January 7 Sunday – Sam left in the a.m. for Elmira, a nine or ten hour train trip [Jan. 6 to Hall].

January 6 Saturday – In New York Sam wrote two notes to Frederick J. Hall. In the first:

I think I will go to Elmira tomorrow and distribute some stock to people who are anxious to get it. I expect to get back Monday night. If I don’t & the bank is stubborn, go to Mr. Rogers…

[Note: MTLTP 361n1: “Perhaps to Susan Crane, who had offered MT $5,000 in stocks and bonds the preceding fall”; See LLMT, p.270.]

January 5 Friday – The New York Times of Jan. 6, p.9 “Notes of the Courts” reported an old lawsuit against Sam was dropped:

The suit brought by Edward House to prevent Samuel L. Clemens, (“Mark Twain,”) Abby Sage Richardson, and Daniel Frohman from producing “The Prince and the Pauper” without consent of the plaintiff, was dismissed by Justice Bischoff in the Special Term of the Court of Common Pleas yesterday.

Note: See May 7, 1890 and other entries concerning House’s lawsuit.

January 4 Thursday – In New York at the Players Club, Sam’s wakeup call came at 8:30 a.m. He was “rested & vigorous,” and “spent the day walking the sidewalk out in front taking the brisk air & keeping watch for messengers.” He wrote all this and much more in another long letter to Livy. He opened with a paragraph referencing, “The Tale of the Dime-Store Maiden” he’d sent on Dec.

January 3 Wednesday – In New York on the stationery of the Office of Woodlawn Cemetery, 20 E. 23rd Street, where the Knevals brothers (of the Conn. Co.–See Dec. 7, 1893) were directors, Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers.

January 2 Tuesday – Sam signed the brief introduction, “A Whisper To The Reader,” to The Tragedy of Pudd’nhead Wilson and the Comedy Those Extraordinary Twins:

Given under my hand this second day of January, 1893, at the Villa Viviani, village of Settignano, three miles back of Florence, on the hills…[Oxford facsimile edition 1996].

January 1 Monday – In New York Sam wrote to Henry G. Newton, attorney for Charles R. North:

It would not avail for me to go to New Haven, or to re-open negociations here, because I have no larger powers now that I have been equipped with heretofore. But if you would like to see Mr. Rogers I will make the appointment for you, or you can communicate directly with him.

January – Sam’s notebook lists several ideal subjects for his “Back Number” magazine, including Pepys’ Diary, Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography, Herodotus’ writings, and “John Johnson (Iceland) in old Littell.

December 31 Sunday – On Players Club letterhead Sam wrote a short note thanking Curtis Bell.

I am very glad to foster & increase our kind of crime, & so I do the thing which you suggest [MTP].

Sam also wrote responding to a request for a photograph from Mr. Moskovitz. He thanked the man for his kind letter but hadn’t a photo “on the place.” They were probably with his family in Paris [MTP]. Note: this may have been Moritz Moskowski, Clara’s piano teacher in Berlin.

December 30 Saturday – In New York at 1.p.m. Sam wrote a short note to H.H. Rogers, asking if Henry G. Newton accepted (for his client Charles R. North) wouldn’t it be “judicious” to get it in writing? Sam emphasized this was only a suggestion to Rogers, who undoubtedly was much wiser in business, “from one accustomed to teach his grandmother how to suck eggs” [MTHHR 31].