happened, .
just now, to be remembered"(80). .
Poe expresses his early attachment to the cat and dramatizes the character changes he .
experiences when he writes "our friendship lasted, in this manner, for several years,.
during which .
my general temperament and character-through instrumentality of the Fiend.
Intemperance-had (I .
blush to confess it) experienced a radical alteration for the worse"(81). He warns the.
reader of .
new events in a cynical tone and implies the beginning of the madness he denies. Poe first.
illustrates this madness when he uses imagery to describe the brutal scene with the cat.
when he .
writes "I took from my waistcoat-pocket a pen knife, opened it, grasped the poor beast by.
the .
throat, and deliberately cut one of its eyes from the socket!" .
The author describes his emotional and physical state of being during the unthinkable act .
as "I blush, I burn, I shudder, while I pen the damnable atrocity"(81). He describes the.
morning .
aftereffect of his actions when he states "when reason returned with the morning-when I.
had slept .
off the fumes of the night's debauch-I experienced a sentiment half of horror, half of.
remorse, for .
the crime of which I had been guilty; but it was, at best, a feeble and equivocable feeling,.
and the .
soul remained untouched"(81). Now Poe implies to the readers that he has truly crossed.
over into .
madness by brutally attacking the animal and feeling little or no remorse. .
Next Poe dramatizes his change in character even further when he writes "and then came,.
