James W. Wallace to Walt Whitman, 18 September 1891

 loc_vm.00921_large.jpg London,1 Ontario, Canada. 18. Sep 18912 My dear Walt Whitman,

Gloriously fine here today, but too warm. I wonder how it is with you. I hope that the heat is not excessive or injurious to you.

I write this in the afternoon—2–30—after a rest & quiet read. Dr3 is away in town on business.

After writing to you yesterday we had a most enjoyable drive to the town &  loc_vm.00922_large.jpg back—the Dr's talk (chiefly about you) being extremely interesting to me.

Alfred Gurd4 & wife5 to tea in addition to previous company. After tea, Dr & I went across to the office together. Most lovely evening—the moon just rising, preternaturally large & impressive—Jupiter, near her, shining with a lustre that rivalled the moon's. A glory still in the west, & golden light touching the trees here & there. An indescribable beautiful scene, peaceful, soothing, perfect.

Amongst other things  loc_vm.00923_large.jpg I wrote to H.L.T.6 while the Dr attended to his business. Then, when he was through, we had a talk I am not likely to forget, in which he told me of an experience he had in '71, which you doubtless know about.7

Home again in the moonlight. Sat for a time in the Verandah looking out on its perfect beauty—figures moving about the lawn seeming of weird & unearthly beauty, in form & movement.

But, lovely as the night was, I was tired & went in pretty good time to bed.

A lazy day today—a little writing, 2 or 3 photos, a  loc_vm.00924_large.jpg visit to the office &c. I was very much touched & pleased to receive another paper from you (The Boston Evening Transcript8) & read the passage you marked with interest

Another letter, too, from our indefatigable & dear friend H.L.T.—His letters are always like a cordial to me, & in their zealous, ever kind, & busy comradeship appeal to my deepest heart—& seem like a prophecy, a foretaste, of a new earth. God's blessings on him & his!

I wish I could see you just now & that I could do something for you. I think of you continually with loving sympathy & blessing. May God be with you, in ever-nearing communion & tenderest love & blessing.9

Yours affectionately J.W. Wallace  loc_vm.00925_large.jpg  loc_vm.00926_large.jpg  loc_vm.00919_large.jpg  loc_vm.00920_large.jpg see notes Sept 21 1891

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Notes

• 1. This letter is addressed: Walt Whitman, | 328, Mickle St | Camden | New Jersey | U.S. It is postmarked: LONDON | [illegible] | SP 19 | 91 | CANADA; CAMDEN, N.J. | SEP21 | 6 AM | 91 | REC'D. [back]
• 2. In September 1891, Wallace traveled to the United States, arriving at Philadelphia on September 8, 1891 (Horace Traubel, With Walt Whitman in Camden, Tuesday, September 8, 1891). Wallace's arrival was shortly preceded by that of the Canadian physician Richard Maurice Bucke, who had recently returned from two months of travel in Europe, where he had spent time with Johnston, Wallace, and the Bolton College group of English Whitman admirers. Both Bucke and Wallace visited Whitman in Camden, and, after spending a few days with the poet, Wallace returned with Bucke to London, Ontario, Canada, where he met Bucke's family and friends. Wallace's account of his time with Whitman was published—along with the Bolton physician John Johnston's account of his own visit with the poet in the summer of 1890—in their memoir, Visits to Walt Whitman in 1890–1891 by Two Lancashire Friends (London: Allen and Unwin, 1917). [back]
• 3. Richard Maurice Bucke (1837–1902) was a Canadian physician and psychiatrist who grew close to Whitman after reading Leaves of Grass in 1867 (and later memorizing it) and meeting the poet in Camden a decade later. Even before meeting Whitman, Bucke claimed in 1872 that a reading of Leaves of Grass led him to experience "cosmic consciousness" and an overwhelming sense of epiphany. Bucke became the poet's first biographer with Walt Whitman (Philadelphia: David McKay, 1883), and he later served as one of his medical advisors and literary executors. For more on the relationship of Bucke and Whitman, see Howard Nelson, "Bucke, Richard Maurice," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
• 4. Alfred Thomas Gurd (1846–1919)—a relative of Bucke's wife Jessie Maria Gurd Bucke (1839–1926)—was a farmer, an independent oil producer, and a politician from Ontario. He represented the consitituency of Lambton West from 1894 to 1898, and he was a member of the anti-Catholic Protestant Protective Association. He also served as mayor of Petrolia, Ontario, in the early 1890s. Later, Gurd moved to Oklahoma, where he continued his work in the oil industry. [back]
• 5. Alfred Thomas Gurd married Dell Shaw in 1879. The couple were the parents of five children. [back]
• 6. Horace L. Traubel (1858–1919) was an American essayist, poet, and magazine publisher. He is best remembered as the literary executor, biographer, and self-fashioned "spirit child" of Walt Whitman. During the late 1880s and until Whitman's death in 1892, Traubel visited the poet virtually every day and took thorough notes of their conversations, which he later transcribed and published in three large volumes entitled With Walt Whitman in Camden (1906, 1908, & 1914). After his death, Traubel left behind enough manuscripts for six more volumes of the series, the final two of which were published in 1996. For more on Traubel, see Ed Folsom, "Traubel, Horace L. [1858–1919]," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
• 7. Bucke claimed in 1872 that a reading of Leaves of Grass led him to experience "cosmic consciousness" and an overwhelming sense of epiphany. Later, in his book Cosmic Consciousness: A Study in the Evolution of the Human Mind (Philadelphia: Innes and Sons, 1905), Bucke discussed the profound awareness or state of "cosmic consciousness" that he believed was achieved by such persons as Buddha, Jesus, Dante, and Whitman, among others. For more on Bucke and his theories of consciousness, see Matthew Ignoffo, "Cosmic Consciousness," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
• 8. The Boston Evening Transcript, founded by Henry Dutton (1796–1869) and James Wentworth in 1830, was a daily evening newspaper in Boston, Massachusetts, published until 1941. [back]
• 9. With this letter Wallace enclosed a newspaper article titled "A Brave Deed" that he had clipped from the September 12, 1890, issue, of the Manchester Weekly Times. He wrote the name and date of the newspaper from which he clipped the article at the bottom of the first page of the clipping in black ink. [back]