December 25 Tuesday – Christmas in Elmira.

Sam inscribed a copy of Tom Sawyer to Warren Leary: “To / Warren Leary / with the kindest regards of / The Author. / We ought never to do wrong when people are looking. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain / Xmas, 1900” [MTP]. Note: Warren Leary (1891-1959) was Katy Leary’s nephew from Elmira [“The Fenton Leary Family” MS in Elmira College]. Thanks to Mark Woodhouse of Elmira College.

Sam also wrote to Mrs. Annie E. Thomas [MTP]. UCCL 13041 letter or inscription not available.

James Lane Allen wrote an inscription in The Choir Invisible (1897) to Sam: “Sincerely Yours, James Lane Allen”; Sam wrote on the front flyleaf:

There is a heritage of heroic example and noble obligation, not reckoned in the Wealth of Nations, but essential to a nation’s life; the contempt of which, in any people, may not slowly, mean even its commercial fall. Very sweet are the uses of prosperity, the harvests of peace and progress, the fostering sunshine of health and happiness, and length of days in the land. But there be things “the good of” which and “the use of” which are beyond all calculation of worldly goods and earthly uses, things such as Love, Honour, and the Soul of Man, which cannot be bought with a price, and which do not die with death. And they who would fain live happily “ever after” should not leave these things out of the lesson of their lives. M.T. December 1900 [MTP].