It was put off too long! No, it put itself off too long. I couldn’t have gone anywhere during the two week’s succeeding my wife’s confinement, because my own confinement (with lumbago) came on then & lasted all that time; & after that fortnight, I (& during part of it) I wrote in bed & finished my book—& so my notion to go to you came at the only time that I was free. But it was to be knocked in the head—consequently it was knocked in the head.

I took the whole afternoon, Monday, to order the packing of my satchel, & to order a place in the “sleeper” for next morning, by telephone,—& so I put in the time leisurely & comfortably on the sunny hilltop, thinking of the Grays, & the years that have come & gone, bringing us an occasional kick, but salving it over right away with such layers-upon-layers of blessings that we couldn’t remember where the kick struck—& so on, & so on, till 8 in the evening; then the news came down stairs that Clara (aged 6⅓) had a throat full of inflammation & canker-sores—my!Ⓐemendation but we were scared. Great is the telephone. Within six minutes that wonderful instrument had ev fixed everything—that is, changed it, reversed it. The man down town, three miles away, who was to hitch up & come for me at 9 P.M, was instructed to remain quiescent; mother Langdon was informed that I should need no bed in her house, nor any 5-o’clock breakfast; the sleeping-car seat was countermanded, & a telegram sent to you. YesⒶemendation, indeed, great is the telephone. (I remember how Mrs. Gray recognized my voice through it.) Consound the thing, its marvels bewitch me—& it is like the telegraph, in that it is always a bran-new miracle—the wonder remains fresh, never grows stale or commonplace. Five hundred years ago—yes, one hundred years ago—I would have been in a fidget to die, in order to find out the mysteries of the world to come; but now I can’t think of death with the right patience because I am so full of curiosity to see what other wonderful things are going to be done here. For we do live in an age compared to which all other ages are dull & eventless. – – – O, they had mind enough,—those other ages—but the miracles they would have wrought were not encouraged. Think of the sublime inventions that lie under the sod for lack of that encouragement.

But this is stuff for talk, not scribbling—we will drop it till you & Mrs. Mattie come to Hartford—which, let us hope, will be during this very coming winter—for you & I are trenching upon age, David, & there’s not much leeway left for postponements.

I was going to take that MS to Buffalo—butⒶemendation no matter, we shouldn’t have had time to read & discuss it. Besides, it had hiatuses in it where it said, in brackets, “Here smouch & insert Queen Elizabeth’s progress through London, & alter it to suit the present case”—& other such things as that; whereas, you had a good opinion of the promise of the book, & it would have been a pity to lay it before you while it still lacked any finishing touch.

I was hoping I might get a chance to run up, yet, but that is knocked in the head, too. Clara was never allowed out of the sick room until this evening; & from now out we must busy ourselves with preparations for the departure Monday—no trifling matter, considering that my gang will number ten persons. I have chartered a special car—a “sleeper” for a daylight train—for the better conservation of Mrs. C’s health on that long trip—& I don’t know but it might have been an economy to charter some n New York hotel, too, seeing we are to remain there a day or two for Madam to rest.

Now you & Mrs. Mattie come to Hartford, & compensate me for my deep disappointment in failing to get to Buffalo—do.