[page 496:]

CHAPTER XVI
 
Widening Horizons — Friends and Enemies

As the new year broke it found Poe still at 85 Amity Street, with no definite means of support. He turned to Duyckinck again:

No edition appeared, however. A letter to Mrs. Sarah J. Hale, written January 16, 1846 reveals in his clear firm handwriting that Poe, even in times of distress, was usually in control of his faculties. It is a courteous letter dealing with her play “Ormond Grosvenor,” which she had sent him for his criticism. The postscript is of especial interest to us:

Poe must have had mental resiliency to a remarkable degree, for he remained undaunted after defeat. There was always comfort and devotion at home. A charming if pathetic evidence of the love of Virginia for him exists in the Valentine she wrote him on February 14, 1846. The initial letters of the lines spell his name:

Conventional as the verses are, there are some that reflect their lives together. The “cottage” was soon to be their home, but the “tattling tongues” were not to be silent. It is the utterance of a wife who wants her husband for herself, and not of the child she is pictured as being by those who force her relations with Poe into a false theory concerning his own physical nature. She was shrewd enough to encourage his friendship with Mrs. Osgood because she recognized that Mrs. Osgood protected him from the literary women like Mrs. Ellet, whose advances were more harmful and whose anonymous letters plagued Virginia. She had to watch the painful later scene, at Fordham, when Mrs. Ellet, seeing a letter from Mrs. Osgood lying open, took it upon herself to supervise her rival's relations with Poe. How she persuaded Mrs. Osgood to permit her to interfere is a mystery, but she did send two other self-appointed guardians of morality to demand from Poe the return of Mrs. Osgood's letters. When these ladies, whom Mrs. [page 498:] Whitman identifies as Margaret Fuller and Anne C. Lynch,(4) came to the Poe cottage, Poe was naturally incensed and incautiously exclaimed “Mrs. Ellet had better come and look after her own letters.” Poe's own account of what followed was given to Mrs. Whitman to warn her against Mrs. Ellet:

The friendship was interrupted and Mrs. Osgood and Poe seem not to have met after 1847. But she sprang to his defence on her own [page 499:] death bed in 1850. This eloquent tribute, from which I have already quoted, was printed, it is true, by Griswold, and the original has disappeared. Yet it rings true, and since it is in Poe's favor it is probably genuine.

There is an informal letter by Mrs. Osgood printed in the correspondence of Dr. Griswold(6) which is so different in its tone, as not to seem the work of the same woman. It is a defence of her actions, and seeks to prove that Poe sought her and that she did not descend to the tactics of the others: “It is too cruel that I, the only one of those literary women who did not seek his acquaintance, — for Mrs. Ellet asked an introduction to him and followed him everywhere, Miss Lynch begged me to bring him there and called upon him at his lodgings, Mrs. Whitman besieged him with valentines and letters long before he wrote or took any notice of her, and all the others wrote poetry and letters to him, — it is too cruel that I should be singled out after his death as the only victim to suffer from the slanders of his mother.” In view of the Broadway Journal courtship, this sentence is rather quaint.

The echoes of his Boston episode did not prevent Poe from being invited in April to read a poem at the Anniversary of the Literary Societies of the University of Vermont in the following August, but he was unable to accept. He declined on the plea of ill health, and pressing engagements,(7) but he probably was too wise to risk another occasional poem, which he could not write. The same letter to Duyckinck asks for a number of autographs, which he was apparently planning to use in connection with the articles on the “Literati.”

The year 1846 saw little of Poe's creative writing. “The Sphinx,” a short story published in Arthur's Ladies Magazine in January, must have been written in 1845. It is a satiric story of a man who thinks he sees a huge animal on a distant hill, when in reality he has been looking at an insect of only one sixteenth of an inch in size, which is, however, barely one sixteenth of an inch distant from the pupil of his eye. The satiric purpose of the story is to call attention to the undue emphasis laid on Democracy by those who see it too near them. “The Sphinx” has its importance in revealing Poe's continued interest in the America of his own day, but the story is not in his best vein. One of his finest Arabesques, however, was probably written early in 1846, [page 500:] although it did not appear in Godey's until the November issue. “The Cask of Amontillado” is a powerful tale of revenge in which the interest lies in the implacable nature of the narrator. By his apparent unwillingness to lead his enemy to his family vaults, he deepens his revenge. He hurls no reproaches at his victim, as he builds up the wall of masonry that will be Fortunato's tomb. For he knows that as Fortunato slowly dies, the thought of his rejected opportunities of escape will sting him with unbearable regret, and as he sobers with terror, the final blow will come from the realization that his craving for the wine has led him to his doom. There is not one word to spare in “The Cask of Amontillado.”

Poe had been busy, however, in writing criticisms for Godey's Lady's Book. Poe's reviews in Godey's were dignified by being placed in a special department called “Literary Criticism” and were signed with his name, an unusual proceeding in those days. The only important utterance, however, in this department was his discussion of Bryant's poetry. While it owed somewhat to his earlier review in 1837 in the Southern Literary Messenger, Poe seized the occasion to publish a scathing description of the log-rolling methods of reviewing then in vogue. He defended Bryant against Griswold's criticism that Bryant was not versatile, had related no history, had not sung of the passion of love and had not described artificial life. Poe claimed that it was by these very omissions that Bryant proved he knew what were the legitimate themes of poetry. In Graham's Magazine for April, 1846, appeared one of Poe's major critical articles, his “Philosophy of Composition” in which he purported to describe the composition of “The Raven.” I have already discussed this essay in connection with the poem itself.

The “Marginalia” in Graham's for March, 1846, were mainly trifles, but in one passage Poe developed his ideas on dreams in an interesting analysis of the fancies he was able to induce, just at the brink of sleep. To him the ecstasy which sprang from these fancies was “a glimpse of the spirit's outer world.”

