November 30 Saturday – Sam’s 43rd birthday. Sam told a story or gave a speech (often there was very little difference) at the American Artists Club in Munich. Just what Sam said has been lost. Sam’s notebook:

Farewell blow-out…to Toby Rosenthal who sails for California. Horstmann, (consul,) read a mighty bright speech, with new & exceedingly funny feature of dropping frequently into rhyming doggerel—every line rhyming with tall & every stanza ending with “Toby Rosenthal.” I mean to borrow & use that happy idea someday [MTNJ 2: 250].

In his Sept. 5, 1906 A.D., Sam puts the following episode to this date:

      November 30, 1878. Clara four years old, Susy six. This morning when Clara discovered that this is my birthday, she was greatly troubled because she had provided no gift for me, and repeated her sorrow several times. Finally she went musing to the nursery and presently returned with her newest and dearest treasure, a large toy horse, and said “You shall have this horse for your birthday, papa.”

      I accepted it with many thanks. After an hour she was racing up and down the room with the horse, when Susy said,

      “Why Clara, you gave that horse to papa, and now you’ve tooken it again.”

      Clara. “I never give it to him for always; I give it to him for his birthday” [AMT 2: 225].