May 20 Sunday – Sam’s notebook entry: “6 AM Making land.” From “Idle Excursion”:

Away across the sunny waves one saw a faint dark stripe stretched along under the horizon,—or pretended to see it, for the credit of his eyesight. Even the Reverend [Twichell] said he saw it, a thing which was manifestly not so. But I never have seen anyone who was morally strong enough to confess that he could not see land when others claimed that they could.

May 18 Friday – From Sam’s notebook:

Bright, sunny, mild—put on light overcoat for the deck. Mother Cary’s chicks very beautiful; bronze, shiny, metallic, broad stripe across tail; —built & carry themselves much like swallows. After luncheon I commenced feeding crumbs to a few over the stern, & in 15 minutes had a thousand collected from nobody knows where. We are very far from land, of course. They never rested a moment. This stormy Petrel is supposed to sleep on the water at night.

May 17 Thursday –Sam wrote from New York to Livy.

“Livy darling, it is 8.30 AM & Joe & I have been wandering about for half an hour with satchels & overcoats, asking questions of policemen; at last we have found the eating house I was after. Joe’s country aspect & the seal-skin coat caused one policeman to follow us a few blocks” [MTLE 2: 73].

May 16 Wednesday – Sam and Joe Twichell left Hartford and traveled to New Haven, Conn., where they took a night boat just before midnight to New York City and spent the night, [Powers, MT A Life 404; D. Hoffman 27] probably at the St.

May 15 Tuesday – Sam, still in Hartford and preparing to leave on his 10-day trip to Bermuda with Twichell, sent a note to George F. Bissell & Co. for Charles Perkins, authorizing the latter, Sam’s attorney, to endorse checks payable to Sam for deposit [MTLE 2: 71].

May 14 Monday – Sam sent his voyage postcard (form letter) to Orion’s suggestions for cold cures, adding a note that death would be “easily preferable” to Orion’s remedy.

“Profanity is more necessary to me than is immunity from colds” [MTLE 2: 70].

May 13 Sunday – Sam wrote from Hartford to William B. Franklin, former Union General who led Ulysses Grant’s West Point class. Sam usually addressed Franklin as “General.” Sam recommended interior decorators, Marcotte of New York and the Household Art Company in Boston to bid some project of Franklin’s. “New York is full of bastard furniture-constructors & decorators,” he wrote [MTLE 2: 68].

May 12 Saturday – Sam wrote from Hartford to the American Publishing Co., asking that cloth copies of Sketches and Tom Sawyer be sent to Hon. J.R. Goodpasture of Nashville, Tenn. (unidentified). Sam also wanted a statement of earnings for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer to Apr. 1 [MTLE 2: 67].

May 11 Friday – Charles T. Parsloe wrote from Wash DC to Sam, not recalling whether he’d acknowledged receipt of check by telegram.

May 10 Thursday – Sam purchased John Liptrott Hatton’s The Songs of England from the Osgood & Co [Gribben 300].

Orion Clemens wrote to thank Sam for the 3 drafts of $42 each, and added his cure for the common cold: