AT FORDHAM.
It was at this time, in the summer of 1845, that Poe's sister, Miss
Rosalie Poe, went on a visit to her brother, whom she had not seen in
ten years. On her return home, and for years thereafter, she was
accustomed to speak of this visit; and it was a curious picture which
she gave of the life of the poet and his family in the humble little
cottage on Fordham Hill.
Poe was away when she arrived--presumably in his insane pursuit of Mrs.
Osgood. Miss Poe told of "Aunt Clemm's" distress and anxiety on his
account, and of how she "scraped together every penny" and borrowed
money from herself to send to Edgar, who, she said, had been taken ill
while on a business trip. There were no provisions in the house
scarcely, and she herself, both then and at various other times, would
purchase supplies from the market and grocers' wagons which passed; for
there were no stores at the little country station of Fordham.
Miss Poe told of her brother's arrival at home, and of how she overheard
Mrs. Clemm administering to him a severe "scolding." He was so ill that
he had to be put to bed by Mrs. Clemm, who sat up with him all night
while he "talked out of his head" and begged for morphine. After some
days he was better, and walked about the house and sat under the pine
trees crowning a rocky knoll within calling distance of the house--ever
a constant and favorite retreat of his, affording fine views of the
river and neighboring country.
One day, still weak and ill, he sat at his desk and looked over his
papers. Mrs. Clemm then took his place, and wrote at his dictation. Aunt
Clemm, said Rosalie, could exactly imitate Edgar's writing. On the
following day she filled her satchel with some of these papers and went
to the city, whence she returned late in the evening, quite after dark,
with a hamper of provisions and medicines to Virginia's great delight,
who had feared some mishap to her mother and cried accordingly. Miss Poe
believed that this hamper was a present from some one, but Aunt Clemm
was very reserved toward her in regard to her affairs. She knew, she
said, that Mrs. Clemm had never liked her, but Edgar and Virginia were
kind.
From this time Poe wrote industriously, seldom going to town, but
sending his mother-in-law instead. Several times Mrs. Clemm gave her
niece some "copying" to do, but this was not to her a very gratifying
task, and when, on her return home, she was asked what it was about, had
not the least idea! She always insisted that _Anabel Lee_ was written at
this time, as she repeatedly heard Edgar read it to Mrs. Clemm and also
to himself, and recognized it when it was published two years afterward.
A curious picture was that which she gave of the poet's reading his
manuscript to his mother-in-law while the latter sat beside his desk
inking the worn seams of his and her own garments; or of Poe, seated on
a "settle" outside the kitchen door, also reading to her some of his
"rare and radiant fancies," while she presided over the family laundry.
He seems to have been constantly appealing to her sympathy with his
writing, but never to Virginia.
According to Miss Poe, Mrs. Clemm was at this time dependent for her own
earnings on her sewing and fancy knitting, with pretty knick-knacks,
which she disposed of at a certain "notion store." Virginia, too, when
well enough, liked this kind of work. They had few visitors, for Mrs.
Clemm, too busy for gossip, made a point of discouraging calls from the
neighbors, with the exception of two or three families of better class
than most of those surrounding them. These latter were a half-rural
people, keeping dairies and cultivating market gardens.
Miss Poe spoke of Virginia's cheerfulness. Nothing ever disturbed her.
"She was always laughing." She liked to have children about her; and
they came every day, bringing their dolls and playthings, with little
offerings of fruit and flowers from their home gardens. She taught them
to cut out and make their dolls' dresses, and would sometimes be very
merry with them. She did not appear to suffer, said Miss Poe--did not
lose flesh, and had always a hearty appetite, eating what the others
ate, though very fond of nice things, especially candy. Her mother and
Edgar petted her like a baby. "Aunt Clemm and Virginia," declared Miss
Poe with conviction, "cared for nobody but themselves and Edgar."
Virginia was at this time twenty-four years of age.
It was not to be wondered at that, as Miss Poe said, her brother,
immediately after his return, remained at home, seldom going into town,
but sending his mother to dispose of his manuscripts. It has been said
that when he did make his appearance in the city and among his usual
business haunts, he found himself everywhere coldly received, in
consequence of the notorious episode with Mrs. Osgood, for whom it was
known he had left his sick wife. His literary enemies, of whom he had
made many by his keen criticisms, made the most of this charge against
him, in addition to that of dissipated habits, to which he now gave
himself up with a recklessness which he had never before shown.
Poe afterward attempted to defend himself against this reproach and the
whole scandal of this season by attributing its excesses to his grief
and anxiety on account of his wife, whom, he says, he "loved as man
never loved before," a phrase the extravagance of which betrays its
insincerity. He describes how through the years of her illness he "loved
her more and more dearly and clung to her with the most desperate
pertinacity, until he became insane, with intervals of horrible
sanity.... During these fits of absolute unconsciousness I drank." And
thus he endeavors to explain away his pursuit of Mrs. Osgood!
