Such was the house to which Mary Davis had now come, and where through the strange, busy days of the next seven years she was destined to be Walt Whitman's indispensable "housekeeper, nurse and friend"--or, from the outsider's point of view, his "single attendant." The spring of 1885 was far advanced before things were fairly in running order, for from the first there had been no intermission in the poet's erratic mode of living, and Mrs. Davis had been obliged to devote much time to his personal wants. Somehow he had a way of demanding attention which she found it impossible to resist. Truly she had been hampered on all sides, this faithful Martha-Mary; so many things to be seen to, so many things to handle and rehandle and change about before an established place for them could be found; the strenuous cleaning, for the former tenants had left the place extremely dirty; and the pondering over repairs, and deciding which were absolutely essential and unpostponable, and which could be put off for a little while longer. She first carpeted, furnished and settled the parlors, intending the back one as the sleeping room for her young charge, until her marriage in the fall, when it could be used as a spare room. But Mr. Whitman had different intentions, for he at once appropriated both rooms, and would not allow the doors separating them to be closed. One of the front windows became his favorite sitting place, and here he wrote, read his papers and sat while entertaining his friends. He was delighted with these rooms, and in them he enjoyed himself to his heart's content: first in getting things into disorder at once, and then in keeping them so. The back room, which became kitchen, dining room and sitting room combined, was so compactly filled that many people remarked its close resemblance to the cabin of a ship, in the way of convenience as compared with space. It was lighted by one window, and over the ingrain carpet a strip of stair carpeting made a pathway from the hall to the outer door. On the sitting room side were a lounge, sewing machine, two rocking chairs, a stand and some small pieces of furniture; on the other was a dining table against the wall, one leaf extended and always set, with the dining chairs pushed under it when not in use; the range--a veritable giant--standing in place of the dwarf it had ousted; a sink with cubby-hole below, crowded to overflowing with pots and kettles, and shelves above loaded with dishes while their enclosing doors were closely hung with kitchen utensils. As the lower shelf only could be reached by hand, a stool (a chair that had lost its back) was kept under a projection of the range. The shed, where Mr. Whitman's stove was set up, was packed with household goods and chattels, classified and stored ready for momentary use, and around the walls were suspended the extra chairs.