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1838
LIGEIA
by Edgar Allan Poe
LIGEIA
LIGEIA
And the will therein lieth, which dieth not. Who knoweth the
mysteries of the will, with its vigor? For God is but a great will
pervading all things by nature of its intentness. Man doth not yield
himself to the angels, nor unto death utterly, save only through the
weakness of his feeble will.
Joseph Glanvill.
I CANNOT, for my soul, remember how, when, or even precisely
where, I first became acquainted with the lady Ligeia. Long years have
since elapsed, and my memory is feeble through much suffering. Or,
perhaps, I cannot now bring these points to mind, because, in truth,
the character of my beloved, her rare learning, her singular yet
placid cast of beauty, and the thrilling and enthralling eloquence
of her low musical language, made their way into my heart by paces
so steadily and stealthily progressive that they have been unnoticed
and unknown. Yet I believe that I met her first and most frequently in
some large, old, decaying city near the Rhine. Of her family --I
have surely heard her speak. That it is of a remotely ancient date
cannot be doubted. Ligeia! Ligeia! in studies of a nature more than
all else adapted to deaden impressions of the outward world, it is
by that sweet word alone --by Ligeia --that I bring before mine eyes
in fancy the image of her who is no more. And now, while I write, a
recollection flashes upon me that I have never known the paternal name
of her who was my friend and my betrothed, and who became the
partner of my studies, and finally the wife of my bosom. Was it a
playful charge on the part of my Ligeia? or was it a test of my
strength of affection, that I should institute no inquiries upon
this point? or was it rather a caprice of my own --a wildly romantic
offering on the shrine of the most passionate devotion? I but
indistinctly recall the fact itself --what wonder that I have
utterly forgotten the circumstances which originated or attended it?
And, indeed, if ever she, the wan and the misty-winged Ashtophet of
idolatrous Egypt, presided, as they tell, over marriages ill-omened,
then most surely she presided over mine.
There is one dear topic, however, on which my memory falls me not.
It is the person of Ligeia. In stature she was tall, somewhat slender,
and, in her latter days, even emaciated. I would in vain attempt to
portray the majesty, the quiet ease, of her demeanor, or the
incomprehensible lightness and elasticity of her footfall. She came
and departed as a shadow. I was never made aware of her entrance
into my closed study save by the dear music of her low sweet voice, as
she placed her marble hand upon my shoulder. In beauty of face no
maiden ever equalled her. It was the radiance of an opium-dream --an
airy and spirit-lifting vision more wildly divine than the
phantasies which hovered vision about the slumbering souls of the
daughters of Delos. Yet her features were not of that regular mould
which we have been falsely taught to worship in the classical labors
of the heathen. "There is no exquisite beauty," says Bacon, Lord
Verulam, speaking truly of all the forms and genera of beauty, without
some strangeness in the proportion." Yet, although I saw that the
features of Ligeia were not of a classic regularity --although I
perceived that her loveliness was indeed "exquisite," and felt that
there was much of "strangeness" pervading it, yet I have tried in vain
to detect the irregularity and to trace home my own perception of "the
strange." I examined the contour of the lofty and pale forehead --it
was faultless --how cold indeed that word when applied to a majesty so
divine! --the skin rivalling the purest ivory, the commanding extent
and repose, the gentle prominence of the regions above the temples;
and then the raven-black, the glossy, the luxuriant and
naturally-curling tresses, setting forth the full force of the Homeric
epithet, "hyacinthine!" I looked at the delicate outlines of the
nose --and nowhere but in the graceful medallions of the Hebrews had I
beheld a similar perfection. There were the same luxurious
smoothness of surface, the same scarcely perceptible tendency to the
aquiline, the same harmoniously curved nostrils speaking the free
spirit. I regarded the sweet mouth. Here was indeed the triumph of all
things heavenly --the magnificent turn of the short upper lip --the
soft, voluptuous slumber of the under --the dimples which sported, and
the color which spoke --the teeth glancing back, with a brilliancy
almost startling, every ray of the holy light which fell upon them
in her serene and placid, yet most exultingly radiant of all smiles. I
scrutinized the formation of the chin --and here, too, I found the
gentleness of breadth, the softness and the majesty, the fullness
and the spirituality, of the Greek --the contour which the god
Apollo revealed but in a dream, to Cleomenes, the son of the Athenian.
And then I peered into the large eves of Ligeia.
For eyes we have no models in the remotely antique. It might have
been, too, that in these eves of my beloved lay the secret to which
Lord Verulam alludes. They were, I must believe, far larger than the
ordinary eyes of our own race. They were even fuller than the
fullest of the gazelle eyes of the tribe of the valley of Nourjahad.
Yet it was only at intervals --in moments of intense excitement --that
this peculiarity became more than slightly noticeable in Ligeia. And
at such moments was her beauty --in my heated fancy thus it appeared
perhaps --the beauty of beings either above or apart from the earth
--the beauty of the fabulous Houri of the Turk. The hue of the orbs
was the most brilliant of black, and, far over them, hung jetty lashes
of great length. The brows, slightly irregular in outline, had the
same tint. The "strangeness," however, which I found in the eyes,
was of a nature distinct from the formation, or the color, or the
brilliancy of the features, and must, after all, be referred to the
expression. Ah, word of no meaning! behind whose vast latitude of mere
sound we intrench our ignorance of so much of the spiritual. The
expression of the eyes of Ligeia! How for long hours have I pondered
upon it! How have I, through the whole of a midsummer night, struggled
to fathom it! What was it --that something more profound than the well
of Democritus --which lay far within the pupils of my beloved? What
was it? I was possessed with a passion to discover. Those eyes!
those large, those shining, those divine orbs! they became to me
twin stars of Leda, and I to them devoutest of astrologers.
There is no point, among the many incomprehensible anomalies of
the science of mind, more thrillingly exciting than the fact
--never, I believe, noticed in the schools --that, in our endeavors to
recall to memory something long forgotten, we often find ourselves
upon the very verge of remembrance, without being able, in the end, to
remember. And thus how frequently, in my intense scrutiny of
Ligeia's eyes, have I felt approaching the full knowledge of their
expression --felt it approaching --yet not quite be mine --and so at
length entirely depart! And (strange, oh strangest mystery of all!)
I found, in the commonest objects of the universe, a circle of
analogies to theat expression. I mean to say that, subsequently to the
period when Ligeia's beauty passed into my spirit, there dwelling as
in a shrine, I derived, from many existences in the material world,
a sentiment such as I felt always aroused within me by her large and
luminous orbs. Yet not the more could I define that sentiment, or
analyze, or even steadily view it. I recognized it, let me repeat,
sometimes in the survey of a rapidly-growing vine --in the
contemplation of a moth, a butterfly, a chrysalis, a stream of running
water. I have felt it in the ocean; in the falling of a meteor. I have
felt it in the glances of unusually aged people. And there are one
or two stars in heaven --(one especially, a star of the sixth
magnitude, double and changeable, to be found near the large star in
Lyra) in a telescopic scrutiny of which I have been made aware of
the feeling. I have been filled with it by certain sounds from
stringed instruments, and not unfrequently by passages from books.
Among innumerable other instances, I well remember something in a
volume of Joseph Glanvill, which (perhaps merely from its quaintness
--who shall say?) never failed to inspire me with the sentiment;
--"And the will therein lieth, which dieth not. Who knoweth the
mysteries of the will, with its vigor? For God is but a great will
pervading all things by nature of its intentness. Man doth not yield
him to the angels, nor unto death utterly, save only through the
weakness of his feeble will."
Length of years, and subsequent reflection, have enabled me to
trace, indeed, some remote connection between this passage in the
English moralist and a portion of the character of Ligeia. An
intensity in thought, action, or speech, was possibly, in her, a
result, or at least an index, of that gigantic volition which,
during our long intercourse, failed to give other and more immediate
evidence of its existence. Of all the women whom I have ever known,
she, the outwardly calm, the ever-placid Ligeia, was the most
violently a prey to the tumultuous vultures of stern passion. And of
such passion I could form no estimate, save by the miraculous
expansion of those eyes which at once so delighted and appalled me
--by the almost magical melody, modulation, distinctness and placidity
of her very low voice --and by the fierce energy (rendered doubly
effective by contrast with her manner of utterance) of the wild
words which she habitually uttered.
I have spoken of the learning of Ligeia: it was immense --such as
I have never known in woman. In the classical tongues was she deeply
proficient, and as far as my own acquaintance extended in regard to
the modern dialects of Europe, I have never known her at fault. Indeed
upon any theme of the most admired, because simply the most abstruse
of the boasted erudition of the academy, have I ever found Ligeia at
fault? How singularly --how thrillingly, this one point in the
nature of my wife has forced itself, at this late period only, upon my
attention! I said her knowledge was such as I have never known in
woman --but where breathes the man who has traversed, and
successfully, all the wide areas of moral, physical, and
mathematical science? I saw not then what I now clearly perceive, that
the acquisitions of Ligeia were gigantic, were astounding; yet I was
sufficiently aware of her infinite supremacy to resign myself, with
a child-like confidence, to her guidance through the chaotic world
of metaphysical investigation at which I was most busily occupied
during the earlier years of our marriage. With how vast a triumph
--with how vivid a delight --with how much of all that is ethereal
in hope --did I feel, as she bent over me in studies but little sought
--but less known --that delicious vista by slow degrees expanding
before me, down whose long, gorgeous, and all untrodden path, I
might at length pass onward to the goal of a wisdom too divinely
precious not to be forbidden!
How poignant, then, must have been the grief with which, after
some years, I beheld my well-grounded expectations take wings to
themselves and fly away! Without Ligeia I was but as a child groping
benighted. Her presence, her readings alone, rendered vividly luminous
the many mysteries of the transcendentalism in which we were immersed.
Wanting the radiant lustre of her eyes, letters, lambent and golden,
grew duller than Saturnian lead. And now those eyes shone less and
less frequently upon the pages over which I pored. Ligeia grew ill.
The wild eyes blazed with a too --too glorious effulgence; the pale
fingers became of the transparent waxen hue of the grave, and the blue
veins upon the lofty forehead swelled and sank impetuously with the
tides of the gentle emotion. I saw that she must die --and I struggled
desperately in spirit with the grim Azrael. And the struggles of the
passionate wife were, to my astonishment, even more energetic than
my own. There had been much in her stern nature to impress me with the
belief that, to her, death would have come without its terrors;
--but not so. Words are impotent to convey any just idea of the
fierceness of resistance with which she wrestled with the Shadow. I
groaned in anguish at the pitiable spectacle. would have soothed --I
would have reasoned; but, in the intensity of her wild desire for
life, --for life --but for life --solace and reason were the uttermost
folly. Yet not until the last instance, amid the most convulsive
writhings of her fierce spirit, was shaken the external placidity of
her demeanor. Her voice grew more gentle --grew more low --yet I would
not wish to dwell upon the wild meaning of the quietly uttered
words. My brain reeled as I hearkened entranced, to a melody more than
mortal --to assumptions and aspirations which mortality had never
before known.
That she loved me I should not have doubted; and I might have been
easily aware that, in a bosom such as hers, love would have reigned no
ordinary passion. But in death only, was I fully impressed with the
strength of her affection. For long hours, detaining my hand, would
she pour out before me the overflowing of a heart whose more than
passionate devotion amounted to idolatry. How had I deserved to be
so blessed by such confessions? --how had I deserved to be so cursed
with the removal of my beloved in the hour of her making them, But
upon this subject I cannot bear to dilate. Let me say only, that in
Ligeia's more than womanly abandonment to a love, alas! all unmerited,
all unworthily bestowed, I at length recognized the principle of her
longing with so wildly earnest a desire for the life which was now
fleeing so rapidly away. It is this wild longing --it is this eager
vehemence of desire for life --but for life --that I have no power
to portray --no utterance capable of expressing.
At high noon of the night in which she departed, beckoning me,
peremptorily, to her side, she bade me repeat certain verses
composed by herself not many days before. I obeyed her. --They were
these:
Lo! 'tis a gala night
Within the lonesome latter years!
An angel throng, bewinged, bedight
In veils, and drowned in tears,
Sit in a theatre, to see
A play of hopes and fears,
While the orchestra breathes fitfully
The music of the spheres.
Mimes, in the form of God on high,
Mutter and mumble low,
And hither and thither fly --
Mere puppets they, who come and go
At bidding of vast formless things
That shift the scenery to and fro,
Flapping from out their Condor wings
Invisible Wo!
That motley drama! --oh, be sure
It shall not be forgot!
With its Phantom chased forever more,
By a crowd that seize it not,
Through a circle that ever returneth in
To the self-same spot,
And much of Madness and more of Sin
And Horror the soul of the plot.
But see, amid the mimic rout,
A crawling shape intrude!
A blood-red thing that writhes from out
The scenic solitude!
It writhes! --it writhes! --with mortal pangs
The mimes become its food,
And the seraphs sob at vermin fangs
In human gore imbued.
Out --out are the lights --out all!
And over each quivering form,
The curtain, a funeral pall,
Comes down with the rush of a storm,
And the angels, all pallid and wan,
Uprising, unveiling, affirm
That the play is the tragedy, "Man,"
And its hero the Conqueror Worm.
"O God!" half shrieked Ligeia, leaping to her feet and extending her
arms aloft with a spasmodic movement, as I made an end of these
lines --"O God! O Divine Father! --shall these things be undeviatingly
so? --shall this Conqueror be not once conquered? Are we not part
and parcel in Thee? Who --who knoweth the mysteries of the will with
its vigor? Man doth not yield him to the angels, nor unto death
utterly, save only through the weakness of his feeble will."
And now, as if exhausted with emotion, she suffered her white arms
to fall, and returned solemnly to her bed of death. And as she
breathed her last sighs, there came mingled with them a low murmur
from her lips. I bent to them my ear and distinguished, again, the
concluding words of the passage in Glanvill --"Man doth not yield
him to the angels, nor unto death utterly, save only through the
weakness of his feeble will."
She died; --and I, crushed into the very dust with sorrow, could
no longer endure the lonely desolation of my dwelling in the dim and
decaying city by the Rhine. I had no lack of what the world calls
wealth. Ligeia had brought me far more, very far more than
ordinarily falls to the lot of mortals. After a few months, therefore,
of weary and aimless wandering, I purchased, and put in some repair,
an abbey, which I shall not name, in one of the wildest and least
frequented portions of fair England. The gloomy and dreary grandeur of
the building, the almost savage aspect of the domain, the many
melancholy and time-honored memories connected with both, had much
in unison with the feelings of utter abandonment which had driven me
into that remote and unsocial region of the country. Yet although
the external abbey, with its verdant decay hanging about it,
suffered but little alteration, I gave way, with a child-like
perversity, and perchance with a faint hope of alleviating my sorrows,
to a display of more than regal magnificence within. --For such
follies, even in childhood, I had imbibed a taste and now they came
back to me as if in the dotage of grief. Alas, I feel how much even of
incipient madness might have been discovered in the gorgeous and
fantastic draperies, in the solemn carvings of Egypt, in the wild
cornices and furniture, in the Bedlam patterns of the carpets of
tufted gold! I had become a bounden slave in the trammels of opium,
and my labors and my orders had taken a coloring from my dreams. But
these absurdities must not pause to detail. Let me speak only of
that one chamber, ever accursed, whither in a moment of mental
alienation, I led from the altar as my bride --as the successor of the
unforgotten Ligeia --the fair-haired and blue-eyed Lady Rowena
Trevanion, of Tremaine.
There is no individual portion of the architecture and decoration of
that bridal chamber which is not now visibly before me. Where were the
souls of the haughty family of the bride, when, through thirst of
gold, they permitted to pass the threshold of an apartment so
bedecked, a maiden and a daughter so beloved? I have said that I
minutely remember the details of the chamber --yet I am sadly
forgetful on topics of deep moment --and here there was no system,
no keeping, in the fantastic display, to take hold upon the memory.
The room lay in a high turret of the castellated abbey, was pentagonal
in shape, and of capacious size. Occupying the whole southern face
of the pentagon was the sole window --an immense sheet of unbroken
glass from Venice --a single pane, and tinted of a leaden hue, so that
the rays of either the sun or moon, passing through it, fell with a
ghastly lustre on the objects within. Over the upper portion of this
huge window, extended the trellice-work of an aged vine, which
clambered up the massy walls of the turret. The ceiling, of
gloomy-looking oak, was excessively lofty, vaulted, and elaborately
fretted with the wildest and most grotesque specimens of a
semi-Gothic, semi-Druidical device. From out the most central recess
of this melancholy vaulting, depended, by a single chain of gold
with long links, a huge censer of the same metal, Saracenic in
pattern, and with many perforations so contrived that there writhed in
and out of them, as if endued with a serpent vitality, a continual
succession of parti-colored fires.
Some few ottomans and golden candelabra, of Eastern figure, were
in various stations about --and there was the couch, too --bridal
couch --of an Indian model, and low, and sculptured of solid ebony,
with a pall-like canopy above. In each of the angles of the chamber
stood on end a gigantic sarcophagus of black granite, from the tombs
of the kings over against Luxor, with their aged lids full of
immemorial sculpture. But in the draping of the apartment lay, alas!
the chief phantasy of all. The lofty walls, gigantic in height
--even unproportionably so --were hung from summit to foot, in vast
folds, with a heavy and massive-looking tapestry --tapestry of a
material which was found alike as a carpet on the floor, as a covering
for the ottomans and the ebony bed, as a canopy for the bed, and as
the gorgeous volutes of the curtains which partially shaded the
window. The material was the richest cloth of gold. It was spotted all
over, at irregular intervals, with arabesque figures, about a foot
in diameter, and wrought upon the cloth in patterns of the most
jetty black. But these figures partook of the true character of the
arabesque only when regarded from a single point of view. By a
contrivance now common, and indeed traceable to a very remote period
of antiquity, they were made changeable in aspect. To one entering the
room, they bore the appearance of simple monstrosities; but upon a
farther advance, this appearance gradually departed; and step by step,
as the visitor moved his station in the chamber, he saw himself
surrounded by an endless succession of the ghastly forms which
belong to the superstition of the Norman, or arise in the guilty
slumbers of the monk. The phantasmagoric effect was vastly
heightened by the artificial introduction of a strong continual
current of wind behind the draperies --giving a hideous and uneasy
animation to the whole.
In halls such as these --in a bridal chamber such as this --I
passed, with the Lady of Tremaine, the unhallowed hours of the first
month of our marriage --passed them with but little disquietude.
That my wife dreaded the fierce moodiness of my temper --that she
shunned me and loved me but little --I could not help perceiving;
but it gave me rather pleasure than otherwise. I loathed her with a
hatred belonging more to demon than to man. My memory flew back,
(oh, with what intensity of regret!) to Ligeia, the beloved, the
august, the beautiful, the entombed. I revelled in recollections of
her purity, of her wisdom, of her lofty, her ethereal nature, of her
passionate, her idolatrous love. Now, then, did my spirit fully and
freely burn with more than all the fires of her own. In the excitement
of my opium dreams (for I was habitually fettered in the shackles of
the drug) I would call aloud upon her name, during the silence of
the night, or among the sheltered recesses of the glens by day, as if,
through the wild eagerness, the solemn passion, the consuming ardor of
my longing for the departed, I could restore her to the pathway she
had abandoned --ah, could it be forever? --upon the earth.
About the commencement of the second month of the marriage, the Lady
Rowena was attacked with sudden illness, from which her recovery was
slow. The fever which consumed her rendered her nights uneasy; and
in her perturbed state of half-slumber, she spoke of sounds, and of
motions, in and about the chamber of the turret, which I concluded had
no origin save in the distemper of her fancy, or perhaps in the
phantasmagoric influences of the chamber itself. She became at
length convalescent --finally well. Yet but a brief period elapsed,
ere a second more violent disorder again threw her upon a bed of
suffering; and from this attack her frame, at all times feeble,
never altogether recovered. Her illnesses were, after this epoch, of
alarming character, and of more alarming recurrence, defying alike the
knowledge and the great exertions of her physicians. With the increase
of the chronic disease which had thus, apparently, taken too sure hold
upon her constitution to be eradicated by human means, I could not
fall to observe a similar increase in the nervous irritation of her
temperament, and in her excitability by trivial causes of fear. She
spoke again, and now more frequently and pertinaciously, of the sounds
--of the slight sounds --and of the unusual motions among the
tapestries, to which she had formerly alluded.
One night, near the closing in of September, she pressed this
distressing subject with more than usual emphasis upon my attention.
She had just awakened from an unquiet slumber, and I had been
watching, with feelings half of anxiety, half of vague terror, the
workings of her emaciated countenance. I sat by the side of her
ebony bed, upon one of the ottomans of India. She partly arose, and
spoke, in an earnest low whisper, of sounds which she then heard,
but which I could not hear --of motions which she then saw, but
which I could not perceive. The wind was rushing hurriedly behind
the tapestries, and I wished to show her (what, let me confess it, I
could not all believe) that those almost inarticulate breathings,
and those very gentle variations of the figures upon the wall, were
but the natural effects of that customary rushing of the wind. But a
deadly pallor, overspreading her face, had proved to me that my
exertions to reassure her would be fruitless. She appeared to be
fainting, and no attendants were within call. I remembered where was
deposited a decanter of light wine which had been ordered by her
physicians, and hastened across the chamber to procure it. But, as I
stepped beneath the light of the censer, two circumstances of a
startling nature attracted my attention. I had felt that some palpable
although invisible object had passed lightly by my person; and I saw
that there lay upon the golden carpet, in the very middle of the
rich lustre thrown from the censer, a shadow --a faint, indefinite
shadow of angelic aspect --such as might be fancied for the shadow
of a shade. But I was wild with the excitement of an immoderate dose
of opium, and heeded these things but little, nor spoke of them to
Rowena. Having found the wine, I recrossed the chamber, and poured out
a gobletful, which I held to the lips of the fainting lady. She had
now partially recovered, however, and took the vessel herself, while I
sank upon an ottoman near me, with my eyes fastened upon her person.
It was then that I became distinctly aware of a gentle footfall upon
the carpet, and near the couch; and in a second thereafter, as
Rowena was in the act of raising the wine to her lips, I saw, or may
have dreamed that I saw, fall within the goblet, as if from some
invisible spring in the atmosphere of the room, three or four large
drops of a brilliant and ruby colored fluid. If this I saw --not so
Rowena. She swallowed the wine unhesitatingly, and I forbore to
speak to her of a circumstance which must, after all, I considered,
have been but the suggestion of a vivid imagination, rendered morbidly
active by the terror of the lady, by the opium, and by the hour.
Yet I cannot conceal it from my own perception that, immediately
subsequent to the fall of the ruby-drops, a rapid change for the worse
took place in the disorder of my wife; so that, on the third
subsequent night, the hands of her menials prepared her for the
tomb, and on the fourth, I sat alone, with her shrouded body, in
that fantastic chamber which had received her as my bride. --Wild
visions, opium-engendered, flitted, shadow-like, before me. I gazed
with unquiet eye upon the sarcophagi in the angles of the room, upon
the varying figures of the drapery, and upon the writhing of the
parti-colored fires in the censer overhead. My eyes then fell, as I
called to mind the circumstances of a former night, to the spot
beneath the glare of the censer where I had seen the faint traces of
the shadow. It was there, however, no longer; and breathing with
greater freedom, I turned my glances to the pallid and rigid figure
upon the bed. Then rushed upon me a thousand memories of Ligeia
--and then came back upon my heart, with the turbulent violence of a
flood, the whole of that unutterable wo with which I had regarded
her thus enshrouded. The night waned; and still, with a bosom full
of bitter thoughts of the one only and supremely beloved, I remained
gazing upon the body of Rowena.
It might have been midnight, or perhaps earlier, or later, for I had
taken no note of time, when a sob, low, gentle, but very distinct,
startled me from my revery. --I felt that it came from the bed of
ebony --the bed of death. I listened in an agony of superstitious
terror --but there was no repetition of the sound. I strained my
vision to detect any motion in the corpse --but there was not the
slightest perceptible. Yet I could not have been deceived. I had heard
the noise, however faint, and my soul was awakened within me. I
resolutely and perseveringly kept my attention riveted upon the
body. Many minutes elapsed before any circumstance occurred tending to
throw light upon the mystery. At length it became evident that a
slight, a very feeble, and barely noticeable tinge of color had
flushed up within the cheeks, and along the sunken small veins of
the eyelids. Through a species of unutterable horror and awe, for
which the language of mortality has no sufficiently energetic
expression, I felt my heart cease to beat, my limbs grow rigid where I
sat. Yet a sense of duty finally operated to restore my
self-possession. I could no longer doubt that we had been
precipitate in our preparations --that Rowena still lived. It was
necessary that some immediate exertion be made; yet turret was
altogether apart from the portion of the abbey tenanted by the
servants --there were none within call --I had no means of summoning
them to my aid without leaving the room for many minutes --and this
I could not venture to do. I therefore struggled alone in my endeavors
to call back the spirit ill hovering. In a short period it was
certain, however, that a relapse had taken place; the color
disappeared from both eyelid and cheek, leaving a wanness even more
than that of marble; the lips became doubly shrivelled and pinched
up in the ghastly expression of death; a repulsive clamminess and
coldness overspread rapidly the surface of the body; and all the usual
rigorous illness immediately supervened. I fell back with a shudder
upon the couch from which I had been so startlingly aroused, and again
gave myself up to passionate waking visions of Ligeia.
An hour thus elapsed when (could it be possible?) I was a second
time aware of some vague sound issuing from the region of the bed. I
listened --in extremity of horror. The sound came again --it was a
sigh. Rushing to the corpse, I saw --distinctly saw --a tremor upon
the lips. In a minute afterward they relaxed, disclosing a bright line
of the pearly teeth. Amazement now struggled in my bosom with the
profound awe which had hitherto reigned there alone. I felt that my
vision grew dim, that my reason wandered; and it was only by a violent
effort that I at length succeeded in nerving myself to the task
which duty thus once more had pointed out. There was now a partial
glow upon the forehead and upon the cheek and throat; a perceptible
warmth pervaded the whole frame; there was even a slight pulsation
at the heart. The lady lived; and with redoubled ardor I betook myself
to the task of restoration. I chafed and bathed the temples and the
hands, and used every exertion which experience, and no little.
medical reading, could suggest. But in vain. Suddenly, the color fled,
the pulsation ceased, the lips resumed the expression of the dead,
and, in an instant afterward, the whole body took upon itself the
icy chilliness, the livid hue, the intense rigidity, the sunken
outline, and all the loathsome peculiarities of that which has been,
for many days, a tenant of the tomb.
And again I sunk into visions of Ligeia --and again, (what marvel
that I shudder while I write,) again there reached my ears a low sob
from the region of the ebony bed. But why shall I minutely detail
the unspeakable horrors of that night? Why shall I pause to relate
how, time after time, until near the period of the gray dawn, this
hideous drama of revivification was repeated; how each terrific
relapse was only into a sterner and apparently more irredeemable
death; how each agony wore the aspect of a struggle with some
invisible foe; and how each struggle was succeeded by I know not
what of wild change in the personal appearance of the corpse? Let me
hurry to a conclusion.
The greater part of the fearful night had worn away, and she who had
been dead, once again stirred --and now more vigorously than hitherto,
although arousing from a dissolution more appalling in its utter
hopelessness than any. I had long ceased to struggle or to move, and
remained sitting rigidly upon the ottoman, a helpless prey to a
whirl of violent emotions, of which extreme awe was perhaps the
least terrible, the least consuming. The corpse, I repeat, stirred,
and now more vigorously than before. The hues of life flushed up
with unwonted energy into the countenance --the limbs relaxed --and,
save that the eyelids were yet pressed heavily together, and that
the bandages and draperies of the grave still imparted their charnel
character to the figure, I might have dreamed that Rowena had indeed
shaken off, utterly, the fetters of Death. But if this idea was not,
even then, altogether adopted, I could at least doubt no longer, when,
arising from the bed, tottering, with feeble steps, with closed
eyes, and with the manner of one bewildered in a dream, the thing that
was enshrouded advanced boldly and palpably into the middle of the
apartment.
I trembled not --I stirred not --for a crowd of unutterable
fancies connected with the air, the stature, the demeanor of the
figure, rushing hurriedly through my brain, had paralyzed --had
chilled me into stone. I stirred not --but gazed upon the
apparition. There was a mad disorder in my thoughts --a tumult
unappeasable. Could it, indeed, be the living Rowena who confronted
me? Could it indeed be Rowena at all --the fair-haired, the
blue-eyed Lady Rowena Trevanion of Tremaine? Why, why should I doubt
it? The bandage lay heavily about the mouth --but then might it not be
the mouth of the breathing Lady of Tremaine? And the cheeks-there were
the roses as in her noon of life --yes, these might indeed be the fair
cheeks of the living Lady of Tremaine. And the chin, with its dimples,
as in health, might it not be hers? --but had she then grown taller
since her malady? What inexpressible madness seized me with that
thought? One bound, and I had reached her feet! Shrinking from my
touch, she let fall from her head, unloosened, the ghastly cerements
which had confined it, and there streamed forth, into the rushing
atmosphere of the chamber, huge masses of long and dishevelled hair;
it was blacker than the raven wings of the midnight! And now slowly
opened the eyes of the figure which stood before me. "Here then, at
least," I shrieked aloud, "can I never --can I never be mistaken
--these are the full, and the black, and the wild eyes --of my lost
love --of the lady --of the LADY LIGEIA."
-THE END-
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1850
LIONIZING
by Edgar Allan Poe
LIONIZING
-all people went
Upon their ten toes in wild wondernment.
Bishop Hall's Satires.
I AM, that is to say I was, a great man, but I am neither the author
of Junius nor the man in the mask, for my name, I believe, is Robert
Jones, and I was born somewhere in the city of Fum-Fudge.
The first action of my life was the taking hold of my nose with both
hands. My mother saw this and called me a genius:- my father wept for
joy and presented me with a treatise on Nosology. This I mastered
before I was breeched.
I now began to feel my way in the science, and soon came to
understand that, provided a man had a nose sufficiently conspicuous,
he might by merely following it, arrive at a Lionship. But my
attention was not confined to theories alone. Every morning I gave
my proboscis a couple of pulls and swallowed a half-dozen of drams.
When I came of age my father asked me, one day, if I would step with
him into his study.
"My son," he said, when we were seated, "what is the chief end of
your existence?"
"My father," I answered, "it is the study of Nosology."
"And what, Robert," he inquired, "is Nosology?"
"Sir," I said, "it is the science of Noses."
"And can you tell me," he demanded, "what is the meaning of a nose?"
"A nose, my father," I replied, greatly softened, "has been
variously defined by about a thousand different authors." [Here I
pulled out my watch.] "It is now noon, or thereabouts- We shall have
time enough to get through with them all before midnight. To
commence then: The nose, according to Bartholinus, is that
protuberance- that bump- that excresence- that-"
"Will do, Robert," interupted the old gentleman. "I am thunderstruck
at the extent of your information- I am positively- upon my soul."
[Here he closed his eyes and placed his hand upon his heart.] "Come
here!" [Here he took me by the arm.] "Your education may now be
considered as finished- it is high time you should scuffle for
yourself- and you cannot do a better thing than merely follow your
nose- so- so- so-" [Here he kicked me down stairs and out of the
door.]-"So get out of my house, and God bless you!"
As I felt within me the divine afflatus, I considered this
accident rather fortunate than otherwise. I resolved to be guided by
the paternal advice. I determined to follow my nose. I gave it a
pull or two upon the spot, and wrote a pamphlet on Nosology forthwith.
All Fum-Fudge was in an uproar.
"Wonderful genius!" said the Quarterly.
"Superb physiologist!" said the Westminster.
"Clever fellow!" said the Foreign.
"Fine writer!", said the Edinburgh.
"Profound thinker!" said the Dublin.
"Great man!" said Bentley.
"Divine soul!" said Fraser.
"One of us!" said Blackwood.
"Who can he be?" said Mrs. Bas-Bleu.
"What can he be?" said big Miss Bas-Bleu.
"Where can he be?" said little Miss Bas-Bleu.- But I paid these
people no attention whatever- I just stepped into the shop of an
artist.
The Duchess of Bless-my-Soul was sitting for her portrait; the
Marquis of So-and-So was holding the Duchess' poodle; the Earl of
This-and-That was flirting with her salts; and his Royal Highness of
Touch-me-Not was leaning upon the back of her chair.
I approached the artist and turned up my nose.
"Oh, beautiful!" sighed her Grace.
"Oh, my!" lisped the Marquis.
"Oh, shocking!" groaned the Earl.
"Oh, abominable!" growled his Royal Highness.
"What will you take for it?" asked the artist.
"For his nose!" shouted her Grace.
"A thousand pounds," said I, sitting down.
"A thousand pounds?" inquired the artist, musingly.
"A thousand pounds," said I.
"Beautiful!" said he, entranced.
"A thousand pounds," said I.
"Do you warrant it?" he asked, turning the nose to the light.
"I do," said I, blowing it well.
"Is it quite original?" he inquired, touching it with reverence.
"Humph!" said I, twisting it to one side.
"Has no copy been taken?" he demanded, surveying it through a
microscope.
"None," said I, turning it up.
"Admirable!" he ejaculated, thrown quite off his guard by the beauty
of the manoeuvre.
"A thousand pounds," said I.
"A thousand pounds?" said he.
"Precisely," said I.
"A thousand pounds?" said he.
"Just so," said I.
"You shall have them," said he. "What a piece of virtu!" So he
drew me a check upon the spot, and took a sketch of my nose. I engaged
rooms in Jermyn street, and sent her Majesty the ninety-ninth
edition of the "Nosology," with a portrait of the proboscis. That
sad little rake, the Prince of Wales, invited me to dinner.
We are all lions and recherches.
There was a modern Platonist. He quoted Porphyry, Iamblicus,
Plotinus, Proclus, Hierocles, Maximus Tyrius, and Syrianus.
There was a human-perfectibility man. He quoted Turgot, Price,
Priestly, Condorcet, De Stael, and the "Ambitious Student in
Ill-Health."
There was Sir Positive Paradox. He observed that all fools were
philosophers, and that all philosophers were fools.
There was Aestheticus Ethix. He spoke of fire, unity, and atoms;
bi-part and pre-existent soul; affinity and discord; primitive
intelligence and homoomeria.
There was Theologos Theology. He talked of Eusebius and Arianus;
heresy and the Council of Nice; Puseyism and consubstantialism;
Homousios and Homouioisios.
There was Fricassee from the Rocher de Cancale. He mentioned Muriton
of red tongue; cauliflowers with veloute sauce; veal a la St.
Menehoult; marinade a la St. Florentin; and orange jellies en
mosaiques.
There was Bibulus O'Bumper. He touched upon Latour and
Markbrunnen; upon Mosseux and Chambertin; upon Richbourg and St.
George; upon Haubrion, Leonville, and Medoc; upon Barac and
Preignac; upon Grave, upon Sauterne, upon Lafitte, and upon St.
Peray. He shook his head at Clos de Vougeot, and told with his eyes
shut, the difference between Sherry and Amontillado.
There was Signor Tintontintino from Florence. He discoursed of
Cimabue, Arpino, Carpaccio, and Argostino- of the gloom of
Caravaggio, of the amenity of Albano, of the colors of Titian, of
the frows of Rubens, and of the waggeries of Jan Steen.
There was the President of the Fum-Fudge University. He was of the
opinion that the moon was called Bendis in Thrace, Bubastis in
Egypt, Dian in Rome, and Artemis in Greece.
There was a Grand Turk from Stamboul. He could not help thinking
that the angels were horses, cocks, and bulls; that somebody in the
sixth heaven had seventy thousand heads; and that the earth was
supported by a sky-blue cow with an incalculable number of green
horns.
There was Delphinus Polyglott. He told us what had become of the
eighty-three lost tragedies of Aeschylus; of the fifty-four orations
of Isaeus; of the three hundred and ninety-one speeches of Lysias; of
the hundred and eighty treatises of Theophrastus; of the eighth book
of the conic sections of Apollonius; of Pindar's hymns and
dithyrambics, and of the five and forty tragedies of Homer Junior.
There was Ferdinand Fitz-Fossillus Feltspar. He informed us all
about internal fires and tertiary formations; about aeriforms,
fluidiforms, and solidforms; about quartz and marl; about schist and
schorl; about gypsum and trap; about talc and calc; about blende and
horn-blende; about micaslate and pudding-stone; about cyanite and
lepidolite; about haematite and tremolite; about antimony and
calcedony; about manganese and whatever you please.
There was myself. I spoke of myself;- of myself, of myself, of
myself;- of Nosology, of my pamphlet, and of myself. I turned up my
nose, and I spoke of myself.
"Marvellous clever man!" said the Prince.
"Superb!" said his guests;- and next morning her Grace of
Bless-my-soul paid me a visit.
"Will you go to Almack's, pretty creature?" she said, tapping me
under the chin.
"Upon honor," said I.
"Nose and all?" she asked.
"As I live," I replied.
"Here then is a card, my life. Shall I say you will be there?"
"Dear, Duchess, with all my heart."
"Pshaw, no!- but with all your nose?"
"Every bit of it, my love," said I:- so I gave it a twist or two,
and found myself at Almack's.
The rooms were crowded to suffocation.
"He is coming!" said somebody on the staircase.
"He is coming!" said somebody farther up.
"He is coming!" said somebody farther still.
"He is come!" exclaimed the Duchess, "He is come, the little
love!"- and, seizing me firmly by both hands, she kissed me thrice
upon the nose.
A marked sensation immediately ensued.
"Diavolo!" cried Count Capricornutti.
"Dios guarda!" muttered Don Stiletto.
"Mille tonnerres!" ejaculated the Prince de Grenouille.
"Tousand teufel!" growled the Elector of Bluddennuff.
It was not to be borne. I grew angry. I turned short upon
Bluddennuff.
"Sir!" said I to him, "you are a baboon."
"Sir," he replied, after a pause. "Donner und Blitzen!"
This was all that could be desired. We exchanged cards. At
Chalk-Farm, the next morning, I shot off his nose- and then called
upon my friends.
"Bete!" said the first.
"Fool!" said the second.
"Dolt!" said the third.
"Ass!" said the fourth.
"Ninny!" said the fifth.
"Noodle!" said the sixth.
"Be off!" said the seventh.
At all this I felt mortified, and so called upon my father.
"Father," I asked, "what is the chief end of my existence?"
"My son," he replied, "it is still the study of Nosology; but in
hitting the Elector upon the nose you have overshot your mark. You
have a fine nose, it is true; but then Bluddennuff has none. You are
damned, and he has become the hero of the day. I grant you that in
Fum-Fudge the greatness of a lion is in proportion to the size of
his proboscis- but, good heavens! there is no competing with a lion
who has no proboscis at all."
THE END
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1850
LITERARY LIFE OF THINGUM BOB, ESQ.
by Edgar Allan Poe
LATE EDITOR OF THE "GOOSETHERUMFOODLE"
BY HIMSELF
I AM now growing in years, and- since I understand that
Shakespeare and Mr. Emmons are deceased- it is not impossible that I
may even die. It has occurred to me, therefore, that I may as well
retire from the field of Letters and repose upon my laurels. But I
am ambitious of signalizing my abdication of the literary sceptre by
some important bequest to posterity; and, perhaps, I cannot do a
better thing than just pen for it an account of my earlier career.
My name, indeed, has been so long and so constantly before the
public eye, that I am not only willing to admit the naturalness of the
interest which it has everywhere excited, but ready to satisfy the
extreme curiosity which it has inspired. In fact, it is no more than
the duty of him who achieves greatness to leave behind him, in his
ascent, such landmarks as may guide others to be great. I propose,
therefore, in the present paper (which I had some idea of calling
"Memoranda to Serve for the Literary History of America") to give a
detail of those important, yet feeble and tottering, first steps, by
which, at length, I attained the high road to the pinnacle of human
renown.
Of one's very remote ancestors it is superfluous to say much. My
father, Thomas Bob, Esq., stood for many years at the summit of his
profession, which was that of a merchant-barber, in the city of
Smug. His warehouse was the resort of all the principal people of
the place, and especially of the editorial corps- a body which
inspires all about it with profound veneration and awe. For my own
part, I regarded them as gods, and drank in with avidity the rich
wit and wisdom which continuously flowed from their august mouths
during the process of what is styled "lather." My first moment of
positive inspiration must be dated from that ever-memorable epoch,
when the brilliant conductor of the "Gad-Fly," in the intervals of the
important process just mentioned, recited aloud, before a conclave
of our apprentices, an inimitable poem in honor of the "Only Genuine
Oil-of-Bob" (so called from its talented inventor, my father), and for
which effusion the editor of the "Fly" was remunerated with a regal
liberality by the firm of Thomas Bob & Company, merchant-barbers.
The genius of the stanzas to the "Oil-of-Bob" first breathed into
me, I say, the divine afflatus. I resolved at once to become a great
man, and to commence by becoming a great poet. That very evening I
fell upon my knees at the feet of my father.
"Father," I said, "pardon me!- but I have a soul above lather. It is
my firm intention to cut the shop. I would be an editor- I would be
a poet- I would pen stanzas to the 'Oil-of-Bob.' Pardon me and aid
me to be great!"
