Chapter VIII: Psychological Studies 390 (4)

63. “Beyond doubt. We removed every carpet, and examined the boards with the microscope.”

64. “And the paper on the walls?”

65. “Yes.”

66. “You looked into the cellars?”

67. “We did.”

[Sidenote: Dupin would not have said this.]

68. “Then,” I said, “you have been making a miscalculation, and the letter is _not_ on the premises, as you suppose.”

[Sidenote: FIRST DEDUCTION REJECTED.]

69. “I fear you are right there,” said the Prefect. “And now, Dupin, what would you advise me to do?”

[Sidenote: THIRD STAGE OF PLOT.]

70 “To make a thorough research of the premises.”

71. “That is absolutely needless,” replied G----. “I am not more sure that I breathe than I am that the letter is not at the Hotel.”

[Sidenote: Preparation for denouement.]

72. “I have no better advice to give you,” said Dupin. “You have, of course, an accurate description of the letter?”

[Sidenote: Attempt to mislead reader.]

[Sidenote: Note the patronizing “good gentleman.”]

73. “Oh, yes.” And here the Prefect, producing a memorandum-book, proceeded to read aloud a minute account of the internal, and especially of the external, appearance of the missing document. Soon after finishing the perusal of this description, he took his departure, more entirely depressed in spirits than I had ever known the good gentleman before.

74. In about a month afterwards he paid us another visit, and found us occupied very nearly as before. He took a pipe and a chair, and entered into some ordinary conversation. At length I said:

75. “Well, but G----, what of the purloined letter? I presume you have at last made up your mind that there is no such thing as overreaching the minister?”

76. “Confound him, say I--yes; I made the reëxamination, however, as Dupin suggested--but it was all labor lost, as I knew it would be.”

77. “How much was the reward offered, did you say?” asked Dupin.

78. “Why, a very great deal--a _very_ liberal reward--I don’t like to say how much precisely; but one thing I _will_ say, that I wouldn’t mind giving my individual check for fifty thousand francs to any one who would obtain me that letter. The fact is, it is becoming of more and more importance every day; and the reward has been lately doubled. If it were trebled, however, I could do no more than I have done.”

79. “Why, yes,” said Dupin drawlingly, between the whiffs of his meerschaum, “I really--think, G----, you have not exerted yourself--to the utmost in this matter. You might--do a little more, I think, eh?”

80. “How?--in what way?”

[Sidenote: FOURTH STAGE OF PLOT.]

[Sidenote: Illustrative anecdote of Dr. John Abernethy, the English surgeon.]

81. “Why [puff, puff], you might [puff, puff] employ counsel in the matter, eh? [puff, puff, puff] Do you remember the story they tell of Abernethy?”

82. “No; hang Abernethy!”

83. “To be sure! hang him and welcome. But once upon a time, a certain rich miser conceived the design of sponging upon this Abernethy for a medical opinion. Getting up, for this purpose, an ordinary conversation in a private company, he insinuated his case to the physician as that of an imaginary individual.”

84. “‘We will suppose,’ said the miser, ‘that his symptoms are such and such; now, doctor, what would _you_ have directed him to take?’”

85. “‘Take!’ said Abernethy, ‘why, take _advice_, to be sure.’”

86. “But,” said the Prefect, a little discomposed, “I am _perfectly_ willing to take advice, and to pay for it. I would _really_ give fifty thousand francs to any one who would aid me in the matter.”

[Sidenote: MINOR CLIMAX.]

87. “In that case,” replied Dupin, opening a drawer, and producing a check-book, “you may as well fill me up a check for the amount mentioned. When you have signed it, I will hand you the letter.”

[Sidenote: Character delineation.]

[Sidenote: CLIMAX.]

[Sidenote: The plot _seems_ to end here, for long reasoning and explanation follow. There is, however, a second climax as Dupin’s story reaches its denouement.]

88. I was astounded. The Prefect appeared absolutely thunderstricken. For some minutes he remained speechless and motionless, looking incredulously at my friend with open mouth, and eyes that seemed starting from their sockets; then, apparently recovering himself in some measure, he seized a pen, and after several pauses and vacant stares, finally filled up and signed a check for fifty thousand francs, and handed it across the table to Dupin. The latter examined it carefully and deposited it in his pocket; then, unlocking an _escritoire_, took thence a letter and gave it to the Prefect. This functionary grasped it in a perfect agony of joy, opened it with a trembling hand, cast a rapid glance at its contents, and then, scrambling and struggling to the door, rushed at length unceremoniously from the room and from the house, without having uttered a syllable since Dupin had requested him to fill up the check.

89. When he had gone, my friend entered into some explanations.

[Sidenote: FIRST STAGE OF DUPIN’S ACCOUNT. This account places Dupin’s methods in artistic contrast with those of the Prefect.]

90. “The Parisian police,” he said, “are exceedingly able in their way. They are persevering, ingenious, cunning, and thoroughly versed in the knowledge which their duties seem chiefly to demand. Thus, when G---- detailed to us his mode of searching the premises at the Hotel D----, I felt entire confidence in his having made a satisfactory investigation--so far as his labors extended.”

91. “So far as his labors extended?” said I.

[Sidenote: Not a precise statement.]

92. “Yes,” said Dupin. “The measures adopted were not only the best of their kind, but carried out to absolute perfection. Had the letter been deposited within the range of their search, these fellows would, beyond a question, have found it.”

93. I merely laughed, but he seemed quite serious in all that he said.

[Sidenote: Illustrative anecdote.]

[Sidenote: Joint inductive-deductive method of reasoning.]

[Sidenote: Inductive reasoning.]

94. “The measures, then,” he continued, “were good in their kind, and well executed; their defect lay in their being inapplicable to the case, and to the man. A certain set of highly ingenious resources are, with the Prefect, a sort of Procrustean bed to which he forcibly adapts his designs. But he perpetually errs by being too deep or too shallow for the matter in hand; and many a schoolboy is a better reasoner than he. I knew one about eight years of age, whose success at guessing in the game of ‘even and odd’ attracted universal admiration. This game is simple, and is played with marbles. One player holds in his hand a number of these toys, and demands of another whether that number is even or odd. If the guess is right, the guesser wins one; if wrong, he loses one. The boy to whom I allude won all the marbles of the school. Of course he had some principle of guessing; and this lay in mere observation and admeasurement of the astuteness of his opponents. For example an arrant simpleton is his opponent, and, holding up his closed hand asks, ‘Are they even or odd?’ Our schoolboy replies, ‘Odd,’ and loses; but upon the second trial he wins, for he then says to himself, ‘The simpleton had them even upon the first trial, and his amount of cunning is just sufficient to make him have them odd upon the second; I will therefore guess odd;’ he guesses odd, and wins. Now, with a simpleton a degree above the first, he would have reasoned thus: ‘This fellow finds that in the first instance I guessed odd, and in the second he will propose to himself, upon the first impulse, a simple variation from even to odd, as did the first simpleton; but then a second thought will suggest that this is too simple a variation, and finally he will decide upon putting it even as before. I will therefore guess even;’ he guesses even, and wins. Now this mode of reasoning in the schoolboy, whom his fellows term ‘lucky’--what, in its last analysis, is it?”

[Sidenote: Reduced to untechnical language.]

95. “It is merely,” I said, “an identification of the reasoner’s intellect with that of his opponent.”

[Sidenote: Compare with Barrie’s statement on p. 217.]

[Sidenote: 1 and 2, French authors and moralists; 3, astute Italian statesman; 4, Italian thinker.]

96. “It is,” said Dupin; “and, upon inquiring of the boy by what means he effected the _thorough_ identification in which his success consisted, I received answer as follows: ‘When I wish to find out how wise, or how stupid, or how good, or how wicked is any one, or what are his thoughts at the moment, I fashion the expression of my face, as accurately as possible, in accordance with the expression of his, and then wait to see what thoughts or sentiments arise in my mind or heart, as if to match or correspond with the expression.’ This response of the schoolboy lies at the bottom of all the spurious profundity which has been attributed to Rochefoucauld, to La Bruyère, to Machiavelli, and to Campanella.”

97. “And the identification,” I said, “of the reasoner’s intellect with that of his opponent’s, depends, if I understand you aright, upon the accuracy with which the opponent’s intellect is admeasured.”

[Sidenote: Analysis.]

[Sidenote: Observe how fond Poe is of long paragraphs.]

[Sidenote: Astute comment.]

[Sidenote: Note the length of this paragraph.]

[Sidenote: A cumbersomely long sentence.]

[Sidenote: _Recherchés_--carefully sought out.]

[Sidenote: Note force of “hidden.”]

[Sidenote: “The undistributed middle” is a form of logical fallacy.]

98. “For its practical value it depends upon this,” replied Dupin, “and the Prefect and his cohort fail so frequently, first, by default of this identification, and secondly, by ill-admeasurement, or rather through non-admeasurement, of the intellect with which they are engaged. They consider only their _own_ ideas of ingenuity; and, in searching for anything hidden, advert only to the modes in which _they_ would have hidden it. They are right in this much--that their own ingenuity is a faithful representative of that of _the mass_; but when the cunning of the individual felon is diverse in character from their own, the felon foils them, of course. This always happens when it is above their own, and very usually when it is below. They have no variation of principle in their investigations; at best, when urged by some unusual emergency, by some extraordinary reward, they extend or exaggerate their old modes of _practice_, without touching their principles. What, for example, in this case of D----, has been done to vary the principle of action? What is all this boring, and probing, and sounding, and scrutinizing with the microscope, and dividing the surface of the building into registered square inches--what is it all but an exaggeration _of the application_ of the one principle or set of principles of search, which are based upon the one set of notions regarding human ingenuity, to which the Prefect, in the long routine of his duty, has been accustomed? Do you not see he has taken it for granted that _all_ men proceed to conceal a letter--not exactly in a gimlet-hole bored in a chair leg--but, at least, in _some_ out of the way hole or corner suggested by the same tenor of thought which would urge a man to secrete a letter in a gimlet-hole bored in a chair leg? And do you not see, also, that such _recherchés_ nooks for concealment are adapted only for ordinary occasions and would be adopted only by ordinary intellects; for, in all cases of concealment, a disposal of the article concealed--a disposal of it in this _recherché_ manner--is, in the very first instance, presumable and presumed; and thus its discovery depends, not at all upon the acumen, but altogether upon the mere care, patience, and determination of the seekers; and where the case is of importance--or, what amounts to the same thing in policial eyes, when the reward is of magnitude--the qualities in question have _never_ been known to fail. You will now understand what I meant in suggesting that, had the purloined letter been hidden anywhere within the limits of the Prefect’s examination--in other words, had the principle of its concealment been comprehended within the principles of the Prefect, its discovery would have been a matter altogether beyond question. This functionary, however, has been thoroughly mystified; and the remote source of his defeat lies in the supposition that the minister is a fool because he has acquired renown as a poet. All fools are poets; this the Prefect _feels_; and he is merely guilty of a _non distributio medii_ in thence inferring that all poets are fools.”

[Sidenote: Note the following series of unusual statements.]

99. “But is this really the poet?” I asked. “There are two brothers, I know; and both have attained reputation in letters. The minister, I believe, has written learnedly on the Differential Calculus. He is a mathematician and no poet.”

