WOMAN AND FREEDOM IN WHITMAN 371 



"The Female equally with the Male I sing. 



Of Life immense in passion, pulse, and power, 

 Cheerful, for freest action form'd under the laws divine, 

 The Modern Man I sing." 



Whitman's passages on woman convey the embodiment of 

 .her under practical aspects; also ideally as the typification 

 of some of his noblest forms, as in the "Santa Spirita" and 

 "Victress on the Peaks." Comprehensively he addresses 

 woman, "You womanhood divine, mistress and source of all, 

 whence life and love and aught that comes from life and love." 

 The mother, wife, sister, daughter, nurse, comforter, the ad- 

 ministrator in sickness and health, the artiste, the working 

 woman or the woman of wealth and power, in all these capa- 

 cities is she described. Even as the lowest prostitute she is 

 not slurred by; in her, Whitman sees "the divine woman." 

 He tells women, "Be not ashamed your privilege encloses 

 the rest, and is the exit of the rest." 



Following the words, "A woman's body at auction," are 

 these lines : 



"She too is not only herself, she is the teeming mother of mothers, 



She is the bearer of them that shall grow and be mates to the mothers. 



Have you ever loved the body of a woman?" 



Whitman's universal love for humanity did not permit him 

 to withhold his heed and sympathy from one or all of these 

 woman-types. 



The personal touch of woman's presence is very dear to 

 him; he relates that, starting betimes for a day's outing at 

 the seashore, fortified by a good breakfast, cooked by hands 

 he loved, his "dear sister Lou's," how much better it made 

 "the victuals taste and then assimilate," the whole day's 

 comfort afterwards resting upon this little service. 



In the hospital wards, too, the magnetic touch of hands, the 

 expressive features of the mother, the silent soothing of her 

 presence, her words, her knowledge and privileges, arrived 

 at only through having had children, are the precious and 

 final qualifications. It is a natural faculty that is required, it 



