February 24 Thursday – A contract signed between Sam and Siegmund Schlesinger concerning the management of a comedy play they’d collaborated on, “Der Gegencandidat, or Woman in Politics” bears this date. The contract itself was in Sam’s hand [MTHHR 317n2].
A detailed review in Neue Freie Presse praised “Stirring Times in Austria,” which ran in the March 1898 issue of Harper’s [Dolmetsch 270].
February 23 Wednesday – Michael Henry Dziewicki replied to Sam from Cracow, Austria, thanking him for his “kind letter”; he’d been busy so had taken awhile to answer. About meeting—there was a chance that he’d be passing through Vienna, but if his novel (unspecified) “really proves a success” he’d prefer to spend his vacation in England.
February 22 Tuesday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Walter Besant (1836-1901), London novelist, historian, and literary critic, who had reviewed FE in the Feb. issue of Munsey. Besant also wrote for the journal Queen.
It makes me very proud—I have just read it in Munsey for February.
February 21 Monday – Vienna, Austria: Clemens wrote a “Memorandum” and “Note” about his play, Is He Dead? [Univ. of Calif. Press 2003].
February 20 Sunday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Laurence Hutton referring to Hutton’s Dec. 14 letter which he started to answer then but didn’t send. He found Hutton’s letter “amidst the disorder of my table at this moment” and so answered. He thanked Hutton for his review of FE (Jan.
February 17 Thursday – In Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Chatto & Windus, enclosing J. Brander Dunbar’s letter of Feb. 13 (see entry). Sam wrote Dunbar that he copied the quotation in question from a “small book of travels & adventures,” but that he didn’t recall the title or the author. He asked Chatto to write Dunbar and refer him to the chapter and page of Roualeyn Gordon Cumming’s book (unspecified).
February 15 Tuesday – In the evening the battleship Maine exploded in Havana harbor, resulting in war between America and Spain. The exact cause of the explosion remains a mystery.
February 13 Sunday – J. Brander Dunbar wrote to Sam questioning his use of a quotation on p. 305 of More Tramps Abroad, (FE). The quotation was by Roualeyn Gordon Cumming (1820-1866), Scottish traveler and sportsman who had written many African hunting safari articles, including some to Harper’s. Dunbar (and Dunbar’s cousin) claimed to have the original quotation, and judged that Sam’s use of it “is at variance with it.” He asked what source Sam used for the quote [MTP].
February 12 Saturday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Austria, Sam replied again to Arthur E. Gilbert, who evidently had queried him about the shape of the stem for the pipe he was naming after Mark Twain.
Yes, large bowl with inclined stem—don’t like straight stem. Send the one you are naming for me.
I enclose the address of a pipe-dealer—the only one my wife knows. She buys my pipes for me. This dealer tries to keep the Peterson, but is generally out of stock when I want one.
February 11 Friday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Frank Bliss, replying to a letter (not extant) of several weeks before.
Considering all the circumstances a 20,000 sale is certainly a little disappointing, for it is a most attractive-looking book; however, maybe the times will improve. They have been bad about long enough.