You inquire my books. For poets, I have Keats, and Mr. and Mrs. Browning. For prose, Mr. Ruskin, Sir Thomas Browne, and the Revelations. I went to school, but in your manner of the phrase had no education. When a little girl, I had a friend who taught me Immortality; but venturing too near, himself, he never returned. Soon after my tutor died, and for several years my lexicon was my only companion. Then I found one more, but he was not contented I be his scholar, so he left the land. You ask of my companions. Hills, sir, and the sundown, and a dog large as myself, that my father bought me. They are better than beings because they know, but do not tell; and the noise in the pool at noon excels my piano. I have a brother and sister; my mother does not care for thought, and father, too busy with his briefs to notice what we do. He buys me many books, but begs me not to read them, because he fears they joggle the mind. They are religious, except me, and address an eclipse, every morning, whom they call their “Father.” But I fear my story fatigues you. I would like to learn. Could you tell me how to grow, or is it unconveyed, like melody or witchcraft? You speak of Mr. Whitman. I never read his book, but was told that it was disgraceful. I read Miss Prescott’s “Circumstance,” but it followed me in the dark, so I avoided her. Two editors of journals came to my father’s house this winter, and asked me for my mind, and when I asked them “why” they said I was penurious, and they would use it for the world. I could not weigh myself, myself. My size felt small to me. I read your chapters in the “Atlantic,” and experienced honor for you. I was sure you would not reject a confiding question. Is this, sir, what you asked me to tell you? Your friend, E. DICKINSON. It will be seen that she had now drawn a step nearer, signing her name, and as my “friend.” It will also be noticed that I had sounded her about certain American authors, then much read; and that she knew how to put her own criticisms in a very trenchant way. With this letter came some more verses, still in the same birdlike script, as for instance the following:— “Your riches taught me poverty, Myself a millionaire In little wealths, as girls could boast, Till, broad as Buenos Ayre, You drifted your dominions A different Peru, And I esteemed all poverty For life’s estate, with you. “Of mines, I little know, myself, But just the names of gems, The colors of the commonest, And scarce of diadems So much that, did I meet the queen, Her glory I should know; But this must be a different wealth, To miss it, beggars so.