WCP4916

Letter (WCP4916.5326)

[1]

Broadstone, Dorset

Feb[ruar]y. 2nd 1904

E. Marriott, Esq.

Dear Sir

I enclose a letter just received about "Leonaine". What do you think or know about it? If an imitation, it is certainly a wonderful one, & shows poetic genius equal to Poe's.

I have written to Mr. Law, (who is a Commissioner in London for the St. Louis Universal Exposition) for further particulars, dates, etc.

Have you in your "Library" the collected works of Riley?

I forget whether I told you that my sister-in-law enquired of [2] the Librarian of the Public Library at St. Francisco, & he knew nothing of Leonaine. I am in hopes Mr. Riley's memory is at fault, but one never knows!

Please return Mr. Riley's letter when done with.

Yours very truly | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Letter (WCP4916.5326)]

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

Revision history

Transcribed by Benny, Ruth [2015-03-31] Transcription checked by Benny, Ruth [2015-03-31] Transcription checked by Sherwood, Danni [2020-08-10]

Enclosure (WCP4916.5327)

[1]

11. The works of J.W. Riley1 as given at the end of the vol[ume] I have are: —

____________________

A Child World2— prose & verse

Neghborly[sic] Poems3 — Hoosier4 Dialect

Sketches in Prose5 — Stories

Afterwhiles6 — Poems

Pipes o' Pan7 — Sketches & Poems

Rhymes of Childhood8 — Dialect and Serious[?]

The Flying Islands of the Night9 (Weird Drama in verse)

Green Fields & Running Brooks.10 102[?] Poems & Sounds. The most Recent?

Armazindly11 — Latest & Best.

Old Fashioned Roses12 — Poems & Sounds

First Pub[lishe]d in England (some of Mr. Riley's choicest poems)

____________________

An Old Sweetheart of Mine.13

A Favourite Poem — A Poetic Gem of fresh[?] Water (Indiana Sentinal[?])

1
Riley, James Whitcomb (1849-1916). American author known as the "Hoosier Poet".
2
Riley, J.W. (1896) A Child-World (Bowen-Merrill, Indianapolis USA).
3
Riley, J.W. (1891) 'Neighborly Poems' (Bowen-Merrill, Indianapolis USA).
4
Nickname for inhabitants of Indiana, USA.
5
Riley, J.W. (1891) 'Sketches in Prose' (Bowen-Merrill, Indianapolis USA).
6
Riley, J.W. (1898) 'Afterwhiles' (Bowen-Merrill, Indianapolis USA).
7
Riley, J.W. (1888) 'Pipes o’ Pan at Zekesbury' (Bobbs-Merrill, Indianapolis USA)
8
Riley, J.W. (1890) 'Rhymes of Childhood' (Bowen-Merrill, Indianapolis USA).
9
Riley, J.W. (1892) 'The Flying Islands of the Night' (Bowen-Merrill, Indianapolis USA).
10
Riley, J.W. (1895) 'Green Fields & Running Brooks' (Bowen-Merrill, Indianapolis USA).
11
Riley, J.W. (1894) 'Armazindly' (Bowen-Merrill, Indianapolis USA).
12
Riley, J.W. 'Old-Fashioned Roses' (Bowen-Merrill, Indianapolis USA).
13
Riley, J.W. (1888) 'An Old Sweetheart of Mine' (Bobbs-Merrill, Indianapolis USA)

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Enclosure (WCP4916.5327)]

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

Revision history

Transcribed by Paterson, Gavin [2019-12-17]

Published letter (WCP4916.5503)

[1]1 [p. 12]

Broadstone, Dorset

Feby. 2nd, 1904

E. Marriott, Esq.

Dear Sir:

I enclose a letter just received about "Leonaine". What do you think or know about it? If an imitation, it is certainly a wonderful one, & shows poetic genius equal to Poe's.

I have written to Mr. Law, (who is a Commissioner in [2] [p. 13] London for the St. Louis Universal Exposition) for further particulars, dates, etc.

Have you in your "Library" the collected works of Riley?

I forget whether I told you that my sister-in-law enquired of the Librarian of the Public Library at St. Francisco, & he knew nothing of Leonaine. I am in hopes Mr. Riley's memory is at fault, but one never knows!

Please return Mr. Riley's letter when done with.

Yours very truly,

(signed) Alfred R. Wallace.

The works of J. W. Riley as given at the end of the volume I have are:—

A Child World—Prose & verse

Neighborly Poems—Hoosier Dialect

Sketches in Prose—Stories

Afterwhiles—Poems

Pipes o' Pan—Sketches & Poems

Rhymes of Childhood—Dialect & Serious

The Flying Islands of the Night—(Weird Drama in verse)

Green Fields & Running Brooks—102 Poems & Sonnets. The most Recent?

Armazindy—Latest and Best

Old Fashioned Roses—Poems & Sonnets. First Pubd. in England. (Some of Mr. Riley's Choicest Poems)

An Old Sweetheart of Mine—A Favorite Poem—A Poetic Gem of finest water (Indiana Sentinel).

1
Editor Charles H. Smith's Note: Tenth 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 (WCP4916.5503)]

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 “WCP4916,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 27 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP4916