[page 385, continued:]

STANZAS [TO F. S. O.]

This poem is clearly a companion piece to “The Divine Right of Kings” and the reasons for its ascription to Poe are discussed in the comment on that poem. Whitty said that Frances Sargent Osgood, in her own copy of Graham's Magazine for December 1845, expanded the signature “P.” to “E. A. Poe” and added “To F. S. O.” to the title.

The lady's “Echo Song,” beginning “I know a noble heart that beats / For one it loves how ‘wildly well,’ ” had appeared in the Broadway Journal of September 6, 1845, and may have called forth Poe's lines. Mrs. Osgood's “To ——,” beginning “Oh, they never can know that heart of thine, / Who dare accuse thee of flirtation,” published in the Broadway Journal for November 22, may — or may not — be her reply to Poe's “Stanzas,” which had appeared about November 15. These pieces of Mrs. Osgood's were collected in her Poems (1850), pp. 464 and 364 respectively.