100. “You are mistaken; I know him well; he is both. As poet _and_ mathematician he would reason well; as mere mathematician he could not have reasoned at all, and thus would have been at the mercy of the Prefect.”

101. “You surprise me,” I said, “by these opinions, which have been contradicted by the voice of the world. You do not mean to set at naught the well-digested idea of centuries. The mathematical reason has long been regarded as _the_ reason _par excellence_.”

[Sidenote: “It may be said that every public idea, every received convention, is a piece of stupidity, for it has suited the greater number.”--NICOLAS CHAMFORT.]

[Sidenote: This whole section of the story triumphs notwithstanding its undue length of learned discussion and its formal diction. It must be admitted that in these respects the present-day short-story is in advance of Poe. A number of paragraphs here fail to advance the narration _as fiction_.]

102. “‘_Il y a à parier_,’” replied Dupin, quoting from Chamfort, “‘_que toute idée publique, toute convention reçue, est une sottise, car elle a convenu au plus grand nombre_.’ The mathematicians, I grant you, have done their best to promulgate the popular error to which you allude, and which is none the less an error for its promulgation as truth. With an art worthy a better cause, for example, they have insinuated the term ‘analysis’ into application to algebra. The French are the originators of this practical deception; but if a term is of any importance--if words derive any value from applicability--then ‘analysis’ conveys ‘algebra,’ about as much as, in Latin, ‘_ambitus_’ implies ‘ambition,’ ‘_religio_,’ ‘religion,’ or ‘_homines honesti_,’ a set of _honorable_ men.”

103. “You have a quarrel on hand, I see,” said I, “with some of the algebraists of Paris; but proceed.”

[Sidenote: Unusual form. Throughout, note Poe’s unusual choice of words.]

[Sidenote: As a piece of pure reasoning this long treatise is not without its defects, but it does bring out--though too laboriously to please--the point at which Dupin is driving.]

[Sidenote: Jacob Bryant.]

[Sidenote: He speaks figuratively.]

[Sidenote: A striking satire.]

[Sidenote: More satire.]

104. “I dispute the availability, and thus the value of that reason which is cultivated in any especial form other than the abstractly logical. I dispute, in particular, the reason educed by mathematical study. The mathematics are the science of form and quantity; mathematical reasoning is merely logic applied to observation upon form and quantity. The great error lies in supposing that even the truths of what is called _pure_ algebra are abstract or general truths. And this error is so egregious that I am confounded at the universality with which it has been received. Mathematical axioms are _not_ axioms of general truth. What is true of _relation_--of form and quantity--is often grossly false in regard to morals, for example. In this latter science it is very usually _un_true that the aggregated parts are equal to the whole. In chemistry, also, the axiom fails. In the consideration of motive it fails; for two motives, each of a given value, have not, necessarily, a value when united equal to the sum of their values apart. There are numerous other mathematical truths which are only truths within the limits of _relation_. But the mathematician argues, from his _finite truths_, through habit, as if they were of an absolutely general applicability--as the world indeed imagines them to be. Bryant, in his very learned ‘Mythology,’ mentions an analogous source of error, when he says that ‘although the Pagan fables are not believed, yet we forget ourselves continually, and make inferences from them as existing realities.’ With the algebraists, however, who are Pagans themselves, the ‘Pagan fables’ _are_ believed and the inferences are made, not so much through lapse of memory as through an unaccountable addling of the brains. In short, I never yet encountered the mere mathematician who could be trusted out of equal roots, or one who did not clandestinely hold it as a point of his faith that _x_^2 + _px_ was absolutely and unconditionally equal to _q_. Say to one of these gentlemen, by way of experiment, if you please, that you believe occasions may occur where _x_^2 + _px_ is not altogether equal to _q_, and, having made him understand what you mean, get out of his reach as speedily as convenient, for beyond doubt he will endeavor to knock you down.”

[Sidenote: Note the force of “last.”]

[Sidenote: A return from the special argument to the practical.]

[Sidenote: Application of the foregoing principles.]

[Sidenote: A difficult point explained.]

[Sidenote: Note the unusual use of “to,” instead of “at.”]

[Sidenote: Is this probable?]

[Sidenote: Compare ¶95.]

[Sidenote: Key. Compare ¶10.]

105. “I mean to say,” continued Dupin, while I merely laughed at his last observations, “that if the minister had been no more than a mathematician the Prefect would have been under no necessity of giving me this check. I knew him, however, as both mathematician and poet, and my measures were adapted to his capacity with reference to the circumstances by which he was surrounded. I knew him as courtier, too, and as a bold _intriguant_. Such a man, I considered, could not fail to be aware of the ordinary policial modes of action. He could not have failed to anticipate--and events have proved that he did not fail to anticipate--the waylayings to which he was subjected. He must have foreseen, I reflected, the secret investigations of his premises. His frequent absences from home at night, which were hailed by the Prefect as certain aids to his success, I regarded only as ruses, to afford opportunity for thorough search to the police, and thus the sooner to impress them with the conviction to which G----, in fact, did finally arrive--the conviction that the letter was not upon the premises. I felt, also, that the whole train of thought, which I was at some pains in detailing to you just now, concerning the invariable principle of policial action in searches for articles concealed--I felt that this whole train of thought would necessarily pass through the mind of the minister. It would imperatively lead him to despise all the ordinary _nooks_ of concealment. _He_ could not, I reflected, be so weak as not to see that the most intricate and remote recess of his hotel would be as open as his commonest closets to the eyes, to the probes, to the gimlets, and to the microscopes of the Prefect. I saw, in fine, that he would be driven, as a matter of course, to _simplicity_, if not deliberately induced to it as a matter of choice. You will remember, perhaps, how desperately the Prefect laughed when I suggested, upon our first interview, that it was just possible this mystery troubled him so much on account of its being so _very_ self-evident.”

