March 8 Monday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Kate Field, answering her Mar. 6 letter about a book disclaiming Mormonism and polygamy.

The Mormon religion is a religion: the negative vote of all of the rest of the globe could not break down that fact; and so I shall probably always go on thinking that the attitude of our Congress and nation toward it is merely good trivial stuff to make fun of. [¶] Am I a friend of the Mormon religion? No. I would like to see it extirpated, but always by fair means, not these Congressional rascalities. If you can destroy it with a book, — by arguments and facts, not brute force, — you will do a good and wholesome work. And I should be very far from unwilling to publish such a book in case my business decks were clear. They are not clear now, however, and it is hard to tell when they will be.

Sam added that his book (Library of Humor) was finished but he was now “an author without a publisher” due to “other people’s more important books.”

I think I could write a good moral fable about an author who turned publisher in order to get a better show, and got shut up entirely [MTP: transcribed: Lilian Whiting, Kate Field: Record, 1990 p 448].

The New York Times, p.3, “Literary Notes,” announced a delay from the scheduled Mar. 10 release date for Volume II of Grant’s Memoirs due to:

The second volume of Gen. Grant’s memoirs will not be ready until about April 1. The delay has been made necessary in order to give time for the preparation of an index.