A Classic Crime Collection (39 page)

I gazed awhile

On her cold smile;

Too cold—too cold for me—

There passed, as a shroud,

A fleecy cloud,

And I turned away to thee,

Proud Evening Star,

In thy glory afar

And dearer thy beam shall be;

For joy to my heart

Is the proud part

Thou bearest in Heaven at night,

And more I admire

Thy distant fire,

Than that colder, lowly light.

A
LONE
¹

From childhood’s hour I have not been

As others were—I have not seen

As others saw—I could not bring

My passions from a common spring.

From the same source I have not taken

My sorrow; I could not awaken

My heart to joy at the same tone;

And all I lov’d,
I
lov’d alone.

Then
—in my childhood—in the dawn

Of a most stormy life—was drawn

From ev’ry depth of good and ill

The mystery which binds me still:

From the torrent, or the fountain,

From the red cliff of the mountain,

From the sun that ’round me roll’d

In its autumn tint of gold—

From the lightning in the sky

As it pass’d me flying by—

From the thunder and the storm,

And the cloud that took the form

(When the rest of Heaven was blue)

Of a demon in my view.

N
OTES

T
ALES

The Tell-Tale Heart

1
.   
The Tell-Tale Heart:
Originally published in January 1843 in
The Pioneer
magazine; Poe revised the tale and published it again in
The Broadway Journal
, August 23, 1845.

2
.   
death watches:
A species of beetle, so called because their presence in walls (they can be heard gnawing on wood) is taken to be an omen of impending death.

3
.   
scantlings:
Small timbers supporting a floor.

The Cask of Amontillado

1
.   
The Cask of Amontillado:
This story was first published in
Godey’s Lady’s Book
, November 1846.

2
.   
a pipe of . . . Amontillado:
Amontillado is a Spanish sherry, which Poe possibly thought was Italian. Montresor imagines a pipe, or large cask, of amontillado to be a sufficient lure to get Fortunato to accompany him into his wine cellar.

3
.   
nitre:
Potassium nitrate, which covers walls of caverns in gray-white crystalline deposits and is used to make gunpowder.

4
.   
roquelaire:
A knee-length cape. Montresor, like Fortunato, is in costume for the carnival.

5
.   
Medoc:
A French red wine.

6
.   
Nemo me impune lacessit:
Latin: “No one provokes me with impunity.”

7
.   
puncheons:
Large casks.

8
.   
De Grâve:
Another type of French red wine; Montresor is having a joke with himself about his plans for Fortunato.

9
.   
In pace requiescat!:
Latin: “May he rest in peace!” Montresor’s revelation that he is telling this story fifty years later and his use of the Latin prayer suggests that he is telling it on his deathbed, perhaps to soothe a guilty conscience.

The Black Cat

1
.   
The Black Cat:
First published in the
United States Saturday Post,
August 19, 1843.

2
.   
baroques:
Extravagant or grotesque stories.

3
.   
Pluto:
Roman god of the underworld.

4
.   
Intemperance:
The excessive consumption of alcohol.

Ligeia

1
.   
Ligeia:
First published in the Baltimore
American Museum
, September 1838.

2
.   
Joseph Glanvill:
English clergyman and philosopher (1636–1680). Scholars have been unable to locate this passage in Glanvill’s work.

3
.   
Ashtophet:
Poe is probably referring to the Phoenician goddess of fertility, Astarte.

4
.   
Delos:
Greek island presided over by the god Apollo and his sister, Artemis.

5
.   
“There is no exquisite beauty . . . without some
strangeness
in the proportion”:
Poe is paraphrasing slightly from the essay “Of Beauty” by Francis Bacon, Lord Verulam, Viscount St. Albans. “There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.”

6
.   
Cleomenes:
Greek sculptor whose statue of the goddess Venus was supposedly inspired by a divine vision of Apollo.

7
.   
Nourjahad:
A reference to the novel
The History of Nourjahad
(1767), about a harem-keeping prince, by Frances Sheridan.

8
.   
Houri:
In Muslim mythology, the virgins who await men in heaven; “houri” literally refers to their dark eyes.

9
.   
Democritus:
Greek philosopher (c. 460–370
B
.
C
.) known for his inquiries into the structure of matter, astronomy, and ethics. The saying “truth lies at the bottom of a well,” meaning the truth is hidden, is attributed to Democritus.

10
.   
Leda:
Mother of Castor and Pollux, twins who were fathered by Zeus. Castor and Pollux are also the names of two stars in the constellation Gemini.

11
.   
Lyra:
Constellation whose name means “the lyre” or “the harp.” The large star in Lyra is Vega, the second brightest in the Northern Hemisphere. Lyra contains several binary star systems.

12
.   
Saturnian lead:
This is a reference to Ligeia’s interest in alchemy, an occult science that was the precursor to chemistry. Alchemists tried to turn matter from one form to another, most famously lead into gold.

13
.   
Azrael:
Muslim angel of death.

The Masque of the Red Death

1
.   
The Masque of the Red Death:
Originally published in
Graham’s Magazine
, May 1842.

2
.   
Avatar:
Originally a reference to the human incarnation of a Hindu god; here meaning its manifestation or sign.

3
.   
pest ban:
First visible signs of the disease.

4
.   
improvisatori:
Performers who improvise songs and poems.

5
.   
decora:
Plural of “decorum,” here meaning the rules of style.

6
.   
“Hernani”:
Controversial play by Victor Hugo that was greeted with rioting at its premiere in 1830.

