January 6, 1860.
I write this seated in the office of Horace Gray, Jr., where I am engaged in studying law. As the statue is pre-existent in the block of marble, so in me may be discerned potential Kents and Storys, which is of course a gratifying reflection, besides vich, as Sam Weller says, it's wery affectina to one's feelin's.
In a worldly point of view, I prosper.
My Western pupil has withdrawn to his native wilds, and I don't expect to resume my charge of his intellect before March; so that one source of income is withdrawn.
But I get two hundred dollars a year for writing book notices weekly for the Advertiser, and am engaged to write anything I choose, editorial or otherwise, for the New York Evening Post; and to write for the Atlantic every month at six dollars per page.
One of his letters, written at this time, contains a remarkable narrative of a conversation which he had with a friend of his mother's,—a woman whose gentle wisdom and frank speech had made a