November 18 Sunday – Sam was in Boston and accompanied the Howellses in a social call upon the Aldriches Sam returned to Hartford directly from the Aldriches, after the Howellses left. Howells wrote him on Nov. 19 about being “half dead …from eating & laughing yesterday” [MTHL 1: 448, 450n3].

Edwin Booth, Matthew Arnold, Charles Dudley Warner, and Oliver Wendell Holmes filled out the lunch party at the Aldriches. Booth wrote that day to William Bispham that “the feast was royal…I both listened and ate my fill” [Edwin Booth: Recollections by His Daughter, Edwina (1894)]. Thanks to JoDee Benussi.

Western Union per J.H. Lounsbury wrote more about the “lost” telegram being sent by phone to a female voice at the Clemens residence [MTP]. Note: even then, telegrams were phoned if possible.