The Complete Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Edgar Allan Poe [976]
In the meantime, here is a passage from another little ballad of mine, called “Lenore,” first published in 1830:
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 young?
And here is a passage from “The Penance of Roland,” by Henry B. Hirst, published in “Graham’s Magazine” for January, 1848:
Mine the tongue that wrought the evil — mine the false and slanderous tongue
That done to death the Lady Gwineth — Oh, my soul is sadly wrung!
“Demon! devil,” groaned the warrior, “devil of the evil eye!”
Now my objection to all this is not that Mr. Hirst has appropriated my property — (I am fond of a nice phrase) — but that he has not done it so cleverly as I could wish. Many a lecture, on literary topics, have I given Mr. H.; and I confess that, in general, he has adopted my advice so implicitly that his poems, upon the whole, are little more than our conversations done into verse.
“Steal, dear Endymion,” I used to say to him — “for very well do I know you can’t help it; and the more you put in your book that is not your own, why the better your book will be: — but be cautious and steal with an air. In regard to myself — you need give yourself no trouble about me. I shall always feel honored in being of use to you; and provided you purloin my poetry in a reputable manner, you are quite welcome to just as much of it as you (who are a very weak little man) can conveniently carry away.”
So far — let me confess — Mr. Hirst has behaved remarkably well in largely availing himself of the privilege thus accorded: — but, in the case now at issue, he stands in need of some gentle rebuke. I do not object to his stealing my verses; but I do object to his stealing them in bad grammar. My quarrel with him is not, in short, that he did this thing, but that he has went and done did it.
ROBERT WALSH.
HAVING read MR. WALSH’s “Didactics,” with much attention and pleasure, I am prepared to admit that he is one of the finest writers, one of the most accomplished scholars, and when not in too great a hurry, one of the most accurate thinkers in the country. Yet had I never seen this work, I should never have entertained these opinions. Mr. Walsh has been peculiarly an anonymous writer, and has thus been instrumental in cheating himself of a great portion of that literary renown which is most unequivocally his due. I have been not unfrequently astonished in the perusal of this book, at meeting with a variety of well known and highly esteemed acquaintances, for whose paternity I had been accustomed to give credit where I now find it should not have been given. Among these I may mention in especial the very excellent Essay on the acting of Kean, entitled “Notices of Kean’s principal performances during his first season in Philadelphia,” to be found at page 146, volume I. I have often thought of the unknown author of this Essay, as of one to whom I might speak, if occasion should at any time be granted me, with a perfect certainty of being understood. I have looked to the article itself as to a fair oasis in the general blankness and futility of our customary theatrical notices. I read it with that thrill of pleasure with which I always welcome my own long-cherished opinions, when I meet them unexpectedly in the language of another. How absolute is the necessity now daily growing, of rescuing our stage criticism from the control of illiterate mountebanks, and placing it in the hands of gentlemen and scholars!
The paper on Collegiate Education is much more than a sufficient reply to that Essay in the Old Bachelor of Mr. Wirt, in which the attempt is made to argue down colleges as seminaries for the young. Mr. Walsh’s article does not uphold Mr. Barlow’s plan of a National University — a plan which is assailed