With Walt Whitman in Camden vol. 4 (1953)

     

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

INTRODUCTION

     The conversations recorded in this volume took place sixty-five years ago, yet they have an immediate interest and value, both for the general reader and the literary scholar. In 1906, when Horace Traubel published the first volume of these discourses, With Walt Whitman in Camden , only a few enthusiasts and far-sighted librarians recognized its value, and preserved it for readers of future generations. It now seems impossible that a book reporting Whitman warmly and truly should have experienced neglect even later, in 1914, when the third volume was published. When Horace Traubel died in 1919, he had been unable to secure a publisher for his fourth volume, and it appears here for the first time.

     With the passing years, there has been a mounting recognition of Whitman. Today he towers among the unquestioned great interpreters of America. A new generation of poets found that he had been their pioneer, enlarging their horizons, and giving a new freedom to their craft. Readers in many lands, during these troubled decades, have taken comfort from Whitman's faith in democracy, his serene individualism, his vision of "inseparable cities with their arms about each other's necks" in a universe whose "kelson" is love. The postponed approval of Whitman caused scholars and critics, somewhat belatedly, to discover the values in Traubel's volumes, so that today they are widely sought by literary specialists and libraries. Except for the writings of the poet himself, there has been no source so clearly indispensable as the three volumes of With Walt Whitman in Camden . Every good biographer and critic of Whitman has used this work as a source, and many serious readers have enjoyed it.

     Each of Traubel's volumes may stand alone, the present no less than the three that preceded it. You may open it anywhere and begin reading, for this work needs no such logical or chronological sequence as is customary in a work of formal interpretation or biographical narrative. Its logic is the delightful and limber illogic

     All this Traubel transferred quickly to his notes, almost with the fidelity of a modern wire recorder. Like a good reporter he made no effort to "improve" Whitman; he impartially recorded both the old invalid, peevish with constipation, and the lofty thinker; both the angry partisan and the magnanimous forgiver of trespasses; he reproduced the trite, the common, even the vulgar remark as cheerfully as the sublime idea. Without the reporter's formal training, Traubel apparently had the reporter's instinct, and the eyes and ears of a television camera. The present writer is indebted to Mrs. Traubel for the following account of her husband's method of work: "The notes of the visits to Whitman were written on small bits of paper to fit into the pocket of his jacket, and were written in what he called 'condensed longhand,' in the dim light of Whitman's room. Within the hour of the words spoken, the material was put into the complete form with which you are familiar in the three published volumes. There was no vacuum of time or emotion, thus preserving the vitality of the original conversation." The idea, one gathers, was to transcribe not only the words, but the very inflection of the poet's voice. The young scribe often read it back to his future bride to check the sound of it.

     Does Whitman know that young Traubel, making notes as they talk, will soon be back in his room, transcribing his "story", as it were, before the midnight deadline? In any case, the old poet knows, by journalistic experience, that eventually it will serve a good purpose. John Burroughs and Dr. Bucke have already published their accounts, authorized and supervised, in part, by the poet himself, but Whitman seems here to be making an effort not to define the book that Traubel might write, not indeed to imply that he is obligated to write any book at all. Yet the two continue endlessly to recall the moments of life, homely or lofty, dark or luminous, that

     Horace Logo Traubel (1858-1919) was well suited for the mission which came to him unsought. Mrs. Traubel believes that her husband had no particular plan to write a book on Whitman when he began to record his conversations. He had known Whitman from his boyhood; he found the poet an exhaustless source of interest and life, and responded naturally to the impulse to set down his conversation. The rest followed as a matter of course. Actually, Traubel had known Whitman for fifteen years or more before the first recorded conversations. In 1873, when Traubel was a boy of fifteen, and Whitman fifty-four, the poet, stricken with paralysis, secured a deputy for his small clerkship in Washington and took lodging with his brother, George, in Camden, New Jersey. The Traubels lived nearby, and were already acquainted with the Whitmans. A couple of years earlier, they had heard that Whitman's mother, on a visit with his brother George, had been stricken with illness, and like good neighbors of an earlier time, they had gone to see her. From that time young Traubel was a familiar at the Whitmans'. The father, Maurice Henry Traubel, a German by birth, came at twenty-one to Philadelphia from Frankfurt-am-Main, where he had received a liberal education in the arts. A lithographer by occupation, he provided for his son the environment of books, music, and ideas. In time, Whitman's young admirer became the mature friend.

     During the earlier years of their association the poet wrote his last great poems, although he recovered somewhat from the paralysis that at first threatened his life. He prepared the Centennial Edition of his works for the celebration of 1876. Still later, he brought Leaves of Grass into its final organization for the edition of 1881, suppressed in Boston and transferred to a publisher in Philadelphia,

     In these later publications, Traubel became truly the poet's literary adviser and critic, as well as his agent with the publisher, the printers, and the bookbinders; for Whitman, to the end, arranged for the printing and binding of his books, for which McKay was sales agent. These events, as contemporary with the present conversations, are vividly portrayed in their daily occurrence, in this scrupulous account of Traubel's regular visits to Whitman in 1888 and 1889. References to present visitors jostle with the memories of old friends. In this house, during the years to come, Horace Traubel was to assist the poet with his very last books, Good-Bye My Fancy (1891), and the last Leaves of Grass (1892), dubbed the "deathbed edition" because Traubel brought one of the first copies, in its brown paper cover, to the dying poet's bedside.

