Part 2

In speaking of this time she said: "When the poor old man was not in sight, he was so much upon my mind I could not pass one peaceful hour." Suffice it to say, Walt Whitman had become the next object of her solicitude.

He has been called a prophet. Was it prophetical when, some years before, he wrote: "Though poor now even to penury, I have not been deprived of any physical thing I need or wish for whatever, and I feel confident I shall not in the future"?

Some have considered him a cunning man; all agree that he was a remarkable judge of character. Understanding this woman as he did,--as he must have done,--had he resolved to have her devote herself to him? This question can never be truthfully answered, but whether with premeditation or not, he certainly had gained a great influence over her.

Although comparatively comfortable in his new home now, he did not discontinue his accustomed morning visits, and as he persisted in his old delinquencies he completely upset the routine of Mrs. Davis's daily life and work.

Things ran on in this way until one morning late in February, while he was sipping his coffee, he told her he had a proposition to make. He said: "I have a house while you pay rent; you have furniture while my rooms are bare; I propose that you come and live with me, bringing your furniture for the use of both." A suggestion of this kind was so unlooked for that she refused to give it a moment's consideration. He said no more at the time, but a few days later again broached the subject. And this he continued to do daily until Mrs. Davis, who remained firm for awhile, at last began to waver.

The young orphan girl strongly opposed such a step, but Mr. Whitman's persistence prevailed, for Mrs. Davis at last gave a reluctant consent. The advantage was all on the poet's side, as he must have seen, but recent events had raised his hopes and he made promises of adequate and more than adequate returns for all that had been done or might be done for him.

As his money was "only in sight," to use his own words, the expenses of moving were paid by Mrs. Davis; as he was disabled, the work and worry were hers as well; but finally all was accomplished, her goods were transferred to his house and put in their new places, and the seven years of their domestic life together commenced. In this way did the "good gray poet" retire with his "single attendant" to the little frame cottage, No. 328 Mickle Street, Camden, New Jersey.

III

THE MICKLE STREET HOUSE

"_The tide turned when he entered the Mickle Street house._"--THOMAS DONALDSON.

"_Whitman had great satisfaction in the managing skill of his housekeeper._"--SIDNEY MORSE.

Added to "managing skill," Mrs. Davis had patience, perseverance, determination, courage and health; furthermore--having accompanied the Fritzinger family upon a number of ocean trips, undertaken in the hope of benefiting Mrs. Fritzinger--she had shipboard experience which enabled her to make available every inch of space in a house smaller than the one she had left. It was an unpretentious brown frame structure, sadly out of repair, and decidedly the poorest tenement in the block. On the right was a brick house whose strong walls seemed to be holding it up, while on the left was an alley--scarcely more than a gutter--closed from the street by a wooden door.

This narrow passage, filled with ice and snow in the winter, often damp and slippery even in warm weather, was unfit for general use; and as the house was not properly drained, the cellar through its one little window was often flooded from dripping eaves.

Three wooden steps without a banister led from the sidewalk to the front door, which had to be closed to allow those who entered to ascend the stairs. This narrow staircase, an equally narrow hall and two connecting rooms called "the parlors" comprised the first floor of the main building. Between the parlors were folding doors, and each room had an exit into the hall. There were two windows in the front parlor and a single one in the back. Between and under the front windows was an entrance to the cellar, with old-fashioned slanting doors.

The rear and smaller portion of the house was divided into but two apartments, the kitchen below and a sleeping room above. At the back of the kitchen was a small shed, and quite a large yard. Some people believed that this yard, with its pear tree and grape vine, had been the main attraction of the place for Mr. Whitman.

On ascending the staircase, a small landing and the back sleeping room were reached; then, turning about, came more stairs, with a larger landing, part of which had been made into a clothespress. Apart from this landing and a little den, sometimes known as "the anteroom," the upper portion of the main building had only one room. But the two doors in it, and a deep rugged scar across the low ceiling, testified to its having formerly been divided by a partition. As one of the doors was permanently fastened, the only access was through the den, anteroom, or "adjoining apartment," as it was also occasionally called.

In the larger room was a fireplace with a mantel shelf above. There were two windows corresponding with the windows below, while the smaller room or den, reduced to one-half its proper width by some pine shelves and an outjutting chimney, had like the room below but one. The outlook from this window, into which the sun made but a few annual peeps, was the brick wall on one side, the back roof on the other, and a glimpse of the sky.

The situation of the house was anything but inviting, and the locality was one that few would choose to live in. It was near both depot and ferry, and as the tracks were but a block away, or scarcely that, being laid in what would have been the centre of the next street, there was an uninterrupted racket day and night. The noise of the passenger and excursion trains--for the excursions to the coast went by way of Camden--was only a minor circumstance compared with that of the freight trains as they thundered by, or passed and re-passed in making up.

