December 5 Friday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Frank Fuller, asking if he could get someone up to Hartford right away to fix the music box he’d ordered in Geneva.

Sam confided that he’d backed out of Slote’s speculation because his “lawyer insisted that it was risky” [MTLE 4: 168].

Sam also wrote to the poet, William Winter (1836-1917), complimenting him on a poem he felt was perfect, a “master-work.” [MTLE 4: 169]. Note: The poem that Sam rhapsodized about was, “The Chieftain,” later collected in The Poems of William Winter (1881) [MTP].