No More Learning

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EDGAR ALLAN POE
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"I no longer hesitated what to do. I resolved to lash myself
securely to the water cask upon which I now held, to cut it
loose from the counter, and to throw myself with it into the
water. I attracted my brother's attention by signs, pointed to
the floating barrels that came near us, and did everything in
my power to make him understand what I was about to do.
I thought at length that he comprehended my design; but
whether this was the case or not, he shook his head despairingly,
and refused to move from his station by the ringbolt. It was
impossible to reach him; the emergency admitted of no delay:
and so with a bitter struggle I resigned him to his fate, fastened
myself to the cask by means of the lashings which secured it to
the counter, and precipitated myself with it into the sea, without
another moment's hesitation.
"The result was precisely what I had hoped it might be. As
it is myself who now tell you this tale, as you see that I did
escape, and as you are already in possession of the mode in
which this escape was effected, and must therefore anticipate
all that I have further to say, I will bring my story quickly to
conclusion. It might have been an hour or thereabout after my
quitting the smack, when, having descended to a vast distance
beneath me, it made three or four wild gyrations in rapid suc-
cession, and bearing my loved brother with it, plunged head-
long, at once and forever, into the chaos of foam below. The
barrel to which I was attached sunk very little farther than
half the distance between the bottom of the gulf and the spot at
which I leaped overboard, before a great change took place in
the character of the whirlpool. The slope of the sides of the
vast funnel became momently less and less steep.
The gyra-
tions of the whirl grew gradually less and less violent. By de-
grees the froth and the rainbow disappeared, and the bottom of
the gulf seemed slowly to uprise. The sky was clear, the winds
had gone down, and the full moon was setting radiantly in
the west, when I found myself on the surface of the ocean, in
full view of the shores of Lofoden, and above the spot where
the pool of the Moskoe-ström had been. It was the hour of the
slack; but the sea still heaved in mountainous waves from the
effects of the hurricane. I was borne violently into the channel
of the Ström, and in a few minutes was hurried down the coast
―――――
into the grounds' of the fishermen. A boat picked me up,-
exhausted from fatigue, and (now that the danger was removed)
1
1
I


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EDGAR ALLAN POE
speechless from the memory of its horror. Those who drew me
on board were my old mates and daily companions; but they
knew me no more than they would have known a traveler from
the spirit-land. My hair, which had been raven-black the day
before, was as white as you see it now. They say too that the
whole expression of my countenance had changed. I told them
my story; they did not believe it. I now tell it to you; and I
can scarcely expect you to put more faith in it than did the
merry fishermen of Lofoden. "
――
THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER
Son cœur est un luth suspendu ;
Sitôt qu'on le touche il résonne.
- DE BÉRANGER.
D
URING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the
autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively
low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horse-
back, through a singularly dreary tract of country; and at length
found myself, as the shades of evening drew on, within view
of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not how it was,
but with the first glimpse of the building a sense of insufferable
gloom pervaded my spirit. I say insufferable; for the feeling
was unrelieved by any of that half pleasurable, because poetic,
sentiment with which the mind usually receives even the sternest
natural images of the desolate or terrible. I looked upon the
scene before me- upon the mere house, and the simple landscape
features of the domain, upon the bleak walls, upon the vacant
eye-like windows, upon a few rank sedges, and upon a few white
trunks of decayed trees-with an utter depression of soul, which
I can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the
after-dream of the reveler upon opium-the bitter lapse into
every-day life-the hideous dropping of the veil. There was
an iciness, a sinking, a sickening of the heart-an unredeemed
dreariness of thought which no goading of the imagination could
torture into aught of the sublime. What was it, I paused to
think, what was it that so unnerved me in the contemplation
of the House of Usher?
It was
a mystery all insoluble; nor
could I grapple with the shadowy fancies that crowded upon me


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EDGAR ALLAN POE
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as I pondered. I was forced to fall back upon the unsatisfactory
conclusion, that while beyond doubt there are combinations of
very simple natural objects which have the power of thus affect-
ing us, still the analysis of this power lies among considera-
tions beyond our depth. It was possible, I reflected, that a mere
different arrangement of the particulars of the scene,- of the
details of the picture,- would be sufficient to modify, or perhaps
to annihilate, its capacity for sorrowful impression; and acting
upon this idea, I reined my horse to the precipitous brink of
a black and lurid tarn that lay in unruffled lustre by the dwell-
ing, and gazed down- but with a shudder more thrilling than
before upon the remodeled and inverted images of the gray
sedge, and the ghastly tree-stems, and the vacant and eye-like
windows.
-
-
Nevertheless, in this mansion of gloom I now proposed to
myself a sojourn of some weeks. Its proprietor, Roderick Usher,
had been one of my boon companions in boyhood; but many
years had elapsed since our last meeting. A letter, however, had
lately reached me in a distant part of the country-a letter from
him which in its wildly importunate nature had admitted of no
other than a personal reply. The MS. gave evidence of nervous
agitation. The writer spoke of acute bodily illness; of a mental
disorder which oppressed him; and of an earnest desire to see
me, as his best and indeed his only personal friend, with a
view of attempting, by the cheerfulness of my society, some alle-
viation of his malady. It was the manner in which all this, and
much more, was said,-it was the apparent heart that went with
his request, which allowed me
no room for hesitation; and I
accordingly obeyed forthwith what I still considered a very sin-
gular summons.
――――――――
Although as boys we had been even intimate associates, yet
I really knew little of my friend. His reserve had been always
excessive and habitual. I was aware, however, that his very
ancient family had been noted, time out of mind, for a peculiar
sensibility of temperament; displaying itself through long ages in
many works of exalted art, and manifested of late in repeated
deeds of munificent yet unobtrusive charity, as well as in a pas-
sionate devotion to the intricacies, perhaps even more than to
the orthodox and easily recognizable beauties, of musical science.
I had learned too the very remarkable fact that the stem of the
Usher race, all time-honored as it was, had put forth at no period