     To the little house in Camden came many literary admirers—American and foreign visitors, great and small—while correspondence poured in from every quarter. Through the years, Traubel became one of the band of somewhat older men—the "Whitman circle"—who came and went continuously in thought and often in person: such as Burroughs, from his farm in New York; or Dr. Bucke from Canada, where he was Superintendent of a mental hospital; or William Douglas O'Connor (superintendent, in Washington, of the United States Life Saving Service), the author, in 1866, of The Good Gray Poet ; and William Sloane Kennedy, man of letters, who, like all these others, wrote authoritative books about Whitman. In addition, there were the Philadelphia friends—Harned, the Smiths, Harrison

     The body with its ills will intrude, of course, from time to time. Whitman is immensely human, an old man beset by infirmities, sometimes goaded by Traubel's sharp questions into momentary vehemence, even anger; but quickly subsiding into a sense of humor much richer than that revealed in his writings. The afflictions of his body, like the foibles of friends, are inevitable conditions of life, both alike to be accepted with a grim amusement that makes the best of all things. He can laugh at the impending frustration that Bucke is predictably destined to experience with his money-making invention, while loving the man dearly; he can recall the tempestuous earlier associations with the Irish O'Connor while being daily concerned by ominous reports of his present illness; he can reflect upon the growing eccentricities of John Burroughs, yet cherish undiminished the tenderness of an undying comradeship. It may after all prove that Traubel, in setting down the facts so faithfully for scholarship, has also accomplished the more difficult literary creation by which the living reality of a man is preserved for posterity.

Sculley Bradley

University of Pennsylvania
November 12, 1952

TO READERS

     My story is left as it was originally written. I have made no attempt to improve it. I have taken nothing off and put nothing on. I know that it has defects. I am not ashamed of defects. I know that it has virtues. I am not proud of virtues. Here is the record as it virginally came from my hands in the quick of the struggle it describes. It might have been made more literary. It might have been made more precise. Its loose joints might have been tightened. Some commas might have been put where colons are. Phrases might have been swung about. The formal grace of the recital might have been improved. I have preferred to respect its integrity. To let it remain untouched by a censorship. To let it continue, for good or bad, in its then native atmosphere. I do not want to reshape those years. I want them left as they were. I keep them forever contemporary. I trust in the spontaneity of their first inspirations.

     Did Whitman know I was keeping such a record? No. Yet he knew I would write of our experiences together. Every now and then he charged me with immortal commissions. He would say: "I want you to speak for me when I am dead." On several occasions I read him my reports. They were very satisfactory. "You do the thing just as I should wish it to be done." He always imposed it upon me to tell the truth about him. The worst truth no less than the best truth. He did not ask to have his failings paraded but he did ask that they should not be hid. He knew that imperfection is a part of perfection. He knew that our blood runs black as well as red. He did not like evil talked about as if it was fatal. But he knew that a place must be provided for it in any portrait of a person or in any portrayal of an event. So I have let Whitman alone. I have let him remain the chief figure in his own story. This book is more his book than my book. It talks his words. It reflects his manner. It is the utterance of his faith. That is why I have not fooled with its text. Why I have chosen to leave it in its unpremeditated arrangement of light and shade. Why I have not attempted to make it conform to any arbitrary

     A number of the collateral documents quoted are from Whitman himself. These are printed without repair. They are kept to his own text without elision and without change. The same thing may be said of the letters from others to Whitman. Nothing has been done to sophisticate the text. It occurs here in the rude dress natural to the incidents that produced it. I had no time then to polish. I have had no disposition since to do what I had no time to do then. The record begs no questions. Never makes worse of better or better of worse. Tries to explain away no sin. Tries to lug in no virtue. Whitman was not afraid of the man who would make too little of him. He was afraid of the man who would make too much of him. He knew that it was easier to survive some kinds of enemies than to survive some kinds of friends. Whitman did not insist upon his faults. But he wanted them all counted in. The last fault with the first fault. He would rather have been thought too little of than too much of. I have never lost sight of his command of commands: "Whatever you do do not prettify me."

HORACE TRAUBEL

Camden, February, 1906

EDITORIAL NOTE

     Three previous volumes of these conversations were published by Horace Traubel:
With Walt Whitman in Camden
Vol. I: Conversations, March 28 to July 14, 1888 (Boston: Small, Maynard and Company, 1906)
Vol. II: Conversations, July 16 to October 31, 1888 (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1908)
Vol. III: Conversations, November 1, 1888, to January 20, 1889 (New York: Mitchell Kennerley, 1914)

     At the time of his death in 1919, Horace Traubel had transcribed and arranged the material for a fourth volume, represented in the present text. This was a typescript, which Traubel corrected in ink. Although the manuscript was then considered by a publisher who declined the venture, there is no final indication as to whether Traubel regarded it as fully ready for the printer.

