August 4 Sunday – James B. Pond’s diary reveals that Livy was again with Sam again on this rest day at the Hotel Helena, in Helena, Montana:

The dry burning sun makes life almost intolerable, so that there has been hardly a soul on the streets all day. “Mark” and I had a good time at the Montana Club last night. He simply beats the world telling stories, but we find some bright lights here. There were present Senator Sanders, Major Maginnis, Hugh McQuade, A. J. Seligman, Judge Knowles, of the United States Supreme Court, who introduced Mr. Beecher in Deer Lodge and Butte in 1883; L. A. Walker, Dr. C. K. Cole, A. J. Steele, and Frank L. Sizer. We have very heavy mails, but are all too tired to open and read letters that are not absolutely necessary to be read.

“Mark” lay around on the floor of his room all day reading and writing in his notebook and smoking. In the gloaming Dr. Cole, with his trotters, drove “Mark” and Mrs. Clemens out to Broadwater, four miles. The heat gave way to a delicious balmy breeze that reinvigorated everybody. How delightful are these summer evenings in the Rocky Mountains! [Railton].

Note: the “heavy mails” Pond spoke of are not extant — only one incoming letter to Sam survives for Aug. 1895 and only two for July. Of interest is Pond’s continual use of quotation marks for “Mark,” which may denote his knowledge and distinction between the man, Samuel L. Clemens, and “Mark Twain,” the stage persona. Wilbur Fiske Sanders (1834-1905) was Senator from Mont. (1890-93).

Among the Helena letters Pond speaks of Sam writing, three survive from this date. The first, to Frank Fuller.

Here’s another application. I directed the former one to Joe Jefferson, President of the Players.

Yes, I will have the newspapers sent to you daily henceforth. It has been blazing weather all along, but I always have good houses, not withstanding, and some times they are crowded — a very handsome compliment.

Sam also was proud of the fact that the crowds were at times local records. The carbuncle was healing, only needing dressing once a day [MTP]. Note: the application was for membership in the Players Club, as the next letter suggests.

Sam also wrote a one-liner to the Players Club Secretary, sponsoring Frank Fuller, merchant of 61 Fifth Ave. in N.Y. for membership [MTP].

Sam also wrote to Owen Wister (1860-1938), American writer of Western fiction, praising his 1892 novel Dragon of Wantley. (Wister was best known for The Virginian, 1902, from which several movies and a TV series were based.) Wantley was a “burlesque” treatment of the “true” story of the Dragon, set in the early thirteenth century. The book was a big hit, with four editions over the next decade.

I have taken the Dragon of Wantley away from my wife & daughter — by violence — & am reading it with a delicate tingling enjoyment which goes searching & soothing & tickling & caressing all through me everywhere like balm of Gilead with a whet of apollinaris in it [MTP]. Note: Apollinaris water.