"My dear Thingum," replied father, (I had been christened Thingum
after a wealthy relative so surnamed,) "My dear Thingum," he said,
raising me from my knees by the ears- "Thingum, my boy, you're a
trump, and take after your father in having a soul. You have an
immense head, too, and it must hold a great many brains. This I have
long seen, and therefore had thoughts of making you a lawyer. The
business, however, has grown ungenteel and that of a politician
don't pay. Upon the whole you judge wisely;- the trade of editor is
best:- and if you can be a poet at the same time,- as most of the
editors are, by the by, why, you will kill two birds with the one
stone. To encourage you in the beginning of things, I will allow you a
garret, pen, ink, and paper, a rhyming dictionary; and a copy of the
'Gad-Fly.' I suppose you would scarcely demand any more."
"I would be an ungrateful villain if I did" I replied with
enthusiasm. "Your generosity is boundless. I will repay it by making
you the father of a genius."
Thus ended my conference with the best of men, and immediately
upon its termination, I betook myself with zeal to my poetical labors;
as upon these, chiefly, I founded my hopes of ultimate elevation to
the editorial chair.
In my first attempts at composition I found the stanzas to "The
Oil-of-Bob" rather a drawback than otherwise. Their splendor more
dazzled than enlightened me. The contemplation of their excellence
tended, naturally, to discourage me by comparison with my own
abortions; so that for a long time I labored in vain. At length
there came into my head one of those exquisitely original ideas
which now and then will permeate the brain of a man of genius. It
was this:- or, rather, thus was it carried into execution. From the
rubbish of an old book-stall, in a very remote corner of the town, I
got together several antique and altogether unknown or forgotten
volumes. The bookseller sold them to me for a song. From one of these,
which purported to be a translation of one Dantes "Inferno," I
copied with remarkable neatness a long passage about a man named
Ugolino, who had a parcel of brats. From another, which contained a
good many old plays by some person whose name I forget, I enacted in
the same manner, and with the same care, a great number of lines about
"angels" and "ministers saying grace," and "goblins damned," and
more besides of that sort. From a third, which was the composition
of some blind man or other, either a Greek or a Choctaw- I cannot be
at the pains of remembering every trifle exactly,- I took about
fifty verses beginning with "Achilles' wrath," and "grease," and
something else. From a fourth, which I recollect was also the work
of a blind man, I selected a page or two all about "hail" and "holy
light"; and, although a blind man has no business to write about
light, still the verses were sufficiently good in their way.
Having made fair copies of these poems, I signed every one of them
"Oppodeldoc" (a fine sonorous name), and, doing each up nicely in a
separate envelope, I dispatched one to each of the four principal
Magazines, with a request for speedy insertion and prompt pay. The
result of this well-conceived plan, however, (the success of which
would have saved me much trouble in after-life,) served to convince me
that some editors are not to be bamboozled, and gave the coup-de-grace
(as they say in France) to my nascent hopes (as they say in the city
of the transcendentals).
The fact is, that each and every one of the Magazines in question
gave Mr. "Oppodeldoc" a complete using-up, in the "Monthly Notices
to Correspondents." The "Hum-Drum" gave him a dressing after this
fashion:
"'Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) has sent us a long tirade concerning a
bedlamite whom he styles 'Ugolino,' had a great many children that
should have been all whipped and sent to bed without their suppers.
The whole affair is exceedingly tame- not to say flat. 'Oppodeldoc'
(whoever he is) is entirely devoid of imagination- and imagination, in
our humble opinion, is not only the soul of Poesy, but also its very
heart. 'Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) has the audacity to demand of
us, for his twattle, a 'speedy insertion and prompt pay.' We neither
insert nor purchase any stuff of the sort. There can be no doubt,
however, that he would meet with a ready sale for all the balderdash
he can scribble, at the office of either the 'Rowdy-Dow,' the
'Lollipop,' or the 'Goosetherumfoodle.'
All this, it must be acknowledged, was very severe upon
"Oppodeldoc,"- but the unkindest cut was putting the word Poesy in
small caps. In those five pre-eminent letters what a world of
bitterness is there not involved!
But "Oppodeldoc" was punished with equal severity in the "Rowdy
Dow," which spoke thus:
"We have received a most singular and insolent communication from
a person (whoever he is) signing himself 'Oppodeldoc,'- thus
desecrating the greatness of the illustrious Roman emperor so named.
Accompanying the letter of 'Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) we find sundry
lines of most disgusting and unmeaning rant about 'angels and
ministers of grace,'- rant such as no madman short of a Nat Lee, or an
'Oppodeldoc,' could possibly perpetrate. And for this trash of
trash, we are modestly requested to 'pay promptly.' No, sir- no! We
pay for nothing of that sort. Apply to the 'Hum-Drum,' the 'Lollipop,'
or the 'Goosetherumfoodle.' These periodicals will undoubtedly
accept any literary offal you may send them- and as undoubtedly
promise to pay for it."
This was bitter indeed upon poor "Oppodeldoc"; but, in this
instance, the weight of the satire falls upon the "Hum-Drum," the
"Lollipop," and the "Goosetherumfoodle," who are pungently styled
"periodicals"- in Italics, too- a thing that must have cut them to the
heart.
Scarcely less savage was the "Lollipop," which thus discoursed:
"Some individual, who rejoices in the appellation 'Oppodeldoc,'
(to what low uses are the names of the illustrious dead too often
applied!) has enclosed us some fifty or sixty verses commencing
after this fashion:
'Achilles' wrath, to Greece the direful spring
Of woes unnumbered, &c., &c., &c, &c.'
"'Oppodeldoc?' (whoever he is) is respectfully informed that there
is not a printer's devil in our office who is not in the daily habit
of composing better lines. Those of 'Oppodeldoc' will not scan.
'Oppodeldoc' should learn to count. But why he should have conceived
the idea that we (of all others, we!) would disgrace our pages with
his ineffable nonsense is utterly beyond comprehension. Why, the
absurd twattle is scarcely good enough for the 'Hum-Drum,' the
'Rowdy-Dow,' the 'Goosetherumfoodle,'- things that are in the practice
of publishing 'Mother Gooses Melodies' as original lyrics. And
'Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) has even the assurance to demand pay
for this drivel. Does 'Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) know- is he aware
that we could not be paid to insert it?"
As I perused this I felt myself growing gradually smaller and
smaller, and when I came to the point at which the editor sneered at
the poem as "verses," there was little more than an ounce of me
left. As for "Oppodeldoc," I began to experience compassion for the
poor fellow. But the "Goosetherumfoodle" showed, if possible, less
mercy than the "Lollipop." It was the "Goosetherumfoodle" that said-
"A wretched poetaster, who signs himself 'Oppodeldoc,' is silly
enough to fancy that we will print and pay for a medley of
incoherent and ungrammatical bombast which he has transmitted to us,
and which commences with the following most intelligible line:-
'Hail Holy Light! Offspring of Heaven, first born.'
"We say, 'most intelligible.' 'Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) will be
kind enough to tell us, perhaps, how 'hail' can be 'holy light.' We
always regarded it as frozen rain. Will he inform us, also, how frozen
rain can be, at one and the same time, both 'holy light' (whatever
that is) and an 'off-spring'?- which latter term (if we understand
anything about English) is only employed, with propriety, in reference
to small babies of about six weeks old. But it is preposterous to
descant upon such absurdity- although 'Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) has
the unparalled effrontery to suppose that we will not only 'insert'
his ignorant ravings, but (absolutely) pay for them?
"Now this is fine- it is rich!- and we have half a mind to punish
this young scribbler for his egotism by really publishing his effusion
verbatim et literatim, as he has written it. We could inflict no
punishment so severe, and we would inflict it, but for the boredom
which we should cause our readers in so doing.
"Let 'Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) send any future composition of
like character to the 'Hum-Drum,' the 'Lollipop,' or the 'Rowdy-Dow:
They will 'insert' it. They 'insert' every month just such stuff. Send
it to them. WE are not to be insulted with impunity."
This made an end of me, and as for the "Hum-Drum," the
"Rowdy-Dow," and the "Lollipop," I never could comprehend how they
survived it. The putting them in the smallest possible minion (that
was the rub- thereby insinuating their lowness- their baseness,) while
WE stood looking upon them in gigantic capitals!- oh it was too
bitter!- it was wormwood- it was gall. Had I been either of these
periodicals I would have spared no pains to have the
"Goosetherumfoodle" prosecuted. It might have been done under the
Act for the "Prevention of Cruelty to Animals." for Oppodeldoc
(whoever he was), I had by this time lost all patience with the
fellow, and sympathized with him no longer. He was a fool, beyond
doubt, (whoever he was,) and got not a kick more than he deserved.
The result of my experiment with the old books convinced me, in
the first place, that "honesty is the best policy," and, in the
second, that if I could not write better than Mr. Dante, and the two
blind men, and the rest of the old set, it would, at least, be a
difficult matter to write worse. I took heart, therefore, and
determined to prosecute the "entirely original" (as they say on the
covers of the magazines), at whatever cost of study and pains. I again
placed before my eyes, as a model, the brilliant stanzas on "The
Oil-of-Bob" by the editor of the "Gad-Fly" and resolved to construct
an ode on the same sublime theme, in rivalry of what had already
been done.
With my first line I had no material difficulty. It ran thus:
"To pen an Ode upon the 'Oil-of-Bob.'"
Having carefully looked out, however, all the legitimate rhymes to
"Bob," I found it impossible to proceed. In this dilemma I had
recourse to paternal aid; and, after some hours of mature thought,
my father and myself thus constructed the poem:
"To pen an Ode upon the 'Oil-of-Bob'
Is all sorts of a job.
(Signed) Snob."
To be sure, this composition was of no very great length,- but I
"have yet to learn," as they say in the "Edinburgh Review," that the
mere extent of a literary work has anything to do with its merit. As
for the Quarterly cant about "sustained effort," it is impossible to
see the sense of it. Upon the whole, therefore, I was satisfied with
the success of my maiden attempt, and now the only question regarded
the disposal I should make of it. My father suggested that I should
send it to the "Gad-Fly,"- but there were two reasons which operated
to prevent me from so doing. I dreaded the jealousy of the editor- and
I had ascertained that he did not pay for original contributions. I
therefore, after due deliberation, consigned the article to the more
dignified pages of the "Lollipop" and awaited the event in anxiety,
but with resignation.
In the very next published number I had the proud satisfaction of
seeing my poem printed at length, as the leading article, with the
following significant words, prefixed in italics and between brackets:
[We call the attention of our readers to the subjoined admirable
on "The Oil-of-Bob." We need say nothing of their sublimity, or of
their pathos.- it is impossible to peruse them without tears. Those
who have been nauseated with a sad dose on the same august topic
from the goose-quill of the editor of the "Gad-Fly," will do well to
compare the two compositions.
P. S.- We are consumed with anxiety to probe the mystery which
envelops the evident pseudonym "Snob" May we hope for a personal
interview?]
All this was scarcely more than justice, but it was, I confess,
rather more than I had expected:- I acknowledge this, be it
observed, to the everlasting disgrace of my country and of mankind.
I lost no time, however, in calling upon the editor of the
"Lollipop" and had the good fortune to find this gentleman at home. He
saluted me with an air of profound respect, slightly blended with a
fatherly and patronizing admiration, wrought in him, no doubt, by my
appearance of extreme youth and inexperience. Begging me to be seated,
he entered at once upon the subject of my poem;- but modesty will ever
forbid me to repeat the thousand compliments which he lavished upon
me. The eulogies of Mr. Crab (such was the editor's name) were,
however, by no means fulsomely indiscriminate. He analyzed my
composition with much freedom and great ability- not hesitating to
point out a few trivial defects- a circumstance which elevated him
highly in my esteem. The "Gad-Fly" was, of course, brought upon the
tapis, and I hope never to be subjected to a criticism so searching,
or to rebukes so withering, as were bestowed by Mr. Crab upon that
unhappy effusion. I had been accustomed to regard the editor of the
"Gad-Fly" as something superhuman; but Mr. Crab soon disabused me of
that idea. He set the literary as well as the personal character of
the Fly (so Mr. C. satirically designated the rival editor), in its
true light. He, the Fly, was very little better than he should be.
He had written infamous things. He was a penny-a-liner, and a buffoon.
He was a villain. He had composed a tragedy which set the whole
country in a guffaw, and a farce which deluged the universe in
tears. Besides all this, he had the impudence to pen what he meant for
a lampoon upon himself (Mr. Crab), and the temerity to style him "an
ass." Should I at any time wish to express my opinion of Mr. Fly,
the pages of the "Lollipop," Mr. Crab assured me, were at my unlimited
disposal. In the meantime, as it was very certain that I would be
attacked in the "Fly" for my attempt at composing a rival poem on
the "Oil-of-Bob," he (Mr. Crab) would take it upon himself to
attend, pointedly, to my private and personal interests. If I were not
made a man of at once, it should not be the fault of himself (Mr.
Crab).
Mr. Crab having now paused in his discourse (the latter portion of
which I found it impossible to comprehend), I ventured to suggest
something about the remuneration which I had been taught to expect for
my poem, by an announcement on the cover of the "Lollipop,"
declaring that it (the "Lollipop") "insisted upon being permitted to
pay exorbitant prices for all accepted contributions,- frequently
expending more money for a single brief poem than the whole annual
cost of the 'Hum-Drum,' the 'Rowdy-Dow,' and the 'Goosetherumfoodle'
combined."
As I mentioned the word "remuneration," Mr. Crab first opened his
eyes, and then his mouth, to quite a remarkable extent, causing his
personal appearance to resemble that of a highly agitated elderly duck
in the act of quacking; and in this condition he remained (ever and
anon pressing his hinds tightly to his forehead, as if in a state of
desperate bewilderment) until I had nearly made an end of what I had
to say.
Upon my conclusion, he sank back into his seat, as if much overcome,
letting his arms fall lifelessly by his side, but keeping his mouth
still rigorously open, after the fashion of the duck. While I remained
in speechless astonishment at behavior so alarming he suddenly
leaped to his feet and made a rush at the bell-rope; but just as he
reached this, he appeared to have altered his intention, whatever it
was, for he dived under a table and immediately re-appeared with a
cudgel. This he was in the act of uplifting (for what purpose I am
at a loss to imagine), when all at once, there came a benign smile
over his features, and he sank placidly back in his chair.
"Mr. Bob," he said, (for I had sent up my card before ascending
myself,) "Mr. Bob, you are a young man, I presume- very?"
I assented; adding that I had not yet concluded my third lustrum.
"Ah!" he replied, "very good! I see how it is- say no more! Touching
this matter of compensation, what you observe is very just,- in fact
it is excessively so. But ah- ah- the first contribution- the first, I
say- it is never the Magazine custom to pay for,- you comprehend,
eh? The truth is, we are usually the recipients in such case." [Mr.
Crab smiled blandly as he emphasized the word "recipients."] "for
the most part, we are paid for the insertion of a maiden attempt-
especially in verse. In the second place, Mr. Bob, the Magazine rule
is never to disburse what we term in France the argent comptant:- I
have no doubt you understand. In a quarter or two after publication of
the article- or in a year or two- we make no objection to giving our
note at nine months; provided, always, that we can so arrange our
affairs as to be quite certain of a 'burst up' in six. I really do
hope, Mr. Bob, that you will look upon this explanation as
satisfactory." Here Mr. Crab concluded, and the tears stood in his
eyes.
Grieved to the soul at having been, however innocently, the cause of
pain to so eminent and so sensitive a man, I hastened to apologize,
and to reassure him, by expressing my perfect coincidence with his
views, as well as my entire appreciation of the delicacy of his
position. Having done all this in a neat speech, I took leave.
One fine morning, very shortly afterwards, "I awoke and found myself
famous." The extent of my renown will be best estimated by reference
to the editorial opinions of the day. These opinions, it will be seen,
were embodied in critical notices of the number of the "Lollipop"
containing my poem, and are perfectly satisfactory, conclusive, and
clear with the exception, perhaps, of the hieroglyphical marks,
"Sep. 15- 1 t," appended to each of the critiques.
The "Owl" a journal of profound sagacity, and well known for the
deliberate gravity of its literary decisions- the "Owl," I say,
spoke as follows:
"The LOLLIPOP! The October number of this delicious Magazine
surpasses its predecessors, and sets competition at defiance. In the
beauty of its typography and paper- in the number and excellence of
its steel plates- as well as in the literary merit of its
contributions- the 'Lollipop' compares with its slow-paced rivals as
Hyperion with Satyr. The 'Hum-Drum,' the 'Rowdy-Dow,' and the
'Goosetherumfoodle,' excel, it is true, in braggadocio, but in all
other points, give us the 'Lollipop'! How this celebrated journal
can sustain its evidently tremendous expenses, is more than we can
understand. To be sure, it has a circulation of 100,000 and its
subscription list has increased one fourth during the last month; but,
on the other hand, the sums it disburses constantly for
contributions are inconceivable. It is reported that Mr. Slyass
received no less than thirty-seven and a half cents for his inimitable
paper on 'Pigs.' With Mr. Crab, as editor, and with such names upon
the list of contributors as SNOB and Slyass, there can be no such word
as 'fail' for the 'Lollipop.' Go and subscribe. Sep. 15- 1 t."
I must say that I was gratified with this high-toned notice from a
paper so respectable as the "Owl." The placing my name- that is to
say, my nom de guerre- in priority of station to that of the great
Slyass, was a compliment as happy as I felt it to be deserved.
My attention was next arrested by these paragraphs in the "Toad"-
print highly distinguished for its uprightness and independence- for
its entire freedom from sycophancy and subservience to the givers of
dinners:
"The 'Lollipop' for October is out in advance of all its
contemporaries, and infinitely surpasses them, of course, in the
splendor of its embellishments, as well as in the richness of its
contents. The 'Hum-Drum,' the 'Rowdy-Dow,' and the 'Goosetherumfoodle'
excel, we admit, in braggadocio, but, in all other points, give us the
'Lollipop.' How this celebrated Magazine can sustain its evidently
tremendous expenses is more than we can understand. To be sure, it has
a circulation of 200,000 and its subscription list has increased one
third during the last fortnight, but, on the other hand, the sums it
disburses, monthly, for contributions, are fearfully great. We learn
that Mr. Mumblethumb received no less than fifty cents for his late
'Monody in a Mud-Puddle.'
"Among the original contributors to the present number we notice
(besides the eminent editor, Mr. Crab), such men as SNOB, Slyass,
and Mumblethumb. Apart from the editorial matter, the most valuable
paper, nevertheless, is, we think, a poetical gem by Snob, on the
'Oil-of-Bob.'-but our readers must not suppose, from the title of this
incomparable bijou, that it bears any similitude to some balderdash on
the same subject by a certain contemptible individual whose name is
unmentionable to ears polite. The present poem 'On the Oil-of-Bob,'
has excited universal anxiety and curiosity in respect to the owner of
the evident pseudonym, 'Snob,'- a curiosity which, happily, we have it
in our power to satisfy. 'Snob' is the nom de plume of Mr. Thingum
Bob, of this city, a relative of the great Mr. Thingum, (after whom he
is named), and otherwise connected with the most illustrious
families of the State. His father, Thomas Bob, Esq., is an opulent
merchant in Smug. Sep. 15- 1 t."
This generous approbation touched me to the heart- the more
especially as it emanated from a source so avowedly- so proverbially
pure as the "Toad." The word "balderdash," as applied to the
"Oil-of-Bob" of the Fly, I considered singularly pungent and
appropriate. The words "gem" and "bijou," however, used in reference
to my composition, struck me as being, in some degree, feeble. They
seemed to me to be deficient in force. They were not sufficiently
prononces (as we have it in France).
I had hardly finished reading the "Toad," when a friend placed in my
hands a copy of the "Mole," a daily, enjoying high reputation for
the keenness of its perception about matters in general, and for the
open, honest, above-ground style of its editorials. The "Mole" spoke
of the "Lollypop" as follows:
"We have just received the 'Lollipop' for October, and must say that
never before have we perused any single number of any periodical which
afforded us a felicity so supreme. We speak advisedly. The 'Hum-Drum.'
the 'Rowdy-Dow,' and the 'Goosetherumfoodle' must look well to their
laurels. These prints, no doubt, surpass everything in loudness of
pretension, but, in all other points, give us the 'Lollipop'! How this
celebrated Magazine can sustain its evidently tremendous expenses,
is more than we can comprehend. To be sure, it has a circulation of
300,000; and its subscription list has increased one half within the
last week, but then the sum it disburses, monthly, for
contributions, is astoundingly enormous. We have it upon good
authority that Mr. Fatquack received no less than sixty-two cents
and a half for his late Domestic Nouvellette, the 'Dish-Clout.'
"The contributors to the number before us are Mr. CRAB (the
eminent editor), SNOB, Mumblethumb, Fatquack, and others; but, after
the inimitable compositions of the editor himself, we prefer a
diamond- like effusion from the pen of a rising poet who writes over
the signature 'Snob'- a nom de guerre which we predict will one day
extinguish the radiance of 'BOZ.' 'SNOB,' we learn, is a Mr. THINGUM
BOB, Esq., sole heir of a wealthy merchant of this city, Thomas Bob,
Esq., and a near relative of the distinguished Mr. Thingum. The
title of Mr. B.'s admirable poem is the 'Oil-of-Bob'- a somewhat
unfortunate name, by-the-bye, as some contemptible vagabond
connected with the penny press has already disgusted the town with a
great deal of drivel upon the same topic. There will be no danger,
however, of confounding the compositions. Sep. 15- 1 t.
The generous approbation of so clear-sighted a journal as the "Mole"
penetrated my soul with delight. The only objection which occurred
to me was, that the terms "contemptible vagabond" might have been
better written "odious and contemptible wretch, villain, and
vagabond." This would have sounded more graceful, I think.
"Diamond-like," also, was scarcely, it will be admitted, of sufficient
intensity to express what the "Mole" evidently thought of the
brilliancy of the "Oil-of-Bob."
On the same afternoon in which I saw these notices in the "Owl," the
"Toad" and the "Mole," I happened to meet with a copy of the
"Daddy-Long-Legs," a periodical proverbial for the extreme extent of
its understanding. And it was the "Daddy-Long-Legs" which spoke thus:
"The 'Lollipop'! This gorgeous Magazine is already before the public
for October. The question of pre-eminence is forever put to rest,
and hereafter it will be preposterous in the 'Hum-Drum,' the
'Rowdy-Dow,' or the 'Goosetherumfoodle' to make any further
spasmodic attempts at competition. These journals may excel the
'Lollipop' in outcry, but, in all other points, give us the
'Lollipop'! How this celebrated Magazine can sustain its evidently
tremendous expenses, is past comprehension. To be sure it has a
circulation of precisely half a million, and its subscription list has
increased seventy-five per cent. within the last couple of days, but
then the sums it disburses, monthly, for contributions, are scarcely
credible; we are cognizant of the fact, that Mademoiselle
Cribalittle received no less than eighty-seven cents and a half for
her late valuable Revolutionary Tale, entitled 'The York-Town
Katy-Did, and the Bunker-Hill Katy-Didn't.'
"The most able papers in the present number are, of course, those
furnished by the editor (the eminent Mr. CRAB), but there are numerous
magnificent contributions from such names as SNOB, Mademoiselle
Cribalittle, Slyass, Mrs. Fibalittle, Mumblethumb, Mrs.
Squibalittle, and last, though not least, Fatquack. The world may well
be challenged to produce so rich a galaxy of genius.
"The poem over the signature, "SNOB" is, we find, attracting
universal commendation, and, we are constrained to say, deserves, if
possible, even more applause than it has received. The 'Oil-of-Bob' is
the title of this masterpiece of eloquence and art. One or two of
our readers may have a very faint, although sufficiently disgusting
recollection of a poem (?) similarly entitled, the perpetration of a
miserable penny-a-liner, mendicant, and cut-throat, connected in the
capacity of scullion, we believe, with one of the indecent prints
about the purlieus of the city, we beg them, for God's sake, not to
confound the compositions. The author of the 'Oil-of-Bob' is, we hear,
Thingum Bob, Esq, a gentleman of high genius, and a scholar. 'Snob' is
merely a nom de guerre. Sep. 15- 1 t."
I could scarcely restrain my indignation while I perused the
concluding portions of this diatribe. It was clear to me that the
yea-nay manner- not to say the gentleness,- the positive
forbearance- with which the "Daddy-Long-Legs" spoke of that pig, the
editor of the "Gad-Fly,"- it was evident to me, I say, that this
gentleness of speech could proceed from nothing else than a partiality
for the "Fly"- whom it was clearly the intention of the
"Daddy-Long-Legs" to elevate into reputation at my expense. Any one,
indeed, might perceive, with half an eye, that, had the real design of
the "Daddy" been what it wished to appear, it (the "Daddy") might have
expressed itself in terms more direct, more pungent, and altogether
more to the purpose. The words "penny-a-liner," "mendicant,"
"scullion," and "cut-throat," were epithets so intentionally
inexpressive and equivocal, as to be worse than nothing when applied
to the author of the very worst stanzas ever penned by one of the
human race. We all know what is meant by "damning with faint
praise," and, on the other hand, who could fail seeing through the
covert purpose of the "Daddy,"- that of glorifying with feeble abuse?
What the "Daddy" chose to say to the "Fly," however, was no business
of mine. What it said of myself was. After the noble manner in which
the "Owl," the "Toad," the "Mole," had expressed themselves in respect
to my ability, it was rather too much to be coolly spoken of by a
thing like the "Daddy-Long-Legs," as merely "a gentleman of high
genius and scholar." Gentleman indeed! I made up my mind at once
either to get written apology from the "Daddy-Long-Legs," or to call
it out.
Full of this purpose, I looked about me to find a friend whom I
could entrust with a message to his "Daddy"ship, and as the editor
of the "Lollipop" had given me marked tokens of regard, I at length
concluded to seek assistance upon the present occasion.
I have never yet been able to account, in a manner satisfactory to
my own understanding, for the very peculiar countenance and demeanor
with which Mr. Crab listened to me, as I unfolded to him my design. He
again went through the scene of the bell-rope and cudgel, and did
not omit the duck. At one period I thought he really intended to
quack. His fit, nevertheless, finally subsided as before, and he began
to act and speak in a rational way. He declined bearing the cartel,
however, and in fact, dissuaded me from sending it at all; but was
candid enough to admit that the "Daddy-Long-Legs" had been
disgracefully in the wrong- more especially in what related to the
epithets "gentleman and scholar."
Toward the end of this interview with Mr. Crab, who really
appeared to take a paternal interest in my welfare, he suggested to me
that I might turn an honest penny, and at the same time, advance my
reputation, by occasionally playing Thomas Hawk for the "Lollypop."
I begged Mr. Crab to inform me who was Mr. Thomas Hawk, and how it
was expected that I should play him.
Here Mr. Crab again "made great eyes" (as we say in Germany), but at
length, recovering himself from a profound attack of astonishment,
he assured me that he employed the words "Thomas Hawk" to avoid the
colloquialism, Tommy, which was low- but that the true idea was
Tommy Hawk- or tomahawk- and that by "playing tomahawk" he referred to
scalping, brow-beating, and otherwise using- up the herd of poor-devil
authors.
I assured my patron that, if this was all, I was perfectly
resigned to the task of playing Thomas Hawk. Hereupon Mr. Crab desired
me to use up the editor of the "Gad-Fly" forthwith, in the fiercest
style within the scope of my ability, and as a specimen of my
powers. This I did, upon the spot, in a review of the original
"Oil-of-Bob," occupying thirty-six pages of the "Lollipop." I found
playing Thomas Hawk, indeed, a far less onerous occupation than
poetizing; for I went upon system altogether, and thus it was easy
to do the thing thoroughly well. My practice was this. I bought
auction copies (cheap) of "Lord Brougham's speeches," "Cobbett's
Complete Works," the "New Slang-Syllabus," the "Whole Art of
Snubbing," "Prentice's Billingsgate" (folio edition), and "Lewis G.
Clarke on Tongue." These works I cut up thoroughly with a
curry-comb, and then, throwing the shreds into a sieve, sifted out
carefully all that might be thought decent (a mere trifle);
reserving the hard phrases, which I threw into a large tin
pepper-castor with longitudinal holes, so that an entire sentence
could get through without material injury. The mixture was then
ready for use. When called upon to play Thomas Hawk, I anointed a
sheet of foolscap with the white of a gander's egg; then, shredding
the thing to be reviewed as I had previously shredded the books-
only with more care, so as to get every word separate- I threw the
latter shreds in with the former, screwed on the lid of the castor,
gave it a shake, and so dusted out the mixture upon the egged
foolscap; where it stuck. The effect was beautiful to behold. It was
captivating. Indeed, the reviews I brought to pass by this simple
expedient have never been approached, and were the wonder of the
world. At first, through bashfulness- the result of inexperience- I
was a little put out by a certain inconsistency- a certain air of
the bizarre (as we say in France), worn by the composition as a whole.
All the phrases did not fit (as we say in the Anglo-Saxon). Many
were quite awry. Some, even, were upside-down; and there were none
of them which were not in some measure, injured in regard to effect,
by this latter species of accident, when it occurred- with the
exception of Mr. Lewis Clarkes paragraphs, which were so vigorous
and altogether stout, that they seemed not particularly disconcerted
by any extreme of position, but looked equally happy and satisfactory,
whether on their heads, or on their heels.
What became of the editor of the "Gad-Fly" after the publication
of my criticism on his "Oil-of-Bob," it is somewhat difficult to
determine. The most reasonable conclusion is, that he wept himself
to death. At all events he disappeared instantaneously from the face
of the earth, and no man has seen even the ghost of him since.
This matter having been properly accomplished, and the Furies
appeased, I grew at once into high favor with Mr. Crab. He took me
into his confidence, gave me a permanent situation as Thomas Hawk of
the "Lollipop," and, as for the present, he could afford me no salary,
allowed me to profit, at discretion, by his advice.
"My dear Thingum," said he to me one day after dinner, "I respect
your abilities and love you as a son. You shall be my heir. When I die
I will bequeath you the "Lollipop." In the meantime I will make a
man of you- I will- provided always that you follow my counsel. The
first thing to do is to get rid of the old bore."
"Boar?" said I inquiringly- "pig, eh?- aper? (as we say in Latin)-
who?- where?"
"Your father," said he.
"Precisely," I replied- "pig."
"You have your fortune to make, Thingum," resumed Mr. Crab, "and
that governor of yours is a millstone about your neck. We must cut him
at once." [Here I took out my knife.] "We must cut him," continued Mr.
Crab, "decidedly and forever. He won't do- he won't. Upon second
thoughts, you had better kick him, or cane him, or something of that
kind."
"What do you say," I suggested modestly, "to my kicking him in the
first instance, caning him afterward, and winding up by tweaking his
nose?"
Mr. Crab looked at me musingly for some moments, and then answered:
"I think, Mr. Bob, that what you propose would answer sufficiently
well- indeed remarkably well- that is to say, as far as it went- but
barbers are exceedingly hard to cut, and I think, upon the whole,
that, having performed upon Thomas Bob the operations you suggest,
it would be advisable to blacken, with your fists, both his eyes, very
carefully and thoroughly, to prevent his ever seeing you again in
fashionable promenades. After doing this, I really do not perceive
that you can do any more. However- it might be just as well to roll
him once or twice in the gutter, and then put him in charge of the
police. Any time the next morning you can call at the watch-house
and swear an assault."
I was much affected by the kindness of feeling toward me personally,
which was evinced in this excellent advice of Mr. Crab, and I did
not fail to profit by it forthwith. The result was, that I got rid
of the old bore, and began to feel a little independent and
gentleman-like. The want of money, however, was, for a few weeks, a
source of some discomfort; but at length, by carefully putting to
use my two eyes, and observing how matters went just in front of my
nose, I perceived how the thing was to be brought about. I say
"thing"- be it observed- for they tell me in the Latin for it is
rem. By the way, talking of Latin, can any one tell me the meaning
of quocunque- or what is the meaning of modo?
My plan was exceedingly simple. I bought, for a song, a sixteenth of
the "Snapping-Turtle":- that was all. The thing was done, and I put
money in my purse. There were some trivial arrangements afterward,
to be sure, but these formed no portion of the plan. They were a
consequence- a result. For example, I bought pen, ink, and paper,
and put them into furious activity. Having thus completed a Magazine
article, I gave it, for appellation, "Fol Lol, by the Author of 'THE
OIL-OF-BOB,'" and enveloped it to the "Goosetherumfoodle." That
journal, however, having pronounced it "twattle" in the "Monthly
Notices to Correspondents," I reheaded the paper
"Hey-Diddle-Diddle," by Thigum BOB, Esq., Author of the Ode on 'The
Oil-of-Bob,' and Editor of the 'Snapping Turtle.'" With this
amendment, I re-enclosed it to the "Goosetherumfoodle," and, while I
awaited a reply, published daily, in the "Turtle," six columns of what
may be termed philosophical and analytical investigation of the
literary merits of the "Goosetherumfoodle," as well as of the personal
character of the editor of the "Goosetherumfoodle." At the end of a
week the "Goosetherumfoodle," discovered that it had, by some odd
mistake, "confounded a stupid article, headed 'Hey-Diddle-Diddle,' and
composed by some unknown ignoramus, with a gem of resplendent lustre
similarly entitled, the work of Thingum Bob, Esq, the celebrated
author of 'The Oil-of-Bob.'" The "Goosetherumfoodle" deeply "regretted
this very natural accident," and promised, moreover, an insertion of
the genuine "Hey-Diddle-Diddle" in the very next number of the
Magazine.
The fact is, I thought- I really thought- I thought at the time- I
thought then- and have no reason for thinking otherwise now- that
the "Goosetherumfoodle" did make a mistake. With the best intentions
in the world, I never knew any thing that made as many singular
mistakes as the "Goosetherumfoodle." From that day I took a liking
to the "Goosetherumfoodle" and the result was I soon saw into the very
depths of its literary merits, and did not fail to expatiate upon
them, in the "Turtle," whenever a fitting opportunity occurred. And it
is to be regarded as a very peculiar coincidence- as one of those
positively remarkable coincidences which set a man to serious
thinking- that just such a total revolution of opinion- just such
entire bouleversement (as we say in French)- just such thorough
topsiturviness (if I may be permitted to employ a rather forcible term
of the Choctaws), as happened, pro and con, between myself on the
one part, and the "Goosetherumfoodle" on the other, did actually again
happen, in a brief period afterwards, and with precisely similar
circumstances, in the case of myself and the "Rowdy-Dow," and in the
case of myself and the "Hum-Drum."
Thus it was that, by a master-stroke of genius, I at length
consummated my triumphs by "putting money in my purse," and thus may
be said really and fairly to have commenced that brilliant and
eventful career which rendered me illustrious, and which now enables
me to say with Chateaubriand: "I have made history"- J'ai fait
l'histoire."
I have indeed "made history." From the bright epoch which I now
record, my actions- my works- are the property of mankind. They are
familiar to the world. It is, then, needless for me to detail how,
soaring rapidly, I fell heir to the "Lollipop"- how I merged this
journal in the "Hum-Drum"- how again I made purchase of the
"Rowdy-Dow," thus combining the three periodicals- how lastly, I
effected a bargain for the sole remaining rival, and united all the
literature of the country in one magnificent Magazine known everywhere
as the-
Rowdy-Dow, Lollipop, Hum-Drum,
and
GOOSETHERUMFOODLE.
Yes, I have made history. My fame is universal. It extends to the
uttermost ends of the earth. You cannot take up a common newspaper
in which you shall not see some allusion to the immortal Thigum Bob.
It is Mr. Thingum Bob said so, and Mr. Thingum Bob wrote this, and Mr.
Thingum Bob did that. But I am meek and expire with an humble heart.
After all, what is it?- this indescribable something which men will
persist in terming "genius"? I agree with Buffon- with Hogarth- it
is but diligence after all.
Look at me!- how I labored- how I toiled- how I wrote! Ye Gods,
did I not write? I knew not the word "ease." By day I adhered to my
desk, and at night, a pale student, I consumed the midnight oil. You
should have seen me- you should. I leaned to the right. I leaned to
the left. I sat forward. I sat backward. I sat tete baissee (as they
have it in the Kickapoo), bowing my head close to the alabaster
page. And, through all, I- wrote. Through joy and through sorrow,
I-wrote. Through hunger and through thirst, I-wrote. Through good
report and through ill report- I wrote. Through sunshine and through
moonshine, I-wrote. What I wrote it is unnecessary to say. The style!-
that was the thing. I caught it from Fatquack- whizz!- fizz!- and I am
giving you a specimen of it now.
THE END
.

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1850
LOSS OF BREATH
A Tale Neither In nor Out of "Blackwood"
by Edgar Allan Poe
O Breathe not, etc.
Moore's Melodies
THE MOST notorious ill-fortune must in the end yield to the untiring
courage of philosophy- as the most stubborn city to the ceaseless
vigilance of an enemy. Shalmanezer, as we have it in holy writings,
lay three years before Samaria; yet it fell. Sardanapalus- see
Diodorus- maintained himself seven in Nineveh; but to no purpose.
Troy expired at the close of the second lustrum; and Azoth, as
Aristaeus declares upon his honour as a gentleman, opened at last
her gates to Psammetichus, after having barred them for the fifth part
of a century....
"Thou wretch!- thou vixen!- thou shrew!" said I to my wife on the
morning after our wedding; "thou witch!- thou hag!- thou
whippersnapper- thou sink of iniquity!- thou fiery-faced quintessence
of all that is abominable!- thou- thou-" here standing upon tiptoe,
seizing her by the throat, and placing my mouth close to her ear, I
was preparing to launch forth a new and more decided epithet of
opprobrium, which should not fail, if ejaculated, to convince her of
her insignificance, when to my extreme horror and astonishment I
discovered that I had lost my breath.
The phrases "I am out of breath," "I have lost my breath," etc., are
often enough repeated in common conversation; but it had never
occurred to me that the terrible accident of which I speak could bona
fide and actually happen! Imagine- that is if you have a fanciful
turn- imagine, I say, my wonder- my consternation- my despair!
There is a good genius, however, which has never entirely deserted
me. In my most ungovernable moods I still retain a sense of propriety,
et le chemin des passions me conduit- as Lord Edouard in the "Julie"
says it did him- a la philosophie veritable.
Although I could not at first precisely ascertain to what degree the
occurence had affected me, I determined at all events to conceal the
matter from my wife, until further experience should discover to me
the extent of this my unheard of calamity. Altering my countenance,
therefore, in a moment, from its bepuffed and distorted appearance, to
an expression of arch and coquettish benignity, I gave my lady a pat
on the one cheek, and a kiss on the other, and without saying one
syllable (Furies! I could not), left her astonished at my drollery, as
I pirouetted out of the room in a Pas de Zephyr.
Behold me then safely ensconced in my private boudoir, a fearful
instance of the ill consequences attending upon irascibility- alive,
with the qualifications of the dead- dead, with the propensities of
the living- an anomaly on the face of the earth- being very calm, yet
breathless.
Yes! breathless. I am serious in asserting that my breath was
entirely gone. I could not have stirred with it a feather if my life
had been at issue, or sullied even the delicacy of a mirror. Hard
fate!- yet there was some alleviation to the first overwhelming
paroxysm of my sorrow. I found, upon trial, that the powers of
utterance which, upon my inability to proceed in the conversation with
my wife, I then concluded to be totally destroyed, were in fact only
partially impeded, and I discovered that had I, at that interesting
crisis, dropped my voice to a singularly deep guttural, I might
still have continued to her the communication of my sentiments; this
pitch of voice (the guttural) depending, I find, not upon the
current of the breath, but upon a certain spasmodic action of the
muscles of the throat.
Throwing myself upon a chair, I remained for some time absorbed in
meditation. My reflections, be sure, were of no consolatory kind. A
thousand vague and lachrymatory fancies took possesion of my soul-
and even the idea of suicide flitted across my brain; but it is a
trait in the perversity of human nature to reject the obvious and
the ready, for the far-distant and equivocal. Thus I shuddered at
self-murder as the most decided of atrocities while the tabby cat
purred strenuously upon the rug, and the very water dog wheezed
assiduously under the table, each taking to itself much merit for
the strength of its lungs, and all obviously done in derision of my
own pulmonary incapacity.
Oppressed with a tumult of vague hopes and fears, I at length
heard the footsteps of my wife descending the staircase. Being now
assured of her absence, I returned with a palpitating heart to the
scene of my disaster.
Carefully locking the door on the inside, I commenced a vigorous
search. It was possible, I thought, that, concealed in some obscure
corner, or lurking in some closet or drawer, might be found the lost
object of my inquiry. It might have a vapory- it might even have a
tangible form. Most philosophers, upon many points of philosophy,
are still very unphilosophical. William Godwin, however, says in his
"Mandeville," that "invisible things are the only realities," and
this, all will allow, is a case in point. I would have the judicious
reader pause before accusing such asseverations of an undue quantum of
absurdity. Anaxagoras, it will be remembered, maintained that snow
is black, and this I have since found to be the case.