     Therefore, certain editorial decisions had to be made in the present edition. We have here reproduced Horace Traubel's typescript unaltered, except for the silent correction of obvious errors or inconsistencies. Wherever error is suspected but not obvious the text has been allowed to stand, followed by [ sic ]. The copied of documents and letters quoted in the text bear Traubel's corrections, attesting to his scrupulous attention to accuracy. The present editor has not altered any document or letter for any reason. Letters of foreign correspondents, sometimes in crabbed idiom, have of course been left as Traubel reproduced them. "I'll not doctor," he wrote, "Schmidt's English."

     In the previous volumes Traubel established certain practices and conventions which he also followed in the present typescript. These we have retained, except for the placing of quotation marks, where for clarity we have followed modern practice in placing commas and periods inside quotes. In the taste of the day, Traubel

     The editor expresses his deep gratitude to Mrs. Anne Montgomerie Traubel for her constant faith that her husband's record would finally be published in its entirety; for her agency in preserving the manuscript and valuable illustrative materials; and for conversations, through the years, which furnished a first-hand insight into Whitman's Camden period, beyond the scope of the printed records. Gertrude Traubel has also proved a patient and most valuable friend and adviser. I am grateful also to my friend, Charles E. Feinberg of Detroit, whose faith in the value of this publication, and whose practical generosity, provided the conditions necessary to bring this book to press. Mr. Feinberg also enthusiastically put at the editor's disposal a number of illustrative items from his own Whitman collection, and made his time and his special knowledge available for the consideration of a number of problems presented by the text. To the staff of the Rare Book Room of the University of Pennsylvania Library, and its Whitman Collection, I am very much indebted for the use of supporting documents, manuscripts, and rare volumes; and to Neda M. Westlake, of the Rare Book Room Staff, for assistance with difficult identifications, and in making a comprehensive topical index. Finally, the editorial staff of the University of Pennsylvania Press, especially Mary M. Wildermuth, furnished unusual and painstaking editorial assistance, which I acknowledge with appreciation.

     S.B.

WITH WALT WHITMAN IN CAMDEN

Monday, January 21, 1889

     W. picked up a newspaper piece on November Boughs. "Some one sent this to me: it has the usual echoey character." Then he added: "These newspaper things while not weighty still say as much as could be expected from such casual sources. The newspaper is so fleeting: is so like a thing gone as quick as come: has no life, so to speak: its birth and death are almost coterminous." He thought "on the whole" he was being "far more generously treated as a penman by newspapers and magazines than formerly." "Why," he added: "if it keeps on like this, some day they may even forgive me for having written Leaves of Grass." He went on: "The gentle Emerson said to me in Boston that time when we had the long walk together: 'We must always remember, Mr. Whitman, that the world will make amends for all this some day.' I asked him: 'For all what?' He looked at me placidly and said: 'I know why you ask, For all what? and I will answer by saying: For everything.'"

     Morse had sent me a copy of the Chicago Mail containing a full text of the decision in the Anarchist case. W. looked it over. "Sidney felt that I didn't quite realize the exceptionalness of that incident. Maybe he was right. I seem to be weak on the protagonist side." And he added: "Leave the paper: it may be more important to me than to you: it may remove my prejudices." I asked: "What prejudices have you?" "Prejudices against bombs, for one thing." "It seems to me you have some prejudices against courts and jails and policemen and soldiers too." He took this up sharply: "So I have: prejudices: not against persons: no: against the institutions that require them—that are built on, are perpetuated by, are shamed by, them."

     W. called my attention to a copy of a French review containing a Whitman essay by Gabriel Sarrazin. "I suppose it will eventually go to Bucke: I thought I might send it to him by way of Kennedy: perhaps I shall: they can tell me what it comes to. I can't read a word of it. I see Dr. Bucke and John Burroughs referred to but just how,

     

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God knows: French or Greek, they are one to me. If I only had my old French friend here—if he was living now—the job could easily be done: he would sit down right here, casually—give it to us viva voce." I said: "Perhaps my father can do it: I'll ask him." "Evidently it went through without being proof-read by Sarrazin," W. remarked quietly: "it is full of emendations—changes: besides, he says in his letter—did I tell you he sent a letter along with it?—that this is not the whole matter—that he will use it in full in some volume he is to bring out." W. handed me the letter. It was written in English. S. speaks of former W.W. translations into the French: alludes to Griffin's work. W. said: "I have seen Laforgue's work: I am told it is brilliant—sparkles. These odds and ends of attention so to speak all get to me sometime or other from somebody: some of them, most of them, are about the house somewhere—or should be: it's my intention to turn them over to you when they show up." Sarrazin has addressed the letter to "Middle" Street. W. enjoyed this. "I suppose he had never been told where he was taught that 'many a mickle makes a muckle' as we were: so he would never have guessed either a mickle or a muckle street. But letters come to me all ways: even the letters addressed by some people more daring than others to 'Walt Whitman, America.'" I put in: "Some day they'll know where to find you if a letter is just addressed to 'Walt Whitman, World'!" He didn't take this up but pointed towards my coat. "What's that you've got in your pocket? Something to show me?" It was a copy of the Bazar. I handed it to him. "Yes! something for you to see: look at this picture: it's by Julien Dupré: it's your sort of a picture: what you call a Leaves of Grass picture." He put on his glasses and held the paper away from him as he looked. The picture was called The Haymaker. "You are sure I'll like it? I do like it: more and more: the more I see of it: Oh! it sinks into me deep. It is Millet: he has studied Millet: subject, treatment, atmosphere: but Millet would not have done that"—pointing to the face—"he would not have made her beautiful, a Maud Muller: no: he would rather have made her heavy, commonplace, almost sullen." But this was "only a minor drawback." "The picture as a whole is certainly vital—stirring, generic." He reached forward picking up the French review again. "See this"—opening it after some search at a sketch of a man at a table eating: "Don't you think it's superb?—quick, natural, good,

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conclusive?" Then he got back to the Dupré. "But this is more spacious—is rather more amply conceived." And he added: "I care nothing at all for some of the brazen art: the mere exhibitions of skilful painting: they rather horrify than attract me—are something like treason. I think of art as something to serve the people—the mass: when it fails to do that it's false to its promises: just as if a man would issue a note which from the first he has no intention of paying."

     James West, who edits The New Ideal in Boston, wrote me this in a letter I received today:

     "I am glad you know Whitman. When next you call on him say, perhaps, if he cares to hear, that for years I have desired to make a pilgrimage to his building. In his writings I have found as much strength, hope, inspiration for my work of teaching, as in any others I know. In the West I quoted him so often in my sermons that some shallow ones began to look on me too as 'bad.' O saving badness! O glorious weakness!"

     I read this to W. who was moved. "That men, women, we never meet, have not even heard of, except in the accidental way, should respond to our work—that is a thing to be pondered. It's a waft of something, a scent, a flavor, some indefinable entity, that must not be carelessly regarded or passed by." And he said further: "This is the precious return: personal love: the precious return." Also: "John Hay in one of our talks said: 'Whitman, no man who has been so successful with the prophetic few should lament his failure with the respectable many.' And I must bear that in mind. I don't think I ever felt sore on my enemies: I rather included them as of the first importance. I was surprised to find in Emerson an occasional asperity from which I think I have been exempt: in fact the dear Emerson said to me himself there in the Astor House: 'I find you agreeably gentle with those who have been cruel to you.' And he called it—thought it—my 'policy': which I disavowed with the statement that if it was true it was rather for temperamental than conscious reasons."

     Oldach takes his own time with the cover. W. ordinarily says: "I don't care: I'm in no hurry." But tonight he expressed some impatience: "I get to want to see it: Oldach is very elephantine." I said:

     W. produced a letter from England which he spoke of to me. "Read it to me," he said: "it is from a woman: a Mary Ashley: the name has a Quakerish sound: I don't know that she's famous for anything: but that's all the better: I shrink from the celebrated and the famous: read it." So I read:

16 New King Street,
Bath, England, January 7, 1889.

Dear Sir:

     I have very often felt that I should like to write to you and tell you how much pleasure and instruction your books have given me, and now I have determined that I will do so, because I have just read November Boughs and am so much pleased with it.

     I have been watching for it to be published for some time, ever since I saw in The Pall Mall Gazette that you were engaged on it. Some of the poetical pieces in it please me greatly.

     I have long cared for Leaves of Grass and Specimen Days. I love nature so much myself that there is much in Specimen Days that appeals to me. I have often experienced the feeling of absorbing into myself, physically and spiritually, the very life and spirit of nature. It is a thing that must be felt to be understood. The other papers in that book are interesting to me too. The broad and deep views you take of the future of democracy in America—everything connected with America—is a most interesting study to me. Your poems touch me very deeply as all true poetry that comes from the heart must do.

     Please accept my best wishes that the year we have entered upon may bring to you much calm peacefulness, and that you may experience

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much comfort and sympathy in return for that which you have so generously given to others during your life.

     I hope you will not think that I shall expect any reply to this, for I know how weak you are, and that you are not able to reply to all the letters that you receive.

I am, my dear sir, yours very truly and gratefully,

Mary Ashley.

     W. said: "I wonder who she is? I haven't the least idea. Take it along. I get many curious things: some adulation—a little (a little's enough): some cussing: now and then somebody goes for me—gives me hell. If I had made a collection of such documents I'd have had some queer stuff for you to preserve. Look at this for instance." He handed me the annual message of the Mayor of Brooklyn. Laughed. "Now ain't that real literature for you? I want to be generous: I'll share my possessions with you." Also gave me Bucke's letter of the 18th: "Take that too: but I don't think you'll find anything in it to excite you. Bucke's almost ready to come: that's the best news." Then: "You'll never thoroughly know, comprehend, Bucke, till you have spent a summer with him at the Asylum—on the farm: till you meet the doctors, the patients, the nurses, there: till you see Bucke at his work." Referred to Mary Ashley again. "What is there in her note to move me so? I confess it moved me. Was it something in the letter or something in me? I find myself emotionally much more readily stirred some times than others. These days I seem to need something: seem to be looking for something—feeling towards it: something my illness makes me crave: God knows what it is: something there seemed to be a hint of in the gentle Mary's letter."

