August 21 Wednesday – The Clemens party arrived in Victoria, B.C. shortly after midnight and took rooms at the Driard Hotel. From J.B. Pond’s diary:
Wednesday, August 21st, Victoria, B.C. — The Driad [sic: Driard].
“Mark” has been in bed all day; he doesn’t seem to get strength. He smokes constantly, and I fear too much also; still, he may stand it. Physicians say it will eventually kill him.
We had a good audience. Lord and Lady Aberdeen, who were in a box, came back on the stage after the lecture and said many very nice things of the entertainment, offering to write to friends in Australia about it. “Mark’s” voice began strong, but showed fatigue toward the last. His audience, which was one of the most appreciative he ever had, was in great sympathy with him as they realized the effort he was obliged to make, owing to his hoarseness.
A telegram from Mr. George McL. Brown says the Warrimoo will sail at six o’clock to-morrow evening. This is the last appearance of “Mark Twain” in America for more than a year I know, and I much fear the very last, for it doesn’t seem possible that his physical strength can hold out. After the lecture to-night he expected to visit a club with Mr. Campbell, who did not come around. He and I, therefore, went out for a walk. He was tired and feeble, but did not want to go back to the hotel. He was nervous and weak, and disappointed, for he had expected to meet and entertain a lot of gentlemen. He and I are alike in one respect — we don’t relish disappointment [Eccentricities of Genius 223].
Sam also wrote to J. Henry Harper:
My wife is a little troubled by my wanting my nom de plume put to Joan of Arc so soon. She thinks it might go counter to your plans & that you ought to be left free & unhampered in the matter. / All right — so be it. [Note: Paine asserts that the authorship of JA “had been pretty generally guessed by the second or third issue” MTB 1006].
Sam also wrote that the Warrimoo should have sailed five days before but thought it would sail the next day, Aug. 22 [MTP].
Sam telegraphed a one-liner to Lucius C. “Lute” Pease, reporter for the Portland Oregonian, referring to the “freehanded” insertion which finished Sam’s point in the Aug. 11 interview.
Good enough. You said it better than I could have said it myself.
Allingham enlightens us about this note:
“Far from objecting to Pease’s ‘freehand approach’ to interviewing, Twain was sufficiently interested in how Pease would render his [Sam’s] words that he purchased a copy of the Sunday Oregonian in Victoria and then sent the telegram on August 21st to compliment the reporter” [More of MT 14].
In the evening in Victoria, B.C. Sam gave the lecture that had been postponed for the previous night. He also may have given a supper speech at a press club dinner [Fatout, MT Speaking 663]. J.B. Pond does not mention this event in his diary, and suggests Sam was stood up.
Allingham’s “More of Mark Twain in Victoria, British Columbia,” p.13 gives Victoria’s newspaper reactions to Sam’s delayed lecture:
“Both the Times and his opposite number at the Daily Colonist describe the evening lecture of the 21st as ‘A Treat Delight a Large Audience’ (Times, Aug. 22: 4) and engendered ‘General Enjoyment’ (Colonist, August 22: 8). ‘His Excellency the Governor-General and the Countess of Aberdeen and their family honored the affair with their presence (Times 4), occupying the Royal box, suitably dressed with flags and flowers, [with] the elite of Victoria…present’” (Colonist 8)
J.B. Pond’s diary:
We had a good audience. Lord and Lady Aberdeen, who were in a box, came back on the stage after the lecture and said many nice things of the entertainment, offering to write to friends in Australia about it. “Mark’s” voice began strong but showed fatigue toward the last. His audience, which was one of the most appreciative he ever had, was in great sympathy with him as they realized the effort he was obliged to make, owing to his hoarseness. [Eccentricities of Genius 223].
From Sam’s notebook of Aug. 22 about this performance:
Lectured last night [Aug. 21] — house full. The Governor-General and Lady Aberdeen and their little son in Highland costume, present. Several bars of “God Save the Queen” played when they entered, the audience standing. They came at 8:45, 15 minutes late. I wish they would always be present, for it isn’t permissible to begin till they come; and by that time the late comers are all in.
Was conducted to their box when I was done, by the Aide de Camp. It was in every way pleasant.
A kitten walked across the stage behind me…The audience laughed in the wrong place. I did not know why till after the reading [Paine, MT Notebook 248-9].
See Allingham’s “More of Mark Twain in Victoria,” etc., p.14 for the Lady Aberdeen’s unflattering reaction to Sam.
This lecture ended the North American segment of Sam’s world tour. According to Milton Meltzer in Mark Twain Himself: A Pictorial Biography (1960), “In 38 days Mark had given 24 lectures in 22 cities” [Allingham 15].
The second half of the world tour was under the management of Robert Sparrow Smythe and his son Carlyle Greenwood Smythe, of Melbourne, Australia.