monastery, both for monks and nuns, but which was afterwards for nuns only; and a long series of deeds relative to his descendants, who were of Malvesyn-Ridware, will be seen in Shaw's History of that country, vol I. William Malvoisin was Bishop of Glasgow and Saint Andrew's, and Peter, Bishop of Ossory. Sir Guy Malvoisin occurs among the crusaders. Peter and John died Governors of the Castle of Oswestry in Shropshire, which they held under the Baron Marchers by the hardy tenure of Border service.

John Malveysin, the last of the line of Berwick-Maviston, who died without issue, was killed at a huntingmatch with men of Shropshire, in the immediate vicinity of the celebrated mountain called the Wrekin, in the reign of King Henry the Fourth; and Sir Robert, of the Mauvesine-Ridware branch, died fighting for that king at Battlefield, near Shrewsbury, in the year 1403.

By the marriage of Edith, the daugh

ter of Alan Malvoisin, and niece of John who was slain at the Wrekin, the lordship and estates at BerwickMaviston were carried into the family of Wydecombe, or Whitcomb, of Somersetshire; from whom a portion of it passed in 1689 to the family of Hambrook of Gloucestershire, and others. This property has subsequently been in the several possessions of the families of Grant of Berwick-Maviston, Burton of Longner, Salop, Russell of Berwick-Maviston, Calcott of Abbat's Betton, Salop, Blakeway of Cronkhill, Salop, and others; from whom the late Noel Hill, esquire, who was elevated to the peerage, and his eldest son, the late Thomas Noel, Lord Berwick, became possessed, by purchase and exchange, of the lordship, and almost the entirety of the lands within the township of Berwick-Maviston; which territory now forms part of the extensive domain of Attingham, the scat and inheritance of the Right Honourable William Noel, Lord Berwick.

Bristol.

I HAVE read with great pleasure the August communication from Cornwall, and think that Mr. Le Grice deserves the thanks of all those who feel an interest in the fame and the fate of

"A wretch of promises and hopes,

A boy of learning, and a bard of tropes." That I should be myself alive to all that concerns him, will be readily understood when I inform you who your new correspondent is. The unhappy, but most highly talented youth has been, during the last 70 years, so mixed up with my ancestors, that the names of Catcott, Smith, and Chatterton will run inseparably down the stream of time together. Under these circumstances, probably, a few notices concerning them ought to be left upon record, especially since the names are not quite unknown to Sylvanus Urban, as a reference to your pages in 1778 will shew.

Sir, two of my paternal uncles were his constant playmates; three of my maternal uncles were very intimate with him; and to this list may be added an aunt and my own father.

T. F. D.

Every one of these he by turns laughed at, ridiculed, censured, and with the exception of the female, satirized most unmercifully, and abused most grossly. I begin with my aunt. She incurred the boy's displeasure by one day taking him to task, and giving him some good advice. Chatterton revenged himself by writing to her a scolding epistlethis has long since been consigned to "the tomb of all the Capulets"-but inclosed was something else, which is now at my elbow. It is her coat of arms, surrounded by a garter, which garter is surmounted by a queer-looking flower, tinted gules, with a scroll over it, and the words "The rose of virginity." For, Sir, my aunt Martha was one of those pious and wise women yclepped old maids. She told me that young Chatterton was a sad wag of a boy, and always upon some joke or another."

"

Alexander Catcott was the son of the many-years master of the grammar-school in Bristol. He was one of the best Hebrew scholars in his time, and otherwise a man of great learning. He was amongst the first who turned their attention to what is

now called Geology. In the year 1750 he explored the antediluvian caves of Banwell, a village in Somersetshire, about 16 miles from hence, and brought away the bones and teeth of hyænas and so forth. In short, he was the Buckland of the day. All these fossil remains are now in our City Library. Also, the whole Hutchinsonian Philosophy question, together with his History of the Deluge, the object of which was to prove that the Mosaic account of that event was true. After slumbering in dust upon the shelves of the Bibliomanist for many years, the latter is now in great request, being

very scarce." The former yet remains in a state of profound qui

escence.

