August 30 Tuesday – The following six local articles in the Call are attributed to Sam: “Police Calendar,” “Dismissed,” “Fined,” “Board of Supervisors,” “Enthusiastic Hard Money Demonstration,” and “Chinese Railroad Obstructions,” below: [Branch, C of Call 296].
Mark Twain - Reporter: Day By Day
August 31 Wednesday – The following seven local articles in the Call are attributed to Sam: “Good and Bad Luck,” “The Pueblo Case,” “Mayhem,” “Strong as Sampson and Meek as Moses,” “Henry Meyer,” “China at the Fair,” and “Shiner No.1” [Branch, C of Call 296].
Sam paid $25 “fr sale of mining stock” to Daggett & Myers for rent owed with De Quille [Mack 246]. Note: evidently, Sam was still sharing the cost for the Virginia City rooms.
August 4 Tuesday – While Sam had been laid up with a cold he invited Clement T. Rice to write local items for the Enterprise, even though he was a Union reporter. Rice played a trick and published an “apology” from Sam to Rice. “An Apology Repudiated” appeared in the Enterprise by Sam:
August 4 Thursday – The following six local articles in the Call are attributed to Sam:
“Otium Cum Dignitate,” “Recovered,” “A Long Fast for Poor Dame Partlet,” “The Tournament,” “Police Calendar,” and “Fruit Swindling” [Branch, C of Call 293].
August 4 Friday – Pamela Moffett’s husband, Sam’s brother-in-law, William Anderson Moffett, died. Widowed just short of 38 years of age, Pamela never remarried. Daughter Annie was thirteen, son Sammy, not quite five [MTL 1: 382].
August 5 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Virginia City to his mother, and sister Pamela, sending another $20 greenback. Sam wrote: “I got burned out about ten days ago—saved nothing but the clothes I had on” [MTL 1: 261].
The Virginia City Bulletin cried quits—they’d had enough jousting with Sam, sort of:
“At the solicitation of at least 1500 of our subscribers, we will refrain from again entering into a controversy with that beef-eating, blear-eyed, hollow-headed, slab-sided ignoramous—that pilfering reporter, Mark Twain” [The Twainian, Nov.-Dec. 1948 p 4].
August 5 Friday – The following nine local articles in the Call are attributed to Sam:
“Soldier Murdered by a Monomaniac,” “Misfortune Gobbleth the Lovely,” “Gentle Julia, Again,” “Gridley,” “Still Going,” “For Seal Rock and the Cliff House,” “Observing the Day,” “Almost an Item,” and “For Gambling” [Branch, C of Call 293].
August 5 Sunday – From Sam’s notebook: “Everybody cheerful—at daylight saw the Comet in the distance on our lee—it is pleasant in this tremendous solitude to have company.” In persistent solitude, Sam recalled childhood incidents, and jotted down superstitions of his boyhood days. Among these:
Wash face in rain water standing on fresh cow dung to remove freckles.
August 6 Thursday – Another “Mark Twain’s Letter” (dated Aug. 2) ran in the Morning Call. Subheadings: Fire Matters; Agricultural Fair; A Duel Ruined; Theatricals; Territorial Politics; Military Arrest; Washoe Cavalry; Phelan Coming; Steam-Printing in Washoe; Judge Jones Resigned; Carson Races; Mines, Etc.; Building; Foot Race [Camfield, bibliog.; The Twainian, Mar-Apr 1952 p1-2].
August 6 Saturday – The following six local articles in the Call are attributed to Sam: “Another Obscene Picture Knave Captured, etc.,” “The Fitzgerald Inquest,” “Attention, Hackmen,” “Police Drill,” “Judicial Strategy,” and “Arrested for Theft” [Branch, C of Call 293].
August 6 Sunday – S. Browne Jones’ sixth article appeared in the Era [Fatout, MT Speaks 19].
August 6 Monday – From Sam’s notebook: “Lat. 39.54—long. 142.13—Distance 80 miles” [MTNJ 1: 161].
He continued the multi-dated letter to his mother and sister:
“This is rather slow. We still drift, drift, drift along—at intervals a spanking breeze, & then—drift again….There is a ship in sight—the first object we have seen since we left Honolulu” [MTL 1: 352].
August 7 Sunday – The following nine local articles in the Call are attributed to Sam:
“Attempted Suicide,” “The Makee Molasses,” “The People’s Excursion,” “To Be Mended,” “Forfeited Bail,” “Locked Up,” “Row Among the Doctors,” “A Dead Dog Case,” and “Shop Lifting” [Branch, C of Call 293].
August 7 Tuesday – Sam continued the multi-dated letter to his mother and sister he began July 30. He wrote about seeing and identifying the Comet, another ship which had left Honolulu the same day, and which they had spotted for a couple of days. “In the morning she was only a little black peg standing out of the glass sea in the distant horizon—an almost invisible mark in the bright sky. Dead calm. So the ships have stood, all day long—have not moved 100 yards” [MTL 1: 352].
August 8 Wednesday – Sam continued the letter he began July 30.
Afternoon—The calm is no more. There are 3 vessels in sight. It is so sociable to have them hovering about us on this broad waste of waters. It is sunny & pleasant, but blowing hard. Every rag about the ship is spread to the breeze & she is speeding over the sea like a bird. There is a large brig right astern of us with all her canvas set & chasing us at her best [MTL 1: 353].
From Sam’s notebook:
August 9 Tuesday – The following four local articles in the Call are attributed to Sam: “Distinguished Arrivals,” “Assault by a House,” “Escaped,” and “Mysterious” [Branch, C of Call 293].
Mining Excursions, More Feet, Backbreaking Labor – Esmeralda – Aurora
Josh Letters Yielded Offer –Territorial Enterprise Reporter
Goodman, McCarthy, De Quille &The Boys – Petrified Man Hoax
Covering the Territorial Legislature
Busy Reporter & Local Editor – “Mark Twain” & “Unreliable”
Bohemian of the Sagebrush – Lingering in S.F. – Burned out Sam – Mineral Baths
Bloody Massacre – Constitutional Convention – Third House – Artemus
1863 or 1864 – An article (title lost) describing the clergymen in Virginia City appeared in the Enterprise [Schmidt].
Third Territorial Legislature – Jennie Clemens Dead
Miscegenation Firestorm – “Poltroon and a Puppy”
San Francisco City Beat for the Morning Call – Jackass Hill
Mining and Tall Tales, Angels Camp – Jumping Frog
Literary Celebrity – Pistol to the Head
Fitz Smythe & Corrupt Cops – Sandwich Islands –Volcanoes & Captain Cook
Sacramento Union Letters – Anson Burlingame – Hornet Disaster
Hymns on the Smyrniote – “Trouble begins at 8”– First Lecture tour
Virginia City Homecoming – Robbed on the Divide – San Francisco Lectures
Isthmus with Ned Wakeman – Cholera Aboard
December 1 Friday – Sam’s article “How is That?” another poke at Albert Evans, ran in the San Francisco Dramatic Chronicle [ET&S 2: 509].
December 1–3 Thursday – “A Tide of Eloquence” was printed in the Enterprise, and was reprinted in the Golden Era on Dec. 6. Afterwards, Mr.
December 10–31 Sunday – Sam’s item, “A Graceful Compliment,” in which Sam is introduced to the income tax, was probably part of Sam’s regular San Francisco letter. The item ran during this period in the Enterprise [ET&S 2: 388].
December 11 Friday – Sam was voted president of the “Third House” of the legislature, a mock body that met in saloons and burlesqued lawmakers and the process of the legislature. The Third House met at 11 PM. Sam made a speech, the text of which was not recorded [Sanborn 213; Fatout, MT Speaking 648].
Sam’s article “Assassination in Carson” (datelined Dec. 10) ran in the Enterprise [Camfield bibliog.].
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