January 17 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Hjalmar H. Boyesen (1848-1895), Norwegian born American writer and literary critic. Boyesen had visited the Clemens family over the holidays. Sam wrote how much they had all enjoyed the visit, extending an open invitation to return. Sam shipped Boyesen’s overshoes and some pamphlets left behind to Boyesen’s home in Ithaca, New York.

Note: Boyesen came to the United States in 1869 and became editor of Fremad, a Norwegian weekly published in Chicago. Later he was a professor at Cornell and Columbia universities; his scholarly works include Goethe and Schiller (1879) and Essays on Scandinavian Literature (1895). Boyesen is best remembered for his fiction, including Gunnar (1874), a romance of Norwegian life, and such realistic urban novels as The Mammon of Unrighteousness (1891) and The Social Strugglers (1893).

Sam wrote Boyesen that he’d asked Bayard Taylor (1825-1878) to be his guest. Taylor was one of the best-known poets, adventurer, and travel writer of his day, soon to lecture in Hartford.

I have asked him to talk to our Young Girls, & I hope he will do it. Warner will talk to them next Saturday, & Gen. Hawley will entertain them soon. I shall make Howells talk to them when I get him here. Gen Franklin is going to instruct them in military matters, or Gatling guns, or something.

      Hart hasn’t come yet—so the play isn’t yet licked into shape—consequently I haven’t demanded Howell’s presence. (He is to come when the play is ready to be read & criticised.)

Sam also mentioned that Francis Millet made “an excellent portrait of me” [MTLE 2: 7].