appear in his right colours, and Griswold fall back into the slough of infamy, branded as one of the most despicable of men. Before proceeding, it may be as well to give an example of Griswold's malicious slanders. In the autumn of 1848 Poe met Mrs. Whitman, fell in love with her, and desired to marry her. They were not married, and the breaking of the engagement affords a striking illustration of Poe's character (Griswold wrote). He said to an acquaintance in New York, who congratulated with him upon the prospect of his union with a person of so much genius and so many virtues, 'It is a mistake: I am not going to be married.' 'Why, Mr. Poe, I understood that the banns have been published!' I cannot help what you have heard, my dear madam: but mark me, I shall not marry her.' He left town the same evening, and the next day was reeling through the streets of the city which was the lady's home, and in the evening-that should have been the evening before the bridal-in his drunkenness he committed at her house such outrages as made necessary a summons of the police. Here was no insanity leading to indulgence: he went from New York with a determination thus to induce an ending of the engagement; and he succeeded. In the face of these details-the conversation with the lady at New York, the reeling about the streets, the drunkenness, the evening call on Mrs. Whitman, the summons of the police-there is apparently no doubt as to the course of events. The reader asks himself, what sort of a man can Poe have been to have been capable of devising such a means to extricate himself from such an engagement; and what sort of woman Mrs. Whitman to have made it necessary for him to resort to such a despicable plan. But, as it happens, the story is not true; from beginning to end it is criminal misrepresentation; it is, indeed, Griswold's crowning infamy! Fortunately for Poe's reputation and her own, Mrs. Whitman was alive when Griswold's 'Memoir' appeared, and, though reluctant to draw the veil from her private life, she bravely put on record what actually did happen. Her own words give Griswold the lie. On the afternoon of the 8th of November, after a prolonged conversation on the subject [of his proposal of marriage], the result of which seemed to have deeply pained and wounded him, he left me abruptly, and in the course of the evening sent me a wild, incoherent note of renunciation and farewell. Early on the following morning he returned to my mother's house in a state of wild excitement, telling me that his fate for good or for evil rested solely with me, and calling on me wildly to save him from the doom that was now awaiting him. It was to me a day of unutterable anxiety and suffering. A physician was sent for, who, finding symptoms of cerebral congestion, recommended his removal to the house of his friend, Mr. W. J. Pabodie, where he received the kindest care and attention until he was sufficiently recovered to leave the city. This is the simple story of an incident which Griswold has perverted into a scene of insult and outrage, perpetrated by Poe on the eve of his approaching marriage, with the assumed intention of breaking off the alliance! No engagement existed between us at the time. It was not until after the scene just related, and, strange as it may seem, in consequence of it, that, with many misgivings, I consented to a conditional engagement, which was annulled only after I discovered that he had literally lost the power to free himself from the terrible maelstrom that was drawing him down to swift destruction. Edgar Poe was born at Boston on the 19th of January 1809. He was the son of David Poe, who, bred to the Bar at the instance of his father, General Poe, meeting a beautiful and talented actress, Elizabeth Arnold, herself also of gentle birth, married her, abandoned his profession, and himself went on the stage. Both Edgar's parents died in 1811-his mother in December of that year at Richmond— and then he was adopted by John Allan, a wealthy Scotch merchant residing in that town, whose wife had been moved at the sight of the forlorn infant. Edgar-henceforth called Edgar Allan Poe-was a precocious child; at the age of six he could read, draw, recite and dance; and Mr. Allan amused himself by showing off the talents of his protégé. This was bad for the little boy, for the excitements caused by these exhibitions had an unfortunate effect upon his nervous temperament. I am the descendant of a race whose imaginative and easily excitable temperament have at all times rendered them remarkable; and in my earliest infancy I gave evidence of having inherited the family character (he wrote years later in the semi-autobiographical William Wilson). As I advanced in years it was more strongly developed, becoming, for many reasons, a cause of serious disquietude to my friends, and of positive injury to myself. . . . My voice was a household law, and, at an age when few children have abandoned their leading strings, I was left the guardian of my own will, and became, in all but name, the master of my own actions. In June 1815 the Allans went to England, and took with them their adopted son, who was sent to the Manor House School at Stoke Newington, then a village some way distant from London. Here the lad spent perhaps the happiest years of his life, under the care of the Rev. John Bransby, the prototype of William Wilson in the story of that name, where the author inserted a description of the fine old schoolhouse. The Allans returned to their home in 1821, and Poe went to a Richmond academy for the next four years. It was in February 1826 that the lad, now seventeen years of age, signed the Matriculation Book of the University of Virginia, and entered the schools of ancient and modern languages. Here he distinguished himself not only as a student-he took the highest honours in Latin and French-but also as an athlete, excelling at the long jump and in swimming. Here, too, begins the record of attacks upon his character: charges of drunkenness and gambling. His passion for strong drink was as marked and as peculiar as that for cards,' his schoolfellow Thomas Tucker has put on record. 