Show EDGAR ALLAN POE UJnciHug of tlic Actors Mcmoria to tlic Illustrious Poet The unveiling of the memorial to Edgar Ed-gar Allan Poe drew a brilliant throng of society people to the Metropolitan Museum of Art today Men of letters conspicuous citizens and actors and managers man-agers were grouped upon a carpeted plat form while millionaires artlovers and society ladies thronged the floor spaces and broad galleries beneath the vaulted glass dome Gilmores band made tin building sonorous with the echoes of ai overture and Hon Algernon S Sullivan stood up among the actors and men of letters on the platform and told the story of the memorial suggested by Edwin Booth The idea had received the enthusiastic en-thusiastic support of Joseph Jefferson Sig Salvini John McCullough Mary Anderson An-derson and others of renown The unveiling un-veiling was to tipify a judgment of reversal re-versal on the poets worth and a reward of the palm of merit to the brow thai ought originally to have worn it undisputed undis-puted The unveiling was further to be a confession that Poes genius was a blazing blaz-ing torch in literature that had never gone out The presence of the memorial memo-rial here today the speaker added transmutes this building from a mere museum of art into a shrine ior intellectual intel-lectual worship Here and now I consecrate conse-crate this alcove in the name of American literature art drama and poetry as the Poets Corner of America Gloved hands were clapped with enthusiasm husiasm all over the building and then Sdwin Booth stepped forward and made the presentation speech on behalf of the actors He said I believe I speak the sentiment of the dramatic profession when I declare that the American stage is proud and glad to have been the means of paying this tribute to American literature litera-ture Actors recognize in Poe a being of strange endowments who in the magni icence of his conceptions the weirdness of his pictures and the vitality of his die ion has rivaled even the wonderful splendor of Coleridge But they remember remem-ber also with a sentiment of personal ride that he was a man of theatrical I lineage While deploring his faults they exult in his noble intellectual powers and his ever growing renown America may hail him as the most original author The stage will always rejoice in him as one of her children The harmonies of Beethovens Fifth Symphony were sent echoing along the r oof and then the veteran actor John Gilbert stood up with a face wreathed with smiles lie tapped a telegraphic key The actors had voted unanimously unani-mously that he should perform this un I veiling ceremony The instant the key I kicked the folds of a flag in an alcove ell from the golden wire and revealed he allegorical figure of Fame holding a laurel wreath about the face of the poet The face was molded in bronzeand sit in a tablet of marble bearing a commemorative commemor-ative inscription The figure and tablet and bronze are the work of Sculptor Rich and Henry Park General Di Cesnola accepted the memorial on behalf of the museum directorsand the grouped choirs of St Thomas and All Souls churches and a chorus of glee singers sang a new American anthem The oration of Rev William Alger kept the hrong listening interestedly for the next half hour to a Bostonians estimate of the mission and errors of genius as seen in the personality and works of Edgar Allen Poe In the notable audience were W Fearing I Fear-ing Gill Poes biographer Dr John G Moran the physician who was at his death bed Park Godwin John Bigelow Luther R Marsh Cyrus W Field E C Steadman and many other well known iterateurs New York Special |