"Six years ago a wife whom I loved as no man ever loved before, ruptured a blood-vessel in singing. I took leave of her forever, and underwent all the agonies of her death. She recovered partially, and I again hoped. At the end of a year the vessel again broke. I went through precisely the same scene. Then again--again--and even once again at varying intervals. Each time I felt all the agonies of her death, and at each accession of the disorder I loved her more dearly and clung to her life with more desperate pertinacity. But I am constitutionally sensitive,--nervous to an unusual degree. I became insane, with long intervals of possible sanity. During these fits of absolute unconsciousness, I drank--God only knows how often or how much. As a matter of course, my enemies referred the insanity to the drink, rather than the drink to the insanity." Although Poe's word is not always to be taken in regard to his own affairs, this doubtless describes his feelings over Virginia's condition quite truthfully; and whether the drinking was cause or effect we shall probably never really know. During one of the periods of Virginia's improved health Poe took her and went to New York, leaving Mrs. Clemm behind to settle up domestic affairs. In a letter which he wrote to his mother-in-law, we have a glimpse of the kindlier side of the man's nature and of his real affection for this devoted friend, as well as some hints of the straits of poverty to which they had been accustomed, by the fulness of his descriptions of the plenty upon which they had fallen. He is speaking of his boarding-house:--