Close at hand was a church with a sharp-toned bell, and a "choir of most nerve-unsettling singers" (_Thomas Donaldson_); and as if this were not enough, there was at times a most disagreeable odor from a guano factory on the Philadelphia side of the Delaware.

Such was the house to which Mary Davis had now come, and where through the strange, busy days of the next seven years she was destined to be Walt Whitman's indispensable "housekeeper, nurse and friend"--or, from the outsider's point of view, his "single attendant."

The spring of 1885 was far advanced before things were fairly in running order, for from the first there had been no intermission in the poet's erratic mode of living, and Mrs. Davis had been obliged to devote much time to his personal wants. Somehow he had a way of demanding attention which she found it impossible to resist.

Truly she had been hampered on all sides, this faithful Martha-Mary; so many things to be seen to, so many things to handle and rehandle and change about before an established place for them could be found; the strenuous cleaning, for the former tenants had left the place extremely dirty; and the pondering over repairs, and deciding which were absolutely essential and unpostponable, and which could be put off for a little while longer.

She first carpeted, furnished and settled the parlors, intending the back one as the sleeping room for her young charge, until her marriage in the fall, when it could be used as a spare room. But Mr. Whitman had different intentions, for he at once appropriated both rooms, and would not allow the doors separating them to be closed.

One of the front windows became his favorite sitting place, and here he wrote, read his papers and sat while entertaining his friends. He was delighted with these rooms, and in them he enjoyed himself to his heart's content: first in getting things into disorder at once, and then in keeping them so.

The back room, which became kitchen, dining room and sitting room combined, was so compactly filled that many people remarked its close resemblance to the cabin of a ship, in the way of convenience as compared with space. It was lighted by one window, and over the ingrain carpet a strip of stair carpeting made a pathway from the hall to the outer door.

On the sitting room side were a lounge, sewing machine, two rocking chairs, a stand and some small pieces of furniture; on the other was a dining table against the wall, one leaf extended and always set, with the dining chairs pushed under it when not in use; the range--a veritable giant--standing in place of the dwarf it had ousted; a sink with cubby-hole below, crowded to overflowing with pots and kettles, and shelves above loaded with dishes while their enclosing doors were closely hung with kitchen utensils. As the lower shelf only could be reached by hand, a stool (a chair that had lost its back) was kept under a projection of the range.

The shed, where Mr. Whitman's stove was set up, was packed with household goods and chattels, classified and stored ready for momentary use, and around the walls were suspended the extra chairs.

A shelf in the inside cellarway off the hall was the only pantry, and the sides of the cellarway the only tin-cupboard; then for want of a place for the flour barrel, it was left standing opposite the cellar door in the hall. In this part of the house people went by feeling, not by sight, and strangers as a rule always collided with the barrel before entering the kitchen.

The little passage between the back part of the house and the wall of the one adjoining it--simply a pathway to the back entrance of the cellar--Mrs. Davis canopied with old sails and utilized as a laundry. Here she kept her washing bench, tubs and pails, and here she washed and ironed when the weather permitted. This furnished the view from the back parlor window.

The cellar and its hanging shelf had their share of plunder, and here the firewood was sawed and split.

As for pictures, there were more than enough for all the rooms, and between them wall pockets, paper racks and brackets abounded.

Her family of birds--a robin she had rescued from a cat, a pair of turtle doves and a canary--she attached to the kitchen ceiling. She made a little place in the shed for her cat's bed, and found a shelter for a few hens in the small outhouse. Her dog, more aristocratic, slept on the lounge.

On a shelf over the dining table were a clock, some china vases, and a stuffed parrakeet. No wonder that upon entering the house the first thing observed was the over-filled appearance of each small room.

Upon a bracket in the front parlor she placed a model of a ship that had been given to Captain Fritzinger by the maker. This pleased Mr. Whitman exceedingly, for he had often noticed and admired it. He said that the first time he had desired to write anything was when he saw a ship in full sail. He tried to describe it exactly and failed; had often since studied ships in the vain hope of getting the whole beautiful story into words, but had never been able to do so.

The mantels of both parlors Mrs. Davis heaped with shells and curiosities from distant parts of the world. Some of them were rare and valuable.

Such was the inside of the house after it had passed through Mary's transforming hands. There were many things in it that might have been better elsewhere, perhaps. But where? It was only a little house, and Mary had come to it from a larger one, with all her possessions. She had nowhere else to put them now, without losing them. If Mr. Whitman had any sense of being over-crowded, it was his own fault. She had come at his urging--and he had taken the two large parlors on the first floor, and the large front chamber with the anteroom above, entirely for his own use, thus leaving for the two women the kitchen (which he shared with them in its aspect of dining room) and the only remaining room in the house--the little back chamber on the second floor. Into this, they condensed and squeezed their more personal belongings.

