| 494 There is sufficient in the Manuscript to base the stories upon made by Howe's witnesses who claimed they had heard it read twenty-two years prior to giving their statements, except as to a few of the technical expressions and names that Hurlbut and Howe run in when they wrote up the "statements" for their "witnesses;" but nothing whatever to show that it was the foundation of the Book of Mormon. . . .
The copy will be ready and placed in your hands next week. The copying will be done by a typewriter copyist, verbatim et literatim, and will contain the certificate of President Fairchild, that it is correct.
The copy that Mr. Rice took will also be published, thus furnishing two independent copies to the public, making any suppressions or erasures impossible without detection.
President Fairchild charges nothing for his time in the examination of the matter and giving certificate; and finding that he desired a copy of the Book of Mormon for the Oberlin Library, I told him I would ask our publishing house to furnish him a copy free.
The Manuscript contains one hundred sixty-five pages, and between forty-five thousand and fifty thousand words. I expect to leave Kirtland for the West on Tuesday or Wednesday next, and hope to hear from you at once at Kirtland, if there are any other points worth looking after. There will be no necessity of getting in further evidences as to the genuineness of the manuscript, as there is proof sufficient. The first pages and indorsement [endorsement] on the last will be photographed so that should you wish to have it stereotyped and presented in this form for evidence, you can do so. There will be three pages of this in photograph form.
July 23 Elder W. H. Kelley contributed a letter to the Saints' Herald touching the same subject. 1
The field of Elder Peter Anderson was changed by order of the First Presidency from Eastern Nebraska and Western Iowa, to the Rocky Mountain Mission, and to the latter field he repaired about the last of July.
Under date of August 1, Elder Joseph Luff wrote of a debate between Elder Jensen of the Utah church, and Elder R. J. Anthony, at Pleasant Grove, Utah.
1 Yesterday, In company with E. L., I dropped into the office of Professor Fairchild, at Oberlin, and had the pleasure of examining the famed old Spalding Manuscript, which has been posed against the faith so long by self-willed and unscrupulous opposers, as constituting the ground-plot for the origin of the Book of Mormon. Beyond question it is the identical Spalding Romance. There are so many things which identifies it, that the mind is set at rest that it is the thing "de facto." It has an antiquated appearance; leaves soiled by use and torn in places, and has a smoked, rusty appearance. The paper is thicker than ordinary writing paper now in use, and is not ruled. Water marks are easily traced upon it. The leaves are six and one half inches wide and eight inches long, and are closely written on both sides in an old fashioned cramped hand. The Manuscript when lying
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