Day By Day Dates

March 22 Thursday – In Washington D.C., Sam wrote Frances F. Cleveland (Mrs. Grover Cleveland). Sam didn’t know the proper protocol about leaving cards when calling. He offered “homage” to the President and “sincere appreciation” for Mrs. Cleveland’s hospitality [MTP].

Sam’s notebook lists a “Miss Clymer, Thursday, 4 p.m.” and also a dinner with Secretary of the Navy, William Collins Whitney (1841-1904).

March 23 Friday – In Washington, Sam gave a speech on international copyright before the House Judiciary Committee. [Washington Post Mar. 24, 1888, p.4, “The Copyright Hearing” paraphrased the speech.]

The New York World ran an “interview” on page 4, “The Insolence of Office”:

March 24 Saturday – Sam was still in Washington. His notebook carries names of people to see and errands to complete while in the Capitol: Mrs. Ralph Cross Johnson wife of the lawyer and prominent art patron; he visited Colonel Alexander Bliss at 9:30 one of these evenings. Bliss was the son of Mrs. George Bancroft by her previous husband. Sam visited George Bancroft (1800-1891), then 87 years young.

March 25 Sunday – Sam was still in Washington D.C..

March 26 Monday – Sam paid his second hotel bill of $78.85 at the Arlington House, which included 2 & ¾ days’ room and services, and railroad tickets: “2 ¾ days @ 16, 44.00; fires 3.00, cash 5.00, Laundry .60, RR tickets 25.40, Messenger .85” [MTP; MTNJ 3:381n271]. He left Washington for New York City and Hartford [380n262]. ‡ See addenda for corrected date of Terry-Irving Farewell banquet.

March 28 Wednesday – Charles M. Underhill wrote from Buffalo to Sam about publishing the poems of the late David Gray; news of the Gray family was given [MTP]. Note: Gray a longtime friend.

March 30 Friday – In Hartford Sam wrote to his nephew, Samuel Moffett in San Francisco. He had misread a letter from Moffett, thinking that Moffett was coming to find a job on a newspaper in New York. Sam thus wrote a paragraph and then crossed it out when he realized it was “McDowell” who was coming. Sam revealed his knowledge of several men who Moffett evidently had asked of:

March 31 Saturday – In Hartford Sam wrote to William Dean Howells, enclosing his speech “Knights of Labor — The New Dynasty” which he’d given at the Monday Evening Club back on Mar. 22, 1886. This letter is evidently a response to one sent by Howells and now lost, which included “Anarchist” pamphlets, probably William M. Salter’s Cure for Anarchy, and possibly John C.

April – J.G. Rathbun & Co. Hartford Pharmacists billed $51.10 for goods from Jan-Mar; paid Apr. 4:

April 1 Sunday – Sam allowed a line about Lorenz Reich’s wine from a Dec. 2, 1882 letter to be quoted in a New York Times article, p.5, “A HOTEL OF HOMES,” about The Cambridge Hotel, which was novel due to its “modern apartment” accommodations.

April 2 Monday – Webster & Co. wrote to Sam that they’d been notified by Gen. Sheridan that his book was now “all revised, and that he will send the manuscript…very shortly.” Maps included [MTP].

Edward B. Hooker wrote to Sam thanking him for efforts on behalf of his engraver friend, Mr. Bass, who had “secured a position in Boston, so that for the present at least he is not in want” [MTP].

April 3 Tuesday – Frederick J. Hall for Webster & Co. wrote to Sam having received his letter (date not given). “We will write to Mr. Chatto at once, and note what you say about the Beecher and Custer books.” They’d been holding back the latter so as not to interfere with Sam’s book [MTP].

Henry C. Robinson wrote a barely legible note to Sam: “Col. Greene thinks that his mis conduct is explained without involving him in any thing…” [MTP]. Note: the matter is obscure.

April 5 Thursday – In Hartford Sam telegraphed Augustin Daly, asking,

Send 3 tickets to murray hill hotel for tomorrow night I will pay at the door [MTP]. Note: it’s conjectural who the third ticket was for, perhaps Susy.

April 6 Friday – Sam, Livy, and perhaps Susy, went to New York and checked into the Murray Hill Hotel. At 8:15 they went to Daly’s Theatre and saw a performance of Midsummer Night’s Dream, starring Miss Ada Rehan, James Lewis, Miss Virginia Dreher, and John Drew. It was the next to last performance of the season for this play, the 78th. It opened on Jan.

April 7 Saturday – The Clemens family likely returned home to Hartford from New York, as trains were few and none on Sundays during this period. Sam must have answered Howell’s Apr. 5 letter, either this day or the next, based on Howells next letter of Apr. 9. In his response to the Apr. 5 letter, Sam informed Howells of seeing Lorettus S.

April 8 Sunday – Blanche W. Howard wrote from Stuttgart, Germany: “You have recently given my sister a glass of punch at some hospitable house in Washington. She was delighted, and wrote me at once with enthusiasm which I share.” [MTP].

April 9 Monday – Still in New York, William Dean Howells wrote to Sam.

My Dear Clemens —

Don’t you go and turn Mr. Metcalf out of doors as soon as he begins to talk article to you; but you listen, and seriously. I’ve told him (what he knew) that you’ve the best head in America for a dead-in-earnest thing, that shall smile and hurt awfully [MTHL 2: 600].

April 10 Tuesday – Lorettus S. Metcalf telegraphed Sam with news of Matthew Arnold’s “Civilization in the United States,” originally published in London’s Nineteenth Century for April:

April 11 Wednesday – Sam wrote to A.C. Armstrong for the New Princeton Review withdrawing from the forgotten promise to write an article [MTNJ 3: 343n134].

Susan L. Crane wrote concerned about Livy’s health and wanting to come take care of her [MTP].

M.P. Handy wrote to Sam (Pierce College of Business, Phila. To Handy Apr. 6 enclosed) seeking his speech at the school’s commencement [MTP].

April 12 Thursday – In Hartford Sam wrote to his sister-in-law, Susan L. Crane that she would be “so welcome!” Livy was ailing again with a bad throat and head; Sam too had “a most infernal cold in the head” [MTP].

April 13 Friday – In Hartford Sam responded to Lorettus S. Metcalf, editor of Forum Magazine.

When I left you I found that Mrs. Clemens’s attack was diptheria — & that she was perilously ill. That stopped the Arnold-article on the spot, of course…. This afternoon one of the children has gone to bed ailing. These are not good times in which to write magazine articles [MTP].

April 14 Saturday – Frederick J. Hall for Webster & Co. wrote to Sam, “sorry indeed to hear of the sickness in your family.” Hall wrote that Webster would be in Fredonia when the book was published and had volunteered to run over to Canada and register “on the other side” [MTP].

April 15 Sunday – Matthew Arnold died while running to catch a tram in Liverpool. He was 65.

In Hartford Sam began a letter to Robert Louis Stevenson, which he would finish on Apr. 17, in response to Stevenson’s Apr. 13 letter.

April 16 Monday – Louise M. Madden wrote from Chicago for Sam’s autograph [MTP].

L..       Loisette for Loisettian School wrote to Sam that he was going to “reply to the unmemorial blackguards who beginning a few years ago with slight misrepresentation have advanced from my silence & forebearance to lies pure & simple” [MTP].

April 17 Tuesday – In Hartford Sam finished his Apr. 15 letter to Robert Louis Stevenson. Livy was better (Sam likened her to a battered ship “slowly undergoing repairs”), and would be out of her sick room in about a week he thought.