iful house and were received in
the charmingly homelike drawing-room opening from the wide hall, by
Rob's wife, a Kentucky belle who had stepped gracefully into her place
as mistress of one of the notable homes in Virginia's capital. As she
gave her jewelled hand to Edgar Poe her handsome black eyes sparkled
with pleasure. She was not only sincerely glad to receive the friend of
her husband's boyhood, but keen appreciation of intellectual gifts made
her feel that to know him was a distinction. Some of the servants who
had known "Marse Eddie" in the old days were still of the
household--having come to Robert Stanard as part of his father's
estate--and they were to their intense gratification, pleasantly greeted
by the visitor.

That evening--and many subsequent evenings--The Dreamer spent at "Duncan
Lodge" with the Mackenzies and their friends. A series of sunlit days
followed--days of lingering in Rob Sully's studio or in the familiar
office of _The Southern Literary Messenger_ where the editor, Mr. John
R. Thompson--himself a poet--gave him a warm welcome always, and gladly
accepted and published in _The Messenger_ anything the famous former
editor would let him have; days of wandering in the woods or by the
tumbling river he had loved as a lad; days of searching out old haunts
and making new ones.

And everywhere he found welcome. Delightful little parties were given in
his honor, when in return for the courtesies paid him he charmed the
company by reciting "The Raven" as he alone could recite it. His
lectures upon "The Poetic Principle" and "The Philosophy of
Composition," and his readings in the assembly rooms of the Exchange
Hotel, drew the elite of the city, who sat spellbound while he, erect
and still and pale as a statue, filled their ears with the music of his
voice, and their souls with wonder at the brilliancy of his thought and
words. Subscriptions to _The Stylus_ poured in. At last, this dream of
his life seemed an assured fact.

One door--one only in all the town did not swing wide to receive him.
The closed portal of the mansion of which he had been the proud young
master, still said to him "Nevermore"--and he always had a creepy
sensation when he passed it, which even the sight of the flower-garden
he had loved, in fullest bloom, did not overcome.

The golden days ran into golden weeks and the weeks into months, and
still Edgar Poe was making holiday in Richmond--the first holiday he had
had since,