‘My dear Sir,—Notwithstanding the knot you tied in your handkerchief last evening, I won’t trust you. I know you to be so beset by the choice things of this life that a tit-bit must be put to your mouth and you must be coaxed to taste it. I send you, therefore, the first volume of the “Tales of an Indian Camp.” Read anyone of the tales I have marked, or, in fact, read any tale in the volume, and if you do not feel induced to read more send back the book and I will say no more about it.
‘I am piqued to have you look into this work because I have the vanity to think I know something of your taste, and to hope that in this instance it will coincide with my own.