It cannot but be noted that in all Poe's accounts of himself, and
especially of his feelings, is a palpable affectation and exaggeration,
with an extravagance of expression bordering on the tragic and
melo-dramatic; a style which is exemplified in some of his writings, and
may be equally imaginative in both cases.
Mrs. Osgood also, in her "_Reminiscences_," after Poe's death, sought to
clear both him and herself from the scandal of that summer by writing of
the affection and confidence existing between himself and his wife--"his
idolized Virginia"--as she saw them in their home, and declares her
belief that his wife was the only woman whom he had ever really loved.
In this we do not feel disposed to question her sincerity. Touching the
slander against herself, she wrote to a friend:
"You have proof in Mrs. Poe's letters to me and Poe's to Mrs. Ellet,
either of which would fully establish my innocence.... Neither of them,
as you know, were persons likely to take much trouble to prove a woman's
innocence, and it was only because she felt that I had been cruelly
wronged by _her mother_ and Mrs. Ellet that she impulsively rendered me
this justice."
Of course, the letter of Mrs. Poe here referred to was written at the
suggestion of her husband, but it is curious to observe how frankly and
_naively_ Mrs. Osgood--not now writing for the public--expresses her
real opinion of Poe and his wife.
Mrs. Osgood goes on to say: "Oh, it is too cruel that I, the only one of
all those women who did _not_ seek his acquaintance, should be sought
out after his death as the only victim to suffer from the slanders of
his mother."
From this it would appear that _after Poe's death_ the old scandal was
revived, and by Mrs. Clemm herself. About this time she was having
frequent interviews with Dr. Griswold in regard to Poe's papers, which
she had handed over to him for use in the _Memoirs_ upon which he was
engaged. Naturally, Mrs. Clemm, who seems never to have forgiven Mrs.
Osgood for the troubles of that unfortunate first summer at Fordham,
would express herself freely to Griswold, who was a warm friend and
admirer of Mrs. Osgood. Was it on account of such utterances that
Griswold wrote to Mrs. Whitman:
"Be very careful what you say to Mrs. Clemm. She is not your friend or
anybody's friend, and has no element of goodness or kindness in her
nature, but whose heart is full of wickedness and malice."
Mrs. Osgood was a lovely and estimable woman, and if she did allow her
admiration of Poe and her warm-hearted sympathy with one of a kindred
poetic nature to impulsively carry her beyond the bounds of a strictly
platonic friendship, it was in all innocence on her part, and did not
lose her the good opinion of those who knew her. The blame was all for
Poe and the feeling against him intense.
Undoubtedly the impression which she made on Poe was something beyond
what he ordinarily experienced toward women. In my own acquaintance with
him he several times spoke of her, and always with a sort of grave and
reverential tenderness--as one may speak of the dead, or as he might
have spoken of the lost friend of his boyhood, Mrs. Stanard. Although,
as Mrs. Osgood says, Poe and herself never met in the few remaining
years of their lives, yet several of his poems, without any real attempt
at disguise, express his remembrance of her. It was to her that the
lines "_To F----_" were addressed, after their parting:
"Beloved, amid the earnest woes
That crowd around my earthly path--
(Dear path, alas! where grows
Not e'en one thornless rose)--
My soul at last a solace hath
In dreams of thee--and therein knows
An Eden of calm 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."
In "_A Dream_" he thus again alludes to her:
"That holy dream, that holy dream,
When all the world was chiding,
Hath cheered me like a lovely beam
A lonely spirit guiding.
"What though that light through storm and night
Still trembles from afar?
What could there be more purely bright
Than truth's day-star?"
About the same time he wrote the lines, "_To My Mother_," the only one
of his poems in which he alluded to his wife, concluding with the
couplet:
"By that infinitude which made my wife
Dearer unto my soul than its own life."
It will be observed that the sentimental things, in both prose and
verse, which Poe has written concerning his love for his wife--and they
are but two or three at most--were written immediately after his affair
with Mrs. Osgood and the universal charge against him that he had
deserted a dying wife for her sake. It is impossible that at this remote
period of time it could be understood how seriously--from all
contemporaneous accounts--Poe's reputation was affected by this
unfortunate episode; especially at the North, where it was best known.
When Miss Poe left Fordham, in July, she carried with her a letter from
Mrs. Clemm to Mr. John Mackenzie, soliciting pecuniary aid for Edgar on
plea of his wretched health. Mr. Mackenzie was at this time married and
with a family of his own, but he never lost his interest in his old
friend or ceased to assist him so far as was in his power.