I suppose the very best pay that ever comes to anyone who writes a book
is to know that the ones he wrote it for really like it. When they like
it well enough to write and tell him so, though they have never seen
him, and perhaps never will, then he feels very proud indeed, and happy.
Perhaps he even looks at himself in the looking-glass to make sure he is
really the one who did it, though of course he wouldn't have anyone see
him doing it, or think him vain, for anything.
The publisher is only going to let me print one of the ever-so-many nice
letters that have come for the man who wrote the Hollow Tree stories and
the other man who drew the pictures for them. So I've picked out one
that is for both of us, and that is signed by three, which makes it
equal to six letters, three for each of us, and as nice letters as
anyone who writes books for other folks to read could ever wish to have.
NEW YORK CITY, 107 SIXTY-NINTH STREET, EAST,
_Oct. 18th, 1900_.