July 11 Thursday – Ashcroft’s notes: “Returned to London with Tay Pay. Calls in the afternoon” [MTB 1399].
In Liverpool, England Sam sent a telegram to Henry Rawcliffe Kirkland in West Kirby, England:
“Very very sorry not to have seen you please accept my cordial thanks for your kind letter and my hearty wish for renewed health and strength for you / Mark Twain” [MTP].
Sam left Liverpool on the 11 a.m. train from the Lime Street station. Lord Mayor John Japp shook his hand in farewell at the station. Ralph Ashcroft and T.P. (Tay Pay) O’Connor again traveled with Sam [Liverpool Evening Express, July 11, p.6, “Mark Twain’s Departure”]. The London Daily Graphic reported Sam had collected so many souvenirs, letters, and photographs that he had to buy a special trunk to carry them home [July 11, p.9].
The Pall Mall Gazette announced Sam’s Saturday departure from England:
MARK TWAIN’S DEPARTURE.
Mark Twain will have to do on Saturday what he has rarely done since his arrival in England, namely, to rise early. Usually, he likes to rest well into the morning, but on Saturday, the day of his departure, the special train which takes passengers to Tilbury who are sailing by the Minnetonka, leaves St. Pancras at 9.52 a.m. It is expected that there will be at the station a party of friends to see him off [July 11, p.8].
George B. Harvey’s article, “Mark Twain’s Prices,” ran in the Journal of Education, p. 68-9. Tenney: “The text of an interview by James B. Morrow; this appears to be a transcription of Harvey’s answers to Morrow’s questions, which are not given. When MT returned from his world lecture tour, he ‘barely could earn $6,000 a year,’ but Harvey negotiated a contract giving MT 30 c per word for all he wrote, whether it was published or not. ‘Mark Twain earns $50,000 a yar. Indeed, I think his income in 1907 will reach $70,000.’ He has learned to dictate to a secretary: ‘Now he lights a cigar after breakfast, sits down in his library, and dictates for three hours on his autobiography. When he gets up he has earned $1,000’” [Tenney: “A Reference Guide Second Annual Supplement,” American Literary Realism, Autumn 1978 p. 175].
Albert Bigelow Paine lost Orion Clemens’ autobiography in Grand Central Station, N.Y. On the following day he advertised for its return [NY Times July 12, 1907].
H. Walter Barnett, photographer, London wrote to Sam, hoping he’d rec’d the prints sent [MTP].
Harry E. Brittain wrote from Westminster to bid Sam “au revoir” [MTP].
Graham Buckley wrote from London to Sam, wishing a bon voyage; Buckley was leaving almost simultaneously on a long journey for his health [MTP].
Prof. James Abram Cross wrote from Southport to ask Sam if he might make a medallion in honor of Sam’s visit there [MTP].
Louis Felberman for Hungarian Soc. wrote from London to Sam: “Please accept my most grateful thanks for sending those beautiful lines in connection with the 40th Anniversary of the Coronation of the King of Hungary, which I feel will be read with delight throughout” the domain of “the Emperor-King” [MTP].
A. Francis wrote from Bucks to Sam, seeing that he wanted to arrange his funeral with a brass band, Francis offered the services of a band he was connected with—what country did Sam think of dying in? [MTP].
Histed photographers, London wrote to Sam sending “rough proofs”—which did Sam prefer? [MTP].
Muriel Cochran Jenkins wrote from London to ask Sam for his photograph. She enclosed poems on the deaths of Henry M. Stanley and President McKinley [MTP].
John Y. W. MacAlister wrote from London to Sam, sad that it looked like he would not get to see Clemens before he left—could Sam dine with him the next evening? [MTP].
Isabel Lyon’s journal: Left Boston for New York and ran across Tino who was crossing Union Square. He dropped into my cab with a weary bang and told me of the calamity that had befallen him. He’d lost his big new handbag in G.C. Station—with nearly all his clothes in it, photos of the King, ms. of his own, and oh, everything; even the Orion letters he was carrying up to Elmira to read. I had told him: best not to take them away. He dined with me and we had a cosy time looking through old letters [MTP 83 Note].: “Tino” was a nickname for Albert Bigelow Paine.