     I wrote Burroughs today. W. has heard from Rolleston. "He's my Irish friend," W. explained: "the real thing, I may say: well favored intellectually: fervent with native faith. There's black round the paper and envelope: I wonder who's dead? What a funny custom that is—to publish such a fact: a death in the family: insist on it: but it's going out: gone out, in fact, except with the old families—except, too, with the new families who want to cut a dash. Over there in England they take their forms seriously—observe them: all of them: from king down, from the slums up: observe them all: forms we on this side for the most part never knew or have dismissed."

     What had Rolleston written? "It's not a long letter: it's about his German edition: Rolleston is anxious to have me pushed in Germany: he says I'm a German requisite—that they'll 'adopt' me. I don't flatter myself: I don't believe in requisites—in chosen people, in chosen peoples, all that—it seems quite like nonsense to me. But I acquiesce in Rolleston as a beautiful friend: yes, I do that: wonderful he is, surely: but as to the 'requisite'—well, I have no opinion on that: though as for Rolleston in the end, it's not me but the idea we stand for that he's really after: the idea: the immortal idea."

     As I was leaving W. said: "I had one of the curios here for you: a letter: but it seems to have got hid away again." He rammed his fingers into several piles of stuff on the table and then dropped tiredly back in his chair. "No: I don't see it: it'll maybe show up tomorrow again: I'll not let it get away if it does: they sort of take to cover when you come"—laughing—"knowing your ruthless appetite." And he admonished me: "Keep both your eyes on the book: I'm absolutely in your keeping."

Tuesday, January 22, 1889

     7.45 P.M. W. reading paper. Appeared exhausted. Yet was willing to talk. Had had trouble with his eyes the past week or so, too. Has to shade his eyes as he reads. Stops often. He said: "I sent the New Revue—Revue Nouvelle—off today. I am altogether in the dark: don't know what the fellow says." Was Kennedy a French scholar? "I don't know: that's what I want to find out: he'll translate it for me if he is: if he can't do it Bucke can—Doctor: either Kennedy or Doctor will do it: at any rate give me the purport of it so I may at least understand what it's all about." I noticed the rocker of his chair had caught up the strings of a couple of bundles of his manuscript: advised him of it. First he said: "Well—never mind: I'm tired"—but when I suggested that if he'd move his chair forward I'd straighten the stuff out he acquiesced, saying: "They are all disturbed: I got them in that shape looking up some scraps today." These "scraps," he informed me, were "Whitmanesque bits of which" he "made up a little package and sent off to the French fellow." He wanted to know if I remembered the man's name: asked: What is it? and when I said, "Sarrazin," repeated it, adding: "That's it: and by and by we'll know what it's all about."

     Says he's feeling "fairly." No signs, outwardly, of any change. Suffers some from indigestion for which he is taking Friedrichsthal Waters again. "There are always devils lurking in the darkness to destroy us: we have to fight for our lives." Talked of a Rhys letter. I quoted a passage. W. exclaimed: "That's it! and splendid it is, too! It ought to be printed broadcast: we should have it printed." And he added: "Did you notice in these phlegmatic people—Rhys is one of them—that when stirred they are the fieriest of all? that when they let go all hell's in it: hell and damnation: the horriblest flames of perdition? Haven't you noticed it? Take me for example. You don't often see me mad: I don't dare get mad: I get so damned mad when I get mad that it shakes me up too much—leaves ugly results: so I hold myself in sternly: have to: yes, must."

     I sent today for copy of San Francisco Chronicle of 13th for Bucke. Received Boston Traveller. Criticism adverse. W. read it while I looked over his shoulder. "Well—that's all right: I'm entitled to it: only, I wish they would print me correctly—use the right marks—not misrepresent: I hate commas in wrong places: I want my i's dotted, my t's crossed." He had a couple of deaf and dumb visitors today. He was "considerably interested and amused to have them come." "We got along pretty well together—though silently!"

     W. talked about Garland. "He's greatly interested in the George movement: is strongly impulsive: is maybe a little one-idea'd—though as to that I don't feel quite sure: is wonderfully human: gets at the simple truths—the everyday truths: is not professional." I said: "You speak of one-idea'd men as though you rather discredited them." "Do I? I don't mean to: they certainly have a place—a vast big vital place: they can't be skipped—escaped." I said again: "You may think you're not, but you're a little one-idea'd yourself—and every man is." He nodded. "No doubt: I have never heard it put quite in that way: Jesus was one-idea'd, I admit, for instance."

     I asked him: "Well—have you some objections to Jesus?" "Yes: why not? Emerson had too: the dear Emerson: he felt that Jesus lacked humor, for one thing: a man who lacks humor is likely to concentrate on one idea." I parried him again. "Why, that's a familiar charge against you, Walt: didn't even Ruskin say that? and I hear it every now and then from somebody or other." He retorted a little hotly: "Well—you've rather got me: I'm not that much good in an

     W. gave me Bucke's letter of day before yesterday. Also a postcard from Garland. "Here's a slip too: Democracy in Literature: my own: it's yours if you want it: file it away: I have a few copies left." He had me read an old Conway letter to him. "It has to do with the publishing end of things: it should go among your documents: but let me hear it again."

