Content:
Whitman probably drafted this manuscript in the early 1850s as he was preparing materials for the first (1855) edition of
Leaves of Grass
. It is a draft of lines that appear in the fourth poem of that edition, eventually titled "The Sleepers." A revised version of the phrase "pennies on their eyes" appears in the poem eventually titled "Song of Myself." Lines on the back of this manuscript leaf (uva.00566) relate to the poem eventually titled "Faces."
