Many thanks for your letter,1 & the promise of an early copy of your book.2
Enclosed please find what I made of your facts for the New York Herald of this date.
Faithfully yours Jeannette L. Gilder3 Mr. Walt Whitman Camden N.J.We learn that early in the new year Walt Whitman will issue a small edition of his complete works in two volumes. "Leaves of Grass" will be one. The other, "Two Rivulets," alternations of prose and verse; the themes about as diverse as they can be—poetry, politics, the war, &c. Mr. Whitman kept a diary from 1862 to 1865 of scenes in Virginia, Washington; and the hospital, camps, battles, are given almost verbatim. A great part of "Two Rivulets," prose and poetry, is fresh matter, hitherto unpublished. Mr. Whitman will publish and sell his book himself. We are sorry to say that the health and strength of this poet are probably irrecoverable. His mind, however, is as brilliant as ever, and his spirits good. He is poor in purse, but not in actual want. He will probably end his days with his brother4 in Camden.
Correspondent:
Jeannette Leonard Gilder (1849–1916) helped
her brother, Richard Watson Gilder (1844–1909), edit Scribner's Monthly and then, with another brother, Joseph Benson
Gilder (1858–1936), co-edited the Critic (which she
co-founded in 1881). For more, see Susan L. Roberson, "Gilder, Jeannette L. (1849–1916)," Walt
Whitman: An Encyclopedia, ed. J.R. LeMaster and Donald D. Kummings (New
York: Garland Publishing, 1998).