[Feb 11—The first chirping]

Whitman Archive Title: [Feb 11—The first chirping]
Whitman Archive ID: ucb.00046
Repository: Catalog of the Walt Whitman Literary Manuscripts in the Walt Whitman Collection, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley
Box: 1
Folder: 61
Repository Title: The first chirping
Date: 1877
Genre: prose
Physical Description: 1 leaf, handwritten
View Images: 1 | 2
Content: Notes dated February 10–11, 1877, which read like a series of journal entries. These notes compose a partial draft of "Spring Overtures—Recreations," a prose piece which first appeared in the 29 January 1881 issue of The Critic , as "How I Get Around at 60, and Take Notes. (No. 1)," under the heading "Spring Overtures." These notes describing the onset of spring were revised and later published in Specimen Days & Collect (1882–1883). "Spring Overtures—Recreations" was finally appeared in Complete Prose Works (1892). On the verso of this manuscript is a partial sketch of a building, with measurements and notes in Whitman's hand.