Sarrazin's2 book (from him from Paris) has come,3 & looks wonderfully inviting all through but is of course sealed to me4—I enclose a slip of title detailedly, as you may want to get one from New York—(but of course you can have my copy as much as you want)—I have written to Knortz5 (540 East 155th St New York)—& a card acknowledging reception to S, Paris—
Fine & sunny here—am rather heavy-headed—& hefty anyhow to-day—nothing specially to particularize—ate my breakfast, (mutton broth & Graham bread with some stew'd apple,) with ab't usual zest—(nothing at all sharp, but will do, & even thankful it's as well as it is)—The "Literary News" (N Y) book &c monthly, May, has a good two page biography6 & notice—wh' I send (or will send soon)—Did you get a letter in wh' I asked you to write out & enclose in my letter for Dr Brown,7 (apothecary here) a proper calomel powder prescription a little stronger (if you thought right)—did you get the letter?—Did you send your WW book to Sarrazin?
Sunday May 5
Fine & sunny to-day—feeling fairly—all going smoothly—In general ab't the world, I guess we are now floating on dead water in literature, politics, theology, even science—resting on our oars &c. &c.—criticising, resuming—at any rate chattering a good deal (of course the simmering, gestation, &c. &c. are going on just the same)—but a sort of lull—a good coming summer to you & Mrs. B8 & all of you—
Walt WhitmanCorrespondent:
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).