     W. asked me to get him from McKay a copy of Bucke's book "simply stitched—not bound." Oldach again disappointed us. W. impatient. "But he's German," W. said: "and so we must wait upon his pleasure: he's the immovable rock." He said: "Give my love to your mother." And he picked up a big apple from the table. "Ain't it a beauty? Give her this." And he spoke of Sam Loag, my friend and his: a printer: "Drop this in on him tomorrow as you go by"—handing me a paper with a string round it: "Sam was here: asked me for it."

Wednesday, January 23, 1889

     I said: "We had to go slow—proceed with deliberation." W. nodded to me. "That's just it: deliberation. Some of my best friends—my own people—accuse me (have always accused me) of procrastination—the most provoking in all private annals!" He threw up his hands: "I couldn't reply to that: I am slow: I could only say with Sidney Morse's nigger, who would go off on fearful sprees, have a high old time of it: 'I am so because I was meant to be so!' But after a pause, while indulging a half-audible laugh, W. said further: "But while that is a good story they would probably meet it with another, perhaps a better, story: the story told by one of the Greek writers: the story of a master beating a slave: the slave protesting: 'I was ordained to do this thing: therefore, why whip me?' the reply being 'And I was ordained to give you a hell of a thrashing!' That might apply wonderfully well to my case."

     He was silent. I waited till he began to talk again, saying nothing myself: "Despite everything the book is here: we have finished the journey: that is our answer: procrastination or no procrastination, the perfect result is in our hands: the book: our book: your book, my book: beautifully done except with one except." He pointed to the lettering: "That's not Leaves of Grass: that's a bit feeble: but I have no doubt it's about as good as the case will allow. If we could control everything—do everything we please: get a first class man here from New York, Paris, London, anywhere: pay five dollars for that: pay men for winking and bowing and scraping: we might have our way absolutely. But—well, we have had no such choice: we should be glad we've done decently well: you, indefatigable as you are: I, loafing round: Oldach, with his man or two. Oh! I'm satisfied: say so for me."

     I said to W.: "Mary intimated that you've not had such a good day." He exclaimed: "How dared she! But as a fact I have spent a dull leaden time of it since I got up this morning: up to four or half-past four it was very bad: then Mary brought me in a big mug of hot coffee: it was very nice: I drank it all. Whether from

     McKay wants to know what W. will sell him the complete W. W. for. He says he'll be sure to be applied to for copies—especially abroad. I asked W. He said: "I'll think it over: I'll tell you tomorrow." I put in: "Always tomorrow—always tomorrow: you're a tomorrow sort of a man!" "I suppose I am: I want to be: even if at the cost of some procrastination." McKay didn't have sheets of Bucke's W. W. handy today. He'll get me a set for W. Oldach will charge us a dollar and twenty-four per copy for big book bound in leather. W. for an instant seemed staggered by the price. Then he recovered himself. "I guess it's worth that much," he quietly said. No letter from Bucke. "In fact no letter from anybody." How about O'Connor? "Oh! did I tell you I had a postcard from Nellie a day or two ago? She said she was fagged out—was too tired to enter into particulars: William a week or ten days ago took to his bed: he has not been about since. The outlook is dismal if not dangerous: it's hard on Nellie: she's frail though resolute: O'Connor himself has great courage—besides, is very optimistic: Nellie being rather the contrary of all that: is a bit pessimistic—sees the bad side." But determined? "Yes! I did not mean to question her force: I only wanted to say she was inclined to take the gloomy view." And yet wasn't she full of faith about things in general? "Yes: this strain is temperamental in her: she can't escape it."

     We talked of Bradley's conviction in the Philadelphia courts yesterday. "Yes, I have read the story: Bradley was monstrous—monstrous: but would you not think him abnormal: I see no other way to account for it: certainly he can't be explained by the ordinary process of reasoning. In the present condition of our criminal laws—of crime—as in affairs like this—these extra sex developments—abnormality is the only word that will cover the case. Then we must remember that such individual abnormality comes from the abnormality of society at large. I think any judge would admit that—perhaps express it almost in my words: it seems to me to arise—so much of it, who knows but all of it?—in an absence of simplicity—

     "I know that in regard to these Anarchists there are contending impulses drawing us two ways, but for liberty, abstract, concrete—the broad question of liberty—there is no doubt at all. I look ahead seeing for America a bad day—a dark if not stormy day—in which this policy, this restriction, this attempt to draw a line against free speech, free printing, free assembly, will become a weapon of menace to our future." He thought this decision not only "good as legal decisions go" but "good practically, as a workable hypothesis." "I like that the judge—Sully, or whatever (Tuley)—faces the question objectively: that he's not theoretic merely but makes his statement to meet other possible cases: like a surgeon—one of the genuine surgeons—who takes a fever for what it is, not what it might be, as developed in everyday John or somebody." I asked him: "You speak of liberty: do you mean every and any liberty? or do you too set limits?" He said: "I can't set limits even if there should be limits: of course we can't do as we please—every man can't do as he pleases: but short of that why shouldn't liberty prevail?" Read W. portions of a letter I have from Bucke.

London, Ontario, January 21, 1889.

