– Livy wrote from Rome to her mother (see Nov. 9 entry).
 

 – The Clemens family left Rome at 10:50 AM, and returned to  Florence, Italy at 6:50 PM, where they spent the night at the Hotel de  New York [MTLE 3: 97; MTNJ 2: 248].  They were headed north to spend the winter in Munich, a 600 mile  trip with 36 hours on slow trains, and four overnight hotel stops to make the journey more bearable for Livy [Rodney 115].  Sam’s notebook:

“… saw splendid torchlight processions crossing the 2 Arno  bridges to see the King, at the Pitti palace.

– The Clemens family  stayed a day and another night in Florence [MTLE 3: 97].
 

  – The Clemens family left Florence at 10:45 AM and reached Bologna, Italy at 4:15 PM [MTLE 3:  97; MTNJ 2: 249].  Sam made a notebook entry that he stopped here to see Guiseppe Mezzofanti (d.1849), “because  he knew 111 languages, but he was dead” [MTNJ 2: 266].
 

– The Clemens family left Bologna at noon and traveled until 10:30 PM to reach Trent in the  Austrian Tyrol, by way of “Modena, Mantua, & Verona.” Sam was acting as the  courier for the group and thought himself “a shining success…so far” [MTNJ 2: 249; MTLE 3:
97].
 

– The Clemens family was up at 6 AM and traveled all day. After twelve hours they arrived in Munich, Germany. At 7 PM they arrived, in “drizzle & fog at  the domicil which had been engaged for us ten months before” [MTLE 3: 94].
 

– Sam wrote from Munich, Germany to  Howells, giving him the itinerary  of the trip from Rome. At first they did not much like the place:

  – Sam “took a workroom at 45 Nymphenstrasse—Frau  Kraze.” He made a purchase on the “Tobacco shop on corner under Hotel Bellevue,  opp. Karls Thor” and noted amounts spent [MTNJ 2: 283].
 

November 20 Wednesday – In Munich, Sam wrote letters to Joe Twichell and Susan Warner. Sam had lost his Switzerland notebook and wrote that if it remained lost he wouldn’t try to write the volume of travels he’d planned.

November 27 Wednesday – Livy’s 33rd birthday.

November 30 Saturday – Sam’s 43rd birthday. Sam told a story or gave a speech (often there was very little difference) at the American Artists Club in Munich. Just what Sam said has been lost. Sam’s notebook:

December – Sam inscribed in a copy of Joseph Norman Lockyer’s (1836-1920) Elementary Lessons in Astronomy (1877): “S.L. Clemens, Munich, Dec. 1878” [Gribben 415].

December 1 Sunday – Sam wrote from Munich to his mother, and sister Pamela:

I broke the back of life yesterday & started down-hill toward old age. This fact has not produced any effect upon me that I can detect.

December 2 Monday – Sam wrote from Munich to Olivia Lewis Langdon, thanking her for a birthday gift (a “covered Krug of beaten brass”). Sam wrote about the many noises that began at 5 AM and were added to by 7, and how many of the things they disliked upon arrival had now been fixed, cleaned, attended to.

December 8 Sunday – Livy, Susy and Sam wrote from Munich to Olivia Lewis Langdon. Most of the letter is from Livy to her mother, whom she’d only received one letter from since they left home. Livy wrote of sore throats and ear aches, Clara Spaulding and Christmas gifts. What her mother had sent was too much, Livy wrote (several times during the trip her mother sent money).

December 14 Saturday – Sam wrote from Munich to Bayard Taylor. Sam had heard in Italy a few weeks back that Taylor was ill, but then saw it contradicted in a newspaper. This day he read that the contradiction was in error. Sam ended by saying they would try to “run over to Berlin in the spring.” [MTLE 3: 112]. Bayard Taylor, the “father of American travel literature,” died five days after Sam wrote him, on Dec. 19, 1878.

December 18 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook:

“On some of the large ocean steamers the old-fashioned settees have been replaced by revolving arm chairs—Harper’s Weekly gravely makes this preposterous statement. Who could stay in one in a storm?” [MTNJ 2: 252].

December 20 Friday – Sam’s notebook:

“To-day, by telegraph in the papers, comes the sad news of Bayard Taylor’s death yesterday afternoon in Berlin, from Dropsy. I wrote him 3 or 4 days ago congratulating him on his recovery. He was a very lovable man” [MTNJ 2: 254].

December 21 Saturday – Sam’s notebook:

“Munich, Dec 21—On scores of street corners, in the snow, are groves of Xmas trees for sale—and the toy & other shops are crowded and driving a tremendous trade” [MTNJ 2: 255].

December 23 Monday – Joe Twichell wrote to Sam; not found at MTP though catalogued as UCLC 32703.

December 25 Wednesday – Christmas –­ Sam’s notebook:

Christmas in Germany.

December 26? Thursday – Sam wrote from Munich to Olivia Lewis Langdon, thanking her for “the magnificent ‘Faust’” [book] she sent for Christmas. “Livy gave me a noble great copy of ‘Reinicke Fuchs,’ nearly as big as the Faust, & containing the original Kaulbach illustrations.” Sam also thanked Susan Crane for her gift [MTLE 3: 113].

December 28 Saturday Baron Tauchnitz wrote from Leipzig.

December 31 Tuesday – Clemens gave a reading which included “The Invalid’s Story,” to the American Artists Club, Munich Germany [MTPO].

[Continue on the 1879]

Paris Balloon Ride, Horse Races, French Morality & Fires All Summer
Onanism At The Stomach Club – Crowded By Visitors
Dirty Brussells, Antwerp & Dinner On The Admiral’s Flagship
Rotterdam, Amsterdam & London – Orion Excommunicated
Spurgeon Preaches, Great Darwin Seen – Gallia For Home – Howells Sleepeth
Writing Tramp – Grant “Fetched Up”– Patriotic Frenzy – Ingersoll, Freethinker
Lavish Colt “Blowout” – Holmes’ 70 Th Redemption