A pencil sketch by Hearn left at Mr. Watkin's shop at the beginning of their friendship.
Mr. Watkin one day left a card for possible customers: "Gone to supper. H. W." Hearn passed by and wrote on the opposite side of the card: "Gone to get my sable plumage plucked." The inevitable raven followed as signature. It was Hearn's way of saying he had come to see Mr. Watkin and had then gone to a barber shop to have his hair cut. Once he omitted the raven and signed his note, "Kaw."
Facsimile of one of the cards Hearn left at Mr. Watkin's shop.
On another occasion when Mr. Watkin came to the office he found a note informing him that he was "a flabbergasted ichthyosaurus and an antediluvian alligator" for not being on hand.
The influence of Poe was strong upon him even in this nonsense. Hearn waited for his friend one night until a late hour. The shop was quite lonely, as it was the only open one in a big building on a more or less deserted street. The quiet became oppressive, and the little man left because "these chambers are cursed with the Curse of Silence. And the night, which is the Shadow of God, waneth."
Mr. Watkin had a dog. Hearn did not like the animal, and it seemed to reciprocate the feeling. One of Hearn's notes was largely devoted to the little beast. When he so chose Hearn could make a fairly good drawing. This particular note was adorned with rude pictures of an animal supposed to be a dog. The teeth were made the most prominent feature. The pictures were purposely made in a childish style, and used for the word "dog."
"Dear Nasty Cross Old Man!
"I tried to find you last night.
"You were not in apparently.
"I shook the door long and violently, and listened.
"I did not hear the [dog] bark.
"Perhaps you were not aware that the night you got so infernally mad I slipped a cooked beefsteak strongly seasoned with Strychnine under the door.
"I was glad that the [dog] did not bark.
"I suspect the [dog] will not bark Any More!
"I think the [dog] must have gone to that Bourne from which No Traveller Returneth.
"I hope the [dog] is Dead."
The note is signed with the usual drawing of a raven. On still another occasion he wrote the following farrago:
"I came to see you—to thank you—to remonstrate with you—to demonstrate matters syllogistically and phlebotomically. Gone!!! Then I departed, wandering among the tombs of Memory, where the Ghouls of the Present gnaw the black bones of the Past. Then I returned and crept to the door and listened to see if I could hear the beating of your hideous heart."