Had he no premonition that even then a darker shadow than that of the Raven was hovering over him? It was one of the last occasions on which I ever saw him.
CHAPTER XXIX.
MRS. SHELTON.
Poe's first visits on his arrival in Richmond had been to Mrs. Shelton, and it soon became known that an engagement existed between them, although they were never seen together in public, and Poe on all occasions denied the engagement. Yet morning after morning the curious neighbors were treated to a sight of the poet ascending the steps of the tall, plain, substantial looking brick house on the corner of Grace street, facing the rear of St. John's church, and had they watched more closely they might at times have seen another figure following in its footsteps. This was Rosalie Poe, who, delighted at her brother's engagement, and being utterly without tact or judgment, would present herself at Mrs. Shelton's door shortly after his own arrival, as she said, for the pleasure of seeing the couple together. Once she surprised them at a tête-à-tête luncheon at which "corned beef and mustard" figured; but on another occasion Mrs. Shelton met and informed her that Mr. Poe had a headache from his long walk and was resting on the parlor sofa, where she herself would attend to him, and so dismissed her, to her great indignation. Not alone to Mrs. Shelton's were these "shadowings" of her brother confined, but if she at any time knew of his intention to call at some house where she herself was acquainted, she would as likely as not make her own appearance during his visit; or, in promenading Broad street, he would unexpectedly find himself waylaid and introduced to some prosy acquaintance of his sister. It required Mrs. Mackenzie's authority to relieve him from these annoyances. There was, however, something pathetic in the sister's pride in and affection for a brother from whom she received but little manifestation of regard. He treated her indulgently, but, as she herself often said, in her homely way, "Edgar could never love me as I do him, because he is so far above me."
About the middle of August Mrs. Shelton's interested neighbors observed that the poet's visits to her suddenly ceased; and then followed a report that the engagement was broken, and that a bitter estrangement existed between the two. Mr. Woodbury, Poe's biographer, doubts this, and declares that, "We have no evidence that such was the case;" but we, who were on the spot, as it were, and had opportunity of judging, knew that the report was true. Miss Van Lew, the famous "war postmistress" of Richmond, once said to me as, standing on the porch of her house, she pointed out Mrs. Shelton's residence: "I used at first to often see Mr. Poe enter there, but never during the latter part of his stay in Richmond. It seemed to be known about here that the engagement was off.... Gossip had it that Mrs. Shelton discarded him because persuaded by friends that he was after her money. All her relatives are said to be opposed to the match."
From Poe's own confidential statement to Mr. John Mackenzie, who had first suggested the match with Mrs. Shelton, it appears that money considerations was really the cause of the trouble. Mrs. Shelton had the reputation of being a thorough business woman and very careful and cautious with regard to her money. Poe was at this time canvassing in the interests of the Stylus, in which he received great encouragement from his friends, but when he applied to Mrs. Shelton it is certain that she failed to respond as he desired. She had no faith in the success of his plan, neither any sympathy with its purpose. Also, in discussing arrangements for their marriage, she announced her intention of keeping entire control of her property. Poe himself broke their engagement. Next there arose a difficulty concerning certain letters which the lady desired to have returned to her and which he declined to give up, except on condition of receiving his own. Possibly each feared that these letters might some time fall into the hands of Poe's biographers. If they were written during his courtship of Mrs. Whitman, and when still uncertain of the result, he appears to have been keeping Mrs. Shelton in reserve.
Mrs. Shelton, during a few days' absence of Poe at the country home of Mr. John Mackenzie, came to Duncan Lodge and appealed to Mrs. Mackenzie to influence Poe in returning her letters. I saw her on this occasion—a tall, rather masculine-looking woman, who drew her veil over her face as she passed us on the porch, though I caught a glimpse of large, shadowy, light blue eyes which must once have been handsome. We heard no more of her until some time about the middle of September, when suddenly Poe's visits to her were resumed, though in a very quiet manner. It seems certain that the engagement was then renewed, and that Mrs. Shelton must have promised to assist Poe in his literary enterprise; for from that time he was enthusiastic in regard to the Stylus and what he termed its "assured success." He even commenced arranging a Table of Contents for the first number of the magazine; and Mrs. Mackenzie told me how he one morning spent an hour in her room taking from her information, notes and data for an article which he intended to appear in one of its earliest numbers. He was in high spirits, and declared that he had never felt in better health. This was after an attack of serious illness, due to his association with dissipated companions. Tempted as he was on every side and wherever he went in the city, it was not strange that he had not always the strength of will to resist; and twice during this visit to Richmond he was subject to attacks somewhat similar to those which he had known at Fordham, and through which he was now kindly nursed by his friends at Duncan Lodge.
Poe gave but one public lecture on this visit to Richmond—that on "The Poetic Principle" —and of this most exaggerated accounts have been given by several writers, even to the present day, they representing it to have been a great financial success. One recent lecturer remarks upon the strangeness of the fate when, just as the hitherto impecunious poet was "about returning home with five thousand and five hundred dollars in his pocket, he should have been robbed of it all." The truth of the matter is that but two hundred and fifty tickets were printed, the price being fifty cents each, and, as Dr. William Gibbon Carter informed me, there were by actual count not more than one hundred persons present at the lecture, some being holders of complimentary tickets. Another account says there were but sixty present, but that they were of the very elite of the city. Considering that from the proceeds of the lecture all expenses of hall rent had to be paid, we cannot wonder at Poe's writing to Mrs. Clemm, "My poor, poor Muddie, I am yet unable to send you a single dollar."