hundred and fifty--seven inhabitants, was the cosmopolitan center of
Long Valley which ran ( if anything in that neighborhood could be said
to run) from Baxter City down below the vicinity of the bridge on the
highway. That is, Long Valley bordered the highway on its western side
for a distance of about ten miles. The valley was, roughly speaking,
a couple of miles wide, very deep in places, and thickly wooded. It
was altogether a very sequestered and romantic region. Through it,
paralleling the highway, was a road, consisting mostly of two wagon
ruts with a strip of grass and weeds between them. To traverse Long
Valley one turned into this road where it left the highway at Baxters,
and in the course of time the wayfarer would emerge out of this dim
tract into the light of day where the unfrequented road came into the
highway again below the bridge.

About midway of this lonely road was Everdoze, and in a pleasant
old-fashioned white house in Everdoze lived Ebenezer Quig who once
upon a time had married Pee-Wee's Aunt Jamsiah. Pee-Wee remembered his
Aunt Jamsiah when she had come to make a visit in Bridgeboro and,
though he had never seen her since, he had always borne her tenderly
in mind because as a little (a very little) boy her name had always
reminded him of jam. The letter, as has been said, bore the postmark
of Everdoze and had been stamped by the very hand of Simeon Drowser,
the local postmaster.

This is what the letter said:

DEAR WALTER:

Your uncle has been pestering me to write to you
but Pepsy has been using the pen for her school