Elimi
Elmira,
Sept 15.
My Dear Aldrich:
Thank you ever so much for the book—I had already finished it, & prodigiously enjoyed it, in the periodical of the notorious Howells, but it hits Mrs. Clemens just right, for she is having a reading-holiday, now, for the first time in some months; so between-times, when the de new baby is asleep & strengthening up for another attempt to ‸take‸ possession of this place, she is going to read it. Her strong friendship for you makes her think she is going to like it.
I finished a story yesterday, myself. I counted up & found it between sixty & eighty thousand words—about the size of your book. It is for boys & girls—been at work at it several years, off & on.
I hopes Howells is enjoying his journey to the Pacific. He wrote me that you & Osgood were going, also, but I doubted it, suspecting liquor believing he was in liquor when he wrote it. In my opinion, this universal applause over his book is going to land that man in a Retreat inside of two months. Is he bloated [much? I] notice the papers say mighty fine things about your book, too. You ought to try to get into the same establishment with Howells; it would be ever so much more cheery than sucking bay rum & make-believe forty-rod out of a sugar-teat in solitude. But applause does not affect me—I am always calm—this is because I am used to it.
Well, good-bye, my boy, & good luck to you. Mrs Clemens asks me to send my ‸her‸ warmest regards to you & Mrs Aldrich——which I do, & add those of
Yrs Ever
Mark.
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