Reminiscent of Whitman

[Address given before Boston Branch of the
Walt Whitman Fellowship, January 21st]

            I have brought in with me to-night, and perhaps I will hand it around before I begin to speak, a copy of the first edition of Leaves of Grass which belonged to Henry Thoreau, and was given to me by his sister, Sophia, a few years before her death.  I do not know the history of the volume further than that; but I imagine it was either given to Thoreau by Whitman himself, or by Emerson.  It may be that Thoreau received this from Whitman himself.  The fly leaf, which the ignorant binder took out, contains Thoreau’s autograph, and there is also a little matter that came to me in it, which contains a line in Thoreau’s handwriting: “Please give this to Mrs. Thoreau.”

The reading of these letters which Mr. {Laurens} Maynard has brought to you to-night has revived in my memory several facts which were lying there concealed. The first letter—the one written from Boston in March, 1860—was dated but a few days before I first met Whitman.  I will speak presently of my acquaintance with his book, which was five years earlier.  But the first time of my seeing Whitman was during that visit to Boston, when he was printing his Boston edition of Leaves of Grass.  I knew his publishers, Thayer & Eldridge, very well.  They were young anti-slavery men who had started publishing in this neighborhood, and such was the success of their Life of Brown (Redpath’s) that they launched out as publishers with a good deal of confidence and with a result, pretty speedily, of failure.  But at this time they were in active business, and were very ready to take up any book which Mr. Redpath recommended.

It is perhaps known to some of this company, though probably not to many, that on the third or fourth of April, 1860—about five days after this letter of Whitman’s was written—I was arrested in Concord, taken out of my house, handcuffed by a party of men from Boston, headed by a United States marshal, who wished to carry me to Washington to testify in the case of John Brown.  I was taken out of the hands of these United States officers by the sheriff or deputy and brought before the court here.  The district attorney, their counsel at that time, was Charles Levi Woodbury. My counsel were the late Governor Andrew, Mr. Samuel Sewall, and my classmate, Robert Treat Paine. \\ sat in the old court house listening to their arguments, and as I sat there saw an extraordinary man sitting near the door, wearing a carpenters jacket, gray or blue—a very striking looking person. I Many friends of mine had gathered there under the impression that if the court refused to discharge me they would themselves take a hand in the business. By three or four o’clock in the afternoon (the first time I had ever been subjected to any process in court) the Chief Justice, old Judge Shaw, pronounced the decision of the court, which was, that this warrant on which I was arrested was addressed to McNair and was served by Carlton, and that under the law laid down by Broome in his “Legal Maxims” delegated power could not be delegated again. I forget exactly how the Chief Justice expressed his opinion. It signified little to me. I said, “All right. That sounds very well,” and just sat there. Wendell Phillips came over to me and said, “You are discharged. It is time for you to go.” I got up, bowed to the court, and left the room. My friends took me over to Cambridge and put me on the train for Concord.

A few days after I was in Boston and went round to the publishing office of Thayer & Eldridge, and there, sitting on the counter, wasfThis extraordinary person\I had seen in the court house. I was introduced to lifTn. He was Walt Whitman. My personal acquaintance began at that time. I had known a great deal about his book and about himself before, from my neighbors, Mr. Emerson, Mr. Thoreau and Mr. Alcott.

It was in the summer of 1855, I should suppose not later than the first of September (I think the book was published in July or August), that I kvas walking one day with Mr. Emerson. We were crossing a bridge over the Concord river, about a mile from Mr. Emerson’s house, when he began to tell me about this book, Leaves of Grass, which had been published in New York.  He asked me if I had seen it.  I said, “No!”  “Well,” he said, “you shall see it.”  I went hom with him and he gave me a copy of this first edition, bound in paper, and in our walk he gave me some description of it, saying: “It is a remarkable mixture of the Bhagvat Ghita and the New York Herald.”  I then, of course, took the book and read it, and was astonished, as everybody was, at the remarkable incongruities in it; it was unlike anything.  Mr. Emerson soon after that went to New York, and when he got back home, told me about his acquaintance with Whitman.  He said he went to New York and sought out Whitman, and Whitman came and dined with him at the hotel which he then frequented, the Astor House, and after dinner Whitman took him round to one or two of the engine houses ; for his particular friends then were the firemen, and he wanted to show Mr. Emerson what the firemen did at that time for their leisure. He also told me about Whitman’s spending so much time riding on the omnibuses in New York, up and down Broadway, sitting with the drivers and observing the city from that point of view.

