June 9 Saturday –William Dean Howells, on vacation in Conanicut, R.I., and “in a white fog that carries desolation to the soul,” wrote to ask Clemens for parts one and three of “Some Rambling Notes,” to put in type “at once.”

“The wretch who sold you that type-writer has not yet come to a cruel death. In the meantime he offers me $20.00 for it. I never could regard it as more than a loan, so I ask you whether I shall sell it at that price, or pass it along to you at Elmira” [MTHL 1: 181-2].

Francis D. Millet wrote to Sam from Bucharest, Romania to explain how he became a war correspondent (Russo-Turkish War 1877-78) for the New York Herald.

We are very busy of course and I only seize this opportunity of writing you because I don’t know but I may get into the mess any day and then I shant have time to write. I wanted to thank you for the very good letter (not extant) you sent me at Paris…. Charlie Stoddard who spent a few days there and who is soon to come to America will see you and tell you just how well we are situated in Paris and all about our establishment….This war will make people as familiar with the Danubian provinces as they are with Spain I suppose. The most surprising characteristic of the country is its great likeness to our South & West. You would feel quite at home here—with the exception of the language which is peculiar. I am wrestling with that and Russian and scarcely get time to eat. I can only now stop to send many kind regards to all your family whom I remember as if I had acquired new relatives—why don’t people recognize the famille de coeur even if there be no drop of blood of the same blood in its members? I never think of those evenings in Hartford but I feel a great glow come over me” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env. “Answered”; See Jan. 17, and ca. Feb. 15 from Susy Clemens; it’s possible that he thanked Sam for a letter now lost that accompanied Susy’s.