Day By Day Dates

December 8 Friday – Henry Ferguson replied from Hartford to Sam’s Nov. 20 offer, giving particulars on names he wished edited in his and his brother’s journals, written during the Hornet saga. He was:

December 10 Sunday – “My First Lie and How I Got Out of It,” ran in the Sunday supplement of the N.Y. World. It was collected in The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg and Other Stories and Essays and My Debut as a Literary Person, with Other Essays and Stories (1903) [Budd, Collected 2: 1005; AMT-1: 707]. Note: Sam first drafted the piece on Oct. 28.

December 11 Monday – In London, England Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers.

I didn’t really want to write for the World, but I was loafing for a few days, & they furnished me with a text & asked for only 2,000 words & offered $500, & I thought I might as well put in an afternoon on it.

But in my case if I had sent it to Harpers they wouldn’t have wanted it enough to pay the half of that….

December 12 Tuesday – In London Sam inscribed a photograph of himself for Mrs. Hinck: “We all have music & truth in us, but the most of us can’t get it out. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain / To Mrs. Hinck, with kindest regards of her friend. / S.L. Clemens / Dec. 12, 1899” [MTP: Joseph M. Maddalena catalogs, No. 12 Item 92].

Sam applied to Henrick Kellgren for a bad case of lumbago, and he claimed a cure with one treatment [Dec. 22 to Crane].

December 16 Saturday – The Saturday Evening Post anonymously published an article “Mark Twain as a Cub Pilot” [Tenney 29].

Elizabeth Davis Fielder’s article, “Familiar Haunts of Mark Twain,” ran in Harper’s Weekly p. 10-11.

Tenney: “A description of Hannibal, Missiouri, with several photographs, including ‘Laura Hawkins as a girl’ and the ‘Hannibal of Fifty Years Ago.’” [30].

December 18 Monday – Somewhat before this date, Mr. & Mrs. Louis I. Seymour sent a fold-out Seasons Greetings card (with only their signature) picturing Capetown, S. Africa’s harbor [MTP].

December 19 Tuesday – In London, England Sam wrote to James M. Tuohy, London correspondent of the N.Y. World.

I forgot. I am barred by the arrangement which I made lately & which I mentioned to you in a note.

However, I should be barred anyway, by my set policy of not appearing with frequency in print.

December 21 Thursday – In London, England Sam wrote to J. Henry Harper.

I return the list of articles for the 2 vols. You will notice that I have made a couple of small transpositions. The arrangement as it now stands, seems to me to be good.

I think it may be well to advertise the fact that the “Peanut Stand” (with original unaffected and unstudied drawings of great merit) and half of the “Xn Science” paper have not been published before [MTP].

December 22 Friday – In London, England Sam added a second PS to his Dec. 21 letter to Katharine I. Harrison.

I’ve withdrawn the Harper letter, & hereby enclose it to you, as his letter was to you, & as I don’t know what may have been happening in the Harper affairs since Harper wrote his letter (Dec. 4). …

December 26 Tuesday – In London, England Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers.

If you approve, won’t you please send the enclosed to Harry Harper & see what comes of it?

December 30 Saturday – An anonymous review of IA in Author’s Edition Deluxe ran in Athenaeum (London), p. 897. Tenney:

December 31 Sunday – Clara and Jean Clemens “danced till 1 o’clock this morning, seeing the Old Year out & the New one in” [Jan. 1 to Hutton].

This Everlasting Exile – Plasmon in Syndication – Depressing Fog, Hadleyburg Book McClure’s Scheme Fizzles – Harvey Runs Harpers – Seeking Osteopaths “I am an Anti-Imperialist” – Another Heart-Stab – Preaching Copyright to Lords Dollis Hill Idyll – “That Singular Tapeworm” – Home at Last! - Feeding & Speeching – Yale-Princeton Football – Crooked Cab Driver Introduces Churchill – Another Lawsuit –“Hide the Looking-glass”

January – In London, England Sam wrote an aphorism to an unidentified man:

“We ought never to do wrong when any one is looking. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain / London, Jan. 1900”

[MTP: Charles Hamilton catalog, 21 May 1965, No. 4, Item 31].

January 1 Monday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam replied to Will M. Clemens (incoming not extant).

January 2 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “San Remo—4 rooms & bath, $125 to 150 a month, ohne Nahrung.[without food] / John Tablock,[sic Tatlock] jr 32 Nassau” [NB 43 TS 4]. Note: in his Apr. 20, 1900 to H.H. Rogers, Sam wrote they might stay at the Hotel San Remo, N.Y.C. upon their return to America.

January 3 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook: “Write Mr. Lawson about / Charles Stewart Walther Manager Estate Department—Army & Navy Stores (Auxiliary)” [NB 43 TS 4]. Note: unknown reference.

January 6 Saturday – Harper & Brothers wrote to Sam (this note was then forwarded by Sam on Jan. 18 to Poultney Bigelow:

We beg leave to enclose herewith a copy of a letter which we received from Mr. J. Boyd Douglass, in which he asks permission to use your story “The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg” as “an incentive for the construction of a “comedy drama.” We have advised Mr. Douglass that we have referred his request to you [MTP].

January 8 Monday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to Katharine I. Harrison, enclosing a typewritten sheet with sections XIV between his and Livy’s Dec. 31, 1896 contract with American Publishing Co., and V, and VI from his Dec. 31, 1896 contract between Harper & Brothers and the American Publishing Co. and Livy:

January 9 Tuesday – Henry Ferguson wrote from Hartford to Sam, enclosing a copy of Sam’s article about the Hornet saga from the Century with changes suggested.

“I should be glad to have the whole passage in regard to the supposed disaffection of the men omitted, but do not feel that I should urge this against your will if the other changes are made.” He added an interesting detail: “Captain Mitchell died on July 23rd 1876…he was taken ill in South America.” In either this or a separate note of this date Ferguson [MTP].

January 10 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook: contains a bus or train schedule for a.m. and p.m. times, “Neasden Lane, N.W. / Pillar Box” [NB 43 TS 5]. Note: an area of N.W. London.

January 11 Thursday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam replied to three lists of questions about his books from Adela M. Goodrich-Freer (1865-1931), English writer-traveler active in the Society for Psychical Research in Hertfordshire, England. She wrote under the pseudonym “Miss X”.

January 12 Friday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to cousin, Dr. James R. Clemens.

Are you home again, or still away?

Mrs. Clemens is up & out—yesterday, & again to-day. I think she only needs that Vienna albumen [Plasmon] now. Where does one get it? [MTP]. Note: Sam’s stationery continued to own a black-border for mourning.

On the back of an envelope dated Jan. 11, 1900, postmarked London, Sam wrote a list of notes about Samuel S. McClure’s offer

January 13 Saturday –At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers.

McClure is here & has made me a proposition [see Jan.11]. As I wanted to ask your advice, I have postponed my answer to the 1st of March.

He is going to start a new magazine next fall, whose complexion is to be peculiarly American; its writers to be nearly all of that nationality; & one of its projects is to help hatch out & develop the rising young American literature.

January 14 Sunday – In New York, William Dean Howells wrote to Sam of the horrors of the platform after his 50 performances on the road.