"Dear Sir,—I have yours of the 9th, inclosing Putnam's check for $59, making $79 in all you have paid me. I am paid in full, and this letter is your receipt in full. I don't want any pay for my 'services,' whatever they may have been. Consider me your friend who wished to serve you, however unsuccessfully. Don't break with C. or Putnam."
A year later, Thoreau renewed his subscription to the "Weekly Tribune," but the letter miscarried. In due time came this reply to a third letter:—
"March 6, 1854.
"Dear Sir,—I presume your first letter containing the $2 was robbed by our general mail robber of New Haven, who has just been sent to the State's Prison. Your second letter has probably failed to receive attention owing to a press of business. But I will make all right. You ought to have the Semi-weekly, and I shall order it sent to you one year on trial; if you choose to write me a letter or so some time, very well; if not, we will be even without that.
"Thoreau, I want you to do something on my urgency. I want you to collect and arrange your 'Miscellanies' and send them to me. Put in 'Ktaadn,' 'Carlyle,' 'A Winter Walk,' 'Canada,' etc., and I will try to find a publisher who will bring them out at his own risk, and (I hope) to your ultimate profit. If you have anything new to put with them, very well; but let me have about a 12mo volume whenever you can get it ready, and see if there is not something to your credit in the bank of Fortune. Yours,
"Horace Greeley."
In reply, Thoreau notified his friend of the early publication of "Walden," and was thus met:—
"March 23, 1854.
"Dear Thoreau,—I am glad your 'Walden' is coming out. I shall announce it at once, whether Ticknor does or not. I am in no hurry now about your 'Miscellanies;' take your time, select your title, and prepare your articles deliberately and finally. Then, if Ticknor will give you something worth having, let him have this too; if proffering it to him is to glut your market, let it come to me. But take your time. I was only thinking you were merely waiting when you might be doing something. I referred (without naming you) to your 'Walden' experience in my lecture on 'Self-Culture,' with which I have had ever so many audiences. This episode excited much interest, and I have been repeatedly asked who it is that I refer to.
"Yours,