC RECO.RDS." But hc doCS HOt tell us what records he means, though fo fingular a fa(ft moll: certaixily requires no ordinary attefta- tion. Mr. Br v ant has been more fair [p. 312]. His record (the only one, I believe, in which any mention of this tranfadrion can be found) is the Memoirs of -Caxyngr, by T.Rov/ley, firft prin- ted in the Tovun and Country Magazine for Novem- ber 1775(2;). In a fubfcqucnt paffage indeed £p. 316J he feems willing to ilrcngthen the autho- (21) It hns been reprinted by Mr. Warton, Hifr. of Eng- lifii Poetry, vol. ii. p. 1^9 — 164, and among Mlfcellanies iiy T- Chatterton, p. 119, I'cq. It is fometimes called Jllunoirs of Canning, fometinu-s jVIcmoirs of Rovjlcy, and forrictimes, more fpccifically, Menvj'irs of Canyngc by Rovj- ley. Mr. Bryant upon this otcalion, as well as many others, J)a3 cited thefe Memoirs as a genuine work of Rowley; but the Dean of Exeter has more than once intimated his doubts about their authenticiry. I hare cited in a former jiote, p. 97, one paiTage, in which he.fpeaks very contemp- tuoully of them ; nor has he treated them with more re- lpe6t in the following note on the Battle of Hajlhigs^ xer, 443. '' As to the treatment which Rowlc-y is faid (in the printed Hillory of Canning's Life, fee Warton, vol. ii.) to have received from the wife of Mr. Pelham, v.ho was dcfcendcd from the family ot I ifcamp ; that account Jlndl he left to plead fcr hjelf. It docs not affcft the authcnti- -city of the Poem; nor is it nccejj'ary to hciicve^ that every toper ^ %vh'ich has been produced through Chaiterton'' s har.ds^ n an undoubted original of Ro-zvley,^' After all this, one cannot but ()t. fnrprifed to fee thefe fame Memoirs referred to by the Dean as the most authenjic; Rucords; for I sni toiiridenr, tlia^ he cannot point out sny other Record, iliftory, [ ^0? ] rity of the Memoirs by other evidence. ** Of "Sir William Canynge's going into orders to avoid the marriage propofcd by King Ediuard, we have the following evidence, for which we are indebted to Mr. Tyrwhitt, // is ccrtaiUy from the regijler of the BiJlMp of Worcefler, that Mr, Canynge zuas or- dained Acolytbe by Bijhop Carpenter on igth of Sep- tember, 1467, and received the higher orders of Sub- deacon, Deacon, andPrieJl, on the izth of March ^ 1467, O.S. the 2d and \6th of April, 1468, re- fpeclivcly.'^ This evidence was produced by me [Introd. Account, p. xxiii.] to fhew the time of Canynge's going into orders, which it does, I think, very precifely ; but I never dreamt of its being applied to fhew, that he went into orders to a-'coid a marriage propofcd by King Edivard, of which the regifter fays not one word. On the contrary, I hope to demonfirate very clearly, that the dates afccrtained by the regifter are totally in- confillent with thofc in the Memoirs ; and of con- fequence, that neither the Memoirs, nor the Sro- RiE OF William Canynge, which agrees with them in the fame extravagant fidtion, could pof- fibly have been written by a genuine Rowley. Mr. BuYANT himfclf allows [p. '^S'^'li ^^'^^ " ^'^''<^ Jiiftory, or Narrative, b\' v.iiich " the menace of King Edward to force a daughter of Woodvile, Lord Rivers, iipon Canynge for a wife, and his flieltering himfclf under fhe f rotcdion of holy orders," cun be ejlahlijhcd. is C :o8 ] is the teji hy zvhich the authenticity of cur author if iQ be tried. If thcfe evidences on each fide do not correfpond, the whole falls to the grou/id," The account of this matter in the Memoirs is thus ftatctl by Mr. Bryant [p. 353]: " In the yeare Kyn^ Ed'ward came to Brifiozv, niafier Cannings fend fur me, to avoide a inarriage ivhich the Kyng was bent Kpon betxveen him and a ladie he neer had feen of thefamike of the Widdeviles (22). I he danger were (22) The Dean of Exeter fays [p. 445], that flie was a daughter of [j/Qodville, Lord Riz'cys, and confequently fifter to the Queen ; fo that, according to him, the King wanted to make mailer Canynge his brother-in-law. So mate- rial an improvement upon the Memoirs makes me ap- prehend a little that I may have wronged the Dean, by fuppofing, in a former note, that he had no other autho- rity than the Memoirs for this tranfaction. Whenever he produces any, I fliall be ready to beg his pardon. Ml'. Bryant has attempted to argue, from the ortho- graphy of the name PFiddevde, that Chatterton copied thcfe Memoirs from a Manufcr'tpt ; '^ as all the printed Tiiflories of England exhibit the name JVoodvdle [p. 319]." But how is the faft ? I will take his word for thofe hillories which he mentions, and has, I fuppofe, exa- mined J but I have w'.)V^ before me a Summary of Rapines Hijiory, in 3 vols. 8vo. London, 1747, (a book not un- likely to have come into Chatterton's hand) in which the name of King Edv/ard's Queen and her family is conftant- ly, I believe, written lV'idevU!e, or IVydcvUe, The inge- nious author of Curjory Objervatioi-n, he. informs us [p. 39], that Mr. Walpole, in his Royal and Noble Au- thors^ has fpelied this fame nime. fVidv die ', and I really imagine that to have been, of late years, the fafliion.able orthography. But it is uifficient to dfcilroy ]\lr. Bryant's argvmient, to have fliewn, that Chatterton might have found this name lo fpcUcd in a printed book. nigh. C 109 ] nigh, unlcfs avoided by one remedce, on holle cnc^ which tuns, to be ordained a fonn of holy church, heyng franke frojn the power of kynges in that cafe, and ca?inot be wedded. — Mr. Cannings injlantly fent me to Carpenter y his good friend, bijhop of Worccfler ; and the Fry day following was prepairdc, and ordaynd the ncxte day, the date of St. Mathezv, and on Sunday fang hisjirjl ?nafs in the church of Our Ladie^ to the ajlonifliir.g of Kyng Edward, &c. According to this account, the tranfadtion palled " in the year Kyng Edwarde came to BriJIowe," and the whole flory fuppofes his prefcnce there. We have feen above, that he was probably at Brillol in the beginning of September, 1461 ; but that was at leaft fix years before Canyngcs ordination ; and, befides, at that tinie the King himlelf had not married into the family of the Widdevilcs. We are alfo in- formed by a Mf. Chronicle, cited by Mr. War- ton [Hilt, of Engl. Poetrv, vol. ii. p. 153], that fving Edward was at Brillol in 1472 ; but at that time Canynge had been in full orders above three years. What rcafon have we to believe that King Edward was at Briitol in 1467, the time of Canynges firft ordination, cflablifhed by the re- giller ? I can find none. Mr. TiiiYANT, in another place [p. 581], fays, " the very article of King Edward being at Brillol in the }ear 1467, could hardly liave been dikoverLd by Chatterton ; as it i>, I believe, iiKntioned but by on-: hlf.orian." i wmi C no ] wlfh he had named that one, as I know not where to look for him. For the prclcnt however let us fuppofe, npoh the fmgle evidence of the Memoirs, that King Ed- ward was at Brillol in September 1467; that he formed the flrange fcheme of making the fortune of one of his wife's coulins, by marrying her to mafter Canynge ; and that maftcr Canynge had no way of avoiding the match but by ftealing into orders. The account goes on to fay, that on the Fry day following be was prepared ', and ordained the 7iexte day (i. e. Saturday), the day of St. Matthew ; and on Sunday fung his firfi juafs : but this is a flat tontradidtion of the rcgifler, which fays, that Canynge received his hrll orders on the imie- teenth of September, 1467; for the day of St. Matthew, as every one knows, is the tiuentieth of that month; and moreover, in the year 1467 the day of St. Matthew fell not on a Saturday, but on a Sunday: another hiftorical fadf, with which the account in the Memoirs is totally inconfiftent. Mr. Bryant indeed has hit upon a curious me- thod of reconciling thcic contradictions, hy fup- pofing, that the day of St. Matthew^ in the Me- moirs, means the Vigil, or, as he calls it, the rnjt of St. Matthew, i. e. in common acceptation, the day before the day rf St. Matthew. If he has difcovcrcd any arguments by which he has been able [ "■ 1 able to make this fuppofition probable to bim- fclf, I admire his ingenuity ; if he can make it probable to others, I ihall certainly never venture again to difpute with (o powerful a mafter of the arts of perfuafion. But even if we Ihould allow, that tbe day of St. Matthew may be conftrued to mean the day be- fore the day of St. Matthew, yet flill the account in the Memoirs would be irreconcileable to the Rcgifter. For the Memoirs fay, that Canysge on Sunday fung hts firjl mafs \ an exprellion which can only be properly ulcd of a prhjl : but the Rcgiller proves, that in September 1467 he was only ordained acolythe (23), and did not receive the higher orders till the March and April follow- inir. It Ihould be remarked further, that, as Canynge at that time was only ordained aeolytbe, however afionlflmi the King might be, there was (23) An acohthe is thus dcfcribed in the Canons of J^X- flic, Codex J.E. A. p. 99. Acolythiis dicitur^ qui candelam 1-cl ccrcum accoijnmfcrt, dnm F.vangcUum le^'itur in Del m'ln'ijierioy vJ dnm faccreloi Sacramoitum Ccipoiis Domini (ul a'.tare coyfeerat. The idea in theMEMoiPs, that Ca- nvngc received all the l'c\c:al orders, including that of j)rii.ft, in the fame d.iy, is not only contrary to the f:'6l, as cilablilhed by the Rcgillci [icc bclorc, p. 107], but alio to cccleliaflical law and praitice [Codex, J. E. A. p. i;i]. I flioiild doubt whetiiei the Pope hiinfeit ever fo far dilpcnfed •with the iiliial toiins, as to c(jnrcr all the orders in one day. The four inferior orders might be conferred together, and I probably were upon Cuivnge, tliough that oi aeolytbe ov\\y^ being ihc highell of thc;n, lo u.eu:ior.cd in the Rcgiller. no [ 1.2 ] no reaibn uhy he lliould give up his projedl of the marriage, as the order of acolytbe, or any of the orders inferior to that oi fub deacon , did not lay the perfon ordained under any incapacity of contrafting matrimony. Canynge therefore, by fuch a flep, would only have provoked the King, without providing himfelf with any fecurity againft his power. This llory in the Memoirs has an additional claufe, which, for feme reafon or other, Mr. Bryant has thought fit to detach, and to illuf- trate in a fcparate article, p. 313. " The King, upon hearing this (fays Mr. Bryant), was angry beyond defcription, and refented Canninge's be- haviour highly : fo that, as we arc informed by the author [of the Memoirs], Canninge was glad to prefent him with three thoufand marks, in or- der to avoid his future ill-will. This was an im- menfe fum for thofc times, and almoft incredible. But we have authority for it in the trcatife before mentioned of William of Worceftre ; who authen- ticates t\{\spart of thejlory^ pafl all difpute, p. 99. " Item ultra ifta Edwardus rex quartus habuit de didto Wilhelmo (Canyngis) III millia marcarum pro pace fua habcnda." Whoever will take the trouble of lookins; into William of Worcester will fee, that all, which he can be brought to au- thenticate, is the fimple fad, that Edward IV. had [ "3 J had once from mailer Canynge a fine of three thoufand marks ; but he has not a fylhible to au- thenticate that fadt, as part of the Jlory in the Memoirs, viz. that the fine was paid to mitigate the King's difplcafure againft Canynge, for going into orders to avoid a marriage with a ladie of the JFiddcville family. With rcfped to the fimple fa(5t, Mr. Bryant needed not to have had recourfe to William of WoRCESTRE to authenticate it. He might have quoted the authority which William ofWoRCESTRE himfclf appcars to have followed, the Epitaph on matter Canynge, Hill remaining to be read by every body, in Latin and Englilh, in Redcliff Church (23). I am not prepared, nor do I think it incumbent upon me, to aflign the (23) It is a common (I will not fay artifice, but) praftice of my learned antagoniih, to cite obfcure and out-of-the- way authorities for the proof of things of vulgar notoriety. If Mr. Bryant had cited Catiyri^c^s Epitaph upon this occa- fion, he would not have illuftratcd his poiition [p. 480], that " it requires a great infight into antiquity to find out the circumftances alluded to" in thefe Poems. The Dean of Exeter has alio had the caution [p. 444] to cite this flory, and other circumftances of Canynge's life, from pViUiam of IVorcefire^ rather than from the Epitaph; though he appears to have examined the monuments in Redcliff churcli with fome attention ; as he alfincs us, that the figure of mnfitr Canynge^ upon one of them, exaflly "jcr'ifici a portruiliire of him, as it appears among Rov:hy^i papers. Is he certain, that the portraiture was not made from the figure ? I true [ 114 ] true confidcratlon for which the fine was paid (24). It is cnou2;h for nic to be able to denv, that it could have any cor^ncxion with the traniaftion re- lated in the MtMoiRs, that tranfaftion itfelf having been proved to be a mere fable. The whole ilory therefore of mafler Canynge's ordination, having been tried by the teji propofed by Mr. Bryant himfelf, and the evidences having been fl^cvvn plaiidy 7iot to correfpond^ the reader can have no difficulty in concluding with Mr. Bryant, that " ihs whole falls to the ground.