April 22 Sunday – In Hartford, Sam wrote to Laurence Hutton, advising that he would not be able to stay with him Apr. 25 and attend the Salvini banquet on Apr. 27 due to Livy’s condition.
April 23 Monday – James R. Osgood wrote: “I have your gloomy communication [not extant], and will respond to your invitation to stop over and brace you up. I will leave here either to-morrow (Tuesday) afternoon by 4.30 train and pass the night with you, or else I will go by 8.30 a.m. train Wednesday morning and arrive at 12.25 and stop over one train. Will telegraph you to-morrow which I will do” [MTP].
April 24 Tuesday – Sam and Livy wrote from Hartford to Charles Langdon of sickness, gaining strength, Olivia Lewis Langdon’s improved health, and Hartford’s “death-list” which had “reached the startling & disgraceful figure of 89” [MTP].
April 25 Wednesday – James R. Osgood arrived at Sam’s [Apr. 24 to Webster].
April 28 Saturday – James R. Osgood wrote (envelope only survives) [MTP].
April 29 Sunday – Hattie J. Gerhardt wrote a short note to Sam & Livy, concerned about Livy’s illness. She added, “…one thing I know will make you happy—every one says Karl has made a decided jump in his art & he is received in the salon & I am happy” [MTP].
May – Sam inscribed LM to Edwin P. Parker: “With kindest regards of Mark Twain” [MTP].
May 1 Tuesday – Sam began a letter from Hartford to Karl & Hattie (“Josie”) Gerhardt, that he finished May 3. Sam questioned Josie about her remark that Charles Ethan Porter had “gone to the dogs,” a remark he said for which “she gave no details.” Porter, a Negro, was to be forgiven sins more than a white person, he said, which says a lot about Sam’s evolution on race matters:
May 3 Thursday – Sam finished the letter of May 1 to the Gerhardts. He confessed that Livy was “not well enough yet, to write, but will be, soon….” He’d received the bronze portraits from Karl and thought the one of him was “very fine.” He didn’t think Warner’s was a good likeness, but excused it because “the artist needs the living model, not the dead & flat photograph” [MTP].
May 7 Monday – In Hartford, Sam typed a letter to Mary Mason Fairbanks, gently accusing her of not “caring any great deal about us or our sufferings” since she’d made several trips east without stopping by then retiring “stealthily west again without ever coming near us.” Livy had suffered through a bout of diphtheria, then quinsy (inflamed tonsils) and “several minor things,” and was now emaciated.
May 8 Tuesday – Sam wrote from Boston to Livy.
“Livy Darling, I grew so uneasy, before I reached Boston, that I determined to go back home unless I got news that you were better. I have just received your answering telegram, & am greatly relieved” [Note: Livy’s telegram to Boston suggests Sam spent at least one night there].
May 9–16 Wednesday – Sam made a flying trip to Montreal during this period to protect copyright of Life on the Mississippi [LLMT 215]. In his May 18 letter to Howells, Sam wrote “When I was in Montreal three or four days ago…” would put the date there a bit later than the May 14 date which Osgood had estimated.
May 10 Thursday – George MacDonald wrote from Bordigera, Italy, once again urging Sam to join him in writing a novel [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env., “Your Ph. Is very lovely. 2 plays & 3 books. & the whole summer engaged. Can’t forecast the future with all these (& other proposed) books (& Hamlet) in my head.”
May 12 Saturday – Life on the Mississippi was published in England by Chatto & Windus [MTHL 1: 433n2]. Prior publication in the Empire was necessary to secure copyright there.
May 13 Sunday – In an unknown place (probably Ottawa or Montreal) Sam inscribed LM to an unidentified person [MTP].
John Irwin wrote a begging letter from Berkshire, Ohio as he couldn’t afford Sam’s latest book [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env., “No Answer”; Sam rarely complied with such requests, unless he knew the person.
May 15 Tuesday – Robert Hirst gives this as the date the “earliest copies of the first edition [LM] were published” [“A Note on the Text” Oxford edition, 1996]. The first review, this from the Hartford Courant, p.1:
May 17 Thursday – Life on the Mississippi was issued by the James R. Osgood & Co. (Two copies were deposited with the Copyright Office of the Library of Congress). Sales before issue barely reached 30,000, a number that enraged Sam [Powers, MT A Life 469; Hirst, “A Note on the Text” Oxford edition, 1996]. Note: under old subscription models, it was thought 40,000 sales before release was a good result.
May 18 Friday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Howells, who wrote from Venice, Italy on Apr. 22 about negotiations with Marshall Mallory for the Colonel Sellers as a Scientist play.
May 19 Saturday – Sam wrote two drafts of a telegram to be sent from Hartford to John Douglas Sutherland Campbell (Marquis of Lorne; 1845-1914), apologizing for his delay after receiving a confused message second hand by telephone. After a:
“…long delay it has come to me correctly & lucidly in manuscript form & I hasten to accept your lordship’s kind invitation & say I shall do myself the honor to report in Ottawa” [MTP].
May 20 Sunday – Sam and James R. Osgood traveled from Hartford to New York City to watch Collender’s great billiard tournament at Tammany Hall [MTBus 214].
May 21 Monday –Sam and James R. Osgood enjoyed the first two days of the Collender’s billiard tournament at Tammany Hall. The contests continued for some eleven days, with Maurice Daly the final winner [N.Y. Times, “Prizes for Billiard Experts” May 30, 1883 p.3].
May 22 Tuesday – After watching more of the billiards tournament, Sam left for Canada, reaching Montreal at 8:30 in the evening. He wrote from Montreal to Livy about a mix-up in the trains that caused him and Osgood to be on different trains [MTP].
May 23 Wednesday – Sam got up at 6:30 AM and went to Samuel E. Dawson’s (his Canadian publisher) house to borrow his “best black frock coat” to “wear it at luncheons in Ottawa”. Then Sam took an 8:30 AM train to Ottawa, arriving at noon [May 22 letter to Livy].
May 24 Thursday – Sam wrote from Government House, Ottawa to Livy, about how well he got along with Princess Louise and how he’d tried hard not to commit any social blunders [LLMT 215-6].
May 27 Sunday – The Governor General and Princess Louise went to church, while Sam played billiards with Lord Frederick Hervey. After lunch Sam played “a few games of billiards” with Miss Hervey…