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

impossible to imagine what view the young poet took of Neal’s friendly criticism, but one thing is certain, and that is, that the literary correspondence thus cordially commenced continued in a similar sympathetic strain until Poe’s death. The second printed but first published volume of Poe, to which the above correspondence refers, bears the following title-page: AL AARAAF, TAMERLANE, AND MINOR POEMS. By Edgar A. Poe. Baltimore: Hatch and Dunning. 1829. This volume — published, apparently, at the close of the year — is stated to have been for private circulation. It contains only sixty-six pages, and many of these are merely extra leaves and bastard titles. The real contents include “Al Aaraaf,” substantially as now printed, and prefixed to it, but unnamed, the sonnet now styled “To Science.” The present version of “Tamerlane” — then dedicated to John Neal — follows, and thereafter succeed ten “Miscellaneous Poems.” These included the lines now known as “Romance,” but then called “Preface;” the song, “I saw thee on thy bridal day;” “The Lake,” from the suppressed volume of 1827, and seven other pieces. Six of these latter are, save some slight variations, as still published, but in the following lines, “To M—— ,” appear three stanzas subsequently omitted, as well as a few trifling alterations. The whole poem, as it stands in the 1829 edition, reads thus “Oh! I care not that my earthly lot Hath little of earth in it — That years of love have been forgot In the fever of a minute. “I heed not that the desolate Are happier, sweet, than I — But that you meddle with my fate Who am a passer-by. “It is not that my founts of bliss Are gushing strange! with tears Or that the thrill of a single kiss Hath palsied many years “ ’Tis not that the flowers of twenty springs, Which have withered as they rose, Lie dead on my heart-strings With the weight of an age of snows. “Nor that the grass — oh! may it thrive! On my grave is growing or grown — But that, while I am dead, yet alive I cannot be, lady, alone.” These somewhat indefinite stanzas are typical of the whole of the fugitive pieces in the little book, and are, as usual, characteristic of his life and idiosyncrasies; — morbid sensibility to kindness, haunting regrets for an unprofited past, and a hopeless, utterly despairing dread of the future. These “Miscellanous Poems,” labelled — “My nothingness — my wants — My sins — and my contritions” — are hinted at, in “Romance,” as “forbidden things” in ordinary hours, and were, but too probably, occupations interdicted by his godfather. But from some suppressed lines in another piece, inscribed to an unknown person, it is clear that no amount of authority would have constrained him from pursuing his own subjects. He exclaims, after bewailing his early hopes, and alluding to an intention of disappearing altogether: — “So young! ah no — not now — Thou hast not seen my brow, But they tell thee I am proud — They lie — they lie aloud — My bosom beats with shame At the paltriness of name With which they dare combine A feeling such as mine — Nor Stoic? I am not In the tenor of my lot I laugh to think how poor That pleasure “to endure!” What! shade of Zeno! — I! Endure! — no — no — defy.” And that he did defy all parental, or assumed parental, power to suppress his poetic aspirations, it is easy to comprehend. But in “Spirits of the Dead” a more faithful representation of his self-styled “funereal mind” is to be found — a very portrayal in one stanza, wherein he alludes to the living being overshadowed by the will of the dead. It was, indeed, a never-ending phantasy with him, that death was not absolute separation from life — that the dead were not wholly heedless of the deeds of the living. But the two long poems constituted the chief value of the 1829 edition. “Al Arâf,” or “Al Aaraaf,” as the poet preferred styling it, is designed by the Mohammedan imagination as an abode wherein a gentle system of purgatory is instituted for the benefit of those who, though too good for hell, are not fitted for heaven — “Apart from heaven’s eternity — and yet how far from hell!” Poe chose to locate this intermediate region in a star discovered, or rather examined, by Tycho Brahe (and which it is now conjectured must have been a sun in course of conflagration), that appeared suddenly in the heavens, and after having rapidly attained a brilliancy surpassing that of Jupiter, Gradually disappeared and has never since been seen.* This poem of “Al Aaraaf” abounds in happy and melodious passages, and has never yet received its due weed of praise: some portions of the lyrical intermedial chant are exquisitely and musically onomatopocial in construction. The revised version of “Tamerlane,” too, given in this volume, is in every respect a great advance upon the previous printed draft: besides its enhanced poetic value, it is also far superior as a worn of art, improved punctuation and indented lines affording evidence of more skilled handicraft than that employed upon the former copy. * This account of Poe’s adventures in Europe is derived from memoranda made at his own request — during a dangerous illness which it was deemed might end fatally — shortly after his wife’s decease. There does not appear to be any reason for doubting the accuracy of this any more than of any other of the poet’s statements. — J. H. I. * J. Hannay, The Life and Genius of Edgar Allan Poe, 1852. † Powell, Living Poets of America, 1850. * Vide Appendix B. * Here follow 32 lines from the poem of “Al Aaraaf.” — J. H. I. * Vide Mr. R. Proctor’s Myths and Marvels of Astronomy. John H. Ingram, “Chapter 08,” Edgar Allan Poe: Life, Letters, and Opinions (1880), pp. 79-91 CHAPTER VIII. WEST POINT. IN 1802, the founders of the young republic saw the necessity of officering their troops with skilled soldiers, and, with a foresight their children have not always shown, instituted the West Point Military