them, I do not think it will be necessary to say 'From the would be too bad;—and, perhaps, 'From a late

4

-that paper,' would do. "I have not forgotten how a good word in season' from you made The Raven,' and made 'Ulalume,' (which, by-the-way, people have done me the honor of attributing to you)-therefore I would ask you, (if I dared,) to say something of these lines-if they please you. "Truly yours ever,

"EDGAR A. POE."

In double proof-of his earnest disposition to do the best for himself, and of the trustful and grateful nature which has been denied him—we give another of the only three of his notes which we chance to retain :

"FORDHAM, January 22, 1848.

My dear Mr. Willis:-I am about to make an effort at re-establishing myself in the literary world, and feel that I may depend upon your aid. My general aim is to start a Magazine, to be called The Stylus;' but it would be useless to me, even when established, if not entirely out of the control of a publisher. I mean, therefore, to get up a Journal which shall be my own, at all points. With this end in view, I must get a list of, at least, five hundred subscribers to begin with:-nearly two hundred I have already. I propose, however, to go South and West, among my personal and literary friends-old college and West Point acquaintances and see what I can do. In order to get the means of taking the first step, I propose to lecture at the Society Library, on Thursday, the 3d of February-and, that there may be no cause of squabbling, my subject shall not be literary

at all, I have chosen a broad text-The Universe.'

Having thus given you the facts of the case, I leave all the rest to the suggestions of your own tact and generosity. Gratefully-most gratefully— "Your friend always,

"EDGAR A. POE."

Brief and chance-taken, as these letters are, we think they sufficiently prove the existence of the very qualities denied to Mr. Poe--humility, wil lingness to persevere, belief in another's kindness, and capability of cordial and grateful friendship! Such he assuredly was when sane. Such only he has invariably seemed to us, in all we have happened personally to know of him, through a friendship of five or six years. And so much easier is it to believe what we have seen and known, than what we hear of only, that we remember him but with admiration and respect-these descriptions of him, when morally insane, seeming to us like portraits, painted in sickness, of a man we have only known in health.

But there is another, more touching, and far more forcible evidence that there was goodness in Edgar A. Poe. To reveal it, we are obliged to venture upon the lifting of the veil which sacredly covers grief and refinement in poverty--but we think it may be excused, if so we can brighten the memory of the poet, even were there not a more needed and immediate service which it may render to the nearest link broken by his death.

Our first knowledge of Mr. Poe's removal to this city was by a call which

we received from a lady who introduced herself to us as the mother of his wife. She was in search of employment for him, and she excused her errand by mentioning that he was ill, that her daughter was a confirmed invalid, and that their circumstances were such as compelled her taking it upon herself. The countenance of this lady, made beautiful and saintly with an evidently complete giving up of her life to privation and sorrowful tenderness, her gentle and mournful voice urging its plea, her long-forgotten but habitually and unconsciously refined manners, and her appealing and yet appreciative mention of the claims and abilities of her son, disclosed at once the presence of one of those angels upon earth that women in adverBity can be. It was a hard fate that she was watching over. Mr. Poe wrote with fastidious difficulty, and in a style too much above the popular level to be well paid. He was always in pecuniary difficulty, and, with his sick wife, frequently in want of the merest necessaries of life. Winter after winter, for years, the most touching sight to us, in this whole city, has been that tireless minister to genius, thinly and insufficiently clad, going from office to office with a poem, or an article on some literary subject, to sellsometimes simply pleading in a broken voice that he was ill, and begging for him-mentioning nothing but that "he was ill," whatever might be the reason for his writing nothing--and never, amid all her tears and recitals of distress, suffering one syllable to escape her lips that could convey a doubt of him, or a complaint, or a lessening of pride in his genius and good intentions. Her daughter died, a year and a half since, but she did not desert him. She continued his ministering angel--living with him--caring for him-guarding him against exposure, and, when he was carried away by temptation, amid grief and the loneliness of feelings unreplied to, and awoke from his self-abandonment prostrated in destitution and suffering, begging for him still. If woman's devotion, born with a first love, and fed with human passion, hallow its object, as it is allowed to do, what does not a devotion like this-pure, disinterested and holy as the watch of an invisible spirit-say for him who inspired it?

We have a letter before us, written by this lady, Mrs. Clemm, on the morning in which she heard of the death of this object of her untiring care. It is merely a request that we would call upon her, but we will copy a few of its words-sacred as its privacy is-to warrant the truth of the picture we have drawn above, and add force to the appeal we wish to make for her:

Ask Mr.

to come, as I must I need not ask you to

"I have this morning heard of the death of my darling Eddie....... Can you give me any circumstances or particulars... . Oh! do not desert your poor friend in this bitter affliction...... deliver a message to him from my poor Eddie.. notice his death and to speak well of him. I know you will. But say what an affectionate son he was to me, his poor desolate mother."......

