Poets, American -- 19th century -- Biography; Whitman, Walt, 1819-1892
_Good-bye and Hail_ = _Good-bye and Hail, W. W._, 1892.
_In re_ = _In re W. W._, 1893.
Johnston = Dr. J. Johnston's _Notes of a Visit to W. W._, 1890.
Kennedy = W. S. Kennedy's _Reminiscences of W. W._, 1896.
_L. of G._ = _Leaves of Grass_, complete edition of 1897: followed by
numerals in brackets, edition of that year.
_Mem. Hist. N.Y._ = J. G. Wilson's _Memorial History of New York_.
Roosevelt = T. Roosevelt's _New York_, 1891.
Symonds = J. A. Symonds's _W. W.: A Study_, 1893.
_Wound-Dresser_ = _The W. D., Letters of W. W. to his Mother_, 1898.
_Whit. Fellowship_ = _Whitman Fellowship Papers_, Philadelphia, 1894.
MANUSCRIPTS.
MSS. Berenson = Letters in possession of Mrs. Bernard Berenson.
MSS. Berenson (_a_) = Reminiscences contributed to this volume.
MSS. Carpenter = Letters in possession of E. Carpenter.
MSS. Diary = A Diary (1876-1887) in possession of H. Traubel.
MSS. Harned = Papers in possession of T. B. Harned.
MSS. Johnston = Papers in possession of J. H. Johnston, New York.
MSS. Traubel = Papers in possession of H. Traubel.
MSS. Wallace = J. W. Wallace's Diary of a Visit to W. W. in 1891.
INTRODUCTION
WHITMAN'S AMERICA
The men of old declared that the lands of adventure lay in the West,
for they were bold to follow the course of the sun; and to this day the
bold do not look back to seek romance behind them in the East.
Whether this be the whole truth or no, such is the notion that
comes upon the wind when, journeying westward in mid-Atlantic, you
begin to know the faces on ship-board, and to understand what it is
that is in their eyes. Strange eyes and foreign faces have these
voyagers--dwellers upon Mediterranean shores, peasants from the borders
of the Baltic, or dumb inhabitants of the vast eastern plains, huddled
now together in the ship. But in them is a hope which triumphs over
the misery of the present as it has survived the misery of the past,
and to-day that hope has a name, and is America. For America is indeed
the hope of the forlorn and disinherited in every land to whom a hope
remains. From the ends of the earth they set out, and separated from
one another by every barrier of race and language, meet here upon the
ocean, having nothing in common but this hope, this dream which will
yet weld them together into a new people. For the comfortable dreamer
there is Italy and the Past, but for many millions of the common
people of Europe and of Italy herself--and the common people too have
their dream--America, the land of the Future, is the Kingdom of Romance.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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