University of Virginia Library
PS;2600;1927
ALD
The works of Edgar Allan Poe i
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LIBRARY OF THE
UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA
UNIVERSITY
1819
OF
VIRGINIA
GIFT OF
MRS. A. R. HOOVER
1
!
:
The Works of
Edgar Allan Poe
in
One Volume
Complete Tales and Poems
GEO. U. S. PAT. OFF.
WALTER J. BLACK INC.
171 Madison Avenue
NEW YORK, N. Y.
PS
2600
1927
457285
Copy 2
COPYRIGHT, 1927,
BY
WALTER J. BLACK CO.
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Table of Contents
VOLUME I
POEMS
YTHE RAVEN
LENORE.
HYMN (SEE TALE, MORELLA, PAGE 335)
A VALENTINE
•
PAGE
35
TO HELEN
TO M. L. S..
ULALUME
THE BELLS.
AN ENIGMA
12
ANNABEL LEE .
12
TO MY MOTHER.
13
6
6
8
00∞∞0222
10
THE HAUNTED PALACE (SEE TALE, THE FALL OF THE HOUSE of Usher,
PAGE 273).
THE CONQUERor Worm (see tale, Ligeia, Page 324)
To F...s O....d
13
TO ONE IN PARADISE (SEE TALE, THE ASSIGNATION, PAGE 183)
TO IANTHE IN HEAVEN (SAME AS ABOVE)
THE VALLEY OF UNREST .
13
THE CITY IN THE SEA
14
· THE SLEEPER
SILENCE.
A DREAM WITHIN A DREAM
DREAMLAND
TO ZANTE
EULALIE.
15
15
16
16
17
17
ELDORADO
18
ISRAFEL
FOR ANNIE
TO MARIE LOUISE (SHEW)
ΤΟ
BRIDAL BALLAD.
TO F
FROM "POLITIAN".
THE COLISEUM
SCENES. .
SONNET-TO SCIENCE.
AL AARAAF
18
19
20
21
21
21
22
2223
34
34
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TAMERLANE .
TO THE RIVER
TO-----
A DREAM.
ROMANCE
FAIRYLAND
THE LAKE
SONG . .
TO HELEN
VOLUME I-POEMS-Continued
SPIRITS OF THE DEAD
EVENING STAR
IMITATION
PAGE
42
45
45
46
46
46
47
47
48
48
48
49
"THE HAPPIEST DAY"
49
HYMN.
TRANSLATION FROM THE GREEK
49
DREAMS
50
"IN YOUTH I HAVE KNOWN ONE"
A PEAN (SAME AS LENORE)
50
VOLUME II
TALES
THE GOLD BUG
53
78
•
103
138
151
160
170
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
THE PURLOINED LETTER
THE OBLONG BOX.
"THOU ART THE MAN"
THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM
VOLUME III
TALES
THE ASSIGNATION
THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH
KING PEST. . .
THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO
THE BLACK CAT.
THE TELL-TALE HEART
THE IMP OF THE PERVERSE
WILLIAM WILSON
MYSTIFICATION.
THE MAN OF THE CROWD
VON KEMPELEN AND HIS DISCOVERY
THE POWER OF WORDS . .
THE COLLOQUY OF MONOS AND UNA
183
191
196
205
209
216
220
224
239
245
251
256
259
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1
B
VOLUME III-TALES-Continued
PAGE
2
THE CONVERSATION OF EIROS AND CHARMION
265
5
SHADOW-A PARABLE.
269
SILENCE-A FABLE
271
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM.
LANDOR'S COTTAGE..
273
287
•
298
TALES
VOLUME IV
THE ISLAND OF THE FAY. .
THE OVAL PORTRAIT
BERENICE .
ELEONORA .
• LIGEIA.
MORELLA
METZENGERSTEIN.
HOP-FROG
307
311
313
319
324
335
339
345
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL 352
THE BALLOON-HOAX
·
MELLONTA TAUTA
MESMERIC REVELATION
THE CASE OF M. VALDEMAR
THE PREMATURE BURIAL
386
396
406
413
420
VOLUME V
TALES
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
431
VOLUME VI
TALES
A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTROM
.
555
MS. FOUND IN A BOTTLE .
567
THE SPHINX..
574
A TALE OF THE RAGGED MOUNTAINS .
577
THE SPECTACLES .
585
THREE SUNDAYS IN A WEEK
602
THE SYSTEM OF DR. TARR AND PROF. FETHER.
607
THE ANGEL OF THE ODD .
620
THE DEVIL IN THE BELFRY
627
TABLE OF CONTENTS
BON-BON.
VOLUME VI-TALES—Continued
THE DUC DE L'OMELETTE
NEVER BET THE DEVIL YOUR HEAD
PAGI
633
644
•
647
WHY THE LITTLE FRENCHMAN WEARS HIS HAND IN A SLING. 654
VOLUME VII
TALES
THE THOUSAND-AND-SECOND TALE OF SCHEHERAZADE
659
A TALE OF JERUSALEM. .
670
FOUR BEASTS IN ONE.
LOSS OF BREATH
THE MAN THAT WAS USED UP
THE BUSINESS MAN.
673
SOME WORDS WITH A MUMMY.
678
690
699
70€
DIDDLING
712
LIONIZING
LITERARY LIFE OF THINGUMBOB ESQ..
HOW TO WRITE A BLACKWOOD ARTICLE
A PREDICAMENT
X-ING A PARAGRAB
MORNING ON THE WISSAHICCON
720
723
738
745
•
752
756
Author's Preface to the Poems
(The poems which have been omitted from the poetry section will be found where
they were published in the tales.-Ed.)
These trifles are collected and repub-
lished chiefly with a view to their
redemption from the many improve-
ments to which they have been sub-
jected while going at random "the
rounds of the press." I am naturally
anxious that what I have written should
circulate as I wrote it, if it circulate at
all. In defence of my own taste, nev-
ertheless, it is incumbent upon me to
say that I think nothing in this volume
of much value to the public, or very
creditable to myself. Events not to be
controlled have prevented me from
making, at any time, any serious effort
in what, under happier circumstances,
would have been the field of my choice.
With me poetry has been not a purpose,
but a passion; and the passions should
be held in reverence; they must not-
they cannot at will be excited, with an
eye to the paltry compensations, or the
more paltry commendations of mankind.
E. A. P.
The Raven
(This poem was first published in the New York Mirror, January, 1845. Rev.
Geo. Gilfillan, a contemporary litterateur of Rev. Rufus Griswold, Poe's
literary executor, declares Poe hastened his wife's death to write the poem.
The Reverends and Poe waged bitter war with politeness, justice, and truth.
on the side of Poe.-Ed.)
ONCE upon a midnight dreary, while I
pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious vol-
ume of forgotten lore-
While I nodded, nearly napping, sud-
denly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping-rap-
ping at my chamber door.
Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tap-
ping at my chamber door-
Only this and nothing more."
Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in
the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought
its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow;-vainly
I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow-
sorrow for the lost Lenore—
For the rare and radiant maiden whom
the angels name Lenore-
Nameless here for evermore.
And the silken sad uncertain rustling of
each purple curtain
Thrilled me-filled me with fantastic
terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my
heart, I stood repeating
""Tis some visitor entreating entrance
at my chamber door-
Some late visitor entreating entrance at
my chamber door;-
This it is and nothing more."
Presently my soul grew stronger; hesi-
tating then no longer,
"Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly your
forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so
gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping-tap-
ping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you”—
here I opened wide the door:—
Darkness there and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long
I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal
ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the
stillness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was
the whispered word, "Lenore"
This I whispered, and an echo mur-
mured back the word, “Lenore!”-
Merely this and nothing more.
Then into the chamber turning, all my
soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping, some-
thing louder than before.
"Surely," said I, "surely that is some-
thing at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and
this mystery explore―
Let my heart be still a moment, and
this mystery explore;-
'Tis the wind and nothing more."
3
4
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Open here I flung the shutter, when,
with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the
saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not
an instant stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched
above my chamber door-
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just
above my chamber door-
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad
fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the
countenance it wore,
"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven,
thou," I said, "art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wan-
dering from the Nightly shore-
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the
Night's Plutonian shore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to
hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning-little
relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no
living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird
above his chamber door-
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust
above his chamber door,
With such name as "Nevermore."
But the Raven, sitting lonely on that
placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that
one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered; not a
feather then he fluttered-
Till I scarcely more than muttered,
"Other friends have flown before-
On the morrow he will leave me, as my
Hopes have flown before."
Then the bird said, “Nevermore."
Startled at the stillness broken by reply
so aptly spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is
its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master,
whom unmerciful Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till
his songs one burden bore-
Till the dirges of his Hope the melan-
choly burden bore
Of "Never-nevermore."
But the Raven still beguiling all my
sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in
front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook
myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this
ominous bird of yore-
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly,
gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking "Nevermore."
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no
syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now
burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my
head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the
lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the
lamp-light gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser,
perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls
tinkled on the tufted floor.
"Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent
thee by these angels he hath sent
thee
POEMS
5
Respite-respite and nepenthe from
thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and
forget this lost Lenore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil!-
prophet still, if bird or devil!-
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tem-
pest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this des-
ert land enchanted-
On this Home by Horror haunted—tell
me truly I implore Gilead
Is there is there balm in Gilead? tell
me-tell me, I implore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil-
prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us-
by that God we both adore-
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if,
within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom
the angels name Lenore.
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom
the angels name Lenore."
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
"Be that word our sign of parting, bird
or fiend!" I shrieked, upstarting-
Get thee back into the tempest and the
Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of
that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit
the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and
take thy form from off my door!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
And the Raven, never flitting, still is
sitting still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above
my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a
Demon that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming
throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow
that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted-nevermore!
LENORE
("Lenore" first appeared in The Pio-
neer, February, 1843.-Ed.)
Ан, broken is the golden bowl! the
spirit flown for ever!
Let the bell toll!-a saintly soul floats
on the Stygian river.
And, Guy de Vere, hast thou no tear?—
weep now or never more!
See! on yon drear and rigid bier low
lies thy love, Lenore!
Come! let the burial rite be read-the
funeral song be sung!-
An anthem for the queenliest dead that
ever died so young-
A dirge for her, the doubly dead in that
she died so young.
"Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth
and hated her for her pride,
And when she fell in feeble health, ye
blessed her that she died!
How shall the ritual, then, be read?-
the requiem how be sung
By you by yours, the evil eye,-by
yours, the slanderous tongue
That did to death the innocence that
died, and died so voung?"
6
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"Peccavimus; but rave not thus! and
let a Sabbath song
Go up to God so solemnly the dead
may feel no wrong!
The sweet Lenore hath "gone before,
with Hope, that flew beside,
Leaving thee wild for the dear child
that should have been thy bride-
For her, the fair and debonnaire, that
now so lowly lies,
The life upon her yellow hair but not
within her eyes-
The life still there, upon her hair-the
death upon her eyes.
"Avaunt! to-night my heart is light.
No dirge will I upraise,
But waft the angel on her flight with
a pæan of old days!
Let no bell toll!-lest her sweet soul,
amid its hallowed mirth,
Should catch the note, as it doth float
up from the damned Earth.
To friends above, from fiends below,
the indignant ghost is riven-
From Hell unto a high estate far up
within the Heaven-
From grief and groan to a golden throne
beside the King of Heaven."
A VALENTINE*
("A Valentine" first appeared in Flag
of Our Union, 1849.-Ed.)
FOR her this rhyme is penned, whose
luminous eyes,
Brightly expressive as the twins of
Leda,
*To find the name referred to in this
poem, read consecutively the first letter
of the first line, the second letter of
the second line, the third letter of the
third line, and so on to the end.
Shall find her own sweet name, that
nestling lies
Upon the page, enwrapped from
every reader.
Search narrowly the lines!-they hold
a treasure
Divine talisman-an amulet
That must be worn at heart. Search
well the measure-
The words the syllables! Do not
forget
The trivialest point, or you may lose
your labour!
And yet there is in this no Gordian
knot
Which one might not undo without a
sabre,
If one could merely comprehend the
plot.
Enwritten upon the leaf where now are
peering
Eyes scintillating soul, there lie
perdus
Three eloquent words oft uttered in the
hearing
Of poets by poets-as the name is a
poet's, too.
Its letters, although naturally lying
Like the knight Pinto-Mendez Fer
dinando-
Still form a synonym for Truth-Cease
trying!
You will not read the riddle, though
you do the best you can do.
TO HELEN
(This poem appeared in The Interna.
tional Miscellany.-Ed.)
I SAW thee once-once only-years ago
I must not say how many-but no!
many.
It was a July midnight; and from ou
POEMS
7
A full-orbed moon, that like thine own
soul soaring,
Sought a precipitate pathway up through
heaven,
There fell a silvery-silken veil of light,
With quietude, and sultriness and
slumber,
Upon the upturn'd faces of a thousand
| Roses that grew in an enchanted garden,
Where no wind dared to stir, unless on
tiptoe-
Fell on the upturn'd faces of these
roses
That gave out, in return for the love-
light,
Their odorous souls in an ecstatic
death-
Fell on the upturn'd faces of these
roses
That smiled and died in this parterre,
enchanted
By thee, and by the poetry of thy
presence.
Clad all in white, upon a violet bank
I saw thee half-reclining; while the
moon
Fell on the upturn'd faces of the roses,
And on thine own, upturn'd-alas, in
sorrow!
Was it not Fate, that, on this July mid-
night-
Was it not Fate (whose name is also
Sorrow),
That bade me pause before that garden-
gate,
To breathe the incense of those slum-
bering roses?
No footstep stirred: the hated world
all slept,
Save only thee and me. I paused-I
looked-
(Ah, bear in mind this garden was
enchanted!)
The pearly lustre of the moon went
out:
The mossy banks and the meandering
paths,
The happy flowers and the repining
trees,
Were seen no more: the very roses'
odours
Died in the arms of the adoring airs.
All-all expired save thee-save less
than thou:
Save only the divine light in thine
eyes-
Save but the soul in thine uplifted
eyes.
I saw but them-they were the world
to me.
I saw but them-saw only them for
hours-
Saw only them until the moon went
down.
What wild heart-histories seemed to lie
enwritten
Upon those crystalline, celestial spheres!
How dark a woe! yet how sublime a
hope!
How silently serene a sea of pride!
How daring an ambition! yet how
deep-
How fathomless a capacity for love!
But now, at length, dear Dian sank
from sight,
Into a western couch of thunder-cloud;
And thou, a ghost, amid the entombing
trees
Didst glide away. Only thine eyes
remained.
They would not go-they never yet
have gone.
And in an instant all things disap- Lighting my lonely pathway home that
peared.
night,
8
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
They have not left me (as my hopes
have) since.
They follow me-
the years.
e—they lead me through
They are my ministers-yet I their
slave.
Their office is to illumine and enkindle-
My duty, to be saved by their bright
light
And purified in their electric fire,
And sanctified in their elysian fire.
They fill my soul with Beauty (which
is Hope),
And are far up in Heaven-the stars
I kneel to
In the sad, silent watches of my night;
While even in the meridian glare of day
I see them still-two sweetly scintillant
Venuses, unextinguished by the sun!
TO M. L. S.
("To M. L. S." was first published
in Home Journal, March, 1847.-Ed.)
Nor long ago, the writer of these lines,
In the mad pride of intellectuality,
Maintained "the power of words"-
denied that ever
A thought arose within the human brain
Beyond the utterance of the human
tongue:
And now, as if in mockery of that
boast,
Two words-two foreign, soft, dissyl-
lables-
Italian tones, made only to be mur-
mured
By angels dreaming in the moonlit "dew
That hangs like chains of pearl on Her-
mon hill,”—
Have stirred from out the abysses of
his heart,
Unthought-like thoughts that are the
souls of thought,
Richer, far wilder, far diviner visions
Than even the seraph harper, Israfel,
(Who has "the sweetest voice of all
God's creatures"),
Could hope to utter. And I! my spells
are broken.
The pen falls powerless from my shiv-
ering hand.
With thy dear name as text, though
bidden by thee,
I cannot write-I cannot speak or
think-
Alas, I cannot feel; for 'tis not feeling.
This standing motionless upon the
golden
Threshold of the wide-open gate of
dreams,
Gazing, entranced, adown the gorgeous
vista
And thrilling as I see, upon the right,
Upon the left, and all the way along,
Amid empurpled vapours, far away
To where the prospect terminates-
thee only.
ULALUME
(Colton's American Review for De-
cember, 1847, published this poem,
signed N. P. Willis. It was also pub-
lished in Willis' Home Journal.—Ed.)
THE skies they were ashen and sober;
The leaves they were crisped and
sere-
The leaves they were withering and
sere;
It was night in the lonesome October
Of my most immemorial year;
In the misty mid region of Weir-
It was down by the dank tarn of
Auber;
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,
In the ghoul-haunted woodland of
Weir.
POEMS
9
Here once, through an alley Titanic,
Of cypress, I roamed with my Soul-
Of cypress, with Psyche, my Soul.
These were days when my heart was
volcanic
As the scoriac rivers that roll-
As the lavas that restlessly roll
Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek
In the ultimate climes of the pole-
That groan as they roll down Mount
Yaanek
In the realms of the boreal pole.
Our talk had been serious and sober,
But our thoughts they were palsied
and sere-
Our memories were treacherous and
sere-
For we knew not the month was
October,
And we marked not the night of the
year-
(Ah, night of all nights in the year!)
We noted not the dim lake of Auber-
(Though once we had journeyed
down here)-
Remembered not the dank tarn of
Auber,
Nor the ghoul-haunted woodland of
Weir.
And now, as the night was senescent
And star-dials pointed to morn-
As the star-dials hinted of morn-
At the end of our path a liquescent
And nebulous lustre was born,
Out of which a miraculous crescent
Arose with a duplicate horn-
Astarte's bediamonded crescent
Distinct with its duplicate horn.
And I said "She is warmer than Dian:
She rolls through an ether of sighs—
She revels in a region of sighs:
She has seen that the tears are not
dry on
These cheeks, where the worm never
dies
And has come past the stars of the
Lion
To point us the path to the skies-
To the Lethean peace of the skies—
Come up, in despite of the Lion,
To shine on us with her bright eyes-
Come up through the lair of the Lion,
With love in her luminous eyes."
But Psyche, uplifting her finger,
Said "Sadly this star I mistrust-
Her pallor I strangely mistrust :-
Oh, hasten!-oh, let us not linger!
Oh, fly!—let us fly!-for we must."
In terror she spoke, letting sink her
Wings till they trailed in the dust-
In agony sobbed, letting sink her
Plumes till they trailed in the dust-
Till they sorrowfully trailed in the
dust.
I replied "This is nothing but dream-
ing:
Let us on by this tremulous light!
Let us bathe in this crystalline light!
Its Sibyllic splendour is beaming
With Hope and in Beauty to-night :-
See!-it flickers up the sky through
the night!
Ah, we safely may trust to its gleaming,
And be sure it will lead us aright-
We safely may trust to a gleaming
That cannot but guide us aright,
Since it flickers up to Heaven through
the night."
Thus I pacified Psyche and kissed her,
And tempted her out of her gloom—
And conquered her scruples and
gloom,
And we passed to the end of the vista,
But were stopped by the door of a
tomb-
By the door of a legended tomb;
10
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
And I said "What is written, sweet
sister,
On the door of this legended tomb?"
She replied "Ulalume-Ulalume-
'Tis the vault of thy lost Ulalume!"
Then my heart it grew ashen and sober
As the leaves that were crisped and
sere-
As the leaves that were withering and
sere;
And I cried-"It was surely October
On this very night of last year
That I journeyed-I journeyed down
here-
That I brought a dread burden down
here!
On this night of all nights in the
year,
Ah, what demon has tempted me
here?
Well I know, now, this dim lake of
Auber-
This misty mid region of Weir-
Well I know, now, this dank tarn of
Auber,
This ghoul-haunted woodland of
Weir."
THE BELLS
("The Bells" was published in Sar-
tain's Union Magazine, October, 1849.
-Ed.)
I
HEAR the sledges with the bells-
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their mel-
ody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars, that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musi-
cally wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells-
From the jingling and the tinkling of
the bells.
II
Hear the mellow wedding bells,
Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their har-
mony foretells!
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight!
From the molten golden-notes,
And all in tune,
What a liquid ditty floats.
To the turtle-dove that listens, while
she gloats
On the moon!
Oh, from out the sounding cells,
What a gush of euphony voluminously
wells!
How it swells!
How it dwells
On the future! how it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells-
To the rhyming and the chiming of
the bells!
III
Hear the loud alarum bells-
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror now their turbu-
lency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
POEMS
11
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy
of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf
and frantic fire
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavour
Now-now to sit or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of Despair!
How they clang, and clash, and
roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air!
Yet the ear it fully knows,
By the twanging
And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and
flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling,
And the wrangling,
How the danger sinks and
swells,
By the sinking or the swelling in the
anger of the bells-
Of the bells-
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells-
In the clamour and the clangour of
the bells!
IV
Hear the tolling of the bells-
Iron bells!
What a world of solemn thought their
monody compels!
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their
tone!
For every sound that floats
From
the rust within their
throats
Is a groan.
And the people-ah, the people-
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,
And who tolling, tolling, tolling,
In that muffled monotone,
Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone-
They are neither man nor woman-
They are neither brute nor human—
They are Ghouls:
And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,
Rolls
A pæan from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells
With the pean of the bells!
And he dances and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the pæan of the bells-
Of the bells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the throbbing of the
bells-
Of the bells, bells,
bells-
To the sobbing of the bells;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy Runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells-
Of the bells, bells, bells—
To the tolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells-
To the moaning and the groaning of
the bells.
12
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
AN ENIGMA*
"SELDOM we find," says Solomon Don
Dunce
"Half an idea in the profoundest
sonnet.
Through all the flimsy things we see
at once
As easily as through a Naples bon-
net-
Trash of all trash!-how can a lady
don it?"
Yet heavier far than your Petrarchan
stuff-
Owl-downy nonsense that the faintest
puff
Twirls into trunk-paper the while you
con it."
And, veritably, Sol is right enough.
The general tuckermanities are arrant
Bubbles ephemeral and SO trans-
parent-
But this is, now-you may depend
upon it-
Stable, opaque, immortal-all by dint
Of the dear names that lie concealed
within't.
ANNABEL LEE
(This poem appeared in The Inter-
national Miscellany. "Annabel Lee" is
generally credited to represent Poe's
young wife, Virginia Clemm.-Ed.)
It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
The name Sarah Anna Lewis will
be found in the above sonnet by read-
ing consecutively the first letter of the
first line, second letter of second line,
and so to the end.
That a maiden there lived whom you
may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other
thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea:
But we loved with a love that was more
than love-
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of
heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes! that was the reason (as all men
know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud
by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee
But our love it was stronger by far
than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the
soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:
POEMS
13
For the moon never beams without
bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I see the
bright eyes
Of the beautiful Anabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down
by the side
Of my darling, my darling, my life and
my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea-
In her tomb by the side of the sea.
TO MY MOTHER
(This poem appeared in the Leaflets
of Memory, a magazine of 1850.-Ed.)
BECAUSE I feel that, in the Heavens
above,
The angels, whispering to one an-
other,
Can find, among their burning terms of
love,
None SO devotional as that of
"Mother,"
Therefore by that dear name I long
have called you—
You who are more than mother unto
me,
And fill my heart of hearts, where
Death installed you,
In setting my Virginia's spirit free.
My mother-my own mother, who died
early,
Was but the mother of nyself; but
you
Are mother to the one I loved so dearly,
And thus are dearer than the mother
I knew
By that infinity with which my wife
Was dearer to my soul than its soul
life.
To FS. S. O—D*
THOU wouldst be loved?-then let thy
heart
From its present pathway part not!
Being everything which now thou art
Be nothing which thou art not.
So with the world thy gentle ways,
Thy grace, thy more than beauty,
Shall be an endless theme of praise,
And love a simple duty.
THE VALLEY OF UNREST
("The Valley of Unrest" was pub
lished in an edition of 1831 under the
title, "Valley of Nis."-Ed.)
ONCE it smiled a silent dell
Where the people did not dwell;
They had gone unto the wars,
Trusting to the mild-eyed stars,
Nightly, from their azure towers,
To keep watch above the flowers,
In the midst of which all day
The red sun-light lazily lay.
*See Contents Literati of New
York.-Ed.
14
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Now each visitor shall confess
The sad valley's restlessness.
Nothing there is motionless-
Nothing save the airs that brood
Over the magic solitude.
Ah, by no wind are stirred those trees
That palpitate like the chill seas
Around the misty Hebrides!
Ah, by no wind those clouds are driven
That rustle through the unquiet Heaven
Unceasingly, from morn till even,
Over the violets there that lie
In myriad types of the human eye-
Over the lilies there that wave
And weep above a nameless grave!
They wave-from out their fragrant
tops
Eternal dews come down in drops.
They weep:-from off their delicate
stems
Perennial tears descend in gems.
THE CITY IN THE SEA
(Under the title of "The Doomed
City," this poem appeared in an edition
of 1831.-Ed.)
Lo! Death has reared himself a throne
In a strange city lying alone
Far down within the dim West,
Where the good and the bad, and the
worst and the best,
Have gone to their eternal rest.
There shrines and palaces and towers
(Time-eaten towers that tremble not!)
Resemble nothing that is ours.
Around, by lifting winds forgot,
Resignedly beneath the sky
The melancholy waters lie.
No rays from the Holy Heaven come
down
On the long night-time of that town;
But light from out the lurid sea
Streams up the turrets silently-
Gleams up the pinnacles far and free-
Up domes-up spires-up kingly halls-
Up fanes-up Babylon-like walls-
Up shadowy long-forgotten bowers
Of sculptured ivy and stone flowers-
Up many and many a marvellous shrine
Whose wreathed friezes intertwine
The viol, the violet, and the vine.
Resignedly beneath the sky
The melancholy waters lie.
So blend the turrets and shadows there
That all seemed pendulous in air,
While from a proud tower in the town
Death looks gigantically down.
There open fanes and gaping graves
Yawn level with the luminous waves;
But not the riches there that lie
In each idol's diamond eye-
Not the gaily jewelled dead
Tempt the waters from their bed;
For no ripples curl alas!
Along that wilderness of glass-
No swellings tell that winds may be
Upon some far-off happier sea-
No heavings hint that winds have been
On seas less hideously serene.
But lo, a stir is in the air!
The wave-there is a movement there!
As if the towers had thrust aside,
In slightly sinking, the dull tide-
As if their tops had feebly given
A void within the filmy Heaven.
The waves have now a redder glow-
The hours are breathing faint and low-
And when, amid no earthly moans,
Down, down that town shall settle
hence,
Hell, rising from a thousand thrones,
Shall do it reverence.
POEMS
15
THE SLEEPER
(This poem was published in an edi-
tion of 1831 under the name, "Irene."
-Ed.)
Ar midnight, in the month of June,
I stand beneath the mystic moon.
An opiate vapor, dewy, dim,
Exhales from out her golden rim,
And, softly dripping, drop by drop,
Upon the quiet mountain top,
Steals drowsily and musically
Into the universal valley.
The rosemary nods upon the grave;
The lily lolls upon the wave;
Wrapping the fog about its breast,
The ruin moulders into rest;
Looking like Lethe, see! the lake
A conscious slumber seems to take,
And would not, for the world, awake.
All Beauty sleeps!-and lo! where lies
(Her casement open to the skies)
Irene, with her Destinies!
Oh, lady bright! can it be right-
This window open to the night?
The wanton airs, from the tree-top,
Laughingly through the lattice drop-
The bodiless airs, a wizard rout,
Flit through thy chamber in and out,
And wave the curtain canopy
So fitfully-so fearfully-
Above the closed and fringed lid
'Neath which thy slumb'ring soul lies
hid,
That, o'er the floor and down the wall,
Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall!
Oh, lady dear, hast thou no fear?
Why and what art thou dreaming here?
Sure thou art come o'er far-off seas,
A wonder to these garden trees!
Strange is thy pallor! strange thy dress!
Strange, above all, thy length of tress,
And this all-solemn silentness!
The lady sleeps! Oh, may her sleep,
Which is enduring, so be deep!
Heaven have her in its sacred keep!
This chamber changed for one more
holy,
This bed for one more melancholy,
I pray to God that she may lie
For ever with unopened eye,
While the dim sheeted ghosts go by!
My love, she sleeps! Oh, may her
sleep,
As it is lasting, so be deep!
Soft may the worms about her creep!
Far in the forest, dim and old,
For her may some tall vault unfold--
Some vault that oft hath flung its black
And winged panels fluttering back,
Triumphant, o'er the crested palls,
Of her grand family funerals-
Some sepulchre, remote, alone,
Against whose portal she hath thrown,
In childhood many an idle stone-
Some tomb from out whose sounding
door
She ne'er shall force an echo more,
Thrilling to think, poor child of sin!
It was the dead who groaned within.
SILENCE
("Silence" first appeared in April,
1840, in Burton's Gentleman's Maga-
zine, of which Poe was co-editor.-Ed.)
THERE are some qualities—some incor-
porate things,
That have a double life, which thus
is made
A type of that twin entity which springs
From matter and light, evinced in
solid and shade
16
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
There is a two-fold Silence-sea and
shore-
Body and soul.
places,
One dwells in lonely
Newly with grass o'ergrown; some
solemn graces,
Some human memories and tearful lore,
Render him terrorless: his name's "No
More."
He is the corporate Silence: dread him
not!
No power hath he of evil in him-
self;
But should some urgent fate (untimely
lot)!
Bring thee to meet his shadow (name-
less elf,
That haunteth the lone regions where
hath trod
No foot of man), commend thyself to
God!
A DREAM WITHIN A DREAM
TAKE this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone!
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.
I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep-while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?
DREAMLAND
(In June, 1844, "Dreamland" was
published in Graham's Magazine, of
which Poe had been editor.-Ed.)
By a route obscure and lonely,
Haunted by ill angels only,
Where an Eidolon, named Night,
On a black throne reigns upright,
I have reached these lands but newly
From an ultimate dim Thule-
From a wild weird clime that lieth,
sublime,
Out of Space-out of Time.
Bottomless vales and boundless floods,
And chasms, and caves, and Titan
woods,
With forms that no man can discover
For the dews that drip all over;
Mountains toppling evermore
Into seas without a shore;
Seas that restlessly aspire,
Surging, unto skies of fire;
Lakes that endlessly outspread
Their lone waters-lone and dead,
Their still waters-still and chilly
With the snows of the lolling lily.
By the lakes that thus out spread
Their lone waters, lone and dead,—
Their sad waters, sad and chilly
With the snows of the lolling lily,-
By the mountains-near the river
Murmuring lowly, murmuring ever,-
POEMS
17
By the grey woods,-by the swamp
Where the toad and the newt encamp,
By the dismal tarns and pools
Where dwell the Ghouls,-
By each spot the most unholy-
In each nook most melancholy,—
There the traveller meets aghast
Sheeted Memories of the Past-
Shrouded forms that start and sigh
As they pass the wanderer by-
White-robed forms of friends long
given,
In agony, to the Earth-and Heaven.
For the heart whose woes are legion
Tis a peaceful, soothing region—
For the spirit that walks in shadow
Tis-oh, 'tis an Eldorado!
But the traveller, travelling through it,
May not dare not openly view it;
Never its mysteries are exposed
To the weak human eyes unclosed;
So wills its King, who hath forbid
The uplifting of the fringed lid;
And thus the sad Soul that here passes
Beholds it but through darkened glasses.
By a route obscure and lonely,
Haunted by ill angels only,
Where an Eidolon, named Night,
On a black throne reigns upright,
I have wandered home but newly
From this ultimate dim Thule.
TO ZANTE
(Published in January, 1837, in
Southern Literary Messenger, which
Poe edited.-Ed.)
FAIR isle, that from the fairest of all
flowers,
Thy gentlest of all gentle names dost
take!
How many memories of what radiant
hours
At sight of thee and thine at once
awake!
How many scenes of what departed
bliss!
How many thoughts of what en-
tombed hopes!
How many visions of a maiden that is
No more no more upon thy verdant
slopes!
No more! alas, that magical sad sound
Transforming all! Thy charms will
shall please no more-
Thy memory no more! Accursed
ground
Henceforth I hold thy flower-enam-
elled shore,
O hyacinthine isle! O purple Zante!
"Isola d'oro! Fior di Levante!"
EULALIE
("Eulalie" was published in the
Broadway Journal, vol. 2:5; 1845. Poe
also edited this magazine.-Ed.)
I DWELT alone
In a world of moan,
And my soul was a stagnant tide,
Till the fair and gentle Eulalie became
my blushing bride-
Till the yellow-haired young Eulalie
became my smiling bride.
Ah, less-less bright
The stars of the night
Than the eyes of the radiant girl!
And never a flake
That the vapour can make
With the moon-tints of purple and
pearl.
18
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Can vie with the modest Eulalie's most
unregarded curl-
Can compare with the bright-eyed Eula-
lie's most humble and careless
curl.
Now Doubt-now Pain
Come never again,
For her soul gives me sigh for sigh,
And all day long
Shines, bright and strong,
Astarte within the sky,
While ever to her dear Eulalie upturns
her matron eye-
While ever to her young Eulalie upturns
her violet eye.
ELDORADO
(This poem was published in The
Flag of Our Union, 1849.-Ed.)
GAILY bedight,
A gallant knight,
In sunshine and in shadow,
Had journeyed long,
Singing a song,
In search of Eldorado.
But he grew old-
This knight so bold-
And o'er his heart a shadow
Fell as he found
No spot of ground
That looked like Eldorado.
And as his strength
Failed him at length,
He met a pilgrim shadow-
"Shadow," said he,
"Where can it be-
This land of Eldorado?"
"Over the Mountains
Of the Moon,
Down the Valley of the Shadow,
Ride, boldly ride,"
The shade replied,—
"If you seek for Eldorado!"
ISRAFEL*
(This poem was published in The
Ladies' Pearl.-Ed.)
IN Heaven a spirit doth dwell
"Whose heart-strings are a lute;"
None sing so wildly well
As the angel Israfel,
And the giddy stars (so legends tell),
Ceasing their hymns, attend the spell
Of his voice, all mute.
Tottering above
In her highest noon,
The enamoured Moon
Blushes with love,
While, to listen, the red levin
(With the rapid Pleiads, even,
Which were seven),
Pauses in Heaven.
And they say (the starry choir
And the other listening things)
That Israfeli's fire
Is owing to that lyre
By which he sits and sings-
The trembling living wire
Of those unusual strings.
*And the angel Israfel, whose heart-
strings are a lute, and who has the
sweetest voice of all God's creatures.-
Koran.
POEMS
1
19
But the skies that angel trod,
Where deep thoughts are a duty—
Where Love's a grown-up God-
Where the Houri glances are
Imbued with all the beauty
Which we worship in a star.
Therefore, thou art not wrong,
Israfeli, who despisest
An unimpassioned song;
To thee the laurels belong,
Best bard, because the wisest!
Merrily live and long!
The ecstasies above
With thy burning measures suit—
Thy grief, thy joy, thy hate, thy love,
With the fervour of thy lute-
Well may the stars be mute!
Yes, Heaven is thine; but this
Is a world of sweets and sours;
Our flowers-are merely flowers,
And the shadow of thy perfect bliss
Is the sunshine of ours.
If I could dwell
Where Israfel
Hath dwelt, and he where I,
He might not sing so wildly well
A mortal melody,
While a bolder note than this might
swell
From my lyre within the sky.
FOR ANNIE
("For Annie" was published in Flag
of Our Union, 1849.-Ed.)
THANK Heaven! the crisis-
The danger is past,
And the lingering illness
Is over at last-
And the fever called "Living"
Is conquered at last.
Sadly, I know,
I am shorn of my strength;
And no muscle I move
As I lie at full length—
But no matter!-I feel
I am better at length.
And I rest so composedly,
Now in my bed,
That any beholder
Might fancy me dead-
Might start at beholding me,
Thinking me dead.
The moaning and groaning,
The sighing and sobbing,
Are quieted now,
With that horrbile throbbing
At heart:-ah, that horrible,
Horrible throbbing!
The sickness-the nausea-
The pitiless pain-
Have ceased, with the fever
That maddened my brain
With the fever called "Living"
That burned in my brain.
And oh! of all tortures
That torture the worst
Has abated-the terrible
Torture of thirst,
For the napthaline river
Of Passion accurst:
I have drunk of a water
That quenches all thirst:-
Of a water that flows,
With a lullaby sound,
From a spring but a very few
Feet under ground-
From a cavern not very far
Down under ground.
20
20
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
And ah! let it never
Be foolishly said
That my room it is gloomy
And narrow my bed;
For man never slept
In a different bed-
And, to sleep, you must slumber
In just such a bed.
My tantalised spirit
Here blandly reposes,
Forgetting, or never
Regretting its roses--
Its old agitations
Of myrtles and roses:
For now, while so quietly
Lying, it fancies
A holier odour
About it, of pansies-
A rosemary odour,
Commingled with pansies-
With rue and the beautiful
Puritan pansies.
And so it lies happily,
Bathing in many
A dream of the truth
And the beauty of Annie-
Drowned in a bath
Of the tresses of Annie.
She tenderly kissed me,
She fondly caressed,
And then I fell gently
To sleep on her breast.
Deeply to sleep
From the heaven of her breast.
When the light was extinguished.
She covered me warm,
And she prayed to the angels
To keep me from harm-
To the queen of the angels
To shield me from harm.
And I lie so composedly
Now in my bed,
(Knowing her love)
That you fancy me dead-
And I rest so contentedly,
Now in my bed,
(With her love at my breast)
That you fancy me dead-
That you shudder to look at me,
Thinking me dead.
But my heart it is brighter
Than all of the many
Stars in the sky,
For it sparkles with Annie-
It glows with the light
Of the love of my Annie-
With the thought of the light
Of the eyes of my Annie.
TO MARIE LOUISE (SHEW)
(This lady at one time, by her kind
nursing, saved Poe's life.-Ed.)
Of all who hail thy presence as the
morning-
Of all to whom thine absence is the
night-
The blotting utterly from out high
heaven
The sacred sun-of all who, weeping,
bless thee
Hourly for hope-for life-ah, above
all,
For the resurrection of deep buried
faith
In truth, in virtue, in humanity-
Of all who, on despairs unhallowed bed
Lying down to die, have suddenly arisen
At thy soft-murmured words, "Let
there be light!"
At thy soft-murmured words that were
fulfilled
POEMS
21
22
In the seraphic glancing of thine eyes-
Of all who owe thee most, whose grati-
tude
Nearest resembles worship,-oh, re-
member
The truest, the most fervently devoted,
And think that these weak lines are
written by him—
By him who, as he pens them, thrills to
think
His spirit is communing with an angel's.
ΤΟ
I HEED not that my early lot
Hath little of Earth in it-
That years of love have been forgot
In the hatred of a minute:-
I mourn not that the desolate
Are happier, sweet, than I,
But that you sorrow for my fate
Who am a passer by.
But he spoke to re-assure me,
And he kissed my pallid brow,
While a reverie came o'er me,
And to the churchyard bore me,
And I sighed to him before me,
"Oh, I am happy now!"
And thus the words were spoken,
And thus the plighted vow,
And, though my faith be broken,
And, though my heart be broken,
Behold the golden token
That proves me happy now!
Would God I could awaken!
For I dream I know not how,
And my soul is sorely shaken
Lest an evil step be taken-
Lest the dead who is forsaken
May not be happy now.
BRIDAL BALLAD
(A somewhat similar poem to the
"Bridal Ballad" appears in a book of
selections called "Amaranth."-Ed.)
THE ring is on my hand,
And the wreath is on my brow;
Satins and jewels grand
Are all at my command,
And many a rood of land
And I am happy now.
And my lord he loves me well;
But, when first he breathed his vow,
I felt my bosom swell-
And the voice seemed his who fell
In the battle down the dell,
And who is happy now.
TO F.
("To F" has also been published
under the title "To One Departed.”—
Ed.)
BELOVED! amid the earnest woes
That crowd around my earthly path-
(Drear path, alas! where grows
Not even one lonely rose)—
My soul at least a solace hath
In dreams of thee, and therein knows
An Eden of bland repose.
And thus thy memory is to me
Like some enchanted far-off isle
In some tumultuous sea-
Some ocean throbbing far and free
With storms-but where meanwhile
Serenest skies continually
Just o'er that one bright island smile.
22
22
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
FROM "POLITIAN”
An Unpublished Drama
THE COLISEUM
TYPE of the antique Rome!
reliquary
Rich
Of lofty contemplation left to Time
By buried centuries of pomp and power!
At length-at length-after so many
days
Of weary pilgrimage and burning thirst
(Thirst for the springs of lore that in
thee lie),
I kneel, an altered and an humble man,
Amid thy shadows, and so drink within
My very soul thy grandeur, gloom, and
glory!
Vastness! and Age! and Memories of
Eld!
Silence!
Night!
and Desolation! and dim
I feel ye now-I feel ye in your
strength-
O spells more sure than e'er Judæan
king
Taught in the gardens of Gethsemane!
O charms more potent than the rapt
Chaldee
Ever drew down from out the quiet
stars!
Here, where a hero fell, a column falls!
Here, where the mimic eagle glared in
gold,
A midnight vigil holds the swarthy bat!
Here, where the dames of Rome their
gilded hair
Waved to the wind, now wave the reed
and thistle!
Here, where on golden throne the mon-
arch lolled
Glides, spectre-like, unto his marble
home,
Lit by the wan light of the horned
moon,
The swift and silent lizard of the
stones!
But stay! these walls-these ivy-clad
arcades-
These mouldering plinths-these sad
and blackened shafts-
These vague entablatures-this crum-
bling frieze-
These shattered cornices,-this wreck,—
this ruin-
These stones,-alas! these grey stones,—
are they all,-
All of the famed, and the colossal left
By the corrosive Hours to Fate and
me?
"Not all"-the Echoes answer me-
"not all!"
Prophetic sounds and loud, arise for
ever
From us, and from all Ruin, unto the
wise,
As melody from Memnon to the Sun.
We rule the hearts of mightiest men-
we rule
With a despotic sway all giant minds.
We are not impotent-we pallid stones.
Not all our power is gone-not all our
fame-
Not all the magic of our high renown-
Not all the wonder that encircles us-
Not all the mysteries that in us lie-
Not all the memories that hang upon
And cling around about us as a gar-
ment,
Clothing us in a robe of more than
glory."
POEMS
223
SCENE J
ROME. A Hall in a Palace. Alessandra
and Castiglione.
Alessandra. Thou art sad, Castig-
lione.
Castiglione. Sad! not I.
Oh, I'm the happiest, happiest man in
Rome!
A few days more, thou knowest, my
Alessandra,
Will make thee mine. Oh, I am very
happy!
Aless. Methinks thou hast a singular
way of showing
Thy happiness!-what ails thee, cousin
of mine?
Why didst thou sigh so deeply?
Cas. Did I sigh?
I was not conscious of it. It is a
fashion,
A silly-a most silly fashion I have
When I am very happy. Did I sigh?
(sighing.)
Aless. Thou didst. Thou art not well.
Thou hast indulged
Too much of late, and I am vexed to
see it.
Late hours and wine, Castiglione,-
these
Will ruin thee! thou art already
altered-
Thy looks are haggard-nothing so
wears away
The constitution as late hours and wine.
Cas. (musing) Nothing, fair cousin,
nothing-not even deep sorrow-
Wears it away like evil hours and wine.
I will amend.
Aless. Do it! I would have thee drop
Thy riotous company, too-fellows low
born
Ill suit the like of old Di Broglio's heir
And Alessandra's husband.
Cas. I will drop them.
Aless. Thou wilt-thou must. Attend
thou also more
To thy dress and equipage-they are
over plain
For thy lofty rank and fashion-much
depends
Upon appearances.
Cas. I'll see to it.
Aless. Then see to it!-pay more at-
tention, sir,
To a becoming carriage-much thou
wantest
In dignity.
Cas. Much, much, oh, much I want
In proper dignity.
Aless. (haughtily) Thou mockest me,
sir!
Cas. (abstractedly) Sweet, gentle
Lalage!
Aless. Heard I aright?
I speak to him-he speaks of Lalage!
Sir Count! (places her hand on his
shoulder) what art thou dreaming?
He's not well!
What ails thee, sir?
Cas. (starting) Cousin! fair cousin!
-madam!
I crave thy pardon-indeed I am not
well-
Your hand from off my shoulder, if you
please.
This air is most oppressive!-Madam
the Duke!
Enter Di Broglio
Di Broglio. My son, I've news for
thee!-hey?—what's the matter?
(observing Alessandra).
I' the pouts? Kiss her, Castiglione!
kiss her,
You dog! and make it up, I say, this
minute!
24
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
I've news for you both. Politian is ex-
pected
Hourly in Rome-Politian, Earl of
Leicester!
We'll have him at the wedding. 'Tis
his first visit
To the imperial city.
Aless. What! Politian
Of Britain, Earl of Leicester?
Di Brog. The same, my love.
We'll have him at the wedding. A man
quite young
In years, but grey in fame. I have not
seen him,
But Rumour speaks of him as of a
prodigy
Pre-eminent in arts, and arms, and
wealth,
And high descent. We'll have him at
the wedding.
Aless. I have heard much of this
Politian.
Gay, volatile and giddy-is he not,
And little given to thinking?
Di Brog. Far from it, love,
No branch, they say, of all philosophy
So deep abstruse he has not mastered it.
Learned as few are learned.
Aless. 'Tis very strange!
I have known men have seen Politian
And sought his company. They speak
of him
As of one who entered madly into life,
Drinking the cup of pleasure to the
dregs.
Cas. Ridiculous! Now I have seen
Politian
And know him well-nor learned nor
mirthful he.
He is a dreamer, and a man shut out
From common passions.
Di Brog. Children, we disagree.
Let us go forth and taste the fragrant
air
Of the garden. Did I dream, or did I
hear
Politian was a melancholy man?
SCENE II
(Exeunt.)
ROME.-A lady's apartment, with a win-
dow open and looking into a garden.
Lalage, in deep mourning, reading
at a table on which lie some books
and a hand-mirror. In the back-
ground Jacinta (a servant-maid)
leans carelessly upon a chair.
Lal. Jacinta! is it thou?
Jac. (pertly). Yes, Ma'am, I'm here.
Lal. I did not know, Jacinta, you
were in waiting.
Sit down!-let not my presence trouble
you-
Sit down!-for I am humble. most
humble.
Jac. (aside) 'Tis time.
(Jacinta seats herself in a side-long
manner upon the chair, resting her
elbows upon the back, and regard-
ing her mistress with a contemptu·
ous look. Lalage continues to
read.)
Lal. "It in another climate," so he
said,
"Bore a bright golden flower, but not i
this soil! (pauses-turns over some
leaves, and resumes.)
No lingering winters there, nor snow
nor shower-
But Ocean ever to refresh mankind
Breathes the shrill spirit of the western
wind."
Oh
beautiful!-most beautiful!-hov
like
To what my fevered soul doth drean
of Heaven!
POEMS
25
O happy land! (pauses.) She died!—
the maiden died!
O still more happy maiden who couldst
die!
Jacinta!
(Jacinta returns no answer and Lalage
presently resumes.)
Again a similar tale
Told of a beauteous dame beyond the
sea!
Thus speaketh one Ferdinand in the
words of the play-
"She died full young"-one Bossola an-
swers him-
"I think not so-her infelicity
Seemed to have years too many"-Ah
luckless lady!
Jacinta! (still no answer).
Here's a far sterner story-
But like oh, very like in its despair-
Of that Egyptian queen, winning so
easily
A thousand hearts-losing at length her
own.
She died. Thus ended the history-
and her maids
Lean over her and weep-two gentle
maids
With gentle names-Eiros and Char-
mion!
Rainbow and Dove!-Jacinta!
Jac. (pettishly). Madam what is it?
Lal. Wilt thou, my good Jacinta, be
so kind
As go down in the library and bring me
The Holy Evangelists.
Jac. Pshaw!
Lal. If there be balm
(exit.)
For the wounded spirit in Gilead, it is
there!
Dew in the night time of my bitter
trouble
Will there be found-"dew sweeter far
than that
Which hangs like chains of pearl on
Hermon hill."
(Re-enter Jacinta, and throws a volume
on the table.)
There, Ma'am, 's the book. Indeed she
is very troublesome (aside.)
Lal. (astonished) What didst thou
say, Jacinta? Have I done aught
To grieve thee or to vex thee?—I am
sorry.
For thou hast served me long and ever
been
Trustworthy and respectful. (resumes
her reading.)
Jac. I can't believe
She has any more jewels-no-no-
she gave me all (aside.)
Lal. What didst thou say, Jacinta?
Now I bethink me
Thou hast not spoken lately of thy
wedding.
How fares good Ugo?-and when is it
to be?
Can I do aught?-is there no further
aid
Thou needest, Jacinta?
Jac. Is there no further aid!
That's meant for me. (aside.) I'm
sure, Madam, you need not
Be always throwing those jewels in my
teeth.
Lal. Jewels! Jacinta,-now indeed,
Jacinta, thought not of the jewels.
Jac. Oh! perhaps not!
But then I might have sworn it. After
all
There's Ugo says the ring is only paste,
For he's sure the Count Castiglione
never
Would have given a real diamond to
such as you;
And at the best I'm certain, Madam,
you cannot
26
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Have use for jewels now. But I might
have sworn it.
(Exit.)
(Lalage bursts into tears and leans her
head upon the table—after a short
pause raises it.)
Lal. Poor Lalage!—and is it come to
this?
Thy servant maid!-but courage!—'tis
but a viper
Whom thou hast cherished to sting
thee to the soul! (taking up the
mirror.)
Ha! here at least's a friend-too much
a friend
In earlier days-a friend will not de-
ceive thee.
Fair mirror and true! now tell me (for
thou canst)
A tale a pretty tale-and heed thou
not
Though it be rife with woe. It answers
me.
It speaks of sunken eyes, and wasted
cheeks,
And Beauty long deceased-remembers
me
Give up thy soul to penitence, and pray!
Lal. (arising hurriedly) I cannot
pray! My soul is at war with
God!
The frightful sounds of merriment be-
low
Disturb my sense-go! I cannot pray-
The sweet airs from the garden worry
me!
Thy presence grieves me go!-thy
priestly raiment
Fills me with dread-thy ebony crucifix
With horror and awe!
Monk. Think of thy precious soul!
Lal. Think of my early days!-think
of my father
And mother in Heaven! think of our
quiet home,
And the rivulet that ran before the
door!
Think of my little sisters!—think of
them!
And think of me!-think of my trust-
ing love
And confidence-his vows-my ruin-
think-think
Of Joy departed-Hope, the Seraph Of my unspeakable misery!--begone!
Hope,
Inurned and entombed!-now, in a tone
Low, sad, and solemn, but most audible,
Whispers of early grave untimely yawn-
ing
For ruined maid. Fair mirror and true!
-thou liest not!
Thou hast no end to gain-no heart to
break-
Castiglione lied who said he loved-
Thou true-he false!-false!-false!
(While she speaks, a monk enters
her apartment and approaches
unobserved.)
Monk. Refuge thou hast,
Sweet daughter! in Heaven. Think of
eternal things!
Yet stay! yet stay!-what was it thou
saidst of prayer
And penitence? Didst thou not speak
of faith
And vows before the throne?
Monk. I did.
Lal. 'Tis well.
There is a vow 'twere fitting should be
made-
A sacred vow, inperative, and urgent, à
A solemn vow!
Monk. Daughter, this zeal is well!
Lal. Father, this zeal is anything but
well!
Hast thou a crucifix fit for this thing?
A crucifix whereon to register
POEMS
27
This sacred vow? (he hands her his
own.)
Not that Oh, no!-no!-no! (shudder-
ing.)
Not that! Not that!—I tell thee, holy
man.
Thy raiments and they ebony cross
affright me!
-
Stand back! I have a crucifix myself,-
I have a crucifix! Methinks 'twere fit-
ting
The deed-the vow-the symbol of the
deed-
And the deed's register should tally,
father!
(draws a cross-handled dagger
and raises it on high.)
Behold the cross wherewith a vow like
mine
Is written in Heaven!
Monk. Thy words are madness
daughter,
And speak a purpose unholy-thy lips
are livid-
Thine eyes are wild-tempt not the
wrath divine!
Pause ere too late-oh, be not-be not
rash!
Swear not the oath-oh, swear it not!
Lal. 'Tis sworn!
SCENE III
An apartment in a palace. Politian and
Baldazzar.
Baldazzar. Arouse thee now, Politian!
Thou must not-nay indeed, indeed,
thou shalt not
Give way unto these humours. Be
thyself!
Shake off the idle fancies that beset thee,
And live, for now thou diest!
Politian. Not so, Baldazzar!
Surely I live.
Bal. Politian, it doth grieve me
To see thee thus.
Pol. Baldazzar, it doth grieve me
To give thee cause for grief, my
honoured friend.
Command me, sir! for what wouldst
thou have me do?
At thy behest I will shake off that
nature
Which from my forefathers I did in-
herit,
Which with my mother's milk I did
imbibe,
And be no more Politian, but some
other.
Command me, sir!
Bal. To the field then-to the field-
To the senate or the field.
Pol. Alas! alas!
There is an imp would follow me even
there!
There is an imp hath followed me even
there!
There is
what voice is that?
Bal. I heard it not.
I heard not any voice except thine own,
And the echo of thine own.
Pol. Then I but dreamed.
Bal. Give not thy soul to dreams: the
camp the court
Befit thee-Fame awaits thee-Glory
calls-
And her the trumpet-tongued thou wilt
not hear
In hearkening to imaginary sounds
And phantom voices,
Pol. It is a phantom voice!
Didst thou not hear it then?
Bal. I heard it not.
Pol. Thou heardst it not!- -Baldaz-
zar, speak no more.
To me, Politian, of thy camps and
courts.
28
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Oh! I am sick, sick, sick, even unto
death,
Of the hollow and high-sounding vani-
ties
Of the populous Earth! Bear with me
yet awhile!
We have been boys together-school-
fellows-
And now are friends-yet shall not be
so long-
For in the eternal city thou shalt do me
A kind and gentle office, and a Power-
benignant, and
A
Power
supreme-
august,
Shall then absolve thee of all further
duties
Unto thy friend.
Bal. Thou speakest a fearful riddle
I will not understand.
Pol. Yet now as Fate
Approaches, and the Hours are breath-
ing low
The sands of Time are changed to
golden grains,
And dazzle me, Baldazzar. Alas! alas!
I cannot die, having within my heart
So keen a relish for the beautiful
As hath been kindled within it. Me-
thinks the air
Is balmier now than it was wont to be-
Rich melodies are floating in the
winds-
A rarer loveliness bedecks the earth-
And with a holier lustre the quiet moon
Sitteth in Heaven.-Hist! hist! thou
canst not say
Thou hearest not now, Baldazzar?
Bal. Indeed I hear not.
Pol. Not hear it!-listen
listen!-the faintest sound
now-
And yet the sweetest that ear ever
heard!
A lady's voice!-and sorrow in the tone!
Baldazzar, it oppresses me like a spell!
Again!-again!-how solemnly if falls
Into my heart of hearts! that eloquent
voice
Surely I never heard-yet it were well
Had I but heard it with its thrilling
tones
In earlier days!
Bal. I myself hear it now.
Be still!-the voice, if I mistake not
greatly,
Proceeds from yonder lattice-which
you may see
Very plainly through the window-it
belongs,
Does it not? unto this palace of the
Duke.
The singer is undoubtedly beneath
The roof of his Excellency-and per-
haps
Is even that Alessandra of whom he
spoke
As the betrothed of Castiglione,
His son and heir.
Pol.
Be still!-it comes again!
Voice (very faintly). "And is thy
heart so strong
As for to leave me thus,
Who have loved thee so long
In wealth and woe among?
And is thy heart so strong
As for to leave me thus?
Bal.
Say nay-say nay!"
The song is English, and I of
have heard it
In merry England-never so plain
tively-
Hist! hist it comes again!
Voice (more loudly). "Is it so stron
As for to leave me thus
Who have loved thee so long
In wealth and woe among?
And is thy heart so strong
As for to leave me thus?
Say nay-say nay!"
POEMS
29
Bal. 'Tis hushed and all is still!
Pol. All is not still.
Bal. Let us go down.
Pol. Go down Baldazzar, go!
Bal. The hour is growing late-the
Duke awaits us,-
Thy presence is expected in the hall
Below. What ails thee, Earl Politian?
Voice (distinctly). "Who have loved
thee so long
In wealth and woe among,
And is thy heart so strong?
Say nay-say nay!"
Bal. Let us descend!-it is time.
Politian give
These fancies to the wind. Remem-
ber, pray,
Your bearing lately savoured much of
rudeness
Unto the Duke. Arouse thee! and re-
member!
Pol. Remember? I do. Lead on!
I do remember
(going.)
Let us descend. Believe me, I would
give,
Freely would give the broad lands of
my earldom
To look upon the face hidden by yon
lattice-
To gaze upon that veiled face, and
hear
Once more that silent tongue."
Bal. Let me beg you, sir,
Descend with me-the Duke may be
offended-
Let us go down, I pray you.
Voice (loudly) Say nay!-say nay!
Pol. (aside). 'Tis strange!-'tis very
strange-methought the voice
Chimed in with my desires, and bade
me stay!
(approaching the window.)
Sweet voice! I heed thee, and wil
surely stay.
Now be this fancy, by Heaven, or be
it Fate,
Still I will not descend.
make
Baldazza/
Apology unto the Duke for me;
I go not down to-night.
Bal. Your lordship's pleasure
Shall be attended to. Good-night
Politian.
Pol. Good-night, my friend, goo
night.
SCENE IV
The gardens of a palace-Moonlight
Lalage and Politian.
Lalage. And dost thou speak of love
To me, Politian?-dost thou speak of
love
To Lalage?-ah woe-ah woe is me!
This mockery is most cruel-most cruel
indeed!
Politian. Weep not! oh, sob not thus!
-thy bitter tears
Will madden me.
lage-
Oh mourn not, La-
Be comforted! I know-I know it all,
And still I speak of love. Look at me,
brightest,
And beautiful Lalage!-turn here thine
eyes!
Thou askest me if I could speak of love,
Knowing what I know, and seeing what
I have seen.
Thou askest me that-and thus I an-
swer thee-
Thus on my bended knee I answer
thee (kneeling.)
Sweet Lalage, I love thee-love thee-
love thee;
30
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Thro' good and ill-thro' weal and woe
I love thee.
Not mother, with her first-born on her
knee,
Thrills with intenser love than I for
thee.
Not on God's altar, in any time or
clime,
Burned there a holier fire than burneth
now
Within my spirit for thee. And do I
love? (arising.)
Even for thy woes I love thee-even
for thy woes-
Thy beauty and thy woes.
Lal. Alas, proud Earl,
Thou dost forget thyself, remembering
me!
How, in thy father's halls, among the
maidens
Pure and reproachless of thy princely
line,
Could the dishonoured Lalage abide?
Thy wife, and with a tainted memory-
My seared and blighted name, how
would it tally
With the ancestral honours of thy
house,
And with thy glory?
Pol. Speak not to me of glory!
I hate I loathe the name; I do abhor
The unsatisfactory and ideal thing.
Art thou not Lalage, and I Politian?
Do I not love-art thou not beautiful—
What need we more? Ha! glory!-
now speak not of it:
By all I hold most sacred and most
solemn-
By all my wishes now-my fears here-
after-
By all I scorn on earth and hope in
heaven-
There is no deed I would more glory in,
Than in thy cause to scoff at this same
glory
And trample it underfoot. What mat-
ters it-
What matters it, my fairest, and my
best,
That we go down unhonoured and for-
gotten
Into the dust-so we descend together.
Descend together-and then-and then
perchance-
Lal. Why dost thou pause, Politian?
Pol. And then perchance
Arise together, Lalage, and roam
The starry and quiet dwellings of the
blest,
And still-
Lal. Why dost thou pause, Politian?
Pol. And still together-together.
Lal. Now, Earl of Leicester!
Thou lovest me, and in my heart of
hearts
I feel thou lovest me truly.
Pol. Oh, Lalage! (throwing himself
upon his knee).
And lovest thou me?
Lal. Hist! hush! within the gloom
Of yonder trees methought a figure
passed-
A spectral figure, solemn and slow, and
noiseless-
Like the green shadow conscience, sol-
emn and noiseless.
(walks across the returns).
I was mistaken-'twas but a giant
bough
Stirred by the autumn wind. Politian!
Pol. My Lalage-my love! why art
thou moved?
Why dost thou turn so pale? Not con-
science' self,
Far less a shadow which thou likenest
to it,
POEMS
31
Should shake the firm spirit thus. But
the night wind
Is chilly—and these melancholy boughs
Throw over all things a gloom.
Lal. Politian!
Thou speakest to me of love. Know-
est thou the land
With which all tongues are busy-a
land new found-
Miraculously found by one of Genoa-
A thousand leagues within the golden
west?
A fairy land of flowers, and fruit, and
sunshine,
And crystal lakes, and over-arching
forests,
And mountains, around whose towering
summits the winds
Of heaven untrammelled flow-which
air to breathe
Is Happiness now, and will be Freedom
hereafter
In days that are to come?
Pol. O, wilt thou-wilt thou
Fly thither with me? There Care shall
be forgotten,
And Sorrow shall be no more, and Eros
be all.
And life shall then be mine, for I will
live
For thee and in thine eyes-and thou
shalt be
No more a mourner-but the radiant
Joys
Shall wait upon thee, and the angel
Hope
Attend thee ever; and I will kneel to
thee
And worship thee, and call thee my be-
loved,
My own, my beautiful, my love, my
wife,
My all;-oh, wilt thou-wilt thou, La-
lage,
Fly thither with me?
Lal. A deed is to be done
Castiglione lives!
Pol. And he shall die!
(Exit.)
Lal. (after a pause). And-he-shall
-die!- -alas!
Castiglione die? Who spoke the words?
Where am I?-what was it he said?-
Politian!
Thou art not gone-thou art not gone,
Politian!
I feel thou art not gone-yet dare not
look,
Lest I behold thee not-thou couldst
not go
With those words upon thy lips-0,
speak to me!
And let me hear thy voice-one word
-one word,
To say thou art not gone,-one little
sentence,
To say how thou dost scorn-how thou
dost hate
My womanly weakness. Ha! ha! thou
art not gone-
O, speak to me! I knew thou wouldst
not go!
I knew thou wouldst not, couldst not,
durst not go.
Villain, thou art not gone-thou mock-
est me!
And thus I clutch thee-thus!-
gone, he is gone-
Gone-gone. Where am I?-
-'tis very well!
-He is
-'tis well
So that the blade be keen-the blow be
sure,
'Tis well, 'tis very well-alas! alas!
SCENE V.
The Suburbs. Politian alone.
Politian. This weakness grows upon
me. I am faint,
32
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
32
And much I fear me ill-it will not do
To die ere I have lived!-Stay-stay
thy hand,
O Azrael, yet awhile!-Prince of the
Powers
Of Darkness and the Tomb, O, pity me!
O, pity me! let me not perish now,
In the budding of my Paradisal Hope!
Give me to live yet-yet a little while:
'Tis I who pray for life—I who so late
Demanded but to die!-what sayeth
the Count?
Enter Baldazzar.
Baldazzar. That, knowing no cause of
quarrel or of feud
Bal. No more, my lord, than I have
told you,
The Count Castiglione will not fight,
Having no cause for quarrel.
Pol. Now this is true-
1
All very true. Thou art my friend, 1
Baldazzar,
And I have not forgotten it-thou❜lt do
me
A piece of service; wilt thou go back
and say
Unto this man, that I, the Earl of
Leicester,
Hold him a villian?-thus much, I
prythee, say
Unto the Count-it is exceeding just
Between the Earl Politian and himself, He should have cause for quarrel.
He doth decline your cartel.
Pol. What didst thou say?
What answer was it you brought me,
good Baldazzar?
With what excessive fragrance the
zephyr comes
Laden from yonder bowers!-a fairer
day,
Or one more worthy Italy, methinks
No mortal eyes have seen!-what said
the Count?
Bal. My lord!-my friend!-
Pol. (aside) 'Tis he-he comes him-
self! (aloud). Thou reasonest well.
I know what thou wouldst say-not
send the message—
Well!-I will think of it-I will not
send it.
Now prythee, leave me hither doth
come a person
With whom affairs of a most private
nature
Bal. That he, Castiglione, not being I would adjust.
aware
Of any feud existing, or any cause
Of quarrel between your lordship and
himself,
Cannot accept the challenge.
Pol. It is most true-
All this is very true.
sir,
When saw you,
When saw you now, Baldazzar, in the
frigid
Ungenial Britain which we left so lately,
A heaven so calm as this-so utterly
free
From the evil taint of clouds?—and he
did say!
Bal. I go-to-morrow we meet,
Do we not?-at the Vatican.
Pol. At the Vatican. (Exit Bal.)
Enter Castiglione.
Cas. The Earl of Leicester here!
Pol. I am the Earl of Leicester, and
thou seest,
Dost thou not, that I am here?
Cas. My Lord, some strange,
Some singular mistake-misunderstand-
ing-
Hath without doubt arisen: thou hast
been urged
POEMS
33
Thereby, in heat of anger, to address
Some words most unaccountable, in
writing,
To me, Castiglione; the bearer being
Baldazzar, Duke of Surrey. I am
aware
Of nothing which might warrant thee
in this thing,
Having given thee no offence. Ha!-
am I right?
Twas a mistake?-undoubtedly-we all
Do err at times.
Pol. Draw, villain, and prate no more!
Cas. Ha!-draw?-and villain? have
at thee then at once,
Proud Earl! (Draws.)
Pol. (drawing). Thus to the expiatory
tomb,
Untimely sepulchre, I do devote thee
In the name of Lalage!
Cas. (letting fall his sword and re-
coiling to the extremity of the
stage) Of Lalage!
Hold off-thy sacred hand!-avaunt I
say!
Avaunt-I will not fight thee-indeed
I dare not.
Pol. Thou wilt not fight with me didst
say, Sir Count?
Shall I be baffled thus?-now this is
well;
Didst say thou darest not? Ha!
Cas. I dare not-dare not-!
Hold off thy hand-with that beloved
name
So fresh upon thy lips I will not fight
thee-
I cannot
dare not.
Pol. Now by my halidom
I do believe thee!-coward, I do be-
lieve thee!
Cas. Ha!-coward!-this may not be!
(clutches his sword and staggers
towards Politian, but his pur-
pose is changed before reaching
him, and he falls upon his knee
at the feet of the Earl.)
Alas, my lord.
It is it is-most true. In such a cause
I am the veriest coward. O pity me!
Pol. (greatly softened). Alas!-I do
indeed, I pity thee.
Cas. And Lalage
Pol. Scoundrel!—arise and die!
Cas. It needeth not be-thus-thus-
O let me die
Thus on my bended knee. It were most
fitting
That in this deep humiliation I perish.
For in the fight I will not raise a hand
Against thee, Earl of Leicester. Strike
thou home (baring his bosom).
Here is no let or hindrance to thy
weapon-
Strike home. I will not fight thee.
Pol. Now's Death and Hell!
Am I not-am I not sorely-greviously
tempted
To take thee at thy word? But mark
me, sir:
Think not to fly me thus. Do thou pre-
pare
For public insult in the streets-before
The eyes of the citizens. I'll follow
thee-
Like an avenging spirit I'll follow thee
Even unto death. Before those whom
thou lovest-
Before all Rome I'll taunt thee, villain,
-I'll taunt thee,
Dost hear? with cowardice-thou wilt
not fight me?
Thou liest! thou shalt! (Exit.)
Cas. Now this indeed is just!
Most righteous, and most just, aveng-
ing Heaven!
34
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
SONNET-TO SCIENCE
which
Private reasons-some of
have reference to the sin of plagiarism,
and others to the date of Tennyson's
first poems-have induced me, after
some hesitation, to re-publish these, the
crude compositions of my earliest boy-
hood. They are printed verbatim-
without alteration from the original ed-
ition-the date of which is too remote
to be judiciously acknowledged. E. A. P.
(The Sonnet to Science headed the
edition prefaced by the above remark.
At the age of 14, Poe was a poet.-Ed.)
SCIENCE! true daughter of Old Time
thou art!
Who alterest all things with thy peer-
ing eyes.
Why preyest thou thus upon the poet's
heart,
Vulture, whose wings are dull reali-
ties?
How should he love thee? or how deem
thee wise,
Who wouldst not leave him in his
wandering
To seek for treasure in the jewelled
skies,
Albeit he soared with an undaunted
wing?
Hast thou not dragged Diana from her
car?
And driven the Hamadryad from the
wood
To seek a shelter in some happier star?
Hast thou not torn the Naiad from
her flood,
The Elfin from the green grass, and
from me
The summer dream beneath the tama-
rind tree?
AL AARAAF*
PART I.
O! NOTHING earthly save the ray
(Thrown back from flowers) of Beau-
ty's eye,
As in those gardens where the day
Springs from the gems of Circassy-
O! nothing earthly save the thrill
Of melody in woodland rill—
Or (music of the passion-hearted)
Joy's voice so peacefully departed,
That, like the murmur in the shell,
Its echo dwelleth and will dwell-
Oh, nothing of the dross of ours-
Yet all the beauty-all the flowers
That list our Love, and deck our bow-
ers-
Adorn yon world afar, afar—
The wandering star.
'Twas a sweet time for Nesace-for
there
Her world lay lolling on the golden air,
Near four bright suns-a temporary
rest-
An oasis in desert of the blest.
Away-away-'mid seas of rays that
roll
Empyrean splendour o'er th' unchained
soul-
The soul that scarce (the billows are so
dense)
Can struggle to its destined eminence—
*A star was discovered by Tycho
Brahe which appeared suddenly in the
heavens attained, in a few days, a bril-
liancy surpassing that of Jupiter-then
as suddenly disappeared, and has never
been seen since.-E. A. P.
(This and subsequent notes were
written by Poe himself.-Ed.)
POEMS
35
To distant spheres, from time to time, Upreared its purple stem around her
she rode,
And late to ours, the favoured one of
God-
But, now, the ruler of an anchored
realm,
She throws aside the sceptre-leaves the
helm,
knees:
And gemmy flower, of Trebizond mis-
named
Inmate of highest stars, where erst it
shamed
All other loveliness; its honied dew
(The fabled nectar that the heathen
knew)
And, amid incense and high spiritual Deliriously sweet, was dropp'd from
hymns,
Laves in quadruple light her angel
limbs.
Now happiest, loveliest in yon lovely
Earth,
Whence sprang the "Idea of Beauty"
into birth.
(Falling in wreaths thro' many a
startled star,
Like woman's hair 'mid pearls, until
afar,
It lit on hills Achaian, and there dwelt)
She looked into Infinity-and knelt.
Rich clouds, for canopies, about her
curled-
Fit emblems of the model of her
world-
Seen but in beauty-not impeding sight
Of other beauty glittering through the
light-
A wreath that twined each starry form
around,
And all the opalled air in colour bound.
All hurriedly she knelt upon a bed
Of flowers; of lilies such as reared the
head
On the fair Capo Deucato, and sprang
So eagerly around about to hang
Upon the flying footsteps of-deep
pride-
Of her who loved a mortal-and so died.
The Sephalica, budding with young bees,
Heaven,
And fell on gardens of the unforgiven
In Trebizond-and on a sunny flower
So like its own above, that, to this hour,
It still remaineth, torturing the bee
With madness, and unwonted reverie:
In Heaven, and all its environs, the leaf
And blossom of the fairy plant, in grief
Disconsolate linger-grief that hangs
her head,
Repenting follies that full long have fled,
Heaving her white breast on the balmy
air,
Like guilty beauty, chastened, and more
fair:
Nyctanthes too, as sacred as the light
She fears to perfume, perfuming the
night:
And Clytia* pondering between many a
sun,
While pettish tears adown her petals
run;
And that aspiring flower that sprang
on Earth-
And died, ere scarce exalted into birth,
Bursting its odorous heart in spirit to
wing
*Clytia-The Chrysanthemum Peru-
vianum.
There is cultivated in the king's
garden at Paris a species of serpentine:
aloes without prickles.
36
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Its way to Heaven, from garden of a
king:
And Valisnerian lotus* thither flown
From struggling with the waters of the
Rhone:
And thy most lovely purple perfume,†
Zante!
Isola d'oro!-Fior-di-Levante!
And the Nelumbo bud‡ that floats for
ever
Have dream'd for thy Infinity
A model of their own-
Thy will is done, Oh, God!
The star hath ridden high
Thro' many a tempest, but she rode
Beneath thy burning eye;
And here, in thought, to thee-
In thought that can alone
Ascend thy empire, and to be
A partner of thy throne-
With Indian Cupid down the holy By winged fantasy
river-
Fair flowers, and fairy! to whose care is
given
To bear the goddess' song, in odours, up
to Heaven:
"Spirit! that dwellest where,
In the deep sky,
The terrible and fair,
In beauty vie!
Beyond the line of blue-
The boundary of the star
Which turneth at the view
Of thy barrier and thy bar-
Of the barrier overgone
By the comets who were cast
From their pride, and from their throne,
To be drudges till the last-
To be carriers of fire
(The red fire of their heart)
With speed that may not tire,
And with pain that shall not 'part-
Who livest-that we know-
In Eternity-we feel-
But the shadow of whose brow
What spirit shall reveal?
Tho' the beings whom thy Nesace,
Thy messenger, hath known
*There is found in the Rhone a beau-
tiful lily of the Valisnerian kind.
The Hyacinth.
A fiction of the Indians.
My embassy is given,
Till secrecy shall knowledge be
In the environs of Heaven."
She ceased-and buried then her burn-
ing cheek
Abashed, amid the lilies there, to seek
A shelter from the fervour of his eye;
For the stars trembled at the Deity.
She stirred not-breathed not-for a
voice was there
How solemnly pervading the calm air!
A sound of silence on the startled ear
Which dreamy poets name "the music
of the sphere."
Ours is a world of words: Quiet we call
"Silence"-which is the merest word of
all.
All Nature speaks, and ev'n ideal things
Flap shadowy sounds from visionary
wings-
But ah! not so when, thus, in realms on
high
The eternal voice of God is passing by,
And the red winds are withering in the
sky!
"What tho' in worlds which sightless
cycles run,
Link'd to a little system, and one sun-
Where all my love is folly and the
crowd
Still think my terrors but the thunder
cloud,
POEMS
37
The storm, the earthquake, and the
ocean-wrath-
(Ah! will they cross me in my angrier
path?)
What tho' in worlds which own a single
sun
The sands of Time grow dimmer as they
run,
Yet thine is my resplendency, so given.
To bear my secrets thro' the upper
Heaven.
Leave tenantless thy crystal home, and
fly,
With all thy train, athwart the moony
sky-
Apart-like fire-flies in Sicilian night,*
And wing to other worlds another light!
Divulge the secrets of thy embassy
To the proud orps that twinkle-and
to be
To every heart barrier and a ban
Lest the st?.s totter in the guilt of
man!"
Up rose the maiden in the yellow
night,
The single-mooned eve!-on Earth we
plight
Our faith to one love-and one moon
ador-
The birthplace of young Beauty had
no more.
As sprang that yellow star from downy
hours
Her way-but left not yet her Ther-
asaean reign.*
PART II.
HIGH on a mountain of enamelled
head-
Such as the drowsy shepherd on his
bed
Of giant pasturage lying at his ease,
Raising his heavy eyelid, starts and
sees
With many a muttered "hope to be for-
given,"
What time the moon is quadrated in
Heaven-
Of rosy head, that towering far away
Into the sunlit ether, caught the ray
Of sunken suns at eve-at noon of
night,
While the moon danced with the fair
stranger light—
Upreared upon such height arose a pile
Or gorgeous columns on th' unburth-
ened air,
Flashing from Parian marble that twin
smile
Far down upon the wave that sparkled
there,
And nursled the young mountain in its
lair.
Of molten stars their pavement, such
as fall
Thro' the ebon air, besilvering the pall
Of their own dissolution, while they
die-
Up rose the maiden from her shrine of Adorning then the dwellings of the
flowers,
And bent o'er sheeny mountain and dim
plain.
*I have ofter noticed a peculiar
movement of the re-flies;-they will
collect in a body and fly off, from a
common centre, into innumerable radii.
sky.
A dome-by linked light from Heaven
let down,
*Therasæa, or Therasea, the island
mentioned by Seneca, which in a mo-
ment arose from the sea to the eyes of
astonished mariners.
38
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Sat gently on these columns as a
crown-
A window of one circular diamond,
there,
Looked out above into the purple air,
And rays from God shot down that
meteor chain
And hallowed all the beauty twice
again,
Save when, between th' Empyrean and
that ring,
Some eager spirit flapped his dusky
wing.
But on the pillars Seraph eyes have
seen
The dimness of this world: that grey-
ish green
That Nature loves the best for Beauty's
grave
Lurked in each cornice, round each
architrave-
And every sculptured cherub there-
about
That from this marble dwelling peered
out,
Seemed earthly in the shadow of his
niche-
Achaian statues in a world so rich!
Friezes from Tadmor and Persepolis-
From Baalbec, and the stilly, clear
abyss
Of beautiful Gomorrha! O, the wave
Is now upon thee-but too late to
save!
Sound loves to revel in a summer
night:
Witness the murmur of the grey
twilight
That stole upon the ear, in Eyraco*
Of many a wild star-gazer long ago-
That stealeth ever on the ear of him
** Eyraco-Chaldea.
Who, musing, gazeth on the distance
dim,
And sees the darkness coming as a
cloud-
Is not its form-its voice-most pal-
pable and loud?*
But what is this!-it cometh-and it
brings
A music with it-'tis the rush of
wings-
A pause-and then a sweeping, falling
strain
And Nesace is in her halls again.
From the wild energy of wanton haste
Her cheeks were flushing, and her
lips apart;
The zone that clung around her gentle
waist
Had burst beneath the heaving of
her heart.
Within the centre of that hall to
breathe
She paused and panted, Zanthe! all
beneath
The fairy light that kissed her golden
hair,
And longed to rest, yet could but
sparkle there!
Young flowers were whispering in
melody
To happy flowers that night-and tree
to tree:
Fountains were gushing music as they
fell
In many a star-lit grave, or moon-lit
dell;
Yet silence came upon material things-
*I have often thought I could dis-
tinctly hear the sound of the darkness
as it stole over the horizon.
POEMS
39
Fair flowers, bright waterfalls, and
angel wings-
And sound alone that from the spirit
sprang
Bore burden to the charm the maiden
sang:
"Neath blue-bell or streamer-
Of tufted wild spray
That keeps, from the dreamer,
The moonbeam away-
Bright beings! that ponder,
With half closing eyes,
On the stars which your wonder
Hath drawn from the skies,
Till they glance thro' the shade, and
Come down to your brow
Like eyes of the maiden
Who calls on you now-
Arise! from your dreaming
In violet bowers,
To duty beseeming
These star-litten hours-
And shake from your tresses
Encumbered with dew
The breath of those kisses
That cumber them too-
(O! how, without you, Love!
Could angels be blest?)
Those kisses of true love
That lulled ye to rest!
Up! shake from your wing
Each hindering thing:
The dew of the night-
It would weigh down your flight;
And true love caresses-
O leave them apart!
They are light on the tresses,
But lead on the heart.
Ligeia! Ligeia!
My beautiful one!
Whose harshest idea
Will to melody run,
O! is it thy will
On the breezes to toss?
Or, capriciously still,
Like the lone Albatross,*
Incumbent on night
(As she on the air)
To keep watch with delight
On the harmony there?
Ligeia! wherever
Thy image may be,
No magic shall sever
Thy music from thee.
Thou hast bound many eyes
In a dreamy sleep-
But the strains still arise
Which thy vigilance keep—
The sound of the rain,
Which leaps down to the flower
And dances again
In the rhythm of the shower-
The murmur that springs
From the growing of grass-
Are the music of things-
But are modelled, alas!-
Away, then, my dearest,
O! hie thee away
To springs that lie clearest
Beneath the moon-ray-
To lone lake that smiles,
In its dream of deep rest,
At the many star-isles
That enjewel its breast-
Where wild flowers, creeping,
Have mingled their shade,
On its margin is sleeping
Full many a maid—
Some have left the cool glade, and
Have slept with the bee-
Arouse them, my maiden,
On moorland and lea-
*The Albatross is said to sleep on
the wing.
40
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Go! breathe on their slumber,
All softly in ear
The musical number
They slumbered to hear-
For what can awaken
An angel so soon
Whose sleep hath been taken
Beneath the cold moon,
As the spell which no slumber
Of witchery may test,
The rhythmical number
Which lulled him to rest?"
Spirits in wing, and angels to the view,
A thousand seraphs burst th' Empyrean
thro',
Young dreams still hovering on their
drowsy flight-
Seraphs in all but "Knowledge," the
keen light
That fell, refracted, thro' thy bounds,
afar,
O Death! from the eye of God upon
that star:
Sweet was that error-sweeter still that
death-
Sweet was that error-ev'n with us the
breath
Of Science dims the mirror of our
joy-
To them 'twere the Simoom, and would
destroy-
For what (to them) availeth it to know
That Truth is Falsehood-or that Bliss
is Woe?
Sweet was their death-with them to
die was rife
With the last ecstasy of satiate life—
Beyond that death no immortality-
But sleep that pondereth and is "not
to be"-
And there-oh! may my weary spirit
dwell-
Apart from Heaven's eternity-and
yet how far from Hell!
What guilty spirit, in what shrubbery
dim,
Heard not the stirring summons of that
hymn?
But two: they fell: for Heaven no
grace imparts
To those who hear not for their beat-
ing hearts.
A maiden angel and her seraph-lover-
O! where (and ye may seek the wide
skies over)
Was Love, the blind, near sober Duty
known?
Unguided Love hath fallen-'mid
"tears of perfect moan."
He was a goodly spirit-he who fell:
A wanderer by mossy-mantled well-
A gazer on the lights that shine above-
A dreamer in the moon-beam by his
love:
What wonder? for each star is eye-like
there,
And looks so sweetly down on Beauty's
hair-
And they, and ev'ry mossy spring were
holy
To his love-haunted heart and melan-
choly.
The night had found (to him a night
of woe)
Upon a mountain crag, young Angelo—
Beetling it bends athwart the solemn
sky,
And scowls on starry worlds that down
beneath it lie.
Here sate he with his love-his dark
eye bent
With eagle gaze along the firmament:
Now turned it upon her-but ever then
It trembled to the orb of Earth again.
POEMS
41
"Ianthe, dearest, see! how dim that
ray!
How lovely 'tis to look so far away!
She seemed not thus upon that autumn
eve
I left her gorgeous halls-nor mourned
to leave.
That eve-that eve-I should remem-
ber well-
The sun-ray dropped, in Lemnos, with
a spell
On th' Arabesque carving of a gilded
hall
Wherein I sate, and on the draperied
wall-
And on my eye-lids-O, the heavy
light!
How drowsily it weighed them into
night!
On flowers, before, and mist, and love
they ran
With Persian Saadi in his Gulistan:
But O, that light!-I slumbered—
Death, the while,
Stole o'er my senses in that lovely isle
So softly that no single silken hair
Awoke that slept-or knew that he was
there.
"The last spot of Earth's orb I trod
upon
Was a proud temple called the Parthe-
non;
More beauty clung around her col-
umned wall
Than even thy glowing bosom beats
withal,
And when old Time my wing did dis-
enthral
Thence sprang I-as the eagle from his
tower,
And years I left behind me in an hour.
What time upon her airy bounds I
hung
One half the garden of her globe was
flung
Unrolling as a chart unto my view-
Tenantless cities of the desert too!
Ianthe, beauty crowded on me then,
And half I wished to be again of men."
"My Angelo! and why of them to be?
A brighter dwelling-place is here for
thee-
And greener fields than in yon world
above,
And woman's loveliness-and passion-
ate love."
“But list, Ianthe! when the air so soft
Failed, as my pennoned spirit leapt
aloft,
Perhaps my brain grew dizzy-but the
world
I left so late was into chaos hurled,
Sprang from her station, on the winds
apart,
And rolled a flame, the fiery Heaven
athwart.
Methought, my sweet one, then I
ceased to soar,
And fell-not swiftly as I rose before,
But with a downward, tremulous
motion thro'
Light, brazen rays, this golden star
unto!
Nor long the measure of my falling
hours,
For nearest of all stars was thine to
ours-
Dread star! that came, amid a night
of mirth,
A red Dædalion on the timid Earth."
"We came and to thy Earth-but not
to us
Be given our lady's bidding to discuss:
We came, my love; around, above,
below.
42
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Gay fire-fly of the night we come and
go,
Nor ask a reason save the angel-nod
She grants to us as granted by her
God-
But, Angelo, than thine grey Time un-
furled
Never his fair wing o'er fairer world!
Dim was its little disc, and angel eyes
Alone could see the phantom in the
skies,
When first Al Aaraaf knew her course
to be
Headlong thitherward o'er the starry
sea-
But when its glory swelled upon the
sky,
As glowing Beauty's bust beneath man's
eye,
We paused before the heritage of men,
And thy star trembled-as doth Beauty
then!"
Thus in discourse, the lovers whiled
away
The night that waned and waned and
brought no day.
They fell: for Heaven to them no hope
imparts
Who hear not for the beating of their
hearts.
TAMERLANE
("Tamerlane" was the first poem
ever published by Poe. It headed a
Boston edition of 1827.-Ed.)
KIND solace in a dying hour!
Such, Father, is not (now) my
theme-
I will not madly deem that power
Of Earth may shrive me of the
sin
Unearthy pride hath revelled in-
I have no time to dote or dream:
You call it hope that fire of fire!
It is but agony of desire:
If I can hope-O God! I can—
Its fount is holier-more divine-
I would not call thee fool, old man,
But such is not a gift of thine.
Know thou the secret of a spirit
Bowed from its wild pride into
shame.
O yearning heart! I did inherit
Thy withering portion with the fame,
The searing glory which hath shone
Amid the jewels of my throne,
Halo of Hell! and with a pain
Not Hell shall make me fear again-
O craving heart, for the lost flowers
And sunshine of my summer hours!
The undying voice of that dead time,
With its interminable chime,
Rings, in the spirit of a spell,
Upon thy emptiness—a knell.
I have not always been as now:
The fevered diadem on my brow
I claimed and won usurpingly-
Hath not the same fierce heirdom given
Rome to the Cæsar-this to me?
The heritage of a kingly mind,
And a proud spirit which hath striven
Triumphantly with human kind.
On mountain soil I first drew life:
The mists of the Tagley have shed
Nightly their dews upon my head,
And, I believe, the winged strife
And tumult of the headlong air
Have nestled in my very hair.
So late from Heaven-that dew-it fell
('Mid dreams of an unholy night)
Upon me with the touch of Hell,
While the red flashing of the light
POEMS
43
From clouds that hung, like banners,
o'er,
Appeared to my half-closing eye
The pageantry of monarchy;
And the deep trumpet-thunder's roar
Came hurriedly upon me, telling
Of human battle where my voice,
My own voice, silly child!-was
swelling
(O! how my spirit would rejoice,
And leap within me at the cry)
The battle-cry of Victory!
The rain came down upon my head
Unsheltered—and the heavy wind
Rendered me mad and deaf and
blind.
It was but man, I thought, who shed
Laurels upon me: and the rush-
The torrent of the chilly air
Gurgled within ear the crush
Of empires-with the captive's
prayer-
The hum of suitors-and the tone
Of flattery 'round a sovereign's throne.
My passion, from that hapless hour,
Usurped a tyranny which men
Have deemed since I have reached to
power,
My innate nature-be it so;
But, father, there lived one who,
then,
Then-in my boyhood-when their fire
Burned with a still intenser glow
(For passion must, with youth, expire)
E'en then who knew this iron heart
In woman's weakness had a part.
I have no words-alas!-to tell
The loveliness of loving well!
Nor would I now attempt to trace
The more than beauty of a face
Whose lineaments, upon my mind,
Are shadows on th' unstable wind:
Thus I remember having dwelt
Some page of early lore upon,
With loitering eye, till I have felt
The letters-with their meaning-melt
To fantasies-with none.
O, she was worthy of all love!
Love as in infancy was mine—
'Twas such an angel minds above
Might envy; her young heart the
shrine
On which my every hope and thought
Were incense then a goodly gift,
For they were childish and up-
right-
Pure as her young example taught:
Why did I leave it, and, adrift,
Trust to the fire within, for light?
We grew in age-and love-together-
Roaming the forest, and the wild;
My breast her shield in wintry
weather-
And, when the friendly sunshine
smiled.
And she would mark the opening skies,
I saw no Heaven-but in her eyes,
Young Love's first lesson is- -the
heart;
For 'mid that sunshine, and those
smiles,
When, from our little cares apart,
And laughing at her girlish wiles,
I'd throw me on her throbbing breast,
And pour my spirit out in tears-
There was no need to speak the rest-
No need to quiet any fears
Of her who asked no reason why,
But turned on me her quiet eye!
Yet more than worthy of the love
My spirit struggled with, and strove,
When, on the mountain peak, alone,
Ambition lent it a new tone-
44
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
I had no being-but in thee:
The world, and all it did contain
In the earth-the air-the sea-
Its joy-its little lot of pain
That was new pleasure-the ideal,
Dim vanities of dreams by night-
And dimmer nothings which were real-
(Shadows and a more shadowy
light!)
Parted upon their misty wings,
Two
And, so, confusedly, became
Thine image and-a name- -a
name!
separate-yet
things.
most intimate
I was ambitious-have you known
The passion, father? You have
not:
A cottager, I marked a throne
Of half the world as all my own,
And murmured at such a lowly
lot-
But, just like any other dream,
Upon the vapour of the dew
My own had past, did not the beam
Of beauty which did while it thro'
The minute the hour-the day-
oppress
My mind with double loveliness.
We walked together on the crown
Of a high mountain which looked down
Afar from its proud natural towers
Of rock and forest, on the hills-
The dwindled hills! begirt with bowers
And shouting with a thousand rills.
I spoke to her of power and pride,
But mystically-in such guise
That she might deem it nought beside
The moment's converse; in her eyes
I read, perhaps too carelessly-
A mingled feeling with my own-
The flush on her bright cheek to me
Seemed to become a queenly throne
Too well that I should let it be
Light in the wilderness alone.
I wrapped myself in grandeur then,
And donned a visionary crown—
Yet it was not that Fantasy
Had thrown her mantle over me-
But that, among the rabble-men,
Lion ambition is chained down-
And crouches to a keeper's hand-
Not so in deserts where the grand-
The wild-the terrible conspire
With their own breath to fan his fire.
Look 'round thee now on Samarcand!-
Is she not queen of Earth? her pride
Above all cities? in her hand
Their destinies? in all beside
Of glory which the world hath known
Stands she not nobly and alone?
Falling-her veriest stepping-stone
Shall form the pedestal of a throne-
And who her sovereign? Timour-he
Whom the astonished people saw
Striding o'er empires haughtily
A diademed outlaw!
O, human love! thou spirit given,
On Earth, of all we hope in Heaven!
Which fall'st into the soul like rain
Upon the Siroc-withered plain,
And failing in thy power to bless,
But leav'st the heart a wilderness!
Idea! which bindest life around
With music of so strange a sound
And beauty of so wild a birth-
Farewell! for I have now the Earth.
When Hope, the eagle that towered,
could see
No cliff beyond him in the sky,
His pinions were bent droopingly-
And homeward turned his softened
eye.
POEMS
45
Twas sunset: when the sun will part
There comes a sullenness of heart
To him who still would look upon
The glory of the summer sun.
That soul will hate the ev'ning mist
So often lovely, and will list
To the sound of the coming darkness
(known
To those whose spirits harken) as one
Who, in a dream of night, would fly,
But cannot, from a danger nigh.
What tho' the moon-tho' the white
moon
Shed all the splendor of her noon,
Her smile is chilly-and her beam,
In that time of dreariness, will seem
(So like you gather in your breath)
A portrait taken after death.
And boyhood is a summer sun
Whose waning is the dreariest one-
For all we live to know is known
And for all we seek to keep hath
flown-
Let life, then, as the day-flower, fall
With the noon-day beauty-which is
all.
I reached my home-my home no
more
For all had flown who made it so.
I passed from out its mossy door,
And, tho' my tread was soft and
low,
A voice came from the threshold stone
Of one whom I had earlier known-
OI defy thee, Hell, to show
On beds of fire that burn below,
An humbler heart-a deeper woe.
Father, I firmly do believe-
I know for Death who comes for
me
From regions of the blest afar,
Where there is nothing to deceive,
Hath left his iron gate ajar
And rays of truth you cannot see
Are flashing thro' Eternity-
I do believe that Eblis hath
A snare in every human path-
Else how, when in the holy grove
I wandered of the idol, Love,-
Who daily scents his snowy wings
With incense of burnt-offerings
From the most unpolluted things,
Whose pleasant bowers are yet so riven
Above with trellised rays from Heaven
No mote may shun-no tiniest fly-
The light'ning of his eagle eye—
How was it that Ambition crept,
Unseen, amid the revels there,
Till growing bold, he laughed and leapt
In the tangles of Love's very hair?
TO THE RIVER
FAIR river; in thy bright clear flow
Of crystal, wandering water,
Thou art an emblem of the glow
Of beauty-the unhidden heart-
The playful maziness of art
In old Alberto's daughter;
But when within they wave she looks—
Which glistens then, and trembles-
Why, then, the prettiest of brooks
Her worshipper resembles;
For in his heart, as in thy stream,
Her image deeply lies-
His heart which trembles at the beam
Of her soul-searching eyes.
ΤΟ
THE bowers whereat, in dreams, I see
The wantonest singing birds,
Are lips and all thy melody
Of lip-begotten words-
46
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Thine eyes, in Heaven of heart en-
shrined
Then desolately fall,
O God! on my funereal mind
Like starlight on a pall-
Thy heart-thy heart!-I wake and
sigh
And sleep to dream till day
Of the truth that gold can never buy-
Of the baubles that it may.
A DREAM
IN visions of the dark night
I have dreamed of joy departed-
But a waking dream of life and light
Hath left me broken-hearted.
Ah! what is not a dream by day
To him whose eyes are cast
On things around him with a ray
Turned back upon the past?
That holy dream-that holy dream,
While all the world were chiding,
Hath cheered me as a lovely beam,
A lonely spirit guiding.
What though that light, thro' storm
and night,
So trembled from afar-
What could there be more purely
bright
In Truth's day-star?
ROMANCE
ROMANCE, who loves to nod and sing,
With drowsy head and folded wing,
Among the green leaves as they shake
Far down within some shadowy lake,
To me a painted paroquet
Hath been-a most familiar bird-
Taught me my alphabet to say-
To lisp my very earliest word
While in the wild wood I did lie,
A child-with a most knowing eye.
Of late, eternal Condor years
So shake the very Heaven on high
With tumult as they thunder by,
I have no time for idle cares
Through gazing on the unquiet sky.
And when an hour with calmer wings
Its down upon my spirit flings-
That little time with lyre and rhyme
To while away-forbidden thing!
My heart would feel to be a crime
Unless it trembled with the strings.
FAIRYLAND
(A portion of "Fairyland" appeared
separately in the Yankee Literary Ga-
zette, 1829.-Ed.)
DIM vales-and shadowy floods-
And cloudy-looking woods,
Whose forms we can't discover
For the tears that drip all over
Huge moons there wax and wane-
Again-again-again—
Every moment of the night-
Forever changing places-
And they put out the star-light
With the breath from their pale faces.
About twelve by the moon-dial
One more filmy than the rest
(A kind which, upon trial,
They have found to be the best)
Comes down-still down-and down
With its centre on the crown
Of a mountain's eminence,
While its wide circumference
In easy drapery falls
Over hamlets, over halls,
Wherever they may be-
POEMS
47
-
O'er the strange woods-o'er the sea Yet that terror was not fright,
But a tremulous delight-
Over spirits on the wing-
Over every drowsy thing-
And buries them up quite
In a labyrinth of light-
And then, how deep!-O, deep!
Is the passion of their sleep.
In the morning they arise,
And their moony covering
Is soaring in the skies,
With the tempests as they toss,
Like almost any thing-
Or a yellow Albatross.
They use that moon no more
For the same end as before-
Videlicet a tent-
Which I think extravagant:
Its atomies, however,
Into a shower dissever,
Of which those butterflies,
Of Earth, who seek the skies,
And so come down again
(Never-contented things!)
Have brought a specimen
Upon their quavering wings.
THE LAKE
In spring of youth it was my lot
To haunt of the wide world a spot
The which I could not love the less-
So lovely was the loneliness
Of a wild lake, with black rock bound,
And the tall pines that towered around.
But when the Night had thrown her
pall
Upon that spot, as upon all,
And the mystic wind went by
Murmuring in melody-
Then-ah, then, I would awake
To the terror of the lone lake.
A feeling not the jewelled mine
Could teach or bribe me to define-
Nor Love-although the Love were
thine.
Death was in that poisonous wave,
And in its gulf a fitting grave
For him who thence could solace bring
To his lone imagining—
Whose solitary soul could make
An Eden of that dim lake.
SONG
I saw thee on thy bridal day-
When a burning blush came o'er
thee,
Though happiness around thee lay,
The world all love before thee:
And in thine eye a kindly light
(Whatever it might be)
Was all on Earth my aching sight
Of loveliness could see.
That blush, perhaps, was
shame-
maiden
As such it well may pass―
Though its glow hath raised a fiercer
flame
In the breast of him, alas!
Who saw thee on that bridal day,
When that deep blush would come
o'er thee,
Though happiness around thee lay,
The world all love before thee.
48
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
TO HELEN
HELEN, thy beauty is to me
Like those Nicean barks of yore,
That gently, o'er a perfumed sea,
The weary, wayworn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.
On desperate seas long wont to roam,
Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,
Thy Naiad airs have brought me home
To the glory that was Greece,
To the grandeur that was Rome.
Lo! in yon brilliant window niche,
How statue-like I see thee stand,
The agate lamp within thy hand!
Ah, Psyche, from the regions which
Are the Holy Land!
SPIRITS OF THE DEAD.
(This poem is also called "Visit of the
Dead."-Ed.)
THY Soul shall find itself alone
'Mid dark thoughts of the grey tomb-
stone-
Not one, of all the crowd, to pry
Into thine hour of secrecy.
Be silent in that solitude
Which is not loneliness-for then
The spirits of the dead who stood
In life before thee are again
In death around thee-and their will
Shall overshadow thee: be still.
The night-tho' clear-shall frown-
And the stars shall not look down
From their high thrones in the Heaven,
With light like Hope to mortals given-
But their red orbs, without beam,
To thy weariness shall seem
As a burning and a fever
Which could cling to thee for ever.
Now are thoughts thou shalt not ban-
ish-
Now are visions ne'er to vanish-
From thy spirit shall they pass
No more-like dew-drops from the
grass.
The breeze-the breath of God-is
still-
And the mist upon the hill
Shadowy-shadowy-yet unbroken,
Is a symbol and a token-
How it hangs upon the trees,
A mystery of mysteries!
EVENING STAR.
"TWAS noontide of summer,
And midtime of night,
And stars, in their orbits,
Shone pale, through the light
Of the brighter, cold moon.
'Mid planets her slaves,
Herself in the Heavens,
Her beam on the waves.
I gazed awhile
On her cold smile;
Too cold-too cold for me-
There passed, as a shroud,
A fleecy cloud,
And I turned away to thee,
Proud Evening Star,
In thy glory afar
And dearer thy beam shall be;
For joy to my heart
Is the proud part
Thou bearest in Heaven at night,
And more I admire
Thy distant fire,
Than that colder, lowly light.
POEMS
49
IMITATION.
A DARK unfathomed tide
Of interminable pride-
A mystery, and a dream,
Should my early life seem;
I say that dream was fraught
With a wild and waking thought
Of beings that have been,
Which my spirit hath not seen,
Had I let them pass me by,
With a dreaming eye!
Let none of earth inherit
That vision on my spirit;
Those thoughts I would control,
As a spell upon his soul:
For that bright hope at last
And that light time have past,
And my worldly rest hath gone
With a sigh as it passed on:
I care not though it perish
With a thought I then did cherish.
"THE HAPPIEST DAY"
I.
THE happiest day-the happiest hour
My seared and blighted heart hath
known,
The highest hope of pride and power,
I feel hath flown.
II.
Of power! said I? Yes! such I ween
But they have vanished long, alas!
The visions of my youth have been-
But let them pass.
III.
And pride, what have I now with thee?
Another brow may ev'n inherit
The venom that hast poured on me-
Be still my spirit!
IV.
The happiest day-the happiest hour
Mine eyes shall see-have ever seen
The brightest glance of pride and power
I feel have been:
V.
But were that hope of pride and power
Now offered with the pain
Ev'n then I felt that brightest hour
I would not live again:
VI.
For on its wing was dark alloy
And as it fluttered-fell
An essence-powerful to destroy
A soul that knew it well.
Translation from the Greek.
HYMN TO ARISTOGEITON AND
HARMODIUS
I.
WREATHED in myrtle, my sword I'll
conceal
Like those champions devoted and
brave,
When they plunged in the tyrant their
steel,
And to Athens deliverance gave.
II.
Beloved heroes! your deathless souls
roam
In the joy breathing isles of the
blest;
Where the mighty of old have their
home-
Where Achilles and Diomed rest.
50
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
III.
In fresh myrtle my blade I'll entwine,
Like Harmodius, the gallant and
good,
When he made at the tutelar shrine
A libation of Tyranny's blood.
IV.
Ye deliverers of Athens from shame!
Ye avengers of Liberty's wrongs!
Endless ages shall cherish your fame
Embalmed in their echoing songs!
DREAMS.
OH! that my young life were a lasting
dream!
My spirit not awakening, till the beam
Of an Eternity should bring the mor-
row.
Yes! though that long dream were of
hopeless sorrow,
"Twere better than the cold reality
Of waking life, to him whose heart
must be,
And hath been still, upon the lovely
earth,
A chaos of deep passion, from his birth.
But should it be that dream eternally
Continuing as dreams have been to me
In my young boyhood-should it thus
be given,
'Twere folly still to hope for higher
Heaven.
For I have revelled when the sun was
bright
I' the summer sky, in dreams of living
light
And loveliness,-have left my very
heart
Inclines of my imaginary apart
From mine own home, with beings that
have been
Of mine own thought-what more could
I have seen?
'Twas once and only once-and the
wild hour
From my remembrance shall not pass
some power
-'twas the chilly
Or spell had bound me-'
wind
Came o'er me in the night, and left
behind
Its image on my spirit-or the moon
Shone on my slumbers in her lofty
noon
Too coldly-or the stars-howe'er it
was
That dream was as that night-wind-
let it pass.
I have been happy, though in a dream.
I have been happy-and I love the
theme:
Dreams! in their vivid colouring of
life
As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty
strife
Of semblance with reality which brings
To the delirious eve, more lovely things
Of Paradise and Love-and all my
own!-
Than young Hope in his sunniest hour
hath known.
"IN YOUTH I HAVE KNOWN
ONE"
How often we forget all time, when
lone
Admiring Nature's universal throne;
Her woods-her winds-her mountains
-the intense
Reply of Hers to Our intelligence!
POEMS
51
I.
IN youth I have known one with whom
the Earth
In secret communing held-as he
with it,
In daylight, and in beauty, from his
birth:
Whose fervid, flickering torch of life
was lit
From the sun and stars, whence he had
drawn forth
A passionate light-such for his spirit
was fit-
And yet that spirit knew-not in the
hour
Of its own fervour—what had o'er it
power.
III.
Doth o'er us pass, when, as th' expand-
ing eye
To the loved object-so the tear to
the lid
Will start, which lately slept in apathy?
And yet it need not be (that
object) hid
From us in life-but common-which
doth lie
Each hour before us—but then only
bid
With a strange sound, as of a harp-
string broken
T' awake us-'Tis a symbol and a
token-
IV.
II.
Perhaps it may be that my mind is
wrought
To a fever by the moonbeam that
hangs o'er,
But I will half believe that wild light
fraught
With more of sovereignty than
ancient lore
Hath ever told-or is it of a thought
The unembodied essence, and no
more
That with a quickening spell doth o'er
us pass
As dew of the night time, o'er the sum-
mer grass?
Of what in other worlds shall be-and
given
In beauty by our God, to those alone
Who otherwise would fall from life and
Heaven
Drawn by their heart's passion, and
that tone,
That high tone of the spirit which hath
striven
Though not with Faith-with god-
liness-whose throne
With desperate energy 't hath beaten
down:
Wearing its own deep feeling as a
crown.
The Gold Bug
(First published in The Dollar Newspaper, Philadelphia, June, 1843, as a
Prize-winner.-Ed.)
What ho! what ho! this fellow is danc-
ing mad!
He hath been bitten by the Tarantula.
-All in the Wrong.
MANY years ago, I contracted an in-
timacy with a Mr. William Legrand.
He was of an ancient Huguenot family,
and had once been wealthy; but a
series of misfortunes had reduced him
to want. To avoid the mortification
consequent upon his disasters, he left
New Orleans, the city of his fore-
fathers, and took up his residence at
Sullivan's Island, near Charleston,
South Carolina.
This island is a very singular one. It
consists of little else than the sea sand,
and is about three miles long. Its
breadth at no point exceeds a quarter
of a mile. It is separated from the
mainland by a scarcely perceptible
creek, oozing its way through a wilder'
ness of reeds and slime, a favorite re-
sort of the marsh-hen. The vegetation,
as might be supposed, is scant, or at
least dwarfish. No trees of any mag-
nitude are to be seen. Near the west-
ern extremity, where Fort Moultrie
stands, and where are some miserable
frame buildings, tenanted, during sum-
mer, by the fugitives from Charleston
dust and fever, may be found, indeed,
the bristly palmetto; but the whole
island, with the exception of this west-
ern point, and a line of hard, white
beach on the sea-coast, is covered with
a dense undergrowth of the sweet
myrtle so much prized by the horticul-
turists of England. The shrub here
often attains the height of fifteen or
twenty feet, and forms an almost im-
penetrable coppice, burdening the air
with its fragrance.
In the inmost recesses of this cop-
pice, not far from the eastern or more
remote end of the island, Legrand had
built himself a small hut, which he oc-
cupied when I first, by mere accident,
made his acquaintance. This soon rip-
ened into friendship for there was
much in the recluse to excite interest
and esteem. I found him well edu-
cated, with unusual powers of mind,
but infected with misanthropy, and sub-
ject to perverse moods of alternate en-
thusiasm and melancholy. He had
with him many books, but rarely em-
ployed them. His chief amusements
were gunning and fishing, or sauntering
along the beach and through the myr
tles, in quest of shells or entomological
specimens his collection of the latter
might have been envied by a Swam-
merdamm. In these excursions he was
usually accompanied by an old negro,
called Jupiter, who had been manu-
mitted before the reverses of the fam-
ily, but who could be induced, neither
by threats nor by promises, to abandon
what he considered his right of attend-
ance upon the footsteps of his young
"Massa Will." It is not improbable
that the relatives of Legrand, conceiv-
53
54
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ing him to be somewhat unsettled in
intellect, had contrived to instil this
obstinacy into Jupiter, with a view to
the supervision and guardianship of the
wanderer.
The winters in the latitude of Sulli-
van's Island are seldom very severe,
and in the fall of the year it is a rare
event indeed when a fire is considered
necessary. About the middle of Octo-
ber, 18, there occurred, however, a
day of remarkable chilliness. Just be-
fore sunset I scrambled my way
through the evergreens to the hut of my
friend, whom I had not visited for
several weeks-my residence being, at
that time, in Charleston, a distance of
nine miles from the island, while the
facilities of passage and re-passage were
very far behind those of the present
day. Upon reaching the hut I rapped,
as was my custom, and getting no reply,
sought for the key where I knew it
was secreted, unlocked the door, and
went in. A fine fire was blazing upon
the hearth. It was a novelty, and by
no means an ungrateful one. I threw
off an overcoat, took an arm-chair by
the crackling logs, and awaited pat-
iently the arrival of my hosts.
Soon after dark they arrived, and
gave me a most cordial welcome. Jup-
iter, grinning from ear to ear, bustled
about to prepare some marsh-hens for
supper. Legrand was in one of his
fits-how else shall I term them?-of
enthusiasm. He had found an unknown
bivalve, forming a new genus, and,
more than this, he had hunted down
and secured, with Jupiter's assistance,
a scarabæus which he believed to be
totally new, but in respect to which he
wished to have my opinion on the
morrow.
"And why not to-night?" I asked,
rubbing my hands over the blaze, and
wishing the whole tribe of scarabai at
the devil.
"Ah, if I had only known you were
here!" said Legrand, "but it's so long
since I saw you; and how could I fore-
see that you would pay me a visit this
very night of all others? As I was
coming home I met Lieutenant G-
from the fort, and, very foolishly, I
lent him the bug; so it will be impos-
sible for you to see it until the morning.
Stay here to-night, and I will send Jup
down for it at sunrise. It is the love-
liest thing in creation!"
"What?-sunrise?"
"Nonsense! no!-the bug. It is of
a brilliant gold color-about the size
of a large hickory-nut-with two jet
black spots near one extremity of the
back, and another, somewhat longer, at
the other. The antennæ are "
"Dey ain't no tin in him, Massa
Will, I keep a tellin' on you," here in-
terrupted Jupiter; "de bug is a goole-
bug, solid, ebery bit of him, inside and
all, sep him wing-neber feel half so
hebby a bug in my life."
"Well, suppose it is, Jup," replied
Legrand, somewhat more earnestly, it
seemed to me, than the case demanded;
"is that any reason for your letting the
birds burn? The color"-here he
turned to me—"is really almost enough
to warrant Jupiter's idea. You never
saw a more brilliant metallic lustre than
the scales emit-but of this you cannot
judge till to-morrow. In the meantime
I can give you some idea of the shape."
Saying this, he seated himself at a
small table, on which were a pen and
ink, but no paper. He looked for some
in a drawer, but found none.
THE GOLD BUG
55
"Never mind," he said at length, "this
will answer;" and he drew from his
waistcoat pocket a scrap of what I
took to be very dirty foolscap, and
made upon it a rough drawing with the
pen. While he did this, I retained my
seat by the fire, for I was still chilly.
When the design was complete, he
handed it to me without rising. As I
received it, a loud growl was heard,
succeeded by a scratching at the door.
Jupiter opened it, and a large New-
foundland, belonging to Legrand,
rushed in, leaped upon my shoulders,
and loaded me with caresses; for I had
shown him much attention during prev-
ious visits. When his gambols were
over, I looked at the paper, and, to
speak the truth, found myself not a
little puzzled at what my friend had
depicted.
"Well!" I said, after contemplating
it for some minutes, "This is a strange
scarabæus, I must confess; new to me;
never saw anything like it before-un-
less it was a skull, or a death's-head,
which it more nearly resembles than
anything else that has come under my
observation."
"A death's-head!" echoed Legrand.
"Oh-yes-well, it has something of
that appearance upon paper, no doubt.
The two upper black spots look like
eyes, eh? and the longer one at the
bottom like a mouth-and then the
shape of the whole is oval."
"Perhaps so," said I; "but, Legrand,
I fear you are no artist. I must wait
until I see the beetle itself, if I am
to form any idea of its personal appear-
ance."
"Well, I don't know," said he, a little
nettled, "I draw tolerably-should do it
at least-have had good masters, and
flatter myself that I am not quite a
blockhead."
"But, my dear fellow, you are jok-
ing, then," said I, "this is a very pass-
able skull—indeed, I may say that it is
a very excellent skull, according to the
vulgar notions about such specimens of
physiology-and your scarabæus must
be the queerest scarabæus in the world
if it resembles it. Why, we may get
up a very thrilling bit of superstition
upon this hint. I presume you will call
the bug scarabæus caput hominis, or
something of that kind-there are
many similar titles in the Natural His-
tories. But where are the antennæ you
spoke of?"
"The antenna!" said Legrand, who
seemed to be getting unaccountably
warm upon the subject; "I am sure
you must see the antennæ. I made
them as distinct as they are in the
original insect, and I presume that is
sufficient."
"Well, well," I said, "perhaps you
have still I don't see them;" and I
handed him the paper without addi-
tional remark, not wishing to ruffle his
temper; but I was much surprised at
the turn affairs had taken; his ill humor
puzzled me and, as for the drawing of
the beetle, there were positively no an-
tennæ visible, and the whole did bear
a very close resemblance to the ordi-
nary cuts of a death's-head.
He received the paper very peevishly,
and was about to crumple it, apparently
to throw it in the fire, when a casual
glance at the design seemed suddenly
to rivet his attention. In an instant
his face grew violently red-in another
excessively pale. For some minutes he
continued to scrutinize the drawing
minutely where he sat. At length he
56
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
arose, took a candle from the table,
and proceeded to seat himself upon a
sea-chest in the farthest corner of the
room. Here again he made an anxious
examination of the paper; turning it in
all directions. He said nothing, how-
ever, and his conduct greatly aston-
ished me; yet I thought it prudent not
to exacerbate the growing moodiness of
his temper by any comment. Presently
he took from his coat-pocket a wallet,
placed the paper carefully in it, and de-
posited both in a writing-desk, which he
locked. He now grew more composed
in his demeanor; but his original air of
enthusiasm had quite disappeared. Yet
he seemed not so much sulky as ab-
stracted. As the evening wore away he
became more and more absorbed in
revery, from which no sallies of mine
could arouse him. It had been my in-
tention to pass the night at the hut,
as I had frequently done before, but,
seeing my host in this mood, I deemed
it proper to take leave. He did not
press me to remain, but, as I departed,
he shook my hand with even more than
his usual cordiality.
It was about a month after this (and
during the interval I had seen nothing
of Legrand) when I received a visit, at
Charleston, from his man, Jupiter.
had never seen the good old negro look
so dispirited, and I feared that some
serious disaster had befallen my friend.
I
"Well, Jup," said I, "what is the
matter now?-how is your master?"
"Why, to speak the troof, massa, him
not so berry well as mought be."
"Not well! I am truly sorry to hear
it. What does he complain of?"
"Dar! dats it!-him neber 'plain of
notin'-but him berry sick for all dat."
"Very sick, Jupiter!-why didn't you
say so at once?
bed?"
Is he confined to
"No, dat he ain't!-he aint 'find'd
nowhar-dat's just whar de shoe pinch
-my mind is got to be berry hebby
'bout poor Massa Will."
"Jupiter, I should like to understand
what it is you are talking about. You
say your master is sick. Hasn't he told
you what ails him?"
"Why, massa, 'taint wof while for
to git mad about de matter-Massa
Will say noffin at all aint de matter
wid him-but den what make him go
about looking dis here way, wid he head
down and he soldiers up, and as white
as a goose? And den he keep a syphon
all de time-
99
"Keeps a what, Jupiter?"
"Keeps a syphon wid de figgurs on
de slate-de queerest figgurs I ebber
did see.
Ise gittin' to be skeered, I
tell you. Hab for to keep mighty tight
eye 'pon him 'noovers. Todder day
he gib me slip 'fore de sun up and was
gone de whole ob de blessed day. I
had a big stick ready cut for to gib
him deuced good beating when he did
come-but Ise sich a fool dat I hadn't
de heart arter all-he looked so berry
poorly."
"Eh?-what?-ah yes!-upon the
whole I think you had better not be
too severe with the poor fellow-don't
flog him, Jupiter-he can't very well
stand it but can you form no idea
of what has occasioned this illness, or
rather this change of conduct? Has
anything unpleasant happened since I
saw you?"
"No, massa, dey aint bin noffin on-
pleasant since den-'twas 'fore den I'm
feared 'twas be berry day you was
dare."
THE GOLD BUG
57
"How? what do you mean?"
"Why, massa, I mean de bug-dare
now."
"That what?"
"De bug-I'm berry sartin dat Massa
Will bin bit somewhere 'bout he head
by dat goole-bug."
"And what cause have you, Jupiter,
for such a supposition?"
"Claws enuff, massa, and mouff, too.
I never did see sich a deuced bug-he
kick and he bite ebery ting what cum
near him. Massa Will cotch him fuss,
but had for to let him go 'gin mighty
quick, I tell you-den was de time he
must ha' got de bite. I didn't like de
look ob de bug mouff, myself, nohow,
so I wouldn't take hold ob him wid my
finger, but I cotch him wid a piece of
paper dat I found. I rap him up in de
paper and stuff a piece of it in he mouff
-dat was de way."
"And you think then, that your mas-
ter was really bitten by the beetle, and
that the bite made him sick?"
"I don't think noffin about it-I nose
it. What make him dream 'bout de
goole so much, if 'taint cause he bit
by the goole-bug? Ise heered 'bout
dem goole-bugs 'fore dis."
"But how do you know he dreams
about gold?"
"How I know? why, 'cause he talk
about it in he sleep-dat's how I nose."
"Well, Jup, perhaps you are right;
but to what fortunate circumstance am
I to attribute the honor of a visit from
you to-day?"
"What de matter, massa?”
"Did you bring any message from
Mr. Legrand?"
"No, massa, I bring dis here pissel;"
and here Jupiter handed me a note
which ran thus:
"MY DEAR
"Why have I not seen you for so
long a time? I hope you have not been
so foolish as to take offence at any
little brusquerie of mine; but no, that
is improbable.
"Since I saw you I have had great
cause for anxiety. I have something
to tell you, yet scarcely know how to
tell it, or whether I should tell it at
all.
"I have not been quite well for some
days past, and poor old Jup annoys
me, almost beyond endurance, by his
well-meant attentions. Would you be-
lieve it? he had prepared a huge stick,
the other day, with which to chastise
me for giving him the slip, and spend-
ing the day, solus, among the hills on
the mainland. I verily believe that my
ill looks alone saved me a flogging.
"I have made no addition to my
cabinet since we met.
"If you can, in any way, make it
convenient, come over with Jupiter.
Do come. I wish to see you to-night,
upon business of importance. I assure
you that it is of the highest importance.
"Ever yours,
ness.
"WILLIAM LEGRAND."
There was something in the tone of
this note which gave me great uneasi-
Its whole style differed mate-
rially from that of Legrand. What
could he be dreaming of? What new
crotchet possessed his excitable brain?
What "business of the highest impor-
tance" could he possibly have to trans-
act? Jupiter's account of him boded
no good. I dreaded lest the continued
pressure of misfortune had, at length,
fairly unsettled the reason of my friend.
Without a moment's hesitation, there.
58
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
fore, I prepared to accompany the
negro.
Upon reaching the wharf, I noticed
a scythe and three spades, all appar-
ently new, lying in the bottom of the
boat in which we were to embark.
"What is the meaning of all this,
Jup?" I inquired.
"Him syfe, massa, and spade."
"Very true; but what are they doing
here?"
"Him de syfe and de spade what
Massa Will sis 'pon my buying for him
in de town, and de debbil's own lot of
money I had to gib for 'em."
"But what, in the name of all that
is mysterious, is your 'Massa Will'
going to do with scythes and spades?"
"Dat's more dan I know, and debbil
take me if I don't b'lieve 'tis more dan
he know too. But it's all cum ob de
bug."
Finding that no satisfaction was to
be obtained of Jupiter, whose whole
intellect seemed to be absorbed by "de
bug," I now stepped into the boat, and
made sail. With a fair and strong
breeze we soon ran into the little cove
to the northward of Fort Moultrie, and
a walk of some two miles brought us
to the hut. It was about three in the
afternoon when we arrived. Legrand
had been awaiting us in eager expecta-
tion. He grasped my hand with a ner-
vous empressement which alarmed me
and strengthened the suspicions already
entertained. His countenance was pale
even to ghastliness, and his deep-set
eyes glared with unnatural lustre. After
some inquiries respecting his health, I
asked him, not knowing what better to
say, if he had yet obtained the scara-
bæus from Lieutenant G.
"Oh, yes," he replied, coloring vio-
lently, "I got it from him the next
morning. Nothing should tempt me to
part with that scarabæus. Do you know
that Jupiter is quite right about it?"
"In what way?" I asked, with a sad
foreboding at heart.
"In supposing it to be a bug of real
gold." He said this with an air of
profound seriousness, and I felt inex-
pressibly shocked.
"This bug is to make my fortune,"
he continued, with a triumphant smile;
"to reinstate me in my family posses-
sions. Is it any wonder, then, that I
prize it? Since Fortune has thought
fit to bestow it upon me, I have only
to use it properly, and I shall arrive at
the gold of which it is the index. Jupi-
ter, bring me that scarabæus!"
"What! de bug, massa? I'd rudder
not go fer trubble dat bug; you mus' git
him for your own self." Hereupon
Legrand arose, with a grave and stately
air, and brought me the beetle from a
glass case in which it was enclosed.
It was a beautiful scarabæus, and, at
that time, unknown to naturalists-of
course a great prize in a scientific point
of view. There were two round black
spots near one extremity of the back,
and a long one near the other. The
scales were exceedingly hard and glossy,
with all the appearance of burnished
gold. The weight of the insect was
very remarkable, and, taking all things
into consideration, I could hardly blame
Jupiter for his opinion respecting it;
but what to make of Legrand's con-
cordance with that opinion, I could not,
for the life of me, tell.
"I sent for you," said he, in a gran-
diloquent tone, when I had completed
my examination of the beetle, "I sent
for you that I might have your counsel
THE GOLD BUG
59
}
and assistance in furthering the views
of Fate and of the bug-"
"My dear Legrand," I cried, inter-
rupting him, "you are certainly unwell,
and had better use some little precau-
tions. You shall go to bed, and I will
remain with you a few days, until you
get over this. You are feverish and-"”
"Feel my pulse," said he.
I felt it, and, to say the truth, found
not the slightest indication of fever.
"But you may be ill and yet have
no fever. Allow me this once to pre-
scribe for you. In the first place go
to bed. In the next-"
"You are mistaken," he interposed,
"I am as well as I can expect to be
under the excitement which I suffer.
If you really wish me well, you will
relieve this excitement."
"And how is this to be done?"
You
"Very easily. Jupiter and myself are
going upon an expedition into the hills,
upon the main land, and, in this expe-
dition, we shall need the aid of some
person in whom we can confide.
are the only one we can trust. Whether
we succeed or fail, the excitement which
you now perceive in me will be equally
allayed."
"I am anxious to oblige you in any
way," I replied; "but do you mean to
say that this infernal beetle has any
connection with your expedition into
the hills?"
"It has."
"Then, Legrand, I can become a
party to no such absurd proceeding."
"I am sorry-very sorry-for we
shall have to try it by ourselves."
"Try it by yourselves! The man is
surely mad!-but stay!-how long do
you propose to be absent?"
"Probably all night. We shall start
immediately, and be back, at all events,
by sunrise."
"And will you promise me, upon
your honor, that when this freak of
yours is over, and the bug business
(good God!) settled to your satisfac-
tion, you will then return home and
follow my advice implicitly, as that of
your physician."
"Yes; I promise; and now let us be
off, for we have no time to lose."
With a heavy heart I accompanied
my friend. We started about four
o'clock-Legrand, Jupiter, the dog, and
myself. Jupiter had with him the
scythe and spades-the whole of which
he insisted upon carrying - more
through fear, it seemed to me, of trust-
ing either of the implements within
reach of his master, than from any
excess of industry or complaisance. His
demeanor was dogged in the extreme,
and "dat deuced bug" were the sole
words which escaped his lips during the
journey. For my own part, I had
charge of a couple of dark lanterns,
while Legrand contented himself with
the scarabæus, which he carried at-
tached to the end of a bit of whip-
cord: twirling it to and fro, with the
air of a conjuror, as he went. When I
observed this last, plain evidence of my
friend's aberration of mind, I could
scarcely refrain from tears. I thought
it best, however, to humor his fancy,
at least for the present, or until I could
adopt some more energetic measures
with a chance of success. In the mean-
time I endeavored, but all in vain, to
sound him in regard to the object of
the expedition. Having succeeded in
inducing me to accompany him, he
seemed unwilling to hold conversation
upon any topic of minor importance,
60
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
and to all my questions vouchsafed no
other reply than "we shall see!"
We crossed the creek at the head of
the island by means of a skiff, and,
ascending the high grounds on the shore
of the main land, proceeded in a north-
westerly direction, through a tract of
country excessively wild and desolate,
where no trace of a human footstep was
to be seen. Legrand led the way with
decision; pausing only for an instant,
here and there, to consult what ap-
peared to be certain landmarks of his
own contrivance upon a former occa-
sion.
In this manner we journeyed for
about two hours, and the sun was just
setting when we entered a region infi-
nitely more dreary than any yet seen.
It was a species of tableland, near the
summit of an almost inaccessible hill,
densely wooded from base to pinnacle,
and interspersed with huge crags that
appeared to lie loosely upon the soil,
and in many cases were prevented from
precipitating themselves into the valleys
below, merely by the support of the
trees against which they reclined. Deep
ravines, in various directions, gave an
air of still sterner solemnity to the
scene.
The natural platform to which we
had clambered was thickly overgrown
with brambles, through which we soon
discovered that it would have been
impossible to force our way but for
the scythe; and Jupiter, by direction.
of his master, proceeded to clear for
us a path to the foot of an enormously
tall tulip-tree, which stood, with some
eight or ten oaks, upon the level, and
far surpassed them all, and all other
trees which I had then ever seen, in
the beauty of its foliage and form, in
the wide spread of its branches, and in
the general majesty of its appearance.
When we reached this tree, Legrand
turned to Jupiter, and asked him if he
thought he could climb it. The old man
seemed a little staggered by the ques-
tion, and for some moments made no
reply. At length he approached the
huge trunk, walked slowly around it,
and examined it with minute attention.
When he had completed his scrutiny,
he merely said:
"Yes, massa, Jup climb any tree he
ebber see in he life."
"Then up with you as soon as pos-
sible, for it will soon be too dark to
see what we are about."
"How far mus' go up, massa?” in-
quired Jupiter.
"Get up the main trunk first, and
then I will tell you which way to go-
and here-stop! take this beetle with
you."
"De bug, Massa Will!-de goole-
bug!" cried the negro, drawing back in
dismay-"what for mus tote de bug
way up de tree?-d-n if I do!"
"If you are afraid, Jup, a great big
negro like you, to take hold of a harm-
less little dead beetle, why you can
carry it up by this string-but, if you
do not take it up with you in some
way, I shall be under the necessity of
breaking your head with this shovel."
"What de matter now, massa?" said
Jup, evidently shamed into compliance;
"always want for to raise fuss wid old
nigger. Was only funnin anyhow. Me
feered de bug! what I keer for de bug?"
Here he took cautiously hold of the
extreme end of the string, and, main-
taining the insect as far from his person
as circumstances would permit, pre-
pared to ascend the tree.
THE GOLD BUG
61
In youth, the tulip-tree, or Lirioden-
dron Tulipiferum, the most magnificent
of American foresters, has a trunk
peculiarly smooth, and often rises to
a great height without lateral branches;
but, in its riper age, the bark becomes
gnarled and uneven, while many short
limbs make their appearance on the
stem. Thus the difficulty of ascension,
in the present case, lay more in sem-
blance than in reality. Embracing the
huge cylinder, as closely as possible,
with his arms and knees, seizing with
his hands some projections, and resting
his naked toes upon others, Jupiter,
after one or two narrow escapes from
falling, at length wriggled himself into
the first great fork, and seemed to
consider the whole business as virtually
accomplished. The risk of the achieve-
ment was, in fact, now over, although
the climber was some sixty or seventy
feet from the ground.
"Which way mus go now, Massa
Will?" he asked.
"Keep up the largest branch—the
one on this side," said Legrand. The
negro obeyed him promptly, and ap-
parently with but little trouble; ascend-
ing higher and higher, until no glimpse
of his squat figure could be obtained
through the dense foliage which envel-
oped it. Presently his voice was heard
in a sort of halloo.
"How much fudder is got for go?"
"How high up
are you?" asked
Legrand.
"Ebber so fur," replied the negro;
"can see de sky fru de top ob de tree."
"Never mind the sky, but attend to
what I say. Look down the trunk and
count the limbs below you on this side.
How many limbs have you passed?"
"One, two, tree, four, fibe-I done
pass fibe big limb, massa, 'pon dis side."
"Then go one limb higher."
In a few minutes the voice was heard
again, announcing that the seventh limb
was attained.
"Now, Jup," cried Legrand, evidently
much excited, "I want you to work
your way out upon that limb as far as
you can. If you see anything strange
let me know."
By this time what little doubt I
might have entertained of my poor
friend's insanity was put finally at rest.
I had no alternative but to conclude
him stricken with lunacy, and I became
seriously anxious about getting him
home. While I was pondering upon
what was best to be done, Jupiter's
voice was again heard.
"Mos feered for to ventur pon dis
limb berry far-'tis dead limb putty
much all de way."
"Did you say it was a dead limb,
Jupiter?" cried Legrand in a quavering
voice.
"Yes, massa, him dead as de door-
nail-done up for sartin-done departed
dis here life."
"What in the name of heaven shall
I do?" asked Legrand, seemingly in the
greatest distress.
""
"Do!" said I, glad of an opportunity
to interpose a word, "why come home
and go to bed. Come now!-that's a
fine fellow. It's getting late, and, be-
sides, you remember your promise.'
"Jupiter," cried he, without heeding
me in the least, "do you hear me?"
"Yes, Massa Will, hear you ebber so
plain."
"Try the wood well, then, with your
knife, and see if you think it very
rotten."
"Him rotten, massa, sure nuff," re-
62
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
plied the negro in a few moments, "but
not so berry rotten as mought be.
Mought venture out leetle way pon de
limb by myself, dat's true."
"By yourself!-what do you mean?"
"Why, I mean de bug. 'Tis berry
hebby bug. Spose I drop him down
fuss, and den de limb won't break wid
just de weight of one nigger."
"You infernal scoundrel!" cried Le-
grand, apparently much relieved, "what
do you mean by telling me such non-
sense as that? As sure as you drop
that beetle I'll break your neck. Look
here, Jupiter, do you hear me?"
"Yes, massa, needn't hollo at poor
nigger dat style."
"Well! now listen!-if you will ven-
ture out on the limb as far as you think
safe, and not let go the beetle, I'll make
you a present of a silver dollar as soon
as you get down."
"I'm gwine, Massa Will-deed I is,"
replied the negro very promptly-"mos
out to the eend now."
"Out to the end!" here fairly
screamed Legrand; "do you say you
are out to the end of that limb?"
"Soon be to de eend, massa-
0-0-0-0-oh! Lor-gol-a-marcy! what is
dis here pon de tree?"
"Well!" cried Legrand, highly de-
lighted, "what is it?"
"Why 'taint noffin but a skull-
somebody bin lef him head up de tree,
and de crows done gobble ebery bit ob
de meat off."
“A skull, you say!-very well,-how
is it fastened to the limb?-what holds
it on?"
"Sure nuff, massa; mus look. Why
dis berry curious sarcumstance, pon my
word-dare's a great big nail in de
skull, what fastens ob it on to de tree.”
"Well now, Jupiter, do exactly as I
tell you do you hear?"
"Yes, massa."
"Pay attention, then-find the left
eye of the skull.”
"Hum! hoo! dat's good! why dey
ain't no eye lef at all."
"Curse your stupidity! do you know
your right hands from your left?"
"Yes, I knows dat-knows all about
dat 'tis my lef hand what I chops de
wood wid."
"To be sure! you are left-handed;
and your left eye is on the same side
as your left hand. Now, I suppose,
you can find the left eye of the skull,
or the place where the left eye has
been. Have you found it?"
Here was a long pause. At length
the negro asked.
"Is de lef eye of de skull pon de
same side as de lef hand of de skull
too?-cause de skull aint got not a bit
ob a hand at all-nebber mind! I got
de lef eye now-here de lef eye! what
mus do wid it?"
"Let the beetle drop through it, as
far as the string will reach-but be
careful and not let go your hold of the
string."
"All dat done, Massa Will; mighty
easy ting for to put de bug fru de
hole-look out for him dare below!"
During this colloquy no portion of
Jupiter's person could be seen; but the
beetle, which he had suffered to de-
scend, was now visible at the end of
the string, and glistened, like a globe
of burnished gold, in the last rays of
the setting sun, some of which still
faintly illumined the eminence upon
which we stood. The scarabæus hung
quite clear of any branches, and, if
allowed to fall, would have fallen at
THE GOLD BUG
63
our feet.
Legrand immediately took
the scythe, and cleared with it a cir-
cular space, three or four yards in
= diameter, just beneath the insect, and,
having accomplished this, ordered Jupi-
ter to let go the string and come down
from the tree.
Driving a peg, with great nicety, into
the ground, at the precise spot where
the beetle fell, my friend now pro-
duced from his pocket a tape-measure.
Fastening one end of this at that point
of the trunk of the tree which was
nearest the peg, he unrolled it till it
reached the peg and thence further
unrolled it, in the direction already
established by the two points of the
tree and the peg, for the distance of
fifty feet-Jupiter clearing away the
brambles with the scythe. At the spot
thus attained a second peg was driven,
and about this, as a centre, a rude cir-
cle, about four feet in diameter, de-
scribed. Taking now a spade himself,
and giving one to Jupiter and one to
me, Legrand begged us to set about
digging as quickly as possible.
To speak the truth, I had no especial
relish for such amusement at any time,
and, at that particular moment, would
willingly have declined it; for the night
was coming on, and I felt much fatigued
with the exercise already taken; but I
saw no mode of escape, and was fearful
of disturbing my poor friend's equanim-
ity by a refusal. Could I have de-
pended, indeed upon Jupiter's aid, I
would have had no hesitation in at-
tempting to get the lunatic home by
force; but I was too well assured of
the old negro's disposition, to hope that
he would assist me, under any circum-
stances, in a personal contest with his
master. I made no doubt that the lat-
ter had been infected with some of the
innumerable Southern superstitions
about money buried, and that his phan-
tasy had received confirmation by the
finding of the scarabæus, or, perhaps,
by Jupiter's obstinacy in maintaining it
to be "a bug of real gold." A mind
disposed to lunacy would readily be led
away by such suggestions-especially if
chiming in with favorite preconceived
ideas and then I called to mind the
poor fellow's speech about the beetle's
being "the index of his fortune." Upon
the whole, I was sadly vexed and puz-
zled, but, at length, I concluded to make
a virtue of necessity to dig with a
good will, and thus the sooner to con-
vince the visionary, by ocular demon-
stration, of the fallacy of the opinion
he entertained.
The lanterns having been lit, we all
fell to work with a zeal worthy a more
rational cause; and, as the glare fell
upon our persons and implements, I
could not help thinking how picturesque
a group we composed, and how strange
and suspicious our labors must have
appeared to any interloper who, by
chance, mighty have stumbled upon our
whereabouts.
We dug very steadily for two hours.
Little was said; and our chief embar-
rassment lay in the yelpings of the dog,
who took exceeding interest in our pro-
ceedings. He, at length, became so
obstreperous that we grew fearful of
his giving the alarm to some stragglers
in the vicinity,—or, rather, this was
the apprehension of Legrand;-for my-
self, I should have rejoiced at any
interruption which might have enabled
me to get the wanderer home. The
noise was, at length, very effectually
silenced by Jupiter, who, getting out
64
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
of the hole with a dogged air of delib-
eration, tied the brute's mouth up with
one of his suspenders, and then re-
turned, with a grave chuckle, to his
task.
When the time mentioned had ex-
pired, we had reached a depth of five
feet, and yet no sign of any treasure
became manifest. A general pause en-
sued, and I began to hope that the
farce was at an end. Legrand, how-
ever, although evidently much discon-
certed, wiped his brow thoughtfully and
recommenced. We had excavated the
entire circle of four feet diameter, and
now we slightly enlarged the limit, and
went to the farther depth of two feet.
Still nothing appeared. The gold-
seeker, whom I sincerely pitied, at
length clambered from the pit, with the
bitterest disappointment imprinted upon
every feature, and proceeded, slowly
and reluctantly, to put on his coat,
which he had thrown off at the begin-
ning of his labor. In the meantime I
made no remark. Jupiter, at a signal
from his master, began to gather up
his tools. This done, and the dog hav-
ing been unmuzzled, we turned in
profound silence toward home.
We had taken, perhaps, a dozen steps
in this direction, when, with a loud
oath, Legrand strode up to Jupiter, and
seized him by the collar. The aston-
ished negro opened his eyes and mouth
to the fullest extent, let fall the spades,
and fell upon his knees.
"You scoundrel!” said Legrand, hiss-
ing out the syllables from between his
clenched teeth-"you infernal black
villain!-speak, I tell you!-answer me
this instant, without prevarication!—
which-which is your left eye?"
"Oh, my golly, Massa Will! aint dis
here my lef eye for sartain?" roared
the terrified Jupiter, placing his hand
upon his right organ of vision, and
holding it there with a desperate per-
tinacity, as if in immediate dread of
his master's attempt at a gouge.
"I thought so!-I knew it! hurrah!"
vociferated Legrand, letting the negro
go and executing a series of curvets
and caracols, much to the astonish-
ment of his valet, who, arising from
his knees, looked, mutely, from his
master to myself, and then from myself
to his master.
"Come! me must go back," said the
latter, "the game's not up yet"; and
he again led the way to the tulip-tree.
"Jupiter," said he, when we reached
its foot, "come here! Was the skull
nailed to the limb with the face out-
ward, or with the face to the limb?"
"De face was out, massa, so dat de
crows could get at de eyes good, without
any trouble."
"Well, then, was it this eye or that
through which you dropped the beetle?"
here Legrand touched each of Jupiter's
eyes.
""Twas dis eye, massa-de lef eye-
jis as you tell me," and here it was
his right eye that the negro indicated.
"That will do we must try it again.”
Here my friend, about whose mad
ness I now saw, or fancied that I saw,
certain indications of method, removed
the peg which marked the spot where
the beetle fell, to a spot about three
inches to the westward of its former
position. Taking, now, the tape meas-
ure from the nearest point of the trunk
to the peg, as before, and continuing
the extension in a straight line to the
distance of fifty feet, a spot was indi-
THE GOLD BUG
65
cated, removed, by several yards, from
the point at which we had been digging.
Around the new position a circle,
somewhat larger than in the former
instance, was now described, and we
again set to work with the spade. I
was dreadfully weary, but, scarcely
understanding what had occasioned the
change in my thoughts, I felt no longer
any great aversion from the labor im-
posed. I had become most unaccount-
ably interested-nay, even excited.
Perhaps there was something, amid all
the extravagant demeanor of Legrand―
some air of forethought, or of delibera-
tion, which impressed. I dug eagerly,
and now and then caught myself actu-
ally looking, with something that very
much resembled expectation, for the
fancied treasure, the vision of which
had demented my unfortunate com-
panion. At a period when such vaga-
ries of thought most fully possessed
me, and when we had been at work
perhaps an hour and a half, we were
again interrupted by the violent howl-
ings of the dog. His uneasiness, in
the first instance, had been, evidently,
but the result of playfulness or caprice,
but he now assumed a bitter and serious
tone. Upon Jupiter's again attempting
to muzzle him, he made furious resist-
ance, and, leaping into the hole, tore
up the mould frantically with his claws.
In a few seconds he had uncovered a
mass of human bones, forming two
complete skeletons, intermingled with
several buttons of metal, and what ap-
peared to be the dust of decayed
woolen. One or two strokes of a spade
upturned the blade of a large Spanish
knife, and, as we dug farther, three or
four loose pieces of gold and silver coin
came to light.
At sight of these the joy of Jupiter
could scarcely be restrained, but the
countenance of his master wore an air
of extreme disappointment. He urged
us, however, to continue our exertions,
and the words were hardly uttered when
I stumbled and fell forward, having
caught the toe of my boot in a large
ring of iron that lay half buried in the
loose earth.
We now worked in earnest, and never
did I pass ten minutes of more intense
excitement. During this interval we
had fairly unearthed an oblong chest
of wood, which, from its perfect preser-
vation and wonderful hardness, had
plainly been subjected to some miner-
alizing process-perhaps that of the
bi-chloride of mercury.
This box was
three feet and a half long, three feet
broad, and two and a half feet deep.
It was firmly secured by bands of
wrought iron, riveted, and forming a
kind of open trellis-work over the
whole. On each side of the chest, near
the top, were three rings of iron-six
in all-by means of which a firm hold
could be obtained by six persons. Our
utmost united endeavors served only to
disturb the coffer very slightly in its
bed. We at once saw the impossibility
of removing so great a weight. Luckily,
the sole fastenings of the lid consisted
of two sliding bolts. These we drew
back-trembling and panting with anx-
iety. In an instant, a treasure of incal-
culable value lay gleaming before us.
As the rays of the lanterns fell within
the pit, there flashed upward a glow
and a glare, from a confused heap of
gold and jewels, that absolutely dazzled
our eyes.
I shall not pretend to describe the
feelings with which I gazed. Amaze-
66
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLEN POE
ment was, of course, predominant.
Legrand appeared exhausted with ex-
citement, and spoke very few words.
Jupiter's countenance wore, for some
minutes, as deadly a pallor as it is
possible, in the nature of things, for any
negro's visage to assume. He seemed
stupefied thunderstricken. Presently
he fell upon his knees in the pit, and
burying his naked arms up to the
elbows in gold, let them there remain,
as if enjoying the luxury of a bath.
At length, with a deep sigh, he ex-
claimed, as if in a soliloquy:
-
"And dis all cum ob de goole-bug!
de putty goole-bug! de poor little goole-
bug, what I boosed in that sabage kind
ob style! Aint you shamed ob your-
self, nigger?-answer me dat!"
It became necessary, at last, that I
should arouse both master and valet
to the expediency of removing the
treasure. It was growing late, and it
behooved us to make exertion, that we
might get every thing housed before
daylight. It was difficult to say what
should be done, and much time was
spent in deliberation-so confused were
the ideas of all. We, finally, lightened
the box by removing two-thirds of its
contents, when we were enabled, with
some trouble to raise it from the hole.
The articles taken out were deposited
among the brambles, and the dog left
to guard them, with strict orders from
Jupiter neither, upon any pretence, to
stir from the spot, nor to open his
mouth until our return. We then hur-
riedly made for home with the chest;
reaching the hut in safety, but after
excessive toil, at one o'clock in the
morning. Worn out as we were, it was
not in human nature to do more imme-
diately. We rested until two, and had
supper; starting for the hills immedi
ately afterward, armed with three stout
sacks, which, by good luck, were upon
the premises. A little before four we
arrived at the pit, divided the remainder
of the booty, as equally as might be,
among us, and, leaving the holes un-
filled, again set out for the hut, at
which, for the second time, we depos
ited our golden burdens, just as the
first faint streaks of the dawn gleamed
from over the tree-tops in the East.
We were now thoroughly broken
down; but the intense excitement of
the time denied us repose. After an
unquiet slumber of some three or four
hours' duration, we arose, as if by
pre-concert, to make examination of our
treasure.
The chest had been full to the brim,
and we spent the whole day, and the
greater part of the next night, in a
scrutiny of its contents. There had
been nothing like order or arrangement.
Everything had been heaped in promis-
cuously. Having assorted all with care,
we found ourselves possessed of ever
vaster wealth than we had at first sup-
posed. In coin there was rather more
than four hundred and fifty thousand
dollars estimating the value of the
pieces, as accurately as we could, by
the tables of the period. There was
not a particle of silver. All was gold
of antique date and of great variety-
French, Spanish, and German money,
with a few English guineas, and some
counters, of which we had never seen
specimens before. There were several
very large and heavy coins, so worn
that we could make nothing of their
inscriptions. There was no American
money. The value of the jewels we
found more difficulty in estimating.
THE GOLD BUG
67
There were diamonds-some of them
exceedingly large and fine-a hundred
and ten in all, and not one of them
small; eighteen rubies of remarkable
brilliancy;-three hundred and ten
emeralds, all very beautiful; and
twenty-one sapphires, with an opal.
These stones had all been broken from
their settings and thrown loose in the
chest. The settings themselves, which
we picked out from among the other
gold, appeared to have been beaten up
with hammers, as if to prevent identi-
fication. Besides all this, there was a
vast quantity of solid gold ornaments;
nearly two hundred massive finger and
ear-rings; rich chains-thirty of these,
if I remember; eighty-three very large
and heavy crucifixes; five gold censers
of great value; a prodigious golden
punch-bowl, ornamented with richly
chased vine-leaves and Bacchanalian
figures; with two sword-handled exqui-
sitely embossed, and many other
smaller articles which I cannot recol-
lect. The weight of these valuables
exceeded three hundred and fifty
pounds avoirdupois; and in this esti-
Imate I have not included one hundred
and ninety-seven superb gold watches;
three of the number being worth each
five hundred dollars, if one. Many of
them were very old, and as timekeepers
valueless; the works having suffered,
more or less, from corrosion-but all
were richly jewelled and in cases of
great worth. We estimated the entire
contents of the chest, that night, at a
million and a half of dollars; and upon
the subsequent disposal of the trinkets
and jewels (a few being retained for
our own use), it was found that we
had greatly under-valued the treasure.
When, at length, we had concluded
our examination, and the intense ex-
citement of the time had, in some
measure, subsided, Legrand, who saw
that I was dying with impatience for
a solution of this most extraordinary
riddle, entered into a full detail of all
the circumstances connected with it.
"You remember," said he, "the night
when I handed you the rough sketch I
had made of the scarabæus. You recol-
lect also, that I became quite vexed at
you for insisting that my drawing
resembled a death's head. When you
first made this assertion I thought you
were jesting; but afterward I called to
mind the peculiar spots on the back
of the insect, and admitted to myself
that your remark had some little foun-
dation in fact. Still, the sneer at my
graphic powers irritated me for I am
considered a good artist-and, there-
fore, when you handed me the scrap
of parchment, I was about to crumple
it up and throw it angrily into the fire."
"The scrap of paper, you mean,"
said I.
"No; it had much of the appearance
of paper, and at first I supposed it to
be such, but when I came to draw upon
it, I discovered it at once to be a piece
of very thin parchment. It was quite
dirty, you remember. Well, as I was
in the very act of crumpling it up, my
glance fell upon the sketch at which
you had been looking, and you may
imagine my astonishment when I per-
ceived, in fact, the figure of a death's-
head just where, it seemed to me, I
had made the drawing of the beetle.
For a moment I was too much amazed
to think with accuracy. I knew that
my design was very different in detail
from this-although there was a certain
similarity in general outline. Presently
68
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
more
I took a candle, and seating myself at
the other end of the room, proceeded
to scrutinize the parchment
closely. Upon turning it over, I saw
my own sketch upon the reverse, just
as I had made it. My first idea, now,
was mere surprise at the really remark-
able similarity of outline-at the singu-
lar coincidence involved in the fact
that, unknown to me, there should have
been a skull upon the other side of the
parchment, immediately beneath my
figure of the scarabæus, and that this
skull, not only in outline, but in size,
should so closely resemble my drawing.
I say the singularity of this coincidence
absolutely stupefied me for a time.
This is the usual effect of such coinci-
dences. The mind struggles to estab-
lish a connection-a sequence of cause
and effect-and, being unable to do so,
suffers a species of temporary paralysis.
But, when I recovered from this stupor,
there dawned upon me gradually a con-
viction which startled me even far more
than the coincidence. I began dis-
tinctly, positively, to remember that
there had been no drawing upon the
parchment, when I made my sketch of
the scarabæus. I became perfectly cer-
tain of this; for I recollected turning
up first one side and then the other, in
search of the cleanest spot. Had the
skull been then there, of course I could
not have failed to notice it. Here was
indeed a mystery which I felt it impos-
sible to explain; but, even at that early
moment, there seemed to glimmer,
faintly, within the most remote and
secret chambers of my intellect, a glow-
worm-like conception of that truth
which last night's adventure brought to
so magnificent a demonstration. I
arose at once, and putting the parch-
ment securely away, dismissed all fur-
ther reflection until I should be alone.
"When you had gone, and when Jupi-
ter was fast asleep, I betook myself to
a more methodical investigation of the
affair. In the first place I considered
the manner in which the parchment had
come into my possession. The spot
where we discovered the scarabæus was
on the coast of the main-land, about a
mile eastward of the island, and but a
short distance above high-water mark.
Upon my taking hold of it, it gave me
a sharp bite, which caused me to let it
drop. Jupiter, with his accustomed
caution, before seizing the insect, which
had flown toward him, looked about
him for a leaf, or something of that
nature, by which to take hold of it. It
was at this moment that his eyes, and
mine also, fell upon the scrap of parch-
ment, which I then supposed to be
paper. It was lying half buried in the
sand, a corner sticking up. Near the
spot where we found it, I observed the
remnants of the hull of what appeared
to have been a ship's long-boat. The
wreck seemed to have been there for
a very great while; for the resemblance
to boat timbers could scarcely be
traced.
"Well, Jupiter picked up the parch-
ment, wrapped the beetle in it, and
gave it to me. Soon afterward we
turned to go home, and on the way
met Lieutenant G. I showed him
the insect, and he begged me to let him
take it to the fort. Upon my consent-
ing, he thrust it forthwith into his
waistcoat pocket, without the parch-
ment in which it had been wrapped,
and which I had continued to hold in
my hand during his inspection. Per-
haps he dreaded my changing my mind,
THE GOLD BUG
69
and thought it best to make sure of
the prize at once-you know how en-
thusiastic he is on all subjects connected
with Natural History. At the same
time, without being conscious of it, I
must have deposited the parchment in
my own pocket.
"You remember that when I went
to the table, for the purpose of making
a sketch of the beetle, I found no paper
where it was usually kept. I looked
in the drawer, and found none there.
I searched my pockets, hoping to find
an old letter, when my hand fell upon
the parchment. I thus detail the pre-
cise mode in which it came into my
possession; for the circumstances im-
pressed me with peculiar force.
"No doubt you will think me fanci-
ful-but I had already established a
kind of connection. I had put together
two links of a great chain. There was
a boat lying upon a sea-coast, and not
far from the boat was a parchment-
not a paper-with a skull depicted upon
it. You will, of course, ask 'where is
the connection?' I reply that the skull,
or death's-head, is the well-known em-
blem of the pirate. The flag of the
death's-head is hoisted in all engage-
ments.
"I have said that the scrap was parch-
ment, and not paper. Parchment is
durable-almost imperishable. Matters
of little moment are rarely consigned
to parchment; since, for the mere ordi-
nary purposes of drawing or writing,
it is not nearly so well adapted as paper.
This reflection suggested some meaning
-some relevancy-in the death's-head.
I did not fail to observe, also, the form
of the parchment. Although one of its
corners had been, by some accident,
destroyed, it could be seen that the
original form was oblong. It was just
such a slip, indeed, as might have been
chosen for a memorandum-for
record of something to be long remem-
bered and carefully preserved."
a
"But," I interposed, "you say that
the skull was not upon the parchment
when you made the drawing of the
beetle. How then do you trace any
connection between the boat and the
skull-since this latter, according to
your own admission, must have been
designed (God only knows how or by
whom) at some period subsequent to
your sketching the scarabæus?"
"Ah, hereupon turns the whole mys-
tery; although the secret, at this point,
I had comparatively little difficulty in
solving. My steps were sure, and could
afford but a single result. I reasoned,
for example, thus: When I drew the
scarabæus, there was no skull apparent
upon the parchment. When I had com-
pleted the drawing I gave it to you,
and observed you narrowly until you
returned it. You, therefore, did not
design the skull, and no one else was
present to do it. Then it was not done
by human agency. And nevertheless it
was done.
the
"At this stage of my reflections I
endeavored to remember, and did re-
member, with entire distinctness, every
incident which occurred about
period in question. The weather was
chilly (oh, rare and happy accident!),
and a fire was blazing upon the hearth.
I was heated with exercise and sat near
the table. You, however, had drawn a
chair close to the chimney. Just as I
placed the parchment in your hand, and
as you were in the act of inspecting it,
Wolf, the Newfoundland, entered, and
leaped upon your shoulders, With your
70
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
left hand you caressed him and kept
him off, while your right, holding the
parchment, was permitted to fall list
lessly between your knees, and in close
proximity to the fire. At one moment
I thought the blaze had caught it, and
was about to caution you, but, before
I could speak, you had withdrawn it,
and were engaged in its examination.
When I considered all these particu-
lars, I doubted not for a moment that
heat had been the agent in bringing to
light, upon the parchment, the skull
which I saw designed upon it. You
are well aware that chemical prepara-
tions exist, and have existed time out
of mind, by means of which it is pos-
sible to write upon either paper or
vellum, so that the characters shall be-
come visible only when subjected to
the action of fire. Zaffre, digested in
aqua regia, and diluted with four times
its weight of water, is sometimes em-
ployed; a green tint results. The regu-
lus of cobalt, dissolved in spirit of nitre,
gives a red. These colors disappear at
longer or shorter intervals after the
material written upon cools, but again
become apparent upon the re-applica-
tion of heat.
"I now scrutinized the death's-head
with care. Its outer edges-the edges
of the drawing nearest the edge of the
vellum-were far more distinct than the
others. It was clear that the action
of the caloric had been imperfect or
unequal. I immediately kindled a fire,
and subjected every portion of the
parchment to a glowing heat. At first,
the only effect was the strengthening
of the faint lines in the skull; but,
upon persevering in the experiment,
there became visible, at the corner of
the slip, diagonally opposite to the spot
in which the death's-head was deline-
ated, the figure of what I at first sup-
posed to be a goat. A closer scrutiny,
however, satisfied me that it was in-
tended for a kid."
"Ha! ha!" said I, "to be sure I have
no right to laugh at you-a million
and a half of money is too serious a
matter for mirth-but you are not
about to establish a third link in your
chain-you will not find any especial
connection between your pirates and a
goat-pirates, you know, have nothing
to do with goats; they appertain to the
farming interest."
"But I have just said that the figure
was not that of a goat."
"Well, a kid then-pretty much the
same thing."
"Pretty much, but not altogether,"
said Legrand. "You may have heard
of one Captain Kidd. I at once looked
upon the figure of the animal as a kind
of punning or hieroglyphical signature.
I say signature; because its position
upon the vellum suggested this idea.
The death's-head at the corner dia-
gonally opposite, had, in the same man-
ner, the air of a stamp, or seal.
I was sorely put out by the absence of
all else of the body to my imagined
instrument-of the text for my con-
text."
But
"I presume you expected to find a
letter between the stamp and the signa-
ture."
"Something of that kind. The fact
is, I felt irresistibly impressed with a
presentiment of some vast good for-
tune impending. I can scarcely say
why. Perhaps, after all, it was rather
a desire than an actual belief;-but do
you know that Jupiter's silly words,
about the bug being of solid gold, had
THE GOLD BUG
71
a remarkable effect upon my fancy?
And then the series of accidents and
coincidents-these were so very extraor-
dinary. Do you observe how mere an
accident it was that these events should
have occurred upon the sole day of all
the year in which it has been, or may
be sufficiently cool for fire, and that
without the fire, or without the inter-
vention of the dog at the precise mo-
ment in which he appeared, I should
never have become aware of the
death's-head, and so never the possessor
of the treasure."
"But proceed-I am all impatience."
"Well; you have heard, of course, the
many stories current-the thousand
vague rumors afloat about money
buried, somewhere upon the Atlantic
coast, by Kidd and his associates.
These rumors must have had some
foundation in fact. And that the ru-
mors have existed so long and so con-
tinuous, could have resulted, it appeared
to me, only from the circumstance of
the buried treasures still remaining
entombed. Had Kidd concealed his
plunder for a time, and afterward re-
claimed it, the rumors would scarcely
have reached us in their present un-
varying form. You will observe that
the stories told are all about money-
seekers, not about money-finders. Had
the pirate recovered his money, there
the affair would have dropped.
seemed to me that some accident-say
the loss of a memorandum indicating
its locality-had deprived him of the
means of recovering it, and that this
accident had become known to his fol-
lowers, who otherwise might never have
heard that the treasure had been con-
It
cealed at all, and who, busying them-
selves in
in vain, because unguided,
attempts to regain it, had given first
birth, and then universal currency, to
the reports which are now so common.
Have you ever heard of any important
treasure being unearthed along the
coast?"
"Never."
"But that Kidd's accumulations were
immense, is well known. I took it for
granted, therefore, that the earth still
held them; and you will scarcely be
surprised when I tell you that I felt a
hope, nearly amounting to certainty,
that the parchment so strangely found
involved a lost record of the place of
deposit."
"But how did you proceed?"
"I held the vellum again to the fire,
after increasing the heat, but nothing
appeared. I now thought it possible
that the coating of dirt might have
something to do with the failure: so I
carefully rinsed the parchment by pour-
ing warm water over it, and, having
done this, I placed it in a tin pan, with
the skull downward, and put the pan
upon a furnace of lighted charcoal. In
a few minutes, the pan having become
thoroughly heated, I removed the slip,
and, to my inexpressible joy, found it
spotted, in several places, with what
appeared to be figures arranged in lines.
Again I placed it in the pan, and suf-
fered it to remain another minute.
Upon taking it off, the whole was just
as you see it now."
Here Legrand, having re-heated the
parchment, submitted it to my inspec-
tion. The following characters were
72
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
rudely traced, in a red tint, between
the death's-head and the goat:
53305)) 6 ; 48 26 ) 4 ‡
06* 48 +8 ¶ 0 )) 85
* 883 (88) 5
96 ? 8 )* (
) 4 +
;I (
(:49 5 6 2 (5
† ; 46
85
4) 8 ¶
8 4069285 ) ; ) 6 † 8) 4 ‡ ‡ I
(+9 4808 I; 8: 8 I; 48 +85
4) 4 8 5 52 8 8 0 6 * 8 I ( ‡ 9; 48
; (88 4 (34; 48) 4; I6I
;:18 8;?;
;
"But," said I, returning him the slip,
"I am as much in the dark as ever.
Were all the jewels of Golconda await-
ing me upon my solution of this enigma,
I am quite sure that I should be unable
to earn them."
"And yet," said Legrand, "the solu-
tion is by no means so difficult as you
might be led to imagine from the first
hasty inspection of the characters.
These characters, as any one might
readily guess, form a cipher-that is to
say, they convey a meaning; but then
from what is known of Kidd, I could
not suppose him capable of construct-
ing any of the more abstruse crypto-
graphs. I made up my mind, at once,
that this was a simple species-such,
however, as would appear, to the crude
intellect of the sailor, absolutely insolu-
ble without the key."
"And you really solved it?"
"Readily; I have solved others of
an abstruseness ten thousand times
greater. Circumstances, and a certain
bias of mind, have led me to take inter-
est in such riddles, and it may well be
doubted whether human ingenuity can
construct an enigma of the kind which
human ingenuity may not, by proper
application, resolve.
In fact, having
once established connected and legible
characters, I scarcely gave a thought
to the mere difficulty of developing
their import.
"In the present case-indeed in all
cases of secret writing-the first ques-
tion regards the language of the cipher;
for the principles of solution, so far,
especially, as the more simple ciphers
are concerned, depend upon, and are
varied by, the genius of the particular
idiom. In general, there is no alterna-
tive but experiment (directed by proba-
bilities) of every tongue known to him
who attempts the solution, until the
true one be attained. But, with the
cipher now before us all difficulty was
removed by the signature.
The pun
upon the word 'Kidd' is appreciable in
no other language than the English.
But for this consideration I should have
begun my attempts with the Spanish
and French, as the tongues in which a
secret of this kind would most naturally
have been written by a pirate of the
Spanish main. As it was, I assumed
the cryptograph to be English.
"You observe there are no divisions
between the words. Had there been
divisions the task would have been com-
paratively easy. In such cases I should
have commenced with a collation and
analysis of the shorter words, and, had
a word of a single letter occurred, as
is most likely, (a or I, for example,) I
should have considered the solution as
assured. But, there being no division,
my first step was to ascertain the pre-
dominant letters, as well as the least
frequent. Counting all, I constructed
a table thus:
THE GOLD BUG
73
Of the character 8 there are 33.
12.
11.
66
;
26.
4
66
19.
66
16.
66
13.
5
66
6
+1
8.
0
66
92
66
:3
?
"6
¶
6.
5.
4.
3.
2.
there is 1.
"Now, in English, the letter which
most frequently occurs is e. After-
ward, the succession runs thus: aoid
hnrstuycfglm wb k p q xz. E pre-
dominates so remarkably, that an indi-
vidual sentence of any length is rarely
seen, in which it is not the prevailing
character.
"Here, then, we have, in the very
beginning, the groundwork for some-
thing more than a mere guess. The
general use which may be made of the
table is obvious-but, in this particular
cipher, we shall only very partially re-
quire its aid. As our predominant
character is 8, we will commence by
assuming it as the e of the natural al-
phabet. To verify the supposition, let
us observe if the 8 be seen often in
couples-for e is doubled with great
frequency in English-in such words,
for example, as 'meet,' 'fleet,' 'speed,'
'seen,' 'been,' 'agree,' etc. In the pres-
ent instance we see it doubled no less
NOTE.-The character ( has been
omitted, of which there are 10. Other
editions have failed to observe this.-Ed.
than five times, although the crypto-
graph is brief.
"Let us assume 8, then, as e. Now,
of all words in the language, 'the' is
most usual; let us see, therefore,
whether there are not repetitions of any
three characters, in the same order of
collocation, the last of them being 8.
If we discover repetitions of such let-
ters, so arranged, they will most proba-
bly represent the word 'the.' Upon
inspection, we find no less than seven
such arrangements, the characters being
;48. We may, therefore, assume that ;
represents t, 4 represents h, and 8 rep-
resents e-the last being now well con-
firmed. Thus a great step has been
taken.
"But, having established a single
word, we are enabled to establish a
vastly important point; that is to say,
several commencements and termina.
tions of other words. Let us refer, for
example, to the last instance but one,
in which the combination ;48 occurs-
not far from the end of the cipher.
We know that the; immediately ensu-
ing is the commencement of a word,
and, of the six characters succeeding
this 'the,' we are cognizant of no less
than five. Let us set these characters
down, thus, by the letters we know
them to represent, leaving a space for
the unknown-
teeth
"Here we are enabled, at once, to
discard the 'th,' as forming no portion
of the word commencing with the first
t; since, by experiment of the entire
alphabet for a letter adapted to the
vacancy, we perceive that no word can
be formed of which this th can be a
part. We are thus narrowed into
74
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLEN POE
t ee
and, going through the alphabet, if
necessary, as before, we arrive at the
word 'tree,' as the sole possible reading.
We thus gain another letter, r, repre-
sented by (with the words 'the tree'
in juxtaposition.
"Looking beyond these words, for a
short distance, we again see the com-
bination ;48, and employ it by way of
termination to what immediately pre-
cedes. We have thus this arrange-
ment:
or,
the tree ;4(?34 the
substituting the natural letters,
where known, it reads thus:
the tree thr‡?3h the
"Now, if, in place of the unknown
characters, we leave blank spaces, or
substitute dots, we read thus:
the tree thr...h the
when the word 'through' makes itself
evident at once. But this discovery
gives us three new letters, o, u, and g,
represented by ‡, ?, and 3.
"Looking now, narrowly, through the
cipher for combinations of known char-
acters, we find, not very far from the
beginning, this arrangement,
83 (88, or egree
which plainly, is the conclusion of the
word 'degree,' and gives us another
letter, d, represented by +.
"Four letters beyond the word 'de-
gree,' we perceive the combination
;46(;88
"Translating the known characters,
and representing the unknown by dots,
as before, we read thus:
th.rtee
an arrangement immediately suggestive
of the word 'thirteen,' and again fur-
nishing us with two new characters,
i and n, represented by 6 and *.
"Referring, now, to the beginning of
the cryptograph, we find the combina-
tion,
53+++
"Translating as before, we obtain
.good
which assures us that the first letter is
A, and that the first two words are
'A good.'
"It is now time that we arrange our
key, as far as discovered, in a tabular
form, to avoid confusion. It will stand
thus:
5 represents a
†
8
3
5+∞ 3 46*
66
"C
པ
d
e
(6
g
པ
66
h
33
6
""
n
""
0
CC
r
t
u
"We have, therefore, no less than
THE GOLD BUG
73
eleven of the most important letters
represented, and it will be unnecessary
to proceed with the details of the solu-
tion. I have said enough to convince
you that ciphers of this nature are
readily soluble, and to give you some
insight into the rationale of their devel-
opment. But be assured that the speci-
men before us appertains to the very
simplest species of cryptograph. It
now only remains to give you the full
translation of the characters upon the
parchment, as unriddled. Here it is:
"A good glass in the bishop's hostel
in the devil's seat forty-one degrees and
thirteen minutes northeast and by north
main branch seventh limb east side
shoot from the left eye of the death's-
head a bee-line from the tree through
the shot fifty feet out."
"But," said I, "the enigma seems
still in as bad a condition as ever. How
is it possible to extort a meaning from
all this jargon about 'devil's seats,'
'death's-heads,' and 'bishop's hotels?""
"I confess," replied Legrand, "that
the matter still wears a serious aspect,
when regarded with a casual glance.
My first endeavor was to divide the
sentence into the natural division in-
tended by the cryptographist."
"You mean, to punctuate it?”
"Something of that kind."
"But how was it possible to effect
this?"
"I reflected that it had been a point
with the writer to run his words to-
Many editions err in stating only
ten letters have been discovered,
whereas actually there are eleven, letter
u having been omitted.-Ed.
gether without division, so as to increase
the difficulty of solution. Now, a not
over-acute man, in pursuing such an
object, would be nearly certain to
overdo the matter. When, in the
course of his composition, he arrived
at a break in his subject which would
naturally require a pause, or a point,
he would be exceedingly apt to run
his characters, at this place, more than
usually close together. If you will
observe the MS., in the present in-
stance, you will easily detect five such
cases of unusual crowding.* Acting
upon this hint, I made the division
thus:
"A good glass in the bishop's hostel
in the devil's seat-forty-one degrees
and thirteen minutes-northeast and by
north-main branch seventh limb east
side-shoot from the left eye of the
death's-head-a bee-line from the tree
through the shot fifty feet out."
"Even this division," said I, "leaves
me still in the dark."
"It left me also in the dark." replied
Legrand, "for a few days; during which
I made diligent inquiry in the neigh-
borhood of Sullivan's Island, for any
building which went by name of the
'Bishop's Hotel'; for, of course, I
dropped the obsolete word 'hostel.'
Gaining no information on the subject,
I was on the point of extending my
sphere of search, and proceeding in a
more systematic manner, when, one
morning, it entered into my head, quite
*It will be observed that this edition
has printed these letters as stated here.
This has been neglected in other edi-
tions.-Ed.
76
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLEN POE
suddenly, that this 'Bishop's Hostel'
might have some reference to an old
family, of the name of Bessop, which,
time out of mind, had held possession
of an ancient manor-house, about four
miles to the northward of the island.
I accordingly went over to the planta-
tion, and re-instituted my inquiries
among the older negroes of the place.
At length one of the most aged of the
women said that she had heard of such
a place as Bessop's Castle, and thought
that she could guide me to it, but that
it was not a castle, nor a tavern, but
a high rock.
"I offered to pay her well for her
trouble, and, after some demur, she
consented to accompany me to the spot.
We found it without much difficulty,
when, dismissing her, I proceeded to
examine the place. The 'castle' con-
sisted of an irregular assemblage of
cliffs and rocks-one of the latter being
quite remarkable for its height as well
as for its insulated and artificial appear-
ance. I clambered to its apex, and then
felt much at a loss as to what should
be next done.
"While I was busied in reflection, my
eyes fell upon a narrow ledge in the
eastern face of the rock, perhaps a yard
below the summit upon which I stood.
This ledge projected about eighteen
inches, and was not more than a foot
wide, while a niche in the cliff just
above it gave it a rude resemblance to
one of the hollow-backed chairs used
by our ancestors. I made no doubt
that here was the 'devil's-seat' alluded
to in the MS., and now I seemed to
grasp the full secret of the riddle.
"The 'good glass,' I knew, could have
reference to nothing but a telescope;
for the word 'glass' is rarely employed
in any other sense by seamen. Now
here, I at once saw, was a telescope to
be used, and a definite point of view,
admitting no variation, from which to
use it. Nor did I hesitate to believe
that the phrases, 'forty-one degrees and
thirteen minutes,' and 'northeast and by
north,' were intended as directions for
the levelling of the glass. Greatly ex-
cited by these discoveries, I hurried
home, procured a telescope, and re-
turned to the rock.
"I let myself down to the ledge, and
found that it was impossible to retain
a seat upon it except in one particular
position. This fact confirmed my pre-
conceived idea. I proceeded to use the
glass. Of course, the 'forty-one degrees
and thirteen minutes' could allude to
nothing but elevation above the visible
horizon, since the horizontal direction
was clearly indicated by the words,
'northeast and by north.' This latter
direction I at once established by means
of a pocket-compass; then, pointing the
glass as nearly at an angle of forty-one
degrees of elevation as I could do it
by guess, I moved it cautiously up or
down, until my attention was arrested
by a circular rift or opening in the
foliage of a large tree that overtopped
its fellows in the distance. In the
centre of this rift I perceived a white
spot, but could not, at first, distinguish
what it was. Adjusting the focus of
the telescope, I again looked, and now
made it out to be a human skull.
"Upon this discovery I was so san-
guine as to consider the enigma solved;
for the phrase 'main branch, seventh
limb, east side,' could refer only to the
position of the skull upon the tree,
while 'shoot from the left eye of the
death's-head' admitted, also, of but one
THE GOLD BUG
77
F
interpretation, in regard to a search for
buried treasure. I perceived that the
design was to drop a bullet from the
left eye of the skull, and that a bee-
line, or, in other words, a straight line,
drawn from the nearest point of the
trunk through the shot' (or the spot
where the bullet fell), and thence ex-
tended to a distance of fifty feet, would
indicate a definite point-and beneath
this point I thought it at least possible
that a deposit of value lay concealed."
"All this," I said, "is exceedingly
clear, and, although ingenious, still sim-
ple and explicit. When you left the
Bishop's Hotel, what then?"
"Why, having carefully taken the
bearings of the tree, I turned home-
ward. The instant that I left 'the
devil's-seat,' however, the circular rift
vanished; nor could I get a glimpse
of it afterward, turn as I would. What
seems to me the chief ingenuity in this
whole business, is the fact (for repeated
= experiment has convinced me it is a
fact) that the circular opening in ques-
tion is visible from no other attainable
point of view than that afforded by the
narrow ledge upon the face of the rock.
"In this expedition to the 'Bishop's
Hotel' I had been attended by Jupiter,
who had, no doubt, observed, for some
weeks past, the abstraction of my de-
meanor, and took especial care not to
leave me alone. But, on the next day,
= getting up very early, I contrived to
give him the slip, and went into the
hills in search of the tree. After much
toil I found it. When I came home at
night my valet proposed to give me a
flogging. With the rest of the adven-
ture I believe you are as well acquainted
as myself."
"I suppose," said I, "you missed the
spot, in the first attempt at digging,
through Jupiter's stupidity in letting
the bug fall through the right instead
of through the left eye of the skull."
"Precisely. This mistake made a dif-
ference of about two inches and a half
in the 'shot'—that is to say, in the
position of the peg nearest the tree;
and had the treasure been beneath the
'shot,' the error would have been of
little moment; but 'the shot,' together
with the nearest point of the tree, were
merely two points for the establishment
of a line of direction; of course the
error, however trivial in the beginning,
increased as we proceeded with the
line, and by the time we had gone fifty
feet threw us quite off the scent. But
for my deep-seated impressions that
treasure was here somewhere actually
buried, we might have had all our labor
in vain."
"But your grandiloquence, and your
conduct in swinging the beetle-how
excessively odd! I was sure you were
mad. And why did you insist upon
letting fali the bug, instead of a bullet,
from the skull?"
"Why, to be frank, I felt somewhat
annoyed by your evident suspicions
touching my sanity, and so resolved to
punish you quietly, in my own way, by
a little bit of sober mystification. For
this reason I swung the beetle, and for
this reason I let it fall from the tree.
An observation of yours about its great
weight suggested the latter idea."
"Yes, I perceive; and now there is
only one point which puzzles me. What
are we to make of the skeletons found
in the hole?"
"That is a question I am no more
able to answer than yourself. There
78
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
seems, however, only one plausible way
of accounting for them-and yet it is
dreadful to believe in such atrocity as
my suggestion would imply. It is clear
that Kidd-if Kidd indeed secreted this
treasure, which I doubt not-it is clear
that he must have had assistance in
the labor. But this labor concluded,
he may have thought it expedient to
remove all participants in his secret.
Perhaps a couple of blows with a mat-
tock were sufficient, while his coad-
jutors were busy in the pit; perhaps it
required a dozen-who shall tell?"
The Murders in the Rue Morgue
(First published in Graham's Magazine, April, 1841.-Ed.)
THE mental features discoursed of
as the analytical, are, in themselves,
but little susceptible of analysis. We
appreciate them only in their effects.
We know of them, among other things,
that they are always to their possessor,
when inordinately possessed, a source
of the liveliest enjoyment. As the
strong man exults in his physical abil-
ity, delighting in such exercises as call
his muscles into action, so glories the
analyst in that moral activity which
disentangles. He derives pleasure from
even the most trivial occupations bring-
ing his talent into play. He is fond
of enigmas, of conundrums, hierogly-
phics; exhibiting in his solutions of each
a degree of acumen which appears to
the ordinary apprehension præterna-
tural. His results, brought about by
the very soul and essence of method,
have, in truth, the whole air of in-
tuition.
The faculty of re-solution is possibly
much invigorated by mathematical
study, and especially by that highest
branch of it which, unjustly, and merely
on account of its retrograde operations,
has been called, as if par excellence,
analysis. Yet to calculate is not in
itself to analyze. A chess-player, for
example, does the one, without effort
at the other. It follows that the game
of chess, in its effects upon mental
character, is greatly misunderstood. I
am not now writing a treatise, but
simply prefacing a somewhat peculiar
narrative by observations very much
at random; I will, therefore, take oc-
casion to assert that the higher powers
of the reflective intellect are more de-
cidedly and more usefully tasked by
the unostentatious game of draughts
than by all the elaborate frivolity of
chess. In this latter, where the pieces
have different and bizarre motions,
with various and variable values, what
is only complex, is mistaken (a not
unusual error) for what is profound.
The attention is here called powerfully
into play. If it flag for an instant, an
oversight is committed, resulting in
injury or defeat. The possible moves
being not only manifold, but involute,
the chances of such oversights are mul-
tiplied; and in nine cases out of ten,
it is the more concentrative rather than
the more acute player who conquers.
In draughts, on the contrary, where
the moves are unique and have but
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
79
little variation, the probabilities of in-
advertence are diminished, and the
mere attention being left comparatively
unemployed, what advantages are ob-
tained by either party are obtained by
superior acumen. To be less abstract,
let us suppose a game of draughts
where the pieces are reduced to four
kings, and where, of course, no over-
sight is to be expected. It is obvious
that here the victory can be decided
(the players being at all equal) only
by some recherche movement, the re-
sult of some strong exertion of the
intellect. Deprived of ordinary re-
sources, the analyst throws himself into
the spirit of his opponent, identifies
himself therewith, and not unfrequently
sees thus, at a glance, the sole meth-
ods (sometimes indeed absurdly simple
ones) by which he may seduce into
error or hurry into miscalculation.
Whist has long been known for its
influence upon what is termed the cal-
culating power; and men of the high-
est order of intellect have been known
to take an apparently unaccountable
delight in it, while eschewing chess as
frivolous. Beyond doubt there is
nothing of a similar nature so greatly
tasking the faculty of analysis. The
best chess-player in Christendom may
be little more than the best player of
chess; but proficiency in whist im-
plies capacity for success in all these
more important undertakings where
mind struggles with mind. When I
say proficiency, I mean that perfection
in the game which includes a compre-
hension of all the sources whence
legitimate advantage may be derived.
These are not only manifold, but multi-
form, and lie frequently among recesses
of thought altogether inaccessible to
the ordinary understanding. To ob-
serve attentively is to remember dis-
tinctly; and, so far, the concentrative
chess-player will do very well at whist;
while the rules of Hoyle (themselves
based upon the mere mechanism of the
game) are sufficiently and generally
comprehensible. Thus to have a re-
tentive memory, and proceed by "the
book" are points commonly regarded
as the sum total of good playing. But
it is in matters beyond the limits of
mere rule that the skill of the analyst
is evinced. He makes, in silence, a host
of observations and inferences. So,
perhaps, do his companions; and the
difference in the extent of the informa-
tion obtained, lies not so much in the
validity of the inference as in the
quality of the observation. The neces-
sary knowledge is that of what to ob-
serve. Our player confines himself not
at all; nor, because the game is the
object, does he reject deductions from
things external to the game. He ex-
amines the countenance of his partner,
comparing it carefully with that of
each of his opponents. He considers
the mode of assorting the cards in each
hand; often counting trump by trump,
and honor by honor, through the
glances bestowed by their holders upon
each. He notes every variation of face
as the play progresses, gathering a fund
of thought from the differences in the
expression of certainty, of surprise, of
triumph, or chagrin. From the man-
ner of gathering up a trick he judges
whether the person taking it, can make
another in the suit. He recognizes
what is played through feint, by the
manner with which it is thrown upon
the table. A casual or inadvertent
word; the accidental dropping or turn-
80
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ing of a card, with the accompanying
anxiety or carelessness in regard to its
concealment; the counting of the tricks,
with the order of their arrangement;
embarrassment, hesitation, eagerness, or
trepidation-all afford, to his apparently
intuitive perception, indications of the
true state of affairs. The first two or
three rounds having been played, he
is in full possession of the contents
of each hand, and thenceforward puts
down his cards with as absolute a pre-
cision of purpose as if the rest of the
party had turned outward the faces of
their own.
The analytical power should not be
confounded with simple ingenuity; for
while the analyst is necessarily ingeni-
ous, the ingenious man is often re-
markably incapable of analysis. The
constructive or combining power, by
which ingenuity is usually manifested,
and to which the phrenologists (I be-
lieve erroneously) have assigned a
separate organ, supposing it a primitive
faculty, has been so frequently seen.
in those whose intellect bordered other-
wise upon idiocy, as to have attracted
general observation among writers on
morals. Between ingenuity and the
analytic ability there exists a difference
far greater, indeed, than that between
the fancy and the imagination, but of
a character very strictly analogous. It
will be found, in fact, that the in-
genious are always fanciful, and the
truly imaginative never otherwise than
analytic.
The narrative which follows will ap-
pear to the reader somewhat in the
light of a commentary upon the prop-
ositions just advanced.
Residing in Paris during the spring
and part of the summer of 18-. I
there became acquainted with a Mon-
sieur C. Auguste Dupin. This young
gentleman was of an excellent, indeed
of an illustrious family, but, by a
variety of untoward events, had been
reduced to such poverty that the energy
of his character succumbed beneath it,
and he ceased to bestir himself in the
world, or to care for the retrieval of
his fortunes. By courtesy of his cred-
itors, there still remained in his posses-
sion a small remnant of his patrimony;
and, upon the income arising from this,
he managed, by means of a rigorous
economy, to procure the necessaries of
life, without troubling himself about
its superfluities. Books, indeed, were
his sole luxuries, and in Paris these
are easily obtained.
Our first meeting was at an obscure
library in the Rue Montmartre, where
the accident of our both being in search
of the same very rare and very re-
markable volume, brought us into closer
communion. We saw each other again
and again. I was deeply interested in
the little family history which he de-
tailed to me with all that candor which
a Frenchman indulges whenever mere
self is the theme. I was astonished,
too, at the vast extent of his reading;
and, above all, I felt my soul enkindled
within me by the wild fervor, and the
vivid freshness of his imagination.
Seeking in Paris the objects I then
sought, I felt that the society of such
a man would be to me a treasure be-
yond price; and this feeling I frankly
confided to him. It was at length ar
ranged that we should live together
during my stay in the city; and as my
wordly circumstances were somewhat
less embarrassed than his own, I was
permitted to be at the expense of rent-
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
81
ing, and furnishing in a style which
suited the rather fantastic gloom of
our common temper, a time-eaten and
grotesque mansion, long deserted
through superstitions into which we
did not inquire, and tottering to its
fall in a retired and desolate portion
of the Faubourg St. Germain.
Had the routine of our life at this
place been known to the world, we
should have been regarded as madmen
-although, perhaps, as madmen of a
harmless nature. Our seclusion was
perfect. We admitted no visitors.
Indeed the locality of our retirement
had been carefully kept a secret from
my own former associates; and it had
been many years since Dupin had
ceased to know or be known in Paris.
We existed within ourselves alone.
It was a freak of fancy in my friend
(for what else shall I call it?) to be
enamored of the night for her own
sake; and into this bizarrerie, as into
all his others, I quietly fell; giving
myself up to his wild whims with a
perfect abandon. The sable divinity
would not herself dwell with us always;
but we could counterfeit her presence.
At the first dawn of the morning we
closed all the massy shutters of our
old building; lighted a couple of tapers
which, strongly perfumed, threw out
only the ghastliest and feeblest of rays.
By the aid of these we then busied our
souls in dreams-reading, writing, or
conversing, until warned by the clock
of the advent of the true Darkness.
Then we sallied forth into the streets,
arm in arm, continuing the topics of
the day, or roaming far and wide until
a late hour, seeking, amid the wild
lights and shadows of the populous
city, that infinity of mental excitement
which quiet observation can afford.
At such times I could not help re-
marking and admiring (although from
his rich ideality I had been prepared
to expect it) a peculiar analytic ability
in Dupin. He seemed, too, to take an
eager delight in its exercise-if not
exactly in its display-and did not hesi-
tate to confess the pleasure thus de-
rived. He boasted to me, with a low
chuckling laugh, that most men, in re-
spect to himself, wore windows in their
bosoms, and was wont to follow up
such assertions by direct and very
startling proofs of his intimate knowl-
edge of my own. His manner at these
moments was frigid and abstract; his
eyes were vacant in expression; while
his voice, usually a rich tenor, rose
into a treble which would have sounded
petulantly but for the deliberateness
and entire distinctness of the enun-
ciation. Observing him in these moods,
I often dwelt meditatively upon the
old philosophy of the Bi-Part Soul, and
amused myself with the fancy of a
double Dupin-the creative and the
resolvent.
Let it not be supposed, from what
I have just said, that I am detailing
any mystery, or penning any romance.
What I have described in the French-
man was merely the result of an ex-
cited, or perhaps of a diseased, intelli-
gence, but of the character of his
remarks at the periods in question an
example will best convey the idea.
We were strolling one night down a
long dirty street, in the vicinity of the
Palais Royal. Being both, apparently,
occupied with thought, neither of us
had spoken a syllable for fifteen min-
82
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
utes at least. All at once Dupin broke
forth with these words:
"He is a very little fellow, that's
true, and would do better for the
Theatre des Varietes."
"There can be no doubt of that,"
I replied, unwittingly, and not at first
observing (so much had I been ab-
sorbed in reflection) the extraordinary
manner in which the speaker had
chimed in with my meditations. In
an instant afterward I recollected my-
self, and my astonishment was pro-
found.
"Dupin," said I, gravely, "this is
beyond my comprehension. I do not
hesitate to say that I am amazed, and
can scarcely credit my senses. How
was it possible you should know I was
thinking of?" Here I paused, to
ascertain beyond a doubt whether he
really knew of whom I thought.
66
of Chantilly," said he, "why
do you pause? You were remarking
to yourself that his diminutive figure
unfitted him for tragedy."
This was precisely what had formed
the subject of my reflections. Chantilly
was a quondam cobbler of the Rue St.
Dennis, who, becoming stage-mad, had
attempted the role of Xerxes, Crebil-
lon's tragedy so called, and been no-
toriously Pasquinaded for his pains.
"Tell me, for Heaven's sake," I ex-
claimed, "the method-if method there
is by which you have been enabled
to fathom my soul in this matter."
In fact, I was even more startled than
I would have been willing to express.
"It was the fruiterer," replied my
friend, "who brought you to the con-
clusion that the mender of soles was
not of sufficient height for Xerxes et
id genus omne."
"The fruiterer!-you astonish me-
I know no fruiterer whomsoever."
"The man who ran up against you
as we entered the street-it may have
been fifteen minutes ago."
I now remembered that, in fact, a
fruiterer, carrying upon his head a large
basket of apples, had nearly thrown me
down, by accident, as we passed from
the Rue C-
into the thorough-
fare where we stood; but what this
had to do with Chantilly I could not
possibly understand.
There was not a particle of char-
latanerie about Dupin. "I will ex-
plain," he said, "and that you may
comprehend all clearly, we will first
retrace the course of your meditations,
from the moment in which I spoke to
you until that of the rencontre with
the fruiterer in question. The larger
links of the chain run thus-Chantilly,
Orion, Dr. Nichols, Epicurus, Stere-
otomy the street stones, the fruit-
erer."
There are few persons who have
not, at some period of their lives,
amused themselves in retracing their
steps by which particular conclusions.
of their own minds have been attained.
The occupation is often full of interest;
and he who attempts it for the first
time is astonished by the apparently
illimitable distance and incoherence be-
tween the starting-point and the goal.
What, then, must have been my amaze-
ment, when I heard the Frenchman
speak what he had just spoken, and
I could not help acknowledging that
he had spoken the truth. He con-
tinued:
"We had been talking of horses, if
I remember aright, just before leaving
the Rue C
This was the last
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
83
subject we discussed. As we crossed
into this street, a fruiterer, with a
large basket upon his head, brushing
quickly past us, thrust you upon a pile
of paving-stones collected at a spot
where the causeway is undergoing re-
pair. You stepped upon one of the
loose fragments, slipped, slightly
strained your ankle, appeared vexed or
sulky, muttered a few words, turned
to look at the pile, and then proceeded
in silence. I was not particularly at-
tentive to what you did; but observa-
tion has become with me, of late, a
species of necessity.
"You kept your eyes upon the
ground-glancing, with a petulant ex-
pression, at the holes and ruts in the
pavement, (so that I saw you were
still thinking of the stones,) until we
reached the little alley called Lamar-
tine, which has been paved, by way
of experiment, with the overlapping
and riveted blocks. Here your counte-
nance brightened up, and, perceiving
your lips move, I could not doubt that
you murmured the word 'stereotomy,'
a term very affectedly applied to this
species of pavement. I knew that you
could not say to yourself 'stereotomy'
without being brought to think of ato-
mies, and thus of the theories of Epi-
curus; and since, when we discussed
this subject not very long ago, I men-
tioned to you how singularly, yet with
how little notice, the vague guesses of
that noble Greek had met with con-
firmation in the late nebular cosmog-
ony, I felt that you could not avoid
casting your eyes upward to the great
nebula in Orion, and I certainly ex-
pected that you would do so. You
did look up; and I was now assured that
I had correctly followed your steps.
But in that bitter tirade upon Chan-
tilly, which appeared in yesterday's
'Musee,' the satirist, making some dis-
graceful allusions to the cobbler's
change of name upon assuming the
buskin, quoted a Latin line about which
we have often conversed. I mean the
line
Perdidit antiquum litera prima sonum.
I had told you that this was in refer-
ence to Orion, formerly written Urion;
and, from certain pungencies connected
with this explanation, I was aware that
you could not have forgotten it. It
was clear, therefore, that you would
not fail to combine the two ideas of
Orion and Chantilly. That you did
combine them I saw by the character
of the smile which passed over your
lips. You thought of the poor cob-
bler's immolation. So far, you had
been stooping in your gait; but now
I saw you draw yourself up to your
full height. I was then sure that you
reflected upon the diminutive figure of
Chantilly. At this point I interrupted
your mediations to remark that as, in
fact, he was a very little fellow-that
Chantilly he would do better at the
Theatre des Varietes."
Not long after this, we were looking
over an evening edition of the Gazette
des Tribunaux, when the following par-
agraphs arrested our attention.
――
"EXTRAORDINARY MURDERS. This
morning, about three o'clock, the in-
habitants of the Quartier St. Roch were
roused from sleep by a succession of
terrific shrieks, issuing, apparently,
from the fourth story of a house in
the Rue Morgue, known to be in the
sole occupancy of one Madame L'Es-
84
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
panaye, and her daughter, Mademoiselle
Camille L'Espanaye. After some de-
lay, occasioned by a fruitless attempt
to procure admission in the usual man-
ner, the gateway was broken in with
a crowbar, and eight or ten of the
neighbors entered, accompanied by two
gendarmes. By this time the cries had
ceased; but, as the party rushed up
the first flight of stairs, two or more
rough voices, in angry contention, were
distinguished, and seemed to proceed
from the upper part of the house. As
the second landing was reached, these
sounds, also, had ceased, and every
thing remained perfectly quiet. The
party spread themselves, and hurried.
from room to room. Upon arriving
at a large back chamber in the fourth
story, (the door of which, being found
locked, with the key inside, was forced
open,) a spectacle presented itself
which struck every one present not
less with horror than with astonish-
ment.
"The apartment was in the wildest
disorder-the furniture broken and
thrown about in all directions. There
was only one bedstead; and from this
the bed had been removed, and thrown
into the middle of the floor. On a
chair lay a razor, besmeared with
blood. On the hearth were two or
three long and thick tresses of gray
human hair, also dabbled with blood,
and seeming to have been pulled out
by the roots. Upon the floor were
found four Napoleons, an ear-ring of
topaz, three large silver spoons, three
smaller of metal d'Alger, and two bags,
containing nearly four thousand francs
in gold. The drawers of a bureau,
which stood in one corner, were open,
and had been, apparently, rifled, al-
though many articles still remained in
them. A small iron safe was discov-
ered under the bed (not under the bed-
stead). It was open, with the key
still in the door. It had no contents
beyond a few old letters, and other
papers of little consequence.
"Of Madame L'Espanaye no traces
were here seen; but an unusual quan-
tity of soot being observed in the fire-
place, a search was made in the chim-
ney, and (horrible to relate!) the
corpse of the daughter, head down-
ward, was dragged therefrom; it hav-
ing been thus forced up the narrow
aperture for a considerable distance.
The body was quite warm. Upon ex-
amining it, many excoriations were per-
ceived, no doubt occasioned by the
violence with which it had been thrust
up and disengaged.
Upon the face
were many severe scratches, and,
upon the throat, dark bruises, and deep.
indentations of finger nails, as if the
deceased had been throttled to death.
"After a thorough investigation of
every portion of the house without far-
ther discovery, the party made its way
into a small paved yard in the rear of
the building, where lay the corpse of
the old lady, with her throat so en-
tirely cut that, upon an attempt to
raise her, the head fell off. The body,
as well as the head, was fearfully muti-
lated the former SO much so as
scarcely to retain any semblance of
humanity.
"To this horrible mystery there is
not as yet, we believe, the slightest
clew."
The next day's paper had these addi-
tional particulars:
"The Tragedy in the Rue Morgue.-
Many individuals have been examined
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
85
in relation to this most extraordinary
and frightful affair," [the word 'affaire'
has not yet, in France, that levity of
import which it conveys with us] "but
nothing whatever has transpired to
throw light upon it. We give below
all the material testimony elicited.
"Pauline Dubourg, laundress, deposes
that she has known both the deceased
for three years, having washed for
them during that period. The old lady
and her daughter seemed on good
terms-very affectionate toward each
other. They were excellent pay. Could
not speak in regard to their mode or
means of living. Believed that Ma-
dame L. told fortunes for a living.
Was reputed to have money put by.
Never met any person in the house
when she called for the clothes or
took them home. Was sure that they
had no servant in employ. There ap-
peared to be no furniture in any part
of the building except in the fourth
story.
"Pierre Moreau, tobacconist, deposes
that he has been in the habit of selling
small quantities of tobacco and snuff
to Madame L'Espanaye for nearly four
years. Was born in the neighborhood,
and has always resided there. The de-
ceased and her daughter had occupied
the house in which the corpses were
found, for more than six years. It was
formerly occupied by a jeweller, who
under-let the upper rooms to various
persons. The house was the property
of Madame L. She became dissatisfied
with the abuse of the premises by her
tenant, and moved into them herself,
refusing to let any portion. The old
lady was childish. Witness had seen
the daughter some five or six times dur-
ing the six years. The two lived an
exceedingly retired life-were reputed
to have money. Had heard it said
among the neighbors that Madame L.
told fortunes-did not believe it. Had
never seen any person enter the door
except the old lady and her daughter,
a porter once or twice, and a physician
some eight or ten times.
"Many other persons, neighbors, gave
evidence to the same effect. No one
was spoken of as frequenting the house.
It was not known whether there were
any living connections of Madame L.
and her daughter. The shutters of the
front windows were seldom opened.
Those in the rear were always closed,
with the exception of the large black
room, fourth story. The house was a
good house-not very old.
"Isidore Muset, gendarme, deposes
that he was called to the house about
three o'clock in the morning, and found
some twenty or thirty persons at the
gateway, endeavoring to gain admit-
tance. Forced it open, at length, with a
bayonet-not with a crowbar. Had
but little difficulty in getting it open,
on account of its being a double or
folding gate, and bolted neither at bot-
tom nor top. The shrieks were con-
tinued until the gate was forced-and
then suddenly ceased. They seemed
to be screams of some person (or per-
sons) in great agony-were loud and
drawn out, not short and quick. Wit-
nesses led the way up stairs. Upon
reaching the first landing, heard two
voices in loud and angry contention-
the one a gruff voice, the other much
shriller-a very strange voice. Could
distinguish some words of the former,
which was that of a Frenchman. Was
positive that it was not a woman's
voice. Could distinguish the words
86
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
'sacre' and 'diable.' The shrill voice
was that of a foreigner. Could not
be sure whether it was the voice of a
man or of a woman. Could not make
out what was said, but believed the
language to be Spanish. The state of
the room and of the bodies was de-
scribed by this witness as we described
them yesterday.
"Henri Duval, a neighbor, and by
trade a silver-smith, deposes that he
was one of the party who first entered
the house. Corroborates the testimony
of Muset in general. As soon as they
forced an entrance, they re-closed the
door, to keep out the crowd, which
collected very fast, notwithstanding the
lateness of the hour. The shrill voice,
this witness thinks, was that of an
Italian. Was certain it was not French.
Could not be sure that it was a man's
voice. It might have been a wom-
an's. Was not acquainted with the Ital-
ian language. Could not distinguish
the words, but was convinced by the
intonation that the speaker was an
Italian. Knew Madame L. and her
daughter. Had conversed with both
frequently. Was sure that the shrill
voice was not that of either of the de-
ceased.
-Odenheimer, restaurateur.
This witness volunteered his testimony.
Not speaking French, was examined
through an interpreter. Is a native of
Amsterdam. Was passing the house
at the time of the shrieks. They lasted
for several minutes-probably ten.
They were long and loud-very awful
and distressing. Was one of those who
entered the building. Corroborated the
previous evidence in every respect but
one. Was sure that the shrill voice was
that of a man-of a Frenchman. Could
not distinguish the words uttered. They
were loud and quick-unequal-spoken
apparently in fear as well as in anger.
The voice was harsh-not so much
shrill as harsh. Could not call it a
shrill voice. The gruff voice said re-
peatedly, 'sacre,'
'mon Dieu.'
'diable, and once
"Jules Mignaud, banker, of the firm
of Mignaud et Fils, Rue Deloraine.
Is the elder Mignaud. Madame L'Es-
panaye had some property. Had opened
an account with his banking house in
the spring of the year-(eight years
previously). Made frequent deposits
in small sums. Had checked for noth-
ing until the third day before her
death, when she took out in person
the sum of 4000 francs. This sum
was paid in gold, and a clerk sent home
with the money.
"Adolphe Le Bon, clerk to Mignaud
et Fils, deposes that on the day in
question, about noon, he accompanied
Madame L'Espanaye to her residence
with the 4000 francs, put up in two
bags. Upon the door being opened,
Mademoiselle L. appeared and took
from his hands one of the bags, while
the old lady relieved him of the other.
He then bowed and departed. Did
not see any person in the street at the
time. It is a by-street-very lonely.
"William Bird, tailor, deposes that
he was one of the party who entered
the house. Is an Englishman. Has
lived in Paris two years. Was one of
the first to ascend the stairs. Heard
the voices in contention. The gruff
voice was that of a Frenchman. Could
make out several words, but cannot
now remember all. Heard distinctly
'sacre' and 'mon Dieu.' There was a
sound at the moment as if of several
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
87
persons struggling-a scraping and
scuffling sound. The shrill voice was
very loud-louder than the gruff one.
Is sure that it was not the voice of an
Englishman. Appeared to be that of
a German. Might have been a wom-
an's voice. Does not understand Ger-
man.
"Four of the above-named witnesses
being recalled, deposed that the door
of the chamber in which was found the
body of Mademoiselle L. was locked
on the inside when the party reached
it. Every thing was perfectly silent-
no groans or noises of any kind. Upon
forcing the door no person was seen.
The windows, both of the back and
front room, were down and firmly fas-
tened from within. A door between
the two rooms was closed but not
locked. The door leading from the
front room into the passage was locked,
with the key on the inside. A small
room in the front of the house, on the
fourth story, at the head of the passage,
was open, the door being ajar. This
room was crowded with old beds, boxes,
and so forth. These were carefully re-
moved and searched. There was not an
inch of any portion of the house which
was not carefully searched. Sweeps
were sent up and down the chimneys.
The house was a four-story one, with
garrets (mansardes). A trap-door on
the roof was nailed down very se-
curely did not appear to have been
opened for years.
The time elapsing
between the hearing of the voices in
contention and the breaking open of
the room door was variously stated
by the witnesses. Some made it as
short as three minutes-some as long
as five. The door was opened with
difficulty.
"Alfonzo Garcio, undertaker, deposes
that he resides in the Rue Morgue.
Is a native of Spain. Was one of the
party who entered the house. Did not
proceed up stairs. Is nervous, and was
apprehensive of the consequences of
agitation. Heard the voices in con-
tention. The gruff voice was that of a
Frenchman. Could not distinguish
what was said. The shrill voice was
that of an Englishman-is sure of this.
Does not understand the English lan-
guage, but judges by the intonation.
"Alberto Montani, confectioner, de-
poses that he was among the first to as-
cend the stairs. Heard the voices in
question.
The gruff voice was that
of a Frenchman. Distinguished several
words. The speaker appeared to be
expostulating. Could not make out
the words of the shrill voice. Spoke
quick and unevenly.
quick and unevenly. Thinks it the
voice of a Russian. Corroborates the
general testimony. Is an Italian.
Never conversed with a native of Rus-
sia.
"Several witnesses, recalled, here
testified that the chimneys of all the
rooms on the fourth story were too
narrow to admit the passage of a hu-
man being. By 'sweeps' were meant
cylindrical sweeping-brushes, such as
are employed by those who clean chim-
neys. These brushes were passed up
and down every flue in the house.
There is no back passage by which
any one could have descended while
the party proceeded up stairs.
The
body of Mademoiselle L'Espanaye was
so firmly wedged in the chimney that
it could not be got down until four
or five of the party united their
strength.
"Paul Dumas, physician, deposes that
88
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
he was called to view the bodies about
daybreak. They were both then lying
on the sacking of the bedstead in the
chamber where Mademoiselle L. was
found. The corpse of the young lady
was much bruised and excoriated. The
fact that it had been thrust up the
chimney would sufficiently account for
these appearances. The throat was
greatly chafed. There were several
deep scratches just below the chin, to-
gether with a series of livid spots
which were evidently the impression
of fingers. The face was fearfully dis-
colored, and the eyeballs protruded.
The tongue had been partially bitten.
through. A large bruise was discov-
ered upon the pit of the stomach, pro-
duced, apparently, by the pressure of
a knee. In the opinion of M. Dumas,
Mademoiselle L'Espanaye had been
throttled to death by some person or
persons unknown. The corpse of the
mother was horribly mutilated. All
the bones of the right leg and arm
were more or less shattered. The left
tibia much splintered, as well as all
the ribs of the left side. Whole body
dreadfully bruised and discolored. It
was not possible to say how the in-
juries had been inflicted. A heavy
club of wood, or a broad bar of iron-
a chair any large, heavy, and obtuse
weapon would have produced such re-
sults, if wielded by the hands of a
very powerful man. No woman could
have inflicted the blows with any
weapon. The head of the deceased,
when seen by witness, was entirely
separated from the body, and was also
greatly shattered. The throat had evi-
dently been cut with some very sharp
instrument-probably with a razor.
"Alexandre Etienne, surgeon, was
called with M. Dumas to view the
bodies. Corroborated the testimony
and the opinions of M. Dumas.
"Nothing further of importance was
elicited, although several other persons
were examined. A murder so mysteri-
ous, and so perplexing in all its par-
ticulars, was never before committed
in Paris-if indeed a murder has been
committed at all. The police are en-
tirely at fault-an unusual occurrence
in affairs of this nature. There is not,
however, the shadow of a clew appar-
ent."
The evening edition of the paper
stated that the greatest excitement still
continued in the Quartier St. Roch-
that the premises in question had been
carefully re-searched, and fresh exami-
nations of witnesses instituted, but all
to no purpose. A postscript, however,
mentioned that Adolphe Le Bon had
been arrested and imprisoned-although
nothing appeared to criminate him be-
yond the facts already detailed.
Dupin seemed singularly interested
in the progress of this affair—at least
so I judged from his manner, for he
made no comments. It was only after
after the announcement that Le Bon
had been imprisoned, that he asked
me my opinion respecting the murders.
I could merely agree with all Paris
in considering them an insoluble mys-
tery. I saw no means by which it
would be possible to trace the mur-
derer.
"We must not judge of the means,"
said Dupin, "by this shell of an exami-
nation. The Parisian police, so much
extolled for acumen, are cunning, but
no more. There is no method in their
proceedings, beyond the method of the
moment. They make a vast parade
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
89
of measures; but, not unfrequently,
these are so ill-adapted to the objects
proposed, as to put us in mind of
Monsieur Jourdain's calling for his
robe-de-chambre pour mieux entendre
la musique. The results attained by
them are not unfrequently surprising,
but, for the most part, are brought
about by simple diligence and activity.
= When these qualities are unavailing,
their schemes fail. Vidocq, for ex-
ample, was a good guesser, and a per-
severing man. But, without educated
thought, he erred continually by the
very intensity at his investigations. He
impaired his vision by holding the ob-
Eject too close. He might see, perhaps,
one or two points with unusual clear-
ness, but in so doing he, necessarily,
lost sight of the matter as a whole.
Thus there is such a thing as being too
profound. Truth is not always in a
well. In fact, as regards the more
important knowledge, I do believe that
she is invariably superficial. The depth
lies in the valleys where we seek her,
and not upon the mountain-tops where
she is found. The modes and sources
of this kind of error are well typified
in the contemplation of the heavenly
bodies. To look at a star by glances-
to view it in a side-long way, by turn-
ing toward it the exterior portions of
the retina (more susceptible of feeble
impressions of light than the interior),
is to behold the star distinctly—is to
have the best appreciation of its lus-
tre-a lustre which grows dim just in
proportion as we turn our vision fully
upon it. A greater number of rays
actually fall upon the eye in the lat-
ter case, but in the former, there is
1 the more refined capacity for compre-
hension. By undue profundity we per-
plex and enfeeble thought; and it is
possible to make even Venus herself
vanish from the firmament by a scru
tiny too sustained, too concentrated
or too direct.
"As for these murders, let us enter
into some examinations for ourselves,
before we make up an opinion respect-
ing them.
ing them. An inquiry will afford us
amusement," [I thought this an odd
term, so applied, but said nothing] "and
besides, Le Bon once rendered me a
service for which I am not ungrateful.
We will go and see the premises with
our own eyes. I know G
the
Prefect of Police, and shall have no
difficulty in obtaining the necessary
permission."
9
The permission was obtained, and
we proceeded at once to the Rue
Morgue. This is one of those miser-
able thoroughfares which intervene be-
tween the Rue Richelieu and the Rue
St. Roch. It was late in the afternoon
when we reached it, as this quarter is
at a great distance from that in which
we resided. The house was readily
found; for there were still many per-
sons gazing up at the closed shutters,
with an objectless curiosity, from the
opposite side of the way. It was an
ordinary Parisian house, with a gate-
way, on one side of which was a glazed
watch-box, with a sliding panel in the
window, indicating a loge de concierge.
Before going in we walked up the
street, turned down an alley, and then,
again turning, passed in the rear of
the building-Dupin, meanwhile, exam-
ining the whole neighborhood, as well
as the house, with a minuteness of at-
tention for which I could see no pos-
sible object.
Retracing our steps we came again
90
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
to the front of the dwelling, rang, and
having shown our credentials, were ad-
mitted by the agents in charge. We
went up stairs-into the chamber where
the body of Mademoiselle L'Espanaye
had been found, and where both the
deceased still lay. The disorders of
the room had, as usual, been suffered
to exist. I saw nothing beyond what
had been stated in the Gazette des
Tribunaux. Dupin scrutinized every
thing-not excepting the bodies of the
victims. We then went into the other
rooms, and into the yard; a gendarme
accompanying us throughout. The ex-
amination occupied us until dark, when
we took our departure. On our way
home my companion stepped in for
a moment at the office of one of the
daily papers.
I have said that the whims of my
friend were manifold, and that Je les
menageais:-for this phrase there is no
English equivalent. It was his humor,
now, to decline all conversation on the
subject of the murder, until about noon
the next day. He then asked me, sud-
denly, if I had observed any thing pe-
culiar at the scene of the atrocity.
There was something in his manner
of emphasizing the word "peculiar,"
which caused me to shudder, without
knowing why.
"No, nothing peculiar," I said; "noth-
ing more, at least, than we both saw
stated in the paper."
"The Gazette," he replied, "has not
entered, I fear, into the unusual hor-
ror of the thing. But dismiss the idle
opinions of this print. It appears to
me that this mystery is considered
insoluble, for the very reason which
should cause it to be regarded as easy
of solution-I mean for the outre
character of its features. The police:
are confounded by the seeming absence
of motive-not for the murder itself- |
but for the atrocity of the murder.
They are puzzled, too, by the seeming
impossibility of reconciling the voices
heard in contention, with the facts that
no one was discovered upstairs by the
assassinated Mademoiselle L'Espanaye,
and that there were no means of egress
without the notice of the party ascend-
ing. The wild disorder of the room;
the corpse thrust, with the head down-
ward, up the chimney; the frightful
mutilation of the body of the old lady;
these considerations, with those just
mentioned, and others which I need
not mention, have sufficed to paralyze
the powers, by putting completely at
fault the boasted acumen, of the gov-
ernment agents. They have fallen into
the gross but common error of con-
founding the unusual with the abstruse.
But it is by these deviations from the
plane of the ordinary, that reason feels
its way, if at all, in its search for the
true. In investigations such as we are
now pursuing, it should not be so much
asked 'what has occurred,' as 'what
has occurred that has never occurred
before.' In fact, the facility with which
I shall arrive, or have arrived, at the
solution of this mystery, is in the direct
ratio of its apparent insolubility in the
eyes of the police."
I stared at the speaker in mute as-
tonishment.
"I am now awaiting," continued he,
looking toward the door of our apart-
ment-"I am now awaiting a person
who, although perhaps not the perpe-
trator of these butcheries, must have
been in some measure implicated in
their perpetration. Of the worst por-
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
91
tion of the crimes committed, it is
probable that he is innocent. I hope
that I am right in this supposition;
for upon it I build my expectation of
reading the entire riddle. I look for
the man here-in this room-every mo-
ment. It is true that he may not ar-
rive; but the probability is that he
will. Should he come, it will be neces-
sary to detain him. Here are pistols;
and we both know how to use them
when occasion demands their use."
I took the pistols, scarcely knowing
what I did, or believing what I heard,
while Dupin went on, very much as
if in a soliloquy. I have already spoken
of his abstract manner at such times.
His discourse was addressed to myself;
but his voice, although by no means
loud, had that intonation which is com-
monly employed in speaking to some
one at a great distance. His eyes, va-
cant in expression, regarded only the
wall.
"That the voices heard in conten-
tion," he said, "by the party upon the
stairs, were not the voices of the
women themselves, was fully proved
by the evidence. This relieves us of all
doubt upon the question whether the
old lady could have first destroyed the
daughter, and afterward have commit-
ted suicide. I speak of this point
chiefly for the sake of method; for the
strength of Madame L'Espanaye would
have been utterly unequal to the task
of thrusting her daughter's corpse up
the chimney as it was found; and the
nature of the wounds upon her own
person entirely precludes the idea of
self-destruction. Murder, then, has
been committed by some third party;
and the voices of this third party were
those heard in contention. Let me
now advert—not to the whole testimony
respecting these voices-but to what
was peculiar in that testimony. Did
you observe any thing peculiar about
it?"
I remarked that. while all the wit-
nesses agreed in supposing the gruff
voice to be that of a Frenchman, there
was much disagreement in regard to the
shrill, or, as one individual termed it,
the harsh voice.
"That was the evidence itself," said
Dupin, "but it was not the peculiarity
of the evidence. You have observed
nothing distinctive. Yet there was
something to be observed. The wit-
nesses, as you remark, agreed about
the gruff voice; they were here unani-
mous. But in regard to the shrill voice,
the peculiarity is not that they dis-
agreed-but that, while an Italian, an
Englishman, a Spaniard, a Hollander, and
a Frenchman attempted to describe it,
each one spoke of it as that of a for-
eigner. Each is sure that it was not
the voice of one of his own country-
men. Each likens it-not to the voice
of an individual of any nation with
whose language he is conversant-but
the converse. The Frenchman supposes
it the voice of a Spaniard, and 'might
have distinguished some words had he
been acquainted with the Spanish.'
The Dutchman maintains it to have
been that of a Frenchman; but he find
it stated that 'not understanding
French this witness was examined
through an interpreter.' The English-
man thinks it the voice of a German,
and 'does not understand German.'
The Spaniard 'is sure' that it was that
of an Englishman, but 'judges by the
intonation' altogether, as he has no
knowledge of the English.' The Italian
92
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
believes it the voice of a Russian, but
'has never conversed with a native of
Russia. A second Frenchman differs,
moreover, with the first, and is positive
that the voice was that of an Italian;
but, not being cognizant of that tongue,
is, like the Spaniard, 'convinced by the
intonation.' Now, how strangely un-
usual must that voice have really been,
about which such testimony as this
could have been elicited!-in whose
tones, even, denizens of the five great
divisions of Europe could recognize
nothing familiar! You will say that it
might have been the voice of an Asi-
atic-of an African. Neither Asiatics
nor Africans abound in Paris; but,
without denying the inference, I will
now merely call your attention to three
points. The voice is termed by one
witness 'harsh rather than shrill.' It
is represented by two others to have
been 'quick and unequal.' No words-
no sounds resembling words-were by
any witness mentioned as distinguish-
able.
"I know not," continued Dupin,
"what impression I may have made,
so far, upon your own understanding;
but I do not hesitate to say that legiti-
mate deductions even from this por-
tion of the testimony-the portion re-
specting the gruff and shrill voices-are
in themselves sufficient to engender a
suspicion which should give direction.
to all farther progress in the investiga-
tion of the mystery. I said 'legitimate
deductions'; but my meaning is not
thus fully expressed. I designed to
imply that the deductions are the sole
proper ones, and that the suspicion
arises inevitably from them as the sin-
gle result. What the suspicion is,
however, I will not say just yet.
I
merely wish you to bear in mind that,
with myself, it was sufficiently forcible
to give a definite form-a certain ten-
dency to my inquiries in the chamber.
"Let us now transport ourselves, in
fancy, to this chamber. What shall we
first seek here? The means of egress
employed by the murderers. It is not
too much to say that neither of us be-
lieve in præternatural events. Madame
and Mademoiselle L'Espanaye were
not destroyed by spirits. The doers
of the deed were material and escaped
materially. Then how? Fortunately
there is but one mode of reasoning
upon the point, and that mode must
lead us to a definite decision. Let us
examine, each by each, the possible
means of egress. It is clear that the
assassins were in the room where Made-
moiselle L'Espanaye was found, or at
least in the room adjoining, when the
party ascended the stairs. It is, then,
only from these two apartments that
we have to seek issues. The police
have laid bare the floors, the ceiling,
and the masonry of the walls, in every
direction. No secret issues could have
escaped their vigilance. But, not trust-
ing to their eyes, I examined with my
own. There were, then, no secret is-
Both doors leading from the
rooms into the passage were securely
locked, with the keys inside. Let us
turn to the chimneys. These, although
of ordinary width for some eight or
ten feet above the hearths, will not
admit, throughout their extent, the
body of a large cat. The impossibility
of egress, by means already stated,
being thus absolute, we are reduced to
the windows. Through those of the
front room no one could have escaped
without notice from the crowd in the
sues.
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
93
street. The murderers must have
passed, then, through those of the back
room. Now, brought to this conclusion
in so unequivocal a manner as we are,
it is not our part, as reasoners, to re-
ject it on account of apparent impossi-
bilities. It is only left for us to prove
that these apparent 'impossibilities' are,
in reality, not such.
"There are two windows in the cham-
ber. One of them is unobstructed by
furniture, and is wholly visible. The
lower portion of the other is hidden
from view by the head of the unwieldy
bedstead which is thrust close up
against it. The former was found se-
curely fastened from within. It re-
sisted the utmost force of those who
endeavored to raise it. A large gimlet-
hole had been pierced in its frame to
the left, and a very stout nail was
found fitted therein, nearly to the head.
Upon examining the other window, a
similar nail was seen similarly fitted
in it; and a vigorous attempt to raise
this sash failed also. The police were
now entirely satisfied that egress had
not been in these directions. And,
therefore, it was thought a matter of
supererogation to withdraw the nails
and open the windows.
"My own examination was somewhat
more particular, and was so for the rea-
son I have just given-because here
it was, I knew, that all apparent im-
possibilities must be proved to be not
such in reality.
"I proceeded to think thus-a pos-
teriori.
The murderers did escape
from one of these windows. This be-
ing so, they could not have re-fas-
tened the sashes from the inside, as
they were found fastened-the consid-
eration which put a stop, through its
obviousness, to the scrutiny of the po..
lice in this quarter. Yet the sashes
were fastened. They must, then, have
the power of fastening themselves.
There was no escape from this con-
clusion. I stepped to the unobstructed
casement, withdrew the nail with some
difficulty, and attempted to raise the
sash. It resisted all my efforts, as I
had anticipated. A concealed spring
must, I now knew, exist; and this cor-
roboration of my idea convinced me
that my premises, at least, were cor-
rect, however mysterious still appeared
the circumstances attending the nails.
A careful search soon brought to light
the hidden spring. I pressed it, and,
satisfied with the discovery, forbore to
upraise the sash.
"I now replaced the nail and re-
garded it attentively. A person pass-
ing through this window might have
reclosed it, and the spring would have
caught-but the nail could not have
been replaced. The conclusion was
plain, and again narrowed in the field
of my investigations. The assassins
must have escaped through the other
window. Supposing, then, the springs.
upon each sash to be the same, as was
probable, there must be found a dif-
ference between the nails, or at least
between the modes of their fixture.
Getting upon the sacking of the bed-
stead, I looked over the head-board
minutely at the second casement. Pass-
ing my hand down behind the board,
I readily discovered and pressed the
spring, which was, as I had supposed,
identical in character with its neighbor
I now looked at the nail. it was as
stout as the other, and apparently fitted
in the same manner-driven in nearly
up to the head.
94
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"You will say that I was puzzled;
but, if you think so, you must have
misunderstood the nature of the induc-
tions. To use a sporting phrase, I
had not been once at fault.' The
scent had never for an instant been
lost. There was no flaw in any link
of the chain. I had traced the secret
to its ultimate result,-and that result
was the nail. It had, I say, in every
respect, the appearance of its fellow
in the other window; but this fact was
an absolute nullity (conclusive as it
might seem to be) when compared
with the consideration that here, at
this point, terminated the clew. 'There
must be something wrong,' I said,
about the nail.' I touched it; and
the head, with about a quarter of an
inch of the shank came off in my fin-
ers. The rest of the shank was in
the gimlet-hole, where it had been
broken off. The fracture was an old
one (for its edges were incrusted with
rust), and had apparently been ac-
complished by the blow of a hammer,
which had partially imbedded, in the
top of the bottom sash, the head por-
tion of the nail. I now carefully re-
placed this head portion in the indenta-
tion whence I had taken it, and the
resemblance to a perfect nail was com-
plete the fissure was invisible. Press-
ing the spring, I gently raised the sash
for a few inches; the head went up
with it, remaining firm in its bed. I
closed the window, and the semblance
of the whole nail was again perfect.
"This riddle, so far, was now un-
riddled. The assassin had escaped
through the window which looked upon
the bed. Dropping of its own accord
upon his exit (or perhaps purposely
closed) it had become fastened by the
spring; and it was the retention of this
spring which had been mistaken by
the police for that of the nail, farther
inquiry being thus considered unneces-
sary.
"The next question is that of the
mode of descent. Upon this point I
had been satisfied in my walk with
you around the building. About five
feet and a half from the casement in
question there runs a lightning-rod.
From this rod it would have been
impossible for any one to reach the
window itself, to say nothing of en-
tering it. I observed, however, that
the shutters of the fourth story were
of the peculiar kind called by Parisian
carpenters ferrades-a kind rarely em-
ployed at the present day, but fre-
quently seen upon very old mansions
at Lyons and Bourdeaux. They are
in the form of an ordinary door (a
single, not a folding door), except that
the lower half is latticed or worked
in open trellis-thus affording an ex-
cellent hold for the hands. In the
present instance these shutters are fully
three feet and a half broad. When
we saw them from the rear of the
house, they were both about half open—
that is to say, they stood off at right
angles from the wall. It is probable
that the police, as well as myself, ex-
amined the back of the tenement; but,
if so, in looking at these ferrades in
the line of their breadth (as they must
have done), they did not perceive this
great breadth itself, or, at all events,
failed to take it into due consideration.
In fact, having once satisfied them-
selves that no egress could have been
made in this quarter, they would nat-
urally bestow here a very cursory ex-
amination It was clear to me, how-
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
95
ever, that the shutter belonging to the
window at the head of the bed, would,
if swung fully back to the wall, reach
to within two feet of the lightning-rod.
It was also evident that, by exertion
of a very unusual degree of activity
and courage, an entrance into the win-
dow, from the rod, might have been
thus effected. By reaching to the dis-
tance of two feet and a half (we now
suppose the shutter open to its whole
extent) a robber might have taken
a firm grasp upon the trellis-work. Let-
ting go, then, his hold upon the rod,
placing his feet securely against the
wall, and springing boldly from it, he
might have swung the shutter so as to
close it, and, if we imagine the win-
dow open at the time, might even have
swung himself into the room.
"I wish you to bear especially in
mind that I have spoken of a very
unusual degree of activity as requisite
to success in so hazardous and so diffi-
cult a feat. It is my design to show
you first, that the thing might possibly
have been accomplished:-but, secondly
and chiefly, I wish to impress upon
your understanding the very extraordi-
nary the almost præternatural charac-
ter of that agility which could have ac-
complished it.
"You will say, no doubt, using the
language of the law, that 'to make
out my case,' I should rather under-
value, than insist upon a full estima-
tion of the activity required in this mat-
ter. This may be the practice in law,
but it is not the usage of reason. My
ultimate object is only the truth. My
immediate purpose is to lead you to
place in juxtaposition, that very un-
1 usual activity of which I have just
spoken, with that very peculiar shrill
(or harsh) and unequal voice, about
whose nationality no two persons could
be found to agree, and in whose ut-
terance no syllabification could be de-
tected."
At these words a vague and half-
formed conception of the meaning of
Dupin flitted over my mind. I seemed
to be upon the verge of comprehen-
sion, without power to comprehend—as
men, at times, find themselves upon
the brink of remembrance, without be-
ing able, in the end, to remember. My
friend went on with his discourse.
"You will see," he said, "that I
have shifted the question from the
mode of egress to that of ingress. It
was my design to convey the idea that
both were effected in the same manner,
at the same point. Let us now revert
to the interior of the room.
Let us
survey the appearances here. The
drawers of the bureau, it is said, had
been rifled, although many articles of
apparel still remained within them. The
conclusion here is absurd. It is a
mere guess-a very silly one-and no
more. How are we to know that the ar-
ticles found in the drawers were not all
these drawers had originally contained?
Madame L'Espanaye and her daughter
lived an exceedingly retired life-saw
no company-seldom went out-had
little use for numerous changes of habil-
iment. Those found were at least of
as good quality as any likely to be
possessed by these ladies. If a thief
had taken any, why did he not take
the best-why did he not take all? In
a word, why did he abandon four thou-
sand francs in gold to encumber him-
self with a bundle of linen? The gold
was abandoned. Nearly the whole sum
mentioned by Monsieur Mignaud, the
96
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
banker, was discovered, in bags, upon
the floor. I wish you therefore, to
discard from your thoughts the blun-
dering idea of motive, engendered in
the brains of the police by that por-
tion of the evidence which speaks of
money delivered at the door of the
house. Coincidences ten times as re-
markable as this (the delivery of the
money, and murder committed within
three days upon the party receiving
it), happened to all of us every hour
of our lives, without attracting even
momentary notice. Coincidences, in
general, are great stumbling-blocks in
the way of that class of thinkers who
have been educated to know nothing
of the theory of probabilities-that
theory to which the most glorious ob-
jects of human research are indebted
for the most glorious of illustration.
In the present instance, had the gold
been gone, the fact of its delivery
three days before would have formed
something more than a coincidence. It
would have been corroborative of this
idea of motive. But, under the real
circumstances of the case, if we are
to suppose gold the motive of this out-
rage, we must also imagine the perpe-
trator so vacillating an idiot as to have
abandoned his gold and his motive to-
gether.
"Keeping now steadily in mind the
points to which I have drawn your at-
tention that peculiar voice, that un-
usual agility, and that startling ab-
sence of motive in a murder so sin-
gularly atrocious as this-let us glance
at the butchery itself. Here is a
woman strangled to death by manual
strength, and thrust up a chimney
head downward. Ordinary assassins
employ no such mode of murder as
this.
Least of all, do they thus dis-
pose of the murdered. In the manner
of thrusting the corpse up the chim-
ney, you will admit that there was
something excessively outre-something
altogether irreconcilable with our com-
mon notions of human action, even
when we suppose the actors the most
depraved of men. Think, too, how
great must have been that strength
which could have thrust the body up
such an aperture so forcibly that the
united vigor of several persons was
found barely sufficient to drag it
down!
"Turn, now, to other indications of
the employment of a vigor most mar-
vellous. On the hearth were thick
tresses-very thick tresses-of gray hu-
man hair. These had been torn out
by the roots. You are aware of the
great force necessary in tearing thus
from the head even twenty or thirty
hairs together. You saw the locks in
question as well as myself. Their roots
(a hideous sight!) were clotted with
fragments of the flesh of the scalp-
sure token of the prodigious power
which had been exerted in uprooting
perhaps half a million of hairs at a
time. The throat of the old lady was
not merely cut, but the head absolutely
severed from the body: the instrument
was a mere razor. I wish you also
to look at the brutal ferocity of these
deeds. Of the bruises upon the body
of Madame L'Espanaye I do not speak.
Monsieur Dumas, and his worthy co-
adjutor Monsieur Etienne, have pro-
nounced that they were inflicted by
some obtuse instrument; and so far
these gentlemen are very correct. The
obtuse instrument was clearly the stone
pavement in the yard, upon which the
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
97
victim had fallen from the window
which looked in upon the bed. This
idea, however simple it may now seem,
escaped the police for the same rea-
son that the breadth of the shutters
escaped them-because, by the affair
of the nails, their perceptions had been
hermetically sealed against the possi-
bility of the windows having ever been
opened at all.
"If now, in addition to all these
things, you have properly reflected upon
the odd disorder of the chamber, we
have gone so far as to combine the
ideas of an agility astounding, a
strength superhuman, a ferocity brutal,
a butchery without motive, a grotes-
querie in horror absolutely alien from
humanity, and a voice foreign in tone
to the ears of men of many nations,
and devoid of all distinct or intelligible
syllabification. What result, then, has
ensued? What impression have I made
upon your fancy?"
I felt a creeping of the flesh as
Dupin asked me the question. "A mad-
man," I said, "has done this deed-
some raving maniac, escaping from a
neighboring Maison de Sante."
"In some respects," he replied, "your
idea is not irrelevant. But the voices
of madmen, even in their wildest par-
oxysms, are never found to tally with
that peculiar voice heard upon the
stairs. Madmen are of some nation,
and their language, however incoher-
ent in its words, has always the co-
herence of syllabification. Besides, the
hair of a madman is not such as I now
hold in my hand. I disentangled this
little tuft from the rigidly clutched fin-
gers of Madame L'Espanaye. Tell me
what you can make of it."
"Dupin!" I said, completely un-
nerved; "this hair is most unusual—
this is no human hair."
"I have not asserted that it is," said
he; "but, before we decide this point,
I wish you to glance at the little sketch
I have here traced upon this paper. It
is a fac-simile drawing of what has
been described in one portion of the
testimony as 'dark bruises and deep in-
dentations of finger nails' upon the
throat of Mademoiselle L'Espanaye, and
in another (by Messrs. Dumas and
Etienne) as a 'series of livid spots,
evidently the impression of fingers.'
"You will perceive," continued my
friend, spreading out the paper upon
the table before us, "that this drawing
gives the idea of a firm and fixed
hold. There is no slipping apparent.
Each finger has retained-possibly un-
til the death of the victim-the fearful
grasp by which it originally imbedded
itself. Attempt, now, to place all your
fingers, at the same time, in the re-
spective impressions as you see them."
I made the attempt in vain.
"We are possibly not giving this mat-
ter a fair trial," he said. "The paper
is spread out upon a plane surface;
but the human throat is cylindrical.
Here is a billet of wood, the circum-
ference of which is about that of the
throat. Wrap the drawing around it,
and try the experiment again."
I did so; but the difficulty was even
more obvious than before. "This," I
said, "is the mark of no human hand."
"Read now," replied Dupin, "this
passage from Cuvier."
It was a minute anatomical and gen-
erally descriptive account of the large
fulvous Ourang-Outang of the East In-
dian Islands. The gigantic stature, the
prodigious strength and activity, the
98
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
wild ferocity, and the imitative pro-
pensities of these mammalia are suffi-
ciently well known to all. I understood
the full horrors of the murder at once.
"The description of the digits," said
I, as I made an end of the reading, "is
in exact accordance with his drawing.
I see that no animal but an Ourang-
Outang, of the species here mentioned,
could have impressed the indentations
as you have traced them. This tuft
of tawny hair, too, is identical in char-
acter with that of the beast of Cuvier.
But I cannot possibly comprehend the
particulars of this frightful mystery.
Besides, there were two voices heard
in contention, and one of them was
unquestionably the voice of a French-
man."
"True; and you will remember an
expression attributed almost unani-
mously, by the evidence, to this voice,
-the expression, 'mon Dieu!' This,
under the circumstances, has been
justly characterized by one of the wit-
nesses (Montani, the confectioner) as
an expression of remonstrance or ex-
postulation. Upon these two words,
therefore, I have mainly built my hopes
of a full solution of the riddle. A
Frenchman was cognizant of the mur-
der. It is possible-indeed it is far
more than probable-that he was in-
nocent of all participation in the bloody
transaction which took place. The Ou-
rang-Outang may have escaped from
him. He may have traced it to the
chamber; but, under the agitating cir-
cumstances which ensued, he could
never have recaptured it. It is still
at large. I will not pursue these
guesses for I have no right to call
them more-since the shades of reflec-
tion upon which they are based are
scarcely of sufficient depth to be ap-
preciable by my own intellect, and since
I could not pretend to make them in-
telligible to the understanding of an-
other. We will call them guesses,
then, and speak of them as such. If
the Frenchman in question is indeed,
as I suppose, innocent of this atrocity,
this advertisement, which I left last
night upon our return home, at the
office of Le Monde (a paper devoted to
the shipping interest, and much sought
by sailors), will bring him to our resi-
dence."
He handed me a paper, and I read
thus:
CAUGHT-In the Bois de Boulogne,
early in the morning of the inst.
(the morning of the murder), a very
large, tawny Ourang-Outang of the
Bornese species. The owner (who is
ascertained to be a sailor, belonging to
a Maltese vessel) may have the ani-
mal again, upon identifying it satisfac-
torily, and paying a few charges aris-
ing from its capture and keeping. Call
at No.
Rue
Faubourg St.
Germain-au troisieme."
"How was it possible," I asked, "that
you should know the man to be a sailor,
and belonging to a Maltese vessel?"
"I do not know it," said Dupin. "I
am not sure of it. Here, however, is
a small piece of ribbon, which from
its form, and from its greasy appear-
ance, has evidently been used in tying
the hair in one of those long queues of
which sailors are so fond. Moreover,
this knot is one which few besides
sailors can tie, and it is peculiar to the
Maltese. I picked the ribbon up at
the foot of the lightning-rod. It could
not have belonged to either of the de-
ceased. Now if, after all, I am wrong
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
99
in my induction from this ribbon, that
the Frenchman was a sailor belonging
to a Maltese vessel, still I can have
done no harm in saying what I did
in the advertisement. If I am right,
a great point is gained. Cognizant
although innocent of the murder, the
Frenchman will naturally hesitate about
replying to the advertisement-about
demanding the Ourang-Outang. He
will reason thus:-'I am innocent; I
am poor; my Ourang-Outang is of
great value-to one in my circum-
stances a fortune of itself-why should
I lose it through idle apprehensions of
danger? Here it is, within my grasp.
It was found in the Bois de Boulogne-
at a vast distance from the scene of
that butchery. How can it ever be
suspected that a brute beast should
have done the deed? The police are
at fault-they have failed to procure
the slightest clew. Should they even
trace the animal, it would be impos-
sible to prove me cognizant of the
murder, or to implicate me in guilt on
account of that cognizance. Above all,
I am known. The advertiser designates
me as the possessor of the beast. I am
not sure to what limit his knowledge
may extend. Should I avoid claiming
a property of so great value, which
it is known that I possess, I will ren-
der the animal at least, liable to sus-
picion. It is not my policy to attract
attention either to myself or to the
beast. I will answer the advertisement,
get the Ourang-Outang, and keep it
close until this matter has blown over.'
At this moment we heard a step
upon the stairs.
"Be ready," said Dupin, "with your
pistols, but neither use them nor show
them until at a signal from myself."
The front door of the house had
been left open, and the visitor had en-
tered, without ringing, and advanced
several steps upon the staircase. Now,
however, he seemed to hesitate. Pres-
ently we heard him descending. Dupin
was moving quickly to the door, when
we again heard him coming up. He
did not turn back a second time, but
stepped up with decision, and rapped
at the door of our chamber.
"Come in," said Dupin, in a cheer-
ful and hearty tone.
A man entered. He was a sailor,
evidently, a tall, stout, and muscular-
looking person, with a certain dare-
devil expression of countenance, not
altogether unprepossessing. His face,
greatly sunburnt, was more than half
hidden by whisker and mustachio. He
had with him huge oaken cudgel,
but appeared to be otherwise unarmed.
He bowed awkwardly, and bade us
"good evening," in French accents,
which, although somewhat Neufchatel-
ish, were still sufficiently indicative of
a Parisian origin.
"Sit down, my friend," said Dupin.
"I suppose you have called about the
Ourang-Outang. Upon my word, I al-
most envy you the possession of him;
a remarkably fine, and no doubt a very
valuable animal. How old do you sup-
pose him to be?"
The sailor drew a long breath, with
the air of a man relieved of some in-
tolerable burden, and then replied, in
an assured tone:
"I have no way of telling-but he
can't be more than four or five years
old. Have you got him here?"
"Oh, no; we had no conveniences for
keeping him here.
He is at a livery
stable in the Rue Dubourg, just by.
100
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
You can get him in the morning. Of
course you are prepared to identify the
property?"
"To be sure I am, sir."
"I shall be sorry to part with him,"
said Dupin.
"I don't mean that you should be
at all this trouble for nothing, sir,"
said the man. "Couldn't expect it.
Am very willing to pay a reward for
the finding of the animal-that is to
say, anything in reason."
"Well," replied my friend, "that is
all very fair, to be sure.
Let me
think!-what should I have? Oh! I
will tell you. My reward shall be this.
You shall give me all the information in
your power about these murders in the
Rue Morgue."
Dupin said the last words in a very
low tone, and very quietly. Just as
quietly, too, he walked toward the door,
locked it, and put the key in his pocket.
He then drew a pistol from his bosom
and placed it, without the least flurry,
upon the table.
The sailor's face flushed up as if he
were struggling with suffocation. He
started to his feet and grasped his cud-
gel; but the next moment he fell back
into his seat, trembling violently, and
with the countenance of death itself.
He spoke not a word. I pitied him
from the bottom of my heart.
"My friend," said Dupin, in a kind
tone, "you are alarming yourself un-
necessarily you are indeed. We mean
you no harm whatever. I pledge you
the honor of a gentleman, and of a
Frenchman, that we intend you no in-
jury. I perfectly well know that you
are innocent of the atrocities in the
Rue Morgue. It will not do, however,
to deny that you are in some measure
implicated in them. From what I have
already said, you must know that I
have had means of information about
this matter-means of which you could
never have dreamed. Now the thing
stands thus. You have done nothing
which you could have avoided—noth-
ing, certainly, which renders you cul-
pable. You are not even guilty of
robbery, when you might have robbed
with impunity. You have nothing to
conceal. You have no reason for con-
cealment. On the other hand, you are
bound by every principle of honor to
confess all you know. An innocent
man is now imprisoned, charged with
that crime of which you can point out
the perpetrator."
The sailor had recovered his presence
of mind, in a great measure, while
Dupin uttered these words; but his
original boldness of bearing was all
gone.
"So help me God!" said he, after
a brief pause, "I will tell you all I
know about this affiair;-but I do not
expect you to believe one half I say-
I would be a fool indeed if I did.
Still, I am innocent, and I will make a
clean breast if I die for it."
What he stated was, in substance,
this. He had lately made a voyage to
the Indian Archipelago. A party, of
which he formed one, landed at Borneo,
and passed into the interior on an ex-
cursion of pleasure. Himself and a
companion had captured the Ourang-
Outang. This companion dying, the
animal fell into his own exclusive pos-
session. After a great trouble, occa-
sioned by the intractable ferocity of
his captive during the home voyage,
he at length succeeded in lodging it
safely at his own residence in Paris,
THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE
101
where, not to attract toward himself
the unpleasant curiosity of his neigh-
bors, he kept it carefully secluded, until
such time as it should recover from
a wound in the foot, received from a
splinter on board ship. His ultimate
design was to sell it.
Returning home from some sailor's
frolic on the night, or rather in the
morning, of the murder, he found the
beast occupying his own bedroom, into
which it had broken from a closet
adjoining, where it had been, as was
thought, securely confined. Razor in
hand, and fully lathered, it was sitting
before a looking-glass, attempting the
operation of shaving, in which it had
no doubt previously watched its master
through the key-hole of the closet.
Terrified at the sight of so dangerous
a weapon in the possession of an animal
so ferocious, and so well able to use it,
the man, for some moments, was at a
loss what to do. He had been ac-
customed, however, to quiet the crea-
ture, even in its fiercest moods, by the
use of a whip, and to this he now
resorted. Upon sight of it, the Ourang-
Outang sprang at once through the
door of the chamber, down the stairs,
and thence, through a window, unfor-
tunately open, into the street.
The Frenchman followed in despair;
the ape, razor still in hand, occasionally
stopping to look back and gesticulate
at his pursuer, until the latter had
nearly come up with it. It then again
made off. In this manner the chase
continued for a long time. The streets
were profoundly quiet, as it was nearly
three o'clock in the morning. In pass-
ing down an alley in the rear of the
Rue Morgue, the fugitive's attention.
was arrested by a light gleaming from
the open window of Madame L'Espa-
naye's chamber, in the fourth story of
her house. Rushing to the building, it
perceived the lightning-rod, clambered
up with inconceivable agility, grasped
the shutter, which was thrown fully
back against the wall, and, by its
means, swung itself directly upon the
headboard of the bed. The whole feat
did not occupy a minute. The shutter
was kicked open again by the Ourang-
Outang as it entered the room.
The sailor, in the meantime, was both
rejoiced and perplexed. He had strong
hopes of now recapturing the brute,
as it could scarcely escape from the
trap into which it had ventured, except
by the rod, where it might be inter
cepted as it came down. On the other
hand, there was much cause for anx-
iety as to what it might do in the
house. This latter reflection urged the
man still to follow the fugitive. A
lightning-rod is ascended without diffi-
culty, especially by a sailor; but, when
he had arrived as high as the window,
which lay far to his left, his career was
stopped; the most that he could ac-
complish was to reach over so as to
obtain a glimpse of the interior of the
room. At this glimpse he nearly fell
from his hold through excess of horror.
Now it was that those hideous shrieks
arose upon the night, which had startled
from slumber the inmates of the Rue
Morgue. Madame L'Espanaye and her
daughter, habited in their night clothes,
had apparently been occupied in ar
ranging some papers in the iron chest
already mentioned, which had been
wheeled into the middle of the room.
It was open, and its contents lay be-
side it on the floor. The victims must
have been sitting with their backs to-
102
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ward the window; and, from the time
elapsing between the ingress of the
beast and the screams, it seems prob-
able that it was not immediately per-
ceived. The flapping to of the shutter
would naturally have been attributed
to the wind.
As the sailor looked in, the gigantic
animal had seized Madame L'Espa-
naye by the hair (which was loose, as
she had been combing it), and was
flourishing the razor about her face,
in imitation of the motions of a barber.
The daughter lay prostrate and mo-
tionless; she had swooned. The screams
and struggles of the old lady (during
which the hair was torn from her
head) had the effect of changing the
probably pacific purposes of the Ou-
rang-Outang into those of wrath. With
one determined sweep of its muscular
arm it nearly severed her head from
her body. The sight of blood inflamed
its anger into frenzy. Gnashing its
teeth, and flashing fire from its eyes,
it flew upon the body of the girl and
embedded its fearful talons in her
throat, retaining its grasp until she ex-
pired. Its wandering and wild glances
fell at this moment upon the head of
the bed, over which the face of its
master, rigid with horror, was just dis-
cernible. The fury of the beast, who
no doubt bore still in mind the dreaded
whip, was instantly converted into fear.
Conscious of having deserved punish-
ment, it seemed desirous of concealing
its bloody deeds, and skipped about the
chamber in an agony of nervous agi-
*ation; throwing down and breaking
the furniture as it moved, and dragging
the bed from the bedstead. In conclu-
sion, it seized first the corpse of the
daughter, and thrust it up the chimney,
as it was found; then that of the old
lady, which, it immediately hurled
through the window headlong.
As the ape approached the casement
with its mutilated burden, the sailor
shrank aghast to the rod, and, rather
gliding than clambering down it, hur-
ried at once home-dreading the con-
sequences of the butchery, and gladly
abandoning, in his terror, all solicitude
about the fate of the Ourang-Outang.
The words heard by the party upon
the staircase were the Frenchman's ex-
clamations of horror and affright, com-
mingled with the fiendish jabberings of
the brute.
I have scarcely any thing to add.
The Ourang-Outang must have escaped
from the chamber, by the rod, just
before the breaking of the door. It
must have closed the window as it
passed through it. It was subsequently
caught by the owner himself, who ob-
tained for it a very large sum at the
Jardin des Plantes. Le Bon was in-
stantly released, upon our narration of
the circumstances (with some com-
ments from Dupin) at the bureau of
the Perfect of Police. This function-
ary, however, well disposed to my
friend, could not altogether conceal his
chagrin at the turn which affairs had
taken, and was fain to indulge in a
sarcasm or two about the propriety of
every person minding his own business.
"Let him talk," said Dupin, who had
not thought it necessary to reply. "Let
him discourse; it will ease his con-
science. I am satisfied with having de-
feated him in his own castle. Never-
theless, that he failed in the solution
of this mystery, is by no means that
matter for wonder which he supposes
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
103
it; for, in truth, our friend the prefect
is somewhat too cunning to be pro-
found.
In his wisdom is no stamen.
It is all head and no body, like the pic-
tures of the Goddess Laverna-or, at
best, all head and shoulders, like a
codfish. But he is a good creature
after all. I like him especially for one
master stroke of cant, by which he has
attained his reputation for ingenuity,
I mean the way he has 'de nier ce qui
est, et d'expliquer ce qui n'est pas.'
* Rousseau-Nouvelle Heloise.
The Mystery of Marie Roget*
A SEQUEL TO "THE MURDERS IN THE RUE MORGUE”
(First published in Lady's Companion, November, 1842.-Ed.)
There are ideal series of events which
run parallel with the real ones. They
rarely coincide. Men and circum-
stances generally modify the ideal
train of events, so that it seems im-
perfect, and its consequences are
equally imperfect. Thus with the
Reformation; instead of Protestant-
ism came Lutheranism. - Novalis.
Moralische Ansichten.
THERE are few persons, even among
the calmest thinkers, who have not
A
* Upon the original publication of
"Marie Roget," the footnotes now ap-
pended were considered unnecessary;
but the lapse of several years since
the tragedy upon which the tale is
based, renders it expedient to give
them, and also to say a few words in
explanation of the general design.
young girl, Mary Cecilia Rogers, was
murdered in the vicinity of New York;
and although her death occasioned an
intense and long-enduring excitement,
the mystery attending it had remained
unsolved at the period when the present
paper was written and published (No-
vember, 1842). Herein, under pre-
occasionally been startled into a vague
yet thrilling half-credence in the super-
natural, by coincidences of so seem-
ingly marvellous a character that, as
tence of relating the fate of a Parisian
grisette, the author has followed, in
minute detail, the essential, while merely
paralleling the inessential, facts of the
real murder of Mary Rogers. Thus an
argument founded upon the fiction is
applicable to the truth: and the investi-
gation of the truth was the object.
The "Mystery of Marie Roget" was
composed at a distance from the scene
of the atrocity, and with no other
means of investigation than the news-
papers afforded. Thus much escaped
the writer of which he could have
availed himself had he been upon the
spot and visited the localities. It may
not be improper to record, nevertheless,
that the confessions of two persons
(one of them the Madame Deluc of
the narrative), made, at different pe-
riods, long subsequent to the publica-
tion, confirmed, in full, not only the
general conclusion, but absolutely all
the chief hypothetical details by which
that conclusion was attained.
104
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
mere coincidences, the intellect has
been unable to receive them. Such
sentiments-for the half-credences of
which I speak have never the full force
of thought-such sentiments are sel-
dom thoroughly stifled unless by refer-
ence to the doctrine of chance, or, as
it is technically termed, the Calculus
of Probabilities. Now this Calculus is,
in its essence, purely mathematical;
and thus we have the anomaly of the
most rigidly exact in science applied
to the shadow and spirituality of the
most intangible in speculation.
The extraordinary details which I
am now called upon to make public,
will be found to form, as regards se-
quence of time, the primary branch of
a series of scarcely intelligible coin-
cidences, whose secondary or conclud-
ing branch will be recognized by all
readers in the late murder of Marie
Cecilia Rogers, at New York.
When, in an article entitled "The
Murders in the Rue Morgue." I en-
deavored, about a year ago, to depict
some very remarkable features in the
mental character of my friend, the
Chevalier C. Auguste Dupin, it did not
occur to me that I should ever resume
the subject. This depicting of char-
acter constituted my design; and this
design was thoroughly fulfilled in the
wild train of circumstances brought
to instance Dupin's idiosyncrasy. I
might have adduced other examples,
but I should have proven no more.
Late events, however, in their surpris-
ing development, have startled me into
some further details, which will carry
with them the air of extorted confes-
sion. Hearing what I have lately heard,
it would be indeed strange should I
remain silent in regard to what I both
heard and saw so long ago.
Upon the winding up of the tragedy
involved in the deaths of Madame
L'Espanaye and her daughter, the
Chevalier dismissed the affair at once
from his attention, and relapsed into
his old habits of moody revery. Prone,
at all times, to abstraction, I readily
fell in with his humor; and continuing
to occupy our chambers in the Fau-
bourg Saint Germain, we gave the Fu-
ture to the winds, and slumbered tran-
quilly in the Present, weaving the dull
world around us into dreams.
But these dreams were not altogether
uninterrupted. It may readily be sup-
posed that the part played by my
friend, in the drama at the Rue Morgue,
had not failed of its impression upon
the fancies of the Parisian police. With
its emissaries, the name of Dupin had
grown into a household word. The
simple character of those inductions by
which he had disentangled the mystery
never having been explained even to
the Prefect, or to any other individual
than myself, of course it is not sur-
prising that the affair was regarded as
little less than miraculous, or that the
Chevalier's analytical abilities acquired
for him the credit of intuition. His
frankness would have led him to dis-
abuse every inquirer of such prejudice;
but his indolent humor forbade all
further agitation of a topic whose in-
terest to himself had long ceased. It
thus happened that he found himself
the cynosure of the political eyes; and
the cases were not few in which at-
tempt was made to engage his services
at the Prefecture. One of the most
remarkable instances was that of the
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
105
murder of a young girl named Marie
Roget.
This event occurred about two years
after the atrocity in the Rue Morgue.
Marie, whose Christian and family
name will at once arrest attention from
their resemblance to those of the un-
fortunate "cigar-girl," was the only
daughter of the widow Estelle Roget.
The father had died during the child's
infancy, and from the period of his
death, until within eighteen months be-
fore the assassination which forms the
subject of our narrative, the mother
and daughter had dwelt together in
the Rue Pavee Saint Andre;* Ma-
dame there keeping a pension, assisted
by Marie. Affairs went on thus until
the latter had attained her twenty-
second year, when her great beauty
attracted the notice of a perfumer,
who occupied one of the shops in the
basement of the Palais Royal, and
whose custom lay, chiefly among the
desperate adventurers infesting that
neighborhood. Monsieur Le Blanct
was not unaware of the advantages
to be derived from the attendance of
the fair Marie in his perfumery; and
his liberal proposals were accepted
eagerly by the girl, although with some-
what more of hesitation by Madame.
The anticipations of the shopkeeper
were realized, and his rooms soon be-
came notorious through the charms of
the sprightly grisette. She had been
in his employ about a year, when her
admirers were thrown into confusion
by her sudden disappearance from the
shop. Monsieur Le Blanc was unable
to account for her absence, and Ma-
*Nassau Street.
† Anderson.
dame Roget was distracted with anx-
iety and terror. The public papers
immediately took up the theme, and
the police were upon the point of mak-
ing serious investigations, when, one
fine morning, after the lapse of a week,
Marie, in good health, but with a some-
what saddened air, made her re-appear-
ance at her usual counter in the per-
fumery. All inquiry, except that of a
private character, was of course, im、
mediately hushed. Monsieur Le Blanc
professed total ignorance, as before,
Marie, with Madame, replied to all
questions, that the last week had been
spent at the house of a relation in the
country. Thus the affair died away,
and was generally forgotten; for the
girl, ostensibly to relieve herself from
the impertinence of curiosity soon
bade a final adieu to the perfumer, and
sought the shelter of her mother's resi-
dence in the Rue Pavee Saint Andre.
It was about five months after this
return home, that her friends were
alarmed by her sudden disappearance
for the second time. Three days
elapsed, and nothing was heard of her.
On the fourth her corpse was found
floating in the Seine,* near the shore
which is opposite the Quartier of the
Rue Saint Andre, and at a point not
very far distant from the secluded
neighborhood of the Barriere du
Roule.+
The atrocity of this murder (for it
was at once evident that murder had
been committed), the youth and beauty
of the victim, and, above all her previ-
ous notoriety, conspired to produce
intense excitement in the minds of the
*The Hudson.
+ Weehawken.
106
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
sensitive Parisians. I can call to mind
no similar occurrence producing so gen-
eral and so intense an effect. For sev-
eral weeks, in the discussion of this
one absorbing theme, even the moment-
ous political topics of the day were
forgotten. The Prefect made unusual
exertions; and the powers of the whole
Parisian police were, of course, tasked
to the utmost extent.
Upon the first discovery of the
corpse, it was not supposed that the
murderer would be able to elude, for
more than a very brief period, the
inquisition which was immediately set
on foot. It was not until the expira-
tion of a week that it was deemed nec-
essary to offer a reward; and even then
this reward was limited to a thousand
francs. In the meantime the investi-
gation proceeded with vigor, if not al-
ways with judgment, and numerous in-
dividuals were examined to no purpose;
while, owing to the continual absence
of all clew to the mystery, the popular
excitement greatly increased. At the
end of the tenth day it was thought
advisable to double the sum originally
proposed; and, at length, the second
week having elapsed without leading
to any discoveries, and the prejudice
which always exists in Paris against
the police having given vent to itself in
several serious emeutes, the Prefect
took it upon himself to offer the sum
of twenty thousand francs "for the
conviction of the assassin," or, if more
than one should prove to have been
implicated, "for the conviction of any
one of the assassins." In the proc-
lamation setting forth this reward, a
full pardon was promised to any ac-
complice who should come forward in
evidence against his fellow; and to
the whole was appended, wherever it
appeared, the private placard of a com-
mittee of citizens, offering ten thou-
sand francs, in addition to the amount
proposed by the Prefecture. The en-
tire reward thus stood at no less than
thirty thousand francs, which will be
regarded as an extraordinary sum when
we consider the humble condition of
the girl, and the great frequency, in
large cities, of such atrocities as the
one described.
No one doubted now that the mys-
tery of this murder would be imme-
diately brought to light. But although,
in one or two instances, arrests were
made which promised elucidation, yet
nothing was elicited which could im-
plicate the parties suspected; and they
were discharged forthwith. Strange as
it may appear, the third week from the
discovery of the body had passed, and
passed without any light being thrown
upon the subject, before even a rumor
of the events which had so agitated
the public mind reached the ears of
Dupin and myself. Engaged in re-
searches which had absorbed our whole
attention, it had been nearly a month
since either of us had gone abroad, or
received a visitor, or more than glanced
at the leading political articles in one
of the daily papers. The first intelli-
gence of the murder was brought us
by G, in person. He called upon
us early in the afternoon of the thir-
teenth of July, 18—, and remained with
us until late in the night. He had been
piqued by the failure of all his en-
deavors to ferret out the assassins.
His reputation-so he said with a pe-
culiarly Parisian air-was at stake.
Even his honor was concerned. The
eyes of the public were upon him;
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
107
and there was really no sacrifice which
he would not be willing to make for
the development of the mystery. He
concluded a somewhat droll speech
with a compliment upon what he was
pleased to term the tact of Dupin, and
made him a direct and certainly a
liberal proposition, the precise nature
of which I do not feel myself at lib-
erty to disclose, but which has no
bearing upon the proper subject of my
narrative.
The compliment my friend rebutted
as best he could, but the proposition
he accepted at once, although its ad-
vantages were altogether provisional.
This point being settled, the Prefect
broke at once into explanations of his
own views, interspersing them with
long comments upon the evidence; of
which latter we were not yet in pos-
session. He discoursed much and, be-
yond doubt, learnedly; while I haz-
arded an occasional suggestion as the
night wore drowsily away. Dupin,
sitting steadily in his accustomed arm-
chair, was the embodiment of respect-
ful attention. He wore spectacles, dur-
ing the whole interview; and an occa-
sional glance beneath their green glasses
sufficed to convince me that he slept
not the less soundly, because silently,
throughout the seven or eight leaden-
footed hours which immediately pre-
ceded the departure of the Prefect.
In the morning, I procured, at the
Prefecture, a full report of all the evi-
dence elicited, and, at the various news-
paper offices, a copy of every paper in
which, from first to last, had been pub-
lished any decisive information in re-
gard to this sad affair. Freed from all
that was positively disproved, this mass
of information stood thus:
Marie Roget left the residence of her
mother, in the Rue Pavee St. Andre,
about nine o'clock in the morning of
Sunday, June the twenty-second, 18—.
In going out, she gave notice to a Mon-
sieur Jacques St. Eustache,* and to
him only, of her intention to spend the
day with an aunt, who resided in the
Rue des Dromes. The Rue des Dromes
is a short and narrow but populous
thoroughfare, not far from the banks
of the river, and at a distance of some
two miles, in the most direct course
possible, from the pension of Madame
Roget. St. Eustache was the accepted
suitor of Marie, and lodged, as well
as took his meals, at the pension. He
was to have gone for his betrothed at
dusk, and to have escorted her home.
In the afternoon, however, it came on
to rain heavily; and, supposing that
she would remain all night at her aunt's
(as she had done under similar circum-
stances before), he did not think it
necessary to keep his promise. As
night drew on, Madame Roget (who
was an infirm old lady, seventy years
of age) was heard to express a fear
"that she should never see Marie
again;" but this observation attracted
little attention at the time.
On Monday it was ascertained that
the girl had not been to the Rue des
Dromes; and when the day elapsed
without tidings of her, a tardy search
was instituted at several points in the
city and its environs. It was not,
however, until the fourth day from
the period of her disappearance that
any thing satisfactory was ascertained
respecting her. On this day (Wednes-
day, the twenty-fifth of June) a Mon-
* Payne.
108
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
sieur Beauvais,* who, with a friend,
had been making inquiries for Marie
near the Barriere du Roule, on the
shore of the Seine which is opposite
the Rue Pavee St. Andre, was in-
formed that a corpse had just been
towed ashore by some fishermen, who
had found it floating in the river. Upon
seeing the body, Beauvais, after some
hesitation, identified it as that of the
perfumery-girl. His friend recognized
it more promptly.
The face was suffused with dark
blood, some of which issued from the
mouth. No foam was seen, as in the
case of the merely drowned. There
was no discoloration in the cellular tis-
sue. About the throat were bruises and
impressions of fingers. The arms were
bent over on the chest, and were rigid.
The right hand was clenched; the left
partially open. On the left wrist were
two circular excoriations, apparently
the effect of ropes, or of a rope in more
than one volution. A part of the right
wrist, also, was much chafed, as well
as the back throughout its extent, but
more especially at the shoulder-blades.
In bringing the body to the shore the
fishermen had attached to it a rope,
but none of the excoriations had been
effected by this. The flesh of the neck
was much swollen.
There were no cuts
apparent, or bruises which appeared the
effect of blows. A piece of lace was
found tied so tightly around the neck
as to be hidden from sight; it was
completely buried in the flesh, and was
fastened by a knot which lay just
under the left ear. This alone would
have sufficed to produce death. The
medical testimony spoke confidently of
* Crommelin.
the virtuous character of the deceased.
She had been subjected, it said, to
brutal violence. The corpse was in
such condition when found, that there
could have been no difficulty in its
recognition by friends.
The dress was much torn and other-
wise disordered. In the outer gar-
ment, a slip, about a foot wide, had
been torn upward from the bottom hem
to the waist, but not torn off. It was
wound three times around the waist,
and secured by a sort of hitch in the
back. The dress immediately beneath
the frock was of fine muslin; and from
this a slip eighteen inches wide had
been torn entirely out-torn very
evenly and with great care. It was
found around her neck, fitting loosely,
and secured with a hard knot. Over
this muslin slip and the slip of lace the
strings of a bonnet were attached, the
bonnet being appended. The knot by
which the strings of the bonnet were
fastened was not a lady's, but a slip
or sailor's knot.
After the recognition of the corpse,
it was not, as usual, taken to the
Morgue (this formality being super-
fluous), but hastily interred not far
from the spot at which it was brought
ashore. Through the exertions of
Beauvais, the matter was industriously
hushed up, as far as possible; and
several days had elapsed before any
public emotion resulted. A weekly
paper, however, at length took up the
theme; the corpse was disinterred, and
a re-examination instituted; but nothing
was elicited beyond what has been al-
ready noted. The clothes, however,
were now submitted to the mother and
*The New York Mercury.
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
109
friends of the deceased, and fully iden-
tified as those worn by the girl upon
leaving home.
Meantime, the excitement increased
hourly. Several individuals were ar-
rested and discharged. St. Eustache
fell especially under suspicion; and he
failed, at first, to give an intelligible
account of his whereabouts during the
Sunday on which Marie left home.
Subsequently, however, he submitted
to Monsieur G, affidavits, account-
ing satisfactorily for every hour of the
day in question. As time passed no
discovery ensued, a thousand contra-
dictory rumors were circulated, and
journalists busied themselves in sug-
gestions. Among these, the one which
attracted the most notice, was the
idea that Marie Roget still lived—that
the corpse found in the Seine was that
of some other unfortunate. It will be
proper that I submit to the reader some
passages which embody the suggestion
alluded to. These passages are literal
translations from L'Etoile,* a paper
conducted, in general, with much ability.
"Mademoiselle Roget left her moth-
er's house on Sunday morning, June
the twenty-second, 18-, with the os-
tensible purpose of going to see her
aunt, or some other connection, in the
Rue des Dromes. From that hour,
nobody is proved to have seen her.
There is no trace or tidings of her
at all. *** There has no person,
whatever, come forward, so far, who
saw her at all, on that day, after she
left her mother's door.
*** Now,
though we have no evidence that
Marie Roget was in the land of the
living after nine o'clock on Sunday,
*The New York Brother Jonathan.
June the twenty-second, we have proof
that, up to that hour, she was alive.
On Wednesday noon, at twelve, a fe-
male body was discovered afloat on the
shore of the Barriere du Roule. This
was, even if we presume that Marie
Roget was thrown into the river within
three hours after she left her mother's
house, only three days from the time
she left her home-three days to an
hour. But it is folly to suppose that
the murder, if murder was committed
on her body, could have been consum-
mated soon enough to have enabled
her murderers to throw the body into
the river before midnight. Those who
are guilty of such horrid crimes choose
darkness rather than light. *** Thus
we see that if the body found in the
river was that of Marie Roget, it
could only have been in the water two
and a half days, or three at the outside.
All experience has shown that drowned
bodies, or bodies thrown into the water
immediately after death by violence,
require from six to ten days for suffi-
cient decomposition to take place to
bring them to the top of the water.
Even where a cannon is fired over a
corpse, and it rises before at least five
or six days' immersion, it sinks again,
if left alone. Now, we ask, what was
there in this case to cause a departure
from the ordinary course of nature?
*** If the body had been kept
in its mangled state on shore until
Tuesday night, some trace would be
found on shore of the murderers. It is
a doubtful point, also, whether the
body would be so soon afloat, even
were it thrown in after having been
dead two days. And, furthermore,
it is exceedingly improbable that any
villains who had committed such a mur-
110
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
der as is here supposed, would have
thrown the body in without weight to
sink it, when such a precaution could
have so easily been taken."
The editor here proceeds to argue
that the body must have been in the
water "not three days merely, but, at
least, five times three days," because
it was so far decomposed that Beauvais
had great difficulty in recognizing it.
This latter point, however, was fully
disproved. I continue the translation:
"What, then, are the facts on which
M. Beauvais says that he had no doubt
the body was that of Marie Roget?
He ripped up the gown sleeve, and
says he found marks which satisfied
him of the identity. The public gen-
erally supposed those marks to have
consisted of some description of scars.
He rubbed the arm and found hair
upon it something as indefinite, we
think, as can readily be imagined-
as little conclusive as finding an arm
in the sleeve. M. Beauvais did not
return that night, but sent word to
Madam Roget, at seven o'clock, on
Wednesday evening, that an investi-
gation was still in progress respecting
her daughter. If we allow that Ma-
dame Roget, from her age and grief,
could not go over (which is allowing
a great deal), there certainly must have
been some one who would have thought
it worth while to go over and attend
the investigation, if they thought the
body was that of Marie. Nobody
went over. There was nothing said
or heard about the matter in the Rue
Pavee St. Andre, that reached even
the occupants of the same building.
M. St. Eustache, the lover and in-
tended husband of Marie, who boarded
in her mother's house, deposes that
he did not hear of the discovery of
the body of his intended until the
next morning, when M. Beauvais came
into his chamber and told him of it.
For an item of news like this, it strikes
us it was very coolly received."
In this way the journal endeavored
to create the impression of an apathy
on the part of the relatives of Marie,
inconsistent with the supposition that
these relatives believed the corpse to
be hers. Its insinuations amount to
this: that Marie, with the connivance
of her friends, had absented herself
from the city for reasons involving
a charge against her chastity; and that
these friends upon the discovery of a
corpse in the Seine, somewhat re-
sembling that of the girl, had availed
themselves of the opportunity to im-
press the pubic with the belief of her
death. But L'Etoile was again over
hasty. It was distinctly proved that
no apathy, such as was imagined, ex-
isted; that the old lady was exceed-
ingly feeble, and so agitated as to be
unable to attend to any duty; that
St. Eustache, so far from receiving
the news coolly, was distracted with
grief, and bore himself so frantically,
that M. Beauvais prevailed upon a
friend and relative to take charge of
him, and prevent his attending the ex-
amination at the disinterment. More-
over, although it was stated by L'Etoile,
that the corpse was re-interred at the
public expense, that an advantageous
offer of private sepulture was absolutely
declined by the family, and that no
member of the family attended the
ceremonial-although, I say, all this
was asserted by L'Etoile in furtherance
of the impression it designed to con-
vey-yet all this was satisfactorily
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
111
disproved. In a subsequent number of
the paper, an attempt was made to
throw suspicion upon Beauvais himself.
The editor says:
"Now, then, a change comes over
the matter. We are told that, on one
occasion, while a Madam B- was
at Madame Roget's house, M. Beau-
vais, who was going out, told her that
a gendarme was expected there, and
that she, Madame B., must not say any
thing to the gendarme until he re-
turned, but let the matter be for him.
In the present posture of af-
fairs, M. Beauvais appears to have the
whole matter locked up in his head.
A single step cannot be taken without
M. Beauvais, for, go which way you
will, you run against him. *** For
some reason he determined that no-
body shall have anything to do with
the proceedings but himself, and he
has elbowed the male relatives out of
the way, according to their representa-
tions, in a very singular manner. He
seems to have been very much averse
to permitting the relatives to see the
body."
By the following fact, some color
was given to the suspicion thus thrown
upon Beauvais. A visitor at his
office, a few days prior to the girl's
disappearance, and during the absence
of its occupant, had observed a rose
in the keyhole of the door, and the
name "Marie" inscribed upon a slate
which hung near at hand.
The general impression, so far as we
were enabled to glean it from the
newspapers, seemed to be, that Marie
had been the victim of a gang of
desperadoes that by these she had
been borne across the river, maltreated,
and murdered. Le Commerciel,* how-
ever, a print of extensive influence,
was earnest in combatting this popular
idea. I quote a passage or two from
its columns:
"We are persuaded that pursuit has
hitherto been on a false scent, so far
as it has been directed to the Barriere
du Roule. It is impossible that a
person so well known to thousands as
this young woman was, should have
passed three blocks without some one
having seen her; and any one who saw
her would have remembered it, for she
interested all who knew her. It was
when the streets were full of people,
when she went out. *** It is im-
possible that she could have gone to
the Barriere du Roule, or to the Rue
des Dromes, without being recognized
by a dozen persons; yet no one has
come forward who saw her outside her
mother's door, and there is no evi-
dence, except the testimony concern-
ing her expressed intentions, that she
did go out at all. Her gown was
torn, bound round her, and tied; and
by that the body was carried as a bun-
dle. If the murder had been com-
Imitted at the Barriere du Roule, there
would have been no necessity for any
such arrangement. The fact that the
body was found floating near the Bar-
riere, is no proof as to where it was
thrown into the water. ** * A
piece of one of the unfortunate girl's
petticoats, two feet long and one foot
wide, was torn out and tied under her
chin around the back of her head,
probably to prevent screams. This
was done by fellows who had no
pocket-handkerchief."
*New York Journal of Commerce.
112
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
A day or two before the Prefect
called upon us, however, some impor-
tant information reached the police,
which seemed to overthrow, at least,
the chief portion of Le Commerciel's
argument. Two small boys, sons of
a Madame Deluc, while roaming among
the woods near the Barriere du Roule,
chanced to penetrate a close thicket,
within which were three or four large
stones, forming a kind of seat with a
back and footstool. On the upper
stone lay a white petticoat; on the sec-
ond, a silk scarf. A parasol, gloves,
and a pocket-handkerchief were also
here found. The handkerchief bore
the name "Marie Roget." Fragments
of dress were discovered on the bram-
bles around. The earth was trampled,
the bushes were broken, and there was
every evidence of a struggle. Between
the thicket and the river, the fences
were found taken down, and the ground
bore evidence of some heavy burthen
having been dragged along it.
A weekly paper, Le Soleil,* had the
following comments upon this discov-
ery-comments which merely echoed
the sentiment of the whole Parisian
press:
"The things had all evidently been
there at least three or four weeks;
they were all mildewed down hard with
the action of the rain, and stuck to-
gether from mildew. The grass had
grown around and over some of them.
The silk on the parasol was strong, but
the threads of it were run together
within. The upper part, where it had
been doubled and folded, was all mil-
dewed and rotten, and tore on its being
opened. *** The pieces of her
*Philadelphia Saturday Evening Post.
frock torn out by the bushes were
about three inches wide and six inches
long. One part was the hem of the
frock, and it had been mended; the
other piece was part of the skirt, not
the hem. They looked like strips torn
off, and were on the thorn bush, about
a foot from the ground. *
There can be no doubt, therefore, that
the spot of this appalling outrage has
been discovered."
Consequent upon this discovery, new
evidence appeared. Madame Deluc
testified that she keeps a roadside inn
not far from the bank of the river,
opposite the Barriere du Roule. The
neighborhood is secluded-particularly
so. It is the usual Sunday resort of
blackguards from the city, who cross
the river in boats. About three o'clock,
in the afternoon of the Sunday in ques-
tion, a young girl arrived at the inn,
accompanied by a young man of dark
complexion. The two remained here
for some time. On their departure,
they took the road to some thick woods
in the vicinity. Madame Deluc's at-
tention was called to the dress worn
by the girl, on account of its resem-
blance to one worn by a deceased rela-
tive. A scarf was particularly noticed.
Soon after the departure of the couple,
a gang of miscreants made their ap-
pearance, behaved boisterously, ate and
drank without making payment, fol-
lowed in the route of the young man
and girl, returned to the inn about
dusk, and re-crossed the river as if in
great haste.
It was soon after dark, upon this
same evening, that Madame Deluc, as
well as her eldest son, heard the screams
of a female in the vicinity of the inn.
The screams were violent but brief.
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
113
*
Madame D. recognized not only the
scarf which was found in the thicket,
but the dress which was discovered upon
the corpse.
An omnibus driver, Val-
ence, now also testified that he saw
Marie Roget cross a ferry on the Seine,
on the Sunday in question, in company
with a young man of dark complexion.
He, Valence, knew Marie, and could not
be mistaken in her identity. The arti-
cles found in the thicket were fully
identified by the relatives of Marie.
The items of evidence and informa-
tion thus collected by myself, from
the newspapers, at the suggestion of
Dupin, embraced only one more point
-but this was a point of seemingly
vast consequence. It appears that, im-
mediately after the discovery of the
clothes as above described, the lifeless
or nearly lifeless body of St. Eustache,
Marie's betrothed, was found in the
vicinity of what all now supposed the
scene of the outrage. A phial labelled
"laudanum," and emptied, was found
near him. His breath gave evidence of
the poison. He died without speaking.
Upon his person was found a letter,
briefly stating his love for Marie, with
his design of self-destruction.
"I need scarcely tell you," said Dupin,
as he finished the perusal of my notes,
"that this is a far more intricate case
than that of the Rue Morgue; from
which it differs in one important respect.
This is an ordinary, although an atro-
cious, instance of crime. There is
nothing peculiarly outre about it. You
will observe that, for this reason, the
mystery has been considered easy, when,
for this reason, it should have been con-
sidered difficult, of solution. Thus, at
* Adam.
first, it was thought unnecessary to
offer a reward. The myrmidons of
G- were able at once to compre-
hend how and why such an atrocity
might have been committed. They
could picture to their imaginations a
mode-many modes, and a motive-
many motives; and because it was not
impossible that either of these numerous
modes or motives could have been the
actual one, they have taken it for
granted that one of them must. But the
ease with which these variable fancies
were entertained, and the very plausi-
bility which each assumed, should have
been understood as indicative rather of
the difficulties than of the facilities
which must attend elucidation. I have,
therefore observed that it is by promi-
nences above the plane of the ordinary,
that reason feels her way, if at all, in
her search for the true, and that the
proper question in cases such as this,
is not so much 'what has occurred?'
as 'what has occurred that has never
occurred before?' In the investigations
at the house of Madame L'Espanaye,*
the agents of G were discouraged
and confounded by that very unusual-
ness which, to a properly regulated in-
tellect, would have afforded the surest
omen of success; while this same intel-
lect might have been plunged in despair
at the ordinary character of all that
met the eye in the case of the per-
fumery-girl, and yet told of nothing
but easy triumph to the functionaries
of the Prefecture.
"In the case of Madame L'Espanaye
and her daughter, there was, even at
the beginning of our investigation, no
doubt that murder had been committed.
* See "Murders in the Rue Morgue."
114
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
The idea of suicide was excluded at
once. Here, too, we are freed, at the
commencement, from all supposition of
self-murder. The body found at the
Barriere du Roule was found under such
circumstances as to leave us no room
for embarrassment upon this important
point. But it has been suggested that
the corpse discovered is not that of
the Marie Roget for the conviction of
whose assassin, or assassins, the reward
is offered, and respecting whom, solely,
our agreement has been arranged with
the Prefect. We both know this gentle-
man well. It will not do to trust him
too far. If, dating our inquiries from
the body found, and then tracing a
murderer, we yet discover this body to
be that of some other individual than
Marie; or if, starting from the living
Marie, we find her, yet find her un-
assassinated-in either case we lose
our labor; since it is Monsieur G-
with whom we have to deal. For our
own purpose, therefore, if not for the
purpose of justice, it is indispensable
that our first step should be the deter-
mination of the identity of the corpse
with the Marie Roget who is missing.
"With the public the arguments of
L'Etoile have had weight; and that the
journal itself is convinced of their im-
portance would appear from the man-
ner in which it commences one of its
essays upon the subject-‘Several of the
morning papers of the day,' it says,
'speak of the conclusive article in Mon-
day's Etoile.' To me, this article ap-
pears conclusive of little beyond the
zeal of its inditer. We should bear in
mind that, in general, it is the object
of our newspapers rather to create a
sensation to make a point-than to
further the cause of truth. The latter
end is only pursued when it seems co-
incident with the former. The print
which merely falls in with ordinary
opinion (however well founded this
opinion may be) earns for itself no
credit with the mob. The mass of the
people regard as profound only him
who suggests pungent contradictions of
the general idea. In ratiocination, not
less than in literature, it is the epigram
which is the most immediately and the
most universally appreciated. In both,
it is of the lowest order of merit.
"What I mean to say is, that it is the
mingled epigram and melodrame of the
idea, that Marie Roget still lives, rather
than any true plausibility in this idea,
which have suggested it to L'Etoile,
and secured it a favorable reception
with the public. Let us examine the
heads of this journal's argument; en-
deavoring to avoid the incoherence with
which it is originally set forth.
"The first aim of the writer is to
show, from the brevity of the interval
between Marie's disappearance and the
finding of the floating corpse, that this
corpse cannot be that of Marie. The
reduction of this interval to its smallest
possible dimension, becomes thus, at
once, an object with the reasoner. In
the rash pursuit of this object, he rushes
into mere assumption at the outset. 'It
is folly to suppose,' he says, 'that the
murder, if murder was committed on
her body, could have been consummated
soon enough to have enabled her mur-
derers to throw the body into the river
before midnight.' We demand at once,
and very naturally, why? Why is it
folly to suppose that the murder was
committed within five minutes after the
girl's quitting her mother's house? Why
is it folly to suppose that the murder
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
115
was committed at any given period of
the day? There have been assassina-
tions at all hours. But, had the murder
taken place at any moment between
nine o'clock in the morning of Sunday
and a quarter before midnight, there
would still have been time enough 'to
throw the body into the river before
midnight.' This assumption, then,
amounts precisely to this-that the mur-
der was not committed on Sunday at
all-and, if we allow L'Etoile to assume
this, we may permit it any liberties
whatever. The paragraph beginning
'It is folly to suppose that the murder,
etc., however it appears as printed in
L'Etoile, may be imagined to have ex-
isted actually thus in the brain of its
inditer: 'It is folly to suppose that the
murder, if murder was committed on
the body, could have been committed
soon enough to have enabled her mur-
derers to throw the body into the river
before midnight; it is folly, we say, to
suppose all this, and to suppose at the
same time, (as we are resolved to sup-
pose), that the body was not thrown
in until after midnight'-a sentence
sufficiently inconsequential in itself, but
not so utterly preposterous as the one
printed.
"Were it my purpose," continued
Dupin, "merely to make out a case
against this passage of L'Etoile's argu-
ment, I might safely leave it where it
is. It is not, however, with L'Etoile
that we have to do, but with truth.
The sentence in question has but one
meaning, as it stands; and this mean-
ing I have fairly stated; but it is mate-
rial that we go behind the mere words,
for an idea which these words have
obviously intended, and failed to con-
vey. It was the design of the journal-
ists to say that at whatever period of
the day or night of Sunday this murder
was committed, it was improbable that
the assassins would have ventured to
bear the corpse to the river before mid-
night. And herein lies, really, the as-
sumption of which I complain. It is
assumed that the murder was committed
at such a position, and under such cir-
cumstances, that the bearing it to the
river became necessary. Now, the as-
sassination might have taken place upon
the river's brink, or on the river itself;
and, thus, the throwing the corpse in
the water might have been resorted to
at any period of the day or night, as
the most obvious and most immediate
mode of disposal. You will understand
that I suggest nothing here as probable,
or as coincident with my own opinion.
My design, so far, has no reference to
the facts of the case. I wish merely to
caution you against the whole tone of
L'Etoile's suggestion, by calling your
attention to its ex-parte character at
the outset.
"Having prescribed thus a limit to
suit its own preconceived notions; hav-
ing assumed that, if this were the body
of Marie, it could have been in the
water but a very brief time, the journal
goes on to say:
All experience has shown that
drowned bodies, or bodies thrown into
the water immediately after death by
violence, require from six to ten days
for sufficient decomposition to take
place to bring them to the top of the
water. Even when a cannon is fired
over a corpse, and it rises before at
least five or six days' immersion, it
sinks again if let alone.
116
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"These assertions have been tacitly
received by every paper in Paris, with
the exception of Le Moniteur.* This
latter print endeavors to combat that
portion of the paragraph which has
reference to 'drowned bodies' only, by
citing some five or six instances in
which the bodies of individuals known
to be drowned were found floating after
the lapse of less time than is insisted
upon by L'Etoile. But there is some-
thing excessively unphilosophical in the
attempt, on the part of Le Moniteur,
to rebut the general assertion of L'-
Etoile, by a citation of particular in-
stances militating against that assertion.
Had it been possible to adduce fifty
instead of five examples of bodies found
floating at the end of two or three days,
these fifty examples could still have
been properly regarded only as excep-
tions to L'Etoile's rule, until such time
as the rule itself should be confuted.
Admitting the rule, (and this Le Moni-
teur does not deny, insisting merely
upon its exceptions,) the argument of
L'Etoile is suffered to remain in full
force; for this argument does not pre-
tend to involve more than a question
of the probability of the body having
risen to the surface in less than three
days; and this probability will be in
favor of L'Etoile's position until the
instances so childishly adduced shall
be sufficient in number to establish an
antagonistical rule.
"You will see at once that all argu-
ment upon this head should be urged,
if at all, against the rule itself; and
for this end we must examine the
rationale of the rule. Now the human
*The New York Commercial Ad-
vertiser.
body, in general, is neither much lighter
nor much heavier than the water of the
Seine; that is to say, the specific gravity
of the human body, in its natural con-
dition, is about equal to the bulk of
fresh water which it displaces. The
bodies of fat and fleshy persons, with
small bones, and of women generally,
are lighter than those of the lean and
large-boned, and of men; and the speci-
fic gravity of the water of a river is
somewhat influenced by the presence
of the tide from the sea. But, leaving
this tide out of the question, it may
be said that very few human bodies
will sink at all, even in fresh water, of
their own accord. Almost any one
falling into a river, will be enabled to
float, if he suffer the specific gravity
of the water fairly to be adduced in
comparison with his own-that is to
say, if he suffer his whole person to be
immersed, with as little exception a
possible. The proper position for one
who cannot swim, is the upright posi
tion of the walker on land, with the
head thrown fully back, and immersed
the mouth and nostrils alone remaining
above the surface. Thus circumstanced
we shall find that we float without diffi
culty and without exertion. It is evi
dent, however, that the gravities of the
body, and of the bulk of water dis
placed, are very nicely balanced, and
that a trifle will cause either to pre
ponderate. An arm, for instance, up
lifted from the water, and thus deprive
of its support, is an additional weigh
sufficient to immerse the whole head
while the accidental aid of the smalles
piece of timber will enable us to elevat
the head so as to look about. Now, i
the struggles of one unused to swimming
the arms are invariably thrown upward
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
117,
while an attempt is made to keep the
head in its usual perpendicular position.
The result is the immersion of the
mouth and nostrils, and the inception,
during efforts to breathe while beneath
the surface of the water into the lungs.
Much is also received into the stomach,
and the whole body becomes heavier by
the difference between the weight of
the air originally distending these cavi-
ties, and that of the fluid which now
fills them. This difference is sufficient
to cause the body to sink, as a general
rule; but is insufficient in the case of
individuals with small bones and an
abnormal quantity of flaccid or fatty
matter. Such individuals float even
after drowning.
"The corpse, being supposed at the
bottom of the river, will there remain
until, by some means, its specific gravity
again becomes less than that of the
bulk of water which it displaces. This
effect is brought about by decomposi-
tion, or otherwise. The result of de-
composition is the generation of gas,
distending the cellular tissues and all
the cavities, and giving the puffed ap-
pearance which is so horrible. When
this distension has so far progressed
that the bulk of the corpse is mate-
rially increased without a corresponding
increase of mass or weight, its specific
gravity becomes less than that of the
water displaced, and it forthwith makes
its appearance at the surface. But de-
composition is modified by innumer-
able circumstances-is hastened or re-
tarded by innumerable agencies; for
example, by the heat or cold of the
season, by the mineral impregnation or
purity of the water, by its depth or
shallowness, by its currency or stagna-
tion, by the temperament of the body,
by its infection or freedom from dis-
ease before death. Thus it is evident
that we can assign no period, with any-
thing like accuracy, at which the corpse
shall rise through decomposition. Un-
der certain conditions this result would
be brought about within an hour; under
others it might not take place at all.
There are chemical infusions by which
the animal frame can be preserved for-
ever from corruption; the bi-chloride
of mercury is one. But, apart from de-
composition, there may be, and very
usually is, a generation of gas within
the stomach, from the acetous fermen-
tation of vegetable matter (or within
other cavities from other causes), suffi-
cient to induce a distension which will
bring the body to the surface. The
effect produced by the firing of a can-
non is that of simple vibration. This
may either loosen the corpse from the
soft mud or ooze in which it is imbed-
ded, thus permitting it to rise when
other agencies have already prepared it
for so doing; or it may overcome the
tenacity of some putrescent portions
of the cellular tissue, allowing the cavi-
ties to distend under the influence of
the gas.
"Having thus before us the whole
philosophy of this subject, we can easily
test by it the assertions of L'Etoile.
'All experience shows,' say this paper,
'that drowned bodies, or bodies thrown
into the water immediately after death
by violence, require from six to ten
days for sufficient decomposition to take
place to bring them to the top of the
water. Even when a cannon is fired
over a corpse, and it rises before at
least five or six days' immersion, it
sinks again if let alone.'
"The whole of this paragraph must
118
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
now appear a tissue of inconsequence
and incoherence. All experience does
not show that 'drowned bodies' require
from six to ten days for sufficient de-
composition to take place to bring them.
to the surface. Both science and ex-
perience show that the period of their
rising is, and necessarily must be, in-
determinate. If, moreover, a body has
risen to the surface through firing of
cannon, it will not 'sink again if let
alone,' until decomposition has so far
progressed as to permit the escape of the
generated gas. But I wish to call your
attention to the distinction which is
made between 'drowned bodies,' and
'bodies thrown into the water immedi-
ately after death by violence.' Although
the writer admits the distinction, he yet
includes them all in the same category.
I have shown how it is that the body
of a drowning man becomes specifically
heavier than its bulk of water, and that
he would not sink at all, except for the
struggle by which he elevates his arms
above the surface, and his gasps for
breath while beneath the surface-
gasps which supply by water the place
of the original air in the lungs. But
these struggles and these gasps would
not occur in the body 'thrown into the
water immediately after death by vio-
lence.' Thus, in the latter instance,
the body, as a general rule, would not
sink at all-a fact of which L'Etoile
is evidently ignorant. When decompo-
sition had proceeded to a very great
extent-when the flesh had in a great
measure left the bones-then, indeed,
but not till then, should we lose sight
of the corpse.
"And now what are we to make of
the argument, that the body found could
not be that of Marie Roget, because,
three days only having elapsed, this
body was found floating? If drowned,
being a woman, she might never have
sunk; or, having sunk, might have re-
appeared in twenty-four hours or less.
But no one supposes her to have been
drowned; and, dying before being
thrown into the river, she might have
been found floating at any period after-
ward whatever.
"But,' says L'Etoile, if the body
had been kept in its mangled state on
shore until Tuesday night, some trace
would be found on shore of the mur-
derers.' Here it is at first difficult to
perceive the intention of the reasoner.
He means to anticipate what he imagines
would be an objection to his theory-
viz. that the body was kept on shore
two days, suffering rapid decomposition
-more rapid than if immersed in water.
He supposes that, had this been the
case, it might have appeared at the sur-
face on the Wednesday, and thinks that
only under such circumstances it could
have so appeared. He is accordingly
in haste to show that it was not kept
on shore; for, if so, 'some trace would
be found on shore of the murderers.'
I presume you smile at the sequitur.
You cannot be made to see how the
mere duration of the corpse on the
shore could operate to multiply traces
of the assassins. Nor can I.
"And furthermore it is exceedingly
improbable,' continues our journal, ‘that
any villains who had committed such a
murder as is here supposed, would have
thrown the body in without weight to
sink it, when such a precaution could
have so easily been taken.' Observe,
here, the laughable confusion of thought!
No one-not even L'Etoile-disputes
the murder committed on the body
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
119
found. The marks of violence are too
obvious. It is our reasoner's object
merely to show that this body is not
Marie's. He wishes to prove that Marie
is not assassinated-not that the corpse
was not. Yet his observation proves
only the latter point. Here is a corpse
without weight attached. Murderers,
casting it in, would not have failed to
attach a weight. Therefore it was not
thrown in by murderers. This is all
which is proved, if any thing is. The
question of identity is not even ap-
proached, and L'Etoile has been at
great pains merely to gainsay now what
it has admitted only a moment before.
We are perfectly convinced,' it says,
that the body found was that of a mur-
dered female.'
"Nor is this the sole instance, even
in this division of his subject, where
our reasoner unwittingly reasons against
himself. His evident object, I have
already said, is to reduce, as much as
possible, the interval between Marie's
disappearance and the finding of the
corpse. Yet we find him urging the
point that no person saw the girl from
the moment of her leaving her mother's
house. 'We have no evidence,' he says,
that Marie Roget was in the land of
the living after nine o'clock on Sunday,
June the twenty-second.' As his argu-
ment is obviously an ex-parte one, he
should, at least, have left this matter
out of sight; for had any one been
known to see Marie, say on Monday,
or on Tuesday, the interval in question
would have been much reduced, and,
by his own ratiocination, the probability
much diminished of the corpse being
that of the grisette. It is, nevertheless,
amusing to observe that L'Etoile insists
upon its point in the full belief of its
furthering its general argument.
"Re-peruse now that portion of this
argument which has reference to the
identification of the corpse by Beau-
vais. In regard to the hair upon the
arm, L'Etoile has been obviously dis-
ingenious. M. Beauvais, not being an
idiot, could never have urged in identi-
fication of the corpse, simply hair upon
its arm. No arm is without hair. The
generality of the expression of L'Etoile
is a mere perversion of the witness'
phraseology. He must have spoken of
some peculiarity in this hair. It must
have been a peculiarity of color, of
quantity, of length, or of situation.
66
'Her foot,' says the journal, 'was
small-so are thousands of feet. Her
garter is no proof whatever-nor is
her shoe for shoes and garters are
sold in packages. The same may be
said of the flowers in her hat. One
thing upon which M. Beauvais strongly
insists is, that the clasp on the garter
found had been set back to take it in.
This amounts to nothing; for most
women find it proper to take a pair of
garters home and fit them to the size
of the limbs they are to encircle, rather
than to try them in the store where
they purchase.' Here it is difficult to
suppose the reasoner in earnest. Had
M. Beauvais, in his search for the body
of Marie, discovered a corpse corre-
sponding in general size and appearance
to the missing girl, he would have been
warranted (without reference to the
question of habiliment at all) in form-
ing an opinion that his search had been
successful. If, in addition to the point
of general size and contour, he had
found upon the arm a peculiar hairy
appearance which he had observed upon
120
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
or
the living Marie, his opinion might have
been justly strengthened; and the in-
crease of positiveness might well have
been in the ratio of the peculiarity,
unusualness, of the hairy mark. If, the
feet of Marie being small, those of the
corpse were also small, the increase of
probability that the body was that of
Marie would not be an increase in a
ratio merely arithmetical, but in one
highly geometrical, or accumulative.
Add to all this shoes such as she had
been known to wear upon the day of
her disappearance, and, although these
shoes may be 'sold in packages,' you
so far augment the probability as to
verge upon the certain. What, of itself,
would be no evidence of identity, be-
comes through its corroborative posi-
tion, proof most sure. Give us, then,
flowers in the hat corresponding to those
worn by the missing girl, and we seek
for nothing further. If only one flower,
we seek for nothing further-what then
if two or three, or more? Each suc-
cessive one is multiple evidence-proof
not added to proof, but multiplied by
hundreds or thousands. Let us now
discover, upon the deceased, garters
such as the living used, and it is almost
folly to proceed. But these garters are
found to be tightened, by the setting
back of a clasp, in just such a manner
as her own had been tightened by Marie
shortly previous to her leaving home.
It is now madness or hypocrisy to
doubt. What L'Etoile says in respect
to this abbreviation of the garters being
an unusual occurrence, shows nothing
beyond its own pertinacity in error.
The elastic nature of the clasp-garter
is self-demonstration of the unusualness
of the abbreviation. What is made to
adjust itself, must of necessity require
foreign adjustment but rarely. It must
have been by an accident, in its strict-
est sense, that these garters of Marie
needed the tightening described. They
alone would have amply established her
identity. But it is not that the corpse
was found to have the garters of the
missing girl, or found to have her shoes,
or her bonnet, or the flowers of her
bonnet, or her feet, or a peculiar mark
upon the arm, or her general size and
appearance it is that the corpse had
each, and all collectively. Could it be
proved that the editor of L'Etoile really
entertained a doubt, under the circum
stances, there would be no need, in his
case, of a commission de lunatico
inquirendo. He has thought it saga-
cious to echo the small talk of the
lawyers, who, for the most part, con-
tent themselves with echoing the rec-
tangular precepts of the courts. I
would here observe that very much of
what is rejected as evidence by a court,
is the best of evidence to the intellect.
For the court, guided itself by the gen-
eral principles of evidence--the recog-
nized and booked principles-is averse
from swerving at particular instances.
And this steadfast adherence to prin-
ciple, with rigorous disregard of the
conflicting exception, is a sure mode
of attaining the maximum of attainable
truth, in any long sequence of time.
The practice, in mass, is therefore philo-
sophical; but it is not the less certain
that it engenders vast individual error
"In respect to the insinuations lev-
elled at Beauvais, you will be willing
to dismiss them in a breath. You have
already fathomed the true character of
this good gentleman. He is a busybody
with much of romance and little o
wit. Any one so constituted will readily
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
121
}
so conduct himself, upon occasion of
real excitement, as to render himself
liable to suspicion on the part of the
over-acute, or the ill-disposed. M.
Beauvais (as it appears from your
notes) had some personal interviews
with the editor of L'Etoile, and offended
him by venturing an opinion that the
corpse, notwithstanding the theory of
the editor, was, in sober fact, that of
Marie. 'He persists,' says the paper,
in asserting the corpse to be that of
Marie, but cannot give a circumstance,
in addition to those which we have
commented upon, to make others be-
lieve.' Now, without re-adverting to
the fact that stronger evidence 'to make
others believe,' could never have been
adduced, it may be remarked that a
man may very well be understood to
believe, in a case of this kind, without
the ability to advance a single reason
for the belief of a second party. Noth-
ing is more vague than impressions of
individual identity. Each man recog-
nizes his neighbor, yet there are few
instances in which any one is prepared
to give a reason for his recognition.
The editor of L'Etoile had no right to
be offended at M. Beauvais's unreason-
ing belief.
"The suspicious circumstances which
invest him, will be found to tally much
better with my hypothesis of romantic
busy-bodyism, than with the reasoner's
suggestion of guilt. Once adopting the
more charitable interpretation, we shall
find no difficulty in comprehending the
rose in the key-hole; the 'Marie' upon
the slate; the 'elbowing the male rela-
tives out of the way'; the 'aversion to
permitting them to see the body'; the
caution given to Madame B-, that
she must hold no conversation with the
gendarme until his (Beauvais') return;
and, lastly, his apparent determination
'that nobody should have any thing to
do with the proceedings except himself.'
It seems to me unquestionable that
Beauvais was a suitor of Marie's; that
she coquetted with him; and that he
was ambitious of being thought to enjoy
her fullest intimacy and confidence. I
shall say nothing more upon this point;
and, as the evidence fully rebuts the
assertion of L'Etoile, touching the mat-
ter of apathy on the part of the mother
and other relatives-an apathy incon-
sistent with the supposition of their
believing the corpse to be that of the
perfumery girl-we shall now proceed
as if the question of identity were set-
tled to our perfect satisfaction."
"And what," I here demanded, "do
you think of the opinions of Le Com-
merciel?"
"That, in spirit, they are far more
worthy of attention than any which
have been promulgated upon the sub-
ject. The deductions from the prem-
ises are philosophical and acute; but
the premises, in two instances, at least,
are founded in imperfect observation.
Le Commerciel wishes to intimate that
Marie was seized by some gang of low
ruffians not far from her mother's door.
'It is impossible,' it urges, 'that a per-
son so well known to thousands as this
young woman was, should have passed
three blocks without some one having
seen her.' This is the idea of a man
long resident in Paris-a public man-
and one whose walks to and fro in the
city have been mostly limited to the
vicinity of the public offices. He is
aware that he seldom passes so far as
a dozen blocks from his own bureau,
without being recognized and accosted.
122
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
And, knowing the extent of his per-
sonal acquaintance with others, and of
others with him, he compares his noto-
riety with that of the perfumery-girl,
finds no great difference between them,
and reaches at once the conclusion that
she, in her walks, would be equally
liable to recognition with himself in
his. This could only be the case were
her walks of the same unvarying,
methodical character, and within the
same species of limited region as are
his own. He passes to and fro, at
regular intervals, within a confined
periphery, abounding in individuals who
are led to observation of his person
through interest in the kindred nature
of his occupation with their own. But
the walks of Marie may, in general,
be supposed discursive. In this par-
ticular instance, it will be understood
as most probable, that she proceeded
upon a route of more than average
diversity from her accustomed ones.
The parallel which we imagine to have
existed in the mind of Le Commerciel
would only be sustained in the event
of the two individuals traversing the
whole city. In this case, granting the
personal acquaintances to be equal, the
chances would be also equal that an
equal number of personal rencontres
would be made. For my own part, I
should hold it not only as possible, but
as far more than probable, that Marie
might have proceeded, at any given
period, by any one of the many routes
between her own residence and that of
her aunt, without meeting a single indi-
vidual whom she knew, or by whom
she was known. In viewing this ques-
tion in its full and proper light, we
must hold steadily in mind the great
disproportion between the personal ac-
quaintances of even the most noted
individual in Paris, and the entire popu-
lation of Paris itself.
"But whatever force there may still
appear to be in the suggestion of Le
Commerciel, will be much diminished
when we take into consideration the
hour at which the girl went abroad.
'It was when the streets were full of
people,' says Le Commerciel, 'that she
went out.' But not so. It was at nine
o'clock in the morning. Now at nine
o'clock of every morning in the week,
with the exception of Sunday, the
streets of the city are, it is true,
thronged with people. At nine on Sun-
day, the populace are chiefly within
doors preparing for church. No ob-
serving person can have failed to notice
the peculiarly deserted air of the town,
from about eight until ten on the morn-
ing of every Sabbath. Between ten and
eleven the streets are thronged, but not
at so early a period as that designated.
"There is another point at which
there seems a deficiency of observation
on the part of Le Commerciel. ‘A
piece,' it says, 'of one of the unfortu-
nate girl's petticoats, two feet long, and
one foot wide, was torn out and tied
under her chin, and around the back
of her head, probably to prevent
screams. This was done by fellows who
had no pocket-handkerchiefs.' Whether
this idea is or is not well founded, we
will endeavor to see hereafter; but by
'fellows who have no pocket-handker-
chiefs,' the editor intends the lowest
class of ruffians. These, however, are
the very description of people who
will always be found to have handker-
chiefs even when destitute of shirts.
You must have had occasion to observe
how absolutely indispensable, of late
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
123
years, to the thorough blackguard, has
become the pocket-handkerchief."
"And what are we to think," I asked,
"of the article in Le Soleil?”
"That it is a vast pity its inditer was
not born a parrot-in which case he
would have been the most illustrious
parrot of his race. He has merely re-
peated the individual items of the
already published opinion; collecting
them, with a laudable industry, from
this paper and from that. "The things
had all evidently been there,' he says,
'at least three or four weeks, and there
can be no doubt that the spot of this
appalling outrage has been discovered.'
The facts here re-stated by Le Soleil,
are very far indeed from removing my
own doubts upon this subject, and we
will examine them more particularly
hereafter in connection with another
division of the theme.
"At present we must occupy our-
selves with other investigations. You
cannot fail to have remarked the ex-
treme laxity of the examination of the
corpse. To be sure, the question of
identity was readily determined, or
should have been; but there were other
points to be ascertained. Had the body
been in any respect despoiled? Had
the deceased any articles of jewelry
about her person upon leaving home?
If so, had she any when found? These
are important questions utterly un-
touched by the evidence; and there are
others of equal moment, which have
met with no attention. We must en-
deavor to satisfy ourselves by personal
inquiry. The case of St. Eustache must
be re-examined. I have no suspicion
of this person; but let us proceed
methodically. We will ascertain beyond.
a doubt the validity of the affidavits
in regard to his whereabouts on the
Sunday. Affidavits of this character are
readily made matter of mystification.
Should there be nothing wrong here,
however, we will dismiss St. Eustache
from our investigations. His suicide,
however, corroborative of suspicion,
were there found to be deceit in the
affidavits, is, without such deceit, in no
respect an unaccountable circumstance,
or one which need cause us to deflect
from the line of ordinary analysis.
"In that which I now propose, we
will discard the interior points of this
tragedy, and concentrate our attention
upon its outskirts. Not the least usual
error in investigations such as this is
the limiting of inquiry to the imme-
diate, with total disregard of the col-
lateral or circumstantial events. It is
the malpractice of the courts to con-
fine evidence and discussion to the
bounds of apparent relevancy. Yet ex-
perience has shown, and a true philoso-
phy will always show, that a vast, per-
haps the larger, portion of truth arises
from the seemingly irrelevant. It is
through the spirit of this principle, if
not precisely through its letter, that
modern science has resolved to calcu-
late upon the unforeseen. But perhaps
you do not comprehend me. The his-
tory of human knowledge has so unin-
terruptedly shown that to collateral, or
incidental, or accidental events we are
indebted for the most numerous and
most valuable discoveries, that it has at
length become necessary, in prospective
view of improvement, to make not only
large, but the largest, allowances for
inventions that shall arise by chance,
and quite out of the range of ordinary
expectation. It is no longer philosophi-
cal to base upon what has been a vision
124
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
We
of what is to be. Accident is admitted
as a portion of the substructure.
make chance a matter of absolute cal-
culation. We subject the unlooked for
and unimagined to the mathematical
formula of the schools.
"I repeat that it is no more than
fact that the larger portion of all truth
has sprung from the collateral; and it
is but in accordance with the spirit of
the principle involved in this fact that
I would divert inquiry, in the present
case, from the trodden and hitherto un-
fruitful ground of the event itself to
the contemporary circumstances which
surround it. While you ascertain the
validity of the affidavits, I will examine
the newspapers more generally than you
have as yet done. So far, we have
only reconnoitred the field of investi-
gation; but it will be strange, indeed,
if a comprehensive survey, such as I
propose, of the public prints will not
afford us some minute points which
shall establish a direction for inquiry."
In pursuance of Dupin's suggestion,
I made scrupulous examination of the
affair of the affidavits. The result was
a firm conviction of their validity, and
of the consequent innocence of St.
Eustache. In the meantime my friend
occupied himself, with what seemed to
me a minuteness altogether objectless,
in a scrutiny of the various newspaper
files. At the end of a week he placed
before me the following extracts:
"About three years and a half ago,
a disturbance very similar to the pres-
ent was caused by the disappearance
of this same Marie Roget from the
parfumerie of Monsieur Le Blanc, in
the Palais Royal. At the end of a
week, however, she re-appeared at her
customary comptoir, as well as ever,
with the exception of a slight paleness
not altogether usual. It was given out
by Monsieur Le Blanc and her mother
that she had merely been on a visit
to some friend in the country; and the
affair was speedily hushed up. We
presume that the present absence is a
freak of the same nature, and that, at
the expiration of a week or, perhaps, of
a month, we shall have her among us
again."-Evening Paper, Monday, June
23.*
"An evening journal of yesterday
refers to a former mysterious disap-
pearance of Mademoiselle Roget. It is
well known that, during the week of
her absence from Le Blanc's parfum-
erie, she was in the company of a young
naval officer much noted for his de-
baucheries. A quarrel, it is supposed,
providentially, led to her return home.
We have the name of the Lothario in
question, who is at present stationed in
Paris, but for obvious reasons forbear
to make it public."-Le Mercure, Tues-
day Morning, June 24.t
"An outrage of the most atrocious
character was perpetrated near this city
the day before yesterday. A gentle-
man, with his wife and daughter, en-
gaged, about dusk, the services of six
young men, who were idly rowing a
boat to and fro near the banks of the
Seine, to convey him across the river.
Upon reaching the opposite shore the
three passengers stepped out, and had
proceeded so far as to be beyond the
view of the boat, when the daughter
discovered that she had left in it her
parasol. She returned for it, was seized
by the gang, carried out into the stream,
*New York Express.
+ New York Herald.
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
125
gagged, brutally treated, and finally
taken to the shore at a point not far
from that at which she had originally
entered the boat with her parents. The
villains have escaped for the time, but
the police are upon their trail, and
some of them will soon be taken."-
Morning Paper, June 25.*
"We have received one or two com-
munications, the object of which is to
fasten the crime of the late atrocity
upon Mennais;† but as this gentleman
has been fully exonerated by a legal
inquiry, and as the arguments of our
several correspondents appear to be
more zealous than profound, we do not
think it advisable to make them pub-
lic."-Morning Paper, June 28.
"We have received several forcibly
written communications, apparently
from various sources, and which go far
to render it a matter of certainty that
the unfortunate Marie Roget has be-
come a victim of one of the numerous
bands of blackguards which infest the
vicinity of the city upon Sunday. Our
own opinion is decidedly in favor of
this supposition. We shall endeavor to
make room for some of these arguments
hereafter."-Evening Paper, Tuesday,
June 31.8
"On Monday, one of the bargemen
connected with the revenue service saw
an empty boat floating down the Seine.
Sails were lying in the bottom of the
boat. The bargeman towed it under
*New York Courier and Inquirer.
+Mennais was one of the parties
originally suspected and arrested, but
discharged through total lack of evi-
dence.
New York Courier and Inquirer.
§ New York Evening Post.
the barge office. The next morning it
was taken from thence without the
knowledge of any of the officers. The
rudder is now at the barge office."-Le
Diligence, Thursday, June 26.*
Upon reading these various extracts,
they not only seemed to me irrelevant,
but I could perceive no mode in which
any one of them could be brought to
bear upon the matter in hand. I
waited for some explanation from
Dupin.
"It is not my present design," h
said, "to dwell upon the first and second
of these extracts. I have copied them
chiefly to show you the extreme remiss-
ness of the police, who, as far as I can
understand from the Prefect, have not
troubled themselves, in any respect,
with an examination of the naval offi-
cer alluded to. Yet it is mere folly to
say that between the first and second
disappearance of Marie there is no sup-
posable connection. Let us admit the
first elopement to have resulted in a
quarrel between the lovers, and the
return home of the betrayed. We are
now prepared to view a second elope-
ment (if we know that an elopement
has again taken place) as indicating a
renewal of the betrayer's advances,
rather than as the result of new pro-
posals by a second individaul-we are
prepared to regard it as a 'making up'
of the old amour, rather than as the
commencement of a new one. The
chances are ten to one, that he who
I had once eloped with Marie would
again propose an elopement, rather than
that she to whom proposals of an
elopement had been made by one indi-
vidual, should have them made to her
*New York Standard.
126
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
by another. And here let me call your
attention to the fact, that the time
elapsing between the first ascertained
and the second supposed elopement is
a few months more than the general
period of the cruises of our men-of-
war. Had the lover been interrupted in
his first villainy by the necessity of
departure to sea, and had he seized the
first moment of his return to renew the
base designs not yet altogether accom-
plished or not yet altogether accom-
plished by him? Of all these things
we know nothing.
"You will say, however, that, in the
second instance, there was no elope-
ment as imagined. Certainly not-but
are we prepared to say that there was
not the frustrated design? Beyond St.
Eustache, and perhaps Beauvais, we
find no recognized, no open, no honor-
able suitors of Marie. Of none other
is there any thing said. Who, then,
is the secret lover, of whom the rela-
tives (at least most of them) know
nothing, but whom Marie meets upon
the morning of Sunday, and who is so
deeply in her confidence, that she hesi-
tates not to remain with him until the
shades of the evening descend, amid
the solitary groves of the Barriere du
Roule? Who is that secret lover, I
ask, of whom, at least, most of the
relatives know nothing? And what
means the singular prophecy of Madam
Roget on the morning Marie's depar-
ture? 'I fear that I shall never see
Marie again.'
"But if we cannot imagine Madame
Roget privy to the design of elopement,
may we not at least suppose this design
entertained by the girl? Upon quitting
home, she gave it to be understood that
she was about to visit her aunt in the
Rue des Dromes, and St. Eustache was
requested to call for her at dark. Now,
at first glance, this fact strongly mili-
tates against my suggestion;-but let
us reflect. That she did meet some
companion, and proceed with him across
the river, reaching the Barriere du
Roule at so late an hour as three o'clock
in the afternoon, is known. But in
consenting so to accompany this indi-
vidual, (for whatever purpose-to her
mother known or unknown,) she must
have thought of her expressed intention
when leaving home, and of the surprise
and suspicion aroused in the bosom of
her affianced suitor, St. Eustache, when,
calling for her, at the hour appointed,
in the Rue des Dromes, he should find
that she had not been there, and when,
moreover, upon returning to the pension
with this alarming intelligence, he
should become aware of her continued
absence from home. She must have
thought of these things, I say.
She
must have foreseen the chagrin of St.
Eustache, the suspicion of all. She
could not have thought of returning to
brave this suspicion; but the suspicion
becomes a point of trivial importance
to her, if we suppose her not intending
to return.
"We may imagine her thinking thus-
'I am to meet a certain person for the
purpose of elopement, or for certain
other purposes known only to myself.
It is necessary that there be no chance
of interruption-there must be sufficient
time given us to elude pursuit-I will
give it to be understood that I shall
visit and spend the day with my aunt
at the Rue des Dromes-I will tell St.
Eustache not to call for me until dark
-in this way, my absence from home
for the longest possible period, without
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
127
causing suspicion or anxiety, will be ac-
counted for, and I shall gain more time
than in any other manner. If I bid
St. Eustache call for me at dark, he
will be sure not to call before; but if
I wholly neglect to bid him call, my
time for escape will be diminished, since
it will be expected that I return the
earlier, and my absence will the sooner
excite anxiety. Now, if it were my
design to return at all-if I had in
contemplation merely a stroll with the
individual in question-it would not be
my policy to bid St. Eustache call;
for, calling, he will be sure to ascertain
that I have played him false-a fact
of which I might keep him forever in
ignorance, by leaving home without
notifying him of my intention, by re-
turning before dark, and by then stating
that I had been to visit my aunt in
the Rue des Dromes. But, as it is
my design never to return-or not for
some weeks or not until certain con-
cealments are effected-the gaining of
time is the only point about which I
need give myself any concern.'
"You have observed, in your notes,
that the most general opinion in rela-
tion to this sad affair is, and was from
the first, that the girl had been the
victim of a gang of blackguards. Now,
the popular opinion, under certain con-
ditions, is not to be disregarded. When
arising of itself-when manifesting it-
self in a strictly spontaneous manner—
we should look upon it as analogous
with that intuition which is the idio-
syncrasy of the individual man of
genius. In ninety-nine cases from the
hundred I would abide by its decision.
But it is important that we find no pal-
pable traces of suggestion. The opinion
must be rigorously the public's own;
and the distinction is often exceedingly
difficult to perceive and to maintain.
In the present instance, it appears to
me that this 'public opinion,' in respect
to a gang, has been superinduced by
the collateral event which is detailed
in the third of my extracts. All Paris
is excited by the discovered corpse of
Marie, a girl young, beautiful, and no-
torious. This corpse is found, bearing
marks of violence, and floating in the
river. But it is now made known that,
at the very period, or about the very
period, in which it is supposed that the
girl was assassinated, an outrage simi-
lar in nature to that endured by the
deceased, although less in extent, was
perpetrated by a gang of young ruf-
fians, upon the person of a second
young female. Is it wonderful that the
one known atrocity should influence the
popular judgment in regard to the other
unknown? This judgment awaited di-
rection, and the known outrage seemed
so opportunely to afford it!
too, was found in the river; and upon
this very river was this known outrage
committed. The connection of the two
events had about it so much of the
palpable, that the true wonder would
have been a failure of the populace to
appreciate and to seize it. But, in fact,
the one atrocity, known to be so com-
mitted, is, if any thing, evidence that
the other, committed at a time nearly
coincident, was not so committed. It
would have been a miracle indeed, if,
while a gang of ruffians were perpe-
trating, at a given locality, a most
unheard of wrong, there should have
been another similar gang, in a similar
locality, in the same city, under the
same circumstances, with the same
means and appliances, engaged in a
Marie,
128
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
wrong of precisely the same aspect, at
precisely the same period of time! Yet
in what, if not in this marvellous train
of coincidence, does the accidentally
suggested opinion of the populace call
upon us to believe?
"Before proceeding further, let us
consider the supposed scene of the as-
sassination, in the thicket at the Bar-
riere du Roule. This thicket, although
dense, was in the close vicinity of a
public road. Within were three or four
large stones, forming a kind of seat
with a back and a footstool. On the
upper stone was discovered a white
petticoat; on the second, a silk scarf.
A parasol, gloves, and a pocket-hand-
kerchief were also here found. The
handkerchief bore the name 'Marie
Roget.' Fragments of dress were seen
on the branches around. The earth
was trampled, the bushes were broken,
and there was every evidence of a vio-
lent struggle.
"Notwithstanding the acclamation
with which the discovery of this thicket
was received by the press, and the
unanimity with which it was supposed
to indicate the precise scene of the
outrage, it must be admitted that there
was some very good reason for doubt.
That it was the scene, I may or I may
not believe-but there was excellent
reason for doubt. Had the true scene
been, as Le Commerciel suggested, in
the neighborhood of the Rue Pavee St.
Andre, the perpetrators of the crime,
supposing them still resident in Paris,
would naturally have been stricken with
terror at the public attention thus
acutely directed into the proper chan-
nel; and, in certain classes of minds,
there would have arisen, at once, a
sense of the necessity of some exertion
to redivert this attention. And thus,
the thicket of the Barriere du Roule
having been already suspected, the idea
of placing the articles where they were
found, might have been naturally en-
tertained. There is no real evidence,
although Le Soleil so supposes, that the
articles discovered had been more than
a very few days in the thicket; while
there is much circumstantial proof that
they could not have remained there,
without attracting attention, during the
twenty days elapsing between the fatal
Sunday and the afternoon upon which
they were found by the boys. "They
were all mildewed down hard,' says
Le Soleil, adopting the opinions of its
predecessors, 'with the action of the
rain and stuck together from mildew.
The grass had grown around and over
some of them. The silk of the parasol
was strong, but the threads of it were
run together within. The upper part,
where it had been doubled and folded,
was all mildewed and rotten, and tore
on being opened.' In respect to the
grass having 'grown around and over
some of them,' it is obvious that the
fact could only have been ascertained
from the words, and thus from the
recollections, of two small boys; for
these boys removed the articles and
took them home before they had been
seen by a third party. But the grass
will grow, especially in warm and damp
weather (such as was that of the period
of the murder), as much as two or
three inches in a single day. A parasol
lying upon a newly turfed ground,
might, in a single week, be entirely
concealed from sight by the upspring-
ing grass. And touching that mildew
upon which the editor of Le Soleil so
pertinaciously insists, that he employs
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
129
the word no less than three times in
the brief paragraph just quoted, is he
really unaware of the nature of this
mildew? Is he to be told that it is
one of the many classes of fungus, of
which the most ordinary feature is its
upspringing and decadence within
twenty-four hours?
"Thus we see, at a glance, that what
has been most triumphantly adduced in
support of the idea that the articles had
been for at least three or four weeks'
in the thicket, is most absurdly null as
regards any evidence of that fact. On
the other hand, it is exceedingly diffi-
cult to believe that these articles could
have remained in the thicket specified
for a longer period than a single week-
for a longer period than from one Sun-
day to the next. Those who know any
thing of the vicinity of Paris, know
the extreme difficulty of finding seclu-
sion, unless at a great distance from its
suburbs. Such a thing as an unex-
plored or even an unfrequently visited
recess, amid its woods or groves, is not
for a moment to be imagined. Let any
one who, being at heart a lover of
nature, is yet chained by duty to the
dust and heat of this great metropolis-
let any such one attempt, even during
the week-days, to slake his thirst for
solitude amid the scenes of natural
loveliness which immediately surround
us. At every second step, he will find
the growing charm dispelled by the
voice and personal intrusion of some
ruffian or party of carousing black-
guards. He will seek privacy amid the
densest foliage, all in vain. Here are
the very nooks where the unwashed
most abound-here are the temples
most desecrate. With sickness of the
heart the wanderer will flee back to
the polluted Paris as to a less odious
because less incongruous sink of pollu-
tion. But if the vicinity of the city
is so beset during the working days
of the week, how much more so on
the Sabbath! It is now especially that,
released from the claims of labor, or
deprived of the customary opportuni-
ties of crime, the town blackguard seeks
the precincts of the town, not through
love of the rural, which in his heart
he despises, but by way of escape from
the restraints and conventionalities of
society. He desires less the fresh air
and the green trees, than the utter
license of the country. Here, at the
road-side inn, or beneath the foliage
of the woods, he indulges unchecked
by any eye except those of his boon
companions, in all the mad excess of
a counterfeit hilarity-the joint off-
spring of liberty and of rum.
I say
nothing more than what must be obvi-
ous to every dispassionate observer,
when I repeat that the circumstance of
the articles in question having remained
undiscovered, for a longer period than
from one Sunday to another, in any
thicket in the immediate neighborhood
of Paris, is to be looked upon as little
less than miraculous.
"But there are not wanting other
grounds for the suspicion that the arti-
cles were placed in the thicket with the
view of diverting attention from the
real scene of the outrage. And first,
let me direct your notice to the date
of the discovery of the articles. Col-
late this with the date of the fifth
extract made by myself from the news-
papers. You will find that the discov-
ery followed, almost immediately, the
urgent communications sent to the eve-
ning paper. These communications,
IL
130
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
although various, and apparently from
various sources, tended all to the same
point-viz., the directing of attention
to a gang as the perpetrators of the
outrage, and to the neighborhood of
the Barriere du Roule as its scene.
Now, here, of course, the situation is
not that, in consequence of these com-
munications, or of the public attention
by them directed, the articles were
found by the boys; but the suspicion
might and may well have been, that
the articles were not before found by
the boys, for the reason that the arti-
cles had not before been in the thicket;
having been deposited there only at so
late a period as at the date, or shortly
prior to the date of the communica-
tions, by the guilty authors of these
communications themselves.
"This thicket was a singular-an ex-
ceedingly singular one. It was unusu-
ally dense. Within its naturally walled
enclosure were three extraordinary
stones, forming a seat with a back and
a footstool. And this thicket, so full
of art, was in the immediate vicinity,
within a few rods, of the dwelling of
Madame Deluc, whose boys were in
the habit of closely examining the
shrubberies about them in search of
the bark of the sassafras. Would it
be a rash wager-a wager of one thou-
sand to one-that a day never passed
over the heads of these boys without
finding at least one of them ensconced
in the umbrageous hall, and enthroned
upon its natural throne? Those who
would hesitate at such a wager, have
either never been boys themselves, or
have forgotten the boyish nature.
repeat-it is exceedingly hard to com-
prehend how the articles could have
remained in this thicket undiscovered,
I
for a longer period than one or two
days; and that thus there is good
ground for suspicion, in spite of the
dogmatic ignorance of Le Soleil, that
they were, at a comparatively late date,
deposited where found.
"But there are still other and stronger
reasons for believing them so deposited.
than any which I have as yet urged.
And, now, let me beg your notice to
the highly artificial arrangement of the
articles. On the upper stone lay a
white petticoat; on the second, a silk
scarf; scattered around, were a parasol,
gloves, and a pocket-handkerchief bear-
ing the name 'Marie Roget.' Here is
just such an arrangement as would
naturally be made by a not over-acute
person wishing to dispose the articles
naturally. But it is by no means a
really natural arrangement. I should
rather have looked to see the things all
lying on the ground and trampled under
foot. In the narrow limits of that
bower, it would have been scarcely pos-
sible that the petticoat and scarf should
have retained a position upon the
stones, when subjected to the brushing
to and fro of many struggling persons.
'There was evidence,' it is said, 'of a
struggle; and the earth was trampled,
the bushes were broken,'-but the pet-
ticoat and the scarf are found deposited
as if upon shelves. "The pieces of the
frock torn out by the bushes were
about three inches wides and six inches
long. One part was the hem of the
frock and it had been mended. They
looked like strips torn off.' Here, inad-
vertently, Le Soleil has employed an
exceedingly suspicious phrase. The
pieces, as described, do indeed ‘look like
strips torn off'; but purposely and by
hand. It is one of the rarest of acci-
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
131
But
dents that a piece is 'torn off,' from
any garment such as is now in question,
by the agency of a thorn. From the
very nature of such fabrics, a thorn
or nail becoming tangled in them, tears
them rectangularly-divides them into
two longitudinal rents, at right angles
with each other, and meeting at an
apex where the thorn enters-but it is
scarcely possible to conceive the piece
'torn off.' I never so knew it, nor did
you. To tear a piece off from such
fabric, two distinct forces, in different
directions, will be, in almost every case,
required. If there be two edges to the
fabric-it, for example, it be a pocket-
handkerchief, and it is desired to tear
from it a slip, then, and then only, will
the one force serve the purpose.
in the present case the question is of
a dress, presenting but one edge. To
tear a piece from the interior, where
no edge is presented, could only be
effected by a miracle through the
agency of thorns, and no one thorn
could accomplish it. But, even where
an edge is presented, two thorns will
be necessary, operating, the one in two
distinct directions, and the other in one.
And this in the supposition that the
edge is unhemmed. If hemmed, the
matter is nearly out of the question.
We thus see the numerous and great
obstacles in the way of pieces being
'torn off' through the simple agency of
'thorns'; yet we are required to believe
not only that one piece but that many
have been so torn. 'And one part,' too,
'was the hem of the frock'! Another
piece was 'part of the skirt, not the
hem,'-that is to say, was torn com-
pletely out, through the agency of
thorns, from the unedged interior of
the dress! These, I say, are things
which one may well be pardoned for
disbelieving; yet, taken collectedly, they
form, perhaps, less of reasonable
ground for suspicion, than the one
startling circumstance of the articles
having been left in this thicket at all,
by any murderers who had enough pre-
caution to think of removing the corpse.
You will not have apprehended me
rightly, however, if you suppose it my
design to deny this thicket as the scene
of the outrage. There might have been
a wrong here, or more possibly, an
accident at Madame Deluc's. But, in
fact, this is a point of minor impor-
tance. We are not engaged in an at-
tempt to discover the scene, but to
produce the perpetrators of the murder.
What I have adduced, notwithstanding
the minuteness with which I have ad-
duced it, has been with the view, first,
to show the folly of the positive and
headlong assertions of Le Soleil, but
secondly and chiefly, to bring you, by
the most natural route, to a further
contemplation of the doubt whether this
assassination has, or has not, been the
work of a gang.
"We will resume this question by
mere allusion to the revolting details of
the surgeon examined at the inquest.
It is only necessary to say that his
published inferences, in regard to the
number of the ruffians, have been prop-
erly ridiculed as unjust and totally
baseless, by all the reputable anatomists
of Paris. Not that the matter might
not have been as inferred, but that
there was no ground for the infer-
ence: was there not much for an-
other?
"Let us reflect now upon 'the traces
of a struggle'; and let me ask what
these traces have been supposed to
132
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
demonstrate. A gang.
But do they
not rather demonstrate the absence of
a gang? What struggle could have
taken place what struggle so violent
and so enduring as to have left its
'traces' in all directions-between a
weak and defenceless girl and a gang
of ruffians imagined? The silent grasp
of a few rough arms and all would
have been over. The victim must have
been absolutely passive at their will.
You will here bear in mind that the
arguments urged against the thicket as
the scene, are applicable, in chief part,
only against it as the scene of an out-
rage committed by more than a single
individual. If we imagine but one vio-
lator, we can conceive, and thus only
conceive, the struggle of so violent and
so obstinate a nature as to have left
the 'traces' apparent.
"And again. I have already men-
tioned the suspicion to be excited by
the fact that the articles in question
were suffered to remain at all in the
thicket where discovered. It seems al-
most impossible that these evidences
of guilt should have been accidentally
left where found. There was sufficient
presence of mind (it is supposed) to
remove the corpse; and yet a more
positive evidence than the corpse itself
(whose features might have been
quickly obliterated by decay), is al-
lowed to lie conspicuously in the scene
of the outrage-I allude to the hand-
kerchief with the name of the deceased.
If this was accident, it was not the
accident of a gang. We can imagine
it only the accident of an individual.
Let us see. An individual has com-
mitted the murder. He is alone with
the ghost of the departed. He is
appalled by what lies motionless before
him. The fury of his passion is over,
and there is abundant room in his
heart for the natural awe of the deed.
His is none of that confidence which
the presence of numbers inevitably
inspires. He is alone with the dead.
He trembles and is bewildered. Yet
there is a necessity for disposing of
the corpse. He bears it to the river,
and leaves behind him the other evi-
dences of his guilt; for it is difficult,
if not impossible to carry all the bur-
then at once, and it will be easy to
return for what is left. But in his
toilsome journey to the water his fears
redouble within him. The sounds of
life encompass his path. A dozen
times he hears or fancies he hears the
step of an observer. Even the very
lights from the city bewilder him. Yet,
in time, and by long and frequent
pauses of deep agony, he reaches the
river's brink, and disposes of his ghastly
charge-perhaps through the medium
of a boat. But now what treasure does
the world hold-what threat of ven-
geance could it hold out-which would
have power to urge the return of that
lonely murderer over that toilsome and
perilous path, to the thicket and its
blood-chilling recollections? He re-
turns not, let the consequences be what
they may. He could not return if he
would. His sole thought is immediate
escape. He turns his back forever
upon those dreadful shrubberies, and
flees as from the wrath to come.
"But how with a gang? Their num-
ber would have inspired them with
confidence; if, indeed, confidence is
ever wanting in the breast of the arrant
blackguard; and of arrant blackguards
alone are the supposed gangs ever con-
stituted. Their number, I say, would
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
133
have prevented the bewildering and
unreasoning terror which I have imag-
ined to paralyze the single man. Could
we suppose an oversight in one, or two,
or three, this oversight would have been
remedied by a fourth. They would
have left nothing behind them; for
their number would have enabled them
to carry all at once. There would have
been no need of return.
"Consider now the circumstance that,
in the outer garment of the corpse
when found, 'a slip, about a foot wide,
had been torn upward from the bottom
hem to the waist, wound three times
around the waist, and secured by a sort
of hitch in the back.' This was done
with the obvious design of affording a
handle by which to carry the body.
But would any number of men have
dreamed of resorting to such an ex-
pedient? To three or four, the limbs
of the corpse would have afforded not
only a sufficient, but the best possible,
hold. The device is that of a single
individual; and this brings us to the
fact that 'between the thicket and the
river the rails of the fences were found
taken down, and the ground bore evi-
dent traces of some heavy burden hav-
ing been dragged along it!' But would
a number of men have put themselves
to the superfluous trouble of taking
down a fence, for the purpose of drag-
ging through it a corpse which they
might have lifted over any fence in an
instant? Would a number of men have
so dragged a corpse at all as to have
left evident traces of the dragging?
"And here we must refer to an ob-
servation of Le Commerciel; an obser-
vation upon which I have already, in
some measure, commented. 'A piece,'
says this journal, 'of one of the unfor-
tunate girl's petticoats was torn out and
tied under her chin, and around the
back of her head, probably to prevent
screams. This was done by fellows
who had no pocket-handkerchiefs.'
"I have before suggested that a genu-
ine blackguard is never without a
pocket-handkerchief. But it is not to
this fact that I now especially advert.
That it was not through want of a
handkerchief for the purpose imagined
by Le Commerciel, that this bandage
was employed, is rendered apparent by
the handkerchief left in the thicket;
and that the object was not 'to prevent
screams' appears, also, from the band-
age having been employed in prefer-
ence to what would so much better
have answered the purpose. But the
language of the evidence speaks of the
strip in question as 'found around the
neck, fitting loosely, and secured with
a hard knot.' These words are suffi-
ciently vague, but differ materially from
those of Le Commerciel. The slip was
eighteen inches wide, and therefore,
although of muslin, would form a strong
band when folded or rumpled longi-
tudinally. And thus rumpled it was
discovered. My inference is this. The
solitary murderer, having borne the
corpse for some distance (whether from
the thicket or elsewhere) by means of
the bandage hitched around its middle,
found the weight, in this mode of pro-
cedure, too much for his strength. He
resolved to drag the burthen-the evi-
dence goes to show that it was dragged.
With this object in view, it became
necessary to attach something like a
rope to one of the extremities. It could
be best attached about the neck, where
the head would prevent its slipping off.
And now the murderer bethought him,
134
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
unquestionably, of the bandage about
the loins. He would have used this, but
for its volution about the corpse, the
hitch which embarrassed it, and the
reflection that it had not been 'torn off'
from the garment. It was easier to
tear a new slip from the petticoat. He
tore it, made it fast about the neck,
and so dragged his victim to the brink
of the river. That this 'bandage,' only
attainable with trouble and delay, and
but imperfectly answering its purpose
that this bandage was employed at all,
demonstrates that the necessity for its
employment sprang from circumstances
arising at a period when the handker-
chief was no longer attainable—that is
to say, arising, as we have imagined,
after quitting the thicket (if the thicket
it was), and on the road between the
thicket and the river.
"But the evidence, you will say, of
Madame Deluc(!) points especially to
the presence of a gang in the vicinity
of the thicket, at or about the epoch
of the murder. This I grant. I doubt
if there were not a dozen gangs, such
as described by Madame Deluc, in and
about the vicinity of the Barriere du
Roule at or about the period of this
tragedy. But the gang which has
drawn upon itself the pointed ani-
madversion, although the somewhat
tardy and very suspicious evidence, of
Madame Deluc, is the only gang which
is represented by that honest and
scrupulous old lady as having eaten
her cakes and swallowed her brandy,
without putting themselves to the trou-
ble of making her payment. Et hinc
illæ ira?
"But what is the precise evidence of
Madame Deluc? 'A gang of miscreants
made their appearance, behaved boister-
ously, ate and drank without making
payment, followed in the route of the
young man and the girl, returned to the
inn about dusk, and re-crossed the river
as if in great haste.'
"Now this 'great haste' very possibly
seemed greater haste in the eyes of
Madame Deluc, since she dwelt linger-
ingly and lamentingly upon her violated
cakes and ale,-cakes and ale for which
she might still have entertained a faint
hope of compensation. Why, otherwise,
since it was about dusk, should she
make point of the haste? It is no
cause for wonder, surely, that even a
gang of blackguards should make haste
to get home when a wide river is to be
crossed in small boats, when storm im-
pends, and when night approaches.
"I say approaches; for the night had
not yet arrived. It was only about dusk
that the indecent haste of these 'mis-
creants' offended the sober eyes of Mad-
ame Deluc. But we are told that it was
upon this very evening that Madame
Deluc, as well as her eldest son, 'heard
the screams of a female in the vicinity
of the inn.' And in what words does
Madame Deluc designate the period of
the evening at which these screams were
heard? 'It was soon after dark,' she
says. But 'soon after dark' is, at least,
dark; and 'about dusk' is as certainly
daylight. Thus it is abundantly clear
that the gang quitted the Barriere du
Roule prior to the screams overheard
(?) by Madame Deluc. And although,
in all the many reports of the evidence,
the relative expressions in question are
distinctly and invariably employed just
as I have employed them in this con-
versation with yourself, no notice what-
ever of the gross discrepancy has, as
yet, been taken by any of the public
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
135
journals, or by any of the myrmidons officer' who is first known to have led
of police.
the unfortunate into crime.
"I shall add but one to the argu-
ments against a gang; but this one has,
to my own understanding at least, a
weight altogether irresistible. Under
the circumstances of large reward of-
fered, and full pardon to any king's ev-
idence, it is not to be imagined, for a
moment, that some member of a gang
of low ruffians, or of any body of men
would not long ago have betrayed his
accomplices. Each one of gang, so
placed, is not so much greedy of reward,
or anxious for escape, as fearful of be-
trayal. He betrays eagerly and early
that he may not himself be betrayed.
That the secret has not been divulged
is the very best of proof that it is, in
fact, a secret. The horrors of this dark
deed are known only to one, or two, liv-
ing human beings, and to God.
"Let us sum up now the meagre yet
certain fruits of our long analysis. We
have attained the idea either of a fatal
accident under the roof of Madame
Deluc, or of a murder perpetrated, in
the thicket at the Barriere du Roule, by
a lover, or at least by an intimate and
secret associate of the deceased. This
associate is of swarthy complexion. This
complexion, the 'hitch' in the bandage,
and the 'sailor's knot' with which the
bonnet-ribbon is tied, point to a seaman.
His companionship with the deceased-
a gay but not an abject young girl-
designates him as above the grade of
the common sailor. Here the well-
written and urgent communications to
the journals are much in the way of
corroboration. The circumstance of the
first elopement, as mentioned by Le
Mercure, tends to blend the idea of
this seaman with that of that 'naval
"And here, most fitly, comes the con-
sideration of the continued absence of
him of the dark complexion. Let me
pause to observe that the complexion of
this man is dark and swarthy; it was no
common swarthiness which constituted
the sole point of remembrance, both as
regards Valence and Madame Deluc.
But why is this man absent? Was he
murdered by the gang? If so, why are
there only traces of the assassinated
girl? The scene of the two outrages
will naturally be supposed identical.
And where is his corpse? The assassins
would most probably have disposed of
both in the same way. But it may be
said that this man lives, and is deterred
from making himself known, through
dread of being charged with the mur-
der. This consideration might be sup-
posed to operate upon him now-at this
late period-since it has been given in
evidence that he was seen with Marie,
but it would have had no force at the
period of the deed. The first impulse of
an innocent man would have been to
announce the outrage, and to aid in
identifying the ruffians. This policy
would have suggested. He had been
seen with the girl. He had crossed the
river with her in an open ferry-boat.
The denouncing of the assassins would
have appeared, even to an idiot, the
surest and sole means of relieving him-
self from suspicion. We cannot sup-
pose him, on the night of the fatal
Sunday, both innocent himself and in-
cognizant of an outrage committed.
Yet only under such circumstances is it
possible to imagine that he would have
failed, if alive, in the denouncement of
the assassins.
136
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"And what means are ours of attain-
ing the truth? We shall find these
means multiplying and gathering dis-
tinctness as we proceed. Let us sift to
the bottom this affair of the first elope-
ment. Let us know the full history of
'the officer,' with his present circum-
stances, and his whereabouts at the pre-
cise period of the murder. Let us care-
fully compare with each other the var-
ious communications sent to the eve-
ning paper, in which the object was to
inculpate a gang. This done, let us
compare these communications, both as
regards style and MS., with those sent
to the morning paper, at a previous pe-
riod, and insisting so vehemently upon
the guilt of Mennais. And, all this
done, let us again compare these various
communications with the known MSS.
of the officer. Let us endeaver to as-
certain, by repeated questionings of
Madame Deluc and her boys, as well as
of the omnibus-driver, Valence, some-
thing more of the personal appearance
and bearing of the 'man of dark com-
plexion.' Queries, skillfully directed
will not fail to elicit, from some of
these parties, information on this par-
ticular point (or upon others)-in-
formation which the parties themselves
may not even be aware of possessing.
And let us now trace the boat picked
up by the bargeman on the morning of
Monday the twenty-third of June, and
which was removed from the barge-of-
fice, without the cognizance of the offi-
cer in attendance, and without the rud-
der, at some period prior to the dis-
covery of the corpse. With a proper
caution and perseverance we shall in-
fallibly trace this boat; for not only
can the bargeman who picked it up
identify it, but the rudder is at hand.
The rudder of a sail boat would not
have been abandoned, without inquiry,
by one altogether at ease in heart. And
here let me pause to insinuate a ques-
tion. There was no advertisement of
the picking up of this boat. It was si-
lently taken to the barge-office and as
silently removed. But its owner ΟΙ
employer-how happened he, at so early
a period as Tuesday morning, to be in-
formed, without the agency of adver-
tisement, of the locality of the boat
taken up on Monday, unless we imagine
some connection with the navy-some
personal permanent connection leading
to cognizance of its minute interests-
its petty local news?
"In speaking of the lonely assassin
dragging his burden to the shore, I
have already suggested the probability
of his availing himself of a boat. Now
we are to understand that Marie Roget
was precipitated from a boat. This
would naturally have been the case. The
corpse could not have been trusted to
the shallow waters of the shore. The
peculiar marks on the back and shoul-
ders of the victim tell of the bottom
ribs of a boat. That the body was
found without weight is also corrobora-
tive of the idea. If thrown from the
shore a weight would have been at-
tached. We can only account for its
absence by supposing the murderer to
have neglected the precaution of sup-
plying himself with it before pushing
off. In the act of consigning the corpse
to the water, he would unquestionably
have noticed his oversight; but then no
remedy would have been at hand. Any
risk would have been preferred to a re-
turn to that accursed shore. Having
rid himself of his ghastly charge, the
murderer would have hastened to the
THE MYSTERY OF MARIE ROGET
137
city. There, at some obscure wharf,
he would have leaped on land. But the
boat-would he have secured it? He
would have been in too great haste for
such things as securing a boat. More-
over, in fastening it to the wharf, he
would have felt as if securing evidence
against himself. His natural thought
would have been to cast from him, as
far as possible, all that had held con-
nection with his crime. He would not
only have fled from the wharf, but he
would not have permitted the boat to
remain. Assuredly he would have cast
it adrift. Let us pursue our fancies.-
In the morning, the wretch is stricken
with unutterable horror at finding that
the boat has been picked up and de-
tained at a locality which he is in the
daily habit of frequenting-at a local-
ity, perhaps, which his duty compels
him to frequent. The next night, with-
out daring to ask for the rudder, he re-
moves it. Now where is that rudder-
less boat? Let it be one of our first
purposes to discover. With the first
glimpse we obtain of it, the dawn of our
success shall begin. This boat shall
guide us, with a rapidity which will
surprise even ourselves, to him who
employed it in the midnight of the fatal
Sabbath. Corroboration will rise upon
corroboration, and the murderer will be
traced."
[For reasons which we shall not spec-
ify, but which to many readers will ap-
pear obvious, we have taken the liberty
of here omitting, from the MSS. placed
in our hands, such portion as details the
following up of the apparently slight
clew obtained by Dupin. We feel it ad-
visable only to state, in brief, that the
result desired was brought to pass; and
that the Prefect fulfilled punctually, al-
though with reluctance, the terms of his
compact with the Chevalier. Mr. Poe's
article concludes with the following
words.-Eds.*]
It will be understood that I speak of
coincidences and no more. What I have
said above upon this topic must suffice.
In my own heart there dwells no faith
in præter-nature. That Nature and its
God are two, no man who thinks will
deny. That the latter, creating the for-
mer, can, at will, control or modify it,
is also unquestionable. I say "at will";
for the question is of will, and not, as
the insanity of logic has assumed, of
power. It is not that the Deity cannot
modify his laws, but that we insult him
in imagining a possible necessity for
modification. In their origin these laws
were fashioned to embrace all contin-
gencies which could lie in the Future.
With God all is Now.
I repeat, then, that I speak of these
things only as of coincidences. And
further: in what I relate it will be seen
that between the fate of the unhappy
Mary Cecilia Rogers, so far as that fate
is known, and the fate of one Marie
Roget up to a certain epoch in her his-
tory, there has existed a parallel in the
contemplation of whose wonderful exact-
itude the reason becomes embarrassed.
I say all this will be seen. But let
it not for a moment be supposed that,
in proceeding with the sad narrative of
Marie from the epoch just mentioned,
and in tracing to its denouement the
mystery which enshrouded her, it is my
covert design to hint at an extension of
the parallel, or even to suggest that the
measures adopted in Paris for the dis-
*Of the Magazine in which the ar
ticle was originally published.
138
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
covery of the assassin of a grisette, or
measures founded in any similar ratio-
cination would produce any similar re-
sult.
For, in respect to the latter branch
of the supposition, it should be consid-
ered that the most trifling variation in
the facts of the two cases might give
rise to the most important miscalcula-
tions, by diverting thoroughly the two
courses of events; very much as, in
arithmetic, an error which, in its own
individuality, may be inappreciable, pro-
duces, at length, by dint of multiplica-
tion at all points of the process, a re-
sult enormously at variance with truth.
And, in regard to the former branch,
we must not fail to hold in view that
the very Calculus of Probabilities to
which I have referred, forbids all idea
of the extension of the parallel,-for-
bids it with a positiveness strong and
decided just in proportion as this par-
allel has already been long-drawn and
exact. This is one of those anomalous
propositions which, seemingly appeal-
ing to thought altogether apart from the
mathematical, is yet one which only the
mathematician can fully entertain.
Nothing, for example, is more difficult
than to convince the merely general
reader that the fact of sixes having been
thrown twice in succession by a player
at dice, is sufficient cause for betting
the largest odds that sixes will not be
thrown in the third attempt. A sugges-
tion to this effect is usually rejected by
the intellect at once. It does not ap-
pear that the two throws which have
been completed, and which lie now ab-
solutely in the Past, can have influence
upon the throw which exists only in the
Future. The chance for throwing sixes
seems to be precisely as it was at any
ordinary time-that is to say, subject
only to the influence of the various
other throws which may be made by the
dice. And this is a reflection which ap-
pears so exceedingly obvious that at-
tempts to controvert it are received
more frequently with a derisive smile
than with any thing like respectful at-
tention. The error here involved-a
gross error redolent of mischief-I can-
not pretend to expose within the limits
assigned me at present; and with the
philosophical it needs no exposure. It
may be sufficient here to say that it
forms one of an infinite series of mis-
takes which arise in the path of Rea-
son through her propensity for seeking
truth in detail.
The Purloined Letter
(First appeared in The Gift, 1845)
Ar Paris, just after dark one gusty
evening in the autumn of 18—, I was
enjoying the twofold luxury of medita-
tion and a meerschaum, in company
with my friend, C. Auguste Dupin, in
his little back library, or book-closet,
au troisieme, No. 33 Rue Dunot, Fau-
bourg St. Germain. For one hour at
least we had maintained a profound si-
lence; while each, to any casual ob-
server, might have seemed intently and
exclusively occupied with the curling
THE PURLOINED LETTER
139
eddies of smoke that oppressed the at-
mosphere of the chamber. For myself,
however, I was mentally discussing cer-
tain topics which had formed matter
for conversation between us at an ear-
lier period of the evening; I mean the
affair of the Rue Morgue, and the mys-
tery attending the murder of Marie Ro-
get. I looked upon it, therefore, as
something of a coincidence, when the
door of our apartment was thrown open
and admitted our old acquaintance,
Monsieur G, the Prefect of the
Parisian police.
We gave him a hearty welcome; for
there was nearly half as much of the
entertaining as of the contemptible
about the man, and we had not seen
him for several years. We had been
şitting in the dark, and Dupin now arose
for the purpose of lighting a lamp, but
sat down again, without doing so, upon
G.'s saying that he had called to con-
sult us, or rather to ask the opinion of
my friend, about some official business
which had occasioned a great deal of
trouble.
"If it is any point requiring reflec-
tion," observed Dupin, as he forebore
to enkindle the wick, "we shall exam-
ine it to better purpose in the dark."
"That is another of your odd no-
tions," said the Prefect, who had the
fashion of calling every thing "odd"
that was beyond his comprehension, and
thus lived amid an absolute legion of
"oddities."
"Very true," said Dupin, as he sup-
plied his visitor with a pipe, and rolled
toward him a comfortable chair.
"And what is the difficulty now?" I
asked. "Nothing more in the assassi-
nation way I hope?"
“Oh, no; nothing of that nature. The
fact is, the business is very simple in-
deed, and I make no doubt that we can
manage it sufficiently well ourselves;
but then I thought Dupin would like to
hear the details of it, because it is so
excessively odd."
"Simple and odd," said Dupin.
"Why, yes; and not exactly that
either. The fact is, we have all been a
good deal puzzled because the affair is
so simple, and yet baffles us altogether."
"Perhaps it is the very simplicity of
the thing which puts you at fault," said
my friend.
"What nonsense you do talk!" replied
the Prefect, laughing heartily.
"Perhaps the mystery is a little too
plain," said Dupin.
"Oh, good heavens! who ever heard
of such an idea?"
"A little too self-evident."
"Ha! ha! ha!-ha! ha! ha!-ho! ho!
ho!" roared our visitor, profoundly
amused, "oh, Dupin, you will be the
death of me yet!"
"And what, after all, is the matter on
hand?" I asked.
"Why, I will tell you," replied the
Prefect, as he gave a long, steady, and
contemplative puff, and settled himself
in his chair. "I will tell you in a few
words; but, before I begin, let me cau-
tion you that this is an affair demand-
ing the greatest secrecy, and that I
should most probably lose the position
I now hold, were it known that I con
fided it to any one."
"Proceed," said I.
"Or not," said Dupin.
"Well, then; I have received personal
information, from a very high quarter,
that a certain document of the last im-
portance has been purloined from the
royal apartments. The individual who
140
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
purloined it is known; this beyond a
doubt; he was seen to take it. It is
known, also, that it still remains in his
possession."
"How is this known?" asked Dupin.
"It is clearly inferred," replied the
Prefect, "from the nature of the doc-
ument, and from the non-appearance of
certain results which would at once
arise from its passing out of the rob-
ber's possession-that is to say, from
his employing it as he must design in
the end to employ it."
"Be a little more explicit," I said.
"Well, I may venture so far as to
say that the paper gives its holder a
certain power in a certain quarter where
such power is immensely valuable." The
Prefect was fond of the cant of diplo-
macy.
"Still I do not quite understand," said
Dupin.
"No? Well; the disclosure of the doc-
ument to a third person, who shall be
nameless, would bring in question the
honor of a personage of most exalted
station; and this fact gives the holder
of the document an ascendancy over the
illustrious personage whose honor and
peace are so jeopardized."
"But this ascendancy," I interposed,
"would depend upon the robber's knowl-
edge of the loser's knowledge of the
robber. Who would dare-"
"The thief," said G., "is the Minister
D—, who dares all things, those un-
becoming as well as those becoming a
man.
The method of the theft was not
less ingenious than bold. The document
in question-a letter, to be frank-had
been received by the personage robbed
while alone in the royal boudoir. Dur-
ing its perusal she was suddenly inter-
rupted by the entrance of the other ex-
alted personage from whom especially
it was her wish to conceal it. After a
hurried and vain endeavor to thrust it
in a drawer, she was forced to place it,
open as it was, upon a table. The ad-
dress, however, was uppermost, and, the
contents thus unexposed, the letter es-
caped notice. At this juncture enters
the Minister D. His lynx eye im-
mediately perceives the paper, recog
nizes the handwriting of the address.
observes the confusion of the person-
age addressed, and fathoms her secret.
After some business transactions, hur-
ried through in his ordinary manner, he
produces a letter somewhat similar to
the one in question, opens it, pretends to
read it, and then places it in close jux-
taposition to the other. Again he con-
verses, for some fifteen minutes, upon
the public affairs. At length, in taking
leave, he takes also from the table the
letter to which he had no claim. Its
rightful owner saw, but, of course, dared
not call attention to the act, in the pres-
ence of the third personage who stood
at her elbow. The minister decamped;
leaving his own letter-one of no im-
portance-upon the table."
"Here, then," said Dupin to me, "you
have precisely what you demand to
make the ascendancy complete-the
robber's knowledge of the loser's knowl
edge of the robber."
"Yes," replied the Prefect; "and the
power thus attained has, for som
months past, been wielded, for politica
purposes, to a very dangerous extent
The personage robbed is more thor
oughly convinced, every day, of th
necessity of reclaiming her letter. Bu
this, of course, cannot be done openly
In fine, driven to despair, she has com
mitted the matter to me."
THE PURLOINED LETTER
141
>
"Than whom," said Dupin, amid a
perfect whirlwind of smoke, "no more
sagacious agent could, I suppose, be
desired, or even imagined."
"You flatter me," replied the Pre-
fect; "but it is possible that some such
opinion may have been entertained."
"It is clear," said I, “as you observe,
that the letter is still in the possession
of the minister; since it is this posses-
sion, and not any employment of the
1 letter, which bestows the power. With
the employment the power departs."
"True," said G.; "and upon this con-
viction I proceeded. My first care was
to make thorough search of the minis-
ter's hotel; and here my chief embar-
rassment lay in the necessity of search-
ing without his knowledge. Beyond all
things, I have been warned of the dan-
ger which would result from giving him
reason to suspect our design."
"But," said I, "you are quite au fait
in these investigations. The Parisian
police have done this thing often be-
fore."
"Oh, yes; and for this reason I did
not despair. The habits of the minister
gave me, too, a great advantage. He is
frequently absent from home all night.
His servants are by no means numerous.
They sleep at a distance from their mas-
ter's apartment, and, being chiefly
Neapolitans, are readily made drunk. I
have keys, as you know, with which I
can open any chamber or cabinet in
Paris. For three months a night has
not passed, during the greater part of
which I have not been engaged, person-
ally, in ransacking the D- Hotel.
My honor is interested, and, to men-
tion a great secret, the reward is enor-
mous. So I did not abandon the search
4 until I had become fully satisfied that
the thief is a more astute man than my-
self. I fancy that I have investigated
every nook and corner of the premises
in which it is possible that the paper
can be concealed."
"But is it not possible," I suggested,
"that although the letter may be in pos-
session of the minister, as it unques-
tionably is, he may have concealed it
elsewhere than upon his own premises?"
"This is barely possible," said Dupin.
"The present peculiar condition of af-
fairs at court, and especially of those
intrigues in which D is known to
be involved, would render the instant
availability of the document-its sus-
ceptibility of being produced at a mo-
ment's notice-a point of nearly equal
importance with its possession."
"Its susceptibility of being pro-
duced?" said I.
"That is to say, of being destroyed,"
said Dupin.
"True," I observed; "the paper is
clearly then upon the premises. As for
its being upon the person of the min-
ister, we may consider that as out of
the question."
"Entirely," said the Prefect. "He
has been twice waylaid, as if by foot-
pads, and his person rigidly searched
under my own inspection."
"You might have spared yourself this
trouble," said Dupin. “D—,
I pre-
sume, is not altogether a fool, and, if
not, must have anticipated these way-
layings, as a matter of course."
"Not altogether a fool," said G., “but
then he is a poet, which I take to be
only one remove from a fool."
"True," said Dupin, after a long and
thoughtful whiff from his meerschaum,
"although I have been guilty of certain
doggerel myself."
142
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"Suppose you detail," said I, "the
particulars of your search."
"Why, the fact is, we took our time,
and we searched everywhere. I have
had long experience in these affairs. I
took the entire building, room by room;
devoting the nights of a whole week to
each. We examined, first, the furniture
of each apartment. We opened every
possible drawer; and I presume you
know that, to a properly trained police-
agent, such a thing as a 'secret' drawer
is impossible. Any man is a dolt who
permits a 'secret' drawer to escape him
in a search of this kind. The thing is
so plain. There is a certain amount of
bulk-of space to be accounted for in
every cabinet. Then we have accurate
rules. The fiftieth part of a line could
not escape us. After the cabinets we
took the chairs. The cushions we
probed with the fine long needles you
have seen me employ. From the tables
we removed the tops."
"Why so?"
"Sometimes the top of a table, or
other similarly arranged piece of fur-
niture, is removed by the person wish-
ing to conceal an article; then the leg
is excavated, the article deposited with-
in the cavity, and the top replaced. The
bottoms and tops of bedposts are em-
ployed in the same way."
"But could not the cavity be detected
by sounding?" I asked.
"By no means, if, when the article
is deposited, a sufficient wadding of cot-
ton be placed around it. Besides, in
our case, we were obliged to proceed
without noise."
"But you could not have removed
you could not have taken to pieces all
articles of furniture in which it would
have been possible to make a deposit in
the manner you mention. A letter may
be compressed into a thin spiral roll,
not differing much in shape or bulk from
a large knitting-needle, and in this form
it might be inserted into the rung of a
chair, for example. You did not take to
pieces all the chairs?"
"Certainly not; but we did better-
we examined the rungs of every chair
in the hotel, and, indeed, the jointings
of every description of furniture, by the
aid of a most powerful microscope. Had
there been any traces of recent distur-
bance we should not have failed to de-
tect it instantly. A single grain of gim-
let-dust, for example, would have been
as obvious as an apple. Any disorder
in the gluing-any unusual gaping in
the joints-would have sufficed to in-
sure detection."
"I presume you looked to the mirrors,
between the boards and the plates, and
you probed the beds and the bed-
clothes, as well as the curtains and car-
pets."
"That of course; and when we had
absolutely completed every particle of
the furniture in this way, then we ex-
amined the house itself. We divided
its entire surface into compartments,
which we numbered, so that none might
be missed; then we scrutinized each in-
dividual square inch throughout the
premises, including the two houses im-
mediately adjoining, with the micro-
scope, as before."
"The two houses adjoining!" I ex-
claimed; "you must have had a great
Ideal of trouble."
"We had; but the reward offered is
prodigious."
"You include the grounds about the
houses?"
"All the grounds are paved with brick.
THE PURLOINED LETTER
143
They gave us comparatively little
trouble. We examined the moss be-
tween the bricks, and found it undis-
turbed."
"You looked among D's papers,
of course, and into the books of the
library?"
"Certainly; we opened every pack-
age and parcel; we not only opened
every book, but we turned over every
leaf in each volume, not contenting our-
selves with a mere shake, according to
the fashion of some of our police offi-
cers. We also measured the thick-
ness of every book-cover, with the most
accurate admeasurement, and applied
to each the most jealous scrutiny of the
microscope. Had any of the bindings
been recently meddled with, it would
have been utterly impossible that the
fact should have escaped observation.
Some five or six volumes, just from the
hands of the binder, we carefully
probed, longitudinally, with
needles."
the
"You explored the floors beneath the
carpets?"
"Beyond doubt. We removed every
carpet, and examined the boards with
the microscope."
"And the paper on the walls?"
"Yes."
"You looked into the cellars?"
"We did."
“Then,” I said, "you have been mak-
ing a miscalculation, and the letter is
not upon the premises, as you suppose."
"I fear you are right there," said the
Prefect. "And now, Dupin, what would
you advise me to do?"
"To make a thorough research of the
premises."
"That is absolutely needless," replied
"I am not more sure that I
breathe than I am that the letter is not
at the hotel."
"I have no better advice to give you,"
said Dupin. "You have, of course, an
accurate description of the letter?"
"Oh, yes!"-And here the Prefect,
producing a memorandum-book, pro.
ceeded to read aloud a minute account
of the internal, and especially of the
external appearance of the missing doc-
ument. Soon after finishing the perusal
of this description, he took his depar-
ture, more entirely depressed in spirits
than I had ever known the good gentle-
man before.
In about a month afterward he paid
us another visit, and found us occupied
very nearly as before. He took a pipe
and a chair and entered into some or-
dinary conversation. At length I said:
"Well, but G, what of the pur-
loined letter? I presume you have at
last made up your mind that there is no
such thing as over-reaching the Min-
ister?"
"Confound him, say I-yes; I made
the re-examination, however, as Dupin
suggested-but it was all labor lost, as
I knew it would be."
"How much was the reward offered,
did you say?" asked Dupin.
"Why, a very great deal-a very lib-
eral reward-I don't like to say how
much, precisely; but one thing I will
say, that I wouldn't mind giving my in-
dividual check for fifty thousand francs
to any one who could obtain me that
letter. The fact is, it is becoming of
more and more importance every day;
and the reward has been lately doubled.
If it were trebled, however, I could do
no more than I have done."
"Why, yes," said Dupin, drawlingly
between the whiffs of his meerschaum.
144
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"I really think, G, you have not
exerted yourself-to the utmost in this
matter. You might-do a little more, I
think, eh?"
"How?-in what way?"
"Why-puff, puff-you might-puff,
puff-employ counsel in the matter, eh?
-puff, puff, puff. Do you remember
the story they tell of Abernethy?"
"No; hang Abernethy!"
"To be sure! hang him and welcome.
But, once upon a time, a certain rich
miser conceived the design of spong-
ing upon this Abernethy for a medical
opinion. Getting up, for this purpose,
an ordinary conversation in a private
company, he insinuated his case to the
physician, as that of an imaginary in-
dividual.
"We will suppose,' said the miser,
'that his symptoms are such and such;
now, doctor, what would you have di-
rected him to take?"
""Take!' said Abernethy, 'why, take
advice, to be sure.'"
"But," said the Prefect, a little dis-
composed, "I am perfectly willing to
take advice, and to pay for it. I
would really give fifty thousand francs
to any one who would aid me in the
matter."
"In that case," replied Dupin, open-
ing a drawer, and producing a check-
book, "you may as well fill me up a
check for the amount mentioned. When
you have signed it, I will hand you the
letter."
I was astounded. The Prefect ap-
peared absolutely thunder-stricken. For
some minutes he remained speechless
and motionless, looking incredulously
at my friend with open mouth, and
eyes that seemed starting from their
sockets; then apparently recovering
himself in some measure, he seized a
pen, and after several pauses and va-
cant stares, finally filled up and signed
a check for fifty thousand francs, and
handed it across the table to Dupin.
The latter examined it carefully and
deposited it in his pocket-book; then,
unlocking an escritoire, took thence a
letter and gave it to the Prefect. This
functionary grasped it in a perfect
agony of joy, opened it with a trem-
bling hand, cast a rapid glance at its
contents, and then scrambling and strug-
gling to the door, rushed at length un-
ceremoniously from the room and from
the house, without having uttered a syl-
lable since Dupin had requested him to
fill up the check.
When he had gone, my friend entered
into some explanations.
"The Parisian police," he said, "are
exceedingly able in their way. They are
persevering, ingenious, cunning, and
thoroughly versed in the knowledge
which their duties seem chiefly to de-
mand. Thus, when G detailed to
us his mode of searching the premises
at the Hotel D, I felt entire confi-
dence in his having made a satisfactory
investigation-so far as his labors ex-
tended."
"So far as his labors extended?" said I.
"Yes," said Dupin. "The measures
adopted were not only the best of their
kind, but carried out to absolute per-
fection. Had the letter been deposited
within the range of their search, these
fellows would, beyond a question, have
found it."
I merely laughed-but he seemed
quite serious in all that he said.
"The measures then," he continued,
"were good in their kind, and well ex-
THE PURLOINED LETTER
145
ecuted; their defect lay in their being
inapplicable to the case and to the
man. A certain set of highly ingenious
resources are, with the Prefect, a sort
of Procrustean bed, to which he forcibly
adapts his designs. But he perpetually
errs by being too deep or too shallow
for the matter in hand; and many a
school-boy is a better reasoner than he.
I knew one about eight years of age,
whose success at guessing in the game of
'even and odd' attracted universal ad-
miration. This game is simple, and is
played with marbles. One player holds
in his hand a number of these toys,
and demands of another whether that
number is even or odd. If the guess is
right, the guesser wins one; if wrong,
he loses one. The boy to whom I al-
lude won all the marbles of the school.
Of course he had some principle of
guessing; and this lay in mere observa.
tion and admeasurement of the astute-
ness of his opponents.
For example,
an arrant simpleton is his opponent, and,
holding up his closed hand, asks, ‘Are
they even or odd?' Our school-boy re-
plies, 'Odd,' and loses; but upon the
second trial he wins, for he then says
to himself: "The simpleton had them
even upon the first trial, and his amount
of cunning is just sufficient to make
him have them odd upon the second; I
will therefore guess odd';-he guesses
odd, and wins. Now, with a simpleton.
a degree above the first, he would have
reasoned thus: "This fellow finds that
in the first instance I guessed odd, and,
in the second, he will propose to him-
self, upon the first impulse, a simple
variation from even to odd, as did the
first simpleton; but then a second
thought will suggest that this is too
simple a variation, and finally he will
decide upon putting it even as before.
I will therefore guess even';-he guesses
even, and wins. Now this mode of rea-
soning in the school-boy, whom his fel-
lows termed 'lucky,'-what, in its last
analysis, is it?"
"It is merely," I said, "an identifi-
cation of the reasoner's intellect with
that of his opponent."
"It is," said Dupin; "and, upon in-
quiring of the boy by what means he
effected the thorough identification in
which his success consisted, I received
answer as follows: 'When I wish to
find out how wise, or how stupid, or
how good, or how wicked is any one,
or what are his thoughts at the moment,
I fashion the expression of my face, as
accurately as possible, in accordance
with the expression of his, and then
wait to see what thoughts or sentiments
arise in my mind or heart, as if to
match or correspond with the expres-
sion.' This response of the school-boy
lies at the bottom of all the spurious
profundity which has been attributed
to Rochefoucault, to La Bougive, to
Machiavelli, and to Campanella."
"And the identification," I said, "of
the reasoner's intellect with that of his
opponent, depends, if I understand you
aright, upon the accuracy with which the
opponent's intellect is admeasured."
"For its practical value it depends
upon this," replied Dupin; "and the
Prefect and his cohort fail so frequently,
first by default of this identification,
and, secondly, by ill-admeasurement, or
rather through non-admeasurement, of
the intellect with which they are en-
gaged. They consider only their own
ideas of ingenuity; and, in searching
for anything hidden advert only to the
modes in which they would have hidden
146
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
it. They are right in this much—that
their own ingenuity is a faithful rep-
resentative of that of the mass; but
when the cunning of the individual
felon is diverse in character from their
own, the felon foils them, of course.
This always happens when it is above
their own, and very usually when it is
below. They have no variation of
principle in their investigations; at best,
when urged by some unusual emergency
-by some extraordinary reward-they
extend or exaggerate their old modes of
practice, without touching their prin-
ciples. What, for example, in this case
of D, has been done to vary the
principle of action? What is all this
boring, and probing, and sounding, and
scrutinizing with the microscope, and
dividing the surface of the building into
registered square inches-what is it all
but an exaggeration of the application
of the one principle or set of principles
of search, which are based upon the
one set of notions regarding human in-
genuity, to which the Prefect, in the
long routine of his duty, has been ac-
customed? Do you not see he has taken
it for granted that all men proceed to
conceal a letter, not exactly in a gim-
let-hole bored in a chair-leg, but, at
least, in some out-of-the-way hole or
corner suggested by the same tenor of
thought which would urge a man to
secrete a letter in a gimlet-hole bored
in a chair-leg? And do you not see
also that such recherches nooks for con-
cealment are adapted only for ordinary
occasions, and would be adopted only by
ordinary intellects; for, in all cases of
concealment, a disposal of the article
concealed a disposal of it in this
recherche manner, is in the very first
instance, presumable and presumed; and
thus its discovery depends, not at all
upon the acumen, but altogether upon
the mere care, patience, and determina-
tion of the seekers; and where the case
is of importance-or, what amounts to
the same thing in the political eyes,
when the reward is of magnitude,—the
qualities in question have never been
known to fail. You will now under-
stand what I meant in suggesting that,
had the purloined letter been hidden
anywhere within the limits of the Pre-
fect's examination-in other words,
had the principle of its concealment
been comprehended within the prin-
ciples of the Prefect-its discovery
would have been a matter altogether
beyond question. This functionary,
however, has been thoroughly mystified;
and the remote source of his defeat lies
in the supposition that the Minister is
a fool, because he has acquired renown
as a poet. All fools are poets; this the
Prefect feels; and he is merely guilty
of a non distributio medii in thence in-
ferring that all poets are fools."
"But is this really the poet?" I asked.
"There are two brothers, I know; and
both have attained reputation in letters.
The minister I believe has written
learnedly on the Differential Calculus.
He is a mathematician, and no poet."
"You are mistaken; I know him well;
he is both. As poet and mathematician,
he would reason well; as mere mathe-
matician, he could not have reasoned at
all, and thus would have been at the
mercy of the Prefect."
"You surprise me," I said, "by these
opinions, which have been contradicted
by the voice of the world. You do not
mean to set at naught the well-digested
idea of centuries. The mathematical
THE PURLOINED LETTER
147
reason has long been regarded as the
reason par excellence."
"Il y a parier," replied Dupin,
quoting from Chamfort, "que toute
idee publique, toute convention recue,
est une sottise, car elle a convenue au
plus grand nombre.' The mathema-
ticians, I grant you, have done their
best to promulgate the popular error to
which you allude, and which is none the
less an error for its promulgation as
truth. With an art worthy a better
cause, for example, they have insinu-
ated the term ‘analysis' into application
to algebra. The French are the orig-
inators of this particular deception; but
if a term is of any importance—if words
derive any value from applicability-
then analysis' conveys 'algebra' about
as much as, in Latin 'ambitus' implies
'ambition,' religio' 'religion,' or 'ho-
mines honesti' a set of honorable men.'
"You have a quarrel on hand, I see,"
said I, "with some of the algebraists of
Paris; but proceed."
"I dispute the availability, and thus
the value, of that reason which is cul-
tivated in any especial form other than
the abstractly logical. I dispute, in
particular, the reason educed by math-
ematical study. The mathematics are
the science of form and quantity; math-
ematical reasoning is merely logic ap-
plied to observation upon form and
quantity. The great error lies in sup-
posing that even the truths of what is
called pure algebra are abstract or gen-
eral truths. And this error is so egre-
gious that I am confounded at the uni-
versality with which it has been re-
ceived. Mathematical axioms are not
axiom; of general truth. What is true
of relation of form and quantity-is
often grossly false in regard to morals,
for example. In this latter science it
is very usually untrue that the aggre-
gated parts are equal to the whole. In
chemistry also the axiom fails. In the
consideration of motive it fails; for two
motives, each of a given value, have not
necessarily, a value when united, equal
to the sum of their values apart. There
are numerous other mathematical
truths which are only truths within the
limits of relation. But the mathema-
tician argues from his finite truths,
through habit, as if they were of an
absolutely general applicability-as the
world indeed imagines them to be.
Bryant, in his very learned 'Mythology,'
mentions an analogous source of error,
when he says that although the pagan
fables are not believed, yet we forget
ourselves continually, and make infer-
ences from them as existing realities.'
With the algebraists, however, who are
pagans themselves, the 'pagan fables'
are believed, and the inferences are
made, not so much through lapse of
memory as through an unaccountable
addling of the brains. In short, I never
yet encountered the mere mathematician
who could be trusted out of equal roots,
or one who did not clandestinely hold it
as a point of his faith that x² + px was
absolutely and unconditionally equal
to q. Say to one of these gentlemen,
by way of experiment, if you please,
that you believe occasions may occur
where x²+px is not altogether equal to
q, and, having made him understand
what you mean, get out of his reach as
speedily as convenient, for, beyond
doubt, he will endeavor to knock you
down.
"I mean to say," continued Dupin,
while I merely laughed at his last ob-
servations, "that if the minister had
148
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
been no more than a mathematician,
the Prefect would have been under no
necessity of giving me this check. I
knew him, however, as both mathema-
tician and poet, and my measures were
adapted to his capacity, with reference
to the circumstances by which he was
surrounded. I knew him as a courtier,
too, and as a bold intriguant. Such a
man, I considered, could not fail to be
aware of the ordinary political modes of
action. He could not have failed to an-
ticipate and events have proved that
he did not fail to anticipate-the way-
layings to which he was subjected. He
must have foreseen, I reflected, the se-
cret investigations of his premises. His
frequent absences from home at night,
which were hailed by the Prefect as cer-
tain aids to his success, I regarded only
as ruses, to afford opportunity for thor-
ough search to the police, and thus the
sooner to impress them with the con-
viction to which G, in fact, did
finally arrive-the conviction that the
letter was not upon the premises.
felt, also, that the whole train of
thought, which I was at some pains in
detailing to you just now, concerning
the invariable principle of political ac-
tion in searches for articles concealed-
I felt that this whole train of thought
would necessarily pass through the mind
of the minister. It would imperatively
lead him to despise all the ordinary
nooks of concealment. He could not, I
reflected, be so weak as not to see that
the most intricate and remote recess of
his hotel would be as open as his com-
monest closets to the eyes, to the
probes, to the gimlets, and to the mi-
croscopes of the Prefect. I saw, in fine,
that he would be driven, as a matter of
course, to simplicity, if not deliberately
I
induced to it as a matter of choice.
You will remember, perhaps, how des-
perately the Prefect laughed when I
suggested, upon our first interview, that
it was just possible this mystery
troubled him so much on account of its
being so very self-evident."
"Yes," said I, "I remember his merri-
ment well. I really thought he would
have fallen into convulsions."
"The material world," continued Du-
pin, "abounds with very strict analo-
gies to the immaterial; and thus some
color of truth has been given to the rhe-
torical dogma, that metaphor, or simile,
may be made to strengthen an argu-
ment as well as to embellish a descrip-
tion. The principle of the vis inertiæ,
for example, seems to be identical in
physics and metaphysics. It is not
more true in the former, that a large
body is with more difficulty set in mo-
tion than a smaller one, and that its
subsequent momentum is commensu-
rate with this difficulty, than it is, in the
latter, that intellects of the vaster ca-
pacity, while more forcible, more con-
stant, and more eventful in their move-
ments than those of inferior grade, are
yet the less readily moved, and more
embarrassed, and full of hesitation in
the first few steps of their progress.
Again: have you ever noticed which of
the street signs, over the shop doors,
are the most attractive of attention?"
"I have never given the matter a
thought," I said.
"There is a game of puzzles," he re-
sumed, "which is played upon a map.
One party playing requires another to
find a given word-the name of town,
river, state, or empire-any word, in
short, upon the motley and perplexed
surface of the chart. A novice in the
THE PURLOINED LETTER
149
1
game generally seeks to embarrass his
opponents by giving them the most
minutely lettered names; but the adept
selects such words as stretch, in large
characters, from one end of the chart
to the other. These, like the over-
largely lettered signs and placards of the
= street, escape observation by dint of
being excessively obvious; and here the
physical oversight is precisely analo-
gous with the moral inapprehension by
which the intellect suffers to pass un-
noticed those considerations which are
too obtrusively and too palpably self-
evident. But this is a point, it appears,
somewhat above or beneath the under-
standing of the Prefect. He never once
thought it probable, or possible, that
the minister had deposited the letter
immediately beneath the nose of the
whole world by way of best preventing
any portion of that world from perceiv-
ing it.
"But the more I reflected upon the
daring, dashing, and discriminating in-
genuity of D-; upon the fact that
the document must always have been
at hand, if he intended to use it to
good purpose; and upon the decisive
evidence, obtained by the Prefect, that
it was not hidden within the limits of
that dignitary's ordinary search-the
more satisfied I became that, to con-
ceal this letter, the minister had re-
sorted to the comprehensive and sa-
gacious expedient of not attempting to
conceal it at all.
"Full of these ideas, I prepared my-
self with a pair of green spectacles, and
called one fine morning quite by acci-
dent, at the Ministerial hotel. I found
Dat home, yawning, lounging, and
dawdling, as usual, and pretending to
be in the last extremity of ennui. He
is, perhaps, the most really energetic
human being now alive-but that is only
when nobody sees him.
"To be even with him, I complained
of my weak eyes, and lamented the
necessity of the spectacles, under cover
of which I cautiously and thoroughly
surveyed the whole apartment, while
seemingly intent only upon the conver-
sation of my host.
"I paid especial attention to a large
writing-table near which he sat, and
upon which lay confusedly, some mis-
cellaneous letters and other papers, with
one or two musical instruments and a
few books. Here, however, after a long
and very deliberate scrutiny, I saw
nothing to excite particular suspicion.
"At length my eyes, in going the cir-
cuit of the room, fell upon a trumpery
filigree cardrack of pasteboard, that
hung dangling by a dirty blue ribbon,
from a little brass knob just beneath the
middle of the mantel-piece. In this
rack, which had three or four compart-
ments; were five or six visiting cards
and a solitary letter. This last was
much soiled and crumpled. It was torn
nearly in two, across the middle-as if
a design, in the first instance, to tear´
it entirely up as worthless, had been
altered or stayed in the second. It had
a large black seal, bearing the D-
cipher very conspicuously, and was ad-
dressed, in a diminutive female hand,
to D, the minister, himself. It was
thrust carelessly, and even, as it
seemed, contemptuously, into one of the
uppermost divisions of the rack.
"No sooner had I glanced at this
letter than I concluded it to be that of
which I was in search. To be sure, it
was, to all appearance, radically differ-
ent from the one of which the Prefect
150
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
had read us so minute a description.
Here the seal was large and black, with
the D-
cipher; there it was small
and red, with the ducal arms of the
Sfamily. Here, the address, to
the minister, was diminutive and fem-
inine; there the superscription, to a cer-
tain royal personage, was markedly bold
and decided; the size alone formed a
point of correspondence. But, then, the
radicalness of these differences, which
was excessive; the dirt; the soiled and
torn condition of the paper, so incon-
sistent with the true methodical habits
of D —, and so suggestive of a design
to delude the beholder into an idea of
the worthlessness of the document;—
these things, together with the hyper-
obtrusive situation of this document,
full in the view of every visitor, and
thus exactly in accordance with the
conclusions to which I had previously
arrived; these things, I say, were
strongly corroborative of suspicion, in
one who came with the intention to sus-
pect.
"I protracted my visit as long as pos-
sible, and, while I maintained a most
animated discussion with the minister,
upon a topic which I knew well had
never failed to interest and excite him,
I kept my attention really riveted upon
the letter. In this examination, I com-
mitted to memory its external appear-
ance and arrangement in the rack; and
also fell, at length, upon a discovery
which set at rest whatever trivial doubt
I might have entertained. In scrutiniz-
ing the edges of the paper, I observed
them to be more chafed than seemed
necessary. They presented the broken
appearance which is manifested when a
stiff paper, having been once folded and
pressed with a folder, is refolded in a
reversed direction, in the same creases
or edges which had formed the original
fold. This discovery was sufficient. It
was clear to me that the letter had
been turned as a glove, inside out, re-
directed and resealed. I bade the min-
ister good-morning, and took my depar-
ture at once, leaving a gold snuff-box
upon the table.
"The next morning I called for the
snuff-box, when we resumed, quite eag-
erly, the conversation of the preceding
day. While thus engaged, however, a
loud report, as if of a pistol, was heard
immediately beneath the windows of
the hotel, and was succeeded by a series
of fearful screams, and the shoutings
of a terrified mob. D — rushed to a
casement, threw it open, and looked
out. In the meantime I stepped to the
card-rack, took the letter, put it in my
pocket, and replaced it by a fac-simile,
(so far as regards externals) which I
had carefully prepared at my lodgings
-imitating the D cipher, very
readily, by means of a seal formed of
bread.
-
"The disturbance in the street had
been occasioned by the frantic behavior
of a man with a musket. He had fired
it among a crowd of women and chil-
dren. It proved, however, to have been
without ball, and the fellow was suf-
fered to go his way as a lunatic or a
drunkard. When he had gone, D
came from the window, whither I had
followed him immediately upon secur-
ing the object in view. Soon afterward
I bade him farewell. The pretended
lunatic was a man in my own pay."
"But what purpose had you,”
asked, "in replacing the letter by a fac
simile? Would it not have been bette
I
THE OBLONG BOX
151
at the first visit, to have seized it open-
ly, and departed?"
"D-," replied Dupin, "is a des-
perate man, and a man of nerve. His
hotel, too, is not without attendants de-
voted to his interests. Had I made the
wild attempt you suggest, I might never
have left the Ministerial presence alive.
The good people of Paris might have
heard of me no more. But I had an
object apart from these considerations.
You know my political prepossessions.
In this matter, I act as a partisan of
the lady concerned. For eighteen
months the minister has had her in his
power. She has now him in hers-
since, being unaware that the letter is
not in his possession, he will proceed
with his exactions as if it was. Thus
will be inevitably commit himself, at
once, to his political destruction. His
downfall, too, will not be more precip-
itate than awkward. It is all very well
to talk about the facilis descensus
Averni; but in all kinds of climbing, as
Catalani said of singing, it is far more
easy to get up than to come down. In
the present instance I have no sym-
pathy at least no pity-for him who
descends. He is that monstrum hor-
rendum, an unprincipled man of genius.
I confess, however, that I should like
very well to know the precise character
of his thoughts, when, being defied by
her whom the Prefect terms 'a certain
personage,' he is reduced to opening the
letter which I left for him in the card
rack."
"How? did you put any thing partic-
ular in it?"
"Why-it did not seem altogether
right to leave the interior blank-that
would have been insulting. D—, at
Vienna once, did me an evil turn, which
I told him, quite good-humoredly, that
I should remember. So, as I knew he
would feel some curiosity in regard to
the identity of the person who had out-
witted him, I thought it a pity not to
give him a clew. He is well acquainted
with my MS., and I just copied into the
middle of the blank sheet the words-
-Un dessein si funeste,
S'il n'est digne d' Atree, est digne
de Thyeste.'
They are to be found in Crebillon's
'Atree.'"
The Oblong Box
(First published in Godey's Lady's Book, September, 1844)
SOME years ago, I engaged passage
from Charleston, S. C., to the city of
New York, in the fine packet-ship "In-
dependence," 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
152
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
been with me a fellow-student at C-
University, where we were very much
together. He had the ordinary tem-
perament of genius, and was a com-
pound 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 suffi-
ciently 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 conclu-
sion 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 serv-
ant was to come with the party: al-
though, 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 bag-
gage, 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 pres-
ence, however, and in his usual style
of enthusiasm. He described her as of
surpassing beauty, wit, and accomplish-
ment. 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 de-
cline 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 persever-
ance, I had nothing to do but to return
THE OBLONG BOX
153
}
home and digest my impatience at
leisure.
I did not receive the expected mes-
sage 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 ar-
rived in about ten minutes after my-
self. 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 spe-
cial attention. He did not even intro-
duce 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.
I
Mrs. Wyatt had been closely veiled;
and when she raised her veil, in ac-
knowledging my bow, I confess that I
was very profoundly astonished.
should have been much more so, how-
ever, had not long experience advised
me not to trust, with too implicit a
reliance, the enthusiastic descriptions
of my friend, the artist, when indulg-
ing 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 regard-
ing 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 set-
tled 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. Imme-
diately 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 pe-
culiar; 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 re-
membered, 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 Nico-
lino. This point, therefore, I consid-
ered as sufficiently settled. I chuckled
excessively when I thought of my acu-
men. 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; ex-
pecting me to know nothing of the
154
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 re-
mained, 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 let-
tered 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, in-
tended 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 misan-
thropic 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 con-
duct 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 state-rooms during the greater
part of the passage, and absolutely re
fused, 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 astonish-
ment, 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 ex-
pectations 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 fas-
tidious, with so exquisite a perception
of the faulty, and so keen an appre-
ciation of the beautiful! To be sure,
the lady seemed especially fond of him
particularly so in his absence-when
THE OBLONG BOX
155
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 ex-
pressions-forever "on the tip of her
tongue." In the meantime, it was ob-
served 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 pub-
lic society of the main cabin.
My conclusion, from what I saw and
heard, was, that the artist, by some
unaccountable freak of fate, or per-
haps in some fit of enthusiastic and
fanciful passion, had been induced to
unite himself with a person altogether
beneath him, and that the natural re-
sult, entire and speedy disgust had
ensued. I pitied him from the bottom
of my heart-but could not, for that
reason, quite forgive his incommuni-
cativeness 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 for-
ward. His gloom, however (which I
considered quite natural under the cir-
cumstances), seemed entirely unabated.
He said little, and that moodily, and
with evident effort. I ventured a jest
or two, and he made a sickening at-
tempt 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. At last I ven-
tured a home thrust. I determined to
commence a series of covert insinua-
tions, 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 mys-
tification. 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 fore-
finger 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 im-
possible 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 aston-
ishment, 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 re-
garded his mere bodily health. Of his
mind I say nothing, of course. I
avoided him during the rest of the pas-
sage, by advice of the captain, who
seemed to coincide with me altogether
in my views of his insanity, but cau-
tioned me to say nothing on this head
to any person on board.
156
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Several circumstances occurred im-
mediately after this fit of Wyatt
which contributed to heighten the cu-
riosity with which I was already pos-
sessed. 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 al-
most 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, no-
body 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 day-
break, when she was called by her hus-
band 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 he
husband. After listening to them for
some time, with thoughtful attention,
I at length succeeded perfectly in trans-
lating 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 dis-
tinguish 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 noth-
ing more, upon either occasion, until
nearly daybreak; unless, perhaps, I
may mention a low sobbing, or mur-
muring 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 imagina-
tion. 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 cus-
THE OBLONG BOX
157
tom, 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 how-
ever, to make him sob. I repeat,
therefore, that it must have been
simply a freak of my own fancy, dis-
tempered by good Captain Hardy's
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 meas-
ure, 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 pe-
riod, 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 immedi-
ately after the other. By this acci-
dent 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 stead-
ily than before.
The
The gale still held on, however, and
we saw no signs of its abating.
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 accom-
plished-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 enter-
tained 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 wonder-
fully to cheer our drooping spirits.
After incredible labor we succeeded,
at length, in getting the long-boat over
the side without material accident, and
into this we crowded the whole of the
158
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
crew and most of the passengers. This
party made off immediately, and, after
undergoing much suffering, finally ar-
rived, in safety, at Ocracoke Inlet, on
the third day after the wreck.
Fourteen passengers, with the cap-
tain, 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 Mexi-
can 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! Cap-
tain 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 salva-
tion, 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 com-
posure, 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 over-
board! 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 ex-
ertion, 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 tre-
mendous 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 rap-
idly 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 ap-
peared 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.
THE OBLONG BOX
159
"Did you observe, captain, how sud-
denly 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 com-
mit himself to the sea."
"They sank as a matter of course,"
replied the captain, "and that like a
shot. They will soon rise again, how-
ever-but not till the salt melts.'
"The salt!" I ejaculated.
22
"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 nar-
row 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 dis-
tress, upon the beach opposite Roa-
noke Island. We remained here a
week, were not ill-treated to the wreck-
ers, 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 con-
versation 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 aban-
doned the ship rather than take pas-
sage with a dead body.
In this dilemma, Captain Hardy ar-
ranged that the corpse, being first par-
tially embalmed, and packed, with a
large quantity of salt, in a box of suit-
able 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's lady's-
maid was easily prevailed on to do,
The extra state-room, originally en-
gaged 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 abil-
ity, the part of her mistress-whose
person, it had been carefully ascer-
tained, was unknown to any of the
passengers on board.
My own mistake arose, naturally
enough, through too careless, too in-
quisitive, and too impulsive a tempera-
ment. 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.
"Thou Art the Man"
(First published in Godey's Lady's Book, November, 1844)
I WILL now play the Edipus to the
Rattleborough enigma. I will expound
to you as I alone can-the secret of
the enginery that effected the Rattle-
borough miracle-the one, the true, the
admitted, the undisputed, the indisputa-
ble miracle, which put a definite end
to infidelity among the Rattleburghers
and converted to the orthodox of the
grandames all the carnal-minded who
had ventured to be sceptical before.
This event-which I should be sorry
to discuss in a tone of unsuitable levity
-occurred in the summer of 18-. Mr.
Barnabas Shuttleworthy-one of the
wealthiest and most respectable citizens
of the borough-had been missing for
several days under circumstances which
gave rise to suspicion of foul play. Mr.
Shuttleworthy had set out from Rattle-
borough very early one Saturday morn-
ing, on horseback, with the avowed
intention of proceeding to the city
of-
about fifteen miles distant, and
of returning the night of the same day.
Two hours after his departure, how-
ever, his horse returned without him,
and without the saddle-bags which had
been strapped on his back at starting.
The animal was wounded, too, and cov-
ered with mud. These circumstances
naturally gave rise to much alarm
among the friends of the missing man;
and when it was found, on Sunday
morning, that he had not yet made his
appearance, the whole borough arose
en masse to go and look for his body.
The foremost and most energetic in
instituting this search was the bosom
friend of Mr. Shuttleworthy-a Mr.
Charles Goodfellow, or, as he was uni-
versally called, "Charley Goodfellow,"
or "Old Charley Goodfellow." Now,
whether it is a marvellous coincidence,
or whether it is that the name itself
has an imperceptible effect upon the
character, I have never yet been able
to ascertain; but the fact is unques-
tionable, that there never yet was any
person named Charles who was not an
open, manly, honest, good-natured, and
frank-hearted fellow, with a rich, clear
voice, that did you good to hear it,
and an eye that looked you always
straight in the face, as much as to say:
"I have a clear conscience myself, am
afraid of no man, and am altogether
above doing a mean action." And thus
all the hearty, careless, "walking gen-
tlemen" of the stage are very certain
to be called Charles.
Now, "Old Charley Goodfellow," al-
though he had been in Rattleborough
not longer than six months or there-
abouts, and although nobody knew any
thing about him before he came to
settle in the neighborhood, had experi-
enced no difficulty in the world in mak-
ing the acquaintance of all the respect-
able people in the borough. Not a man
of them but would have taken his bare
word for a thousand at any moment;
and as for the women, there is no saying
what they would not have done to
oblige him. And all this came of his
having been christened Charles, and of
his possessing, in consequence, that
ingenuous face which is proverbially
160
THOU ART THE MAN
161
the very “best letter of recommenda-
tion."
I have already said that Mr. Shut-
tleworthy was one of the most respecta-
ble and, undoubtedly, he was the most
wealthy man in Rattleborough, while
"Old Charley Goodfellow" was upon as
intimate terms with him as if he had
been his own brother. The two old
gentlemen were next-door neighbors,
and, although Mr. Shuttleworthy sel-
dom, if ever, visited "Old Charley," and
never was known to take a meal in his
house, still this did not prevent the
two friends from being exceedingly
intimate, as I have just observed; for
"Old Charley" never let a day pass
without stepping in three or four times
to see how his neighbor came on, and
very often he would stay to breakfast
or tea, and almost always to dinner;
and then the amount of wine that was
made way with by the two cronies at
a sitting, it would really be a difficult
thing to ascertain. "Old Charley's"
favorite beverage was Chateau Mar-
gaux, and it appeared to do Mr. Shut-
tleworthy's heart good to see the old
fellow swallow it, as he did, quart after
quart; so that, one day, when the wine
was in and the wit, as a natural conse-
quence, somewhat out, he said to his
crony, as he slapped him upon the
back; "I tell you what it is, 'Old
Charley,' you are, by all odds, the
heartiest old fellow I ever came across
in all my born days; and, since you
love to guzzle the wine at that fashion,
I'll be darned if I don't have to make
thee a present of a big box of the
Chateau Margaux. Od rot me,”—(Mr.
Shuttleworthy had a sad habit of
swearing, although he seldom went be-
yond "Od rot me," or "By gosh," or
"By the jolly golly,")-"Od rot me,"
says he, "if I don't send an order to
town this very afternoon for a double
box of the best that can be got, and
I'll make ye a present of it, I will!-
ye needn't say a word now-I will, I
tell ye, and there's an end of it; so
look out for it-it will come to hand
some of these fine days, precisely when
ye are looking for it the least!" I men-
tion this little bit of liberality on the
part of Mr. Shuttleworthy, just by
way of showing you how very intimate
an understanding existed between the
two friends.
Well, on the Sunday morning in ques
tion, when it came to be fairly under-
stood that Mr. Shuttleworthy had met
with foul play, I never saw any one so
profoundly affected as "Old Charley
Goodfellow." When he first heard that
the horse had come home without his
master, and without his master's saddle-
bags, and all bloody from a pistol-shot,
that had gone clean through and
through the poor animal's chest with-
out quite killing him,-when he heard
all this, he turned as pale as if the
missing man had been his own dear
brother or father, and shivered and
shook all over as if he had had a fit
of the ague.
At first he was too much overpow-
ered with grief to be able to do any
thing at all, or to decide upon any plan
of action; so that for a long time he
endeavored to dissuade Mr. Shuttle-
worthy's other friends from making a
stir about the matter, thinking it best
to wait awhile-say for a week or two,
or a month, or two-to see if some-
thing wouldn't turn up, or if Mr. Shut-
tleworthy wouldn't come in the natural
way, and explain his reasons for sending
162
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
his horse on before. I dare say you
have often observed this disposition to
temporize, or to procrastinate, in people
who are laboring under any very poig-
nant sorrow. Their powers of mind
seem to be rendered torpid, so that they
have a horror of any thing like action,
and like nothing in the world so well
as to lie quietly in bed and "nurse their
grief," as the old ladies express it-
that is to say, ruminate over the
trouble.
The people of Rattleborough had,
indeed, so high an opinion of the wis-
dom and discretion of "Old Charley,"
that the greater part of them felt dis-
posed to agree with him, and not make
a stir in the business "until something
should turn up," as the honest old gen-
tleman worded it; and I believe that,
after all, this would have been the gen-
eral determination, but for the very
suspicious interference of Mr. Shuttle-
worthy's nephew, a young man of very
dissipated habits, and otherwise of
rather bad character. This nephew,
whose name was Pennifeather, would
listen to nothing like reason in the
matter of "lying quiet," but insisted
upon making immediate search for the
"corpse of the murdered man." This
was the expression he employed; and
Mr. Goodfellow acutely remarked at
the time, that it was "a singular expres-
sion, to say no more." This remark
of "Old Charley's," too, had great effect
upon the crowd; and one of the party
was heard to ask, very impressively,
"how it happened that young Mr. Pen-
nifeather was so intimately cognizant
of all the circumstances connected with
his wealthy uncle's disappearance, as to
feel authorized to assert, distinctly and
unequivocally, that his uncle was 'a
999
murdered man.' Hereupon some little
squibbling and bickering occurred
among various members of the crowd,
and especially between "Old Charley"
and Mr. Pennifeather-although this
latter occurrence was, indeed, by no
means a novelty, for little good-will
had subsisted between the parties for
the last three or four months; and mat-
ters had even gone so far that Mr.
Pennifeather had actually
had actually knocked
down his uncle's friend for some alleged
excess of liberty that the latter had
taken in the uncle's house, of which the
nephew was an inmate. Upon this
occasion "Old Charley" is said to have
behaved with exemplary moderation
and Christian charity. He arose from
the blow, adjusted his clothes, and
made no attempt at retaliation at all-
merely muttered a few words about
"taking summary vengeance at the first
convenient opportunity," a natural
and very justifiable ebullition of anger,
which meant nothing, however, and,
beyond doubt, was no sooner given vent
to than forgotten.
However these matters may be
(which have no reference to the point
now at issue), it is quite certain that
the people of Rattleborough, princi-
pally through the persuasion of Mr.
Pennifeather, came at length to the
determination of dispersion over the
adjacent country in search of the miss-
ing Mr. Shuttleworthy. I say they
came to this determination in the first
instance. After it had been fully re-
solved that a search should be made, it
was considered almost a matter of
course that the seekers should disperse
-that is to say, distribute themselves
in parties for the more thorough ex-
amination of the region round about.
THOU ART THE MAN
163
I forgot, however, by what ingenious
train of reasoning it was that "Old
Charley" finally convinced the assembly
that this was the most injudicious plan
that could be pursued. Convince them,
however, he did-all except Mr. Penni-
feather; and, in the end, it was ar-
ranged that a search should be insti-
tuted, carefully and very thoroughly, by
the burghers en masse, “Old Charley"
himself leading the way.
As for the matter of that, there could
have been no better pioneer than "Old
Charley," whom everybody knew to
have the eye of a lynx; but, although
he led them into all manner of out-of-
the-way holes and corners, by routes
that nobody had ever suspected of ex-
isting in the neighborhood, and although
the search was incessantly kept up day
and night for nearly a week, still no
trace of Mr. Shuttleworthy could be
discovered. When I say no trace, how-
ever, I must not be understood to speak
literally; for trace, to some extent,
there certainly was. The poor gentle-
man had been tracked, by his horse's
shoes (which were peculiar), to a spot
about three miles to the east of the
borough, on the main road leading to
the city. Here the track made off into
a by-path through a piece of woodland
-the path coming out again into the
main road, and cutting off about half
a mile of the regular distance. Fol-
lowing the shoe-marks down this lane,
the party came at length to a pool of
stagnant water, half hidden by the
brambles, to the right of the lane, and
opposite this pool all vestige of the
track was lost sight of. It appeared,
however, that a struggle of some nature
had here taken place, and it seemed as
if some large and heavy body, much
larger and heavier than a man, had been
drawn from the by-path to the pool.
This latter was carefully dragged twice,
but nothing was found; and the party
was upon the point of going away,
in despair of coming to any result,
when Providence suggested to Mr.
Goodfellow the expediency of draining
the water off altogether. This project
was received with cheers, and many
high compliments to "Old Charley"
upon his sagacity and consideration.
As many of the burghers had brought
spades with them, supposing that they
might possibly be called upon to dis-
inter a corpse, the drain was easily
and speedily effected; and no sooner
was the bottom visible, than right in
the middle of the mud that remained
was discovered a black silk velvet
waistcoat, which nearly every one pres-
ent immediately recognized as the prop
erty of Mr. Pennifeather. This waist-
coat was much torn and stained with
blood, and there were several persons
among the party who had a distinct
remembrance of its having been worn
by its owner on the very morning of
Mr. Shuttleworthy's departure for the
city; while there were others, again,
ready to testify upon oath, if required,
that Mr. P. did not wear the garment
in question at any period during the
remainder of that memorable day; nor
could any one be found to say that
he had seen it upon Mr. P.'s person
at any period at all subsequent to Mr.
Shuttleworthy's disappearance.
Matters now wore a very serious
aspect for Mr. Pennifeather, and it was
observed, as an indubitable confirma.
tion of the suspicions which were ex-
cited against him, that he grew exceed-
ingly pale, and when asked what he
164
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
had to say for himself, was utterly
incapable of saying a word. Hereupon,
the few friends his riotous mode of
living had left him, deserted him at
once to a man, and were even more
clamorous than his ancient and avowed
enemies for his instantaneous arrest.
But, on the other hand, the magnanim-
ity of Mr. Goodfellow shone forth with
only the more brilliant lustre through
contrast. He made a warm and in-
tensely eloquent defence of Mr. Penni-
feather, in which he alluded more than
once to his own sincere forgiveness of
that wild young gentleman-"the heir
of the worthy Mr. Shuttleworthy,"-
for the insult which he (the young
gentleman) had, no doubt in the heat
of passion, thought proper to put upon
him (Mr. Goodfellow). "He forgave
him for it," he said, "from the very
bottom of his heart; and for himself
(Mr. Goodfellow), so far from push-
ing the suspicious circumstances to
extremity, which he was sorry to say,
really had arisen against Mr. Penni-
feather, he (Mr. Goodfellow) would
make every exertion in his power,
would employ all the little eloquence
in his possession to-to-to-soften
down, as much as he could conscien-
tiously do so, the worst features of
this really exceedingly perplexing piece
of business."
Mr. Goodfellow went on for some
half hour longer in this strain, very
much to the credit both of his head
and of his heart; but your warm-
hearted people are seldom apposite in
their observations-they run into all
sorts of blunders, contre-temps and mal
apropos-isms, in the hot-headedness of
their zeal to serve a friend-thus, often
with the kindest intentions in the world,
doing infinitely more to prejudice his
cause than to advance it.
So, in the present instance, it turned
out with all the eloquence of "Old
Charley"; for, although he labored
earnestly in behalf of the suspected, yet
it so happened, somehow or other, that
every syllable he uttered of which the
direct but unwitting tendency was not
to exalt the speaker in the good opinion
of his audience, had the effect of deep-
ening the suspicion already attached to
the individual whose cause he pled, and
of arousing against him the fury of
the mob.
One of the most unaccountable errors
committed by the orator was his allu-
sion to the suspected as "the heir of
the worthy old gentleman Mr. Shuttle-
worthy." The people had really never
thought of this before. They had only
remembered certain threats of disin-
heritance uttered a year or two previ-
ously by the uncle (who had no living
relative except the nephew), and they
had, therefore, always looked upon this
disinheritance as a matter that was set-
tled-so single-minded a race of beings
were the Rattleburghers; but the re-
mark of "Old Charley" brought them
at once to a consideration of this point,
and thus gave them to see the possi-
bility of the threats having been nothing
more than a threat. And straightway
hereupon, arose the natural question of
cui bono?-a question that tended even
more than the waist coat to fasten the
terrible crime upon the young man.
And here, lest I may be misunderstood,
permit me to digress for one moment
merely to observe that the exceedingly
brief and simple Latin phrase which I
have employed, is invariably mistrans-
THOU ART THE MAN
165
lated and misconceived.
"Cui bono?"
in all the crack novels and elsewhere,-
in those of Mrs. Gore, for example, (the
author of "Cecil,") a lady who quotes.
all tongues from the Chaldæan to
Chickasaw, and is helped to her learn-
ing, "as needed," upon a systematic
plan, by Mr. Beckford,-in all the crack
novels, I say, from those of Bulwer
and Dickens to those of Turnapenny
and Ainsworth, the two little Latin
words cui bono are rendered "to what
purpose?" or, (as if quo bono,) "to
what good?" Their true meaning, nev-
ertheless, is "for whose advantage."
Cui, to whom; bono, is it for a benefit?
It is a purely legal phrase, and applica-
ble precisely in cases such as we have
now under consideration, where the
probability of the doer of a deed hinges
upon the probability of the benefit ac-
cruing to this individual or to that
from the deed's accomplishment. Now
in the present instance, the question
cui bono? very pointedly implicated
Mr. Pennifeather. His uncle had
threatened him, after making a will in
his favor, with disinheritance. But the
threat had not been actually kept; the
original will, it appeared, had been al-
tered. Had it been altered, the only
supposable motive for murder on the
part of the suspected would have been
the ordinary one of revenge; and even
this would have been counteracted by
the hope of reinstation into the good
graces of the uncle. But the will be-
ing unaltered, while the threat to alter
remained suspended over the nephew's
head, there appears at once the very
strongest possible inducement for the
atrocity; and so concluded, very saga-
ciously, the worthy citizens of the bor
ough of Rattle.
Mr. Pennifeather was, accordingly,
arrested upon the spot, and the crowd,
after some further search, proceeded
homeward, having him in custody. On
the route, however, another circum-
stance occurred tending to confirm the
suspicion entertained. Mr. Goodfel-
low, whose zeal led him to be always
a little in advance of the party, was
seen suddenly to run forward a few
paces, stoop, and then apparently to
pick up some small object from the
grass. Having quickly examined it, he
was observed, too, to make a sort of
half attempt at concealing it in his
coat pocket; but this action was no-
ticed, as I say, and consequently pre-
vented, when the object picked up was
found to be a Spanish knife which a
dozen persons at once recognized as
belonging to Mr. Pennifeather. More-
over, his initials were engraved upon
the handle. The blade of this knife
was open and bloody.
No doubt now remained of the guilt
of the nephew, and immediately upon
reaching Rattleborough he was taken
before a magistrate for examination.
Here matters again took a most un-
favorable turn. The prisoner, being
questioned as to his whereabouts on
the morning of Mr. Shuttleworthy's
disappearance, had absolutely the au-
dacity to acknowledge that on that
very morning he had been out with
his rifle deer-stalking, in the immedi-
ate neighborhood of the pool where
the blood-stained waistcoat had been
discovered through the sagacity of Mr.
Goodfellow.
This latter now came forward, and
with tears in his eyes, asked permission
166
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
to be examined. He said that a stern
sense of the duty he owed his Maker,
not less than his fellow-men, would
permit him no longer to remain silent.
Hitherto, the sincerest affection for the
young man (notwithstanding the latter's
ill-treatment of himself, Mr. Goodfel-
low) had induced him to make every
hypothesis which imagination could
suggest, by way of endeavoring to ac-
count for what appeared suspicious in
the circumstances that told so seriously
against Mr. Pennifeather; but these
circumstances were now altogether too
convincing-too damning; he would
hesitate no longer-he would tell all
he knew, although his heart (Mr.
Goodfellow's) should absolutely burst
asunder in the effort. He then went
on to state that, on the afternoon of
the day previous to Mr. Shuttleworthy's
departure for the city, that worthy old
gentleman had mentioned to his nephew,
in his hearing (Mr. Goodfellow's), that
his object in going to town on the
morrow was to make a deposit of an
unusually large sum of money in the
"Farmers and Merchants' Bank," and
that, then and there, the said Mr. Shut-
tleworthy had distinctly avowed to the
said nephew his irrevocable determina-
tion of rescinding the will originally
made, and of cutting him off with a
shilling. He (the witness) now sol-
emnly called upon the accused to state
whether what he (the witness) had
just stated was or was not the truth
in every substantial particular. Much
to the astonishment of every one pres-
ent, Mr. Pennifeather frankly admitted
that it was.
The magistrate now considered it his
duty to send a couple of constables
to search the chamber of the accused
in the house of his uncle. From this
search they almost immediately re-
turned with the well-known steel-
bound, russet leather pocket-book
which the old gentleman had been in
the habit of carrying for years. Its
valuable contents, however, had been
abstracted, and the magistrate in vain
endeavored to extort from the prisoner
the use which had been made of them,
or the place of their concealment. In-
deed, he obstinately denied all knowl-
edge of the matter. The constables,
also, discovered, between the bed and
sacking of the unhappy man, a shirt
and neck-handkerchief both marked
with the initials of his name, and both
hideously besmeared with the blood
of the victim.
At this juncture, it was announced
that the horse of the murdered man
had just expired in the stable from
the effects of the wound he had re-
ceived, and it was proposed by Mr.
Goodfellow that a post-mortem exami-
nation of the beast should be imme-
diately made, with the view, if pos-
sible, of discovering the ball. This was
accordingly done; and, as if to demon-
strate beyond a question the guilt of
the accused, Mr. Goodfellow, after con-
siderable searching in the cavity of the
chest, was enabled to detect and to
pull forth a bullet of very extraordi-
nary size, which, upon trial, was found
to be exactly adapted to the bore of
Mr. Pennifeather's rifle, while it was
far too large for that of any other per-
son in the borough or its vicinity. To
render the matter even surer yet, how-
ever, this bullet was discovered to have
a flaw or seam at right angles to the
usual suture, and upon examination,
this seam corresponded precisely with
THOU ART THE MAN
167
an accidental ridge or elevation in a
pair of moulds acknowledged by the
accused himself to be his own property.
Upon finding of this bullet, the exam-
ining magistrate refused to listen to
any further testimony, and immediately
committed the prisoner for trial-de-
clining resolutely to take any bail in
the case, although against this severity
Mr. Goodfellow very warmly remon-
strated, and offered to become surety
in whatever amount might be required.
This generosity on the part of "Old
Charley" was only in accordance with
the whole tenor of his amiable and
chivalrous conduct during the entire
period of his sojourn in the borough
of Rattle. In the present instance the
worthy man was so entirely carried
away by the excessive warmth of his
sympathy, that he seemed to have quite
forgotten, when he offered to go bail
for his young friend, that he himself
(Mr. Goodfellow) did not possess a
single dollar's worth of property upon
the face of the earth.
The result of the committal may be
readily foreseen. Mr. Pennifeather,
amid the loud execrations of all Rat-
tleborough, was brought to trial at
the next criminal sessions, when the
chain of circumstantial evidence
(strengthened as it was by some addi-
tional damning facts, which Mr. Good-
fellow's sensitive conscientiousness for-
bade him to withhold from the court)
was considered so unbroken and so thor-
oughly conclusive, that the jury, with-
out leaving their seats, returned an
immediate verdict of "Guilty of mur-
der in the first degree." Soon after-
ward the unhappy wretch received sen-
tence of death, and was remanded to
the county jail to await the inexorable
vengeance of the law.
In the meantime, the noble behavior
of "Old Charley Goodfellow" had dou
bly endeared him to the honest citizens
of the borough. He became ten times
a greater favorite than ever; and, as
a natural result of the hospitality with
which he was treated, he relaxed, as it
were, perforce, the extremely parsimo-
nious habits which his poverty had
hitherto impelled him to observe, and
very frequently had little reunions at
his own house, when wit and jollity
reigned supreme-dampened a little, of
course, by the occasional remembrance
of the untoward and melancholy fate
which impended over the nephew of
the late lamented bosom friend of the
generous host.
One fine day, this magnanimous old
gentleman was agreeably surprised at
the receipt of the following letter.
"Charles Goodfellow, Esquire:
"Dear Sir-In conformity with an
order transmitted to our firm about
two months since, by our esteemed cor
respondent, Mr. Barnabas Shuttle-
worthy, we have the honor of forward-
ing this morning, to your address, a
double box of Chateau-Margaux, of the
antelope brand, violet seal. Box num-
bered and marked as per margin.
"We remain, sir,
"
"Your most ob'nt ser'ts,
"HOGGS, FROGS, BOGS, & Co.
"City of June 21, 18-.
"P. S.-The box will reach you by
wagon, on the day after your receipt
of this letter.
Shuttleworthy.
Our respects to Mr.
"H., F., B., & Co."
168
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
The fact is, that Mr. Goodfellow
had, since the death of Mr. Shuttle-
worthy, given over all expectation of
ever receiving the promised Chateau-
Margaux; and he, therefore, looked
upon it now as a sort of especial dis-
pensation of Providence in his behalf.
He was highly delighted, of course,
and in the exuberance of his joy in-
vited a large party of friends to a petit
souper on the morrow, for the pur-
pose of broaching the good old Mr.
Shuttleworthy's present. Not that he
said any thing about "the good old Mr.
Shuttleworthy" when he issued the in-
vitations. The fact is, he thought much
and concluded to say nothing at all.
He did not mention to any one-if I
remember aright-that he had received
a present of Chateau-Margaux.
merely asked his friends to come and
help him drink some of a remarkable
fine quality and rich flavor that he
had ordered up from the city a couple
of months ago, and of which he would
be in the receipt upon the morrow. I
have often puzzled myself to imagine
why it was that "Old Charley" came
to the conclusion to say nothing about
having received the wine from his old
friend, but I could never precisely
understand his reason for the silence,
although he had some excellent and
very magnanimous reason, no doubt.
He
The morrow at length arrived, and
with it a very large and highly respect-
able company at Mr. Goodfellow's
house. Indeed, half the borough was
there, I myself among the number,-
but, much to the vexation of the host,
the Chateau-Margaux did not arrive
until a late hour, and when the sump-
tuous supper supplied by "Old Charley"
had been done very ample justice by
the guests. It came at length, how-
ever, a monstrously big box of it
there was, too-and as the whole party
were in excessively good humor, it was
decided, nem. con., that it should be
lifted upon the table and its contents
disembowelled forthwith.
No sooner said than done. I lent
a helping hand; and, in a trice we had
the box upon the table, in the midst
of all the bottles and glasses, not a
few of which were demolished in the
scuffle. "Old Charley," who was pretty
much intoxicated, and excessively red
in the face, now took a seat, with an
air of mock dignity, at the head of
the board, and thumped furiously upon
it with a decanter, calling upon the
company to keep order "during the
ceremony of disinterring the treasure."
After some vociferation, quiet was at
length fully restored, and, as very often
happens in similar cases, a profound
and remarkable silence ensued. Being
then requested to force open the lid,
I complied, of course, "with an infi-
nite deal of pleasure." I inserted a
chisel, and giving it a few slight taps
with a hammer, the top of the box
flew suddenly off, and at the same in
stant, there sprang up into a sitting po-
sition, directly facing the host, the
bruised, bloody, and nearly putrid
corpse of the murdered Mr. Shuttle-
worthy himself. It gazed for a few sec-
onds, fixedly and sorrowfully, with its
decaying and lack-lustre eyes, full into
the countenance of Mr. Goodfellow; ut-
tered slowly, but clearly and impres-
sively, the words-"Thou art the man!"
and then, falling over the side of the
chest as if thoroughly satisfied, stretched
out its limbs quiveringly upon the table.
The scene that ensued is altogether
THOU ART THE MAN
169
beyond description. The rush for the
doors and windows was terrific, and
many of the most robust men in the
room fainted outright through sheer
horror. But after the first wild, shriek-
ing burst of affright, all eyes were di-
rected to Mr. Goodfellow. If I live a
thousand years, I can never forget the
more than mortal agony which was
depicted in that ghastly face of his, so
lately rubicund with triumph and wine.
For several minutes he sat rigidly as
a statue of marble; his eyes seeming,
in the intense vacancy of their gaze,
to be turned inward and absorbed in
the contemplation of his own miser-
able, murderous soul. At length their
expression appeared to flash suddenly
out into the external world, when, with
a quick leap, he sprang from his chair,
and falling heavily with his head and
shoulders upon the table, and in contact
with the corpse, poured out rapidly
and vehemently a detailed confession
of the hideous crime for which Mr.
Pennifeather was then imprisoned and
doomed to die.
What he recounted was in substance
this: He followed his victim to the
vicinity of the pool; there shot his
horse with a pistol; despatched its rider
with the butt end; possessed himself
of the pocket-book; and, supposing the
horse dead, dragged it with great labor
to the brambles by the pond. Upon
his own beast he slung the corpse of
Mr. Shuttleworthy, and thus bore it
to a secure place of concealment a
long distance off through the woods.
The waistcoat, the knife, the pocket-
book, and bullet, had been placed by
himself where found, with the view of
avenging himself upon Mr. Penni-
feather. He had also contrived the dis-
covery of the stained handkerchief and
shirt.
Toward the end of the blood-chilling
recital, the words of the guilty wretch
faltered and grew hollow. When the
record was finally exhausted, he arose,
staggered backward from the table, and
fell-dead.
The means by which this happily-
timed confession was extorted, although
efficient, were simple indeed. Mr.
Goodfellow's excess of frankness had
disgusted me, and excited my suspi-
cions from the first. I was present
when Mr. Pennifeather had struck him,
and the fiendish expression which then
arose upon his countenance, although
momentary, assured me that his threat
of vengeance would, if possible, be rig-
idly fulfilled. I was thus prepared to
view the manœuvring of "Old Charley"
in a very different light from that in
which it was regarded by the good citi-
zens of Rattleborough. I saw at once
that all the criminating discoveries
arose, either directly or indirectly, from
himself. But the fact which clearly
opened my eyes to the true state of
the case, was the affair of the bullet,
found by Mr. G. in the carcass of
the horse. I had not forgotten, al-
though the Rattleburghers had, that
there was a hole where the ball had
entered the horse, and another where it
went out. If it were found in the ani-
mal then, after having made its exit,
I saw clearly that it must have been
deposited by the person who found it.
The bloody shirt and handkerchief con-
firmed the idea suggested by the bullet;
for the blood on examination proved to
be capital claret, and no more. When
I came to think of these things, and
170
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
also of the late increase of liberality
and expenditure on the part of Mr.
Goodfellow, I entertained a suspicion
which was none the less strong because
I kept it altogether to myself.
In the meantime, I instituted a rig-
orous private search for the corpse of
Mr. Shuttleworthy, and, for good rea-
sons, searched in quarters as divergent
as possible from those to which Mr.
Goodfellow conducted his party. The
result was that, after some days, I
came across an old dry well, the mouth
of which was nearly hidden by bram-
bles; and here, at the bottom, I dis-
covered what I sought.
Now it so happened that I had over-
heard the colloquy between the two
cronies, when Mr. Goodfellow had con-
trived to cajole his host into the prom-
ise of a box of Chateau-Margaux. Upon
this hint I acted. I procured a stiff
piece of whalebone, thrust it down the
throat of the corpse, and deposited
the latter in an old wine box-taking
care so to double the body up as to
double the whalebone with it. In this
manner I had to press forcibly upon
the lid to keep it down while I se-
cured it with nails; and I anticipated,
of course, that as soon as these latter
were removed, the top would fly off
and the body up.
Having thus arranged the box, I
marked, numbered, and addressed it as
already told; and then writing a let-
ter in the name of the wine-merchants
with whom Mr. Shuttleworthy dealt,
I gave instructions to my servant to
wheel the box to Mr. Goodfellow's door,
in a barrow, at a given signal from
myself. For the words which I in-
tended the corpse to speak, I confi-
dently depended upon my ventriloquial
abilities; for their effect, I counted
upon the conscience of the murderous
wretch.
I believe there is nothing more to
be explained. Mr. Pennifeather was
released upon the spot, inherited the
fortune of his uncle, profited by the
lessons of experience, turned over a
new leaf, and led happily ever after-
ward a new life.
The Pit and the Pendulum
(First published in The Gift, 1843)
Impia tortorum longas hic turba furores
Sanguinis innocui, non satiata, aluit.
Sospite nunc patria, fracto nunc funeris
antro,
Mors ubi dira fuit vita salusque patent.
(Quatrain composed for the gates of a
market to be erected upon the site
of the Jacobin Club House at Paris.)
I WAS sick-sick unto death with
that long agony; and when they at
length unbound me, and I was permitted
to sit, I felt that my senses were leaving
me. The sentence-the dread sentence
of death-was the last of distinct accen-
tuation which reached my ears. After
that, the sound of the inquisitorial
voices seemed merged in one dreamy
indeterminate hum. It conveyed to
my soul the idea of revolution-per-
haps from its association in fancy with
the burr of a mill-wheel. This only for
THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM
171
a brief period, for presently I heard no
more. Yet, for a while, I saw-but
with how terrible an exaggeration! I
saw the lips of the black-robed judges.
They appeared to me white-whiter
than the sheet upon which I trace these
words-and thin even to grotesqueness;
thin with the intensity of their ex-
pression of firmness-of immovable
resolution-of stern contempt of human
torture. I saw that the decrees of what
to me was Fate were still issuing from
those lips. I saw them writhe with a
deadly locution. I saw them fashion
the syllables of my name; and I shud-
dered because no sound succeeded. I
saw, too, for a few moments of delirious
horror, the soft and nearly imperceptible
waving of the sable draperies which
enwrapped the walls of the apartment.
And then my vision fell upon the seven
tall candles upon the table. At first
they wore the aspect of charity, and
seemed white slender angels who would
save me; but then, all at once, there
came a most deadly nausea over my
spirit, and I felt every fibre in my frame
thrill as if I had touched the wire of
a galvanic battery, while the angel
forms became meaningless spectres, with
heads of flame, and I saw that from
them there would be no help. And
then there stole into my fancy, like a
rich musical note, the thought of what
sweet rest there must be in the grave.
The thought came gently and stealthily,
and it seemed long before it attained
full appreciation; but just as my spirit
came at length properly to feel and
entertain it, the figures of the judges
vanished, as if magically, from before
me; the tall candles sank into nothing-
ness; their flames went out utterly; the
blackness of darkness supervened; all
sensations appeared swallowed up in a
mad rushing descent as of the soul into
Hades. Then silence, and stillness, and
night were the universe.
I had swooned; but still will not say
that all of consciousness was lost. What
of it there remained I will not attempt
to define, or even to describe; yet all
was not lost. In the deepest slumber
-no! In delirium-no! In a swoon
-no! In death-no! even in the grave
all is not lost. Else there is no im-
mortality for man. Arousing from the
most profound of slumbers, we break
the gossamer web of some dream. Yet
in a second afterward, (so frail may
that web have been) we remember not
that we have dreamed. In the return
to life from the swoon there are two
stages: first, that of the sense of mental
or spiritual; secondly, that of the sense
of physical, existence. It seems prob-
able that if, upon reaching the second
stage, we could recall the impressions
of the first, we should find these im-
pressions eloquent in memories of the
gulf beyond. And that gulf is-what?
How at least shall we distinguish its
shadows from those of the tomb? But
if the impressions of what I have termed
the first stage are not, at will, recalled,
yet, after long interval, do they not
come unbidden, while we marvel whence
they come? He who has never swooned,
is not he who finds strange palaces and
wildly familiar faces in coals that glow;
is not he who beholds floating in mid-
air the sad visions that the many may
not view; is not he who ponders over
the perfume of some novel flower; is
not be whose brain grows bewildered
with the meaning of some musical ca-
dence which has never before arrested
his attention.
172
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Amid frequent and thoughtful en-
deavors to remember, amid earnest
struggles to regather some token of the
state of seeming nothingness into which
my soul had lapsed, there have been
moments when I have dreamed of suc-
cess; there have been brief, very brief
periods when I have conjured up re-
membrances which the lucid reason of
a later epoch assures me could have
had reference only to that condition of
seeming unconsciousness. These shad-
ows of memory tell, indistinctly, of tall
figures that lifted and bore me in silence
down-down-still down-till a hideous
dizziness oppressed me at the mere idea
of the interminableness of the descent.
They tell also of a vague horror at my
heart, on account of that heart's un-
natural stillness. Then comes a sense
of sudden motionlessness throughout all
things; as if those who bore me (a
ghastly train!) had outrun, in their
descent, the limits of the limitless, and
paused from the wearisomeness of their
toil. After this I call to mind flatness
and dampness; and then all is madness
-the madness of a memory which
busies itself among forbidden things.
Very suddenly there came back to my
soul motion and sound-the tumultu-
ous motion of the heart, and, in my
ears, the sound of its beating. Then a
pause in which all is blank. Then
again sound, and motion, and touch-a
tingling sensation pervading my frame.
Then the mere consciousness of exist-
ence, without thought-a condition
which lasted long. Then, very suddenly,
thought, and shuddering terror, and
earnest endeavor to comprehend my
true state. Then a strong desire to
lapse into insensibility. Then a rushing
revival of soul and a successful effort
to move. And now a full memory of
the trial, of the judges, of the sable
draperies, of the sentence, of the sick-
ness, of the swoon. Then entire for-
getfulness of all that followed; of all
that a later day and much earnestness
of endeavor have enabled me vaguely
to recall.
So far, I had not opened my eyes.
I felt that I lay upon my back, unbound.
I reached out my hand, and it fell
heavily upon something damp and hard.
There I suffered it to remain for many
minutes, while I strove to imagine where
and what I could be. I longed, dared
not, to employ my vision. I dreaded
the first glance at objects around me.
It was not that I feared to look upon
things horrible, but that I grew aghast
lest there should be nothing to see.
At length, with a wild desperation at
heart, I quickly unclosed my eyes. My
worst thoughts, then, were confirmed.
The blackness of eternal night encom-
passed me. I struggled for breath.
The intensity of the darkness seemed to
oppress and stifle me. The atmosphere
was intolerably close. I still lay quietly.
and made effort to exercise my reason.
I brought to mind the inquisitorial
proceedings, and attempted from that
point to deduce my real condition. The
sentence had passed; and it appeared
to me that a very long interval of time
had since elapsed. Yet not for a mo-
ment did I suppose myself actually
dead. Such a supposition, notwith-
standing what we read in fiction, is
altogether inconsistent with real ex-
istence; but where and in what state
was I? The condemned to death, 1
knew, perished usually at the auto-da
fes, and one of these had been held
on the very night of the day of my
THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM
173
trial. Had I been remanded to my
dungeon, to await the next sacrifice,
which would not take place for many
months? This I at once saw could not
be. Victims had been in immediate
demand. Moreover, my dungeon, as
well as all the condemned cells at
Toledo, had stone floors, and light was
not altogether excluded.
A fearful idea now suddenly drove the
blood in torrents upon my heart, and
for a brief period I once more relapsed
into insensibility. Upon recovering, I
at once started to my feet, trembling
convulsively in every fibre. I thrust
my arms wildly above and around me
- in all directions. I felt nothing; yet
dreaded to move a step, lest I should
be impeded by the walls of a tomb.
Perspiration burst from every pore, and
stood in cold big beads upon my fore-
head. The agony of suspense grew at
- length intolerable, and I cautiously
moved forward, with my arms extended,
and my eyes straining from their sockets
in the hope of catching some faint ray
of light. I proceeded for many paces;
but still all was blackness and vacancy.
I breathed more freely. It seemed evi-
dent that mine was not, at least, the
most hideous of fates.
And now, as I still continued to step
cautiously onward, there came throng-
ing upon my recollection a thousand
vague rumors of the horrors of Toledo.
Of the dungeons there had been strange
things narrated-fables I had always
deemed them, but yet strange, and
too ghastly to repeat, save in a whisper.
Was I left to perish of starvation in
the subterranean world of darkness; or
what fate, perhaps even more fearful,
+awaited me? That the result would be
death, and a death of more than cus-
tomary bitterness, I knew too well the
character of my judges to doubt. The
mode and the hour were all that oc-
cupied or distracted me.
My outstretched hands at length en-
countered some solid obstruction. It
was a wall, seemingly of stone masonry
-very smooth, slimy, and cold. I fol-
lowed it up; stepping with all the care-
ful distrust with which certain antique
narratives had inspired me. This pro-
cess, however, afforded me no means
of ascertaining the dimensions of my
dungeon, as I might make its circuit
and return to the point whence I set
out without being aware of the fact, so
perfectly uniform seemed the wall. I
therefore sought the knife which had
been in my pocket when led into the
inquisitorial chamber; but it was gone;
my clothes had been exchanged for a
wrapper of coarse serge. I had thought
of forcing the blade in some minute
crevice of the masonry, so as to identify
my point of departure. The difficulty,
nevertheless, was but trivial; although,
in the disorder of my fancy, it seemed
at first insuperable. I tore a part of
the hem from the robe and placed the
fragment at full length, and at right
angles to the wall. In groping my way
around the prison, I could not fail to
encounter this rag upon completing the
circuit. So, at least, I thought; but I
had not counted upon the extent of the
dungeon, or upon my own weakness.
The ground was moist and slippery.
I staggered onward for some time, when
I stumbled and fell. My excessive
fatigue induced me to remain prostrate;
and sleep soon overtook me as I lay.
Upon awaking, and stretching forth
an arm, I found beside me a loaf and
a pitcher with water. I was too much
174
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
exhausted to reflect upon this circum-
stance, but ate and drank with avidity.
Shortly afterward, I resumed my tour
around the prison, and with much toil,
came at last upon the fragment of the
serge. Up to the period when I fell,
I had counted fifty-two paces, and, upon
resuming my walk, I had counted forty-
eight more-when I arrived at the rag.
There were in all, then, a hundred
paces; and, admitting two paces to the
yard, I presumed the dungeon to be
fifty yards in circuit. I had met, how-
ever, with many angles in the wall, and
thus I could form no guess at the shape
of the vault, for vault I could not help
supposing it to be.
I had little object-certainly no hope
-in these researches; but a vague curi-
esity prompted me to continue them.
Quitting the wall, I resolved to cross
the area of the enclosure. At first, I
proceeded with extreme caution, for
the floor, although seemingly of solid
material, was treacherous with slime.
At length, however, I took courage, and
did not hesitate to step firmly-en-
deavoring to cross in as direct a line
as possible. I had advanced some ten
or twelve paces in this manner, when
the remnant of the torn hem of my
robe became entangled between my legs.
I stepped on it, and fell violently on
my face.
In the confusion attending my fall, I
did not immediately apprehend a some-
what startling circumstance, which yet,
in a few seconds afterward, and while
I still lay prostrate, arrested my atten-
tion. It was this: my chin rested upon
the floor of the prison, but my lips, and
the upper portion of my head, although
seemingly at a less elevation than the
chin, touched nothing. At the same
time, my forehead seemed bathed in a
clammy vapor, and the peculiar smell
of decayed fungus arose to my nostrils.
I put forward my arm, and shuddered
to find that I had fallen at the very
brink of a circular pit, whose extent,
of course, I had no means of ascertain-
ing at the moment. Groping about the
masonry just below the margin, I suc-
ceeded in dislodging a small fragment,
and let it fall into the abyss. For many
seconds I hearkened to its reverbera-
tions as it dashed against the sides of
the chasm in its descent; at length,
there was a sullen plunge into water,
succeeded by loud echoes. At the same
moment, there came a sound resembling
the quick opening and as rapid closing
of a door overhead, while a faint gleam
of light flashed suddenly through the
gloom, and as suddenly faded away.
I saw clearly the doom which had
been prepared for me, and congratu
lated myself upon the timely accident
by which I had escaped. Another step
before my fall, and the world had seen
me no more. And the death just
avoided was of that very character
which I had regarded as fabulous and
frivolous in the tales respecting the
Inquisition. To the victims of it
tyranny, there was the choice of death
with its direst physical agonies, or death
with its most hideous moral horrors
I had been reserved for the latter. By
long suffering my nerves had been un
strung, until I trembled at the sound o
my own voice, and had become in every
respect a fitting subject for the specie
of torture which awaited me.
Shaking in every limb, I groped m
way back to the wall-resolving ther
to perish rather than risk the terror
of the wells, of which my imaginatio
THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM
175
now pictured many in various positions
about the dungeon. In other conditions
of mind, I might have had courage to
end my misery at once, by a plunge
into one of these abysses; but now I
was the veriest of cowards. Neither
could I forget what I had read of these
pits-that the sudden extinction of life
formed no part of their most horrible
plan.
Agitation of spirit kept me awake
for many long hours, but at length I
again slumbered. Upon arousing, I
found by my side, as before, a loaf
and a pitcher of water. A burning
thirst consumed me, and I emptied the
vessel at a draught. It must have been
drugged-for scarcely had I drunk, be-
fore I became irresistibly drowsy. A
deep sleep fell upon me-a sleep like
that of death. How long it lasted, of
course I know not; but when, once
again, I unclosed my eyes, the objects
around me were visible. By a wild,
sulphurous lustre, the origin of which
I could not at first determine, I was
enabled to see the extent and aspect of
the prison.
In its size I had been greatly mis-
taken. The whole circuit of its walls
did not exceed twenty-five yards. For
some minutes this fact occasioned me a
world of vain trouble; vain indeed-
for what could be of less importance,
under the terrible circumstances which
environed me, than the mere dimensions
of my dungeon? But my soul took a
wild interest in trifles, and I busied my-
self in endeavors to account for the
error I had committed in my measure-
ment. The truth at length flashed upon
me. In my first attempt at exploration
I had counted fifty-two paces, up to
1 the period when I fell: I must then have
been within a pace or two of the frag-
ment of serge; in fact, I had nearly
performed the circuit of the vault. I
then slept and, upon awaking, I must
have returned upon my steps-thus sup-
posing the circuit nearly double what
it actually was. My confusion of mind
prevented me from observing that I
began my tour with the wall to the left,
and ended it with the wall to the right.
I had been deceived, too, in respect
to the shape of the enclosure. In feel-
ing my way I had found many angles,
and thus deduced an idea of great ir-
regularity; so potent is the effect of
total darkness upon one arousing from
lethargy or sleep! The angles were
simply those of a few slight depressions,
or niches, at odd intervals. The gen-
eral shape of the prison was square.
What I had taken for masonry seemed
now to be iron, or some other metal, in
huge plates, whose sutures or joints
occasioned the depression. The entire
surface of this metallic enclosure was
rudely daubed in all the hideous and
repulsive devices to which the charnel
superstition of the monks has given rise.
The figures of fiends in aspects of men-
ace, with skeleton forms, and other
more really fearful images, overspread
and disfigured the walls. I observed
that the outlines of these monstrosities
were sufficiently distinct, but that the
colors seemed faded and blurred, as if
from the effects of a damp atmosphere.
I now noticed the floor, too, which was
of stone. In the centre yawned the
circular pit from whose jaws I had
escaped; but it was the only one in
the dungeon.
All this I saw indistinctly and by
much effort-for my personal condi-
tion had been greatly changed during
176
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
slumber. I now lay upon my back, and
at full length, on a species of low frame-
work of wood. To this I was securely
bound by a long strap resembling a
surcingle. It passed in many convolu-
tions about my limbs and body, leaving
at liberty only my head, and my left
arm to such an extent, that I could, by
dint of much exertion, supply myself
with food from an earthen dish which
lay by my side on the floor. I saw, to
my horror, that the pitcher had been
removed. I say to my horror-for I
was consumed with intolerable thirst.
This thirst it appeared to be the design
of my persecutors to stimulate-for the
food in the dish was meat pungently
seasoned.
Looking upward, I surveyed the ceil-
ing of my prison. It was some thirty
or forty feet overhead, and constructed
much as the side walls. In one of its
panels a very singular figure riveted
my whole attention. It was the painted
figure of Time as he is commonly rep-
resented, save that, in lieu of a scythe,
he held what, at a casual glance, I sup-
posed to be the pictured image of a
huge pendulum, such as we see on an-
tique clocks. There was something,
however, in the appearance of this ma-
chine which caused me to regard it
more attentively. While I gazed directly
upward at it (for its position was im-
mediately over my own) I fancied that
I saw it in motion. In an instant after-
ward the fancy was confirmed. Its
sweep was brief, and of course slow.
I watched it for some minutes some-
what in fear, but more in wonder.
Wearied at length with observing its
dull movement, I turned my eyes upon
the other objects in the cell.
A slight noise attracted my notice,
and, looking to the floor, I saw several
enormous rats traversing it. They had
issued from the well which lay just
within view to my right. Even then,
while I gazed, they came up in troops,
hurriedly, with ravenous eyes, allured
by the scent of the meat. From this
it required much effort and attention
to scare them away.
It might have been half an hour,
perhaps, even an hour (for I could take
but imperfect note of time), before I
again cast my eyes upward. What I
then saw confounded and amazed me.
The sweep of the pendulum had in-
creased in extent by nearly a yard. As a
natural consequence its velocity was
also much greater. But what mainly
disturbed me was the idea that it had
perceptibly descended. I now observed
-with what horror it is needless to say
-that its nether extremity was formed
of a crescent of glittering steel, about
a foot in length from horn to horn; the
horns upward, and the under edge evi-
dently as keen as that of a razor. Like
a razor also, it seemed massy and
heavy, tapering from the edge into a
solid and broad structure above. I
was appended to a weighty rod of brass
and the whole hissed as it swung through
the air.
I could no longer doubt the doon
prepared for me by monkish ingenuity
in torture. My cognizance of the pi
had become known to the inquisitoria
agents-the pit, whose horrors had beer
destined for so bold a recusant as my
self-the pit, typical of hell and re
garded by rumor as the Ultima Thul
of all their punishments. The plung
into this pit I had avoided by the meres
of accidents, and I knew that surprise
or entrapment into torment, formed a
THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM
177
important portion of all the grotes-
querie of these dungeon deaths. Hav-
ing failed to fall, it was no part of the
demon plan to hurl me into the abyss,
and thus (there being no alternative) a
different and a milder destruction
awaited me. Milder! I half smiled in
my agony as I thought of such appli-
cation of such a term.
What boots it to tell of the long,
long hours of horror more than mortal,
during which I counted the rushing
oscillations of the steel! Inch by inch
-line by line-with a descent only
appreciable at intervals that seemed
ages down and still down it came!
Days passed-it might have been that
many days passed-ere it swept so
closely over me as to fan me with its
acrid breath. The odor of the sharp
steel forced itself into my nostrils. I
prayed I wearied heaven with my
prayer for its more speedy descent. I
grew frantically mad, and struggled to
force myself upward against the sweep
of the fearful scimitar. And then I
fell suddenly calm, and lay smiling at
the glittering death, as a child at some
rare bauble.
There was another interval of utter
insensibility; it was brief; for, upon
again lapsing into life, there had been
Do perceptible descent in the pendulum.
But it might have been long-for I
knew there were demons who took note
of my swoon, and who could have ar-
rested the vibration at pleasure. Upon
by recovery, too, I felt very-oh! in-
expressibly-sick and weak, as if
through long inanition. Even amid the
agonies of that period, the human
mature craved food. With painful effort
I outstretched my left arm as far as
ay bonds permitted, and took posses-
sion of the small remnant which had
been spared me by the rats. As I put
a portion of it within my lips, there
rushed to my mind a half-formed
thought of joy-of hope. Yet what
business had I with hope? It was, as
I say, a half-formed thought-man has
many such, which are never completed.
I felt that it was of joy-of hope; but
I felt also that it had perished in its
formation. In vain I struggled to per-
fect to regain it. Long suffering had
nearly annihilated all my ordinary
powers of mind. I was an imbecile-
an idiot.
The vibration of the pendulum was
at right angles to my length. I saw
that the crescent was designed to cross
the region of the heart. It would fray
the serge of my robe-it would return
and repeat its operations-again-and
again. Notwithstanding its terrifically
wide sweep (some thirty feet or more),
and the hissing vigor of its descent,
sufficient to sunder these very walls of
iron, still the fraying of my robe would
be all that, for several minutes, it would
accomplish. And at this thought I
paused. I dared not go further than
this reflection. I dwelt upon it with a
pertinacity of attention-as if, in so
dwelling, I could arrest here the descent
of the steel. I forced myself to ponder
upon the sound of the crescent as it
should pass across the garment-upon
the peculiar thrilling sensation which
the friction of cloth produces on the
nerves. I pondered upon all this frivol-
ity until my teeth were on edge.
Down steadily down it crept. I
took a frenzied pleasure in contrasting
its downward with its lateral velocity.
To the right-to the left-far and wide
with the shriek of a damned spirit! to
178
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
my heart, with the stealthy pace of the
tiger! I alternately laughed and howled,
as the one or the other idea grew pre-
dominant.
Down-certainly, relentlessly down!
It vibrated within three inches of my
bosom! I struggled violently-furiously
-to free my left arm. This was free
only from the elbow to the hand. I
could reach the latter, from the plat-
ter beside me, to my mouth, with great
effort, but no farther. Could I have
broken the fastenings above the elbow,
I would have seized and attempted to
arrest the pendulum. I might as well
have attempted to arrest an avalanche!
Down-still unceasingly-still inevi-
tably down! I gasped and struggled
at each vibration. I shrunk convul-
sively at its every sweep. My eyes
followed its outward or upward whorls
with the eagerness of the most un-
meaning despair; they closed them-
selves spasmodically at the descent,
although death would have been a
relief, oh, how unspeakable!
Still I
quivered in every nerve to think how
slight a sinking of the machinery would
precipitate that keen, glistening axe
upon my bosom. It was hope that
prompted the nerve to quiver-the
frame to shrink. It was hope-the
hope that triumphs on the rack-that
whispers to the death-condemned even
in the dungeons of the Inquisition.
I saw that some ten or twelve vibra-
tions would bring the steel in actual
contact with my robe-and with this
observation there suddenly came over
my spirit all the keen, collected calm-
ness of despair. For the first time dur-
ing many hours or perhaps days-I
thought. It now occurred to me, that
the bandage, or surcingle, which en-
veloped me, was unique. I was tied
by no separate cord. The first stroke
of the razor-like crescent athwart any
portion of the band would so detach
it that it might be unwound from my
person by means of my left hand. But
how fearful, in that case, the proximity
of the steel! The result of the slightest
struggle, how deadly! Was it likely,
moreover, that the minions of the tor-
turer had not foreseen and provided for
this possibility? Was it probable that
the bandage crossed my bosom in the
track of the pendulum? Dreading to
find my faint and, as it seemed, my last
hope frustrated, I so far elevated my
head as to obtain a distinct view of my
breast. The surcingle enveloped my
limbs and body close in all directions-
save in the path of the destroying cres-
cent.
Scarcely had I dropped my head back
into its original position, when there
flashed upon my mind what I cannot
better describe than as the unformed
half of that idea of deliverance to
which I had previously alluded, and
of which a moiety only floated indeter-
minately through my brain when I
raised food to my burning lips. The
whole thought was now present-feeble,
scarcely sane, scarcely definite-but
still entire. I proceeded at once, with
the nervous energy of despair, to at-
tempt its execution.
For many hours the immediate vicin-
ity of the low framework upon which
I lay had been literally swarming with
rats. They were wild, bold, ravenous-
their red eyes glaring upon me as if
they waited but for motionlessness on
my part to make me their prey. "To
what food," I thought, "have they been
accustomed in the well?"
THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM
179
1
They had devoured, in spite of all
my efforts to prevent them, all but a
small remnant of the contents of the
dish. I had fallen into an habitual
see-saw or wave of the hand about the
platter; and, at length, the unconscious
uniformity of the movement deprived
it of effect. In their voracity, the ver-
min frequently fastened their sharp
fangs in my fingers. With the particles
of the oily and spicy viand which now
remained, I thoroughly rubbed the ban-
dage wherever I could reach it; then,
raising my hand from the floor, I lay
breathlessly still.
At first, the ravenous animals were
startled and terrified at the change-
at the cessation of movement. They
shrank alarmedly back; many sought
the well. But this was only for a
moment. I had not counted in vain
upon their voracity. Observing that I
remained without motion, one or two
of the boldest leaped upon the frame-
work, and smelt at the surcingle. This
seemed the signal for a general rush.
Forth from the well they hurried in
fresh troops. They clung to the wood
-they overran it, and leaped in hun-
dreds upon my person. The measured
movement of the pendulum disturbed
them not at all. Avoiding its strokes,
they busied themselves with the anointed
bandage. They pressed-they swarmed
upon me in ever accumulating heaps.
They writhed upon my throat; their
cold lips sought my own; I was half
stifled by their thronging pressure; dis-
gust, for which the world has no name,
swelled my bosom, and chilled, with a
heavy clamminess, my heart. Yet one
minute, and I felt that the struggle
would be over. Plainly I perceived the
loosening of the bandage. I knew that
in more than one place it must be
already severed. With a more than
human resolution I lay still.
Nor had I erred in my calculations-
nor had I endured in vain. I at length
felt that I was free. The surcingle hung
in ribands from my body. But the
stroke of the pendulum already pressed
upon my bosom. It had divided the
serge of the robe. It had cut through
the linen beneath. Twice again it
swung, and a sharp sense of pain shot
through every nerve. But the moment
of escape had arrived. At a wave of
my hand my deliverers hurried tumul-
tuously away, With a steady move-
ment-cautious, sidelong, shrinking, and
slow-I slid from the embrace of the
bandage and beyond the reach of the
scimitar. For the moment, at least,
I was free.
Free!-and in the grasp of the In-
quisition! I had scarcely stepped from
my wooden bed of horror upon the
stone floor of the prison, when the
motion of the hellish machine ceased,
and I beheld it drawn up, by some in-
visible force, through the ceiling. This
was a lesson which I took desperately
to heart. My every motion was un-
doubtedly watched. Free!-I had but
escaped death in one form of agony,
to be delivered unto worse than death
in some other. With that thought I
rolled my eyes nervously around on
the barriers of iron that hemmed me in.
Something unusual-some change which,
at first, I could not appreciate distinctly
-it was obvious, had taken place in the
apartment. For many minutes of a
dreamy and trembling abstraction, I
busied myself in vain, unconnected con-
jecture. During this period, I became
aware, for the first time, of the origin
180
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
of the sulphurous light which illumined
the cell. It proceeded from a fissure,
about half an inch in width, extending
entirely around the prison at the base
of the walls, which thus appeared, and
were completely separated from the
floor. I endeavored, but of course in
vain, to look through the aperture.
As I arose from the attempt, the mys-
tery of the alteration in the chamber
broke at once upon my understanding.
I have observed that, although the out-
lines of the figures upon the walls were
sufficiently distinct, yet the colors
seemed blurred and indefinite. These
colors had now assumed, and were
momentarily assuming, a startling and
most intense brilliancy, that gave to
the spectral and fiendish portraitures an
aspect that might have thrilled even
firmer nerves than my own. Demon
eyes, of a wild and ghastly vivacity,
glared upon me in a thousand directions
where none had been visible before,
and gleamed with the lurid lustre of a
fire that I could not force my imagina-
tion to regard as unreal.
Unreal!-even while I breathed
there came to my nostrils the breath
of the vapor of heated iron! A suffocat-
ing odor pervaded the prison! A deeper
glow settled each moment in the eyes
that glared at my agonies! A richer
tint of crimson diffused itself over the
pictured horrors of blood. I panted! I
gasped for breath! There could be no
doubt of the design of my tormentors-
oh! most unrelenting! oh! most de-
moniac of men! I shrank from the
glowing metal to the centre of the cell.
Amid the thought of the fiery destruc-
tion that impended, the idea of the
coolness of the well came over my soul
like balm. I rushed to its deadly brink.
I threw my straining vision below. The
glare from the enkindled roof illumined
its inmost recesses. Yet, for a wild
moment, did my spirit refuse to compre-
hend the meaning of what I saw. At
length it forced-it wrestled its way
into my soul-it burned itself in upon
my shuddering reason. Oh! for a voice
to speak!-oh! horror!-oh! any hor-
ror but this! With a shriek, I rushed
from the margin, and buried my face
in my hands-weeping bitterly.
As
The heat rapidly increased, and once
again I looked up, shuddering as with a
fit of the ague. There had been a
second change in the cell-and now the
change was obviously in the form.
before, it was in vain that I at first
endeavored to appreciate or understand
what was taking place. But not long
was I left in doubt. The Inquisitorial
vengeance had been hurried by my
two-fold escape, and there was to be no
more dallying with the King of Terrors.
The room had been square. I saw that
two of its iron angles were now acute-
two, consequently, obtuse. The fearful
difference quickly increased with a low
rumbling or moaning sound. In an in-
stant the apartment had shifted its form
into that of a lozenge. But the altera-
tion stopped not here-I neither hoped
nor desired it to stop. I could have
clasped the red walls to my bosom as
a garment of eternal peace. "Death,"
I said, "any death but that of the pit!"
Fool! might I not have known that
into the pit it was the object of the
burning iron to urge me? Could I
resist its glow? or if even that, could I
withstand its pressure? And now, flat-
ter and flatter grew the lozenge, with a
rapidity that left me no time for con-
templation. Its centre, and of course
THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM
181
its greatest width, came just over the
yawning gulf. I shrank back-but the
closing walls pressed me resistlessly on-
ward. At length for my seared and
writhing body there was no longer an
inch of foothold on the firm floor of
the prison. I struggled no more, but
the agony of my soul found vent in
one loud, long, and final scream of
despair. I felt that I tottered upon the
brink-I averted my eyes-
There was a discordant hum of
human voices! There was a loud blast
as of many trumpets! There was a
harsh grating as of a thousand thun-
ders! The fiery walls rushed back!
An outstretched arm caught my own
as I fell, fainting, into the abyss. It
was that of General Lasalle. The
French army had entered Toledo. The
Inquisition was in the hands of its
enemies,
The Assignation
(This tale is also called The Visionary. It was first published in the Southern
Literary Messenger, July, 1835.-Ed.)
ILL-FATED and mysterious man!-be-
wildered in the brilliancy of thine own
imagination, and fallen in the flames
of thine own youth! Again in fancy I
behold thee! Once more thy form hath
risen before me!-not-oh! as thou
art-in the cold valley and shadow-
but as they shouldst be-squandering
away a life of magnificent meditation
in that city of dim visions, thine own
Venice-which is a star-beloved Ely-
sium of the sea, and the wide win-
dows of whose Palladian palaces look
down with a deep and bitter meaning
upon the secrets of her silent waters.
Yes! I repeat it—as thou shouldst be.
There are surely other worlds than
this-other thoughts than the thoughts
of the multitude-other speculations
than the speculations of the sophist.
Who then shall call thy conduct into
question? who blame thee for thy vis-
ionary hours, or denounce those occu-
pations as a wasting away of life,
which were but the overflowings of
thine everlasting energies?
It was at Venice, beneath the cov-
ered archway there called the Ponte
di Sospiri, that I met, for the third
or fourth time the person of whom I
speak. It is with a confused recol-
lection that I bring to mind the cir-
cumstances of that meeting. Yet I
remember-ah! how should I forget?-
the deep midnight, the Bridge of
Sighs, the beauty of woman, and the
Genius of Romance that stalked up and
down the narrow canal.
It was a night of unusual gloom.
The great clock of the Piazza had
sounded the fifth hour of the Italian
evening. The square of the Campanile
lay silent and deserted, and the lights.
in the old Ducal Palace were dying
fast away. I was returning home from
the Piazetta, by way of the Grand
Canal. But as my gondola arrived op-
posite the mouth of the canal San
Marco, a female voice from its recesses
broke suddenly upon the night, in one
wild, hysterical, and long-continued
shriek. Startled at the sound, I sprang
upon my feet; while the gondolier,
letting slip his single oar, lost it in
the pitchy darkness beyond a chance
of recovery, and we were consequently
left to the guidance of the current
which here sets from the greater into
the smaller channel. Like some huge
and sable-feathered condor, we were
slowly drifting down toward the Bridge
of Sighs, when a thousand flambeaux
flashing from the windows, and down.
the staircases of the Ducal Palace,
turned all at once that deep gloom into
a livid and praeternatural day.
A child, slipping from the arms of
its own mother, had fallen from an
upper window of the lofty structure
into the deep and dim canal. The
quiet waters had closed placidly over
their victim; and, although my own
183
184
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
gondola was the only one in sight,
many a stout swimmer, already in the
stream, was seeking in vain upon the
surface, the treasure which was to be
found, alas! only within the abyss.
Upon the broad black marble flagstones
at the entrance of the palace, and a
few steps above the water, stood a fig-
ure which none who then saw can have
ever since forgotten. It was the Mar-
chesa Aphrodite the adoration of all
Venice-the gayest of the gay-the
most lovely where all were beautiful-
but still the young wife of the old and
intriguing Mentoni, and the mother of
that fair child, her first and only one,
who now, deep beneath the murky wa-
ter, was thinking in bitterness of heart
upon her sweet caresses, and exhaust-
ing its little life in struggles to call
upon her name.
She stood alone. Her small, bare
and silvery feet gleamed in the black
mirror of marble beneath her. Her
hair, not as yet more than half loos-
ened for the night from its ball-room
array, clustered, amid a shower of dia-
monds, round and round her classical
head, in curls like those of the young
hyacinth. A snowy-white and gauze-
like drapery seemed to be nearly the
sole covering to her delicate form; but
the mid-summer and midnight air was
hot, sullen, and still, and no motion in
the statue-like form itself, stirred even
the folds of that raiment of very vapor
which hung around it as the heavy mar-
ble hangs around the Niobe. Yet-
strange to say!-her large lustrous
eyes were not turned downward upon
that grave wherein her brightest hope
lay buried-but riveted in a widely
different direction! The prison of the
Old Republic is. I think, the stateliest
---
building in all Venice-but how could
that lady gaze so fixedly upon it, when
beneath her lay stifling her own child?
Yon dark, gloomy niche, too, yawns
right opposite her chamber window-
what, then could there be in its shad-
ows in its architecture-in its ivy-
wreathed and solemn cornices-that the
Marchesa di Mentoni had not wondered
at a thousand times before?
sense- -Who does not remember that,
at such a time as this, the eye, like a
shattered mirror, multiplies the images.
of its sorrow, and sees in innumerable
far-off places, the woe which is close
at hand?
Non-
Many steps above the Marchesa, and
within the arch of the water-gate, stood.
in full dress, the Satyr-like figure of
Mentoni himself. He was occasion-
ally occupied in thrumming a guitar,
and seemed ennuye to the very death.
as at intervals he gave directions for
the recovery of his child. Stupefied
and aghast, I had myself no power to
move from the upright position I had
assumed upon first hearing the shriek,
and must have presented to the eyes of
the agitated group a spectral and omi-
nous appearance, as with pale counte-
nance and rigid limbs, I floated down
among them in that funereal gondola.
All efforts proved in vain. Many
of the most energetic in the search
were relaxing their exertions, and yield-
ing to a gloomy sorrow. There seemed
but little hope for the child; (how
much less than for the mother!) but
now, from the interior of that dark
niche which has been already mentioned
as forming a part of the Old Repub-
lican prison, and as fronting the lat-
tice of the Marchesa, a figure muffled
in a cloak, stepped out within reach
THE ASSIGNATION
185
of the light, and, pausing a moment
upon the verge of the giddy descent,
plunged headlong into the canal. As, in
an instant afterward, he stood with
the still living and breathing child
within his grasp, upon the marble flag-
stones by the side of the Marchesa,
his cloak, heavy with the drenching
water, became unfastened, and, falling
in folds about his feet, discovered to
the wonder-stricken spectators the
graceful person of a very young man,
with the sound of whose name the
greater part of Europe was then ring-
ing.
No word spoke the deliverer. But
the Marchesa! She will now receive
her child-she will press it to her
heart she will cling to its little form,
and smother it with her caresses. Alas!
another's arms have taken it from the
stranger-another's arms have taken it
away, and borne it afar off, unnoticed,
into the palace! And the Marchesa!
Her lip her beautiful lip trembles;
tears are gathering in her eyes-those
eyes which, like Pliny's acanthus, are
"soft and almost liquid." Yes! tears
are gathering in those eyes-and see!
the entire woman thrills throughout the
soul, and the statue has started into
life! The pallor of the marble counte-
nance, the swelling of the marble bosom,
the very purity of the marble feet, we
behold suddenly flushed over with a
tide of ungovernable crimson; and a
slight shudder quivers about her deli-
cate frame, as a gentle air at Napoli
about the rich silver lilies in the grass.
Why should that lady blush!
this demand there is no answer-ex-
cept that, having left, in the eager
haste and terror of a mother's heart,
the privacy of her own boudoir, she
Το
has neglected to enthral her tiny feet
in their slippers, and utterly forgotten
to throw over her Venetian shoulders
that drapery which is their due. What
other possible reason could there have
been for her so blushing?-for the
glance of those wild appealing eyes?-
for the unusual tumult of that throb-
bing bosom?-for the convulsive pres-
sure of that trembling hand?-that
hand which fell, as Mentoni turned into
the palace, accidentally, upon the hand
of the stranger. What reason could
there have been for the low-the sin-
gularly low tone of those unmeaning
words which the lady uttered hurriedly
in bidding him adieu? "Thou hast
conquered," she said, or the murmurs
of the water deceived me; "thou hast
conquered-one hour after sunrise-we
shall meet-so let it be!"
*
*
*
*
The tumult had subsided, the lights
had died away within the palace, and
the stranger, whom I now recognized,
stood alone upon the flags. He shook
with inconceivable agitation, and his
eyes glanced around in search of a
gondola. I could not do less than
offer him the service of my own; and
he accepted the civility. Having ob-
tained an oar at the water-gate, we
proceeded together to his residence,
while he rapidly recovered his self-
possession, and spoke of our former
slight acquaintance in terms of great
apparent cordiality.
There are some subjects upon which
I take pleasure in being minute. The
person of the stranger-let me call him
by this title, who to all the world was
still a stranger-the person of the
stranger is one of these subjects. In
height he might have been below rather
186
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
than above the medium size: although
there were moments of intense passion
when his frame actually expanded and
belied the assertion. The light, al-
most slender symmetry of his figure
promised more of that ready activity.
which he evinced at the Bridge of
Sighs, than of that Herculean strength
which he has been known to wield
without an effort, upon occasions of
more dangerous emergency. With the
mouth and chin of a deity-singular,
wild, full, liquid eyes, whose shadows
varied from pure hazel to intense and
brilliant jet-and a profusion of curl-
ing, black hair, from which a fore-
head of unusual breadth gleamed forth
at intervals all light and ivory-his
were features than which I have seen
none more classically regular, except,
perhaps, the marble ones of the Em-
peror Commodus. Yet his countenance
was, nevertheless, one of those which
all men have never afterward seen
again. It had no peculiar, it had no
settled predominant expression to be
fastened upon the memory; a counte-
nance seen and instantly forgotten, but
forgotten with a vague and never-ceas-
ing desire of recalling it to mind. Not
that the spirit of each rapid passion
failed, at any time, to throw its own
distinct image upon the mirror of that
face-but that the mirror, mirror-like,
retained no vestige of the passion,
when the passion had departed.
Upon leaving him on the night of
our adventure, he solicited me, in what
I thought an urgent manner, to call
upon him very early the next morning.
Shortly after sunrise, I found myself
accordingly at his Palazzo, one of those
huge structures of gloomy yet fantastic
Domp, which tower above the waters
of the Grand Canal in the vicinity of
the Rialto. I was shown up a broad
winding staircase of mosaics, into ar
apartment whose unparalleled splendo
burst through the opening door with
an actual glare, making me blind and
dizzy with luxuriousness.
I knew my acquaintance to b
wealthy. Report had spoken of hi
possessions in terms which I had eve
ventured to call terms of ridiculou
exaggeration.
But as I gazed abou
me, I could not bring myself to believ
that the wealth of any subject in Eu
rope could have supplied the princel
magnificence which burned and blaze
around.
Although, as I say, the sun ha
arisen, yet the room was still bri
liantly lighted up. I judge from thi
circumstance, as well as from an ai
of exhaustion in the countenance c
my friend, that he had not retired t
bed during the whole of the precedin
night. In the architecture and embe
lishments of the chamber, the evider
design had been to dazzle and astound
Little attention had been paid to th
decora of what is technically calle
keeping, or to the proprieties of na
tionality. The eye wandered from ol
ject to object, and rested upon none-
neither the grotesques of the Gree
painters, nor the sculptures of the be
Italian days, nor the huge carvings
untutored Egypt. Rich draperies
every part of the room trembled to th
vibration of low, melancholy musi
whose origin was not to be discovere
The senses were oppressed by mingl
and conflicting perfumes, reeking
from strange convolute censers, t
gether with multitudinous flaring a
flickering tongues of emerald and vi
THE ASSIGNATION
187
let fire. The rays of the newly risen
sun poured in upon the whole, through
windows, formed each of a single pane
of crimson-tinted glass. Glancing to
and fro, in a thousand reflections, from
curtains which rolled from their cor-
nices like cataracts of molten silver,
the beams of natural glory mingled at
length fitfully with the artificial light,
and lay weltering in subdued masses
upon a carpet of rich, liquid-looking
cloth of Chili gold.
"Ha! ha! ha-ha! ha! ha!"-
laughed the proprietor, motioning me
to a seat as I entered the room, and
throwing himself back at full-length
upon an ottoman. "I see," said he,
perceiving that I could not immediately
reconcile myself to the bienseance of so
singular a welcome,-"I see you are
astonished at my apartment-at my
statues my pictures-my originality
of conception in architecture and up-
holstery! absolutely drunk, eh, with my
magnificence? But pardon me, my
dear sir; (here his tone of voice
dropped to the very spirit of cordial-
ity,) pardon me for my uncharitable
laughter. You appeared so utterly as-
tonished. Besides, some things are so
completely ludicrous, that a man must
laugh, or die. To die laughing must
be the most glorious of all glorious
deaths! Sir Thomas More-a very fine
man was Sir Thomas More-Sir
Thomas More died laughing, you re-
member. Also in the 'Absurdities' of
Ravisius Textor, there is a long list of
characters who came to the same mag-
nificent end. Do you know, however,"
continued he, musingly, "that at Sparta
(which is now Palæochori), at Sparta,
I say, to the west of the citadel, among
a chaos of scarcely visible ruins, is a
kind of socle, upon which are still
legible the letters LASM. They are
undoubtedly part of GELASMA. Now,
at Sparta were a thousand tem-
ples and shrines to a thousand differ-
ent divinities. How exceedingly strange
that the altar of Laughter should have
survived all the others! But in the
present instance," he resumed, with a
singular alteration of voice and man-
ner, "I have no right to be merry at
your expense. You might well have
been amazed. Europe cannot produce
any thing so fine as this, my little legal
cabinet. My other apartments are by
no means of the same order-mere
ultras of fashionable insipidity. This
is better than fashion-is it not? Yet
this has but to be seen to become the
rage-that is, with those who could af-
ford it at the cost of their entire patri-
mony. I have guarded, however,
against any such profanation. With
one exception, you are the only hu-
man being, besides myself and my
valet, who has been admitted within
the mysteries of these imperial pre-
cincts, since they have been bedizened
as you see!"
I bowed in acknowledgment-for the
overpowering sense of splendor and
perfume and music, together with the
unexpected eccentricity of his address
and manner, prevented me from ex-
pressing, in words, my appreciation of
what I might have construed into a
compliment.
"Here," he resumed, arising and
leaning on my arm as he sauntered
around the apartment, "here are paint-
ings from the Greeks to Cimabue, and
from Cimabue to the present hour.
Many are chosen, as you see, with little
deference to the opinions of Virtu.
188
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
They are all, however, fitting tapestry
for a chamber such as this. Here, too,
are some chef-d'oeuvres of the unknown
great; and here, unfinished designs by
men, celebrated in their day, whose
very names the perspicacity of the
academies has left to silence and to
me. What think you," said he, turning
abruptly as he spoke,-"what think you
of this Madonna della Pieta?"
"It is Guido's own!" I said, with
all the enthusiasm of my nature, for I
had been poring intently over its sur-
passing loveliness. "It is Guido's
own!-how could you have obtained it?
she is undoubtedly in painting what
Venus is in sculpture."
"Ha!" said he, thoughtfully, "the
Venus?-the beautiful Venus-the Ve-
nus of the Medici?-she of the diminu-
tive head and the gilded hair? Part
of the left arm [here his voice dropped
so as to be heard with difficulty], and
all the right, are restorations, and in
the coquetry of that right arm lies,
I think, the quintessence of all affecta-
tion. Give me the Canova! The
Apollo, too, is a copy-there can be
no doubt of it-blind fool that I am,
who cannot behold the boasted inspira-
tion of the Apollo! I cannot help
pity me! I cannot help preferring the
Antinous. Was it not Socrates who
said that the statuary found his statue
in the block of marble? Then Michal
Angelo was by no means original in his
couplet-
'Non ha l'ottimo artista alcun concetto
Che un marmo solo in se non circun-
scriva.'
It has been, or should be remarked,
that, in the manner of the true gentle-
man, we are always aware of a differ-
ence from the bearing of the vulgar,
without being at once precisely able to
determine in what such difference con-
sists. Allowing the remark to have
applied in its full force to the outward
demeanor of my acquaintance, I felt
it, on that eventful morning, still more
fully applicable to his moral tempera-
ment and character. Nor can I bet-
ter define that peculiarity of spirit
which seemed to place him so essenti-
ally apart from all other human beings,
than by calling it a habit of intense and
continual thought, pervading even his
most trivial actions-intruding upon
his moments of dalliance-and inter-
weaving itself with his very flashes of
merriment-like adders which writhe
from out the eyes of the grinning masks
in the cornices around the temples of
Persepolis.
I could not help, however, repeatedly
observing, through the mingled tone of
levity and solemnity with which he rap-
idly descanted upon matters of little
importance, a certain air of trepida-
tion-a degree of nervous unction in
action and in speech-an unquiet ex-
citability of manner which appeared
to me at all times unaccountable, and
upon some occasions even filled me
with alarm. Frequently, too, pausing
in the middle of a sentence whose com-
mencement he had apparently forgot-
ten, he seemed to be listening in the
deepest attention, as if either in mo-
mentary expectation of a visitor, or to
sounds which must have had existence
in his imagination alone.
It was during one of these reveries
or pauses of apparent abstraction, that,
in turning over a page of the poet and
scholar Politian's beautiful tragedy,
"The Orfeo" (the first native Italian
tragedy), which lay near me upon an
THE ASSIGNATION
189
ottoman, I discovered a passage under-
lined in pencil. It was a passage to-
ward the end of the third act-a pas-
sage of the most heart-stirring excite-
ment -a passage which, although
tainted with impurity, no man shall
read without a thrill of novel emo-
tion-no woman without a sigh. The
whole page was blotted with fresh
tears; and, upon the opposite interleaf,
were the following English lines, writ-
ten in a hand so very different from
the peculiar characters of my acquaint-
ance, that I had some difficulty in
recognizing it as his own:
Thou wast that all to me, love,
For which my soul did pine-
A green isle in the sea, love,
A fountain and a shrine,
All wreathed with fairy fruits and flow-
ers;
And all the flowers were mine.
