Elizabeth Leavitt Keller

“ During Captain Fritzinger's nine years of blindness, and through all his long sickness, Mary's ingrained habit of devotion to one person made her somewhat forgetful of others; and dearly as she loved the boys who called her mother, their happiness was too often sacrificed to their father's infirmities. Strange—and yet not strange, perhaps—that one whose childhood had been an unbroken martyrdom, should now be not always conscious of the needs of a new generation. ”

“ I never saw a bigger one in my life. "We all sleep in it," said the boy.
I know, Walt Whitman, you are shrugging your shoulders, smiling indifferently. What does it matter to you who is sleeping now in the room where you died, who is living now in the house where you lived, loved and sang? But my heart cramped and ached. The poverty, the bad odor, the utter irreverence! This Italian pays $10 a month rent. The neighborhood is run down, and the property could be easily bought for a few thousand dollars. Is this how the greatest nation honors its greatest literary genius? ”

“ Warren knew that the old man had money, that right was on the wood-dealer's side, and he would not follow his mother's way of putting people off—telling them that Mr. Whitman was too miserable to be troubled, asking for an extension of time, etc., then paying the bill herself and lacking the courage to present the receipt. No, "Warry" would approach the subject in such an original fashion and hand the bill to his patient in such an offhand way that it would appeal to him directly, and as a rule the money was counted out with a quiet chuckle. ”

“ Davis had much sympathy for him while the dreary mood lasted, and in many ways endeavored to dispel it. During the inclement weather she found in her cheery canary bird a valued assistant, and knowing the old man's fondness for the little fellow, she would at times stealthily place the cage in his room, "and let the sun shine out for a moment, this bird would flood the room with trills of melody." (The canary outlived Mr. Whitman, and through his long sickness, lasting from the summer of 1888 to the spring of 1892, it was always a welcome visitor in his room.) ”

“ Surely the tide turned when this good woman ceased to be an independent being and became the strong prop on which he leaned; a shield between him and all annoyances.
While perplexed with settling the house, and having no time to go over the same ground twice, although the condition of the parlors troubled her, Mrs. Davis had let them go, awaiting a favorable time to clean and regulate them thoroughly. This opportunity came in the summer, during the first of Mr. Whitman's temporary absences. ”

“ Davis's surprise he did not hesitate to entertain visitors in his sleeping room if they arrived while he was there, and many of them would remain until "the wee sma' hours." There was a charm in fellowship with him, and ill and lethargic as he had grown, it was said: "Walt Whitman's friends rarely visited him without having a good laugh over something or other"; and "gifted with a clear resonant voice, the poet often gratifies his friends as he sits by a blazing wood fire—which is his delight—singing old-fashioned songs." ”

“ Whitman's friends, especially his literary executors, were more than he could combat. But with all outward signs of contentment, the confinement soon left visible marks upon him; a second pair of rosy cheeks faded, and from handling the icy wood in the cellar a lasting cold was contracted.
He purchased a writing desk—one that fitted the niche between the chimney and the window in the anteroom—and here he wrote, studied and read when not actively employed; always busy, always within call. When the monotony and confinement became too pressing, he purchased a violin and took music lessons. ”

“ The longer Whitman is dead the better he will be known. He seems to me the typical American, the typical modern, the source and centre of a new, spiritual aspiration, saner and manlier than any heretofore. Whitman thought that man has within him the element of the Divine, and that this element was capable of indefinite growth and expansion. ”

“ Bonsall and myself had not much use for Whitman, who stabbed his friends in the back at the first opportunity."
"Hurt vanity," I thought. How small this man Kettler seemed to me with his petty grievances. Forty years have passed and he couldn't forget your refusal of a poem.
"But what is the worst," Mr. Kettler continued, "Whitman has spoiled the life of Horace Traubel. What an excellent young man he used to be, the son of an honored, upright citizen. Traubel got obsessed with Whitman's greatness. He devoted his whole life to Whitman. He took Whitman's morals for his own standard." ”

“ Walt Whitman and Mrs. Davis were not personally acquainted. To be sure, he had seen her innumerable times leading Captain Fritzinger past his brother's house, but he had never spoken to her. As for her, the poor old man had long been a secret pensioner upon her tender heart, drawing a full bounty of pity therefrom. ”

“ The ready sale of Frank was a great mortification to Mrs. Davis, and she felt it [Pg 53] keenly; the more so as the pony had been, in a measure, the outcome of her suggestion.
Although the horse and carriage were "a source of infinite joy and satisfaction to Mr. Whitman, and aided him to pass three years of his invalid life in comparative ease, giving him touches of life and air and scenery otherwise impossible," they were a constant expense and vexation to others.
He seldom went for a drive alone, and as a rule chose as his companion one of the many young men of his acquaintance. ”

“ ON the morrow the little parlors were again cleared—this time to make room for a coffin—and Walt Whitman, at last free from pain, was brought downstairs. An artist was in waiting to take a cast of his face, and later a post-mortem was held. Mrs. Davis thought the latter something dreadful, believing as she did that it was either prompted by curiosity or was done simply for the sake of a newspaper article. When all preliminaries were over, the poet, clothed in his accustomed style, was laid in his coffin. ”

“ For many years his income from all sources has not exceeded an average of two hundred dollars, which to a person in his helpless condition goes but a little way even in supplying the roughest and commonest of food and care." And again: "His wants are not many, for he lives simply from necessity and choice; but in his old age and constantly [Pg 127] failing health, he needs that comfort and attendance which he has not the means to procure."
The poet himself was neither discontented nor dull. As his infirmities brought new privations, he bowed to the inevitable. ”

