May 23 Thursday – This is the probable day that the Clemens family continued on to Elmira. The May 26 to Rogers reveals they did not go directly to Quarry Farm.
Bainbridge Colby finalized the contract with Harper & Brothers for a Uniform Edition of Sam’s works. H.H. Rogers handled many of the details, and the contract bore his signature as Sam’s attorney. The contract was delivered on July 26, 1895 [MTHHR 155n1].
May 23 Saturday – In Johannesburg, Adele Chapin arrived to help Sam pack, and with her husband Robert Chapin took him to the train station. The trio left with Carlyle G. Smythe at 10:46 a.m. and traveled the 46 miles to Pretoria, Transvaal, S. Africa, arriving in the early afternoon. In his May 24 letter to Joe Twichell he wrote:
May 24 Friday – In Elmira Sam responded to James B. Pond (Pond’s letter not extant), attempting to “strike out something definite and get down to business” on the American leg of the world tour. Sam numbered eight conditions and offers: He would give Pond a fourth of the profits except in San Francisco, where Sam wanted four-fifths. Wherever he talked outside of San Francisco he must talk two nights, “so as to practice two readings & give Mrs.
May 24 Sunday – In Pretoria Carlyle Smythe led a Press reporter to interview Sam in the Grand Hotel. Sam was talkative giving the journalist an hour “full of wit and entertaining items,” including a desire to meet the “man of the hour,” President Kruger. He then gave the reporter an autograph and a curious line:
Truth is stranger than fiction — to some people. But I am measurably familiar with it / Truly yours, Mark Twain. / May 24, 1896 [Parsons, “Clubman in S.A.” 248].
May 25 Saturday – In Elmira Sam wrote a short paragraph to Franklin G. Whitmore in Hartford, asking him to “look out for a package for Mrs. Clemens, & lay it away.” The package for Livy was coming from Paris addressed to Whitmore and contained “a couple of waists….made out of old dresses…& of course are not dutiable” [MTP].
Sam’s notebook reveals a response from Pond to his May 25 telegram: “His reply, by telegraph, May 25. ‘Terms accepted. See letter’” [NB 34 TS 10].
May 25 Monday – In Pretoria, South Africa Sam wrote to Livy:
Livy darling, I am sending “A Monk of Fife” to you. I have just finished it. There is no “Joan” in the May Harper; so it is finished. …
May 26 Sunday – In Elmira Sam wrote to his brother Orion. This letter is not extant but was quoted in a June 17 to Samuel Moffett from Pamela Moffett.
May 26 Tuesday – In Pretoria, Transvaal, Sam met with President Paul Kruger. Tenney suggests, “it is possible that friends saw the interview [Press of May 25] and urged him to set matters right. Twain said little of the meeting in his notebook:”
May 27 Monday – The Clemens family moved from Elmira to Quarry Farm [May 26 to Rogers].
May 27 Wednesday – In the morning in Pretoria, S. Africa Sam wrote to Livy, who evidently had tried to reach him by more than one telegraph.
May 28 Thursday – At 10 a.m. in Krugersdorp, Mrs. G. Seymour drove Sam and Smythe to the train station. From Sam’s notebook about Mrs. Seymour and the ride to the station:
May 29 Friday – In Johannesburg Sam wrote to his beloved:
Dear, dear, Livy dear, it was a busy day yesterday & day before & on one or the other I failed to write you — the first failure, I believe.
I saw Mr. Davis last night, & he gave me good news of you & Clara — that you were well & enjoying life; Poultney Bigelow has arrived, & is mighty likeable….He leaves for Natal soon & I hope he will find you still in Durban. He sails thence for Zanzibar. I love you most dearly, sweetheart. / Saml [MTP].
May 3 Sunday –The Clemens party was at sea aboard the Arundel Castle bound for South Africa. Sam wrote in FE:
May 3. Sunday. Fifteen or twenty Africanders who will end their voyage to-day and strike for their several homes from Delagoa Bay to-morrow, sat up singing on the after-deck in the moonlight till 3 A.M. Good fun and wholesome. And the songs were clean songs, and some of them were hallowed by tender associations [ch LXIV 632].
