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While we were talking, Mrs. Davis brought in his dinner.

There were two Stoker letters and the draft of a letter from W. acknowledging them.

But I am glad to say that I have been the means of making your work known to many who were scoffers at

If I were before your face I would like to shake hands with you, for I feel that I would like you.

If you were the same as the mass I would not write at all.

What were her subjects? "Oh!

Bad or good, its publication by the Sun will make Fra Diavolo Godkin howl.I return your Salt Lake City

The North American man called it "so very valuable a manuscript," apologizing for declining it on the

Twelve were for him. I had twelve sent to McKay. Oldach made his charge one twenty-eight.

I asked: "Were you always as stubbornly deliberate over trifles as you are today?"

Miss Stafford and a newspaper man were turned away.

New York, May 12, 1860.My dear Walt,The books are duly delivered.

Were I near you I should like to have the honor of paying my personal respects to you.

Did he say where we were to send the book? "Yes, to West Park: he is going back to his farm."

There were four.

I said: "Bonsall said the other day that except for the fact that you said and he knew you were sick

, even Kansas City, on the edge of the Missouri: start off on the ride to Denver, a matter of seven or

They were not miscellaneous poems but one vol: a drama and the other a Chinese story.

When I asked W. about the portrait, he said again: "I've done nothing with it: I thought we were going

Several memorandums were pinned to the letter.

These were the names on the lists: G.T. Glover, John Wallace, John Fraser, G.R.

They were closely written over. "Is this something new?" I asked.

All these were meant for thee, and more I need not now extract.Hast thou had experience such as I speak

And if it were possible, I know thou wouldst come.Yet it shall come to pass somehow, soon or late.

the curious, beautiful self-deception of youth: Stoker, this boy: it's the same: they thought they were

writing to me: so they were, incidentally: but they were really writing more definitely to themselves

Rice, proprietor of the North American Review, altho' nominally he may have corresponded with you—that

He has set about to secure the reminiscences of all eminent Americans who came into personal relations

Some of these papers he may publish in the North American Review, and others in the North American Review

The two letters that follow were dictated to a stenographer and signed by Redpath.North American Review

Didn't you tell me that Redpath and Ingersoll were great friends?

my experiences South—all my experiences in the hospitals, among the soldiers in the crowds of the cities

, with the masses, in the great centers of population—allowing for all idiosyncrasies, idiocrasies, passions

it, years back from the start—but in my very first contact with the human Yankee all my prejudices were

I like you to know just how our crowd got along with each other—what we were saying to each other in

You had not then flashed on the scene—you were a youngster then—but you ought to be informed of all the

When she was here last she brought me a bunch of roses, which were very beautiful, very beautiful—though

I was right glad to get your letter and to know your eyes were so much better.

Referring to another paper in the American series on W. W. "Well, let them go on.

If Patrick Ford rightly reports himself in his North American Review article when he attributes the miseries

He was very grateful for your interest, and his last words to me were—"tell him to write to me."

There seems a sort of hopelessness about this, and being unused to hospitals my feelings were far from

The books were found. We returned in the same way to his chair.

Do you and the man over in the city put your heads together and make what you can of it, using you own

say, that though I haven't any theory in the matter you can't hit a landlord too often, Irish or American

, and if you hit and don't hear my amen that's because I didn't see what you were about."

W. seriously: "There were the Fenians, yes: God knows they didn't come too soon or without a reason."

"I met him here and there but we were never on close terms.

most severe, most malignant, conservatives—old conservatives—are made out of men who in their youth were

Littell's used to quote consistently the meanest things that were being said about me.

Where were the letters he wrote his mother in Brooklyn from the War?

The other jewels were letters from William Michael Rossetti and Mrs.

Whitman,We were delighted at receiving your books—and from you.

—in London, who were all intensely interested and impressed.

Rossetti, your good friend, and others, who all were anxious to hear from you.

Burroughs and Richard were camping out in September and there was a great deal of talk of W.

