Text: Killis Campbell, “News for Bibliophiles.” The Nation (New York, NY), vol. 93, October 19, 1911, pp. 362-363

NEWS FOR BIBLIOPHILES.

In the Nation of December 23, 1909, I was able to call attention to a number of brief essays belonging to Poe that had hitherto not been accredited to him. I have since come across several other items that have escaped his bibliographers.

These are as follows:

1.) A review of R. M. Bird's “Calavar,” in the Southern Literary Messenger of February, 1835. That this is Poe's is established by his references back to it in his reviews of Bird's “The Infidel” and “The Hawks of Hawk-Hollow,” published respectively in the June and December issues of the Messenger for 1835 (see the “Virginia Poe,” VIII, 32 f., 63 f.). The item is of special interest as being, so far as we have any tangible evidence, the earliest of Poe's contributions to the Messenger, and the first of a long line of book reviews.

2.) A notice of Anthon's edition of Smith's “Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities,” in the Southern Literary Messenger for May, 1845. This paraphrases in part Poe's notice of the same work in the Broadway Journal of April 12, 1845 (“Virginia [column 3:] Poe,” XII, 129 f.). I am aware that some doubt is thrown on the authenticity of this item by Mr. B. B. Minor's statement, in his history of the Southern Literary Messenger, p. 140, that Poe, who, as announced in the Messenger of the month preceding that in which this article appeared, had been engaged by the editor (then Mr. Minor himself) to furnish “monthly a critique raisonnée of the most important forthcoming works,” did not fulfil his engagement “in the least part.” But the most reasonable assumption to be made is that Mr. Minor's memory played him false in this matter, and that Poe simply made his article do double duty, as he did, we know, on more than one other occasion. Poe had also been engaged to write for the Messenger in the autumn of 1844; and in accordance with this arrangement he did send to the editor ‘”’two or three articles’ — so Mr. Minor wrote Prof. James A. Harrison (“Virginia Poe,” I, 220) — though only one of these, “The Literary Life of Thingum Bob,” in the Messenger of December, 1844, can now be traced. It is probable, I think, that Mr. Minor confuses the two engagements.

3.) A brief but lively notice of Grattan's “Highways and By-Ways,” in Burton's Gentleman's Magazine for June, 1840. This article subsequently appeared either verbatim or in paraphrase in two separate instalments of the “Marginalia” (see the “Virginia Poe,” XVI, 63, 140 f.)

4.) A review of a pamphlet detailing the “Discoveries and Results of the United States Exploring Expedition” into the South Seas led by J. N. Reynolds in the late thirties. This appeared in Graham's Magazine, September, 1843. The item is acknowledged by Poe in a memorandum sent to Graham in 1845 or thereabouts, and is included by the latter in his article on Poe in Graham's for March, 1850.

5.) A series of five editorials on the “Pay of American Authors,” in the New York Evening Mirror, published, respectively, in the issues of October 12, 1844, and January 24, 25; 27, and 31, 1845. The first is entitled, “The Pay for Periodical Writing,” the fourth has the sub-title, “The Magazines,” and the fifth the sub-title, “Synopsis of the International Copyright Question.” Poe's authorship is established in two ways: first, by Willis's announcement in an editorial on October 10, 1844, that Poe would take up the subject of “Authors’ Pay in America,” in the columns of the Mirror (“We have hot coals smouldering in the ashes of ‘things put off,’ which we poke reluctantly to the surface just now — reluctantly only because we wish to light beacons for an authors’ crusade, and we have no leisure to be more than its Peter the Hermit. We solemnly summon Edgar Poe to do the devoir of Cour De Lion — no man's weapon half so trenchant!”); secondly, by the reappearance, in close paraphrase, of the last four paragraphs of the concluding article of the series in a set of the “Marginalia,” published in Godey's Lady's Book in September, 1845 (“Virginia Poe,” XVI, 78 f.).

6.) An editorial, entitled “American Diffuseness — Objectionable Concision,” in the Evening Mirror of January 22, 1845. A part of the fourth paragraph is compiled from the ninth paragraph of a “Marginalia” item on Gibbon and Carlyle, published [page 363:] in the Democratic Review for November, 1844 (“Virginia Poe,” XVI, 16).

7.) “Why not try a Mineralized Pavement?” an editorial, published in the Evening Mirror, February 8, 1845. The ninth and tenth paragraphs reappeared with slight changes as the seventh and eighth paragraphs of Poe's article on “Street Paving” in the Broadway Journal of April 19, 1845 (“Virginia Poe,” XIV, 164 f.). The article is valueless as literature, but possesses significance as showing the variety of Poe's interests.

I wish also in this connection to point out that Poe's tale, “Diddling Considered as One of the Exact Sciences,” of which the place of original publication has been advertised by Poe's editors and biographers as unknown, first appeared in the Philadelphia Saturday Courier for October 14 1843. It there has the title, “Raising the Wind; or, Diddling Considered as One of the Exact Sciences.” In the same journal there appeared on June 24, July 1, and July 8, 1843, a reprint of the “Gold Bug” as originally published in the Philadelphia Dollar Newspaper of June 21 and 28, 1843 This text of the “Gold Bug” has heretofore been held to be inaccessible, owing to the fact that no copy of the Dollar Newspaper for 1843 has been found. A file of the Saturday Courier for the years 1838 and 1840 to 1849 is preserved in the library of the Pennsylvania Historical Society, at Philadelphia.

KILLIS CAMPBELL.

University of Texas.