May 8 Friday – In Durban, Natal Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers.
We reached here day before yesterday, 41 days out from Calcutta — breaking the journey a couple of days in Ceylon and near a fortnight in Mauritius. We have been in the pitiless and uninterrupted blaze of summer from the time I saw you last until we reached this place — more than ten straight months of it. …
May 7 Thursday – At daybreak in Durban, S. Africa, more annoyance:
May 7. A bang on the door at 6. Did I want my boots cleaned? Fifteen minutes later another bang. Did we want coffee? Fifteen later, bang again, my wife’s bath ready; 15 later, my bath ready. Two other bangs; I forget what they were about. Then lots of shouting back and forth, among the servants just as in an Indian hotel.
Evening. At 4 P.M. it was unpleasantly warm. Half-hour after sunset one needed a spring overcoat; by 8 a winter one.
May 6 Wednesday – The Arundel Castle arrived in Durban, S. Africa. Sam wrote in FE:
At 3 P.M., May 6th, the ship slowed down, off the land, and thoughtfully and cautiously picked her way into the snug harbor of Durban, South Africa [ch LXIV 643]. Note: The Natal Mercury reported a 2 p.m. arrival.
May 5 Tuesday – The Clemens party, at sea aboard the Arundel Castle bound for Durban, S. Africa.
May 4 Monday – The Arundel Castle arrived in Delagoa Bay, Mozambique; Sam wrote about briefly going ashore in the port of Lourenço Marques:
Steaming slowing in the stupendous Delagoa Bay, its dim arms stretching far away and disappearing on both sides. It could furnish plenty of room for all the ships in the world, but it is shoal. The lead has given us 3 ½ fathoms several times and we are drawing that, lacking 6 inches.
May 3 Sunday –The Clemens party was at sea aboard the Arundel Castle bound for South Africa. Sam wrote in FE:
May 3. Sunday. Fifteen or twenty Africanders who will end their voyage to-day and strike for their several homes from Delagoa Bay to-morrow, sat up singing on the after-deck in the moonlight till 3 A.M. Good fun and wholesome. And the songs were clean songs, and some of them were hallowed by tender associations [ch LXIV 632].
May 2 Saturday – The Clemens party was at sea aboard the Arundel Castle bound for South Africa. Sam wrote in FE:
May 2, A.M. A fair, great ship in sight, almost the first we have seen in these weeks of lonely voyaging. We are now in the Mozambique Channel, between Madagascar and South Africa, sailing straight west for Delagoa Bay [ch LXIV 631].
May 1 Friday – The Clemens party was at sea aboard the Arundel Castle bound for South Africa. In his May 2 entry in FE, Sam related this night’s story:
May – Joe Twichell’s piece appeared as the lead article in the May issue of Harper’s Monthly Magazine as “Mark Twain.” Brander Matthews’ article, “The Penalty of Humor,” p. 897-900, also ran in the same magazine. Matthews thought Twain’s writing was uneven, but the best of it was very good; critics did an injustice if they dismissed him as merely a humorist. (Reprinted in The Twainian, XXX (Mar.-Apr. 1971 1-4)) [Tenney 25].
April 30 Thursday – The Clemens party was at sea aboard the Arundel Castle bound for South Africa.