David Poe was the son of old General Poe, who won his honors in Revolutionary times and was a man of sterling character and many heroic qualities. Miss Arnold belonged to the stage by birth, and from earliest youth had been attached to the theatre in some capacity. It is a most miserable fate for a child, but she knew of nothing better. She came before the public with a naïveté that was touching, and played her little airs on the piano and sung her little songs and uttered her childish sentences always to the very best of her ability, putting up with the late hours and the hasty and often scanty meals and the general discomfort of her lot with the utmost amiability and good-nature. No sheltered home, no days of careless pleasure, no constant and watchful care over health or manners or morals, fell to her lot; but the frowns and sometimes the curses of the older actors, the ill-nature of the manager, and the wearied fretfulness of her mother, who was growing old in the drudgery of her profession,--for she never rose above that at any time. Nor does it appear that Miss Arnold had any particular talent, though she won a moderate share of favor upon the stage; but she was always much esteemed by those who knew her in private. She sung and sometimes danced, as did her husband, who was an actor of inferior merit. There is something very pathetic in the story of the little second-rate actress who was so conscientious and so persevering, and one cannot but hope that she received her due share of the applause which lends such a fascination to the life of the actor that he rarely abandons it for any other career. There is a hint of the hardship of her life in the fact that there are but three short breaks in her dramatic career through all those years,--the times when the three children were born to them. Edgar was born Jan. 19, 1809, and his mother appeared upon the stage again February 10, and played to the end of the season almost incessantly. The family were poor to the verge of destitution at all times, and the little woman had need of a brave heart when the children came crowding into the poor unfurnished nest. One cannot doubt that there was much of pain and worry in the little creature's heart before the birth of Edgar; and no doubt the paint covered the traces of many tears on the faded cheeks, and the smiles which wreathed her face were more artificial than the usual stage smiles during all those weary months. In 1811 she and her husband were playing in Richmond, when her health failed her, and they were brought to great straits for the means of life. The actors gave her a benefit, but the receipts were small, and the following card was inserted in the Richmond papers:-- "TO THE HUMANE: On this night Mrs. Poe, lingering on the bed of disease and surrounded by her children, asks your assistance; _and asks it perhaps, for the last time_."