F 1903. TO VARIOUS PERSONS. HARD DAYS AT RIVERDALE. LAST
SUMMER AT ELMIRA. THE RETURN TO ITALY.

The reader may perhaps recall that H. H. Rogers, some five
or six years earlier, had taken charge of the fortunes of
Helen Keller, making it possible for her to complete her
education. Helen had now written her first book--a
wonderful book--'The Story of My Life', and it had been
successfully published. For a later generation it may be
proper to explain that the Miss Sullivan, later Mrs. Macy,
mentioned in the letter which follows, was the noble woman
who had devoted her life to the enlightenment of this blind,
dumb girl--had made it possible for her to speak and
understand, and, indeed, to see with the eyes of luminous
imagination.

The case of plagiarism mentioned in this letter is not now
remembered, and does not matter, but it furnished a text for
Mark Twain, whose remarks on the subject in general are
eminently worth while.

*****

To Helen Keller, in Wrentham, Mass.:

RIVERDALE-ON-THE-HUDSON,
ST. PATRICK'S DAY, '03.

DEAR HELEN,--I must steal half a moment from my work to say how glad I
am to have your book, and how highly I value it, both for its own sake
and as a remembrances of an affectionate friendship which has subsisted
between us for nine years without a break, and without a single act of
violence that I can call to mind. I suppose there is nothing like it in
heaven; and not likely to be, until we get there and show off. I often
think of it with longing, and how they'll say, "There they come--sit
down in front!" I am practicing with a tin halo. You do the same. I was
at Henry Rogers's last night, and of course we talked of you. He is not
at all well; you will not like to hear that; but like you and me, he is
just as lovely as ever.

I am charmed with your book-enchanted. You are a wonderful creature,
the most wonderful in the world--you and your other half together--Miss
Sullivan, I mean, for it took the pair of you to make a complete and
perfect whole. How she stands out in her letters! her brilliancy,
penetration, originality, wisdom, character, and the fine literary
competencies of her pen--they are all there.

Oh, dear me, how unspeakably funny and owlishly idiotic and grotesque
was that "plagiarism" farce! As if there was