The Democratic Review was more hospitable to large installments of “Marginalia” than the other journals. In April, 1846, Poe discoursed at length on topics that varied from credulity and penance, to Longfellow and Carlyle. Poe inveighed also against hero-worship in literature, and observed that except for the inevitable reaction against Carlyle, “we might have gone on for yet another century Emersonizing in prose, Wordsworth-izing in poetry, and Fourier-izing in philosophy.” In the Democratic Review for July, 1846, there was a [page 501:] discussion of the decline of the drama, repeating some of Poe's essay(8) on the American Drama, but varying the language somewhat. Simms’ volume of sonnets was highly praised and Christopher Pease [sic] Cranch was more tenderly treated than Poe's custom, when dealing with the Transcendentalists. This essay is a preliminary sketch for the article on Cranch which appeared among “The Literati” in the same month in Godey's.

In May, 1846, appeared in Godey's the first installment of “The Literati of New York City. Some Honest Opinions at Random Respecting their Autorial Merits, with Occasional Words of Personality.”(9)

So much comment was occasioned by the May installment that Godey republished it in June, announcing that “the May edition was exhausted before the first of May, and we have had orders for hundreds from Boston and New York, which we could not supply.” He also recorded the receipt of letters protesting against the criticisms by Poe, but asserted that he was not to be intimidated. To the reprint of the May number in June, Poe added some autographs, and the series belongs to the same division of his critical work as his earlier “Autography” papers. But he gave up this idea or could not obtain the necessary autographs, for no more appeared.

The perturbation on the part of the writers or their friends was in most cases unnecessary. Poe made clear in his introduction that he intended to reproduce the tone of conversation in literary circles in New York, while expressing his own unbiased opinions. He believed that oral judgments were more sincere than published criticism.

Nearly all of the thirty-eight authors of whom he spoke in Godey's have been forgotten, and of those who are now remembered, Poe's opinions have usually been ratified by the judgment of time. When he made a mistake it was more often on account of too great leniency, than of too great severity. The women generally were treated with gallantry, although there was some slight malice in his personal picture of Margaret Fuller. The accounts of Willis, Halleck, Catherine Sedgwick, Lydia M. Child, Anna Cora Mowatt, Caroline Kirkland, Christopher Pearse Cranch and Epes Sargent will remain valuable to the student of American literature.(10) [page 502:]

Considering Lewis Gaylord Clark's personal attack in his review of The Raven and Other Poems, Poe's picture of him, although a bit contemptuous, was mild. “Mr. Clark once did me the honor to review my poems, and — I forgive him. ... He is noticeable for nothing in the world except for the markedness by which he is noticeable for nothing,”(11) is the worst thing Poe said of his enemy. His statements concerning the Knickerbocker, Clark's magazine, are quite fair. But the Knickerbocker clique was the strongest in New York, and Clark was personally popular.

In a few cases Poe indulged in personal criticism unworthy of him. “Mr. Briggs,” he remarked, “has never composed in his life three consecutive sentences of grammatical English. He is grossly uneducated.”(12)

A letter from Poe to Field, the Editor of the St. Louis Reveillé, on June 15, 1846, shows that the first installment of “The, Literati” papers had drawn an editorial attack from Hiram Fuller, the new Editor of the Mirror since Willis and Morris had left it. After a vitriolic account of Fuller's private life, which is of no interest to us here, Poe continued:

Poe was also summoning aid, in preparation for the attack he knew was coming, in consequence of the “Literati” article on Thomas Dunn English. This article, published in the July number of Godey's(15) must have been out by June 20th, for English replied to it in the Mirror on June 23rd. Poe and English had been friends in Philadelphia and they had contributed to each other's journals. English claimed that he had loaned Poe thirty dollars to help buy the Broadway Journal; Poe claimed that English owed him money for an article on “American Poetry” for The Aristidean — this caused some feeling. Poe's explanation for the break is given in a letter to Hirst:

Judging from these letters to Field and Hirst, Poe evidently felt that an organized attack was being made on him and that he had better strike first. His criticism of English even in its first form, in Godey's, was contemptuous and unfair. Poe referred to him as, “without the commonest school education ... Mr. E. is yet young — and might with his talents, readily improve himself at points where he is most defective. No one of any generosity would think the worse of him for getting private instruction. ... I do not personally know Mr. English.” This was sufficiently galling to a man who had attended two good preparatory schools and graduated from the School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, and Poe's denial of acquaintance with English was silly. Poe paid little attention to the writings of English except to accuse him of plagiarising from Hirst.

English replied in the Evening Mirror of June 23, 1846, in a vicious attack on Poe's morality and sanity, which even Griswold later said was unworthy of a man of his standing. It is fortunately unnecessary(17) to reprint it here. English repeated with additions all the unsavory details of the scandals circulated concerning the Ellet and other affairs, describing Poe as “thoroughly unprincipled, base and depraved, but silly, vain and ignorant, not alone an assassin in morals, but a quack in literature.” He also made a definite charge that Poe had committed forgery.

Notwithstanding the vileness of English's language, Poe should have let the obvious, intemperance of the attack defeat itself. But instead he sent to Godey a long reply, dated June 27th, which that editor declined to print. Godey secured its publication, however, in the Philadelphia Spirit of the Times, of July 10, 1846, paying ten dollars for the privilege. Poe literally tore English apart so far as his charge of cowardice was concerned. He had the manliness to admit the charge of intoxication and he gave an explanation which is of great value to his biographers.(18) [page 505:]

The specific charge of forgery Poe successfully disproved by publishing the letter of the merchant, E. J. Thomas, who had been the source of the rumor. Thomas cleared Poe fully of this charge. English published a second reply in the Mirror on July 13, 1846, daring Poe to sue him.

