PAGE 23. Tarantula: the bite of this spider was once supposed to cause a form of madness which made the victim dance. Compare the musical term "tarantelle." Huguenot French Protestant. Many fled to South Carolina from persecutions in France. Sullivan's Island: Poe has been criticised for his inaccuracies concerning this island. He should have known it well, as he was stationed at Fort Moultrie in 1828 when a private in the United States Artillery.

24. Swammerdamm: Jan Swammerdaming to the Century Dictionary — (1637–1680). Dutch naturalist.

one final m accordA distinguished

27. scarabæus caput hominis : (Latin) a man's head beetle. There is no such species known.

29. syphon: Negro dialect for ciphering, a colloquial word for "reckoning in figures." Poe hardly seems successful in representing the sounds of the speech of Negroes. Not much attention had been paid to the subject in literature at that time. To-day, since the work of Joel Chandler Harris in "Uncle Remus" and of Thomas Nelson Page in "In Ole Virginia," we rather look down on these early crude attempts. noovers Negro dialect for ma

nœuvres in the sense of movements.

32. empressement: (French) eagerness.

44. curvets and caracoles: the prancing and turning of a horse. 45. violent howlings of the dog it is popularly supposed that a dog, through its extraordinary sense of smell, can indicate the presence of parts of a human body, though buried.

48. counter: obsolete term for pieces of money.

49. solution of this most extraordinary riddle: this story exemplifies Poe's power in such work. He specialized on it in magazines. 52. long boat: "The largest and strongest boat belonging to a sailing ship."– · Century Dictionary.

54. aqua regia: (Latin) royal water. A chemical compound so called from its power of dissolving gold. regulus of cobalt: early

chemical term referring to the metallic mass of an ore.

55. Captain Kidd: William Kidd, about whose early life nothing is positively known, was commissioned by the Governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1695 to put down piracy. under him, however, he himself turned pirate.

With a good ship

On his return he

was arrested, sent to England, tried, and executed in London in 1701. Some of his buried treasure was recovered by the colonial authorities in 1699.

58. Golconda: a place near Hyderabad, India, noted for its diamonds. cryptographs: from two Greek words meaning hidden and write. The commoner term is "cryptogram."

59. Spanish main: the ocean near the coast of South America and the adjacent parts of the Caribbean Sea over which the Spaniards exercised power.

67. insignium: (Latin) a sign.

NOTES TO "THE PURLOINED LETTER"

This detective story was published in “The Gift" for 1845.

Most writers au troisième :

PAGE 69. Nil sapientiæ, etc.: (Latin) Nothing is more hateful to wisdom than too great acuteness. C. Auguste Dupin: clever amateur who solves the mysteries which baffle the police. of detective stories follow this example set by Poe. (French) on the third floor. Faubourg: (French) section of a city. Saint Germain: a section of Paris on the south bank of the Seine, once the abode of the French nobility. affair of the Rue Morgue: a reference to the detective story, "The Murders in the Rue Morgue." the murder of Marie Rogêt: a reference to another detective story, "The Mystery of Marie Rogêt." The writer is playing the same part as does Dr. Watson in the various Sherlock Holmes stories by Conan Doyle. Prefect (French) chief.

71. cant of diplomacy: set phrases used in intercourse between representatives of governments by which they hint at their meaning. 73. hôtel: (French) residence. au fait (French) expert.

76. microscope: since Poe's time the microscope is, in stories, almost an invariable part of a detective's outfit.

79. Abernethy: John Abernethy (1764-1831). A celebrated London physician.

80. escritoire: “A piece of furniture with conveniences for writing, as an opening top or falling front panel, places for inkstand, pens, and stationery, etc." -- Century Dictionary. Procrustean bed: In Greek mythology, Procrustes (derivatively "the stretcher") was

a giant who tied those whom he caught on a bed, making them fit by stretching them out if too short, and by cutting off their limbs if too long.

