October 2 Wednesday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Isabel V. Lyon replied for Sam on Edward Anthony’s Sept. 29: “Mr. C[lemens asks me to] write for him and say that he has given all the cigar bands from his imported cigars to a little friend who asked for them; and he regrets that he has none” [MTP].
Sam also began a letter to Dorothy Quick that he finished on Oct.3.
It is a very good photograph, Dorothy dear, & I am very glad to have it. I wish I could have you here, too—I miss you all the time. Goodness! what makes you think I have forgotten you? Indeed I haven’t, but I have been so busy lately that I haven’t to my daughters, & they are scolding me. I hope to do better, now, & be good, for a while. It will attract attention. I like that.
I wish I could go & see you, dear, but I know you couldn’t save me from the reporters—they would find me out in spite of all you could do to prevent it, you dear child. But I’ll be back in New York just at the end of this month & then I hope you can come to us on Saturdays & stay over.
We can have very good times together.
Mr. Ashcroft is here to-day [MTAq 68].
In the afternoon Sam took a ride over the “bigger-pond road” around the lake. In the evening Sam, Ashcroft, Lyon, and possibly one of the servants played hearts (best with at least four players) [Oct. 3 to Quick].
Isabel Lyon’s journal: My joy is so much the heaviest part of me, & yet it makes me as lightsome as this the [illegible word] in my spirit, & in my flesh. It’s the great wash from the shores of the soul of the King, that cap over in little waves & come to the shores of my soul. Perhaps the shores of my soul would be quite barren, quite bleak & alone, but that they can sometimes catch the overlappings from the darling ones of the earth.
We drove this afternoon. In 2 afternoons we have made 8 calls with never anyone at home. But the air was divine and the King cuddled down into his great coat, and buttoned it up under his chin, with the collar turned up under such an enchanting frill of white curling hair. Oh, terrible, terrible that his children cannot come under the spell of his glories, his subtleties, his sweetnesses. For this morning there was a cruel letter from Jean, damning me—finding fault with him—with him. Always he says that she is not to blame, it is the God who can create such natures, such maladies as hers, and in the creating, run them into a mould as inflexible as bronze. But later we got ready to go dine with Mr. [Charles E.] Sampson and Miss Sampson (they are so lovely). I went down to the King’s room to find that he had put on his heavy white canvas shoes, and that he had folded his necktie over in his own way and struck a pin in it. It’s lovely to see it that way ordinarily, and when I offered to change it for him, and gave him his white slippers to put on and he underwent the changes; he sighed gently and said, he thought it was better [MTP TS 110-111].
John J. Craven wrote a fan letter to Sam, requesting “just a line or two to acknowledge this letter” [MTP]. Note: Lyon wrote on the letter, “Answd. Oct. 8, ‘07”
Harry Windsor Dearborn for Robert Fulton Monument wrote to invite Sam to a meeting of the Robert Fulton Monument Assoc. [MTP]. Note: Lyon wrote on the letter, “Tell him I never attend Committee meetings”
Frances Nunnally wrote to Sam, thanking him for their visit on Sept. 28; they had lots of fun playing hearts with him. Frances and her mother reached Baltimore the day before and she entered St. Timothy’s [MTP].
On this day or Oct. 9 Joe Twichell wrote to Sam.
Read (if you haven’t) the extracts from Omar Khayyam on the first page of this morning’s Courant. I think we’ll have to get the book. I never came across anything that uttered certain thoughts of mine so adequately. And it’s only a translation. Read it, and we’ll talk it over. There is something in it very like the passage of Emerson you read me last night, in fact identical with it in thought.
Surely this Omar was a great poet. Anyhow he has given me an immense revelation this morning. Hoping that you are better / J.H.T. [MTP].
George F. Walker wrote from Naugatuck, Conn. to thank Sam and Lyon for their “favor of Sept. 30” [MTP].