Poe instituted a suit for damages against Fuller and Clason, the editor and proprietor of the Mirror, in the Superior Court of New York City on July 23, 1846. English departed for Washington, fearing to be involved in a criminal action, and the Court appointed a commission to go to the Capitol and force him to make a deposition.(19) The defence could find no witnesses to establish the truth of English's charges, and Poe was awarded a verdict of $225.00 damages on February 17, 1847. It was a costly victory, however, from the point of view of his reputation. His own view of the matter was given later to Eveleth.(20)

A letter from E. J. Thomas to Mrs. Osgood shows the sordid level of the trial:

When Griswold published the Literati as Volume III of the Complete Works of Poe, in 1850, he substituted for five of the papers other versions, among them one on English entitled “Thomas Dunn Brown.” This paper is more contemptuous than the actual version published in Godey's, stating that English's father was a ferryman on the Schuylkill, emphasizing English's supposed lack of education, and calling him “an ass.” This paper was actually written by Poe and is now in manuscript in the Huntington Library. It is part of a projected book to be called Literary America, Some Honest Opinion about our Autorial [page 506:] Merits and Demerits with Occasional Words of Personality, on which Poe was working during 1846, 1847, and 1848. Griswold found this manuscript and substituted it for the article in Godey's. Killis Campbell defended Griswold on the ground that Poe intended to publish this paper in his Literary America. But the important point remains, that he had not published it, and had not written the worst features of it in 1846. Griswold's insertion of the later article as though it had been published in 1846, makes English's reply apparently more justifiable. Poe's later article is dated 1848, and was written by him after the charges of forgery made by English had been disproved and English had become his bitter enemy. An author even of a foolish paper, such as Poe's first sketch, is entitled to have it republished as it was written on the date assigned to it.

According to a letter from Mary Hewitt to Poe, he had gone to Baltimore early in 1846, probably to lecture, and had been ill while there.(22) He had also been keeping his residence from her and the rest of the literary society, for Mrs. Hewitt did not know where to address him. There may have been method in his madness, however. There is also a long and rambling letter from Dr. R. D’Unger to E. R. Reynolds,(23) which despite many obvious errors, seems to establish Poe's presence in Baltimore in 1846, at least for a short time. D’Unger's account of Poe's work on the Patriot, an evening paper, during 1846 cannot be reconciled with known facts, but his picture of Poe, mingling with the Bohemian crowd of newspapermen but always maintaining the reserve of a gentleman, can hardly be entirely imaginary. D’Unger's statement, “The loss of his wife was a sad blow to him. He did not seem to care, after she was gone, whether he lived an hour, a day, a week or a year; she was his all,” indicates that Poe was in Baltimore in 1847 or 1848.

The family in New York spent a brief time at a farmhouse of Mrs. John C. Miller, near what is now the foot of 47th Street. It was known as Turtle Bay, and provided healthful surroundings for Virginia until Poe could secure a home of their own.

This was found in a cottage at Fordham, in the district known as West Farms, at that time thirteen miles out of the city.(24) When the Poe family went there in May or June of 1846, there were farmhouses [page 507:] and cottages, lining at intervals the Kingsbridge highway. Near the present East 192nd Street, on the eastern side of the road, stood a small frame dwelling house of one story and an attic, surrounded by about an acre of ground. It was owned by John Valentine, who leased it to Poe for an annual rent of one hundred dollars. Valentine had bought it from Richard Corsa on March 28, 1846. The cottage during Poe's day stood close to the road, with lilac bushes and a cherry tree between them. There were three rooms, on the first floor, a sitting room, a small bedroom for Virginia and a kitchen. The attic was divided into two rooms, that were evidently unheated. From the piazza, Poe could look south and east over the grounds of St. John's College, and if he walked to the high point of the ledge nearby, he could even see the Long Island hills beyond the East River.

The cottage was an inspiration to him. In a letter to Mrs. Whitman, written in October, 1848, he paints a picture of an ideal life with her in a home which is a dramatization of the actual surroundings of the cottage, but is evidently inspired by them. In his published story, “Landor's Cottage,” the picture of the house which attracted him on his walking trip begins: “The main building was about twenty-four feet long and sixteen broad — certainly not more. Its total height, from the ground to the apex of the roof, could not have exceeded eighteen feet. To the west end of this structure was attached one about a third smaller in all its proportions.” These figures are close to the actual proportions of the Fordham Cottage, although Poe naturally did not limit himself to an exact photograph of the house. The surroundings, including the flowers and the birds in their cages enter, too, into the story. As was Poe's usual method, he idealized reality.(25)

A vivid contemporary description of the house and its occupants as they were in 1846 was given by Mrs. Mary Gove Nichols in 1863.(26) [page 508:] Mrs. Mary Gove, as she was known in 1846, before her divorce from her first husband, was described in “The Literati” as “a mesmerist, a Swedenborgian, a phrenologist, a homeopathist and a disciple of Priessnitz.”(27) She and George Colton, who had accepted “The Raven,” paid the Poes a visit:

After a walk in the nearby woods, Mrs. Gove Nichols tells how Poe split his shoes in leaping with some of the other men in the company. Mrs. Clemm was, as usual, equal to the occasion. She took the visitor aside and asked her to speak to George Colton about the poem which she had taken to him the week before. The practical nature of Mrs. Clemm led her to continue:

The poem was probably “Ulalume.” Let us hope Mrs. Gove was more accurate in her statement concerning the payment than she was concerning the publication, for the poem did not appear until December, 1847.

The installments of the Marginalia which appeared in Graham's and the Democratic Review during the early part of 1846 had been written earlier, for Poe was too ill from February to July to write for the magazines.(29) He was not idle, however, when his illness permitted him to work. He spent the morning in what Mrs. Clemm called euphemistically “his study,” and later worked in the garden or read aloud to Virginia and herself.(30) [page 510:]

Two more installments of the “Marginalia” appeared in Graham's in November and December, 1846. A long passage on the principles that should guide translators has some valuable suggestions. Those critics who dwell heavily on the supposed influence of German literature upon Poe might read with advantage his judgment on German criticism, including his statement, “I am not ashamed to say that I prefer even Voltaire to Goethe, and hold Macaulay to possess more of the true critical spirit than Augustus William and Frederick Schlegel combined.”

