I have dictated 36 letters this morning, & made from two to half a dozen mistakes in every one of them; & here you rebuke me with a two-page letter with only a single error in it! Years ago, a man captured me on this little error of yours, & now I get my revenge. This man said to me: “Coats are hung—on nails; cats are hung—on clothes lines; birds & fishes are hung—in the meat closet; a dead man is hung—where you please; but a living human being is the one only detail of creation that is never hung, but always hanged.” Now you watch, & you will soon get your revenge; for within three months you will be sure to hear somebody say such-&-such a person has been hung—then you floor him with a skillet, or something, to attract his attention, & say, “Excuse me, sir, but if the man was alive at the time, he was not hung, he was hanged.” And if the adversary is as grateful for a correction as I am, he will not be offended with you, but will say, “It is a tough language, this English tongue—only give me a fact in it that is sound & will stay with me, & I’ll forgive the giver.”

I vastly prize that drawing which you sent me, for its merit, & also because it is a remembrancer of you. I promise myself that your mother’s talent is transmitted to you, undiminished, & that ◊ Ⓐemendation you will prize it, & nurture it with faithful husbandry, & bring out of it all that is in it. For there is nothing that is comparable to a special talent. It makes cheap the king’s accolade, for its possessors are God’s nobility.

I am not going to forget to thank your mother for the Mammy, but only going to defer the exercise of that privilege for another spell, I being an adept at procrastination.

We did prodigiously enjoy your uncle’s brief visit, & shall allow ourselves to hope he will come here from Baltimore in March if he find opportunity—& by that time maybe I shall have been able to make Mrs. Clemens go & get herself photographed. With our kindest regards to you all,