Chatterton. My life, and it is yours.
Bertha. No, not your life;
But that you nobly live.
Chatterton. I'll try, I'll try.
Bertha. Give me some token; let it be a verse
In your own hand.
Chatterton. I have none worthy you.
Bertha. Have you not one among your papers there?
I know 'tis much to ask.
Chatterton. No: it is yours.
[Taking up a sheet of paper.]
On melancholy—that will scarcely do.
Bertha. Read it to me, and I shall be the judge.
Chatterton. [Reads.]
When silent are the chambers of the mind
To rippling laughter and to whispering love,
When Hope hath whirred away, a mourning dove,
And bats dart in and out, and moans the wind,
Then Melancholy comes, to night consigned,
And haunts the moonlit windows. Perhaps above,
Not on this earth, can shadowy thoughts that rove
Like troubled ghosts a sweet oblivion find.