^^ So (24.) The matters of difculTion, both civil and criminal, bLtvvetn the prince and his fubjcfts, were in thcie times ib numerous, and were all fo frequently terminated by a fine, or payinent of money, that the field is too wide for con- jedure. It appears from Aladoxcs Hhl. of the Exchequer^ Ch. :-;iii. Seft. x. that this particular fort of fine pro -pace hubcnda was generally paid for the luipenfion or rcverfal of fomc legal procefs or judgement, though perhaps it was not unfrequently levied under the larger terms, Pro henevO' laitla regis habenda, IJt rex indigiiationcm ranittnt, &c. ibid. Sect. v. Among various offences, enumerated by Madox, in which the King's peace was to be purchafcd, I cannot find any one quite fimilar to that atrocious fpecics of La-fc-maje/iy^ with which poor mafter Canynge has been charged by the author of the Memoirs, viz. a refiijal to mfiriy the ^uccii's cou/in. As the offence was new and un- pi'ecedented, we may fuppofe, that the intent of fo fevere a fine was to nip it in the bud. But to be ferious : though it may not be fciiy to diicover what was the real occafion of this payment, we may be morally certain, that, as the Epit;?ph muft have been written by fome friend of Canynge*s in the life-time of King Edward, the cranfadion alluded to was of fuch a nature, as not to imply any criminality in Canynge, or any opprcffion on the part of the King. dire<^ [ "5 ] dire(ft and manifcft a contradiction to his- tory, in fo remarkable a tranlaiflion, in which the writer pretends to have borne himfelf fo con- fiderable a part, muft outweigh a hundred little coincidcncics with probability, or even with truth, in names, ufages, &c. all of which arc, in general, fuch as an impollor of moderate abilities iinght at any time cither borrow from books, or invent himfelf. li PART ii5 3 PART THE THIRD. BY the preceding examination of various parts of the internal evidence, I flatter myfelf that I have edabliihed this incontrovertible pofition, that the Poems, attributed to Rowley, were not WRITTEN BY HIM, OR ANY PERSON IN THE XVth CENTURY. The remaining qucHion is, by whom and WHEN they were written. But before I pro- ceed to the difcuflion of that, I think it proper to examine, fhortly, what is the earlieft external evi- dence which we have of the exiftence of any Poems under the name of Rowley, That thefe Poems were written by any fuch perfon, no exter- nal evidence whatfoevcr can be fufficient tO' prove ; but it may be of ufe in determining the date of their iirfl appearance in the world, and confe- quently lead to the difcovery of the real author. The firft ftory, which was circulated concerning thefe Poems, and which the advocates for their authenticity are flill obliged to fupport as well as they can, was, that they made part of a collec- tion of ancient writings, and other curiofities, de- pofited by Mr. Canynge in Redclift^ Church. But what evidence have we that Mr. Canvnge made C n7 ] made any fuch depofitc? It was faid at firft to appear from his will; in which he had given particular dircdions for dcpofiting thcfe poems, with the rcil of his collcdtion, in a certain chcft locked with fix keys; and, for the better prc- fervation of fuch treafurcs, had ordered the cheft to be annually vifited and infpc(flcd by the Mayor, and others. This mufl: be allowed to found well ; but, unkickily, upon examination of Canynge's will, not a fyllablc of this curious tale is to be found in it. No books or writings are there men- tioned, except ** two books, called *' Liggers cum intc-rra lejrenda," which he leaves to RcdclifF church, to be ufed occafionally in the choir by the two chaplains there by him eftablilhcd." Wc are now told by Mr. Brvakt [p. 508], that we have a mod flitisfatTlory proof of this fadt from a Latin deed in the polTcflion of i\Ir. Bar- pett; which he defcribcs " as fairly written in an official hand of indifputable antiquity ; made in the 8th vear of Edward IV. and containing an account of fome chantries, founded by Mr. Ca- nynge; of the principal chcft locked with fix keys, filled CiJIa ferata cum Jex clavihiis ; of the annual vifitation," &c. But he docs not tell us, whiit this Latin deed fays about the Poems. I h\s ni)felf, and have quoted in the Litroduv/V/? in London. A monk of Bury ii^ piiclVs orders, while icfiding in London, iiiiglu farcly be K 3 tailed [ '34 ] Another of thefe fragments, entitled, " ^he ac- counte of William Caiiynge's feajl,*' has been copied called n prieft in London. If Mr. Bryant could prove that there ever was another Lydgate, to whom the circumftances of this correfpondence would bemoreluitable than to the monk of Burj', we might admit his diftiqflion. As matters Hand, 1 cannot help thinking that he is too feverc upon thofe, who *' have been Searching into Lydgate's works of Bury, to find out the name of Rowley;" and perhaps at bottom he himfelf may be not fo much difpleafcd with them for having fearched, as for not having found. I muii; not conceal what the Dean of Exeter tells us, that *' this was the firll of Rowley's compolhions produced by Chatterton to Mr. Barrett ; and, behdes the apparent anti- quity of the vellum, ink, and hand-writing, it had this unufua!^ hut Jliong proof of authenticity^ that it was writ- ten in continued lines, extending the whole breadth of the parchment, like a profe co-.-npofuion." Mr. Bryant has the fame ilory, p. 566, and adds, " This was of old ufual, in order to fave expcnce, by croiuling as much as could be brought together within a Unall (.ompafs ; becaufe mate- rials for writing v/cre der.r." But in the circumftances of this cafe, this minncr of Tvriting is fo far from being a proof of authenticity, that in my opinioii it very much in-r crcafcs the fufpicion of forgery. In 13 13 (according to Anderfon, vol. i. p." 153), a Ikin of parchment coll two pence farthing. A Ikin was often folded into 12 leaves, of which every p.ige would very well contain 36 lines; fo that, I apprehend, all the works attributed to Rowley, unpub- iifliLd as Well as pnblifiied, might have been tranfcribed fairly, without croudiiig one vcrle into another, upon five or fix Ikins of parchment ; the price of which at Briftol in 1460 (we will fuppofe) might be double to that in 1313. Make if treble, or (juadruple, we iraiil: reverfe all our ideas of Canynge, before we can believe, that he would fufTer his poetical friend to be reduced to the necelfity of facrificing the beauty of his writings to fuch a pitiful faving of parch- ment. But poor Chatterton Iiad no Canynge; and his ma- terials for writing were probaijly fcaiee. He might think too C '3i 3 4n the manner of a Facfimilc, and fubmlttcd to public examination in my edition, and fince in the Dean's. I have never met with any one, who had examined that Fac fimile with the Icaft atten- tion, who was not fatisficd that the archetype was a forgery (29). Of the two other fragments, one contains the " F.pitaph on Robert Cafiyn^^c," and the other the 36 firft verfcs of the " Storie of JVil- Ham CanyJigey If it had been thought that cither of them would bear the light better than '' The AccQunte of W, Canyr}ge*s Feajle" one or other of the learned advocates for Rowley vvould certainly have obtained Mr. Barrett's permiflion to give us a Fac Jimik of them. An engraving of that too, that a manner of writing fo contrary to modcra prac- tice would have the appearance of being antient; as in ge- neral he fecms to have thought, with reipert to words and things, that whatever was not modern^ was ancient, (29) Though the Dean has been pleafed to declare roundly [p. 4^9]> " ^^^^ '^his Facjimile does not do jurtice to the original," he has not attempted to point out any inftance of deficiency, redundance, or variation in it. They who are ac(piaintcd with the diligence and ability of the engraver wjll not be much moved, I apprehend, by fo vague a cenfure. Will the Dean venture to fay, that he believes the original to be genuine ? I will only take notice here of one egregious llip of the forger. Whoever has been at all converfant with ancient MIT. muft have obfcived, that the forms of many of the Arabian numerals have varied at different times as much as any letters, liut the figures 6^ in the Fac Ihn'ilc are perfedly modern, and not only mo. dern, but they are exactly fuch figures as Chatterton him- felf \ifed to make; as can be proved by comparing them V'ith fpecinic;i3 of his hand-writing now in bcirg. K 4 l^rr [ >36 ] fort would have afforded at leaft as interefting a decoration to the Dkan's commentary as either the feal of Sir Baldwin de Fulford, or the tomb-flone of John Lamington, or even the Anglo-Saxon dulcimer with nine or ten firings. However there is no reafon why they, who can- not have ths ocular proof, fhould fufpend their judgements upon this occafion> If the whole An- t'quarian Society had infpeded thefe two frag- ments, and had decided unanimously, that the hand-writing was fimilar to that of the XVth century j that the parchment had the true yellozv tinoe, and the exadl rwnpie And foil of antiquity; that the ink was of a due faintnefs and g^'eynefs, and the charaders fufncitnrly obfcure ; all this would prove, not that the fragments were genuine, but that the forgery was well enough executed to impofc, at firfl: fight, upon good judges. The <' Epitaph on Robcr} Canpige" mud ftill be deemed fuppofititiqus, from its mentioning him 41S the ^rf^/^^r^^z^^^/^/^^r of William [fee before, p. 99]; and the 36 firil: verfes of the " Storie of I'fill'iam Canytigc'" cannot be exempted from the condemnation, which has already been pafTed upon the whole (lory, as full of impoffible falfities [fee before, p. 107 — 115]. One of thole falfities ap- pears in this pretended original, ver. 31 — 34; the jnention of Saint W.'.peburgus, whom the Dean him- [ 137 ] himfelf calls truly apocryphal [fee before, p. 96. n. 14] {Zo). ( jo) I cannot part with thefe curiou'- fragments, without oblervintj, that they are very iil calculated to iirprcls us with the idea of tlitir iiaving been depofired, anaonjj other valuable curiolities, by a wealthy merchant in Redcliff Church. One fl\oiild rather fiifpeO them of having been fcrawled by a be^ear upon fcraps of parchment picked off a dunghill. The Dean of Kxeter [p. 429] fays, " that the hand m which the fragment of the S'oric of IViUuim Ca- nynge is written, is fomewhat different from the /Iccount of Cunyn45 ] inllrufllon or encouragement, commenced poet; fuch a boy muft undoubtedly have poflcfTcd that' confcioufnefs of his own powers, and that cagcr- nefs to exert them, which may be termed genius. The peculiarities which have been recollcfted of his temper and appearance; his pride and impe- rioufnefs, his refervc, his inequality of fpirits, his glooms, his reveries, the drearinefs and wildncfs in his looks, the light in his eyes; though none of them perhaps, hngly, any proof of a fuperio- rity of parts, yet are all remarkably confiftcnt with fuch a fuperiority, and, taken together, would na- turally lead the obferver to experhty, ver. 400 and 442, as well as thofeofvl//- yicrva and Nii?or." Except thcl'e paffages, and the bare mention of Virgilius in Lydgate^ Anfiver^ I cannot fee a fmgle reference or allufioii to arty Greek or Roman authoi" in the Focms ; a circuirflance, which I have always conli- dered as affording good ground to believe, that tlicv were entirely compofed by Chattetton. We know that lie, from his education^ was nfecelfarily a ihanger to antierit litera- ture ; but it would be contrary to all experience, tliat .5 learned priell:, as Rowley is fuppofcd to have been, flioulJ write four thoufand vcrles without much (Ironger and more frequent proofs of his acquaintance with clajfual Hlflory ■M\A Alythilogy than are to be found in the Poems. Ths Quota r IONS in the Sermon uf>on the Ho/vS/rite, and in the Story of John Larr.inpto}i, v/ill he taken noiice of bclow^ and flievvii to have lain within the reach of even Chatter- ton's very limited erudition. L 2 number t h8 ] number of words borrowed from the old French, Saxon, and Scottifh languages.'* Of that number I have Ihevvn how ignorantly many are ufed, and I hope to fhew how eafily they were all borrowed* In Ihort, it is my opinion, that very little learning was neceflary for the compofition of the Poems attributed to Rowley. Whether Chatterton was actually polTcflcd of that little, we Ihould know with more prccifion, if the Catalogue above- mentioned were extant of the books which he had read before he was twelve years old. As they arc faid to have amounted to the number o^ feven* ty^ chiefly in Hiflory and Divinity ; we may pre- fumc, that there was at Icalt one History of England among them. We are told, from his mother, that, before he left fchool, he borrowed from three different bookfellers y?/^Z> hooks as their Jhops produced; and particularly that Mr. Green, who had the larg-eft coUedtion of anv bookfeller in Brillol, furnifhcd him with Speght's Chaucer, the Gloflary to which he is faid to have tranfcribed for his own ufe. It is furely not improbable, that, in thefe refearches, he Ihould have laid hold on fome elementary treatife on Heraldry, and fuch In- trodudtions to EngliJJj Antiquity as Cambden's Re- mains and Verstegan. If he Ihould be thought lefs likely to have travelled through Cambden's Britannia, he might at leaft have made himfclf tnaftcr of thofc parts of it which relate to Briflol and [ 149 1 and the neighbourhood ; or lie might have met with thofe parts extracted to his hand in fome to- pographical hiflory (30). Me muft probably have (38) I have now before me two numbers of a work, en- titled, *' Bri/iollia, or Memoirs of the City of Brijiol^'" by Andrew Hooke, Efq; native thereof, printed in 1748 and 1749. At the end of the firlt number, which contains a Dlffcrtation on the Antiquity of Briftcl, is fubjoincd *' a tranfcript of the "juhole paragraph relating to Brijh!,^* from Cambden^s Britannia. 1 think it probable, that Chatterton was mifled by Cambden to confider Canyngc as the founder of Redcliff Church. [See before, p. g8.] From Cambden too he probably learned the title of Robert Conful of Glou- cefter ; though Mr. Bryant, in his article of Robert Con- sul, p. 326, choofes rather to authenticate that title from Leland, Matthew Paris, and Henry of Huntingdon, and adds : *' Were it not for thefe fortunate atteftations, the account of a perfon named Conful in Rowley would have been looked upon as a fiction." Is not this another inflancc of that practice which I have mentioned above, p. 113, n. 23 ? But, befide thefe JLxtracls from Cambden, there are many other pairag<:s in this work of Mr. Hooke, of which Chatterton feems to have made m'e, as will appear more fully, whenever the " Dijcorfe on Briflovi'c^^* attributed to 'J'urgot and Rowley, fliall be publiflicd. 