He was working on his projected book on “American Letters,” preliminary extracts from it, such as the revised critique on Hawthorne and “The Rationale of Verse,” appearing in 1847 and 1848. Magazine editors were evidently not printing his contributions as soon as he expected, for while he wrote Eveleth that the Hawthorne article was to appear in January, 1847, it was not published until November. How closely he kept secluded at Fordham, watching over Virginia, one of the two extant letters from him to his wife reveals:

What this business was is not clear. Perhaps it was the proposed publication of The Literati in book form, with autographs, simultaneously in this country and England, which is announced in an [page 511:] article accompanying a republication of “The Raven.”(32) If so, it came to nothing.

What sacrifices he was making for Virginia are indicated by another interview with Mrs. Gove:

This last sentence explains, perhaps, the charges that he was willing to substitute his own work for that of another if he were paid to do so.

If we accept his various statements concerning his health, Poe was too ill to do any work during 1846. He may have overstressed this condition, for he did not neglect his correspondence with other writers. A letter from Hawthorne shows what his closest rival in fiction thought of his judgment:

A letter from Poe to Chivers gives some important personal information:

Simms wrote him on July 30th from New York City where he was too busy reading proof to visit Poe, a long and friendly letter, giving him some good advice concerning the tone of his criticism, but declining to be drawn into any of the controversies.

A request from Poe to Cooke to continue Lowell's memoir on Poe brought a friendly discriminating letter from Cooke on August 4th. Poe, in reply, showed how well he could criticize his own work:

Poe naturally welcomed any recognition from abroad. On December 30, 1846, he wrote to Duyckinck:

Poe's reference to the Charivari was probably an error, but it is true that the first important analytical criticism of the Tales of 1845 came in 1846 from France. Poe's recognition in France began in 1845, when in the November issue of the Revue Brittannique appeared a translation of “The Gold Bug” entitled “Le Scarabée d’Or,” and signed “A. B.” Alphonse Borghers was, therefore, the first translator of Poe into French.(38) In September, 1846, the Revue also published “Une [page 517:] Descente au Maelström,” signed “O. N.,” or “Old Nick,” the pen-name of E. D. Forgues. In both cases, the stories were credited to Poe. In the meantime, La Quotidienne, a Paris newspaper, had published, on June 11, 12, and 13, 1846, “Un Meurtre sans exemple dans les Fastes de la Justice” a free version of “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” representing it as being found in the papers of an American. It was signed “G. B.” and Poe was not mentioned. The rue Morgue became “rue de l’Ouest,” Madame L’Espanye became Madame Duparc, “Dupin” was transformed into “Bernier,” and there were changes tending to deepen the horror.(39) On October 12, 1846, E. D. Forgues published in Le Commerce a version of VThe Murders” under the title of “Une Sanglante Enigme,” without credit to Poe. Forgues had accused a rival paper, La Presse, of plagiarism and this journal seized the occasion to accuse Forgues of having copied his story from La Quotidienne. In his reply, he acknowledged that he had taken the story from Poe. La Presse refused to print his reply and he sued that journal, but lost the suit. The trial in December, 1846, and consequent discussion brought Poe's name prominently before the French public.

On October 15, 1846, E. D. Forgues published an extended criticism of Poe's Tales in Revue des Deux Mondes. (40) In a sympathetic and penetrating analysis, Forgues treated the Tales seriously and placed them for the first time in the great succession of English fiction. [page 518:] Instead of merely describing the stories, he tried to discover the underlying creative principle of Poe's fiction, and he found it in the triumph of logic over an apparent mystery, which is the basis of the novel and the drama. The Frenchman naturally was attracted by the logic of Poe, and it was this quality which maintained Poe's hold on French critics and readers. With Poe, Forgues pointed out, logic is the mistress, not the slave, and he weighs probabilities not by uniform precepts, but by an instinctive sagacity belonging to the man himself. Forgues analyzed first Monos and Una, the tale in which Poe took “au serieux” that brotherhood of sleep and death which so many poets have sung. He felt that Poe, probably for the first time, had given to the memories of a dead man the character of an exact definition and of a reasoned conviction.

“Eiros and Charmion” attracted Forgues through the verity of its scientific approach. He devoted three of the ample pages of the Revue to this “récit extraordinaire,” retelling the growth of the terror as the comet relentlessly approached the earth, appreciating Poe's marvellous establishment of its effect by the sudden vividness of vegetable life, until the end comes in the flame of universal destruction.

Forgues did not know, of course, the dates of the first appearances of Poe's stories in magazines. But in his efforts to show a development in Poe's fiction, or at least to establish a classification, the French critic revealed a certain instinctive knowledge of a progress which later students of Poe, with more material to judge, still find interesting. Having attempted with success to deal with problems of the future life, Poe was drawn to seek a plausible explanation of the relations of the human soul and the divinity. To illustrate this phase, Forgues chose “Mesmeric Revelation,” and showed his understanding of the lucidity of Poe's logic in the story, which I have discussed fully elsewhere.

Forgues was not always an understanding critic. His objection to the “paysan” who tells the story of the wreck in “A Descent into the Maelström,” because he could not have thought out the theory of the cylinder which saved him, is beside the question. In the first place, he is not a “peasant” but a fisherman, and, in any event, the reader of that story has to swallow the initial improbability of the fisherman talking like a man of letters, and nobody bothers about it.

When it came to the stories of ratiocination, the Frenchman recognized that Dupin was not a name, but a human being, and prepared his readers by a description of Dupin's intellectual training for his [page 519:] analytic feats. Apply this perspicacity, Forgues said, resulting from a tension of mind almost superhuman, and from a marvellous instinct, to an “operation de police,” and you have an investigator whom nothing escapes. He attributes this success to Poe's American tenacity. Forgues regretted that Poe should have chosen Paris for his scene of Dupin's exploits, although he recognized the valid reason why Poe placed them far away from Baltimore or Philadelphia. He remarked that of Paris Poe had not the least idea, and gave evidence of errors in localities which disprove the stories that place Poe at any time in Paris. Forgues was also bothered by the spectacle of the prefect of police visiting Dupin — again missing Poe's method. Indeed, Forgues’ treatment of the ratiocinative stories is the least effective portion of his essay. He omitted any analysis of “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” possibly because of his own earlier translation, treated “The Purloined Letter” and “The Gold Bug” with scant mention, and selected for extensive treatment “Marie Rogêt,” the weakest of the four. Even here he does not contribute much of value. But he recognized that “The Black Cat” and “The Man of the Crowd” represented Poe in another phase, that of poetic invention, though he neglected to treat “The Fall of the House of Usher,” the greatest of all the stories in that category.

Forgues called attention to Poe's relation to Brockden Brown as a painter of obsessions of the soul and maladies of the spirit, and concluded by a comparison of the short story, with the novel, to the advantage of the former. “La victoire,” he said, “était hier aux gros bataillons. Elle appartiendra demain aux troupes d’élite.”(41)

The Tales of 1845 continued to be the source of French translations. “The Black Cat,” “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” “Eiros and Charmion” and “A Descent into the Maelström” were translated by Madame Isabelle Meunier in La Democratie Pacifique in 1847 and “The Gold Bug” in 1848. Baudelaire, whose relation to Poe would call for a separate volume, chose for his first translation “Mesmeric Revelation,” which appeared as “Révélation Magnétique” in La Liberté de Penser in July, 1848. The first volume of Poe's stories to appear in France was the Nouvelles Choisies d’Edgar Poe, translated by Alphonse Borghers, Paris, 1853. Borghers reprinted his translation of the “Gold Bug” and added “Hans Pfaall” as “l’Aeronaute Hollandais.” The great vogue of Poe in France belongs to the period after his death, but his foreign recognition was a source of unusual satisfaction [page 520:] to him, even if he was not always exact in his knowledge or his statements regarding it.

Poe found intellectual and spiritual companionship during his life at Fordham with members of the Faculty of St. John's College. The College, opened formally in June, 1841, passed under the control of the Jesuit Order in the summer of 1846, just about the time Poe moved to Fordham. His cottage was not far from the grounds of the University, as it had just become, and Poe was a constant visitor, with the freedom of the College grounds. The Reverend Edward Doucet, S. J., afterwards President of the University and a young Scholastic in 1846, was a close friend of Poe and has left testimony concerning his habits at that time:

Father Doucet was an accomplished musician, and no doubt Poe discussed with him the relations of music and poetry, and found pleasure in listening to his friend's playing on the College organ.

In the midst of his anxieties Poe found time to continue a correspondence with a young admirer, George W. Eveleth, of Phillips, Maine, to which we owe much first-hand information concerning his later years.(43) [page 521:]

The letters represent Poe in one of his most attractive phases, that of a man taking the trouble to answer many questions of a young student of Medicine, who had no claim on Poe except his admiration of a great writer whom he never met. Sometimes Eveleth's criticisms are penetrating, but his main service lay in eliciting replies from Poe concerning points of importance.

Eveleth wrote Poe three letters, beginning December 21, 1845, before he received a reply, finally demanding the return of three dollars which he had sent for a subscription to the Broadway Journal. Poe replied:

After a long silence, Poe replied to a number of his queries:

As the winter of 1846 drew on, Poe faced the realization of the sorrow that had threatened him so long. Virginia was dying, and to his natural grief was added the bitterness of knowing that his poverty forbade him even to bring the great love of his life to an end in dignity and peace.

Once more Mrs. Gove's story draws a picture etched with sympathy:

Mrs. Marie Louise Shew, afterwards Mrs. Roland Houghton, was the new friend who came to the rescue of the family. She had some medical training, and was distinctly different from the “literary women” who plagued Poe. Her help was practical and timely.

Poe's necessities became public through a paragraph in the New York Express on December 15, 1846, which asked his friends and admirers to come to his assistance. Another, less cordial, in the Saturday Evening Post of Philadelphia began, “It is said that Edgar A. Poe is lying dangerously ill with the brain fever, and that his wife is in the last stages of consumption — they are without money and without friends, etc.”(48) It was this last sentence which stung Poe and hurt Virginia.

These notices prompted Willis to write an Editorial in the Home Journal, in which he raised the very proper question why illness of those whose pride forbade them to ask for help must remain uncared for. He then continued:

Poe wrote to Willis denying his extreme privation and that he was without friends.(50)

How widely Poe had become known is proved by the republication of the appeal in Philadelphia papers and through them in Easton and [page 527:] other Pennsylvania towns. Their tone is friendly, as indicated by a sentence like, “Mr. Poe has many friends in this city, and we have no doubt that they would willingly aid in so benevolent a design.”(51)

The day before Virginia's death Poe wrote to Mrs. Shew, who, after many visits of friendship, had gone into the city to make some arrangements for her comfort:

Before she left the cottage, Virginia gave Mrs. Shew a picture of her husband, and a little jewel case. She also took a worn letter and a fragment of one from a portfolio, which Mrs. Shew read at her request. They relieved Poe of blame for the break with John Allan. So far Mrs. Shew's memory, when she sent these reminiscences to Ingram in 1875 may be relied on. But as always, romance and rumor, twin sources of inaccuracy, surround the contents of these letters, which have disappeared. That they were written by the second Mrs. Allan, as Mrs. Shew stated, is hardly possible, as we know that lady's nature. Perhaps they were from Frances Allan, written after Poe's flight from Richmond. The story of “Poe's Mary” who says that on this day, Virginia joined her hand to Poe's may also be sent to join the other vagaries of that lady.

Virginia died on January 30, 1847, in the tiny bedroom on the first [page 528:] floor. She was clad in the “fine linen sheets” which gave Mrs. Clemm such comfort, and buried in the vault belonging to the Valentines, the owners of the cottage. Years later Virginia's body was taken to Baltimore and rests now beside the husband she adored. But as “Ulalume” tells us, her love, entrenched in his memory, guarded him even against himself.

Poe collapsed, as was natural, after the prolonged effort to meet his daily anxiety. Mrs. Clemm and Mrs. Shew took care of him, and the latter, whose medical knowledge was more reliable than her acquaintance with the Allan family, gave this explanation of their difficulties:

Poe, like any nervous patient, had his ups and downs. He received a long letter from Eveleth in January, 1847, who unfortunately sent him word of the charge of plagiarism made in the Saturday Evening Post concerning The Conchologist's First Book. Poe replied on February 16, 1847, demanding more facts and evidently being wrought up about the matter.(54) Eveleth sent him, on February 21st, the date [page 529:] of the publication of the charge, March 14, 1846. But Poe decided that the slander was not actionable.(55)  He added:

That Poe was still capable of writing vigorous English is revealed in a letter to Horace Greeley on February 21, 1847. On February 19th, The Tribune had contained an unfavorable editorial concerning the suit against The Mirror, and after stating the facts Poe continued:

Among those who had helped the family in their distress was Mrs. Jane Ermina Locke, a poetess of Lowell, Massachusetts, who sent Poe verses and some financial assistance. His letter to her, dated March 10, 1847, is so evidently a draft, corrected and recorrected,(58) that it has been made by some an argument for Poe's nervous instability at this time. But a reference to a similar draft of the letter to Anthon in 1844, will show that Poe was simply taking pains to write a tactful but courteous letter of appreciation. It would have been better for his peace of mind if he had dropped the letter in the waste basket. Mrs. Locke was to plague him later.

Poe attempted to repay Mrs. Shew by his verses, “To M. L. S—,” in the Home Journal, March 13, 1847. They bear evidence of the deepest sincerity, which the free medium of blank verse emphasizes. Poe thanked her [page 531:]

The closing lines written

show that the poem was written after Virginia's death.

In the same month “The Domain of Arnheim” appeared in the Columbian Magazine. Poe revised and continued “The Landscape Garden,” of 1842, by describing the voyages of Ellison in search of the most suitable spot on which to build his paradise of natural beauty. Poe's own habit of canoeing is reflected in the approach to Arnheim by the river, and the luxuriant dream, Oriental in its coloring, is a visual echo of his own imagining as he drifted on the Wissahickon or the Hudson, or looked down from the High Bridge over the Harlem valley.

Poe went to Philadelphia in August, 1847, to reestablish his magazine contacts. An unaddressed letter, probably to Judge Robert T. Conrad, who was one of the editors of the North American and who was assisting George Graham with his magazine, tells a story that was often to be repeated:

Poe's most important publication of 1847 was “Ulalume,” one of his original and powerful poems. It was published anonymously in the American Review for December, 1847, as “To ——. Ulalume, A Ballad.” According to Mrs. Whitman, it was written after Virginia's death,(60) although the description of the poem Mrs. Gove made Colton buy in 1846 tallies with “Ulalume.” It may have been begun in 1846, sold to Colton and revised in 1847. Poe never considered the form of any of his poems as final, and he told Eveleth that he gave Colton “Ulalume” in return for “The Poetic Principle,” which Colton could not print.

In “Ulalume” Poe depicts a struggle in the mind of a man between the human passion for one woman and the spiritual love he still cherishes for the memory of his “lost Ulalume.” They are symbols of the tragic conflict in a human soul which has lost without knowing it, its spiritual integrity. The same conflict had been expressed in prose in “William Wilson,” and in “The Fall of the House of Usher,” and in poetry it had been suggested in “Silence,” “The Haunted Palace” and “Eulalie,” but it received its supreme expression in “Ulalume.” Nothing is so terrible to the living soul as this loss of identity. “Psyche,” who accompanies the poet is, of course, the spiritual aspect of this soul. She sees the danger which the poet does not wish to see. He tries to lull her terrors, to conquer “her scruples and gloom” and he has almost succeeded, but she points to the tomb of Ulalume, who preserves through her love for the poet that integrity, and he is saved.

It is dangerous always to read much of a poet's personal life into [page 533:] his verse. But if “Ulalume” is to have a meaning in terms of Poe's emotional conflicts, that meaning is clear. Virginia had fulfilled both sides of his nature, the spiritual and the physical. She died and he was adrift. He turned to others for that support he needed in the endless struggle and was about to delude himself with the love that is merely passion, when the memory of Virginia came to his rescue. If there were any need to refute the theories which deny to Poe the normal experiences of a man, and to Virginia, those of a woman, “Ulalume” would be an answer. Perhaps in advance Poe foresaw what psychoanalysis, the naïveté of science, would suggest. Fortunately this struggle for identity is essentially a universal theme, and the symbolism makes it unnecessary to search too minutely for the living or dead women whom Poe meant to represent. One side of his nature is drawn by Astarté, the Phœnician form for the Babylonian Ishtar, the goddess of fertility. She is associated in Babylonian astrology with the planet Venus, later with the moon goddess Selene. In “Eulalie,” Astarté clearly meant Venus, and the star in “Ulalume” represents passion of the flesh. She is contrasted with “Dian” who usually is represented by the moon — and chastity. In the endeavor to solve the perennial dispute as to whether Venus or the moon is meant, I asked many years ago my colleague in Astronomy, Eric Doolittle, which of these planets would have been crescent in the month of October, early in the morning and would have come up through the constellation of “the Lion.” “Both,” he replied. That Poe knew enough astronomy to place the pallid star in the right spot is not surprising, since he walked on the promenade at High Bridge, at all times of the day or night. It is also not surprising that he forgot the fact that a planet does not “flicker” like a fixed star, but shines with a steady light. Dr. Doolittle suggested that Venus could not be seen crescent with the naked eye, but that would not have worried Poe.

The form of “Ulalume” in general is peculiarly fitting to the thought. The repetition of verses is organic, for it represents the conflict in the poet's soul as he comes step by step to the tomb. How perfectly the measure glides along is seen when the last stanza suddenly goes to pieces. This was published, however, in the American Review, and is in the copy he sent to Miss Susan V. C. Ingram in 1849,(61) so that while Poe omitted it in other versions at Mrs. Whitman's suggestion, he evidently thought it necessary.

In this connection Poe's letter to Miss Ingram reveals his unwillingness to make any clearer the meaning of “Ulalume”: [page 534:]

Poe has been criticized for using words like “Auber” and “Weir,” simply to provide easy rimes for “October” and “year.” But “Auber” he knew as a French composer(63) and “Weir” is a well known family name in Philadelphia — Dr. S. Weir Mitchell being named after a member of it. The words fit into the tone of the poem; that is the important matter.

If Poe had temporarily lost his grip on life, he had not lost his power to express a great theme in verse of haunting and inevitable phrases.

[[Footnotes]]

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 496:]

(1)  Original Autograph Ms., Duyckinck Collection, New York Public Library.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 497:]

(2)  Original Autograph Ms., Huntington Library.

(3)  Facsimile published by Josephine Poe January, “Edgar Allan Poe's ‘Child Wife’,” Century Magazine, LXXVIII (October, 1909), 894-896.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 498:]

(4)  There is a question about the second woman. Gill states that Miss Lynch told him she never heard of the episode.

(5)  Original Autograph Ms. Letter, Friday, November 24 [1848], J. K. Lilly, Jr. Collection. In this connection Mrs. Osgood's poem “Slander” in the Broadway Journal, II (August 30, 1845), 113, may refer to the rumors which hurt Virginia.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 499:]

(6)  Passages from the Correspondence of Rufus W. Griswold (Cambridge, 1898), pp. 256-257.

(7)  Poe to Duyckinck, April 28, 1846. Original Autograph Ms., New York Public Library.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 501:]

(8)  American Review, II (August, 1845), 117-131.

(9)  The six installments were published in: XXXII (May, 1846), 194-201; (June, 1846), 266-272, also reprint of May installment, 289-296; XXXIII (July), 13-19; (August), 72-78; (September), 126-133; (October), 157-162.

(10)  For Poe's own opinion of “The Literati,” see p. 523.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 502:]

(11)  Godey's Lady's Book, XXXIII (September, 1846), 132.

(12)  Godey's Lady's Book, XXXII (May, 1845), 295.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 503:]

(13)  Then follow quotations from Miss Barrett's letter, see Chapter XV, and minor details.

(14)  Original Autograph Ms., Huntington Library.

(15)  Vol. XXXIII (July, 1846), pp. 17-18.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 504:]

(16)  Original Autograph Ms., Huntington Library.

(17)  The entire controversy may be read in the Virginia Edition, XVII, 233-258.

(18)  See Chapter I, in connection with his father's habits.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 505:]

(19)  The curious may find this in “A Close-Up of Poe,” by Carl Schreiber, Saturday Review of Literature, III (October 9, 1926), 165-167.

(20)  See Letter to Eveleth, January 4, 1848.

(21)  Original Autograph Ms., Griswold Collection, Boston Public Library.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 506:]

(22)  Original Autograph Ms., Mary E. Hewitt to Poe, April 15, 1846. Griswold Collection, Boston Public Library.

(23)  Published by J. A. Harrison in the Independent, LXI (November 1, 1906), 1049-1050.

(24)  Poe to Chivers, July 22, 1846.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 507:]

(25)  Owing to the encroachments of building operations, the cottage was moved in June, 1913, to its present location, about four hundred and fifty feet north, opposite Poe Park, the property of the city. The cottage is under the charge of the Bronx Society of Arts and Sciences. The old kitchen which had been destroyed was replaced in facsimile in 1917, and the cottage is well cared for. The history of the cottage, based on original search among the real-estate records is given in Henry N. MacCracken's “Poe at Fordham,” read at the Poe Centenary Exercises, January 19, 1909, published in Transactions of the Bronx Society of Arts and Sciences, I (May, 1910), 21-36. This account is to be supplemented by The Poe Cottage at Fordham by Reginald P. Bolton (New York, 1927).

(26)  Six Penny Magazine, February, 1863. Reprinted in full by the Union Square Book Shop, with an introductory letter by Thomas O. Mabbott (New York, 1931).

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 508:]

(27)  Godey's Lady's Book, XXXIII (July, 1846), 16. She was best known as an advocate of health reform, marrying in 1848 Thomas Low Nichols, a pioneer in that field. See D. A. B., for interesting accounts of both.

(28)  The house originally had two rooms on the first floor, but the third room must by all accounts have been added before Mrs. Gove's visit.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 509:]

(29)  Poe to Chivers, July 22, 1846.

(30)  Mrs. Clemm to Neilson Poe, Ingram, II, 89.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 510:]

(31)  Ingram, II, 88-89. Mrs. Shew's copy of the letter, which she sent to Ingram, is now at the University of Virginia.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 511:]

(32)  Philadelphia Saturday Courier, July 25, 1846.

