Sunny & cold & dry to-day—(most yet this winter)—I keep on much the same—probably slowly certainly ebbing—fairly buoyant spirits—rare egg & tea & bread for breakfast—good bowel action—Shall probably have a poemet (8 or 9 lines) in Feb. Century—Shall send it you in slip, soon as out—Stead has sent me his "Review of Reviews" f'm London—shall I send it to you? Horace has it now—
I have written to Mrs. Costelloe—Alys comes quite regularly—R[obert] P[earsall] S[mith] is well—Logan writes—am sitting here dully enough—stupid—no exhilaration—no massage or wheel-chair to day—my nurse has disappear'd for the day—now 3½ oclock—If I had a good hospital, well conducted—some good nurse—to retreat to for good I sometimes think it w'd be best for me—I shall probably get worse, & may linger along yet some time—of course I know that death has struck me & it is only a matter of time, but may be quite a time yet—But I must get off this line—don't know why I got on it—but having written I will let it remain—enclosed (I have just come across it & I tho't I w'd send it to you) is Sylvanus Baxter's Pension Proposition two years ago—Peremptorily declined by me—but for all that & against my own decision put before the U S H[ouse of] R[epresentatives] pension committee at Washington & passed, (did I send you the U S H R Committee report?)—but not definitively pass'd by Congress—Perhaps I had better tell you, dear Maurice, that the money or income question is the one that least bothers me—I have enough to last. This is a sort of crazy letter but I will let it go—
Walt Whitmanfinish'd toward 4 P M—all right—