


Forgive the rhymes! I have tried, but cannot wield your weapons. I have sent this to 'Scribner' but I don't suppose they'll take it. I have just been reading an essay on 'Walt Whitman' in Scribner, which, beautifully written as it is, rather reminds me of that proverbial representation of Hamlet, with the part of Hamlet left out. The supreme value of your works, to me, is that they have given me unspeakable religious certitude and confidence, have opened my eyes to the realities within and around me, and made me see in them something far grander and more assuring than any traditional dogmas. And this work I think no poet has hitherto approached, though the great metaphysicians have opened the path.—I rather suspect from the essay that Stedman is an orthodox Christian? His paragraph on the "Children of Adam" seems to me to show either animus or a real want of perception, for obviously the method of Nature which he praises so well is just that which is followed in those poems—poems for which I, for one, am unreservedly thankful.
T W H R. Nov. '80 Splendid letter from Rolleston, Dresden—answer to Stedman—can be used | the fine ballad of 'Calvin Harlowe' enclosed