We clip the following from The Summary, a weekly journal published in the interests of the New York State Reformatory:--

Some time ago the Concord Library purchased Mark Twain's 'Huckleberry Finn,' and was grieved to find that it was an 'irreligious' book. The local newspapers took up the story and passed it around, each adding its own embellishment, until at last it was proclaimed that Mark Twain's day as a humorist was over. The Reformatory Library also procured 'Huckleberry Finn,' was similarly impressed, and the fact came under the notice of Professor Sanborn when he was visiting us. In a letter of last week this gentleman writes to the Superintendent: 'I have read "Huckleberry Finn," and I do not see any reason why it should not go into your Reference Library, at least, and form the subject of a debate in your Practical Morality Class. I am serious in this.' This at least suggests an adequate apology for the general toleration of 'Huckleberry Finn.'

["Professor Sanborn" was probably F. B. Sanborn, who in 1885 lectured on Emerson in Concord, and also published books on Henry Thoreau and John Brown -- like Huck, both "outlaws."]