"Horace," said W., suddenly, "I think the time has come for the American magazine—for a magazine designed

masses—to give the smack of the heath—the native heath: to get its color from a life particularly American

By and bye the American magazine will come as the gift of some far-sighted far-hearted individual, who

My brave young American soldiers—now for so many months I have gone around among them, where they lie

The Gardner people were fiery mad over it—to me it seemed funny."

"That explains it—I thought we were enjoying an extra extra treat!"

I used to make a fellow I knew mad by saying there were as many Hamlets as there were actors to act Hamlet

My little books were beginnings—they were the ground into which I dropped the seed.

Everybody in Washington wanted to think well of Jackson—I with the rest—and we were inclined to the very

nothing from Lige Jackson punished him by making him walk the ten miles to Richmond while the others were

It always struck me in the War, how honest and direct the private soldiers were—how superior they were

Lee had great qualities his own but these were the greatest.

He had read Lüders' paper in last Saturday's American.

conciliate the howlers: Leaves of Grass has gone through a number of editions since those objections were

After Lennon was gone W. said: "Did you notice how he set his American love up against the English like

The next day when I looked for the letters they were gone.

W. spoke dismally of American maternity this evening.

.: "Why is it you have lately had me read so many things to you that you were already perfectly familiar

I remember when Swinburne at last turned against me, John Burroughs said he felt that things were coming

The north countries were always miracle countries to me, somehow.

One sentence, "In nothing is there more evolution than in the American mind," I have also used in company

phases of American literature, etc.

"That all great literature lent itself to the lips—that you were never so impressive as when rightly

He said that when he found his arguments were making no impression he resorted to your book and read

"I suppose Tom and Frank are at Atlantic City today? And the children? Ah! The dear dear children!

I was asked whether those verses were written for the book, or about yourself, and I said "no—they were

published in the magazine some time ago and were suggested by another writer."

I am very sorry that paragraph appeared as it did, or at all, as it might look as if I were not a friend

as follows: "I am very sorry that paragraph appeared as it did, or at all, as it might look as if I were

The "Carlyls" as the Scotch call them were a numerous race in this section.

They were a stern savage set, not to be trifled with. One old Scotchman said they were "bullies."

You would have a good time if you were to come.

Years ago—I was a small boy—we were on a ferry-boat together, sitting in front of the cabin.

am not writing from an unworthy spirit of self-assertion: but that I should feel shame for myself, were

The American Book Maker, it seems, has been printing something about me—a portrait—which Bonsall seems

Bonsall had written: "The American Book Maker prints a life-like picture of Walt Whitman, which may be

sometimes like a house afire, of their enthusiasms—socialistic, many of them, perhaps most of them, were—very

One thing we must remember: we were born in the political sense free—they were not: that creates an altogether

Did I never show you a fine letter I had from him while he was making his American trip? No?

We had also been looking forward to the pleasure of feeling that you were comfortably domiciled in the

desired cottage of your own, away from the stifling and noisy city, but your friends who worked to that

Gilchrist's talks with me about him were always charmed, touched, as with the contact of an unusual personality

—were not scattered about the room, if I didn't know every object and spot, I don't believe I could navigate

But I can have nothing I should like so well.I wish you were here now that the storms seem over.

Her views were very broad, she touched the widest range of themes—spoke informally, colloquially.

public justice to three people—three of the superber characters of my day or America's early days who were

One of them was Thomas Paine: Paine the chiefest of these: the other two were Elias Hicks and Fanny Wright

Most of the editors, in spite of this exhibit, were dead agin me—some even violently so: I ought to know

There were exceptions—maybe I should have turned this over to you as a batch of exceptions."

I asked W.: "What were the poems?"

You're getting in the habit of taking the best things right out of my mouth and saying them as if they were

Coates were in today? Well, they were.

American printing is all gloss, glare: the paper is bad, the ink is anemic—pale in the gills: makes me

There were three or four letters left but there didn't seem to be much of him left.

The North American Review. New York, Oct. 5, 1886. My dear Friend: The syndicate is dissolved. Mr.

Just wait a few days, however, and I will read it and see if it will not do for the North American.

In my opinion it makes a new era in American Literature, and is to stand out more and more prominently

, as time advances, as the distinctively American book.Most respectfully,S.

