March 16 Friday – Jonas Henrick Kellgren Osteopath, billed £12.12.0 for March 7 through March 16 for Jean’s treatments [1900 Financial file MTP].
March 17 Saturday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to John Y. MacAlister, entirely about Harper & Brothers plans to make two books out of his assorted sketches. MacAlister was editor of the Library in London, as well as being a principal in the Plasmon schemes, so may have had some interest in publishing a few of Mark Twain’s sketches. Or, Sam may have considered him a valued advisor in sorting out the complications of British copyright, simultaning, magazine articles, etc.
March 18 Sunday – The New York Times, p. 14 reprinted a short letter from Sam to the London Anti-vivisection Society of London:
“Mark Twain” on Sport and Vivisection.
From the London Times.
March 21 Wednesday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam replied to Frank Bliss.
All right—I perceive that I did tell Whitmore to get the asphalt-money from you. I had forgotten it. If he needs more money I will give him an order on Elmira, so that he will not have to go to you until a time when it will not inconvenience you. …
March 23 Friday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote two postcards and a letter to John Y. MacAlister.
March 24 Saturday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to Paul Kester in N.Y.
I should like to see Tom Sawyer staged. If you will agree upon royalties with Mr. Howells I will accept the result. You can arrange the rest of the business with my friend Mr. H.H. Rogers, 26 Broadway. And I wish you would leave with him a copy of the play, if you don’t mind. We have no copies of [plays] “Colonel Sellers” & “Pudd’nhead Wilson,” I believe.
March 25 Sunday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote a short PS to his Mar. 24 to Paul Kester. Livy had advised against Kester seeking William Dean Howells’ help in dramatizing TS. Sam advised Kester to “Try him, anyway, & if he won’t, load the job onto Mr. Rogers; he is used to umpiring for me” [MTP].
March 26 Monday – London: Sam was free in the daytime for a meeting with John Y. MacAlister [Mar. 23 postcard #2 to MacAlister].
The New York Times, p. 1, ran a squib:
Mark Twain Coming Home Soon.
HARTFORD. March 25.—Letters received from Samuel L. Clemens (Mark Twain) say that he and his family will return soon to Hartford and take up their permanent home there.
March 27 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “Burlingame, 11 am / Mr. Lucy of ‘Punch,’ lunch 1.30. / Enid Stoker, tea 4.30. / Lady Pontifex tea 5.30 / Görz, dinner, 7.30 / MacAlister, 11.30 p.m” [NB 43 TS 6].
March 28 Wednesday – In London, England Sam cabled James R. Clemens and Katharine Boland
Clemens: “WE SEND LOVE AND THE HEARTIEST CONGRATULATIONS” [MTP]. Note: no doubt—a little Clemens!
Muriel Clemens Gotwals (1900-1989); exact birthday not determined.
March 29 Thursday – The New York Times, p. 2, ran a memo sent from the Hartford Courant:
Mr. Clemens to Return to Hartford.
From the Hartford (Conn.) Courant.
March 30 before – Frank Bliss wrote to Sam about discrepancies in origins of the “Jumping Frog” story:
[Written in top margin:] This is yr a/c of how you originally heard the Story, told by a man who was not telling it to his hearers as a thing new to them. He was a dull person and ignorant he… [in bottom margin:] Then follows the Greek Story (Sidgwick) of Jumping Frog.
April – Bookman (London) ran an anonymous review of the Chatto & Windus collection of Mark Twain’s works, commenting on the pleasure in looking again at RI, TS, GA, and LM [Tenney 32].
Current Literature (NY) featured a large photo of Mark Twain “recently taken in London” on its cover though only a short paragraph on p.102 of comment: “The white hair emphasizes his advancing years, but the face is the same strong and kindly one so familiar to Americans” [not in Tenney]. See insert
April 1 Sunday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to Sir William Martin Conway.
“I am dreadfully sorry, but we have but this moment returned from E.A. Abbey’s.
If I had known it was a birthday orgie I would have forseen that it would run late, but I had forgotten that detail. I hope we can go to the Cosmopolitan another night.”
April 2 Monday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam acknowledged receipt of £1,019. 18s. 3d. from Chatto & Windus for sales of the de luxe edition [MTP; Welland 203].
April 3 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “Testify before the Copyright Committee, House of Lords (on copyright). Lord Monkswell, Knutsford, Avebury, & 2 others” [NB 43 TS 6a]. Note: in his Apr. 5 NB entry Sam identifies Lord Avebury as “formerly Sir John Lubbock”.
London: Sam spoke before the Select Committee on Copyright in the House of Lords. On Apr. 4, p.6
The New York Times reported Mark Twain’s testimony:
April 4 Wednesday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to George B. Harvey, at this time in London.
Dear Col. Harvey
After our conversation I will now state my desires, in the hope that it may be possible to grant them.
That there shall be no Canadian cheap edition.
That the proposed two books shall be compressed into one, and no cheap edition be issued.
April 5 Thursday – Sam’s notebook: “Sir Richd Farrant, Rowton Houses, 5 pm / Breakfast, 9.30. Lord Avebury (formerly Sir John Lubbock), 2 St. James’s” [NB 43 TS 6a]. Note: Richard Farrant ( 1836-1907), acted with Lord Rowton to establish the Rowton Houses in 1896. At his death he was the Treasure of the University College, London.
April 6 Friday – Sam’s notebook: “Ward’s studio, 11 a.m. / Goerz, Savoy 6.45 German play” [NB 43 TS 6a]. Note: in his Apr. 9 NB entry he lists “Ward the artist—sit for portrait.”
April 7 Saturday
At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to C.F. Moberly Bell, editor of the London Times:
Although you are going out of town I want this note to catch you & thank you for accommodating the A.P. representative with an early proof. But for that he would have been delayed 5 or 6 hours.
April 8 Sunday – In London, England Sam began a letter to H.H. Rogers that he added a long PS to on April 9. Samuel S. McClure was trying to interest Sam in editing a new magazine; Sam referred the matter to Rogers.
McClure wrote, some weeks ago, that there was nothing lacking but an understanding in written detail of what my duties were to be—then he would lay the contract before you. I said go ahead, there’s no hurry, & when his contract was ready, carry it to you.
April 9 Monday – Sam’s notebook: “Canon Wilberforce / both of us—1.30. / J. Ross Clemens, / Bath Club, 7.30, 24 Dover / Ward the artist—sit for portrait” [NB 43 TS 6b].
At 30 Wellington Court in London, England, Sam finished his Apr. 8 to H.H. Rogers:
P.S., April 9. Mrs. Clemens is greatly troubled about that Plasmon-cure, and wants me to write you and tell you to boil it before using….
April 10 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “Dillingham, Savoy, dinner, 7.30. / Marda. / She Stoops to Conquer. / Invite Doubleday & wife here to tea” [NB 43 TS 8].
Note: this entry was written & struck through on Apr. 7. Sam noted Oliver Goldsmiths’ (1728-1774) play, She Stoops to Conquer. Gribben speculates “conceivably he saw a performance of it around that time in London”
April 11 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook: “Made Director” [NB 43 TS 8]. Note: of the Plasmon Syndicate.
Paul Kester replied to Sam’s Mar. 24 suggestions:
April 12 Thursday – In London, England Sam wrote to George B. Harvey, sending a table of contents for the proposed London and Tauchnitz editions of The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg and Other Stories. Sam wrote he’d “knocked out 42,000 words & left 130,000—an over-abundance still,” and gave Harvey, the new President of Harper & Brothers, permission to “knock out anything you want; & leave in anything you please” [MTP]. Note: the letter written on old Chatto & Windus letterhead.