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EDGAR ALLAN POE
any enduring branch; in other words, that the entire family lay
in the direct line of descent, and had always, with very trifling
and very temporary variation, so lain. It was this deficiency, I
considered, while running over in thought the perfect keeping
of the character of the premises with the accredited character of
the people, and while speculating upon the possible influence
which the one, in the long lapse of centuries, might have exer-
cised upon the other, it was this deficiency perhaps of collat-
eral issue, and the consequent undeviating transmission from sire
to son of the patrimony with the name, which had at length so
identified the two as to merge the original title of the estate in
the quaint and equivocal appellation of the "House of Usher, "-
an appellation which seemed to include, in the minds of the peas-
antry who used it, both the family and the family mansion.
I have said that the sole effect of my somewhat childish ex-
periment that of looking down within the tarn-had been to
deepen the first singular impression. There can be no doubt
that the consciousness of the rapid increase of my superstition —
for why should I not so term it? -served mainly to accelerate
the increase itself. Such, I have long known, is the paradoxical
law of all sentiments having terror as a basis. And it might
have been for this reason only, that when I again uplifted my
eyes to the house itself from its image in the pool, there grew
in my mind a strange fancy; a fancy so ridiculous, indeed, that I
but mention it to show the vivid force of the sensations which
oppressed me. I had so worked upon my imagination as really
to believe that about the whole mansion and domain there hung
an atmosphere peculiar to themselves and their immediate vicin-
ity; an atmosphere which had no affinity with the air of heaven,
but which had reeked up from the decayed trees, and the gray
wall, and the silent tarn; a pestilent and mystic vapor, dull, slug-
gish, faintly discernible, and leaden-hued.
Shaking off from my spirit what must have been a dream,
I scanned more narrowly the real aspect of the building. Its
principal feature seemed to be that of an excessive antiquity.
The discoloration of ages had been great. Minute fungi over-
spread the whole exterior, hanging in a fine tangled web-work
from the eaves. Yet all this was apart from any extraordinary
dilapidation. No portion of the masonry had fallen; and there
appeared to be a wild inconsistency between its still perfect
adaptation of parts and the crumbling condition of the individual
-


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EDGAR ALLAN POE
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stones. In this there was much that reminded me of the spe-
cious totality of old woodwork which had rotted for long years
in some neglected vault, with no disturbance from the breath of
the external air. . Beyond this indication of extensive decay, how-
ever, the fabric gave little token of instability. Perhaps the
eye of a scrutinizing observer might have discovered a barely per-
ceptible fissure, which, extending from the roof of the building
in front, made its way down the wall in a zigzag direction, until
it became lost in the sullen waters of the tarn.
Noticing these things, I rode over a short causeway to the
house. A ervant in waiting took my horse, and I entered the
Gothic archway of the hall. A valet of stealthy step thence con-
ducted me, in silence, through many dark and intricate passages.
in my progress to the studio of his master. Much that I en-
countered on the way contributed, I know not how, to heighten
the vague sentiments of which I have already spoken. While
the objects around me- while the carvings of the ceilings, the
sombre tapestries of the walls, the ebon blackness of the floors,
and the phantasmagoric armorial trophies which rattled as I
strode, were but matters to which, or to such as which, I had
been accustomed from my infancy,- while I hesitated not to
acknowledge how familiar was all this, I still wondered to find
how unfamiliar were the fancies which ordinary images were
stirring up. On one of the staircases I met the physician of the
family. His countenance, I thought, wore a mingled expression
of low cunning and perplexity. He accosted me with trepidation
and passed on. The valet now threw open a door and ushered
me into the presence of his master.
The room in which I found myself was very large and lofty.
The windows were long, narrow, and pointed, and at so vast a
distance from the black oaken floor as to be altogether inaccessi-
ble from within. Feeble gleams of encrimsoned light made their
way through the trellised panes, and served to render sufficiently
distinct the more prominent objects around; the eye, however,
struggled in vain to reach the remoter angles of the chamber, or
the recesses of the vaulted and fretted ceiling. Dark draperies
hung upon the walls. The general furniture was profuse, comfort-
less, antique, and tattered. Many books and musical instruments.
lay scattered about, but failed to give any vitality to the scene.
I felt that I breathed an atmosphere of sorrow. An air of stern,
deep, and irredeemable gloom hung over and pervaded all.