To hedge round a grave with respect, what choice is there, between the

relinquished wealth and honors of the world, and the story of such a woman's unrewarded devotion! Risking what we do, in delicacy, by making it public, we feel--other reasons aside-that it betters the world to make known that there are such ministrations to its erring and gifted. What we have said will speak to some hearts. There are those who will be glad to know how the lamp, whose light of poetry has beamed on their far-away recognition, was watched over with care and pain-that they may send to her, who is more darkened than they by its extinction, some token of their sympathy. She is destitute, and alone. If any, far or near, will send to us what may aid and cheer her through the remainder of her life, we will joyfully place it in her hands.

MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR.

PREFACE.

HITHERTO I have not written or published a syllable upon the subject of Mr. PoE's life, character, or genius, since I was informed, some ten days after his death, of my appointment to be his literary executor. I did not suppose I was debarred from the expression of any feelings or opinions in the case by the acceptance of this office, the duties of which I regarded as simply the collection of his works, and their publication, for the benefit of the rightful inheritors of his property, in a form and manner that would probably have been most agreeable to bis own wishes. I would gladly have declined a trust imposing so much labor, for I had been compelled by ill health to solicit the indulgence of my publishers, who had many thousand dollars invested in an unfinished work under my direction; but when I was told by several of Mr. Pok's most intimate friends-among others by the family of S. D. LEWIS, Esq., to whom in his last years he was under greater obligations than to any or to all others that he had long been in the habit of expressing a desire that in the event of his death I should be his editor, I yielded to the apparent necessity, and proceeded immediately with the preparation of the two volumes which have heretofore been published. But I had, at the request of the Editor of "The Tribune," written hastily a few paragraphs about Mr. PoE, which appeared in that paper with the telegraphic communication of his death; and two or three of these paragraphs having been quoted by Mr. N. P. WILLIS, in his Notice of Mr. Pos, were as a part of that Notice unavoidably reprinted in the volume of the deceased author's Tales. And my unconsidered and imperfect, but, as every one who knew its subject readily perceived, very kind article, was now vehemently attacked. A writer under the signature of "GEORGE R. GRAHAM," in a sophomorical and trashy but widely circulated Letter, denounced it as "the fancy sketch of a jaundiced vision," "an immortal infamy," and its composition a "breach of trust." And to excuse his five months' silence, and to induce a belief that he did not KNOW that what I had written was already published before I COULD have been advised that I was to be Mr. Por's executor, (a condition upon which all the possible force of his Letter depends,) this silly and ambitious person, while represented as entertaining a friendship really passionate in its tenderness for the poor author, (of whom in four years of his extremest poverty he had not purchased for his magazine a single line,) is made to asy that in half a year he had not seen so noticeable an article,-though within a week after Mr. Poe's death it appeared in "The Tribune," in "The Home Journal," in three of the daily papers of his own city, and in "The Saturday Evening Post," of which he was or had been himself one of the chief proprietors and editors! And Mr. JOHN NEAL, too, who had never had even the slightest personal acquaintance with Por in his life, rushes from a sleep which the public had trusted was eternal, to declare that my characterization of Pox (which he is pleased to describe as "poetry, exalted poetry, poetry of astonishing and original strength") is false and malicious, and that I am a "calumniator," a "Rhadamanthus," etc. Both these writers-JOIN NEAL following the author of the Letter signed "GEORGE R. GRAHAM"-Dot only assume what I have shown to be false, (that the remarks on Por's character were written by me as his executor,) but that there was a long, intense, and impla cable enmity betwixt Pos and myself, which disqualified me for the office of his biographer. This scarcely needs an answer after the poet's dying request that I should be his editor; but the manner in which it has been urged, will, I trust, be a sufficient excuse for the following demonstration of its absurdity.

My acquaintance with Mr. PoE commenced in the spring of 1841. He called at my hotel, and not finding me at home, left two letters of introduction. The next morning I visited him, and we had a long conversation about literature and literary men, pertinent to the subject of a book, "The Poets and Poetry of America," which I was then preparing for the press. The following letter was sent to me a few days afterwards:

PHILADELPHIA, March 29.

