October 11 Sunday – Cunard line Commodore Daniel Dow ended his weekend stay at Stormfield. Sam returned his coat and cap worn in the insert photo, likely taken this very day (see Oct. 12 to Nunnally).
Sam’s original guestbook lists Elizabeth G. Guillaume and Jules A. Guillaume, New York [Mac Donnell TS 5].
October 10 Saturday – Sam wrote an aphorism to an unidentified person: “We ought never to do wrong when people are looking. / Truly yours / Mark Twain” [MTP: Superior Auction Galleries catalog, Oct. 15, 1991, Item 1832].
In Redding, Conn., Isabel V. Lyon wrote for Sam to Laura Hawkins Frazer, his childhood sweetheart.
October 9 Friday – In Redding, Conn. Sam finished his Oct. 6, 7, 8 to Margaret Blackmer at the Misses Tewksbury’s School in Irvington-on-Hudson, NY.
Friday, Oct. 9. I have a lovely letter from your mother this morning, & I gather from it that one of these days you are going to invite me again to visit the school. That is very pleasant, dear heart, I shall be sure to accept.
October 8 Thursday – In Redding, Conn. Sam added to his Oct. 6, 7 to Margaret Blackmer. Here is the Oct. 8 segment:
Oct. 8. You’ve been gone so long, now, that I suppose I wouldn’t know you if I met you. But fortunately there’s the shell! By that I should know you in a minute; for there’s only the one shell.
October 7 Wednesday – In Redding, Conn. Sam added to his Oct. 6 to Margaret Blackmer. Here is the Oct. 7 segment:
October 6 Tuesday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to daughter Clara at 17 Livington Place, N.Y.C.
Clärchen dear, your letter sounds ever so good. Your sunny apartment seems to be a rare & fine stroke of luck. I hope you have secured a refusal of it for a year or two; but if you haven’t you can keep it anyway, no doubt, if you behave yourself. Miss Lyon will be able to give me a lot of details concerning the place when she comes back.
October 5 Monday – In his Oct. 6 to Margaret Blackmer, Sam related activities of this day. See entry.
Edith Virginia Gazella wrote from Rutherford, NJ to Sam. She’d sent him a copy of La Vita Nova, her new magazine and asked if he might look it over and offer how she might improve it. She’d ridden on the streetcar with him a few times but never had the nerve to speak to him. As a girl she would hide in the attic and read HF and TS and wanted so badly to be a boy [MTP].
October 4 Sunday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Fanny the pony, Jeannette Cholmely-Jones’s little steed arrived today for me to use and to take care of. The use of her for the care of her. She is very soft; Benares and I just drove around the circle and that is all, before we took her out to the stall made for her in the garage. We shan’t be able to drive her for a fortnight” [MTP: IVL TS 68].
October 3 Saturday – At “Stormfield,” Isabel Lyon wrote for Sam to Miss Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874-1942), author of Anne of Green Gables (1908):
Dear Miss Montgomery:
Mr. Clemens directs me to thank you for your charming book & says I may quote to you from his letter to Francis Wilson about it:
In “Anne of Green Gables” you will find the dearest & most moving & delightful child since the immortal Alice.
October 2 Friday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to daughter Jean in Berlin, Germany (she would have arrived about this day after leaving Sept. 26). [in left margin: Clara is to send us your address to-day, by telephone or letter.]
Oct. 2’08. Jean dear, it was delightful to hear from you from mid-ocean. Wonderful times we live in!
As I understand it, Clara has completed the arranging of her little flat in Stuyvesant Square, & is moving in, to-day. There is a small extra room for a guest.