October 20 Thursday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote a letter of introduction for Herr Van Dyke to Laurence Hutton: “any kindness you & Mrs. Hutton may show him is a kindness shown to me.” Sam requested that Hutton introduce Van Dyke to the Players Club and also the Century magazine staff

[MTP]. Note: could this have been Henry Van Dyke, later professor of literature at Princeton?

Sam also wrote a postcard to Siegmund Schlesinger in Vienna: “November 1. Schon gut. Dass ist wie ich’s verstanden habe. / Mark Twain” [MTP].

About this day Sam also wrote to Franklin G. Whitmore (only the envelope survives) [MTP].

J.L. Campbell wrote to Sam from Manchester, N.H., enclosing a newspaper clipping of a poem by a grieving widow: “Knowing your weakness for touching obituaries…I enclose …a pathetic little poem by a heart-broken widow” [MTP].

The New York Times, Oct. 20, p.7 ran an article datelined London of this date:

Mark Twain on Universal Peace.

LONDON, Oct. 20.—The Vienna correspondent of The Daily News says: “Samuel L. Clemens, (Mark Twain,) who has addressed a meeting of the Society of the Friends of Peace here, told them that he formerly doubted whether the world would ever be able to put a stop to war, but that the Czar had convinced and converted him. He spoke in English. The speech was not interpreted to the assembly, because the Government representative doubted that all Mr. Clemens said would bear translation.”

Note: Sam spoke to the group on Feb. 17, 1898. See entry.

Sam’s notebook:

“Oct. 20. Turn back to Sept. 21. Count Coudenhove called to-day. He says that the young man’s brain hangs away down his cheek; his horrible wounds have healed; he suffers little or no pain; smokes; is apparently going to get well, but he does not want to” [NB 40 TS 47-8].