Page:The Raven; with literary and historical commentary.djvu/27

 Rh There was necessarily a misunderstanding in this: assuredly, Poe did derive useful hints from Lady Geraldine's Courtship but not to the extent surmised: he has one line too close a parallel to that just cited to admit of accidental resemblance:—

" And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain,"

together with other points to be noted.

We know by experience how greatly Poe revised, and, how differently from the original drafts, he re-wrote his poems. The Bells, for instance, was originally only an unimportant colourless piece of seventeen lines, and underwent numerous transformations before it reached its present form. It is fairly safe to assume, therefore, that upon the strength of the suggestions given by Pike's Isadore, Poe had devised if, indeed, he had not already written the Raven in its original form when he met with Lady Geraldine's Courtship. Here was something instinct with genius and replete with that Beauty which he worshipped. Do we go beyond probability, in deeming he returned to his unpublished poem, already, there is reason to believe, the rejected of several editors, and, fired by Mrs. Browning's attempt, determined to make his poem one of those "pyramids for immortality" of which he had spoken?

It may be further assumed that by the light of this new pharos he revised and rewrote his poem, as he did so reflecting, amid its original beauties, some stray gleams from his new beacon.

Besides the line already pointed out there are several lesser points of likeness, as between,—

"And she treads the crimson carpet and she breathes the perfumed air,"