Chicago, April 22, 1861

 

L. Spooner Esq.

 

My Dear Sir,

 

     Yours of the 14th just [?] is received. I received the two copies of your pamphlet, and have read it not however with so much care as I intend.

     However it might be understand ordinary circumstances, I doubt whether anything can be done in regard to introducing your system at the present time. Scarcely any thing else is talked of or thought of, during this dreadful war excitement, than the passing events of each day. Business is entirely suspended, and will remain so, I fear, for a long time, and nothing can be done outside of recruiting preparation for the “pomps + circumstances of glorious war.” When is this horrid state of things going to end? You could not possibly have published your system at a more unfavorable juncture. Whatever aid I can contribute in making it known introducing it to the public, I will give cheerfully. Mr. Haite as well as some others have read your work and they pronounce it decidedly ingenious and plausible + able, but are at a loss to determine how it will succeed in practice.

     If you send on the copies you mention, I will do what I can in introducing them. But, as I said before, the war fever rages so extensively that every thing else is absorbed by it. Even our counts have adjourned their sittings—so that literally inter arma leges silent.    

     Mrs. Brackett desires me [?] to send in my letter the expression of her best regards for you.

                                  Very Truly + Sincerely

                                      Yours,

                                      Mr. Brackett