Day By Day Dates

January 13 Friday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “I have lost 2 days of real living owing to my strange headache. Mr. Clemens is still in bed. Gout again. We play cards every evening. Today Mother went to the Customs Office and found there Don Raffaello’s gift to me. A book in a bottle, very realistic” [MTP: TS 37].

January 14 Saturday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Trying to catch up the threads lost by that eadache. It is David’s [her nephew] birthday” [MTP: TS 37].

January 15 Sunday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Today has been very full of the joy of living. I wrote letters and read some in the morning. Looked out of my window just in time to see dear Mother look up at me on her way home from Church and in the afternoon she came over. Later I played cards with my chief. Some day the penalty for having such perfect living will come [MTP: TS 37]. Note: on Jan. 3, 1933 she added a note to this entry that “No penalty attaches itself to perfect living. No penalties ever attach themselves to joys.”

January 16 Monday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Very busy with much writing to do. Mother came in the afternoon. I went this evening to a Beethoven concert with Francesca and Rosamond—such sweet children. There was a stupid lecture on Beethoven and then 3 beautiful numbers. I met Mrs. Nowell, the one who sketched Mr. Clemens for The Outlook—and some Tuesday I am going up for a dish of tea with her. I had a late game of cards with Mr. Clemens, on my return from the concert [MTP: TS 37]. Note: Kate Rogers Nowell.

January 17 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Busy every moment. / (Dublin note—July 7, 1905) Mr. Clemens takes up a novel and begins in the middle and swings along to the finish” [MTP: TS 38]. Note: just why she added this to Jan. 17 is not known. Isabel Lyon’s journal #2: “Today Mr. Clemens sat for several hours in the study. Gout Continues. Miss Harrison sent a check to Mr. Larkin for $841.21 for transfer tax to be paid on Mrs.Clemens’s estate” [MTP TS 2].

January 18 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Today Santissima’s beautiful black cat Bambino arrived. Katie brought it down in a cab. A patient in Santissima’s sanitarium cannot stand cats and she is to be there for a fortnight. It is Mr. Dana’s birthday” [MTP: TS 38]. Isabel Lyon’s journal# 2: “Mr. Clemens took more cold when he sat in the Study yesterday, and today he is not so well” [MTP TS 2].

January 19 Thursday – At 21 Fifth Ave. Jean Clemens wrote for her father to Anne Sullivan.

My dear Miss Sullivan; / As Father is still ill in bed with gout he cannot write you himself and has therefor asked me to do so for him.

He was of course very much pleased to hear of your happy engagement, especially so as he once met M Macy, at Mrs. Hutton’s, I believe.

January 20 Friday – Ralph W. Ashcroft wrote on Koy-Lo Co.letterhead to Sam, concerning ongoing disputes with Howard E. Wright and the American Plasmon Co. “The other day, I came across the card of admission issued by Hammond to Butters in connection with the ‘freeze-out’ game. I enclose it” [MTP].

January 22 Sunday – “Bloody Sunday” (or “Red Sunday”) in St. Petersburg, Russia was the impetus for Mark Twain’s “The Czar’s Soliloquy,” written shortly after this day. (See Jan. 30, and Feb. entries.) Peaceful demonstrators petitioning Czar Nicholas II were gunned down by the Imperial guard. Budd writes:

January 23 Monday – Isabel Lyon’s journal # 2: “Sent card to Mrs Clander, for Mr. Clemens” [MTP TS 2].

George B. Harvey wrote to Sam, soliciting him to attend the “little dinner to the Archbishop Thursday evening,” urged by Mr. O’Day [MTP]. Note: this may be Daniel O’Day.

January 24 Tuesday – At 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Sam wrote to the American Academy of Arts and Letters, casting his vote for the election of Thomas Bailey Aldrich as the fifteenth member of that select group. On Dec. 2, 1904 Sam had been one of the original seven elected [MTP].

Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Today mother and I did some shopping together. It was blustery, but fine. Ugo is going away tomorrow. / Mr. Clemens is still in his bed, though better” [MTP: TS 38]. Note: Ugo Piemontini, the Italian servant brought back from Florence.