IV

THE NEW RÉGIME

"_I know an old story. It goes back to 1826, when a monument to Bellman, the Swedish poet, was unveiled in Stockholm. The King and Queen were there, and Bellman's old wife. And the King spoke of the dead poet, and praised him in a flight of purple phrases; but the old wife said, 'Oh yes, but if your Majesty only knew what a nuisance he was about the house....' But frankly, wouldn't you like to know what kind of a nuisance the poet was at home?_"--VANCE THOMPSON.

Discovering so quickly that her new charge was decidedly a self-centered person, and seeing that waiting upon him promised to be her chief occupation, Mrs. Davis planned her work accordingly, and being an early riser was able to devote the untrammelled morning hours to preparations for the day.

Mr. Whitman usually arose at nine o'clock, but in this, as in all things, he consulted his own wishes alone. His breakfast hour was any time during the forenoon; and no doubt he did not understand how or why this could discommode his new housekeeper.

When the signal came--one that Mrs. Davis soon learned, three or four loud peremptory raps upon the floor above--she dropped whatever she might be doing and hastened upstairs.

Since Mr. Whitman's first stroke of paralysis, nearly twenty years before, he had become so disabled that he required much assistance while dressing, and for this he was not at all diffident in asking. Besides, he was "very curiously deliberate."

There being no water on the second floor, Mrs. Davis carried up and down all that he needed for his baths,--and he used water freely. Then when fully dressed he consulted his own feelings in regard to coming downstairs.

In his mother's house in Long Island, and in his brother's in Camden, Walt had seldom taken his meals with the family. While living in Brooklyn, New Orleans and Washington, his meal times were of no importance to anyone except himself, and he could not see why this rule should not apply to his own house, or any house where he might be staying. To him regular meals were a bondage he could not endure.

Going up and down stairs was a difficult task, and after coming to the Mickle Street house he seldom did so unaided, so the old signal was repeated when he was ready to descend, and again Mrs. Davis hastened to him.

As he never would tell what he wanted until he was seated at the table, she always kept a supply of special things on hand; nothing elaborate,--maybe steak, chops, oysters or eggs. He never found fault with his food, and although he did not often commend it he must have been fully appreciative, for all through his letters and conversations, as given in the various books about him, are allusions to Mary's good cooking.

Occasionally, to suit her own convenience, she would have his breakfast prepared; but if she mentioned this fact while helping him to dress he would invariably say, "Ah! I will not eat anything for awhile." When the dishes had been set aside to be kept warm, and Mary was again busily engaged,--the wash perhaps partly hung on the line, or her deft hands in the dough,--the peremptory signal would come, and on being helped down and seated at the table he would coolly demand something entirely different from what she had provided.

He commenced housekeeping by inviting company--lord or beggar--to dine with him, and would keep these guests at the table for hours; even "when he was eating off a dry goods box for a table, and drinking milk warmed over a coal oil lamp, and a few crackers with it, he would ask you to dine, with the dignity of a prince, and never apologize or mention the food." (_Thomas Donaldson._)

A biographer (_Horace Traubel_) says, "He was very simple in his tastes, taking only two meals in a day." True; but the day was nearly consumed in getting and serving these two meals, with the after work that followed. To Mrs. Davis's surprise he did not hesitate to entertain visitors in his sleeping room if they arrived while he was there, and many of them would remain until "the wee sma' hours." There was a charm in fellowship with him, and ill and lethargic as he had grown, it was said: "Walt Whitman's friends rarely visited him without having a good laugh over something or other"; and "gifted with a clear resonant voice, the poet often gratifies his friends as he sits by a blazing wood fire--which is his delight--singing old-fashioned songs."

It was this irregularity that had worn upon his sister-in-law, for during the years in which she had endured Walt's thoughtlessness, she had had the care of Edward, the irresponsible, feeble-minded brother; and when, by the doctor's advice, she left Camden for the country, the home was tendered to Walt with this option: he was to conform to their way of living and cease turning night into day.

He did indeed have "runs of luck" after 1884, and who can deny that the greatest of these was in securing the undivided attention of a warm-hearted, unselfish woman, and in her making it possible for him to live untrammelled, in his own home? Surely the tide turned when this good woman ceased to be an independent being and became the strong prop on which he leaned; a shield between him and all annoyances.

While perplexed with settling the house, and having no time to go over the same ground twice, although the condition of the parlors troubled her, Mrs. Davis had let them go, awaiting a favorable time to clean and regulate them thoroughly. This opportunity came in the summer, during the first of Mr. Whitman's temporary absences.

