FEINBERG/WHITMAN      NOTES and NOTEBOOKS  NOTES--Literary, Aug. 1890, What This Union Cost

Box 39   Folder 34

Includes verso letter from Horace Traubel, Aug. 11, 1890.363

1890 August  What This Union Cost: prose.  A.MS. (1p. 23¼ x 14½ 
cm.)

Written in ink at the bottom of a letter (Camden Aug. 11, '90.
Dear Walt: I have made up The Conservator tonight, & left a 
little space--a few inches--for you to fill up with some word,
which I hope you will have tomorrow ev'g when I come.  A little
sketch, in succinct flowing lines such as / vividly & unfailingly
tell their story, would satisfy me: & make me, as well as
others, grateful.  Poor O'Reilley!--it is a tragic exit!  Horace),
52 words:

[the dead volunteers the soldiers, all-the-States--the] the soldiers,
volunteers, all States--the wounded, suffering, dying
--the hot exhausting summers, and the battles, and the carnage--
the trenches heap'd by thousands--the many thousands of 'unknown'
--will America ever realize what this Union cost as it is
and after all?Camden
Aug. 11, '90.

Dear Walt:
I have made
up the Conservator
tonight, & left a
little space — a few
inches — for you to
fill up with some
word, which I hope
you will have tomorrow
ev'g when
I come.  A little
sketch, in succinct
flowing lines such asvividly & unfailingly
tell their story, would
satisfy me & make 
me, as well as others,
grateful. Poor
O'Reilley! — it is 
a tragic exit!
Horace

[the dead volunteers the soldiers, all-the-States — the] the soldiers,
volunteers, all States — the wounded, suffering, dying
— the hot exhausting summers, and the battles, and the carnage —
the trenches heap'd by thousands — the many thousands of 'unknown'
— will America ever realize what this Union cost as it is and after all?