Page:Edgar Allan Poe - a centenary tribute.pdf/71

 them,—but on this occasion we may well remember sympathetically some of the finer traits of his life—which were as truly part of him—more truly, I think, than the darker side. There were many kindly and lovable features of his life which glint forth at times in his poems, as well as in the reminiscences of some of his best friends.

Remember that, besides his sad and weird side, he had a side which was bright and cheerful. Some of his friends who knew him well bear testimony to the fact that often he was most cheerful and even playful in mood and brilliant in light-hearted repartee. Remember the humor that comes out at times in some of his brilliant stories, like that rollicking farce, "The Spectacles," which tells the story of the near-sighted young man who married his great-grandmother. And there are here and there light, brilliant, playful touches in some of his poems. Remember the purity, the clean-mindedness of his work. Not a single line in all his poetry or his prose that is unworthy to be read by the purest-hearted. It is a wonderful record for one who loved the occult, the gruesome, the abnormal. It shows character and ideals.

Remember the exquisite faithfulness, sweetness and devotion of his home-life, in both his poetry and in the reality of his life. His child-wife, Virginia, as one says, was "a dark-eyed, dark-haired daughter of the South; her face exquisitely lovely—the most delicate realization of the poet's ideal." And his love for his wife was "a sort of rapturous worship."

Remember also that his poems, in delicacy and nobility of phrasing and feeling, as well as the letters of his friends, bear testimony to the fact that throughout his life and