other, blind admiration would depict him as far "too good for human
nature's daily food." Let us endeavor to judge him impartially, granting
that he was as a mortal subject to the ordinary weaknesses of mortality,
but that he was tempted sorely, treated badly, and suffered deeply.

The poet's ancestry and parentage are chiefly interesting as explaining
some of the complexities of his character. His father, David Poe, was of
Anglo-Irish extraction. Educated for the Bar, he elected to abandon it
for the stage. In one of his tours through the chief towns of the United
States he met and married a young actress, Elizabeth Arnold, member of
an English family distinguished for its musical talents. As an actress,
Elizabeth Poe acquired some reputation, but became even better known for
her domestic virtues. In those days the United States afforded little
scope for dramatic energy, so it is not surprising to find that when her
husband died, after a few years of married life, the young widow had a
vain struggle to maintain herself and three little ones, William Henry,
Edgar, and Rosalie. Before her premature death, in December, 1811, the
poet's mother had been reduced to the dire necessity of living on the
charity of her neighbors.

Edgar, the second child of David and Elizabeth Poe, was born at Boston,
in the United States, on the 19th of January, 1809. Upon his mother's
death at Richmond, Virginia, Edgar was adopted by a wealthy Scotch
merchant, John Allan. Mr. Allan, who had married an American lady and
settled in Virginia, was childless. He therefore took naturally to the
brilliant and beautiful little boy, treated him as his son, and made him
take his own surname. Edgar Allan, as he was now styled, after some
elementary tuition in Richmond, was taken to England by his adopted
parents, and, in 1816, placed at the Manor House School,
Stoke-Newington.