The Blackest Bird (39 page)
Authors: Joel Rose
64
New York Mirror:
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OFFICE OF PUBLICATION, CORNER OF NASSAU AND ANN STREETS.
VOLUME 1. NEW-YORK, SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1845. NUMBER XVIII
We are permitted to copy (in advance of publication) from the 2d No. of the American Review, the following remarkable poem by edgar poe. In our opinion, it is the most effective single example of “fugitive poetry” ever published in this country; and unsurpassed in English poetry for subtle conception, masterly ingenuity of versification, and consistent sustaining of imaginative lift and “pokerishness.” It is one of these “dainties bred in a book” which we
feed
on. It will stick to the memory of everybody who reads it.
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door—
“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping 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 tried 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 repeatin
g
“’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; hesitating 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, tapping 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 darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, “Lenore!”
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, “Lenore!”
Merely this, and nothing more
.
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping, somewhat louder than before.
“Surely,” said I, “surely that is something 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!”
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 a minute 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 wandering 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 the placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing farther 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 that melancholy burden bore
That sad answer, “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
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 tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate, yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—
On this home by Horror haunted,—tell me truly, I implore—
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, with 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’s 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!
M
inutes after seven, a brown hansom cab left the soft gaslight glow of Lispenard Street with High Constable Jacob Hays and his daughter Olga aboard.
“It will change everything for him,” Olga was saying to her father. “He has outdone himself. Believe me when I tell you, Papa, in one stroke Edgar Poe has transformed American letters. You will hear for yourself. It is quite chilling. His voice takes on such omnificence. The women are all taken by the performance, and if I am any judge,” she added excitedly, “this pleases him greatly.”
“And the men? How does Mr. Poe’s performance strike the men?”
She sighed as if her father truly was without hope. “He does not really pursue the society of men, Papa,” she answered. “Rather that of highly intellectual women with whom he likes to fall into peculiar, eloquent monologue, half dream, half poetry. Men, Mr. Hays, like you, are intolerant of such performance, but women are transfixed. To this starry sisterhood, reports of his domestic tragedy are all too consuming. His beautiful but doomed young wife, his poverty, his until-now-unrecognized genius, these are the themes of much fascination and relished gossip among those of the female gender.”
“You included, Olga?”
She smiled. “Me included, Papa.”
“So heed me, O my daughter,” Hays turned to her, his face a tight mask, “quoth the ancient papa: Just beware.”
“Stop, Papa,” she laughed in spite of herself, half amused, half annoyed.
“Need I remind you, dear, I have had the pleasure of hearing Mr. Poe’s iteration and have witnessed his poem’s effect firsthand. I remain under the impression the verse has taken the nation by storm.”
“Papa, you must keep in mind he is loathed. His raven has brought out his enemies, and they are multiple.”
At that moment the hack veered off Sixth Avenue and came to rest in front of number 116 Waverly Place. Old Hays pulled from his overcoat his pocket purse in order to pay the driver the fifty-cent fare, and, upon completion of this transaction, followed after his daughter.
She and the high constable arrived this Saturday evening in early April, of the year 1845, at the home of Olga’s friend and colleague from the Brooklyn Female Academy, Miss Anne Lynch, Hays sharing Olga’s invitation to Miss Lynch’s renowned weekly salon, the most sought-after of all sophisticated Gotham’s glittering conversaziones, regularly well-attended by gents and ladies from the highest stratum of social and cultural life.
Three handsome young gentlemen of this elite echelon, in silk stovepipe hats, two in black cloaks, one wrapped in a dark gray shoulder shawl, sat smoking on the interior stairs. The man in the shawl recognized Old Hays, alerting his mates, and the three immediately rose as one to make way. With his daughter on his arm, his constabulary staff held in hand stoutly, with a nod of the head for their consideration, the high constable maneuvered past them to Miss Lynch’s rooms on the second floor.
The three-story pitch-roofed red brick building, only a few doors off Sixth Avenue, occupied a lot, twenty-five feet by one hundred, one block west of the northern boundary of Washington Square. At the
top of the landing a varnished yellow oak door stood open leading into the apartment of Miss Lynch.
