I arrived here at noon today saw Horace1 for a short time at
Camden this morning (as he will have told you). I go to Camden friday morning but
have a little business matter to attend to so shall not get around to your house untill say 1 or 2 P.M. (Guess you don't want any one earlier than that any
how)—Am much pleased to hear both from Horace and yourself that your health is
rather looking up than the reverse—but shall see about that friday. If Mrs
Costelloe2 should get out for 31st that
loc_es.00749.jpg
would really be immense3—It seems almost too good to
come true.
I like this place so far very well—think I feel better already since I came this noon! Quick cure you will say—but then happily there was not much to cure!
Your friend R M BuckeCorrespondent:
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).