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I suppose Mr. Conway has received, & you have read,
the letter I sent over about three weeks since,
assenting to the substitution of other words, &c.
as proposed by you, in your reprint of my book, or selections therefrom.
I suppose the reprint intends to avoid any expressed or
implied character of being an expurgated edition.
I hope it will simply assume the form & name of a selection
from the various editions of my pieces printed here.
I suggest, in the interest of that view, whether the
adjoining might not be a good form of Title page:
I wish particularly not only that the little figures numbering the stanzas, but also that the larger figures dividing the pieces into separate passages or sections be carefully followed & preserved, as in copy.
When I have my next edition brought out here,
I shall change the title of the piece "When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd,"
to President Lincoln's Funeral Hymn.
It is quite certain that I shall add to my next edition (carrying out my plan from the first,) a brief cluster of pieces, born of thoughts on the deep themes of Death & Immortality.
Allow me to send you an article I have written on "Democracy"—a hasty charcoal-sketch of a piece, but indicative, to any one interested in Leaves of Grass, as of the audience the book supposes, & in whose interest it is made. I shall probably send it next mail.
Allow me also to send you (as the ocean-postage law is now so easy,)
a copy of Mr. Burroughs's Notes,
And now, my dear sir, you must just make what use—or no use at all—of any thing I suggest or send—as your occasions call for. Very likely some of my suggestions have been anticipated.