January 15 Saturday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Brown & Gross, Hartford Bookseller, ordering Thomas Babington Macaulay’s History of England (1869) and John Richard Green’s one-volume version of A Short History of the English People; both books in half-morocco [MTP; Gribben 274 & 437]. See Jan. 20.

Sam also helped Jean Clemens write a thank you note to her cousin, Samuel E. Moffett, now in Berkeley, Calif. [MTP].

Hattie (“Josie”) Gerhardt wrote to Sam & Livy thanking them for the letter of introduction to Gen. Lucius Fairchild. It “was just simply & exquisitely kind” [MTP].

Belle C. Greene (1844- ) wrote from Nashua, N.H. to “Mark Twain”. “This summer I sent to your Hartford home a copy of my humorous sketches — to which my publisher gave the somewhat startling title ‘Adventures of An Old Maid.’” She was not one, she wrote, as “the newspapers might suppose.” Had the book been lost ? She’d heard nothing from Sam. Could he read one chapter, say “The Old Maid Goes to the Dentist” and let her know what he thought? [MTP]. (See Jan. 17.)