"The first people outside of Random House who had a chance to see the manuscript of the new novel were the editors at Reader's Digest. They studied the contents for a long time and belatedly concluded that they could use my chapter on the Arapaho Indian whose life spanned the arrival of both the horse and the gun. I was delighted, for such a sale would go far toward repaying me for the heavy expense I had been under in the writing of this book. These papers illustrate how such editors work."