February 29 Saturday – At 10 p.m. the Clemens party left Agra and traveled 140 miles to Jaipur. Sam’s notebook:
Feb. 29. Mr. Achlom [Aklom] & wife & 2 dau; they live in Ajmir
At noon, gave Mouza a note to carry to Smythe & bring an answer, & told him he could consider himself discharged at 7 this evening. He laid his fingers against his forehead as usual, made the usual inclination, said “wair good” (very good), just as he always does when receiving an order, — & that was all. It was pathetic….
February 3 Monday – The Clemens party arrived in Allahabad:
We arrived in the forenoon, and short-handed; for Satan [their servant] got left behind somewhere that morning, and did not overtake us until after nightfall. It seemed very peaceful without him. The world seemed asleep and dreaming.
February 4 Tuesday – In Allahabad, India, Sam was up at dawn. When Livy and Clara were ready, they took a drive.
In the early brightness we made a long drive out to the Fort [built by Akbar, the Mogul emperor in the 16th C.]. Part of the way was beautiful. It led under stately trees and through groups of native houses and by the usual village well, where the picturesque gangs are always flocking to and fro and laughing and chattering….
February 5 Wednesday – In Benares The Clemens family was up at 6 a.m. and spent the whole day sightseeing [Feb. 8 to Rogers]. It was likely, then, that this was the day they hired a “commodious hand-propelled ark” and took several trips up and down the Ganges. Parsons writes,
February 6 Thursday – The Clemens party left Benares at 1:28 p.m. [NB 36 TS 39]. It was a seventeen and a half hour train ride from Benares to Calcutta. Parsons writes,
February 7 Friday – The Clemens party changed trains at Moghalserais at 2 a.m. and arrived in Calcutta at 7 a.m. [NB 36 TS 39]. They took rooms at the Hotel Continental [Parsons “MT India” 85]. FE:
February 8 Saturday – Sam’s notebook:
To-day and yesterday lay abed & starved a cold.
This evening went to Belvedere & dined with the Lt. Governor of Bengal (Sir Alexander Mackenzie) & a dozen — private dinner party [NB 36 TS 40].
Sam sent a short note to Child & Co. after receiving some pipe tobacco:
This is the brand I wanted. I have smoked your Honey Dew Mixed in another part of the world, and learned to prefer it. Truly yours [MTP].
February 9 Sunday – In Calcutta, Sam went sightseeing. From his notebook:
Drove through native quarter & to Black Hole. Saw them excavating old brick cellars under the old Fort William [NB 36 TS 40].
This is indeed India!
January 13 Monday – From FE ch XXXVII, p.336:
January 14 Tuesday – From FE ch XXXVII, p.336-44, a day of sight-seeing in Colombo:
January 15 Wednesday – On the S.S. Rosetta the Clemens party was en route on a three-day passage through the Arabian Sea to Bombay, India.
January 16 Thursday – On the S.S. Rosetta the Clemens party was en route on a three-day passage through the Arabian Sea to Bombay, India.
January 17 Friday – On the S.S. Rosetta the Clemens party was en route on a three-day passage through the Arabian Sea to Bombay, India. Livy began a letter to Sue Crane that she finished in Bombay on Jan. 24. Due to the heat Livy and Clara put their mattresses on deck for the night, but Sam was still confined to his cabin with a bad cold [Livy to Crane Jan. 18].
January 18 Saturday – From FE ch XXXVIII p. 345:
We have been running up the Arabian Sea, latterly. Closing up on Bombay now, and due to arrive this evening.
January 19 Sunday – In Bombay, Sam wrote of the first night from midnight on:
Then came peace — stillness deep and solemn — and lasted till five.
January 20 Monday – In Bombay, Sam’s notebook [NB 36 TS 20]:
Been shut up all the time with this infernal cough. It does not improve. I wish I was in hell.
Parsons writes,
January 21 Tuesday – Sam was still laid up at Watson’s Hotel in Bombay. He would not be able to venture out until his lecture on Friday, Jan. 24. In his notebook he jotted, “Private Life of an Eastern King. — Chelsea Library. Get it,” referring to William Knighton’s book by that title (1855). Sam would check it out from the London Library on Oct. 22.
January 22 Wednesday – In Bombay, Sam’s notebook:
Wed., Jan 22, ’96. Read Edwin Lord Weeks’s article on Bombay in Nov. Harper [NB 36 TS 22].
January 23 Thursday – Having declined an invitation with Lord William Sandhurst to lunch at Malabar Point, Sam was recovering in time for his lecture the following day, Jan. 24.
January 24 Friday – In Bombay, Sam took the stage for his first “At Home” lecture in India at the Novelty Theater, 5:30 p.m. to an enthusiastic and “crowded house,” with “a party of ladies and gentlemen from Government House,” mostly an audience of Europeans, but “with a large number of Parsees present — to say nothing of a good sprinkling of Mahomedans and Hindus” [Ahluwalia 9: Bombay Gazette, Jan. 25].
January 25 Saturday – In Bombay, Sam’s notebook:
It was Mr. Ghandi (delegate to Chicago World’s Fair Congress of Religions) who explained everything to us yesterday at the Jain temple.
From there went to the house of a wealthy Parsee to assist at a gathering in honor of knighthood being bestowed upon H H The Prince of Politana….
Afterward Parsee palace. Owner had heard me in London 22 years ago [NB 36 TS 24-5].
January 26 Sunday – In Bombay, Sam’s notebook:
Sunday, we lunched at Government House with their excellencies, the Governor and Lady Sandhurst; & at 4 p.m. visited the Towers of Silence with three Parsi gentlemen.
Lovely drive around the sea at sunset, Malabar Point and Scandal Point [NB 36 TS 25-6].
January 27 Monday – The Hindoo Patriot of Feb. 4, 1896 reported on Sam’s whereabouts,
Mark Twain, accompanied by Miss Clemens, visited Monday, in company with Mr. A.S. Panday [sic], the rooms of the Bombay Natural History Society, where Mr Phipson accorded the distinguished visitor a cordial reception. Mr. Clemens expressed himself much pleased with the museum in the rooms of the society [Ahluwalia 10].
January 28 Tuesday – In Bombay, the wedding festivities of the prior night lasted till the wee hours. Sam wrote of it in FE: