January 12 Sunday – The New York World on page 14 ran a long interview and feature article, “‘Mark Twain’ at Home.” A brief excerpt about Sam’s writing habits:

“I don’t know how much copy I write each day in those three summer months. The amount varies. ‘Do a little every day’ is my rule. Stick to it and you find the pile of manuscript growing rapidly. If on reading it over I find things I don’t like I simply tear up twenty or thirty pages and there is no harm done. Don’t be in a hurry to do too much, but work regularly.”

January 11 Saturday – Sam read selections from CY at the USMA, West Point, New York. Philip Leon writes:

“While West Point and the cadets are by no means the central metaphor for the novel, he clearly intended for West Point to play an important role in representing an egalitarian institution in which merit counts above heredity” [81].

Not all reviews of CY were glowing: An unsigned article, “Didactic Humorists” ran in Speaker p.49-50 and included a review of CY:

January 10 Friday – Sam wrote to Webster & Co. asking for books to be shipped. His letter not extant but referred to in Webster & Co.’s Jan. 14. Hall was out of the country [MTP].

Charles Ethan Davis telegraphed Sam: “Pump to be made if not delayed any more by La Grippe can be ready without pump in eighteen working days” [MTP].

January 9 Thursday – The Post Orders, Circular No. 2 at West Point announced the January 11th appearance at 7:45 p.m., of Mark Twain [Leon 77].

On or just after this day Sam answered through Whitmore that Pattison’s Jan. 7 request was for a paper now out of print, but that the “Bermuda paper” (“Some Rambling Notes of an Idle Excursion”) was in Stolen White Elephant [MTP].

January 8 Wednesday – From Hartford Sam wrote to his brother Orion Clemens of a Hartford epidemic of the grippe (flu or influenza). Even the doctors in town were laid up.

The cases in our house were Clara (now slowly convalescing,) four servants (all out of bed but one, now,) & one of Patrick’s [McAleer] children. Susie seems to be attacked since dinner, & the doctor has been notified [MTP].

January 7 Tuesday – A.E. Pattison for Pope Mfg. wrote to Sam asking where he might buy a “paper covered collection of short sketches” of Sam’s which included his “Bermuda paper,” by Slote, he thought. (“Some Rambling Notes of an Idle Excursion”) [MTP].

The Manchester Guardian, p.6 in “Books of the Week” wrote:

We owe sincere and large thanks to “Mark Twain” for writing and publishing this book [Budd, Contemporary 299]. Note: CY.

January 6 Monday – George W. Cable wrote to Sam from Northampton, Mass.

I have asked my publishers…to send you a copy of my Strange True Stories of Louisiana [Gribben 124]. Note: Strange True Stories of Louisiana by Cable was published in 1889.

January 5 Sunday – The New York Times, p.11 ran a long description of the life and biography of ex-senator from New York, Roscoe Conkling (1829-1888). Conkling’s biography was published by Webster & Co. Interestingly, Conkling and Sam had both opposed the 1876 candidacy of James G. Blaine.

The Charleston, S.C. Sunday News, p.5 under “New Books” praised CY:

January 4 Saturday – The Hartford Courant of Jan. 6, p.8 reported in “The Cliff Dwellers”:

January 3 Friday – In Hartford Sam met Edward Bellamy, author of Looking Backward: 2000-1887 (1888). Sylvester Baxter accompanied Bellamy at Sam’s invitation [MTHL 2: 622n2]. Bellamy and Baxter shared political sentiments.

Sam also wrote to Isabel Von Oppen, who had sent a manuscript. Sam wrote that he was “not connected with a magazine or other periodical” and would not be able to use her submission [MTP].