and the
sovereigns of Europe sent wreaths to place upon his coffin. As
historian, diplomatist, and private citizen, he had honored his
country as is the privilege of few.

CHAPTER X

EDGAR ALLAN POE

1809-1849

In the play-ground of an old-fashioned English school the boy Edgar
Allan Poe, then in his ninth year, first entered that world of
day-dreams, whose wonders he afterward transcribed so beautifully in
his prose and poetry. The school was situated in the old town of Stoke
Newington, and the quaint, sleepy village, with its avenues shaded
by ancient trees and bordered by fragrant shrubberies, and with its
country stillness broken only by the chime of the church-bell tolling
the hour, seemed to the boy hardly a part of the real world. In
describing it in after years he speaks of the dream-like and soothing
influence it had upon his early life. The school building, also the
village parsonage, as the master of the school was a clergyman, had
a similar effect; it was a large, rambling house, whose passages and
rooms had a labyrinthine irregularity which charmed the young student
and made him regard it almost as a place of enchantment. It had
many nooks and corners in which one might lose one's self and dream
day-dreams out of the books, poetry and history, with which it was
pretty well stocked. The school-room itself was low-walled and ceiled
with oak, and filled with desks and benches that had been hacked and
hewed by generations of boys. It was of great size, and seemed to Poe
the largest in the world. In this room he studied mathematics and the
classics, while in the play-ground outside, which was surrounded by
brick walls topped with mortar and broken glass, he spent many of his
leisure hours, taking part in those sports so loved by the English
school-boy. The boys were allowed beyond the grounds only three times
in a week; twice on Sunday, when they went to church, and once during
the week, when, guarded by two ushers, they were taken a solemn walk
through the neighboring fields. All the rest of life lay within the
walls that separated the school from the village streets. In this
quiet spot Poe spent five years of his life, speaking of them
afterward as most happy years and rich in those poetic influences
which formed his character.

In his thirteenth year he left England and returned to America with
his adopted parents, Mr. and Mrs. Allan, of Baltimore, spending the
next four or five years of his l