July 13 Friday – En route from Southampton to New York on the S.S. Paris, Sam wrote to Livy:

Livy darling, we shall arrive early to-morrow — Saturday. It has been an astonishing voyage, as regards weather: warm, brilliant, smooth — the sea is a millpond, all the way over.

Sam wrote of his writing efforts on board (see July 8 and 9) and of the 200 first class cabin passengers he called “very pleasant people & considerably above the quality of folks who travel by German ships.” He’d met a Mrs. Hammond who’d met Clara at Sybil Sanderson’s, and whose husband was employed by the British government to oversee all the mining in South Africa. Sam was impressed enough with his salary and benefits, totaling $100,000 a year, to share these with Livy. He’d also seen Mrs. P.T. Barnum who had been an invalid for eight years but was cured in five months by the London doctor Playfair. “She thinks Susy ought to go to him.” He also mentioned the Consul-General; Sam found him “very pleasant company.” Mrs. Horowitz, her daughter and her daughter’s fiancée were on board. Also Mrs. Smith, “the one who met me on the street in Paris” was on board.

Sam wondered if Livy was still in La Bourboule, calling it a “weary and doleful place” for her. He loved her dearly and always would [LLMT 302-3]. Note: Sam would see Mrs. John Hays Hammond again in late May, 1896 in Praetoria, S. Africa during his world tour. He would visit her husband, then in jail for his part in the Jameson raid [303].