Page:Familiar letters of Henry David Thoreau.djvu/228

 204 GOLDEN AGE OF ACHIEVEMENT. [1848,

till March and April, 1847 ; even then the promised payment was not forthcoming. On the 31st of March, 1848, a year and a half after it had been put in Griswold s posses sion, Thoreau wrote again to Greeley, saying that no money had come to hand. At once, and at the very time when Mr. Blake was open ing his spiritual state to Thoreau (April 3, 1848), the busy editor of the &quot; Tribune &quot; re plied : &quot;It saddens and surprises me to know that your article was not paid for by Graham ; and, since my honor is involved, I will see that you are paid, and that at no distant day.&quot; Ac cordingly, on May 17th, he adds : &quot; To-day I have been able to lay my hand on the money due you. I made out a regular bill for the contri bution, drew a draft 011 G. E. Graham for the amount, gave it to his brother in New York for collection, and received the money. I have made Graham pay you seventy-five dollars, but I only send you fifty dollars,&quot; having deducted twenty-five dollars for the advance of that sum he had made a month before to Thoreau for his &quot; Ktaadn and the Maine Woods,&quot; which finally came out in &quot; Sartain s Union Magazine &quot; of Philadelphia, late in 1848. To this letter and remittance of fifty dollars Thoreau replied, May 19, 1848, substantially thus :