June – Osgood & Co. published The New Guide of the Conversation in Portuguese and English, by Pedro Carolino, with an introduction by Mark Twain, written a year before. Paine calls it “an absurd little volume” [MTLP 1: 431]. (See June 4 entry.)
May 30 Wednesday – The New York Times ran a short piece, page one, on Sam’s efforts to secure Canadian copyright:
MARK TWAIN’S COPYWRIGHT STRUGGLES.
May 29 Tuesday – Sam took an early morning train from Montreal bound for Hartford. If the train was on time, he arrived at about 8 or 8:30 PM [May 28 to Livy].
May 28 Monday – Sam wrote two letters from Ottawa to Livy: His plans to leave had been repeatedly delayed since Saturday. A raft trip down some rapids planned for three or four o’clock that day were scrapped due to a storm; Sam expected to leave at 4:30.
May 27 Sunday – The Governor General and Princess Louise went to church, while Sam played billiards with Lord Frederick Hervey. After lunch Sam played “a few games of billiards” with Miss Hervey…
May 24 Thursday – Sam wrote from Government House, Ottawa to Livy, about how well he got along with Princess Louise and how he’d tried hard not to commit any social blunders [LLMT 215-6].
May 23 Wednesday – Sam got up at 6:30 AM and went to Samuel E. Dawson’s (his Canadian publisher) house to borrow his “best black frock coat” to “wear it at luncheons in Ottawa”. Then Sam took an 8:30 AM train to Ottawa, arriving at noon [May 22 letter to Livy].
May 22 Tuesday – After watching more of the billiards tournament, Sam left for Canada, reaching Montreal at 8:30 in the evening. He wrote from Montreal to Livy about a mix-up in the trains that caused him and Osgood to be on different trains [MTP].
May 21 Monday –Sam and James R. Osgood enjoyed the first two days of the Collender’s billiard tournament at Tammany Hall. The contests continued for some eleven days, with Maurice Daly the final winner [N.Y. Times, “Prizes for Billiard Experts” May 30, 1883 p.3].
May 20 Sunday – Sam and James R. Osgood traveled from Hartford to New York City to watch Collender’s great billiard tournament at Tammany Hall [MTBus 214].