March 12 Wednesday – Livy wrote on Mar. 2 and 3 that Sam would gain occupancy of Millet’s studio on this day.
Christian Tauchnitz wrote to Sam. “In accordance with your kind lines of March 8, I have much pleasure in handing you enclosed the additional M. 200—in a draft at sight of Frs. 250” [MTP].
March 11 Tuesday – Sam stood up at Francis Davis Millet’s wedding to Elizabeth (“Lil”) Greeley Merrill in Montmartre, an art colony in Paris.
March 10 Monday – Orion Clemens received the formal notice that he had been excommunicated from the Presbyterian church for publicly espousing what they considered heresy. He’d been called before the church elders on Mar. 8 to answer the charges [Fanning 176-7]. Orion repeated his lecture, “Man the Architect of Our Religion” on May 19 but had a sparse audience [178].
March 8 Saturday – Caroline Dahlweiner wrote from France, proud that Clemens had been in her house. “I received your kind letter and thank you very much…I am so sorry that you do not find so comfortable in the Hotel as you hopped” [MTP]. Her spelling.
Sam wrote to Christian Tauchnitz, letter not extant but mentioned in Tauchnitz’s Mar. 12 reply.
March 6 Thursday – Sam wrote from the Normandy Hotel in Paris to Elisha Bliss after receiving his letter. The “old dead” contract signed years before about the Riley book was not canceled and Sam wanted the matter resolved. Bliss reported that the subscription sales for the new book (A Tramp Abroad) were going well, and Sam was gratified since the family’s expenses in Paris were “something perfectly gaudy.” Sam also wrote:
March 4 Tuesday – The Clemens family moved to the Normandy Hotel on Rue de l’Echelle. In his letter of Mar. 6, Sam related, “Tauchnitz bought of me the right to put the Innocents Abroad in his series, day before yesterday” [MTLE 4: 36]. Verlag Bernard Tauchnitz imprinted many popular authors, and by law at that time did not have to pay Sam a royalty, but did.
March 2 Sunday – From Livy’s pen:
March 1 Saturday – Christian Tauchnitz wrote from Leipzig to Sam.
“I am most obliged for your kind lines of Feby 21 and for the very nice preface. / Hoping that you are now safely arrived in Paris through snow and ice—for we are living here like in Siberia—I have the pleasure of enclosing the 300 Marks in a draft at sight on (Mefers.) Credit Lyonnaise at frances 375…” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env., “Funny letter”.
March – Sam’s article “The Great Revolution in Pitcairn” ran in the March issue of the Atlantic Monthly [Wells 22].
February 28 Friday – The Clemens family arrived in Paris with five trunks and took rooms at the Grand Hotel St. James in the rue Saint-Honoré, where they stayed until Mar. 4 [MTNJ 2: 292n7].
From Sam’s notebook
Feb. 29/79—Arrived at Paris at 5 P.M.
In ungraciousness of stranger to stranger we are exactly like the French—mannerless.