I wish to thank you heartily for a most pleasant sojourn in Keokuk—& of course I also thank Ma & Mollie—that goes without saying. I had a perfect 24 hours there, with the sort of social activity which produces rest instead of fatigue.

I don’t like to think of the Burlington performance. Cable had been on the platform more than an hour & a half when I arrived; & so I did not dare to try to make the house listen an hour to me. I had to cut myself shorter than I wanted to, & I did not talk well, anyway, because I felt myself so heavily handicapped by the hellish circumstances.

With great love to all of you