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EDGAR ALLAN POE
Upon my entrance, Usher arose from a sofa on which he had
been lying at full length, and greeted me with a vivacious
warmth which had much in it, I at first thought, of an overdone
cordiality, of the constrained effort of the ennuyé man of the
world. A glance, however, at his countenance, convinced me of
his perfect sincerity. We sat down; and for some moments, while
he spoke not, I gazed upon him with a feeling half of pity,
half of awe. Surely, man had never before so terribly altered,
in so brief a period, as had Roderick Usher! It was with diffi-
culty that I could bring myself to admit the identity of the wan
being before me with the companion of my early boyhood. Yet
the character of his face had been at all times remarkable. A
cadaverousness of complexion; an eye large, liquid, and luminous
beyond comparison; lips somewhat thin and very pallid, but of a
surpassingly beautiful curve; a nose of a delicate Hebrew model,
but with a breadth of nostril unusual in similar formations; a
finely molded chin, speaking, in its want of prominence, of a
want of moral energy; hair of a more than web-like softness
and tenuity, these features, with an inordinate expansion above
the regions of the temple, made up altogether a countenance
not easily forgotten. And now in the mere exaggeration of
the prevailing character of these features, and of the expression
they were wont to convey, lay so much of change that I doubted
to whom I spoke. The now ghastly pallor of the skin, and the
now miraculous lustre of the eye, above all things startled and
even awed me. The silken hair, too, had been suffered to grow
all unheeded; and as in its wild gossamer texture it floated
rather than fell about the face, I could not, even with effort,
connect its arabesque expression with any idea of simple hu-
manity.
In the manner of my friend I was at once struck with an
incoherence an inconsistency; and I soon found this to arise
from a series of feeble and futile struggles to overcome a habit-
ual trepidancy- an excessive nervous agitation. For something
of this nature I had indeed been prepared, no less by his letter
than by reminiscences of certain boyish traits, and by conclus-
ions deduced from his peculiar physical conformation and tem-
perament.
His action was alternately vivacious and sullen.
His voice varied rapidly from a tremulous indecision (when the
animal spirits seemed utterly in abeyance) to that species of
energetic concision-that abrupt, weighty, unhurried, and hollow-
-


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EDGAR ALLAN POE
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sounding enunciation—that leaden, self-balanced, and perfectly
modulated guttural utterance, which may be observed in the lost.
drunkard, or the irreclaimable eater of opium, during the periods
of his most intense excitement.
It was thus that he spoke of the object of my visit, of his
earnest desire to see me, and of the solace he expected me to
afford him. He entered at some length into what he conceived
to be the nature of his malady. It was, he said, a constitutional
and a family evil, and one for which he despaired to find a
remedy; a mere nervous affection, he immediately added, which
would undoubtedly soon pass off. It displayed itself in a host
of unnatural sensations. Some of these, as he detailed them,
interested and bewildered me; although perhaps the terms and
the general manner of the narration had their weight. He suf-
fered much from a morbid acuteness of the senses: the most
insipid food was alone endurable; he could wear only garments
of certain texture; the odors of all flowers were oppressive; his
eyes were tortured by even a faint light; and there were but
peculiar sounds, and these from stringed instruments, which did
not inspire him with horror.
—
To an anomalous species of terror I found him a bounden
slave. "I shall perish," said he, "I must perish, in this deplor-
able folly. Thus, thus, and not otherwise, shall I be lost. I
dread the events of the future, not in themselves, but in their
results. I shudder at the thought of any, even the most triv-
ial, incident which may operate upon this intolerable agitation of
soul. I have indeed no abhorrence of danger, except in its abso-
lute effect,--in terror. In this unnerved-in this pitiable condi-
tion, I feel that the period will sooner or later arrive when I
must abandon life and reason together, in some struggle with
the grim phantasm, FEAR. "
4
I learned moreover at intervals, and through broken and
equivocal hints, another singular feature of his mental condition.
He was enchained by certain superstitious impressions in regard
to the dwelling which he tenanted, and whence for many years he
had never ventured forth-in regard to an influence whose sup-
posititious force was conveyed in terms too shadowy here to be
restated—an influence which some peculiarities in the mere form
and substance of his family mansion had (by dint of long suf-
ferance, he said) obtained over his spirit—an effect which the
physique of the gray walls and turrets, and of the dim tarn into
I


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EDGAR ALLAN POE
which they all looked down, had at length brought about upon
the morale of his existence.
He admitted, however, although with hesitation, that much
of the peculiar gloom which thus afflicted him could be traced
to a more natural and far more palpable origin; to the severe
and long-continued illness-indeed, to the evidently approaching
dissolution of a tenderly beloved sister, his sole companion for
long years, his last and only relative on earth. "Her decease,"
he said, with a bitterness which I can never forget, "would leave
him (him the hopeless and the frail) the last of the ancient race
of the Ushers. " While he spoke, the lady Madeline (for so was
she called) passed slowly through a remote portion of the apart
ment, and without having noticed my presence, disappeared. I
regarded her with an utter astonishment not unmingled with
dread; and yet I found it impossible to account for such feelings.
A sensation of stupor oppressed me, as my eyes followed her
retreating steps. When a door at length closed upon her, my
glance sought instinctively and eagerly the countenance of the
brother; but he had buried his face in his hands, and I could
only perceive that a far more than ordinary wanness had over-
spread the emaciated fingers through which trickled many pas-
sionate tears.
―――――――
The disease of the lady Madeline had long baffled the skill of
her physicians. A settled apathy, a gradual wasting away of the
person, and frequent although transient affections of a partially
cataleptical character, were the usual diagnosis. Hitherto she
had steadily borne up against the pressure of her malady, and
had not betaken herself finally to bed; but on the closing in
of the evening of my arrival at the house, she succumbed (as
her brother told me at night with inexpressible agitation) to
the prostrating power of the destroyer; and I learned that the
glimpse I had obtained of her person would thus probably be
the last I should obtain that the lady, at least while living,
would be seen by me no more.
For several days ensuing, her name. was unmentioned by
either Usher or myself; and during this period I was busied in
earnest endeavors to alleviate the melancholy of my friend. We
painted and read together; or I listened, as if in a dream, to the
wild improvisations of his speaking guitar. And thus, as a closer
and still closer intimacy admitted me more unreservedly into the
recesses of his spirit, the more bitterly did I perceive the futility


