December 26 Monday – In Buffalo, Sam wrote a letter of regret to decline an invitation from Alfred B. Crandell and Other Members of the Farmers’ Club to speak at a Jan. 5, 1871 dinner at the Metropolitan Hotel in New York City [MTL 4: 286].

Sam also dropped a line to John R. Drake, brother of Francis S. Drake. Sam also wrote Francis about information requested for a biography. Francis Drake was preparing the first edition of the Dictionary of American Biography, Including Men of the Time (1872). “There is really no biography to my career,” Sam wrote, and then contrasted the numbers of sales expected for his first two books with the actual sales numbers [MTL 4: 288].

Sam also wrote and asked Whitelaw Reid to put a notice about Sam’s burlesque autobiography in his promotional literature [MTL 4: 288].

Sam also wrote to John Henry Riley, letter not extant but referred to in Riley’s Dec. 31.

John Henry Riley wrote from Phila. to acknowledge Sam’s of Dec. 22 with check for $1,500. “I shall return to Washington to-morrow night, pack up my traps, come back here for a day, and then on to New York for the final arrangements preparatory to starting on the long voyage” [MTP].