The inevitable rupture soon came, and Poe went to Boston, the city of his physical birth and destined to become the place of his birth into the tempestuous world of authorship.  Forty copies of “Tamerlane and Other Poems” appeared upon the shelf of the printer—­and nowhere else.  It is said that seventy-three years later a single copy was sold for $2,250.  Had this harvest been reaped by the author in those early days, who can estimate the gain to the field of literature?

Boston proving inhospitable to the firstling of her gifted son’s imagination, the Common soon missed the solitary, melancholy figure that had for months haunted the old historic walks.  Edgar A. Poe dropped out of the world, or perhaps out of the delusion of fancying himself in the world, and Edgar A.  “Perry” appeared, an enlisted soldier in the First Artillery at Fort Independence.  For two years “Perry” served his country in the sunlight, and Poe, under night’s starry cover, roamed through skyey aisles in the service of the Muse and explored “Al Araaf,” the abode of those volcanic souls that rush in fatal haste to an earthly heaven, for which they recklessly exchange the heaven of the spirit that might have achieved immortality.

A severe illness resulted in the disclosure of the identity of the young soldier, and a message was sent to Mr. Allan, who effected his discharge and helped secure for him an appointment to West Point.  On his way to the Academy he stopped in Baltimore and arranged for the publication of a new volume, to contain “Al Araaf,” a revised version of “Tamerlane,” and some short poems.

Some months later No. 28 South Barracks, West Point, was the despair of the worthy inspector who spent his days and nights in unsuccessful efforts to keep order among the embryo protectors of his country.  Poe, the leader of the quartette that made life interesting in Number 28, was destined never to evolve into patriotic completion.  He soon reached the limit of the endurance of the officials, that being, in the absence of a pliant guardian, the only method by which a cadet could be freed from the walls of the Academy.

Soon after leaving the military school Poe made a brief visit to Richmond, the final break with Mr. Allan took place, and the poet went to Baltimore.

Number 9 Front Street, Baltimore, is claimed as the birthplace of Poe.  There is a house in Norfolk that is likewise so distinguished.  There are other places, misty with passing generations, similarly known to history.  Poe, though not Homeric in his literary methods, had much the same post-mortem experience as the Father of the Epicists.

At the time of the Poet-wanderer’s return to Baltimore his aunt, Mrs. Clemm, had her humble but neat and comfortable home on Eastern Avenue, then Wilks Street, and here he found the first home he had known since his childhood and, incidentally, his charming child cousin, Virginia, who was to make his home bright with her devotion through the remainder of her brief life.