Part 21 (1/2)
Virginia found it the greatest fun imaginable to go to market with ”Muddie,” with a basket hanging from her pretty arm. The market men and women began to daily watch for the sweet face and tripping step of the exquisite child whom it seemed so comical to address as ”_Mrs._ Poe,”
and who rewarded their open admiration with the loveliest smile, the prettiest words of greeting and interest, the merriest rippling laugh that rang through the market place and waked echoes in many a heart that had believed itself a stranger to joy.
And the Valley of the Many-Colored Gra.s.s was reconstructed in even more than its old beauty. The flowers of love and contentment and innocent pleasure that besprinkled its green carpet had never been so many or so gay, the dream-mountains that shut it in from the rest of the world were as fair as sunset clouds, and the peace that flowed through it as a river broke into singing as it flowed.
Meantime Edgar Poe worked--and worked--and worked.
Every number of the _Messenger_ contained page after page of the brilliantly conceived and artistically worded product of his brain and pen. His heart--his imagination satisfied and at rest in the love and comrades.h.i.+p of a woman who fulfilled his ideal of beauty, of character, and of charm, whose mind he himself had taught and trained to appreciate and to love the things that meant most to him, whose sympathy responded to his every mood, whose voice soothed his tired nerves with the music that was one of the necessities of his temperament, a woman, withal, who lived with no other thought than to love and be loved by him--his hara.s.sing devils cast out by this true heartsease, Edgar Poe's industry and his power of mental production were almost past belief.
As he worked a dream that had long been half-formed in his brain took definite shape and became the moving influence of the intellectual side of his life. His literary conscience had always been strict--even exacting--with him, making him push the quest for the right word in which to express his idea--just the right word, no other--to its farthest limit. Urged by this conscience, he could rarely ever feel that his work was finished, but kept revising, polis.h.i.+ng and republis.h.i.+ng it in improved form, even after it had been once given to the world. He had in his youth contemplated serving his country as a soldier. He now began to dream of serving her as a captain of literature, as it were--as a defender of purity of style; for this dream which became the most serious purpose of his life was of raising the standard of American letters to the ideal perfection after which he strove in his own writings.
For his campaign a trusty weapon was at hand in the editorial department of the _Southern Literary Messenger_, which he turned into a sword of fearless, merciless criticism.
Literary criticism (so called) in America had been hitherto mere puffery--puffery for the most part of weak, prolix, commonplace scribblings of little would-be authors and poets. A reformation in criticism, therefore, Edgar Poe conceived to be the only remedy for the prevalent mediocrity in writing that was vitiating the taste of the day, the only hope of placing American literature upon a footing of equality with that of England--in a word, for bringing about anything approaching the perfection of which he dreamed.
The new kind of criticism to which he introduced his readers created a sensation by reason of its very novelty. His brilliant, but withering critiques were more eagerly looked for than the most thrilling of his stories, and though the little, namby-pamby authors whom the gleaming sword mowed down by tens were his and the _Messenger's_ enemies for life, the interested readers that were gathered in by hundreds were loud in their praise of the progressiveness of the magazine and the genius of the man who was making it.
In the North as well as the South the name of Edgar Poe was now on many lips and serious attention began to be paid to the opinion of the _Southern Literary Messenger_.
CHAPTER XXIII.
Between his literary work, his home and his social life in Richmond, it would seem that every need of The Dreamer's being was now satisfied and the days of his life were moving in perfect harmony. But ”the little rift within the lute” all too soon made its appearance. It was caused by the alarm of Mr. White, the owner and founder of the _Messenger_.
”Little Tom White” was a most admirable man--within his limitations. If he was not especially interesting, his daughter Eliza of the violet eyes was, and he was reliable--which was better. He had a kind little heart and a clear little business head and his advice upon all matters (within his experience) was safe. Though he saw from the handsome increase in the number of the _Messenger's_ subscribers that his young editor was a valuable aid, he did not realize how valuable. Indeed, Edgar Poe and his style of writing were entirely outside of Mr. White's experience. They were so altogether unlike anything he had known before that in spite of the praise of the thousands of readers which they had brought to the magazine the dissatisfaction of the tens of little namby-pamby authors alarmed him. Edgar Poe found him one morning in a state of positive trepidation. He sat at his desk in the _Messenger_ office with the morning's mail--an unusually large pile of it--before him. In it there were a number of new subscriptions, several letters from the little authors protesting against the manner in which their works were handled in the review columns of the magazine and one or two from well-known and highly respected country gentlemen expressing their disapproval of the _strangeness_ in Edgar Poe's tales and poems.
Mr. White appreciated the genius of his editor--within his limitations--but he was afraid of it and these letters made him more afraid of it. He saw that he must speak to Edgar--add his protest to the protests of the little authors and the country gentlemen and see if he could not persuade him to tone down the sharpness of his criticisms and the strangeness of his stories.
It was with a feeling of relief that he saw the trim, black-clad figure of the young editor and author at the door, for he would like to settle the business before him at once. His manner was grave--solemn--as he approached the subject upon which his employe must be spoken to.
”Edgar,” he said, when good-mornings had been exchanged, ”I want you to read these letters. They are in the same line as some others we have been receiving lately--but more so--decidedly more so.”
”Ah?” said The Dreamer, as he seated himself at the desk and began to unfold and glance over the letters.
”Little Tom” watched his face with a feeling of wonder at the look of mixed scorn and amus.e.m.e.nt that appeared in the expressive eyes and mouth as he read. Finally the anxious little man laid his hand upon the arm of his unruly a.s.sistant, with an air of kindly patronage.
”You have talent, Edgar,” he said, with a touch of condescension, ”Good talent--especially for criticism--and will some day make your mark in that line if you will stick to it and let these weird stories alone. We must have fewer of the stories in future and more critiques, but milder ones. It is the critiques that the readers want; but in both stories and critiques you must put a restraint on that pen of yours, Edgar. In the stories less of the weird--the strange--in the critiques, less of the satirical. Let moderation be your watchword, my boy. Cultivate moderation in your writing, and with your endowment you will make a name for yourself as well as the magazine.”
Edgar Poe was all attention--respectful attention that was most encouraging--while Mr. White was speaking, and when he had finished sat with a contemplative look in his eyes, as if weighing the words he had just heard. Presently he looked up and with the expression of face and voice of one who in all seriousness seeks information, asked,
”Is moderation really the word you are after, Mr. White, or is it mediocrity?”
The announcement at the very moment when the question was put, of a visitor--a welcome one, for he brought a new subscription--precluded a reply, and in the busy day that followed the broken thread of conversation was never taken up again. But the unanswered question left Mr. White with a confused sense which stayed with him during the whole day and at intervals all through it he was asking himself what Edgar Poe meant. Truly his talented employe was a puzzling fellow! Could it be possible that the question asked with that serious face, that quiet respectful air, was intended for a joke? That the impudent fellow could have been quizzing him? No wonder his stories gave people s.h.i.+vers--there was at times something about the fellow himself which was positively uncanny!
That he and ”little Tom” would always see opposite sides of the picture became more and more apparent to The Dreamer as time went on and along with this difficulty another and a more serious one arose.
Though the amount of work--of successful work, for it brought the _Messenger_ a steadily increasing stream of new subscribers--which he was now putting forth, should have surrounded the beloved wife and mother with luxuries and placed him beyond the reach of financial embarra.s.sment, the returns he received from the entire fruitage of his brilliant talent--his untiring pen--at this the prime-time of his life--in the fullness of mental and physical vigour, was so small that he was constantly harra.s.sed by debt and frequently reduced to the humiliating necessity of borrowing from his friends to make two ends meet.