The mad genius writes,

"Reform your manners, and with solemn air Hear Catcott bray, and Robins squeak, in prayer."

Again,

"This truth, this mighty truth, if truth can

shine

In the smooth polish of a laboured line,
Catcott by sad experience testifies!
And who shall tell a sable priest he lies?
Bred to the juggling of a specious band,
Predestinated to adorn the land,
The selfish Catcott ripen'd to a priest,
And wears the sable livery of the Beast;
By birth to prejudice and whim allied,
And heavy with hereditary pride,
He modelled pleasure by a fossil rule,
And spent his youth to prove himself a fool!"
Again,

"If Catcott's flimsy system can't be proved, Let it alone-for Catcott's much beloved."

In fact, Chatterton was vain of his

acquaintance with him, boasted that he had " access whenever he pleased to the parson's study," which he considered to be a feather in his cap. This I know to have been somewhat beyond the right reading; but Mr. Catcott, having proved his love for the Muses, by a metrical translation of the Books of Job and Isaiah, could not but admire the genius and precocious talents of the youth, however he might censure his conduct. Besides, Redcliff and Temple parishes adjoin each other, and the proximity of the parsonage-house of the latter to the Pile-street school, where Chatterton resided, might throw them often into contact. Mr. Catcott died in 1779.

Mr. George Symes Catcott was the person who inquired at Rudhall's printing-office, in October, 1768, respecting "Dunhelmus Bristoliensis," the title assumed by the person who

left" the description of the Mayor's passing over the Old Bridge;" and thus was ferreted out Chatterton, then just beyond 15! An acquaintance was soon scraped, and from the latter the former received the exquisitely beautiful" Ode to Ella;" the tragedy of Ella; the Death of Sir Charles Bawdin, or the Brystowe Tragedy; the Battle of Hastings, and other pieces. All which, seven years after Chatterton's death, Mr. Catcott sold for 50%. to Payne and Son, the London booksellers. There is no memorandum extant of the moneys which Chatterton had of Mr. Catcott, but the following is now before me, in the poet's autograph :

This does not wear the look of money for a purchase, but a bold-faced means of obtaining a gratuity.

Mr. Catcott unfortunately joined in the pewter trade one Bergum, and was by him robbed of his all, 30007. Bergum was a presumptuous, vulgar, ignorant fellow, who boasted of his ancestry. Chatterton saw this weak point, and brought him a copy-book filled with the pedigree of the De Burghams, who came over with Rollo Duke of Normandy. In it the family was traced, with their several shields and armorial bearings, down to the Pewterer of Bristol. He had the mo

desty to take it, and give in return five shillings.

In "the Will" the youth alludes to this:

"Gods! what would Burgum give to get a name,

And snatch his blundering dialect from shame?
What would he give to hand his memory down
To time's remotest boundary ?-a Crown!
Would you ask more, his swelling face looks
blue,

Futurity he rates at two pound two!
Well, Burgum-take thy laurel to thy brow,
With a rich saddle decorate a sow!""

The De Bergham pedigree was purchased by Mr. Joseph Cottle of this city from the family for five guineas, and is in his possession at this mo

ment.

I may, perhaps, be pardoned for tacking on an anecdote respecting this

book. One evening it was shewn to Samuel Ireland, the person who palmed upon the public "the tragedy of Vortigern and Rowena," which he asserted to be in Shakspeare's own handwriting. See Gent. Mag. 1796 and 7. Ireland admired the fabrication of the De Bergham progeny, and, at the request of Mr. Cottle, wrote on a vacant leaf fac-similes of all the various ways in which good Queen Bess and Will Shakspeare have autographed their names. This book will for ever remain a great curiosity.

