October 12 Friday – Davies & Co. NYC wrote to advise Sam that “a box said to contain engraving has arrived from London”; they asked him to remit $112.31 [MTP]. Note: engraving, “Christ leaving the Praetorium.”
October 14 Sunday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Charles Perkins, offering to take the tardy engraving and pay no more than fifty dollars [MTLE 2:174]. (See Oct. 3 to 5 entries.)
Minnie L. Wakeman-Curtis wrote to thank Sam for his of Oct. 5; she understood his reply and that her father’s stories could never be the same in print as he told them [MTP].
October 15 Monday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Howells, whose Oct. 14 letter carried good news about his play starring Lawrence Barrett, a matinee idol. Sam had seen the reviews in the papers and answered:
October 17 Wednesday – Kate Cowan, Chicago schoolteacher, wrote to ask Sam “for a few interesting facts” of his life for her literary group [MTP].
October 18 Thursday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Charles Perkins, another communication on the engraving purchased five years before in London. Sam wanted Mr. D. Vorce to sell the engraving in New York [MTLE 2:176]. Note: engraving, “Christ leaving the Praetorium.”
October 19 Friday – Davies & Co. wrote to Sam. “We have since writing on 12th received draft endorsed to our order drawn by you in London 4th Oct 1872 for sixteen pounds, in payment for the engraving ‘Christ leaving the Prætorium.’ The note is drawn on Mess Geo Routledge & Sons, London” [MTP]. Note: they denied ever doing a commission on a time schedule, as Twain had claimed.
October 20 Saturday – Twichell’s journal:
“Saw Charles Warren Stoddard the author at M.T’s” [Yale, copy at MTP].
Livy started a “visitor’s book” for the many callers to write in. Eight years later, on June 7, 1885, she turned it into a diary, “as we always forget to ask visitors to write in it.” Stoddard was the first to sign the visitor’s book: “Livy: First—the most” / yours always / Chas. Warren Stoddard”
October 23 Tuesday – Davies & Co. wrote to Sam that they’d received the $112.06 and forwarded the engraving this day by express by A. Vorce, dealer in fine arts, as his instructions [MTP].
October 24 Wednesday – Sam purchased books from James R. Osgood & Co., including: Early Travels in Palestine, etc. (1848), by Thomas Wright, Chronicles of the Crusades (1876), Abbot Ingulf of Crowland’s (d. 1109) Ingulph’s Chronicle of the Abbey of Croyland (trans. 1854), and Huntington’s History of England (1853) [Gribben 789; 142; 308].
October 25 Thursday – Andrew Chatto wrote of publishing business to Sam, sorry he’d sent the wrong edition of Arabian Nights, and pleased to have rec’d his “Idle Notes” [MTP].
October 26 Friday – The Howellses traveled to Hartford and dined with the Charles Warners, then attended a reception for Yung Wing and his wife at the Clemens home [Twichell’s Journal, Yale; MTHL 1: 207n1]. (See Oct. 31 Howells to Sam entry)
Twichell’s journal: “thence to M.T’s after a trip to Yale” [Yale, copy at MTP].
October 27 Saturday – Based on his Oct. 31 letter, Howells and wife probably returned home to Cambridge after an overnight stay.
October 29 Monday – Orion Clemens wrote from Keokuk to thank his brother for 3 checks, $42 each. He sent news of their mother heading home with R.F. Bower this afternoon [MTP].
October 30 Tuesday – Livy’s visitor’s book was signed by H. Watie Gridley, a coal dealer [MTP].
October 31 Wednesday – In Hartford, Sam wrote to Mary Mason Fairbanks, who was considering publishing a book (probably on the Quaker City excursion) and asked Sam’s advice. He answered that it was not “absurd” to offer a “best effort…to the public for trial & judgment.” Sam offered to write the introduction, and recommended Osgood if she was considering an eastern publisher. Then he dropped this jewel of writing wisdom:
November – The second of a four-part, 15,000 word article on Sam and Joe Twichell’s trip to Bermuda, ran in the Atlantic Monthly: “Some Rambling Notes of an Idle Excursion” [Wells 22]. Note: Budd notes that “The Captain’s Story,” which was a part of “Rambling Notes,” was later printed separately in several collections; and that “The Invalid’s Story” was excluded by Howells from the piece for being “too offensive” for the magazine
November 1 Thursday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Howells. Sam also felt Howells’ visit was too short, and hoped when he returned in December it would be a longer stay. Sam enclosed a piece that Joe Twichell got from a “Cleveland clergyman, who said it was very recent” for Howells consideration.
November 6 Tuesday – H.W. Bergen wrote from Toronto to thank Sam for the $60 check but returned it as he had gotten a “little ahead in money matters” and had “good cities and towns to visit yet” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env “Bergen enclosing ‘not used’ check for $60”
**W.D. Wells wrote from Jesup, Iowa to ask for a “short sketch” of Twain’s life [MTP].
November 7 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Hartford per Fanny Hess to Andrew Chatto. Sam repeated that he only wanted to confirm Moncure Conway’s receipt of commissions for work placed with Chatto. Sam also had received two checks, one for over seven English pounds.
“The larger a check is, the more I like it; & the more I honor & glorify the sender, & the more it stirs me up to high literary achievement in that man’s behoof” [MTLE 2:189].
November 8 Thursday – Sam wrote from Hartford per Fanny Hesse to Moncure Conway. Sam had found an old letter of Conway’s about the cost of telegrams sent, and thought he may have forgotten to reimburse their cost. Sam wanted Conway to “take that £3.11.s out of the next Sawyer money due me from Chatto” [MTLE 2:190].
November 9 Friday – Sam wrote from Hartford to E.S. Sykes (Hartford druggist) evidently about some carping on a recent event to raise money for charity, which Sam had volunteered for but wished only a lesser role in, and his name kept out of the newspapers. Relating the complaints about the shortcomings of the fundraiser to a sermon by Twichell, Sam quoted:
November 12 Monday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Thomas Nast, proposing the same plan that he had turned down in Nov. 1867—that is, to lecture together, Sam talking while Nast drew pictures. Sam listed the 75 cities they would tour, and estimated a net profit from $60,000 to $75,000 to split.
November 13 Tuesday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Orion in Keokuk. Only the envelope survives [MTLE 2: 196]. Sam paid a bill from Osgood & Co. for a copy of Fridthjof’s Saga that he’d ordered on Mar. 20 and for Bayard Taylor’s The National Ode: The Memorial Freedom Poem (1877) purchased on Jan.
November 17 Saturday – Orion Clemens wrote of his change of offices, his being made Secretary of Republicans to publish the proceedings of the primary, thanking Livy for her account of Hall’s death, and of reading extracts of Sam’s Bermuda letters in the Atlantic Monthly [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env. “Preserve”
November 18 Sunday – Edward Fordham Flower wrote from London: “I send you some notices of two pamphlets in one which are now published in New York by Cassells & Co. Can you do or say anything to make them known[?]” [MTP]. Note: father of Charles Edward Flower.