Ɛpsilon

WCP608

Letter (WCP608.608)

[1]

Dear Dr. Wallace:

This letter1 has just arrived and I send it at once for your perusal.

How many poets in England can afford the luxury of a Private Secretary2 from their professional (poetical) income, as my friend Riley3 has been able to do for many years?

Sincerely | James D. Law.4 [signature]

70 Gt. Russell St,

London, W.C.

April 2. 1904

1
The letter referred to is https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP608Dickey, John M. (-). Private secretary to James Whitcomb Riley.Riley, James Whitcomb (1849-1916). American writer, poet and journalist.Law, James D. has not been identified.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Letter (WCP608.608)]

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

Revision history

Transcribed by Truong, Michael [2011-07-08] Transcription checked by Catchpole, Caroline [2013-01-15] Transcription checked by Chua, Christine [2024-11-11]

Enclosure (WCP608.1485)

[1]1

[Letterhead] JAMES WHITCOMB RILEY2

INDIANAPOLIS

Indianapolis, Indiana,

March 21st., 1904.

James D. Law,3 Esq.,

London, England.

Dear Mr. Law:—

Daily confronted with unfinished work, Mr. Riley finds it impossible to write you now but asks me to especially thank you for your fraternal interest in championing his claims to the authorship of the hoax Poe-poem "Leonainie".4 Therefore with the promptest return herewith of the enclosed letter of indictment,* he bids me say, that he is grieved to reassure you that he is the author of the poem "Leonainie"— coined name and all— and that this fact was confirmed and has been generally known in this country since the expose of the hoax in August of 1877. Regarding the eminent literary experts’ arraignment of him as a false claimant, Mr. Riley good-naturedly remarks that it would be to him truly a source of relief if the poem could be successfully "saddled" onto the Pegasus of Poe—or any other poet happily “past

To where beyond there voices there is peace.”

Very truly yours | John M. Dickey5 [signature]

Private Secretary

[in margin by hand] *Dr. A. R. Wallace’s letter6 to J. D. Law. — March 5, 1904.

1
The letter was type-written. It was enclosed in letter WCP608.https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP608
2
Riley, James Whitcomb (1849-1916). American writer, poet and journalist.
3
Law, James D. has not been identified.
4
"Leonainie" was a poem published in the Kimono Dispatch in 1877 as a previously unpublished poem by Edgar Allan Poe. It was in fact a hoax by the poet James Whitcomb Riley. ARW came across it years later and was convinced that Poe was actually the true author, and there ensued a heated debate in literary circles. See Schwartz; Joel S. 1984. Alfred Russell Wallace and 'Leonainie': A Hoax that would not Die. Victorian Periodicals Review17: 2-15.
5
Dickey, John M. (-). Private secretary to James Whitcomb Riley.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Enclosure (WCP608.1485)]

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

Revision history

Transcribed by Truong, Michael [2012-12-03] Transcription checked by Catchpole, Caroline [2013-01-15] Transcription checked by Chua, Christine [2024-11-11]

Please cite as “WCP608,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP608