April 2 Thursday – The Sacramento arrived in San Francisco and Sam stayed at the Occidental Hotel [MTL 2: 205; Sanborn 391]. Sam wrote to Mary Mason Fairbanks of his safe arrival:
“The Prodigal in a far country chawing of husks, P.S.—& with nobody to molest or keep him straight. (!) mild exultation.”
March 29 Sunday – Sam’s “Holy Land Excursion. Letter from Mark Twain Number Forty-eight” dated Sept. 1867 at “Jerusalem” ran in the Alta California [McKeithan 281-7].
March 22 Sunday – Sam’s “Holy Land Excursion. Letter from Mark Twain Number Forty-seven” dated Sept. 1867 at “Jerusalem” ran in the Alta California [McKeithan 277-81].
March 20–April 1 Wednesday – Sam made a speech on board sometime between these dates, entitled “Charade” [Fatout, MT Speaking 649].
March 19 Thursday – The Henry Chauncey reached Aspinwall, Panama. Sam traveled across the Isthmus by train and boarded the Sacramento at Panama City at night [MTL 2: 205n1].
March 18 Wednesday – Sam wrote at sea to Mary Mason Fairbanks.
“Dear Mother—We shall reach the Isthmus tomorrow morning. It is getting very hot. Cuba was such a vision!—a perfect garden!” [MTL 2: 204-5].
March 15 Sunday – Sam wrote from the Henry Chauncey en route from New York to Aspinwall, Panama to his mother and family.
March 13 Friday – Sam’s MARK TWAIN’S LETTERS FROM WASHINGTON, NUMBER X dated Feb. 22 ran in the Enterprise. Sections included: “The Grand Coup d’Etat,” and “How the Delegations” [MTP].
March 11 Wednesday – Sam left New York on the steamer Henry Chauncey, bound for San Francisco [Sanborn 391].
Sam’s undated letter to the editor, “The Chinese Mission” ran in the New York Tribune [Camfield, bibliog.].
March 10 Tuesday – Sam traveled to New York, where he wrote Mary Mason Fairbanks:
“I am so glad of an excuse to go to sea again, even for three weeks. My mother will be grieved—but I must go. If the Alta’s book were to come out with those wretched, slangy letters unrevised, I should be utterly ruined” [MTL 2: 202].