July 16 Thursday – In Elmira, Sam wrote to his 1854 St. Louis roommate, Jacob H. Burrough.

My Dear Jake:

Have just received two papers from your town. Are the Misses Ida & Emma Burroughs any kin to you? And who is Dean?—my old mud clerk comrade?

My boy, don’t you ever come East? I wish you would stop in on us next winter. (We are house-building & shant be well settled till the middle of the fall.)

Why don’t you die?—Are you going to live forever? You must be about 80 or 90 now.

Yrs Ever, / Saml L. Clemens

We lived in the same house with Disraeli a couple of months in London—it kept reminding me of how you used to admire his earlier novels [MTP drop-in letters].

Note: Jake was only eight years older than Sam; wife Mary b. 1837; Daughters R. Ida b. 1859, Emma Doane b. 1862, sons Frank E. (1865-1903), George b. 1867.  

From Charles E. Perkins’ cash book, Sam’s account: “To po Garvie 2000.00” [Berg collection, NYPL].

Phineas T. Barnum wrote from Bridgeport, Conn. “a thousand thanks” to Sam “for taking me into partnership,” and wished he could thank him in person [MTP].