excellent brother, and the whole of his papers were consigned into my hands, with as many of his letters as could be collected.

These papers (exclusive of the correspondence) filled a box of considerable size. Mr. Coleridge was present when I opened them, and was, as well as myself, equally affected and astonished at the proofs of industry which they displayed. Some of them had been written before his hand was formed, probably before he was thirteen. There were papers upon law, upon electricity, upon chemistry, upon the Latin and Greek Languages, from their rudiments to the higher branches of critical study, upon history, chronology, divinity, the fathers, etc. Nothing seemed to have escaped him. His poems were numerous: among the earliest was a sonnet addressed to myself, long before the little intercourse which had subsisted between us had taken place. Little did he think, when it was written, on what occasion it would fall into my hands. He had begun three tragedies when very young; one was upon Boadicea, another upon Inez de Castro: the third was a fictitious subject. He had planned also a history of Nottingham. There was a letter upon the famous Nottingham election, which seemed to have been intended either for the newspapers, or for a separate pamphlet. It was written to confute the absurd stories of the Tree of Liberty, and the Goddess of Reason; with the most minute knowledge of the circumstances, and a not improper feeling of indignation against so infamous a calumny :

and this came with more weight from him, as his party inclinations seemed to have leaned towards the side which he was opposing. This was his only finished compositton in prose. Much of his time, latterly, had been devoted to the study of Greek prosody: he had begun several poems in Greek, and a translation of the Samson Agonistes. I have inspected all the existing manuscripts of Chatterton, and they excited less wonder than these.

Had my knowledge of Henry terminated here, I should have hardly believed that my admiration and regret for him could have been increased; but I had yet to learn that his moral qualities, his good sense, and his whole feelings, were as admirable as his industry and genius. All his letters to his family have been communicated to me without reserve, and most of those to his friends. They make him his own biographer, and lay open as pure and as excellent a heart as it ever pleased the Almighty to warm into life.

It is not possible to conceive a human being more amiable in all the relations of life. He was the confidential friend and adviser of every member of his family: this he instinctively became ; and the thorough good sense of his advice is not less remarkable, than the affection with which it is always communicated. To his mother he is as earnest in beseeching her to be careful of her health, as he is in labouring to convince her that his own complaints were abating: his letters to her are always of hopes, of consolation, and of

love. To Neville he writes with the most brotherly intimacy, still, however, in that occasional tone of advice which it was his nature to assume, not from any arrogance of superiority, but from earnestness of pure affection. To his younger brother he addresses himself like the tenderest and wisest parent; and to two sisters, then too young for any other communication, he writes to direct their studies, to inquire into their progress, to encourage and to improve them. Such letters as these are not for the public; but they to whom they are addressed will lay them to their hearts like relics, and will find in. them a saving virtue, more than ever relics possessed.

With regard to his poems, the criterion for selection was not so plain; undoubtedly many have been chosen which he himself would not have published; and some few which, had he lived to have taken that rank among English poets which would assuredly have been within his reach, 1 also should then have rejected among his posthumous papers. I have, however, to the best of my judgment, selected none which does not either mark the state of his mind, or its progress, or discover evident proofs of what he would have been, if it had not been the will of Heaven to remove him so soon. The reader, who feels any admiration for Henry, will take some interest in all these Remains, because they are his: he who shall feel none must have a blind heart, and therefore a blind understanding. Such poems are to be considered as making up his history. But the greater

number are of such beauty, that Chatterton is the only youthful poet whom he does not leave far behind him.

While he was under Mr. Grainger he wrote very little; and when he went to Cambridge he was advised to stifle his poetical fire, for severer and more important studies; to lay a billet on the embers until he had taken his degree, and then he might fan it into a flame again. This advice he followed so scrupulously, that a few fragments, written chiefly upon the back of his mathematical papers, are all which he produced at the University. The greater part, therefore, of these poems, indeed nearly the whole of them, were written before he was nineteen. Wise as the advice may have been which had been given him, it is now to be regretted that he adhered to it, his latter fragments bearing all those marks of improvement which were to be expected from a mind so rapidly and continually progressive. Frequently he expresses a fear that early death would rob him of his fame; yet, short as his life was, it has been long enough for him to leave works worthy of remembrance. The very circumstance of his early death gives a new interest to his memory, and thereby new force to his example. Just at that age when the painter would have wished to fix his likeness, and the lover of poetry would delight to contemplate him,—in the fair morning of his virtues, the full spring-blossom of his hopes,just at that age hath death set the seal of eternity upon him, and the beautiful hath been made per

manent. To the young poets who come after him, Henry will be what Chatterton was to him; and they will find in him an example of hopes with regard to worldly fortune, as humble, and as exalted in all better things, as are enjoined equally by wisdom and religion, by the experience of man, and the word of God: and this example will be as encouraging as it is excellent. It has been too much the custom to complain that genius is neglected, and to blame the public when the public is not in fault. They who are thus lamented as the victims of genius, have been, in almost every instance, the victims of their own vices; while genius has been made, like charity, to cover a multitude of sins, and to excuse that which in reality it aggravates. In this age, and in this country, whoever deserves encouragement is sooner or later, sure to receive it. Of this Henry's history is an honourable proof. The particular patronage which he accepted was given as much to his piety and religious opinions as to his genius: but assistance was offered him from other quarters. Mr. P. Thomson (of Boston, Lincolnshire,) merely upon perusing his little volume, wrote to know how he could serve him; and there were many friends of literature who were ready to have afforded him any support which he needed, if he had not been thus provided. In the University he received every encouragement which he merited; and from Mr. Simeon, and his tutor, Mr. Catton, the most fatherly kindness.

"I can venture," says a lady of Cambridge, in