January 25 Tuesday – Sam wrote from Hartford to James R. Osgood, again about the legal matter of watching William Gill, who had made a habit of plagiarizing and exploiting authors. Sam’s intention was to sue Gill for trademark infringement for using the name “Mark Twain,” a rather novel legal strategy at that time. But Gill had removed Sam’s nom de plume from his book, leaving the article in, which thwarted Sam’s suit. Sam offered his opinion of lawyers:
The more I see of lawyers, the more I despise them. They seem to be natural, born, cowards, & on top of that they are God damned idiots. I suppose our law firm are above average; & yet it would be base flattery to say that their heads contain any thing more valuable than can be found in a new tripe [MTLE 1: 15]. Note: The MTP’s “Explanatory Notes” for this letter corrects Sam’s conclusion: “1 Ultimately Gill did not make good on his promise to remove Clemens’s pen name from Burlesque (see 17 Jan 76 to Osgood, n. 1, and L6, 511–12). The lawyer who had made the ineffectual compromise has not been identified.”
Charles Carroll Hubbard (1832-1898), Mayor of Middletown, Conn. wrote to Sam:
Dear Sir / I have taken the liberty to forward you by mail, a little book, not as a sample, nor for review exactly, but to do as you please with. I do, however, desire to say a word on business. I have spent several winters in Florida, and have seen the tourist and native elements in all their phases, and am confirmed in the opinion that the pen that produced the “Innocents Abroad” should write up Florida. It is the richest field now open to such a pen, and the harvest is ripe for the sickle,—or thereabouts.
< What I would like to propose is, to be brief, that you take a tour down there this winter—3 or 4 weeks will do if you do not wish to stay longer—and write a book on Florida, and I should like to assist and take a certain share in the sale of the book. There is plenty of material and a large market, and the assistance I could give would be to furnish information of incidents and localities to be put into shape by you. You will very naturally think this proposition presumptuous, but I simply wish to say that I am willing to take the risk of the sale of the book for my remuneration, and have no doubt of a satisfactory adjustment of what that share should be. I can give you plenty of crude material. I would undertake the publishing of the book, or have it published by any house you choose.
I am not a literary man, as you see, but could be of assistance in the way indicated.
It is a good thing. Messrs. Burr Bros. of the Hartford Times, and especially Mr. Frank L. Burr, can tell you all about me.
Will you be kind enough to answer; and if you should entertain the subject I can come to Hartford at any time to see you farther about it. Would like to come anyway, but do not wish to bore you uselessly. If you wish to go to Florida, and are willing to go by water, and can go within say a fortnight (just in time for the heighth of the season) I could furnish you with a ticket from N.Y. to Palatka & return, free; but I have no doubt you could go by either route on the same terms, if you chose. An early answer will greatly oblige / Yours very truly / C.C. Hubbard / Middletown, Conn. [MTP]. Note: Alfred E. Burr and Frank L. Burr were co-owners and editors of the Hartford Courant. Clemens was in Florida twice: see Jan. 6, 1867 in Key West, and Mar. 15-18, 1902 (Vol. III). No reply by Clemens is extant. The few collaborations Sam engaged in did not go smoothly: the play Ah Sin with Bret Harte, and GA with Charles Dudley Warner.