January 31 Sunday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to Dorothy Sturgis.

My dear Annieanlouise—

I have been in New York ten days, visiting friends, & got back home with some guests yesterday evening by the light of the fresh snow, no lanterns being needed & none displayed either at the front door or in the loggia. So the days are really lengthening, & I am so glad!

Mr. Rogers had a birthday, night before last, (69) & a family dinner-party—a pretty large one, for it is a big family when they all get together. He was a happy man, for the last rail of his railroad was laid down & spiked that morning—a road just twice as long (lacking 6 miles) as the distance from New York to Boston; & he has built the bulk of it since the panic began & all large enterprises were hampered, crippled, & thrown into confusion. A stately achievement for a man his age. The first through train will leave Norfolk tomorrow for the terminus, 446 miles west’ard.

Benares [Ashcroft] went to England for me a month or more ago, & is on the ocean, now, homeward bound & aware that there’s trouble awaiting him when he arrives at this house on the evening of the 6th of February: for I sent a message by him to the English angel-fish, & he has confessed, himself, by letter to Miss Lyon, that he utilized that opportunity to flirt with her. I think he hunts for trouble. The last time Margaret was here we took her home to her school at Irvington-on-Hudson, & they flirted all the way, in the most mutinous disregard of my authority.

 The burglar notice is to appear in “Country Life in America,” but I don’t know the date. The article is by that gifted and charming lady Mrs. Doubleday, who writes the books about the birds.

1 p.m. I think I will get up, now, & talk with the guests while they feed. / Affectionately …  [MTP; MTAq 246-7].

Sam’s new guestbook entry:  

Name Address Date Remarks

Frederick T. Leigh   “        “  [New York] Jan. 31 1909

Sara Leigh   “         “   “     “     “

Sam inscribed a copy of Eve’s Diary with an aphorism to Sarah Leigh, who was a guest at Stormfield with her husband Frederick: “To Mrs. Sarah Leigh, with the kindest regards of the Author. Clothes make the man, but they seldom improve the woman. Truly Yours Mark Twain

Jan.31/09 Stormfield.” [MTP: Parke-Bernet Galleries catalogs, Dec. 11, 1956, No. 1719, Item 137]. Note: Frederick Leigh was treasurer of Harpers.