January 25 Wednesday – At 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Sam wrote to Susan Crane.

January 26 Thursday – Isabel Lyon’s journal #2: “French butler Leon arrived today. / Sale of Tarry Town property closed today. Mr. Benjamin has had charge of the sale” [MTP TS 3]. Note: Leon not further identified.

January 27 Friday – Isabel Lyon’s journal #2: “Mr. Langdon arrived this evening at 9:45” [MTP TS 3].

William Evarts Benjamin wrote to Sam concerning papers he’d handed him the day before on the Tarrytown property. Complexities regarding a Trolley Co. encroachment, ownership of half the adjoining streets and “other papers relating to the matter are in charge of” Mr. Andrew M. Clute, Sam’s attorney on the matters [MTP].

January 28 Saturday – At 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Sam wrote to William L. Alden.

I thank you heartily for giving me a chance to read it. Your article has given me great pleasure, special pleasure. It requires courage to say what you have said; few can run counter to an accepted & established popular notion & not lose nerve in the transit. We have all seen it, many times.

January 29 Sunday – Harper & Brothers wrote to Sam.

We have an inquiry for the following sketches: “The Grateful Poodle,” “The Benevolent Author,” “The Grateful Husband,” which we are unable to indentify. Our correspondent states that all appeared in the Atlantic Monthly. It occurs to us that possibly these are not independent sketches or that the sketches were reproduced in book form under another title. Can you give us any information? [MTP].

On this day or just after Harper’s above letter arrived, Sam answered:

January 30 Monday – Robert Galbraith wrote from Tarrytown, NY to Sam, having rec’d his letter (not extant) and check on Monday. He’d been kept busy shoveling snow that blew back at night [MTP]. Note: Sam’s letter had likely been sent on Saturday, Jan. 28.

January 31 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal #2: “Pay Rent, / Check for Mrs. Greening – 25.00” [MTP TS 3]. Note: Tabitha Quarles Greening (“Puss”).

February – Clemens inscribed a copy of TS (1903 ed.) to an unidentified person: “One of the most striking and convincing differences between a lie & a cat is, that the cat has only nine lives. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain / Feb. 1905” [MTP: listed in Profiles in History, Oct. 2005, no. 40, item 130].

February 1 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal#2: Mr. Clemen’s preferences for new members to the national Institute of Arts and Letters.

February 2 Thursday – Isabel Lyon’s Journal: “Colonel Harvey is here. Mr. Clemens creeps about the house a little, but mostly he stays in bed. Mother comes over every day to sit in my little warm room. Bambino Bronchitis Clemens grows ever better as a cat” [MTP: TS 39]. Note: “Bambino” for short.

Isabel Lyon’s journal #2: “Miss Clemens is now well enough to read. I sent down for Plato and the Iliad & Byron. She has gained 5 ½ pounds, and is allowed to sit up a little while each day” [MTP TS 4].

February 2, ca. – Isabel V. Lyon wrote responding for Sam to Arthur Newall’s Jan. 24 inquiry about obtaining a copy of 1601, writing on the bottom of Newall’s letter: “Mr. Clemens still has no copy & in every case where he thought he was on the track of one it failed—” [MTP].

February 3 Friday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Today we have the news that Santissima can sit up a little and she is beginning to read a little too. She sends down for Plato and Byon and the Iliad and dry essays. All the morning Mr. Clemens has been revising the Russian article and this afternoon he read me the revision. I was glad to hear that Col. Harvey said it was the strongest thing he had ever written. It is wonderful [MTP: TS 39]. Notes: The Czar’s Soliloquy ran in the Mar. issue of the NAR. Gribben (549) mistakes this journal entry for Feb. 2.

February 4 Saturday – At 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Isabel Lyon Sam replied for to Elizabeth (Ann Chase) Akers Allen (Elizabeth C. Akers), whose incoming question about the source of the verse on Susy’s headstone is not extant.

February 5 Sunday – Isabel Lyon’s journal #2: “Mr. Johnson called this afternoon” [MTP TS 4]. Note: likely Robert Underwood Johnson.