1 will only take notice here of one circumllance. Mr. Bryant, in his article Bithrickus, p. 336, has taken a great deal of pains to prove, that fuch an eminent per- fon could not fail of being prefent at the battle of Haftings. I do not know (fays he) of any hiftory to authenticate this ; but, ivhat is extraordinary, he is thus rcprelcuted in the Poem concerning that battle. And, iL-hatisjlillmore remarkable, he is introduced at the head of the very people from Brijiol" Mr. Bryant goes on to call this " a '>.'.' on - dcrful coincidence of circumllance, in confirmation of the hiilory aftbrdcd us by the poet." But, if we fuppole Chat- terton to have read BriJioUia, we fliall fee nothing wonder- ful in this circumftance. For in the fccond number of that work, the Hiilory of Brirtol, from the Conouelt to L 3 the C 150 ] been ImprelTed with an early admiration of Ca- NYNGE, by the two monuments eredted to his me« mory in Redcliff Church. The principal outlines of Canynge's life appear in his Epitaph [fee be- fore, p. 112]]; and the names of other benefaftors toBriftol, fuch as Fitzharding, Burton, Gaunt, &:c. might eafily have been colle6ted from build- ings and infcriptions flill remaining. If there arc any paiTages of true History in the Poems, which could not have been drawn from one or other of thefe fources, they have efcaped my no- tice (39). With rcfpedt to what may be properly the feconcl year of Henry L is digefted in the forni of An- nals, the names of the King of England and of the Lord of £ri/lo%ve being prefixed to each year j and to the year of the Confjueft is prefixed the narne of Brictric, Earl of Gloucefier, as Lord of Eristowe. "What fo natural as to introduce the Lord of Brijlowe at the liead of the people from Briilol ? The greatell part of the learning which Mr. Bryant has colle6ted, with relation to the perfonal hif- tory of Briihlc^ is to be found in the notes u})on BrijloU Via; but Ipafs all that over, as I cannot find that Chatter- ton has made any ufe of it, except perhaps to borrow the 7iarncs o^ y'lgar vt.i\i\ AilvJcird. 1 muft add, tliat, as Chatterton might have read thoie parts of Crnhdoi^ Biitcnmia which relate to Briilol in this pamphlet, fo I apprehend, that he might have found every other part of the Britannia, of which he can be fup- pofcd to have made any ufe, in fomc of thofe County Hif- toncs, which have of late years been repeated oyer and over again in the Maga-zuic:. (39) "I have faid paffagcs of true hifoxy. As to thofe *' dark hir.ts and oblique references" v.hich Mr. Bryant [p. 402] ccnfiders as " a proof of the antiquity of thefe ?ot;n;s," 1 have a better right, I think, to fct them all down for called the Poetry of them, Chatterton is al- lowed by Mr. Bryant [p. 1563] to have been " converfant in Milton, Shakespeare, and for airy nothings^ the workmniifhip of a bold but unin- formed imagination. Mr Bryant has obfcrved, p. 471, that Chatterton, in \\'\$ j^frtcan Eclogues, "not being ac- quainted with the names of the principal phtces, with the culloms and rehgion of the natives, nor -ivitli the produce of the country — has fubftituted a number of rtrange appel- lations, vvhich hxifuncy in its ivantomtefs fuggelled." But why may not \\\% fancy have operated with the fame uianton- nefi in the Poems attributed to RovAc^ f Why arc we to fuppofe a better foundation in hiftory for *' the overthrovj of Standrlp tower, Tinyati's }iecromaficy^ the goats of Conyan^ and rht fouls of the faiiy-flricken people, whicli are faid to wander to the dike of Off'u^^^ than for the I'lica Rhadal upon the coafl of Calabar^ the God Chalma^ Lorbar^s cavCy the [acred oak a?id myjl'ic trees on thi coafi of Guinea, and the African river Tiber, running through the dcfcrts of Ara- bia? In another place, p. 583, Mr. liryant afks, *' How- could he (Chatterton) know any thing of the Bhu Briton, and Tinvan ? ot Fou'ls-Iand and Mati az'a/, and the hJ/Ury of Hoive/ a/> fez'ah y" It is eafy to anfwer, that he might have met with Po-wls-land and Matraval, in a paflage of Cambden, wliich Mr. Bryant liimfelf has quoted, p. 229, or probablv in any other defcription of ^.lontgomoryniirc ; and the name of Hoivcl ap ftvah he might ha\e found, where Mr. Bryant has found it, in the common hiftoriesof Wales. But the hl/hrv oi' Hoivri apjcvah, who is intrq- duced in the Batt/e of Ha/lhigs, N^ i. I conceive to have been as mere a fiction as that of his friend Mcrvyn ap Tcir- dor, of whom even Mr. Bryant, it fecms, has been able to difcover only h{df the namr, p. 391. Of the hfhry therefore of thefe imagin:>ry perlonages, Chatterton knew iull; as much as he did of the Blue Briton, and Tlnyan, Sec. &c. ike. and I would humbly ndvife his learned commenta- tors not to be too defirous of knowing more, about any of theni, th^n he hag been pleafcd to tell us. L 4 TnoM- [ 15- J ThoxMsok." How infinitely might the genius of Shak E SPEAK E havc been brought forward by a fimilar advantage } But it is probable, that Chat- TERTOM had dipped into many other of our befl poets ; and, however contemptuoufly we may talk and think of Magazines and Mifcellanies (in which much of his reading is faid " to have been ex- per^ded"), I conceive, that a fingle volume of any one of our Magazines would have furnifhed a more inftrudtive fchool for Englifh poetry, better mo- dels of verfification and compofition, than a true Rowley, in the XVth century, could have found in all the libraries of the kingdom. Whatever {lock of antient Language may be fuppofed to have been wanted for the varnijh of thefe Poems, the whole might have been derived from very common dictionaries. The third and laft fpecics of inability, which is urged in exculpation of Chatterton from the charge of forgery, is a want of time. But who can determine how much tmie was neceflary for the compofition of ihefc Poems ? In the motions of bodies, where the velocity is known, the fpacc palTed through Ihews the time of the pafTage ; but the velocity of mind is always indeterminate, and therefore we cannot fafely argue from the length of a poem to the precife time employed in compofing ir. We have been lately told by re- fpcd^able authority [Wartcn on Pope, II. 83], 4 that [ '53 ] that Dryden's ode to St. Cecilia was the work of one night. Statius has informed us himftlf of what is by no means incredible, that his Epithiih- mium to Stella, confifting of 272 hexameter vcrfes, was written by him in two days. At that rate the Georgics of Virgil might have been finiflied in fixtcen days, and the yEncis in lefs than three months. It will not be difputed, I believe, that the {lylc and manner of rhcfe Poems are rather Statian than VIrgilian. If, in (lead of 136 verfes» the author fliould be fuppofed to have written only twelve, one day with another, the quantity of poetry attributed to Rowley might have been compofed in about a twelve-month. But it Is probable, that a lad of a vigorous invention, who had fo much leifure for profecuting the ftudl^s of his own choice (40), would have made a much (40) We are told by his fiittr [Milles. p. 11], *♦ that- he had little of his nuiltcr's bufinels to do, ibmetimes not two hours in a day, which gave him an opportunitv to pur- ine his genius *' She adds, that flie had heard liim fre- quently lay, " that he found he fludied bell toward the full of the moon ; and would ofren lit up all nii;ht and write by moon-light." The circumilance or his Ikepitig very lit- tle is confirmed by the evidence, collected by the author of Love and Madnefs, Whether this vcakejuhicfi fl)ould be confidered as the cauft- or the efteift of a dilleir.pcred mind, I leave to be determined by the Faculty ; it certainly added much to the time of his 'rifftive lile. Tlie Dean of Exeter indeed contends fp. 17], " that two years and nine months Ipent with Mr. Lambert (part tf which was employed in copying books of precedents for his luafter), was not n-.ore than fufficicnt for the bufincfs of ti.iHJlr'U'.n^ thefe parch- mcntr. [ 154 ] more rapid progrefs ; (o that not only the poctiy, but the prole ahb, and other devices, attributed' ments, endeavouring to underjt'and their contents, reading Chaucer, tranfcrlblng Speght's Gloflar)-, and acquiring a competent knowledge cf the meaning of ancient words ;" not to mention the hours dedicated to other Itadies and amufe- nients. And Mr. Bryant has infifted ftrongly [p. 499 and 54q] upon the time which mult have been neceffary " for 7inderjlanding and tranfcrlhbig the numerous manufcripts.'* 3ut, il' my hypotheiis be well-founded, that Chatterton ne- ver was poiTeffed of any manufcripts whatfoever of Rovyley, all the thnc, which he is fuppofed to have expended in iranjcribing and endeavouring to iindcrfland them, might have been faved, and applied to the compojitlon of the Poems, &c. under the nanie of Rowley, and i\\^ forgery of the few pretended originals. How much time he fliould l)e fuppofed to have fpent in reading Chaucer, and in ac- quiring a competent knoti.'lcdgc of the meaning of ancient VL'ords, I cannot precifely deteimine. I have proved, I think, that he never had acquired a competent knowledge of the m.eaning of ancient words ; and I cannot find any marks of his having been a diligent reader of Chaucer. The two quotations relating to Minflrels [in the j^ntlqulty of ChrlJlmasGameSy Chattert. Mifcell. p. 133] are very likely to have been taken at fecond-hand ; and a third paflage, which he has pretended to cite from Chaucer, I fufpetl ta have been forged by hinifclf. He exi)lains the word ahredden^ F.. I. 6. to mean abruptly; and -adds, " So Chaucer, Syke he abredden dyd attonrncP Till I fee fuch a line in Chaucer's works, I fliall not believe that it exilts there. That he fpent fome time in tranfcrlblng Speght's Glof- fary, or rather, perhaps, in comjMling a Crlollary fron\ Speght and other books, I have no doubt. I am even willing to allow a double portion of time for this operation, more tlian the Dean items dcfirous to crave, as he has omitted to llnte one half of the labour and difficulty of the. undertaking. He has ftattd Chatterton's Glofiary to have, been a mere tranfcrlpt frona Speght'?, p. 507 ; but, accord- ing [ '55 ] io RowLF.Y, might have been fabricated withui the year (41). ing to the information, which I received feveral years ago from Mr. Barrett, and which he has been lb obliging as to confirm to me very lately, the Gloffary, which Chatterton had compihxl, was in tivo parts. The firll: contained " the old ivordi ivith the moiirni Engli/?), and the lecond the mo- dcrn Rngl'ijh iv'ith the old w or d^^ both alphabetically." As the idea of \\\\% fecond part ravift have been quite nev.\ the execution miift have been proportionably troublefome; and therefore we may juftly wonder, that the Dean, whofe point was to employ ns much of Chatterton's time as he could in any thing but forgery, fliould have intiiely omitted all men- tion of this feeond Gloflarv, in which a number of modern Ku^li/Jj words were difpofed alphabetically, and interpreted (if it m^y be fo called) by old v.'.ords of the fame fignifica- tion. Was he apprehenfive, that this GlolUiry, though not itfelf a forgery, would be deemed by every one to have been an in/lrument prepared ioY forgery P In our common Latin and Englifli Dictionaries, the part in which the Eng- lifli words are placed firu, is faid to be for the piirpofe of ^£lft''''S />' V^'" '" tran/lating Engli/h into Latin ; and for what other purpofe could this GlolFary hav^e poffibly been compiled, but that of alnuing the compiler :'« trayfiating modern Englijh into old i* Whether the folicitude, which Chatterton exprefled repeatedly in his Letters to his Silver, to have this Gloffary fent after him to London [Milles, p, 507], fliould be alcribed to a conlcioufncfs of the infe- rence which might be drawn from it, or to a dcfire of ufing it in new forgeries, I will not pretend to determine. When the Dean fays, " that Mr. Bui ett copied it, and that the tranfcript is rtill in hi: polTeflion," he is not quite accurate. Mr. Barrett, unluckily, copied only the /zV/? part; but his teftimony, as to the cxillcncc and nature of the fecond parr, cannot be dilputcd, and ought not to have been hip- prclfed. (41) We have a proof of the rapidity, with which Chat- terton could compofc, in a f.mcifnl will, with fome fuirical verles prefixed; " v.hich will and verfes (as Mr. Bryant in- forms [ '56 ] We cannot pronounce with certainty how foon Chatterton might have conceived the idea of forging either poetry or profc, and of afcribing the forgery to Rowley. If we believe Mr. THiSTLETHWAiTE[Milles, p. 455], he commenced forger as early as he is known to have com- menced poet, in the fummer of 1764, in the twelfth year of his age ; though at that time the name of Rowley is not faid to have been men- tioned. But there is no neceffity to affign fo early a beginning to Chatterton*s love of forgery. The fummer of 1767, when he was between four- teen and fifteen years of age, and when he is ge- nerally agreed to have firft difcovered the famous parchments, which his father had taken from Redciiff Church, would be early enough for my purpofe ; but I muft obfervc, that, before this difcovcry of the parchments, according to his forms lis, p. 546) were made at a very folemn feafon, when he purpofcd to put an end to his life." — " Upon the cover of the book, which contained in his hand-wrifing the will and verfes, was the following memorandum: ^11 thmurote bctzueen eleven and tzvo o'clock^ Saturday ^ in the utmoft dif- trcf% of m'nid.