America to Old-World Bards
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| A reminiscence from reading Walter Scott |
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leaf 1 verso |
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leaf 2 recto |
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The
The
[Am?]
[qu?]
imported
ancient
ballad reciting, ending |
| Once, America, gazing
I gazing
toward thee, ^
Mother of all,
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| Musing, seeking as ever the themes of thee, |
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Thank
^
well
for me, thou saidst, before thou goest
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| the old bards
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Speak
Name out
the word
for me acknowledging
each
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ancient
past gone
singe
rs.
r.
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I too receive them with perfect hospitality.
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| Well-pleased, accepting all, ^
curiously prepared for, |
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leaf 2 verso |
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leaf 3 recto |
(Of many de
p
b
ts incalculable |
| Haply the ^
New World's chiefest debts
debt
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| is to past poets
? poems
.) |
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leaf 3 verso |
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leaf 4 recto |
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Unwittingly for thee
^
Far back Preluding thee, America
^
America,
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| First Egyp chants, Egyptian priests and those of |
| Ethiopia |
| The Hindu epics, the Grecian,
the Chinese, and
the
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| Persian, |
| The Biblic books and prophets, the beauteous
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| deep idylls of the Nazarene, |
| The Iliad, Odyssey, ^
plots, doings, wanderings of Eneas, |
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Hesiod Eschylus, Sophocles, Merlin, Arthur, |
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leaf 4 verso |
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leaf 5 recto |
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These as a mighty
great
As some great shadowy
group, ^
gathering around
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[paper glued]
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Launching, long-darting,
Darting
m
a
their
mighty |
| many
crowding
masterful eyes ^
forward at thee |
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Thee
Thou
with ^
as now
thy ben
thy
thy bending
head [an?]
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| neck and head |
with courteous hand & wor
k
d
word
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[paper glued]
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[paus?]
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| pausing
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Thee
Thou,
as pausing for a moment, ^
bending thine
drop'st thine
eyes
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| observing
on
them
^
the past
, enterest
ing
at
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| thy entrance-porch. |
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Preluding thee America
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Date
- This manuscript was probably composed in autumn, 1890 as is suggested by the postmarks on the envelopes on which it is written. The order of the manuscript leaves has been derived from the published poem.
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Editorial note
- This poem was revised and published under the title "Old Chants," first in the New York Truth, March 19, 1891.
- The leaves that comprise this manuscript are five opened-up envelopes and one cancelled letter written to Whitman from J. Harry Schneller, Jr. The verso envelopes and letter are all dated September through October, 1890.
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Location
- America to Old-World Bards | The Charles E. Feinberg Collection of the Papers of Walt Whitman, 1839-1919, Library of Congress, Washington, DC..
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Whitman Archive ID
- loc.00047
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