The expense of my brief sojourn in Concord was: Canvas shoes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $1.95 Baseball bat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25 ) gifts to take back Left-handed fielder’s glove . . . . . . . . . . 1.25 ) to a boy Hotel and meals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.25 In all . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $7.70 As you see, this amount was almost what you spent for food for eight months. I cannot defend the shoes or the expenditure for shelter and food: they reveal a meanness and grossness in my nature which you would find contemptible. The baseball equipment, however, is the kind of impediment with which you were never on even terms. You must remember that the house where you practiced the sort of economy which I respect was haunted only by mice and squirrels. You never had to cope with a shortstop.