October 15 Tuesday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam wrote to Theodore A. Bingham.

Dear Bingham: / Here is a far-wandering breath from over the fields of Long Ago. Ten days ago we found this letter among relics & mementoes of Susy & her Mother. It is from Susy to her Mother. It was an eager message out of a beating heart then; it is compliment, affection & gratitude uttered from the grave, now.

Yours sincerely

S. L. Clemens

[note by IVL on transcript: “Phelps always teased & distressed Susy & Clara before company, & they dreaded his sarcastic attentions”; MTP]. Note: see Bingham’s reply of Oct. 24.

Fatout lists a reading at an unidentified function in Tuxedo Park for this day [MT Speaking 678]. Note: Sam did spin a few of his standard yarns on Oct. 22. See IVL entry.

The Pilgrim Dinner for Rev. Winnington-Ingram, lord bishop of London was held this evening, but Sam had declined to attend, though he wrote a speech for the event (see Fatout 590-5), which criticized the US political system and President Roosevelt, whom he called “President of the Republican party,” and not the US; that all patriotism was lodge in the Republican party, and “All others are traitors; though Americans might mock royalties, they loved to look at pictures of them and even envied them: “An American girl would rather marry a title than an angel.” Sam compared the slaughter of railroad and automobile deaths in America with a relative few in England, and pointed to the Thaw trial as scandal that Americans decried yet couldn’t take their eyes from. He criticized everything in America from their International Yacht races to potholes in their highways. He closed on a positive note hoping that the Lord Bishop would be treated as well by America as he had been in England for the Oxford degree and honors [Note: this speech probably was written shortly after Sam wrote Harvey on Oct. 5 that the invite had arrived, and no later than a few days before the event on Oct. 15; just why Sam did not deliver the speech may be speculated upon; he may have felt the time wasn’t right for another dollop of controversy].

Isabel Lyon’s journal: We drove up to the Douglases this afternoon. Mr. D. is an ex-clergyman. The King looked him over and said he was a clergyman for revenue only. “He stood the chief mate’s watch in Grace Church; he looked the flock over and picked out the government bonds,” and it proclaims itself at every turn. The house is splendid, and beautifully planned, but Mrs. Douglas is long and lank and lean and purely of the spinster type. Not one attraction about her.

I was to go into town today to help C.C. buy a concert gown—but the kitchen range is broken—the floor wet and Katie Laundress has a cold, and so it has been deferred to the end of the week. I was just on my way down stairs last evening to tell the King that the trip was off, and he said “and I was just on my way to call up to you that I’d go in with you and go down to Broughton’s office to see about Utah. (stocks are very, very low just now). The King cannot bear to stay alone in this house or any house. If I stay away the night he cannot eat, for it is solitude, and he says that he will not try to ever again. He will stay in bed and take a glass of milk [MTP TS 116-117].

Edwin P. Parker wrote to Sam [MTP]. Note: letter could not be located at the MTP.

Frances A. Ramsay wrote asking Sam for a letter of recommendation as a stenographer [MTP]. Note: Sam answered on Oct. 17.

Robert C. Richardson, Jr. for West Point sent tickets to “various football games to be played at West Point”; also a schedule for 9 home games for 1907 [MTP]. Note: Lyon wrote for Sam on the letter, “I should thank him very much”

A.E. Sunderhauf wrote from NYC to Sam, representing Mrs. Parsloe (see above) for the play Ah Sin, to be renamed “Where the Trail Divides”—did her authorization include the use of Twain’s name? [MTP]. Note: Lyon wrote on the letter, “In the case of Mrs Parsloe they must use the line [“]revised & reconstructed by consent of Mark Twain from a play written by Bret Harte & Mark Twain, called Ah Sin.[”] / This is necessary both on Mrs. P’s acct & mine. This states the fact & could be taken hold of by the critics & damage done to the interests of the play. It would  not be fair to leave Bret Harte’s name out because he constructed the scenario mainly. He furnished the main character, & he wrote fully half the play. therefore the bulk of the play is Bret Harte’s, not Mr. Clemens”