My dear Horace:

     Yours of 18th just to hand. I agree with all you say and with all you have done about the will. I have no doubt W. understands perfectly well what has become of it and is satisfied that it should be taken care of. All quiet here and all sound with meter and everything else. Thanks for the German paper though it is a stupid little piece. What he means is that W. "though a living writer belongs to

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an elder race (Hebrew prophets, authors of Eddas, &c.) of humanitarianism, poetical, inspired eccentrics. The contents of his work is poetic (an art rhapsody) but (as regards execution) he is innocent of rhyme, rhythm or form. Freiligrath's translations of him (W. W.) are better than the original." Evidently a critic of heavy caliber (Herr Siller)—heavy in the sense of dumm!

R.M. Bucke.

     W. laughed over the reference to Freiligrath. "I'll bet that made the Doctor mad: he'd fire up at such a comparison: but then—who knows? A translation is often enough worse but it may well be better than the original." I quoted another of Bucke's notes in which Doctor speaks of probably being here early in February. W. said of the meter: "Doctor sets such store by it: he's hot for it: somehow I have my doubts: wouldn't wonder if the whole scheme went to smash. I don't know but it would be better for Doctor if it did: yes, better: I shudder when I think of him, of anyone, you, anyone I love, making money—getting on what they call easy street: easy street has killed many a man who was worth keeping alive." W. said as I left: "You are doing everything for me now: I know it: you are more to me than my right hand: but you'll do more for me after I'm dead—way into the future. I'll haunt you after you've buried me: you'll feel me taking part with you in many a great undertaking. Take my word for it—and wait: you'll find that I'm not mistaken."

Thursday, January 24, 1889

     W. was reading Laurence Hutton's Literary Notes in Harper's when I entered. "Some one sent me the magazine: who could it have been?" Then he handed me the envelope. "Was it Howells?" he asked: adding: "Probably Howells' suggestion." It had come addressed to "Mr. Walter Whitman." In the Editor's Study this issue H. starts off with a section about November Boughs. W. called it "so-so" and "friendly" but didn't in the least warm up over it. "Take it along," he said: "see what you can make of it yourself." He had read some other things in the magazine. "You will find the first article very interesting in spite of its title—The Hôtel Drouot: Theodore Child." Had also read and "found very good" Verestchagin's A Russian Village: but The Work of John Ruskin by Charles Waldstein "I tried to read but found so dull I had to drop it." Frontispiece portrait of Ruskin "very vital": indeed, W. felt that "all the illustrations" were "fine, convincing, conclusive." Still, he was not "a wholesale Ruskin man": rather "take my Ruskin with some qualifications": though insisting still that Ruskin "is not to be made little of: is of unquestionable genius and nobility." He wanted to know about Waldstein, he listening to what I said as if he really wished to know. "My first feeling about Howells' piece," he said, "is wholly indifference." Then he asked: "Don't you find Howells tame? I think tame is the word: yes, tame." And he added: "He's not exactly colorless: only, he rather seems to be afraid of color."

     "You know Thorndike Rice?" W. asked. "I had a note from him here today saying that he proposes having another symposium in the Review: the influence of novels on life—of English novels on American life: then he goes on to invite me to take a hand in it." "Will you do it?" "That depends: I am not at all settled in my own notions on the subject as yet." But "take the letter," he said, handing it over: "take it home: I shall not want it at once—can wait till you bring it back."

     Bucke (22d) wrote me as to The Critic review: "The piece is (as you say) 'astonishingly enthusiastic,' but its enthusiasm somehow offends me, as if it were not genuine. How is it? What is the matter with it?" I referred this to W., who said: "Yes: he wrote to the same effect to me: made the same remark about The Critic: said he liked Sanborn's column better." Gave me letter in which Bucke says: "It has a smack of unrealness, want of sincerity (but perhaps I do the writer injustice)." Had he felt such a thing himself? "Not at all: not anything that could be called even a tinge, suspicion, of it." Then he didn't agree with Bucke? "Oh no! no! I consider the objection gratuitous: have not experienced the slightest reason for such a criticism of the piece: I am even inclined to rate it above all the other things so far said of the book." W. again said: "Doctor is inclined to make impossible claims for me: he is too much disposed to wipe out the other fellows in my interest: which, of course, is an injustice to me as well as to them."

     Harrison Morris writes me about W.'s "fierce" piece in The Critic. "Fierce" is Bucke's word, too. W. repeated the word "fierce—fierce," then said: "Well, what of it? If Morris was to ask me I should have to ask: Sure enough, what does it mean?" I said: "That's one way to get rid of a question, Walt: but sometimes there's another way—a better way." "Sometimes: that's so: but not this time." Then he went on half jesting, half mad: "God Almighty how I hate to be catechized!" He does, you bet. Again, upon a reference to Rice: "Not Rice—Jim Redpath was my very good friend in the Review. Redpath has been sick: is now better: has gone to Ireland: visiting, I think, somebody or other. He is a vehement Home Ruler: fiery, flaming: is an Irish sympathizer of the intensest sort." I asked W. how he stood on Home Rule. "Home Rule? I want home rule for everybody—every section: home rule: for races, persons: liberty, freedom: as little politics as possible: as little: as much goodwill, as much fraternity, as possible: that's how it presents itself to me."