^'' By this (fays Mr. Bryant) is meant, between eleven and two at midnight ; and, as it elfewhere appears, upon the i4fh of April, 1770." Mr. Biyant has quoted part of the will and fome of the verfes, 1. c. [See alfo p. 560, and Milles, p. 34.] In the tranfcript, which I fiw, there were ilfty-thvcc verfes and a halfy and about [even pn^e.^ \n qwarto of profc, each, as 1 remember, containing :ibout tiventy lines; the whole of which, both verfe and profe, according to the memorandum, was written within THRtt Hot" F.s, in the utmofi dijlrcjs of mind I f:ftcr's [ -57 1 filler's account, " foon after his apprcntlceHfip,^ which commenced on the ill of July, 1767, " he wrote a Letter to an old Schoolmate, a collcdtion of all the bard "words in the Engliih language, and requcfted him to anfvver it [Milles, p. 10]." This circumrtance, I think, argues fuch a profi- ciency in antique lore, as may fairly lead us to in- fer, that he might at Icaft have been qualifying himfclf for the forgery of old poetry from the beginning of 1767, or even an earlier period. Upon that fuppofition, we may account for his joy upon the firft difcovery of the parchments, and for the cagcrners with which he is faid to have been " perpetually rummaging and ranfacking every corner of the houfe for more [Milles, p. 7]." He was probabl}- at firft in hope of finding fomc- tliing which might gratify his taile for antiqua- rian knowledge ; and, when that failed, he was ftill defirous to have the parchments thought valuable, from the convenient pretext which they afforded him of putting off any fidlion of his own as tranfcribcd from them (42). It docs not ap- (da) It dcfervcs remark, that the learned perfon?, who wifli to havcChatterton confidered as merely the tranrcii'oer of thefe Poems, have not been able, after all their inqui- ries, to produce a fingle witncfs, who has given a fatistac- tory attellation to the point of having feen him in the :i{t of copying the original parchments. The attcflation, which I fliould think fatisfactory to this point, would be that of a peri'on, who had not merely feen Chatterton zi-ith porch' rtfnts lyhtg be/ore LItt., which he faid he was or had been copying i C 158 ] |)ear that he parted with any of thefc pretended tranfcripts out of his own hands till he fent to the copying ; but who had alfo coJhpared the pretended copy zv'ith the parchments^ anfl found them to agree. It would be' neceflary too, that fuch a perlbn fliould be able to give a general dcfcriptiori, at ieall, of the Jize, and form^ and contents of the parchment which he faw copied j for what additional weight of evidence would accrue from the tcfti- jnony of any one, who fliould have feen Chatterton fitting in great form and copying the /Iccounte of IV. Canyngcs fecijic, or any other of the fi"agments which he had forged himfelf ? [See before^ p. 134 — 9. n. 29, 30.] But not oi\6 of the u'itnefl'es, who have been produced to prove the co- pying of the parchments by Chatterton, pretends to have compared the copy with the parchment j (indeed it maybd doubted whether anyone of them w'as capable of making inch a compnrifon ; ) not one of them has defcribed the iize, and form, and contetlts of the parchment fuppofed to have been copied. Even in their Vague and delufive fenfe of the word copying, Mrs. Newton, Chatterton's fifler, "• does not remember to have ever fceri him copying any of the manufcripts, excepting onse ; ot which time Jbe can.e upon him uncxpeticdly at his mojler'' s office." [Bryantj p. 522.] Mr. Capel " often called in upon him when he Was writing; and he aflured me (fays Mr. Bryant, p. 523], that he had at times feen him copying the manufcripts." But when Mr. Capel was aflced, " if they were parchments^ hfe Snfwtred, with proper caution, that he could not after iuch an interval take up't)n him to determine about thcift ', — he remembered very well that they lay in heaps, and in great confufion, and feemed rumpled and ftained ; and near them were the papers upon which Chatterton was tran- fcribing." The next withefs, Mr. Cary, who is faid to have been one of Chattctton's moil intimate fiiends, ap- pears to have been fo far from having feen him in the aft of copying Rowley's manufcripts, that he never faw any fuch manufcripts. Theffe are his words, in his Letter pub- liflied by Mr. Bryant, p. 526: *' Not having any tafte my- felf for ancient poetry, 1 do not recollect his having ever fliewn [ 159 ] Vi-cfs the Account of the Ceremonies ohfervcd at the cpening of the Old Bridge , a little before the ift of flic un them (Ro\Tlcy's mamifcripts) to me; but he often mnitionrd x.\\cm, ?arehme/it, 1 am not tertain.''^ Helide thefe witnellc?, produced by Mr. Bryant, to prove that Chaltcrton had been leen tranfcribing, the Dean of JExeter has publiflicd the ttllimony of a Mr. Thilllethwaite^^ which, it mull be confcfl"ed, goes nearer to the mark. His words are [Milles, p. 457I, " During the year 1768, at divers vifits 1 made him, I found him employed in copving. kowley, from what 1 then confidcred, and do Hill confi- dor, as authentic and undoubted originals. — Amongft otlicrs, I perfectly remember to have read feveral ftan/:as copied from the Demh of Sir Char'es Baivdin, the original ulUi [ '60 ] October, 1768 ; bun at that time he had probably a confidcrahle flock, as the greateft part of the Pfeudo-Rovvleian poetry and profe was given out by him in ':he latter months of that year, and the firft half of 1769. He continued to deal out his treafures, though more fparingly, during the re- mainder of 1769, and as long as till the 4th of July I/70, near three years from the difcovcry of the parchments. The two firfl years only give double the time, which has been calculated above to be neceffary for the compofition of every thing, which has appeared under the name of Rowley. So much I have thought necellary to premife, in anfwcr to the fa<5ts and arguments which have been urged to prove, generally, that the Poems neither were, nor could have been, written by Chatterton. I hope I have made it fufficiently clear, that no inipcljibility, cither phyfical or mo- ral, prevented him from writing them. I fhall alfoof v.hich then lay Irfcrc h'.m.^* Eiit lierc again we are left in the dark, hon- Mr. Tliiftlctliwaiie knew that the llanzas which he re:ui hau been cojjicil from the original, which, he fays, thoii by before Chatterton. Did he com- pare them togcthiCr ? If he did not, his tclliir.cny is of no more weight than Mr. Smith's, &.'c. If he did, and found them to agree, we ivcSi fuppofe that Chatterton had taken the pains to forge an original of thofe flan/as for the fpe- cial purpofe of deceiving Mr. Thiftletliwaire ; as it does not appear that he ever produced, or promifed to ])roduce, to anyone clio, any part of ihcDcthc cf Sir Charles Bali,- din in the uriginal. now [ >6. 3 now proceed to fhew that they actually were w'nt- ttn by him. And here (after a long dlgrcfllon, but, I hope, not improperly interpofed) I fliall take up the vin- dication of the httei pent of my Appendix, in which I endeavoured to prove, from the internal evidence of the Lang i' age only, that thefe Poems WERE WRITTEN F.NlIRILY BY TiI^maS ChaT- TERTON. My argument was founded upon this principle, that, if a perfon produces a compofi- tion, which nobody but himfclf can interpret, he muit be confidcred as the author. I proved, as I thought^ in many inflances, that thefe Poems ware inexplicable, except by the falie and unwarranted interpretations which Chattertox had annexed to them. If I had flopped there, the confequence would have followed inevitably, that he was the author ; but, in tracing his mifinterpretations to their fourcc^, I made an unlucky miftake, which the Dean of Exeter has refuted [_p,£o6~\ as often- tatioufly as if it afFed:ed the main argument. I J'uf)pofed, that the interpretations annexed to the Poems were almoft all taken from Skivner's Etymologicon ; but the Dzan, v.ith more pro- bability, I confefs, fuppofcs, that they were rather taken from Speght's Glossary to Chaucer. As at prefent advifcd, I Ihall fuppofe, that they were taken from a Lexicographer, of whom, I am afhamed to fay, I had never heard the name M till [ '6^ ) till very lately, Mr. John Kersey, ThUohihU as he figns himfelf ; who with laudable induftry has colleded almoft all the o/<^ words, I believe, which -are to be found either in Speght or Skinner, and has generally with much fidelity copied the inter- pretations affigncd to them by thofe two Gloffa- rifts. Wherever therefore Chatterton is fup- pofed in the Appendix to have been mifled by Skinner, I beg leave to fubflitute Kersey inftead of Skinner; and, in that cafe, I flatter myfelf that the main argument will be fo far from re- ceiving any detriment, that it will be confiderably :improved, as it will be manifefl that the impoftor, who wrote thefc Poems, lived not only fince Skinner, but fince Kersey (43). (43) Kerfey publiflied his Di(rti()nary in 1708. The fize of the volume and the lownefs of its price make it very likely to .have fallen into the hands of Chatterton ; and there .arefome peculiarities in it, not to be found, I believe, in other Diftionaries, which he feems to have copied. Some of them will be pointed out below. At the fame time, I muft beg the reader to remember, that my argument by no means requires me to prove, that Chatterton in cvery^ hi- Jlance followed Kerfey, and him only. Many of Kerfey'e ,old words, with their interpretations, are taken from Speght, whom Chatterton is allowed to have ftudied ; and many have been repeated very exadtly by Coles and Bailey, to both of whofe books he may eafily be fuppofed to have had accefs. It is fufficient for my argument, that Chatter- ton fhould be proved to have concurred (not accidentally) \':'\x.\\. fime older writer in unvarranted interpretations of various words, of many of which even the ufe is unautho- rized. Wq [ 1^3 ] We arc firfl: to confidcr the Inftanccs of words and interpretations, which I fuppofe to have been immediately derived from blunders of Kersey. All a bo )n. E. hi. 41. AUiMEREs. E. iir. 25. Thefc two words, the Dean fays [p. 507], have been already explained \ and, for my own part, I have nothing to add to my former obfervations upon them [fee above, p. 32 and ^iS]^ except to ll;ate both articles, as they appear in Klrsev. AuMER, in Si'FGHr, is rendered J//i(^^r. j^U'-n-bonc, (O.) a made Requeft. ilumerc, (O.) Welt, Skirt, or Border. Bawsin, ^.57. Large, Chattcrton. M. lor. Hu^c, bulky. Charterton. The manner in which I have declined the deter- mination of the precife meanbia of this word, might have led the Dean to fufpedt, that I was not fo entirely unacquainted, as he fuppofcs, with that pafliige, which he has quoted from a ballad printed among Sto.ve's additions to Chaucer's works. I mull beg leave to fay, that it is not ex- plained by Si'EGHT in the lame manner as by CnATTERTON. Speght's explanation is — '* 215alU- Icn, higge : Ibmc fay it is a B.idgcr or Graye." He evidentlv doubted what the true meaning- of the word was. Skinner, who came after him, hss made two words out of one, a fubftantive and an M2 C 164 1 an adjective. The former he interprets Taxus, Miles y upon the authority o'i Julian Barnes; and to the latter he has affigned the dubious inter- pretation of SpEGHT, " magjiusy grandis," as if it h^d been pojltive. But Chatter ton probably foUoived Kersey, who has followed Skinner, in giving both fenfes as equally authentic. ** 3i5atU- Cn, (O.) grofs, big : alfo the Badger, a wild bcaft/' Brondeous. E. II. 24. furious, Chatterton, BrONDED. H. 2. 55S. BllONDEYNG. M., 704. BuRLiE BRONDE. G. 7. Fury, Anger. Chatterton. See alfo H. 2. 664. I fliould have imagined, that every body muft have feen that thefe pafTages were cited by me, to fhew that the author and interpreter of thefe Poems (whether one or two perfons) had fallen into the fame miftake of fuppofing Bronde to iig- nify Fury, and had formed various derivatives from it in that fenfe. One muft therefore be furprifed, that Mr. Bryant [p. 120] fhould not make the leafl attempt to jullify that iignification of Bronde (Fury)i to which I had objedled ; and which is ab- folutely neceffary in moft ot thole paliages, and not inconfiftent with any one of them; but fliould rather employ fcvcral pages to prove, what I had allowed, that Bronde has a fignification (Sivord)y which can be applied to make fenfe of only one of thofe paliages. In burlie bronde, G. 7, it may be conftrued either fivord or Jury j but which Is the C -65 ] the moft probable conllrudion will appear fiom another paflage, H. 2. 664. Campynon's Iwerd in burlic-brande did dree ; where it mitjl be conftrued fury^ as the Dean of Exeter has rendered it. But, if this fenfc of byo}7de and burlie-brande be, as I contend it is, totally unauthorized, from whence did the author and interpreter of thefe Poems derive his, or their, ufe of it ? I anfvver, Probably, from the two following articles in Kersey : l!5ronD, (O.) Fury, Rage. OiSurl^^branD, (O.) a huge Sword, alfo great Fury. In the firft article Kersey has only copied a blunder of Speght and Skixner. In the fe- cond, to a right interpretation of theirs he has added a blunder of his own (44), which has been copied in the Poems. The inference is plain. Burled. M. 20. Armed. Chatterton. The Dean of Exeter fays, that this word is " fo explained on Speght's authority, and jufli- (44) I obferve, however, that he might have taken it from Phillips. As I find that ic requires a Irrongtr me- mory than I am pofTclTed of, or a more imrcmitting atten- tion than I can betlou- upon fo many dic'tionaries, to allot evejry blunder to its original author, I muft beg, when I fpeak of a blunder as Kerfey's, to be underrtood to mean only, that it is to be found in Kcrfcy, without warranting fctut it ia HOt to be found in feme older dictionary. M 3 ficd C -66 ] fied by the fenjeral pajfages in the Pocmi in which, it occurs.'" But the qucftion is, whether the word can be juftified by any paflagc of any author, ex- cept the ivritcr of the Poems, Ki!RS£Y has given the fame explanation of it : '' iBurlcO, (O.) Armed." I am flill much inclined to believe that there is no fuch word. Bysmare. M. 95. Bewildered, curious. Chat- terton. Bysmarelie. Le. 26. CuriouJ/y. Chat- terton. See alfo p. 285. ver. 141. Bismarde. Thefe words, as the Dean fays [p. 509], have, already been confidercd [fee above, p. 43]. I only add, that Kersey has the following article ; OBifmare, (O.) Curiofity. Calke. G. 25. cajl, Chatterton. Calked. E. i-^9« caff Gilt, ejeSled. Chatterton. As the Dean of Exeter feems to give up this word, by propofing to alter it in both thefe paf- fages, and Mr. Bryant has faid nothing for it, I think my conjecture much flrengthened, tha,t it had its original from a mijprint in the Frankeleines ^lale of Chaucer, [vcr. 1 1596. See the Appen^ pix, p. 328.] The advocates for the gcnuine- nefs of the Poems may fay, however, that there was the liimc error in the Mf. copy of Chaucer, which Rowley read ! The ufe of the word in the Poem.s feems rather derived from Kersey or Speght than from Skin- J5ER, as 1 had fuj^pofed. C 167 ] CalbcD, cad. Speght — CnlkcD, exp. cal^, (redo, cafi: up. Skinner. — CalftcD;, (O.) caft up, or caft out. Kersey, We have now gone through the words and in- terpretations, which I had pointed out as derived from the blunders of Skinner, but which I have juft craved leave to confider as taken immediately from Kersey. With the fame indulgence, I fhall proceed to confider the words and interpretations, which I had fuppofcd to be founded upon Chat- tejiton's mifapprchcnfions of paflages in Skin- ner, as taken in like manner from Kersey, who had himfelf mifapprehended Skinner, or fome* pther Lexicographer. Alyse. Le. 29. G. 180. Mlow. Chattcrton. That this interpretation is erroneous has been Ihewn above [p. 24]. CHArTERTON probably took it from Kkrsey. ^* J^lifeO, (O.) allowed." From whence Kersey took it is lefs material ; but I am ftill inclined to believe that it was fornied originally from a miflakcn reading of the article 3IlfcD in Skinner, The very diftlndl lignifica- tions qi the two words are thus ftated by Ver- STEGAN, p. 227 : ^lifcOf Allowed, Licenfed. — r 0llfe. Rcleafe. — jailfeD. Relcafcd. Brstoiker. Ai. 91. Deceiver. Chattcrton. Sec alfp yE. 1064, M 4 Mr, [ '68 ] !Mr. Bryant allows [p. io8], that this word has been put by miftakc for Befwiker, I wonder that he, who appears to have had Kf.rsey at hand, did not advert to the following article in him : «* To IP^effOlfee, (O.) to betray," which, I am perfuaded, milled Chatterton. But then there would have been no room for the inference, " that this young man could not read the charac- ters, with which he was engaged." I cannot fee that the letters in Skinner are fo well defined, but that Kersey might as eafijy have been led into fuch a niiilake by them as by thofc of a ma- nufcript. Blake. M. 178.407. Naked. Chatterton. Blakied. E. III. 4. Nakcdy Oi'iginal. Chatter- ton. The attempts which have been made tojuftif} thtfe Vvords, and the interpretation of them, have been confrJcred above | p. aol. I fliall onlv add here, that Chattt r ton probably followed Ker- sey ; " i3Ia!iC, (O.) naked;" and that Kersey's interpretation probably originated from a mifap- prehcnfion of that paffagc of Skinner, which I iave quoted in the Apiendix, p. 320. Hancelled. G. 49. Cut off, dcjlroycd. Chat- terton. There was no occafion, I find, to fend Chat- terton to Skinner for this word^ as Kersey would [ >69 ] would have furnifhed him with the fame ambi- guous interpretation of it. " K^ailCelct), (O.) cut off." It is ncedlefs to obfervc, how very different cut offi as explained by Skinner to mean cut off hy vjay of fpecimen or /ample, is from dcjlroycd, the fenfc affixed to hancelcd in the Poems (45). Shap. ^E. 34. G. iS. Fate. Chattcrton. Shap- scuRGED. JiL. 603. Fdte-fcouyged. Chattcrton. The Dean of Exeter obferves, that " Shap is objedied to only becaufe it is ufcd as a iionnj* (He ihould have faid, as a noiw, fignifying Fate.) But, if fo, why has he accumulated fo many in- ilances of the I'crb Shapen, with its participles f At laft indeed he gives us one inftance of the (45) If there be any fiich word as hanceled^ which I much doubt, the true icnie ot it can only be determined by the paffage in which it is luppofed to have been ufcd ; tor Skinner plainly knew nothing more ot it, than that he had found it in Speght's Glollary. But in that Gloffary there are two articles fb very fmiilar, that I cannot help Ailpec'ting one to be an er'onenus repetition of the other. " l^amdci, d. cut ojF, abated." — '• l^ancricU, cut c/"." Hamcicd is an authuiifed word, and occurs in Troilos, ! I. 964. Algatc o fote is ham-led of thy forowe. It anAvers properly to our word hamjlrung; but, in this paffige, might be rendered cut off. S^Jbatcd feemi to be the interpretation of a various reading LijJ'fJ^ mentioned in GloJJ.Ur.'] But it would not be eaiy, I am perfuaded, to ilnd the word hanccUd in Chaucer, c;- in any of thofc writers publiflied with him; and accordingly I obferve that it is omitted in GlofJ'.Ur. As Speght's GlofTarv is not ar- ranged in exad alphabetical order, he has frequently re- peated the fame word iu two articles. noup [ 170 I >isun ScHAp, fropi Bifliop Douglas, p. i8o. v. 12, -where fat q is rendered By werdis fc/jap ; which, the Dean fays, means Parcarum fato. If he had put it in Englifli, By the fates* fate, everyone miift have feen, th.^x.fchap in that pafTagc does not fig- nify Fate, but the ffnipiiig, or difpofitlon, of the Fates. Accordingly in the vqry iiext paflage, quoted by the Dean from Hickes, Gram. A. S. p. 112, uurdi gif^'pu (a Franco-Theotifcan cx- preffion, anfwering exadtly to werdu fchap in Scot- tifh) is rendered Barcarwn decreta. I fliall not fol- low the Dean into Scandinavia. Till fome aur thority nearer home is produced, I mufl be of opinion, that Chatterton, in this \vo.rd as in moft others, copied Kersey, who has this article 5 ^' ^[jap, (O.) Fate, Deiliny;" and that Kersey's error was probably owing to his mifapprehenfioi^ of Skinner. See the Appendix, p. 330. • The foregoing are the inftances, which were particularly applied in the latter part o^ the Ap- pendix to prove, that many words, with their interpretations, in thcfc Poems, were copied from the blunders of another writer ; and confcquently^ that the Poems are of a later date than that writer. When two men agree in ufing a fet of fiditious words, or gibberifli, which none but themfclvcs can underhand, and in afHxinr to known words the fame fanciful and unauthorized fignifications, it mufc be prefumcd, that one of them copied from [ •?■ ] from the other. But that Kersey fhould have ever Icon the Poems, cannot be fuppofed. It foU lows, therefore, that the author of the Poems co- pied from KcRSEY. This will appear ftill more plainly, if we com- pare the explanations given by Chatterton of thofe words, to which I have objedted in the former part of the Appendix, as either not ancient, or not njed in their ancient Jenfc, with the expla- nations of the fame or fimilar words in Kersey. I will ftatc them alphabetically. Abessie ; Humility. C— jilbcCTcD, (O.) cafl down, humbled. K. A BORNE ; Burnijhed, C. — To IBorU, (O.) to burnifh. K. Acrool; Faintly. C — To Crool, (O.) to mut- ter or growl. K. Adente, Adented; Fajlened, annexed. C. — To aocnt, (O.) to faften. K. Adrames; Churls. C> — ^Oramincj, (O.) Chur- lifli. K. Aledge ; Idly. C. — ^IcDge, Eafe, Chaucer. K. All a boon; A manner of ajking a favour. C. — ^Il-'a-bonc, (O.) a made requeft. K. Alyse; Allow. C. — lillifcD, (O.) allowed. K. Asterte; ISlegle^edj or f>aj[ed b\, C. — ^ttcrt, (O.) puffed. K. Al'Mere; r [ 17^ ] AuMERE ; Borders of gold or fdver. A loofe robe er maiitle. C— ^umere, (O.) Welt, Skirt, or Border. K. Blake; Naked, C— BlflliC, (O.) naked. K. Bodykyn; Body, fubjlance. C— llSoO^Uin, (O.) a little Body. K. BordI'l; Cottage. C— 3i5or5cl, (S.) a fmall Cottage ; alfo a flew, or bawdy-houfe, K. B Y s M ARE; Bewildered, curious. Bismarelte; Curioiijl}'. C— 115ifmarc, (O.) Curiofity. K. Contake; Difpute. Conteke ; Confufe^ con- tend wUh. C— Contche, (O.) Contention, or Strife. K. . Derne; Cra^/. 'Dv.B.^i'E;lVoful, lameiitahle. C. — E>crJT, (O.) fad, folitary; alfo barbarous or cruel. K. Droorie; Modcfiy. C— SDrur^j, (O.) Sobriety, Modefty. K. FoNS, FcNNEs; Fancies, or Devices, C— irOKEiefi, (O.) Devices. K. Kncpped ; Fajlenedj chained, congealed. C. — ■ ULioppet), (O.) tied, laced. K. Lithie; Humble. C.--fiit\)^,(0.)\i\~^mb\c. K.. From two of thefe words, Aborne and Acrool, which difTcred a little from their originals, I took occafion to remark, that " it was ufual with Chat- TERTON to prefix a to words of all forts, ivithout any regard to cufiom or prcpricty ;" and I referred to r ^73 ] to the following inftanccs in the Alphabetical GlolT. Ahouney AbrezuCj Acome, Adygne, Agrame, Jgreme, Ale/f, &c. Of thefe inftances the Dean has at- tempted to juftifv only one, viz. Agrame, or Agreme, which, he fays, occurs in the Plowman's Tale of Chaucer, v. 2283. Then wol the officers be agramed. But I wonder he did not fee, that a^amcd is a ^ariiciple, and therefore gives no countenance to the ufe of Agrame, as a nomi, in the Poems. To take an obvious example ; Agrieved is a regular word ; but no one, I believe, ever met with fuch a compound noun as Jgrief. The Dean goes on to judify his author, ge- nerally, in prefixing a to words of all forts, from the pradice of Chaucer, and the obfervations re- lating to this prefix, both in Urry's and mv Glof- fary. But he forgets that his author is not charged fimply with prefixing a to words of all forts, but with prefixing it, without any regard to cujlom or propriety. No one ever doubted that words of all forts, beginning with a, are to be found in all authors. The qucftion is, whether this initial a is ufually added arbitrarily, without any authority from cuftom,or any change in the fignificationof the word; As the DiiAN has done me the honour to refer to my obfervation on this fubjeft, I Jball take the liberty to repeat it here from the Glossary to C. T. vol. v. p. 2. "A in compofition, in words of _ [ 174 ] • of Saxon original, is an abbreviation of af, or of; of AT ; of ON, or IN i and often only a corrup- tion of the prcpofitive particle ck or y. In wotds of French original, it is gerierally to be deduced from the Latin ab, ad, and fometimes ex." I cannot {ce how this obfervation can be applied to juftify fuch an arbitrary ufe of the initial a, as appears in the words above quoted from the Poems. That they are all unauthorifed by cuftom is confefTed ; and it is as plain, that the additional a has no operation whatever but that of lengthen- ing them. The Dean himfclf takes notice^ that thefe words " are fometimes ufed by our Poet without the prefix, as bouni', cojne, derne, dygne, left, &c." arid he might have added, in exa^ly the fa mc fignification . I have now gone through, I think, all the words, from the ufe or interpretation of which I had en- deavoured to prove, in the latter part of my Ap- pendix, that the Poems were written by Chat- TERTON. Upon the cooleft and moll impartial review of tlie attempts, which have been made by my learned antagonifts to authenticate thefe words, I fee no reafon for doubting, that every one of them was copied by the author of the Poems from Kersey, or fome former Lexico- grapher not older than Speght. I might there- fore, perhaps, fafely reft the caufc upon the in- stances produced ; but as I think that the evidence from [ "75 ] rroni Language mufl have the mofl decifive weight in determining this qiicftion, I fhall add here another lift of words, with their interpreta- tions ; each of which I conceive to have been de- rived, in the whole or in part, from blunders of Kersey. Attenes. J^. I ■'. 140. 317. G. 109. Ch. 13. i}2. At once. Chatterton. And fo Kersey, after Speght. But I very much fufpecft, that the word Attaies ftands upon no better authority than a mif- print in Chaucer, C.T. ver. 4072, where Speght's edition has atteneSy and, at the end of the pre- ceding verfe, benes I though the edition of 1542 reads rightly banes and utancs, agreeably to the beft Mff. Bkstadde. p. 2S6. 1. 3. CiiATTERTON has not given any interpretation of this word. The Dean of Exeter in his note, p. 448, fays, that in the prefent paflagc it feems merely to imply a fixed fituaticn. In his Gloflliry, however, he renders it, fituated, dijlrc/fedy upon the authority, as it fhould fcem, of the Promptoriiim purvulorum. But neither of thcfe fenfes fuits the context. Kersey, upon what ground I know hot, has the following ar- ticle ; " locflraD, (O.; /cy?;" which, I am per- fuaded, Chatterton followed. In the Poem on Happieneffe, he makes Canynge to afk, Was it loll -wif/j Eden^s bozver ? &c. In another paflTage, ^-E. 410, with his ufual licence, he has put Bejianne for C ■76 ] for BcJla^Je ; but, 1 think, in the fame fcnfe s *' Who kens ne thee or is to thee beflanne." That is, I fuppofe, " Who knows thee not, or is loft to thee." This meaning of Beftamie and Bejladde, it muft be allowed, is unauthoriied ; but it makes fenfe of both palTages, and therefore is likely to have been adopted by the writer. Bevyle. E. 1 1. 57. Speers bevyle fperes. Bevyle is explained by Chatterton to mean *' break ; a herald teniiy fydfyhig a j-pcar hrokin in iiltingJ* The idea of breaking, which is quite foreign from bevyle, might perhaps have been fug- gefled by the following paffage in Kersey : " yBc^ilB (in Heraldry), broken, or open, like a bevel, or carpenter's rule," Bewopen. H. 2. 