Page 3 of 172 MEMOIR OF EDGAR ALLAN POE. - Complete Poetical Works

Under the Rev. Dr. Bransby, the future poet spent a lustrum of his life neither unprofitably nor, apparently, ungenially. Dr. Bransby, who is himself so quaintly portrayed in Poe's tale of 'William Wilson', described "Edgar Allan," by which name only he knew the lad, as "a quick and clever boy," who "would have been a very good boy had he not been spoilt by his parents," meaning, of course, the Allans. They "allowed him an extravagant amount of pocket-money, which enabled him to get into all manner of mischief. Still I liked the boy," added the tutor, "but, poor fellow, his parents spoiled him."

Poe has described some aspects of his school days in his oft cited story of 'William Wilson'. Probably there is the usual amount of poetic exaggeration in these reminiscences, but they are almost the only record we have of that portion of his career and, therefore, apart from their literary merits, are on that account deeply interesting. The description of the sleepy old London suburb, as it was in those days, is remarkably accurate, but the revisions which the story of 'William Wilson' went through before it reached its present perfect state caused many of the author's details to deviate widely from their original correctness. His schoolhouse in the earliest draft was truthfully described as an "old, irregular, and cottage-built" dwelling, and so it remained until its destruction a few years ago.

The 'soi-disant' William Wilson, referring to those bygone happy days spent in the English academy, says,

"The teeming brain of childhood requires no external world of incident

to occupy or amuse it. The morning's awakening, the nightly summons to

bed; the connings, the recitations, the periodical half-holidays and

perambulations, the playground, with its broils, its pastimes, its

intrigues--these, by a mental sorcery long forgotten, were made to

involve a wilderness of sensation, a world of rich incident, a

universe of varied emotion, of excitement the most passionate and

spirit-stirring, _'Oh, le bon temps, que ce siecle de fer!'"_

From this world of boyish imagination Poe was called to his adopted parents' home in the United States. He returned to America in 1821, and was speedily placed in an academy in Richmond, Virginia, in which city the Allans continued to reside. Already well grounded in the elementary processes of education, not without reputation on account of his European residence, handsome, proud, and regarded as the heir of a wealthy man, Poe must have been looked up to with no little respect by his fellow pupils. He speedily made himself a prominent position in the school, not only by his classical attainments, but by his athletic feats--accomplishments calculated to render him a leader among lads.

"In the simple school athletics of those days, when a gymnasium had

not been heard of, he was 'facile princeps',"

		Friendship is a soul dwelling in two bodies; a heart dwelling in two souls. Arist teles

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