     W. discussed the big book. "I have turned it into all sorts of disadvantageous positions today: it always turned up well: I'll have

     I told W. that Frothingham (Octavius Brooks) would speak at the Ethical Convention tomorrow evening. "He has been very cordially my friend first and last," W. said: "I suppose he is so still: though as for that he may have shifted his point of view: they do it sometimes. I met Frothingham several years ago: talked with him: we got along together famously: he was expansive, sympathetic: he was of latitudinal longitudinal dimensions." It was curious after this that W. should have given me an old O'Connor letter in which Frothingham was alluded to. He had me read it to him.

Washington, Sept. 20, 1882.

Dear Walt:

     I have your postals of the 3d and the 17th.

     Comstock takes the dare! He cowers, like a kicked spaniel, and does not venture to carry out his threat. I thought my letter would have the effect of making him cautious.

     Now for Tobey. Look out for the Tribune—I have sent (last Saturday) an elaborate vivisection of the Boston postmaster and Oliver

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Stevens together, which, if the Tribune publishes, will certainly make a big row. I think you will like it as well as my first letter. It is gay and stinging until near the close, when it rises and darkens into righteous anger. The Boston Journal will surely respond to it, and Tobey will rue the day. Old orthodox rascal!

     Glad to hear your other book is near the launch. I got the programme—very attractive and picturesque. I only regretted that you had included your paper on Poe, which I think all mistaken. Everyone flings a stone at poor Edgar—Stedman's the worst of all. No such man as you fancy ever got and held the love of such a woman as Helen Whitman. I know so much about him through her, and through much reading of what he wrote, that I cannot help deploring all adverse criticisms upon him.

     Frothingham's article is fair, but unworthy of him. The arrière pensée is evident. He thinks better of your book than he dares to write. But such cowardice is simply shameful. A scholar ought to be a soldier, and face the batteries proudly.

     I will send the Modern Thought to Bucke soon. Hurrah for Molloy! I read his article with gratification. Apropos, I wish you would tell me just what Ruskin said about L. of G., for I discover that it was to you, or some near friend of yours, that he wrote. I want to know very much.

     Is there any chance of Rees Welsh printing Bucke's book? I wish it might be done. It would help, and now is the time, while public interest is alive.

     I will try to get the American Queen ("spell it with an A," as I once heard Horace Mann say sarcastically) and peruse the fury.

     I am glad you liked the way I cooked Comstock.

     The weather here is very oppressive, and "the weight of the superincumbent hour is hard to bear, together with the load of office work and the lassitude and illness that afflict the subscriber. But October will soon be here, with healing in its wings.

     My Jeannie has been very ill this summer, but is getting better, and will go to Providence on Friday. She can scarcely walk with weakness, but is on the mend. It has made life heavy for me.

     Good bye. Faithfully,

William D. O'Connor.

     W. quoted the line: "A scholar ought to be a soldier, and face the batteries proudly." "That sounds like a call to battle: no one could do that more wonderfully than William." And he added: "In spite of what may in that incident have looked like timidity in Frothingham he has steadfastly been my friend." I said: "You and William evidently run afoul of each other over Poe." He smiled: "Yes—some: William takes a polemic interest in Poe: won't have any heresy at all with regard to him: has always made the whole demand, which I am by no means convinced of. William is a vehement expounder, propounder: won't let a fellow off with compromises, half measures." W. spoke of Comstock as "the anomaly of the age." I said: "The age supports him—allows him: how is he an anomaly?" W. assented to this. "That may be said, too: I rather suspect that we have Anthony in spite of, not because of, the age." Left at 9:30.

Friday, January 25, 1889

     Then W. said: "Look at Dick Stoddard: he's not only weak but malignant." I said: "Not only afraid to love but given to hate." W. smiled. "Exactly: look at that Poe thing: it's a fair sample: it was a cowardly attack: it was dirty, indeed: but that's the man—the certain size, style, shape of the man: a false note in it all—though true for Stoddard I suppose: more a picture of Dick himself than of poor Poe: an awful self-exposure, too: worthy of Billy Winter in his palmiest days: which is about as low as you can get." After continued general talk of Poe, W. said: "I have seen Poe—met him: he impressed me very favorably: was dark, quiet, handsome—Southern from top to toe: languid, tired out, it is true, but altogether ingratiating." Was that in New York? "Oh yes: there: we had only a brief visit: he was frankly conciliatory: I left him with no doubts left, if I ever had any." Poe was "curiously a victim of history—like Paine." "The disposition to parade, to magnify, his defects has grown into a habit: every literary, every moralistic, jackanapes who comes along has to give him an additional kick. His weaknesses were obvious enough to anybody: but what do they amount to after all? Paine is defamed in the same way: poor Paine: rich Paine: they spare him nothing."

     I said: "You should write about Paine." He nodded. "So I should: I don't think there's anybody living—anybody at all—(I don't think there ever was anybody, living or dead)—more able than I am to depict, to picture, Paine, in the right way. I have told you of my old friend Colonel Fellows: he was an uncommon man both in what he looked like and i