665. Bcwopen Alfwoulde fellen on his knee. Chatterton has not explained this word ; but it is clearly ufed by him in the fenfe affixed to it by Kersey. " 'B^tccpClT, (O.) made fenfelefs." Accordingly I fee that the Dean of Exeter has interpreted \\.Jtupefied, BiK bewopen, I apprehend, can only fignify one fort of faipejaBioii, arijlngfrom exceffive ijueeping, which cannot be fuppofed to have been Alfvvoulde's cafe. So it is applied by Chau- cer, in his Troilus, IV. 916. and rightly ex- plained by Speght : '* 2Sl!tU0pcri (it is printed by miflake [ ^77 ] niiftake 3i5^toOFen), made fcnfclefs, ovowcpt'^ It may be oblervcd, by the way, that in this indanee GhattiiRton probably followed Kerslv, and not Speght. Cherisaunei. Ent. i. Soninie cherifaunei 'tys to gentle mhide. In my edition of thcle Poems, when I was but a novice in genuine Archaological language, I kt this down among the evident viiJUikcs cf the Iranfcriber, and corredtcd it vcrv probably, as 1 thought, into cherifaunce it ys. My cxcufe mult be, that 1 had not then feen Kersey, who, from a rriiftake, as it feems, of the printer, has thisi article. "^ CtlCl'irdUncJ, (O.) comfort." I\Ir. Bryant, p. 562, allows, that this word was bor- rowed by Chatter TON from Kersey; though be- fore, p. ic6 — 7, he has taken a great deal of pains to point out the feveral fieps by which Chatthrton, whom he there confidcrs as an igno- rant tr^nfcriber from MfT. arrived at fuch a coirpU' cation cf mijlakesy as are to be found in this palfage. Ele. M. 74. Hdp. Chatterton. And Kei^set and Speght have explained the fame word in the fame manner ; but I cannot believe that fuch a word was ever ufed by a genuine author. [ 178 ] ENTYNi P. G. 10. Entjn a k} nge mote bee full pleafcd to nyghtc. Chatterton explains this word to mean cven^ The Dean of Exeter adds — or in jhort \ upon what ground, I know not. I never had the leall conception from v/hencc this word could be de- rived, till I faw in Kersey, '' ^xxt^xi, (O.) even." I have little doubt that Chatterton, in his hur- r}', either mifread or mifwrote (Il;jtt^n for Cut^rt. From whence Kersey derived his word Eutyn is immaterial to our prefent enquiry ; but I think it probable, that he only intended to copy Speght's article, " ^\x^x\, even ;" and that the t was in- fertcd by fome accidental jumble at the prefs. FoRGARD. J^, 564. Whatte, doefl forgard thie blodde ? ys ytte for feare ? In this place Chatterton interprets this word to mean lofe; in two other places, ^.434, and St. of C. 57, it is a participle, and confequently muft be conftrucd loft, agreeably to this article in Kersey. " jrorgarD, (O.) loil." I know no other authority for this word in either of thefc fenfes ; which may both be wrong, though it is fcarce polTible that both iliould be right. Forswat. Ch. 30. The forfwai meadowes fmcthc, anddrcnchc the rainc. 5 Chat- r 179 J tifATTERTON's interpretation oi forfivat \s, fun- huriit^ to which the Dean of Exeter has lub- joined, by way of corrcdion, fweathig. It mud be confellcdj thac the Dean's interpretation is nearer the truth, but the image of a fiveatlng jncadozu is fo aukward and unnatural, that no Poet could poffibly have made ule of it. For-^ fzvonke and Vorfwat are epithets properly applied to a Plowman, in the Prologue to the Plowman's TalCf ver. 16, and Skinnier has explained them feparatcly; but Kersey has joined them together in the following article : " iforflUonlJC, or jfcrflBaf, (O.) over-laboured and fweated, or fun-burnt.'* There can be little doubt, I think, that this article fuggefted the fenfe oi fun-buiiit, which Chatter- ton has affixed to Forfzvat. Gratche. JE. 115. M. 6S. Apparel, Chat- TERTON. And fo it is interpreted by Kersey and Speght. It is always ufed as c; noun in the Poems; but in the paffagc to which Speght probably re- fers (as there is no other, J. believe, in which the word can be found), it is 11 led as a verb>, R. R. 7368. And gan her gratche as a beginc. But even its exigence as a verb may be doubted ; for the author of Glojf. Ur. has obferved very pro- perly, that Gratche is perhaps the fame with Graii/jCi if not millaken for It." To graif.be ^ or p-eit/jc, is a verb ufed by Cjiauclr in feveral N .^ other [ i8o ] other places, iignifying to prepare or mal^e ready ^ a fenfe, which fuits exacftly with this pafTage ot R. R. Haile, Hailie. K. III. 6c. M>< 148. 409^ M. ^'^^ Happy. Chattcrton. I fufped: thefe two adjcdives to have been formed from the following article in Kersey : *' i^^ailcs, (O.) Happinefs." But Kersey appears to have been miilcd by Skinker, who has ex- plained the word Ha'iles in Chaucer, C. T. ver. 1258(5, to meaa either m San^is fedibus, or in Beatitudinc, the laft of which fenfes Kersey has adopted. The miftake of Skinner is equally evident, as he has quoted the line of Chaucer, which he attempts to explain. *^ And by the bloude of Chrift that is in llailes.** For Hailes in that line fignifies neither holy feats nor happinefs, but is the proper name of the Abbey of Hailes in Glouceflcrlliirc. See note on C, T. ver. 12586, Lere. M. 567. H. 2. 597. 676. This word has not been explained by Chatter- TON, but the Dean of Exeter in all thefe places very probably fuppofes it to mean leather. And fo Kersey has explained it. " j^crt? (O.) Lea- ther." But here again I fufpecft that Kersev has been mified by, or has mifapprehended. Skin- ner, who has the two following article? : " jLfrc, exp. [ iSr ] cxp. ComplcrioiT, Colour. — lerc, PcHIs, fort. contr. a JLcattjer." Thele two articles appear to have been formed from this fingle one in Speght: ** Here, complexion, colour, /?;>/." But Jkin in SpF.GHT, which Skinner has rendered />*:///j, and fuppofcd to be contracted fiom leather^ was un- doubtedly intended to be rhe interpretation of here in the tollowing paffagc of Chaucer, C. T. vcr. 1 3/86 : He didde next his white kre» Where kre^ if it fignifics any thing more than (ompkx'wn (which may be doubted), can only be fuppofcd to fignify \\\t Jkin of a living man, and therefore affords no pretence for conlidcring it as contracted from leather^ LissE. T. 2. Sport or play, LissEth. M. 15, Boundcth, LissED. T. 97. Bounded. Chatterton. The reader will be plcafcd to obfcrve, that, in the lail palfage, the participle Lijfed is properly applied to a field hounded by a lifi; but, in the two former, the verb Lijfc is applied to borfcs, and a Javelin y in another fenfe of the word bound, of which L}/Je is abfolutely incapable. There can be little doubt, I think, that Chatterton' was mif- led by the equivocal article in Kersey ; " JLiffcD, (O.) bounded ;" to fuppofc, that To life might be ufed in all the fenfes of To bound. The Dean of Exeter fecms fo fcnfible of rhe inference which m\ift be drawn from this unau- N 3 thorifed L 1S2 ] thorifed ufe of Life, that after fome hopclcfs efforts to explain it in a different fenfe, he con- cludes with a conjedture, " that the word in both thefe pallages Hiould be read GUJJctb, fignifying to glide, or pafs quickly,'^ But where ar^ we to look for fuch a word as GliJJdb f Obaie. E. I. 41. E. II. 26. Abide. Chatter- ton. And fo the fame word is explained by Kert SEY and Speght. But the compiler of Gloff. Un has obferved, that Obay, in the fingle paffage of Chaucer, in which it occurs, C. T. ver. 12034, is a niifp/ifif, and fliould be Abeye, as it is printed ill the laft edition from the bcft Mff. The infe- rence is plain enough, from whence the author of the Poems got his word Ohaic, with its inter- pretation. The Dean of Exeter, in hisGloffary, has added to this word P. Pa. from which one j[liould naturally fuppofe, that the ufe of it was authorifed by the Prompiorium Pa"'-oulorum\ but, upon looking into the only co})y of that book which I have an opportunity of confulting, Mf. Harl. 22 1, I can find nothing nearer to Obaie than the following article; *' Obeyyn or be buxum. Obedic:^^- If the Dean has any thing more to. the purpofe in his copy of P. Pa. he will do well to. publifh it a,t length in the next edition of hiq Commentary. RhGRATE. Le. 7. EJleem, M. 70. EJke^j fa-^ vour, Chatterton, And C 183 ] And fo Kersey. " jRcgratc, (O.) Courtcfv, Efteem." But this interpretation is founded upon a mlftake of Skinner in the following article; " Kegrate, exp. Courtefy or Eflimation." To what author Skinner refers, I cannot find. I have obferved, n. (6,, that cxp. generally denotes the cxpojition ot che '.vord in Spegbt^s Glojfdry ; but in this cafe Spegiit's expof'ion is different, and nearer the truth. " iicgratc, lamentation, for- rowful fute." I conceive the noun Regrate to be capable of exadtly the fame fenfes with the more modern word Regret, none of which will fuit with thefe paflages in the Poems, or the interpretation of them by Chatterton. Sr.Mi.YKLENE. J^. 9. Countenancc. G. 56. Beau- ty, countenance. Chatterton. See alfo M.. 11 45. H» 2, 568, where the fame word occurs in the fame fenfc. In other places it is written Skmly- KEED. M- 298. St. of C. 113- To this laft paf- fage the Dean of Exeter in his Gloffary has added the interpretation countenance, and refers us to P. Fa. but I can find nothins: in P. Pa. which in the leaft authorifes fuch an interpretation. It feems plain to me, that both thcfc words owe their original to the following article inKERSEv; ** ^rmclil)CC^, (O.) Semelincfs, comelinefs" Unliart. P.O. 4. Unforgiving. Chatterton. The Dean of Exeter has obferved very pro- perly, that Unliart is the oppofitc to Uart. The IS9 ] Another argunient is drawn irom what Mr. Bryant fp. 564] calls Chatterton's miscon* CEPTioNs, or miftakcs in tranfcribing, which are fuppofed to have arifcn from his not being able to read the Mir. I had pointed out [Introd. Ace, p. xv] fevcral variations between a copy of the ** Son^c to jElla, &c." which Oiatte.iton^ had (favs Mr. Bryant) from tliefe indirnl^ and repeated appeals to Rowley, that he was etlcemed by Chattcrton n real per- fon, the lame from uhofe writings he copied." But all, 1 think, that can be fafely inferred from rhefc appeals is^ that Chattcrton was gencraliy mindful of his aiTumed chji^ rarter, ^nd loll no convenient opportunity of exhibiti;ig ir. In one paflbgc, however, (if the very will above iiientioncd, he fceu^s, either from inadvertence or deilgn, to have dropped the niafk. The^pairagc is as follav/s : ^'' I have Mr. Clayfield thcjincerejl thanks my gratitude can give, and I Will and dire fi, that, "juhatevcr any perfon may think the pleafurc of reading my Works ivorth, they immediately pav their own valuation to him, Br.ct it is ihen become a laivfui dtbttome; and to him, as my executor iri that cale." Upoa a former occafion, he is faid to have carried a fiditicj? bil.l to Mr, Catcot, charging him as debtor in a certain funi. *'y tl\U3; [ ^97 3 thus (]>), was iifed in the common writing of that century, the other cxpreflion of it (^), which only could be miilaken for a cl, was at that time, i am perfuadcd, totally dlfufcd and obfolete. But, bcfide thcfe fiippofcd Miscokceptions, or miltakcs in tranfcribing, which Mr. Bryant has allcdgcd, to Ihew, that Chatterton copied from Mir. which he was not able to read, he has produced a number of what he calls Misinter- pretations of particular paflliges, which, ac- cording to him, prove, that this boy did not even iinderllaiid the compofitions which he copied, and confequently could not have been the author of them. In this argument he is joined by the Dean of Exeter, who fccms not to have been aware of the other argument, drawn from the miilakes of the tranfcribcr, or even to have dif- covered that there were any miflakes of that fort, which fhoujd not be confidered as mere Hips of the pen.. It would be too tedious to 0:0 throuiih all the jnftances of Misinterpretation, with which Chatterton has been char2;cd bv thefe two learned men. Many of them have been aJready confidered in thecourfe of this dilquifition, I wili take notice here of a fevv more, which have been uro-ed wirh the jrreatell confidence. If I can fliew, that in thefe the interpretations of the boy of BrijJol arc as probable as thofe of his abkil 3 critif ksj C 198 ] crlticks, the reader will know what to think of the reft. I ihall begin with three words, which the Dean of Exeter, confcious, as it feems, of their ir- refiftiblc force, has placed together; according to the rules of oratory, in his Peroration, p. 515. The words are Be r ten, Lordykge, and Hour TON. The two firft occur in the Tournainenty ver. 57 — 8. The lordynge toade ynn all hys paffes bides ; The hertcn ncdcrs att hymm darte the ftynge. J^ordynge is explained by Chatterton to mean Jlanding on their bind legs. But this the two learned commentators pronounce to be a mijiake^ and they both agree, that lordynge is put for lourdi/i, or Jourdan, and Ihould be rendered dully bcav)\ iin- ivieldy. This is plaufible, I confefs, and, though by no means <:onvincing, I might perhaps have been puzzled to give it a fiat refutation, if a young friend of mine, who is frcfher from this fort of reading than I am, had not informed me, that Spenser has applied this very participle lording to a toad, and that his Gloflarift has ex- plained it in fuch a manner as might very well fuggcft Chatterton's interpretation. The paf- fage of Spens:':r is in his Paftoral of December, Aanza xii. Where I wns wont to feek the hony bee Wcrkinr^ har formal rowms in wexcn frame, The 1 [ 199 J The grkfly todcftool grown there moiight I lie. And loathing paddocks lording on the lame. Upon which the Gloflarill has obfervcd ; " Lord- ing, fpoken after the manner of Paddocks and Frogs fitting, which Is indeed lonlly, r.ot moving or looking once afide, unlefs they aie llirred." Thele authorities, I conceive, are t'ully Tuilicienr. to jullity CiiATiERTON againft any charge of either having mifwritten or mifintcrpreted this word. If any one fhall be inclined to go further, and to confider fo remarkable a coincidence of expreffion as a proof of plagiarifm, I mnfl warn him, that the Dean of Exeter, upon occafion ot another coincidence with Spknser, which he himfelf has pointed out in B. H. N° i. j). 64, has declared ver\' peremptorily, that to fuppofe, that Chaiterton had borrowed a thought from Spkn- SF,R, would be a7i incredible idea. The next word hcrtcn is rendered by Ciiat- TERTON venomous ; and this too both the learned commentators pronounce a juiflahe ; though they are bv no means fo well agreed, as in the former inftancc, what the interpretation fliould be. Mr. Bryant, p. 2S5, fuppofes that Btrtni is an acl- jedtive, " probably a contracftion of Bcirn/iy and relates to colour;" — from the liarb. Lat. " BarL- linus, cinereus, leueopha?us. Du Cangc." But he has produced no manner of proof that fuch a word was ever ufed in Englifh, or even in French. O 4 The £ 200 "] The Dii.\N of ExLTER, OH tlic othcr hand, fup- pofes it to be (or to be put for) a participle of the prcfcnt tcnfe. He fa\s, in his note, " The j^erten nedcrs do not mean 'venomous ^ but leafing^ to cxprefs their manner of attack. The Prompnar» Fiirvifl. explains, burtyn by infilio, cornupeto, to leap vpo7i, or piijh, as horned cattle do." But how can adders be faid to attack^ like horned cattle f And } et, from an inl'pediion of feveral articles in the prompt. Parv. I cannot find that the old verb To hurt had any other fenfe than the modern one I'd Imit. Ik-R'iAR. beste is explained Cgrnupeta. — BL'ur\NG, Curniipctiis. Burton, as hornyd Bisns, Corniipcio. So that I am quite at a lofs to gucfs upon what grounds the Dean has aflerted, in p. ^13 (in contradidiion to his own quotation iult clued), that the Pr. Par, had explained the v^ord (berien) by darting or leaping, 1 need not fay any niore, I think, to fliew that the explana- tions of this word by thofe two learned men are totally unfounded and inadmiffible. To jullify Chatterton's interpretation of it is no part of my undertaking. If he invented the word, as 1 piuch fufpedt, he had a right to affix his own fenfe to it. With the third word, honton, I Ihall have lefs trouble, as Chatterton's miilake about it (it he has made any) has efcapcd the corrcdion of Mr. [ 201 ] Mr. Br^VAN'T. It occurs twice in the Poems ; h} the MetdJuorphofis, vcr. 93. The goddcs — — Hcuton dyd make the mountainc hie thclrc mighte. and in the Epitaph on llohcrt CanyngCy ver. 6 ; Hoitton are wordcs for to telle hys doe. In the former palllige Ciiatterton has inter- preted it to mean hollow. But the Dean of Exe- ter fays it means lofiyi becaufe " hazuicn is ex- plained in the Prompts Farv. by excilto, and is ufcd in this fenfe by Peter Langtoft; and l'aulai?ty in old French, fignihcs proud or lofly." But why iliould we believe, that /jouton is the fame word with haiitain ? and how will the fenle of bautain. fuit with thefc pafiages ? In the firll it has a very queftionable meaning, and the other it makes ab- folute nonfcnfe. But the fenfe of hollozu will fuit with both. The mountain is made hoUozv, not, as the Dean furmifes, by way of alleviation to the fate of EJirild and Sabtina; but that the river may run forth from it ; and words are faid to be Lollou.', metaphorically, i, e. itnfuhftantial, zicak. I can- not therefore allow that Chaiterton has made any millake in his interpretation of this word, efpecially as it is fupported by the Dldionary- writers, Phillip?, Kersey, Bailey, &c. who ail interpret /jouton to mean boHozv. Whether there be any I'uch word as kouion is another (^uef- tion. tlon. As far as I am informed, it ftands upon no better authority than the following article in SpEGHT'sGloflary to Chaucer; " i^ototeil,/^^//oii?i'* ^nd that, if I am not much deceived, refers to the following palTage of the PLo^jnaii's Tale, [\'Gi\ 2812. Ed. Ur.] Hoppen and hoiiten with heve and hale. The article in Speght, which immediately pre-: cedes Howten, is " ^Dppcn, leape." But it is plain, that in this paflage of the Plowman's Tale hoiitcn is a verl) fignifying to hoot, or halloo, cx- preflcd by Speght hallow, from which the Dicflionary-writcrs and Chatterton have formed an adjedlive houton, fignifying hollow. I do not fee how Rowley could have fallen into fuch a-. miftake. I will only add here one of thofe words, in the explanation of which Chatterton is fuppofcd to have failed, becaufe '* the Gloflaries, in which alone they exifted, were not in his hands, nor was it within his ability to underftand them if they had been before him** [Milles, p. 514]. In the lAetamorphofis, v. 9. Whofe eyne dyd feerie Iheene, like blue-hayred defi That dreerie hange upon Dover's emblaunchecj clefs. The bhie-hayred defs (fays the Dkan of ExEr TER in his note) " are explained by Chatter- ton as meteors or vapours ; they rather mean fpcclres [ 203 ] fpcBrcs or fj'iries, which might be fi^ppofcd to in- habit thcle clirts. Dijfe nctyll^ in the P. Puti. is explained Archangcliu. ^^-JtI^ i hi- khfore may (ignify y/>//77." From this conclufion the Dean proceeds to draw feveral ingenious coroUarics, \A.'hich may be read in his book. I iliall only briefly examine the conclufion itlelt. DeJ/t; > etyll is QxyA-^\i\c<\ Arcbaiigelus ', therkfore Dcjf'e may u^mix J'pirit. 1 lliall not dii'pute the connexion of Archangel y Angel, Spirit, Sped re, and Fiiirie ; though, according to the pofirion of the words, one might perhaps more probably infer, that Dejfc^ lignificd arcfj, and yietyll, angel; but the truth is, that Dsffj netyll, in the Prompt, j'arv. means nei- ther more nor lefs than Deaf nettU (a weed mora commonly called Dead nettle), of which the tech- nical name is Archangel. Mow unfortunate was poor CiiATTERToN, that the Gloliaries, in which alone fuch curious learning is to be found, were not in his hands, and that he was not even able to undcrfland them, if they had been before him ! For lack of erudition, he was frequently obliged to have recourfe to his o.vn invention, of which, in the prefent inftance, hi has certainly availed himfelf as fuccefsfuUy as the Di an has of his Prompt. Pdiv. for though L believe ir.cieovs or vapours to be not a lefs fap.cihil inter])retation of defs thjiU Jpe^res or fairies, itb total want of foun- dation cannot fo eafily be demonlhajd. I come [ 204 ]' I come now to the lail argument of any weight, which has been urged to prove, that Chatterton was not author of the Poems, viz. that they con- tain niany things, with which he could not poffibly have been acquainted. The inftances alledged are, chieilv, of ivords too rare and obfcure to have been underftood by him, and of hiftorical fcclsy which lay out of the reach of his fcanty means of information. Of the firft fort is Faldstole, J£..6i, which the Dean of Exeter in his note explains very Jearncdly, and adds : '' A modern writer, not aware of the difference, would probably have called it a/^i'^'?lir. It is priPxted \\\ Mifcell. Cbnttert. p. 114. Mr. Bryan r lays, p. 564, " the very texture of it fhews, that it w-as the compofition of a pcrfon verfed in divinity. Hence fomc have thought, that Chatterton accidentally lit upon an old fer- mon, and put it off for Rowley's." I am much inclined to think niyfclf, that the ground work of 7 this N ■ S. i'r, 4 ^ ^ ■5? \ 'd [ 2<57 ] this Fragment was an old fcrmon, in which Ckat- TERTON found the two quotations ready to hh hand. The reft, if not his own invention, was at leall tranflated by him into the Rowhian diatcit ; as the language abounds with the fame foleeifms and barbarifms, which have demonftratcd the fpurioufnefs of the Poems. But^ without having recourfe to them upon this occafion, it happens, that the Greek quotation from Gregory Nazian- ZEN contains in itfelf the molt unaucrtionable proof, that it was not copied from any Mf. of the XVth century. It will be allowed, I prcfume, that Chatterton could only copy the charadiers which he found in his original. He had not ikill enough to vary the forms of the letters; to com- bine thofc which were feparate, or to fcparate thofe which were connected together. We may be certain, therefore, that his tranfcript (involun- tary errors excepted) was in all refpedts as like to his archetype aa he could make it. But his tran- fcript differs totally from all the fpecimens which 1 have ever fecn of Creek writing in the XVth century. It appears to mc to have been evident- ly copied trom a printed bock; but, us I do not wifh to judge lor others in thefe matters, 1 fl^all annex an exadt I'ac f.mile of the paOage, as it ftands in Chatterton's own hand- writing. The reader will determine, whether it could have been copied by him from any Mf. of Rowlev. [ 20S ] Mr. Bryant's next aro-iimcnt is drawn frdrii " the many Latin quotations in the Story of Johii Lamingtoni" ThelCj I apprehend, arc all to h6 found in what the Dean of Exeter has printed j p. 185, under the title of a Dialogue between MaJ- ier Fhilpot and Walworth Cocbieies^ fiibjoined to Iscamme's Poem on Lamington. This dialogue therefore it may be proper to reprint here^ with a few corrections from Chatterton's Mf* FhiL God ye goodden, my good naighbour, how d\e aylc > Howe docs your wyfe, man ' What never aflble ? W. Cum reflate vivas verborum mala ne cures* Ah maftrc Phillepot, evil tongues do faie, That my wyfe will lyen down to dale, Tis ne twaine moneths fyth Ihee was myne for aie. Phil. Ani?num fubmitterc noli Rebus in adverjis* Nolito quccdam referent i fcmper credere^ But I pity you, nayghbour, if it [be] fo; W. ^a requirit wyfericordiaju Mala caufa eji-^ Alack ! alack ! a fad dome mine in fay. But oft with Citizens it is the cafe. '- Honefia tttrpiiudo — pro bona *• Caufa ?non^ as aunclent Pcnfmcn fayfc. *' None of thcfe quotations (fays Mr. Bryant) were obvious, and fuch as a boy could attain to.'' And I can eafily believe that they were not obvious to [ 209 ] to Mr. Bryant, whofe ftudies, we know, have generally travelled a higher road ; but I can fay, with truth, that I found them in the very firft book in which I looked for them. The three former are tranfprofed out of Cato's Dijlichs, and the two others out of the Sentences of Publius SyritSy ufually fubjoined to the Dijlichs, in a little volume, which, in many fmall fchools, I believe, is Hill the firfl that is put into the hands of learners of Latin after the Grammar (47). It appears from the (4.7) They {land thus in an edition by Boxhorn'rus, L. Bat. 1635. Cato, T,ih. III. Dift. 4. Quum icifte vivas, ne cures verba malorum. Lib, J I. Did. 26. Rebus in adverlis animum lubmittere noli. Lib. II. Dill. 21. Noli tu qua;dam ret'crcnti credere femper. Syrus, Sentcnt. Iamb. p. i u). Mala caufa eft qui requirit mifericordiam. Sentfnt. Troch. v. 3. Eft honefta turpitude pro bon.i caufa mori. In Chaf.crton's tranfcript of this laft line he had origi- nally infercci! e/i after turpitixdo ; and he had written ic.v.Ty, (to rime, I iuppofe, more exadly to fay). The blunders in the firft hne of re(:late for re6it, and of verhorum mala for verba malorum^ ieem to ftie'.v that he wrote from memory. They imift hive been overlooked, I prefuiric, by the Dean of Exeter, v.'ho conliders all thefc palTages, not as quotations, but as original compofuions, and argues, in p^rt, " from the corrstfnefi of the Latin^ that they muft have been written at leaft by a better icholar than Chatterton." P tcUimonys I 210 ] tclliiiiony of Mr. Smith [Bryant, p. 532], tlii* Chatter TON h^d intimated very frequently both a i^'f.te to learn ^ and a defign to teach hinifelf, Latins innd though I do not fuppofe that he ever made any great progrefs in that language, I really think that he might have attained to thefe quotations. With refpcdt to their -pertinency, and their not being Idly and ofientatiGvJly introduced, it is fcarcc credible, 1 think, that fuch a medley of quota- tions, from fuch a book, Ihould have been hud- dled together, in fuch a dialogue, by any one, but 'a boy, ^vho was proud of difplaying the little Latin which he hadjuft acquired. So much for the words, which Chatterton is fuppofcd to have been incapable of underltand- ing. I proceed, in the lafl. place, to confider the Hijtoricid fa^s, with which, it is faid, he could not poflibly have been acquainted. Some of thefc fuppofed/i^ffZo" I have fhewn above [p. 150. n. 393? to be probably nothing more than empty words; fuch as the Blue Briton, Tinyan, &c. Others are of a mixed nature ; a combination of truths with falfitlcs ; of which the true part was eaiily known, and the falfe might as eafily have been invented by Chatterton as by any other perfon. Of this ■fort are the Ordination of Canynge — to avoid a nmrriage propofed by Kino^ Edward, and the Fine of 3000 marks exad:ed from' him— ^or refufing to comply with that propojah The Ordination and the C '-■! ] the Fine, which are the true parts of thefe two ftories, might have been known by any one froiii Canynge's Epitaph in Rcdcliff Church [I'cc before, p. 113. n. 23]; the motive to the one, and the caufe of the other, have been fhevvn to be mere fidions, totally void of truth, or even pro- bability [fee before, p. 107, and p. 114. n. 24.]; and yet Mr. Bryant, in his Rilcapitulation', p. 580 — I, alledgcs both thefe ftories, as having been verified in all their circu?)' fiances, and as provincr that the iniclligencc of them dwie from Redcliff'Tozver. I fhiiU therefore confine myfelf to the confide- ration of the few fadts rkally historical, which are fuppofed to have lain out of Chatter - ton's reach ; only prcmiling, that I can never al- low a fatL to have lain out of his reach, merely bccaufe I myfelf, or even my learned opponents, / may not be able to point out exa(5tly the place where he found it. We have feen already, in feveral inftances, that his reach was much more comprehenfive than they imagined, or at leaft have been willing to acknowledge; and it is cer- ■ tainly