Part 2 (1/2)

He seeher order of man than the driver of the present horse-cars He usually had his prih expert ina very difficult hfare

”It was this kind of a man that so attracted Walt Whitside one of the up and down Broadway I often watched the poet and driver, as probably did many another New Yorker in those days

”I do not wonder as much now as I did in 1860 that a man like Walt Whitman became interested in these drivers He was not interested in the news of every-day life--the murders and accidents and political convulsions--but he was interested in strong types of huh to understand this kind of a man It seems to me now that we looked at Whitman simply as a kind of crank, if the word had then been invented His talk to us was chiefly of books, and the men rote them: especially of poetry, and what he considered poetry He never said much of the class whom he visited in our wards, after he had satisfied himself of the nature of the injury and of the prospect of recovery

”White at that time He was always dressed in a blue flannel coat and vest, with gray and baggy trousers He wore a woolen shi+rt, with a Byronic collar, low in the neck, without a cravat, as I reray, and he had a full beard and mustache of the same color His face and neck were bronzed by exposure to the sun and air He was large, and gave the iorous man He was scrupulously careful of his si the early inception of ”Leaves of Grass” he was a carpenter in Brooklyn, building and selling s people He frequently knocked off work to write his poems In his life Whit sort In this respect he was not typical of his countryency and strenuousness he reserved for his book He see, observing, absorbing, keeping aloof fro the most of the hour and the place in which he happened to be He was in no sense a typical literaryhis life in New York and Brooklyn, we see hi entirely outside the fashi+onable circles, the learned circles, the literary circles, the s to no set or club He is seenclasses,--drivers, boatmen, mechanics, printers,--and I suspect may often be found with publicans and sinners He is fond of the ferries and of the omnibuses He is a frequenter of the theatre and of the Italian opera

Alboniimpression upon him It is probably to her that he writes these lines:--

”Here take this gift, I was reserving it for soood old cause, the great idea, the progress and freedo rebel; But I see that what I was reserving belongs to you just as much as to any”

Elsewhere he refers to Alboni by name and speaks of her as

”The lustrousob Venus contralto, the bloo mother, Sister of loftiest Gods”

Soers evidently gave hiestions that were applicable to his own art

His study was out of doors He wrote on the street, on the ferry, at the seaside, in the fields, at the opera,--always fro at the moment, and alith his eye upon the fact He says he has read his ”Leaves” to himself in the open air, and tried them by the realities of life and nature about him Were they as real and alive as they?--this was the only question with him

At hoentle, patient, conciliatory, hbors seek his advice He is cool, deliberate, impartial A marked trait is his indifference to money matters; his people are often troubled because he lets opportunities to make money pass by When his ”Leaves” appear, his family are puzzled, do not knohat to make of it His mother thinks that, if ”Hiawatha” is poetry, may be Walt's book is, too He never counsels with any one, and is utterly indifferent as to what peopleand punctual man, is always a little late; not an early riser, not prompt at dinner; always has ample time, and will not be hurried; the business Gods do not receive his horay at thirty, and is said to have had a look of age in youth, as he had a look of youth in age He has few books, cares little for sport, never uses a gun; has no bad habits; has no entanglee It is said that during his earliest years of e of nineteen he edited ”The Long Islander,” published at Huntington A recent visitor to these early haunts of Whitathered some reminiscences of him at this date:--

”Amid the deep revery of nature, on that ton, there to meet the few, the very few, survivors who recall Walt's first appearance in the literary world as the editor of 'The Long Islander,' nigh sixty years ago (1838) Two of these forefathers of the hamlet clearly re in strength, careless of time and the world, ofto gather round his, and tell them stories and read them poetry, his own and others'

That of his own he called his 'Yawps,' a hich he afterwards enerous to a fault, glorying in youth, negligent of his affairs, issuing 'The Long Islander' at random intervals,--once a week, once in teeks, once in three,--until its financial backers lost faith and hope and turned him out, and with him the whole office corps; for Walt himself was editor, publisher, compositor, pressman, and printer's devil, all in one”

II

Few men were so deeply impressed by our Civil War as was Whitman It aroused all his patriotism, all his syreat contemporary events and scenes He was first drawn to the seat of war on behalf of his brother, Lieutenant-Colonel George W Whit This was in the fall of 1862 This brought him in contact with the sick and wounded soldiers, and henceforth, as long as the war lasts and longer, he devoted his ti to theton he supported himself by correspondence with Northern newspapers, mainly with the ”New York Times” These letters, as well as the weekly letters to histhe sa record

They contain such revelations of hi, that I shall here quote freely fro extract is fro the third or fourth day after the battle of Decee brick mansion on the banks of the Rappahannock, i It is used as a hospital since the battle, and seems to have received only the worst cases Out of doors, at the foot of a tree, within ten yards of the front of the house, I notice a heap of as, arms, hands, etc, about a load for a one-horse cart Several dead bodies lie near, each covered with its brooolen blanket In the door-yard, toward the river, are fresh graves, mostly of officers, their names on pieces of barrel-staves, or broken board, stuck in the dirt (Most of these bodies were subsequently taken up and transported North to their friends)

”The house is quite crowded, everything ih, but I have no doubt the best that can be done; all the wounds pretty bad, sohtful, the men in their old clothes, unclean and bloody Some of the wounded are rebel officers, prisoners One, a Mississippian,--a captain,--hit badly in leg, I talked with soave hiton, with leg ah the roo

I had nothing to give at that visit, but wrote a few letters to folks home, mothers, etc Also talked to three or four who see it”

”Deceade, and division hospitals somewhat Few at home realize that these areon the ground, lucky if their blanket is spread on a layer of pine or hes, or soround It is pretty cold I go around froood, but I cannot leave thester holds on to me convulsively, and I do what I can for him; at any rate, stop with him and sit near him for hours, if he wishes it

”Besides the hospitals, I also go occasionally on long tours through the ca the groups around the fires, in their shebang enclosures of bushes I soon get acquainted anywhere in camp, with officers or o down on picket with the regih the winter, he returns to Washi+ngton, where the wounded and sick have mainly been concentrated The Capital city, truly, is now one huge hospital; and there Whitman establishes himself, and thenceforward, for several years, has but one daily and nightly avocation

He alludes to writing letters by the bedside, and says:--

”I do a good deal of this, of course, writing all kinds, including love-letters Many sick and wounded soldiers have not written home to parents, brothers, sisters, and even wives, for one reason or another, for a long, long tiet paper and envelopes; , because they dread to worry the folks at home,--the facts about thee the limpse of the scenes after Chancellorsville:--