December 16 Friday – Sam wrote to Andrew M. Clute, NY attorney, requesting that the canceled contracts for the sale of the Tarrytown house be returned to William Evarts Benjamin, Sam’s friend and attorney who had handled the sale. This letter is not extant but referred to in the following from Clute:
December 15 Thursday – In Keokuk, Iowa Edward F. Brownell wrote to Isabel Lyon to clarify if the Dec. allowance for Tabitha “Puss” Quarles (Greening) was to be increased to $25 or if the $15 was to be added to her allowance [MTP].
December 13 Tuesday – Ralph W. Ashcroft wrote “Due back Jan. 6th S.S. Lucania” on a postcard picturing Trafalgar Square, London [MTP].
R. Howard Krause and Mrs., in Kidderminster, England, sent a Christmas card to Sam [MTP].
December 12 Monday – Hal W. Greer, attorney in Beaumont, Texas, wrote to Sam, thanking him for “The $30,000 Bequest” in Harper’s Weekly, Christmas edition [MTP].
I.M. Horsfall wrote from London to Sam, having just read his article Joan of Arc in the Dec.Harper’s. He enclosed a sonnet on Joan by his blind daughter [MTP].
December 11 Sunday – William B. Throop wrote from Aurora, Ill. to Sam, asking where he might find the old story of a man who went to Washington to collect money due on a beef contract [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote “ ‘Roughing It,’ I think,” at the top.
December 10 Saturday – At 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Sam wrote to Robert Underwood Johnson, thanking him for being elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters on Dec. 2. Johnson was the Secretary of the National Institute of Arts and Letters, which founded the Academy in emulation of the French Academy, and formed to “foster, assist, and sustain excellence” in American literature, music, and art [MTP].
December 9 Friday – On or after this day at 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Sam replied to the Nov. 6 from A. Silk.
“Dear Sir: / I thank you for the library catalogue cutting for I have often wanted to know what that Diary is—and now find by the heading that it is philosophical or religious or both—and I am glad to know—“ [MTP]. Note: the “Diary” was “Extracts of Adam’s Diary.”
December 8 Thursday – Mary C. Waters wrote to Sam, having read his Joan of Arc article in the Dec. Harper’s. She enclosed an article, no longer extant [MTP].
December 7 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal contains an entry for this date: “And then Mr. Thomas Bailey Aldrich came in to ask Mr. Clemens and Jean to go tonight to see a tragedy that he has recently written.” Note: The play was Judith of Bethulia, a Tragedy, which was his dramatization of an earlier poem, “Judith and Holofernes” (1896); Her Journal also contained: “This has been a day of events—for this morning Mr. [Finley Peter] Dunne came for a closeting with Mr. Clemens” [Gribben 16: 1903-1906 Diary, TS 31, MTP]. The New York Times, Dec.
December 6 Tuesday – Gale puts Sam as a guest at George B. Harvey’s dinner for Henry James [Henry James Encyclopedia 683].