106. “Yes,” said I, “I remember his merriment well. I really thought he would have fallen into convulsions.”

[Sidenote: A return to philosophising.]

[Sidenote: Force of inertia.]

[Sidenote: This inquiry is the heart of the inference.]

107. “The material world,” continued Dupin, “abounds with very strict analogies to the immaterial; and thus some color of truth has been given to the rhetorical dogma, that metaphor, or simile, may be made to strengthen an argument, as well as to embellish a description. The principle of the _vis inertiæ_, for example, seems to be identical in physics and metaphysics. It is not more true in the former, that a large body is with more difficulty set in motion than a smaller one, and that its subsequent momentum is commensurate with this difficulty, than it is, in the latter, that intellects of the vaster capacity, while more forcible, more constant, and more eventful in their movements than those of inferior grade, are yet the less readily moved, and more embarrassed and full of hesitation in the first few steps of their progress. Again: have you ever noticed which of the street signs over the shop doors are the most attractive of attention?”

108. “I have never given the matter a thought,” I said.

[Sidenote: Illustrative example.]

[Sidenote: Note the diction.]

[Sidenote: Compare ¶94 and ¶98.]

[Sidenote: Summary of ”accusation” against the Prefect’s sagacity.]

109. “There is a game of puzzles,” he resumed, “which is played upon a map. One party playing requires another to find a given word--the name of town, river, state, or empire--any word, in short, upon the motley and perplexed surface of the chart. A novice in the game generally seeks to embarrass his opponents by giving them the most minutely lettered names; but the adept selects such words as stretch in large characters from one end of the chart to the other. These, like the over-largely lettered signs and placards of the street, escape observation by dint of being excessively obvious; and here the physical oversight is precisely analogous with the moral inapprehension by which the intellect suffers to pass unnoticed those considerations which are too obtrusively and too palpably self-evident. But this is a point, it appears, somewhat above or beneath the understanding of the Prefect. He never once thought it probable, or possible, that the minister had deposited the letter immediately beneath the nose of the whole world, by way of best preventing any portion of that world from perceiving it.

[Sidenote: Note the alliteration.]

[Sidenote: Climax of Dupin’s inferential reasoning.]

[Sidenote: BEGINNING OF REAL PLOT.]

[Sidenote: INCIDENT OF DUPIN’S STORY.]

[Sidenote: From this point the narration is free from the formalities of expression which mar the central section of the story. These, however, were a characteristic of Poe and his era.]

[Sidenote: Note the use of “now.”]

110. “But the more I reflected upon the daring, dashing, and discriminating ingenuity of D----; upon the fact that the document must always have been _at hand_, if he intended to use it to good purpose; and upon the decisive evidence, obtained by the Prefect, that it was not hidden within the limits of that dignitary’s ordinary search--the more satisfied I became that, to conceal this letter, the minister had resorted to the comprehensive and sagacious expedient of not attempting to conceal it at all.

111. “Full of these ideas, I prepared myself with a pair of green spectacles, and called one fine morning, quite by accident, at the ministerial hotel. I found D---- at home, yawning, lounging, and dawdling, as usual, and pretending to be in the last extremity of _ennui_. He is, perhaps, the most really energetic human being now alive--but that is only when nobody sees him.

112. “To be even with him, I complained of my weak eyes, and lamented the necessity of the spectacles, under cover of which I cautiously and thoroughly surveyed the whole apartment, while seemingly intent only upon the conversation of my host.

113. “I paid especial attention to a large writing-table near which he sat, and upon which lay confusedly some miscellaneous letters and other papers, with one or two musical instruments and a few books. Here, however, after a long and very deliberate scrutiny, I saw nothing to excite particular suspicion.

[Sidenote: Dupin’s reasoning sustained.]

114. “At length my eyes, in going the circuit of the room, fell upon a trumpery filigree card-rack of paste-board, that hung dangling, by a dirty blue ribbon, from a little brass knob just beneath the middle of the mantelpiece. In this rack, which had three or four compartments, were five or six visiting cards and a solitary letter. This last was much soiled and crumpled. It was torn nearly in two, across the middle--as if a design, in the first instance, to tear it entirely up as worthless had been altered, or stayed, in the second. It had a large black seal, bearing the D---- cipher _very_ conspicuously, and was addressed, in a diminutive female hand, to D----, the minister himself. It was thrust carelessly, and even, as it seemed, contemptuously, into one of the uppermost divisions of the rack.

[Sidenote: Throughout, Poe used punctuation more freely than is now the custom.]

[Sidenote: It was the custom in earlier times simply to fold a letter, seal it with a wafer, and address it on the back, which was allowed to remain otherwise blank. This accounts for there being no reference to an envelope, and also for the refolding of the letter.]

115. “No sooner had I glanced at this letter than I concluded it to be that of which I was in search. To be sure, it was, to all appearance, radically different from the one of which the Prefect had read us so minute a description. Here the seal was large and black, with the D---- cipher; there it was small and red, with the ducal arms of the S---- family. Here the address, to the minister, was diminutive and feminine; there, the superscription, to a certain royal personage, was markedly bold and decided; the size alone formed a point of correspondence. But, then, the _radicalness_ of these differences, which was excessive; the dirt, the soiled and torn condition of the paper, so inconsistent with the _true_ methodical habits of D----, and so suggestive of a design to delude the beholder into an idea of the worthlessness of the document; these things, together with the hyper-obtrusive situation of this document, full in the view of every visitor, and thus exactly in accordance with the conclusions to which I had previously arrived; these things, I say, were strongly corroborative of suspicion, in one who came with the intention to suspect.