'It was not the taste of the beverage that influenced him; without a sip or smack of the mouth, he would seize a full glass, without water or sugar, and send it home at a single gulp. This frequently used him up; but if not, he rarely returned to the charge.' This is given for what it is worth, but there is no reason to suppose Tucker untruthful; and it must be confessed that his statement is in no wise disproved by the testimony of the University librarian, Wertenbaker, that Poe was never in the slightest degree under the influence of drink in the lecture-room, and never fell under the censure of the Faculty. No one, however, supposes for an instant that at this time the lad was a confirmed toper-no one, that is, except Griswold. Poe was, however, beyond all doubt a reckless card-player, and when on the 15th of December the session terminated he was in debt to the tune of five hundred pounds, gambling losses. Mr. Allan paid the numerous tradesmen's bills, refused point-blank to discharge the debts of honour,' and withdrew his adopted son from the University. Griswold states that Poe was expelled. Poe had been foolish, he had endeavoured to satisfy the cravings of his highly strung nature with the excitement of gambling: a judicious blending of firmness and kindness might have had farreaching effects on his character, and so have influenced his future. There is no question but that he was susceptible to kindness. It has been related that one day he accompanied a schoolfellow named Stannard to his home, and there met his friend's mother. The lady's graciousness, her gentle words and address, moved the heart of the orphan boy so deeply that he could not speak, and lost himself in a dream. Subsequently she allowed him to confide his youthful sorrows to her, and guided him in the early days of his turbulent and passionate youth. After her untimely death, he visited her grave every day for months, and eventually immortalised her memory in the exquisite verses, To Helen. Helen, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicéan barks of yore On desperate seas long wont to roam, Lo, in yon brilliant window-niche, Unfortunately, Mr. Allan, at this crisis in the life of his adopted son, was found wanting. The lad had appealed rather to his vanity than to his heart; and now that it seemed that his swan would after all turn out to be a goose, he lost interest in him. He did not abandon him, but he showed little or no sympathy. He put him in his office. This was equivalent to imprisonment to the sensitive youngster, who, unhappy at home, and excited by the efforts of Greece to throw off the Turkish yoke, fled from Richmond and went to Europe. Whether he ever reached Greece is unknown, and, indeed, there is nothing certain except that later in the year, under the name of Edgar A. Perry, he enlisted at Boston as a private soldier, and was drafted to Battery H of the First Artillery. A steady life and attention to his duties, backed by his education, secured him promotion, and on the 1st of January 1829 he was appointed sergeant-major. Perhaps encouraged thereto by the fact that he had proved his mettle, he now made known his whereabouts to Mr. Allan, who secured his discharge by substitute. Poe then returned to Mr. Allan's house, shortly after the death of Mrs. Allan, who had always befriended him; and in July, having secured a nomination, he entered West Point as a cadet. Older than most of his companions, he found the discipline, necessary for lads of tender years, extremely irksome; and, having in his brief military career seen something of the world, he found the life unbearably monotonous. He begged his guardian to permit him to resign; and when he declined, rendered desperate by the refusal, Poe deliberately committed certain minor offences against the regulations for which he was court-martialled and dismissed the service in March 1831. It has been suggested, and it is not improbable, that an additional reason why he desired to leave West Point is that, after Mr. Allan's second marriage, on the 5th of October 1830, to a girl very many years his junior, the young man realised that, since there might be issue of this union, he could no longer count upon being his guardian's heir, and it was incumbent upon him to seek some calling by the exercise of which he could secure a livelihood. The wisdom of his decision was proved when Mr. Allan died in March 1834 and left him not a penny. Poe published in 1827 a volume of verses, Tamerlane, and Other Poems, by a Bostonian, on the title-page of which he placed Cowper's lines : Young heads are giddy, and young hearts are warm, and two years later, under the title of Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane, and Minor Poems, he issued a revised and enlarged edition, which bore his name as author. Now, when he had to decide how to make his living, he thought—and, as we know, thought rightly—that in literature was to be found his career. When in 1831 he left West Point, VOL. LXV- No. 383 L where his local squibs had delighted his comrades, he issued, by subscription among the cadets, a third volume of verse; after which event he returned to Mr. Allan on sufferance,' fell in love with a Miss Royster, whose father opposed the suggestion of marriage, and quarrelled violently with his guardian. What was the subject of the rupture has not transpired, but the young man at least was convinced, even after a decade had elapsed, that he was in the right. By the God Who reigns in Heaven (he wrote to Mrs. Whitman, on some occasion when he had been maligned to her), by the God Who reigns in Heaven I swear to you that my soul is incapable of dishonour-that, with the exception of occasional follies and excesses, which I bitterly lament, but to which I have been driven by intolerable sorrow, and which are hourly committed by others without attracting any notice whatever-I can call to mind no act of my life which would bring a blush to my cheek-or to yours. If I have erred at all, in this regard, it has been on the side of what the world would call a quixotic sense of the honourable-of the chivalrous. The indulgence of this sense has been the true voluptuousness of my life. It was for this species of luxury that in early life I deliberately threw away from me a large fortune rather than endure a trivial wrong. Poe left Richmond with the intention to go to Poland, to bear arms in the service of that country against Russia; but before he set out came the news of the fall of Warsaw, and he did not go beyond Baltimore. What he did during the rest of this year and in 1832 no one knows-probably he earned a few pounds by his pen; but in 1833 he came again into sight when the Baltimore Saturday Visitor announced a competition for the best poem and the best prose story. Poe sent in a poem, The Coliseum, and several short stories, grouped together under the title of Tales of the Folio Club. The judges were John P. Kennedy, J. H. B. Latrobe, and James H. Miller, and they declared The Coliseum the best poem and The MS. Found in a Bottle the best prose story submitted to them. They were not content merely to announce their decision, but published a statement in which they referred to the singular force and beauty' of the Tales of the Folio Club. It would hardly be doing justice to the writer of the collection to say that the tale we have chosen is the best of the six offered by him (they wrote enthusiastically). We cannot refrain from saying that the author owes it to his own reputation, as well as the gratification of the community, to publish the entire volume. These tales are eminently distinguished by a wild, vigorous, and poetical imagination, a rich style, a fertile invention, and varied and curious learning. Kennedy, desirous to meet the unknown author, invited him to dinner. 'Your invitation to dinner has wounded me to the quick,' Poe replied. I cannot come for reasons of the most humiliating nature-my personal appearance. You may imagine my mortification in making this disclosure to you, but it is necessary.' Without delay Kennedy sought out Poe and found him nearly starving, |