August 5 Tuesday – Reginald Cholmondeley wrote to Sam: “I shall be happy to see you & Mrs Clemens at the end of August or beginning of September with your little girl & I will ask Tom Hughes & his wife to meet you” [MTP]. Note: This labeled Aug. 6 but date is written over; could be either.
August 4 Monday – Sam wrote from Edinburgh to Edmund H. Yates of the New York Herald objecting to an offensive insertion made into Sam’s Shah letter published July 1. Yates had been at Ostend; was in London on Aug. 2, and then went to Vienna [MTL 5: 430].
August 2 Saturday – Sam telegraphed and then wrote from Edinburgh to Elisha Bliss, telling him to stop the publication of the pamphlet containing the Herald letters. Paragraphs had been added at the paper causing Sam grief and a desire not to have them reprinted by Bliss, something he feared might harm the sale of The Gilded Age [MTL 5: 425].
August – John Moffat of Edinburgh made a formal group photograph of Sam, Livy, Susy, Clara Spaulding and Dr. John Brown [MTL 5: 662].
July 31 Thursday – From Veitch’s Hotel in Edinburgh, Sam wrote to an unidentified autograph seeker asking for Sam’s help in securing the autograph of William Cullen Bryant [MTL 5: 422].
July 30 Wednesday – In Edinburgh, Clemens wrote to an unidentified man. “I have some idea of lecturing in New York,—& possibly in Boston; but shall not be able to do more than that. With thanks for the invitation, I am / Ys Truly …” [MTP].
July 28 Monday – Sam’s reply letter of March was printed in Josh Billings’ column in the New York Weekly. The Josh Billings’ Farmer’s Allminax had sold hundreds of thousands of copies since 1869 [MTL 5: 306n1&3].
July 27 Sunday – Sam wrote from Edinburgh, Scotland to Elisha Bliss. English law required that publication in England precede that in other countries, thus the agreement Sam had with Routledge provided a three-week window; Sam expected The Gilded Age to be out in England before his planned departure on Oct. 25. Sam was pressing Bliss for the proofs [MTL 5: 420-1 & n2].
July 26 Saturday – The inserted cartoon ran in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper for this day, “The New Heathen Chinee / Mark Twain Teaches the Shah the American Game of Draw Poker” [MTJ Spring/Fall 2011; Vol. 49 p.111]. See cartoon in June 22 entry.