Copying Book: Secretary's Letters, 1860 (page 420)

420

16 Pemberton Square,

May 26, [186]8

T.A. Chapman Esq. Milwaukee Wis. --

Dear Sir,

Out Treas^r, Mr Bond, has sent
me your note of May 13^th requesting me to reply to it:

I regret to perceive that you have got an erro-
nous impression in the matter. The bill as
I see, is $53.25 for the first grading and sodding
the lot. Your lot (no 3530 Mound Avenue) was
graded up with a line of lots of which Mr Collier's
is first and Mr Clark's last -- in advance of sale.
The Corporation only occasionally grades lot before sale, and
invariably, when this is done, adds the price of grading to
the piece of land. Your land (400 feet) as you find
in your deed cost you $600. This was for land in
its naked condition. You may have got the idea that
the $600 covered the whole from the fact that it was
graded when you first saw it. The reason we make
the charge for the land and grading separate is
that we divide proceeds of land with the Massa-
chusetts Horticultural Society, and it has no interest
in the work -- so we keep separate accounts, & the
bills are rendered separately to the purchaser.

Every other gentleman near you has been
charged this separate bill in the same way
and has paid it. The fact, that if one