The

R. W. Griswold, Esq.: My Dear Sir:-On the other leef I send such poems as I think my best, from which you can select any which please your fancy. I should be proud to see one or two of them in your book. one called "The Haunted Palace" is that of which I spoke in reference to Professor Longfellow's plagiarism. I first published the "H. P." in Brooks's "Museum," a monthly journal at Baltimore, now dead. Afterwards, I embodied it in a tale called "The House of Usher," in Burton's magazine. Here it was, I suppose, that Professor Longfellow saw it; for, about six weeks afterwards, there appeared in the "Southern Literary Messenger" a poem by him called "The Beleaguered City," which may now be found in his volume. The identity in title is striking for by "The Haunted Palace "I mean to imply a mind haunted by phantoms-a disordered brain-and b the "Beleaguered City" Prof. L. means just the same. But the whole tournure of the poem is based upon mine as you will see at once. Its allegorical conduct, the style of its versification and expression-all are mine. A I understood you to say that you meant to preface each set of poems by some biographical notice, I have ventured to send you the above memoranda-the particulars of which (in a case where an author is so little known as myself) might not be easily obtained elsewhere. "The Coliseum" was the prize poem alluded to.

The next is without date:

With high respect and esteem, I am your obedient servant,

EDGAR A. POE.

My Dear Sir-I made use of your name with Carey & Hart, for a copy of your book, and am writing a review of it, which I shall send to Lowell for "The Pioneer." I like it decidedly. It is of immense importance, as a guide to what we have done; but you have permitted your good nature to influence you to a degree: I would have omitted at least a dozen whom you have quoted, and I can think of five or six that should have been in. But with all its faults-you see I am perfectly frank with you-it is a better book than any other man in the United States could have made of the materials. This I will say. With high respect, I am your obedient servant, EDGAR A. Poz. The next refers to some pecuniary matters: Dear Griewold-Can you not send me $5! I am sick, and Virginia is almost gone. Come and see me. Peterson says you suspect me of a curious anonymous letter. I did not write it, but bring it along with you when yon make the visit you promised to Mrs. Clemm. I will try to fix that matter soon. Could you do anything with my note? Yours truly, E. A. P.

PHILADELPHIA, June 11, 1843.

We had no further correspondence for more than a year. In this period he delivered a lecture upon "The Poets and Poetry of America," in which my book under that title was, I believe, very sharply reviewed.

L

the meantime advertisement was made of my intention to publish "The Prose Writers of America," and I received, one day, just as I was leaving Philadelphia for New-York, the following letter:

NEW-YORK, Jan. 10, 1845.

Rev. Rufus W. Griswold: Sir-I perceive by a paragraph in the papers, that your "Prose Writers of Ameri ca" is in press. Unless your opinions of my literary character are entirely changed, you will, I think, liks Bomething of mine, and you are welcome to whatever best pleases you, if you will permit me to furnish a corrected copy; but with your present feelings you can hardly do me justice in any criticism, and I shall be glad if you will simply say after my name: "Born 1811; published Tales of the Grotesque and the Arabesque in 1839; has resided latterly in New-York." Your obedient servant, EDGAR A. POE.

I find my answer to this among his papers: PHILADELPHIA, Jan. 11, 1845. Sir-Although I have some cause of quarrel with you, as you seem to remember, I do not under any circum stances permit, as you have repeatedly charged, my personal relations to influence the expression of my opin. ions as a critic. By the inclosed proof-sheets of what I had written before the reception of your note, you will see that I think quite as well of your works as I did when I had the pleasure of being Your friend. R. W. GRISWOLD. This was not mailed until the next morning; I however left Philadelphia the same evening, and in the cours of the following day Poe and myself met in the office of "The Tribune," but without any recognition. Sooa after he received my note, he sent the following to my hotel: NEW-YORK, Jan. 16, 1845. Dear Griswold-If you will permit me to call you so your letter occasioned me first pain and then pleasure: pain, because it gave me to see that I had lost, through my own folly, an honorable friend :-pleasure, because I saw in it a hope of reconciliation. I have been aware, for several weeks, that my reasons for speaking of your book as I did, (of yourself I have always spoken kindly,) were based in the malignant slanders of a mischiefmaker by profession. Still, as I supposed you irreparably offended, I could make no advances when we met the Tribune" office, although I longed to do so. I know of nothing which would give me more sincere pleasur than your accepting these apologies, and meeting me as a friend. If you can do this, and forget the past, let m know where I shall call on you-or come and see me at the "Mirror" office, any morning about ten. We ca then talk over the other matters, which, to me at least, are far less important than your good will. Very truly yours, EDGAR A. Por

His next letter is dated February 24, 1845:

