Richard Maurice Bucke to Walt Whitman, [1–2 August 1891]

About This Item

Title: Richard Maurice Bucke to Walt Whitman, [1–2 August 1891]
Date: [August 1–2, 1891]
Creator(s): Richard Maurice Bucke
Whitman Archive ID: loc.08454
Source: The Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1839–1919, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. The transcription presented here is derived from Richard Maurice Bucke, The Letters of Dr. Richard Maurice Bucke to Walt Whitman, ed. Artem Lozynsky (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1977), 244. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the correspondence, see our statement of editorial policy.
Contributors to digital file: Stephanie Blalock Cristin Noonan Erel Michaelis Amanda J. Axley
Cite this page: Bucke, Richard Maurice. "Richard Maurice Bucke to Walt Whitman, [1–2 August 1891]." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 26 April 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
Source File: loc.08454.xml (TEI)

[1–2 August 1891]1

which is as little as one can possibly get on with here unless the woman of the house actually works herself which would be a heresy of the very deepest dye—for breakfast we have a bit of bacon and egg and toast—for lunch a chop and potato—for dinner soup, a joint, and a pudding. The house is furnished comfortably but very plainly. It would not suit you for it is very narrow and all up and down stairs—altogether there are no less than 5 flats to it—viz—/1/ basement containing kitchen and, I presume, servants room. 2 Ground floor dining-room with a little sort of office at the back where Mr C.2 works sometimes [/] 3, Drawing room up one stair. 4, Bedrooms up two stairs—and 5 two snug little rooms in the attic, a bedroom and sitting room.—these two rooms [mutilation] /are/ for the present mine & I am now sitting and writing a bundle of letters in the little sitting room. [—] Have this moment got a note from Herbert Gilchrist3 (have not seen him yet) he says he must see me and I have written to arrange a meeting—he asks me to stay with him (the people here are very kind if I accepted all my invitations I should have to stay a year) and [mutilation] I shall do so if possible. [—] I hope you are not very warm in Camden yet. Here we have had no warm weather—I have worn my over-coat so far all the time. I enclose a note4 from Mrs. Costelloe5

Goodly With much love R M Bucke

Correspondent:
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).

Notes

1. At the time of this letter, Bucke was traveling abroad in England in an attempt to establish a foreign market for a fluid meter he was building with his brother-in-law William John Gurd (1845–1903). During this trip, he also visited several of Whitman's English friends, including the political activist and art historian Mary Whithall Smith Costelloe (1864–1945) and her first husband, the lawyer Benjamin Conn Costello (1854–1899). This letter was written on either 1 or 2 August 1891 from the Costelloes' home at 41 Grosvenor Road in London. In his letter to Whitman of July 31, 1891, Bucke notes that he has "received an invitation from Mary Costelloe to accompany her to the country (Hazelmere) next Sunday evening [i.e. August 2, 1891]." Apparently Bucke had been invited to spend a day or two with the Costelloes before leaving for Friday's Hill, the country house of Mary Costelloe's parents, the evangelical minister Robert Pearsall (1827–1898) and his wife Hannah Whitall Smith (1831–1911). [back]
2. Benjamin Francis Conn Costelloe (1854–1899), Mary's first husband, was an English barrister and Liberal Party politician. [back]
3. Herbert Harlakenden Gilchrist (1857–1914), son of Alexander and Anne Gilchrist, was an English painter and editor of Anne Gilchrist: Her Life and Writings (London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1887). For more information, see Marion Walker Alcaro, "Gilchrist, Herbert Harlakenden (1857–1914)," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]
4. This letter has not yet been located. [back]
5. Mary Whitall Smith Costelloe (1864–1945) was a political activist, art historian, and critic, whom Whitman once called his "staunchest living woman friend." A scholar of Italian Renaissance art and a daughter of Robert Pearsall Smith, she would in 1885 marry B. F. C. "Frank" Costelloe. She had been in contact with many of Whitman's English friends and would travel to Britain in 1885 to visit many of them, including Anne Gilchrist shortly before her death. For more, see Christina Davey, "Costelloe, Mary Whitall Smith (1864–1945)," Walt Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New York: Garland Publishing, 1998). [back]