November 24 Thursday – In Florence Sam wrote to Henry M. Alden of Harper & Brothers. He had sent what he thought was “the most delicious thing that has been offered to a magazine in 30 years,” and would “never get over the astonishment” of Alden’s rejection, simply because Sam did not write it.
November 20 Sunday – Elihu Root for the New England Society wrote to Sam, asking him to respond to a toast at the 87th annual dinner held Dec. 22 [MTP].
November 16 Wednesday – In Florence Sam wrote to daughter Clara at Mrs. Mary B. Willard’s school in Berlin. In the top margin he wrote that Ned Bunce wanted her address. After expressing concern for Clara reporting she’d had a case of the “grippe” (flu; influenza) he wrote he was relieved she was better. Livy was not; she was “very weak & all wasted away.”
November 13 Sunday – In Florence, Sam sent condolences to his Hartford attorney and billiards buddy, Henry C. Robinson, whose mother had just passed away. The Courant had come and Sam mentioned “Dr. Parker’s well-thought & well-said words” [MTP].
November 12 Saturday – The N.Y. Times, Nov. 13, 1892 p.2 ran an obituary notice for Dr. A. Reeves Jackson of Chicago, who died this day.
…the original of Mark Twain’s character My Friend the Doctor, in “Innocents Abroad,” died …Dr. Jackson had been ill ten days from the effects of a stroke of apoplexy. He will be interred at Janesville, Wis. [Note: Dr. Jackson was one of Sam’s favorites on the QC excursion.]
November 11 Friday – The King sisters ended their month-long visit and left for Paris [Nov. 10 to Clara Clemens]. Sam threw himself into finishing PW:
Dec. 20/92. Finished ‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ last Wednesday, 14th. Began it 11th or 12th of last month, after the King girls left. Wrote more than 60,000 words between Nov. 12 and Dec. 14. One day, [Dec. 1] wrote 6,000 words in 13 hours. Another day wrote 5,000 in 11 [MTLTP 328-9; NB 32, TS 51].
November 10 Thursday – In Florence, Sam wrote a short note thanking Chatto & Windus for a copy of Finger Prints which just arrived. He would “devour it” [MTP]. Note: See Gribben, p.251. Francis Galton was the author (1892). Sam would use the new science in his detective tale, Pudd’nhead Wilson. See also June 25, 1895 and Feb. 23, 1897 entries relating to Galton’s book and its contribution.
November 9 Wednesday – Livy came down with an attack of dysentery [Nov. 10 to Clara Clemens].
J.W. Ryckman for Authors & Actors Carnival, N.Y.C. wrote asking Sam to be on the “Committee of prominent citizens” for the carnival, Dec. 19 to 31 [MTP].
November 8 Tuesday – In Florence Sam wrote to Miss Page, thanking her for letting him “see those pleasant words.” Miss Page and those mentioned were evidently residents of Florence.
November 6 Sunday – In Florence, Susy Clemens wrote Louise Brownell: