Text: John Pendleton Kennedy to Edgar Allan Poe — December 22, 1834

Dear Sir, — I have recd your note, and should have apprised you of what I had done, but that Carey’s letter only reached me a few days ago as I was stepping into a carriage to go to Annapolis, whence I returned only a day or two since.

I requested Carey immediately upon the receipt of your first letter to do something for you as speedily as he might find an opportunity and to make some advance on your book. His answer let me know that he would go on to publish, but the expectation of any profit from the undertaking he considered doubtful, — not from want of merit in the production but because small books of detached tales however well written seldom yield a sum sufficient to enable the bookseller to purchase a copyright. He recommended however that I should allow him to sell some of the tales to the publishers of the annuals. My reply was that I thought you would not object to this if the right to publish the same tale was reserved for the volume. He has accordingly sold one of the tales to Miss Leslie for the Souvenir at a dollar a page, I think, with the reservation above mentioned, — and has remitted me a draft for fifteen dollars, which I will hand over to you as soon as you call upon me, which I hope you will do as soon as you can make it convenient. If the other tales can be sold in the same way you will get more for the work than by an exclusive publication.

Yours truly
John P. Kennedy.

Balt. Dec. 22, 1834.

Edgar A. Poe, Esq.