The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-01-03

entitled THE Story OF a Soldiers Lie,
1 gave a glance at his distinguished re-
cord as a British commander, the highest
in his country, England, when he retired
with recorded honors upon his name"
/ am gratiiied to be able to give extracts
showing his high and most deserved aG
miration of this country's greatest soldier
and most knightly son. 1 mentioned late
ly that he published within few years
that in his opinion Gen. Lee was great
er soldier than the Duke of Wellington,
England's greatest soldier possibly after
the Duke of Marlborough. Lord Wose.
ley had the opportunity of knowing Gen.
Lee personally for in the war with the
North by the South he visited Gen. Lees
Headquarters, and had frequent interviews
with him. 1t is alike gratifying and in
teresting to know mis- opinion and i'm
pressions. He says in his just published
autobiography, mark you, in 1908:
He was the ablest General and, to me.
seemed the greatest man l ever con-
versed with; and yet l have had the
privilege of meeting Won Moltke and
Prince Bismarck, and, at least upon one
occasion, had very long and intensely
ter" Lord Wolseley continues:
"Gen. Lee was one of the few men who
ever seriously impressed and awed me with
their natural, their inherent greatness.
Forty years have come and gone since
our meeting, yet the majesty of his manly
bearing, the genial, winning grace, the
sweetness of his smile, and the impressive
dignity OF his old-fashioned style of ad
~
cherished of my recollections. He
spoke of the future with confidence-it
was just after the battle of Antietam-
although one could clearly see he was
of no very sanguine temperament.
Even when the great and noble Chris
tan captain referred to the bad treat
ment of Southern soldiers and people by
the Yankees, he showed no resentment or
bitterness while deploring the fact He
even showed no resentment when he told
OF the destruction of his own home at
Washington Heights, near Washington,
which he had inherited from Gen. Wash
ington. Lord Wolseley writes:
He had merely gone with his State.
Virginia-the prevailing principle that had
influenced most of the soldiers l spoke
with during my visit to the South. He
was, indeed, a beautiful character, and
of him might truthfully be written, 'In
righteousness he did judge and make
war;
After that it would be most appetizing
to read the autobiography of a soldier.
author and soldier of distinction beyond
seas and of the same race that Gen.
Lees ancestors were-English. Gen Lee
was the man Bishop Phillips Brooks so
truculently and foully branded in
his own Boston pulpit as Traitor"
and years after the death of the great
South'S son.
Mr.. Edgar Poe, the genius OF
all America, was great help
for literary aspirants to follow after him.
Maupassant and others among the French,
and others abroad and at home, were in
debted to him for the artistic and ingen-
ious way of writing short stories. Hun
dreds perhaps have tried their skill al
short story writing who were ignorant
of whence came the needed art and the
invention that enter into that very popu
lar form of entertainment. An English.
writer lately said that it was Poe who
really was the inventor of the genuine
detective story. That may be true. He
further claims that Doyle, the novelist.
modelled his much read Sherlock
Holmes" stories on Poe's two stories
concerning the French detective Dupic.
Very probably. w. l.. Alden wrote re
Gently to the N. Y Saturday Review"
of this change of plagiarism, and says
that the theory that Doyle is indebted
to Poe seems to have struck the fancy
of a number of persons, and it has given
rise to a mild newspaper controversy
upon the subject
If there is no plagiarism there is sug-
gestion and no model of a new kind OF
story Mr.. Alden warmly denies there Is
plagiarism" but is pleased to say that
"of course no noe knows better than Sic
Conan Doyle that Holmes and Dupin bear
q certain resemblance in their methods
OF work, but he could never have been
so dull as not to know that every one
else would recognize the fact"
1 would like to know if 1t were possible
to receive that information sought, II
Sherlock Holmes would have ever beer
written as he appears in the stories in
which he figures, if Poe had never lived?
/ wonder if his best novel. Micah Clark
would have ever seen the light OF day,
ii Walter Scott had never lived? Scores
of popular writer's have been moderately
successful who were indebted to Poe or
Scott. Poe has even made his impression
upon science. His Eureka" is under dis
cussion among men of astronomical pre-
tenton.
Alfred Russell Wallace has made state
ment relative to limitation IF the
stella universe" that you pass by and
through and beyond it if you go upwards
fer a great distance. The editor of the
N. Y. Saturday Review says:
ernest Marriott, the Manchester Ii
brarian, writes to The Fortnightly Re-
view quoting the passage in Eureka" II
which Poe set forth the same theory as
long ago as 1S4S, with some of his reas-
ons. including that given in the follow
ing striking sentence:
Were the succession of stars endless
then the background of the sky would
present US a uniform luminosity like that
displayed by the Galaxy-since there
could be absolutely no point, in all that
background, at which would not exist
star"
Whatever Poe meant to communicate
whatever his story may saver of, it is
certain he was ingenious, and wild in bis
epoo,lofiop Piit Woe ba cor,o,c IN woe