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EDGAR ALLAN POE
11677
of all attempts at cheering a mind from which darkness, as if an
inherent positive quality, poured forth upon all objects of the
moral and physical universe, in one unceasing radiation of gloom.
I shall ever bear about me a memory of the many solemn
hours I thus spent alone with the master of the House of Usher.
Yet I should fail in any attempt to convey an idea of the exact
character of the studies or of the occupations in which he in-
volved me, or led me the way. An excited and highly distem-
pered ideality threw a sulphurous lustre over all. His long
improvised dirges will ring forever in my ears. Among other
things, I hold painfully in mind a certain singular perversion
and amplification of the wild air of the last waltz of Von Weber.
From the paintings over which his elaborate fancy brooded, and
which grew, touch by touch, into vaguenesses at which I shud-
dered, the more thrillingly because I shuddered knowing not
why; from these paintings (vivid as their images now are be-
fore me) I would in vain endeavor to educe more than a small
portion which should lie within the compass of merely written.
words. By the utter simplicity, by the nakedness of his designs,
he arrested and overawed attention. If ever mortal painted an
idea, that mortal was Roderick Usher. For me at least-in the
circumstances then surrounding me. there arose out of the pure
abstractions which the hypochondriac contrived to throw upon
his canvas, an intensity of intolerable awe, no shadow of which
felt I ever yet in the contemplation of the certainly glowing yet
too concrete reveries of Fuseli.
—
—
One of the phantasmagoric conceptions of my friend, partak-
ing not so rigidly of the spirit of abstraction, may be shadowed
forth, although feebly, in words. A small picture presented the
interior of an immensely long and rectangular vault or tun-
nel, with low walls, smooth, white, and without interruption or
device. Certain accessory points of the design served well to
convey the idea that this excavation lay at an exceeding depth.
below the surface of the earth. No outlet was observed in any
portion of its vast extent, and no torch or other artificial source
of light was discernible; yet a flood of intense rays rolled through-
out, and bathed the whole in a ghastly and inappropriate splen-
dor.
I have just spoken of that morbid condition of the auditory
nerve which rendered all music intolerable to the sufferer, with
the exception of certain effects of stringed instruments.
It was


## p. 11678 (#298) ##########################################

11678
EDGAR ALLAN POE
perhaps the narrow limits to which he thus confined himself upon
the guitar, which gave birth, in great measure, to the fantastic
character of his performances. But the fervid facility of his im-
promptus could not be so accounted for. They must have been,
and were, in the notes as well as in the words of his wild fanta-
sias (for he not unfrequently accompanied himself with rhymed
verbal improvisations), the result of that intense mental collected-
ness and concentration to which I have previously alluded as
observable only in particular moments of the highest artificial
excitement. The words of one of these rhapsodies I have easily
remembered. I was perhaps the more forcibly impressed with it
as he gave it, because in the under or mystic current of its
meaning I fancied that I perceived, and for the first time, a full
consciousness on the part of Usher of the tottering of his lofty
reason upon her throne. The verses, which were entitled The
Haunted Palace,' ran very nearly, if not accurately, thus:-
IN THE greenest of our valleys,
By good angels tenanted,
Once a fair and stately palace -
-
Radiant palace-reared its head.
In the monarch Thought's dominion-
It stood there!
Never seraph spread a pinion
Over fabric half so fair.
Banners yellow, glorious, golden,
On its roof did float and flow;
(This all this-was in the olden
Time long ago;)
And every gentle air that dallied,
In that sweet day,
Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,
A winged odor went away.
Wanderers in that happy valley
Through two luminous windows saw
Spirits moving musically
To a lute's well-tunèd law,
Round about a throne, where sitting
(Porphyrogene! )
In state his glory well befitting,
The ruler of the realm was seen.


## p. 11679 (#299) ##########################################

EDGAR ALLAN POE
11679
And all with pearl and ruby glowing
Was the fair palace door,
Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing,
And sparkling evermore,
A troop of Echoes whose sweet duty
Was but to sing,
In voices of surpassing beauty,
The wit and wisdom of their king.
But evil things, in robes of sorrow,
Assailed the monarch's high estate;
(Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow
Shall dawn upon him, desolate! )
And round about his home, the glory
That blushed and bloomed
Is but a dim remembered story
Of the old time entombed.
And travelers now within that valley,
Through the red-litten windows, see
Vast forms that move fantastically
To a discordant melody;
While like a rapid, ghastly river,
Through the pale door,
A hideous throng rush out forever,
And laugh- but smile no more.
I well remember that suggestions arising from this ballad led
us into a train of thought wherein there became manifest an
opinion of Usher's, which I mention not so much on account
of its novelty (for other men have thought thus) as on account
of the pertinacity with which he maintained it. This opinion, in
its general form, was that of the sentience of all vegetable things.
But in his disordered fancy, the idea had assumed a more daring
character, and trespassed, under certain conditions, upon the king-
dom of inorganization. I lack words to express the full extent
or the earnest abandon of his persuasion. The belief, however,
was connected (as I have previously hinted) with the gray stones
of the home of his forefathers. The conditions of the sentience
had been here, he imagined, fulfilled in the method of colloca-
tion of these stones; in the order of their arrangement, as well
as in that of the many fungi which overspread them, and of
the decayed trees which stood around; above all, in the long-


