September 8 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Buffalo to Henry M. Crane about lecturing:

“No, your ‘persistence’ don’t annoy me a bit—it is complimentary to me. I am only going to lecture till the middle of January, anyhow.”

Sam noted that his wedding had been postponed until the first week in February, due to lecture dates he was unable to cancel. Sam’s intention at this point was to “get out of the lecture-field forever” [MTL 3: 346-7].

Sam started a letter to Livy, finished the next day. “Livy, my precious little darling, I am as happy as a king, now that it is settled & I can count the exact number of days that are to intervene before we are married. I am full of thankfulness, & the world looks bright & happy ahead” [LLMT 109]

Bret Harte wrote from San Francisco:

My dear Clemens, / Bancroft sent me no book; more than that he refused, outright, to send me one even on the shaming of your letter. He took the Bulletin’s copy from them after they had noticed it, and sold it. Enterprising as [two lines (about 10 words torn away] your relation to the affair—and my sole reason for stating it—is that I do not intend to subscribe to the volume for the rare pleasure of reviewing it in the Overland. It is enough for me to read it again; friendship even of a more romantic kind than ours could not ask more [two lines, probably closing and signature, torn away] [MTP]. Note: Hubert Howe Bancroft (1832-1918), historian and ethnologist. .