October 8 Sunday – In Cambridge, Mass., Howells wrote to Sam. He liked the idea of the “blind novelettes,” (see Oct. 12 entry) and his owners were “crazy over it,” though he saw difficulties in persuading people to write them. He confessed the failure of the bio he’d done on Hayes, and “bills continue to come in with unabated fierceness.” He also praised Sam’s Sept.
October 7 Saturday – Bill paid to Paul Thompson for straw, etc. delivered Sept. 30. $14.60 [MTP].
October 5 Thursday – In Hartford Sam wrote a short letter to his attorney, Charles E. Perkins, enclosing a piece of plagiarism that was:
“…made up of paragraphs taken bodily from my various books, & idiotically strung together upon the thin thread of a silly love tale.” Should Sam go to the expense of an injunction? [MTLE 1: 123].
October 4 Wednesday – In Hartford Sam responded with a short note to William Seaver’s request for a miscellaneous article, probably for Harper’s. Sam wrote, “I can’t, old man—am too busy” [MTLE 1: 122]. Sam began collaborating with Bret Harte for a stage play, Ah Sin [MTLE 1: 124].
October 2 Monday – The Hartford Evening Post ran Sam’s speech of Sept. 30 on page two, “Just Before the Battle.”
October – The German edition of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer was published in Leipzig by F.W. Grunow [Norton, Writing The Adventures of Tom Sawyer 90].
September 30 Saturday – Following a noisy torchlight parade with a band and Civil War veteran marchers, Sam gave his first political speech. He spoke for Rutherford B. Hayes at Allyn Hall in Hartford. Though the city was Republican, there was some mud-slinging by supporters of Tilden.
September 29 Friday – In the evening, Sam and Livy entertained Hartford friends in their “big, long talked of party,” that “went off well.” (See Sept. 27 entry.)
Peter Henderson, Seedsman and Florist, New York City receipted $2.50 [MTP].
September 27 Wednesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to John and Alice Hooker Day that he and Livy would be happy to see them on “Friday evening from 7 till 11” [MTLE 1: 119]. Note: Sam & Livy had attended the 1869 Hooker-Day wedding in New York. This note from MTPO:
September 25 Monday – Henry W. Shaw (Josh Billings) wrote a note from NYC. He advised sending Sam one of his books: Josh Billings: His Works, Complete. If Sam should “be seized with a longing to say something tender” then Shaw would be very much pleased. In the book he wrote this inscription: