The Jabberwock has many friends, and perhaps a few (very few, let us hope) enemies.  But, of the former, the friend who has helped us most on the road to success is Mr. Lewis Carroll, the author of “Alice in Wonderland,” &c.  Our readers will remember his kind letter granting us permission to use the name “Jabberwock,” and also giving the meaning of that word.  Since then we have received another letter from him, in which he expresses both surprise and regret at an anecdote which we published in an early number of our little paper.  We would assure Mr. Carroll, as well as our other friends, that we had no intention of making light of a serious matter, but merely quoted the anecdote to show what sort of a book Washington’s diary was.

    But now a third letter from our kind friend has come,
    enclosing, to our delight, a poem, “A Lesson in Latin,” the
    pleasantest Latin lesson we have had this year.

The first two letters from Mr. Carroll were in a beautiful literary hand, whereas the third is written with a typewriter.  It is to this fact that he refers in his letter, which is as follows:—­

      “29, Bedford Street,
      Covent Garden, LONDON,

      May 16, 1888.

Dear Young Friends,—­After the Black Draught of serious remonstrance which I ventured to send to you the other day, surely a Lump of Sugar will not be unacceptable?  The enclosed I wrote this afternoon on purpose for you.

      I hope you will grant it admission to the columns of The
      Jabberwock, and not scorn it as a mere play upon words.

This mode of writing, is, of course, an American invention.  We never invent new machinery here; we do but use, to the best of our ability, the machines you send us.  For the one I am now using, I beg you to accept my best thanks, and to believe me

      Your sincere friend,

      Lewis Carroll.”

    Surely we can patiently swallow many Black Draughts, if we
    are to be rewarded with so sweet a Lump of Sugar!

    The enclosed poem, which has since been republished in
    “Three Sunsets,” runs as follows: 

      A LESSON IN LATIN.

      Our Latin books, in motley row,
        Invite us to the task—­
      Gay Horace, stately Cicero;
      Yet there’s one verb, when once we know,
        No higher skill we ask: 
      This ranks all other lore above—­
      We’ve learned “amare” means “to love”!

      So hour by hour, from flower to flower,
        We sip the sweets of life: 
      Till ah! too soon the clouds arise,
      And knitted brows and angry eyes
        Proclaim the dawn of strife. 
      With half a smile and half a sigh,
      “Amare!  Bitter One!” we cry.