[EVERT AUGUSTUS DUYCKINCK], 'An Author in Europe and America', Home Journal, January 1847

The reception of Mr Poe's tales in England is well known. The mystification of M. Valdemar was taken up by a mesmeric journal as a literal verity, and enquiries were sent on here, to be supplied (in case the historian of the event were not accessible) by personal solicitation of the poor victim's neighbours at Harlem, where the scene was laid. 1 A London publisher has got it out, in pamphlet, under the title of 'Mesmerism in Articulo Mortis', 2 and a Scotchman in Stonehaven has recently paid a postage by steamer, in a letter to the author, to test the matter-of-factness of the affair. We can conceive of nothing more impressive in the way of curiosity.3 Miss Barrett, by the way, paid the author a handsome compliment on this story. After admiring the popular credulity, she says 'The certain thing in the tale in question, is the power of the writer, and the faculty he has of making horrible improbabilities seem near and familiar. '4