WCP4907

Letter (WCP4907.5316)

[1]1

Broadstone, Dorset

Oct[obe]r. 29th. 1903

Ernest Marriott Esq.2

Dear Sir

Although an admirer of Poe3 I have never seen the Essay quoted by you in the Nov[ember]. "Fortnightly"4, which I must try & obtain. The limitation of the Stellar Universe is however but a small part of my theory, and I doubt if it was original in Poe, as so obvious a conclusion as he draws, was put forth a little later by Herschell5[sic] & Proctor6 & I think must have occurred in earlier astronomical works.

[2] But what induces me to write to you is to ask you if the Edition of Poe's works you quote from contains a short poem — Leonainie7, of which the first verse is, —

Leonainie angels named her and they took the light Of the laughing stars and framed her, in a smile of white, And they made her hair of gloomy midnight, and her eyes of bloomy Moonshine, and they brought her to me in a solemn night.

There are four verses, quite equal to any of Poe[']s work, and they were sent [to] me (in MSS.) from California as having been "written at a Wayside Inn" [3] where not stated — "in lieu of cash for one night's board and lodging".

I shall be glad to know whether this statement is confirmed in any Edition of Poe's work you have access to.

Yours very truly | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]

1

In the top left hand corner of page one of the manuscript, the text reads "1." This letter was one of a series of seventeen letters published privately by an unknown person.

Smith, Charles. (2012). Edgar Allan Poe;

A series of seventeen letters concerning Poe's scientific

erudition in Eureka and his authorship of Leonainie.

http://people.wku.edu/charles.smith/wallace/S708.htm [accessed 30 May 2014]

2
Marriott, Ernest (1882-1918). English literary figure and Librarian at the Portico Library in Manchester from 1901 until 1911.
3
Poe, Edgar Allan (1809-1849). American author and poet.
4
The Fortnightly Review. A popular nineteenth century magazine.
5
Herschel, Sir John Frederick William (1792-1871). English astronomer.
6
Proctor, Richard A. (1837-1888). English astronomer.
7
Leonainie. A poem allegedly written by Edgar Allan Poe, published in 1877 in The Kokomo Dispatch. The poem was actually written by James Whitcomb Riley.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Letter (WCP4907.5316)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Published letter (WCP4907.5494)

[1]1 [p. 5]

Broadstone, Dorset

Oct. 29th, 1903

Ernest Marriott, Esq

Dear Sir:

Although an admirer of Poe I have never seen the essay quoted by you in the Nov. "Fortnightly," which I must try and obtain. The limitation of the Stellar Universe is however but a small part of my theory and I doubt if it was original in Poe, as so obvious a conclusion as he draws, was put forth a little later by Herschell & Proctor & I think must have occurred in earlier astronomical works. But what induces me to write to you is to ask you if the edition of Poe's works you quote from contains a short poem—Leonainie, of which the first verse is,—

Leonainie angels named her, and they took the light

Of the laughing stars and framed her in a smile of white,

And they made her hair of gloomy midnight, and her eyes of bloomy

Moonshine, and they brought her to me in a solemn night.

There are four verses, quite equal to any of Poe's work, and they were sent me (in MSS.) from California as having been "written at a Wayside Inn" where not stated—"in lieu of cash for one night's board and lodging."

I shall be glad to know whether this statement is confirmed in any edition of Poe's works you have access to.

Yours very truly,

(signed) Alfred R. Wallace.

1
Editor Charles H. Smith's Note: First of fifteen letters in a pamphlet, a background to which is as follows: In 1904 Wallace published a pair of short essays (S612 and S614) describing what he had mistakenly taken to be a previously unknown poem by Edgar Allan Poe. This turned out to be a hoax that had been perpetrated by the Indiana writer James Whitcomb Riley some years earlier. In late 1903 Wallace had entered into a correspondence with the literary figure Ernest Marriott about this matter; sometime later Wallace's part of the correspondence—seventeen letters in all (actually, fifteen separately dated ones)—was collected and turned into a privately printed pamphlet. Who did this and when it was done is unknown, though it could not have taken place any later than 1930 (by which time both Wallace and Marriott were long dead), the date a copy of the pamphlet was added to the New York Public Library's collection.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Published letter (WCP4907.5494)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Revision history

Transcribed by Smith, Charles Hyde [2013-02-07] Transcription checked by Arias, Lily C. [2013-02-08] Transcription checked by Catchpole, Caroline [2013-02-08]

Please cite as “WCP4907,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 27 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP4907