
Last Spring I happened upon a nest of poets at Avignon—Provençal poets—successors
of the old troubadours—among them Mssr
Charles Bonaparte Wyse, a descendant of Lucien Bonaparte
& the son of an Irishman. He went to the South of France, from Ireland, some 25 years ago & was so
charmed with the poets there that he learned the Provençal language & became one
of them. He spends a part of every year there. He is a gentleman, a scholar, & a poet; also a good
judge of poetry. Well, he is one of your warmest friends & appreciators—and has sent by me all
sorts of messages to you. As I am not to return till the Spring I send them by mail. Last April we dined
with him at the inn of "La Chevelure d'Or," at the ancient, ruined & almost deserted city of Les Baux,
In the top of a mountain near Arles. This inn, by the way, was named by Mr. Wyse after
a magnificent head of golden hair found in an old tomb at Les Baux, which he has made the subject of a
Provençal poem, & which was in the possesion of the landlord. At this dinner Mr. Wyse proposed,
& we all drank, standing, the health of Walt Whitman.
I have just received a letter from my friend in which he says:
"I enclose you my promised Provençal translation of two of the sweetest bits of Manahatta's poetry.
I have not attempted his poetic prose, which is not to be imitated, but
have had the audacity to compress, Procrustes-wise,
his touching lines into the stocks of my verse. Do, I beg of you, do me the great favor to present them to
him, in my name, when next you see him. Insignificant as is the attention, it is at any rate a straw which
will show which way the wind blows. If ever I go to America, I assure you that one of my first visits will
be to this most sympathetic of poets, for whose large & lofty nature my admiration is merged into
love."
No one has written to me about the lecture. How did it succeed?
Yours very truly Richard W. Gilder. Munroe & Co. 7 Rue Scribe Paris—Mrs. Gilder sends her regards.