editorial office of the atlantic monthly. the riverside press, cambridge, mass.
Sept. 17, 1877.
Dear Clemens:
Decidedly don’t let those fellows have that story about the captain. They’d be sure to slap it into print.
I have to see Mrs. Howells and talk over the whens of our visit to the Warners before I can fix a time for seeing you. I’m quite as eager to see the new play as you are to show it.
Can’t I use that story in the Club about your Elmira life-preserver? As you tell it, I think it’s one of the most impressive things I’ve ever read. I feel myself quite a beast for not thanking you at once for my private copy of it.
Yours ever
W. D. Howells.
I don’t know where I’ve put that ¶ of yours that you wanted me to father for the press. But if I were you, I’d let my new play answer the censures of the old.
