Edgar Allan Poe: His Life, Letters, and Opinions — John H. Ingram, 1880, volume II — reading text

published just as she died — a few months after Poewas inscribed to him, and was of him, as “Israfel.”* The poet’s literary labours during the early half of 1845, after his relinquishment of the Broadway Journal, do not appear to have been either voluminous or valuable. To Graham’s Magazine, and the Democratic Review, he contributed a certain quantum of “Marginalia,” but his own and his wife’s ill health rendered him little able to wield his pen with any of the readiness he had so lately displayed. The settlement of various matters connected with his defunct periodical occupied a considerable portion of his time, and as an example of the honourable manner in which he strove to perform the pecuniary engagements — despite the difficulties under which he laboured — that arose out of his recent publishership, this little note may be cited: — “NEW YORK, April 16, ‘46. “MY DEAR SIR, — You seem to take matters very easily, and I really wonder at your patience under the circumstances. But the truth is, I am in no degree to blame. Your letters, one and all, reached me in due course of mail, and I attended to them as far as I could. The business, in fact, was none of mine, but of the person to whom I transferred the Journal, and in whose hands it perished. “Of course, I feel no less in honour bound to refund you your money, and now do so, with many thanks for your promptness and courtesy. — Very cordially yours, “EDGAR A. POE.” During the months of February, March, and April, the poet contributed notices of leading American authors to the pages of Godey’s Lady’s Book, and in May commenced in the same magazine a series of critical studies on “The Literati of New York.” These essays, which were continued from month to month until October, were immensely successful, so far as creating a sensation was concerned, but in some respects they greatly injured Poe’s prospects, both by enlarging still further the number of his foes, and even by causing the intimidation of the less courageous of his friends, who foresaw and dreaded the decrease of his popularity in many influential places. The causticity of these critiques, indeed, produced a terrible commotion in the ranks of mediocrity, and no effort was left untried to put a stop to their publication. Poe himself was alternately threatened and cajoled, but of course to no purpose; similar efforts were made with Mr. Godey, but with what little success this letter from the Philadelphian publisher will show: — “The Authors and Mr. Poe. “June 1846. “We have received several letters from New York, anonymous and from personal friends, requesting us to be careful what we allow Mr. Poe to say of the New York authors, many of whom are our personal friends. We reply to one and all, that we have nothing to do but publish Mr. Poe’s opinions, not our own. Whether we agree with Mr. Poe or not, is another matter. We are not to be intimidated by a threat of the loss of friends, or turned from our purpose by honeyed words. . . . Many attempts have been made, and are making, by various persons to forestall public opinion. We have the name of one person, — others are busy with reports of Mr. Poe’s illness. Mr. Poe has been ill, but we have letters from him of very recent dates, also a new batch of The Literati, which show anything but feebleness either of body or mind. Almost every paper that we exchange with has praised our new enterprise, and spoken in high terms of Mr. Poe’s opinion.” Highly successful as Poe’s “opinions” may have been for the publisher’s pocket — and some of the Lady’s Book issues ran through three editions — the unfortunates of whom they were expressed were scarcely so contented. One of them, duplicately named “Thomas Dunn English” and “Thomas Dunn Brown,” dissatisfied with the manner in which his literary shortcomings had been dissected by the critic, or, as Poe suggests, hankering after wider notoriety, obtained the use of the Evening Mirror from its new proprietors, Fuller and Company, and inserted therein a grossly personal attack upon the poet, who thereupon instituted a libel suit against the newspaper, and recovered heavy damages for defamation of character. From the so-called “Reply of Mr. English,” some of the more relevant paragraphs may be cited, but the “card” is too lengthy and too indecent to be quoted in extenso. It was editorially introduced with the plea that “As Mr. Godey, ‘for a consideration,’ lends the use of his battery for an attack on the one side, it is but fair that we allow our friends an opportunity to exercise a little ‘self-defence’ on the other.” As Poe’s critique was purely directed against the literary weaknesses of “English,” the personalities of the “Reply” were utterly uncalled for; it began thus: — “As I have not, of late, replied to attacks made upon me through the public press, I can easily afford to make an exception, and still keep my rule a general one. A Mr. Edgar A. Poe has been engaged for some time past in giving to the public, through the medium of the Lady’s Book, sketches of what he facetiously calls the ‘Literati of New York.’ These he names, by way of distinction, I presume, from his ordinary writings, ‘honest opinions.’ He honours me by including me in the very numerous and remarkably august body he affects to describe. . . . As he seems to covet a notice from me, he shall be gratified. “Mr. Poe states in his article, ‘I do not personally know Mr. English.’ . . . I know Mr. Poe by a succession of his acts — one of which is rather costly. I hold Mr. Poe’s acknowledgment for a sum of money which he obtained of me under false pretences. As I stand in need of it at this time, I am content he should forget to know me, provided he acquits himself of the money he owes me. I ask no interest, in lieu of which I am willing to credit him with the sound cuffing I gave him when I last saw him. “Another act of his gave me some knowledge of him. A merchant of this city had accused him of committing forgery. He consulted me on the mode of punishing his accuser, and as he was afraid to challenge him to the field, or chastise him personally, I suggested a legal prosecution as his sole remedy. At his request I obtained a counsellor who was willing, as a compliment to me, to conduct his suit without the customary retaining fee. But, though so eager at first to commence proceedings, he dropped the matter altogether when the time came for him to act — thus virtually admitting the truth of the charge. “Some time before this, if I mistake not, Mr. Poe accepted an invitation to deliver a poem before a society of the New York University. About a week before the time when this poem was to be pronounced, he called on me, appearing to be much troubled — said he could not write the poem, and begged me to help him out with some idea of the course to pursue. I suggested that he had better write a note to the society, and frankly state his inability to compose a poem on a stated subject, He did not do this, but — as he always does when troubled — drank until intoxicated; and remained in a state of intoxication during the week. When the night of exhibition came, it was gravely announced that Mr. Poe could not deliver his poem, on account of severe indisposition! “His next affair of a similar kind, was still more discreditable. Unmindful of his former act, he accepted an invitation to deliver a poem before a Boston institution — the Lyceum, I think. When I remonstrated with him on undertaking a task he could not perform, he alleged that he was in want of the money they would pay him, and would contrive to I cook up something.’ Want of ability prevented him from performing his intention, and he insulted his audience, and rendered himself a laughing-stock, by reciting a mass of ridiculous stuff, written by some one, and printed under his name when he was about eighteen years of age. It had a peculiar effect upon his audience, who dispersed under its infliction; and when he was rebuked for his fraud, he asserted that he had intended a hoax. . . . His lamentation over my lack of a common English education is heartrending to hear. I will acknowledge my deficiencies with pleasure. It is a great pity that he is not equally candid. “He really does not possess one tithe of that greatness which he seems to regard as an uncomfortable burden. He mistakes coarse abuse for polished invective, and vulgar in sinuation for sly satire. He is not alone thoroughly unprincipled, base, and depraved, but silly, vain, and ignorant, — not alone an assassin in morals, but a quack in literature. His frequent quotations from languages of which he is entirely ignorant, and his consequent blunders, expose him to ridicule; while his cool plagiarisms, from known or forgotten writers, excite the public amazement. He is a complete evidence of his own assertion, that I no spectacle can be more pitiable than that of a man without the commonest school education, busying himself in attempts to instruct mankind on topics of polite literature.’ ” Mr. English next proceeds to furnish his version of the Mrs. E——’s letters case — alleges a chastisement he had inflicted on Poe was so violent that it had caused the poet’s confinement to his bed for a day or two, and winds up his diatribe by declaring his reviewer “overrates his own powers.” That any newspaper could be found to insert such a communication in its columns, appears extraordinary, even although the proprietors made no concealment of their hatred for the person attacked, but what was still more lamentable was the fact that Poe, not content to leave to public justice the exoneration of his character from all charges not self-evidentIy false, foolishly increased the importance of the attack by publishing a refutation of it. The slanders signed with the name of “English,” but generally believed to have been the joint composition of various persons, appeared in the Evening Mirror of the 23d of June, and on the 28th inst. Poe’s answer appeared in the Philadelphia Saturday Gazette. The editor of the latter paper, remarking tbat, at the “particular request of some of Mr. Poe’s friends in this city,” he publishes that gentleman’s reply to the attack made upon him in the Mirror, adding justly, “Mr. English’s letter was very severe upon the private character of Mr. Poe, and the latter retaliates in the same spirit. All this is, to our notion, in bad taste, yet we cannot well refuse the assailed an opportunity to exculpate himself.” Of the poet’s voluminous Reply to Mr. English and Others, only a small portion can possibly be quoted, as the letter, which would fill a small volume, deals not only with “English,” but with the “Others.” It is dated New York, June 27th, and begins in this wise: — “To the Public. — A long and serious illness of such character as to render quiet and perfect seclusion in the country of vital importance, has hitherto prevented me from seeing an article headed ‘The War of the Literati,’ signed. ‘Thomas Dunn English.‘. . . This article I might, and should, indeed, never have seen, but for the kindness of Mr. Godey, who enclosed it to me with a suggestion that certain portions of it might be thought on my part to demand a reply. “I had some difficulty in comprehending what that was, said or written by Mr. English, that could be deemed answerable by any human being; but I had not taken into consideration that I had been, for many months, absent and dangerously ill — that I had no longer a journal in which to defend myself — that these facts were well known to Mr. English — that he is a blackguard of the lowest order — that it would be a silly truism, if not unpardonable flattery, to term him either a coward or a liar — and, lastly, that the magnitude of a slander is usually in the direct ratio of the littleness of the slanderer, but, above all things, of the impunity with which he fancies it may be uttered. “Of the series of papers which have called down upon me, while