Bristol Bells: A Story of the Eighteenth Century

ter Bryda and Jack Henderson had gone away toge

rred hope that Mr Walpole would at least return the manuscripts, at firs

gay throng of pleasure seekers on the f

with a strange longing that he could find rest there, and be

into the dun-coloured waters, a hand was la

Alexander, the parson. I'll warrant you have got some more bits of history for him to put into his bi

very good sir, but I am in n

walking with a mighty pretty young lady, with a figure like a sylph and a face

as to be under the same roof with me in Dowry Square, and m

now, a real poet, and Bristol will be proud of you some day. Why, there is not a lad of your age who can boast of his verses being taken by a London magazine and printed and admired.

t even when not long after the great Dr Johnson asserted that the poems were a forgery, though at the same time he acknowledged that it was wonderful how the whelp had written such things. The honest

ountry practitioners of his times, who were for the most part men of scant education. Mr Barrett's introduction to Thomas Chatterton was brought about by the boy assuring Mr Burgum, Mr Catcott's partner in the pewt

ve the boy, then scarcely fourteen years

pewterer's ancestors, one John de Bergheim, a Cistercian monk, and a poem called the Romaunt of t

was appended, and very soon the boy at Colston's School attracted attention and beca

Sunday evening with much cordiality, and the conve

manuscripts?' M

l be. I fear now they

Walpole shall be forced to return th

pole's whole manner changed when he discovered I was th

more value in his eyes. But means shall not be wanting to come to the bottom of this cond

ions, which in a person of quality like him is scarce reasonable to suppose,' and then the author of The History of the Deluge pu

uarter to ten o'clock Chatt

sir. Permit me to b

or, and laying his hand kindly on his ar

ded me on Bristol antiquities. Be of good courage, my boy; your time will come,

sed Mr Barrett'

u I might be delivered from the chains which gall me.' Then Chatterton took a flyin

s of the rich and great, nor the buffets which all must meet in life. Poor boy!

rton had a longing to throw

single knock which should announce his arrival, he, looking up at the starlit sky, felt there was somet

fingers, the moon and the stars which Thou hast created, what is man that Thou art mindful of Him, or the son of man that Thou visites

thunder sha

his atom gl

my only R

in Thy jus

c mazes o

s of celes

e power of

e Eternal d

soul, dost

g, seek the

the melanc

reated al

sorrowful as if it were but a story of yesterday, that for Chatterton the last verse of th

mantle of

sinking sp

h at the m

y East, my S

e door of his study with his hands full

wyer said, surveying her with his keen

lowed Mr Lambert into t

ere yesterday, as

stol, sir,' Bryda sai

sion before proceeding to recover the debt

d, with some dignity, 'is mad

sight with a pretty face. He says, if you will marry him, he will le

was sufficient answer

decision was made. I

l more. That is all I have to say. I felt bound to tell you what passed yesterday between me and Mr Bayfield. And, Miss Palmer, pardon me, but do not encourage that apprentice of mine to talk to you. You may find him troublesome. He is half mad, I think, and he does the most preposterous things, aiming the shafts of his so-called wit at those above him in station-his old master at Colston's School for one, and I thrashed him for his pains. I am seriously thinking

her hands, a

peak of private affairs to Mr Lambert-about me. No, not even to save poor old grandfather will I have any more to do with him. After all, if the stock is sold, there will be the

ar-lined bookcase and reading while Mrs Lambert dosed in her chair, or was engaged with some crony who looked in for a gos

her knee, and some fine lace of Mrs Lambert's in her hand, which she was supposed to be darning, Bryda committed t

n her little attic and set down the thoughts of every day as they occurred to her. As th

he old lady would go to the pump-room and drink a glass of the water, and Bryda was quietly amus

nvariable desire of consumptive patients to appear better than they are, would sink exhausted on one of the benches, and then

of a girl who had just recovered from a violent fit of coughing, and

er walk. Don't m

n she recalled the elegy on the dead lamb, and the same sh

fternoon. And she was also to call in at the grocer's and buy some allspice and orange peel for a tasty pudding which Mr Lambert wanted for a supper he was to give to some friends. Bryda looked as fres

ink in the middle where the comfits lie. They are sure to be heavy; and take care you get the na

st deal too dainty to walk Bristol streets alone. I've seen the fellows turn and stare at her as she crosses the square, and

d the kitchen was enough to stifle her, proceeded to

uay, and the water rippling at their sides, where the sunbeams danced and sparkled, gave her a sense of life and gladness which for the moment made her forget how near she was st

, and she shrank from it with the s

e in the large leather purse, when the cathedral bells, chiming

ossible by the irreverent fashion in which they were hurried over. But Bryda's ear caught the words o

Messiah, but it was well sung, and t

ll be made alive. For as by man came death, b

ad for her so much of darkness and fear-death could be ch

got the passing of time, till, as the half-dozen old men and women tottered

and Bryda rose hastily, and with heightened