July 18 Saturday – In Virginia City, Sam wrote his mother, and sister Pamela and sent another $20 greenback. Sam now roomed in the White House on B Street. The letter was a defense of his money and its source: selling wildcat mining ground that was given to him. He wrote that he:
“never gamble[s], in any shape or manner, and never drink anything stronger than claret or lager beer, which conduct is regarded as miraculously temperate in this country” [MTL 1: 260].
Another of Sam’s “Mark Twain’s Letter” (dated July 16) ran in the San Francisco Morning Call. Sam wrote of the Ophir mine and a minor cave in there [The Twainian, Jan-Feb 1952, p3].