But to return to Mr. Catcott. The fame of Rowley had been reflected upon "his Midwife," as my uncle was nicknamed, and it was supposed that he must be "a most learned Theban;" which was a great mistake, for he had "small Latin and no Greek;" in fact, he was nothing more than a simple, plain, single-hearted, honest mantoo simple, indeed, or he would not have fallen into the snare spread for him, and for his Chattertonian manuscripts, by the Rev. Herbert Croft (a shameful transaction), afterwards so ably exposed by Dr. Robert Southey the Laureate (see Monthly Mag. Oct. 1799). That Mr. Catcott should not be a great scholar was a matter of wonderment to many strangers, who came in shoals to see him and his papers. Amongst these were the following persons, and with the greater part of them he corresponded upon the subject when the controversy began :— Dr. Samuel Johnson, Oliver Goldsmith, Thomas Tyrwhitt, Dr. Glynn, David Garrick, Lord Charlemont, Dr. Fry, Dr. Woodward, Rev. Herbert Croft, Jacob Bryant, Thomas Warton, Jeremiah Milles, Dean of Exeter and President of the Antiquarian Society, William Mason the poet, Bishop Percy, Lord Dacre, Dr. Gregory, and others. Mr. Catcott having copied all their letters and his answers, the book now lies upon my table, and is a valuable relic. I have some of the originals, but the greatest part is destroyed.

Chatterton's Will, dated April 14, 1770, the original of which is deposited in the Bristol Institution, has these lines:

"Catcott, for thee, I know thy heart is good,
But, ah! thy meri's seldom understood;
Too bigoted to whimsies, which thy youth
Received to venerate as Gospel proof;
Thy friendship never could be dear to me,
Since all I am is opposite to thee!

If ever obligated to thy purse,
Rowley discharges all, my first, chief curse."
And so on.

Mr. Catcott desired him to write

upon Happiness, which he did in 1770. This is what he says of his patron :—

"Catcott is very fond of talk and fame,
His wish a perpetuity of name;
Which to procure, a pewter altar's made
To bear his name and signify his trade;
In pomp burlesque the rising spire to head,
To tell futurity a Pewterer's dead!

Incomparable Catcott, still pursue

The seeming happiness thou hast in view, Unfinished chiminies, gaping spires compleat, Eternal fame on oval dishes beat;

Ride four-inched bridges-clouded turrets climb,

And bravely die, to live in after time!
Horrid idea-if on rolls of fame

The twentieth century only find thy name!
Unnoticed thus in prose or tagging flower,
He left his dinner to ascend the tower!
Then what avails thy anxious spitting pain,
Thy laugh-provoking labours all are vain.
On matrimonial pewter set thy hand,
Hammer with all the force thou canst com-
mand;

Stamp thy whole self, original as 'tis,
And propagate thy whimsies, name, and phiz.
Then, when the tottering spires or chimnies fall,
A Catcott shall remain, admired by all!"
Many passages in the above lines re-
late to the strange and most eccentric
history of Mr. Catcott. He died in
1802.

William Bradford Smith was Chatterton's bosom friend; in fact, they were birds of a feather. He was the person to whom Chatterton addressed the letter commencing" Infallible Doctor." He was not a medical man, but, after various vicissitudes of fortune, went upon the stage, and wrote verses in torrents daily, to within a few hours of his death, which happened only three years ago. He had once a quantity of the youth's autographs, but he gave them away or lost them.

To the last he never would believe that Chatterton was the author of "the Poems." I have often talked with him upon the subject. "What, Sir! (he would say) he write Rowley? No! no! no! I knew him well-he was a clever fellow, but he could not write Rowley-there was a mystery about the Poems beyond me-but Tom no more wrote them than I did-he could not!" Such was the undeviating opinion of his everyday companion.

Mr. Le Grice is right in his conjectures as to the signature-Flasmot Eychaoritt. It is clearly an anagram of Thomas Chatterton, and the wonder only is that it did not so occur to