Your good letter came all right—it is pretty much "the same subject continued"—with my health & feelings—very grave depressions, alternated with more favorable spells—
To-day, as I write, I am in good spirits & comparatively comfortable—after a painful attack last night—So it goes—What will be the finale remains to be seen.
I await your further letters with some curiosity—(for strange as it may seem, men have that weakness as well as your sect)—I have to-day dispatched dear Mrs. Johnson's picture by mail—(It is intended to be put in a square gray or white mat with oval top, & then in a plain black walnut rustic square frame, with thin strip of gilt inside, & good plate glass)—I shall look for Charles Eldridge—
My sister is spending a few weeks at Atlantic City—I am here, (declining several invitations) muchly but pleasantly, alone—We have a fine old Irish woman, (an old maid, not so very old either) who cooks nicely & runs the domestic machinery, for brothers George & Eddy, & self—She little knows how much good she does me with her great splendid coarse face & stout figure & warm-blooded & quaint & simple & affectionate ways—
Write soon, Nelly dear— Walt.This letter is endorsed, "Ans'd." Its envelope bears the address, "Mrs. E. M. O'Connor, | 1015 O street, near 11th N. W. | Washington | D.C." It is postmarked: "Camden | Aug | 5 | N. (?) ; Carrier | 6 | Aug | 8 AM."
The year is corroborated by the allusion to Nancy Johnson in the third paragraph; see Whitman's June 10, 1874 letter to Ellen O'Connor.
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