infested by reptiles, resounding with the bellow of the alligator, the sad noises of the night-owl and the wild-cat, and the whirr of the rattlesnake; The mocking-bird, the American mimic, singing all the forenoon--singing through the moon-lit night, The humming-bird, the wild-turkey, the raccoon, the opossum; A Tennessee corn-field--the tall, graceful, long-leaved corn--slender, flapping, bright green, with tassels--with beautiful ears, each well-sheathed in its husk; An Arkansas prairie--a sleeping lake, or still bayou. O my heart! O tender and fierce pangs--I can stand them not--I will depart! O to be a Virginian, where I grew up! O to be a Carolinian! O longings irrepressible! O I will go back to old Tennessee, and never wander more! [Footnote 1: These expressions cannot be understood in a literal sense, for Whitman was born, not in the South, but in the State of New York. The precise sense to be attached to them may be open to some difference of opinion.] _APPEARANCES._ Of the terrible doubt of appearances, Of the uncertainty after all--that we may be deluded, That maybe reliance and hope are but speculations after all, That maybe identity beyond the grave is a beautiful fable only, Maybe the things I perceive--the animals, plants, men, hills, shining and flowing waters, The skies of day and night--colours, densities, forms--Maybe these are (as doubtless they are) only apparitions, and the real something has yet to be known; (How often they dart out of themselves, as if to confound me and mock me! How often I think neither I know, nor any man knows, aught of them!) Maybe seeming to me what they are (as doubtless they indeed but seem) as from my present point of view--And might prove (as of course they would) naught of what they appear, or naught anyhow, from entirely changed points of view; --To me, these, and the like of these, are curiously answered by my lovers, my dear friends. When he whom I love travels with me, or sits a long while holding me by the hand, When the subtle air, the impalpable, the sense that words and reason hold not, surround us and pervade us, Then I am charged with untold and untellable wisdom--I am silent--I require nothing further, I cannot answer the question of appearances, or that of identity beyond the grave; But I walk or sit indifferent--I am satisfied, He ahold of my hand has completely satisfied me. _THE FRIEND._