Long and earnestly did I continue the investigation: but the
contemptible reward of my industry and perseverance proved to be
only a set of false teeth, two pair of hips, an eye, and a bundle of
billets-doux from Mr. Windenough to my wife. I might as well here
observe that this confirmation of my lady's partiality for Mr. W.
occasioned me little uneasiness. That Mrs. Lackobreath should admire
anything so dissimilar to myself was a natural and necessary evil. I
am, it is well known, of a robust and corpulent appearance, and at the
same time somewhat diminutive in stature. What wonder, then, that
the lath-like tenuity of my acquaintance, and his altitude, which
has grown into a proverb, should have met with all due estimation in
the eyes of Mrs. Lackobreath. But to return.
My exertions, as I have before said, proved fruitless. Closet
after closet- drawer after drawer- corner after corner- were
scrutinized to no purpose. At one time, however, I thought myself sure
of my prize, having, in rummaging a dressing-case, accidentally
demolished a bottle of Grandjean's Oil of Archangels- which, as an
agreeable perfume, I here take the liberty of recommending.
With a heavy heart I returned to my boudoir- there to ponder upon
some method of eluding my wife's penetration, until I could make
arrangements prior to my leaving the country, for to this I had
already made up my mind. In a foreign climate, being unknown, I might,
with some probability of success, endeavor to conceal my unhappy
calamity- a calamity calculated, even more than beggary, to estrange
the affections of the multitude, and to draw down upon the wretch
the well-merited indignation of the virtuous and the happy. I was
not long in hesitation. Being naturally quick, I committed to memory
the entire tragedy of "Metamora." I had the good fortune to
recollect that in the accentuation of this drama, or at least of
such portion of it as is allotted to the hero, the tones of voice in
which I found myself deficient were altogether unnecessary, and the
deep guttural was expected to reign monotonously throughout.
I practised for some time by the borders of a well frequented
marsh;- herein, however, having no reference to a similar proceeding
of Demosthenes, but from a design peculiarly and conscientiously my
own. Thus armed at all points, I determined to make my wife believe
that I was suddenly smitten with a passion for the stage. In this, I
succeeded to a miracle; and to every question or suggestion found
myself at liberty to reply in my most frog-like and sepulchral tones
with some passage from the tragedy- any portion of which, as I soon
took great pleasure in observing, would apply equally well to any
particular subject. It is not to be supposed, however, that in the
delivery of such passages I was found at all deficient in the
looking asquint- the showing my teeth- the working my knees- the
shuffling my feet- or in any of those unmentionable graces which are
now justly considered the characteristics of a popular performer. To
be sure they spoke of confining me in a strait-jacket- but, good God!
they never suspected me of having lost my breath.
Having at length put my affairs in order, I took my seat very
early one morning in the mail stage for --, giving it to be
understood, among my acquaintances, that business of the last
importance required my immediate personal attendance in that city.
The coach was crammed to repletion; but in the uncertain twilight
the features of my companions could not be distinguished. Without
making any effectual resistance, I suffered myself to be placed
between two gentlemen of colossal dimensions; while a third, of a size
larger, requesting pardon for the liberty he was about to take,
threw himself upon my body at full length, and falling asleep in an
instant, drowned all my guttural ejaculations for relief, in a snore
which would have put to blush the roarings of the bull of Phalaris.
Happily the state of my respiratory faculties rendered suffocation
an accident entirely out of the question.
As, however, the day broke more distinctly in our approach to the
outskirts of the city, my tormentor, arising and adjusting his
shirt-collar, thanked me in a very friendly manner for my civility.
Seeing that I remained motionless (all my limbs were dislocated and my
head twisted on one side), his apprehensions began to be excited;
and arousing the rest of the passengers, he communicated, in a very
decided manner, his opinion that a dead man had been palmed upon
them during the night for a living and responsible fellow-traveller;
here giving me a thump on the right eye, by way of demonstrating the
truth of his suggestion.
Hereupon all, one after another (there were nine in company),
believed it their duty to pull me by the ear. A young practising
physician, too, having applied a pocket-mirror to my mouth, and
found me without breath, the assertion of my persecutor was pronounced
a true bill; and the whole party expressed a determination to endure
tamely no such impositions for the future, and to proceed no farther
with any such carcasses for the present.
I was here, accordingly, thrown out at the sign of the "Crow" (by
which tavern the coach happened to be passing), without meeting with
any farther accident than the breaking of both my arms, under the left
hind wheel of the vehicle. I must besides do the driver the justice to
state that he did not forget to throw after me the largest of my
trunks, which, unfortunately falling on my head, fractured my skull in
a manner at once interesting and extraordinary.
The landlord of the "Crow," who is a hospitable man, finding that my
trunk contained sufficient to indemnify him for any little trouble
he might take in my behalf, sent forthwith for a surgeon of his
acquaintance, and delivered me to his care with a bill and receipt for
ten dollars.
The purchaser took me to his apartments and commenced operations
immediately. Having cut off my ears, however, he discovered signs of
animation. He now rang the bell, and sent for a neighboring apothecary
with whom to consult in the emergency. In case of his suspicions
with regard to my existence proving ultimately correct, he, in the
meantime, made an incision in my stomach, and removed several of my
viscera for private dissection.
The apothecary had an idea that I was actually dead. This idea I
endeavored to confute, kicking and plunging with all my might, and
making the most furious contortions- for the operations of the
surgeon had, in a measure, restored me to the possession of my
faculties. All, however, was attributed to the effects of a new
galvanic battery, wherewith the apothecary, who is really a man of
information, performed several curious experiments, in which, from
my personal share in their fulfillment, I could not help feeling
deeply interested. It was a course of mortification to me,
nevertheless, that although I made several attempts at conversation,
my powers of speech were so entirely in abeyance, that I could not
even open my mouth; much less, then, make reply to some ingenious
but fanciful theories of which, under other circumstances, my minute
acquaintance with the Hippocratian pathology would have afforded me
a ready confutation.
Not being able to arrive at a conclusion, the practitioners remanded
me for farther examination. I was taken up into a garret; and the
surgeon's lady having accommodated me with drawers and stockings,
the surgeon himself fastened my hands, and tied up my jaws with a
pocket-handkerchief- then bolted the door on the outside as he
hurried to his dinner, leaving me alone to silence and to meditation.
I now discovered to my extreme delight that I could have spoken
had not my mouth been tied up with the pocket-handkerchief. Consoling
myself with this reflection, I was mentally repeating some passages
of the "Omnipresence of the Deity," as is my custom before resigning
myself to sleep, when two cats, of a greedy and vituperative turn,
entering at a hole in the wall, leaped up with a flourish a la
Catalani, and alighting opposite one another on my visage, betook
themselves to indecorous contention for the paltry consideration of my
nose.
But, as the loss of his ears proved the means of elevating to the
throne of Cyrus, the Magian or Mige-Gush of Persia, and as the cutting
off his nose gave Zopyrus possession of Babylon, so the loss of a
few ounces of my countenance proved the salvation of my body.
Aroused by the pain, and burning with indignation, I burst, at a
single effort, the fastenings and the bandage. Stalking across the
room I cast a glance of contempt at the belligerents, and throwing
open the sash to their extreme horror and disappointment, precipitated
myself, very dexterously, from the window.
this moment passing from the city jail to the scaffold erected for his
execution in the suburbs. His extreme infirmity and long continued ill
health had obtained him the privilege of remaining unmanacled; and
habited in his gallows costume- one very similar to my own,- he lay at
full length in the bottom of the hangman's cart (which happened to
be under the windows of the surgeon at the moment of my precipitation)
without any other guard than the driver, who was asleep, and two
recruits of the sixth infantry, who were drunk.
As ill-luck would have it, I alit upon my feet within the vehicle.
immediately, he bolted out behind, and turning down an alley, was
out of sight in the twinkling of an eye. The recruits, aroused by
the bustle, could not exactly comprehend the merits of the
transaction. Seeing, however, a man, the precise counterpart of the
felon, standing upright in the cart before their eyes, they were of
(so they expressed themselves,) and, having communicated this
opinion to one another, they took each a dram, and then knocked me
down with the butt-ends of their muskets.
It was not long ere we arrived at the place of destination. Of
course nothing could be said in my defence. Hanging was my
inevitable fate. I resigned myself thereto with a feeling half stupid,
half acrimonious. Being little of a cynic, I had all the sentiments of
a dog. The hangman, however, adjusted the noose about my neck. The
drop fell.
I forbear to depict my sensations upon the gallows; although here,
undoubtedly, I could speak to the point, and it is a topic upon
which nothing has been well said. In fact, to write upon such a
theme it is necessary to have been hanged. Every author should confine
himself to matters of experience. Thus Mark Antony composed a treatise
upon getting drunk.
I may just mention, however, that die I did not. My body was, but
I had no breath to be, suspended; and but for the knot under my left
ear (which had the feel of a military stock) I dare say that I
should have experienced very little inconvenience. As for the jerk
given to my neck upon the falling of the drop, it merely proved a
corrective to the twist afforded me by the fat gentleman in the coach.
For good reasons, however, I did my best to give the crowd the worth
of their trouble. My convulsions were said to be extraordinary. My
spasms it would have been difficult to beat. The populace encored.
Several gentlemen swooned; and a multitude of ladies were carried home
in hysterics. Pinxit availed himself of the opportunity to retouch,
from a sketch taken upon the spot, his admirable painting of the
"Marsyas flayed alive."
When I had afforded sufficient amusement, it was thought proper to
remove my body from the gallows;- this the more especially as the
real culprit had in the meantime been retaken and recognized, a fact
which I was so unlucky as not to know.
Much sympathy was, of course, exercised in my behalf, and as no
one made claim to my corpse, it was ordered that I should be
interred in a public vault.
Here, after due interval, I was deposited. The sexton departed,
and I was left alone. A line of Marston's "Malcontent"-
Death's a good fellow and keeps open house-
struck me at that moment as a palpable lie.
I knocked off, however, the lid of my coffin, and stepped out. The
place was dreadfully dreary and damp, and I became troubled with
ennui. By way of amusement, I felt my way among the numerous coffins
ranged in order around. I lifted them down, one by one, and breaking
open their lids, busied myself in speculations about the mortality
within.
"This," I soliloquized, tumbling over a carcass, puffy, bloated, and
rotund- "this has been, no doubt, in every sense of the word, an
unhappy- an unfortunate man. It has been his terrible lot not to walk
but to waddle- to pass through life not like a human being, but like
an elephant- not like a man, but like a rhinoceros.
"His attempts at getting on have been mere abortions, and his
circumgyratory proceedings a palpable failure. Taking a step
forward, it has been his misfortune to take two toward the right,
and three toward the left. His studies have been confined to the
poetry of Crabbe. He can have no idea of the wonder of a pirouette. To
him a pas de papillon has been an abstract conception. He has never
ascended the summit of a hill. He has never viewed from any steeple
the glories of a metropolis. Heat has been his mortal enemy. In the
dog-days his days have been the days of a dog. Therein, he has dreamed
of flames and suffocation- of mountains upon mountains- of Pelion upon
Ossa. He was short of breath- to say all in a word, he was short of
breath. He thought it extravagant to play upon wind instruments. He
was the inventor of self-moving fans, wind-sails, and ventilators. He
patronized Du Pont the bellows-maker, and he died miserably in
attempting to smoke a cigar. His was a case in which I feel a deep
interest- a lot in which I sincerely sympathize.
"But here,"- said I- "here"- and I dragged spitefully from its
receptacle a gaunt, tall and peculiar-looking form, whose remarkable
appearance struck me with a sense of unwelcome familiarity- "here is
a wretch entitled to no earthly commiseration." Thus saying, in
order to obtain a more distinct view of my subject, I applied my thumb
and forefinger to its nose, and causing it to assume a sitting
position upon the ground, held it thus, at the length of my arm, while
I continued my soliloquy.
-"Entitled," I repeated, "to no earthly commiseration. Who indeed
would think of compassioning a shadow? Besides, has he not had his
full share of the blessings of mortality? He was the originator of
tall monuments- shot-towers- lightning-rods- Lombardy poplars. His
treatise upon "Shades and Shadows" has immortalized him. He edited
with distinguished ability the last edition of "South on the Bones."
He went early to college and studied pneumatics. He then came home,
talked eternally, and played upon the French-horn. He patronized the
bagpipes. Captain Barclay, who walked against Time, would not walk
against him. Windham and Allbreath were his favorite writers,- his
favorite artist, Phiz. He died gloriously while inhaling gas- levique
flatu corrupitur, like the fama pudicitae in Hieronymus.* He was
indubitably a"-
*Tenera res in feminis fama pudicitiae, et quasi flos pulcherrimus,
cito ad levem marcessit auram, levique flatu corrumpitur, maxime,
&c.- Hieronymus ad Salvinam.
"How can you?- how- can- you?"- interrupted the object of my
animadversions, gasping for breath, and tearing off, with a
desperate exertion, the bandage around its jaws- "how can you, Mr.
Lackobreath, be so infernally cruel as to pinch me in that manner by
the nose? Did you not see how they had fastened up my mouth- and you
must know- if you know any thing- how vast a superfluity of breath I
have to dispose of! If you do not know, however, sit down and you
shall see. In my situation it is really a great relief to be able to
open ones mouth- to be able to expatiate- to be able to communicate
with a person like yourself, who do not think yourself called upon at
every period to interrupt the thread of a gentleman's discourse.
Interruptions are annoying and should undoubtedly be abolished- don't
you think so?- no reply, I beg you,- one person is enough to be
speaking at a time.- I shall be done by and by, and then you may
begin.- How the devil sir, did you get into this place?- not a word I
beseech you- been here some time myself- terrible accident!- heard of
it, I suppose?- awful calamity!- walking under your windows- some
short while ago- about the time you were stage-struck- horrible
occurrence!- heard of "catching one's breath," eh?- hold your tongue
I tell you!- I caught somebody elses!- had always too much of my own-
met Blab at the corner of the street- wouldn't give me a chance for a
word- couldn't get in a syllable edgeways- attacked, consequently,
with epilepsis- Blab made his escape- damn all fools!- they took me up
for dead, and put me in this place- pretty doings all of them!- heard
all you said about me- every word a lie- horrible!- wonderful-
outrageous!- hideous!- incomprehensible!- et cetera- et cetera- et
cetera- et cetera-"
It is impossible to conceive my astonishment at so unexpected a
discourse, or the joy with which I became gradually convinced that the
breath so fortunately caught by the gentleman (whom I soon
recognized as my neighbor Windenough) was, in fact, the identical
expiration mislaid by myself in the conversation with my wife. Time,
place, and circumstances rendered it a matter beyond question. I did
not at least during the long period in which the inventor of Lombardy
poplars continued to favor me with his explanations.
In this respect I was actuated by that habitual prudence which has
ever been my predominating trait. I reflected that many difficulties
might still lie in the path of my preservation which only extreme
exertion on my part would be able to surmount. Many persons, I
considered, are prone to estimate commodities in their
possession- however valueless to the then proprietor- however
troublesome, or distressing- in direct ratio with the advantages to
be derived by others from their attainment, or by themselves from
their abandonment. Might not this be the case with Mr. Windenough?
In displaying anxiety for the breath of which he was at present so
willing to get rid, might I not lay myself open to the exactions of
his avarice? There are scoundrels in this world, I remembered with a
sigh, who will not scruple to take unfair opportunities with even a
next door neighbor, and (this remark is from Epictetus) it is
precisely at that time when men are most anxious to throw off the
burden of their own calamities that they feel the least desirous of
relieving them in others.
Upon considerations similar to these, and still retaining my grasp
upon the nose of Mr. W., I accordingly thought proper to model my
reply.
"Monster!" I began in a tone of the deepest indignation- "monster
and double-winded idiot!- dost thou, whom for thine iniquities it has
pleased heaven to accurse with a two-fold respimtion- dost thou, I
say, presume to address me in the familiar language of an old
acquaintance?- 'I lie,' forsooth! and 'hold my tongue,' to be
sure!- pretty conversation indeed, to a gentleman with a single
breath!- all this, too, when I have it in my power to relieve the
calamity under which thou dost so justly suffer- to curtail the
superfluities of thine unhappy respiration."
Like Brutus, I paused for a reply- with which, like a tornado, Mr.
Windenough immediately overwhelmed me. Protestation followed upon
protestation, and apology upon apology. There were no terms with which
he was unwilling to comply, and there were none of which I failed to
take the fullest advantage.
Preliminaries being at length arranged, my acquaintance delivered me
the respiration; for which (having carefully examined it) I gave him
afterward a receipt.
I am aware that by many I shall be held to blame for speaking in a
manner so cursory, of a transaction so impalpable. It will be
thought that I should have entered more minutely, into the details
of an occurrence by which- and this is very true- much new light might
be thrown upon a highly interesting branch of physical philosophy.
To all this I am sorry that I cannot reply. A hint is the only
answer which I am permitted to make. There were circumstances- but I
think it much safer upon consideration to say as little as possible
about an affair so delicate- so delicate, I repeat, and at the time
involving the interests of a third party whose sulphurous resentment I
have not the least desire, at this moment, of incurring.
We were not long after this necessary arrangement in effecting an
escape from the dungeons of the sepulchre. The united strength of
our resuscitated voices was soon sufficiently apparent. Scissors,
the Whig editor, republished a treatise upon "the nature and origin of
subterranean noises." A reply- rejoinder- confutation- and
justification- followed in the columns of a Democratic Gazette. It
was not until the opening of the vault to decide the controversy, that
the appearance of Mr. Windenough and myself proved both parties to
have been decidedly in the wrong.
I cannot conclude these details of some very singular passages in
a life at all times sufficiently eventful, without again recalling
to the attention of the reader the merits of that indiscriminate
philosophy which is a sure and ready shield against those shafts of
calamity which can neither be seen, felt nor fully understood. It
was in the spirit of this wisdom that, among the ancient Hebrews, it
was believed the gates of Heaven would be inevitably opened to that
sinner, or saint, who, with good lungs and implicit confidence, should
vociferate the word "Amen!" It was in the spirit of this wisdom
that, when a great plague raged at Athens, and every means had been in
vain attempted for its removal, Epimenides, as Laertius relates, in
his second book, of that philosopher, advised the erection of a shrine
and temple "to the proper God."
LYTTLETON BARRY.
-THE END-
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1850
THE MAN OF THE CROWD
by Edgar Allan Poe
Ce grand malheur, de ne pouvoir etre seul.
LA BRUYERE.
IT WAS well said of a certain German book that "er lasst sich
nicht lesen"- it does not permit itself to be read. There are some
secrets which do not permit themselves to be told. Men die nightly
in their beds, wringing the hands of ghostly confessors, and looking
them piteously in the eyes- die with despair of heart and convulsion
of throat, on account of the hideousness of mysteries which will not
suffer themselves to be revealed. Now and then, alas, the conscience
of man takes up a burden so heavy in horror that it can be thrown down
only into the grave. And thus the essence of all crime is undivulged.
Not long ago, about the closing in of an evening in autumn, I sat at
the large bow- window of the D-- Coffee-House in London. For some
months I had been ill in health, but was now convalescent, and, with
returning strength, found myself in one of those happy moods which are
so precisely the converse of ennui-moods of the keenest appetency,
when the film from the mental vision departs- achlus os prin epeen-
and the intellect, electrified, surpasses as greatly its everyday
condition, as does the vivid yet candid reason of Leibnitz, the mad
and flimsy rhetoric of Gorgias. Merely to breathe was enjoyment; and I
derived positive pleasure even from many of the legitimate sources
of pain. I felt a calm but inquisitive interest in every thing. With a
cigar in my mouth and a newspaper in my lap, I had been amusing myself
for the greater part of the afternoon, now in poring over
advertisements, now in observing the promiscuous company in the
room, and now in peering through the smoky panes into the street.
This latter is one of the principal thoroughfares of the city, and
had been very much crowded during the whole day. But, as the
darkness came on, the throng momently increased; and, by the time
the lamps were well lighted, two dense and continuous tides of
population were rushing past the door. At this particular period of
the evening I had never before been in a similar situation, and the
tumultuous sea of human heads filled me, therefore, with a delicious
novelty of emotion. I gave up, at length, all care of things within
the hotel, and became absorbed in contemplation of the scene without.
At first my observations took an abstract and generalizing turn. I
looked at the passengers in masses, and thought of them in their
aggregate relations. Soon, however, I descended to details, and
regarded with minute interest the innumerable varieties of figure,
dress, air, gait, visage, and expression of countenance.
By far the greater number of those who went by had a satisfied,
business-like demeanor, and seemed to be thinking only of making their
way through the press. Their brows were knit, and their eyes rolled
quickly; when pushed against by fellow-wayfarers they evinced no
symptom of impatience, but adjusted their clothes and hurried on.
Others, still a numerous class, were restless in their movements,
had flushed faces, and talked and gesticulated to themselves, as if
feeling in solitude on account of the very denseness of the company
around. When impeded in their progress, these people suddenly ceased
muttering; but redoubled their gesticulations, and awaited, with an
absent and overdone smile upon their lips, the course of the persons
impeding them. If jostled, they bowed profusely to the jostlers, and
appeared overwhelmed with confusion. There was nothing very
distinctive about these two large classes beyond what I have noted.
Their habiliments belonged to that order which is pointedly termed the
decent. They were undoubtedly noblemen, merchants, attorneys,
tradesmen, stock-jobbers- the Eupatrids and the common-places of
society- men of leisure and men actively engaged in affairs of their
own- conducting business upon their own responsibility. They did not
greatly excite my attention.
The tribe of clerks was an obvious one; and here I discerned two
remarkable divisions. There were the junior clerks of flash houses-
young gentlemen with tight coats, bright boots, well-oiled hair, and
supercilious lips. Setting aside a certain dapperness of carriage,
which may be termed deskism for want of a better word, the manner of
these persons seemed to be an exact facsimile of what had been the
perfection of bon ton about twelve or eighteen months before. They
wore the castoff graces of the gentry;- and this, I believe,
involves the best definition of the class.
The division of the upper clerks of staunch firms, or of the "steady
old fellows," it was not possible to mistake. These were known by
their coats and pantaloons of black or brown, made to sit comfortably,
with white cravats and waistcoats, broad solid-looking shoes, and
thick hose or gaiters. They had all slightly bald heads, from which
the right ears, long used to pen-holding, had an odd habit of standing
off on end. I observed that they always removed or settled their
hats with both bands, and wore watches, with short gold chains of a
substantial and ancient pattern. Theirs was the affectation of
respectability- if indeed there be an affectation so honorable.
There were many individuals of dashing appearance, whom I easily
understood as belonging to the race of swell pick-pockets, with
which all great cities are infested. I watched these gentry with
much inquisitiveness, and found it difficult to imagine how they
should ever be mistaken for gentlemen by gentlemen themselves. Their
voluminousness of wristband, with an air of excessive frankness,
should betray them at once.
The gamblers, of whom I descried not a few, were still more easily
recognizable. They wore every variety of dress, from that of the
desperate thimble-rig bully, with velvet waistcoat, fancy neckerchief,
gilt chains, and filagreed buttons, to that of the scrupulously
inornate clergyman, than which nothing could be less liable to
suspicion. Still all were distinguished by a certain sodden
swarthiness of complexion, a filmy dimness of eye, and pallor and
compression of lip. There were two other traits, moreover, by which
I could always detect them: a guarded lowness of tone in conversation,
and a more than ordinary extension of the thumb in a direction at
right angles with the fingers. Very often, in company with these
sharpers, I observed an order of men somewhat different in habits, but
still birds of a kindred feather. They may be defined as the gentlemen
who live by their wits. They seem to prey upon the public in two
battalions- that of the dandies and that of the military men. Of the
first grade the leading features are long locks and smiles; of the
second, frogged coats and frowns.
Descending in the scale of what is termed gentility, I found
darker and deeper themes for speculation. I saw Jew pedlars, with hawk
eyes flashing from countenances whose every other feature wore only an
expression of abject humility; sturdy professional street beggars
scowling upon mendicants of a better stamp, whom despair alone had
driven forth into the night for charity; feeble and ghastly
invalids, upon whom death had placed a sure hand, and who sidled and
tottered through the mob, looking every one beseechingly in the
face, as if in search of some chance consolation, some lost hope;
modest young girls returning from long and late labor to a cheerless
home, and shrinking more tearfully than indignantly from the glances
of ruffians, whose direct contact, even, could not be avoided; women
of the town of all kinds and of all ages- the unequivocal beauty in
the prime of her womanhood, putting one in mind of the statue in
Lucian, with the surface of Parian marble, and the interior filled
with filth- the loathsome and utterly lost leper in rags- the
wrinkled, bejewelled, and paint-begrimed beldame, making a last effort
at youth- the mere child of immature form, yet, from long association,
an adept in the dreadful coquetries of her trade, and burning with a
rabid ambition to be ranked the equal of her elders in vice; drunkards
innumerable and indescribable- some in shreds and patches, reeling,
inarticulate, with bruised visage and lack-lustre eyes- some in
whole although filthy garments, with a slightly unsteady swagger,
thick sensual lips, and hearty-looking rubicund faces- others
clothed in materials which had once been good, and which even now were
scrupulously well brushed-men who walked with a more than naturally
firm and springy step, but whose countenances were fearfully pale, and
whose eyes were hideously wild and red; and who clutched with
quivering fingers, as they strode through the crowd, at every object
which came within their reach; beside these, pic-men, porters,
coal-heavers, sweeps; organ-grinders, monkey-exhibitors, and
ballad-mongers, those who vended with those who sang; ragged
artizans and exhausted laborers of every description, and all full
of a noisy and inordinate vivacity which jarred discordantly upon
the ear, and gave an aching sensation to the eye.
As the night deepened, so deepened to me the interest of the
scene; for not only did the general character of the crowd
materially alter (its gentler features retiring in the gradual
withdrawal of the more orderly portion of the people, and its
harsher ones coming out into bolder relief, as the late hour brought
forth every species of infamy from its den), but the rays of the
gas-lamps, feeble at first in their struggle with the dying day, had
now at length gained ascendancy, and threw over every thing a fitful
and garish lustre. All was dark yet splendid- as that ebony to which
has been likened the style of Tertullian.
The wild effects of the light enchained me to an examination of
individual faces; and although the rapidity with which the world of
light flitted before the window prevented me from casting more than
a glance upon each visage, still it seemed that, in my then peculiar
mental state, I could frequently read, even in that brief interval
of a glance, the history of long years.
With my brow to the glass, I was thus occupied in scrutinizing the
mob, when suddenly there came into view a countenance (that of a
decrepid old man, some sixty-five or seventy years of age)- a
countenance which at once arrested and absorbed my whole attention, on
account of the absolute idiosyncrasy of its expression. Any thing even
remotely resembling that expression I had never seen before. I well
remember that my first thought, upon beholding it, was that Retszch,
had he viewed it, would have greatly preferred it to his own
pictural incarnations of the fiend. As I endeavored, during the
brief minute of my original survey, to form some analysis of the
meaning conveyed, there arose confusedly and paradoxically within my
mind, the ideas of vast mental power, of caution, of penuriousness, of
avarice, of coolness, of malice, of blood-thirstiness, of triumph,
of merriment, of excessive terror, of intense- of supreme despair. I
felt singularly aroused, startled, fascinated. "How wild a history," I
said to myself, "is written within that bosom!" Then came a craving
desire to keep the man in view- to know more of him. Hurriedly putting
on all overcoat, and seizing my hat and cane, I made my way into the
street, and pushed through the crowd in the direction which I had seen
him take; for he had already disappeared. With some little
difficulty I at length came within sight of him, approached, and
followed him closely, yet cautiously, so as not to attract his
attention.
I had now a good opportunity of examining his person. He was short
in stature, very thin, and apparently very feeble. His clothes,
generally, were filthy and ragged; but as he came, now and then,
within the strong glare of a lamp, I perceived that his linen,
although dirty, was of beautiful texture; and my vision deceived me,
or, through a rent in a closely buttoned and evidently second-handed
roquelaire which enveloped him, I caught a glimpse both of a diamond
and of a dagger. These observations heightened my curiosity, and I
resolved to follow the stranger whithersoever he should go.
It was now fully night-fall, and a thick humid fog hung over the
city, soon ending in a settled and heavy rain. This change of
weather had an odd effect upon the crowd, the whole of which was at
once put into new commotion, and overshadowed by a world of umbrellas.
The waver, the jostle, and the hum increased in a tenfold degree.
For my own part I did not much regard the rain- the lurking of an
old fever in my system rendering the moisture somewhat too dangerously
pleasant. Tying a handkerchief about my mouth, I kept on. For half
an hour the old man held his way with difficulty along the great
thoroughfare; and I here walked close at his elbow through fear of
losing sight of him. Never once turning his head to look back, he
did not observe me. By and by he passed into a cross street, which,
although densely filled with people, was not quite so much thronged as
the main one he had quitted. Here a change in his demeanor became
evident. He walked more slowly and with less object than before-
more hesitatingly. He crossed and re-crossed the way repeatedly,
without apparent aim; and the press was still so thick, that, at every
such movement, I was obliged to follow him closely. The street was a
narrow and long one, and his course lay within it for nearly an
hour, during which the passengers had gradually diminished to about
that number which is ordinarily seen at noon in Broadway near the
park- so vast a difference is there between a London populace and that
of the most frequented American city. A second turn brought us into
a square, brilliantly lighted, and overflowing with life. The old
manner of the stranger reappeared. His chin fell upon his breast,
while his eyes rolled wildly from under his knit brows, in every
direction, upon those who hemmed him in. He urged his way steadily and
perseveringly. I was surprised, however, to find, upon his having made
the circuit of the square, that he turned and retraced his steps.
Still more was I astonished to see him repeat the same walk several
times- once nearly detecting me as he came around with a sudden
movement.
In this exercise he spent another hour, at the end of which we met
with far less interruption from passengers than at first. The rain
fell fast, the air grew cool; and the people were retiring to their
homes. With a gesture of impatience, the wanderer passed into a
by-street comparatively deserted. Down this, some quarter of a mile
long, he rushed with an activity I could not have dreamed of seeing in
one so aged, and which put me to much trouble in pursuit. A few
minutes brought us to a large and busy bazaar, with the localities
of which the stranger appeared well acquainted, and where his original
demeanor again became apparent, as he forced his way to and fro,
without aim, among the host of buyers and sellers.
During the hour and a half, or thereabouts, which we passed in
this place, it required much caution on my part to keep him within
reach without attracting his observation. Luckily I wore a pair of
caoutchouc overshoes, and could move about in perfect silence. At no
moment did he see that I watched him. He entered shop after shop,
priced nothing, spoke no word, and looked at all objects with a wild
and vacant stare. I was now utterly amazed at his behavior, and firmly
resolved that we should not part until I had satisfied myself in
some measure respecting him.
A loud-toned clock struck eleven, and the company were fast
deserting the bazaar. A shop-keeper, in putting up a shutter,
jostled the old man, and at the instant I saw a strong shudder come
over his frame. He hurried into the street, looked anxiously around
him for an instant, and then ran with incredible swiftness through
many crooked and peopleless lanes, until we emerged once more upon the
great thoroughfare whence we had started- the street of the D---Hotel.
It no longer wore, however, the same aspect. It was still brilliant
with gas; but the rain fell fiercely, and there were few persons to be
seen. The stranger grew pale. He walked moodily some paces up the once
populous avenue, then, with a heavy sigh, turned in the direction of
the river, and, plunging through a great variety of devious ways, came
out, at length, in view of one of the principal theatres. It was about
being closed, and the audience were thronging from the doors. I saw
the old man gasp as if for breath while he threw himself amid the
crowd; but I thought that the intense agony of his countenance had, in
some measure, abated. His head again fell upon his breast; he appeared
as I had seen him at first. I observed that he now took the course
in which had gone the greater number of the audience but, upon the
whole, I was at a loss to comprehend the waywardness of his actions.
As he proceeded, the company grew more scattered, and his old
uneasiness and vacillation were resumed. For some time he followed
closely a party of some ten or twelve roisterers; but from this number
one by one dropped off, until three only remained together, in a
narrow and gloomy lane, little frequented. The stranger paused, and,
for a moment, seemed lost in thought; then, with every mark of
agitation, pursued rapidly a route which brought us to the verge of
the city, amid regions very different from those we had hitherto
traversed. It was the most noisome quarter of London, where every
thing wore the worst impress of the most deplorable poverty, and of
the most desperate crime. By the dim light of an accidental lamp,
tall, antique, worm-eaten, wooden tenements were seen tottering to
their fall, in directions so many and capricious, that scarce the
semblance of a passage was discernible between them. The paving-stones
lay at random, displaced from their beds by the rankly-growing
grass. Horrible filth festered in the dammed-up gutters. The whole
atmosphere teemed with desolation. Yet, as we proceeded, the sounds of
human life revived by sure degrees, and at length large bands of the
most abandoned of a London populace were seen reeling to and fro.
The spirits of the old man again flickered up, as a lamp which is near
its death-hour. Once more he strode onward with elastic tread.
Suddenly a corner was turned, a blaze of light burst upon our sight,
and we stood before one of the huge suburban temples of
Intemperance- one of the palaces of the fiend, Gin.
It was now nearly daybreak; but a number of wretched inebriates
still pressed in and out of the flaunting entrance. With a half shriek
of joy the old man forced a passage within, resumed at once his
original bearing, and stalked backward and forward, without apparent
object, among the throng. He had not been thus long occupied, however,
before a rush to the doors gave token that the host was closing them
for the night. It was something even more intense than despair that
I then observed upon the countenance of the singular being whom I
had watched so pertinaciously. Yet he did not hesitate in his
career, but, with a mad energy, retraced his steps at once, to the
heart of the mighty London. Long and swiftly he fled, while I followed
him in the wildest amazement, resolute not to abandon a scrutiny in
which I now felt an interest all-absorbing. The sun arose while we
proceeded, and, when we had once again reached that most thronged mart
of the populous town, the street of the D-- Hotel, it presented an
appearance of human bustle and activity scarcely inferior to what I
had seen on the evening before. And here, long, amid the momently
increasing confusion, did I persist in my pursuit of the stranger.
But, as usual, he walked to and fro, and during the day did not pass
from out the turmoil of that street. And, as the shades of the
second evening came on, I grew wearied unto death, and, stopping fully
in front of the wanderer, gazed at him steadfastly in the face. He
noticed me not, but resumed his solemn walk, while I, ceasing to
follow, remained absorbed in contemplation. "The old man," I said at
length, "is the type and the genius of deep crime. He refuses to be
alone. He is the man of the crowd. It will be in vain to follow, for I
shall learn no more of him, nor of his deeds. The worst heart of the
world is a grosser book than the 'Hortulus Animae,'* and perhaps it is
but one of the great mercies of God that "er lasst sich nicht lesen."
* The "Hortulus Animae cum Oratiunculis Aliquibus Superadditis" of
Grunninger.
THE END
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1850
THE MAN THAT WAS USED UP
A Tale of the Late Bugaboo and Kickapoo Campaign
by Edgar Allan Poe
Pleurez, pleurez, mes yeux, et fondez vous en eau!
La moitie de ma vie a mis l'autre au tombeau.
CORNEILLE
I CANNOT just now remember when or where I first made the
acquaintance of that truly fine-looking fellow, Brevet Brigadier
General John A. B. C. Smith. Some one did introduce me to the
gentleman, I am sure- at some public meeting, I know very well- held
about something of great importance, no doubt- at some place or other,
I feel convinced, whose name I have unaccountably forgotten. The truth
is- that the introduction was attended, upon my part, with a degree of
anxious embarrassment which operated to prevent any definite
impressions of either time or place. I am constitutionally nervous-
this, with me, is a family failing, and I can't help it. In
especial, the slightest appearance of mystery- of any point I cannot
exactly comprehend- puts me at once into a pitiable state of
agitation.
There was something, as it were, remarkable- yes, remarkable,
although this is but a feeble term to express my full meaning- about
the entire individuality of the personage in question. He was,
perhaps, six feet in height, and of a presence singularly
commanding. There was an air distingue pervading the whole man,
which spoke of high breeding, and hinted at high birth. Upon this
topic- the topic of Smith's personal appearance- I have a kind of
melancholy satisfaction in being minute. His head of hair would have
done honor to a Brutus,- nothing could be more richly flowing, or
possess a brighter gloss. It was of a jetty black,- which was also the
color, or more properly the no-color of his unimaginable whiskers. You
perceive I cannot speak of these latter without enthusiasm; it is
not too much to say that they were the handsomest pair of whiskers
under the sun. At all events, they encircled, and at times partially
overshadowed, a mouth utterly unequalled. Here were the most
entirely even, and the most brilliantly white of all conceivable
teeth. From between them, upon every proper occasion, issued a voice
of surpassing clearness, melody, and strength. In the matter of
eyes, also, my acquaintance was pre-eminently endowed. Either one of
such a pair was worth a couple of the ordinary ocular organs. They
were of a deep hazel exceedingly large and lustrous; and there was
perceptible about them, ever and anon, just that amount of interesting
obliquity which gives pregnancy to expression.
The bust of the General was unquestionably the finest bust I ever
saw. For your life you could not have found a fault with its wonderful
proportion. This rare peculiarity set off to great advantage a pair of
shoulders which would have called up a blush of conscious
inferiority into the countenance of the marble Apollo. I have a
passion for fine shoulders, and may say that I never beheld them in
perfection before. The arms altogether were admirably modelled. Nor
were the lower limbs less superb. These were, indeed, the ne plus
ultra of good legs. Every connoisseur in such matters admitted the
legs to be good. There was neither too much flesh nor too little,-
neither rudeness nor fragility. I could not imagine a more graceful
curve than that of the os femoris, and there was just that due
gentle prominence in the rear of the fibula which goes to the
conformation of a properly proportioned calf. I wish to God my young
and talented friend Chiponchipino, the sculptor, had but seen the legs
of Brevet Brigadier General John A. B. C. Smith.
But although men so absolutely fine-looking are neither as plenty as
reasons or blackberries, still I could not bring myself to believe
that the remarkable something to which I alluded just now,- that the
odd air of je ne sais quoi which hung about my new acquaintance,-
lay altogether, or indeed at all, in the supreme excellence of his
bodily endowments. Perhaps it might be traced to the manner,- yet here
again I could not pretend to be positive. There was a primness, not to
say stiffness, in his carriage- a degree of measured and, if I may
so express it, of rectangular precision attending his every
movement, which, observed in a more diminutive figure, would have
had the least little savor in the world of affectation, pomposity,
or constraint, but which, noticed in a gentleman of his undoubted
dimensions, was readily placed to the account of reserve, hauteur-
of a commendable sense, in short, of what is due to the dignity of
colossal proportion.
The kind friend who presented me to General Smith whispered in my
ear some few words of comment upon the man. He was a remarkable man- a
very remarkable man- indeed one of the most remarkable men of the age.
He was an especial favorite, too, with the ladies- chiefly on
account of his high reputation for courage.
"In that point he is unrivalled- indeed he is a perfect desperado- a
downright fire-eater, and no mistake," said my friend, here dropping
his voice excessively low, and thrilling me with the mystery of his
tone.
"A downright fire-eater, and no mistake. Showed that, I should
say, to some purpose, in the late tremendous swamp-fight, away down
South, with the Bugaboo and Kickapoo Indians." [Here my friend
opened his eyes to some extent.] "Bless my soul!- blood and thunder,
and all that!- prodigies of valor!- heard of him of course?- you
know he's the man-"
"Man alive, how do you do? why, how are ye? very glad to see ye,
indeed!" here interrupted the General himself, seizing my companion by
the hand as he drew near, and bowing stiffly but profoundly, as I
was presented. I then thought (and I think so still) that I never
heard a clearer nor a stronger voice, nor beheld a finer set of teeth:
but I must say that I was sorry for the interruption just at that
moment, as, owing to the whispers and insinuations aforesaid, my
interest had been greatly excited in the hero of the Bugaboo and
Kickapoo campaign.
However, the delightfully luminous conversation of Brevet
Brigadier General John A. B. C. Smith soon completely dissipated
this chagrin. My friend leaving us immediately, we had quite a long
tete-a-tete, and I was not only pleased but really-instructed. I never
heard a more fluent talker, or a man of greater general information.
With becoming modesty, he forebore, nevertheless, to touch upon the
theme I had just then most at heart- I mean the mysterious
circumstances attending the Bugaboo war- and, on my own part, what I
conceive to be a proper sense of delicacy forbade me to broach the
subject; although, in truth, I was exceedingly tempted to do so. I
perceived, too, that the gallant soldier preferred topics of
philosophical interest, and that he delighted, especially, in
commenting upon the rapid march of mechanical invention. Indeed,
lead him where I would, this was a point to which he invariably came
back.
