CHAPTER IV.
POE'S BOYHOOD.
The Allans returned to Richmond in June, 1820, Edgar being then twelve years old. Having no house ready for their reception they were invited by Mr. Ellis, Mr. Allan's business partner, to his home on Franklin, then as now the fashionable street of the city.
Mr. Allan at once put Edgar to Professor Clarke's classical school, where he was in intimate association with boys of the best city families.
At the end of this year the Allans removed to a plain cottage-like dwelling at the corner of Clay and Fifth streets, in a quiet and out-of-the-way neighborhood. It consisted of but five rooms on the ground floor and a half story above; and here for some years they resided.
Of Poe as a schoolboy various accounts have been given by former schoolmates, with most of whom he was very popular, while others represent him as reserved and not generally liked. All, however, agree that he was a remarkably bright pupil, with, in the higher classes, but one rival, and that he was high-spirited and the leader in all sorts of fun and frolic.
Mrs. Mackenzie's eldest son, John, or "Jack," two years older than Edgar, though not mentioned by any of Poe's biographers, was the most intimate and trusted of all his lifelong friends. The two were playmates in childhood, and schoolmates and companions up to the time of Poe's departure for the University. Poe always called Mrs. Mackenzie "Ma," and was almost as much at home in her house as was his sister.
I remember Mr. John Mackenzie as a portly, jolly, middle-aged gentleman with a florid face and a hearty laugh. This is what he said of Poe after the latter's death:
"I never saw in him as boy or man a sign of morbidness or melancholy; unless," he added, "it was when Mrs. Stanard died, when he appeared for some time grieving and depressed. At all other times he was bright and full of fun and high spirits. He delighted in playing practical jokes, masquerading, and making raids on orchards and turnip-patches. Oh, yes; every schoolboy liked a sweet, tender, juicy turnip; and many a time after the apple crop had been gathered in, we might have been seen, a half dozen of us, seated on a rail-fence like so many crows, munching turnips. We didn't object to a raw sweet potato at times—anything that had the relish of being stolen. On Saturdays we had fish-fries by the river, or tramped into the woods for wild grapes and chinquepins. It was not always that Mr. Allan would allow Edgar to go on these excursions, and more than once he would steal off and join us, though knowing that he would be punished for it."
"Mr. Allan was a good man in his way," added Mr. Mackenzie, "but Edgar was not fond of him. He was sharp and exacting, and with his long, hooked nose and small keen eyes looking from under his shaggy eyebrows, always reminded me of a hawk. I know that often, when angry with Edgar, he would threaten to turn him adrift, and that he never allowed him to lose sight of his dependence on his charity."