March 6 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook: “Mr. Rogers’s, 26 E. 57th. / March 6/95, 10.45 a.m. Bliss” [NB 34 TS 5].

March 5 Tuesday – From H.H. Rogers’ abode at 26 E. 57th in New York, Sam wrote to Frank Fuller.

I am in America for a few days. Part of my errand is to arrange for my new book [JA], which is now finished. Another part of it is to consider a uniform edition of my books.

Can you come down now? If so, the car that passes the Grand Central Station will bring you to the above dwelling house.

March 4 Monday – Lloyd S. Bryce, editor of the North American Review, wrote to Sam, the letter not extant but mentioned in Sam’s Mar. 9 to Bryce.

March 2 Saturday – The S.S. New York arrived in New York City [NY Times, Mar. 3, 1895 p.14, “Arrivals from Europe”; Mar. 11 to Livy]. Mrs. Cara Rogers Duff met his boat and escorted him to the Rogers’ home at 26 E. 57th Street [2nd Apr. 3 to Rogers].

March – The North American Review for March carried Max O’Rell’s (Leon Paul Blouët) article, “Mark Twain & Paul Bourget,” an answer to Sam’s criticism of Bourget’s observations of America. O’Rell added a spirited defense of French morality [Tenney 24].

February 26 Tuesday – In Hartford attorney Henry C. Robinson, in the matter of renting the Clemenses Hartford house, wrote a follow up letter to his Feb. 15 to John C. Day, stating that Day, in Robinson’s judgment, wouldn’t want to rent the barn, so that $800 would be sufficient rent for the six-month period in question [Stowe-Day Library; 1981 copy from Tenney].

February 23 Saturday – The S.S. New York sailed from Havre, France with Sam aboard. The ship stopped in Southampton and sailed for New York. MTHHR, p.132 offers the following exposition of this trip back to the US:

February 22 Friday – At 169 rue de l’Université in Paris, Sam wrote to Franklin G. Whitmore, heading the letter, “Birthington’s Washday/95”. Sam supposed that John and Alice Day had taken the Clemens house in Hartford for rent because Sam had received no cable otherwise from Day.

In three hours I leave for Havre & New York.

February 20 Wednesday – Frederick Douglass, American ex-slave and author, friend of the Langdon family, died of a heart attack or stroke in Washington D.C. Sam met Douglass in 1869 while lecturing in Rhode Island, and wrote to Livy that Douglass had “a grand face.” See Dec. 15, 1869 and other entries in Vol. I.

February 15 Friday – At 169 rue de l’Université in Paris, Sam wrote to Elizabeth H. Colt, commenting on the 52 page A Memorial to Caldwell Hart Colt: 1858-1894. “Colly” Colt, her son, died on Jan. 21, 1894.