The Bayliss Rare Books in London sold last month, for £15.000, a letter by Bram Stoker written only a few weeks after Dracula was published in 1897.
My dear Williams,
I send you Dracula & have honoured myself by writing your name in it.
How is enclosed for high? Lord forgive me. I am quite shameless.
Yours ever,
Bram Stoker
That’s how I read it, too.