Ah, dream too bright to last!
Ah, starry Hope, that didst arise
But to be overcast!
A voice from out the Future cries,
"Onward!"-but o'er the Past
(Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies,
Mute-motionless-aghast!
For alas! alas! with me
The light of life is o'er.
"No more-no more-no more,"
(Such language holds the solemn sea
To the sands upon the shore,)
Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree,
Or the stricken eagle soar!
Now all my hours are trances;
And all my nightly dreams
Are where thy dark eye glances,
And where thy footstep gleams
In what ethereal dances,
By what Italian streams.
Alas! for that accursed time
They bore thee o'er the billow,
From Love to titled age and crime,
And an unholy pillow!-
From me, and from our misty clime,
Where weeps the silver willow!
That these lines were written in Eng-
lish a language with which I had not
believed their author acquainted-af-
forded me little matter for surprise. I
was too well aware of the extent of
his acquirements, and of the singular
pleasure he took in concealing them
from observation, to be astonished at
any similar discovery; but the place of
date, I must confess, occasioned me
no little amazement. It had been orig-
inally London, and afterward carefully
underscored-not, however, so effectu-
ally as to conceal the word from a scru-
tinizing eye. I say, this occasioned me
no little amazement; for I well re-
member that, in a former conversation
with my friend, I particularly inquired
if he had at any time met in London
the Marchesa di Mentoni (who for
some years previous to her marriage
had resided in that city), when his
answer, if I mistake not, gave me to
understand that he had never visited
the metropolis of Great Britain. I
might as well here mention, that I
have more than once heard, (without,
of course, giving credit to a report in-
volving so many improbabilities,) that
the person of whom I speak, was not
only by birth, but in education, an
Englishman.
*
*
"There is one painting," said he,
190
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
without being aware of my notice of
the tragedy,-"there is still one paint-
ing which you have not seen." And
throwing aside a drapery, he discovered
a full-length portrait of the Marchesa
Aphrodite.
Human art could have done no more
in the delineation of her superhuman
beauty. The same ethereal figure
which stood before me the preceeding
night upon the steps of the Ducal
Palace, stood before me once again.
But in the expression of the counte-
nance, which was beaming all over with
smiles, there still lurked (incompre-
hensible anomaly!) that fitful stain of
melancholy which will ever be found
inseparable from the perfection of the
beautiful. Her right arm lay folded
over her bosom. With her left she
pointed downward to a curiously fash-
ioned vase. One small, fairy foot, alone
visible, barely touched the earth; and,
scarcely discernible in the brilliant at-
mosphere which seemed to encircle and
enshrine her loveliness, floated a pair
of the most delicately imagined wings.
My glance fell from the painting to
the figure of my friend, and the vigor-
ous words of Chapman's Bussy D'Am-
bois, quivered instinctively upon my
lips:
He is up
There like a Roman statue! He will
stand
Till Death hath made him marble!
"Come," he said at length, turning
toward a table of richly enamelled and
massive silver, upon which were a few
goblets fantastically stained, together
with two large Etruscan vases, fashioned
in the same extraordinary model as that
in the foreground of the portrait, and
filled with what I supposed to be Johan-
nisberger. "Come," he said, abruptly,
"let us drink! It is early-but let us
drink. It is indeed early," he con-
tinued, musingly, as a cherub with a
heavy golden hammer made the apart-
ment ring with the first hour after
sunrise: "it is indeed early-but what
matters it? let us drnk! Let us pour
out an offering to yon solemn sun
which these gaudy lamps and censers
are so eager to subdue!" And having
made me pledge him in a bumper, he
swallowed in rapid succession several
goblets of the wine.
"To dream," he continued, resuming
the tone of his desultory conversation,
as he held up to the rich light of a
censer one of the magnificent vases-
"to dream has been the business of
my life. I have therefore framed for
myself, as you see, a bower of dreams.
In the heart of Venice could I have
erected a better? You behold around
you, it is true, a medley of architec-
tural embellishments. The chastity of
Ionia is offended by antediluvian de-
vices, and the sphynxes of Egypt are
outstretched upon carpets of gold. Yet
the effect is incongruous to the timid
alone. Proprieties of place, and espe-
cially of time, are the bugbears which
terrify mankind from the contempla-
tion of the magnificent. Once I was
myself a decorist; but that sublimation
of folly has palled upon my soul. All
this is now the fitter for my purpose.
Like these arabesque censers, my spirit
is writhing in fire, and the delirium of
this scene is fashioning me for the
wilder visions of that land of real
dreams whither I am now rapidly de-
parting." He here paused abruptly,
THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH
191
bent his head to his bosom, and seemed
to listen to a sound which I could not
hear. At length, erecting his frame,
he looked upwards, and ejaculated the
lines of the Bishop of Chichester:
Stay for me there! I will not fail,
To meet thee in that hollow vale.
In the next instant, confessing the
power of the wine, he threw himself
at full length upon an ottoman.
A quick step was now heard upon
the staircase, and a loud knock at the
door rapidly succeeded. I was hasten-
ing to anticipate a second disturbance,
when a page of Mentoni's household
burst into the room, and faltered out,
in a voice choking with emotion, the
incoherent words, "My mistress!-my
mistress!-Poisoned!-poisoned!
beautiful Aphrodite!"
Oh,
Bewildered, I flew to the ottoman,
and endeavored to arouse the sleeper
to a sense of the startling intelligence.
But his limbs were rigid-his lips were
livid-his lately beaming eyes were riv-
eted in death. I staggered back to-
ward the table-my hand fell upon a
cracked and blackened goblet-and a
consciousness of the entire and terrible
truth flashed suddenly over my soul.
The Masque of the Red Death
(First appeared in Graham's Magazine, May, 1842)
THE "Red Death" had long devas-
tated 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 thou-
sand 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 nor
egress to the sudden impulses of de-
spair or of frenzy from within. The
abbey was amply provisioned. With
such precautions the courtiers might
bid defiance to contagion. The ex-
ternal 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 improvisa-
192
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
tori, 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 fu-
riously abroad, that the Prince Pros-
pero entertained his thousand friends at
a masked ball of the most unusual mag-
nificence.
It was a voluptuous scene, that mas-
querade. 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 im-
peded. Here the case was very dif-
ferent; as might have been expected
from the duke's love of the bizarre.
The apartments were so irregularly dis-
posed that the vision embraced but lit-
tle 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 cor-
ridor 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 win-
dows. The second chamber was pur-
ple 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 the lamp or
candle within the suite of chambers.
But in the corridors that followed the
suite, there stood, opposite to each win-
dow, a heavy tripod, bearing a brazier
of fire, that projected its rays through
the tinted glass and so glaringly illu-
mined the room. And thus were pro-
duced a multitude of gaudy and fan
tastic appearances. But in the western
or black chamber the effect of the fire
light that streamed upon the dark hang-
ings 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 min-
ute-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,
THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH
193
but of so peculiar a note and emphasis
that, at each lapse of an hour, the mu-
sicians of the orchestra were constrained
to pause, momentarily, in their per-
formance, to hearken to the sound; and
thus the waltzers perforce ceased their
evolutions; and there was a brief dis-
concert 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 se-
date passed their hands over their
brows as if in confused revery or medi-
tation. But when the echoes had fully
ceased, a light laughter at once per-
vaded 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 sec-
onds 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.
He
But, in spite of these things, it was
a gay and magnificent revel. The
tastes of the duke were peculiar.
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 bar-
baric lustre. There are some who
would have thought him mad. His fol-
lowers 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
movable embellishments of the seven
chambers, upon occasion of this great
fete; and it was his own guiding taste
which had given character to the mas
queraders. Be sure they were grotes-
.que. There were much glare and glit-
ter and piquancy and phantasm-much
of what has been since seen in "Her-
nani." There were arabesque figures
with unsuited limbs and appointments.
There were delirious fancies such as
the madman fashions. There were
much of the beautiful, much of the
wanton, much of the bizarre, some-
thing of the terrible, and not a little
of that which might have excited dis-
gust. To and fro in the seven cham-
bers 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 rud-
dier light through the blood-colored
panes; and the blackness of the sable
drapery appalls; and to him whose foot
falls upon the sable carpet, there comes
from the near clock of ebony a muffle
peal more solemnly emphatic than any
194
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 fev-
erishly the heart of life. And the revel
went whirlingly on, until at length
there commenced the sounding of mid-
night 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 hap-
pened, perhaps that more of thought
crept, with more of time, into the medi-
tations of the thoughtful among those
who revelled. And thus too, it hap-
pened, perhaps, that before the last
echoes of the last chime had utterly
sunk into silence, there were many in-
dividuals in the crowd who had found
leisure to become aware of the pres-
ence of a masked figure which had ar-
rested the attention of no single indi-
vidual before. And the rumor of this
new presence having spread itself whis-
peringly 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 ques-
tion 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 con-
cealed the visage was made so nearly
to resemble the countenance of a stiff-
ened 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 mum-
mer 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 mo-
ment 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 blas-
phemous mockery? Seize him and un-
mask him that we may know whom
we have to hang, at sunrise, from the
battlements!"
It was in the eastern or blue cham-
ber 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
THE MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH
195
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 cour-
tiers 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 as-
sumptions 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 im-
pulse, 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
afterward, fell prostrate in death the
Prince Prospero. Then, summoning
the wild courage of despair, a throng
of the revellers at once threw them-
selves 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 rude-
ness, untenanted by any tangible form.
And now was acknowledged the pres-
ence of the Red Reath. 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 domin-
ion over all.
King Pest
(First published in the Southern Literary Messenger, September, 1835. It is also
called "King Pest the First."-Ed.)
A TALE CONTAINING AN ALLEGORY
The gods do bear and will allow in
kings
The things which they abhor in rascal
routes.
-Buckhurst's Tragedy of Ferrex and
Porrex.
ABOUT twelve o'clock one night in
the month of October, and during the
chivalrous reign of the third Edward,
two seamen belonging to the crew of
the "Free and Easy," a trading
schooner plying between Sluys and the
Thames, and then at anchor in that
river, were much astonished to find
themselves seated in the tap-room of
an ale-house in the parish of St. An-
drews, London-which ale-house bore
for sign the portraiture of a "Jolly
Tar."
room, although ill-contrived,
smoke-blackened, low-pitched, and in
every other respect agreeing with the
general character of such places at the
period was nevertheless, in the opinion
of the grotesque groups scattered here
and there within it, sufficiently well
adapted to its purpose.
Of these groups our two seamen
formed, I think, the most interesting, if
not the most conspicuous.
The one who appeared to be the
elder, and whom his companion ad-
dressed by the characteristic appella-
tion of "Legs," was at the same time
much the taller of the two. He might
have measured six feet and a half, and
an habitual stoop in the shoulders
seemed to have been the necessary con-
sequence of an altitude so enormous.
Superfluities in height were, however,
more than accounted for by deficiencies
in other respects. He was exceedingly
thin; and might, as his associates as-
serted, have answered, when drunk, for
a pennant at the mast-head, or, when
sober, have served for a jib-boom. But
these jests, and others of a similar na-
ture, had evidently produced, at no
time, any effect upon the cachinnatory
muscles of the tar. With high cheek-
bones, a large hawk-nose, retreating
chin, fallen under-jaw, and huge pro-
truding white eyes, the expression of
his countenance, although tinged with
a species of dogged indifference to mat-
ters and things in general, was not the
less utterly solemn and serious beyond
all attempts at imitation or description.
The younger seaman was, in all out-
ward appearance, the converse of his
companion. His stature could not
have exceeded four feet. A pair of
stumpy bow-legs supported his squat,
unwieldy figure, while his unusually
short and thick arms, with no ordinary
fists at their extremities, swung off
dangling from his sides like the fins of
a sea-turtle. Small eyes, of no particu-
lar color, twinkled far back in his head.
His nose remained buried in the mass
of flesh which enveloped his round, full,
196
KING PEST
197
and purple face: and his thick upper-
lip rested upon the still thicker one
beneath with an air of complacent
self-satisfaction, much heightened by
the owner's habit of licking them at
intervals. He evidently regarded his
tall shipmate with a feeling half-won-
drous, half-quizzical; and stared up oc-
casionally in his face as the red setting
sun stares up at the crags of Ben Nevis.
Various and eventful, however, had
been the peregrinations of the worthy
couple in and about the different tap-
houses of the neighborhood during the
earlier hours of the night. Funds even
the most ample, are not always ever-
lasting: and it was with empty pockets
our friends had ventured upon the pres-
ent hostelrie.
At the precise period, then, when this
history properly commences, Legs and
his fellow, Hugh Tarpaulin, sat, each
with both elbows resting upon the large
oaken table in the middle of the floor,
and with a hand upon either cheek.
They were eying, from behind a huge
flagon of unpaid-for "humming-stuff,"
the portentous words, "No Chalk,"
which to their indignation and aston-
ishment were scored over the doorway
by means of that very mineral whose
presence they purported to deny. Not
that the gift of decyphering written
characters-a gift among the common-
alty of that day considered little less
cabalistical than the art of inditing-
could, in strict justice, have been laid
to the charge of either disciple of the
sea; but there was, to say the truth,
a certain twist in the formation of
the letters-an indescribable lee-lurch
about the whole-which foreboded, in
the opinion of both seamen, a long run
of dirty weather; and determined them
at once, in the allegorical words of Legs
himself, to "pump ship, clew up all
sail, and scud before the wind."
Having accordingly disposed of what
remained of the ale, and looped up the
points of their short doublets, they
finally made a bolt for the street. Al-
though Tarpaulin rolled twice into the
fireplace, mistaking it for the door, yet
their escape was at length happily ef-
fected and half after twelve o'clock
found our heroes ripe for mischief, and
running for life down a dark alley in
the direction of St. Andrew's Stair,
hotly pursued by the landlady of the
"Jolly Tar."
At the epoch of this eventful tale,
and periodically, for many years before
and after, all England, but more espe-
cially the metropolis, resounded with
the fearful cry of "Plague!" The city
was in a great measure depopulated-
and in those horrible regions, in the
vicinity of the Thames, where, amid
the dark, narrow, and filthy lanes and
alleys, the Demon of Disease was sup-
posed to have had his nativity, Awe,
Terror, and Superstition were alone to
be found stalking abroad.
By authority of the king such dis-
tricts were placed under ban, and all
persons forbidden, under pain of death,
to intrude upon their dismal solitude.
Yet neither the mandate of the mon-
arch, nor the huge barriers erected at
the entrance of the streets, nor the
prospect of that loathsome death which,
with almost absolute certainty, over-
whelmed the wretch whom no peril
could deter from the adventure, pre-
vented the unfurnished and untenanted
dwellings from being stripped, by the
hand of nightly rapine, of every article,
such as iron, brass, or lead-work, which
198
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
1
could in any manner be turned to a
profitable account.
Above all, it was usually found, upon
the annual winter opening of the bar-
riers, that locks, bolts, and secret cel-
lars had proved but slender protection
to those rich stores of wines and liquors
which, in consideration of the risk and
trouble of removal, many of the nu-
merous dealers having shops in the
neighborhood had consented to trust,
during the period of exile, to so insuffi-
cient a security.
But there were very few of the ter-
ror-stricken people who attributed these
doings to the agency of human hands.
Pest-spirits, plague-goblins, and fever-
demons were the popular imps of mis-
chief; and tales so blood-chilling were
hourly told, that the whole mass of
forbidden buildings was, at length, en-
veloped in terror as in a shroud, and
the plunderer himself was often scared
away by the horrors his own depreda-
tions had created; leaving the entire
vast circuit of prohibited district to
gloom, silence, pestilence, and death.
It was by one of the terrific barriers
already mentioned, and which indicated
the region beyond to be under the Pest-
ban, that, in scrambling down an alley,
Legs and the worthy Hugh Tarpaulin
found their progress suddenly impeded.
To return was out of the question, and
no time was to be lost, as their pur-
suers were close upon their heels. With
thoroughbred seamen to clamber up the
roughly fashioned plank-work was a
trifle; and, maddened with the twofold
excitement of exercise and liquor, they
leaped unhesitatingly down within the
enclosure, and holding on their drunken
course with shouts and yellings, were
soon bewildered in its noisome and in-
tricate recesses.
Had they not, indeed, been intoxi-
cated beyond moral sense, their reeling
footsteps must have been palsied by
the horrors of their situation. The air
was cold and misty. The paving-stones,
loosened from their beds, lay in wild
disorder amid the tall rank grass, which
sprang up around the feet and ankles.
Fallen houses choked up the streets.
The most fetid and poisonous smells
everywhere prevailed-and by the aid
of that ghastly light which, even at
midnight, never fails to emanate from
a vapory and pestilential atmosphere,
might be discerned lying in the by-
paths and alleys, or rotting in the win-
dowless habitations, the carcass of
many a nocturnal plunderer arrested by
the hand of the plague in the very per-
petration of his robbery.
But it lay not in the power of images,
or sensations, or impediments such as
these, to stay the course of men who,
naturally brave, and at that time espe-
cially, brimful of courage and of “hum-
ming-stuff," would have reeled, as
straight as their condition might have
permitted, undauntedly into the very
jaws of Death. Onward-still onward
stalked the grim Legs, making the deso-
late solemnity echo and re-echo with
yells like the terrific war-whoop of the
Indian; and onward, still onward rolled
the dumpy Tarpaulin, hanging on to
the doublet of his more active com-
panion, and far surpassing the latter's
most strenuous exertions in the way of
vocal music, by bull-roarings in basso,
from the profundity of his stentorian
lungs.
They had now evidently reached the
stronghold of the pestilence. Their
KING PEST
199
way at every step or plunge grew more
noisome and more horrible-the paths
more narrow and more intricate. Huge
stones and beams falling momently
from the decaying roofs above them,
gave evidence, by their sullen and
heavy descent, of the vast height of
the surrounding houses; and while ac-
tual exertion became necessary to force
a passage through frequent heaps of
rubbish, it was by no means seldom
that the hand fell upon a skeleton or
rested upon a more fleshy corpse.
Suddenly, as the seamen stumbled
against the entrance of a tall and
ghastly-looking building, a yell more
than usually shrill from the throat of
the excited Legs, was replied to from
within, in a rapid succession of wild,
laughter-like, and fiendish shrieks.
Nothing daunted at sounds, which, of
such a nature, at such a time, and in
such a place, might have curdled the
very blood in hearts less irrevocably on
fire, the drunken couple rushed head-
long against the door, burst it open,
and staggered into the midst of things
with a volley of curses.
The room within which they found
themselves proved to be the shop of an
undertaker, but an open trap-door, in
a corner of the floor near the entrance,
looked down upon a long range of wine-
cellars, whose depths the occasional
sound of bursting bottles proclaimed to
be well-stored with their appropriate
contents.
In the middle of the room stood a
table in the centre of which again
arose a huge tub of what appeared to
be punch. Bottles of various wines
and cordials, together with jugs, pitch-
ers, and flagons of every shape and
quality, were scattered profusely upon
the board. Around it, upon coffin-tres-
sels, was seated a company of six. This
company I will endeavor to delineate
one by one.
Fronting the entrance, and elevated
a little above his companions, sat a
personage who appeared to be the presi-
dent of the table. His stature was
gaunt and tall, and Legs was confounded
to behold in him a figure more ema-
ciated than himself. His face was as
yellow as saffron-but no feature ex-
cepting one alone, was sufficiently
marked to merit a particular descrip-
tion. This one consisted in a forehead
so unusually and hideously lofty, as to
have the appearance of a bonnet or
crown of flesh superadded upon the
natural head. His mouth was puckered
and dimpled into an expression of
ghastly affability, and his eyes, as in-
deed the eyes of all at table, were
glazed over with the fumes of intoxica-
tion. This gentleman was clothed from
head to foot in a richly-embroidered
black silk-velvet pall, wrapped negli-
gently around his form after the fash-
ion of a Spanish cloak. His head was
stuck full of sable hearse-plumes, which
he nodded to and fro with a jaunty and
knowing air; and, in his right hand, he
held a huge human thigh-bone, with
which he appeared to have been just
knocking down some member of the
company for a song.
Opposite him, and with her back to
the door, was a lady of no whit the
less extraordinary character. Although
quite as tall as the person just de-
scribed, she had no right to complain
of his unnatural emaciation. She was
evidently in the last stage of a dropsy;
and her figure resembled nearly that of
the huge puncheon of October beer
200
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
which stood, with the head driven in,
close by her side, in a corner of the
chamber. Her face was exceedingly
round, red, and full; and the same pe-
culiarity, or rather want of peculiarity,
attached itself to her countenance,
which I before mentioned in the case
of the president-that is to say, only
one feature of her face was sufficiently
distinguished to need a separate char-
acterization: indeed the acute Tarpaulin
immediately observed that the same re-
mark might have applied to each in-
dividual person of the party; every
one of whom seemed to possess a mo-
nopoly of some particular portion of
physiognomy. With the lady in ques-
tion this portion proved to be the
mouth. Commencing at the right ear,
it swept with a terrific chasm to the
left-the short pendants which she wore
in either auricle continually bobbing
into the aperture. She made, however,
every exertion to keep her mouth closed
and look dignified, in a dress consist-
ing of a newly-starched and ironed
shroud coming up close under her chin,
with a crimpled ruffle of cambric
muslin.
At her right hand sat a diminutive
young lady whom she appeared to pat-
ronize. This delicate little creature, in
the trembling of her wasted fingers, in
the livid hue of her lips, and in the
slight hectic spot which tinged her
otherwise leaden complexion, gave evi-
dent indications of a galloping consump-
tion. An air of extreme haut ton, how-
ever, pervaded her whole appearance;
she wore in a graceful and degage man-
ner, a large and beautiful winding-
sheet of the finest India lawn; her hair
hung in ringlets over her neck; a soft
smile played about her mouth; but her
nose, extremely long, thin, sinuous,
flexible, and pimpled, hung down far
below her under-lip, and, in spite of
the delicate manner in which she now
and then moved it to one side or the
other with her tongue, gave to her
countenance a somewhat equivocal ex-
pression.
Over against her, and upon the left
of the dropsical lady, was seated a little
puffy, wheezing, and gouty old man,
whose cheeks reposed upon the shoul-
ders of their owner, like two huge
bladders of Oporto wine. With his
arms folded, and with one bandaged
leg deposited upon the table, he seemed
to think himself entitled to some con-
sideration. He evidently prided him-
self much upon every inch of his per-
sonal appearance, but took more espe-
cial delight in calling attention to his
gaudy-colored surtout. This, to say the
truth, must have cost him no little
money, and was made to fit him exceed-
ingly well-being fashioned from one
of the curiously embroidered silken
covers appertaining to those glorious
escutcheons which, in England and else-
where, are customarily hung up, in some
conspicuous place, upon the dwellings
of departed aristocracy.
Next to him, and at the right hand
of the president, was a gentleman in
long white hose and cotton drawers.
Eis frame shook, in a ridiculous man-
ner, with a fit of what Tarpaulin called
"the horrors." His jaws, which had
been newly shaved, were tightly tied
up by a bandage of muslin; and his
arms being fastened in a similar way
at the wrists, prevented him from help-
ing himself too freely to the liquors
upon the table; a precaution rendered
necessary, in the opinion of Legs, by
KING PEST
201
the peculiarly sottish and wine-bibbing
cast of his visage. A pair of prodigious
ears, nevertheless, which it was no doubt
found impossible to confine, towered
away into the atmosphere of the apart-
ment, and were occasionally pricked
up in a spasm, at the sound of the
drawing of a cork.
Fronting him, sixthly and lastly, was
situated a singularly stiff-looking per-
sonage, who being afflicted with paraly-
sis, must, to speak seriously, have felt
very ill at ease in his unaccommodating
habiliments. He was habited, some-
what uniquely, in a new and handsome
mahogany coffin. Its top or head-piece
pressed upon the
skull of the wearer,
and extended over it in the fashion of
a hood, giving to the entire face an
air of indescribable interest. Arm-
holes had been cut in the sides for the
sake not more of elegance than of con-
venience; but the dress, nevertheless,
prevented its proprietor from sitting as
erect as his associates; and as he lay
reclining against his tressel, at an angle
of forty-five degrees, a pair of huge
goggle eyes rolled up their awful whites
toward the ceiling in absolute amaze-
ment at their own enormity.
Before each of the party lay a por-
tion of a skull, which was used as a
drinking-cup. Overhead was suspended
a human skeleton, by means of a rope
tied round one of the legs and fastened
to a ring in the ceiling. The other
limb, confined by no such fetter, stuck
off from the body at right angles, caus-
ing the whole loose and rattling frame
to dangle and twirl about at the caprice
of every occasional puff of wind which
found its way into the apartment. In
the cranium of this hideous thing lay
a quantity of ignited charcoal, which
threw a fitful but vivid light over the
entire scene; while coffins, and other
wares appertaining to the shop of an
undertaker, were piled high up around
the room, and against the windows, pre-
venting any ray from escaping inte
the street.
At sight of this extraordinary assem-
bly, and of their still more extraordi-
nary paraphernalia, our two seamen
did not conduct themselves with that
degree of decorum which might have
been expected. Legs, leaning against
the wall near which he happened to be
standing, dropped his lower jaw still
lower than usual, and spread open his
eyes to their fullest extent; while Hugh
Tarpaulin, stooping down so as to bring
his nose upon a level with the table,
and spreading out a palm upon either
knee, burst into a long, loud, and ob-
streperous roar of very ill-timed and
immoderate laughter.
Without, however, taking offence at
behavior so excessively rude, the tall
president smiled very graciously upon
the intruders-nodded to them in a dig-
nified manner with his head of sable
plumes and, arising, took each by an
arm, and led him to a seat which some
others of the company had placed in
the meantime for his accommodation.
Legs to all this offered not the slightest
resistance, but sat down as he was di-
rected; while the gallant Hugh, remov-
ing his coffin-tressel from its station
near the head of the table, to the vi-
cinity of the little consumptive lady in
the winding sheet, plumped down by
her side in high glee, and pouring out
a skull of red wine, quaffed it to their
better acquaintance. But at this pre-
sumption the stiff gentleman in the
coffin seemed exceedingly nettled; and
202
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
serious consequences might have en-
sued, had not the president, rapping
upon the table with his truncheon, di-
verted the attention of all present to
the following speech:
.
"It becomes our duty upon the pres-
ent happy occasion-
"Avast there!" interrupted Legs,
looking very serious, "avast there a
bit, I say, and tell us who the devil ye
all are, and what business ye have here,
rigged off like the foul fiends, and swill-
ing the snug blue ruin stowed away
for the winter by my honest ship-mate,
Will Wimble, the undertaker!"
At this unpardonable piece of ill-
breeding, all the original company half-
started to their feet, and uttered the
same rapid succession of wild fiendish
shrieks which had before caught the
attention of the seamen The president,
however, was the first to recover his
composure, and at length, turning to
Legs with great dignity, recommenced:
"Most willingly will we gratify any
reasonable curiosity on the part of
guests so illustrious, unbidden though
they be. Know then that in these do-
minions I am monarch, and here rule
with undivided empire under the title
of 'King Pest the First.'
"This apartment, which you no doubt
profanely suppose to be the shop of
Will Wimble the undertaker-a man
whom we know not, and whose plebeian
appellation has never before this night
thwarted our royal ears-this apart-
ment, I say, is the Dais-Chamber of
our Palace, devoted to the councils of
our kingdom, and to other sacred and
lofty purposes.
"The noble lady who sits opposite is
Queen Pest, our Serene Consort. The
other exalted personages whom you be-
Pest-Ilential'-'His
-
hold are all of our family, and wear the
insignia of the blood royal under the
respective titles of 'His Grace the Arch
Duke Pest-Iferous'-'His Grace the
Duke
Grace the
Duke Tem-Pest' and 'Her Serene
Highness the Arch Duchess Ana-Pest.'
"As regards," continued he, “your
demand of the business upon which
we sit here in council, we might be
pardoned for replying that it concerns,
and concerns alone, our own private
and regal interest, and is in no manner
important to any other than ourself.
But in consideration of those rights to
which as guests and strangers you may
feel yourselves entitled, we will fur-
thermore explain that we are here this
night, prepared by deep research and
accurate investigation, to examine, ana-
lyze, and thoroughly determine the in-
definable spirit-the incomprehensible
qualities and nature-of those inesti-
mable treasures of the palate, the wines,
ales, and liquors of this goodly metrop-
olis: by so doing to advance not more
our own designs than the true welfare
of that unearthly sovereign whose reign
is over us all, whose dominions are
unlimited, and whose name is 'Death.'"
"Whose name is Davy Jones!" ejac-
ulated Tarpaulin, helping the lady by
his side to a skull of liqueur, and pour-
ing out a second for himself.
"Profane varlet!" said the president,
now turning his attention to the worthy
Hugh, "profane and execrable wretch!
-we have said, that in consideration of
those rights which, even in thy filthy
person, we feel no inclination to vio-
late, we have condescended to make
reply to thy rude and unreasonable in-
quiries. We nevertheless, for your un-
hallowed intrusion upon our councils,
KING PEST
203
believe it our duty to mulct thee and
thy companion in each a gallon of Black
Strap having imbibed which to the
prosperity of our kingdom-at a single
draught-and upon your bended knees
-ye shall be forthwith free either to
proceed upon your way, or remain and
be admitted to the privileges of our
table, according to your respective and
individual pleasures."
"It would be a matter of utter un-
possibility," replied Legs, whom the as-
sumption and dignity of King Pest the
First had evidently inspired with some
feelings of respect, and who arose and
steadied himself by the table as he
spoke "it would, please your majesty,
be a matter of utter unpossibility to
stow away in my hold even one fourth
part of that same liquor which your
majesty has just mentioned. To say
nothing of the stuffs placed on board
in the forenoon by way of ballast, and
not to mention the various ales and
liqueurs shipped this evening at vari-
ous seaports, I have, at present, a full
cargo of humming-stuff' taken in and
duly paid for at the sign of the 'Jolly
Tar. You will therefore, please your
majesty, be so good as to take the
will for the deed-for by no manner of
means either can I or will I swallow
another drop-least of all a drop of
that villainous bilge-water that answers
to the name of 'Black Strap.'"
"Belay that!" interrupted Tarpaulin,
astonished not more at the length of
his companion's speech than at the na-
ture of his refusal-"Belay that, you
lubber!-and I say, Legs, none of your
palaver. My hull is still light, al-
though I confess you yourself seem to
be a little top-heavy; and as far as
the matter of your share of the cargo,
why rather than raise a squall I would
find stowage-room for it myself,
but-
"This proceeding," interposed the
president, "is by no means in accord-
ance with the terms of the mulct or
sentence, which is in its nature Median,
and not to be altered or recalled. The
conditions we have imposed must be
fulfilled to the letter, and that with-
out a moment's hesitation-in failure
of which fulfillment we decree that you
do here be tied neck and heels together,
and duly drowned as rebels in yon
hogshead of October beer!"
"A sentence!-a sentence!-a right-
eous and just sentence!-a glorious de-
cree!-a most worthy and upright, and
holy condemnation!" shouted the Pest
family altogether. The king elevated
his forehead into innumerable wrinkles;
the gouty little old man puffed like a
pair of bellows; the lady of the wind-
ing-sheet waved her nose to and fro;
the gentleman in the cotton drawers
pricked up his ears; she of the shroud
gasped like a dying fish; and he of the
coffin looked stiff and rolled up his eyes.
"Ugh! ugh! ugh!" chuckled Tarpaulin,
without heeding the general excitation,
"ugh! ugh! ugh!-ugh! ugh! ugh! ugh!
-ugh! ugh! ugh!-I was saying," said
he "I was saying when Mr. King Pest
poked in his marlinspike, that as for the
matter of two or three gallons more or
less of Black Strap, it was a trifle to
a tight sea-boat like myself not over-
stowed-but when it comes to drinking
the health of the Devil (whom God
assoilzie) and going down upon my
marrow-bones to his ill-favored majesty
there, whom I know, as well as I know
myself to be a sinner, to be nobody in
the whole world but Tim Hurlygurly
204
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
the stage-player!-why! it's quite an-
other guess sort of a thing, and utterly
and altogether past my comprehension."
He was not allowed to finish this
speech in tranquillity. At the name of
Tim Hurlygurly the whole assembly
leaped from their seats.
"Treason!"
shouted his Majesty
King Pest the First.
"Treason!" said the little man with
the gout.
"Treason!" screamed the Arch Duch-
ess Ana-Pest.
"Treason!" muttered the gentleman
with his jaws tied up.
"Treason!" growled he of the coffin.
"Treason! treason!" shrieked her
majesty of the mouth; and seizing by
the hinder part of his breeches the un-
fortunate Tarpaulin, who had just com-
menced pouring out for himself a skull
of liqueur, she lifted him high into the
air, and let him fall without ceremony
into the huge open puncheon of his
beloved ale. Bobbing up and down,
for a few seconds, like an apple in a
bowl of toddy, he, at length, finally
disappeared amid the whirlpool of foam
which, in the already effervescent liquor,
his struggles easily succeeded in creating.
Not tamely, however, did the tall
seaman behold the discomfiture of his
companion. Jostling King Pest through
the open trap, the valiant Legs slammed
the door down upon him with an oath,
and strode toward the centre of the
room. Here tearing down the skeleton
which swung over the table, he laid it
about him with so much energy and
good-will that, as the last glimpses of
light died away within the apartment,
he succeeded in knocking out the brains
of the little gentleman with the gout.
Rushing then with all his force against
the fatal hogshead full of October ale
and Hugh Tarpaulin, he rolled it over
and over in an instant. Out poured a
deluge of liquor so fierce-so impetu-
ous-so overwhelming that the room
was flooded from wall to wall-the
loaded tables was overturned-the tres-
sles were thrown upon their backs-
the tub of punch into the fire-place-
and the ladies into hysterics. Piles
of death-furniture floundered about.
Jugs, pitchers, and carboys mingled
promiscuously in the melee, and wicker
flagons encountered desperately with
bottles of junk. The man with the
horrors was drowned upon the spot-
the little stiff gentleman floated off in
his coffin-and the victorious Legs,
seizing by the waist the fat lady in
the shroud, rushed out with her into
the street, and made a bee-line for
the "Free and Easy," followed under
easy sail by the redoubtable Hugh Tar-
paulin, who, having sneezed three or
four times, panted and puffed after
him with the Arch Duchess Ana-Pest
The Cask of Amontillado
(First appeared in Godey's Lady's Book, November, 1846.-Ed.)
THE thousand injuries of Fortunato
I had borne as I best could, but when
he ventured upon insult, I vowed re-
venge. You, who so well know the
nature of my soul, will not suppose,
however, that I gave utterance to a
threat. At length I would be avenged;
this was a point definitively settled-
but the very definitiveness with which
it was resolved, precluded the idea of
risk. I must not only punish, but pun-
ish with impunity. A wrong is unre-
dressed when retribution overtakes its
redresser. It is equally unredressed
when the avenger fails to make him-
self felt as such to him who has done
the wrong.
It must be understood that neither
by word nor deed had I given Fortu-
nato cause to doubt my good will. I
continued as was my wont, to smile in
his face, and he did not perceive that
my smile now was at the thought of
his immolation.
He had a weak point-this Fortu-
nato-although in other regards he was
a man to be respected and even feared.
He prided himself on his connoisseur-
ship in wine. Few Italians have the
true virtuoso spirit. For the most part
their enthusiasm is adapted to suit the
time and opportunity-to practice im-
posture upon the British and Austrian
millionaires. In painting and gemmary
Fortunato, like his country men, was a
quack-but in the matter of old wines
he was sincere. In this respect I did
not differ from him materially: I was
skilful in the Italian vintages myself,
and bought largely whenever I could.
It was about dusk, one evening dur
ing the supreme madness of the carni-
val season, that I encountered my
friend. He accosted me with excessive
warmth, for he had been drinking much.
The man wore motley. He had on a
tight-fitting parti-striped dress, and his
head was surmounted by the conical
cap and bells. I was so pleased to see
him, that I thought I should never have
done wringing his hand.
I said to him: "My dear Fortunato,
you are luckily met. How remarkably
well you are looking to-day! But I
have received a pipe of what passes for
Amontillado, and I have my doubts."
"How?" said he "Amontillado? A
pipe? Impossible! And in the middle
of the carnival!"
"I have my doubts," I replied; "and
I was silly enough to pay the full
Amontillado price without consulting
you in the matter. You were not to be
found, and I was fearful of losing a
bargain."
"Amontillado!"
"I have my doubts."
"Amontillado!"
"And I must satisfy them."
"Amontillado!"
"As you are engaged, I am on my
way to Luchesi. If any one has a
critical turn, it is he. He will tell
me-
"Luchesi cannot tell Amontillado
from Sherry."
"And yet some fools will have it
205
206
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
that his taste is a match for your
own."
"Come, let us go."
"Whither?"
"To your vaults."
"My friend, no; I will not impose
upon your good nature. I perceive
you have an engagement. Luchesi-
"I have no engagement-come."
""
"My friend, no. It is not the en-
gagement, but the severe cold with
which I perceive you are afflicted. The
vaults are insufferably damp. They
are encrusted with nitre."
"Let us go, nevertheless. The cold
is merely nothing. Amontillado! You
have been imposed upon. And as for
Luchesi, he cannot distinguish Sherry
from Amontillado."
Thus speaking, Fortunato possessed
himself of my arm. Putting on a mask
of black silk, and drawing a roquelaire
closely about my person, I suffered him
to hurry me to my palazzo.
There were no attendants at home;
they had absconded to make merry in
honor of the time. I had told them
that I should not return until the morn-
ing, and had given them explicit orders
not to stir from the house. These
orders were sufficient, I well knew, to
insure their immediate disappearance,
one and all, as soon as my back was
turned.
I took from their sconces two flam-
beaux, and giving one to Fortunato,
bowed him through several suites of
rooms to the archway that led into the
vaults. I passed down a long and wind-
ing staircase, requesting him to be cau-
tious as he followed. We came at
length to the foot of the descent, and
stood together on the damp ground of
the catacombs of the Montresors.
The gait of my friend was unsteady,
and the bells upon his cap jingled as
he strode.
"The pipe?" said he.
"It is farther on," said I; "but ob-
serve the white webwork which gleams
from these cavern walls."
He turned toward me, and looked
into my eyes with two filmy orbs that
distilled the rheum of intoxication.
"Nitre?" he asked, at length.
"Nitre," I replied. "How long have
you had that cough?"
"Ugh! ugh! ugh!-ugh! ugh! ugh!-
ugh ugh ugh!-ugh! ugh! ugh!-
ugh! ugh! ugh!"
My poor friend found it impossible
to reply for many minutes.
"It is nothing," he said, at last.
"Come," I said, with decision, "we
will go back; your health is precious.
You are rich, respected, admired, be-
loved; you are happy, as once I was.
You are a man to be missed. For me
it is no matter. We will go back; you
will be ill, and I cannot be responsible.
Besides, there is Luchesi-
29
I
"Enough," he said; "the cough is a
mere nothing; it will not kill me.
shall not die of a cough."
"True true," I replied; "and, in-
deed, I had no intention of alarming
you unnecessarily; but you should use
all proper caution. A draught of this
Medoc will defend us from the damps."
Here I knocked off the neck of a
bottle which I drew from a long row
of its fellows that lay upon the mould.
"Drink," I said, presenting him the
wine.
He raised it to his lips with a leer.
He paused and nodded to me familiarly,
while his bells jingled.
THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO
207
"I drink," he said, "to the buried
that repose around us."
"And I to your long life.”
He again took my arm, and we pro-
ceeded.
"These vaults," he said, "are ex-
tensive."
"The Montresors," I replied, "were
a great and numerous family."
"I forget your arms."
"A huge human foot d'or, in a field
azure; the foot crushes a serpent ramp-
ant whose fangs are imbedded in the
beel."
"And the motto?"
"Nemo me impune lacessit."
"Good!" he said.
The wine sparkled in his eyes and
the bells jingled. My own fancy grew
warm with the Medoc. We had passed
through walls of piled bones, with casks
and puncheons intermingling, into the
inmost recesses of the catacombs. I
paused again, and this time I made bold
to seize Fortunato by an arm above the
elbow.
"The nitre!" I said; "see, it in-
creases. It hangs like moss upon the
vaults. We are below the river's bed.
The drops of moisture trickle among
the bones. Come, we will go back ere
it is too late. Your cough-
""
"It is nothing," he said; "let us go
But first, another draught of the
Medoc."
on.
I broke and reached him a flagon of
De Grave. He emptied it at a breath.
His eyes flashed with a fierce light. He
laughed and threw the bottle upward
with a gesticulation I did not understand.
I looked at him in surprise. He re-
peated the movement-a grotesque one.
"You do not comprehend?" he said.
"Not I," I replied.
"Then you are not of the brother-
hood."
"How?"
"You are not of the masons."
"Yes, yes," I said; "yes, yes."
"You? Impossible! A mason?"
"A mason," I replied.
"A sign," he said.
"It is this," I answered, producing
a trowel from beneath the folds of my
roquelaire.
"You jest," he exclaimed, recoiling
a few paces.
"But let us proceed to
the Amontillado."
"Be it so," I said, replacing the
tool beneath the cloak, and again offer-
ing him my arm. He leaned upon it
heavily. We continued our route in
search of the Amontillado. We passed
through a range of low arches, de-
scribed, passed on, and descending
again, arrived at a deep crypt, in which
the foulness of the air caused our
flambeaux rather to glow than flame.
At the most remote end of the crypt
there appeared another less spacious.
Its walls had been lined with human
remains, piled to the vault overhead,
in the fashion of the great catacombs
of Paris. Three sides of this interior
crypt were still ornamented in this
manner. From the fourth the bones
had been thrown down, and lay pro-
miscuously upon the earth, forming at
one point a mound of some size. With-
in the wall thus exposed by the dis-
placing of the bones, we perceived a
still interior recess, in depth about four
feet, in width three, in height six or
seven. It seemed to have been con-
structed for no especial use within
itself, but formed merely the interval
between two of the colossal supports of
the roof of the catacombs, and was
208
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
backed by one of their circumscribing
walls of solid granite.
It was in vain that Fortunato, unlift-
ing his dull torch, endeavored to pry
into the depth of the recess. Its ter-
mination the feeble light did not en-
able us to see.
"Proceed," I said; "herein is the
Amontillado. As for Luchesi—"
"He is an ignoramus," interrupted
my friend, as he stepped unsteadily
forward, while I followed immediately
at his heels. In an instant he had
reached the extremity of the niche,
and finding his progress arrested by the
rock, stood stupidly bewildered. A mo-
ment more and I had fettered him to
the granite. In its surface were two
iron staples, distant from each other
about two feet, horizontally. From one
of these depended a short chain, from
the other a padlock. Throwing the
links about his waist, it was but the
work of a few seconds to secure it.
He was too much astounded to resist.
Withdrawing the key I stepped back
from the recess.
No?
"Pass your hand," I said, "over the
wall; you cannot help feeling the nitre.
Indeed it is very damp. Once more
let me implore you to return.
Then I must positively leave you. But
I must first render you all the little
attentions in my power."
"The Amontillado!" ejaculated my
friend, not yet recovered from his
astonishment.
"True," I replied; "the Amontillado."
As I said these words I busied my-
self among the pile of bones of which
I have before spoken. Throwing them
aside, I soon uncovered a quantity of
building stone and mortar. With these
materials and with the aid of my trowel,
I began vigorously to wall up the en-
trance of the niche.
I had scarcely laid the first tier of
the masonry when I discovered that the
intoxication of Fortunato had in a great
measure worn off. The earliest indica-
tion I had of this was a low moaning
cry from the depth of the recess. It
was not the cry of a drunken man.
There was then a long and obstinate
silence. I laid the second tier, and
the third, and the fourth; and then I
heard the furious vibrations of the
chain. The noise lasted for several
minutes, during which, that I might
hearken to it with the more satisfac-
tion, I ceased my labors and sat down
upon the bones. When at last the
clanking subsided, I resumed the trowel,
and finished without interruption the
fifth, the sixth, and the seventh tier.
The wall was now nearly upon a level
with my breast. I again paused, and
holding the flambeaux over the mason-
work, threw a few feeble rays upon the
figure within.
A succession of loud and shrill
screams, bursting suddenly from the
throat of the chained form, seemed to
thrust me violently back. For a brief
moment I hesitated-I trembled. Un-
sheathing my rapier, I began to grope
with it about the recess; but the
thought of an instant reassured me. 1
placed my hand upon the solid fabric
of the catacombs, and felt satisfied. I
reapproached the wall. I replied to the
yells of him who clamored. I re-echoed
-I aided-I surpassed them in volume
and in strength. I did this, and the
clamorer grew still.
It was now midnight, and my task
was drawing to a close. I had com-
pleted the eighth, the ninth, and the
THE BLACK CAT
209
It
tenth tier. I had finished a portion
of the last and the eleventh; there re-
mained but a single stone to be fitted
and plastered in. I struggled with its
weight; I placed it partially in its des-
tined position. But now there came
from out the niche a low laugh that
erected the hairs upon my head.
was succeeded by a sad voice, which I
had difficulty in recognizing as that of
the noble Fortunato. The voice said-
"Ha! ha! ha!-he! he!-a very good
joke indeed an excellent jest. We
will have many a rich laugh about it
at the palazzo-he! he! he!- -over
our wine-he! he! he!"
"The Amontillado!" I said.
"He! he he!-he! he! he!-yes, the
Amontillado. But is it not getting
late? Will not they be awaiting us at
the palazzo, the Lady Fortunato and
the rest? Let us be gone."
"Yes," I said, "let us be gone."
"For the love of God, Montresor!"
"Yes," I said, "for the love of God!"
But to these words I hearkened in
vain for a reply. I grew impatient. I
called aloud;
"Fortunato!"
No answer. I called again;
"Fortunato!"
No answer still. I thrust a torch
through the remaining aperture and let
it fall within. There came forth in
return only a jingling of the bells. My
heart grew sick-on account of the
dampness of the catacombs. I has-
tened to make an end of my labor. I
forced the last stone into its position;
I plastered it up. Against the new ma-
sonry I re-erected the old rampart of
bones. For the half of a century no
mortal has disturbed them. In pace
requiescat!
The Black Cat
(First appeared in United States Saturday Post, August, 1843.-Ed.)
For the most wild yet most homely
narrative which I am about to pen, I
neither expect nor solicit belief. Mad
indeed would I be to expect it, in a
case where my very senses reject their
own evidence. Yet, mad am I not-
and very surely do I not dream. But
to-morrow I die, and to-day I would
unburden my soul. My immediate
purpose is to place before the world,
plainly, succinctly, and without com-
ment, a series of mere household events.
In their consequences, these events
have terrified-have tortured-have de-
stroyed me. Yet I will not attempt
to expound them. To me, they have
presented little but horror-to many
they will seem less terrible than bar-
roques. Hereafter, perhaps, some in-
tellect may be found which will reduce
my phantasm to the commonplace-
some intellect more calm, more logical,
and far less excitable than my own,
which will perceive, in the circumstances
I detail with awe, nothing more than
an ordinary succession of very natural
causes and effects.
From my infancy I was noted for
the docility and humanity of my dis-
position. My tenderness of heart was
210
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
even so conspicuous as to make me the
jest of my companions. I was espe-
cially fond of animals, and was in-
dulged by my parents with a great
variety of pets. With these I spent
most of my time, and never was so
happy as when feeding and caressing
them. This peculiarity of character
grew with my growth, and, in my man-
hood, I derived from it one of my
principal sources of pleasure. To those
who have cherished an affection for a
faithful and sagacious dog, I need
hardly be at the trouble of explaining
the nature or the intensity of the grati-
fication thus derivable. There is some-
thing in the unselfish and self-sacrific-
ing love of a brute, which goes directly
to the heart of him who has had fre-
quent occasion to test the paltry friend-
ship and gossamer fidelity of mere Man.
I married early, and was happy to
find in my wife a disposition not un-
congenial with my own. Observing my
partiality for domestic pets, she lost
no opportunity of procuring those of
the most agreeable kind. We had
birds, gold-fish, a fine dog, rabbits, a
small monkey, and a cat.
This latter was a remarkably large
and beautiful animal, entirely black,
and sagacious to an astonishing degree.
In speaking of his intelligence, my wife,
who at heart was not a little tinctured
with superstition, made frequent al-
lusion to the ancient popular notion,
which regarded all black cats as witches
in disguise. Not that she was ever
serious upon this point-and I men-
tion the matter at all for no better
reason than that it happens, just now,
to be remembered.
Pluto this was the cat's name-was
my favorite pet and playmate. I alone
fed him, and he attended me wherever
I went about the house. It was even
with difficulty that I could prevent him
from following me through the streets.
Our friendship lasted, in this man-
ner, for several years, during which
my general temperament and character
through the instrumentality of the
Fiend Intemperance-had ( I blush to
confess it) experienced a radical altera-
tion for the worse. I grew, day by day,
more moody, more irritable, more re-
gardless of the feelings of others. I
suffered myself to use intemperate lan-
guage to my wife. At length, I even
offered her personal violence. My pets,
of course, were made to feel the change
in my disposition. I not only neglected,
but ill-used them. For Pluto, however,
I still retained sufficient regard to re-
strain me from maltreating him, as I
made no scruple of maltreating the rab-
bits, the monkey, or even the dog, when,
by accident, or through affection, they
came in my way. But my disease grew
upon me for what disease is like Al-
cohol!—and at length even Pluto, who
was now becoming old, and conse-
quently somewhat peevish-even Pluto
began to experience the effects of my
ill temper.
One night, returning home, much in-
toxicated, from one of my haunts about
town, I fancied that the cat avoided my
presence. I seized him; when, in his
fright at my violence, he inflicted a
slight wound upon my hand with his
teeth. The fury of a demon instantly
possessed me. I knew myself no
longer. My original soul seemed, at
once, to take its flight from my body;
and a more than fiendish malevolence
gin-nurtured, thrilled every fibre of my
frame.
I took from my waistcoat-
THE BLACK CAT
211
pocket a penknife, opened it, grasped
the poor beast by the throat, and de-
liberately cut one of its eyes from the
socket! I blush, I burn, I shudder,
while I pen the damnable atrocity.
When reason returned with the morn-
ing-when I had slept off the fumes of
the night's debauch-I experienced a
sentiment half of horror, half of re-
morse, for the crime of which I had
been guilty; but it was, at best, a
feeble and equivocal feeling, and the
soul remained untouched. I again
plunged into excess, and soon drowned
in wine all memory of the deed.
In the meantime the cat slowly re-
covered. The socket of the lost eye
presented, it is true, a frightful appear-
ance, but he no longer appeared to
suffer any pain. He went about the
house as usual, but, as might be ex-
pected, fled in extreme terror at my
approach. I had so much of my old
heart left, as to be at first grieved by
this evident dislike on the part of a
creature which had once so loved me.
But this feeling soon gave place to
irritation. And then came, as if to
my final and irrevocable overthrow, the
spirit of PERVERSENESS. Of this spirit
philosophy takes no account. Yet I
am not more sure that my soul lives,
than I am that perverseness is one of
the primitive impulses of the human
heart-one of the indivisible primary
faculties, or sentiments, which give di-
rection to the character of Man. Who
has not, a hundred times, found himself
committing a vile or a stupid action,
for no other reason than because he
knows he should not? Have we not a
perpetual inclination, in the teeth of
our best judgment, to violate that which
is Law, merely because we understand
it to be such? This spirit of perverse-
ness, I say, came to my final over-
throw. It was this unfathomable long-
ing of the soul to vex itself to offer
violence to its own nature-to do wrong
for the wrong's sake only-that urged
me to continue and finally to consum-
mate the injury I had inflicted upon
the unoffending brute. One morning,
in cold blood, I slipped a noose about
its neck and hung it to the limb of a
tree-hung it with the tears streaming
from my eyes, and with the bitterest
remorse at my heart-hung it because
I knew that it had loved me, and be-
cause I felt it had given me no reason
of offence-hung it because I knew that
in so doing I was committing a sin―
a deadly sin that would so jeopardize
my immortal soul as to place it-if
such a thing were possible-even be-
yond the reach of the infinite mercy
of the Most Merciful and Most Ter-
rible God.
On the night of the day on which
this most cruel deed was done, I was
aroused from sleep by the cry of fire.
The curtains of my bed were in flames.
The whole house was blazing. It was
with great difficulty that my wife, a
servant, and myself, made our escape
from the conflagration. The destruc-
tion was complete. My entire worldly
wealth was swallowed up, and I re-
signed myself thenceforward to despair.
I am above the weakness of seeking
to establish a sequence of cause and
effect, between the disaster and the
atrocity. But I am detailing a chain
of facts-and wish not to leave even a
possible link imperfect. On the day
succeeding the fire, I visited the ruins.
The walls, with one exception, had
fallen in. This exception was found in
212
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
a compartment wall, not very thick,
which stood about the middle of the
house, and against which had rested the
head of my bed. The plastering had
here, in great measure, resisted the
action of the fire-a fact which I attrib-
uted to its having been recently spread.
About this wall a dense crowd were
collected, and many persons seemed to
be examining a particular portion of
it with very minute and eager atten-
tion. The words "strange!" "singu-
lar!" and other similar expressions, ex-
cited my curiosity. I approached and
saw, as if graven in bas-relief upon the
white surface, the figure of a gigantic
cat. The impression was given with
an accuracy truly marvellous. There
was a rope about the animal's neck.
When I first beheld this apparition-
for I could scarcely regard it as less-
my wonder and my terror were extreme.
But at length reflection came to my
aid. The cat, I remembered, had been
hung in a garden adjacent to the house.
Upon the alarm of fire, this garden
had been immediately filled by the
crowd-by some one of whom the ani-
mal must have been cut from the tree
and thrown, through an open window,
into my chamber. This had probably
been done with the view of arousing
me from sleep. The falling of other
walls had compressed the victim of
my cruelty into the substance of the
freshly-spread plaster; the lime of
which, with the flames, and the am-
monia from the carcass, had then ac-
complished the portraiture as I saw it.
Although I thus readily accounted
to my reason, if not altogether to my
conscience, for the startling fact just
detailed, it did not the less fail to make
a deep impression upon my fancy. For
months I could not rid myself of the
phantasm of the cat; and, during this
period, there came back into my spirit
a half-sentiment that seemed, but was
not, remorse. I went so far as to re-
gret the loss of the animal, and to look
about me, among the vile haunts which
I now habitually frequented, for an-
other pet of the same species, and of
somewhat similar appearance, with
which to supply its place.
One night as I sat, half stupefied, in
a den of more than infamy, my atten-
tion was suddenly drawn to some black
object, reposing upon the head of one
of the immense hogsheads of gin, or of
rum, which constituted the chief furni-
ture of the apartment. I had been
looking steadily at the top of this hogs-
head for some minutes, and what now
caused me surprise was the fact that
I had not sooner perceived the ob-
ject thereupon. I approached it, and
touched it with my hand. It was a
black cat a very large one-fully as
large as Pluto, and closely resembling
him in every respect but one. Pluto
had not a white hair upon any portion
of his body; but this cat had a large,
although indefinite splotch of white,
covering nearly the whole region of the
breast.
Upon my touching him, he imme-
diately arose, purred loudly, rubbed
against my hand, and appeared de-
lighted with my notice. This, then,
was the very creature of which I was
in search. I at once offered to pur-
chase it of the landlord; but this per-
son made no claim to it-knew noth-
ing of it-had never seen it before.
I continued my caresses, and when
I prepared to go home, the animal
evinced a disposition to accompany me.
THE BLACK CAT
213
I permitted it to do so; occasionally
stooping and patting it as I proceeded.
When it reached the house it domesti-
cated itself at once, and became imme-
diately a great favorite with my wife.
For my own part, I soon found a
dislike to it arising within me. This
was just the reverse of what I had an-
ticipated; but I know not how or why
it was its evident fondness for my-
self rather disgusted and annoyed me.
By slow degrees these feelings of dis-
gust and annoyance rose into the bit-
terness of hatred. I avoided the crea-
ture; a certain sense of shame, and
the remembrance of my former deed
of cruelty, preventing me from physi-
cally abusing it. I did not, for some
weeks, strike, or otherwise violently
ill use it; but gradually-very gradu-
ally-I came to look upon it with un-
utterable loathing, and to flee silently
from its odious presence, as from the
breath of a pestilence.
What added, no doubt, to my hatred
of the beast, was the discovery, on the
morning after I brought it home, that,
like Pluto, it also had been deprived
of one of its eyes. This circumstance,
however, only endeared it to my wife,
who, as I have already said, possessed,
in a high degree, that humanity of
feeling which had once been my dis-
tinguishing trait, and the source of many
of my simplest and purest pleasures.
With my aversion to this cat, how-
ever, its partiality for myself seemed
to increase. It followed my footsteps
with a pertinacity which it would be
difficult to make the reader compre-
hend. Wherever I sat, it would crouch
beneath my chair, or spring upon my
knees, covering me with its loathsome
caresses. If I arose to walk it would
get between my feet and thus nearly
throw me down, or, fastening its long
and sharp claws in my dress, clamber,
in this manner, to my breast. At such
times, although I longed to destroy it
with a blow, I was yet withheld from
so doing, partly by a memory of my
former crime, but chiefly-let me con-
fess it at once-by absolute dread of
the beast.
This dread was not exactly a dread
of physical evil-and yet I should be
at a loss how otherwise to define it.
I am almost ashamed to own-yes, even
in this felon's cell, I am almost ashamed
to own that the terror and horror
with which the animal inspired me,
had been heightened by one of the
merest chimeras it would be possible
to conceive. My wife had called my
attention, more than once, to the char-
acter of the mark of white hair, of
which I have spoken, and which con-
stituted the sole visible difference be-
tween the strange beast and the one
I had destroyed. The reader will re-
member that this mark, although large,
had been originally very indefinite;
but, by slow degrees-degrees nearly
imperceptible, and which for a long
time my reason struggled to reject as
fanciful-it had, at length, assumed a
rigorous distinctness of outline. It was
now the representation of an object that
I shudder to name—and for this, above
all, I loathed, and dreaded, and would
have rid myself of the monster had I
dared-it was now, I say, the image
of a hideous-of a ghastly thing-of
the GALLOWS!—oh, mournful and ter-
rible engine of Horror and of Crime-
of Agony and of Death!
And now was I indeed wretched be-
yond the wretchedness of mere Hu-
214
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
manity. And a brute beast-whose
fellow I had contemptuously destroyed
-a brute beast to work out for me-
for me, a man fashioned in the image
of the High God-so much of insuffer-
able woe! Alas! neither by day nor
by night knew I the blessing of rest
any more! During the former the
creature left me no moment alone, and
in the latter I started hourly from
dreams of unutterable fear to find the
hot breath of the thing upon my face,
and its vast weight-an incarnate
nightmare that I had no power to shake
off-incumbent eternally upon my
heart!
Beneath the pressure of torments
such as these the feeble remnant of
the good within me succumbed. Evil
thoughts became my sole intimates—
the darkest and most evil of thoughts.
The moodiness of my usual temper in-
creased to hatred of all things and of
all mankind; while from the sudden,
frequent, and ungovernable outbursts
of a fury to which I now blindly aban-
doned myself, my uncomplaining wife,
alas, was the most usual and the most
patient of sufferers.
One day she accompanied me, upon
some household errand, into the cellar
of the old building which our poverty
compelled us to inhabit. The cat fol-
lowed me down the steep stairs, and,
nearly throwing me headlong, exasper-
ated me to madness. Uplifting an axe,
and forgetting in my wrath the child-
ish dread which had hitherto stayed
my hand, I aimed a blow at the ani-
mal, which, of course, would have
proved instantly fatal had it descended
as I wished. But this blow was ar-
rested by the hand of my wife.
Goaded by the interference into a rage
more than demoniacal, I withdrew my
arm from her grasp and buried the axe
in her brain. She fell dead upon the
spot without a groan.
This hideous murder accomplished,
I set myself forthwith, and with entire
deliberation, to the task of concealing
the body. I knew that I could not
remove it from the house, either by
day or night, without the risk of be-
ing observed by the neighbors. Many
projects entered my mind. At one
period I thought of cutting the corpse.
into minute fragments, and destroying
them by fire. At another, I resolved
to dig a grave for it in the floor of
the cellar. Again, I deliberated about
casting it in the well in the yard-
about packing it in a box, as if mer-
chandise, with the usual arrangements,
and so getting a porter to take it from
the house. Finally I hit upon what
I considered a far better expedient
than either of these. I determined to
wall it up in the cellar, as the monks
of the Middle Ages are recorded to
have walled up their victims.
For a purpose such as this the cel-
lar was well adapted. Its walls were
loosely constructed, and had lately
been plastered throughout with a rough
plaster, which the dampness of the at-
mosphere had prevented from hard-
ening. Moreover, in one of the walls
was a projection, caused by a false
chimney, or fireplace, that had been
filled up and made to resemble the
rest of the cellar. I made no doubt
that I could readily displace the bricks
at this point, insert the corpse, and
wall the whole up as before, so that
no eye could detect any thing sus-
picious.
And in this calculation I was not de-
THE BLACK CAT
215
1
ceived. By means of a crowbar I
easily dislodged the bricks, and, hav-
ing carefully deposited the body against
the inner wall, I propped it in that
position, while with little trouble I re-
laid the whole structure as it originally
stood. Having procured mortar, sand,
and hair, with every possible precau-
tion, I prepared a plaster which could
not be distinguished from the old, and
with this I very carefully went over
the new brick-work. When I had fin-
ished, I felt satisfied that all was right.
The wall did not present the slightest
appearance of having been disturbed.
The rubbish on the floor was picked
up with the minutest care. I looked
around triumphantly, and said to my-
self: "Here at least, then, my labor has
not been in vain."
My next step was to look for the
beast which had been the cause of so
much wretchedness; for I had, at
length, firmly resolved to put it to
death. Had I been able to meet with
it at the moment, there could have
been no doubt of its fate; but it ap-
peared that the crafty animal had been
alarmed at the violence of my previous
anger, and forebore to present itself in
my present mood. It is impossible to
describe or to imagine the deep, the
blissful sense of relief which the ab-
sence of the detested creature occa-
sioned in my bosom. It did not make
its appearance during the night; and
thus for one night, at least, since its
introduction into the house, I soundly
and tranquilly slept; aye, slept even
with the burden of murder upon my
soul.
The monster, in terror, had fled the
premises for ever! I should behold
it no more! My happiness was su-
preme! The guilt of my dark deed
disturbed me but little. Some few in-
quiries had been made, but these had
been readily answered. Even a search
was instituted-but of course nothing
was to be discovered. I looked upon
my future felicity as secured.
Upon the fourth day of the assassi-
nation, a party of the police came,
very unexpectedly, into the house, and
proceeded again to make rigorous in-
vestigation of the premises. Secure,
however, in the inscrutability of my
place of concealment, I felt no em-
barrassment whatever. The officers
bade me accompany them in their
search. They left no nook or corner
unexplored. At length, for the third
or fourth time, they descended into the
cellar. I quivered not in a muscle.
My heart beat calmly as that of one
who slumbers in innocence. I walked
the cellar from end to end. I folded
my arms upon my bosom, and roamed
easily to and fro. The police were
thoroughly satisfied and prepared to
depart. The glee at my heart was too
strong to be restrained. I burned to
say if but one word, by way of tri-
umph, and to render doubly sure their
assurance of my guiltlessness.
"Gentlemen," I said at last, as the
party ascended the steps, "I delight
to have allayed your suspicions. I
wish you all health and a little more
courtesy. By the bye, gentlemen, this
-this is a very well-constructed house,"
(in the rabid desire to say something
The second and the third day passed, easily, I scarcely knew what I uttered
and still my tormentor came not.
Once again I breathed as a free man.
at all), "I may say an excellently
well-constructed house. These walls-
216
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
are you going, gentlemen?-these walls
are solidly put together"; and here,
through the mere frenzy of bravado,
I rapped heavily with a cane which I
held in my hand, upon that very por-
tion of the brickwork behind which
stood the corpse of the wife of my
bosom.
But may God shield and deliver me
from the fangs of the Arch-Fiend! No
sooner had the reverberation of my
blows sunk into silence, than I was
answered by a voice from within the
tomb!-by a cry, at first muffled and
broken, like the sobbing of a child,
and then quickly swelling into one
long, loud and continuous scream, ut-
terly anomalous and inhuman-a howl
-a wailing shriek, half of horror and
half of triumph, such as might have
arisen only out of hell, conjointly from
the throats of the damned in their
agony and of the demons that exult in
the damnation.
awe.
Of my own thoughts it is folly to
speak. Swooning, I staggered to the
opposite wall. For one instant the
party on the stairs remained motion-
less, through extremity of terror and
In the next a dozen stout arms
were toiling at the wall. It fell bodily.
The corpse, already greatly decayed and
clotted with gore, stood erect before
the eyes of the spectators. Upon its
head, with red extended mouth and
solitary eye of fire, sat the hideous
beast whose craft had seduced me into
murder, and whose informing voice had
consigned me to the hangman. I had
walled the monster up within the tomb.
The Tell-Tale Heart
(First published in The Pioneer, January, 1843.-Ed.)
TRUE!-nervous-very, very dread-
fully nervous I had been and am!
but why will you say that I am mad?
The disease had sharpened my senses-
not destroyed-not dulled them. Above
all was the sense of hearing acute.
I heard all things in the heaven and
in the earth. I heard many things in
hell. How, then, am I mad? Hearken!
and observe how healthily-how calmly
I can tell you the whole story.
It is impossible to say how first the
idea entered my brain; but once con-
ceived, it haunted me day and night.
Object there was none. Passion there
was none. I loved the old man. He
had never wronged me.
He had never
given me insult. For his gold I had
no desire. I think it was his eye!
yes, it was this! One of his eyes re-
sembled that of a vulture-a pale blue
eye, with a film over it. Whenever it
fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and
so by degrees-very gradually-I made
up my mind to take the life of the
old man, and thus rid myself of the
eye for ever.
Now this is the point. You fancy
me mad. Madmen know nothing. But
you should have seen me. You should
have seen how wisely I proceeded-with
what caution-with what foresight—with
what dissimulation I went to work!
I was never kinder to the old man
THE TELL-TALE HEART
217
than during the whole week before I
killed him. And every night, about
midnight, I turned the latch of his
door and opened it-oh, so gently!
And then, when I had made an opening
sufficient for my head, I put in a dark
lantern, all closed, closed, so that no
light shone out, and then I thrust in
my head. Oh, you would have laughed
to see how cunningly I thrust it in! I
moved it slowly-very, very slowly, so
that I might not disturb the old man's
sleep. It took me an hour to place
my whole head within the opening so
far that I could see him as he lay upon
his bed. Ha!-would a madman have
been so wise as this? And then, when
my head was well in the room, I un-
did the lantern cautiously-oh, so cau-
tiously-cautiously (for the hinges
creaked)-I undid it just so much that
a single thin ray fell upon the vulture
eye. And this I did for seven long
nights every night just at midnight-
but I found the eye always closed; and
so it was impossible to do the work;
for it was not the old man who vexed
me, but his Evil Eye. And every
morning, when the day broke, I went
boldly into the chamber, and spoke
courageously to him, calling him by
name in a hearty tone, and inquiring
how he had passed the night. So you
see he would have been a very pro-
found old man, indeed, to suspect that
every night, just at twelve, I looked
in upon him while he slept.
Upon the eighth night I was more
than usually cautious in opening the
door. A watch's minute hand moves
more quickly than did mine. Never
before that night had I felt the extent
of my own powers-of my sagacity. I
could scarcely contain my feelings of
triumph. To think that there I was,
opening the door, little by little, and
he not even to dream of my secret
deeds or thoughts. I fairly chuckled at
the idea; and perhaps he heard me;
for he moved on the bed suddenly, as
if startled. Now you may think that
I drew back-but no. His room was
as black as pitch with the thick dark-
ness, (for the shutters were close fas-
tened, through fear of robbers,) and
so I knew that he could not see the
opening of the door, and I kept push-
ing it on steadily, steadily.
I had my head in, and was about
to open the lantern, when my thumb
slipped upon the tin fastening, and the
old man sprang up in the bed, crying
out-"Who's there?"
I kept quite still and said nothing.
For a whole hour I did not move a
muscle, and in the meantime I did not
hear him lie down. He was still sitting
up in the bed listening;-just as I
have done, night after night, hearken-
ing to the death watches in the wall.
Presently I heard a slight groan, and
I knew it was the groan of mortal ter-
ror. It was not a groan of pain or
of grief-oh no!-it was the low stifled
sound that arises from the bottom of
the soul when overcharged with awe.
I knew the sound well. Many a night,
just at midnight, when all the world
slept, it has welled up from my own
bosom, deepening, with its dreadful
echo, the terrors that distracted me.
I say I knew it well. I knew what
the old man felt, and pitied him, al-
though I chuckled at heart. I knew
that he had been lying awake ever
since the first slight noise, when he had
turned in the bed. His fears had been
ever since growing upon him. He had
218
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
been trying to fancy them causeless, but
could not. He had been saying to him-
self "It is nothing but the wind in
the chimney-it is only a mouse cross-
ing the floor," or "it is merely a cricket
which has made a single chirp." Yes,
he has been trying to comfort himself
with these suppositions; but he had
found all in vain. All in vain; because
Death, in approaching him, had stalked
with his black shadow before him, and
enveloped the victim. And it was the
mournful influence of the unperceived
shadow that caused him to feel-al-
though he neither saw nor heard-to
feel the presence of my head within
the room.
When I had waited a long time, very
patiently, without hearing him lie down,
I resolved to open a little-a very, very
little crevice in the lantern. So I
opened it-you cannot imagine how
stealthily, stealthily-until, at length,
a single dim ray, like the thread of
the spider, shot from out the crevice
and full upon the vulture eye.
It was open-wide, wide open-and
I grew furious as I gazed upon it. I
saw it with perfect distinctness-all a
dull blue, with a hideous veil over it
that chilled the very marrow in my
bones; but I could see nothing else of
the old man's face or person: for I
had directed the ray as if by instinct,
precisely upon the damned spot.
And now have I not told you that
what you mistake for madness is but
over-acuteness of the senses?-now, I
say, there came to my ears a low, dull,
quick sound, such as a watch makes
when enveloped in cotton. I knew that
sound well too. It was the beating of
the old man's heart. It increased my
fury, as the beating of a drum stimu-
lates the soldier into courage.
But even yet I refrained and kept
still. I scarcely breathed. I held the
lantern motionless. I tried how stead-
ily I could maintain the ray upon the
eye. Meantime the hellish tattoo of
the heart increased. It grew quicker
and quicker, and louder and louder
every instant. The old man's terror
must have been extreme! It grew
louder, I say, louder every moment!--
do you mark me well? I have told
you that I am nervous: so I am. And
now at the dead hour of the night, amid
the dreadful silence of that old house,
so strange a noise as this excited me
to uncontrollable terror. Yet, for some
minutes longer I refrained and stood
still. But the beating grew louder,
louder! I thought the heart must
burst. And now a new anxiety seized
me-the sound would be heard by a
neighbor! The old man's hour had
come! With a loud yell, I threw open
the lantern and leaped into the room.
He shrieked once-once only. In an
instant I dragged him to the floor, and
pulled the heavy bed over him. I then
smiled gaily, to find the deed so far
done. But, for many minutes, the
heart beat on with a muffled sound.
This, however, did not vex me; it would
not be heard through the wall. At
length it ceased. The old man was
dead. I removed the bed and examined
the corpse. Yes, he was stone, stone
dead. I placed my hand upon the
heart and held it there many minutes.
There was no pulsation. He was stone
dead. His eye would trouble me no
more.
If still you think me mad, you will
think so no longer when I describe the
THE TELL-TALE HEART
219
wise precautions I took for the con-
cealment of the body. The night
waned, and I worked hastily, but in
silence. First of all I dismembered
the corpse. I cut off the head and the
arms and the legs.
I then took up three planks from the
flooring of the chamber, and deposited
all between the scantlings. I then re-
placed the boards so cleverly, so cun-
ningly, that no human eye-not even his
-could have detected any thing wrong.
There was nothing to wash out-no
stain of any kind-no blood-spot what-
ever. I had been too wary for that.
A tub had caught all—ha! ha!
When I had made an end of these
labors, it was four o'clock-still dark
as midnight. As the bell sounded the
hour, there came a knocking at the
street door. I went down to open it
with a light heart, for what had I
now to fear? There entered three men,
who introduced themselves, with perfect
suavity, as officers of the police. A
shriek had been heard by a neighbor
during the night: suspicion of foul play
had been aroused; information had been
lodged at the police office, and they
(the officers) had been deputed to
search the premises.
I smiled, for what had I to fear?
I bade the gentlemen welcome. The
shriek, I said, was my own in a dream.
The old man, I mentioned, was absent
in the country. I took my visitors all
over the house. I bade them search-
search well. I led, them, at length, to
his chamber. I showed them his treas-
ures, secure, undisturbed. In the en-
thusiasm of my confidence, I brought
chairs into the room, and desired them
here to rest from their fatigues, while
I myself, in the wild audacity of my
perfect triumph, placed my own seat
upon the very spot beneath which re-
posed the corpse of the victim.
The officers were satisfied. My man-
ner had convinced them. I was singu-
larly at ease. They sat, and while I an-
swered cheerily, they chatted of familiar
things. But, ere long, I felt myself
getting pale and wished them gone.
My head ached, and I fancied a ring-
ing in my ears: but still they sat and
still chatted. The ringing became more
distinct:-it continued and became
more distinct: I talked more freely
to get rid of the feeling: but it con-
tinued and gained definitiveness—until,
at length, I found that the noise was
not within my ears.
No doubt I now grew very pale;-
but I talked more fluently, and with a
heightened voice. Yet the sound in-
creased-and what could I do? It was
a low, dull, quick sound-much such
a sound as a watch makes when en-
veloped in cotton. I gasped for breath
-and yet the officers heard it not. I
talked more quickly--more vehemently;
but the noise steadily increased. I arose
and argued about trifles, in a high key
and with violent gesticulations, but the
noise steadily increased. Why would
they not be gone? I paced the floor
to and fro with heavy strides, as if
excited to fury by the observation of
the men-but the noise steadily in-
creased. Oh God! what could I do? I
foamed-I raved-I swore. I swung
the chair upon which I had been sit-
ting, and grated it upon the boards,
but the noise arose over all and con-
tinually increased. It grew louder-
louder-louder! And still the men
chatted pleasantly, and smiled. Was
it possible they heard not? Almighty
220
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
God!-no, no! They heard!-they
suspected!-they knew!-they were
making a mockery of my horror!-
this I thought, and this I think. But
any thing was better than this agony!
Any thing was more tolerable than this
derision! I could bear those hypocriti-
cal smiles no longer! I felt that I
must scream or die!-and now-again!
-hark! louder! louder! louder!—
"Villains!" I shrieked, "dissemble no
more! I admit the deed!-tear up the
planks!-here, here!-it is the beating
of his hideous heart!"]
The Imp of the Perverse
(First published in Graham's Magazine July, 1845.-Ed.)
IN the consideration of the faculties
and impulses of the prima mobilia
of the human soul, the phrenologists
have failed to make room for a pro-
pensity whica, although obviously ex-
isting as a radical, primitive, irreduci-
ble sentiment, has been equally over-
looked by all the moralists who have
preceded them. In the pure arrogance
of the reason, we have all overlooked
it. We have suffered its existence to
escape our senses, solely through want
of belief-of faith;-whether it be
faith in Revelation, or faith in the
Kabbala. The idea of it has never
occurred to us, simply because of its
supererogation. We saw no need of
the impulse-for the propensity.
could not perceive its necessity. We
could not understand, that is to say,
we could not have understood, had
the notion of this primum mobile ever
obtruded itself; we could not have
understood in what manner it might
be made to further the objects of hu-
manity, either temporal or eternal. It
cannot be denied that phrenology and,
in great measure, all metaphysicianism
have been concocted a priori. The in-
tellectual or logical man, rather than
We
Sec-
the understanding or observant man,
set himself to imagine designs-to dic-
tate purposes to God. Having thus
fathomed, to his satisfaction, the in-
tentions of Jehovah, out of these inten-
tions he built his innumerable systems
of mind. In the matter of phrenology,
for example, we first determined, nat-
urally enough, that it was the design
of the Deity that man should eat. We
then assigned to man an organ of ali-
mentiveness, and this organ is the
scourge with which the Deity compels
man, will-I nill-I, into eating.
ondly, having settled it to be God's
will that man should continue his spe-
cies, we discovered an organ of ama-
tiveness, forthwith. And so with com-
bativeness, with ideality, with causality,
with constructiveness, so, in short,
with every organ, whether representing
a propensity, a moral sentiment, or a
faculty of the pure intellect. And in
these arrangements of the principia of
human action, the Spurzheimites,
whether right or wrong, in part, or
upon the whole, have but followed, in
principle, the footsteps of their prede-
cessors; deducing and establishing every
thing from the preconceived destiny of
1
THE IMP OF THE PERVERSE
221
man, and upon the ground of the ob-
jects of his Creator.
It would have been wiser, it would
have been safer, to classify (if classify
we must) upon the basis of what man
usually or occasionally did, and was
always occasionally doing, rather than
upon the basis of what we took it for
granted the Deity intended him to do.
If we cannot comprehend God in his
visible works, how then in his incon-
ceivable thoughts, that call the works
into being? If we cannot understand
him in his objective creatures, how
then in his substantive moods and
phases of creation?
Induction, a posteriori, would have
brought phrenology to admit, as an
innate and primitive principle of hu-
man action, a paradoxical something,
which we may call perverseness, for
want of a more characteristic term. In
the sense I intend, it is, in fact, a mo-
bile without motive, a motive not mo-
tivirt. Through its promptings we act
without comprehensible object; or, if
this shall be understood as a contra-
diction in terms, we may so far modify
the proposition as to say, that through
its promptings we act, for the reason
that we should not. In theory, no rea-
son can be more unreasonable; but,
in fact, there is none more strong.
With certain minds, under certain con-
ditions, it becomes absolutely irresisti-
ble. I am not more certain that I
breathe, than that the assurance of the
wrong or error of any action is often
the one unconquerable force which im-
pels us, and alone impels us to its
prosecution. Nor will this overwhelm-
ing tendency to do wrong for the
wrong's sake, admit of analysis, or reso-
lution into ulterior elements. It is a
radical, a primitive impulse-elemen-
tary. It will be said, I am aware,
that when we persist in acts because
we feel we should not persist in them,
our conduct is but a modification of
that which ordinarily springs from the
combativeness of phrenology. But a
glance will show the fallacy of this
idea. The phrenological combativeness
has for its essence, the necessity of
self-defence. It is our safeguard
against injury. Its principle regards
our well-being; and thus the desire
to be well is excited simultaneously
with its development. It follows, that
the desire to be well must be excited
simultaneously with any principle which
shall be merely a modification of com-
bativeness, but in the case of that some-
thing which I term perverseness, the
desire to be well is not only not aroused,
but a strongly antagonistical sentiment
exists.
An appeal to one's own heart is,
after all, the best reply to the sophis-
try just noticed. No one who trust-
ingly consults and thoroughly questions
his own soul, will be disposed to deny
the entire radicalness of the propensity
in question. It is not more incompre-
hensible than distinctive. There lives
no man who at some period has not
been tormented, for example, by an
earnest desire to tantalize a listener
by circumlocution. The speaker is
aware that he displeases; he has every
intention to please; he is usually curt,
precise, and clear; the most laconic
and luminous language is struggling for
utterance upon his tongue; it is only
with difficulty that he restrains him-
self from giving it flow; he dreads and
deprecates the anger of him whom he
addresses; yet, the thought strikes him,
222
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
The
that by certain involutions and paren-
theses this anger may be engendered.
That single thought is enough.
impulse increases to a wish, the wish
to a desire, the desire to an uncon-
trollable longing, and the longing (to
the deep regret and mortification of the
speaker, and in defiance of all conse-
quences) is indulged.
We have a task before us which
must be speedily performed. We know
that it will be ruinous to make de-
lay. The most important crisis of our
life calls, trumpet-tongued, for imme-
diate energy and action. We glow, we
are consumed with eagerness to com-
mence the work, with the anticipation
of whose glorious result our whole
souls are on fire. It must, it shall be
undertaken to-day, and yet we put it
off until to-morrow; and why? There
is no answer, except that we feel per-
verse, using the word with no com-
prehension of the principle. To-mor-
row arrives, and with it a more im-
patient anxiety to do our duty, but
with this very increase of anxiety ar-
rives, also, a nameless, a positively fear-
ful, because unfathomable, craving for
delay.
This craving gathers strength
as the moments fly. The last hour for
action is at hand. We tremble with
the violence of the conflict within us,-
of the definite with the indefinite-of
the substance with the shadow. But,
if the contest has proceeded thus far,
it is the shadow which prevails,-we
struggle in vain. The clock strikes,
and is the knell of our welfare.
the same time, it is the chanticleer-
note to the ghost that has so long
overawed us. It flies-it disappears-
we are free. The old energy returns.
We will labor now. Alas, it is too late!
At
We stand upon the brink of a preci
pice. We peer into the abyss-we
grow sick and dizzy. Our first impulse
is to shrink from the danger. Unac-
countably we remain. By slow degrees
our sickness and dizziness and horror
become merged in a cloud of unnam
able feeling. By gradations, still more
imperceptible, this cloud assumes shape,
as did the vapor from the bottle out
of which arose the genius in the Ara-
bian Nights. But out of this our cloud
upon the precipice's edge, there grows
into palpability, a shape, far more ter-
rible than any genius or any demon
of a tale, and yet it is but a thought,
although a fearful one, and one which
chills the very marrow of our bones
with the fierceness of the delight of
its horror. It is merely the idea of
what would be our sensations during
the sweeping precipitancy of a fall from
such a height. And this fall-this
rushing annihilation-for the very rea-
son that it involves that one most
ghastly and loathsome of all the most
ghastly and loathsome images of death
and suffering which have ever pre-
sented themselves to our imagination—
for this very cause do we now the most
vividly desire it. And because our rea-
son violently deters us from the brink,
therefore do we the most impetuously
approach it. There is no passion in
nature so demoniacally impatient, as
that of him who, shuddering upon the
edge of a precipice, thus meditates a
plunge. To indulge, for a moment, in
any attempt at thought, is to be inevi-
tably lost; for reflection but urges us
to forbear, and therefore it is, I say,
that we cannot. If there be no friendly
arm to check us, or if we fail in a
sudden effort to prostrate ourselves
THE IMP OF THE PERVERSE
223
backward from the abyss, we plunge,
and are destroyed.
Examine these similar actions as we
will, we shall find them resulting solely
from the spirit of the Perverse. We
perpetrate them because we feel that
we should not. Beyond or behind this
there is no intelligible principle; and
we might, indeed, deem this perverse-
ness a direct instigation of the arch-
fiend, were it not occasionally known
to operate in furtherance of good.
I have said thus much, that in some
measure I may answer your question-
that I may explain to you why I am
here that I may assign to you some-
thing that shall have at least the faint
aspect of a cause for my wearing these
fetters, and for my tenanting this cell
of the condemned. Had I not been
thus prolix, you might either have mis-
understood me altogether, or, with the
rabble, have fancied me mad. As it
is, you will easily perceive that I am
one of the many uncounted victims of
the Imp of the Perverse.
At
It is impossible that any deed could
have been wrought with a more thor-
ough deliberation. For weeks, for
months, I pondered upon the means
of the murder. I rejected a thousand
schemes, because their accomplishment
involved a chance of detection.
length, in reading some French me-
moirs, I found an account of a nearly
fatal illness that occurred to Madame
Pilau, through the agency of a candle
accidentally poisoned. The idea struck
my fancy at once. I knew my victim's
habit of reading in bed. I knew, too,
that his apartment was narrow and ill-
ventilated. But I need not vex you
with impertinent details. I need not
describe the easy artifices by which
I substituted, in his bed-room candle-
stand, a wax-light of my own making
for the one which I there found. The
next morning he was discovered dead
in his bed, and the coroner's verdict
was-"Death by the visitation of God."
Having inherited his estate, all went
well with me for years. The idea of
detection never once entered my brain.
Of the remains of the fatal taper I
had myself carefully disposed. I had
left no shadow of a clew by which it
would be possible to convict, or even
to suspect, me of the crime. It is
inconceivable how rich a sentiment of
satisfaction arose in my bosom as I
reflected upon my absolute security.
For a very long period of time I was
accustomed to revel in this sentiment.
It afforded me more real delight than
all the mere worldly advantages accru-
ing from my sin. But there arrived
at length an epoch, from which the
pleasurable feeling grew, by scarcely
perceptible gradations, into a haunting
and harassing thought. It harassed be-
cause it haunted. I could scarcely get
rid of it for an instant. It is quite a
common thing to be thus annoyed with
the ringing in our ears, or rather in
our memories, of the burthen of some
ordinary song, or some unimpressive
snatches from an opera. Nor will we
be the less tormented if the song in
itself be good, or the opera air meri-
torious. In this manner, at last, I
would perpetually catch myself pon-
dering upon my security, and repeating,
in a low under-tone, the phrase, "I am
safe."
One day, whilst sauntering along the
streets, I arrested myself in the act of
murmuring, half aloud, these customary
syllables. In a fit of petulance, I re-
224
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
modelled them thus; "I am safe-I am
safe-yes-if I be not fool enough
to make open confession!"
No sooner had I spoken these words,
than I felt an icy chill creep to my
heart. I had had some experience in
these fits of perversity (whose nature
I have been at some trouble to ex-
plain), and I remembered well that in
no instance I had successfully resisted
their attacks. And now my own casual
self-suggestion that I might possibly
be fool enough to confess the murder
of which I had been guilty, confronted
me, as if the very ghost of him whom
I had murdered-and beckoned me on
to death.
At first, I made an effort to shake
off this nightmare of the soul. I walked
vigorously faster - still faster - at
length I ran. I felt a maddening de-
sire to shriek aloud. Every succeed-
ing wave of thought overwhelmed me
with new terror, for, alas! I well, too
well, understood that to think,
in my
situation, was to be lost. I still quick-
ened my pace. I bounded like a mad-
man through the crowded thorough-
fares. At length, the populace took
the alarm, and pursued me. I felt then
the consummation of my fate. Could I
have torn out my tongue, I would have
done it but a rough voice resounded
in my ears-a rougher grasp seized me
by the shoulder. I turned-I gasped
for breath. For a moment I experi-
enced all the pangs of suffocation; I
became blind, and deaf, and giddy;
and then some invisible fiend, I thought,
struck me with his broad palm upon
the back. The long-imprisoned secret
burst forth from my soul.
They say that I spoke with a dis-
tinct enunciation, but with marked em-
phasis and passionate hurry, as if in
dread of interruption before concluding
the brief but pregnant sentences that
consigned me to the hangman and to
hell.
Having related all that was neces-
sary for the fullest judicial conviction,
I fell prostrate in a swoon.
But why shall I say more? To-day
I wear these chains, and am here!
To-morrow I shall be fetterless!-but
where?
William Wilson
(Published in The Gift, 1840.-Ed.)
What say of it? what say CONSCIENCE
grim,
That spectre in my path?
-Chamberlain's Pharronida.
LET me call myself, for the present,
William Wilson. The fair page now
lying before me need not be sullied with
my real appellation. This has been
already too much an object for the
scorn-for the horror-for the detesta-
tion of my race. To the uttermost
regions of the globe have not the in-
dignant winds bruited its unparalleled
infamy? Oh, outcast of all outcasts
most abandoned!-to the earth art
thou not for ever dead? to its honors,
to its flowers, to its golden aspirations?
WILLIAM WILSON
225
--and a cloud, dense, dismal, and limit-
less, does it not hang eternally between
thy hopes and heaven?
I would not, if I could, here or to-
day, embody a record of my later years
of unspeakable misery and unpardon-
able crime. This epoch-these later
years took unto themselves a sudden
elevation in turpitude, whose origin
alone it is my present purpose to assign.
Men usually grow base by degrees.
From me, in an instant, all virtue
dropped bodily as a mantle. From
comparatively trivial wickedness I
passed, with the stride of a giant, into
more than the enormities of an Elah-
Gabalus. What chance-what one
event brought this evil thing to pass,
bear with me while I relate. Death
approaches; and the shadow which
foreruns him has thrown a softening
influence over my spirit. I long, in
passing through the dim valley, for the
sympathy-I had nearly said for the
pity of my fellow men. I would fain
have them believe that I have been, in
some measure, the slave of circum-
stances beyond human control. I would
wish them to seek out for me, in the
details I am about to give, some little
oasis of fatality amid a wilderness of
error. I would have them allow-what
they cannot refrain from allowing-
that, although temptation may have ere-
while existed as great, man was never
thus, at least, tempted before-cer-
tainly, never thus fell. And is it there-
fore that he has never thus suffered?
Have I not indeed been living in a
dream? And am I not now dying a
victim to the horror and the mystery of
the wildest of all sublunary visions?
I am the descendant of a race whose
imaginative and easily excitable tem-
perament has at all times rendered them
remarkable; and, in my earliest infancy,
I gave evidence of having fully in-
herited the family character. As I
advanced in years it was more strongly
developed; becoming, for many reasons,
a cause of serious disquietude to my
friends, and of positive injury to my-
self. I grew self-willed, addicted to
the wildest caprices, and a prey to the
most ungovernable passions. Weak-
minded, and beset with constitutional
infirmities akin to my own, my parents
could do but little to check the evil
propensities which distinguished me.
Some feeble and ill-directed efforts re-
sulted in complete failure on their part,
and, of course, in total triumph on
mine. Thenceforward my voice was
a household law; and at an age when
few children have abandoned their lead-
ing-strings, I was left to the guidance
of my own will, and became, in all but
name, the master of my own actions.
My earliest recollections of a school-
life, are connected with a large, ram-
bling, Elizabethan house, in a misty-
looking village of England, where were
a vast number of gigantic and gnarled
trees, and where all the houses were
excessively ancient. In truth, it was a
dream-like and spirit-soothing place,
that venerable old town. At this
moment, in fancy, I feel the refreshing
chilliness of its deeply-shadowed ave-
nues, inhale the fragrance of its thou-
sand shrubberies, and thrill anew with
undefinable delight, at the deep hollow
note of the church-bell, breaking, each
hour, with sullen and sudden roar, upon
the stillness of the dusky atmosphere
in which the fretted Gothic steeple lay
imbedded and asleep.
It gives me, perhaps, as much of
226
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
pleasure as I can now in any manner
experience, to dwell upon minute recol-
lections of the school and its concerns.
Steeped in misery as I am-misery,
alas! only too real-I shall be pardoned
for seeking relief, however slight and
temporary, in the weakness of a few
rambling details.
These, moreover,
utterly trivial, and even ridiculous in
themselves, assume, to my fancy, ad-
ventitious importance, as connected
with a period and a locality when and
where I recognize the first ambiguous
monitions of the destiny which after-
ward so fully overshadowed me. Let
me then remember.
The house, I have said, was old and
irregular. The grounds were extensive,
and a high and solid brick wall, topped
with a bed of mortar and broken glass,
encompassed the whole. This prison-
like rampart formed the limit of our
domain; beyond it we saw but thrice
a week-once every Saturday after-
noon, when, attended by two ushers,
we were permitted to take brief walks
in a body through some of the neigh-
boring fields and twice during Sun-
day, when we were paraded in the same
formal manner to the morning and
evening service in the one church in
the village. Of this church the prin-
cipal of our school was pastor. With
how deep a spirit of wonder and per-
plexity was I wont to regard him from
our remote pew in the gallery, as, with
step solemn and slow, he ascended the
pulpit! This reverend man, with coun-
tenance so demurely benign, with robes
so glossy and so clerically flowing, with
wig so minutely powdered, so rigid and
so vast, could this be he who, of late,
with sour visage, and in snuffy habili-
ments, administered, ferule in hand, the
Draconian Laws of the academy? Oh,
gigantic paradox, too utterly monstrous
for solution!
At an angle of the ponderous wall
frowned a more ponderous gate. It
was riveted and studded with iron bolts,
and surmounted with jagged iron spikes.
What impressions of deep awe did it
inspire! It was never opened save
for the three periodical egressions and
ingressions already mentioned; then, in
every creak of its mighty hinges, we
found a plenitude of mystery-a world
of matter for solemn remark, or for
more solemn meditation.
The extensive enclosure was irregular
in form, having many capacious re-
cesses. Of these, three or four of the
largest constituted the play-ground. It
was level, and covered with fine hard
gravel. I well remember it had no
trees, nor benches, nor any thing similar
within it. Of course it was in the rear
of the house. In front lay a small
parterre, planted with box and other
shrubs, but through this sacred division
we passed only upon rare occasions in-
deed-such as a first advent to school
or final departure thence, or perhaps,
when a parent or friend having called
for us, we joyfully took our way home
for the Christmas or Midsummer
holidays.
But the house!-how quaint an old
building was this!-to me how veritable
a palace of enchantment! There was
really no end to its windings-to its
incomprehensible subdivisions. It was
difficult, at any given time, to say with
certainty upon which of its two stories
one happened to be. From each room
to every other there were sure to be
found three or four steps either in
ascent or descent. Then the lateral
WILLIAM WILSON
227
branches were innumerable-inconceiv-
able and so returning in upon them-
selves, that our most exact ideas in
regard to the whole mansion were not
very far different from those with
which we pondered upon infinity. Dur-
ing the five years of my residence here,
I was never able to ascertain with pre-
cision, in what remote locality lay the
little sleeping apartment assigned to
myself and some eighteen or twenty
other scholars.
The school-room was the largest in
the house-I could not help thinking,
in the world. It was very long, nar-
row, and dismally low, with pointed
Gothic windows and a ceiling of oak.
In a remote and terror-inspiring angle
was a square enclosure of eight or ten
feet, comprising the sanctum, “during
hours," of our principal, the Reverend
Dr. Bransby. It was a solid structure,
with massy door, sooner than open
which in the absence of the "Dominie,"
we would all have willingly perished
by the peine forte et dure. In other
angles were two other similar boxes, far
less reverenced, indeed, but still greatly
matters of awe. One of these was the
pulpit of the "classical" usher, one of
the "English and mathematical."
terspersed about the room, crossing and
recrossing in endless irregularity, were
innumerable benches and desks, black,
ancient, and time-worn, piled desper-
ately with much bethumbed books, and
so beseamed with initial letters, names
at full length, grotesque figures, and
other multiplied efforts of the knife,
as to have entirely lost what little of
original form might have been their
portion in days long departed. A huge
bucket with water stood at one ex-
In-
tremity of the room, and a clock of
stupendous dimensions at the other.
Encompassed by the massy walls of
this venerable academy, I passed, yet
not in tedium or disgust, the years of
the third lustrum of my life. The
teeming brain of childhood requires no
external world of incident to occupy or
amuse it; and the apparently dismal
monotony of a school was replete with
more intense excitement than my riper
youth has derived from luxury, or my
full manhood from crime. Yet I must
believe that my first mental develop-
ment had in it much of the uncommon
-even much of the outre. Upon man-
kind at large the events of very early
existence rarely leave in mature age
any definite impression. All is gray
shadow-a weak and irregular remem-
brance an indistinct regathering of
feeble pleasures and phantasmagoric
pains. With me this is not so. In
childhood I must have felt with the
energy of a man what I now find
stamped upon memory in lines as vivid,
as deep, and as durable as the exergues
of the Carthaginian medals.
Yet in fact-in the fact of the
world's view-how little was there to
remember! The morning's awakening,
the nightly summons to bed; the con-
nings, the recitations; the periodical
half-holidays, and perambulations; the
play-ground, with its broils, its pas-
times, its intrigues;-these, by a men-
tal sorcery long forgotten, were made
to involve a wilderness of sensation, a
world of rich incident, a universe of
varied emotion, of excitement, the most
passionate and spirit-stirring. "Oh, le
bon temps que se siecle de fer!"
In truth, the ardor, the enthusiasm,
and the imperiousness of my disposi
228
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
tion, soon rendered me a marked char-
acter among my schoolmates, and by
slow, but natural gradations, gave me
an ascendancy over all not greatly older
than myself;-over all with a single
exception. This exception was found
in the person of a scholar, who,
although no relation, bore the same
christian and surname as myself;-a
circumstance, in fact, little remarkable;
for notwithstanding a noble descent,
mine was one of those every-day appel-
lations which seem, by prescriptive
right, to have been, time out of mind,
the common property of the mob. In
this narrative I have therefore desig-
nated myself as William Wilson-a fic-
titious title not very dissimilar to the
real. My namesake alone, of those
who in school phraseology constituted
"our set," presumed to compete with
me in the studies of the class-in the
sports and broils of the play-ground
to refuse implicit belief in my asser-
tions, and submission to my will-in-
deed, to interfere with my arbitrary
dictation in any respect whatsoever. If
there is on earth a supreme and unqual-
ified despotism, it is the despotism of
a master-mind in boyhood over the less
energetic spirits of its companions.
Wilson's rebellion was to me a source
of the greatest embarrassment; the
more so as, in spite of the bravado
with which in public I made a point
of treating him and his pretensions, I
secretly felt that I feared him, and
could not help thinking the equality.
which he maintained so easily with my-
self, a proof of his true superiority;
since not to be overcome cost me a
perpetual struggle. Yet this superior-
ity even this equality-was in truth
acknowledged by no one but myself;
our associates, by some unaccountable
blindness, seemed not even to suspect
it. Indeed, his competition, his resist-
ance, and especially his impertinent and
dogged interference with my purposes,
were not more pointed than private.
He appeared to be destitute alike of the
ambition which urged, and of the pas-
sionate energy of mind which enabled
me to excel. In his rivalry he might
have been supposed actuated solely by
a whimsical desire to thwart, astonish,
or mortify myself; although there were
times when I could not help observing,
with a feeling made up of wonder,
abasement, and pique, that he mingled
with his injuries, his insults, or his con-
tradictions, a certain most inappro-
priate, and assuredly most unwelcome
affectionateness of manner. I could
only conceive this singular behavior to
arise from a consummate self-conceit
assuming the vulgar airs of patronage
and protection.
Perhaps it was this latter trait in
Wilson's conduct, conjoined with our
identity of name, and the mere accident
of our having entered the school upon
the same day, which set afloat the
notion that we were brothers, among
the senior class in the academy. These
do not usually inquire with much strict-
ness into the affairs of their juniors.
I have before said, or should have said,
that Wilson was not, in a most remote
degree, connected with my family. But
assuredly if we had been brothers we
must have been twins; for, after leav-
ing Dr. Bransby's, I casually learned
that my namesake was born on the nine-
teenth of January, 1813-and this is a
somewhat remarkable coincidence; for
the day is precisely that of my own
nativity.
WILLIAM WILSON
229
It may seem strange that in spite of
the continual anxiety occasioned me by
the rivalry of Wilson, and his intoler-
able spirit of contradiction, I could not
bring myself to hate him altogether.
We had, to be sure, nearly every day a
quarrel in which, yielding me publicly
the palm of victory, he, in some man-
ner, contrived to make me feel that it
was he who had deserved it; yet a sense
of pride on my part, and a veritable
dignity on his own, kept us always
upon what are called "speaking terms,"
while there were many points of strong
congeniality in our tempers, operating
to awake in me a sentiment which our
position alone, perhaps, prevented from
ripening into friendship. It is difficult,
indeed, to define, or even to describe,
my real feelings toward him. They
formed a motley and heterogeneous ad-
mixture;-some petulant animosity,
which was not yet hatred, some esteem,
more respect, much fear, with a world
of uneasy curiosity. To the moralist it
will be necessary to say, in addition,
that Wilson and myself were the most
inseparable of companions.
It was no doubt the anomalous state
of affairs existing between us, which
turned all my attacks upon him, (and
there were many, either open or covert)
into the channel of banter or practical
joke (giving pain while assuming the
aspect of mere fun) rather than into
a more serious and determined hostility.
But my endeavors on this head were
by no means uniformly successful, even
when my plans were the most wittily
concocted; for my namesake had much
about him, in character, of that unas-
suming and quiet austerity which, while
enjoying the poignancy of its own
jokes, has no heel of Achilles in itself,
and absolutely refuses to be laughed
at. I could find, indeed, but one vul-
nerable point, and that, lying in a per-
sonal peculiarity, arising, perhaps, from
constitutional disease, would have been
spared by any antagonist less at his
wit's end than myself;-my rival had
a weakness in the facial or guttural
organs, which precluded him from rais-
ing his voice at any time above a very
low whisper. Of this defect I did not
fail to take what poor advantage lay
in my power.
Wilson's retaliations in kind were
many; and there was one form of his
practical wit that disturbed me beyond
measure. How his sagacity first dis-
covered at all that so petty a thing
would vex me, is a question I never
could solve; but having discovered, he
habitually practised the annoyance. I
had always felt aversion to my un-
courtly patronymic, and its very com-
mon, if not plebeian prænomen. The
words were venom in my ears; and
when, upon the day of my arrival, a
second William Wilson came also to
the academy, I felt angry with him for
bearing the name, and doubly disgusted
with the name because a stranger bore
it, who would be the cause of its two-
fold repetition, who would be constantly
in my presence, and whose concerns,
in the ordinary routine of the school
business, must inevitably, on account of
the detestable coincidence, be often con-
founded with my own.
The feeling of vexation thus engen-
dered grew stronger with every circum-
stance tending to show resemblance,
moral or physical, between my rival
and myself. I had not then discov-
ered the remarkable fact that we were
of the same age; but I saw that we
230
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
were of the same height, and I per-
ceived that we were even singularly
alike in general contour of person and
outline of feature. I was galled, too,
by the rumor touching a relationship,
which had grown current in the upper
forms. In a word, nothing could more
seriously disturb me, (although I scru-
pulously concealed such disturbance),
than any allusion to a similarity of mind,
person, or condition existing between us.
But, in truth, I had no reason to believe
that (with the exception of the matter
of relationship, and in the case of Wilson
himself), this similarity had ever been
made a subject of comment, or even ob-
served at all by our schoolfellows. That
he observed it in all its bearings, and as
fixedly as I, was apparent; but that he
could discover in such circumstances so
fruitful a field of annoyance, can only
be attributed, as I said before, to his
more than ordinary penetration.
His cue, which was to perfect an imi-
tation of myself, lay both in words and
in actions; and most admirably did he
play his part. My dress it was an easy
matter to copy; my gait and general
manner were without difficulty, appro-
priated; in spite of his constitutional de-
fect, even my voice did not escape him.
My louder tones were, of course, unat-
tempted, but then the key,—it was iden-
tical; and his singular whisper, it grew
the very echo of my own.
How greatly this most exquisite por-
traiture harassed me (for it could not
justly be termed a caricature), I will not
now venture to describe. I had but one
consolation—in the fact that the imita-
tion, apparently, was noticed by myself
alone, and that I had to endure only the
knowing and strangely sarcastic smiles
of my namesake himself. Satisfied with
having produced in my bosom the in-
tended effect, he seemed to chuckle in
secret over the sting he had inflicted,
and was characteristically disregardful of
the public applause which the success of
his witty endeavors might have so easily
elicited. That the school, indeed, did
not feel his design, perceive its accom-
plishment, and participate in his sneer,
was, for many anxious months, a riddle
I could not resolve. Perhaps the gra-
dation of his copy rendered it not readily
perceptible; or, more possibly, I owed
my security to the masterly air of the
copyist, who, disdaining the letter
(which in a painting is all the obtuse
can see), gave but the full spirit of his
original for my individual contemplation
and chagrin.
I have already more than once spoken
of the disgusting air of patronage which
he assumed toward me, and of his fre-
quent officious interference with my will.
This interference often took the ungra-
cious character of advice; advice not
openly given, but hinted or insinuated.
I received it with a repugnance which
gained strength as I grew in years. Yet,
at this distant day, let me do him the
simple justice to acknowledge that I can
recall no occasion when the suggestions
of my rival were on the side of those
errors or follies so usual to his immature
age and seeming inexperience; that his
moral sense, at least, if not his general
talents and worldly wisdom, was far
keener than my own; and that I might,
to-day, have been a better and thus a
happier man, had I less frequently re-
jected the counsels embodied in those
meaning whispers which I then but too
cordially hated and too bitterly despised.
As it was I at length grew restive in
the extreme under his distasteful super-
WILLIAM WILSON
231
vision, and daily resented more and more
openly, what I considered his intolerable
arrogance. I have said that, in the first
years of our connection as schoolmates,
my feelings in regard to him might have
been easily ripened into friendship; but,
in the latter months of my residence at
the academy, although the intrusion of
his ordinary manner had, beyond doubt,
in some measure, abated, my sentiments,
in nearly similar proportion, partook
very much of positive hatred. Upon
one occasion he saw this, I think, and
afterward avoided, or made a show
of avoiding me.
It was about the same period, if I
remember aright, that, in an altercation
of violence with him, in which he was
more than usually thrown off his guard,
and spoke and acted with an openness
of demeanor rather foreign to his
nature, I discovered, or fancied I dis-
covered, in his accent, in his air, and
general appearance, a something which
first startled, and then deeply inter-
ested me, by bringing to mind dim vis-
ions of my earliest infancy-wild, con-
fused, and thronging memories of a
time when memory herself was yet un-
born. I cannot better describe the sen-
sation which oppressed me, than by
saying that I could with difficulty shake
off the belief of my having been ac-
quainted with the being who stood be-
fore me, at some epoch very long ago—
some point of the past even infinitely
remote. The delusion, however, faded
rapidly as it came; and I mention it at
all but to define the day of the last
conversation I there held with my sin-
gular namesake.
The huge old house, with its count-
less sub-divisions, had several large
chambers communicating with each
other, where slept the greater number
of the students. There were, however
(as must necessarily happen in a build-
ing so awkwardly planned), many little
nooks or recesses, the odds and ends of
the structure; and these the economic
ingenuity of Dr. Bransby had also fitted
up as dormitories; although, being the
merest closets, they were capable of
accommodating but a single individual.
One of these small apartments was oc-
cupied by Wilson.
One night, about the close of my
fifth year at the school, and immediately
after the altercation just mentioned,
finding every one wrapped in sleep, I
arose from bed, and, lamp in hand,
stole through a wilderness of narrow
passages, from my own bedroom to
that of my rival. I had long been plot-
ting one of those ill-natured pieces of
practical wit at his expense in which I
had hitherto been so uniformly un-
successful. It was my intention, now,
to put my scheme in operation and I
resolved to make him feel the whole
extent of the malice with which I was
imbued. Having reached his closet, I
noiselessly entered, leaving the lamp,
with a shade over it, on the outside.
I advanced a step and listened to the
sound of his tranquil breathing. As-
sured of his being asleep, I returned,
took the light, and with it again ap-
proached the bed. Close curtains were
around it, which, in the prosecution of
my plan, I slowly and quietly withdrew,
when the bright rays fell vividly upon
the sleeper, and my eyes at the same
moment, upon his countenance.
looked; and a numbness, an iciness of
feeling instantly pervaded my frame.
My breast heaved, my knees tottered,
my whole spirit became possessed with
I
232
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
an abjectless yet intolerable horror.
Gasping for breath, I lowered the lamp
in still nearer proximity to the face.
Were these-these the lineaments of
William Wilson? I saw, indeed, that
they were his, but I shook as if with
a fit of the ague, in fancying they were
not. What was there about them to
confound me in this manner? I gazed;
-while my brain reeled with a multi-
tude of incoherent thoughts. Not thus
he appeared-assuredly not thus-in
the vivacity of his waking hours. The
same name! the same contour of per-
son! the same day of arrival at the
academy! And then his dogged and
meaningless imitation of my gait, my
voice, my habits, and my manner! Was
it, in truth, within the bounds of human
possibility, that what I now saw was
the result, merely, of the habitual prac-
tise of this sarcastic imitation? Awe-
stricken, and with a creeping shudder,
I extinguished the lamp, passed silently
from the chamber, and left, at once,
the halls of that old academy, never to
enter them again.
After a lapse of some months, spent
at home in mere idleness, I found my-
self a student at Eton. The brief in-
terval had been sufficient to enfeeble
my remembrance of the events at Dr.
Bransby's, or at least to effect a mate-
rial change in the nature of the feelings
with which I remembered them. The
truth-the tragedy-of the drama was
no more. I could now find room to
doubt the evidence of my senses; and
seldom called up the subject at all but
with wonder at the extent of human
credulity, and a smile at the vivid force
of the imagination which I hereditarily
possessed. Neither was this species of
skepticism likely to be diminished by
the character of the life I led at Eton.
The vortex of thoughtless folly into
which I there so immediately and so
recklessly plunged, washed away all but
the froth of my past hours, ingulfed
at once every solid or serious impres-
sion, and left to memory only the
veriest levities of a former existence.
I do not wish, however, to trace the
course of my miserable profligacy here
-a profligacy which set at defiance the
laws, while it eluded the vigilance of the
institution. Three years of folly, passed
without profit, had but given me rooted
habits of vice, and added, in a some-
what unusual degree, to my bodily
stature, when, after a week of soulless
dissipation, I invited a small party of
the most dissolute students to a secret
carousal in my chambers. We met at a
late hour of the night; for our debauch-
eries were to be faithfully protracted
until morning. The wine flowed freely,
and there were not wanting other and
perhaps more dangerous seductions; so
that the gray dawn had already faintly
appeared in the east while our delirious
extravagance was at its height. Madly
flushed with cards and intoxication, I
was in the act of insisting upon a toast
of more than wonted profanity, when
my attention was suddenly diverted by
the violent, although partial, unclosing
of the door of the apartment, and by
the eager voice of a servant from with-
out. He said that some person, appar-
ently in great haste, demanded to speak
with me in the hall.
Wildly excited with wine, the unex-
pected interruption rather delighted
than surprised me. I staggered for-
ward at once, and a few steps brought
me to the vestibule of the building.
In this low and small room there hung
WILLIAM WILSON
233
no lamp; and now no light at all was
admitted, save that of the exceedingly
feeble dawn which made its way
through the semi-circular window. As
I put my foot over the threshold, I
became aware of the figure of a youth
about my own height, and habited in a
white kerseymere morning frock, cut in
the novel fashion of the one I myself
wore at the moment. This the faint
light enabled me to perceive; but the
features of his face I could not dis-
tinguish. Upon my entering, he strode
hurriedly up to me, and, seizing me by
the arm with a gesture of petulant im-
patience, whispered the words "William
Wilson" in my ear.
I
grew perfectly sober in an instant.
There was that in the manner of the
stranger, and in the tremulous shake of
his uplifted finger, as he held it between
my eyes and the light, which filled me
with unqualified amazement; but it was
not this which had so violently moved
me. It was the pregnancy of solemn
admonition in the singular, low, hissing
utterance; and, above all, it was the
character, the tone, the key, of those
few, simple, and familiar, yet whispered
syllables, which came with a thousand
thronging memories of by-gone days,
and struck upon my soul with the shock
of a galvanic battery. Ere I could
recover the use of my senses he was
gone.
Although this event failed not of a
vivid effect upon my disordered imagi-
nation, yet was it evanescent as vivid.
For some weeks, indeed, I busied my-
self in earnest enquiry, or was wrapped
in a cloud of morbid speculation. I
did not pretend to disguise from my
perception the identity of the singular
individual who thus perseveringly inter-
fered with my affairs, and harassed me
with his insinuated counsel. But who
and what was this Wilson?-and whence
came he?—and what were his purposes?
Upon neither of these points could I be
satisfied-merely ascertaining, in regard
to him, that a suddent accident in his
family had caused his removal from Dr.
Bransby's academy on the afternoon of
the day in which I myself had eloped.
But in a brief period I ceased to think
upon the subject, my attention being all
absorbed in a contemplated departure
for Oxford. Thither I soon went, the
uncalculating vanity of my parents fur-
nishing me with an outfit and annual
establishment, which would enable me
to indulge at will in the luxury already
so dear to my heart-to vie in profuse-
ness of expenditure with the haughtiest
heirs of the wealthiest earldoms in
Great Britain.
Excited by such appliances to vice,
my constitutional temperament broke
forth with redoubled ardor, and I
spurned even the common restraints of
decency in the mad infatuation of my
revels. But it were absurd to pause in
the detail of my extravagance. Let it
suffice, that among spendthrifts I out-
Heroded Herod, and that, giving name
to a multitude of novel follies, I added
no brief appendix to the long catalogue
of vices then usual in the most dissolute
university in Europe.
It could hardly be credited, however,
that I had, even here, so utterly fallen
from the gentlemanly estate, as to seek
acquaintance with the vilest arts of the
gambler by profession, and, having be-
come an adept in his despicable science,
to practice it habitually as a means of
increasing my already enormous income
at the expense of the weak-minded
234
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
among my fellow-collegians. Such,
nevertheless, was the fact. And the
very enormity of this offence against
all manly and honorable sentiment
proved, beyond doubt, the main if not
the sole reason of the impunity with
which it was committed. Who, indeed,
among my most abandoned associates,
would not rather have disputed the
clearest evidence of his senses, than
have suspected of such courses, the gay,
the frank, the generous William Wil-
son-the noblest and most liberal com-
moner at Oxford-him whose follies
(said his parasites) were but the follies
of youth and unbridled fancy-whose
errors but inimitable whim-whose
darkest vice but a careless and dashing
extravagance?
I had been now two years success-
fully busied in this way, when there
came to the university a young parvenu
nobleman, Glendenning-rich, said re-
port, as Herodes Atticus-his riches,
too, as easily acquired. I soon found
him of weak intellect, and, of course,
marked him as a fitting subject for my
skill. I frequently engaged him in play,
and contrived, with the gambler's usual
art, to let him win considerable sums,
the more effectually to entagle him in
my snares. At length, my schemes
being ripe, I met him (with the full-
intention that this meeting should be
final and decisive) at the chambers of
a fellow-commoner (Mr. Preston),
equally intimate with both, but who, to
do him justice, entertained not even a
remote suspicion of my design. To
give this a better coloring, I had con-
trived to have assembled a party of
some eight or ten, and was solicitously
careful that the introduction of cards
should appear accidental, and originate
in the proposal of my contemplated
dupe himself. To be brief upon a vile
topic, none of the low finesse was
omitted, so customary upon similar
occasions, that it is a just matter for
wonder how any are still found so be-
sotted as to fall its victim.
We had protracted our sitting far
into the night, and I had at length
effected the manoeuvre of getting Glen-
denning as my sole antagonist. The
game, too, was my favorite ecarte.
The rest of the company, interested
in the extent of our play, had aban-
doned their own cards, and were stand-
ing around us as spectators. The par-
venu, who had been induced by my
artifices in the early part of the eve-
ning, to drink deeply, now shuffled,
dealt, or played, with a wild nervous-
ness of manner for which his intoxica-
tion, I thought, might partially, but
could not altogether account. In a very
short period he had become my debtor
to a large amount, when, having taken
a long draught of port, he did precisely
what I had been coolly anticipating—
he proposed to double our already ex-
travagant stakes. With a well-feigned
show of reluctance, and not until after
my repeated refusal had seduced him
into some angry words which gave a
color of pique to my compliance, did
I finally comply. The result, of course,
did but prove how entirely the prey
was in my toils: in less than an hour
he had quadrupled his debt. For some
time his countenance had been losing
the florid tinge lent it by the wine; but
now, to my astonishment, I perceived
that it had grown to a pallor truly
fearful. I say, to my astonishment.
Glendenning had been represented to my
eager inquiries as immeasurably wealthy;
WILLIAM WILSON
235
and the sums which he had as yet lost,
although in themselves vast, could not,
I supposed, very seriously annoy, much
less so violently affect him. That he
was overcome by the wine just swal-
lowed, was the idea which most readily
presented itself; and, rather with a
view to the preservation of my own
character in the eyes of my associates,
than from any less interested motive,
I was about to insist, peremptorily,
upon a discontinuance of the play, when
some expressions at my elbow from
among the company, and an ejaculation
evincing utter despair on the part of
Glendenning, gave me to understand
that I had effected his total ruin under
circumstances which, rendering him an
object for the pity of all, should have
protected him from the ill offices even
of a fiend.
What now might have been my con-
duct it is difficult to say. The pitiable
condition of my dupe had thrown an
air of embarrassed gloom over all; and,
for some moments, a profound silence
was maintained, during which I could
not help feeling my cheeks tingle with
the many burning glances of scorn or
reproach cast upon me by the less aban-
doned of the party. I will even own
that an intolerable weight of anxiety
was for a brief instant lifted from my
bosom by the sudden and extraordinary
interruption which ensued. The wide,
heavy folding doors of the apartment
were all at once thrown open, to their
full extent, with a vigorous and rush-
ing impetuosity that extinguished, as
if by magic, every candle in the room.
Their light in dying, enabled us just to
perceive that a stranger had entered,
about my own height, and closely muf-
filed in a cloak. The darkness, how-
ever, was not total; and we could only
feel that he was standing in our midst.
Before any one of us could recover
from the extreme astonishment into
which this rudeness had thrown all, we
heard the voice of the intruder.
"Gentlemen," he said, in a low, dis-
tinct, and never-to-be-forgotten whisper
which thrilled to the very marrow of
my bones, "gentlemen, I make an apol-
ogy for this behavior, because in thus
behaving, I am fulfilling a duty. You
are, beyond doubt, uninformed of the
true character of the person who has
to-night won at ecarte a large sum of
money from Lord Glendenning. I will
therefore put you upon an expeditious
and decisive plan of obtaining this very
necessary information. Please to ex-
amine, at your leisure, the inner linings
of the cuff of his left sleeve, and the sev-
eral little packages which may be found
in the somewhat capacious pockets
of his embroidered morning wrapper."
While he spoke, so profound was the
stillness that one might have heard a
pin drop upon the floor. In ceasing,
he departed at once, and as abruptly as
he had entered. Can I-shall I de-
scribe my sensations? Must I say that
I felt all the horrors of the damned?
Most assuredly I had a little time for
reflection. Many hands roughly seized
me upon the spot, and lights were im-
mediately reproduced. A search en-
sued. In the lining of my sleeve were
found all the court cards essential in
ecarte, and, in the pockets of my
wrapper, a number of packs, fac-similes
of those used at our sittings, with the
single exception that mine were of the
species called, technically, arron-dees;
the honors being slightly convex
at the sides. In this disposition, the
236
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
dupe who cuts, as customary, at the
length of the pack, will invariably find
that he cuts his antagonist an honor;
while the gambler, cutting at the
breadth, will, as certainly, cut nothing
for his victim which may count in the
records of the game.
Any burst of indignation upon this dis-
covery would have affected me less than
the silent contempt, or the sarcastic
composure, with which it was received.
"Mr. Wilson," said our host, stooping
to remove from beneath his feet an ex-
ceedingly luxurious cloak of rare furs,
"Mr. Wilson, this is your property."
(The weather was cold; and, upon quit-
ting my own room, I had thrown a
cloak over my dressing wrapper, put-
ting it off upon reaching the scene of
play.) "I presume it is supererogatory
to seek here (eyeing the folds of the
garment with a bitter smile) for any
farther evidence of your skill. Indeed,
we have had enough. You will see the
necessity, I hope, of quitting Oxford-
at all events, of quitting instantly my
chambers."
Abased, humbled to the dust as I
then was, it is probable that I should
have resented this galling language by
immediate personal violence, had not
my whole attention been at the mo-
ment arrested by a fact of the most
startling character. The cloak which I
had worn was of a rare description of
fur; how rare, how extravagantly costly,
I shall not venture to say. Its fashion,
too, was of my own fantastic inven-
tion; for I was fastidious to an absurd
degree of coxcombry, in matters of this
frivolous nature. When, therefore, Mr.
Preston reached me that which he had
picked up upon the floor, and near the
folding-doors of the apartment, it was
with an astonishment nearly bordering
upon terror, that I perceived my own
already hanging on my arm, (where I
had no doubt unwittingly placed it,)
and that the one presented me was
but its exact counterpart in every, in
even the minutest possible particular.
The singular being who had so disas-
trously exposed me, had been muffled,
I remembered, in a cloak; and none
had been worn at all by any of the
members of our party, with the excep-
tion of myself. Retaining some pres-
ence of mind, I took the one offered
me by Preston; placed it, unnoticed,
over my own; left the apartment with
a resolute scowl of defiance; and, next
morning ere dawn of day, commenced
a hurried journey from Oxford to the
continent, in a perfect agony of horror
and of shame.
I fled in vain. My evil destiny pur-
sued me as if in exultation, and proved,
indeed, that the exercise of its myste-
rious dominion had as yet only begun.
Scarcely had I set foot in Paris, ere I
had fresh evidence of the detestable
interest taken by this Wilson in my
concerns. Years flew, while I experi-
enced no relief. Villain!-at Rome,
with how untimely, yet with how spec-
tral an officiousness, stepped he in be-
tween me and my ambition! at Vienna,
too at Berlin - and at Moscow!
Where, in truth, had I not bitter cause
to curse him within my heart? From
his inscrutable tyranny did I at length
flee, panic-stricken, as from a pesti-
lence; and to the very ends of the
earth I fled in vain.
And again, and again, in secret com-
munion with my own spirit, would I
demand the questions "Who is he?-
whence came he?-and what are his
.
WILLIAM WILSON
237
objects?" But no answer was there
found. And now I scrutinized, with a
minute scrutiny, the forms, and the
methods, and the leading traits of his
impertinent supervision. But even here
there was very little upon which to
base a conjecture. It was noticeable,
indeed, that, in no one of the multiplied
instances in which he had of late crossed
my path, had he so crossed it except
to frustrate those schemes, or to dis-
turb those actions, which, if fully car-
ried out, might have resulted in bitter
mischief. Poor justification this, in
truth, for an authority so imperiously
assumed! Poor indemnity for natural
rights of self-agency so pertinaciously,
so insultingly denied!
I had also been forced to notice that
my tormentor, for a very long period
of time, (while scrupulously and with
miraculous dexterity maintaining his
whim of an identity of apparel with
myself,) had so contrived it, in the
execution of his varied interference
with my will, that I saw not, at any
moment, the features of his face. Be
Wilson what he might, this, at least,
was but the veriest of affectation, or
of folly. Could he, for an instant, have
supposed that, in my admonisher at
Eton-in the destroyer of my honor at
Oxford,-in him who thwarted my am-
bition at Rome, my revenge at Paris,
my passionate love at Naples, or what
he falsely termed my avarice in Egypt,
-that in this, my arch-enemy and evil
genius, I could fail to recognize the
William Wilson of my school-boy days,
-the name-sake, the companion, the
rival, the hated and dreaded rival at
Dr. Bransby's? Impossible!-But let
me hasten to the last eventful scene of
the drama.
Thus far I had succumbed supinely
to this imperious domination. The
sentiment of deep awe with which I
habitually regarded the elevated charac-
ter, the majestic wisdom, the apparent
omnipresence and omnipotence of Wil-
son, added to a feeling of even terror,
with which certain other traits in his
nature and assumptions inspired me,
had operated, hitherto, to impress me
with an idea of my own utter weakness
and helplessness, and to suggest an
implicit, although bitterly reluctant sub-
mission to his arbitrary will.
But, of
late days, I had given myself up en-
tirely to wine; and its maddening
influence upon my hereditary temper
rendered me more and more impatient
of control. I began to murmur,-to
hesitate,-to resist. And was it only
fancy which induced me to believe that,
with the increase of my own firmness,
that of my tormentor underwent a pro-
portional diminution? Be this as it
may, I now began to feel the inspira-
tion of a burning hope, and at length
nurtured in my secret thoughts a stern
and desperate resolution that I would
submit no longer to be enslaved.
It was at Rome, during the Carnival
of 18, that I attended a masquerade
in the palazzo of the Neapolitan Duke
Di Broglio. I had indulged more freely
than usual in the excesses of the wine-
table; and now the suffocating atmos-
phere of the crowded rooms irritated
me beyond endurance. The difficulty,
too, of forcing my way through the
mazes of the company contributed not
a little to the ruffling of my temper;
for I was anxiously seeking (let me
not say with what unworthy motive)
the young, the gay, the beautiful wife
of the aged and doting Di Broglio.
238
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
With a too unscrupulous confidence she
had previously communicated to me
the secret of the costume in which she
would be habited, and now, having
caught a glimpse of her person, I was
hurrying to make my way into her
presence. At this moment I felt a light
hand placed upon my shoulder, and that
ever-remembered, low, damnable whis-
per within my ear.
In an absolute frenzy of wrath, I
turned at once upon him who had thus
interrupted me, and seized him vio-
lently by the collar. He was attired,
as I had expected, in a costume alto-
gether similar to my own; wearing a
Spanish cloak of blue velvet, begirt
about the waist with a crimson belt
sustaining a rapier. A mask of black
silk entirely covered his face.
"Scoundrel!" I said, in a voice husky
with rage, while every syllable I ut-
tered seemed as new fuel to my fury;
"scoundrel! impostor! accursed villain!
you shall not-you shall not dog me
unto death! Follow me, or I stab you
where you stand!"-and I broke my
way from the ball-room into a small
ante-chamber adjoining, dragging him
unresistingly with me as I went.
Upon entering, I thrust him furiously
from me. He staggered against the
wall, while I closed the door with an
oath, and commanded him to draw. He
hesitated but for an instant; then, with
a slight sigh, drew in silence, and put
himself upon his defence.
The contest was brief indeed. I was
frantic with every species of wild ex-
citement, and felt within my single arm
the energy and power of a multitude.
In a few seconds I forced him by sheer
strength against the wainscotting, and
thus, getting him at mercy, plunged my
sword, with brute ferocity, repeatedly
through and through his bosom.
At that instant some person tried
latch of the door. I hastened to pre-
vent an intrusion, and then immediately
returned to my dying antagonist. But
what human language can adequately
portray that astonishment, that horror
which possessed me at the spectacle
then presented to view? The brief mo-
ment in which I averted my eyes had
been sufficient to produce, apparently,
a material change in the arrangements
at the upper or farther end of the room.
A large mirror,-so at first it seemed
to me in my confusion-now stood
where none had been perceptible before;
and as I stepped up to it in extremity
of terror, mine own image, but with
features all pale and dabbled in blood,
advanced to meet me with a feeble
and tottering gait.
Thus it appeared, I say, but was not.
It was my antagonist-it was Wilson,
who then stood before me in the ago-
nies of his dissolution. His mask and
cloak lay, where he had thrown them,
upon the floor. Not a thread in all
his raiment-not a line in all the
marked and singular lineaments of his
face which was not, even in the most
absolute identity, mine own!
It was Wilson; but he spoke no
longer in a whisper, and I could have
fancied that I myself was speaking
while he said:
"You have conquered, and I yield.
Yet henceforward art thou also dead—
dead to the World, to Heaven, and to
Hope! In me didst thou exist-and,
in my death, see by this image, which
is thine own, how utterly thou hast
murdered thyself."
Mystification
(This tale is also called "Von Jung," and was published in the Broadway Journal,
vol. 2:25.-Ed.)
THE Baron Ritzner von Jung was of
a noble Hungarian family, every mem-
ber 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 concep-
tion of which Tieck, a scion of the
house, has given a vivid, although by
no means the most vivid exemplifica-
tion. My acquaintance with Ritzner
commenced at the magnificent Chateau
Jung, into which a train of droll adven-
tures, not to be made public, threw me
during the summer months of the year
18. Here it was that I obtained a
place in his regard, and here, with
somewhat more difficulty, a partial in-
sight into his mental conformation. In
later days this insight grew more clear,
as the intimacy which had at first per-
mitted it became more close; and when,
after three years separation, we met
at Gn, I knew all that it was neces-
sary to know of the character of the
Baron Ritzner von Jung.
I remember the buzz of curiosity
which his advent excited within the col-
lege precincts on the night of the
twenty-fifth of June. I remember still
more distinctly, that while he was pro-
nounced 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 wil
merely observe that, from the first mo-
ment of his setting foot within the
limits of the university, he began to
exercise over the habits, manners, per-
sons, 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 unac-
countable. Thus the brief period of
his residence at the university forms
an era in its annals, and is character-
ized by all classes of people appertain-
ing to it or its dependencies as "that
very extraordinary epoch forming the
domination of the Baron Ritzner von
Jung."
Upon his advent to Gn, he sought
me out in my apartments. He was
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 fashion that it is impossible to
conceive any, even the most complex,
combination of features, conveying so
239
240
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 anoma-
lies 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 proj-
ects into effect. I firmly believe that
no student at Gn, during that re-
nowned epoch so quaintly termed the
domination of the Baron Ritzner von
Jung, ever rightly entered into the
mystery which overshadowed his char-
acter. 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 con-
ceivable tricks, whimsicalities and buf-
fooneries 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 intui-
tive 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 conse-
quence 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 morti-
fication, which upon each such failure
of his praiseworthy endeavors, would
suffuse every lineament of his coun-
tenance, 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 be-
fore that of which I speak, have I
known the habitual mystific escape the
natural consequence of his manœuvres
-an attachment of the ludicrous to
his own character and person. Con-
tinually developed 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.
During the epoch of his residence at
Gn it really appeared that the
demon of the dolce far niente lay like
an incubus upon the university. Noth-
ing, at least, was done beyond eating
and drinking and making merry. The
apartments of the students were con-
verted 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
MYSTIFICATION
241
drunk. The
company consisted of
seven or eight individuals besides the
Baron and myself. Most of these were
young men of wealth, of high connec-
tion, 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 recounters at Gn, had given
new vigor and impulse; and thus the
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 abso-
lutely staggered even myself, who well
knew him to be at heart a ridiculer of
those very points for which he con-
tended, 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 Cole-
ridge), 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-ex-
cept, perhaps, in the single particular
that he was a very great fool. He con-
trived to bear, however, among a par-
ticular set at the university, a reputation
for deep metaphysical thinking, and, I
believe, for some logical talent. As a
duellist he had acquired great renown,
even at Gn. I forget the precise
number of victims 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 peculiari-
ties had for a long time past afforded
food for mystification. Of this, how.
ever, 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 dis-
course, or rather monologue, I per-
ceived the excitement of the latter
momentarily 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 maintain-
ing 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 dis-
tinctly remember. "Your opinions,
allow me to say, Baron von Jung, al-
242
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
though in the main correct, are, in
many nice points, discreditable to your-
self 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 equivo-
cal sentence, all eyes were turned upon
the Baron. He became pale, then ex-
cessively 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 un-
bent himself freely. In an instant after-
ward he stood erect, confronting
Hermann; and so total an alteration
of countenance in so short a period I
certainly never saw before. For a mo-
Iment I even fancied that I had miscon-
ceived him, and that he was in sober
earnest. He appeared to be stifling
with passion, and his face was cadaver-
ously 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 address-
ing 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 gentle-
man, is an observation so directly
offensive as to allow me but one line
of conduct. Some courtesy, neverthe-
less, is due to the presence of this
company, and to yourself, at this mo-
ment, as my guest. You will pardon
me, therefore, if, upon this considera-
tion, 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 reflec-
tion of your person in yonder mirror
as the living Mynheer Hermann him-
self. This being done, there will be
no difficulty whatever. I shall dis-
charge 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 de-
canter, full of wine, against the mirror
which hung directly opposite Hermann;
striking the reflection of his person
with great precision, and of course shat-
tering 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 whis-
pered 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 apart-
ment. I could hardly forbear laughing
in his face while he proceeded to dis-
MYSTIFICATION
243
cuss, with the profoundest gravity, what
he termed "the refinedly peculiar char-
acter" of the insult he had received.
After a tiresome harangue in his ordi-
nary style, he took down from his book
shelves a number of musty volumes on
the subject of the duello, and enter-
tained me for a long time with their
contents; reading aloud, and comment-
ing 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 particu-
larly, 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 droll-
est chapters in the world concerning
"Injuriæ per applicationem, per con-
structionem, et per se," about half of
which, he averred, was strictly applica-
ble 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.
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.
ran thus:
I
"SIR, My friend, M. P.-, will
hand you this note. I find it incum-
bent upon me to request, at your
earliest convenience, an explanation of
this evening's occurrences at your cham-
bers. 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 HERMANN."
"To the Baron Ritzner von Jung,
August 18th, 18—."
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 car-
ried 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 ex-
planation you suggest.
This being
admitted, I still find great difficulty,
(owing to the refinedly peculiar nature
of our disagreement, and of the per-
sonal 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
244
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
of my own, to refer you to the opin-
ions of the Sieur Hedelin, as set forth
in the ninth paragraph of the chapter
of "Injuriæ per applicationem, per con-
structionem, 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 re-
spect,
"Your most obedient servant,
"VON JUNG."
"The Herr Johann Hermann,
August 18th, 18—."
Hermann commenced the perusal of
this epistle with a scowl, which, how-
ever, was converted into a smile of the
most ludicrous self-complacency as he
came to the rigmarole about Injuriæ
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 ques-
tion. 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 ac-
quaintance, 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; show-
ing 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 ingeni-
ously framed so as to present to the
ear all the outward signs of intelligi-
bility, 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.
The Man of the Crowd
(First published in Burton's Gentleman's Magazine, December, 1840.-Ed.)
Ce grand malheur, de ne pouvoir etre
seul.-LA BRUYERE.
-
IT WAS Well said of a certain German
book that "es 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 them-
selves 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 con-
valescent, and, with returning strength,
found myself in one of those happy
moods which are so precisely the con-
verse of ennui-moods of the keenest
appetency, when the film from the
mental vision departs the achlus os
prin epæen (Gr.)—and the intellect,
electrified, surpasses as greatly its every-
day condition, as does the vivid yet
candid reason of Leibnitz, the mad and
flimsy rhetoric of Gorgias. Merely to
breathe was enjoyment; and 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 news-
paper in my lap, I had been amusing
myself for the greater part of the after-
noon, now in poring over advertise-
ments, now in observing the promiscu-
ous 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 con-
templation 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 think-
ing only of making their way through
the press. Their brows were knit, and
245
246
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 prog-
ress, these people suddenly ceased mut-
tering; but redoubled their gesticula-
tions, 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 noble-
men, 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 busi-
ness upon its own responsibility. They
did not greatly excite my attention.
The tribe of clerks was an obvious
one; and here I discerned two remarka-
ble divisions. There were the junior
clerks of flash houses-young gentle-
men 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 fac-
simile of what had been the perfection
of bon ton about twelve or eighteen
months before. They wore the cast-off
graces of the gentry;-and this, I be-
lieve, 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 re-
moved or settled their hats with both
hands, 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 volu-
minousness 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 recog-
nizable. They wore every variety of
dress, from that of the desperate thim-
ble-rig bully, with velvet waistcoat,
fancy neckerchief, gilt chains, and fila-
greed buttons, to that of the scrupu-
lously 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
THE MAN OF THE CROWD
247
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 mendi-
cants 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 later 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 mar-
ble, 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 im-
mature form, yet, from long associa-
tion, 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,
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 rubi-
cund 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, pie-men, porters, coal-heavers,
sweeps; organ-grinders, monkey-exhib-
itors, 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 dis-
cordantly 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 with-
drawal of the more orderly portion of
the people, and its harsher ones coming
out into bolder relief, as the late hour
248
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 en-
chained me to an examination of indi-
vidual 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 fre-
quently 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 atten-
tion, on account of the absolute idio-
syncrasy of its expression. Any thing
even remotely resembling that expres-
Ision 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 tri-
umph, 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. Hur-
riedly putting on an overcoat, and seiz-
ing 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 dis-
appeared. 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 tex-
ture; and my vision deceived me, or,
through a rent in a closely-buttoned
and evidently second-handed roque-
laire 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 com-
motion, 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
THE MAN OF THE CROWD
249
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 repeat-
edly, 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 on Broadway near the
park-so vast a difference is there be-
tween 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
re-appeared. 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 persever-
ingly. I was surprised, however, to
find, upon his having made the circuit
of the square, that he turned and re-
traced his steps. Still more was I
astonished to see him repeat the same
walk several times-once nearly detect-
ing me as he came around with a sud-
den 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 ges-
ture 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 locali-
ties of which the stranger appeared well
acquainted, and where his original de-
meanor 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 there-
abouts, 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 over-shoes,
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 re-
specting 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
250
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 wayward-
ness 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 hith-
erto traversed. It was the most noi-
some 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 popu
lace 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 Intem-
perance 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 en-
trance. 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,
VON KEMPELEN AND HIS DISCOVERY
251
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 in-
ferior to what I had seen on the evening
before. And here, long, amid the mo-
mently increasing confusion, did I per-
sist 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, stop-
ping 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.
"This 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 Animæ," and perhaps it is
but one of the great mercies of God
that "es lasst sich nicht lesen."*
Von Kempelen and His Discovery
AFTER the very minute and elaborate
paper by Arago, to say nothing of the
summary in Silliman's Journal, with the
detailed statement just published by
Lieutenant Maury, it will not be sup-
posed, of course, that in offering a few
hurried remarks in reference to Von
Kempelen's discovery, I have any de-
sign to look at the subject in a scientific
point of view. My object is simply,
in the first place, to say a few words
of Von Kempelen himself (with whom,
some years ago, I had the honor of a
slight personal acquaintance), since
every thing which concerns him must
necessarily, at this moment, be of inter-
est; and, in the second place, to look
in a general way, and speculatively, at
the results of the discovery.
It may be as well, however, to pre-
mise the cursory observations which I
have to offer, by denying, very decid-
edly, what seems to be a general im-
pression (gleaned, as usual in a case of
this kind, from the newspapers), viz.:
that this discovery, astounding as it
unquestionably is, is unanticipated.
By reference to the "Diary of Sir
Humphrey Davy" (Cottle and Munroe,
London, pp. 150), it will be seen at
pp. 53 and 82, that this illustrious chem-
ist had not only conceived the idea
now in question, but had actually made
no inconsiderable progress, experimen-
tally, in the very identical analysis now
so triumphantly brought to an issue by
Von Kempelen, who although he makes
not the slightest allusion to it, is, with-
*This is a favorite idea of Poe and
forms the introduction to the tale, "The
Premature Burial."-Ed.
252
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
out doubt (I say it unhesitatingly, and
can prove it, if required), indebted to
the "Diary" for at least the first hint
of his own undertaking.
The paragraph from the Courier and
Enquirer, which is now going the rounds
of the press, and which purports to
claim the invention for a Mr. Kissam,
of Brunswick, Maine, appears to me, I
confess, a little apocryphal, for several
reasons; although there is nothing either
impossible or very improbable in the
statement made. I need not go into
details. My opinion of the paragraph
is founded principally upon its manner.
It does not look true. Persons who
are narrating facts, are seldom so par-
ticular as Mr. Kissam seems to be,
about day and date and precise loca-
tion. Besides, if Mr. Kissam actually
did come upon the discovery he says
he did, at the period designated nearly
eight years ago, how happens it that
he took no steps, on the instant, to reap
the immense benefits which the merest
bumpkin must have known would have
resulted to him individually, if not to
the world at large, from the discovery?
It seems to me quite incredible that
any man of common understanding
could have discovered what Mr. Kissam
says he did, and yet have subsequently
acted so like a baby-so like an owl-
as Mr. Kissam admits that he did. By-
the-way, who is Mr. Kissam? and is not
the whole paragraph in the Courier and
Enquirer a fabrication got up to "make
a talk"? It must be confessed that it
has an amazingly moon-hoaxy-air. Very
little dependence is to be placed upon
it, in my humble opinion; and if I
were not well aware, from experience,
how very easily men of science are
mystified, on points out of their usual
range of inquiry, I should be profoundly
astonished at finding so eminent a chem-
ist as Professor Draper, discussing Mr.
Kissam's (or is it Mr. Quizzem's?)
pretensions to the discovery, in so
serious a tone.
But to return to the "Diary” of Sir
Humphrey Davy. This pamphlet was
not designed for the public eye, even
upon the decease of the writer, as any
person at all conversant with author-
ship may satisfy himself at once by
the slightest inspection of the style.
At page 13, for example, near the mid-
dle, we read, in reference to his
researches about the protoxide of azote:
"In less than half a minute the respira-
tion being continued, diminished gradu-
ally and were succeeded by analogous
to gentle pressure on all the muscles."
That the respiration was not "dimin-
ished," is not only clear by the subse-
quent context, but by the use of the
plural, "were." The sentence, no doubt,
was thus intended: "In less than half
a minute, the respiration being con-
tinued, [these feelings] diminished
gradually, and were succeeded by [a
sensation] analogous to gentle pressure
on all the muscles." A hundred similar
instances go to show that the MS. so
inconsiderately published, was merely a
rough note-book, meant only for the
writer's own eye; but an inspection of
the pamphlet will convince almost any
thinking person of the truth of my
suggestion. The fact is, Sir Humphrey
Davy was about the last man in the
world to commit himself on scientific
topics. Not only had he a more than
ordinary dislike to quackery, but he was
morbidly afraid of appearing empirical;
so that, however fully he might have
been convinced that he was on the
VON KEMPELEN AND HIS DISCOVERY
253
right track in the matter now in ques-
tion, he would never have spoken out,
until he had every thing ready for the
most practical demonstration. I verily
believe that his last moments would
have been rendered wretched, could he
have suspected that his wishes in regard
to burning this "Diary" (full of crude
speculations) would have been unat-
tended to; as, it seems, they were. I
say "his wishes," for that he meant to
include this note-book among the mis-
cellaneous papers directed "to be burnt,"
I think there can be no manner of
doubt. Whether it escaped the flames
by good fortune or by bad, yet remains
to be seen. That the passages quoted
above, with the other similar ones re-
ferred to, gave Von Kempelen the hint,
I do not in the slightest degree ques-
tion; but I repeat, it yet remains to be
seen whether this momentous discovery
itself (momentous under any circum-
stances) will be of service or disservice
to mankind at large. That Von Kem-
pelen and his immediate friends will
reap a rich harvest, it would be folly
to doubt for a moment. They will
scarcely be so weak as not to “realize,"
in time, by large purchases of houses
and land, with other property of intrin-
sic value.
In the brief account of Von Kem-
pelen which appeared in the Home
Journal, and has since been extensively
copied, several misapprehensions of the
German original seem to have been
made by the translator, who professes
to have taken the passage from a late
number of the Presburg Schnellpost.
"Viele" has evidently been miscon-
ceived (as it often is), and what the
translator renders by "sorrows," is
probably "lieden," which, in its true
version, "sufferings," would give a
totally different complexion to the
whole account; but, of course, much
of this is merely guess, on my part.
Von Kempelen, however, is by no
means "a misanthrope," in appearance,
at least, whatever he may be in fact.
My acquaintance with him was casual
altogether; and I am scarcely war-
ranted in saying that I know him at
all; but to have seen and conversed
with a man of so prodigious a notoriety
as he has attained, or will attain in a
few days, is not a small matter, as
times go.
The Literary World speaks of him,
confidently, as a native of Presburg
(misled, perhaps, by the account in
The Home Journal) but I am pleased
in being able to state positively, since
I have it from his own lips, that he
was born in Utica, in the State of New
York, although both his parents, I be-
lieve, are of Presburg descent. The
family is connected, in some way, with
Maelzel, of automaton - chess - player
memory. In person, he is short and
stout, with large, fat, blue eyes, sandy
hair and whiskers, a wide but pleasing
mouth, fine teeth, and I think a Roman
nose. There is some defect in one of
his feet. His address is frank, and his
whole manner noticeable for bonhomie.
Altogether, he looks, speaks, and acts
as little like "a misanthrope" as any
man I ever saw. We were fellow-
sojourners for a week about six years
ago, at Earl's Hotel, in Providence,
Rhode Island; and I presume that I
conversed with him, at various times,
for some three or four hours altogether.
His principal topics were those of the
day; and nothing that fell from him
led me to suspect his scientific attain-
254
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
hotel before me,
New York, and
ments. He left the
intending to go to
thence to Bremen; it was in the latter
city that his great discovery was first
made public; or, rather, it was there
that he was first suspected of having
made it. This is about all that I per-
sonally know of the now immortal Von
Kempelen; but I have thought that
even these few details would have
interest for the public.
There can be little question that
most of the marvellous rumors afloat
about this affair are pure inventions,
entitled to about as much credit as the
story of Aladdin's lamp; and yet, in
a case of this kind, as in the case of
the discoveries in California, it is clear
that the truth may be stranger than
fiction. The following anecdote, at
least, is so well authenticated, that we
may receive it implicitly.
Von Kempelen had never been even
tolerably well off during his residence
at Bremen; and often, it was well
known, he had been put to extreme
shifts in order to raise trifling sums.
When the great excitement occurred
about the forgery on the house of
Gutsmuth & Co., suspicion was directed
toward Von Kempelen, on account of
his having purchased a considerable
property in Gasperitch Lane, and his
refusing, when questioned, to explain
how he became possessed of the pur-
chase money. He was at length ar-
rested, but nothing decisive appearing
against him, was in the end set at
liberty. The police, however, kept a
strict watch upon his movements, and
thus discovered that he left home fre-
quently, taking always the same road,
2nd invariably giving his watchers the
slip in the neighborhood of that laby-
rinth of narrow and crooked passages
known by the flash name of the "Don-
dergat." Finally, by dint of great per-
severance, they traced him to a garret
in an old house of seven stories, in an
alley called Flatzplatz; and, coming
upon him suddenly, found him, as they
imagined, in the midst of his counter-
feiting operations. His agitation is rep-
resented as so excessive that the officers
had not the slightest doubt of his guilt.
After handcuffing him, they searched
his room, or rather rooms, for it ap-
pears he occupied all the mansarde.
Opening into the garret where they
caught him, was a closet, ten feet by
eight, fitted up with some chemical
apparatus, of which the object has not
yet been ascertained. In one corner
of the closet was a very small furnace,
with a glowing fire in it, and on the
fire a kind of duplicate crucible-two
crucibles connected by a tube. One of
these crucibles was nearly full of lead
in a state of fusion, but not reaching
up to the aperture of the tube, which
was close to the brim. The other cru-
cible had some liquid in it, which, as
the officers entered, seemed to be fur-
iously dissipating in vapor. They relate
Kempelen seized the crucibles with both
hands (which were encased in gloves
that afterward turned out to be asbes-
tic), and threw the contents on the
tiled floor. It was now that they hand-
cuffed him; and before proceeding to
ransack the premises they searched his
person, but nothing unusual was found
about him, excepting a paper parcel, in
his coat-pocket, containing what was
afterward ascertained to be a mixture of
antimony and some unknown substance,
in nearly, but not quite, equal propor-
tions. All attempts at analyzing the
VON KEMPELEN AND HIS DISCOVERY
255
unknown substance have, so far, failed,
but that it will ultimately be analyzed,
is not to be doubted.
Passing out of the closet with their
prisoner, the officers went through a
sort of ante-chamber, in which nothing
material was found, to the chemist's
sleeping-room. They here rummaged
some drawers and boxes, but discovered
only a few papers, of no importance,
and some good coin, silver and gold.
At length, looking under the bed, they
saw a large, common hair trunk, with-
out hinges, hasp, or lock, and with the
top lying carelessly across the bottom
portion. Upon attempting to draw this
trunk out from under the bed, they
found that, with their united strength
(there were three of them, all powerful
men), they "could not stir it one inch."
Much astonished at this, one of them
crawled under the bed, and looking into
the trunk, said:
"No wonder we couldn't move it-
why it's full to the brim of old bits of
brass!"
Putting his feet, now, against the
wall, so as to get a good purchase, and
pushing with all his force, while his
companions pulled with all theirs, the
trunk, with much difficulty, was slid
out from under the bed, and its con-
tents examined. The supposed brass
with which it was filled was all in small,
smooth pieces, varying from the size of
a pea to that of a dollar; but the pieces
were irregular in shape, although more
or less flat-looking, upon the whole,
"very much as lead looks when thrown
upon the ground in a molten state, and
there suffered to grow cool." Now, not
one of these officers for a moment sus-
pected this metal to be any thing but
brass. The idea of its being gold never
entered their brains, of course; how
could such a wild fancy have entered
it? And their astonishment may be
well conceived, when the next day it
became known, all over Bremen, that
the "lot of brass" which they had
carted so contemptuously to the police
office, without putting themselves to the
trouble of pocketing the smallest scrap,
was not only gold-real gold—but gold
far finer than any employed in coinage
gold, in fact, absolutely pure, virgin,
without the slightest appreciable alloy.
I need not go over the details of
Von Kempelen's confession (as far as
it went) and release, for these are
familiar to the public. That he has
actually realized, in spirit and in effect,
if not to the letter, the old chimera
of the philosopher's stone, no sane per-
son is at liberty to doubt. The opin-
ions of Arago are, of course, entitled
to the greatest consideration; but he
is by no means infallible; and what he
says of bismuth, in his report to the
Academy, must be taken cum grano
salis. The simple truth is, that up to
this period all analysis has failed; and
until Von Kempelen chooses to let us
have the key to his own published
enigma, it is more than probable that
the matter will remain, for years, in
statu quo. All that yet can fairly be
said to be known is, that "Pure gold
can be made at will, and very readily
from lead in connection with certain
other substances, in kind and in pro-
portions, unknown."
Speculation, of course, is busy as to
the immediate and ultimate results of
this discovery-a discovery which few
thinking persons will hesitate in refer-
ring to an increased interest in the mat-
مار
256
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ter of gold generally, by the late de-
velopments in California; and this re-
flection brings us inevitably to another
-the exceeding inopportuneness of Von
Kempelen's analysis. If many were
prevented from adventuring to Califor-
nia, by the mere apprehension that gold
would so materially diminish in value,
on account of its plentifulness in the
mines there, as to render the specula-
tion of going so far in search of it a
doubtful one-what impression will be
wrought now, upon the minds of those
about to emigrate, and especially upon
the minds of those actually in the min-
eral region, by the announcement of
this astounding discovery of Von Kem-
pelen, a discovery which declares, in
so many words, that beyond its intrinsic
·
worth for manufacturing
manufacturing purposes
(whatever that worth may be), gold
now is, or at least soon will be (for
it cannot be supposed that Von Kem-
pelen can long retain his secret), of no
greater value than lead, and of far in-
ferior value to silver? It is, indeed,
exceedingly difficult to speculate pros-
pectively upon the consequences of the
discovery; but one thing may be posi-
tively maintained-that the announce-
ment of the discovery six months ago
would have had material influence in
regard to the settlement of California.
In Europe, as yet, the most notice-
able results have been a rise of two
hundred per cent. in the price of lead,
and nearly twenty-five per cent. in that
of silver.
The Power of Words
(Oinos [Greek], Wine: Agathos, Good.-Ed.)
OINOS. Pardon, Agathos, the weak-
ness of a spirit new-fledged with immor-
tality!
Agathos. You have spoken nothing,
my Oinos, for which pardon is to be de-
manded. Not even here is knowledge
a thing of intuition. For wisdom, ask
of the angels freely, that it may be
given!
Oinos. But in this existence, I
dreamed that I should be at once cog-
nizant of all things, and thus at once
be happy in being cognizant of all.
Agathos. Ah, not in knowledge is
happiness, but in the acquisition of
knowledge! In for ever knowing, we
are for ever blessed; but to know all,
were the curse of a fiend.
Oinos. But does not The Most High
know all?
Agathos. That (since he is The Most
Happy) must be still the one thing un-
known even to HIM.
Oinos. But, since we grow hourly in
knowledge, must not at last all things
be known?
Even
Agathos. Look down into the abys-
mal distances!-attempt to force the
gaze down the multitudinous vistas of
the stars, as we sweep slowly through
them thus—and thus—and thus!
the spiritual vision, is it not at all
points arrested by the continuous golden
walls of the universe?-the walls of the
myriads of the shining bodies that mere
THE POWER OF WORDS
257
number has appeared to blend into
unity?
Oinos. I clearly perceive that the
infinity of matter is no dream.
Agathos. There are no dreams in
Aidenn-but it is here whispered that,
of this infinity of matter, the sole pur-
pose is to afford infinite springs, at
which the soul may allay the thirst to
know which is for ever unquenchable
within it since to quench it, would be
to extinguish the soul's self. Question
me then, my Oinos, freely and without
fear. Come! we will leave to the left
the loud harmony of the Pleiades, and
swoop outward from the throne into
the starry meadows beyond Orion,
where, for pansies and violets, and
heart's-ease, are the beds of the tripli-
cate and triple-tinted suns.
Oinos. And now, Agathos, as we pro-
ceed, instruct me!-speak to me in the
earth's familiar tones. I understand
not what you hinted to me, just now,
of the modes or of the method of what,
during mortality, we were accustomed
to call Creation. Do you mean to say
that the Creator is not God?
Agathos. I mean to say that the
Deity does not create.
Oinos. Explain.
Agathos. In the beginning only, he
created. The seeming creatures which
are now, throughout the universe, so
perpetually springing into being, can
only be considered as the mediate or
indirect, not as the direct or immediate
results of the Divine creative power.
Oinos.
Among men, my Agathos,
this idea would be considered heretical
in the extreme.
Agathos. Among angels, my Oinos,
it is seen to be simply true.
far-that certain operations of what
we term Nature, or the natural laws,
will, under certain conditions, give rise
to that which has all the appearance of
creation. Shortly before the final over-
throw of the earth, there were, I well
remember, many very successful exper-
iments in what some philosophers were
weak enough to denominate the cre-
ation of animalculæ.
Agathos. The cases of which you
speak were, in fact, instances of the sec-
ondary creation-and of the only spe-
cies of creation which has ever been,
since the first word spoke into existence
the first law.
Oinos. Are not the starry worlds
that, from the abyss of nonentity, burst
hourly forth into the heavens are not
these stars, Agathos, the immediate
handiwork of the King?
Agathos. Let me endeavor, my
Oinos, to lead you, step by step, to the
conception I intend. You are well
aware that, as no thought can perish, so
no act is without infinite result. We
moved our hands, for example, when
we were dwellers on the earth, and, in
so doing, we gave vibration to the at-
mosphere which engirdled it. This vi-
bration was indefinitely extended, till
it gave impulse to every particle of the
earth's air, which thenceforward, and
for ever, was actuated by the one move-
ment of the hand. This fact the math-
ematicians of our globe well knew. They
made the special effects, indeed, wrought
in the fluid by special impulses, the
subject of exact calculation-so that it
became easy to determine in what pre-
cise period an impulse of given extent
would engirdle the orb, and impress
(for ever) every atom of the atmos-
Oinos. I can comprehend you thus phere circumambient. Retrograding,
258
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
they found no difficulty, from a given
effect, under given conditions, in deter-
mining the value of the original im-
pulse. Now the mathematicians who
saw that the results of any given im-
pulse were absolutely endless-and who
saw that a portion of these results were
accurately traceable through the agency
of algebraic analysis-who saw, too, the
facility of the retrogradation-these
men saw, at the same time, that this
species of analysis itself, had within it-
self a capacity for indefinite progress―
that there were no bounds conceivable
to its advancement and applicability, ex-
cept within the intellect of him who ad-
vanced or applied it. But at this point
our mathematicians paused.
Oinos.
back from the throne of the Godhead.
And not only could such a thing do this,
but at any epoch, should a given result
be afforded him-should one of these
numberless comets, for example, be pre-
sented to his inspection-he could have
no difficulty in determining, by the an-
alytic retrogradation, to what original
impulse it was due. This power of
retrogradation in its absolute fulness
and perfection-this faculty of referring
at all epochs, all effects to all causes-
is of course the prerogative of the Deity
alone but in every variety of degree,
short of the absolute perfection, is the
power itself exercised by the whole host
of the Angelic intelligences.
Oinos. But you speak merely of im-
And why, Agathos, should pulses upon the air.
they have proceeded?
Agathos. Because there were some
considerations of deep interest beyond.
It was deducible from what they knew,
that to a being of infinite understand-
ing-one to whom the perfection of the
algebraic analysis lay unfolded-there
could be no difficulty in tracing every
impulse given the air-and the ether
through the air-to the remotest con-
sequences at any even infinitely remote
epoch of time. It is indeed demon-
strable that every such impulse given
the air, must, in the end, impress every
individual thing that exists within the
universe; and the being of infinite un-
derstanding the being whom we have
imagined-might trace the remote un-
dulations of the impulse-trace them
upward and onward in their influences
upon all particles of all matter-upward
and onward for ever in their modifica-
tions of old forms-or, in other words,
in their creation of new-until he found
them reflected-unimpressive at last-
Agathos. In speaking of the air, I
referred only to the earth; but the gen-
eral proposition has reference to im-
pulses upon the ether-which, since it
pervades, and alone pervades all space,
is thus the great medium of creation.
Oinos. Then all motion, of whatever
nature, creates?
Agathos. It must: but a true phi-
losophy has long taught that the source
of all motion is thought-and the source
of all thought is-
Oinos. God.
Agathos. I have spoken to you,
Oinos, as to a child of the fair Earth
which lately perished-of impulses upon
the atmosphere of the Earth.
Oinos. You did.
Agathos. And while I thus spoke, did
there not cross your mind some thought
of the physical power of words? Is not
every word an impulse on the air?
Oinos. But why, Agathos, do you
weep-and why, oh why do your wings
droop as we hover above this fair star
THE COLLOQUY OF MONOS AND UNA
259
-which is the greenest and yet most
terrible of all we have encountered in
our flight? Its brilliant flowers look
like a fairy dream-but its fierce vol-
canoes like the passions of a turbulent
heart.
Agathos. They are!-they are! This
wild star-it is now three centuries
since, with clasped hands, and with
streaming eyes, at the feet of my be-
loved-I spoke it-with a few passion.
ate sentences-into birth. Its brilliant
flowers are the dearest of all unfulfilled
dreams, and its raging volcanoes are the
passions of the most turbulent and un.
hallowed of hearts.
The Colloquy of Monos and Una
Una. "Born again?"
Monos. Yes, fairest and best beloved
Una, "born again." These were the
words upon whose mystical meaning I
had so long pondered, rejecting the ex-
planations of the priesthood, until Death
itself resolved for me the secret.
Una. Death!
Monos. How strangely, sweet Una,
you echo my words! I observe, too, a
vacillation in your step, a joyous in-
quietude in your eyes. You are con
fused and oppressed by the majestic
novelty of the Life Eternal. Yes, it was
of Death I spoke. And here how sin-
gularly sounds that word which of old
was wont to bring terror to all hearts,
throwing a mildew upon all pleasures!
Una. Ah, Death, the spectre which
sat at all feasts! How often, Monos,
did we lose ourselves in speculations
upon its nature! How mysteriously did
it act as a check to human bliss, saying
unto it "thus far and no further!" That
earnest mutual love, my own Monos,
which burned within our bosoms-how
vainly did we flatter ourselves, feeling
happy in its first upspringing, that our
happiness would strengthen with its
strength! Alas! as it grew, so grew in
our hearts the dread of that evil hour
which was hurrying to separate us for-
ever! Thus, in time, it became pain-
ful to love. Hate would have been
mercy then.
Monos. Speak not here of these
griefs, dear Una-mine, mine, forever
now!
Una. But the memory of past sorrow
-is it not present joy? I have much
to say yet of the things which have
been. Above all, I burn to know the
incidents of your own passage through
the dark Valley and Shadow.
Monos. And when did the radiant
Una ask any thing of her Monos in
vain? I will be minute in relating all-
but at what point shall the weird nar-
rative begin?
Una. At what point?
Monos. You have said.
Una. Monos, I comprehend you. In
Death we have both learned the pro-
pensity of man to define the indefin-
able. I will not say, then, commence
with the moment of life's cessation-
but commence with that sad, sad in-
stant when, the fever having aban-
doned you, you sank into a breathless
and motionless torpor, and I pressed
down your pallid eyelids with the pas-
sionate fingers of love.
260
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Monos. One word first, my Una, in
regard to man's general condition at
this epoch. You will remember that
one or two of the wise among our fore-
fathers-wise in fact, although not in
the world's esteem-had ventured to
doubt the propriety of the term "im-
provement," as applied to the progress
of our civilization. There were periods
in each of the five or six centuries im-
mediately preceding our dissolution,
when arose some vigorous intellect,
boldly contending for those principles
whose truth appears now, to our disen-
franchised reason, so utterly obvious-
principles which should have taught our
race to submit to the guidance of the
natural laws, rather than attempt their
control. At long intervals some master-
minds appeared, looking upon each ad-
vance in practical science as a retro-
gradation in the true utility. Occasion-
ally the poetic intellect-that intellect
which we now feel to have been the
most exalted of all-since those truths
to us were of the most enduring im-
portance could only be reached by that
analogy which speaks in proof-tones to
the imagination alone, and to the un-
aided reason bears no weight-occa-
sionally did this poetic intellect proceed
a step farther in the evolving of the
vague idea of the philosophic, and find
in the mystic parable that tells of the
tree of knowledge, and of its forbidden
fruit, death-producing, a distinct inti-
mation that knowledge was not meet
for man in the infant condition of his
soul. And these men, the poets, living
and perishing amid the scorn of the
"utilitarians"-or rough pedants, who
arrogated to themselves a title which
could have been properly applied only
to the scorned-these men, the poets,
ponder piningly, yet not unwisely, upon
the ancient days when our wants were
not more simple than our enjoyments
were keen-days when mirth was a
word unknown, so solemnly deep-toned
was happiness-holy, august and bliss-
ful days, when blue rivers ran un-
dammed, between hills unhewn, into far
forest solitudes, primeval, odorous, and
unexplored.
en-
Yet these noble exceptions from the
general misrule served but to strengthen
it by opposition. Alas! we had fallen
upon the most evil of all our evil days.
The great "movement”—that was the
cant term-went on: a diseased com-
motion, moral and physical. Art-the
Arts-arose supreme, and, once
throned, cast chains upon the intellect
which had elevated them to power. Man
because he could not but acknowledge
the majesty of Nature, fell into child-
ish exultation at his acquired and still-
increasing dominion over her elements.
Even while he stalked a God in his own
fancy, an infantine imbecility came over
him. As might be supposed from the
origin of his disorder, he grew infected
with system, and with abstraction. He
enwrapped himself in generalities.
Among other odd ideas, that of uni-
versal equality gained ground; and in
the face of analogy and of God-in
despite of the loud warning voice of
the laws of gradation so visibly pervad-
ing all things in Earth and Heaven-
wild attempts at an omni-prevalent
Democracy were made. Yet this evil
sprang necessarily from the leading evil
-Knowledge. Man could not both
know and succumb. Meantime huge
smoking cities arose, innumerable.
Green leaves shrank before the hot
breath of furnaces. The fair face of
THE COLLOQUY OF MONOS AND UNA
261
Nature was deformed as with the rav-
ages of some loathsome disease. And
methinks, sweet Una, even our slum-
bering sense of the forced and of the
farfetched might have arrested us here.
But now it appears that we had worked
out our own destruction in the perver-
sion of our taste, or rather in the blind
neglect of its culture in the schools.
For, in truth, it was at this crisis that
taste alone that faculty which, holding
a middle position between the pure in-
tellect and the moral sense, could never
safely have been disregarded-it was
now that taste alone could have led us
gently back to Beauty, to Nature, and
to Life. But alas for the pure contem-
plative spirit and majestic intuition of
Plato! Alas for the mousikae (Gr.)*
which he justly regarded as an all suf-
ficient education for the soul! Alas for
him and for it!-since both were most
desperately needed when both were
most entirely forgotten or despised.
Pascal, a philosopher whom we both
love, has said, how truly!-"que tout
notre raisonnement se reduit a ceder au
sentiment,;" and it is not impossible
that the sentiment of the natural, had
time permitted it, would have regained
its old ascendancy over the harsh math-
ematical reason of the schools.
But
* Music had, among the Athenians, a
far more comprehensive signification
than with us. It included not only the
harmonies of time and of tune, but the
poetic diction, sentiment and creation
each in its widest sense. The study of
music was with them in fact, the gen-
eral cultivation of the taste of that
which recognizes the beautiful-in con-
tra-distinction from reason, which deals
only with the true.
this thing was not to be. Prematurely
induced by intemperance of knowledge,
the old age of the world drew on. This
the mass of mankind saw not, or, liv-
ing lustily although unhappily, affected
not to see. But, for myself, the
Earth's records had taught me to look
for widest ruin as the price of high-
est civilization. I had imbibed a
prescience of our Fate from comparison
of China the simple and enduring, with
Assyria the architect, with Egypt the
astrologer, with Nubia, more crafty than
either, the turbulent mother of all Arts.
In history of these regions I met with
a ray from the Future. The individual
artificialities of the three latter were
local diseases of the Earth, and in their
individual overthrows we had seen lo-
cal remedies applied; but for the
infected world at large I could antici.
pate no regeneration save in death. That
man, as a race, should not become ex-
tinct, I saw that he must be "born
again."
And now it was, fairest and dearest,
that we wrapped our spirits, daily, in
dreams. Now it was that, in twilight,
we discoursed of the days to come,
when the Art-scarred surface of the
Earth, having undergone that purifica-
tion which alone could efface its rec-
tangular obscenities, should clothe it-
self anew in the verdure and the moun-
tain-slopes and the smiling waters of
Paradise, and be rendered at length a
fit dwelling-place for man:-for man
the Death-purged-for man to whose
*"History," from istorein (Gr.), to
contemplate.
The word "purification" seems here
to be used with reference to its root in
the Greek. pur, fire.
262
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
now exalted intellect there should be
poison in knowledge no more-for the
redeemed, regenerated, blissful, and now
immortal, but still for the material,
man.
through the mere sufficiency of his
sleep, and without being awakened by
external disturbances.
I breathed no longer. The pulses
were still. The heart had ceased to
beat. Volition had not departed, but
versations, dear Monos; but the epoch usually active, although eccentrically so
was powerless. The senses were un-
Una. Well do I remember these con-
of the fiery overthrow was not so near
at hand as we believed, and as the cor-
ruption you indicate did surely warrant
us in believing. Men lived; and died
individually.
You yourself sickened,
and passed into the grave; and thither
your constant Una speedily followed
you. And though the century which has
since elapsed, and whose conclusion
brings us thus together once more, tor-
tured our slumbering senses with no
impatience of duration, yet, my Monos,
it was a century still.
Monos. Say, rather, a point in the
vague infinity. Unquestionably, it was
in the Earth's dotage that I died.
Wearied at heart with anxieties which
had their origin in the general turmoil
and decay, I succumbed to the fierce
fever. After some few days of pain,
and many of dreamy delirium replete
with ecstacy, the manifestations of
which you mistook for pain, while I
longed but was impotent to undeceive
you-after some days there came upon
me, as you have said, a breathless and
motionless torpor; and this was termed
Death by those who stood around me.
Words are vague things. My condi-
tion did not deprive me of sentience.
It appeared to me not greatly dissimi-
lar to the extreme quiescence of him,
who, having slumbered long and pro-
foundly, lying motionless and fully
prostrate in a midsummer noon, begins
to steal slowly back into consciousness,
-assuming often each other's functions
at random. The taste and the smell
were inextricably confounded, and be-
came one sentiment, abnormal and in-
tense. The rose-water with which your
tenderness had moistened my lips to the
last, affected me with sweet fancies of
flowers-fantastic flowers, far more
lovely than any of the old Earth, but
whose prototypes we have here bloom-
ing around us. The eyelids, transpar-
ent and bloodless, offered no complete
impediment to vision. As volition was
in abeyance the balls could not roll in
their sockets-but all objects within
the range of the visual hemisphere were
seen with more or less distinctness; the
rays which fell upon the external
retina, or into the corner of the eye,
producing a more vivid effect than those
which struck the front or anterior sur-
face. Yet, in the former instance, this
effect was so far anomalous that I ap-
preciated it only as sound-sound
sweet or discordant as the matters pre-
senting themselves at my side were
light or dark in shade-curved or an-
gular in outline. The hearing at the
same time, although excited in degree,
was not irregular in action-estimating
real sounds with an extravagance of
precision, not less than of sensibility.
Touch had undergone a modification
more peculiar. Its impressions were
tardily received, but pertinaciously re-
tained, and resulted always in the high-
THE COLLOQUY OF MONOS AND UNA
263
est physical pleasure. Thus the pres-
sure of your sweet fingers upon my eye-
lids, at first only recognized through
vision, at length, long after their re-
moval, filled my whole being with a
sensual delight immeasurable.
I say
with a sensual delight. All my percep-
tions were purely sensual. The ma-
terials furnished the passive brain by
the senses were not in the least degree
wrought into shape by the deceased
understanding. Of pain there was some
little; of pleasure there was much; but
of moral pain or pleasure none at all.
Thus your wild sobs floated into my ear
with all their mournful cadences, and
were appreciated in their every varia-
tion of sad tone; but they were soft
musical sounds and no more; they con-
veyed to the extinct reason no intima-
tion of the sorrows which gave them
birth; while the large and constant tears
which fell upon my face, telling the
bystanders of a heart which broke,
thrilled every fibre of my frame with
ecstasy alone. And this was in truth
the Death of which these by-standers
spoke reverently, in low whispers you,
sweet Una, gaspingly, with loud cries.
They attired me for the coffin-three
or four dark figures which flitted busily
to and fro. As these crossed the direct
line of my vision they affected me as
forms; but upon passing to my side
their images impressed me with the idea
of shrieks, groans, and other dismal ex-
pressions of terror, of horror, or of woe.
You alone, habited in a white robe,
passed in all directions musically about
me.
The day waned; and, as its light
faded away, I became possessed by a
vague uneasiness-an anxiety such as
the sleeper feels when sad real sounds
fall continuously within his ear-low
distant bell tones, solemn, at long but
equal intervals, and commingling with
melancholy dreams. Night arrived;
and with its shadows a heavy discom-
fort. It oppressed my limbs with the
oppression of some dull weight, and was
palpable. There was also a moaning
sound, not unlike the distant reverber-
ation of surf, but more continuous,
which beginning with the first twilight,
had grown in strength with the dark-
ness. Suddenly lights were brought into
the room, and this reverberation became
forthwith interrupted into frequent un-
equal bursts of the same sound, but
less dreary and less distinct. The pon-
derous oppression was in a great meas-
ure relieved; and, issuing from the flame
of each lamp, (for there were many,)
there flowed unbrokenly into my ears a
strain of melodious monotone. And
when now, dear Una, approaching the
bed upon which I lay outstretched, you
sat gently by my side, breathing odor
from your sweet lips, and pressing them
upon my brow, there arose tremu-
lously within my bosom, and mingling
with the merely physical sensations
which circumstances had called forth,
a something akin to sentiment itself—
a feeling that, half appreciating, half
responded to your earnest love and sor-
row; but this feeling took no root in
the pulseless heart, and seemed indeed
rather a shadow than a reality, and
faded quickly away, first into extreme
quiescence, and then into a purely sen-
sual pleasure as before.
And now, from the wreck and the
chaos of the usual senses, there ap-
peared to have arisen within me a sixth,
all perfect. In its exercise I found a
wild delight-yet a delight still physical,
264
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
inasmuch as the understanding in it
had no part. Motion in the animal
frame had fully ceased. No muscle
quivered; no nerve thrilled; no artery
throbbed. But there seemed to have
sprung up in the brain, that of which no
words could convey to the merely hu-
man intelligence even an indistinct con-
ception. Let me term it a mental pen-
dulous pulsation. It was the moral em-
bodiment of man's abstract idea of
Time. By the absolute equalization of
this movement-or of such as this-
had the cycles of the firmamental orbs
themselves, been adjusted. By its aid
I measured the irregularities of the
clock upon the mantel, and of the
watches of the attendants. Their tick-
ings came sonorously to my ears. The
slightest deviation from the true pro-
portion-and these deviations were
omni-prevalent-affected me just as vi-
olations of abstract truth are wont, on
earth, to affect the moral sense.
though no two of the time-pieces in the
chamber struck individual seconds ac-
curately together, yet I had no difficulty
in holding steadily in mind the tones,
and the respective momentary errors of
each. And this—this keen, perfect, self-
existing sentiment of duration—this
sentiment existing (as man could not
possibly have conceived it to exist) in-
dependently of any succession of events
-this idea this sixth sense, upspring-
ing from the ashes of the rest, was the
first obvious and certain step of the in-
temporal soul upon the threshold of the
temporal Eternity.
Al-
It was midnight; and you still sat by
my side. All others had departed from
the chamber of Death. They had de-
posited me in the coffin. The lamps
burned flickeringly; for this I knew by
the tremulousness of the monotonous
strains. But, suddenly these strains di-
minished in distinctness and in volume.
Finally they ceased. The perfume in
my nostrils died away. Forms affected
my vision no longer. The oppression
of the Darkness uplifted itself from
my bosom. A dull shock like that of
electricity pervaded my frame, and was
followed by total loss of the idea of
contact. All of what man has termed
sense was merged in the sole conscious-
ness of entity, and in the one abiding
sentiment of duration. The mortal
body had been at length stricken with
the hand of the deadly Decay.
Yet had not all of sentience departed;
for the consciousness and the sentiment
remaining supplied some of its func-
tions by a lethargic intuition. I appre-
ciated the direful change now in op-
eration upon the flesh, and, as the
dreamer is sometimes aware of the bod-
ily presence of one who leans over him,
so, sweet Una, I still dully felt that you
sat by my side. So, too, when the
noon of the second day came, I was
not unconscious of those movements
which displaced you from my side,
which confined me within the coffin,
which deposited me within the hearse,
which bore me to the grave, which low-
ered me within it, which heaped heav
ily the mould upon me, and which thus
left me, in blackness and corruption, to
my sad and solemn slumbers with the
worm.
And here, in the prison-house which
has few secrets to disclose, they rolled
away days and weeks and months; and
the soul watched narrowly each second
as it flew, and, without effort, took
record of its flight-without effort and
without object.
1
THE CONVERSATION OF EIROS AND CHARMION
265
The
A year passed. The consciousness of
being had grown hourly more indistinct,
and that of mere locality had, in great
measure, usurped its position.
idea of entity was becoming merged in
that of place. The narrow space im-
mediately surrounding what had been.
the body, was now going to be the
body itself. At length, as often hap-
pens to the sleeper (by sleep and its
world alone is Death imaged)—at
length, as sometimes happened on
Earth to the deep slumberer, when some
fitting light half startled him into
awaking, yet left him half enveloped in
dreams so to me, in the strict em-
brace of the Shadow, came that light
which alone might have had power to
startle the light of enduring Love.
Men toiled at the grave in which I lay
darkling.
They upthrew the damp
earth. Upon my mouldering bones
there descended the coffin of Una.
And now again all was void. That
nebulous light had been extinguished.
That feeble thrill had vibrated itself
into quiescence. Many lustra had su-
pervened. Dust had returned to dust.
The worm had food no more. The
sense of being at length utterly de-
parted, and there reigned in its stead—
instead of all things-dominant and
perpetual-the autocrats Place and
Time. For that which was not-for
that which had no form-for that which
had no thought-for that which had no
sentience for that which was soulless,
yet of which matter formed no portion
-for all this nothingness, yet for all
this immortality, the grave was still a
home, and the corrosive hours, co-
mates.
The Conversation of Eiros and Charmion
(See Contents From "Politian" Scene II-Ed.)
EIROS. Why do you call me Eiros?
CHARMION. So henceforward will you
always be called. You must forget,
too, my earthly name, and speak to me
as Charmion.
EIROS. This is indeed no dream!
CHARMION. Dreams are with us no
more; but of these mysteries anon. I
rejoice to see you looking life-like and
rational. The film of the shadow has
already passed from off your eyes. Be
of heart and fear nothing. Your al-
lotted days of stupor have expired; and,
to-morrow, I will myself induct you in-
to the full joys and wonders of your
novel existence.
EIROS. True, I feel no stupor, none
at all. The wild sickness and the ter-
rible darkness have left me, and I hear
no longer that mad, rushing, horrible
sound, like the "voice of many waters."
Yet my senses are bewildered, Char-
mion, with the keenness of their percep-
tion of the new.
CHARMION. A few days will remove
all this;-but I fully understand you,
and feel for you. It is now ten earthly
years since I underwent what you un-
dergo, yet the remembrance of it hangs
by me still. You have now suffered all
of pain, however, which you will suf-
fer in Aidenn.
266
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
EIROS. In Aidenn?
CHARMION. In Aidenn.
EIROS. Oh, God!-pity me, Char-
mion!-I am overburdened with the
majesty of all things of the unknown.
now known of the speculative Future
merged in the august and certain Pres-
ent.
CHARMION. Grapple not now with
such thoughts. Tomorrow we will
speak of this. Your mind wavers, and
its agitation will find relief in the ex-
ercise of simple memories. Look not
around, nor forward-but back. I am
burning with anxiety to hear the de-
tails of that stupendous event which
threw you among us. Tell me of it.
Let us converse of familiar things, in
the old familiar language of the world
which has so fearfully perished.
EIROS. Most fearfully, fearfully!—
this is indeed no dream.
CHARMION. Dreams are no more.
Was I much mourned, my Eiros?
EIROS. Mourned, Charmion?-oh
deeply. To that last hour of all, there
hung a cloud of intense gloom and de-
vout sorrow over your household.
CHARMION. And that last hour--
speak of it. Remember that, beyond
the naked fact of the catastrophe itself,
I know nothing. When, coming out
from among mankind, I passed into
Night through the Grave-at that pe-
riod, if I remember aright, the calam-
ity which overwhelmed you was utterly
unanticipated. But, indeed, I knew
little of the speculative philosophy of
the day.
EIROS. The individual calamity was,
as you say, entirely unanticipated; but
analogous misfortunes had been long a
subject of discussion with astronomers.
I need scarce tell you, my friend, that,
even when you left us, men had agreed
to understand those passages in the
most holy writings which speak of the
final destruction of all things by fire,
as having reference to the orb of the
earth alone. But in regard to the im-
mediate agency of the ruin, speculation
had been at fault from that epoch in
astronomical knowledge in which the
comets were divested of the terrors of
flame. The very moderate density of
these bodies had been well established.
They had been observed to pass among
the satellites of Jupiter, without bring-
ing about any sensible alteration either
in the masses or in the orbits of these
secondary planets.
secondary planets. We had long re-
garded the wanderers as vapory cre-
ations of inconceivable tenuity, and as
altogether incapable of doing injury to
our substantial globe, even in the event
of contact. But contact was not in any
degree dreaded; for the elements of all
the comets were accurately known. That
among them we should look for the
agency of the threatened fiery destruc-
tion had been for many years consid-
ered an inadmissible idea. But wonders
and wild fancies had been, of late days,
strangely rife among mankind; and al-
though it was only with a few of the
ignorant that actual apprehension pre-
vailed, upon the announcement by as-
tronomers of a new comet, yet this an-
nouncement was generally received with
I know not what of agitation and mis-
trust.
The elements of the strange orb
were immediately calculated, and it was
at once conceded by all observers, that
its path, at perihelion, would bring it
into very close proximity with the
earth. There were two or three as-
tronomers, of secondary note, who res-
THE CONVERSATION OF EIROS AND CHARMION
267
olutely maintained that a contact was
inevitable. I cannot very well express
to you the effect of this intelligence
upon the people. For a few short days
they would not believe an assertion
which their intellect, so long employed
among worldly considerations, could not
in any manner grasp. But the truth
of a vitally important fact soon makes
its way into the understanding of even
the most stolid. Finally, all men saw
that astronomical knowledge lied not,
and they awaited the comet.
Its ap-
proach was not, at first, seemingly
rapid; nor was its appearance of very
unusual character. It was of a dull red,
and had little perceptible train. For
seven or eight days we saw no material
increase in its apparent diameter, and
but a partial alteration in its color.
Meanwhile the ordinary affairs of men
were discarded, and all interests ab-
sorbed in a growing discussion, insti-
tuted by the philosophic, in respect to
the cometary nature. Even the grossly
ignorant aroused their sluggish capaci-
ties to such considerations. The learned
now gave their intellect-their soul-to
no such points as the allaying of fear,
or to the sustenance of loved theory.
They sought-they panted for right
views. They groaned for perfected
knowledge. Truth arose in the purity
of her strength and exceeding majesty,
and the wise bowed down and adored.
That material injury to our globe or
to its inhabitants would result from the
apprehended contact, was an opinion
which hourly lost ground among the
wise; and the wise were now freely per-
mitted to rule the reason and the fancy
of the crowd. It was demonstrated,
that the density of the comet's nucleus
was far less than that of our rarest gas;
and the harmless passage of a similar
visitor among the satellites of Jupiter
was a point strongly insisted upon, and
which served greatly to allay terror.
Theologists, with an earnestness fear-
enkindled, dwelt upon the biblical pro-
phecies, and expounded them to the peo-
ple with a directness and simplicity of
which no previous instance had been
known. That the final destruction of
the earth must be brought about by
the agency of fire, was urged with a
spirit that enforced everywhere con-
viction; and that the comets were of no
fiery nature (as all men now knew) was
a truth which relieved all, in a great
measure, from the apprehension of the
great calamity foretold. It is notice-
able that the popular prejudices and
vulgar errors in regard to pestilences
and wars-errors which were wont to
prevail upon every appearance of a
comet-were now altogether unknown.
As if by some sudden convulsive exer-
tion, reason had at once hurled super-
stition from her throne. The feeblest
intellect had derived vigor from exces-
sive interest.
What minor evils might arise from
the contact were points of elaborate
question. The learned spoke of slight
geological disturbances, of probable al-
terations in climate, and consequently
in vegetation; of possible magnetic and
electric influences. Many held that no
visible or perceptible effect would in
any manner be produced. While such
discussions were going on, their sub-
ject gradually approached, growing
larger in apparent diameter, and of a
more brilliant lustre. Mankind grew
paler as it came. All human operations
were suspended. There was an epoch
in the course of the general sentiment
268
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
when the comet had attained, at length,
a size surpassing that of any previously
recorded visitation. The people now,
dismissing any lingering hope that the
astronomers were wrong, experienced all
the certainty of evil. The chimerical
aspect of their terror was gone. The
hearts of the stoutest of our race beat
violently within their bosoms. A very
few days sufficed, however, to merge
even such feelings in sentiments more
unendurable. We would no longer ap-
ply to the strange orb any accustomed
thoughts. Its historical attributes had
disappeared. It oppressed us with a
hideous novelty of emotion. We saw
it not as an astronomical phenomenon
in the heavens, but as an incubus upon
our hearts, and a shadow upon our
brains. It had taken, with inconceiv-
able rapidity, the character of a gigan-
tic mantle of rare flame, extending from
horizon to horizon.
Yet a day, and men breathed with
greater freedom. It was clear that we
were already within the influence of the
comet; yet we lived. We even felt an
unusual elasticity of frame and vivac-
ity of mind. The exceeding tenuity
of the object of our dread was appar-
ent; for all heavenly objects were
plainly visible through it. Meantime,
our vegetation had perceptibly altered;
and we gained faith, from this predicted
circumstance, in the foresight of the
wise. A wild luxuriance of foliage, ut-
terly unknown before, burst out upon
every vegetable thing.
Yet another day-and the evil was
not altogether upon us. It was now ev-
ident that its nucleus would first reach
us. A wild change had come over all
men; and the first sense of pain was the
wild signal for general lamentation and
horror. This first sense of pain lay in
a rigorous constriction of the breast
and lungs, and an insufferable dryness
of the skin. It could not be denied that
our atmosphere was radically affected;
the conformation of this atmosphere
and the possible modifications to which
it might be subjected, were now the
topics of discussion. The result of in-
vestigation sent an electric thrill of the
intensest terror through the universal
heart of man.
It had been long known that the air
which encircled us was a compound of
oxygen and nitrogen gases, in the pro-
portion of twenty-one measures of oxy-
gen, and seventy-nine of nitrogen, in
every one hundred of the atmosphere.
Oxygen, which was the principle of
combustion, and the vehicle of heat, was
absolutely necessary to the support of
animal life, and was the most powerful
and energetic agent in nature. Nitro-
gen, on the contrary, was incapable of
supporting either animal life or flame.
An unnatural excess of oxygen would
result, it had been ascertained, in just
such an elevation of the animal spirits
as we had latterly experienced. It was
the pursuit, the extension of the idea,
which had engendered awe. What
would be the result of a total extrac-
tion of the nitrogen? A combustion ir-
resistible, all-devouring, omni-prevalent,
immediate; the entire fulfillment, in
all their minute and terrible details, of
the fiery and horror-inspiring denunci-
ations of the prophecies of the Holy
Book.
Why need I paint, Charmion, the now
disenchained frenzy of mankind? That
tenuity in the comet which had pre-
viously inspired us with hope, was now
the source of the bitterness of despair.
SHADOW-A PARABLE
269
In its inpalpable gaseous character we
clearly perceived the consummation of
Fate. Meantime a day again passed,
bearing away with it the last shadow of
Hope. We gasped in the rapid modi-
fication of the air. The red blood
bounded tumultuously through its strict
channels. A furious delirium possessed
all men; and, with arms rigidly out-
stretched toward the threatening
heavens, they trembled and shrieked
aloud. But the nucleus of the destroyer
was now upon us; even here in Aidenn,
I shudder while I speak. Let me be
brief-brief as the ruin that over-
whelmed. For a moment there was a
wild lurid light alone, visiting and pen-
etrating all things. Then let me bow
down, Charmion, before the excessive
majesty of the great God!-then, there
came a shouting and pervading sound,
as if from the mouth itself of HIM;
while the whole incumbent mass of
ether in which we existed, burst at once
into a species of intense flame, for
whose surpassing brilliancy and all-fer-
vid heat even the angels in the high
Heaven of pure knowledge have no
name. Thus ended all.
Shadow-A Parable
(First published in Southern Literary Messenger, September, 1835.-Ed.)
YE who read are still among the liv-
ing; but I who write shall have long
since gone my way into the region of
shadows. For indeed strange things
shall happen, and secret things be
known, and many centuries shall pass
away, ere these memorials be seen of
men. And, when seen, there will be
some to disbelieve, and some to doubt,
and yet a few who will find much to
ponder upon in the characters here gra-
ven with a stylus of iron.
The year had been a year of terror,
and of feelings more intense than terror
for which there is no name upon the
earth. For many prodigies and signs
had taken place, and far and wide, over
sea and land, the black wings of the
Pestilence were spread abroad. Το
those, nevertheless, cunning in the stars,
it was not unknown that the heavens
wore an aspect of ill; and to me, the
Greek Oinos, among others, it was ev-
ident that now had arrived the altera-
tion of that seven hundred and ninety-
fourth year when, at the entrance of
Aries, the planet Jupiter is conjoined
with the red ring of the terrible Satur-
nus. The peculiar spirit of the skies,
if I mistake not greatly, made itself
manifest, not only in the physical orb
of the earth, but in the souls, imagina-
tions, and meditations of mankind.
Over some flasks of the red Chian
wine, within the walls of a noble hall,
in a dim city called Ptolemais, we sat,
at night, a company of seven.
And to
our chamber there was no entrance
save by a lofty door of brass: and the
door was fashioned by the artisan Cor-
innos, and, being of rare workmanship,
was fastened from within. Black drap-
eries, likewise, in the gloomy room, shut
out from our view the moon, the lurid
270
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
stars, and the peopleless streets-but
the boding and the memory of Evil
they would not be so excluded. There
were things around us and about of
which I can render no distinct account
-things material and spiritual-heavi-
ness in the atmosphere-a sense of suf-
focation-anxiety-and, above all, that
terrible state of existence which the nerv-
ous experience when the senses are
keenly living and awake, and meanwhile
the powers of thought lie dormant. A
dead weight hung upon us. It hung
upon our limbs-upon the household
furniture upon the goblets from which
we drank; and all things were de-
pressed, and borne down thereby-all
things save only the flames of the seven
iron lamps which illuminated our revel.
Uprearing themselves in tall slender
lines of light, they thus remained burn-
ing all pallid and motionless; and in
the mirror which their lustre formed
upon the round table of ebony at which
we sat, each of us there assembled be-
held the pallor of his own countenance,
and the unquiet glare in the downcast
eyes of his companions. Yet we laughed
and were merry in our proper way—
which was hysterical; and sang the
songs of Anacreon-which are madness;
and drank deeply-although the purple
wine reminded us of blood. For there
was yet another tenant of our chamber
in the person of young Zoilus. Dead,
and at full length he lay, enshrouded;
the genius and the demon of the scene.
Alas! he bore no portion in our mirth,
save that his countenance, distorted
with the plague, and his eyes, in which
Death had but half extinguished the fire
of the pestilence, seemed to take such
interest in our merriment as the dead
may haply take in the merriment of
those who are to die. But although I,
Oinos, felt that the eyes of the departed
were upon me, still I forced myself not
to perceive the bitterness of their ex-
pression, and gazing down steadily into
the depths of the ebony mirror, sang
with a loud and sonorous voice the
songs of the son of Teios. But gradu-
ally my songs they ceased, and their
echoes, rolling afar off among the sable
draperies of the chamber, became weak,
and undistinguishable, and so faded
away. And lo! from among those sable
draperies where the sounds of the song
departed, there came forth a dark and
undefined shadow-a shadow such as
the moon, when low in heaven, might
fashion from the figure of a man: but
it was the shadow neither of man nor of
God, nor of any familiar thing. And
quivering awhile among the draperies
of the room, it at length rested in full
view upon the surface of the door of
brass. But the shadow was vague, and
formless, and indefinite, and was the
shadow neither of man nor God-
neither God of Greece, nor God of
Chaldæa, nor any Egyptian God. And
the shadow rested upon the brazen
doorway, and under the arch of the
entablature of the door, and moved not,
nor spoke any word, but there became
stationary and remained. And the door
whereupon the shadow rested was, if I
remember aright, over against the feet
of the young Zoilus enshrouded. But
we, the seven there assembled, having
seen the shadow as it came out from
among the draperies, dared not steadily
behold it, but cast down our eyes, and
gazed continually into the depths of the
mirror of ebony. And at length I,
Oinos, speaking some low words, de-
manded of the shadow its dwelling and
SILENCE-A FABLE
271
its appellation. And the shadow an-
swered, "I am SHADOW, and my
dwelling is near to the Catacombs of
Ptolemais, and hard by those dim plains
of Helusion which border upon the foul
Charonian canal." And then did we,
the seven, start from our seats in hor-
ror, and stand trembling, and shudder-
ing, and aghast, for the tones in the
voice of the shadow were not the tones
of any one being, but of a multitude of
beings, and, varying in their cadences
from syllable to syllable fell duskly
upon our ears in the well-remembered
and familiar accents of many thousand
departed friends.
Silence A Fable
(First published in the Baltimore Book, 1839. This tale is also called Siope, the
Greek word for silence.-Ed.)
"LISTEN to me," said the Demon, as
he placed his hand upon my head. "The
region of which I speak is a dreary re-
gion in Libya, by the borders of the
river Zaire, and there is no quiet there,
nor silence.
"The waters of the river have a saf-
fron and sickly hue; and they flow not
onward to the sea, but palpitate forever
and forever beneath the red eye of the
sun with a tumultuous and convulsive
motion. For many miles on either side
of the river's oozy bed is a pale desert
of gigantic water-lilies. They sigh one
unto the other in that solitude, and
stretch toward the heavens their long
and ghastly necks, and nod to and fro
their everlasting heads. And there is
an indistinct murmur which cometh out
from among them like the rushing of
subterrene water. And they sigh one
unto the other.
"But there is a boundary to their
realm-the boundary of the dark, hor-
rible, lofty forest. There, like the
waves about the Hebrides, the low un-
derwood is agitated continually. But
there is no wind throughout the heaven.
And the tall primeval trees rock eter-
nally hither and thither with a crashing
and mighty sound. And from their
high summits, one by one, drop ever-
lasting dews. And at the roots strange
poisonous flowers lie writhing in per-
turbed slumber. And overhead, with a
rustling and loud noise, the gray clouds
rush westwardly forever, until they roll,
a cataract, over the fiery wall of the
horizon. But there is no wind through-
out the heaven. And by the shores of
the river Zaire there is neither quiet nor
silence.
"It was night, and the rain fell; and,
falling, it was rain, but, having fallen,
it was blood. And I stood in the
morass among the tall lilies, and the
rain fell upon my head-and the lilies
sighed one unto the other in the sol-
emnity of their desolation.
"And, all at once, the moon arose
through the thin ghastly mist, and was
crimson in color. And mine eyes fell
upon a huge gray rock which stood by
the shore of the river, and was lighted
by the light of the moon. And the
rock was gray, and ghastly, and tall,—
272
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
and the rock was gray. Upon its front
were characters engraven in the stone;
and I walked through the morass of
water-lilies, until I came close unto the
shore, that I might read the characters
upon the stone. But I could not de-
cipher them. And I was going back
into the morass, when the moon shone
with a fuller red, and I turned and
looked again upon the rock, and upon,
the characters, and the characters were/
DESOLATION.
a
"And I looked upward, and there
stood a man upon the summit of the
rock; and I hid myself among the
water-lilies that I might discover the
actions of the man. And the man was
tall and stately in form, and was
wrapped up from his shoulders to his
feet in the toga of old Rome. And the
outlines of his figure were indistinct—
but his features were the features
deity; for the mantle of the night, and
of the mist, and of the moon, and of
the dew, had left uncovered the fea-
tures of his face. And his brow was
lofty with thought, and his eye wild
with care; and, in the few furrows upon
his cheek I read the fables of sorrow,
and weariness, and disgust with man-
kind, and a longing after/solitude.
"And the man sat upon the rock, and
leaned his head upon his hand, and
looked out upon the desolation. He
looked down into the low unquiet shrub-
bery, and up into the tall primeval
trees, and up higher at the rustling
heaven, and into the crimson moon.
And I lay close within shelter of the
lilies, and observed the actions of the
And the man trembled in the
solitude; but the night waned, and he
sat upon the rock.
man.
"And the man turned his attention
from the heaven, and looked out upon
the dreary river Zaire, and upon the
yellow ghastly waters, and upon the
pale legions of the water-lilies. And
the man listened to the sighs of the
water-lilies, and to the murmur that
came up from among them. And I lay
close within my covert and observed
the actions of the man. And the man
trembled in the solitude; but the night
waned and he sat upon the rock.
"Then I went down into the recesses
of the morass and waded afar in among
the wilderness of lilies, and called upon
the hippopotami which dwelt among the
fens in the recesses of the morass. And
the hippopotami heard my call, and
came with the behemoth, unto the foot
of the rock, and roared loudly and fear-
fully beneath the moon. And I lay
close within my covert and observed
the actions of the man. And the man
trembled in the solitude;-but the night
waned and he sat upon the rock.
"Then I cursed the elements with the
curse of tumult; and a frightful tem-
pest gathered in the heaven, where, be-
fore, there had been no wind. And the
heaven became livid with the violence
of the tempest-and the rain beat upon
the head of the man-and the floods of
the river came down-and the river
was tormented into foam-and the
water-lilies shrieked within their beds-
and the forest crumbled before the
wind-and the thunder rolled-and the
lightning fell-and the rock rocked to
its foundation// And I lay close within
my covert and observed the actions of
the man. And the man trembled in
the solitude;-but the night waned and
he sat upon the rock.
"Then I grew angry and cursed, with
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
273
the curse of silence the river, and the
lilies, and the wind, and the forest, and
the heaven, and the thunder, and the
sighs of the water-lilies. And they be-
came accursed,/ and were still. And
the moon ceased to totter up its path-
way to heaven-and the thunder died
away-and the lightning did not flash-
and the clouds hung motionless-and
the waters sunk to their level and re-
mained and the trees ceased to rock-
and the water-lilies sighed no more-
and the murmur was heard no longer
from among them, nor any shadow of
sound throughout the vast illimitable
desert. And I looked upon the char-
acters of the rock, and they were
changed; and the characters
the characters were
SILENCE.
"And mine eyes fell upon the coun-
tenance of the man and his countenance
was wan with terror. And, hurriedly,
he raised his head from his hand, and
stood forth upon the rock and listened.
But there was no voice throughout the
vast illimitable desert, and the charac-
ters upon the rock were silence. And
the man shuddered, and turned his face
away, and fled afar off, in haste, so
that I beheld him no more." (Laugh?
*
*
*
* *
Now there are fine tales in the vol-
umes of the Magi-in the iron-bound,
melancholy volumes of the Magi.
Therein, I say, are glorious histories of
the Heaven, and of the Earth, and of
the mighty sea-and of the Genii that
overruled the sea, and the earth, and
the lofty heaven. There were much
lore too in the sayings which were said
by the Sibyls; and holy, holy things
were heard of old by the dim leaves
that trembled around Dodona but, as
Allah liveth that fable which the
Demon told me as he sat by my side in
the shadow of the tomb, I hold to be
the most wonderful of all! And as
the Demon made an end of his story,
he fell back within the cavity of the
tomb and laughed. And I could not
laugh with the Demon, and he cursed
me because I could not laugh. And the
lynx which dwelleth forever in the
tomb, came out therefrom, and lay
down at the feet of the Demon/and
looked at him steadily in the face.
The Fall of the House of Usher
(First published in Burton's Gentleman's Magazine, September, 1839.-Ed.)
Son cœur est un luth suspendu;
Sitot qu'on le touche il resonne.
De Beranger.
DURING the whole of a dull, dark,
and resoundless day in the autumn of
the year, when the clouds hung oppres-
sively low in the heavens, I had been
passing alone, on horseback, through a
singularly dreary tract of country, and
at length found myself, as the shades
of evening drew on, within view of the
melancholy House of Usher. I know
not how it was-but, with the first
glimpse of the building, a sense of in-
sufferable gloom pervaded my spirit.
I say insufferable; for the feeling was
unrelieved by any of that half-pleasur-
274
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
able, because poetic, sentiment, with
which the mind usually receives even
the sternest natural images of the des-
olate or terrible. I looked upon the
scene before me-upon the mere house,
and the simple landscape features of
the domain-upon the bleak walls-
upon the vacant eye-like windows-
upon a few rank sedges-and upon a
few white trunks of decayed trees-
with an utter depression of soul, which
I can compare to no earthly sensation
more properly than to the after-dream
of the reveller upon opium-the bitter
lapse into every-day life-the hideous
dropping of the veil.
There was an iciness, a sinking, a
sickening of the heart-an unredeemed
dreariness of thought which no goading
of the imagination could torture into
aught of the sublime. What was it-
I paused to think-what was it that so
unnerved me in the contemplation of
the House of Usher? It was a mys-
tery all insoluble; nor could I grapple
with the shadowy fancies that crowded
upon me as I pondered. I was forced
to fall back upon the unsatisfactory
conclusion, that while, beyond doubt,
there are combinations of very simple
natural objects which have the power
of thus affecting us, still the analysis
of this power lies among considerations
beyond our depth. It was possible, I
reflected, that a mere different arrange-
ment of the particulars of the scene,
of the details of the picture, would be
sufficient to modify, or perhaps to an-
nihilate its capacity for sorrowful im-
pression; and, acting upon this idea,
I reined my horse to the precipitous
brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay
in unruffled lustre by the dwelling, and
gazed down-but with a shudder even
more thrilling than before-upon the
remodelled and inverted images of the
gray sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems,
and the vacant and eye-like windows.
Nevertheless, in this mansion of
gloom I now proposed to myself a so-
journ of some weeks. Its proprietor,
Roderick Usher, had been one of my
boon companions in boyhood; but many
years had elapsed since our last meet-
ing. A letter, however, had lately
reached me in a distant part of the
country a letter from him-which, in
its wildly importunate nature, had ad-
mitted of no other than a personal
reply. The MS. gave evidence of ner-
vous agitation. The writer spoke of
acute bodily illness of a mental dis-
order which oppressed him—and of an
earnest desire to see me, as his best
and indeed his only personal friend,
with a view of attempting, by the cheer-
fulness of my society, some alleviation
of his malady. It was the manner in
which all this, and much more, was
said it was the apparent heart that
went with his request-which allowed
me no room for hesitation; and I ac-
cordingly obeyed forthwith what I still
considered a very singular summons.
Although, as boys, we had been even
intimate associates, yet I really knew
little of my friend. His reserve had
been always excessive and habitual. I
was aware, however, that his very an-
cient family had been noted, time out
of mind, for a peculiar sensibility of
temperament, displaying itself, through
long ages, in many works of exalted art,
and manifested, of late, in repeated
deeds of munificent yet unobtrusive
charity, as well as in a passionate de-
votion to the intricacies, perhaps even
more than to the orthodox and easily
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
275
of musical
recognizable beauties,
science. I had learned, too, the very
remarkable fact, that the stem of the
Usher race, all time-honored as it was,
had put forth, at no period, any endur-
ing branch; in other words, that the
entire family lay in the direct line of
descent, and had always, with very
trifling and very temporary variations,
so lain. It was this deficiency, I con-
sidered, while running over in thought
the perfect keeping of the character of
the premises with the accredited char-
acter of the people, and while speculat-
ing upon the possible influence which
the one, in the long lapse of centuries,
might have exercised upon the other-
it was this deficiency, perhaps of col-
lateral issue, and the consequent un-
deviating transmission, from sire to son,
of the patrimony with the name, which
had, at length, so identified the two as
to merge the original title of the estate
in the quaint and equivocal appellation
of the "House of Usher"-an appella-
tion which seemed to include, in the
minds of the peasantry who used it,
both the family and the family man-
sion.
I have said that the sole effect of my
somewhat childish experiment-that of
looking down within the tarn-had
been to deepen the first singular im-
pression. There can be no doubt that
the consciousness of the rapid increase
of my superstition-for why should I
not so term it?-served mainly to
accelerate the increase itself. Such, I
have long known, is the paradoxical
law of all sentiments having terror as
a basis. And it might have been for
this reason only, that, when I again
uplifted my eyes to the house itself,
from its image in the pool, there grew
in my mind a strange fancy-a fancy
so ridiculous, indeed, that I but men-
tion it to show the vivid force of the
sensations which oppressed me. I had
so worked upon my imagination as
really to believe that about the whole
mansion and domain there hung an at-
mosphere peculiar to themselves and
their immediate vicinity-an atmos-
phere which had no affinity with the air
of heaven, but which had reeked up
from the decayed trees, and the gray
wall, and the silent tarn-a pestilent
and mystic vapor, dull, sluggish, faintly
discernible and leaden-hued.
Shaking off from my spirit what must
have been a dream, I scanned more nar-
rowly the real aspect of the building.
Its principal feature seemed to be that
of an excessive antiquity. The dis
coloration of ages had been great.
Minute fungi overspread the whole ex-
terior, hanging in a fine tangled web-
work from the eaves. Yet all this was
apart from any extraordinary dilapida
tion. No portion of the masonry had
fallen; and there appeared to be a wild
inconsistency between its still perfect
adaptation of parts, and the crumbling
condition of the individual stones.
this there was much that reminded me
of the specious totality of old wood-
work which has rotted for long years in
some neglected vault, with no distur-
bance from the breath of the external
air. Beyond this indication of exten-
sive decay, however, the fabric gave
little token of instability. Perhaps the
eye of a scrutinizing observer might
have discovered a barely perceptible
fissure, which, extending from the roof
of the building in front, made its way
down the wall in a zig-zag direction,
In
276
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
until it became lost in the sullen waters
of the tarn.
Noticing these things, I rode over a
short causeway to the house. A ser-
vant in waiting took my horse, and I
entered the Gothic archway of the hall.
A valet, of stealthy step, then con-
ducted me, in silence, through many
dark and intricate passages in my prog-
ress to the studio of his master. Much
that I encountered on the way con-
tributed, I know not how, to heighten
the vague sentiments of which I have
already spoken. While the objects
around me while the carvings of the
ceilings, the sombre tapestries of the
walls, the ebon blackness of the floors,
and the phantasmagoric armorial tro-
phies which rattled as I strode, were but
matters to which, or to such as which, I
had been accustomed from my infancy
-while I hesitated not to acknowledge
how familiar was all this-I still won-
dered to find how unfamiliar were the
fancies which ordinary images were
stirring up. On one of the staircases,
I met the physician of the family. His
countenance, I thought, wore a mingled
expression of low cunning and perplex-
ity. He accosted me with trepidation
and passed on. The valet now threw
open a door and ushered me into the
presence of his master.
The room in which I found myself
was very large and lofty. The windows
were long, narrow, and pointed, and at
so vast a distance from the black oaken
floor as to be altogether inaccessible
from within. Feeble gleams of encrim-
soned light made their way through the
trellised panes, and served to render
sufficiently distinct the more prominent
objects around; the eye, however, strug-
gled in vain to reach the remoter angles
of the chamber, or the recesses of the
vaulted and fretted ceiling. Dark drap-
eries hung upon the walls. The general
furniture was profuse, comfortless, an-
tique, and tattered. Many books and
musical instruments lay scattered about,
but failed to give any vitality to the
scene. I felt that I breathed an at-
mosphere of sorrow. An air of stern,
deep, and irredeemable gloom hung
over and pervaded all.
Upon my entrance, Usher arose from
a sofa on which he had been lying at
full length, and greeted me with a
vivacious warmth which had much in
it, I at first thought, of an overdone
cordiality of the constrained effort of
the ennuye man of the world. A glance,
however, at his countenance convinced
me of his perfect sincerity. We sat
down; and for some moments, while he
spoke not, I gazed upon him with a
feeling half of pity, half of awe. Surely,
man had never before so terribly
altered, in so brief a period, as had
Roderick Usher! It was with difficulty
that I could bring myself to admit the
identity of the wan being before me
with the companion of my early boy--
hood. Yet the character of his face
had been at all times remarkable. A
cadaverousness of complexion; an eye
large, liquid, and luminous beyond com-
parison; lips somewhat thin and very
pallid, but of a surpassingly beautiful
curve; a nose of a delicate Hebrew
model, but with a breadth of nostril
unusual in similar formations; a finely
moulded chin, speaking, in its want of
prominence, of a want of moral energy;
hair of a more than web-like softness
and tenuity; these features, with an
inordinate expansion above the regions
of the temple, made up altogether a
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
277
countenance not easily to be forgotten.
And now in the mere exaggeration of
the prevailing character of these fea-
tures, and of the expression they were
wont to convey, lay so much of change
that I doubted to whom I spoke. The
now ghastly pallor of the skin, and the
now miraculous lustre of the eye, above
all things startled and even awed me.
The silken hair, too, had been suffered
to grow all unheeded, and as, in its wild
gossamer texture, it floated rather than
fell about the face, I could not, even
with effort, connect its Arabesque ex-
pression with any idea of simple hu-
manity.
In the manner of my friend I was at
once struck with an incoherence—an
inconsistency; and I soon found this to
arise from a series of feeble and futile
struggles to overcome an habitual trepi-
dancy an excessive nervous agitation.
For something of this nature I had in-
deed been prepared, no less by his letter
than by reminiscences of certain boyish
traits, and by conclusions deduced from
his peculiar physical conformation and
temperament. His action was alter-
nately vivacious and sullen. His voice
varied rapidly from a tremulous inde-
cision (when the animal spirits seemed
utterly in abeyance) to that species
of energetic concision-that abrupt,
weighty, un-hurried, and hollow-sound-
ing enunciation-that leaden, self-bal-
anced, and perfectly modulated gut-
tural utterance, which may be observed
in the lost drunkard, or the irreclaim-
able eater of opium, during the periods
of his most intense excitement.
It was thus that he spoke of the
object of my visit, of his earnest desire
to see me, and of the solace he expected
me to afford him. He entered, at some
length, into what he conceived to be
the nature of his malady. It was, he
said, a constitutional and a family evil
and one for which he despaired to find
a remedy-a mere nervous affection, he
immediately added, which would un-
doubtedly soon pass off. It displayed
itself in a host of unnatural sensation.
Some of these, as he detailed them, in-
terested and bewildered me; although,
perhaps, the terms and the general man-
ner of their narration had their weight.
He suffered much from a morbid acute-
ness of the senses; the most insipid
food was alone endurable; he could
wear only garments of certain texture;
the odors of all flowers were oppres-
sive; his eyes were tortured by even
a faint light; and there were but pecul-
iar sounds, and these from stringed in-
struments, which did not inspire him
with horror.
To an anomalous species of terror I
found him a bounden slave. "I shall
perish," said he, "I must perish in this
deplorable folly. Thus, thus, and not
otherwise, shall I be lost. I dread the
events of the future, not in themselves,
but in their results. I shudder at the
thought of any, even the most trivial,
incident, which may operate upon this
intolerable agitation of soul. I have,
indeed, no abhorrence of danger, except
in its absolute effect-in terror. In
this unnerved, in this pitiable, condition
I feel that the period will sooner or
later arrive when I must abandon life
and reason together, in some struggle
with the grim phantasm, FEAR.”
I learned, moreover, at intervals, and
through broken and equivocal hints,
another singular feature of his mental
condition. He was enchained by cer-
tain superstitious impressions in regard
278
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
to the dwelling which he tenanted, and
whence, for many years, he had never
ventured forth-in regard to an in-
fluence whose supposititious force was
conveyed in terms too shadowy here to
be re-stated-an influence which some
peculiarities in the mere form and sub-
stance of his family mansion had, by
dint of long sufferance, he said, ob-
tained over his spirit-an effect which
the physique of the gray walls and tur-
rets, and of the dim tarn into which
they all looked down, had at length,
brought about upon the morale of his
existence.
He admitted, however, although with
hesitation, that much of the peculiar
gloom which thus afflicted him could
be traced to a more natural and far
more capable origin-to the severe and
long-continued illness-indeed to the
evidently approaching dissolution-of
a tenderly beloved sister, his sole com-
panion for long years, his last and only
relative on earth. "Her decease," he
said, with a bitterness which I can
never forget, "would leave him (him,
the hopeless and the frail) the last of
the ancient race of the Ushers." While
he spoke, the lady Madeline (for so was
she called) passed through a remote
portion of the apartment, and, without
having noticed my presence, disap-
peared. I regarded her with an utter
astonishment not unmingled with dread;
and yet I found it impossible to account
for such feelings. A sensation of stupor
oppressed me as my eyes followed her
retreating steps. When a door, at
length, closed upon her, my glance
sought instictively and eagerly the
countenance of the brother; but he had
buried his face in his hands, and I could
only perceive that a far more than ordi-
nary wanness had overspread the ema-
ciated fingers through which trickled
many passionate tears.
The disease of the lady Madeline
had long baffled the skill of her phy-
sicians. A settled apathy, a gradual
wasting away of the person, and fre-
quent although transient affections of
a partially cataleptical character were
the unusual diagnosis. Hitherto she
had steadily borne up against the pres-
sure of her malady, and had not be-
taken herself finally to bed; but on the
closing in of the evening of my arrival
at the house, she succumbed (as her
brother told me at night with inex-
pressible agitation) to the prostrating
power of the destroyer; and I learned
that the glimpse I had obtained of her
person would thus probably be the last
I should obtain—that the lady, at least
while living, would be seen by me no
more.
For several days ensuing, her name
was unmentioned by either Usher or
myself; and during this period I was
busied in earnest endeavors to alleviate
the melancholy of my friend.
painted and read together, or I listened,
as if in a dream, to the wild improvisa.
tions of his speaking guitar. And thus,
as a closer and still closer intimacy ad-
mitted me more unreservedly into the
recesses of his spirit, the more bitterly
did I perceive the futility of all attempt
at cheering a mind from which dark-
ness, as if an inherent positive quality,
poured forth upon all objects of the
moral and physical universe in one un-
ceasing radiation of gloom.
I shall ever bear about me a memory
of the many solemn hours I thus spent
alone with the master of the House of
Usher. Yet I should fail in any at-
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
279
tempt to convey an idea of the exact
character of the studies, or of the oc-
cupations, in which he involved me, or
led me the way. An excited and highly
distempered ideality threw a sulphu-
reous lustre over all. His long impro-
vised dirges will ring forever in my
ears. Among other things, I hold pain-
fully in mind a certain singular per-
version and amplification of the wild air
of the last waltz of Von Weber. From
the paintings over which his elaborate
fancy brooded, and which grew, touch
by touch, into vaguenesses at which I
shuddered the more thrillingly, because
I shuddered knowing not why-from
these paintings (vivid as their images
now are before me) I would in vain
endeavor to educe more than a small
portion which should lie within the
compass of merely written words. By
the utter simplicity, by the nakedness
of his designs, he arrested and over-
awed attention. If ever mortal painted
an idea, that mortal was Roderick
Usher. For me at least, in the circum-
stances then surrounding me, there
arose out of the pure abstractions which
the hypochondriac contrived to throw
upon his canvas, an intensity of intoler-
able awe, no shadow of which felt I
ever yet in the contemplation of the
certainly glowing yet too
reveries of Fuseli.
concrete
One of the phantasmagoric concep-
tions of my friend, partaking not so
rigidly of the spirit of abstraction, may
be shadowed forth, although feebly, in
words. A small picture presented the
interior of an immensely long and rec-
tangular vault or tunnel, with low walls,
smooth, white and without interruption
or device. Certain accessory points of
the design served well to convey the
idea that this excavation lay at an ex-
ceeding depth below the surface of the
earth. No outlet was observed in any
portion of its vast extent, and no torch
or other artificial source of light was
discernible; yet a flood of intense rays
rolled throughout, and bathed the whole
in a ghastly and inappropriate splendor.
I have just spoken of that morbid
condition of the auditory nerve which
rendered all music intolerable to the
sufferer, with the exception of certain
effects of stringed instruments. It was,
perhaps, the narrow limits to which
he thus confined himself upon the gui-
tar which gave birth, in great measure,
to the fantastic character of his per-
formances. But the fervid facility of
his impromptus could not be so ac-
counted for. They must have been,
and were, in the notes, as well as in the
words of his wild fantasias (for he
not unfrequently accompanied himself
with rhymed verbal improvisations),
the result of that intense mental col-
lectedness and concentration to which
I have previously alluded as observable
only in particular moments of the high-
est artificial excitement. The words of
one of these rhapsodies I have easily
remembered. I was, perhaps, the more
forcibly impressed with it as he gave
it, because, in the under or mystic cur-
rent of its meaning, I fancied that I
perceived, and for the first time, a full
consciousness on the part of Usher of
the tottering of his lofty reason upon
her throne. The verses, which were
entitled "The Haunted Palace,"*
very nearly, if not accurately, thus:-
ran
*This poem appeared in Brook's
Magazine published in Baltimore.-Ed.
280
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
I.
In the greenest of our valleys,
By good angels tenanted,
Once a fair and stately palace-
Radiant palace-reared its head.
In the monarch Thought's dominion-
It stood there!
Never seraph spread a pinion
Over fabric half so fair.
7.
But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
Assailed the monarch's high estate;
(Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow
Shall dawn upon him, desolate!)
And, round about his home, the glory
That blushed and bloomed
Is but a dim-remembered story
Of the old time entombed.
II.
Banners yellow, glorious, golden,
On its roof did float and flow
(This-all this-was in the olden
Time long ago);
And every gentle air that dallied,
In that sweet day,
Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,
A winged odor went away.
III.
Wanderers in that happy valley
Through two luminous windows saw
Spirits moving musically
To a lute's well-tuned law;
Round about a throne, where sitting
(Porphyrogene!)
In state his glory well befitting,
The ruler of the realm was seen.
IV.
VI.
And travellers now within that valley,
Through the red-litten windows see
Vast forms that move fantastically
To a discordant melody;
While, like a rapid ghastly river,
Through the pale door,
A hideous throng rush out forever,
And laugh-but smile no more.
I well remember that suggestions
arising from this ballad led us into a
train of thought wherein there became
manifest an opinion of Usher's which
I mention not so much on account of
its novelty (for other men have thought
thus), as on account of the pertinacity
with which he maintained it. This opin-
ion, in its general form, was that of the
sentience of all vegetable things. But,
in his disordered fancy the idea
had assumed a more daring char-
And all with pearl and ruby glowing acter, and trespassed, under cer-
Was the fair palace door,
Through which came flowing, flowing,
flowing
And sparkling evermore,
A troop of Echoes whose sweet duty
Was but to sing,
In voices of surpassing beauty,
The wit and wisdom of their king.
tain conditions, upon the kingdom of
inorganization. I lack words to express
the full extent, or the earnest abandon
of his persuasion. The belief, however.
was connected (as I have previously
hinted) with the gray stones of the
home of his forefathers. The condi-
tions of the sentence had been here. he
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
281
imagined, fufilled in the method of col-
Location of these stones-in the order
of their arrangement, as well as in that
of the many fungi which overspread
them, and of the decayed trees which
stood around-above all, in the long
undisturbed endurance of this arrange-
ment, and in its reduplication in the
still waters of the tarn. Its evidence-
the evidence of the sentience-was to
be seen, he said (and I here started as
he spoke), in the gradual yet uncertain
condensation of an atmosphere of their
own about the waters and the walls.
The result was discoverable, he added,
in that silent yet importunate and ter-
rible influence which for centuries had
moulded the destinies of his family, and
which made him what I now saw him-
what he was. Such opinions need no
comment, and I will make none.
Our books-the books which, for
years, had formed no small portion of
the mental existence of the invalid-
were, as might be supposed, in strict
keeping with this character of phaniasm.
We pored together over such works as
the "Belphegor" of Machiavelli; the
"Heaven and Hell" of Swedenborg; the
Subterranean Voyage of Nicholas
Klimm" by Holberg; the "Chiro-
mancy" of Robert Flud, of Jean D'
Indagine and of De la Chambre; the
"Journey into the Blue Distance" of
Tieck; and the "City of the Sun" of
Campanella. One favorite volume was
a small octavo edition of the "Direc-
torium Inquisitorium," by the Dom-
inican Eymeric de Gironne; and there
were passages in Pomponius Mela,
about the old African Satyrs and Egi-
pans, over which Usher would sit
dreaming for hours. His chief delight,
however, was found in the perusal of
an exceedingly rare and curious book in
quarto Gothic-the manual of a for-
gotten church-the *Vigilio Mortuorum
secundum Chorum Ecclesiæ Magun-
tinc.
The
I could not help thinking of the wild
ritual of this work, and of its probable
influence upon the hypochondriac,
when, one evening, having informed
me abruptly that the lady Madeline
was no more, he stated his intention of
preserving her corpse for a fortnight
(previously to its final interment), in
one of the numerous vaults within the
main walls of the building. The worldly
reason, however, assigned for this sin-
gular proceeding, was one which I did
not feel at liberty to dispute.
brother had been led to his resolution
(so he told me) by consideration of
the unusual character of the malady of
the deceased, of certain obstrusive and
eager inquiries on the part of her med-
ical men, and of the remote and ex-
posed situation of the burial-ground of
the family. I will not deny that when
I called to mind the sinister counte-
nance of the person whom I met upon
the staircase, on the day of my arrival
at the house, I had no desire to oppose
what I regarded as at best but a harm-
less, and by no means an unnatural
precaution.
At the request of Usher, I personally
aided in the arrangements for the tem-
porary entombment. The body having
been encoffined, we two alone bore it to
its rest. The vault in which we placed
it (and which had been so long un-
opened that our torches, half smoth-
ered in its oppressive atmosphere, gave
us little opportunity for investigation)
*"Watches for the Dead."-Ed.
282
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
was small, damp, and entirely without
means of admission for light; lying, at
great depth, immediately beneath that
portion of the building in which was
my own sleeping apartment. It had
been used, apparently, in remote feudal
times, for the worst purposes of a don-
jon-keep, and, in later days, as a place
of deposit for powder, or some other
highly combustible substance, as a por-
tion of its floor, and the whole interior
of a long archway through which we
reached it, were carefully sheathed
with copper. The door, of massive
iron, had been, also, similarly protected.
Its immense weight caused an unusu-
ally sharp, grating sound, as it moved
upon its hinges.
Having deposited our mournful bur-
den upon tressels within this region of
horror, we partially turned aside the yet
unscrewed lid of the coffin, and looked
upon the face of the tenant. A strik-
ing similitude between the brother and
sister now first arrested my attention;
and Usher, divining, perhaps, my
thoughts, murmured out some few
words from which I learned that the
deceased and himself had been twins,
and that sympathies of a scarcely in-
telligible nature had always existed be-
tween them. Our glances, however,
rested not long upon the dead-for we
could not regard her unawed. The
disease which had thus entombed the
lady in the maturity of youth, had left,
as usual in all maladies of a strictly
cataleptical character, the mockery of
a faint blush upon the bosom and the
face, and that suspiciously lingering
smile upon the lip which is so terrible
in death. We replaced and screwed
down the lid, and, having secured the
door of iron, made our way, with toil,
into the scarcely less gloomy apart-
ments of the upper portion of the
house.
And now, some days of bitter grief
having elapsed, an observable change
came over the features of the mental
disorder of my friend. His ordinary
manner had vanished. His ordinary
occupations were neglected or forgot-
ten. He roamed from chamber to
chamber with hurried, unequal, and ob-
jectless step. The pallor of his counte-
nance had assumed, if possible, a more
ghastly hue-but the luminousness of
his eye had utterly gone out. The once
occasional huskiness of his tone was
heard no more; and a tremulous quaver,
as if of extreme terror, habitually char-
acterized his utterance. There were
times, indeed, when I thought his un-
ceasingly agitated mind was laboring
with some oppressive secret, to divulge
which he struggled for the necessary
courage. At times, again, I was obliged
to resolve all into the mere inexplicable
vagaries of madness, for I beheld him
gazing upon vacancy for long hours, in
an attitude of the profoundest atten
tion, as if listening to some imaginary
sound. It was no wonder that his con-
dition terrified-that it infected me. I
felt creeping upon me, by slow yet un-
certain degrees, the wild influences of
his own fantastic yet impressive su-
perstitions.
It was, especially, upon retiring to
bed late in the night of the seventh or
eighth day after the placing of the lady
Madeline within the don-jon, that I ex-
perienced the full power of such feel-
ings. Sleep came not near my couch-
while the hours waned and waned away.
I struggled to reason off the nervous-
ness which had dominion over me. I
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
283
endeavored to believe that much, if not
all of what I felt, was due to the bewil-
dering influence of the gloomy furniture
of the room-of the dark and tattered
draperies, which, tortured into motion
by the breath of a rising tempest,
swayed fitfully to and fro upon the
walls, and rustled uneasily about the
decorations of the bed. But my efforts
were fruitless. An irrepressible tremor
gradually pervaded my frame; and, at
length, there sat upon my very heart an
incubus of utterly causeless alarm.
Shaking this off with a gasp and a
struggle, I uplifted myself upon the
pillows, and, peering earnestly within
the intense darkness of the chamber,
hearkened-I know not why, except
that an instinctive spirit prompted me
-to certain low and indefinite sounds
which came, through the pauses of the
storm, at long intervals, I knew not
whence. Overpowered by an intense
sentiment of horror, unaccountable yet
unendurable, I threw on my clothes
with haste (for I felt that I should
sleep no more during the night), and
endeavored to arouse myself from the
pitiable condition into which I had
fallen by pacing rapidly to and fro
through the apartment.
I had taken but few turns in this
manner, when a light step on an adjoin-
ing staircase arrested my attention. I
presently recognized it as that of Usher.
In an instant afterward he rapped, with
a gentle touch, at my door, and entered,
bearing a lamp. His countenance was,
as usual, cadaverously wan-but, more-
over, there was a species of mad hilar-
ity in his eyes-an evidently restrained
hysteria in his whole demeanor. His
air appalled me-but any thing was
preferable to the solitude which I had
so long endured, and I even welcomed
his presence as a relief.
"And you have not seen it?" he said
abruptly, after having stared about him
for some moments in silence-"you
have not then seen it?-but, stay! you
shall." Thus speaking, and having
carefully shaded his lamp, he hurried
to one of the casements, and threw it
freely open to the storm.
The impetuous fury of the entering
gust nearly lifted us from our feet.
It was, indeed, a tempestuous yet
sternly beautiful night, and one wildly
singular in its terror and its beauty.
A whirlwind had apparently collected
its force in our vicinity; for there were
frequent and violent alterations in the
direction of the wind; and the exceed-
ing density of the clouds (which hung
so low as to press upon the turrets of
the house) did not prevent our perceiv-
ing the life-like velocity with which
they flew careering from all points
against each other, without passing
away into the distance. I say that even
their exceeding density did not prevent
our perceiving this yet we had no
glimpse of the moon or stars, nor was
there any flashing forth of the light-
ning. But the under surfaces of the
huge masses of agitated vapor, as well
as all terrestrial objects immediately
around us, were glowing in the un-
natural light of a faintly luminous and
distinctly visible gaseous exhalation
which hung about and enshrouded the
mansion.
"You must not-you shall not be-
hold this!" said I, shuddering, to Usher,
as I led him, with a gentle violence,
from the window to a seat. "These
appearances, which bewilder you, are
merely electrical phenomena not un-
284
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
common-or it may be that they have
their ghastly origin in the rank miasma
of the tarn. Let us close this case-
ment; the air is chilling and danger-
ous to your frame. Here is one of your
favorite romances. I will read, and
you shall listen:-and so we will pass
away this terrible night together."
The antique volume which I had
taken up was the "Mad Trist" of Sir
Launcelot Canning; but I had called
it a favorite of Usher's more in sad
jest than in earnest; for, in truth, there
is little in its uncouth and unimagina-
tive prolixity which could have had in-
terest for the lofty and spiritual ideality
of my friend. It was, however, the
only book immediately at hand; and I
indulged a vague hope that the excite-
ment which now agitated the hypochon-
driac, might find relief (for the history
of mental disorder is full of similar
anomalies) even in the extremeness of
the folly which I should read. Could I
have judged, indeed, by the wild over-
strained air of vivacity with which he
hearkened, or apparently hearkened, to
the words of the tale, I might well have
congratulated myself upon the success
of my design.
I had arrived at that well-known
portion of the story where Ethelred, the
hero of the Trist, having sought in vain
for peaceable admission into the dwell-
ing of the hermit, proceeds to make
good an entrance by force. Here, it
will be remembered, the words of the
narrative run thus:
"And Ethelred, who was by nature
of a doughty heart, and who was now
mighty withal, on account of the power-
fulness of the wine which he had
drunken, waited no longer to hold par-
ley with the hermit, who, in sooth, was
of an obstinate and maliceful turn, but
feeling the rain upon his shoulders, and
fearing the rising of the tempest, up-
lifted his mace outright, and, with
blows, made quickly room in the plank-
ings of the door for his gauntleted
hand; and now pulling therewith
sturdily, he so cracked, and ripped, and
tore all asunder, that the noise of the
dry and hollow-sounding wood alarumed
and reverberated throughout the for-
est."
At the termination of this sentence
I started and, for a moment, paused;
for it appeared to me (although I at
once concluded that my excited fancy
had deceived me)--it appeared to me
that, from some very remote portion of
the mansion, there came, indistinctly to
my ears, what might have been, in its
exact similarity of character, the echo
(but a stifled and dull one certainly)
of the very cracking and ripping sound
which Sir Launcelot had so particularly
described. It was, beyond doubt, the
coincidence alone which had arrested
my attention; for, amid the rattling of
the sashes of the casements, and the
ordinary commingled noises of the still
increasing storm, the sound, in itself,
had nothing, surely, which should have
interested or disturbed me. I con-
tinued the story:
"But the good champion Ethelred,
now entering within the door, was sore
enraged and amazed to perceive no sig-
nal of the maliceful hermit; but, in
the stead thereof, a dragon of a scaly
and prodigious demeanor, and of a fiery
tongue, which sate in guard before a
palace of gold, with a floor of silver;
and upon the wall there hung a shield
of shining brass with this legend en-
written-
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
285
Who entereth herein, a conqueror hath
bin;
Who slayeth the dragon, the shield he
shall win.
And Ethelred uplifted his mace, and
struck upon the head of the dragon,
which fell before him, and gave up his
pesty breath, with a shriek so horrid
and harsh, and withal so piercing, that
Ethelred had fain to close his ears with
his hands against the dreadful noise of
it, the like whereof was never before
heard."
Here again I paused abruptly, and
now with a feeling of wild amazement
-for there could be no doubt what-
ever that, in this instance, I did actu-
ally hear (although from what direction
it proceeded I found it impossible to
say) a low and apparently distant, but
harsh, protracted, and most unusual
screaming or grating sound-the exact
counterpart of what my fancy had al-
ready conjured up for the dragon's
unnatural shriek as described by the
romancer.
Oppressed, as I certainly was, upon
the extraordinary coincidence, by a
thousand conflicting sensations, in which
wonder and extreme terror was pre-
dominant, I still retained sufficient
presence of mind to avoid exciting, by
an observation, the sensitive nervous-
ness of my companion. I was by no
means certain that he had noticed the
sounds in question; although, assuredly,
a strange alteration had, during the last
few minutes, taken place in his de-
meanor. From a position fronting my
own, he had gradually brought round
his chair, so as to sit with his face to
the door of the chamber; and thus I
could but partially perceive his features,
although I saw that his lips trembled
as if he were murmuring inaudibly.
His head had dropped upon his breast-
yet I knew that he was not asleep, from
the wide and rigid opening of the eye
as I caught a glance of it in profile.
The motion of his body, too, was at
variance with this idea-for he rocked
from side to side with a gentle yet
constant and uniform sway. Having
rapidly taken notice of all this, I re-
sumed the narrative of Sir Launcelot,
which thus proceeded:
"And now, the champion, having es-
caped from the terrible fury of the
dragon, bethinking himself of the brazen
shield, and of the breaking up of the
enchantment which was upon it, re-
moved the carcass from out of the way
before him, and approached valorously
over the silver pavement of the castle
to where the shield was upon the wall;
which in sooth tarried not for his full
coming, but fell down at his feet upon
the silver floor, with a mighty great
and terrible ringing sound."
No sooner had these syllables passed
my lips, than-as if a shield of brass
had indeed, at the moment, fallen
heavily upon a floor of silver-I became
aware of a distinct, hollow, metallic,
and clangorous, yet apparently muffled,
reverberation. Completely unnerved, I
leaped to my feet; but the measured
rocking movement of Usher was undis-
turbed. I rushed to the chair in which
he sat. His eyes were bent fixedly
before him, and throughout his whole
countenance there reigned a stony
rigidity. But, as I placed my hand
upon his shoulder, there came a strong
shudder over his whole person; a sickly
smile quivered about his lips; and I
saw that he spoke in a low, hurried,
286
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
and gibbering murmur, as if uncon-
scious of my presence. Bending closely
over him I at length drank in the
hideous import of his words.
"Not hear it?-yes, I hear it, and
have heard it. Long-long-long-
many minutes, many hours, many days,
have I heard it—yet I dared not—oh,
pity me, miserable wretch that I am!-
I dared not-I dared not speak! We
have put her living in the tomb! Said I
not that my senses were acute? I now
tell you that I heard her first feeble
movement in the hollow coffin. I heard
them-many, many days ago-yet I
dared not-I dared not speak! And
now-to-night-Ethelred-ha! ha!-the
breaking of the hermit's door, and the
death-cry of the dragon, and the clangor
of the shield-say, rather, the rending
of her coffin, and the grating of the
iron hinges of her prison, and her strug-
gles within the coppered archway of
the vault! Oh! whither shall I fly?
Will she not be here anon? Is she
not hurrying to upbraid me for my
haste? Have I not heard her footstep
on the stair? Do I not distinguish
that heavy and horrible beating of her
heart? Madman!"-here he sprang
furiously to his feet, and shrieked out
his syllables, as if in the effort he were
giving up his soul-"Madman! I tell
you that she now stands without the
door!"
As if in the superhuman energy of
his utterance there had been found the
potency of a spell, the huge antique
panels to which the speaker pointed
threw slowly back, upon the instant,
their ponderous and ebony jaws. It
was the work of the rushing gust-bu?
then without those doors there did
stand the lofty and enshrouded figure
of the lady Madeline of Usher. There
was blood upon her white robes, and
the evidence of some bitter struggle
upon every portion of her emaciated
frame. For a moment she remained
trembling and reeling to and fro upon
the threshold-then, with a low moan-
ing cry, fell heavily inward upon the
person of her brother, and in her violent
and now final death-agonies, bore him
to the floor a corpse, and a victim to
the terrors he had anticipated.
From that chamber, and from that
mansion, I fled aghast. The storm was
still abroad in all its wrath as I found
myself crossing the old causeway. Sud-
denly there shot along the path a wild
light, and I turned to see whence a gleam
so unusual could have issued; for the
vast house and its shadows were alone
behind me. The radiance was that of
the full, setting, and blood-red moon
which now shone vividly through that
once barely-discernible fissure of which
I have before spoken as extending from
the roof of the building, in a zigzag
direction, to the base. While I gazed,
this fissure rapidly widened-there came
a fierce breath of the whirlwind-the en-
tire orb of the satellite burst at once
upon my sight-my brain reeled as I
saw the mighty walls rushing asunder-
there was a long tumultuous shouting
sound like the voice of a thousand
waters-and the deep and dank tarn at
my feet closed sullenly and silently over
the fragments of the "HOUSE of Usher "
The Domain of Arnheim
(The story called The Landscape Garden, sometimes published separately, is
nothing more than the first part of this tale.-Ed.)
The garden like a lady fair was cut,
That lay as if she slumbered in
delight,
And to the open skies her eyes did shut.
The azure fields of Heaven were
'sembled right
In a large round, set with the flowers
of light.
The flowers-de-luce, and the round
sparks of dew.
That hung upon their azure leaves did
shew
Like twinkling stars that sparkle in the
evening blue.
Giles Fletcher.
I
FROM his cradle to his grave a gale
of prosperity bore my friend Ellison
along. Nor do I use the word pros-
perity in its mere worldly sense.
mean it as synonymous with happiness.
The person of whom I speak seemed
born for the purpose of forshadowing
the doctrines of Turgot, Price, Priest-
ley, and Condorcet-of exemplifying
by individual instance what has been
decmed the chimera of the perfection-
ists. In the brief existence of Ellison
I fancy that I have seen refuted the
dogma, that in man's very nature lies
some hidden principle, the antagonist
of bliss. An anxious examination of his
career has given me to understand that
in general, from the violation of a few
simple laws of humanity arises the
wretchedness of mankind-that as a
species we have in our possession the
as yet unwrought elements of content-
and that, even now, in the present dark-
ness and madness of all thought on the
great question of the social condition,
it is not impossible that man, the indi-
vidual, under certain unusual and highly
fortuitous conditions, may be happy.
With opinions such as these my
young friend, too, was fully imbued,
and thus it is worthy of observation
that the uninterrupted enjoyment which
distinguished his life was, in great meas-
ure, the result of preconcert. It is
indeed evident that with less of the
instinctive philosophy which now and
then, stands so well in the stead of
experience, Mr. Ellison would have
found himself precipitated, by the very
extraordinary success of his life, into
the common vortex of unhappiness
which yawns for those of pre-eminent
endowments. But it is by no means
my object to pen an essay on happiness.
The ideas of my friend may be summed
up in a few words. He admitted but
four elementary principles, or more
strictly, conditions of bliss. That
which he considered chief was (strange
to say!) the simple and purely physical
one of free exercise in the open air.
"The health," he said, "attainable by
other means is scarcely worth the
name." He instanced the ecstacies of
the fox-hunter, and pointed to the
tillers of the earth, the only people
who, as a class, can be fairly considered
happier than others. His second con-
Idition was the love of woman. His
third, and most difficult of realization,
287
288
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
was the contempt of ambition, His
fourth was an object of unceasing pur-
suit; and he held that, other things
being equal, the extent of attainable
happiness was in proportion to the
spirituality of this object.
Ellison was remarkable in the con-
tinuous profusion of good gifts lav-
ished upon him by fortune. In per-
sonal grace and beauty he exceeded all
men. His intellect was of that order
to which the acquisition of knowledge
is less a labor than an intuition and a
necessity. His family was one of the
most illustrious of the empire. His
bride was the loveliest and most de-
voted of women. His possessions had
been always ample; but on the attain-
ment of his majority, it was discovered
that one of those extraordinary freaks
of fate had been played in his behalf
which startle the whole social world
amid which they occur, and seldom fail
radically to alter the moral constitution
of those who are their objects.
It appears that about a hundred
years before Mr. Ellison's coming of
age, there had died, in a remote prov-
ince, one Mr. Seabright Ellison. This
gentleman had amassed a princely for-
tune, and, having no immediate connec-
tions, conceived the whim of suffering
his wealth to accumulate for a century
after his decease. Minutely and saga-
ciously directing the various modes of
investment, he bequeathed the aggre-
gate amount to the nearest of blood,
bearing the name of Ellison, who should
be alive at the end of the hundred
years. Many attempts had been made
to set aside this singular bequest; their
ex post facto character rendered them
abortive; but the attention of a jealous
government was aroused, and a legisla-
tive act finally obtained, forbidding all
similar accumulations. This act, how-
ever, did not prevent young pllison from
entering into possession, on his twenty-
first birthday, as the heir of his ances-
tor Seabright, of a fortune of four
hundred and fifty millions of dollars.*
When it had become known that such
was the enormous wealth inherited,
there were, of course, many specula-
tions as to the mode of its disposal.
The magnitude and the immediate
availability of the sum bewildered all
who thought on the topic. The pos-
sessor of any appreciable amount of
money might have been imagined to
perform any one of a thousand things.
With riches merely surpassing those of
any citizen, it would have been easy
to suppose him engaging to supreme
excess in the fashionable extravagances
* An incident, similar in outline to
the one here imagined, occurred, not
very long ago, in England. The name
of the fortunate heir was Thelluson. I
first saw an account of this matter in
the "Tour" of Prince Puckler Muskau,
who makes the sum inherited ninety
millions of pounds, and justly observes
that "in the contemplation of so vast
a sum, and of the services to which it
might be applied, there is something
even of the sublime." To suit the
views of this article I have followed
the Prince's statement, although a
grossly exaggerated one. The germ, and
in fact, the commencement of the pres-
ent paper was published many years
ago-previous to the issue of the first
number of Sue's admirable "Juif Er-
rant," which may possibly have been
suggested to him by Muskau's ac-
count.-E. A. P.
THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM
289
of his time or busying himself with
political intrigue or aiming at minis-
terial power-or purchasing increase of
nobility or collecting large museums
of virtu―or playing the munificent
patron of letters, of science, of art-
or endowing, and bestowing his name
upon extensive institutions of charity.
But for the inconceivable wealth in the
actual possession of the heir, these
objects and all ordinary objects were
felt to afford too limited a field. Re-
course was had to figures, and these
but sufficed to confound. It was seen
that, even at three per cent., the annual
income of the inheritance amounted to
no less than thirteen millions and five
hundred thousand dollars; which was
one million and one hundred and
twenty-five thousand per month; or
thirty-six thousand nine hundred and
eighty-six per day; or one thousand
five hundred and forty-one per hour;
or six and twenty dollars for every
minute that flew. Thus the usual track
of supposition was thoroughly broken
up. Men knew not what to imagine.
There were some who even conceived
that Mr. Ellison would divest himself
of at least one-half of his fortune, as
of utterly superfluous opulence-en-
riching whole troops of his relatives by
division of his superabundance. To
the nearest of these he did, in fact,
abandon the very unusual wealth which
was his own before the inheritance.
I was not surprised, however, to per-
ceive that he had long made up his
mind on a point which had occasioned
so much discussion to his friends. Nor
was I greatly astonished at the nature
of his decision. In regard to indi-
vidual charities he had satisfied his con-
science. In the possibility of any im-
provement, properly so called, being
effected by man himself in the general
condition of man, he had (I am sorry
to confess it) little faith. Upon the
whole, whether happily or unhappily, he
was thrown back, in very great measure,
upon self.
In the widest and noblest sense he
was a poet. He comprehended, more-
over, the true character, the august
aims, the supreme majesty and dignity
of the poetic sentiment. The fullest,
if not the sole proper satisfaction of
this sentiment he instinctively felt to
lie in the creation of novel form of
beauty. Some peculiarities, either in
his early education, or in the nature
of his intellect, had tinged with what
is termed materialism all his ethical
speculations; and it was this bias, per-
haps, which led him to believe that the
most advantageous at least, if not the
sole legitimate field for the poetic exer-
cise, lies in the creation of novel moods
of purely physical loveliness. Thus it
happened he became neither musician
nor poet-if we use this latter term in
its every-day acceptation. Or it might
have been that he neglected to become
either, merely in pursuance of his idea
that in contempt of ambition is to be
found one of the essential principles
of happiness on earth. Is it not indeed,
possible that, while a high order of
genius is necessarily ambitious, the
highest is above that which is termed
ambition? And may it not thus hap-
pen that many far greater than Milton
have contentedly remained “mute and
inglorious?" I believe that the world
has never seen—and that, unless through
some series of accidents goading the
noblest order of mind into distasteful
exertion, the world will never see-that
290
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
full extent of triumphant execution, in
the richer domains of art, of which the
human nature is absolutely capable.
Ellison became neither musician nor
poet; although no man lived more pro-
foundly enamored of music and poetry.
Under other circumstances than those
which invested him, it is not impossible
that he would have become a painter.
Sculpture, although in its nature rig-
orously poetical, was too limited in its
extent and consequences, to have occu-
pied, at any time, much of his attention.
And I have now mentioned all the
provinces in which the common under-
standing of the poetic sentiment has
declared it capable of expatiating. But
Ellison maintained that the richest, the
truest, and most natural, if not alto-
gether the most extensive province, had
been unaccountably neglected. No defi-
nition had spoken of the landscape-
gardener as of the poet; yet it seemed
to my friend that the creation of the
landscape-garden offered to the proper
Muse the most magnificent of oppor-
tunities. Here, indeed, was the faintest
field for the display of imagination in
the endless combining of forms of
novel beauty; the elements to enter into
combination being, by a vast superior-
ity, the most glorious which the earth
could afford. In the multiform and
multicolor of the flower and the trees,
he recognised the most direct and ener-
getic efforts of Nature at physical love-
liness. And in the direction or concen-
tration of this effort-or, more prop-
erly, in its adaptation to the eyes which
were to behold it on earth-he per-
ceived that he should be employing the
best means-laboring to the greatest
advantage in the fulfilment, not only
of his own destiny as poet, but of the
august purposes for which the Deity
had implanted the poetic sentiment in
man.
"Its adaptation to the eyes which
were to behold it on earth." In his
explanation of this phraseology, Mr.
Ellison did much toward solving what
has always seemed to me an enigma:-
I mean the fact (which none but the
ignorant dispute) that no such com-
bination of scenery exists in nature as
the painter of genius may produce. No
such paradises are to be found in reality
as have glowed on the canvas of Claude.
In the most enchanting of natural land-
scapes, there will always be found a
defect or an excess-many excesses and
defects. While the component parts
may defy, individually, the highest skill
of the artist, the arrangement of these
parts will always be susceptible of im-
provement. In short, no position can
be attained on the wide surface of the
natural earth, from which an artistical
eye, looking steadily, will not find mat-
ter of offence in what is termed the
"composition" of the landscape. And
yet how unintelligible is this! In all
other matters we are justly instructed
to regard nature as supreme. With her
details we shrink from competition.
Who shall presume to imitate the col-
ors of the tulip, or to improve the
proportions of the lily of the valley?
The criticism which says, of sculpture
or portraiture, that here nature is to
be exalted or idealized rather than imi-
tated, is in error. No pictorial or
sculptural combinations of points of
human loveliness do more than ap-
proach the living and breathing beauty.
In landscape alone is the principle of
the critic true; and, having felt its
truth here, it is but the headlong spirit
THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM
291
of generalization which has led him to
pronounce it true throughout all the
domains of art. Having, I say, felt its
truth here; for the feeling is no affecta-
tion or chimera. The mathematics
afford no more absolute demonstrations
than the sentiments of his art yields
the artist. He not only believes, but
positively knows, that such and such
apparently arbitrary arrangements of
matter constitute and alone constitute
the true beauty. His reasons, however,
have not yet been matured into expres-
sion. It remains for a more profound
analysis than the world has yet seen,
fully to investigate and express them.
Nevertheless he is confirmed in his in-
stinctive opinions by the voice of all
his brethren. Let a "composition" be
defective; let an emendation be wrought
in its mere arrangement of form; let
this emendation be submitted to every
artist in the world; by each will its
necessity be admitted. And even far
more than this; in remedy of the defec-
tive composition, each insulated mem-
ber of the fraternity would have sug-
gested the identical emendation.
I repeat that in landscape arrange-
ments alone is the physical nature sus-
ceptible of exaltation, and that, there-
fore, her susceptibility of improvement
at this one point, was a mystery I had
been unable to solve. My own thoughts
on the subject had rested in the idea
that the primitive intention of nature
would have so arranged the earth's sur-
face as to have fulfilled at all points
man's sense of perfection in the beau-
tiful, the sublime, or the picturesque;
but that this primitive intention had
been frustrated by the known geological
disturbances-disturbances of form and
color-grouping, in the correction or
allaying of which lies the soul of art.
The force of this idea was much weak-
ened, however, by the necessity which
it involved of considering the disturb-
ances abnormal and unadapted to any
purpose. It was Ellison who suggested
that they were prognostic of death. He
thus explained:-Admit the earthly im-
mortality of man to have been the first
intention. We have then the primitive
arrangement of the earth's surface
adapted to his blissful estate, as not
existent but designed. The disturbances
were the preparations for his subse-
quently conceived deathful condition.
"Now," said my friend, "what we
regard as exaltation of the landscape
may be really such, as respects only
the moral or human point of view.
Each alteration of the natural scenery
may possibly effect a blemish in the
picture, if we can suppose this picture
viewed at large-in mass-from some
point distant from the earth's surface,
although not beyond the limits of its
atmosphere. It is easily understood
that what might improve a closely
scrutinized detail, may at the same time
injure a general or more distinctly ob-
served effect. There may be a class of
beings, human once, but now invisible
to humanity, to whom, from afar, our
disorder may seem order-our unpic-
turesqueness picturesque; in a word, the
earth-angels, for whose scrutiny more
especially than our own, and for whose
death-refined appreciation of the beau-
tiful, may have been set in array by
God the wide landscape-gardens of the
hemispheres."
In the course of discussion, my friend
quoted some passages from a writer on
landscape-gardening, who has been sup-
posed to have well treated his theme:
292
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"There are properly but two styles of
landscape-gardening, the natural and the
artificial. One seeks to recall the orig-
inal beauty of the country, by adapting
its means to the surrounding scenery;
cultivating trees in harmony with the
hills or plains of the neighboring land;
detecting and bringing into practice
those nice relations of size, proportion,
and color which, hid from the common
observer, are revealed everywhere to
the experienced student of nature. The
result of the natural style of gardening,
is seen rather in the absence of all
defects and incongruities-in the preva-
lence of a healthy harmony and order
than in the creation of any special won-
ders or miracles. The artificial style
has as many varieties as there are dif-
ferent tastes to gratify. It has a cer-
tain general relation to the various
styles of building. There are the
stately avenues and retirements of Ver-
sailles; Italian terraces; and a various
mixed old English style, which bears
some relation to the domestic Gothic
or English Elizabethan architecture.
Whatever may be said against the
abuses of the artificial landscape-gar-
dening, a mixture of pure art in the
garden scene adds to it a great beauty.
This is partly pleasing to the eye, by
the show of order and design, and partly
moral. A terrace, with an old moss-
covered balustrade, calls up at once to
the eye the fair forms that have passed
there in other days. The slightest exhi-
bition of art is an evidence of care and
human interest."
"From what I have already ob-
served," said Ellison, "you will under-
stand that I reject the idea, here ex-
pressed, of recalling the original beauty.
of the country. The original beauty is
never so great as that which may be
introduced. Of course, every thing de
pends on the selection of a spot with
capabilities. What is said about de-
tecting and bringing into practice nice
relations of size, proportion, and color,
is one of those mere vaguenesses of
speech which serve to veil inaccuracy
of thought. The phrase quoted may
mean any thing, or nothing, and guides
in no degree. That the true result of
the natural style of gardening is seen
rather in the absence of all defects and
incongruities than in the creation of
any special wonders or miracles, is a
proposition better suited to the grovel-
ling apprehension of the herd than to
the fervid dreams of the man of genius.
The negative merit suggested apper-
tains to that hobbling criticism which,
in letters, would elevate Addison into
apotheosis. In truth, while that virtue.
which consists in the mere avoidance
of vice appeals directly to the under-
standing, and can thus be circumscribed
in rule, the loftier virtue, which flames
in creation, can be apprehended in its
results alone. Rule applies but to the
merits of denial-to the excellencies
which refrain. Beyond these, the criti-
cal art can but suggest. We may be
instructed to build a "Cato," but we
are in vain told how to conceive a
Parthenon or an "Inferno." The thing
done, however; the wonder accom-
plished; and the capacity for apprehen-
sion becomes universal. The sophists
of the negative school who, through
inability to create, have scoffed at crea-
tion, are now found the loudest in
applause. What, in its chrysalis condi-
tion of principle, affronted their demure
reason, never fails, in its maturity of
THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM
293
accomplishment, to extort admiration
from their instinct of beauty.
"The author's observations on the
artificial style," continued Ellison, "are
less objectionable. A mixture of pure
art in a garden scene adds to it a great
beauty. This is just; as also is the
reference to the sense of human inter-
est. The principle expressed is incon-
trovertible-but there may be some-
thing beyond it. There may be an
object in keeping with the principle
an object unattainable by the means
ordinarily possessed by individuals, yet
which, if attained, would lend a charm
to the landscape-garden far surpassing
that which a sense of merely human
interest could bestow. A poet, having
very unusual pecuniary resources,
might, while retaining the necessary
idea of art or culture, or, as our author
expresses it, of interest, so imbue his
designs at once with extent and novelty
of beauty, as to convey the sentiment
of spiritual interference. It will be seen
that, in bringing about such result, he
secures all the advantages of interest
or design, while relieving his work of
the harshness or technicality of the
worldly art. In the most rugged of
wildernesses—in the most savage of the
scenes of pure nature-there is apparent
the art of a creator; yet this art is
apparent to reflection only; in no
respect has it the obvious force of a
feeling. Now let us suppose this sense
of the Almighty design to be one step
depressed to be brought into some-
thing like harmony or consistency with
the sense of human art-to form an
intermedium between the two:-let us
imagine, for example, a landscape whose
combined vastness and definitiveness—
whose united beauty, magnificence, and
strangeness, shall convey the idea of
care, or culture, or superintendence, on
the part of beings superior, yet akin to
humanity-then the sentiment of inter-
est is preserved, while the art inter-
volved is made to assume the air of
an intermediate or secondary nature-
a nature which is not God, nor an
emanation from God, but which still is
nature in the sense of the handiwork
of the angels that hover between man
and God."
It was in devoting his enormous
wealth to the embodiment of a vision
such as this in the free exercise in the
open air ensured by the personal super-
intendence of his plans-in the unceas-
ing object which these plans afforded-
in the high spirituality of the object-
in the contempt of ambition which it
enabled him truly to feel-in the peren-
nial springs with which it gratified,
without possibility of satiating, that
one master passion of his soul, the
thirst for beauty; above all, it was in
the sympathy of a woman, not unwom-
anly, whose loveliness and love envel-
oped his existence in the purple atmos-
phere of Paradise, that Ellison thought
to find, and found, exemption from the
ordinary cares of humanity, with a far
greater amount of positive happiness
than ever glowed in the rapt day-
dreams of De Stael.
I despair of conveying to the reader
any distinct conception of the marvels
which my friend did actually accom-
plish. I wish to describe, but am dis-
heartened by the difficulty of descrip-
tion, and hesitate between detail and
generality. Perhaps the better course
will be to unite the two in their
extremes.
Mr. Ellison's first step regarded, of
294
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
course, the choice of a locality; and
scarcely had he commenced thinking on
this point, when the luxuriant nature
of the Pacific Islands arrested his at-
tention. In fact, he had made up his
mind for a voyage to the South Seas,
when a night's reflection induced him
to abandon the idea. "Were I misan-
thropic," he said, "such a locale would
suit me. The thoroughness of its insu-
lation and seclusion, and the difficulty
of ingress and egress, would in such
case be the charm of charms; but as
yet I am not Timon. I wish the com-
posure but not the depression of soli-
tude. There must remain with me a
certain control over the extent and du-
ration of my repose. There will be
frequent hours in which I shall need,
too, the sympathy of the poetic in what
I have done. Let me seek, then, a
spot not far from a populous city-
whose vicinity, also, will best enable
me to execute my plans."
In search of a suitable place so situ-
ated, Ellison travelled for several years,
and I was permitted to accompany him.
A thousand spots with which I was
enraptured he rejected without hesita-
tion, for reasons which satisfied me, in
the end, that he was right. We came
at length to an elevated table-land of
wonderful fertility and beauty, afford-
ing a panoramic prospect very little
less in extent than that of Ætna, and,
in Ellison's opinion as well as my own,
surpassing the far-famed view from that
mountain in all the true elements of
the picturesque.
"I am aware," said the traveller, as
he drew a sigh of deep delight after
gazing on this scene, entranced, for
nearly an hour, "I know that here, in
my circumstances, nine-tenths of the
most fastidious of men would rest con-
tent. This panorama is indeed glorious,
and I should rejoice in it but for the
excess of its glory. The taste of all
the architects I have ever known leads
them, for the sake of 'prospect,' to put
up buildings on hill-tops. The error
is obvious. Grandeur in any of its
moods, but especially in that of extent,
startles, excites-and then fatigues, de-
presses. For the occasional scene noth-
ing can be better-for the constant
view nothing worse. And, in the con-
stant view, the most objectionable
phase of grandeur is that of extent;
the worst phase of extent, that of dis-
tance. It is at war with the sentiment
and with the sense of seclusion—the
sentiment and sense which we seek to
humor in 'retiring to the country.' In
looking from the summit of a mountain
we cannot help feeling abroad in the
world. The heart-sick avoid distant
prospects as a pestilence."
It was not until toward the close of
the fourth year of our search that we
found a locality with which Ellison pro-
fessed himself satisfied. It is, of course,
needless to say where was the locality.
The late death of my friend, in causing
his domain to be thrown open to cer-
tain classes of visitors, has given to
Arnheim a species of secret and sub-
dued if not solemn celebrity, similar in
kind, although infinitely superior in
degree, to that which so long distin-
guished Fonthill.
The usual approach to Arnheim was
by the river. The visitor left the city
in the early morning. During the fore-
noon he passed between shores of a
tranquil and domestic beauty, on which
grazed innumerable sheep, their white
fleeces spotting the vivid green of roll-
THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM
295
ing meadows. By degrees the idea of
cultivation subsided into that of merely
pastoral care. This slowly became
merged in a sense of retirement-this
again in a consciousness of solitude.
As the evening approached, the channel
grew more narrow; the banks more and
more precipitous; and these latter were
clothed in richer, more profuse, and
more sombre foliage. The water in-
creased in transparency. The stream
took a thousand turns, so that at no
moment could its gleaming surface be
seen for a greater distance than a fur-
long. At every instant the vessel
seemed imprisoned within an enchanted
circle, having insuperable and impene-
trable walls of foliage, a roof of ultra-
marine satin, and no floor-the keel
balancing itself with admirable nicety
on that of a phantom bark which, by
some accident having been turned up-
side down, floated in constant company
with the substantial one, for the pur-
pose of sustaining it. The channel now
became a gorge-although the term is
somewhat inapplicable, and I employ it
merely because the language has no
word which better represents the most
striking-not the most distinctive-
feature of the scene. The character
of gorge was maintained only in the
height and parallelism of the shores; it
was lost altogether in their other traits.
The walls of the ravine (through which
the clear water still tranquilly flowed)
arose to an elevation of a hundred and
occasionally of a hundred and fifty
feet, and inclined so much toward each
other as, in a great measure, to shut
out the light of day; while the long
plume-like moss which depended densely
from the intertwining shrubberies over-
head, gave the whole chasm an air of
funereal gloom. The windings became
more frequent and intricate, and seemed
often as if returning in upon them-
selves, so that the voyager had long
lost all idea of direction.
He was,
moreover, enwrapt in an exquisite sense
of the strange. The thought of nature
still remained, but her character seemed
to have undergone modification, there
was a weird symmetry, a thrilling uni-
formity, a wizard propriety in these her
works. Not a dead branch-not a with-
ered leaf-not a stray pebble-not a
patch of the brown earth was anywhere
visible. The crystal water welled up
against the clean granite, or the un-
blemished moss, with a sharpness of
outline that delighted while it bewil-
dered the eye.
Having threaded the mazes of this
channel for some hours, the gloom
deepening every moment, a sharp and
unexpected turn of the vessel brought
it suddenly, as if dropped from heaven,
into a circular basin of very consider-
able extent when compared with the
width of the gorge. It was about two
hundred yards in diameter, and girt in
at all points but one-that immediately
fronting the vessel as it entered-by
hills equal in general height to the walls.
of the chasm, although of a thoroughly
different character. Their sides sloped
to the water's edge at an angle of some
forty-five degrees, and they were
clothed from base to summit-not a
perceptible point escaping-in a drap-
ery of the most gorgeous flower-blos-
soms; scarcely a green leaf being visible
among the sea of odorous and fluctuat-
ing color. This basin was of great
depth, but so transparent was the water
that the bottom, which seemed to con-
sist of a thick mass of small round
296
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
alabaster pebbles, was distinctly visible
by glimpses-that is to say, whenever
the eye could permit itself not to see,
far down in the inverted heaven, the
duplicate blooming of the hills. On
these latter there were no trees, nor
even shrubs of any size. The impres-
sions wrought on the observer were
those of richness, warmth, color, quie-
tude, uniformity, softness, delicacy,
daintiness, voluptuousness, and a mirac-
ulous extremeness of culture that sug-
gested dreams of a new race of fairies,
laborious, tasteful, magnificent, and
fastidious; but as the eye traced upward
the myriad-tinted slope, from its sharp
junction with the water to its vague
termination amid the folds of over-
hanging cloud, it became, indeed, diffi-
cult not to fancy a panoramic cataract
of rubies, sapphires, opals, and golden
onyxes, rolling silently out of the sky.
The visitor, shooting suddenly into
this bay from out the gloom of the
ravine, is delighted but astounded by
the full orb of the declining sun, which
he had supposed to be already far
below the horizon, but which now con-
fronts him, and forms the sole termina-
tion of an otherwise limitless vista seen
through another chasm-like rift in the
hills.
But here the voyager quits the vessel
which has borne him so far, and de-
scends into a light canoe of ivory,
stained with arabesque devices in vivid
scarlet, both within and without. The
poop and beak of this boat arise high
above the water, with sharp points, so
that the general form is that of an
irregular crescent. It lies on the sur-
face of the bay with the proud grace of
a swan. On its ermined floor reposes a
single feathery paddle of satin-wood;
but no oarsmen or attendant is to be
seen. The guest is bidden to be of
good cheer that the fates will take
care of him. The larger vessel dis-
appears, and he is left alone in the
canoe, which lies apparently motionless
in the middle of the lake. While he
considers what course to pursue, how-
ever, he becomes aware of a gentle
movement in the fairy bark. It slowly
swings itself around until its prow
points toward the sun. It advances
with a gentle but gradually accelerated
velocity, while the slight ripples it
creates seem to break about the ivory
side in divinest melody-seem to offer
the only possible explanation of the
soothing yet melancholy music for
whose unseen origin the bewildered voy-
ager looks around him in vain.
The canoe steadily proceeds, and the
rocky gate of the vista is approached,
so that its depths can be more dis-
tinctly seen. To the right arise a chain
of lofty hills rudely and luxuriantly
wooded. It is observed, however, that
the trait of exquisite cleanness where
the bank dips into the water, still pre-
vails. There is not one token of the
usual river debris. To the left the
character of the scene is softer and
more obviously artificial. Here the
bank slopes upward from the stream
in a very gentle ascent, forming a broad
sward of grass of a texture resembling
nothing so much as velvet, and of a
brilliancy of green which would bear
comparison with the tint of the purest
emerald. This plateau varies in width
from ten to three hundred yards; reach-
THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM
291
ing from the river-bank to a wall, fifty
feet high, which extends, in an infinity
of curves, but following the general
direction of the river, until lost in the
distance to the westward. This wall
is of one continuous rock, and has been
formed by cutting perpendicularly the
once rugged precipice of the stream's
southern bank; but no trace of the
labor has been suffered to remain. The
chiselled stone has the hue of ages, and
is profusely overhung and overspread
with the ivy, the coral honeysuckle, the
eglantine, and the clematis. The uni-
formity of the top and bottom lines of
the wall is fully relieved by occasional
trees of gigantic height, growing singly
or in small groups, both along the
plateau and in the domain behind the
wall, but in close proximity to it; so
that frequent limbs (of the black wal-
nut especially) reach over and dip their
pendent extremities in the water. Far-
ther back within the domain, the vision
is impeded by an impenetrable screen
of foliage.
These things are observed during the
canoe's gradual approach to what I have
called the gate of the vista. On draw-
ing nearer to this, however, its chasm-
like appearance vanishes; a new outlet
from the bay is discovered to the left-
in which direction the wall is also seen
to sweep, still following the general
course of the stream. Down this new
opening the eye cannot penetrate very
far; for the stream, accompanied by
the wall, still bends to the left, until
both are swallowed up by the leaves.
The boat, nevertheless, glides mag-
ically into the winding channel; and
here the shore opposite the wall is
found to resemble that opposite the
wall in the straight vista. Lofty hills,
rising occasionally into mountains, and
covered with vegetation in wild luxu-
riance, still shut in the scene.
Floating gently onward, but with a
velocity slightly augmented, the voy-
ager, after many short turns, finds his
progress apparently barred by a gigan-
tic gate or rather door of burnished
gold, elaborately carved and fretted, and
reflecting the direct rays of the now
fast-sinking sun with an effulgence that
seems to wreath the whole surrounding
forest in flames. This gate is inserted
in the lofty wall; which here appears
to cross the river at right angles. In
a few moments, however, it is seen that
the main body of the water still sweeps
in a gentle and extensive curve to the
left, the wall following it as before,
while a stream of considerable volume,
diverging from the principal one, makes
its way, with a slight ripple, under the
door, and is thus hidden from sight.
The canoe falls into the lesser channel
and approaches the gate. Its ponderous
wings are slowly and musically ex-
panded. The boat glides between them,
and commences a rapid descent into a
vast amphitheatre entirely begirt with
purple mountains, whose bases are laved
by a gleaming river throughout the
full extent of their circuit. Meantime
the whole Paradise of Arnheim bursts
upon the view. There is a gush of
entrancing melody; there is an oppres-
sive sense of strange sweet odor;-
there is a dream-like intermingling to
the eye of tall slender Eastern trees-
bosky shrubberies-flocks of golden and
crimson birds-lily-fringed lakes -
--
298
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
meadows of violets, tulips, poppies,
hyacinths, and tuberoses-long inter-
tangled lines of silver streamlets—and,
upspringing confusedly from amid all,
a mass of semi-Gothic, semi-Saracenic
architecture, sustaining itself by miracle
in mid-air; glittering in the red sun-
light with a hundred oriels, minarets,
and pinnacles; and seeming the phan-
tom handiwork, conjointly, of the
Sylphs, of the Fairies, of the Genii, and
of the Gnomes.
Landor's Cottage
A PENDANT TO "THE DOMAIN OF ARNHEIM”
DURING a pedestrian trip last sum-
mer, through one or two of the river
counties of New York, I found myself,
as the day declined, somewhat embar-
rassed about the road I was pursuing.
The land undulated very remarkably;
and my path, for the last hour, had
wound about and about so confusedly,
in its effort to keep in the valleys, that
I no longer knew in what direction lay
the sweet village of B, where I
had determined to stop for the night.
The sun had scarcely shone—strictly
speaking during the day, which never-
theless, had been unpleasantly warm.
A smoky mist, resembling that of the
Indian summer, enveloped all things,
and of course, added to my uncertainty.
Not that I cared much about the mat-
ter. If I did not hit upon the village
before sunset, or even before dark, it
was more than possible that a little
Dutch farmhouse, or something of that
kind, would soon make its appearance
-although, in fact, the neighborhood
(perhaps on account of being more pic-
turesque than fertile) was very sparsely
inhabited. At all events, with my knap-
sack for a pillow, and my hound as a
sentry, a bivouac in the open air was
just the thing which would have amused
me. I sauntered on, therefore, quite
at ease Ponto taking charge of my
gun-until at length, just as I had
begun to consider whether the numer-
ous little glades that led hither and
thither, were intended to be paths at
all, I was conducted by one of them
into an unquestionable carriage track.
There could be no mistaking it. The
traces of light wheels were evident;
and although the tall shrubberies and
overgrown undergrowth met overhead,
there was no obstruction whatever be-
low, even to the passage of a Virginian
mountain wagon-the most aspiring
vehicle, I take it, of its kind. The
road, however, except in being open
through the wood-if wood be not too
weighty a name for such an assemblage
of light trees-and except in the par-
ticulars of evident wheel-tracks-bore
no resemblance to any road I had
before seen. The tracks of which I
speak were but faintly perceptible-
having been impressed upon the firm,
yet pleasantly moist surface of what
looked more like green Genoese velvet
than any thing else. It was grass,
clearly-but grass such as we seldom
see out of England-so short, so thick,
so even, and so vivid in color. Not a
LANDOR'S COTTAGE
299
single impediment lay in the wheel-
route-not even a chip or dead twig.
The stones that once obstructed the
way had been carefully placed-not
thrown-along the sides of the lane,
so as to define its boundaries at bottom
with a kind of half-precise, half-negli-
gent, and wholly picturesque definition.
Clumps of wild flowers grew every-
where, luxuriantly, in the interspaces.
What to make of all this, of course
I knew not. Here was art undoubtedly
-that did not surprise me—all roads,
in the ordinary sense, are works of art;
nor can I say that there was much to
wonder at in the mere excess of art
manifested; all that seemed to have
been done, might have been done here
-with such natural "capabilities" (as
they have it in the books on Landscape
Gardening)-with very little labor and
expense. No; it was not the amount
but the character of the art which
caused me to take a seat on one of the
blossomy stones and gaze up and down
this fairy-like avenue for half an hour
or more in bewildered admiration. One
thing became more and more evident
the longer I gazed: an artist, and one
with a most scrupulous eye for form,
had superintended all these arrange-
ments. The greatest care had been
taken to preserve a due medium be-
tween the neat and graceful on the
one hand, and the pittoresque, in the
true sense of the Italian term, on the
other. There were few straight, and no
long uninterrupted lines. The same
effect of curvature or of color appeared
twice, usually, but not oftener, at any
one point of view. Everywhere was
variety in uniformity. It was a piece
of "composition," in which the most
fastidiously critical taste could scarcely
have suggested an emendation.
I had turned to the right as I en-
tered this road, and now, arising, I con-
tinued in the same direction. The path
was so serpentine, that at no moment
could I trace its course for more than
two or three paces in advance. Its
character did not undergo any material
change.
Presently the murmur of water fell
gently upon my ear-and in a few mo-
ments afterward, as I turned with the
road somewhat more abruptly than
hitherto, I became aware that a build-
ing of some kind lay at the foot of a
gentle declivity just before me. I could
see nothing distinctly on account of the
mist which occupied all the little valley
below. A gentle breeze, however, now
arose, as the sun was about descending;
and while I remained standing on the
brow of the slope, the fog gradually
became dissipated into wreaths, and so
floated over the scene.
As it came fully into view-thus
gradually as I describe it-piece by
piece, here a tree, there a glimpse of
water, and here again the summit of a
chimney, I could scarcely help fancying
that the whole was one of the ingenious
illusions sometimes exhibited under the
name of "vanishing pictures."
By the time, however, that the fog
had thoroughly disappeared, the sun had
made its way down behind the gentle
hills, and thence, as if with a slight
chassez to the south, had come again
fully into sight, glaring with a purplish
lustre through a chasm that entered the
valley from the west. Suddenly, there-
fore-and as if by the hand of magic-
this whole valley and every thing in it
became brilliantly visible.
300
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
The first coup d'œil, as the sun slid
into the position described, impressed
me very much as I have been im-
pressed, when a boy, by the concluding
scene of some well-arranged theatrical
spectacle or melodrama. Not even the
monstrosity of color was wanting; for
the sunlight came out through the
chasm, tinted all orange and purple;
while the vivid green of the grass in
the valley was reflected more or less
upon all objects from the curtain of
vapor that still hung overhead, as if
loth to take its total departure from a
scene so enchantingly beautiful.
The little vale into which I thus
peered down from under the fog-canopy
could not have been more than four
hundred yards long; while in breadth
it varied from fifty to one hundred and
fifty or perhaps two hundred. It was
most narrow at its northern extremity,
opening out as it tended southwardly,
but with no very precise regularity.
The widest portion was within eighty
yards of the southern extreme. The
slopes which encompassed the vale
could not fairly be called hills, unless
at their northern face. Here a precipi-
tous ledge of granite arose to a height
of some ninety feet; and, as I have
mentioned, the valley at this point was
not more than fifty feet wide; but as
the visitor proceeded southwardly from
the cliff, he found on his right hand
and on his left, declivities at once less
high, less precipitous, and less rocky.
All, in a word, sloped and softened to
the south; and yet the whole vale was
engirdled by eminences, more or less
high, except at two points. One of
these I have already spoken of. It lay
considerably to the north of west, and
was where the setting sun made its
way, as I have before described, into
the amphitheatre, through a clean cut
natural cleft in the granite embank-
ment; this fissure might have been ten
yards wide at its widest point, so far
as the eye could trace it. It seemed
to lead up, up like a natural causeway,
into the recesses of unexplored moun-
tains and forests. The other opening
was directly at the southern end of the
vale. Here, generally, the slopes were
nothing more than gentle inclinations,
extending from east to west about one
hundred and fifty yards. In the middle
of this extent was a depression, level
with the ordinary floor of the valley.
As regards vegetation, as well as in
respect to every thing else, the scene
softened and sloped to the south. To
the north on the craggy precipice-a
few paces from the verge-up sprang
the magnificent trunks of numerous
hickories, black walnuts, and chestnuts,
interspersed with occasional oak; and
the strong lateral branches thrown out
by the walnuts especially, spread far
over the edge of the cliff. Proceeding
southwardly, the explorer saw, at first,
the same class of trees, but less and
less lofty and Salvatorish in character;
then he saw the gentler elm, succeeded
by the sassafras and locust-these again
by the softer linden, red-bud, catalpa,
and maple-these yet again by still
more graceful and more modest varie-
ties.
The whole face of the southern
declivity was covered with wild shrub-
bery alone-an occasional silver willow
or white poplar excepted. In the bot-
tom of the valley itself-(for it must
be borne in mind that the vegetation
hitherto mentioned grew only on the
cliffs or hillsides) were to be seen
three insulated trees. One was an elm
LANDOR'S COTTAGE
301
of fine size and exquisite form: it stood
guard over the southern gate of the
vale. Another was a hickory, much
larger than the elm, and altogether a
much finer tree, although both were
exceedingly beautiful: it seemed to have
taken charge of the northwestern en-
trance, springing from a group of rocks
in the very jaws of the ravine, and
throwing its graceful body, at an angle
of nearly forty-five degrees, far out
into the sunshine of the amphitheatre.
About thirty yards east of this tree
stood, however, the pride of the valley,
and beyond all question the most mag-
nificent tree I have ever seen, unless,
perhaps, among the cypresses of the
Itchiatuckanee. It was a triple-
stemmed tulip-tree-the Liriodendron
Tulipiferum-one of the natural order
of magnolias. Its three trunks sepa-
rated from the parent at about three
feet from the soil, and diverging very
slightly and gradually, were not more
than four feet apart at the point where
the largest stem shot out into foliage:
this was at an elevation of about eighty
feet. The whole height of the principal
division was one hundred and twenty
feet. Nothing can surpass in beauty
the form, or the glossy, vivid green of
the leaves of the tulip-tree. In the
present instance they were fully eight
inches wide; but their glory was alto-
gether eclipsed by the gorgeous splendor
of the profuse blossoms. Conceive,
closely congregated, a million of the
largest and most resplendent tulips!
Only thus can the reader get any idea
of the picture I would convey. And
then the stately grace of the clean, deli-
cately-granulated columnar stems, the
largest four feet in diameter, at twenty
from the ground. The innumerable
blossoms, mingling with those of other
trees scarcely less beautiful, although
infinitely less majestic, filled the valley
with more than Arabian perfumes.
The general floor of the amphitheatre
was grass of the same character as that
I had found in the road; if any thing,
more deliciously soft, thick, velvety,
and miraculously green. It was hard
to conceive how all this beauty had
been attained.
I have spoken of two openings into
the vale. From the one to the north-
west issued a rivulet, which came, gently
murmuring and slightly foaming, down
the ravine, until it dashed against the
group of rocks out of which sprang the
insulated hickory. Here, after encir-
cling the tree, it passed on a little to
the north of east, leaving the tulip tree
some twenty feet to the south, and
making no decided alteration in its
course until it came near the midway
between the eastern and western boun-
daries of the valley. At this point,
after a series of sweeps, it turned off
at right angles and pursued a generally
southern direction-meandering as it
went-until it became lost in a small
lake of irregular figure (although
roughly oval), that lay gleaming near
the lower extremity of the vale. This
lakelet was, perhaps, a hundred yards
in diameter at its widest part. No
crystal could be clearer than its waters.
Its bottom, which could be distinctly
seen, consisted altogether of pebbles
brilliantly white. Its banks, of the
emerald grass already described.
rounded, rather than sloped, off into
the clear heaven below; and so clear
was this heaven, so perfectly, at times,
did it reflect all objects above it, that
where the true bank ended and where
302
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
the mimic one commenced, it was a
point of no little difficulty to deter-
mine. The trout, and some other va-
rieties of fish, with which this pond
seemed to be almost inconveniently
crowded, had all the appearance of ver-
itable flying-fish. It was almost impos-
sible to believe that they were not
absolutely suspended in the air. A
light birch canoe that lay placidly on
the water, was reflected in its minutest
fibres with a fidelity unsurpassed by
the most exquisitely polished mirror.
A small island, fairly laughing with
flowers in full bloom, and affording
little more space than just enough for
a picturesque little building, seemingly
a fowl-house-arose from the lake not
far from its northern shore-to which
it was connected by means of an incon-
ceivably light-looking and yet very
primitive bridge. It was formed of a
single, broad and thick plank of the
tulip wood. This was forty feet long,
and spanned the interval between shore
and shore with a slight but very per-
ceptible arch, preventing all oscillation.
From the southern extreme of the lake
issued a continuation of the rivulet,
which, after meandering for, perhaps,
thirty yards, finally passed through the
"depression" (already described) in the
middle of the southern declivity, and
tumbling down a sheer precipice of a
hundred feet, made its devious and
unnoticed way to the Hudson.
The lake was deep-at some points
thirty feet-but the rivulet seldom ex-
ceeded three, while its greatest width
was about eight. Its bottom and banks
were as those of the pond-if a defect
could have been attributed, in point of
picturesqueness, it was that of excessive
neatness.
The expanse of the green turf was
relieved, here and there, by an occa
sional showy shrub, such as the hydran-
gea, or the common snowball, or the
aromatic seringa; or, more frequently,
by a clump of geraniums blossoming
gorgeously in great varieties. These
latter grew in pots which were carefully
buried in the soil, so as to give the
plants the appearance of being indig-
eneous. Besides all this, the lawn's
velvet was exquisitely spotted with
sheep a considerable flock of which
roamed about the vale, in company with
three tamed deer, and a vast number
of brilliantly-plumed ducks.
A very
large mastiff seemed to be in vigilant
attendance upon these animals, each
and all. Along the eastern and western
cliffs-where, toward the upper portion
of the amphitheatre, the boundaries
were more or less precipitous-grew ivy
in great profusion-so that only here
and there could even a glimpse of the
naked rock be obtained. The northern
precipice, in like manner, was almost
entirely clothed by grape-vines of rare
luxuriance; some springing from the
soil at the base of the cliff, and others
from ledges on its face.
The slight elevation which formed
the lower boundary of this little do-
main, was crowned by a neat stone wall,
of sufficient height to prevent the es-
cape of the deer. Nothing of the fence
kind was observable elsewhere, for no-
where else was an artificial enclosure
needed: any stray sheep, for example,
which should attempt to make its way
out of the vale by means of the ravine,
would find its progress arrested, after
a few yards' advance, by the precipitous
ledge of rock over which tumbled the
cascade that had arrested my attention
I
LANDOR'S COTTAGE
303
as I first drew near the domain. In
short, the only ingress or egress was
through a gate occupying a rocky pass
in the road, a few paces below the
point at which I stopped to reconnoitre
the scene.
I have described the brook as mean-
dering very irregularly through the
whole of its course. Its two general
directions, as I have said, were first
from west to east, and then from north
to south. At the turn, the stream,
sweeping backward, made an almost
circular loop, so as to form a peninsula
which was very nearly an island, and
which included about the sixteenth of
an acre. On this peninsula stood a
dwelling-house-and when I say that
this house, like the infernal terrace seen
by Vathek, "etait d'une architecture
inconnue dans les annales de la terre,"
I mean, merely, that its tout ensemble
struck me with the keenest sense of
combined novelty and propriety-in a
word, of poetry (for, than in the
words just employed, I could scarcely
give, of poetry in the abstract, a more
rigorous definition)—and I do not mean
that merely outre was perceptible in
any respect.
In fact nothing could well be more
simple-more utterly unpretending than
this cottage. Its marvellous effect lay
altogether in its artistic arrangement as
a picture. I could have fancied, while
I looked at it, that some eminent land-
scape-painter had built it with his
brush.
The point of view from which I
first saw the valley, was not altogether,
although it was nearly, the best point
from which to survey the house.
will therefore describe it as I after-
wards saw it from a position on the
I
stone wall at the southern extreme of
the amphitheatre.
The main building was about twenty-
four feet long and sixteen broad-cer-
tainly not more. Its total height, from
the ground to the apex of the roof,
could not have exceeded eighteen feet.
To the west end of this structure was
attached one about a third smaller in
all its proportions:-the line of its
front standing back about two yards
from that of the larger house; and the
line of its roof, of course, being con-
siderably depressed below that of the
roof adjoining. At right angles to these
buildings, and from the rear of the
main one-not exactly in the middle-
extended a third compartment, very
small-being, in general, one-third less
than the western wing. The roofs of
the two larger were very steep-sweep-
ing down from the ridge-beam with a
long concave curve, and extending at
least four feet beyond the walls in
front, so as to form the roofs of two
piazzas. These latter roofs, of course,
needed no support; but as they had
the air of needing it, slight and per-
fectly plain pillars were inserted at the
corners alone. The roof of the north-
ern wing was merely an extension of a
portion of the main roof. Between the
chief building and western wing arose
a very tall and rather slender square
chimney of hard Dutch bricks, alter-
nately black and red:-a slight cornice
of projecting bricks at the top. Over
the gables the roofs also projected very
much:-in the main building about four
feet to the east and two to the west.
The principal door was not exactly in
the main division, being a little to the
east-while the two windows were to
the west. These latter did not extend
304
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
to the floor, but were much longer and
narrower than usual-they had single
shutters like doors-the panes were of
lozenge form, but quite large. The
door itself had its upper half of glass,
also in lozenge panes a moveable shut-
ter secured it at night. The door to
the west wing was in its gable, and
quite simple-a single window looked
out to the south. There was no ex-
ternal door to the north wing, and it
also had only one window to the east.
The blank wall of the eastern gable
was relieved by stairs (with a balus-
trade) running diagonally across it-the
ascent being from the south. Under
cover of the widely projecting eave
these steps gave access to a door lead-
ing into the garret, or rather loft-for
it was lighted only by a single window
to the north, and seemed to have been
intended as a store room.
The piazzas of the main building and
western wing had no floors, as is usual;
but at the doors and at each window,
large, flat irregular slabs of granite lay
imbedded in the delicious turf, affording
comfortable footing in all weather.
Excellent paths of the same material—
not nicely adapted, but with the velvety
sod filling frequent intervals between
the stones, led hither and thither from
the house, to a crystal spring above
five paces off, to the road, or to one
or two out-houses that lay to the north,
beyond the brook, and were thoroughly
concealed by a few locusts and catalpas.
Not more than six steps from the
main door of the cottage stood the dead
trunk of a fantastic pear-tree, SO
clothed from head to foot in the gor-
geous bignonia blossoms that one re-
quired no little scrutiny to determine
what manner of sweet thing it could be.
From various arms of this tree hung
cages of different kinds. In one, a large
wicker cylinder with a ring at top,
revelled a mocking bird; in another an
oriole; in a third the impudent bobo-
link-while three or four more delicate
prisons were loudly vocal with canaries.
The pillars of the piazza were en-
wreathed in jasmine and sweet honey-
suckle; while from the angle formed
by the main structure and its west
wing, in front, sprang a grape-vine of
unexampled luxuriance. Scorning all
restraint, it had clambered first to the
lower roof-then to the higher; and
along the ridge of this latter it con-
tinued to writhe on, throwing out ten-
drils to the right and left, until at
length it fairly attained the east gable.
and fell trailing over the stairs.
The whole house, with its wings, was
constructed of the old-fashioned Dutch
shingles-broad, and with unrounded
corners. It is a peculiarity of this
material to give houses built of it the
appearance of being wider at bottom
than at top-after the manner of Egyp-
tian architecture; and in the present
instance, this exceedingly picturesque
effect was aided by numerous pots of
gorgeous flowers that almost encom-
passed the base of the buildings.
The shingles were painted a dull
gray; and the happiness with which this
neutral tint melted into the vivid green
of the tulip tree leaves that partially
overshadowed the cottage, can readily
be conceived by an artist.
From the position near the stone
wall, as described, the buildings were
seen at great advantage-for the south-
eastern angle was thrown forward-so
that the eye took in at once the whole
of the two fronts, with the picturesque
LANDOR'S COTTAGE
305
eastern gable, and at the same time
obtained just a sufficient glimpse of the
northern wing, with parts of a pretty
roof to the spring-house, and nearly
half a light bridge that spanned the
brook in the near vicinity of the main
buildings.
I did not remain very long on the
brow of the hill, although long enough
to make a thorough survey of the scene
at my feet. It was clear that I had
wandered from the road to the village,
and I had thus good travellers' excuse
to open the gate before me, and inquire
my way, at all events; so, without more
ado. I proceeded.
The road, after passing the gate,
seemed to lie upon a natural ledge,
sloping gradually down along the face.
of the north-eastern cliffs. It led me
on to the foot of the northern precipice,
and thence over the bridge, round by
the eastern gable to the front door. In
this progress, I took notice that no
sight of the out-houses could be ob-
tained.
As I turned the corner of the gable,
the mastiff bounded towards me in
stern silence, but with the eye and the
whole air of a tiger. I held him out
my hand, however, in token of amity-
and I never yet knew the dog who was
proof against such an appeal to his
courtesy. He not only shut his mouth
and wagged his tail, but absolutely
offered me his paw-afterward extend-
ing his civilities to Ponto.
As no bell was discernible, I rapped
with my stick against the door, which
stood half open. Instantly a figure
advanced to the threshold-that of a
young woman about twenty-eight years
of age slender, or rather slight, and
somewhat above the medium height.
As she approached, with a certain mod-
est decision of step altogether inde-
scribable, I said to myself, "Surely
here I have found the perfection of
natural, in contradistinction from arti-
ficial grace." The second impression
which she made on me, but by far the
more vivid of the two, was that of
enthusiasm. So intense an expression
of romance, perhaps I should call it, or
of unworldliness, as that which gleamed
from her deep-set eyes, had never so
sunk into my heart of hearts before.
I know not how it is, but this peculiar
expression of the eye, wreathing itself
occasionally into the lips, is the most
powerful, if not absolutely the sole
spell, which rivets my interest in
woman. "Romance," provided my
readers fully comprehended what I
would here imply by the word "ro-
mance" and "womanliness" seem to me
convertible terms: and, after all, what
man truly loves in woman, is simply
her womanhood. The eyes of Annie*
(I heard some one from the interior
call her "Annie, darling!") were "spir-
itual gray;" her hair, a light chestnut:
this is all I had time to observe of her.
At her most courteous of invitations,
I entered-passing first into a tolerably
wide vestibule. Having come mainly to
observe, I took notice that to my right
as I stepped in, was a window, such as
those in front of the house; to the left,
a door leading into the principal room;
while, opposite me, an open door
enabled me to see a small apartment,
just the size of the vestibule, arranged
as a study, and having a large bow
window looking out to the north.
Passing into the parlor, I found my-
* See poem "For Annie."-Ed.
306
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
self with Mr. Landor-for this, I after-
wards found, was his name. He was
civil, even cordial in his manner; but
just then, I was more intent on observ-
ing the arrangements of the dwelling
which had so much interested me, than
the personal appearance of the tenant.
The north wing, I now saw, was a
bed-chamber; its door opened into the
parlor. West of this door was a single
window, looking toward the brook. At
the west end of the parlor, were a fire-
place, and a door leading into the west
wing-probably a kitchen.
Nothing could be more rigorously
simple than the furniture of the parlor.
On the floor was an ingrain carpet, of
excellent texture-a white ground,
spotted with small circular green
figures. At the windows were curtains
of snowy white jaconet muslin: they
were tolerably full, and hung decisively,
perhaps rather formally in sharp, paral-
lel plaits to the floor-just to the floor.
The walls were prepared with a French
paper of great delicacy, a silver ground,
with a faint green cord running zig-zag
throughout. Its expanse was relieved
merely by three of Julien's exquisite
lithographs a trois crayons, fastened to
the wall without frames. One of these
drawings was a scene of Oriental lux-
ury, or rather voluptuousness; another
was a "carnival piece," spirited beyond
compare; the third was a Greek female
head-a face so divinely beautiful, and
yet of an expression so provokingly in-
determinate, never before arrested my
attention.
The more substantial furniture con-
sisted of a round table, a few chairs
(including a large rocking-chair), and
a sofa, or rather "settee;" its material
was plain maple painted a creamy
white, slightly interstriped with green;
the seat of cane. The chairs and table
were "to match," but the forms of all
had evidently been designed by the
same brain which planned "the
grounds;" it is impossible to conceive
anything more graceful.
On the table were a few books, a
large, square, crystal bottle of some
novel perfume, a plain ground-glass
astral (not solar) lamp with an Italian
shade, and a large vase of resplen
dently-blooming flowers. Flowers, in-
deed, of gorgeous colours and delicate
odour formed the sole mere decoration
of the apartment. The fire-place was
nearly filled with a vase of brilliant
geranium. On a triangular shelf in each
angle of the room stood also a similar
vase, varied only as to its lovely con-
tents. One or two smaller bouquets
adorned the mantel, and late violets
clustered about the open windows.
It is not the purpose of this work
to do more than give in detail, a picture
of Mr. Landor's residence as I found it.
The Island of the Fay
(First published in Graham's Magazine, June, 1841.-Ed.)
Nullus enim locus sine genio est.-
Servius.
"LA MUSIQUE," says Marmontel, in
those "Contes Moraux"* which in all
our translations, we have insisted upon
calling "Moral Tales," as if in mock-
ery of their spirit-"la musique est le
seul des talents qui jouissent de lui-
meme; tous les autres veulent des te-
moins." He here confounds the pleas-
ure derivable from sweet sounds with
the capacity for creating them. No
more than any other talent, is that for
music susceptible of complete enjoy-
ment, where there is no second party
to appreciate its exercise. And it is
only in common with other talents
that it produces effects which may be
fully enjoyed in solitude. The idea
which the raconteur has either failed
to entertain clearly, or has sacrificed
in its expression to his national love of
point, is, doubtless, the very tenable
one that the higher order of music
is the most thoroughly estimated when
we are exclusively alone. The prop-
osition, in this form, will be ad-
mitted at once by those who love
the lyre for its own sake, and for its
spiritual uses. But there is one pleas-
ure still within the reach of fallen
mortality and perhaps only one-
*Moraux is here derived from
mœurs, and its meaning is "of man-
ners."-E. A. P.
which owes even more than does music
to the accessory sentiment of seclusion.
I mean the happiness experienced in
the contemplation of natural scenery.
In truth, the man who would behold
aright the glory of God upon earth
must in solitude behold that glory. To
me, at least, the presence-not of hu-
man life only, but of life in any other
form, than that of the green things
which grow upon the soil and are voice-
less-is a stain upon the landscape-
is at war with the genius of the scene.
I love, indeed, to regard the dark val-
leys, and the gray rocks, and the wa-
ters that silently smile, and the forests
that sigh in uneasy slumbers, and the
proud watchful mountains that look
down upon all,-I love to regard these
as themselves but the colossal mem-
bers of one vast animate and sentient
whole-a whole whose form (that of
the sphere) is the most perfect and
most inclusive of all; whose path is
among associate planets; whose meek
handmaiden is the moon, whose medi-
ate sovereign is the sun; whose life
is eternity; whose thought is that of a
God; whose enjoyment is knowledge;
whose destinies are lost in immensity;
whose cognizance of ourselves is akin
with our own cognizance of the animal-
cule which infest the brain-a being
which we, in consequence, regard as
purely inanimate and material, much
in the same manner as these animal-
culæ must regard us.
307
308
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Our telescopes and our mathematical
investigations assure us on every hand
-notwithstanding the cant of the more
ignorant of the priesthood-that space,
and therefore that bulk, is an impor-
tant consideration in the eyes of the
Almighty. The cycles in which the
stars move are those best adapted
for the evolution, without collision, of
the greatest possible number of bodies.
The forms of those bodies are accu-
rately such as, within a given surface,
to include the greatest possible amount
of matter;-while the surfaces them-
selves are so disposed as to accommo-
date a denser population than could
be accommodated on the same sur-
faces otherwise arranged. Nor is it
any argument against bulk being an
object with God, that space itself is
infinite; for there may be an infinity
of matter to fill it. And since we see
clearly that the endowment of matter
with vitality is a principle-indeed, as
far as our judgments extend, the lead-
ing principle in the operations of Deity,
-it is scarcely logical to imagine it
confined to the regions of the minute,
where we daily trace it, and not ex-
tending to those of the august. As
we find cycle within cycle without
end, yet all revolving around one far-
distant centre which is the God-head,
may we not analogically suppose in the
same manner, life within life, the less
within the greater, and all within the
Spirit Divine? In short, we are madly
erring, through self-esteem, in believ-
ing man, in either his temporal or fu-
ture destinies, to be of more moment
in the universe than that vast "clod
of the valley" which he tills and con-
temns, and to which he denies a soul
for no more profound reason than that
he does not behold it in operation.*
These fancies, and such as these,
have always given to my meditations
among the mountains and the forests.
by the rivers and the ocean, a tinge
of what the everyday world would not
fail to term fantastic. My wanderings
amid such scenes have been many, and
far-searching, and often solitary; and
the interest with which I have strayed
through many a dim, deep valley, or
gazed into the reflected heaven of many
a bright lake, has been an interest
greatly deepened by the thought that
I have strayed and gazed alone. What
flippant Frenchman + was it who said
in allusion to the well-known work of
Zimmerman, that, "la solitude est une
belle chose; mais il faut quelqu'un pour
vous dire que la solitude est une belle
chose?" The epigram cannot be gain-
said; but the necessity is a thing that
does not exist.
It was during one of my lonely jour-
neyings, amid a far distant region of
mountain locked within mountain, and
sad rivers and melancholy tarns writh-
ing or sleeping within all-that I
chanced upon a certain rivulet and is-
land. I came upon them suddenly in
the leafy June, and threw myself upon
the turf, beneath the branches of an
unknown odorous shrub, that I might
doze as I contemplated the scene. I
felt that thus only should I look upon
*Speaking of the tides, Pomponius
Mela, in his treatise "De Situ Orbis,"
says "either the world is a great ani-
mal, or" etc.-E. A. P.
Balzac-in substance-I do not re-
member the words.-E. A. P.
THE ISLAND OF THE FAY
309
it-such was the character of phantasm foliage, with bark smooth, glossy, and
which it wore.
On all sides-save to the west, where
the sun was about sinking-arose the
verdant walls of the forest. The little
river which turned sharply in its course,
and was thus immediately lost to sight,
seemed to have no exit from its prison,
but to be absorbed by the deep green
foliage of the trees to the east-while
in the opposite quarter (so it appeared
to me as I lay at length and glanced
upward) there poured down noiselessly
and continuously into the valley, a rich
golden and crimson waterfall from the
sunset fountains of the sky.
About midway in the short vista
which my dreamy vision took in, one
small circular island, profusely ver-
dured, reposed upon the bosom of the
stream.
So blended bank and shadow there
That each seemed pendulous in air-
so mirror-like was the glassy water,
that it was scarcely possible to say
at what point upon the slope of the
emerald turf its crystal dominion be-
gan.
My position enabled me to include
in a single view both the eastern and
western extremities of the islet, and
I observed a singularly marked differ-
ence in their aspects. The latter was
all one radiant harem of garden beau-
ties. It glowed and blushed beneath
the eyes of the slant sunlight, and
fairly laughed with flowers. The grass
was short, springy, sweet-scented, and
asphodel-interspersed. The trees were
lithe, mirthful, erect-bright, slender,
and graceful,-of Eastern figure and
parti-colored. There seemed a deep
sense of life and joy about all; and
although no airs blew from out the
heavens, yet every thing had motion
through the gentle sweepings to and
fro of innumerable butterflies, that
might have been mistaken for tulips
with wings.*
The other or eastern end of the isle
was whelmed in the blackest shade. A
sombre, yet beautiful and peaceful
gloom here pervaded all things. The
trees were dark in color, and mourn-
ful in form and attitude, wreathing
themselves into sad, solemn, and spec-
tral shapes that conveyed ideas of mor-
tal sorrow and untimely death. The
grass wore the deep tint of the cypress,
and the heads of its blades hung droop-
ingly, and hither and thither among it
were many small unsightly hillocks,
low and narrow, and not very long, that
had the aspect of graves, but were not;
although over and all about them the
rue and the rosemary clambered. The
shade of the trees fell heavily upon
the water, and seemed to bury itself
therein, impregnating the depths of the
element with darkness. I fancied that
each shadow, as the sun descended
lower and lower, separated itself sul-
lenly from the trunk that gave it birth,
and thus became absorbed by the
stream; while other shadows issued mo-
mently from the trees, taking the place
of their predecessors thus entombed.
This idea, having once seized upon
my fancy, greatly excited it, and I lost
myself forthwith in revery. "If ever
island were enchanted," said I to my-
*Florem putares nare per liquidum
æthera.-P. Commire.
310
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
self, "this is it. This is the haunt of
the few gentle Fays who remain from
the wreck of the race. Are these green
tombs theirs?-or do they yield up
their sweet lives as mankind yield up
their own? In dying, do they not
rather waste away mournfully, render-
ing unto God, little by little, their ex-
istence, as these trees render up shadow
after shadow, exhausting their sub-
stance unto dissolution? What the
wasting tree is to the water that im-
bibes its shade, growing thus blacker
by what it preys upon, may not the
life of the Fay be to the death which
engulfs it?"
As I thus mused, with half-shut eyes,
while the sun sank rapidly to rest, and
eddying currents careered round and
round the island, bearing upon their
bosom large, dazzling, white flakes of
the bark of the sycamore-flakes which,
in their multiform positions upon the
water, a quick imagination might have
converted into any thing it pleased,
while I thus mused, it appeared to me
that the form of one of those very
Fays about whom I had been pon-
dering made its way slowly into the
darkness from out the light at the west-
ern end of the island. She stood erect
in a singularly fragile canoe, and urged
it with the mere phantom of an oar.
While within the influence of the lin-
gering sunbeams, her attitude seemed
indicative of joy-but sorrow deformed
it as she passed within the shade.
Slowly she glided along, and at length
rounded the islet and re-entered the re-
gion of light. "The revolution which
has just been made by the Fay," con-
tinued I, musingly, "is the cycle of the
brief year of her life. She has floated
through her winter and through her
summer. She is a year nearer unto
death; for I did not fail to see that,
as she came into the shade, her shadow
fell from her, and was swallowed up
in the dark water, making its blackness
more black."
And again the boat appeared and the
Fay, but about the attitude of the lat-
ter there was more of care and un-
certainty and less of elastic joy. She
floated again from out the light and
into the gloom (which deepened mo-
mently) and again her shadow fell from
her into the ebony water, and became
absorbed into its blackness. And again
and again she made the circuit of the
island, (while the sun rushed down
to his slumbers), and at each issuing
into the light there was more sorrow
about her person, while it greew feebler
and far fainter and more indistinct,
and at each passage into the gloom
there fell from her a darker shade,
which became whelmed in a shadow
more black. But at length when the
sun had utterly departed, the Fay, now
the mere ghost of her former self,
went disconsolately with her boat into
the region of the ebony flood, and that
she issued thence at all I cannot say,
for darkness fell over all things and I
beheld her magical figure no more.
The Oval Portrait
(First published in Graham's Magazine, April, 1842. Also called Life in
Death.-Ed.)
THE chateau into which my valet had
ventured to make forcible entrance,
rather than permit me, in my desper-
ately wounded condition, to pass a
night in the open air, was one of those
piles of commingled gloom and gran-
deur which have so long frowned among
the Appennines, not less in fact than
in the fancy of Mrs. Radcliffe. To all
appearance it had been temporarily and
very lately abandoned. We established
ourselves in one of the smallest and
least sumptuously furnished apart-
ments. It lay in a remote turret of
the building. Its decorations were rich,
yet tattered and antique. Its walls
were hung with tapestry and bedecked
with manifold and multiform armorial
trophies, together with an unusually
great number of very spirited modern
paintings in frames of rich golden ara-
besque. In these paintings, which de-
pended from the walls not only in their
main surfaces, but in very many nooks
which the bizarre architecture of the
chateau rendered necessary—in these
paintings my incipient delirium, per-
haps, had caused me to take deep in-
terest; so that I bade Pedro to close
the heavy shutters of the room-since
it was already night,-to light the
tongues of a tall candelabrum which
stood by the head of my bed, and
to throw open far and wide the fringed
curtains of black velvet which envel-
oped the bed itself. I wished all this
done that I might resign myself, if
not to sleep, at least alternately to the
contemplation of these pictures, and the
perusal of a small volume which had
been found upon the pillow, and which
purported to criticise and describe
them.
Long, long I read-and devoutly, de-
voutly I gazed. Rapidly and gloriously
the hours flew by and the deep mid-
night came. The position of the can-
delabrum displeased me, and outreach-
ing my hand with difficulty, rather than
disturb my slumbering valet, I placed
it so as to throw its rays more fully
upon the book.
But the action produced an effect
altogether unanticipated. The rays of
the numerous candles (for there were
many) now fell within a niche of the
room which had hitherto been thrown
into deep shade by one of the bed-
posts. I thus saw in vivid light a pic-
ture all unnoticed before. It was the
portrait of a young girl just ripening
into womanhood. I glanced at the
painting hurriedly, and then closed my
eyes. Why I did this was not at first
apparent even to my own perception.
But while my lids remained thus shut,
I ran over in my mind my reason for
so shutting them. It was an impulsive
movement to gain time for thought-
to make sure that my vision had not
deceived me to calm and subdue my
fancy for a more sober and more cer-
tain gaze. In a very few moments I
again looked fixedly at the painting.
That I now saw aright I could not
and would not doubt; for the first
311
312
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
flashing of the candles upon that can-
vas had seemed to dissipate the dreamy
stupor which was stealing over my
senses, and to startle me at once, into
waking life.
The portrait, I have already said,
was that of a young girl. It was a
mere head and shoulders, done in what
is technically termed a vignette man-
ner; much in the style of the favorite
heads of Sully. The arms, the bosom,
and even the ends of the radiant hair
melted imperceptibly into the vague
yet deep shadow which formed the
background of the whole.
The frame
was oval, richly gilded and filigreed
in Moresque. As a thing of art noth-
ing could be more admirable than the
painting itself. But it could have been
neither the execution of the work, nor
the immortal beauty of the counte-
nance, which had so suddenly and so
vehemently moved me. Least of all,
could it have been that my fancy,
shaken from its half slumber, had mis-
taken the head for that of a living per-
son. I saw at once that the peculiari-
ties of the design, of the vignetting,
and of the frame, must have instantly
dispelled such idea-must have pre-
vented even its momentary entertain-
ment. Thinking earnestly upon these
points, I remained, for an hour per-
haps, half sitting, half reclining, with
my vision riveted upon the portrait.
At length, satisfied with the true secret
of its effect, I fell back within the
bed. I had found the spell of the pic-
ture in an absolute life-likeliness of ex-
pression, which, at first startling, finally
confounded, subdued, and appalled me.
With deep and reverent awe I replaced
the candelabrum in its former position.
The cause of my deep agitation being
thus shut from view, I sought eagerly
the volume which discussed the paint-
ings and their histories. Turning to
the number which designated the oval
portrait, I there read the vague and
quaint words which follow:
"She was a maiden of rarest beauty,
and not more lovely than full of glee.
And evil was the hour when she saw,
and loved, and wedded the painter.
He, passionate, studious, austere, and
having already a bride in his Art; she
a maiden of rarest beauty, and not
more lovely than full of glee; all light
and smiles, and frolicsome as the young
fawn; loving and cherishing all things;
hating only the Art which was her rival;
dreading only the pallet and brushes
and other untoward instruments which
deprived her of the countenance of her
lover. It was thus a terrible thing for
this lady to hear the painter speak of
his desire to portray even his young
bride. But she was humble and obe-
dient, and sat meekly for many weeks
in the dark, high turret-chamber where
the light dripped upon the pale canvas
only from overhead. But he, the
painter, took glory in his work, which
went on from hour to hour, and from
day to day. And he was a passionate,
and wild, and moody man, who became
lost in reveries; so that he would not
see that the light which fell so ghastly
in that lone turret withered the health
and the spirits of his bride, who pined
visibly to all but him. Yet she smiled
on and still on, uncomplainingly, be-
cause she saw that the painter (who
had high renown) took a fervid and
burning pleasure in his task, and
wrought day and night to depict her
who so loved him, yet who grew daily
BERENICE
313
more dispirited and weak. And in sooth
some who beheld the portrait spoke
of its resemblance in low words, as of
a mighty marvel, and a proof not less
of the power of the painter than of
his deep love for her whom he depicted
so surpassingly well. But at length,
as the labor drew nearer to its conclu-
sion, there were admitted none into
the turret; for the painter had grown
wild with the ardor of his work, and
turned his eyes from the canvas rarely,
even to regard the countenance of his
wife. And he would not see that the
tints which he spread upon the can-
vas were drawn from the cheeks of
her who sat beside him. And when
many weeks had passed, and but little
remained to do, save one brush upon
the mouth and one tint upon the eye,
the spirit of the lady again flickered
up as the flame within the socket of
the lamp. And then the brush was
given, and then the tint was placed;
and, for one moment, the painter stood
entranced before the work which he
had wrought; but in the next, while he
yet gazed, he grew tremulous and very
pallid, and aghast, and crying with a
loud voice, 'This is indeed Life itself!'
turned suddenly to regard his beloved:
-She was dead!"
Berenice
(First published in the Southern Literary Messenger, March, 1835.-Ed.)
Dicebant mihi sodales, si sepulchrum
amicæ visitarem, curas meas aliquan-
tulum fore levatas.-Ebn Zaiat.
MISERY is manifold. The wretched-
ness of earth is multiform. Overarch-
ing the wide horizon as the rainbow,
its hues are as various as the hues of
that arch, as distinct too, yet as inti-
mately blended. Overarching the wide.
horizon as the rainbow! How is it
that from beauty I have derived a
type of unloveliness? from the cove-
nant of peace a simile of sorrow? But
as in ethics, evil is a consequence of
good, so in fact, out of joy is sorrow
born. Either the memory of the past
bliss is the anguish of to-day, or the
agonies which are have their origin
in the ecstasies which might have been.
My baptismal name is Egæus, that of
my family I will not mention. Yet
there are no towers in the land more
time-honoured than my gloomy, grey,
hereditary halls. Our line has been
called a race of visionaries; and in
many striking particulars-in the char-
acter of the family mansion, in the
frescoes of the chief saloon, in the tap-
estries of the dormitories, in the chisel-
ling of some buttresses in the armoury,
but more especially in the gallery of
antique paintings, in the fashion of the
library chamber, and lastly, in the very
peculiar nature of the library's contents
-there is more than sufficient evidence
to warrant the belief.
The recollections of my earliest years
are connected with that chamber, and
with its volumes-of which latter I will
say no more. Here died my mother.
Herein was I born. But it is mere idle-
314
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ness to say that I had not lived be-
fore-that the soul has no previous ex-
istence. You deny it let us not
argue the matter. Convinced myself,
I seek not to convince. There is, how-
ever, a remembrance of aerial forms-
of spiritual and meaning eyes-of
sounds, musical yet sad; a remembrance
which will not be excluded; a memory
like a shadow-vague, variable, indefi-
nite, unsteady; and like a shadow, too,
in the impossibility of my getting rid
of it while the sunlight of my reason
shall exist.
In that chamber was I born. Thus
awaking from the long night of what
seemed, but was not, nonentity, at once
into the very regions of fairy land-
into a palace of imagination-into the
wild dominions of monastic thought
and erudition-it is not singular that I
gazed around me with a startled and
ardent eye-that I loitered away my
boyhood in books, and dissipated my
youth in revery; but it is singular, that
as years rolled away, and the noon of
manhood found me still in the mansion
of my fathers-it is wonderful what a
stagnation there fell upon the springs
of my life-wonderful how total an
inversion took place in the character of
my commonest thought. The realities
of the world affected me as visions, and
as visions only, while the wild ideas of
the land of dreams became, in turn, not
the material of my every-day existence,
but in very deed that existence utterly
and solely in itself.
Berenice and I were cousins, and we
grew up together in my paternal halls.
Yet differently we grew-I, ill of health,
and buried in gloom-she, agile, grace-
ful, and overflowing with energy; her's
-
the ramble on the hill-side-mine, the
studies of the cloister; I, living within
my own heart, and addicted, body and
soul, to the most intense and painful
meditation she, roaming carelessly
through life, with no thought of the
shadows in her path, or the silent flight
of the raven-winged hours. Berenice!
-I call upon her name-Berenice!-
and from the gray ruins of memory a
thousand tumultuous recollections are
startled at the sound! Ah, vividly is
her image before me now, as in the
early days of her light-heartedness and
joy! Oh, gorgeous yet fantastic
beauty! Oh, sylph amid the shrub-
beries of Arnheim! Oh, naiad among
its fountains! And then-then all is
mystery and terror, and a tale which
should not be told. Disease-a fatal
disease, fell like the simoom upon her
frame; and even, while I gazed upon
her, the spirit of change swept over
her, pervading her mind, her habits
and her character, and, in a manner
the most subtle and terrible, disturbing
even the identity of her person! Alas!
the destroyer came and went!—and the
victim-where is she? I knew her
not or knew her no longer as Bere-
nice!
Among the numerous train of mala
dies superinduced by that fatal and
primary one which effected a revolu
tion of so horrible a kind in the mora
and physical being of my cousin, may
be mentioned as the most distressing
and obstinate in its nature, a species
of epilepsy not unfrequently terminat
ing in trance itself-trance very nearly
resembling positive dissolution, and from
which her manner of recovery was, ir
most instances, startlingly abrupt. Ir
the meantime, my own disease for 1
BERENICE
315
have been told that I should call it by
no other appellation-my own disease,
then, grew rapidly upon me, and as-
sumed finally a monomaniac character
of a novel and extraordinary form-
hourly and momently gaining vigor-
and at length obtaining over me the
most incomprehensible ascendency.
This monomania, if I must so term it,
consisted in a morbid irritability of
those properties of the mind in meta-
physical science termed the attentive.
It is more than probable that I am not
understood; but I fear, indeed, that it
is in no manner possible to convey to
the mind of the merely general reader,
an adequate idea of that nervous in
tensity of interest with which, in my
case, the powers of meditation (not to
speak technically) busied and buried
themselves, in the contemplation of
even the most ordinary objects of the
universe.
To muse for long unwearied hours,
with my attention riveted to some frivo-
lous device on the margin or in the
typography of a book; to become ab-
sorbed, for the better part of a sum-
mer's day, in a quaint shadow falling
aslant upon the tapestry or upon the
floor; to lose myself, for an entire
night, in watching the steady flame of a
lamp, or the embers of a fire, to dream
away whole days over the perfume of
flower; to repeat, monotonously,
some common word, until the sound, by
dint of frequent repetition, ceased to
convey any idea whatever to the mind;
to lose all sense of motion or physical
existence, by means of absolute bodily
quiescence long and obstinately per-
severed in: such were a few of the most
common and least pernicious vagaries
induced by a condition of the mental
faculties, not, indeed, altogether un-
paralleled, but certainly bidding de-
fiance to any thing like analysis or
explanation.
Yet let me not be misapprehended.
The undue, earnest, and morbid atten-
tion thus excited by objects in their
own nature frivolous, must not be con-
founded in character with that rumi-
nating propensity common to all man-
kind, and more especially indulged in
by persons of ardent imagination. It
was not even, as might be at first sup-
posed, an extreme conditions, or exag-
geration of such propensity, but pri-
marily and essentially distinct and
different. In the one instance, the
dreamer, or enthusiast, being interested
by an object usually not frivolous, im-
perceptibly loses sight of this object in
a wilderness of deductions and sugges-
tions issuing therefrom, until, at the
conclusion of a day-dream often replete
with luxury, he finds the incitamentum,
or first cause of his musings, entirely
vanished and forgotten. In my case,
the primary object was invariably frivo-
lous, although assuming, through the
medium of my distempered vision, a
refracted and unreal importance. Few
deductions, if any, were made; and
those few pertinaciously returning in
upon the original object as a centre.
The meditations were never pleasure-
able; and, at the termination of the
revery, the first cause, so far from being
out of sight, had attained that super-
naturally exaggerated interest which
was the prevailing feature of the dis-
ease. In a word, the powers of mind
more particularly exercised were, with
me as I have said before, the attentive,
316
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
and are, with the day-dreamer, the
speculative.
My books, at this epoch, if they did
not actually serve to irritate the dis-
order, partook, it will be perceived,
largely, in their imaginative and in-
consequential nature, of the character-
istic qualities of the disorder itself. I
well remember, among others, the trea-
tise of the noble Italian, Cœlius Secun-
dus Curio, "De Amplitudine Beati
Regni Dei"; St. Austin's great work,
"The City of God"; and Tertullian's
"De Carne Christi," in which the para-
doxical sentence, "Mortuus est Dei
filius; credibile est quia ineptum est;
et sepultus resurrexit; certum est quia
impossible est," occupied my undivided
time, for many weeks of laborious and
fruitless investigation.
Thus it will appear that, shaken
from its balance only by trivial things,
my reason bore resemblance to that
ocean-crag spoken of by Ptolemy He-
phestion, which steadily resisting the
attacks of human violence, and the
fiercer fury of the waters and the winds,
trembled only to the touch of the
flower called Asphodel. And although,
to a careless thinker, it might appear
a matter beyond doubt, that the altera-
tion produced by her unhappy malady,
in the moral condition of Berenice,
would afford me many objects for the
exercise of that intense and abnormal
meditation whose nature I have been
at some trouble in explaining, yet such
was not in any degree the case. In
the lucid intervals of my infirmity, her
calamity, indeed, gave me pain, and,
taking deeply to heart that total wreck
of her fair and gentle life, I did not fail
to ponder, frequently and bitterly, upon
the wonder-working means by which
so strange a revolution had been so
suddenly brought to pass. But these
reflections partook not of the idiosyn-
crasy of my disease, and were such as
would have occurred, under similar cir-
cumstances, to the ordinary mass of
mankind. True to its own character,
my disorder revelled in the less impor-
tant but more startling changes wrought
in the physical frame of Berenice-in
the singular and most appalling distor-
tortion of her personal identity.
During the brightest days of her un-
paralleled beauty, most surely I had
never loved her. In the strange anomaly
of my existence, feelings with me, had
never been of the heart, and my pas-
sions always were of the mind. Through
the gray of the early morning-among
the trellised shadows of the forest at
noonday-and in the silence of my
library at night-she had flitted by my
eyes, and I had seen her-not as the
living and breathing Berenice, but as
the Berenice of a dream; not as a being
of the earth, earthly, but as the ab-
straction of such a being; not as a
thing to admire, but to analyze; not as
an object of love, but as the theme of
the most abstruse although desultory
speculation. And now-now I shud-
dered in her presence, and grew pale at
her approach; yet, bitterly lamenting
her fallen and desolate condition, I
called to mind that she had loved me
long, and, in an evil moment, I spoke
to her of marriage.
And at length the period of our nup-
tials was approaching, when, upon an
afternoon in the winter of the year-
one of those unseasonably warm, calm,
and misty days which are the nurse
BERENICE
317
of the beautiful Halcyon,*-I sat (and
sat, as I thought, alone) in the inner
apartment of the library. But uplift-
ing my eyes, I saw that Berenice stood
before me.
Was it my own excited imagination—
or the misty influence of the atmosphere
-or the uncertain twilight of the cham-
ber-or the gray draperies which fell
around her figure-that caused in it so
vacillating and indistinct an outline?
I could not tell. She spoke no word;
and I-not for words could I have
uttered a syllable. An icy chill ran
through my frame; a sense of insuffer-
able anxiety oppressed me; a consum-
ing curiosity pervaded my soul; and,
sinking back upon the chair, I remained
for some time breathless and motion-
less, with my eyes riveted upon her
person. Alas! its emaciation was ex-
cessive, and not one vestige of the
former being lurked in any single line
of the conotur. My burning glances at
length fell upon the face.
The forehead was high, and very pale,
and singularly placid; and the once
jetty hair fell partially over it, and
overshadowed the hollow temples with
innumerable ringlets, now of a vivid
yellow, and jarring discordantly, in
their fantastic character, with the reign-
ing melancholy of the countenance. The
eyes were lifeless, and lustreless, and
seemingly pupilless, and I shrank in-
voluntarily from their glassy stare to
the contemplation of the thin and
shrunken lips. They parted; and in a
* For as Jove, during the winter sea-
son, gives twice seven days of warmth,
men have called this element and tem-
perate time the nurse of the beautiful
Halcyon.-Simonides.
smile of peculiar meaning, the teeth
of the changed Berenice disclosed them-
selves slowly to my view. Would to
God that I had never beheld them, or
that, having done so, I had died!
*
*
*
*
The shutting of a door disturbed me,
and looking up, I found that my cousin
had departed from the chamber. But
from the disordered chamber of my
brain, had not, alas! departed, and
would not be driven away, the white
and ghastly spectrum of the teeth. Not
a speck on their surface-not a shade
on their enamel-not an indenture in
their edges-but what the brief period
of her smile had sufficed to brand in
upon my memory. I saw them now
even more unequivocally than I be-
held them then. The teeth!-the teeth!
-they were here, and there, and every-
where, and visibly and palpably before
me; long, narrow, and excessively white,
with the pale lips writhing about them,
as in the very moment of their first
terrible development. Then came the
full fury of my monomania, and I
struggled in vain against its strange and
irresistible influence. In the multiplied
objects of the external world I had no
thoughts but for the teeth. For these
I longed with a frenzied desire. All
other matters and all different interests
became absorbed in their single con-
templation. They they alone were
present to the mental eye, and they,
in their sole individuality, became the
essence of my mental life. I held them
in every light. I turned them in every
attitude. I surveyed their character-
istics. I dwelt upon their peculiarities.
I pondered upon their conformation. I
mused upon the alteration in their na-
ture. I shuddered as I assigned to
518
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
them, in imagination, a sensitive and
sentient power, and even when unas-
sisted by the lips, a capability of moral
expression. Of Mademoiselle Salle it
has been well said: "Que tous ses pas
etaient des sentiments," and of Berenice
I more seriously believed que tous ses
dents etaient des idees. Des idees!-
ah, here was the idiotic thought that
destroyed me! Des idees!-ah, there-
fore it was that I coveted them so
madly! I felt that their possession
could alone ever restore me to peace,
in giving me back to reason.
And the evening closed in upon me
thus-and then the darkness came, and
tarried, and went-and the day again
dawned-and the mists of a second
night were now gathering around-and
still I sat motionless in that solitary
room-and still I sat buried in medita-
tion-and still the phantasma of the
teeth maintained its terrible ascendancy,
as, with the most vivid and hideous dis-
tinctness, it floated about amid the
changing lights and shadows of the
chamber. At length there broke in
upon my dreams a cry as of horror and
dismay; and thereunto, after a pause,
succeeded the sound of troubled voices,
intermingled with many low moanings
of sorrow or of pain. I arose from
my seat, and throwing open one of the
doors of the library, saw standing out
in the antechamber a servant maiden,
all in tears, who told me that Berenice
was no more! She had been seized
with epilepsy in the early morning, and
now, at the closing in of the night, the
grave was ready for its tenant, and all
the preparations for the burial were
completed.
I found myself sitting in the library,
and again sitting there alone. It seemed
to me that I had newly awakened from
a confused and exciting dream. I
knew that it was now midnight, and
I was well aware, that since the setting
of the sun, Berenice had been interred.
But of that dreary period which inter-
vened I had no positive, at least no
definite, comprehension. Yet its mem-
ory was replete with horror-horror
more horrible from being vague, and
terror more terrible from ambiguity. It
was a fearful page in the record of my ex-
istence, written all over with dim, and
hideous, and unintelligible recollections.
I strived to decipher them, but in vain;
while ever and anon, like the spirit of
a departed sound, the shrill and pierc-
ing shriek of a female voice seemed to
be ringing in my ears. I had done a
deed-what was it? I asked myself the
question aloud, and the whispering
echoes of the chamber answered me-
"What was it?"
On the table beside me burned a
lamp, and near it lay a little box. It
was of no remarkable character, and I
had seen it frequently before, for it
was the property of the family physi-
cian; but how came it there, upon my
table, and why did I shudder in regard-
ing it These things were in no man-
ner to be accounted for, and my eyes
at length dropped to the open pages
of a book, and to a sentence under-
scored therein. The words were the
singular but simple ones of the poet
Ebn Zaiat:-"Dicebant mihi sodales si
sepulchrum amica visitarem, curas meas
aliquantulum fore levatas." Why, then,
as I perused them, did the hairs of
my head erect themselves on end, and
the blood of my body become congealed
within my veins?
ELEONORA
319
There came a light tap at the library
door-and, pale as the tenant of a
tomb, a menial entered upon tiptoe.
His looks were wild with terror, and
he spoke to me in a voice tremulous,
husky and very low. What said he?
-some broken sentences I heard. He
told of a wild cry disturbing the silence
of the night-of the gathering together
of the household-of a search in the
direction of the sound; and then his
tones grew thrillingly distinct as he
whispered me of a violated grave-of
a disfigured body enshrouded, yet still
breathing still palpitating-still alive!
He pointed to my garments; they
were muddy and clotted with gore. I
spoke not, and he took me gently by
the hand: it was indented with the im
press of human nails. He directed my
attention to some object against the
wall. I looked at it for some minutes:
it was a spade. With a shriek I bounded
to the table, and grasped the box that
lay upon it. But I could not force it
open; and, in my tremor, it slipped
from my hands, and fell heavily, and
burst into pieces; and from it, with
a rattling sound, there rolled out some
instruments of dental surgery, inter-
mingled with thirty-two small, white,
and ivory-looking substances that were.
scattered to and fro about the floor.
Eleonora
(First published in The Gift, 1842.- Ed.)
Sub conservatione formæ specificæ salva
anima. Raymond Lully.
I AM come of a race noted for vigor
of fancy and ardor of passion. Men
have called me mad; but the question
is not yet settled, whether madness is
or is not the loftiest intelligence-
whether much that is glorious-whether
all that is profound-does not spring
from disease of thought-from moods
of mind exalted at the expense of the
general intellect. They who dream by
day are cognizant of many things which
escape those who dream only by night.
In their gray visions they obtain
glimpses of eternity, and thrill, in wak-
ing, to find that they have been upon
the verge of the great secret. In
snatches, they learn something of the
wisdom which is of good, and more of
the mere knowledge which is of evil.
They penetrate, however, rudderless or
compassless into the vast ocean of the
"light ineffable," and again, like the
adventures of the Nubian geographer,
"agressi sunt mare tenebrarum,* quid
in eo esset exploraturi."
We will say, then, that I am mad. I
grant, at least, that there are two dis-
tinct conditions of my mental existence
-the condition of a lucid reason, not
to be disputed, and belonging to the
memory of events forming the first
epoch of my life-and a condition of
*The phrase and idea of mare te-
nebrarum is a favorite prose and poetic
theme of Poe. It means "Sea of
Shadows."-Ed.
320
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
shadow and doubt, appertaining to the
present, and to the recollection of what
constitutes the second great era of my
being. Therefore, what I shall tell of
the earlier period, believe; and to what
I may relate of the later time, give
only such credit as may seem due; or
doubt it altogether; or, if doubt it ye
cannot, then play unto its riddle the
Edipus.
She whom I loved in youth, and of
whom I now pen calmly and distinctly
these remembrances, was the sole daugh-
ter of the only sister of my mother
long departed. Eleonora was the name
of my cousin. We had always dwelled
together, beneath a tropical sun, in the
Valley of the Many-Colored Grass. No
unguided footstep ever came upon that
vale; for it lay far away up among
a range of giant hills that hung beetling
around about it, shutting out the sun-
light from its sweetest recesses.
path was trodden in its vicinity; and,
to reach our happy home, there was
need of putting back, with force, the
foliage of many thousands of forest
trees, and of crushing to death the
glories of many millions of fragrant
flowers. Thus it was that we lived all
alone, knowing nothing of the world.
without the valley-I, and my cousin,
and her mother.
No
From the dim regions beyond the
mountains at the upper end of our en-
circled domain, there crept out a nar-
row and deep river, brighter than all
save the eyes of Eleonora; and, winding
stealthily about in mazy courses, it
passed away, at length, through a
shadowy gorge, among hills still dimmer
than those whence it had issued.
called it the "River of Silence;" for
there seemed to be a hushing influence
We
in its flow. No murmur arose from its
bed, and so gently it wandered along,
that the pearly pebbles upon which we
loved to gaze, far down within its
bosom, stirred not at all, but lay in a
motionless content, each in its own old
station, shining on gloriously forever.
The margin of the river, and of the
many dazzling rivulets that glided
through devious ways into its channel,
as well as the spaces that extended
from the margins away down into the
depths of the streams until they
reached the bed of pebbles at
the bottom-these spots, not less
than the whole surface of the valley,
from the river to the mountains that
girdled it in, were carpeted all by
a soft green grass, thick, short, per-
fectly even, and vanilla-perfumed, but
so besprinkled throughout with the ye!-
low buttercup, the white daisy, the pur-
ple violet, and the ruby-red asphodel,
that its exceeding beauty spoke to
our hearts in loud tones, of the love
and of the glory of God.
And, here and there, in groves about
this grass, like wildernesses of dreams,
sprang up fantastic trees, whose tall
slender stems stood not upright, but
slanted gracefully toward the light that
peered at noon-day into the centre of
the valley. Their bark was speckled
with the vivid alternate splendor of
ebony and silver, and was smoother
than all save the cheeks of Eleonora;
so that, but for the brilliant green of
the huge leaves that spread from their
summits in long, tremulous lines, dally-
ing with the Zephyrs, one might have
fancied them giant serpents of Syria
doing homage to their Sovereign the
Sun.
ELEONORA
321
Haid in hand about this valley, for
fifteen years, roamed I with Eleonora
before Love entered within our hearts.
It was one evening at the close of the
third lustrum of her life, and of the
fourth of my own, that we sat, locked
in each other's embrace, beneath the
serpent-like trees, and looked down
within the water of the River of Silence
at our images therein. We spoke no
words during the rest of that sweet
day; and our words even upon the
morrow were tremulous and few. We
had drawn the god Eros from that
wave, and now we felt that he had
enkindled within us the fiery souls of
our forefathers. The passions which
had for centuries distinguished our
race, came thronging with the fancies
for which they had been equally noted,
and together breathed a delirious bliss
over the Valley of the Many-Colored
Grass. A change fell upon all things.
Strange, brilliant flowers, star-shaped,
burst out upon the trees where no flow-
ers had been known before. The tints
of the green carpet deepened; and when,
one by one, the white daisies shrank
away, there sprang up in place of them,
ten by ten of the ruby-red asphodel.
And life arose in our paths; for the tall
flamingo, hitherto unseen, with all gay
glowing birds, flaunted his scarlet plum-
age before us. The golden and silver
fish haunted the river, out of the bosom
of which issued, little by little, a mur-
mur that swelled, at length, into a
lulling melody more divine than that of
the harp of Eolus-sweeter than all
save the voice of Eleonora. And now,
too, a voluminous cloud, which we had
long watched in the regions of Hesper,
floated out thence, all gorgeous in crim-
son and gold, and settling in peace
above us, sank, day by day, lower and
lower, until its edges rested upon the
tops of the mountains, turning all their
dimness into magnificence, and shutting
us up, as if forever, within a magic
prison-house of grandeur and of glory.
No
The loveliness of Eleonora was that
of the seraphim; but she was a maiden
artless and innocent as the brief life
she had led among the flowers.
guile disguised the fervor of love which
animated her heart, and she examined
with me its inmost recesses as we
walked together in the Valley of the
Many-Colored Grass, and discoursed of
the mighty changes which had lately
taken place therein.
At length, having spoken one day, in
tears, of the last sad change which
must befall Humanity, she thencefor-
ward dwelt only upon this one sorrow-
ful theme, interweaving it into all our
converse, as, in the songs of the bard
of Schiraz, the same images are found
occurring, again and again, in every im-
pressive variation of phrase.
She had seen that the finger of Death
was upon her bosom-that, like the
ephemeron, she had been made per-
fect in lovliness only to die; but the
terrors of the grave to her lay solely
in a consideration which she revealed
to me, one evening at twilight, by the
banks of the River of Silence. She
grieved to think that, having entombed
her in the Valley of the Many-Colored
Grass, I would quit forever its happy
recesses, transferring the love which
now was so passionately her own to
some maiden of the outer and every-
day world. And, then and there, I
threw myself hurriedly at the feet of
Eleonora, and offered up a vow, to
herself and to Heaven, that I would
322
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
never bind myself in marriage to any
daughter of Earth-that I would in no
manner prove recreant to her dear
memory, or to the memory of the
devout affection with which she had
blessed me. And I called the Mighty
Ruler of the Universe to witness the
pious solemnity of my vow. And the
curse which I invoked of Him and of
her, a saint in Helusion should I prove
traitorous to that promise, involved a
penalty the exceeding great horror of
which will not permit me to make rec-
ord of it here. And the bright eyes of
Eleonora grew brighter at my words;
and she sighed as if a deadly burthen
had been taken from her breast; and
she trembled and very bitterly wept;
but she made acceptance of the vow,
(for what was she but a child?) and
it made easy to her the bed of her
death. And she said to me, not many
days afterward, tranquilly dying, that,
because of what I had done for the
comfort of her spirit she would watch
over me in that spirit when departed,
and, if so it were permitted her return
to me visibly in the watches of the
night; but, if this thing were, indeed,
beyond the power of the souls in Para-
dise, that she would, at least, give me
frequent indications of her presence;
sighing upon me in the evening winds,
or filling the air which I breathed with
perfume from the censers of the angels.
And, with these words upon her lips,
she yielded up her innocent life, put-
ting an end to the first epoch of my
own.
Thus far I have faithfully said.
But as I pass the barrier in Time's
path, formed by the death of my be-
loved, and proceed with the second era
of my existence, I feel that a shadow
gathers over my brain, and I mistrust
the perfect sanity of the record. But
let me on.-Years dragged themselves
along heavily, and still I dwelled within
the Valley of the Many-Colored Grass;
but a second change had come upon
all things. The star-shaped flowers
shrank into the stems of the trees, and
appeared no more. The tints of the
green carpet faded; and, one by one,
the ruby-red asphodels withered away;
and there sprang up, in place of them,
ten by ten, dark, eye-like violets, that
writhed uneasily and were ever en-
cumbered with dew. And Life de-
parted from our paths; for the tall
flamingo flaunted no longer his scarlet
plumage before us, but flew sadly from
the vale into the hills, with all the
gay glowing birds that had arrived in
his company. And the golden and
silver fish swam down through the
gorge at the lower end of our domain
and bedecked the sweet river never
again. And the lulling melody that
had been softer than the wind-harp of
Eolus, and more divine than all save
the voice of Eleonora, it died little by
little away, in murmurs growing lower
and lower, until the stream returned,
at length, utterly, into the solemnity
of its original silence. And then, lastly,
the voluminous cloud uprose, and,
abandoning the tops of the mountains
to the dimness of old, fell back into
the regions of Hesper, and took away
all its manifold golden and gorgeous
glories from the Valley of the Many-
Colored Grass.
Yet the promises of Eleonora were
not forgotten; for I heard the sounds
of the swinging of the censers of the
angels; and streams of a holy perfume
floated ever and ever about the valley;
ELEONORA
323
and at lone hours, when my heart beat
heavily, the winds that bathed my brow
came unto me laden with soft sighs;
and indistinct murmurs filled often the
night air; and once- oh, but once only!
I was awakened from a slumber, like
the slumber of death, by the pressing
of spiritual lips upon my own.
But the void within my heart re-
fused, even thus, to be filled. I longed
for the love which had before filled it
to overflowing. At length the valley
pained me through its memories of
Eleonora, and I left it for ever for the
vanities and the turbulent triumphs of
the world.
*
*
I found myself within a strange city,
where all things might have served to
blot from recollection the sweet dreams
I had dreamed so long in the Valley
of the Many-Colored Grass. The
pomps and pageantries of a stately
court, and the mad clangor of arms,
and the radiant loveliness of women,
bewildered and intoxicated my brain.
But as yet my soul had proved true
to its vows, and the indications of the
presence of Eleonora were still given
me in the silent hours of the night.
Suddenly these manifestations they
ceased, and the world grew dark before
mine eyes, and I stood aghast at the
burning thoughts which possessed,
at the terrible temptations which beset
me; for there came from some far,
far distant and unknown land, into the
gay court of the king I served, a maiden
to whose beauty my whole recreant
heart yielded at once-at whose foot-
stool I bowed down without a struggle,
in the most ardent, in the most abject
worship of love. What, indeed, was
my passion for the young girl of the
valley in comparison with the fervor,
and the delirium, and the spirit-lifting
ecstasy of adoration with which I
poured out my whole soul in tears at
the feet of the ethereal Ermengarde?
Oh, bright was the seraph Ermengarde!
and in that knowledge I had room for
none other. Oh, divine was the ange
Ermengarde! and as I looked down.
into the depths of her memorial eyes,
I thought only of them-and of her.
I wedded-nor dreaded the curse I
had invoked; and its bitterness was not
visited upon me. And once-but once
again in the silence of the night-there
came through my lattice the soft sighs
which had forsaken me; and they
modelled themselves into familiar and
sweet voice, saying:
"Sleep in peace! for the Spirit of
Love reigneth and ruleth, and, in tak-
ing to thy passionate heart her who is
Ermengarde, thou art absolved, for
reasons which shall be made known to
thee in Heaven, of thy vows unto
Eleonora."
Ligeia
(See poem, "Al Aaraaf."-Ed.)
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 musi-
cal language, made their way into my
heart by paces so steadily and stealthily
progressive, that they have been un-
noticed and unknown. Yet I believe
that I met her first and most fre-
quently 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! Buried 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 devo-
tion? I but indistinctly recall the fact
itself what wonder that I have utterly
forgotten the circumstances which origi-
nated or attended it? And, indeed, if
ever that spirit which is entitled Ro-
mance-if ever she, the wan and the
misty-winged Ashtophet of idolatrous
Egypt, presided, as they tell, over mar-
riages ill-omened, then most surely she
presided over mine.
There is one dear topic, however,
on which my memory fails 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 elastic-
ity of her footfall. She came and de-
parted 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 about the slumbering
souls of the daughters of Delos. Yet
her features were not of that regu-
lar 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 strange-
ness in the proportion." Yet, although
I saw that the features of Ligeia were
324
LIGEIA
325
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 ex-
amined 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 ex-
tent 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 Ho-
meric epithet, "hyacinthine!" I looked
at the delicate outlines of the nose-
and nowhere but in the graceful medal-
lions 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 heav-
enly 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 fulness 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 eyes of Ligeia.
For eyes we have no models in the
remotely antique. It might have been,
too, that in these eyes 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 mo-
ments of intense excitement-that this
peculiarity became more than slightly
noticeable in Ligeia. And at such mo-
ments 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 fabu-
lous 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 fea-
tures, and must, after all, be referred
to the expression. Ah, word of no
meaning! behind whose vast latitude
of mere sound we intrench our igno-
rance 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 De-
mocritus-which lay far within the
pupils of my beloved. What was it?
I was possessed with a passion to dis-
cover. Those eyes! those large, those
shining, those divine orbs! they became
326
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
to me twin stars of Leda, and I to them
devoutest of astrologers.
There is no point, among the many
incomprehensible anomalies of the sci-
ence of mind, more thrillingly exciting
than the fact-never, I believe, noticed
in the schools-than in our endeavors
to recall to memory something long
forgotten, we often find ourselves upon
the very verge of remembrance, with-
out being able, in the end, to remember.
And thus how frequently, in my in-
tense 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 that expresion.
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 around, 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 run-
ning 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 un-
frequently 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
Length of years and subsequent re-
flection have enabled me to trace, in-
deed, 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 voli-
tion which, during our long intercourse.
failed to give other and more imme-
diate 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
LIGEIA
327
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 thrill-
ingly, 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 sci-
ence? I saw not then what I now
clearly perceive that the acquisitions
of Ligeia were gigantic, were astound-
ing; yet I was sufficiently aware of her
infinite supremacy to resign myself,
with a child like confidence, to her guid-
ance through the chaotic world of meta-
physical 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 de-
grees 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 lumi-
nous the many mysteries of the tran-
scendentalism in which we were im-
mersed. Wanting the radiant lustre of
her eyes, letters, lambent and golden,
grew duller than Saturnian lead. And
now those eyes shone less and less fre-
quently upon the pages over which I
pored. Ligeia grew ill. The wild eyes
blazed with a too-too glorious efful-
gence; the pale fingers became of the
transparent waven hue of the grave;
and the blue veins upon the lofty fore-
head swelled and sank impetuously
with the tides of the most gentle emo-
tion. 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 aston-
ishment, 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. I would have soothed-I
would have reasoned; but in the in-
tensity of her wild desire for life-for
life but for life- solace and reason
were alike the uttermost of folly. Yet
not until the last instance, amid the
most convulsive writhings of her fierce
spirit, was shaken the external placid-
ity 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, en-
tranced to a melody more than mortal—
to assumptions and aspirations which
mortality had never before known.
That she loved me I should not have
328
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 af-
fection. 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 my making them? But upon this
subject I cannot bear to dilate.
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 flee-
ing 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.
Let
At high noon of the night in which
she departed, beckoning me, peremp-
torily, 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 Woe!
That motley drama!-oh, be sure
It shall not be forgot!
With its Phantom chased for evermore,
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, leap-
ing 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
LIGEIA
329
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 emo-
tion, 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 pas-
sage in Glanvill: "Man doth not yield
him to the angels, nor unto death ut-
terly, 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 mor-
tals. 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 widest and least frequented por-
tions 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 re-
gion 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 child-
hood, I had imbibed a taste, and now
they came back to me as if in the dot-
age of grief. Alas, I feel how much
even of incipient madness might have
been discovered in the gorgeous and
fantastic draperies, in the solemn carv-
ings of Egypt, in the wild cornices and
furniture, in the Bedlam patterns of
the carpets of tufted gold! I had be-
come a bounden slave in the trammels
of opium, and my labors and my orders
had taken a coloring from my dreams.
But these absurdities I 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 suc-
cessor 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 daugh-
ter 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 fan-
tastic 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. Oc-
cupying the whole southern face of the
pentagon was the sole window-an im-
mense sheet of unbroken glass from
Venice a single pane, and tinted of a
330
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
leaden hue, so that the days 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 trellis-work
of an aged vine, which clambered up
the massy walls of the turret. The
ceiling of gloomy-looking oak, was ex-
cessively 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 metals, Saracenic in pat-
tern, 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 can-
delabra, of Eastern figure, were in vari-
ous stations about; and there was the
couch, too-the 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 sar-
cophagus 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-look-
ing tapestry-tapestry of a material
which was found alike as a carpet on
the floor, as a covering for the otto-
mans 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 diam-
eter, and wrought upon the cloth in
patterns of the most jetty black. But
these figures partook of the true char-
acter of the arabesque only when re-
garded 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 ad-
vance, this appearance gradually de-
parted; and, step by step, as the visi-
tor moved his station in the chamber,
he saw himself surrounded by an end-
less succession of the ghastly forms
which belong to the superstition of the
Norman, or arise in the guilty slumbers
of the monk. The phantasmagoric ef-
fect was vastly heightened by the arti
ficial 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 mar-
riage passed them with but little dis-
quietude. 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 other-
wise. I loathed her with a hatred be-
longing more to demon than to man.
My memory flew back (oh, with what
intensity of regret!) to Ligeia, the be-
loved, the august, the beautiful, the
entombed. I revelled in recollections
LIGEIA
331
of her purity, of her wisdom, of her
lofty-her ethereal nature, of her pas-
sionate, 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 re-
store her to the pathways she had
abandoned-ah, could it be for ever?-
upon the earth.
About the commencement of the
second month of the marriage, the
Lady Rowena was attacked with sud-
den 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 tur-
ret, which I concluded had no origin
save in the distemper of her fancy, or
perhaps in the phantasmagoric influ-
ences of the chamber itself. She be-
came at length convalescent-finally,
well. Yet but a brief period elapsed,
ere a second more violent disorder
again threw her upon a bed of suffer-
ing; 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 exer-
tions of her physicians. With the in-
crease of the chronic disease, which had
thus, apparently, taken too sure hold
upon her constitution to be eradicated
by human means, I could not fail to
observe a similar increase in the nerv-
ous 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 tapes-
tries, to which she
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 awak-
ened from an unquiet slumber, and I
had been watching, with feelings half
of anxiety, half of vague terror, the
workings of her amaciated 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 inarticu-
late 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, over-spreading her face,
had proved to me that my exertions to
reassure her would be fruitless. She
appeared to be fainting, and no attend-
ants 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
332
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
attracted my attention. I had felt that
some palpable although invisible ob-
ject 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 per-
son. It was then that I became dis-
tinctly aware of a gentle foot-fall 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 swal-
lowed the wine unhesitatingly, and I
forebore to speak to her of a circum-
stance which must, after all, I consid-
ered, 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 sub-
sequent 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 fan-
tastic 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 free-
dom, 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 unutter-
able woe 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 per-
haps earlier, or later, for I had taken
no note of time, when a sob, low, gen-
tle, 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
LIGEIA
333
minutes elapsed before any circum-
stance occurred tending to throw light
upon the mystery. At length it be-
came 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 un-
utterable 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-pos-
session. I could no longer doubt that
we had been precipitate in our prepa-
rations that Rowena still lived. It
was necessary that some immediate ex-
ertion be made; yet the turret was al-
together 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 en-
deavors to call back the spirit still
hovering. In a short period it was cer-
tain, 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
stiffness immediately supervened. I
fell back with a shudder upon the
couch from which I had been so star-
tlingly 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 lis-
tened-in extremity of horror. The
sound came again-it was a sigh. Rush-
ing to the corpse, I saw-distinctly saw
-a tremor upon the lips. In a min-
ute afterward they relaxed, disclosing
a bright line of the pearly teeth.
Amazement now struggled in my bosom
with the profound awe which had hith-
erto 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 nerv-
ing myself to the task which duty
thus once more had pointed out. There
was now a partial glow upon the fore-
head 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 sug-
gest. But in vain. Suddenly, the color
fled, the pulsation ceased, the lips re-
sumed 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,
334
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 ap-
palling 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 ex-
treme awe was perhaps the least ter-
rible, the least consuming. The corpse,
I repeat, stirred, and now more vigor-
ously 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, tot-
tering, with feeble steps, with closed
eyes, and with the manner of one be-
wildered in a dream, the thing that was
enshrouded advanced boldly and palp-
ably 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 tu-
mult 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 breath-
ing 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 Tre-
maine. 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 mid-
night! 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."
Morella
Auto kath auto meth autou monoeides aiei on.—(Gr.)
Itself, by itself solely, ONE everlastingly, and single.-PLATO Sympos.
(This tale was published in the Southern Literary Messenger and contains the
complete verses of the beautiful poem to the Mother of God, including the
first four lines which are often omitted. Although this short poem is one of
the most glorious tributes ever uttered to the Madonna, Rev. Rufus Griswold,
leading litterateur of Poe's age, omitted it from his collection of Christian
Ballads.-Ed.)
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 tor-
menting 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 hap-
piness 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 con-
sidered 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 mis-
taken, either in my deeds or in my
thoughts. Persuaded of this, I aban-
doned myself implicitly to the guidance
of my wife, and entered with an un-
flinching 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
335
336
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
words, whose strange meaning burned
themselves in upon my memory.
Sancta Maria! turn thine eyes—
Upon the sinner's sacrifice,
Of fervent prayer and humble love,
From thy holy throne above.
At morn-at noon-at twilight dim-
Maria! thou hast heard my hymn!
In joy and wo—in good and ill—
Mother of God, be with me still!
When the Hours flew brightly by,
And not a cloud obscured the sky,
My soul, lest it should truant be,
Thy grace did guide to thine and thee;
Now, when storms of Fate o'ercast
Darkly my Present and my Past,
Let my Future radiant shine
With sweet hopes of thee and thine!
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 GeHenna.
It is unnecessary to state the exact
character of those disquisitions which,
growing out of the volumes I have men-
tioned, 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 Pan-
theism of Fichte; the modified
Paliggenesia (Gr.) of Pythagoras; and,
above all, the doctrines of Identity as
urged by Schelling, were generally the
points of discussion presented the most
of beauty to the imaginative Morella.
That identity which is termed personal,
Mr. Locke, I think, truly defines to con-
sist in the saneness of rational
being. And since by person we under-
stand an intelligent essence having
reason, and since there is a conscious-
ness which always accompanies think.
ing, 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 individua-
tionis, 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 fin-
gers, nor the low tone of her musical
language, nor the lustre of her melan-
choly eyes. And she knew all this, but
did not upbraid; she seemed conscious
of my weakness or my folly, and, smil-
ing, 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 fore-
head became prominent; and one in-
stant my nature melted into pity, but
MORELLA
337,
in the next I met the glance of her
meaning eyes, and then my soul sick-
ened and became giddy with the giddi-
ness of one who gazes downward into
some dreary and unfathomable abyss.
I
Shall I then say that I longed with
an earnest and consuming desire for
the moment of Morella's decease?
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 mas-
tery 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 con-
tinued:
"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!"
But
"I repeat that I am dying.
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 im-
pressions, 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 Pæstum 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 re-
semblance 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 develop-
ment 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?
338
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
when the lessons of experience fell from
the lips of infancy? and when the wis-
dom or the passions of maturity I
found hourly gleaming from its full
and speculative eye? When, I say, all
this became 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 ex-
citing, 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 resem-
blance 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 them-
selves 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 con-
suming 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 affec-
tion, and the rigid seclusion of her days
precluded all other intercourse. Mo-
rella'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 pe-
riod of her existence, the latter had
received no impressions from the out-
ward world, save such as might have
been afforded by the narrow limits of
her privacy. But at length the cere-
mony 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 for-
eign 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 tor-
rents 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
METZENGERSTEIN
339
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 hiss-
ingly into my brain. Years-years may
pass away, but the memory of that
epoch never. Nor was I indeed igno-
rant of the flowers and the vine-but
the hemlock and the cypress over-
shadowed 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 charnel
Iwhere I laid the second.-Morella.
Metzengerstein
(First published in Southern Literary Messenger, January, 1836.-Ed.)
Pestis eram vivus-moriens tua mors
ero.-Martin Luther.
HORROR and fatality have been stalk-
ing 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
tre seuls."
But there were some points in the
Hungarian superstition which were fast
verging to absurdity. They-the Hun-
garians-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 demure 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 Metz-
engerstein had been at variance for
centuries. Never before were two
houses so illustrious, mutually embit-
tered by hostility so deadly. 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 tri-
umph over the immortality of Berlifitz-
ing."
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
340
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
were contiguous, had long exercised a
rival influence in the affairs of a busy
government. Moreover, near neighbors
are seldom friends; and the inhabit-
ants of the Castle Berlifitzing might
look, from their lofty buttresses, into
the very windows of the palace Metzen-
gerstein. Least of all had the more
than feudal magnificence, thus discov-
ered, 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 jeal-
ousy? The prophecy seemed to imply
-if it implied anything—a final tri-
umph on the part of the already more
powerful house; and was of course re-
membered with the more bitter ani-
mosity 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 anti-
pathy 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, pre-
vented his daily participation in the
dangers of the chase.
Frederick, Baron Metzengerstein, was,
on the other hand, not yet of age. His
father, the Minister G, died young.
His mother, the Lady Mary, followed
him quickly. Frederick was, at that
time, in his eighteenth year. In a city,
eighteen years are no long period; but
in a wilderness-in so magnificent a
wilderness as
that old principality,
the pendulum vibrates with a deeper
meaning.
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 "Palace Metzen-
gerstein." The boundary line of his
dominions was never clearly defined;
but his principal park embraced a cir-
cuit 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 treach-
eries 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 medi-
tation, in a vast and desolate upper
apartment of the family palace of
METZENGERSTEIN
341
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 dig-
nitaries, familiarly seated with the au-
tocrat and the sovereign, put a veto on
the wishes of a temporal king, or re-
strained with the fiat of papal su-
premacy 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 af-
fected to listen, to the gradually in-
creasing uproar in the stables of Ber-
liftzing or perhaps pondered upon
some more novel, some more decided
act of audacity-his eyes were turned
unwittingly to the figure of an enor-
mous, 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 fore-
ground of the design, stood motionless
and statute-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 absorb-
ing became the spell-the more im-
possible 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 apart-
ment.
The action, however, was but mo-
mentary; his gaze returned mechan-
ically 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 com-
passion, 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 ap-
parently enraged horse left in full view
his sepulchral and disgusting teeth.
ically to the wall.
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 shud-
dered to perceive that shadow-as he
staggered awhile upon the threshold-
assuming the exact position, and pre-
cisely 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
342
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 restrain-
ing the convulsive plunges of a gigan-
tic and fiery-colored horse.
"Whose horse? Where did you get
him?” demanded the youth, in a queru-
lous and husky tone, as he became in-
stantly aware that the mysterious steed
in the tapestried chamber was the very
counterpart of the furious animal be-
fore 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. Sup-
posing 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 fore-
head," interrupted a second equerry;
“I supposed them, of course, to be the
initials of William 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 appar-
ently unconscious of the meaning of
his words. "He is, as you say, a re-
markable horse-a prodigious horse!
although, as you very justly observe,
of a suspicious and untractable char-
acter; 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 bed-
chamber 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; enter
ing, at the same time, into particulars
of a minute and circumstantial char
acter; but from the low tone of voice
in which these latter were communi
cated, nothing escaped to gratify the
excited curiosity of the equerries.
The young Frederick, during the con
ference, seemed agitated by a variety
of emotions. He soon, however, recov
ered his composure, and an expression
of determined malignancy settled upor
his countenance, as he gave peremptory
orders that the apartment in question
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 cur-
veted, with redoubled fury, down the
long avenue which extended from the
palace to the stables of Metzengerstein.
"No!" said the Baron, turning ab-
ruptly toward the speaker, "dead! say
you?"
"It is indeed true, my lord; and,
METZENGERSTEIN
343
to the noble of your name, will be, I
imagine, no unwelcome intelligence."
A rapid smile shot over the counte-
nance of the listener. "How died he?"
"In his rash exertions to rescue a
favorite portion of the 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 ex-
citing idea.
"Indeed;" repeated the vassal.
"Shocking!" said the youth, calmly,
and turned quietly into the palace.
From this date a marked alteration
took place in the outward demeanor
of the dissolute young Baron Frederick
Von Metzengerstein. Indeed, his be-
havior 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 neigh-
boring aristocracy. He was never to
be seen beyond the limits of his own
domain, and, in his wide and social
world, was utterly companionless-un-
less, indeed, that unnatural, impetuous,
and fiery-colored horse, which he hence-
forward 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?"-"Metzen-
gerstein does not hunt;" "Metzenger-
stein 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 al-
together. The widow of the unfor-
tunate 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 pre-
ferred 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, attrib-
uted the alteration in the conduct of
the young nobleman to the natural sor-
row of a son for the untimely loss of
his parents-forgetting, however, his
atrocious and reckless behavior during
the short period immediately succeed-
ing that bereavement. Some there were,
indeed, who suggested a too haughty
idea of self-consequence and dignity.
Others again (among whom 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 multi-
tude.
Indeed, the Baron's perverse attach-
ment 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 hide-
ous 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 Metz-
344
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
engerstein seemed riveted 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 ca-
pabilities 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, al-
though all the rest in his collection
were distinguished by characteristic ap-
pellations. His stable, too, was ap-
pointed 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
horse's 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 Ber-
lifitzing, had succeeded in arresting his
course, by means of a chain-bridle and
noose-yet not 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, 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 ani-
mal 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 Metzen-
gerstein turned pale and shrunk away
from the rapid and searching expression
of his 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 de-
formities were in everybody's way, and
whose opinions were of the least pos
sible importance. He (if his ideas are
worth mentioning at all) had the ef-
frontery to assert that his master
never vaulted into the saddle without
an unaccountable and almost imper-
ceptible shudder; and that, upon his
return from every long-continued and
habitual ride, an expression of tri-
umphant malignity distorted every
muscle in his countenance.
One tempestuous night, Metzenger.
stein, 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 at-
tracted no particular attention, but his
return was looked for with intense anx-
iety on the part of his domestics, when,
after some hours' absence, the stupen-
dous and magnificent battlements of the
Palace 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 al-
ready made so terrible a progress that
all efforts to save any portion of the
building were evidently futile, the as-
HOP-FROG
345
tonished neighborhood stood idly around
in silent if not pathetic wonder. But
a new and fearful object soon riveted
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 Palace Metzengerstein,
a steed, bearing an unbonneted and dis-
ordered rider, was seen leaping with
an impetuosity which outstripped the
very Demon of the Tempest.
The career of the horseman was in-
disputably, on his own part, uncon-
trollable. The agony of his counte-
nance, 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 sin-
gle 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 way, and a dead calm sullenly
succeeded. A white flame still envel-
oped the building like a shroud, and,
streaming far away into the quiet at-
mosphere, shot forth a glare of praeter-
natural light; while a cloud of smoke
settled heavily over the battlements in
the distinct colossal figure of—a horse.
Hop-Frog
(First published in Flag of Our Union, 1849.-Ed.)
He
To
I NEVER knew any one so keenly
alive to a joke as the king was.
seemed to live only for joking.
tell a good story of the joke kind, and
to tell it well, was the surest road to
his favor. Thus it happened that his
seven ministers were all noted for their
accomplishments as jokers. They all
took after the king, too, in being large,
corpulent, oily men, as well as inimita-
ble jokers. Whether people grow fat
by joking, or whether there is some-
thing in fat itself which predisposes to
a joke, I have never been quite able
to determine; but certain it is that a
lean joker is a rara avis in terris.
About the refinements, or, as he
called them, the "ghost" of wit, the
king troubled himself very little. He
had an especial admiration for breadth
in a jest, and would often put up with
length, for the sake of it. Over-niceties
weared him. He would have preferred
Rabelais' "Gargantua" to the "Zadig"
of Voltaire: and, upon the whole, prac-
tical jokes suited his taste far better
than verbal ones.
At the date of my narrative, profess
ing jesters had not altogether gone
out of fashion at court. Several of the
great continental "powers" still retain
their "fools," who wore motley, with
346
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
caps and bells, and who were expected
to be always ready with sharp witti-
cisms, at a moment's notice, in consid-
eration of the crumbs that fell from
the royal table.
Our king, as a matter of course, re-
tained his "fool." The fact is, he re-
quired something in the way of folly—
if only to counterbalance the heavy
wisdom of the seven wise men who were
his ministers-not to mention himself.
His fool, or professional jester, was
not only a fool, however. His value
was trebled in the eyes of the king,
by the fact of his being also a dwarf
and a cripple. Dwarfs were as com-
mon at court, in those days, as fools;
and many monarchs would have found
it difficult to get through their days
(days are rather longer at court than
elsewhere) without both a jester to
laugh with, and a dwarf to laugh at.
But, as I have already observed, your
jesters, in ninety-nine cases out of a
hundred, are fat, round, and unwieldy
---
so that it was no small source of
self-gratulation with our king that, in
Hop-Frog (this was the fool's name),
he possessed a triplicate treasure in one
person.
I believe the name "Hop-Frog" was
not that given to the dwarf by his
sponsors at baptism, but it was con-
ferred upon him, by general consent
of the seven ministers, on account of
his inability to walk as other men do.
In fact, Hop-Frog could only get along
by a sort of interjectional gait-some-
thing between a leap and a wriggle
a movement that afforded illimitable
amusement, and of course consolation,
to the king, for (notwithstanding the
protuberance of his stomach and a
constitutional swelling of the head)
the king, by his whole court, was ac-
counted a capital figure.
But although Hop-Frog, through the
distortion of his legs, could move only
with great pain and difficulty along a
road or floor, the prodigious muscular
power which nature seemed to have
bestowed upon his arms, by way of
compensation for deficiency in the lower
limbs, enabled him to perform many
feats of wonderful dexterity, where
trees or ropes were in question, or any
thing else to climb. At such exercises
he certainly much more resembled a
squirrel, or a small monkey, than a
frog.
I am not able to say, with precision,
from what country Hop-Frog originally
came. It was from some barbarous
region, however, that no person ever
heard of a vast distance from the
court of our king. Hop-Frog, and a
young girl very little less dwarfish than
himself (although of equisite propor-
tions, and a marvellous dancer), had
been forcibly carried off from their
respective homes in adjoining provinces,
and sent as presents to the king, by one
of his ever victorious generals.
Under these circumstances, it is not
to be wondered at that a close intimacy
arose between the two little captives.
Indeed, they soon became sworn friends.
Hop-Frog, who, although he made a
great deal of sport, was by no means
popular, had it not in his power to
render Trippetta many services; but
she, on account of her grace and ex-
quisite beauty (although a dwarf), was
universally admired and petted; so she
possessed much influence; and never
failed to use it, whenever she could,
for the benefit of Hop-Frog.
On some grand state occasion-
HOP-FROG
347
forgot what-the king determined to
have a masquerade, and whenever a
masquerade or any thing of that kind,
occurred at our court, then the talents
both of Hop-Frog and Trippetta were
sure to be called into play. Hop-Frog,
in especial, was so inventive in the
way of getting up pageants, suggesting
novel characters, and arranging cos-
tumes, for masked balls, that nothing
could be done, it seems, without his
assistance.
The night appointed for the fete had
arrived. A gorgeous hall had been
fitted up, under Trippetta's eye,
with
every kind of device which could pos-
sibly give eclat to a masquerade. The
whole court was in a fever of expecta-
tion. As for costumes and characters,
it might well be supposed that every-
body had come to a decision on such
points. Many had made up their minds
(as to what roles they should assume)
a week, or even a month, in advance;
and, in fact, there was not a particle
of indecision anywhere-except in the
case of the king and his seven ministers.
Why they hesitated I never could tell,
unless they did it by way of a joke.
More probably, they found it difficult,
on account of being so fat, to make
up their minds. At all events, time
flew; and, as a last resort, they sent
for Trippetta and Hop-Frog.
When the two little friends obeyed
the summons of the king, they found
him sitting at his wine with the seven
members of his cabinet council; but the
monarch appeared to be in a very ill
humor. He knew that Hop-Frog was
not fond of wine; for it excited the
poor cripple almost to madness; and
madness is no comfortable feeling. But
the king loved his practical jokes, and
took pleasure in forcing Hop-Frog to
drink and (as the king called it) "to
be merry."
"Come here, Hop-Frog," said he, as
the jester and his friend entered the
room; "swallow this bumper to the
health of your absent friends, [here
Hop-Frog sighed,] and then let us have
the benefit of your invention. We want
characters-characters, man—something
novel-out of the way. We are wearied
with this everlasting sameness. Come,
drink! the wine will brighten your wits."
Hop-Frog endeavored, as usual, to
get up a jest in reply to these advances
from the king; but the effort was too
much. It happened to be the poor
dwarf's birthday, and the command to
drink to his "absent friends" forced the
tears to his eyes. Many large, bitter
drops fell into the goblet as he took
it, humbly, from the hand of the
tyrant.
"Ah! ha! ha! ha!" roared the latter,
as the dwarf reluctantly drained the
breaker. "See what a glass of good
wine can do! Why, your eyes are
shining already!"
Poor fellow! his large eyes gleamed,
rather than shone; for the effect of
wine on his excitable brain was not
more powerful than instantaneous. He
placed the goblet nervously on
table, and looked round upon the com-
pany with a half-insane stare. They
all seemed highly amused at the suc-
cess of the king's “joke."
"And now to business," said the
prime minister, a very fat man.
"Yes," said the king; "Come, Hop-
Frog, lend us your assistance. Char-
acters, my fine fellow; we stand in
need of characters-all of us-ha! ha!
ha!" and as this was seriously meant
348
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
for a joke, his laugh was chorused by
the seven.
Hop-Frog also laughed although
feebly and somewhat vacantly.
"Come, come," said the king, im-
patiently, "have you nothing to sug-
gest?"
"I am endeavoring to think of some-
thing novel," replied the dwarf, ab-
stractedly, for he was quite bewildered
by the wine.
"Endeavoring!" cried the tyrant,
fiercely; "what do you mean by that?
Ah, I perceive. You are sulky, and want
more wine. Here, drink this!" and he
poured out another goblet full and of-
fered it to the cripple, who merely
gazed at it, gasping for breath.
"Drink, I say!" shouted the monster,
"or by the fiends-
99
The dwarf hesitated. The king grew
purple with rage. The courtiers
smirked. Trippetta, pale as a corpse,
advanced to the monarch's seat, and,
falling on her knees before him, im-
plored him to spare her friend.
The tyrant regarded her, for some
moments, in evident wonder at her
audacity. He seemed quite at a loss
what to do or say-how most becom-
ingly to express his indignation. At
last, without uttering a syllable, he
pushed her violently from him, and
threw the contents of the brimming
goblet in her face.
The poor girl got up the best she
could, and, not daring even to sigh,
resumed her position at the foot of the
table.
There was a dead silence for about
half a minute, during which the falling
of a leaf, or of a feather, might have
been heard. It was interrupted by a
low, but harsh and protracted grating
sound which seemed to come at once
from every corner of the room.
"What-what-what are you making
that noise for?" demanded the king,
turning furiously to the dwarf.
The latter seemed to have recovered,
in great measure, from his intoxica-
tion, and looking fixedly but quietly
into the tyrant's face, merely ejaculated:
"I-I? How could it have been
me?"
"The sound appeared to come from
without," observed one of the courtiers.
"I fancy it was the parrot at the win-
dow, whetting his bill upon his cage-
wires."
"True," replied the monarch, as if
much relieved by the suggestion; "but,
on the honor of a knight, I could have
sworn that it was the gritting of this
vagabond's teeth."
Hereupon the dwarf laughed (the
king was too confirmed a joker to ob
ject to any one's laughing), and dis-
played a set of large, powerful, and
very repulsive teeth. Moreover, he
avowed his perfect willingness to swal-
low as much wine as desired. The
monarch was pacified; and having
drained another bumper with no very
perceptible ill effect, Hop-Frog entered
at once, and with spirit, into the plans
for the masquerade.
"I cannot tell what was the associa-
tion of idea," observed he, very tran-
quilly, and as if he had never tasted
wine in his life, "but just after your
majesty had struck the girl and thrown
the wine in her face-just after your
majesty had done this, and while the
parrot was making that odd noise out-
side the window, there came into my
mind a capital diversion-one of my
country frolics-often enacted
own
HOP-FROG
349
among us, at our masquerades: but
here it will be new altogether. Un-
fortunately, however, it requires a
company of eight persons and-
"Here we are!" cried the king, laugh-
ing at his acute discovery of the coin-
cidence; "eight to a fraction-I and my
seven ministers. Come! what is the
diversion?"
"We call it," replied the cripple,
"the Eight Chained Ourang-Outangs,
and it really is excellent sport if well
enacted."
"We will enact it," remarked the
king, drawing himself up, and lowering
his eyelids.
"The beauty of the game," continued
Hop-Frog, "lies in the fright it occa-
sions among the woman."
"Capital!" roared in chorus the mon-
arch and his ministry.
"I will equip you as ourang-outangs,"
proceeded the dwarf; "leave all that to
me. The resemblance shall be so strik-
ing, that the company of masqueraders
will take you for real beasts—and of
course, they will be as much terrified
as astonished."
"Oh, this is exquisite!" exclaimed the
king. "Hop-Frog! I will make a man
of you."
"The chains are for the purpose of
increasing the confusion by their jan-
gling. You are supposed to have es-
caped, en masse, from your keepers.
Your majesty cannot conceive the effect
produced, at a masquerade, by eight
chained ourang-outangs, imagined to
be real ones by most of the company;
and rushing in with savage cries,
among the crowd of delicately and
gorgeously habited men and women.
The contrast is inimitable."
"It must be," said the king: and the
council arose hurriedly (as it was
growing late), to put in execution the
scheme of Hop-Frog.
His mode of equipping the party as
ourang-outangs was very simple, but
effective enough for his purposes. The
animals in question had, at the epoch
of my story, very rarely been seen in
any part of the civilized world; and as
the imitations made by the dwarf were
sufficiently beast-like and more than
sufficiently hideous, their truthfulness
to nature was thus thought to be se-
cured.
The king and his ministers were first
encased in tight-fitting stockinet shirts
and drawers. They were then satu-
rated with tar. At this stage of the
process, some one of the party sug-
gested feathers; but the suggestion was
at once overruled by the dwarf, who
soon convinced the eight, by ocular
demonstration, that the hair of such a
brute as the ourang-outang was much
more efficiently represented by flax. A
thick coating of the latter was accord-
ingly plastered upon the coating of
tar. A long chain was now procured.
First, it was passed about the waist of
the king, and tied; then about another
of the party, and also tied; then about
all successively, in the same manner.
When this chaining arrangement was
complete, and the party stood as far
apart from each other as possible, they
formed a circle; and to make all things
appear natural, Hop-Frog passed the
residue of the chain in two diameters,
at right angles, across the circle, after
the fashion adopted, at the present day,
by those who capture chimpanzees, or
other large apes, in Borneo.
The grand saloon in which the
masquerade was to take place, was a
350
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
circular room, very lofty, and receiv-
ing the light of the sun only through
a single window at top. At night (the
season for which the apartment was
especially designed) it was illuminated
principally by a large chandelier, de-
pending by a chain from the centre of
the sky-light, and lowered, or elevated,
by means of a counter-balance
usual; but (in order not to look un-
sightly) this latter passed outside the
cupola and over the roof.
as
The arrangements of the room had
been left to Trippetta's superintend-
ence; but, in some particulars, it seems,
she had been guided by the calmer
judgment of her friend the dwarf. At
his suggestion it was that, on this occa-
sion, the chandelier was removed. Its
waxen drippings (which, in weather so
warm, it was quite impossible to pre-
vent) would have been seriously detri-
mental to the rich dresses of the guests,
who, on account of the crowded state
of the saloon, could not all be expected
to keep from out its centre-that is to
say, from under the chandelier. Addi-
tional sconces were set in various parts
of the hall, out of the way; and a
flambeau, emitting sweet odor, was
placed in the right hand of each of the
Caryatides that stood against the wall-
some fifty or sixty altogether.
The eight ourang-outangs, taking
Hop-Frog's advice, waited patiently
until midnight (when the room was
thoroughly filled with masqueraders)
before making their appearance. No
sooner had the clock ceased striking,
however, than they rushed, or rather
rolled in, all together-for the impedi-
ments of their chains caused most of
the party to fall, and all to stumble
as they entered.
The excitement among the masque-
raders was prodigious, and filled the
heart of the king with glee. As had
been anticipated, there were not a few
of the guests who supposed the fero-
cious-looking creatures to be beasts of
some kind in reality, if not precisely
ourang-outangs. Many of the women
swooned with affright; and had not the
king taken the precaution to exclude
all weapons from the saloon, his party
might soon have expiated their frolic
in their blood. As it was, a general
rush was made for the doors; but the
king had ordered them to be locked
immediately upon his entrance; and, at
the dwarf's suggestion, the keys had
been deposited with him.
While the tumult was at its height.
and each masquerader attentive only
to his own safety (for, in fact, there
was much real danger from the pres-
sure of the excited crowd), the chain
by which the chandelier ordinarily
hung, and which had been drawn up
on its removal, might have been seen
very gradually to descend, until its
hooked extremity came within three
feet of the floor.
Soon after this, the king and his
seven friends having reeled about the
hall in all directions, found themselves,
at length, in its centre, and, of course,
in immediate contact with the chain.
While they were thus situated, the
dwarf, who had followed noiselessly at
their heels, inciting them to keep up
the commotion, took hold of their own
chain at the intersection of the two
portions which crossed the circle dia-
metrically and at right angles. Here.
with the rapidity of thought, he in-
serted the hook from which the chande-
lier had been wont to depend; and, in
HOP-FROG
351
an instant, by some unseen agency, the
chandelier-chain was drawn so far up-
ward as to take the hook out of reach,
and, as an inevitable consequence, to
drag the ourang-outangs together in
close connection, and face to face.
The masqueraders, by this time, had
recovered, in some measure, from their
alarm; and, beginning to regard the
whole matter as a well-contrived pleas-
antry, set up a loud shout of laughter
at the predicament of the apes.
"Leave them to me!" now screamed
Hop-Frog, his shrill voice making itself
easily heard through all the din. "Leave
them to me. I fancy I know them. If
I can only get a good look at them, I
can soon tell who they are."
Here, scrambling over the heads of
the crowd, he managed to get to the
wall; when, seizing a flambeau from
one of the Caryatides, he returned, as
he went, to the centre of the room-
leaped, with the agility of a monkey,
upon the king's head-and thence clam-
bered a few feet up the chain-holding
down the torch to examine the group
of ourang-outangs, and still screaming:
"I shall soon find out who they are!"
And now, while the whole assembly
(the apes included) were convulsed
with laughter, the jester suddenly ut-
tered a shrill whistle; when the chain
flew violently up for about thirty feet
-dragging with it the dismayed and
struggling ourang-outangs, and leaving
them suspended in mid-air between the
sky-light and the floor. Hop-Frog,
clinging to the chain as it rose, still
maintained his relative position in re-
spect to the eight maskers, and still
(as if nothing were the matter) con-
tinued to thrust his torch down toward
them, as though endeavoring to discover
who they were.
So thoroughly astonished was the
whole company at this ascent, that a
dead silence, of about a minute's dura-
tion, ensued. It was broken by just
such a low, harsh, grating sound, as
had before attracted the attention of
the king and his councillors when the
former threw the wine in the face of
Trippetta. But, on the present occa-
sion, there could be no question as to
whence the sound issued. It came from
the fang-like teeth of the dwarf, who
ground them and gnashed them as he
foamed at the mouth, and glared, with
an expression of maniacal rage, into the
upturned countenances of the king and
his seven companions.
"Ah, ha!" said at length the infuri
ated jester. "Ah, ha! I begin to see
who these people are now!" Here,
pretending to scrutinize the king more
closely, he held the flambeau to the
flaxen coat which enveloped him, and
which instantly burst into a sheet of
vivid flame. In less than half a minute
the whole eight ourang-outangs were
blazing fiercely, amid the shrieks of the
multitude who gazed at them from
below, horror-stricken, and without the
power to render them the slightest
assistance.
At length the flames, suddenly in-
creasing in virulence, forced the jester
to climb higher up the chain, to be out
of their reach; and, as he made this
movement, the crowd again sank, for
a brief instant, into silence. The dwarf
seized his opportunity, and once more
spoke:
"I now
see distinctly," he said,
"what manner of people these maskers
352
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
are. They are a great king and his
seven privy-councillors,-a king who
does not scruple to strike a defenceless
girl, and his seven councillors who abet
him in the outrage. As for myself, I
am simply Hop-Frog, the jester-and
this is my last jest."
Owing to the high combustibility of
both the flax and the tar to which it
adhered, the dwarf had scarcely made
an end of his brief speech before the
work of vengeance was complete. The
eight corpses swung in their chains, a
fetid, blackened, hideous, and indistin-
guishable mass. The cripple hurled his
torch at them, clambered leisurely to
the ceiling, and disappeared through the
sky-light.
It is supposed that Trippetta, sta-
tioned on the roof of the saloon, had
been the accomplice of her friend in
his fiery revenge, and that, together,
they effected their escape to their own
country; for neither was seen again.
The Unparalleled Adventures of One
Hans Pfaall
(This tale was published in the Southern Literary Messenger. Observe the pun
in the title Hans Pfaall (Fall). See also Criticism of Richard Adams Locke
in the Literati of New York. It is known under another title, "A Journey
to the Moon."-Ed.)
With a heart of furious fancies,
Whereof I am commander,
With a burning spear and a horse of
air,
To the wilderness I wander.
-Tom o'Bedlam's Song.
of
(I am not positive about
the date), a vast crowd of people, for
purposes not specifically mentioned,
were assembled in the great square of
the Exchange in the well-conditioned
city of Rotterdam. The day was
warm-unusually so for the season-
there was hardly a breath of air stir-
ring; and the multitude were in no bad
humor at being now and then besprin-
kled with friendly showers of momen-
tary duration, that fell from large
white masses of cloud profusely dis-
tributed about the blue vault of the
firmament. Nevertheless, about noon,
a slight but remarkable agitation be-
came apparent in the assembly: the
clattering of ten thousand tongues suc-
day ceeded; and, in an instant afterward,
By late accounts from Rotterdam,
that city seems to be in a high state
of philosophical excitement. Indeed,
phenomena have there occurred of a
nature so completely unexpected-so
entirely novel-so utterly at variance
with preconceived opinions-as to leave
no doubt on my mind that long ere
this all Europe is in an uproar, all
physics in a ferment, all reason and
astronomy together by the ears.
It appears that on the
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
353
ten thousand faces were upturned to-
ward the heavens, ten thousand pipes
descended simultaneously from the cor-
ners of ten thousand mouths, and a
shout, which could be compared to
nothing but the roaring of Niagara,
resounded long, loudly, and furiously,
through all the city and through all
the environs of Rotterdam.
The origin of this hubbub soon be-
came sufficiently evident. From behind
the huge bulk of one of those sharply
defined masses of cloud already men-
tioned, was seen slowly to emerge into
an open area of blue space, a queer,
heterogeneous, but apparently solid
substance, so oddly shaped, so whimsi-
cally put together, as not to be in any
manner comprehended, and never to
be sufficiently admired, by the host
of sturdy burghers who stood open-
mouthed below. What could it be? In
the name of all the devils in Rotter-
dam, what could it possibly portend?
No one knew; no one could imagine;
no one-not even the burgomaster
Mynheer Superbus Von Underduk―
had the slightest clew by which to un-
ravel the mystery; so, as nothing more
reasonable could be done, every one to
a man replaced his pipe carefully in
the corner of his mouth, and maintain-
ing an eye steadily upon the phenome-
non, puffed, paused, waddled about, and
grunted significantly then waddled
back, grunted, paused, and finally-
puffed again.
In the meantime, however, lower and
still lower toward the goodly city, came
the object of so much curiosity, and
the cause of so much smoke. In a very
few minutes it arrived near enough to
be accurately discerned. It appeared
to be-yes! it was undoubtedly a
species of balloon; but surely no such
balloon had ever been seen in Rotter-
dam before. For who, let me ask,
ever heard of a balloon manufactured
entirely of dirty newspapers? No man
in Holland certainly; yet here, under
the very noses of the people, or rather
at some distance above their noses was
the identical thing in question, and
composed, I have it on the best author-
ity, of the precise material which no
one had ever before known to be used
for a similar purpose. It was an egre-
gious insult to the good sense of the
burghers of Rotterdam. As to the
shape of the phenomenon, it was even
still more reprehensible. Being little
or nothing better than a huge fool's-cap
turned upside down. And this simili-
tude was regarded as by no means
lessened when, upon nearer inspection,
the crowd saw a large tassel depending
from its apex, and, around the upper
rim or base of the cone, a circle of
little instruments, resembling sheep-
bells, which kept up a continual tin-
kling to the tune of Betty Martin. But
still worse.-Suspended by blue ribbons
to the end of this fantastic machine,
there hung, by way of car, an enor-
mous drab beaver hat, with a brim
superlatively broad, and a hemispheri-
cal crown with a black band and a sil-
ver buckle. It is, however, somewhat
remarkable that many citizens of Rot-
terdam swore to having seen the same
hat repeatedly before; and indeed the
whole assembly seemed to regard it
with eyes of familiarity; while the
vrow Grettel Pfaall, upon sight of it,
uttered an exclamation of joyful sur-
prise, and declared it to be the iden-
tical hat of her good man himself.
Now this was a circumstance the more
354
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
to be observed, as Pfaall, with three
companions, had actually disappeared
from Rotterdam about five years be-
fore, in a very sudden and unaccount-
able manner, and up to the date of this
narrative all attempts at obtaining in-
telligence concerning them had failed.
To be sure, some bones which were
thought to be human, mixed up with
a quantity of odd-looking rubbish, had
been lately discovered in a retired situ-
ation to the east of the city; and some
people went so far as to imagine that
in this spot a foul murder had been
committed, and that the sufferers were
in all probability Hans Pfaall and his
associates. But to return.
The balloon (for such no doubt it
was) had now descended to within a
hundred feet of the earth, allowing the
crowd below a sufficiently distinct view
of the person of its occupant. This
was in truth a very singular somebody.
He could not have been more than two
feet in height; but this altitude, little
as it was, would have been sufficient to
destroy his equilibrium, and tilt him
over the edge of his tiny car, but for
the intervention of a circular rim
reaching as high as the breast, and
rigged on to the cords of the balloon.
The body of the little man was more
than proportionately broad, giving to
his entire figure a rotundity highly ab-
surd. His feet, of course, could not be
seen at all. His hands were enormously
large. His hair was gray, and collected
into a queue behind. His nose was
prodigiously long, crooked, and inflam-
matory; his eyes full, brilliant, and
acute; his chin and cheeks, although
wrinkled with age, were broad, puffy,
and double; but of ears of any kind
there was not a semblance to be discov-
ered upon any portion of his head.
This odd little gentleman was dressed
in a loose surtout of sky-blue satin,
with tight breeches to match, fastened
with silver buckles at the knees. His
vest was of some bright yellow mate-
rial; a white taffety cap was set jaunt-
ily on one side of his head; and, to
complete his equipment, a blood-red
silk handkerchief enveloped his throat,
and fell down, in a dainty manner,
upon his bosom, in a fantastic bow-
knot of super-eminent dimensions.
Having descended, as I said before,
to about one hundred feet from the
surface of the earth, the little old gen-
tleman was suddenly seized with a fit
of trepidation, and appeared disinclined
to make any nearer approach to terra
firma. Throwing out, therefore, a
quantity of sand from a canvas bag,
which he lifted with great difficulty, he
became stationary in an instant. He
then proceeded, in a hurried and agi
tated manner, to extract from a side-
pocket in his surtout a large morocco
pocket-book. This he poised suspi-
ciously in his hand, then eyed it with
an air of extreme surprise, and was
evidently astonished at its weight. He
at length opened it, and drawing there-
from a huge letter sealed with red
sealing-wax and tied carefully with red
tape, let it fall precisely at the feet
of the burgomaster, Superbus Von
Underduk. His Excellency stooped to
take it up. But the aeronaut, still
greatly discomposed, and having appar-
ently no further business to detain him
in Rotterdam, began at this moment
to make busy preparations for depart-
ure; and it being necessary to discharge
a portion of ballast to enable him to
reascend, the half dozen bags which he
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
355
threw out, one after another, without
taking the trouble to empty their con-
tents, tumbled, every one of them,
most unfortunately upon the back of
the burgomaster, and rolled him over
and over no less than half a dozen
times, in the face of every individual
in Rotterdam. It is not to be sup-
posed, however, that the great Under-
duk suffered this impertinence on the
part of the little old man to pass off
with impunity. It is said, on the con-
trary, that during each of his half
dozen circumvolutions he emitted no
less than half a dozen distinct and furi-
ous whiffs from his pipe, to which he
held fast the whole time with all his
might, and to which he intends holding
fast (God willing) until the day of his
decease.
In the meantime the balloon arose
like a lark, and, soaring far away above
the city. at length drifted quietly be-
hind a cloud similar to that from which
it had so oddly emerged, and was thus
lost forever to the wondering eyes of
the good citizens of Rotterdam. All
attention was now directed to the let-
ter, the descent of which, and the con-
sequences attending thereupon, had
proved so fatally subversive of both
person and personal dignity to his
Excellency, Von Underduk. That func-
tionary, however, had not failed, dur-
ing his circumgyratory movements, to
bestow a thought upon the important
object of securing the epistle, which
was seen, upon inspection, to have
fallen into the most proper hands, be-
ing actually addressed to himself and
Professor Rubadub, in their official
capacities of President and Vice-Presi-
dent of the Rotterdam College of
Astronomy. It was accordingly opened
by those dignitaries upon the spot, and
found to contain the following extraor-
dinary, and indeed very serious, com-
munication:-
"To their Excellencies Von Underduk
and Rubadub, President and Vice-
President of the States' College of
Astronomers, in the city of Rotter-
dam.
"Your Excellencies may perhaps be
able to remember an humble artizan,
by name Hans Pfaall, and by occupa-
tion a mender of bellows, who, with
three others, disappeared from Rotter-
dam, about five years ago, in a manner
which must have been considered unac-
countable. If, however, it so please
your Excellencies, I, the writer of this
communication, am the identical Hans
Pfaall himself. It is well known to
most of my fellow-citizens, that for the
period of forty years I continued to
occupy the little square brick building,
at the head of the alley called Sauer-
kraut, in which I resided at the time
of my disappearance. My ancestors.
have also resided therein time out of
mind-they, as well as myself, steadily
following the respectable and indeed
lucrative profession of mending of
bellows; for, to speak the truth, until
of late years, that the heads of all
the people have been set agog with
politics, no better business than my
own could an honest citizen of Rot-
terdam either desire or deserve. Credit
was good, employment was never want-
ing, and there was no lack of either
money or good-will. But, as I was
saying, we soon began to feel the ef-
fects of liberty and long speeches, and
radicalism, and all that sort of thing.
356
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
People who were formerly the best
customers in the world, had now not a
moment of time to think of us at all.
They had as much as they could do to
read about the revolutions, and keep up
with the march of intellect and the
spirit of the age. If a fire wanted
fanning, it could readily be fanned with
a newspaper; and as the government
grew weaker, I have no doubt that
leather and iron acquired durability in
proportion-for, in a very short time,
there was not a pair of bellows in all
Rotterdam that ever stood in need of
a stitch or required the assistance of
a hammer. This was a state of things
not to be endured. I soon grew as
poor as a rat, and, having a wife and
children to provide for, my burdens
at length became intolerable, and I
spent hour after hour in reflecting
upon the most convenient method of
putting an end to my life. Duns, in
the meantime, left me little leisure for
contemplation. My house was literally
besieged from morning till night. There
were three fellows in particular who
worried me beyond endurance, keeping
watch continually about my door, and
threatening me with the law. Upon
these three I vowed the bitterest re-
venge, if ever I should be so happy as
to get them within my clutches; and I
believe nothing in the world but the
pleasure of this anticipation prevented
me from putting my plan of suicide
into immediate execution, by blowing
my brains out with a blunderbuss. I
thought it best, however, to dissemble
my wrath, and to treat them with
promises and fair words, until, by some
good turn of fate, an opportunity of
vengeance should be afforded me.
"One day, having given them the
me.
slip, and feeling more than usually de-
jected, I continued for a long time to
wander about the most obscure streets
without object, until at length I
chanced to stumble against the corner
of a bookseller's stall. Seeing a chair
close at hand, for the use of customers,
I threw myself doggedly into it, and,
hardly knowing why, opened the pages
of the first volume which came within
my reach. It proved to be a small
pamphlet treatise on Speculative As-
tronomy, written either by Professor
Encke of Berlin or by a Frenchman
of somewhat similar name. I had some
little tincture of information on mat-
ters of this nature, and soon became
more and more absorbed in the con-
tents of the book-reading it actually
through twice before I awoke to a
recollection of what was passing around
By this time it began to grow
dark, and I directed my steps toward
home. But the treatise (in conjunc-
tion with a discovery in pneumatics,
lately communicated to me as an im
portant secret, by a cousin from Nantz)
had made an indelible impression on
my mind, and, as I sauntered along
the dusky streets, I revolved carefully
over in my memory the wild and some-
times unintelligible reasonings of the
writer. There are some particular pas-
sages which affected my imagination in
an extraordinary manner. The longer
I meditated upon these the more in-
tense grew the interest which had been
excited within me. The limited nature
of my education in general, and more
especially my ignorance on subjects
connected with natural philosophy, so
far from rendering me diffident of my
own ability to comprehend what I had
read, or inducing me to mistrust the
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
357
many vague notions which had arisen
in consequence, merely served as a
farther stimulus to imagination; and I
was vain enough, or perhaps reasonable
enough, to doubt whether those crude
ideas which, arising in ill-regulated
minds, have all the appearance, may
not often in effect possess all the force,
the reality, and other inherent proper-
ties, of instinct or intuition.
"It was late when I reached home,
and I went immediately to bed. My
mind, however, was too much occupied
to sleep, and I lay the whole night
buried in meditation. Arising early in
the morning, I repaired eagerly to the
bookseller's stall, and laid out what
little ready money I possessed, in
the purchase of some volumes of
Mechanics and Practical Astronomy.
Having arrived at home safely with
these, I devoted every spare moment
to their perusal, and soon made such
proficiency in studies of this nature as
I thought sufficient for the execution of
a certain design with which either the
Devil or my better genius had inspired
me. In the intervals of this period, I
made every endeavor to conciliate the
three creditors who had given me so
much annoyance. In this I finally suc-
ceeded-partly by selling enough of
my household furniture to satisfy a
moiety of their claim, and partly by a
promise of paying the balance upon
completion of a little project which I
told them I had in view, and for assist-
ance in which I solicited their services.
By these means (for they were igno-
rant men) I found little difficulty in
gaining them over to my purpose.
"Matters being thus arranged, I
contrived, by the aid of my wife and
with the greatest secrecy and caution,
to dispose of what property I had re-
maining, and to borrow, in small sums,
under various pretences, and without
giving any attention (I am ashamed to
say) to my future means of repayment,
no inconsiderable quantity of ready
money. With the means thus accruing
I proceeded to procure at intervals,
cambric muslin, very fine, in pieces of
twelve yards each; twine; a lot of the
varnish of caoutchouc; a large and
deep basket of wicker-work, made to
order; and several other articles neces-
sary in the construction and equipment
of a balloon of extraordinary dimen-
sions. This I directed my wife to
make up as soon as possible, and gave
her all requisite information as to the
particular method of proceeding. In
the meantime I worked up the twine
into network of sufficient dimensions;
rigged it with a hoop and the necessary
cords; and made purchase of numerous
instruments and materials for experi-
ment in the upper regions of the upper
atmosphere. I then took opportunities
of conveying by night, to a retired situ-
ation east of Rotterdam, five iron-
bound casks, to contain about fifty
gallons each, and one of a larger size;
six tin tubes, three inches in diameter,
properly shaped, and ten feet in length;
a quantity of a particular metallic sub-
stance, or semi-metal, which I shall not
name, and a dozen demijohns of a very
common acid. The gas to be formed
from these latter materials is a gas
never yet generated by any other per-
son than myself-or at least never ap-
plied to any similar purpose. I can
only venture to say here, that it is
a constituent of azote, so long consid-
ered irreducible, and that its density is
about 37.4 times less than that of hy
358
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
The
drogen. It is tasteless, but not odor-
less; burns, when pure, with a greenish
flame; and is instantaneously fatal to
animal life. Its full secret I would
make no difficulty in disclosing, but
that it of right belongs (as I have
before hinted) to a citizen of Nantz,
in France, by whom it was condition-
ally communicated to myself.
same individual submitted to me, with-
out being at all aware of my intentions,
a method of constructing balloons from
the membrane of a certain animal,
through which substance any escape of
gas was nearly an impossibility. I
found it, however, altogether too ex-
pensive, and was not sure, upon the
whole, whether cambric muslin with a
coating of gum caoutchouc, was not
equally as good. I mention this cir-
cumstance, because I think it probable
that thereafter the individual in ques-
tion may attempt a balloon ascension
with the novel gas and material I have
spoken of, and I do not wish to deprive
him of the honor of a very singular
invention.
"On the spot which I intended each
of the smaller casks to occupy respec-
tively during the inflation of the bal-
loon, I privately dug a small hole; the
holes forming in this manner a circle
twenty-five feet in diameter. In the
centre of this circle, being the station
designed for the large cask, I also dug
a hole of greater depth. In each of
the five smaller holes, I deposited a
canister containing fifty pounds, and in
the larger one a keg holding one hun-
dred and fifty pounds, of cannon pow-
der. These the keg and canisters-I
connected in a proper manner with
covered trains; and having let into one
of the canisters the end of about four
feet of slow-match, I covered up the
hole, and placed the cask over it, leav
ing the other end of the match pro-
truding about an inch, and barely visi
ble beyond the cask. I then filled up
the remaining holes, and placed the
barrels over them in their destined
situation!
"Besides the articles above enumer-
ated, I conveyed to the depot, and
there secreted, one of M. Grimm's im-
provements upon the apparatus for con-
densation of the atmospheric air. I
found this machine, however, to require
considerable alteration before it could
be adapted to the purposes to which I
intended making it applicable. But,
with severe labor and unremitting per-
severance, I at length met with entire
success in all my preparations. My
balloon was soon completed. It would
contain more than forty thousand cubic
feet of gas; would take me up easily,
I calculated, with all my implements,
and, if I managed rightly, with one
hundred and seventy-five pounds of
ballast into the bargain. It had re-
ceived three coats of varnish, and I
found the cambric muslin to answer
all the purposes of silk itself, being
quite as strong and a good deal less
expensive.
"Everything being now ready, I ex-
acted from my wife an oath of secrecy
in relation to all my actions from the
day of my first visit to the bookseller's
stall; and promising, on my part, to
return as soon as circumstances would
permit, I gave her what little money
I had left, and bade her farewell. In-
Ideed I had no fear on her account.
She was what people call a notable
woman, and could manage matters in
the world without my assistance.
I
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL 359
believe, to tell the truth, she always
looked upon me as an idle boy-a
mere make-weight-good for nothing
but building castles in the air-and was
rather glad to get rid of me. It was
a dark night when I bade her good-bye,
and taking with me, as aides-de-camp,
the three creditors who had given me
so much trouble, we carried the balloon,
with the car and accoutrements, by a
roundabout way, to the station where
the other articles were deposited. We
there found them all unmolested, and I
proceeded immediately to business.
"It was the first of April. The night,
as I said before, was dark; there was
not a star to be seen; and a drizzling
rain, falling at intervals, rendered us
very uncomfortable. But my chief
anxiety was concerning the balloon,
which, in spite of the varnish with
which it was defended, began to grow
rather heavy with the moisture; the
powder also was liable to damage. I
therefore kept my three duns working
with great diligence, pounding down ice
around the central cask, and stirring
the acid in the others. They did not
cease, however, importuning me with
questions as to what I intended to do
with all this apparatus, and expressed
much dissatisfaction at the terrible
labor I made them undergo. They
could not perceive (so they said) what
good was likely to result from their
getting wet to the skin, merely to take
a part in such horrible incantations. I
began to get uneasy, and worked away
with all my might, for I verily believe
the idiots supposed that I had entered
into a compact with the Devil, and
that, in short, what I was now doing
was nothing better than it should be.
I was. therefore, in great fear of their
•
leaving me altogether. I contrived,
however, to pacify them by promises
of payment of all scores in full, as
soon as I could bring the present busi-
ness to a termination. To these
speeches they gave, of course, their
own interpretation; fancying, no doubt,
that at all events I should come into
possession of vast quantities of ready
money; and provided I paid them all
I owed, and a trifle more, in considera-
tion of their services, I dare say they
cared very little what became of either
my soul or my carcass.
"In about four hours and a half I
found the balloon sufficiently inflated.
I attached the car, therefore, and put
all my implements in it: a telescope,
a barometer, with some important
modifications; a thermometer; an elec-
trometer; a compass; a magnetic
needle; a seconds watch; a bell; a
speaking-trumpet, etc., etc., etc.; also
a globe of glass, exhausted of air and
carefully closed with a stopper,-not
forgetting the condensing apparatus,
some unslacked lime, a stick of sealing-
wax, a copious supply of water, and a
large quantity of provisions, such as
pemmican, in which much nutriment is
contained in comparatively little bulk.
I also secured in the car a pair of
pigeons and a cat.
"It was now nearly daybreak, and I
thought it high time to take my de-
parture. Dropping a lighted cigar on
the ground, as if by accident, I took
the opportunity, in stooping to pick it
up, of igniting privately the piece of
slow-match, the end of which, as I said
before, protruded a little beyond the
lower rim of one of the smaller casks.
This manœuvre was totally unperceived
on the part of the three duns; and,
360
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
jumping into the car, I immediately
cut the single cord which held me to
the earth, and was pleased to find that
I shot upward with inconceivable rapid-
ity, carrying with all ease one hundred
and seventy-five pounds of leaden bal-
last, and able to have carried up as
many more. As I left the earth, the
barometer stood at thirty inches, and
the centigrade thermometer at nineteen
degrees.
"Scarcely, however, had I attained
the height of fifty yards, when, roaring
and rumbling up after me in the most
tumultuous and terrible manner, came
so dense a hurricane of fire, and gravel,
and burning wood, and blazing metal,
and mangled limbs, that my very heart
sunk within me, and I fell down in the
bottom of the car, trembling with ter-
ror. Indeed, I now perceived that I
had entirely overdone the business, and
that the main consequences of the
shock were yet to be experienced. Ac-
cordingly, in less than a second, I felt
all the blood in my body rushing to
my temples, and immediately there-
upon, a concussion, which I shall never
forget, burst abruptly through the
night, and seemed to rip the very
firmament asunder. When I afterward
had time for reflection, I did not fail
to attribute the extreme violence of
the explosion, as regarded myself, to
its proper cause-my situation directly
above it, and in the line of its greatest
power. But at the time, I thought only
of preserving my life. The balloon at
first collapsed, then furiously expanded,
then whirled round and round with
sickening velocity, and finally, reeling
and staggering like a drunken man,
hurled me over the rim of the car, and
left me dangling, at a terrific height,
with my head downward, and my face
outward, by a piece of slender cord
about three feet in length, which hung
accidentally through a crevice near the
bottom of the wicker-work, and in
which, as I fell, my left foot became
most providentially entangled. It is im-
possible utterly impossible-to form
any adequate idea of the horror of my
situation. I gasped convulsively for
breath a shudder resembling a fit of
the ague agitated every nerve and
muscle in my frame-I felt my eyes
starting from their sockets-a horrible
nausea overwhelmed me—and at length
I lost all consciousness in a swoon.
"How long I remained in this state
it is impossible to say. It must, how-
ever, have been no inconsiderable time,
for when I partially recovered the sense
of existence, I found the day breaking,
the balloon at a prodigious height over
a wilderness of ocean, and not a trace
of land to be discovered far and wide
within the limits of the vast horizon.
My sensations, however, upon thus re-
covering, were by no means so replete
with agony as might have been antici-
pated. Indeed, there was much of
madness in the calm survey which I
began to take of my situation. I drew
up to my eyes each of my hands, one
after the other, and wondered what
occurrence could have given rise to the
swelling of the veins, and the horrible
blackness of the finger-nails. I after-
ward carefully examined my head,
shaking it repeatedly, and feeling it
with minute attention, until I succeeded
in satisfying myself that it was not, as
I had more than half suspected, larger
than my balloon. Then, in a knowing
manner, I felt in both my breeches
pockets, and, missing therefrom a set
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL 361
of tablets and a toothpick case, endeav-
ored to account for their disappearance,
and not being able to do so, felt inex-
pressibly chagrined. It now occurred
to me that I suffered great uneasiness
in the joint of my left ankle, and a
dim consciousness of my situation be-
gan to glimmer through my mind. But,
strange to say! I was neither astonished
nor horror-stricken. If I felt any emo-
tion at all, it was a kind of chuckling
satisfaction at the cleverness I was
about to display in extricating myself
from this dilemma; and never, for a
moment, did I look upon my ultimate
safety as a question susceptible of
doubt. For a few minutes I remained
wrapped in the profoundest meditation.
I have a distinct recollection of fre-
quently compressing my lips, putting
my fore-finger to the side of my nose,
and making use of other gesticulations
and grimaces common to men who, at
ease in their arm-chairs, meditate upon
matters of intricacy or importance.
Having, as I thought, sufficiently col-
lected my ideas, I now, with great cau-
tion and deliberation, put my hands
behind my back, and unfastened the
large iron buckle which belonged to the
waistband of my pantaloons. This
buckle had three teeth, which, being
somewhat rusty, turned with great diffi-
culty on their axis. I brought them,
however, after some trouble, at right
angles to the body of the buckle, and
was glad to find them remain firm in
that position. Holding within my teeth.
the instrument thus obtained, I now
proceeded to untie the knot of my
cravat. I had to rest several times
before I could accomplish this manœu-
vre; but it was at length accomplished.
To one end of the cravat I then made
fast the buckle, and the other end 1
tied, for greater security, tightly around
my wrist. Drawing now my body up-
ward, with a prodigious exertion of
muscular force, I succeeded, at the
very first trial, in throwing the buckle
over the car, and entangling it, as I
had anticipated, in the circular rim of
the wicker-work.
"My body was now inclined toward
the side of the car, at an angle of about
forty-five degrees; but it must not be
understood that I was therefore only
forty-five degrees below the perpen-
dicular. So far from it, I still lay
nearly level with the plane of the hori-
zon; for the change of situation which
I had acquired, had forced the bottom
of the car considerably outward from
my position, which was accordingly one
of the most imminent peril. It should
be remembered, however, that when I
fell, in the first instance, from the car,
if I had fallen with my face turned
toward the balloon, instead of turned
outwardly from it, as it actually was;
or if, in the second place, the cord by
which I was suspended had chanced to
hang over the upper edge, instead of
through a crevice near the bottom of
the car, I say it may readily be con-
ceived that, in either of these supposed
cases, I should have been unable to
accomplish even as much as I had now
accomplished, and the disclosures now
made would have been utterly lost to
posterity. I had therefore every rea-
son to be grateful; although, in point
of fact, I was still too stupid to be
anything at all, and hung for, perhaps,
a quarter of an hour in that ex-
traordinary manner, without making
the slightest farther exertion, and in a
singularly tranquil state of idiotic en-
362
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
joyment. But this feeling did not fail
to die rapidly away, and thereunto suc-
ceeded horror, and dismay, and a sense
of utter helplessness and ruin. In fact,
the blood so long accumulating in the
vessels of my head and throat, and
which had hitherto buoyed up my
spirits with delirium, had now begun to
retire within their proper channels, and
the distinctness which was thus added
to my perception of the danger, merely
served to deprive me of the self-posses-
sion and courage to encounter it. But
this weakness was, luckily for me, of
no very long duration. In good time
came to my rescue the spirit of despair,
and, with frantic cries and struggles, I
jerked my way bodily upward, till at
length, clutching with a vise-like grip
the long-desired rim, I writhed my per-
son over it, and fell headlong and shud-
dering within the car.
"It was not until some time after-
ward that I recovered myself suffi-
ciently to attend to the ordinary cares
of the balloon. I then, however, exam-
ined it with attention, and found it, to
my great relief, uninjured. My imple-
ments were all safe, and, fortunately,
I had lost neither ballast nor provi-
sions. Indeed, I had so well secured
them in their places, that such an acci-
dent was entirely out of the question.
Looking at my watch, I found it six
o'clock. I was still rapidly ascending,
and the barometer gave a present alti-
tude of three and three-quarter miles.
Immediately beneath me in the ocean,
lay a small black object, slightly oblong
in shape, seemingly about the size of a
domino, and in every respect bearing a
great resemblance to one of those toys.
Bringing my telescope to bear upon it,
I plainly discerned it to be a British
ninety-four-gun ship, close-hauled, and
pitching heavily in the sea with her
head to the W. S. W. Besides this
ship, I saw nothing but the ocean and
the sky, and the sun, which had long
arisen.
"It is now high time that I should
explain to your Excellencies the object
of my voyage. Your Excellencies will
bear in mind that distressed circum-
stances in Rotterdam had at length
driven me to the resolution of commit-
ting suicide. It was not, however, that
to life itself I had any positive disgust.
but that I was harassed beyond endur-
ance by the adventitious miseries at-
tending my situation. In this state of
mind, wishing to live, yet wearied with
life, the treatise at the stall of the
bookseller, backed by the opportune
discovery of my cousin of Nantz,
opened a resource to my imagination.
I then finally made up my mind. I
determined to depart, yet live-to leave
the world, yet continue to exist-in
short, to drop enigmas, I resolved, let
what would ensue, to force a passage,
if I could, to the moon. Now, lest I
should be supposed more of a madman
than I actually am, I will detail, as well
as I am able, the considerations which
led me to believe that an achievement
of this nature, although without doubt
difficult, and full of danger, was not
absolutely, to a bold spirit, beyond the
confines of the possible.
"The moon's actual distance from
the earth was the first thing to be at-
tended to. Now, the mean or average
interval between the centres of the two
planets is 59.9643 of the earth's equa-
torial radi, or only about 237,000
miles. I say the mean or average in-
terval, but it must be borne in mind
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
363
that the form of the moon's orbit being
an ellipse of eccentricity amounting to
no less than 0.05484 of the major semi-
axis of the ellipse itself, and the earth's
centre being situated in its focus, if I
could, in any manner, contrive to meet
the moon in its perigee, the above men-
tioned distance would be materially
diminished. But, to say nothing at
present of this possibility, it was very
certain that, at all events, from the
237,000 miles I would have to deduct
the radius of the earth, say 4,000, and
the radius of the moon, say 1,080, in
all 5,080, leaving an actual interval to
be traversed, under average circum-
stances, of 231,920 miles. Now this, I
reflected, was no very extraordinary
distance. Travelling on the land has
been repeatedly accomplished at the
rate of sixty miles per hour; and in-
deed a much greater speed may be an-
ticipated. But even at this velocity, it
would take me no more than 161 days
to reach the surface of the moon.
There were, however, many particulars
inducing me to believe that my average
rate of travelling might possibly very
much exceed that of sixty miles per
hour, and, as these considerations did
not fail to make a deep impression
upon my mind, I will mention them
more fully hereafter.
"The next point to be regarded was
one of far greater importance. From
indications afforded by the barometer,
we find that, in ascensions from the
surface of the earth we have, at the
height of 1,000 feet, left below us
about one-thirtieth of the entire mass
of atmospheric air; that at 10,600 we
have ascended through nearly one-
third; and that at 18,000, which is not
far from the elevation of Cotopaxi, we
have surmounted one-half the mate-
rial, or, at all events, one-half the
ponderable, body of air incumbent upon
our globe. It is also calculated that at
an altitude not exceeding the hundredth
part of the earth's diameter-that is,
not exceeding eighty miles--the rare-
faction would be so excessive that
animal life could in no manner be sus-
tained, and, moreover, that the most
delicate means we possess of ascertain-
ing the presence of the atmosphere
would be inadequate to assure us of its
existence. But I did not fail to per-
ceive that these latter calculations are
founded altogether on our experimental
knowledge of the properties of air, and
the mechanical laws regulating its dila-
tion and compression, in what may be
called, comparatively speaking, the im-
mediate vicinity of the earth itself;
and, at the same time, it is taken for
granted that animal life is and must be
essentially incapable of modification at
any given unattainable distance from
the surface. Now, all such reasoning
and from such data must, of course, be
simply analogical. The greatest height
ever reached by man was that of 25,000
feet, attained in the aeronautic expe-
dition of Messieurs Gay-Lussac and
Biot. This is a moderate altitude, even
when compared with the eighty miles
in question; and I could not help think-
ing that the subject admitted room for
doubt and great latitude for specula-
tion.
"But, in point of fact, an ascension.
being made to any given altitude, the
ponderable quantity of air surmounted
in any farther ascension is by no means
in proportion to the additional height
ascended (as may be plainly seen from
what has been stated before), but in a
364
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ratio constantly decreasing. It is there-
fore evident that, ascend as high as we
may, we cannot, literally speaking, ar-
rive at a limit beyond which no at-
mosphere is to be found. It must exist,
I argued; although it may exist in a
state of infinite rarefaction.
"On the other hand, I was aware that
arguments have not been wanting to
prove the existence of a real and defi-
nite limit to the atmosphere, beyond
which there is absolutely no air what-
soever. But a circumstance which has
been left out of view by those who
contend for such a limit, seemed to me,
although no positive refutation of their
creed, still a point worthy very serious
investigation. On comparing the inter-
vals between the successive arrivals of
Encke's comet at its perihelion, after
giving credit, in the most exact manner,
for all the disturbances due to the at-
tractions of the planets, it appears that
the periods are gradually diminishing;
that is to say, the major axis of the
comet's ellipse is growing shorter, in a
slow but perfectly regular decrease.
Now, this is precisely what ought to be
the case, if we suppose a resistance
experienced from the comet from an
extremely rare ethereal medium per-
vading the regions of its orbit. For it
is evident that such a medium must, in
retarding the comet's velocity, increase
its centripetal, by weakening its cen-
trifugal, force. In other words, the
sun's attraction would be constantly
attaining greater power, and the comet
would be drawn nearer at every revo-
lution. Indeed, there is no other way
of accounting for the variation in
question. But again:-The real diame-
ter of the same comet's nebulosity is
observed to contract rapidly as it ap-
proaches the sun, and dilate with equal
rapidity in its departure towards its
aphelion. Was I not justifiable in sup-
posing, with M. Valz, that this appar-
ent condensation of volume has its
origin in the compression of the same
ethereal medium I have spoken of be-
fore, and which is dense in proportion
to its vicinity to the sun? The lenticu-
lar-shaped phenomenon, also called the
zodiacal light, was a matter worthy of
attention. This radiance, so apparent
in the tropics, and which cannot be
mistaken for any meteoric lustre, ex-
tends from the horizon obliquely up-
ward, and follows generally the direc
tion of the sun's equator. It appeared
to me evidently in the nature of a rare
atmosphere extending from the sun
outward, beyond the orbit of Venus at
least, and I believed indefinitely far-
ther.* Indeed, this medium I could
not suppose confined to the path of the
comet's ellipse, or to the immediate
neighborhood of the sun. It was easy,
on the contrary, to imagine it pervad
ing the entire regions of our planetary
system, condensed into what we call
atmosphere at the planets themselves,
and perhaps at some of them modified
by considerations purely geological;
that is to say, modified, or varied in its
proportions (or absolute nature) by
matters volatilized from the respective
orbs.
"Having adopted this view of the
subject, I had little farther hesitation.
Granting that on my passage I should
meet with atmosphere essentially the
*The zodiacal light is probably what
the ancients called Trabes. Emicant
Trabes quos docos vocant.-Pliny, lib.
2, p. 26.
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
365
same as at the surface of the earth,
I conceived that, by means of the very
ingenious apparatus of M. Grimm, I
should readily be enabled to condense
it in sufficient quantity for the purposes
of respiration. This would remove the
chief obstacle in a journey to the
moon. I had indeed spent some money
and great labor in adapting the appa-
ratus to the object intended, and confi-
dently looked forward to its successful
application, if I could manage to com-
plete the voyage within any reasonable
period. This brings me back to the
rate at which it would be possible to
travel.
"It is true that balloons, in the first
stage of their ascensions from the
earth, are known to rise with a velocity
comparatively moderate. Now, the
power of elevation lies altogether in
the superior gravity of the atmospheric
air compared with the gas in the bal-
loon; and, at first sight, it does not
appear probable that, as the balloon
acquires altitude, and consequently ar-
rives successively in atmospheric strata
of densities rapidly diminishing-I say,
it does not appear at all reasonable
that, in this its progress upward, the
original velocity should be accelerated.
On the other hand, I was not aware
that, in any recorded ascension, a
diminution had been proved to be ap-
parent in the absolute rate of ascent;
although such should have been the
case, if on account of nothing else, on
account of the escape of gas through
balloons ill-constructed, and varnished
with no better material than the ordi-
nary varnish. It seemed, therefore, that
the effect of such escape was only suffi-
cient to counterbalance the effect of
the acceleration attained in the dimin-
ishing of the balloon's distance from
the gravitating centre. I now consid-
ered that, provided in my passage I
found the medium I had imagined, and
provided that it should prove to be
essentially what we denominate atmos-
pheric air, it could make comparatively
little difference at what extreme state
of rarefaction I should discover it-
that is to say, in regard to my power
of ascending for the gas in the balloon
would not only be itself subject to
similar rarefaction (in proportion to
the occurrence of which, I could suffer
an escape of so much as would be
requisite to prevent explosion), but,
being what it was, would, at all events,
continue specifically lighter than any
compound whatever of mere nitrogen
and oxygen. Thus there was a chance
-in fact there was a strong proba-
bility-that, at no epoch of my ascent,
I should reach a point where the united
weights of my immense balloon, the
inconceivably rare gas within it, the
car, and its contents, should equal the
weight of the mass of the surrounding
atmosphere displaced; and this will be
readily understood as the sole condition
upon which my upward flight would be
arrested. But, if this point were even
attained, I could dispense with ballast
and other weight to the amount of
nearly three hundred pounds. In the
meantime, the force of gravitation
would be constantly diminishing, in
proportion to the squares of the dis-
tances, and so, with a velocity pro-
digiously accelerating, I should at
length arrive in those distant regions
where the force of the earth's attrac-
tion would be superseded by that of the
moon.
"There was another difficulty, how-
360
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ever, which occasioned me some little
disquietude. It has been observed,
that, in balloon ascensions to any con-
siderable height, besides the pain at-
tending respiration, great uneasiness
is experienced about the head and body,
often accompanied with bleeding at the
nose, and other symptoms of an
alarming kind, and growing more and
more inconvenient in proportion to the
altitude attained.* This was a reflec-
tion of a nature somewhat startling.
Was it not probable that these symp-
toms would increase until terminated
by death itself? I finally thought not.
Their origin was to be looked for in
the progressive removal of the cus-
tomary atmospheric pressure upon the
surface of the body, and consequent
distention of the superficial blood-ves-
sels-not in any positive disorganiza-
tion of the animal system, as in the
case of difficulty in breathing, where
the atmospheric density is chemically
insufficient for the due renovation of
blood in a ventricle of the heart. Un-
less for default of this renovation, I
could see no reason, therefore, why life
could not be sustained even in a
vacuum; for the expansion and com-
pression of chest, commonly called
breathing, is action purely muscular,
and the cause, not the effect, of respi-
ration. In a word, I conceived that, as
the body should become habituated to
*Since the original publication of
Hans Pfaall, I find that Mr. Green, of
Nassau-balloon notoriety, and other
late aeronauts, deny the assertions of
Humboldt, in this respect, and speak
of a decreasing inconvenience,-pre-
cisely in accordance with the theory
here urged.-E. A. P.
the want of atmospheric pressure, the
sensations of pain would gradually di-
minish-and to endure them while they
continued, I relied with confidence
upon the iron hardihood of my consti-
tution.
"Thus, may it please your Excellen-
cies, I have detailed some, though by
no means all, the considerations which
led me to form the project of a lunar
voyage. I shall now proceed to lay
before you the result of an attempt so
apparently audacious in conception,
and, at all events, so utterly unparal
leled in the annals of mankind.
"Having attained the altitude before
mentioned that is to say three miles
and three-quarters-I threw out from
the car a quantity of feathers, and
found that I still ascended with suffi-
cient rapidity; there was, therefore, no
necessity for discharging any ballast. I
was glad of this, for I wished to retain
with me as much weight as I could
carry, for the obvious reason that I
could not be positive either about the
gravitation or the atmospheric density
of the moon. I as yet suffered no
bodily inconvenience, breathing with
great freedom, and feeling no pain
whatever in the head. The cat was
lying very demurely upon my coat,
which I had taken off, and eyeing the
pigeons with an air of nonchalance.
These latter being tied by the leg, to
prevent their escape, were busily em-
ployed in picking up some grains of
rice scattered for them in the bottom
of the car.
"At twenty minutes past six o'clock.
the barometer showed an elevation of
26,400 feet, or five miles to a fraction.
The prospect seemed unbounded. In-
deed, it is very easily calculated by
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
367
means of spherical geometry, how great
an extent of the earth's area I beheld.
The convex surface of any segment of
a sphere is, to the entire surface of the
sphere itself, as the versed sine of the
segment to the diameter of the sphere.
Now, in my case, the versed sine-
that is to say, the thickness of the seg-
ment beneath me-was about equal to
my elevation, or the elevation of the
point of sight above the surface. 'As
five miles, then, to eight thousand,'
would express the proportion of the
earth's area seen by me. In other
words, I beheld as much as a sixteen-
hundredth part of the whole surface
of the globe. The sea appeared un-
ruffled as a mirror, although, by means
of the telescope, I could perceive it to
be in a state of violent agitation. The
ship was no longer visible, having
drifted away, apparently to the east-
ward. I now began to experience, at
intervals, severe pain in the head, espe-
cially about the ears-still, however,
breathing with tolerable freedom. The
cat and pigeons seemed to suffer no
inconvenience whatsoever.
"At twenty minutes before seven,
the balloon entered a long series of
dense cloud, which put me to great
trouble, by damaging my condensing
apparatus and wetting me to the skin;
this was, to be sure, a singular recontre,
for I had not believed it possible that a
cloud of this nature could be sustained
at so great an elevation. I thought it
best, however, to throw out two five-
pound pieces of ballast, reserving still
a weight of one hundred and sixty-five
pounds. Upon so doing, I soon rose
above the difficulty, and perceived im-
mediately, that I had obtained a great
increase in my rate of ascent.
In a
few seconds after my leaving the cloud,
a flash of vivid lightning shot from one
end of it to the other, and caused it
to kindle up, throughout its vast ex-
tent, like a mass of ignited charcoal.
This, it must be remembered, was in
the broad light of day. No fancy may
picture the sublimity which might have.
been exhibited by a similar phenome-
non taking place amid the darkness of
the night. Hell itself might have been
found a fitting image. Even as it was,
my hair stood on end, while I gazed
afar down within the yawning abysses,
letting imagination descend, and stalk
about in the strange vaulted halls, and
ruddy gulfs, and red ghastly chasms of
the hideous and unfathomable fire. I
had indeed made a narrow escape. Had
the balloon remained a very short while
longer within the cloud-that is to say,
had not the inconvenience of getting
wet, determined me to discharge the
ballast-my destruction might, and
probably would, have been the conse-
quence. Such perils, although little
considered, are perhaps the greatest
which must be encountered in balloons.
I had by this time, however, attained
too great an elevation to be any longer
uneasy on this head.
"I was now rising rapidly, and by
seven o'clock the barometer indicated
an altitude of no less than nine miles
and a half. I began to find great diffi-
culty in drawing my breath. My head,
too, was excessively painful; and, hav-
ing felt for some time a moisture about
my cheeks, I at length discovered it to
be blood, which was oozing quite fast
from the drums of my ears. My eyes,
also, gave me great uneasiness. Upon
passing the hand over them they
seemed to have protruded from their
368
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
sockets in no inconsiderable degree;
and all objects in the car, and even the
balloon itself, appeared distorted to my
vision. These symptoms were more
than I had expected, and occasioned
me some alarm. At this juncture, very
imprudently, and without consideration,
I threw out from the car three five-
pound pieces of ballast. The accele-
rated rate of ascent thus obtained, car-
ried me too rapidly, and without suffi-
cient gradation, into a highly rarefied
stratum of the atmosphere, and the
result had nearly proved fatal to my
expedition and to myself. I was sud-
denly seized with a spasm which lasted
for more than five minutes, and even
when this, in a measure, ceased, I
could catch my breath only at long
intervals, and in a gasping manner—
bleeding all the while copiously at the
nose and ears, and even slightly at the
eyes. The pigeons appeared distressed
in the extreme, and struggled to escape;
while the cat mewed piteously, and,
with her tongue hanging out of her
mouth, staggered to and fro in the car
as if under the influence of poison. I
now too late discovered the great rash-
ness of which I had been guilty in dis-
charging the ballast, and my agitation
was excessive. I anticipated nothing
less than death, and death in a few min-
utes. The physical suffering I under-
went contributed also to render me
nearly incapable of making any exer-
tion for the preservation of my life. I
had, indeed, little power of reflection
left, and the violence of the pain in
my head seemed to be greatly on the
increase. Thus I found that my senses
would shortly give way altogether, and
I had already clutched one of the valve
ropes with the view of attempting a
descent, when the recollection of the
trick I had played the three creditors,
and the possible consequences to myself,
should I return, operated to deter me
for the moment. I lay down in the
bottom of the car, and endeavoured to
collect my faculties. In this I so far
succeeded as to determine upon the
experiment of losing blood. Having no
lancet, however, I was constrained to
perform the operation in the best man-
ner I was able, and finally succeeded in
opening a vein in my left arm, with
the blade of my penknife. The blood
had hardly commenced flowing when I
experienced a sensible relief, and by
the time I had lost about half a mod-
erate basinful, most of the worst symp-
toms had abandoned me entirely. I
nevertheless did not think it expedient
to attempt getting on my feet imme-
diately; but, having tied up my arm
as well as I could, I lay still for about
a quarter of an hour. At the end of
this time I arose, and found myself
freer from absolute pain of any kind
than I had been during the last hour
and a quarter of my ascension. The
difficulty of breathing, however, was
diminished in a very slight degree, and
I found that it would soon be positively
necessary to make use of my condenser.
In the meantime, looking toward the
cat, who was again snugly stowed away
upon my coat, I discovered to my in-
finite surprise, that she had taken the
opportunity of my indisposition to bring
into light a litter of three little kittens.
This was an addition to the number
of passengers on my part altogether
unexpected; but I was pleased at the
occurrence. It would afford me a chance
of bringing to a kind of test the truth
of a surmise, which, more than any-
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
369
thing else, had influenced me in at-
tempting this ascension. I had imag-
ined that the habitual endurance of the
atmospheric pressure at the surface of
the earth was the cause, or nearly so,
of the pain attending animal existence
at a distance above the surface. Should
the kittens be found to suffer uneasiness
in an equal degree with their mother,
I must consider my theory in fault, but
a failure to do so I should look upon
as a strong confirmation of my idea.
"By eight o'clock I had actually at-
tained an elevation of seventeen miles
above the surface of the earth. Thus
it seemed to me evident that my rate of
ascent was not only on the increase, but
that the progression would have been
apparent in a slight degree even had I
not discharged the ballast which I did.
The pains in my head and ears returned,
at intervals, with violence, and I still
continued to bleed occasionally at the
nose; but, upon the whole, I suffered
much less than might have been ex-
pected. I breathed, however, at every
moment, with more and more difficulty,
and each inhalation was attended with
a troublesome spasmodic action of the
chest. I now unpacked the condensing
apparatus, and got it ready for imme-
diate use.
"The view of the earth, at this period
of my ascension, was beautiful indeed.
To the westward, the northward, and
the southward, as far as I could see,
lay a boundless sheet of apparently
unruffled ocean, which every moment
gained a deeper nd deeper tint of blue.
At a vast distance to the eastward, al-
though perfectly discernible, extended
the islands of Great Britain, the entire
Atlantic coasts of France and Spain,
with a small portion of the northern
Of
part of the continent of Africa.
individual edifices not a trace could
be discovered, and the proudest cities
of mankind had utterly faded away
from the face of the earth.
"What mainly astonished me, in the
appearance of things below, was the
seeming concavity of the surface of the
globe. I had, thoughtlessly enough, ex-
pected to see its real convexity become
evident as I ascended; but a very little
reflection sufficed to explain the dis-
crepancy. A line dropped from my po-
sition perpendicularly to the earth,
would have formed the perpendicular
of a right-angled triangle, of which the
base would have extended from the
right-angle to the horizon, and the
hypothenuse from the horizon to my
position. But my height was little or
nothing in comparison with my pros-
pect. In other words, the base and
hypothenuse of the supposed triangle
would, in my case, have been so long,
when compared to the perpendicular,
that the two former might have been
regarded as nearly parallel. In this
manner the horizon of the aeronaut
appears always to be upon a level with
the car. But as the point immediately
beneath him seems, and is, at a great
distance below him, it seems, of course,
also at a great distance below the hori-
zon. Hence the impression of concav-
ity; and this impression must remain,
until the elevation shall bear so great
a proportion to the prospect, that the
apparent parallelism of the base and
hypothenuse disappears.
"The pigeons about this time seeming
to undergo much suffering, I determined
upon giving them their liberty. I first
untied one of them, a beautiful gray-
mottled pigeon, and placed him upon
370
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
the rim of the wicker-work.
He ap-
peared extremely uneasy, looking anx-
iously around him, fluttering his wings,
and making a loud cooing noise, but
could not be persuaded to trust him-
self from the car. I took him up at
last, and threw him to about half a
dozen yards from the balloon. He made,
however, no attempt to descend as I
had expected, but struggled with great
vehemence to get back, uttering at
the same time very shrill and piercing
cries. He at length succeeded in re-
gaining his former station on the rim,
but had hardly done so when his head
dropped upon his breast, and he fell
Idead within the car. The other one
did not prove so unfortunate. To pre-
vent his following the example of his
companion, and accomplishing a return,
I threw him downward with all my
force, and was pleased to find him con-
tinue his descent, with great velocity,
making use of his wings with ease, and
in a perfectly natural manner.
very short time he was out of sight,
and I have no doubt he reached home
in safety. Puss, who seemed in a great
measure recovered from her illness, now
made a hearty meal of the dead bird,
and then went to sleep with much ap-
parent satisfaction. Her kittens were
quite lively, and so far evinced not the
slightest sign of any uneasiness.
In a
"At a quarter past eight, being no
longer able to draw breath without the
most intolerable pain, I proceeded
forthwith to adjust around the car the
apparatus belonging to the condenser.
This apparatus will require some little
explanation, and your Excellencies will
please to bear in mind that my object,
in the first place, was to surround my-
self and car entirely with a barricade
against the highly rarefied atmospher
in which I was existing, with the in
tention of introducing within this bar
ricade, by means of my condenser, a
quantity of this same atmosphere suff
ciently condensed for the purposes o
respiration. With this object in view
I had prepred a very strong, perfectl
air-tight, but flexible gum-elastic bag
In this bag, which was of sufficient di
mensions, the entire car was in a man
ner placed. That is to say, it (th
bag) was drawn over the whole botton
of the car, up its sides, and so on, alon
the outside of the ropes, to the uppe
rim or hoop where the net-work i
attached. Having pulled the bag u
in this way, and formed a complete en
closure on all sides, and at bottom, i
was now necessary to fasten up its to
or mouth, by passing its material ove
the hoop of the net-work-in othe
words, between the net-work and th
hoop. But if the net-work were sep
rated from the hoop to admit this pa
sage, what was to sustain the car i
the meantime? Now the net-work w
not permanently fastened to the hoo
but attached by a series of runnit
loops or nooses. I therefore undid on
a few of these loops at one time, lea
ing the car suspended by the remainde
Having thus inserted a portion of th
cloth forming the upper part of the ba
I refastened the loops-not to the hoo
for that would have been impossibl
since the cloth now intervened-b
to a series of large buttons, affixed
the cloth itself, about three feet b
low the mouth of the bag; the interva
between the buttons having been ma
to correspond to the intervals betwe
the loops. This done, a few more
the lops were unfastened from the ri
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
371
a farther portion of the cloth intro-
duced, and the disengaged loops then
connected with their proper buttons.
In this way it was possible to insert
the whole upper part of the bag between
the net-work and the hoop. It is evi-
dent that the hoop would now drop
down within the car. while the whole
weight of the car itself, with all its
contents, would be held up merely by
the strength of the buttons. This, at
first sight, would seem an inadequte de-
pendence; but it was by no means so,
for the buttons were not only very
strong in themselves, but so close to-
gether that a very slight portion of the
whole weight was supported by any
one of them. Indeed, had the car and
contents been three times heavier than
they were, I should not have been at
all uneasy. I now raised up the hoop
again within the covering of gum-elastic,
and propped it at nearly its former height
by means of three light poles prepared
for the occasion. This was done, of
course, to keep the bag distended at
the top, and to preserve the lower part
of the net-work in its proper situation.
All that now remained was to fasten up
the mouth of the enclosure; and this
was readily accomplished by gathering
the folds of the material together, and
twisting them up very tightly on the
inside by means of a kind of stationary
tourniquet.
"In the sides of the covering thus
adjusted round the car, had been in-
serted three circular panes of thick but
clear glass, through which I could see
without difficulty around me in every
horizontal direction. In that portion of
the cloth forming the bottom, was like-
wise, a fourth window, of the same kind,
and corresponding with a small aperture
in the floor of the car itself. This en-
abled me to see perpendicularly down,
but having found it impossible to place
any similar contrivance overhead, on ac-
count of the peculiar manner of closing
up the opening there, and the conse-
quent wrinkles in the cloth, I could
expect to see no objects situated di-
rectly in my zenith. This, of course,
was a matter of little consequence;
for had I even been able to place a
window at top, the balloon itself would
have prevented my making any use
of it.
"About a foot below one of the side
windows was a circular opening, three
inches in diameter, and fitted with a
brass rim adapted in its inner edge to
the windings of a screw. In this rim
was screwed the large tube of the con-
denser, the body of the machine being,
of course, within the chamber of gum-
elastic. Through this tube a quantity
of the rare atmosphere circumjacent
being drawn by means of a vacuum
created in the body of the machine,
was thence discharged, in a state of
condensation, to mingle with the thin
air already in the chamber. This op-
eration being repeated several times,
at length filled the chamber with atmos-
phere proper for all the purposes of
respiration; but in so confined a space
it would, in a short time, necessarily be-
come foul, and unfit for use from fre-
quent contact with the lungs. It was
then ejected by a small valve at the
bottom of the car-the dense air readily
sinking into the thinner atmosphere be-
low. To avoid the inconvenience of
making a total vacuum at any moment
within the chamber, this purification
was never accomplished all at once,
but in a gradual manner-the valve
372
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
being opened only for a few seconds,
then closed again, until one or two
strokes from the pump of the condenser
had supplied the place of the atmos-
phere ejected. For the sake of experi-
ment I had put the cat and kittens in
a small basket, and suspended it outside
the car to a button at the bottom, close
by the valve, through which I could
feed them at any moment when neces-
sary. I did this at some little risk,
and before closing the mouth of the
chamber, by reaching under the car
with one of the poles before mentioned
to which a hook had been attached.
As soon as dense air was admitted in
the chamber, the hoop and poles be-
came unnecessary; the expansion of the
enclosed atmosphere powerfully distend-
ing the gum-elastic.
"By the time I had fully completed
these arrangements and filled the cham-
ber as explained, it wanted only ten
minutes of nine o'clock. During the
whole period of my being thus em-
ployed, I endured the most terrible dis-
tress from difficulty of respiration, and
bitterly did I repent the negligence or
rather fool-hardiness, of which I had
been guilty, of putting off to the last
moment a matter of so much impor-
tance. But having at length accom-
plished it, I soon began to reap the
benefit of my invention. Once again
I breathed with perfect freedom and
ease-and indeed why should I not? I
was also agreeably surprised to find
myself, in a great measure, relieved
from the violent pains which had hither-
to tormented me. A slight headache,
accompanied with a sensation of ful-
ness or distention about the wrists, the
ankles, and the throat, was nearly all
of which I had now to complain. Thus
it seemed evident that a greater part of
the uneasiness attending the removal of
atmospheric pressure had actually worn
off, as I had expected, and that much of
the pain endured for the last two hours
should have been attributed altogether
to the effects of a deficient respiration.
"At twenty minutes before nine
o'clock-that is to say, a short time
prior to my closing up the mouth of the
chamber, the mercury attained its
limit, or ran down, in the barometer,
which, as I mentioned before, was one
of an extended construction. It then
indicated an altitude on my part of
132,000 feet, or five-and-twenty miles,
and I consequently surveyed at that
time an extent of the earth's area
amounting to no less than the three-
hundred-and-twentieth part of its en-
tire superficies. At nine o'clock I had
again lost sight of land to the eastward,
but not before I became aware that
the balloon was drifting rapidly to the
N. N. W. The ocean beneath me still
retained its apparent concavity, al-
though my view was often interrupted
by the masses of cloud which floated
to and fro.
"At half past nine I tried the ex-
periment of throwing out a handful of
feathers through the valve. They did
not float as I had expected; but dropped
down perpendicularly, like a bullet, en
masse, and with the greatest velocity-
being out of sight in a very few seconds.
I did not at first know what to make
of this extraordinary phenomenon; not
being able to believe that my rate of
ascent had, of a sudden, met with so
prodigious an
prodigious an acceleration. But it
soon occurred to me that the atmos-
phere was now far too rare to sustain
even the feathers; that they actually
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
373
fell, as they appear to do, with great
rapidity; and that I had been surprised
by the united velocities of their descent
and my own elevation.
"By ten o'clock I found that I had
very little to occupy my immediate
attention. Affairs went swimmingly,
and I believed the balloon to be going
upward with a speed increasing mo-
mently although I had no longer any
means of ascertaining the progression
of the increase. I suffered no pain or
uneasiness of any kind, and enjoyed
better spirits than I had at any period
since my departure from Rotterdam!
busying myself now in examining the
state of my various apparatus, and now
in regenerating the atmosphere within
the chamber. This latter point I de-
termined to attend to at regular in-
tervals of forty minutes, more on ac-
count of the preservation of my health,
than from so frequent a renovation
being absolutely necessary. In the
meanwhile I could not help making
anticipations. Fancy revelled in the
wild and dreamy regions of the moon.
Imagination, feeling herself for once
unshackled, roamed at will among the
ever-changing wonders of a shadowy
and unstable land. Now there were
hoary and time-honored forests, and
craggy precipices, and waterfalls tum-
bling with a loud noise into abysses
without a bottom. Then I came sud-
denly into still noonday solitudes,
where no wind of heaven ever intruded,
and where vast meadows of poppies,
and slender, lily-looking flowers spread
themselves out a weary distance, all
silent and motionless for ever. Then
again I journeyed far down away into
another country where it was all one
dim and vague lake, with a boundary
line of clouds. But fancies such as
these were not the sole possessors of
my brain. Horrors of a nature most
stern and most appalling would too fre-
quently obtrude themselves upon my
mind, and shake the innermost depths
of my soul with the bare supposition of
their possibility. Yet I would not suf-
fer my thoughts for any length of time
to dwell upon these latter speculations,
rightly judging the real and palpable
dangers of the voyage sufficient for my
undivided attention.
"At five o'clock, p. m., being engaged
in regenerating the atmosphere within
the chamber, I took that opportunity
of observing the cat and kittens through
the valve. The cat herself appeared
to suffer again very much, and I had
no hesitation in attributing her uneasi-
ness chiefly to a difficulty in breathing;
but my experiment with the kittens had
resulted very strangely. I had expected,
of course, to see them betray a sense
of pain, although in a less degree than
their mother; and this would have been
sufficient to confirm my opinion con-
cerning the habitual endurance of at-
mospheric pressure. But I was not
prepared to find them, upon close ex-
amination, evidently enjoying a high
degree of health, breathing with the
greatest ease and perfect regularity, and
evincing not the slightest sign of any
uneasiness. I could only account for
all this by extending my theory, and
supposing that the highly rarefied at-
mosphere around might perhaps not be,
as I had taken for granted, chemically
insufficient for the purposes of life,
and that a person born in such a medium
might, possibly, be unaware of any
inconvenience attending its inhalation,
while, upon removal to the denser
374
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
strata near the earth, he might endure
tortures of a similar nature to those I
had so lately experienced. It has since
been to me a matter of deep regret that
an awkward accident, at this time, oc-
casioned me the loss of my little family
of cats, and deprived me of the insight
into this matter which a continued ex-
periment might have afforded. In pass-
ing my hand through the valve, with a
cup of water for the old puss, the
sleeves of my shirt became entangled in
the loop which sustained the basket,
and thus, in a moment, loosened it from
the bottom. Had the whole actually
vanished into air, it could not have shot
from my sight in a more abrupt and
instantaneous manner. Positively, there
could not have intervened the tenth
part of a second between the disengage-
ment of the basket and its absolute dis-
appearance with all that it contained.
My good wishes followed it to the
earth, but of course, I had no hope that
either cat or kittens would ever live to
tell the tale of their misfortune.
"At six o'clock, I perceived a great
portion of the earth's visible area to
the eastward involved in thick shadow,
which continued to advance with great
rapidity, until, at five minutes before
seven, the whole surface in view was
enveloped in the darkness of night. It
was not, however, until long after this
time that the rays of the setting sun
ceased to illumine the balloon; and
this circumstance, although of course
fully anticipated, did not fail to give
me an infinite deal of pleasure. It was
evident that, in the morning, I should
behold the rising luminary many hours
at least before the citizens of Rotter-
dam, in spite of their situation so much
farther to the eastward, and thus, day
after day, in proportion to the height
ascended, would I enjoy the light of the
sun for a longer and a longer period.
I now determined to keep a journal of
my passage, reckoning the days from
one to twenty-four hours continuously.
without taking into consideration the
intervals of darkness.
"At ten o'clock, feeling sleepy, I
determined to lie down for the rest of
the night; but here a difficulty presented
itself, which, obvious as it may appear.
had escaped my attention up to the
very moment of which I am now speak-
ing. If I went to sleep as I proposed.
how could the atmosphere in the cham-
ber be regenerated in the interim? To
breathe it for more than an hour, at
the farthest, would be a matter of im
possibility; or, if even this term could
be extended to an hour and a quarter
the most ruinous consequences might
ensue. The consideration of this di
lemma gave me no little disquietude:
and it will hardly be believed, that
after the dangers I had undergone,
should look upon this business in s
serious a light, as to give up all hop
of accomplishing my ultimate design
and finally make up my mind to the
necessity of a descent. But this hesi
tation was only momentary. I reflected
that man is the veriest slave of custom
and that many points in the routine o
his existence are deemed essentially im
portant, which are only so at all by hi
having rendered them habitual. It wa
very certain that I could not do with
out sleep; but I might easily bring my
self to feel no inconvenience from bein
awakened at intervals of an hour dur
ing the whole period of my repose. I
would require but five minutes at mos
to regenerate the atmosphere in the
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL 375
fullest manner-and the only real diffi-
culty was to contrive a method of
arousing myself at the proper moment
for so doing. But this was a question
which, I am willing to confess, occa-
sioned me no little trouble in its solu-
tion. To be sure, I had heard of the
student who, to prevent his falling
asleep over his books, held in one hand
a ball of copper, the din of whose
descent into a basin of the same metal
on the floor beside his chair, served
effectually to startle him up, if, at any
moment, he should be overcome with
drowsiness. My own case, however,
was very different indeed, and left me
no room for any similar idea; for I
did not wish to keep awake, but to be
aroused from slumber at regular inter-
vals of time. I at length hit upon the
following expedient, which, simple as
it may seem, was hailed by me, at the
moment of discovery, as an invention
fully equal to that of the telescope, the
steam-engine, or the art of printing
itself.
"It is necessary to premise, that the
balloon, at the elevation now attained,
continued its course upward with an
even and undeviating ascent, and the
car consequently followed with a steadi-
ness so perfect that it would have been
impossible to detect in it the slightest.
vacillation. This circumstance favored
me greatly in the project I now de-
termined to adopt. My supply of
water had been put on board in kegs
containing five gallons each, and ranged
very securely around the interior of the
car. I unfastened one of these, and
taking two ropes tied them tightly
across the rim of the wicker-work from
one side to the other; placing them
about a foot apart and parallel, so as
to form a kind of shelf, upon which I
placed the keg, and steadied it in a hori-
zontal position. About eight inches im-
mediately below these ropes, and four
feet from the bottom of the car I
fastened another shelf-but made of
thin plank, being the only similar piece
of wood I had. Upon this latter shelf,
and exactly beneath one of the rims of
the keg, a small earthen pitcher was
deposited. I now bored a hole in the
end of the keg over the pitcher, and
fitted in a plug of soft wood, cut in
a tapering or conical shape. This plug
I pushed in or pulled out, as might
happen, until, after a few experiments,
it arrived at that exact degree of tight-
ness, at which the water, oozing from
the hole, and falling into the pitcher
below, would fill the latter to the brim
in the period of sixty minutes. This,
of course, was a matter briefly and
easily ascertained, by noticing the pro-
portion of the pitcher filled in any given
time. Having arranged all this, the
rest of the plan is obvious. My bed
was so contrived upon the floor of the
car, as to bring my head, in lying down,
immediately below the mouth of the
pitcher. It was evident, that, at the
expiration of an hour, the pitcher, get-
ting full, would be forced to run over,
and to run over at the mouth, which
was somewhat lower than the rim. It
was also evident, that the water thus
falling from a height of more than four
feet, could not do otherwise than fall
upon my face, and that the sure con-
sequences would be, to waken me up
instantaneously, even from the soundest
slumber in the world.
"It was fully eleven by the time, I
had completed these arrangements, and
I immediately betook myself to bed,
376
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
with full confidence in the efficiency of
my invention. Nor in this matter was
I disappointed. Punctually every sixty
minutes was I aroused by my trusty
chronometer, when, having emptied the
pitcher into the bung-hole of the keg,
and performed the duties of the con-
denser, I retired again to bed. These
regular interruptions to my slumber
caused me even less discomfort than
I had anticipated; and when I finally
arose for the day, it was seven o'clock,
and the sun had attained many degrees
above the line of my horizon.
"April 3d. I found the balloon at an
immense height indeed, and the earth's
convexity had now become strikingly
manifest. Below me in the ocean lay
a cluster of black specks, which un-
doubtedly were islands. Overhead the
sky was of a jetty black, and the stars
were brilliantly visible; indeed they
had been so constantly since the first
day of ascent. Far away to the north-
ward I perceived a thin, white, and
exceedingly brilliant line, or streak, on
the edge of the horizon, and I had no
hesitation in supposing it to be the
southern disc of the ices of the Polar
Sea. My curiosity was greatly excited,
for I had hopes of passing on much
farther to the north, and might pos-
sibly, at some period, find myself placed
directly above the Pole itself. I now
lamented that my great elevation would,
in this case, prevent my taking as ac-
curate a survey as I could wish. Much,
however, might be ascertained.
"Nothing else of an extraordinary
nature occurred during the day. My
apparatus all continued in good order,
and the balloon still ascended without
any perceptible vacillation. The cold
was intense, and obliged me to wrap
up closely in an overcoat. When darl,
ness came over the earth, I betook my
self to bed, although it was for many
hours afterward broad daylight all
around my immediate situation. The
water-clock was punctual in its duty,
and I slept until next morning soundly,
with the exception of the periodical
interruption.
"April 4th. Arose in good health and
spirits, and was astonished at the singu
lar change which had taken place in the
appearance of the sea. It had lost, in
a great measure, the deep tint of blue
it had hitherto worn, being now of a
grayish-white, and of a lustre dazzling
to the eye. The convexity of the ocean
had become so evident, that the entire
mass of the distant water seemed to be
tumbling headlong over the abyss of
the horizon, and I found myself lis
tening on tiptoe for the echoes of the
mighty cataract. The islands were no
longer visible; whether they had passed
down the horizon to the southeast, or
whether my increasing elevation had
left them out of sight, it is impossible
to say. I was inclined, however, to the
latter opinion. The rim of ice to the
northward was growing more and more
apparent. Cold by no means so intense
Nothing of importance occurred, and 1
passed the day in reading, having taker
care to supply myself with books.
"April 5th. Beheld the singular phe
nomenon of the sun rising while nearly
the whole visible surface of the earth
continued to be involved in darkness.
In time, however, the light spread itself
over all, and I again saw the line of ict
to the northward. It was now very
distinct, and appeared of a much darker
hue than the waters of the ocean. 1
was evidently approaching it, and with
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
377
great rapidity. Fancied I could again
distinguish a strip of land to the east-
ward, and one also to the westward,
but could not be certain. Weather
moderate. Nothing of any consequence
happened during the day. Went early
to bed.
"April 6th. Was surprised at finding
the rim of ice at a very moderate dis-
tance, and an immense field of the same
material stretching away off to the hori-
zon in the north. It was evident that
if the balloon held its present course, it
would soon arrive above the Frozen
Ocean, and I had now little doubt of
ultimately seeing the Pole. During the
whole of the day I continued to near
the ice. Toward night the limits of
my horizon very suddenly and mate-
rially increased, owing undoubtedly to
the earth's form being that of an oblate
spheroid, and my arriving above the
flattened regions in the vicinity of the
Arctic circle. When darkness at length
overtook me, I went to bed in great
anxiety, fearing to pass over the object.
of so much curiosity when I should
have no opportunity of observing it.
"April 7th. Arose early, and, to my
great joy, at length beheld what there
could be no hesitation in supposing the
northern Pole itself. It was there, be-
yond a doubt, and immediately beneath.
my feet; but, alas! I had now ascended
to so vast a distance, that nothing
could with accuracy be discerned. In-
deed, to judge from the progression of
the numbers indicating my various alti-
tudes, respectively, at different periods,
between six a. m. on the second of
April, and twenty minutes before nine
2. m. of the same day (at which time
the barometer ran down), it might be
fairly inferred that the balloon had now,
at four o'clock in the morning of April
the seventh, reached a height of not
less, certainly, than 7,254 miles above
the surface of the sea. This elevation
may appear immense, but the estimate
upon which it is calculated gave a
result in all probability far inferior to
the truth. At all events I undoubtedly
beheld the whole of the earth's major
diameter; the entire northern hemi-
sphere lay beneath me like a chart
orthographically projected: and the
great circle of the equator itself formed
the boundary line of my horizon. Your
Excellencies, may, however, readily
imagine that the confined regions hith-
erto unexplored within the limits of the
Arctic circle, although situated directly
beneath me, and therefore seen with-
out any appearance of being foreshort-
ened, were still, in themselves, com-
paratively too diminutive, and at too
great a distance from the point of sight,
to admit of any very accurate examina-
tion. Nevertheless, what could be seen
was of a nature singular and exciting.
Northwardly from that huge rim before
mentioned, and which, with slight quali-
fication, may be called the limit of
human discovery in these regions, one
unbroken, or nearly unbroken, sheet of
ice continues to extend. In the first
few degrees of this its progress, its sur-
face is very sensibly flattened, farther
on depressed into a plane, and finally,
becoming not a little concave, it ter-
minates, at the Pole itself, in a circular
centre, sharply defined, whose apparent
diameter subtended at the balloon an
angle of about sixty-five seconds, and
whose dusky hue, varying in intensity,
was, at all times, darker than any other
spot upon the visible hemisphere, and
occasionally deepened into the most ab-
378
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
solute blackness. Farther than this,
little could be ascertained. By twelve
o'clock the circular centre had mate-
rially decreased in circumference, and
by seven p. m. I lost sight of it en-
tirely; the balloon passing over the
western limb of the ice, and floating
away rapidly in the direction of the
equator.
"April 8th. Found a sensible diminu-
tion in the earth's apparent diameter,
besides a material alteration in its gen-
eral color and appearance. The whole
visible area partook in different degrees
of a tint of pale yellow, and in some
portions had acquired a brilliancy even
painful to the eye. My view downward
was also considerably impeded by the
dense atmosphere in the vicinity of the
surface being loaded with clouds, be-
tween whose masses I could only now
and then obtain a glimpse of the earth
itself. This difficulty of direct vision
had troubled me more or less for the
last forty-eight hours; but my present
enormous elevation brought closer to-
gether, as it were, the floating bodies of
vapor, and the inconvenience became,
of course, more and more palpable in
proportion to my ascent. Nevertheless,
I could easily perceive that the balloon
now hovered above the range of great
lakes in the continent of North Amer-
ica, and was holding a course, due south,
which would soon bring me to the
tropics. This circumstance did not fail
to give me the most heartful satisfac-
tion, and I hailed it as a happy omen
of ultimate success. Indeed, the direc-
tion I had hitherto taken, had filled me
with uneasiness; for it was evident
that, had I continued it much longer,
there would have been no possibility
of my arriving at the moon at all, whose
orbit is inclined to the ecliptic at only
the small angle of 5° 8′ 48″. Strange
as it may seem, it was only at this late
period that I began to understand the
great error I had committed, in not
taking my departure from earth at
some point in the plane of the lunar
ellipse.
April 9th. To-day the earth's diam-
eter was greatly diminished, and the
color of the surface assumed hourly a
deeper tint of yellow. The balloon
kept steadily on her course to the south-
ward, and arrived, at nine p. m., over
the northern edge of the Mexican Gulf.
"April 10th. I was suddenly aroused
from slumber, about five o'clock this
morning, by a loud, crackling, and ter-
rific sound, for which I could in no
manner account. It was of very brief
duration, but, while it lasted, resembled
nothing in the world of which I had any
previous experience. It is needless to
say that I became excessively alarmed.
having, in the first instance, attributed
the noise to the bursting of the balloon.
I examined all my apparatus, however,
with great attention, and could discover
nothing out of order. Spent a great
part of the day in meditating upon an
occurrence so extraordinary, but could
find no means whatever of accounting
for it. Went to bed dissatisfied, and in
a state of great anxiety and agitation.
"April 11th. Found a startling dimi-
nution in the apparent diameter of the
earth, and a considerable increase, now
observable for the first time, in that
of the moon itself, which wanted only
a few days of being full. It now re-
quired long and excessive labor to con-
dense within the chamber sufficient at-
mospheric air for the sustenance of
life.
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
379
"April 12th. A singular alteration
took place in regard to the direction
of the balloon, and although fully an-
ticipated, afforded me the most un-
equivocal delight. Having reached, in
its former course, about the twentieth
parallel of southern latitude, it turned
off suddenly, at an acute angle, to the
eastward, and thus proceeded through-
out the day, keeping nearly, if not alto-
gether, in the exact plane of the lunar
ellipse. What was worthy of remark,
a very perceptible vacillation in the
car was a consequence of this change
of route-a vacillation which prevailed,
in a more or less degree, for a period of
many hours.
"April 13th. Was again very much
alarmed by a repetition of the loud,
crackling noise which terrified me on
the tenth. Thought long upon the sub-
ject, but was unable to form any satis-
factory conclusion. Great decrease in
the earth's apparent diameter, which
now subtended from the balloon an
angle of very little more than twenty-five
degrees. The moon could not be seen
at all, being nearly in my zenith. I still
continued in the plane of the ellipse, but
made little progress to the eastward.
"April 14th. Extremely rapid decrease
in the diameter of the earth. To-day
I became strongly impressed with the
idea, that the balloon was now actually
running up the line of apsides to the
point of perigee-in other words, hold-
ing the direct course which would bring
it immediately to the moon in that part
of its orbit the nearest to the earth.
The moon itself was directly overhead,
and consequently hidden from my view.
Great and long-continued labor neces-
sary for the condensation of the at-
mosphere.
"April 15th. Not even the outlines
of continents and seas could now be
traced upon the earth with distinctness.
About twelve o'clock I became aware,
for the third time, of that appalling
sound which had so astonished me be-
fore. It now, however, continued for
some moments, and gathered intensity
as it continued. At length, while, stupe-
fied and terror-stricken, I stood in ex-
pectation of I knew not what hideous
destruction, the car vibrated with ex-
cessive violence, and a gigantic and
flaming mass of some material which
I could not distinguish, came with a
voice of a thousand thunders, roaring
and booming by the balloon. When
my fears and astonishment had in some
degree subsided, I had little difficulty
in supposing it to be some mighty vol-
canic fragment ejected from that world
to which I was so rapidly approaching,
and, in all probability, one of that
singular class of substances occasionally
picked up on the earth, and termed
meteoric stones for want of a better
appellation.
"April 16th. To-day, looking upward
as well as I could, through each of the
side windows alternately, I beheld, to
my great delight, a very small portion
of the moon's disk protruding, as it
were, on all sides beyond the huge cir-
cumference of the balloon. My agita-
tion was extreme; for I had now little
doubt of soon reaching the end of my
perilous voyage. Indeed, the labor now
required by the condenser, had increased
to a most oppressive degree, and al-
lowed me scarcely any respite from
exertion. Sleep was a matter nearly
out of the question. I became quite
ill, and my frame trembled with ex-
haustion. It was impossible that hu
380
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
man nature could endure this state of
intense suffering much longer. During
the now brief interval of darkness
a meteoric stone again passed in my
vicinity, and the frequency of these
phenomena began to occasion me much
apprehension.
"April 17th. This morning proved an
epoch in my voyage. It will be remem-
bered that, on the thirteenth, the earth
subtended an angular breadth of twenty-
five degrees. On the fourteenth this
had greatly diminished; on the fifteenth
a still more remarkable decrease was
observable; and, on retiring on the
night of the sixteenth, I had noticed
an angle of no more than about seven
degrees and fifteen minutes. What,
therefore, must have been my amaze-
ment, on awakening from a brief and
disturbed slumber, on the morning of
this day, the seventeenth, at finding the
surface beneath me so suddenly and
wonderfully augmented in volume, as
to subtend no less than thirty-nine de-
grees in apparent angular diameter! I
was thunderstruck! No words can give
any adequate idea of the extreme, the
absolute horror and astonishment, with
which I was seized possessed, and al-
together overwhelmed. My knees tot-
tered beneath me-my teeth chattered
-my hair started up on end. "The
balloon, then, had actually burst!'
These were the first tumultuous ideas
that hurried through my mind: "The
balloon had positively burst!-I was
falling-falling with the most impetu-
ous, the most unparalleled velocity!
To judge by the immense distance al-
ready so quickly passed over, it could
not be more than ten minutes, at the
farthest, before I should reach the sur-
face of the earth, and be hurled into
annihilation!' But at length reflection
came to my relief. I paused; I con-
sidered; and I began to doubt. The
matter was impossible. I could not in
any reason have so rapidly come down.
Besides, although I was evidently ap
proaching the surface below me, it was
with a speed by no means commensurate
with the velocity I had at first con-
ceived. This consideration served to
calm the perturbation of my mind, and
I finally succeeded in regarding the
phenomenon in its proper point of view.
In fact, amazement must have fairly
deprived me of my senses, when I
could not see the vast difference, in
appearance, between the surface below
me, and the surface of my mother
earth. The latter was indeed over my
head, and completely hidden by the
balloon, while the moon-the moon
itself in all its glory-lay beneath me,
and at my feet.
"The stupor and surprise produced in
my mind by this extraordinary change
in the posture of affairs, was, perhaps,
after all, that part of the adventure
least susceptible of explanation. For
the bouleversement in itself was not
only natural and inevitable, but had
been long actually anticipated as a
circumstance to be expected when-
ever I should arrive at that exact
point of my voyage where the attrac-
tion of the planet should be superseded
by the attraction of the satellite-or,
more precisely, where the gravitation
of the balloon toward the earth should
be less powerful than its gravitation
toward the moon. To be sure I arose
from a sound slumber, with all my
senses in confusion, to the contempla-
tion of a very startling phenomenon,
and one which, although expected, was
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
381
not expected at the moment. The revo-
lution itself must, of course, have taken
place in an easy and gradual manner,
and it is by no means clear that, had I
even been awake at the time of the oc-
currence, I should have been made
aware of it by any internal evidence
of an inversion-that is to say, by any
inconvenience or disarrangement, either
about my person or about my apparatus.
"It is almost needless to say that,
upon coming to a due sense of my situa-
tion, and emerging from the terror
which had absorbed every faculty of
my soul, my attention was, in the first
place, wholly directed to the contem-
plation of the general physical appear-
ance of the moon. It lay beneath me
like a chart-and although I judged it
to be still at no inconsiderable distance,
the indentures of its surface were de-
fined to my vision with a most striking
and altogether unaccountable distinct-
ness. The entire absence of ocean or
sea, and indeed of any lake or river, or
body of water whatsoever, struck me,
at first glance, as the most extraordi-
nary feature in its geological condition.
Yet, strange to say, I beheld vast level
regions of a character decidedly alluvial,
although by far the greater portion of
the hemisphere in sight was covered
with innumerable volcanic mountains,
conical in shape, and having more the
appearance of artificial than of natural
protuberance. The highest among them
does not exceed three and three-quarter
miles in perpendicular elevation; but a
map of the volcanic districts of the
Campi Phlegræi would afford to your
Excellencies a better idea of their gen-
eral surface than any unworthy descrip-
tion I might think proper to attempt.
The greater part of them were in a
state of evident eruption, and gave me
fearfully to understand their fury and
their power, by the repeated thunders
of the miscalled meteoric stones, which
now rushed upward by the balloon
with a frequency more and more
appalling.
"April 18th. To-day I found an enor-
mous increase in the moon's apparent
bulk-and the evidently accelerated
velocity of my descent began to fill me
with alarm. It will be remembered,
that, in the earliest stage of my specu-
lations upon the possibility of a pas-
sage to the moon, the existence, in its
vicinity, of an atmosphere, dense in
proportion to the bulk of the planet,
had entered largely into my calcula-
tions; this too in spite of many theories
to the contrary, and, it may be added,
in spite of a general disbelief in the
existence of any lunar atmosphere at
all. But, in addition to what I have
already urged in regard to Encke's
comet and the zodiacal light, I had
been strengthened in my opinion by cer-
tain observations of Mr. Schroeter, of
Lilienthal. He observed the moon when
two days and a half old, in the eve-
ning soon after sunset, before the dark
part was visible, and continued to watch
it until it became visible. The two
cusps appeared tapering in a very sharp
faint prolongation, each exhibiting its
farthest extremity faintly illuminated
by the solar rays, before any part of
the dark hemisphere was visible. Soon
afterward, the whole dark limb be-
came illuminated. This prolongation of
the cusps beyond the semicircle, I
thought, must have arisen from the
refraction of the sun's rays by the
moon's atmosphere. I computed, also,
the height of the atmosphere (which
382
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
could refract light enough into its dark
hemisphere to produce a twilight more
luminous than the light reflected from
the earth when the moon is about 32°
from the new) to be 1,356 Paris feet;
in this view, I supposed the greatest
height capable of refracting the solar
ray, to be 5,376 feet. My ideas on this
topic had also received confirmation by
a passage in the eighty-second volume
of the Philosophical Transactions, in
which it is stated, that, at an occulta-
tion of Jupiter's satellites, the third dis-
appeared after having been about 1" or
2" of time indistinct, and the fourth
became indiscernible near the limb.*
*Hevelius writes that he has several
times found, in skies perfectly clear,
when even stars of the sixth and seventh
magnitude were conspicuous, that, at
the same altitude of the moon, at the
same elongation from the earth, and
with one and the same excellent tele-
scope, the moon and its maculæ did not
appear equally lucid at all times. From
the circumstances of the observation,
it is evident that the cause of this
phenomenon is not either in our air, in
the tube, in the moon, or in the eye of
the spectator, but must be looked for
in something (an atmosphere?) exist-
ing about the moon.
Cassini frequently observed Saturn,
Jupiter, and the fixed stars, when ap-
proaching the moon to occultation, to
have their circular figure changed into
an oval one; and, in other occultations,
he found no alteration of figure at all.
Hence it might be supposed, that at
some times, and not at others, there is
a dense matter encompassing the moon
wherein the rays of the stars are
refracted.-E. A. P.
"Upon the resistance or, more prop-
erly, upon the support of an atmos
phere, existing in the state of density
imagined, I had, of course, entirely de-
pended for the safety of my ultimate
descent. Should I then, after all,
prove to have been mistaken, I had in
consequence nothing better to expect,
as a finale to my adventure, than being
dashed into atoms against the rugged
surface of the satellite. And, indeed, I
had now every reason to be terrified.
My distance from the moon was com-
paratively trifling, while the labor re-
quired by the condenser was diminished
not at all, and I could discover no
indication whatever of a decreasing
rarity in the air.
"April 19th. This morning, to my
great joy, about nine o'clock, the sur-
face of the moon being frightfully near,
and my apprehensions excited to the
utmost, the pump of my condenser at
length gave evident tokens of an altera-
tion in the atmosphere. By ten, I had
reason to believe its density consider-
ably increased. By eleven, very little
labor was necessary at the apparatus;
and at twelve o'clock, with some hesi-
tation, I ventured to unscrew the tourni
quet, when, finding no inconvenience
from having done so, I finally threw
open the gum-elastic chamber, and un-
rigged it from around the car. As
might have been expected, spasms and
violent headache were the immediate
consequences of an experiment so pre-
cipitate and full of danger. But these
and other difficulties attending respira-
tion, as they were by no means so great
as to put me in peril of my life, I
determined to endure as I best could, in
consideration of my leaving them be-
hind me momently in my approach to
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL
383
This
the denser strata near the moon.
approach, however, was still impetuous.
in the extreme; and it soon became
alarmingly certain that, although I had
probably not been deceived in the ex-
pectation of an atmosphere dense in
proportion to the mass of the satellite,
still I had been wrong in supposing this
density, even at the surface, at all ade-
quate to the support of the great weight
contained in the car of my balloon.
