Instead of sending the final instalment of the stipulated $4,500 in two letters of credit, I have put it into a single one of a thousand dollars, & it will reach you before you are out of money. I have done this in order that you might have opportunity to look about you & make your plans wisely & unhurriedly for the future. Or, rather, I should say complete your plans; for it goes without saying that you have given the matter careful thought & mapped out your plans, in the main, before this time. Complete them clearly & distinctly, so that you may go at them understandingly, & thus make the fewer mistakes. And keep us posted, as you go along, concerning your situation, so that we can lend a prompt helping hand when it is needed, & not sit ignorant & know nothing about that it is needed until it be too late to be effective. For if we have earned anything it is the right to know when you are in trouble, & the trust that should make you unafraid to let us know.

We want you both to write us just as often as you can, & thus keep the bridge strong & firm between your hearts & ours,—don’t let it fall to decay & leave the affections without a highway to cross on. Tell us all your affairs, circumstances, prospects, purposes, hopes, fears, achievements. Be liberal with us, in this, & try to forgive & excuse & bear with a niggardly return in the matter of written words; for we are worthless correspondents, & write hardly any letters except such as business compels with the strong hand. They are numberless—the infernal business letters—& now that I keep no stenographer they eat into my time ruinously. But be sure of one thing—I shall write you as often as I write my own mother, or any other best friend. It isn’t saying much—in fact it is saying very little—but it’s saying more than I would say to anybody else outside of the family. So, while it isn’t saying much, it is saying something, you see.