Walt Whitman to Abby H. Price, 13 March 1867

Attorney General's Office, Washington. Wednesday  
 March 13, 1867.1 Dear friends, all,

I have just rec'd the letter of the 10th—I sympathise deeply with those of you that have suffered with pains & illness—but hope, from the wording of what you write, that it is now all over.

Poor Emily—it must have been such agony—that kind of distress2 is about as severe as any thing can be, for human endurance—I hope Emily will try to go over, soon, and make a good call on Mother—

Mother isn't well—she has rheumatism pretty bad—I am sorry to hear that Helen has attacks of sick head-ache—& that you too have been unwell—I do hope you are now both of you well, & may continue so.

There is nothing important or new in my affairs here—I am still in the same Office—find my work mild & agreeable, & the place one remarkably well suited to a lazy, elderly, literary gentleman—

The O'Connors are well as usual—They have to move, the end of this month. Mr. Parker3 wrote me, some time since, & I have written an answer & sent it.

I still go to the Hospitals—always go Sunday afternoons.

We are having a dark, cloudy, rainy time here, just now—not for a novelty—I have good health, & good spirits. I send love to you & Helen & Emmy & all, not forgetting Mr. Arnold—Remember me to Arthur, when you write—God give you health, in body & in spirit—Farewell,

Walt Whitman

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Notes

• 1. This letter's envelope bears the address, "Abby H. Price, | 279 East 55th street, | New York City." It is postmarked, "Washington | Mar | 13 | D.C." [back]
• 2. Someone, probably Helen Price, had written above this word, "(Ear ache)." [back]
• 3. In 1860, Erastus Otis Parker was indicted on seven counts of theft. On October 28, 1866, Whitman wrote a letter to Attorney General Henry Stanbery successfully petitioning for a pardon on the grounds that "the whole theory on which he was convicted was but an inference from an inference" and that Parker had "already served four years in prison." [back]