formation, that he himself had searched
the old "_cofres_,"[9] and discovered the poems of the Monk Rowley.
Certainly he could not have had a better person to trumpet his discovery
than "a talkative fool" like Burgum, who was so proud of his pedigree as
to torment the officers of the Herald's College about his ancestors; and
he was not the only one imposed on by Chatterton's talent. His
simple-minded mother bore testimony to his joy at discovering those
"written parchments upon the covered books:" and, of course, each
discovery added to his antiquarian knowledge; for, though no trace
exists of the Monk Rowley's originals, there is little doubt that on
some of those parchments he found enough to set him thinking, and with
him to think and act was the same thing; indeed, there is one passage in
his poems bearing so fully upon the fraud, that we transcribe it. He is
writing of having discharged all his obligations to Mr. Catcott:--

"If ever obligated to thy purse,
_Rowley discharges all, my first chief curse!_
For had I never known the antique lore,
I ne'er had ventured from my peaceful shore,
But, happy in my humble sphere, had moved
Untroubled, unsuspected, unbeloved."[10]

[Illustration: MUNIMENT ROOM.]

A Mr. Rudhall[11] said that, when Chatterton wrote on a parchment, he
held it over a candle to give it the appearance of antiquity; and a Mr.
Gardener has recorded, that he once saw Chatterton rub a parchment over
with ochre, and afterwards rub it on the ground, saying, "that was the
way to antiquate it." This _expose_ of Chatterton's craft is so at
variance with his usual caution that we can hardly credit it. A humble
woman, Mrs. Edkins, speaks of his spending all his holidays in the
little den of a room we have mentioned, where he _locked_ himself in,
and would remain the entire day without meals, returning with his hands
and face completely begrimed with dirt and charcoal; and she well
remembers his having a charcoal pounce-bag and parchment and letters on
a little deal table, and all over the ground was a litter of parchments;
and she and his mother at one time fancied he intended to discolor
himself and run away to the gipsies; but afterwards Mrs. Edkins believed
that he was laboring at the Rowley manuscripts, and she thought he got
himself bound to a lawyer that he might get at old law books. The
testimony she bears to his affectionate tenderness towards his mother
and sister is touchi