7
.   
out-Heroded Herod:
Herod, ruler of Palestine, was known for his extravagance as well as his cruelty. This line alludes to William Shakespeare’s
Hamlet
, where Hamlet utters the same words referring to bad actors.

8
.   
habiliments:
Garments.

9
.   
mummer:
A pantomime performer.

10
.   
thief in the night:
1 Thessalonians 5:2–3 contains one of several references to the Lord returning like a “thief in the night”: “. . . then sudden destruction cometh upon them . . . and they shall not escape.”

The Fall of the House of Usher

1
.   
The Fall of the House of Usher:
Originally published in
Burton’s Gentleman’s Magazine
, September 1839.

2
.   
Son cœur est . . . —
De Béranger:
“His heart is like a suspended lute; as soon as it is touched it resonates.” These lines are derived from “Le Refus,” a poem written in 1830 by Pierre-Jean de Béranger (1780–1857), a French poet and songwriter.

3
.   
direct line of descent:
The narrator is referring to the Ushers’ habit of inbreeding.

4
.   
ennuyé:
Bored; suffering from ennui.

5
.   
affections of . . . cataleptical:
She has fits during which she becomes rigid, like a corpse.

6
.   
ideality:
A reference to the Romantic idea of a transcendent level of ideal or pure thought. Usher’s ideality is corrupted by his line of study.

7
.   
Von Weber:
German Romantic composer Carl Maria von Weber (1786–1826).

8
.   
Fuseli:
Swiss-born painter Henry Fuseli (1741–1825), best known for his two paintings entitled
The Nightmare
.

9
.   
seraph spread a pinion:
A seraph is the highest-ranking order of angel in the Judeo-Christian hierarchy, each possessing two or three pairs of pinions, or wings.

10
.   
Porphyrogene!:
Greek: “born in the purple.” The color purple has long been associated with royalty, and so a porphyrogene is one born into royalty.

11
.   
Watson, Dr. Percival . . . See “Chemical Essays,” vol. v:
Note added here by Poe to lend credibility to Usher’s poem. Richard Watson (1737–1816) was a British theologian, who became the Bishop of Llandaff; Percival was probably a Dr. Thomas Percival (1740–1804), the author of
Medical Ethics
(1803); Lazzaro Spallanzani (1729–1799) was an Italian professor of natural history.

12
.   
We pored together . . . Campanella:
Jean-Baptiste-Louis Gresset (1709–1777), a French poet and dramatist, two of whose poems were “Vert-Vert” and “La Chartreuse;” “Belphegor,” or “Belfagor arcidiavolo,” by Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527), is a satirical novella about men and women; Emanuel Swedenborg (1688–1772) was a Swedish mystical philosopher; Ludvig Holberg (1684–1754) was a Danish historian and playwright; Flud, or Robert Fludd, was a practitioner of palm-reading, or chiromancy, as were Jean D’Indaginé and Marin Cureau de la Chambre, and all three wrote volumes under that title; Ludwig Tieck (1773–1853) was a German Romantic poet, dramatist, and fiction writer; Tomasso Campanella (1568–1639) was the author of the utopian
City of the Sun.

13
.   
Directorium . . . Œgipans:
Nicolas Eymeric was the grand inquisitor of Aragon beginning in 1356; his
Directorium Inquisitorium
contained instructions for interrogating heretics. Pomponius Mela was a Roman geographer who described a variety of strange creatures in faraway lands, including the goatlike Œgipans.

14
.   
Vigilæ . . . Maguntinæ:
“The Vigils of the Dead According to the Church of Mainz.”

15
.   
donjon-keep:
A dungeon.

16
.   
“Mad Trist” of Sir Launcelot Canning:
Unlike Usher’s other books, critics consider this one an invention of Poe’s.

17
.   
doughty:
Resolute; fearless.

18
.   
alarumed:
Made an alarm or call to arms.

The Murders in the Rue Morgue

1
.   
The Murders in the Rue Morgue:
Originally published in
Graham’s Magazine
, April 1841.

2
.   
What song . . . —
Sir Thomas Browne:
From Browne’s essay
Hydriotaphia, or Urn-Burial
.

3
.   
draughts:
Checkers.

4
.   
involute:
Intricate; involved.

5
.   
recherché:
Exotic or refined.

6
.   
whist:
A card game played with partners, similar to bridge.

7
.   
Hoyle:
Edmond Hoyle (1672–1769), author of
A Short Treatise on the Game of Whist
.

8
.   
phrenologists:
Believers in a pseudoscience, popular in the nineteenth century (Poe makes frequent reference to it), premised on the belief that the shape of the skull corresponds to aspects of a person’s character.

9
.   
Théâtre des Variétés:
A theater that produces variety shows.

10
.   
quondam:
Latin: “former.”

11
.   
Crébillon’s tragedy:
Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon (1674–1762) was a French dramatist, author of
Xerxes
(1714).

12
.   
Pasquinaded:
To be publicly mocked. From the Piazza di Pasquino, a piazza in Rome where satirists posted lampoons of public figures.

13
.   
et id genus omne:
Latin: “and all that sort of thing.”

14
.   
charlatânerie:
The act of perpetrating a fraud; charlatanism.

15
.   
rencontre:
Encounter, sometimes hostile.

16
.   
Dr. Nichols:
A reference to astronomer J. P. Nichol, author of
Views of the Architecture of the Heavens in a Series of Letters to a Lady
(1837).

17
.   
stereotomy:
The science of stonecutting.