ced it in August. I
read two or three of the first chapters, to see that everything
was going on right, and read no more then. She proceeded,--the
story grew,--it seemed to have no end,--everybody talked of it.
I thought the mails were never so irregular, for none of my
subscribers was willing to lose a single number of the Era
while the story was going on. Mrs. Bailey attracted my
attention by her special devotion to it, and Mr. Chase always
read it before anything else. Of the hundreds of letters
received weekly, renewing subscriptions or sending new ones,
there was scarcely one that did not contain some cordial
reference to Uncle Tom. I wrote to Mrs. Stowe, and told her
that, although such a story had not been contracted for, and I
had, in my programme, limited my remittance to her to one
hundred dollars, yet, as the thing had grown beyond all our
calculations, I felt bound to make her another remittance. So I
sent her two hundred dollars more. The story was closed early
in the spring of 1852. I had not yet read it; but I wrote to
Mrs. Stowe that, as I had not contemplated so large an outlay
in my plans for the volume, as the paper had not received so
much pecuniary benefit from its publication as it would have
done could my readers have foreseen what it was to be, and as
my large circulation had served as a tremendous advertisement
for the work, which was now about to be published separately,
and of which she held the copyright alone, I supposed that I
ought not to pay for it so much as if these circumstances had
not existed. But I simply stated the case to her,--submitted
everything to her judgment,--and would pay her additional just
exactly what she should determine was right. She named one
hundred dollars more; this I immediately remitted. And thus
terminated my relations with 'Uncle Tom's Cabin,' but not with
its author, who is still engaged as a regular contributor to
the Era. Dr. Snodgrass is hereby commended to Mr. Clephane [Dr.
Bailey's clerk], who is authorized to hand him any letters
between Mrs. Stowe and myself that may aid him in his
undertaking."

It may be proper to say that the "undertaking" referred to contemplated
a biographical sketch, not of Dr. Bailey, but of his distinguished
contributor,--a project the execution of whic