16                                    J. V. Ridgely

in the "fearfully far" reaches of Brookl)n. Whitman told Con¬
way that he was the first to visit him because of his poems, and he
eagerly inquired for more news of Emerson. The two men con¬
tinued their talk on the ferry to New York; and, as Conway re¬
ported to Emerson in a letter, he "came off delighted with him
. .. He is clearly his Book."

The next year Whitman, having written and published several
reviews of his own book in an effort to gain readership, also found
a way to turn Emerson into a blurb writer. Without seeking
Emerson's permission, he printed the full text of Emerson's per¬
sonal note in a new edition of Leaves of Grass, and managed to
have his sentence of "greeting" stamped in gold on the backstrip.
Since Whitman had already allowed a newspaper to quote the
letter, Emerson might justly have been piqued at this democratic
use of his words by his democratic poet. Conway, howevet, re¬
cords that Emerson did not complain "seriously," though he did
remark that if he had known his letter would have such an audi¬
ence he "might have qualified his praise." "There are parts of the
book where I hold my nose as I read," he confided to Conway,
but such sensitivity did not keep him from visiting the poet too.

On a second excursion in 1857, recalled Conway, he took a good
look around the bard's home. There were no books about that
he could observe, but — somewhat disconcertingly — there were
on the bedroom wall two engravings of Silenus and Bacchus.
The day, however, passed soberly in a ramble around Staten Island
and a long swim. In the i86o's Conway became active in the anti-
slaveiy movement, and during the Civil Wat he went to England
to plump for the Northern cause. It was there, during a long resi¬
dence as the free-thinking pastor of a London congregation, that
he was able to perform his greatest services for Whitman: acting
as his literary agent and assisting behind the scenes in W. M. Ros-
setti's edition of a selection of the poems. Only once did Conway
slip in his faithful attention to the Whitman legend and that was
in an article which he contiibuted to an English periodical in