May 16 Saturday – At 10 a.m. in Pietermaritzburg Sam wrote to Livy:

I have just had my bath & coffee, Sweetheart, & am back in bed again. My proposed program is the one I used in Calcutta:

First Night. Dead Man, Plug, Ram, Smallpox, Christening.

Second. Watermelon, Duel, Crusade, Interviewer, Poem, Whistle.

Third. Punch, McWilliams, Sandpile, German. (And possibly Golden Arm.)

Sam felt the previous night’s lecture went well: “[I am] satisfied with myself & with the noise that was made.” He also wrote of his dinner speech at the combined meeting of the Victoria and Savage Clubs. He ended by reassuring her, probably in response to her letter (not extant):

Yes, my darling, you’ll be telegraphically informed if I get sick. Smythe has seen that the coffee & eggs were promptly ready.

I love you, love you, love you. / Saml [MTP; not in LLMT].

At 1 p.m. Sam had lunch at the Government House. In the evening he gave his “At Home” (No. 2) lecture at the Theatre Royal [Philippon 15].

In his first May 19 letter to Livy Sam referred to “the fatigue of that sleepless night in the train,” which could only have referred to this night, traveling from Pietermaritzburg to Johannesburg. Parsons writes,

He told how, coming by train from Maritzburg, a pair of inebriates wanted to know what he did for a living, only to mistake write books for keep books. This led to the conjecture that his go-ahead countryman, John Hays Hammond, might turn up a job for him [“Clubman in S.A.” 243].

Poultney Bigelow, traveling in Africa, wrote to Sam (Sam enclosed this in his first May 19 to Livy)

My dear Mr. Clemens.

Hail to you! I be so fortunate as to shake hands with you again! Where I don’t know, I am off for some savage life amongst the Basutos, but shall be here the 23d May & then travel northward to Johannesburg. I sh’d like to compare notes in Africa as we did in Paris near the Madeleine.

Yesterday my despatch case was stolen from me here, also my letter of credit with a balance of f225 — that is a warning to you. I hope to recover it or at least to get enough to carry me home.

I have left a letter for you here introducing you to the President of the Orange Free State — he is a man you will like — these Boers remind me of our primitive hell fire Puritans [MTP]. Note: In response, Sam would telegram Bigelow and offered help [noted on Sam’s May 19 to Livy].