CHATTERTON--poor Chatterton! We had been brooding sadly over his fragment of a life, ending at seventeen--when ordinary lives begin--and turning page after page of Horace Walpole's literary fooleries, to find his explanations and apologies for want of feeling and sympathy, which his flippant style, and heartless commentaries, illustrate to perfection; and we closed, with an aching heart, the volumes of both the parasite of genius, and him who was its mightiest creation and most miserable victim:-- "The marvellous boy who perished in his pride." It was only natural for us to recall the many instances we have ourselves known, during the past twenty years, or more, of sorrow and distress among those who sought distinction in the thorny labyrinths of literature;--those who ----"waged with Fortune an eternal war, Checked by the scoff of Pride, by Envy's frown, And Poverty's unconquerable bar;" and those who, after a brief struggle with untoward fate, left the battle-field, to die, "unpitied and unknown!" We have seen the career of a young literary man commenced with the first grand requisite of all excellence worth achieving--ENTHUSIASM; high notions of moral honor, and a warm devotedness to that "calling" which lifts units to a pinnacle formed by the dry bones of hundreds slain. We have seen that enthusiasm frozen by disappointment--that honor corrupted by the contamination of dissipated men--that devotedness to THE CAUSE fade away before the great want of nature--want of bread--which it had failed to bestow. We have seen, ay, in one little year, the flashing eye dimmed--the round cheek flattened--the bright, hopeful creature, who went forth into the world--rejoicing like the sun to run his course--dragged from the waters of our leaden Thames, a discolored remnant of mortality--recognized only by the mother who looked to him for all the world could give!