February 24 Sunday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to daughter Clara, now at the Hotel Worthy in Springfield, Mass. on a singing tour.  

I shall watch with interest for your code-signals, Clärchen dear, & shall hope that they will bring good news from my self-banished exile.

I like Mr. Wark & his honest blue eyes ever so much. I think you are fortunate to be in his guardianship.

To-day I have received the golden-wedding cards of the Murat Halsteads. They had been married 21 years when we crossed with them & the Bayard Taylors in the Holsatia in 1878.

However, you were only 4 years old & will not remember them.

This is a deserted house—nobody in it but me. I wandered into this parlor of yours, & I thought I would drop you a line from your desk. The Colonel [Harvey] was to come up & play billiards, but he has gotten mislaid, I reckon.

I am going to Candace Wheeler’s on the 28 . In fact I go out very frequently & exhibit my clothes. Howells has dubbed me the Whited Sepulchre.

Only one person asked after me! Oh, well, I’ll send you Candace Wheeler’s letter & take some of the self-complacency out of you.

Take good—good—good care of yourself, precious Ashcat [MTP].

Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Rogers to dinner. Drake Brass Collection” [MTP TS 31]. Note: published in 1907, was a booklet, The Notable Collection of Brass and Copper, by A.W. Drake, American Art Galleries, Madison Square South, NYC. Alexander Wilson Drake (1843-1916), artist, collector, and critic, whose large collection sold at auction in 1913. A sale of lesser import was held on Feb. 27; see Lyon’s entry.

William Laffan Mackay wrote to Sam. “Dear Mark: / You might not see the Cosmopolitan, so I tear this out and send it to you. Coming from an Earl you must feel it a rebuke. / Read about the island—good big island too—in the S. Pacific; and the rum epidemic. Curious the reticence of the Scotch earls; no name for his island, no name for the vigorous ailment, no name for the city and none for the steamer. Can an Earl lie?” [MTP]. Note: Mackay referred to “The Truth About Christian Science” by the Seventh Earl of Dunmore (Charles Adolphus Murray 1841- 1907) in the Mar. 1907 Vol. 42 of Cosmopolitan, p. 541-44. The heading states: “With his family he is a firm believer in the principles of Christian Science…He has been most influential in the spread of Christian Science throughout Great Britain…”  Twain is not mentioned in the article.

Sam attended another tea at Mally Graham Coatsworth Lord’s (Mrs. Herbert Gardiner Lord), helping her “receive 200 women & girls.” Before the event he fell on the ice and tore his white pants and had to stand with his “back to the wall”during the reception [Feb. 25 to Jean]. Or did he? [Mar. 5 to Jean].