Text: John C. Miller, ed., “Entry 149: John H. Ingram to Sarah Helen Whitman, May 2, 1876,” Poe's Helen Remembers (1979), pp. 417-419 (This material is protected by copyright)

[page 417, continued:]

149. John H. Ingram to Sarah Helen Whitman

My dear Providence,

Yours dated the 18th Ultimo to hand and, in compliance with your request, I reply at once. You say reply on enclosed card, but no card was enclosed — only a most fragrant bunch of Arbutus — not the European Arbutus evidently, but a sweeter & an earlier flowering bloom.

Your lines are most beautiful — truly redolent of spring sweetness &, for once, I must confess the reply is not unworthy of the lines replied to. Why are you so chary of your poems? Why not republish during your earthly life?

As nothing in the shape of a card was enclosed, I give my “authority” for the Graham testimony on the next scrap. You will see that “S.H.W.” — whose authority I always accept — gave me the information. But all is put right now. ’Twas evidently only a slip of the pen.

The Didier herein referred to is, I am told, meditating a new life of Poe. He has been so doing for some years, he says, but, if his facts are not more reliable than those prefixed to the “Alone” lines, I am afraid we shall not get much useful information therefrom. I suppose he’ll be on the right side.

Looking over the Literary World (New York) for 1850, I see that in reviewing Vol. iii of Poe's works, Griswold was severely handled &, even then, accused of inserting into Poe's critiques things Poe had not put there. The notice, however, cannot be styled friendly to Poe. [page 418:]

I’ll send a Sappho to you for Mr. Harris in course of a few posts. “Stella” is, of course, Mrs. Lewis. Did I ever tell you she gave me the MS. of Politian? Keep this sub rosa — I have reasons. I have done much for her. “What a lot” we shall have for our viva voce exchanges!

Ever yours,

In yours dated 27 May 1875 you say, after telling how the MS. of “To Helen” passed into the hands of Dr. Buchanan: “The lines to Helen were first published in Graham's Magazine in Oct. 1848. Poe brought me the number & pointed out to me that they had left out the words, ‘Oh God, oh heaven! how my heart beats in coupling those two words.’” I need not send the leaf, need I? I fear to lose a line of yours (save two pistol & dagger epistles, & those I keep in lieu of sackcloth & ashes). I at once entered the above date in a book I keep of Poe's first publications. I mean a list of when his various productions appeared. I have only two vols. of Graham's & some odd parts. There are none in the British Museum & I still await a full list of Poe's contributions to the magazine, but his acknowledged pieces is nearly full. Recently I was investigating Sartain's Union Maga. & found the “Lines to ——.”* I noted the discrepancy at once & wrote to you. This is the whole story.(1)

Mallarmé is translating & publishing Poe's “Marginalia” in La République des Lettres. I have given you information re. the 1827 vol. — in my last — as soon as I can get the paper published you shall have copies.

Do you see Notes & Queries? No. 121 for 22 April, page 336, headed “Philadelphia Authors,” contained a charge against Poe of plagiarism.(2) I have responded & have let a certain plagiaristic “cat out of the bag,” where I have long kept it, that will startle one Philadelphia author, I fancy. My reply should appear next Saturday the 6th.(3)

At last Scribner's have responded politely with respect to my communication on “Alone.” They state:

After receiving your letter we sent to Baltimore & got from Mr. Didier the original copy of the Poe verses. We had already submitted the photo of it to a “Poe expert” who pronounced the poem & the handwriting as probably genuine. Upon examination of MS. we found that the date and, also, the title had been added by another hand — but we think there is no doubt as to the authenticity of the poem itself.

I had no idea you possessed “Poe experts”! The “probably” is very [page 419:] convincing, n’est ce pas? The poem is doubtless genuine, but it will need a goodly array of Poe experts to convince me that the handwriting is that of “The Raven's” author.

Mrs. E. O. Smith's address is Hollywood, Carteret County, North Carolina — but I send her last letter. Pray let it be private & return it, because it is so full of misapprehensions, to speak mildly, that I have not cared to answer it. I returned her MS. at once.

 

1. Mrs. Whitman's letter of May 27, 1875, contains neither an account of the “To Helen” manuscript nor the sentences Ingram here quotes. But Ingram's date is surely correct (he seldom erred in this respect), for the quoted passage cannot be found in the surviving correspondence (the Buchanan affair is discussed several times). In its present state the six-page holograph is clearly incomplete (see p. 296), lacking one leaf. When Mrs. Whitman persisted in pursuing this question (see her next letter, No. 150), Ingram apparently returned this leaf in his letter of May 31, 1876 (No. 151), with the request that she return it (see p. 422). It has not survived.

2. Notes and Queries, 5th ser., 5 (Apr. 22, 1876), 336: “Mr. Francis Harold is living, and is a member of the Philadelphia board of stockbrokers. He is a gentleman of decided literary taste{.1 Some years ago, Mr. Duffee proved that Poe (a most unprincipled man) was a plagiary of his most celebrated story, The Gold Bug[. ...] UNEDA, Philadelphia.”

3. Ingram's reply appeared on schedule, May 6, 1876, 377: “UNEDA, in speaking of a Philadelphian, a certain Mr. Duffee, alleges, ‘Some years ago Mr. Duffee proved that Poe (a most unprincipled man) was a plagiarist of his most celebrated story, The Gold Bug.’ If your correspondent means, and the construction of his sentence is somewhat curious, that Edgar Poe stole the story from some one else, will he or she be good enough to state how, when, and where the charge was proved? As your readers are aware, similar charges have been frequently trumped up against the author of The Raven; but hitherto, upon examination, they have been proved utterly false. Speaking with a full knowledge of Poe's life and character, I emphatically deny that he was ‘a most unprincipled man.’ ”

[[Footnotes]]

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 418:]

* [Mrs. Whitman's note:] It was not Sartains's, neither Graham's, but the Union.