"There is nothing at all like it," he would say, "we are a wonderful
people, and live in a wonderful age. Parachutes and
rail-roads-mantraps and spring-guns! Our steam-boats are upon every
sea, and the Nassau balloon packet is about to run regular trips (fare
either way only twenty pounds sterling) between London and
Timbuctoo. And who shall calculate the immense influence upon social
life- upon arts- upon commerce- upon literature- which will be the
immediate result of the great principles of electro-magnetics! Nor, is
this all, let me assure you! There is really no end to the march of
invention. The most wonderful- the most ingenious- and let me add,
Mr.- Mr.- Thompson, I believe, is your name- let me add, I say the
most useful- the most truly useful- mechanical contrivances are
daily springing up like mushrooms, if I may so express myself, or,
more figuratively, like- ah- grasshoppers- like grasshoppers, Mr.
Thompson- about us and ah- ah- ah- around us!"
Thompson, to be sure, is not my name; but it is needless to say that
I left General Smith with a heightened interest in the man, with an
exalted opinion of his conversational powers, and a deep sense of
the valuable privileges we enjoy in living in this age of mechanical
invention. My curiosity, however, had not been altogether satisfied,
and I resolved to prosecute immediate inquiry among my
acquaintances, touching the Brevet Brigadier General himself, and
particularly respecting the tremendous events quorum pars magna
fuit, during the Bugaboo and Kickapoo campaign.
The first opportunity which presented opportunity which presented
itself, and which (horresco referens) I did not in the least scruple
to seize, occurred at the Church of the Reverend Doctor Drummummupp,
where I found myself established, one Sunday, just at sermon time, not
only in the pew, but by the side of that worthy and communicative
little friend of mine, Miss Tabitha T. Thus seated, I congratulated
myself, and with much reason, upon the very flattering state of
affairs. If any person knew any thing about Brevet Brigadier General
John A. B. C. Smith, that person it was clear to me, was Miss
Tabitha T. We telegraphed a few signals and then commenced, soto voce,
a brisk tete-a-tete.
"Smith!" said she in reply to my very earnest inquiry: "Smith!- why,
not General John A. B. C.? Bless me, I thought you knew all about him!
This is a wonderfully inventive age! Horrid affair that!- a bloody set
of wretches, those Kickapoos!- fought like a hero- prodigies of valor-
immortal renown. Smith!- Brevet Brigadier General John A. B. C.!
Why, you know he's the man-
"Man," here broke in Doctor Drummummupp, at the top of his voice,
and with a thump that came near knocking the pulpit about our ears;
"man that is born of a woman hath but a short time to live; he
cometh up and is cut down like a flower!" I started to the extremity
of the pew, and perceived by the animated looks of the divine, that
the wrath which had nearly proved fatal to the pulpit had been excited
by the whispers of the lady and myself. There was no help for it; so I
submitted with a good grace, and listened, in all the martyrdom of
dignified silence, to the balance of that very capital discourse.
Next evening found me a somewhat late visitor at the Rantipole
Theatre, where I felt sure of satisfying my curiosity at once, by
merely stepping into the box of those exquisite specimens of
affability and omniscience, the Misses Arabella and Miranda
Cognoscenti. That fine tragedian, Climax, was doing Iago to a very
crowded house, and I experienced some little difficulty in making my
wishes understood; especially as our box was next the slips, and
completely overlooked the stage.
"Smith!" said Miss Arabella, as she at comprehended the purport of
my query; "Smith?- why, not General John A. B. C.?"
"Smith!" inquired Miranda, musingly. "God bless me, did you ever
behold a finer figure?"
"Never, madam, but do tell me-"
"Or so inimitable grace?"
"Never, upon my word!- But pray, inform me-"
"Or so just an appreciation of stage effect?"
"Madam!"
"Or a more delicate sense of the true beauties of Shakespeare? Be so
good as to look at that leg!"
"The devil!" and I turned again to her sister.
"Smith!" said she, "why, not General John A. B. C.? Horrid affair
that, wasn't it?- great wretches, those Bugaboos- savage and so on-
but we live in a wonderfully inventive age!- Smith!- O yes! great
man!- perfect desperado- immortal renown- prodigies of valor! Never
heard!" [This was given in a scream.] "Bless my soul! why, he's the
man-"
"-mandragora
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou ow'dst yesterday!"
here roared our Climax just in my ear, and shaking his fist in my face
all the time, in a way that I couldn't stand, and I wouldn't. I left
the Misses Cognoscenti immediately, went behind the scenes
forthwith, and gave the beggarly scoundrel such a thrashing as I trust
he will remember till the day of his death.
At the soiree of the lovely widow, Mrs. Kathleen O'Trump, I was
confident that I should meet with no similar disappointment.
Accordingly, I was no sooner seated at the card-table, with my
pretty hostess for a vis-a-vis, than I propounded those questions
the solution of which had become a matter so essential to my peace.
"Smith!" said my partner, "why, not General John A. B. C.? Horrid
affair that, wasn't it?- diamonds did you say?- terrible wretches
those Kickapoos!- we are playing whist, if you please, Mr. Tattle-
however, this is the age of invention, most certainly the age, one may
say- the age par excellence- speak French?- oh, quite a hero-
perfect desperado!- no hearts, Mr. Tattle? I don't believe it!-
Immortal renown and all that!- prodigies of valor! Never heard!!- why,
bless me, he's the man-"
"Mann?- Captain Mann!" here screamed some little feminine interloper
from the farthest corner of the room. "Are you talking about Captain
Mann and the duel?- oh, I must hear- do tell- go on, Mrs. O'Trump!- do
now go on!" And go on Mrs. O'Trump did- all about a certain Captain
Mann, who was either shot or hung, or should have been both shot and
hung. Yes! Mrs. O'Trump, she went on, and I- I went off. There was
no chance of hearing any thing farther that evening in regard to
Brevet Brigadier General John A. B. C. Smith.
Still I consoled myself with the reflection that the tide of
ill-luck would not run against me forever, and so determined to make a
bold push for information at the rout of that bewitching little angel,
the graceful Mrs. Pirouette.
"Smith!" said Mrs. P., as we twirled about together in a pas de
zephyr, "Smith?- why, not General John A. B. C.? Dreadful business
that of the Bugaboos, wasn't it?- dreadful creatures, those
Indians!- do turn out your toes! I really am ashamed of you- man of
great courage, poor fellow!- but this is a wonderful age for
invention- O dear me, I'm out of breath- quite a desperado-
prodigies of valor- never heard!!- can't believe it- I shall have to
sit down and enlighten you- Smith! why, he's the man-"
"Man-Fred, I tell you!" here bawled out Miss Bas-Bleu, as I led Mrs.
Pirouette to a seat. "Did ever anybody hear the like? It's Man-Fred, I
say, and not at all by any means Man-Friday." Here Miss Bas-Bleu
beckoned to me in a very peremptory manner; and I was obliged, will
I nill I, to leave Mrs. P. for the purpose of deciding a dispute
touching the title of a certain poetical drama of Lord Byron's.
Although I pronounced, with great promptness, that the true title
was Man-Friday, and not by any means Man-Fred yet when I returned to
seek Mrs. Pirouette she was not to be discovered, and I made my
retreat from the house in a very bitter spirit of animosity against
the whole race of the Bas-Bleus.
Matters had now assumed a really serious aspect, and I resolved to
call at once upon my particular friend, Mr. Theodore Sinivate; for I
knew that here at least I should get something like definite
information.
"Smith!" said he, in his well known peculiar way of drawling out his
syllables; "Smith!- why, not General John A. B. C.? Savage affair that
with the Kickapo-o-o-os, wasn't it? Say, don't you think so?-
perfect despera-a-ado- great pity, 'pon my honor!- wonderfully
inventive age!- pro-o-digies of valor! By the by, did you ever hear
about Captain Ma-a-a-a-n?"
"Captain Mann be d-d!" said I; "please to go on with your story."
"Hem!- oh well!- quite la meme cho-o-ose, as we say in France.
Smith, eh? Brigadier-General John A. B. C.? I say"- [here Mr. S.
thought proper to put his finger to the side of his nose]- "I say, you
don't mean to insinuate now, really and truly, and conscientiously,
that you don't know all about that affair of Smith's, as well as I do,
eh? Smith? John A-B-C.? Why, bless me, he's the ma-a-an-"
"Mr. Sinivate," said I, imploringly, "is he the man in the mask?"
"No-o-o!" said he, looking wise, "nor the man in the mo-o-on."
This reply I considered a pointed and positive insult, and so left
the house at once in high dudgeon, with a firm resolve to call my
friend, Mr. Sinivate, to a speedy account for his ungentlemanly
conduct and ill breeding.
In the meantime, however, I had no notion of being thwarted touching
the information I desired. There was one resource left me yet. I would
go to the fountain head. I would call forthwith upon the General
himself, and demand, in explicit terms, a solution of this
abominable piece of mystery. Here, at least, there should be no chance
for equivocation. I would be plain, positive, peremptory- as short
as pie-crust- as concise as Tacitus or Montesquieu.
It was early when I called, and the General was dressing, but I
pleaded urgent business, and was shown at once into his bedroom by
an old negro valet, who remained in attendance during my visit. As I
entered the chamber, I looked about, of course, for the occupant,
but did not immediately perceive him. There was a large and
exceedingly odd looking bundle of something which lay close by my feet
on the floor, and, as I was not in the best humor in the world, I gave
it a kick out of the way.
"Hem! ahem! rather civil that, I should say!" said the bundle, in
one of the smallest, and altogether the funniest little voices,
between a squeak and a whistle, that I ever heard in all the days of
my existence.
"Ahem! rather civil that I should observe."
I fairly shouted with terror, and made off, at a tangent, into the
farthest extremity of the room.
"God bless me, my dear fellow!" here again whistled the bundle,
"what- what- what- why, what is the matter? I really believe you don't
know me at all."
What could I say to all this- what could I? I staggered into an
armchair, and, with staring eyes and open mouth, awaited the
solution of the wonder.
"Strange you shouldn't know me though, isn't it?" presently
resqueaked the nondescript, which I now perceived was performing
upon the floor some inexplicable evolution, very analogous to the
drawing on of a stocking. There was only a single leg, however,
apparent.
"Strange you shouldn't know me though, isn't it? Pompey, bring me
that leg!" Here Pompey handed the bundle a very capital cork leg,
already dressed, which it screwed on in a trice; and then it stood
upright before my eyes.
"And a bloody action it was," continued the thing, as if in a
soliloquy; "but then one mustn't fight with the Bugaboos and
Kickapoos, and think of coming off with a mere scratch. Pompey, I'll
thank you now for that arm. Thomas" [turning to me] "is decidedly
the best hand at a cork leg; but if you should ever want an arm, my
dear fellow, you must really let me recommend you to Bishop." Here
Pompey screwed on an arm.
"We had rather hot work of it, that you may say. Now, you dog,
slip on my shoulders and bosom. Pettit makes the best shoulders, but
for a bosom you will have to go to Ducrow."
"Bosom!" said I.
"Pompey, will you never be ready with that wig? Scalping is a
rough process, after all; but then you can procure such a capital
scratch at De L'Orme's."
"Scratch!"
"Now, you nigger, my teeth! For a good set of these you had better
go to Parmly's at once; high prices, but excellent work. I swallowed
some very capital articles, though, when the big Bugaboo rammed me
down with the butt end of his rifle."
"Butt end! ram down!! my eye!!"
"O yes, by the way, my eye- here, Pompey, you scamp, screw it in!
Those Kickapoos are not so very slow at a gouge; but he's a belied
man, that Dr. Williams, after all; you can't imagine how well I see
with the eyes of his make."
I now began very clearly to perceive that the object before me was
nothing more nor less than my new acquaintance, Brevet Brigadier
General John A. B. C. Smith. The manipulations of Pompey had made, I
must confess, a very striking difference in the appearance of the
personal man. The voice, however, still puzzled me no little; but even
this apparent mystery was speedily cleared up.
"Pompey, you black rascal," squeaked the General, "I really do
believe you would let me go out without my palate."
Hereupon, the negro, grumbling out an apology, went up to his
master, opened his mouth with the knowing air of a horse-jockey, and
adjusted therein a somewhat singular-looking machine, in a very
dexterous manner, that I could not altogether comprehend. The
alteration, however, in the entire expression of the General's
countenance was instantaneous and surprising. When he again spoke, his
voice had resumed all that rich melody and strength which I had
noticed upon our original introduction.
"D-n the vagabonds!" said he, in so clear a tone that I positively
started at the change, "D-n the vagabonds! they not only knocked in
the roof of my mouth, but took the trouble to cut off at least
seven-eighths of my tongue. There isn't Bonfanti's equal, however,
in America, for really good articles of this description. I can
recommend you to him with confidence," [here the General bowed,]
"and assure you that I have the greatest pleasure in so doing."
I acknowledged his kindness in my best manner, and took leave of him
at once, with a perfect understanding of the true state of affairs-
with a full comprehension of the mystery which had troubled me so
long. It was evident. It was a clear case. Brevet Brigadier General
John A. B. C. Smith was the man- the man that was used up.
THE END
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1844-49
MARGINALIA
by Edgar Allan Poe
MARGINALIA
DEMOCRATIC REVIEW, November, 1844
In getting my books, I have been always solicitous of an ample
margin; this not so much through any love of the thing in itself,
however agreeable, as for the facility it affords me of pencilling
suggested thoughts, agreements, and differences of opinion, or brief
critical comments in general. Where what I have to note is too much to
be included within the narrow limits of a margin, I commit it to a
slip of paper, and deposit it between the leaves; taking care to
secure it by an imperceptible portion of gum tragacanth paste.
All this may be whim; it may be not only a very hackneyed, but a
very idle practice;- yet I persist in it still; and it affords me
pleasure; which is profit, in despite of Mr. Bentham, with Mr. Mill on
his back.
This making of notes, however, is by no means the making of mere
memorandum- a custom which has its disadvantages, beyond doubt "Ce que
je mets sur papier," says Bernadine de St. Pierre, "je remets de ma
memoire et par consequence je l'oublie;"- and, in fact, if you wish to
forget anything upon the spot, make a note that this thing is to be
remembered.
But the purely marginal jottings, done with no eye to the Memorandum
Book, have a distinct complexion, and not only a distinct purpose, but
none at all; this it is which imparts to them a value. They have a
rank somewhat above the chance and desultory comments of literary
chit-chat- for these latter are not unfrequently "talk for talk's
sake," hurried out of the mouth; while the marginalia are deliberately
pencilled, because the mind of the reader wishes to unburthen itself
of a thought;- however flippant- however silly- however trivial- still
a thought indeed, not merely a thing that might have been a thought in
time, and under more favorable circumstances. In the marginalia,
too, we talk only to ourselves; we therefore talk freshly- boldly-
originally- with abandonnement- without conceit- much after the
fashion of Jeremy Taylor, and Sir Thomas Browne, and Sir William
Temple, and the anatomical Burton, and that most logical analogist,
Butler, and some other people of the old day, who were too full of
their matter to have any room for their manner, which, being thus left
out of question, was a capital manner, indeed,- a model of manners,
with a richly marginalic air.
The circumscription of space, too, in these pencillings, has in it
something more of advantage than of inconvenience. It compels us
(whatever diffuseness of idea we may clandestinely entertain), into
Montesquieu-ism, into Tacitus-ism (here I leave out of view the
concluding portion of the "Annals")- or even into Carlyle-ism- a thing
which, I have been told, is not to be confounded with your ordinary
affectation and bad grammar. I say "bad grammar," through sheer
obstinacy, because the grammarians (who should know better) insist
upon it that I should not. But then grammar is not what these
grammarians will have it; and, being merely the analysis of
language, with the result of this analysis, must be good or bad just
as the analyst is sage or silly- just as he is Horne Tooke or a
Cobbett.
But to our sheep. During a rainy afternoon, not long ago, being in a
mood too listless for continuous study, I sought relief from ennui
in dipping here and there, at random, among the volumes of my library-
no very large one, certainly, but sufficiently miscellaneous; and, I
flatter myself, not a little recherche.
Perhaps it was what the Germans call the "brain-scattering" humor of
the moment; but, while the picturesqueness of the numerous
pencil-scratches arrested my attention, their helter-skelter-iness
of commentary amused me. I found myself at length forming a wish
that it had been some other hand than my own which had so bedevilled
the books, and fancying that, in such case, I might have derived no
inconsiderable pleasure from turning them over. From this the
transition- thought (as Mr. Lyell, or Mr. Murchison, or Mr.
Featherstonhaugh would have it) was natural enough:- there might be
something even in my scribblings which, for the mere sake of
scribblings would have interest for others.
The main difficulty respected the mode of transferring the notes
from the volumes- the context from the text- without detriment to that
exceedingly frail fabric of intelligibility in which the context was
imbedded. With all appliances to boot, with the printed pages at their
back, the commentaries were too often like Dodona's oracles- or
those of Lycophron Tenebrosus- or the essays of the pedant's pupils,
in Quintilian, which were "necessarily excellent, since even he (the
pedant) found it impossible to comprehend them":- what, then, would
become of it- this context- if transferred?- if translated? Would it
not rather be traduit (traduced) which is the French synonym, or
overzezet (turned topsy-turvy) which is the Dutch one?
I concluded, at length, to put extensive faith in the acumen and
imagination of the reader:- this as a general rule. But, in some
instances, where even faith would not remove mountains, there seemed
no safer plan than so to re-model the note as to convey at least the
ghost of a conception as to what it was all about. Where, for such
conception, the text itself was absolutely necessary, I could quote
it, where the title of the book commented upon was indispensable, I
could name it. In short, like a novel-hero dilemma'd, I made up my
mind "to be guided by circumstances," in default of more
satisfactory rules of conduct.
As for the multitudinous opinion expressed in the subjoined farrago-
as for my present assent to all, or dissent from any portion of it- as
to the possibility of my having, in some instances, altered my mind-
or as to the impossibility of my not having altered it often- these
are points upon which I say nothing, because upon these there can be
nothing cleverly said. It may be as well to observe, however, that
just as the goodness of your true pun is in the direct ratio of its
intolerability, so is nonsense the essential sense of the Marginal
Note.
I have seen many computations respecting the greatest amount of
erudition attainable by an individual in his life-time, but these
computations are falsely based, and fall infinitely beneath the truth.
It is true that, in general we retain, we remember to available
purpose, scarcely one-hundredth part of what we read; yet there are
minds which not only retain all receipts, but keep them at compound
interest forever. Again:- were every man supposed to read out, he
could read, of course, very little, even in half a century; for, in
such case, each individual word must be dwelt upon in some degree.
But, in reading to ourselves, at the ordinary rate of what is called
"light reading," we scarcely touch one word in ten. And, even
physically considered, knowledge breeds knowledge, as gold gold; for
he who reads really much, finds his capacity to read increase in
geometrical ratio. The helluo librorum will but glance at the page
which detains the ordinary reader some minutes; and the difference
in the absolute reading (its uses considered), will be in favor of the
helluo, who will have winnowed the matter of which the tyro mumbled
both the seeds and the chaff. A deep-rooted and strictly continuous
habit of reading will, with certain classes of intellect, result in an
instinctive and seemingly magnetic appreciation of a thing written;
and now the student reads by pages just as other men by words. Long
years to come, with a careful analysis of the mental process, may even
render this species of appreciation a common thing. It may be taught
in the schools of our descendants of the tenth or twentieth
generation. It may become the method of the mob of the eleventh or
twenty-first. And should these matters come to pass- as they will-
there will be in them no more legitimate cause for wonder than there
is, to-day, in the marvel that, syllable by syllable, men comprehend
what, letter by letter, I now trace upon this page.
Is it not a law that need has a tendency to engender the thing
needed?
Moore has been noted for the number of appositeness, as well as
novelty of his similes; and the renown thus acquired is indicial of
his deficiency in that noble merit- the noblest of all. No poet thus
distinguished was ever richly ideal. Pope and Cowper are instances.
Direct similes are of too palpably artificial a character to be
artistical. An artist will always contrive to weave his
illustrations into the metaphorical form.
Moore has a peculiar facility in prosaically telling a poetical
story. By this I mean that he preserves the tone and method of
arrangement of a prose relation, and thus obtains great advantage,
in important points, over his more stilted compeers. His is no
poetical style (such as the French have- a distinct style for a
distinct purpose) but an easy and ordinary prose manner, which rejects
the licenses because it does not require them, and is merely
ornamented into poetry. By means of this manner he is enabled to
encounter, effectually, details which would baffle any other versifier
of the day; and at which Lamartine would stand aghast. In
"Alciphron" we see this exemplified. Here the minute and perplexed
incidents of the descent into the pyramid, are detailed, in verse,
with quite as much precision and intelligibility as could be
attained even by the coolest prose of Mr. Jeremy Bentham.
Moore has vivacity; verbal and constructive dexterity; a musical ear
not sufficiently cultivated; a vivid fancy; an epigrammatic spirit;
and a fine taste- as far as it goes.
Democratic Review, December, 1844
I am not sure that Tennyson is not the greatest of poets. The
uncertainty attending the public conception of the term "poet" alone
prevents me from demonstrating that he is. Other bards produce effects
which are, now and then, otherwise produced than by what we call
poems; but Tennyson an effect which only a poem does. His alone are
idiosyncratic poems. By the enjoyment or non-enjoyment of the "Morte
D'Arthur" or of the "Oenone," I would test any one's ideal sense.
There are passages in his works which rivet a conviction I had
long entertained, that the indefinite is an element in the true
poiesis. Why do some persons fatigue themselves in attempts to unravel
such fantasy-pieces as the "Lady of Shalott"? As well unweave the
"ventum textilem." If the author did not deliberately propose to
himself a suggestive indefinitiveness of meaning with the view of
bringing about a definitiveness of vague and therefore of spiritual
effect- this, at least, arose from the silent analytical promptings of
that poetic genius which, in its supreme development, embodies all
orders of intellectual capacity.
I know that indefinitiveness is an element of the true music- I mean
of the true musical expression. Give to it any undue decision- imbue
it with any very determinate tone- and you deprive it at once of its
ethereal, its ideal, its intrinsic and essential character. You dispel
its luxury of dream. You dissolve the atmosphere of the mystic upon
which it floats. You exhaust it of its breath of fiery. It now becomes
a tangible and easily appreciable idea- a thing of the earth,
earthy. It has not, indeed, lost its power to please, but all which
I consider the distinctiveness of that power. And to the
uncultivated talent, or to the unimaginative apprehension, this
deprivation of its most delicate air will be, not unfrequently, a
recommendation. A determinateness of expression is sought- and often
by composers who should know better- is sought as a beauty rather than
rejected as a blemish. Thus we have, even from high authorities,
attempts at absolute imitation in music. Who can forget the
silliness of the "Battle of Prague"? What man of taste but must
laugh at the interminable drums, trumpets, blunderbusses, and thunder?
"Vocal music," says L'Abbate Gravina, who would have said the same
thing of instrumental, "ought to imitate the natural language of the
human feelings and passions, rather than the warblings of canary
birds, which our singers, now-a-days, affect so vastly to mimic with
their quaverings and boasted cadences." This is true only so far as
the "rather" is concerned. If any music must imitate anything, it were
assuredly better to limit the imitation as Gravina suggests.
Tennyson's shorter pieces abound in minute rhythmical lapses
sufficient to asure me that- in common with all poets living or
dead- he has neglected to make precise investigation of the principles
of metre; but, on the other hand, so perfect is his rhythmical
instinct in general that, like the present Viscount Canterbury, he
seems to see with his ear.
Godey's Lady's Book, September, 1845
The increase, within a few years, of the magazine literature, is
by no means to be regarded as indicating what some critics would
suppose it to indicate- a downward tendency in American taste or in
American letters. It is but a sign of the times, an indication of an
era in which men are forced upon the curt, the condensed, the
well-digested in place of the voluminous- in a word, upon journalism
in lieu of dissertation. We need now the light artillery rather than
the peace-makers of the intellect. I will not be sure that men at
present think more profoundly than half a century ago, but beyond
question they think with more rapidity, with more skill, with more
tact, with more of method and less of excrescence in the thought.
Besides all this, they have a vast increase in the thinking
material; they have more facts, more to think about. For this
reason, they are disposed to put the greatest amount of thought in the
smallest compass and disperse it with the utmost attainable
rapidity. Hence the journalism of the age; hence, in especial,
magazines. Too many we cannot have, as a general proposition; but we
demand that they have sufficient merit to render them noticeable in
the beginning, and that they continue in existence sufficiently long
to permit us a fair estimation of their value.
Broadway Journal, Oct. 4, 1845
Much has been said, of late, about the necessity of maintaining
a proper nationality in American Letters; but what this nationality
is, or what is to be gained by it, has never been distinctly
understood. That an American should confine himself to American
themes, or even prefer them, is rather a political than a literary
idea- and at best is a questionable point. We would do well to bear in
mind that "distance lends enchantment to the view." Ceteris paribus, a
foreign theme is, in a strictly literary sense, to be preferred. After
all, the world at large is the only legitimate stage for the
autorial histrio.
But of the need of that nationality which defends our own
literature, sustains our own men of letters, upholds our own
dignity, and depends upon our own resources, there can not be the
shadow of a doubt. Yet here is the very point at which we are most
supine. We complain of our want of International Copyright on the
ground that this want justifies our publishers in inundating us with
British opinion in British books; and yet when these very
publishers, at their own obvious risk, and even obvious loss, do
publish an American book, we turn up our noses at it with supreme
contempt (this is a general thing) until it (the American book) has
been dubbed "readable" by some literate Cockney critic. Is it too much
to say that, with us, the opinion of Washington Irving- of Prescott-
of Bryant- is a mere nullity in comparison with that of any
anonymous sub-sub-editor of the Spectator, the Athenaeum, or the
London Punch? It is not saying too much to say this. It is a solemn-
an absolutely awful fact. Every publisher in the country will admit it
to be a fact. There is not a more disgusting spectacle under the sun
than our subserviency to British criticism. It is disgusting, first
because it is truckling, servile, pusilanimous- secondly, because of
its gross irrationality. We know the British to bear us little but ill
will- we know that, in no case, do they utter unbiased opinions of
American books- we know that in the few instances in which our writers
have been treated with common decency in England, these writers have
either openly paid homage to English institutions, or have had lurking
at the bottom of their hearts a secret principle at war with
Democracy:- we know all this, and yet, day after day, submit our necks
to the degrading yoke of the crudest opinion that emanates from the
fatherland. Now if we must have nationality, let it be a nationality
that will throw off this yoke.
The chief of the rhapsodists who have ridden us to death like the
Old Man of the Mountain, is the ignorant and egotistical Wilson. We
use the term rhapsodists with perfect deliberation; for, Macaulay, and
Dilke, and one or two others, excepted, there is not in Great
Britain a critic who can be fairly considered worthy the name. The
Germans and even the French, are infinitely superior. As regards
Wilson, no man ever penned worse criticism or better rhodomontade.
That he is "egotistical" his works show to all men, running as they
read. That he is "ignorant" let his absurd and continuous school-boy
blunders about Homer bear witness. Not long ago we ourselves pointed
out a series of similar inanities in his review of Miss Barret's [sic]
poems- a series, we say, of gross blunders, arising from sheer
ignorance- and we defy him or any one to answer a single syllable of
what we then advanced.
And yet this is the man whose simple dictum (to our shame be it
spoken) has the power to make or to mar any American reputation! In
the last number of Blackwood, he has a continuation of the dull
"Specimens of the British Critics," and makes occasion wantonly to
insult one of the noblest of our poets, Mr. Lowell. The point of the
whole attack consists in the use of slang epithets and phrases of
the most ineffably vulgar description. "Squabashes" is a pet term.
"Faugh!" is another. "We are Scotsmen to the spiner" says Sawney- as
if the thing were not more than self-evident. Mr. Lowell is called a
"magpie," an "ape," a "Yankee cockney," and his name is
intentionally mis-written John Russell Lowell. Now were these
indecencies perpetrated by an American critic, that critic would be
sent to Coventry by the whole press of the country, but since it is
Wilson who insults, we, as in duty bound, not only submit to the
insult, but echo it, as an excellent jest, throughout the length and
breadth of the land. "Quamdiu Catilina?" We do indeed demand the
nationality of self-respect. In Letters as in Government we require
a Declaration of Independence. A better thing still would be a
Declaration of War- and that war should be carried forthwith "into
Africa."
Graham's Magazine, March, 1846
Some Frenchman- possibly Montaigne- says: "People talk about
thinking, but for my part I never think except when I sit down to
write." It is this never thinking, unless when we sit down to write,
which is the cause of so much indifferent composition. But perhaps
there is something more involved in the Frenchman's observation than
meets the eye. It is certain that the mere act of inditing tends, in a
great degree, to the logicalisation of thought. Whenever, on account
of its vagueness, I am dissatisfied with a conception of the brain,
I resort forthwith to the pen, for the purpose of obtaining, through
its aid, the necessary form, consequence, and precision.
How very commonly we hear it remarked that such and such thoughts
are beyond the compass of words! I do not believe that any thought,
properly so called, is out of the reach of language. I fancy,
rather, that where difficulty in expression is experienced, there
is, in the intellect which experiences it, a want either of
deliberateness or of method. For my own part, I have never had a
thought which I could not set down in words, with even more
distinctness than that with which I conceived it:- as I have before
observed, the thought is logicalised by the effort at (written)
expression.
There is, however, a class of fancies, of exquisite delicacy,
which are not thoughts, and to which, as yet, I have found it
absolutely impossible to adapt language. I use the word fancies at
random, and merely because I must use some word; but the idea commonly
attached to the term is not even remotely applicable to the shadows of
shadows in question. They seem to me rather psychal than intellectual.
They arise in the soul (alas, how rarely!) only at its epochs of
most intense tranquillity- when the bodily and mental health are in
perfection- and at those mere points of time where the confines of the
waking world blend with those of the world of dreams. I am aware of
these "fancies" only when I am upon the very brink of sleep, with
the consciousness that I am so. I have satisfied myself that this
condition exists but for an inappreciable point of time- yet it is
crowded with these "shadows of shadows"; and for absolute thought
there is demanded time's endurance.
These "fancies" have in them a pleasurable ecstasy, as far beyond
the most pleasurable of the world of wakefulness, or of dreams, as the
Heaven of the Northman theology is beyond its Hell. I regard the
visions, even as they arise, with an awe which, in some measure
moderates or tranquillises the ecstasy- I so regard them, through a
conviction (which seems a portion of the ecstasy itself) that this
ecstasy, in itself, is of a character supernal to the Human Nature- is
a glimpse of the spirit's outer world; and I arrive at this
conclusion- if this term is at all applicable to instantaneous
intuition- by a perception that the delight experienced has, as its
element, but the absoluteness of novelty. I say the absoluteness-
for in the fancies- let me now term them psychal impressions- there is
really nothing even approximate in character to impressions ordinarily
received. It is as if the five senses were supplanted by five myriad
others alien to mortality.
Now, so entire is my faith in the power of words, that at times I
have believed it possible to embody even the evanescence of fancies
such as I have attempted to describe. In experiments with this end
in view, I have proceeded so far as, first, to control (when the
bodily and mental health are good), the existence of the condition:-
that is to say, I can now (unless when ill), be sure that the
condition will supervene, if I so wish it, at the point of time
already described: of its supervention until lately I could never be
certain even under the most favorable circumstances. I mean to say,
merely, that now I can be sure, when all circumstances are
favorable, of the supervention of the condition, and feel even the
capacity of inducing or compelling it:- the favorable circumstances,
however, are not the less rare- else had I compelled already the
Heaven into the Earth.
I have proceeded so far, secondly, as to prevent the lapse from
the Point of which I speak- the point of blending between
wakefulness and sleep- as to prevent at will, I say, the lapse from
this border- ground into the dominion of sleep. Not that I can
continue the condition- not that I can render the point more than a
point- but that I can startle myself from the point into
wakefulness; and thus transfer the point itself into the realm of
Memory- convey its impressions, or more properly their
recollections, to a situation where (although still for a very brief
period) I can survey them with the eye of analysis.
For these reasons- that is to say, because I have been enabled to
accomplish thus much- I do not altogether despair of embodying in
words at least enough of the fancies in question to convey to
certain classes of intellect, a shadowy conception of their character.
In saying this I am not to be understood as supposing that the
fancies or psychal impressions to which I allude are confined to my
individual self- are not, in a word, common to all mankind- for on
this point it is quite impossible that I should form an opinion- but
nothing can be more certain than that even a partial record of the
impressions would startle the universal intellect of mankind, by the
supremeness of the novelty of the material employed, and of its
consequent suggestions. In a word- should I ever write a paper on this
topic, the world will be compelled to acknowledge that, at last, I
have done an original thing.
Democratic Review, April, 1846
In general, our first impressions are true ones- the chief
difficulty is in making sure which are the first. In early youth we
read a poem, for instance, and are enraptured with it. At manhood we
are assured by our reason that we had no reason to be enraptured.
But some years elapse, and we return to our primitive admiration, just
as a matured judgment enables us precisely to see what and why we
admired.
Thus, as individuals, we think in cycles, and may, from the
frequency, or infrequency of our revolutions about the various
thought-centres, form an accurate estimate of the advance of our
thought toward maturity. It is really wonderful to observe how
closely, in all the essentials of truth, the child- opinion
coincides with that of the man proper- of the man at his best.
And as with individuals so, perhaps, with mankind. When the world
begins to return, frequently, to its first impressions, we shall
then be warranted in looking for the millennium- or whatever it is:-
we may safely take it for granted that we are attaining our maximum of
wit, and of the happiness which is thence to ensue. The indications of
such a return are, at present, like the visits of angels- but we
have them now and then- in the case, for example, of credulity. The
philosophic, of late days, are distinguished by that very facility
in belief which was the characteristic of the illiterate half a
century ago. Skepticism in regard to apparent miracles, is not, as
formerly, an evidence either of superior wisdom or knowledge. In a
word, the wise now believe- yesterday they would not believe- and
day before yesterday (in the time of Strabo, for example) they
believed, exclusively, anything and everything:- here, then, is one of
the indicative cycles of discretion. I mention Strabo merely as an
exception to the rule of his epoch- (just as one in a hurry for an
illustration, might describe Mr. So and So to be as witty or as
amiable as Mr. This and That is not- for so rarely did men reject in
Strabo's time, and so much more rarely did they err by rejection, that
the skepticism of this philosopher must be regarded as one of the most
remarkable anomalies on record.
I have not the slightest faith in Carlyle. In ten years- possibly in
five- he will be remembered only as a butt for sarcasm. His linguistic
Euphuisms might very well have been taken as prima facie evidence of
his philosophic ones; they were the froth which indicated, first,
the shallowness, and secondly, the confusion of the waters. I would
blame no man of sense for leaving the works of Carlyle unread merely
on account of these Euphuisms; for it might be shown a priori that
no man capable of producing a definite impression upon his age or
race, could or would commit himself to such inanities and
insanities. The book about 'Hero-Worship'- is it possible that it ever
excited a feeling beyond contempt? No hero-worshipper can possess
anything within himself. That man is no man who stands in awe of his
fellow-man. Genius regards genius with respect- with even enthusiastic
admiration- but there is nothing of worship in the admiration, for
it springs from a thorough cognizance of the one admired- from a
perfect sympathy, the result of the cognizance; and it is needless
to say, that sympathy and worship are antagonistic. Your
hero-worshippers, for example- what do they know about Shakespeare?
They worship him- rant about him- lecture about him- about him, him
and nothing else- for no other reason than that he is utterly beyond
their comprehension. They have arrived at an idea of his greatness
from the pertinacity with which men have called him great. As for
their own opinion about him- they really have none at all. In
general the very smallest of mankind are the class of men-worshippers.
Not one out of this class have ever accomplished anything beyond a
very contemptible mediocrity.
Carlyle, however, has rendered an important service (to posterity,
at least) in pushing rant and cant to that degree of excess which
inevitably induces reaction. Had he not appeared we might have gone on
for yet another century, Emerson-izing in prose, Wordsworth-izing in
poetry, and Fourier-izing in philosophy, Wilson-izing in criticism-
Hudson-izing and Tom O'Bedlam-izing in everything. The author of the
'Sartor Resartus,' however, has overthrown the various arguments of
his own order, by a personal reductio ad absurdum. Yet an Olympiad,
perhaps, and the whole horde will be swept bodily from the memory of
man- or be remembered only when we have occasion to talk of such
fantastic tricks as, erewhile, were performed by the Abderites.
Graham's Magazine, January, 1848
If any ambitious man have a fancy a revolutionize, at one
effort, the universal world of human thought, human opinion, and human
sentiment, the opportunity is his own- the road to immortal renown
lies straight, open, and unencumbered before him. All that he has to
do is to write and publish a very little book. Its title should be
simple- a few plain words- "My Heart Laid Bare." But- this little book
must be true to its title.
Now, is it not very singular that, with the rabid thirst for
notoriety which distinguishes so many of mankind- so many, too, who
care not a fig what is thought of them after death, there should not
be found one man having sufficient hardihood to write this little
book? To write, I say. There are ten thousand men who, if the book
were once written, would laugh at the notion of being disturbed by its
publication during their life, and who could not even conceive why
they should object to its being published after their death. But to
write it- there is the rub. No man dare write it. No man ever will
dare write it. No man could write it, even if he dared. The paper
would shrivel and blaze at every touch of the fiery pen.
Southern Literary Messenger, April, 1849
I blush to see, in the--, an invidious notice of Bayard Taylor's
"Rhimes of Travel." What makes the matter worse, the critique is
from the pen of one who, although undeservedly, holds, himself, some
position as a poet:- and what makes the matter worst, the attack is
anonymous, and (while ostensibly commending) most zealously
endeavors to damn the young writer "with faint praise." In his whole
life, the author of the criticism never published a poem, long or
short, which could compare, either in the higher merits, or in the
minor morals of the Muse, with the worst of Mr. Taylor's compositions.
Observe the generalizing, disingenuous, patronizing tone:-
"It is the empty charlatan, to whom all things are alike impossible,
who attempts everything. He can do one thing as well as another, for
he can really do nothing.... Mr. Taylor's volume, as we have
intimated, is an advance upon his previous publication. We could
have wished, indeed, something more of restraint in the rhetoric,
but," &c., &c., &c.
The concluding sentence, here, is an excellent example of one of the
most ingeniously malignant of critical ruses- that of condemning an
author, in especial, for what the world, in general, feel to be his
principal merit. In fact, the "rhetoric" of Mr. Taylor, in the sense
intended by the critic, is Mr. Taylor's distinguishing excellence.
He is, unquestionably, the most terse, glowing, and vigorous of all
our poets, young or old- in point, I mean, of expression. His
sonorous, well-balanced rhythm puts me often in mind of Campbell (in
spite of our anonymous friend's implied sneer at "mere jingling of
rhymes, brilliant and successful for the moment,") and his rhetoric in
general is of the highest order:- By "rhetoric, I intend the mode
generally in which thought is presented. When shall we find more
magnificent passages than these?
First queenly Asia, from the fallen thrones
Of twice three thousand years
Came with the woe a grieving Goddess owns
Who longs for mortal tears.
The dust of ruin to her mantle clung
And dimmed her crown of gold,
While the majestic sorrow of her tongue
From Tyre to Indus rolled.
Mourn with me, sisters, in my realm of woe
Whose only glory streams
From its lost childhood like the Arctic glow
Which sunless winter dreams.
In the red desert moulders Babylon
And the wild serpent's hiss
Echoes in Petra's palaces of stone
And waste Persepolis.
Then from her seat, amid the palms embowered
That shade the Lion-land,
Swart Africa in dusky aspect towered,
The fetters on her hand.
Backward she saw, from out the drear eclipse,
The mighty Theban years,
And the deep anguish of her mournful lips
Interpreted, her tears.
I copy these passages first, because the critic in question has
copied them, without the slightest appreciation of their grandeur- for
they are grand; and secondly, to put the question of "rhetoric" at
rest. No artist who reads them will deny that they are the
perfection of skill in their way. But thirdly, I wish to call
attention to the glowing imagination evinced in the lines. My very
soul revolts at such efforts, (as the one I refer to,) to depreciate
such poems as Mr. Taylor's. Is there no honor- no chivalry left in the
land? Are our most deserving writers to be forever sneered down, or
hooted down, or damned down with faint praise, by a set of men who
possess little other ability than that which assures temporary success
to them, in common with Swaim's Panaces or Morrison's Pills? The
fact is, some person should write, at once, a Magazine paper exposing-
ruthlessly exposing, the dessous de cartes of our literary affairs. He
should show how and why it is that ubiquitous quack in letters can
always "succeed," while genius, (which implies self-respect with a
scorn of creeping and crawling,) must inevitably succumb. He should
point out the "easy arts" by which any one, base enough to do it,
can get himself placed at the very head of American Letters by an
article in that magnanimous Journal, "The Review." He should
explain, too, how readily the same work can be induced (in the case of
Simms,) to vilify personally, any one not a Northerner, for a trifling
"consideration." In fact, our criticism needs a thorough regeneration,
and must have it.
Southern Literary Messenger, June, 1849
I have sometimes amused myself by endeavoring to fancy what
would be the fate of any individual gifted, or rather accursed, with
an intellect very far superior to that of his race. Of course, he
would be conscious of his superiority; nor could he (if otherwise
constituted as man is) help manifesting his consciousness. Thus he
would make himself enemies at all points. And since his opinions and
speculations would widely differ from those of all mankind- that he
would be considered a madman, is evident. How horribly painful such
a condition! Hell could invent no greater torture than that of being
charged with abnormal weakness on account of being abnormally strong.
In like manner, nothing can be clearer than that a very generous
spirit- truly feeling what all merely profess- must inevitably find
itself misconceived in every direction- its motives misinterpreted.
Just as extremeness of intelligence would be thought fatuity, so
excess of chivalry could not fail of being looked upon as meanness
in its last degree- and so on with other virtues. This subject is a
painful one indeed. That individuals have so soared above the plane of
their race, is scarcely to be questioned; but, in looking back through
history for traces of their existence, we should pass over all
biographies of "the good and the great," while we search carefully the
slight records of wretches who died in prison, in Bedlam, or upon
the gallows.
THE END
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1842
THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH
by Edgar Allan Poe
THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH
THE "Red Death" had long devastated the country. No pestilence had
ever been so fatal, or so hideous. Blood was its Avatar and its seal
--the redness and the horror of blood. There were sharp pains, and
sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with
dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and especially upon
the face of the victim, were the pest ban which shut him out from
the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men. And the whole
seizure, progress and termination of the disease, were the incidents
of half an hour.
But the Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and sagacious.
When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his
presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the
knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep
seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys. This was an extensive
and magnificent structure, the creation of the prince's own
eccentric yet august taste. A strong and lofty wall girdled it in.
This wall had gates of iron. The courtiers, having entered, brought
furnaces and massy hammers and welded the bolts. They resolved to
leave means neither of ingress or egress to the sudden impulses of
despair or of frenzy from within. The abbey was amply provisioned.
With such precautions the courtiers might bid defiance to
contagion. The external world could take care of itself. In the
meantime it was folly to grieve, or to think. The prince had
provided all the appliances of pleasure. There were buffoons, there
were improvisatori, there were ballet-dancers, there were musicians,
there was Beauty, there was wine. All these and security were
within. Without was the "Red Death."
It was toward the close of the fifth or sixth month of his
seclusion, and while the pestilence raged most furiously abroad,
that the Prince Prospero entertained his thousand friends at a
masked ball of the most unusual magnificence.
It was a voluptuous scene, that masquerade. But first let me
tell of the rooms in which it was held. There were seven --an imperial
suite. In many palaces, however, such suites form a long and
straight vista, while the folding doors slide back nearly to the walls
on either hand, so that the view of the whole extent is scarcely
impeded. Here the case was very different; as might have been expected
from the duke's love of the bizarre. The apartments were so
irregularly disposed that the vision embraced but little more than one
at a time. There was a sharp turn at every twenty or thirty yards, and
at each turn a novel effect. To the right and left, in the middle of
each wall, a tall and narrow Gothic window looked out upon a closed
corridor which pursued the windings of the suite. These windows were
of stained glass whose color varied in accordance with the
prevailing hue of the decorations of the chamber into which it opened.
That at the eastern extremity was hung, for example, in blue --and
vividly blue were its windows. The second chamber was purple in its
ornaments and tapestries, and here the panes were purple. The third
was green throughout, and so were the casements. The fourth was
furnished and lighted with orange --the fifth with white --the sixth
with violet. The seventh apartment was closely shrouded in black
velvet tapestries that hung all over the ceiling and down the walls,
falling in heavy folds upon a carpet of the same material and hue. But
in this chamber only, the color of the windows failed to correspond
with the decorations. The panes here were scarlet --a deep blood
color. Now in no one of the seven apartments was there any lamp or
candelabrum, amid the profusion of golden ornaments that lay scattered
to and fro or depended from the roof. There was no light of any kind
emanating from lamp or candle within the suite of chambers. But in the
corridors that followed the suite, there stood, opposite to each
window, a heavy tripod, bearing a brazier of fire that protected its
rays through the tinted glass and so glaringly illumined the room. And
thus were produced a multitude of gaudy and fantastic appearances. But
in the western or black chamber the effect of the fire-light that
streamed upon the dark hangings through the blood-tinted panes, was
ghastly in the extreme, and produced so wild a look upon the
countenances of those who entered, that there were few of the
company bold enough to set foot within its precincts at all.
It was in this apartment, also, that there stood against the
western wall, a gigantic clock of ebony. Its pendulum swung to and fro
with a dull, heavy, monotonous clang; and when the minute-hand made
the circuit of the face, and the hour was to be stricken, there came
from the brazen lungs of the clock a sound which was clear and loud
and deep and exceedingly musical, but of so peculiar a note and
emphasis that, at each lapse of an hour, the musicians of the
orchestra were constrained to pause, momentarily, in their
performance, to hearken to the sound; and thus the waltzers perforce
ceased their evolutions; and there was a brief disconcert of the whole
gay company; and, while the chimes of the clock yet rang, it was
observed that the giddiest grew pale, and the more aged and sedate
passed their hands over their brows as if in confused reverie or
meditation. But when the echoes had fully ceased, a light laughter
at once pervaded the assembly; the musicians looked at each other
and smiled as if at their own nervousness and folly, and made
whispering vows, each to the other, that the next chiming of the clock
should produce in them no similar emotion; and then, after the lapse
of sixty minutes, (which embrace three thousand and six hundred
seconds of the Time that flies,) there came yet another chiming of the
clock, and then were the same disconcert and tremulousness and
meditation as before.
But, in spite of these things, it was a gay and magnificent revel.
The tastes of the duke were peculiar. He had a fine eye for colors and
effects. He disregarded the decora of mere fashion. His plans were
bold and fiery, and his conceptions glowed with barbaric lustre. There
are some who would have thought him mad. His followers felt that he
was not. It was necessary to hear and see and touch him to be sure
that he was not.
He had directed, in great part, the moveable embellishments of the
seven chambers, upon occasion of this great fete; and it was his own
guiding taste which had given character to the masqueraders. Be sure
they were grotesque. There were much glare and glitter and piquancy
and phantasm --much of what has been since seen in "Hernani." There
were arabesque figures with unsuited limbs and appointments. There
were delirious fancies such as the madman fashions. There was much
of the beautiful, much of the wanton, much of the bizarre, something
of the terrible, and not a little of that which might have excited
disgust. To and fro in the seven chambers there stalked, in fact, a
multitude of dreams. And these --the dreams --writhed in and about,
taking hue from the rooms, and causing the wild music of the orchestra
to seem as the echo of their steps. And, anon, there strikes the ebony
clock which stands in the hall of the velvet. And then, for a
moment, all is still, and all is silent save the voice of the clock.
The dreams are stiff-frozen as they stand. But the echoes of the chime
die away --they have endured but an instant --and a light,
half-subdued laughter floats after them as they depart. And now
again the music swells, and the dreams live, and writhe to and fro
more merrily than ever, taking hue from the many-tinted windows
through which stream the rays from the tripods. But to the chamber
which lies most westwardly of the seven, there are now none of the
maskers who venture; for the night is waning away; and there flows a
ruddier light through the blood-colored panes; and the blackness of
the sable drapery appals; and to him whose foot falls upon the sable
carpet, there comes from the near clock of ebony a muffled peal more
solemnly emphatic than any which reaches their ears who indulge in the
more remote gaieties of the other apartments.
But these other apartments were densely crowded, and in them
beat feverishly the heart of life. And the revel went whirlingly on,
until at length there commenced the sounding of midnight upon the
clock. And then the music ceased, as I have told; and the evolutions
of the waltzers were quieted; and there was an uneasy cessation of all
things as before. But now there were twelve strokes to be sounded by
the bell of the clock; and thus it happened, perhaps, that more of
thought crept, with more of time, into the meditations of the
thoughtful among those who revelled. And thus, too, it happened,
perhaps, that before the last echoes of the last chime had utterly
sunk into silence, there were many individuals in the crowd who had
found leisure to become aware of the presence of a masked figure which
had arrested the attention of no single individual before. And the
rumor of this new presence having spread itself whisperingly around,
there arose at length from the whole company a buzz, or murmur,
expressive of disapprobation and surprise --then, finally, of
terror, of horror, and of disgust.
In an assembly of phantasms such as I have painted, it may well be
supposed that no ordinary appearance could have excited such
sensation. In truth the masquerade license of the night was nearly
unlimited; but the figure in question had out-Heroded Herod, and
gone beyond the bounds of even the prince's indefinite decorum.
There are chords in the hearts of the most reckless which cannot be
touched without emotion. Even with the utterly lost, to whom life
and death are equally jests, there are matters of which no jest can be
made. The whole company, indeed, seemed now deeply to feel that in the
costume and bearing of the stranger neither wit nor propriety existed.
The figure was tall and gaunt, and shrouded from head to foot in the
habiliments of the grave. The mask which concealed the visage was made
so nearly to resemble the countenance of a stiffened corpse that the
closest scrutiny must have had difficulty in detecting the cheat.
And yet all this might have been endured, if not approved, by the
mad revellers around. But the mummer had gone so far as to assume
the type of the Red Death. His vesture was dabbled in blood --and
his broad brow, with all the features of the face, was besprinkled
with the scarlet horror.
When the eyes of Prince Prospero fell upon this spectral image
(which with a slow and solemn movement, as if more fully to sustain
its role, stalked to and fro among the waltzers) he was seen to be
convulsed, in the first moment with a strong shudder either of
terror or distaste; but, in the next, his brow reddened with rage.
"Who dares?" he demanded hoarsely of the courtiers who stood
near him --"who dares insult us with this blasphemous mockery? Seize
him and unmask him --that we may know whom we have to hang at sunrise,
from the battlements!"
It was in the eastern or blue chamber in which stood the Prince
Prospero as he uttered these words. They rang throughout the seven
rooms loudly and clearly --for the prince was a bold and robust man,
and the music had become hushed at the waving of his hand.
It was in the blue room where stood the prince, with a group of
pale courtiers by his side. At first, as he spoke, there was a
slight rushing movement of this group in the direction of the
intruder, who at the moment was also near at hand, and now, with
deliberate and stately step, made closer approach to the speaker.
But from a certain nameless awe with which the mad assumptions of
the mummer had inspired the whole party, there were found none who put
forth hand to seize him; so that, unimpeded, he passed within a yard
of the prince's person; and, while the vast assembly, as if with one
impulse, shrank from the centres of the rooms to the walls, he made
his way uninterruptedly, but with the same solemn and measured step
which had distinguished him from the first, through the blue chamber
to the purple --through the purple to the green --through the green to
the orange --through this again to the white --and even thence to
the violet, ere a decided movement had been made to arrest him. It was
then, however, that the Prince Prospero, maddening with rage and the
shame of his own momentary cowardice, rushed hurriedly through the six
chambers, while none followed him on account of a deadly terror that
had seized upon all. He bore aloft a drawn dagger, and had approached,
in rapid impetuosity, to within three or four feet of the retreating
figure, when the latter, having attained the extremity of the velvet
apartment, turned suddenly and confronted his pursuer. There was a
sharp cry --and the dagger dropped gleaming upon the sable carpet,
upon which, instantly afterwards, fell prostrate in death the Prince
Prospero. Then, summoning the wild courage of despair, a throng of the
revellers at once threw themselves into the black apartment, and,
seizing the mummer, whose tall figure stood erect and motionless
within the shadow of the ebony clock, gasped in unutterable horror
at finding the grave-cerements and corpse-like mask which they handled
with so violent a rudeness, untenanted by any tangible form.
And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had
come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revellers
in the blood-bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the
despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went
out with that of the last of the gay. And the flames of the tripods
expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable
dominion over all.
-THE END-
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1850
MELLONTA TAUTA
by Edgar Allan Poe
TO THE EDITORS OF THE LADY'S BOOK:
I have the honor of sending you, for your magazine, an article which
I hope you will be able to comprehend rather more distinctly than I do
myself. It is a translation, by my friend, Martin Van Buren Mavis,
(sometimes called the "Toughkeepsie Seer") of an odd-looking MS. which
I found, about a year ago, tightly corked up in a jug floating in
the Mare Tenebrarum- a sea well described by the Nubian geographer,
but seldom visited now-a-days, except for the transcendentalists and
divers for crotchets.
Truly yours,
EDGAR A. POE
ON BOARD BALLOON "SKYLARK"
April, 1, 2848
NOW, my dear friend- now, for your sins, you are to suffer the
infliction of a long gossiping letter. I tell you distinctly that I am
going to punish you for all your impertinences by being as tedious, as
discursive, as incoherent and as unsatisfactory as possible.
Besides, here I am, cooped up in a dirty balloon, with some one or two
hundred of the canaille, all bound on a pleasure excursion, (what a
funny idea some people have of pleasure!) and I have no prospect of
touching terra firma for a month at least. Nobody to talk to.
Nothing to do. When one has nothing to do, then is the time to
correspond with ones friends. You perceive, then, why it is that I
write you this letter- it is on account of my ennui and your sins.
Get ready your spectacles and make up your mind to be annoyed. I
mean to write at you every day during this odious voyage.
Heigho! when will any Invention visit the human pericranium? Are
we forever to be doomed to the thousand inconveniences of the balloon?
Will nobody contrive a more expeditious mode of progress? The jog-trot
movement, to my thinking, is little less than positive torture. Upon
my word we have not made more than a hundred miles the hour since
leaving home! The very birds beat us- at least some of them. I
assure you that I do not exaggerate at all. Our motion, no doubt,
seems slower than it actually is- this on account of our having no
objects about us by which to estimate our velocity, and on account
of our going with the wind. To be sure, whenever we meet a balloon
we have a chance of perceiving our rate, and then, I admit, things
do not appear so very bad. Accustomed as I am to this mode of
travelling, I cannot get over a kind of giddiness whenever a balloon
passes us in a current directly overhead. It always seems to me like
an immense bird of prey about to pounce upon us and carry us off in
its claws. One went over us this morning about sunrise, and so
nearly overhead that its drag-rope actually brushed the network
suspending our car, and caused us very serious apprehension. Our
captain said that if the material of the bag had been the trumpery
varnished "silk" of five hundred or a thousand years ago, we should
inevitably have been damaged. This silk, as he explained it to me, was
a fabric composed of the entrails of a species of earth-worm. The worm
was carefully fed on mulberries- kind of fruit resembling a
water-melon- and, when sufficiently fat, was crushed in a mill. The
paste thus arising was called papyrus in its primary state, and went
through a variety of processes until it finally became "silk."
Singular to relate, it was once much admired as an article of female
dress! Balloons were also very generally constructed from it. A better
kind of material, it appears, was subsequently found in the down
surrounding the seed-vessels of a plant vulgarly called euphorbium,
and at that time botanically termed milk-weed. This latter kind of
silk was designated as silk-buckingham, on account of its superior
durability, and was usually prepared for use by being varnished with a
solution of gum caoutchouc- a substance which in some respects must
have resembled the gutta percha now in common use. This caoutchouc was
occasionally called Indian rubber or rubber of twist, and was no doubt
one of the numerous fungi. Never tell me again that I am not at
heart an antiquarian.
Talking of drag-ropes- our own, it seems, has this moment knocked
a man overboard from one of the small magnetic propellers that swarm
in ocean below us- a boat of about six thousand tons, and, from all
accounts, shamefully crowded. These diminutive barques should be
prohibited from carrying more than a definite number of passengers.
The man, of course, was not permitted to get on board again, and was
soon out of sight, he and his life-preserver. I rejoice, my dear
friend, that we live in an age so enlightened that no such a thing
as an individual is supposed to exist. It is the mass for which the
true Humanity cares. By-the-by, talking of Humanity, do you know
that our immortal Wiggins is not so original in his views of the
Social Condition and so forth, as his contemporaries are inclined to
suppose? Pundit assures me that the same ideas were put nearly in
the same way, about a thousand years ago, by an Irish philosopher
called Furrier, on account of his keeping a retail shop for cat
peltries and other furs. Pundit knows, you know; there can be no
mistake about it. How very wonderfully do we see verified every day,
the profound observation of the Hindoo Aries Tottle (as quoted by
Pundit)- "Thus must we say that, not once or twice, or a few times,
but with almost infinite repetitions, the same opinions come round
in a circle among men."
April 2.- Spoke to-day the magnetic cutter in charge of the middle
section of floating telegraph wires. I learn that when this species of
telegraph was first put into operation by Horse, it was considered
quite impossible to convey the wires over sea, but now we are at a
loss to comprehend where the difficulty lay! So wags the world.
Tempora mutantur- excuse me for quoting the Etruscan. What would we do
without the Atalantic telegraph? (Pundit says Atlantic was the ancient
adjective.) We lay to a few minutes to ask the cutter some
questions, and learned, among other glorious news, that civil war is
raging in Africa, while the plague is doing its good work
beautifully both in Yurope and Ayesher. Is it not truly remarkable
that, before the magnificent light shed upon philosophy by Humanity,
the world was accustomed to regard War and Pestilence as calamities?
Do you know that prayers were actually offered up in the ancient
temples to the end that these evils (!) might not be visited upon
mankind? Is it not really difficult to comprehend upon what
principle of interest our forefathers acted? Were they so blind as not
to perceive that the destruction of a myriad of individuals is only so
much positive advantage to the mass!
April 3.- It is really a very fine amusement to ascend the
rope-ladder leading to the summit of the balloon-bag, and thence
survey the surrounding world. From the car below you know the prospect
is not so comprehensive- you can see little vertically. But seated
here (where I write this) in the luxuriously-cushioned open piazza
of the summit, one can see everything that is going on in all
directions. Just now there is quite a crowd of balloons in sight,
and they present a very animated appearance, while the air is resonant
with the hum of so many millions of human voices. I have heard it
asserted that when Yellow or (Pundit will have it) Violet, who is
supposed to have been the first aeronaut, maintained the
practicability of traversing the atmosphere in all directions, by
merely ascending or descending until a favorable current was attained,
he was scarcely hearkened to at all by his contemporaries, who
looked upon him as merely an ingenious sort of madman, because the
philosophers (?) of the day declared the thing impossible. Really
now it does seem to me quite unaccountable how any thing so
obviously feasible could have escaped the sagacity of the ancient
savans. But in all ages the great obstacles to advancement in Art have
been opposed by the so-called men of science. To be sure, our men of
science are not quite so bigoted as those of old:- oh, I have
something so queer to tell you on this topic. Do you know that it is
not more than a thousand years ago since the metaphysicians
consented to relieve the people of the singular fancy that there
existed but two possible roads for the attainment of Truth! Believe it
if you can! It appears that long, long ago, in the night of Time,
there lived a Turkish philosopher (or Hindoo possibly) called Aries
Tottle. This person introduced, or at all events propagated what was
termed the deductive or a priori mode of investigation. He started
with what he maintained to be axioms or "self-evident truths," and
thence proceeded "logically" to results. His greatest disciples were
one Neuclid, and one Cant. Well, Aries Tottle flourished supreme until
advent of one Hog, surnamed the "Ettrick Shepherd," who preached an
entirely different system, which he called the a posteriori or
inductive. His plan referred altogether to Sensation. He proceeded
by observing, analyzing, and classifying facts-instantiae naturae,
as they were affectedly called- into general laws. Aries Tottle's
mode, in a word, was based on noumena; Hog's on phenomena. Well, so
great was the admiration excited by this latter system that, at its
first introduction, Aries Tottle fell into disrepute; but finally he
recovered ground and was permitted to divide the realm of Truth with
his more modern rival. The savans now maintained the Aristotelian
and Baconian roads were the sole possible avenues to knowledge.
"Baconian," you must know, was an adjective invented as equivalent
to Hog-ian and more euphonious and dignified.
Now, my dear friend, I do assure you, most positively, that I
represent this matter fairly, on the soundest authority and you can
easily understand how a notion so absurd on its very face must have
operated to retard the progress of all true knowledge- which makes its
advances almost invariably by intuitive bounds. The ancient idea
confined investigations to crawling; and for hundreds of years so
great was the infatuation about Hog especially, that a virtual end was
put to all thinking, properly so called. No man dared utter a truth to
which he felt himself indebted to his Soul alone. It mattered not
whether the truth was even demonstrably a truth, for the bullet-headed
savans of the time regarded only the road by which he had attained it.
They would not even look at the end. "Let us see the means," they
cried, "the means!" If, upon investigation of the means, it was
found to come under neither the category Aries (that is to say Ram)
nor under the category Hog, why then the savans went no farther, but
pronounced the "theorist" a fool, and would have nothing to do with
him or his truth.
Now, it cannot be maintained, even, that by the crawling system
the greatest amount of truth would be attained in any long series of
ages, for the repression of imagination was an evil not to be
compensated for by any superior certainty in the ancient modes of
investigation. The error of these Jurmains, these Vrinch, these
Inglitch, and these Amriccans (the latter, by the way, were our own
immediate progenitors), was an error quite analogous with that of
the wiseacre who fancies that he must necessarily see an object the
better the more closely he holds it to his eyes. These people
blinded themselves by details. When they proceeded Hoggishly, their
"facts" were by no means always facts- a matter of little
consequence had it not been for assuming that they were facts and must
be facts because they appeared to be such. When they proceeded on
the path of the Ram, their course was scarcely as straight as a
ram's horn, for they never had an axiom which was an axiom at all.
They must have been very blind not to see this, even in their own day;
for even in their own day many of the long "established" axioms had
been rejected. For example- "Ex nihilo nihil fit"; "a body cannot
act where it is not"; "there cannot exist antipodes"; "darkness cannot
come out of light"- all these, and a dozen other similar propositions,
formerly admitted without hesitation as axioms, were, even at the
period of which I speak, seen to be untenable. How absurd in these
people, then, to persist in putting faith in "axioms" as immutable
bases of Truth! But even out of the mouths of their soundest reasoners
it is easy to demonstrate the futility, the impalpability of their
axioms in general. Who was the soundest of their logicians? Let me
see! I will go and ask Pundit and be back in a minute.... Ah, here
we have it! Here is a book written nearly a thousand years ago and
lately translated from the Inglitch- which, by the way, appears to
have been the rudiment of the Amriccan. Pundit says it is decidedly
the cleverest ancient work on its topic, Logic. The author (who was
much thought of in his day) was one Miller, or Mill; and we find it
recorded of him, as a point of some importance, that he had a
mill-horse called Bentham. But let us glance at the treatise!
Ah!- "Ability or inability to conceive," says Mr. Mill, very
properly, "is in no case to be received as a criterion of axiomatic
truth." What modern in his senses would ever think of disputing this
truism? The only wonder with us must be, how it happened that Mr. Mill
conceived it necessary even to hint at any thing so obvious. So far
good- but let us turn over another paper. What have we here?-
"Contradictories cannot both be true- that is, cannot co-exist in
nature." Here Mr. Mill means, for example, that a tree must be
either a tree or not a tree- that it cannot be at the same time a tree
and not a tree. Very well; but I ask him why. His reply is this- and
never pretends to be any thing else than this- "Because it is
impossible to conceive that contradictories can both be true." But
this is no answer at all, by his own showing, for has he not just
admitted as a truism that "ability or inability to conceive is in no
case to be received as a criterion of axiomatic truth."
Now I do not complain of these ancients so much because their
logic is, by their own showing, utterly baseless, worthless and
fantastic altogether, as because of their pompous and imbecile
proscription of all other roads of Truth, of all other means for its
attainment than the two preposterous paths- the one of creeping and
the one of crawling- to which they have dared to confine the Soul that
loves nothing so well as to soar.
By the by, my dear friend, do you not think it would have puzzled
these ancient dogmaticians to have determined by which of their two
roads it was that the most important and most sublime of all their
truths was, in effect, attained? I mean the truth of Gravitation.
Newton owed it to Kepler. Kepler admitted that his three laws were
guessed at- these three laws of all laws which led the great
Inglitch mathematician to his principle, the basis of all physical
principle- to go behind which we must enter the Kingdom of
Metaphysics. Kepler guessed- that is to say imagined. He was
essentially a "theorist"- that word now of so much sanctity,
formerly an epithet of contempt. Would it not have puzzled these old
moles too, to have explained by which of the two "roads" a
cryptographist unriddles a cryptograph of more than usual secrecy,
or by which of the two roads Champollion directed mankind to those
enduring and almost innumerable truths which resulted from his
deciphering the Hieroglyphics.
One word more on this topic and I will be done boring you. Is it not
passing strange that, with their eternal prattling about roads to
Truth, these bigoted people missed what we now so clearly perceive
to be the great highway- that of Consistency? Does it not seem
singular how they should have failed to deduce from the works of God
the vital fact that a perfect consistency must be an absolute truth!
How plain has been our progress since the late announcement of this
proposition! Investigation has been taken out of the hands of the
ground-moles and given, as a task, to the true and only true thinkers,
the men of ardent imagination. These latter theorize. Can you not
fancy the shout of scorn with which my words would be received by
our progenitors were it possible for them to be now looking over my
shoulder? These men, I say, theorize; and their theories are simply
corrected, reduced, systematized- cleared, little by little, of
their dross of inconsistency- until, finally, a perfect consistency
stands apparent which even the most stolid admit, because it is a
consistency, to be an absolute and an unquestionable truth.
April 4.- The new gas is doing wonders, in conjunction with the
new improvement with gutta percha. How very safe, commodious,
manageable, and in every respect convenient are our modern balloons!
Here is an immense one approaching us at the rate of at least a
hundred and fifty miles an hour. It seems to be crowded with people-
perhaps there are three or four hundred passengers- and yet it soars
to an elevation of nearly a mile, looking down upon poor us with
sovereign contempt. Still a hundred or even two hundred miles an
hour is slow travelling after all. Do you remember our flight on the
railroad across the Kanadaw continent?- fully three hundred miles
the hour- that was travelling. Nothing to be seen though- nothing to
be done but flirt, feast and dance in the magnificent saloons. Do
you remember what an odd sensation was experienced when, by chance, we
caught a glimpse of external objects while the cars were in full
flight? Every thing seemed unique- in one mass. For my part, I
cannot say but that I preferred the travelling by the slow train of
a hundred miles the hour. Here we were permitted to have glass
windows- even to have them open- and something like a distinct view of
the country was attainable.... Pundit says that the route for the
great Kanadaw railroad must have been in some measure marked out about
nine hundred years ago! In fact, he goes so far as to assert that
actual traces of a road are still discernible- traces referable to a
period quite as remote as that mentioned. The track, it appears was
double only; ours, you know, has twelve paths; and three or four new
ones are in preparation. The ancient rails were very slight, and
placed so close together as to be, according to modern notions,
quite frivolous, if not dangerous in the extreme. The present width of
track- fifty feet- is considered, indeed, scarcely secure enough.
For my part, I make no doubt that a track of some sort must have
existed in very remote times, as Pundit asserts; for nothing can be
clearer, to my mind, than that, at some period- not less than seven
centuries ago, certainly- the Northern and Southern Kanadaw continents
were united; the Kanawdians, then, would have been driven, by
necessity, to a great railroad across the continent.
April 5.- I am almost devoured by ennui. Pundit is the only
conversible person on board; and he, poor soul! can speak of nothing
but antiquities. He has been occupied all the day in the attempt to
convince me that the ancient Amriccans governed themselves!- did
ever anybody hear of such an absurdity?- that they existed in a sort
of every-man-for-himself confederacy, after the fashion of the
"prairie dogs" that we read of in fable. He says that they started
with the queerest idea conceivable, viz: that all men are born free
and equal- this in the very teeth of the laws of gradation so
visibly impressed upon all things both in the moral and physical
universe. Every man "voted," as they called it- that is to say meddled
with public affairs- until at length, it was discovered that what is
everybody's business is nobody's, and that the "Republic" (so the
absurd thing was called) was without a government at all. It is
related, however, that the first circumstance which disturbed, very
particularly, the self-complacency of the philosophers who constructed
this "Republic," was the startling discovery that universal suffrage
gave opportunity for fraudulent schemes, by means of which any desired
number of votes might at any time be polled, without the possibility
of prevention or even detection, by any party which should be merely
villainous enough not to be ashamed of the fraud. A little
reflection upon this discovery sufficed to render evident the
consequences, which were that rascality must predominate- in a word,
that a republican government could never be any thing but a rascally
one. While the philosophers, however, were busied in blushing at their
stupidity in not having foreseen these inevitable evils, and intent
upon the invention of new theories, the matter was put to an abrupt
issue by a fellow of the name of Mob, who took every thing into his
own hands and set up a despotism, in comparison with which those of
the fabulous Zeros and Hellofagabaluses were respectable and
delectable. This Mob (a foreigner, by-the-by), is said to have been
the most odious of all men that ever encumbered the earth. He was a
giant in stature- insolent, rapacious, filthy, had the gall of a
bullock with the heart of a hyena and the brains of a peacock. He
died, at length, by dint of his own energies, which exhausted him.
Nevertheless, he had his uses, as every thing has, however vile, and
taught mankind a lesson which to this day it is in no danger of
forgetting- never to run directly contrary to the natural analogies.
As for Republicanism, no analogy could be found for it upon the face
of the earth- unless we except the case of the "prairie dogs," an
exception which seems to demonstrate, if anything, that democracy is a
very admirable form of government- for dogs.
April 6.- Last night had a fine view of Alpha Lyrae, whose disk,
through our captain's spy-glass, subtends an angle of half a degree,
looking very much as our sun does to the naked eye on a misty day.
Alpha Lyrae, although so very much larger than our sun, by the by,
resembles him closely as regards its spots, its atmosphere, and in
many other particulars. It is only within the last century, Pundit
tells me, that the binary relation existing between these two orbs
began even to be suspected. The evident motion of our system in the
heavens was (strange to say!) referred to an orbit about a
prodigious star in the centre of the galaxy. About this star, or at
all events about a centre of gravity common to all the globes of the
Milky Way and supposed to be near Alcyone in the Pleiades, every one
of these globes was declared to be revolving, our own performing the
circuit in a period of 117,000,000 of years! We, with our present
lights, our vast telescopic improvements, and so forth, of course find
it difficult to comprehend the ground of an idea such as this. Its
first propagator was one Mudler. He was led, we must presume, to
this wild hypothesis by mere analogy in the first instance; but,
this being the case, he should have at least adhered to analogy in its
development. A great central orb was, in fact, suggested; so far
Mudler was consistent. This central orb, however, dynamically,
should have been greater than all its surrounding orbs taken together.
The question might then have been asked- "Why do we not see it?"-
we, especially, who occupy the mid region of the cluster- the very
locality near which, at least, must be situated this inconceivable
central sun. The astronomer, perhaps, at this point, took refuge in
the suggestion of non-luminosity; and here analogy was suddenly let
fall. But even admitting the central orb non-luminous, how did he
manage to explain its failure to be rendered visible by the
incalculable host of glorious suns glaring in all directions about it?
No doubt what he finally maintained was merely a centre of gravity
common to all the revolving orbs- but here again analogy must have
been let fall. Our system revolves, it is true, about a common
centre of gravity, but it does this in connection with and in
consequence of a material sun whose mass more than counterbalances the
rest of the system. The mathematical circle is a curve composed of
an infinity of straight lines; but this idea of the circle- this
idea of it which, in regard to all earthly geometry, we consider as
merely the mathematical, in contradistinction from the practical,
idea- is, in sober fact, the practical conception which alone we
have any right to entertain in respect to those Titanic circles with
which we have to deal, at least in fancy, when we suppose our
system, with its fellows, revolving about a point in the centre of the
galaxy. Let the most vigorous of human imaginations but attempt to
take a single step toward the comprehension of a circuit so
unutterable! I would scarcely be paradoxical to say that a flash of
lightning itself, travelling forever upon the circumference of this
inconceivable circle, would still forever be travelling in a
straight line. That the path of our sun along such a circumference-
that the direction of our system in such an orbit- would, to any human
perception, deviate in the slightest degree from a straight line
even in a million of years, is a proposition not to be entertained;
and yet these ancient astronomers were absolutely cajoled, it appears,
into believing that a decisive curvature had become apparent during
the brief period of their astronomical history- during the mere point-
during the utter nothingness of two or three thousand years! How
incomprehensible, that considerations such as this did not at once
indicate to them the true state of affairs- that of the binary
revolution of our sun and Alpha Lyrae around a common centre of
gravity!
April 7.- Continued last night our astronomical amusements. Had a
fine view of the five Neptunian asteroids, and watched with much
interest the putting up of a huge impost on a couple of lintels in the
new temple at Daphnis in the moon. It was amusing to think that
creatures so diminutive as the lunarians, and bearing so little
resemblance to humanity, yet evinced a mechanical ingenuity so much
superior to our own. One finds it difficult, too, to conceive the vast
masses which these people handle so easily, to be as light as our
own reason tells us they actually are.
April 8.- Eureka! Pundit is in his glory. A balloon from Kanadaw
spoke us to-day and threw on board several late papers; they contain
some exceedingly curious information relative to Kanawdian or rather
Amriccan antiquities. You know, I presume, that laborers have for some
months been employed in preparing the ground for a new fountain at
Paradise, the Emperor's principal pleasure garden. Paradise, it
appears, has been, literally speaking, an island time out of mind-
that is to say, its northern boundary was always (as far back as any
record extends) a rivulet, or rather a very narrow arm of the sea.
This arm was gradually widened until it attained its present
breadth- a mile. The whole length of the island is nine miles; the
breadth varies materially. The entire area (so Pundit says) was, about
eight hundred years ago, densely packed with houses, some of them
twenty stories high; land (for some most unaccountable reason) being
considered as especially precious just in this vicinity. The
disastrous earthquake, however, of the year 2050, so totally
uprooted and overwhelmed the town (for it was almost too large to be
called a village) that the most indefatigable of our antiquarians have
never yet been able to obtain from the site any sufficient data (in
the shape of coins, medals or inscriptions) wherewith to build up even
the ghost of a theory concerning the manners, customs, &c., &c.,
&c., of the aboriginal inhabitants. Nearly all that we have hitherto
known of them is, that they were a portion of the Knickerbocker
tribe of savages infesting the continent at its first discovery by
Recorder Riker, a knight of the Golden Fleece. They were by no means
uncivilized, however, but cultivated various arts and even sciences
after a fashion of their own. It is related of them that they were
acute in many respects, but were oddly afflicted with monomania for
building what, in the ancient Amriccan, was denominated "churches"-
a kind of pagoda instituted for the worship of two idols that went
by the names of Wealth and Fashion. In the end, it is said, the island
became, nine tenths of it, church. The women, too, it appears, were
oddly deformed by a natural protuberance of the region just below
the small of the back- although, most unaccountably, this deformity
was looked upon altogether in the light of a beauty. One or two
pictures of these singular women have in fact, been miraculously
preserved. They look very odd, very- like something between a
turkey-cock and a dromedary.
Well, these few details are nearly all that have descended to us
respecting the ancient Knickerbockers. It seems, however, that while
digging in the centre of the emperors garden, (which, you know, covers
the whole island), some of the workmen unearthed a cubical and
evidently chiseled block of granite, weighing several hundred
pounds. It was in good preservation, having received, apparently,
little injury from the convulsion which entombed it. On one of its
surfaces was a marble slab with (only think of it!) an inscription-
a legible inscription. Pundit is in ecstacies. Upon detaching the
slab, a cavity appeared, containing a leaden box filled with various
coins, a long scroll of names, several documents which appear to
resemble newspapers, with other matters of intense interest to the
antiquarian! There can be no doubt that all these are genuine Amriccan
relics belonging to the tribe called Knickerbocker. The papers
thrown on board our balloon are filled with fac-similes of the
coins, MSS., typography, &c., &c. I copy for your amusement the
Knickerbocker inscription on the marble slab:-
This Corner Stone of a Monument to
The Memory of
GEORGE WASHINGTON
Was Laid With Appropriate Ceremonies
on the
19th Day of October, 1847
The Anniversary of the Surrender of
Lord Cornwallis
to General Washington at Yorktown
A. D. 1781
Under the Auspices of the
Washington Monument Association of
the City of New York
This, as I give it, is a verbatim translation done by Pundit
himself, so there can be no mistake about it. From the few words
thus preserved, we glean several important items of knowledge, not the
least interesting of which is the fact that a thousand years ago
actual monuments had fallen into disuse- as was all very proper- the
people contenting themselves, as we do now, with a mere indication
of the design to erect a monument at some future time; a
corner-stone being cautiously laid by itself "solitary and alone"
(excuse me for quoting the great American poet Benton!), as a
guarantee of the magnanimous intention. We ascertain, too, very
distinctly, from this admirable inscription, the how as well as the
where and the what, of the great surrender in question. As to the
where, it was Yorktown (wherever that was), and as to the what, it was
General Cornwallis (no doubt some wealthy dealer in corn). He was
surrendered. The inscription commemorates the surrender of- what? why,
"of Lord Cornwallis." The only question is what could the savages wish
him surrendered for. But when we remember that these savages were
undoubtedly cannibals, we are led to the conclusion that they intended
him for sausage. As to the how of the surrender, no language can be
more explicit. Lord Cornwallis was surrendered (for sausage) "under
the auspices of the Washington Monument Association"- no doubt a
charitable institution for the depositing of corner-stones.- But,
Heaven bless me! what is the matter? Ah, I see- the balloon has
collapsed, and we shall have a tumble into the sea. I have, therefore,
only time enough to add that, from a hasty inspection of the
fac-similes of newspapers, &c., &c., I find that the great men in
those days among the Amriccans, were one John, a smith, and one
Zacchary, a tailor.
Good-bye, until I see you again. Whether you ever get this letter or
not is point of little importance, as I write altogether for my own
amusement. I shall cork the MS. up in a bottle, however, and throw
it into the sea.
Yours everlastingly, PUNDITA.
THE END
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1850
MESMERIC REVELATION
by Edgar Allan Poe
WHATEVER doubt may still envelop the rationale of mesmerism, its
startling facts are now almost universally admitted. Of these
latter, those who doubt, are your mere doubters by profession- an
unprofitable and disreputable tribe. There can be no more absolute
waste of time than the attempt to prove, at the present day, that man,
by mere exercise of will can so impress his fellow as to cast him into
an abnormal condition, of which the phenomena resemble very closely
those of death, or at least resemble them more nearly than they do the
phenomena of any other normal condition within our cognizance; that,
while in this state, the person so impressed employs only with effort,
and then feebly, the external organs of sense, yet perceives, with
keenly refined perception, and through channels supposed unknown,
matters beyond the scope of the physical organs; that, moreover, his
intellectual faculties are wonderfully exalted and invigorated; that
his sympathies with the person so impressing him are profound, and,
finally, that his susceptibility to the impression increases with
its frequency, while in the same proportion, the peculiar phenomena
elicited are more extended and more pronounced.
I say that these- which are the laws of mesmerism in its general
features- it would be supererogation to demonstrate; nor shall I
inflict upon my readers so needless a demonstration to-day. My purpose
at present is a very different one indeed. I am impelled, even in
the teeth of a world of prejudice, to detail without comment, the very
remarkable substance of a colloquy occurring between a sleep-waker and
myself.
I had long been in the habit of mesmerizing the person in question
(Mr. Vankirk), and the usual acute susceptibility and exaltation of
the mesmeric perception had supervened. For many months he had been
laboring under confirmed phthisis, the more distressing effects of
which had been relieved by my manipulations; and on the night of
Wednesday, the fifteenth instant, I was summoned to his bedside.
The invalid was suffering with acute pain in the region of the
heart, and breathed with great difficulty, having all the ordinary
symptoms of asthma. In spasms such as these he had usually found
relief from the application of mustard to the nervous centres, but
to-night this had been attempted in vain.
As I entered his room he greeted me with a cheerful smile, and
although evidently in much bodily pain, appeared to be, mentally,
quite at ease.
"I sent for you to-night," he said, "not so much to administer to my
bodily ailment, as to satisfy me concerning certain physical
impressions which, of late, have occasioned me much anxiety and
surprise. I need not tell you how skeptical I have hitherto been on
the topic of the soul's immortality. I cannot deny that there has
always existed, as if in that very soul which I have been denying, a
vague half-sentiment of its own existence. But this half-sentiment
at no time amounted to conviction. With it my reason had nothing to
do. All attempts at logical inquiry resulted, indeed, in leaving me
more sceptical than before. I had been advised to study Cousin. I
studied him in his own works as well as in those of his European and
American echoes. The 'Charles Elwood' of Mr. Brownson for example, was
placed in my hands. I read it with profound attention. Throughout I
found it logical but the portions which were not merely logical were
unhappily the initial arguments of the disbelieving hero of the
book. In his summing up it seemed evident to me that the reasoner
had not even succeeded in convincing himself. His end had plainly
forgotten his beginning, like the government of Trinculo. In short,
I was not long in perceiving that if man is to be intellectually
convinced of his own immortality, he will never be so convinced by the
mere abstractions which have been so long the fashion of the moralists
of England, of France, and of Germany. Abstractions may amuse and
exercise, but take no hold on the mind. Here upon earth, at least,
philosophy, I am persuaded, will always in vain call upon us to look
upon qualities as things. The will may assent- the soul- the
intellect, never.
