Y'rs of 3d2 rec'd—No I am not worse—bad enough, the most obstinate & long continued bound up spell yet—but I fancy a slight shade leaning to the better—you must be this moment at the highest of the tempest gale there3—we have got the international copyright law4 pass'd here—my piece is in March N[orth] A[merican] Rev[iew].5
I send you slips6—
W WCorrespondent:
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).