[Sidenote: Note use of “fold” and its derivatives.]

[Sidenote: A good device.]

116. “I protracted my visit as long as possible, and while I maintained a most animated discussion with the minister, upon a topic which I knew well had never failed to interest and excite him, I kept my attention really riveted upon the letter. In this examination, I committed to memory its external appearance and arrangement in the rack; and also fell, at length, upon a discovery which set at rest whatever trivial doubt I might have entertained. In scrutinizing the edges of the paper, I observed them to be more _chafed_ than seemed necessary. They presented the _broken_ appearance which is manifested when a stiff paper, having been once folded and pressed with a folder, is refolded in a reversed direction, in the same creases or edges which had formed the original fold. This discovery was sufficient. It was clear to me that the letter had been turned, as a glove, inside out, re-directed, and re-sealed. I bade the minister good-morning, and took my departure at once, leaving a gold snuff-box upon the table.

[Sidenote: APPARENT FULL CLIMAX.]

117. “The next morning I called for the snuff-box, when we resumed, quite eagerly, the conversation of the preceding day. While thus engaged, however, a loud report, as if of a pistol, was heard immediately beneath the windows of the hotel, and was succeeded by a series of fearful screams, and the shoutings of a mob. D---- rushed to a casement, threw it open, and looked out. In the meantime, I stepped to the card-rack, took the letter, put it in my pocket, and replaced it by a _facsimile_ (so far as regards externals) which I had carefully prepared at my lodgings--imitating the D---- cipher very readily by means of a seal formed of bread.

[Sidenote: Concluding explanations.]

[Sidenote: Note how the climax of Dupin’s story also serves as the climax of the Prefect’s earlier statement of the problem and his efforts to solve it.]

118. “The disturbance in the street had been occasioned by the frantic behavior of a man with a musket. He had fired it among a crowd of women and children. It proved, however, to have been without ball, and the fellow was suffered to go his way as a lunatic or a drunkard. When he had gone, D---- came from the window, whither I had followed him immediately upon securing the object in view. Soon afterwards I bade him farewell. The pretended lunatic was a man in my own pay.”

119. “But what purpose had you,” I asked, “in replacing the letter by a _facsimile_? Would it not have been better, at the first visit, to have seized it openly and departed?”

[Sidenote: In the interest in Dupin’s reasoning and its results we have lost sight of the real importance of the letter.]

[Sidenote: Is “was” correct?]

[Sidenote: The descent to Avernus (the fabled entrance to the Infernal Regions) is easy.]

[Sidenote: Monster to be shuddered at.]

120. “D----,” replied Dupin, “is a desperate man, and a man of nerve. His hotel, too, is not without attendants devoted to his interest. Had I made the wild attempt you suggest I might never have left the ministerial presence alive. The good people of Paris might have heard of me no more. But I had an object apart from these considerations. You know my political prepossessions. In this matter I act as a partisan of the lady concerned. For eighteen months the minister has had her in his power. She has now him in hers--since, being unaware that the letter is not in his possession, he will proceed with his exactions as if it was. Thus will he inevitably commit himself at once to his political destruction. His downfall, too, will not be more precipitate than awkward. It is all very well to talk about the _facilis descensus Averni_; but in all kinds of climbing, as Catalani said of singing, it is far more easy to get up than to come down. In the present instance I have no sympathy--at least no pity--for him who descends. He is that _monstrum horrendum_, an unprincipled man of genius. I confess, however, that I should like very well to know the precise character of his thoughts, when, being defied by her whom the Prefect terms ‘a certain personage,’ he is reduced to opening the letter which I left for him in the card-rack.”

121. “How? Did you put anything particular in it?”

[Sidenote: REAL CLIMAX.]

122. “Why, it did not seem altogether right to leave the interior blank--that would have been insulting. D----, at Vienna, once did me an evil turn, which I told him, quite good-humoredly, I should remember. So, as I knew he would feel some curiosity in regard to the identity of the person who had outwitted him, I thought it a pity not to give him a clew. He is well acquainted with my MS., and I just copied into the middle of the blank sheet the words:--

‘---- Un dessein si funeste, S’il n’est digne d’Atrée, est digne de
Thyeste.’

[Sidenote: A design so baleful, if not worthy of Atreus, is worthy of Thyestes.]

They are to be found in Crébillon’s ‘Atrée.’”

JACOBS AND HIS WRITINGS

William Wymark Jacobs was born in London, September 8, 1863, the son of William Gage Jacobs. He was educated at private schools, and entered the employ of the Post Office Savings Bank at sixteen. Four years later he secured a regular clerkship there. He began his literary career at the age of twenty-one with a contribution to the _Blackfriars Magazine_, a publication conducted by the clerks at the Post Office, and from that he was led to contributing articles to various London papers, though he retained his Civil Service position until 1899. His remarkable acquaintance with nautical subjects, and characters of the coasting trade and seaport wharves, was acquired during several years spent in Wapping, while his father was wharfinger there, as during that period the younger Jacobs was brought into contact with many seamen and wharf hands, and came to know many of them very well. In 1900 he married Agnes Eleanor Williams. Some of Jacobs’ most popular collections of stories are _Many Cargoes_; _More Cargoes_; _Short Cruises_; _Odd Craft_; _Captains All_; _Light Freights_; and _The Lady of the Barge_. His longer stories include _A Master of Craft_, _Dialstone Lane_; _Salthaven_, and _At Sunwich Port_.

Mr. Jacobs is known mostly by his delightfully quaint and humorous character delineations of river, shore, and sea-faring folk. The remarkable short-story given herewith, however, is of a very different sort and discloses a mastery of the weird, of the supernatural, which is not surpassed in the whole short-story field. With a sureness of character-drawing which is nothing short of amazing in a humorist, he outlines scene and actors, and when the crises are reached--so completely is all visualized--we are able to infer the swift-moving climax with scarce the need of a word. “The Monkey’s Paw” is one of the most dramatically poignant stories of the supernatural ever written, and invites us to a closer study of its gifted and versatile author.

It [a sea-life] is a man’s life. It teaches self-restraint and
discipline and the art of governing men. It is a fine, healthy
life that breeds men. All that I mean to say is that distance
lends enchantment to the view, and that the essential romance and
comedy of the life of those who go down to the sea in ships are
intensified in the perspective of years.--W. W. JACOBS, _London
Daily Chronicle_.

Londoners, in particular, should hail him with applause, for he has
done more than make them laugh; he has added character to their
river. Henceforward no one who has read _Many Cargoes_ will look
at a passing barge with an apathetic gaze. He will see before him
not merely a vehicle of porterage, but a hot-bed of liquorish and
acceptable sarcasm.--_Academy_ (London).

Mr. Jacobs has two great gifts: one is the power to place a
simple-minded man in a corner, excite our sympathies for him,
magnify his embarrassments, and keep us engrossed all the time....
But we do not consider that herein lies Mr. Jacobs’s special
distinction.... It is in his eye for character, his knowledge of a
certain kind of human nature, his genius for the little touches, as
we prefer to call them, that Mr. Jacobs stands out so notably. No
one now writing can manage the little touches as Mr. Jacobs can, at
once so naturally, so truthfully, so usefully, and so joyously....
None of them actually helps the plot, but every one of them is so
much added to the characters and conditions of the story.--IBID.

We cannot think of any other books with which to compare Mr.
Jacobs’s, because there are none just like them. To-day a number
of the best and brightest English and American writers seem to
be getting their inspiration from the sea.... Each one of these
has his own particular field, and in presenting the humour
of the sailor’s life and environment no one approaches Mr.
Jacobs.--BOOKMAN (New York).

We are acquainted with one pronounced pessimist, who maintains
defiantly and aggressively that he never reads anything in the
nature of modern fiction. “Except, of course,” he adds, “the short
stories of W. W. Jacobs, which certainly make me laugh....” We are
inclined to believe that there are a number of men who are of the
same mind in regard to the work of Mr. Jacobs. Yet we do not think
that his most ardent admirer, after having laid aside one of his
books for three days, would be able to give more than the vaguest
description of the tales contained therein. To this rule there are,
however, several exceptions. “The Monkey’s Paw,” as grewsome a
story as has appeared for years, was one.--IBID.

FURTHER REFERENCES FOR READING ON JACOBS

_Sketch of W. W. Jacobs_, _Current Literature_, vol. 26, 117; His _Work_, _Academy_, vol. 52, 496; _Living Age_, vol. 218, 366; _Strand_, vol. 16, 676; _W. W. Jacobs_, _Book News_, vol. 19; _The Little Touches_ (Review of _A Master of Craft_), _Academy_, vol. 59; _A New Humorist_, _Spectator_, vol. 78; _More Cargoes_ (Review), _Public Opinion_, vol. 25; _The Skipper’s Wooing_ (Review), _Saturday Review_, vol. 84.

FOR ANALYSIS

THE MONKEY’S PAW[19]
BY W. W. JACOBS

I

Without, the night was cold and wet, but in the small parlour of Laburnam Villa the blinds were drawn and the fire burned brightly. Father and son were at chess, the former, who possessed ideas about the game involving radical changes, putting his king into such sharp and unnecessary perils that it even provoked comment from the white-haired old lady knitting placidly by the fire.

2. “Hark at the wind,” said Mr. White, who having seen a fatal mistake after it was too late, was amiably desirous of preventing his son from seeing it.

3. “I’m listening,” said the latter, grimly surveying the board as he stretched out his hand. “Check.”

4. “I should hardly think that he’d come to-night,” said his father, with his hand poised over the board.

5. “Mate,” replied the son.

6. “That’s the worst of living so far out,” bawled Mr. White, with sudden and unlooked-for violence; “of all the beastly, slushy, out-of-the-way places to live in, this is the worst. Pathway’s a bog, and the road’s a torrent. I don’t know what people are thinking about. I suppose because only two houses in the road are let, they think it doesn’t matter.”

7. “Never mind, dear,” said his wife, soothingly; “perhaps you’ll win the next one.”

8. Mr. White looked up sharply, just in time to intercept a knowing glance between mother and son. The words died away on his lips, and he hid a guilty grin in his thin grey beard.

9. “There he is,” said Herbert White, as the gate banged to loudly and heavy footsteps came toward the door.

10. The old man rose with hospitable haste, and opening the door, was heard condoling with the new arrival. The new arrival also condoled with himself, so that Mrs. White said, “Tut, tut!” and coughed gently as her husband entered the room, followed by a tall, burly man, beady of eye and rubicund of visage.

11. “Sergeant-Major Morris,” he said, introducing him.

12. The sergeant-major shook hands, and taking the proffered seat by the fire, watched contentedly while his host got out whiskey and tumblers and stood a small copper kettle on the fire.

13. At the third glass his eyes got brighter, and he began to talk, the little family circle regarding with eager interest this visitor from distant parts, as he squared his broad shoulders in the chair and spoke of wild scenes and doughty deeds; of wars and plagues and strange peoples.

14. “Twenty-one years of it,” said Mr. White, nodding at his wife and son. “When he went away he was a slip of a youth in the warehouse. Now look at him.”

15. “He don’t look to have taken much harm,” said Mrs. White, politely.

