November 14 Wednesday – In the evening Sam and Livy and Howells attended a Hartford reception for Matthew Arnold (1822-1888), who was to lecture in Hartford the next day. Arnold had lectured in Boston on Nov. 7 and would repeat the talk there on Nov. 17. The reception was given by the David Clarks [MTHL 1: 449n2]. Howells introduced Sam to Arnold and they had a conversation [Powers, MT A Life 480]. Camfield writes Arnold was “best known and reviled in the nineteenth-century United States for his stinging criticism of American culture” [36].

Sam wrote from Hartford to an unidentified person that he’d had “nothing to do with getting that item into print,” so was “in no way responsible for its statements….” Still, Sam thought “the vital fact which they seem to convey is true.” The rest of the letter is lost [MTP].

Karl Gerhardt wrote to Clemens & Livy with the news he’d be sending a bust he’d made with Dr. Beard of the American Chapel, who was going to America and probably to Hartford [MTP].