“ The old man with his basket of literature upon his arm, plodding his way through the streets of Camden and Philadelphia, had long been a familiar sight, and now with slow sales and lack of former comforts it was doubly hard on him. ”

“ While nursing her patient, Walt Whitman, during his last illness, she learnt much about his personality and home life, and much also about his unselfish friend and housekeeper, Mrs. Davis. The desire to tell the truth about the whole case—so often misunderstood or distorted—grew stronger with the passing years, and finally Mrs. Keller entered an old ladies' home in her own city, where she would have leisure to carry out her design. ”

“ A thousand times she slipped out quietly to the little side gutter and ran (she always ran) to procure a loaf of bread, an extra supply of butter, crackers or cheese. The home-made supplies rarely gave out, as she provided bountifully for all. Mr. Whitman had good reason for going on to say, as he did: "I am well pleased with my housekeeper. She does better for me than a whole retinue of pompous bothering waiters. ”

“ Occasional excursions to the studio in front for memory sketches seemed to be serving me all right."
Up to this time Mrs. Davis had had undisputed possession of the yard, and this constant running back and forth was almost unendurable to her. For the excursions were not confined to the sculptor; all comers, casual or constant visitors, old friends and strangers, even ordinary passers-by—following the lead of others—deliberately took the right of way through the hall and kitchen, until it might as well have been a public passage from street to yard. ”

“ A poet? I dare say that there are hundreds of magazine writers to-day as there were during his lifetime, who write just as good verse as he did. And his prose is abominable. His writings are not fit to be read in a respectable home. They corrupt the mind and are dangerous to the morals. We knew him well, we saw him daily and his disgraceful way of living was open town talk.
[Pg 197]
"I was a newspaper man and associated with the old Camden Post at the time of Bonsall, when Whitman used to come to see us almost daily. Bonsall used to be a friend of his and did him a great many good turns. ”

“ Some have considered him a cunning man; all agree that he was a remarkable judge of [Pg 16] character. Understanding this woman as he did,—as he must have done,—had he resolved to have her devote herself to him? This question can never be truthfully answered, but whether with premeditation or not, he certainly had gained a great influence over her.
Although comparatively comfortable in his new home now, he did not discontinue his accustomed morning visits, and as he persisted in his old delinquencies he completely upset the routine of Mrs. Davis's daily life and work. ”

“ Whitman had reached the age of seventy-two, his last birthday (as it proved) was celebrated by a dinner given in his own home. This arrangement was adopted as the only means of ensuring his presence, and the gathering was the final social event in that little house.
The managing committee was composed of young men, most of whom knew nothing of the limited dimensions of the place, and had not reflected upon the incongruity of their undertaking; nor, until the plans were all made, arrangements nearly completed and the invitations issued, was Mrs. Davis told what was to take place. ”

“ The good doctors marvelled that you could have carried on respiration for so long a time with the [Pg 205] limited amount of useful lung tissue. They ascribed it largely to that indomitable energy "which was so characteristic of everything pertaining to the life of Walt Whitman." They said in their official report that any other man would have died much earlier with one-half of the pathological changes which existed in your body.
In the late afternoon while the sun was setting over an ideal spring day, I walked out to the Harleigh Cemetery, where you built for yourself that magnificent tomb. ”

“ Whitman, in truth, have an accurate or an undeveloped knowledge of the cost of living?
Eddie Wilkins writes: "Oh, he knows the value of money, and is very careful with his own."
His benevolence to the sick and wounded soldiers during a great part of the civil war is an old and often repeated story, but in this he was to a great extent the almoner of others. His self-sacrificing labors as a volunteer visiting nurse were his own free-will offering, and from them came his long years of suffering, for his early paralysis was the result of these exhaustive and unremitted efforts. ”

“ Davis had learned to realize that into all lives there comes a time when self has the right of consideration, she could have avoided further complications. But the early precepts were too deeply implanted, and before she had left the Mickle Street house a selfish uninteresting woman had in some insidious way fastened upon her. ”

“ The mere suggestion was the extreme of cruelty, for the sick man, although a little better at present, was too low for any change, especially one that would touch him so closely. Dr. Bucke gave her his word that he would be personally responsible for all she had spent, and for proper payment for her services as housekeeper both in the past and the future; he told her that her work would be lightened [Pg 106] immeasurably, as a regular nurse was to be engaged; and that in case Mr. Whitman should die before matters were settled, her interests should be carefully looked after. ”

“ XV THE LAST BIRTHDAY PARTY "There was one more birthday dinner celebrated with his friends in the Mickle Street house on May 31, 1891. Whitman was seventy-two. That privacy, which is the normal privilege of old age, was one of the kinds of happiness which he didn't experience."—Bliss Perry. ”

“ Warren was indeed a blessing, not only to the patient, but to his mother, for he was always ready to assist her and to help out in times of need. But, better than all, he soon acquired a way of quietly managing the "good gray poet" that no other living mortal ever attained. When it was decided that massage would benefit Mr. Whitman, he took a course in a Philadelphia hospital and became a professional masseur, as well as wood-sawyer and amateur carpenter. ”

“ She also went with him to places of business in Camden and Philadelphia, at which times he depended upon her alone, both going and coming back. The task of walking with him was doubly burdensome when the roads were rough and uneven, or slippery with snow and ice, which caused him to cling to her arm with a grip of iron. He had lost strength in his lower limbs, but gained it in the upper, as Mary often realized, though Mr. Whitman was unaware of the severity of the pressure. ”