normal, and to a healthy mind affords less of pleasure through its novelty, than of pain through its incoherence. When, proceeding a step farther, however, Fantasy seeks not merely disproportionate but incongruous or antagonistical elements, the effect is rendered more pleasurable from its greater positiveness; - there is a merry effort of Truth to shake from her that which is no property of hers : and we laugh outright in

recognizing Humor.

The four faculties in question appear to me all of their class; but when either Fancy or Humor is expressed to gain an end is pointed at a purpose whenever either becomes objective in place of subjective then it becomes, also, pure Wit or Sarcasm, just as the purpose is well-intentioned or malevolent.

Having thus comfortably defined our position, we shall be the more readily understood when we repeat that the marked idiosyncrasy of the prose style of Mr. Willis - that the charm which has wrought for it so vast and so well-merited a popularity - is traceable, in the last result, to the brilliant FANCY with which it perpetually scintillates or glows-a fancy possessed not as in the case of Moore, to the exclusion of qualities more noble - but possessed, certainly, to an extent altogether unparalleled, and of a kind both relatively and intrinsically the most valuable, because at once the most radiant and the most rare.

IMITATION

PLAGIARISM

- MR.

POE'S REPLY TO

THE LETTER OF OUTIS A LARGE

ACCOUNT

OF A SMALL MATTER A VOLUMINOUS HISTORY
OF THE LITTLE LONGFELLOW WAR.

[Text: Broadway Journal, March 8, 1845.]

[Broadway Journal, i. 10-14; cf. Burton's Gentlemen's Magazine, February, 1840; 1 Graham's Magazine, March, 1842; New York Evening Mirror, Jan. 14, 1845; 2 Graham's Magazine, May, 1845.]

NOTE. Poe's "A Reply to Outis" is in five parts and begins in the Broadway Journal for March 8, 1845, PP. 147150, Vol. i., continues March 15, pp. 161-163, with "A Continuation of the Voluminous History of the Little Longfellow War - Mr. Poe's further reply to the letter of Outis;" March 22, pp. 178–182, continuation of “A Reply to Outis;" March 29, pp. 194-198, continuation of "A Reply to Outis;" April 5, pp. 211, 212, conclusion of "A Reply to Outis," under the title of "Postscript." The preferable plan seemed to be to print the papers consecutively here, slightly disarranging the chronological order. - ED.

I.

In replying to the letter signed "Outis," which appears in last Saturday's Weekly Mirror," I find it advisable, for reasons which shall be obvious as I proceed, to dismiss for the present the editorial "we."

66

For the Evening Mirror" of January 14, (1846), before my editorial connexion with the " Broadway Journal," I furnished a brief criticism on Professor Longfellow's Waif." "Waif." In the course of my observations, I collated a poem called "The Death-Bed,"

1 Vol. X.

2 Vol. XI.

and written by Hood, with one by Mr. Aldrich, entitled A Death-Bed." The criticism ended thus :

We conclude our notes on the Waif," with the observation that, although full of beauties, it is infected with a moral taint· or is this a mere freak of our own fancy? We shall be pleased if it be so; - but there does appear, in this little volume, a very careful avoidance of all American poets who may be supposed especially to interfere with the claims of Mr. Longfellow. These men Mr. Longfellow can continuously imitate (is that the word?) and yet never even incidentally commend.

Much discussion ensued. A friend of Mr. Longfellow's penned a defence which had at least the merit of being thoroughly impartial; for it defended Mr. L., not only from the one-tenth of very moderate disapproval in which I had indulged, but from the ninetenths of my enthusiastic admiration into the bargain. The fact is, if I was not convinced that in ninety-nine hundredths of all that I had written about Mr. Longfellow I was decidedly in the wrong, at least it was no fault of Mr. Longfellow's very luminous friend. This well-intended defence was published in the "Mirror" with a few words of preface by Mr. Willis, and of postscript by myself. Still dissatisfied, Mr. L., through a second friend, addressed to Mr. Willis an expostulatory letter, of which the "Mirror” printed only the following portion :

It has been asked, perhaps, why Lowell was neglected in this collection? Might it not as well be asked why Bryant, Dana and Halleck were neglected? The answer

is obvious to any one who candidly considers the character of the collection. It professed to be, according to the

Proem, from the humbler poets; and it was intended to embrace pieces that were anonymous, or which were easily accessible to the general reader - the waifs and estrays of literature. To put anything of Lowell's, for example, into a collection of waifs would be a particular liberty with pieces which are all collected and christened.

Not yet content, or misunderstanding the tenor of some of the wittily-put comments which accompanied the quotation, the aggrieved poet, through one of the two friends as before, or perhaps through a third, finally prevailed on the good nature of Mr. Willis to publish an explicit declaration of his disagreement with "all the disparagement of Longfellow" which had appeared in the criticism in question.

Now when we consider that many of the points of censure made by me in this critique were absolutely as plain as the nose upon Mr. Longfellow's face - that it was impossible to gainsay them that we defied him and his coadjutors to say a syllable in reply to them— and that they held their tongues and not a syllable said - when we consider all this, I say, then the satire of the "all" in Mr. Willis' manifesto becomes apparent at once. Mr. Longfellow did not see it; and I presume his friends did not see it. I did. In my mind's eye it expanded itself thus ; My dear Sir, or Sirs, what will you have? You are an insatiable set of cormorants, it is true; but if you will only let me know what you desire, I will satisfy you, if I die for it. Be quick! merely say what it is you wish me to admit, and (for the sake of getting rid of you) I will admit it upon the spot. Come! I will grant at once that Mr. Longfellow is Jupiter Tonans, and that his three friends are the Graces, or the Furies, whichever you please.

As for a fault to be found with either of you, that is impossible, and I say so. I disagree with all — with every syllable of the disparagement that ever has been whispered against you up to this date, and (not to stand upon trifles) with all that ever shall be whispered against you henceforward, forever and forever. May I hope at length that these assurances will be sufficient?" But if Mr. Willis really hoped anything of the kind he was mistaken.

in this paper

did

In the meantime Mr. Briggs me the honor of taking me to task for what he supposed to be my insinuations against Mr. Aldrich. My reply (in the Mirror"), prefaced by a few words

from Mr. Willis, ran as follows:

Much interest has been given in our literary circles of late to the topic of plagiarism. About a month ago a very eminent critic connected with this paper, took occasion to point out a parallelism between certain lines of Thomas Hood, and certain others which appeared in the collection of American poetry edited by Mr. Griswold. Transcribing the passages, he ventured the assertion that "somebody is a thief.' The matter had been nearly forgotten, if not altogether so, when a "good-natured friend" of the American author (whose name had by us never been mentioned) considered it advisable to re-collate the passages, with the view of convincing the public (and himself) that no plagiarism is chargeable to the party of whom he thinks it chivalrous to be the "good-natured friend." For our own part, should we ever be guilty of an indiscretion of this kind, we deprecate all aid from our "good-natured friends -but in the mean time it is rendered necessary that once again we give publicity to the collation of poems in question. Mr. Hood's lines run thus: