Charles Dickens, whose early career was not without its severe discipline, and who was indisputably one of the greatest literary geniuses of modern times, certainly shortened his life by free living. He was extravagantly fond of the pleasures of the table, and a constant participant in convivial occasions.[155] Undoubtedly his domestic infelicity was largely attributable to a habit of overstimulating, besides which, brandy and continuous literary effort are incompatible with each other. His later works will not compare favorably with his earlier ones. "Our Mutual Friend" was not worthy of his reputation; and the half of "Edwin Drood" which was published was not of a character to make an intelligent reader desire more. At fifty-eight his brain was failing. Both Dickens and Thackeray were really sacrificed to the Moloch of conviviality. The latter was not only a remarkable novelist, but is entitled to distinct fame as a poet. He was a man of noble impulses, and charitable to a fault. He inherited a small fortune, in the expenditure of which he was very lavish, at one time giving the impecunious Dr. Maginn five hundred pounds,--an unfortunate brother author who appealed to Thackeray when he was in a strait; and no needy man was ever refused by the author of "Vanity Fair." There are few objects which if held up against a strong light, will not betray some defect. A perfect emerald was perhaps never seen, and almost as rare is a perfect diamond; the magnifying-glass is pretty sure to detect some flaw in the gem, be it never so small. So the microscope applied to genius is apt to discover those imperfections of humanity from which no mortal is entirely exempt. Washington said it was lamentable that great characters are so seldom without blot.[156] Edgar A. Poe, whose genius has so lately received public recognition, was left an orphan at a tender age, thus lacking the moral influence and training which might have prevented the blight of his after years. His father was a law-student, and his mother an actress named Elizabeth Arnold. Heaven had breathed into his soul the fire of a master-spirit, but at the same time endowed him with a morbid sensitiveness which rendered his imagination weird and gloomy. He became the victim of strong drink, and was thereby marked for an early grave, dying, after an erratic career, in a public hospital. He was an editor, critic, and poet, wielding a most witty but bitterly sarcastic pen. When penniless and in absolute want, he wrote to a friend, with a supreme contempt of the very sinews of war for which he was suffering: "The Romans worshipped their standard, and the Roman standard happened to be an eagle. Our standard is only one tenth of an eagle, one dollar, but we make all even by adoring it with tenfold devotion." Even in boyhood Poe developed a wild, unruly disposition, being expelled from the University of Virginia, and afterwards from the West Point Academy. The writer of these pages knew