November 22 Friday – Sam arrived in Washington, D.C. and roomed with his new employer, Senator William Morris Stewart (1827-1909) in a second-floor apartment run by 70-year-old Miss Virginia Wells. “Clemens took his meals and socialized at the Round Robin bar at the Willard Hotel (see insert picture)….a favorite watering hole of Washington power brokers” [Bliss 64].

Sam then wrote John Russell Young, editor of the New York Tribune. Sam explained that Young was out when he’d visited the Tribune’s offices and sent him several letters which passed the “most fastidious censor on shipboard” (probably Mrs. Fairbanks).

“I would so like to write some savage letters about Palestine, but it wouldn’t do. And I would like to modernize the biographies of some of the patriarchs—but that would not do, either” [MTL 2: 108-111].

Sam arrived in the nation’s capitol with grand ideas of fame and fortune, of making more of a name for himself by associating with important people, of gaining influence for his brother Orion and for himself. It wasn’t long before being tied to a desk job soured these dreams. The position lasted not quite a month. Powers writes: “Shortly after arriving, Sam hit Stewart up for a loan. Stewart turned him down” [Powers, MT A Life 225]. Lorch puts forth the idea that Sam took the Washington job to “become more knowledgeable for his contemplated trip to China” [69].