March 23 Tuesday – Phineas T. Barnum wrote to Sam.

March 22 Monday – Reginald Cholmondeley wrote from Funchal, Madiera.

March 20 Saturday – In Hartford Sam wrote to his old childhood friend, Will Bowen, who returned the $20 check Sam sent on or about Feb. 6 for Sam Bowen. Will felt his brother would never repay the loan. Sam insisted that it was for Sam Bowen to say whether or not he needed the check and to accept or return it. So Sam asked Will simply to give it to his brother and explain.

March 19 Friday – Susy Clemens’ third birthday; in a letter to her mother, Livy told of the presents that Susy shared with her baby sister “Bay” (Clara): dolls, candy, a silver setting, a gold ring, silver thimble, a Bible from the servants, and from her father a Noah’s ark with 200 wooden animals [Willis 97].

March 18 Thursday – Sam had a large maple cut down in the yard, “five steps from the house,” thinking it was dead. He wrote in a letter to David Gray ten days later that only one limb was dead and that he found “himself keeping away from the windows on that side because that stump is such a reproach…” [MTL 6: 429].

March 17 Wednesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Charles Warren Stoddard, the day after receiving a reply to his letter of Feb. 1. Stoddard dislocated and broken his left arm in a riding accident. Sam answered that he’d never before been:

“…bodily hurt…But I had 8 cousins in one family [Lamptons] every devil of whom had enjoyed from one to two broken arms before reaching puberty. Think of it!”

March 16 Tuesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Howells, responding to William’s Mar. 15 note of thanks for the visit. Sam related Livy’s remark that “Nothing could have been added to that visit to make it more charming, except days.”

March 15 Monday – William Dean Howells wrote a short note:

My dear Clemens: /Your own feelings will give you no clew to our enjoyment of the little visit we made you. There never was anything more unalloyed in the way of pleasure—I was even spared the pang of bidding the ladies goodbye.

I’m sorry you’re not coming up to the Aldrich lunch, to which I found myself invited.— Don’t say anything to anybody about the Longfellow book till you hear from me.

March 14 Sunday – In Hartford, Livy and Sam wrote to Olivia Lewis Langdon. Livy wrote a page or two and Sam added a few short lines about wishing that Howells had seen the silver set for baby Clara. Each of their children received such a set from Grandmother Langdon [MTL 6: 411-12].

March 13 Saturday – The Howellses departed at noon [MTL 6: 411-2]. Joe Twichell dropped in on Sam, hoping the Howellses were still there [MTL 6: 415].