July 23 Friday – Sam wrote from Elmira to his sister, Pamela Moffett. Sam had lumbago (general lower back pain). Evidently a clergyman named Adams had done something outside the bounds of his church rules and Sam offered that the man would be “worsted in his fight” [MTLE 5: 136].
Sam made a $75 loan to Patrick Francis of Bloomfield Conn., who made his “X” mark on the agreement [MTP, 1880 financial file].
July 20 Tuesday – Sam paid a bill to Estes & Lauriat of Boston for 21 books in all, including $3.85 for a three-volume set of Plutarch’s Lives, Marie Sevigne’s Letters of (1878) [Gribben 550, 621-2] three volumes of “Popular Fiction,” two volumes of Adolphe Taine’s History of English Literature (1871); Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queen and Epithalamion;
July 19 Monday – Clemens wrote from Quarry Farm, Elmira to Joe Twichell.
Dear old Joe:
July 18 Sunday – Howells wrote from Boston, chiding Clemens for not writing and urging him to visit Charles Eliot Norton at his summer home in Ashfield, Mass.
“Better do so. Warner is going, and so are Winny and I; and Curtis will be there. We shall have a famous time, and you will enjoy yourself, and make every body else happy. I hope Mrs. Clemens is well—I know you are” [MTHL 1: 317].
July 17 Saturday – Sam paid $5.62 for Young’s History from Estes & Lauriat, booksellers, Boston [MTP].
Joe Twichell wrote a folksy fun letter to Sam about being left alone when his wife and children went off to the Adirondacks; about Dean Sage’s latest adventures, fishing and camping; and gave a hooray for Willard Fiske, whose son was recently married [MTP].
July 16 Friday – John Milton Hay wrote to thank Sam for TA and also for 1601 [MTP]. A reply is not extant.
July 15 Thursday – The Hartford Courant, on page one, ran an excerpt from Sam’s sketch, “Edward Mills and George Benton: A Tale” from the August issue of the Atlantic Monthly.
The new Atlantic contains the tale of Edward Mills and George Benton by Mark Twain, which is as clever a satire on the sentimentality over crime as that sort of gush has ever received.
July 14 Wednesday – Sam purchased books from Estes & Lauriat of Boston, including James Freeman Clarke’s Memorial and Biographical Sketches (1878), and Sara Coleridge’s Memoirs and Letters (1874) [Gribben 145; 153]. A bill in MTP shows a total of $50.55 for a list of 21 books.
July 13 Tuesday – Sam wrote to his attorney, Charles E. Perkins; the letter not extant but referred to in Perkins’ July 14 reply.
Elihu Vedder (1836-1923) painter/illustrator wrote from NY to Sam that he was leaving the country and would return in two years. He sent a package containing a “silver comic mask. Hang it on your watch chain and think of me” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the letter, “Vedder the artist”
July 10 Saturday – Sam ordered 100 Cortina Mora R. Chic cigars from James Lidgerwood & Co., fine groceries, New York; bill paid Aug. 11 [MTP].