Page:Edgar Allan Poe - a centenary tribute.pdf/96

 which Poe belonged, but to which Mr. Allan objected; he also belonged to the Junior Morgan Riflemen, in which Poe was a lieutenant. When Lafayette visited Richmond, this company was selected as his body-guard, and Ellis tells how he admired Poe as he kept guard when the old General held his reception in the autumn of 1824. During this time as a boy of fourteen, Poe wrote the imperishable lines To Helen, inspired by Mrs. Jane Stith Stanard, the mother of his most intimate friend.

In 1825, Mr. Allan, who had come into a legacy from his uncle, Mr. Gault, bought a handsome place, its attendant surroundings bringing the life of luxury which has been ascribed to Poe's childhood. Poe, now about sixteen, admired greatly a young girl, Sarah Elmira Royster. Of him she wrote later, "He was a gentleman in every sense of the word. He was one of the most fascinating and refined men I ever knew." Mr. Allan and Mr. Royster objected to the love affair, on the ground of the exceeding youth of both parties, and after Poe left for the University Mr. Royster intercepted his letters, and the young lady at seventeen married Mr. Shelton of Richmond.

On the fourteenth day of February, 1826, Poe matriculated at the University of Virginia, having just passed his seventeenth birthday. Under the new system of elective studies he entered the schools of Ancient and Modern Languages, and remained at the University until the close of the same year. His career was much as that of other students, he played cards, idled, and drank "peach and honey," but though in this year of 1826 students were censured, and so entered on the books of the University, Poe's name only appears when signing the