within the bounds of probability, that one, who ^uejfed fo often as he did, fhould not always • guffs wrong. Next to the two ftories juft mentioned, Mr. Bryant alledges the burni,ig of Rcdcliff Spire. *' Rowley (fays he, p. 581} muft have been in I P 2 foiiic [ 212 ] fome degree an eye-witnefs of the event : but Chatterton had no hijlory of it ; 7io record^ except^ ing what muji have come from Rowley. He could not have mentioned it without fome previous inti- mation from that quarter ; for no account was elfe^ where to be had. This, like the two articles above, has fince his death been attefled, and by the fame hand : by the teflimony of William of Worceftrc/* Mr, Bryant had before employed feveral pages (537 — 542 )> ^^^ much ingenious argumentation, to make it probable that this burning of the fpire happened in the time of Rowley, before 1478; but the Dean of Exeter, who, in this inllance, cannot be charged with having afted in concert with his learned ally, has told us plainly and ihortly, p. 410, that the fpire was thrown down by lightning in 1445, foon after it was eredled ; and for this fadl he quotes the Mf. Chronicles of Bri/lol, which, though no record, may fairly be called a h'Jlory. If it Ihould fiill be contended, that this fad: might be fliut up clofe in the Mf. Chronicles, and out of the reach of Chatterton, I will add, that I have been informed, from un- queflionable authority, that " in 1746 was pub- lished at Brillol a print of St. Mary Redcliff' s Church, with an account of its foundation, &c. by one John Halfpenny : in which was recounted ihc ruin of the Steeple in 1446, by a tcmpejl and fire." Indeed it is fcarce poflible that fuch an 4 e^^ent C 213 ] event as this fhould not always have been gene- rally kn »vvn by tradition to hundreds of people at Briftol, though it may have remained a fecret to very inquifitive antiquaries in London. Another initance urged by Mr. Bryant, p. 582, is a romantic ftory, produced by Cha tterton in the Rowkian dialctl, concerning the Temple-chttrih at Briftol, which, he fays, was lb badly conflrufted by the firfl: builder (Gremordie, a Lombard), that it fubfided; but a better architeies. " Of" the Siixoi's (he lays very truly, p. 372) no lifts have been trrjii- mitted." The brothers of Harold exccj^tcd, *' of the other perlqns mentioned on the fame fide, there is hardly a trace left in the accounts o«f thofe tmics : To that to many they may have appeared as imaginary characters, the work of poetical fancy." In another place, p. 579, IMr. BuYANt, in his Recapitulation, afks, rather triumphantlvj " How could he (Chatterton) j)offibly krow //'? navies of ibe Saxon Er,rL<, which occur in the Battje ofHaJilngs, and whi,ch ar.e not to be found in any hiftorian. They are indeed authenticated by DoomfJay-book. But did he ever hear of tliat book: or, if he did, had he ever accefs toit?" JTere therefore feems to be a fair illuc, whether the iiames of the Sax-07i Ecirls, ia the Eattk of llaftings^ not to be found in any hiftoriao, are au- thenticated by Doojvfday-bock. The quefiion is very properly reftrifted to Earls ; for the names of inferior perfons, in the mpft genuine poem, could not be expedted to be authenticated by a record of that nature. The whole number of Saxon combatants men- tioned in \.\\c Battle of HiijlingSy exclufive of tlie ;royal family, is, 1 think, tuenty-feven. Of eleven ,of thefe Air. BiiVANT has found the iiames (or fomething like them) in Doonfilay^hook ; but pf thefe eleven not one has any pretence to the title P4 ' of [ 2l6 ] of Earl, except Brihtric. How Chatterton might eafily have become acquainted with him, has been explained above, p. 149. n. 38. Here- ward indeed is called Earl in H. i. 301 ; but his title is not authenticated by Doomjday-booky or by any other evidence. It happens rather unluckily for the credit of our poetical hiftorian, that ia this Herpward, a really historical charac- ter, we find a perpetual contradiction to hiftory. He is reprefented as born at Sarum, though he was in all probability a native of Croyland ; he is repeatedly called an Earl, though he certainly never vvas one ; he is introduced at the Battle of Haflings, though he was undoubtedly at that time not in England : and he is faid to have been killed there, H. r. 409. though he is known to have furvived that battle many years. But to return to the names of our Saxon Earls, Befides Herewapd, we have Erie Adhelm, H. 2^ 505. Erie CuTHBERT, H. i. 262. Erie Egward, H. I. 545. Erie Ethelbert, H. i. 541. Eric Ethelward, H. I. 216, Erie Ethelv^^olf, H. i. 213. The names of i\\dQ fix Earls, it is allowed, are not to be found in any hiflorian ; but how many of them has Mr Bryant authenticated from Doomfday-book ? Not one. The reader will judge, with what propriety the vames of the Saxon ^arls, m the Battle of Hajiings, not to be found t 217 ] in any hiftovian, can be faid to be authenti- cated by Doom [day 'hook, Thefc, I think, are the fa(fVs really histori- cal, upon which Mr. Bryant has infifted in his Recapitulation, as having lain out of Chatter- TON*s reach. \ have been fo long in examining them, that the Dean of Exeter mull excufe me, if, in this ftage — extremo fiih fine labonm, — I pafs more lightly over fome objcdions of the fame kind, which are peculiar to him. — The incredibi- lity, that Chatterton Ihould have been acquainted with Spenser, has been touched upon above, p. 1 99.— He thinks that there is not the leajl de- gree of probability, that Chatterton fhould have known the n^ia of Walworth and Philpot [Milles, p. 187], though they figure, as he partly allows himfelf, in all the common hiftories of England. — In another place, p. 370, he fays, " It is by no means probable that Chatterton could have known the reputation of the manufadure of Lincoln cloth ;" though he has quoted himfelf two paffages from old ballads about Robin Hood, in which mantles and gowns of Lincoln-green arc mentioned. — In his Introdu(flion to the Englijh Met amor fhofi?, p. 354, he infills, " that the hif- tory was beyond the compafs of Charterton's eru- dition : he could not have underwood the original, Geffrey of Monmouth ; and even the Enirlifh tranf- lation, by Aaron Thompfon, is not commonly to be [ ^i8 ] be met with/' But the Dean allows himfelf, that this hiftory, or rather fable, is to be met vyith in the tragedy of Locrine, contained in fome editions of Shakespeare. It is alfo recited very much at large in the Colh-^ion of Old Ballads [London, .1726],, vol. II. p, I, — 5, abook wjiich Chatter- TOi^ had certainly feen,; and in Stowe^s Chronicle^ whom I take to have been his principal hiflorian. ...But the Dean's moft formidable argument is drawn from the Poem of the tournament -^ " the ceremonial of which (he fays, p. 305) is fo well adapted to the cuftoms of that age, that it could not have been fo accurately defcribed by any fub- fequent writer, who was not perfectly inflrufted in the ancient formulary : Chatterton therefore could not have been the author." That Chat- terton was not perfectly intruded in the ancient formulary of Tournaments, I can readily allow ; but how has the Dean eftablilhed the other part of his premifTes, " that the ceremonial in the Poem is well adapted to the cuftoms of that age ?'* Whether he means the age of Bourton, or that of the fuppofed Rowley, it feems to me, that the iiril and leading idea of the whole Poem, the in- troduction of an alderman of Briftol tilting with hnightSy muft have been not only ridiculous but offcnfive in any age, while the true ceremonial of tilts and tournaments was obferved. But, waiving for the prefent that fundamental objtdion, I ^o on [ ~^9 ] on to rem.irk iliortly, that the Herald, through-, out the whole l^ocm, takes much more upon h)iii than his office, which was merely miniilerial, could warrant. — The form of challe72gd between Bolr- T0\' and Neville; [ver. 87] " I clavme the pallagc." " I contake thie waic;'* is (juite unapplicable to a tiltiiigviatcb, in which the two combatants ran in parallel lines, with a low partition of wood or cloth between them,' and their object was, not to ftop the paflage of each other, but, in paffing, to break their refpec- tive lances with a good grace. — The fequel of this, when B;)URi0N replies, ver. 88, *' Then there's m\z gauntlate en mie gaberdine," is equally incongruous. The Dean indeed has obfervcd, that '' the ibrowhig doivn the gcmitlct luns ihe ufual form cf challenge';'" and fo it was to a due! 'y but where can he fhew an inflance of its having been pradfifcd at a tilt'mg-matchf — The arrangement propofed by De Bergham, ver. 105. feq. and the orders of the Herald, ver. 121, fcq. are, I am pcrfuadcd, quite fanciful, and un- fupported by any ancient cullom ; though the Dean has been pleafed to affert, " that the. lat- ter are fo much in charadter, that they could not have been did:ated by any perfon who was igno- rant of the ceremonial, or a flran^er to ihe rules of Tournament." I willi he had told us where vvc may find that Cv:rcmonial and thole rules. — I will [ 220 ] will only take notice of one more impropriety, which is, that Bourton, the conqueror in the tilts, is declared King; Kynge of 'Tourney-illtey Ver. 155. That title, in fome countries, was given to the Frefidents, or Judges^ of the Tournament, but never, as far as I am informed, to the vid:o- rious combatant. — When thefe things have been duly confidered, the reader will determine, whe- ther the poem of the Tournament is conftrufted according to a formulary of really ancient ufages, which lay out of the reach of Chatterton, or whether it difplays that mixture of ignorance and invention which marks him, in a peculiar manner, for the author. I will now conclude with a fingle obfervation upon a matter, which, I think, has not yet been properly attended to, or indeed fully flated. Among the poems, which Chatterton pretended to have tranfcribed from his Mff. belide thofe at- tributed to Rowley, there are others under the names of Canynge, Sir Thybbot Gorges, John IscAMME, and Johne, fecond abbot of St. Auguf- tine's, who is faid to have died in mccxv. (48) (48) The Poems under the names of Canynge and Sir Tl-ybbot Gorges are printed in my edition. " The pleafaunt difcorfes (as they are called by the fuppofed Rowley) of Mayftre 'John a IJeam^ hight the merr'ie tricks of Laming- tOHy'' have been lately printed in the Dean of Exeter's edi- tion, p. 183. I fliall inlert here the Poem attributed to Abbot ^o/;«, as it ftands in my tranfcript of the Abbot's Life, from what is called Rowley's " Lijl of fktllcd Painters and [ 221 ] In all thefe we fee not only a fimilarity, but an abfolute identity, of manner, language, verfifica- »nd Carvellersy As this Life contains evidence oi Row- ley's proficiency in the Greek language, of which his learned advocates have not availed themfelves, I think it bat fair to publifh the whole. *' Johne, feconde abbotte of Seyndc Auguftynns, was a manne well fkyllde ynn the languages of yore ; hee wrote ynn the Greke tongc a poem onneRoberte Fitz Hardynge, whyche as nie as Englyflie wylic ferve I have thus tranf- placedd : Wythe daityvc fteppe relyg}'onn dyghte yn greie, Herr face of doleful hue, Swyfte as a takel throwe bryghte hcav'nn tokc hcrrwaic. And oft and ere anonn dydd faie. Ah nice, whatte flialle I doe ! Sec Bryftowe cittie, whyche I nowc doe kennc Aryfeing to mic vicwe, Thycke throngde wythe foldyerrs rind traffyquc menne^, Botte feyndes I feen fewe. Fitz Hardynge rofe ; he rofe, 13'cke bryghte fonne ynn the morne ; Fayre Dame, adrie thyne eyne, Lette all thys greefe bee myne, Forrel v.ylle reere thee uppe a mynfterr hie, (And wylle a inonckc bee fliorne) The toppe whereoff fiiall reuchenn to the fkie. Thanne dydd the Dame replie ; 1 ihall ne bee forlorne. Hcere wylle I take a cheryfauniedd refte, And fpende mie dales uppunne Fitz Hardynge's bfcile, Norr was hec lackcynge ynne defcryptionncs of battles and drcarc accountes, as yee male fee underre bic hymfchV. onne Kynge Rycharde. Harte of Lyonne ! fliake thie fwcrdc, Bare thie morthie fternandc hondc, Quace whol armies toe the Queede, W'orkL' thie wylle ynn Eurlie Brond*. BarreRi [ 222 3 tion, S:c. fo that no one can doubt that they all came from the fame author. Bur, though perhaps phmfible rcafons may be affigned why the fup- poled Rowley might have given out a few flight copies of verfes under the names of his patron Canynge and his friend Gorges, it is fcarce cre- dible that he fliould have inferted in his *' Difcorfe on Brijiowe^' a long poem of his own, as com- pofed by John Iscamme; and flill lefs, that he fhould have forged a poem under the name of abbot John, who had ♦been dead above two hun- dred years. Thefe Poems therefore cannot have been written by the fuppofedRowLF.Y. But they, as well as the Poems attributed to Rowley, un- Barrens heere onne Bankcrrs broivded fyghte ynne furrits 'genlle the Cale, Whyleft thou ynne thonderynge maylc Warrikethe whole cyttyes bale. Harte of Lyonne ! foiinde the beme, t^ounde ytt yntoe inner Londes, Feere flyes fporteynge ynn the cleembe, Ynne thie banneir terroure ftondes. Thus mochc forr abbott Johannes poemies. Hre vv.is ynndiiftedd 20. yeres, and dydd a6te as abbotte 9 yeres before hys ynnduftyonne forr Phylyppe then abbotte. Hee dyedde ynne M.CC.XV. beeynge bviryedde ynne hys albe ynn the mynfterre." If r.ny one can perceive any difii"erence of hand between this po: m, attributed to abbot John, and thofe which pafs under the name of the fuppofed Rowley, he miift poflefs nnich greater powers of difcrimination, than fall to the fliareof commoa»criticks, doubtedly [ 223 ] doubtcdly came from one and the fame author ; and I cannot fee the leaft ground for imaghiing, that thc}^ could all have come from any one au- thor except Chatterton. 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