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11680
EDGAR ALLAN POE
undisturbed endurance of this arrangement, and in its reduplica-
tion in the still waters of the tarn. Its evidence - the evidence
of the sentience was to be seen, he said (and I here started
as he spoke), in the gradual yet certain condensation of an atmo-
sphere of their own about the waters and the walls. The result
was discoverable, he added, in that silent yet importunate and
terrible influence which for centuries had molded the destinies
of his family, and which made him what I now saw him-
what he was. Such opinions need no comment, and I will make
none.
―――――
Our books the books which for years had formed no small
portion of the mental existence of the invalid-were, as might
be supposed, in strict keeping with this character of phantasm.
We pored together over such works as the 'Ververt et Char-
treuse' of Gresset; the 'Belphegor' of Machiavelli; the Heaven
and Hell' of Swedenborg; the Subterranean Voyage of Nicho-
las Klim,' by Holberg; the 'Chiromancy' of Robert Flud, of
Jean D'Indaginé, and of De la Chambre; the 'Journey into the
Blue Distance' of Tieck; and the City of the Sun' of Campa-
nella. One favorite volume was a small octavo edition of the
'Directorium Inquisitorium,' by the Dominican Eymeric de Gi-
ronne; and there were passages in Pomponius Mela, about the old
African Satyrs and Egipans, over which Usher would sit dream-
ing for hours. His chief delight, however, was found in the
perusal of an exceedingly rare and curious book in quarto Gothic,
-the manual of a forgotten church,- the Vigiliæ Mortuorum
secundum Chorum Ecclesiæ Maguntinæ. '
I could not help thinking of the wild ritual of this work, and
of its probable influence upon the hypochondriac, when one even-
ing, having informed me abruptly that the lady Madeline was no
more, he stated his intention of preserving her corpse for a fort-
night (previously to its final interment) in one of the numerous
vaults within the main walls of the building. The worldly rea-
son, however, assigned for this singular proceeding, was one which
I did not feel at liberty to dispute. The brother had been led
to his resolution (so he told me) by consideration of the unusual
character of the malady of the deceased, of certain obtrusive
and eager inquiries on the part of her medical man, and of the
remote and exposed situation of the burial-ground of the fam-
ily. I will not deny that when I called to mind the sinister
countenance of the person whom I met upon the staircase, on


## p. 11681 (#301) ##########################################

EDGAR ALLAN POE
11681
the day of my arrival at the house, I had no desire to oppose
best but a harmless, and by no means an
what I regarded as at
unnatural, precaution.
At the request of Usher, I personally aided him in the ar-
rangements for the temporary entombment. The body having
been encoffined, we two alone bore it to its rest. The vault in
which we placed it (and which had been so long unopened that
our torches, half smothered in its oppressive atmosphere, gave us
little opportunity for investigation) was small, damp, and entirely
without means of admission for light; lying, at great depth,
immediately beneath that portion of the building in which was
my own sleeping apartment. It had been used, apparently, in
remote feudal times, for the worst purposes of a donjon-keep;
and in later days as a place of deposit for powder, or some other
highly combustible substance,—as a portion of its floor, and the
whole interior of a long archway through which we reached it,
were carefully sheathed with copper. The door of massive iron
had been also similarly protected. Its immense weight caused an
unusually sharp grating sound, as it moved upon its hinges.
Having deposited our mournful burden upon tressels within
this region of horror, we partially turned aside the yet unscrewed
lid of the coffin and looked upon the face of the tenant. A strik-
ing similitude between the brother and sister now first arrested
my attention; and Usher, divining perhaps my thoughts, mur-
mured out some few words from which I learned that the
deceased and himself had been twins, and that sympathies of
a scarcely intelligible nature had always existed between them.
Our glances, however, rested not long upon the dead; for we
could not regard her unawed. The disease which had thus
entombed the lady in the maturity of youth had left, as usual
in all maladies of a strictly cataleptical character, the mockery of
a faint blush upon the bosom and the face, and that suspiciously
lingering smile upon the lip which is so terrible in death. We
replaced and screwed down the lid; and having secured the door
of iron, made our way with toil into the scarcely less gloomy
apartments of the upper portion of the house.
And now, some days of bitter grief having elapsed, an observ-
able change came over the features of the mental disorder of my
friend. His ordinary manner had vanished. His ordinary occu-
pations were neglected or forgotten. He roamed from chamber
to chamber with hurried, unequal, and objectless step. The pallor
I
I
XX-731


## p. 11682 (#302) ##########################################

11682
EDGAR ALLAN POE
of his countenance had assumed, if possible, a more ghastly hue;
but the luminousness of his eye had entirely gone out.
The once
occasional huskiness of his tone was heard no more; and a trem-
ulous quaver, as if of extreme terror, habitually characterized his
utterance. There were times, indeed, when I thought his unceas-
ingly agitated mind was laboring with some oppressive secret, to
divulge which he struggled for the necessary courage. At times
again I was obliged to resolve all into the mere inexplicable vaga-
ries of madness; for I beheld him gazing upon vacancy for long
hours in an attitude of the profoundest attention, as if listening
to some imaginary sound. It was no wonder that his condition
terrified that it infected me. I felt creeping upon me, by slow
yet certain degrees, the wild influences of his own fantastic yet
impressive superstitions.
It was especially upon retiring to bed late in the night of
the seventh or eighth day after the placing of the lady Madeline
within the donjon, that I experienced the full power of such feel-
ings. Sleep came not near my couch, while the hours waned and
waned away.
I struggled to reason off the nervousness which
had dominion over me. I endeavored to believe that much if
not all of what I felt was due to the bewildering influence of
the gloomy furniture of the room,- of the dark and tattered
draperies, which, tortured into motion by the breath of a rising
tempest, swayed fitfully to and fro upon the walls, and rustled
uneasily about the decorations of the bed. But my efforts were
fruitless. An irrepressible tremor gradually pervaded my frame;
and at length there sat upon my very heart an incubus of utterly
causeless alarm. Shaking this off with a gasp and a struggle, I
uplifted myself upon the pillows, and peering earnestly within
the intense darkness of the chamber, hearkened-I know not
why, except that an instinctive spirit prompted me-certain low
and indefinite sounds which came through the pauses of the
storm, at long intervals, I knew not whence. Overpowered by
an intense sentiment of horror, unaccountable yet unendurable, I
threw on my clothes with haste (for I felt that I should sleep
no more during the night), and endeavored to arouse myself from
the pitiable condition into which I had fallen, by pacing rapidly
to and fro through the apartment. "
I had taken but few turns in this manner, when a light step
on an adjoining staircase arrested my attention. I presently rec-
ognized it as that of Usher. In an instant afterward he rapped


## p. 11683 (#303) ##########################################

EDGAR ALLAN POE
11683
with a gentle touch at my door, and entered, bearing a lamp.
His countenance was, as usual, cadaverously wan; but moreover,
there was a species of mad hilarity in his eyes, and evidently
restrained hysteria in his whole demeanor. His air appalled me;
but anything was preferable to the solitude which had so long
endured, and I even welcomed his presence as a relief.
"And you have not seen it? " he said abruptly, after having
stared about him for some moments in silence,-"you have not
then seen it? but stay! you shall. " Thus speaking, and having
carefully shaded his lamp, he hurried to one of the casements,
and threw it freely open to the storm.
The impetuous fury of the entering gust nearly lifted us from
our feet. It was indeed a tempestuous yet sternly beautiful
night, and one wildly singular in its terror and its beauty. A
whirlwind had apparently collected its force in our vicinity: for
there were frequent and violent alterations in the direction of the
wind; and the exceeding density of the clouds (which hung so
low as to press upon the turrets of the house) did not prevent
our perceiving the lifelike velocity with which they flew career-
ing from all points against each other, without passing away into
the distance. I say that even their exceeding density did not
prevent our perceiving this; yet we had no glimpse of the moon
or stars, nor was there any flashing forth of the lightning. But
the under surfaces of the huge masses of agitated vapor, as well
as all terrestrial objects immediately around us, were glowing
in the unnatural light of a faintly luminous and distinctly visible
gaseous exhalation which hung about and enshrouded the man-
sion.
-
"You must not- you shall not behold this! " said I shud-
deringly to Usher, as I led him with a gentle violence from the
window to a seat. "These appearances which bewilder you are
merely electrical phenomena not uncommon; or it may be that
they have their ghastly origin in the rank miasma of the tarn.
Let us close this casement: the air is chilling and dangerous to
your frame. Here is one of your favorite romances. I will read,
and you shall listen; and so we will pass away this terrible night
together. "
The antique volume which I had taken up was the 'Mad
Trist' of Sir Launcelot Canning: but I had called it a favorite of
Usher's more in sad jest than in earnest; for in truth there is
little in its uncouth and unimaginative prolixity which could have
had interest for the lofty and spiritual ideality of my friend. It


## p. 11684 (#304) ##########################################

11684
EDGAR ALLAN POE
was, however, the only book immediately at hand; and I indulged
a vague hope that the excitement which now agitated the hypo-
chondriac might find relief (for the history of mental disorder is
full of similar anomalies) even in the extremeness of the folly
which I should read. Could I have judged, indeed, by the wild
overstrained air of vivacity with which he hearkened, or appar-
ently hearkened, to the words of the tale, I might well have
congratulated myself upon the success of my design.
I had arrived at that well-known portion of the story where
Ethelred, the hero of the Trist, having sought in vain for peace-
able admission into the dwelling of the hermit, proceeds to make
good an entrance by force. Here, it will be remembered, the
words of the narrative run thus:-
"And Ethelred, who was by nature of a doughty heart, and
who was now mighty withal on account of the powerfulness of
the wine which he had drunken, waited no longer to hold parley
with the hermit, who in sooth was of an obstinate and maliceful
turn: but feeling the rain upon his shoulders, and fearing the
rising of the tempest, uplifted his mace outright, and with blows,
made quickly room in the plankings of the door for his gaunt-
leted hand; and now pulling therewith sturdily, he so cracked
and ripped and tore all asunder, that the noise of the dry and
hollow-sounding wood alarumed and reverberated throughout the
forest. "
At the termination of this sentence I started, and for a mo-
ment paused; for it appeared to me (although I at once con-
cluded that my excited fancy had deceived me) —it appeared to me
that from some very remote portion of the mansion, there came
indistinctly to my ears what might have been, in its exact simi-
larity of character, the echo (but a stifled and dull one certainly)
of the very cracking and ripping sound which Sir Launcelot had
so particularly described. It was beyond doubt the coincidence.
alone which had arrested my attention; for amid the rattling of
the sashes of the casements, and the ordinary commingled noises
of the still increasing storm, the sound in itself had nothing,
surely, which should have interested or disturbed me.
I con-
tinued the story:—
"But the good champion Ethelred, now entering within the
door, was sore enraged and amazed to perceive no signal of the
maliceful hermit: but in the stead thereof, a dragon of a scaly
and prodigious demeanor, and of a fiery tongue, which sate in
guard before a palace of gold, with a floor of silver; and upon


