editorial office of the atlantic monthly. the riverside press, cambridge, mass.
Jan. 19, 1875.
My dear Clemens:
There is one chance in a thousand that I may run down alone on Saturday afternoon; Mrs. Howells is quite out of the question, and I’d rather come some time soon when you haven’t your Club. I confess that I’d like awfully to go now, but an interruption would be disastrous to my work: I’m ‸not‸ confused about it; I have a perfectly clear vision of what I want to do, and I only need the time to do it.
As to the point in your book: I’d have that swearing out in an instant. I suppose I didn’t notice it because the locution was so familiar to my Western sense, and so exactly the thing that Huck would say. But it wont do for the children.
My love is longer than I can make my letter. Don’t expect me, but—
Yours ever
W. D. Howells.
