Chatterton

Ernest Lacy
CHATTERTON.
—A Garret in Brooke Street, London. Casement at back C. opening on the street; door, L. 3. E.; rough bedstead R. of window; rude chairs and table, with candle, manuscripts, and writing materials on it, L. C.; old washstand, on which are a glass, a basin, and a broken jug of water, R. 2. E. The Garret is in the house of Mrs. Angell, and is the lodging of the Poet Chatterton. It is the night of August 24th, 1770. Music on rise of curtain. A distant bell is heard tolling the hour.
Enter Mrs. Angell with lamp. Lights up.
Enter Burgum and Bertha.
Mr. Chatterton is not in. Will you wait, Mr.—, Mr.—
Bertha. There is no more honorable title, father.
Burgum. Bah! romantic.
Mrs. Angell. He surely will return soon: he is seldom out in the evening.
Burgum. I'll await his coming. I must see him on a matter connected with the de Burgum Pedigree, which he was fortunate enough to discover. I say fortunate enough, since otherwise some one else would have discovered it—birth, like murder, will out.
Bertha. The rewards of poetry, father, only poets know.
Burgum. Another romantic speech! If you must worship a poet, worship my collateral ancestor, Master John de Bergham, a Cistercian monk, one of the greatest ornaments of his age—so the Pedigree reads—and a translator of the Iliad. This boy never can be a poet: he knows no Latin and Greek.