MEMOIR OF EDGAR ALLAN POE.
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uring the last few years every incident in the life of Edgar Poe hasbeen subjected to microscopic investigation. The result has not beenaltogether satisfactory. On the one hand, envy and prejudice havemagnified every blemish of his character into crime, whilst on theother, blind admiration would depict him as far "too good for humannature's daily food." Let us endeavor to judge him impartially, grantingthat he was as a mortal subject to the ordinary weaknesses of mortality,but that he was tempted sorely, treated badly, and suffered deeply. The poet's ancestry and parentage are chiefly interesting as explainingsome of the complexities of his character. His father, David Poe, was ofAnglo-Irish extraction. Educated for the Bar, he elected to abandon itfor the stage. In one of his tours through the chief towns of the UnitedStates he met and married a young actress, Elizabeth Arnold, member ofan English family distinguished for its musical talents. As an actress,Elizabeth Poe acquired some reputation, but became even better known forher domestic virtues. In those days the United States afforded littlescope for dramatic energy, so it is not surprising to find that when herhusband died, after a few years of married life, the young widow had avain struggle to maintain herself and three little ones, William Henry,Edgar, and Rosalie. Before her premature death, in December, 1811, thepoet's mother had been reduced to the dire necessity of living on thecharity of her neighbors. Edgar, the second child of David and Elizabeth Poe, was born at Boston,in the United States, on the 19th of January, 1809. Upon his mother'sdeath at Richmond, Virginia, Edgar was adopted by a wealthy Scotchmerchant, John Allan. Mr. Allan, who had married an American lady andsettled in Virginia, was childless. He therefore took naturally to thebrilliant and beautiful little boy, treated him as his son, and made himtake his own surname. Edgar Allan, as he was now styled, after someelementary tuition in Richmond, was taken to England by his adoptedparents, and, in 1816, placed at the Manor House School,Stoke-Newington. Under the Rev. Dr. Bransby, the future poet spent a lustrum of his lifeneither unprofitably nor, apparently, ungenially. Dr. Bransby, who ishimself so quaintly portrayed in Poe's tale of 'William Wilson',described "Edgar Allan," by which name only he knew the lad, as "a quickand clever boy," who "would have been a very good boy had he not beenspoilt by his parents," meaning, of course, the Allans. They "allowedhim an extravagant amount of pocket-money, which enabled him to get intoall manner of mischief. Still I liked the boy," added the tutor, "but,poor fellow, his parents spoiled him." Poe has described some aspects of his school days in his oft cited storyof 'William Wilson'. Probably there is the usual amount of poeticexaggeration in these reminiscences, but they are almost the only recordwe have of that portion of his career and, therefore, apart from theirliterary merits, are on that account deeply interesting. The descriptionof the sleepy old London suburb, as it was in those days, is remarkablyaccurate, but the revisions which the story of 'William Wilson' wentthrough before it reached its present perfect state caused many of theauthor's details to deviate widely from their original correctness. Hisschoolhouse in the earliest draft was truthfully described as an "old,irregular, and cottage-built" dwelling, and so it remained until itsdestruction a few years ago. The 'soi-disant' William Wilson, referring to those bygone happy daysspent in the English academy, says, "The teeming brain of childhood requires no external world of incidentto occupy or amuse it. The morning's awakening, the nightly summons tobed; the connings, the recitations, the periodical half-holidays andperambulations, the playground, with its broils, its pastimes, itsintrigues--these, by a mental sorcery long forgotten, were made toinvolve a wilderness of sensation, a world of rich incident, auniverse of varied emotion, of excitement the most passionate andspirit-stirring, _'Oh, le bon temps, que ce siècle de fer!'"_ From this world of boyish imagination Poe was called to his adoptedparents' home in the United States. He returned to America in 1821, andwas speedily placed in an academy in Richmond, Virginia, in which citythe Allans continued to reside. Already well grounded in the elementaryprocesses of education, not without reputation on account of hisEuropean residence, handsome, proud, and regarded as the heir of awealthy man, Poe must have been looked up to with no little respect byhis fellow pupils. He speedily made himself a prominent position in theschool, not only by his classical attainments, but by his athleticfeats--accomplishments calculated to render him a leader among lads. "In the simple school athletics of those days, when a gymnasium hadnot been heard of, he was 'facile princeps'," is the reminiscence of his fellow pupil, Colonel T. L. Preston. Poe heremembers as "a swift runner, a wonderful leaper, and, what was more rare, a boxer,with some slight training.... He would allow the strongest boy in theschool to strike him with full force in the chest. He taught me thesecret, and I imitated him, after my measure. It was to inflate thelungs to the uttermost, and at the moment of receiving the blow toexhale the air. It looked surprising, and was, indeed, a little rough;but with a good breast-bone, and some resolution, it was not difficultto stand it. For swimming he was noted, being in many of his athleticproclivities surprisingly like Byron in his youth." In one of his feats Poe only came off second best. "A challenge to a foot race," says Colonel Preston, "had been passedbetween the two classical schools of the city; we selected Poe as ourchampion. The race came off one bright May morning at sunrise, in theCapitol Square. Historical truth compels me to add that on thisoccasion our school was beaten, and we had to pay up our small bets.Poe ran well, but his competitor was a long-legged, Indian-lookingfellow, who would have outstripped Atalanta without the help of thegolden apples." "In our Latin exercises in school," continues the colonel, "Poe wasamong the first--not first without dispute. We had competitors whofairly disputed the palm, especially one, Nat Howard, afterwards knownas one of the ripest scholars in Virginia, and distinguished also as aprofound lawyer. If Howard was less brilliant than Poe, he was farmore studious; for even then the germs of waywardness were developingin the nascent poet, and even then no inconsiderable portion of histime was given to versifying. But if I put Howard as a Latinist on alevel with Poe, I do him full justice." "Poe," says the colonel, "was very fond of the Odes of Horace, andrepeated them so often in my hearing that I learned by sound the wordsof many before I understood their meaning. In the lilting rhythm ofthe Sapphics and Iambics, his ear, as yet untutored in morecomplicated harmonies, took special delight. Two odes, in particular,have been humming in my ear all my life since, set to the tune of hisrecitation: _'Jam satis terris nivis atque dirceGrandinis misit Pater, et rubente,'_
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