My friend Ellery Channing, who is living with me, the other night, speaking of Whitman, said to me: “I was present when Mr. Emerson first saw his own letter of praise printed by Whitman.”  I asked, “What did Mr. Emerson say?”  He replied, “Nothing; but he was as angry as I ever saw him in my life.” That was the occasion of a certain change of mind in Mr. Emerson, not, however, with regard to the genius of Mr. Whitman.  His letter was a private letter and it had no business with the public, and Emerson should have been asked if there had been any wish to publish it or any part of it.  Instead of asking consent Whitman rushed into print with the letter.  That shocked Mr. Emerson’s sense of propriety, which was very acute, so he probably very seldom thought of Whitman after that without thinking, “That is the man who printed my private letter.”  His opinion of Whitman’s genius never changed, but he lost interest in the later poems.    When Drum-Taps came out, or soon after, I was very much struck with them and took the book down to Mr. Emerson’s house, where I was in the habit of going frequently, and asked him if he had seen it.  I think he said he had seen it but took no particular interest in it.  I asked, “Have you seen this poem?” and called his attention to the Lincoln poem, and to that very extraordinary poem in which the old colored woman appears, surveying Sherman’s army.  I either read them to him, or he read them; but he said, “I like the Leaves of Grass, but I do not see in these later poems what I saw in them.”  He never spoke with the slightest disrespect of Whitman.

You may remember that after Thoreau’s death ( he died in 1862) Mr. Emerson edited a collection of Thoreau’s letters and poems (I have since edited a more complete edition of the letters).  Soon after it appeared I was walking with him one day and he said to me: “When, in eulogizing Thoreau, I made that remark about three persons (the three persons, as you probably know, were John Brown, Joe Polis and Walt Whitman), and Sophia Thoreau heard what I said, she told me she did not think that her brother was so much interested in Whitman as I thought, and, in deference to her, in printing I left out that passage.  But I have lately been looking over the journals of Thoreau, and I am satisfied that I was right.  He did make that impression on Thoreau which I thought he made.

That introduces another little circumstance: During this first visit of Whitman in Boston, in 1860, it was the ish of Emerson and Thoreau to invite him to Concord. The  ladies   of  these  houses, Mrs. Emerson, Sophia Thoreau and Mrs. Alcott, declared  they  would  not have him in the house.  Afterwards Louisa Alcott was so much interested in Whitman,  that when I went to see him in Philadelphia in 1876 (while visiting the exposition there), she desired me to purchase for her a copy of his last edition.  And I did so, and brought it home to  her.  Mrs. Alcott was not living when Whitman finally visited Concord, though I think she had overcome her prejudices on the subject; and Sophia Thoreau was not living;  but Louisa Alcott was present at my house on the occasion that Whitman speaks of in his Specimen Days, when we discussed Thoreau, and we were invited the next day to Emerson’s house, where, as he says, he had a very pleasant conversation with Mrs. Emerson.  But still, there was a great feeling of prejudice in regard to Whitman. When I invited my neighbors to be present at this conference there was considerable censure on the part of the people of the town. They advised their friends, especially the young ladies, not to come.  Emerson came and Mr. Alcott and Louisa Alcott, as Whitman mentions in his account of the matter.

I have printed in my edition of Thoreau’s Familiar Letters the same passages that Emerson printed with regard to Whitman, and perhaps some that Emerson omitted, and you will find there in that volume, either in the letters or in my notes, some passages showing how strong was the impression Whitman produced upon Thoreau and Alcott. They went together to see him in Brooklyn.

Whitman was certainly a striking looking man, and would attract the attention of people in any city of the world.  I think Whitman was a little too well aware of his fine appearance.  There was a strong element of individuality mixed up with his personality, and he did not have occasion to experience what the Arkansas colonel did in walking up and down Broadway.  The colonel put on his military cloak with red facing, and walked up and down, and when he met his friend the major, in the evening, he said: “I am going to leave this town.  I walked up and down Broadway this morning and not a man looked at me, but when I am at home I am hell on Pea Ridge.”

When Whitman came to visit me in Concord, in 1881, he wore, as always in his later years, some white, soft colors and that long, white beard. His hair was perfectly white. He had a singular resemblance to Gerrit Smith, which I attributed to his Dutch ancestry, Smith being almost wholly Dutch.

Then Whitman’s manners were interesting. I fancy in his younger days, when he dined with Mr. Emerson at the Astor House and insisted on having a tin cup at table, that his manners were not so distinguished; but after he had been through the war and had seen more of life he certainly had very distinguished manners, so that anybody accustomed to the circles of the great would have been struck with them.  As Thomas Cholmondeley said of Bronson Alcott, Whitman “had the manners of a very great peer.”  He was independent in bearing anti had the composure of manner which always produces an impression on the people of Europe.  He was extremely friendly to all persons.   In Concord, on the morning of the Sunday spent with me, he drove with Miss Prestonia Mann, who was living in Concord for the summer, and had a fine pair of Arabian-looking horses.   She took him in her carriage, driving herself.  In the afternoon I took a carriage, and with Whitman, Mrs. Sanborn and some friend—Mr. Alcott, I think—we also took a drive around the town, and we were out an hour or two; and, finally, towards sunset (this was in September), we drove to my house.  We had been driven by a coachman because I wished to leave the carriage and show Whitman those places which I thought  he had not seen  in the morning, and it was more convenient to have some one drive this pair of horses.  We were helping Whitman out; his movements were slow, and we were about going into the house.  The rest of us had not thought about the driver.  I was in the habit of seeing him every day. Whitman turned to  him, with his magnificent manner, and said:  “My friend, I suppose I shall not see you again,” giving him his hand, and bidding him good-bye, which is, I suppose, what “a very great peer” would do, though it is not customary in this part of the world.