"I repeat, then, that I only half felt, and never intellectually
believed. But latterly there has been a certain deepening of the
feeling, until it has come so nearly to resemble the acquiesence of
reason, that I find it difficult to distinguish the two. I am enabled,
too, plainly to trace this effect to the mesmeric influence. I
cannot better explain my meaning than by the hypothesis that the
mesmeric exaltation enables me to perceive a train of ratiocination
which, in my abnormal existence, convinces, but which, in full
accordance with the mesmeric phenomena, does not extend, except
through its effect, into my normal condition. In sleep-waking, the
reasoning and its conclusion- the cause and its effect- are present
together. In my natural state, the cause vanishes, the effect only,
and perhaps only partially, remains.
"These considerations have led me to think that some good results
might ensue from a series of well-directed questions propounded to
me while mesmerized. You have often observed the profound
self-cognizance evinced by the sleep-waker- the extensive knowledge he
displays upon all points relating to the mesmeric condition itself,
and from this self-cognizance may be deduced hints for the proper
conduct of a catechism."
I consented of course to make this experiment. A few passes threw
Mr. Vankirk into the mesmeric sleep. His breathing became
immediately more easy, and he seemed to suffer no physical uneasiness.
The following conversation then ensued:-V. in the dialogue
representing the patient, and P. myself.
P. Are you asleep?
V. Yes- no; I would rather sleep more soundly.
P. [After a few more passes.] Do you sleep now?
V. Yes.
P. How do you think your present illness will result?
V. [After a long hesitation and speaking as if with effort.] I
must die.
P. Does the idea of death afflict you?
V. [Very quickly.] No- no!
P. Are you pleased with the prospect?
V. If I were awake I should like to die, but now it is no matter.
The mesmeric condition is so near death as to content me.
P. I wish you would explain yourself, Mr. Vankirk.
V. I am willing to do so, but it requires more effort than I feel
able to make. You do not question me properly.
P. What then shall I ask?
V. You must begin at the beginning.
P. The beginning! But where is the beginning?
V. You know that the beginning is GOD. [This was said in a low,
fluctuating tone, and with every sign of the most profound
veneration.]
P. What, then, is God?
V. [Hesitating for many minutes.] I cannot tell.
P. Is not God spirit?
V. While I was awake I knew what you meant by "spirit," but now it
seems only a word- such, for instance, as truth, beauty- a quality,
I mean.
P. Is not God immaterial?
V. There is no immateriality- it is a mere word. That which is not
matter, is not at all- unless qualities are things.
P. Is God, then, material?
V. No. [This reply startled me very much.]
P. What, then, is he?
V. [After a long pause, and mutteringly.] I see- but it is a thing
difficult to tell. [Another long pause.] He is not spirit, for he
exists. Nor is he matter, as you understand it. But there are
gradations of matter of which man knows nothing; the grosser impelling
the finer, the finer pervading the grosser. The atmosphere, for
example, impels the electric principle, while the electric principle
permeates the atmosphere. These gradations of matter increase in
rarity or fineness until we arrive at a matter unparticled- without
particles- indivisible-one, and here the law of impulsion and
permeation is modified. The ultimate or unparticled matter not only
permeates all things, but impels all things; and thus is all things
within itself. This matter is God. What men attempt to embody in the
word "thought," is this matter in motion.
P. The metaphysicians maintain that all action is reducible to
motion and thinking, and that the latter is the origin of the former.
V. Yes; and I now see the confusion of idea. Motion is the action of
mind, not of thinking. The unparticled matter, or God, in quiescence
is (as nearly as we can conceive it) what men call mind. And the power
of self-movement (equivalent in effect to human volition) is, in the
unparticled matter, the result of its unity and omniprevalence; how, I
know not, and now clearly see that I shall never know. But the
unparticled matter, set in motion by a law or quality existing
within itself, is thinking.
P. Can you give me no more precise idea of what you term the
unparticled matter?
V. The matters of which man is cognizant escape the senses in
gradation. We have, for example, a metal, a piece of wood, a drop of
water, the atmosphere, a gas, caloric, electricity, the luminiferous
ether. Now, we call all these things matter, and embrace all matter in
one general definition; but in spite of this, there can be no two
ideas more essentially distinct than that which we attach to a
metal, and that which we attach to the luminiferous ether. When we
reach the latter, we feel an almost irresistible inclination to
class it with spirit, or with nihilty. The only consideration which
restrains us is our conception of its atomic constitution; and here,
even, we have to seek aid from our notion of an atom, as something
possessing in infinite minuteness, solidity, palpability, weight.
Destroy the idea of the atomic constitution and we should no longer be
able to regard the ether as an entity, or, at least, as matter. For
want of a better word we might term it spirit. Take, now, a step
beyond the luminiferous ether- conceive a matter as much more rare
than the ether, as this ether is more rare than the metal, and we
arrive at once (in spite of all the school dogmas) at a unique mass-
an unparticled matter. For although we may admit infinite littleness
in the atoms themselves, the infinitude of littleness in the spaces
between them is an absurdity. There will be a point- there will be a
degree of rarity at which, if the atoms are sufficiently numerous, the
interspaces must vanish, and the mass absolutely coalesce. But the
consideration of the atomic constitution being now taken away, the
nature of the mass inevitably glides into what we conceive of
spirit. It is clear, however, that it is as fully matter as before.
The truth is, it is impossible to conceive spirit since it is
impossible to imagine what is not. When we flatter ourselves that we
have formed its conception, we have merely deceived our
understanding by the consideration of infinitely rarefied matter.
P. There seems to me an insurmountable objection to the idea of
absolute coalescence;- and that is the very slight resistance
experienced by the heavenly bodies in their revolutions through space-
a resistance now ascertained, it is true, to exist in some degree, but
which is, nevertheless, so slight as to have been quite overlooked
by the sagacity even of Newton. We know that the resistance of
bodies is, chiefly, in proportion to their density. Absolute
coalescence is absolute density. Where there are no interspaces, there
can be no yielding. An ether, absolutely dense, would put an
infinitely more effectual stop to the progress of a star than would an
ether of adamant or of iron.
V. Your objection is answered with an ease which is nearly in the
ratio of its apparent unanswerability.- As regards the progress of the
star, it can make no difference whether the star passes through the
ether or the ether through it. There is no astronomical error more
unaccountable than that which reconciles the known retardation of
the comets with the idea of their passage through an ether, for,
however rare this ether be supposed, it would put a stop to all
sidereal revolution in a very far briefer period than has been
admitted by those astronomers who have endeavored to slur over a point
which they found it impossible to comprehend. The retardation actually
experienced is, on the other hand, about that which might be
expected from the friction of the ether in the instantaneous passage
through the orb. In the one case, the retarding force is momentary and
complete within itself- in the other it is endlessly accumulative.
P. But in all this- in this identification of mere matter with
God- is there nothing of irreverence? [I was forced to repeat this
question before the sleep-waker fully comprehended my meaning.]
V. Can you say why matter should be less reverenced than mind? But
you forget that the matter of which "mind" or "spirit" of the schools,
so far as regards its high capacities, and is, moreover, the
"matter" of these schools at the same time. God, with all the powers
attributed to spirit, is but the perfection of matter.
P. You assert, then, that the unparticled matter, in motion, is
thought.
V. In general, this motion is the universal thought of the universal
mind. This thought creates. All created things are but the thoughts of
God.
P. You say, "in general."
V. Yes. The universal mind is God. For new individualities, matter
is necessary.
P. But you now speak of "mind" and "matter" as do the
metaphysicians.
V. Yes- to avoid confusion. When I say "mind," I mean the
unparticled or ultimate matter, by "matter," I intend all else.
P. You were saying that "for new individualities matter is
necessary."
V. Yes; for mind, existing unincorporate, is merely God. To create
individual, thinking beings, it was necessary to incarnate portions of
the divine mind. Thus man is individualized. Divested of corporate
investiture, he were God. Now the particular motion of the
incarnated portions of the unparticled matter is the thought of man;
as the motion of the whole is that of God.
P. You say that divested of the body man will be God?
V. [After much hesitation.] I could not have said this; it is an
absurdity.
P. [Referring to my notes.] You did say that "divested of
corporate investiture man were God."
V. And this is true. Man thus divested would be God- would be
unindividualized. But he can never be thus divested- at least never
will be- else we must imagine an action of God returning upon
itself- a purposeless and futile action. Man is a creature.
Creatures are thoughts of God. It is the nature of thought to be
irrevocable.
P. I do not comprehend. You say that man will never put off the
body?
V. I say that he will never be bodiless.
P. Explain.
V. There are two bodies- the rudimental and the complete,
corresponding with the two conditions of the worm and the butterfly.
What we call "death," is but the painful metamorphosis. Our present
incarnation is progressive, preparatory, temporary. Our future is
perfected, ultimate, immortal. The ultimate life is the full design.
P. But of the worm's metamorphosis we are palpably cognizant.
V. We, certainly- but not the worm. The matter of which our
rudimental body is composed, is within the ken of the organs of that
body; or, more distinctly, our rudimental organs are adapted to the
matter of which is formed the rudimental body, but not to that of
which the ultimate is composed. The ultimate body thus escapes our
rudimental senses, and we perceive only the shell which falls, in
decaying, from the inner form, not that inner form itself; but this
inner form as well as the shell, is appreciable by those who have
already acquired the ultimate life.
P. You have often said that the mesmeric state very nearly resembles
death. How is this?
V. When I say that it resembles death, I mean that it resembles
the ultimate life; for when I am entranced the senses of my rudimental
life are in abeyance and I perceive external things directly,
without organs, through a medium which I shall employ in the ultimate,
unorganized life.
P. Unorganized?
V. Yes; organs are contrivances by which the individual is brought
into sensible relation with particular classes and forms of matter, to
the exclusion of other classes and forms. The organs of man are
adapted to his rudimental condition, and to that only; his ultimate
condition, being unorganized, is of unlimited comprehension in all
points but one- the nature of the volition of God- that is to say, the
motion of the unparticled matter. You may have a distinct idea of
the ultimate body by conceiving it to be entire brain. This it is not,
but a conception of this nature will bring you near a comprehension of
what it is. A luminous body imparts vibration to the luminiferous
ether. The vibrations generate similar ones within the retina; these
again communicate similar ones to the optic nerve. The nerve conveys
similar ones to the brain; the brain, also, similar ones to the
unparticled matter which permeates it. The motion of this latter is
thought, of which perception is the first undulation. This is the mode
by which the mind of the rudimental life communicates with the
external world; and this external world is, to the rudimental life,
limited, through the idiosyncrasy of its organs. But in the
ultimate, unorganized life, the external world reaches the whole body,
(which is of a substance having affinity to brain, as I have said,)
with no other intervention than that of an infinitely rarer ether than
even the luminiferous; and to this ether- in unison with it- the whole
body vibrates, setting in motion the unparticled matter which
permeates it. It is to the absence of idiosyncratic organs, therefore,
that we must attribute the nearly unlimited perception of the ultimate
life. To rudimental beings, organs are the cages necessary to
confine them until fledged.
P. You speak of rudimental "beings." Are there other rudimental
thinking beings than man?
V. The multitudinous conglomeration of rare matter into nebulae,
planets, suns, and other bodies which are neither nebulae, suns, nor
planets, is for the sole purpose of supplying pabulum for the
idiosyncrasy of the organs of an infinity of rudimental beings. But
for the necessity of the rudimental, prior to the ultimate life, there
would have been no bodies such as these. Each of these is tenanted
by a distinct variety of organic rudimental thinking creatures. In
all, the organs vary with the features of the place tenanted. At
death, or metamorphosis, these creatures, enjoying the ultimate
life- immortality- and cognizant of all secrets but the one, act all
things and pass every where by mere volition:- indwelling, not the
stars, which to us seem the sole palpabilities, and for the
accommodation of which we blindly deem space created- but that space
itself- that infinity of which the truly substantive vastness swallows
up the star-shadows- blotting them out as non-entities from the
perception of the angels.
P. You say that "but for the necessity of the rudimental life, there
would have been no stars." But why this necessity?
V. In the inorganic life, as well as in the inorganic matter
generally, there is nothing to impede the action of one simple
unique law- the Divine Volition. With the view of producing
impediment, the organic life and matter (complex, substantial and law-
encumbered) were contrived.
P. But again- why need this impediment have been produced?
V. The result of law inviolate is perfection- right- negative
happiness. The result of law violate is imperfection, wrong,
positive pain. Through the impediments afforded by the number,
complexity, and substantiality of the laws of organic life and matter,
the violation of law is rendered, to a certain extent, practicable.
Thus pain, which is the inorganic life is impossible, is possible in
the organic.
P. But to what good end is pain thus rendered possible?
V. All things are either good or bad by comparison. A sufficient
analysis will show that pleasure in all cases, is but the contrast
of pain. Positive pleasure is a mere idea. To be happy at any one
point we must have suffered at the same. Never to suffer would have
been never to have been blessed. But it has been shown that, in the
inorganic life, pain cannot be; thus the necessity for the organic.
The pain of the primitive life of Earth, is the sole basis of the
bliss of the ultimate life in Heaven.
P. Still there is one of your expressions which I find it impossible
to comprehend- "the truly substantive vastness of infinity."
V. This, probably, is because you have no sufficiently generic
conception of the term "substance" itself. We must not regard it as
a quality, but as a sentiment:- it is the perception, in thinking
beings, of the adaptation of matter to their organization. There are
many things on the Earth, which would be nihility to the inhabitants
of Venus- many things visible and tangible in Venus, which we could
not be brought to appreciate as existing at all. But to the
inorganic beings- to the angels- the whole of the unparticled matter
is substance; that is to say, the whole of what we term "space," is to
them the truest substantiality;- the stars, meantime, through what
we consider their materiality, escaping the angelic sense, just in
proportion as the unparticled matter, through what we consider its
immateriality, eludes the organic.
As the sleep-waker pronounced these latter words, in a feeble
tone, I observed on his countenance a singular expression, which
somewhat alarmed me, and induced me to awake him at once. No sooner
had I done this than, with a bright smile irradiating all his
features, he fell back upon his pillow and expired. I noticed that
in less than a minute afterward his corpse had all the stern
rigidity of stone. His brow was of the coldness of ice. Thus,
ordinarily, should it have appeared, only after long pressure from
Azrael's hand. Had the sleep-waker, indeed, during the latter
portion of his discourse, been addressing me from out the regions of
the shadows?
THE END
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1850
METZENGERSTEIN
by Edgar Allan Poe
METZENGERSTEIN
Pestis eram vivus - moriens tua mors ero. Martin Luther
HORROR and fatality have been stalking abroad in all ages. Why
then give a date to this story I have to tell? Let it suffice to
say, that at the period of which I speak, there existed, in the
interior of Hungary, a settled although hidden belief in the doctrines
of the Metempsychosis. Of the doctrines themselves- that is, of their
falsity, or of their probability- I say nothing. I assert, however,
that much of our incredulity- as La Bruyere says of all our
unhappiness- "vient de ne pouvoir etre seuls."
But there are some points in the Hungarian superstition which were
fast verging to absurdity. They- the Hungarians- differed very
essentially from their Eastern authorities. For example, "The soul,"
said the former- I give the words of an acute and intelligent
Parisian- "ne demeure qu'un seul fois dans un corps sensible: au
reste- un cheval, un chien, un homme meme, n'est que la ressemblance
peu tangible de ces animaux."
The families of Berlifitzing and Metzengerstein had been at variance
for centuries. Never before were two houses so illustrious, mutually
embittered by hostility so deadly. Indeed at the era of this
history, it was observed by an old crone of haggard and sinister
appearance, that "fire and water might sooner mingle than a
Berlifitzing clasp the hand of a Metzengerstein." The origin of this
enmity seems to be found in the words of an ancient prophecy- "A
lofty name shall have a fearful fall when, as the rider over his
horse, the mortality of Metzengerstein shall triumph over the
immortality of Berlifitzing."
To be sure the words themselves had little or no meaning. But more
trivial causes have given rise- and that no long while ago- to
consequences equally eventful. Besides, the estates, which were
contiguous, had long exercised a rival influence in the affairs of a
busy government. Moreover, near neighbors are seldom friends; and
the inhabitants of the Castle Berlifitzing might look, from their
lofty buttresses, into the very windows of the palace
Metzengerstein. Least of all had the more than feudal magnificence,
thus discovered, a tendency to allay the irritable feelings of the
less ancient and less wealthy Berlifitzings. What wonder then, that
the words, however silly, of that prediction, should have succeeded in
setting and keeping at variance two families already predisposed to
quarrel by every instigation of hereditary jealousy? The prophecy
seemed to imply- if it implied anything- a final triumph on the part
of the already more powerful house; and was of course remembered
with the more bitter animosity by the weaker and less influential.
Wilhelm, Count Berlifitzing, although loftily descended, was, at the
epoch of this narrative, an infirm and doting old man, remarkable
for nothing but an inordinate and inveterate personal antipathy to the
family of his rival, and so passionate a love of horses, and of
hunting, that neither bodily infirmity, great age, nor mental
incapacity, prevented his daily participation in the dangers of the
chase.
Frederick, Baron Metzengerstein, was, on the other hand, not yet
Mary, followed him quickly after. Frederick was, at that time, in
his fifteenth year. In a city, fifteen years are no long period- a
child may be still a child in his third lustrum: but in a
wilderness- in so magnificent a wilderness as that old principality,
fifteen years have a far deeper meaning.
The beautiful Lady Mary! How could she die?- and of consumption!
But it is a path I have prayed to follow. I would wish all I love to
perish of that gentle disease. How glorious- to depart in the heyday
of the young blood- the heart of all passion- the imagination all
fire- amid the remembrances of happier days- in the fall of the year-
and so be buried up forever in the gorgeous autumnal leaves!
Thus died the Lady Mary. The young Baron Frederick stood without a
living relative by the coffin of his dead mother. He placed his hand
upon her placid forehead. No shudder came over his delicate frame- no
sigh from his flinty bosom. Heartless, self-willed and impetuous
from his childhood, he had reached the age of which I speak through
a career of unfeeling, wanton, and reckless dissipation; and a barrier
had long since arisen in the channel of all holy thoughts and gentle
recollections.
From some peculiar circumstances attending the administration of his
father, the young Baron, at the decease of the former, entered
immediately upon his vast possessions. Such estates were seldom held
before by a nobleman of Hungary. His castles were without number.
The chief in point of splendor and extent was the "Chateau
Metzengerstein." The boundary line of his dominions was never clearly
defined; but his principal park embraced a circuit of fifty miles.
Upon the succession of a proprietor so young, with a character so
well known, to a fortune so unparalleled, little speculation was
afloat in regard to his probable course of conduct. And, indeed, for
the space of three days, the behavior of the heir out-heroded Herod,
and fairly surpassed the expectations of his most enthusiastic
admirers. Shameful debaucheries- flagrant treacheries- unheard-of
atrocities- gave his trembling vassals quickly to understand that no
servile submission on their part- no punctilios of conscience on his
own- were thenceforward to prove any security against the remorseless
fangs of a petty Caligula. On the night of the fourth day, the stables
of the castle Berlifitzing were discovered to be on fire; and the
unanimous opinion of the neighborhood added the crime of the
incendiary to the already hideous list of the Baron's misdemeanors and
enormities.
But during the tumult occasioned by this occurrence, the young
nobleman himself sat apparently buried in meditation, in a vast and
desolate upper apartment of the family palace of Metzengerstein. The
rich although faded tapestry hangings which swung gloomily upon the
walls, represented the shadowy and majestic forms of a thousand
illustrious ancestors. Here, rich-ermined priests, and pontifical
dignitaries, familiarly seated with the autocrat and the sovereign,
put a veto on the wishes of a temporal king, or restrained with the
fiat of papal supremacy the rebellious sceptre of the Arch-enemy.
There, the dark, tall statures of the Princes Metzengerstein- their
muscular war-coursers plunging over the carcasses of fallen
foes- startled the steadiest nerves with their vigorous expression;
and here, again, the voluptuous and swan-like figures of the dames of
days gone by, floated away in the mazes of an unreal dance to the
strains of imaginary melody.
But as the Baron listened, or affected to listen, to the gradually
increasing uproar in the stables of Berlifitzing- or perhaps pondered
upon some more novel, some more decided act of audacity- his eyes
became unwittingly rivetted to the figure of an enormous, and
unnaturally colored horse, represented in the tapestry as belonging to
a Saracen ancestor of the family of his rival. The horse itself, in
the foreground of the design, stood motionless and statue-like- while
farther back, its discomfited rider perished by the dagger of a
Metzengerstein.
On Frederick's lip arose a fiendish expression, as he became aware
of the direction which his glance had, without his consciousness,
assumed. Yet he did not remove it. On the contrary, he could by no
means account for the overwhelming anxiety which appeared falling like
a pall upon his senses. It was with difficulty that he reconciled
his dreamy and incoherent feelings with the certainty of being
awake. The longer he gazed the more absorbing became the spell- the
more impossible did it appear that he could ever withdraw his glance
from the fascination of that tapestry. But the tumult without becoming
suddenly more violent, with a compulsory exertion he diverted his
attention to the glare of ruddy light thrown full by the flaming
stables upon the windows of the apartment.
The action, however, was but momentary, his gaze returned
mechanically to the wall. To his extreme horror and astonishment,
the head of the gigantic steed had, in the meantime, altered its
position. The neck of the animal, before arched, as if in
compassion, over the prostrate body of its lord, was now extended,
at full length, in the direction of the Baron. The eyes, before
invisible, now wore an energetic and human expression, while they
gleamed with a fiery and unusual red; and the distended lips of the
apparently enraged horse left in full view his gigantic and disgusting
teeth.
Stupefied with terror, the young nobleman tottered to the door. As
he threw it open, a flash of red light, streaming far into the
chamber, flung his shadow with a clear outline against the quivering
tapestry, and he shuddered to perceive that shadow- as he staggered
awhile upon the threshold- assuming the exact position, and precisely
filling up the contour, of the relentless and triumphant murderer of
the Saracen Berlifitzing.
To lighten the depression of his spirits, the Baron hurried into the
open air. At the principal gate of the palace he encountered three
equerries. With much difficulty, and at the imminent peril of their
lives, they were restraining the convulsive plunges of a gigantic
and fiery-colored horse.
"Whose horse? Where did you get him?" demanded the youth, in a
querulous and husky tone of voice, as he became instantly aware that
the mysterious steed in the tapestried chamber was the very
counterpart of the furious animal before his eyes.
"He is your own property, sire," replied one of the equerries, "at
least he is claimed by no other owner. We caught him flying, all
smoking and foaming with rage, from the burning stables of the
Castle Berlifitzing. Supposing him to have belonged to the old Count's
stud of foreign horses, we led him back as an estray. But the grooms
there disclaim any title to the creature; which is strange, since he
bears evident marks of having made a narrow escape from the flames.
"The letters W. V. B. are also branded very distinctly on his
forehead," interrupted a second equerry, "I supposed them, of
course, to be the initials of Wilhelm Von Berlifitzing- but all at
the castle are positive in denying any knowledge of the horse."
"Extremely singular!" said the young Baron, with a musing air, and
apparently unconscious of the meaning of his words. "He is, as you
say, a remarkable horse- a prodigious horse! although, as you very
justly observe, of a suspicious and untractable character, let him
be mine, however," he added, after a pause, "perhaps a rider like
Frederick of Metzengerstein, may tame even the devil from the
stables of Berlifitzing."
"You are mistaken, my lord; the horse, as I think we mentioned, is
not from the stables of the Count. If such had been the case, we
know our duty better than to bring him into the presence of a noble of
your family."
"True!" observed the Baron, dryly, and at that instant a page of the
bedchamber came from the palace with a heightened color, and a
precipitate step. He whispered into his master's ear an account of the
sudden disappearance of a small portion of the tapestry, in an
apartment which he designated; entering, at the same time, into
particulars of a minute and circumstantial character; but from the low
tone of voice in which these latter were communicated, nothing escaped
to gratify the excited curiosity of the equerries.
The young Frederick, during the conference, seemed agitated by a
variety of emotions. He soon, however, recovered his composure, and an
expression of determined malignancy settled upon his countenance, as
he gave peremptory orders that a certain chamber should be immediately
locked up, and the key placed in his own possession.
"Have you heard of the unhappy death of the old hunter
Berlifitzing?" said one of his vassals to the Baron, as, after the
departure of the page, the huge steed which that nobleman had
adopted as his own, plunged and curvetted, with redoubled fury, down
the long avenue which extended from the chateau to the stables of
Metzengerstein.
"No!" said the Baron, turning abruptly toward the speaker, "dead!
say you?"
"It is indeed true, my lord; and, to a noble of your name, will
be, I imagine, no unwelcome intelligence."
A rapid smile shot over the countenance of the listener. "How died
he?"
"In his rash exertions to rescue a favorite portion of his hunting
stud, he has himself perished miserably in the flames."
"I-n-d-e-e-d-!" ejaculated the Baron, as if slowly and
deliberately impressed with the truth of some exciting idea.
"Indeed;" repeated the vassal.
"Shocking!" said the youth, calmly, and turned quietly into the
chateau.
From this date a marked alteration took place in the outward
demeanor of the dissolute young Baron Frederick Von Metzengerstein.
Indeed, his behavior disappointed every expectation, and proved little
in accordance with the views of many a manoeuvering mamma; while his
habits and manner, still less than formerly, offered any thing
congenial with those of the neighboring aristocracy. He was never to
be seen beyond the limits of his own domain, and, in this wide and
social world, was utterly companionless- unless, indeed, that
unnatural, impetuous, and fiery-colored horse, which he henceforward
continually bestrode, had any mysterious right to the title of his
friend.
Numerous invitations on the part of the neighborhood for a long
time, however, periodically came in. "Will the Baron honor our
festivals with his presence?" "Will the Baron join us in a hunting
of the boar?"- "Metzengerstein does not hunt;" "Metzengerstein will
not attend," were the haughty and laconic answers.
These repeated insults were not to be endured by an imperious
nobility. Such invitations became less cordial- less frequent- in
time they ceased altogether. The widow of the unfortunate Count
Berlifitzing was even heard to express a hope "that the Baron might be
at home when he did not wish to be at home, since he disdained the
company of his equals; and ride when he did not wish to ride, since he
preferred the society of a horse." This to be sure was a very silly
explosion of hereditary pique; and merely proved how singularly
unmeaning our sayings are apt to become, when we desire to be
unusually energetic.
The charitable, nevertheless, attributed the alteration in the
conduct of the young nobleman to the natural sorrow of a son for the
untimely loss of his parents- forgetting, however, his atrocious and
reckless behavior during the short period immediately succeeding
that bereavement. Some there were, indeed, who suggested a too haughty
idea of self-consequence and dignity. Others again (among them may be
mentioned the family physician) did not hesitate in speaking of morbid
melancholy, and hereditary ill-health; while dark hints, of a more
equivocal nature, were current among the multitude.
Indeed, the Baron's perverse attachment to his lately-acquired
charger- an attachment which seemed to attain new strength from every
fresh example of the animal's ferocious and demon-like propensities-
at length became, in the eyes of all reasonable men, a hideous and
unnatural fervor. In the glare of noon- at the dead hour of night- in
sickness or in health- in calm or in tempest- the young Metzengerstein
seemed rivetted to the saddle of that colossal horse, whose
intractable audacities so well accorded with his own spirit.
There were circumstances, moreover, which coupled with late
events, gave an unearthly and portentous character to the mania of the
rider, and to the capabilities of the steed. The space passed over
in a single leap had been accurately measured, and was found to
exceed, by an astounding difference, the wildest expectations of the
most imaginative. The Baron, besides, had no particular name for the
animal, although all the rest in his collection were distinguished
by characteristic appellations. His stable, too, was appointed at a
distance from the rest; and with regard to grooming and other
necessary offices, none but the owner in person had ventured to
officiate, or even to enter the enclosure of that particular stall. It
was also to be observed, that although the three grooms, who had
caught the steed as he fled from the conflagration at Berlifitzing,
had succeeded in arresting his course, by means of a chain-bridle
and noose- yet no one of the three could with any certainty affirm
that he had, during that dangerous struggle, or at any period
thereafter, actually placed his hand upon the body of the beast.
Instances of peculiar intelligence in the demeanor of a noble and
high-spirited horse are not to be supposed capable of exciting
unreasonable attention- especially among men who, daily trained to
the labors of the chase, might appear well acquainted with the
sagacity of a horse- but there were certain circumstances which
intruded themselves per force upon the most skeptical and phlegmatic;
and it is said there were times when the animal caused the gaping
crowd who stood around to recoil in horror from the deep and
impressive meaning of his terrible stamp- times when the young
Metzengerstein turned pale and shrunk away from the rapid and
searching expression of his earnest and human-looking eye.
Among all the retinue of the Baron, however, none were found to
doubt the ardor of that extraordinary affection which existed on the
part of the young nobleman for the fiery qualities of his horse; at
least, none but an insignificant and misshapen little page, whose
deformities were in everybody's way, and whose opinions were of the
least possible importance. He- if his ideas are worth mentioning at
all- had the effrontery to assert that his master never vaulted into
the saddle without an unaccountable and almost imperceptible
shudder, and that, upon his return from every long-continued and
habitual ride, an expression of triumphant malignity distorted every
muscle in his countenance.
One tempestuous night, Metzengerstein, awaking from a heavy slumber,
descended like a maniac from his chamber, and, mounting in hot
haste, bounded away into the mazes of the forest. An occurrence so
common attracted no particular attention, but his return was looked
for with intense anxiety on the part of his domestics, when, after
some hours' absence, the stupendous and magnificent battlements of the
Chateau Metzengerstein, were discovered crackling and rocking to their
very foundation, under the influence of a dense and livid mass of
ungovernable fire.
As the flames, when first seen, had already made so terrible a
progress that all efforts to save any portion of the building were
evidently futile, the astonished neighborhood stood idly around in
silent and pathetic wonder. But a new and fearful object soon rivetted
the attention of the multitude, and proved how much more intense is
the excitement wrought in the feelings of a crowd by the contemplation
of human agony, than that brought about by the most appalling
spectacles of inanimate matter.
Up the long avenue of aged oaks which led from the forest to the
main entrance of the Chateau Metzengerstein, a steed, bearing an
unbonneted and disordered rider, was seen leaping with an
impetuosity which outstripped the very Demon of the Tempest, and
extorted from every stupefied beholder the ejaculation- "horrible."
The career of the horseman was indisputably, on his own part,
uncontrollable. The agony of his countenance, the convulsive
struggle of his frame, gave evidence of superhuman exertion: but no
sound, save a solitary shriek, escaped from his lacerated lips,
which were bitten through and through in the intensity of terror.
One instant, and the clattering of hoofs resounded sharply and shrilly
above the roaring of the flames and the shrieking of the
winds- another, and, clearing at a single plunge the gate-way and the
moat, the steed bounded far up the tottering staircases of the palace,
and, with its rider, disappeared amid the whirlwind of chaotic fire.
The fury of the tempest immediately died away, and a dead calm
sullenly succeeded. A white flame still enveloped the building like
a shroud, and, streaming far away into the quiet atmosphere, shot
forth a glare of preternatural light; while a cloud of smoke settled
heavily over the battlements in the distinct colossal figure of- a
horse.
-THE END-
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1850
MORELLA
by Edgar Allan Poe
MORELLA
Itself, by itself, solely, one everlasting, and single.
PLATO: SYMPOS.
WITH a feeling of deep yet most singular affection I regarded my
friend Morella. Thrown by accident into her society many years ago, my
soul from our first meeting, burned with fires it had never before
known; but the fires were not of Eros, and bitter and tormenting to my
spirit was the gradual conviction that I could in no manner define
their unusual meaning or regulate their vague intensity. Yet we met;
and fate bound us together at the altar, and I never spoke of
passion nor thought of love. She, however, shunned society, and,
attaching herself to me alone rendered me happy. It is a happiness
to wonder; it is a happiness to dream.
Morella's erudition was profound. As I hope to live, her talents
were of no common order- her powers of mind were gigantic. I felt
this, and, in many matters, became her pupil. I soon, however, found
that, perhaps on account of her Presburg education, she placed before
me a number of those mystical writings which are usually considered
the mere dross of the early German literature. These, for what reason
I could not imagine, were her favourite and constant study- and that
in process of time they became my own, should be attributed to the
simple but effectual influence of habit and example.
In all this, if I err not, my reason had little to do. My
convictions, or I forget myself, were in no manner acted upon by the
ideal, nor was any tincture of the mysticism which I read to be
discovered, unless I am greatly mistaken, either in my deeds or in
my thoughts. Persuaded of this, I abandoned myself implicitly to the
guidance of my wife, and entered with an unflinching heart into the
intricacies of her studies. And then- then, when poring over
forbidden pages, I felt a forbidden spirit enkindling within me-
would Morella place her cold hand upon my own, and rake up from the
ashes of a dead philosophy some low, singular words, whose strange
meaning burned themselves in upon my memory. And then, hour after
hour, would I linger by her side, and dwell upon the music of her
voice, until at length its melody was tainted with terror, and there
fell a shadow upon my soul, and I grew pale, and shuddered inwardly at
those too unearthly tones. And thus, joy suddenly faded into horror,
and the most beautiful became the most hideous, as Hinnon became
Ge-Henna.
It is unnecessary to state the exact character of those
disquisitions which, growing out of the volumes I have mentioned,
formed, for so long a time, almost the sole conversation of Morella
and myself. By the learned in what might be termed theological
morality they will be readily conceived, and by the unlearned they
would, at all events, be little understood. The wild Pantheism of
Fichte; the modified Paliggenedia of the Pythagoreans; and, above all,
the doctrines of Identity as urged by Schelling, were generally the
points of discussion presenting the most of beauty to the imaginative
Morella. That identity which is termed personal, Mr. Locke, I think,
truly defines to consist in the saneness of rational being. And
since by person we understand an intelligent essence having reason,
and since there is a consciousness which always accompanies
thinking, it is this which makes us all to be that which we call
ourselves, thereby distinguishing us from other beings that think, and
giving us our personal identity. But the principium indivduationis,
the notion of that identity which at death is or is not lost for ever,
was to me, at all times, a consideration of intense interest; not more
from the perplexing and exciting nature of its consequences, than from
the marked and agitated manner in which Morella mentioned them.
But, indeed, the time had now arrived when the mystery of my wife's
manner oppressed me as a spell. I could no longer bear the touch of
her wan fingers, nor the low tone of her musical language, nor the
lustre of her melancholy eyes. And she knew all this, but did not
upbraid; she seemed conscious of my weakness or my folly, and,
smiling, called it fate. She seemed also conscious of a cause, to me
unknown, for the gradual alienation of my regard; but she gave me no
hint or token of its nature. Yet was she woman, and pined away
daily. In time the crimson spot settled steadily upon the cheek, and
the blue veins upon the pale forehead became prominent; and one
instant my nature melted into pity, but in, next I met the glance of
her meaning eyes, and then my soul sickened and became giddy with
the giddiness of one who gazes downward into some dreary and
unfathomable abyss.
Shall I then say that I longed with an earnest and consuming
desire for the moment of Morella's decease? I did; but the fragile
spirit clung to its tenement of clay for many days, for many weeks and
irksome months, until my tortured nerves obtained the mastery over
my mind, and I grew furious through delay, and, with the heart of a
fiend, cursed the days and the hours and the bitter moments, which
seemed to lengthen and lengthen as her gentle life declined, like
shadows in the dying of the day.
But one autumnal evening, when the winds lay still in heaven,
Morella called me to her bedside. There was a dim mist over all the
earth, and a warm glow upon the waters, and amid the rich October
leaves of the forest, a rainbow from the firmament had surely fallen.
"It is a day of days," she said, as I approached; "a day of all days
either to live or die. It is a fair day for the sons of earth and
life- ah, more fair for the daughters of heaven and death!"
I kissed her forehead, and she continued:
"I am dying, yet shall I live."
"Morella!"
"The days have never been when thou couldst love me- but her whom
in life thou didst abhor, in death thou shalt adore."
"Morella!"
"I repeat I am dying. But within me is a pledge of that affection-
ah, how little!- which thou didst feel for me, Morella. And when my
spirit departs shall the child live- thy child and mine, Morella's.
But thy days shall be days of sorrow- that sorrow which is the most
lasting of impressions, as the cypress is the most enduring of trees.
For the hours of thy happiness are over and joy is not gathered
twice in a life, as the roses of Paestum twice in a year. Thou shalt
no longer, then, play the Teian with time, but, being ignorant of
the myrtle and the vine, thou shalt bear about with thee thy shroud
on the earth, as do the Moslemin at Mecca."
"Morella!" I cried, "Morella! how knowest thou this?" but she turned
away her face upon the pillow and a slight tremor coming over her
limbs, she thus died, and I heard her voice no more.
Yet, as she had foretold, her child, to which in dying she had given
birth, which breathed not until the mother breathed no more, her
child, a daughter, lived. And she grew strangely in stature and
intellect, and was the perfect resemblance of her who had departed,
and I loved her with a love more fervent than I had believed it
possible to feel for any denizen of earth.
But, ere long the heaven of this pure affection became darkened, and
gloom, and horror, and grief swept over it in clouds. I said the child
grew strangely in stature and intelligence. Strange, indeed, was her
rapid increase in bodily size, but terrible, oh! terrible were the
tumultuous thoughts which crowded upon me while watching the
development of her mental being. Could it be otherwise, when I daily
discovered in the conceptions of the child the adult powers and
faculties of the woman? when the lessons of experience fell from the
lips of infancy? and when the wisdom or the passions of maturity I
found hourly gleaming from its full and speculative eye? When, I
say, all this beeame evident to my appalled senses, when I could no
longer hide it from my soul, nor throw it off from those perceptions
which trembled to receive it, is it to be wondered at that suspicions,
of a nature fearful and exciting, crept in upon my spirit, or that
my thoughts fell back aghast upon the wild tales and thrilling
theories of the entombed Morella? I snatched from the scrutiny of
the world a being whom destiny compelled me to adore, and in the
rigorous seclusion of my home, watched with an agonizing anxiety
over all which concerned the beloved.
And as years rolled away, and I gazed day after day upon her holy,
and mild, and eloquent face, and poured over her maturing form, day
after day did I discover new points of resemblance in the child to her
mother, the melancholy and the dead. And hourly grew darker these
shadows of similitude, and more full, and more definite, and more
perplexing, and more hideously terrible in their aspect. For that
her smile was like her mother's I could bear; but then I shuddered
at its too perfect identity, that her eyes were like Morella's I could
endure; but then they, too, often looked down into the depths of my
soul with Morella's own intense and bewildering meaning. And in the
contour of the high forehead, and in the ringlets of the silken
hair, and in the wan fingers which buried themselves therein, and in
the sad musical tones of her speech, and above all- oh, above all, in
the phrases and expressions of the dead on the lips of the loved and
the living, I found food for consuming thought and horror, for a
worm that would not die.
Thus passed away two lustra of her life, and as yet my daughter
remained nameless upon the earth. "My child," and "my love," were
the designations usually prompted by a father's affection, and the
rigid seclusion of her days precluded all other intercourse. Morella's
name died with her at her death. Of the mother I had never spoken to
the daughter, it was impossible to speak. Indeed, during the brief
period of her existence, the latter had received no impressions from
the outward world, save such as might have been afforded by the narrow
limits of her privacy. But at length the ceremony of baptism presented
to my mind, in its unnerved and agitated condition, a present
deliverance from the terrors of my destiny. And at the baptismal
font I hesitated for a name. And many titles of the wise and
beautiful, of old and modern times, of my own and foreign lands,
came thronging to my lips, with many, many fair titles of the
gentle, and the happy, and the good. What prompted me then to
disturb the memory of the buried dead? What demon urged me to
breathe that sound, which in its very recollection was wont to make
ebb the purple blood in torrents from the temples to the heart? What
fiend spoke from the recesses of my soul, when amid those dim
aisles, and in the silence of the night, I whispered within the ears
of the holy man the syllables- Morella? What more than fiend
convulsed the features of my child, and overspread them with hues of
death, as starting at that scarcely audible sound, she turned her
glassy eyes from the earth to heaven, and falling prostrate on the
black slabs of our ancestral vault, responded- "I am here!"
Distinct, coldly, calmly distinct, fell those few simple sounds
within my ear, and thence like molten lead rolled hissingly into my
brain. Years- years may pass away, but the memory of that epoch
never. Nor was I indeed ignorant of the flowers and the vine- but the
hemlock and the cypress overshadowed me night and day. And I kept no
reckoning of time or place, and the stars of my fate faded from
heaven, and therefore the earth grew dark, and its figures passed by
me like flitting shadows, and among them all I beheld only- Morella.
The winds of the firmament breathed but one sound within my ears,
and the ripples upon the sea murmured evermore- Morella. But she
died; and with my own hands I bore her to the tomb; and I laughed with
a long and bitter laugh as I found no traces of the first in the
channel where I laid the second.- Morella.
THE END
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1850
MORNING ON THE WISSAHICCON
by Edgar Allen Poe
MORNING ON THE WISSAHICCON
THE NATURAL scenery of America has often been contrasted, in its
general features as well as in detail, with the landscape of the Old
World- more especially of Europe- and not deeper has been the
enthusiasm, than wide the dissension, of the supporters of each
region. The discussion is one not likely to be soon closed, for,
although much has been said on both sides, a word more yet remains
to be said.
