July 8/82
Dear Charley—
Yes the Bank Note Co. stock arrifved all [right.
The] American Publishing Co declared another 5 per cent div. July 1, making the third since I sold out. In over nine years they paid no dividend; in which time they sold, say
60,000
705,000
Roughing It
60,000 Gilded Age
40,000 Tom Sawyer
40,000 Sketches
70,000 Tramp Abroad
285,000 books. ‸& 15,00[0] Innocents—300,000 in all.‸
Since then they have sold 10 or 15,000 books & paid $7,500 in dividends. How’s that?
When the expert comes, let him do his level best to find out exactly how many of each of my books have been sold, if possible. And especially how many Sketches—for if ‸when‸ they have sold 50,000 Sketches they will owe me a rebate of 2½ per cent on each copy of the whole 50,000. It is a three-dollar book—so the rebate coming to me will be $3,750. You perceive the importance of finding out about this.
Ys Truly
S L C.
Textual Commentary
Source text(s):Previous publication:
MTBus, 188–90; MicroPUL, reel 2.
Provenance:
See McKinney Family Papers in Description of Provenance.
Emendations and textual notes:
right. [¶] The • ~.— | [¶] ~