Yet this should have been the case, and
in an equal degree as at the surface of
the earth, the actual gravity of bodies
at either planet supposed in the ratio
of the atmospheric condensation. That
it was not the case, however, my pre-
cipitous downfall gave testimony
enough; why it was not so, can only be
explained by a reference to those pos-
sible geological disturbances to which
I have formerly alluded. At all events
I was now close upon the planet, and
coming down with the most terrible
impetuosity. I lost not a moment, ac-
cordingly, in throwing overboard first
my ballast, then my water-kegs, then
my condensing apparatus and gum-elas-
tic chamber, and finally every article
within the car. But it was all to no
purpose. I still fell with horrible rap-
idity, and was now not more than half
a mile from the surface. As a last re-
source, therefore, having got rid of my
coat, hat, and boots, I cut loose from
the balloon the car itself, which was
of no inconsiderable weight, and thus,
clinging with both hands to the net-
work, I had barely time to observe that
the whole country, as far as the eye
could reach, was thickly interspersed
with diminutive habitations, ere I
tumbled headlong into the very heart
of a fantastical-looking city, and into
the middle of a vast crowd of ugly
little people, who none of them uttered
a single syllable, or gave themselves
the least trouble to render me assist-
ance, but stood, like a parcel of idiots,
grinning in a ludicrous manner, and
eyeing me and my balloon askant, with
their arms set a-kimbo. I turned from
them in contempt, and, gazing upward
at the earth so lately left, and left per-
haps for ever, beheld it like a huge,
dull, copper shield, about two degrees
in diameter, fixed immovably in the
heavens overhead, and tipped on one
of its edges with a crescent border of
the most brilliant gold. No traces of
land or water could be discovered, and
the whole was clouded with variable
spots, and belted with tropical and
equatorial zones.
"Thus, may it please your Excel-
lencies, after a series of great anxieties,
unheard-of dangers, and unparalleled es-
capes, I had, at length, on the nineteenth
day of my departure from Rotterdam,
arrived in safety at the conclusion of
a voyage undoubtedly the most extraor-
dinary, and the most momentous, ever
accomplished, undertaken, or conceived
by any denizen of earth. But my ad-
ventures yet remain to be related. And
indeed your Excellencies may well
imagine that, after a residence of five
years upon a planet not only deeply in-
teresting in its own peculiar character,
but rendered doubly so by its intimate
connection, in capacity of satellite, with
the world inhabited by man, I may have
intelligence for the private ear of the
State's College of Astronomers of far
more importance than the details, how-
ever wonderful, of the mere voyage
which so happily concluded. This is,
in fact, the case. I have much-very
384
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
much which it would give me the great-
est pleasure to communicate. I have
much to say of the climate of the
planet; of its wonderful alternations of
heat and cold; of unmitigated and burn-
ing sunshine for one fortnight, and more
than polar frigidity for the next; of a
constant transfer of moisture, by distil-
lation like that in vacuo, from the point
beneath the sun to the point the farth-
est from it; of a variable zone of
running water; of the people them-
selves; of their manners, customs, and
political institutions; of their peculiar
physical construction; of their ugliness;
of their want of ears, those useless ap-
pendages in an atmosphere so peculiarly
modified; of their consequent ignorance
of the use and properties of speech;
of their substitute for speech in a singu-
lar method of inter-communication; of
the incomprehensible connection be-
tween each particular individual in the
moon with some particular individual
on the earth-a connection analogous
with, and depending upon, that of the
orbs of the planet and the satellite, and
by means of which the lives and desti-
nies of the inhabitants of the one are
interwoven with the lives and destinies
of the inhabitants of the other; and
above all, if it so please your Excel-
lencies-above all, of those dark and
hideous mysteries which lie in the outer
regions of the moon-regions which,
owing to the almost miraculous accord-
ance of the satellite's rotation on its
own axis with its sidereal revolution
about the earth, have never yet been
turned, and, by God's mercy, never
shall be turned, to the scrutiny of the
telescopes of man. All this, and more
-much more-would I most willingly
detail. But, to be brief, I must have
my reward. I am pining for a return
to my family and to my home; and
as the price of any farther communica-
tion on my part-in consideration of
the light which I have it in my power
to throw upon many very important
branches of physical and metaphysical
science-I must solicit, through the in-
fluence of your honorable body, a par-
don for the crime of which I have been
guilty in the death of the creditors upon
my departure from Rotterdam. This,
then, is the object of the present paper.
Its bearer, an inhabitant of the moon,
whom I have prevailed upon, and prop-
erly instructed, to be my messenger
to the earth, will await your Excellen-
cies' pleasure, and return to me with
the pardon in question, if it can, in
any manner, be obtained.
"I have the honor to be, etc., your
Excellencies' very humble servant,
"HANS PFAALL."
Upon finishing the perusal of this
very extraordinary document, Professor
Rubadub, it is said, dropped his pipe
upon the ground in the extremity of
his surprise, and Mynheer Superbus
Von Underduk having taken off his
spectacles, wiped them, and deposited
them in his pocket, so far forgot both
himself and his dignity, as to turn
round three times upon his heel in the
quintessence of astonishment and ad-
miration. There was no doubt about
the matter-the pardon should be ob-
tained. So at least swore, with a
round oath, Professor Rubadub, and so
finally thought the illustrious Von Un-
derduk, as he took the arm of his
brother in science, and without saying
a word, began to make the best of his
way home to deliberate upon the
THE UNPARALLELED ADVENTURES OF ONE HANS PFAALL 385
measures to be adopted. Having
reached the door, however, of the
burgomaster's dwelling, the professor
ventured to suggest that as the mes-
senger had thought proper to disappear
-no doubt frightened to death by the
savage appearance of the burghers of
Rotterdam-the pardon would be of
little use, as no one but a man of the
moon would undertake a voyage to so
vast a distance. To the truth of this
observation the burgomaster assented,
and the matter was therefore at an
end. Not so, however, rumors and
speculations. The letter, having been
published, gave rise to a variety of
gossip and opinion. Some of the over-
wise even made themselves ridiculous
by decrying the whole business as noth-
ing better than a hoax. But hoax, with
these sort of people, is, I believe, a
general term for all matters above their
comprehension. For my part, I cannot
conceive upon what data they have
founded such an accusation.
see what they say:
Let us
Imprimis. That certain wags in
Rotterdam have certain especial antip-
athies to certain burgomasters and
astronomers.
Secondly. That an odd little dwarf
and bottle conjurer, both of whose
ears, for some misdemeanor, have been
cut off close to his head, has been miss-
ing for several days from the neighbor-
ing city of Bruges.
Thirdly. That the newspapers which
were stuck all over the little balloon
were newspapers of Holland, and there-
fore could not have been made in the
moon. They were dirty papers-very
dirty and Gluck, the printer, would
take his Bible oath to their having been
Drinted in Rotterdam.
Fourthly. That Hans Pfaall him-
self, the drunken villain, and the three
very idle gentlemen styled his creditors,
were all seen, no longer than two or
three days ago, in a tippling house in
the suburbs, having just returned, with
money in their pockets from a trip be-
yond the sea.
Lastly. That it is an opinion very
generally received, or which ought to
be generally received, that the College
of Astronomers in the city of Rotter-
dam, as well as all other colleges in all
other parts of the world,-not to men-
tion colleges and astronomers in gen-
eral, are, to say the least of the
matter, not a whit better, nor greater,
nor wiser than they ought to be.*
*There have been other "voyages to
the moon," but none of higher merit
than the "Moon-Story" of R. A. Locke.
That of Bergerac is utterly meaning-
less. In the third volume of the
American Quarterly Review will be
found an elaborate criticism upon a
certain "Journey" of the kind in ques-
tion: a criticism in which it is diffi
cult to say whether the critic most
exposes the stupidity of the book, or
his own absurd ignorance of astronomy.
I forget the title of the work; but the
means of the voyage are more deplor-
ably ill conceived than are even the
ganzas of our friend the Signor Gon-
zales. The adventurer, in digging the
earth, happens to discover a peculiar
metal for which the moon has a strong
attraction, and straightway constructs
of it a box, which, when cast loose
from its terrestrial fastenings, flies with
him, forthwith, to the satellite. The
"Flight of Thomas O'Rourke," is a jeu
d'esprit not altogether contemptible,
386
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
and has been translated into German.
Thomas, the hero, was, in fact, the
game-keeper of an Irish peer, whose
eccentricities gave rise to the tale. The
"flight" is made on an eagle's back,
from Hungry Hill, a lofty mountain at
the end of Bantry Bay.
In these various brochures the aim
is always satirical; the theme being a
description of Lunarian customs as
compared with ours. In none is there
any effort at plausibility in the details
of the voyage itself. The writers seem,
in each instance, to be utterly unin-
formed in respect to astronomy. In
"Hans Pfaall" the design is original,
inasmuch as regards an attempt at
verisimilitude, in the application of
scientific principles (so far as the
whimsical nature of the subject would
permit), to the actual passage between
the earth and the moon.-E. A. P.
The Balloon-Hoax
(Astounding News by Express, via Norfolk!-The Atlantic Crossed in Three
Days! Signal Triumph of Mr. Monck Mason's Flying Machine!-Arrival at
Sullivan's Island, near Charleston, S. C., of Mr. Mason, Mr. Robert Holland,
Mr. Henson, Mr. Harrison Ainsworth, and four others, in the Steering
Balloon, "Victoria," after a Passage of Seventy-five Hours from Land to
Land! Full Particulars of the Voyage!
The subjoined jeu d'esprit with the preceding heading in magnificent capitals, well
interspersed with notes of admiration, was, originally published, as matter of
fact, in the New York Sun, a daily newspaper, and therein fully subserved
the purpose of creating indigestible aliment for the quidnuncs during the few
hours intervening between a couple of the Charleston mails. The rush for the
"sole paper which had the news" was something beyond even the prodigious;
and, in fact, if (as some assert) the "Victoria" did not absolutely accomplish
the voyage recorded, it will be difficult to assign a reason why she should not
have accomplished it.-E. A. P.)
THE great problem is at length
solved! The air, as well as the earth
and the ocean, has been subdued by
science, and will become a common and
convenient highway for mankind. The
Atlantic has been actually crossed in a
Balloon! and this too without difficulty
-without any great apparent danger-
with thorough control of the machine—
and in the inconceivably brief period of
seventy-five hours from shore to shore!
By the energy of an agent at Charles-
ton, S. C., we are enabled to be the
first to furnish the public with a de-
tailed account of this most extraordi-
nary voyage, which was performed be-
tween Saturday, the 6th instant, at 11
A. M. and 2 P. M., on Tuesday, the 9th
instant, by Sir Everard Bringhurst;
Mr. Osborne, a nephew of Lord Ben-
tinck's; Mr. Monck Mason and Mr.
Robert Holland, the well-known aero-
nauts; Mr. Harrison Ainsworth, author
of "Jack Sheppard," etc.; and Mr.
THE BALLOON-HOAX
387
Henson, the projector of the late un-
successful flying machine-with two
seamen from Woolwich-in all, eight
persons. The particulars furnished be-
low may be relied on as authentic and
accurate in every respect, as, with a
slight exception, they are copied ver-
batim from the joint diaries of Mr.
Monck Mason and Mr. Harrison Ains-
worth, to whose politeness our agent is
also indebted for much verbal informa-
tion respecting the balloon itself, its
construction, and other matters of in-
terest. The only alteration in the MS.
received, has been made for the pur-
pose of throwing the hurried account
of our agent, Mr. Forsyth, into a con-
hected and intelligible form.
THE BALLOON
"Two very decided failures, of late,
-those of Mr. Henson and Sir George
Cayley, had much weakened the pub-
lic interest in the subject of aerial
navigation. Mr. Henson's scheme
(which at first was considered very
feasible even by men of science) was
founded upon the principle of an in-
clined plane, started from an eminence
by an extrinsic force, applied and con-
tinued by the revolution of impinging
vanes, in form and number resembling
the vanes of a windmill. But, in all the
experiments made with models at the
Adelaide Gallery, it was found that
the operation of these fans not only
did not propel the machine, but actu-
ally impeded its flight. The only pro-
pelling force it ever exhibited, was the
mere impetus acquired from the de-
scent of the inclined plane; and this
impetus carried the machine farther
when the vanes were at rest, than when
they were in motion-a fact which
sufficiently demonstrates their inutility;
and in the absence of the propelling,
which was also the sustaining, power,
the whole fabric would necessarily
descend. This consideration led Sir
George Cayley to think only of adapt-
ing a propeller to some machine having
of itself an independent power of sup-
port-in a word, to a balloon; the idea,
however, being novel, or original, with
Sir George, only so far as regards the
mode of its application to practice. He
exhibited a model of his invention at
the Polytechnic Institution. The pro-
pelling principle, or power, was here,
also, applied to interrupted surfaces, or
vanes, put in revolution. These vanes
were four in number, but were found
entirely ineffectual in moving the bal-
loon, or in aiding its ascending power.
The whole project was thus a complete
failure.
"It was at this juncture that Mr.
Monck Mason (whose voyage from
Dover to Weilburg in the balloon 'Nas-
sau' occasioned so much excitement in
1837) conceived the idea of employing
the principle of the Archimedean screw
for the purpose of propulsion through
the air rightly attributing the failure
of Mr. Henson's scheme, and of Sir
George Cayley's to the interruption of
surface in the independent vanes. He
made the first public experiment at
Willis's Rooms, but afterward removed
his model to the Adelaide Gallery.
"Like Sir George Cayley's balloon,
his own was an ellipsoid. Its length
was thirteen feet six inches-height,
six feet eight inches. It contained
about three hundred and twenty cubic
feet of gas, which, if pure hydrogen,
would support twenty-one pounds upon
388
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
its first inflation, before the gas has
time to deteriorate or escape. The
weight of the whole machine and appa-
ratus was seventeen pounds-leaving
about four pounds to spare. Beneath
the centre of the balloon, was a frame
of light wood, about nine feet long, and
rigged on to the balloon itself with a
network in the customary manner.
From this framework was suspended
a wicker basket or car.
"The screw consists of an axis of
hollow brass tube, eighteen inches in
length, through which, upon a semi-
spiral inclined at fifteen degrees, pass a
series of steel-wire radii, two feet long,
and thus projecting a foot on either
side. These radii are connected at the
outer extremities by two bands of flat-
tened wire the whole in this manner
forming the framework of the screw,
which is completed by a covering of
oiled silk cut into gores, and tightened
so as to present a tolerably uniform
surface. At each end of its axis this
screw is supported by pillars of hollow
brass tube descending from the hoop.
In the lower ends of these tubes are
holes in which the pivots of the axis
revolve. From the end of the axis
which is next the car, proceeds a shaft
of steel, connecting the screw with the
pinion of a piece of spring machinery
fixed in the car. By the operation of
this spring, the screw is made to re-
volve with great rapidity, communi-
cating a progressive motion to the
whole. By means of the rudder, the
machine was readily turned in any di-
rection. The spring was of great power,
compared with its dimensions, being
capable of raising forty-five pounds
upon a barrel of four inches diameter,
after the first turn, and gradually in-
creasing as it was wound up. It
weighed, altogether, eight pounds six
ounces. The rudder was a light frame
of cane covered with silk, shaped some-
what like a battledoor, and was about
three feet long, and at the widest, one
foot. Its weight was about two ounces.
It could be turned flat, and directed
upward or downward, as well as to the
right or left; and thus enabled the aero-
naut to transfer the resistance of the
air which in an inclined position it
must generate in its passage, to any
side upon which he might desire to act;
thus determining the balloon in the
opposite direction.
"This model (which, through want
of time, we have necessarily described
in an imperfect manner) was put in
action at the Adelaide Gallery, where
it accomplished a velocity of five miles
per hour; although, strange to say, it
excited very little interest in compari-
son with the previous complex machine
of Mr. Henson-so resolute is the
world to despise anything which carries
with it an air of simplicity. To accom-
plish the great desideratum of aerial
navigation, it was very generally sup-
posed that some exceedingly compli-
cated application must be made of
some unusually profound principle in
dynamics.
"So well satisfied, however, was Mr.
Mason of the ultimate success of his
invention, that he determined to con-
struct immediately, if possible, a bal-
loon of sufficient capacity to test the
question by a voyage of some extent-
the original design being to cross the
British Channel, as before, in the Nas-
sau balloon. To carry out his views,
he solicited and obtained the patronage
of Sir Everard Bringhurst and Mr.
THE BALLOON-HOAX
389
Osborne, two gentlemen well known
for scientific acquirement, and espe-
cially for the interest they have ex-
hibited in the progress of aerostation.
The project, at the desire of Mr. Os-
borne, was kept a profound secret from
the public-the only persons entrusted
with the design being those actually
engaged in the construction of the
machine, which was built (under the
superintendence of Mr. Mason, Mr.
Holland, Sir Everard Bringhurst, and
Mr. Osborne) at the seat of the latter
gentleman near Penstruthal, in Wales.
Mr. Henson, accompanied by his friend
Mr. Ainsworth, was admitted to a pri-
vate view of the balloon, on Saturday
last-when the two gentlemen made
final arrangements to be included in the
adventure. We are not informed for
what reason the two seamen were also
included in the party-but, in the
course of a day or two, we shall put
our readers in possession of the
minutest particulars respecting this
extraordinary voyage.
"The balloon is composed of silk,
varnished with the liquid gum caout-
chouc. It is of vast dimensions, con-
taining more than 40,000 cubic feet of
gas; but as coal-gas was employed in
place of the more expensive and incon-
venient hydrogen, the supporting power
of the machine, when fully inflated, and
immediately after inflation, is not more
than about 2500 pounds. The coal-gas
is not only much less costly, but is
easily procured and managed.
"For its introduction into common
use for purposes of aerostation, we are
indebted to Mr. Charles Green. Up
to his discovery, the process of infla-
tion was not only exceedingly expen-
sive, but uncertain. Two and even
three days have frequently been wasted
in futile attempts to procure a suffi-
ciency of hydrogen to fill a balloon,
from which it had great tendency to
escape, owing to its extreme subtlety,
and its affinity for the surrounding at-
mosphere. In a balloon sufficiently per-
fect to retain its contents of coal-gas
unaltered, in quantity or amount, for
six months, an equal quantity of hydro-
gen could not be maintained in equal
purity for six weeks.
"The supporting power being esti-
mated at 2500 pounds, and the united
weights of the party amounting only
to about 1200, there was left a surplus
of 1300, of which again 1200 was ex-
hausted by ballast, arranged in bags of
different sizes, with their respective
weights marked upon them-by cord-
age, barometers, telescopes, barrels
containing provision for a fortnight,
water-casks, cloaks, carpet-bags, and
various other indispensable matters,
including a coffee-warmer, contrived
for warming coffee by means of slack-
lime, so as to dispense altogether with
fire, if it should be judged prudent to
do so. All these articles, with the ex-
ception of the ballast, and a few trifles,
were suspended from the hoop over-
head. The car is much smaller and
lighter, in proportion, than the one ap-
pended to the model. It is formed of
a light wicker, and is wonderfully
strong, for so frail-looking a machine.
Its rim is about four feet deep. The
rudder is also very much larger, in pro-
portion, than that of the model; and
the screw is considerably smaller. The
balloon is furnished besides with a
grapnel, and a guide-rope; which latter
is of the most indispensable impor-
tance. A few words, in explanation,
390
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
will here be necessary for such of our
readers as are not conversant with the
details of aerostation.
"As soon as the balloon quits the
earth, it is subjected to the influence
of many circumstances tending to cre-
ate a difference in its weight; augment-
ing or diminishing its ascending power.
For example, there may be a deposition
of dew upon the silk, to the extent,
even, of several hundred pounds; bal-
last has then to be thrown out, or the
machine may descend. This ballast
being discarded, and a clear sunshine
evaporating the dew, and at the same
time expanding the gas in the silk, the
whole will again rapidly ascend. To
check this ascent, the only recourse is
(or rather was, until Mr. Green's in-
vention of the guide-rope) the permis-
sion of the escape of gas from the
valve; but, in the loss of gas, is a
proportionate general loss of ascending
power; so that, in a comparatively
brief period, the best-constructed bal-
loon must necessarily exhaust all its
resources, and come to the earth. This
was the great obstacle to voyages of
length.
"The guide-rope remedies the diffi-
culty in the simplest manner conceiv-
able. It is merely a very long rope
which is suffered to trail from the car,
and the effect of which is to prevent
the balloon from changing its level in
any material degree. If, for example,
there should be a deposition of mois-
ture upon the silk, and the machine
'begins to descend in consequence, there
will be no necessity for discharging bal-
last to remedy the increase of weight,
for it is remedied, or counteracted, in
an exactly just proportion, by the de-
posit on the ground of just so much of
the end of the rope as is necessary.
If, on the other hand, any circum-
stances should cause undue levity, and
consequent ascent, this levity is imme-
diately counteracted by the additional
weight of rope upraised from the earth.
Thus, the balloon can neither ascend
nor descend, except within very narrow
limits, and its resources, either in gas
or ballast, remain comparatively unim-
paired. When passing over an expanse
of water, it becomes necessary to em-
ploy small kegs of copper or wood,
filled with liquid ballast of a lighter
nature than water. These float, and
serve all the purposes of a mere rope
on land. Another most important office
of the guide-rope, is to point out the
direction of the balloon. The rope
drags, either on land or sea, while the
balloon is free; the latter, consequently,
is always in advance, when any prog-
ress whatever is made: a comparison,
therefore, by means of the compass, of
the relative positions of the two ob-
jects, will always indicate the course.
In the same way, the angle formed by
the rope with the vertical axis of the
machine, indicates the velocity. When
there is no angle-in other words, when
the rope hangs perpendicularly, the
whole apparatus is stationary; but the
larger the angle, that is to say, the
farther the balloon precedes the end
of the rope, the greater the velocity;
and the converse.
"As the original design was to cross
the British Channel, and alight as near
Paris as possible, the voyagers had
taken the precaution to prepare them-
selves with passports directed to all
parts of the Continent, specifying the
nature of the expedition, as in the case
of the 'Nassau' voyage, and entitling
THE BALLOON-HOAX
391
the adventurers to exemption from the
usual formalities of office; unexpected
events, however, rendered these pass-
ports superfluous.
"The inflation was commenced very
quietly at day-break, on Saturday
morning, the 6th instant, in the court-
yard of Wheal-Vor House, Mr. Os-
borne's seat, about a mile from Pen-
struthal, in North Wales; and at seven
minutes past eleven, everything being
ready for departure, the balloon was set
free, rising gently but steadily, in a
direction nearly south; no use being
made, for the first half hour, of either
the screw or the rudder. We proceed
now with the journal, as transcribed by
Mr. Forsyth from the joint MSS. of
Mr. Monck Mason and Mr. Ainsworth.
The body of the journal, as given, is
in the handwriting of Mr. Mason, and
a P. S. is appended, each day, by Mr.
Ainsworth, who has in preparation, and
will shortly give the public a more
minute and, no doubt, a thrillingly in-
teresting account of the voyage.
The
and more in the sun's rays, our ascent
became very rapid. I did not wish,
however, to lose gas at so early a
period of the adventure, and so con-
cluded to ascend for the present. We
soon ran out our guide-rope; but even
when we had raised it clear of the
earth, we still went up very rapidly.
The balloon was unusually steady, and
looked beautifully. In about ten min-
utes after starting, the barometer indi-
cated an altitude of 15,000 feet.
weather was remarkably fine, and the
view of the subjacent country-a most
romantic one when seen from any point
-was now especially sublime. The
numerous deep gorges presented the
appearance of lakes, on account of the
dense vapors with which they were
filled, and the pinnacles and crags to
the east, piled in inextricable confu-
sion, resembling nothing so much as
the giant cities of Eastern fable. We
were rapidly approaching the moun-
tains in the south, but our elevation
was more than sufficient to enable us to
pass them in safety. In a few minutes
we soared over them in fine style; and
Mr. Ainsworth, with the seamen, was
"Saturday, April the 6th.-Every surprised at their apparent want of
preparation likely to embarrass us hav- altitude when viewed from the car, the
ing been made overnight, we com- tendency of great elevation in a balloon
menced the inflation this morning at being to reduce inequalities of the sur-
daybreak; but owing to a thick fog, face below, to nearly a dead level. At
which encumbered the folds of the silk half-past eleven still proceeding nearly
and rendered it unmanageable, we did south, we obtained our first view of the
not get through before nearly eleven Bristol Channel; and, in fifteen minutes
o'clock. Cut loose, then, in high spirits, afterward, the line of breakers on the
and rose gently but steadily, with a coast appeared immediately beneath us,
light breeze at north, which bore us in and we were fairly out at sea. We
the direction of the British Channel. now resolved to let off enough gas to
Found the ascending force greater than bring our guide-rope, with the buoys
we had expected; and as we arose affixed, into the water. This was im-
higher and so got clear of the cliffs, mediately done, and we commenced a
THE JOURNAL
392
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
gradual descent. In about twenty min-
utes our first buoy dipped, and at the
touch of the second soon afterward, we
remained stationary as to elevation.
We were all now anxious to test the
efficiency of the rudder and screw, and
we put them both into requisition
forthwith, for the purpose of altering
our direction more to the eastward,
and in a line for Paris. By means of
the rudder we instantly effected the
necessary change of direction, and our
course was brought nearly at right
angles to that of the wind; when we
set in motion the spring of the screw,
and were rejoiced to find it propel us
readily as desired. Upon this we gave
nine hearty cheers, and dropped in the
sea a bottle, inclosing a slip of parch-
ment with a brief account of the prin-
ciple of the invention. Hardly, how-
ever, had we done with our rejoicings,
when an unforeseen accident occurred
which discouraged us in no little de-
gree.
The steel rod connecting the
spring with the propeller was suddenly
jerked out of place, at the car end,
(by a swaying of the car through some
movement of one of the two seamen
we had taken up,) and in an instant
hung dangling out of reach, from the
pivot of the axis of the screw. While
we were endeavoring to regain it, our
attention being completely absorbed,
we became involved in a strong current
of wind from the east, which bore us,
with rapidly increasing force, toward
the Atlantic. We soon found ourselves
driving out to sea at the rate of not
less, certainly, than fifty or sixty miles
an hour, so that we came up with Cape
Clear, at some forty miles to our north,
before we had secured the rod, and had
time to think what we were about. It
was now that Mr. Ainsworth made an
extraordinary but, to my fancy, a by
no means unreasonable or chimerical
proposition, in which he was instantly
seconded by Mr. Holland-viz.: that
we should take advantage of the strong
gale which bore us on, and in place of
beating back to Paris, make an attempt
to reach the coast of North America.
After slight reflection, I gave a willing
assent to this bold proposition, which
(strange to say) met with objection
from the two seamen only. As the
stronger party, however, we overruled
their fears, and kept resolutely upon
our course. We steered due west; but
as the trailing of the buoys materially
impeded our progress, and we had the
balloon abundantly at command, either
for ascent or descent, we first threw
out fifty pounds of ballast, and then
wound up (by means of a windlass) so
much of the rope as brought it quite
clear of the sea. We perceived the
effect of this manœuvre immediately,
in a vastly increased rate of progress;
and, as the gale freshened, we flew with
a velocity nearly inconceivable; the
guide-rope flying out behind the car,
like a streamer from a vessel. It is
needless to say that a very short time
sufficed us to lose sight of the coast.
We passed over innumerable vessels of
all kinds, a few of which were en-
deavoring to beat up, but the most of
them lying to. We occasioned the
greatest excitement on board all-an
excitement greatly relished by our-
selves, and especially by our two men,
who, now under the influence of a dram
of Geneva, seemed resolved to give all
scruple, or fear, to the wind. Many of
the vessels fired signal guns; and in
all we were saluted with loud cheers
THE BALLOON-HOAX
393
(which we heard with surprising dis-
tinctness) and the waving of caps and
handkerchiefs.
We kept on in this
manner throughout the day with no
material incident, and, as the shades
of night closed around us, we made
a rough estimate of the distance trav-
ersed. It could not have been less than
five hundred miles, and was probably
much more. The propeller was kept
in constant operation, and, no doubt,
aided our progress materially. As the
sun went down, the gale freshened into
an absolute hurricane, and the ocean
beneath was clearly visible on account
of its phosphorescence. The wind was
from the east all night, and gave us
the brightest omen of success. We
suffered no little from cold, and the
dampness of the atmosphere was most
unpleasant; but the ample space in the
car enabled us to lie down, and by
means of cloaks and a few blankets we
did sufficiently well.
The
"P. S. [by Mr. Ainsworth.]
last nine hours have been unquestion-
ably the most exciting of my life. I
can conceive nothing more sublimating
than the strange peril and novelty of
an adventure such as this. May God
grant that we succeed! I ask not suc-
cess for mere safety to my insignifi-
cant person, but for the sake of human
knowledge and-for the vastness of the
triumph. And yet the feat is only so
evidently feasible that the sole wonder
is why men have scrupled to attempt
it before. One single gale such as now
befriends us-let such a tempest whirl
forward a balloon for four or five days
(these gales often last longer) and the
voyager will be easily borne, in that
period, from coast to coast. In view
of such a gale the broad Atlantic be-
comes a mere lake. I am more struck,
just now, with the supreme silence
which reigns in the sea beneath us,
notwithstanding its agitation, than with
any other phenomenon presenting itself.
The waters give up no voice to the
heavens. The immense flaming ocean
writhes and is tortured uncomplain-
ingly. The mountainous surges suggest
the idea of innumerable dumb gigantic
fiends struggling in impotent agony. In
a night such as is this to me, a man
lives-lives a whole century of ordi
nary life nor would I forego this
rapturous delight for that of a whole
century of ordinary existence.
"Sunday, the 7th. [Mr. Mason's
MS.] This morning the gale, by ten,
had subsided to an eight- or nine-knot
breeze (for a vessel at sea), and bears
us, perhaps, thirty miles per hour, or
more. It has veered, however, very
considerably to the north; and now, at
sundown, we are holding our course
due west, principally by the screw and
rudder, which answer their purposes to
admiration. I regard the project as
thoroughly successful, and the easy
navigation of the air in any direction
(not exactly in the teeth of a gale) as
no longer problematical. We could not
have made head against the strong
wind of yesterday; but, by ascending,
we might have got out of its influence,
if requisite. Against a pretty stiff
breeze, I feel convinced, we can make
our way with the propeller. At noon,
to-day, ascended to an elevation of
nearly 25,000 feet, by discharging bal-
last. Did this to search for a more
direct current, but found none so fa-
vorable as the one we are now in.
We have an abundance of gas to take
us across this small pond, even should
394
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
the voyage last three weeks. I have
not the slightest fear for the result.
The difficulty has been strangely exag-
gerated and misapprehended. I can
choose my current, and should I find
all currents against me, I can make
very tolerable headway with the pro-
peller. We have had no incidents
worth recording. The night promises
fair.
"P. S. [By Mr. Ainsworth.] I have
little to record, except the fact (to
me quite a surprising one) that, at an
elevation equal to that of Cotopaxi, I
experienced neither very intense cold,
nor headache, nor difficulty of breath-
ing; neither, I find, did Mr. Mason,
nor Mr. Holland, nor Sir Everard. Mr.
Osborne complained of constriction of
the chest-but this soon wore off. We
have flown at a great rate during the
day, and we must be more than half
way across the Atlantic. We have
passed over some twenty or thirty ves-
sels of various kinds, and all seem to
be delightfully astonished. Crossing
the ocean in a balloon is not so diffi-
cult a feat after all. Omne ignotum
pro magnifico. Mem.: at 25,000 feet
elevation the sky appears nearly black,
and the stars are distinctly visible;
while the sea does not seem convex (as
one might suppose) but absolutely and
most unequivocally concave.*
*"Mr. Ainsworth has not attempted
to account for this phenomenon, which,
however, is quite susceptible of expla-
nation. A line dropped from an eleva-
tion of 25,000 feet, perpendicularly to
the surface of the earth (or sea), would
form the perpendicular of a right-
angled triangle, of which the base
would extend from the right angle to
"Monday, the 8th.
[Mr. Mason's
MS.] This morning we had again
some little trouble with the rod of the
propeller, which must be entirely re-
modelled, for fear of serious accident-
I mean the steel rod, not the vanes.
The latter could not be improved. The
wind has been blowing steadily and
strongly from the northeast all day;
and so far fortune seems bent upon
favoring us. Just before day, we were
all somewhat alarmed at some odd
noises and concussions in the balloon,
accompanied with the apparent rapid
subsidence of the whole machine.
These phenomena were occasioned by
the expansion of the gas, througn in-
crease of heat in the atmosphere, and
the consequent disruption of the minute
particles of ice with which the network
the horizon, and the hypothenuse from
the horizon to the balloon. But the
25,000 feet of altitude is little or noth-
ing, in comparison with the extent of
the prospect. In other words, the base
and hypothenuse of the supposed tri-
angle would be so long, when compared
with the perpendicular, that the two
former may be regarded as nearly
parallel. In this manner the horizon
of the aeronaut would appear to be
on a level with the car. But, as the
point immediately beneath him seems,
and is, at a great distance below him,
it seems, of course, also, at a great
distance below the horizon. Hence the
impression of concavity; and this im-
pression must remain, until the eleva-
tion shall bear so great a proportion to
the extent of prospect, that the appar-
ent parallelism of the base and by-
pothenuse disappears-when the earth's
real convexity must become apparent.
THE BALLOON-HOAX
395
had become encrusted during the night.
Threw down several bottles to the ves-
sels below. See one of them picked
up by a large ship seemingly one of
the New York line packets. Endeav-
ored to make out her name, but could
not be sure of it. Mr. Osborne's tele-
scope made it out something like 'Ata-
lanta.' It is now twelve at night, and
we are still going nearly west, at a
rapid pace. The sea is peculiarly
phosphorescent.
"P. S. [By Mr. Ainsworth.] It is
now two A. M., and nearly calm, as
well as I can judge-but it is very
difficult to determine this point, since
we move with the air so completely.
I have not slept since quitting Wheal-
Vor, but can stand it no longer, and
must take a nap. We cannot be far
- from the American coast.
"Tuesday, the 9th. [Mr. Ains-
worth's MS.] One, P. M. We are in
full view of the low coast of South
Carolina. The great problem is accom-
plished. We have crossed the Atlantic
-fairly and easily crossed it in a bal-
loon! God be praised! Who shall say
that anything is impossible hereafter?"
The Journal here ceases. Some par-
ticulars of the descent were communi-
cated, however, by Mr. Ainsworth to
Mr. Forsyth. It was nearly dead calm
when the voyagers first came in view
of the coast, which was immediately
recognized by both the seamen, and by
Mr. Osborne. The latter gentleman
having acquaintances at Fort Moultrie,
it was immediately resolved to descend
in its vicinity. The balloon was brought
over the beach (the tide being out and
the sand hard, smooth, and admirably
adapted for a descent), and the grap-
nel let go, which took firm hold at
once. The inhabitants of the island,
and of the fort, thronged out, of
course, to see the balloon; but it was
with the greatest difficulty that any one
could be made to credit the actual
voyage-the crossing of the Atlantic.
The grapnel caught at two P. M. pre-
cisely; and thus the whole voyage was
completed in seventy-five hours; or
rather less, counting from shore to
shore. No serious accident occurred.
No real danger was at any time appre-
hended. The balloon was exhausted
and secured without trouble; and when
the MS. from which this narrative is
compiled was despatched from Charles-
ton, the party were still at Fort Moul-
trie. Their further intentions were not
ascertained; but we can safely promise
our readers some additional informa-
tion either on Monday or in the course
of the next day, at furthest.
This is unquestionably the most
stupendous, the most interesting, and
the most important undertaking ever
accomplished or even attempted by
man. What magnificent events may
ensue, it would be useless now to think
of determining.
Mellonta Tauta
(This tale was published in Godey's Lady's Book. Mellonta Tauta are two Greek
words meaning "Things of the Future." The idea is a great favorite of
Poe.-Ed.)
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 dis-
tinctly that I am going to punish you
for all your impertinences by being as
tedious, as discursive, as incoherent,
and as unsatisfactory as possible. Be-
sides, 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 one's 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 move-
ment, 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 ne
objects about us by which to estimate
our velocity, and on account of our
going with the wind. To be sure, when.
ever 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 suspend-
ing 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 hun-
dred 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-a kind of
fruit resembling a watermelon—and,
when sufficiently fat, was crushed in
a mill.
The paste thus arising was
396
MELLONTA TAUTA
397
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! Bal-
loons were also very generally con-
structed 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 botan-
ically 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 guttapercha 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 mag-
netic propellers that swarm in ocean
below us-a boat of about six thousand
tons, and, from all accounts, shame-
fully crowded. These diminutive
barques should be prohibited from car-
rying 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 en-
lightened 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 Wig-
gins is not so original in his views of
the Social Condition and so forth, as
his contemporaries are inclined to sup-
pose? 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 ac-
count of his keeping a retail shop for
cat peltries and other furs. Pundit
knows, you know; there can be no mis-
take about it. How very wonderfully
do we see verified every day, the pro-
found 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 came
round in a circle among men."
April 2d.-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 con-
vey the wires over sea, but now we are
at a loss to comprehend where the diffi-
culty lay! So wags the world. Tem-
pora mutantur-excuse me for quoting
the Etruscan. What would we do with-
out the Atlantic telegraph? (Pundit
says Atlantic was the ancient adjec-
tive.) 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 Human-
ity, the world was accustomed to re-
gard War and Pestilence as calamities?
Do you know that prayers were actu-
ally offered up in the ancient temples
to the end that these evils (!) might
not be visited upon mankind? Is it
398
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
not really difficult to comprehend upon
what principle of interest our fore-
fathers 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 3d. 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 every thing
that is going on in all directions. Just
now there is quite a crowd of balloons
in sight, and they present a very ani-
mated appearance, while the air is re-
sonant with the hum of so many mill-
ions 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 æronaut, maintained
the practicability of traversing the at-
mosphere in all directions, by merely
ascending or descending until a favor-
able current was attained, he was
scarcely hearkened to at all by his con-
temporaries, 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 ob-
viously feasible could have escaped the
sagacity of the ancient savans. But in
all ages the great obstacles to advance-
ment 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 pos
sibly) called Aries Tottle.
This per
son introduced, or at all events propa
gated what was termed the deductive
or a priori mode of investigation. H
started with what he maintained to b
axioms or "self-evident truths," an
thence proceeded "logically" to results
His greatest disciples were one Neuclid
and one Cant. Well, Aries Tottle flour
ished supreme until advent of one Hog
surnamed the "Ettrick Shepherd," wh
preached an entirely different system
which he called the a posteriori or in
ductive. His plan referred altogethe
to Sensation. He proceeded by observ
ing, analyzing, and classifying facts-
instantiæ naturæ, as they were affect
edly called-into general laws. Arie
Tottle's mode, in a word, was based o
noumena; Hog's on phenomena Wel
so great was the admiration excited b
this latter system that, at its first ir
troduction, Aries Tottle fell into di
repute; but finally he recovered groun
and was permitted to divide the real:
of Truth with his more modern riva
The savans now maintained the Aris
totelian and Baconian roads were th
sole possible avenues to knowledge
"Baconian," you must know, was a
adjective invented as equivalent t
Hog-ian and more euphonious and dig
nified.
Now, my dear friend, I do assur
you, most positively, that I represen
MELLONTA TAUTA
399
this matter fairly, on the soundest au-
thority; and you can easily understand
how a notion so absurd on its very face
nust have operated to retard the prog-
ess of all true knowledge—which
nakes its advances almost invariably by
ntuitive bounds. The ancient idea
confined investigations to crawling;
and for hundreds of years so great was
he infatuation about Hog especially,
hat a virtual end was put to all think-
ng, properly so called. No man dared
tter a truth to which he felt himself
ndebted to his Soul alone. It mattered
ot whether the truth was even demon-
trably a truth, for the bullet-headed
avans of the time regarded only the
bad by which he had attained it. They
Fould not even look at the end. "Let
is see the means," they cried, "the
beans!" If, upon investigation of the
neans, it was found to come under
either the category Aries (that is to say
lam) nor under the category Hog, why
hen the savans went no farther, but
ronounced the "theorist" a fool, and
would have nothing to do with him or
is truth.
Now, it cannot be maintained, even,
hat by the crawling system the great-
st amount of truth would be attained
n any long series of ages, for the re-
pression of imagination was an evil
ot 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 pro-
Fenitors), 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
to his eyes. These people blinded
themselves by details. When they pro-
ceeded 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 anti-
podes"; "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 impal-
pability of their axioms in general.
Who was the soundest of their logi-
cians? 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-
400
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
horse called Bentham. But let us glance
at the treatise!
Ah! "Ability or inability to con-
ceive," says Mr. Mill, very properly,
"is in no case to be received as a cri-
terion of axiomatic truth." What mod-
ern in his senses would ever think of
disputing this truism? The only won-
der 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 deter-
mined 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 Gravita-
tion. Newton owed it to Kepler. Kep-
ler admitted that his three laws were
guessed at-these three laws of all laws
which led the great Inglitch mathe-
matician to his principle, the basis of
all physicial 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 con
tempt. Would it not have puzzled these
old moles too, to have explained by
which of the two "roads" a crypto-
graphist 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 high-
way 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 con-
sistency must be an absolute truth!
How plain has been our progress since
the late announcement of this proposi-
tion! 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 imagi-
nation. These latter theorize. Can
you not fancy the shout of scorn with
which my words would be received by
MELLONTA TAUTA
401
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 inconsis-
tency-until, finally, a perfect consis-
tency stands apparent which even the
most stolid admit, because it is a con-
sistency, to be an absolute and an un-
questionable truth.
April 4th.-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 im-
mense 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 con-
tempt. 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. Noth-
ing 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 hun-
dred 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 at-
tainable. ✶✶✶ 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 men-
tioned. 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 are
very slight, and placed so close to-
gether as to be, according to modern.
notions, quite frivolous, if not danger-
ous in the extreme. The present width
of track-fifty feet-is considered, in-
deed, 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 con-
tinents were united; the Kanawdians,
then, would have been driven, by nec-
essity, to a great railroad across the
continent.
April 5th.-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 absurd-
ity? 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 con-
ceivable, viz: that all men are born free
and equal-this in the very teeth of the
402
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 med-
dled 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 govern-
ment at all. It is related, however,
that the first circumstance which dis-
turbed, very particularly, the self-com-
placency of the philosophers who con-
structed this "Republic,” was the
startling discovery that universal suf-
frage gave opportunity for fraudulent
schemes, by means of which any de-
sired 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 conse-
quences, which were that rascality must
predominate-in a word, that a repub-
lican government could never be any
thing but a rascally one. While the
philosophers, however, were busied in
blushing at their stupidity in not hav-
ing 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, rapac-
ious, 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 ex-
hausted 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 forget-
ting-never to run directly contrary to
the natural analogies. As for Republi-
canism, 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 any thing, that democ
racy is a very admirable form of gov-
ernment-for dogs.
April 6th.-Last night had a fine
view of Alpha Lyra, whose disk,
through our captain's spy-glass, sub-
tends an angle of half a degree, looking
very much as our sun does to the naked
eye on a misty day. Alpha Lyra,
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 per
forming the circuit in a period of 117,-
000,000 of years! We, with our pres-
ent lights, our vast telescopic improve-
ments, and so forth, of course find it
difficult to comprehend the ground of
MELLONTA TAUTA
403
an idea such as this. Its first propa-
gator 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 de-
velopment. 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 to-
gether. 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-luminos-
ity; 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 glor-
ious suns glaring in all directions about
it? No doubt what he finally main-
tained 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 infin-
ity of straight lines; but this idea of
the circle-this idea of it which, in re-
gard to all earthly geometry, we con-
sider 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 sup-
pose our system, with its fellows, re-
volving 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 compre-
hension of a circuit so unutterable! It
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 cir-
cumference 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 proposi-
tion not to be entertained; and yet
these ancient astronomers were abso-
lutely cajoled, it appears, into believ-
ing that a decisive curvature had be-
come apparent during the brief period
of their astronomical history—during
the mere point-during the utter noth-
ingness of two or three thousand years!
How incomprehensible, that consider-
ations such as this did not at once in-
dicate to them the true state of affairs
-that of the binary revolution of our
sun and Alpha Lyræ around a common
centre of gravity!
April 7th.-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 resem-
blance to humanity, yet evinced a me-
chanical ingenuity so much superior to
404
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 tell us they actually
are.
April 8th.-Eureka! Pundit is in his
glory. A balloon from Kanadaw spoke
us to-day and threw on board several
late papers; they contain some exceed-
ingly curious information relative to
Kanawdian or rather Amriccan an-
tiquities. You know, I presume, that
laborers have for some months been
employed in preparing the ground for a
new fountain at Paradise, the Emper-
or's principal pleasure garden. Par-
adise, 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 nar-
row 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 unaccount-
able reason) being considered as espe-
cially precious just in this vicinity. The
disastrous earthquake, however, of the
year 2050, so totally uprooted and over-
whelmed the town (for it was almost
too large to be called a village) that
the most indefatigable of our antiquar-
ians 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, cus-
toms, etc., etc., etc., 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 pro-
tuberance of the region just below the
small of the back-although, most un-
accountably, 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 cen-
tre of the emperor's garden, (which.
you know, covers the whole island).
some of the workmen unearthed a cub-
ical and evidently chiseled block of
granite, weighing several hundred
pounds. It was in good preservation.
having received, apparently, little in-
jury from the convulsion which en-
tombed 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
MELLONTA TAUTA
405
the slab, a cavity appeared, containing
a leaden box filled with various coins,
a long scroll of names, several docu-
ments which appear to resemble news-
papers, 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, etc., etc. I copy for your
amusement the Knickerbocker inscrip-
tion 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 trans-
lation 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 con-
tenting 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 mag-
nanimous intention. We ascertain, too,
very distinctly, from this admirable in-
scription, the how as well as the where
and the what, of the great surrender in
question. As to the where, it was York-
town (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 re-
member that these savages were un-
doubtedly cannibals, we are led to the
conclusion that they intended him for
sausage. As to the how of the sur-
render, no language can be more ex-
plicit. Lord Cornwallis was surren-
dered (for sausage) "under the auspices
of the Washington Monument Associa-
tion"-no doubt a charitable institution
for the depositing of corner-stones.—
But, Heaven bless me! what is the mat-
ter? Ah, I see- -the balloon has col-
lapsed, 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 news-
papers, etc., etc., I find that the great
men in those days among the Amric-
cans, 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, how-
ever, and throw it into the sea.
Yours everlastingly,
PUNDITA.
Mesmeric Revelation*
(Published in Columbian Magazine, 1845.-Ed.)
WHATEVER doubt may still envelop
the rationale of mesmerism, its startling
facts are now almost universally ad-
mitted. Of these latter, those who
doubt, are your mere doubters by pro-
fession-an unprofitable and disrep-
utable tribe. There can be no more
absolute waste of time than the at-
tempt 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, in which the
phenomena resemble very closely those
of death, or at least resemble them
more nearly than they do the phe-
nomena of any other normal condition
within our cognizance; that, while in
this state, the person so impressed em-
ploys only with effort, and then feebly,
the external organs of sense, yet per-
ceives, with keenly refined perception,
and through channels supposed un-
known, matters beyond the scope of
the physical organs; that, moreover, his
intellectual faculties are wonderfully
exalted and invigorated; that his sym-
pathies with the person so impressing
him are profound; and, finally, that
his susceptibility to the impression in-
creases with its frequency, while in the
same proportion, the peculiar pheno-
mena 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 demon-
*See Contents Marginalia for Brit-
ish reprint.-Ed.
strate; nor shall I inflict upon my read-
ers so needless a demonstration to-day.
My purpose at present is a very differ-
ent one indeed. I am impelled, even
in the teeth of a world of prejudice, to
detail, without comment, the very re
markable substance of a colloquy occur
ring between a sleep-waker and myself.
I had long been in the habit of mes
merizing the person in question (Mr
Vankirk), and the usual acute suscep
tibility and exaltation of the mesmerit
perception had supervened. For many
months he had been laboring unde
confirmed phthisis, the more distressing
effects of which had been relieved by
my manipulations; and on the night o
Wednesday, the fifteenth instant, I wa
summoned to his bedside.
The invalid was suffering with acut
pain in the region of the heart, an
breathed with great difficulty, havin
all the ordinary symptoms of asthma
In spasms such as these he had usuall
found relief from the application o
mustard to the nervous centres, but to
night this had been attempted in vai
As I entered his room he greeted m
with a cheerful smile, and although ev
dently in much bodily pain, appeare
to be, mentally, quite at ease.
"I sent for you to-night," he sai
"not so much to administer to my bo
ily ailment, as to satisfy me concernin
certain physical impressions which, o
late, have occasioned me much anxiet
and surprise. I need not tell you ho
skeptical I have hitherto been on th
topic of the soul's immortality. I can
406
MESMERIC REVELATION
407.
not 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-sen-
timent at no time amounted to con-
viction. 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 ad-
vised 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 suc-
ceeded 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 abstrac-
tions which have been so long the fash-
ion 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 deep-
ening of the feeling, until it has come
so nearly to resemble the acquiescence
of reason, that I find it difficult to dis-
tinguish between the two. I am en-
abled, too, plainly to trace this effect
to the mesmeric influence. I cannot
better explain my meaning than by the
hypothesis that the mesmeric exalta-
tion enables me to perceive a train of
ratiocination which, in my abnormal
existence, convinces, but which, in full
accordance with the mesmeric pheno-
mena, does not extend, except through
its effect, into my normal condition. In
sleep-waking, the reasoning and its con-
clusion-the cause and its effect-are
present together. In my natural state,
the cause vanishing, 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 mes-
merized. 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 itslf; 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 phy-
sical uneasiness. The following conver-
sation 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?
408
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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!
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 im-
P. Are you pleased with the pros- pelling the finer, the finer pervading the
pect?
V. If I were awake I should like to
die, but now it is no matter. The mes-
meric condition is so near death as to
content me.
P. I wish you would explain your-
self, Mr. Vankirk.
V. I am willing to do so, but it re-
quires more effort than I feel able to
make. You do not question me prop-
erly.
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, fluctuat-
ing 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 mat-
ter, 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 mutter-
ingly.] I see-but it is a thing difficult
to tell. [Another long pause.] He is
grosser. The atmosphere, for example,
impels the electric principle, while the
electric principle permeates the atmos-
phere. These gradations of matter in-
crease 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 mat-
ter, or God, in quiescence is (as nearly
as we can conceive it) what men call
mind. And the power of self-move-
ment (equivalent in effect to human
volition) is, in the unparticled matter,
the result of its unity and omnipreval-
ence; 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 cog-
nizant escape the senses in gradation.
We have, for example, a metal, a piece
MESMERIC REVELATION
409
of wood, a drop of water, the atmos-
phere, 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 nihility.
The only consideration which restrains
us is our conception of its atomic con-
stitution; 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 consti-
tution and we should no longer be able
to regard the ether as an entity, or, at
least, as matter. For want of a bet-
ter 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 ar-
rive at once (in spite of all the school
dogmas) at a unique mass-an unpar-
ticled matter. For although we may
admit infinite littleness in the atoms
themselves, the infinitude of littleness
in the spaces between them is an ab-
surdity. 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 consider-
ation 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 rarified
matter.
P. There seems to me an insur-
mountable objection to the idea of
absolute coalescence;-and that is the
very slight resistance experienced by
the heavenly bodies in their revolu-
tions 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 dens-
ity. Where there are no interspaces,
there can be no yielding. An ether,
absolutely dense, would put an infi-
nitely more effectual stop to the prog-
ress 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 re-
gards 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, how-
ever rare this ether be supposed, it
would put a stop to all sidereal revolu-
tion in a very far briefer period than
has been admitted by those astrono-
mers who have endeavored to slur over
a point which they found it impossible
to comprehend. The retardation actu-
ally experienced is, on the other hand,
410
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 accumu-
lative.
[I was
P. But in all this-in this identifi-
cation of mere matter with God-is
there nothing of irreverence?
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
I speak is, in all respects, the very
"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 unpar-
ticled matter, in motion, is thought.
V. In general, this motion is the
universal thought of the universal
mind. This thought creates. All cre-
ated 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 unincor-
porate, is merely God. To create
individual, thinking beings, it was
necessary to incarnate portions of the
divine mind. Thus man is individual-
ized. 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?
I
V. [After much hesitation.]
could not have said this; it is an
absurdity.
You
P. [Referring to my notes.]
did say that "divested of corporate in-
vestiture man were God."
V. And this is true. Man thus di-
vested would be God-would be unin-
dividualized. But he can never be thus
divested at least never will be-else
we must imagine an action of God re-
turning 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 rudi-
mental and the complete, correspond-
ing with the two conditions of the
worm and the butterfly. What we call
"death," is but the painful metamor-
phosis. Our present incarnation is
progressive, preparatory, temporary.
Our future is perfected, ultimate, im-
mortal. The ultimate life is the full
design.
P. But of the worm's metamorpho-
sis we are palpably cognizant.
V. We, certainly-but not the worm.
MESMERIC REVELATION
411
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 com-
posed. 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 ulti-
mate 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 na-
ture will bring you near a comprehen-
sion 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 lat-
ter 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 ex-
ternal 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.
rudimental beings, organs are the
cages necessary to confine them until
fledged.
To
P. You speak of rudimental "be.
ings."
Are there other rudimental
thinking beings than man?
V. The multitudinous conglomera-
tion of rare matter into nebulæ, plan-
ets, suns, and other bodies which are
neither nebulæ, 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.
412
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 crea-
tures, enjoying the ultimate life-im-
mortality-and cognizant of all secrets
but the one, act all things and pass
every where by mere volition:-in-
dwelling, 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
as
non-entities from the perception of the
angels.
P. You say that "but for the neces-
sity 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 Voli-
tion. With the view of producing im-
pediment, the organic life and matter
(complex, substantial, and law-encum-
bered) were contrived.
P. But again-why need this im-
pediment have been produced?
V. The result of law inviolate is
perfection-right-negative happiness.
The result of law violate is imperfec-
tion, wrong, positive pain. Through
the impediments afforded by the num-
ber, complexity, and substantiality of
the laws of organic life and matter, the
violation of law is rendered, to a cer-
tain extent, practicable. Thus pain,
which in the inorganic life is impos-
sible, 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 expres-
sions 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 unpar-
ticled matter, through what we con-
sider its immateriality, eludes the
organic.
THE CASE OF M. VALDEMAR
413
As the sleep-waker pronounced these
latter words, in a feeble tone, I ob-
served 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 dis-
course, been addressing me from out
the regions of the shadows?
The Case of M. Valdemar*
(Published in American Review, December, 1845.-Ed.)
Of course I shall not pretend to con-
sider it any matter for wonder, that the
extraordinary case of M. Valdemar has
excited discussion. It would have been
a miracle had it not-especially under
the circumstances. Through the desire
of all parties concerned, to keep the
affair from the public, at least for the
present, or until we had further oppor-
tunities for investigation-through our
endeavors to effect this-a garbled or
exaggerated account made its way into
society, and became the source of many
unpleasant misrepresentations; and,
very naturally, of a great deal of dis-
belief.
It is now rendered necessary that I
give the facts-as far as I comprehend
them myself. They are, succinctly,
these:
My attention, for the last three
years, had been repeatedly drawn to the
subject of Mesmerism; and, about nine
months ago, it occurred to me, quite
suddenly, that in the series of experi-
*See Contents, Marginalia, for Brit-
ish reprint.-Ed
ments made hitherto, there had been a
very remarkable and most unaccount-
able omission:-no person had as yet
been mesmerized in articulo mortis. It
remained to be seen, first, whether, in
such condition, there existed in the pa-
tient any susceptibility to the magnetic
influence; secondly, whether, if any ex-
isted, it was impaired or increased by
the condition; thirdly, to what extent,
or for how long a period, the encroach-
ments of Death might be arrested by
the process. There were other points
to be ascertained, but these most ex-
cited my curiosity-the last in especial,
from the immensely important charac-
ter of its consequences.
In looking around me for some sub-
ject by whose means I might test these
particulars, I was brought to think of
my friend, M. Ernest Valdemar, the
well-known compiler of the "Biblio-
theca Forensica," and author (under the
nom de plume of Issachar Marx) of
the Polish versions of "Wallenstein"
and "Gargantua." M. Valdemar, who
has resided principally at Harlem, N.
Y., since the year 1839, is (or was).
414
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
particularly noticeable for the extreme
spareness of his person-his lower
limbs much resembling those of John
Randolph; and, also, for the whiteness
of his whiskers, in violent contrast to
the blackness of his hair-the latter, in
consequence, being very generally mis-
taken for a wig. His temperament was
markedly nervous, and rendered him a
good subject for mesmeric experiment.
On two or three occasions I had put
him to sleep with little difficulty, but
was disappointed in other results which
his peculiar constitution had naturally
led me to anticipate. His will was at
no period positively, or thoroughly,
under my control, and in regard to
clairvoyance, I could accomplish with
him nothing to be relied upon. I al-
ways attributed my failure at these
points to the disordered state of his
health. For some months previous to
my becoming acquainted with him, his
physicians had declared him in a con-
firmed phthisis. It was his custom,
indeed, to speak calmly of his ap-
proaching dissolution, as of a matter
neither to be avoided nor regretted.
When the ideas to which I have al-
luded first occurred to me, it was of
course very naturaì that I should think
of M. Valdemar. I knew the steady
philosophy of the man too well to ap-
prehend any scruples from him; and
he had no relatives in America who
would be likely to interfere. I spoke
to him frankly upon the subject; and,
to my surprise, his interest seemed
vividly excited. I say to my surprise,
for, although he had always yielded
his person freely to my experiments,
he had never before given me any
tokens of sympathy with what I did.
His disease was of that character which
would admit of exact calculation in re
spect to the epoch of its termination in
death; and it was finally arranged be-
tween us that he would send for me
about twenty-four hours before the
period announced by his physicians as
that of his decease.
It is now rather more than seven
months since I received, from M. Val
demar himself, the subjoined note:
"MY DEAR P———.
D-
"You may as well come now.
and F are agreed that I cannot
hold out beyond to-morrow midnight;
and I think they have hit the time
very nearly.
VALDEMAR."
I received this note within half an
hour after it was written, and in fifteen
minutes more I was in the dying man's
chamber. I had not seen him for ten
days, and was appalled by the fearful
alteration which the brief interval had
wrought in him. His face wore a leaden
hue; the eyes were utterly lustreless;
and the emaciation was so extreme,
that the skin had been broken through
by the cheek-bones. His expectoration
was excessive. The pulse was barely
perceptible. He retained, nevertheless,
in a very remarkable manner, both his
mental power and a certain degree of
physical strength. He spoke with dis-
tinctness-took some palliative medi-
cines without aid-and, when I entered
the room, was occupied in penciling
memoranda in a pocket-book. He was
propped up in the bed by pillows.
Doctors D and F were in
attendance.
After pressing Valdemar's hand, I
took these gentlemen aside, and ob-
tained from them a minute account of
the patient's condition. The left lung
THE CASE OF M. VALDEMAR
415
had been for eighteen months in a
semi-osseous or cartilaginous state, and
was, of course, entirely useless for all
purposes of vitality. The right, in its
upper portion, was also partially, if not
thoroughly, ossified, while the lower
region was merely a mass of purulent
tubercles, running one into another.
Several extensive perforations existed;
and, at one point, permanent adhesion
to the ribs had taken place. These
appearances in the right lobe were of
comparatively recent date. The ossifi-
cation had proceeded with very unusual
rapidity; no sign of it had been dis-
covered a month before, and the adhe-
sion had only been observed during the
three previous days. Independently of
the phthisis, the patient was suspected
of aneurism of the aorta; but on this
point the osseous symptoms rendered
an exact diagnosis impossible. It was
the opinion of both physicians that M.
Valdemar would die about midnight on
the morrow (Sunday). It was then
seven o'clock on Saturday evening.
On quitting the invalid's bedside to
hold conversation with myself, Doctors
D and F had bidden him a
final farewell. It had not been their
intention to return; but, at my request,
they agreed to look in upon the patient
about ten the next night.
When they had gone, I spoke freely
with M. Valdemar on the subject of
his approaching dissolution, as well as,
more particularly, of the experiment
proposed. He still professed himself
quite willing and even anxious to have
it made, and urged me to commence it
at once. A male and a female nurse
were in attendance; but I did not feel
myself altogether at liberty to engage
in a task of this character with no
more reliable witnesses than these peo-
ple, in case of sudden accident, might
prove. I therefore postponed opera-
tions until about eight the next night,
when the arrival of a medical student,
with whom I had some acquaintance
(Mr. Theodore L), relieved me
from further embarrassment. It had
been my design, originally, to wait for
the physicians; but I was induced to
proceed, first, by the urgent entreaties
of M. Valdemar, and secondly, by my
conviction that I had not a moment
to lose, as he was evidently sinking
fast.
Mr. L- -I was so kind as to accede
to my desire that he would take notes
of all that occurred; and it is from
his memoranda that what I now have
to relate is, for the most part, either
condensed or copied verbatim.
It wanted about five minutes of
eight when, taking the patient's hand,
I begged him to state, as distinctly as
he could, to Mr. L, whether he
(M. Valdemar) was entirely willing
that I should make the experiment of
mesmerizing him in his then condition.
He replied feebly, yet quite audibly:
"Yes, I wish to be mesmerized”—add-
ing immediately afterward: "I fear you
have deferred it too long."
While he spoke thus, I commenced
the passes which I had already found
most effectual in subduing him. He
was evidently influenced with the first
lateral stroke of my hand across his
forehead; but, although I exerted all
my powers, no further perceptible ef-
fect was induced until some minutes
after ten o'clock, when Doctors D-
and F called, according to appoint-
ment. I explained to them, in a few
words, what I designed, and as they
416
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
opposed no objection, saying that the
patient was already in the death agony,
I proceeded without hesitation-ex-
changing, however, the lateral passes
for downward ones, and directing my
gaze entirely into the right eye of the
sufferer.
By this time his pulse was imper-
ceptible and his breathing was stertori-
ous, and at intervals of half a minute.
This condition was nearly unaltered
for a quarter of an hour. At the expi-
ration of this period, however, a natural
although a very deep sigh escaped from
the bosom of the dying man, and the
stertorious breathing ceased-that is to
say, its stertoriousness was no longer
apparent; the intervals were undimin-
ished. The patient's extremities were
of an icy coldness.
At five minutes before eleven, I per-
ceived unequivocal signs of the mes-
meric influence. The glassy roll of the
eye was changed for that expression of
uneasy inward examination which is
never seen except in cases of sleep-
waking, and which it is quite impos-
sible to mistake. With a few rapid
lateral passes I made the lids quiver,
as in incipient sleep, and with a few
more I closed them altogether. I was
not satisfied, however, with this, but
continued the manipulations vigorously,
and with the fullest exertion of the will,
until I had completely stiffened the
limbs of the slumberer, after placing
them in a seemingly easy position. The
legs were at full length; the arms were
nearly so, and reposed on the bed at a
moderate distance from the loins. The
head was very slightly elevated.
When I had accomplished this, it was
fully midnight, and I requested the
gentlemen present to examine M. Val-
demar's condition. After a few experi
ments, they admitted him to be in an
unusually perfect state of mesmeric
trance. The curiosity of both the phy-
sicians was greatly excited. Dr. D-
resolved at once to remain with the
patient all night, while Dr. F― took
leave with a promise to return at day-
break. Mr. L-1 and the nurses re-
mained.
We left M. Valdemar entirely undis-
turbed until about three o'clock in the
morning, when I approached him and
found him in precisely the same con-
dition as when Dr. F― went away-
that is to say, he lay in the same posi-
tion; the pulse was imperceptible; the
breathing was gentle (scarcely notice-
able, unless through the application of
a mirror to the lips); the eyes were
closed naturally; and the limbs were as
rigid and as cold as marble. Still, the
general appearance was certainly not
that of death.
As I approached M. Valdemar I
made a kind of half effort to influence
his right arm into pursuit of my own, as
I passed the latter gently to and fro
above his person. In such experiments
with this patient, I had never perfectly
succeeded before, and assuredly I had
little thought of succeeding now; but
to my astonishment, his arm very read-
ily, although feebly, followed every di-
rection I assigned it with mine. I de-
termined to hazard a few words of con-
versation.
"M. Valdemar," I said, "are you
asleep?" He made no answer, but I
perceived a tremor about the lips, and
was thus induced to repeat the question,
again and again. At its third repetition,
his whole frame was agitated by a very
slight shivering; the eyelids unclosed
THE CASE OF M. VALDEMAR
417
themselves so far as to display a white
line of a ball; the lips moved sluggishly,
and from between them, in a barely
audible whisper, issued the words:
"Yes-asleep now. Do not wake
me!-let me die so!"
I here felt the limbs, and found them
as rigid as ever. The right arm, as
before, obeyed the direction of my
hand. I questioned the sleep-waker
again:
"Do you still feel pain in the breast,
M. Valdemar?”
The answer now was immediate, but
even less audible than before:
"No pain-I am dying!"
I did not think it advisable to dis-
turb him further just then, and noth-
ing more was said or done until the
arrival of Dr. F—, who came a little
before sunrise, and expressed unbounded
astonishment at finding the patient still
alive. After feeling the pulse and ap-
plying a mirror to the lips, he requested
me to speak to the sleep-waker again.
I did so, saying:
"M. Valdemar, do you still sleep?"
As before, some minutes elapsed ere
a reply was made; and during the in-
terval the dying man seemed to be col-
lecting his energies to speak. At my
fourth repetition of the question, he
said very faintly, almost inaudibly:
"Yes; still asleep-dying."
It was now the opinion, or rather the
wish, of the physicians, that M. Valde-
mar should be suffered to remain un-
disturbed in his present apparently tran-
quil condition, until death should super-
vene-and this, it was generally agreed,
must now take place within a few min-
utes. I concluded, however, to speak
to him once more, and merely repeated
my previous question.
While I spoke, there came a marked
change over the countenance of the
sleep-waker. The eyes rolled themselves
slowly open, the pupils disappearing up-
wardly; the skin generally assumed a
cadaverous hue, resembling not so much
parchment as white paper; and the cir-
cular hectic spots which, hitherto, had
been strongly defined in the centre of
each cheek, went out at once. I use
this expression, because the suddenness
of their departure put me in mind of
nothing so much as the extinguishment
of a candle by a puff of the breath. The
upper lip, at the same time, writhed
itself away from the teeth, which it
had previously covered completely;
while the lower jaw fell with an audible
jerk, leaving the mouth widely extended,
and disclosing in full view the swollen
and blackened tongue. I presume that
no member of the party then present
had been unaccustomed to death-bed
horrors; but so hideous beyond concep-
tion was the appearance of M. Valde-
mar at this moment, that there was a
general shrinking back from the region
of the bed.
I now feel that I have reached a
point of this narrative at which every
reader will be startled into positive dis-
belief. It is my business, however,
simply to proceed.
There was no longer the faintest sign
of vitality in M. Valdemar; and con-
cluding him to be dead, we were con-
signing him to the charge of the nurses,
when a strong vibratory motion was
observable in the tongue. This con-
tinued for perhaps a minute. At the
expiration of this period, there issued
from the distended and motionless jaws
a voice-such as it would be madness
in me to attempt describing. There
418
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
are, indeed, two or three epithets which
might be considered as applicable to it
in part; I might say, for example, that
the sound was harsh, and broken and
hollow; but the hideous whole is in-
describable, for the simple reason that
no similar sounds have ever jarred upon
the ear of humanity. There were two
particulars, nevertheless, which I thought
then, and still think, might fairly be
stated as characteristic of the intona-
tion as well adapted to convey some
idea of its unearthly peculiarity. In
the first place, the voice seemed to reach
our ears at least mine-from a vast
distance, or from some deep cavern
within the earth. In the second place,
it impressed me (I fear, indeed,
that it will be impossible to make my-
self comprehended) as gelatinous or
glutinous matters impress the sense of
touch.
I have spoken both of "sound" and
of "voice." I mean to say that the
sound was one of distinct-of even
wonderfully, thrillingly distinct--syllabi-
fication. M. Valdemar spoke-obvi-
ously in reply to the question I had
propounded to him a few minutes be-
fore. I had asked him, it will be re-
membered, if he still slept. He now
said:
"Yes;-no;-I have been sleeping-
and now-now-I am dead."
No person present even affected to
deny, or attempted to repress, the
unutterable, shuddering horror which
these few words, thus uttered, were so
well calculated to convey. Mr. Ll
(the student) swooned. The nurses
Immediately left the chamber, and could
not be induced to return. My own
impressions I would not pretend to
render intelligible to the reader. For
nearly an hour, we busied ourselves,
silently-without the utterance of a
word-in endeavors to revive Mr.
Ll. When he came to himself, we
addressed ourselves again to an inves-
tigation of M. Valdemar's condition.
It remained in all respects as I have
last described it, with the exception
that the mirror no longer afforded evi-
dence of respiration. An attempt to
draw blood from the arm failed. I
should mention, too, that this limb was
no further subject to my will. I en-
deavored in vain to make it follow the
direction of my hand. The only real
indication, indeed, of the mesmeric in-
fluence, was now found in the vibratory
movement of the tongue, whenever I
addressed M. Valdemar a question. He
seemed to be making an effort to reply,
but had no longer sufficient volition.
To queries put to him by any other
person than myself he seemed utterly
insensible—although I endeavored to
place each member of the company in
mesmeric rapport with him. I believe
that I have now related all that is neces-
sary to an understanding of the sleep-
waker's state at this epoch. Other
nurses were procured; and at ten o'clock
I left the house in company with the
two physicians and Mr. L-1.
In the afternoon we all called again
to see the patient. His condition re-
mained precisely the same. We had
now some discussion as to the propriety
and feasibility of awakening him; but
we had little difficulty in agreeing that
no good purpose would be served by so
doing. It was evident that, so far,
death (or what is usually termed death)
had been arrested by the mesmeric
process. It seemed clear to us all that
to awaken M. Valdemar would be
THE CASE OF M. VALDEMAR
419
merely to insure his instant, or at least
his speedy, dissolution.
From this period until the close of
last week-an interval of nearly seven
months-we continued to make daily
calls at M. Valdemar's house, accom-
panied, now and then, by medical and
other friends. All this time the sleep-
waker remained exactly as I have last
described him. The nurses' attentions
were continual.
It was on Friday last that we finally
resolved to make the experiment of
awakening, or attempting to awaken
him; and it is the (perhaps) unfortu-
nate result of this latter experiment
which has given rise to so much dis-
cussion in private circles-to so much
of what I cannot help thinking un-
warranted popular feeling.
For the purpose of relieving M.
Valdemar from the mesmeric trance, I
made use of the customary passes.
These for a time were unsuccessful.
The first indication of revival was af-
forded by a partial descent of the iris.
It was observed, as especially remark-
able, that this lowering of the pupil
was accompanied by the profuse out-
flowing of a yellowish ichor (from be-
neath the lids) of a pungent and highly
offensive odor.
It was now suggested that I should
attempt to influence the patient's arm
as heretofore. I made the attempt and
failed. Dr. F then intimated a
desire to have me put a question. I
did so, as follows:
"M. Valdemar, can you explain to us
what are your feelings or wishes now?"
There was an instant return of the
hectic circles on the cheeks: the tongue
quivered, or rather rolled violently in
the mouth (although the jaws and lips
remained rigid as before), and at length
the same hideous voice which I have
already described, broke forth:
"For God's sake!-quick!-quick!-
put me to sleep-or, quick!-waken
me!-quick!-I say to you that I am
dead!"
I was thoroughly unnerved, and for
an instant remained undecided what to
do. At first I made an endeavor to re-
compose the patient; but, failing in
this through total abeyance of the will,
I retracted my steps and as earnestly
struggled to awaken him. In this at-
tempt I soon saw that I should be
successful or at least I soon fancied
that my success would be complete-
and I am sure that all in the room were
prepared to see the patient awaken.
For what really occurred, however, it
is quite impossible that any human
being could have been prepared.
As I rapidly made the mesmeric
passes, amid ejaculations of "dead!
dead!" absolutely bursting from the
tongue and not from the lips of the
sufferer, his whole frame at once-
within the space of a single minute, or
even less, shrunk-crumbled, absolutely
rotted away beneath my hands. Upon
the bed, before that whole company,
there lay a nearly liquid mass of loath-
some of detestable putrescence.
The Premature Burial
(See tale, The Man of the Crowd.-Ed.)
THERE are certain themes of which
the interest is all-absorbing, but which
are too entirely horrible for the pur-
poses of legitimate fiction. These the
mere romanticist must eschew, if he do
not wish to offend or to disgust. They
are with propriety handled only when
the severity and majesty of truth sanc-
tify and sustain them. We thrill, for
example, with the most intense of
"pleasurable pain" over the accounts of
the Passage of the Beresina, of the
Earthquake at Lisbon, of the Plague at
London, of the Massacre of St. Barth-
olomew, or of the stifling of the hun-
dred and twenty-three prisoners in the
Black Hole at Calcutta. But in these
accounts it is the fact-it is the reality
-it is the history which excites. As
inventions, we should regard them with
simple abhorrence.
I have mentioned some few of the
more prominent and august calamities
on record; but in these it is the extent,
not less than the character of the calam-
ity, which so vividly impresses the
fancy. I need not remind the reader
that, from the long and weird catalogue
of human miseries, I might have se-
lected many individual instances more
replete with essential suffering than
any of these vast generalities of dis-
aster. The true wretchedness, indeed
-the ultimate woe-is particular, not
diffuse. That the ghastly extremes of
agony are endured by man the unit, and
never by man the mass-for this let
us thank a merciful God!
question, the most terrific of these ex-
tremes which has ever fallen to the lot
of mere mortality. That it has fre-
quently, very frequently, so fallen will
scarcely be denied by those who think.
The boundaries which divide Life from
Death are at best shadowy and vague.
Who shall say where the one ends, and
where the other begins? We know
that there are diseases in which occur
total cessations of all the apparent func-
tions of vitality, and yet in which these
cessations are merely suspensions, prop-
erly so called. They are only tempo-
rary pauses in the incomprehensible
mechanism. A certain period elapses,
and some unseen mysterious principle
again sets in motion the magic pinions
and the wizard wheels. The silver cord
was not for ever loosed, nor the golden
bowl irreparably broken. But where,
meantime, was the soul?
Apart, however, from the inevitable
conclusion, a priori that such causes
must produce such effects-that the
well-known occurrence of such cases
of suspended animation must naturally
give rise, now and then, to premature
interments-apart from this considera-
tion, we have the direct testimony of
medical and ordinary experience to
prove that a vast number of such inter-
ments have actually taken place. I
might refer at once, if necessary to a
hundred well-authenticated instances.
One of very remarkable character, and
of which the circumstances may be fresh
in the memory of some of my readers,
To be buried while alive is, beyond occurred, not very long ago, in the
420
THE PREMATURE BURIAL
421
neighboring city of Baltimore, where
it occasioned a painful, intense, and
widely-extended excitement. The wife
of one of the most respectable citizens
-a lawyer of eminence and a member
of Congress-was seized with a sudden
and unaccountable illness, which com-
pletely baffled the skill of her physi-
cians. After much suffering she died,
or was supposed to die. No one sus-
pected, indeed, or had reason to sus-
pect, that she was not actually dead.
She presented all the ordinary appear-
ances of death. The face assumed the
usual pinched and sunken outline. The
lips were of the usual marble pallor.
The eyes were lustreless. There was
no warmth. Pulsation had ceased. For
three days the body was preserved un-
buried, during which it had acquired
a stony rigidity. The funeral, in short,
was hastened, on account of the rapid
advance of what was supposed to be
decomposition.
The lady was deposited in her family
vault, which, for three subsequent years,
was undisturbed. At the expiration of
this term it was opened for the recep-
tion of a sarcophagus-but, alas! how
fearful a shock awaited the husband,
who, personally, threw open the door!
As its portals swung outwardly back,
some white-apparelled object fell rat-
tling within his arms. It was the skele-
ton of his wife in her yet unmoulded
shroud.
A careful investigation rendered it
evident that she had revived within two
days after her entombment; that her
struggles within the coffin had caused
it to fall from a ledge, or shelf to the
floor, where it was so broken as to per-
mit her escape. A lamp which had been
accidentally left, full of oil, within the
tomb, was found empty; it might have
been exhausted, however, by evapora-
tion. On the uppermost of the steps
which led down into the dread chamber
was a large fragment of the coffin, with
which, it seemed, that she had en-
deavored to arrest attention by striking
the iron door. While thus occupied,
she probably swooned, or possibly died,
through sheer terror; and, in falling,
her shroud became entangled in some
iron-work which projected interiorly.
Thus she remained, and thus she rotted,
erect.
In the year 1810, a case of living
inhumation happened in France, at-
tended with circumstances which go far
to warrant the assertion that truth is,
indeed, stranger than fiction. The
heroine of the story was a Mademoiselle
Victorine Lafourcade, a young girl of
illustrious family, of wealth, and of
great personal beauty. Among her nu-
merous suitors was Julien Bossuet, a
poor litterateur, or journalist of Paris.
His talents and general amiability had
recommended him to the notice of the
heiress, by whom he seems to have been
truly beloved; but her pride of birth
decided her, finally, to reject him, and
to wed a Monsieur Renelle, a banker
and a diplomatist of some eminence.
After marriage, however, this gentleman
neglected, and, perhaps, even more posi-
tively ill-treated her. Having passed
with him some wretched years, she died
-at least her condition so closely re-
sembled death as to deceive every one
who saw her. She was buried-not in
a vault, but in an ordinary grave in the
village of her nativity. Filled with
despair, and still inflamed by the mem-
ory of profound atttachment, the lover
journeys from the capital to the remote
422
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Vi-
province in which the village lies, with
the romantic purpose of disinterring the
corpse, and possessing himself of its
luxuriant tresses. He reaches the grave.
At midnight he unearths the coffin,
opens it, and is in the act of detaching
the hair, when he is arrested by the
unclosing of the beloved eyes. In fact,
the lady had been buried alive.
tality had not altogether departed, and
she was aroused by the caresses of her
lover from the lethargy which had been
mistaken for death. He bore her fran-
tically to his lodgings in the village. He
employed certain powerful restoratives
suggested by no little medical learning.
In fine, she revived. She recognized
her preserver. She remained with him
until, by slow degrees, she fully recov-
ered her original health. Her woman's
heart was not adamant, and this last
lesson of love sufficed to soften it. She
bestowed it upon Bossuet. She returned
no more to her husband, but, conceal-
ing from him her resurrection, fled with
her lover to America. Twenty years
afterward, the two returned to France,
in the persuasion that time had so
greatly altered the lady's appearance
that her friends would be unable to
recognize her. They were mistaken,
however; for, at the first meeting, Mon-
sieur Renelle did actually recognize and
make claim to his wife. This claim she
resisted, and a judicial tribunal sus-
tained her in her resistance, deciding
that the peculiar circumstances, with
the long lapse of years, had extin-
guished, not only equitably, but legally,
the authority of the husband.
The Chirurgical Journal of Leipsic,
a periodical of high authority and merit,
which some American book-seller would
do well to translate and republish, rec-
ords in a late number a very distressing
event of the character in question.
An officer of artillery, a man of
gigantic stature and of robust health,
being thrown from an unmanageable
horse, received a very severe contusion
upon the head, which rendered him in-
sensible at once; the skull was slightly
fractured, but no immediate danger was
apprehended. Trepanning was accom-
plished successfully. He was bled, and
many other of the ordinary means of
relief were adopted. Gradually, how-
ever, he fell into a more and more
hopeless state of stupor, and, finally, it
was thought that he died.
The weather was warm, and he was
buried with indecent haste in one of the
public cemeteries. His funeral took
place on Thursday. On the Sunday
following, the grounds of the cemetery
were, as usual, much thronged with
visitors, and about noon an intense ex-
citement was created by the declaration
of a peasant that, while sitting upon
the grave of the officer, he had distinctly
felt a commotion of the earth, as if
occasioned by some one struggling be-
neath. At first little attention was paid
to the man's asseveration; but his evi-
dent terror, and the dogged obstinacy
with which he persisted in his story,
had at length their natural effect upon
the crowd. Spades were hurriedly pro-
cured, and the grave, which was shame-
fully shallow, was in a few minutes so
far thrown open that the head of its
occupant appeared. He was then seem-
ingly dead; but he sat nearly erect
within his coffin, the lid of which, in
his furious struggles, he had partially
uplifted.
He was forthwith conveyed to the
nearest hospital, and there pronounced
THE PREMATURE BURIAL
423
to be still living, although in an asphytic
condition. After some hours he re-
vived, recognized individuals of his ac-
quaintance, and, in broken sentences
spoke of his agonies in the grave.
From what he related, it was clear
that he must have been conscious of
life for more than an hour, while in-
humed, before lapsing into insensibility.
The grave was carelessly and loosely
filled with an exceedingly porous soil;
and thus some air was necessarily ad-
mitted. He heard the footsteps of the
crowd overhead, and endeavored to
make himself heard in turn. It was
the tumult within the grounds of the
cemetery, he said, which appeared to
awaken him from a deep sleep, but no
sooner was he awake than he became
fully aware of the awful horrors of his
position.
This patient, it is recorded, was doing
well, and seemed to be in a fair way of
ultimate recovery, but fell a victim to
the quackeries of medical experiment.
The galvanic battery was applied, and
he suddenly expired in one of those
ecstatic paroxysms which, occasionally,
it superinduces.
The mention of the galvanic battery,
nevertheless, recalls to my memory a
well-known and very extraordinary case
in point, where its action proved the
means of restoring to animation a young
attorney of London, who had been
interred for two days. This occurred
in 1831, and created, at the time, a
very profound sensation wherever it
was made the subject of converse.
The patient, Mr. Edward Stapleton,
had died, apparently, of typhus fever,
accompanied with some anomalous
symptoms which had excited the curi-
osity of his medical attendants. Upon
his seeming decease, his friends were
requested to sanction a post-mortem
examination, but declined to permit it.
As often happens, when such refusals
are made, the practitioners resolved to
disinter the body and dissect it at
leisure, in private. Arrangements were
easily effected with some of the nu-
merous corps of body-snatchers, with
which London abounds; and, upon the
third night after the funeral, the sup-
posed corpse was unearthed from a
grave eight feet deep, and deposited in
the operating chamber of one of the pri-
vate hospitals.
An incision of some extent had been
actually made in the abdomen, when
the fresh and undecayed appearance of
the subject suggested an application of
the battery. One experiment succeeded
another, and the customary effects
supervened, with nothing to character-
ize them in any respect, except, upon
one or two occasions, a more than ordi-
nary degree of life-likeness in the con-
vulsive action.
It grew late. The day was about to
dawn; and it was thought expedient, at
length, to proceed at once to the dis-
section. A student, however, was es-
pecially desirous of testing a theory of
his own, and insisted upon applying the
battery to one of the pectoral muscles.
A rough gash was made, and a wire
hastily brought in contact; when the
patient, with a hurried but quite un-
convulsive movement, arose from the
table, stepped into the middle of the
floor, gazed about him uneasily for a
few seconds, and then-spoke. What
he said was unintelligible; but words
were uttered; the syllabification was
distinct. Having spoken, he fell heavily
to the floor.
424
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
For some moments all were paralyzed
with awe-but the urgency of the case
soon restored them their presence of
mind. It was seen that Mr. Stapleton
was alive, although in a swoon. Upon
exhibition of ether he revived and was
rapidly restored to health, and to the
society of his friends-from whom,
however, all knowledge of his resuscita-
tion was withheld, until a relapse was
no longer to be apprehended.
wonder their rapturous astonishment
-may be conceived.
Their
The most thrilling peculiarity of this
incident, nevertheless, is involved in
what Mr. S. himself asserts. He de-
clares that at no period was he alto-
gether insensible-that, dully and con-
fusedly, he was aware of everything
which happened to him, from the mo-
ment in which he was pronounced dead
by his physicians, to that in which he
fell swooning to the floor of the hos-
pital. “I am alive," were the uncom-
prehended words which, upon recogniz-
ing the locality of the dissecting-room,
he had endeavored, in his extremity,
to utter.
It were an easy matter to multiply
such histories as these-but I forbear-
for, indeed, we have no need of such
to establish the fact that prematur
interments occur. When we reflect how
very rarely, from the nature of the
case, we have it in our power to detect
them, we must admit that they may
frequently occur without our cogni-
zance. Scarcely, in truth, is a grave-
yard ever encroached upon, for any
purpose, to any great extent, that skele-
tons are not found in postures which
suggest the most fearful of suspicions.
Fearful indeed the suspicion-but
more fearful the doom! It may be
asserted, without hesitation, that no
event is so terribly well adapted to in-
spire the supremeness of bodily and of
mental distress, as is burial before
death. The unendurable oppression of
the lungs the stifling fumes of the
damp earth-the clinging to the death
garments the rigid embrace of the
narrow house-the blackness of the ab-
solute Night-the silence like a sea that
overwhelms the unseen but palpable
presence of the Conqueror Worm-
these things, with the thoughts of the
air and grass above, with memory of
dear friends who would fly to save us
if but informed of our fate, and with
consciousness that of this fate they can
never be informed that our hopeless
portion is that of the really dead-these
considerations, I say, carry into the
heart, which still palpitates, a degree of
appalling and intolerable horror from
which the most daring imagination must
recoil. We know of nothing so agoniz-
ing upon Earth-we can dream of noth-
ing half so hideous in the realms of the
nethermost Hell. And thus all narra-
tives upon this topic have an interest
profound; an interest, nevertheless,
which, through the sacred awe of the
topic itself, very properly and very pe-
culiarly depends upon our conviction of
the truth of the matter narrated. What
I have now to tell is of my own actual
knowledge of my own positive and
personal experience.
For several years I had been subject
to attacks of the singular disorder which
physicians have agreed to term cata-
lepsy, in default of a more definitive
title. Although both the immediate and
the predisposing causes, and even the
actual diagnosis, of this disease are still
mysterious, its obvious and apparent
THE PREMATURE BURIAL
425
character is sufficiently well understood.
Its variations seem to be chiefly of
degree. Sometimes the patient lies, for
a day only, or even for a shorter period,
in a species of exaggerated lethargy.
He is senseless and externally motion-
less; but the pulsation of the heart is
still faintly perceptible; some traces of
warmth remain; a slight color lingers
within the centre of the cheek; and,
upon application of a mirror to the lips,
we can detect a torpid, unequal, and
vacillating action of the lungs. Then
again the duration of the trance is for
weeks-even for months; while the
closest scrutiny, and the most rigorous
medical tests, fail to establish any ma-
terial distinction between the state of
the sufferer and what we conceive of
absolute death. Very usually he is
saved from premature interment solely
by the knowledge of his friends that he
has been previously subject to cata-
lepsy, by the consequent suspicion ex-
cited, and, above all, by the non-ap-
pearance of decay. The advances of
the malady are, luckily, gradual. The
first manifestations, although marked,
are unequivocal. The fits grow succes-
sively more and more distinctive, and
endure each for a longer term than the
preceding. In this lies the principal
security from inhumation. The unfor-
tunate whose first attack should be of
the extreme character which is occa-
sionally seen, would almost inevitably
be consigned alive to the tomb.
My own case differed in no important
particular from those mentioned in
medical books. Sometimes, without any
apparent cause, I sank, little by little,
into a condition of semi-syncope, or
half swoon; and, in this condition, with-
out pain, without ability to stir, or,
strictly speaking, to think, but with a
dull lethargic consciousess of life and
of the presence of those who surrounded
my bed, I remained, until the crisis
of the disease restored me, suddenly, to
perfect sensation. At other times I
was quickly and impetuously smitten.
I grew sick, and numb, and chilly, and
dizzy, and so fell prostrate at once.
Then, for weeks, all was void, and
black, and silent, and Nothing became
the universe. Total annihilation could
be no more. From these latter at-
tacks I awoke, however, with a grada-
tion slow in proportion to the sudden-
ness of the seizure. Just as the day
dawns to the friendless and houseless
beggar who roams the streets through-
out the long desolate winter night-
just so tardily-just so wearily—just so
cheerily came back the light of the
Soul to me.
Apart from the tendency to trance,
however, my general health appeared
to be good; nor could I perceive that
it was at all affected by the one preva-
lent malady-unless, indeed, an idiosyn-
crasy in my ordinary sleep may be
looked upon as superinduced. Upon
awaking from slumber, I could never
gain, at once, thorough possession of
my senses, and always remained, for
many minutes, in much bewilderment
and perplexity-the mental faculties in
general, but the memory in especial,
being in a condition of absolute abey-
ance.
In all that I endured there was no
physical suffering, but of moral distress
an infinitude. My fancy grew charnel.
I talked "of worms, of tombs, and
epitaphs." I was lost in reveries of
death, and the idea of premature burial
held continual possession of my brain.
426
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
The ghastly Danger to which I was
subjected haunted me day and night.
In the former, the torture of meditation
was excessive; in the latter, supreme.
When the grim Darkness overspread
the Earth, then, with every horror of
thought, I shook-shook as the quiver-
ing plumes upon the hearse. When Na-
ture
could endure wakefulness no
longer, it was with a struggle that I
consented to sleep-for I shuddered to
reflect that, upon awaking, I might
find myself the tenant of a grave. And
when, finally, I sank into slumber, it
was only to rush at once into a world
of phantasms, above which, with vast,
sable, overshadowing wings, hovered,
predominant, the one sepulchral Idea.
From the innumerable images of
gloom which thus oppressed me in
dreams, I select for record but a soli-
tary vision. Methought I was im-
mersed in a cataleptic trance of more
than usual duration and profundity.
Suddenly there came an icy hand upon
my forehead, and an impatient, gibber-
ing voice whispered the word "Arise!"
within my ear.
I sat erect. The darkness was total.
I could not see the figure of him who
had aroused me. I could call to mind
neither the period at which I had fallen
into the trance, nor the locality in
which I then lay. While I remained
motionless, and busied in endeavors to
collect my thought, the cold hand
grasped me fiercely by the wrist, shak-
ing it petulantly, while the gibbering
voice said again:
"Arise! did I not bid thee arise?"
"And who," I demanded, "art thou?"
"I have no name in the regions which
I inhabit," replied the voice, mourn-
fully; "I was mortal, but am fiend. I
was merciless, but am pitiful. Thou
dost feel that I shudder. My teeth
chatter as I speak, yet it is not with
the chilliness of the night-of the night
without end. But this hideousness is
insufferable. How canst thou tran
quilly sleep? I cannot rest for the cry
of these great agonies. These sights
are more than I can bear. Get thee
up! Come with me into the outer
Night, and let me unfold to thee the
graves. Is not this a spectacle of woe?
-Behold!"
I looked; and the unseen figure,
which still grasped me by the wrist, had
caused to be thrown open the graves of
all mankind; and from each issued the
faint phosphoric radiance of decay; so
that I could see into the innermost
recesses, and there view the shrouded
bodies in their sad and solemn slumbers
with the worm. But alas! the real
sleepers were fewer, by many millions,
than those who slumbered not at all;
and there was a feeble struggling; and
there was a general and sad unrest; and
from out the depths of the countless
pits there came a melancholy rustling
from the garments of the buried. And
of those who seemed tranquilly to re-
pose, I saw that a vast number had
changed, in a greater or less degree,
the rigid and uneasy position in which
they had originally been entombed.
And the voice again said to me as I
gazed:
"Is it not-oh! is it not a pitiful
sight?" But, before I could find words
to reply, the figure had ceased to grasp
my wrist, the phosphoric lights expired,
and the graves were closed with a sud-
den violence, while from out them arose
a tumult of despairing cries, saying
THE PREMATURE BURIAL
427
again: "Is it not-O, God, is it not a
very pitiful sight?"
Phantasies such as these, presenting
themselves at night, extended their ter-
rific influence far into my waking hours.
My nerves became thoroughly unstrung,
and I fell a prey to perpetual horror.
I hesitated to ride, or to walk, or to
indulge in any exercise that would carry
me from home. In fact, I no longer
dared trust myself out of the immediate
presence of those who were aware of
my proneness to catalepsy, lest, falling
into one of my usual fits, I should be
buried before my real condition could
be ascertained. I doubted the care,
the fidelity of my dearest friends. I
dreaded that, in some trance of more
than customary duration, they might
be prevailed upon to regard me as irre-
coverable. I even went so far as to
fear that, as I occasioned much trou-
ble, they might be glad to consider any
very protracted attack as sufficient ex-
cuse for getting rid of me altogether.
It was in vain they endeavored to re-
assure me by the most solemn promises.
I exacted the most sacred oaths, that
under no circumstances they would bury
me until decomposition had so mate-
rially advanced as to render further
preservation impossible. And, even
then, my mortal terrors would listen to
no reason would accept no consola-
tion. I entered into a series of elabo-
rate precautions. Among other things,
I had the family vault so remodelled as
to admit of being readily opened from
within. The slightest pressure upon a
long lever that extended far into the
tomb would cause the iron portals to
fly back. There were arrangements also
for the free admission of air and light,
and convenient receptacles for food and
water, within immediate reach of the
coffin intended for my reception. This
coffin was warmly and softly padded,
and was provided with a lid, fashioned
upon the principle of the vault-door,
with the addition of springs so contrived
that the feeblest movement of the body
would be sufficient to set it at liberty.
Besides all this, there was suspended
from the roof of the tomb, a large bell,
the rope of which, it was designed,
should extend through a hole in the
coffin, and so be fastened to one of
the hands of the corpse. But, alas!
what avails the vigilance against the
Destiny of man? Not even these well-
contrived securities sufficed to save
from the uttermost agonies of living in-
humation, a wretch to these? nie
foredoomed!
There arrived an epoch-as unten
before there had arrived-in which I
found myself emerging from total un-
consciousness into the first feeble and
indefinite sense of existence. Slowly-
with a tortoise gradation-approached
the faint gray dawn of the psychal day.
A torpid uneasiness. An apathetic en-
durance of dull pain. No care-no
hope no effort. Then, after a long in-
terval, a ringing in the ears; then, after
a lapse still longer, a prickling or
tingling sensation in the extremities;
then a seemingly eternal period of pleas-
urable quiescence, during which the
awakening feelings are struggling into
thought; then a brief re-sinking into
nonentity; then a sudden recovery. At
length the slight quivering of an eye-
lid, and immediately thereupon, an elec-
tric shock of a terror, deadly and in-
definite, which sends the blood in tor-
rents from the temples to the heart.
And now the first positive effort to
428
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
think. And now the first endeavor to
remember. And now a partial and
evanescent success. And now the mem-
ory has so far regained its dominion,
that, in some measure, I am cognizant
of my state. I feel that I am not
awaking from ordinary sleep. I recol-
lect that I have been subject to cata-
lepsy. And now, at last, as if by the
rush of an ocean, my shuddering spirit
is overwhelmed by the one grim Danger
-by the one spectral and ever-preva-
lent idea.
For some minutes after this fancy
possessed me, I remained without mo-
tion. And why? I could not summon
courage to move. I dared not make
the effort which was to satisfy me of
my fate-and yet there was something
at my heart which whispered me it was
sure. Despair-such as no other spe-
cies of wretchedness ever calls into
being-despair alone urged me, after
long irresolution, to uplift the heavy
lids of my eyes. I uplifted them. It
was dark-all dark. I knew that the
fit was over. I knew that the crisis of
my disorder had long passed. I knew
that I had now fully recovered the
use of my visual faculties-and yet it
was dark-all dark-the intense and
utter raylessness of the Night that en-
dureth for evermore.
I endeavored to shriek; and my lips
and my parched tongue moved con-
vulsively together in the attempt-but
no voice issued from the cavernous
lungs, which oppressed as if by the
weight of some incumbent mountain,
gasped and palpitated, with the heart,
at every elaborate and struggling
inspiration.
The movement of the jaws, in this
effort to cry aloud, showed me that
they were bound up, as is usual with
the dead. I felt, too, that I lay upon
some hard substance; and by something
similar my sides were, also, closely com-
pressed. So far, I had not ventured
to stir any of my limbs-but now I
violently threw up my arms, which had
been lying at length, with the wrists
crossed. They struck a solid wooden
substance, which extended above my
person at on elevation of not more
than six inches from my face. I could
no longer doubt that I reposed within
a coffin at last.
And now, amid all my infinite mis-
eries, came sweetly the cherub Hope-
for I thought of my precautions. I
writhed, and made spasmodic exertions
to force open the lid: it would not
move. I felt my wrists for the bell-
rope: it was not to be found. And
now the Comforter fled for ever, and
a still sterner Despair reigned
tri-
umphant; for I could not help perceiv-
ing the absence of the paddings which
I had so carefully prepared-and then,
too, there came suddenly to my nostrils
the strong peculiar odor of moist earth.
The conclusion was irresistible. I was
not within the vault. I had fallen into
a trance while absent from home-
while among strangers-when, or how, I
could not remember-and it was they
who had buried me as a dog-nailed up
in some common coffin-and thrus
deep, deep, and for ever, into some
ordinary and nameless grave.
As this awful conviction forced itself,
thus, into the innermost chambers of my
soul, I once again struggled to cry aloud.
And in this second endeavor I succeeded.
A long, wild, and continuous shriek, or
yell, of agony, resounded through the
realms of the subterranean Night.
THE PREMATURE BURIAL
429
"Hillo! hillo, there!" said a gruff
voice, in reply.
"What the devil's the matter now!"
said a second.
"Get out o' that!" said a third.
"What do you mean by yowling in
that ere kind of style, like a catty-
mount?" said a fourth; and hereupon
I was seized and shaken without cere-
mony, for several minutes, by a junto
of very rough-looking individuals. They
did not arouse me from my slumber-
for I was wide-awake when I screamed
-but they restored me to the full pos-
session of my memory.
This adventure occurred near Rich-
mond, in Virginia. Accompanied by a
friend, I had proceeded, upon a gunning
expedition, some miles down the banks
of the James River. Night approached,
and we were overtaken by a storm.
The cabin of a small sloop lying at
anchor in the stream, and laden with
garden mould, afforded us the only
available shelter. We made the best
of it, and passed the night on board. I
slept in one of the only two berths in
the vessel-and the berths of a sloop
of sixty or seventy tons need scarcely
be described. That which I occupied
had no bedding of any kind. Its ex-
treme width was eighteen inches. The
distance of its bottom from the deck
overhead was precisely the same.
found it a matter of exceeding diffi-
culty to squeeze myself in. Neverthe-
less, I slept soundly; and the whole of
my vision-for it was no dream, and no
nightmare-arose naturally from the
circumstances of my position-from my
ordinary bias of thought-and from the
difficulty, to which I have alluded, of
collecting my senses, and especially of
regaining my memory, for a long time
I
after awaking from slumber. The men
who shook me were the crew of the
sloop, and some laborers engaged to
unload it. From the load itself came
the earthly smell. The bandage about
the jaws was a silk handkerchief in
which I had bound up my head, in de-
fault of my customary nightcap.
The tortures endured, however, were
indubitably quite equal, for the time,
to those of actual sepulture. They
were fearfully-they were inconceiv-
ably hideous; but out of Evil proceeded
Good; for their very excess wrought in
my spirit an inevitable revulsion. My
soul acquired tone-acquired temper.
I went abroad. I took vigorous exer-
cise. I breathed the free air of Heaven.
I thought upon other subjects than
Death. I discarded my medical books.
"Buchan" I burned. I read no "Night
Thoughts"-no fustian about church-
yards-no bugaboo tales-such as this.
In short I became a new man, and lived
a man's life. From that memorable
night, I dismissed forever my charnel
apprehensions, and with them vanished
the cataleptic disorder, of which, per-
haps, they had been less the conse-
quence than the cause.
There are moments when, even to
the sober eye of Reason, the world of
our sad Humanity may assume the
semblance of a Hell-but the imagina-
tion of man is no Carathis, to explore
with impunity its every cavern. Alas!
the grim legion of sepulchral terrors can-
not be regarded as altogether fanciful-
but, like the Demons in whose company
Afrasiab made his voyage down the
Oxus, they must sleep, or they will
devour us-they must be suffered to
slumber, or we perish.
(
The Narrative of A. Gordon Pym
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
UPON my return to the United States
a few months ago, after the extraordi-
nary series of adventure in the South
Seas and elsewhere, of which an account
is given in the following pages, accident
threw me into the society of several
gentlemen in Richmond, Va., who felt
deep interest in all matters relating to
the regions I had visited, and who were
constantly urging it upon me, as a duty,
to give my narrative to the public. I
had several reasons, however, for de-
clining to do so, some of which were
of a nature altogether private, and con-
cern no person but myself; others not
so much so. One consideration which
deterred me was, that having kept no
journal during a greater portion of the
time in which I was absent, I feared I
should not be able to write, from mere
memory, a statement so minute and
connected as to have the appearance of
that truth it would really possess, bar-
ring only the natural and unavoidable
exaggeration to which all of us are
prone when detailing events which have
had powerful influence in exciting the
imaginative faculties. Another reason
was, that the incidents to be narrated
were of a nature so positively marvel-
lous that, unsupported as my assertions
must necessarily be (except by the evi-
dence of a single individual, and he a
half-breed Indian), I could only hope
for belief among my family, and those
of my friends who have had reason,
through life, to put faith in my verac-
ity-the probability being that the pub-
lic at large would regard what I should
put forth as merely an impudent and
ingenious fiction. A distrust in my
own abilities as a writer was, neverthe-
less, one of the principal causes which
prevented me from complying with the
suggestion of my advisers.
Among those gentlemen in Virginia
who expressed the greatest interest in
my statement, more particularly in re-
gard to that portion of it which related
to the Antartic Ocean, was Mr. Poe,
lately editor of the Southern Literary
Messenger, a monthly magazine, pub-
lished by Mr. Thomas W. White, in the
city of Richmond. He strongly advised
me, among others, to prepare at once
a full account of what I had seen and
undergone, and trust to the shrewdness
and common-sense of the public-in-
sisting, with great plausibility, that
however roughly, as regards mere au-
thorship, my book should be got up, its
very uncouthness, if there were any,
would give it all the better chance of
being received as truth.
Notwithstanding this representation,
I did not make up my mind to do as
he suggested. He afterward proposed
(finding that I would not stir in the
matter) that I should allow him to
draw up, in his own words, a narrative
of the earlier portion of my adventures
from facts afforded by myself, publish-
431
432
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ing it in the Southern Messenger under
the garb of fiction. To this, perceiving
no objection, I consented, stipulating
only that my real name should be re-
tained. Two numbers of the pretended
fiction appeared, consequently, in the
Messenger for January and February,
(1837), and, in order that it might cer-
tainly be regarded as fiction, the name
of Mr. Poe was affixed to the articles
in the table of contents of the mag-
azine.
The manner in which this ruse was
received has induced me at length to
undertake a regular compilation and
publication of the adventures in ques-
tion; for I found that, in spite of the
air of fable which had been so ingen-
iously thrown around that portion of
my statement which appeared in the
Messenger (without altering or distort-
ing a single fact), the public were still
not at all disposed to receive it as fable,
and several letters were sent to Mr.
P.'s address, distinctly expressing a con-
viction to the contrary. I thence con-
cluded that the facts of my narrative
would prove of such a nature as to
carry with them sufficient evidence of
their own authenticity, and that I had
consequently little to fear on the score
of popular incredulity.
This expose being made, it will be
seen at once how much of what follows
I claim to be in my own writing; and
it will also be understood that no fact
is misrepresented in the first few pages
which were written by Mr. Poe. Even
to those readers who have not seen the
Messenger, it will be unnecessary to
point out where his portion ends and
my own commences; the difference in
point of style will be readily perceived.
A. G. PYM.
CHAPTER I
My name is Arthur Gordon Pym.
My father was a respectable trader in
sea-stores at Nantucket, where I was
born. My maternal grandfather was an
attorney in good practice. He was for-
tunate in every thing, and had specu
lated very successfully in stocks of the
Edgarton New Bank, as it was formerly
called. By these and other means h
had managed to lay by a tolerable sun
of money. He was more attached to
myself, I believe, than to any othe
person in the world, and I expected t
inherit the most of his property at hi
death. He sent me, at six years
age, to the school of old Mr. Ricketts
a gentleman with only one arm, and
eccentric manners-he is well known t
almost every person who has visite
New Bedford. I stayed at his schoo
until I was sixteen, when I left hir
for Mr. E. Ronald's academy on th
hill. Here I became intimate with th
son of Mr. Barnard, a sea-captain, wh
generally sailed in the employ of Lloy
and Vredenburgh-Mr. Barnard is als
very well known in New Bedford, an
has many relations, I am certain, i
Edgarton. His son was named Augu
tus, and he was nearly two years olde
than myself. He had been on a whalin
voyage with his father in the Joh
Donaldson, and was always talking t
me of his adventures in the Sout
Pacific Ocean. I used frequently to g
home with him, and remain all day, an
sometimes all night. We occupied th
same bed, and he would be sure t
keep me awake until almost light, tell
ing me stories of the natives of th
Island of Tinian, and other places h
had visited in his travels. At last
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
433
could not help being interested in what
he said, and by degrees I felt the great-
est desire to go to sea. I owned a sail-
boat called the Ariel, and worth about
seventy-five dollars. She had a half
deck or cuddy, and was rigged sloop-
fashion-I forget her tonnage, but she
would hold ten persons without much
crowding. In this boat we were in the
habit of going on some of the maddest
freaks in the world; and, when I now
think of them, it appears to me a thou-
sand wonders that I am alive to-day.
I will relate one of these adventures
by way of introduction to a longer and
more momentous narrative. One night
there was a party at Mr. Barnard's, and
both Augustus and myself were not a
little intoxicated toward the close of it.
As usual, in such cases, I took part of
his bed in preference to going home.
He went to sleep, as I thought, very
quietly (it being near one when the
party broke up), and without saying a
word on his favorite topic. It might
have been half an hour from the time
of our getting in bed, and I was just
about falling into a doze, when he sud-
denly started up, and swore with a ter-
rible oath that he would not go to sleep
for any Arthur Pym in Christendom,
when there was so glorious a breeze
from the southwest. I never was so
astonished in my life, not knowing what
he intended, and thinking that the wines
and liquors he had drunk had set him
entirely beside himself. He proceeded
to talk very coolly, however, saying he
knew that I supposed him intoxicated,
but that he was never more sober in
his life. He was only tired, he added,
of lying in bed on such a fine night
like a dog, and was determined to get
up and dress, and go out on a frolic
with the boat. I can hardly tell what.
possessed me, but the words were no
sooner out of his mouth than I felt a
thrill of the greatest excitement and
pleasure, and thought his mad idea one
of the most delightful and most reason-
able things in the world. It was blow-
ing almost a gale, and the weather was
very cold-it being late in October. I
sprang out of bed, nevertheless, in a
kind of ecstacy, and told him I was
quite as brave as himself, and quite as
tired as he was of lying in bed like
a dog, and quite as ready for any fun
or frolic as any Augustus Barnard in
Nantucket.
We lost no time in getting on our
clothes and hurrying down to the boat.
She was lying at the old decayed wharf
by the lumber-yard of Pankey & Co.,
and almost thumping her side out
against the rough logs. Augustus got
into her and bailed her, for she was
nearly half full of water. This being
done, we hoisted jib and mainsail, kept
full, and started boldly out to sea.
The wind, as I before said, blew
freshly from the southwest. The night
was very clear and cold. Augustus had
taken the helm, and I stationed myself
by the mast, on the deck of the cuddy.
We flew along at a great rate-neither
of us having said a word since casting
loose from the wharf. I now asked my
companion what course he intended to
steer, and what time he thought it prob-
able we should get back. He whistled
for a few minutes, and then said crust-
ily: "I am going to sea-you may go
home if you think proper." Turning
my eyes upon him, I perceived at once
that, in spite of his assumed nonchal-
ance, he was greatly agitated. I could
see him distinctly by the light of the
434
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
moon-his face was paler than any
marble, and his hand shook so exces-
sively that he could scarcely retain hold
of the tiller. I found that something
had gone wrong, and became seriously
alarmed. At this period I knew little
about the management of a boat, and
was now depending entirely upon the
nautical skill of my friend. The wind,
too, had suddenly increased, and we
were fast getting out of the lee of the
land-still I was ashamed to betray any
trepidation, and for almost half an hour
maintained a resolute silence. I could
stand it no longer, however, and spoke
to Augustus about the propriety of
turning back. As before, it was nearly
a minute before he made answer, or
took any notice of my suggestion. "By
and by," said he at length-"time
enough-home by and by." I had ex-
pected such a reply, but there was
something in the tone of these words
which filled me with an indescribable
feeling of dread. I again looked at the
speaker attentively. His lips were per-
fectly livid, and his knees shook so
violently together that he seemed
scarcely able to stand. "For God's
sake, Augustus," I screamed, now heart-
ily frightened, "what ails you?-what
is the matter?-what are you going to
do?" "Matter!" he stammered, in the
greatest apparent surprise, letting go
the tiller at the same moment, and
falling forward into the bottom of the
boat-"matter-why, nothing is the
matter― going home-d-d—don't
you see?" The whole truth now flashed
upon me. I flew to him and raised
him up. He was drunk-beastly drunk
-he could no longer either stand, speak
or see. His eyes were perfectly glazed;
and as I let him go in the extremity of
-
my despair, he rolled like a mere log
into the bilgewater, from which I had
lifted him. It was evident that, dur
ing the evening, he had drunk far more
than I suspected, and that his conduct
in bed had been the result of a highly
concentrated state of intoxication-
state which, like madness, frequently
enables the victim to imitate the out
ward demeanor of one in perfect pos
session of his senses. The coolness o
the night air, however, had had it
usual effect-the mental energy began
to yield before its influence-and the
confused perception which he no doub
then had of his perilous situation ha
assisted in hastening the catastrophe
He was now thoroughly insensible, and
there was no probability that he woul
be otherwise for many hours.
It is hardly possible to conceive th
extremity of my terror. The fumes o
the wine lately taken had evaporated
leaving me doubly timid and irresolute
I knew that I was altogether incapabl
of managing the boat, and that a-fierc
wind and strong ebb-tide were hurryin
us to destruction. A storm was evi
dently gathering behind us; we ha
neither compass nor provisions; and i
was clear that, if we held our preser
course, we should be out of sight
land before daybreak. These thought
with a crowd of others equally fearfu
flashed through my mind with a bewi
dering rapidity, and for some momen
paralyzed me beyond the possibility
making any exertion. The boat w
going through the water at a terrib
rate-full before the wind-no reef i
either jib or mainsail-running he
bows completely under the foam. 1
was a thousand wonders she did no
broach to Augustus having let go th
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
435
tiller, as I said before, and I being too
much agitated to think of taking it my-
self. By good luck, however, she kept
steady, and gradually I recovered some
degree of presence of mind. Still the
wind was increasing fearfully; and
whenever we rose from a plunge for-
ward, the sea behind fell combing over
our counter, and deluged us with water.
I was so utterly benumbed, too, in
every limb, as to be nearly unconscious
of sensation. At length I summoned
up the resolution of despair, and rush-
ing to the mainsail, let it go by the run.
As might have been expected, it flew
over the bows, and, getting drenched
with water, carried away the mast short
off by the board. This latter accident
alone saved me from instant destruc-
tion. Under the jib only, I now
boomed along before the wind, ship-
ping heavy seas occasionally, but re-
lieved from the terror of immediate
death. I took the helm, and breathed
with greater freedom, as I found that
there, yet remained to us a chance of
ultimate escape. Augustus still lay
senseless in the bottom of the boat;
and as there was imminent danger of
his drowning (the water being nearly
a foot deep just where he fell), I con-
trived to raise him partially up, and
keep him in a sitting position, by pass-
ing a rope round his waist, and lashing
it to a ring-bolt in the deck of the
cuddy. Having thus arranged every
thing as well as I could in my chilled
and agitated condition, I recommended
myself to God, and made up my mind
to bear whatever might happen with
all the fortitude in my power.
Hardly had I come to this resolution,
when, suddenly, a loud and long scream
or yell, as if from the throats of a
thousand demons, seemed to pervade
the whole atmosphere around and above
the boat. Never while I live shall I
forget the intense agony of terror I
experienced at that moment. My hair
stood erect on my head-I felt the
blood congealing in my veins-my
heart ceased utterly to beat, and with-
out having once raised my eyes to learn
the source of my alarm, I tumbled
headlong and insensible upon the body
of my fallen companion.
I found myself, upon reviving, in the
cabin of a large whaling-ship (the Pen-
guin) bound to Nantucket. Several
persons were standing over me, and
Augustus, paler than death, was busily
occupied in chafing my hands. Upon
seeing me open my eyes, his exclama-
tions of gratitude and joy excited alter-
nate laughter and tears from the rough
looking personages who were present.
The mystery of our being in existence
was now soon explained. We had been
run down by the whaling-ship, which
was close-hauled, beating up to Nan-
tucket with every sail she could ven-
ture to set, and consequently running
almost at right angles to our Own
course. Several men were on the look-
out forward, but did not perceive our
boat until it was an impossibility to
avoid coming in contact-their shouts
of warning upon seeing us were what
so terribly alarmed me. The huge ship,
I was told, rode immediately over us
with as much ease as our own little
vessel would have passed over a feather,
and without the least perceptible im-
pediment to her progress. Not a scream
arose from the deck of the victim-
there was a slight grating sound to be
heard mingling with the roar of wind
and water, as the frail bark which was
436
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
swallowed up rubbed for a moment
along the keel of her destroyer-but
this was all. Thinking our boat (which
it will be remembered was dismasted)
some mere shell cut adrift as useless,
the captain (Captain E. T. V. Block,
of New London) was for proceeding on
his course without troubling himself
further about the
matter. Luckily,
there were two of the look-out who
swore positively to having seen some
person at our helm, and represented the
possibility of yet saving him. A dis-
cussion ensued, when Block grew angry,
and, after a while, said that “it was no
business of his to be eternally watching
for egg-shells; that the ship should not
put about for any such nonsense; and
if there was a man run down, it was
nobody's fault but his own-he might
drown and be d-d," or some language
to that effect. Henderson, the first
mate, now took the matter up, being
justly indignant, as well as the whole
ship's crew, at a speech evincing such
a degree of heartless atrocity. He spoke
plainly, seeing himself upheld by the
men, told the captain he considered him
a fit subject for the gallows, and that
he would disobey his orders if he were
hanged for it the moment he set his
foot on shore. He strode aft, jostling
Block (who turned pale and made no
answer) on one side, and seizing the
helm, gave the word, in a firm voice,
Hard-a-lee! The men flew to their
posts, and the ship went cleverly about.
All this had occupied nearly five min-
utes, and it was supposed to be hardly
within the bounds of possibility that
any individual could be saved-allow-
ing any to have been on board the boat.
Yet, as the reader has seen, both Au-
gustus and myself were rescued; and
our deliverance seemed to have been
brought about by two of those almost
inconceivable pieces of good fortune.
which are attributed by the wise and
pious to the special interference of
Providence.
While the ship was yet in stays, the
mate lowered the jolly-boat and jumped
into her with the very two men, 1
believe, who spoke up as having seer
me at the helm. They had just lef
the lee of the vessel (the moon stil
shining brightly) when she made a lon
and heavy roll to windward, and Hen
derson, at the same moment, starting
up in his seat, bawled out to his cre
to back water. He would say nothin
else-repeating his cry impatiently
back water! back water! The men pu
back as speedily as possible; but by
this time the ship had gone round
and gotten fully under headway
although all hands on board were mak
ing great exertions to take in sail. I
despite of the danger of the attempt, th
mate clung to the main-chains as soo
as they came within his reach. Anothe
huge lurch now brought the starboar
side of the vessel out of the wate
neatly as far as her keel, when th
cause of his anxiety was rendere
obvious enough. The body of a ma
was seen to be affixed in the most sin
gular manner to the smooth and shin
ing bottom (the Penguin was coppere
and copper-fastened), and beating vio
lently against it with every movemen
of the hull. After several ineffectua
efforts, made during the lurches of th
ship, and at the imminent risk o
swamping the boat, I was finally dis
engaged from my perilous situation an
taken on board-for the body prove
to be my own. It appeared that on
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
437
of the timber-bolts having started and
broken a passage through the copper, it
had arrested my progress as I passed
under the ship, and fastened me in so
extraordinary a manner to her bottom.
The head of the bolt had made its way
through the collar of the green baize
jacket I had on, and through the back
part of my neck, forcing it self out
between two sinews and just below the
right ear. I was immediately put to
bed-although life seemed to be totally
extinct. There was no surgeon on
board. The captain, however, treated
me with every attention-to make
amends, I presume, in the eyes of his
crew, for his atrocious behavior in the
previous portion of the adventure.
In the meantime, Henderson had
again put off from the ship, although
the wind was now blowing almost a
hurricane. He had not been gone many
minutes when he fell in with some
fragments of our boat, and shortly
afterward one of the men with him
asserted that he could distinguish a cry
for help at intervals amid the roaring
of the tempest. This induced the hardy
seamen to persevere in their search for
more than half an hour, although re-
peated signals to return were made
them by Captain Block and although
every moment on the water in so frail
a boat was fraught to them with the
most imminent and deadly peril. In-
deed, it is nearly impossible to conceive
how the small jolly they were in could
have escaped destruction for a single
instant. She was built, however, for
the whaling service, and was fitted, as
I have since had reason to believe, with
air-boxes, in the manner of some life-
boats used on the coast of Wales.
After searching in vain for about the
period of time just mentioned, it was
determined to get back to the ship.
They had scarcely made this resolve
when a feeble cry arose from a dark
object that floated rapidly by. They
pursued and soon overtook it. It proved
to be the entire deck of the Ariel's
cuddy. Augustus was struggling near
it, apparently in the last agonies. Upon
getting hold of him it was found that
he was attached by a rope to the float-
ing timber. This rope, it will be re-
membered, I had myself tied around his
waist, and made fast to a ring-bolt, for
the purpose of keeping him in an up-
right position, and my so doing, it ap-
peared, had been ultimately the means
of preserving his life. The Ariel was
slightly put together, and in going down
her frame naturally went to pieces; the
deck of the cuddy, as might have been
expected, was lifted, by the force of the
water rushing in, entirely from the main
timbers, and floated (with other frag-
ments, no doubt) to the surface-Au-
gustus was buoyed up with it, and thus
escaped a terrible death.
It was more than an hour ofter being
taken on board the Penguin before he
could give any account of himself, or
be made to comprehend the nature of
the accident which had befallen our
boat. At length he became thoroughly
aroused, and spoke much of his sensa-
tions while in the water. Upon his first
attaining any degree of consciousness,
he found himself beneath the surface,
whirling round and round with incon-
ceivable rapidity, and with a rope
wound in three or four folds tightly
about his neck. In an instant after-
ward he felt himself going rapidly up-
ward, when, his head striking violently
against a hard substance, he again re-
438
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
lapsed in insensibility. Upon once more
reviving he was in fuller possesion of
his reason this was still, however, in
the greatest degree clouded and con-
fused. He now knew that some acci-
dent had occurred, and that he was in
the water, although his mouth was
above the surface, and he could breathe
with some freedom. Possibly, at this
period the deck was drifting rapidly
before the wind, and drawing him after
it as he floated upon his back. Of
course, as long as he could have re-
tained his position, it would have been
nearly impossible that he should be
drowned. Presently a surge threw him
directly athwart the deck; and this
post he endeavored to maintain,
screaming at intervals for help. Just
before he was discovered by Mr. Hen-
derson, he had been obliged to relax
his hold through exhaustion, and, fall-
ing into the sea, had given himself up
for lost. During the whole period of
his struggles he had not the faintest
recollection of the Ariel, nor of any
matters in connection with the source
of his disaster. A vague feeling of ter-
ror and despair had taken entire pos-
session of his faculties. When he was
finally picked up, every power of his
mind had failed him; and, as before
said, it was nearly an hour after get-
ting on board the Penguin before he
became fully aware of his condition.
In regard to myself-I was resuscitated
from a state bordering very nearly upon
death (and after every other means had
been tried in vain for three hours and
a half) by vigorous friction with flan-
nels bathed in hot oil-a proceeding
suggested by Augustus. The wound in
my neck, although of an ugly appear-
ance, proved of little real consequence,
and I soon recovered from its effects.
The Penguin got into port about nine
o'clock in the morning, after encounter-
ing one of the severest gales ever ex
perienced off Nantucket. Both Augus
tus and myself managed to appear at
Mr. Barnard's in time for breakfast-
which luckily, was somewhat late,
owing to the party overnight. I sup
pose, all at the table were too much
fatigued themselves to notice our jaded
appearance of course, it would not
have borne a very rigid scrutiny
School-boys, however, can accomplish
wonders in the way of deception, and 1
verily believe not one of our friends in
Nantucket had the slightest suspicion
that the terrible story told by some
sailors in town of their having ru
down a vessel at sea and drowned some
thirty or forty poor devils, had refer
ence either to the Ariel, my compan
ion, or myself. We two have since very
frequently talked the matter over-bui
never without a shudder. In one of ou
conversations Augustus frankly com
fessed to me, that in his whole life h
had at no time experienced so excru
ciating a sense of dismay, as when ot
board our little boat he first discovere
the extent of his intoxication, and fel
himself sinking beneath its influence.
CHAPTER II
IN no affairs of mere prejudice, pr
or con, do we deduce inferences with
entire certainty, even from the mos
simple data. It might be supposed the
a catastrophe such as I have just re
lated would have effectually cooled my
incipient passion for the sea. On the
contrary, I never experienced a more
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
439
ardent longing for the wild adventures
incident to the life of a navigator than
within a week after our miraculous de-
liverance. This short period proved
amply long enough to erase from my
memory the shadows and bring out in
vivid light all the pleasurably exciting
points of color, all the picturesqueness,
of the late perilous accident. My con-
versations with Augustus grew daily
more frequent and more intensely full
of interest. He had a manner of re-
lating his stories of the ocean (more
than one half of which I now suspect
to have been sheer fabrications) well
adapted to have weight with one of my
enthusiastic temperament and some-
what gloomy although glowing imagina-
tion. It is strange, too, that he most
strongly enlisted my feelings in behalf
of the life of a seaman, when he de-
picted his more terrible moments of
suffering and despair. For the bright
side of the painting I had a limited
sympathy. My visions were of ship-
wreck and famine; of death or captiv-
ity among barbarian hordes; of a life-
time dragged out in sorrow and tears,
upon some gray and desolate rock, in
an ocean unapproachable and unknown.
Such visions or desires for they
amounted to desires are common, I
have since been assured, to the whole
numerous race of the melancholy
among men at the time of which I
speak I regarded them only as pro-
phetic glimpses of a destiny which I
felt myself in a measure bound to ful-
fil. Augustus thoroughly entered into
my state of mind. It is probable, in-
deed, that our intimate communion had
resulted in a partial interchange of
character.
About eighteen months after the
Mr.
period of the Ariel's disaster, the firm
of Lloyd and Vredenburgh (a house
connected in some manner with the
Messieurs Enderby, I believe, of Liver-
pool) were engaged in repairing and
fitting out the brig Grampus for a whal-
ing voyage. She was an old hulk, and
scarcely sea-worthy when all was done
to her that could be done. I hardly
know why she was chosen in preference
to other and good vessels belonging to
the same owners-but so it was.
Barnard was appointed to command
her, and Augustus was going with him.
While the brig was getting ready, he
frequently urged upon me the excel-
lency of the opportunity now offered
for indulging my desire of travel. He
found me by no means an unwilling
listener―yet the matter could not be so
easily arranged. My father made no
direct opposition; but my mother went
into hysterics at the bare mention of
the design; and, more than all, my
grandfather, from whom I expected
much, vowed to cut me off with a shil-
ling if I should ever broach the subject
to him again. These difficulties, how-
ever, so far from abating my desire,
only added fuel to the flame. I deter
mined to go at all hazards; and, having
made known my intentions to Augustus,
we set about arranging a plan by which
it might be accomplished. In the mean-
time I forbore speaking to any of my
relations in regard to the voyage, and,
as I busied myself ostensibly with my
usual studies, it was supposed that I
had abandoned the design. I have since
frequently examined my conduct on
this occasion with sentiments of dis-
pleasure as well as of surprise. The
intense hypocrisy I made use of for the
furtherance of my project-an hypoc-
440
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
risy pervading every word and action
of my life for so long a period of time
-could only have been rendered toler-
able to myself by the wild and burning
expectation with which I looked for-
ward to the fulfilment of my long-
cherished visions of travel.
In pursuance of my scheme of de-
ception, I was necessarily obliged to
leave much to the management of Au-
gustus, who was employed for the
greater part of every day on board the
Grampus, attending to some arrange-
ments for his father in the cabin and
cabin-hold. At night, however, we were
sure to have a conference and talk over
our hopes. After nearly a month
passed in this manner, without our hit-
ting upon any plan we thought likely
to succeed, he told me at last that he
had determined upon every thing neces-
sary. I had a relation living in New
Bedford, a Mr. Ross, at whose house I
was in the habit of spending occasion-
ally two or three weeks at a time. The
brig was to sail about the middle of
June (June, 1827), and it was agreed
that, a day or two before her putting
to sea, my father was to receive a note,
as usual, from Mr. Ross, asking me to
come over and spend a fortnight with
Robert and Emmet (his sons). Augus-
tus charged himself with the inditing
of this note and getting it delivered.
Having set out, as supposed, for New
Bedford, I was then to report myself
to my companion, who would contrive
a hiding-place for me in the Grampus.
This hiding-place, he assured me, would
be rendered sufficiently comfortable for
a residence of many days, during which
I was not to make my appearance.
When the brig had proceeded so far
on her course as to make any turning
back a matter out of question, I should
then, he said, be formally installed in
all the comforts of the cabin; and as to
his father, he would only laugh heartily
at the joke. Vessels enough would be
met with by which a letter might be
sent home explaining the adventure to
my parents.
The middle of June at length arrived.
and every thing had been matured.
The note was written and delivered, and
on a Monday morning I left the house
for the New Bedford packet, as sup-
posed. I went, however, straight to
Augustus, who was waiting for me at
the corner of a street. It had been our
original plan that I should keep out of
the way until dark, and then slip on
board the brig; but, as there was now a
thick fog in our favor, it was agreed
to lose no time in secreting me. Au-
gustus led the way to the wharf, and I
followed at a little distance, enveloped
in a thick seaman's cloak, which he had
brought with him, so that my person
might not be easily recognized. Just as
we turned the second corner,
after pass
ing Mr. Edmund's well, who should ap
pear, standing right in front of me, and
looking me full in the face, but old Mr.
Peterson, my grandfather. "Why, bless
my soul, Gordon," said he, after a long
pause, "why, why, whose dirty cloak
is that you have on?" "Sir!" I re-
plied, assuming, as well as I could, in
the exigency of the moment, an air of
offended surprise, and talking in the
gruffest of all imaginable tones-“sir!
you are a sum'mat mistaken-my name,
in the first place, bee'nt nothing at all
like Gordon, and I'd want you for to
know better, you blackguard, than to
call my new overcoat a darty one."
For my life I could hardly refrain from
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
441
screaming with laughter at the odd
manner in which the old gentleman
received this handsome rebuke. He
started back two or three steps, turned
first pale and then excessively red,
threw up his spectacles, then, putting
them down, ran full tilt at me, with
his umbrella uplifted. He stopped
short, however, in his career, as if
struck with a sudden recollection; and
presently, turning round, hobbled off
down the street, shaking all the while
with rage, and muttering between his
teeth: "Won't do-new glasses-
thought it was Gordon-d-d good-for-
nothing salt water Long Tom.”
After this narrow escape we pro-
ceeded with greater caution, and ar-
rived at our point of destination in
safety. There were only one or two
of the hands on board, and these were
busy forward, doing something to the
forecastle combings. Captain Barnard,
we knew very well, was engaged at
Lloyd and Vredenburgh's, and would
remain there until late in the evening,
so we had little to apprehend on his
account. Augustus went first up the
vessel's side, and in a short while I fol-
loved him, without being noticed by the
men at work. We proceeded at once
into the cabin, and found no person
there. it was fitted up in the most
comfortable style-a thing somewhat
unusual in a whaling-vessel. There
were four very excellent state-rooms,
with wide and convenient berths. There
was also a large stove, I took notice,
and a remarkably thick and valuable
carpet covering the floor of both the
cabin and state-rooms. The ceiling
was full seven feet high, and, in short,
every thing appeared of a more roomy
and agreeable nature than I had an-
ticipated. Augustus, however, would
allow me but little time for observa-
tion, insisting upon the necessity of my
concealing myself as soon as possible.
He led the way into his own state-
room, which was on the starboard side
of the brig, and next to the bulkheads.
Upon entering, he closed the door and
bolted it. I thought I had never seen
a nicer little room than the one in
which I now found myself. It was
about ten feet long, and had only one
berth, which, as I said before, was wide
and convenient. In that portion of the
closet nearest the bulkheads there was a
space of four feet square, containing a
table, a chair, and a set of hanging
shelves full of books, chiefly books of
voyages and travels. There were many
other little comforts in the room,
among which I ought not to forget a
kind of safe or refrigerator, in which
Augustus pointed out to me a host of
delicacies, both in the eating and drink-
ing department.
He now pressed with his knuckles
upon a certain spot of the carpet in one
corner of the space just mentioned,
letting me know that a portion of the
flooring, about sixteen inches square,
had been neatly cut out and again ad-
justed. As he pressed, this portion
rose up at one end sufficiently to allow
the passage of his finger beneath. In
this manner he raised the mouth of the
trap (to which the carpet was still
fastened by tacks), and I found that
it led into the after-hold. He next lit
a small taper by means of a phosphor-
ous match, and, placing the light in a
dark lantern, descended with it through
the opening, bidding me follow. I did
so, and he then pulled the cover upon
the hole, by means of a nail driven
442
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
into the under side-the carpet, of
course, resuming its original position on
the floor of the state-room, and all
traces of the aperture being concealed.
The taper gave out so feeble a ray
that it was with the greatest difficulty
I could grope my way through the con-
fused mass of lumber among which I
now found myself. By degrees, how-
ever, my eyes became accustomed to
the gloom, and I proceeded with less
trouble, holding on to the skirts of my
friend's coat. He brought me, at
length, after creeping and winding
through innumerable narrow passages,
to an iron-bound box, such as is used
sometimes for packing fine earthen-
ware. It was nearly four feet high, and
full six long, but very narrow. Two
large empty oil-casks lay on the top
of it, and above these, again, a vast
quantity of straw matting, piled up as
high as the floor of the cabin. In every
direction around was wedged as closely
as possible, even up to the ceiling, a
complete chaos of almost every species
of ship-furniture, together with a
heterogeneous medley of crates, ham-
pers, barrels, and bales, so that it
seemed a matter no less than mirac-
ulous that we had discovered any pas-
sage at all to the box. I afterward
found that Augustus had purposely ar-
ranged the stowage in this hold with a
view to affording me a thorough: con-
cealment, having had only one assistant
in the labor, a man not going out in the
brig.
My companion now showed me that
one of the ends of the box could be
removed at pleasure. He slipped it
aside and displayed the interior, at
which I was excessively amused. A
mattress from one of the cabin berths
covered the whole of its bottom, and it
contained almost every article of mere (
comfort which could be crowded into
so small a space, allowing me, at the
same time, sufficient room for my ac-
commodation, either in a sitting posi
tion or lying at full length. Among
other things, there were some books,
pen, ink, and paper, three blankets, a
large jug full of water, a keg of sea-
biscuit, three or four immense Bologna
sausages, an enormous ham, a cold leg
of roast mutton, and half a dozen bot-
tles of cordials and liqueurs. I pro-
ceeded immediately to take possession
of my little apartment, and this with
feelings of higher satisfaction, I am
sure, than any monarch ever exper
ienced upon entering a new palace. Au-
gustus now pointed out to me the
method of fastening the open end of
the box, and then, holding the taper
close to the deck, showed me a piece
of dark whipcord lying along it. This.
he said, extended from my hiding-place
throughout all the necessary windings
among the lumber, to a nail which was
driven into the deck of the hold, im-
mediately beneath the trap-door leading
into his state-room. By means of this
cord I should be enabled readily to
trace my way out without his guidance.
provided any unlooked for accident
should render such a step necessary.
He now took his departure, leaving with
me the lantern, together with a copious
supply of papers and phosphorous, and
promising to pay me a visit as often as
he could contrive to do so without ob-
servation. This was on the seventeenth
of June.
I remained three days and nights (as
nearly as I could guess) in my hiding-
place without getting out of it at all
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
443
except twice for the purpose of stretch-
ing my limbs by standing erect between
two crates just opposite the opening.
During the whole period I saw nothing
of Augustus; but this occasioned me
little uneasiness, as I knew the brig
was expected to put to sea every hour,
and in the bustle he could not easily
find opportunities of coming down to
me. At length I heard the trap open
and shut, and presently he called in a
low voice; asking if all was well, and
if there was any thing I wanted.
"Nothing," I replied; "I am as com-
fortable as can be; when will the brig
sail?" "She will be under way in less
than half an hour," he answered. "I
came to let you know, and for fear you
should be uneasy at my absence. I
shall not have a chance of coming down
again for some time-perhaps for three
or four days more. All is going on
right above-board. After I go up and
close the trap, do you creep along the
whipcord to where the nail is driven
in. You will find my watch there—
it may be useful to you, as you have
no daylight to keep time by. I suppose
you can't tell how long you have been
buried-only three days-this is the
twentieth. I would bring the watch to
your box, but am afraid of being
missed." With this he went up.
In about an hour after he had gone
I distinctly felt the brig in motion, and
congratulated myself upon having at
length fairly commenced a voyage.
Satisfied with this idea, I determined
to make my mind as easy as possible,
and await the course of events until I
should be permitted to exchange the
box for the more roomy, although
hardly more comfortable accommoda-
tions of the cabin. My first care was
to get the watch. Leaving the taper
burning, I groped along in the dark,
following the cord through windings
innumerable, in some of which I dis-
covered that, after toiling a long dis-
tance, I was brought back within a
foot or two of a former position. At
length I reached the nail, and securing
the object of my journey, returned
with it in safety. I now looked over
the books which had been so thought-
fully provided, and selected the expe-
dition of Lewis and Clarke to the mouth
of the Columbia. With this I amused
myself for some time, when, growing
sleepy, I extinguished the light with
great care, and soon fell into a sound
slumber.
Upon awakening I felt strangely
confused in mind, and some time
elapsed before I could bring to recol
lection all the various circumstances of
my situation. By degrees, however, I
remembered all. Striking a light, I
looked at the watch; but it was run
down, and there were, consequently, no
means of determining how long I slept.
My limbs were greatly cramped, and I
was forced to relieve them by standing
between the crates. Presently feeling
an almost ravenous appetite, I be-
thought myself of the cold mutton,
some of which I had eaten just before
going to sleep, and found excellent.
What was my astonishment in discover-
ing it to be in a state of absolute putre-
faction! This circumstance occasioned
me great disquietude; for, connecting it
with the disorder of mind I exper-
ienced upon awakening, I began to sup-
pose that I must have slept for an in-
ordinately long period of time. The
close atmosphere of the hold might
have something to do with this, and
444
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
might, in the end, be productive of the
most serious results. My head ached
excessively; I fancied that I drew every
breath with difficulty; and, in short, I
was oppressed with a multitude of
gloomy feelings. Still I could not
venture to make any disturbance by
opening the trap or otherwise, and, hav-
ing wound up the watch, contented my-
self as well as possible.
Throughout the whole of the next
tedious twenty-four hours no person
came to my relief, and I could not
help accusing Augustus of the grossest
inattention. What alarmed me chiefly
was, that the water in my jug was re-
duced to about half a pint, and I was
suffering much from thirst, having
having
eaten freely of the Bologna sausages
after the loss of my mutton. I became
very uneasy, and could no longer take
any interest in my books. I was over-
powered, too, with a desire to sleep,
yet trembled at the thought of in-
dulging it, lest there might exist some
pernicious influence, like that of burn-
ing charcoal, in the confined air of the
hold. In the meantime the roll of the
brig told me that we were far in the
main ocean, and a dull humming sound,
which reached my ears as if from an
immense distance, convinced me no
ordinary gale was blowing. I could not
imagine a reason for the absence of
Augustus. We were surely far enough
advanced on our voyage to allow of
my going up. Some accident might
have happened to him-but I could
think of none which would account for
his suffering me to remain so long a
prisoner, except, indeed, his having
suddenly died or fallen overboard, and
upon this idea I could not dwell with
any degree of patience. It was possible
that we had been baffled by head-winds,
and were still in the near vicinity of
Nantucket. This notion, however, I
was forced to abandon; for such being
the case, the brig must have frequently
gone about; and I was entirely satisfied,
from her continual inclination to the
larboard, that she had been sailing all
along with a steady breeze on her star
board quarter. Besides, granting that
we were still in the neighborhood of
the island, why should not Augustus
have visited me and informed me of the
circumstance? Pondering in this man-
ner upon the difficulties of my solitary
and cheerless condition, I resolved to
wait yet another twenty-four hours,
when, if no relief were obtained, I
would make my way to the trap, and
endeavor either to hold a parley with
my friend, or get at least a little fresh
air through the opening, and a further
supply of water from the state-room.
While occupied with this thought, how
ever, I fell, in spite of every exertion
to the contrary, into a state of pro-
found sleep, or rather stupor. My
dreams were of the most terrific de-
scription. Every species of calamity
and horror befell me. Among other
miseries I was smothered to death be-
tween huge pillows, by demons of the
most ghastly and ferocious aspect. Im-
mense serpents held me in their em-
brace, and looked earnestly in my face
with their fearfully shining eyes. Then
deserts, limitless, and of the most for-
lorn and awe-inspiring character, spread
themselves out before me. Immensely
tall trunks of trees, gray and leafless,
rose up in endless succession as far as
the eye could reach. Their roots were
concealed in wide-spreading morasses,
whose dreary water lay intensely black,
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
445
still, and altogether terrible, beneath. die. The sound of my voice seemed to
And the strange trees seemed endowed
with a human vitality, and waving to
and fro their skeleton arms, were cry-
ing to the silent waters for mercy, in
the shrill and piercing accents of the
most acute agony and despair. The
scene changed; and I stood, naked and
alone, amidst the burning sand-plains of
Sahara. At my feet lay crouched a
fierce lion of the tropics. Suddenly his
wild eyes opened and fell upon me.
With a convulsive bound he sprang to
his feet, and laid bare his horrible teeth.
In another instant there burst from his
red throat a roar like the thunder of
the firmament, and I fell impetuously
to the earth. Stifling in a paroxysm of
terror, I at last found myself partially
awake. My dream, then, was not all
a dream. Now, at least, I was in pos-
session of my senses. The paws of
some huge and real monster were pres-
sing heavily upon my bosom-his hot
breath was in my ear-and his white
and ghastly fangs were gleaming upon
me through the gloom.
Had a thousand lives hung upon the
movement of a limb or the utterance
of a syllable, I could have neither
stirred nor spoken. The beast, what-
ever it was, retained his position with-
out attempting any immediate violence,
while I lay in an utterly helpless, and,
I fancied, a dying condition beneath
him. I felt that my powers of body
and mind were fast leaving me in a
word, that I was perishing, and per-
ishing of sheer fright. My brain swam
-I grew deadly sick-my vision failed
-even the glaring eyeballs above me
grew dim. Making a last strong effort,
I at length breathed a faint ejacula-
tion to God, and resigned myself to
arouse all the latent fury of the animal.
He precipitated himself at full length
upon my body; but what was my as-
tonishment, when, with a long and low
whine, he commenced licking my face
and hands with the greatest eagerness,
and with the most extravagant demon-
stration of affection and joy! I was
bewildered, utterly lost in amazement
-but I could not forget the peculiar
whine of my Newfoundland dog Tiger,
and the odd manner of his caresses I
well knew. It was he. I experienced
a sudden rush of blood to my temples-
a giddy and overpowering sense of de-
liverance and reanimation. I rose hur-
riedly from the mattress upon which
I had been lying, and, throwing myself
upon the neck of my faithful follower
and friend, relieved the long oppression
of my bosom in a flood of the most
passionate tears.
As upon a former occasion my con-
ceptions were in a state of the great-
est indistinctness and confusion after
leaving the mattress. For a long time
I found it nearly impossible to connect
any ideas; but, by very slow degrees,
my thinking faculties returned, and I
again called to memory the several in-
cidents of my condition. For the pres-
ence of Tiger I tried in vain to ac-
count; and after busying myself with a
thousand different conjectures respect-
ing him, was forced to content myself
with rejoicing that he was with me to
share my dreary solitude, and render
me comfort by his caresses. Most peo-
ple love their dogs, but for Tiger I had
an affection far more ardent than com-
mon; and never, certainly, did any
creature more truly deserve it. For
seven years he had been my inseparable
446
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
companion, and in a multitude of in-
stances had given evidence of all the
noble qualities for which we value the
animal. I had rescued him, when a
puppy, from the clutches of a malignant
little villain in Nantucket who was
leading him, with a rope around his
neck, to the water; and the grown dog
repaid the obligation, about three years
afterward, by saving me from the
bludgeon of a street robber.
Getting now hold of the watch, I
found, upon applying it to my ear, that
it had again run down; but at this I
was not at all surprised, being con-
vinced, from the peculiar state of my
feelings, that I had slept, as before,
for a very long period of time; how
long, it was of course impossible to
say. I was burning up with fever, and
my thirst was almost intolerable. I
felt about the box for my little remain-
ing supply of water, for I had no light,
the taper having burnt to the socket of
the lantern, and the phosphorus-box not
coming readily to hand. Upon finding
the jug, however, I discovered it to be
empty-Tiger, no doubt, having been
tempted to drink it, as well as to de-
vour the remnant of mutton, the bone
of which lay, well picked, by the open-
ing of the box. The spoiled meat I
could well spare, but my heart sank as
I thought of the water. I was feeble
in the extreme, so much so that I shook
all over, as with an ague, at the slight-
est movement or exertion. To add to
my troubles, the brig was pitching and
rolling with great violence, and the oil-
casks which lay upon my box were in
momentary danger of falling down, so
as to block up the only way of ingress
or egress. I felt, also, terrible suffer-
ings from sea-sickness. These consid-
erations determined me to make my
way, at all hazards, to the trap, and
obtain immediate relief, before I should
be incapacitated from doing so alto-
gether. Having come to this resolve,
I again felt about for the phosphorus-
box and tapers. The former I found
after some little trouble; but, not dis-
covering the tapers as soon as I had
expected (for I remembered very nearly
the spot in which I had placed them),
I gave up the search for the present,
and bidding Tiger lie quiet, began at
once my journey toward the trap.
In this attempt my great feebleness
became more than ever apparent. It
was with the utmost difficulty I could
crawl along at all, and very frequently
my limbs sank suddenly from beneath
me; when, falling prostrate on my face,
I would remain for some minutes in a
state bordering on insensibility. Still
I struggled forward by slow degrees,
dreading every moment that I should
swoon amid the narrow and intricate
windings of the lumber, in which event
I had nothing but death to expect as
the result. At length, upon making a
push forward with all the energy I
could command, I struck my forehead
violently against the sharp corner of
an iron-bound crate. The accident only
stunned me for a few moments; but I
found, to my inexpressible grief, that
the quick and violent roll of the vessel
had thrown the crate entirely across
my path, so as effectually to block up
the passage. With my utmost exer-
tions I could not move it a single inch
from its position, it being closely
wedged in among the surrounding boxes
and ship-furniture. It became neces-
sary, therefore, enfeebled as I was,
either to leave the guidance of the
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
447
whipcord and seek out a new passage,
or to climb over the obstacle, and re-
sume the path on the other side. The
former alternative presented too many
difficulties and dangers to be thought
of without a shudder. In my present
weak state of both mind and body, I
should infallibly lose my way if I at-
tempted it, and perish miserably amid
the dismal and disgusting labyrinths of
the hold. I proceeded, therefore, with-
out hesitation, to summon up all my
remaining strength and fortitude, and
endeavor, as I best might, to clamber
over the crate.
Upon standing erect, with this end in
view, I found the undertaking even a
more serious task than my fears had
led me to imagine. On each side of
the narrow passage arose a complete
wall of various heavy lumber, which the
least blunder on my part might be the
means of bringing down upon my head;
or, if this accident did not occur, the
path might be effectually blocked up
against my return by the descending
mass, as it was in front by the obstacle
there. The crate itself was a long and
unwieldy box, upon which no foothold
could be obtained. In vain I attempted,
by every means in my power, to reach
the top, with the hope of being thus
enabled to draw myself up. Had I
succeeded in reaching it, it is certain
that my strength would have proved
utterly inadequate to the task of getting
over, and it was better in every respect
that I failed. At length, in a desperate
effort to force the crate from its ground,
I felt a strong vibration in the side
next me. I thrust my hand eagerly to
the edge of the planks, and found that
a very large one was loose. With my
pocket-knife, which, luckily, I had with
me, I succeeded, after great labor, in
prying it entirely off; and getting
it through the aperture, discovered, to
my exceeding joy, that there were no
boards on the opposite side-in other
words, that the top was wanting, it
being the bottom through which I had
forced my way. I now met with no
important difficulty in proceeding along
the line until I finally reached the nail.
With a beating heart I stood erect, and
with a gentle touch pressed against the
cover of the trap. It did not rise as
soon as I had expected, and I pressed
it with somewhat more determination,
still dreading lest some other person
than Augustus might be in his state-
room. The door, however, to my aston-
ishment, remained steady, and I became
somewhat uneasy, for I knew that it
had formerly required but little or no
effort to remove it. I pushed it
strongly-it was nevertheless firm; with
all my strength-it still did not give
way with rage, with fury, with de-
spair it set at defiance my utmost
efforts; and it was evident, from the
unyielding nature of the resistance, that
the hole had either been discovered and
effectually nailed up, or that some im-
mense weight had been placed upon it.
which it was useless to think of
removing.
My sensations were those of extreme
horror and dismay. In vain I attempted
to reason on the probable cause of my
being thus entombed. I could summon
up no connected chain of reflection, and,
sinking on the floor, gave way, unre-
sistingly, to the most gloomy imagin-
ings, in which the dreadful deaths of
thirst, famine, suffocation, and prema-
ture interment crowded upon me as the
prominent disasters to be encountered.
448
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
At length there returned to me some
portion of presence of mind. I arose,
and felt with my fingers for the seams
or cracks of the aperture. Having
found them, I examined them closely
to ascertain if they emitted any light
from the state-room; but none was
visible. I then forced the blade of my
pen-knife through them, until I met
with some hard obstacle. Scraping
against it, I discovered it to be a solid
mass of iron, which, from its peculiar
wavy feel as I passed the blade along
it, I concluded to be a chain-cable. The
only course now left me was to retrace
my way to the box, and there either
yield to my sad fate, or try so to tran-
quilize my mind as to admit of my
arranging some plan of escape. I im-
mediately set about the attempt, and
succeeded, after innumerable difficulties,
in getting back. As I sank, utterly ex-
hausted, upon the mattress, Tiger threw
himself at full length by my side, and
seemed as if desirous, by his caresses,
of consoling me in my troubles, and
urging me to bear them with fortitude.
The singularity of his behavior at
length forcibly arrested my attention.
After licking my face and hands for
some minutes, he would suddenly cease
doing so, and utter a low whine. Upon
reaching out my hand toward him, I
then invariably found him lying on his
back, with his paws uplifted. This con-
duct, so frequently repeated, appeared
strange, and I could in no manner ac-
count for it. As the dog seemed dis-
tressed, I concluded that he had received
some injury; and, taking his paws in
my hands, I examined them one by
one, but found no sign of any hurt. I
then supposed him hungry, and gave
him a large piece of ham, which he
devoured with avidity-afterward, how
ever, resuming his extraordinary ma-
nœuvres. I now imagined that he was
suffering, like myself, the torments of
thirst, and was about adopting this con-
clusion as the true one, when the idea
occurred to me that I had as yet only
examined his paws, and that there might
possibly be a wound upon some por-
tion of his body or head. The latter
I felt carefully over, but found nothing.
On passing my hand, however, along
his back, I perceived a slight erection
of the hair extending completely across
it. Probing this with my finger, I dis-
covered a string, and tracing it up.
found that it encircled the whole body.
Upon a closer scrutiny, I came across
a small slip of what had the feeling of
letter paper, through which the string
had been fastened in such a manner as
to bring it immediately beneath the
left shoulder of the animal.
CHAPTER III
THE thought instantly occurred to
me that the paper was a note from
Augustus, and that some unaccountable
accident having happened to prevent
his relieving me from my dungeon, he
had devised this method of acquainting
me with the true state of affairs. Trem-
bling with eagerness, I now commenced
another search for my phosphorus
matches and tapers. I had a confused
recollection of having put them care-
fully away just before falling asleep;
and, indeed, previously to my last jour-
ney to the trap, I had been able to
remember the exact spot where I had
deposited them. But now I endeavored
in vain to call it to mind, and busied
myself for a full hour in a fruitless and
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
449
vexatious search for the missing arti-
cles; never, surely, was there a more
tantalizing state of anxiety and sus-
pense. At length, while groping about,
with my head close to the ballast, near
the opening the box, and outside of it,
I perceived a faint glimmering of light
in the direction of the steerage. Greatly
surprised, I endeavored to make my
way toward it, as it appeared to be but
a few feet from my position. Scarcely
had I moved with this intention, when
I lost sight of the glimmer entirely,
and, before I could bring it into view
again, was obliged to feel along by the
box until I had exactly resumed my
original situation. Now, moving my
head with caution to and fro, I found
that, by proceeding slowly, with great
care, in an opposite direction to that
in which I had at first started, I was
enabled to draw near the light, still
keeping it in view. Presently I came
directly upon it (having squeezed my
way through innumerable narrow wind-
ings), and found that it proceeded from
some fragments of my matches lying in
an empty barrel turned upon its side.
I was wondering how they came in
such a place, when my hand fell upon
two or three pieces of taper-wax, which
had been evidently mumbled by the
dog. I concluded at once that he had
devoured the whole of my supply of
candles, and I felt hopeless of being
ever able to read the note of Augustus.
The small remnants of the wax were
so mashed up among other rubbish in
the barrel, that I despaired of deriving
any service from them, and left them
as they were. The phosphorus, of which
there was only a speck or two, I gath-
ered up as well as I could, and returned
with it, after much difficulty, to my
box, where Tiger had all the while
remained.
What to do next I could not tell.
The hold was so intensely dark that I
could not see my hand, however close
I would hold it to my face. The white
slip of paper could barely be discerned,
and not even that when I looked at it
directly; by turning the exterior por-
tions of the retina toward it-that is
to say, by surveying it slightly askance,
I found that it became in some measure
perceptible. Thus the gloom of my
prison may be imagined, and the note
of my friend, if indeed it were a note
from him, seemed only likely to throw
me into further trouble, by disquieting
to no purpose my already enfeebled
and agitated mind. In vain I revolved
in my brain a multitude of absurd ex-
pedients for procuring light-such expe-
dients precisely as a man in the perturbed
sleep occasioned by opium would be
apt to fall upon for a similar purpose→
each and all of which appear by turns
to the dreamer the most reasonable and
the most preposterous of conceptions,
just as the reasoning or imaginative
faculties flicker, alternately, one above
the other. At last an idea occurred
to me which seemed ratfonal, and which
gave me cause to wonder, very justly,
that I had not entertained it before.
I placed the slip of paper on the back
of a book, and, collecting the fragments
of the phosphorus matches which I
had brought from the barrel, laid them
together upon the paper. I then, with
the palm of my hand, rubbed the whole
over quickly, yet steadily. A clear light
diffused itself immediately throughout
the whole surface; and had there been
any writing upon it, I should not have
experienced the least difficulty, I am
450
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
sure, in reading it. Not a syllable was
there, however-nothing but a dreary
and unsatisfactory blank; the illumina-
tion died away in a few seconds, and
my heart died away within me as it
went.
I have before stated more than once
that my intellect, for some period prior
to this, had been in a condition nearly
bordering on idiocy. There were, to be
sure, momentary intervals of perfect
sanity, and, now and then, even of
energy; but these were few. It must
be remembered that I had been, for
many days certainly, inhaling the almost
pestilential atmosphere of a close hold
in a whaling vessel, and for a long por-
tion of that time but scantily supplied
with water. For the last fourteen or
fifteen hours I had none-nor had I
slept during that time. Salt provisions
of the most exciting kind had been my
chief, and, indeed, since the loss of the
mutton, my only supply of food, with
the exception of the sea-biscuit; and
these latter were utterly useless to me,
as they were too dry and hard to be
swallowed in the swollen and parched
condition of my throat. I was now in
a high state of fever, and in every
respect exceedingly ill. This will ac-
count for the fact that many miserable
hours of despondency elapsed after my
last adventure with the phosphorus,
before the thought suggested itself that
I had examined only one side of the
paper. I shall not attempt to describe
my feelings of rage (for I believe I
was more angry than any thing else)
when the egregious oversight I had
committed flashed suddenly upon my
perception. The blunder itself would
have been unimportant, had not my
own folly and impetuosity rendered it
otherwise-in my disappointment at not
finding some words upon the slip, I had
childishly torn it in pieces and thrown
it away, it was impossible to say where.
From the worst part of this dilemma
I was relieved by the sagacity of Tiger.
Having got, after a long search, a small
piece of the note, I put it to the dog's
nose, and endeavored to make him un-
derstand that he must bring me the
rest of it. To my astonishment, (for I
had taught him none of the usual tricks
for which his breed are famous,) he
seemed to enter at once into my mean-
ing, and, rummaging about for a few
moments, soon found another consider-
able portion. Bringing me this, he
paused awhile, and, rubbing his nose
against my hand, appeared to be wait-
ing for my approval of what he had
done. I patted him on the head, when
he immediately made off again. It was
now some minutes before he came back
--but when he did come, he brought
with him a large slip, which proved to
be all the paper missing-it having been
torn, it seems, only into three pieces.
Luckily, I had no trouble in finding
what few fragments of the phosphorus
were left-being guided by the indis-
tinct glow of one or two of the particles
still emitted. My difficulties had taught
me the necessity of caution, and I now
took time to reflect upon what I was
about to do. It was very probable, I
considered, that some words were writ-
ten upon that side of the paper which
had not been examined-but which side
was that? Fitting the pieces together
gave me no clue in this respect, although
it assured me that the words (if there
were any) would be found all on one
side, and connected in a proper manner,
as written. There was the greater
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
451
necessity of ascertaining the point in
question beyond a doubt, as the phos-
phorus remaining would be altogether
insufficient for a third attempt, should
I fail in the one I was now about to
make. I placed the paper on a book
as before, and sat for some minutes
thoughtfully revolving the matter over
in my mind. At last I thought it barely
possible that the written side might
have some unevenness on its surface,
which a delicate sense of feeling might
enable me to detect. I determined to
make the experiment, and passed my
finger very carefully over the side which
first presented itself. Nothing, how-
ever, was perceptible, and I turned the
paper, adjusting it on the book. I now
again carried my forefinger cautiously
along, when I was aware of an exceed-
ingly slight, but still discernible glow,
which followed as it proceeded. This,
I knew, must arise from some very
minute remaining particles of the phos-
phorus with which I had covered the
paper in my previous attempt. The
other, or under side, then, was that on
which lay the writing, if writing there
should finally prove to be. Again I
turned the note, and went to work as
I had previously done. Having rubbed
in the phosphorus, a brilliancy ensued
as before-but this time several lines
of MS. in a large hand, and apparently
in red ink, became distinctly visible.
The glimmer, although sufficiently
bright, was but momentary. Still, had
I not been too greatly excited, there
would have been ample time enough
for me to peruse the whole three sen-
tences before me for I saw there were
three. In my anxiety, however, to read
all at once, I succeeded only in reading
the seven concluding words, which thus
appeared-"blood-your life depends
upon lying close."
Had I been able to ascertain the
entire contents of the note the full
meaning of the admonition which my
friend had thus attempted to convey,
that admonition, even although it should
have revealed a story of disaster the
most unspeakable, could not, I am
firmly convinced, have imbued my mind
with one tithe of the harrowing and yet
indefinable horror with which I was
inspired by the fragmentary warning
thus received. And "blood," too, that
word of all words-so rife at all times
with mystery, and suffering, and terror
-how trebly full of import did it now
appear-how chilly and heavily (dis-
jointed, as it thus was, from any fore-
going words to qualify or render it dis-
tinct) did its vague syllables fall, amid
the deep gloom of my prison, into the
innermost recesses of my soul!
Augustus had, undoubtedly, good rea
sons for wishing me to remain con-
cealed, and I formed a thousand sur-
mises as to what they could be-but I
think of nothing affording a satisfac
tory solution of the mystery. Just
after returning from my last journey
to the trap, and before my attention
had been otherwise directed by the sin.
gular conduct of Tiger, I had come to
the resolution of making myself heard
at all events by those on board, or,
if I could not succeed in this directly,
of trying to cut my way through the
orlop deck. The half certainty which
I felt of being able to accomplish one
of these two purposes in the last emer-
gency, had given me courage (which I
should not otherwise have had) to en-
dure the evils of my situation. The
few words I had been able to read,
452
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
however, had cut me off from these
final resources, and I now, for the first
time, felt all the misery of my fate.
In a paroxysm of despair I threw my-
self again upon the mattress, where,
for about the period of a day and night,
I lay in a kind of stupor, relieved only
by momentary intervals of reason and
recollection.
At length I once more arose, and
busied myself in reflection upon the
horrors which encompassed me. For
another twenty-four hours it was barely
possible that I might exist without
water-for a longer time I could not
do so. During the first portion of my
imprisonment I had made free use of
the cordials with which Augustus had
supplied me, but they only served to
excite fever, without in the least degree
assuaging my thirst. I had now only
about a gill left, and this was of a
species of strong peach liqueur at which
my stomach revolted. The sausages
were entirely consumed; of the ham
nothing remained but a small piece of
the skin; and all the biscuit, except a
few fragments of one, had been eaten
by Tiger. To add to my troubles, I
found that my headache was increasing
momentarily, and with it the species
of delirium which had distressed me
more or less since my first falling
asleep. For some hours past it had
been with the greatest difficulty I could
breathe at all, and now each attempt
at so doing was attended with the most
depressing spasmodic action of the
chest.
But there was still another and
very different source of disquietude, and
one, indeed, whose harassing terrors had
been the chief means of arousing me
to exertion from my stupor on the
mattress. It arose from the demeanor
of the dog.
I first observed an alteration in his
conduct while rubbing in the phos-
phorus on the paper in my last attempt.
As I rubbed, he ran his nose against
my hand with a slight snarl; but I was
too greatly excited at the time to pay
much attention to the circumstance.
Soon afterward, it will be remembered,
I threw myself on the mattress, and
fell into a species of lethargy. Pres-
ently I became aware of a singular
hissing sound close at my ears, and
discovered it to proceed from Tiger,
who was panting and wheezing in a
state of the greatest apparent excite-
ment, his eyeballs flashing fiercely
through the gloom. I spoke to him,
when he replied with a low growl, and
then remained quiet. Presently I re-
lapsed into my stupor, from which I
was again awakened in a similar man-
This was repeated three or four
times, until finally his behavior inspired
me with so great a degree of fear, that
I became fully aroused. He was now
lying close by the door of the box,
snarling fearfully, although in a kind
of undertone, and grinding his teeth as
if strongly convulsed. I had no doubt
whatever that the want of water or the
confined atmosphere of the hold had
driven him mad, and I was at a loss
what course to pursue. I could not
endure the thought of killing him, yet
it seemed absolutely necessary for my
own safety. I could distinctly perceive
his eyes fastened upon me with an ex-
pression of the most deadly animosity,
and I expected every instant that he
would attack me. At last I could en-
dure my terrible situation no longer,
and determined to make my way from
ner.
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
453
the box at all hazards, and dispatch
him, if his opposition should render it
necessary for me to do so. To get out,
I had to pass directly over his body,
and he already seemed to anticipate my
design-raising himself upon his fore-
legs (as I perceived by the altered posi-
tion of his eyes), and displayed the
whole of his white fangs, which were
easily discernible. I took the remains
of the ham-skin, and the bottle con-
taining the liqueur, and secured them
about my person, together with a large
carving-knife which Augustus had left
me-then, folding my cloak around me
as closely as possible, I made a move-
ment toward the mouth of the box. No
sooner did I do this, than the dog sprang
with a loud growl toward my throat.
The whole weight of his body struck
me on the right shoulder, and I fell
violently to the left, while the enraged
animal passed entirely over me. I had
fallen upon my knees, with my head
buried among the blankets, and these
protected me from a second furious
assault, during which I felt the sharp
teeth pressing vigorously upon the
woollen which enveloped my neck—yet,
luckily, without being able to penetrate
all the folds. I was now beneath the
dog, and a few moments would place
me completely in his power. Despair
gave me strength, and I rose boldly
up, shaking him from me by main force,
and dragging with me the blankets from
the mattress. These I now threw over
him, and before he could extricate him-
self, I had got through the door and
closed it effectually against his pursuit.
In this struggle, however, I had been
forced to drop the morsel of ham-skin,
and I now found my whole stock of
provisions reduced to a single gill of
liqueur. As this reflection crossed my
mind, I felt myself actuated by one
of those fits of perverseness which
might be supposed to influence a spoiled
child in similar circumstances, and,
raising the bottle to my lips, I drained
it to the last drop, and dashed it furi-
ously upon the floor.
Scarcely had the echo of the crash
died away, when I heard my name
pronounced in an eager but subdued
voice, issuing from the direction of the
steerage. So unexpected was any thing
of the kind, and so intense was the
emotion excited within me by the
sound, that I endeavored in vain to
reply. My powers of speech totally
failed, and in an agony of terror lest
my friend should conclude me dead,
and return without attempting to reach
me, I stood up between the crates near
the door of the box, trembling convul-
sively, and gasping and struggling for
utterance. Had a thousand words de-
pended upon a syllable, I could not have
spoken it. There was a slight move-
ment now audible among the lumber
somewhere forward of my station. The
sound presently grew less distinct, then
again less so, and still less. Shall I
ever forget my feelings at this moment?
He was going-my friend, my com-
panion, from whom I had a right to
expect so much-he was going-he
would abandon me he was gone! He
would leave me to perish miserably, to
expire in the most horrible and loathe-
some of dungeons-and one word, one
little syllable, would save me—yet that
single syllable I could not utter! I felt,
I am sure, more than ten thousand
times the agonies of death itself. My
brain reeled, and I fell, deadly sick,
against the end of the box.
454
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
As I fell, the carving-knife was
shaken out from the waist-band of my
pantaloons, and dropped with a rattling
sound to the floor. Never did any
strain of the richest melody come so
sweetly to my ears! With the intensest
anxiety I listened to ascertain the effect
of the noise upon Augustus-for I knew
that the person who called my name
could be no one but himself. All was
silent for some moments. At length I
again heard the word "Arthur!" re-
peated in a low tone, and one full of
hesitation. Reviving hope loosened at
once my powers of speech, and I now
screamed at the top of my voice,
"Augustus! oh, Augustus!" "Hush!
for God's sake be silent!" he replied,
in a voice trembling with agitation; "I
will be with you immediately-as soon
as I can make my way through the
hold." For a long time I heard him
moving among the lumber, and every
moment seemed to me an age.
At
length I felt his hand upon my shoul-
der, and he placed, at the same moment,
a bottle of water to my lips. Those
only who have been suddenly redeemed
from the jaws of the tomb, or who
have known the insufferable torments
of thirst under circumstances as aggra-
vated as those which encompassed me
in my dreary prison, can form any idea
of the unutterable transports which that
one long draught of the richest of all
physical luxuries afforded.
When I had in some degree satisfied
my thirst, Augustus produced from his
pocket three or four boiled potatoes,
which I devoured with the greatest
avidity. He had brought with him a
light in a dark lantern, and the grateful
rays afforded me scarcely less comfort
than the food and drink. But I was
impatient to learn the cause of his pro-
tracted absence, and he proceeded to
recount what had happened on board
during my incarceration.
CHAPTER IV
THE brig put to sea, as I had sup-
posed, in about an hour after he had
left the watch. This was on the twen-
tieth of June. It will be remembered
that I had then been in the hold for
three days; and, during this period,
there was so constant a bustle on board,
and so much running to and fro, espe-
cially in the cabin and state-rooms, that
he had had no chance of visiting me
without the risk of having the secret
of the trap discovered. When at length
he did come, I had assured him that I
was doing as well as possible; and,
therefore, for the two next days he felt
but little uneasiness on my account-
still, however, watching an opportunity
of going down. It was not until the
fourth day that he found one. Several
times during this interval he had made
up his mind to let his father know of
the adventure, and have me come up
at once; but we were still within reach-
ing distance of Nantucket, and it was
doubtful, from some expressions which
had escaped Captain Barnard, whether
he would not immediately put back if
he discovered me to be on board. Be-
sides, upon thinking the matter over,
Augustus, so he told me, could not
imagine that I was in immediate want,
or that I would hesitate, in such case,
to make myself heard at the trap.
When, therefore, he considered every
thing he concluded to let me stay until
he could meet with an opportunity of
visiting me unobserved. This, as I said
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
455
before, did not occur until the fourth
day after his bringing me the watch,
and the seventh since I had first entered
the hold. He then went down without
taking with him any water or provi-
sions, intending in the first place merely
to call my attention, and get me to
come from the box to the trap,-when
he would go up to the state-room and
thence hand me down a supply. When
he descended for this purpose he found
that I was asleep, for it seems that I
was snoring very loudly. From all the
calculations I can make on the subject,
this must have been the slumber into
which I fell just after my return from
the trap with the watch, and which,
consequently, must have lasted for more
than three entire days and nights at
the very least. Latterly, I have had
reason both from my own experience
and the assurance of others, to be ac-
quainted with the strong soporific
effects of the stench arising from old
fish-oil when closely confined; and when
I think of the condition of the hold
in which I was imprisoned, and the
long period during which the brig had
been used as a whaling vessel, I am
more inclined to wonder that I awoke
at all, after once falling asleep, than
that I should have slept uninterruptedly
for the period specified above.
Augustus called to me at first in a
low voice and without closing the trap
-but I made him no reply. He then
shut the trap, and spoke to me in a
louder, and finally in a very loud tone-
still I continued to snore. He was now
at a loss what to do. It would take
him some time to make his way through
the lumber to my box, and in the mean-
while his absence would be noticed by
Captain Barnard, who had occasion for
his services every minute, in arranging
and copying papers connected with the
business of the voyage. He determined,
therefore, upon reflection, to ascend,
and await another opportunity of visit-
ing me. He was the more easily in-
duced to this resolve, as my slumber
appeared to be of the most tranquil
nature, and he could not suppose that
I had undergone any inconvenience
from my incarceration. He had just
made up his mind on these points when
his attention was arrested by an un-
usual bustle, the sound of which pro-
ceeded apparently from the cabin. He
sprang through the trap as quickly as
possible, closed it, and threw open the
door of his state-room. No sooner had
he put his foot over the threshold than
a pistol flashed in his face, and he was
knocked down, at the same moment,
by a blow from a handspike.
A strong hand held him on the cabin
floor, with a tight grasp upon his throat;
still he was able to see what was going
on around him. His father was tied
hand and foot, and lying along the steps
of the companion-way, with his head
down, and a deep wound in the fore-
head, from which the blood was flowing
in a continued stream. He spoke not
a word, and was apparently dying. Over
him stood the first mate, eyeing him
with an expression of fiendish derision,
and deliberately searching his pockets,
from which he presently drew forth a
large wallet and a chronometer. Seven
of the crew (among whom was the cook,
a negro) were rummaging the state-
rooms on the larboard for arms, where
they soon equipped themselves with
muskets and ammunition. Besides Au-
gustus and Captain Barnard, there were
nine men altogether in the cabin, and
456
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
these among the most ruffianly of the
brig's company. The villains now went
upon deck, taking my friend with them
after having secured his arms behind
his back. They proceeded straight to
the forecastle, which was fastened down
-two of the mutineers standing by it
with axes-two also at the main hatch.
The mate called out in a loud voice:
"Do you hear there below? tumble up
with you, one by one-now, mark that
-and no grumbling!" It was some
minutes before any one appeared;-at
last an Englishman, who had shipped
as a raw hand, came up, weeping pit-
eously, and entreating the mate, in the
most humble manner, to spare his life.
The only reply was a blow on the fore-
head from an axe. The poor fellow fell
to the deck without a groan, and the
black cook lifted him up in his arms
as he would a child, and tossed him
deliberately into the sea. Hearing the
blow and the plunge of the body, the
men below could now be induced to
venture on deck neither by threats nor
promises, until a proposition was made
to smoke them out. A general rush
then ensued, and for a moment it
seemed possible that the brig might be
retaken. The mutineers, however, suc-
ceeded at last in closing the forecastle
effectually before more than six of their
opponents could get up. These six,
finding themselves so greatly outnum-
bered and without arms, submitted after
a brief struggle. The mate gave them
fair words-no doubt with a view of
inducing those below to yield, for they
had no difficulty in hearing all that was
said on deck. The result proved his
sagacity, no less than his diabolical vil-
lainy. All in the forecastle presently
signified their intention of submitting,
and, ascending one by one, were pin-
ioned and then thrown on their backs,
together with the first six-there being,
in all of the crew who were not con-
cerned in the mutiny, twenty-seven.
A scene of the most horrible butchery
ensued. The bound seamen were
dragged to the gangway. Here the cook
stood with an axe, striking each victim
on the head as he was forced over the
side of the vessel by the other muti-
neers. In this manner twenty-two per-
ished, and Augustus had given himself
up for lost, expecting every moment
his own turn to come next. But it
seemed that the villains were now either
weary, or in some measure disgusted
with their bloody labor; for the four
remaining prisoners, together with my
friend, who had been thrown on the
deck with the rest, were respited while
the mate sent below for rum, and the
whole murderous party held a drunken
carouse, which lasted until sunset. They
now fell to disputing in regard to the
fate of the survivors, who lay not more
than four paces off, and could distin-
guish every word said. Upon some of
the mutineers the liquor appeared to
have a softening effect, for several
voices were heard in favor of releasing
the captives altogether, on condition of
joining the mutiny and sharing the
profits. The black cook, however (who
in all respects was a perfect demon,
and who seemed to exert as much in-
fluence, if not more, than the mate
himself), would listen to no proposition
of the kind, and rose repeatedly for
the purpose of resuming his work at
the gangway. Fortunately he was so
far overcome by intoxication as to be
easily restrained by the less blood-
thirsty of the party, among whom was
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
457
a line-manager, who went by the name
of Dirk Peters. This man was the son
of an Indian woman of the tribe of
Upsarokas, who lived among the fast-
nesses of the Black Hills, near the
source of the Missouri. His father was
a fur-trader, I believe, or at least con-
nected in some manner with the Indian
trading-posts on Lewis river. Peters
himself was one of the most ferocious-
looking men I ever beheld. He was
short in stature, not more than four
feet eight inches high, but his limbs
were of Herculean mould. His hands,
especially, were so enormously thick and
broad as hardly to retain a human
shape. His arms, as well as legs, were
bowed in the most singular manner,
and appeared to possess no flexibility
whatever. His head was equally de-
formed, being of immense size, with an
indentation on the crown (like that on
the head of most negroes), and entirely
bald. To conceal this latter deficiency,
which did not proceed from old age,
he usually wore a wig formed of any
hair-like material which presented itself
occasionally the skin of a Spanish
dog or American grizzly bear. At the
time spoken of, he had on a portion
of one of these bear-skins; and it added
no little to the natural ferocity of his
countenance, which betook of the Up-
saroka character. The mouth extended
nearly from ear to ear; the lips were
thin, and seemed, like some other por-
tions of his frame, to be devoid of
natural pliancy, so that the ruling ex-
pression never varied under the influ-
ence of any emotion whatever. This
ruling expression may be conceived
when it is considered that the teeth
were exceedingly long and protruding,
and never even partially covered, in
any instance, by the lips. To pass this
man with a casual glance, one might
imagine him to be convulsed with
laughter; but a second look would in-
duce a shuddering acknowledgment, that
if such an expression were indicative
of merriment, the merriment must be
that of a demon. Of this singular being
many anecdotes were prevalent among
the seafaring men of Nantucket. These
anecdotes went to prove his prodigious
strength when under excitement, and
some of them had given rise to a doubt
of his sanity. But on board the Gram-
pus, it seems, he was regarded, at the
time of the mutiny, with feelings more
of derision than of any thing else. I
have been thus particular in speaking
to Dirk Peters, because, ferocious as
he appeared, he proved the main instru-
ment in preserving the life of Augustus,
and because I shall have frequent occa-
sion to mention him hereafter in the
course of my narrative-a narrative, let
me here say, which, in its later portions,
will be found to include incidents of a
nature so entirely out of the range of
human experience, and for this reason
so far beyond the limits of human
credulity, that I proceed in utter hope-
lessness of obtaining credence for all
that I shall tell, yet confidently trusting
in time and progressing science to verify
some of the most important and most
improbable of my statements.
After much indecision and two or
three violent quarrels, it was deter-
mined at last that all the prisoners
(with the exception of Augustus, whom
Peters insisted in a jocular manner
upon keeping as his clerk) should be
set adrift in one of the smallest whale-
boats. The mate went down into the
cabin to see if Captain Barnard was
458
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
still living-for, it will be remembered,
he was left below when the mutineers
came up. Presently the two made their
appearance, the captain pale as death,
but somewhat recovered from the ef-
fects of his wound. He spoke to the
men in a voice hardly articulate, en-
treated them not to set him adrift, but
to return to their duty, and promising
to land them wherever they chose, and
to take no steps for bringing them to
justice. He might as well have spoken
to the winds. Two of the ruffians
seized him by the arms and hurled him
over the brig's side into the boat, which
had been lowered while the mate went
below. The four men who were lying
on the deck were then untied and or-
dered to follow, which they did without
attempting any resistance-Augustus
being still left in his painful position,
although he struggled and prayed only
for the poor satisfaction of being per-
mitted to bid his father farewell. A
handful of sea-biscuit and a jug of
water were now handed down; but
neither mast, sail, oar, nor compass.
The boat was towed astern for
minutes, during which the mutineers
held another consultation-it was then
finally cut adrift. By this time night
had come on-there were neither moon
nor stars visible-and a short and ugly
sea was running, although there was no
great deal of wind. The boat was
instantly out of sight, and little hope
could be entertained for the unfortunate
sufferers who were in it. This event
happened, however, in latitude 35° 30'
north, longitude 61° 20′ west, and con-
sequently at no very great distance
from the Bermuda Islands. Augustus
therefore endeavored to console himself
with the idea that the boat might either
few
succeed in reaching the land, or come
sufficiently near to be fallen in with by
vessels off the coast.
All sail was now put upon the brig,
and she continued her original course
to the southwest-the mutineers being
bent upon some piratical expedition, in
which, from all that could be under-
stood, a ship was to be intercepted on
her way from the Cape Verd Islands
to Porto Rico. No attention was paid
to Augustus, who was untied and suf- 1
fered to go about anywhere forward
of the cabin companion-way. Dirk
Peters treated him with some degree of
kindness, and on one occasion saved him
from the brutality of the cook. His
situation was still one of the most pre-
carious, as the men were continually
intoxicated, and there was no relying
upon their continued good-humor or
carelessness in regard to himself. His
anxiety on my account he represented,
however, as the most distressing result
of his condition; and, indeed, I had (
never reason to doubt the sincerity of i
his friendship. More than once he had
resolved to acquaint the mutineers with &
the secret of my being on board, butį
was restrained from so doing, partly
through recollection of the atrocities he
had already beheld, and partly through
a hope of being able soon to bring me
relief. For the latter purpose he was
constantly on the watch; but, in spite
of the most constant vigilance, three
days elapsed after the boat was cut
adrift before any chance occurred. At
length, on the night of the third day,
there came on a heavy blow from the
eastward, and all hands were called up
to take in sail. During the confusion
which ensued, he made his way below
unobserved, and into the state-room.
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
459
What was his grief and horror in dis-
covering that the latter had been ren-
dered a place of deposit for a variety
of sea-stores and ship-furniture, and
that several fathoms of old chain-cable,
which had been stowed away beneath
the companion-ladder, had been dragged
thence to make room for a chest, and
were now lying immediately upon the
trap! To remove it without discovery
was impossible, and he returned on
deck as quickly as he could. As he
came up, the mate seized him by the
throat, and demanding what he had
been doing in the cabin, was about
finging him over the larboard bulwark,
when his life was again preserved
hrough the interference of Dirk Peters.
Augustus was now put in handcuffs (of
which there were several pairs on
board), and his feet lashed tightly
ogether. He was then taken into the
steerage, and thrown into a lower berth
ext to the forecastle bulkheads, with
he assurance that he should never put
is foot on deck again "until the brig
was no longer a brig." This was the
expression of the cook, who threw him
nto the berth-it is hardly possible to
ay what precise meaning was intended
by the phrase. The whole affair, how-
ver, proved the ultimate means of my
elief, as will presently appear.
CHAPTER V
FOR some minutes after the cook had
left the forecastle, Augustus abandoned
himself to despair, never hoping to
leave the berth alive. He now came
to the resolution of acquainting the
first of the men who should come down
with my situation, thinking it better
to let me take my chance with the
mutineers than perish of thirst in the
hold, for it had been ten days since
I was first imprisoned, and my jug of
water was not a plentiful supply even
for four. As he was thinking on this
subject, the idea came all at once into
his head that it might be possible to
communicate with me by the way of
the main hold. In any other circum-
stances, the difficulty and hazard of the
undertaking would have prevented him
from attempting it; but now he had,
at all events, little prospect of life, and
consequently little to lose; he bent his
whole mind, therefore, upon the task.
His handcuffs were the first consider-
ation. At first he saw no method of
removing them, and feared that he
should thus be baffled in the very out-
set; but upon a closer scrutiny he dis-
covered that the irons could be slipped
off and on at pleasure, with very little
effort or inconvenience, merely by
squeezing his hands through them,-
this species of manacle being alto-
gether ineffectual in confining young
persons, in whom the smaller bones
readily yield to pressure. He now un-
tied his feet, and, leaving the cord in
such a manner that it could easily be
readjusted in the event of any person's
coming down, proceeded to examine the
bulkhead where it joined the berth.
The partition here was of soft pine
board, an inch thick, and he saw that
he should have little trouble in cutting
his way through. A voice was now
heard at the forecastle companion-way.
and he had just time to put his right
hand into its handcuff (the left had not
been removed) and to draw the rope
in a slipknot around his ankle, when
Dirk Peters came below, followed by
Tiger, who immediately leaped into the
460
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
berth and lay down. The dog had
been brought on board by Augustus,
who knew my attachment to the ani-
mal, and thought it would give me
pleasure to have him with me during
the voyage. He went up to our house
for him immediately after first taking
me into the hold, but did not think of
mentioning the circumstance upon his
bringing the watch. Since the mutiny,
Augustus had not seen him before his
appearance with Dirk Peters, and had
given him up for lost, supposing him
to have been thrown overboard by some
of the malignant villains belonging to
the mate's gang. It appeared after-
ward that he had crawled into a hole
beneath a whale-boat, from which, not
having room to turn round, he could
not extricate himself. Peters at last
let him out, and, with a species of good
feeling which my friend knew well how
to appreciate, had now brought him to
him in the forecastle as a companion,
leaving at the same time some salt junk
and potatoes, with a can of water; he
then went on deck, promising to come
down with something more to eat on
the next day.
When he had gone, Augustus freed
both hands from the manacles and un-
fastened his feet. He then turned down
the head of the mattress on which he
had been lying, and with his penknife
(for the ruffians had not thought it
worth while to search him) commenced
cutting vigorously across one of the
partition planks, as closely as possible
to the floor of the berth. He chose
to cut here, because, if suddenly inter-
rupted, he would be able to conceal
what had been done by letting the head
of the mattress fall into its proper posi-
tion. For the remainder of the day,
however, no disturbance occurred, a
by night he had completely divided t
plank. It should here by observ
that none of the crew occupied t
forecastle as a sleeping-place, livi
altogether in the cabin since the mutir
drinking the wines and feasting on t
sea-stores of Captain Barnard, and gi
ing no more heed than was absolute
necessary to the navigation of the br
These circumstances proved fortuna
both for myself and Augustus; for, h
matters been otherwise, he would ha
found it impossible to reach me.
it was, he proceeded with confidence
his design. It was near daybreak, ho
ever, before he completed the seco
division of the board (which was abo
a foot above the first cut), thus ma
ing an aperture quite large enough
admit his passage through with facili
to the main orlop deck. Having g
here, he made his way with but lit
trouble to the lower main hatch,
though in so doing he had to scramb
over tiers of oil-casks piled nearly
high as the upper deck, there bei
barely room enough left for his bo
Upon reaching the hatch he found th
Tiger had followed him below, squee
ing between two rows of the casks.
was now too late, however, to attem
getting to me before dawn, as the chi
difficulty lay in passing through t
close stowage in the lower hold. I
therefore resolved to return, and w
till the next night. With this desig
he proceeded to loosen the hatch,
that he might have as little detenti
as possible when he should come agai
No sooner had he loosened it th
Tiger sprang eagerly to the small ope
ing produced, snuffed for a momer
and then uttered a long whine, scratc
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
461
ng at the same time, as if anxious to
emove the covering with his paws.
There could be no doubt, from his be-
avior, that he was aware of my being
the hold, and Augustus thought it
ossible that he would be able to get
o me if he put him down. He now
it upon the expedient of sending the
ote, as it was especially desirable that
should make no attempt at forcing
ay way out, at least under existing
ircumstances, and there could be no
ertainty of his getting to me himself
n the morrow as he intended. After-
vents proved how fortunate it was that
he idea occurred to him as it did;
or, had it not been for the receipt
f the note, I should undoubtedly have
allen upon some plan, however desper-
te, of alarming the crew, and both
ur lives would most probably have
een sacrificed in consequence.
Having concluded to write, the dif-
iculty was now to procure the mate-
ials for so doing. An old toothpick
was soon made into a pen; and this
y means of feeling altogether, for the
etween-decks was as dark as pitch.
Paper enough was obtained from the
ack of a letter--a duplicate of the
orged letter from Mr. Ross. This had
een the original draught; but the hand-
writing not being sufficiently well imi-
tated, Augustus had written another,
thrusting the first, by good fortune,
into his coat-pocket, where it was now
most opportunely discovered. Ink
alone was thus wanting, and a substi-
tute was immediately found for this
by means of a slight incision with the
penknife on the back of a finger just
above the nail-a copious flow of blood
ensuing, as usual, from wounds in that
vicinity. The note was now written,
as well as it could be in the dark and
under the circumstances. It briefly ex-
plained that a mutiny had taken place;
that Captain Barnard was set adrift;
and that I might expect immediate
relief as far as provisions were con-
cerned, but must not venture upon
making any disturbance. It concluded
with these words: "I have scrawled
this with blood-your life depends upon
lying close."
This slip of paper being tied upon
the dog, he was now put down the
hatchway, and Augustus made the best.
of his way back to the forecastle, where
he found no reason to believe that any
of the crew had been in his absence.
To conceal the hole in the partition,
he drove his knife in just above it, and
hung up a pea-jacket which he found
in the berth. His handcuffs were then
replaced, and also the rope around his
ankles.
These arrangements were scarcely
completed when Dirk Peters came be-
low, very drunk, but in excellent humor,
and bringing with him my friend's al-
lowance of provision for the day. This
consisted of a dozen large Irish pota-
toes roasted, and a pitcher of water.
He sat for some time on a chest by the
berth, and talked freely about the mate
and the general concerns of the brig.
His demeanor was exceedingly capri-
cious, and even grotesque. At one time
Augustus was much alarmed by his odd
conduct. At last, however, he went on
deck, muttering a promise to bring his
prisoner a good dinner on the morrow.
During the day two of the crew (har-
pooners) came down, accompanied by
the cook, all three in nearly the last
stage of intoxication. Like Peters, they
made no scruple of talking unreservedly
462
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
about their plans. It appeared that
they were much divided among them-
selves as to their ultimate course, agree-
ing in no point, except the attack on
the ship from the Cape Verd Islands,
with which they were in hourly expecta-
tion of meeting. As far as could be
ascertained, the mutiny had not been
brought about altogether for the sake
of booty; a private pique of the chief
mate's against Captain Barnard having
been the main instigation. There now
seemed to be two principal factions
among the crew-one headed by the
mate, the other by the cook. The for-
mer party were for seizing the first
suitable vessel which should present
itself, and equipping it at some of the
West India Islands for a piratical
cruise. The latter division, however,
which was the stronger, and included
Dirk Peters among its partisans, were
bent upon pursuing the course originally
laid out for the brig into the South
Pacific; there either to take whale, or
act otherwise, as circumstances should
suggest. The representations of Peters,
who had frequently visited these re-
gions, had great weight, apparently, with
the mutineers, wavering, as they were,
between half-engendered notions of
profit and pleasure. He dwelt on the
world of novelty and amusement to
be found among the innumerable islands
of the Pacific, on the perfect security
and freedom from all restraint to be
enjoyed, but, more particularly, on the
deliciousness of the climate, on the
abundant means of good living, and on
the voluptuous beauty of the women.
As yet, nothing had been absolutely
determined upon; but the pictures of
the hybrid line-manager were taking
strong hold upon the ardent imagina-
tions of the seamen, and there wa
every probability that his intention
would be finally carried into effect.
The three men went away in abou
an hour, and no one else entered
forecastle all day. Augustus lay quie
until nearly night. He then freed him
self from the rope and irons, and pre
pared for his attempt. A bottle w
found in one of the berths, and th
he filled with water from the pitch
left by Peters, storing his pockets 4
the same time with cold potatoes.
his great joy he also came across
lantern, with a small piece of talla
candle in it. This he could light
any moment, as he had in his posse
sion a box of phosphorus matche
When it was quite dark, he got throug
the hole in the bulkhead, having take
the precaution to arrange the bedcloth
in the berth so as to convey the id
of a person covered up. When throug
he hung up the pea-jacket on his knif
as before, to conceal the aperture
this manœuvre being easily effected,
he did not readjust the piece of plan
taken out until afterward. He was no
on the main orlop deck, and proceede
to make his way, as before, betwee
the upper deck and the oil-casks to th
main hatchway. Having reached thi
he lit the piece of candle, and d
scended, groping with extreme difficul
among the compact stowage of the hol
In a few moments he became alarme
at the insufferable stench and the clos
ness of the atmosphere. He could n
think it possible that I had surviv
my confinement for so long a peri
breathing so oppressive an air.
called my name repeatedly, but I ma
him no reply, and his apprehension
seemed thus to be confirmed. The br
E
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
463
was rolling violently, and there was so
nuch noise in consequence, that it was
seless to listen for any weak sound,
uch as those of my breathing or snor-
1g. He threw open the lantern, and
eld it as high as possible, whenever
a opportunity occurred, in order that,
y observing the light, I might, if alive,
* aware that succor was approaching.
till nothing was heard from me, and
e supposition of my death began to
sume the character of certainty. He
etermined, nevertheless, to force a
issage, if possible, to the box, and at
ast ascertain beyond a doubt the
uth of his surmises. He pushed on
r some time in a most pitiable state
anxiety, until, at length, he found
e pathway utterly blocked up, and
at there was no possibility of making
ry farther way by the course in which
had set out. Overcome now by his
elings, he threw himself among the
mber in despair, and wept like a
ild. It was at this period that he
ard the crash occasioned by the bottle
ich I had thrown down. Fortunate,
deed, was it that the incident oc-
rred for, upon this incident, trivial
it appears, the thread of my destiny
pended. Many years elapsed, how-
er, before I was aware of this fact.
natural shame and regret for his
takness and indecision prevented Au-
istus from confiding to me at once
hat a more intimate and unreserved
mmunion afterward induced him to
weal. Upon finding his further prog-
ss in the hold impeded by obstacles
hich he could not overcome, he had
solved to abandon his attempt at
taching me, and return at once to the
recastle. Before condemning him en-
rely on this head, the harassing cir-
cumstances which embarrassed him
should be taken into consideration.
The night was fast wearing away, and
his absence from the forecastle might
be so, if he should fail to get back to
the berth by daybreak. His candle
was expiring in the socket, and there
would be the greatest difficulty in re-
tracing his way to the hatchway in the
dark. It must be allowed, too, that
he had every good reason to believe me
dead; in which event no benefit could
result to me from his reaching the box,
and a world of danger would be en-
countered to no purpose by himself.
He had repeatedly called, and I had
made him no answer. I had been now
eleven days and nights with no more
water than that contained in the jug
which he had left with me a supply
which it was not at all probable I had
hoarded in the beginning of my con-
finement, as I had every cause to expect
a speedy release. The atmosphere of
the hold, too, must have appeared to
him, coming from the comparatively
open air of the steerage, of a nature
absolutely poisonous, and by far more
intolerable than it had seemed to me
upon my first taking up my quarters
in the box-the hatchway at that time
having been constantly open for many
months previous. Add to these con-
siderations that of the scene of blood-
shed and terror so lately witnessed by
my friend; his confinement, privations,
and narrow escapes from death, to-
gether with the frail and equivocal
tenure by which he still existed-cir-
cumstances all so well calculated to
prostrate every energy of mind-and
the reader will be easily brought, as I
have been, to regard his apparent fall-
464
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ing off in friendship and in faith with
sentiments rather of sorrow than of
anger.
The crash of the bottle was distinctly
heard, yet Augustus was not sure that
it proceeded from the hold. The doubt,
however, was sufficient inducement to
persevere. He clambered up nearly to
the orlop deck by means of the stow-
age, and then, watching for a lull in the
pitchings of the vessel, he called out
to me in as loud a tone as he could
command, regardless, for the moment,
of being overheard by the crew. It
will be remembered that on this occa-
sion the voice reached me, but I was
so entirely overcome by violent agita-
tion as to be incapable of reply. Con-
fident, now, that his worst apprehen-
sions were well founded, he descended,
with a view of getting back to the fore-
castle without loss of time. In his
haste some small boxes were thrown
down, the noise occasioned by which I
heard, as will be recollected. He had
made considerable progress on his re-
turn when the fall of the knife again
caused him to hesitate. He retraced
his steps immediately, and, clambering
up the stowage a second time, called
out my name, loudly as before, having
watched for a lull. This time I found
voice to answer. Overjoyed at discov-
ering me to be still alive, he now re-
solved to brave every difficulty and
danger in reaching me. Having extri-
cated himself as quickly as possible
from the labyrinth of lumber by which
he was hemmed in, he at length struck
into an opening which promised better,
and finally, after a series of struggles,
arrived at the box in a state of utter
exhaustion.
CHAPTER VI
THE leading particulars of this nar
ration were all that Augustus communi
cated to me while we remained near
the box. It was not until afterward
that he entered fully into all the de
tails. He was apprehensive of being
missed, and I was wild with impatience
to leave my detested place of confine
ment. We resolved to make our way
at once to the hole in the bulkhead,
near which I was to remain for the
present, while he went through to recon
noitre. To leave Tiger in the box was
what neither of us could endure to
think of; yet, how to act otherwise was
the question. He now seemed to be
perfectly quiet, and we could not even
distinguish the sound of his breathing
upon applying our ears closely to the
box. I was convinced that he was
dead, and determined to open the door,
We found him lying at full length, ap
parently in a deep stupor, yet still alive.
No time was to be lost, yet I could not
bring myself to abandon an animal who
had now been twice instrumental in
saving my life, without some attemp
at preserving him. We therefore
dragged him along with us as well a
we could, although with the greates
difficulty and fatigue; Augustus, during
part of the time, being forced to clam
ber over the impediments in our wa
with the huge dog in his arms—a fea
to which the feebleness of my fram
rendered me totally inadequate. A
length we succeeded in reaching th
hole, when Augustus got through, an
Tiger was pushed in afterward.
was found to be safe, and we did no
fail to return sincere thanks to God fo
our deliverance from the imminent da
A
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
465
r we had escaped. For the present,
was agreed that I should remain
ar the opening, through which my
mpanion could readily supply me
ith a part of his daily provision, and
here I could have the advantages of
eathing an atmosphere comparatively
are.
In explanation of some portions of
is narrative, wherein I have spoken
the stowage of the brig, and which
ay appear ambiguous to some of my
aders who may have seen a proper
- regular stowage, I must here state
at the manner in which this most
Iportant duty had been performed on
ard the Grampus was a most shame-
1 piece of neglect on the part of
ptain Barnard, who was by no means
careful or as experienced a seaman
the hazardous nature of the service
which he was employed would seem
cessarily to demand. A proper stow-
e cannot be accomplished in a care-
is manner, and many most disastrous
cidents, even within the limits of my
m experience, have arisen from neg-
tor ignorance in this particular.
Jasting vessels, in the frequent hurry
d bustle attendant upon taking in or
scharging cargo, are the most liable
mishap from the want of a proper
tention to stowage. The great point
to allow no possibility of the cargo
ballast shifting position even in the
Ost violent rollings of the vessel.
ith this end, great attention must be
id, not only to the bulk taken in,
it to the nature of the bulk, and
hether there be a full or only a partial
argo. In most kinds of freight the
wage is accomplished by means of a
crew.
Thus, in a load of tobacco or
our, the whole is screwed so tightly
into the hold of the vessel that the
barrels or hogsheads, upon discharging,
are found to be completely flattened,
and take some time to regain their
original shape. This screwing, however,
is resorted to principally with a view
of obtaining more room in the hold;
for in a full load of any such com-
modities as flour or tobacco, there can
be no danger of any shifting whatever,
at least none from which inconveni-
ence can result. There have been in-
stances, indeed, where this method of
screwing has resulted in the most
lamentable consequences, arising from
a cause altogether distinct from the
danger attendant upon a shifting of
cargo. A load of cotton, for example,
tightly screwed while in certain condi-
tions, has been known, through the
expansion of its bulk, to rend a vessel
asunder at sea. There can be no doubt,
either that the same result would ensue
in the case of tobacco, while under-
going its usual course of fermentation,
were it not for the interstices conse-
quent upon the rotundity of the hogs-
heads.
It is when a partial cargo is received
that danger is chiefly to be apprehended
from shifting, and that precautions
should be always taken to guard against
such misfortune. Only those who have
encountered a violent gale of wind, or
rather who have experienced the rolling
of a vessel in a sudden calm after the
gale, can form an idea of the tremen-
dous force of the plunges, and of the
consequent terrible impetus given to all
loose articles in the vessel. It is then
that the necessity of a cautious stow-
age, when there is a partial cargo, be-
comes obvious. When lying-to (espe-
cially with a small head-sail), a vessel
466
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
which is not properly modelled in the
bows is frequently thrown upon her
beam-ends; this occurring even every
fifteen or twenty minutes upon an aver-
age, yet without any serious conse-
quences resulting, provided there be a
proper stowage. If this, however, has
not been strictly attended to, in the
first of these heavy lurches the whole
of the cargo tumbles over to the side
of the vessel which lies upon the water,
and, being thus prevented from regain-
ing her equilibrium, as she would other-
wise necessarily do, she is certain to
fill in a few seconds and go down. It
is not too much to say that at least
one-half of the instances in which ves-
sels have foundered in heavy gales at
sea may be attributed to a shifting of
cargo or of ballast.
When a partial cargo of any kind is
taken on board, the whole, after being
first stowed as compactly as may be,
should be covered with a layer of stout
shifting-boards, extending completely
across the vessel. Upon these boards
strong temporary stanchions should be
erected, reaching to the timbers above,
and thus securing every thing in its
place. In cargoes consisting of grain,
or any similar matter, additional pre-
cautions are requisite. A hold filled
entirely with grain upon leaving port
will be found not more than three-
fourths full upon reaching its destina-
tion-this, too, although the freight,
when measured bushel by bushel by
the consignee, will overrun by a vast
Ideal (on account of the swelling of the
grain) the quantity consigned. This
result is occasioned by settling during
the voyage, and is the more perceptible
in proportion to the roughness of the
weather experienced. If grain loosely
thrown in a vessel, then, is ever so well
secured by shifting-boards and stand
chions, it will be liable to shift in a
long passage so greatly as to bring
about the most distressing calamities.
To prevent these, every method should
be employed before leaving port to
settle the cargo as much as possible;
and for this there are many contriv
ances, among which may be mentioned
the driving of wedges into the grain.
Even after all this is done, and unusual
pains taken to secure the shifting
boards, no seaman who knows what he
is about will feel altogether secure in
a gale of any violence with a cargo of
grain on board, and, least of all, with
a partial cargo. Yet there are hundreds
of our coasting vessels, and, it is likely,
many more from the ports of Europe,
which sail daily with partial cargoes,
even of the most dangerous species,
and without any precaution whatever.
The wonder is that no more accidents
occur than do actually happen. A b
mentable instance of this heedlessness
occurred to my knowledge in the case
of Captain Joel Rice of the schooner
Firefly, which sailed from Richmond.
Virginia, to Madeira, with a cargo of
corn, in the year 1825. The captain
had gone many voyages without serious
accident, although he was in the habit
of paying no attention whatever to his
stowage, more than to secure it in the
ordinary manner. He had never before
sailed with a cargo of grain, and on this
occasion had the corn thrown on board
loosely, when it did not much more
than half fill the vessel. For the first
portion of the voyage he met with
nothing more than light breezes; but
when within a day's sail of Madeira
there came on a strong gale from the
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
467
N. N. E. which forced him to lie-to.
He brought the schooner to the wind
under a double-reefed foresail alone,
when she rode as well as any vessel
could be expected to do, and shipped
not a drop of water. Toward night
the gale somewhat abated, and she
rolled with more unsteadiness than be-
fore, but still did very well, until a
heavy lurch threw her upon her beam-
ends to starboard. The corn was then
heard to shift bodily, the force of the
movement bursting open the main
hatchway. The vessel went down like
a shot. This happened within hail of
a small sloop from Madeira, which
picked up one of the crew (the only
person saved), and which rode out the
gale in perfect security, as indeed a
jolly-boat might have done under proper
management.
The stowage on board the Grampus
was most clumsily done, if stowage that
could be called which was little better
than a promiscuous huddling together
of oil-casks* and ship furniture. I have
already spoken of the condition of arti-
cles in the hold. On the orlop deck
there was space enough for my body
(as I have stated) between the oil-
casks and the upper deck; a space was
left open around the main hatchway;
and several other large spaces were
left in the stowage. Near the hole cut
through the bulkhead by Augustus there
was room enough for an entire cask,
and in this space I found myself com-
fortably situated for the present.
By the time my friend had got safely
* Whaling vessels are usually fitted
with iron oil-tanks-why the Grampus
was not I have never been able to
ascertain.
They
into the berth, and readjusted his hand-
cuffs and the rope, it was broad day-
light. We had made a narrow escape
indeed; for scarcely had he arranged
all matters, when the mate came below
with Dirk Peters and the cook.
talked for some time about the vessel
from the Cape Verds, and seemed to
be excessively anxious for her appear-
ance. At length the cook came to the
berth in which Augustus was lying, and
seated himself in it near the head. I
could see and hear every thing from
my hiding-place, for the piece cut out
had not been put back, and I was in
momentary expectation that the negro
would fall against the pea-jacket, which
was hung up to conceal the aperture,
in which case all would have been dis-
covered, and our lives would, no doubt,
have been instantly sacrificed. Our
good fortune prevailed, however; and
although he frequently touched it as
the vessel rolled, he never pressed
against it sufficiently to bring about a
discovery. The bottom of the jacket
had been carefully fastened to the bulk-
head, so that the hole might not be
seen by its swinging to one side. All
this time Tiger was lying in the foot
of the berth, and appeared to have
recovered in some measure his facul-
ties, for I could see him occasionally
open his eyes and draw a long breath.
After a few minutes the mate and
cook went above, leaving Dirk Peters
behind, who, as soon as they were gone,
came and sat himself down in the place
just occupied by the mate. He began
to talk very sociably with Augustus,
and we could now see that the greater
part of his apparent intoxication, while
the two others were with him, was a
feint. He answered all my companion's
468
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
questions with perfect freedom; told
him that he had no doubt of his father's
having been picked up, as there were
no less than five sail in sight just before
sundown on the day he was cut adrift;
and used other language of a consola-
tory nature, which occasioned me no
less surprise than pleasure. Indeed, I
began to entertain hopes, that through
the instrumentality of Peters we might
be finally enabled to regain possession
of the brig, and this idea I mentioned
to Augustus as soon as I found an
opportunity. He thought the matter
possible, but urged the necessity of the
greatest caution in making the attempt,
as the conduct of the hybrid appeared
to be instigated by the most arbitrary
caprice alone; and, indeed, it was diffi-
cult to say if he was at any moment
of sound mind. Peters went upon deck
in about an hour, and did not return
again until noon, when he brought Au-
gustus a plentiful supply of junk beef
and pudding. Of this, when we were
left alone, I partook heartily, without
returning through the hole. No one
else came down into the forecastle dur-
ing the day, and at night, I got into
Augustus' berth, where I slept soundly
and sweetly until nearly daybreak, when
he awakened me upon hearing a stir
upon deck, and I regained my hiding-
place as quickly as possible. When the
day was fully broke, we found that
Tiger had recovered his strength almost
entirely, and gave no indications of
hydrophobia, drinking a little water
that was offered him with great appar-
ent eagerness. During the day he re-
gained all his former vigor and appetite.
His strange conduct had been brought
on, no doubt, by the deleterious quality
of the air of the hold, and had no con-
nection with canine madness. I could
not sufficiently rejoice that I had per-
sisted in bringing him with me from
the box. This day was the thirtieth of
June, and the thirteenth since the
Grampus made sail from Nantucket.
On the second of July the mate came
below drunk as usual, and in an exces-
sively good-humor. He came to Au-
gustus' berth, and, giving him a slap on
the back, asked him if he thought he
could behave himself if he let him loose,
and whether he would promise not to
be going into the cabin again. To this,
of course, my friend answered in the
affirmative, when the ruffian set him at
liberty, after making him drink from a
flask of rum which he drew from his
coat-pocket. Both now went on deck,
and I did not see Augustus for about
three hours. He then came below with
the good news that he had obtained
permission to go about the brig as be
pleased anywhere forward of the main-
mast, and that he had been ordered to
sleep, as usual, in the forecastle. He
brought me, too, a good dinner, and a
plentiful supply of water. The brig
was still cruising for the vessel from
the Cape Verds, and a sail was now
in sight, which was thought to be the
one in question. As the events of the
ensuing eight days were of little impor-
tance, and had no direct bearing upon
the main incidents of my narrative, I
will here throw them into the form of
a journal, as I do not wish to omit
them altogether.
July 3d.-Augustus furnished me with
three blankets, with which I contrived
a comfortable bed in my hiding-place.
No one came below, except my com-
panion, during the day. Tiger took his
station in the berth just by the aper-
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
469
ture, and slept heavily, as if not yet
entirely recovered from the effects of
his sickness. Toward night a flaw of
wind struck the brig before sail could
be taken in, and very nearly capsized
her. The pull died away immediately,
however, and no damage was done be-
yond the splitting of the foretopsail.
Dirk Peters treated Augustus all this
day with great kindness and entered
into a long conversation with him re-
specting the Pacific Ocean, and the
islands he had visited in that region.
He asked him whether he would not
like to go with the mutineers on a kind
of exploring and pleasure voyage in
those quarters, and said that the men
were gradually coming over to the
mate's views. To this Augustus thought
it best to reply that he would be glad
to go on such an adventure, since noth-
ing better could be done, and that any
thing was preferable to a piratical life.
July 4th. The vessel in sight proved
to be a small brig from Liverpool, and
was allowed to pass unmolested. Au-
gustus spent most of his time on
deck, with a view of obtaining all the
information in his power respecting the
intentions of the mutineers. They had
frequent and violent quarrels among
themselves, in one of which a harpooner,
Jim Bonner, was thrown overboard.
The party of the mate was gaining
ground. Jim Bonner belonged to the
cook's gang, of which Peters was a
partisan.
July 5th.-About daybreak there
came on a stiff breeze from the west,
which at noon freshened into a gale,
so that the brig could carry nothing
more than her trysail and foresail. In
taking in the foretopsail, Simms, one of
the common hands, and belonging also
to the cook's gang, fell overboard, being
very much in liquor, and was drowned
-no attempt being made to save him.
The whole number of persons on board
was now thirteen, to wit: Dirk Peters;
Seymour, the black cook; Jones;
Greely; Hartman Rogers; and
William Allen, of the cook's party; the
mate, whose name I never learned;
Absalom Hicks;
Wilson; John
Hunt; and Richard Parker, of the
mate's party;-besides Augustus and
myself.
July 6th.-The gale lasted all this
day, blowing in heavy squalls, accom-
panied with rain. The brig took in a
good deal of water through her seams,
and one of the pumps was kept con-
tinually going, Augustus being forced to
take his turn. Just at twilight a large
ship passed close by us, without having
been discovered until within hail. The
ship was supposed to be the one for
which the mutineers were on the look-
out. The mate hailed her, but the reply
was drowned in the roaring of the gale.
At eleven, a sea was shipped amidships,
which tore away a great portion of the
larboard bulwarks, and did some other
slight damage. Toward morning the
weather moderated, and at sunrise there
was very little wind.
July 7th.-There was a heavy swell
running all this day, during which the
brig, being light, rolled excessively, and
many articles broke loose in the hold,
as I could hear distinctly from my
hiding-place. I suffered a great deal
from sea-sickness. Peters had a long
conversation this day with Augustus,
and told him that two of his gang,
Greely and Allen, had gone over to the
mate, and were resolved to turn pirates.
470
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
He put several questions to Augustus
which he did not then exactly under-
stand. During a part of this evening
the leak gained upon the vessel; and
little could be done to remedy it, as it
was occasioned by the brig's straining,
and taking in the water through her
seams. A sail was thrummed, and got
under the bows, which aided us in some
measure, so that we began to gain upon
the leak.
July 8th.-A light breeze sprang up
at sunrise from the eastward, when the
mate headed the brig to the southwest,
with the intention of making some of
the West India islands in pursuance of
his piratical designs. No opposition
was made by Peters or the cook—at
least none in the hearing of Augustus.
All idea of taking the vessel from the
Cape Verds was abandoned. The leak
was now easily kept under by one pump
going every three quarters of an hour.
The sail was drawn from beneath the
bows. Spoke two small schooners dur-
ing the day.
July 9th-Fine weather. All hands
employed in repairing bulwarks. Peters
had again a long conversation with Au-
gustus, and spoke more plainly than
he had done heretofore. He said noth-
ing should induce him to come into the
mate's views, and even hinted his inten-
tion of taking the brig out of his hands.
He asked my friend if he could depend
upon his aid in such case, to which
Augustus said, "Yes," without hesita-
tion. Peters then said he would sound
the others of his party upon the sub-
ject, and went away. During the re-
mainder of the day Augustus had no
opportunity of speaking with him pri-
vately.
CHAPTER VII
JULY 10TH.-Spoke a brig from Rio,
bound to Norfolk. Weather hazy, with
a light baffling wind from the eastward
To-day Hartman Rogers died, having
been attacked on the eighth with spasms
after drinking a glass of grog. This
man was of the cook's party, and one
upon whom Peters placed his main reli
ance. He told Augustus that he be-
lieved the mate had poisoned him, and
that he expected, if he did not be on
the look-out, his own turn would come
shortly. There were now only himself,
Jones, and the cook belonging to his
own gang-on the other side there were
five. He had spoken to Jones about
taking the command from the mate;
but the project having been coolly re-
ceived, he had been deterred from
pressing the matter any further, or from
saying any thing to the cook. It was
well, as it happened, that he was so
prudent, for in the afternoon the cook
expressed his determination of siding
with the mate, and went over formally
to that party; while Jones took an
opportunity of quarrelling with Peters,
and hinted that he would let the mate
know of the plan in agitation. There
was now, evidently, no time to be lost,
and Peters expressed his determination
of attempting to take the vessel at all
hazards, provided Augustus would lend
him his aid. My friend at once assured
him of his willingness to enter into
any plan for that purpose, and, think-
ing the opportunity a favorable one,
made known the fact of my being on
board. At this the hybrid was not
more astonished than delighted, as he
had no reliance whatever upon Jones,
whom he already considered as belong
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
471
ing to the party of the mate. They
went below immediately, when Augus-
tus called to me by name, and Peters
and myself were soon made acquainted.
It was agreed that we should attempt
to retake the vessel upon the first good
opportunity, leaving Jones altogether
out of our councils. In the event of
success, we were to run the brig into
the first port that offered, and deliver
her up.
The desertion of his party
had frustrated Peters' design of going
into the Pacific-an adventure which
could not be accomplished without a
rew, and he depended upon either get-
ing acquitted upon trial, on the score
of insanity (which he solemnly averred
ad actuated him in lending his aid
o the mutiny), or upon obtaining a
ardon, if found guilty, through the
epresentations of Augustus and my-
elf. Our deliberations were interrupted
or the present by the cry of, “All
ands take in sail," and Peters and
Augustus ran up on deck.
As usual, the crew were nearly all
runk; and, before sail could be prop-
rly taken in, a violent squall laid the
rig on her beam-ends. By keeping
er away, however, she righted, having
hipped a good deal of water. Scarcely
vas every thing secure, when another
quall took the vessel, and immediately
fterward another-no damage being
lone.
There was every appearance of
gale of wind, which, indeed, shortly
ame on, with great fury, from the
northward and westward. All was
made as snug as possible, and we laid-to,
as usual, under a close-reefed foresail.
As night drew on, the wind increased
in violence, with a remarkably heavy
sea. Peters now came into the fore-
castle with Augustus, and we resumed
our deliberations.
We agreed that no opportunity could
be more favorable than the present for
carrying our designs into effect, as an
attempt at such a moment would never
be anticipated. As the brig was snugly
laid-to, there would be no necessity of
manoeuvring her until good weather,
when, if we succeeded in our attempt,
we might liberate one, or perhaps two
of the men, to aid us in taking her into
port. The main difficulty was the great
disproportion in our forces. There were
only three of us, and in the cabin there
were nine. All the arms on board, too,
were in their possession, with the excep-
tion of a pair of small pistols which
Peters had concealed about his person,
and the large seaman's knife which he
always wore in the waistband of his
pantaloons. From certain indications,
too-such, for example, as there being
no such thing as an axe or a handspike
lying in their customary places-we
began to fear that the mate had his
suspicions, at least in regard to Peters,
and that he would let slip no oppor-
tunity of getting rid of him. It was
clear, indeed, that what we should de-
termine to do could not be done too
soon. Still the odds were too much
against us to allow of our proceeding
without the greatest caution.
Peters proposed that he should go up
on deck, and enter into conversation
with the watch (Allen), when he would
be able to throw him into the sea
without trouble, and without making
any disturbance, by seizing a good op-
portunity; that Augustus and myself
should then come up, and endeavor to
provide ourselves with some kind of
weapons from the deck; and that we
472
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
should then make a rush together, and
secure the companion-way before any
opposition could be offered. I objected
to this, because I could not believe that
the mate (who was a cunning fellow
in all matters which did not affect his
superstitious prejudices) would suffer
himself to be so easily entrapped. The
very fact of there being a watch on
deck at all was sufficient proof that he
was upon the alert,-it not being usual,
except in vessels where discipline is
most rigidly enforced, to station a watch
on deck when a vessel is lying-to in a
gale of wind. As I address myself
principally, if not altogether, to persons
who have never been to sea, it may be
as well to state the exact condition of
a vessel under such circumstances.
Lying-to, or, in sea-parlance, "laying-to,"
is a measure resorted to for various
purposes, and effected in various man-
ners. In moderate weather it is fre-
quently done with a view of merely
bringing the vessel to a standstill, to
wait for another vessel, or any similar
object. If the vessel which lies-to is
under full sail, the manœuvre is usually
accomplished by throwing round some
portion of her sails, so as to let the
wind take them aback, when she be-
comes stationary. But we are now
speaking of lying-to in a gale of wind.
This is done when the wind is ahead,
and too violent to admit of carrying
sail without danger of capsizing; and
sometimes even when the wind is fair,
but the sea too heavy for the vessel
to be put before it. If a vessel be
suffered to scud before the wind in a
very heavy sea, much damage is usually
done her by the shipping of water over
her stern, and sometimes by the violent
plunges she makes forward. This ma-
nœuvre, then, is seldom resorted to in
such case, unless through necessity.
When the vessel is in a leaky condition
she is often put before the wind even
in the heaviest seas; for, when lying-to,
her seams are sure to be greatly opened
by her violent straining, and it is not
so much the case when scudding. Often,
too, it becomes necessary to scud
vessel, either when the blast is so ex
ceedingly furious as to tear in pieces
the sail which is employed with a view
of bringing her head to the wind, of
when, through the false modelling of
the frame or other causes, this main
object cannot be effected.
Vessels in a gale of wind are laid-to
in different manners, according to the
peculiar construction. Some lie-to bes
under a foresail, and this, I believe, i
the sail most usually employed. Larg
square-rigged vessels have sails for th
express purpose, called storm-staysails
But the jib is occasionally employed by
itself,-sometimes the jib and foresai
or a double-reefed foresail, and no
unfrequently the after-sails, are mad
use of. Foretopsails are very ofte
found to answer the purpose better that
any other species of sail. The Grampu
was generally laid-to under a close
reefed foresail.
When a vessel is to be laid-to, ht
head is brought up to the wind just $
nearly as to fill the sail under whic
she lies when hauled flat aft,—that i
when brought diagonally across the ve
sel. This being done, the bows poin
within a few degrees of the directio
from which the wind issues, and th
windward bow of course receives th
shock of the waves. In this situatio
a good vessel will ride out a very heav
gale of wind without shipping a dro
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
473
of water, and without any further atten-
tion being requisite on the part of the
crew. The helm is usually lashed down,
but this is altogether unnecessary
(except on account of the noise it
makes when loose), for the rudder has
no effect upon the vessel when lying-to.
Indeed, the helm had far better be
left loose than lashed very fast, for the
rudder is apt to be torn off by heavy
seas if there be no room for the helm
to play. As long as the sail holds, a
well modelled vessel will maintain her
situation, and ride every sea, as if
instinct with life and reason. If the
violence of the wind, however, should
tear the sail into pieces (a feat which
it requires a perfect hurricane to accom-
plish under ordinary circumstances),
there is then imminent danger. The
vessel falls off from the wind, and,
coming broadside to the sea, is com-
pletely at its mercy: the only resource
in this case is to put her quietly before
the wind, letting her scud until some
other sail can be set. Some vessels will
lie-to under no sail whatever, but such
are not to be trusted at sea.
But to return from this digression.
It had never been customary with the
mate to have any watch on deck when
lying-to in a gale of wind, and the fact
that he had now one, coupled with the
circumstance of the missing axes and
hand-spikes, fully convinced us that the
crew were too well on the watch to be
taken by surprise in the manner Peters
had suggested. Something, however,
was to be done, and that with as little
delay as practicable, for there could be
no doubt that a suspicion having been
once entertained against Peters, he
would be sacrificed upon the earliest
occasion, and one would certainly be
either found or made upon the breaking
of the gale.
Augustus now suggested that if Peters
could contrive to remove, under any
pretext, the piece of chain-cable which
lay over the trap in the state-room,
we might possibly be able to come
upon them unawares by means of the
hold; but a little reflection convinced
us that the vessel rolled and pitched
too violently for any attempt of that
nature.
By good fortune I at length hit upon
the idea of working upon the super-
stitious terrors and guilty conscience of
the mate. It will be remembered that
one of the crew, Hartman Rogers, had
died during the morning, having been
attacked two days before with spasms
after drinking some spirits and water.
Peters had expressed to us his opinion
that this man had been poisoned by the
mate, and for this belief he had rea-
sons, so he said, which were incontro-
vertible, but which he could not be
prevailed upon to explain to us—this
wayward refusal being only n keeping
with other points of his singular charac-
ter. But whether or not he had any
better grounds for suspecting the mate
than we had ourselves, we were easily
led to fall in with his suspicion, and
determined to act accordingly.
Rogers had died about eleven in the
forenoon, in violent convulsions; and
the corpse presented in a few minutes
after death one of the most horrid and
loathsome spectacles I ever remember
to have seen. The stomach was swol-
len immensely, like that of a man who
has been drowned and lain under water
for many weeks. The hands were in
the same condition, while the face was
shrunken, shrivelled, and of a chalky
474
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
whiteness, except where relieved by two
or three glaring red blotches like those
occasioned by the erysipelas: one of
these blotches extended diagonally
across the face, completely covering up
an eye as if with a band of red velvet.
In this disgusting condition the body
had been brought up from the cabin
at noon to be thrown overboard, when
the mate getting a glimpse of it (for
he now saw it for the first time), and
being either touched with remorse for
his crime or struck with terror at so
horrible a sight, ordered the men to
sew the body up in its hammock, and
allow it the usual rites of sea-burial.
Having given these directions, he went
below, as if to avoid any further sight
of his victim. While preparations were
making to obey his orders, the gale
came on with great fury, and the design
was abandoned for the present.
corpse, left to itself, was washed into
the larboard scuppers, where it still
lay at the time of which I speak, floun-
dering at cut with the furious lurches of
the brig.
The
Having arranged our plan, we set
about putting it in execution as speedily
as possible. Peters went upon deck,
and, as he had anticipated, was imme-
diately accosted by Allen, who appeared
to be stationed more as a watch upon
the forecastle than for any other pur-
pose. The fate of this villain, however,
was speedily and silently decided; for
Peters, approaching him in a careless
manner, as if about to address him,
seized him by the throat, and, before
he could utter a single cry, tossed him
over the bulwarks. He then called to
us, and we came up. Our first precau-
tion was to look about for something
with which to arm ourselves, and in
doing this we had to proceed with great
care, for it was impossible to stand on
deck an instant without holding fast
and violent seas broke over the vesse
at every plunge forward. It was indis
pensable, too, that we should be quic
in our operations, for every minute w
expected the mate to be up to set th
pumps going, as it was evident th
brig must be taking in water very fast
After searching about for some time
we could find nothing more fit for ou
purpose than the two pumphandles, on
of which Augustus took, and I the other
Having secured these, we stripped of
the shirt of the corpse and droppe
the body overboard. Peters and myse
then went below, leaving Augustus
watch upon deck, where he took hi
station just where Allen had bee
placed, and with his back to the cabi
companionway, so that, if any of th
mate's gang should come up, he migh
suppose it was the watch.
As soon as I got below I commence
disguising myself so as to represent th
corpse of Rogers. The shirt which w
had taken from the body aided us ver
much, for it was of singular form an
character, and easily recognizable-
kind of smock, which the decease
wore over his other clothing. It w
a blue stockinett, with large whit
stripes running across. Having put th
on, I proceeded to equip myself wit
a false stomach, in imitation of th
horrible deformity of the swolle
corpse. This was soon effected b
means of stuffing with some bedclothe
I then gave the same appearance to m
hands by drawing on a pair of whit
woollen mittens, and filling them in wit
any kind of rags that offered then
selves. Peters then arranged my fac
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
475
first rubbing it well over with white
chalk, and afterward blotching it with
blood, which he took from a cut in his
finger. The streak across the eye was
not forgotten and presented a most
shocking appearance.
CHAPTER VIII
As I viewed myself in a fragment of
looking-glass which hung up in the
cabin, and by the dim light of a kind
of battle-lantern, I was so impressed
with a sense of vague awe at my ap-
pearance, and at the recollection of the
terrific reality which I was thus repre-
senting, that I was seized with a violent
tremor, and could scarcely summon
resolution to go on with my part. It
was necessary, however, to act with
decision, and Peters and myself went
upon deck.
We there found every thing safe, and,
keeping close to the bulwarks, the three
of us crept to the cabin companionway.
It was only partially closed, precau-
tions having been taken to prevent its
being suddenly pushed to from without,
by means of placing billets of wood on
the upper step so as to interfere with
the shutting. We found no difficulty
in getting a full view of the interior
of the cabin through the cracks where
the hinges were placed. It now proved
to have been very fortunate for us that
we had not attempted to take them by
surprise, for they were evidently on
the alert. Only one was asleep, and he
lying just at the foot of the companion-
ladder, with a musket by his side. The
rest were seated on several mattresses,
which had been taken from the berths
and throwns on the floor. They were
engaged in earnest conversation; and
although they had been carousing, as
appeared from two empty jugs, with
some tin tumblers which lay about, they
were not as much intoxicated as usual.
All had knives, one or two of them
pistols, and a great many muskets were
lying in a berth close at hand.
We listened to their conversation for
some time before we could make up
our minds how to act, having as yet
resolved on nothing determinate, except
that we would attempt to paralyze their
exertions, when we should attack them,
by means of the apparition of Rogers.
They were discussing their piratical
plans, in which all we could hear dis-
tinctly was, that they would unite with
the crew of a schooner Hornet, and, if
possible, get the schooner herself into
their possession preparatory to some
attempt on a large scale, the particu-
lars of which could not be made out
by either of us.
One of the men spoke of Peters,
when the mate replied to him in a low
voice which could not be distinguished,
and afterward added more loudly, that
"he could not understand his being so
much forward with the captain's brat
in the forecastle, and he thought the
sooner both of them were overboard
the better." To this no answer was
made, but we could easily perceive that
the hint was well received by the whole
party, and more particularly by Jones.
At this period I was excessively agi-
tated, the more so as I could see that
neither Augustus nor Peters could de-
termine how to act. I made up my
mind, however, to sell my life as dearly
as possible, and not to suffer myself
to be overcome by any feelings of
trepidation.
The tremendous noise made by the
476
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
roaring of the wind in the rigging, and
the washing of the sea over the deck,
prevented us from hearing what was
said, except during momentary lulls. In
one of these, we all distinctly heard
the mate tell one of the men to "go
forward, and order the d-d lubbers to
come into the cabin," where he could
have an eye upon them, for he wanted
no such secret doings on board the
brig. It was well for us that the pitch-
ing of the vessel at this moment was
so violent as to prevent this order from
being carried into instant execution.
The cook got up from his mattress to
go for us, when a tremendous lurch,
which I thought would carry away the
masts, threw him headlong against one
of the larboard state-room doors, burst-
ing it open, and creating a good deal
of other confusion. Luckily, neither of
our party was thrown from his position,
and we had time to make a precipitate
retreat to the forecastle, and arrange a
hurried plan of action before the mes-
senger made his appearance, or rather
before he put his head out of the com-
panion-hatch, for he did not come on
deck. From this station he could not
notice the absence of Allen, and he
accordingly bawled out, as if to him,
repeating the orders of the mate.
Peters cried out, "Ay, ay," in a dis-
guised voice, and the cook immediately
went below, without entertaining a sus-
picion that all was not right.
My two companions now proceeded
boldly aft and down into the cabin,
Peters closing the door after him in the
same manner he had found it. The
mate received them with feigned cor-
diality, and told Augustus that, since
he had behaved himself so well of late,
he might take up his quarters in the
cabin and be one of them for the future.
He then poured him out a tumbler half
full of rum, and made him drink it.
All this I saw and heard, for I followed
my friends to the cabin as soon as the
door was shut, and took up my old
point of observation. I had brought
with me the two pump-handles, one of
which I secured near the companion
way, to be ready for use when required.
I now steadied myself as well as
possible so as to have a good view of
all that was passing within, and en
deavored to nerve myself to the task
of descending among the mutineers
when Peters should make a signal to
me, as agreed upon. Presently he con
trived to turn the conversation upon
the bloody deeds of the mutiny, and
by degrees led the men to talk of the
thousand superstitions which are so
universally current among seamen. I
could not make out all that was said,
but I could plainly see the effects of
the conversation in the countenances
of those present. The mate was evi
dently much agitated, and presently,
when some one mentioned the terrific
appearance of Rogers' corpse, I thought
he was upon the point of swooning.
Peters now asked him if he did not
think it would be better to have the
body thrown overboard at once as it
was too horrible a sight to see it floun-
dering about in the scuppers. At this
the villain absolutely gasped for breath,
and turned his head slowly round upon
his companions, as if imploring some
one to go up and perform the task
No one, however, stirred, and it was
quite evident that the whole party were
wound up to the highest pitch of ner-
vous excitement. Peters now made me
the signal. I immediately threw open
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
477
the door of the companion-way, and,
descending, without uttering a syllable,
stood erect in the midst of the party.
The intense effect produced by this
sudden apparition is not at all to be
wondered at when the various circum-
Stances are taken into consideration.
Usually, in cases of a similar nature,
there is left in the mind of the spec-
tator some glimmering of doubt as to
the reality of the vision before his
eyes; a degree of hope, however feeble,
that he is the victim of chicanery, and
that the apparition is not actually a
visitant from the old world of shadows.
It is not too much to say that such
remnants of doubt have been at the
bottom of almost every such visitation,
and that the appalling horror which has
sometimes been brought about, is to be
attributed, even in the cases most in
point, and where most suffering has
been experienced, more to a kind of
anticipative horror, lest the apparition
might possibly be real, than to an un-
wavering belief in its reality. But, in
the present instance, it will be seen
immediately, that in the minds of the
mutineers there was not even the
shadow of a basis upon which to rest
a doubt that the apparition of Rogers
was indeed a revivification of his dis-
gusting corpse, or at least its spiritual
image. The isolated situation of the
brig, with its entire inaccessibility on
account of the gale, confined the appar-
ently possible means of deception within
such narrow and definite limits, that
they must have thought themselves
enabled to survey them all at a glance.
They had now been at sea twenty-four
days, without holding more than a
speaking communication with any ves-
sel whatever. The whole of the crew,
too at least all whom they had the
most remote reason for suspecting to
be on board-were assembled in the
cabin, with the exception of Allen, the
watch; and his gigantic stature (he was
six feet six inches high) was too fami-
liar in their eyes to permit the notion
that he was the apparition before them
to enter their minds even for an instant.
Add to these considerations the awe-
inspiring nature of the tempest, and
that of the conversation brought about
by Peters; the deep impression which
the loathsomeness of the actual corpse
had made in the morning upon the
imaginations of the men; the excellence
of the imitation in my person, and the
uncertain and wavering light in which
they beheld me, as the glare of the
cabin lantern, swinging violently to and
fro, fell dubiously and fitfully upon my
figure, and there will be no reason to
wonder that the deception had even
more than the entire effect which we
had anticipated. The mate sprang up
from the mattress on which he was
lying, and, without uttering a syllable,
fell back, stone dead, upon the cabin
floor, and was hurled to the leeward.
like a log by a heavy roll of the brig.
Of the remaining seven, there were but
three who had at first any degree of
presence of mind. The four others
sat for some time rooted apparently
to the floor-the most pitiable objects
of horror and utter despair my eyes
ever encountered. The only opposition
we experienced at all was from the
cook, John Hunt, and Richard Parker;
but they made but a feeble and irreso-
lute defense. The two former were
shot instantly by Peters, and I felled
Parker with a blow on the head from
the pump-handle which I had brought
478
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
with me. In the mean time, Augustus
seized one of the muskets lying on
the floor and shot. another mutineer
( Wilson) through the breast.
There were now but three remaining;
but by this time they had become
aroused from their lethargy, and per-
haps began to see that a deception had
been practised upon them, for they
fought with great resolution and fury,
and, but for the immense muscular
strength of Peters, might have ulti-
mately got the better of us. These
three men were Jones,- Greely,
and Absalom Hicks. Jones had thrown
Augustus on the floor, stabbed him in
several places along the right arm, and
would no doubt have soon dispatched
him (as neither Peters nor myself could
immediately get rid of our own antag-
onists) had it not been for the timely
aid of a friend, upon whose assistance
we, surely, had never depended. This
friend was no other than Tiger. With
a low growl, he bounded into the cabin,
at a most critical moment for Augus-
tus, and throwing himself upon Jones,
pinned him to the floor in an instant.
My friend, however, was now too much
injured to render us any aid whatever,
and I was so encumbered with my dis-
guise that I could do but little. The
dog would not leave his hold upon the
throat of Jones-Peters, nevertheless,
was far more than a match for the
two men who remained, and would, no
doubt, have dispatched them sooner,
had it not been for the narrow space
in which he had to act, and the tre-
mendous lurches of the vessel. Pres-
ently he was enabled to get hold of a
heavy stool, several of which lay about
the floor. With this he beat out the
brains of Greely as he was in the act
of discharging a musket at me, and
immediately afterward a roll of the
brig throwing him in contact with
Hicks, he seized him by the throat,
and, by dint of sheer strength, strangled
him instantaneously. Thus, in far less
time than I have taken to tell it, we
found ourselves masters of the brig.
The only person of our opponents
who was left alive was Richard Parker.
This man, it will be remembered, I had
knocked down with a blow from the
pump-handle at the commencement of
the attack. He now lay motionless by
the door of the shattered state-room;
but, upon Peters touching him with his
foot, he spoke, and entreated for mercy.
His head was only slightly cut, and
otherwise he had received no injury,
having been merely stunned by the
blow. He now got up, and, for the
present, we secured his hands behind
his back. The dog was still growling
over Jones; but, upon examination, we
found him completely dead, the blood
issuing in a stream from a deep wound
in the throat, inflicted, no doubt, by
the sharp teeth of the animal.
It was now about one o'clock in the
morning, and the wind was still blowing
tremendously. The brig evidently la
bored much more than usual, and it
became absolutely necessary that some
thing should be done with a view of
easing her in some measure. At almost
every roll to leeward she shipped a sea,
several of which came partially down
into the cabin during our scuffle, the
hatchway having been left open by
myself when I descended. The entire
range of bulwarks to larboard had been
swept away, as well as the caboose,
together with the jolly-boat from the
counter. The creaking and working of
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
479
the mainmast, too, gave indication that
it was nearly sprung. To make room
for more stowage in the after-hold, the
heel of this mast had been stepped
between decks (a very reprehensible
practice, occasionally resorted to by
ignorant ship-builders), so that it was
in imminent danger of working from
its step. But, to crown all our diffi-
culties, we plummed the well, and found
no less than seven feet of water.
Leaving the bodies of the crew lying
in the cabin, we got to work immedi-
ately at the pumps-Parker, of course,
being set at liberty to assist us in the
labor. Augustus' arm was bound up
as well as we could effect it, and he
Idid what he could, but that was not
much. However, we found that we
could just manage to keep the leak from
gaining upon us by having one pump
constantly going. As there were only
four of us, this was severe labor; but
we endeavored to keep up our spirits,
and looked anxiously for daybreak,
when we hoped to lighten the brig by
cutting away the mainmast.
We
In this manner we passed a night of
terrible anxiety and fatigue, and, when
the day at length broke, the gale had
neither abated in the least, nor were
there any signs of its abating.
now dragged the bodies on deck and
threw them overboard. Our next care
was to get rid of the mainmast. The
necessary preparations having been
made, Peters cut away at the mast
(having found axes in the cabin), while
the rest of us stood by the stays and
lanyards. As the brig gave a tremen-
dous lee-lurch, the word was given to
cut away the weather-lanyards, which
being done, the whole mass of wood
and rigging plunged into the sea, clear
of the brig, and without doing any ma-
terial injury. We now found that the
vessel did not labor quite as much as
before, but our situation was still ex-
ceedingly precarious, and in spite of
the utmost exertions, we could not gain
upon the leak without the aid of both
pumps. The little assistance which Au-
gustus could render us was not really
of any importance. To add to our dis-
tress, a heavy sea, striking the brig to
the windward, threw her off several
points from the wind, and, before she
could regain her position, another broke
completely over her, and hurled her full
upon her beam-ends. The ballast now
shifted in a mass to leeward (the stow-
age had been knocking about perfectly
at random for some time), and for a
few moments we thought nothing could
save us from capsizing. Presently, how-
ever, we partially righted; but the bal-
last still retaining its place to larboard,
we lay so much along that it was use-
less to think of working the pumps,
which indeed we could not have done
much longer in any case, as our hands
were entirely raw with the excessive
labor we had undergone, and were
bleeding in the most horrible manner!
Contrary to Parker's advice, we now
proceeded to cut away the foremast,
and at length accomplished it after
much difficulty, owing to the position
in which we lay. In going overboard
the wreck took with it the bowsprit,
and left us a complete hulk.
So far we had had reason to rejoice
in the escape of our long-boat, which
had received no damage from any of
the huge seas which had come on board.
But we had not long to congratulate
ourselves; for the foremast having gone,
and, of course, the foresail with it, by
480
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
which the brig had been steadied, every
sea now made a complete breach over
us, and in five minutes our deck was
swept from stem to stern, the long-boat
and starboard bulwarks torn off, and
even the windlass shattered into frag-
ments. It was, indeed, hardly possible
for us to be in a more pitiable con-
dition.
At noon there seemed to be some
slight appearance of the gale's abating,
but in this we were sadly disappointed,
for it only lulled for a few minutes
to blow with redoubled fury. About
four in the afternoon it was utterly
impossible to stand up against the vio-
lence of the blast; and, as the night
closed in upon us, I had not a shadow
of hope that the vessel would hold
together until morning.
By midnight we had settled very deep
in the water, which was now up to the
orlop deck. The rudder went soon
afterward, the sea which tore it away
lifting the after-portion of the brig
entirely from the water, against which
she thumped in her descent with such
a concussion as would be occasioned
by going ashore. We had all calculated
that the rudder would hold its own to
the last, as it was unusually strong,
being rigged as I have never seen one
rigged either before or since. Down
its main timber there ran a succession
of stout iron hooks, and others in the
same manner down the stern-post.
Through these hooks there extended a
very thick wrought-iron rod, the rudder
being thus held to the stern-post and
swinging freely on the rod. The tre-
mendous force of the sea which tore it
off may be estimated by the fact, that
the hooks in the stern-post, which ran
entirely through it, being clinched on
the inside, were drawn every one of
them completely out of the solid wood.
We had scarcely time to draw breath
after the violence of this shock, when
one of the most tremendous waves I
had then ever known broke right on
board of us, sweeping the companion-
way clear off, bursting in the hatch-
ways, and filling every inch of the
vessel with water.
CHAPTER IX
LUCKILY, just before night, all four
of us had lashed ourselves firmly to
the fragments of the windlass. lying in
this manner as flat upon the deck as
possible. This precaution alone saved
us from destruction. As it was, we
were all more or less stunned by the
immense weight of water which tumbled
upon us, and which did not roll from
above us until we were nearly ex-
hausted. As soon as I could recover
breath, I called aloud to my compan-
ions. Augustus alone replied, saying:
"It is all over with us, and may God
have mercy upon our souls!" By and
by both the others were enabled to
speak, when they exhorted us to take
courage, as there was still hope; it being
impossible, from the nature of the
cargo, that the brig could go down, and
there being every chance that the gale
would blow over by the morning.
These words inspired me with new life;
for, strange as it may seem, although
it was obvious that a vessel with a
cargo of empty oil-casks would not
sink, I had been hitherto so confused
in mind as to have overlooked this
consideration altogether; and the dan-
ger which I had for some time regarded
as the most imminent was that of
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
481
foundering. As hope revived within me,
I made use of every opportunity to
strengthen the lashings which held me
to the remains of the windlass, and in
this occupation I soon discovered that
my companions were also busy. The
night was as dark as it could possibly
be, and the horrible shrieking din and
confusion which surrounded us it is
useless to attempt describing. Our deck
lay level with the sea, or rather we
were encircled with a towering ridge
of foam, a portion of which swept over
us every instant. It is not too much
to say that our heads were not fairly
out of the water more than one second
in three. Although we lay close to-
gether, no one of us could see the
other, or, indeed, any portion of the
brig itself, upon which we were so tem-
pestuously hurled about. At intervals
we called one to the other, thus endeav-
oring to keep alive hope, and render
consolation and encouragement to such
of us as stood most in need of it. The
feeble condition of Augustus made him
an object of solicitude with us all; and
as, from the lacerated condition of his
right arm, it must have been impossi-
ble for him to secure his lashings with
any degree of firmness, we were in
momentary expectation of finding that
he had gone overboard-yet to render
him aid was a thing altogether out of
the question. Fortunately, his station.
was more secure than that of any of
the rest of us; for the upper part of his
body lying just beneath a portion of
the shattered windlass, the seas, as they
tumbled in upon him, were greatly
broken in their violence. In any other
situation than this (into which he had
been accidentally thrown after having
lashed himself in a very exposed spot)
he must inevitably have perished before
morning. Owing to the brig's lying so
much along, we were all less liable to
be washed off than otherwise would
have been the case. The heel, as I have
before stated, was to larboard, about
one-half of the deck being constantly
under water. The seas, therefore, which
struck us to starboard were much
broken, by the vessel's side, only reach-
ing us in fragments as we lay flat on
our faces; while those which came from
larboard being what are called back-
water seas, and obtaining little hold
upon us on account of our posture, had
not sufficient force to drag us from our
fastenings.
In this frightful situation we lay until
the day broke so as to show us more
fully the horrors which surrounded us.
The brig was a mere log, rolling about.
at the mercy of every wave; the gale
was upon the increase, if any thing,
blowing indeed a complete hurricane,
and there appeared to us no earthly
prospect of deliverance. For several
hours we held on in silence, expecting
every moment that our lashings would
either give way, that the remains of
the windlass would go by the board,
or that some of the huge seas, which
roared in every direction around us and
above us, would drive the hulk so far
beneath the water that we should be
drowned before it could regain the sur-
face. By the mercy of God, however,
we were preserved from these imminent
dangers, and about midday were cheered
by the light of the blessed sun. Shortly
afterward we could perceive a sensible
diminution in the force of the wind,
when, now for the first time since the
latter part of the evening before, Au-
gustus spoke, asking Peters, who lay
482
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
closest to him, if he thought there was
any possibility of our being saved. As
no reply was at first made to this
question, we all concluded that the
hybrid had been drowned where he lay;
but presently, to our great joy, he
spoke, although very feebly, saying that
he was in great pain, being so cut by
the tightness of his lashings across the
stomach, that he must either find means
of loosening them or perish, as it was
impossible that he could endure his
misery much longer. This occasioned
us great distress, as it was altogether
useless to think of aiding him in any
manner while the sea continued wash-
ing over us as it did. We exhorted him
to bear his sufferings with fortitude,
and promised to seize the first oppor-
tunity which should offer itself to re-
lieve him. He replied that it would
soon be too late; that it would be all
over with him before we could help
him; and then, after moaning for some
minutes, lay silent, when we concluded
that he had perished.
As the evening drew on, the sea had
fallen so much that scarcely more than
one wave broke over the hulk from
windward in the course of five minutes,
and the wind had abated a great deal,
although still blowing a severe gale. I
had not heard any of my companions
speak for hours, and now called to Au-
gustus. He replied, although very
feebly, so that I could not distinguish
what he said. I then spoke to Peters
and to Parker, neither of whom returned
any answer.
Shortly after this period I fell into
a state of partial insensibility, during
which the most pleasing images floated
in my imagination; such as green trees,
waving meadows of ripe grain, proces-
sions of dancing girls, troops of cavalry,
and other phantasies. I now remember
that, in all which passed before my
mind's eye, motion was a predominant
idea. Thus, I never fancied any sta-
tionary object, such as a house, a moun-
tain, or any thing of that kind; but
windmills, ships, large birds, balloons,
people on horseback, carriages driving
furiously, and similar moving objects,
presented themselves in endless succes-
sion. When I recovered from this state,
the sun was, as near as I could guess,
an hour high. I had the greatest diffi-
culty in bringing to recollection the
various circumstances connected with
my situation, and for some time re-
mained firmly convinced that I was
still in the hold of the brig, near the
box, and that the body of Parker was
that of Tiger.
When I at length completely came
to my senses, I found that the wind
blew no more than a moderate breeze,
and that the sea was comparatively
calm; so much so that it only washed
over the brig amidships. My left arm
had broken loose from its lashings, and
was much cut about the elbow; my
right was entirely benumbed, and the
hand and wrist swollen prodigiously by
the pressure of the rope, which had
worked from the shoulder downward.
I was also in great pain from another
rope which went about my waist, and
had been drawn to an insufferable de-
gree of tightness. Looking round upon
my companions, I saw that Peters still
lived, although a thick line was pulled
so forcibly around his loins as to give
him the appearance of being cut nearly
in two; as I stirred, he made a feeble
motion to me with his hand, pointing
to the rope. Augustus gave no indica-
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
483
tion of life whatever, and was bent
nearly double across a splinter of the
windlass. Parker spoke to me when he
saw me moving, and asked me if I had
not sufficient strength to release him
from his situation, saying, that if I
would summon up what spirits I could,
and contrive to untie him, we might
yet save our lives; but that otherwise
we must all perish. I told him to take
courage, and I would endeavor to free
him. Feeling in my pantaloons' pocket,
I got hold of my penknife, and, after
several ineffectual attempts, at length
succeeded in opening it. I then, with
my left hand, managed to free my right
from its fastenings, and afterward cut
the other ropes which held me. Upon
attempting, however, to move from my
position, I found that my legs failed
me altogether, and that I could not
get up; neither could I move my right
arm in any direction. Upon mention-
ing this to Parker, he advised me to
lie quiet for a few minutes, holding on
to the windlass with my left hand, so as
to allow time for the blood to circulate.
Doing this, the numbness presently
began to die away so that I could move
first one of my legs, and then the other,
and, shortly afterward I regained the
partial use of my right arm. I now
crawled with great caution toward Par-
ker, without getting on my legs, and
soon cut loose all the lashings about
him, when, after a short delay, he also
recovered the partial use of his limbs.
We now lost no time in getting loose
the rope from Peters. It had cut a
deep gash through the waist-band of
his woollen pantaloons, and through two
shirts, and made its way into his groin,
from which the blood flowed out copi-
ously as we removed the cordage. No
sooner had we removed it, however,
than he spoke, and seemed to experi-
ence instant relief, being able to move
with much greater ease than either
Parker or myself-this was no doubt
owing to the discharge of blood.
We had little hopes that Augustus
would recover, as he evinced no signs
of life; but, upon getting to him, we
discovered that he had merely swooned
from the loss of blood, the bandages
we had placed around his wounded arm
having been torn off by the water;
none of the ropes which held him to
the windlass were drawn sufficiently
tight to occasion his death. Having
relieved him from the fastenings, and
got him clear of the broken wood about
the windlass, we secured him in a dry
place to windward, with his head some-
what lower than his body, and all three
of us busied ourselves in chafing his
limbs. In about half an hour he came
to himself, although it was not until
the next morning that he gave signs of
recognizing any of us, or had sufficient
strength to speak. By the time we
had thus got clear of our lashings it
was quite dark, and it began to cloud
up, so that we were again in the great-
est agony lest it should come on to
blow hard, in which event nothing
could have saved us from perishing,
exhausted as we were. By good for-
tune it continued very moderate during
the night, the sea subsiding every min-
ute, which gave us great hopes of ulti-
mate preservation. A gentle breeze still
blew from the N. W., but the weather
was not at all cold. Augustus was
lashed carefully to windward in such
a manner as to prevent him from slip-
ping overboard with the rolls of the
vessel, as he was still too weak to hold
484
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
on at all. For ourselves there was no
such necessity. We sat close together,
supporting each other with the aid of
the broken ropes about the windlass,
and devising methods of escape from
our frightful situation. We derived
much comfort from taking off our
clothes and wringing the water from
them. When we put them on after
this, they felt remarkably warm and
pleasant, and served to invigorate us
in no little degree. We helped Augus-
tus off with his, and wrung them for
him, when he experienced the same
comfort.
Our chief sufferings were now those
of hunger and thirst, and when we
looked forward to the means of relief
in this respect, our hearts sunk within
us, and we were induced to regret that
we had escaped the less dreadful perils
of the sea. We endeavored, however,
to console ourselves with the hope of
being speedily picked up by some ves-
sel, and encouraged each other to bear
with fortitude the evils that might
happen.
The morning of the fourteenth at
length dawned, and the weather still
continued clear and pleasant, with a
steady but very light breeze from the
N. W. The sea was now quite smooth,
and as, from some cause which we
could not determine, the brig did not
lie so much along as she had done
before, the deck was comparatively dry,
and we could move about with freedom.
We had now been better than three
entire days and nights without either
food or drink, and it became absolutely
necessary that we should make an
attempt to get up something from
below. As the brig was completely
full of water, we went to this work
despondingly, and with but little ex-
pectation of being able to obtain any
thing. We made a kind of drag by
driving some nails which we broke out
from the remains of the companion-
hatch into two pieces of wood. Tying
these across each other, and fastening
them to the end of a rope, we threw
them into the cabin, and dragged them
to and fro, in the faint hope of being
thus able to entangle some article which
might be of use to us for food, or
which might at least render us assist-
ance in getting it. We spent the
greater part of the morning in this
labor without effect, fishing up nothing
more than a few bedclothes, which
were readily caught by the nails. In-
deed, our contrivance was so very
clumsy that any greater success was
hardly to be anticipated.
We now tried the forecastle, but
equally in vain, and were upon the
brink of despair, when Peters proposed
that we should fasten a rope to his
body, and let him make an attempt
to get up something by diving into the
cabin. This proposition we hailed with
all the delight which reviving hope could
inspire. He proceeded immediately to
strip off his clothes with the exception
of his pantaloons; and a stronge rope
was then carefully fastened around his
middle, being brought up over his
shoulders in such a manner that there
was no possibility of its slipping. The
undertaking was one of great difficulty
and danger; for, as we could hardly
expect to find much, if any, provision
in the cabin itself, it was necessary
that the diver, after letting himself
down, should make a turn to the right,
and proceed under water a distance of
ten or twelve feet, in a narrow passage,
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
485
to the store-room, and return, without
drawing breath.
Every thing being ready, Peters now
descended in the cabin, going down the
companion-ladder until the water
reached his chin. He then plunged in,
head first, turning to the right as he
plunged, and endeavoring to make his
way to the store-room. In his first
attempt, however, he was altogether un-
successful. In less than half a minute
after his going down we felt the rope
jerked violently (the signal we had
agreed upon when he desired to be
drawn up). We accordingly drew him
up instantly, but so incautiously as
to bruise him badly against the ladder.
He had brought nothing with him, and
had been unable to penetrate more than
a very little way into the passage, owing
to the constant exertions he found it
necessary to make in order to keep
himself from floating up against the
deck. Upon getting out he was very
much exhausted, and had to rest full
fifteen minutes before he could again
venture to descend.
The second attempt met with even
worse success; for he remained so long
under water without giving the signal,
that, becoming alarmed for his safety,
we drew him out without it, and found
that he was almost at the last gasp,
having, as he said, repeatedly jerked at
the rope without our feeling it. This
was probably owing to a portion of it
having become entangled in the balus-
trade at the foot of the ladder. This
balustrade was, indeed, so much in the
way, that we determined to remove it,
if possible, before proceeding with our
design. As we had no means of getting
it away except by main force, we all
descended into the water as far as we
could on the ladder, and giving a pull
against it with our united strength, suc
ceeded in breaking it down.
The third attempt was equally un
successful with the two first, and it now
became evident that nothing could be
done in this manner without the aid
of some weight with which the diver
might steady himself, and keep to the
floor of the cabin while making his
search. For a long time we looked
about in vain for something which
might answer this purpose; but at
length, to our great joy, we discovered
one of the weather-forechains so loose
that we had not the least difficulty in
wrenching it off. Having fastened this
securely to one of his ankles, Peters
now made his fourth descent into the
cabin, and this time succeeded in mak-
ing his way to the door of the steward's
room. To his inexpressible grief, how-
ever, he found it locked, and was
obliged to return without effecting an
entrance, as, with the greatest exertion,
he could remain under water not more,
at the utmost extent, than a single min-
ute. Our affairs now looked gloomy in-
deed, and neither Augustus nor myself
could refrain from bursting into tears,
as we thought of the host of difficulties
which encompassed us, and the slight
probability which existed of our finally
making an escape. But this weakness
was not of long duration. Throwing
ourselves on our knees to God, we im-
plored His aid in the many dangers
which beset us; and arose with renewed
hope and vigor to think what could yet
be done by mortal means toward ac-
complishing our deliverance.
486
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
CHAPTER X
SHORTLY afterward an incident occur-
red which I am induced to look upon
as more intensely productive of emo-
tion, as far more replete with the ex-
tremes first of delight and then of
horror, than even any of the thousand
chances which afterward befell me in
nine long years, crowded with events
of the most startling and, in many
cases, of the most unconceived and un-
conceivable character. We were lying
on the deck near the companion-way, and
debating the possibility of yet making
our way into the storeroom, when, look-
ing toward Augustus, who lay fronting
myself, I perceived that he had become
all at once deadly pale, and that his lips
were quivering in the most singular and
unaccountable manner. Greatly alarmed,
I spoke to him, but he made me no reply,
and I was beginning to think that he was
suddenly taken ill, when I took notice of
his eyes, which were glaring apparently
at some object behind me. I turned my
head, and shall never forget the ecstatic
joy which thrilled through every particle
of my frame, when I perceived a large
brig bearing down upon us, and not
more than a couple of miles off. I
sprung to my feet as if a musket bullet
had suddenly struck me to the heart;
and, stretching out my arms in the
direction of the vessel, stood in this
manner, motionless, and unable to ar-
ticulate a syllable. Peters and Parker
were equally affected, although in dif-
ferent ways. The former danced
about the deck like a madman, utter-
ing the most extravagant rhodomonta-
des, intermingled with howls and im-
precations, while the latter burst into
tears, and continued for many minutes
weeping like a child.
The vessel in sight was a large her
maphrodite brig, of a Dutch build, and
painted black, with a tawdry gilt
figure-head. She had evidently seen a
good deal of rough weather, and, we
supposed, had suffered much in the gale
which had proved so disastrous to our-
selves; for her fore-topmast was gone,
and some of her starboard bulwarks.
When we first saw her, she was, as I
have already said, about two miles off
and to windward, bearing down upon
us. The breeze was very gentle, and
what astonished us chiefly was, that
she had no other sails set than her fore-
sail and mainsail, with a flying jib-
of course she came down but slowly,
and our impatience amounted nearly to
frenzy. The awkward manner in which
she steered, too, was remarked by all
of us, even excited, as we were. She
yawed about so considerably, that once
or twice we thought it impossible she
could see us, or imagined that, having
seen us, and discovered no person on
board, she was about to tack and make
off in another direction. Upon each
of these occasions we screamed and
shouted at the top of our voices, when
the stranger would appear to change
for a moment her intention, and again
hold on toward us-this singular con-
duct being repeated two or three times,
so that at last we could think of no
other manner of accounting for it than
by supposing the helmsman to be in
liquor.
No person was seen upon her decks
until she arrived within about a quarter
of a mile of us. We then saw three
seamen, whom by their dress we took
to be Hollanders Two of these were
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
487
lying on some old sails near the fore-
castle, and the third, who appeared to
be looking at us with great curiosity,
was leaning over the starboard bow
near the bowsprit. This last was a
stout and tall man, with a very dark
skin. He seemed by his manner to be
encouraging us to have patience, nod-
ding to us in a cheerful although rather
odd way, and smiling constantly, so as
to display a set of the most brilliantly
white teeth. As his vessel drew nearer,
we saw a red flannel cap which he had
on fall from his head into the water;
but of this he took little or no notice,
continuing his odd smiles and gesticu-
lations. I relate these things and cir-
cumstances minutely, and I relate them,
it must be understood, precisely as they
appeared to us.
The brig came on slowly, and now
more steadily than before, and—I can-
not speak calmly of this event-our
hearts leaped up wildly within us, and
we poured out our whole souls in shouts
and thanksgiving to God for the com-
plete, unexpected, and glorious deliver-
ance that was so palpably at hand. Of
a sudden, and all at once, there came
wafted over the ocean from the
strange vessel (which was now close
upon us) a smell, a stench, such as
the whole world has no name for-no
conception of hellish-utterly suffocat-
ing insufferable, inconceivable. I
gasped for breath, and turning to my
companions, perceived that they were
paler than marble. But we had now
no time left for question or surmise-
the brig was within fifty feet of us, and
it seemed to be her intention to run
under our counter, that we might board
her without putting out a boat. We
rushed aft, when, suddenly, a wide yaw
threw her off full five or six points from
the course she had been running, and,
as she passed under our stern at the
distance of about twenty feet, we had a
full view of her decks. Shall I ever
forget the triple horror of that spec-
tacle? Twenty-five or thirty human
bodies, among whom were several fe-
males, lay scattered about between the
counter and the galley in the last and
most loathsome state of putrefaction.
We plainly saw that not a soul lived in
that fated vessel! Yet we could not
help shouting to the dead for help!
Yes, long and loudly did we beg, in the
agony of the moment, that those silent
and disgusting images would stay for
us, would not abandon us to become
like them, would receive us among their
goodly company! We were raving with
horror and despair-thoroughly mad
through the anguish of our grievous
disappointment.
As our first loud yell of terror broke
forth, it was replied to by something,
from near the bowsprit of the stranger,
so closely resembling the scream of a
human voice that the nicest ear might
have been startled and deceived. At
this instant another sudden yaw brought
the region of the forecastle for a mo-
ment into view, and we beheld at once
the origin of the sound. We saw the
tall stout figure still leaning on the bul-
wark, and still nodding his head to and
fro, but his face was now turned from
us so that we could not behold it. His
arms were extended over the rail, and
the palms of his hands fell outward.
His knees were lodged upon a stout
rope, tightly stretched, and reaching
from the heel of the bowsprit to a cat-
head. On his back, from which a por-
tion of the shirt had been torn, leaving
488
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
it bare, there sat a huge sea-gull, busily
gorging itself with the horrible flesh,
its bill and talons deep buried, and its
white plumage spattered all over with
blood. As the brig moved farther round
so as to bring us close in view, the bird,
with much apparent difficulty, drew out
its crimsoned head, and, after eyeing
us for a moment as if stupefied, arose
lazily from the body upon which it had
been feasting, and, flying directly above
our deck, hovered there a while with a
portion of clotted and liver-like sub-
stance in its beak. The horrid morsel
dropped at length with a sullen splash
immediately at the feet of Parker.
May God forgive me, but now, for the
first time, there flashed through my
mind a thought, a thought which I will
not mention, and I felt myself making
a step toward the ensanguined spot. I
looked upward, and the eyes of Augus-
tus met my own with a degree of in-
tense and eager meaning which imme-
diately brought me to my senses.
sprang forward quickly, and, with a
deep shudder, threw the frightful thing
into the sea.
I
The body from which it had been
taken, resting as it did upon the rope,
had been easily swayed to and fro by
the exertions of the carnivorous bird,
and it was this motion which had at
first impressed us with the belief of its
being alive. As the gull relieved it of
its weight, it swung round and fell
partially over, so that the face was fully
discovered. Never, surely, was any ob-
ject so terribly full of awe! The eyes
were gone, and the whole flesh around
the mouth, leaving the teeth utterly
naked. This, then, was the smile which
had cheered us on to hope! this the—
but I forbear. The brig, as I have al-
ready told, passed under our stern, and
made its way slowly but steadily to
leeward. With her and with her ter-
rible crew went all our gay visions of
deliverance and joy. Deliberately as
she went by, we might possibly have
found means of boarding her, had not
our sudden disappointment, and the
appalling nature of the discovery
which accompanied it, laid entirely
prostrate every active faculty of mind
and body. We had seen and felt, but
we could neither think nor act, until,
alas! too late. How much our intellects
had been weakened by this incident
may be estimated by the fact, that when
the vessel had proceeded so far that we
could perceive no more than the half of
her hull, the proposition was seriously
entertained of attempting to overtake
her by swimming!
I have, since this period, vainly en-
deavored to obtain some clew to the
hideous uncertainty which enveloped
the fate of the stranger. Her build
and general appearance, as I have be
fore stated, led us to the belief that
she was a Dutch trader, and the dresses
of the crew also sustained this opinion.
We might have easily seen the name
upon her stern, and, indeed, taken other
observations, which would have guided
us in making out her character; but the
intense excitement of the moment
blinded us to every thing of that na-
ture. From the saffron-like hue of
such of the corpses as were not entirely
decayed, we concluded that the whole
of her company had perished by the
yellow fever, or some other virulent
disease of the same fearful kind. If
such were the case (and I know not what
else to imagine), death, to judge from
the positions of the bodies, must have
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
489
come upon them in a manner awfully
sudden and overwhelming,-in a way
totally distinct from that which gen-
erally characterizes even the most dead-
ly pestilences with which mankind are
acquainted. It is possible, indeed, that
poison, accidentally introduced into
some of their sea-stores, may have
brought about the disaster; or that the
eating some unknown venomous species
of fish, or other marine animal, or
oceanic bird, might have induced it,
but it is utterly useless to form conjec-
tures where all is involved, and will, no
doubt, remain for ever involved, in the
most appalling and unfathomable mys-
tery.
CHAPTER XI
WE spent the remainder of the day
in a condition of stupid lethargy, gazing
after the retreating vessel until the
darkness, hiding her from our sight,
recalled us in some measure to our
senses. The pangs of hunger and thirst
then returned, absorbing all other cares
and considerations. Nothing, however,
could be done until the morning, and,
securing ourselves as well as possible,
we endeavored to snatch a little repose.
In this I succeeded beyond my expecta-
tions, sleeping until my companions,
who had not been so fortunate, aroused
me at daybreak to renew our attempts
at getting up provisions for the hull.
It was now a dead calm, with the sea
as smooth as I have ever known it,-
the weather warm and pleasant. The
brig was out of sight. We commenced
our operations by wrenching off, with
some trouble, another of the forechains;
and having fastened both to Peters'
feet, he again made an endeavor to
reach the door of the store-room, think-
ing it possible that he might be able to
force it open, provided he could get
at it in sufficient time; and this he
hoped to do, as the hulk lay much more
steadily than before.
He succeeded very quickly in reach、
ing the door, when, loosening one of the
chains from his ankle, he made every
exertion to force the passage with it,
but in vain, the frame-work of the room
being far stronger than was anticipated.
He was quite exhausted with his long
stay under water, and it became ab、
solutely necessary that some other
one of us should take his place. For
this service Parker immediately volun-
teered; but, after making three inef-
fectual efforts, found that he could
never even succeed in getting near the
door. The condition of Augustus's
wounded arm rendered it useless for
him to attempt going down, as he would
be unable to force the room
open
should he reach it, and it accordingly
now devolved upon me to exert myself
for our common deliverance.
Peters had left one of the chains in
the passage, and I found, upon plung-
ing in, that I had not sufficient balance
to keep me firmly down. I determined,
therefore, to attempt no more, in my
first effort, than merely to recover the
other chain. In groping along the floor
of the passage for this, I felt a hard
substance, which I immediately grasped,
not having time to ascertain what it
was, but returning and ascending in-
stantly to the surface. The prize proved
to be a bottle, and our joy may be con-
ceived when I say that it was found to
be full of port-wine. Giving thanks to
God for this timely and cheering as-
sistance, we immediately drew the cork.
490
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
with my penknife, and, each taking a
moderate sup, felt the most inde-
scribable comfort from the warmth,
strength, and spirits with which it in-
spired us. We then carefully recorked
the bottle, and, by means of a hand-
kerchief, swung it in such a manner
that there was no possibility of its get-
ting broken.
Having rested a while after this for-
tunate discovery, I again descended, and
now recovered the chain, with which I
instantly came up. I then fastened it
on and went down for the third time,
when I became fully satisfied that no
exertions whatever, in that situation,
would enable me to force open the door
of the store-room. I therefore returned
in despair.
There seemed now to be no longer
any room for hope, and I could per-
ceive in the countenances of my com-
panions that they had made up their
minds to perish. The wine had evi-
dently produced in them a species of
delirium, which, perhaps, I had been
prevented from feeling by the immer-
sion I had undergone since drinking it.
They talked incoherently, and about
matters unconnected with our condi-
tion, Peters repeatedly asking me ques-
tions about Nantucket. Augustus, too,
I remember, approached me with a
serious air, and requested me to lend
him a pocket-comb, as his hair was full
of fish-scales, and he wished to get
them out before going on shore. Par-
ker appeared somewhat less affected,
and urged me to dive at random into
the cabin, and bring up any article which
might come to hand. To this I con-
sented, and, in the first attempt, after
staying under a full minute, brought
up a small leather trunk belonging to
Captain Barnard. This was imme-
diately opened in the faint hope that it
might contain something to eat or
drink. We found nothing, however,
except a box of razors and two linen
shirts. I now went down again, and
returned without any success. As my
head came above water I heard a crash
on deck, and, upon getting up, saw that
my companions had ungratefully taken
advantage of my absence to drink the
remainder of the wine, having let the
bottle fall in the endeavor to replace it
before I saw them. I remonstrated
with them on the heartlessness of their
conduct, when Augustus burst into
tears. The other two endeavored to
laugh the matter off as a joke, but I
hope never again to behold laughter of
such a species: the distortion of counte-
nance was absolutely frightful. Indeed,
it was apparent that the stimulus, in
the empty state of their stomachs, had
taken instant and violent effect, and
that they were all exceedingly intoxi-
cated. With great difficulty I prevailed
upon them to lie down, when they fell
very soon into a heavy slumber, accom-
panied with loud stertorous breathing.
I now found myself, as it were, alone
in the brig, and my reflections, to be
sure, were of the most fearful and
gloomy nature. No prospect offered
itself to my view but a lingering death
by famine, or, at the best, by being
overwhelmed in the first gale which
should spring up, for in our present
exhausted condition we could have no
hope of living through another.
The gnawing hunger which I now ex-
perienced was nearly insupportable, and
I felt myself capable of going to any
lengths in order to appease it. With
my knife I cut off a small portion of
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
491
the leather trunk, and endeavored to
eat it, but found it utterly impossible
to swallow a single morsel, although I
fancied that some little alleviation of
my suffering was obtained by chewing
small pieces of it and spitting them out.
Toward night my companions awoke,
one by one, each in an indescribable
state of weakness and horror, brought
on by the wine, whose fumes had now
evaporated. They shook as if with a
violent ague, and uttered the most la-
mentable cries for water. Their condi-
ion affected me in the most lively
degree, at the same time causing me to
ejoice in the fortunate train of circum-
stances which had prevented me from
indulging in the wine, and consequently
from sharing their melancholy and most
distressing sensations. Their conduct,
10wever, gave me great uneasiness and
larm; for it was evident that, unless
some favorable change took place, they
could afford me no assistance in pro-
viding for our common safety. I had
not yet abandoned all idea of being
ible to get up something from below;
out the attempt could not possibly be
resumed until some one of them was
sufficiently master of himself to aid me
by holding the end of the rope while I
went down. Parker appeared to be
somewhat more in possession of his
senses than the others, and I en-
deavored, by every means in my power,
to rouse him. Thinking that a plunge
in the sea-water might have a beneficial
effect, I contrived to fasten the end of
a rope around his body, and then,
leading him to the companion-way (he
remaining quite passive all the while),
pushed him in, and immediately drew
him out. I had good reason to congrat-
ulate myself upon having made this
experiment; for he appeared much re-
vived and invigorated, and, upon, get-
ting out, asked me, in a rational man-
ner, why I had so served him. Having
explained my object, he expressed him-
self indebted to me, and said that he
felt greatly better from the immersion,
afterward conversing sensibly upon our
situation. We then resolved to treat
Augustus and Peters in the same way.
which we immediately did, when they
both experienced much benefit from the
shock. This idea of sudden immersion
had been suggested to me by reading in
some medical work the good effect of
the shower-bath in a case where the
patient was suffering from mania a potu.
Finding that I could now trust my
companions to hold the end of the rope,
I again made three or four plunges into
the cabin, although it was now quite
dark, and a gentle but long swell from
the northward rendered the hulk some-
what unsteady. In the course of these
attempts I succeeded in bringing up two
case-knives, a three-gallon jug—empty—
and a blanket, but nothing which could
serve us for food. I continued my
efforts, after getting these articles, un-
til I was completely exhausted, but
brought up nothing else. During the
night Parker and Peters occupied them-
selves by turns in the same manner;
but nothing coming to hand, we now
gave up this attempt in despair, con-
cluding that we were exhausting our-
selves in vain.
We passed the remainder of this night
in a state of the most intense mental
and bodily anguish that can possibly be
imagined. The morning of the sixteenth
at length dawned, and we looked ea-
gerly around the horizon for relief, but
no purpose. The sea was still
to
492
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
smooth, with only a long swell from the
northward, as on yesterday. This was
the sixth day since we had tasted either
food or drink, with the exception of
the bottle of port-wine, and it was clear
that we could hold out but a very little
while longer unless something could be
obtained. I never saw before, nor wish
to see again, human beings so utterly
emaciated as Peters and Augustus. Had
I met them on shore in their present
condition I should not have had the
slightest suspicion that I had ever be-
held them. Their countenances were
totally changed in character, so that I
could not bring myself to believe them
really the same individuals with whom
I had been in company but a few days
before. Parker, although sadly re-
duced, and so feeble that he could not
raise his head from his bosom, was not
so far gone as the other two. He suf-
fered with great patience, making no
complaint, and endeavoring to inspire
us with hope in every manner he could
devise. For myself, although at the
commencement of the voyage I had
been in bad health, and was at all times
of a delicate constitution, I suffered
less than any of us, being much less re-
duced in frame, and retaining my pow-
ers of mind in a surprising degree, while
the rest were completely prostrated in
intellect, and seemed to be brought to
a species of second childhood, generally
simpering in their expressions, with
idiotic smiles, and uttering the most
absurd platitudes. At intervals, how-
ever, they would appear to revive sud-
denly, as if inspired all at once with a
consciousness of their condition, when
they would spring upon their feet in a
momentary flash of vigor, and speak,
for a short period, of their prospects, in
a manner altogether rational, although
full of the most intense despair. It is
possible, however, that my companions
may have entertained the same opinion
of their own condition as I did of mine,
and that I may have unwittingly been
guilty of the same extravagances and
imbecilities as themselves-this is a
matter which cannot be determined.
About noon Parker declared that he
saw land off the larboard quarter, and
it was with the utmost difficulty I could
restrain him from plunging into the sea
with the view of swimming toward it.
Peters and Augustus took little notice
of what he said, being apparently
wrapped up in moody contemplation.
Upon looking in the direction pointed
out, I could not percieve the faintest
appearance of the shore-indeed, I was
too well aware that we were far from
any land to indulge in a hope of that
nature. It was a long time, neverthe-
less, before I could convince Parker
of his mistake. He then burst into a
flood of tears, weeping like a child,
with loud cries and sobs, for two or
three hours, when becoming exhausted.
he fell asleep.
Peters and Augustus now made sev
eral ineffectual efforts to swallow por-
tions of the leather. I advised them
to chew it and spit it out; but they
were too excessively debilitated to be
able to follow my advice. I continued
to chew pieces of it at intervals, and
found some relief from so doing; my
chief distress was for water, and I was
only prevented from taking a draught
from the sea by remembering the hor-
rible consequences which thus have re-
sulted to others who were similarly
situated with ourselves.
The day wore on in this manner,
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
493
when I suddenly discovered a sail to
the eastward, and on our larboard bow.
She appeared to be a large ship, and
was coming nearly athwart us, being
probably twelve or fifteen miles distant.
None of my companions had as yet dis-
covered her, and I forbore to tell them
of her for the present, lest we might
again be disappointed of relief. At
length upon her getting nearer, I saw
distinctly that she was heading imme-
diately for us, with her light sails filled.
I could now contain myself no longer,
and pointed her out to my fellow-suf-
ferers. They immediately sprang to
their feet, again indulging in the most
extravagant demonstrations of joy,
weeping, laughing in an idiotic manner,
jumping, stamping upon the deck, tear-
ing their hair, and praying and cursing
by turns. I was so affected by their
conduct, as well as by what I now con-
sidered a sure prospect of deliverance,
that I could not refrain from joining in
with their madness, and gave way to
the impulses of my gratitude and ecstacy
by lying and rolling on the deck, clap-
ping my hands, shouting, and other
similar acts, until I was suddenly called
to my recollection, and once more to
the extreme human misery and despair,
by perceiving the ship all at once with
her stern fully presented toward us, and
steering in a direction nearly opposite
to that in which I had at first perceived
her.
It was some time before I could in-
duce my poor companions to believe
that this sad reverse in our prospects
had actually taken place. They replied
to all my assertions with a stare and a
gesture implying that they were not to
be deceived by such misrepresentations.
The conduct of Augustus most sensibly
affected me. In spite of all I could say
or do to the contrary, he persisted in
saying that the ship was rapidly nearing
us, and in making preparations to go
on board of her. Some sea-weed float-
ing by the brig, he maintained that it
was the ship's boat, and endeavored to
throw himself upon it, howling and
shrieking in the most heart-rending
manner, when I forcibly restrained him
from thus casting himself into the sea.
Having become in some degree paci-
fied, we continued to watch the ship
until we finally lost sight of her, the
weather becoming hazy, with a light
breeze springing up. As soon as she
was entirely gone, Parker turned sud-
denly toward me with an expression of
countenance which made me shudder.
There was about him an air of self-
possession which I had not noticed in
him until now, and before he opened his
lips my heart told me what he would
say. He proposed, in a few words, that
one of us should die to preserve the
existence of the others.
CHAPTER XII
I HAD for some time past, dwelt upon
the prospect of our being reduced to
this last horrible extremity, and had
secretly made up my mind to suffer
death in any shape or under any cir-
cumstances rather than resort to such
a course. Nor was this resolution in
any degree weakened by the present
intensity of hunger under which I la-
bored. The proposition had not been
heard by either Peters or Augustus. J
therefore took Parker aside; and men-
tally praying to God for power to dis-
suade him from the horrible purpose he
entertained, I expostulated with him
494
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
for a long time, and in the most sup-
plicating manner, begging him in the
name of every thing which he held
sacred, and urging him by every species
of argument which the extremity of the
case suggested, to abandon the idea,
and not to mention it to either of the
other two.
He heard all I said without attempt-
ing to controvert any of my arguments,
and I had begun to hope that he would
be prevailed upon to do as I desired.
But when I had ceased speaking, he
said that he knew very well all I had
said was true, and that to resort to such
a course was the most horrible alterna-
tive which could enter into the mind of
man; but that he had now held out as
ong as human nature could be sus-
tained; that it was unnecessary for all
to perish, when, by the death of one,
it was possible, and even probable, that
the rest might be finally preserved;
adding that I might save myself the
trouble of trying to turn him from his
purpose, his mind having been thor-
oughly made up on the subject even
before the appearance of the ship, and
that only her heaving in sight had pre-
vented him from mentioning his inten-
tion at an earlier period.
I now begged him, if he would not
be prevailed upon to abandon his de-
sign, at least to defer it for another
day, when some vessel might come to
our relief; again reiterating every argu-
ment I could devise, and which I
thought likely to have influence with
one of his rough nature. He said, in
reply, that he had not spoken until the
very last possible moment, that he could
exist no longer without sustenance of
some kind, and that therefore in another
day his suggestion would be too late, as
regarded himself at least.
Finding that he was not to be moved
by any thing I could say in a mild
tone, I now assumed a different de-
meanor, and told him that he must be
aware I had suffered less than any of
us from our calamities; that my health
and strength, consequently, were at that
moment far better than his own, or than
that either of Peters or Augustus; in
short, that I was in a condition to have
my own way by force if I found it
necessary; and that if he attempted in
any manner to acquaint the others with
his bloody and cannibal designs, I would
not hesitate to throw him into the sea.
Upon this he immediately seized me by
the throat, and drawing a knife, made
several ineffectual efforts to stab me in
the stomach; an atrocity which his ex-
cessive debility alone prevented him
from accomplishing. In the meantime
being roused to a high pitch of anger.
I forced him to the vessel's side, with
the full intention of throwing him over-
board. He was saved from his fate.
however, by the interference of Peters.
who now approached and separated us,
asking the cause of the disturbance.
This Parker told before I could find
means in any manner to prevent him.
The effect of his words was even
more terrible than what I had antici-
pated. Both Augustus and Peters, who,
it seems, had long secretly entertained
the same fearful idea which Parker had
been merely the first to broach, joined
with him in his design and insisted upon
its immediately being carried into effect.
I had calculated that one at least of the
two former would be found still pos-
sessed of sufficient strength of mind to
side with myself in resisting any at-
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
495
tempt to execute so dreadful a purpose;
and, with the aid of either one of them,
I had no fear of being able to prevent
its accomplishment. Being disappointed
n this expectation, it became absolutely
necessary that I should attend to my
own safety, as a further resistance on
ny part might possibly be considered
by men in their frightful condition a
sufficient excuse for refusing me fair
play in the tragedy that I knew would
peedily be enacted.
I now told them I was willing to sub-
nit to the proposal, merely requesting
delay of about one hour, in order that
he fog which had gathered around us
night have an opportunity of lifting,
when it was possible that the ship we
ad seen might be again in sight. After
reat difficulty I obtained from them a
romise to wait thus long; and, as I
ad anticipated (a breeze rapidly com-
ng in), the fog lifted before the hour
ad expired, when, no vessel appearing
n sight, we prepared to draw lots.
It is with extreme reluctance that I
well upon the appalling scene which
nsued; a scene which, with its minutest
letails, no after-events have been able
o efface in the slightest degree from
ny memory, and whose stern recollec-
ion will embitter every future moment
of my existence. Let me run over this
ortion of my narrative with as much
aste as the nature of the events to be
poken of will permit. The only
nethod we could devise for the terrific
ottery, in which we were to take each
chance, was that of drawing straws.
Small splinters of wood were made to
answer our purpose, and it was agreed
that I should be the holder. I retired
to one end of the hulk, while my poor
companions silently took up their sta-
tion in the other with their backs
turned toward me. The bitterest
anxiety which I endured at any period
of this fearful drama was while I oc-
cupied myself in the arrangement of
the lots. There are few conditions into
which man can possibly fall where he
will not feel a deep interest in the
preservation of his existence; an inter-
est momentarily increasing with the
frailness of the tenure by which that
existence may be held. But now that
the silent, definite, and stern nature of
the business in which I was engaged
(so different from the tumultuous dan-
gers of the storm or the gradually ap-
proaching horrors of famine) allowed
me to reflect on the few chances I had
of escaping the most appalling of
deaths-a death for the most appalling
of purposes-every particle of that
energy which had so long buoyed me up
departed like feathers before the wind,
leaving me a helpless prey to the most
abject and pitiable terror. I could not.
at first, even summon up sufficient
strength to tear and fit together the
small splinters of wood, my fingers ab-
solutely refusing their office, and my
knees knocking violently against each
other. My mind ran over rapidly a
thousand absurd projects by which to
avoid becoming a partner in the awful
speculation. I thought of falling on my
knees to my companions, and entreat-
ing them to let me escape this neces-
sity; of suddenly rushing upon them,
and, by putting one of them to death.
of rendering the decision by lot use-
less-in short, of every thing but of
going through with the matter I had in
hand. At last, after wasting a long
time in this imbecile conduct, I was
recalled to my senses by the voice of
496
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Parker, who urged me to relieve them
at once from the terrible anxiety they
were enduring. Even then I could not
bring myself to arrange the splinters
upon the spot, but thought over every
species of finesse by which I could trick
some one of my fellow-sufferers to draw
the short straw, as it had been agreed
that whoever drew the shortest of four
splinters from my hand was to die for
the preservation of the rest. Before
any one condemn me for this apparent
heartlessness, let him be placed in a
situation precisely similar to my own.
At length delay was no longer possible,
and, with a heart almost bursting from
my bosom, I advanced to the region of
the forecastle, where my companions
were awaiting me. I held out my hand
with the splinters, and Peters imme-
diately drew. He was free-his, at
least, was not the shortest; and there
was now another chance against my
escape. I summoned
up all
my
strength, and passed the lots to Augus-
tus. He also drew immediately, and
he also was free; and now, whether I
should live or die, the chances were no
more than precisely even. At this mo-
ment all the fierceness of the tiger
possessed my bosom, and I felt toward
my poor fellow-creature, Parker, the
most intense, the most diabolical hatred.
But the feeling did not last; and, at
length, with a convulsive shudder and
closed eyes, I held out the two re-
maining splinters toward him. It was
fully five minutes before he could
summon resolution to draw, during
which period of heart-rending suspense
I never once opened my eyes. Present-
ly one of the two lots was quickly
drawn from my hand. The decision
was then over, yet I knew not whether
it was for me or against me. No one
spoke, and still I dared not satisfy
myself by looking at the splinter I held.
Peters at length took me by the hand,
and I forced myself to look up, when
I immediately saw by the countenance
of Parker that I was safe, and that he
it was who had been doomed to suffer.
Gasping for breath, I fell senseless to
the deck.
I recovered from my swoon in time
to behold the consummation of the
tragedy in the death of him who had
been chiefly instrumental in bringing it
about. He made no resistance what-
ever, and was stabbed in the back by
Peters, when he fell instantly dead. I
must not dwell upon the fearful repast
which immediately ensued. Such things
may be imagined, but words have no
power to impress the mind with the
exquisite horror of their reality. Let
it suffice to say that, having in some
measure appeased the raging thirst
which consumed us by the blood of the
victim, and having by common consent
taken off the hands, feet, and head,
throwing them together with the en-
trails, into the sea, we devoured the rest
of the body, piecemeal, during the four
ever memorable days of the seventeenth,
eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth of
the month.
On the nineteenth, there coming on
a smart shower which lasted fifteen or
twenty minutes, we contrived to catch
some water by means of a sheet which
had been fished up from the cabin by
our drag just after the gale. The quan-
tity we took in all did not amount to
more than half a gallon; but even this
scanty allowance supplied us with com-
parative strength and hope.
On the twenty-first we were again re-
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
497
duced to the last necessity. The
weather still remained warm and pleas-
ant, with occasional fogs and light
breezes, most usually from N. to W.
On the twenty-second, as we were
sitting close huddled together, gloomily
revolving over our lamentable condi-
tion, there flashed through my mind all
at once an idea which inspired me with
a bright gleam of hope. I remembered
that, when the foremast had been cut
away, Peters, being in the windward
chains, passed one of the axes into
my hand, requesting me to put it, if
possible, in a place of security, and that
a few minutes before the last heavy sea
struck the brig and filled her I had
taken this axe into the forecastle and
laid it in one of the larboard berths.
I now thought it possible that, by get-
ting at this axe, we might cut through
the deck over the store-room, and thus
readily supply ourselves with pro-
visions.
When I communicated this object to
my companions, they uttered a feeble.
shout of joy, and we all proceeded
forthwith to the forecastle. The diffi-
culty of descending here was greater
than that of going down in the cabin,
the opening being much smaller, for
it will be remembered that the whole
framework about the cabin companion-
hatch had been carried away, whereas
the forecastle-way, being a simple hatch
of only about three feet square, had
remained uninjured. I did not hesitate,
however, to attempt the descent; and
a rope being fastened round my body
as before, I plunged boldly in, feet
foremost, made my way quickly to the
berth, and at the first attempt brought
up the axe. It was hailed with the most
ecstatic joy and triumph, and the ease
with which it had been obtained was
regarded as an omen of our ultimate
preservation.
We now commenced cutting at the
deck with all the energy of rekindled
hope, Peters and myself taking the axe
by turns, Augustus' wounded arm not
permitting him to aid us in any degree.
As we were still so feeble as to be
scarcely able to stand unsupported, and
could consequently work but a minute
or two without resting, it soon became
evident that many long hours would be
necessary to accomplish our task-that
is, to cut an opening sufficiently large
to admit of a free access to the store-
room. This consideration, however, did
not discourage us; and, working all
night by the light of the moon, we
succeeded in effecting our purpose by
daybreak on the morning of the twenty-
third.
Peters now volunteered to go down;
and, having made all arrangements as
before, he descended, and soon re-
turned bringing up with him a small
jar, which, to our great joy, proved
to be full of olives. Having shared
these among us, and devoured them
with the greatest avidity, we proceeded
to let him down again. This time he
succeeded beyond our utmost expecta-
tions, returning instantly with a large
ham and a bottle of Madeira wine. Of
the latter we each took a moderate
sup, having learned by experience the
pernicious consequences of indulging
too freely. The ham, except about two
pounds near the bone, was not in a
condition to be eaten, having been en-
tirely spoiled by the salt water. The
sound part was divided among us. Pet-
ers and Augustus, not being able to
restrain their appetite, swallowed theirs
498
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
upon the instant; but I was more cau-
tious, and ate but a small portion of
mine, dreading the thirst which I knew
would ensue.
We now rested a while
from our labors. which had been intol-
erably severe.
By noon, feeling somewhat strength-
ened and refreshed, we again renewed
our attempt at getting up provisions,
Peters and myself going down alter-
nately, and always with more or less
success, until sundown. During this in-
terval we had the good fortune to bring
up, altogether, four more small jars of
olives, another ham, a carboy contain-
ing nearly three gallons of excellent
Cape Madeira wine, and, what gave
us still more delight, a small tortoise
of the Gallipago breed, several of which
had been taken on board by Captain
Barnard, as the Grampus was leaving
port, from the schooner Mary Pitts,
just returned from a sealing voyage in
the Pacific.
In a subsequent portion of this nar-
rative I shall have frequent occasion to
mention this species of tortoise. It is
found principally, as most of my read-
ers may know, in the group of islands
called the Gallipagos, which, indeed, de-
rive their name from the animal-the
Spanish word Gallipago meaning a
fresh-water terrapin. From the pecu-
liarity of their shape and action they
have been sometimes called the ele-
phant tortoise. They are frequently
found of an enormous size. I have my-
self seen several which would weigh
from twelve to fifteen hundred pounds,
although I do not remember that any
navigator speaks of having seen them
weighing more than eight hundred.
Their appearance is singular, and even
disgusting. Their steps are very slow,
measured, and heavy, their bodies being
carried about a foot from the ground.
Their neck is long, and exceedingly
slender; from eighteen inches to two
feet is a very common length, and I
killed one, where the distance from the
shoulder to the extremity of the head
was no less than three feet ten inches.
The head has a striking resemblance to
that of a serpent. They can exist with-
out food for an almost incredible length
of time, instances having been known
where they have been thrown into the
hold of a vessel and lain two years
without nourishment of any kind-
being as fat, and, in every respect, in
as good order at the expiration of the
time as when they were first put in
In one particular these extraordinary
animals bear a resemblance to the
dromedary, or camel of the desert. In
a bag at the root of the neck they
carry with them a constant supply of
water. In some instances, upon killing
them after a full year's deprivation of
all nourishment, as much as three gal
lons of perfectly sweet and fresh water
have been found in their bags. Their
food is chiefly wild parsley and celery.
with purslain, sea-kelp, and prickly-
pears, upon which latter vegetable they
thrive wonderfully, a great quantity of
it being usually found on the hillsides
near the shore wherever the animal
itself is discovered. They are excellent
and highly nutritious food, and have.
no doubt, been the means of preserving
the lives of thousands of seamen em-
ployed in the whale-fishery and other
pursuits in the Pacific.
The one which we had the good for-
tune to bring up from the store-room
was not of a large size, weighing prob-
ably sixty-five or seventy pounds. It
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
499
was a female, and in excellent condi-
tion, being exceedingly fat, and having
more than a quart of limpid and sweet
water in its bag. This was indeed a
treasure; and, falling on our knees with
one accord, we returned fervent thanks
to God for so seasonable a relief.
We had great difficulty in getting
the animal up through the opening, as
its struggles were fierce and its strength
prodigious. It was upon the point of
making its escape from Peter's grasp,
and slipping back into the water, when
Augustus, throwing a rope with a slip-
knot around its throat, held it up in
this manner until I jumped into the
hole by the side of Peters, and assisted
him in lifting it out.
The water we drew carefully from
the bag into the jug, which, it will be
remembered, had been brought up be-
fore from the cabin. Having done this,
we broke off the neck of a bottle so as
to form, with the cork, a kind of glass,
holding not quite half a gill. We then
each drank one of these measures full,
and resolved to limit ourselves to this
quantity per day as long as it should
hold out.
During the last two or three days,
the weather having been dry and pleas-
ant, the bedding we had obtained from
the cabin, as well as our clothing, had
become thoroughly dry, so that we
passed this night (that of the twenty-
third) in comparative comfort, enjoy-
ing a tranquil repose, after having
supped plentifully on olives and ham,
with a small allowance of the wine.
Being afraid of losing some of our
stores overboard during the night, in
the event of a breeze springing up, we
secured them as well as possible with
cordage to the fragments of the wind-
were
lass. Our tortoise, which we
anxious to preserve alive as long as we
could, we threw on its back, and other-
wise carefully fastened.
CHAPTER XIII
JULY 24TH.-This morning saw us
wonderfully recruited in spirits and
strength. Notwithstanding the perilous
situation in which we were still placed,
ignorant of our position, although cer-
tainly at a great distance from land,
without more food than would last us
for a fortnight even with great care,
almost entirely without water, and
floating about at the mercy of every
wind and wave on the merest wreck
in the world, still the infinitely more
terrible distresses and dangers from
which we had so lately and so provi-
dentially been delivered caused us to
regard what we now endured as but
little more than an ordinary evil-so
strictly comparative is either good or
ill.
At sunrise we were preparing to re-
new our attempts at getting up some-
thing from the store-room, when, a
smart shower coming on, with some
lightning, we turned our attention to
the catching of water by means of the
sheet we had used before for this pur-
pose. We had no other means of col-
lecting the rain than by holding the
sheet spread out with one of the fore-
chain-plates in the middle of it. The
water, thus conducted to the centre,
was drained through into our jug. We
had nearly filled it in this manner,
when, a heavy squall coming on from
the northward, obliged us to desist, as
the hulk began once more to roll so
violently that we could no longer keep
500
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
our feet. We now went forward, and,
lashing ourselves securely to the rem-
nant of the windlass as before, awaited
the event with far more calmness than
could have been anticipated or would
have been imagined possible under the
circumstances. At noon the wind had
freshened into a two-reef breeze, and
by night into a stiff gale, accompanied
with a tremendously heavy swell. Ex-
perience having taught us, however, the
best method of arranging our lashings,
we weathered this dreary night in toler-
able security, although thoroughly
drenched at almost every instant by
the sea, and in momentary dread of
being washed off. Fortunately, the
weather was so warm as to render the
water rather grateful than otherwise.
July 25th. This morning the gale
had diminished to a mere ten-knot
breeze, and the sea had gone down with
it so considerably that we were able to
keep ourselves dry upon the deck. To
our great grief, however, we found that
two jars of our olives, as well as the
whole of our ham, had been washed
overboard, in spite of the careful man-
ner in which they had been fastened.
We determined not to kill the tortoise
as yet, and contented ourselves for the
present with a breakfast on a few of
the olives, and a measure of water each,
which latter we mixed half and half,
with wine, finding great relief and
strength from the mixture, without the
distressing intoxication which had ensued
upon drinking the port. The sea was
still far too rough for the renewal of
our efforts at getting up provision from
the store-room. Several articles, of no
importance to us in our present situa-
tion, floated up through the opening
during the day, and were immediately
washed overboard. We also now ob-
served that the hulk lay more along
than ever, so that we could not stand
an instant without lashing ourselves.
On this account we passed a gloomy
and uncomfortable day. At noon the
sun appeared to be nearly vertical, and
we had no doubt that we had bee
driven down by the long succession of
northward and northwesterly winds inte
the near vicinity of the equator. To
ward evening saw several sharks, and
were somewhat alarmed by the au
dacious manner in which an enormoush
large one approached us. At one time
a lurch throwing the deck very far be
neath the water, the monster actually
swam in upon us, floundering for som
moments just over the companion
hatch, and striking Peters violently with
his tail. A heavy sea at length hurle
him overboard, much to our relief. I
moderate weather we might have easil
captured him.
July 26th.-This morning, the win
having greatly abated, and the sea no
being very rough, we determined to re
new our exertions in the store-room
After a great deal of hard labor durin
the whole day, we found that nothin
further was to be expected from thi
quarter, the partitions of the room hay
ing been stove during the night, and it
contents swept into the hold. Th
discovery, as may be supposed, fille
us with despair.
July 27th.-The sea nearly smoot
with a light wind, and still from
northward and westward. The su
coming out hotly in the afternoon,
occupied ourselves in drying our clothe
Found great relief from thirst, an
much comfort otherwise, by bathin
in the sea; in this, however, we wer
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
501
orced to use great caution, being afraid
of sharks, several of which were seen
wimming around the brig during the
lay.
July 28th.-Good weather still. The
orig now began to lie along so alarm-
ngly that we feared she would even-
ually roll bottom up. Prepared our-
elves as well as we could for this
mergency, lashing our tortoise, water-
ug, and two remaining jars of olives as
ar as possible over to the windward,
lacing them outside the hull, below
he main-chains. The sea very smooth
Il day, with little or no wind.
July 29th.-A continuance of the
ame weather. Augustus' wounded arm
egan to evince symptoms of mortifi-
ation. He complained of drowsiness
nd excessive thirst, but no acute pain.
Yothing could be done for his relief
eyond rubbing his wounds with a
ttle of the vinegar from the olives,
nd from this no benefit seemed to be
xperienced. We did every thing in
ur power for his comfort, and trebled
is allowance of water.
July 30th.-An excessively hot day,
ith no wind. An enormous shark kept
lose by the hulk during the whole of
he forenoon. We made several un-
uccessful attempts to capture him by
neans of a noose. Augustus much
Forse, and evidently sinking as much
rom want of proper nourishment as
rom the effect of his wounds. He con-
tantly prayed to be relieved from his
sufferings, wishing for nothing but
death. This evening we ate the last
of our olives, and found the water in
our jug so putrid that we could not
swallow it at all without the addition
of wine. Determined to kill our tor-
toise in the morning.
July 31st.-After a night of exces-
sive anxiety and fatigue, owing to the
position of the hulk, we set about kill-
ang and cutting up our tortoise. He
proved to be much smaller than we
had supposed, although in good condi-
tion, the whole meat about him not
amounting to more than ten pounds.
With a view of preserving a portion of
this as long as possible, we cut it into
fine pieces, and filled with them our
three remaining olive-jars and the wine-
bottle (all of which had been kept),
pouring in afterward the vinegar from
the olives. In this manner we put away
about three pounds of the tortoise,
intending not to touch it until we had
consumed the rest. We concluded to
restrict ourselves to about four ounces
of the meat per day; the whole would
thus last us thirteen days. A brisk
shower, with severe thunder and light-
ning, came on about dusk, but lasted
so short a time that we only succeeded
in catching about half a pint of water.
The whole of this, by common consent,
was given to Augustus, who now ap、
peared to be in the last extremity. He
drank the water from the sheet as we
caught it (we holding it above him as
he lay so as to let it run into his
mouth), for we had now nothing left
capable of holding water, unless we had
chosen to empty out our wine from the
carboy, or the stale water from the
jug. Either of these expedients would
have been resorted to had the shower
lasted.
The sufferer seemed to derive but
little benefit from the draught. His
arm was completely black from the
wrist to the shoulder, and his feet were
like ice. We expected every moment
to see him breathe his last. He was
502
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
frightfully emaciated; so much so that,
although he weighed a hundred and
twenty-seven pounds upon his leaving
Nantucket, he now did not weight more
than forty or fifty at the farthest. His
eyes were sunk far in his head, being
scarcely perceptible, and the skin of
his cheeks hung so loosely as to pre-
vent his masticating any food, or even
swallowing any liquid, without great
difficulty.
August 1st.-A continuance of the
same calm weather, with an oppres-
sively hot sun. Suffered exceedingly
from thirst, the water in the jug being
absolutely putrid and swarming with
vermin. We contrived, nevertheless, to
swallow a portion of it by mixing it
with wine; our thirst, however, was but
little abated. We found more relief by
bathing in the sea, but could not avail
ourselves of this expedient except at
long intervals, on account of the con-
tinual presence of sharks. We now
saw clearly that Augustus could not be
saved, that he was evidently dying.
We could do nothing to relieve his suf-
ferings, which appeared to be great.
About twelve o'clock he expired in
strong convulsions, and without having
spoken for several hours. His death
filled us with the most gloomy forebod-
ings, and had so great an effect upon
our spirits that we sat motionless by
the corpse during the whole day, and
never addressed each other except in a
whisper. It was not until some time
after dark that we took courage to get
up and throw the body overboard. It
was then loathsome beyond expression,
and so far decayed that, as Peters at-
tempted to lift it, an entire leg came
off in his grasp. As the mass of putre-
faction slipped over the vessel's side
into the water, the glare of phosphoric
light with which it was surrounded
plainly discovered to us seven or eight
large sharks, the clashing of whose hor-
rible teeth, as their prey was torn to
pieces among them, might have been
heard at the distance of a mile. We
shrunk within ourselves in the extrem
ity of horror at the sound.
August 2d. The same fearfully calm
and hot weather. The dawn found u
in a state of pitiable dejection as wel
as bodily exhaustion. The water in the
jug was now absolutely useless, being
thick gelatinous mass,-nothing bu
frightful-looking worms mingled with
slime. We threw it out, and washe
the jug well in the sea, afterward pour
ing a little vinegar in it from our bot
tles of pickled tortoise. Our thirs
could now scarcely be endured, and w
tried in vain to relieve it by wine, whic
seemed only to add fuel to the flame
and excited us to a high degree of in
toxication. We afterward endeavore
to relieve our sufferings by mixing th
wine with sea-water; but this instant
brought about the most violent retch
ings, so that we never again attempte
it. During the whole day we anxioush
sought an opportunity of bathing, bu
to no purpose; for the hulk was no
entirely besieged on all sides wit
sharks-no doubt the identical monster
who had devoured our poor companio
on the evening before, and who were i
momentary expectation of another sim
ilar feast. This circumstance occa
sioned us the most bitter regret an
filled us with the most depressing an
melancholy forebodings. We had ex
perienced indescribable relief in bath
ing, and to have this resource cut off i
so frightful a manner was more tha
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
503
we could bear. Nor, indeed, were we
altogether free from the apprehension
of immediate danger, for the least slip
or false movement would have thrown
us at once within reach of those vorac-
ious fish, who frequently thrust them-
selves directly upon us, swimming up
to leeward. No shouts or exertions on
our part seemed to alarm them. Even
when one of the largest was struck
with an axe by Peters and much
wounded, he persisted in his attempts
to push in where we were. A cloud
came up at dusk, but, to our extreme
inguish, passed over without discharg-
ng itself. It is quite impossible to
conceive our sufferings from thirst at
this period. We passed a sleepless
night, both on this account and through
read of the sharks.
August 3d.-No prospect of relief,
ind the brig lying still more and more
long, so that now we could not main-
ain a footing upon deck at all. Busied
ourselves in securing our wine and tor-
oise-meat, so that we might not lose
hem in the event of our rolling over.
Got out two stout spikes from the fore-
hains, and, by means of the axe, drove
hem into the hull to windward within
I couple of feet of the water; this not
being very far from the keel, as we
vere nearly upon our beam-ends. To
hese spikes we now lashed our pro-
isions, as being more secure than their
former position beneath the chains.
Suffered great agony from thirst during
he whole day-no chance of bathing
on account of the sharks, which never
left us for a moment. Found it im-
possible to sleep.
August 4th.-A little before day-
break we perceived that the hulk was
heeling over, and aroused ourselves to
prevent being thrown off by the move.
ment. At first the roll was slow and
gradual, and we contrived to clamber
over to windward very well, having
taken the precaution to leave ropes
hanging from the spikes we had driven
in for the provision. But we had not
calculated sufficiently upon the acceler-
ation of the impetus; for, presently the
heel became too violent to allow of our
keeping pace with it; and, before either
of us knew what was to happen, we
found ourselves hurled furiously into
the sea, and struggling several fathoms
beneath the surface, with the huge hull
immediately above us.
In going under the water I had been
obliged to let go my hold upon the
rope; and finding that I was completely
beneath the vessel, and my strength
nearly exhausted, I scarcely made a
struggle for life, and resigned myself, in
a few seconds, to die. But here again
I was deceived, not having taken into
consideration the natural rebound of
the hull to windward. The whirl of the
water upward, which the vessel occa-
sioned in rolling partially back, brought
me to the surface still more violently
than I had been plunged beneath. Upon
coming up I found myself about twenty
yards from the hulk, as near as I could
judge. She was lying keel up, rocking
furiously from side to side, and the
sea in all directions around was much
agitated, and full of strong whirlpools.
I could see nothing of Peters. An oil-
cask was floating within a few feet of
me, and various other articles from the
brig were scattered about.
My principal terror was now on ac-
count of the sharks, which I knew to be
in my vicinity. In order to deter these,
if possible, from approaching me, I
504
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
splashed the water vigorously with both
hands and feet as I swam towards the
hulk, creating a body of foam. I have
no doubt that to this expedient, simple
as it was, I was indebted for my pres-
ervation; for the sea all round the brig,
just before her rolling over, was so
crowded with these monsters, that I
must have been, and really was, in
actual contact with some of them dur-
ing my progress. By great good for-
tune, however, I reached the side of the
vessel in safety, although so utterly
weakened by the violent exertion I had
used that I should never have been
able to get upon it but for the timely
assistance of Peters, who, now, to my
great joy, made his appearance (hav-
ing scrambled up to the keel from the
opposite side of the hull), and threw
me the end of a rope-one of those
which had been attached to the spikes.
Having barely escaped this danger,
our attention was now directed to the
dreadful imminency of another-that
of absolute starvation. Our whole stock
of provision had been swept overboard
in spite of all our care in securing it;
and seeing no longer the remotest pos-
sibility of obtaining more, we gave way
both of us to despair, weeping aloud
like children, and neither of us at-
tempting to offer consolation to the
other. Such weakness can scarcely be
conceived, and to those who have never
been similarly situated will, no doubt,
appear unnatural; but it must be re-
membered that our intellects were so
entirely disordered by the long course
of privation and terror to which we
had been subjected, that we could not
justly be considered, at that period, in
the light of rational beings. In subse-
quent perils, nearly as great, if not
greater, I bore up with fortitude against
all the evils of my situation, and Peters,
it will be seen, evinced a stoical phi
losophy nearly as incredible as his pres-
ent childlike supineness and imbecility
-the mental condition made the differ
ence.
The overturning of the brig, even
with the consequent loss of the wine
and turtle, would not, in fact, have ren
dered our situation more deplorabl
than before, except for the disappear
ance of the bedclothes by which we hat
been hitherto enabled to catch rain
water, and of the jug in which we hat
kept it when caught; for we found th
whole bottom, from within two or thre
feet of the bends as far as the keel, to
gether with the keel itself, thickly cor
ered with large barnacles, which prove
to be excellent and highly nutrition
food. Thus, in two important respects
the accident we had so greatly dreade
proved to be a benefit rather than a
injury; it had opened to us a suppl
of provisions which we could not hav
exhausted, using it moderately, in
month; and it had greatly contribute
to our comfort as regards position, w
being much more at ease, and in infi
nitely less danger, than before.
The difficulty, however, of now ot
taining water blinded us to all th
benefits of the change in our condition
That we might be ready to avail ou
selves, as far as possible, of any showe
which might fall, we took off our shirt
to make use of them as we had of th
sheets-not hoping, of course, to ge
more in this way, even under the mos
favorable circumstances, than half
gill at a time. No signs of a cloud ap
peared during the day, and the agonie
of our thirst were nearly intolerable
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
505
At night, Peters obtained about an
hour's disturbed sleep, but my intense
sufferings would not permit me to close
my eyes for a single moment.
August 5th.-To-day, a gentle breeze
springing up carried us through a vast
quantity of sea-weed, among which we
were so fortunate as to find eleven
small crabs, which afforded us several
delicious meals. Their shells being
quite soft, we ate them entire, and
ound that they irritated our thirst far
ess than the barnacles. Seeing no trace
of sharks among the sea-weed, we also
ventured to bathe, and remained in the
water for four or five hours, during
which we experienced a very sensible
liminution of our thirst. Were greatly
efreshed, and spent the night some-
vhat more comfortably than before,
oth of us snatching little sleep.
August 6th.-This day we were
lessed by a brisk and continual rain,
asting from about noon until after
lark. Bitterly did we now regret the
oss of our jug and carboy; for, in spite
of the little means we had of catching
he water, we might have filled one, if
ot both of them. As it was, we con-
rived to satisfy the cravings of thirst
y suffering the shirts to become satur-
ted, and then wringing them so as
o let the grateful fluid trickle into our
nouths. In this occupation we passed
he entire day.
August 7th.-Just at daybreak we
both at the same instant descried a
ail to the eastward, and evidently com-
ng towards us! We hailed the glorious
sight with a long, although feeble shout
of rapture; and began instantly to
make every signal in our power, by
flaring the shirts in the air, leaping as
high as our weak condition would per-
mit, and even by hallooing with all the
strength of our lungs, although the ves-
sel could not have been less than fifteen
miles distant. However, she still con-
tinued to near our hulk, and we felt
that, if she but held her present course,
she must eventually come so close as to
perceive us. In about an hour after
we first discovered her, we could clearly
see the people on her decks. She was
a long, low, and rakish-looking topsail
schooner, with a black ball in her fore-
topsail, and had, apparently, a full
crew. We now became alarmed, for
we could hardly imagine it possible that
she did not observe us, and were appre-
hensive that she meant to leave us to
perish as we were an act of fiendish
barbarity, which, however incredible it
may appear, has been repeatedly per-
petuated at sea, under circumstances
very nearly similar, and by beings who
were regarded as belonging to the
human species.* In this instance, how-
*The case of the brig Polly, of Bos-
ton, is one so much in point, and her
fate, in many respects, so remarkably
similar to our own, that I cannot for-
bear alluding to it here. This vessel,
of one hundred and thirty tons burden,
sailed from Boston, with a cargo of
lumber and provisions, for Santa Croix,
on the 12th of December, 1811, under
the command of Captain Casneau.
There were eight souls on board besides
the captain-the mate, four seamen,
and the cook, together with a Mr.
Hunt, and a negro girl belonging to him.
On the fifteenth, having cleared the
shoal of Georges, she sprung a leak in
a gale of wind from the south-east, and
was finally capsized; but, the masts
going by the board, she afterward
506
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ever, by the mercy of God, we were
destined to be most happily deceived;
for, presently we were aware of a sud-
den commotion on the deck of the
stranger, who immediately afterward
ran up a British flag, and, hauling her
wind, bore up directly upon us.
half an hour more we found ourselves
in her cabin. She proved to be the
In
righted. They remained in this situa-
tion, without fire, and with very little
provision, for the period of one hundred
and ninety-one days (from December
the fifteenth to June the twentieth),
when Captain Casneau and Samuel
Badger, the only survivors, were taken
off the wreck by the Fame, of Hull,
Captain Featherstone, bound home
from Rio Janeiro. When picked up,
they were in latitude 28° N., longitude
13° W., having drifted above two thou-
sand miles! On the ninth of July the
Fame fell in with the brig Dromero,
Captain Perkins, who landed the two
sufferers in Kennebeck. The narrative
from which we gather these details
ends in the following words:
"It is natural to inquire how they
could float such a vast distance, upon
the most frequented part of the At-
lantic, and not be discovered all this
time. They were passed by more than
a dozen sail, one of which came so
nigh them that they could distinctly
see the people on deck and on the rig-
ging looking at them; but, to the
inexpressible disappointment of the
starving and freezing men, they stifled
the dictates of compassion, hoisted sail,
and cruelly abandoned them to their
fate."
Jane Guy, of Liverpool, Captain Guy
bound on a sealing and trading voyage
to the South Seas and Pacific.
CHAPTER XIV
THE Jane Guy was a fine-lookin
topsail schooner of a hundred an
eighty tons burden. She was unusually
sharp in the bows, and on a wind, i
moderate weather, the fastest sailer
have ever seen. Her qualities, how
ever, as a rough sea-boat, were not
good, and her draught of water was b
far too great for the trade to whic
she was destined. For this peculi
service, a larger vessel, and one of
light proportionate draught, is desi
able say a vessel of from three hu
dred to three hundred and fifty ton
She should be bark-rigged, and in oth
respects of a different constructie
from the usual South Sea ships. It
absolutely necessary that she shou
be well armed. She should have, s
ten or twelve twelve-pound carronad
and two or three long twelves, wi
brass blunderbusses, and water-tig
arm-chests for each top. Her anche
and cables should be of far great
strength than is required for any oth
species of trade, and, above all. h
crew should be numerous and efficie
-not less, for such a vessel as I ha
described, than fifty or sixty able-b
ied men. The Jane Guy had a cr
of thirty-five, all able seamen, besit
the captain and mate, but she was
altogether as well armed or otherw
equipped, as a navigator acquaint
with the difficulties and dangers of
trade could have desired.
Captain Guy was a gentleman
great urbanity of manner, and of d
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
507
siderable experience in the southern
traffic, to which he had devoted the
greater portion of his life. He was
deficient, however, in energy, and, con-
sequently, in that spirit of enterprise
which is here so absolutely requisite.
He had
He was part owner of the vessel in
which he sailed, and was invested with
discretionary powers to cruise in the
South Seas for any cargo which might
come most readily to hand.
on board, as usual in such voyages,
beads, looking-glasses, tinder-works,
ixes, hatchets, saws, adzes, planes,
chisels, gouges, gimlets, files, spoke-
shaves, rasps, hammers, nails, knives,
scissors, razors, needles, thread, crock-
ery-ware, calico, trinkets, and other
similar articles.
The schooner sailed from Liverpool
on the tenth of July, crossed the tropic
of Cancer on the twenty-fifth, in longi-
tude twenty degrees west, and reached
Sal, one of the Cape Verd islands, on
the twenty-ninth, where she took in
salt and other necessaries for the voy-
ige. On the third of August, she left
the Cape Verds and steered southwest,
stretching over toward the coast of
Brazil, so as to cross the equator be-
tween the meridians of twenty-eight
and thirty degrees west longitude. This
is the course usually taken by vessels
bound from Europe to the Cape of
Good Hope, or by that route to the
East Indies. By proceeding thus they
avoid the calms and strong contrary
currents which continually prevail on
the coast of Guinea, while, in the end,
it is found to be the shortest track, as
westerly winds are never wanting after-
ward by which to reach the Cape. It
was Captain Guy's intention to make
his first stoppage at Kerguelen's Land-
I hardly know for what reason. On
the day we were picked up the schooner
was off Cape St. Roque, in longitude
thirty-one degrees west; so that, when
found, we had drifted probably, from
north to south, not less than five-and-
twenty degrees!
On board the Jane Guy we were
treated with all the kindness our dis-
tressed situation demanded. In about
a fortnight, during which time we con-
tinued steering to the southeast, with
gentle breezes and fine weather, both
Peters and myself recovered entirely
from the effects of our late privation
and dreadful sufferings, and we began
to remember what had passed rather
as a frightful dream from which we
had been happily awakened, than as
events which had taken place in sober
and naked reality. I have since found
that this species of partial oblivion is
usually brought about by sudden tran-
sition, whether from joy to sorrow or
from sorrow to joy-the degree of for-
getfulness being proportioned to the
degree of difference in the exchange.
Thus, in my own case, I now feel it
impossible to realize the full extent of
the misery which I endured during the
days spent upon the hulk. The inci-
dents are remembered, but not the feel-
ings which the incidents elicited at the
time of their occurrence. I only know,
that when they did occur, I then
thought human nature could sustain
nothing more of agony.
We continued our voyage for some
weeks without any incidents of greater
moment than the occosional meeting
with whaling-ships, and more frequently
with the black or right whale, so called
in contradistinction to the spermaceti.
These, however, were chiefly found
508
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
south of the twenty-fifth parallel. On
the sixteenth of September, being in
the vicinity of the Cape of Good Hope,
the schooner encountered her first gale
of any violence since leaving Liver-
pool. In this neighborhood, but more
frequently to the south and east of the
promontory (we were to the westward),
navigators have often to contend with
storms from the northward, which rage
with great fury. They always bring
with them a heavy sea, and one of their
most dangerous features is the instan-
taneous chopping round of the wind,
an occurrence almost certain to take
place during the greatest force of the
gale. A perfect hurricane will be blow-
ing at one moment from the northward
or northeast, and in the next not a
breath of wind will be felt in that direc-
tion, while from the southwest it will
come out all at once with a violence
almost inconceivable. A bright spot
to the southward is the sure forerun-
ner of the change, and vessels are thus
enabled to take the proper precautions.
It was about six in the morning when
the blow came on with a white squall,
and, as usual, from the northward. By
eight it had increased very much, and
brought down upon us one of the most
tremendous seas I had then ever be-
held. Every thing had been made as
snug as possible, but the schooner
labored excessively, and gave evidence
of her bad qualities as a sea-boat, pitch-
ing her forecastle under at every plunge
and with the greatest difficulty strug-
gling up from one wave before she was
buried in another. Just before sunset
the bright spot for which we had been
on the look-out made its appearance in
the southwest, and in an hour after-
ward we perceived the little head-sail
we carried flapping listlessly against the
mast. In two minutes more, in spite of
every preparation, we were hurled or
our beam-ends, as if by magic, and a
perfect wilderness of foam made a clear
breach over us as we lay. The blow
from the southwest, however, luckily
proved to be nothing more than a
squall, and we had the good fortune to
right the vessel without the loss of a
spar. A heavy cross sea gave us great
trouble for a few hours after this, bu
toward morning we found ourselves in
nearly as good condition as before the
gale. Captain Guy considered that h
had made an escape little less that
miraculous.
On the thirteenth of October we cam
in sight of Prince Edward's Island, i
latitude 46° 53' S., longitude 37° 46' E
Two days afterward we found ourselve
near Possession Island, and presently
passed the islands of Crozet, in latitud
42° 59' S., longitude 48° E. On th
eighteenth we made Kerguelen's
Desolation Island, in the Southern
dian Ocean, and came to anchor
Christmas Harbor, having four fathom
of water.
This island, or rather group of is
ands, bears southeast from the Cape
Good Hope, and is distant therefro
nearly eight hundred leagues. It wa
first discovered in 1772, by the Bar
de Kergulen, or Kerguelen, a French
man, who, thinking the land to form
portion of an extensive southern conti
nent carried home information to the
effect, which produced much excitemen
at the time. The government, takin
the matter up, sent the baron back
the following year for the purpose
giving his new discovery a critical er
amination, when the mistake was dis
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
509
covered. In 1777, Captain Cook fell in
with the same group, and gave to the
principal one the name of Desolation
Island, a title which it certainly well
deserves. Upon approaching the land,
however, the navigator might be in-
duced to suppose otherwise, as the sides
of most of the hills, from September
to March, are clothed with very bril-
liant verdure. This deceitful appear-
ance is caused by a small plant resem-
bling saxifrage, which is abundant,
growing in large patches on a species
of crumbling moss. Besides this plant
there is scarcely a sign of vegetation
on the island, if we except some coarse
ank grass near the harbor, some lichen,
ind a shrub which bears resemblance
to a cabbage shooting into seed, and
which has a bitter and acrid taste.
The face of the country is hilly,
although none of the hills can be called
ofty. Their tops are perpetually cov-
ered with snow. There are several har-
ors, of which Christmas Harbor is the
nost convenient. It is the first to be
net with on the northeast side of the
sland after passing Cape Francois,
which forms the northern shore, and, by
ts peculiar shape, serves to distinguish
he harbor. Its projecting point ter-
ninates in a high rock, through which is
1 large hole, forming a natural arch.
The entrance is in latitude 48° 40′ S.,
longitude 69° 6' E. Passing in here,
good anchorage may be found under
the shelter of several small islands,
which form a sufficient protection from
all easterly winds. Proceeding on east-
wardly from this anchorage you come
to Wasp Bay, at the head of the har-
bor. This is a small basin, completely
landlocked, into which you can go with
four fathoms, and find anchorage in
from ten to three, hard clay bottom
A ship might lie here with her best
bower ahead all the year round with-
out risk. To the westward, at the head
of Wasp Bay, is a small stream of ex-
cellent water, easily procured.
Some seal of the fur and hair species
are still to be found on Kerguelen's
Island, and sea-elephants abound. The
feathered tribes are discovered in great
numbers. Penguins are very plenty,
and of these there are four different
kinds. The royal penguin, so called
from its size and beautiful plumage, is
the largest. The upper part of the
body is usually gray, sometimes of a
lilac tint; the under portion of the
purest white imaginable. The head is
of a glossy and most brilliant black,
the feet also. The chief beauty of
plumage, however, consists in two
broad stripes of a gold color, which
pass along from the head to the breast.
The bill is long, and either pink or
bright scarlet. These birds walk erect;
with a stately carriage. They carry
their heads high with their wings droop-
ing like two arms, and, as their tails
project from their body in a line with
the legs, the resemblance to a human
figure is very striking, and would be
apt to deceive the spectator at a casual
glance or in the gloom of the evening.
The royal penguins which we met with
on Kerguelen's Land were rather larger
than a goose. The other kinds are the
maccaroni, the jackass, and the rook-
ery penguin. These are much smaller,
less beautiful in plumage, and different
in other respects.
Besides the penguin many other bir
are here to be found, among which may
be mentioned sea-hens, blue peterels,
teal, ducks, Port Egmont hens, shags,
510
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Cape pigeons, the nelly, sea-swallows,
terns, sea-gulls, Mother Carey's chick-
ens, Mother Carey's geese, or the great
peterel, and, lastly, the albatross.
The great peterel is as large as the
common albatross, and is carnivorous.
It is frequently called the break-bones,
or osprey peterel. They are not at all
shy, and, when properly cooked, are
palatable food. In flying they some-
times sail very close to the surface of
the water, with the wings expanded,
without appearing to move them in the
least degree, or make any exertion with
them whatever.
The albatross is one of the largest
and fiercest of the South Sea birds. It
is of the gull species, and takes its prey
on the wing, never coming on land ex-
cept for the purpose of breeding. Be-
tween this bird and the penguin the
most singular friendship exists. Their
nests are constructed with great unifor-
mity upon a plan concerted between the
two species-that of the albatross being
placed in the centre of a little square
formed by the nests of four penguins.
Navigators have agreed in calling an as-
semblage of such encampments a rook-
ery. These rookeries have been often
described, but as my readers may not
all have seen these descriptions, and as I
shall have occasion hereafter to speak of
the penguin and albatross, it will not
be amiss to say something here of their
mode of building and living.
When the season for incubation ar-
rives, the birds assemble in vast num-
bers, and for some days appear to be
deliberating upon the proper course to
be pursued. At length they proceed to
action. A level piece of ground is
selected, of suitable extent, usually
comprising three or four acres, and
situated as near the sea as possible,
being still beyond its reach. The spot
is chosen with reference to its evenness
of surface, and that is preferred which
is the least encumbered with stones
This matter being arranged, the birds
proceed, with one accord, and actuated
apparently by one mind, to trace out
with mathematical accuracy, either a
square or other parallelogram, as may
best suit the nature of the ground, and
of just sufficient size to accommodate
easily all the birds assembled, and n
more in this particular seeming deter
mined upon preventing the access of
future stragglers who have not partic
pated in the labor of the encampment
One side of the place thus marked ou
runs parallel with the water's edge, ant
is left open for ingress or egress.
Having defined the limits of th
rookery, the colony now begin to clea
it of every species of rubbish, picking
up stone by stone, and carrying them
outside of the lines, and close by them
so as to form a wall on the three inlan
sides. Just within this wall a perfectly
level and smooth walk is formed, from
six to eight feet wide, and extending
around the encampment-thus servin
the purpose of a general promenade.
The next process is to partition ou
the whole area into small squares ex
actly equal in size. This is done b
forming narrow paths, very smooth
and crossing each other at right angle
throughout the entire extent of th
rookery. At each intersection of thes
paths the nest of an albatross is con
structed, and a penguin's nest in th
centre of each square-thus every pen
guin is surrounded by four albatrosses
and each albatross by a like numbe
of penguins. The penguin's nest con
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
511
ists of a hole in the earth, very shal-
ow, being only just of sufficient depth
o keep her single egg from rolling.
The albatross is somewhat less simple
her arrangements, erecting a hillock
bout a foot high and two in diameter.
This is made of earth, seaweed, and
hells. On its summit she builds her
est.
The birds take especial care never
o leave their nests unoccupied for an
istant during the period of incubation,
r, indeed, until the young progeny are
Ifficiently strong to take care of them-
elves. While the male is absent at sea
1 search of food, the female remains
a duty, and it is only upon the return
f her partner that she ventures abroad.
he eggs are never left uncovered at
-while one bird leaves the nest the
ther nestling in by its side. This pre-
ution is rendered necessary by the
ieving propensities prevalent in the
okery, the inhabitants making no
ruple to purloin each other's eggs at
very good opportunity.
Although there are some rookeries in
hich the penguin and albatross are the
le population, yet in most of them a
ariety of oceanic birds are to be met
ith, enjoying all the privileges of citi-
nship, and scattering their nests here
id there, wherever they can find room,
ver interfering, however, with the sta-
ons of the larger species. The appear-
ice of such encampments, when seen
om a distance, is exceedingly singular.
he whole atmosphere just above the
ttlement is darkened with the immense
umber of the albatross (mingled with
e smaller tribes) which are continually
overing over it, either going to the
tean or returning home. At the same
me a crowd of penguins are to be
observed, some passing to and fro in
the narrow alleys, and some marching
with the military strut so peculiar to
them, around the general promenade-
ground which encircles the rookery. In
short, survey it as we will, nothing can
be more astonishing than the spirit of
reflection evinced by these feathered
beings, and nothing surely can be better
calculated to elicit reflection in every
well-regulated human intellect.
On the morning after our arrival in
Christmas Harbor the chief mate, Mr.
Patterson, took the boats, and (although
it was somewhat early in the season)
went in search of seal, leaving the cap-
tain and a young relation of his on a
point of barren land to the westward,
they having some business, whose na-
ture I could not ascertain, to transact
in the interior of the island. Captain
Guy took with him a bottle, in which
was a sealed letter, and made his way
from the point on which he was set
on shore toward one of the highest
peaks in the place. It is probable that
his design was to leave the letter on
that height for some vessel which he
expected to come after him. As soon
as we lost sight of him we proceeded
(Peters and myself being in the mate's
boat) on our cruise around the coast,
looking for seal. In this business we
were occupied about three weeks, exam-
ining with great care every nook and
corner, not only of Kerguelen's Land,
but of the several small islands in the
vicinity. Our labors, however, were not
crowned with any important success.
We saw a great many fur seal, but
they were exceedingly shy, and with
the greatest exertions, we could only
procure three hundred and fifty skins
in all. Sea-elephants were abundant,
512
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
especially on the western coast of the
mainland, but of these we killed only
twenty, and this with great difficulty.
On the smaller islands we discovered
a good many of the hair seal, but did
not molest them. We returned to the
schooner on the eleventh, where we
found Captain Guy and his nephew,
who gave a very bad account of the
interior, representing it as one of the
most dreary and utterly barren coun-
tries in the world. They had remained
two nights on the island, owing to some
misunderstanding, on the part of the
second mate, in regard to the sending
a jolly-boat from the schooner to take
them off.
CHAPTER XV
ON the twelfth we made sail from
Christmas Harbor retracing our way to
the westward, and leaving Marion's
Island, one of Crozet's group, on the
larboard. We afterward passed Prince
Edward's Island, leaving it also on our
left; then, steering more to the north-
ward, made, in fifteen days, the islands
of Tristan d'Acunha, in latitude 37° 8'
S., longitude 12° 8' W.
This group, now so well known, and
which consists of three circular islands,
was first discovered by the Portuguese,
and was visited afterward by the Dutch
in 1643, and by the French in 1767.
The three islands together form a tri-
angle, and are distant from each other
about ten miles, there being fine open
passages between. The land in all of
them is very high, especially in Tristan
d'Acunha, properly so-called. This is
the largest of the group, being fifteen
miles in circumference, and so elevated
that it can be seen in clear weather at
the distance of eighty or ninety miles.
A part of the land toward the north
rises more than a thousand feet per-
pendicularly from the sea. A table-
land at this height extends back nearly
to the centre of the island, and from
this table-land arises a lofty cone like
that of Teneriffe. The lower half of
this cone is clothed with trees of good
size, but the upper region is barren
rock, usually hidden among the clouds
and covered with snow during the
greater part of the year. There are no
shoals or other dangers about the island,
the shores being remarkably bold and
the water deep. On the northwester
coast is a bay, with a beach of black
sand where a landing with boats can
be easily effected, provided there be a
southerly wind. Plenty of excellent
water may here be readily procured;
also cod and other fish may be taken
with hook and line.
size, and
group, is
Its pre
The next island in point of
the most westwardly of the
that called the Inaccessible.
cise situation is 37° 17′ S. latitude
longitude 12° 24′ W. It is seven o
eight miles in circumference, and on all
sides presents a forbidding and precipi
tous aspect. Its top is perfectly flat
and the whole region is sterile, nothing
growing upon it except a few stunted
shrubs.
Nightingale Island, the smallest and
most southerly, is in latitude 37° 26' S
longitude 12° 12′ W. Off its southern
extremity is a high ledge of rocky islets;
a few also of a similar appearance are
seen to the northeast. The ground is
irregular and sterile, and a deep valley
partially separates it.
The shores of these islands abound
in the proper season, with sea-lions, sea-
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
513
elephants, the hair and fur seal, to-
gether with a great variety of oceanic
birds. Whales are also plenty in their
vicinity. Owing to the ease with which
these various animals were here for-
merly taken, the group has been much
visited since its discovery. The Dutch
and French frequented it at a very
early period. In 1790, Captain Patten,
of the ship Industry, of Philadelphia,
made Tristan d'Acunha, where he re-
mained seven months (from August,
1790, to April, 1791) for the purpose
of collecting seal-skins. In this time
le gathered no less than five thousand
six hundred, and says that he would
have had no difficulty in loading a large
ship with oil in three weeks. Upon his
arrival he found no quadrupeds, with
the exception of a few wild goats; the
sland now abounds with all our most
valuable domestic animals, which have
been introduced by subsequent navi-
gators.
I believe it was not long after Cap-
ain Patten's visit that Captain Colqu-
boun, of the American brig Betsey,
touched at the largest of the islands
for the purpose of refreshment. He
planted onions, potatoes, cabbages, and
a great many other vegetables, an
abundance of all which is now to be
met with.
In 1811, a Captain Haywood, in the
Nereus, visited Tristan. He found
there three Americans, who were resid-
ing upon the island to prepare sealskins
and oil. One of these men was named
Jonathan Lambert, and he called him-
self the sovereign of the country. He
had cleared and cultivated about sixty
acres of land, and turned his attention
to raising the coffee-plant and sugar-
cane, with which he had been furnished
by the American Minister at Rio
Janeiro. This settlement, however, was
finally abandoned, and in 1817 the
islands were taken possession of by the
British Government, who sent a detach-
ment for that purpose from the Cape
of Good Hope. They did not, how-
ever, retain them long; but, upon the
evacuation of the country as a British
possession, two or three English fami-
lies took up their residence there inde-
pendently of the Government. On the
twenty-fifth of March, 1824, the Ber-
wick, Captain Jeffrey, from London to
Van Diemen's Land, arrived at the
place, where they found an Englishman
of the name of Glass, formerly a cor-
poral in the British artillery. He
claimed to be supreme governor of the
islands, and had under his control
twenty-one men and three women. He
gave a very favorable account of the
salubrity of the climate and of the pro-
ductiveness of the soil. The population
occupied themselves chiefly in collecting
seal-skins and sea-elephant oil, with
which they traded to the Cape of Good
Hope, Glass owning a small schooner.
At the period of our arrival the gov-
ernor was still a resident, but his little
community had multiplied, there being
fifty-six persons upon Tristan, besides
a smaller settlement of seven on Night-
ingale Island. We had no difficulty in
procuring almost every kind of refresh-
ment which we required-sheep, hogs,
bullocks, rabbits, poultry, goats, fish in
great variety, and vegetables were abun-
dant. Having come to anchor close in
with the large island, in eighteen fath-
oms, we took all we wanted on board
very conveniently. Captain Guy also
purchased of Glass five hundred seal-
skins and some ivory. We remained
514
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
here a week, during which the prevail-
ing winds were from the northward and
westward, and the weather somewhat
hazy. On the fifth of November we
made sail to the southward and west-
ward, with the intention of having a
thorough search for a group of islands
called the Auroras, respecting whose
existence a great diversity of opinion
has existed.
In
In
These islands are said to have been
discovered as early as 1762, by the
commander of the ship Aurora.
1790, Captain Manuel de Oyarvido, in
the ship Princess, belonging to the
Royal Philippine Company, sailed, as
he asserts, directly among them.
1794, the Spanish corvette Atrevida
went with the determination of ascer-
taining their precise situation, and, in
a paper published by the Royal Hydro-
graphical Society of Madrid in the year
1809, the following language is used
respecting this expedition: "The cor-
vette Atrevida practised, in their imme-
diate vicinity, from the twenty-first to
the twenty-seventh of January, all the
necessary observations, and measured
by chronometers the difference of longi-
tude between these islands and the port
of Soledad in the Manillas. The islands
are three; they are very nearly in the
same meridian; the centre one is rather
low, and the other two may be seen
at nine leagues' distance." The obser-
vations made on board the Atrevida
give the following results as the precise
situation of each island. The most
northern is in latitude 52° 37′ 24″ S.,
longitude 47° 43′ 15″ W.; the middle
one in latitude 53° 2′ 40″ S., longitude
47° 55′ 15″ W.; and the most southern
in latitude 53° 15′ 22″ S., longitude
47° 57' 15" W.
On the twenty-seventh of January
1820, Captain James Weddel, of the
British navy, sailed from Staten Land
also in search of the Auroras. He
reports that, having made the most
diligent search and passed not only
immediately over the spots indicated
by the commander of the Atrevida, but
in every direction throughout the vi
cinity of these spots, he could discover
no indication of land. These conflict
ing statements have induced other navi
gators to look out for the islands; and
strange to say, while some have sailed
through every inch of sea where they
are supposed to lie without finding
them, there have been not a few who
declare positively that they have seen
them; and even been close in with their
shores. It was Captain Guy's inten-
tion to make every exertion within his
power to settle the question so oddly
in dispute.*
We kept on our course, between the
south and west, with variable weather,
until the twentieth of the month, when
we found ourselves on the debated
ground, being in latitude 53° 15' S
longitude 47° 58′ W.-that is to say.
very nearly upon the spot indicated
as the situation of the most southern
of the group. Not perceiving any sign
of land, we continued to the westward
of the parallel of fifty-three degrees
south, as far as the meridian of fifty
* Among the vessels which at various
times have professed to meet with the
Auroras may be mentioned the ship San
Miguel, in 1769; the ship Aurora, in
1774; the brig Pearl, in 1779; and the
ship Dolores, in 1790. They all agree
in giving the mean latitude fifty-three
degrees south.
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
515
degrees west. We then stood to the
1orth as far as the parallel of fifty-two
legrees south, when we turned to the
astward, and kept our parallel by
louble altitudes, morning and evening,
nd meridian altitudes of the planets
nd moon. Having thus gone east-
ardly to the meridian of the western
oast of Georgia, we kept that meridian
atil we were in the latitude from which
re set out. We then took diagonal
ourses throughout the entire extent of
ea circumscribed, keeping a look-out
onstantly at the masthead, and repeat-
g our examination with the greatest
ire for a period of three weeks, during
hich the weather was remarkably
leasant and fair, with no haze what-
>ever. Of course we were thoroughly
tisfied that, whatever islands might
ave existed in this vicinity at any
>rmer period, no vestige of them re-
ained at the present day. Since my
eturn home I find that the same
ound was traced over, with equal care,
1822, by Captain Johnson, of the
merican schooner Henry, and by Cap-
in Morrell, in the American schooner
Jasp in both cases with the same
sult as in our own.
CHAPTER XVI
Ir had been Captain Guy's original
tention, after satisfying himself about
he Auroras, to proceed through the
trait of Magellan, and up along the
estern coast of Patagonia; but infor-
nation received at Tristan d'Acunha
duced him to steer to the southward,
n the hope of falling in with some
mall islands said to lie about the par-
llel of 60° S., longitude 41° 20′ W.
In the event of his not discovering
these lands, he designed, should the sea-
son prove favorable, to push on toward
the pole. Accordingly, on the twelfth
of December, we made sail in that
direction. On the eighteenth we found
ourselves about the station indicated by
Glass, and cruised for three days in
that neighborhood without finding any
traces of the islands he had mentioned.
On the twenty-first, the weather being
unusually pleasant, we again made sail
to the southward, with the resolution
of penetrating in that course as far
as possible. Before entering upon this
portion of my narrative, it may be as
well, for the information of those read-
ers who have paid little attention to
the progress of discovery in these
regions, to give some brief account of
the very few attempts at reaching the
southern pole which have hitherto been
made.
That of Captain Cook was the first
of which we have any distinct account.
In 1772 he sailed to the south in the
Resolution, accompanied by Lieutenant
Furneaux in the Adventure. In Decem.
ber he found himself as far as the
fifty-eighth parallel of south latitude, and
in longitude 26° 57′ E. Here he met
with narrow fields of ice, about eight
or ten inches thick, and running north-
west and southeast. This ice was in
large cakes, and usually it was packed
so closely that the vessel had great dif-
ficulty in forcing a passage. At this
period Captain Cook supposed, from
the vast number of birds to be seen,
and from other indications, that he
was in the near vicinity of land. He
kept on to the southward, the weather
being exceedingly cold, until he reached
the sixty-fourth parallel, in longitude
38° 14′ E. Here he had mild weather,
516
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
with gentle breezes, for five days, the
thermometer being at thirty-six. In
January, 1773, the vessels crossed the
Antarctic circle, but did not succeed in
penetrating much farther; for upon
reaching latitude 67° 15′ they found
all farther progress impeded by an im-
mense body of ice, extending all along
the southern horizon as far as the eye
could reach. This ice was of every
variety and some large floes of it,
miles in extent, formed a compact mass,
rising eighteen or twenty feet above the
water. It being late in the season, and
no hope entertained of rounding these
obstructions, Captain Cook now reluc-
tantly turned to the northward.
In
In the November following he re-
newed his search in the Antarctic. In
latitude 59° 40′ he met with a strong
current setting to the southward.
December, when the vessels were in
latitude 67° 31', longitude 142° 54′ W.,
the cold was excessive, with heavy gales
and fog. Here also birds were abun-
dant; the albatross, the penguin, and
e peterel especially. In latitude 70°
23' some large islands of ice were en-
countered, and shortly afterward the
clouds to the southward were observed
to be of a snowy whiteness, indicating
the vicinity of field ice. In latitude
71° 10′, longitude 106° 54′ W., the
navigators were stopped, as before, by
an immense frozen expanse, which filled
the whole area of the southern horizon.
The northern edge of this expanse was
ragged and broken, so firmly wedged
together as to be utterly impassable,
and extending about a mile to the south-
ward. Behind it the frozen surface was
comparatively smooth for some dis-
tance, until terminated in the extreme
background by gigantic ranges of ice-
mountains, the one towering above
other. Captain Cook concluded
this vast field reached the southern
or was joined to a continent. Mi
N. Reynolds, whose great exertions
perseverance have at length succe
in getting set on foot a national e
dition, partly for the purpose of ex
ing these regions, thus speaks of
attempt of the Resolution: "We
not surprised that Captain Cook
unable to go beyond 71° 10′, but
are astonished that he did attain
point on the meridian of 106° 54'
longitude. Palmer's Land lies sout
the Shetland, latitude sixty-four
grees, and tends to the southward
westward farther than any navig
has yet penetrated. Cook was st
ing for this land when his progress
arrested by the ice; which, we ap
hended, must always be the cas
that point, and so early in the se
as the sixth of January-and we sh
not be surprised if a portion of the
mountains described was attache
the main body of Palmer's Land
to some other portions of land!
farther to the southward and 1
ward."
In 1803, Captains Kreutzenstern
Lisiausky were dispatched by Ale
der of Russia for the purpose of
cumnavigating the globe. In endea
ing to get south, they made no fa
than 59° 58′, in longitude 70° 15'
They here met with strong cur
setting eastwardly. Whales were a
dant, but they saw no ice. In re
to this voyage, Mr. Reynolds obse
that, if Kreutzenstern had arrived w
he did earlier in the season, he
have encountered ice-it was M
when he reached the latitude speci
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
517
The winds, prevailing, as they do, from
the southward and westward, had car-
ried the floes, aided by currents, into
hat icy region bounded on the north
y Georgia, east by Sandwich Land and
he South Orkneys, and west by the
South Shetland islands.
In 1822, Captain James Weddell, of
he British navy, with two very small
ressels, penetrated farther to the south
han any previous navigator, and this,
00, without encountering extraordinary
lifficulties. He states that although he
was frequently hemmed in by ice before
eaching the seventy-second parallel,
'et, upon attaining it, not a particle
vas to be discovered, and that, upon
arriving at the latitude of 74° 15', no
elds, and only three islands of ice were
isible. It is somewhat remarkable
hat, although vast flocks of birds were
een, and other usual indications of
and, and although, south of the Shet-
ands, unknown coasts were observed
rom the mast-head tending south-
wardly, Weddell discourages the idea
of land existing in the polar regions of
he south.
On the 11th of January, 1823, Cap-
ain Benjamin Morrell, of the American
schooner Wasp, sailed from Kerguelen's
Land with a view of penetrating as far
south as possible. On the first of Feb-
uary he found himself in latitude 64°
52' S., longitude 118° 27' E. The fol-
lowing passage is extracted from his
journal of that date: "The wind soon
freshened to an eleven-knot breeze, and
we embraced this opportunity of mak-
ing to the west; being however con-
vinced that the farther we went south
beyond latitude sixty-four degrees, the
less ice was to be apprehended, we
steered a little to the southward, until
we crossed the Antarctic circle, and
were in latitude 69° 15' E. In this
latitude there was no field ice, and very
few ice islands in sight.
Under the date of March fourteenth
I find also this entry: "The sea was
now entirely free of field ice, and there
were not more than a dozen ice islands
in sight. At the same time the tem-
perature of the air and water was at
least thirteen degrees higher (more
mild) than we had ever found it be-
tween the parallels of sixty and sixty-
two south. We were now in latitude
70° 14' S., and the temperature of
the air was forty-seven, and that of
the water forty-four. In this situation
I found the variation to be 14° 27'
* *
easterly, per azimuth.
* I have
several times passed within the Ant-
arctic circle, on different meridians, and
have uniformly found the temperature,
both of the air and the water, to be-
come more and more mild the farther
I advanced beyond the sixty-fifth de-
gree of south latitude, and that the
variation decreases in the same propor-
tion. While north of this latitude, say
between sixty and sixty-five south, we
frequently had great difficulty in finding
a passage for the vessel between the
immense and almost innumerable ice
islands, some of which were from one
to two miles in circumference, and
more than five hundred feet above the
surface of the water."
Being nearly destitute of fuel and
water, and without proper instruments,
it being also late in the season, Captain
Morrell was now obliged to put back,
without attempting any further progress
to the westward, although an entirely
open sea lay before him. He expresses
the opinion that, had not these over-
518
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ruling considerations obliged him to
retreat, he could have penetrated, if
not to the pole itself, at least to the
eighty-fifth parallel. I have given his
ideas respecting these matters some-
what at length, that the reader may
have an opportunity of seeing how far
they were borne out by my own subse-
quent experience.
In 1831, Captain Briscoe, in the em-
ploy of the Messieurs Enderby, whale-
ship owners of London, sailed in the
brig Lively for the South Seas, accom-
panied by the cutter Tula. On the
twenty-eighth of February, being in lat-
itude 66° 30' S., longitude 47° 13′ E.,
he descried land, and "clearly discov-
ered through the snow the black peaks
of a range of mountains running
E. S. E." He remained in this neigh-
borhood during the whole of the fol-
lowing month, but was unable to ap-
proach the coast nearer than within ten
leagues, owing to the boisterous state
of the weather. Finding it impossible
to make further discovery during this
season, he returned northward to winter
in Van Diemen's Land.
In the beginning of 1832 he again
proceeded southwardly, and on the
fourth of February was seen to the
southeast in latitude 67° 15', longitude
69° 29′ W. This was soon found to
be an island near the headland of the
country he had first discovered. On
the twenty-first of the month he suc-
ceeded in landing on the latter, and
took possession of it in the name of
William IV, calling it Adelaide's Island,
in honor of the English queen. These
particulars being made known to the
Royal Geographical Society of London,
the conclusion was drawn by that body
"that there is a continuous tract of
land extending from 47° 30′ E. to 6
29′ W. longitude, running the paral
of from sixty-six to sixty-seven degre
south latitude." In respect to
conclusion Mr. Reynolds observes:
the correctness of it we by no mea
concur; nor do the discoveries of Br
coe warrant any such inference. It
within these limits that Weddel pr
ceeded south on a meridian to the
of Georgia, Sandwich Land, and
South Orkney and Shetland islands
My own experience will be found
testify most directly to the falsity
the conclusion arrived at by the societ
These are the principal attemp
which have been made at penetrati
to a high southern latitude, and it wi
now be seen that there remained, prev
ous to the voyage of the Jane, near
three hundred degrees of longitude i
which the Antarctic circle had not bee
crossed at all. Of course a wide fiel
lay before us for discovery, and it wa
with feelings of most intense intere
that I heard Captain Guy express
resolution of pushing boldly to th
southward.
CHAPTER XVII
We kept our course southwardly f
four days after giving up the sear
for Glass' islands, without meeting wi
any ice at all. On the twenty-sixth,
noon, we were in latitude 63° 23' 9
longitude 41° 25' W. We now sa
several large ice islands, and a floe
field ice, not, however, of any gre
extent. The winds generally blew from
the southeast, or the northeast, b
were very light. Whenever we had
westerly wind, which was seldom,
was invariably attended with a rai
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
519
quall. Every day we had more or
ess snow. The thermometer, on the
wenty-seventh stood at thirty-five.
January 1, 1828.-This day we found
urselves completely hemmed in by the
ce, and our prospects looked cheerless
ndeed. A strong gale blew, during the
vhole forenoon, from the northeast,
nd drove large cakes of the drift
gainst the rudder and counter with
uch violence that we all trembled for
he consequences. Toward evening, the
ale still blowing with fury, a large
eld in front separated, and we were
nabled, by carrying a press of sail, to
orce a passage through the smaller
lakes into some open water beyond.
is we approached this space we took
a sail by degrees, and having at length
ot clear, lay-to under a single-reefed
oresail.
January 2nd.-We had now tolerably
pleasant weather. At noon we found
urselves in latitude 69° 10′ S., longi-
ude 42° 20′ W., having crossed the
Antarctic circle. Very little ice was to
e seen to the southward, although large
ields of it lay behind us. This day
ve rigged some sounding gear, using
large iron pot capable of holding
wenty gallons, and a line of two hun-
ired fathoms. We found the current
setting to the north, about a quarter
of a mile per hour. The temperature
of the air was now about thirty-three.
Here we found the variation to be 14°
28' easterly, per azimuth.
January 5th.-We had still held on to
the southward without any very great
impediments. On this morning, how-
ever, being in latitude 73° 15′ E., longi-
tude 42° 10′ W., we were again brought
to a stand by an immense expanse of
firm ice. We saw, nevertheless, much
open water to the southward, and felt
no doubt of being able to reach it even-
tually. Standing to the eastward along
the edge of the floe, we at length came
to a passage of about a mile in width,
through which we warped our way by
sundown. The sea in which we now
were was thickly covered with ice
islands, but had no field ice, and we
pushed on boldly as before. The cold
did not seem to increase, although we
had snow very frequently, and now and
then hail squalls of great violence. Im-
mense flocks of the albatross flew over
the schooner this day, going from south-
east to northwest.
January 7th.-The sea still remained
pretty well open, so that we had no
difficulty in holding on our course. To
the westward we saw some icebergs of
incredible size, and in the afternoon
passed very near one whose summit
could not have been less than four
hundred fathoms from the surface of
the ocean. Its girth was probably, at
the base, three-quarters of a league, and
several streams of water were running
from crevices in its sides. We re-
mained in sight of this island two days,
and then only lost it in a fog.
January 10th.-Early this morning
we had the misfortune to lose a man
overboard. He was an American,
named Peter Vrendenburgh, a native of
New York, and was one of the most
valuable hands on board the schooner.
In going over the bows his foot slipped,
and he fell between two cakes of ice,
never rising again. At noon of this day
we were in latitude 78° 30', longitude
40° 15′ W. The cold was now exces-
sive, and we had hail squalls continually
from the northward and eastward. In
this direction also we saw several more
520
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
immense icebergs, and the whole hori-
zon to the eastward appeared to be
blocked up with field ice, rising in tiers,
one mass above the other. Some drift-
wood floated by during the evening, and
a great quantity of birds flew over,
among which were nellies, peterels, alba-
trosses, and a large bird of a brilliant
blue plumage. The variation here, per
azimuth, was less than it had been pre-
viously to our passing the Antarctic
circle.
January 12th.-Our passage to the
south again looked doubtful, as nothing
was to be seen in the direction of the
pole but one apparently limitless floe,
backed by absolute mountains of ragged
ice, one precipice of which arose frown-
ingly above the other. We stood to
the westward until the fourteenth, in
the hope of finding an entrance.
January 14th.-This morning we
reached the western extremity of the
field which had impeded us, and,
weathering it, came to an open sea,
without a particle of ice. Upon sound-
ing with two hundred fathoms, we here
found a current setting southwardly at
the rate of half a mile per hour. The
temperature of the air was forty-seven,
that of the water thirty-four. We now
sailed to the southward without meet-
ing any interruption of moment until
the sixteenth, when, at noon, we were
in latitude 81° 21', longitude 42° W.
We here again sounded, and found a
current setting still southwardly, and at
the rate of three-quarters of a mile per
hour. The variation per azimuth had
diminished, and the temperature of the
air was mild and pleasant, the ther-
mometer being as high as fifty-one. At
this period not a particle of ice was
to be discovered. All hands on board
now felt certain of attaining the pole.
January 17th.-This day was full of
incident. Innumerable flights of birds
flew over us from the southward, and
several were shot from the deck; one
of them, a species of pelican, proved
to be excellent eating. About midday
a small floe of ice was seen from the
mast-head off the larboard bow, and
upon it there appeared to be some large
animal. As the weather was good and
nearly calm, Captain Guy ordered out
two of the boats to see what it was
Dirk Peters and myself accompanied
the mate in the larger boat. Upon
coming up with the floe, we perceived
that it was in the possession of a gigan
tic creature of the race of the Arctic
bear, but far exceeding in size the larg
est of these animals. Being well armed,
we made no scruple of attacking it at
once. Several shots were fired in quick
succession, the most of which took
effect, apparently, in the head and body,
Nothing discouraged, however, the mon
ster threw himself from the ice, and
swam with open jaws, to the boat in
which were Peters and myself. Owing
to the confusion which ensued among
us at this unexpected turn of the adven
ture, no person was ready immediately
with a second shot, and the bear had
actually succeeded in getting half his
vast bulk across our gunwale, and seiz
ing one of the men by the small of his
back, before any efficient means were
taken to repel him. In this extremity
nothing but the promptness and agility
of Peters saved us from destruction
Leaping upon the back of the huge
beast, he plunged the blade of a knife
behind the neck, reaching the spinal
marrow at a blow. The brute tumbled
into the sea lifeless. and without a
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
521
truggle, rolling over Peters as he fell.
The latter soon recovered himself, and
rope being thrown him, he secured
he carcass before entering the boat.
We then returned in triumph to the
chooner, towing our trophy behind us.
This bear, upon admeasurement, proved
o be full fifteen feet in his greatest
ength. His wool was perfectly white,
nd very coarse, curling tightly. The
yes were of a blood red, and larger
han those of the Arctic bear; the snout
Iso more rounded, rather resembling
he snout of the bull-dog. The meat
as tender, but excessively rank and
shy, although the men devoured it
ith avidity, and declared it excellent
ating.
Scarcely had we got our prize along-
ide, when the man at the mast-head
ave the joyful shout of "land on the
tarboard bow!" All hands were now
pon the alert, and, a breeze springing
p very opportunely from the north-
ward and eastward, we were soon close
1 with the coast. It proved to be a
>w rocky islet, of about a league in
ircumference, and altogether destitute
f vegetation, if we except a species
f prickly-pear. In approaching it from
he northward, a singular ledge of rock
s seen projecting into the sea, and
earing a strong resemblance to corded
ales of cotton. Around this ledge to
he westward is a small bay, at the
ottom of which our boats effected a
convenient landing.
It did not take us long to explore
every portion of the island, but, with
one exception, we found nothing worthy
of our observation. In the southern
extremity, we picked up near the shore,
alf buried in a pile of loose stones,
piece of wood, which seemed to have
formed the prow of a canoe. There
had been evidently some attempt at
carving upon it, and Captain Guy fan-
cied that he made out the figure of a
tortoise, but the resemblance did not
strike me very forcibly. Besides this
prow, if such it were, we found no
other token that any living creature
had ever been here before. Around
the coast we discovered occasional small
floes of ice-but these were very few.
The exact situation of the islet (to
which Captain Guy gave the name of
Bennet's Islet, in honor of his partner
in the ownership of the schooner) is
82° 50' S. latitude, 42° 20′ W. longi-
tude.
We had now advanced to the south-
ward more than eight degrees farther
than any previous navigators, and the
sea still lay perfectly open before us.
We found, too, that the variation uni-
formly decreased as we proceeded, and,
what was still more surprising, that the
temperature of the air, and latterly of
the water, became milder. The weather
might even be called pleasant, and we
had a steady but very gentle breeze
always from some northern point of the
compass. The sky was usually clear,
with now and then a slight appearance
of thin vapor in the southern horizon-
this, however, was invariably of brief
duration. Two difficulties alone pre-
sented themselves to our view; we were
getting short of fuel, and symptoms of
scurvy had occurred among several of
the crew. These considerations began
to impress upon Captain Guy the neces-
sity of returning, and he spoke of it
frequently. For my own part, confi-
dent as I was of soon arriving at land
of some description upon the course
we were pursuing, and having every
522
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
reason to believe, from present appear-
ances, that we should not find it the
sterile soil met with in the higher Arctic
latitudes, I warmly pressed upon him
the expediency of persevering, at least
for a few days longer, in the direction.
we were now holding. So tempting an
opportunity of solving the great prob-
lem in regard to an Antarctic continent
had never yet been afforded to man,
and I confess that I felt myself burst-
ing with indignation at the timid and
ill-timed suggestions of our commander.
I believe, indeed, that what I could
not refrain from saying to him on this
head had the effect of inducing him to
push on. While, therefore, I cannot but
lament the most unfortunate and bloody
events which immediately arose from
my advice, I must still be allowed to
feel some degree of gratification at
having been instrumental, however re-
motely, in opening to the eye of science
one of the most intensely exciting
secrets which has ever engrossed its
attention.
CHAPTER XVIII
JANUARY 18TH.-This morning* we
continued to the southward, with the
same pleasant weather as before. The
sea was entirely smooth, the air tol-
erably warm and from the northeast,
* The terms morning and evening,
which I have made use of to avoid con-
fusion in my narrative, as far as pos-
sible, must not, of course, be taken in
their ordinary sense. For a long time
past we had had no night at all, the
daylight being continual. The dates
throughout are according to nautical
time. and the bearings must be under-
the temperature of the water fifty-three
We now again got our sounding-gear
in order, and, with a hundred and fifty
fathoms of line, found the current set-
ting toward the pole at the rate of a
mile an hour. This constant tendency
to the southward, both in the wind and
current, caused some degree of specula
tion, and even of alarm, in different
quarters of the schooner, and I saw
distinctly that no little impression had
been made upon the mind of Captain
Guy. He was exceedingly sensitive to
ridicule, however, and I finally suc
ceeded in laughing him out of his ap
prehensions. The variation was now
very trivial. In the course of the day
we saw several large whales of the
right species, and innumerable flights
of the albatross passed over the vessel.
We also picked up a bush, full of red
berries, like those of the hawthorn, and
the carcass of a singular-looking land-
animal. It was three feet in length, and
but six inches in height, with four very
short legs, the feet armed with long
claws of a brilliant scarlet, and resem
bling coral in substance. The body was
covered with a straight silky hair, per
fectly white. The tail was peaked like
that of a rat, and about a foot and
half long. The head resembled a cat's,
with the exception of the ears-these
stood as per compass. I would also
remark, in this place, that I cannot, in
the first portion of what is here written,
pretend to strict accuracy in respect to
dates, or latitudes and longitudes, hav-
ing kept no regular journal until after
the period of which this first portion
treats. In many instances I have relied
altogether upon memory.
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
523
were flopped like the ears of a dog.
The teeth were of the same brilliant
scarlet as the claws.
January 19th.-To-day, being in lati-
tude 83° 20′, longitude 43° 5′ W. (the
sea being of an extraordinarily dark
color), we again saw land from the
mast-head, and, upon a closer scrutiny,
found it to be one of a group of very
large islands.
The shore was precipi-
tous, and the interior seemed to be well
wooded, a circumstance which occa-
sioned us great joy. In about four
hours from our first discovering the
land we came to anchor in ten fathoms,
sandy bottom, a league from the coast,
as a high surf, with strong ripples here
and there, rendered a nearer approach
of doubtful expediency. The two larg-
est boats were now ordered out, and a
party, well armed (among whom were
Peters and myself), proceeded to look
for an opening in the reef which ap-
peared to encircle the island. After
searching about for some time, we dis-
covered an inlet, which we were enter-
ing, when we saw four large canoes
put off from the shore, filled with men
who seemed to be well armed. We
waited for them to come up, and, as
they moved with great rapidity, they
were soon within hail. Captain Guy
now held up a white handkerchief on
the blade of an oar, when the strang-
ers made a full stop, and commenced a
loud jabbering all at once, intermingled
with occasional shouts, in which we
could distinguish the words Anamoo-
moo! and Lama-Lama! They continued
this for at least half an hour, during
which we had a good opportunity of
observing their appearance.
In the four canoes, which might have
been fifty feet long and five broad,
there were a hundred and ten savages
in all. They were about the ordinary
stature of Europeans, but of a more
muscular and brawny frame. Their
complexion a jet black, with thick and
long woolly hair. They were clothed
in skins of an unknown black animal,
shaggy and silky, and made to fit the
body with some degree of skill, the
hair being inside, except where turned
out about the neck, wrists, and ankles.
Their arms consisted principally of
clubs, of a dark, and apparently very
heavy wood. Some spears, however,
were observed among them, headed with
flint, and a few slings. The bottoms
of the canoes were full of black stones
about the size of a large egg.
When they had concluded their ha-
rangue (for it was clear they intended
their jabbering for such), one of them
who seemed to be the chief stood up
in the prow of his canoe, and made
signs for us to bring our boats along-
side of him. This hint we pretended
not to understand, thinking it the wiser
plan to maintain, if possible, the inter-
val between us, as their number more
than quadrupled our own. Finding this
to be the case, the chief ordered the
three other canoes to hold back, while
he advanced toward us with his own.
As soon as he came up with us he leaped
on board the largest of our boats, and
seated himself by the side of Captain
Guy, pointing at the same time to the
schooner, and repeating the words Ana-
moo-moo! and Lama-Lama! We now
put back to the vessel, the four canoes
following at a little distance.
Upon getting alongside, the chief
evinced symptoms of extreme surprise
and delight, clapping his hands, slap-
ping his thighs and breast, and laughing
524
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
obstreperously. His followers behind
joined in his merriment, and for some
minutes the din was so excessive as to
be absolutely deafening. Quiet being at
length restored, Captain Guy ordered
the boats to be hoisted up, as a neces-
sary precaution, and gave the chief
(whose name we soon found to be
Too-wit) to understand that we could
admit no more than twenty of his men
on deck at one time. With this arrange-
ment he appeared perfectly satisfied,
and gave some directions to the canoes,
when one of them approached, the rest
remaining about fifty yards off. Twenty
of the savages now got on board, and
proceeded to ramble over every part
of the deck, and scramble about among
the rigging, making themselves much at
home, and examining every article with
great inquisitiveness.
It was quite evident that they had
never before seen any of the white
race from whose complexion, indeed,
they appeared to recoil. They believed
the Jane to be a living creature, and
seemed to be afraid of hurting it with
the points of their spears, carefully
turning them up. Our crew were much
amused with the conduct of Too-wit
in one instance. The cook was splitting
some wood near the galley, and, by
accident, struck his axe into the deck,
making a gash of considerable depth.
The chief immediately ran up, and
pushing the cook on one side rather
roughly, commenced a half whine, half
howl, strongly indicative of sympathy
in what he considered the sufferings of
the schooner, patting and smoothing
the gash with his hand, and washing it
from a bucket of sea-water which stood
by. This was a degree of ignorance
for which we were not prepared, and
for my part I could not help thinking
some of it affected.
When the visitors had satisfied, as
well as they could, their curiosity in
regard to our upper works, they were
admitted below, when their amazement
exceeded all bounds. Their astonish-
ment now appeared to be far too deep
for words, for they roamed about in
silence, broken only by low ejaculations.
The arms afforded them much food for
speculation, and they were suffered to
handle and examine them at leisure.
I do not believe that they had the least
suspicion of their actual use, but rather
took them for idols, seeing the care
we had of them, and the attention with
which we watched their movements
while handling them. At the great guns
their wonder was redoubled. They ap
proached them with every mark of the
profoundest reverence and awe, but for-
bore to examine them minutely. There
were two large mirrors in the cabin,
and here was the acme of their amaze-
ment. Too-wit was the first to ap-
proach them, and he had got in the
middle of the cabin, with his face to
one and his back to the other, before
he fairly perceived them. Upon raising
his eyes and seeing his reflected self in
the glass, I thought the savage would
go mad; but, upon turning short round
to make a retreat, and beholding him-
self a second time in the opposite direc-
tion, I was afraid he would expire upon
the spot. No persuasion could prevail
upon him to take another look; but,
throwing himself upon the floor, with
his face buried in his hands, he re
mained thus until we were obliged to
drag him upon deck.
The whole of the savages were ad-
mitted on board in this manner, twenty
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
525
at a time, Too-wit being suffered to
remain during the entire period. We
saw no disposition to thievery among
them, nor did we miss a single article
after their departure. Throughout the
whole of their visit they evinced the
most friendly manner. There were,
however, some points in their demeanor
which we found it impossible to under-
stand; for example, we could not get
them to approach several very harmless
objects such as the schooner's sails, an
egg, an open book, or a pan of flour.
We endeavored to ascertain if they had
among them any articles which might
be turned to account in the way of
traffic, but found great difficulty in
being comprehended. We made out,
nevertheless, what greatly astonished us,
that the islands abounded in the large
tortoise of the Gallipagos, one of which
we saw in the canoe of Too-wit. We
saw also some biche de mer in the
hands of one of the savages, who was
greedily devouring it in its natural state.
These anomalies-for they were such
when considered in regard to the lati-
tude-induced Captain Guy to wish for
a thorough investigation of the country,
in the hope of making a profitable
speculation in his discovery. For my
own part, anxious as I was to know
something more of these islands, I was
still more earnestly bent on prosecuting
the voyage to the southward without
delay. We had now fine weather, but
there was no telling how long it would
last; and being already in the eighty-
fourth parallei, with an open sea before
us, a current setting strongly to the
southward, and the wind fair, I could
not listen with any patience to propo-
sition of stopping longer than was abso-
lutely necessary for the health of the
crew and the taking on board a proper
supply of fuel and fresh provisions. I
represented to the captain that we might
easily make this group on our return,
and winter here in the event of being
blocked up by the ice. He at length
came into my views (for in some way,
hardly known to myself, I had ac-
quired much influence over him), and
it was finally resolved that, even in
the event of our finding biche de mer,
we should only stay here a week to
recruit, and then push on to the south-
ward while we might. Accordingly we
made every necessary preparation-and,
under the guidance of Too-wit, got the
Jane through the reef in safety, com-
ing to anchor about a mile from the
shore, in an excellent bay, completely
landlocked, on the southeastern coast
of the main island, and in ten fathoms
of water, black sandy bottom. At the
head of this bay there were three fine
springs (we were told) of good water,
and we saw abundance of wood in the
vicinity. The four canoes followed us
in, keeping, however, at a respectful
distance. Too-wit himself remained on
board, and, upon dropping our anchor,
invited us to accompany him on shore,
and visit his village in the interior.
To this Captain Guy consented; and
ten savages being left on board as
hostages, a party of us, twelve in all,
got in readiness to attend the chief.
We took care to be well armed, yet
without evincing any distrust. The
schooner had her guns run out, her
boarding-nettings up, and every other
proper precaution was taken to guard
against surprise. Directions were left
with the chief mate to admit no per-
son on board during our absence, and,
in the event of our not appearing in
526
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
twelve hours, to send the cutter, with
a swivel, around the island in search
of us.
At every step we took inland the
conviction forced itself upon us that
we were in a country differing essen-
tially from any hitherto visited by
civilized men. We saw nothing with
which we had been formerly conver-
sant. The trees resembled no growth
of either the torrid, the temperate, or
the northern frigid zones, and were al-
together unlike those of the lower
southern latitudes we had already trav-
ersed. The very rocks were novel in
their mass, their color, and their strati-
fication; and the streams themselves,
utterly incredible as it may appear, had
so little in common with those of other
climates, that we were scrupulous of
tasting them, and, indeed, had difficulty
in bringing ourselves to believe that
their qualities were purely those of na-
ture. At a small brook which crossed
our path (the first we had reached)
Too-wit and his attendants halted to
drink. On account of the singular
character of the water, we refused to
taste it, supposing it to be polluted;
and it was not until some time after-
ward we came to understand that such
was the appearance of the streams
throughout the whole group. I am at
a loss to give a distinct idea of the
nature of this liquid, and cannot do
so without many words. Although it
flowed with rapidity in all declivities
where common water would do so, yet
never, except when falling in a cascade,
had it the customary appearance of
limpidity. It was, nevertheless, in
point of fact, as perfectly limpid as
any limestone water in existence, the
difference being only in appearance. At
first sight, and especially in cases where
little declivity was found, it bore re-
semblance, as regards consistency, to a
thick infusion of gum arabic in com
mon water. But this was only the
least remarkable of its extraordinary
qualities. It was not colorless, nor was
it of any one uniform color-present-
ing to the eye, as it flowed, every
possible shade of purple, like the hues
of a changeable silk. This variation
in shade was produced in a manner
which excited as profound astonish-
ment in the minds of our party as the
mirror had done in the case of Too-
wit. Upon collecting a basinful, and
allowing it to settle thoroughly, we
perceived that the whole mass of liquid
was made up of a number of distinct
veins, each of a distinct hue; that these
veins did not commingle; and that their
cohesion was perfect in regard to their
own particles among themselves, and
imperfect in regard to neighboring
veins. Upon passing the blade of a
knife athwart the veins, the water
closed over it immediately, as with us,
and also, in withdrawing it, all traces
of the passage of the knife were in-
stantly obliterated. If, however, the
blade was passed down accurately be-
tween the two veins, a perfect separa-
tion was effected, which the power of
cohesion did not immediately rectify.
The phenomena of this water formed
the first definite link in that vast chain
of apparent miracles with which I was
destined to be at length encircled.
CHAPTER XIX
We were nearly three hours in reach-
ing the village, it being more than nine
miles in the interior, and the path lying
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
527
through a rugged country.
As we
passed along, the party of Too-wit (the
whole hundred and ten savages of the
canoes) was momentarily strengthened
by smaller detachments, of from two
to six or seven, which joined us, as if
by accident, at different turns of the
road. There appeared so much of sys-
tem in this that I could not help feel-
ing distrust, and I spoke to Captain
Guy of my apprehensions. It was now
too late, however, to recede, and we
concluded that our best security lay in
evincing a perfect confidence in the
good faith of Too-wit. We accordingly
went on, keeping a wary eye upon the
manœuvres of the savages, and not
permitting them to divide our numbers
by pushing in between. In this way,
passing through a precipitous ravine,
we at length reached what we were
told was the only collection of habita-
tions upon the island. As we came in
sight of them, the chief set up a shout,
and frequently repeated the word
Klock-klock, which we supposed to be
the name of the village, or perhaps the
generic name for villages.
The dwellings were of the most
miserable description imaginable, and,
unlike those of even the lowest of the
savage races with which mankind are
acquainted, were of no uniform plan.
Some of them (and these we found
belonged to the Wampoos or Yampoos,
the great men of the land) consisted of
a tree cut down at about four feet
from the root, with a large black skin
thrown over it, and hanging in loose
folds upon the ground. Under this the
savage nestled. Others were formed by
means of rough limbs of trees, with the
withered foliage upon them, made to
recline, at an angle of forty-five de-
grees, against a bank of clay, heaped
up, without regular form, to the height
of five or six feet. Others, again, were
mere holes dug in the earth perpen-
dicularly, and covered over with simi-
lar branches, these being removed when
the tenant was about to enter, and
pulled on again when he had entered.
A few were built among the forked
limbs of trees as they stood, the upper
limbs being partially cut through, so as
to bend over upon the lower, thus
forming thicker shelter from the
weather. The greater number, how-
ever, consisted of small shallow cav-
erns, apparently scratched in the face
of a precipitous ledge of dark stone,
resembling fuller's earth, with which
three sides of the village were bounded.
At the door of each of these primitive
caverns was a small rock, which the
tenant carefully placed before the en-
trance upon leaving his residence, for
what purpose I could not ascertain, as
the stone itself was never of sufficient
size to close up more than a third of
the opening.
This village, if it were worthy of the
name, lay in a valley of some depth,
and could only be approached from the
southward, the precipitous ledge of
which I have already spoken cutting
off all access in other directions.
Through the middle of the valley ran
a brawling stream of the same magical-
looking water which has been described.
We saw several strange animals about
the dwellings, all appearing to be
thoroughly domesticated. The largest
of these creatures resembled our com-
mon hog in the structure of the body
and snout; the tail, however, was
bushy, and the legs slender as those of
the antelope. Its motion was exceed-
528
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ingly awkward and indecisive, and we
never saw it attempt to run. We no-
ticed also several animals very similar
in appearance, but of a greater length
of body, and covered with a black
wool. There were a great variety of
tame fowls running about, and these
seemed to constitute the chief food of
the natives. To our astonishment we
saw black albatross among these birds
in a state of entire domestication, go-
ing to sea periodically for food, but
always returning to the village as a
home, and using the southern shore
in the vicinity as a place of incubation.
There they were joined by their friends
the pelicans as usual, but these latter
never followed them to the dwellings
of the savages. Among the other kinds
of tame fowls were ducks, differing
very little from the canvas-back of our
own country, black gannets, and a large
bird not unlike the buzzard in appear-
ance, but not carnivorous. Of fish
there seemed to be a great abundance.
We saw, during our visit, a quantity
of dried salmon, rock cod, blue dol-
phins, mackerel, blackfish, skate, conger
eels, elephant-fish, mullets, soles, par-
rot-fish, leather-jackets, gurnards, hake,
flounders, paracutas, and innumerable
other varieties. We noticed, too, that
most of them were similar to the fish
about the group of the Lord Auckland
islands, in a latitude as low as fifty-one
degrees south. The Gallipago tortoise
was also very plentiful. We saw but
few wild animals, and none of a large
size, or of a species with which we
were familiar. One or two serpents of
a formidable aspect crossed our path,
but the natives paid them little atten-
tion, and we concluded that they were
not venomous.
As we approached the village with
Too-wit and his party, a vast crowd
of the people rushed out to meet us.
with loud shouts, among which we
could only distinguish the everlasting
Ana-moo-moo! and Lama-Lama! We
were much surprised at perceiving that,
with one or two exceptions, these new
comers were entirely naked, the skins
being used only by the men of the
canoes. All the weapons of the count-
try seemed also to be in the possession
of the latter, for there was no appear-
ance of any among the villagers. There
were a great many women and chil-
dren, the former not altogether want-
ing in what might be termed personal
beauty. They were straight, tall, and
well formed, with a grace and freedom
of carriage not to be found in civilized
society. Their lips, however, like those
of the men, were thick and clumsy, so
that, even when laughing, the teeth
were never disclosed. Their hair was
of a finer texture than that of the
males. Among these naked villagers
there might have been ten or twelve
who were clothed, like the party of
Too-wit, in dresses of black skin, and
armed with lances and heavy clubs.
These appeared to have great influence
among the rest, and were always ad-
dressed by the title Wampoo. These,
too, were the tenants of the black skin
palaces. That of Too-wit was situated
in the centre of the village, and was
much larger and somewhat better con-
structed than others of its kind. The
tree which formed its support was cut
off at a distance of twelve feet or
thereabouts from the root, and there
were several branches left just below
the cut, these serving to extend the
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
529
covering, and in this way prevent its
flapping about the trunk. The cover-
ing, too, which consisted of four very
large skins fastened together with
wooden skewers, was secured at the
bottom with pegs driven through it and
into the ground. The floor was strewed
with a quantity of dry leaves by way
of carpet.
To this hut we were conducted with
great solemnity, and as many of the
natives crowded in after us as possible.
Too-wit seated himself on the leaves,
and made signs that we should follow
his example. This we did, and pres-
ently found ourselves in a situation
peculiarly uncomfortable, if not criti-
cal.
We were on the ground, twelve
in number, with the savages, as many
as forty, sitting on their hams so
closely around us that, if any disturb-
ance had arisen, we should have found
it impossible to make use of our arms,
or indeed to have risen to our feet.
The pressure was not only inside the
tent, but outside, where probably was
every individual on the whole island,
the crowd being prevented from tramp-
ling us to death only by the incessant
exertions and vociferations of Too-wit.
Our chief security lay, however, in the
presence of Too-wit himself among us,
and we resolved to stick by him closely,
as the best chance of extricating our-
selves from the dilemma, sacrificing
him immediately upon the first appear-
ance of hostile design.
After some trouble a certain degree
of quiet was restored, when the chief
addressed us in a speech of great
length, and very nearly resembling the
one delivered in the canoes, with the
exception that the Anamoo-moos! were
now somewhat more strenuously in-
sisted upon than the Lama-Lamas!
We listened in profound silence until
the conclusion of this harangue, when
Captain Guy replied by assuring the
chief of his eternal friendship and
good-will, concluding what he had to
say by a present of several strings of
blue beads and a knife. At the former
the monarch, much to our surprise,
turned up his nose with some expres-
sion of contempt; but the knife gave
him the most unlimited satisfaction,
and he immediately ordered dinner.
This was handed into the tent over the
heads of the attendants, and consisted
of the palpitating entrails of a species.
of unknown animal, probably one of
the slim-legged hogs which we had ob-
served in our approach to the village.
Seeing us at a loss how to proceed, he
began, by way of setting us an exam-
ple, to devour yard after yard of the
enticing food, until we could positively
stand it no longer, and evinced such
manifest symptoms of rebellion of
stomach as inspired his majesty with a
degree of astonishment only inferior to
that brought about by the looking-
glasses. We declined, however, partak-
ing of the delicacies before us, and
endeavored to make him understand
that we had no appetite whatever, hav-
ing just finished a hearty dejeuner.
When the monarch had made an end
of his meal, we commenced a series of
cross-questioning in every ingenious
manner we could devise, with a view of
discovering what were the chief pro-
ductions of the country, and whether
any of them might be turned to profit.
At length he seemed to have some idea
of our meaning, and offered to accom
530
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
pany us to a part of the coast where
he assured us the biche de mer (point-
ing to a specimen of that animal) was
to be found in great abundance. We
were glad of this early opportunity of
escaping from the oppression of the
crowd, and signified our eagerness to
proceed. We now left the tent, and,
accompanied by the whole population
of the village, followed the chief to the
southeastern extremity of the island,
not far from the bay where our vessel
lay at anchor. We waited here for
about an hour, until the four canoes
were brought round by some of the
зavages to our station. The whole of
our party then getting into one of
them, we were paddled along the edge
of the reef before mentioned, and of
another still farther out, where we saw
a far greater quantity of biche de mer
than the oldest seamen among us had
ever seen in those groups of the lower
latitudes most celebrated for this arti-
cle of commerce. We stayed near these
reefs only long enough to satisfy our-
selves that we could easily load a dozen
vessels with the animal if necessary,
when we were taken alongside the
schooner, and parted with Too-wit,
after obtaining from him a promise
that he would bring us, in the course
of twenty-four hours, as many of the
canvas-back ducks and Gallipago tor-
toises as his canoes would hold. In the
whole of this adventure we saw noth-
ing in the demeanor of the natives cal-
culated to create suspicion, with the
single exception of the systematic man-
ner in which their party was strength-
ened during our route from the
schooner to the village.
CHAPTER XX
THE chief was as good as his word,
and we were soon plentifully supplied
with fresh provisions. We found the
tortoises as fine as we had ever seen,
and the ducks surpassed our best spe-
cies of wild fowl, being exceedingly
tender, juicy, and well-flavored. Be-
sides these, the savages brought us,
upon our making them comprehend our
wishes, a vast quantity of brown celery
and scurvy-grass, with a canoe-load of
fresh fish and some dried. The celery
was a treat indeed, and the scurvy-
grass proved of incalculable benefit in
restoring those of our men who had
shown symptoms of disease. In a very
short time we had not a single person
on the sick-list. We had also plenty
of other kinds of fresh provisions,
among which may be mentioned a spe-
cies of shell-fish resembling the mussel
in shape, but with the taste of an
oyster. Shrimps, too, and prawns were
albatross
abundant, and
and other
birds' eggs with dark shells. We took
in, too, a plentiful stock of the flesh
of the hog which I have mentioned
before. Most of the men found it a
palatable food, but I thought it fishy
and otherwise disagreeable. In return
for these good things we presented the
natives with blue beads, brass trinkets,
nails, knives, and pieces of red cloth,
they being fully delighted in the ex-
change. We established a regular mar-
ket on shore, just under the guns of
the schooner, where our barterings were
carried on with every appearance of
good faith, and a degree of order which
their conduct at the village of Klock-
klock had not led us to expect from
the savages.
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
531
Matters went on thus very amicably
for several days, during which parties
of the natives were frequently on
board the schooner, and parties of our
men frequently on shore, making long
excursions into the interior, and receiv-
ing no molestation whatever. Finding
the ease with which the vessel might
be loaded with biche de mer, owing to
the friendly disposition of the island-
ers, and the readiness with which they
would render us assistance in collecting
it, Captain Guy resolved to enter into
negotiation with Too-wit for the erec-
tion of suitable houses in which to cure
the article, and for the services of him-
self and tribe in gathering as much as
possible, while he himself took advan-
take of the fine weather to prosecute
his voyage to the southward. Upon
mentioning this project to the chief he
seemed very willing to enter into an
agreement. A bargain was accordingly
struck, perfectly satisfactory to both
parties, by which it was arranged that,
after making the necessary prepara-
tions, such as laying off the proper
grounds, erecting a portion of the
buildings, and doing some other work
in which the whole of our crew would
be required, the schooner should pro-
ceed on her route, leaving three of her
men on the island to superintend the
fulfilment of the project, and instruct
the natives in drying the biche de mer.
In regard to terms, these were made
to depend upon the exertions of the
savages in our absence. They were to
receive a stipulated quantity of blue
beads, knives, red cloth, and so forth,
for every certain number of piculs of
the biche de mer which should be ready
on our return.
A description of the nature of this
important article of commerce, and the
method of preparing it, may prove of
some interest to my readers, and I can
find no more suitable place than this
for introducing an account of it. The
following comprehensive notice of the
substance is taken from a modern his-
tory of a voyage to the South Seas:
"It is that mollusca from the Indian
Seas which is known to commerce by
the French name bouche de mer (a
nice morsel from the sea). If I am
not much mistaken, the celebrated
Cuvier calls it gasteropeda pulmoni-
fera. It is abundantly gathered in the
coasts of the Pacific islands, and gath-
ered especially for the Chinese market,
where it commands a great price, per-
haps as much as their much-talked-of
edible birds' nests, which are properly
made up of the gelatinous matter
picked up by a species of swallow from
the body of these molluscæ. They have
no shell, no legs, nor any prominent
part, except an absorbing and an excre-
tory, opposite organs; but, by their
elastic wings, like caterpillars or worms,
they creep in shallow waters, in which,
when low, they can be seen by a kind
of swallow, the sharp bill of which,
inserted in the soft animal, draws a
gummy and filamentous substance,
which, by drying, can be wrought into
the solid walls of their nest. Hence
the name of gasteropeda pulmonifera.
"This mollusca is oblong, and of dif-
ferent sizes, from three to eighteen
inches in length; and I have seen a few
that were not less than two feet long.
They were nearly round, a little flattish
on one side, which lies next to the bot-
tom of the sea; and they are from one
to eight inches thick. They crawl up
into shallow water at particular seasons
532
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
of the year, probably for the purpose
of gendering, as we often find them
in pairs. It is when the sun has the
most power on the water, rendering it
tepid, that they approach the shore;
and they often go up into places so
shallow that, on the tide's receding,
they are left dry, exposed to the heat
of the sun. But they do not bring
forth their young in shallow water, as
we never see any of their progeny, and
full-grown ones are always observing
coming in from deep water. They feed
principally on that class of zoophites
which produce the coral.
"The biche de mer is generally taken
in three or four feet of water; after
which they are brought on shore, and
split at one end with a knife, the in-
cision being one inch or more, ac-
cording to the size of the mollusca.
Through this opening the entrails are
forced out by pressure, and they are
much like those of any other small
tenant of the deep. The article is then
washed, and afterward boiled to a cer-
tain degree, which must not be too
much or too little. They are then
buried in the ground for four hours,
then boiled again for a short time,
after which they are dried, either by
the fire or the sun. Those cured by
the sun are worth the most; but where
one picul (133 1-3 lbs.) can be cured
that way, I can cure thirty piculs by
the fire. When once properly cured,
they can be kept in a dry place for two
or three years without any risk; but
they should be examined once in every
few months, say four times a year, to
see if any dampness is likely to affect
them.
"The Chinese, as before stated, con-
sider biche de mer a very great luxury,
believing that it wonderfully strength-
ens and nourishes the system, and
renews the exhausted system of the
immoderate voluptuary. The first
quality commands a high price in Can-
ton, being worth ninety dollars a picul;
the second quality, seventy-five dollars;
the third, fifty dollars; the fourth,
thirty dollars; the fifth, twenty dollars;
the sixth, twelve dollars; the seventh.
eight dollars; and the eighth, four dol
lars; small cargoes, however, will often
bring more in Manilla, Singapore, and
Batavia."
An agreement having been thus en-
tered into, we proceeded immediately
to land everything necessary for pre-
paring the buildings and clearing the
ground. A large flat space near the
eastern shore of the bay was selected.
where there was plenty of both wood
and water, and within a convenient
distance of the principal reefs on which
the biche de mer was to be procured.
We now all set to work in good earnest,
and soon, to the great astonishment of
the savages, had felled a sufficient num-
ber of trees for our purpose, getting
them quickly in order for the frame-
work of the houses, which in two or
three days were so far under way that
we could safely trust the rest of the
work to the three men whom we in-
tended to leave behind. These were
John Carson, Alfred Harris,
Peterson (all natives of London, I
believe), who volunteered their services
in this respect.
By the last of the month we had
everything in readiness for departure.
We had agreed, however, to pay a
formal visit of leave-taking to the
village, and Too-wit insisted so perti-
naciously upon our keeping the promise
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
533
that we did not think it advisable to
run the risk of offending him by a final
refusal. I believe that not one of us
had at this time the slightest suspicion
of the good faith of the savages. They
had uniformly behaved with the great-
est decorum, aiding us with alacrity in
our work, offering us their commodi-
ties, frequently without price, and
never, in any instance, pilfering a single
article, although the high value they
set upon the goods we had with us was
evident by the extravagant demonstra-
tions of joy always manifested upon
our making them a present.
The
women especially were most obliging in
every respect, and, upon the whole, we
should have been the most suspicious
of human beings had we entertained a
single thought of perfidy on the part
of a people who treated us so well. A
very short while sufficed to prove that
this apparent kindness of disposition
was only the result of a deeply laid
plan for our destruction, and that the
islanders for whom we entertained such
inordinate feelings of esteem, were
among the most barbarous, subtle, and
bloodthirsty wretches that ever con-
taminated the face of the globe.
It was on the first of February that
we went on shore for the purpose of
visiting the village. Although, as said
before, we entertained not the slightest
suspicion, still no proper precaution
was neglected. Six men were left in
the schooner, with instructions to per-
mit none of the savages to approach
the vessel during our absence, under
any pretence whatever, and to remain
constantly on deck. The boarding-
nettings were up, the guns double-
shotted with grape and canister, and
the swivels loaded with canisters of
musket-balls. She lay, with her anchor
apeak, about a mile from the shore,
and no canoe could approach her in
any direction without being distinctly
seen and exposed to the full fire of our
swivels immediately.
The six men being left on board,
our shore-party consisted of thirty-two
persons in all. We were armed to the
teeth, having with us muskets, pistols,
and cutlasses; besides, each had a long
kind of seaman's knife, somewhat re-
sembling the bowie knife now so much
used throughout our western and south-
ern country. A hundred of the black-
skin warriors met us at the landing for
the purpose of accompanying us on our
way. We noticed, however, with some
surprise, that they were now entirely
without arms; and, upon questioning
Too-wit in relation to this circum-
stance, he merely answered that Mattee
non we pa pa si-meaning that there
was no need of arms where all were
brothers. We took this in good part,
and proceeded.
We had passed the spring and rivulet
of which I before spoke, and were now
entering upon a narrow gorge leading
through the chain of soapstone hills
among which the village was situated.
This gorge was very rocky and uneven,
so much so that it was with no little
difficulty we scrambled through it on
our first visit to Klock-klock. The
whole length of the ravine might have
been a mile and a half, or probably
two miles. It wound in every possible
direction through the hills (having ap-
parently formed, at some remote
period, the bed of a torrent), in no
instance proceeding more than twenty
yards without an abrupt turn. The
sides of this dell would have averaged,
534
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
I am sure, seventy or eighty feet in
perpendicular altitude throughout the
whole of their extent, and in some por-
tions they arose to an astonishing
height, overshadowing the pass so com-
pletely that but little of the light of
day could penetrate. The general
width was about forty feet, and occa-
sionally it diminished so as not to allow
the passage of more than five or six
persons abreast. In short, there could
be no place in the world better adapted
for the consummation of an ambus-
cade, and it was no more than natural
that we should look carefully to our
arms as we entered upon it. When I
now think of our egregious folly, the
chief subject of astonishment seems to
be, that we should have ever ventured,
under any circumstances, so completely
into the power of unknown savages as
to permit them to march both before
and behind us in our progress through
this ravine. Yet such was the order
we blindly took up, trusting foolishly
to the force of our party, the unarmed
condition of Too-wit and his men, the
certain efficacy of our fire-arms (whose
effect was yet a secret to the natives),
and, more than all, to the long-sus-
tained pretension of friendship kept up
by these infamous wretches. Five or
six of them went on before, as if to
lead the way, ostentatiously busying
themselves in removing the larger
stones and rubbish from the path.
Next came our own party. We walked
closely together, taking care only to
prevent separation. Behind followed
the main body of the savages, observ-
ing unusual order and decorum.
Dirk Peters, a man named Wilson
Allen, and myself were on the right
of our companions, examining, as we
went along, the singular stratification
of the precipice which overhung us. A
fissure in the soft rock attracted our
attention. It was about wide enough
for one person to enter without squeez-
ing, and extended back into the hill
some eighteen or twenty feet in a
straight course, sloping afterward to
the left. The height of the opening.
as far as we could see into it from the
main gorge,
was perhaps sixty or
seventy feet. There were one or two
stunted shrubs growing from the crev-
ices, bearing a species of filbert which
I felt some curiosity to examine, and
pushed in briskly for that purpose.
gathering five or six of the nuts at a
grasp, and then hastily retreating. As
I turned, I found that Peters and Allen
had followed me. I desired them to
go back, as there was not room for two
persons to pass, saying they should
have some of my nuts. They accord-
ingly turned, and were scrambling
back, Allen being close to the mouth
of the fissure, when I was suddenly
aware of a concussion resembling noth-
ing I had ever before experienced, and
which impressed me with a vague con-
ception, if indeed I then thought of
anything, that the whole foundations
of the solid globe were suddenly rent
asunder, and that the day of universal
dissolution was at hand.
CHAPTER XXI
As soon as I could collect my scat-
tered senses, I found myself nearly
suffocated, and grovelling in utter dark-
ness among a quantity of loose earth,
which was also falling upon me heavily
in every direction, threatening to bury
me entirely. Horribly alarmed at this
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
535
idea, I struggled to gain my feet, and
at last succeeded. I then remained mo-
tionless for some moments, endeavor-
ing to conceive what had happened to
me, and where I was. Presently I
heard a deep groan just at my ear,
and afterward the smothered voice of
Peters calling to me for aid in the
name of God. I scrambled one or two
paces forward, when I fell directly
over the head and shoulders of my
companion, who, I soon discovered, was
buried in a loose mass of earth as far
as his middle, and struggling desper-
ately to free himself from the pressure.
I tore the dirt from around him with
all the energy I could command, and at
length succeeded in getting him out.
As soon as we sufficiently recovered
from our fright and surprise to be
capable of conversing rationally, we
both came to the conclusion that the
walls of the fissure in which we had
ventured had, by some convulsion of
nature, or probably from their own
weight, caved in overhead, and that we
were consequently lost for ever, being
thus entombed alive. For a long time
we gave up supinely to the most intense
agony and despair, such as cannot be
adequately imagined by those who have
never been in a similar position. I
firmly believed that no incident ever
occurring in the course of human
events is more adapted to inspire the
supremeness of mental and bodily dis-
tress than a case like our own, of living
inhumation. The blackness of darkness
which envelops the victim, the terrific
oppression of lungs, the stifling fumes
from the damp earth, unite with the
ghastly considerations that we are be-
yond the remotest confines of hope, and
that such is the allotted portion of the
dead, to carry into the human heart a
degree of appalling awe and horror not
to be tolerated-never to be conceived.
At length Peters proposed that we
should endeavor to ascertain precisely
the extent of our calamity, and grope
about our prison; it being barely pos-
sible, he observed, that some opening
might yet be left us for escape. I
caught eagerly at this hope, and, arous-
ing myself to exertion, attempted to
force my way through the loose earth.
Hardly had I advanced a single step
before a glimmer of light became per-
ceptible, enough to convince me that,
at all events, we should not immedi-
ately perish for want of air. We now
took some degree of heart, and encour-
aged each other to hope for the best.
Having scrambled over a bank of rub-
bish which impeded our farther prog-
ress in the direction of the light, we
found less difficulty in advancing and
also experienced some relief from the
excessive oppression of lungs which had
tormented us. Presently we were en-
abled to obtain a glimpse of the objects
around, and discovered that we were
near the extremity of the straight por-
tion of the fissure, where it made a
turn to the left. A few struggles more,
and we reached the bend, when to our
inexpressible joy, there appeared a long
seam or crack extending upward a vast
distance, generally at an angle of about
forty-five degrees, although sometimes
much more precipitous. We could not
see through the whole extent of this
opening; but, as a good deal of light
came down it, we had little doubt of
finding at the top of it (if we could by
any means reach the top) a clear pas-
sage into the open air.
I now called to mind that three of us
536
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
had entered the fissure from the main
gorge, and that our companion, Allen,
was still missing; we determined at
once to retrace our steps and look for
him. After a long search, and much
danger from the farther caving in of
the earth above us, Peters at length
cried out to me that he had hold of
our companion's foot, and that his
whole body was deeply buried beneath
the rubbish beyond the possibility of
extricating him. I soon found that
what he said was too true, and that,
of course, life had been long extinct.
With sorrowful hearts, therefore, we
left the corpse to its fate, and again
made our way to the bend.
The breadth of the seam was barely
sufficient to admit us, and, after one
or two ineffectual efforts at getting up,
we began once more to despair. I have
before said that the chain of hills
through which ran the main gorge was
composed of a species of soft rock
resembling soapstone. The sides of the
cleft we were now attempting to ascend
were of the same material, and so ex-
cessively slippery, being wet, that we
could get but little foothold upon them
even in their least precipitous parts;
in some places, where the ascent was
nearly perpendicular, the difficulty was,
of course, much aggravated; and, in-
deed, for some time we thought insur-
mountable. We took courage, however,
from despair; and what, by dint of
cutting steps in the soft stone with our
bowie knives, and swinging at the risk
of our lives, to small projecting points
of a harder species of slaty rock which
now and then protruded from the
general mass, we at length reached a
natural platform, from which was per-
ceptible a patch of blue sky, at the
extremity of a thickly-wooded ravine.
Looking back now, with somewhat
more leisure, at the passage through
which we had thus far proceeded, we
clearly saw from the appearance of its
sides, that it was of late formation,
and we concluded that the concussion.
whatever it was, which had so uner-
pectedly overwhelmed us, had also, at
the same moment, laid open this path
for escape. Being quite exhausted with
exertion, and indeed, so weak that we
were scarcely able to stand or articu
late, Peters now proposed that we
should endeavor to bring our compan
ions to the rescue by firing the pistols
which still remained in our girdles-the
muskets as well as cutlasses had been
lost among the loose earth at the bot-
tom of the chasm. Subsequent events
proved that, had we fired, we should
have sorely repented it, but luckily a
half suspicion of foul play had by this
time arisen in my mind, and we fore-
bore to let the savages know of our
whereabouts.
After having reposed for about an
hour, we pushed on slowly up the
ravine, and had gone no great way
before we heard a succession of tre
mendous yells. At length we reached
what might be called the surface of the
ground; for our path hitherto, since
leaving the platform, had lain beneath
an archway of high rock and foliage.
at a vast distance overhead. With
great caution we stole to a narrow
opening, through which we had a clear
sight of the surrounding country, when
the whole dreadful secret of the con-
cussion broke upon us in one moment
and at one view.
The spot from which we looked was
not far from the summit of the highest
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
537
peak in the range of the soapstone
hills. The gorge in which our party
of thirty-two had entered ran within
fifty feet to the left of us. But, for
at least one hundred yards, the channel
or bed of this gorge was entirely filled
up with the chaotic ruins of more than
a million tons of earth and stone that
had been artificially tumbled within it.
The means by which the vast mass had
been precipitated were not more sim-
ple than evident, for sure traces of the
murderous work were yet remaining.
In several spots along the top of the
eastern side of the gorge (we were now
on the western) might be seen stakes
of wood driven into the earth. In
these spots the earth had not given
way; but throughout the whole extent
of the face of the precipice from which
the mass had fallen, it was clear, from
marks left in the soil resembling those
made by the drill of the rock-blaster,
that stakes similar to those we saw
standing had been inserted, at not more
than a yard apart, for the length of
perhaps three hundred feet, and rang-
ing at about ten feet back from the
edge of the gulf. Strong cords of
grape vine were attached to the stakes
still remaining on the hill, and it was
evident that such cords had also been
attached to each of the other stakes.
I have already spoken of the singular
stratification of these soapstone hills;
and the description just given of the
narrow and deep fissure through which
we effected our escape from inhumation
will afford a further conception of its
nature. This was such that almost
every natural convulsion would be sure
to split the soil into perpendicular
layers or ridges running parallel with
one another; and a very moderate ex-
értion of art would be sufficient for
effecting the same purpose. Of this
stratification the savages had availed
themselves to accomplish their treach-
erous ends. There can be no doubt
that, by the continuous line of stakes,
a partial rupture of the soil had been
brought about, probably to the depth
of one or two feet, when by means of
a savage pulling at the end of each of
the cords (these cords being attached
to the tops of the stakes, and extend-
ing back from the edge of the cliff),
a vast leverage power was obtained,
capable of hurling the whole face of
the hill, upon a given signal, into the
bosom of the abyss below. The fate of
our poor companions was no longer a
matter of uncertainty. We alone had
escaped from the tempest of that over-
whelming destruction. We were the
only living white men upon the island.
CHAPTER XXII
OUR situation, as it now appeared,
was scarcely less dreadful than when
we had conceived ourselves entombed
forever. We saw before us no prospect
but that of being put to death by the
savages, or of dragging cut a miserable
existence in captivity among them. We
might, to be sure, conceal ourselves for
a time from their observation among
the fastnesses of the hills, and, as a
final resort, in the chasm from which
we had just issued; but we must either
perish in the long polar winter through
cold and famine, or be ultimately dis-
covered in our efforts to obtain relief.
The whole country around us seemed
to be swarming with savages, crowds
of whom, we now perceived, had come
over from the islands to the southward
.538
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
on flat rafts, doubtless with a view of
lending their aid in the capture and
plunder of the Jane. The vessel still
lay calmly at anchor in the bay, those
on board being apparently quite uncon-
scious of any danger awaiting them.
How we longed at that moment to be
with them either to aid in effecting
their escape, or to perish with them in
attempting a defence. We saw no
chance even of warning them of their
danger without bringing immediate de-
struction upon our own heads, with
but a remote hope of benefit to them.
A pistol fired might suffice to apprise
them that something wrong had oc-
curred; but the report could not pos-
sibly inform them that their only
prospect of safety lay in getting out
of the harbour forthwith-nor tell them
no principles of honor now bound them
to remain, that their companions were
no longer among the living. Upon
hearing the discharge they could not
be more thoroughly prepared to meet
the foe, who were now getting ready
to attack, than they already were, and
always had been. No good, therefore,
and infinite harm, would result from
our firing, and after mature deliberation,
we forbore.
Our next thought was to attempt to
rush toward the vessel, to seize one of
the four canoes which lay at the head
of the bay, and endeavor to force a
passage on board. But the utter im-
possibility of succeeding in this desper-
ate task soon became evident. The
country, as I said before, was literally
swarming with the natives, skulking
among the bushes and recesses of the
hills, so as not to be observed from
the schooner. In our immediate vicin-
ity especially, and blockading the sole
path by which we could hope to attain
the shore at the proper point were
stationed the whole party of the black-
skin warriors, with Too-wit at their
head, and apparently only waiting for
some re-enforcement to commence his
onset upon the Jane. The canoes, too,
which lay at the head of the bay, were
manned with savages, unarmed, it is
true, but who undoubtedly had arms
within reach. We were forced, there-
fore, however unwillingly, to remain in
our place of concealment, mere specta-
tors of the conflict which presently
ensued.
In about half an hour we saw some
sixty or seventy rafts, or flat-boats,
with outriggers, filled with savages, and
coming round the southern bight of the
harbor. They appeared to have no
arms except short clubs, and stones
which lay in the bottom of the rafts.
Immediately afterward another detach-
ment, still larger, appeared in an oppo-
site direction, and with similar weap
ons. The four canoes, too, were now
quickly filled with natives, starting up
from the bushes at the head of the
bay, and put off swiftly to join the
other parties. Thus, in less time than
I have taken to tell it, and as if by
magic, the Jane saw herself surrounded
by an immense multitude of despera
does evidently bent upon capturing her
at all hazards.
That they would succeed in so doing
could not be doubted for an instant.
The six men left in the vessel, how-
ever resolutely they might engage in
her defence, were altogether unequal
to the proper management of the guns,
or in any manner to sustain a contest
at such odds. I could hardly imagine
that they would make resistance at all,
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
539
ut in this was deceived; for presently
saw them get springs upon the cable,
nd bring the vessel's starboard broad-
ide to bear upon the canoes, which by
his time were within pistol range, the
afts being nearly a quarter of a mile
o windward. Owing to some cause
nknown, but most probably to the agi-
ation of our poor friends at seeing
hemselves in so hopeless a situation,
he discharge was an entire failure.
Not a canoe was hit or a single savage
jured, the shots striking short and
icochetting over their heads. The
nly effect produced upon them was
stonishment at the unexpected report
nd smoke, which was so excessive that
or some moments I almost thought
ey would abandon their design en-
rely, and return to the shore. And
is they would most likely have done
ad our men followed up their broad-
de by a discharge of small-arms, in
hich, as the canoes were now so near
hand, they could not have failed in
oing some execution, sufficient, at
ast, to deter this party from a farther
dvance, until they could have given
le rafts also a broadside. But, in
lace of this, they left the canoe party
recover from their panic, and, by
oking about them, to see that no in-
ry had been sustained, while they
ew to the larboard to get ready for
le rafts.
The discharge to larboard produced
he most terrible effect. The star and
ouble-headed shot of the large guns
ut seven or eight of the rafts com-
letely asunder, and killed, perhaps,
hirty or forty of the savages outright,
hile a hundred of them, at least, were
hrown into the water, the most of
them dreadfully wounded.
The re-
mainder, frightened out of their senses,
commenced at once a precipitate re-
treat, not even waiting to pick up their
maimed companions, who were swim-
ming about in every direction, scream-
ing and yelling for aid. This great
success, however, came too late for the
salvation of our devoted people. The
canoe party were already on board the
schooner to the number of more than
a hundred and fifty, the most of them
having succeeded in scrambling up the
chains and over the boarding-nettings
even before the matches had been ap-
plied to the larboard guns. Nothing
now could withstand their brute rage.
Our men were borne down at once,
overwhelmed, trodden under foot, and
absolutely torn to pieces in an instant.
Seeing this, the savages on the rafts
got the better of their fears, and came
up in shoals to the plunder. In five
minutes the Jane was a pitiable scene
indeed of havoc and tumultuous out-
rage. The decks were split open and
ripped up; the cordage, sails, and
everything movable on deck demol-
ished as if by magic; while, by dint
of pushing at the stern, towing with the
canoes, and hauling at the sides, as
they swam in thousands around the
vessel, the wretches finally forced her
on shore (the cable having been
slipped), and delivered her over to the
good offices of Too-wit, who, during
the whole of the engagement, had
maintained, like a skilful general, his
post of security and reconnoissance
among the hills, but, now that the vic-
tory was completed to his satisfaction,
condescended to scamper down with his
warriors of the black skin, and become
a partaker in the spoils.
Too-wit's descent left us at liberty
540
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
to quit our hiding-place and recon-
noitre the hill in the vicinity of the
chasm. At about fifty yards from the
mouth of it we saw a small spring of
water, at which we slaked the burning
thirst that now consumed us. Not far
from the spring we discovered several
of the filbert-bushes which I mentioned
before. Upon tasting the nuts we
found them palatable, and very nearly
resembling in flavor the common Eng-
lish filbert. We collected our hats full
immediately, deposited them within the
ravine, and returned for more. While
we were busily employed in gathering
these, a rustling in the bushes alarmed
us, and we were upon the point of
stealing back to our covert, when a
large black bird of the bittern species
strugglingly and slowly arose above the
shrubs. I was so much startled that
I could do nothing, but Peters had
sufficient presence of mind to run up
to it before it could make its escape,
and seize it by the neck. Its struggles
and screams were tremendous, and we
had thoughts of letting it go, lest the
noise should alarm some of the savages
who might be still lurking in the neigh-
borhood. A stab with a bowie knife, how-
ever, at length brought it to the ground,
and we dragged it into the ravine, con-
gratulating ourselves that, at all events,
we had thus obtained a supply of food
enough to last us for a week.
We now went out again to look about
us, and ventured a considerable dis-
tance down the southern declivity of
the hill, but met with nothing else
which could serve us for food. We
therefore collected a quantity of dry
wood and returned, seeing one or two
large parties of the natives on their
way to the village, laden with the plun-
der of the vessel, and who, we were
apprehensive, might discover us in
passing beneath the hill.
Our next care was to render our
place of concealment as secure as pos
sible, and with this object, we arranged
some brushwood over the aperture
which I have before spoken of as the
one through which we saw the patch of
blue sky, on reaching the platform
from the interior of the chasm. We
left only a very small opening just wide
enough to admit of our seeing the bay,
without the risk of being discovered
from below. Having done this, we
congratulated ourselves upon the secu
rity of the position; for we were now
completely excluded from observation
as long as we chose to remain within
the ravine itself, and not venture out
upon the hill. We could perceive a
traces of the savages having ever been
within this hollow; but, indeed, wher
we came to reflect upon the probability
that the fissure through which we at
tained it had been only just now cre
ated by the fall of the cliff opposite
and that no other way of attaining i
could be perceived, we were not s
much rejoiced at the thought of bein
secure from molestation as fearful les
there should be absolutely no mean
left us for descent. We resolved to
explore the summit of the hill thor
oughly, when a good opportunity shou
offer. In the meantime we watche
the motions of the savages through ou
loophole.
They had already made a complet
wreck of the vessel, and were now pre
paring to set her on fire. In a litt
while we saw the smoke ascending i
huge volumes from her main hatchway
and, shortly afterward, a dense mas
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
541
f flame burst up from the forecastle.
The rigging, masts and what remained
of the sails caught immediately, and
The fire spread rapidly along the decks.
Still a great many of the savages re-
ained their stations about her, ham-
mering with large stones, axes, and
annon-balls at the bolts and other iron
and copper work. On the beach, and
n canoes and rafts, there were not less,
altogether, in the immediate vicinity of
he schooner, than ten thousand na-
ives, besides the shoals of them who,
aden with booty, were making their
way inland and over to the neighboring
slands. We now anticipated a catas-
rophe, and were not disappointed.
First of all there came a smart shock
(which we felt as distinctly where we
were as if we had been slightly galvan-
zed), but unattended with any visible
signs of an explosion. The savages
were evidently startled, and paused for
in instant from their labors and yell-
ngs. They were upon the point of
recommencing, when suddenly a mass
of smoke puffed up from the decks,
resembling a black and heavy thunder-
cloud-then, as if from its bowels,
arose a tall stream of vivid fire to the
height, apparently, of a quarter of a
mile-then there came a sudden circular
expansion of the flame-then the whole
atmosphere was magically crowded, in
a single instant, with a wild chaos of
wood, and metal, and human limbs-
and, lastly, came the concussion in its
fullest fury, which hurled us impetu-
ously from our feet, while the hills
echoed and re-echoed the tumult, and
a dense shower of the minutest frag-
ments of the ruins tumbled headlong
in every direction around us.
The havoc among the savages far
exceeded our utmost expectation, and
they had now, indeed, reaped the full
and perfect fruits of their treachery.
Perhaps a thousand perished by the
explosion, while at least an equal num-
ber were desperately mangled. The
whole surface of the bay was literally
strewn with the struggling and drown-
ing wretches, and on shore matters
were even worse. They seemed utterly
appalled by the suddenness and com-
pleteness of their discomfiture, and
made no efforts at assisting one an-
other. At length we observed a total
change in their demeanor. From abso-
lute stupor, they appeared to be, all
at once, aroused to the highest pitch
of excitement, and rushed wildly about,
going to and from a certain point on
the beach, with the strangest expres-
sions of mingled horror, rage, and
intense curiosity depicted on their
countenances, and shouting, at the top
of their voices, "Tekeli-li! Tekcli-li!"
Presently we saw a large body go
off into the hills, whence they returned
in a short time, carrying stakes of
wood. These they brought to the sta-
tion where the crowd was the thickest,
which now separated so as to afford us
a view of the object of all this excite-
ment. We perceived something white
lying upon the ground, but could not
immediately make out what it was. At
length we saw that it was the carcass
of the strange animal with the scarlet
teeth and claws which the schooner had
picked up at sea on the eighteenth of
January. Captain Guy had had the
body preserved for the purpose of
stuffing the skin and taking it to Eng-
land. I remember he had given some
directions about it just before our mak-
ing the island, and it had been brought
542
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
into the cabin and stowed away in one
of the lockers. It had now been
thrown on shore by the explosion; but
why it had occasioned so much concern
among the savages was more than we
could comprehend. Although they
crowded around the carcass at a little
distance, none of them seemed willing
to approach it closely. By and by the
men with the stakes drove them in a
circle around it, and no sooner was this
arrangement completed, than the whole
of the vast assemblage rushed into the
interior of the island, with loud screams
of "Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!"
CHAPTER XXIII
DURING the six or seven days imme-
diately following we remained in our
hiding-place upon the hill, going out
only occasionally, and then with the
greatest precaution, for water and fil-
berts. We had made a kind of pent-
house on the platform, furnishing it
with a bed of dry leaves, and placing
in it three large flat stones, which
served us for both fireplace and table.
We kindled a fire without difficulty by
rubbing two pieces of dry wood to-
gether, the one soft, the other hard.
The bird we had taken in such good
season proved excellent eating, although
somewhat tough. It was not an oceanic
fowl, but a species of bittern, with jet
black and grizzly plumage, and diminu-
tive wings in proportion to its bulk.
We afterward saw three of the same
kind in the vicinity of the ravine, ap-
parently seeking for the one we had
captured; but, as they never alighted,
we had no opportunity of catching
them.
As long as this fowl lasted we suf-
fered nothing from our situation, but
it was now entirely consumed, and it
became absolutely necessary that we
should look out for provision. The
filberts would not satisfy the cravings
of hunger, afflicting us, too, with sever
gripings of the bowels, and, if freely
indulged in, with violent headache. We
had seen several large tortoises near the
seashore to the eastward of the hill
and perceived they might be easily
taken, if we could get at them withou
the observation of the natives. It wa
resolved, therefore, to make an attemp
at descending.
We commenced by going down th
southern declivity, which seemed t
offer the fewest difficulties, but had ne
proceeded a hundred yards before (a
we had anticipated from appearance
on the hilltop) our progress was en
tirely arrested by a branch of the gorg
in which our companions had perished
We now passed along the edge of thi
for about a quarter of a mile, when w
were again stopped by a precipice a
immense depth, and, not being able t
make our way along the brink of it
we were forced to retrace our steps b
the main ravine.
We now pushed over to the eastward
but with precisely similar fortune
After an hour's scramble, at the risi
of breaking our necks, we discovere
that we had merely descended into
vast pit of black granite, with fine dus
at the bottom, and whence the onl
egress was by the rugged path in whic
we had come down. Toiling again u
this path, we now tried the norther
edge of the hill. Here we were oblige
to use the greatest possible caution i
our manœuvres, as the least indiscre
tion would expose us to the full view
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
543
We
of the savages in the village.
crawled along, therefore, on our hands
and knees, and, occasionally, were even
forced to throw ourselves at full length,
dragging our bodies along by means of
the shrubbery. In this careful manner
we had proceeded but a little way,
when we arrived at a chasm far deeper
than any we had yet seen, and leading
directly into the main gorge. Thus
our fears were fully confirmed, and we
found ourselves cut off entirely from
access to the world below. Thoroughly
exhausted by our exertions, we made
he best of our way back to the plat-
form, and throwing ourselves upon the
bed of leaves, slept sweetly and
Soundly for some hours.
For several days after this frutiless
search we were occupied in exploring
every part of the summit of the hill,
in order to inform ourselves of its
actual resources. We found that it
would afford us no food, with the ex-
ception of the unwholesome filberts,
and a rank species of scurvy-grass,
which grew in a little patch of not more
han four rods square, and would be
soon exhausted. On the fifteenth of
February, as near as I can remember,
there was not a blade of this left, and
he nuts were growing scarce; our situa-
tion, therefore, could hardly be more
lamentable.* On the sixteenth we again
went round the walls of our prison, in
hope of finding some avenue of escape;
but to no purpose. We also descended
the chasm in which we had been over-
whelmed, with the faint expectation of
*This day was rendered remarkable
by our observing in the south several
huge wreaths of the grayish vapor I
have before spoken of.
discovering, through this channel, some
opening to the main ravine. Here, too,
we were disappointed, although we
found and brought up with us a musket.
On the seventeenth we set out with
the determination of examining more
thoroughly the chasm of black granite
into which we had made our way in
the first search. We remembered that
one of the fissures in the sides of this
pit had been but partially looked into,
and we were anxious to explore it, al-
though with no expectation of discov-
ering here any opening.
We found no great difficulty in reach-
ing the bottom of the hollow as before,
and were now sufficiently calm to sur-
vey it with some attention. It was,
indeed, one of the most singular-looking
places imaginable, and we could scarcely
bring ourselves to believe it altogether
the work of nature. The pit, from its
eastern to its western extremity, was
about five hundred yards in length,
when all its windings were threaded;
the distance from east to west in a
straight line not being more (I should
suppose, having no means of accurate
examination) than forty or fifty yards.
Upon first descending into the chasm—
that is to say, for a hundred feet down.
ward from the summit of the hill, the
sides of the abyss bore little resemblance
to each other, and, apparently, had at
no time been connected, the one sur-
face being of the soapstone, and the
other of marl, granulated with some
metallic matter. The average breadth
or interval between the two cliffs was
probably here sixty feet, but there
seemed to be no regularity of forma-
tion. Passing down, however, beyond
the limit spoken of, the interval rapidly
contracted, and the sides began to run
544
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
parallel, although, for some distance
farther, they were still dissimilar in
their material and form of surface.
Upon arriving within fifty feet of the
bottom, a perfect regularity commenced.
The sides were now entirely uniform
in substance, in color, and in lateral
direction, the material being a very
black and shining granite, and the
distance between the two sides, at all
points, facing each other, exactly
twenty yards. The precise formation.
of the chasm will be best understood
by means of a delineation taken upon
the spot; for I had luckily with me a
pocket-book and pencil, which I pre-
served with great care through a long
series of subsequent adventure, and to
which I am indebted for memoranda of
many subjects which would otherwise
have been crowded from my remem-
brance.
This figure (see fig. 1) gives the gen-
Å
FIG. 1.
eral outlines of the chasm, without the
minor cavities in the sides, of which
there were several, each cavity having
a corresponding protuberance opposite.
The bottom of the gulf was covered to
the depth of three or four inches with a
powder almost impalpable, beneath
which we found a continuation of the
black granite. To the right, at the lower
extremity, will be noticed the appear-
ance of a small opening; this is the
fissure alluded to above, and to ex
amine which more minutely than before
was the object of our second visit. We
now pushed into it with vigor, cutting
away a quantity of brambles which
impeded us, and removing a vast heap
of sharp flints somewhat resembling
arrow-heads in shape. We were en
couraged to persevere, however, by per
ceiving some little light proceeding from
the farther end. We at length squeezed
our way for about thirty feet, and
found that the aperture was a low and
regularly formed arch, having a bottom
of the same impalpable powder as that
in the main chasm. A strong light now
broke upon us, and, turning a short
bend, we found ourselves in another
lofty chamber, similar to the one we
had left in every respect but longi
tudinal form. Its general figure
here given. (See fig. 2.)
The total length of this chasm, com
a

FIG. 2.
mencing at the opening a and proceed
ing round the curve b to the extremity
d, is five hundred and fifty yards. A
c we discovered a small aperture simi
lar to the one through which we had
issued from the other chasm, and this
was choked up in the same manner
with brambles and a quantity of the
white arrow-head flints. We forced our
way through it, finding it about forty
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
545
feet long, and emerged into a third.
chasm. This, too, was precisely like
the first, except in its longitudinal
shape, which was thus. (See fig. 3.)
them to have been the work of nature.
Fig. 4 presents an accurate copy of the
whole.
FIG. 3.
FIG. 5.
We found the entire length of the
third chasm three hundred and twenty
yards. At the point a was an opening
about six feet wide, and extending fif-
:een feet into the rock, where it ter-
minated in a bed of marl, there being
no other chasm beyond, as we had
expected. We were about leaving this
fissure, into which very little light was
admitted, when Peters called my atten-
tion to a range of singular-looking in-
dentures in the surface of the marl
forming the termination of the cul-de-
sac.
With a very slight exertion of
the imagination, the left, or most north-
ern of these indentures might have been
taken for the intentional, although rude,
representation of a human figure stand-
ing erect, with out-stretched arm. The
rest of them bore also some little re-
semblance to alphabetical characters,
and Peters was willing, at all events, to
adopt the idle opinion that they were
really such. I convinced him of his
error, finally, by directing his attention
to the floor of the fissure, where, among
the powder, we picked up, piece by
piece, several large flakes of the marl,
which had evidently been broken off
by some convulsion from the surface
where the indentures were found, and
which had projecting points exactly
fitting the indentures; thus proving
TIRES PH
FIG. 4.
After satisfying ourselves that these
singular caverns afforded us no means
of escape from our prison, we made our
way back, dejected and dispirited, to
the summit of the hill. Nothing worth
mentioning occurred during the next
twenty-four hours, except that, in ex-
amining the ground to the eastward of
the third chasm, we found two triangu-
lar holes of great depth, and also with
black granite sides. Into these holes
we did not think it worth while to at-
tempt descending, as they had the ap-
pearance of mere natural wells, with-
out outlet. They were each about
twenty yards in circumference, and
their shape, as well as relative position
in regard to the third chasm, is shown
in figure 5, this page.
CHAPTER XXIV
On the twentieth of the month, find-
ing it altogether impossible to subsist
any longer upon the filberts, the use of
which occasioned us the most excruciat-
ing torment, we resolved to make a
desperate attempt at descending the
southern declivity of the hill. The face
of the precipice was here of the softest
species of soapstone, although nearly
perpendicular throughout its whole ex-
tent (a depth of a hundred and fifty
546
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
feet at the least), and in many places
even overarching. After a long search
we discovered a narrow ledge about
twenty feet below the brink of the gulf;
upon this Peters contrived to leap,
with what assistance I could render him
by means of our pocket-handkerchiefs
tied together. With somewhat more
difficulty I also got down; and we then
saw the possibility of descending the
whole way by the process in which we
had clambered up from the chasm when
we had been buried by the fall of the
hill-that is, by cutting steps in the
face of the soapstone with our knives.
The extreme hazard of the attempt
can scarcely be conceived; but, as there
was no other resource, we determined
to undertake it.
Upon the ledge where we stood there
grew some filbert-bushes; and to one
of these we made fast an end of our
rope of handkerchiefs. The other end
being tied round Peters' waist, I low-
ered him down over the edge of the
precipice until the handkerchiefs were
stretched tight. He now proceeded to
dig a deep hole in the soapstone (as
far in as eight or ten inches), sloping
away the rock above to the height of
a foot, or thereabout, so as to allow
of his driving, with the butt of a
pistol, a tolerably strong peg into the
levelled surface. I then drew him up
for about four feet, when he made a
hole similar to the one below, driving
in a peg as before, and having thus a
resting-place for both feet and hands.
I now unfastened the handkerchiefs
from the bush, throwing him the end,
which he tied to the peg in the upper-
most hole, letting himself down gently
to a station about three feet lower than
he had yet been-that is, to the full
extent of the handkerchiefs. Here he
dug another hole, and drove another
peg. He then drew himself up, so 19
to rest his feet in the hole just cut,
taking hold with his hands upon the
peg in the one above. It was now
necessary to untie the handkerchiefs
from the topmost peg, with the view d
fastening them to the second; and her
he found that an error had been com
mitted in cutting the holes at so grea
a distance apart. However, after on
or two unsuccessful and dangerous at
tempts at reaching the knot (hav
to hold on with his left hand while b
labored to undo the fastening with hi
right), he at length cut the string, leav
ing six inches of it affixed to the pet
Tying the handkerchiefs now to the set
ond peg, he descended to a station be
low the third, taking care not to g
too far down. By these means (mean
which I should never have conceive
of myself, and for which we were in
debted altogether to Peters' ingenui
and resolution) my companion final
succeeded, with the occasional aid
projections in the cliff, in reaching th
bottom without accident.
It was some time before I could sun
mon sufficient resolution to follow him
but I did at length attempt it. Peter
had taken off his shirt before descend
ing, and this, with my own, formed th
rope necessary for the adventure. Afte
throwing down the musket found in th
chasm, I fastened this rope to th
bushes, and let myself down rapidly
striving, by the vigor of my move
ments, to banish the trepidation which
could overcome in no other manner
This answered sufficiently well for th
first four or five steps; but presenth
I found my imagination growing ter
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
547
ribly excited by thoughts of the vast
depths yet to be descended, and the
precarious nature of the pegs and soap-
stone holes which were my only sup-
port. It was in vain I endeavored to
banish these reflections, and to keep my
eyes steadily bent upon the flat surface
of the cliff before me. The more earn-
estly I struggled not to think, the more
intensely vivid became my conceptions,
and the more horribly distinct. At
length arrived that crisis of fancy, so
fearful in all similar cases, the crisis in
which we began to anticipate the feel-
ings with which we shall fall-to picture
to ourselves the sickness, and dizziness,
and the last struggle, and the half
swoon, and the final bitterness of the
rushing and headlong descent. And
now I found these fancies creating
their own realities, and all imagined
horrors crowding upon me in fact. I
felt my knees strike violently together,
while my fingers were gradually but
certainly relaxing their grasp. There
was a ringing in my ears, and I said,
"This is my knell of death!" And now
I was consumed with the irrepressible
desire of looking below. I could not, I
would not, confine my glances to the
cliff; and, with a wild, indefinable emo-
tion, half of horror, half of a relieved
oppression, I threw my vision far down
into the abyss. For one moment my
fingers clutched convulsively upon their
hold, while, with the movement, the
faintest possible idea of ultimate es-
cape wandered, like a shadow, through
my mind—in the next my whole soul
was pervaded with a longing to fall; a
desire, a yearning, a passion utterly un-
controllable. I let go at once my grasp
upon the peg, and, turning half round
from the precipice, remained tottering
for an instant against its naked face.
But now there came a spinning of the
brain; a shrill-sounding and phantom
voice screamed within my ears; a
dusky, fiendish, and filmy figure stood
immediately beneath me; and, sighing,
I sunk down with a bursting heart, and
plunged within its arms.
I had swooned, and Peters had caught
me as I fell. He had observed my pro-
ceedings from his station at the bottom
of the cliff; and perceiving my immi-
nent danger, had endeavored to inspire
me with courage by every suggestion
he could devise; although my confusion
of mind had been so great as to prevent
my hearing what he said, or being con-
scious that he had even spoken to me
at all. At length, seeing me totter, he
hastened to ascend to my rescue, and
arrived just in time for my preserva-
tion. Had I fallen with my full weight,
the rope of linen would inevitably have
snapped, and I should have been pre-
cipitated into the abyss; at it was, he
contrived to let me down gently, so
as to remain suspended without danger
until animation returned. This was in
about fifteen minutes. On recovery,
my trepidation had entirely vanished;
I felt a new being, and, with some
little further aid from my companion,
reached the bottom also in safety.
We now found ourselves not far
from the ravine which had proved the
tomb of our friends, and to the south-
ward of the spot where the hill had
fallen. The place was one of singular
wildness, and its aspect brought to my
mind the descriptions given by travel-
lers of those dreary regions marking the
site of degraded Babylon. Not to speak
of the ruins of the disrupted cliff, which
formed a chaotic barrier in the vista
548
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
to the northward, the surface of the
ground in every other direction was
strewn with huge tumuli, apparently the
wreck of some gigantic structures of
art; although, in detail, no semblance
of art could be detected. Scoria were
abundant, and large shapeless blocks
of the black granite, intermingled with
others of marl,* and both granulated
with metal. Of vegetation there were
no traces whatsoever throughout the
whole of the desolate area within sight.
Several immense scorpions were seen,
and various reptiles not elsewhere to
be found in the high latitudes. As food
was our most immediate object, we
resolved to make our way to the sea-
coast, distant not more than half a mile,
with a view of catching turtle, several
of which we had observed from our
place of concealment on the hill. We
had proceeded some hundred yards,
threading our route cautiously between
the huge rocks and tumuli, when, upon
turning a corner, five savages sprung
upon us from a small cavern, felling
Peters to the ground with a blow from
a club. As he fell the whole party
rushed upon him to secure their victim,
leaving me time to recover from my
astonishment. I still had the musket,
but the barrel had received so much
injury in being thrown from the preci-
pice that I cast it aside as useless,
preferring to trust my pistols, which
had been carefully preserved in order.
With these I advanced upon the assail-
ants, firing one after the other in quick
succession. Two savages fell, and one,
who was in the act of thrusting a spear
*The marl was also black; indeed,
we noticed no light colored substances
of any kind upon the island.
into Peters, sprung to his feet without
accomplishing his purpose. My com-
panion being thus released, we had no
further difficulty. He had his pistols
also, but prudently declined using them,
confiding in his great personal strength,
which far exceeded that of any per-
son I have ever known. Seizing a
club from one of the savages who had
fallen, he dashed out the brains of the
three who remained, killing each in-
stantaneously with a single blow of the
weapon, and leaving us completely mas
ters of the field.
So rapidly had these events passed,
that we could scarcely believe in their
reality, and were standing over the
bodies of the dead in a species of
stupid contemplation, when we were
brought to recollection by the sound of
shouts in the distance. It was clear
that the savages had been alarmed by
the firing, and that we had little chance
of avoiding discovery. To regain the
cliff, it would be necessary to proceed
in the direction of the shouts; and
even should we succeeded in arriving
at its base, we should never be able to
ascend it without being seen. Our
situation was one of the greatest peril.
and we were hesitating in which path
to commence a flight, when one of the
savages whom I had shot, and supposed
dead, sprang briskly to his feet, and
attempted to make his escape. We
overtook him, however, before he had
advanced many paces, and were about
to put him to death, when Peters sug-
gested that we might derive some bene-
fit from forcing him to accompany us
in our attempt to escape. We therefore
dragged him with us, making him under-
stand that we would shoot him if he
offered resistance. In a few minute
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
549
he was perfectly submissive, and ran by
our sides as we pushed in among the
rocks, making for the sea-shore.
So far, the irregularities of the ground
we had been traversing hid the sea,
except at intervals, from our sight, and,
when we first had it fairly in view, it
was perhaps, two hundred yards dis-
tant. As we emerged into the open
beach we saw, to our great dismay,
an immense crowd of the natives pour-
ing from the village, and from all visi-
ble quarters of the island, making to-
ward us with gesticulations of extreme
fury, and howling like wild beasts. We
were upon the point of turning upon
our steps, and trying to secure a retreat
among the fastnesses of the rougher
ground, when I discovered the bows of
WO canoes projecting from behind a
arge rock which ran out into the water.
Toward these we now ran with all
speed, and, reaching them, found them.
unguarded, and without any other
freight than three of the large Galli-
bago turtles and the usual supply of
paddles for sixty rowers. We instantly
Look possession of one of them, and,
forcing our captive on board, pushed
out to sea with all the strength we
could command.
We had not made, however, more
than fifty yards from the shore before
we became sufficiently calm to per-
ceive the great oversight of which we
had been guilty in leaving the other
canoe in the power of the savages,
who, by this time, were not more than
twice as far from the beach as our-
selves, and were rapidly advancing to
the pursuit. No time was now to be
lost. Our hope was, at best, a forlorn
one, but we had none other. It was
very doubtful whether, with the utmost
exertion, we could get back in time to
anticipate them in taking possession of
the canoe; but yet there was a chance
that we could. We might save our-
selves if we succeeded, while not to
make the attempt was to resign our-
selves to inevitable butchery.
The canoe was modelled with the
bow and stern alike, and, in place of
turning it around, we merely changed
our position in paddling. As soon as
the savages perceived this they redou-
bled their yells, as well as their speed,
and approached with inconceivable rap-
idity. We pulled, however, with all the
energy of desperation, and arrived at
the contested point before more than
one of the natives had attained it. This
man paid dearly for his superior agility,
Peters shooting him through the head
with a pistol as he approached the
shore. The foremost among the rest
of his party were probably some twenty
or thirty paces distant as we seized upon
the canoe.
We at first endeavored to
pull her into the deep water, beyond
the reach of the savages, but, finding
her too firmly aground, and there being
no time to spare, Peters, with one or
two heavy strokes from the butt of the
musket, succeeded in dashing out a
large portion of the bow and of one
side. We then pushed off. Two of the
natives by this time had got hold of
our boat, obstinately refusing to let go,
until we were forced to dispatch them
with our knives. We were now clear
off, and making great way out to sea.
The main body of the savages, upon
reaching the broken canoe, set up the
most tremendous yell of rage and dis-
appointment conceivable. In truth,
from every thing I could see of these
wretches, they appeared to be the most.
550
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
wicked, hypocritical, vindictive, blood-
thirsty, and altogether fiendish race of
men upon the face of the globe. It is
clear we should have had no mercy had
we fallen into their hands. They made
a mad attempt at following us in the
fractured canoe, but, finding it useless,
again vented their rage in a series of
hideous vociferations, and rushed up
into the hills.
We were thus relieved from imme-
diate danger, but our situation was still
sufficiently gloomy. We knew that four
canoes of the kind we had were at one
time in the possession of the savages,
and were not aware of the fact (after-
ward ascertained from our captive)
that two of these had been blown to
pieces in the explosion of the Jane Guy.
We calculated, therefore, upon being
yet pursued, as soon as our enemies
could get round to the bay (distant
about three miles) where the boats
were usually laid up. Fearing this, we
made every exertion to leave the island
behind us, and went rapidly through
the water, forcing the prisoner to take
a paddle. In about half an hour, when
we had gained probably, five or six
miles to the southward, a large fleet of
the flat-bottomed canoes or rafts were
seen to emerge from the bay evidently
with the design of pursuit. Presently
they put back, despairing to over-
take us.
CHAPTER XXV
WE now found ourselves in the wide
and desolate Antarctic Ocean, in a lati-
tude exceeding eighty-four degrees, in
a frail canoe, and with no provision
but the three turtles. The long polar
winter. too. could not be considered
as far distant, and it became necessary
that we should deliberate well upon the
course to be pursued. There were six
or seven islands in sight belonging to
the same group, and distant from each
other about five or six leagues; but
upon neither of these had we any in
tention to venture. In coming from
the northward in the Jane Guy we had
been gradually leaving behind us the
severest regions of ice-this, however
little it may be in accordance with the
generally received notions respecting
the Antarctic, was a fact experienc
would not permit us to deny. To at
tempt, therefore, getting back would b
folly-especially at so late a period
the season. Only one course seemed t
be left open for hope. We resolve
to steer boldly to the southward, when
there was at least a probability of dis
covering lands, and more than a prob
ability of finding a still milder climate
So far we had found the Antarctic
like the Arctic Ocean, peculiarly fre
from violent storms or immoderatel
rough water; but our canoe was, a
best, of frail structure, although larg
and we set busily to work with a vie
of rendering her as safe as the limite
means in our possession would admi
The body of the boat was of no bette
material than bark-the bark of a tre
unknown. The ribs were of a toug
osier, well adapted to the purpose fo
which it was used. We had fifty fee
room from stem to stern. from fou
to six in breadth, and in depth through
out four feet and a half-the boat
thus differing vastly in shape from
those of any other inhabitants of th
Southern Ocean with whom civilize
nations are acquainted. We never di
believe them the workmanship of th
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
551
ignorant islanders who owned them;
and some days after this period dis-
covered, by questioning our captive,
that they were in fact made by the na-
ives of a group to the southwest of
he country where we found them, hav-
ng fallen accidentally into the hands
of our barbarians. What we could do
or the security of our boat was very
ittle indeed. Several wide rents were
liscovered near both ends, and these we
contrived to patch up with pieces of
voollen jacket. With the help of the
uperfluous paddles, of which there were
I great many, we erected a kind of
'ramework about the bow, so as to
reak the force of any seas which might
hreaten to fill us in that quarter. We
lso set up two paddle-blades for masts,
placing them opposite each other, one
y each gunwale, thus saving the neces-
ity of a yard. To these masts we
attached a sail made of our shirts-
loing this with some difficulty, as here
we could get no assistance from our
risoner whatever, although he had been
willing enough to labor in all the other
>perations. The sight of the linen
seemed to affect him in a very singular
nanner. He could not be prevailed
upon to touch it or go near it, shud-
iering when we attempted to force him,
and shrieking out, "Tekeli-li!"
Having completed our arrangements
in regard to the security of the canoe,
we now set sail to the south-southeast
for the present, with the view of
weathering the most southerly of the
group in sight. This being done, we
turned the bow full to the southward.
The weather could by no means be
considered disagreeable. We had a pre-
vailing and very gentle wind from the
northward, a smooth sea, and continual
daylight. No ice whatever was to be
seen; nor did I ever see one particle
of this after leaving the parallel of
Bennet's Islet. Indeed, the temperature
of the water was here far too warm for
its existence in any quantity. Having
killed the largest of our tortoises, and
obtained from him not only food but
a copious supply of water, we continued
on our course, without any incident of
moment, for perhaps seven or eight
days, during which period we must have
proceeded a vast distance to the south-
ward, as the wind blew constantly with
us, and a very strong current set con-
tinually in the direction we were pur-
suing.
March 1st.*-Many unusual phe-
nomena now indicated that we were
entering upon a region of novelty and
wonder. A high range of light gray
vapor appeared constantly in the south-
ern horizon, flaring up occasionally in
lofty streaks, now darting from east
to west, now from west to east, and
again presenting a level and uniform
summit-in short, having all the wild
variations of the Aurora Borealis. The
average height of this vapor, as appar-
ent from our station, was about twenty-
five degrees. The temperature of the
sea seemed to be increasing momentarily,
and there was a very perceptible altera-
tion in its color.
March 2d.-To-day by repeated ques-
tioning of our captive, we came to the
knowledge of many particulars in re-
gard to the island of the massacre, its
* For obvious reasons I cannot pre-
tend to strict accuracy in these dates.
They are given principally with a view
to perspicuity of narration, and as set
down in my pencil memorandum.
552
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
inhabitants, and customs-but with
these how can I now detain the reader?
I may say, however, that we learned
there were eight islands in the group-
that they were governed by a common
king, named Tsalemon or Psalemoun,
who resided in one of the smallest of
the islands; that the black skins form-
ing the dress of the warriors came from
an animal of huge size to be found only
in a valley near the court of the king-
that the inhabitants of the group fabri-
cated no other boats than the flat-bot-
tomed rafts; the four canoes being all
of the kind in their possession, and these
having been obtained, by mere accident,
from some large island in the southwest
-that his own name was Nu-Nu-that
he had no knowledge of Bennet's Islet―
and that the appellation of the island
he had left was Tsalal. The commence-
ment of the words Tsalemon and Tsalel
was given with a prolonged hissing
sound, which we found it impossible to
imitate, even after repeated endeavors,
and which was precisely the same with
the note of the black bittern we had
eaten up on the summit of the hill.
March 3d.-The heat of the water
was now truly remarkable, and in color
was undergoing a rapid change, being
no longer transparent, but of a milky
consistency and hue. In our imme-
diate vicinity it was usually smooth,
never so rough as to endanger the
canoe but we were frequently sur-
prised at perceiving, to our right and
left, at different distances, sudden and
extensive agitations of the surface-
these, we at length noticed, were always
preceded by wild flickerings in the
region of vapor to the southward.
March 4th.-To-day, with the view
of widening our sail, the breeze from
the northward dying away perceptibly,
I took from my coat-pocket a white
handkerchief. Nu-Nu was seated at
my elbow, and the linen accidently flar-
ing in his face, he became violently
affected with convulsions. These were
suceeded by drowsiness and stupor,
and low murmurings of "Tekeli-li!
Tekeli-li!"
March 5th. The wind had entirely
ceased, but it was evident that we were
still hurrying on to the southward,
under the influence of a powerful cur-
rent. And now, indeed, it would seem
reasonable that we should experience
some alarm at the turn events were
taking-but we felt none. The coun-
tenance of Peters indicated nothing of
this nature, although it wore at times
an expression I could not fathom. The
polar winter appeared to be coming on
-but coming without its terrors. I
felt a numbness of body and mind-a
dreaminess of sensation-but this was
all.
March 6th-The gray vapor bad
now arisen many more degrees above
the horizon, and was gradually losing its
grayness of tint. The heat of the water
was extreme, even unpleasant to the
touch, and its milky hue was more
evident than ever. To-day a violent
agitation of the water occurred very
close to the canoe. It was attended, as
usual, with a wild flaring up of the
vapor at its summit, and a momentary
division at its base. A fine white
powder, resembling ashes-but certainly
not such-fell over the canoe and over
a large surface of the water, as the
flickering died away among the vapor
and the commotion subsided in the sea.
Nu-Nu now threw himself on his face
THE NARRATIVE OF A. GORDON PYM
553'
in the bottom of the boat, and no per-
suasions could induce him to arise.
March 7th.-This day we questioned
Nu-Nu concerning the motives of his
countrymen in destroying our compan-
ions; but he appeared to be too utterly
overcome by terror to afford us any
rational reply. He still obstinately lay
in the bottom of the boat; and, upon
reiterating the questions as to the mo-
tive, made use only of idiotic gesticu-
lations, such as raising with his fore-
finger the upper lip, and displaying the
teeth which lay beneath it. These were
black. We had never before seen the
teeth of an inhabitant of Tsalal.
March 8th.-To-day there floated by
is one of the white animals whose ap-
pearance upon the beach at Tsalal had
occasioned so wild a commotion among
the savages. I would have picked it
up, but there came over me a sudden
listlessness, and I forbore. The heat
of the water still increased, and the
hand could no longer be endured within
it. Peters spoke little, and I knew not
what to think of his apathy. Nu-Nu
breathed, and no more.
I
March 9th.-The whole ashy mate-
rial fell now continually around us, and
in vast quantities. The range of vapor
to the southward had arisen prodigi-
ously in the horizon, and began to as-
sume more distinctness of form.
can liken it to nothing but a limitless
cataract, rolling silently into the sea
from some immense and far-distant
rampart in the heaven. The gigantic
curtain ranged along the whole extent
of the southern horizon. It emitted
no sound.
March 21st.-A sullen darkness now
hovered above us-but from out the
milky depths of the ocean a luminous
glare arose, and stole up along the bul-
warks of the boat. We were nearly
overwhelmed by the white ashy shower
which settled upon us and upon the
canoe, but melted into the water as it
fell. The summit of the cataract was
utterly lost in the dimness and the dis-
tance. Yet we were evidently approach-
ing it with a hideous velocity. At
intervals there were visible in it wide,
yawning, but momentary rents, and
from out these rents, within which was
a chaos of flitting and indistinct images,
there came rushing and mighty, but
soundless winds, tearing up the en-
kindled ocean in their course.
March 22d.-The darkness had ma-
terially increased, relieved only by the
glare of the water thrown back from
the white curtain before us. Many
gigantic and pallidly white birds flew
continuously now from beyond the veil,
and their scream was the eternal Tekeli-
li! as they retreated from our vision.
Hereupon Nu-Nu stirred in the bot-
tom of the boat; but upon touching
him, we found his spirit departed. And
now we rushed into the embraces of the
cataract, where a chasm threw itself
open to receive us. But there arose
in our pathway a shrouded human fig-
ure, very far larger in its proportions
than any dweller among men. And the
hue of the skin of the figure was of the
perfect whiteness of the snow.*
*Poe refused to finish this tale be-
cause of the inaccuracy of the facts
supplied to him.-Ed.
Note
THE circumstances connected with
the late sudden and distressing death
of Mr. Pym are already well known to
the public through the medium of the
daily press. It is feared that the few
remaining chapters which were to have
completed his narrative, and which were
retained by him, while the above were
in type, for the purpose of revision, have
been irrecoverably lost through the ac-
cident by which he perished himself.
But as the facts in relation to all
the figures are most singular (especially
when taken in connection with state-
ments made in the body of the narra-
tive), it may be as well to say a word or
two concerning them all-this, too, the
more especially as the facts in question
have, beyond doubt, escaped the atten-
tion of Mr. Poe.
Figure 1, then, figure 2, figure 3, and
figure 5, when conjoined with one an-
other in the precise order which the
chasms themselves presented, and when
deprived of the small lateral branches
or arches (which, it will be remembered,
served only as a mass of communication
between the main chambers, and were
of totally distinct character), constitute
an Ethiopian verbal root-the root
"To be shady"-whence
all the inflections of shadow or dark-
ness.
In regard to the "left or most north-
wardly" of the indentures in figure 4, it
is more than probable that the opinion
of Peters was correct, and that the hi-
eroglyphical appearance was really the
work of art, and intended as the repre-
sentation of a human form. The deline
ation is before the reader, and he may,
or may not, perceive the resemblance
suggested; but the rest of the indentures
afford strong confirmation of Peters'
idea. The upper range is evidently the
Arabic verbal root
"To be
white," whence all the inflections of
brilliancy and whiteness. The lower
range is not so immediately perspicuous.
The characters are somewhat broken
and disjointed; nevertheless, it cannot
be doubted that, in their perfect state,
they formed the full Egyptian word
П&НYPHС. "The region of the
south." It should be observed that
these interpretations confirm the opinion
of Peters in regard to the "most north-
wardly" of the figures. The arm is out-
stretched towards the south.
Tekeli-li! was the cry of the affrighted
natives of Tsalal upon discovering the
carcass of the white animal picked up
at sea. This also was the shuddering
exclamation of the captive Tsalalian
upon encountering the white materials
in possession of Mr. Pym. This also
was the shriek of the swift-flying.
white, and gigantic birds which issued
from the vapoury white curtain of the
South. Nothing white was to be found
at Tsalal, and nothing otherwise in the
subsequent voyage to the region beyond.
554
A Descent Into the Maelstrom
(Published in Carpenter's Penny Book, London, under the title, "In a
Maelstrom."-Ed.)
The ways of God in Nature, as in
Providence, are not as our ways; nor
are the models that we frame in any
way commensurate to the vastness, pro-
fundity, and unsearchableness of His
works, which have a depth in them
greater than the well of Democritus.
-Joseph Glanville.
WE had now reached the summit of
the loftiest crag. For some minutes the
old man seemed too much exhausted to
speak.
"Not long ago," said he at length,
"and I could have guided you on this
route as well as the youngest of my
sons; but, about three years past, there
happened to me an event such as never
happened before to mortal man—or at
least such as no man ever survived to
tell of-and the six hours of deadly ter-
ror which I then endured have broken
me up body and soul. You suppose me
a very old man-but I am not. It took
less than a single day to change these
hairs from a jetty black to white, to
weaken my limbs, and to unstring my
nerves, so that I tremble at the least ex-
ertion, and am frightened at a shadow.
Do you know I can scarcely look over
this little cliff without getting giddy?"
The "little cliff," upon whose edge
he had so carelessly thrown himself
down to rest that the weightier portion
of his body hung over it, while he was
only kept from falling by the tenure of
his elbow on its extreme and slippery
edge this "little cliff" arose, a sheer
unobstructed precipice of black shining
rock, some fifteen or sixteen hundred
feet from the world of crags beneath us.
Nothing would have tempted me to be
within half dozen yards of its brink.
In truth so deeply was I excited by the
perilous position of my companion, that
I fell at full length upon the ground,
clung to the shrubs around me, and
dared not even glance upward at the
sky-while I struggled in vain to divest
myself of the idea that the foundations
of the mountain were in danger from
the fury of the winds. It was long be-
fore I could reason myself into suffi-
cient courage to sit up and look out into
the distance.
"You must get over these fancies,"
said the guide, "for I have brought you
here that you might have the best pos-
sible view of the scene of that event I
mentioned and to tell you the whole
story with the spot just under your
eye."
"We are now," he continued, in that
particularizing manner which distin-
guished him-"we are now close upon
the Norwegian coast-in the sixty-eighth
degree of latitude-in the great prov-
ince of Nordland-and in the dreary
district of Lofoden. The mountain
upon whose top we sit is Helseggen, the
Cloudy. Now raise yourself up a little
higher-hold on to the grass if you
555
556
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
feel giddy-so-and look out, beyond
the belt of vapor beneath us, into the
sea."
I looked dizzily, and beheld a wide
expanse of ocean, whose waters wore so
inky a hue as to bring at once to my
mind the Nubian geographer's account
of the Mare Tenebrarum. A panorama
more deplorably desolate no human im-
agination can conceive. To the right
and left, as far as the eye could reach,
there lay outstretched, like ramparts of
the world, lines of horribly black and
beetling cliff, whose character of gloom
was but the more forcibly illustrated
by the surf which reared high up
against it its white and ghastly crest,
howling and shrieking for ever. Just
opposite the promontory upon whose
apex we were placed, and at a distance
of some five or six miles out at sea,
there was visible a small, bleak-looking
island; or, more properly, its position
was discernible through the wilderness
of surge in which it was enveloped.
About two miles nearer the land, arose
another of smaller size; hideously
craggy and barren, and encompassed at
various intervals by a cluster of dark
rocks.
The appearance of the ocean, in the
space between the more distant island
and the shore, had something very un-
usual about it. Although, at the time,
so strong a gale was blowing landward
that a brig in the remote offing lay to
under a double-reefed trysail, and con-
stantly plunged her whole hull out of
sight, still there was here nothing like
a regular swell, but only a short, quick,
angry cross dashing of water in every
direction-as well in the teeth of the
wind as otherwise. Of foam there was
little except in the immediate vicinity
of the rocks.
"The island in the distance," resumed
the old man, "is called by the Nor-
wegians Vurrgh. The one midway is
Moskoe. That a mile to the northward
is Ambaaren. Yonder are Islesen.
Hotholm, Keildhelm, Suarven, and
Buckholm. Further off-between Mos-
koe and Vurrgh—are Otterholm, Fli
men, Sandflesen, and Stockholm. These
are the true names of the places-but
why it has been thought necessary to
name them at all, is more than either
you or I can understand. Do you hear
anything? Do you see any change in
the water?"
We had now been about ten min-
utes upon the top of Helseggen, to
which we had ascended from the in-
terior of Lofoden so that we had caught
no glimpse of the sea until it had burst
upon us from the summit. As the old
man spoke, I became aware of a loud
and gradually increasing sound, like the
moaning of a vast herd of buffaloes
upon an American prairie; and at the
same moment I perceived that what
seamen term the chopping character of
the ocean beneath us, was rapidly
changing into a current which set to the
eastward. Even while I gazed, this cur-
rent acquired a monstrous velocity.
Each moment added to its speed-to its
headlong impetuosity. In five minutes
the whole sea, as far as Vurrgh, was
lashed into ungovernable fury; but it
was between Moskoe and the coast that
the main uproar held its sway. Here
the vast bed of the waters, seamed
and scarred into a thousand conflicting
channels, burst suddenly into phrensied
convulsion-heaving, boiling, hissing-
gyrating in gigantic and innumerable
A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTROM
557
vortices, and all whirling and plunging
on to the eastward with a rapidity
which water never elsewhere assumes,
except in precipitous descents.
In a few minutes more, there came
over the scene another radical altera-
tion. The general surface grew some-
what more smooth, and the whirlpools,
one by one, disappeared, while prodigi-
ous streaks of foam became apparent
where none had been seen before.
These streaks, at length, spreading out
to a great distance, and entering into
combination, took unto themselves the
gyratory motion of the subsided vor-
tices, and seemed to form the germ of
another more vast. Suddenly-very
suddenly-this assumed a distinct and
definite existence, in a circle of more
than a mile in diameter. The edge of
the whirl was represented by a broad
belt of gleaming spray; but no particle
of this slipped into the mouth of the
terrific funnel, whose interior, as far
as the eye could fathom it, was a
smooth, shining, and jet-black wall of
water, inclined to the horizon at an
angle of some forty-five degrees, speed-
ing dizzily round and round with a
swaying and sweltering motion, and
sending forth to the winds an appalling
voice, half shriek, half roar, such as
not even the mighty cataract of Niagara
ever lifts up in its agony to Heaven.
The mountain trembled to its very
base, and the rock rocked. I threw
myself upon my face, and clung to the
scant herbage in an excess of nervous
agitation.
"This," said I at length, to the old
man—“this can be nothing else than the
great whirlpool of the maelstrom."
"So it is sometimes termed," said he.
"We Norwegians call it the Moskoe-
strom, from the island of Moskoe in
the midway."
The ordinary account of this vortex
had by no means prepared me for what
I saw.
That of Jonas Ramus, which
is perhaps the most circumstantial of
any, cannot impart the faintest con-
ception either of the magnificence, or
of the horror of the scene-or of the
wild bewildering sense of the novel
which confounds the beholder. I am
not sure from what point of view the
writer in question surveyed it. nor at
what time; but it could neither have
been from the summit of Helseggen,
nor during a storm. There are some
passages of this description, neverthe-
less, which may be quoted for their de-
tails, although their effect is exceeding-
ly feeble in conveying an impression of
the spectacle.
"Between Lofoden and Moskoe," he
says, "the depth of the water is be-
tween thirty-six and forty fathoms;
but on the other side, toward Ver
(Vurrgh) this depth decreases so as not
to afford a convenient passage for a
vessel, without the risk of splitting on
the rocks, which happens even in the
calmest weather. When it is flood, the
stream runs up the country between
Lofoden and Moskoe with a boisterous
rapidity; but the roar of its impetuous
ebb to the sea is scarce equalled by the
loudest and most dreadful cataracts;
the noise being heard several leagues
off, and the vortices or pits are of such
an extent and depth, that if a ship
comes within its attraction, it is in-
evitably absorbed and carried down to
the bottom, and there beat to pieces
against the rocks; and when the water
relaxes, the fragments thereof
thrown up again. But these intervals
are
558
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
of tranquility are only at the turn of
the ebb and flood, and in calm weather,
and last but a quarter of an hour, its
violence gradually returning. When
the stream is most boisterous, and its
fury heightened by a storm, it is dan-
gerous to come within a Norway mile
of it. Boats, yachts, and ships have
been carried away by not guarding
against it before they were carried with-
in its reach. It likewise happens fre-
quently, that whales come too near the
stream, and are overpowered by its
violence; and then it is impossible to
describe their howlings and bellowings
in their fruitless struggles to disengage
themselves. A bear once, attempting
to swim from Lofoden to Moskoe, was
caught by the stream and borne down,
while he roared terribly, so as to be
heard on shore. Large stocks of firs
and pine trees, after being absorbed by
the current, rise again broken and torn
to such a degree as if bristles grew
upon them. This plainly shows the
bottom to consist of craggy rocks,
among which they are whirled to and
fro. This stream is regulated by the
flux and reflux of the sea-it being con-
stantly high and low water every six
hours. In the year 1645, early in the
morning of Sexagesima Sunday, it raged
with such noise and impetuosity that
the very stones of the houses on the
coast fell to the ground."
In regard to the depth of the water,
I could not see how this could have
been ascertained at all in the immediate
vicinity of the vortex. The "forty
fathoms" must have reference only to
portions of the channel close upon the
shore either of Moskoe or Lofoden.
The depth in the centre of the Mos-
Loe-strom must be unmeasurably great-
er: and no better proof of this fact is:
necessary than can be obtained from
even the sidelong glance into the abyss
of the whirl which may be had from
the highest crag of Helseggen. Look
ing down from this pinnacle upon the
howling Phlegethon below, I could not
help smiling at the simplicity with
which the honest Jonas Ramus records,
as a matter difficult of belief, the anec-
dotes of the whales and the bears, for
it appeared to me, in fact, a self-evident
thing, that the largest ships of the line
in existence, coming within the influence
of that deadly attraction, could resist
it as little as a feather the hurricane,
and must disappear bodily and at once..
The attempts to account for the phe
nomenon-some of which I remember,
seemed to me sufficiently plausible in
perusal now wore a very different and
unsatisfactory aspect. The idea gen-
erally received is that this, as well as
three smaller vortices among the Ferroe
Islands, "have no other cause than the
collision of waves rising and falling, at
flux and reflux, against a ridge of rocks
and shelves, which confines the water so
that it precipitates itself like a cataract;
and thus the higher the flood rises, the
deeper must the fall be, and the natural
result of all is a whirlpool or vortex,
the prodigious suction of which is suffi-
ciently known by lesser experiments."—
These are the words of the Encyclo-
paedia Brittanica. Kircher and others
imagine that in the centre of the chan-
nel of the Maelstrom is an abyss pene-
trating the globe, and issuing in some
very remote part-the Gulf of Bothnia
being somewhat decidedly named in one
instance. This opinion, idle in itself.
was the one to which, as I gazed, my
imagination most readily assented; and
A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTROM
559
mentioning it to the guide, I was rather
surprised to hear him say that, although
it was the view almost universally en-
tertained of the subject by the Nor-
wegians, it nevertheless was not his
own. As to the former notion he con-
fessed his inability to comprehend it;
and here I agreed with him-for, how-
ever conclusive on paper, it becomes
altogether unintelligible, and even ab-
surd, amid the thunder of the abyss.
"You have had a good look at the
whirl now," said the old man, "and if
you will creep round this crag, so as
to get in its lee, and deaden the roar
of the water, I will tell you a story
that will convince you I ought to know
something of the Moskoe-strom."
I placed myself as desired, and he
proceeded.
"Myself and my two brothers once
owned a schooner-rigged smack of about
seventy tons burthen, with which we
were in the habit of fishing among the
islands beyond Moskoe, nearly to
Vurrgh. In all violent eddies at sea
there is good fishing, at proper oppor-
tunities, if one has only the courage to
attempt it; but among the whole of
the Lofoden coastmen, we three were
the only ones who made a regular busi-
ness of going out to the islands, as I
tell you. The usual grounds are a great
way lower down to the southward.
There fish can be got at all hours,
without much risk, and therefore these
places are preferred. The choice spots
over here among the rocks, however,
not only yield the finest variety, but in
far greater abundance; so that we often
got in a single day, what the more timid
of the craft could not scrape together
in a week. In fact, we made it a matter
of desperate speculation-the risk of
life standing instead of labor, and cour-
age answering for capital.
"We kept the smack in a cove about
five miles higher up the coast than this;
and it was our practice, in fine weather,
to take advantage of the fifteen min.
utes' slack to push across the main
channel of the Moskoe-strom, far above
the pool, and then drop down upon an-
chorage somewhere near Otterholm, or
Sandflesen, where the eddies are not so
violent as elsewhere. Here we used to
remain until nearly time for slack-
water again, when we weighed and made
for home. We never set out upon this
expedition without a steady side wind
for going and coming-one that we felt
sure would not fail us before our re-
turn-and we seldom made a miscalcu-
lation upon this point. Twice, during
six years, we were forced to stay all
night at anchor on account of a dead
calm, which is a rare thing indeed just
about here; and once we had to remain
on the grounds nearly a week, starving
to death, owing to a gale which blew
up shortly after our arrival, and made
the channel too boisterous to be
thought of. Upon this occasion we
should have been driven out to sea in
spite of every thing, (for the whirlpools
threw us round and round so violently,
that, at length we fouled our anchor
and dragged it) if it had not been that
we drifted into one of the innumerable
cross currents-here today and gone to-
morrow-which drove us under the lee
of Flimen, where, by good luck, we
brought up.
"I could not tell you the twentieth
part of the difficulties we encountered
'on the ground'-it is a bad spot to be
in, even in good weather-but we make
shift always to run the gauntlet of the
560
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Moskoe-strom itself without accident;
although at times my heart has been in
my mouth when we happened to be a
minute or so behind or before the slack.
The wind sometimes was not as strong
as we thought it at starting, and then
we made rather less way than we could
wish, while the current rendered the
smack unmanageable. My eldest broth-
er had a son eighteen years old, and I
had two stout boys of my own. These
would have been of great assistance at
such times, in using the sweeps as well
as afterward in fishing-but somehow,
although we ran the risk ourselves, we
had not the heart to let the young ones
get into the danger-for, after all said
and done, it was a horrible danger, and
that is the truth.
"It is now within a few days of three
years since what I am going to tell you
occurred. It was on the tenth of July,
18, a day which the people of this
part of the world will never forget-
for it was one in which blew the most
terrible hurricane that ever came out of
the heavens. And yet all the morning
and indeed until late in the afternoon,
there was a gentle and steady breeze
from the southwest, while the sun shone
brightly, so that the oldest seaman
among us could not have foreseen what
was to follow.
"The three of us-my two brothers
and myself-had crossed over to the
islands about two o'clock p. m., and
soon nearly loaded the smack with fine
fish, which, we all remarked, were more
plentiful that day than we had ever
known them. It was just seven, by my
watch, when we weighed and started for
home, so as to make the worst of the
Strom at slack water, which we knew
would be at eight.
"We set out with a fresh wind on our
starboard quarter, and for some time (
spanked along at a great rate, never
dreaming of danger, for indeed we saw
not the slightest reason to apprehend it.
All at once we were taken aback by a
breeze from over Helseggen. This was
most unusual-something that had never
happened to us before-and I began to
feel a little uneasy, without exactly
knowing why. We put the boat on the
wind, but could make no headway at all
for the eddies, and I was upon the point
of proposing to return to the anchorage,
when looking astern, we saw the whole
horizon covered with a singular copper-
colored cloud that rose with the most
amazing velocity.
"In the meantime the breeze that had
headed us off fell away and we were
dead becalmed, drifting about in every
direction. This state of things, how-
ever, did not last long enough to give
us time to think about it. In less than
a minute the storm was upon us-in
less than two the sky was entirely over-
cast-and what with this and the driv-
ing spray, it became suddenly so dark
that we could not see each other in the
smack.
"Such a hurricane as then blew it is
folly to attempt describing. The old-
est seaman in Norway never experi-
enced any thing like it. We had let our
sails go by the run before it cleverly
took us; but, at the first puff, both our
masts went by the board as if they had
been sawed off-the mainmast taking
with it my youngest brother, who had
lashed himself to it for safety.
"Our boat was the lightest feather of
a thing that ever sat upon water. It
had a complete flush deck, with only a
small hatch near the bow, and this
A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTROM
561
hatch it had always been our custom to
batten down when about to cross the
Strom, by way of precaution against
the chopping seas. But for this circum-
stance we should have foundered at
once for we lay entirely buried for
some moments. How my elder brother
escaped destruction I cannot say, for I
never had an opportunity of ascertain-
ing. For my part, as soon as I had let
the foresail run, I threw myself flat on
deck, with my feet against the narrow
gunwale of the bow, and with my hands
grasping a ring-bolt near the foot of the
foremast. It was mere instinct that
prompted me to do this-which was un-
doubtedly the very best thing I could
have done for I was too much flurried
to think.
"For some moments we were com-
pletely deluged, as I say, and all this
time I held my breath, and clung to the
bolt. When I could stand it no longer
I raised myself upon my knees, still
keeping hold with my hands, and thus
got my head clear. Presently our little
boat gave herself a shake, just as a dog
does in coming out of the water, and
thus rid herself, in some measure, of the
sea. I was now trying to get the better
of the stupor that had come over me,
and to collect my senses so as to see
what was to be done, when I felt some-
body grasp my arm. It was my elder
brother, and my heart leaped for joy,
for I had made sure that he was over-
board-but the next moment all this
joy was turned into horror-for he put
his mouth close to my ear, and
screamed out the word 'Moskoe-strom!'
"No one will ever know what my
feelings were at that moment. I shook
from head to foot as if I had had the
most violent fit of the ague. I knew
what he meant by that one word well
enough I knew what he wished to
make me understand. With the wind
that now drove us on, we were bound
for the whirl of the Strom, and nothing
could save us!
"You perceive that in crossing the
Strom channel, we always went a long
way up above the whirl, even in the
calmest weather, and then had to wait
and watch carefully for the slack-but
now we were driving right upon the pool
itself, and in such a hurricane as this!
'To be sure,' I thought, 'we shall get
there just about the slack-there is
some little hope in that'-but in the
next moment I cursed myself for be-
ing so great a fool as to dream of hope
at all. I knew very well that we were
doomed, had we been ten times a
ninety-gun ship.
"By this time the first fury of the
tempest had spent itself, or perhaps we
did not feel it so much, as we scudded
before it, but at all events the seas,
which at first had been kept down by
the wind, and lay flat and frothing,
now got up into absolute mountains. A
singular change, too had come over the
heavens. Around in every direction it
was still as black as pitch, but nearly
overhead there burst out, all at once, a
circular rift of clear sky-as clear as
I ever saw-and of a deep bright blue-
and through it there blazed forth the
full moon with a lustre that I never
before knew her to wear. She lit up
everything about us with the greatest
distinctness-but, oh God, what a scene
it was to light up!
"I now made one or two attempts to
speak to my brother-but in some man.
ner which I could not understand, the
din had so increased that I could not
562
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
make him hear a single word, although
I screamed at the top of my voice in
his ear. Presently he shook his head,
looking as pale as death, and held up
one of his fingers, as if to say 'listen!"
"At first I could not make out what
he meant-but soon a hideous thought
flashed upon me. I dragged my watch
from its fob. It was not going. I
glanced at its face by the moonlight,
and then burst into tears as I flung it
far away into the ocean. It had run
down at seven o'clock! We were be-
hind the time of the slack, and the whirl
of the Strom was in full fury!
"When a boat is well built, properly
trimmed, and not deep laden, the waves
in a strong gale, when she is going large,
seem always to slip from beneath her-
which appears strange to a landsman-
and this is what is called riding, in sea
phrase.
"Well, so far we had ridden the swells
very cleverly; but presently a gigantic
sea happened to take us right under the
ounter, and bore us with it as it rose-
up-up-as if into the sky. I would
not have believed that any wave could
rise so high. And then down we came
with a sweep, a slide, and a plunge that
made me feel sick and dizzy, as if I
was falling from some lofty mountain-
top in a dream. But while we were up
I had thrown a quick glance around-
and that one glance was all-sufficient.
I saw our exact position in an instant.
