rlier days of his turbulent and
passionate youth."

When Edgar was unhappy at home, which, says his aunt, Mrs. Clemm, "was
very often the case, he went to Mrs. Stannard for sympathy, for
consolation, and for advice." Unfortunately, the sad fortune which so
frequently thwarted his hopes ended this friendship. The lady was
overwhelmed by a terrible calamity, and at the period when her guiding
voice was most requisite, she fell a prey to mental alienation. She
died, and was entombed in a neighboring cemetery, but her poor boyish
admirer could not endure to think of her lying lonely and forsaken in
her vaulted home, so he would leave the house at night and visit her
tomb. When the nights were drear, "when the autumnal rains fell, and the
winds wailed mournfully over the graves, he lingered longest, and came
away most regretfully."

The memory of this lady, of this "one idolatrous and purely ideal love"
of his boyhood, was cherished to the last. The name of Helen frequently
recurs in his youthful verses, "The Paean," now first included in his
poetical works, refers to her; and to her he inscribed the classic and
exquisitely beautiful stanzas beginning "Helen, thy beauty is to me."

Another important item to be noted in this epoch of his life is that he
was already a poet. Among his schoolfellows he appears to have acquired
some little reputation as a writer of satirical verses; but of his
poetry, of that which, as he declared, had been with him "not a purpose,
but a passion," he probably preserved the secret, especially as we know
that at his adoptive home poesy was a forbidden thing. As early as 1821
he appears to have essayed various pieces, and some of these were
ultimately included in his first volume. With Poe poetry was a personal
matter--a channel through which the turbulent passions of his heart
found an outlet. With feelings such as were his, it came to pass, as a
matter of course, that the youthful poet fell in love. His first affair
of the heart is, doubtless, reminiscently portrayed in what he says of
his boyish ideal, Byron. This passion, he remarks, "if passion it can
properly be called, was of the most thoroughly romantic, shadowy, and
imaginative character. It was born of the hour, and of the youthful
necessity to love. It had no peculiar regard to the person, or to the
character, or to the reciprocating affection... Any maiden, not
immediately and positively repulsive," he deems would have suited the
oc