The most conspicuous of the British tourists who have attempted a
comparison, seem to regard our northern and eastern seaboard,
comparatively speaking, as all of America, at least, as all of the
United States, worthy consideration. They say little, because they
have seen less, of the gorgeous interior scenery of some of our
western and southern districts- of the vast valley of Louisiana, for
example,- a realization of the wildest dreams of paradise. For the
most part, these travellers content themselves with a hasty inspection
of the natural lions of the land- the Hudson, Niagara, the
Catskills, Harper's Ferry, the lakes of New York, the Ohio, the
prairies, and the Mississippi. These, indeed, are objects well
worthy the contemplation even of him who has just clambered by the
castellated Rhine, or roamed
By the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone;
but these are not all of which we can boast; and, indeed, I will be so
hardy as to assert that there are innumerable quiet, obscure, and
scarcely explored nooks, within the limits of the United States, that,
by the true artist, or cultivated lover of the grand and beautiful
amid the works of God, will be preferred to each and to all of the
chronicled and better accredited scenes to which I have referred.
In fact, the real Edens of the land lie far away from the track of
our own most deliberate tourists- how very far, then, beyond the reach
of the foreigner, who, having made with his publisher at home
arrangements for a certain amount of comment upon America, to be
furnished in a stipulated period, can hope to fulfil his agreement
in no other manner than by steaming it, memorandum- book in hand,
through only the most beaten thoroughfares of the country!
I mentioned, just above, the valley of Louisiana. Of all extensive
areas of natural loveliness, this is perhaps the most lovely. No
fiction has approached it. The most gorgeous imagination might
derive suggestions from its exuberant beauty. And beauty is, indeed,
its sole character. It has little, or rather nothing, of the
sublime. Gentle undulations of soil, interwreathed with fantastic
crystallic streams, banked by flowery slopes, and backed by a forest
vegetation, gigantic, glossy, multicoloured, sparkling with gay
birds and burthened with perfume- these features make up, in the
vale of Louisiana, the most voluptuous natural scenery upon earth.
But, even of this delicious region, the sweeter portions are reached
only by the bypaths. Indeed, in America generally, the traveller who
would behold the finest landscapes, must seek them not by the
railroad, nor by the steamboat, not by the stage-coach, nor in his
private carriage, not yet even on horseback- but on foot. He must
walk, he must leap ravines, he must risk his neck among precipices, or
he must leave unseen the truest, the richest, and most unspeakable
glories of the land.
Now in the greater portion of Europe no such necessity exists. In
England it exists not at all. The merest dandy of a tourist may
there visit every nook worth visiting without detriment to his silk
stockings; so thoroughly known are all points of interest, and so
well-arranged are the means of attaining them. This consideration
has never been allowed its due weight, in comparisons of the natural
scenery of the Old and New Worlds. The entire loveliness of the former
is collated with only the most noted, and with by no means the most
eminent items in the general loveliness of the latter.
River scenery has, unquestionably, within itself, all the main
elements of beauty, and, time out of mind, has been the favourite
theme of the poet. But much of this fame is attributable to the
predominance of travel in fluvial over that in mountainous
districts. In the same way, large rivers, because usually highways,
have, in all countries, absorbed an undue share of admiration. They
are more observed, and, consequently, made more the subject of
discourse, than less important, but often more interesting streams.
A singular exemplification of my remarks upon this head may be found
in the Wissahiccon, a brook, (for more it can scarcely be called,)
which empties itself into the Schuylkill, about six miles westward
of Philadelphia. Now the Wissahiccon is of so remarkable a
loveliness that, were it flowing in England, it would be the theme
of every bard, and the common topic of every tongue, if, indeed, its
banks were not parcelled off in lots, at an exorbitant price, as
building-sites for the villas of the opulent. Yet it is only within
a very few years that any one has more than heard of the
Wissahiccon, while the broader and more navigable water into which
it flows, has been long celebrated as one of the finest specimens of
American river scenery. The Schuylkill, whose beauties have been
much exaggerated, and whose banks, at least in the neighborhood of
Philadelphia, are marshy like those of the Delaware, is not at all
comparable, as an object of picturesque interest, with the more humble
and less notorious rivulet of which we speak.
It was not until Fanny Kemble, in her droll book about the United
States, pointed out to the Philadelphians the rare loveliness of a
stream which lay at their own doors, that this loveliness was more
than suspected by a few adventurous pedestrians of the vicinity.
But, the "Journal" having opened all eyes, the Wissahiccon, to a
certain extent, rolled at once into notoriety. I say "to a certain
extent," for, in fact, the true beauty of the stream lies far above
the route of the Philadelphian picturesque-hunters, who rarely proceed
farther than a mile or two above the mouth of the rivulet- for the
very excellent reason that here the carriage-road stops. I would
advise the adventurer who would behold its finest points to take the
Ridge Road, running westwardly from the city, and, having reached
the second lane beyond the sixth mile-stone, to follow this lane to
its termination. He will thus strike the Wissahiccon, at one of its
best reaches, and, in a skiff, or by clambering along its banks, he
can go up or down the stream, as best suits his fancy, and in either
direction will meet his reward.
I have already said, or should have said, that the brook is
narrow. Its banks are generally, indeed almost universally,
precipitous, and consist of high hills, clothed with noble shrubbery
near the water, and crowned at a greater elevation, with some of the
most magnificent forest trees of America, among which stands
conspicuous the liriodendron tulipiferum. The immediate shores,
however, are of granite, sharply defined or moss-covered, against
which the pellucid water lolls in its gentle flow, as the blue waves
of the Mediterranean upon the steps of her palaces of marble.
Occasionally in front of the cliffs, extends a small definite
plateau of richly herbaged land, affording the most picturesque
position for a cottage and garden which the richest imagination
could conceive. The windings of the stream are many and abrupt, as
is usually the case where banks are precipitous, and thus the
impression conveyed to the voyager's eye, as he proceeds, is that of
an endless succession of infinitely varied small lakes, or, more
properly speaking, tarns. The Wissahiccon, however, should be visited,
not like "fair Melrose," by moonlight, or even in cloudy weather,
but amid the brightest glare of a noonday sun; for the narrowness of
the gorge through which it flows, the height of the hills on either
hand, and the density of the foliage, conspire to produce a
gloominess, if not an absolute dreariness of effect, which, unless
relieved by a bright general light, detracts from the mere beauty of
the scene.
Not long ago I visited the stream by the route described, and
spent the better part of a sultry day in floating in a skiff upon
its bosom. The heat gradually overcame me, and, resigning myself to
the influence of the scenes and of the weather, and of the gentle
moving current, I sank into a half slumber, during which my
imagination revelled in visions of the Wissahiccon of ancient days- of
the "good old days" when the Demon of the Engine was not, when picnics
were undreamed of, when "water privileges" were neither bought nor
sold, and when the red man trod alone, with the elk, upon the ridges
that now towered above. And, while gradually these conceits took
possession of my mind, the lazy brook had borne me, inch by inch,
around one promontory and within full view of another that bounded the
prospect at the distance of forty or fifty yards. It was a steep rocky
cliff, abutting far into the stream, and presenting much more of the
Salvator character than any portion of the shore hitherto passed. What
I saw upon this cliff, although surely an object of very extraordinary
nature, the place and season considered, at first neither startled nor
amazed me- so thoroughly and appropriately did it chime in with the
half-slumberous fancies that enwrapped me. I saw, or dreamed that I
saw, standing upon the extreme verge of the precipice, with neck
outstretched, with ears erect, and the whole attitude indicative of
profound and melancholy inquisitiveness, one of the oldest and boldest
of those identical elks which had been coupled with the red men of
my vision.
I say that, for a few moments, this apparition neither startled
nor amazed me. During this interval my whole soul was bound up in
intense sympathy alone. I fancied the elk repining, not less than
wondering, at the manifest alterations for the worse, wrought upon the
brook and its vicinage, even within the last few years, by the stern
hand of the utilitarian. But a slight movement of the animal's head at
once dispelled the dreaminess which invested me, and aroused me to a
full sense of novelty of the adventure. I arose upon one knee within
the skiff, and, while I hesitated whether to stop my career, or let
myself float nearer to the object of my wonder, I heard the words
"hist!" "hist!" ejaculated quickly but cautiously, from the
shrubbery overhead. In an instant afterwards, a negro emerged from the
thicket, putting aside the bushes with care, and treading
stealthily. He bore in one hand a quantity of salt, and, holding it
towards the elk, gently yet steadily approached. The noble animal,
although a little fluttered, made no attempt at escape. The negro
advanced; offered the salt; and spoke a few words of encouragement
or conciliation. Presently, the elk bowed and stamped, and then lay
quietly down and was secured with a halter.
Thus ended my romance of the elk. It was a pet of great age and very
domestic habits, and belonged to an English family occupying a villa
in the vicinity.
THE END
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1833
MS. FOUND IN A BOTTLE
by Edgar Allan Poe
Qui n'a plus qu'un moment a vivre
N'a plus rien a dissimuler. --Quinault --Atys.
OF my country and of my family I have little to say. Ill usage and
length of years have driven me from the one, and estranged me from the
other. Hereditary wealth afforded me an education of no common
order, and a contemplative turn of mind enabled me to methodize the
stores which early study very diligently garnered up. --Beyond all
things, the study of the German moralists gave me great delight; not
from any ill-advised admiration of their eloquent madness, but from
the ease with which my habits of rigid thought enabled me to detect
their falsities. I have often been reproached with the aridity of my
genius; a deficiency of imagination has been imputed to me as a crime;
and the Pyrrhonism of my opinions has at all times rendered me
notorious. Indeed, a strong relish for physical philosophy has, I
fear, tinctured my mind with a very common error of this age --I
mean the habit of referring occurrences, even the least susceptible of
such reference, to the principles of that science. Upon the whole,
no person could be less liable than myself to be led away from the
severe precincts of truth by the ignes fatui of superstition. I have
thought proper to premise thus much, lest the incredible tale I have
to tell should be considered rather the raving of a crude imagination,
than the positive experience of a mind to which the reveries of
fancy have been a dead letter and a nullity.
After many years spent in foreign travel, I sailed in the year 18--,
from the port of Batavia, in the rich and populous island of Java,
on a voyage to the Archipelago of the Sunda islands. I went as
passenger --having no other inducement than a kind of nervous
restlessness which haunted me as a fiend.
Our vessel was a beautiful ship of about four hundred tons,
copper-fastened, and built at Bombay of Malabar teak. She was
freighted with cotton-wool and oil, from the Lachadive islands. We had
also on board coir, jaggeree, ghee, cocoa-nuts, and a few cases of
opium. The stowage was clumsily done, and the vessel consequently
crank.
We got under way with a mere breath of wind, and for many days stood
along the eastern coast of Java, without any other incident to beguile
the monotony of our course than the occasional meeting with some of
the small grabs of the Archipelago to which we were bound.
One evening, leaning over the taffrail, I observed a very
singular, isolated cloud, to the N.W. It was remarkable, as well for
its color, as from its being the first we had seen since our departure
from Batavia. I watched it attentively until sunset, when it spread
all at once to the eastward and westward, girting in the horizon
with a narrow strip of vapor, and looking like a long line of low
beach. My notice was soon afterwards attracted by the dusky-red
appearance of the moon, and the peculiar character of the sea. The
latter was undergoing a rapid change, and the water seemed more than
usually transparent. Although I could distinctly see the bottom,
yet, heaving the lead, I found the ship in fifteen fathoms. The air
now became intolerably hot, and was loaded with spiral exhalations
similar to those arising from heat iron. As night came on, every
breath of wind died away, an more entire calm it is impossible to
conceive. The flame of a candle burned upon the poop without the least
perceptible motion, and a long hair, held between the finger and
thumb, hung without the possibility of detecting a vibration. However,
as the captain said he could perceive no indication of danger, and
as we were drifting in bodily to shore, he ordered the sails to be
furled, and the anchor let go. No watch was set, and the crew,
consisting principally of Malays, stretched themselves deliberately
upon deck. I went below --not without a full presentiment of evil.
Indeed, every appearance warranted me in apprehending a Simoom. I told
the captain my fears; but he paid no attention to what I said, and
left me without deigning to give a reply. My uneasiness, however,
prevented me from sleeping, and about midnight I went upon deck.
--As I placed my foot upon the upper step of the companion-ladder, I
was startled by a loud, humming noise, like that occasioned by the
rapid revolution of a mill-wheel, and before I could ascertain its
meaning, I found the ship quivering to its centre. In the next
instant, a wilderness of foam hurled us upon our beam-ends, and,
rushing over us fore and aft, swept the entire decks from stem to
stern.
The extreme fury of the blast proved, in a great measure, the
salvation of the ship. Although completely water-logged, yet, as her
masts had gone by the board, she rose, after a minute, heavily from
the sea, and, staggering awhile beneath the immense pressure of the
tempest, finally righted.
By what miracle I escaped destruction, it is impossible to say.
Stunned by the shock of the water, I found myself, upon recovery,
jammed in between the stern-post and rudder. With great difficulty I
gained my feet, and looking dizzily around, was, at first, struck with
the idea of our being among breakers; so terrific, beyond the
wildest imagination, was the whirlpool of mountainous and foaming
ocean within which we were engulfed. After a while, I heard the
voice of an old Swede, who had shipped with us at the moment of our
leaving port. I hallooed to him with all my strength, and presently he
came reeling aft. We soon discovered that we were the sole survivors
of the accident. All on deck, with the exception of ourselves, had
been swept overboard; --the captain and mates must have perished as
they slept, for the cabins were deluged with water. Without
assistance, we could expect to do little for the security of the ship,
and our exertions were at first paralyzed by the momentary expectation
of going down. Our cable had, of course, parted like pack-thread, at
the first breath of the hurricane, or we should have been
instantaneously overwhelmed. We scudded with frightful velocity before
the sea, and the water made clear breaches over us. The frame-work
of our stern was shattered excessively, and, in almost every
respect, we had received considerable injury; but to our extreme Joy
we found the pumps unchoked, and that we had made no great shifting of
our ballast. The main fury of the blast had already blown over, and we
apprehended little danger from the violence of the wind; but we looked
forward to its total cessation with dismay; well believing, that, in
our shattered condition, we should inevitably perish in the tremendous
swell which would ensue. But this very just apprehension seemed by
no means likely to be soon verified. For five entire days and nights
--during which our only subsistence was a small quantity of
jaggeree, procured with great difficulty from the forecastle --the
hulk flew at a rate defying computation, before rapidly succeeding
flaws of wind, which, without equalling the first violence of the
Simoom, were still more terrific than any tempest I had before
encountered. Our course for the first four days was, with trifling
variations, S.E. and by S.; and we must have run down the coast of New
Holland. --On the fifth day the cold became extreme, although the wind
had hauled round a point more to the northward. --The sun arose with a
sickly yellow lustre, and clambered a very few degrees above the
horizon --emitting no decisive light. --There were no clouds apparent,
yet the wind was upon the increase, and blew with a fitful and
unsteady fury. About noon, as nearly as we could guess, our
attention was again arrested by the appearance of the sun. It gave out
no light, properly so called, but a dull and sullen glow without
reflection, as if all its rays were polarized. Just before sinking
within the turgid sea, its central fires suddenly went out, as if
hurriedly extinguished by some unaccountable power. It was a dim,
sliver-like rim, alone, as it rushed down the unfathomable ocean.
We waited in vain for the arrival of the sixth day --that day to
me has not arrived --to the Swede, never did arrive. Thenceforward
we were enshrouded in patchy darkness, so that we could not have
seen an object at twenty paces from the ship. Eternal night
continued to envelop us, all unrelieved by the phosphoric
sea-brilliancy to which we had been accustomed in the tropics. We
observed too, that, although the tempest continued to rage with
unabated violence, there was no longer to be discovered the usual
appearance of surf, or foam, which had hitherto attended us. All
around were horror, and thick gloom, and a black sweltering desert
of ebony. --Superstitious terror crept by degrees into the spirit of
the old Swede, and my own soul was wrapped up in silent wonder. We
neglected all care of the ship, as worse than useless, and securing
ourselves, as well as possible, to the stump of the mizen-mast, looked
out bitterly into the world of ocean. We had no means of calculating
time, nor could we form any guess of our situation. We were,
however, well aware of having made farther to the southward than any
previous navigators, and felt great amazement at not meeting with
the usual impediments of ice. In the meantime every moment
threatened to be our last --every mountainous billow hurried to
overwhelm us. The swell surpassed anything I had imagined possible,
and that we were not instantly buried is a miracle. My companion spoke
of the lightness of our cargo, and reminded me of the excellent
qualities of our ship; but I could not help feeling the utter
hopelessness of hope itself, and prepared myself gloomily for that
death which I thought nothing could defer beyond an hour, as, with
every knot of way the ship made, the swelling of the black
stupendous seas became more dismally appalling. At times we gasped for
breath at an elevation beyond the albatross --at times became dizzy
with the velocity of our descent into some watery hell, where the
air grew stagnant, and no sound disturbed the slumbers of the kraken.
We were at the bottom of one of these abysses, when a quick scream
from my companion broke fearfully upon the night. "See! see!" cried
he, shrieking in my ears, "Almighty God! see! see!" As he spoke, I
became aware of a dull, sullen glare of red light which streamed
down the sides of the vast chasm where we lay, and threw a fitful
brilliancy upon our deck. Casting my eyes upwards, I beheld a
spectacle which froze the current of my blood. At a terrific height
directly above us, and upon the very verge of the precipitous descent,
hovered a gigantic ship of, perhaps, four thousand tons. Although
upreared upon the summit of a wave more than a hundred times her own
altitude, her apparent size exceeded that of any ship of the line or
East Indiaman in existence. Her huge hull was of a deep dingy black,
unrelieved by any of the customary carvings of a ship. A single row of
brass cannon protruded from her open ports, and dashed from their
polished surfaces the fires of innumerable battle-lanterns, which
swung to and fro about her rigging. But what mainly inspired us with
horror and astonishment, was that she bore up under a press of sail in
the very teeth of that supernatural sea, and of that ungovernable
hurricane. When we first discovered her, her bows were alone to be
seen, as she rose slowly from the dim and horrible gulf beyond her.
For a moment of intense terror she paused upon the giddy pinnacle,
as if in contemplation of her own sublimity, then trembled and
tottered, and --came down.
At this instant, I know not what sudden self-possession came over my
spirit. Staggering as far aft as I could, I awaited fearlessly the
ruin that was to overwhelm. Our own vessel was at length ceasing
from her struggles, and sinking with her head to the sea. The shock of
the descending mass struck her, consequently, in that portion of her
frame which was already under water, and the inevitable result was
to hurl me, with irresistible violence, upon the rigging of the
stranger.
As I fell, the ship hove in stays, and went about; and to the
confusion ensuing I attributed my escape from the notice of the
crew. With little difficulty I made my way unperceived to the main
hatchway, which was partially open, and soon found an opportunity of
secreting myself in the hold. Why I did so I can hardly tell. An
indefinite sense of awe, which at first sight of the navigators of the
ship had taken hold of my mind, was perhaps the principle of my
concealment. I was unwilling to trust myself with a race of people who
had offered, to the cursory glance I had taken, so many points of
vague novelty, doubt, and apprehension. I therefore thought proper
to contrive a hiding-place in the hold. This I did by removing a small
portion of the shifting-boards, in such a manner as to afford me a
convenient retreat between the huge timbers of the ship.
I had scarcely completed my work, when a footstep in the hold forced
me to make use of it. A man passed by my place of concealment with a
feeble and unsteady gait. I could not see his face, but had an
opportunity of observing his general appearance. There was about it an
evidence of great age and infirmity. His knees tottered beneath a load
of years, and his entire frame quivered under the burthen. He muttered
to himself, in a low broken tone, some words of a language which I
could not understand, and groped in a corner among a pile of
singular-looking instruments, and decayed charts of navigation. His
manner was a wild mixture of the peevishness of second childhood,
and the solemn dignity of a God. He at length went on deck, and I
saw him no more.
A feeling, for which I have no name, has taken possession of my soul
--a sensation which will admit of no analysis, to which the lessons of
bygone times are inadequate, and for which I fear futurity itself will
offer me no key. To a mind constituted like my own, the latter
consideration is an evil. I shall never --I know that I shall never
--be satisfied with regard to the nature of my conceptions. Yet it
is not wonderful that these conceptions are indefinite, since they
have their origin in sources so utterly novel. A new sense --a new
entity is added to my soul.
It is long since I first trod the deck of this terrible ship, and
the rays of my destiny are, I think, gathering to a focus.
Incomprehensible men! Wrapped up in meditations of a kind which I
cannot divine, they pass me by unnoticed. Concealment is utter folly
on my part, for the people will not see. It was but just now that I
passed directly before the eyes of the mate --it was no long while ago
that I ventured into the captain's own private cabin, and took
thence the materials with which I write, and have written. I shall
from time to time continue this Journal. It is true that I may not
find an opportunity of transmitting it to the world, but I will not
fall to make the endeavour. At the last moment I will enclose the
MS. in a bottle, and cast it within the sea.
An incident has occurred which has given me new room for meditation.
Are such things the operation of ungoverned Chance? I had ventured
upon deck and thrown myself down, without attracting any notice, among
a pile of ratlin-stuff and old sails in the bottom of the yawl.
While musing upon the singularity of my fate, I unwittingly daubed
with a tar-brush the edges of a neatly-folded studding-sail which
lay near me on a barrel. The studding-sail is now bent upon the
ship, and the thoughtless touches of the brush are spread out into the
word DISCOVERY.
I have made many observations lately upon the structure of the
vessel. Although well armed, she is not, I think, a ship of war. Her
rigging, build, and general equipment, all negative a supposition of
this kind. What she is not, I can easily perceive --what she is I fear
it is impossible to say. I know not how it is, but in scrutinizing her
strange model and singular cast of spars, her huge size and
overgrown suits of canvas, her severely simple bow and antiquated
stern, there will occasionally flash across my mind a sensation of
familiar things, and there is always mixed up with such indistinct
shadows of recollection, an unaccountable memory of old foreign
chronicles and ages long ago. I have been looking at the timbers of
the ship. She is built of a material to which I am a stranger. There
is a peculiar character about the wood which strikes me as rendering
it unfit for the purpose to which it has been applied. I mean its
extreme porousness, considered independently by the worm-eaten
condition which is a consequence of navigation in these seas, and
apart from the rottenness attendant upon age. It will appear perhaps
an observation somewhat over-curious, but this wood would have
every, characteristic of Spanish oak, if Spanish oak were distended by
any unnatural means.
In reading the above sentence a curious apothegm of an old
weather-beaten Dutch navigator comes full upon my recollection. "It is
as sure," he was wont to say, when any doubt was entertained of his
veracity, "as sure as there is a sea where the ship itself will grow
in bulk like the living body of the seaman."
About an hour ago, I made bold to thrust myself among a group of the
crew. They paid me no manner of attention, and, although I stood in
the very midst of them all, seemed utterly unconscious of my presence.
Like the one I had at first seen in the hold, they all bore about them
the marks of a hoary old age. Their knees trembled with infirmity;
their shoulders were bent double with decrepitude; their shrivelled
skins rattled in the wind; their voices were low, tremulous and
broken; their eyes glistened with the rheum of years; and their gray
hairs streamed terribly in the tempest. Around them, on every part
of the deck, lay scattered mathematical instruments of the most quaint
and obsolete construction.
I mentioned some time ago the bending of a studding-sail. From
that period the ship, being thrown dead off the wind, has continued
her terrific course due south, with every rag of canvas packed upon
her, from her trucks to her lower studding-sail booms, and rolling
every moment her top-gallant yard-arms into the most appalling hell of
water which it can enter into the mind of a man to imagine. I have
just left the deck, where I find it impossible to maintain a
footing, although the crew seem to experience little inconvenience. It
appears to me a miracle of miracles that our enormous bulk is not
swallowed up at once and forever. We are surely doomed to hover
continually upon the brink of Eternity, without taking a final
plunge into the abyss. From billows a thousand times more stupendous
than any I have ever seen, we glide away with the facility of the
arrowy sea-gull; and the colossal waters rear their heads above us
like demons of the deep, but like demons confined to simple threats
and forbidden to destroy. I am led to attribute these frequent escapes
to the only natural cause which can account for such effect. --I
must suppose the ship to be within the influence of some strong
current, or impetuous under-tow.
I have seen the captain face to face, and in his own cabin --but, as
I expected, he paid me no attention. Although in his appearance
there is, to a casual observer, nothing which might bespeak him more
or less than man-still a feeling of irrepressible reverence and awe
mingled with the sensation of wonder with which I regarded him. In
stature he is nearly my own height; that is, about five feet eight
inches. He is of a well-knit and compact frame of body, neither robust
nor remarkably otherwise. But it is the singularity of the
expression which reigns upon the face --it is the intense, the
wonderful, the thrilling evidence of old age, so utter, so extreme,
which excites within my spirit a sense --a sentiment ineffable. His
forehead, although little wrinkled, seems to bear upon it the stamp of
a myriad of years. --His gray hairs are records of the past, and his
grayer eyes are Sybils of the future. The cabin floor was thickly
strewn with strange, iron-clasped folios, and mouldering instruments
of science, and obsolete long-forgotten charts. His head was bowed
down upon his hands, and he pored, with a fiery unquiet eye, over a
paper which I took to be a commission, and which, at all events,
bore the signature of a monarch. He muttered to himself, as did the
first seaman whom I saw in the hold, some low peevish syllables of a
foreign tongue, and although the speaker was close at my elbow, his
voice seemed to reach my ears from the distance of a mile.
The ship and all in it are imbued with the spirit of Eld. The crew
glide to and fro like the ghosts of buried centuries; their eyes
have an eager and uneasy meaning; and when their fingers fall
athwart my path in the wild glare of the battle-lanterns, I feel as
I have never felt before, although I have been all my life a dealer in
antiquities, and have imbibed the shadows of fallen columns at Balbec,
and Tadmor, and Persepolis, until my very soul has become a ruin.
When I look around me I feel ashamed of my former apprehensions.
If I trembled at the blast which has hitherto attended us, shall I not
stand aghast at a warring of wind and ocean, to convey any idea of
which the words tornado and simoom are trivial and ineffective? All in
the immediate vicinity of the ship is the blackness of eternal
night, and a chaos of foamless water; but, about a league on either
side of us, may be seen, indistinctly and at intervals, stupendous
ramparts of ice, towering away into the desolate sky, and looking like
the walls of the universe.
As I imagined, the ship proves to be in a current; if that
appellation can properly be given to a tide which, howling and
shrieking by the white ice, thunders on to the southward with a
velocity like the headlong dashing of a cataract.
To conceive the horror of my sensations is, I presume, utterly
impossible; yet a curiosity to penetrate the mysteries of these
awful regions, predominates even over my despair, and will reconcile
me to the most hideous aspect of death. It is evident that we are
hurrying onwards to some exciting knowledge --some
never-to-be-imparted secret, whose attainment is destruction.
Perhaps this current leads us to the southern pole itself. It must
be confessed that a supposition apparently so wild has every
probability in its favor.
The crew pace the deck with unquiet and tremulous step; but there is
upon their countenances an expression more of the eagerness of hope
than of the apathy of despair.
In the meantime the wind is still in our poop, and, as we carry a
crowd of canvas, the ship is at times lifted bodily from out the sea
--Oh, horror upon horror! the ice opens suddenly to the right, and
to the left, and we are whirling dizzily, in immense concentric
circles, round and round the borders of a gigantic amphitheatre, the
summit of whose walls is lost in the darkness and the distance. But
little time will be left me to ponder upon my destiny --the circles
rapidly grow small --we are plunging madly within the grasp of the
whirlpool --and amid a roaring, and bellowing, and thundering of ocean
and of tempest, the ship is quivering, oh God! and --going down.
NOTE.--The "MS. Found in a Bottle," was originally published in 1831
[1833], and it was not until many years afterwards that I became
acquainted with the maps of Mercator, in which the ocean is
represented as rushing, by four mouths, into the (northern) Polar
Gulf, to be absorbed into the bowels of the earth; the Pole itself
being represented by a black rock, towering to a prodigious height.
-THE END-
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1850
MYSTIFICATION
by Edgar Allan Poe
MYSTIFICATION
Slid, if these be your "passados" and "montantes," I'll have none o'
them.
NED KNOWLES.
THE BARON RITZNER VON JUNG was a noble Hungarian family, every
member of which (at least as far back into antiquity as any certain
records extend) was more or less remarkable for talent of some
description- the majority for that species of grotesquerie in
conception of which Tieck, a scion of the house, has given a vivid,
although by no means the most vivid exemplifications. My
acquaintance with Ritzner commenced at the magnificent Chateau Jung,
into which a train of droll adventures, not to be made public, threw
a place in his regard, and here, with somewhat more difficulty, a
partial insight into his mental conformation. In later days this
insight grew more clear, as the intimacy which had at first
permitted it became more close; and when, after three years
of the character of the Baron Ritzner von Jung.
I remember the buzz of curiosity which his advent excited within the
college precincts on the night of the twenty-fifth of June. I remember
still more distinctly, that while he was pronounced by all parties
at first sight "the most remarkable man in the world," no person
made any attempt at accounting for his opinion. That he was unique
appeared so undeniable, that it was deemed impertinent to inquire
wherein the uniquity consisted. But, letting this matter pass for
the present, I will merely observe that, from the first moment of
his setting foot within the limits of the university, he began to
exercise over the habits, manners, persons, purses, and propensities
of the whole community which surrounded him, an influence the most
extensive and despotic, yet at the same time the most indefinite and
altogether unaccountable. Thus the brief period of his residence at
the university forms an era in its annals, and is characterized by all
classes of people appertaining to it or its dependencies as "that very
extraordinary epoch forming the domination of the Baron Ritzner von
Jung."
then of no particular age, by which I mean that it was impossible to
form a guess respecting his age by any data personally afforded. He
might have been fifteen or fifty, and was twenty-one years and seven
months. He was by no means a handsome man- perhaps the reverse. The
contour of his face was somewhat angular and harsh. His forehead was
lofty and very fair; his nose a snub; his eyes large, heavy, glassy,
and meaningless. About the mouth there was more to be observed. The
lips were gently protruded, and rested the one upon the other, after
such a fashion that it is impossible to conceive any, even the most
complex, combination of human features, conveying so entirely, and
so singly, the idea of unmitigated gravity, solemnity and repose.
It will be perceived, no doubt, from what I have already said,
that the Baron was one of those human anomalies now and then to be
found, who make the science of mystification the study and the
business of their lives. For this science a peculiar turn of mind gave
him instinctively the cue, while his physical appearance afforded
him unusual facilities for carrying his prospects into effect. I
quaintly termed the domination of the Baron Ritzner von Jung, ever
rightly entered into the mystery which overshadowed his character. I
truly think that no person at the university, with the exception of
myself, ever suspected him to be capable of a joke, verbal or
practical:- the old bull-dog at the garden-gate would sooner have been
accused,- the ghost of Heraclitus,- or the wig of the Emeritus
Professor of Theology. This, too, when it was evident that the most
egregious and unpardonable of all conceivable tricks, whimsicalities
and buffooneries were brought about, if not directly by him, at
least plainly through his intermediate agency or connivance. The
beauty, if I may so call it, of his art mystifique, lay in that
consummate ability (resulting from an almost intuitive knowledge of
human nature, and a most wonderful self-possession,) by means of which
he never failed to make it appear that the drolleries he was
occupied in bringing to a point, arose partly in spite, and partly
in consequence of the laudable efforts he was making for their
prevention, and for the preservation of the good order and dignity
of Alma Mater. The deep, the poignant, the overwhelming mortification,
which upon each such failure of his praise worthy endeavors, would
suffuse every lineament of his countenance, left not the slightest
room for doubt of his sincerity in the bosoms of even his most
skeptical companions. The adroitness, too, was no less worthy of
observation by which he contrived to shift the sense of the
grotesque from the creator to the created- from his own person to
the absurdities to which he had given rise. In no instance before that
of which I speak, have I known the habitual mystific escape the
natural consequence of his manoevres- an attachment of the ludicrous
to his own character and person. Continually enveloped in an
atmosphere of whim, my friend appeared to live only for the severities
of society; and not even his own household have for a moment
associated other ideas than those of the rigid and august with the
memory of the Baron Ritzner von Jung.
the demon of the dolce far niente lay like an incubus upon the
university. Nothing, at least, was done beyond eating and drinking
and making merry. The apartments of the students were converted into
so many pot-houses, and there was no pot-house of them all more famous
or more frequented than that of the Baron. Our carousals here were
many, and boisterous, and long, and never unfruitful of events.
Upon one occasion we had protracted our sitting until nearly
daybreak, and an unusual quantity of wine had been drunk. The
company consisted of seven or eight individuals besides the Baron
and myself. Most of these were young men of wealth, of high
connection, of great family pride, and all alive with an exaggerated
sense of honor. They abounded in the most ultra German opinions
respecting the duello. To these Quixotic notions some recent
Parisian publications, backed by three or four desperate and fatal
conversation, during the greater part of the night, had run wild
upon the all- engrossing topic of the times. The Baron, who had been
unusually silent and abstracted in the earlier portion of the evening,
at length seemed to be aroused from his apathy, took a leading part in
the discourse, and dwelt upon the benefits, and more especially upon
the beauties, of the received code of etiquette in passages of arms
with an ardor, an eloquence, an impressiveness, and an
affectionateness of manner, which elicited the warmest enthusiasm from
his hearers in general, and absolutely staggered even myself, who well
knew him to be at heart a ridiculer of those very points for which
he contended, and especially to hold the entire fanfaronade of
duelling etiquette in the sovereign contempt which it deserves.
Looking around me during a pause in the Baron's discourse (of
which my readers may gather some faint idea when I say that it bore
resemblance to the fervid, chanting, monotonous, yet musical
sermonic manner of Coleridge), I perceived symptoms of even more
than the general interest in the countenance of one of the party. This
gentleman, whom I shall call Hermann, was an original in every
respect- except, perhaps, in the single particular that he was a
very great fool. He contrived to bear, however, among a particular set
at the university, a reputation for deep metaphysical thinking, and, I
believe, for some logical talent. As a duellist he had acquired
who had fallen at his hands; but they were many. He was a man of
courage undoubtedly. But it was upon his minute acquaintance with
the etiquette of the duello, and the nicety of his sense of honor,
that he most especially prided himself. These things were a hobby
which he rode to the death. To Ritzner, ever upon the lookout for
the grotesque, his peculiarities had for a long time past afforded
food for mystification. Of this, however, I was not aware; although,
in the present instance, I saw clearly that something of a whimsical
nature was upon the tapis with my friend, and that Hermann was its
especial object.
As the former proceeded in his discourse, or rather monologue I
perceived the excitement of the latter momently increasing. At
length he spoke; offering some objection to a point insisted upon by
R., and giving his reasons in detail. To these the Baron replied at
length (still maintaining his exaggerated tone of sentiment) and
concluding, in what I thought very bad taste, with a sarcasm and a
sneer. The hobby of Hermann now took the bit in his teeth. This I
could discern by the studied hair-splitting farrago of his
rejoinder. His last words I distinctly remember. "Your opinions, allow
me to say, Baron von Jung, although in the main correct, are, in
many nice points, discreditable to yourself and to the university of
which you are a member. In a few respects they are even unworthy of
serious refutation. I would say more than this, sir, were it not for
the fear of giving you offence (here the speaker smiled blandly), I
would say, sir, that your opinions are not the opinions to be expected
from a gentleman."
As Hermann completed this equivocal sentence, all eyes were turned
upon the Baron. He became pale, then excessively red; then, dropping
his pocket-handkerchief, stooped to recover it, when I caught a
glimpse of his countenance, while it could be seen by no one else at
the table. It was radiant with the quizzical expression which was
its natural character, but which I had never seen it assume except
when we were alone together, and when he unbent himself freely. In
an instant afterward he stood erect, confronting Hermann; and so total
an alteration of countenance in so short a period I certainly never
saw before. For a moment I even fancied that I had misconceived him,
and that he was in sober earnest. He appeared to be stifling with
passion, and his face was cadaverously white. For a short time he
remained silent, apparently striving to master his emotion. Having
at length seemingly succeeded, he reached a decanter which stood
near him, saying as he held it firmly clenched "The language you
have thought proper to employ, Mynheer Hermann, in addressing yourself
to me, is objectionable in so many particulars, that I have neither
temper nor time for specification. That my opinions, however, are
not the opinions to be expected from a gentleman, is an observation so
directly offensive as to allow me but one line of conduct. Some
courtesy, nevertheless, is due to the presence of this company, and to
yourself, at this moment, as my guest. You will pardon me,
therefore, if, upon this consideration, I deviate slightly from the
general usage among gentlemen in similar cases of personal affront.
You will forgive me for the moderate tax I shall make upon your
imagination, and endeavor to consider, for an instant, the
reflection of your person in yonder mirror as the living Mynheer
Hermann himself. This being done, there will be no difficulty
whatever. I shall discharge this decanter of wine at your image in
yonder mirror, and thus fulfil all the spirit, if not the exact
letter, of resentment for your insult, while the necessity of physical
violence to your real person will be obviated."
With these words he hurled the decanter, full of wine, against the
mirror which hung directly opposite Hermann; striking the reflection
of his person with great precision, and of course shattering the glass
into fragments. The whole company at once started to their feet,
and, with the exception of myself and Ritzner, took their departure.
As Hermann went out, the Baron whispered me that I should follow him
and make an offer of my services. To this I agreed; not knowing
precisely what to make of so ridiculous a piece of business.
The duellist accepted my aid with his stiff and ultra recherche air,
and, taking my arm, led me to his apartment. I could hardly forbear
laughing in his face while he proceeded to discuss, with the
profoundest gravity, what he termed "the refinedly peculiar character"
of the insult he had received. After a tiresome harangue in his
ordinary style, he took down from his book shelves a number of musty
volumes on the subject of the duello, and entertained me for a long
time with their contents; reading aloud, and commenting earnestly as
he read. I can just remember the titles of some of the works. There
were the "Ordonnance of Philip le Bel on Single Combat"; the
"Theatre of Honor," by Favyn, and a treatise "On the Permission of
Duels," by Andiguier. He displayed, also, with much pomposity,
Brantome's "Memoirs of Duels,"- published at Cologne, 1666, in the
types of Elzevir- a precious and unique vellum-paper volume, with a
fine margin, and bound by Derome. But he requested my attention
particularly, and with an air of mysterious sagacity, to a thick
octavo, written in barbarous Latin by one Hedelin, a Frenchman, and
having the quaint title, "Duelli Lex Scripta, et non; aliterque." From
this he read me one of the drollest chapters in the world concerning
"Injuriae per applicationem, per constructionem, et per se," about
half of which, he averred, was strictly applicable to his own
"refinedly peculiar" case, although not one syllable of the whole
matter could I understand for the life of me. Having finished the
chapter, he closed the book, and demanded what I thought necessary
to be done. I replied that I had entire confidence in his superior
delicacy of feeling, and would abide by what he proposed. With this
answer he seemed flattered, and sat down to write a note to the Baron.
It ran thus:
Sir,- My friend, M. P.-, will hand you this note. I find it
incumbent upon me to request, at your earliest convenience, an
explanation of this evening's occurrences at your chambers. In the
event of your declining this request, Mr. P. will be happy to arrange,
with any friend whom you may appoint, the steps preliminary to a
meeting.
With sentiments of perfect respect,
Your most humble servant,
JOHANN HERMAN.
To the Baron Ritzner von Jung,
Not knowing what better to do, I called upon Ritzner with this
epistle. He bowed as I presented it; then, with a grave countenance,
motioned me to a seat. Having perused the cartel, he wrote the
following reply, which I carried to Hermann.
SIR,- Through our common friend, Mr. P., I have received your note
of this evening. Upon due reflection I frankly admit the propriety
of the explanation you suggest. This being admitted, I still find
great difficulty, (owing to the refinedly peculiar nature of our
disagreement, and of the personal affront offered on my part,) in so
wording what I have to say by way of apology, as to meet all the
minute exigencies, and all the variable shadows, of the case. I have
great reliance, however, on that extreme delicacy of discrimination,
in matters appertaining to the rules of etiquette, for which you
have been so long and so pre-eminently distinguished. With perfect
certainty, therefore, of being comprehended, I beg leave, in lieu of
offering any sentiments of my own, to refer you to the opinions of
Sieur Hedelin, as set forth in the ninth paragraph of the chapter of
"Injuriae per applicationem, per constructionem, et per se," in his
"Duelli Lex scripta, et non; aliterque." The nicety of your
discernment in all the matters here treated, will be sufficient, I
am assured, to convince you that the mere circumstance of me referring
you to this admirable passage, ought to satisfy your request, as a man
of honor, for explanation.
With sentiments of profound respect,
Your most obedient servant,
VON JUNG.
