October 5 Friday – In Dublin, N.H. Sam replied to the Oct. 3 from (Harold) Witter Bynner, supporting Bynner’s decision to devote himself to poetry.
Dear Poet: / You have certainly done right—for several good reasons; at least, of them, I can name two: 1. With your reputation you can have your freedom & yet earn your living: if you fall short of succeeding to your wish, your reputation will provide you another job. And so, in high approval I suppress the scolding & give you the saintly & fatherly pat instead.
Susy’s prayer was “…..I pray that there may be a God & a Heaven—or something better.”
We are comfortable here, as yet, but I expect to retire to New York within ten days, leaving Jean behind for a fortnight. Miss Lyon will stop in Boston a couple of weeks, for a rest, for she has been ill & has lost strength [MTP]. Note: see Gribben p.120
Sam signed Albert B. Paine’s contract with Harper & Brothers, and noted on the last page: “The above terms are satisfactory to me. S.L. Clemens. Oct.5/06” [MTP: Sotheby’s N.Y. catalogs, Dec. 10, 1993, No. 6515 Item 248].
Clemens’ A.D. of this day included: Authorship of the two letters concerning San Francisco sufferers traced to Miss Grace Donworth—Letter from Miss Anne Stockbridge [MTP Autodict2].
Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Now I’m not sure that I understand the King at all. Or, rather, there is such a deep side to him that I know I don’t understand him & that I never can. But I don’t want to. It’s the side of him that is unfathomable that helps to make his sweet greatness. This afternoon I went to the Upper pasture, & it’s the sweetest place in the world” [MTP TS 127- 128].
Jerome A. Hart, Editor of The Argonaut (S.F.) wrote to Sam enclosing a clipping from “one of the early numbers of the Argonaut some thirty or more years ago. It refers, as you will see, to a ‘farewell lecture’ to be delivered by you in San Francisco, and contains a letter apparently written by you, several others addressed to you which seem also as if they might have been written by you.” Due to the interest in the Autobiography, Hart felt Sam might be interested [MTP]. Note: enclosure in file dated Oct. 6, 1906 includes “MARK TWAIN’S LECTURE IN ‘68”. Chapters from “My Autobiography—III” ran in the N.A.R. p.577-89.