The Moskoe-strom whirlpool was about
a quarter of a mile dead ahead-but
no more like the every-day Moskoe-
strom than the whirl, as you now see it,
is like a mill-race. If I had not known
where we were, and what we had to ex-
pect, I should not have recognized the
place at all. As it was, I involuntarily
closed my eyes in horror. The lids
clenched themselves together as if in a
spasm.
"It could not have been more than
two minutes afterwards until we sud-
denly felt the waves subside, and wert
enveloped in foam. The boat made a
sharp half turn to larboard, and thea
shot off in its new direction like a
thunderbolt. At the same moment the
roaring noise of the water was com
pletely drowned in a kind of shrill
shriek-such a sound as you might in
agine given out by the water-pipes of
many thousand steam-vessels letting off
their steam all together. We were now
in the belt of surf that always surrounds
the whirl; and I thought, of course, that
another moment would plunge us int
the abyss, down which we could only
see indistinctly on account of the amaz
ing velocity with which we were born
along. The boat did not seem to sinl
into the water at all, but to skim lik
an air-bubble upon the surface of th
surge. Her starboard side was next th
whirl, and on the larboard arose th
world of ocean we had left. It stoo
like a huge writhing wall between u
and the horizon.
"It may appear strange, but now
when we were in the very jaws of th
gulf, I felt more composed than whe
we were only approaching it. Havin
made up my mind to hope no more,
got rid of a great deal of that terr
which unmanned me at first.
I su
posed it was despair that strung m
nerves.
"It may look like boasting—bt
what I tell you is truth-I began t
reflect how magnificent a thing it w
to die in such a manner, and how foo
ish it was in me to think of so paltry
A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTROM
563
consideration as my own individual life,
in view of so wonderful a manifesta-
tion of God's power. I do believe that
I blushed with shame when this idea
crossed my mind. After a little while
I became possessed with the keenest
curiosity about the whirl itself. I posi-
tively felt a wish to explore its depths,
even at the sacrifice I was going to
make; and my principal grief was that
I should never be able to tell my old
companions on shore about the mys-
teries I should see. These, no doubt,
were singular fancies to occupy a man's
mind in such extremity-and I have
often thought since, that the revolutions
of the boat around the pool might have
rendered me a little light-headed.
"There was another circumstance
which tended to restore my self-pos-
session; and this was the cessation of
the wind, which could not reach us in
our present situation-for, as you saw
for yourself, the belt of the surf is con-
siderably lower than the general bed of
the ocean, and this latter now towered
above us, a high black, mountainous
ridge. If you have never been at sea
in a heavy gale, you can form no idea
of the confusion of mind occasioned by
the wind and spray together. They
blind, deafen, and strangle you, and
take away all power of action or reflec-
tion. But we were now, in a great
measure, rid of these annoyances—just
as death-condemned felons in prison are
allowed petty indulgences, forbidden
them while their doom is yet uncertain.
"How often we made the circuit of
the belt it is impossible to say. We
careered round and round for perhaps
an hour, flying rather than floating, get-
ting gradually more and more into the
middle of the surge, and then nearer
and nearer to its horrible inner edge.
All this time I had never let go of the
ring-bolt. My brother was at the stern,
holding on to a small empty water-
cask which had been securely lashed
under the coop of the counters, and was
the only thing on deck that had not
been swept overboard when the gale
first took us. As we approached the
brink of the pit he let go his hold upon
this, and made for the ring, from which,
in the agony of his terror, he en-
deavored to force my hands, as it was
not large enough to afford us both a
secure grasp. I never felt deeper grief
than when I saw him attempt this act―
although I knew he was a madman
when he did it-a raving maniac
through sheer fright. I did not care,
however, to contest the point with him.
I knew it could make no difference
whether either of us held on at all; so
I let him have the bolt, and went astern
to the cask. This there was no great
difficulty in doing; for the smack flew
round steadily enough, and upon an
even keel-only swaying to and fro with
the immense sweeps and swelters of the
whirl. Scarcely had I secured myself
in my new position, when we gave a
wild lurch to starboard, and rushed
headlong into the abyss. I muttered a
hurried prayer to God, and thought all
was over.
"As I felt the sickening sweep of the
descent, I had instinctively tightened
my hold upon the barrel, and closed my
eyes.
For some seconds I dared not
open them-while I expected instant
destruction, and wondered that I was
not already in my death-struggles with
the water. But moment after moment
elapsed. I still lived. The sense of
falling had ceased; and the motion of
564
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
the vessel seemed much as it had been
before, while in the belt of foam, with
the exception that she now lay more
along. I took courage and looked once
again upon the scene.
"Never shall I forget the sensation of
awe, horror, and admiration with which
I gazed about me. The boat appeared
to be hanging, as if by magic, midway
down, upon the interior surface of a
funnel vast in circumference, prodigi-
ous in depth, and whose perfectly
smooth sides might have been mistaken
for ebony, but for the bewildering
rapidity with which they spun around,
and for the gleaming and ghastly radi-
ance they shot forth, as the rays of the
full moon, from that circular rift amid
the clouds which I have already de-
scribed, streamed in a flood of golden
glory along the black walls, and far
away down into the inmost recesses of
the abyss.
"At first I was too much confused
to observe any thing accurately. The
general burst of terrific grandeur was all
that I beheld. When I recovered my-
self a little, however, my gaze fell in-
stinctively downward. In this direction
I was able to obtain an unobstructed
view, from the manner in which the
smack hung on the inclined surface of
the pool. She was quite upon an even
keel-that is to say, her deck lay in a
plane parallel with that of the water-
but this latter sloped at an angle of
more than forty-five degrees, so that
we seemed to be lying upon our beam-
ends. I could not help observing,
nevertheless, that I had scarcely more
difficulty in maintaining my hold and
footing in this situation, than if we had
been upon a dead level; and this, I sup-
pose, was owing to the speed at which
we revolved.
"The rays of the moon seemed to
search the very bottom of the profound
gulf; but still I could make out nothing
distinctly on account of a thick mist in
which there hung a magnificent rain-
bow, like that narrow and tottering
bridge which Mussulmen say is the only
pathway between Time and Eternity.
This mist, or spray, was no doubt oc
casioned by the clashing of the great
walls of the funnel, as they all met to-
gether at the bottom-but the yell tha:
went up to the Heavens from out of
that mist I dare not attempt to de-
scribe.
"Our first slide into the abyss itself,
from the belt of foam above, had car-
ried us to a great distance down the
slope; but our father descent was by
no means proportionate. Round and
round we swept-not with any uniform
movement-but in dizzying swings and
jerks, that sent us sometimes only a
few hundred yards-sometimes nearly
the complete circuit of the whirl. Our
progress downward, at each revolution,
was slow, but very perceptible.
"Looking about me upon the wid
waste of liquid ebony on which we were
thus borne, I perceived that our boat
was not the only object in the embrace
of the whirl. Both above and below us
were visible fragments of vessels, large
masses of building-timber and trunks of
trees, with many smaller articles, such
as pieces of house furniture, broken
boxes, barrels and staves. I have al-
ready described the unnatural curiosity
which had taken the place of my orig-
inal terrors. It appeared to grow upor
me as I drew nearer and nearer to my
dreadful doom. I now began to watch
A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTROM
565
with a strange interest, the numerous
things that floated in our company. I
must have been delirious, for I even
sought amusement in speculating upon
the relative velocities of their several
descents toward the foam below. "This
fir-tree,' I found myself at one time
saying, 'will certainly be the next thing
that takes the awful plunge and disap-
pears, and then I was disappointed to
find that the wreck of a Dutch mer-
chant ship overtook it and went down
before. At length, after making several
guesses of this nature, and being de-
ceived in all-this fact-the fact of my
invariable miscalculation, set me upon
a train of reflection that made my limbs
again tremble, and my heart beat
heavily once more.
"It was not a new terror that thus
affected me, but the dawn of a more ex-
citing hope. This hope arose partly
from memory, and partly from present
observation. I called to mind the great
variety of buoyant matter that strewed
the coast of Lofoden, having been ab-
sorbed and then thrown forth by the
Moskoe-strom. By far the greater
number of the articles were shattered
in the most extraordinary way-so
chafed and roughened as to have the
appearance of being stuck full of splint-
ers-but then I distinctly recollected
that there were some of them which
were not disfigured at all. Now I could
not account for this difference except
by supposing that the roughened frag-
ments were the only ones which had
been completely absorbed that the
others had entered the whirl at so late a
period of the tide, or, from some rea-
son, had descended so slowly after en-
tering, that they did not reach the bot-
tom before the turn of the flood came,
or the ebb, as the case might be. I
conceived it possible, in either instance,
that they might thus be whirled up
again to the level of the ocean, without
undergoing the fate of those which had
been drawn in more early or absorbed
more rapidly. I made, also, three im-
portant observations.
The first was,
that as a general rule, the larger the
bodies were, the more rapid their de-
scent-the second, that, between two
masses of equal extent, the one spher-
ical, and the other of any other shape,
the superiority in speed of descent was
with the sphere-the third, that, be-
tween two masses of equal size, the one
cylindrical, and the other of any other
shape, the cylinder was absorbed the
more slowly. Since my escape, I have
had several conversations on this sub-
ject with an old school-master of the
district; and it was from him that I
learned the use of the words 'cylinder'
and 'sphere.' He explained to me-al-
though I have forgotten the explana-
tion-how what I observed was, in fact,
the natural consequence of the forms of
the floating fragments-and showed me
how it happened that a cylinder, swim-
ming in a vortex, offered more resist-
ance to its suction, and was drawn in
with greater difficulty than an equally
bulky body, of any form whatever.*
"There was one startling circum-
stance which went a great way in en-
forcing these observations, and render-
ing me anxious to turn them to account,
and this was that, at every revolution,
we passed something like a barrel, or
else the yard or the mast of a vessel,
while many of these things, which had
*See Archimedes, "De Incidentibus in
Fluido."-lib. 2.
566
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
been on our level when I first opened
my eyes upon the wonders of the whirl-
pool, were now high up above us, and
seemed to have moved but little from
their original station.
"I no longer hesitated what to do.
I resolved to lash myself securely to
the water-cask upon which I now held,
to cut it loose from the counter, and
to throw myself with it into the water.
I attracted my brother's attention by
signs, pointed to the floating barrels that
came near us, and did everything in my
power to make him understand what I
was about to do. I thought at length
that he comprehended my design-but,
whether this was the case or not, he
shook his head despairingly, and refused
to move from his station by the ring-
bolt. It was impossible to reach him;
the emergency admitted of no delay;
and so, with a bitter struggle, I resigned
him to his fate, fastened myself to the
cask by means of the lashings which
secured it to the counter, and precipi-
tated myself with it into the sea, with-
out another moment's hesitation.
"The result was precisely what I had
hoped it might be. As it is myself who
now tell you this tale-as you see that
I did escape—and as you are already in
possession of the mode in which this
escape was effected, and must therefore
anticipate all that I have farther to
say I will bring my story quickly to
conclusion. It might have been an
hour, or thereabout, after my quitting
the smack, when, having descended to
a vast distance beneath me, it made
three or four wild gyrations in rapid
succession, and, bearing my loved broth-
er with it, plunged headlong, at once
and forever, into the chaos of foam be-
low. The barrel to which I was at
tached sunk very little farther than
half the distance between the bottom of
the gulf and the spot at which I leaped
overboard before a great change took
place in the character of the whirlpool.
The slope of the sides of the vast fun-
nel became momently less and less
steep. The gyrations of the whirl grew,
gradually, less and less violent. By de-
grees, the froth and the rainbow dis-
appeared, and the bottom of the gulf
seemed slowly to uprise. The sky was
clear, and the winds had gone down, and
the full moon was setting radiantly in
the west, when I found myself on the
surface of the ocean, in full view of
the shores of Lofoden, and above the
spot where the pool of the Moskoe-
strom had been. It was the hour of the
slack-but the sea still heaved in moun-
tainous waves from the effects of the
hurricane. I was borne violently into
the channel of the Strom, and in a few
minutes, was hurried down the coast
into the 'grounds' of the fishermen. A
boat picked me up exhausted from
fatigue and (now that the danger was
removed) speechless from the memory
of its horror. Those who drew me on
board were my old mates and daily
companions-but they knew me no
more than they would have known a
traveller from the spirit-land. My hair,
which had been raven black the day be
fore, was as white as you see it now.
They say too that the whole expression
of my countenance had changed. I told
them my story-they did not believe it.
I now tell it to you-and I can
scarcely expect you to put more faith
in it than did the merry fishermen of
Lofoden."
Ms. Found in a Bottle
(First published in Baltimore Saturday Visitor, October, 1833.--Ed.)
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 edu-
cation of no common order, and a con-
templative turn of mind enabled me to
methodise the stores which early study
very diligently garnered up. Beyond
all things, the works 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, tinc-
tured 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 experi-
ence 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 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-fast-
ened, 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, cocoanuts, and a few
cases of opium. The stowage was
clumsily done, and the vessel conse-
quently 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 meet-
ing with some of the small crabs 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 from its color as from its be-
ing the first we had seen since our de-
parture from Batavia. I watched it
attentively until sunset, when it spread
all at once to the eastward and west-
ward, girding in the horizon with a nar-
row strip of vapor, and looking like a
long line of low beach. My notice was
567
568
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
soon afterward attracted by the dusky-
red appearance of the moon, and the
peculiar character of the sea. The lat-
ter was undergoing a rapid change, and
the water seemed more than usually
transparent. Although I could distinct-
ly 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 heated
iron. As night came on, every breath
of wind died away, and a more entire
calm it is impossible to conceive. The
flame of a candle burned upon the poop
without the least perceptibile 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 dan-
ger, 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 them-
selves deliberately upon deck. I went
below-not without a full presentiment
of evil. Indeed, every appearance war-
ranted me in apprehending a Simoon.
I told the captain of my fears; but he
paid no attention to what I said, and
left me without deigning to give a re-
ply. My uneasiness, however, pre-
vented 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 oc-
casioned by the rapid revolution of a
mill-wheel, and before I could ascer-
tain its meaning, I found the ship quiv-
ering to its center. 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-log
ged, yet, as her masts had gone by the
board, she rose, after a minute, heavily
from the sea, and, staggering awhile be
neath the immense pressure of the
tempest, finally righted.
By what miracle I escaped destruc-
tion, it is impossible to say. Stunned
by the shock of the water, I found my
self, upon recovery, jammed in between
the stern-post and rudder. With great
difficulty I regained my feet, and look-
ing dizzily around, was at first struck
with the idea of our being among break-
ers; so terrific, beyond the wides
imagination, was the whirlpool of moun-
tainous and foaming ocean within which
we were engulfed. After a while I
heard the voice of an old Swede, whe
had shipped with us at the moment of
leaving port. I hallooed to him with a
my strength, and presently he came
reeling aft. We soon discovered that
we were the sole survivors of the acci-
dent. All on deck, with the exception
of ourselves, had been swept overboard:
the captain and mates must have per-
ished while they slept, for the cabins:
were deluged with water. Without as-
sistance we could expect to do little
for the security of the ship, and our ex-
ertions 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 in-
stantaneously overwhelmed. We scud-
ded with frightful velocity before the
sea, and the water made clear breaches
MS. FOUND IN A BOTTLE
569
over us. The frame-work of our stern
was shattered excessively, and, in al-
most 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 vio-
lence of the wind; but we looked for-
ward to its total cessation with dismay;
well believing, that in our shattered con-
dition, we should inevitably perish in
the tremendous swell which would en-
sue.
But this very just apprehension
seemed by no means likely to be soon
verified. For five entire days and
nights during which our only subsist-
ence was a small quantity of jaggeree,
procured with great difficulty from the
forecastle-the hulk flew at a rate de-
fying computation, before rapidly suc-
ceeding flaws of wind, which, without
equalling the first violence of the
Simoon, were still more terrific than
iny 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
Jad 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
lecisive light. There were no clouds
apparent, yet the wind was upon the
increase, and blew with a fitful and un-
steady 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 re-
flection, 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 dim, sil-
ver-like rim, alone, as it rushed down
the unfathomable ocean.
us.
We waited in vain for the arrival of the
sixth day-that day to me has not yet
arrived to the Swede never did arrive.
Thenceforward we were enshrouded
in pitchy darkness, so that we could not
have seen an object at twenty paces from
the ship. Eternal night continued to
envelope us, all unrelieved by the phos-
phoric sea-brilliancy to which we had
been accustomed in the tropics. We
observed, too, that, although the temp-
est continued to rage with unabated
violence, there was no longer to be
discovered the usual appearance of surf,
or foam, which had hitherto attended
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 wrapt 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 mizzen-mast, looked out
bitterly into the world of ocean. We
had no means of calculating time, nor
could we form any guess of our situa-
tion. We were, however, well aware of
having made further 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 pos-
sible, and that we were not instantly
buried is a miracle. My companion
570
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
spoke of the lightness of our cargo, and
reminded me of the excellent qualities
of our ship; but I could not help feel-
ing 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 be-
yond 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 precip-
itous 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 al-
titude, her apparent size still exceeded
that of any ship of the line or East In-
diaman 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 pro-
truded from her open ports, and dashed
from the 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 un-
governable 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 con-
templation of her own sublimity, then
trembled,
down.
and tottered, and came
At this instant, I know not what sud-
den 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 nearly under water,
and the inevitable result was to hurl me,
with irresistible violence, upon the rig
ging 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 dif-
culty 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 had
taken, so many points of vague novelty,
doubt, and apprehension. I therefore
thought proper to contrive a hiding-
MS. FOUND IN A BOTTLE
571
place in the hold. This I did by remov-
ing 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 observ-
ing 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 burden. He mut-
tered 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 instru-
ments, and decayed charts of naviga-
tion. 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 analy-
sis, to which the lessons of by-gone
time 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 wonder-
ful 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! Wrap-
ped up in meditations of a kind which
I cannot divine, they pass me by un-
noticed. Concealment is utter folly on
my part, for the people will not see.
It is 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 fail to make the endeavor. 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 un-
governed 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 in the word DISCOVERY.
I have made my observations lately
upon the structure of the vessel. Al-
though well armed, she is not, I think, a
ship of war. Her rigging, build, and
general equipment, all negative a sup-
position 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
572
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 pe-
culiar 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, consid-
ered independently of 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 would
have every characteristic of Spanish
oak, if Spanish oak were distended by
any unnatural means.
In reading the above sentence, a curi-
ous 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 en-
tered of his veracity, "as sure as there
is a sea where the ship itself will grow
in bulk like the living body of the sea-
man." *
*
About an hour ago, I made bold to
trust myself among a group of the
crew. They paid no manner of atten-
tion, and, although I stood in the very
midst of them all, seemed utterly un-
conscious 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 in-
firmity; 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 mathe-
matical 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 truck
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 man to imagine. I have just
left the deck, where I find it impos-
sible to maintain a footing, although the
crew seem to experience little incon-
venience. 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 con-
tinually 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 forbid-
den to destroy. I am led to attribute
these frequent escapes to the only nat
ural 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 ex-
MS. FOUND IN A BOTTLE
573
pected, he paid me no attention. Al-
though 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 won-
der 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 remarkable
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 ut-
ter, so extreme, which excites within
my spirit a sense-a sentiment ineffa-
ble. 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 moul-
dering instruments of science, and ob-
solete, 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 commis-
sion, and which, at all events, bore the
signature of a monarch. He murmured
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 cen-
turies; their eyes have an eager and un-
easy 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 be-
come a ruin.
* * *
When I look around me, I feel
ashamed of my former apprehension.
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 simoon are trivial and in-
effective? 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 inter-
vals, stupendous ramparts of ice, tower-
ing 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, howl-
ing 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 sensa-
tions is, I presume, utterly impossible;
yet a curiosity to penetrate the mys-
teries of these awful regions, predomi-
nates even over my despair, and will
reconcile me to the most hideous aspect
of death. It is evident that we are
hurrying onward 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 con-
fessed that a supposition apparently so
wild has every probability in its fa-
vor.
*
*
574
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
The crew pace the deck with unquiet
and tremulous step; but there is upon
their countenance and 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 bel-
lowing, and thundering of ocean and
tempest, the ship is quivering-oh God!
and-going down!
The "MS. Found in a Bottle," was
originally published in 1831, and it was
not until many years afterward that I
became acquainted with the maps of
Mercator, in which the ocean is repre-
sented as rushing, by four mouths. into
the (northern) Polar Gulf, to be ab-
sorbed into the bowels of the earth; the
Pole itself being represented by a black
rock, towering to a prodigious height.-
E. A. P.
The Sphinx
DURING the dread reign of cholera
in New York, I had accepted the invi-
tation of a relative to spend a fortnight
with him in the retirement of his cot-
tage ornee on the banks of the Hudson.
We had here around us all the ordinary
means of summer amusement; and
what with rambling in the woods,
sketching, boating, fishing, bathing,
music, and books, we should have
passed the time pleasantly enough, but
for the fearful intelligence which
reached us every morning from the
populous city. Not a day elapsed which
did not bring us news of the decease of
some acquaintance. Then, as the fatal-
ity increased, we learned to expect
daily the loss of some friend. At length
we trembled at the approach of every
messenger. The very air from the
South seemed to us redolent with death.
That palsying thought, indeed, took en-
tire possession of my soul. I could
neither speak, think, nor dream of any
thing else. My host was of a less ex-
citable temperament, and, although
greatly depressed in spirits, exerted
himself to sustain my own. His richly
philosophical intellect was not at any
time affected by unrealities. To the
substances of terror he was sufficiently
alive, but of its shadows he had no
apprehension.
His endeavors to arouse me from the
condition of abnormal gloom into which
I had fallen, were frustrated, in great
measure, by certain volumes which I
had found in his library. These were
of a character to force into germina-
tion whatever seeds of hereditary super-
stition lay latent in my bosom. I had
been reading these books without his
THE SPHINX
575
knowledge, and thus he was often at a
loss to account for the forcible impres-
sions which had been made upon my
fancy.
A favorite topic with me was the
popular belief in omens-a belief which,
at this one epoch of my life, I was al-
most seriously disposed to defend. On
this subject we had long and animated
discussions; he maintaining the utter
groundlessness of faith in such matters,
I contending that a popular sentiment
arising with absolute spontaneity-that
is to say, without apparent traces of
suggestion had in itself the unmistak-
able elements of truth, and was entitled
to much respect.
The fact is, that soon after my ar-
rival at the cottage there had occurred
to myself an incident so entirely inex-
plicable, and which had in it so much
of the portentous character, that I
might well have been excused for re-
garding it as an omen. It appalled, and
at the same time so confounded and
bewildered me, that many days elapsed
before I could make up my mind to
communicate the circumstances to my
friend.
Near the close of an exceedingly
warm day, I was sitting, book in hand,
at an open window, commanding,
through a long vista of the river banks,
a view of a distant hill, the face of
which nearest my position had been de-
nuded by what is termed a land-slide,
of the principal portion of its trees.
My thoughts had been long wandering
from the volume before me to the
gloom and desolation of the neighbor-
ing city. Uplifting my eyes from the
page, they fell upon the naked face of
the hill, and upon an object-upon
some living monster of hideous confor-
mation, which very rapidly made its
way from the summit to the bottom,
disappearing finally in the dense forest
below. As this creature first came in
sight, I doubted my own sanity—or at
least the evidence of my own eyes; and
many minutes passed before I suc-
ceeded in convincing myself that I
was neither mad nor in a dream. Yet
when I described the monster (which I
distinctly saw, and calmly surveyed
through the whole period of its prog-
ress), my readers, I fear, will feel more
difficulty in being convinced of these
points than even I did myself.
Estimating the size of the creature by
comparison with the diameter of the
large trees near which it passed-the
few giants of the forest which had
escaped the fury of the land-slide-I
concluded it to be far larger than any
ship of the line in existence. I say ship
of the line, because the shape of the
monster suggested the idea-the hull of
one of our seventy-four might convey
a very tolerable conception of the gen-
eral outline. The mouth of the animal
was situated at the extremity of a pro-
boscis some sixty or seventy feet in
length, and about as thick as the body
of an ordinary elephant. Near the root
of this trunk was an immense quantity
of black shaggy hair-more than could
have been supplied by the coats of a
score of buffaloes; and projecting from
this hair downwardly and laterally,
sprang two gleaming tusks not unlike
those of the wild boar, but of infinitely
greater dimensions. Extending forward,
parallel with the proboscis, and on each
side of it, was a gigantic staff, thirty or
forty feet in length, formed seemingly of
pure crystal, and in shape a perfect
prism, it reflected in the most gor-
576
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
geous manner the rays of the declining
sun. The trunk was fashioned like a
wedge with the apex to the earth.
From it there were outspread two pairs
of wings each wing nearly one hun-
dred yards in length-one pair being
placed above the other, and all thickly
covered with metal scales; each scale
apparently some ten or twelve feet in
diameter. J observed the upper and
lower tiers of wings were connected by
a strong chain. But the chief peculiar-
ity of this horrible thing was the repre-
sentation of a Death's Head, which
covered nearly the whole surface of its
breast, and which was as accurately
traced in glaring white, upon the dark
ground of the body, as if it had been
there carefully designed by an artist.
While I regarded the terrific animal,
and more especially the appearance on
its breast, with a feeling of horror and
awe-with a sentiment of forthcoming
evil, which I found it impossible to
quell by any effort of the reason, I
perceived the huge jaws at the extrem-
ity of the proboscis suddenly expand
themselves, and from them there pro-
ceeded a sound so loud and so expres-
sive of woe, that it struck upon my
nerves like a knell, and as the monster
disappeared at the foot of the hill, I
fell at once, fainting, to the floor.
Upon recovering, my first impulse, of
course, was to inform my friend of what
I had seen and heard-and I can scarce-
ly explain what feeling of repugnance
it was which, in the end, operated to
prevent me.
At length, one evening, some three
or four days after the occurrence, we
were sitting together in the room in
which I had seen the apparition-I oc-
upying the same seat at the same win-
dow, and he lounging on a sofa near at
hand. The association of the place and
time impelled me to give him an ac
count of the phenomenon. He heard
me to the end-at first laughed heart-
ily-and then lapsed into an excessively
grave demeanor, as if my insanity was
a thing beyond suspicion. At this in-
stant I again had a distinct view of the
monster-to which, with a shout of ab-
solute terror, I now directed his atten-
tion. He looked eagerly-but main-
tained that he saw nothing-although I
designated minutely the course of the
creature, as it made its way down the
naked face of the hill.
I was now immeasurably alarmed.
for I considered the vision either as an
omen of my death, or, worse, as the
forerunner of an attack of mania. I
threw myself passionately back in my
chair, and for some moments buried
my face in my hands. When I un-
covered my eyes, the apparition was no
longer visible.
My host, however, had in some de-
gree resumed the calmness of his de-
meanor, and questioned me very rigor-
ously in respect to the conformation of
the visionary creature. When I had
fully satisfied him on this head, be
sighed deeply, as if relieved of some
intolerable burden, and went on to talk,
with what I thought a cruel calmness,
of various points of speculative phi-
losophy, which had heretofore formed
subject of discussion between us. I re-
member his insisting very especially
(among other things) upon the idea
that the principal source of error in ail
human investigations lay in the liability
of the understanding to underrate or to
overvalue the importance of an object,
through mere misadmeasurement of its
A TALE OF THE RAGGED MOUNTAINS
577
propinquity. "To estimate properly,
for example," he said, "the influence to
be exercised on mankind at large by the
thorough diffusion of Democracy, the
distance of the epoch at which such dif-
fusion may possibly be accomplished
should not fail to form an item in the
estimate. Yet can you tell me one
writer on the subject of government
who has ever thought this particular
branch of the subject worthy of discus-
sion at all?"
He here paused for a moment,
stepped to a book-case, and brought
forth one of the ordinary synopses of
Natural History. Requesting me then
to exchange seats with him, that he
might the better distinguish the fine
print of the volume, he took my arm-
chair at the window, and, opening the
book, resumed his discourse very much
in the same tone as before.
"But for your exceeding minuteness,”
he said, "in describing the monster, I
might never have had it in my power
to demonstrate to you what it was. In
the first place, let me read to you a
school-boy account of the genus Sphinx,
of the family Crepuscularia, of the order
Lepidoptera, of the class of Insecta-or
insects. The account runs thus:
66
'Four membranous wings covered
with little colored scales of metallic ap-
pearance; mouth forming a rolled pro-
boscis, produced by an elongation of
the jaws, upon the sides of which are
found the rudiments of mandibles and
downy palpi; the inferior wings re-
tained to the superior by a stiff hair;
antennae in the form of an elongated
club, prismatic; abdomen pointed, The
Death's-headed Sphinx has occasioned
much terror among the vulgar, at times,
by the melancholy kind of cry which
it utters, and the insignia of death
which it wears upon its corslet.""
He here closed the book and leaned
forward in the chair, placing himself
accurately in the position which I had
occupied at the moment of beholding
"the monster."
"Ah, here it is," he presently ex-
claimed “it is reascending the face of
the hill, and a very remarkable looking
creature I admit it to be. Still, it is by
no means so large or so distant as you
imagined it; for the fact is that, as it
wriggles its way up this thread, which
some spider has wrought along the win-
dow-sash, I find it to be about the
sixteenth of an inch in its extreme
length, and also about the sixteenth of
an inch distant from the pupil of my
eye."
A Tale of the Ragged Mountains
(First published in Godey's Lady's Book, April, 1844.-Ed.)
DURING the fall of the year 1827,
while residing near Charlottesville, Vir-
ginia, I casually made the acquaintance
of Mr. Augustus Bedloe. This young
gentleman was remarkable in every re-
spect, and excited in me a profound in-
terest and curiosity. I found it im-
possible to comprehend him either in
his moral or his physical relations. Of
his family I could obtain no satisfac-
tory account. Whence he came, I
Even about his age
never ascertained.
578
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
-although I call him a young gen-
tleman there was something which
perplexed me in no little degree. He
certainly seemed young-and he made
a point of speaking about his youth
yet there were moments when I should
have had little trouble in imagining
him a hundred years of age. But in no
regard was he more peculiar than in his
personal appearance. He was singu-
larly tall and thin. He stooped much.
His limbs were exceedingly long and
emaciated. His forehead was broad and
low. His complexion was absolutely
bloodless. His mouth was large and
flexible, and his teeth were more widely
uneven, although sound, than I had
ever before seen teeth in a human head.
The expression of his smile, however,
was by no means unpleasing, as might
be supposed; but it had no variation
whatever. It was one of profound mel-
ancholy-of a phaseless and unceasing
gloom. His eyes were abnormally large,
and round like those of a cat. The
pupils, too, upon any accession or
diminution of light, underwent contrac-
tion or dilation, just such as is observed
in the feline tribe. In moments of
excitement the orbs grew bright to a
degree almost inconceivable; seeming
to emit luminous rays, not of a reflected
but of an intrinsic lustre, as does a
candle or the sun; yet their ordinary
condition was so totally vapid, filmy,
and dull, as to convey the idea of the
eyes of a long-interred corpse.
These peculiarities of person appeared
to cause him much annoyance, and he
was continually alluding to them in a
sort of half explanatory, half apologetic
strain, which, when I first heard it, im-
pressed me very painfully.
I soon,
however, grew accustomed to it, and my
uneasiness wore off. It seemed to be
his design rather to insinuate than di-
rectly to assert that, physically, he had
not always been what he was-that a
long series of neuralgic attacks had re-
duced him from a condition of more
than usual personal beauty, to that
which I saw. For many years past he
had been attended by a physician,
named Templeton-an old gentleman.
perhaps seventy years of age-whom he
had first encountered at Saratoga, and
from whose attention, while there, he
either received, or fancied that he re-
ceived, great benefit. The result was
that Bedloe, who was wealthy, had made
an arrangement with Dr. Templeton, by
which the latter, in consideration of a
liberal annual allowance, had consented
to devote his time and medical ex-
perience exclusively to the care of the
invalid.
Doctor Templeton had been a travel-
ler in his younger days, and at Paris
had become a convert, in great meas-
ure, to the doctrines of Mesmer. It
was altogether by means of magnetic
remedies that he had succeeded in al-
leviating the acute pains of his patient:
and this success had very naturally
inspired the latter with a certain degree
of confidence in the opinions from
which the remedies had been educed.
The Doctor, however, like all enthusi
asts, had struggled hard to make a thor-
ough convert of his pupil, and finally
so far gained his point as to induce
the sufferer to submit to numerous ex-i
periments. By a frequent repetition of
these, a result had arisen, which of late
days has become so common as to at-
tract little or no attention, but which.
at the period of which I write, had very
rarely been known in America. I mean
A TALE OF THE RAGGED MOUNTAINS
579
to say, that between Doctor Templeton
and Bedloe there had grown up, little
by little, a very distinct and strongly
marked rapport, or magnetic relation.
I am not prepared to assert, however,
that this rapport extended beyond the
limits of the simple sleep-producing
power; but this power itself had at-
tained great intensity. At the first
attempt to induce the magnetic som-
nolency, the mesmerist entirely failed.
In the fifth or sixth he succeeded very
partially, and after long-continued ef-
fort. Only at the twelfth was the tri-
umph complete. After this the will of
the patient succumbed rapidly to that
of the physician, so that, when I first
became acquainted with the two, sleep
was brought about almost instantane-
ously by the mere volition of the opera-
tor, even when the invalid was unaware
of his presence. It is only now, in the
year 1845, when similar miracles are
witnessed daily by thousands, that I
dare venture to record this apparent
impossibility as a matter of serious fact.
The temperature of Bedloe was, in
the highest degree sensitive, excitable,
enthusiastic. His imagination was singu-
larly vigorous and creative; and no
doubt it derived additional force from
the habitual use of morphine, which
he swallowed in great quantity, and
without which he would have found it
impossible to exist. It was his practice
to take a very large dose of it imme-
diately after breakfast each morning-
or, rather, immediately after a cup of
strong coffee, for he ate nothing in the
forenoon-and then set forth alone, or
attended only by a dog, upon a long
ramble among the chain of wild and
dreary hills that lie westward and south-
ward of Charlottesville, and are there
dignified by the title of the Ragged
Mountains.
Upon a dim, warm, misty day, to
ward the close of November, and dur-
ing the strange interregnum of the sea-
sons which in America is termed the
Indian summer, Mr. Bedloe departed
as usual for the hills. The day passed,
and still he did not return.
About eight o'clock at night, having
become seriously alarmed at his pro-
tracted absence, we were about setting
out in search of him, when he unex-
pectedly made his appearance, in health
no worse than usual, and in rather more
than ordinary spirits. The account
which he gave of his expedition, and of
the events which had detained him,
was a singular one indeed.
"You will remember," said he, "that
it was about nine in the morning when
I left Charlottesville. I bent my steps
immediately to the mountains, and,
about ten, entered a gorge which was
entirely new to me. I followed the
windings of this pass with much inter-
est. The scenery which presented itself
on all sides, although scarcely entitled
to be called grand, had about it an
indescribable and to me a delicious as-
pect of dreary desolation. The solitude
seemed absolutely virgin. I could not
help believing that the green sods and
the gray rocks upon which I trod had
been trodden never before by the foot
of a human being. So entirely secluded,
and in fact inaccessible, except through
a series of accidents, is the entrance of
the ravine, that it is by no means im-
possible that I was indeed the first
adventurer-the very first and sole ad-
venturer who had ever penetrated its
recesses.
"The 'thick and peculiar mist, o
580
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
smoke, which distinguishes the Indian
summer, and which now hung heavily
over all objects, served, no doubt, to
deepen the vague impressions which
these objects created. So dense was
this pleasant fog that I could at no time
see more than a dozen yards of the
path before me. This path was ex-
cessively sinuous, and as the sun could
not be seen, I soon lost all idea of the
direction in which I journeyed. In the
meantime the morphine had its cus-
tomary effect-that of enduing all the
external world with an intensity of
interest. In the quivering of a leaf-
in the hue of a blade of grass-in the
shape of a trefoil-in the humming of
a bee in the gleaming of a dew-drop-
in the breathing of the wind-in the
faint odors that came from the forest-
there came a whole universe of sug-
gestion-a gay and motley train of
rhapsodical and immethodical thought.
"Busied in this, I walked on for sev-
eral hours, during which the mist deep-
ened around me to so great an extent
that at length I was reduced to an
absolute groping of the way. And now
an indescribable uneasiness possessed
me-a species of nervous hesitation
and tremor. I feared to tread, lest I
should be precipitated into some abyss.
I remembered, too, strange stories told
about these Ragged Hills, and of the
uncouth and fierce races of men, who
tenanted their groves and caverns.
thousand vague fancies oppressed and
disconcerted me-fancies the more dis-
tressing because vague. Very suddenly
my attention was arrested by the loud
beating of a drum.
A
"My amazement was, of course, ex-
treme. A drum in these hills was a
thing unknown. I could not have been
more surprised at the sound of the
trump of the Archangel. But a new
and still more astounding source of
interest and perplexity arose. There
came a wild rattling or jingling sound,
as if of a bunch of large keys, and upon
the instant a dusky-visaged and half-
naked man rushed past me with a
shriek. He came so close to my per-
son that I felt his hot breath upon my
face. He bore in one hand an instru-
ment composed of an assemblage of
steel rings, and shook them vigorously
as he ran. Scarcely had he disappeared
in the mist before, panting after him,
with open mouth and glaring eyes, there
darted a huge beast. I could not be
mistaken in its character. It was a
hyena.
"The sight of this monster rather
relieved than heightened my terrors-
for I now made sure that I dreamed,
and endeavored to arouse myself to
waking consciousness. I stepped boldly
and briskly forward. I rubbed my
eyes. I called aloud. I pinched my
limbs. A small spring of water pre-
sented itself to my view, and here,
stooping, I bathed my hands and my
head and neck. This seemed to dissipate
the equivocal sensations which had
hitherto annoyed me. I arose, as I
thought, a new man, and proceeded
steadily and complacently on my un-
known way.
"At length, quite overcome by exer-
tion, and by a certain oppressive close-
ness of the atmosphere, I seated myself
beneath a tree. Presently there came
a feeble gleam of sunshine, and the
shadow of the leaves of the tree fell
faintly but definitely upon the grass.
At this shadow I gazed wonderingly for
many minutes. Its character stupefied
A TALE OF THE RAGGED MOUNTAINS
581
me with astonishment. I looked up-
ward. The tree was a palm.
"I now arose hurriedly, and in a state
of fearful agitation-for the fancy that
I dreamed would serve me no longer.
I saw I felt that I had perfect com-
mand of my senses-and these senses
now brought to my soul a world of
novel and singular sensation. The heat
became all at once intolerable.
strange odor loaded the breeze.
low, continuous murmur, like that aris-
ing from a full, but gently flowing river,
came to my ears, intermingled with
the peculiar hum of multitudinous hu-
man voices.
A
A
"While I listened in an extremity of
astonishment which I need not attempt
to describe, a strong and brief gust of
wind bore off the incumbent fog as if
by the wand of an enchanter.
"I found myself at the foot of a high
mountain, and looking down into a vast
plain, through which wound a majestic
river. On the margin of this river stood
an Eastern-looking city, such as we read
of in the Arabian Tales, but of a char-
acter even more singular than any there
described. From my position, which
was far above the level of the town, I
could perceive its every nook and cor-
ner, as if delineated on a map. The
streets seemed innumerable, and crossed
each other irregularly in all directions,
but were rather long winding alleys
than streets, and absolutely swarmed
with inhabitants. The houses were
wildly picturesque. On every hand was
a wilderness of balconies, of verandas,
of minarets, of shrines, and fantas-
tically carved oriels. Bazaars abounded;
and there were displayed rich wares in
infinite variety and profusion-silks,
muslins, the most dazzling cutlery, the
most magnificent jewels and gems. Be-
sides these things, were seen, on all
sides, banners and palanquins, litters
with stately dames close-veiled, ele-
phants gorgeously caparisoned, idols
grotesquely hewn, drums, banners, and
gongs, spears, silver and gilded maces.
And amid the crowd, and the clamor,
and the general intricacy and confusion
-amid the million of black and yellow
men, turbaned and robed, and of flow-
ing beard, there roamed a countless
multitude of holy filleted bulls, while
vast legions of the filthy but sacred
ape clambered, chattering and shriek-
ing, about the cornices of the mosques,
or clung to the minarets and oriels.
From the swarming streets to the banks
of the river, there descended innumer-
able flights of steps leading to bathing
places, while the river itself seemed to
force a passage with difficulty through
the vast fleets of deeply burdened ships
that far and wide encountered its sur-
face.
Beyond the limits of the city
arose, in frequent majestic groups, the
palm and the cocoa, with other gigantic
and weird trees of vast age; and here
and there might be seen a field of rice,
the thatched hut of a peasant, a tank,
a stray temple, a gypsy camp, or a
solitary graceful maiden taking her way,
with a pitcher upon her head, to the
banks of the magnificent river.
"You will say now, of course, that I
dreamed; but not so. What I saw-
what I heard-what I felt what I
thought-had about it nothing of the
unmistakable idiosyncrasy of the dream.
All was rigorously self-consistent. At
first, doubting that I was really awake,
I entered into a series of tests, which
soon convinced me that I really was.
Now, when one dreams, and, in the
582
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
dream, suspects that he dreams, the
suspicion never fails to confirm itself,
and the sleeper is almost immediately
aroused. Thus Novalis errs not in say-
ing that 'we are near waking when we
dream that we dream.' Had the vision
occurred to me as I describe it, without
my suspecting it as a dream, then a
dream it might absolutely have been,
but, occurring as it did, and suspected
as it was, I am forced to class it among
other phenomena."
"In this I am not sure that you are
wrong," observed Dr. Templeton, "but
proceed. You arose and descended into
the city."
"I arose," continued Bedloe, regard-
ing the Doctor with an air of profound
astonishment, "I arose, as you say,
and descended into the city. On my
way I fell in with an immense populace,
crowding through every avenue, all in
the same direction, and exhibiting in
every action the wildest excitement.
Very suddenly, and by some incon-
ceivable impulse, I became intensely
imbued with personal interest in what
was going on. I seemed to feel that
I had an important part to play, with-
sut exactly understanding what it was.
Against the crowd which environed me,
however, I experienced a deep senti-
ment of animosity. I shrank from amid
them, and, swiftly, by a circuitous path,
reached and entered the city. Here all
was the wildest tumult and contention.
A small party of men, clad in garments
half Indian, half European, and of-
ficered by gentlemen in a uniform partly
British, were engaged, at great odds,
with the swarming rabble of the alleys.
I joined the weaker party, arming my-
self with the weapons of a fallen officer,
and fighting I knew not whom with the
nervous ferocity of despair. We were
soon overpowered by numbers, and |
driven to seek refuge in a species of
kiosk. Here we barricaded ourselves,
and, for the present, were secure. From
a loop-hole near the summit of the
kiosk, I perceived a vast crowd, in
furious agitation, surrounding and as-
saulting a gay palace that overhung the
river. Presently, from an upper win-
dow of this place, there descended an
effeminate-looking person, by means of
a string made of the turbans of his at-
tendants. A boat was at hand, in which
he escaped to the opposite bank of the
river.
"And now a new object took pos
session of my soul. I spoke a few hur-
ried but energetic words to my compan-
ions, and, having succeeded in gaining
over a few of them to my purpose made
a frantic sally from the kiosk. We
rushed amid the crowd that surrounded
it. They retreated, at first, before us.
They rallied, fought madly, and re-
treated again. In the meantime we
were borne far from the kiosk, and be-
came bewildered and entangled among
the narrow streets of tall, overhanging
houses, into the recesses of which the
sun had never been able to shine. The
rabble pressed impetuously upon us.
harrassing us with their spears, and
overwhelming us with flights of arrows.
These latter were very remarkable, and
resembled in some respects the writhing
creese of the Malay. They were made
to imitate the body of a creeping ser-
pent, and were long and black, with a
poisoned barb. One of them struck
me upon the right temple. I reeled
and fell. An instantaneous and dread-
ful sickness seized me. I struggled-I
gasped-I died."
A TALE OF THE RAGGED MOUNTAINS
583
"You will hardly persist now," said
I smiling, "that the whole of your ad-
venture was not a dream. You are not
prepared to maintain that you are
dead?"
When I said these words, I of course
expected some lively sally from Bedloe
in reply; but, to my astonishment, he
hesitated, trembled, became fearfully
pallid, and remained silent. I looked
toward Templeton. He sat erect
and rigid in his chair-his teeth chat-
tered, and his eyes were starting from
their sockets. "Proceed!" he at length
said hoarsely to Bedloe.
"For many minutes," continued the
latter, "my sole sentiment-my sole
feeling-was that of darkness and non-
entity, with the consciousness of death.
At length there seemed to pass a vio-
lent and sudden shock through my soul,
as if of electricity. With it came the
sense of elasticity and of light. This
latter I felt-not saw. In an instant
I seemed to rise from the ground. But
I had no bodily, no visible, audible, or
= palpable presence. The crowd had de-
parted. The tumult had ceased. The
city was in comparative repose. Be-
neath me lay my corpse, with the arrow
in my temple, the whole head greatly
swollen and disfigured. But all these
things I felt-not saw. I took interest
in nothing. Even the corpse seemed a
Ematter in which I had no concern.
Volition I had none, but appeared to
be impelled into motion, and flitted
buoyantly out of the city, retracing the
circuitous path by which I had entered
it. When I had attained that point of
the ravine in the mountains at which I
had encountered the hyena, I again
experienced a shock as of a galvanic
battery; the sense of weight, of voli-
tion, of substance, returned. I became
my original self, and bent my steps eag-
erly homeward-but the past had not
lost the vividness of the real-and not
now, even for an instant, can I compel
my understanding to regard it as a
dream."
"Nor was it," said Templeton, with
an air of deep solemnity, "yet it would
be difficult to say how otherwise it
should be termed. Let us suppose only,
that the soul of the man of to-day is
upon the verge of some stupendous
psychal discoveries. Let us content
ourselves with this supposition. For
the rest I have some explanation to
make. Here is a water-color drawing,
which I should have shown you before,
but which an unaccountable sentiment
of horror has hitherto prevented me
from showing."
We looked at the picture which he
presented. I saw nothing in it of an
extraordinary character; but its effect
upon Bedloe was prodigious. He nearly
fainted as he gazed. And yet it was
but a miniature portrait-a miracu-
lously accurate one, to be sure-of his
own very remarkable features. At least
this was my thought as I regarded it.
"You will perceive," said Templeton,
"the date of this picture-it is here,
scarcely visible, in this corner-1780.
In this year was the portrait taken.
It is the likeness of a dead friend-a
Mr. Oldeb-to whom I became much
attached at Calcutta, during the ad-
ministration of Warren Hastings. I
was then only twenty years old. When
I first saw you, Mr. Bedloe, at Sara-
toga, it was the miraculous similarity
which existed between yourself and the
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
584
painting which induced me to accost
you, to seek your friendship, and to
bring about those arrangements which
resulted in my becoming your constant
companion. In accomplishing this
point, I was urged partly, and perhaps
principally, by a regretful memory of
the deceased, but also, in part, by an
uneasy, and not altogether horrorless
curiosity respecting yourself.
"In your detail of the vision which
presented itself to you amid the hills,
you have described, with the minutest
accuracy, the Indian city of Benares,
upon the Holy River. The riots, the
combat, the massacre, were the actual
events of the insurrection of Cheyte
Sing, which took place in 1780, when
Hastings was put in imminent peril of
his life. The man escaping by the
string of turbans was Cheyte Sing him-
self. The party in the kiosk were
sepoys and British officers, headed by
Hastings. Of this party I was one,
and did all I could to prevent the
rash and fatal sally of the officer who
fell, in the crowded alleys, by the poi-
soned arrow of a Bengalee. That offi-
cer was my dearest friend. It was
Oldeb. You will perceive by these
manuscripts," (here the speaker pro-
duced a note-book in which several
pages appeared to have been freshly
written,) "that at the very period in
which you fancied these things amid
the hills, I was engaged in detailing
them upon paper here at home."
In about a week after this conversa-
tion, the following paragraphs appeared
in a Charlottesville paper:
"We have the painful duty of an-
nouncing the death of MR. Augustus
BEDLO, a gentleman whose amiable
manners and many virtues have long
endeared him to the citizens of Char-
lottesville.
"Mr. B., for some years past, has
been subject to neuralgia, which has
often threatened to terminate fatally;
but this can be regarded only as the
mediate cause of his decease. The
proximate cause was one of especial
singularity. In an excursion to the
Ragged Mountains, a few days since, a
slight cold and fever were contracted,
attended with great determination of
blood to the head. To relieve this, Dr. ||
Templeton resorted to topical bleeding.
Leeches were applied to the temples.
In a fearfully brief period the patient
died, when it appeared that, in the
jar containing the leeches, had been in-
troduced, by accident, one of the
venomous vermicular sangsues which
are now and then found in the neigh-
boring ponds. This creature fastened
itself upon a small artery in the right
temple. Its close resemblance to the
medicinal leech caused the mistake to
be overlooked until too late.
"N. B. The poisonous sangsue of
Charlottesville may always be distin-
guished from the medicinal leech by its
blackness, and especially by its writhing
or vermicular motions, which very
nearly resemble those of a snake."
I was speaking with the editor of the
paper in question, upon the topic of
this remarkable accident, when it oc-
curred to me to ask how it happened
that the name of the deceased had been
given as Bedlo.
"I presume," I said, "you have au-
thority for this spelling, but I have al-
ways supposed the name to be written
with an e at the end."
THE SPECTACLES
585
"Authority?-no," he replied. "It is
a mere typographical error. The name
is Bedlo with an e, all the world over,
and I never knew it to be spelt other-
wise in my life.”
turned upon my heel, "then indeed has
it come to pass that one truth is stranger
than any fiction-for Bedloe, without
the e, what is it but Oldeb conversed!
And this man tells me that it is a typo-
"Then," said I mutteringly, as I graphical error."
The Spectacles
(Published in Broadway Journal, Vol. 2:20.-Ed.)
MANY years ago, it was the fashion
to ridicule the idea of "love at first
sight;" but those who think, not less
than those who feel deeply, have always
advocated its existence. Modern dis-
coveries, indeed, in what may be termed
ethical magnetism or magnetoæsthetics,
render it probable that the most nat-
ural, and, consequently, the truest and
most intense of the human affections
are those which arise in the heart as
if by electric sympathy-in a word,
that the brightest and most enduring
of the psychal fetters are those which
are riveted by a glance. The confession
I am about to make will add another
to the already almost innumerable in-
stances of the truth of the position.
My story requires that I should be
somewhat minute. I am still a very
young man-not yet twenty-two years
of age. My name, at present, is a very
usual and rather plebeian one- -Simp-
son. I say "at present;" for it is only
lately that I have been so called-
having legislatively adopted this sur
name within the last year in order to
receive a large inheritance left me by
a distant male relative, Adolphus Simp-
son, Esq. The bequest was conditioned
Don my taking the name of the testa-
tor-the family, not the Christian name;
my Christian name is Napoleon Bona-
parte or, more properly, these are my
first and middle appellations.
I assumed the name, Simpson, with
some reluctance, as in my true pa-
tronym, Froissart, I felt a very pardon.
able pride-believing that I could trace
a descent from the immortal author of
the "Chronicles." While on the sub-
ject of names, by the by, I may men.
tion a singular coincidence of sound
attending the names of some of my
immediate predecessors. My father was
a Monsieur Froissart, of Paris. His
wife my mother, whom he married at
fifteen-was a Mademoiselle Croissart,
eldest daughter of Croissart the banker;
whose wife, again being only sixteen
when married, was the eldest daughter
of one Victor Voissart. Monsieur Vois-
sart, very singularly, had married a
lady of similar name-a Mademoiselle
Moissart. She, too, was quite a child
when married; and her mother, also,
Madame Moissart, was only fourteen
when led to the altar. These early mar-
riages are usual in France. Here, how-
ever, are Moissart, Voissart, Croissart,
and Froissart, all in the direct line of
descent. My own name, though, as I
586
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
say, became Simpson, by act of Legis-
lature, and with so much repugnance on
my part, that, at one period, I actually
hesitated about accepting the legacy
with the useless and annoying proviso
attached.
As to personal endowments, I am by
no means deficient. On the contrary, I
believe that I am well made, and pos-
sess what nine tenths of the world
would call a handsome face. In height
I am five feet eleven. My hair is black
and curling. My nose is sufficiently
good. My eyes are large and gray;
and although, in fact, they are weak
to a very inconvenient degree, still no
defect in this regard would be suspected
from their appearance. The weakness
itself, however, has always much an-
noyed me, and I have resorted to every
remedy short of wearing glasses. Be-
ing youthful and good-looking, I nat-
urally dislike these, and have resolutely
refused to employ them. I know noth-
ing, indeed, which so disfigures the
countenance of a young person, or so
impresses every feature with an air of
demureness, if not altogether of sanc-
timoniousness and of age. An eye-
glass, on the other hand, has a savor
of downright foppery and affectation.
I have hitherto managed as well as I
could without either. But something
too much of these merely personal de-
tails, which, after all, are of little
importance. I will content myself with
saying, in addition, that my tempera
ment is sanguine, rash, ardent, enthu-
siastic and that all my life I have been
a devoted admirer of the women.
One night last winter I entered a box
at the P Theatre, in company with
a friend, Mr. Talbot. It was an opera
night. and the b.lls presented a very
rare attraction, so that the house was
excessively crowded. We were in time,
however, to obtain the front seats which
had been reserved for us, and into
which, with some little difficulty, we
elbowed our way.
For two hours my companion, who
was a musical fanatico, gave his un-
divided attention to the stage; and, in
the meantime, I amused myself by ob-
serving the audience, which consisted.
in chief part, of the very elite of the
city. Having satisfied myself upon this
point, I was about turning my eyes to
the prima donna, when they were ar-
rested and riveted by a figure in one of
the private boxes which had escaped
my observation.
If I live a thousand years I can never
forget the intense emotion with which
I regarded this figure. It was that of
a female, the most exquisite I had ever
beheld. The face was so far turned
toward the stage that, for some min.
utes, I could not obtain a view of it-
but the form was divine; no other
word can sufficiently express its mag-
nificent proportion-and even the term
"divine" seems ridiculously feeble as I
write it.
The magic of a lovely form in woman
-the necromancy of female graceful-
ness-was always a power which I had
found it impossible to resist; but here
was grace personified, incarnate, the
beau ideal of my wildest and most
enthusiastic visions. The figure, almost
all of which the construction of the
box permitted to be seen, was some-
what above the medium height, and
nearly approached, without positively
reaching, the majestic. Its perfect ful-
ness and tournure were delicious. The
head, of which only the back was visi
THE SPECTACLES
587
ole, rivalled in outline that of the
Greek Psyche, and was rather displayed
han concealed by an elegant cap of
aze aerienne, which put me in mind of
he ventum textilem of Apuleius. The
ight arm hung over the balustrade of
he box, and thrilled every nerve of my
rame with its exquisite symmetry. Its
pper portion was draperied by one of
he loose open sleeves now in fashion.
This extended but little below the el-
ow.
Beneath it was worn an under
ne of some frail material, close-fitting,
nd terminated by a cuff of rich lace,
hich fell gracefully over the top of
he hand, revealing only the delicate
ngers, upon one of which sparkled a
iamond ring, which I at once saw was
f extraordinary value. The admirable
oundness of the wrist was well set off
y a bracelet which encircled it, and
hich also was ornamented and clasped
y a magnificent aigrette of jewels-
elling, in words that could not be mis-
iken, at once of the wealth and fastidi-
us taste of the wearer.
I gazed at this queenly apparition for
t least half an hour, as if I had been
uddenly converted to stone; and, dur-
ng this period, I felt the full force and
ruth of all that has been said or sung
oncerning "love at first sight." My
eelings were totally different from any
which I had hitherto experienced, in
he presence of even the most cele-
rated specimens of female loveliness.
An unaccountable, and what I am com-
elled to consider a magnetic, sympathy
of soul for soul, seemed to rivet, not
only my vision, but my whole powers
of thought and feeling, upon the ad-
nirable object before me.
I saw-I
ielt-I knew that I was deeply, madly,
irrevocably in love-and this even be-
fore seeing the face of the person
beloved. So intense, indeed, was the
passion that consumed me, that I really
believe it would have received little if
any abatement had the features, yet
unseen, proved of merely ordinary char-
acter; so anomalous is the nature of the
only true love of the love at first sight
-and so little really dependent is it
upon the external conditions which only
seem to create and control it.
While I was thus wrapped in admira-
tion of this lovely vision, a sudden dis-
turbance among the audience caused
her to turn her head partially toward
me, so that I beheld the entire profile
of the face. Its beauty even exceeded
my anticipations-and yet there was
something about it which disappointed
me without my being able to tell exactly
what it was. I said "disappointed,"
but this is not altogether the word. My
sentiments were at once quieted and
exalted. They partook less of trans-
port and more of calm enthusiasm-of
enthusiastic repose. This state of feel-
ing arose, perhaps, from the Madonna-
like and matronly air of the face; and
yet I at once understood that it could
not have arisen entirely from this.
There was something else—some mys-
tery which I could not develop some
expression about the countenance which
slightly disturbed me while it greatly
heightened my interest. In fact, I
was just in that condition of mind
which prepares a young and susceptible
man for any act of extravagance. Had
the lady been alone, I should undoubt-
edly have entered her box and accosted
her at all hazards; but, fortunately, she
was attended by two companions—a
gentleman, and a strikingly beautiful
588
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
woman, to all appearance a few years
younger than herself.
I revolved in my mind a thousand
schemes by which I might obtain, here-
after, an introduction to the elder lady,
or, for the present, at all events, a more
distinct view of her beauty. I would
have removed my position to one nearer
her own, but the crowded state of the
theatre rendered this impossible; and
the stern decrees of Fashion had, of
late, imperatively prohibited the use of
the opera-glass in a case such as this,
even had I been so fortunate as to have
one with me-but I had not-and was
thus in despair.
At length I bethought me of applying
to my companion.
"Talbot," I said, “you have no opera-
glass. Let me have it."
"An opera-glass!-no!-what do you
suppose I would be doing with an opera-
glass?" Here he turned impatiently
toward the stage.
"But, Talbot," I continued, pulling
him by the shoulder, "listen to me will
you? Do you see the stage-box?-
there!-no, the next.-Did you ever
behold as lovely a woman?"
"She is very beautiful, no doubt,"
he said.
"I wonder who she can be?"
"Why, in the name of all that is
angelic, don't you know who she is?
'Not to know her argues yourself un-
known.' She is the celebrated Madame
Lalande-the beauty of the day par
excellence, and the talk of the whole
town. Immensely wealthy too—a widow
-and a great match-has just arrived
from Paris."
"Do you know her?"
"Yes-I have the honor."
"Will you introduce me?”
"Assuredly-with the greatest ple s
ure; when shall it be?"
"To-morrow, at one, I will call un
you at B- -'s."
"Very good; and now do hold y
tongue, if you can."
In this latter respect I was for d
to take Talbot's advice; for he e
mained obstinately deaf to every
ther question or suggestion, and ou
pied himself exclusively for the
of the evening with what was tris
acting upon the stage.
In the meantime I kept my eyes
eted on Madame Lalande, and at ler
had the good fortune to obtain a
front view of her face. It was
quisitely lovely: this, of course,
heart had told me before, even had
Talbot fully satisfied me upon the p
-but still the unintelligible someth
disturbed me. I finally concluded t
my senses were impressed by a certi
air of gravity, sadness, or, still m
properly, of weariness, which t
something from the youth and fr
ness of the countenance, only to en
it with a seraphic tenderness and n
esty, and thus, of course, to my
thusiastic and romantic temperam
with an interest tenfold.
While I thus feasted my eyes, I ¦
ceived, at last, to my great trepidat
by an almost imperceptible start on b
part of the lady, that she had becom
suddenly aware of the intensity of
gaze. Still, I was absolutely fascina d
and could not withdraw it, even for a
instant. She turned aside her face,
again I saw only the chiselled conta
of the back portion of the head. A e
some minutes, as if urged by curio
to see if I was still looking, she gra lu
ally brought her face again around
E
THE SPECTACLES
589
gain encountered my burning gaze.
Her large dark eyes fell instantly, and
1 deep blush mantled her cheek. But
what was my astonishment at perceiv-
ng that she not only did not a second
ime avert her head, but that she ac-
ually took from her girdle a double
ye-glass-elevated it-adjusted it-and
hen regarded me through it, intently
nd deliberately, for the space of sev-
ral minutes.
Had a thunderbolt fallen at my feet
could not have been more thoroughly
stounded-astounded only-not of-
ended or disgusted in the slightest de-
ree; although an action so bold in any
ther woman would have been likely to
ffend or disgust. But the whole thing
as done with so much quietude-so
uch nonchalance-so much repose-
ith so evident an air of the highest
reeding, in short-that nothing of mere
ffrontery was perceptible, and my sole
entiments were those of admiration
nd surprise.
I observed that, upon her first ele-
ation of the glass, she had seemed
atisfied with a momentary inspection
f my person, and was withdrawing the
1strument, when, as if struck by a
econd thought, she resumed it, and so
ontinued to regard me with fixed at-
ention for the space of several min-
tes-for five minutes, at the very least,
am sure.
This action, so remarkable in an
American theatre, attracted very gen-
ral observation, and gave rise to an
ndefinite movement, or buzz, among
he audience, which for a moment filled
ne with confusion, but produced no
isible effect upon the countenance of
Madame Lalande.
Having satisfied her curiosity-if such
it was she dropped the glass, and
quietly gave her attention again to the
stage; her profile now being turned to-
ward myself, as before. I continued to
watch her unremittingly, although I
was fully conscious of my rudeness in
so doing. Presently I saw the head
slowly and slightly change its position;
and soon I became convinced that the
lady, while pretending to look at the
stage was, in fact, attentively regarding
myself. It is needless to say what
effect this conduct, on the part of so
fascinating a woman, had upon my ex-
citable mind.
Having thus scrutinized me for per-
haps a quarter of an hour, the fair
object of my passion addressed the gen-
tleman who attended her, and while she
spoke, I saw distinctly, by the glances
of both, that the conversation had ref-
erence to myself.
Upon its conclusion, Madame Lalande
again turned toward the stage, and for
a few minutes, seemed absorbed in the
performance. At the expiration of this
period, however, I was thrown into an
extremity of agitation by seeing her
unfold, for the second time, the eye-
glass which hung at her side, fully con-
front me as before, and, disregarding
the renewed buzz of the audience, sur-
vey me, from head to foot, with the
same miraculous composure which had
previously so delighted and confounded.
my soul.
This extraordinary behavior, by throw-
ing me into a perfect fever of excite-
ment-into an absolute delirium of love
-served rather to embolden than to
disconcert me. In the mad intensity
of my devotion, I forgot every thing
but the presence and the majestic love-
liness of the vision which confronted
590
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
my gaze. Watching my opportunity,
when I thought the audience were fully
engaged with the opera, I at length
caught the eyes of Madame Lalande,
and, upon the instant, made a slight but
unmistakable bow.
She blushed very deeply-then averted
her eyes then slowly and cautiously
looked around, apparently to see if my
rash action had been noticed-then
leaned over toward the gentleman who
sat by her side.
I now felt a burning sense of the
impropriety I had committed, and ex-
pected nothing less than instant ex-
posure; while a vision of pistols upon
the morrow floated rapidly and un-
comfortably through my brain. I was
greatly and immediately relieved, how-
ever, when I saw the lady merely hand
the gentleman a play-bill, without
speaking; but the reader may form
some feeble conception of my aston-
ishment of my profound amazement—
my delirious bewilderment of heart and
soul-when, instantly afterward, having
again glanced furtively around, she al-
lowed her bright eyes to set fully and
steadily upon my own, and then, with
a faint smile, disclosing a bright line
of her pearly teeth, made two distinct,
pointed, and unequivocal affirmative in-
clinations of the head.
It is useless, of course, to dwell upon
my joy-upon my transport-upon my
illimitable ecstasy of heart. If ever
man was mad with excess of happiness,
it was myself at that moment. I loved.
This was my first love-so I felt it to
be. It was love supreme-indescrib-
able. It was "love at first sight;" and
at first sight, too, it had been appre-
ciated and returned.
Yes, returned. How and why should
Thes
I doubt it for an instant. What other
construction could I possibly put upon
such conduct, on the part of a lady so
beautiful-so wealthy-evidently so ac
complished-of so high breeding-of
so lofty a position in society-in every
regard so entirely respectable as I felt
assured was Madame Lalande? Yes,
she loved me she returned the enthu
siasm of my love, with an enthusiasm
as blind-as uncompromising-as un
calculating as abandoned—and as ut
terly unbounded as my own!
delicious fancies and reflections, how
ever, were now interrupted by the fall
ing of the drop-curtain. The audiend
arose; and the usual tumult imme
diately supervened. Quitting Talbo
abruptly, I made every effort to ford
my way into closer proximity with Ma
dame Lalande. Having failed in this
on account of the crowd, I at lengt
gave up the chase, and bent my step
homeward; consoling myself for my dis
appointment in not having been able
touch even the hem of her robe, b
the reflection that I should be intre
duced by Talbot, in due form, upon th
morrow.
This morrow at last came; that is
say, a day finally dawned upon a lon
and weary night of impatience; an
then the hours until "one" were sna
paced, dreary, and innumerable. Ba
even Stamboul, it is said, shall have a
end, and there came an end to thi
long delay. The clock struck. As th
last echo ceased, I stepped into B-
and inquired for Talbot.
"Out," said the footman-Talbot
own.
"Out!" I replied, staggering bad
half a dozen paces-"let me tell you
my fine fellow, that this thing is thor
THE SPECTACLES
391
oughly impossible and impracticable;
Mr. Talbot is not out. What do you
nean?"
"Nothing, sir; only Mr. Talbot is not
o, that's all. He rode over to S——,
mmediately after breakfast, and left
word that he would not be in town
gain for a week."
I stood petrified with horror and
age. I endeavored to reply, but my
ongue refused its office. At length I
urned on my heel, livid with wrath,
nd inwardly consigning the whole tribe
of the Talbots to the innermost regions
f Erebus. It was evident that my con-
iderate friend, il fanatico, had quite
orgotten his appointment with myself
-had forgotten it as soon as it was
ade. At no time was he a very scru-
ulous man of his word. There was
o help for it; so smothering my vexa-
ion as well as I could, I strolled
100dily up the street, propounding
utile inquiries about Madame Lalande
> every male acquaintance I met. By
eport she was known, I found, to all
-to many by sight-but she had been
1 town only a few weeks, and there
tere very few, therefore, who claimed
er personal acquaintance. These few,
eing still comparatively strangers,
ould not, or would not, take the lib-
ty of introducing me through the
ormality of a morning call. While I
ood thus in despair, conversing with
trio of friends upon the all-absorbing
ubject of my heart, it so happened
hat the subject itself passed by.
"As I live, there she is!" cried one.
"Surprisingly beautiful!" exclaimed a
econd.
"An angel upon earth!" ejaculated a
hird. I looked; and in an open car-
iage which approached us, passing
slowly down the street, sat the enchant-
ing vision of the opera, accompanied by
the younger lady who had occupied a
portion of her box.
"Her companion also wears remark-
ably well," said the one of my trio who
had spoken first.
"Astonishingly," said the second;
"still quite a brilliant air; but art will
do wonders. Upon my word, she looks
better than she did at Paris five years
ago. A beautiful woman still:-don't
you think so, Froissart?-Simpson, I
mean."
“Still!” said I, "and why shouldn't
she be? But compared with her friend
she is as a rush-light to the evening star
-a glow-worm to Antares."
""
"Ha! ha! ha!-why, Simpson, you
have an astonishing tact at making dis-
coveries-original ones, I mean.' And
here we separated, while one of the trio
began humming a gay vaudeville, of
which I caught only the lines-
* Ninon, Ninon, Ninon a bas-
A bas Ninon De L'Enclos!
During this little scene, however, one
thing had served greatly to console me,
although it fed the passion by which I
was consumed. As the carriage of Ma-
dame Lalande rolled by our group, I
had observed that she recognized me;
and more than this, she had blessed
me, by the most seraphic of all imagin-
able smiles, with no equivocal mark of
the recognition.
As for an introduction, I was obliged
to abandon all hope of it, until such
time as Talbot should think proper to
* A celebrated beauty of France and
patroness of Voltaire.-Ed.
592
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
return from the country. In the mean-
time I perseveringly frequented every
reputable place of public amusement;
and, at length, at the theatre, where I
first saw her, I had the supreme bliss
of meeting her, and of exchanging
glances with her once again. This did
not occur, however, until the lapse of
a fortnight. Every day, in the interim,
I had inquired for Talbot at his hotel,
and every day had been thrown into a
spasm of wrath by the everlasting "Not
come home yet" of his footman.
Upon the evening in question, there-
fore, I was in a condition little short
of madness. Madame Lalande, I had
been told, was a Parisian-had lately
arrived from Paris-might she not sud-
dently return?-return before Talbot
came back-and might she not be thus
lost to me forever? The thought was
too terrible to bear. Since my future
happiness was at issue, I resolved to
act with a manly decision. In a word,
upon the breaking up of the play, I
traced the lady to her residence, noted
the address, and the next morning sent
her a full and elaborate letter, in which
I poured out my whole heart.
I spoke boldly, freely-in a word, I
spoke with passion. I concealed noth-
ing-nothing even of my weakness. I
alluded to the romantic circumstances
of our first meeting even to the glances
which had passed between us. I went
so far as to say that I felt assured of
her love; while I offered this assurance,
and my own intensity of devotion, as
two excuses for my otherwise unpardon-
able conduct. As a third, I spoke of
my fear that she might quit the city
before I could have the opportunity
of a formal introduction. I concluded
the most wildly enthusiastic epistle ever
penned, with a frank declaration of my
worldly circumstances-of my affluence
-and with an offer of my heart and of
my hand.
In an agony of expectation I awaited
the reply. After what seemed the lapse
of a century it came.
Yes, actually came. Romantic as al
this may appear, I really received a
letter from Madame Lalande—the beau
tiful, the wealthy, the idolized Ma
dame Lalande. Her eyes her mag
nificent eyes, had not belied her nobk
heart. Like a true Frenchwoman a
she was she had obeyed the frank dic
tates of her reason—the generous im
pulses of her nature-despising the com
ventional pruderies of the world. Sh
had not scorned my proposals. She ha
not sheltered herself in silence. Sh
had not returned my letter unopened
She had even sent me, in reply, on
penned by her own exquisite finger
It ran thus:
"Monsieur Simpson vill pardonne m
for not compose de butefulle tong
his contree so vell as might. It is on
de late dat I am arrive, and not y
ave do opportunite for to-l'etudier.
"Vid dis apologie for the maniere,
vill now say dat, helas!-Monsie
Simpson ave guess but de too tru
Need I say de more? Helas! am I n
ready speak de too moshe?
"EUGENIE LALANDE.
This noble-spirited note I kissed
million times, and committed, no doub
on its account, a thousand other
travagances that have now escaped
memory. Still Talbot would not
turn. Alas! could he have formed eve
the vaguest idea of the suffering h
absence had occasioned his friend, woul
THE SPECTACLES
593
not his sympathizing nature have flown
mmediately to my relief? Still, how-
ver, he came not. I wrote. He re-
>lied. He was detained by urgent
usiness-but would shortly return. He
egged me not to be impatient-to
oderate my transports-to read sooth-
ig books to drink nothing stronger
ian Hock-and to bring the consola-
ons of philosophy to my aid. The
ol! if he could not come himself,
hy, in the name of every thing ra-
onal, could he not have enclosed me a
tter of presentation? I wrote him
rain, entreating him to forward one
rthwith. My letter was returned by
at footman, with the following en-
rsement in pencil. The scoundrel had
ined his master in the country:
"Left Syesterday, for parts un-
own-did not say where-or when be
ck-so thought best to return letter,
owing your handwriting, and as how
u is always, more or less, in a hurry.
"Yours sincerely,
"STUBBS."
After this, it is needless to say, that
devoted to the infernal deities both
Ester and valet:—but there was little
in anger, and no consolation at all
complaint.
But I had yet a resource left, in my
stitutional audacity. Hitherto it had
ved me well, and I now resolved
make it avail me to the end. Be-
es, after the correspondence which
passed between us, what act of
-re informality could I commit, with-
bounds, that ought to be regarded
indecorous by Madame Lalande?
ce the affair of the letter, I had
en in the habit of watching her house,
thus discovered that, about twi-
light, it was her custom to promenade,
attended only by a negro in livery, in a
public square overlooked by her win-
dows. Here, amid the luxuriant and
shadowing groves, in the gray gloom of
a sweet mid-summer evening, I ob-
served my opportunity and accosted
her.
The better to deceive the servant in
attendance, I did this with the assured
air of an old and familiar acquaintance.
With a presence of mind truly Parisian,
she took the cue at once, and, to greet
me, held out the most bewitchingly little
of hands. The valet at once fell into
the rear; and now, with hearts full to
overflowing, we discoursed long and
unreservedly of our love.
As Madame Lalande spoke English
even less fluently than she wrote it, our
conversation was necessarily in French.
In this sweet tongue, so adapted to pas-
sion, I gave loose to the impetuous en-
thusiasm of my nature, and, with all
the eloquence I could command, be-
sought her to consent to an immediate
marriage.
At this impatience she smiled. She
urged the old story of decorum-that
bug-bear which deters so many from
bliss until the opportunity for bliss has
forever gone by. I had most impru-
dently made it known among my friends,
she observed, that I desired her ac-
quaintance—thus that I did not possess
it-thus, again, there was no possibility
of concealing the date of our first
knowledge of each other. And then she
adverted, with blush, to the extreme
recency of this date. To wed imme-
diately would be improper-would be
indecorous-would be outre. All this
she said with a charming air of naivete
which enraptured while it grieved and
594
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
convinced me. She went even so far
as to accuse me, laughingly, of rashness
-of imprudence. She bade me remem-
ber that I really even know not who
she was what were her prospects, her
connections, her standing in society.
She begged me, but with a sigh, to re-
consider my proposal, and termed my
love an infatuation—a will o' the wisp
-a fancy or fantasy of the moment—
a baseless and unstable creation rather
of the imagination than of the heart.
These things she uttered as the shadows
of the sweet twilight gathered darkly
and more darkly around us—and then,
with a gentle pressure of her fairy-like
land, overthrew, in a single sweet in-
stant, all the argumentative fabric she
had reared.
I replied as best I could-as only a
true lover can. I spoke at length, and
perseveringly of my devotion, of my
passion-of her exceeding beauty,
and of my own enthusiastic admiration.
In conclusion, I dwelt, with a convincing
energy, upon the perils that encompass
the course of love—that course of true
love that never did run smooth-and
thus deduced the manifest danger of
rendering that course unnecessarily long.
This latter argument seemed finally
to soften the rigor of her determina-
tion. She relented; but there was yet
an obstacle, she said, which she felt as-
sured I had not properly considered.
This was a delicate point-for a woman
to urge, especially so; in mentioning
it, she saw that she must make a sac-
rifice of her feelings; still, for me, every
sacrifice should be made. She alluded
to the topic of age. Was I aware-was
I fully aware of the discrepancy be-
tween us? That the age of the husband.
should surpass by a few years-even
by fifteen or twenty-the age of the
wife, was regarded by the world as ad-
missible, and, indeed, as even proper;
but she had always entertained the be-
lief that the years of the wife should
never exceed in number those of the
husband. A discrepancy of this un
natural kind gave rise, too frequently
alas! to a life of unhappiness. Now
she was aware that my own age did not
exceed two and twenty; and I, on the
contrary, perhaps, was not aware that
the years of my Eugenie extended very
considerably beyond that sum.
About all this there was a nobility of
soul-a dignity of candor-which de
lighted-which enchanted me whic
eternally riveted my chains. I couk
scarcely restrain the excessive transpor
which possessed me.
"My sweetest Eugenie," I cried
"what is all this about which you ar
discoursing? Your years surpassi
some measure my own. But what the
The customs of the world are so man
conventional follies. To those wh
love as ourselves, in what respect dif
fers a year from an hour? I am twenty
two, you say; granted: indeed, you ma
as well call me, at once, twenty-thre
Now you yourself, my dearest E
genie, can have numbered no more tha
-can have numbered no more than
no more than-than-than-than—”
Here I paused for an instant, in th
expectation that Madame Lalande woul
interrupt me by supplying her true ag
But a French-woman is seldom dired
and has always, by way of answer
an embarrassing query, some little prac
tical reply of her own. In the presen
instance, Eugenie, who for a few me
THE SPECTACLES
595
ments past had seemed to be searching
for something in her bosom, at length
et fall upon the grass a miniature, which
[ immediately picked up and presented
o her.
"Keep it!" she said, with one of her
nost ravishing smiles. "Keep it for
ny sake-for the sake of her whom
t too flatteringly represents. Besides,
pon the back of the trinket you may
liscover, perhaps, the very information
you seem to desire. It is now, to be
ure, growing rather dark-but you can
xamine it at your leisure in the morn-
ng. In the meantime, you shall be my
scort home to-night. My friends are
bout holding a little musical levee. I
an promise you, too, some good sing-
ng. We French are not nearly so
unctilious as you Americans, and I
hall have no difficulty in smuggling
ou in, in the character of an old
cquaintance."
With this, she took my arm, and I
ttended her home. The mansion was
uite a fine one, and, I believe, fur-
ished in good taste. Of this latter
oint, however, I am scarcely qualified
> judge; for it was just dark as we
rrived; and in American mansions of
he better sort lights seldom, during the
eat of summer, make their appear-
nce at this, the most pleasant period
f the day. In about an hour after
y arrival, to be sure, a single shaded
olar lamp was lit in the principal
rawing-room; and this apartment, I
ould thus see, was arranged with un-
sual good taste and even splendor;
ut two other rooms of the suite, and
1 which the company chiefly assem-
led, remained, during the whole eve-
ing, in a very agreeable shadow. This
a well-conceived custom, giving the
party at least a choice of light or
shade, and one which our friends over
the water could not do better than
immediately adopt.
The evening thus spent was unques-
tionably the most delicious of my life.
Madame Lalande had not overrated
the musical abilities of her friends;
and the singing I here heard I had
never heard excelled in any private
circle out of Vienna. The instrumental
performers were many and of superior
talents. The vocalists were chiefly
ladies, and no individual sang less than
well. At length, upon a peremptory
call for "Madame Lalande," she arose
at once, without affectation or demur,
from the chaise longue upon which she
had sat by my side, and, accompanied
by one or two gentlemen and her fe-
male friend of the opera, repaired to
the piano in the main drawing-room.
I would have escorted her myself, but
felt that, under the circumstances of
my introduction to the house, I had
better remain unobserved where I was.
I was thus deprived of the pleasure of
seeing, although not of hearing, her
sing.
The impression she produced upon
the company seemed electrical-but
the effect upon myself was something
even more. I know not how ade-
quately to describe it. It arose in part,
no doubt, from the sentiment of love
with which I was imbued; but chiefly
from my conviction of the extreme
sensibility of the singer. It is beyond
the reach of art to endow either air or
recitative with more impassioned ex-
pression than was hers. Her utterance
of the romance in Otello-the tone with
which she gave the words "Sul mio
sasso," in the Capuletti-is ringing in
596
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
my memory yet. Her lower tones were
absolutely miraculous. Her voice em-
braced three complete octaves, extend-
ing from the contralto D to the D
upper soprano, and, though sufficiently
powerful to have filled the San Carlos,
executed, with the minutest precision,
every difficulty of vocal composition
ascending and descending scales, ca-
dences, or fiorituri. In the finale of
the Somnambula, she brought about a
most remarkable effect at the words:
Ah! non guinge uman pensiero
Al contento ond 'io son piena.
Here, in imitation of Malibran, she
modified the original phrase of Bellini,
so as to let her voice descend to the
tenor G, when, by a rapid transition,
she struck the G above the treble stave,
springing over an interval of two oc-
taves.
Upon rising from the piano after
these miracles of vocal execution, she
resumed her seat by my side; when I
expressed to her, in terms of the
deepest enthusiasm, my delight at her
performance. Of my surprise I said
nothing, and yet was I most unfeign-
edly surprised; for a certain feebleness,
or rather a certain tremulous indecision
of voice in ordinary conversation, had
prepared me to anticipate that, in sing-
ing, she would not acquit herself with
any remarkable ability.
Our conversation was now long, earn-
est, uninterrupted, and totally unre-
served. She made me relate many of
the earlier passages of my life, and
listened with breathless attention to
every word of the narrative. I con-
cealed nothing—felt that I had a right
to conceal nothing-from her confiding
affection. Encouraged by her candor
upon the delicate point of her age, I
entered, with perfect frankness, not
only into a detail of my many minor
vices, but made full confession of those
moral and even of those physical in-
firmities, the disclosure of which, in
demanding so much higher a degree of
courage, is so much surer an evidence
of love. I touched upon my college
indiscretions-upon my extravagances
-upon my carousals-upon my debts
-upon my flirtations. I even went so
far as to speak of a slightly hectic cough
with which, at one time, I had been
troubled-of a chronic rheumatism-of
a twinge of hereditary gout-and, it
conclusion, of the disagreeable and in
convenient, but hitherto carefully con
cealed, weakness of my eyes.
"Upon this latter point," said Ma
dame Lalande, laughingly, "you have
been surely injudicious in coming t
confession; for, without the confession
I take it for granted that no one woul
have accused you of the crime. By the
by," she continued, "have you any
recollection-" and here I fancied the
a blush, even through the gloom of the
apartment, became distinctly visibl
upon her cheek-"have you any recal
lection, mon cher ami, of this litt
ocular assistant which now depend
from my neck?"
As she spoke she twirled in her fin
gers the identical double eye-glas
which had so overwhelmed me wi
confusion at the opera.
"Full well-alas! do I remember it
I exclaimed, pressing passionately
delicate hand which offered the glasse
for my inspection. They formed
complex and magnificent toy, rich
chased and filigreed, and gleaming wit
THE SPECTACLES
597,
jewels which, even in the deficient
ight, I could not help perceiving were
of high value.
"Eh bien! mon ami," she resumed
vith a certain empressment of manner
hat rather surprised me "Eh bien!
non ami, you have earnestly besought
f me a favor which you have been
leased to denominate priceless. You
ave demanded of me my hand upon
he morrow. Should I yield to your
ntreaties—and, I may add, to the
leadings of my own bosom-would I
ot be entitled to demand of you a
ery-a very little boon in return?"
"Name it!" I exclaimed with an
nergy that had nearly drawn upon us
he observation of the company, and
estrained by their presence alone from
rowing myself impetuously at her
et. "Name it, my beloved, my Eu-
enie, my own!-name it!-but, alas!
is already yielded ere named."
"You shall conquer, then, mon ami,"
id she, “for the sake of the Eugenie
hom you love, this little weakness
hich you have at last confessed-this
eakness more moral than physical
id which, let me assure you, is so
becoming the nobility of your real
iture so inconsistent with the candor
your usual character-and which,
permitted further control, will as-
redly involve you, sooner or later, in
me very disagreeable scrape. You
all conquer, for my sake, this affecta-
on which leads you, as you yourself
knowledge, to the tacit or implied
enial of your infirmity of vision. For,
is infirmity you virtually deny, in
fusing to employ the customary
eans for its relief. You will under-
and me to say, then, that I wish you
wear spectacles;-ah, hush!-you
have already consented to wear them,
for my sake. You shall accept the
little toy which I now hold in my hand,
and which, though admirable as an aid
to vision, is really of no very immense
value as a gem. You perceive that, by
a trifling modification thus-or thus-
it can be adapted to the eyes in the
form of spectacles, or worn in the
waistcoat pocket as an eye-glass. It is
in the former mode, however, and
habitually, that you have already con-
sented to wear it for my sake."
This request-must I confess it?-
confused me in no little degree. But
the condition with which it was coupled
rendered hesitation, of course, a matter
altogether out of the question.
"It is done!" I cried, with all the
enthusiasm that I could muster at the
moment. "It is done-it is most cheer-
fully agreed. I sacrifice every feeling
for your sake. To-night I wear this
dear eye-glass, as an eye-glass, and
upon my heart; but with the earliest
dawn of that morning which gives me
the pleasure of calling you wife, I will
place it upon my-upon my nose,—and
there wear it ever afterward, in the less
romantic, and less fashionable, but cer-
tainly in the more serviceable, form
which you desire."
Our conversation now turned upon
the details of our arrangements for
the morrow. Talbot, I learned from
my betrothed, had just arrived in
town. I was to see him at once, and
procure a carriage. The soiree would
scarcely break up before two; and by
this hour the vehicle was to be at the
door; when, in the confusion occa-
sioned by the departure of the com-
pany, Madame L. could easily enter it
unobserved. We were then to call at
598
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
the house of a clergyman who would
be in waiting; there be married, drop
Talbot, and proceed on a short tour
to the East, leaving the fashionable
world at home to make whatever com-
ments upon the matter it thought best.
Having planned all this, I immedi-
ately took leave, and went in search
of Talbot, but, on the way, I could
not refrain from stepping into a hotel,
for the purpose of inspecting the
miniature; and this I did by the
powerful aid of the glasses.
The
countenance was a surpassingly beau-
tiful one! Those large luminous eyes!
-that proud Grecian nose!—those
dark luxuriant curls!-"Ah!" said I,
exultingly to myself, "this is indeed
the speaking image of my beloved!"
I turned the reverse, and discovered
the words "Eugenie Lalande-aged
twenty-seven years and seven months."
I found Talbot at home, and pro-
ceeded at once to acquaint him with
my good fortune. He professed ex-
cessive astonishment, of course, but
congratulated me most cordially, and
proffered every assistance in his power.
In a word, we carried out our arrange-
ment to the letter, and, at two in the
morning, just ten minutes after the
ceremony, I found myself in a close
carriage with Madame Lalande-with
Mrs. Simpson, I should say—and driv-
ing at a great rate out of town, in a
direction northeast by north, half-
north.
It had been determined for us by
Talbot, that, as we were to be up all
night, we should make our first stop
at C, a village about twenty miles
from the city, and there get an early
breakfast and some repose, before pro-
ceeding upon our route. At four
precisely, therefore, the carriage drew
up at the door of the principal inn.
I handed my adored wife out, and
ordered breakfast forthwith. In the
meantime we were shown into a small
parlor, and sat down.
It was now nearly if not altogether
daylight; and, as I gazed, enraptured.
at the angel by my side, the singular
idea came, all at once, into my head.
that this was really the very first mo-
ment since my acquaintance with the
celebrated loveliness of Madame La-
lande, that I had enjoyed a near in-
spection of that loveliness by daylight
at all.
"And now, mon ami," said she, tak-
ing my hand, and so interrupting this
train of reflection, "and now, mon
cher ami, since we are indissolubly
one-since I have yielded to your
passionate entreaties, and performed
my portion of our agreement-I pre-
sume you have not forgotten that you
also have a little favor to bestow-
little promise which it is your inten
tion to keep Ah! let me see! Let
me remember! Yes; full easily do 1
call to mind the precise words of the
dear promise you made to Eugenie
last night. Listen! You spoke thus
'It is done!-it is most cheerfully
agreed! I sacrifice every feeling for
your sake. To-night I wear this dest
eye-glass as an eye-glass, and upon my
heart; but with the earliest dawn of
that morning which gives me th
privilege of calling you wife, I wi
place it upon my-upon my nose,-and
there wear it ever afterward, in the
less romantic, and less fashionable, bu
certainly in the more serviceable, forn
which you desire.' These were the
THE SPECTACLES
599
exact words, my beloved husband,
were they not?"
"They were," I said; "you have an
excellent memory; and assuredly, my
beautiful Eugenie, there is no dispo-
sition on my part to evade the per-
formance of the trivial promise they
mply. See! Behold! They are be-
coming-rather-are they not?” And
here, having arranged the glasses in
he ordinary form of spectacles, I
Applied them gingerly in their proper
osition; while Madame Simpson, ad-
usting her cap, and folding her arms,
at bolt upright in her chair, in a
omewhat stiff and prim, and indeed,
n a somewhat undignified position.
"Goodness gracious me!" I ex-
laimed, almost at the very instant
hat the rim of the spectacles had
ettled upon my nose-"My! goodness
racious me!-why, what can be the
natter with these glasses?" and tak-
ng them quickly off, I wiped them
arefully with a silk handkerchief, and
djusted them again.
But if, in the first instance, there
ad occurred something which occa-
ioned me surprise, in the second, this
urprise became elevated into aston-
shment; and this astonishment was
rofound-was extreme-indeed I may
ay it was horrific. What, in the
ame of everything hideous, did this
nean? Could I believe my eyes?—
ould I?-that was the question. Was
hat was that-was that rouge? And
vere those-and were those were
hose wrinkles, upon the visage of
Eugenie Lalande? And oh! Jupiter,
and every one of the gods and god-
lesses, little and big!-what-what-
what-what had become of her teeth?
I dashed the spectacles violently to
the ground, and, leaping to my feet,
stood erect in the middle of the floor,
confronting Mrs. Simpson, with my
arms set a-kimbo, and grinning and
foaming, but, at the same time, ut-
terly speechless with terror and with
rage.
Now I have already said that Ma
dame Eugenie Lalande-that is to say,
Simpson-spoke the English language
but very little better than she wrote
it; and for this reason she very prop-
erly never attempted to speak it upon
ordinary occasions. But rage will
carry a lady to any extreme; and in
the present case it carried Mrs. Simp-
son to the very extraordinary extreme
of attempting to hold a conversation
in a tongue that she did not altogether
understand.
"Vell, Monsieur," said she, after
surveying me, in great apparent as-
tonishment, for some moments-"Vell,
Monsieur?-and vat den?-vat de
matter now? Is it de dance of de
Saint Vitusse dat you ave? If not
like me, vat for vy buy de pig in de
poke?"
"You wretch!" said I, catching my
breath · “you — you —you villainous
old hag!"
――
"Ag?-ole?-me not SO ver ole,
after all! Me not one single day more
dan de eighty-doo."
"Eighty-two!" I ejaculated, stagger-
ing to the wall-"eighty-two hundred
thousand baboons! The miniature
said twenty-seven years and seven
months!"
"To be sure!-dat is so!-ver true!
but den de portraite has been take
for dese fifty-five year. Ven I go
marry my segonde usbande, Monsieur
Lalande, at dat time I had de por
600
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
traite take for my daughter by my
first usbande, Monsieur Moissart!"
"Moissart!" said I.
"Yes, Moissart," said she, mimick-
ing my pronunciation, which to speak
the truth, was none of the best; "and
vat den? Vat you know about de
Moissart?"
"Nothing, you old fright!-I know
nothing about him at all; only I had
an ancestor of that name, once upon
a time."
"Dat name! and vat you ave for
say to dat name? 'Tis ver goot name;
and so is Voissart-dat is ver goot
name too. My daughter, Mademoi-
selle Moissart, she marry von Mon-
sieur Voissart; and de name is both
ver respectaable name."
"Moissart?" I exclaimed, "and Vois-
sart! Why, what is it you mean?"
"Vat I mean?-I mean Moissart
and Voissart; and for de matter of
dat, I mean Croissart and Froissart,
too, if I only tink proper to mean it.
My daughter's daughter, Mademoiselle
Voissart, she marry von Monsieur
Croissart, and den agin, my daughter's
grande daughter, Mademoiselle Crois-
sart, she marry von Monsieur Frois-
sart; and I suppose you say dat dat
is not von ver respectaable name."
"Froissart!" said I, beginning to
faint, "why, surely you don't say
Moissart, and Voissart, and Croissart,
and Froissart?"
"Yes," she replied, leaning fully
back in her chair, and stretching out
her lower limbs at great length; "yes,
Moissart, and Voissart, and Croissart,
and Froissart. But Monsieur Frois-
sart, he vas von ver big vat you call
fool-he vas von ver great big donce
like yourself-for he lef la belle
France for come to dis stupide Ame
rique and ven he get here he vent
and ave von ver stupide, von ver, ver
stupide sonn, so I hear, dough I not
yet av ad de plaisir to meet vid him-
neither me nor my companion, de Ma
dame Stephanie Lalande. He is name
de Napoleon Bonaparte Froissart, and
I suppose you say dat dat, too, is not
von ver respectable name."
Either the length or the nature of
this speech, had the effect of working
up Mrs. Simpson into a very extraor
dinary passion indeed; and as she
made an end of it, with great labor
she jumped up from her chair like
somebody bewitched, dropping upo
the floor an entire universe of bustle
as she jumped. Once upon her feet
she gnashed her gums, brandished her
arms, rolled up her sleeves, shook he
fist in my face, and concluded the
performance by tearing the cap from
her head, and with it an immense wi
of the most valuable and beautifu
black hair, the whole of which sh
dashed upon the ground with a yell
and there trampled and danced a
fandango upon it, in an absolut
ecstasy and agony of rage.
Meantime I sank aghast into th
Ichair which she had vacated. "Mois
sart and Voissart!" I repeated
thoughtfully, as she cut one of he
pigeon-wings, and "Croissart an
Froissart!" as she completed anoth
-"Moissart and Voissart and Croi
sart and Napoleon Bonaparte Fro
sart!-why, you ineffable old serpes
that's me that's me-d'ye hear?-
that's me"-here I screamed at th
top of my voice-"that's me-e-e!
am Napoleon Bonaparte Froissart! ar
if I have not married my great, grea
THE SPECTACLES
601
grandmother, I wish I may be ever-
astingly confounded!"
Madame Eugenie Lalande, quasi
Simpson-formerly Moissart-was, in
ober fact, my great, great, grand-
nother. In her youth she had been
beautiful, and even at eighty-two, re-
ained the majestic height, the sculp-
ural contour of head, the fine eyes
nd the Grecian nose of her girlhood.
By the aid of these, of pearl-powder,
r rouge, of false hair, false teeth,
nd false tournure, as well as of the
nost skilful modistes of Paris, she
ontrived to hold a respectable foot-
ng among the beauties en peu passees
of the French metropolis. In this
espect, indeed, she might have been
egarded as little less than the equal
of the celebrated Ninon De L'Enclos.
She was immensely wealthy, and
eing left, for the second time, a
idow without children, she bethought
erself of my existence in America,
nd for the purpose of making me
er heir, paid a visit to the United
tates, in company with a distant
nd exceedingly lovely relative of her
econd husband's-a Madame Stepha-
ie Lalande.
At the opera, my great, great,
randmother's attention was arrested
y my notice; and, upon surveying me
hrough her eye-glass, she was struck
ith a certain family resemblance to
erself. Thus interested, and knowing
hat the heir she sought was actually
the city, she made inquiries of her
arty respecting me. The gentleman
vho attended her knew my person,
nd told her who I was. The infor-
nation thus obtained induced her to
enew her scrutiny; and this scrutiny
t was which so emboldened me that I
behaved in the absurd manner already
detailed. She returned my bow, how-
ever, under the impression that, by
some odd accident, I had discovered
her identity. When, deceived by my
weakness of vision, and the arts of the
toilet, in respect to the age and charms
of the strange lady, I demanded so
enthusiastically of Talbot who she
was, he concluded that I meant the
younger beauty, as a matter of course,
and so informed me, with perfect
truth, that she was "the celebrated
widow, Madame Lalande."
In the street, next morning, my
great, great, grandmother encountered
Talbot, an old Parisian acquaintance;
and the conversation, very naturally,
turned upon myself. My deficiencies
of vision were then explained; for
these were notorious, although I was
entirely ignorant of their notoriety;
and my good old relative discovered,
much to her chagrin, that she had
been deceived in supposing me aware
of her identity, and that I had been
merely making a fool of myself in
making open love, in a theatre, to an
old woman unknown. By way of
punishing me for this imprudence, she
concocted with Talbot a plot. He
purposely kept out of my way to
avoid giving me the introduction. My
street inquiries about "the lovely
widow, Madame Lalande," were sup-
posed to refer to the younger lady,
of course; and thus the conversation
with the three gentlemen whom I
encountered shortly after leaving Tal-
bot's hotel will be easily explained, as
also their allusion to Ninon De L'En-
clos. I had no opportunity of seeing
Madame Lalande closely during day-
602
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
1
light, and, at her musical soiree, my
silly weakness in refusing the aid of
glasses effectually prevented me from
making a discovery of her age. When
"Madame Lalande" was called upon to
sing, the younger lady was intended;
and it was she who arose to obey the
call; my great, great, grandmother, to
further the deception, arising at the
same moment and accompanying her
to the piano in the main drawing-
room. Had I decided upon escorting
her thither, it had been her design to
suggest the propriety of my remaining
where I was; but my own prudential
views rendered this unnecessary. The
songs which I so much admired, and
which so confirmed my impression of
the youth of my mistress, were exe-
cuted by Madame Stephanie Lalande.
The eye-glass was presented by way
of adding a reproof to the hoax-a
sting to the epigram of the deception.
Its presentation afforded an oppor-
tunity for the lecture upon affectation
with which I was so especially edified.
It is almost superfluous to add that
the glasses of the instrument, as worn
by the old lady, had been exchanged
by her for a pair better adapted to my
years. They suited me, in fact, to
а т.
The clergyman, who merely pre
tended to tie the fatal knot, was a
boon companion of Talbot's, and no
priest. He was an excellent "whip,*
however; and having doffed his cas
sock to put on a great-coat, he drove
the hack which conveyed the "happy
couple" out of town. Talbot took a
seat at his side. The two scoundrel
were thus "in at the death," and
through a half-open window of the
back parlor of the inn, amused them
selves in grinning at the denouemen
of the drama. I believe I shall b
forced to call them both out.
Nevertheless, I am not the husban
of my great, great, grandmother; an
this is a reflection which affords
infinite relief;-but I am the husban
of Madame Lalande-of Madame St
phanie Lalande-with whom my goe
old relative, besides making me b
sole heir when she dies-if she ew
does has been at the trouble of co
cocting me a match. In conclusion
I am done forever with billets dow
and am never to be met witho
SPECTACLES.
Three Sundays in a Week
(First published in Saturday Evening Post, November, 1841. This tale is al
called A Succession of Sundays.-Ed.)
"You hard-headed, dunder-headed,
obstinate, rusty, crusty, musty, fusty,
old savage!" said I, in fancy, one after-
noon, to my grand-uncle Rumgudgeon-
shaking my fist at him in imagination.
Only in imagination. The fact is,
some trivial discrepancy did exist, just
then, between what I said and what
had not the courage to say-betwe
what I did and what I had half a mi
to do.
The old porpoise, as I opened t
drawing-room door, was sitting with
feet upon the mantel-piece, and
THREE SUNDAYS IN A WEEK
603
bumper of port in his paw, making
strenuous efforts to accomplish the
ditty.
Remplis ton verre vide!
Vide ton verre plein!
"My dear uncle," said I, closing the
door gently, and approaching him with
the blandest of smiles, "you are always
so very kind and considerate, and have
evinced your benevolence in so many-
so very many ways-that-that I feel
I have only to suggest this little point
to you once more to make sure of your
full acquiescence."
"Hem!" said he, "good boy! go on!"
"I am sure, my dearest uncle [you
confounded old rascal!], that you have
no design really, seriously, to oppose
my union with Kate. This is merely
a joke of yours, I know-ha! ha! ha!-
how very pleasant you are at times."
"Ha! ha! ha!" said he, "curse you!
yes!"
"To be sure-of course! I knew you
were jesting. Now, uncle, all that Kate
and myself wish at present, is that you
would oblige us with your advice as―
as regards the time-you know, uncle-
in short, when will it be most con-
venient for yourself, that the wedding
shall-shall-come off, you know?”
"Come off, you scoundrel!-what do
you mean by that?-Better wait till it
goes on."
"Ha! ha! ha!-he! he! he!-hi! hi!
hi!-ho! ho! ho!-hu! hu! hu!-oh,
that's good!-oh that's capital-such a
wit! But all we want just now, you
know, uncle, is that you would indicate
the time precisely."
"Ah!-precisely?"
"Yes, uncle-that is, if it would be
quite agreeable to yourself."
"Wouldn't it answer, Bobby, if I
were to leave it at random-some time
within a year or so, for example?—
must I say precisely?"
"If you please, uncle-precisely."
"Well, then, Bobby, my boy-you're
a fine fellow, aren't you?-since you
will have the exact time I'll—why I'll
oblige you for once."
"Dear uncle!"
-
"Hush, sir!" [drowning my voice]-
I'll oblige you for once. You shall have
my consent-and the plum, we mus'n't
forget the plum-let me see! when
shall it be? To-day's Sunday-isn't it?
Well, then, you shall be married pre-
cisely precisely, now mind! — when
three Sundays come together in a
week! Do you hear me, sir! What
are you gaping at? I say, you shall
have Kate and her plum when three
Sundays come together in a week-but
not till then-you young scapegrace-
not till then, if I die for it. You know
me-I'm a man of my word—now be
off!" Here he swallowed his bumper
of port, while I rushed from the room
in despair.
A very "fine old English gentleman,"
was my granduncle Rumgudgeon, but
unlike him of the song, he had his weak
points. He was a little, pursy, pomp-
ous, passionate semicircular somebody,
with a red nose, a thick skull, a long
purse, and a strong sense of his own
consequence. With the best heart in
the world, he contrived, through a pre-
dominant whim of contradiction, to earn
for himself, among those who only knew
him superficially, the character of a
curmudgeon. Like many excellent peo-
ple, he seemed possessed with a spirit.
of tantalization, which might easily, at
a casual glance, have been mistaken for
604
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
malevolence. To every request, a posi-
tive "No!" was his immediate answer;
but in the end-in the long, long end-
there were exceedingly few requests
which he refused. Against all attacks
upon his purse he made the most sturdy
defence; but the amount extorted from
him, at last, was generally in direct
ratio with the length of the siege and
the stubbornness of the resistance. In
charity no one gave more liberally or
with a worse grace.
:
For the fine arts, and especially for
the belles-lettres, he entertained a pro-
found contempt. With this he had
been inspired by Casimir Perier, whose
pert little query "A quoi un poete est
il bon?" he was in the habit of quoting,
with a very droll pronunciation, as the
ne plus ultra of logical wit. Thus my
own inkling for the Muses had excited
his entire displeasure. He assured me
one day, when I asked him for a new
copy of Horace, that the translation of
"Poeta nascitur non fit" was "a nasty
poet for nothing fit”—a remark which
I took in high dudgeon. His repug-
nance to "the humanities" had, also,
much increased of late, by an acci-
dental bias in favor of what he sup-
posed to be natural science. Somebody
had accosted him in the street, mistak-
ing him for no less a personage than
Doctor Dubble L. Dee, the lecturer on
quack physics. This set him off at a
tangent; and just at the epoch of this
story-for story it is getting to be after
all-my grand-uncle Rumgudgeon was
accessible and pacific only upon points
which happened to chime in with the
caprioles of the hobby he was riding.
For the rest, he laughed with his arms
and legs, and his politics were stubborn
and easily understood. He thought,
with Horsley, that "the people have
nothing to do with the laws but to
obey them."
I had lived with the old gentleman
all my life. My parents, in dying, had
bequeathed me to him as a rich legacy.
I believe the old villain loved me as his
own child-nearly if not quite as well
as he loved Kate-but it was a dog's
existence that he led me, after all. From
my first year until my fifth, he obliged
me with very regular floggings. From
five to fifteen, he threatened me, hourly,
with the House of Correction. From
fifteen to twenty, not a day passed in
which he did not promise to cut me
off with a shilling. I was a sad dog, it
is true-but then it was a part of my
nature-a point of my faith. In Kate,
however, I had a firm friend, and I
knew it. She was a good girl, and told
me very sweetly that I might have her
(plum and all) whenever I could badger
my grand-uncle Rumgudgeon, into the
necessary consent. Poor girl!-she was
barely fifteen, and without this con-
sent, her little amount in the funds
was not come-at-able until five im-
measurable summers had "dragged their
slow length along." What, then, to do?
At fifteen, or even at twenty-one (for
I had now passed my fifth olympiad)
five years in prospect are very much
the same as five hundred. In vain we
besieged the old gentleman with im-
portunities. Here was a piece de re-
sistance (as Messieurs Ude and Carne
would say) which suited his perverse
fancy to a T. It would have stirred
the indignation of Job himself, to see
how much like an old mouser he be-
haved to us two poor wretched little
mice. In his heart he wished for noth-
ing more ardently than our union. He
THREE SUNDAYS IN A WEEK
605
had made up his mind to this all along.
In fact, he would have given ten thou-
sand pounds from his own pocket
(Kate's plum was her own) if he could
have invented any thing like an excuse
for complying with our very natural
wishes. But then we had been so im-
prudent as to broach the subject our-
selves. Not to oppose it under such
circumstances, I sincerely believe, was
not in his power.
I have said already that he had his
weak points; but in speaking of these,
I must not be understood as referring
to his obstinacy: which was one of his
strong points-"assurement ce n'etait
pas sa foible." When I mention his
weakness I have allusion to a bizarre
old-womanish superstition which beset
him. He was great in dreams, portents,
et id genus omne of rigmarole. He
was excessively punctilious, too, upon
small points of honor, and, after his
own fashion, was a man of his word,
beyond doubt. This was, in fact, one
of his hobbies. The spirit of his vows
he made no scruple of setting at naught,
but the letter was a bond inviolable.
Now it was this latter peculiarity in
his disposition, of which Kate's inge-
nuity enabled us one fine day, not long
after our interview in the dining-room,
to take a very unexpected advantage,
and, having thus, in the fashion of all
modern bards and orators, exhausted in
prolegomena, all the time at my com-
mand, and nearly all the room at my
disposal, I will sum up in a few words
what constitutes the whole pith of the
story.
It happened then-so the Fates or-
dered it-that among the naval ac-
quaintances of my betrothed, were two
gentlemen who had just set foot upon
the shores of England, after a year's
absence, each, in foreign travel. In
company with these gentlemen, my
cousin and I, preconcertedly paid uncle
Rumgudgeon a visit on the afternoon
of Sunday, October the tenth,—just
three weeks after the memorable deci-
sion which had so cruelly defeated our
hopes. For about half an hour the
conversation ran upon ordinary topics;
but at last, we contrived, quite natu-
rally, to give it the following turn:
Capt. Pratt. "Well I have been ab-
sent just one year. Just one year
to-day, as I live-let me see! yes!—
this is October the tenth. You remem-
ber, Mr. Rumgudgeon, I called, this day
year to bid you good-bye. And by the
way, it does seem something like a
coincidence, does it not-that our
friend, Captain Smitherton, here, has
been absent exactly a year also—a year
to-day!"
Smitherton. "Yes! just one year to
a fraction. You will remember, Mr.
Rumgudgeon, that I called with Capt.
Pratt on this very day, last year, to
pay my parting respects."
Uncle. "Yes, yes, yes-I remember
it very well-very queer indeed! Both
of you gone just one year.
A very
strange coincidence, indeed! Just what
Doctor Dubble L. Dee would denomi-
nate an extraordinary concurrence of
events. Doctor Dub-'
Kate. [Interrupting.] "To be sure,
papa, it is something strange; but then
Captain Pratt and Captain Smitherton
didn't go altogether the same route, and
that makes a difference, you know."
Uncle. "I don't know any such
thing, you huzzy! How should I? I
think it only makes the matter more
remarkable, Doctor Dubble L. Dee-"
606
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Kate. "Why, papa, Captain Pratt
went round Cape Horn, and Captain
Smitherton doubled the Cape of Good
Hope."
Uncle.
"Precisely!-the one went
east and the other went west, you jade,
and they both have gone quite round
the world. By the by, Doctor Dubble
L. Dee-"
Myself. [Hurriedly.] "Captain Pratt,
you must come and spend the evening
with us to-morrow-you and Smither-
ton-you can tell us all about your
voyage, and we'll have a game of whist
and-
Pratt. "Whist, my dear fellow-you
forget. To-morrow will be Sunday.
Some other evening—”
Kate. "Oh, no. fie!-Robert's not
quite so bad as that. To-day's Sunday."
Uncle. "To be sure-to be sure!"
Pratt. "I beg both your pardons-
but I can't be so much mistaken. I
know to-morrow's Sunday, because-"
Smitherton. [Much surprised.] "What
are you all thinking about? Wasn't
yesterday Sunday, I should like to
know?"
All. "Yesterday, indeed! you are
out!"
Uncle. "To-day's Sunday, I say-
don't I know?"
Pratt. "Oh no!-to-morrow's Sun-
day."
Smitherton. "You are all mad-
every one of you. I am as positive
that yesterday was Sunday as I am
that I sit upon this chair."
Kate. [Jumping up eagerly.] "I see
it-1 see it all. Papa, this is a judg-
ment upon you, about-about you know
what. Let me alone, and I'll explain
it all in a minute. It's a very simple
thing, indeed. Captain Smitherton says
•
that yesterday was Sunday: so it was;
he is right. Cousin Bobby, and uncle
and I say that to-day is Sunday: so it
is; we are right. Captain Pratt main-
tains that to-morrow will be Sunday:
so it will; he is right, too. The fact
is, we are all right, and thus three Sun-
days have come together in a week."
Smitherton. [After a pause.] "By
the by, Pratt, Kate has us completely.
What fools we two are! Mr. Rum-
gudgeon, the matter stands thus: the
earth, you know, is twenty-four thou
sand miles in circumference. Now this
globe of the earth turns upon its own
axis-revolves-spins round - these
twenty-four thousand miles of extent,
going from west to east, in precisely
twenty-four hours. Do you understand
Mr. Rumgudgeon?—"
Uncle. "To be sure to be sure-
Doctor Dub-"
Smitherton. [Drowning his voice.]
"Well, sir; that is at the rate of one
thousand miles per hour. Now, sup-
pose that I sail from this position a
thousand miles east. Of course I antici-
pate the rising of the sun here at Lon-
don by just one hour. I see the sun
rise one hour before you do. Proceed
ing, in the same direction, yet another
thousand miles, I anticipate the rising
by two hours-another thousand, and
I anticipate it by three hours, and so
on, until I go entirely round the globe,
and back to this spot, when, having
gone twenty-four thousand miles east, I
anticipate the rising of the London sun
by no less than twenty-four hours; that
is to say, I am a day in advance of
your time. Understand, eh?"
Uncle. "But Dubble L. Dee-"
Smitherton. [Speaking very loud.]
"Captain Pratt, on the contrary, when
THE SYSTEM OF DR. TARR AND PROF. FETHER
607
he had sailed a thousand miles west
of this position, was an hour, and when
he had sailed twenty-four thousand
miles west, was twenty-four hours, or
one day, behind the time at London.
Thus, with me, yesterday was Sunday-
thus, with you, to-day is Sunday-and
thus, with Pratt, to-morrow will be
Sunday. And what is more, Mr. Rum-
gudgeon, it is positively clear that we
are all right; for there can be no philo-
sophical reason assigned why the idea
of one of us should have preference
over that of the other."
Uncle. "My eyes!-well, Kate-
well, Bobby!-this is a judgment upon
me, as you say. But I am a man of
my word-mark that! you shall have
her, boy, (plum and all,) when you
please. Done up, by Jove! Three Sun-
days all in a row! I'll go, and take
Dubble L. Dee's opinion upon that."
The System of Dr. Tarr and
Prof. Fether
(First published in Graham's Magazine, November, 1845.-Ed.)
DURING the autumn of 18—, while
on a tour through the extreme southern
provinces of France, my route led me
within a few miles of a certain Maison
de Sante or private Mad-house, about
which I had heard much in Paris from
my medical friends. As I had never
visited a place of the kind, I thought
the opportunity too good to be lost;
and so proposed to my travelling com-
panion (a gentleman with whom I had
made casual acquaintance a few days
before) that we should turn aside for
an hour or so and look through the
establishment. To this he objected—
pleading haste in the first place, and in
the second, a very usual horror at the
sight of a lunatic. He begged me,
however, not to let any mere courtesy
towards himself interfere with the grati-
fication of my curiosity, and said that
he would ride on leisurely, so that I
might overtake him during the day, or
at all events, during the next. As he
bade me good-bye, I bethought me that
there might be some difficulty in obtain-
ing access to the premises, and men-
tioned my fears on this point. He
replied that, in fact, unless I had per-
sonal knowledge of the superintendent,
Monsieur Maillard, or some credential
in the way of a letter, a difficulty might
be found to exist, as the regulations of
these private mad-houses were more
rigid than the public hospital laws. For
himself, he added, he had, some years
since, made the acquaintance of Mail-
lard, and would so far assist me as to
ride up to the door and introduce me;
although his feelings on the subject of
lunacy would not permit of his entering
the house.
I thanked him, and, turning from the
main road, we entered a grass-grown
by-path, which, in half an hour, nearly
lost itself in a dense forest, clothing
the base of a mountain. Through this
dank and gloomy wood we rode some
608
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
two miles, when the Maison de Sante
came in view. It was a fantastic
chateau, much dilapidated, and indeed
scarcely tenantable through age and
neglect. Its aspect inspired me with
absolute dread, and, checking my horse,
I half resolved to turn back. I soon,
however, grew ashamed of my weak-
ness, and proceeded.
As we rode up to the gate-way, I
perceived it slightly open, and the vis-
age of a man peering through. In an
instant afterward, this man came forth,
accosted my companion by name, shook
him cordially by the hand, and begged
him to alight. It was Monsieur Mail-
lard himself. He was a portly, fine-
looking gentleman of the old school,
with a polished manner, and a certain
air of gravity, dignity, and authority
which was very impressive.
My friend, having presented me,
mentioned my desire to inspect the
establishment, and received Monsieur
Maillard's assurance that he would
show me all attention, now took leave,
and I saw him no more.
When he had gone, the superin-
tendent ushered me into a small and
exceedingly neat parlor, containing,
among other indications of refined
taste, many books, drawings, pots of
flowers, and musical instruments. A
cheerful fire blazed upon the hearth.
At a piano, singing an aria from Bellini,
sat a young and very beautiful woman,
who, at my entrance, paused in her
song, and received me with graceful
courtesy. Her voice was low, and her
whole manner subdued. I thought, too,
that I perceived the traces of sorrow
in her countenance, which was exces-
sively, although to my taste, not un-
pleasingly, pale. She was attired in
deep mourning, and excited in my
bosom a feeling of mingled respect,
interest, and admiration.
I had heard, at Paris, that the insti-
tution of Monsieur Maillard was man-
aged upon what is vulgarly termed the
"system of soothing"-that all punish-
ments were avoided-that even confine-
ment was seldom resorted to-that the
patients, while secretly watched, were
left much apparent liberty, and that
most of them were permitted to roam
about the house and grounds in the
ordinary apparel of persons in right
mind.
Keeping these impressions in view, I
was cautious in what I said before the
young lady; for I could not be sure
that she was sane; and, in fact, there
was a certain restless brilliancy about
her eyes which half led me to imagine
she was not. I confined my remarks,
therefore, to general topics, and to such
as I thought would not be displeasing
or exciting even to a lunatic. She
replied in a perfectly rational manner
to all that I said; and even her original
observations were marked with the
soundest good sense; but a long ac-
quaintance with the metaphysics of
mania, had taught me to put no faith
in such evidence of sanity, and I con-
tinued to practise, throughout the inter-
view, the caution with which I com-
menced it.
Presently a smart footman in livery
brought in a tray with fruit, wine, and
other refreshments, of which I partook,
the lady soon afterward leaving the
As she departed I turned my
eyes in an inquiring manner toward
my host.
room.
"No," he said, "oh, no-a member
THE SYSTEM OF DR. TARR AND PROF. FETHER
609
of my family-my niece, and a most
accomplished woman."
"I beg a thousand pardons for the
suspicion," I replied, "but of course
you will know how to excuse me. The
excellent administration of your affairs
here is well understood in Paris, and
I thought it just possible, you know—"
"Yes, yes-say no more-or rather it
is myself who should thank you for
the commendable prudence you have
displayed. We seldom find so much of
forethought in young men; and, more
than once, some unhappy contre-temps
has occurred in consequence of thought-
lessness on the part of our visitors.
While my former system was in opera-
tion, and my patients were permitted
the privilege of roaming to and fro at
will, they were often aroused to a dan-
gerous frenzy by injudicious persons
who called to inspect the house. Hence
I was obliged to enforce a rigid system
of exclusion; and none obtained access
to the premises upon whose discretion
I could not rely."
"While your former system was in
operation!" I said, repeating his words.
-"do I understand you, then, to say
that the 'soothing system' of which I
have heard so much is no longer in
force?"
"It is now," he replied, "several
weeks since we have concluded to
renounce it forever."
"Indeed! you astonish me!"
"We found it, sir," he said, with a
sigh, "absolutely necessary to return to
the old usages. The danger of the
soothing system was, at all times, ap-
palling; and its advantages have been
much overrated. I believe, sir, that
in this house it has been given a fair
trial, if ever in any. We did every
thing that rational humanity could sug-
gest. I am sorry that you could not
have paid us a visit at an earlier period,
that you might have judged for your-
self. But I presume you are conversant
with the soothing practice-with its
details."
"Not altogether. What I have heard
has been at third or fourth hand."
"I may state the system, then, in
general terms, as one in which the pa-
tients were menages-humored. We
contradicted no fancies which entered
the brains of the mad. On the con-
trary, we not only indulged but encour-
aged them; and many of our most
permanent cures have been thus ef-
fected. There is no argument which
so touches the feeble reason of the
madman as the reductio ad absurdum.
We have had men, for example, who
fancied themselves chickens. The cure
was, to insist upon the thing as a fact-
to accuse the patient of stupidity in not
sufficiently perceiving it to be a fact-
and thus to refuse him any other diet
for a week than that which properly
appertains to a chicken. In this manner
a little corn and gravel were made to
perform wonders."
"But was this species of acquiescence
all?"
"By no means. We put much faith
in amusements of a simple kind, such
as music, dancing, gymnastic exercises.
generally, cards, certain classes of
books, and so forth. We affected to
treat each individual as if for some
ordinary physical disorder; and the
word 'lunacy' was never employed. A
great point was to set each lunatic to
guard the actions of all the others. To
repose confidence in the understanding
or discretion of a madman, is to gain
610
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
him body and soul. In this way we
were enabled to dispense with an expen-
sive body of keepers."
"And you had no punishments of any
kind?"
"None."
"And you never confined your
patients?"
"Very rarely. Now and then, the
malady of some individual growing to
a crisis, or taking a sudden turn of
fury, we conveyed him to a secret cell,
lest his disorder should infect the rest,
and there kept him until we could dis-
miss him to his friends-for with the
raging maniac we have nothing to do.
He is usually removed to the public
hospitals."
"And you have now changed all this
-and you think for the better?"
"Decidedly. The system had its dis-
advantages, and even its dangers. It
is now, happily, exploded throughout
all the Maisons de Sante of France."
"I am very much surprised," I said,
"at what you tell me; for I made sure
that, at this moment, no other method
of treatment for mania existed in any
portion of the country."
"You are young yet, my friend," re-
plied my host, "but the time will arrive
when you will learn to judge for your-
self of what is going on in the world,
without trusting to the gossip of others.
Believe nothing you hear, and only one-
half that you see. Now about our
Maisons de Sante, it is clear that some
ignoramus has misled you. After din-
ner, however, when you have sufficiently
recovered from the fatigue of your ride,
I will be happy to take you over the
house, and introduce to you a system
which, in my opinion, and in that of
every one who has witnessed its opera-
tion, is incomparably the most effectual
as yet devised."
"Your own?" I inquired "one of
your own invention?"
"I am proud," he replied, "to ac-
knowledge that it is at least in some
measure."
In this manner I conversed with
Monsieur Maillard for an hour or two.
during which he showed me the gar
dens and conservatories of the place.
"I cannot let you see my patients."
he said, "just at present. To a sensi-
tive mind there is always more or less
of the shocking in such exhibitions;
and I do not wish to spoil your appe-
tite for dinner. We will dine. I can
give you some veal a la Menehoult,
with cauliflowers in veloute sauce-
after that a glass of Clos de Vougeot-
then your nerves will be sufficiently
steadied."
At six, dinner was announced; and
my host conducted me into a large
salle a manger, where a very numerous
company were assembled-twenty-five
or thirty in all. They were, apparently,
people of rank-certainly of high breed-
ing - although their habiliments, I
thought, were extravagantly rich, par-
taking somewhat too much of the osten-
tatious finery of the ville cour. I no-
ticed that at least two-thirds of these
guests were ladies; and some of the
latter were by no means accoutred in
what a Parisian would consider good
taste at the present day. Many females,
for example, whose age could not have
been less than seventy, were bedecked
with a profusion of jewelry, such as
rings, bracelets, and ear-rings, and wore
their bosoms and arms shamefully bare.
I observed, too, that very few of the
dresses were well made or, at least,
THE SYSTEM OF DR. TARR AND PROF. FETHER
611
that very few of them fitted the wear-
ers. In looking about, I discovered the
interesting girl to whom Monsieur Mail-
lard had presented me in the little par-
lor; but my surprise was great to see
her wearing a hoop and farthingale,
with high-heeled shoes, and a dirty cap
of Brussels lace, so much too large for
her that it gave her face a ridiculously
diminutive expression. When I had
first seen her, she was attired, most
becomingly, in deep mourning. There
was an air of oddity, in short, about
the dress of the whole party, which,
at first, caused me to recur to my origi-
nal idea of the "soothing system," and
to fancy that Monsieur Maillard had
been willing to deceive me until after
dinner, that I might experience no un-
comfortable feelings during the repast,
at finding myself dining with lunatics;
but I remembered having been in-
formed, in Paris, that the southern
provincialists were a peculiarly eccen-
tric people, with a vast number of
antiquated notions; and then, too, upon
conversing with several members of the
company, my apprehensions were imme-
diately and fully dispelled.
The dining-room itself, although per-
haps sufficiently comfortable and of
good dimensions, had nothing too much
of elegance about it. For example, the
floor was uncarpeted; in France, how-
ever, a carpet is frequently dispensed
with. The windows, too, were without
curtains; the shutters, being shut, were
securely fastened with iron bars, applied
diagonally, after the fashion of our
shop-shutters. The apartment, I ob-
served, formed, in itself, a wing of the
chateau, and thus the windows were on
three sides of the parallelogram, the
door being at the other. There were
no less than ten windows in all.
The table was superbly set out. It
was loaded with plate, and more than
loaded with delicacies. The profusion
was absolutely barbaric. There were
meats enough to have feasted the Ana-
kim. Never, in all my life, had I
witnessed so lavish, so wasteful an
expenditure of the good things of life.
There seemed very little taste, how-
ever, in the arrangements; and my eyes,
accustomed to quiet lights, were sadly
offended by the prodigious glare of a
multitude of wax candles, which, in
silver candelabra, were deposited upon
the table, and all about the room,
wherever it was possible to find a place.
There were several active servants in
attendance; and, upon a large table, at
the farther end of the apartment, were
seated seven or eight people with fid-
dles, fifes, trombones, and a drum.
These fellows annoyed me very much,
at intervals, during the repast, by an
infinite variety of noises, which were
intended for music, and which appeared
to afford much entertainment to all
present, with the exception of myself.
Upon the whole, I could not help
thinking that there was much of the
bizarre about every thing I saw-but
then the world is made up of all kinds
of persons, with all modes of thought,
and all sorts of conventional customs.
I had travelled, too, so much, as to
be quite an adept at the nil admirari;
so I took my seat very coolly at the
right hand of my host, and, having an
excellent appetite, did justice to the
good cheer set before me.
The conversation, in the meantime,
was spirited and general. The ladies,
as usual, talked a great deal. I soon
612
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
found that nearly all the company were
well educated; and my host was a
world of good-humored anecdote in
himself. He seemed quite willing to
speak of his position as superintendent
of a Maison de Sante; and, indeed, the
topic of lunacy was, much to my sur-
prise, a favorite one with all present.
A great many amusing stories were
told, having reference to the whims of
the patients.
"We had a fellow here once," said
a fat little gentleman, who sat at my
right, "a fellow that fancied himself
a teapot; and by the way, is it not
especially singular how often this par-
ticular crotchet has entered the brain
of the lunatic? There is scarcely an
insane asylum in France which cannot
supply a human teapot. Our gentleman
was a Britannia-ware tea-pot, and was
careful to polish himself every morning
with buckskin and whiting."
"And then," said a tall man just
opposite, "we had here, not long ago,
a person who had taken it into his
head that he was a donkey-which alle-
gorically speaking, you will say, was
quite true. He was a troublesome
patient; and we had much ado to keep
him within bounds. For a long time
he would eat nothing but thistles; but
of this idea we soon cured him by
insisting upon his eating nothing else.
Then he was perpetually kicking up his
heels-so-so—”
"Mr. De Kock! I will thank you
to behave yourself!" here interrupted
an old lady, who sat next to the speaker.
"Please keep your feet to yourself!
You have spoiled my brocade! Is it
necessary, pray, to illustrate a remark
in so practical a style? Our friend
here can surely comprehend you with-
out all this. Upon my word, you are
nearly as great a donkey as the poor
unfortunate imagined himself. Your
acting is very natural, as I live."
"Mille pardons! Ma'm'selle!" replied
Monsieur De Kock, thus addressed-
"a thousand pardons! I had no inten-
tion of offending. Ma'm'selle Laplace
-Monsieur De Kock will do himself
the honor of taking wine with you.”
Here Monsieur De Kock bowed low,
kissed his hand with much ceremony,
and took wine with Ma'm'selle Laplace.
"Allow me, mon ami," now said Mon-
sieur Maillard, addressing myself, "allow
me to send you a morsel of this veal
a la St. Menhoult-you will find it
particularly fine."
At this instant three sturdy waiters
had just succeeded in depositing safely
upon the table an enormous dish, or
trencher, containing what I supposed to
be the "monstrum horrendum, informe,
ingens, cui lumen ademptum." A closer
scrutiny assured me, however, that it
was only a small calf roasted whole,
and set upon its knees, with an apple
in its mouth, as is the English fashion
of dressing a hare.
"Thank you, no," I replied; "to say
the truth, I am not particularly partial
to veal a la St. what is it?-for I
do not find that it altogether agrees
with me. I will change my plate, how-
ever, and try some of the rabbit."
There were several side-dishes on the
table, containing what appeared to be
the ordinary French rabbit-a very
delicious morceau, which I can recom-
mend.
"Pierre," cried the host, "change this
gentleman's plate, and give him a side-
piece of this rabbit au-chat."
"This what?" said I.
"This rabbit au-chat."
THE SYSTEM OF DR. TARR AND PROF. FETHER
613
"Why, thank
you-upon second
thoughts, no. I will just help myself
to some of the ham."
There is no knowing what one eats,
thought I to myself, at the tables of
these people of the province. I will
have none of their rabbit au-chat-
and, for the matter of that, none of
their cat-au-rabbit either.
“And then," said a cadaverous-look-
ing personage, near the foot of the
table, taking up the thread of the con-
versation where it had been broken
off,—“and then, among other oddities,
we had a patient, once upon a time,
who very pertinaciously maintained
himself to be a Cordova cheese, and
went about, with a knife in his hand,
soliciting his friends to try a small
slice from the middle of his leg."
"He was a great fool, beyond doubt,"
interposed some one, "but not to be
compared with a certain individual
whom we all know, with the exception
of this strange gentleman. I mean the
man who took himself for a bottle of
champagne, and always went off with a
pop and a fizz, in this fashion."
Here the speaker, very rudely, as I
thought, put his right thumb in his
left cheek, withdrew it with a sound
resembling the popping of a cork, and
then, by a dexterous movement of the
tongue upon the teeth, created a sharp
hissing and fizzing, which lasted for
several minutes, in imitation of the
frothing of champagne. This behavior,
I saw plainly, was not very pleasing to
Monsieur Maillard; but that gentleman
said nothing, and the conversation was
resumed by a very lean little man in
a big wig.
"And then there was an ignoramus,"
said he, "who mistook himself for a
frog; which, by the way, he resembled
in no little degree. I wish you could
have seen him, sir,"-here the speaker
addressed myself "it would have done
your heart good to see the natural airs
that he put on. Sir, if that man was
not a frog, I can only observe that it
is a pity he was not. His croak thus-
0-0-0-0-gh-0-0-0-0-gh! was the finest
note in the world-B flat; and when
he put his elbows upon the table thus-
after taking a glass or two of wine-
and distended his mouth, thus, and
rolled up his eyes, thus, and winked
them with excessive rapidity, thus, why
then, sir, I take it upon myself to say,
positively, that you would have been
lost in admiration of the genius of the
man."
"I have no doubt of it," I said.
"And then," said somebody else,
"then there was Petit Gaillard, who
thought himself a pinch of snuff, and
was truly distressed because he could
not take himself between his own finger
and thumb."
"And then there was Jules Desou-
lieres, who was a very singular genius,
indeed, and went mad with the idea
that he was a pumpkin. He persecuted
the cook to make him up into pies-
a thing which the cook indignantly
refused to do. For my part, I am by
no means sure that a pumpkin pie a la
Desoulieres would not have been very
capital eating indeed!"
"You astonish me!" said I; and I
looked inquisitively at Monsieur Mail-
lard.
"Ha! ha! ha!" said that gentleman-
"he! he he!-hi! hi! hi!-ho! ho!
ho!-hu! hu! hu!-very good indeed!
You must not be astonished, mon ami;
614
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
our friend here is a wit-a drole-you
must not understand him to the letter."
"And then," said some other one of
the party,-"then there was Bouffon
Le Grand-another extraordinary per-
sonage in his way. He grew deranged
through love, and fancied himself pos-
sessed of two heads. One of these he
maintained to be the head of Cicero;
the other he imagined a composite one,
being Demosthenes' from the top of
the forehead to the mouth, and Lord
Brougham's from the mouth to the
chin. It is not impossible that he was
wrong; but he would have convinced
you of his being in the right; for he
was a man of great eloquence. He had
an absolute passion for oratory, and
could not refrain from display. For
example, he used to leap upon the
dinner-table thus, and-and-”
Here a friend, at the side of the
speaker, put a hand upon his shoulder
and whispered a few words in his ear;
upon which he ceased talking with great
suddenness, and sank back within his
chair.
"And then," said the friend who had
whispered, "there was Boullard, the tee-
totum. I call him the tee-totum be-
cause, in fact, he was seized with the
droll, but not altogether irrational,
crotchet, that he had been converted
into a tee-totum. You would have
roared with laughter to see him spin.
He would turn round upon one heel
by the hour, in this manner—so—”
Here the friend whom he had just
interrupted by a whisper, performed an
exactly similar office for himself.
"But then," cried an old lady, at the
top of her voice, "your Monsieur Boul-
lard was a madman, and a very silly
madman at best; for who, allow me to
ask you, ever heard of a human tee-
totum? The thing is absurd. Madame
Joyeuse was a more sensible person, as
you know. She had a crotchet, but it
was instinct with common sense, and
gave pleasure to all who had the honor
of her acquaintance. She found, upon
mature deliberation, that, by some acci-
dent, she had been turned into a
chicken-cock; but, as such, she behaved
with propriety. She flapped her wings
with prodigious effect-so-so—so
and, as for her crow, it was delicious!
Cock - a - doodle - doo! — cock-a-doodle-
doo! cock-a-doodle-de-doo-doo-dooo-
--
do-0-0-0-0-0-0!"
"Madame Joyeuse, I will thank you
to behave yourself!" here interrupted
our host, very angrily. "You can either
conduct yourself as a lady should do
or you can quit the table forthwith-
take your choice."
The lady (whom I was much aston-
ished to hear addressed as Madame
Joyeuse, after the description of Ma-
dame Joyeuse she had just given)
blushed up to the eyebrows, and seemed
exceedingly abashed at the reproof. She
hung down her head, and said not a
syllable in reply. But another and
younger lady resumed the theme. It
was my beautiful girl of the little
parlor.
"Oh, Madame Joyeuse was a fool!"
she exclaimed, "but there was really
much sound sense, after all, in the
opinion of Eugenie Salsafette. She was
a very beautiful and painfully modest
young lady, who thought the ordinary
mode of habiliment indecent, and
wished to dress herself, always, by get-
ting outside instead of inside of her
clothes. It is a thing very easily done,
after all. You have only to do so-
THE SYSTEM OF DR. TARR AND PROF. FETHER
615
and then so-so-so-and then so-
so-so-and then-"
"Mon dieu! Ma'm'selle Salsafette!"
here cried a dozen voices at once.
"What are you about?-forbear!-that
is sufficient!-we see, very plainly, how
it is done!-hold! hold!" and several
persons were already leaping from their
seats to withhold Ma'm'selle Salsafette
from putting herself upon a par with
the Medicean Venus, when the point
was very effectually and suddenly ac-
complished by a series of loud screams,
or yells, from some portion of the main
body of the chateau.
My nerves were very much affected,
indeed, by these yells: but the rest of
the company I really pitied. I never
saw any set of reasonable people so
thoroughly frightened in my life. They
all grew as pale as so many corpses,
and, shrinking within their seats, sat
quivering and gibbering with terror, and
listening for a repetition of the sound.
It came again-louder and seemingly
nearer and then a third time very
loud, and then a fourth time with a
vigor evidently diminished. At this
apparent dying away of the noise, the
spirits of the company were imme-
diately regained, and all was life and
anecdote as before. I now ventured
to inquire the cause of the disturbance.
"A mere bagatelle," said Monsieur
Maillard. "We are used to these
things, and care really very little about
them. The lunatics, every now and
then, get up a howl in concert; one
starting another, as is sometimes the
case with a bevy of dogs at night. It
occasionally happens, however, that the
concerto yells are succeeded by a simul-
taneous effort at breaking loose; when,
of course, some little danger is to be
apprehended."
"And how many have you in charge?"
"At present we have not more than
ten, altogether."
"Principally females, I presume?"
“Oh, no—every one of them men, and
stout fellows, too, I can tell you."
"Indeed! I have always understood
that the majority of lunatics were of
the gentler sex."
"It is generally so, but not always.
Some time ago, there were about
twenty-seven patients here; and, of that
number, no less than eighteen were
women; but, lately, matters have
changed very much, as you see."
"Yes-have changed very much, as
you see," here interrupted the gentle-
man who had broken the shins of
Ma'm'selle Laplace.
"Yes-have changed very much, as
you see!" chimed in the whole com-
pany at once.
"Hold your tongues, every one of
you!" said my host, in a great rage.
Whereupon the whole company main-
tained a dead silence for nearly a
minute. As for one lady, she obeyed
Monsieur Maillard to the letter, and
thrusting out her tongue, which was
an excessively long one, held it very
resignedly, with both hands, until the
end of the entertainment.
"And this gentlewoman," said I, to
Monsieur Maillard, bending over and
addressing him in a whisper-"this good
lady who has just spoken, and who
gives us the cock-a-doodle-de-doo-she,
I presume, is harmless-quite harm-
less, eh?"
"Harmless!" ejaculated he, in un-
feigned surprise, "why-why, what can
you mean?"
616
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"Only slightly touched?" said I,
touching my head. "I take it for
granted that she is not particularly-
not dangerously affected, eh?"
"Mon dieu! what is it you imagine?
This lady, my particular old friend,
Madame Joyeuse, is as absolutely sane
as myself. She has her little eccen-
tricities, to be sure but then, you
know, all old women-all very old
women-are more or less eccentric!"
"To be sure," said I,-"to be sure-
and then the rest of these ladies and
gentlemen-"
"Are my friends and keepers," inter-
rupted Monsieur Maillard, drawing
himself up with hauteur,-"my very
good friends and assistants."
"What! all of them?" I asked, "the
women and all?”
"Assuredly," he said,-"we could not
do at all without the women; they are
the best lunatic nurses in the world;
they have a way of their own, you
know; their bright eyes have a mar-
vellous effect-something like the fas-
cination of the snake, you know."
"To be sure," said I,-"to be sure!
They behave a little odd, eh?-they
are a little queer, eh?-don't you think
so?"
"Odd!-queer!-why, do you really
think so? We are not very prudish,
to be sure, here in the South-do pretty
much as we please enjoy life, and all
that sort of thing you know—"
"To be sure," said I,-"to be sure."
"And then, perhaps, this Clos de
Vougeot is a little heady, you know-
a little strong-you understand, eh?"
"To be sure," said I,-"to be sure.
By the by, Monsieur, did I understand
you to say that the system you have
adopted, in place of the celebrated
soothing system, was one of very rig-
orous severity?"
"By no means. Our confinement is
necessarily close; but the treatment-
the medical treatment, I mean-is
rather agreeable to the patients than
otherwise."
"And the new system is one of your
own invention?"
"Not altogether.
Some portions of
it are referable to Professor Tarr, of
whom you have, necessarily, heard;
and, again, there are modifications in
my plan which I am happy to acknowl-
edge as belonging of right to the cele
brated Fether, with whom, if I mistake
not, you have the honor of an intimate
acquaintance.
""
"I am quite ashamed to confess," I
replied, "that I have never even heard
the names of either gentleman before."
"Good heavens!" ejaculated my host,
drawing back his chair abruptly, and
uplifting his hands. "I surely do not
hear you aright! You did not intend
to say, eh? that you had never heard
either of the learned Doctor Tarr, or
of the celebrated Professor Fether?" ||
"I am forced to acknowledge my
ignorance," I replied; "but the truth
should be held inviolate above all
things. Nevertheless, I feel humbled
to the dust, not to be acquainted with
the works of these, no doubt, extraor
dinary men. I will seek out their writ-
ings forthwith, and peruse them with
deliberate care. Monsieur Maillard.
you have really-I must confess it-
you have really-made me ashamed of
myself!"
And this was the fact.
"Say no more, my good young
friend," he said kindly, pressing my
THE SYSTEM OF DR. TARR AND PROF. FETHER
617
hand,-"join me now in a glass of
Sauterne."
We drank. The company followed
our example without stint. They
chatted-they jested-they laughed-
they perpetrated a thousand absurdi-
ties-the fiddles shrieked the drum
row-de-dowed-the trombones bellowed
like so many brazen bulls of Phalaris-
and the whole scene, growing gradually
worse and worse, as the wines gained
the ascendancy, became at length a
sort of pandemonium in petto. In the
meantime, Monsieur Maillard and my-
self, with some bottles of Sauterne and
Vougeot between us, continued our con-
versation at the top of the voice. A
word spoken in an ordinary key stood
no more chance of being heard than
the voice of a fish from the bottom of
Niagara Falls.
"And, sir," said I, screaming in his
ear, "you mentioned something before
dinner about the danger incurred in the
old system of soothing. How is that?"
"Yes," he replied, "there was, occa-
sionally, very great danger indeed.
There is no accounting for the caprices
of madmen; and, in my opinion as
well as in that of Dr. Tarr and Profes-
sor Fether, it is never safe to permit
them to run at large unattended. A
lunatic may be 'soothed,' as it is called,
for a time, but, in the end, he is very
apt to become obstreperous. His cun-
ning, too, is proverbial and great. If
he has a project in view, he conceals
his design with a marvellous wisdom;
and the dexterity with which he coun-
terfeits sanity, presents, to the meta-
physician, one of the most singular
problems in the study of mind. When
a madman appears thoroughly sane,
indeed, it is high time to put him in
a strait-jacket."
"But the danger, my dear sir, of
which you were speaking, in your own
experience during your control of this
house-have you had practical reason
to think liberty hazardous in the case
of a lunatic?"
"Here?-in my own experience?—
why, I may say, yes. For example:-
no very long while ago, a singular cir-
cumstance occurred in this very house.
The 'soothing system,' you know, was
then in operation, and the patients.
were at large. They behaved remark-
ably well-especially so,-any one of
sense might have known that some
devilish scheme was brewing from that
particular fact, that the fellows behaved
so remarkably well. And, sure enough,
one fine morning the keepers found
themselves pinioned hand and foot, and
thrown into the cells, where they were
attended, as if they were the lunatics,
by the lunatics themselves, who had
usurped the offices of the keepers."
"You don't tell me so! I never
heard of any thing so absurd in my
life!"
"Fact-it all came to pass by means
of a stupid fellow-a lunatic-who, by
some means, had taken it into his head
that he had invented a better system
of government than any ever heard of
before of lunatic government, I mean.
He wished to give his invention a trial,
I suppose, and so he persuaded the
rest of the patients to join him in a
conspiracy for the overthrow of the
reigning powers."
"And he really succeeded?"
"No doubt of it. The keepers and
kept were soon made to exchange
places. Not that exactly either, for
618
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
the madmen had been free, but the
keepers were shut up in cells forth-
with, and treated, I am sorry to say,
in a very cavalier manner."
"But I presume a counter-revolution
was soon effected. This condition of
things could not have long existed. The
country people in the neighborhood
visitors coming to see the establish-
ment-would have given the alarm.”
"There you are out. The head rebel
was too cunning for that. He admitted
no visitors at all-with the exception,
one day, of a very stupid-looking young
gentleman of whom he had no reason
to be afraid. He let him in to see the
place just by way of variety,-to have
a little fun with him. As soon as he
had gammoned him sufficiently, he let
him out, and sent him about his busi-
ness."
"And how long, then, did the madmen
reign?"
"Oh, a very long time, indeed-a
month certainly-how much longer I
can't precisely say. In the meantime,
the lunatics had a jolly season of it—
that you may swear. They doffed their
own shabby clothes, and made free
with the family wardrobe and jewels.
The cellars of the chateau were well
stocked with wine; and these madmen
are just the devils that know how to
drink it. They lived well, I can tell
you."
"And the treatment-what was the
particular species of treatment which
the leader of the rebels put into opera-
tion?"
"Why, as for that, a madman is not
necessarily a fool, as I have already
observed; and it is my honest opinion
that his treatment was a much better
treatment than that which it super-
seded. It was a very capital system
indeed-simple-neat-no trouble at all
-in fact it was delicious-it was-"
Here my host's observations were cut
short by another series of yells, of the
same character as those which had
previously disconcerted us. This time.
however, they seemed to proceed from
persons rapidly approaching.
"Gracious heavens!" I ejaculated-
"the lunatics have most undoubtedly
broken loose."
"I very much fear it is so," replied
Monsieur Maillard, now becoming ex-
cessively pale. He had scarcely fin-
ished the sentence, before loud shouts
and imprecations were heard beneath
the windows; and, immediately after-
ward, it became evident that some per-
sons outside were endeavoring to gain
entrance into the room. The door was
beaten with what appeared to be a
sledge-hammer, and the shutters were
wrenched and shaken with prodigious
violence.
A scene of the most terrible confu-
sion ensued. Monsieur Maillard, to my
excessive astonishment, threw himself
under the sideboard. I had expected
more resolution at his hands. The
members of the orchestra, who, for the
last fifteen minutes, had been seemingly
too much intoxicated to do duty, now
sprang all at once to their feet and to
their instruments, and, scrambling upon
their table, broke out, with one accord.
into, "Yankee Doodle," which they per-
formed, if not exactly in tune, at least
with an energy superhuman, during the
whole of the uproar.
Meantime, upon the main dining-
table, among the bottles and glasses.
leaped the gentleman who, with such
difficulty, had been restrained from
leaping there before. As soon as he
fairly settled himself, he commenced
THE SYSTEM OF DR. TARR AND PROF. FETHER
619
1 oration, which, no doubt, was a very
pital one, if it could only have been
eard. At the same moment, the man
ith the tee-totum predilection, set
mself to spinning around the apart-
ent, with immense energy, and with
ms outstretched at right angles with
s body; so that he had all the air of
tee-totum in fact, and knocked every-
ody down that happened to get in his
ay. And now, too, hearing an incredi-
e popping and fizzing of champagne,
discovered at length, that it proceeded
om the person who performed the
ottle of that delicate drink during din-
er.
And then, again, the frog-man
oaked away as if the salvation of his
ul depended upon every note that he
ttered. And, in the midst of all this,
le continuous braying of a donkey
rose over all. As for my old friend,
Madame Joyeuse, I really could have
ept for the poor lady, she appeared
> terribly perplexed. All she did,
owever, was to stand up in a corner,
y the fireplace, and sing out inces-
intly at the top of her voice, "Cock-
-doodle-de-dooooooh!"
And now came the climax-the ca-
strophe of the drama. As no resist-
nce, beyond whooping and yelling and
ock-a-doodling, was offered to the
ncroachments of the party without, the
en windows were very speedily, and
Imost simultaneously, broken in. But
shall never forget the emotions of
wonder and horror with which I gazed,
when, leaping through these windows,
nd down among us pele-mele, fighting,
tamping, scratching, and howling, there
ushed a perfect army of what I took
o be chimpanzees, ourang-outangs, or
big black baboons of the Cape of Good
Hope.
I received a terrible beating-after
which I rolled under a sofa and lay
still. After lying imprisoned for more
than a month, during which time I
listened with all my ears to what was
going on in the room, I came to some
satisfactory denouement of this tragedy.
Monsieur Maillard, it appeared, in giv-
ing me the account of the lunatic who
had excited his fellows to rebellion, had
been merely relating his own exploits.
This gentleman had, indeed, some two
or three years before, been the super-
intendent of the establishment; but
grew crazy himself and so became a
patient. This fact was unknown to
the travelling companion who intro-
duced me. The keepers, ten in number,
having been suddenly overpowered,
were first well tarred, then carefully
feathered, and then shut up in under-
ground cells. They had been so im-
prisoned for more than a month, during
which period Monsieur Maillard had
generously allowed them not only the
tar and feathers (which constituted his
"system"), but some bread and abun-
dance of water. The latter was pumped
on them daily. At length, one escap-
ing through a sewer, gave freedom to
all the rest.
The "soothing system," with impor-
tant modifications, has been resumed
at the chateau; yet I cannot help agree-
ing with Monsieur Maillard, that his
own "treatment" was a very capital
one of its kind. As he justly observed.
it was "simple-neat-and gave no
trouble at all-not the least."
I have only to add that, although I
have searched every library in Europe
for the works of Doctor Tarr and
Professor Fether, I have, up to the
present day, utterly failed in my en-
deavors to procure a copy.
The Angel of the Odd
AN EXTRAVAGANZA
It was a chilly November afternoon.
I had just consummated an unusually
hearty dinner, of which the dyspeptic
truffe formed not the least important
item, and was sitting alone in the
dining-room, with my feet upon the
fender, and at my elbow a small table
which I had rolled up to the fire, and
upon which were some apologies for
dessert, with some miscellaneous bot-
tles of wine, spirit, and liqueur. In the
morning I had been reading Glover's
"Leonidas," Wilkie's "Epigoniad," La-
martine's "Pilgrimage," Barlow's "Co-
lumbiad," Tuckermann's "Sicily," and
Griswold's "Curiosities"; I am willing
to confess, therefore, that I now felt
a little stupid. I made effort to arouse
myself by aid of frequent Lafitte, and,
all failing, I betook myself to a stray
newspaper in despair. Having care-
fully perused the column of "houses to
let," and the column of "dogs lost,"
and then the two columns of "wives
and apprentices runaway," I attacked
with great resolution the editorial mat-
ter, and, reading it from beginning to
end without understanding a syllable,
conceived the possibility of its being
Chinese, and so re-read it from the
end to the beginning, but with no more
satisfactory result. I was about throw-
ing away, in disgust,
"This folio of four pages, happy work
Which not even poets criticise,"
when I felt my attention somewhat
aroused by the paragraph which
lows:
"The avenues to death are numera
and strange. A London paper m
tions the decease of a person from
singular cause. He was playing at
the dart,' which is played with a le
needle inserted in some worsted.
blown at a target through a tin
He placed the needle at the wrong
of the tube, and drawing his bre
strongly to puff the dart forward w
force, drew the needle into his thro
It entered the lungs, and in a few da
killed him."
Upon seeing this I fell into a gr
rage, without exactly knowing wh
"This thing," I exclaimed, "is a co
temptible falsehood-a poor hoax-
lees of the invention of some pitia
penny-a-liner-of some wretched
coctor of accidents in Cocaigne. Th
fellows, knowing the extravagant g
bility of the age, set their wits to w
in the imagination of improbable pos
bilities of odd accidents, as they te
mine," I added, in parenthesis, putti
them; but to a reflecting intellect (
my forefinger unconsciously to u
side of my nose,) "to a contemplati
understanding such as I myself poss
it seems evident at once that the ma
velous increase of late in these 'od
accidents' is by far the oddest accide
of all. For my own part, I intend t
believe nothing henceforward that h
anything of the 'singular' about it."
620
THE ANGEL OF THE ODD
621
"Mein Gott, den, vat a vool you bees
r dat!" replied one of the most re-
arkable voices I ever heard. At first
took it for a rumbling in my ears-
ch as man sometimes experiences
hen getting very drunk-but, upon
cond thought, I considered the sound
more nearly resembling that which
oceeds from an empty barrel beaten
ith a big stick; and, in fact, this I
ould have concluded it to be, but for
te articulation of the syllables and
ords. I am by no means naturally
ervous, and the very few glasses of
afitte which I had sipped served to
nbolden me a little, so that I felt
othing of trepidation, but merely up-
fted my eyes with a leisurely move-
ent, and looked carefully around the
oom for the intruder. I could not,
owever, perceive any one at all.
"Humph!" resumed the voice, as I
ontinued my survey, "you mus pe so
ronk as de pig, den, for not zee me
I zit here at your zide."
Hereupon I bethought me of look-
g immediately before my nose, and
here, sure enough, confronting me at
e table sat a personage nondescript,
Ithough not altogether indescribable.
lis body was a wine pipe, or a rum-
uncheon, or something of that char-
cter, and had a truly Falstaffian air.
n its nether extremity were inserted
wo kegs, which seemed to answer all
he purposes of legs. For arms there
angled from the upper portion of the
arcass two tolerably long bottles, with
he necks outward for hands. All the
ead that I saw the monster possessed
of was one of those Hessian canteens
which resemble a large snuff-box with
a hole in the middle of the lid. This
canteen (with a funnel on its top, like
a cavalier cap slouched over the eyes)
was set on edge upon the puncheon,
with the hole toward myself; and
through this hole, which seemed puck-
ered up like the mouth of a very pre-
cise old maid, the creature was emit-
ting certain rumbling and grumbling
noises which he evidently intended for
intelligible talk.
"I zay," said he, "you mos pe dronk
as de pig, vor zit dare and not zee me
zit ere; and I zay, doo, you most pe
pigger vool as de goose, vor to dispelief
vat iz print in de print. 'Tiz de troof
-dat it iz-eberry vord ob it."
"Who are you, pray?" said I, with
much dignity, although somewhat puz-
zled; "how did you get here? and what
is it you are talking about?"
"Az vor ow I com'd ere," replied the
figure, "dat iz none of your pizzness;
and as vor vat I be talking apout, I
be talk apout vot I tink proper; and as
vor who I be, vy dat is de very ting
I com'd here for to let you zee for
yourzelf."
"You are a drunken vagabond," said
I, “and I shall ring the bell and order
my footman to kick you into the
street."
"He! he he!" said the fellow, "hu!
hu! hu! dat you can't do."
"Can't do!" said I, "what do you
mean? I can't do what?"
"Ring de pell," he replied, attempt-
ing a grin with his little villainous
mouth.
Upon this I made an effort to get
up, in order to put my threat into
execution; but the ruffian just reached
across the table very deliberately, and
hitting me a tap on the forehead with
the neck of one of the long bottles,
knocked me back into the arm-chair
622
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
from which I had half arisen. I was
utterly astounded; and, for a moment,
was quite at a loss what to do. In the
meantime, he continued his talk.
"You zee," said he, "it iz te bess
vor zit still; and now you shall know
who I pe. Look at me! zee! I am te
Angel ov te Odd!"
"And odd enough, too," I ventured
to reply; "but I was always under the
impression that an angel had wings."
"Te wing!" he cried, highly incensed,
"vat I pe do mit te wing? Mein Gott!
do you take me vor a shicken?"
"No-oh, no!" I replied, much
alarmed, "you are no chicken-cer-
tainly not."
"Well, den, zit still and pehabe your-
self, or I'll rap you again mid me vist.
It iz te shicken ab te wing, und te owl
ab te wing, und te imp ab te wing,
und te headteuffel ab te wing. Te
angel ab not te wing, and I am te
Angel ov te Odd."
"And your business with me at pres-
ent is-is-"
"My pizzness!" ejaculated the thing,
"vy vot a low-bred puppy you mos pe
vor to ask a gentleman und an angel
apout his pizzness!"
This language was rather more than
I could bear, even from an angel; so,
plucking up courage, I seized a salt-
cellar which lay within reach, and
hurled it at the head of the intruder.
Either he dodged, however, or my aim
was inaccurate; for all I accomplished
was the demolition of the crystal which
protected the dial of the clock upon
the mantel-piece. As for the Angel, he
evinced his sense of my assault by giv-
ing me two or three hard consecutive
raps upon the forehead as before.
These reduced me at once to submis-
sion, and I am almost ashamed to com
fess that, either through pain or vexa
tion, there came a few tears into my
eyes.
"Mein Gott!" said the Angel of
Odd, apparently much softened at
distress; "mein Gott, te man is ede
ferry dronk or ferry sorry. You ma
not trink it so strong-you mos pu
de water in te wine. Here, trink dis
like a goot veller, und don't gry now
don't!"
Hereupon the Angel of the Odd re
plenished my goblet (which was about
a third full of Port) with a colorless
fluid that he poured from one of his
hand bottles. I observed that these
bottles had labels about their necks
and that these labels were inscribed
"Kirschenwasser."
The considerate kindness of the
Angel mollified me in no little measure.
and, aided by the water with which he
diluted my Port more than once, I a
length regained sufficient temper ta
listen to his very extraordinary d
course. I cannot pretend to recount all
that he told me, but I gleaned from
what he said that he was the genius
who presided over the contretemps of
mankind, and whose business it was to
bring about the odd accidents which
are continually astonishing the skeptic
Once or twice, upon my venturing to
express my total incredulity in respect
to his pretensions, he grew very angry
indeed, so that at length I considered it
the wiser policy to say nothing at al
and let him have his own way. He
talked on, therefore, at great length.
while I merely leaned back in my chair
with my eyes shut, and amused mysel
with munching raisins and flipping the
stems about the room. But, by and
THE ANGEL OF THE ODD
623
He
7, the Angel suddenly construed this
havior of mine into contempt.
ose in a terrible passion, slouched his
nnel down over his eyes, swore a
st oath, uttered a threat of some
aracter which I did not precisely
mprehend, and finally made me a low
w and departed, wishing me, in the
nguage of the archbishop in "Gil-
as,” “beaucoup de bonheur et un peu
us de bon sens."
His departure afforded me relief.
he very few glasses of Lafitte that I
d sipped had the effect of rendering
e drowsy, and I felt inclined to take
nap of some fifteen or twenty min-
es, as is my custom after dinner.
six I had an appointment of conse-
ence, which it was quite indispensa-
e that I should keep. The policy of
surance for my dwelling-house had
pired the day before; and, some dis-
ite having arisen, it was agreed that,
six, I should meet the board of
rectors of the company and settle the
rms of a renewal. Glancing upward
It
the clock on the mantel-piece (for I
It too drowsy to take out my watch),
had the pleasure to find that I had
ill twenty-five minutes to spare.
s half-past five; I could easily walk
the insurance office in five minutes;
d my usual siestas had never been
own to exceed five and twenty. I
It sufficiently safe, therefore, and
mposed myself to my slumbers forth-
th.
Having completed them to my satis-
ction, I again looked toward the
ne-piece, and was half inclined to
elieve in the possibility of odd acci-
ents when I found that, instead of
y ordinary fifteen or twenty minutes,
had been dozing only three; for it
still wanted seven and twenty of the
appointed hour. I betook myself again
to my nap, and at length a second time
awoke, when, to my utter amazement,
it still wanted twenty-seven minutes of
six. I jumped up to examine the clock,
and found that it had ceased running.
My watch informed me that it was
half-past seven; and, of course, having
slept two hours, I was too late for my
appointment. "It will make no differ-
ence," I said; "I can call at the office
in the morning and apologize; in the
meantime what can be the matter with
the clock?" Upon examining it I dis-
covered that one of the raisin-stems
which I had been flipping about the
room during the discourse of the Angel
of the Odd had flown through the frac-
tured crystal, and lodging, singularly
enough, in the key-hole, with an end
projecting outward, had thus arrested
the revolution of the minute-hand.
"Ah!" said I; "I see how it is. This
thing speaks for itself. A natural acci-
dent, such as will happen now and
then!"
I gave the matter no further con-
sideration, and at my usual hour retired
to bed. Here, having placed a candle
upon a reading-stand at the bed-head,
and having made an attempt to peruse
some pages of the "Omnipresence of
the Deity," I unfortunately fell asleep
in less than twenty seconds, leaving the
light burning as it was.
My dreams were terrifically disturbed
by visions of the Angel of the Odd.
Methought he stood at the foot of the
couch, drew aside the curtains, and, in
the hollow, detestable tones of a rum-
puncheon, menaced me with the bit-
terest vengeance for the contempt with
which I had treated him. He con-
624
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
cluded a long harangue by taking off
his funnel-cap, inserting the tube into
my gullet, and thus deluging me with
an ocean of Kirschenwasser, which he
poured, in a continuous flood, from one
of the long-necked bottles that stood
him instead of an arm. My agony was
at length insufferable, and I awoke just.
in time to perceive that a rat had run
off with the lighted candle from the
stand, but not in season to prevent his
making his escape with it through the
hole. Very soon, a strong suffocating
odor assailed my nostrils; the house, I
clearly perceived, was on fire. In a few
minutes the blaze broke forth with vio-
lence, and in an incredibly brief period
the entire building was wrapped in
flames. All egress from my chamber,
except through a window, was cut off.
The crowd, however, quickly procured
and raised a long ladder. By means of
this I was descending rapidly, and in
apparent safety, when a huge hog,
about whose rotund stomach, and in-
deed about whose whole air and physi-
ognomy, there was something which
reminded me of the Angel of the Odd,
-when this hog, I say, which hitherto
had been quietly slumbering in the
mud, took it suddenly into his head
that his left shoulder needed scratch-
ing, and could find no more convenient
rubbing-post than that afforded by the
foot of the ladder. In an instant I
was precipitated, and had the misfor-
tune to fracture my arm.
This accident, with the loss of my
insurance, and with the more serious
loss of my hair,-the whole of which
had been singed off by the fire,-pre-
disposed me to serious impressions, so
that, finally, I made up my mind to
take a wife. There was a rich widow
disconsolate for the loss of her seventh
husband, and to her wounded spirit
offered the balm of my vows. She
yielded a reluctant consent to my
prayers. I knelt at her feet in gra
tude and adoration. She blushed, and
bowed her luxuriant tresses into cas
contact with those supplied me, tempe
rarily, by Grandjean. I know not ha
the entanglement took place, but so
I arose with a shining pate, wig
less; she in disdain and wrath, hal
buried in alien hair. Thus ended m
hopes of the widow by an acciden
which could not have been anticipated
to be sure, but which the natural s
quence of events had brought about.
was.
Without despairing, however, I m
dertook the siege of a less implacabl
heart. The fates were again propitios
for a brief period; but again a triva
incident interfered. Meeting my bi
trothed in an avenue thronged with t
elite of the city, I was hastening
greet her with one of my best-cons
ered bows, when a small particle
some foreign matter lodging in
corner of my eye, rendered me, for
moment, completely blind. Before
could recover my sight, the lady of
love had disappeared-irreparably 4
fronted at what she chose to consid
my premeditated rudeness in passi
her by ungreeted. While I stood
wildered at the suddenness of this ad
dent (which might have happen
nevertheless, to any one under the su
and while I still continued incapable
sight, I was accosted by the Angel
the Odd, who proffered me his aid
a civility which I had no reason
expect. He examined my disorder
eye with much gentleness and skill,
formed me that I had a drop in it,
THE ANGEL OF THE ODD
625
whatever a "drop" was) took it out,
id afforded me relief.
I now considered it high time to die,
ince fortune had so determined to
rsecute me,) and accordingly made
y way to the nearest river. Here,
vesting myself of my clothes, (for
ere is no reason why we cannot die as
e were born,) I threw myself head-
ng into the current; the sole witness
my fate being a solitary crow that
id been seduced into the eating of
andy-saturated corn, and SO had
aggered away from his fellows. No
oner had I entered the water than
is bird took it into its head to fly
way with the most indispensable por-
on of my apparel. Postponing, there-
re, for the present, my suicidal de-
gn, I just slipped my nether extremi-
es into the sleeves of my coat, and
etook myself to a pursuit of the felon
ith all the nimbleness which the case
equired and its circumstances would
imit. But my evil destiny attended
le still. As I ran at full speed, with
y nose up in the atmosphere, and
tent only upon the purloiner of my
roperty, I suddenly perceived that my
eet rested no longer upon terra-firma;
he fact is, I had thrown myself over a
recipice, and should inevitably have.
een dashed to pieces, but for my good
ortune in grasping the end of a long
uide-rope, which depended from a
assing balloon.
As soon as I sufficiently recovered
ay senses to comprehend the terrific
redicament in which I stood or rather
ung, I exerted all the power of my
ungs to make that predicament known
o the aeronaut overhead. But for a
ong time I exerted myself in vain.
Either the fool could not, or the villain
would not perceive me. Meantime the
machine rapidly soared, while my
strength even more rapidly failed. I
was soon upon the point of resigning
myself to my fate, and dropping quietly
into the sea, when my spirits were sud-
denly revived by hearing a hollow voice
from above, which seemed to be lazily
humming an opera air. Looking up,
I perceived the Angel of the Odd. He
was leaning with his arms folded, over
the rim of the car; and with a pipe in
his mouth, at which he puffed leisurely,
seemed to be upon excellent terms with
himself and the universe. I was too
much exhausted to speak, so I merely
regarded him with an imploring air.
For several minutes, although he
looked me full in the face, he said
nothing. At length removing carefully
his meerschaum from the right to the
left corner of his mouth, he conde-
scended to speak.
"Who pe you?" he asked, "und what
der teuffel you pe do dare?"
To this piece of impudence, cruelty,
and affectation, I could reply only by
ejaculating the monosyllable "Help!"
"Elp!" echoed the ruffian-"not L
Dare iz te pottle-elp yourself, und pe
tam'd!"
With these words he let fall a heavy
bottle of Kirschenwasser which, drop-
ping precisely upon the crown of my
head, caused me to imagine that my
brains were entirely knocked out. Im-
pressed with this idea, I was about to
relinquish my hold and give up the
ghost with a good grace, when I was
arrested by the cry of the Angel, who
bade me hold on.
"Old on!" he said; "don't pe in te
urry-don't. Will you pe take de
626
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
odder pottle, or ave you pe got zober
yet and come to your zenzes?"
I made haste, hereupon, to nod my
head twice-once in the negative,
meaning thereby that I would prefer
not taking the other bottle at present-
and once in the affirmative, intending
thus to imply that I was sober and had
positively come to my senses. By these
means I somewhat softened the Angel.
"Und you pelief, ten," he inquired,
"at te last? You pelief, ten, in te
possibility of te odd?"
I again nodded my head in assent.
"Und you ave pelief in me, te Angel
of te Odd?"
I nodded again.
"Und you acknowledge tat you pe te
blind dronk and te vool?"
I nodded once more.
"Put your right hand into your left
hand preeches pocket, ten, in token ov
your vull zubmission unto te Angel ov
te Odd."
This thing, for very obvious reasons,
I found it quite impossible to do. In
the first place, my left arm had been
broken in my fall from the ladder, and,
therefore, had I let go my hold with
the right hand, I must have let go alto-
gether. In the second place, I could
have no breeches until I came across
the crow.
I was therefore obliged,
much to my regret, to shake my h
in the negative intending thus to
the Angel to understand that I fo
it inconvenient, just at that mom
to comply with his very reasonable
mand! No sooner, however, ha
ceased shaking my head than—
"Go to der teuffel, ten!" roared
Angel of the Odd.
In pronouncing these words, he d
a sharp knife across the guide-rope
which I was suspended, and as we t
happened to be precisely over my
house, (which, during my peregr
tions, had been handsomely rebuilt,
so occurred that I tumbled head
down the ample chimney and alit t
the dining-room hearth.
Upon coming to my senses, (for
fall had very thoroughly stunned
I found it about four o'clock in
morning. I lay outstretched whe
had fallen from the balloon. My l
grovelled in the ashes of an e
guished fire, while my feet rep
upon the wreck of a small table, o
thrown, and amid the fragments (
miscellaneous dessert, intermingled
a newspaper, some broken glass
shattered bottles, and an empty ju
the Schiedam Kirschenwasser. 1
revenged himself the Angel of the (
The Devil in the Belfry
(First published in Philadelphia Saturday Chronicle, May, 1839.-Ed.)
What o'clock is it?-Old Saying.
EVERYBODY knows, in a general way,
it the finest place in the world is—
, alas, was-the Dutch borough of
ndervotteimittiss. Yet as it lies
me distance from any of the main
ads, being in a somewhat out-of-the-
y situation, there are perhaps very
v of my readers who have ever paid
a visit. For the benefit of those who
ve not, therefore, it will be only
oper that I should enter into some
count of it. And this is indeed the
ore necessary, as with the hope of
listing public sympathy in behalf of
e inhabitants, I design here to give a
story of the calamitous events which
ve so lately occurred within its
nits. No one who knows me will
ubt that the duty thus self-imposed
Il be executed to the best of my
ility, with all that rigid impartiality,
that cautious examination into facts,
d diligent collation of authorities,
ich should ever distinguish him who
pires to the title of historian.
By the united aid of medals, manu-
ripts, and inscriptions, I am enabled
say, positively, that the borough of
ondervotteimittiss has existed, from
; origin, in precisely the same condi-
on which it at present preserves. Of
e date of this origin, however, I
ieve that I can only speak with that
ecies of indefinite definiteness which
athematicians are, at times, forced to
ut up with in certain algebraic for-
ulæ. The date, I may thus say, in
regard to the remoteness of its an-
tiquity, cannot be less than any assign-
able quantity whatsoever.
Touching the derivation of the name
Vondervotteimittiss, I confess myself,
with sorrow, equally at fault. Among
a multitude of opinions upon this deli-
cate point-some acute, some learned,
some sufficiently the reverse-I am
able to select nothing which ought to
be considered satisfactory. Perhaps
the idea of Grogswigg-nearly coinci-
dent with that of Kroutaplenttey-is to
be cautiously preferred.-It runs:-
Vondervotteimittis-Vonder, lege Don-
der-Votteimittis, quasi und Bleitziz-
Bleitziz obsol: pro Blitzen." This de-
rivative, to say the truth, is still coun-
tenanced by some traces of the electric
fluid evident on the summit of the
steeple of the House of the Town-
Council. I do not choose, however, to
commit myself on a theme of such im-
portance, and must refer the reader
desirous of information to the "Orati-
unculæ de Rebus Præter-Veteris," of
Dundergutz. See, also, Blunderbuzzard
"De Derivationibus," pp. 27 to 5010,
Folio, Gothic edit., Red and Black
character, Catch-word and No Cypher;
wherein consult, also, marginal notes in
the autograph of Stuffundpuff, with the
Sub-Commentaries of Gruntundguzzell.
Notwithstanding the obscurity which
thus envelops the date of the founda-
tion of Vondervotteimittiss, and the
derivation of its name, there can be
no doubt, as I said before, that it has
always existed as we find it at this
627
628
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
epoch. The oldest man in the borough
can remember not the slightest differ-
ence in the appearance of any portion
of it; and, indeed, the very suggestion
of such a possibility is considered an
insult. The site of the village is in a
perfectly circular valley, about a quar-
ter of a mile in circumference, and
entirely surrounded by gentle hills, over
whose summit the people have never
yet ventured to pass.
For this they
assign the very good reason that they
do not believe there is anything at all
on the other side.
Round the skirts of the valley
(which is quite level, and paved
throughout with flat tiles), extends a
continuous row of sixty little houses.
These, having their backs on the hills,
must look, of course, to the centre of
the plain, which is just sixty yards
from the front door of each dwelling.
Every house has a small garden before
it, with a circular path, a sun-dial, and
twenty-four cabbages. The buildings
themselves are so precisely alike, that
one can in no manner be distinguished
from the other. Owing to the vast an-
tiquity, the style of architecture is
somewhat odd, but it is not for that
reason the less strikingly picturesque.
They are fashioned of hard-burned lit-
tle bricks, red, with black ends, so that
the walls look like a chess-board upon
a great scale. The gables are turned
to the front, and there are cornices, as
big as all the rest of the house, over the
eaves and over the main doors. The
windows are narrow and deep, with
very tiny panes and a great deal of
sash. On the roof is a vast quantity of
tiles with long curly ears. The wood-
work, throughout, is of a dark hue and
there is much carving about it, with
but a trifling variety of pattern
time out of mind, the carvers of '
dervotteimittiss have never been
to carve more than two object
timepiece and a cabbage. But t
they do exceedingly well, and i
sperse them, with singular ingen
wherever they find 100m for the cl
The dwellings are as much alik
side as out, and the furniture i
upon one plan. The floors are of sc
tiles, the chairs and tables of b
looking wood with thin crooked
and puppy feet. The mantel-piece
wide and high, and have not only t
pieces and cabbages sculptured
the front, but a real time-piece, ▾
makes a prodigious ticking, on the
in the middle, with a flower-pot
taining a cabbage standing on
extremity by way of outrider. Bet
each cabbage and the time-piece, a
is a little China man having a
stomach with a great round hole i
through which is seen the dial-plat
a watch.
The fireplaces are large and
with fierce crooked-looking fire-
There is constantly a rousing fire.
a huge pot over it, full of sauer-l
and pork, to which the good woma
the house is always busy in atten
She is a little fat old lady, with
eyes and a red face, and wears a
cap like a sugar-loaf, ornamented
purple and yellow ribbons. Her (
is of orange-colored linsey-woo
made very full behind and very
in the waist-and indeed very s
in other respects, not reaching b
the middle of her leg. This is st
what thick, and so are her ankles.
she has a fine pair of green stock
to cover them. Her shoes--of |
THE DEVIL IN THE BELFRY
629
ther are fastened each with a
ich of yellow ribbons puckered up in
shape of a cabbage. In her left
id she has a little heavy Dutch
ch; in her right she wields a ladie
the sauer-kraut and pork. By her
e there stands a fat tabby cat, with
ilt toy-repeater tied to its tail, which
e boys" have there fastened by way
a quiz.
The boys themselves are, all three of
m, in the garden attending the pig.
ey are each two feet in height. They
re three-cornered cocked hats, purple
istcoats reaching down to their
ghs, buckskin knee-breeches, red
ollen stockings, heavy shoes with big
er buckles, and long surtout coats
h large buttons of mother-of-pearl.
ch, too, has a pipe in his mouth, and
ittle dumpy watch in his right hand.
takes a puff and a look, and then a
k and a puff. The pig-which is
pulent and lazy-is occupied now in
king up the stray leaves that fall
m the cabbages, and now in giving
ick behind at the gilt repeater, which
: urchins have also tied to his tail,
order to make him look as handsome
the cat.
Right at the front door, in a high-
cked leather-bottomed armed chair,
th crooked legs and puppy feet like
tables, is seated the old man of the
use himself. He is an exceedingly
ffy little old gentleman, with big cir-
lar eyes and a huge double chin. His
ess resembles that of the boys-and
need say nothing further about it.
1 the difference is, that his pipe is
mewhat bigger than theirs, and he
n make a greater smoke. Like them,
e has a watch, but he carries his
atch in his pocket. To say the truth,
he has something of more importance
than a watch to attend to and what
that is, I shall presently explain. He
sits with his right leg upon his left
knee, wears a grave countenance, and
always keeps one of his eyes, at least,
resolutely bent upon a certain remark-
able object in the centre of the plain.
This object is situated in the steeple
of the House of the Town Council.
The Town Council are all very little,
round, oily, intelligent men, with big
saucer eyes and fat double chins, and
have their coats much longer and their
shoe-buckles much bigger than the or-
dinary inhabitants of Vondervotteimit-
tiss. Since my sojourn in the borough,
they have had several special meetings,
and have adopted these three important
resolutions:
"That it is wrong to alter the good
old course of things:"
"That there is nothing tolerable out
of Vondervotteimittiss:" and-
"That we will stick by our clocks
and our cabbages."
Above the session-room of the Coun-
cil is the steeple, and in the steeple is
the belfry, where exists, and has ex-
isted time out of mind, the pride and
wonder of the village-the great clock
of the borough of Vondervotteimittiss.
And this is the object to which the
eyes of the old gentlemen are turned
who sit in the leather-bottomed arm-
chairs.
The great clock has seven faces-one
in each of the seven sides of the steeple
-so that it can be readily seen from
all quarters. Its faces are large and
white, and its hands heavy and black.
There is a belfry-man whose sole duty
is to attend to it; but this duty is the
most perfect of sinecures for the clock
630
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
of Vondervotteimittiss was never yet
known to have anything the matter
with it. Until lately, the bare suppo-
sition of such a thing was considered
heretical. From the remotest period
of antiquity to which the archives have
reference, the hours have been regu-
larly struck by the big bell. And. in-
Ideed the case was just the same with
all the other clocks and watches in the
borough. Never was such a place for
keeping the true time. When the large
clapper thought proper to say "Twelve
o'clock!" all its obedient followers
opened their throats simultaneously,
and responded like a very echo. In
short, the good burghers were fond of
their sauer-kraut, but then they were
proud of their clocks.
All people who hold sinecure offices
are held in more or less respect, and as
the belfry-man of Vondervotteimittiss
has the most perfect of sinecures, he
is the most perfectly respected of any
man in the world. He is the chief dig-
nitary of the borough, and the very
pigs look up to him with a sentiment
of reverence. His coat-tail is very far
longer-his pipe, his shoe-buckles, his
eyes, and his stomach, very far bigger
-than those of any other old gentle-
man in the village; and as to his chin,
it is not only double, but triple.
I have thus painted the happy estate
of Vondervotteimittiss: alas, that so
fair a picture should ever experience
a reverse!
There has been long a saying among
the wisest inhabitants, that "no good
can come from over the hills"; and it
really seemed that the words had in
them something of the spirit of proph-
есу.
It wanted five minutes of noon,
on the day before yesterday, when there
appeared a very odd-looking oɔject
the summit of the ridge of the e
ward. Such an occurrence, of cou
attracted universal attention, and ev
little old gentleman who sat in
leather-bottomed arm-chair turned
of his eyes with a stare of dismay u
the phenomenon, still keeping the ot
upon the clock in the steeple.
By the time that it wanted only th
minutes to noon, the droll object
question was perceived to be a v
diminutive foreign-looking young п
He descended the hills at a great r
so that everybody had soon a g
look at him. He was really the п
finicky little personage that had €
been seen in Vondervotteimittiss.
countenance was of a dark snuff-co
and he had a long hooked nose,
eyes, a wide mouth, and an excel
set of teeth, which latter he seer
anxious of displaying, as he was g
ning from ear to ear. What with n
tachios and whiskers, there was nont
the rest of his face to be seen.
head was uncovered, and his hair ne
done up in papillotes. His dress
a tight-fitting swallow-tailed black (
(from one of whose pockets dangle
vast length of white handkerchi
black kerseymere knee-breeches, bi
stockings, and stumpy-looking pun
with huge bunches of black satin
bon for bows. Under one arm he
ried a huge chapeau-de-bras, and un
the other a fiddle nearly five times
big as himself. In his left hand wa
gold snuff-box, from which, as he
pered down the hill, cutting all man
of fantastic steps, he took snuff inc
santly with an air of the greatest p
sible self-satisfaction. God bless ¤
THE DEVIL IN THE BELFRY
631
ere was a sight for the honest
ghers of Vondervotteimittiss!
'o speak plainly, the fellow had, in
e of his grinning, an audacious and
ster kind of face; and as he cur-
ed right into the village, the old
npy appearance of his pumps ex-
d no little suspicion; and many a
gher who beheld him that day would
e given a trifle for a peep beneath
white cambric handkerchief which
g so obtrusively from the pocket
his swallow-tailed coat. But what
nly occasioned a righteous indigna-
was, that the scoundrelly popinjay,
le he cut a fandango here, and a
rligig there, did not seem to have
remotest idea in the world of such
ing as keeping time in his steps.
he good people of the borough had
cely a chance, however, to get their
thoroughly open, when, just as it
ted half a minute of noon, the
al bounced, as I say, right into
midst of them; gave a chassez here,
a balancez there; and then, after a
uette and a pas-de-zephyr, pigeon-
ged himself right up into the belfry
the House of the Town Council,
re the wonder-stricken belfry-man
smoking in a state of dignity and
nay. But the little chap seized him
once by the nose; gave it a swing
a pull; clapped the big chapeau-
bras upon his head; knocked it
vn over his eyes and mouth; and
n, lifting up the big fiddle, beat him
h it so long and so soundly, that
at with the belfry-man being so fat,
1 the fiddle being so hollow, you
uld have sworn that there was a
iment of double-bass drummers all
iting the devil's tattoo up in the
belfry of the steeple of Vondervottei-
mittiss.
There is no knowing to what des-
perate act of vengeance this unprin-
cipled attack might have aroused the
inhabitants, but for the important fact
that it now wanted only half a second
of noon. The bell was about to strike,
and it was a matter of absolute and
pre-eminent necessity that everybody
should look well at his watch. It was
evident, however, that just at this mo-
ment the fellow in the steeple was
doing something that he had no busi-
ness to do with the clock. But as it
now began to strike, nobody had any
time to attend to his manœuvres, for
they had all to count the strokes of the
bell as it sounded.
"One!" said the clock.
"Von!" echoed every little old gen-
tleman in every leather-bottomed arm-
chair in Vondervotteimittiss. "Von!"
said his watch also; "von!" said the
watch of his vrow; and "von!" said
the watches of the boys, and the little
gilt repeaters on the tails of the cat
and pig.
"Two!" continued the big bell; and
"Doo!" repeated all the repeaters.
"Three! Four! Five! Six! Seven!
Eight! Nine! Ten!" said the bell.
"Dree! Vour! Fibe! Sax! Seben!
Aight! Noin! Den!" answered the
others.
"Eleven!" said the big one.
"Eleben!" assented the little ones.
"Twelve!" said the bell.
"Dvelf!" they replied perfectly satis-
fied, and dropping their voices.
"Und dvelf it is!" said all the little
old gentlemen, putting up their watches.
But the big bell had not done with
them yet.
632
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"Thirteen!" said he.
"Der Teufel!" gasped the little old
gentlemen, turning pale, dropping their
pipes, and putting down all their right
legs from over their left knees.
"Der Teufel!" groaned they, "Dir-
teen! Dirteen!!-Mein Gott, it is Dir-
teen o'clock!!"
Why attempt to describe the ter-
rible scene which ensued? All Vonder-
votteimittiss flew at once into a la-
mentable state of uproar.
"Vot is cum'd to mein pelly?" roared
all the boys-"I've been ongry for dis
hour!"
"Vot is cum'd to mein kraut?"
screamed all the vrows, "It has been
done to rags for this hour!"
"Vot is cum'd to mein pipe?" swore
all the little old gentlemen, "Donder
and Blitzen; it has been smoked out for
dis hour!"—and they filled them up
again in a great rage, and sinking back
in their arm-chairs, puffed away so fast
and so fiercely that the whole valley
was immediately filled with impene-
trable smoke.
Meantime the cabbages all turned
very red in the face, and it seemed as
if old Nick himself had taken posses-
sion of every thing in the shape of a
time-piece. The clocks carved upon
the furniture took to dancing as if be-
witched, while those upon the mantel-
pieces could scarcely contain themselves
for fury, and kept such a continual
striking of thirteen, and such a frisking
and wriggling of their pendulums as
was really horrible to see. But, wors
than all, neither the cats nor the
could put up any longer with the
havior of the little repeaters tied
their tails, and resented it by scamp
ing all over the place, scratching
poking, and squeaking and screeching
and caterwauling and squalling, and
ing into the faces, and running und
the petticoats of the people, and cre
ing altogether the most abominable
and confusion which it is possible for
reasonable person to conceive. And
make matters still more distressing,
rascally little scape-grace in the steep
was evidently exerting himself to
utmost. Every now and then
might catch a glimpse of the scound
through the smoke. There he sat
the belfry upon the belfry-man.
was lying flat upon his back. In
teeth the villain held the bell-rop
which he kept jerking about with
head, raising such a clatter that
ears ring again even to think of
On his lap lay the big fiddle, at whi
he was scraping, out of all time
tune, with both hands, making a
show, the nincompoop! of playing "Ju
O'Flannagan and Paddy O'Rafferty
Affairs being thus miserably situat
I left the place in disgust, and
appeal for aid to all lovers of com
time and fine kraut. Let us proceed
a body to the borough, and restore
ancient order of things in Vond
votteimittiss by ejecting that little
low from the steeple.
Bon-Bon
This tale was published in the Southern Literary Messenger, August, 1835.-Ed.)
uand un bon vin meuble mon estomac
▸ suis plus savant que Balzac-
lus sage que Pibrac;
[on bras seul faisant l'attaque
e la nation Cossaque,
a mettroit au sac;
e Charon je passerois le lac
n dormant dans son bac;
irois au fier Eac,
ins que mon coeur fit tic ni tac,
resenter du tabac.
-French Vaudeville.
THAT Pierre Bon-Bon was a restau-
teur of uncommon qualifications, no
an who during the reign of
fre-
ented the little cafe in the cul-de-sac
e Febre at Rouen, will, I imagine, feel
mself at liberty to dispute. That
ierre Bon-Bon was, in an equal degree,
illed in the philosophy of that period
, I presume still more especially un-
niable. His pates a la fois were
yond doubt immaculate; but what
n can do justice to his essays
r la Nature—his thoughts sur l'Ame—
s observations sur l'Esprit? If his
nelettes-if his fricandeaux were ines-
mable, what litterateur of that day
ould not have given twice as much for
1 "Idee de Bon-Bon" as for all the
ash of all the "Idees" of all the rest
the savants? Bon-Bon had ransacked
oraries which no other man had ran-
cked-had read more than any other
ould have entertained a notion of
ading-had understood more than any
ther would have conceived the possi-
ility of understanding; and although,
while he flourished, there were not
wanting some authors at Rouen to as-
sert "that his dicta evinced neither the
purity of the Academy, nor the depth
of the Lyceum"-although, mark me,
his doctrines were by no means very
generally comprehended, still it did not
follow that they were difficult of com-
prehension. It was, I think, on account
of their self-evidency that many persons
were led to consider them abstruse. It
is to Bon-Bon-but let this go no fur-
ther it is to Bon-Bon that Kant him-
self is mainly indebted for his meta-
physics. The former was indeed not a
Platonist, nor strictly speaking an
Aristotelian-nor did he, like the mod-
ern Leibnitz, waste those precious
hours which might be employed in the
invention of a fricasee or, facili gradu,
the analysis of a sensation, in frivolous
attempts at reconciling the obstinate
oils and waters of ethical discussion.
Not at all. Bon-Bon was Ionic-Bon-
Bon was equally Italic. He reasoned
a priori-He reasoned a posteriori. His
ideas were innate or otherwise. He
believed in George of Trebizond-He
believed in Bossarion. Bon-Bon was
emphatically a-Bon-Bonist.
I have spoken of the philosopher in
his capacity of restaurateur. I would
not, however, have any friend of mine
imagine that, in fulfilling his hereditary
duties in that line, our hero wanted a
proper estimation of their dignity and
importance. Far from it. It was im-
possible to say in which branch of his
profession he took the greater pride.
633
634
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
If
In his opinion the powers of the intel-
lect held intimate connection with the
capabilities of the stomach. I am not
sure, indeed, that he greatly disagreed
with the Chinese, who hold that the soul
lies in the abdomen. The Greeks at all
events were right, he thought, who em-
ployed the same words for the mind and
the diaphragm.* By this I do not mean
to insinuate a charge of gluttony, or
indeed any other serious charge to the
prejudice of the metaphysician.
Pierre Bon-Bon had his failings—and
what great man has not a thousand?-
if Pierre Bon-Bon, I say, had his fail-
ings, they were failings of very little im-
portance-faults indeed which, in other
tempers, have often been looked upon
rather in the light of virtues. As re-
gards one of these foibles, I should not
even have mentioned it in this history
but for the remarkable prominency-the
extreme alto relievo-in which it jutted
out from the plane of his general dis-
position. He could never let slip an
opportunity of making a bargain.
Not that he was avaricious-no. It
was by no means necessary to the sat-
isfaction of the philosopher, that the
bargain should be to his own proper ad-
vantage. Provided a trade could be
effected-a trade of any kind, upon any
terms, or under any circumstances-a
triumphant smile was seen for many
days thereafter to enlighten his counte-
nance, and a knowing wink of the eye
to give evidence of his sagacity.
At any epoch it would not be very
wonderful if a humor so peculiar as the
one I have just mentioned, should elicit
attention and remark. At the epoch
of our narrative, had this peculiarity
*Phrenes.
not attracted observation, there woul
have been room for wonder indeed 1
was soon reported that, upon all occa
sions of the kind, the smile of Bon-E
was found to differ widely from
downright grin with which he woul
laugh at his own jokes, or welcome a
acquaintance. Hints were thrown
of an exciting nature; stories were al
of perilous bargains made in a hum
and repented of at leisure; and
stances were adduced of unaccountabl
capacities, vague longings, and unnatun
inclinations implanted by the author
all evil for wise purposes of his own
The philosopher had other weak
nesses-but they are scarcely worth
our serious examination. For examp
there are few men of extraordina
profundity who are found wanting in a
inclination for the bottle. Whethe
this inclination be an exciting cause.
rather a valid proof of such profundių
it is a nice thing to say. Bon-Bon,
far as I can learn, did not think
subject adapted to minute investin
tion; nor do I. Yet in the indulgent
of a propensity so truly classical, it i
not to be supposed that the restauraia
would lose sight of that intuitive
crimination which was wont to chara
terize, at one and the same time.
essais and his omelettes. In his sed
sions the Vin de Bourgogne had
allotted hour, and there were approp
ate moments for the Cotes du Rho
With him Sauterne was to Medoc
Catulus was to Homer. He would sp
with a syllogism in sipping St. Per
but unravel an argument over Clos
Vougeot, and upset a theory in a ta
rent of Chambertin. Well had it bee
if the same quick sense of propriety
attended him in the peddling propensi
BON-BON
635
to which I have formerly alluded-but
this was by no means the case. Indeed
to say the truth, that trait of mind in
the philosophic Bon-Bon did begin at
length to assume a character of strange
intensity and mysticism, and appeared
deeply tinctured with the diablerie of
his favorite German studies.
To enter the little cafe in the cul-
de-sac Le Febre was, at the period of
our tale, to enter the sanctum of a man
of genius. Bon-Bon was a man of
genius. There was not a sous-cuisinier
in Rouen, who could not have told you
that Bon-Bon was a man of genius.
His very cat knew it, and forebore to
whisk her tail in the presence of the
man of genius. His large water-dog
was acquainted with the fact, and upon
the approach of his master, betrayed
his sense of inferiority by a sanctity of
deportment, a debasement of the ears,
and a dropping of the lower jaw not al-
together unworthy of a dog. It is, how-
ever, true that much of this habitual
respect might have been attributed to
the personal appearance of the meta-
physician. A distinguished exterior will,
I am constrained to say, have its way
even with a beast; and I am willing to
allow much in the outward man of the
restaurateur calculated to impress the
imagination of the quadruped. There
is a peculiar majesty about the atmos-
phere of the little great-if I may be
permitted so equivocal an expression-
which mere physical bulk alone will be
found at all times inefficient in creat-
ing. If, however, Bon-Bon was barely
three feet in height, and if his head was
diminutively small, still it was impos-
sible to behold the rotundity of his
stomach without a sense of magnifi-
cence nearly bordering upon the sub-
lime. In its size both dogs and men
must have seen a type of his acquire
ments in its immensity a fitting habi
tation for his immortal soul.
I might here-if it so pleased me-
dilate upon the matter of habiliment,
and other mere circumstances of the
external metaphysician. I might hint
that the hair of our hero was worn
short, combed smoothly over his fore-
head, and surmounted by a conical-
shaped white flannel cap and tassels-
that his pea-green jerkin was not after
the fashion of those worn by the com-
mon class of restaurateurs at that day—
that the sleeves were something fuller
than the reigning costume permitted-
that the cuffs were turned up, not as
usual in that barbarous period, with
cloth of the same quality and color as
the garment, but faced in a more fanci-
ful manner with the particolored velvet
of Genoa-that his slippers were of a
bright purple, curiously filigreed, and
might have been manufactured in Ja-
pan, but for the exquisite pointing of
the toes, and the brilliant tints of the
binding and embroidery-that
breeches were of the yellow satin-like
material called aimable-that his sky-
blue cloak, resembling in form a dress-
ing-wrapper, and richly bestudded all
over with crimson devices, floated
cavalierly upon his shoulders like a mist
of the morning-and that his tout en-
semble gave rise to the remarkable
words of Benevenuta, the Improvisatrice
of Florence, "that it was difficult to say
whether Pierre Bon-Bon was indeed a
bird of Paradise, or the rather a very
Paradise of perfection." I might, I say,
expatiate upon all these points if I
pleased, but I forbear; merely per-
sonal details may be left to historical
his
636
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
novelists, they are beneath the moral
dignity of matter-of-fact.
I have said that "to enter the cafe
in the cul-de-sac Le Febre was to enter
the sanctum of a man of genius"-but
then it was only the man of genius who
could duly estimate the merits of the
sanctum. A sign, consisting of a vast
folio, swung before the entrance. On
one side of the volume was painted a
bottle; on the reverse a pate. On the
back were visible in large letters Euvres
de Bon-Bon. Thus was delicately
shadowed forth the twofold occupation
of the proprietor.
Upon stepping over the threshold, the
whole interior of the building presented
itself to view.
A long, low-pitched room, of antique
construction, was indeed all the accom-
modation afforded by the cafe. In a
corner of the apartment stood the bed
of the metaphysician. An array of cur-
tains, together with a canopy a la
Greque, gave it an air at once classic
and comfortable. In the corner diag-
onally opposite, appeared, in direct
family communion, the properties of
the kitchen and the bibliotheque. A
dish of polemics stood peacefully upon
the dresser. Here lay an ovenful of
the latest ethics-there a kettle of du-
decimo melanges. Volumes of German
morality were hand and glove with the
gridiron a toasting-fork might be dis-
covered by the side of Eusebius-Plato
reclined at his ease in the frying-pan-
and contemporary manuscripts were
filed away upon the spit.
In other respects the Cafe de Bon-
Bon might be said to differ little from
the usual restaurants of the period. A
fireplace yawned opposite the door. On
the right of the fireplace an open cup-
board displayed a formidable array
labelled bottles.
It was here, about twelve o'clock
night during the severe winter of
that Pierre Bon-Bon, after havin
listened for some time to the comment
of his neighbors upon his singular pro
pensity-that Pierre Bon-Bon, I sa
having turned them all out of his hous
locked the door upon them with
oath, and betook himself in no ve
pacific mood to the comforts of
leather-bottomed arm-chair, and a f
of blazing fagots.
It was one of those terrific night
which are only met with once or twi
during a century. It snowed fiercely
and the house tottered to its centre wi
the floods of wind that, rushing throug
the crannies of the wall, and pourin
impetuously down the chimney, shoo
awfully the curtains of the philosopher
bed, and disorganized the economy
his pate-pans and papers. The hu
folio sign that swung without, expose
to the fury of the tempest, creaks
ominously, and gave out a moanin
sound from its stanchions of solid o
It was in no placid temper, I
that the metaphysician drew up
chair to its customary station by
hearth. Many circumstances of a pe
plexing nature had occurred during t
day, to disturb the serenity of his me
itations. In attempting des œufs a
Princesse, he had unfortunately perp
trated an omelette a la Reine; the d
covery of a principle in ethics had be
frustrated by the overturning of a ste
and last, not least, he had been thwarte
in one of those admirable bargai
which he at all times took such especi
delight in bringing to a successful ter
ination. But in the chafing of his mis
BON-BON
637
it these unaccountable vicissitudes,
here did not fail to be mingled some de-
ree of that nervous anxiety which the
ury of a boisterous night is so well
alculated to produce. Whistling to his
nore immediate vicinity the large black
waterdog we have spoken of before,
nd settling himself uneasily in his
hair, he could not help casting a wary
nd unquiet eye toward those distant
ecesses of the apartment whose inex-
rable shadows not even the red fire-
ight itself could more than partially
ucceed in overcoming. Having com-
leted a scrutiny whose exact purpose
vas perhaps unintelligible to himself,
e drew close to his seat a small table
overed with books and papers, and
oon became absorbed in the task of
etouching a voluminous manuscript,
ntended for publication on the morrow.
He had been thus occupied for some
ninutes, "I am in no hurry, Monsieur
lon-Bon," suddenly whispered a whin-
ng voice in the apartment.
"The devil!" ejaculated our hero,
tarting to his feet, overturning the
able at his side, and staring around
im in astonishment.
"Very true," calmly replied the voice.
"Very true!-what is very true?-
ow came you here?" vociferated the
etaphysician, as his eye fell upon
omething which lay stretched at full
ength upon the bed.
"I was saying," said the intruder,
vithout attending to the interroga
ives, "I was saying that I am not at
Il pushed for time-that the business
pon which I took the liberty of calling,
of no pressing importance-in short,
hat I can very well wait until you have
nished your Exposition."
"My Exposition!-there now!-how
do you know?-how came you to un-
derstand that I was writing an Exposi,
tion-good God!"
"Hush!" replied the figure, in a shrill
undertone; and, arising quickly from
the bed, he made a single step toward
our hero, while an iron lamp that de-
pended over-head swung convulsively
back from his approach.
The philosopher's amazement did not
prevent a narrow scrutiny of the
stranger's dress and appearance. The
outlines of his figure, exceedingly lean,
but much above the common height,
were rendered minutely distinct by
means of a faded suit of black cloth
which fitted tight to the skin, but was
otherwise cut very much in the style
of a century ago. These garments had
evidently been intended for a much
shorter person than their present owner.
His ankles and wrists were left naked
for several inches. In his shoes, how-
ever, a pair of very brilliant buckles
gave the lie to the extreme poverty im-
plied by the other portions of his dress.
His head was bare, and entirely bald,
with the exception of a hinder-part,
from which depended a queue of con-
siderable length. A pair of green spec-
tacles, with side glasses, protected his
eyes from the influence of the light, and
at the same time prevented our hero
from ascertaining either their color or
their conformation. About the entire
person there was no evidence of a shirt;
but a white cravat, of filthy appearance,
was tied with extreme precision around
the throat, and the ends hanging down
formally side by side gave (although
I dare say unintentionally) the idea of
an ecclesiastic. Indeed, many other
points both in his appearance and de-
meanor might have very well sustained
638
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
a conception of that nature. Over his
left ear, he carried, after the fashion of
a modern clerk, an instrument resem-
bling the stylus of the ancients. In a
breast-pocket of his coat appeared con-
spicuously a small black volume fas-
tened with clasps of steel. This book,
whether accidentally or not, was so
turned outwardly from the person as to
discover the words "Rituel Catholique"
in white letters upon the back. His en-
tire physiognomy was interestingly
saturnine—even cadaverously pale. The
forehead was lofty, and deeply fur-
rowed with the ridges of contemplation.
The corners of the mouth were drawn
down into an expression of the most
submissive humility. There was also a
clasping of the hands, as he stepped to-
ward our hero-a deep sigh-and alto-
gether a look of such utter sanctity as
could not have failed to be unequivo-
cally prepossessing. Every shadow of
anger faded from the countenance of
the metaphysician, as, having completed
a satisfactory survey of his visitor's
person, he shook him cordially by the
hand, and conducted him to a seat.
There would however be a radical
error in attributing this instantaneous
transition of feeling in the philosopher,
to any one of those causes which might
naturally be supposed to have had an
influence. Indeed, Pierre Bon-Bon,
from what I have been able to under-
stand of his disposition, was of all
men the least likely to be imposed upon
by any speciousness of exterior deport-
ment. It was impossible that so accu-
rate an observer of men and things
should have failed to discover, upon the
moment, the real character of the per-
sonage who had thus intruded upon his
hospitality. To say no more, the con-
formation of his visitor's feet was suf
ficiently remarkable he maintained
lightly upon his head an inordinately
tall hat-there was a tremulous swelling
about the hinder part of his breeches-
and the vibration of his coat tail was a
palpable fact. Judge, then, with what
feelings of satisfaction our hero found
himself thrown thus at once into the
society of a person for whom he had at
all times entertained the most unquali-
fied respect.
He was, however, too
much of the diplomatist to let escape
him any intimation of his suspicions in
regard to the true state of affairs. I
was not his cue to appear at all con-
scious of the high honor he thus unex-
pectedly enjoyed; but, by leading his
guest into conversation, to elicit some
important ethical ideas, which might, in
obtaining a place in his contemplated
publication, enlighten the human race,
and at the same time immortalize him-
self-ideas which, I should have added,
his visitor's great age, and well-known
proficiency in the science of morals,
might very well have enabled him to
afford.
Actuated by these enlightened views
our hero bade the gentleman sit down,
while he himself took occasion to throw
some fagots upon the fire, and place
upon the now re-established table some
bottles of Mousseux. Having quickly
completed these operations, he drew his
chair vis-a-vis to his companion's, and
waited until the latter should open the
conversation. But plans even the most
skilfully matured are often thwarted in
the outset of their application—and the
restaurateur found himself nonplussed
by the very first words of his visitor's
speech.
"I see you know me, Bon-Bon," said
BON-BON
639
he; "ha! ha! ha!-he! he! he!-hi! hi!
hi!-ho! ho! ho!-hu! hu! hu!"-and
the Devil, dropping at once the sanctity
of his demeanor, opened to its fullest
extent a mouth from ear to ear, so as to
display a set of jagged and fang-like
teeth, and, throwing back his head,
laughed long, loudly, wickedly, and up-
roariously, while the black dog, crouch-
ing down upon his haunches, joined
lustily in the chorus, and the tabby cat,
flying off at a tangent, stood up on end,
and shrieked in the farthest corner of
the apartment.
Not so the philosopher: he was too
much a man of the world either to
laugh like the dog, or by shrieks to be-
tray the indecorous trepidation of the
cat. It must be confessed, he felt a
little astonishment to see the white let-
ters which formed the words "Rituel
Catholique" on the book in his guest's
pocket, momently changing both their
color and their import, and in a few
seconds, in place of the original title,
the words "Regitre des Condamnes"
blazed forth in characters of red. This
startling circumstance, when Bon-Bon
replied to his visitor's remark, imparted
to his manner an air of embarrassment
which probably might not otherwise
have been observed.
"Why sir," said the philosopher, "why
sir, to speak sincerely-I believe you
are upon my word-the d-dest-
that is to say, I think-I imagine-I
have some faint-some very faint
idea of the remarkable honor"
"Oh!-ah!-yes!-very well!" inter-
rupted his Majesty; "say no more-I
see how it is." And hereupon, taking
off his green spectacles, he wiped the
glasses carefully with the sleeve of his
coat, and deposited them in his pocket.
If Bon-Bon had been astonished at
the incident of the book, his amaze-
ment was now much increased by the
spectacle which here presented itself to
view. In raising his eyes, with a strong
feeling of curiosity to ascertain the col-
or of his guest's, he found them by no
means black, as he had anticipated-nor
gray, as might have been imagined-nor
yet hazel nor blue-nor indeed yellow
nor red-nor purple-nor white-nor
green-nor any other color in the
heavens above, or in the earth beneath,
or in the waters under the earth. In
short, Pierre Bon-Bon not only saw
plainly that his Majesty had no eyes
whatsoever, but could discover no indi-
cations of their having existed at any
previous period-for the space where
eyes should naturally have been was,
I am constrained to say, simply a dead
level of flesh.
It was not in the nature of the met-
aphysician to forbear making some in-
quiry into the sources of so strange a
phenomenon, and the reply of his Maj-
esty was at once prompt, dignified, and
satisfactory.
"Eyes! my dear Bon-Bon-eyes! did
you say?-oh!-ah!-I perceive! The
ridiculous prints, eh, which are in cir
culation, have given you a false idea
of my personal appearance? Eyes!-
true. Eyes, Pierre Bon-Bon, are very
well in their proper place-that, you
would say, is the head?-right-the
head of a worm. To you, likewise,
these optics are indispensable-yet I
will convince you that my vision is
more penetrating than your own. There
is a cat I see in the corner-a pretty cat
-look at her-observe her well. Now,
Bon-Bon, do you behold the thoughts-
the thoughts, I say the ideas-the re-
640
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
flections which are being engendered
in her pericranium? There it is, now-
you do not! She is thinking we admire
the length of her tail and the profundity
of her mind. She has just concluded
that I am the most distinguished of
ecclesiastics, and that you are the most
superficial of metaphysicians. Thus
you see I am not altogether blind; but
to one of my profession, the eyes you
speak of would be merely an incum-
brance, liable at any time to be put
out by a toasting-iron, or a pitchfork.
To you, I allow, these optical affairs
are indispensable. Endeavor, Bon-Bon,
to use them well;-my vision is the
soul."
Hereupon the guest helped himself
to the wine upon the table, and pouring
out a bumper for Bon-Bon, requested
him to drink it without scruple, and
make himself perfectly at home.
"A clever book that of yours, Pierre,"
resumed his Majesty, tapping our friend
knowingly upon the shoulder, as the lat-
ter put down his glass after a thorough
compliance with his visitor's injunction.
"A clever book that of yours, upon my
honor. It's a work after my own heart.
Your arrangement of the matter, I
think, however, might be improved, and
many of your notions remind me of
Aristotle. That philosopher was one of
my most intimate acquaintances. I
liked him as much for his terrible ill
temper, as for his happy knack at mak-
ing a blunder. There is only one solid
truth in all that he has written, and for
that I gave him the hint out of pure
compassion for his absurdity. I sup-
pose, Pierre Bon-Bon, you very well
know to what divine moral truth I am
alluding?"
"Cannot say that I-"
"Indeed!-why it was I who told
Aristotle that by sneezing, men expelled
superfluous ideas through the probos-
cis."
"Which is hiccup! — undoubtedly
the case," said the metaphysician while
he poured out for himself another
bumper of Mousseux, and offered his
snuff-box to the fingers of his visitor.
"There was Plato, too," continued
his Majesty, modestly declining the
snuff-box and the compliment it im-
plied "there was Plato, too, for whom
I, at one time, felt all the affection of
a friend. You knew Plato, Bon-Bon?-
ah, no, I beg a thousand pardons. He
met me at Athens, one day, in the Par-
thenon, and told me he was distressed
for an idea. I bade him write, down
that o nous estin aulos. He said that
he would do so, and went home, while
I stepped over to the pyramids.
my conscience smote me for having ut-
tered a truth, even to aid a friend, and
hastening back to Athens, I arrived be-
hind the philosopher's chair as he was
inditing the 'aulos.'
But
"Giving the lambda a fillip with my
finger, I turned it upside down. So the
sentence now reads 'o nous estin augos,
and is, you perceive, the fundamental
doctrines in his metaphysics."
"Were you ever at Rome?" asked the
restaurateur, as he finished his second
bottle of Mousseux, and drew from the
closet a larger supply of Chambertin
"But once, Monsieur Bon-Bon, but
once. There was a time," said the
Devil, as if reciting some passage from
a book "there was a time when oc-
curred an anarchy of five years, dur
ing which the republic, bereft of all its
officers, had no magistracy besides the
tribunes of the people, and these were
BON-BON
641
not legally vested with any degree of
executive power-at that time, Mon-
sieur Bon-Bon-at that time only I was
in Rome, and I have no earthly ac-
quaintance, consequently, with any of
its philosophy."*
"What do you think of-what do
you think of hiccup!-Epicurus?"
"What do I think of whom?" said the
Devil, in astonishment, "you surely do
not mean to find any fault with Epicu-
rus! What do I think of Epicurus! Do
you mean me, sir?-I am Epicurus! I
am the same philosopher who wrote each
of the three hundred treatises commem-
orated by Diogenes Laertes."
"That's a lie!" said the metaphysi-
cian, for the wine had gotten a little
into his head.
"Very well!-very well, sir!-very
well, indeed, sir!" said his Majesty,
apparently much flattered.
"That's a lie!" repeated the restaura-
teur, dogmatically; "that's a-hiccup!-
a lie!"
"Well, well, have it your own way!"
said the Devil, pacifically, and Bon-
Bon, having beaten his Majesty at an
argument, thought it his duty to con-
clude a second bottle of Chambertin.
"As I was saying," resumed the visi-
tor "as I was observing a little while
ago, there are some very outre notions
in that book of yours Monsieur Bon-
Bon. What, for instance, do you mean
by all that humbug about the soul?
Pray, sir, what is the soul?"
"The hiccup!-soul," replied the
metaphysician, referring to his MS., "is
undoubtedly"
* Ils ecrivaient sur la Philosophie
(Cicero, Lucretius, Seneca) mais c'etait
la Philosophie Grecque.-Condorcet.
""
""
99
"No, sir!"
"Indubitably-
"No, sir!"
"Indisputably-
"No, sir!"
"Evidently-
"No, sir!"
"Incontrovertibly-
"No, sir!"
"Hiccup!-
"No, sir!"
99
"And beyond all question, a-
"No, sir, the soul is no such thing!"
(Here the philosopher, looking daggers,
took occasion to make an end, upon the
spot, of his third bottle of Chambertin.)
"Then-hiccup!—pray, sir-what-
what is it?"
"That is neither here nor there, Mon-
sieur Bon-Bon," replied his Majesty,
musingly. "I have tasted-that is to
say, I have known some very bad souls,
and some too-pretty good ones."
Here he smacked his lips, and, having
unconsciously let fall his hand upon the
volume in his pocket, was seized with a
violent fit of sneezing.
He continued.
"There was the soul of Cratinus-
passable: Aristophanes-racy: Plato-
exquisite not your Plato, but Plato the
comic poet; your Plato would have
turned the stomach of Cerberus-
faugh! Then let me see! there were
Naevius, and Andronicus, and Plautus,
and Terentius. Then there were
Lucilius, and Catullus, and Naso, and
Quintus Flaccus,-dear Quinty! as I
called him when he sung a seculare for
my amusement, while I toasted him,
in pure good humor, on a fork. But
they want flavor, these Romans. One
fat Greek is worth a dozen of them,
and besides will keep, which cannot be
642
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Isaid of a Quirite. Let us taste your
Sauterne."
Bon-Bon had by this time made up
his mind to nil admirari, and endeavored
to hand down the bottles in question.
He was, however, conscious of a
strange sound in the room like the wag-
ging of a tail. Of this, although ex-
tremely indecent in his Majesty, the
philosopher took no notice:-simply
kicking the dog, and requesting him to
be quiet. The visitor continued:
"I found that Horace tasted very
much like Aristotle;-you know I am
fond of variety. Terentius I could not
have told from Menander. Naso, to
my astonishment, was Nicander in dis-
guise. Virgilius had a strong twang of
Theocritus. Martial put me much in
mind of Archilochus-and Titus Livius
was positively Polybius and none other."
"Hiccup!" here replied Bon-Bon, and
his Majesty proceeded:
"But if I have a penchant, Monsieur
Bon-Bon-if I have a penchant, it is
for a philosopher. Yet, let me tell you,
sir, it is not every dev-I mean it is
not every gentleman who knows how to
choose a philosopher. Long ones are
not good; and the best, if not carefully
shelled, are apt to be a little rancid on
account of the gall."
"Shelled!"
"I mean taken out of the carcass."
"What do you think of a-hiccup!-
physician?"
"Don't mention them!-ugh! ugh!"
(Here his Majesty retched violently.)
"I never tasted but one-that rascal
Hippocrates!-smelt of asafoetida-
ugh ugh ugh!-caught a wretched
cold washing him in the Styx-and af-
ter all he gave me the cholera-morbus."
"The hiccup!-wretch!" ejaculated
Bon-Bon, "the hiccup! - absorption
of a pill-box!"-and the philosophers
dropped a tear.
"After all," continued the visitor
"after all, if a dev-if a gentlema
wishes to live, he must have more tak
ents than one or two; and with us a fal
face is an evidence of diplomacy."
"How so?"
"Why, we are sometimes exceedingly
pushed for provisions. You must know
that, in a climate so sultry as mine. it
is frequently impossible to keep a spirit
alive for more than two or three hours;
and after death, unless pickled imme
diately (and a pickled spirit is no
good), they will-smell-you under-
stand, eh? Putrefaction is always to be
apprehended when the souls are cons
signed to us in the usual way."
"Hiccup!-hiccup!-good God! how
do you manage?"
Here the iron lamp commenced
swinging with redoubled violence, and
the Devil half started from his seat;-
however, with a slight sigh, he recov
ered his composure, merely saying to
our hero in a low tone: "I tell you
what, Pierre Bon-Bon, we must have
no more swearing."
The host swallowed another bumper,
by way of denoting thorough compre
hension and acquiescence, and the visi
tor continued.
I
"Why, there are several ways of man
aging. The most of us starve: some
put up with the pickle: for my part
purchase my spirits vivente corpore, in
which case I find they keep very well.
"But the body! hiccup! the
body!!"
-
"The body, the body-well, what of
the body?-oh! ah! I perceive. Why,
sir, the body is not at all affected by the
BON-BON
648
transaction. I have made innumerable
purchases of the kind in my day, and
the parties never experienced any in-
convenience. There were Cain and
Nimrod, and Nero, and Caligula, and
Dionysius, and Pisistratus, and—and a
thousand others, who never knew what
it was to have a soul during the latter
part of their lives; yet, sir, these men
adorned society. Why isn't there
A—————, now, whom you know as well
as I? Is he not in possession of his
faculties, mental and corporeal? Who
writes a keener epigram? Who reasons
more wittily? Who-but stay!
have his agreement in my pocket-book."
Thus saying, he produced a red leath-
er wallet, and took from it a number
of papers. Upon some of these Bon-
Bon caught a glimpse of the letters
Machi-Maza-Robesp-with the words
Caligula, George, Elizabeth. His Maj-
esty selected a narrow slip of parch-
ment, and from it read aloud the fol-
lowing words:
I
"In consideration of certain mental
endowments which it is unnecessary to
specify, and in further consideration of
one thousand louis d'or, I being aged
one year and one month, do hereby
nake over to the bearer of this agree-
nent all my right, title, and appurte-
lance in the shadow called my soul.
(Signed) A . . ""* (Here His
Majesty repeated a name which I did
not feel justified in indicating more un-
equivocally.)
"A clever fellow that," resumed he;
but, like you, Monsieur Bon-Bon, he
was mistaken about the soul. The soul
a shadow, truly! The soul a shadow;
* Quere-Arouet?
Ha ha ha!-he! he! he!-hu! hu! hu!
Only think of a fricasseed shadow!"
"Only think-hiccup!-of a fricas.
seed shadow!" exclaimed our hero,
whose faculties were becoming much
illuminated by the profundity of his
Majesty's discourse.
"Only think of a hiccup!-fricas-
seed shadow!! Now, damme!-hic-
cup!-humph! If I would have been
such a hiccup!-nincompoop!
soul, Mr.-humph!"
"Your soul, Monsieur Bon-Bon?"
"Yes, sir-hiccup!-my soul is-
"What, sir?"
""
My
"1
"No shadow, damme!"
"Did you mean to say-
"Yes, sir, my soul is-hiccup!-
humph!-yes, sir."
""
99
"Did you not intend to assert-
"My soul is- hiccup! - peculiarly
for-hiccup!-a-
"What, sir?"
"Stew."
"Ha!"
"Soufflee."
"Eh!"
"Fricassee."
"Indeed!"
"Ragout and fricandeau-and see
here, my good fellow! I'll let you have
it hiccup! a bargain." Here the
philosopher slapped his Majesty upon
the back.
- -
-
"Couldn't think of such a thing," said
the latter calmly, at the same time ris-
ing from his seat. The metaphysician
stared.
"Am supplied at present," said his
Majesty.
"Hic-cup!-e-h?" said the philoso
pher.
"Have no funds on hand."
"What?"
644
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"Besides, very unhandsome in me-"
"Sir!"
"To take advantage of
"Hic-cup!"
"Your present disgusting and un-
gentlemanly situation."
Here the visitor bowed and with-
drew-in what manner could not pre-
cisely be ascertained-but in a well-con-
certed effort to discharge a bottle at
"the villain," the slender chain was
severed that depended fom the ceil
ing, and the metaphysician prostrated
by the downfall of the lamp.
The Duc De L'Omelette
(First published in Southern Literary Messenger, February, 1836.-Ed.)
And stepped at once into a cooler clime.
-Cowper.
KEATS fell by a criticism. Who was
it died of "The Andromache?"* Ignoble
souls!-De L'Omelette perished of an
ortolan. L'histoire en est breve. Assist
me, Spirit of Apicius!
A golden cage bore the little winged
wanderer, enamoured, melting, indolent,
to the Chaussee D'Antin, from its home
in far Peru. From its queenly pos-
sessor La Bellissima, to the Duc De
L'Omelette, six peers of the empire con-
veyed the happy bird.
That night the Duc was to sup alone.
In the privacy of his bureau he reclined
languidly on that ottoman for which
he sacrificed his loyalty in outbidding.
his king-the notorious ottoman of
Cadet.
He buries his face in the pillow. The
clock strikes! Unable to restrain his
feelings, his Grace swallows an olive.
At this moment the door gently opens
to the sound of soft music, and lo!
the most delicate of birds is before
the most enamoured of men! But
*See "Marginalia.”—Ed.
--
--
what inexpressible dismay now over-
shadows the countenance of the Duc?-
"Horreur! chien! — Baptiste! —l'oi-
seau! ah, bon Dieu! cet oiseau modeste
que tu as deshabille de ses plumes, et
que tu as servi sans papier!" It is
superfluous to say more:-the Duc
expired in a paroxysm of disgust.
"Ha! ha! ha!" said his Grace on the
third day after his decease.
"He! he he!" replied the Devil
faintly, drawing himself up with an
air of hauteur.
"Why, surely you are not serious,"
retorted De L'Omelette. "I have sinned
-c'est vrai-but, my good sir, con-
sider!-you have no actual intention
of putting such-such barbarous threats
into execution."
"No what?" said his majesty-"come.
sir, strip!"
"Strip, indeed! very pretty i' faith!
no, sir, I shall not strip. Who are you,
pray, that I, Duc De L'Omelette
Prince de Foie-Gras, just come of age.
author of the 'Mazurkiad,' and member
of the Academy, should divest myself
at your bidding of the sweetest panta-
loons ever made by Bourdon, the
daintiest robe-de-chambre ever put to-
THE DUC DE L'OMELETTE
645
gether by Rombert-to say nothing of
the taking my hair out of paper-not
to mention the trouble I should have
in drawing off my gloves?"
"Who am I?-ah, true! I am Baal-
Zebub, Prince of the Fly. I took thee,
just now, from a rose-wood coffin inlaid
with ivory. Thou wast curiously
scented, and labelled as per invoice.
Belial sent thee, my Inspector of
Cemeteries.
The pantaloons, which
thou sayest were made by Bourdon, are
an excellent pair of linen drawers, and
thy robe-de-chambre is a shroud of no
scanty dimensions."
"Sir!" replied the Duc, "I am not
to be insulted with impunity!-Sir! I
shall take the earliest opportunity of
avenging this insult!-Sir! you shall
hear from me! In the meantime au
revoir!"-and the Duc was bowing
himself out of the Satanic presence,
when he was interrupted and brought
back by a gentleman in waiting. Here-
upon his Grace rubbed his eyes,
yawned, shrugged his shoulders, re-
flected. Having become satisfied of his
identity, he took a bird's-eye view of
his whereabouts.
The apartment was superb. Even
De L'Omelette pronounced it bien
comme il faut. It was not its length
nor its breadth, but its height-ah,
that was appalling!-There was no
ceiling-certainly none-but a a dense
whirling mass of fiery-colored clouds.
His Grace's brain reeled as he glanced
upward. From above, hung a chain of
an unknown blood-red metal-its upper
end lost, like the city of Boston, parmi
les nues. From its nether extremity
swung a large cresset. The Duc knew
it to be a ruby; but from it there
poured a light so intense, so still, so
terrible, Persia never worshipped such
-Gheber never imagined such-Mus-
sulman never dreamed of such when,
drugged with opium, he has tottered to
a bed of poppies, his back to the flow-
ers, and his face to the God Apollo.
The Duc muttered a slight oath, de-
cidedly approbatory.
The corners of the room were
rounded into niches. Three of these
were filled with statues of gigantic pro-
portions. Their beauty was Grecian,
their deformity Egyptian, their tout
ensemble French. In the fourth niche
the statue was veiled; it was not
colossal. But then there was a taper
ankle, a sandalled foot. De L'Omelette
pressed his hand upon his heart, closed
his eyes, raised them, and caught his
Satanic Majesty-in a blush.
As-
But the paintings!-Kupris!
tarte! Astoreth!-a thousand and the
same! And Rafaelle has beheld them!
Yes, Rafaelle has been here; for did
he not paint the -? and was he not
consequently damned? The paintings!
-the paintings! O luxury! O love!-
who, gazing on those forbidden beau-
ties, shall have eyes for the dainty
devices of the golden frames that be-
sprinkled, like stars, the hyacinth and
the porphyry walls?
But the Duc's heart is fainting within
him. He is not, however, as you sup-
pose, dizzy with magnificence, nor
drunk with the ecstatic breath of those
innumerable censers. C'est vrai que de
toutes ces choses il a pense beaucoup—
mais! The Duc De L'Omelette is ter-
ror-stricken; for, through the lurid
vista which a single uncurtained win-
dow is affording, lo! gleams the most
ghastly of all fires!
Le pauvre Duc! He could not help
646
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
imagining that the glorious, the volup-
tuous, the never-dying melodies which
pervaded that hall, as they passed fil-
tered and transmuted through the
alchemy of the enchanted window-
panes, were the wailings and the howl-
ings of the hopeless and the damned!
And there, too!-there!-upon the
ottoman!-who could he be?-he, the
petitmaitre-no, the Deity-who sat as
if carved in marble, et qui sourit, with
his pale countenance, si amerement?
Mais il faut agir-that is to say, a
Frenchman never faints outright. Be-
sides, his Grace hated a scene-De
L'Omelette is himself again. There
were some foils upon a table-some
points also. The Duc had studied
under B-; il avait tue ses six
hommes. Now, then, il peut s'echapper.
He measures two points, and, with a
grace inimitable, offers his Majesty the
choice. Horreur! his Majesty does not
fence!
Mais il joue!-how happy a thought!
-but his Grace had always an excel-
lent memory. He had dipped in the
"Diable" of the Abbe Gualtier. Therein
it is said "que le Diable n'ose pas
refuser un jeu d'ecarte."
But the chances the chances! True
-desperate; but scarcely more desper-
ate than the Duc. Besides, was he
not in the secret?-had he not skimmed
over Pere Le Brun?-was he not
member of the Club Vingt-un? “Si
perds," said he, "je serai deux jo
perdu-I shall be doubly damned-voi
tout! (Here his Grace shrugged h
shoulders.) Si je gagne, je reviendr
a mes ortolans-que les cartes soie
preparees!"
His Grace was all care, all attenti
-his Majesty all confidence. A spe
tator would have thought of Franc
and Charles. His Grace thought of h
game. His Majesty did not think; 1
shuffled. The Duc cut.
The cards are dealt. The trump
turned-it is-it is-the king!
No-
it was the queen. His Majesty curs
her masculine habiliments. De L'On
elette placed his hand upon his hear
They play. The Duc counts. Ti
hand is out. His Majesty coun
heavily, smiles, and is taking win
The Duc slips a card.
"C'est a vous a faire," said his Ma
esty, cutting. His Grace bowed, deal
and arose from the table en presenta
le Roi.
His Majesty looked chagrined.
Had Alexander not been Alexande
he would have been Diogenes; and th
Duc assured his antagonist in takin
leave, "que s'il n'eut ete De L'Omelett
il n'aurait point d'objection d'etre
Diable."
Never Bet the Devil Your Head
A MORAL TALE
(This tale under the title, "Never Bet Your Head," was published in Graham's
Magazine, September, 1841.-Ed.)
"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 discov-
ered that every fiction has. Philip
Melanchthon, some time ago, wrote a
commentary upon the "Batrachomyo-
machia," and proved that the poet's
object was to excite a distaste for sedi-
tion. Pierre la Seine, going a step
farther, shows that the intention was
to recommend to young men temper-
ance in eating and drinking. Just so,
too, Jacobus Hugo has satisfied himself
that, by Euenis, Homer meant to in-
sinuate 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 trou-
ble 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 pre-
cise 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 stu-
pidity. In the meantime, by way of
staying execution-by way of mitigat-
ing 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 arrange-
647
648
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
ment-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 mor-
tuis nil nisi bonum is an excellent
injunction-even if the dead in ques-
tion be nothing but dead small beer.
It is not my design, therefore, to vitu-
perate my deceased friend, Toby Dam-
mit. He was a sad dog, it is true, and
a dog's death it was that he died; but
be 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 mak-
ing him wriggle himself into a fit, I
could stand it no longer, but went down
upon my knees forthwith, and, uplift-
ing 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 kiss-
ing the female babies. At eight months
he peremptorily refused to put his sig-
nature 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 ungentle-
manly practice, the ruin which I had
predicted to Tobby 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 3
sentence without interlarding it with a
proposition to gamble. Not that he
actually laid wagers-no. I will do y
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 what-
They were simple if not alto-
gether innocent expletives-imaginative
phrases wherewith to round off a sen-
tence. 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-thi
ever.
NEVER BET THE DEVIL YOUR HEAD
649
I begged him to believe. It was dis-
countenanced by society-here I said
nothing but the truth. It was forbid-
den by act of Congress-here I had
not the slightest intention of telling a
lie. I remonstrated-but to no pur-
pose. I demonstrated-in vain. I
entreated-he smiled. I implored-he
laughed. I preached-he sneered.
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.
I
Poverty was another vice which the
peculiar physical deficiency of Dam-
mit'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 dispo-
sition would not permit him to com-
prehend. In the end, he abandoned all
other forms of wager, and gave him-
self 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 afterward 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 hyperquiz-
zitistical. I began not to like it at all.
Mr. Dammit's soul was in a perilous
state. I resolved to bring all my elo-
quence 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
650
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
them both up very tight. Then he
opened them both so very wide that I
became seriously alarmed for the con-
sequences. 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.
Did
Did
I can call to mind only the heads
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.
I still think him baby Dammit?
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 pre-
cipitation. 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 protec
tion from the weather, and the arch
way, having but few windows, was thus
very uncomfortably dark. As w
entered the passage, the contrast be
tween 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 impossi
ble that he was affected with the tran
scendentals. 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, be-
NEVER BET THE DEVIL YOUR HEAD
651
cause 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 wrig-
gling 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 turn-
stile 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 brag-
gadocio, and could not do what he said.
For this I had reason to be sorry after-
ward; for he straightway offered to
bet the Devil his head that he could.
I was about to reply, notwithstand-
ing 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 framework of the bridge, and upon
the figure of a little lame old gentle-
man 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 pen-
sively together over the 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 circum-
stance, he interrupted me with a second
"ahem!"
To this observation I was not imme-
diately 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 re-
mark on the score of profundity; I did
not think it profound myself; but I
652
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 on the head with the
"Poets and Poetry of America," he
could hardly have been more discom-
fited 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
alı 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 alter-
ation 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, withou
expressing myself aloud,-"this is quite
a remarkable silence on the part of
Toby Dammit, and is no doubt a con-
sequence of his verbosity upon a previ
ous 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 lec-
ture? 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 con-
science 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 transcen-
dentally, 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-
999
One-two-three-and-away!
Punctually at the word "away," my
poor friend set off in a strong gallop.
The style was not very high, like Mr.
Lord's-nor yet very low, like that of
NEVER BET THE DEVIL YOUR HEAD
653
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 any-
where; 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 turn-
stile, 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 unfortu-
nate 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 liv-
ers. 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 transcendent-
alists. The scoundrels refused to pay
it, so I had Mr. Dammit dug up at
once, and sold him for dog's meat.
Why the Little Frenchman Wears His
Hand in a Sling
(First appeared in an edition of 1840.-Ed.)
It's on my visiting cards sure enough
(and it's them that's all o' pink satin
paper) that inny gintleman that plases
may behould the intheristhin words,
"Sir Pathrick O'Grandison, Barronitt,
39 Southampton Row, Russell Square,
Parrish o' Bloomsbury." And shud ye
be wantin' to diskiver who is the pink
of purliteness quite, and the laider of
the hot tun in the houl city o' Lonon-
why it's jist mesilf. And fait that same
is no wonder at all at all (so be plased
to stop curlin your nose), for every
inch o' the six wakes that I've been a
gintleman, and left aff wid the bog-
throthing to take up wid the Barronissy,
it's Pathrick that's been living like a
houly imperor, and gitting the iddica-
tion and the graces.
Och! and wouldn't
it be a blessed thing for your spirrits
if ye cud lay your two peepers jist
upon Sir Pathrick O'Grandison, Bar-
ronitt, when he is all riddy drissed for
the hopperer, or stipping into the
Brisky for the drive into the Hyde
Park. But it's the illigant big figgur
that I ave, for the rason o' which all
the ladies fall in love wid me. Isn't
it my own swate silf now that'll mis-
sure the six fut, and the three inches
more nor that, in me stockings, and
that am excadingly will proportioned
all over to match? And is it ralelly
more than three fut and a bit that
there is, inny how, of the little ould
furrener Frinchman that lives jist over
the way, and that's a-oggling and
a-goggling the houl day, (and bad luck
to him,) at the purty widdy Misthress
Tracle that's my own nixt-door neigh-
bor, (God bliss her!) and most par
ticuler frind and acquaintance? You
percave the little spalpeen is summat
down in the mouth, and wears his lift
hand in a sling; and it's for that same
thing, by yur lave, that I'm going to
give you the good rason.
The truth of the houl matter is jist
simple enough; for the very first day
that I com'd from Connaught, and
showd my swate little silf in the strait
to the widdy, who was looking through
the windy, it was a gone case althe-
gither wid the heart o' the purty Mis-
thress Tracle. I percaved it, ye see,
all at once, and no mistake, and that's
God's truth. First of all it was up
wid the windy in a jiffy, and thin she
threw open her two peepers to the
itmost, and thin it was a little gould
spy-glass that she clapped tight to one
o' them, and divil may burn me if it
didn't spake to me as plain as a peeper
cud spake, and says it, through the
spy-glass: "Och! the tip o' the mornin'
to ye, Sir Patrick O'Grandison, Bar-
ronitt, mavourneen; and it's a nate
gintleman that ye are, sure enough, and
it's mesilf and me forten jist that'll
be at yur sarvice, dear, inny time o
day at all at all for the asking." And
it's not mesilf ye wud have to
be bate in the purliteness; so I made
her a bow that wud ha' broken yur
654
WHY THE LITTLE FRENCHMAN WEARS HIS HAND IN A SLING 655
heart altegither to behould, and thin I
pulled aff me hat with a flourish, and
thin I winked at her hard wid both
eyes, as much as to say: "True for
you, yer a swate little crature, Mrs.
Tracle, me darlint, and I wish I may
be drownthed dead in a bog, if it's
not mesilf, Sir Pathrick O'Grandison,
Barronitt, that'll make a houl bushel
o' love to yur leddyship, in the twin-
kling o' the eye of a Londonderry
purraty."
And it was the nixt mornin', sure,
jist as I was making up me mind
whither it wouldn't be the purlite thing
to sind a bit o' writin' to the widdy by
way of a love-litter, when up com'd
the delivery servant wid an illegant
card, and he tould me that the name
on it (for I niver could rade the copper-
plate printin' on account of being lift-
handed) was all about Mounseer, the
Count, A Goose, Look-aisy, Maiter-
di-dauns, and that the houl of the
divilish lingo was the spalpeeny long
name of the little ould furrener Frinch-
man as lived over the way.
And jist wid that in cum'd the little
willain himself, and thin he made me
a broth of a bow, and thin he said
he had ounly taken the liberty of doing
me the honor of the giving me a call,
a thin he went on to palaver at a great
rate, and divil the bit did I comprehind
what he wud be afther the tilling me
at all at all, excepting and saving that
he said "pully wou, woolly wou," and
tould me, among a bushel o' lies, bad
luck to him, that he was mad for the
love o' my widdy Misthress Tracle,
and that my widdy Mrs. Tracle had a
puncheon for him.
At the hearin' of this, ye may swear,
though, I was as mad as a grasshopper,
but I remimbered that I was Sir Path-
rick O'Grandison, Barronitt, and that
it wasn't althegither gentaal to lit the
anger git the upper hand o' the pur-
liteness, so I made light o' the matter
and kipt dark, and got quite sociable
wid the little chap, and afther a while
what did he do but ask me to go wid
him to the widdy's, saying he wud give
me the feshionable inthroduction to her
leddyship.
"Is it there ye are?" said I thin to
mesilf, "and it's thrue for you, Patrick,
that ye're the fortunittest mortal in
life. We'll soon see now whither it's
your swate silf, or whither it's little
Mounseer Maiter-di-dauns, that Mis-
thress Tracle is head and ears in the
love wid."
Wid that we wint aff to the widdy's,
next door, and ye may well say it was
an illegant place; so it was. There
was a carpet all over the floor, and in
one corner there was a forty-pinny and
a jew's-harp and the divil knows what
ilse, and in another corner was a sofy,
the beautifullest thing in all natur, and
sitting on the sofy, sure enough, there
was the swate little angel, Misthress
Tracle.
"The tip o' the mornin' to ye," says
I, "Mrs. Tracle," and thin I made
sich an illegant obaysance that it wud
ha quite althegither bewildered the
brain o' ye.
"Wully woo, pully woo, plump in
the mud," says the little furrenner
Frinchman, "and sure Mrs. Tracle,"
says he, that he did, "isn't this gintle-
man here jist his reverence Sir Patrick
O'Grandison, Barronitt, and isn't he
althegither and entirely the most par-
ticular frind and acquaintance that I
have in the houl world?"
656
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
And wid that the widdy, she gits up
from the sofy, and makes the swatest
curthchy nor iver was seen; and thin
down she sits like an angel; and thin,
by the powers, it was that little spal-
peen Mounseer Maiter-di-dauns that
plumped his silf right down by the right
side of her. Och hon! I ixpicted the
two eyes o' me wud ha cum'd out of
my head on the spot, I was so disper-
ate mad! Howiver, "Bait who!" says
I, after awhile. "Is it there ye are,
Mounseer Maiter-di-dauns?" and SO
down I plumped on the lift side of her
leddyship, to be aven with the willain.
Botheration! it wud ha done your heart
good to percave the illegant double
wink that I gived her jist thin right
in the face with both eyes.
But the little ould Frinchman he
niver beginned to suspict me at all at
all, and disperate hard it was he made
the love to her leddyship. "Woully
wou," says he, "Pully wou," says he,
"Plump in the mud," says he.
"That's all to no use, Mounseer Frog,
mavourneen," thinks I; and I talked
as hard and as fast as I could all the
while, and throth it was mesilf jist that
divarted her leddyship complately and
intirely, by rason of the illegant con-
versation that I kipt up wid her all
about the dear bogs of Connaught. And
by and by she gived me such a swate
smile, from one ind of her mouth to
the ither, that it made me as bould as
a pig, and I jist took hould of the ind
of her little finger in the most dilikit-
test manner in natur, looking at her all
the while out o' the whites of my
eyes.
And then ounly percave the cuteness
of the swate angel, for no sooner did
she obsarve that I was afther the
squazing of her flipper, than she up wid
it in a jiffy, and put it away behind
her back, jist as much as to say, "Now
thin, Sir Pathrick O'Grandison, there's
a bitther chance for ye, mavourneen
for it's not altogether the gentaal thing
to be afther the squazing of my flipper
right full in the sight of that little
furrenner Frinchman, Mounseer Maiter-
di-dauns."
Wid that I giv'd her a big wink jist
to say, "lit Sir Pathrick alone for the
likes o' them thricks," and thin I wint
aisy to work, and you'd have died wid
the divarsion to behould how cliverly
I slipped my right arm betwane the
back o' the sofy, and the back of her
leddyship, and there, sure enough, I
found a swate little flipper all a waiting
to say, "the tip o' the mornin' to ye.
Sir Pathrick O'Grandison, Barronitt."
And wasn't it mesilf, sure, that jist
giv'd it the laste little bit of a squaze
in the world, all in the way of a com-
mincement, and not to be too rough
wid her leddyship? and och, bothera-
tion, wasn't it the gentaalest and dii-
kittest of all the little squazes that I
got in return? "Blood and thunder.
Sir Pathrick, mavourneen," thinks I to
myself, "fait it's jist the mother's son
of you, and nobody else at all at all
that's the handsomest and the fortunit-
test young bog-throtter that ever cum'd
out of Connaught!" And wid that I
giv'd the flipper a big squaze, and a
big squaze it was, by the powers, that
her leddyship giv'd to me back. But
it would ha split the seven sides of
you wid the laffin' to behould, jist then
all at once, the consated behavior of
Mounseer Maiter-di-dauns. The likes
o' sich a jabbering, and a smirking, and
WHY THE LITTLE FRENCHMAN WEARS HIS HAND IN A SLING 657
a parley-wouing as he begin'd wid her
leddyship, niver was known before
upon arth; and divil may burn me if
it wasn't me own very two peepers
that cotch'd him tipping her the wink
out of one eye. Och, hon! if it wasn't
mesilf thin that was mad as a Kilkenny
cat I shud like to be tould who it was!
"Let me infarm you, Mounseer
Maiter-di-dauns," said I, as purlite as
iver ye seed, "that it's not the gintaal
thing at all at all, and not for the likes
o' you inny how, to be afther the
oggling and a-goggling at her leddyship
in that fashion," and jist wid that such
another squaze as it was I giv'd her
flipper, all as much as to say: “isn't it
Sir Pathrick now, my jewel, that'll be
able to the protectin' o' you, my dar-
lint?" and then there cum'd another
squaze back, all by way of the answer.
"Thrue for you, Sir Pathrick," it said
as plain as iver a squaze said in the
world, "Thrue for you, Sir Pathrick,
mavourneen, and it's a proper nate gin-
tleman ye are-that's God's truth," and
with that she opened her two beautiful
peepers till I belaved they wud ha'
com'd out of her hid althegither and
intirely, and she looked first as mad
as a cat at Mounseer Frog, and thin
as smiling as all out o' doors at mesilf.
"Thin," says he, the willain, "Och
hon! and a wolly-wou, pully-wou," and
then wid that he shoved up his two
shoulders till the devil the bit of his
hid was to be diskivered, and then
he let down the two corners of his
purraty-trap, and thin not a haporth
more of the satisfaction could I git
out o' the spalpeen.
Belave me, my jewel, it was Sir
Pathrick that was unreasonable mad
thin, and the more by token that the
Frinchman kipt an wid his winking at
the widdy; and the widdy she kept an
wid the squazing of my flipper, as much
as to say: "At him again, Sir Pathrick
O'Grandisen, mavourneen:" so I just
ripped out wid a big oath, and says I:
"Ye little spalpeeny frog of a bog-
throtting son of a bloody noun!"-and
jist thin what d'ye think it was that
her leddyship did? Troth she jumped
up from the sofy as if she was bit, and
made off through the door, while I
turned my head round afther her, in
a complete bewilderment and bothera-
tion, and followed her wid me two
peepers. You percave I had a reason
of my
own for knowing that she
couldn't git down the stares althegither
and intirely; for I knew very well that
I had hould of her hand, for divil the
bit had I iver lit it go. And says I:
"Isn't it the laste little bit of a mis-
take in the world that ye've been afther
the making, yer leddyship? Come back
now, that's a darlint, and I'll give ye
yur flipper." But aff she wint down
the stares like a shot, and thin I turned
round to the little Frinch furrenner.
Och hon! if it wasn't his spalpeeny
little paw that I had hould of in my
own-why thin-thin it wasn't-that's
all.
And maybe it wasn't mesilf that jist
died then outright wid the laffin', to
behold the little chap when he found
out that it wasn't the widdy at all at
all that he had hould of all the time,
but only Sir Pathrick O'Grandison. The
ould divil himself niver behild sich a
long face as he pet an! As for Sir
Pathrick O'Grandison, Barronitt, it
wasn't for the likes of his riverence to
658
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
be afther the minding of a thrifle of
a mistake. Ye may jist say, though
(for it's God's thruth), that afore I left
hould of the flipper of the spalpeen
(which was not till afther her leddy-
ship's futman had kicked us both down
the stares), I giv'd it such a nice little
broth of a squaze as made it all up
into raspberry jam.
"Woully wou," says he, "pully wou
says he "Cot tam!"
And that's jist the thruth of the
rason why he wears his lift hand in
a sling.
The Thousand-and-Second Tale of
Scheherazade
(First published in Godey's Lady's Book, February, 1845.-Ed.)
Truth is stranger than fiction-Old
Javing.
HAVING had occasion, lately, in the
course of some Oriental investigations,
to consult the "Tellmenow Isitsoornot,"
a work which (like the "Zohar” of Si-
meon Jochaides) is scarcely known at
all, even in Europe; and which has
never been quoted, to my knowledge,
by any American-if we except, per-
haps, the author of the "Curiosities of
American Literature";-having had oc-
casion, I say, to turn over some pages
of the first-mentioned very remarkable
work, I was not a little astonished to
discover that the literary world has
hitherto been strangely in error respect-
ing the fate of the vizier's daughter,
Scheherazade, as that fate is depicted
in the "Arabian Nights"; and that the
denouement there given, if not alto-
gether inaccurate, as far as it goes, is at
least to blame in not having gone very
much farther.
For full information on this interest-
ing topic, I must refer the inquisitive
reader to the "Isitsoornot" itself; but
in the meantime, I shall be pardoned
for giving a summary of what I there
discovered.
It will be remembered, that, in the
usual version of the tales, a certain
monarch having good cause to be jeal-
ous of his queen, not only puts her to
death, but makes a vow, by his beard
and the prophet, to espouse each night
the most beautiful maiden in his domin-
ions, and the next morning to deliver
her up to the executioner.
Having fulfilled this vow for many
years to the letter, and with a relig-
ious punctuality and method that con-
ferred great credit upon him as a man
of devout feeling and excellent sense,
he was interrupted one afternoon (no
doubt at his prayers) by a visit from
his grand vizier, to whose daughter, it
appears, there had occurred an idea.
Her name was Scheherazade, and her
idea was, that she would either redeem
the land from the depopulating tax
upon its beauty, or perish, after the
approved fashion of all heroines, in the
attempt.
Accordingly, and although we do not
find it to be leap-year (which makes the
sacrifice more meritorious), she deputes
her father, the grand vizier, to make an
offer to the king of her hand. This
hand the king eagerly accepts-(he had
intended to take it at all events, and
had put off the matter from day to day,
only through fear of the vizier),—but,
in accepting it now, he gives all parties
very distinctly to understand, that,
grand vizier or no grand vizier, he has
not the slightest design of giving up
one iota of his vow or of his privileges.
When, therefore, the fair Scheherazade
659
660
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
insisted upon marrying the king, and
did actually marry him despite her
father's excellent advice not to do any
thing of the kind-when she would and
did marry him, I say, will I, nill I, it
was with her beautiful black eyes as
thoroughly open as the nature of the
case would allow.
It seems, however, that this politic
damsel (who had been reading Machi-
avelli, beyond doubt), had a very in-
genious little plot in her mind. On the
night of the wedding, she contrived,
upon I forget what specious pretence,
to have her sister occupy a couch suf-
ficiently near that of the royal pair to
admit of easy conversation from bed
to bed; and, a little before cock-crow-
ing, she took care to awaken the good
monarch, her husband (who bore her
none the worse will because he intended
to wring her neck on the morrow),—
she managed to awaken him, I say, (al-
though on account of a capital con-
science and an easy digestion, he slept
well,) by the profound interest of a
story (about a rat and a black cat, I
think) which she was narrating (all in
an undertone, of course) to her sister.
When the day broke, it so happened
that this history was not altogether fin-
ished, and that Scheherazade, in the na-
ture of things could not finish it just
then, since it was high time for her to
get up and be bowstrung-a thing very
little more pleasant than hanging, only
a trifle more genteel!
The king's curiosity, however, pre-
vailing, I am sorry to say, even over
his sound religious principles, induced
him for this once to postpone the ful-
filment of his vow until next morning,
for the purpose and with the hope of
hearing that night how it fared in the
end with the black cat (a black cat, I
think it was) and the rat.
The night having arrived, however,
the lady Scheherazade not only put the
finishing stroke to the black cat and
the rat (the rat was blue) but before
she well knew what she was about.
found herself deep in the intricacies of
a narration, having reference (if I am
not altogether mistaken) to a pink horse
(with green wings) that went, in a vio-
lent manner, by clockwork, and was
wound up with an indigo key. With
this history the king was even more pro-
foundly interested than with the other
-and, as the day broke before its con-
clusion (notwithstanding all the queen's
endeavors to get through with it in time
for the bowstringing), there was again
no resource but to postpone that cere-
mony as before, for twenty-four hours.
The next night there happened a simi-
lar accident with a similar result; and
then the next-and then again the next;
so that, in the end, the good monarch
having been unavoidably deprived of
all opportunity to keep his vow during
a period of no less than one thousand
and one nights, either forgets it alto-
gether by the expiration of this time,
or gets himself absolved of it in the
regular way, or (what is more prob-
able) breaks it outright, as well as the
head of his father confessor. At al
events, Scheherazade, who, being lin-
eally descended from Eve, fell heir, per-
haps, to the whole seven baskets of talk.
which the latter lady, we all know.
picked up from under the trees in the
garden of Eden; Scheherazade, I say,
finally triumphed, and the tariff uper
beauty was repealed.
Now, this conclusion (which is tha:
of the story as we have it upon record)
THE THOUSAND AND SECOND TALE OF SCHEHERAZADE
661
is, no doubt, excessively proper and
pleasant-but alas! like a great many
pleasant things, is more pleasant than
true; and I am indebted altogether to
the "Isitsoornot" for the means of cor-
recting the error. "Le mieux," says a
French proverb, “est l'ennemi du bien,"
and, in mentioning that Scheherazade
had inherited the seven baskets of talk,
I should have added that she put them
out at compound interest until they
amounted to seventy-seven.
"My dear sister," said she, on the
thousand-and-second night, (I quote the
language of the "Isitsoornot" at this
point, verbatim) "my dear sister," said
she, "now that all this little difficulty
about the bowstring has blown over,
and that this odious tax is so happily
repealed, I feel that I have been guilty
of great indiscretion in withholding
from you and the king (who I am sorry
to say, snores-a thing no gentleman
would do) the full conclusion of Sin-
bad the sailor. This person went
through numerous other and more in-
teresting adventures than those which
I related; but the truth is, I felt sleepy
on the particular night of their narra-
tion, and so was seduced into cutting
them short-a grievous piece of miscon-
duct, for which I only trust that Allah
will forgive me. But even yet it is not
too late to remedy my great neglect-
and as soon as I have given the king
a pinch or two in order to wake him
up so far that he may stop making that
horrible noise, I will forthwith enter-
tain you (and him if he pleases) with
the sequel of this very remarkable
story."
Hereupon the sister of Scheherazade,
as I have it from the "Isitsoornot," ex-
pressed no very particular intensity of
gratification; but the king, having been.
sufficiently pinched, at length ceased
snoring, and finally said, "Hum!" and
then "Hoo!" when the queen, under-
standing these words (which are no
doubt Arabic) to signify that he was all
attention, and would do his best not to
snore any more-the queen, I say, hav-
ing arranged these matters to her sat-
isfaction, re-entered thus, at once, into
the history of Sinbad the sailor:
“‘At length, in my old age' (these are
the words of Sinbad himself, as retailed
by Scheherazade)-'at length, in my
old age, and after enjoying many years
of tranquility at home, I became once
more possessed of a desire of visiting
foreign countries; and one day, without
acquainting any of my family with my
design, I packed up some bundles of
such merchandise as was most precious
and least bulky, and, engaging a porter
to carry them, went with him down to
the sea-shore, to await the arrival of
any chance vessel that might convey
me out of the kingdom into some region
which I had not as yet explored.
66
'Having deposited the packages
upon the sands, we sat down beneath
some trees, and looked out into the
ocean in the hope of perceiving a ship,
but during several hours we saw none
whatever. At length I fancied that I
could hear a singular buzzing or hum-
ming sound-and the porter, after lis-
tening awhile, declared that he also
could distinguish it. Presently it grew
louder, and then still louder, so that we
could have no doubt that the object
which caused it was approaching us. At
length, on the edge of the horizon, we
discovered a black speck, which rapidly
increased in size until we made it out
to be a vast monster, swimming with a
662
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
great part of its body above the sur-
face of the sea. It came toward us
with inconceivable swiftness, throwing
up huge waves of foam around its
breast, and illuminating all that part of
the sea through which it passed, with
a long line of fire that extended far off
into the distance.
"As the thing drew near we saw it
very distinctly. Its length was equal
to that of three of the loftiest trees
that grow, and it was as wide as the
great hall of audience in your palace,
O most sublime and munificent of the
caliphs. Its body, which was unlike
that of ordinary fishes, was as solid as
a rock, and of a jetty blackness through-
out all that portion of it which floated
above the water with the exception of
a narrow blood-red streak that com-
pletely begirdled it. The belly, which
floated beneath the surface, and of
which we could get only a glimpse now
and then as the monster rose and fell
with the billows, was entirely covered
with metallic scales, of a color like that
of the moon in misty weather. The
back was flat and nearly white, and
from it there extended upwards of six
spines, about half the length of the
whole body.
'This horrible creature had no
mouth that we could perceive; but, as
if to make up for this deficiency, it was
provided with at least four score of
eyes, that protruded from their sockets
like those of the green dragon-fly, and
were arranged all around the body in
two rows, one above the other, and par-
allel to the blood-red streak, which
seemed to answer the purpose of an
eyebrow. Two or three of these dread-
ful eyes were much larger than the
others, and had the appearance of solid
gold.
"Although this beast approached us,
as I have before said, with the greatest
rapidity, it must have been moved al-
together by necromancy-for it had
neither fins like a fish nor web-feet like
a duck, nor wings like the seashell
which is blown along in the manner of
a vessel; nor yet did it writhe itself
forward as do the eels. Its head and its
tail were shaped precisely alike, only,
not far from the latter, were two small
holes that served for nostrils, and
through which the monster puffed out
its thick breath with prodigious vio-
lence, and with a shrieking, disagreeable
noise.
"Our terror at beholding this hide-
ous thing was very great, but it was
even surpassed by our astonishment,
when upon getting a nearer look, we
perceived upon the creature's back a
vast number of animals about the size
and shape of men, and altogether much
resembling them, except that they wore
no garments (as men do), being sup-
plied (by nature, no doubt,) with an
ugly uncomfortable covering, a good
deal like cloth, but fitting so tight to
the skin, as to render the poor wretches
laughably awkward, and put them ap-
parently to severe pain. On the very
tips of their heads were certain square-
looking boxes, which, at first sight, I
thought might have been intended to
answer as turbans, but I soon discovered
that they were excessively heavy and
solid, and I therefore concluded they
were contrivances designed, by their
great weight, to keep the heads of the
animals steady and safe upon their
shoulders. Around the necks of the
creatures were fastened black collars,
THE THOUSAND AND SECOND TALE OF SCHEHERAZADE
663
(badges of servitude, no doubt,) such
as we keep on our dogs, only much
wider and infinitely stiffer-so that it
was quite impossible for these poor vic-
tims to move their heads in any direc-
tion without moving the body at the
same time; and thus they were doomed
to perpetual contemplation of their
noses a view puggish and snubby in a
wonderful if not positively in an awful
degree.
"When the monster had nearly
reached the shore where we stood, it
suddenly pushed out one of its eyes to
a great extent, and emitted from it a
terrible flash of fire, accompanied by a
dense cloud of smoke, and a noise that
I can compare to nothing but thunder.
As the smoke cleared away, we saw one
of the odd man-animals standing near
the head of the large beast with a trump-
et in his hand, through which (putting
it to his mouth) he presently addressed
us in loud, harsh, and disagreeable ac-
cents, that, perhaps, we should have
mistaken for language, had they not
come altogether through the nose.
"Being thus evidently spoken to, I
was at a loss how to reply, as I could
in no manner understand what was said;
and in this difficulty I turned to the por-
ter, who was near swooning through af-
fright, and demanded of him his opinion
as to what species of monster it was,
what it wanted, and what kind of crea-
tures those were that so swarmed upon
its back. To this the porter replied, as
well as he could for trepidation, that
he had once before heard of this sea-
beast; that it was a cruel demon, with
bowels of sulphur and blood of fire, cre-
ated by evil genii as the means of in-
flicting misery upon mankind; that the
things upon its back were vermin, such
as sometimes infest cats and dogs, only
a little larger and more savage; and that
these vermin had their uses, however
evil-for, through the torture they
caused the beast by their nibblings and
stingings, it was goaded into that de-
gree of wrath which was requisite to
make it roar and commit ill, and so ful-
fil the vengeful and malicious designs
of the wicked genii.
"This account determined me to take
to my heels, and, without once even
looking behind me, I ran at full speed
up into the hills, while the porter ran
equally fast, although nearly in an op-
posite direction, so that, by these means,
he finally made his escape with my
bundles, of which I have no doubt he
took excellent care-although this is a
point I cannot determine, as I do not
remember that I ever beheld him again.
"For myself, I was so hotly pur-
sued by a swarm of the men-vermin
(who had come to the shore in boats)
that I was very soon overtaken, bound
hand and foot, and conveyed to the
beast, which immediately swam
again into the middle of the sea.
out
""I now bitterly repented my folly in
quitting a comfortable home to peril
my life in such adventures as this; but
regret being useless, I made the best
of my condition, and exerted myself to
secure the good-will of the man-animal
that owned the trumpet, and who ap-
peared to exercise authority over his fel-
lows. I succeeded so well in this en-
deavor that, in a few days, the creature
bestowed upon me various tokens of his
favor, and in the end even went to the
trouble of teaching me the rudiments
of what it was vain enough to denom-
inate its language; so that, at length, I
was enabled to converse with it readily,
664
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
and came to make it comprehend the
ardent desire I had of seeing the world.
""Washish squashish squeak, Sinbad,
heydiddle diddle, grunt unt grumble,
hiss, fiss, whiss,' said he to me, one day
after dinner-but I beg a thousand par-
dons, I had forgotten that your maj-
esty is not conversant with the dialect
of the Cock-neighs (so the man-animals
were called; I presume because their
language formed the connecting link be-
tween that of the horse and that of the
rooster). With your permission, I will
translate. 'Washish squashish,' and so
forth: that is to say, 'I am happy to
find, my dear Sinbad, that you are really
a very excellent fellow; we are now
about doing a thing which is called cir-
cumnavigating the globe; and since you
are so desirous of seeing the world, I
will strain a point and give you a free
passage upon the back of the beast.'"
When the Lady Scheherazade had
proceeded thus far, relates the "Isitsoor-
not," the king turned over from his left
side to his right, and said:
"It is, in fact, very surprising, my
dear queen, that you omitted, hitherto,
these latter adventures of Sinbad. Do
you know I think them exceedingly en-
tertaining and strange?"
The king having thus expressed him-
self, we are told, the fair Scheherazade
resumed her history in the following
words:
"Sinbad went on in this manner with
his narrative-'I thanked the man-ani-
mal for its kindness, and soon found
myself very much at home on the beast,
which swam at a prodigious rate through
the ocean; although the surface of the
latter is, in that part of the world, by
no means flat, but round like a pome-
granate, so that we went-so to say-
either up hill or down hill all the
time.'"
"That, I think, was very singular,"
interrupted the king.
"Nevertheless, it is quite true," re-
plied Scheherazade.
"I have my doubts," rejoined the
king; "but, pray, be so good as to go
on with the story."
"I will," said the queen. ""The
beast,' continued Sinbad, 'swam, as I
have related, up hill and down hill, un-
til, at length, we arrived at an island.
many hundreds of miles in circumfer
ence, but which, nevertheless, had been
built in the middle of the sea by a
colony of little things like caterpil
lars.'"*
"Hum!" said the king.
66
'Leaving this island,' said Sinbad-
(for Scheherazade, it must be under-
stood, took no notice of her husband's
ill-mannered ejaculation)-leaving this
island, we came to another where the
forests were of solid stone, and so hard
that they shivered to pieces the fines-
tempered axes with which we endeav-
ored to cut them down." "+
"Hum!" said the king, again; bu
Scheherazade, paying him no attention.
continued in the language of Sinbad.
"L
'Passing beyond this last island, we
reached a country where there was a
cave that ran to the distance of thirty
or forty miles within the bowels of the
earth, and that contained a greater num
ber of far more spacious and more mag-
nificent palaces than are to be found
in all Damascus and Bagdad. From the
*The coralites..
"One of the most remarkable nat-
ural curiosities in Texas is a petrified
forest, near the head of Pasigno river.
THE THOUSAND AND SECOND TALE OF SCHEHERAZADE
665
ofs of these palaces there hung myr-
ds of gems, like diamonds, but larger
an men; and in among the streets of
wers and pyramids and temples, there
owed immense rivers as black as
Dony, and swarming with fish that had
› eyes.'
"Hum!" said the king.
“‘We then swam into a region of the
a where we found a lofty mountain,
>wn whose sides there streamed tor-
nts of melted metal, some of which
ere twelve miles wide and sixty miles
ng;† while from an abyss on the sum-
it, issued so vast a quantity of ashes
at the sun was entirely blotted out
om the heavens, and it became darker
an the darkest midnight; so that
hen we were even at the distance of
hundred and fifty miles from the
ountain, it was impossible to see the
hitest object, however close we held it
our eyes.' "
"Hum!" said the king.
"After quitting this coast, the beast
ntinued his voyage until we met with
land in which the nature of things
emed reversed-for we here saw a
eat lake, at the bottom of which, more
an a hundred feet beneath the surface
the water, there flourished in full leaf
forest of tall and luxuriant trees." "§
* The Mammoth Cave of Kentucky.
f In Iceland, 1783.
"During the eruption of Hecla, in
66, clouds of this kind produced such
degree of darkness that, at Glaumba,
nich is more than fifty leagues from
e mountain, people could only find
eir way by groping.
"In the year 1790, in the Caraccas
ring an earthquake a portion of the
anite soil sank and left a lake eight
"Hoo!" said the king.
"Proceeding still in the same direc-
tion, we presently arrived at the most
magnificent region in the whole world.
Through it there meandered a glorious
river for several thousands of miles.
This river was of unspeakable depth,
of amber. It was from three to six
miles in width; and its banks which
arose on either side to twelve hundred
feet in perpendicular height, were
crowned with ever-blossoming trees, and
perpetual sweet-scented flowers, that
made the whole territory one gorgeous
garden; but the name of this luxuriant
land was the Kingdom of Horror, and
to enter it was inevitable death.'"*
"Humph!" said the king.
"We left this kingdom in great haste
and, after some days, came to another,
where we were astonished to perceive
myriads of monstrous animals with
horns resembling scythes upon their
heads. These hideous beasts dig for
themselves vast caverns in the soil, of a
funnel shape, and line the sides of them
with rocks, so disposed one upon the
other that they fall instantly, when
trodden upon by other animals, thus
precipitating them into the monster's
dens, where their blood is immediately
sucked, and their carcasses afterwards
hurled contemptuously out to an im-
mense distance from "the caverns of
death."'"+
"Pooh!" said the king.
hundred yards in diameter, and from
eighty to a hundred feet deep. It was
a part of the forest of Aripao which
sank, and the trees remained green for
several months under the water."
*The region of the Niger.
The Myrmeleon-lion-ant.
666
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"Continuing our progress, we per-
ceived a district with vegetables that
grew not upon any soil, but in the air.*
There were others that sprang from the
substance of other vegetables; † others
that derived their substance from the
bodies of living animals; and then
again, there were others that glowed all
over with intense fire;§ others that
moved from place to place at pleasure,
and what was still more wonderful, we
discovered flowers that lived and
breathed and moved their limbs at will,
and had, moreover, the detestable pas-
sion of mankind for enslaving other
creatures, and confining them in horrid
and solitary prisons until the fulfillment
of appointed tasks.'"¶
"Pshaw!" said the king.
"Quitting this land, we soon arrived
at another in which the bees and the
birds are mathematicians of such genius
and erudition, that they give daily in-
structions in the science of geometry to
the wise men of the empire. The king
of the place having offered a reward
for the solution of two very difficult
problems, they were solved upon the
spot-the one by the bees, and the other
by the birds; but the king keeping their
solution a secret, it was only after the
most profound researches and labor,
and the writing of an infinity of big
*The Epidendron, Flos Aeris, of the
family of the Orchidea.
The Parasites, such as the wonder-
ful Rafflesia Arnaldii.
The Planta Epizoœ. Of this class
are the Fuci and Algœ.
§ In mines and natural caves we find
a species of cryptogamous fungus that
emits an intense phosphorescence.
¶ Aristolachia Clematitis.
books, during a long series of years, that
the men-mathematicians at length ar
rived at the identical solutions which
had been given upon the spot by the
bees and by the birds.'"*
"Oh my!" said the king.
66
'We had scarcely lost sight of this
empire when we found ourselves close
upon another, from whose shores there
flew over our heads a flock of fowls a
mile in breadth, and two hundred and
forty miles long; so that although they
flew a mile during every minute, it re
quired no less than four hours for the
whole flock to pass over us-in which
there were several millions of millions
of fowl.'"+
"Oh fy!" said the king.
"No sooner had we got rid of these
birds, which occasioned us great annoy
ance, than we were terrified by the ap-
pearance of a fowl of another kind, and
infinitely larger than even the roc
which I met in my former voyages; for
it was bigger than the biggest of the
domes on your seraglio, oh, most Mu
nificent of Caliphs. This terrible fol
had no head that we could perceive, tu
*The bees-ever since bees were
have been constructing their cells with
just such sides, in just such number,
and at just such inclinations, as it has
been demonstrated (in a problem in
volving the profoundest mathematical
principles) are the very sides, in the
very number, and at the very angles
which will afford the creatures the most
room that is compatible with the great
est stability of structure. The wind
mill and the aeroplane are constructed
by observation of bird-flight.
A flight of pigeons described in
book of travels.
THE THOUSAND AND SECOND TALE OF SCHEHERAZADE
667
was fashioned entirely of belly, which
was of a prodigious fatness and round-
ness, of a soft-looking substance,
smooth, shining and striped with va-
rious colors. In its talons, the monster
was bearing away to his eyrie in the
heavens, a house from which it had
knocked off the roof, and in the interior
of which we distinctly saw human be-
ings, who, beyond doubt, were in a
state of frightful despair at the horrible
fate which awaited them. We shouted
with all our might, in the hope of
frightening the bird into letting go of
its prey; but it merely gave a snort or
puff, as if of rage and then let fall upon
our heads a heavy sack which proved to
be filled with sand!'"
"Stuff!" said the king.
"It was just after this adventure
that we encountered a continent of im-
mense extent and prodigious solidity,
but which, nevertheless, was supported
entirely upon the back of a sky-blue
cow that had no fewer than four hun-
dred horns.'"*
"That, now, I believe," said the king,
"because I have read something of the
kind before, in a book."
"We passed immediately beneath this
continent, swimming in between the
legs of the cow, and, after some hours,
found ourselves in a wonderful country
indeed, which, I was informed by the
man-animal, was his own native land,
inhabited by things of his own species.
This elevated the man-animal very
much in my esteem, and in fact, I now
began to feel ashamed of the contempt-
uous familiarity with which I had
"The earth is upheld by a cow of
a blue color, having horns four hun-
dred in number."-Sale's Koran.
treated him; for I found that the man-
animals in general were a nation of the
most powerful magicians, who lived with
worms in their brain,* which, no doubt,
served to stimulate them by their pain-
ful writhings and wrigglings to the most
miraculous efforts of imagination.''
"Nonsense!" said the king.
"Among the magicians, were domes-
ticated several animals of very singu-
lar kinds; for example, there was a huge
horse whose bones were iron and whose
blood was boiling water. In place of
corn, he had black stones for his usual
food; and yet, in spite of so hard a
diet, he was so strong and swift that
he could drag a load more weighty than
the grandest temple in this city, at a
rate surpassing that of the flight of
most birds.'
"""
"Twattle!" said the king.
"I saw, also, among those people a
hen without feathers, but bigger than a
camel; instead of flesh and bone she
had iron and brick; her blood, like that
of the horse, (to whom, in fact, she was
nearly related,) was boiling water; and
like him she ate nothing but wood or
black stones. This hen brought forth
very frequently, a hundred chickens in
the day; and, after birth, they took up
their residence for several weeks with-
in the stomach of their mother." "+
"Fal lal!" said the king.
66
'One of this nation of mighty con-
jurors created a man out of brass and
wood, and leather, and endowed him
with such ingenuity that he would have
*The Entozoa, or intestinal worms,
have repeatedly been observed in the
muscles, and in the cerebral substance
of men.
+ The Eccalobeion.
668
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
beaten at chess, all the race of mankind
with the exception of the great Caliph,
Haroun Alraschid.* Another of these
magi constructed (of like material) a
creature that put to shame even the
genius of him who made it; for so great
were its reasoning powers that, in a
second, it performed calculations of so
vast an extent that they would have re-
quired the united labor of fifty thousand
fleshy men for a year. But a still more
wonderful conjuror fashioned for him-
self a mighty thing that was neither
man nor beast, but which had brains
of lead, intermixed with a black matter
like pitch, and fingers that employed
with such incredible speed and dexterity
that it would have had no trouble in
writing out twenty thousand copies of
the Koran in an hour; and this with so
exquisite a precision, that in all the
copies there should not be found one
to vary from another by the breadth
of the finest hair. This thing was of
prodigious strength, so that it erected
or overthrew the mightiest empires at a
breath; but its powers were exercised
equally for evil and for good.""
"Ridiculous!" said the king.
"Among this nation of necroman-
cers there was also one who had in his
veins the blood of the salamanders; for
he made no scruple of sitting down to
smoke his chibouc in a red-hot oven un-
til his dinner was thoroughly roasted
upon its floor. Another had the fac-
ulty of converting the common metals
into gold, without even looking at them
*Maelzel's Automaton Chess-player.
+ Babbage's Calculating Machine.
Chabert, and since him, a hundred
others.
during the process.* Another had such
a delicacy of touch that he made a wire
so fine as to be invisible.† Another had
such quickness of perception that he
counted all the separate motions of an
elastic body, while it was springing
backward and forward at the rate of
nine hundred millions of times in a
second." "+
"Absurd!" said the king.
"Another of these magicians by
means of a fluid that nobody ever ye
saw, could make the corpses of his
friends brandish their arms, kick out
their legs, fight, or even get up and
dance at his will.§ Another had culti
vated his voice to so great an extent
that he could have made himself heard
from one end of the world to the
other. Another had so long an arm
that he could sit down in Damascus and
indite a letter at Bagdad-or indeed at
any distance whatsoever. Another
commanded the lightning to come down
to him out of the heavens, and it came
at his call; and served him for a play-
thing when it came. Another took two
* The Electrotype.
+ Wollaston made of platinum for the
field of views in a telescope a wire one
eighteen-thousandth part of an inch in
thickness.
Newton demonstrated that the ret
ina beneath the influence of the violet
ray of the spectrum, vibrated 900,000-
000 of times in a second.
§ The Voltaic pile.
The Electro Telegraph Printing Ap
paratus.
The Electro telegraph transmits in-
telligence instantaneously-at least so
far as regards any distance upon the
earth.
THE THOUSAND AND SECOND TALE OF SCHEHERAZADE
669
oud sounds and out of them made a
silence. Another constructed a deep
darkness out of two brilliant lights.*
Another made ice in a red-hot furnace.
Another directed the sun to paint his
portrait, and the sun did. Another
ook this luminary with the moon and
he planets, and having first weighed
hem with scrupulous accuracy, probed
nto their depths and found out the
solidity of the substance of which they
ire made. But the whole nation is,
ndeed, of so surprising a necromantic
ability, that not even their infants, nor
heir commonest cats and dogs have any
difficulty in seeing objects that do not
exist at all, or that for twenty millions
of years before the birth of the nation
itself had been blotted out from the
face of creation." "+
"Preposterous!" said the king.
""The wives and daughters of these
incomparably great and wise magi,""
continued Scheherazade, without being
in any manner disturbed by these fre-
* Common experiments in Natural
Philosophy.
+ The Daguerreotype.
Although light travels 167,000 miles
in a second, the distance of 61 Cygni
(the only star whose distance is ascer-
tained) is so inconceivably great, that
its rays would require more than ten
years to reach. For stars beyond this,
20 or even 1000 years-would be a
moderate estimate. Thus, if they had
been annihilated 20, or 1000 years ago,
we might still see them to-day by the
light which started from their surfaces
20 or 1000 years in the past time. That
many which we see daily are really ex-
tinct, is not impossible-not even im-
probable.
quent and most ungentlemanly inter-
ruptions on the part of her husband-
"the wives and daughters of these em-
inent conjurers are every thing that is
accomplished and refined; and would
be every thing that is interesting and
beautiful, but for an unhappy fatality
that besets them, and from which not
even the miraculous powers of their
husbands and fathers has, hitherto, been
adequate to save. Some fatalities come
in certain shapes, and some in others—
but this of which I speak has come in
the shape of a crotchet.'
999
"A what?" said the king.
"A crotchet,' said Scheherazade.
"One of the evil genii, who are per-
petually upon the watch to inflict ill,
has put it into the heads of these ac-
complished ladies that the thing which
we describe as personal beauty consists
altogether in the protuberance of the
region which lies not very far below the
small of the back. Perfection of love-
liness, they say, is in the direct ratio
of the extent of this lump. Having
been long possessed of this idea, and
bolsters being cheap in that country, the
days have long gone by since it was
possible to distinguish a woman from a
dromedary-'"
"Stop!" said the king-"I can't stand
that, and I won't. You have already
given me a dreadful headache with your
lies. The day, too, I perceive, is be-
ginning to break. How long have we
been married?-my conscience is getting
to be troublesome again. And then that
dromedary touch-do you take me for
a fool? Upon the whole, you might
as well get up and be throttled."
These words, as I learn from the
"Isitsoornot," both grieved and aston-
ished Scheherazade; but, as she knew
670
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
the king to be a man of scrupulous in-
tegrity, and quite unlikely to forfeit his
word, she submitted to her fate with
a good grace. She derived, however,
great consolation, (during the tighten-
ing of the bowstring,) from the reflec-
tion that much of the history remained
still untold, and that the petulance of
her brute of a husband had reaped for
him a most righteous reward, in de-
priving him of many inconceivable ac
ventures.
A Tale of Jerusalem
(First published in Southern Literary Messenger, April, 1836-Ed.)
Intensos rigidam in frontem ascendere
canos passus erat-
-a bristly bore.
-LUCAN.
Translation.
"LET us hurry to the walls," said
Abel-Phittim to Buzi-Ben-Levi and Si-
meon the Pharisee, on the tenth day of
the month Thammuz, in the year of the
world three thousand nine hundred and
forty-one "let us hasten to the ram-
parts adjoining the gate of Benjamin,
which is in the city of David, and over-
looking the camp of the uncircumcised;
for it is the last hour of the fourth
watch, being sunrise; and the idolaters,
in fulfilment of the promise of Pom-
pey, should be awaiting us with the
lambs for the sacrifices."
Simeon, Abel-Phittim, and Buzi-Ben-
Levi, were the Gizbarim, or sub-collec-
tors of the offering, in the holy city of
Jerusalem.
"Verily," replied the Pharisee, “let
us hasten: for this generosity in the
heathen is unwonted; and fickle-mind-
edness has ever been an attribute of
the worshippers of Baal."
"That they are fickle-minded and
treacherous is as true as the Penta-
teuch," said Buzi-Ben-Levi, "but that
is only toward the people of Adonai.
When was it ever known that the Am-
monites proved wanting to their own
interests? Methinks it is no grea:
stretch of generosity to allow us lambs
for the altar of the Lord, receiving in
lieu thereof thirty silver shekels pe:
head!"
"Thou forgettest, however, Ben-
Levi," replied Abel-Phittim, "that the
Roman Pompey, who is now impiously
besieging the city of the Most High, has
no assurity that we apply not the lambs
thus purchased for the altar, to the
sustenance of the body, rather than of
the spirit."
"Now, by the five corners of my
beard!" shouted the Pharisee, who be
longed to the sect called The Dashers
(that little knot of saints whose manner
of dashing and lacerating the feet
against the pavement was long a thor
and a reproach to less zealous devotees
-a stumbling-block to less gifted per-!
ambulators)-"by the five corners of
that beard which, as a priest, I am for-
bidden to shave!-have we lived to see
the day when a blaspheming and idola-
trous upstart of Rome shall accuse us
of appropriating to the appetites of the
flesh the most holy and consecrated ele-
ments? Have we lived to see the day
when-"
"Let us not question the motives of
A TALE OF JERUSALEM
671
the Philistine," interrupted Abel-Phit-
tim, "for to-day we profit for the first
time by his avarice or by his generosity;
but rather let us hurry to the ramparts,
lest offerings should be wanting for that
altar whose fire the rains of heaven can-
not extinguish, and whose pillars of
smoke no tempest can turn aside."
That part of the city to which our
worthy Gizbarin now hastened, and
which bore the name of its architect,
King David, was esteemed the most
strongly fortified district of Jerusalem;
being situated upon the steep and lofty
hill of Zion. Here, a broad, deep, cir-
cumvallatory trench, hewn from the
solid rock, was defended by a wall of
great strength erected upon its inner
edge. This wall was adorned, at reg-
ular interspaces, by square towers of
white marble; the lowest sixty, and the
highest one hundred and twenty cubits
in height. But, in the vicinity of the
gate of Benjamin, the wall arose by no
means from the margin of the fosse. On
the contrary, between the level of the
ditch and the basement of the rampart,
sprang up a perpendicular cliff of two
hundred and fifty cubits, forming part
of the precipitous Mount Moriah. So
that when Simeon and his associates ar-
rived on the summit of the tower called
Adoni-Bezek-the loftiest of all the
turrets around about Jerusalem, and the
usual place of conference with the be-
sieging army-they looked down upon
the camp of the enemy from an em-
inence excelling by many feet that of
the Pyramid of Cheops, and, by several,
that of the temple of Belus.
"Verily," sighed the Pharisee, as he
peered dizzily over the precipice, "the
uncircumcised are as the sands by the
seashore-as the locusts in the wilder-
ness! The valley of the King hath be-
come the valley of Adommin.”
"And yet," added Ben-Levi, "thou
canst not point me out a Philistine-no,
not one-from Aleph to Tau-from the
wilderness to the battlements-who
seemeth any bigger than the letter Jod!"
"Lower away the basket with the
shekels of silver!" here shouted a Ro-
man soldier in a hoarse, rough voice,
which appeared to issue from the re-
gions of Pluto-"lower away the basket
with the accursed coin which it has
broken the jaw of a noble Roman to
pronounce! Is it thus you evince your
gratitude to our master Pompeius, who,
in his condescension, has thought fit to
listen to your idolatrous importunities?
The god Phoebus, who is a true god,
has been charioted for an hour-and
were you not to be on the ramparts by
sunrise? Aedepol! do you think that
we, the conquerors of the world, have
nothing better to do than stand waiting
by the walls of every kennel, to traf-
fic with the dogs of the earth? Lower
away! I say and see that your trum-
pery be bright in color and just in
weight!"
"El Elohim!" ejaculated the Phari-
see, as the discordant tones of the cen-
turion rattled up the crags of the preci-
pice, and fainted away against the
temple "El Elohim!-who is the God
Phoebus?-whom doth the blasphemer
invoke? Thou, Buzi-Ben-Levi! who art
read in the laws of the Gentiles, and
hast sojourned among them who dabble
with the Teraphim!-is it Nergal of
whom the idolater speaketh?—or Ashi-
mah?-cr-Nibhaz?-or Tartak?-or
Adramalech? or Anamalech?-or Suc-
coth-Benith? or Dagon?-or Belial?—
672
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
or Baal-Perith?
Baal-Zebub?"
-
or Baal-Peor?
―
or
"Verily it is neither-but beware how
thou lettest the rope slip too rapidly
through thy fingers; for should the
wicker-work chance to hang on the pro-
jection of yonder crag, there will be a
woful outpouring of the holy things of
the sanctuary."
By the assistance of some rudely con-
structed machinery, the heavily laden
basket was now carefully lowered down
among the multitude; and, from the
giddy pinnacle, the Romans were seen
gathering confusedly round it; but ow-
ing to the vast height and the preva-
lence of a fog, no distinct view of their
operations could be obtained.
Half an hour had already elapsed.
"We shall be too late!" sighed the
Pharisee, as at the expiration of this
period, he looked over into the abyss-
"we shall be too late! we shall be
turned out of office by the Katholim."
"No more," responded Abel-Phittim,
-"no more shall we feast upon the fat
of the land-no longer shall our beards
be odorous with frank-incense-our
loins girded up with fine linen from the
Temple."
"Raca!" swore Ben-Levi, "Raca! do
they mean to defraud us of the pur-
chase money? or, Holy Moses! are they
weighing the shekels of the tabernacle?"
"They have given the signal at last!"
cried the Pharisee "they have given
the signal at last!-pull away, Abel-
Phittim!-and thou, Buzi-Ben-Levi, pull
away!-for verily the Philistines have
either still hold upon the basket, or the
Lord hath softened their hearts to
place therein a beast of good weight!||
And the Gizbarim pulled away, while
their burthen swung heavily upward
through the still increasing mist.
*
*
*
*
"Booshoh he!"-as, at the conclusion
of an hour, some object at the extrem-
ity of the rope became indistinctly vis-
ible "Booshoh he!" was the exclama-
tion which burst from the lips of Ben-
Levi.
"Booshoh he!-for shame!-it is a
ram from the thickets of Engedi, and
as rugged as the valley of Jehosaphat!"
"It is a firstling of the flock," said
Abel-Phittim, "I know him by the
bleating of his lips, and the innocen:
folding of his limbs. His eyes are more
beautiful than the jewels of the Pec-
toral, and his flesh is like the honey of
Hebron."
"It is a fatted calf from the pastures
of Bashan," said the Pharisee, "the hea
then have dealt wonderfully with us!-
let us raise up our voices in a psalm!-
let us give thanks on the shawm and on
the psaltery-on the harp and on the
huggab on the cythern and on the
sack-but!"
It was not until the basket had a-
rived within a few feet of the Gizbarin,
that a low grunt betrayed to their pe
ception a hog of no common size.
"Now El Emanu!" slowly, and with
upturned eyes ejaculated the trio, as,
letting go their hold, the emancipated
porker tumbled headlong among the
Philistines, “El Emanu!-God be with
us-it is the unutterable flesh!”
Four Beasts in One
(Four Beasts in One is also titled Epimanes and first appeared in Southern
Literary Messenger, March, 1836.-Ed.)
Chacun a ses vertus.
-Crebillon's Xerxes.
ANTIOCHUS EPIPHANES is very gen-
erally looked upon as the Gog of the
prophet Ezekiel. This honor is, how-
ever, more properly attributable to
Cambyses, the son of Cyrus. And,
indeed the character of the Syrian
monarch does by no means stand in
need of any adventitious embellishment.
His accession to the throne, or rather
his usurpation of the sovereignty, a hun-
dred and seventy-one years before the
coming of Christ; his attempt to plun-
der the temple of Diana at Ephesus;
his implacable hostility to the Jews;
his pollution of the Holy of Holies; and
his miserable death at Taba, after a
tumultuous reign of eleven years, are
circumstances of a prominent kind, and
therefore more generally noticed by the
historians of his time than the impious,
dastardly, cruel, silly, and whimsical
achievements which make up the sum
total of his private life and reputation.
*
*
*
*
Let us suppose, gentle reader, that it
is now the year of the world three thou-
sand eight hundred and thirty, and let
us, for a few minutes, imagine ourselves
at that most grotesque habitatior of
man, the remarkable city of Antioch.
To be sure there were, in Syria and
other countries, sixteen cities of that
appellation, besides the one to which
I more particularly allude.
is that which went by the
But ours
name of
Antiochia Epidaphne, from its vicinity
to the little village of Daphne, where
stood a temple to that divinity. It was
built (although about this matter there
is some dispute) by Seleucus Nicanor,
the first king of the country after Alex-
ander the Great, in memory of his
father Antiochus, and became immedi-
ately the residence of the Syrian mon-
archy. In the flourishing times of the
Roman Empire it was the ordinary
station of the prefect of the eastern
provinces; and many of the emperors
of the Queen city (among whom may
be mentioned, especially, Verus and
Valens) spent here the greater part of
their time. But I perceive we have
arrived at the city itself. Let us ascend
this battlement, and throw our eyes
upon the town and neighboring country.
"What broad and rapid river is that
which forces its way, with innumerable
falls, through the mountainous wilder-
ness, and finally through the wilderness
of buildings?"
That is the Orontes, and it is the only
water in sight, with the exception of
the Mediterranean, which stretches,
like a broad mirror, about twelve miles
off to the southward. Every one has
seen the Mediterranean; but let me tell
you, there are few who have had a peep
at Antioch. By few, I mean, few who,
like you and me, have had, at the same
time, the advantages of a modern edu-
cation. Therefore cease to regard that
sea, and give your whole attention to
the mass of houses that lie beneath us.
673
674
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
You will remember that it is now the
year of the world three thousand eight
hundred and thirty. Were it later-
for example, were it the year of our
Lord eighteen hundred and forty-five-
we should be deprived of this extraordi-
nary spectacle. In the nineteenth cen-
tury Antioch is-that is to say, Antioch
will be in a lamentable state of decay.
It will have been, by that time, totally
destroyed, at three different periods, by
three successive earthquakes. Indeed,
to say the truth, what little of its
former self may then remain, will be
found in so desolate and ruinous a state
that the patriarch shall have removed
his residence to Damascus. This is
well. I see you profit by my advice,
and are making the most of your time
in inspecting the premises-in
-satisfying your eyes
With the memorials and the things of
fame
That most renown this city.—
I beg pardon; I had forgotten that
Shakespeare will not flourish for seven-
teen hundred and fifty years to come.
But does not the appearance of Epi-
daphne justify me in calling it
grotesque?
"It is well fortified; and in this re-
spect is as much indebted to nature as
to art."
Very true.
"There are a prodigious number of
stately palaces."
There are.
"And the numerous temples, sump-
tuous and magnificent, may bear com-
parison with the most lauded of
antiquity."
All this I must acknowledge. Still
there is an infinity of mud huts, and
abominable hovels. We cannot help
perceiving abundance of filth in every
kennel, and, were it not for the over
powering fumes of idolatrous incense,
I have no doubt we should find a most
intolerable stench. Did you ever be
hold streets so insufferably narrow, of
houses so miraculously tall? What a
gloom their shadows cast upon the
ground! It is well the swinging lamps
in those endless colonnades are kept
burning throughout the day; we should
otherwise have the darkness of Egypt
in the time of her desolation.
"It is certainly a strange place! What
is the meaning of yonder singular build-
ing? See! it towers above all others,
and lies to the eastward of what I take
to be the royal palace!"
That is the new Temple of the Sun,
who is adored in Syria under the title
of Elah Gabalah. Hereafter a very no-
torious Roman emperor will institute
this worship in Rome, and thence derive
a cognomen, Heliogabalus. I dare say
you would like to take a peep at the
divinity of the temple. You need not
look up at the heavens; his Sunship is
not there at least not the Sunship
adored by the Syrians. That deity will
be found in the interior of yonder build-
ing. He is worshipped under the figure
of a large stone pillar terminating at the
summit in a cone or pyramid, whereby
is denoted Fire.
can those
"Hark!-behold!-who
ridiculous beings be, half naked, with
their faces painted, shouting and ges-
ticulating to the rabble?"
Some few are mountebanks. Others
more particularly belong to the race of
philosophers. The greatest portion.
however those especially who belabor
FOUR BEASTS IN ONE
675
he populace with clubs-are the prin-
pal courtiers of the palace, executing,
3 in duty bound, some laudable comic-
lity of the king's.
"But what have we here? Heavens!
he town is swarming with wild beasts!
[ow terrible a spectacle!-how dan-
erous a peculiarity!"
Terrible if you please; but not in the
ast degree dangerous. Each animal,
you will take the pains to observe,
following, very quietly, in the wake
i its master. Some few, to be sure,
e led with a rope about the neck, but
lese are chiefly the lesser or timid
>ecies. The lion, the tiger, and the
opard are entirely without restraint.
hey have been trained without diffi-
ilty to their present profession, and
tend upon their respective owners in
le capacity of valets-de-chambre. It
true, there are occasions when Na-
tre asserts her violated dominions-
it then the devouring of a man-at-
ms, or the throttling of a consecrated
ill, is a circumstance of too little mo-
ent to be more than hinted at in
pidaphne.
"But what extraordinary tumult do
hear? Surely this is a loud noise
en for Antioch! It argues some com-
otion of unusual interest."
Yes-undoubtedly. The king has or-
ered some novel spectacle-some
adiatorial exhibition at the hippo-
come or perhaps the massacre of the
cythian prisoners or the conflagra-
on of his new palace-or the tearing
own of a handsome temple-or, in-
eed, a bonfire of a few Jews. The
proar increases. Shouts of laughter
scend the skies The air becomes dis-
onant with wind instruments, and hor-
ible with clamor of a million throats.
Let us descend, for the love of fun, and
see what is going on! This way-be
careful! Here we are in the principal
street, which is called the street of
Timarchus. The sea of people is com
ing this way, and we shall find a diffi-
culty in stemming the tide. They are
pouring through the alley of Heraclides,
which leads directly from the palace-
therefore the king is most probably
among the rioters. Yes I hear the
shouts of the herald proclaiming his
approach in the pompous phraseology
of the East. We shall have a glimpse
of his person as he passes by the temple
of Ashimah. Let us ensconce ourselves
in the vestibule of the sanctuary; he
will be here anon. In the meantime let
us survey this image. What is it? Oh!
it is the god Ashimah in proper person.
You perceive, however, that he is
neither a lamb, nor a goat, nor a satyr;
neither has he much resemblance to
the Pan of the Arcadians. Yet all these
appearances have been given-I beg
pardon-will be given-by the learned.
of future ages, to the Ashimah of the
Syrians. Put on your spectacles, and
tell me what it is. What is it?
"Bless me! it is an ape!"
True a baboon; but by no means
the less a deity. His name is a deriva-
tion of the Greek Simia-what great
fools are antiquarians! But see!-see!
-yonder scampers a ragged little
urchin. Where is he going? What is
he bawling about? What does he say?
Oh! he says the king is coming in tri-
umph; that he is dressed in state; that.
he has just finished putting to death,
with his own hand, a thousand chained
Israelitish prisoners! For this exploit
the ragamuffin is lauding him to the
skies! Hark! here cames a troop of a
676
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
similar description.
They have made
a Latin hymn upon the valor of the
king, and are singing it as they go:
Mille, mille, mille,
Mille, mille, mille,
Decollavimus, unus homo!
Mille, mille, mille, mille, decollavimus!
Mille, mille, mille,
Vivat qui mille mille occidit!
Tantum vini habet nemo
Quantum sanguinis effudit!*
Which may be thus paraphrased:
A thousand, a thousand, a thousand,
A thousand, a thousand, a thousand,
We, with one warrior, have slain!
A thousand, a thousand, a thousand, a
thousand.
Sing a thousand over again!
Soho!-let us sing
Long life to our king,
Who knocked over a thousand so fine!
Soho!-let us roar,
He has given us more
Red gallons of gore
Than all Syria can furnish of wine!
"Do you hear that flourish of trump-
ets?"
Yes the king is coming! See! the
people are aghast with admiration, and
lift up their eyes to the heavens in rev-
erence! He comes!-he is coming!-
there he is!
"Who?-where?-the king?-I do
* Flavius Vospicus says, that the
hymn here introduced was sung by the
rabble upon the occasion of Aurelian,
in the Sarmatic war, having slain, with
his own hand, nine hundred and fifty of
the enemy.
not behold him-cannot say that I per
ceive him."
Then you must be blind.
"Very possible. Still I see nothing
but a tumultuous mob of idiots and
madmen, who are busy in prostrating
themselves before a gigantic cameleop
ard, and endeavoring to obtain a kiss
of the animal's hoofs. See! the beast
has very justly kicked one of the rabble
over-and another-and another-and
another. Indeed, I cannot help admir
ing the animal for the excellent use he
is making of his feet.”
Rabble, indeed!-why these are the
noble and free citizens of Epidaphne!
Beast, did you say?-take care that
you are not overheard. Do you not
perceive that the animal has the visage
of a man? Why, my dear sir, that
cameleopard is no other than Antiochus
Epiphanes-Antiochus the Illustrious,
King of Syria, and the most potent of
all the autocrats of the East! It is
true, that he is entitled, at times, Anti-
ochus Epimanes-Antiochus the mad
man-but that is because all people
have not the capacity to appreciate his
merits. It is also certain that he is at
present ensconced in the hide of a beast,
and is doing his best to play the part
of a cameleopard; but this is dose
for the better sustaining his dignity as
king. Besides, the monarch is of gigan
tic stature, and the dress is therefore
neither unbecoming nor over large. We
may, however, presume he would not
have adopted it but for some occasion
of especial state. Such, you will allow,
is the massacre of a thousand Jews.
With how superior a dignity the mon
arch perambulates on all fours! His
tail, you perceive, is held aloft by his
two principal concubines, Elline and
FOUR BEASTS IN ONE
677
rgelais; and his whole appearance
ould be infinitely prepossessing, were
not for the protuberance of his eyes,
hich will certainly start out of his
ead, and the queer color of his face,
hich has become nondescript from the
uantity of wine he has swallowed. Let
s follow him to the hippodrome,
hither he is proceeding, and listen to
he song of triumph which he is com-
iencing:
Who is king but Epiphanes?
Say-do you know?
Who is king but Epiphanes?
Bravo!-bravo!
There is none but Epiphanes,
No there is none:
So tear down the temples,
And put out the sun!
Well and strenuously sung! The
Dopulace are hailing him "Prince of
'oets," as well as "Glory of the East,"
Delight of the Universe," and "Most
Remarkable of Cameleopards." They
ave encored his effusion, and-do you
ear? he is singing it over again.
When he arrives at the hippodrome, he
will be crowned with the poetic wreath,
n anticipation of his victory at the
pproaching Olympics.
"But good Jupiter! what is the mat-
er in the crowd behind us?"
Behind us, did you say?-oh! ah!-
perceive. My friend, it is well that
you spoke in time. Let us get into a
lace of safety as soon as possible.
Here!-let us conceal ourselves in the
rch of this aqueduct, and I will inform
you presently of the origin of the com-
notion. It has turned out as I have
been anticipating. The singular ap-
pearance of the cameleopard with the
head of a man, has, it seems, given
offence to the notions of propriety en-
tertained in general by the wild animals
domesticated in the city. A mutiny has
been the result; and, as is usual upon
such occasions, all human efforts will
be of no avail in quelling the mob.
Several of the Syrians have already
been devoured; but the general voice
of the four-footed patriots seems to be
for eating up the cameleopard. "The
Prince of Poets," therefore, is upon his
hinder legs running for his life. His
courtiers have left him in the lurch,
and his concubines have followed so
excellent an example. "Delight of the
Universe," thou art in a sad predica-
ment! "Glory of the East," thou art in
danger of mastication! Therefore never
regard so piteously thy tail; it will
undoubtedly be draggled in the mud,
and for this there is no help. Look
not behind thee, then, at its unavoid-
able degradation; but take courage, ply
thy legs with vigor, and scud for the
hippodrome! Remember that thou art
Antiochus Epiphanes. Antiochus the
Illustrious!-also "Prince of Poets,"
"Glory of the East," "Delight of the
Universe," and "Most Remarkable of
Cameleopards!" Heavens! what a power
of speed thou art displaying!
What a
capacity for leg-bail thou are develop-
ing! Run, Prince!-Bravo, Epiphanes!
-Well done, Cameleopard!-Glorious
Antiochus! He runs!-he leaps!-he
flies! Like an arrow from a catapult
he approaches the hippodrome! He
leaps!-he shrieks!-he is there! This
is well; for hadst thou, "Glory of the
East," been half a second longer in
reaching the gates of the amphitheatre,
there is not a bear's cub in Epidaphne
678
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
that would not have had a nibble at
thy carcass. Let us be off-let us take
our departure!-for we shall find our
delicate modern ears unable to endure
the vast uproar which is about to com-
mence in celebration of the king's es-
cape! Listen! it has already com-
menced. See!-the whole town is
topsy-turvy.
"Surely this is the most populous
city of the East! What a wilderness of
people! What a jumble of all ranks
and ages! What a multiplicity of sects
and nations! what a variety of cos-
tumes! what a Babel of languages! what
a screaming of beasts! what a tinkling
of instruments! what a parcel of phi-
losophers!"
Come let us be off.
"Stay a moment! I see a vast hubbub
in the hippodrome; what is the meaning
of it, I beseech you?"
That?-oh, nothing! The noble and
free citizens of Epidaphne being, as
they declare, well satisfied of the faith
valor, wisdom, and divinity of the
king, and having, moreover, been eye
witnesses of his late superhuman agility,
do think it no more than their duty to
invest his brows (in addition to the
poetic crown) with the wreath of vic-
tory in the foot-race-a wreath which
it is evident he must obtain at the
celebration of the next Olympiad, and
which, therefore, they now give him in
advance.
Some Words with a Mummy
(First published in American Whig Review, April, 1845.-Ed.)
THE SYMPOSIUM of the preceding eve-
ning had been a little too much for
my nerves. I had a wretched head-
ache, and was desperately drowsy. In-
stead of going out therefore to spend
the evening as I had proposed, it oc-
curred to me that I could not do a
wiser thing than just eat a mouthful
of supper and go immediately to bed.
A light supper of course. I am ex-
ceedingly fond of Welsh rabbit. More
than a pound at once, however, may
not at all times be advisable.
Still,
there can be no material objection to
two. And really between two and three,
there is merely a single unit of differ-
ence. I ventured, perhaps, upon four.
My wife will have it five-but, clearly,
she has confounded two very distinct
affairs. The abstract number, five. !
am willing to admit; but, concretely
it has reference to bottles of brow
stout, without which, in the way of
condiment, Welsh rabbit is to be
eschewed.
Having thus concluded a frugal me!
and donned my night-cap, with the
serene hope of enjoying it till noon the
next day, I placed my head upon the
pillow, and, through the aid of a capital
conscience, fell into a profound slumber
forthwith.
But when were the hopes of human-
ity fulfilled? I could not have com
pleted my third snore when there came
a furious ringing at the street-door bell,
and then an impatient thumping at the
knocker, which awakened me at once.
SOME WORDS WITH A MUMMY
a minute afterward, and while I was
ill rubbing my eyes, my wife thrust
my face a note, from my old friend,
octor Ponnonner. It ran thus:
"Come to me, by all means, my dear
od friend, as soon as you receive this..
ome and help us to rejoice. At last,
7 long persevering diplomacy, I have
ined the assent of the Directors of
e City Museum, to my examination
the Mummy-you know the one I
ean. I have permission to unswathe
and open it, if desirable. A few
iends only will be present-you, of
ourse. The Mummy is now at my
ouse, and we shall begin to unroll it
eleven to-night.
"Yours, ever,
"PONNONNER."
By the time I had reached the "Pon-
nner," it struck me that I was as
ide awake as a man need be. I
aped out of bed in an ecstacy, over-
rowing all in my way; dressed my-
If with a rapidity truly marvellous;
d set off, at the top of my speed,
r the doctor's.
There I found a very eager company
sembled. They had been awaiting
e with much impatience; the Mummy
as extended upon the dining-table;
id the moment I entered its examina-
on was commenced.
It was one of a pair brought, sev-
al years previously, by Captain Ar-
ur Sabretash, a cousin of Ponnonner's,
om a tomb near Eleithias, in the
ybian mountains, a considerable dis-
ince above Thebes on the Nile. The
rottos at this point, although less mag-
ificent than the Theban sepulchres, are
f higher interest, on account of afford-
ng more numerous illustrations of the
679
private life of the Egyptians. The
chamber from which our specimen was
taken, was said to be very rich in such
illustrations-the walls being completely
covered with fresco paintings and bas-
reliefs, while statues, vases, and Mosaic
work of rich patterns, indicated the
vast wealth of the deceased.
The treasure had been deposited in
the museum precisely in the same con-
dition in which Captain Sabretash had
found it-that is to say, the coffin had
not been disturbed. For eight years it
had thus stood, subject only externally
to public inspection. We had now,
therefore, the complete Mummy at our
disposal; and to those who are aware
how very rarely the unransacked an-
tique reaches our shores, it will be evi-
dent, at once that we had great reason
to congratulate ourselves upon our good
fortune.
Approaching the table, I saw on it a
large box, or case, nearly seven feet
long, and perhaps three feet wide, by
two feet and a half deep. It was
oblong-not coffin-shaped. The mate-
rial was at first supposed to be the
wood of the sycamore (platanus), but,
upon cutting into it, we found it to
be pasteboard, or, more properly, papier
mache, composed of papyrus. It was
thickly ornamented with paintings, rep-
resenting funeral scenes, and other
mournful subjects-interspersed among
which, in every variety of position, were
certain series of hieroglyphical char-
acters, intended, no doubt, for the name
of the departed. By good luck, Mr.
Gliddon formed one of our party; and
he had no difficulty in translating the
letters, which were simply phonetic, and
represented the word Allamistakeo.
We had some difficulty in getting
680
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
this case open without injury; but,
having at length accomplished the task,
we came to a second, coffin-shaped, and
very considerably less in size than the
exterior one, but resembling it precisely
in every other respect. The interval
between the two was filled with resin,
which had, in some degree, defaced the
colors of the interior box.
Upon opening this latter (which we
did quite easily), we arrived at a third
case, also coffin-shaped, and varying
from the second one in no particular,
except in that of its material, which
was cedar, and still emitted the peculiar
and highly aromatic odor of that wood.
Between the second and the third case
there was no interval-the one fitting
accurately within the other.
Removing the third case, we discov-
ered and took out the body itself. We
had expected to find it, as usual, en-
veloped in frequent rolls, or bandages,
of linen; but, in place of these, we
found a sort of sheath, made of papy-
rus, and coated with a layer of plaster,
thickly gilt and painted. The paintings
represented subjects connected with the
various supposed duties of the soul, and
its presentation to different divinities,
with numerous identical human figures,
intended, very probably, as portraits of
the persons embalmed. Extending from
head to foot was a columnar, or per-
pendicular, inscription, in
inscription, in phonetic
hieroglyphics, giving again his name and
titles, and the names and titles of his
relations.
Around the neck thus unsheathed,
was a collar of cylindrical glass beads,
diverse in color, and so arranged as to
form images of deities, of the scarabæus,
etc., with the winged globe. Around the
small of the waist was a similar collar
or belt.
Stripping off the papyrus, we found
the flesh in excellent preservation, with
no perceptible odor. The color wa
reddish. The skin was hard, smooth,
and glossy. The teeth and hair were i
good condition. The eyes (it seemed
had been removed, and glass ones sub-
stituted, which were very beautiful and
wonderfully life-like, with the exception
of somewhat too determined a stare.
The fingers and the nails were brilliantly
gilded.
Mr. Gliddon was of opinion, from
the redness of the epidermis, that the
embalmment had been effected alto-
gether by asphaltum; but, on scraping
the surface with a steel instrument, and
throwing into the fire some of the
powder thus obtained, the flavor of
camphor and other sweet-scented gums)
became apparent.
We searched the corpse very care-
fully for the usual openings through
which the entrails are extracted, but, to
our surprise, we could discover none.
No member of the party was at that
period aware that entire or unopened
mummies are not unfrequently met.
The brain it was customary to withdraw
through the nose; the intestines through
an incision in the side; the body was
then shaved, washed, and salted; then
laid aside for several weeks, when the
operation of embalming, properly so
called, began.
As no trace of an opening could be
found, Doctor Ponnonner was prepar-
ing his instruments for dissection, when
I observed that it was then past two
o'clock. Hereupon it was agreed to
postpone the internal examination until
the next evening; and we were about to
SOME WORDS WITH A MUMMY
681
parate for the present, when some one
1ggested an experiment or two with
le Voltaic pile.
The application of electricity to a
fummy three or four thousand years
d at the least, was an idea, if not very
ge, still sufficiently original, and we
1 caught it at once. About one-tenth
earnest and nine-tenths in jest, we
rranged a battery in the Doctor's
udy, and conveyed thither the Egyp-
an.
It was only after much trouble that
e succeeded in laying bare some por-
ons of the temporal muscle which ap-
ared of less stony rigidity than other
irts of the frame, but which, as we
ad anticipated, of course, gave no
dication of galvanic susceptibility
hen brought in contact with the wire.
his, the first trial, indeed, seemed de-
sive, and, with a hearty laugh at our
wn absurdity, we were bidding each
her good night, when my eyes, hap-
ening to fall upon those of the
[ummy, were there immediately riv-
ed in amazement. My brief glance,
fact, had sufficed to assure me that
e orbs which we had all supposed to
e glass, and which were originally no-
ceable for a certain wild stare, were
ow so far covered by the lids, that
nly a small portion of the tunica al-
uginea remained visible.
With a shout I called attention to the
ict, and it became immediately obvious
› all.
I cannot say that I was alarmed at
le phenomenon, because "alarmed" is,
1 my case, not exactly the word. It
possible, however, that, but for the
rown Stout, I might have been a little
ervous. As for the rest of the com-
any, they really made no attempt at
concealing the downright fright which
possessed them. Doctor Ponnonner was
a man to be pitied. Mr. Gliddon, by
some peculiar process, rendered him-
self invisible. Mr. Silk Buckingham, I
fancy, will scarcely be so bold as to
deny that he made his way, upon all
fours, under the table.
After the first shock of astonishment,
however, we resolved, as a matter of
course, upon further experiment forth-
with. Our operations were now directed
against the great toe of the right foot.
We made an incision over the outside
of the exterior os sesamoideum pollicis
pedis, and thus got at the root of the
abductor muscle. Readjusting the bat-
tery, we now applied the fluid to the
bisected nerves-when, with a move-
ment of exceeding life-likeness, the
Mummy first drew up its right knee so
as to bring it nearly in contact with the
abdomen, and then, straightening the
limb with inconceivable force, bestowed
a kick upon Doctor Ponnonner, which
had the effect of discharging that gen-
tleman, like an arrow from a catapult,
through a window into the street below.
We rushed out en masse to bring in
the mangled remains of the victim, but
had the happiness to meet him upon the
staircase, coming up in an unaccount-
able hurry, brimful of the most ardent
philosophy, and more than ever im-
pressed with the necessity of prosecut-
ing our experiment with vigor and with
zeal.
It was by his advice, accordingly,
that we made, upon the spot, a pro-
found incision into the tip of the sub-
ject's nose, while the Doctor himself,
laying violent hands upon it, pulled it
into vehement contact with the wire.
Morally and physically-figuratively
'682
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
and literally-was the effect electric.
In the first place, the corpse opened its
eyes and winked very rapidly for sev-
eral minutes, as does Mr. Barnes in the
pantomime; in the second place, it
sneezed; in the third, it sat upon end;
in the fourth, it shook its fist in Doc-
tor Ponnonner's face; in the fifth,
turning to Messieurs Gliddon and Buck-
ingham, it addressed them, in very
capital Egyptian, thus:
"I must say, gentlemen, that I am as
much surprised as I am mortified at
your behavior. Of Doctor Ponnonner
nothing better was to be expected. He
is a poor little fat fool who knows no
better. I pity and forgive him. But
you, Mr. Gliddon-and you, Silk-who
have travelled and resided in Egypt
until one might imagine you to the
manner born-you, I say who have been
so much among us that you speak
Egyptian fully as well, I think, as you
write your mother-tongue-you, whom
I have always been led to regard as
the firm friend of the mummies-I
really did anticipate more gentlemanly
conduct from you. What am I to
think of your standing quietly by and
seeing me this unhandsomely used?
What am I to suppose by your permit-
ting Tom, Dick, and Harry to strip me.
of my coffins, and my clothes, in this
wretchedly cold climate? In what light
(to come to the point) am I to re-
gard your aiding and abetting that mis-
erable little villain, Doctor Ponnonner,
in pulling me by the nose?"
It will be taken for granted, no
doubt, that upon hearing this speech
under the circumstances, we all either
made for the door, or fell into violent
hysterics, or went off in a general
swoon. One of these three things was,
I say, to be expected.
Indeed each
and all of these lines of conduct might
have been very plausibly pursued. And,
upon my word, I am at a loss to know
how or why it was that we pursued
neither the one nor the other. B
perhaps, the true reason is to be sought
in the spirit of the age, which proceeds
by the rule of contraries altogether, and
is now usually admitted as the solution
of every thing in the way of parados
and impossibility. Or, perhaps, after
all, it was only the Mummy's exceed
ingly natural and matter-of-course air
that divested his words of the terrible
However this may be, the facts are
clear, and no member of our party be
trayed any very particular trepidation
or seemed to consider that any thing
had gone very especially wrong.
For my part I was convinced it was
all right, and merely stepped aside, out
of the range of the Egyptian's fist
Doctor Ponnonner thrust his hands into
his breeches' pockets, looked hard at the
Mummy, and grew excessively red in
the face. Mr. Gliddon stroked his
whiskers and drew up the collar of his
shirt. Mr. Buckingham hung down his
head, and put his right thumb into the
left corner of his mouth.
The Egyptian regarded him with a
severe countenance for some minutes,
and at length, with a sneer, said:
"Why don't you speak, Mr. Bucking
ham? Did you hear what I asked you.
or not? Do take your thumb out of
your mouth!"
Mr. Buckingham, hereupon, gave a
slight start, took his right thumb out
of the left corner of his mouth, and,
by way of indemnification inserted his
left thumb in the right corner of the
aperture above-mentioned.
I
SOME WORDS WITH A MUMMY
683
Not being able to get an answer from
Mr. B., the figure turned peevishly to
Mr. Gliddon, and, in a peremptory tone,
demanded in general terms what we all
meant.
Mr. Gliddon replied at great length,
in phonetics; and but for the deficiency
of American printing-offices in hiero-
glyphical type, it would afford me much
pleasure to record here, in the original,
the whole of his very excellent speech.
I may as well take this occasion to
remark, that all the subsequent con-
versation in which the Mummy took a
part, was carried on in primitive Egyp-
tian, through the medium (so far as
concerned myself and other untravelled
members of the company)—through the
medium, I say, of Messieurs Gliddon
and Buckingham, as interpreters. These
gentlemen spoke the mother tongue of
the mummy with inimitable fluency and
grace; but I could not help observing
that (owing, no doubt, to the introduc-
tion of images entirely modern, and, of
course, entirely novel to the stranger)
the two travellers were reduced, occa-
sionally, to the employment of sensible
forms for the purpose of conveying
a particular meaning. Mr. Gliddon, at
one period, for example, could not make
the Egyptian comprehend the term
"politics," until he sketched upon the
wall, with a bit of charcoal, a little
carbuncle-nosed gentleman, out at el-
bows, standing upon a stump, with his
left leg drawn back, right arm thrown
forward, with his fist, shut, the eyes
rolled up toward Heaven, and the
mouth open at an angle of ninety de-
grees. Just in the same way Mr. Buck-
ingham failed to convey the absolutely
modern idea "whig," until (at Doctor
Ponnonner's suggestion) he grew very
pale in the face, and consented to take
off his own.
It will be readily understood that
Mr. Gliddon's discourse turned chiefly
upon the vast benefits accruing to sci-
ence from the unrolling and disem-
bowelling of mummies; apologizing,
upon this score, for any disturbance
that might have been occasioned him, in
particular, the individual Mummy
called Allamistakeo; and concluding
with a mere hint (for it could scarcely
be considered more) that, as these little
matters were now explained, it might
be as well to proceed with the investiga-
tion intended. Here Doctor Ponnonner
made ready his instruments.
In regard to the latter suggestions
of the orator, it appears that Alla-
mistakeo had certain scruples of con-
science, the nature of which I did not
distinctly learn; but he expressed him-
self satisfied with the apologies tend-
ered, and, getting down from the table,
shook hands with the company all
round.
When this ceremony was at an end,
we immediately busied ourselves in re-
pairing the damages which our subject
had sustained from the scalpel. We
sewed up the wound in his temple,
bandaged his foot, and applied a square
inch of black plaster to the tip of his
nose.
It was now observed that the Count
(this was the title, it seems, of Alla-
mistakeo) had a slight fit of shivering—
no doubt from the cold. The Doctor
immediately repaired to his wardrobe,
and soon returned with a black dress
coat, made in Jennings' best manner,
a pair of sky-blue plaid pantaloons
with straps, a pink gingham chemise, a
flapped vest of brocade, a white sack
684
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
overcoat, a walking cane with a hook,
a hat with no brim, patent-leather boots,
straw-colored kid gloves, an eye-glass,
a pair of whiskers, and a waterfall cra-
vat. Owing to the disparity of size
between the Count and the Doctor (the
proportion being as two to one), there
was some little difficulty in adjusting
these habiliments upon the person of
the Egyptian; but when all was ar-
ranged, he might have been said to be
dressed. Mr. Gliddon, therefore, gave
him his arm, and led him to a com-
fortable chair by the fire, while the
Doctor rang the bell upon the spot
and ordered a supply of cigars and
wine.
The conversation soon grew animated.
Much curiosity was, of course, expressed
in regard to the somewhat remarkable
fact of Allamistakeo's still remaining
alive.
"I should have thought," observed
Mr. Buckingham, "that it is high time
you were dead."
"Why," replied the Count, very much
astonished, "I am little more than
seven hundred years old! My father
lived a thousand, and was by no means
in his dotage when he died."
Here ensued a brisk series of ques-
tions and computations, by means of
which it became evident that the an-
tiquity of the Mummy had been grossly
misjudged. It had been five thousand
and fifty years and some months since
he had been consigned to the catacombs
at Eleithias.
"But my remark," resumed Mr.
Buckingham, "had no reference to your
age at the period of interment (I am
willing to grant, in fact, that you are
still a young man), and my allusion
was to the immensity of time during
which, by your own showing, you must
have been done up in asphaltum."
"In what?" said the Count.
"In asphaltum," persisted Mr. B.
"Ah, yes; I have some faint notion
of what you mean; it might be made
to answer, no doubt-but in my time
we employed scarcely any thing else
than the Bichloride of Mercury.”
"But what we are especially at a loss
to understand," said Doctor Ponnonner.
"is how it happens that, having been
dead and buried in Egypt five thou-
sand years ago, you are here to-day
all alive and looking so delightfully
well."
"Had I been, as you say, dead,” re-
plied the Count, "it is more than prob-
able that dead I should still be; for I
perceive you are yet in the infancy
of Galvanism, and cannot accomplish
with it what was a common thing
among us in the old days. But the
fact is, I fell into catalepsy, and it was
considered by my best friends that I
was either dead or should be; they
accordingly embalmed me at once-I
presume you are aware of the chief
principle of the embalming process?"
"Why, not altogether."
"Why, I perceive a deplorable con-
dition of ignorance! Well, I cannot
enter into details just now: but it is
necessary to explain that to embalm
(properly speaking), in Egypt, was to
arrest indefinitely all the animal func-
tions subjected to the process. I use
the word 'animal' in its widest sense.
as including the physical not more than
the moral and vital being. I repeat
that the leading principle of embalm-
ment consisted, with us, in the imme
diately arresting, and holding in per
petual abeyance, all the animal func
SOME WORDS WITH A MUMMY
685
tions subjected to the process. To be
brief, in whatever condition the indi-
vidual was, at the period of embalm-
ment, in that condition he remained.
Now, as it is my good fortune to be of
the blood of the Scarabæus, I was em-
balmed alive, as you see me at present."
"The blood of the Scarabæus!" ex-
claimed Doctor Ponnonner.
"Yes. The Scarabæus was the insig-
nium, or the ‘arms,' of a very distin-
guished and very rare patrician family.
To be of the blood of the Scarabæus,'
is merely to be one of that family of
which the Scarabæus is the insignium.
I speak figuratively."
"But what has this to do with you
being alive?”
"Why, it is the general custom in
Egypt to deprive a corpse, before em-
balmment, of its bowels and brains; the
race of the Scarabæi alone did not coin-
cide with the custom. Had I not been
a Scarabæus, therefore, I should have
been without bowels and brains; and
without either it is inconvenient to
live."
"I perceive that," said Mr. Bucking-
ham, "and I presume that all the entire
mummies that come to hand are of the
race of Scarabæi."
"Beyond doubt."
"I thought," said Mr. Gliddon, very
meekly, "that the Scarabæus was one
of the Egyptian gods."
"One of the Egyptian what?" ex-
claimed the Mummy, starting to its
feet.
"Gods!" repeated the traveller.
"Mr. Gliddon, I really am astonished
to hear you talk in this style," said
the Count, resuming his chair. "No
nation upon the face of the earth has
ever acknowledged more than one god.
The Scarabæus, the Ibis, etc., were
with us (as similar creatures have been
with others) the symbols, or media,
through which we offered worship to
the Creator too august to be more
directly approached."
There was here a pause. At length
the colloquy was renewed by Doctor
Ponnonner.
"It is not improbable, then, from
what you have explained," said he,
"that among the catacombs near the
Nile there may exist other mummies of
the Scarabæus tribe, in a condition of
vitality."
"There can be no question of it,"
replied the Count; "all the Scarabæi
embalmed accidentally while alive, are
alive. Even some of those purposely so
embalmed, may have been overlooked
by their executors, and still remain in
the tomb."
"Will you be kind enough to explain,"
I said, "what you mean by 'purposely
so embalmed'?"
"With great pleasure," answered the
Mummy, after surveying me leisurely
through his eye-glass-for it was the
first time I had ventured to address
him a direct question.
"With great pleasure," he said.
"The usual duration of man's life, in
my time, was about eight hundred
years. Few men died, unless by most
extraordinary accident, before the age
of six hundred; few lived longer than
a decade of centuries; but eight were
considered the natural term. After the
discovery of the embalming principle,
as I have already described it to you,
it occurred to our philosophers that a
laudable curiosity might be gratified,
and, at the same time, the interests of
science much advanced, by living this
686
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
natural term in instalments. In the
case of history, indeed, experience dem-
onstrated that something of this kind
was indispensable. An historian, for
example, having attained the age of
five hundred, would write a book with
great labor and then get himself care-
fully embalmed; leaving instructions
to his executors pro tem., that they
should cause him to be revivified after
the lapse of a certain period-say five
or six hundred years. Resuming ex-
istence at the expiration of this time,
he would invariably find his great work
converted into a species of hap-hazard
note-book-that is to say, into a kind
of literary arena for the conflicting
guesses, riddles, and personal squabbles
of whole herds of exasperated com-
mentators. These guesses, etc., which
passed under the name of annotations,
or emendations, were found so com-
pletely to have enveloped, distorted,
and overwhelmed the text, that the au-
thor had to go about with a lantern to
discover his own book. When discov-
ered, it was never worth the trouble
of the search. After rewriting it
throughout, it was regarded as the
bounden duty of the historian to set
himself to work immediately in correct-
ing, from his own private knowledge
and experience, the traditions of the
day concerning the epoch at which he
had originally lived. Now this process
of rescription and personal rectification,
pursued by various individual sages
from time to time, had the effect of
preventing our history from degenerat-
ing into absolute fable."
"I beg your pardon," said Doctor
Ponnonner at this point, laying his
hand gently upon the arm of the Egyp-
tian-"I beg your pardon, sir, but may
I
presume to interrupt you for one
moment?"
"By all means, sir," replied the
Count, drawing up.
"I merely wished to ask you a ques-
tion," said the Doctor. "You men
tioned the historian's personal correc-
tion of traditions respecting his own
cpoch. Pray, sir, upon an average what
proportion of these Kabbala were
usually found to be right?"
"The Kabbala, as you properly term
them, sir, were generally discovered to
be precisely on a par with the facts
recorded in the unre-written histories
themselves-that is to say, not one in
dividual iota of either was ever known,
under any circumstances, to be not
totally and radically wrong."
"But since it is quite clear," resumed
the Doctor, "that at least five thou-
sand years have elapsed since your en
tombment, I take it for granted that
your histories at that period, if not your
traditions were sufficiently explicit on
that one topic of universal interest, the
Creation, which took place, as I pre-
sume you are aware, only about ten
centuries before."
"Sir!" said the Count Allamistakeo.
The Doctor repeated his remarks, but
it was only after much additional ex-
planation that the foreigner could be
made to comprehend them. The latter
at length said, hesitatingly:
"The ideas you have suggested are
to me, I confess, utterly novel. During
my time I never knew any one to en-
tertain so singular a fancy as that the
universe (or this world if you will have
it so) ever had a beginning at all. I
remember once, and once only, hearing
something remotely hinted, by a man
of many speculations, concerning the
SOME WORDS WITH A MUMMY
687
origin of the human race; and by this
individual, the very word Adam (or
Red Earth), which you make use of,
was employed. He employed it, how-
ever, in a generical sense, with reference
to the spontaneous germination from
rank soil (just as a thousand of the
lower genera of creatures are germi-
nated) the spontaneous germination,
I say, of five vast hordes of men, simul-
taneously upspringing in five distinct
and nearly equal divisions of the globe."
Here, in general, the company shrugged
their shoulders, and one or two of
us touched our foreheads with a very
significant air. Mr. Silk Buckingham,
first glancing slightly at the occiput and
then at the sinciput of Allamistakeo,
spoke as follows:
"The long duration of human life in
your time, together with the occasional
practice of passing it, as you have ex-
plained, in instalments, must have had,
indeed, a strong tendency to the general
development and conglomeration of
knowledge. I presume, therefore, that
we are to attribute the marked infe-
riority of the old Egyptians in all par-
ticulars of science, when compared with
the moderns, and more especially with
the Yankees, altogether to the superior
solidity of the Egyptian skull."
"I confess again," replied the Count,
with much suavity, "that I am some-
what at a loss to comprehend you;
pray, to what particulars of science do
you allude?"
Here our whole party, joining voices,
detailed, at great length, the assump-
tions of phrenology and the marvels of
animal magnetism.
Having heard us to an end, the Count
proceeded to relate a few anecdotes,
which rendered it evident that proto-
types of Gall and Spurzheim had flour-
ished and faded in Egypt so long ago
as to have been nearly forgotten, and
that the manoeuvres of Mesmer were
really very contemptible tricks when
put in collation with the positive mira-
cles of the Teban savans, who created
lice and a great many other similar
things.
I here asked the Count if his people
were able to calculate eclipses. He
smiled rather contemptuously, and said
they were.
This put me a little out, but I began
to make other inquiries in regard to his
astronomical knowledge, when a mem-
ber of the company, who had never as
yet opened his mouth, whispered in my
ear, that for information on this head,
I had better consult Ptolemy (whoever
Ptolemy is), as well as one Plutarch
de facie lunæ.
I then questioned the Mummy about
burning-glasses and lenses, and, in gen-
eral, about the manufacture of glass;
but I had not made an end of my
queries before the silent member again
touched me quietly on the elbow, and
begged me for God's sake to take a
peep at Diodorus Siculus. As for the
Count, he merely asked me, in the way
of reply, if we moderns possessed any
such microscopes as would enable us to
cut cameos in the style of the Egyp-
tians. While I was thinking how I
should answer this question, little Doc-
tor Ponnonner committed himself in a
very extraordinary way.
"Look at our architecture!" he ex-
claimed, greatly to the indignation of
both the travellers, who pinched him
black and blue to no purpose.
"Look," he cried with enthusiasm,
"at the Bowling-Green Fountain in New
688
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
York! or if this be too vast a contem-
plation, regard for a moment the Capi-
tol at Washington, D. C.!"-and the
good little medical man went on to
detail, very minutely, the proportions
of the fabric to which he referred. He
explained that the portico alone was
adorned with no less than four and
twenty columns, five feet in diameter,
and ten feet apart.
The Count said that he regretted not
being able to remember, just at that
moment, the precise dimensions of any
one of the principal buildings of the
city of Aznac, whose foundations were
laid in the night of Time, but the ruins
of which were still standing, at the
epoch of his entombment, in a vast
plain of sand to the westward of
Thebes. He recollected, however, (talk-
ing of the porticoes,) that one affixed
to an inferior palace in a kind of suburb
called Carnac, consisted of a hundred
and forty-four columns, thirty-seven
feet in circumference, and twenty-five
feet apart. The approach to this por-
tico, from the Nile, was through an
avenue two miles long, composed of
sphynxes, statues, and obelisks, twenty,
sixty, and a hundred feet in height.
The palace itself (as well as he could
remember) was, in one direction, two
miles long, and might have been alto-
gether about seven in circuit. Its walls
were richly painted all over, within and
without, with hieroglyphics. He would
not pretend to assert that even fifty or
sixty of the Doctor's Capitols might
have been built within these walls, but
he was by no means sure that two or
three hundred of them might not have
been squeezed in with some trouble.
That palace at Carnac was an insigni-
ficant little building after all. He (the
Count), however, could not conscien-
tiously refuse to admit the ingenuity,
magnificence, and superiority of the
Fountain at the Bowling Green, as de-
scribed by the Doctor. Nothing like
it, he was forced to allow, had ever
been seen in Egypt or elsewhere.
I here asked the Count what he had
to say to our railroads.
"Nothing," he replied, "in particu-
lar." They were rather slight, rather
ill-conceived, and clumsily put together.
They could not be compared, of course,
with the vast, level, direct, iron-grooved
causeways upon which the Egyptians
conveyed entire temples and solid obe-
lisks of a hundred and fifty feet in
altitude.
I spoke of our gigantic mechanical
forces.
He agreed that we knew something in
that way, but inquired how I should
have gone to work in getting up the im-
posts on the lintels of even the little
palace at Carnac.
This question I concluded not to
hear, and demanded if he had any idea
of Artesian wells; but he simply raised
his eyebrows; while Mr. Gliddon
winked at me very hard and said, in a
low tone, that one had been recently
discovered by the engineers employed
to bore for water in the Great Oasis.
I then mentioned our steel; but the
foreigner elevated his nose, and asked
me if our steel could have executed
the sharp carved work seen on the
obelisks, and which was wrought alto-
gether by edge-tools of copper.
This disconcerted us so greatly that
we thought it advisable to vary the
attack to Metaphysics. We sent for a
copy of a book called the "Dial," and
read out of it a chapter or two about
SOME WORDS WITH A MUMMY
689
something which is not very clear, but
which the Bostonians call the Great
Movement of Progress.
The Count merely said that Great
Movements were awfully common
things in his day, and as for Progress,
it was at one time quite a nuisance, but
it never progressed.
We then spoke of the great beauty
and importance of Democracy, and
were at much trouble in impressing the
Count with a due sense of the advan-
tages we enjoyed in living where there
was suffrage ad libitum, and no king.
He listened with marked interest,
and in fact seemed not a little amused.
When we had done, he said that, a
great while ago, there had occurred
something of a very similar sort. Thir-
teen Egyptian provinces determined all
at once to be free, and to set a mag-
nificent example to the rest of mankind.
They assembled their wise men, and
concocted the most ingenious constitu-
tion it is possible to conceive. For a
while they managed remarkably well;
only their habit of bragging was pro-
digious. The thing ended, however, in
the consolidation of the thirteen states,
with some fifteen or twenty others, in
the most odious and insupportable des-
potism that was ever heard of upon the
face of the Earth.
I asked what was the name of the
usurping tyrant.
As well as the Count could recollect,
it was Mob.
Not knowing what to say to this, I
raised my voice, and deplored the
Egyptian ignorance of steam.
The Count looked at me with much
astonishment, but made no answer. The
silent gentleman, however, gave me a
violent nudge in the ribs with his el-
bows-told me I had sufficiently ex-
posed myself for once-and demanded
if I was really such a fool as not to
know that the modern steam-engine is
derived from the invention of Hero,
through Solomon de Caus.
We were now in imminent danger of
being discomfited; but, as good luck
would have it, Doctor Ponnonner, hav-
ing rallied, returned to our rescue, and
inquired if the people of Egypt would
seriously pretend to rival the moderns
in the all-important particular of dress.
The Count, at this, glanced down-
ward to the straps of his pantaloons,
and then taking hold of the end of one
of his coat-tails, held it up close to
his eyes for some minutes. Letting it
fall, at last, his mouth extended itself
very gradually from ear to ear; but I
do not remember that he said any thing
in the way of reply.
Hereupon we recovered our spirits,
and the Doctor, approaching the
Mummy with great dignity, desired it
to say candidly, upon its honor as a
gentleman, if the Egyptians had com-
prehended, at any period, the manufac-
ture of either Ponnonner's lozenges or
Brandreth's pills.
We looked, with profound anxiety,
for an answer-but in vain. It was not
forthcoming. The Egyptian blushed
and hung down his head. Never was
triumph more consummate; never was
defeat borne with so ill a grace. In-
deed, I could not endure the spectacle
of the poor Mummy's mortification. I
reached my hat, bowed to him stiffly,
and took leave.
Upon getting home I found it past
four o'clock, and went immediately to
bed. It is now ten a. m. I have been
690
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
up since seven, penning these memo-
randa for the benefit of my family and
of mankind. The former I shall be-
hold no more. My wife is a shrew.
The truth is, I am heartily sick of this
life and of the nineteenth century in
general. I am convinced that every
thing is going wrong. Besides, I am
anxious to know who will be President
in 2045. As soon, therefore, as I shave
and swallow a cup of coffee, I shall
just step over to Ponnonner's and get
embalmed for a couple of hundred
years.
Loss of Breath
(First published in Southern Literary Messenger, September, 1835.-Ed.)
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 lus-
trum; and Azoth, as Aristæus 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 morn-
ing after our wedding; "thou witch!-
thou hag! thou whipper-snapper! -
thou sink of iniquity!-thou fiery-faced
quintessence of all that is abominable!
-
-
on
thou thou" - here standing
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 opprobium,
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 conversa.
tion; but it had never occurred to me
that the terrible accident of which I
speak could bona fide and actually hap-
pen! Imagine that is if you have a
fanciful turn-imagine, I say, my won
der-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 Ed
ouard in the "Julie" says it did him—
a la philosophie veritable.
Although I could not at first precisely
ascertain to what degree the occurrence
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 appear.
ance, to an expression of arch and co-
quettish benignity, I gave my lady a
pat on the one cheek, and a kiss on
LOSS OF BREATH
691
the other, and without saying one syl-
lable (Furies! I could not), left her
astonished at my drollery, as I pirou-
etted 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 qualifica-
tions of the dead-dead, with the pro-
pensities of the living-an anomaly on
the face of the earth-being very calm,
yet breathless.
Yes! breathless. I am serious in as-
serting 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 alle-
viation 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 interest-
ing crisis, dropped my voice to a singu-
larly 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 re-
mained for some time absorbed in
meditation. My reflections, be sure,
were of no consolatory kind. A thou-
sand vague and lachrymatory fancies
took possession 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 atroci-
ties while the tabby-cat purred strenu-
ously 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, con-
cealed in some obscure corner, or lurk-
ing 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 philoso-
phers, upon many points of philosophy,
are still very unphilosophical. William
Godwin, however, says in his "Mande-
ville," 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 quan-
tum 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 persever-
ance proved to be only a set of false
teeth, two pair of hips, an eye, and a
number of billets-doux from Mr. Win-
denough to my wife. I might as well
here observe that this confirmation of
692
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
my lady's partiality for Mr. W. occa-
sioned 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 di-
minutive 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 cor-
ner-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 Archan-
gels-which, as an agreeable perfume,
I here take the liberty of recommend-
ing.
With a heavy heart I returned to my
boudoir-there to ponder upon some
method of eluding my wife's penetra-
tion, 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 suc-
cess, endeavor to conceal my unhappy
calamity-a calamity calculated, even
more than beggary, to estrange the af-
fections 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 "Meta-
mora." 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 defi-
cient were altogether unnecessary, and
that 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 con-
scientiously my own. Thus armed at
all points, I determined to make my
wife believe that I was suddenly smit
ten with a passion for the stage. In
this, I succeeded to a miracle; and to
every question or suggestion found my-
self 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 de-.
livery 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 charac
teristics of a popular performer. T
be sure they spoke of confining me in 2
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 per-
sonal attendance in that city.
The coach was crammed to repletion:
but in the uncertain twilight the fea-
tures of my companions could not be
LOSS OF BREATH
693
distinguished. Without making any ef-
fectual 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 Pha-
laris. Happily the state of my respira-
tory faculties rendered suffocation an
accident entirely out of the question.
As, however, the day broke more dis-
tinctly 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 civil-
ity. Seeing that I remained motionless
(all my limbs were dislocated and my
head twisted on one side), his appre-
hensions began to be excited; and
arousing the rest of the passengers, he
communicated, in a very decided man-
ner, his opinion that a dead man had
been palmed upon them during the
night for a living and responsible fel-
low-traveller; here giving me a thump
on the right eye, by way of demon-
strating 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 as-
sertion of my prosecutor was pro-
nounced a true bill; and the whole
party expressed a determination to en-
dure 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 pass-
ing), without meeting with any further
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 extraor-
dinary.
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 apart-
ments and commenced operations im-
mediately. Having cut off my ears,
however, he discovered signs of anima-
tion. 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 endeav-
ored 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, re-
stored 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 sev-
eral curious experiments, in which, from
694
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
my personal share in their fulfillment,
I could not help feeling deeply inter-
ested. 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 Hippocra-
tian pathology would have afforded me
a ready confutation.
Not being able to arrive at a conclu-
sion, the practitioners remanded me for
further examination. I was taken up
into a garret; and the surgeon's lady
having accommodated me with drawers
and stockings, the surgeon himself fas-
tened 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 de-
light 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 alight-
ing opposite one another on my visage,
betook themselves to indecorous con-
tention 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 counte
nance 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. Stalk-
ing across the room I cast a glance of
contempt at the belligerents, and throw.
ing open the sash to their extreme
horror and disappointment, precipitated
myself, very dexterously, from the
window.
The mail-robber W, to whom I
bore a singular resemblance, was at 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 unman-
acled; and habited in his gallows cos
tume 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) with-
out 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. W-
who was an acute fellow, perceived his
opportunity. Leaping up immediately,
he bolted out behind, and turning down
an alley, was out of sight in the twink-
ling of an eye. The recruits, aroused
by the bustle, could not exactly com-
prehend the merits of the transaction.
Seeing, however, a man, the precise
counterpart of the felon, standing up
right in the cart before their eyes, they
were of the opinion that the rascal
(meaning W) was after making his
escape, (so they expressed themselves,)
and, having communicated this opinion
to one another, they took each a dram,
LOSS OF BREATH
695
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
Icould be said in my defence. Hanging
was my inevitable fate. I resigned my-
self 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, un-
doubtedly, 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 expe-
rience. 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 gentle-
men 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 un-
lucky as not to know.
Much sympathy was, of course, exer-
cised 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 de-
posited. 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 be-
came 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, 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 unfortu
nate 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 circumgy-
ratory proceedings a palpable failure.
696
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Taking a step forward, it has been his
nisfortune 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 me-
tropolis. 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 extrava-
gant to play upon wind-instruments.
He was the inventor of self-moving
fans, wind-sails, and ventilators.
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.
He
"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 fore-
finger 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 so-
liloquy.
-"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 monu-
ments - shot-towers lightning-rods-
Lombardy poplars. His treatise upon
'Shades and Shadows' has immortalized
him. He edited with distinguished abil
ity 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
bag-pipes. 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 pudicitia in Hieronymus.
He was indubitably a-
"How can you?-how-can-you?"-
interrupted the object of my animad-
versions, gasping for breath, and tear-
ing off, with a desperate exertion, the
bandage around its jaws-"how con
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 re-
lief to be able to open one's mouth-
to be able to expatiate to be able to
communicate with a person like your
self, who do not think yourself called
upon at every period to interrupt the
thread of a gentleman's discourse. In-
terruptions are annoying and should un-
doubtedly 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
LOSS OF BREATH
697
nay begin.—How the devil, sir, did you
get into this place?-not a word I be-
seech you-been here some time my-
self-terrible accident!-heard of it, I
uppose?-awful calamity!-walking un-
ler your windows-some short while
go-about the time you were stage-
struck-horrible occurrence!-heard of
catching one's breath,' eh?-hold your
ongue I tell you!-I caught somebody
lse's!-had always too much of my
>wn-met Blab at the corner of the
treet-wouldn't give me a chance for
t word—couldn't get in a syllable edge-
ways-attacked, consequently, with epi-
epsis-Blab made his escape-damn all
ools!-they took me up for dead, and
out me in this place-pretty doings all
of them!-heard all you said about
ne-every word a lie-horrible!-won-
lerful!
hideous!
outrageous!
ncomprehensible! - et cetera
cetera et cetera-et cetera "
-
-
-
--
et
It is impossible to conceive my as-
onishment at so unexpected a dis-
ourse; or the joy with which I became
radually convinced that the breath so
ortunately caught by the gentleman
whom I soon recognized as my neigh-
or Windenough) was, in fact, the
dentical expiration mislaid by myself
n the conversation with my wife.
Time, place, and circumstances ren-
lered it a matter beyond question. I
lid not, however, immediately release.
ny hold upon Mr. W.'s proboscis-not
t least during the long period in
which the inventor of Lombardy pop-
ars continued to favor me with his ex-
lanations.
In this respect I was actuated by that
abitual prudence which has ever been
ny predominating trait. I reflected
hat 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 com-
modities in their possession-however
valueless to the then proprietor-how-
ever troublesome, or distressing-in di-
rect ratio with the advantages to be de-
rived by others from their attainment,
or by themselves from their abandon-
ment. Might not this be the case with
Mr. Windenough? In displaying anxiety
for the breath of which he was at pres-
ent 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 oppor-
tunities 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 dou-
ble-winded idiot!—dost thou, whom for
thine iniquities it has pleased heaven to
accurse with a twofold respiration-
dost thou, I say, presume to address me
in the familiar language of an old ac-
quaintance? '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."
698
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Like Brutus, I paused for a reply-
with which, like a tornado, Mr. Win-
denough 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 ad-
vantage.
Preliminaries being at length ar-
ranged, my acquaintance delivered me
the respiration; for which (having care-
fully 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 impalpa-
ble. 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 in-
volving the interests of a third party
whose sulphurous resentment I have not
the least desire, at this moment, of in-
curring.
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-rejoin
der - confutation and justification-
followed in the columns of a Demo-
cratic gazette. It was not until the
opening of the vault to decide the con-
troversy, 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 indiscrimi
nate 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 confi-
dence, 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, ad-
vised the erection of a shrine and tem-
ple "to the proper God."
LYTTLETON BARRY.
The Man That Was Used Up
A TALE OF THE LATE BUGABOO AND KICKAPOO CAMPAIGN
(First published in Burton's Gentleman's Magazine, August, 1839.-Ed.)
Pleurez, pleurez, mes yeux, et fondez Upon this topic-the topic of Smith's
vous en eau!
La moitie de ma vie a mis l'autre au
-CORNEILLE.
tombeau.
I CANNOT just now remember when
or where I first made the acquaintance
of that truly fine-looking fellow,
3revet Brigadier-General John A. B. C.
Smith. Some one did introduce me to
he gentleman, I am sure-at some pub-
ic meeting, I know very well-held
about something of great importance,
10 doubt-at some place or other, I feel
convinced,—whose name I have unac-
ountably forgotten. The truth is-
hat the introduction was attended,
pon my part, with a degree of anxious
'mbarrassment which operated to pre-
ent any definite impressions of either
ime or place. I am constitutionally
ervous-this, with me, is a family fail-
ng, and I can't help it. In especial,
he slightest appearance of mystery—of
ny point I cannot exactly compre-s
end-puts me at once into a pitiable
tate of agitation.
There was something, as it were, re-
aarkable-yes, remarkable, although
his is but a feeble term to express my
ull meaning-about the entire individ-
ality of the personage in question. He
vas, perhaps, six feet in height, and of
presence singularly commanding.
There was an air distingue pervading
he whole man, which spoke of high
reeding, and hinted at high birth.
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 whis-
kers. 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 lus-
trous; 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 un-
questionably 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 con-
699
700
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
scious inferiority into the countenance
of the marble Apollo. I have a pas-
sion for fine shoulders, and may say
that I never beheld them in perfection
before. The arms altogether were ad-
mirably 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 im-
agine 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 confor-
mation of a properly proportioned calf.,
I wish to God my young and talented 's
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 rea-
sons or blackberries, still I could not
bring myself to believe that the remark-
able something to which I alluded just
now,--that the odd air of je ne sais quoi
which hung about my new acquaint-
ance,--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 stiff-
ness, in his carriage-a degree of meas-
ured and, if I may so express it, of rec-
tangular precision attending his every
movement, which, observed in a more
diminutive figure, would have had the
least little savor in the world of affec-
tation, pomposity, or constraint, but
which, noticed in a gentleman of his un-
doubted 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 propor
tion.
The kind friend who presented me to
General Smith whispered in my ea
some few words of comment upon th
man. He was a remarkable man-
very remarkable man-indeed one o
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 downrigh
fire-eater, and no mistake," said my
friend, here dropping his voice exces
sively low, and thrilling me with the
mystery of his tone.
"A downright fire-eater, and no mis
take. 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 di
valor!-heard of him of course?-you
know he's the man-
99
"Man alive, how do you do? why
how are ye? very glad to see ye, i
deed!" here interrupted the Gener
himself, seizing my companion by the
hand as he drew near, and bowing sti
but profoundly, as I was presented. I
then thought (and I think so still) tha
I never heard a clearer nor a strong
voice, nor beheld a finer set of teeth
but I must say that I was sorry for the
interruption just at that moment, s
owing to the whispers and insinuatics
aforesaid, my interest had been great
excited in the hero of the Bugaboo a
Kickapoo campaign.
However, the delightfully luminous
THE MAN THAT WAS USED UP
701
conversation of Brevet Brigadier-Gen-
eral John A. B. C. Smith soon com-
pletely dissipated this chagrin. My
friend leaving us immediately, we had
quite a tete-a-tete, and I was not only
ɔleased but really-instructed. I never
heard a more fluent talker, or a man of
greater general information. With be-
coming modesty, he forebore, neverthe-
less, 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 sub-
ject; although, in truth, I was exceed-
ngly tempted to do so. I perceived,
00, that the gallant soldier preferred
opics of philosophical interest, and that
e delighted, especially, in commenting
pon the rapid march of mechanical in-
vention. Indeed, lead him where I
would, this was a point to which he in-
variably came back.
"There is nothing at all like it," he
would say; "we are a wonderful people,
nd live in a wonderful age. Parachutes
nd railroads-man-traps and spring-
uns!
Our steam-boats are upon every
ea, and the Nassau balloon packet is
bout to run regular trips (fare either
way only twenty pounds sterling) be-
ween London and Timbuctoo. And
ho shall calculate the immense influ-
nce upon social life-upon arts-upon
ommerce-upon literature-which will
e the immediate result of the great
rinciples of electro-magnetics! Nor, is
his all, let me assure you! There is
eally no end to the march of invention.
The most wonderful-the most ingeni-
us-and let me add, Mr.-Mr. Thomp-
on, I believe, is your name-let me
dd, 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 wrung
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 privi-
leges we enjoy in living in this age of
mechanical invention. My curiosity,
however, had not been altogether sat-
isfied, and I resolved to prosecute im-
mediate inquiry among my acquaint-
ances, touching the Brevet Brigadier-
General himself, and particularly re-
specting the tremendous events quorum
pars magna fuit, during the Bugaboo
and Kickapoo campaign.
The first opportunity which presented
itself, and which (horresco referens) I
did not in the least scruple to seize, oc-
curred 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 com-
municative little friend of mine, Miss.
Tabitha T. Thus seated, I congratu-
lated 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, sotto
voce, a brisk tete-a-tete.
"Smith!" said she in reply to my
very earnest inquiry: "Smith!—why,
not General A. B. C.? Bless me, I
thought you knew all about him! This
702
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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" interupt
"Man," here broke in Doctor Drum-
mummupp, at the top of his voice, and
with a thump that came near knock-
ing 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 submit-
ted with a good grace, and listened, in
all the martyrdom of dignified silence,
to the balance of that very capital dis-
course.
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 speci-
mens of affability and omniscience, the
Misses Arabella and Miranda Cognos-
centi. That fine tragedian, Climax, was
doing Iago to a very crowded house,
and I experienced some little difficulty
in making my wishes understood; espe-
cially as our box was next the slips, and
completely overlooked the stage.
"Smith!" said Miss Arabella, as she
at length comprehended the purport of
my query; "Smith!-why, not General
John A. B. C.?"
"Smith!" inquired Miranda, musing-
ly. "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 Bug-
aboos-savage and so on-but we live
in a wonderfully inventive age-
Smith! O yes! great man!—perfect
desperado!-immortal renown!-proc
gies of valor! Never heard!"
[This
was given in a scream.] "Bless my
soul!-why, he's the man-
interupt
"-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 Co
noscenti immediately, went behind the
scenes forthwith, and gave the beggar
scoundrel such a thrashing as I trust
he will remember till the day of h
death.
At the soiree of the lovely wide
Mrs. Kathleen O'Trump, I was con
Ident that I should meet with no simi
disappointment. Accordingly, I was
sooner seated at the card-table, with y
pretty hostess for a vis-a-vis, than 1
THE MAN THAT WAS USED UP
703
propounded those questions the solution
of which had become a matter so essen-
ial to my peace.
"Smith!" said my partner, "why, not
General John A. B. C.? Horrid affair
hat, wasn't it?-diamonds did you
ay?-terrible wretches those Kicka-
Doos!-we are playing whist, if you
lease, Mr. Tattle-however, this is the
ge of invention, most certainly the
ge, one may say the age par excel
ence-speak French?-oh, quite a
ero-perfect desperado!-no hearts,
Mr. Tattle? I don't believe it.—Im
nortal renown and all that!-prodigies
of valor! Never heard!!-why, bless
ne, he's the man-
interupt
-
""
Captain Mann!"
"Mann!
here
creamed some little feminine interloper
rom the farthest corner of the room.
Are you talking about Captain Mann
nd the duel?-oh, I must hear-do
ell-go on, Mrs. O'Trump-do now go
n!" And go on Mrs. O'Trump did-
Il about a certain Captain Mann, who
was either shot or hung, or should have
een both shot and hung. Yes! Mrs.
Trump, she went on, and I-I went
ff. There was no chance of hearing
ny thing further that evening in regard
› Brevet Brigadier-General John A. B.
. Smith.
Still I consoled myself with the re-
ection that the tide of ill-luck would
ot run against me forever, and so de-
ermined to make a bold push for in-
ormation at the rout of that bewitch-
ng little angel, the graceful Mrs. Pi-
ouette.
"Smith!" said Mrs. P., as we twirled
bout together in a pas de zephyr,
Smith!-why, not General John A. B.
? Dreadful business that of the Bug-
boos, 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 des-
perado-prodigies of valor never
heard!-can't believe it-I shall have
to sit down and enlighten you-Smith!
why, he's the man- Interupt
"Man-Fred, I tell you!" here bawled
out Miss Bas-Bleu, as I led Mrs. Pi-
rouette to a seat. "Did ever anybody
hear the like? It's Man-Fred, I say,
and not at all by any means Man-Fri-
day." 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 sylla-
bles; "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!-wonder-
fully inventive age-pro-o-odigies of
valor! By the by, did you ever hear
about Captain Ma-a-a-a-n?”
704
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
"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 conscien-
tiously, 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-
99
"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 re-
solve to call my friend, Mr. Sinivate,
to a speedy account for his ungentle-
manly 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 forth-
with upon the General himself, and de-
mand, 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, posi-
tive, peremptory-as short as piecrust-
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 occu-
pant, but did not immediately perceive
him. There was a large and exceed-
ingly 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 fun-
niest 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 ob
serve."
I fairly shouted with terror, and
made off, at a tangent, into the far-
thest extremity of the room.
"God bless me, my dear fellow!"
here again whistled the bundle, “what
—what—what—why, what is the mat
ter? I really believe you don't know
me at all."
What could I say to all this-what
could I? I staggered into an arm
chair, and, with staring eyes and open
mouth, awaited the solution of the
wonder.
"Strange you shouldn't know
though, isn't it?" presently re-squeaked
the nondescript, which I now perceived
was performing upon the floor sont
inexplicable evolution, very analogous
to the drawing on of a stocking. Ther
was only a single leg, however, apparent
"Strange you shouldn't know
though, isn't it? Pompey, bring
that leg!" Here Pompey handed he
bundle a very capital cork leg, already
dressed, which it screwed on in a trice
and then it stood up before my eyes
"And a bloody action it was," com
tinued the thing, as if in a soliloquy
"but then one mustn't fight with the
Bugaboos and Kickapoos, and think
coming off with a mere scratch. Po
THE MAN THAT WAS USED UP
bey, I'll thank you now for that arm.
Thomas" [turning to me] "is decidedly
he best hand at a cork leg; but if you
should ever want an arm, my dear fel-
ow, you must really let me recommend
you to Bishop." Here Pompey screwed
›n an arm.
"We had rather hot work of it, that
you may say. Now, you dog, slip on my
houlders and bosom. Pettit makes the
best shoulders, but for a bosom you will
ave to go to Ducrow."
"Bosom!" said I.
"Pompey, will you never be ready
with that wig? Scalping is a rough
rocess, after all; but then you can
rocure such a capital scratch at De
''Orme's."
Scratch!"
"Now, you nigger, my teeth! For a
ood set of these you had better go
o Parmly's at once; high prices, but
xcellent work. I swallowed some very
apital articles, though, when the big
ugaboo rammed me down with the
utt end of his rifle."
"Butt end! ram down!! my eye!!"
"O yes, by the by, my eye-here,
ompey, you scamp, screw it in! Those
ickapoos are not so very slow at a
uge; but he's a belied man, that Dr.
Villiams, after all; you can't imagine
w well I see with the eyes of his
ake."
I now began very clearly to perceive
at the object before me was nothing
ore nor less than my new acquaint-
ice, Brevet Brigadier-General John A.
. C. Smith. The manipulations of
ompey had made, I must confess, a
ry striking difference in the personal
pearance of the man. The voice,
wever, still puzzled me no little; but
705
even this apparent mystery was speedily mys
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 intro-
duction.
"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 Gen-
eral 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 mys
comprehension of the mystery which
had troubled me so long. It was evi-
dent. It was a clear case. Brevet
Brigadier-General John A. B. C. Smith
was the man-was the man that was
used up.
The Business Man
(First published in Burton's Gentleman's Magazine, February, 1840. The Business
Man is also known as Peter Pendulum.-Ed.)
Method is the soul of business.
-OLD SAYING.
I AM a business man. I am a me-
thodical man. Method is the thing,
after all. But there are no people I more
heartily despise than your eccentric
fools who prate about method without
understanding it; attending strictly to
its letter, and violating its spirit. These
fellows are always doing the most out-
of-the-way things in what they call an
orderly manner. Now here, I conceive,
is a positive paradox. True method
appertains to the ordinary and the
obvious alone, and cannot be applied
to the outre. What definite idea can
a body attach to such expressions as
"methodical Jack o' Dandy," or "a
systematical Will o' the Wisp?"
My notions upon this head might not
have been so clear as they are, but
for a fortunate accident which hap-
pened to me when I was a very little
boy. A good-hearted old Irish nurse
(whom I shall not forget in my will)
took me up one day by the heels, when
I was making more noise than was
necessary, and swinging me round two
or three times, "d-d my eyes for a
skreeking little spalpeen," and then
knocked my head into a cocked hat
against the bedpost. This, I say, de-
cided my fate, and made my fortune.
A bump arose at once on my sinciput,
and turned out to be as pretty an organ
of order as one shall see on a summer's
day. Hence that positive appetite for
system and regularity which has made
me the distinguished man of business
that I am.
If there is any thing on earth I hate.
it is a genius. Your geniuses are all
arrant asses-the greater the genius the
greater the ass-and to this rule there:
is no exception whatever. Especially.
you cannot make a man of business out
of a genius, any more than money out
of a Jew, or the best nutmegs out of
pine-knots. The creatures are always
going off at a tangent into some fan-
tastic employment, or ridiculous specu
lation, entirely at variance with the "Et
ness of things," and having no business
whatever to be considered as a business
at all. Thus you may tell these charac-
ters immediately by the nature of the
occupations. If you ever perceive 1
man setting up as a merchant or 1
manufacturer; or going into the cotto
or tobacco trade, or any of those ecce
tric pursuits; or getting to be a dry-
goods dealer, or soap-boiler, or some
thing of that kind; or pretending t
be a lawyer, or a blacksmith, or
physician-any thing out of the usu
way you may set him down at o
as a genius, and then, according to
rule-of-three, he's an ass.
Now I am not in any respect
genius, but a regular business man. M
day-book and ledger will evince this
a minute. They are well kept, thou
I say it myself; and, in my genera
habits of accuracy and punctuality
am not to be beat by a clock. More
706
THE BUSINESS MAN
707
over, my occupations have been always
made to chime in with the ordinary
habitudes of my fellow-men. Not that
I feel the least indebted, upon this
score, to my exceedingly weak-minded
parents, who, beyond doubt, would have
made an arrant genius of me at last,
if my guardian angel had not come, in
good time, to the rescue. In biography
the truth is every thing, and in auto-
biography it is especially so yet I
scarcely hope to be believed when I
state, however solemnly, that my poor
father put me, when I was about fif-
teen years of age, into the counting-
house of what he termed "a respectable
hardware and commission merchant
doing a capital bit of business!" A
capital bit of fiddlestick! However,
the consequence of this folly was, that
in two or three days, I had to be sent
home to my button-headed family in
a high state of fever, and with a most
violent and dangerous pain in the sinci-
put, all round about my organ of order.
It was nearly a gone case with me then
-just touch-and-go for six weeks-the
physicians giving me up and all that
sort of thing. But, although I suffered
much, I was a thankful boy in the
main. I was saved from being a
"respectable hardware and commission
merchant, doing a capital bit of busi-
ness," and I felt grateful to the pro-
tuberance which had been the means
of my salvation, as well as to the kind-
hearted female who had originally put
these means within my reach.
The most of boys run away from
home at ten or twelve years of age,
but I waited till I was sixteen. I
don't know that I should have gone
even then, if I had not happened to
hear my old mother talk about setting
me up on my own hook in the grocery
way. The grocery way!-only think of
that! I resolved to be off forthwith,
and try and establish myself in some
decent occupation, without dancing at-
tendance any longer upon the caprices
of these eccentric old people, and run-
ning the risk of being made a genius
of in the end. In this project I suc-
ceeded perfectly well at the first effort,
and by the time I was fairly eighteen,
found myself doing an extensive and
profitable business in the Tailor's Walk-
ing Advertisement line.
I was enabled to discharge the oner-
ous duties of this profession, only by
that rigid adherence to system which
formed the leading feature of my mind.
A scrupulous method characterized my
actions as well as my accounts. In
my case, it was method-not money-
which made the man-at least all of
him that was not made by the tailor
whom I served. At nine, every morn-
ing, I called upon that individual for
the clothes of the day. Ten o'clock
found me in some fashionable prom-
enade or other place of public amuse-
ment. The precise regularity with
which I turned my handsome person
about, so as to bring successively into
view every portion of the suit upon
my back, was the admiration of all the
knowing men in the trade. Noon never
passed without my bringing home a
customer to the house of my employ-
ers, Messrs. Cut & Comeagain. I say
this proudly, but with tears in my eyes
—for the firm proved themselves the
basest of ingrates. The little account,
about which we quarreled and finally
parted, cannot, in any item, be thought
overcharged, by gentlemen really con-
versant with the nature of the business.
708
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Upon this point, however, I feel a
degree of proud satisfaction in permit-
ting the reader to judge for himself.
My bill ran thus:
MESSRS. CUT & COMEAGAIN,
Merchant Tailors.
TO PETER PROFFIT, Walking Advertiser,
July 10. To promenade, as usual
Drs.
and customer brought home..$ .25
July 11.-To do do do .25
July 12.-To one lie, second
class; damaged black cloth
sold for invisible green...... .25
July 13. To one lie, first class,
extra quality and size; recom-
mending milled satinet as
broadcloth
.75
.02
July 20. To purchasing bran-
new paper shirt collar or
dickey, to set off gray Peter-
sham
Aug. 15.-To wearing double-
padded bobtail frock, (ther-
mometer 106 in the shade,).. .25
Aug. 16.-Standing on one leg
three hours, to show off new-
style strapped pants at 12½
cents per leg per hour......
Aug. 17.-To promenade, as
usual, and large customer
brought (fat man)....
Aug. 18.-To do do do
(medium size)
do
.372
.50
.25
Aug. 19.-To do do
(small man and bad pay)... .06
$2.952
The item chiefly disputed in this bill
was the very moderate charge of two
pennies for the dickey. Upon my word
of honor, this was not an unreasonable
price for that dickey. It was one of
the cleanest and prettiest little dickeys
I ever saw; and I have good reason.
to believe that it effected the sale of
three Petershams. The elder partner
of the firm, however, would allow me
only one penny of the charge, and took
it upon himself to show in what man-
ner four of the same-sized conveni-
ences could be got out of a sheet of
foolscap. But it is needless to say
that I stood upon the principle of the
thing. Business is business, and should
be done in a business way. There was
no system whatever in swindling me
out of a penny-a clear fraud of fifty
per cent.-no method in any respect.
I left at once the employment of
Messrs. Cut & Comeagain, and set up
in the Eye-Sore line by myself-one
of the most lucrative, respectable, and
independent of the ordinary occupa
tions.
My strict integrity, economy, and
rigorous business habits, here again
came into play. I found myself driv
ing a flourishing trade, and soon became
a marked man upon "Change." The
truth is, I never dabbled in flashy mat-
ters, but jogged on in the good old
sober routine of the calling-a calling
in which I should, no doubt, have
remained to the present hour, but for
a little accident which happened to me
in the prosecution of one of the usual
business operations of the profession.
Whenever a rich old hunks or prodigal
heir or bankrupt corporation gets into
the notion of putting up a palace, there
is no such thing in the world as stop
ping either of them, and this every
intelligent person knows. The fact in
question is indeed the basis of the Eye
THE BUSINESS MAN
709
Sore trade.
As soon, therefore, as a
building project is fairly afoot by one
of these parties, we merchants secure
a nice corner of the lot in contempla-
tion, or a prime little situation just
adjoining, or right in front. This done,
we wait until the palace is half-way
up, and then we pay some tasty archi-
tect to run us up an ornamental mud
hovel, right against it; or a Down-
East or Dutch pagoda, or a pig-sty,
or an ingenious little bit of fancy work,
either Esquimau, Kickapoo, or Hotten-
tot. Of course we can't afford to take
these structures down under a bonus
of five hundred per cent. upon the
prime cost of our lot and plaster. Can
we? I ask the question. I ask it of
business men.
It would be irrational
to suppose that we can. And yet there
was a rascally corporation which asked
me to do this very thing-this very
thing! I did not reply to their absurd
proposition, of course; but I felt it a
duty to go that same night, and lamp-
black the whole of their palace. For
this the unreasonable villains clapped
me into jail; and the gentlemen of the
Eye-Sore trade could not well avoid
cutting my connection when I came
out.
The Assault-and-Battery business,
into which I was now forced to adven-
ture for a livelihood, was somewhat
ill-adapted to the delicate nature of my
constitution; but I went to work in it
with a good heart, and found my ac-
count here, as heretofore, in those stern
habits of methodical accuracy which
had been thumped into me by that
delightful old nurse-
e-I would indeed
be the basest of men not to remember
her well in my will. By observing, as
I say, the strictest system in all my
dealings, and keeping a well-regulated
set of books, I was enabled to get
over many serious difficulties, and, in
the end, to establish myself very de-
cently in the profession. The truth
is, that few individuals, in any line,
did a snugger little business than I.
I will just copy a page or so out of
my day-book; and this will save me the
necessity of blowing my own trumpet
-a contemptible practice of which no
high-minded man will be guilty. Now,
the day-book is a thing that don't lie.
"Jan. 1.-New Year's Day. Met
Snap in the street, groggy. Mem-he'll
do. Met Gruff shortly afterward, blind
drunk. Mem-he'll answer, too. En-
tered both gentlemen in my ledger, and
opened a running account with each.
I
"Jan. 2.-Saw Snap at the Exchange,
and went up and trod on his toe. Dou-
bled his fist and knocked me down.
Good!-got up again. Some trifling
difficulty with Bag, my attorney.
want the damages at a thousand, but
he says that for so simple a knock-
down we can't lay them at more than
five hundred. Mem-must get rid of
Bag-no system at all.
"Jan. 3.-Went to the theatre, to
look for Gruff. Saw him sitting in a
side box, in the second tier, between
a fat lady and a lean one. Quizzed
the whole party through an opera-glass,
till I saw the fat lady blush and whis-
per to G. Went round, then, into the
box, and put my nose within reach of
his hand. Wouldn't pull it-no go.
Blew it, and tried again-no go. Sat
down then, and winked at the lean
lady, when I had the high satisfaction
of finding him lift me up by the nape
of the neck, and fling me over into
the pit. Neck dislocated, and right leg
710
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
capitally splintered. Went home in
high glee, drank a bottle of champagne,
and booked the young man for five
thousand. Bag says it'll do.
"Feb. 15.-Compromised the case of
Mr. Snap. Amount entered in journal
-fifty cents-which see.
"Feb. 16.-Cast by that ruffian,
Gruff, who made me a present of five
dollars. Costs of suit, four dollars and
twenty-five cents. Net profit, see
journal, seventy-five cents."
Now, here is a clear gain, in a very
brief period, of no less than one dollar
and twenty-five cents-this is in the
mere cases of Snap and Gruff; and I
solemnly assure the reader that these
extracts are taken at random from my
day-book.
It's an old saying, and a true one,
however, that money is nothing in com-
parison with health. I found the exac-
tions of the profession somewhat too
much for my delicate state of body;
and, discovering, at last, that I was
knocked all out of shape, so that I
didn't know very well what to make
of the matter, and so that my friends,
when they met me in the street, couldn't
tell that I was Peter Proffit at all, it
occurred to me that the best expedient
I could adopt was to alter my line of
business. I turned my attention, there-
fore, to Mud-Dabbling, and continued
it for some years.
The worst of this occupation is, that
too many people take a fancy to it,
and the competition is in consequence
excessive. Every ignoramus of a fel-
low who finds that he hasn't brains in
sufficient quantity to make his way as
a walking advertiser, or an eye-sore
prig, or a salt-and-batter man, thinks,
of course, that he'll answer very well
as a dabbler of mud. But there never
was entertained a more erroneous idea
than that it requires no brains to mud-
dabble. Especially, there is nothing to
be made in this way without method.
I did only a retail business myself, but
my old habits of system carried me
swimmingly along. I selected my
street-crossing, in the first place, with
great deliberation, and I never pu
down a broom in any part of the town
but that. I took care, too, to have a
nice little puddle at hand, which I :
could get at in a minute. By these
means I got to be well known as a man
to be trusted; and this is one-half the
battle, let me tell you, in trade. No-
body ever failed to pitch me a copper,
and got over my crossing with a clean
pair of pantaloons. And, as my busi-
ness habits, in this respect, were suffi-
ciently understood, I never met with
any attempt at imposition. I wouldn't
have put up with it, if I had. Never
imposing upon any one myself, I suf
fered no one to play the possum with
me. The frauds of the banks of course
I couldn't help. Their suspension put
me to ruinous inconvenience. These.
however, are not individuals, but cor-
porations; and corporations, it is very
well known, have neither bodies to be
kicked nor souls to be damned.
I was making money at this business
when, in an evil moment, I was induced
to merge in the Cur-Spattering-
somewhat analogous, but, by no mears,
so respectable a profession. My loca
tion, to be sure, was an excellent one.
being central, and I had capital black-
ing and brushes. My little dog, too.
was quite fat and up to all varieties
of snuff. He had been in the trade a
long time, and, I may say, understood
THE BUSINESS MAN
711
it.
Our general routine was this:-
Pompey, having rolled himself well in
the mud, sat upon end at the shop door,
until he observed a dandy approaching
in bright boots. He then proceeded to
meet him, and gave the Wellingtons a
rub or two with his wool. Then the
dandy swore very much, and looked
about for a boot-black. There I was,
full in his view, with blacking and
brushes. It was only a minute's work,
and then came a sixpence. This did
moderately well for a time;-in fact,
I was not avaricious, but my dog was.
I allowed him a third of the profit, but
he was advised to insist upon half.
This I couldn't stand-so we quarrelled
and parted.
I next tried my hand at the Organ-
Grinding for a while, and may say that
I made out pretty well. It is a plain,
straightforward business, and requires
no particular abilities. You can get a
music-mill for a mere song, and to put
it in order, you have but to open the
works, and give them three or four
smart raps with a hammer. It im-
proves the tone of the thing, for busi-
ness purposes, more than you can
imagine. This done, you have only to
stroll along, with the mill on your back,
until you see tanbark in the street, and
a knocker wrapped up in buckskin.
Then you stop and grind; looking as
if you meant to stop and grind till
doomsday. Presently a window opens,
and somebody pitches you a sixpence,
with a request to "Hush up and go on,'
etc. I am aware that some grinders have
actually afforded to "go on" for this
sum; but for my part, I found the neces-
sary outlay of capital too great to per-
mit of my "going on" under a shilling.
At this occupation I did a good deal;
""
but, somehow, I was not quite satisfied,
and so finally abandoned it. The truth
is, I labored under the disadvantage of
having no monkey-and American
streets are so muddy, and a Democratic
rabble is so obstrusive, and so full of
demnition mischievous little boys.
I was now out of employment for
some months, but at length succeeded,
by dint of great interest, in procuring
a situation in the Sham-Post. The
duties, here, are simple, and not alto-
gether unprofitable. For example:-
very early in the morning I had to
make up my packet of sham letters.
Upon the inside of each of these I had
to scrawl a few lines-on any subject
which occurred to me as sufficiently
mysterious-signing all the epistles
Tom Dobson, or Bobby Tompkins, or
anything in that way. Having folded
and sealed all, and stamped them with
sham postmarks-New Orleans, Ben-
gal, Botany Bay, or any other place a
great way off-I set out, forthwith,
upon my daily route, as if in a very
great hurry. I always called at the big
houses to deliver the letters, and re-
ceive the postage. Nobody hesitates
at paying for a letter-especially for a
double one-people are such fools-
and it was no trouble to get round a
corner before there was time to open
the epistles. The worst of this pro-
fession was, that I had to walk so much
and so fast; and so frequently to vary
my route. Besides, I had serious
scruples of conscience. I can't bear to
hear innocent individuals abused—and
the way the whole town took to cursing
Tom Dobson and Bobby Tompkins was
really awful to hear. I washed my
hands of the matter in disgust.
My eighth and last speculation has
712
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
been in the Cat-Growing way. I have
found this a most pleasant and lucra-
tive business, and, really, no trouble
at all. The country, it is well known,
has become infested with cats-so much
so of late, that a petition for relief,
most numerously and respectably
signed, was brought before the Legis-
lature at its late memorable session.
The Assembly, at this epoch, was un-
usually well-informed, and, having
passed many other wise and wholesome
enactments, it crowned all with the
Cat-Act. In its original form, this law
offered a premium for cat-heads (four-
pence a-piece), but the Senate suc-
ceeded in amending the main clause, so
as to substitute the word "tails" for
"heads." This amendment was SO
obviously proper, that the House con-
curred in it nem. con.
As soon as the governor had signed
the bill, I invested my whole estate in
the purchase of Toms and Tabbies. At
first I could only afford to feed them
upon mice (which are cheap), but they
fulfilled the scriptural injunction at so
marvellous a rate, that I at length con-
sidered it my best policy to be liberal,
and so indulged them in oysters and
turtle. Their tails, at a legislative
price, now bring me in a good income;
for I have discovered a way, in which.
by means of Mamassar oil, I can force
three crops in a year. It delights me
to find, too, that the animals soon get
accustomed to the thing, and would
rather have the appendages cut off than?
otherwise. I consider myself, there-
fore, a made man, and am bargaining
for a country-seat on the Hudson.
Diddling
CONSIDERED AS ONE OF THE EXACT SCIENCES
(Published in Broadway Journal, Vol. 2:10.-Ed.)
Hey, diddle diddle,
The cat and the fiddle.
SINCE the world began there have
been two Jeremys. The one wrote a
Jeremiad about usury, and was called
Jeremy Bentham. He has been much
admired by Mr. John Neal, and was
a great man in a small way. The other
gave name to the most important of
the Exact Sciences, and was a great
man in a great way-I may say, in-
deed, in the very greatest of ways.
Diddling or the abstract idea con-
veyed by the verb to diddle-is suff-
ciently well understood. Yet the fact.
the deed, the thing diddling, is some-
what difficult to define. We may get.
however, at a tolerably distinct con-
ception of the matter in hand, by de-
fining-not the thing diddling in itself
-but man as an animal that diddles
Had Plato but hit upon this, he would
have been spared the affront of the
picked chicken.
Very pertinently it was demanded of
Plato why a picked chicken, which was
clearly "a biped without feathers." was
DIDDLING
713
not, according to his own definition, a
man? But I am not to be bothered
by any similar query. Man is an ani-
mal that diddles, and there is no ani-
mal that diddles but man. It will take
an entire hen-coop of picked chickens
to get over that.
What constitutes the essence, the
nare, the principle of diddling is, in
fact, peculiar to the class of creatures
that wear coats and pantaloons. A
crow thieves; a fox cheats; a weasel
outwits; a man diddles. To diddle is
his destiny. "Man was made to
mourn," says the poet. But not so:-
he was made to diddle. This is his
aim his object-his end. And for
this reason when a man's diddled we
say he's "done."
Diddling, rightly considered, is a
compound, of which the ingredients are
minuteness, interest, perseverance, in-
genuity, audacity, nonchalance, original-
ity, impertinence, and grin.
Minuteness:-Your diddler is mi-
nute. His operations are upon a small
scale. His business is retail, for cash,
or approved paper at sight. Should he
ever be tempted into magnificent spec-
ulation, he then, at once, loses his dis-
tinctive features, and becomes what we
term "financier." This latter word con-
veys the diddling idea in every respect
except that of magnitude. A diddler
may thus be regarded as a banker in
petto a "financial operation," as a
diddle at Brobdignag. The one is to
the other, as Homer to "Flaccus❞—as
a Mastodon to a mouse-as the tail of
a comet to that of a pig.
Interest:-Your diddler is guided by
self-interest. He scorns to diddle for
the mere sake of the diddle. He has
an object in view-his pocket-and
yours. He regards always the main
chance. He looks to Number One.
You are Number Two, and must look
to yourself.
Perseverance:-Your diddler perse-
veres. He is not readily discouraged.
Should even the banks break, he cares
nothing about it. He steadily pursues
his end, and
Ut canis a corio nunquam abster-
rebitur uncto.
so he never lets go of his game.
Ingenuity:-Your diddler is ingen-
ious. He has constructiveness large.
He understands plot. He invents and
circumvents. Were he not Alexander
he would be Diogenes. Were he not
a diddler, he would be a maker of pat-
ent rat-traps or an angler for trout.
Audacity:-Your diddler is auda-
cious. He is a bold man. He carries
the war into Africa. He conquers all
by assault. He would not fear the
daggers of Frey Herren. With a little
more prudence Dick Turpin would have
made a good diddler; with a trifle less
blarney, Daniel O'Connell; with a
pound or two more brains Charles the
Twelfth.
Nonchalance:-Your diddler is non-
chalant. He is not at all nervous. He
never had any nerves. He is never
seduced into a flurry. He is never put
out-unless put out of doors. He is
cool-cool as a cucumber. He is calm
-"calm as a smile from Lady Bury."
He is easy-easy as an old glove, or the
damsels of ancient Baiæ.
Originality:-Your diddler is original
-conscientiously so. His thoughts are
his own. He would scorn to employ
those of another. A stale trick is his
aversion. He would return a purse, I
714
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
am sure, upon discovering that he had
obtained it by an unoriginal diddle.
Impertinence:-Your diddler is im-
pertinent. He swaggers. He sets his
arms a-kimbo. He thrusts his hands in
his trowsers' pockets. He sneers in your
face. He treads on your corns. He
eats your dinner, he drinks your wine,
he borrows your money, he pulls your
nose, he kicks your poodle, and he
kisses your wife.
Grin:-Your true diddler winds up
all with a grin. But this nobody sees
but himself. He grins when his daily
work is done-when his allotted labors
are accomplished—at night in his own
closet, and altogether for his own pri-
vate entertainment. He goes home.
He locks his door. He divests himself
of his clothes. He
He gets into bed.
upon the pillow.
your diddler grins.
sis. It is a matter of course. I reason
a priori, and a diddle would be no did-
dle without a grin.
puts out his candle.
He places his head
All this done, and
This is no hypothe-
The origin of the diddle is referrable
to the infancy of the Human Race.
Perhaps the first diddler was Adam.
At all events, we can trace the science
back to a very remote period of an-
tiquity. The moderns, however, have
brought it to a perfection never
dreamed of by our thick-headed pro-
genitors. Without pausing to speak of
the "old saws," therefore, I shall con-.
tent myself with a compendious ac-
count of some of the more "modern
instances."
A very good diddle is this. A house-
keeper in want of a sofa, for instance,
is seen to go in and out of several cab-
inet warehouses. At length she arrives
at one offering an excellent variety.
She is accosted, and invited to enter,
by a polite and voluble individual at
the door. She finds a sofa well adapted
to her views, and upon inquiring the
price, is surprised and delighted to hear
a sum named at least twenty per cent.
lower than her expectations. She has-
tens to make the purchase, gets a bill
and receipt, leaves her address, with a
request that the article be sent home as
speedily as possible, and retires amid a
profusion of bows from the shop-
keeper. The night arrives and no sofa.
A servant is sent to make inquiry about
the delay. The whole transaction is
denied. No sofa has been sold—no
money received-except by the didder.
who played shop-keeper for the nonce.
Our cabinet warehouses are left en-
tirely unattended, and thus afford every
facility for a trick of this kind. Visi-
tors enter, look at furniture, and depart
unheeded and unseen. Should any one
wish to purchase, or to inquire the price
of an article, a bell is at hand, and this
is considered amply sufficient.
Again, quite a respectable diddle is
this. A well-dressed individual enters
a shop; makes a purchase to the value
of a dollar; finds, much to his vexation.
that he has left his pocket-book in
another coat pocket; and so says to
the shopkeeper-
"My dear sir, never mind! just oblige
me, will you, by sending the bundle
home? But stay! I really believe
that I have nothing less than a five
dollar bill, even there. However, you
can send four dollars in change with
the bundle, you know."
"Very good, sir," replies the shop-
keeper, who entertains, at once, a lofty
opinion of the high-mindedness of his
customer. "I know fellows," he says
DIDDLING
715
to himself, "who would just have put
the goods under their arm, and walked
off with a promise to call and pay the
dollar as they came by in the after-
noon."
-I
A boy is sent with the parcel and
change. On the route, quite acciden-
tally, he is met by the purchaser, who
exclaims:
"Ah! this is my bundle, I see-
thought you had been home with it,
long ago. Well, go on! My wife, Mrs.
Trotter, will give you the five dollars-
I left instructions with her to that
effect. The change you might as well
give to me-I shall want some silver
for the Post Office. Very good!
two, is this a good quarter?-three,
four-quite right! Say to Mrs. Trot-
ter that you met me, and be sure now
and do not loiter on the way."
One,
The boy doesn't loiter at all-but he
is a very long time in getting back from
his errand-for no lady of the precise
name of Mrs. Trotter is to be dis-
covered. He consoles himself, how-
ever, that he has not been such a fool
as to leave the goods without the
money, and re-entering his shop with a
self-satisfied air, feels sensibly hurt and
indignant when his master asks him
what has become of the change.
A very simple diddle, indeed, is this.
The captain of a ship, which is about
to sail, is presented by an official look-
ing person with an unusually moderate
bill of city charges. Glad to get off
so easily, and confused by a hundred
duties pressing upon him all at once,
he discharges the claim forthwith. In
about fifteen minutes, another and less
reasonable bill is handed him by one
who soon makes it evident that the first
collector was a diddler, and the original
collection a diddle.
And here, too, is a somewhat similar
thing. A steamboat is casting loose
from the wharf. A traveller, port-
manteau in hand, is discovered running
toward the wharf, at full speed. Sud-
denly, he makes a dead halt, stoops,
and picks up something from the
ground in a very agitated manner. It
is a pocket-book, and-"Has any gen-
tleman lost a pocket-book?" he cries.
No one can say that he has exactly
lost a pocketbook; but a great excite-
ment ensues, when the treasure trove is
found to be of value. The boat, how-
ever, must not be detained.
"Time and tide wait for no man,"
says the captain.
"For God's sake, stay only a few
minutes," says the finder of the book-
"the true claimant will presently
appear."
"Can't wait!" replies the man in
authority; "cast off there, d'ye hear?"
"What am I to do?" asks the finder,
in great tribulation. "I am about to
leave the country for some years, and
I cannot conscientiously retain this
large amount in my possession. I beg
your pardon, sir," [here he addresses a
gentleman on shore,] "but you have
the air of an honest man. Will you
confer upon me the favor of taking
charge of this pocket-book-I know I
can trust you-and of advertising it?
The notes, you see, amount to a very
considerable sum. The owner will, no
doubt, insist upon rewarding you for
your trouble"
"Me!-no, you!-it was you who
found the book."
"Well, if you must have it so- -I will
take a small reward-just to satisfy
716
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
your scruples. Let me see why these
notes are all hundreds-bless my soul!
a hundred is too much to take-fifty
would be quite enough, I am sure-"
"Cast off there!" says the captain.
"But then I have no change for a
hundred, and upon the whole, you had
better-"
"Cast off there!" says the captain.
"Never mind!" cries the gentleman
on shore, who has been examining his
own pocket-book for the last minute or
so "never mind! I can fix it-here
is a fifty on the Bank of North Amer-
ica-throw me the book."
And the
over-conscientious finder
takes the fifty with marked reluctance,
and throws the gentleman the book, as
desired, while the steamboat fumes and
fizzes on her way. In about half an
hour after her departure, the "large
amount" is seen to be a "counterfeit
presentment," and the whole thing a
capital diddle.
A bold diddle is this. A camp-meet-
ing, or something similar, is to be held.
at a certain spot which is accessible
only by means of a free bridge. A did-
dler stations himself upon this bridge,
respectfully informs all passers by of
the new county law, which establishes
a toll of one cent for foot passengers,
two for horses and donkeys, and so
forth, and so forth. Some grumble but
all submit, and the diddler goes home a
wealthier man by some fifty or sixty
dollars well earned. This taking a toll
from a great crowd of people is an
excessively troublesome thing.
A neat diddle is this. A friend holds
one of the diddler's promises to pay,
filled up and signed in due form, upon
the ordinary blanks printed in red ink.
The diddler purchases one or two dozen
of these blanks, and every day dips one
of them in his soup, makes his dog jump
for it, and finally gives it to him as
a bonne bouche. The note arriving at
maturity, the diddler, with the diddler's
dog, calls upon the friend, and the
promise to pay is made the topic of
discussion. The friend produces it from
his escritoire, and is in the act of reach-
ing it to the diddler, when up jumps
the diddler's dog and devours it forth-
with. The diddler is not only surprised
but vexed and incensed at the absurd
behavior of his dog, and expresses his
entire readiness to cancel the obligation
at any moment when the evidence of
the obligation shall be forthcoming.
A very mean diddle is this. A lady
is insulted in the street by a diddler's
accomplice. The diddler himself flies
to her assistance, and, giving his friend
a comfortable thrashing, insists upon
attending the lady to her own door.
He bows, with his hand upon his heart,
and most respectfully bids her adieu.
She entreats him, as her deliverer, to
walk in and be introduced to her big
brother and her papa. With a sigh, be
declines to do so. "Is there no way,
then, sir," she murmurs, "in which I
may be permitted to testify my grat
itude?"
"Why, yes, madam, there is. Will
you be kind enough to lend me a couple
of shillings?"
In the first excitement of the mo-
ment the lady decides upon fainting
outright. Upon second thought, how-
ever, she opens her purse-strings and
delivers the specie. Now this, I say, is
a diddle minute-for one entire moiety
of the sum borrowed has to be paid to
the gentleman who had the trouble of
performing the insult, and who had
DIDDLING
717
then to stand still and be thrashed for
performing it.
Rather a small, but still a scientific
diddle is this. The diddler approaches
the bar of a tavern, and demands a
couple of twists of tobacco. These are
handed to him, when, having slightly
examined them, he says:
"I don't much like this tobacco.
Here, take it back, and give me a glass
of brandy and water in its place."
The brandy and water is furnished
and imbibed, and the diddler makes his
way to the door. But the voice of the
tavern-keeper arrests him.
"I believe, sir, you have forgotten to
pay for your brandy and water."
"Pay for my brandy and water!-
didn't I give you the tobacco for the
brandy and water? What more would
you have?"
"But, sir, if you please, I don't re-
member that you paid me for the to-
bacco."
"What do you mean by that, you
Scoundrel? Didn't I give you back
your tobacco? Isn't that your tobacco
lying there? Do you expect me to pay
for what I did not take?"
"But, sir," says the publican, now
rather at a loss what to say, "but
sir-"
"But me no buts, sir," interrupts the
diddler, apparently in very high dud-
geon, and slamming the door after him,
as he makes his escape.-"But me no
buts, sir, and none of your tricks upon
travellers."
Here again is a very clever diddle,
of which the simplicity is not its least
recommendation. A purse, or pocket-
book, being really lost, the loser inserts
in one of the daily papers of a large
city a fully descriptive advertisement.
Whereupon our diddler copies the
facts of this advertisement, with a
change of heading, of general phrase-
ology and address. The original, for
instance, is long, and verbose, is headed
"A Pocket-Book Lost!" and requires
the treasure, when found, to be left at
No. 1 Tom Street. The copy is brief,
and being headed with "Lost" only, in-
dicates No. 2 Dick, or No. 3 Harry
Street, as the locality in which the
owner may be seen. Moreover, it is
inserted in at least five or six of the
daily papers of the day, while in point
of time, it makes its appearance only a
few hours after the original. Should it
be read by the loser of the purse, he
would hardly suspect it to have any
reference to his own misfortune. But,
of course, the chances are five or six
to one, that the finder will repair to
the address given by the diddler, rather
than to that pointed out by the rightful
proprietor. The former pays the re-
ward, pockets the treasure and de-
camps.
Quite an analogous diddle is this. A
lady of ton has dropped, some where in
the street, a diamond ring of very un-
usual value. For its recovery, she offers
some forty or fifty dollars reward-
giving, in her advertisement, a very
minute description of the gem, and of
its settings, and declaring that, on its
restoration at No. so and so, in such
and such Avenue, the reward would be
paid instanter, without a single question
being asked. During the lady's absence
from home, a day or two afterwards,
a ring is heard at the door of No. so
and so, in such and such Avenue; a
servant appears; the lady of the house
is asked for and is declared to be out,
at which astounding information, the
718
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
visitor expresses the most poignant re-
gret. His business is of importance
and concerns the lady herself. In fact,
he had the good fortune to find her
diamond ring. But perhaps it would
be as well that he should call again.
"By no means!" says the servant; and
"By no means!" says the lady's sister
and the lady's sister-in-law, who are
summoned forthwith. The ring is
clamourously identified, the reward is
paid, and the finder nearly thrust out
of doors. The lady returns and ex-
presses some little dissatisfaction with
her sister and sister-in-law, because
they happen to have paid forty or fifty
dollars for a fac-simile of her diamond
ring-a fac-simile made out of real
pinch-beck and unquestionable paste.
But as there is really no end to did-
dling, so there would be none to this
essay, were I even to hint at half the
variations, inflections, of which this
science is susceptible. I must bring
this paper, perforce, to a conclusion,
and this I cannot do better than by a
summary notice of a very decent, but
rather elaborate diddle, of which our
own city was made the theatre, not
very long ago, and which was subse-
quently repeated with success, in other
still more verdant localities of the
Union. A middle-aged gentleman ar-
rives in town from parts unknown. He
is remarkably precise, cautious, staid,
and deliberate in his demeanor. His
dress is scrupulously neat, but plain,
unostentatious. He wears a white
cravat, an ample waist-coat, made with
an eye to comfort alone; thick-soled
cosy-looking shoes, and pantaloons
without straps. He has the whole air,
in fact, of your well-to-do, sober-sided,
exact, and respectable "man of busi-
ness," par excellence-one of the stem
and outwardly hard, internally soft,
sort of people that we see in the crack
high comedies-fellows whose words
are so many bonds, and who are noted
for giving away guineas, in charity,
with the one hand, while, in the way of
mere bargain, they exact the utter-
most fraction of a farthing with the
other.
He makes much ado before he can
get suited with a boarding-house. He
dislikes children. He has been accus-
tomed to quiet. His habits are me-
thodical and then he would prefer
getting into a private and respectable
small family, piously inclined. Terms.
however, are no object-only he must
insist upon settling his bill on the firs:
of every month, (it is now the second) :
and begs his landlady, when he finally
obtains one to his mind, not on any
account to forget his instructions upon
this point-but to send in a bill, and
receipt, precisely at ten o'clock on the
first day of every month, and under no
circumstances to put it off to the
second.
These arrangements made, our man
of business rents an office in a reputable
rather than a fashionable quarter of
the town. There is nothing he more
despises than pretense. "Where there
is much show," he says, "there is sel
dom any thing very solid behind”-an
observation which so profoundly im-
presses his landlady's fancy, that she
makes a pencil memorandum of it
forthwith, in her great family Bible, on
the broad margin of the Proverbs of
Solomon.
The next step is to advertise, after
some such fashion as this, in the prin
cipal business six-pennies of the city-
DIDDLING
719
the pennies are eschewed as not "re-
spectable"-and as demanding pay-
- ment for all advertisements in advance.
Our man of business holds it as a point
of his faith that work should never be
paid for until done.
"WANTED. The advertisers, being
about to commence extensive business
operations in this city, will require the
services of three or four intelligent and
competent clerks, to whom a liberal
salary will be paid. The very best rec-
ommendations, not so much for capac-
ity, as for integrity, will be expected.
Indeed, as the duties to be performed,
involve high responsibilities, and large
amounts of money must necessarily
pass through the hands of those en-
gaged, it is deemed advisable to de-
mand a deposit of fifty dollars from
each clerk employed. No person need
apply, therefore, who is not prepared
to leave this sum in the possession of
the advertisers, and who cannot furnish
the most satisfactory testimonials of
morality. Young gentlemen piously in-
clined will be preferred. Application
should be made between the hours of
ten and eleven a. m., and four and
five p. m., of Messrs.
"BOGS, HOGS, LOGS, FROGS & Co.,
"No. 110 Dog Street."
By the thirty-first day of the month,
this advertisement has brought to the
office of Messrs. Bogs, Hogs, Logs,
Frogs, and Company, some fifteen or
twenty young gentlemen piously in-
clined. But our man of business is in
no hurry to conclude a contract with
any-no man of business is ever pre-
cipitate and it is not until the most
rigid catechism in respect to the piety
of each young gentleman's inclination,
that his services are engaged and his
fifty dollars receipted for, just by way
of proper precaution, on the part of the
respectable firm of Bogs, Hogs, Logs,
Frogs, and Company. On the morning
of the first day of the next month, the
landlady does not present her bill, ac-
cording to promise-a piece of neglect
for which the comfortable head of the
house ending in ogs would no doubt
have chided her severely, could he
have been prevailed upon to remain in
town a day or two for that purpose.
As it is, the constables have had a
sad time of it, running hither and
thither, and all they can do is to declare
the man of business most emphatically,
a "hen knee high"-by which some per-
sons imagine them to imply that, in
fact, he is n. e. i.-by which again the
very classical phrase non est inventus,
is supposed to be understood. In the
meantime the young gentlemen, one
and all, are somewhat less piously in-
clined than before, while the landlady
purchases a shilling's worth of the In-
dian rubber, and very carefully obliter-
ates the pencil memorandum that some
fool has made in her great family Bible,
on the broad margin of the Proverbs
of Solomon.
Lionizing
(This tale was published in the Southern Literary Messenger, May, 1835. It is
also called Some Passages in the Life of a Lion.-Ed.)
all people went
Upon their ten toes in wild wonderment.
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 Iron 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 suffi-
ciently 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," said he, 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 there-
abouts-we shall have time enough to
get through with them all before mid-
night. To commence then:-The nose,
according to Bartholinus, is that pro-
tuberance that bump-that excresence
-that-
99
"Will do, Robert," interrupted the
good old gentleman. "I am thunder-
struck at the extent of your informa
tion 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 consid
ered 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 re-
solved to be guided by the paternal
advice. I determined to follow my
I gave it a pull or two upon the
spot, and wrote a pamphlet on Nosol
ogy forthwith.
nose.
All Fum-Fudge was in an uproar.
720
LIONIZING
721
"Wonderful genius!" said the Quar-
terly.
"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 what ever-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, turn-
ing 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 de-
manded, surveying it through a micro-
scope.
"None," said I, turning it up.
"Admirable!" he ejaculated, thrown
quite off his guard by the beauty of the
manœuvre.
"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 "Nos-
ology," 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, Priest-
ley, Condorcet, De Stael, and the "Am-
bitious Student in Ill-Health."
There was Sir Positive Paradox. He
observed that all fools were philoso-
phers, and that all philosophers were
fools.
There was Estheticus Ethix. He
spoke of fire, unity, and atoms; bi-part
and pre-existent soul; affinity and dis-
cord; primitive intelligence and ho-
moomeria.
722
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
There was Theologos Theology. He
talked of Eusebius and Arianus; heresy
and the Council of Nice; Puseyism and
con-substantialism; 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; mari-
nade a la St. Florentin; and orange jel-
lies en mosaiques.
There was Bibulus O'Bumper. He
touched upon Latour and Markbrun-
nen; 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 amen-
ity 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 opin-
ion that the moon was called Bendis in
Thrace, Bubastis in Egypt, Dian in
Rome, and Artemis in Greece.
There was a Grand Turk from Stam-
boul. 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 num-
ber of green horns.
There was Delphinus Polyglott. He
told us what had become of the eighty-
three lost tragedies of Eschylus; of the
fifty-four orations of Isæus; 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 abou:
internal fires and tertiary formations;
about aeriforms, fluidiforms, and solid-
forms; about quartz and marl; about
schist and schorl; about gypsum and
trap; about talc and calc; about blende
and horn-blende; about mica-slate and
pudding-stone; about cyanite and lepi-
dolite; about hæmatite and tremolite:
about antimony and calcedony; about
manganese and whatever you please.
There was myself. I spoke of my-
self; 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-Sou!
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 you:
nose?"
"Every bit of it, my love," said I:
LITERARY LIFE OF THINGUM BOB, ESQ.
723
-so I gave it a twist or two, and found
myself at Almack's.
The rooms were crowded to suffoca-
tion.
"He is coming!" said somebody on
the staircase.
"He is coming!" said somebody far-
ther up.
"He is coming!" said somebody far-
ther still.
"He is come!" exclaimed the Duch-
ess, "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 Capricor-
nutti.
"Dios guarda!" muttered Don Sti-
letto.
"Mille tonnerres!" ejaculated the
Prince de Grenouille.
"Tousand teufel!" growled the Elec-
tor of Bluddennuff.
It was not to be borne.
I grew
angry. I turned short upon Bludden-
nuff.
"Sir!" said I to him, "you are
baboon."
a
"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 over-
shot 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.”
Literary Life of Thingum Bob, Esq.
(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 Let-
ters and repose upon my laurels. But
I am ambitious of signalizing my ab-
dication of the literary sceptre by some
important bequest to posterity; and,
724
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 pub-
lic 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, there-
fore, 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 im-
portant, 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-memor-
able epoch, when the brilliant conduc-
tor 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 ed-
itor 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 com-
mence 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 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 encour
age 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
LITERARY LIFE OF THINGUM BOB, ESQ.
725
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 en-
lightened 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 rub-
bish of an old book-stall, in a very re-
mote 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 trans-
lation of one Dante's "Inferno," I
copied with remarkable neatness a long
passage about a man named Ugolino,
who had a parcel of brats. From an-
other, which contained a good many old
plays by some person whose name I for-
get, I extracted in the same manner,
and with the same care, a great number
of lines about "angels" and "minis-
ters saying grace," and "goblins
damned," and more besides of that sort.
From a third, which was the composi-
tion 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 be-
ginning 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 busi-
ness 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 "Op-
podeldoc" (a fine sonorous name), and,
doing each up nicely in a separate en-
velope, 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 Correspond-
ents." The Hum-Drum gave him a
dressing after this fashion:
"Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) has
sent us a long tirade concerning a bed-
lamite whom he styles 'Ugolino,' who
had a great many children that should
have been all whipped and sent to bed
without their suppers. The whole af-
fair 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
726
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 em-
peror 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 ac-
cept 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 commenc-
ing 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
'Oppodeldoc' should learn to
scan.
count. But why he should have con-
ceived the idea that we (of all others,
we!) would disgrace our pages with his
ineffable nonsense is utterly beyond
comprehension. Why, the absurd twat-
tle is scarcely good enough for the
Hum-Drum, the Rowdy-Dow, the
Goosetherumfoodle,-things that are in
the practice of publishing 'Mother
Goose's Melodies' as original lyrics.
And 'Oppodeldoc' (whoever he is) has
even the assurance to demand pay for
this drivel. Does 'Oppodeldoc' (who-
ever he is) know-is he aware that we
could not be paid to insert it?”
As I perused this I felt myself grow.
ing 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 be-
LITERARY LIFE OF THINGUM BOB, ESQ.
727
gan to experience compassion for the
poor fellow. But the Goosetherum-
foodle showed, if possible, less mercy
than the Lollipop. It was the Goose-
therumfoodle 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 ungrammati-
cal 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.' 'Oppo-
deldoc' (whoever he is) will be kind
enough to tell us, perhaps, how 'hail'
can be 'holy light.' We always re-
garded it as frozen rain. Will he in-
form 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 refer-
ence to small babies of about six weeks
old. But it is preposterous to descant
upon such absurdity-although 'Oppo-
deldoc' (whoever he is) has the un-
paralleled effrontery to suppose that we
will not only 'insert' his ignorant rav-
ings, 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 Lolli-
pop, 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."
Had
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 down upon them in
gigantic capitals!-oh it was too bitter!
-it was wormwood-it was gall.
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 Ani-
mals." As for Oppodeldoc (whoever
he was) I had by this time lost all
patience with the fellow, and sympa-
thized with him no longer. He was a
fool, beyond doubt, (whoever he was,)
and got not a kick more than he de-
served.
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 maga-
zines), 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
728
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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, how-
ever, all the legitimate rhymes to
"Bob," I found it impossible to pro-
ceed. In this dilemma I had recourse
to paternal aid; and, after some hours
of mature thought, my father and my-
self thus constructed the poem:
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 stanzas on
"The Oil-of-Bob." We need say noth-
ing 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 anx-
"To pen an Ode upon the 'Oil-of-Bob' iety to probe the mystery which en-
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 impossi-
ble 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 dis-
posal 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, con-
signed 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
velops the evident pseudonym "Snob."
May we hope for a personal inter-
view?]
All this was scarcely more than jus
tice, but it was, I confess, rather more
than I had expected:-I acknowledged
this, be it observed, to the everlasting
disgrace of my country and of man
kind. I lost no time, however, in call-
ing upon the editor of the Lollipop and
had the good fortune to find this gen-
tleman 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 thou-
sand compliments which he lavished
upon me. The eulogies of Mr. Crab
(such was the editor's name) were
however, by no means fulsomely indis-
criminate. He analyzed my composi
tion with much freedom and great
LITERARY LIFE OF
729
THINGUM, BOB, ESQ.
ability-not hesitating to point out a
few trivial defects-a circumstance
which elevated him highly in my es-
teem. 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 ac-
customed 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 Lolli-
pop) "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 "remunera-
tion," Mr. Crab first opened his eyes,
and then his mouth, to quite a remark-
able extent, causing his personal ap-
pearance to resemble that of a highly
agitated elderly duck in the act of
quacking; and in this condition he re-
mained (ever and anon pressing his
hands 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, let-
ting 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 aston-
ishment 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 al-
tered 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 pre-
sume-very?"
730
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 ob-
serve is very just,-in fact it is exces-
sively so. But ah-ah-the first con-
tribution-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 empha-
sized 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 un-
derstand. In a quarter or two after
publication of the article-or in a year
or two-we make no objection to giv-
ing 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 con-
cluded, 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 coinci-
dence 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 after-
ward, "I awoke and found myself fa-
mous." 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 sa-
gacity, and well known for the deliber-
ate gravity of its literary decisions-
the Owl, I say, spoke as follows:
"The Lollipop! The October num-
ber of this delicious magazine surpasses
its predecessors, and sets competition
at defiance. In the beauty of its typog
raphy and paper-in the number and
excellence of its steel plates-as well
as in the literary merit of its contribu-
tions-the Lollipop compares with its
slow-paced rivals as Hyperion with
Satyr. The Hum-Drum, the Rowdy-
Dow, and the Goosetherumfoodle, ex-
cel, 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 incon-
ceivable. 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 con-
tributors as SNOB and Slyass, there can
be no such word as 'fail' for the Lolli-
pop. Go and subscribe. Sep. 15-11"
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
LITERARY LIFE OF THINGUM, BOB, ESQ.
731
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-a print
highly distinguished for its uprightness
and independence-from its entire free-
dom 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 ad-
mit, in braggadocio, but, in all other
points, give us the Lollipop. How this
celebrated magazine can sustain its evi-
dently 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 fear-
fully great. We learn that Mr. Mum-
blethumb 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 Mumble-
thumb. Apart from the editorial mat-
ter, the most valuable paper, neverthe-
less, 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 con-
temptible 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 rela-
tive 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 mer-
chant 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 consid-
ered singularly pungent and appropri-
ate. The words "gem" and "bijou,"
however, used in reference to my com
position, 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 Lollipop 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 af-
forded us a felicity so supreme. We
speak advisedly. The Hum-Drum, the
732
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
Rowdy-Dow, and the Goosetherumfoo-
dle must look well to their laurels.
These prints, no doubt, surpass every-
thing in loudness of pretension, but,
in all other points, give us the Lollipop!
How this celebrated magazine can sus-
tain 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 con-
tributions, is astonishingly 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 be-
fore us are Mr. CRAB (the eminent edi-
tor), 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 extin-
guish the radiance of 'Boz.' 'SNOB,'
we learn, is a Mr. THINGUM BOв, 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 ad-
mirable poem is the 'Oil-of-Bob'—a
somewhat unfortunate name, by-the-by,
as some contemptible vagabond con-
nected 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 con-
founding 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 vaga.
bond" might have been better written
"odious and contemptible wretch, vil
lain, and vagabond." This would have
sounded more gracefully, 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 Tood,
and the Mole, I happened to meet with
a copy of the Daddy-Long-Legs, a peri-
odical proverbial for the extreme extent
of its understanding. And it was the
Daddy-Long-Legs which spoke thus:
"The Lollipop!! This gorgeous mag-
azine is already before the public for
October. The question of pre-eminence
is forever put to rest, and hereafter it
will be excessively preposterous in the
Hum-Drum, the Rowdy-Dow, or the
Goosetherumfoodle to make any fur-
ther spasmodic attempts at competi
tion. These journals may excel the
Lollipop in outcry, but, in all other
points, give us the Lollipop! How this
celebrated magazine can sustain its evi-
dently 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 Criba.
little received no less than eighty-seven
cents and a half for her late valuable
Revolutionary tale, entitled 'The York
LITERARY LIFE OF THINGUM. BOB, ESQ.
733
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 com-
mendation, 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 master-
piece 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 indigna-
tion 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 for-
bearance 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 par-
tiality for the Fly-whom it was clearly
the intention of the Daddy-Long-Legs
to elevate into reputation at my ex-
pense. Any one, indeed, might per-
ceive, 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," "scul-
lion," and "cut-throat," were epithets
so intentionally inexpressive and equiv-
ocal, 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 them-
selves 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 a scholar." Gentleman indeed! I
made up my mind at once either to get
a 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 en-
trust with a message to his Daddyship,
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.
734
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
I have never yet been able to ac-
count, in a manner satisfactory to my
own understanding, for the very pecu-
liar 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 in-
tended 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, how-
ever, 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 epi-
thets "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 Lollipop.
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 pro-
found attack of astonishment, he as-
sured me that he employed the words
"Thomas Hawk" to avoid the colloqui-
alism, 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 Lolli-
pop. 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 prac-
tice was this. I bought auction copies
(cheap) of "Lord Brougham's Speech-
es," "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); reserv
ing the hard phrases, which I threw
into a large tin pepper-castor with
longitudinal holes, so that an entire
sentence could get through without ma-
terial 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 mix-
ture upon the egged foolscap; where it
stuck. The effect was beautiful to be
hold. It was captivating. Indeed, the
reviews I brought to pass by this sim
ple expedient have never been ap-
proached, and were the wonder of the
LITERARY LIFE OF THINGUM, BOB, ESQ.
735
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 composi-
tion 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 meas-
ure, injured in regard to effect, by this
latter species of accident, when it oc-
curred--with the exception of Mr.
Lewis Clarke's paragraphs, which were
so vigorous and altogether stout, that
they seemed not particularly discon-
certed 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 ac-
complished, 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 dis-
cretion, 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 mod-
estly, "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 pre-
vent his ever seeing you again in fash-
ionable 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
736
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 gentle-
man-like. The want of money, how-
ever, 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 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 ar-
rangements 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 activ-
ity. 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 Goose-
therumfoodle. That journal, however,
having pronounced it "twattle" in the
"Monthly Notices to correspondents," I
reheaded the paper "Hey-Diddle-Did-
dle,' by THINGUM 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
Goosetherum foodle, and, while I awaited
a reply, published daily, in the Turtle,
six columns of what may be termed
philosophical and analytical investiga-
tion of the literary merits of the Goose-
therumfoodle, as well as of the personal
character of the editor of the Goose-
therumfoodle. At the end of a week
the Goosetherumfoodle discovered that
it had, by some odd mistake, “con-
founded 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 cele-
brated author of 'The Oil-of-Bob.'"
The Goosetherumfoodle deeply "re-
gretted 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 Goose-
therumfoodle. 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 bouleverse-
ment (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 Goosetherumfood
on the other, did actually again happen,
LITERARY LIFE OF THINGUM,
737
BOB, ESQ.
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."
From
I have indeed "made history."
the bright epoch which I now record,
my actions-my works-are the prop-
erty 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-Dum-how
again I made purchase of the Rowdy-
Dow, thus combining the three periodi-
cals-how lastly, I effected a bargain
for the sole remaining rival, and united
all the literature of the country in one
nagnificent Magazine known every-
where as the
Rowdy-Dow, Lollipop, Hum-Drum,
and
Goosetherumfoodle.
Yes; I have made history. My fame
is universal. It extends to the utter-
most ends of the earth. You cannot
take up a common newspaper in which
you shall not see some allusion to the
immortal THINGUM 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.
How to Write a Blackwood Article
(This tale has another name, Signora Zenobia. Published in Broadway Journal,
vol. 2:1.-Ed.)
"In the name of the prophet-figs!!"
-Cry of Turkish fig-peddler.
I PRESUME everybody has heard of
me. My name is the Signora Psyche
Zenobia. This I know to be a fact.
Nobody but my enemies ever calls me
Suky Snobbs. I have been assured
that Suky is but a vulgar corruption
of Psyche, which is good Greek, and
means "the soul" (that's me, I'm all
soul) and sometimes "a butterfly,"
which latter meaning undoubtedly al-
ludes to my appearance in my new
crimson satin dress, with the sky-blue
Arabian mantelet, and the trimmings of
green agraffas, and the seven flounces of
orange-colored auriculas. As for Snobbs
-any person who should look at me
would be instantly aware that my name
wasn't Snobbs. Miss Tabitha Turnip
propagated that report through sheer
envy. Tabitha Turnip indeed! Oh the
little wretch! But what can we expect
from a turnip? Wonder if she remem-
bers the old adage about “blood out of
a turnip," etc.? [Mem.: put her in mind
of it the first opportunity.] [Mem.
again-pull her nose.] Where was I?
Ah! I have been assured that Snobbs
is a mere corruption of Zenobia, and
that Zenobia was a queen-(So am I.
Dr. Moneypenny always calls me the
Queen of Hearts)—and that Zenobia,
as well as Psyche, is good Greek, and
that my father was "a Greek," and
that consequently I have a right to
our patronymic, which is Zenobia and
not by any means Snobbs. Nobody but
Tabitha Turnip calls me Suky Snobbs.
I am the Signora Psyche Zenobia.
As I said before, everybody has
heard of me. I am that very Signora
Psyche Zenobia, so justly celebrated as
corresponding secretary to the "Phila-
delphia, Regular, Exchange, Tea, Total,
Young, Belles, Letters, Universal, Ex-
perimental, Bibliographical, Association,
To, Civilize, Humanity." Dr. Money-
penny made the title for us, and says
he chose it because it sounded big
like an empty rum-puncheon. (A vul-
gar man that sometimes-but he's
deep.) We all sign the initials of the
society after our names, in the fashion
of the R. S. A., Royal Society of Arts
--the S. D. U. K., Society for the
Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, etc.,
etc. Dr. Moneypenny says that S.
stands for stale, and that D. U. K.
spells duck, (but it don't,) that that
S. D. U. K. stands for Stale Duck,
and not for Lord Brougham's society
-but then Dr. Moneypenny is such
a queer man that I am never sure
when he is telling me the truth. At
any rate we always add to our names
the initials P. R. E. T. T. Y. B. L.
U. E. B. A. T. C. H.-that is to say,
Philadelphia, Regular, Exchange, Tea,
Total, Young, Belles, Lettres, Universal,
Experimental, Bibliographical, Associa
tion, To, Civilize, Humanity-one letter
for each word, which is a decided im-
provement upon Lord Brougham. Dr.
Moneypenny will have it that our ini
I
738
HOW TO WRITE A BLACKWOOD ARTICLE
739
tials give our true character-but for
my life I can't see what he means.
Notwithstanding the good offices of
the Doctor, and the strenuous exer-
tions of the association to get itself into
notice, it met with no very great suc-
cess until I joined it. The truth is,
the members indulged in too flippant
a tone of discussion. The papers read
every Saturday evening were character-
ized less by depth than buffoonery.
They were all whipped syllabub. There
was no investigation of first cause, first
principles. There was no investigation
of any thing at all. There was no at-
tention paid to that great point, the
"fitness of things." In short there was
no fine writing like this. It was all low
-very! No profundity, no reading,
no metaphysics-nothing which the
learned call spirituality, and which the
unlearned choose to stigmatize as cant.
[Dr. M. says I ought to spell "cant"
with a capital K-but I know better.]
When I joined the society it was my
endeavor to introduce a better style of
thinking and writing, and all the world
knows how well I have succeeded. We
get up as good papers now in the
P. R. E. T. T. Y. B. L. U. E. B. A.
T. C. H. as any to be found even in
Blackwood. I say, Blackwood, because
I have been assured that the finest
writing, upon every subject, is to be
discovered in the pages of that justly
celebrated Magazine. We now take
it for our model upon all themes, and
are getting into rapid notice accord-
ingly. And, after all, it's not SO
very difficult a matter to compose
an article of the genuine Blackwood
stamp, if one only goes properly about
i. Of course I don't speak of the po-
litical articles Everybody knows how
they are managed, since Dr. Money-
penny explained it. Mr. Blackwood has
a pair of tailor's-shears, and three ap-
prentices who stand by him for orders.
One hands him the Times, another the
Examiner and a third a "Gulley's New
Compendium of Slang-Whang." Mr. B.
merely cuts out and intersperses. It is
soon done nothing but Examiner,
"Slang-Whang," and Times-then Times,
"Slang-Whang," and Examiner-and
then Times, Examiner, and "Slang-
Whang."
But the chief merit of the Magazine
lies in its miscellaneous articles; and
the best of these come under the head
of what Dr. Moneypenny calls the
bizarreries (whatever that may mean)
and what everybody else calls the in-
tensities. This is a species of writing
which I have long known how to appre-
ciate, although it is only since my late
visit to Mr. Blackwood (deputed by
the society) that I have been made
aware of the exact method of composi-
tion. This method is very simple, but
not so much so as the politics. Upon
my calling at Mr. B.'s, and making
known to him the wishes of the society,
he received me with great civility,
took me into his study, and gave
me a clear explanation of the whole
process.
"My dear madman," said he, evi-
dently struck with my majestic appear-
ance, for I had on the crimson satin,
with the green agraffas, and orange-
colored auriculas. "My dear madam,"
said he, "sit down. The matter stands
thus: In the first place your writer of
intensities must have very black ink,
and a very big pen, with a very blunt
nib. And, mark me, Miss Psyche
Zenobia!" he continued, after a pause,
740
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
with the most expressive energy and
solemnity of manner, "mark me!-that
pen-must-never be mended! Herein,
madam, lies the secret, the soul, of
intensity. I assume upon myself to
say, that no individual, of however
great genius ever wrote with a good
pen-understand me-a good article.
You may take it for granted, that
when manuscript can be read it is never
worth reading. This is a leading prin-
ciple in our faith, to which if you
cannot readily assent, our conference is
at an end."
He paused. But, of course, as I had
no wish to put an end to the conference,
I assented to a proposition so very
obvious, and one, too, of whose truth
I had all along been sufficiently aware.
He seemed pleased, and went on with
his instructions.
"It may appear invidious in me, Miss
Psyche Zenobia, to refer you to an ar-
ticle, or set of articles, in the way of
model or study; yet perhaps I may
as well call your attention to a few
cases. Let me see. There was "The
Dead Alive,' a capital thing!-the rec-
ord of a gentleman's sensations when
entombed before the breath was out
of his body-full of tastes, terror, senti-
ment, metaphysics, and erudition. You
would have sworn that the writer had
been born and brought up in a coffin.
Then we had the 'Confessions of an
Opium-eater-fine, very fine!-glorious
imagination deep philosophy - acute
speculation-plenty of fire and fury,
and a good spicing of the decidedly un-
intelligible. That was a nice bit of
flummery, and went down the throats
of the people delightfully. They would.
have it that Coleridge wrote the paper
-but not so. It was composed by my
pet baboon, Juniper, over a rummer of
Hollands and water, 'hot, without
sugar.'"
[This I could scarcely have
believed had it been anybody but Mr.
Blackwood, who assured me of it.]
"Then there was 'The Involuntary Ex-
perimentalist,' all about a gentleman
who got baked in an oven, and came
out alive and well, although certainly
done to a turn. And then there was
"The Diary of a Late Physician,' where
the merit lay in good rant, and indif-
ferent Greek-both of them taking
things with the public. And then there
was 'The Man in the Bell,' a paper by-
the-by, Miss Zenobia, which I cannot
sufficiently recommend to your atten-
tion. It is the history of a young
person who goes to sleep under the
clapper of a church bell, and is awak-
ened by its tolling for a funeral. The
sound drives him mad, and, accord-
ingly, pulling out his tablets, he gives
a record of his sensations. Sensations
are the great things after all. Should
you ever be drowned or hung, be sure
and make a note of your sensations-
they will be worth to you ten guineas
a sheet. If you wish to write forcibly
Miss Zenobia, pay minute attention to
the sensations."
"That I certainly will, Mr. Black-
wood," said I.
"Good!" he replied.
But I
"I see you are
a pupil after my own heart.
must put you au fait to the details nec
essary in composing what may be de
nominated a genuine Blackwood article
of the sensation stamp-the kind which
you will understand me to say I con-
sider the best for all purposes.
"The first thing requisite is to get
yourself into such a scrape as no one
ever got into before. The oven, for
HOW TO WRITE A BLACKWOOD ARTICLE
741
Instance that was a good hit. But
f you have no oven or big bell, at hand,
and if you cannot conveniently tumble
out of a balloon, or be swallowed up in
an earthquake, or get stuck fast in a
chimney, you will have to be contented
with simply imagining some similar mis-
adventure. I should prefer, however,
that you have the actual fact to bear
you out. Nothing so well assists the
fancy, as an experimental knowledge
of the matter in hand. 'Truth is
strange,' you know, 'stranger than fic-
tion'-besides being more to the pur-
pose."
Here I assured him I had an excellent
pair of garters, and would go and hang
myself forthwith.
"Good!" he replied, "do so-although
hanging is somewhat hackneyed. Per-
haps you might do better. Take a
dose of Brandreth's pills, and then give
us your sensations. However, my in-
structions will apply equally well to
any variety of misadventure, and in
your way home you may easily get
knocked in the head, or run over by
an omnibus, or bitten by a mad dog,
or drowned in a gutter. But to proceed.
"Having determined upon your sub-
ject, you must next consider the tone,
or manner, of your narration. There
is the tone didactic, the tone enthusias-
tic, the tone natural-all common-place
enough. But then there is the tone
laconic, or curt, which has lately come
: much into use. It consists in short
sentences. Somehow thus: Can't be too
brief. Can't be too snappish. Always
a full stop. And never a paragraph.
"Then there is the tone elevated, dif-
fusive, and interjectional. Some of our
best novelists patronize this tone. The
words must be all in a whirl, like a
humming-top, and make a noise very
similar, which answers remarkably well
instead of meaning. This is the best
of all possible styles where the writer
is in too great a hurry to think.
"The tone metaphysical is also a
good one. If you know any big words
this is your chance for them. Talk
of the Ionic and Eleatic schools-of
Archytas, Gorgias, and Alcmæon. Say
something about objectivity and sub-
jectivity. Be sure and abuse a man
named Locke. Turn up your nose at
things in general, and when you let
slip any thing a little too absurd, you
need not be at the trouble of scratch-
ing it out, but just add a foot-note and
say that you are indebted for the above
profound observation to the 'Kritik der
reinem Vernunft, or to the 'Meta-
physithe Anfongsgrunde der Noturwis-
senchaft.' This would look erudite and
-and-and frank.
"There are various other tones of
equal celebrity, but I shall mention only
two more-the tone transcendental and
the tone heterogeneous. In the former
the merit consists in seeing into the
nature of affairs a very great deal
farther than anybody else. This second
sight is very efficient when properly
managed. A little reading of the Dial
will carry you a great way. Eschew,
in this case, big words; get them as
small as possible, and write them up-
side down. Look over Channing's
poems and quote what he says about a
'fat little man with a delusive show of
Can.' Put in something about the Su-
pernal Oneness. Don't say a syllable
about the Infernal Twoness. Above
all, study innuendo. Hint everything-
assert nothing, If you feel inclined to
say 'bread and butter,' do not by any
742
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
means say it outright. You may say
any thing and every thing approaching
to 'bread and butter.' You may hint
at buck-wheat cake, or you may even
go so far as to insinuate oatmeal por-
ridge, but if bread and butter be your
real meaning, be cautious, my dear Miss
Psyche, not on any account to say
'bread and butter!""
I assured him that I should never
say it again as long as I lived. He
kissed me and continued:
"As for the tone heterogeneous, it
is merely a judicious mixture, in equal
proportions, of all the other tones in
the world, and is consequently made
up of every thing deep, great, odd,
piquant, pertinent, and pretty.
"Let us suppose now you have deter-
mined upon your incidents and tone.
The most important portion-in fact,
the soul of the whole business, is yet to
be attended to-I allude to the filling
up. It is not to be supposed that a
lady, or gentleman either, has been
leading the life of a book-worm. And
yet above all things it is necessary that
your article have an air of erudition,
or at least afford evidence of extensive
general reading. Now I'll put you in
the way of accomplishing this point.
See here!" (pulling down some three
or four ordinary-looking volumes, and
opening them at random). "By casting
your eye down almost any page of any
book in the world, you will be able
to perceive at once a host of little
scraps of either learning or bel-esprit-
ism, which are the very thing for the
spicing of a Blackwood article. You
might as well note down a few while I
read them to you. I shall make two
divisions: first, Piquant Facts for the
Manufacture of Similes; and, second.
Piquant Expressions to be introduced
as occasion may require. Write now."
-and I wrote as he dictated.
"PIQUANT FACTS FOR SIMILES. 'There
were originally but three Muses-Me-
lete, Mneme, Aœde-meditation, mem-
ory, and singing.' You may make a
good deal of that little fact if properly
worked. You see it is not generally
known, and looks recherche. You must
be careful and give the thing with a
downright improviso air.
"Again. "The river Alpheus passed
beneath the sea, and emerged without
injury to the purity of its waters."
Rather stale that, to be sure, but, if
properly dressed and dished up, will
look quite as fresh as ever.
"Here is something better. The
Persian Iris appears to some persons to
possess a sweet and very powerful per
fume, while to others it is perfectly
scentless.' Fine that, and very delicate!
Turn it about a little, and it will do
wonders. We'll have some thing else
in the botanical line. There's nothing
goes down so well, especially with the
help of a little Latin. Write!
"The Epidendrum Fos Aeris, of
Java, bears a very beautiful flower, and
will live when pulled up by the roots.
The natives suspend it by a cord from
the ceiling, and enjoy its fragrance for
years.' That's capital! That will do
for the similes. Now for the Piquant
Expressions.
"PIQUANT EXPRESSIONS. 'The Vener
able Chinese novel Ju-Kiao-Li' Good!
By introducing these few words with
dexterity you will evince your intimate
acquaintance with the language and lit-
erature of the Chinese. With the aid
of this you may possibly get along
without either Arabic, or Sanscrit, or
HOW TO WRITE A BLACKWOOD ARTICLE
743
Chickasaw. There is no passing muster,
however, without Spanish, Italian, Ger-
man, Latin, and Greek. I must look
you out a little specimen of each. Any
scrap will answer, because you must
depend upon your own ingenuity to
make it fit into your article. Now
write!
"Aussi tendre que Zaire'-as tender
as Zaire-French. Alludes to the fre-
quent repetition of the phrase, la tendre
Zaire, in the French tragedy of that
name. Properly introduced, will show
not only your knowledge of the lan-
guage, but your general reading and
wit. You can say, for instance, that
the chicken you were eating (write an
article about being choked to death
by a chicken-bone) was not altogether
aussi tendre que Zaire. Write!
'Van muerte tan escondida,
Que no te sienta venir,
Porque el plazer del morir,
No mestorne a dar la vida.'
"That's Spanish-from Miguel de
Cervantes. 'Come quickly, O death!
but be sure and don't let me see you
coming, lest the pleasure I shall feel at
your appearance should unfortunately
bring me back again to life.' This you
may slip in quite a propos when you
are struggling in the last agonies with
the chicken-bone. Write!
'Il pover 'huomo che non se'n era
accorto,
Andava combattendo, e era morto.'
That's Italian, you perceive-from
Ariosto. It means that a great hero,
in the heat of combat, not perceiving
that he had been fairly killed, continued
to fight valiantly, dead as he was. The
application of this to your own case is
obvious-for I trust, Miss Psyche, that
you will not neglect to kick for at least
an hour and a half after you have been
choked to death by that chicken-bone.
Please to write!
'Und sterb'ich doch, no sterb'ich denn
Durch sie durch sie!'
'And
That's German-from Schiller.
if I die, at least I die-for thee-for
thee!' Here it is clear that you are
apostrophizing the cause of your dis-
aster, the chicken. Indeed what gentle-
man (or lady either) of sense, wouldn't
die, I should like to know, for a well
fattened capon of the right Molucca
breed, stuffed with capers and mush-
rooms, and served up in a salad-bowl,
with orange-jellies en mosaiques. Write!
(You can get them that way at Tor
toni's)--Write, if you please!
"Here is a nice little Latin phrase,
and rare too, (one can't be too recherche
or brief in one's Latin, it's getting so
common-ignoratio elenchi. He has
committed an ignoratio elenchi-that is
to say, he has understood the words of
your proposition, but not the idea.
The man was a fool, you see. Some
poor fellow whom you address while
choking with that chicken-bone, and
who therefore didn't precisely under-
stand what you were talking about.
Throw the ignoratio elenchi in his teeth,
and, at once, you have him annihilated.
If he dares to reply, you can tell him
from Lucan (here it is) that speeches
are mere anemonae verborum, ane-
mone words. The anemone, with great
brilliancy, has no smell. Or, if he be-
gins to bluster, you may be down udon
744
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
him with insomnia Jovis, reveries of
Jupiter a phrase which Silius Italicus.
(see here!) applies to thoughts pom-
pous and inflated. This will be sure and
cut him to the heart. He can do noth-
ing but roll over and die. Will you be
kind enough to write?
"In Greek we must have some thing
pretty-from Demosthenes, for example.
'Aner o pheugoen kai palin makesetai.'
There is a tolerably good translation of
it in Hudibras-
'For he that flies may fight again,
Which he can never do that's slain.'
In
Blackwood article nothing makes
so fine a show as your Greek. The
very letters have an air of profundity
about them. Only observe, madam, the
astute look of that Epsilon! That Phi
ought certainly to be a bishop! Was
ever there a smarter fellow than that
Omicron? Just twig that Tau! In
short, there is nothing like Greek for
a genuine sensation-paper. In the pres-
ent case your application is the most
obvious thing in the world. Rap out
the sentence, with a huge oath, and
by way of ultimatum at the good-for-
nothing dunder-headed villain who
couldn't understand your plain English
in relation to the chicken-bone. He'll
take the hint and be off, you may
depend upon it."
These were all the instructions Mr.
B. could afford me upon the topic in
question, but I felt they would be en-
tirely sufficient. I was, at length, able
to write a genuine Blackwood article,
and determined to do it forthwith. In
taking leave of me, Mr. B. made a
proposition for the purchase of the
paper when written; but as he could
offer me only fifty guineas a sheet, I
thought it better to let our society have
it, than sacrifice it for so paltry a sum.
Notwithstanding this niggardly spirit,
however, the gentleman showed his
consideration for me in all other re-
spects, and indeed treated me with the
greatest civility. His parting word:
made a deep impression upon my heart,
and I hope I shall always remember
them with gratitude.
"My dear Miss Zenobia," he said,
while the tears stood in his eyes, "is
there any thing else I can do to
promote the success of your laudable
undertaking? Let me reflect! It is
just possible that you may not be
able, so soon as convenient, to-to-
get yourself drowned, or-choked with
a chicken-bone, or-or hung,-or-bit-
ten by a-but stay! Now I think me
of it, there are a couple of very excel-
lent bull-dogs in the yard-fine fel-
lows, I assure you-savage, and all
that-indeed just the thing for your
money-they'll have you eaten up.
auriculas and all, in less than five min-
utes (here's my watch!)—and then
only think of the sensations! Here
I say-Tom!-Peter!-Dick, you vil
lain!-let out those"-but as I was
really in a great hurry, and had not an-
other moment to spare, I was reluc
tantly forced to expedite my departure
and accordingly took leave at once-
somewhat more abruptly, I admit, than
strict courtesy would have otherwise
allowed.
It was my primary object upon quit-
ting Mr. Blackwood, to get into some
immediate difficulty, pursuant to his ad
vice, and with this view I spent the
A PREDICAMENT
745
greater part of the day in wandering
about Edinburgh, seeking for desperate
adventures-adventures adequate to the
intensity of my feelings, and adapted
to the vast character of the article I
intended to write. In this excursion I
was attended by one negro-servant,
Pompey, and my little lap-dog Diana,
whom I had brought with me from
Philadelphia. It was not, however, until
late in the afternoon that I fully suc-
ceeded in my arduous undertaking. An
important event then happened of
which the following Blackwood article,
in the tone heterogeneous, is the sub-
stance and result.
A Predicament
(The tale, The Scythe of Time is the same as A Predicament.-Ed.)
(A Sequel)
What chance, good lady, hath bereft
you thus?-COMUS.
Ir was a quiet and still afternoon
when I strolled forth in the goodly city
of Edina. The confusion and bustle
in the streets were terrible. Men were
talking. Women were screaming. Chil-
dren were choking. Pigs were whistling.
Carts they rattled. Bulls they bellowed.
Cows they lowed. Horses they neighed.
Cats they caterwauled. Dogs they
danced. Danced! Could it then be
possible? Danced! Alas, thought I,
my dancing days are over! Thus it is
ever. What a host of gloomy recollec-
tions will ever and anon be awakened
in the mind of genius and imaginative
contemplation, especially of a genius
doomed to the everlasting, and eternal,
and continual, and, as one might say,
the-continued-yes, the continued and
continuous, bitter, harassing, disturbing,
and, if I may be allowed the expression,
the very disturbing influence of the
serene, and god-like, and heavenly, and
exalting, and elevated, and purifying ef-
fect of what may be rightly termed the
most enviable, the most truly enviable
-nay! the most benignly beautiful, the
most deliciously ethereal, and, as it
were, the most pretty (if I may use so
bold an expression) thing (pardon me,
gentle reader!) in the world—but I am
always led away by my feelings. In
such a mind, I repeat, what a host of
recollections are stirred up by a trifle!
The dogs danced! I-I could not!
They frisked-I wept. They capered-
I sobbed aloud. Touching circum-
stances! which cannot fail to bring to
the recollection of the classical reader
that exquisite passage in relation to the
fitness of things, which is to be found in
the commencement of the third volume
of that admirable and venerable Chinese
novel the Jo-Go-Slow.
In my solitary walk through the city
I had two humble but faithful compan-
ions. Diana, my poodle! sweetest of
creatures! She had a quantity of hair
over her one eye, and a blue riband tied
fashionably around her neck. Diana
was not more than five inches in height,
746
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
but her head was somewhat bigger than
her body, and her tail being cut off ex-
ceedingly close, gave an air of injured
innocence to the interesting animal
which rendered her a favorite with all.
And Pompey, my negro!-sweet
Pompey! how shall I ever forget thee?
I had taken Pompey's arm. He was
three feet in height (I like to be par-
ticular) and about seventy, or perhaps
eighty, years of age. He had bow-legs
and was corpulent. His mouth should
not be called small, nor his ears short.
His teeth, however, were like pearl, and
his large full eyes were deliciously
white. Nature had endowed him with
no neck, and had placed his ankles (as
usual with that race) in the middle of
the upper portion of the feet. He was
clad with a striking simplicity. His
sole garments were a stock of nine
inches in height, and a nearly-new
drab overcoat which had formerly been
in the service of the tall, stately, and
illustrious Dr. Moneypenny. It was
a good overcoat. It was well cut. It
was well made. The coat was nearly
new. Pompey held it up out of the
dirt with both hands.
I
There were three persons in our
party, and two of them have already
beep the subject of remark. There was
a third-that person was myself.
am the Signora Psyche Zenobia. I
am not Suky Snobbs. My appearance
is commanding. On the memorable oc-
casion of which I speak I was habited
in a crimson satin dress, with a sky-
blue Arabian mantelet. And the dress
had trimmings of green agraffas, and
seven graceful flounces of the orange-
colored auricula. I thus formed the
third of the party. There was the
poodle. There was Pompey There
was myself. We were three. Thus it
is said there were originally but three
Furies-Melty, Nimmy, and Hetty-
Meditation, Memory, and Fiddling.
ar
Leaning upon the arm of the gallant
Pompey, and attended at a respectable
distance by Diana, I proceeded down
one of the populous and very pleasant
streets of the now deserted Edina. On
a sudden, there presented itself to view
a church-a Gothic cathedral-vast,
venerable, and with a tall steeple, which
towered into the sky. What madness
now possessed me? Why did I rush
upon my fate? I was seized with an T
uncontrollable desire to ascend the D
giddy pinnacle, and then survey the
immense extent of the city. The door
of the cathedral stood invitingly open.
My destiny prevailed. I entered the
ominous archway. Where then was my
guardian angel?-if indeed such angels
there be. If! Distressing monosyllable!
what a world of mystery, and meaning.
and doubt, and uncertainty is there
involved in thy two letters! I entered
the ominous archway! I entered; and,
without injury to my orange-colored
auriculas, I passed beneath the portal
and emerged within the vestibule. Thus
it is said the immense river Alfred
passed, unscathed, and unwetted, be
neath the sea.
I thought the staircase would never
have an end. Round! Yes, they went
round and up, and round and up and
round and up, until I could not hel
surmising, with the sagacious Pompey
upon whose supporting arm I leaned in
all the confidence of early affection-I
could not help surmising that the upper
end of the continuous spiral ladder had
been accidentally, or perhaps design
edly, removed. I paused for breath;
A PREDICAMENT
747
and, in the meantime, an accident oc-
curred of too momentous a nature in a
moral, and also in a metaphysical point
of view, to be passed over without no-
tice. It appeared to me-indeed I was
quite confident of the fact-I could not
be mistaken-no! I had, for some mo-
ments, carefully and anxiously observed
the motions of my Diana-I say that
I could not be mistaken-Diana smelt
a rat! At once I called Pompey's at-
tention to the subject, and he-he
agreed with me. There was then no
longer any reasonable room for doubt.
The rat had been smelled-and by
Diana. Heavens! shall I ever forget
the intense excitement of the moment?
The rat!-it was there-that is to say,
it was somewhere. Diana smelled the
rat. I-I could not! Thus it is said
the Prussian Isis has, for some persons,
a sweet and very powerful perfume,
while to others it is perfectly scentless.
The staircase had been surmounted,
and there were now only three or four
more upward steps intervening between
us and the summit. We still ascended,
and now only one step remained. One
step! One little, little step! Upon
one such little step in the great stair-
case of human life how vast a sum of
human happiness or misery depends!
I thought of myself, then of Pompey,
and then of the mysterious and inex-
plicable destiny which surrounded us.
I thought of Pompey!-alas, I thought
of love! I thought of my many false
steps which have been taken, and may
be taken again. I resolved to be more
cautious, more reserved. I abandoned
the arm of Pompey, and, without his
> assistance, surmounted the one remain-
ing step, and gained the chamber of the
belfry. I was followed immediately
afterward by my poodle. Pompey
alone remained behind. I stood at the
head of the staircase, and encouraged
him to ascend. He stretched forth to
me his hand, and unfortunately in so
doing was forced to abandon his firm
hold upon the overcoat. Will the gods
never cease their persecution? The
overcoat is dropped, and, with one of
his feet, Pompey stepped upon the
long and trailing skirt of the overcoat.
He stumbled and fell-this conse-
quence was inevitable. He fell for-
ward, and, with his accursed head, strik-
ing me full in the-in the breast, pre-
cipitated me headlong, together with
himself, upon the hard, filthy, and de-
testable floor of the belfry. But my
revenge was sure, sudden, and com-
plete. Seizing him furiously by the
wool with both hands, I tore out a
vast quantity of black, and crisp, and
curling material, and tossed it from me
with every manifestation of disdain. It
fell among the ropes of the belfry and
remained. Pompey arose, and said no
word. But he regarded me piteously
with his large eyes and-sighed. Ye
Gods that sigh! It sunk into my
heart. And the hair-the wool! Could
I have reached that wool I would have
bathed it with my tears, in testimony
of regret. But alas! it was now far
beyond my grasp. As it dangled among
the cordage of the bell, I fancied it
alive. I fancied that it stood on end
with indignation. Thus the happy-
dandy Flos Aeris of Java bears, it is
said, a beautiful flower, which will live
when pulled up by the roots. The na-
tives suspend it by a cord from the
ceiling and enjoy its fragrance for
years.
Our quarrel was now made up, and
748
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
we looked about the room for an aper-
ture through which to survey the city
of Edina. Windows there were none.
The sole light admitted into the gloomy
chamber proceeded from a square open-
ing, about a foot in diameter, at a
height of about seven feet from the
floor. Yet what will the energy of true
genius not effect? I resolved to clamber
up to this hole. A vast quantity of
wheels, pinions, and other cabalistic-
looking machinery stood opposite the
hole, close to it; and through the hole
there passed an iron rod from the ma-
chinery. Between the wheels and the
wall where the hole lay there was barely
room for my body-yet I was des-
perate, and determined to persevere. I
called Pompey to my side.
"You perceive that aperture, Pompey.
I wish to look through it. You will
stand here just beneath the hole-so.
Now, hold out one of your hands,
Pompey, and let me step upon it-
thus. Now, the other hand, Pompey,
and with its aid I will get upon your
shoulders."
He did every thing I wished, and I
found, upon getting up, that I could
easily pass my head and neck through
the aperture. The prospect was sub-
lime. Nothing could be more magnifi-
cent. I merely paused a moment to
bid Diana behave herself, and assure
Pompey that I would be considerate
and bear as lightly as possible upon his
shoulders. I told him I would be tender
of his feelings-ossi tender que beef-
steak. Having done this justice to my
faithful friend, I gave myself up with
great zest and enthusiasm to the en-
joyment of the scene which so oblig-
ingly spread itself out before my eyes.
Upon this subject, however, I shall
forbear to dilate. I will not describe
the city of Edinburgh. Every one has
been to the city of Edinburgh. Every
one has been to Edinburgh-the classic
Edina. I will confine myself to the mo-
mentous details of my own lamentable
adventure. Having, in some measure,
satisfied my curiosity in regard to the
extent, situation, and general appear-
ance of the city, I had leisure to survey
the church in which I was, and the deli-
cate architecture of the steeple. I
observed that the aperture through
which I had thrust my head was an
opening in the dial-plate of a gigantic
clock, and must have appeared, from
the street, as a large key-hole, such as
we see in the face of the French watches.
No doubt the true object was to admit
the arm of an attendant, to adjust,
when necessary, the hands of the clock
from within. I observed also, with sur-
prise, the immense size of these hands,
the longest of which could not have
been less than ten feet in length, and.
where broadest, eight or nine inches
in breadth. They were of solid steel
apparently, and their edges appeared to
be sharp. Having noticed these par-
ticulars, and some others, I again
turned my eyes upon the glorious pros
pect below, and soon became absorbed
in contemplation.
From this, after some minutes, I was
aroused by the voice of Pompey, who
declared that he could stand it no
longer, and requested that I would be
so kind as to come down. This was
unreasonable, and I told him so in a
speech of some length. He replied, but
with an evident misunderstanding of
my ideas upon the subject. I accord-
ingly grew angry, and told him in plain
words. that he was a fool, that he had
A PREDICAMENT
749
committed an ignoramus e-clench-eye,
that his notions were mere insommary
Bovis, and his words little better than
an ennemywerrybor'em. With this he
appeared satisfied, and I resumed my
contemplations.
It might have been half an hour after
this altercation when, as I was deeply
absorbed in the heavenly scenery be-
neath me, I was startled by something
very cold which pressed with a gentle
pressure on the back of my neck. It
is needless to say that I felt inex-
pressibly alarmed. I knew that Pom-
pey was beneath my feet, and that
Diana was sitting, according to my ex-
plicit directions, upon her hind legs, in
the farthest corner of the room. What
could it be? Alas! I but too soon
discovered. Turning my head gently to
one side, I perceived, to my extreme
horror, that the huge, glittering, scime-
tar-like minute hand of the clock had,
in the course of its hourly revolution,
descended upon my neck. There was,
I knew, not a second to be lost. I
pulled back at once-but it was too
late. There was no chance of forcing
my head through the mouth of that
terrible trap in which it was so fairly
caught, and which grew narrower and
narrower with a rapidity too horrible to
be conceived. The agony of that mo-
ment is not to be imagined. I threw
up my hands and endeavored, with all
my strength, to force upward the pon-
derous iron bar. I might as well have
tried to lift the cathedral itself. Down,
down, down it came, closer and yet
closer. I screamed to Pompey for aid;
but he said that I had hurt his feelings
by calling him "an ignorant old squint-
eye." I yelled to Diana; but she only
said "bow-wow-wow," and that I had
told her "on no account to stir from
the corner." Thus I had no relief to
expect from my associates.
Meantime the ponderous and terrific
Scythe of Time (for I now discovered
the literal import of that classical
phrase) had not stopped, nor was it
likely to stop, in its career. Down
and still down, it came. It had al-
ready buried its sharp edge a full inch
in my flesh, and my sensations grew
indistinct and confused. At one time
I fancied myself in Philadelphia with
the stately Dr. Moneypenny, at an-
other in the back parlor of Mr. Black-
wood receiving his invaluable instruc-
tions. And then again the sweet recol-
lection of better and earlier times came
over me, and I thought of that happy
period when the world was not all a
desert, and Pompey not altogether cruel.
The ticking of the machinery amused
me. Amused me, I say, for my sensa-
tions now bordered upon perfect happi-
ness, and the most trifling circum-
stances afforded me pleasure. The
eternal click-clak, click-clak, click-clak
of the clock was the most melodious
of music in my ears, and occasionally
even put me in mind of the graceful
sermonic harangues of Dr. Ollapod.
Then there were the great figures upon
the dial-plate-how intelligent, how in-
tellectual, they all looked! And pres-
ently they took to dancing the Ma-
zurka, and I think it was the figure
V. who performed the most to my satis-
faction. She was evidently a lady of
breeding. None of your swaggerers,
and nothing at all indelicate in her mo-
tions. She did the pirouette to admira-
tion-whirling round upon her apex.
I made an endeavor to hand her a
chair, for I saw that she appeared
750
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
fatigued with her exertions-and it was
not until then that I fully perceived my
lamentable situation. Lamentable in-
deed! The bar had buried itself two
inches in my neck. I was aroused to
a sense of exquisite pain.
I prayed
for death, and, in the agony of the
moment, could not help repeating those
exquisite verses of the poet Miguel De
Cervantes:
Vanny Buren, tan escondida
Query no te senty venny
Pork and pleasure, delly morry
Nommy, torny, darry, widdy!
But now a new horror presented
itself, and one indeed sufficient to
startle the strongest nerves. My eyes,
from the cruel pressure of the machine,
were absolutely starting from their
sockets. While I was thinking how I
should possibly manage without them,
one actually tumbled out of my head,
and, rolling down the steep side of the
steeple, lodged in the rain gutter which
ran along the eaves of the main build-
ing. The loss of the eye was not so
much as the insolent air of independ-
ence and contempt with which it re-
garded me after it was out. There it
lay in the gutter just under my nose,
and the airs it gave itself would have
been ridiculous had they not been dis-
gusting. Such a winking and blinking
were never before seen. This be-
havior on the part of my eye in the
gutter was not only irritating on ac-
count of its manifest insolence and
shameful ingratitude, but was also ex-
ceedingly inconvenient on account of
the sympathy which always exists be-
tween two eyes of the same head,
however far apart. I was forced, in
a manner, to wink and to blink, whether
I would or not, in exact concert with
the scoundrelly thing that lay just
under my nose. I was presently re-
lieved, however, by the dropping out
of the other eye. In falling it took the
same direction (possibly a concerted
plot) as its fellow. Both rolled out
of the gutter together, and in truth
I was very glad to get of them.
The bar was now tour inches and a
half deep in my neck, and there wa
only a litle bit of skin to cut through
My sensations were those of entire
happiness, for I felt that in a few
minutes, at farthest, I should be re-
lieved from my disagreeable situation.
And in this expectation I was not at
all deceived. At twenty-five minutes
past five in the afternoon, precisely, the
huge minute-hand had proceeded suffi
ciently far on its terrible revolution to
sever the small remainder of my neck.
I was not sorry to see the head which
had occasioned me so much embarrass-
ment at length make a final separation
from my body. It first rolled down
the side of the steeple, then lodged, for
a few seconds, in the gutter, and then
made its way, with a plunge, into the
middle of the street.
I will candidly confess that my feel
ings were now of the most singular-
nay, of the most mysterious, the most
perplexing and incomprehensible char-
acter. My senses were here and there
at one and the same moment. With
my head I imagined, at one time, that
I, the head, was the real Signora Psyche ||
Zenobia-at another I felt convinced
that myself, the body, was the proper
identity. To clear my ideas on this
topic I felt in my pocket for my snuf
box, but, upon getting it, and endeavor
A PREDICAMENT
751
ing to apply a pinch of its grateful
contents in the ordinary manner, I
became immediately aware of my pecu-
liar deficiency, and threw the box at
once down to my head. It took a
pinch with great satisfaction, and
smiled me an acknowledgement in re-
turn. Shortly afterward it made me a
speech, which I could hear but indis-
tinctly without ears. I gathered enough,
however, to know that it was astonished
at my wishing to remain alive under
such circumstances. In the concluding
sentences it quoted the noble words of
Ariosto-
Il pover hommy che non sera corty
And have a combat tenty erry morty;
thus comparing me to the hero who,
in the heat of the combat, not perceiv-
ing that he was dead, continued to con-
test the battle with inextinguishable
valor. There was nothing now to pre-
vent my getting down from my eleva-
tion, and I did so. What it was that
Pompey saw so very peculiar in my
appearance I have never yet been able
to find out. The fellow opened his
mouth from ear to ear, and shut his
two eyes as if he were endeavoring to
crack nuts between the lids. Finally,
throwing off his overcoat, he made one
spring for the staircase and disappeared.
I hurled after the scoundrel these vehe-
ment words of Demosthenes-
Andrew O'Phlegethon, you really make
haste to fly,
and then turned to the darling of my
heart, to the one-eyed! the shaggy-
haired Diana. Alas! what a horrible
vision affronted my eyes? Was that a
rat I saw skulking into his hole? Are
these the picked bones of the little
angel who has been cruelly devoured by
the monster? Ye gods! and what do
I behold-is that the departed spirit,
the shade, the ghost, of my beloved
puppy, which I perceive sitting with
a grace so melancholy, in the corner?
Hearken! for she speaks, and, heavens!
it is in the German of Schiller-
"Unt stubby duk, so stubby dun
Duk she! duk she!"
Alas! and are not her words too true}
“And if I died, at least I died
For thee-for thee."
Sweet creature! she too has sacrificed
herself in my behalf. Dogless, nigger-
less, headless, what now remains for the
unhappy Signora Psyche.
Signora Psyche Zenobia?
Alas-nothing! I have done.
X-ing a Paragrab
As it is well known that the "wise
men" came "from the East," and as
Mr. Touch-and-go Bullet-head came
from the East, it follows that Mr. Bul-
let-head was a wise man; and if col-
lateral proof of the matter be needed,
here we have it-Mr. B. was an editor.
Irascibility was his sole foible; for in
fact the obstinacy of which men ac-
cused him was anything but his foible,
since he justly considered it his forte.
It was his strong point-his virtue;
and it would have required all the logic
of a Brownson to convince him that it
was "anything else.”
I have shown that Touch-and-go Bul-
let-head was a wise man; and the only
occasion on which he did not prove
infallible, was when, abandoning that
legitimate home for all wise men, the
East, he migrated to the city of Alex-
ander-the-Great-o-nopolis, or some place
of a similar title, out West.
I must do him the justice to say,
however, that when he made up his
mind finally to settle in that town, it
was under the impression that no news-
paper, and consequently no editor, ex-
isted in that particular section of the
country. In establishing The Tea-Pot
he expected to have the field all to
himself. I feel confident he never
would have dreamed of taking up his
residence in Alexander-the-Great-o-nop-
olis had he been aware that, in Alex-
ander-the-Great-o-nopolis, there lived a
gentleman named John Smith (if I
rightly remember), who for many
years had there quietly grown fat in
editing and publishing the Alexander-
the-Great-o-nopolis Gazette. It was
solely, therefore, on account of having
been misinformed, that Mr. Bullet-
head found himself in Alex— sup
pose we call it Nopolis, "for short”—
but, as he did find himself there, he
determined to keep up his character
for obst-for firmness, and remain. So
remain he did; and he did more; he
unpacked his press, type, etc., etc.,
rented an office exactly opposite to that
of the Gazette, and, on the third morn
ing after his arrival, issued the first
number of The Alexan-that is to say,
of The Nopolis Tea-Pot-as nearly as
I can recollect, this was the name of
the new paper.
The leading article, I must admit,
was brilliant-not to say severe. It
was especially bitter about things in
general-and as for the editor of The
Gazette, he was torn all to pieces in
particular. Some of Bullet-head's re-
marks were really so fiery that I have
always, since that time, been forced to
look upon John Smith, who is still
alive, in the light of a salamander. I
cannot pretend to give all the Tea-Pot's
paragraphs verbatim, but one of them
runs thus:
"Oh, yes!-Oh, we perceive! Oh. no
doubt! The editor over the way is a
genius-0, my! Oh, goodness, gra-
cious!-what is this world coming to?
Oh, tempora! Oh, Moses!"
A philippic at once so caustic and so
classical, alighted like a bombshe"
among the hitherto peaceful citizens of
Nopolis. Groups of excited individuals
gathered at the corners of the streets.
Every one awaited, with heartfelt anx
752
X-ING A PARAGRAB
753
iety, the reply of the dignified Smith.
Next morning it appeared as follows:
"We quote from The Tea-Pot of
yesterday the subjoined paragraph:
'Oh, yes! Oh, we perceive! Oh, no
doubt! Oh, my! Oh, goodness! Oh,
tempora! Oh, Moses!' Why, the fel-
low is all O! That accounts for his
reasoning in a circle, and explains why
there is neither beginning nor end to
him, nor to anything he says. We
really do not believe the vagabond can
write a word that hasn't an O in it.
Wonder if this O-ing is a habit of his?
By-the-by, he came away from Down-
East in a great hurry. Wonder if he
O's as much there as he does here? 'O!
it is pitiful.""
The indignation of Mr. Bullet-head
at these scandalous insinuations, I shall
not attempt to describe. On the eel-
skinning principle, however, he did not
seem to be so much incensed at the
attack upon his integrity as one might
have imagined. It was the sneer at
his style that drove him to desperation.
What!-he Touch-and-go Bullet-head!
-not able to write a word without an
O in it! He would soon let the jack-
anapes see that he was mistaken. Yes!
he would let him see how much he was
mistaken, the puppy! He, Touch-and-
go Bullet-head, of Frogpondium, would
let Mr. John Smith perceive that he,
Bullet-head, could indite, if it so
pleased him, a whole paragraph-ay! a
whole article-in which that contempt-
ible vowel should not once-not even
once-make its appearance. But no;-
that would be yielding a point to the
said John Smith. He, Bullet-head,
would make no alteration in his style,
to suit the caprices of any Mr. Smith
in Christendom. Perish so vile a
thought! The O forever! He would
persist in the O. He would be as O-wy
as O-wy could be.
Burning with the chivalry of this
determination, the great Touch-and-go,
in the next Tea-Pot, came out merely
with this simple but resolute para-
graph, in reference to this unhappy
affair:
"The editor of the Tea-Pot has the
honor of advising the editor of the
Gazette that he (the Tea-Pot) will take
an opportunity in to-morrow morning's
paper, of convincing him (the Gazette)
that he (the Tea-Pot) both can and
will be his own master, as regards
style; he (the Tea-Pot) intending to
show him (the Gazette) the supreme,
and indeed the withering contempt with
which the criticism of him (the Ga-
zette) inspires the independent bosom
of him (the Tea-Pot) by composing for
the especial gratification (?) of him
(the Gazette) a leading article, of some
extent, in which the beautiful vowel-
the emblem of Eternity-yet so offen-
sive to the hyper-exquisite delicacy of
him (the Gazette) shall most certainly
not be avoided by his (the Gazette's)
most obedient, humble servant, the
Tea-Pot. 'So much for Buckingham!'"
In fulfilment of the awful threat
thus darkly intimated rather than de-
cidedly enunciated, the great Bullet-
head, turning a deaf ear to all entreaties
for "copy," and simply requesting his
foreman to "go to the d-1," when
he (the foreman) assured him (the
Tea-Pot!) that it was high time to "go
to press": turning a deaf ear to every-
thing, I say, the great Bullet-head sat
up until daybreak, consuming the mid-
night oil, and absorbed in the compo-
754
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
sition of the really unparalleled para-
graph, which follows:-
"So ho, John! how now? Told you
so, you know. Don't crow, another
time, before you're out of the woods!
Does your mother know you're out?
Oh, no, no!-so go home at once, now,
John, to your odious old woods of
Concord! Go home to your woods, old
owl, go! You won't! Oh, poh, poh,
John, don't do so! You've got to go,
you know! So go at once, and don't
go slow; for nobody owns you here,
you know! Oh! John, John, if you
don't go you're no homo-no! You're
only a fowl, an owl; a cow, a sow; a
doll, a poll; a poor, old, good-for-noth-
ing-to-nobody, log, dog, hog, or frog.
come out of a Concord bog. Cool, now
-cool! Do be cool, you fool! None
of your crowing, old cock! Don't
frown so don't! Don't hollo, nor
howl, nor growl, nor bow-wow-wow!
Good Lord, John, how you do look!
Told you so, you know-but stop roll-
ing your goose of an old poll about so,
and go and drown your sorrows in a
bowl!"
Exhausted, very naturally, by so stu-
pendous an effort, the great Touch-and-
go could attend to nothing farther that
night. Firmly, composedly, yet with
an air of conscious power, he handed
his MS. to the devil in waiting, and
then, walking leisurely home, retired,
with ineffable dignity to bed.
Meantime the devil, to whom the
copy was entrusted, ran up stairs to his
"case," in an unutterable hurry, and
forthwith made a commencement at
"setting" the MS. "up."
In the first place, of course,-as the
opening word was "So," he made a
plunge into the capital S hole and came
out in triumph with a capital S. Elated
by this success, he immediately threw
himself upon the little-o box with a
blindfold impetuosity-but who shall
describe his horror when his fingers
came up without the anticipated letter
in their clutch? who shall paint his 25-
tonishment and rage at perceiving, as
he rubbed his knuckles, that he had
been only thumping them to no pur-
pose, against the bottom of an empty
box. Not a single little-o was in the
little-o hole; and, glancing fearfully at
the capital-O partition, he found that.
to his extreme terror, in a precisely
similar predicament. Awe-stricken, his
first impulse was to rush to the fore-
man.
"Sir!" said he, gasping for breath,
"I can't never set up nothing without
no o's."
"What do you mean by that?"
growled the foreman, who was in a
very ill humor at being kept so late.
"Why, sir, there beant an o in the
office, neither a big un nor a little un!"
"What-what the d-1 has become
of all that were in the case?"
"I don't know, sir," said the boy.
"but one of them ere G'zette devils is
bin prowling 'bout here all night, and
I spect he's gone and cabbaged 'em
every one."
"Dod rot him! I haven't a doubt
of it," replied the foreman, getting pur
ple with rage-"but I tell you what you
do, Bob, that's a good boy-you go
over the first chance you get and hook
every one of their i's and (d—n them?\
their izzards."
"Jist so," replied Bob, with a wink
and a frown-"I'll be into 'em, I'll let
'em know a thing or two; but in det
meantime, that ere paragrab? Mus go
X-ING A PARAGRAB
755
in to-night, you know else there'll be
he d-1 to pay, and-"
"And not a bit of pitch hot," inter-
upted the foreman, with a deep sigh,
and an emphasis on the "bit." "Is it
1 long paragraph, Bob?”
"Shouldn't call it a wery long para-
gral," said Bob.
"Ah, well, then! do the best you can
with it! We must get to press," said
he foreman, who was over head and
ars in work; "just stick in some other
etter for o; nobody's going to read the
ellow's trash anyhow."
"Wery well," replied Bob, "here goes
t!" and off he hurried to his case;
nuttering as he went: "Considdeble
ell, them ere expressions, perticcler
or a man as doesn't swar. So I's to
ouge out all their eyes, eh? and d-n
ll their gizzards! Vell! this here's the
hap as is just able for to do it." The
act is that although Bob was but
welve years old and four feet high, he
Tas equal to any amount of fight, in a
mall way.
The exigency here described is by no
means of rare occurrence in printing-
ffices; and I cannot tell how to ac-
ount for it, but the fact is indisputable,
hat when the exigency does occur, it
Imost always happens that x is adopted
s a substitute for the letter deficient.
he true reason, perhaps, is that x is
ather the most superabundant letter
the cases, or at least was so in the
ld times long enough to render the
abstitution in question an habitual
ing with printers. As for Bob, he
ould have considered it heretical to
mploy any other character, in a case
f this kind, than the x to which he
ad been accustomed.
"I shell have to x this ere paragrab,"
said he to himself, as he read it over
in astonishment, "but it's jest about
the awfulest o-wy paragrab I ever did
see" so x it he did, unflinchingly, and
to press it went x-ed.
Next morning the population of
Nopolis were taken all aback by read-
ing in The Tea-Pot, the following ex-
traordinary leader:
"Sx hx, Jxhn! hxw nxw? Txld yxu
Sx, yxu knxw. Dxn’t crxw, anxther
time, befxre yxu're xut xf the wxxds!
Dxes yxur mxther knxw yxu're xut?
Xh, nx, nx!-sx gx hxme at xnce, nxw,
Jxhn, tx yxur xdixus xld wxxds xf
Cxncxrd! Gx hxme tx yxur wxxds, xld
xwl,−gx! Yxu wxn’t? Xh, pxh, pxh,
Jxhn, dxn't dx sx! Yxuve gxt tx gx,
yxu knxw; sx gx at xnce, and dxn't gx
slxw; fxr nxbxdy xwns yxu here, yxu
knxw. Xh, Jxhn, Jxhn, if yxu dxn't
gx yxu're nx hxmx-nx! Yxu're xnly
a fxwl, an xwl; a cxw, a sxw; a dxll, a
pxll; a pxxr xld gxxd-fxr-nxthing-tx-
nxbxdy, lxg, dxg, hxg, xr frxg, cxme
xut xf a Cxncxrd bxg. Cxxl, nxw-
cxxl! Dx be cxxl, yxu fxxl! Nxne
xf yxur crxwing, xld cxck! Dxn’t
frxwn sx-dxn't! Dxn't hxllx, nxr
hxwl, nxr grxwl, nxr bxw-wxw-wxw!
Gxxd Lxrd, Jxhn, hxw yxu dx lxxk!
Txld yxu sx, yxu knxw,--but stxp rxll-
ing yxur gxxse xf an xld px abxut sx,
and gx and drxwn yxur sxrrxws in a
bxwl!"
The uproar occasioned by this mys-
tical and cabalistical article, is not to
be conceived. The first definite idea
entertained by the populace was, that
some diabolical treason lay concealed in
the hieroglyphics; and there was a gen-
eral rush to Bullet-head's residence, for
the purpose of riding him on a rail;
but that gentleman was nowhere to be
756
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
found. He had vanished, no one could
tell how; and not even the ghost of him
has ever been seen since.
Unable to discover its legitimate ob-
ject, the popular fury at length sub-
sided; leaving behind it, by way of
sediment, quite a medley of opinion
about this unhappy affair.
One gentleman thought the whole an
X-ellent joke.
Another said that, indeed, Bullet-
head had shown much X-uberance of
fancy.
A third admitted him X-entric, but
no more.
A fourth could only suppose it the
Yankee's design to X-press, in a general
way, his X-asperation.
"Say, rather, to set an X-ample to
posterity," suggested a fifth.
That Bullet-head had been driven to
an extremity, was clear to all; and in
fact, since that editor could not be
found, there was some talk about
lynching the other one.
The more common conclusion, how
ever, was that the affair was, simply,
X-traordinary and in-X-plicable. Even
the town mathematician confessed that
he could make nothing of so dark a
problem. X, everybody knew, was an
unknown quantity; but in this case (as
he properly observed), there was an
unknown quantity of X.
The opinion of Bob, the devil (who
kept dark about his having "X-ed the
paragrab"), did not meet with so much
attention as I think it deserved, al
though it was very openly and very
fearlessly expressed. He said that, for
his part, he had no doubt about the
matter at all, that it was a clear case,
that Mr. Bullet-head "never could be
persvaded fur to drink like other folks,
but vas continually a-svigging o' that
ere blessed XXX ale, and, as a naiteral
consekvence, it just puffed him up sav
age, and made him X (cross) in the
X-treme."
Morning on the Wissahiccon
(This tale is also called The Elk and was published in The Opal, a literary
annual, 1844.-Ed.)
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 com
parison, seem to regard our northern
and eastern seaboard, comparatively
speaking, as all of America, at least, as
all of the United States, worthy consid
eration. 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 realiza-
MORNING ON THE WISSAHICCON
757
ion of the wildest dreams of paradise.
For the most part, these travellers con-
ent 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,
he prairies, and the Mississippi. These,
ndeed, are objects well worthy the con-
emplation even of him who has just
lambered by the castellated Rhine, or
oamed
By the blue rushing of the arrowy
Rhone;
out these are not all of which we can
Doast; and, indeed, I will be so hardy
is to assert that there are innumerable
quiet, obscure, and scarcely explored
looks, within the limits of the United
states, that, by the true artist, or cul-
ivated lover of the grand and beautiful
mid the works of God, will be pre-
erred to each and to all of the chron-
cled and better accredited scenes to
vhich I have referred.
In fact, the real Edens of the land
ie far away from the track of our own
nost deliberate tourists-how very far,
hen, beyond the reach of the foreigner,
vho, having made with his publisher at
ome arrangements for a certain amount
of comment upon America, to be fur-
ished in a stipulated period, can hope
o fulfil his agreement in no other man-
er than by steaming it, memorandum-
ook in hand, through only the most
>eaten thoroughfares of the country!
I mentioned, just above, the valley
of Louisiana. Of all extensive areas of
atural loveliness, this is perhaps the
nost lovely. No fiction has approached
t. The most gorgeous imagination
night derive suggestions from its exu-
berant 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, multicol-
oured, 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 be-
hold 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-ar-
ranged are the means of attaining them.
This consideration has never been al-
lowed 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
758
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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, ab-
sorbed an undue share of admiration.
They are more observed, and, conse-
quently, made more the subject of dis-
course, than less important, but often
more interesting streams.
A singular exemplification of my re-
marks 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 Eng-
land, 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 cele-
brated as one of the finest specimens
of American river scenery. The Schuyl-
kill, 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 ad
venturous pedestrians of the vicinity
But, the "Journal" having opened a
eyes, the Wissahiccon, to a certain ex-
tent, rolled at once into notoriety. I
say "to a certain extent," for, in fact
the true beauty of the stream lies in
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 e-
cellent reason that here the carriage-
road stops. I would advise the adve
turer who would behold its finest points
to take the Ridge Road, running west-
wardly 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 uni-
versally, precipitous, and consist of high
hills, clothed with noble shrubbery near
the water, and crowned at a greater
elevation, with some of the most mag
nificent forest trees of America, among
which stands conspicuous the li
dendron tulipiferum. The immediat
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 Mediter
ranean upon the steps of her palaces of
marble. Occasionally in front of the
cliffs, extends a small definite plates
of richly herbaged land, affording the
most picturesque position for a cottage
and garden which the richest imagina
MORNING ON THE WISSAHICCON
759
Ion could conceive. The windings of
he stream are many and abrupt, as
s usually the case where banks are
recipitous, and thus the impression
onveyed to the voyager's eye, as he
roceeds, is that of an endless succes-
ion of infinitely varied small lakes, or,
more properly speaking, tarns. The
Vissahiccon, however, should be visited,
ot like "fair Melrose," by moonlight,
r even in cloudy weather, but amid the
rightest glare of a noonday sun; for
he narrowness of the gorge through
which it flows, the height of the hills
n either hand, and the density of the
oliage, conspire to produce a gloomi-
ess, if not an absolute dreariness of
ffect, which, unless relieved by a bright
eneral light, detracts from the mere
eauty of the scene.
Not long ago I visited the stream by
he route described, and spent the bet-
er part of a sultry day in floating in a
kiff upon its bosom. The heat grad-
tally overcame me, and, resigning my-
elf to the influence of the scenes and
of the weather, and of the gentle mov-
ng current, I sank into a half slumber,
luring which my imagination revelled
n visions of the Wissahiccon of ancient
lays-of the "good old days" when the
Demon of the Engine was not, when
ic-nics were undreamed of, when
'water privileges" were neither bought
tor sold, and when the red man trod
lone, with the elk, upon the ridges
hat now towered above. And, while
radually these conceits took possession
f my mind, the lazy brook had borne
ne, inch by inch, around one prom-
intory and within full view of another
hat bounded the prospect at the dis-
ance of forty or fifty yards. It was a
teep 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
Ichime 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 pro-
found 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 move-
ment of the animal's head at once dis-
pelled 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 cau-
tiously, 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 quan-
tity of salt, and, holding it towards the
760
WORKS OF EDGAR ALLAN POE
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 encourage-
ment or conciliation. Presently, the elk
bowed and stamped, and then lay
quietly down and was secured with
halter.
Thus ended my romance of the el
It was a pet of great age and ver
domestic habits, and belonged to a
English family occupying a villa in th
vicinity.
DATE DUE
1/15/83 120.8911-24-93
1/18/84 5-9-89 12/18/43
4/26 84 12/19/89 3.1.94
4/27/84 3/24/189-24-95
10.30 84 8.31.00 11/25/an
11-23-904-27
5-13-85
6.1.85 12-9-90 11.29.96
1/27/86 5-9-91
4/3/86/7/27/91
81868-15-91
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12.18.826 402-92
4-30-87/2/26/52
1-18-88 11.25.92
2-24.88 1-6-93
10-4-89506-93
6-04-93
12/193
GAYLORD
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