Sam’s notebook:

The Italians all seem  to go to work before daylight—& all in couples, singing tenor & bass or  alto duet—all got strong voices & many good ones—don’t sing simple airs but  starchy opera stuff—they wake you up and keep you awake.

The Milan clocks are not useful. This morning one struck  2, another 3, another 1, another 2, two others 3—all this occupied 10  minutes—so I got up & looked at my watch—correct time 4.15. 15 minutes  later, the procession of striking began again.

Sam (and probably the ladies) went to see Da Vinci’s “Last Supper” in  the refectory of the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan. “If there is  anything worse than the original, it is the 15 or 20 copies in oil & water”  [MTNJ 2: 190]. They also  visited the “great picture gallery” (Brera).

“There are artists in  Arkansas to-day who would not have had to paint signs for a living if they had  had the luck to live in the time of the old masters” [191].
 

The Clemens party spent the day looking around Milan. They would spend five days in the city.
 

The family left Turin at 9:15 AM and arrived at Milan at 1:30 PM [MTNJ 2: 188]. Sam’s  notebook is full of things they saw in Milan, and observations on a host of  items and situations.

Some favorites:

I think the arcade  system is borrowed from Turin.

Saw a starchy suit of  clothes marked $9—doorway full of dummies dressed—stepped in to order one like the $9—nothing inside! The old man hauled in the dummy, stripped him & I  ordered the clothes sent to the hotel.

The family spent the day in Turin, shopping and enjoying the  sights [MTLE  3: 101].
 

The Clemens family left Chambéry for Turin by the fast express train, which Sam noted “makes  4 miles an hour—the other trains make only 3 1/4 . By 11 we were out of sight  of Chambery.” Three hours from Turin, the train barely won a race with a  team of oxen, Sam wrote [MTNJ  2:185]. It took  eight more hours to arrive in Turin, at about 7 PM. They took rooms in the Hotel  d’Europe, which Sam noted  had “wonderful rooms” [186].  They went to supper and drank Barolo wine.

September 15 Sunday Sam’s notebook:

 Sam was awakened at 3 AM  by a braying jackass in front of the hotel. The party left Geneva for  Italy, stopping at Chambéry, France for a break. More from his notebook:

– John Marshall had been drafted for a border war with Iowa over a disputed boundary, but the matter was settled by this time [Wecter 56].

Sam’s fourth birthday.