The Herr Johann Hermann
Hermann commenced the perusal of this epistle with a scowl, which,
however, was converted into a smile of the most ludicrous
self-complacency as he came to the rigmarole about Injuriae per
applicationem, per constructionem, et per se. Having finished reading,
he begged me, with the blandest of all possible smiles, to be
seated, while he made reference to the treatise in question. Turning
to the passage specified, he read it with great care to himself,
then closed the book, and desired me, in my character of
confidential acquaintance, to express to the Baron von Jung his
exalted sense of his chivalrous behavior, and, in that of second, to
assure him that the explanation offered was of the fullest, the most
honorable, and the most unequivocally satisfactory nature.
Somewhat amazed at all this, I made my retreat to the Baron. He
seemed to receive Hermann's amicable letter as a matter of course, and
after a few words of general conversation, went to an inner room and
brought out the everlasting treatise "Duelli Lex scripta, et non;
aliterque." He handed me the volume and asked me to look over some
portion of it. I did so, but to little purpose, not being able to
gather the least particle of meaning. He then took the book himself,
and read me a chapter aloud. To my surprise, what he read proved to be
a most horribly absurd account of a duel between two baboons. He now
explained the mystery; showing that the volume, as it appeared prima
facie, was written upon the plan of the nonsense verses of Du
Bartas; that is to say, the language was ingeniously framed so as to
present to the ear all the outward signs of intelligibility, and
even of profundity, while in fact not a shadow of meaning existed. The
key to the whole was found in leaving out every second and third
word alternately, when there appeared a series of ludicrous quizzes
upon a single combat as practised in modern times.
The Baron afterwards informed me that he had purposely thrown the
treatise in Hermann's way two or three weeks before the adventure, and
that he was satisfied, from the general tenor of his conversation,
that he had studied it with the deepest attention, and firmly believed
it to be a work of unusual merit. Upon this hint he proceeded. Hermann
would have died a thousand deaths rather than acknowledge his
inability to understand anything and everything in the universe that
had ever been written about the duello.
LITTLETON BARRY.
THE END
.

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1850
NEVER BET THE DEVIL YOUR HEAD
A Tale With a Moral
by Edgar Allan Poe
CON tal que las costumbres de un autor," says Don Thomas de las
Torres, in the preface to his "Amatory Poems" "sean puras y castas,
importo muy poco que no sean igualmente severas sus obras"- meaning,
in plain English, that, provided the morals of an author are pure
personally, it signifies nothing what are the morals of his books.
We presume that Don Thomas is now in Purgatory for the assertion. It
would be a clever thing, too, in the way of poetical justice, to
keep him there until his "Amatory Poems" get out of print, or are laid
definitely upon the shelf through lack of readers. Every fiction
should have a moral; and, what is more to the purpose, the critics
have discovered that every fiction has. Philip Melanchthon, some
time ago, wrote a commentary upon the "Batrachomyomachia," and
proved that the poet's object was to excite a distaste for sedition.
Pierre la Seine, going a step farther, shows that the intention was to
recommend to young men temperance in eating and drinking. Just so,
too, Jacobus Hugo has satisfied himself that, by Euenis, Homer meant
to insinuate John Calvin; by Antinous, Martin Luther; by the
Lotophagi, Protestants in general; and, by the Harpies, the Dutch. Our
more modern Scholiasts are equally acute. These fellows demonstrate
a hidden meaning in "The Antediluvians," a parable in Powhatan," new
views in "Cock Robin," and transcendentalism in "Hop O' My Thumb."
In short, it has been shown that no man can sit down to write
without a very profound design. Thus to authors in general much
trouble is spared. A novelist, for example, need have no care of his
moral. It is there- that is to say, it is somewhere- and the moral and
the critics can take care of themselves. When the proper time arrives,
all that the gentleman intended, and all that he did not intend,
will be brought to light, in the "Dial," or the "Down-Easter,"
together with all that he ought to have intended, and the rest that he
clearly meant to intend:- so that it will all come very straight in
the end.
There is no just ground, therefore, for the charge brought against
me by certain ignoramuses- that I have never written a moral tale, or,
in more precise words, a tale with a moral. They are not the critics
predestined to bring me out, and develop my morals:- that is the
secret. By and by the "North American Quarterly Humdrum" will make
them ashamed of their stupidity. In the meantime, by way of staying
execution- by way of mitigating the accusations against me- I offer
the sad history appended,- a history about whose obvious moral there
can be no question whatever, since he who runs may read it in the
large capitals which form the title of the tale. I should have
credit for this arrangement- a far wiser one than that of La
Fontaine and others, who reserve the impression to be conveyed until
the last moment, and thus sneak it in at the fag end of their fables.
Defuncti injuria ne afficiantur was a law of the twelve tables,
and De mortuis nil nisi bonum is an excellent injunction- even if
the dead in question be nothing but dead small beer. It is not my
design, therefore, to vituperate my deceased friend, Toby Dammit. He
was a sad dog, it is true, and a dog's death it was that he died;
but he himself was not to blame for his vices. They grew out of a
personal defect in his mother. She did her best in the way of flogging
him while an infant- for duties to her well- regulated mind were
always pleasures, and babies, like tough steaks, or the modern Greek
olive trees, are invariably the better for beating- but, poor woman!
she had the misfortune to be left-handed, and a child flogged
left-handedly had better be left unflogged. The world revolves from
right to left. It will not do to whip a baby from left to right. If
each blow in the proper direction drives an evil propensity out, it
follows that every thump in an opposite one knocks its quota of
wickedness in. I was often present at Toby's chastisements, and,
even by the way in which he kicked, I could perceive that he was
getting worse and worse every day. At last I saw, through the tears in
my eyes, that there was no hope of the villain at all, and one day
when he had been cuffed until he grew so black in the face that one
might have mistaken him for a little African, and no effect had been
produced beyond that of making him wriggle himself into a fit, I could
stand it no longer, but went down upon my knees forthwith, and,
uplifting my voice, made prophecy of his ruin.
The fact is that his precocity in vice was awful. At five months
of age he used to get into such passions that he was unable to
articulate. At six months, I caught him gnawing a pack of cards. At
seven months he was in the constant habit of catching and kissing
the female babies. At eight months he peremptorily refused to put
his signature to the Temperance pledge. Thus he went on increasing
in iniquity, month after month, until, at the close of the first year,
he not only insisted upon wearing moustaches, but had contracted a
propensity for cursing and swearing, and for backing his assertions by
bets.
Through this latter most ungentlemanly practice, the ruin which I
had predicted to Toby Dammit overtook him at last. The fashion had
"grown with his growth and strengthened with his strength," so that,
when he came to be a man, he could scarcely utter a sentence without
interlarding it with a proposition to gamble. Not that he actually
laid wagers- no. I will do my friend the justice to say that he
would as soon have laid eggs. With him the thing was a mere formula-
nothing more. His expressions on this head had no meaning attached
to them whatever. They were simple if not altogether innocent
expletives- imaginative phrases wherewith to round off a sentence.
When he said "I'll bet you so and so," nobody ever thought of taking
him up; but still I could not help thinking it my duty to put him
down. The habit was an immoral one, and so I told him. It was a vulgar
one- this I begged him to believe. It was discountenanced by
society- here I said nothing but the truth. It was forbidden by act of
Congress- here I had not the slightest intention of telling a lie. I
remonstrated- but to no purpose. I demonstrated- in vain. I entreated-
he smiled. I implored- he laughed. I preached- he sneered. I
threatened- he swore. I kicked him- he called for the police. I pulled
his nose- he blew it, and offered to bet the Devil his head that I
would not venture to try that experiment again.
Poverty was another vice which the peculiar physical deficiency of
Dammit's mother had entailed upon her son. He was detestably poor, and
this was the reason, no doubt, that his expletive expressions about
betting, seldom took a pecuniary turn. I will not be bound to say that
I ever heard him make use of such a figure of speech as "I'll bet
you a dollar." It was usually "I'll bet you what you please," or "I'll
bet you what you dare," or "I'll bet you a trifle," or else, more
significantly still, "I'll bet the Devil my head."
This latter form seemed to please him best;- perhaps because it
involved the least risk; for Dammit had become excessively
parsimonious. Had any one taken him up, his head was small, and thus
his loss would have been small too. But these are my own reflections
and I am by no means sure that I am right in attributing them to
him. At all events the phrase in question grew daily in favor,
notwithstanding the gross impropriety of a man betting his brains like
bank-notes:- but this was a point which my friend's perversity of
disposition would not permit him to comprehend. In the end, he
abandoned all other forms of wager, and gave himself up to "I'll bet
the Devil my head," with a pertinacity and exclusiveness of devotion
that displeased not less than it surprised me. I am always
displeased by circumstances for which I cannot account. Mysteries
force a man to think, and so injure his health. The truth is, there
was something in the air with which Mr. Dammit was wont to give
utterance to his offensive expression- something in his manner of
enunciation- which at first interested, and afterwards made me very
uneasy- something which, for want of a more definite term at
present, I must be permitted to call queer; but which Mr. Coleridge
would have called mystical, Mr. Kant pantheistical, Mr. Carlyle
twistical, and Mr. Emerson hyperquizzitistical. I began not to like it
at all. Mr. Dammits soul was in a perilous state. I resolved to
bring all my eloquence into play to save it. I vowed to serve him as
St. Patrick, in the Irish chronicle, is said to have served the toad,-
that is to say, "awaken him to a sense of his situation." I
addressed myself to the task forthwith. Once more I betook myself to
remonstrance. Again I collected my energies for a final attempt at
expostulation.
When I had made an end of my lecture, Mr. Dammit indulged himself in
some very equivocal behavior. For some moments he remained silent,
merely looking me inquisitively in the face. But presently he threw
his head to one side, and elevated his eyebrows to a great extent.
Then he spread out the palms of his hands and shrugged up his
shoulders. Then he winked with the right eye. Then he repeated the
operation with the left. Then he shut them both up very tight. Then he
opened them both so very wide that I became seriously alarmed for
the consequences. Then, applying his thumb to his nose, he thought
proper to make an indescribable movement with the rest of his fingers.
Finally, setting his arms a-kimbo, he condescended to reply.
I can call to mind only the beads of his discourse. He would be
obliged to me if I would hold my tongue. He wished none of my
advice. He despised all my insinuations. He was old enough to take
care of himself. Did I still think him baby Dammit? Did I mean to
say any thing against his character? Did I intend to insult him? Was I
a fool? Was my maternal parent aware, in a word, of my absence from
the domiciliary residence? He would put this latter question to me
as to a man of veracity, and he would bind himself to abide by my
reply. Once more he would demand explicitly if my mother knew that I
was out. My confusion, he said, betrayed me, and he would be willing
to bet the Devil his head that she did not.
Mr. Dammit did not pause for my rejoinder. Turning upon his heel, he
left my presence with undignified precipitation. It was well for him
that he did so. My feelings had been wounded. Even my anger had been
aroused. For once I would have taken him up upon his insulting
wager. I would have won for the Arch-Enemy Mr. Dammit's little head-
for the fact is, my mamma was very well aware of my merely temporary
absence from home.
But Khoda shefa midehed- Heaven gives relief- as the Mussulmans
say when you tread upon their toes. It was in pursuance of my duty
that I had been insulted, and I bore the insult like a man. It now
seemed to me, however, that I had done all that could be required of
me, in the case of this miserable individual, and I resolved to
trouble him no longer with my counsel, but to leave him to his
conscience and himself. But although I forebore to intrude with my
advice, I could not bring myself to give up his society altogether.
I even went so far as to humor some of his less reprehensible
propensities; and there were times when I found myself lauding his
wicked jokes, as epicures do mustard, with tears in my eyes:- so
profoundly did it grieve me to hear his evil talk.
One fine day, having strolled out together, arm in arm, our route
led us in the direction of a river. There was a bridge, and we
resolved to cross it. It was roofed over, by way of protection from
the weather, and the archway, having but few windows, was thus very
uncomfortably dark. As we entered the passage, the contrast between
the external glare and the interior gloom struck heavily upon my
spirits. Not so upon those of the unhappy Dammit, who offered to bet
the Devil his head that I was hipped. He seemed to be in an unusual
good humor. He was excessively lively- so much so that I entertained I
know not what of uneasy suspicion. It is not impossible that he was
affected with the transcendentals. I am not well enough versed,
however, in the diagnosis of this disease to speak with decision
upon the point; and unhappily there were none of my friends of the
"Dial" present. I suggest the idea, nevertheless, because of a certain
species of austere Merry-Andrewism which seemed to beset my poor
friend, and caused him to make quite a Tom-Fool of himself. Nothing
would serve him but wriggling and skipping about under and over
every thing that came in his way; now shouting out, and now lisping
out, all manner of odd little and big words, yet preserving the
gravest face in the world all the time. I really could not make up
my mind whether to kick or to pity him. At length, having passed
nearly across the bridge, we approached the termination of the
footway, when our progress was impeded by a turnstile of some
height. Through this I made my way quietly, pushing it around as
usual. But this turn would not serve the turn of Mr. Dammit. He
insisted upon leaping the stile, and said he could cut a pigeon-wing
over it in the air. Now this, conscientiously speaking, I did not
think he could do. The best pigeon-winger over all kinds of style
was my friend Mr. Carlyle, and as I knew he could not do it, I would
not believe that it could be done by Toby Dammit. I therefore told
him, in so many words, that he was a braggadocio, and could not do
what he said. For this I had reason to be sorry afterward;- for he
straightway offered to bet the Devil his head that he could.
I was about to reply, notwithstanding my previous resolutions,
with some remonstrance against his impiety, when I heard, close at
my elbow, a slight cough, which sounded very much like the ejaculation
"ahem!" I started, and looked about me in surprise. My glance at
length fell into a nook of the frame- work of the bridge, and upon the
figure of a little lame old gentleman of venerable aspect. Nothing
could be more reverend than his whole appearance; for he not only
had on a full suit of black, but his shirt was perfectly clean and the
collar turned very neatly down over a white cravat, while his hair was
parted in front like a girl's. His hands were clasped pensively
together over his stomach, and his two eyes were carefully rolled up
into the top of his head.
Upon observing him more closely, I perceived that he wore a black
silk apron over his small-clothes; and this was a thing which I
thought very odd. Before I had time to make any remark, however,
upon so singular a circumstance, he interrupted me with a second
"ahem!"
To this observation I was not immediately prepared to reply. The
fact is, remarks of this laconic nature are nearly unanswerable. I
have known a Quarterly Review non-plussed by the word "Fudge!" I am
not ashamed to say, therefore, that I turned to Mr. Dammit for
assistance.
"Dammit," said I, "what are you about? don't you hear?- the
gentleman says 'ahem!'" I looked sternly at my friend while I thus
addressed him; for, to say the truth, I felt particularly puzzled, and
when a man is particularly puzzled he must knit his brows and look
savage, or else he is pretty sure to look like a fool.
"Dammit," observed I- although this sounded very much like an
oath, than which nothing was further from my thoughts- "Dammit," I
suggested- "the gentleman says 'ahem!'"
I do not attempt to defend my remark on the score of profundity; I
did not think it profound myself; but I have noticed that the effect
of our speeches is not always proportionate with their importance in
our own eyes; and if I had shot Mr. D. through and through with a
Paixhan bomb, or knocked him in the head with the "Poets and Poetry of
America," he could hardly have been more discomfited than when I
addressed him with those simple words: "Dammit, what are you about?-
don't you hear?- the gentleman says 'ahem!'"
"You don't say so?" gasped he at length, after turning more colors
than a pirate runs up, one after the other, when chased by a
man-of-war. "Are you quite sure he said that? Well, at all events I am
in for it now, and may as well put a bold face upon the matter. Here
goes, then- ahem!"
At this the little old gentleman seemed pleased- God only knows why.
He left his station at the nook of the bridge, limped forward with a
gracious air, took Dammit by the hand and shook it cordially,
looking all the while straight up in his face with an air of the
most unadulterated benignity which it is possible for the mind of
man to imagine.
"I am quite sure you will win it, Dammit," said he, with the
frankest of all smiles, "but we are obliged to have a trial, you know,
for the sake of mere form."
"Ahem!" replied my friend, taking off his coat, with a deep sigh,
tying a pocket-handkerchief around his waist, and producing an
unaccountable alteration in his countenance by twisting up his eyes
and bringing down the corners of his mouth- "ahem!" And "ahem!" said
he again, after a pause; and not another word more than "ahem!" did
I ever know him to say after that. "Aha!" thought I, without
expressing myself aloud- "this is quite a remarkable silence on the
part of Toby Dammit, and is no doubt a consequence of his verbosity
upon a previous occasion. One extreme induces another. I wonder if
he has forgotten the many unanswerable questions which he propounded
to me so fluently on the day when I gave him my last lecture? At all
events, he is cured of the transcendentals."
"Ahem!" here replied Toby, just as if he had been reading my
thoughts, and looking like a very old sheep in a revery.
The old gentleman now took him by the arm, and led him more into the
shade of the bridge- a few paces back from the turnstile. "My good
fellow," said he, "I make it a point of conscience to allow you this
much run. Wait here, till I take my place by the stile, so that I
may see whether you go over it handsomely, and transcendentally, and
don't omit any flourishes of the pigeon-wing. A mere form, you know. I
will say 'one, two, three, and away.' Mind you, start at the word
'away'" Here he took his position by the stile, paused a moment as
if in profound reflection, then looked up and, I thought, smiled
very slightly, then tightened the strings of his apron, then took a
long look at Dammit, and finally gave the word as agreed upon-
One- two- three- and- away!
Punctually at the word "away," my poor friend set off in a strong
gallop. The stile was not very high, like Mr. Lord's- nor yet very
low, like that of Mr. Lord's reviewers, but upon the whole I made sure
that he would clear it. And then what if he did not?- ah, that was the
question- what if he did not? "What right," said I, "had the old
gentleman to make any other gentleman jump? The little old
dot-and-carry-one! who is he? If he asks me to jump, I won't do it,
that's flat, and I don't care who the devil he is." The bridge, as I
say, was arched and covered in, in a very ridiculous manner, and there
was a most uncomfortable echo about it at all times- an echo which I
never before so particularly observed as when I uttered the four
last words of my remark.
But what I said, or what I thought, or what I heard, occupied only
an instant. In less than five seconds from his starting, my poor
Toby had taken the leap. I saw him run nimbly, and spring grandly from
the floor of the bridge, cutting the most awful flourishes with his
legs as he went up. I saw him high in the air, pigeon-winging it to
admiration just over the top of the stile; and of course I thought
it an unusually singular thing that he did not continue to go over.
But the whole leap was the affair of a moment, and, before I had a
chance to make any profound reflections, down came Mr. Dammit on the
flat of his back, on the same side of the stile from which he had
started. At the same instant I saw the old gentleman limping off at
the top of his speed, having caught and wrapt up in his apron
something that fell heavily into it from the darkness of the arch just
over the turnstile. At all this I was much astonished; but I had no
leisure to think, for Dammit lay particularly still, and I concluded
that his feelings had been hurt, and that he stood in need of my
assistance. I hurried up to him and found that he had received what
might be termed a serious injury. The truth is, he had been deprived
of his head, which after a close search I could not find anywhere;
so I determined to take him home and send for the homoeopathists. In
the meantime a thought struck me, and I threw open an adjacent
window of the bridge, when the sad truth flashed upon me at once.
About five feet just above the top of the turnstile, and crossing
the arch of the foot-path so as to constitute a brace, there
extended a flat iron bar, lying with its breadth horizontally, and
forming one of a series that served to strengthen the structure
throughout its extent. With the edge of this brace it appeared evident
that the neck of my unfortunate friend had come precisely in contact.
He did not long survive his terrible loss. The homoeopathists did
not give him little enough physic, and what little they did give him
he hesitated to take. So in the end he grew worse, and at length died,
a lesson to all riotous livers. I bedewed his grave with my tears,
worked a bar sinister on his family escutcheon, and, for the general
expenses of his funeral, sent in my very moderate bill to the
transcendentalists. The scoundrels refused to pay it, so I had Mr.
Dammit dug up at once, and sold him for dog's meat.
THE END
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1850
THE OBLONG BOX
by Edgar Allan Poe
SOME YEARS ago, I engaged passage from Charleston, S. C, to the city
of New York, in the fine packet-ship "Independence," Captain Hardy. We
were to sail on the fifteenth of the month (June), weather permitting;
and on the fourteenth, I went on board to arrange some matters in my
state-room.
I found that we were to have a great many passengers, including a
more than usual number of ladies. On the list were several of my
acquaintances, and among other names, I was rejoiced to see that of
Mr. Cornelius Wyatt, a young artist, for whom I entertained feelings
of warm friendship. He had been with me a fellow-student at C-
University, where we were very much together. He had the ordinary
temperament of genius, and was a compound of misanthropy, sensibility,
and enthusiasm. To these qualities he united the warmest and truest
heart which ever beat in a human bosom.
I observed that his name was carded upon three state-rooms; and,
upon again referring to the list of passengers, I found that he had
engaged passage for himself, wife, and two sisters- his own. The
state-rooms were sufficiently roomy, and each had two berths, one
above the other. These berths, to be sure, were so exceedingly
narrow as to be insufficient for more than one person; still, I
could not comprehend why there were three state-rooms for these four
persons. I was, just at that epoch, in one of those moody frames of
mind which make a man abnormally inquisitive about trifles: and I
confess, with shame, that I busied myself in a variety of ill-bred and
preposterous conjectures about this matter of the supernumerary
state-room. It was no business of mine, to be sure, but with none
the less pertinacity did I occupy myself in attempts to resolve the
enigma. At last I reached a conclusion which wrought in me great
wonder why I had not arrived at it before. "It is a servant of
course," I said; "what a fool I am, not sooner to have thought of so
obvious a solution!" And then I again repaired to the list- but here I
saw distinctly that no servant was to come with the party, although,
in fact, it had been the original design to bring one- for the words
"and servant" had been first written and then overscored. "Oh, extra
baggage, to be sure," I now said to myself- "something he wishes not
to be put in the hold- something to be kept under his own eye- ah, I
have it- a painting or so- and this is what he has been bargaining
about with Nicolino, the Italian Jew." This idea satisfied me, and I
dismissed my curiosity for the nonce.
Wyatt's two sisters I knew very well, and most amiable and clever
girls they were. His wife he had newly married, and I had never yet
seen her. He had often talked about her in my presence, however, and
in his usual style of enthusiasm. He described her as of surpassing
beauty, wit, and accomplishment. I was, therefore, quite anxious to
make her acquaintance.
On the day in which I visited the ship (the fourteenth), Wyatt and
party were also to visit it- so the captain informed me- and I
waited on board an hour longer than I had designed, in hope of being
presented to the bride, but then an apology came. "Mrs. W. was a
little indisposed, and would decline coming on board until
to-morrow, at the hour of sailing."
The morrow having arrived, I was going from my hotel to the wharf,
when Captain Hardy met me and said that, "owing to circumstances" (a
stupid but convenient phrase), "he rather thought the 'Independence'
would not sail for a day or two, and that when all was ready, he would
send up and let me know." This I thought strange, for there was a
stiff southerly breeze; but as "the circumstances" were not
forthcoming, although I pumped for them with much perseverance, I
had nothing to do but to return home and digest my impatience at
leisure.
I did not receive the expected message from the captain for nearly a
week. It came at length, however, and I immediately went on board. The
ship was crowded with passengers, and every thing was in the bustle
attendant upon making sail. Wyatt's party arrived in about ten minutes
after myself. There were the two sisters, the bride, and the artist-
the latter in one of his customary fits of moody misanthropy. I was
too well used to these, however, to pay them any special attention. He
did not even introduce me to his wife- this courtesy devolving, per
force, upon his sister Marian- a very sweet and intelligent girl, who,
in a few hurried words, made us acquainted.
Mrs. Wyatt had been closely veiled; and when she raised her veil, in
acknowledging my bow, I confess that I was very profoundly astonished.
I should have been much more so, however, had not long experience
advised me not to trust, with too implicit a reliance, the
enthusiastic descriptions of my friend, the artist, when indulging
in comments upon the loveliness of woman. When beauty was the theme, I
well knew with what facility he soared into the regions of the
purely ideal.
The truth is, I could not help regarding Mrs. Wyatt as a decidedly
plain-looking woman. If not positively ugly, she was not, I think,
very far from it. She was dressed, however, in exquisite taste- and
then I had no doubt that she had captivated my friend's heart by the
more enduring graces of the intellect and soul. She said very few
words, and passed at once into her state-room with Mr. W.
My old inquisitiveness now returned. There was no servant- that
was a settled point. I looked, therefore, for the extra baggage. After
some delay, a cart arrived at the wharf, with an oblong pine box,
which was every thing that seemed to be expected. Immediately upon its
arrival we made sail, and in a short time were safely over the bar and
standing out to sea.
The box in question was, as I say, oblong. It was about six feet
in length by two and a half in breadth; I observed it attentively, and
like to be precise. Now this shape was peculiar; and no sooner had I
seen it, than I took credit to myself for the accuracy of my guessing.
I had reached the conclusion, it will be remembered, that the extra
baggage of my friend, the artist, would prove to be pictures, or at
least a picture; for I knew he had been for several weeks in
conference with Nicolino:- and now here was a box, which, from its
shape, could possibly contain nothing in the world but a copy of
Leonardo's "Last Supper;" and a copy of this very "Last Supper,"
done by Rubini the younger, at Florence, I had known, for some time,
to be in the possession of Nicolino. This point, therefore, I
considered as sufficiently settled. I chuckled excessively when I
thought of my acumen. It was the first time I had ever known Wyatt
to keep from me any of his artistical secrets; but here he evidently
intended to steal a march upon me, and smuggle a fine picture to New
York, under my very nose; expecting me to know nothing of the
matter. I resolved to quiz him well, now and hereafter.
One thing, however, annoyed me not a little. The box did not go into
the extra state-room. It was deposited in Wyatt's own; and there, too,
it remained, occupying very nearly the whole of the floor- no doubt to
the exceeding discomfort of the artist and his wife;- this the more
especially as the tar or paint with which it was lettered in sprawling
capitals, emitted a strong, disagreeable, and, to my fancy, a
peculiarly disgusting odor. On the lid were painted the words- "Mrs.
Adelaide Curtis, Albany, New York. Charge of Cornelius Wyatt, Esq.
This side up. To be handled with care."
Now, I was aware that Mrs. Adelaide Curtis, of Albany, was the
artist's wife's mother,- but then I looked upon the whole address as a
mystification, intended especially for myself. I made up my mind, of
course, that the box and contents would never get farther north than
the studio of my misanthropic friend, in Chambers Street, New York.
For the first three or four days we had fine weather, although the
wind was dead ahead; having chopped round to the northward,
immediately upon our losing sight of the coast. The passengers were,
consequently, in high spirits and disposed to be social. I must
except, however, Wyatt and his sisters, who behaved stiffly, and, I
could not help thinking, uncourteously to the rest of the party.
Wyatt's conduct I did not so much regard. He was gloomy, even beyond
his usual habit- in fact he was morose- but in him I was prepared
for eccentricity. For the sisters, however, I could make no excuse.
They secluded themselves in their staterooms during the greater part
of the passage, and absolutely refused, although I repeatedly urged
them, to hold communication with any person on board.
Mrs. Wyatt herself was far more agreeable. That is to say, she was
chatty; and to be chatty is no slight recommendation at sea. She
became excessively intimate with most of the ladies; and, to my
profound astonishment, evinced no equivocal disposition to coquet with
the men. She amused us all very much. I say "amused"- and scarcely
know how to explain myself. The truth is, I soon found that Mrs. W.
was far oftener laughed at than with. The gentlemen said little
about her; but the ladies, in a little while, pronounced her "a
good-hearted thing, rather indifferent looking, totally uneducated,
and decidedly vulgar." The great wonder was, how Wyatt had been
entrapped into such a match. Wealth was the general solution- but this
I knew to be no solution at all; for Wyatt had told me that she
neither brought him a dollar nor had any expectations from any
source whatever. "He had married," he said, "for love, and for love
only; and his bride was far more than worthy of his love." When I
thought of these expressions, on the part of my friend, I confess that
I felt indescribably puzzled. Could it be possible that he was
taking leave of his senses? What else could I think? He, so refined,
so intellectual, so fastidious, with so exquisite a perception of
the faulty, and so keen an appreciation of the beautiful! To be
sure, the lady seemed especially fond of him- particularly so in his
absence- when she made herself ridiculous by frequent quotations of
what had been said by her "beloved husband, Mr. Wyatt." The word
"husband" seemed forever- to use one of her own delicate
expressions- forever "on the tip of her tongue." In the meantime, it
was observed by all on board, that he avoided her in the most
pointed manner, and, for the most part, shut himself up alone in his
state-room, where, in fact, he might have been said to live
altogether, leaving his wife at full liberty to amuse herself as she
thought best, in the public society of the main cabin.
My conclusion, from what I saw and heard, was, that, the artist,
by some unaccountable freak of fate, or perhaps in some fit of
enthusiastic and fanciful passion, had been induced to unite himself
with a person altogether beneath him, and that the natural result,
entire and speedy disgust, had ensued. I pitied him from the bottom of
my heart- but could not, for that reason, quite forgive his
incommunicativeness in the matter of the "Last Supper." For this I
resolved to have my revenge.
One day he came upon deck, and, taking his arm as had been my
wont, I sauntered with him backward and forward. His gloom, however
(which I considered quite natural under the circumstances), seemed
entirely unabated. He said little, and that moodily, and with
evident effort. I ventured a jest or two, and he made a sickening
attempt at a smile. Poor fellow!- as I thought of his wife, I wondered
that he could have heart to put on even the semblance of mirth. I
determined to commence a series of covert insinuations, or innuendoes,
about the oblong box- just to let him perceive, gradually, that I
was not altogether the butt, or victim, of his little bit of
pleasant mystification. My first observation was by way of opening a
masked battery. I said something about the "peculiar shape of that
box-," and, as I spoke the words, I smiled knowingly, winked, and
touched him gently with my forefinger in the ribs.
The manner in which Wyatt received this harmless pleasantry
convinced me, at once, that he was mad. At first he stared at me as if
he found it impossible to comprehend the witticism of my remark; but
as its point seemed slowly to make its way into his brain, his eyes,
in the same proportion, seemed protruding from their sockets. Then
he grew very red- then hideously pale- then, as if highly amused
with what I had insinuated, he began a loud and boisterous laugh,
which, to my astonishment, he kept up, with gradually increasing
vigor, for ten minutes or more. In conclusion, he fell flat and
heavily upon the deck. When I ran to uplift him, to all appearance
he was dead.
I called assistance, and, with much difficulty, we brought him to
himself. Upon reviving he spoke incoherently for some time. At
length we bled him and put him to bed. The next morning he was quite
recovered, so far as regarded his mere bodily health. Of his mind I
say nothing, of course. I avoided him during the rest of the
passage, by advice of the captain, who seemed to coincide with me
altogether in my views of his insanity, but cautioned me to say
nothing on this head to any person on board.
Several circumstances occurred immediately after this fit of Wyatt
which contributed to heighten the curiosity with which I was already
possessed. Among other things, this: I had been nervous- drank too
much strong green tea, and slept ill at night- in fact, for two nights
I could not be properly said to sleep at all. Now, my state-room
opened into the main cabin, or dining-room, as did those of all the
single men on board. Wyatt's three rooms were in the after-cabin,
which was separated from the main one by a slight sliding door,
never locked even at night. As we were almost constantly on a wind,
and the breeze was not a little stiff, the ship heeled to leeward very
considerably; and whenever her starboard side was to leeward, the
sliding door between the cabins slid open, and so remained, nobody
taking the trouble to get up and shut it. But my berth was in such a
position, that when my own state-room door was open, as well as the
sliding door in question (and my own door was always open on account
of the heat,) I could see into the after-cabin quite distinctly, and
just at that portion of it, too, where were situated the state-rooms
of Mr. Wyatt. Well, during two nights (not consecutive) while I lay
awake, I clearly saw Mrs. W., about eleven o'clock upon each night,
steal cautiously from the state-room of Mr. W., and enter the extra
room, where she remained until daybreak, when she was called by her
husband and went back. That they were virtually separated was clear.
They had separate apartments- no doubt in contemplation of a more
permanent divorce; and here, after all I thought was the mystery of
the extra state-room.
There was another circumstance, too, which interested me much.
During the two wakeful nights in question, and immediately after the
disappearance of Mrs. Wyatt into the extra state-room, I was attracted
by certain singular cautious, subdued noises in that of her husband.
After listening to them for some time, with thoughtful attention, I at
length succeeded perfectly in translating their import. They were
sounds occasioned by the artist in prying open the oblong box, by
means of a chisel and mallet- the latter being apparently muffled,
or deadened, by some soft woollen or cotton substance in which its
head was enveloped.
In this manner I fancied I could distinguish the precise moment when
he fairly disengaged the lid- also, that I could determine when he
removed it altogether, and when he deposited it upon the lower berth
in his room; this latter point I knew, for example, by certain
slight taps which the lid made in striking against the wooden edges of
the berth, as he endeavored to lay it down very gently- there being no
room for it on the floor. After this there was a dead stillness, and I
heard nothing more, upon either occasion, until nearly daybreak;
unless, perhaps, I may mention a low sobbing, or murmuring sound, so
very much suppressed as to be nearly inaudible- if, indeed, the
whole of this latter noise were not rather produced by my own
imagination. I say it seemed to resemble sobbing or sighing- but, of
course, it could not have been either. I rather think it was a ringing
in my own ears. Mr. Wyatt, no doubt, according to custom, was merely
giving the rein to one of his hobbies- indulging in one of his fits of
artistic enthusiasm. He had opened his oblong box, in order to feast
his eyes on the pictorial treasure within. There was nothing in
this, however, to make him sob. I repeat, therefore, that it must have
been simply a freak of my own fancy, distempered by good Captain
Hardy's green tea. just before dawn, on each of the two nights of
which I speak, I distinctly heard Mr. Wyatt replace the lid upon the
oblong box, and force the nails into their old places by means of
the muffled mallet. Having done this, he issued from his state-room,
fully dressed, and proceeded to call Mrs. W. from hers.
We had been at sea seven days, and were now off Cape Hatteras,
when there came a tremendously heavy blow from the southwest. We were,
in a measure, prepared for it, however, as the weather had been
holding out threats for some time. Every thing was made snug, alow and
aloft; and as the wind steadily freshened, we lay to, at length, under
spanker and foretopsail, both double-reefed.
In this trim we rode safely enough for forty-eight hours- the ship
proving herself an excellent sea-boat in many respects, and shipping
no water of any consequence. At the end of this period, however, the
gale had freshened into a hurricane, and our after- sail split into
ribbons, bringing us so much in the trough of the water that we
shipped several prodigious seas, one immediately after the other. By
this accident we lost three men overboard with the caboose, and nearly
the whole of the larboard bulwarks. Scarcely had we recovered our
senses, before the foretopsail went into shreds, when we got up a
storm stay- sail and with this did pretty well for some hours, the
ship heading the sea much more steadily than before.
The gale still held on, however, and we saw no signs of its abating.
The rigging was found to be ill-fitted, and greatly strained; and on
the third day of the blow, about five in the afternoon, our
mizzen-mast, in a heavy lurch to windward, went by the board. For an
hour or more, we tried in vain to get rid of it, on account of the
prodigious rolling of the ship; and, before we had succeeded, the
carpenter came aft and announced four feet of water in the hold. To
add to our dilemma, we found the pumps choked and nearly useless.
All was now confusion and despair- but an effort was made to lighten
the ship by throwing overboard as much of her cargo as could be
reached, and by cutting away the two masts that remained. This we at
last accomplished- but we were still unable to do any thing at the
pumps; and, in the meantime, the leak gained on us very fast.
At sundown, the gale had sensibly diminished in violence, and as the
sea went down with it, we still entertained faint hopes of saving
ourselves in the boats. At eight P. M., the clouds broke away to
windward, and we had the advantage of a full moon- a piece of good
fortune which served wonderfully to cheer our drooping spirits.
After incredible labor we succeeded, at length, in getting the
longboat over the side without material accident, and into this we
crowded the whole of the crew and most of the passengers. This party
made off immediately, and, after undergoing much suffering, finally
arrived, in safety, at Ocracoke Inlet, on the third day after the
wreck.
Fourteen passengers, with the captain, remained on board,
resolving to trust their fortunes to the jolly-boat at the stern. We
lowered it without difficulty, although it was only by a miracle
that we prevented it from swamping as it touched the water. It
contained, when afloat, the captain and his wife, Mr. Wyatt and party,
a Mexican officer, wife, four children, and myself, with a negro
valet.
We had no room, of course, for any thing except a few positively
necessary instruments, some provisions, and the clothes upon our
backs. No one had thought of even attempting to save any thing more.
What must have been the astonishment of all, then, when having
proceeded a few fathoms from the ship, Mr. Wyatt stood up in the
stern-sheets, and coolly demanded of Captain Hardy that the boat
should be put back for the purpose of taking in his oblong box!
"Sit down, Mr. Wyatt," replied the captain, somewhat sternly, "you
will capsize us if you do not sit quite still. Our gunwhale is
almost in the water now."
"The box!" vociferated Mr. Wyatt, still standing- "the box, I say!
Captain Hardy, you cannot, you will not refuse me. Its weight will
be but a trifle- it is nothing- mere nothing. By the mother who bore
you- for the love of Heaven- by your hope of salvation, I implore
you to put back for the box!"
The captain, for a moment, seemed touched by the earnest appeal of
the artist, but he regained his stern composure, and merely said:
"Mr. Wyatt, you are mad. I cannot listen to you. Sit down, I say, or
you will swamp the boat. Stay- hold him- seize him!- he is about to
spring overboard! There- I knew it- he is over!"
As the captain said this, Mr. Wyatt, in fact, sprang from the
boat, and, as we were yet in the lee of the wreck, succeeded, by
almost superhuman exertion, in getting hold of a rope which hung
from the fore-chains. In another moment he was on board, and rushing
frantically down into the cabin.
In the meantime, we had been swept astern of the ship, and being
quite out of her lee, were at the mercy of the tremendous sea which
was still running. We made a determined effort to put back, but our
little boat was like a feather in the breath of the tempest. We saw at
a glance that the doom of the unfortunate artist was sealed.
As our distance from the wreck rapidly increased, the madman (for as
such only could we regard him) was seen to emerge from the
companion- way, up which by dint of strength that appeared gigantic,
he dragged, bodily, the oblong box. While we gazed in the extremity of
astonishment, he passed, rapidly, several turns of a three-inch
rope, first around the box and then around his body. In another
instant both body and box were in the sea- disappearing suddenly, at
once and forever.
We lingered awhile sadly upon our oars, with our eyes riveted upon
the spot. At length we pulled away. The silence remained unbroken
for an hour. Finally, I hazarded a remark.
"Did you observe, captain, how suddenly they sank? Was not that an
exceedingly singular thing? I confess that I entertained some feeble
hope of his final deliverance, when I saw him lash himself to the box,
and commit himself to the sea."
"They sank as a matter of course," replied the captain, "and that
like a shot. They will soon rise again, however- but not till the salt
melts."
"The salt!" I ejaculated.
"Hush!" said the captain, pointing to the wife and sisters of the
deceased. "We must talk of these things at some more appropriate
time."
We suffered much, and made a narrow escape, but fortune befriended
us, as well as our mates in the long-boat. We landed, in fine, more
dead than alive, after four days of intense distress, upon the beach
opposite Roanoke Island. We remained here a week, were not ill-treated
by the wreckers, and at length obtained a passage to New York.
About a month after the loss of the "Independence," I happened to
meet Captain Hardy in Broadway. Our conversation turned, naturally,
upon the disaster, and especially upon the sad fate of poor Wyatt. I
thus learned the following particulars.
The artist had engaged passage for himself, wife, two sisters and
a servant. His wife was, indeed, as she had been represented, a most
lovely, and most accomplished woman. On the morning of the
fourteenth of June (the day in which I first visited the ship), the
lady suddenly sickened and died. The young husband was frantic with
grief- but circumstances imperatively forbade the deferring his voyage
to New York. It was necessary to take to her mother the corpse of
his adored wife, and, on the other hand, the universal prejudice which
would prevent his doing so openly was well known. Nine-tenths of the
passengers would have abandoned the ship rather than take passage with
a dead body.
In this dilemma, Captain Hardy arranged that the corpse, being first
partially embalmed, and packed, with a large quantity of salt, in a
box of suitable dimensions, should be conveyed on board as
merchandise. Nothing was to be said of the lady's decease; and, as
it was well understood that Mr. Wyatt had engaged passage for his
wife, it became necessary that some person should personate her during
the voyage. This the deceased lady's-maid was easily prevailed on to
do. The extra state-room, originally engaged for this girl during
her mistress' life, was now merely retained. In this state-room the
pseudo-wife, slept, of course, every night. In the daytime she
performed, to the best of her ability, the part of her mistress- whose
person, it had been carefully ascertained, was unknown to any of the
passengers on board.
My own mistake arose, naturally enough, through too careless, too
inquisitive, and too impulsive a temperament. But of late, it is a
rare thing that I sleep soundly at night. There is a countenance which
haunts me, turn as I will. There is an hysterical laugh which will
forever ring within my ears.
THE END
.