Yours of April 5th just recd, & very much welcomed2—Some how it is a special comfort—I have not been well as usual for two months but am now better & shall soon be ab't as of late years—I have moved into a little old shanty of my own—(See new address above)—am much more contented—am writing this impromptu at P.O. so you will get it at once. Will write more fully soon—best love—
W WCorrespondent:
Anne Burrows Gilchrist
(1828–1885) was the author of one of the first significant pieces of
criticism on Leaves of Grass, titled "A Woman's Estimate
of Walt Whitman (From Late Letters by an English Lady to W. M. Rossetti)," The Radical 7 (May 1870), 345–59. Gilchrist's long
correspondence with Whitman indicates that she had fallen in love with the poet
after reading his work; when the pair met in 1876 when she moved to
Philadelphia, Whitman never fully returned her affection, although their
friendship deepened after that meeting. For more information on their
relationship, see Marion Walker Alcaro, "Gilchrist, Anne Burrows (1828–1885)," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998).