until the following February was all the time that Poe spent in the
Allan mansion.

The Allan House, in its palmy days, might appeal irresistibly to the
mind of a poet, attuned to the harmonies of artistic design and
responsive to the beauties of romantic environment. It was a two-story
building with spacious rooms and appointments that suggested the taste
of the cultivated mistress of the stately dwelling. On the second floor
was "Eddie's room," as she lovingly called it, wherein her affectionate
imagination as well as her skill expended themselves lavishly for the
pleasure of the son of her heart.

A few years later, upon his sudden return after a long absence, it was
his impetuous inquiry of the second Mrs. Allan as to the dismantling of
this room that led to his hasty retreat from the house, an incident
upon which his early biographers, led by Dr. Griswold, based the
fiction that Mr. Allan cherished Poe affectionately in his home until
his conduct toward "the young and beautiful wife" forced the expulsion
of the poet from the Allan house. The fact is that Poe saw the second
Mrs. Allan only once, for a moment marked by fiery indignation on his
part, and on hers by a cold resentment from which the unfortunate
visitor fled as from a north wind; the second Mrs. Allan's strong point
being a grim and middle-aged determination, rather than "youth and
beauty." Not that the thirty calendar years of that lady would
necessarily have conducted her across the indefinite boundaries of the
uncertain region known as "middle age," but the second Mrs. Allan was
born middle-aged, and the almanac had nothing to do with it.

It was in the sunshine of youth and the warmth of love and the
fragrance of newly opening flowers of poetry that Edgar Poe lived in