Academya military school in many respects equal to the best of Europe. Education and subsistence are gratuitous, and a monthly allowance of twenty-eight dollars is made to each of the cadets, so as to place them, as it were, beyond the necessity of appealing to relatives for anything. The course of study covers a period of four years, during which the student is placed under a discipline little less rigid than that of a soldier on active duty. The number of cadets is limited, and very great interest is required, as will be readily comprehended, in order to obtain a nomination. It was, doubtless, the prospect or promise of receiving a nomination to this institution that induced Poe to return to Mr. Allan’s. General Scott, and other influential friends, interested themselves on the youth’s behalf, and eventually obtained him an appointment. According to the rules of the Military Academy, nominations are not given to candidates after they have attained their twenty-first birthday, consequently Poe was only just in time to receive his appointment. The West Point records show that he was admitted into the institution as a cadet on the 1st of July 1830. At the time Poe was admitted, the Military Academy was anything but a suitable place for the residence of a high-spirited and sensitive youth. The discipline was not only of the most severe description, but the place itself was utterly unfit for the habits of growing lads. An inquiry having been made into the rules and regulations of the institution, in consequence of an excitement caused by the death of some of the cadets, the Board sent in a report to the Secretary of War, about a year previous to the poet’s admission, in which, after the examination of special cases, they said, “With regard to all the cadets, however, it may be averred, that they are constantly tasked to the utmost in the way of mental exertion, while from the nature of the climate, for very nearly an entire moiety of the year, they are, for all the purposes of recreation, debarred from the use of their limbs,” and, to obviate this latter objection, a building for exercise was recommended. Poe is declared to have entered upon his new mode of living with customary energy — for the idleness which he vaunted to Neal was more in theory than in practice — but he speedily discovered how totally unsuited for him was the strict discipline and monotonous training of such a place as West Point. The wayward and erratic course of existence to which he had been so long accustomed, as well as the fact that he had for so long a time been sole master of his own actions, rendered the restraints of the Academy most galling; nevertheless, that docility and amiability which he generally manifested towards those with whom he came in personal contact, caused him to become a general favourite and a not altogether unhopeful cadet. One of his fellow-cadets, speaking of Poe’s inability to follow the mathematical requirements of the place, says, “His mind was off from the matter-of-fact routine of the drill, which, in such a case as his, seemed practical joking, on some ethereal visionary expedition.” “His utter inefficiency and state of abstractness at that place” were, doubtless, the reasons that caused this authority to deem him “marked for an early death.”* Complaints of the severity of the rules frequently crop up in the press of the period: Niles’ Register for September 19th, 1829, after remarking that “each cadet is to remain four years at the institution, and then serve one year in the military establishmept of the United States,” goes on to state, “But the service is so strict, and the punishment so uniformly inflicted, that many are suspended or expelled before the expiration of the four years — and it is generally rather a small minority of the whole number that is seen to pass through the whole tour of service;” finally, the report declares that out of a total of 204 cadets only 26 are without black marks attached to their names. Whether Poe would have been one of the “small minority” had not events occurred to render, in his own opinion, his withdrawal requisite, is a debateable subject. According to the most circumstantial account furnished of his residence at West Point,* the poet’s career in the Military Academy was one scarcely calculated to cover him with institutional honours; but Mr. Thomas W. Gibson, its author — a fellow-cadet, and a fellow-prisoner at a subsequent Court-Martial — is occasionally so inaccurate in his memory of the facts, that the whole of his narrative must be received cum granô salis. “Number 28 South Barracks,” says Mr. Gibson, “in the last months of the year of our Lord 1830, was pretty generally regarded as a hard room. Cadets who aspired to high standing on the Merit Roll were not much given to visiting it, at least in day-time. To compensate in some measure for this neglect, however, the inspecting-officer was uncommonly punctual in his visits, and rarely failed to fund some subject for his daily report of demerit. The old barracks have passed away, and are now only a dream of stone and mortar; but the records of the sins of omission and commission of Number 28 and its occupants remain, and are piled carefully away among the dusty archives of the Academy. “Edgar A. Poe was one of the occupants of the room. ‘Old P——’ [Henderson?] and the writer of this sketch completed the household. . . . Poe at that time, though only about twenty years of age, had the appearance of being much older. He had a worn, weary, discontented look, not easily forgotten by those who were intimate with him. Poe was easily fretted by any jest at his expense, and was not a little annoyed by a story that some of the class got up, to the effect that he had procured a cadet’s appointment for his son, and the boy having died, the father had substituted himself in his place. Another report current in the corps was that he was a grandson of Benedict Arnold.* Some good-natured friend told