LAFAYETTE IN BROOKLYN BY WALT WHITMAN 1904 o L3 LAFAYETTE IN BROOKLYN Of this book 250 copies have been printed at the Literary Collector Press, as follows : 15 copies on Imperial Japanese Vellum, and 235 copies on American Hand Made Paper. LAFAYETTE IN BROOKLYN BY WALT WHITMAN WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY JOHN BURROUGHS GEORGE D. SMITH NEW YORK 1905 Copyright, 1905 BY GEORGE D. SMITH THE LITERARY COLLECTOR PRESS GREENWICH, CONNECTICUT CONTENTS Introduction By John Burroughs Lafayette in Brooklyn By Walt Whitman Notes PLATES Walt Whitman From a photograph by Cox Lafayette From the painting by S. F. B. Morse Facsimile of a part of Whitman's Manuscript The following paper is printed lit erally from an undated MS. prepared by Whitman for the printer, but never published. The minutes of the New England Historic Gene alogical Society mention two occa sions October 5, and December 7, 1 8 8 1 on which papers on Lafayette were read and followed by "remarks by several gentlemen." Whitman's name is not recorded in the minutes of either meeting. INTRODUCTION BY JOHN BURROUGHS INTRODUCTION I HAVE often heard Whitman speak of the incident of his childhood narrated in the following pages, and always with a feeling of pride and pleasure. It probably occurred in the fall of 1824 as Lafayette landed in this country in August of that year. He came in response to an invitation from Congress, made through President Monroe, and remained with us over a INTRODUCTION year, visiting all the principal cities and each of the twenty- four states. At this time the Whitman family had recently moved to Brooklyn from the country, and I fancy that Walt was a typical country boy of about five years, not at all "bright and smart" as city boys so often are, but ruddy, normal, healthy a bit of sound rural humanity, yet very im pressionable, as his vivid recol lection of the Lafayette incident, even to the color of the horses and of the barouche in which he came, clearly shows. In that casual incident of a moment, the French democracy of the eight eenth century, as exemplified by the life and character of one of its most noted representatives, embraced and caressed the heir INTRODUCTION of the new democracy of the nineteenth century its future poet and most complete and composite embodiment. There is something very significant, al most fateful, iti the incident. In all that crowd of children La fayette could have touched none other who was destined so to glorify and embody in imagina tive words the spirit of the coun try to whose service he had, in his young manhood, so freely offered his life. How much his memory of Lafayette influenced Whitman's liking for the French people, it would be impossible to deter mine. Certain it is that he al ways had a peculiarly warm feeling for that nation, more so I think than for any other Eu ropean country. There was some INTRODUCTION thing in that audacious revolu tionary spirit of the French that moved him; that struggle for liberty, Alone, among the sisters, thou, Giantess, didst rend the ones that shamed thee. He wrote two poems to France, the first on the French Revolution, published in 1860, in which he says Pale, silent, stern, what could I say to that long-accrued retribution ? Could I wish humanity different ? Could I wish the people made of wood and stone ? Or that there be no justice in destiny or time? The last poem in 1870 was sug gested by the defeat of France by the Germans. During this war I remember that Whitman's sympathies were as pronounced in favor of the French, as are our sympathies to-day, in favor of Japan as against Russia. The INTRODUCTION poem is entitled "O Star of France. " Dim, smitten star Orb not of France alone, pale symbol of my soul, its dearest hopes, The struggle and the daring, rage divine for liberty, Of aspirations toward the far ideal enthusiast's dream of brotherhood, Of terror to the tyrant and the priest. Truly there was something prophetic in this caress of the child Whitman by Lafayette. JOHN BURROUGHS. LAFAYETTE IN BROOKLYN BY WALT WHITMAN i ^}