MASON'S BIOGRAPHY OF GRAY trate, the tender husband and father, the kindly host of his poorer friends, the practical philanthropist, the patient and magnanimous hero of the Voyage to Lisbon. If these things be remembered, it will seem of minor importance that to his dying day he never knew the value of money, or that he forgot his troubles over a chicken and champagne. And even his improvidence was not without its excusable side. Once-so runs the legend-Andrew Millar made him an advance to meet the claims of an importunate tax-gatherer. Carrying it home, he met a friend, in even worse straits than his own; and the money changed hands. When the tax-gatherer arrived there was nothing but the answer : Friendship has called for the money and had it; let the collector call again." Justice, it is needless to say, was satisfied by a second advance from the bookseller. But who shall condemn the man of whom such a story can be told? 44 (Henry Fielding-A Memoir.) WILLIAM MASON AND HIS BIOGRAPHY OF GRAY ON 30th July, 1771, Gray died, and was buried on 6th August in Stoke-Poges churchyard. He left to Mason £500, together with all his "books, manuscripts, coins, music printed or written, and papers of all kinds, to preserve or destroy at his own discretion." Out of this bequest Mason began, not long afterwards, to prepare Gray's "Memories." 44 MASON'S BIOGRAPHY OF GRAY Borrowing a hint either from his own indolence, or Conyers Middleton's life of Cicero, and discarding the stereotyped method of his day he proceeded, by printing Gray's letters with a brief connecting narrative and notes, to make him, as far as possible, "his own biographer," and in this way to present a regular and clear delineation of his life and character." His plan proved excellent; and it was at once adopted by subsequent writers as the true method of life-writing. It remains the true method of life-writing still-where there are letters, be it understood; but in Mason's case there was one grave defect, of which his contemporaries were happily ignorant. Regarding Gray's correspondence as mere raw material, he treated it in a way which would now be regarded as disingenuous. A biographer is no doubt entitled to suppress or withhold as he thinks fit, but he is not justified in garbling or falsifying. Mason practically did both. He left out passages without indicating that anything had been omitted; he turned two letters into one; and he freely altered the wording in others where he thought alteration was required. He may possibly have held that he was justified in what he did by the custom of his day; and it is not necessary to suppose him wilfully misleading. But he certainly cannot be defended on one plea which has been put forward in his defence, namely-that he could not foresee the future interest which would attach to Gray as an author. The question is one of editorial good faith; and it remains a serious drawback to a work which Rogers read and re-read delightedly; which Miss Mitford regarded as one of the most 44 TO AN INTRUSIVE BUTTERFLY attractive books ever written "; and which, sophisticated though it be, does not give an unfavourable or inadequate picture of Mason's friend and critic. (At Prior Park and Other Papers.) TO AN INTRUSIVE BUTTERFLY "Kill not-for Pity's sake—and lest ye slay -FIVE RULES OF BUDDHA. I WATCH you through the garden walks, And flicker on the green; Across the room in loops of flight Dance down a shaft of glancing light, Review my books a-row ; Of "blind Mæonides - Ah, trifler, on his lips there lit Not butterflies, but bees! You pause, you poise, you circle up Among my old Japan; You find a comrade on a cup, A friend upon a fan ; WALPOLE AND CHATTERTON You wind anon, a breathing-while, Away! Her thoughts are not as thine. Her steadfast soul with deep design Of baby bows and frills; What care hath she for worlds without, Whose endless hopes revolve about A planet, ætat One. Away Tempt not the best of wives; Let not thy garish wing Come fluttering our Autumn lives With truant dreams of Spring! Should slay .. a future PRAED! HORACE WALPOLE AND CHATTERTON TOWARDS the close of 1768, and early in 1769, Chatterton fretting in Mr. Lambert's office at Bristol, and casting about eagerly for possible clues to a literary life, had offered some specimens of the pseudo-Rowley to James Dodsley of Pall Mall, but apparently without success. His next appeal was made to Walpole, and mainly as the author of the 44 WALPOLE AND CHATTERTON Anecdotes of Painting in England. What documents he actually submitted to him is not perfectly clear, but they manifestly included further fabrications of monkish verse, and hinted at, or referred to, a sequence of native artists in oil, hitherto wholly undreamed of by the distinguished virtuoso he addressed. The packet was handed to Walpole at Arlington Street by Mr. Bathoe, his bookseller (also notable as the keeper of the first circulating library in London) ; and, incredible to say, Walpole was instantly drawn." He despatched without delay to his unknown Bristol correspondent such a courteous note as he might have addressed to Zouch or Ducarel, expressing interest, curiosity, and a desire for further particulars. Chatterton as promptly rejoined, forwarding more extracts from the Rowley poems. But he also, from Walpole's recollection of his letter, in part unbosomed himself, making revelation of his position as a widow's son and Lawyer's apprentice who had taste and turn for more elegant studies," which inclinations, he suggested, his illustrious correspondent might enable him to gratify. Upon this, perhaps not unnaturally, Walpole's suspicions were aroused, the more so that Mason and Gray, to whom he showed the papers, declared them to be forgeries. He made, nevertheless, some private enquiry from an aristocratic relative at Bath as to Chatterton's antecedents, and found that, although his description of himself was accurate, no account of his character was forthcoming. He accordingly-he tells us wrote him a letter "with as much kindness and tenderness as if he had been his guardian,’ recommending him to stick to his profession, and 44 |