82. Rochefoucauld: François La Rochefoucauld (1613-1680). A French moralist known for his "Maxims " published in 1665. La Bougive In the edition of Poe's works prepared by Edmund Clarence Stedman and Professor George Edward Woodberry, this name is given as La Bruyère. Jean de La Bruyère (1645–1696) was a French moralist. Machiavelli: Nicolo Machiavelli (1469-1527). A celebrated statesman and writer of Florence, Italy, whose book "The Prince" is based on unscrupulous principles. Campanella:

Tomaso Campanella (1568-1639). An Italian writer.

83. recherché: (French) far-fetched. policial a rare word, meaning "pertaining to the police."

84. non distributio medii: (Latin) a non-distribution of the middle, or the undistributed middle. This is a mistake in reasoning. When the Prefect reasons that all fools are poets, therefore all poets are fools, he has no middle term at all; that is, no class of which poets and fools are both members. Correct reasoning is represented by this all men are mortal; John is a man; therefore John is mortal. Between mortal and John, two terms, there is a middle term, men, of which both are members. Differential Calculus: a higher form of mathematics.

etc.: (French).

par excellence: (French) above all. Il y a,

The odds are that every public idea, every accepted convention, is a foolish trick, for it is suitable for the greatest number. Chamfort: Sebastian Roch Nicolas Chamfort (1741-1794). A French writer of maxims. ambitus: (Latin) a going around. Poe means by this example and by those that follow that mere similarity of two words does not make them of the same meaning.

85. Bryant: Jacob Bryant (1715-1804). An English writer on mythology.

86. intrigant: (French) intriger.

87. vis inertiæ: (Latin) the force of inertia, the same as inertia, a term of physics which denotes the tendency of a body to remain

at rest or in motion.

88. ministerial hôtel: house of the minister or cabinet officer. 92. facilis descensus Averni: a misquotation from Vergil's "Aeneid," Book VI, line 126. It should be "facilis descensus

Catalani

:

Angelica

monstrum horrendum :

Averno," easy is the descent to Avernus. Catalani (1779-1849). An Italian singer. (Latin) a horrible monster, the epithet applied to the one-eyed giant, Polyphemus, in Vergil's "Aeneid," Book III, line 658. Un dessein, etc. (French). A design so fatal, if it is not worthy of Atrée, it is worthy of Thyeste. Crébillon's "Atrée ": Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon (1674-1762). A French tragic poet. His play, "Atrée et Thyeste," bears the date 1707.

NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE

Nathaniel Hawthorne, or Hathorne, as it was spelled before he changed it, was born in Salem, Massachusetts, July 4, 1804. His family, settled in New England since 1630, had played its part in the activities of the land in various capacities, including the persecution of so-called witches. His father, a sea-captain, died on a voyage when the lad was four years old. The excessive mourning then in vogue made the widow practically seclude herself in her room, throwing a consequent gloom over the household and affecting the boy's spirits. From this depressing atmosphere he found relief in an early developed taste for reading. In 1818 the family moved to a lonely part of Maine, where in roaming the lonely woods he gained a liking for solitude as well as for nature. He returned to Salem in 1819 to prepare for Bowdoin College, which he entered in 1821. After an undistinguished course he went back to his native town, whither his mother had also returned.

In Salem he remained for twelve years, a recluse in a family of recluses, devoting himself to reading and writing. In 1828 his first book, "Fanshawe," was published at his own expense. Its failure caused him to destroy all the copies he could find. Some of the stories which he wrote during this period were published in the annuals, then fashionable, and in The New England Magazine, but without making much impression.

This hermit-like existence was healthily broken in 1836 by his becoming the editor of an obscure magazine, though it was hack work and lasted but a short time. The anonymity to which he had stubbornly clung was also dispelled by one friend, and the publication of his "Twice-Told Tales" was arranged for by another, his classmate, Horatio Bridge. These two facts made him known and mark the beginning of the disappearance of his solitary depression, which was ended by his engagement to Sophia Peabody.

In January, 1839, he became a weigher and gauger in the Boston Custom House, a position which he lost in April, 1841, owing to a change in the political administration. Then for a few months he was a member of the Brook Farm Community, a group of reformers who