y credited. If he had designed the complete work in advance, he
scarcely would have made so harsh a prelude of rattle-pan rhymes to the
delicious melody of the second stanza,--not even upon his theory of the
fantastic. Of course an artist, having perfected a work, sees, like the
first Artist, that it is good, and sees why it is good. A subsequent
analysis, coupled with a disavowal of any sacred fire, readily enough may
be made. My belief is that the first conception and rough draft of this
poem came as inspiration always comes; that its author then saw how it
might be perfected, giving it the final touches described in his chapter on
Composition, and that the latter, therefore, is neither wholly false nor
wholly true. The harm of such analysis is that it tempts a novice to fancy
that artificial processes can supersede imagination. The impulse of genius
is to guard the secrets of its creative hour. Glimpses obtained of the
toil, the baffled experiments, which precede a triumph, as in the
sketch-work of Hawthorne recently brought to light, afford priceless
instruction and encouragement to the sincere artist. But one who
voluntarily exposes his Muse to the gaze of all comers should recall the
fate of King Candaules.

The world still thinks of Poe as a "luckless man of genius." I recently
heard him mentioned as "one whom everybody seems chartered to misrepresent,
decry or slander." But it seems to me that his ill-luck ended with his
pitiable death, and that since then his defence has been persistent, and
his fame of as steadfast growth as a suffering and gifted author could pray
for in his hopeful hour. Griswold's decrial and slander turned the current
in his favor. Critics and biographers have come forward with successive
refutations, with tributes to his character, with new editions of his
works. His own letters and the minute incidents of his career are before
us; the record, good and bad, is widely known. No appellor has received
more tender and forgiving judgement. His mishaps in life belonged to his
region and period, perchance still more to his own infirmity of will.
Doubtless his environment was not one to guard a fine-grained, ill-balanced
nature from perils without and within. His strongest will, to be lord of
himself, gained for him "that heritage of woe." He confessed himself the
bird's unhappy master, the stricken sufferer of this poem. But his was a
full share of that dramatic temper which exults in the presage