As Hays entered the lively room, he immediately heard himself called out. “High Constable!”
He turned.
Samuel Colt stood in front of him, his face bright. “Good to see you again, sir!” Colt exuded.
The Colonel had taken a post just inside the door. A suppressed smile strained his wind-roughened face under his whiskers. He did not seek to disguise his avid surveillance of the womanhood in abundant attendance.
The men shook hands. “I understand you are coming out of your financial difficulties. Good for you,” congratulated the high constable.
After Colonel Colt had gone bankrupt with his Paterson repeater, he had cast about for some months, eventually embarking on an enterprise to manufacture marine explosives, a type of water mine he liked to call “torpedo.”
In one apparent exuberant and effective public display (to which Hays and his new municipal force had received more than one frantic call), the Colonel had succeeded in blowing up a ship in the lower harbor from five miles away using an electric submarine cable to set off the blast.
When commented on by Hays, Colt granted he was gratified by his success, but not completely satisfied. “As result, I did manage to procure a fifteen-thousand-dollar government grant. No small potatoes. But I admit my first love remains the revolver business.” He moved closer, speaking directly, in subdued voice, in Hays’ ear. “Recently I have been approached by a young Texas Ranger by the name of Samuel Walker, a veteran of the Seminole Indian War in Florida, now fighting in Texas against the Mexicans under Zachary Taylor. In both Florida and Texas, this young man has made good use of my Paterson repeating firearm on the battlefield. He told me riding with fourteen fellow combatants, all equipped with Colt five-shooters, they went up
against eighty Comanche warriors, leaving thirty-three dead Indians on the battlefield. Ranger Walker has come to me as a representative of the United States Army, and in this role has contracted for one thousand new weapons to be manufactured and delivered.”
Colt told Old Hays each weapon was to be priced at twenty-five dollars. A nice windfall, but at present, he confessed, he had no factory at his disposal. So in turn he had been forced to approach Eli Whitney Jr., son of the famed inventor of the cotton gin, and in his own right a successful armaments maker, boasting a government contract for the manufacture of military muskets.
“We’re in it together now,” Colt said. “We’ve a factory in Whitneyville, in Connecticut, and, God bless us, on the verge of signing up a thousand more weapons for the army.”
“So all sounds well. I am sure you must feel relief to be back on your feet again,” Hays said. “In my estimation, Colonel, your invention of the repeating revolver has only been outstripped this century by Howe’s invention of the sewing machine.”
“Thank you, sir,” Colt said slowly, not sure how to take this commentary. “I am indeed back on my feet.”
“And have you received word from your brother?”
Colonel Colt blinked, then grinned.
“You make this same inquiry each time we have the pleasurable fortune to see one another. You know he is dead, High Constable.”
“Yes, yes, so he is. It totally slipped my mind.” Hays grinned back at him. “Still I have had several cards with word that he is reincarnated in Texas. It wouldn’t have been his apparition who has put Ranger Walker onto you and your munitions enterprise, would it, sir?” Hays shook his head as if only now catching on to himself. “No, no, no, impossible,” he admitted. “I forget myself yet again. A mere phantasm, wouldn’t you say, Colonel?”
“Speaking of phantasms,” Sam Colt responded, taking opportunity to change subject and drift, “Mr. Poe has certainly garnered some renown of late.”
“Indeed. He is our man of the hour.”
“Notwithstanding, poor fellow seems to be suffering somewhat mightily for the sins of a lifetime, wouldn’t you say?”
“Indeed.”
“I tried to help him when last we encountered each other. I suggested he keep his bowels open, pay his bills, and trust in God,” Samuel Colt spoke, his voice tinged with dire. “I told him these were my three rules for living, and he might find success employing them as well.”
“And how did Mr. Poe respond to such consideration?” asked Hays.
“He said he might very well do.”