My dear Griswold-A thousand thanks for your kindness in the matter of those books, which I could not af ford to buy, and had so much need of. Soon after seeing you, I sent you, through Zieber, all my poems worth republishing, and I presume they reached you. I was sincerely delighted with what you said of them, and it you will write your criticism in the form of a preface, I shall be greatly obliged to you. I say this not became you praised me: everybody praises me now: but because you so perfectly understand me, or what I have sitnoë at, in all my poems: I did not think you had so much delicacy of appreciation joined with your strong sense; I can say truly that no man's approbation gives me so much pleasure. I send you with this another package, also through Zieber, by Burgess & Stringer. It contains, in the way of essay, "Meameric Revelation," which I would like to have go in, even if you have to omit the "House of Usher." I send also corrected copies of (in the way of funny criticism, but you don't like this) "Flaccus," which conveys a tolerable idea of iny style; and of my serious manner "Barnaby Rudge " is a good specimen. In the tale line, "The Murders of the Rue Morgue, "The Gold Bug," and the "Man that was Used Up,"-far more than enough, but you can select to suit yourself, I prefer the "G. B." to the "M. in the R. M." I have taken a third interest in the "Broadway Journal," and will be glad if you could send me anything for it. Why not let me anticipate the book publication of your splendid essay on Milton! Truly yours,

The next is without date:

Dear Griswold:-1 return the proofs with many thanks for your attentions. The poems look quite as well in the short metres as in the long ones, and I am quite content as it is. In "The Sleeper" you have Forever with unclosed eye" for "Forever with unopen'd eye." Is it possible to make the correction! I presume you under stand that in the repetition of my Lecture on the Poets, (in N. Y.) I left out all that was offensive to yourself. I am ashamed of myself that I ever said anything of you that was so unfriendly or so unjust; but what I did say I am confident has been misrepresented to you. See my notice of C. F. Hoffman's (?) sketch of you. Very sincerely yours,

Por.

On the twenty-sixth of October, 1845, he wrote: My dear Griswold;--Will you aid me at a pinch--at one of the greatest pinches conceivable! If you will, I will be indebted to you for life. After a prodigious deal of manoravering, I have succeeded in getting the "Broadway Journal" entirely within my own control. It will be a fortune to me if I can hold it-and I can do it easily with a very trifling aid from my friends. May I count you as one! Lead me $50, and you shall never have cause to regret it. Truly yours, EDGAR A. Poz.

And on the first of November:

My dear Grineeld:-Thank you for the $25. And since you will allow me to draw upon you for the other half of what I asked, if it shall be needed at the end of a month, I am just as grateful as if it were all in hand -for my friends here have seted generously by me. Don't have any more doubts of my success. I am, by the way, preparing an article about you for the B. J., in which I do you justice--which is all you can ask of soy one Ever truly yours, EDGAR A. POE

The next is without date, but appears to have been written early in 1849:

Dear Gringold-Your uniform kindness leads me to hope that you will attend to this little matter of Mr L, to whom I truly think you have done less than justice. I am ashamed to ask favors of you, to whom I am eo much indebted, but I have promised Mrs. L-this. They lied to you, (if you told — what he may you told him,) upon the subject of my forgotten Lecture on the American Poeta, and I take this opportunity te say that what I have always held in conversations about you, and what I believe to be entirely true, as far as it goes, is contained in my notice of your "Female Poets of America," in the forthcoming "Southern Literary Messenger." By glancing at what I have published about you, (Aut. in Graham, 1841; Review in Pioneer, 1843; notice in B. Journal, 1545; Letter in Int., 1947; and the Review of your Female Poets,) you will see that I have never hazarded my own reputation by a disrespectful word of you, though there were, as I long ago explained, in consequence of sales imputation of that beastly article to you, some absurd jokes at your ex. pense in the Lecture at Philadelphia, me up and see me: the cars pass within a few rods of the New-York Hotel, where I have called two or three times without finding you in. Yours truly, Pox. I soon after visited him at Fordham, and passed two or three hours with him. The only letter he afterward sent me at least the only one now in my possession-follows:

Dear Griswold-I inclose perfect copies of the lines "For Annie" and "Annabel Lee," in hopes that you may make room for them in your new edition. As regards "Lenore," (which you were kind enough to say you would insert,) I would prefer the concluding stanza to run sa here written.... It is a point of no great impor tance, but in one of your editions you have given my sister's age instead of mine. I was born in Dec. 1813; my sister, Jan. 1811. [The date of his birth to which he refers was printed from his statement in the memoranda referred to in the first of the letters here printed.-R. W. G.] Willis, whose good opinion I value highly, and of whose good word I have a right to be proud, has done me the honor to speak very pointedly in praise of "The