In   the   call  which Thoreau and Alcott made upon Whitman they found him  living with his mother and sister,  in great simplicity.  They were taken up to his bedroom, which was a small room, and there had their conversation  with  him!  They were  struck with the simple, affectionate relations which he seemed to have with everybody, and how proud his mother was of him!  Mr. Alcott called in the morning, and found he was not at  home; but his mother was  here, and Mr. Alcott stayed as long as he had time, for Mrs. Whitman, the mother, occupied a good deal of that time in telling Mr. Alcott  what a remarkable boy Walt had been, what a good son, etc., things that mothers generally say concerning such sons.

My own relations with Whitman, though always friendly, were not very close.  I corresponded with him but little.  When there was occasion to mention him or render any service to him, I did so, but I think I only saw him on those three occasions, possibly four: in Boston, in 1860, at the Court House, afterwards at the publishers; in 1876, at Camden, and in 1881, when he came to my house.  I had seen him in Boston at another time, and may have heard him read his account of the assassination of Lincoln, in Boston. Although I read his Leaves of Grass, I cannot say I have read very carefully his prose writings. I have read them more or less.  The extraordinary impression that his first book produced on a few persons was repeated when the English people came to know about him.  I printed some years ago, in the Atlantic Monthly, some letters of an English friend, Thomas Cholmondeley, and in one letter he speaks of having received from Thoreau a copy of Leaves of Grass.  He says: “I fail to find the gentleman in it.”  In 1859-60, before I had ever seen Whitman, a friend of mine, Edwin Morton, who was in England, and knew Cholmondeley, went down to Cholmondeley’s home in the town of Shrewsbury. Mrs. Cholmondeley, his mother, living at Hodnet, had married again, and Cholmondeley’s step-father was the Rev. Zachary Macaulay, a cousin of Lord Macaulay.  Cholmondeley told Morton: “Thoreau sent over to me your Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass, and I was greatly interested in it.  One day, after dinner, I undertook to read some pages of it to the Rev. Mr. Macaulay, and he said he would not listen to it, and if I went on reading he would throw it into the fire.”

As you well know, Whitman’s genius has received more full recognition in England than in this country partly because the English do not well understand the conditions in which it was written.  The most striking personal tribute to Whitman’s influence that I have read, I think, is by that remarkable writer, J. A. Symonds.  I have only recently read it; but he seems to ascribe to Whitman an effect on his own life and character and hopes, such as we commonly ascribe to the process called “regeneration.”  I do not know that any Americans have taken precisely that view.  Some of the younger generation may.  What was particularly impressive, I think, to Emerson, was the enormous reach of Whitman’s thought.  That shocking conception of poetical form which Whitman had, but which he sometimes departed from, always to the advantage of what he was saying, produced no favorable impression upon Emerson, who had a very accurate ear for verse or prose.  He was willing to regard Whitman as a prose writer, but did not take him seriously as a poet, and I am inclined to think the absence in Drum-Taps of that wide-reaching imagination of earlier poems in Leaves of Grass accounted for his failure to regard Drum-Taps with the same interest, though they came nearer to conformity to accepted poetical forms.  The curious fact that Whitman was wholly unlike most American writers was what Emerson saw.  Whitman did not impress Thoreau exactly so.

I find a great deal of affectation in Whitman’s poetry; a great deal that he borrowed; and a certain kind of egoism, as if he identified the universe with himself, and considered the course of the stars more important because they had passed through the mind of Whitman.

I showed these notes in the conservator about Julian Hawthorne to a friend who was a great friend to the elder Hawthorne and knew Julian as a boy.  I asked him: “What do you think of this?”  He replied: “In that speech at the Camden dinner Julian presented what may be called the opinion of courtesy, but he has now presented the critic’s opinion.”  Julian Hawthorne, however, knows a great deal too much to say what he has lately said about Whitman.

I was much struck in the Drum-Taps with the rhythmical movement of some of Whitman’s lines as resembling those in the choruses of the Greek tragedies.  I happened to meet one day in the train a gentleman that I never saw afterwards, old Uncle Sam Taylor of Andover.  I had just been reading Whitman, and I said, “I want you to observe what a similarity there is in some of these lines of Whitman to the Greek in such and such a tragedy.”  He was a great deal impressed by it.  He said, “I will look that up.”  Whitman’s rhythmical faculty is very peculiar.  It is sometimes of me most perfect description and then it seems to fail entirely.  He might have a strophe; he never had the antistrophe.

Frank B. Sanborn.