The horror short story called The Involuntary Experimentalist by Samuel Ferguson (18180-1886) was a tale of sensation and it drew a parody from Edgar Allan Poe who mentioned it in his How to Write a Blackwood Article. The story was first published in the October 1837 issue of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine and was reprinted many times during the nineteenth century. In it a doctor topples into a cooper kettle in a distillery during a fire. In the kettle he is safe from the fire, but not the heat, so he begins logging its effects while alive. Poe thought this a bit odd and laid out how to write a tale of sensation in his story:
The first thing requisite is to get yourself into such a scrape as no one ever got into before. The oven, for instance, — that was a good hit. But if you have no oven, or big bell, at hand, and if you cannot conveniently tumble out of a balloon, or be swallowed up in an earthquake, or get stuck fast in a chimney, you will have to be contented with simply imagining some similar misadventure. I should prefer, however, that you have the actual fact to bear you out. Nothing so well assists the fancy, as an experimental knowledge of the matter in hand.
Poe nailed it. The Involuntary Experimentalist could have been one of the best horror short stories of 1800-1849 had it not been for the unbelievable note taking that the good doctor does when trapped in a fiery distillery. On the plus side, the writing is good and the story is captivating. Because of this I have picked it as the 25th best horror short story for this period.
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