## p. 11685 (#305) ##########################################

EDGAR ALLAN POE
11685
the wall there hung a shield of shining brass with this legend
enwritten:
-:
<<<Who entereth herein, a conqueror hath bin;
Who slayeth the dragon, the shield he shall win. '
And Ethelred uplifted his mace, and struck upon the head of the
dragon, which fell before him, and gave up his pesty breath with
a shriek so horrid and harsh, and withal so piercing, that Ethel-
red had fain to close his ears with his hands against the dread-
ful noise of it, the like whereof was never before heard. "
Here again I paused abruptly, and now with a feeling of
wild amazement; for there could be no doubt whatever that in
this instance I did actually hear (although from what direction
it proceeded, I found it impossible to say) a low and apparently
distant, but harsh, protracted, and most unusual screaming or
grating sound,- the exact counterpart of what my fancy had
already conjured up for the dragon's unnatural shriek as de-
scribed by the romancer.
Oppressed as I certainly was, upon the occurrence of this
second and most extraordinary coincidence, by a thousand con-
flicting sensations, in which wonder and extreme terror were
predominant, I still retained sufficient presence of mind to avoid
exciting, by any observation, the sensitive nervousness of my
companion. I was by no means certain that he had noticed the
sounds in question; although assuredly a strange alteration had
during the last few minutes taken place in his demeanor. From
a position fronting my own, he had gradually brought round his
chair so as to sit with his face to the door of the chamber; and
thus I could but partially perceive his features, although I saw
that his lips trembled as if he were murmuring inaudibly. His
head had dropped upon his breast; yet I knew that he was not
asleep, from the wide and rigid opening of the eye as I caught
a glance of it in profile. The motion of his body, too, was at
variance with this idea; for he rocked from side to side with
a gentle yet constant and uniform sway. Having rapidly taken
notice of all this, I resumed the narrative of Sir Launcelot, which
thus proceeded:
-:
"And now the champion, having escaped from the terrible
fury of the dragon, bethinking himself of the brazen shield, and
of the breaking up of the enchantment which was upon it,
removed the carcass from out of the way before him, and


## p. 11686 (#306) ##########################################

11686
EDGAR ALLAN POE
approached valorously over the silver pavement of the castle to
where the shield was upon the wall; which in sooth tarried not
for his full coming, but fell down at his feet upon the silver
floor, with a mighty great and terrible ringing sound. ”
No sooner had these syllables passed my lips, than-as if a
shield of brass had indeed, at the moment, fallen heavily upon
a floor of silver-I became aware of a distinct, hollow, metallic
and clamorous, yet apparently muffled reverberation. Completely
unnerved, I leaped to my feet; but the measured rocking move-
ment of Usher was undisturbed. I rushed to the chair in which
he sat. His eyes were bent fixedly before him, and throughout
his whole countenance there reigned a stony rigidity. But as I
placed my hand upon his shoulder, there came a strong shud-
der over his whole person; a sickly smile quivered about his lips,
and I saw that he spoke in a low, hurried, and gibbering mur-
mur, as if unconscious of my presence. Bending closely over
him, I at length drank in the hideous import of his words.
"Not hear it? -yes, I hear it, and have heard it. Long-
long-long—many minutes, many hours, many days, have I
heard it - yet I dared not oh, pity me, miserable wretch that I
am! I dared not-I dared not speak! We have put her living
in the tomb! Said I not that my senses were acute? I now tell
you that I heard her first feeble movements in the hollow coffin.
I heard them-many, many days ago-yet I dared not-I
dared not speak! And now-to-night- Ethelred-ha! ha! - the
breaking of the hermit's door, and the death-cry of the dragon,
and the clangor of the shield! say rather the rending of her
coffin, and the grating of the iron hinges of her prison, and her
struggles within the coppered archway of the vault! Oh, whither
shall I fly? Will she not be here anon? Is she not hurrying to
upbraid me for my haste? Have I not heard her footstep on the
stair? Do I not distinguish that heavy and horrible beating of
her heart? Madman! "— here he sprang furiously to his feet, and
shrieked out his syllables, as if in the effort he were giving up
his soul - "Madman! I tell you that she now stands without the
door! »
-――
As if in the superhuman energy of his utterance there had
been found the potency of a spell-the huge antique panels to
which the speaker pointed, threw slowly back upon the instant
their ponderous ebony jaws. It was the work of the rushing
gust; but then, without those doors there did stand the lofty


## p. 11687 (#307) ##########################################


EDGAR ALLAN POE
11687
and enshrouded figure of the lady Madeline of Usher. There was
blood upon her white robes, and the evidence of some bitter
struggle upon every portion of her emaciated frame.
For a
moment she remained trembling and reeling to and fro upon.
the threshold; then, with a low, moaning cry, fell heavily inward
upon the person of her brother, and in her violent and now final
death agonies bore him to the floor a corpse, and a victim to the
terror he had anticipated.
From that chamber, and from that mansion, I fled aghast.
The storm was still abroad in all its wrath as I found myself
crossing the old causeway. Suddenly there shot along the path a
wild light, and I turned to see whence a gleam so unusual could
have issued; for the vast house and its shadows were alone
behind me. The radiance was that of the full, setting, and blood-
red moon, which now shone vividly through that once barely dis-
cernible fissure, of which I have before spoken as extending from
the roof of the building, in a zigzag direction, to the base. While
I gazed, this fissure rapidly widened; there came a fierce breath
of the whirlwind; the entire orb of the satellite burst at once
upon my sight; my brain reeled as I saw the mighty walls rush-
ing asunder; there was a long tumultuous shouting sound like
the voice of a thousand waters-and the deep and dark tarn at
my feet closed sullenly and silently over the fragments of the
"House of Usher. "
FOR ANNIE
THAN
HANK Heaven! the crisis
The danger-is past,
And the lingering illness
Is over at last-
And the fever called "Living"
Is conquered at last.
—
Sadly, I know,
I am shorn of my strength,
And no muscle I move
As I lie at full length;
But no matter! - I feel
I am better at length.
And I rest so composedly
Now, in my bed,


## p. 11688 (#308) ##########################################

11688
EDGAR ALLAN POE
That any beholder
Might fancy me dead,-
Might start at beholding me,
Thinking me dead.
The moaning and groaning,
The sighing and sobbing,
Are quieted now,
With that horrible throbbing
At heart;-ah, that horrible,
Horrible throbbing!
The sickness, the nausea,
The pitiless pain,
Have ceased, with the fever
That maddened my brain —
With the fever called "Living"
That burned in my brain.
And oh! of all tortures,
That torture the worst
Has abated,- the terrible
Torture of thirst
For the naphthaline river
Of Passion accurst;-
I have drank of a water
That quenches all thirst:
Of a water that flows,
With a lullaby sound,
From a spring but a very few
Feet under ground
From a cavern not very far
Down under ground.
And ah! let it never
Be foolishly said
-
That my room it is gloomy,
And narrow my bed;
For man never slept
In a different bed-
And, to sleep, you must slumber
In just such a bed.
My tantalized spirit
Here blandly reposes,


