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Show HOW GREAT MEN MAKE LOVE AS REVEALED BY THEIR LOVE LETTERS By JOSEPH KAYE C by Wbcir Syndicate, loci WALT WHITMAN AND ANNE GILCHRIST ANNE GILCHRIST was a passionate passion-ate admirer of Walt Whitman, the poet and the man; she was free; she whs the woman he admired above any other yet they were fated to remain apart, for Walt Whitman had given Ids heart to another and It remained In that other's possession even after she hail married some one else. Mrs. Gilchrist was an English writer whose husband had died when she was thirty-three and left her with four children. chil-dren. Eight years later she read the newly published book of Whitman's first poems, "Leaves of Grass." It was a revelation to her and made her a devoted Whitman disciple. Whitman was badly in need of such friends. His book, which he had Bet up with his own hands he was a printer among other things because he could not find a publisher for It, was universally abused and ridiculed. His unconventional metrical style and his freedom in discussing social and moral subjects both astonished and shocked readers and critics and a friendly word for his work was a holiday holi-day for the poet. During the Civil war, Whitman had served as a volunteer nurse, and when It was over, he found he had ruined his health. Thereafter, he was partly an Invalid In his home at Camden. N. J. Mrs. Gilchrist, to be near the man she loved in his affliction, came to America with her children and lived In Philadelphia and then In New York. Personal acquaintance caused no disillusionment disil-lusionment and their platonic love continued con-tinued as before. Mrs. Gilchrist had to leave America to educate her daughter In Europe and Whitman never saw her again. She died in England in 1SS5. The following Is the third letter In the series Mrs. Gilchrist wrote to Whitman : "I wrote yon a letter of th Cth of September and would fain know whether It has reached your hand. If It has not I will write its contents again quickly to you If It has I will await your time with courage and with patience for an answer; but spare me the needless suffering of uncertainty uncer-tainty on this point and let me have one line, one word of assurance that I am no longer hidden from yon by a thick cloud I from thee, thou from me ; for I have never set eyes upon thee. All the Atlantic flowing between be-tween us, yet cleave closer than these that stand nearest around thee lov I the day and night last thoughts, fir thoughts, my soul's passionate yearning yearn-ing toward thy divine soul, every hour, every deed and thought my lore for my children, my hopes, my aspirations for them, all taking new shape, new height, through this great love. My soul has staked all upon It. In dull, dark moods when I cannot, as It were, see thee, still, still always a dumb, blind yearning toward thee still It comforts me to touch, to press to me the beloved books like a child holding hold-ing some hand in the dark it knows not whose but knows it -enough knows it Is a dear, strong, comforting hand. Do not say I am forward, or that I lack pride because I tell this : love to thee who never have sought or made a sign of desiring to seek me. Oh, for all that, this love is my pride, my glory. . . ." |