Helen Hunt Jackson Papers, Part 2, Ms 0156, Box 2, Folder 23f, Oliver Wendell Holmes to HHJ, 1879.
Transcribed by Gloria Helmuth, 2003.

[written at top of page: from Oliver Wendell Holmes, Dec. 13, 1879]

Boston, Dec. 13th 1879.

My dear Mrs. Jackson,

You cleared up what was little more than a myth to me by your presence and by the poem which you sent to grace our innocent festival. I have long known the deep-lined contralto who sang under the name H.H. but seemed more like "a wandering voice" than a vocalised personality and a possible voter. I thank you for revealing yourself and still more for the very kind way in which you alluded to me and my poems. It was a great pleasure you presence and your power gave me, as I am sure they must have given others who had long listened to every note of yours but had never found what thicket or what cloud it came from.

Believe me, dear Mrs. Jackson

Very sincerely yours

O.W. Holmes.