November 18 Saturday – The Saturday Press first published the Jumping Frog story. The story was an immediate sensation and was reprinted by newspapers and magazines around the county [Rasmussen 266; ET&S 2: 262]. It was a sensation in New York.  

Sam’s article “The Old Thing” ran in the Enterprise [ET&S 2: 332].  

Another article, “Bad Precedent” ran in the San Francisco Dramatic Chronicle [ET&S 2: 502].  

In the Californian, Sam’s article ran: “Mark Twain” on the Launch of the Steamer “Capital.” Note: Budd points out that this was reprinted in several collections, sometimes under the title “The Entertaining History of the Scriptural Panoramist” or “A Traveling Show” [“Collected” 1005].

I get Mr. Muff Nickerson to go with me and assist in reporting The Great Steamboat Launch. he relates the interesting history of the travelling panoramist.  

I was just starting off to see the launch of the great steamboat Capital, on Saturday week, when I came across Mulph, Mulff, Muff, Mumph, Murph, Mumf, Murf, Mumford, Mulford, Murphy Nickerson — (he is well known to the public by all these names, and I cannot say which is the right one) — bound on the same errand, He said that if there was one thing he took more delight in than another, it was a steamboat launch; he would walk miles to see one, any day; he had seen a hundred thousand steamboat launches in his time, and hoped he might live to see a hundred thousand more; he knew all about them; knew everything — everything connected with them — said he “had it all down to a scratch;” he could explain the whole process in minute detail; to the uncultivated eye a steamboat-launch presented nothing grand, nothing startling, nothing beautiful, nothing romantic, or awe-inspiring or sublime — but to an optic like his (which saw not the dull outer coating, but the radiant gem it hid from other eyes,) it presented all these — and behold, he had power to lift the veil and display the vision even unto the uninspired. He could do this by word of mouth — by explanation and illustration. Let a man stand by his side, and to him that launch should seem arrayed in the beauty and the glory of enchantment! [Schmidt].