Your two postals came duly to hand—the last on the 2d of last month—but the letter there in announced has not come. It is now too late I presume to expect it:
I will say for Mr syr_kc.00002_large.jpg
Laforgue1 that he is glad of your permission to translate "Leaves of Grass" & that he expects to make of
it an interesting Volume2
We want to publish it with a preface in the shape of a biographical sketch. It would
be pleasant to have syr_kc.00003_large.jpg facts in your life not yet published: your youth, how you gave yourself on the
battlefield during the war, etc. Would you have the strength & the inclination
to furnish us such?
I am sorry to learn thro' the papers that you are permanently disabled physically. I
trust that the appearance of your poems syr_kc.00004_large.jpg in a foreign dress will have a
happy pecuniary result. In any event you have too many friends on both sides the
ocean ever to be forgotten.
As the interpreter of the little group here I am the bearer of many good words
Ever yours sincerely R. BrisbaneCorrespondent:
R. Brisbane was a French admirer of
Whitman and apparently a collaborator on a planned translation of Leaves of Grass into French.