May 2 Thursday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to Edith Elsie Baker about the Actors’ Fund Fair flap:

I am back from the South, & find your letter which has given me deep & unqualified pleasure.

And pain, too! But on your account, not on mine. I am very very sorry, most sincerely sorry, that an incident has troubled & distressed you which has drenched my jaded spirit with the refreshing waters of a pure delight. Cheer up! & be glad, & grateful, & happy, & enjoy your president’s [Mrs. Sidney Rosenfeld] attitude at its full value: as the most innocently & impressively & comprehensively humorous thing that has been imagined by a mere uninspired human being these many, many, many centuries! Ah, I wish I could be as funny as that.

Miss Lyon knew quite well that the episode would only entertain me, & would cost me not a pang; & if she didn’t tell you that, she needs disciplining.

Now you must not retire from the field. Daniel Frohman & I are unanimously of that opinion. It is not for victors to retire under fire: that is for the defeated, & you have not been defeated.

Yours in unembarrassed sincerity [MTP].

Sam also wrote to daughter Clara now at the Parker House in Boston.  

O dear Ashcat, but we did have a foggy & gashly time!—after the first day of the fair, which was sunny & bright. [see Apr. 26 & 27 for this section of the letter, which described his activities at the Exposition].

I am glad you are having such a lovely time, Spiderchen; aunt Sue says you sang superbly at Elmira, & we have heard that you carried your Utica house by storm. I suppose it is because you are Mark Twain’s daughter. But anyway it is splendid, & I am glad.

Miss Lyon is ill, & there is no one to fight the reporters . She thinks she can go to Tuxedo Saturday—& I’ve got to go. I hope I can be there all the time of your visit, but maybe I’ll be gone South. Let us see you as soon as we can, dearheart. With lots of love, …. [MTP].

Isabel Lyon’s journal: “I moved my couch over by the telephone and the King came up and talked things for 2 hours” [MTP TS 55].

Whitelaw Reid was at this time the American Ambassador to the Court of St. James. Oxford University’s Chancellor, Lord Curzon of Kedelston (George Nathaniel Curzon 1859-1925), wrote to Reid on this date that it was the “customary function” to confer “honorary degrees on distinguished men” and that he wished to confer such an honor on Samuel L. Clemens, and Thomas A. Edison among others [MTFWE 4]. Note: Reid also was given an honorary degree, and would cable Sam on May 3. Edison would be unable to attend.

Members of the Actors’ Fund Fair adopted a resolution of apology to Clemens, in the Mrs. Sidney Rosenfeld matter, expressing “shame that Christian Science and Mark Twain had come into collision over the fair” [NY Times, May 2, p.11, “Warm Apologies to Mark Twain”]. Note: See May 1 entry on the squabble.

H. Craper wrote from England to Sam. His wife had asked and rec’d Sam’s letter and photo, and when she presented them to him it was “one of the greatest & most pleasant surprises of my lifetime” [MTP].