February 22 Friday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote instructions and a draft for Isabel Lyon to use to reply to Laura M. Dake (Laura Wright), who had written on Feb. 12 and 16.
Idle as he seems to be he’s representing Satan & he always finds something for M . Clemens to r turn his attention to, and wants to keep on his good side so has to attend to business Put in the customary glads and sorrys Glad the protege is progressing to her satisfaction— Sorry that her health & circumstances are not what they would be if our Heavenly father really lived up to the character given him by an overcharitable & limitlessly stupid pulpit. We mustn’t go too deep—we must stop on the verge—but have to say something about God’s inhumanity to man.
When she’s settled she must say so & then we’ll send her some books [MTP]. Note: David “Wattie” Bowser had been Laura’s “protégé” student back in 1882, and she may have reported his progress as a man.
Sam also wrote to George B. Harvey about a paper his nephew, Samuel E. Moffett had written for the NAR. Sam thought it good but realized Harvey was “the final court.” He was embarrassed to ask Thomas Bailey Aldrich to look at the paper. Would Harvey ask Aldrich or show it to David A. Munro? [MTP].
Sam also wrote to an unidentified person. “If I’ve become a Whitmanite I’m sorry—I never read 40 lines of him in my life—but I contributed $200 toward building a cottage for the old man to die in.” On the flip side Isabel Lyon wrote: “A letter came from a woman who had sent him Extracts from Whitman but he never rec’d it” [MTP].
Hill has Sam entertaining (John) Gutzon de la Mothe Borglum (1867-1941), American artist and sculptor on this day. Borglum was most famous for the Stone Mountain and Mt. Rushmore projects [164]. Fatout lists a ladies tea Sam attended at Columbia University, where he made a few remarks (likely an error) [676]. Lyon makes no mention of the tea in her journal but does mention Borgulm’s visit. See her entry below.
Isabel Lyon’s journal: Gutzon Borglum came in to see the King this afternoon & when we spoke of him at dinner the King said that he removed only that part of the statues on St. John’s Cathedral that could not be used, & that he didn’t destroy anything. He has sent 2 photographs of a statue of John Mackay & one of a statue of Ruskin, that are fine.
This morning at eight o’clock AB went away & the King is so lonely without him that he has gone to bed. AB’s as bad at spoiling me as Stiattesi ever was, he gives me books & books, forever [MTP TS 31].
Albert Bigelow Paine left for the West to gather biographical information on Clemens [Hill 165]. Note: Paine puts his departure to March, 1907. He would interview John Briggs, Joe Goodman, Steve Gillis, and Horace Bixby [MTB 1376].
Edward Livingston Hunt, M.D. wrote from NYC to Miss Lyon. “I thought it would interest and please Mr. Clemens to know that Miss Jean, whom I saw to-day, had in the last three weeks suffered from only one slight attack and that one of the petit mal type” [MTP].
The Columbia (Mo.) Statesman ran a brief, anonymous item, “Mark Twain’s Snow-White Garb.” Tenney: “…describing the broadcloth coat (and broadcloth-covered buttons), and white silk lapels and lining and zig-zag embroidery around the edges; there is white-silk braid down the outside seams of the trousers” [Tenney: “A Reference Guide Second Annual Supplement,” American Literary Realism, Autumn 1978 p. 174-5].