## p. 11689 (#309) ##########################################

EDGAR ALLAN POE
11689
Forgetting, or never
Regretting, its roses,-
Its old agitations
Of myrtles and roses.
-
For now, while so quietly
Lying, it fancies
A holier odor
About it, of pansies,-
A rosemary odor
Commingled with pansies -
With rue and the beautiful
Puritan pansies.
And so it lies happily,
Bathing in many
A dream of the truth
And the beauty of Annie,-
Drowned in a bath
Of the tresses of Annie.
She tenderly kissed me,
She fondly caressed,
And then I fell gently
To sleep on her breast,-
Deeply to sleep
From the heaven of her breast.
When the light was extinguished
She covered me warm,
And she prayed to the angels
To keep me from harm,-
To the queen of the angels
To shield me from harm.
And I lie so composedly
Now, in my bed,
(Knowing her love,)
That you fancy me dead;
And I rest so contentedly
Now, in my bed,
—
(With her love at my breast,)
That you fancy me dead,-
That you shudder to look at me,
Thinking me dead.
But my heart it is brighter
Than all of the many
―


## p. 11690 (#310) ##########################################

11690
EDGAR ALLAN POE
Stars in the sky,
For it sparkles with Annie;
It glows with the light
Of the love of my Annie,-
With the thought of the light
Of the eyes of my Annie.
SONG FROM THE ASSIGNATION›
THOU
HOU wast that all to me, love,
For which my soul did pine:
A green isle in the sea, love,
A fountain and a shrine,
All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers;
And all the flowers were mine.
Ah, dream too bright to last!
Ah, starry Hope, that didst arise
But to be overcast!
A voice from out the Future cries,
"Onward! "—but o'er the Past
(Dim gulf! ) my spirit hovering lies,
Mute-motionless - aghast!
For alas! alas! with me
The light of life is o'er.
"No more no more-no more »
(Such language holds the solemn sea
To the sands upon the shore)
"Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree,
Or the stricken eagle soar! "
Now all my hours are trances;
And all my nightly dreams
Are where thy dark eye glances
And where thy footstep gleams,
In what ethereal dances,
By what Italian streams.
Alas for that accursed time
They bore thee o'er the billow,
From Love to titled age and crime,
And an unholy pillow! -
From me, and from our misty clime,
Where weeps the silver willow.


## p. 11691 (#311) ##########################################

EDGAR ALLAN POE
11691
THE RAVEN
O
NCE upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,-
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping-rapping at my chamber door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door:
Only this, and nothing more. "
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow: vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow. sorrow for the lost Lenore,
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore,-
Nameless here for evermore.
—
And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me-filled me- with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating,
'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door:
This it is, and nothing more. "
—
Presently my soul grew stronger: hesitating then no longer,-
"Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is, I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you. " Here I opened wide the door
Darkness there, and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fear-
ing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore! "
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore! "
Merely this, and nothing more.
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping, something louder than before.
"Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window-lattice:
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore,-
Let my heart be still a moment, and this mystery explore:
'Tis the wind, and nothing more. "


## p. 11692 (#312) ##########################################

11692
EDGAR ALLAN POE
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed
he:
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door,-
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door,—
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebon bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no
craven,
Ghastly, grim, and ancient Raven, wandering from the Nightly shore.
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore! "
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore. "
Much I marveled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door-
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door -
With such name as "Nevermore. "
But the Raven, sitting lonely on that placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered; not a feather then he fluttered:
Till I scarcely more than muttered, "Other friends have flown be-
fore!
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before! "
Then the bird said, "Nevermore. "
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store;
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore,—
Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore
Of Never- nevermore! >»
But the Raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and
door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking "Nevermore. "


## p. 11693 (#313) ##########################################

EDGAR ALLAN POE
11693
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er,—
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamplight gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen
censer
Swung by Seraphim whose footfalls tinkled on the tufted floor.
"Wretch! " I cried, "thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he
hath sent thee
Respite-respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget the lost Lenore! »
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore. "
"Prophet! " cried I, "thing of evil! -prophet still, if bird or devil! —
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted,-
On this home by horror haunted,- tell me truly, I implore,
Is there is there balm in Gilead? Tell me! tell me, I implore! "
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore. "
"Prophet! " cried I, "thing of evil! -prophet still, if bird or devil! -
By that heaven that bends above us,—by that God we both adore,-
Tell this soul with sorrow laden, if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore –
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore. »
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore. »
"Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend! " I shrieked, up-
starting.
"Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! -quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my
door! »
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore. "
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the
floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!


## p. 11694 (#314) ##########################################

11694
EDGAR ALLAN POE
HEA
Н
THE BELLS
I
EAR the sledges with the bells,-
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells,-
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.
II
Hear the mellow wedding bells,-
Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight!
From the molten golden notes,
And all in tune,
What a liquid ditty floats
To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats
On the moon!
Oh, from out the sounding cells,
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!
How it swells!
How it dwells
On the Future! How it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing.
Of the bells, bells, bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells,-
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!


## p. 11695 (#315) ##########################################

EDGAR ALLAN POE
11695
III
Hear the loud alarum bells,-
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor
Now now to sit, or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!