March 17 and 18 Monday – Orion Clemens wrote to Sam.

I feel lonesome and disappointed. I have had a longing to get back to Hartford, and be with you. In yesterday evening’s paper I see that you and family are going to Germany to be gone two years, starting 11th April. I could not sleep. So I got up at 2 o’clock this morning, and finished my story. I will not take time to read it over. I feel that I have suffered the hell I have for forty or more years, in consequence of the infernal doctrine of government by fear. I have been trained a coward, and I mean to put out the fires of hell, and this is the gist of the Kingdom of Sir John Franklin [MTP].