May 30 Thursday – At Quarry Farm Sam wrote to Henry M. Alden of Harper & Brothers:
May 30 Saturday – The Clemens party arrived in Bloemfontein, S. Africa at 4 p.m. after “18 hours steady travel….Fine cars, easy riding, all the conveniences.” He thought the veldt in winter “as beautiful as Paradise,” and Bloemfontein “even prettier than Pretoria” [Philippon 19; June 1 to Livy]. Sam wrote a letter of admiration to Mrs. Chapin (Adele):
May 31 Friday – The Boston Daily Globe, p.6. ran “MARK TWAIN’S KEEPER,” a good natured spoof about an imaginary interceptor of his invitations.
Isaac Answers His Invitations and Says Mr. Clemens is Sick.
Mark Twain once expressed a desire to attend the annual dinner of the Gridiron club of correspondents in Washington; but when an invitation was sent him, his regrets were received by return mail.
May 31 Sunday – Sam spent the day sightseeing in Bloemfontein. In FE:
May 4 Monday – The Arundel Castle arrived in Delagoa Bay, Mozambique; Sam wrote about briefly going ashore in the port of Lourenço Marques:
Steaming slowing in the stupendous Delagoa Bay, its dim arms stretching far away and disappearing on both sides. It could furnish plenty of room for all the ships in the world, but it is shoal. The lead has given us 3 ½ fathoms several times and we are drawing that, lacking 6 inches.
May 5 Tuesday – The Clemens party, at sea aboard the Arundel Castle bound for Durban, S. Africa.
May 6 Wednesday – The Arundel Castle arrived in Durban, S. Africa. Sam wrote in FE:
At 3 P.M., May 6th, the ship slowed down, off the land, and thoughtfully and cautiously picked her way into the snug harbor of Durban, South Africa [ch LXIV 643]. Note: The Natal Mercury reported a 2 p.m. arrival.
May 7 Thursday – At daybreak in Durban, S. Africa, more annoyance:
May 7. A bang on the door at 6. Did I want my boots cleaned? Fifteen minutes later another bang. Did we want coffee? Fifteen later, bang again, my wife’s bath ready; 15 later, my bath ready. Two other bangs; I forget what they were about. Then lots of shouting back and forth, among the servants just as in an Indian hotel.
Evening. At 4 P.M. it was unpleasantly warm. Half-hour after sunset one needed a spring overcoat; by 8 a winter one.
May 8 Friday – In Durban, Natal Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers.
We reached here day before yesterday, 41 days out from Calcutta — breaking the journey a couple of days in Ceylon and near a fortnight in Mauritius. We have been in the pitiless and uninterrupted blaze of summer from the time I saw you last until we reached this place — more than ten straight months of it. …
May 9 Saturday – The Clemenses went sightseeing in Durban [Philippon 14].
The Chicago Tribune, p.10 ran a review of JA:
Books of the Day
Mark Twain in Sober Mood
November 1 Friday – The Clemens party was en route on the Mararoa from Melbourne to a brief stop in Hobart, Tasmania [Shillingsburg, “Down Under” 21].
Sam’s notebook:
Nov. 1 — noon. A lovely day, a brilliant sun. Warm in the sun, cold in the shade — an icy little breeze right out of the South. Passing between Tasmania & neighboring islands — islands whence the poor exiled Tasmanian savages used to gaze at their beloved land & cry; & die of heart-break.
November 10 Sunday – In Timaru Sam was driven around the town and down to the beach, where he viewed the Elginshire, shipwrecked on May 9, 1892. He wrote, “big flowering mills; wonderful opaline clouds…a pretty town & cosy pretty homes all around it. Plenty of greenery & flowers…broom & gorse.” About the botanical gardens he wrote, “Why haven’t we have these?” [Shillingsburg, At Home; NB 34 TS 37]