7.45 P. M. Saw as I approached the house that the light was low in W.'s room—indicating that he was not up—arousing forebodings in me. Ed told me W. had not been so well. W. lying on his bed. Heard me enter. "Aha! it 's Horace!"—extending his hand without rising. How was he? "Bad! bad!" he said: "I spent a horrible night: stayed awake, suffered much pain, was restless: I am little better now." Added: "It seems as though the pain all concentrated in the urinary organs—in the kidneys: I was up often: there was no relief." Said he had "slipped back again" from yesterday. Then he stopped talking about his illness. "What of Germantown? Who did you see there? What did Dr. Brinton say? And I suppose you met Clifford?" As to Brinton's address: "It is a sublime subject: I think we may very well use that word there." In

     Got up heavily, I helping him: stood there with his blue gown on, tall, massive: turned back my way: went to the bed alone, saying as he stood there: "Ah! my boy! who can tell the sweetness, the comfort, the peace, the happiness, I have now, for knowing that whatever becomes of me, the book is safe: we have the book safe—both books! Doubtful long ago of one, we have achieved both: in its way that is a triumph indeed." He had "achieved his great wish": he had "the two volumes in one—the collectivity: I have desired it always: it is done." Here he turned, took up his cane, put his left arm out for me, going painfully to the chair opposite, saying on the way: "Whether Dr. Osler said it because he believed it, because he thought he should say it—whether for some other reason—I do not know, but to me his dismissal of this thing as trivial is wrong, wrong—far wrong: to me it seems rather that an end is near." Then, as he reached the chair: "The Doctor might promise respite, pause, that: but is this not bad enough as it is? Who would want more of this—have this aggravated, prolonged?" No complaint—rather greater amiability: desiring to keep on a right footing with events. "Ah!" he said after he sat down: "the days are slow: the

     I showed him a copy of the complete book to-day stitched and bound by Oldach—a temporary cover for the fifty copies. Instead of a paper binder had put on a board back: but on the edge and at the corners the book was finished with green cloth and marbleized paper to represent leafage. W. accepted the errors as "inspiration." He regards Curtz's label, pasted on the edge of the book, curiously and humorously. "It is queer, don't you think?—like Curtz: looks as if he had taken an axe and gone out into the woods—hewn it out of the rough, the axe not very sharp, either. I should not commend it as a deliberate piece of work: but it is like Curtz—like me, too: besides, it seems to fit well in its place there." Then he proceeded: "Thank Oldach for it: thank him for the mistake: tell him Walt Whitman more than likes it." He turned the book over and over: "Done at last!" he said: made various little comments: finally addressed me: "Did you notice in Doctor's letter that he says he looks for us to give the book a characteristic cover? I wonder if we will?" Here he paused. Then: "We must wait till it is done before we can say it is well done." Then he gave me a letter—Bucke's of the 28th—and inquired: "Did you write to Moulton to-day?" I had done so. He was perfectly satisfied. Handed me a specimen page of Moulton's Magazine. "You may wish to look it over: it shows the way he aims to do it." I read his letter of 29th from Bucke. Much about the meter. A paragraph devoted to Pardee, which W. insisted on hearing in full. "Poor Pardee!" he exclaimed: "and he was such a gentle man: gentle in all ways: I met him: he was physically rather small: pleasing, bright: evidently a man of force." He commented on the meter business: "Willie Gurd is much like Ed in there—characteristically Scotch: a natural inventor: his mind always ran

     Back to Bucke. He reminded me: "I have said, you must some day take a trip up to London: see them: we have been talking about them so often: see Bucke in his home: the house: the acres surrounding: the hedges (what we call hedges here) half the thickness of this room: the

     He spoke of his rare enjoyment of those days in London. "I liked Doctor—loved Doctor: his folks, the staff, inmates, all of them: liked, too, the men who had come to see him while I was there. He had them come while I was there: Englishmen, most of them." I spoke of Bucke's catholic nature. W.: "You are quite right: he has n't in him the first sign of the dogmatism we are led to expect in an Englishman: yet he is English: I may say, too, of those others—I found in none an objectionable assertiveness: Doctor himself is the most modest of men: a more modest

     W. asked: "Do you understand that the swallow poem was written by Dowden?" "Not necessarily." "I have wondered: I like it much: it has real kinks to it—is far and away above the ordinary rhyming of the nature singers." Then again: "Dowden has always shown me that same delicate consideration; doing enough, never overdoing: loving enough, never overloving; saying enough, never overtalking: he just seems to maintain a fine balance: judicial—looking both sides, not hurrying to decisions. I know you may say I don't always talk like this: that I love O'Connor for doing exactly the opposite thing: so I do: I like William to do what he does, I like Dowden for doing what he must do: they are different men—they are two sides: one is important, the other is important." I said: "You speak of William and Dowden: I don't think that the difference between them is the difference between the dynamic and the static—do you? Bucke says William