by Poe · Cluster: Satire of Society · Epigram · Satire
Abstract
A grotesque satire (companion to ‘How to Write a Blackwood Article’) in which Signora Psyche Zenobia is decapitated by a giant clock-hand; parodies sensational magazine fiction through black comedy and the grotesque.
Testo / Text
Parti / Parts
Readability (prose)70.2 Flesch ease7 FK grade9.8 Fog10% complex14.2 words/sent
Connections
Topoi: Tempus Fugit, Memento Mori Archetypes: Fool Motifs: Clock, Time, Death, Eyes and Sight Themes & Concepts: Grotesque, Satire of Society, Terror and Horror, Mortality Forms & Genres: Parody, Satire, Short Story
Testo integrale / Full text
What chance, good lady, hath bereft you thus?—COMUS.
It was a quiet and still afternoon when I strolled forth in the
goodly city of Edina. The confusion and bustle in the streets
were terrible. Men were talking. Women were screaming. Children
were choking. Pigs were whistling. Carts they rattled. Bulls they
bellowed. Cows they lowed. Horses they neighed. Cats they
caterwauled. Dogs they danced. _Danced!_ Could it then be
possible? Danced! Alas, thought I, my dancing days are over! Thus
it is ever. What a host of gloomy recollections will ever and
anon be awakened in the mind of genius and imaginative
contemplation, especially of a genius doomed to the everlasting,
and eternal, and continual, and, as one might say,
the—continued—yes, the continued and continuous, bitter,
harassing, disturbing, and, if I may be allowed the expression,
the very disturbing influence of the serene, and godlike, and
heavenly, and exalted, and elevated, and purifying effect of what
may be rightly termed the most enviable, the most truly
enviable—nay! the most benignly beautiful, the most deliciously
ethereal, and, as it were, the most pretty (if I may use so bold
an expression) thing (pardon me, gentle reader!) in the world—but
I am always led away by my feelings. In such a mind, I repeat,
what a host of recollections are stirred up by a trifle! The dogs
danced! I—I could not! They frisked—I wept. They capered—I sobbed
aloud. Touching circumstances! which cannot fail to bring to the
recollection of the classical reader that exquisite passage in
relation to the fitness of things, which is to be found in the
commencement of the third volume of that admirable and venerable
Chinese novel the Jo-Go-Slow.
In my solitary walk through, the city I had two humble but
faithful companions. Diana, my poodle! sweetest of creatures! She
had a quantity of hair over her one eye, and a blue ribbon tied
fashionably around her neck. Diana was not more than five inches
in height, but her head was somewhat bigger than her body, and
her tail being cut off exceedingly close, gave an air of injured
innocence to the interesting animal which rendered her a favorite
with all.
And Pompey, my negro!—sweet Pompey! how shall I ever forget thee?
I had taken Pompey’s arm. He was three feet in height (I like to
be particular) and about seventy, or perhaps eighty, years of
age. He had bow-legs and was corpulent. His mouth should not be
called small, nor his ears short. His teeth, however, were like
pearl, and his large full eyes were deliciously white. Nature had
endowed him with no neck, and had placed his ankles (as usual
with that race) in the middle of the upper portion of the feet.
He was clad with a striking simplicity. His sole garments were a
stock of nine inches in height, and a nearly-new drab overcoat
which had formerly been in the service of the tall, stately, and
illustrious Dr. Moneypenny. It was a good overcoat. It was well
cut. It was well made. The coat was nearly new. Pompey held it up
out of the dirt with both hands.
There were three persons in our party, and two of them have
already been the subject of remark. There was a third—that person
was myself. I am the Signora Psyche Zenobia. I am not Suky
Snobbs. My appearance is commanding. On the memorable occasion of
which I speak I was habited in a crimson satin dress, with a
sky-blue Arabian mantelet. And the dress had trimmings of green
agraffas, and seven graceful flounces of the orange-colored
auricula. I thus formed the third of the party. There was the
poodle. There was Pompey. There was myself. We were three. Thus
it is said there were originally but three Furies—Melty, Nimmy,
and Hetty—Meditation, Memory, and Fiddling.
Leaning upon the arm of the gallant Pompey, and attended at a
respectable distance by Diana, I proceeded down one of the
populous and very pleasant streets of the now deserted Edina. On
a sudden, there presented itself to view a church—a Gothic
cathedral—vast, venerable, and with a tall steeple, which towered
into the sky. What madness now possessed me? Why did I rush upon
my fate? I was seized with an uncontrollable desire to ascend the
giddy pinnacle, and then survey the immense extent of the city.
The door of the cathedral stood invitingly open. My destiny
prevailed. I entered the ominous archway. Where then was my
guardian angel?—if indeed such angels there be. If! Distressing
monosyllable! what world of mystery, and meaning, and doubt, and
uncertainty is there involved in thy two letters! I entered the
ominous archway! I entered; and, without injury to my
orange-colored auriculas, I passed beneath the portal, and
emerged within the vestibule. Thus it is said the immense river
Alfred passed, unscathed, and unwetted, beneath the sea.
I thought the staircase would never have an end. Round! Yes, they
went round and up, and round and up and round and up, until I
could not help surmising, with the sagacious Pompey, upon whose
supporting arm I leaned in all the confidence of early
affection—I could not help surmising that the upper end of the
continuous spiral ladder had been accidentally, or perhaps
designedly, removed. I paused for breath; and, in the meantime,
an accident occurred of too momentous a nature in a moral, and
also in a metaphysical point of view, to be passed over without
notice. It appeared to me—indeed I was quite confident of the
fact—I could not be mistaken—no! I had, for some moments,
carefully and anxiously observed the motions of my Diana—I say
that I could not be mistaken—Diana smelt a rat! At once I called
Pompey’s attention to the subject, and he—he agreed with me.
There was then no longer any reasonable room for doubt. The rat
had been smelled—and by Diana. Heavens! shall I ever forget the
intense excitement of the moment? Alas! what is the boasted
intellect of man? The rat!—it was there—that is to say, it was
somewhere. Diana smelled the rat. I—I could not! Thus it is said
the Prussian Isis has, for some persons, a sweet and very
powerful perfume, while to others it is perfectly scentless.
The staircase had been surmounted, and there were now only three
or four more upward steps intervening between us and the summit.
We still ascended, and now only one step remained. One step! One
little, little step! Upon one such little step in the great
staircase of human life how vast a sum of human happiness or
misery depends! I thought of myself, then of Pompey, and then of
the mysterious and inexplicable destiny which surrounded us. I
thought of Pompey!—alas, I thought of love! I thought of my many
false steps which have been taken, and may be taken again. I
resolved to be more cautious, more reserved. I abandoned the arm
of Pompey, and, without his assistance, surmounted the one
remaining step, and gained the chamber of the belfry. I was
followed immediately afterward by my poodle. Pompey alone
remained behind. I stood at the head of the staircase, and
encouraged him to ascend. He stretched forth to me his hand, and
unfortunately in so doing was forced to abandon his firm hold
upon the overcoat. Will the gods never cease their persecution?
The overcoat is dropped, and, with one of his feet, Pompey
stepped upon the long and trailing skirt of the overcoat. He
stumbled and fell—this consequence was inevitable. He fell
forward, and, with his accursed head, striking me full in the—in
the breast, precipitated me headlong, together with himself, upon
the hard, filthy, and detestable floor of the belfry. But my
revenge was sure, sudden, and complete. Seizing him furiously by
the wool with both hands, I tore out a vast quantity of black,
and crisp, and curling material, and tossed it from me with every
manifestation of disdain. It fell among the ropes of the belfry
and remained. Pompey arose, and said no word. But he regarded me
piteously with his large eyes and—sighed. Ye Gods—that sigh! It
sunk into my heart. And the hair—the wool! Could I have reached
that wool I would have bathed it with my tears, in testimony of
regret. But alas! it was now far beyond my grasp. As it dangled
among the cordage of the bell, I fancied it alive. I fancied that
it stood on end with indignation. Thus the happy-dandy Flos Aeris
of Java bears, it is said, a beautiful flower, which will live
when pulled up by the roots. The natives suspend it by a cord
from the ceiling and enjoy its fragrance for years.
Our quarrel was now made up, and we looked about the room for an
aperture through which to survey the city of Edina. Windows there
were none. The sole light admitted into the gloomy chamber
proceeded from a square opening, about a foot in diameter, at a
height of about seven feet from the floor. Yet what will the
energy of true genius not effect? I resolved to clamber up to
this hole. A vast quantity of wheels, pinions, and other
cabalistic-looking machinery stood opposite the hole, close to
it; and through the hole there passed an iron rod from the
machinery. Between the wheels and the wall where the hole lay
there was barely room for my body—yet I was desperate, and
determined to persevere. I called Pompey to my side.
“You perceive that aperture, Pompey. I wish to look through it.
You will stand here just beneath the hole—so. Now, hold out one
of your hands, Pompey, and let me step upon it—thus. Now, the
other hand, Pompey, and with its aid I will get upon your
shoulders.”
He did every thing I wished, and I found, upon getting up, that I
could easily pass my head and neck through the aperture. The
prospect was sublime. Nothing could be more magnificent. I merely
paused a moment to bid Diana behave herself, and assure Pompey
that I would be considerate and bear as lightly as possible upon
his shoulders. I told him I would be tender of his feelings—ossi
tender que beefsteak. Having done this justice to my faithful
friend, I gave myself up with great zest and enthusiasm to the
enjoyment of the scene which so obligingly spread itself out
before my eyes.
Upon this subject, however, I shall forbear to dilate. I will not
describe the city of Edinburgh. Every one has been to the city of
Edinburgh. Every one has been to Edinburgh—the classic Edina. I
will confine myself to the momentous details of my own lamentable
adventure. Having, in some measure, satisfied my curiosity in
regard to the extent, situation, and general appearance of the
city, I had leisure to survey the church in which I was, and the
delicate architecture of the steeple. I observed that the
aperture through which I had thrust my head was an opening in the
dial-plate of a gigantic clock, and must have appeared, from the
street, as a large key-hole, such as we see in the face of the
French watches. No doubt the true object was to admit the arm of
an attendant, to adjust, when necessary, the hands of the clock
from within. I observed also, with surprise, the immense size of
these hands, the longest of which could not have been less than
ten feet in length, and, where broadest, eight or nine inches in
breadth. They were of solid steel apparently, and their edges
appeared to be sharp. Having noticed these particulars, and some
others, I again turned my eyes upon the glorious prospect below,
and soon became absorbed in contemplation.
From this, after some minutes, I was aroused by the voice of
Pompey, who declared that he could stand it no longer, and
requested that I would be so kind as to come down. This was
unreasonable, and I told him so in a speech of some length. He
replied, but with an evident misunderstanding of my ideas upon
the subject. I accordingly grew angry, and told him in plain
words, that he was a fool, that he had committed an ignoramus
e-clench-eye, that his notions were mere insommary Bovis, and his
words little better than an ennemywerrybor’em. With this he
appeared satisfied, and I resumed my contemplations.
It might have been half an hour after this altercation when, as I
was deeply absorbed in the heavenly scenery beneath me, I was
startled by something very cold which pressed with a gentle
pressure on the back of my neck. It is needless to say that I
felt inexpressibly alarmed. I knew that Pompey was beneath my
feet, and that Diana was sitting, according to my explicit
directions, upon her hind legs, in the farthest corner of the
room. What could it be? Alas! I but too soon discovered. Turning
my head gently to one side, I perceived, to my extreme horror,
that the huge, glittering, scimetar-like minute-hand of the clock
had, in the course of its hourly revolution, descended upon my
neck. There was, I knew, not a second to be lost. I pulled back
at once—but it was too late. There was no chance of forcing my
head through the mouth of that terrible trap in which it was so
fairly caught, and which grew narrower and narrower with a
rapidity too horrible to be conceived. The agony of that moment
is not to be imagined. I threw up my hands and endeavored, with
all my strength, to force upward the ponderous iron bar. I might
as well have tried to lift the cathedral itself. Down, down, down
it came, closer and yet closer. I screamed to Pompey for aid; but
he said that I had hurt his feelings by calling him “an ignorant
old squint-eye.” I yelled to Diana; but she only said
“bow-wow-wow,” and that I had told her “on no account to stir
from the corner.” Thus I had no relief to expect from my
associates.
Meantime the ponderous and terrific Scythe of Time (for I now
discovered the literal import of that classical phrase) had not
stopped, nor was it likely to stop, in its career. Down and still
down, it came. It had already buried its sharp edge a full inch
in my flesh, and my sensations grew indistinct and confused. At
one time I fancied myself in Philadelphia with the stately Dr.
Moneypenny, at another in the back parlor of Mr. Blackwood
receiving his invaluable instructions. And then again the sweet
recollection of better and earlier times came over me, and I
thought of that happy period when the world was not all a desert,
and Pompey not altogether cruel.
The ticking of the machinery amused me. Amused me, I say, for my
sensations now bordered upon perfect happiness, and the most
trifling circumstances afforded me pleasure. The eternal
click-clak, click-clak, click-clak of the clock was the most
melodious of music in my ears, and occasionally even put me in
mind of the graceful sermonic harangues of Dr. Ollapod. Then
there were the great figures upon the dial-plate—how intelligent
how intellectual, they all looked! And presently they took to
dancing the Mazurka, and I think it was the figure V. who
performed the most to my satisfaction. She was evidently a lady
of breeding. None of your swaggerers, and nothing at all
indelicate in her motions. She did the pirouette to
admiration—whirling round upon her apex. I made an endeavor to
hand her a chair, for I saw that she appeared fatigued with her
exertions—and it was not until then that I fully perceived my
lamentable situation. Lamentable indeed! The bar had buried
itself two inches in my neck. I was aroused to a sense of
exquisite pain. I prayed for death, and, in the agony of the
moment, could not help repeating those exquisite verses of the
poet Miguel De Cervantes:
Vanny Buren, tan escondida
Query no te senty venny
Pork and pleasure, delly morry
Nommy, torny, darry, widdy!
But now a new horror presented itself, and one indeed sufficient
to startle the strongest nerves. My eyes, from the cruel pressure
of the machine, were absolutely starting from their sockets.
While I was thinking how I should possibly manage without them,
one actually tumbled out of my head, and, rolling down the steep
side of the steeple, lodged in the rain gutter which ran along
the eaves of the main building. The loss of the eye was not so
much as the insolent air of independence and contempt with which
it regarded me after it was out. There it lay in the gutter just
under my nose, and the airs it gave itself would have been
ridiculous had they not been disgusting. Such a winking and
blinking were never before seen. This behavior on the part of my
eye in the gutter was not only irritating on account of its
manifest insolence and shameful ingratitude, but was also
exceedingly inconvenient on account of the sympathy which always
exists between two eyes of the same head, however far apart. I
was forced, in a manner, to wink and to blink, whether I would or
not, in exact concert with the scoundrelly thing that lay just
under my nose. I was presently relieved, however, by the dropping
out of the other eye. In falling it took the same direction
(possibly a concerted plot) as its fellow. Both rolled out of the
gutter together, and in truth I was very glad to get rid of them.
The bar was now four inches and a half deep in my neck, and there
was only a little bit of skin to cut through. My sensations were
those of entire happiness, for I felt that in a few minutes, at
farthest, I should be relieved from my disagreeable situation.
And in this expectation I was not at all deceived. At twenty-five
minutes past five in the afternoon, precisely, the huge
minute-hand had proceeded sufficiently far on its terrible
revolution to sever the small remainder of my neck. I was not
sorry to see the head which had occasioned me so much
embarrassment at length make a final separation from my body. It
first rolled down the side of the steeple, then lodge, for a few
seconds, in the gutter, and then made its way, with a plunge,
into the middle of the street.
I will candidly confess that my feelings were now of the most
singular—nay, of the most mysterious, the most perplexing and
incomprehensible character. My senses were here and there at one
and the same moment. With my head I imagined, at one time, that
I, the head, was the real Signora Psyche Zenobia—at another I
felt convinced that myself, the body, was the proper identity. To
clear my ideas on this topic I felt in my pocket for my
snuff-box, but, upon getting it, and endeavoring to apply a pinch
of its grateful contents in the ordinary manner, I became
immediately aware of my peculiar deficiency, and threw the box at
once down to my head. It took a pinch with great satisfaction,
and smiled me an acknowledgement in return. Shortly afterward it
made me a speech, which I could hear but indistinctly without
ears. I gathered enough, however, to know that it was astonished
at my wishing to remain alive under such circumstances. In the
concluding sentences it quoted the noble words of Ariosto—
Il pover hommy che non sera corty
And have a combat tenty erry morty;
thus comparing me to the hero who, in the heat of the combat, not
perceiving that he was dead, continued to contest the battle with
inextinguishable valor. There was nothing now to prevent my
getting down from my elevation, and I did so. What it was that
Pompey saw so very peculiar in my appearance I have never yet
been able to find out. The fellow opened his mouth from ear to
ear, and shut his two eyes as if he were endeavoring to crack
nuts between the lids. Finally, throwing off his overcoat, he
made one spring for the staircase and disappeared. I hurled after
the scoundrel these vehement words of Demosthenes—
Andrew O’Phlegethon, you really make haste to fly,
and then turned to the darling of my heart, to the one-eyed! the
shaggy-haired Diana. Alas! what a horrible vision affronted my
eyes? Was that a rat I saw skulking into his hole? Are these the
picked bones of the little angel who has been cruelly devoured by
the monster? Ye gods! and what do I behold—is that the departed
spirit, the shade, the ghost, of my beloved puppy, which I
perceive sitting with a grace so melancholy, in the corner?
Hearken! for she speaks, and, heavens! it is in the German of
Schiller—
“Unt stubby duk, so stubby dun
Duk she! duk she!”
Alas! and are not her words too true?
“And if I died, at least I died
For thee—for thee.”
Sweet creature! she too has sacrificed herself in my behalf.
Dogless, niggerless, headless, what now remains for the unhappy
Signora Psyche Zenobia? Alas—nothing! I have done.