February 15 Saturday – Sam and Livy were still at the Murray Hill Hotel in New York, waiting for Livy to recover.
Franklin G. Whitmore wrote from Hartford to Sam, advising on the status of the typesetter. He’d expected to see Sam on Friday so hadn’t written before. “Mr. Goodman is still at your home & expects to see you tomorrow evening.” He was sorry about Livy’s illness in N.Y. and trusted that she would “entirely recover” [MTP].
The Sydney, Australia Bulletin ran a long quotation of Sam’s concerning the struggle for international copyright, under the caption, “Mark Twain and Divine Right.” It was the first substantive notice of Sam in that newspaper [J. Jones 228n1].
London Athenaeum, No. 3251 reviewed CY:
[This] rather laborious piece of fun with a sort of purpose in it is mechanical and too long, but harmless: Sir Thomas Malory and Lord Tennyson will survive [Tenney 17].
Leave it to stuffy reviewers in Boston (Literary World) to offer this diatribe against Sam’s new book:
We can laugh at Mark Twain’s exaggerations in “Life on the Mississippi, [but] when he prostitutes his humorous gift to the base uses of historical injustice, democratic bigotry, Protestant intolerance, and nineteenth-century vainglory, we must express the very sincere animosity we feel at such a performance. If anything could be less of a credit to our literature than the matter of this book, it certainly is the illustrations which disfigure it [Tenney 18].
Orion Clemens wrote to Sam. The doctor “seems puzzled as to what to do” about Ma. “I fear she is losing ground.” Orion offered “legal advice” about the Edward House matter [MTP].
Frederick J. Hall wrote to Sam about considering a book by Rev. E.B. (Elias Benjamin) Sanford who had asked for a little advance money; also of Dr. Thomas De Witt Talmage’s travel book through the Holy Land; “Talmage is exceedingly popular in Brooklyn,” Hall wrote. Quarters were crowded there and Hall thought they should move; Hall summarized finances [MTP]. See Gribben 602 on Sanford; 685 on Talmage.
Daniel Whitford wrote to Sam enclosing a check (amount not specified) for the previous week’s P&P play royalties [MTP].
Alfred P. Burbank wrote from the Hotel Eastman, Hot Springs, Ark. to Sam:
Yours of the 9th inst. catches me here. I think we can make the deal. We reach N.Y. Mch 10 to play a week’s engagement at the Harlem Opera House. Will you and Mr. Taylor come and see me as “Phenyl” and then hold a [illegible word] over “Hank Morgan”? [Sam wrote on the envevlope, “We’ll answer this, Brer SLC”] [MTP].