October 24 Tuesday – Charles Webster acknowledged Sam’s check for $500, which was used to purchase a list of Western agents from H.N. Hinckley, who had been sent by Elisha Bliss to open a Chicago branch of Am. Publishing Co. The lists held about 500 agents who had sold Sam’s prior books, and another 7,000 persons who’d applied for agency to sell the books. Also included was Hinckley’s unsold supply of older books.
October 23 Monday – In Hartford, Sam typed a letter to Hattie and Karl Gerhardt.
“I STARTED A LETTER OF CREDIT FOR A HUNDRED POUNDS TO PARIS ABOUT THREE DAYS AGO, AND INTENDED TO WRITE YOU AT THE SAME TIME; BUT HAVE BEEN DELAYED IN VARIOUS WAYS. IN FACT MY PRINCIPAL DELAY COMES OF THE UNFINISHED AND APPARENTLY UNFINISHABLE CONDITION OF MY BOOK” [MTP].
George W. Cable attended a Monday Evening Club with Sam [MTHL 1: 420n4].
October 21 Saturday – In Hartford, Sam typed a response to his sister Pamela Moffett all about autographs and how he hated to give them out. He thought it a silly practice, save for those he knew. His sister had requested an autograph or a book for the Schroeters (Schroters), who had been business partners and neighbors to the Moffetts at the outbreak of the Civil War. It was the Schroeter house that Sam “hid out” in prior to running off to join the Marion Rangers.
October 20 Friday – George Gebbie wrote from Phila to Sam wanting to “renew the discussion” about the “Library of Humor” book after not corresponding for a year [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env., “Return no answer to this fraud.”
October 19 Thursday – Sam gave a speech, titled “City of Hartford” for the Reception for Worcester Continentals at Allyn Hall, Hartford.
October 18 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Hartford to James R. Osgood:
“I am sending Webster to talk with you. I would like him to take pretty full charge of the matter of running the book, if this will disadvantage you in no way.”
This is seen as Sam’s “first step in CLW’s eventual career as MT’s publisher” [MTLTP 158-9 & n1]. Also in the works was “A Handbook of Etiquette,” planned as a trade book (never published), and much later, “Mark Twain’s Cyclopedia of Humor."
October 17 Tuesday – In Vaud, Switzerland, Howells wrote to Sam:
“What you want to do is pack up your family, and come to Florence for the winter….We are having a good, dull, wholesome time in this little pension on the shore of Lake Leman, within gunshot of the Castle of Chillon; but a thousand jokes rot in my breast every day for want of companionship” [MTHL 1: 415].
R.O. Dienwis wrote a postcard from Kings Ferry, Fla., with a non-sensical message [MTP].
October 16 Monday – From Hartford, Sam typed a letter to George W. Cable. A date for Cable’s visit had evidently been set. The weather was beautiful; they’d seen a comet and Sam hoped to finish LM this week,
“FOR I HAVE ALREADY FINSHED WRITING ALL I DON’T KNOW ABOUT NEW ORLEANS” [MTP].
October 14 Saturday – Sam wrote to Worden & Co., letter not extant, referred to in Worden’s Oct. 16.
October 13 Friday – 18 yr old Edward W. Bok wrote from Brooklyn, this time seeking “a few words of opinion” about his autograph collection, which was the subject of enclosed clippings [MTP].