16. “I’d like to go to India myself,” said the old man, “just to look round a bit, you know.”

17. “Better where you are,” said the sergeant-major, shaking his head. He put down the empty glass, and sighing softly, shook it again.

18. “I should like to see those old temples and fakirs and jugglers,” said the old man. “What was that you started telling me the other day about a monkey’s paw or something, Morris?”

19. “Nothing,” said the soldier, hastily. “Leastways nothing worth hearing.”

20. “Monkey’s paw?” said Mrs. White, curiously.

21. “Well, it’s just a bit of what you might call magic, perhaps,” said the sergeant-major, offhandedly.

22. His three listeners leaned forward eagerly. The visitor absentmindedly put his empty glass to his lips and then set it down again. His host filled it for him.

23. “To look at,” said the sergeant-major, fumbling in his pocket, “it’s just an ordinary little paw, dried to a mummy.”

24. He took something out of his pocket and proffered it. Mrs. White drew back with a grimace, but her son, taking it, examined it curiously.

25. “And what is there special about it?” inquired Mr. White as he took it from his son, and having examined it, placed it upon the table.

26. “It had a spell put on it by an old fakir,” said the sergeant-major, “a very holy man. He wanted to show that fate ruled people’s lives, and that those who interfered with it did so to their sorrow. He put a spell on it so that three separate men could each have three wishes from it.”

27. His manner was so impressive that his hearers were conscious that their light laughter jarred somewhat.

28. “Well, why don’t you have three, sir?” said Herbert White, cleverly.

29. The soldier regarded him in the way that middle age is wont to regard presumptuous youth. “I have,” he said, quietly, and his blotchy face whitened.

30. “And did you really have the three wishes granted?” asked Mrs. White.

31. “I did,” said the sergeant-major, and his glass tapped against his strong teeth.

32. “And has anybody else wished?” persisted the old lady.

33. “The first man had his three wishes. Yes,” was the reply; “I don’t know what the first two were, but the third was for death. That’s how I got the paw.”

34. His tones were so grave that a hush fell upon the group.

35. “If you’ve had your three wishes, it’s no good to you now, then, Morris,” said the old man at last. “What do you keep it for?”

36. The soldier shook his head. “Fancy, I suppose,” he said, slowly. “I did have some idea of selling it, but I don’t think I will. It has caused enough mischief already. Besides, people won’t buy. They think it’s a fairy tale, some of them; and those who do think anything of it want to try it first and pay me afterward.”

37. “If you could have another three wishes,” said the old man, eyeing him keenly, “would you have them?”

38. “I don’t know,” said the other. “I don’t know.”

39. He took the paw, and dangling it between his forefinger and thumb, suddenly threw it upon the fire. White, with a slight cry, stooped down and snatched it off.

40. “Better let it burn,” said the soldier, solemnly.

41. “If you don’t want it, Morris,” said the other, “give it to me.”

42. “I won’t,” said his friend doggedly. “I threw it on the fire. If you keep it, don’t blame me for what happens. Pitch it on the fire again like a sensible man.”

43. The other shook his head and examined his new possession closely. “How do you do it?” he inquired.

44. “Hold it up in your right hand and wish aloud,” said the sergeant-major, “but I warn you of the consequences.”

45. “Sounds like the Arabian Nights,” said Mrs. White, as she rose and began to set the supper. “Don’t you think you might wish for four pairs of hands for me?”

46. Her husband drew the talisman from his pocket, and then all three burst into laughter as the sergeant-major, with a look of alarm on his face, caught him by the arm.

47. “If you must wish,” he said, gruffly, “wish for something sensible.”

48. Mr. White dropped it back in his pocket, and placing chairs, motioned his friend to the table. In the business of supper the talisman was partly forgotten, and afterward the three sat listening in an enthralled fashion to a second installment of the soldier’s adventures in India.

49. “If the tale about the monkey’s paw is not more truthful than those he has been telling us,” said Herbert, as the door closed behind their guest, just in time for him to catch the last train, “we shan’t make much out of it.”

50. “Did you give him anything for it, father?” inquired Mrs. White, regarding her husband closely.

51. “A trifle,” said he, colouring slightly. “He didn’t want it, but I made him take it. And he pressed me again to throw it away.”

52. “Likely,” said Herbert, with pretended horror. “Why, we’re going to be rich, and famous and happy. Wish to be an emperor, father, to begin with; then you can’t be hen-pecked.”

53. He darted round the table, pursued by the maligned Mrs. White armed with an antimacassar.

54. Mr. White took the paw from his pocket and eyed it dubiously. “I don’t know what to wish for, and that’s a fact,” he said, slowly. “It seems to me I’ve got all I want.”

55. “If you only cleared the house, you’d be quite happy, wouldn’t you?” said Herbert, with his hand on his shoulder. “Well, wish for two hundred pounds, then; that’ll just do it.”

56. His father, smiling shamefacedly at his own credulity, held up the talisman, as his son, with a solemn face, somewhat marred by a wink at his mother, sat down at the piano and struck a few impressive chords.

57. “I wish for two hundred pounds,” said the old man distinctly.

58. A fine crash from the piano greeted the words, interrupted by a shuddering cry from the old man. His wife and son ran toward him.

59. “It moved,” he cried, with a glance of disgust at the object as it lay on the floor.

60. “As I wished, it twisted in my hand like a snake.”

61. “Well, I don’t see the money,” said his son as he picked it up and placed it on the table, “and I bet I never shall.”

62. “It must have been your fancy, father,” said his wife, regarding him anxiously.

63. He shook his head. “Never mind, though; there’s no harm, but it gave me a shock all the same.”

64. They sat down by the fire again while the two men finished their pipes. Outside, the wind was higher than ever, and the old man started nervously at the sound of a door banging up-stairs. A silence unusual and depressing settled upon all three, which lasted until the old couple rose to retire for the night.

65. “I expect you’ll find the cash tied up in a big bag in the middle of your bed,” said Herbert, as he bade them good-night, “and something horrible squatting up on top of the wardrobe watching you as you pocket your ill-gotten gains.”

66. He sat alone in the darkness, gazing at the dying fire, and seeing faces in it. The last face was so horrible and so simian that he gazed at it in amazement. It got so vivid that, with a little uneasy laugh, he felt on the table for a glass containing a little water to throw over it. His hand grasped the monkey’s paw, and with a little shiver he wiped his hand on his coat and went up to bed.

II

67. In the brightness of the wintry sun next morning as it streamed over the breakfast table he laughed at his fears. There was an air of prosaic wholesomeness about the room which it had lacked on the previous night, and the dirty, shrivelled little paw was pitched on the sideboard with a carelessness which betokened no great belief in its virtues.

68. “I suppose all old soldiers are the same,” said Mrs. White. “The idea of our listening to such nonsense! How could wishes be granted in these days? And if they could, how could two hundred pounds hurt you, father?”

69. “Might drop on his head from the sky,” said the frivolous Herbert.

70. “Morris said the things happened so naturally,” said his father, “that you might if you so wished attribute it to coincidence.”

71. “Well, don’t break into the money before I come back,” said Herbert as he rose from the table. “I’m afraid it’ll turn you into a mean, avaricious man, and we shall have to disown you.”

72. His mother laughed, and following him to the door, watched him down the road; and returning to the breakfast table, was very happy at the expense of her husband’s credulity. All of which did not prevent her from scurrying to the door at the postman’s knock, nor prevent her from referring somewhat shortly to retired sergeant-majors of bibulous habits when she found that the post brought a tailor’s bill.

73. “Herbert will have some more of his funny remarks, I expect, when he comes home,” she said, as they sat at dinner.

74. “I dare say,” said Mr. White, pouring himself out some beer; “but for all that, the thing moved in my hand; that I’ll swear to.”

75. “You thought it did,” said the old lady soothingly.

76. “I say it did,” replied the other. “There was no thought about it; I had just--What’s the matter?”

77. His wife made no reply. She was watching the mysterious movements of a man outside, who, peering in an undecided fashion at the house, appeared to be trying to make up his mind to enter. In mental connection with the two hundred pounds, she noticed that the stranger was well dressed, and wore a silk hat of glossy newness. Three times he paused at the gate, and then walked on again. The fourth time he stood with his hand upon it, and then with sudden resolution flung it open and walked up the path. Mrs. White at the same moment placed her hands behind her, and hurriedly unfastening the strings of her apron, put that useful article of apparel beneath the cushion of her chair.

78. She brought the stranger, who seemed ill at ease, into the room. He gazed at her furtively, and listened in a preoccupied fashion as the old lady apologized for the appearance of the room, and her husband’s coat, a garment which he usually reserved for the garden. She then waited as patiently as her sex would permit, for him to broach his business, but he was at first strangely silent.

79. “I--was asked to call,” he said at last, and stooped and picked a piece of cotton from his trousers. “I come from Maw and Meggins.”

80. The old lady started. “Is anything the matter?” she asked, breathlessly. “Has anything happened to Herbert? What is it? What is it?”

81. Her husband interposed. “There, there, mother,” he said, hastily. “Sit down, and don’t jump to conclusions. You’ve not brought bad news, I’m sure, sir;” and he eyed the other wistfully.

82. “I’m sorry--” began the visitor.

83. “Is he hurt?” demanded the mother, wildly.

84. The visitor bowed in assent. “Badly hurt,” he said, quietly, “but he is not in any pain.”

85. “Oh, thank God!” said the old woman, clasping her hands. “Thank God for that! Thank--”

86. She broke off suddenly as the sinister meaning of the assurance dawned upon her and she saw the awful confirmation of her fears in the other’s averted face. She caught her breath, and turning to her slower-witted husband, laid her trembling old hand upon his. There was a long silence.

87. “He was caught in the machinery,” said the visitor at length in a low voice.

88. “Caught in the machinery,” repeated Mr. White, in a dazed fashion, “yes.”

89. He sat staring blankly out at the window, and taking his wife’s hand between his own, pressed it as he had been wont to do in their old courting-days nearly forty years before.

90. “He was the only one left to us,” he said, turning gently to the visitor. “It is hard.”

91. The other coughed, and rising, walked slowly to the window. “The firm wished me to convey their sincere sympathy with you in your great loss,” he said, without looking round. “I beg that you will understand I am only their servant and merely obeying orders.”

92. There was no reply; the old woman’s face was white, her eyes staring, and her breath inaudible; on the husband’s face was a look such as his friend the sergeant might have carried into his first action.

93. “I was to say that Maw and Meggins disclaim all responsibility,” continued the other. “They admit no liability at all, but in consideration of your son’s services, they wish to present you with a certain sum as compensation.”

94. Mr. White dropped his wife’s hand, and rising to his feet, gazed with a look of horror at his visitor. His dry lips shaped the words. “How much?”

95. “Two hundred pounds,” was the answer.

96. Unconscious of his wife’s shriek, the old man smiled faintly, put out his hands like a sightless man, and dropped, a senseless heap, to the floor.

III

97. In the huge new cemetery, some two miles distant, the old people buried their dead, and came back to a house steeped in shadow and silence. It was all over so quickly that at first they could hardly realize it, and remained in a state of expectation as though of something else to happen--something else which was to lighten this load, too heavy for old hearts to bear.