Each man forced his false smile upon the other. Meanwhile, next to Hays, having approached from his rear, Olga cleared her throat. Her radiant russet hair had been arranged for the evening in a Greek style with a band of exquisite cameos representing Roman emperors encircling her crown. Her gown, with waist seven inches across, had been made of palest pink tulle, embroidered with cut-steel beads. Both gentlemen turned toward her with pleasure. Hays took his daughter’s hand and made the introductions. “Colonel Colt, my daughter, Miss Hays.”
Sam Colt gazed upon her with obvious appreciation. “Fortunately for you, Miss Hays, our most merciful Protector has looked down upon you with utmost benevolence, given the most evident fact that you do not in any way take after or resemble your father, most specifically in the realm of beauty. I daresay you are a striking presence, Miss Hays.” He bowed. “Miss Hays, my distinct pleasure.”
She smiled demurely and thanked Colonel Colt, who, for his part, continued to study her with the eye of a shrewd appraiser. “Papa, you must say your hello to Annie. She is beside herself awaiting your approach.” She took her father’s hand, made rudimentary excuse to Colonel Colt, and led her father away.
Hays saw the mistress of the house, his daughter’s friend, as slender and dark as ever, dramatically framed, dressed to her advantage in
indigo taffeta, at the far end of the dark brown room, standing in front of the black-manteled fireplace. Two women, who proved to be Miss Lynch’s mother and younger sister, were positioned at her side.
“High Constable Hays, my mother has been looking forward to this honor,” Annie Lynch gushed. “Welcome, sir, welcome to our home.”
A second fireplace occupied the wall at the opposite end of the room. There, a slightly smaller parlor adjoined the first. Over Mrs. Lynch’s shoulder, Hays noted on a couch nearby the open coal fire in the outer parlor sat Mayor Harper and G. P. Putnam, heads together, engaged in what appeared private talk.
The drawing rooms fairly glowed with an abundance of satin-upholstered furniture. Marble-topped side tables with copper and zinc fittings, reproduced to replicate gold, or inlaid with glass and ceramic tile, were appointed and strewn with various silk-bound volumes of the latest poetry. Several embossed, leather-covered editions of the Reverend Rufus Griswold’s lately published
The Poets and Poetry of
America
had been made prominently visible to Miss Lynch’s guests.
Anne Charlotte Lynch kissed her friend Olga on both cheeks in the French style and took Hays’ hand up in both of hers.
“How delightful, High Constable Hays,” she insisted. “When Olga sent her most elegant note to say that she would like to bring you, I could only think what have I done to have Old Hays after me. But seriously, what a terrible failing on my part. My dear sir, you must think how remiss of me not to have extended invitation to you on my own.”
“Not at all, not at all.” Hays returned her charming smile. “It is only for pure pleasure, and my own edification, that I asked Olga to inquire if there might not be a place for me at your function. I am very glad to be here, young lady. Thank you for having me.”
“Friendship is my mental sustenance,” she explained, holding his hand tightly in her own and smiling into his eyes. “If you could only know how happy and fortunate I am made by personal relationships
such as these, Mr. Hays. I thank the good Lord every day for your daughter. I find the act of friendship as absolutely necessary as the material, yet infinitely higher. But I must confess, sir, I give no entertainment except what my guests find in each other.”
By this time there were about thirty-five people in attendance in Miss Lynch’s parlors, not including those smoking on the stairs and those standing in the hall, accounting perhaps for an additional ten. Olga had mentioned that on a good night, sometimes as many as eighty might attend Miss Lynch’s function. With Poe invited to again repeat his “Raven,” Olga estimated at least that many were conservatively expected.
And indeed, still more guests, in a steady stream, found their way into the warmly lit living room through the course of the early evening. Lynchie’s mother had abandoned her daughter’s side to serve tea and cookies with the assistance of the younger Miss Lynch.
Some of the new attendees Old Hays knew to be quite illustrious. All, illustrious or not, were filled with visible expectation. Olga pointed out the New England transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson, in the city, she said, to visit with his dear friend and like-minded thinker Miss Margaret Fuller, also in attendance, a mechanical para-graphist for Greeley’s
Tribune
as well as author of a newly favorite tome of Olga’s, the feminist study
Woman in the Nineteenth Century
.