Rose late this forenoon & very miserable—half a cup of coffee for my breakfast—but found your letter waiting for me—& have been better ever since—somehow does me more good than any2—The illness of last ten days must ab't have a turn for good or bad, & I guess it is going to be the former—
W WCorrespondent:
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).