February 13 Sunday – William Dean Howells wrote to Sam and enclosed a proof for his “Editor’s Study” for the May issue of Harper’s as to why the public cared for Mark Twain’s books “in prodigious degree” — “under every fantastic disguise they are honest and true.” Howells also touched upon an old issue:

Say: if I could get a publisher to take that Library of Humor off your hands, what would you ask for it? You know the work is almost wholly Clark’s and mine; and it would appear under my name, if I could get the pub. It grinds me all the time to think you should have paid me $2600 for work that you don’t expect to use [MTHL 2: 583-4]. (See May entry.)

Caroline B. Le Row wrote thanking Sam for having the Century article proofs sent to her, but her publisher, Dunham of Cassell & Co. Had learned of a hitch in including the article in her book — the magazine denied anyone to republish the material for six months. She asked if he might write another, “with more ‘Twain’ and less teaching in it” — an idea of Dunham’s [MTP]. Note: many teachers felt slighted by the article and Le Row’s book.