in."

He disclaimed any originality for the stories, adding, "I understand
that my relations toward Uncle Remus are similar to those that exist
between an almanac maker and the calendar." He had not heard the
"Golden Arm" story and asked for the outlines; also for some
publishing advice, out of Mark Twain's long experience.

*****

To Joel Chandler Harris, in Atlanta:

ELMIRA, N.Y., Aug. 10.

MY DEAR MR. HARRIS,--You can argue yourself into the delusion that the
principle of life is in the stories themselves and not in their setting;
but you will save labor by stopping with that solitary convert, for he
is the only intelligent one you will bag. In reality the stories
are only alligator pears--one merely eats them for the sake of the
salad-dressing. Uncle Remus is most deftly drawn, and is a lovable and
delightful creation; he, and the little boy, and their relations with
each other, are high and fine literature, and worthy to live, for their
own sakes; and certainly the stories are not to be credited with them.
But enough of this; I seem to be proving to the man that made the
multiplication table that twice one are two.

I have been thinking, yesterday and to-day (plenty of chance to think,
as I am abed with lumbago at our little summering farm among the
solitudes of the Mountaintops,) and I have concluded that I can answer
one of your questions with full confidence--thus: Make it a subscription
book. Mighty few books that come strictly under the head of literature
will sell by subscription; but if Uncle Remus won't, the gift of
prophecy has departed out of me. When a book will sell by subscription,
it will sell two or three times as many copies as it would in the trade;
and the profit is bulkier because the retail price is greater.....

You didn't ask me for a subscription-publisher. If you had, I should
have recommended Osgood to you. He inaugurates his subscription
department with my new book in the fall.....

Now the doctor has been here and tried to interrupt my yarn about "The
Golden Arm," but I've got through, anyway.

Of course I tell it in the negro dialect--that is necessary; but I have
not written it so, for I can't spell it in your matchless way. It is
marvelous the way you and Cable spell the negro and creole dialects.

Two grand features are lost in print: the weird wailing, the rising and
falling cadences of the wind, so