Since he had been in his own house, old friends had occasionally called to take him to spend the day with them. This time he was asked to remain a week. He gladly availed himself of the change, and his housekeeper was no less pleased to have a week to herself. In it she did her best to restore order, and when she had finished was really proud of the improvement she had effected.

Mr. Whitman returned. He at once discovered what had taken place during his absence, and his consternation knew no bounds! He said that he had left _everything exactly_ as he wished it to remain; where he could find it; now the very things he needed most were gone; in fact he could find nothing he wanted, and in the future he forbade _anyone_ to meddle with his private property; he desired and expected to find--at all times and upon all occasions--his personal matters unmolested, undisturbed, left entirely alone.

Mrs. Davis mildly replied that she had only taken from the room some useless papers, scraps of letters, old envelopes, bits of twine and wrapping paper.

He declared that these were the very things he needed most; the ones he specially missed.

She remonstrated, but to no purpose; he silenced her; just how, she could not comprehend.

To Walt Whitman's credit be it said, he never spoke an unkind word to Mrs. Davis; never was arrogant or overbearing to her; never belittled her or put her down before others; always treated her as an equal; relied upon her judgment and often sought her advice;--but he would have his own way, and she with her yielding nature soon gave in; the struggle was only a short one; before winter commenced, confusion once more reigned.

In due time piles of periodicals were stacked on the table and on chairs; newspapers, letters, envelopes and bundles of manuscript were in the corners; and as he had immediately set about the work he had so greatly at heart, cuttings, rejected scraps of paper and general litter soon covered the floor, the confusion gradually making its way into the next room and threatening to invade the hall.

The front parlor became a veritable editor's sanctum; nothing but the smell of printer's ink and the sound of the press were wanting.

Some of his poems he altered and revised again and again, and in a short time the large waste basket Mary had placed in the room was filled to overflowing. As he would not allow her to remove or empty the basket, it became the foundation of a hillock of débris. Sometimes when he seemed off-guard she would surreptitiously remove a few dust pans full, but he was not deceived, and even this she had to discontinue.

The first summer and fall in his own house were decidedly pleasant and beneficial to Mr. Whitman. He worked as he felt able or inclined; was encouraged with the progress he was making, and gratified with the prospect before him. He believed, and must have seen, that situated so advantageously the one desire of his life was to be consummated, and that even though it were to be accomplished in a slow way, he would live to see his book completed and in a form to meet his most sanguine wishes.

Visitors retarded his work, but this was no real detriment, nor did he feel the time lost that he spent in returning visits. Making over the old material and adding to it the poems he had composed since the issue of the last edition, was something he could lay down and take up at any time. And he certainly did enjoy agreeable company, delighting whole-heartedly in their companionship as he dispensed the hospitality of his own board.

By degrees Mrs. Davis accustomed herself to her new surroundings and was no longer astonished at any of Walt's remarkable ways or unreasonable requests; besides, she remembered that the step she had taken was after all self-imposed, that all her friends had protested, and that it was now irrevocable; so with good sense and in good time she became, if not fully reconciled, at least resigned. She didn't exactly regret coming to Mickle Street, but she could judge from the few months she had passed there what the years to come might bring; yet even with this outlook she resolved not to shrink from but bravely to face the future, whatever might betide; and so unconsciously she transferred to Walt Whitman the devotion she had given to others.

She seldom left the house when he was there alone, for with that enigmatical instinct chronic patients develop he knew, and always wanted something, whenever she was busiest or on a momentary absence. Therefore after awhile she put all other considerations aside, and gave her full energies to the work she had undertaken; individual wishes were surrendered as she strove to adjust her ways to the erratic ones of the old man; familiar customs were discarded and former friends neglected. She seemed almost to lose her personality and to become a part of the house and the peculiar life lived there.

She was never obtrusive, and did all things in a quiet manner. If company lingered until midnight she remained up to assist her charge to bed; she humored his vagaries, and always had a smile and a pleasant word for him. When he was inclined to be despondent, she cheered him; when he was in pain, she had some simple remedy at hand; when he was in danger of overtaxing his strength, she gently cautioned him; and if the disorder of his rooms troubled her, she did not let him guess how much.

At first she supposed he was not in a position to purchase new clothing, and did her best to make him presentable in what he had, while she patiently awaited the time when the expected money should come in; and through her efficiency in washing, darning, patching and mending he soon presented a much improved appearance, often commented on.

His brother, his good sister-in-law, his other relatives and all his friends rested in peace. They knew the hands he was in, the shoulders upon which the burden had fallen.

V

CURIOUS NEIGHBORS

"_Mr. Whitman and his housekeeper were closely watched by some curious people who had never lived near a poet before. In addition they minded their own business. That Camden should contain two such people in one street was enough to create wonder._"--THOMAS DONALDSON.