The picture arrived this morning—it is a splendid piece of work & I feel sure a good likeness—At any rate it is that rare bird a perfect photo—& I am mighty glad to get it—it leans against the wall before me this moment with the Bacon—(I am ashamed to say never before acknowledged—but it is in my little sitting room & before my eyes every day—more than half the time is taken for Shakspere)3—
I am about as well as usual in general health—full as well—but laid by with lameness—added to by a fall two months ago & turning my ankle in. I hear from Dr Bucke and John Burroughs—both well—Doctor busy as a bee—both vehement in hospitable invitations to me which I should be most glad to accept—but I find it best not to stray too far from my own chair & bed4—Mrs Gilchrist has a strong article abt L. of G. &c printed in the "To-day," cheap radical English magazine for June—I shall probably have some soon & will send you one—It is equal to the 1872 piece5—
How are you? Any prospect of decapitation?6 How is Nelly? Give my best love & remembrances to her? I am comfortable here in my shanty. I suppose you get the papers & pieces I send—So long, dear friend—
W. W.Correspondent:
William Douglas O'Connor
(1832–1889) was the author of the grand and grandiloquent Whitman pamphlet
The Good Gray Poet: A Vindication, published in 1866.
For more on Whitman's relationship with O'Connor, see Deshae E. Lott, "O'Connor, William Douglas (1832–1889)," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998).