(33)  Original Autograph Ms., H. B. Martin Collection.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 513:]

(34)  Original Autograph Ms., Huntington Library. A notation, presumably by Chivers, probably refers to the English magazines noted by Poe in his letter to Field of June 15, 1846. There is also the title of an article from the Reveillé, copied from the Home Journal, dealing with Poe's fame “in Europe and America.” This was probably the article “Edgar A. Poe” printed in the Reveillé, July 6, 1846. Dr. Mabbott has a copy of the original, now in the Jefferson Memorial, St. Louis.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 514:]

(35)  This analysis of the ratiocinative stories is repeated almost verbatim, in Griswold's “Memoir,” as Griswold's own criticism.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 515:]

(36)  Original Autograph Ms., Young Collection, New York Public Library. The letter is not addressed, but several references make it clear that it is written to Cooke. I have omitted four paragraphs which repeat matters already treated in other letters such as Mrs. Browning's opinion of his work.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 516:]

(37)  Original Autograph Ms., Duyckinck Collection, New York Public Library.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 516, continuing to the bottom of page 517:]

(38)  Revue Brittannique, 5th Series, Vol. 30, pp. 168-212. Biographers have usually depended on the letter just quoted, or on Poe's statement in Marginalia [page 517:] in Graham's, November, 1846, “Some years ago, ‘The Paris Charivari’ copied my story with complimentary comments,” and his remark, “We have written paper after paper which attracted no notice at all until it appeared as original in ‘Bentley's Miscellany’ or the ‘Paris Charivari.’” Broadway Journal, II (August 30, 1845), 125. A thorough search of the Charivari reveals no copy of the story or mention of Poe. The details of the law suit, incorrectly given by Griswold, have also been copied extensively, and the mythical “first volume of translations of Poe in French” by Madame Meunier in 1846, appears in a number of bibliographies. The correct facts were given by Louis Seylaz, Edgar Poe et les Premiers Symbolistes Français (Lausanne, 1923), pp. 37-45; more fully by Léon Lemonnier, Les Traducteurs d’Edgar Poe en France de 1845 à 1875 (Paris, 1928), pp. 11-67, who gives interesting parallel passages of Poe's stories with the translations. C. L. Cambiaire, in The Influence of Edgar Allan Poe in France (New York, 1927), pp. 1-41, has also given the correct facts. All three seem to have worked independently, with the original sources.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 517:]

(39)  The searchers found the women's clothes in the bureau “tachés de sang.” The bloody tracks led them to the chimney, where the body of the daughter had been thrust. Poe spared his readers such details.

(40)  “Les Contes D’Edgar A. Poe” in “Études sur le Roman Anglais et Américain,” XVI, new series (1846), 341-366.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 519:]

(41)  Revue des Deux Mondes, p. 366. Forgues seems to have been unaware of the poetry or the critical work of Poe.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 520:]

(42)  Thomas Gaffney Taaffe, A History of St. John's College, Fordham, N. Y. (New York, 1891), pp. 100-101. Mr. Taaffe, in speaking of Poe's cottage, then in its first location, made an earnest plea for its preservation, pp. 7-8.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 520, continuing to the bottom of page 521:]

(43)  Eveleth's letters to Poe were printed for the first time by Thomas Ollive Mabbott, from the Mss. in the New York Public Library, in the Bulletin of the New York Public Library, March, 1922, pp. 3-27. A reprint was published separately in April, 1922, under the title of The Letters From George W. Eveleth to Edgar Allan Poe. I am indebted to Dr. Mabbott for the privilege of quoting them. [page 521:]

Poe's letters to Eveleth were published by Ingram in his Life of Poe, “as letters from a young friend.” These were printed in part from copies sent by Eveleth to Ingram. These copies are now at the University of Virginia. They were published by James Southall Wilson in the Alumni Bulletin of the University of Virginia, January, 1924, and a reprint was published, under title of The Letters of Edgar A. Poe to George W. Eveleth. Dr. Wilson printed the letters complete for the first time. I am indebted to his courtesy for permission to quote from his copyrighted edition. The original autograph letters, in certain cases, have come to light, and I have printed from these when possible. When not otherwise indicated, the letters are quoted from Dr. Wilson's article.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 521:]

(44)  Original Autograph Ms., W. H. Koester Collection.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 522:]

(45)  In Graham's, XXIV (March, 1844), 142-143.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 523:]

(46)  This refers to his “Literary America,” see pp. 560-561.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 524:]

(47)  Original Autograph Ms., Berg Collection, New York Public Library.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 525:]

(48)  Quoted by Eveleth without date in his letter to Poe, January 19, 1847.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 526:]

(49)  Home Journal, Editorial Page, Saturday, December 26, 1846. Photostat from Library of Congress.

(50)  Poe's letter is quoted by several biographers from Griswold's “Memoir,” under date of December 30, 1846. I cannot locate the issue of the Home Journal in which it is supposed to have appeared, and to quote from Griswold unsupported is, of course, dangerous.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 527:]

(51)  Easton Star, January 5, 1847, from “a Philadelphia paper.” I have not been able to identify this paper.

(52)  Original Autograph Ms., Huntington Library.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 528:]

(53)  Ingram, Life, II, 115-116; Rev. Ed., 330. Dr. Valentine Mott was then one of the leading members of the School of Medicine of New York University.

(54)  See pp. 275-277, where Poe's explanation is given in relation to the original publication.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 529:]

(55)  Letter to Eveleth, March 11, 1847, J. S. Wilson's edition, pp. 13-14.

(56)  The review of Hawthorne's Twice Told Tales of 1842 and Mosses from an Old Manse, of 1846, appeared in Godey's Lady's Book, November, 1847. It is reprinted in Harrison, XIII, 141-155.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 530:]

(57)  Original Autograph Ms., J. P. Morgan Library.

(58)  Original Autograph Ms., Griswold Collection, Boston Public Library.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 532:]

(59)  Original Autograph Ms., University of Virginia Library. There is a letter, addressed to Conrad, on August 31, 1847, in which Poe refers to these details. A facsimile of this letter is in Dr. Mabbott's Collection.

(60)  Edgar Poe and his Critics, pp. 28-29.

[The following footnote appears at the bottom of page 533:]

(61)  Original Autograph Ms., J. P. Morgan Library.

[The following footnotes appear at the bottom of page 534:]

(62)  Original Autograph Ms., Morgan Library.

(63)  See “Foreign Intelligence” in Broadway Journal, II, 356. “Auber has been seriously indisposed — he was unable to preside at the last meeting of the Conservatoire.”