Page:Cursory Observations on the Poems Attributed to Thomas Rowley (1782).pdf/55

Rh ago in the House of Lords to read an old deed, excused himself by saying that it was illegible, informing their lordships at the same time that he would make out a fair copy of it against the next day. Chatterton, I believe, understood better how to make fair copies of illegible parchments, than to read any ancient manuscript whatsoever.

It is amusing enough to observe the miseraeble shifts to which his new editor is forced to have recourse, when he is obliged to run full tilt against matters of fact.—Thus Chatterton, we find, owned that he was the authour of the first Battle of Hastings; but we are not to believe his declaration, says Mr. Thistlethwaite, whose doctrine on this subject the reverend commentator has adopted. “Chatterton thought himself not sufficiently rewarded by his Bristol patrons, in proportion to what his communications deserved.” He pretended, therefore, “on Mr. Barrett's repeated solicitations for the original [of the Battle of Hastings], that he himself wrote that poem for a friend; thinking, perhaps, that if he parted with the original poem, he might not be properly rewarded for the loss of it. ”—As if there was no other way for