"I was glad to see a little notice of November Boughs," said W., "in the American Stationer: a little

All the letters were prepared letters—designed, mulled over, worked out and out.

Letters were events in those days. There's something peculiar in my notion about this book.

Now I read the letters.The North American Review, New York City, Oct. 20, 1885. Dear Mr.

James was himself sickly, I was always well: we were physically antithetical.

That these things were not always fixed in their right relations by a couple both of whom were extremely

I wish it were farther along.I have been using the spare hours when I have felt less weak and woe-begone

There were a couple of years in O'Connor's life when he had nothing to do—was looking for work (that

William often says of himself—did say it when we were together: 'I can read him through to the back coat

The sheets were pinned together. It was 9.45 when I left. Saturday, September 1, 1888.

The gap was found and the abstracted sheets were put back in their place. "Home again!"

I picked up an old piece of manuscript written on the reverse of a blue billhead of the City of Williamsburgh

I thought we were keeping it all so mum and yet the cat is out of the bag."

publication called Parodies (part 58: Vol. 5) put out by Reeves & Taylor, London—this number devoted to American

As I left to go W. gave me two letters tied in red string of which he said: "I think they were the start

Sunday, April 29, 1888.W. took a drive at eleven, forenoon, and came in at Harned's after we were done

We were gathered about him, he eating and drinking and talking.

if you were half as well prepared to die as I am you would be a happy man!'"

say is that he had no avenue of approach to the people; he lost his way in the jungle: the people were

not a beautiful abstraction—they were an ugly fact: he shrank from the people.

None of them were sold—practically none—perhaps one or two, perhaps not even that many.

I think the American theory would be, should be, must be, something different.

"The morals of the churches: they might be morals if they were not something else.

The spirit of the tariff is malevolent: it flies in the face of all American ideals: I hate it root and

He does not approach life as a man or as an American or as a lover or even as a hater but from a minister's

Again: "You can detach poems from the book and wonder why they were written.

I am weary and want rest, and I cannot rest in cities.

The grandest and truest American I know, accept the love of your son,Joaquin Miller.

W. spoke of "the nebulous South American republics which one day will melt in our North American sun.

But were not the old orthodoxies necessary? Would they still exist if they were not necessary?

Take that Methodist church we were talking about awhile ago—do you call that necessary?

W. said again: "In that narrow sense I am no American—count me out."

was quite pitiful—One thing was he could not talk very comfortably at any time, his throat and chest were

on it, "but," he says "I am not much of a player yet"—I was very anxious he should be saved and so were

He is one of the thousands of our unknown American young men in the ranks about whom there is no record

Poor dear son, though you were not my son, I felt to love you as a son, what short time I saw you, sick

All the songs were long ago sung.'

"Well—were you interested?" "Not much." "Why?" "I don't know why. She is too effusive."

Ought it not to be a duty, too, of—not the American public to recognize your gift to America as a writer

, but—the American Government to recognize your services, as of one who saved the lives, and lightened

the sufferings, of many American citizens?

"I never could have known how they were done, of course, as I have absolutely no conversancy with the

When we were through W. remarked: "I feel as if I was getting acquainted with a new world—I feel guilty—I

reminded W. that B. was now absent in Florence pursuing studies in connection with his own work in American

I think now is the time for archaeology to be exploited here anyhow—especially American archeaology.

Why not open up our own past—exploit the American contribution to this important science?

W. said: "His manners were stately, conventional—all right but all careful."

We none of us question that yours is the clearest, and sweetest, and fullest American voice.

I think there were twenty thousand things coming before him and at his time and since—things, men, illuminati—and

I met him there in that casual way—we had a good talk: we were at it probably half an hour.

Then he added: "Ministers are rarely friendly to me—perhaps are a little more tolerant than they were

W. discussed Stedman's American Poets again.

I met these brothers: they were both 'gentlemanly men'—and by the way I don't know any description that

wonderful experience—of a related but dissimilar experience—of an incident in which all the integers were

simple—were more directly related to life.

The priests—Protestant, Catholic, secular, I don't care which—don't study man as though they were themselves

men but as though they were themselves priests.