March 4 Thursday – Sam wrote from Lockport to Livy:
“My last lecture (for some time, at least,) is delivered, & I am so glad that I must fly to you (on paper,) & make you help me hurrah. The long siege is over, & I may rest at last. I feel like a captive set free” [MTL 3: 134].
Sam was not through lecturing, but he would have a twelve-day rest. He left Lockport for Hartford, traveling all night and part of the next day.
March 3 Wednesday – Sam gave his “Vandals” lecture, which had been postponed from Feb. 27, in Arcade Hall, Lockport, New York [MTPO].
Reverend Joseph L. Bennett (b. 1823 or 1824) called on Clemens in the evening. Referred to in Sam’s Mar. 4 to Livy:
March 1 Monday – Sam gave his “Vandals” lecture at Concert Hall in Geneseo, New York [MTPO].
Sam wrote from Rochester, NY to Livy:
March – Sam’s OPEN LETTER TO COM. VANDERBILT appeared in the March edition of Packard’s Monthly: The Young Men’s Magazine. The letter was a sarcastic blast at Cornelius Vanderbilt, which parodied the effusive and uncritical press Vanderbilt usually received [Camfield, bibliog.].
February 28 Sunday – Sam wrote from Rochester, New York finishing the Feb. 27 letter to Mary Mason Fairbanks. He also wrote to Livy:
February 27 Saturday –Sam traveled all night and arrived in Lockport, some 250 miles. He wrote from Lockport, New York to Livy. Sam wrote much more flippantly about Jervis than he had in the past. The two men were becoming closer friends, and Sam loved to tease Livy, or anyone whom he liked. Sam also wrote to Jane Clemens and family, and started a letter to Mary Mason Fairbanks [MTL 3: 114]. Note: also Sam’s first meeting of John De La Fletcher Slee (1837-1901). See 119n4 in source.
February 26 Friday – Sam wrote after midnight from Stuyvesant to Livy, and enclosed a photograph of himself taken at Gurney & Son on Fifth Avenue in New York. He had left New York City early in the day. In Stuyvesant, Sam was the guest of Rev. Elbert Nevius [MTL 3: 111-14]. Sam left Stuyvesant in the morning and traveled all day.
February 25 Thursday – Early in the morning, Sam took a train 125 miles north to Stuyvesant, New York, where he gave his “Vandals” lecture.
February 23 Tuesday – Sam reached Trenton early in the day. That evening he gave his “Vandals” lecture in Trenton, New Jersey and then returned to New York, where he waited “all day” for a room at the St. Nicholas Hotel. That evening Sam and Jervis tried without success to visit Fidele (Mrs. Henry) Brooks. The Brooks were family friends of the Langdons. Sam probably wrote Livy a letter, which has been lost [MTL 3: 113n2].
February 19–22 Monday – Sam spent four days visiting the Langdons in Elmira. Sam sent three telegrams from Elmira to the Genesco Academy, promising to lecture there Mar. 1 [MTL 3: 110- 111]. Sam left Elmira on Feb.22 with Jervis Langdon, who was headed to New York City on business. Sam stayed with him a day or two [Sanborn 422].