July 31, 1905 Monday
July 31 Monday – In Dublin, N.H. Isabel V. Lyon replied for Sam to M.H. Crandall.

“M . Clemens directs me to write for him and say that he has so many calls upon his purse, for one cause or another, that he must decline your invitation to endow a scholarship in your university” [MTP]. Note: the university in question was Alfred University. See below entry from Crandall.

M.H. Crandall wrote on Alfred University, Alfred, NY to ask Sam to endown a “Mark Twain Scholarship” for $1,000 [MTP].
August 1, 1905 Tuesday
August 1 Tuesday – H.H. Rogers wrote to Sam about the thankful letters from Joe and Harmony Twichell: “The letters are lovely. Don’t breathe. They are so happy! It would be a crime to let them think that you have in any-way deceived them. I can keep still. You must”[MTHHR 594-5].

Isabel Lyon’s journal:
August 2, 1905 Wednesday

August 2 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “I walked with Miss Greene up to the top of Oak Hill” [MTP TS 83].

Helena Gilder wrote from “Four Brooks Farm,” Tyringham, Mass. to Sam, expressing it “a great pleasure to have Clara and find her like her old sweet self.” She was glad Sam and Jean liked Dublin. Her handwriting is somewhat inscrutable [MTP].

August 3, 1905 Thursday
August 3 Thursday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:

Hock! Hock! dear Abott H. Thayer! Jean asked him to dine here tomorrow night with Mr. and Mrs. Pumpelly, but he said he couldn’t! He said it was so lovely to see Mr. Clemens all alone, and to hear him talk when there weren’t others around, that—Oh, he couldn’t—And that is only the borderland of it all, for if it is better to hear Mr. Clemens without an audience, then how best it is to just be near him in his beautiful silences [MTP TS 84].
August 4, 1905 Friday

August 4 Friday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:

August 5, 1905 Saturday
August 5 Saturday – In Dublin, N.H. Sam responded to Roi Cooper Megrue’s request of Aug. 3.

I have your favor of Aug. the 3rd in which I understand Miss Marbury to suggest that I give Mr. Timmory an extension of one year on his contracts with me; also that I grant Mr. Timmory free choice of theatre. I beg you to say to Miss Marbury I am quite willing that she shall make these concessions for me [MTP]. Note: Gabriel Timmory, French playwright.
August 6, 1905 Sunday
August 6 Sunday – In Dublin, N.H. Isabel V. Lyon wrote for Sam to Frederick A. Duneka.

M . Clemens directs me to say that upon thinking over the matter of auto-graphing any of the maxim postcards he has decided that to auto-graph any of them would be a distinct mistake. He is inclined to be afraid of the post card scheme even without the auto-graph, and wishes me to ask what you think of it. But don’t throw the scheme away, for M . Clemens thinks it may be a good one after he’s dead. That is Mr. Clemens’s language not mine [MTP].
August 7, 1905 Monday
August 7 Monday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Today Mrs. Thayer sent up some very beautiful pink poppies. Delicate, exquisite, each one a darling delight” [MTP TS 84].

Winifred Holt wrote from NYC to Sam. “Helen Keller has written an interesting article which may show you more clearly why I am brave enough to write to you again—I forward under separate cover what she has just written in the “World’s Work” [MTP].
August 8, 1905 Tuesday

August 8 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “The fallow days are still with Mr. Clemens. All day he has been very, very tired and resting. At dinner tonight the talk was of Babylon and its great, great glories” [MTP TS 84].

Frederick T. Leigh wrote to Sam that Duneka was on vacation and Sam’s post-card scheme, according to Sam’s wishes, would be “dropped for the present” [MTP].

August 9, 1905 Wednesday
August 9 Wednesday – In Dublin, N.H. Isabel V. Lyon wrote for Sam to Frederick A. Duneka.

M . Clemens directs me to write and say that his idea of publishing the Adam’s and Eve’s Diaries, is to have them go into one volume—using the corrected form of the Adam’s Diary .
August 10, 1905 Thursday
August 10 Thursday – Sam left Dublin for Boston and Norfolk, Conn. to visit daughter Clara. F. Kaplan adds he stopped over in Hartford. No further record of the stop was found [622].

Isabel Lyon’s journal:

Mr. Clemens went away today. Norfolk, Conn, to see Clara. It is hot and I have just discovered that the train between here and Boston stops at ever so many stations, or I’m afraid it does, and Mr. Clemens dreads, hates and remembers with horror a railway journey.
August 12, 1905 Saturday
August 12 Saturday – In Norfolk, Conn. Sam was ailing from gout [NY Times, Aug. 20, p.7, “Mark Twain Ill of Gout”] Note: Source puts onset of attack to this day.
August 13, 1905 Sunday
August 13 Sunday – Sam was in Norfolk, Conn. ailing from gout [Aug. 14 to Rogers].

In Dublin, N.H. Isabel Lyon’s Journal: “Jean has been droopy and sad all day. We took a rug and some books and went up into the woods, and I read a delightful article on Carlyle and Newman. Tonight Jean is dining with Mr. and Mrs. Sumner” [MTP TS 88].

Albert R. Halley wrote from Nashville, Tenn. to ask Sam if he would write an introduction for Halley’s book A History of the Divine Comedy [MTP]. Note: not in Gribben.
August 14, 1905 Monday
August 14 Monday – In Dublin, N.H. Isabel V. Lyon wrote for Sam to Roi Cooper Megrue. Lyon noted that Sam was out of town but that in June he wrote M. Worth Colwell, referring him to Elisabeth Marbury—whatever arrangements she made would satisfy him [MTP].

Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Choisey [her home in Conn.] is rented to Mr. Bushnell, $20 a month. There seems a chance for me to begin to get financially square with the world. Oh, world” [MTP TS 88]. Isabel Lyon’s journal # 2: “Today word came that Mr. Clemens has gout” [MTP TS 25].
August 15, 1905 Tuesday
August 15 Tuesday – In Norfolk, Conn. Sam wrote to Richard Watson Gilder.

I can say only a word. You & Johnson are the only organizers I am acquainted with: won’t you get up a Jerome petition & have all our fellow craftsmen sign it, & add “Mark Twain” to the list —in a large & legible hand?

Love to you all.
August 16, 1905 Wednesday
August 16 Wednesday – In Norfolk, Conn. Sam wrote to Isabel V. Lyon.

I go to Fairhaven to-morrow for a day or two. Please look at Kipling’s account of his visit to me at Susy Crane’s farm, & see if Mrs. Clemens as well as Susy Clemens was present. Mrs. Laura M. Dake has not yet written. Suppose you telephone the bank & ask if that check has been collected.
August 17, 1905 Thursday
August 17 Thursday – In Norfolk, Conn. Sam started a letter marked Private to Joe Twichell that he finished on Feb. 19:
August 18, 1905 Friday

August 18 Friday – Ralph W. Ashcroft wrote on Koy-Lo Co. letterhead to Sam, giving him an update on the lawsuit involving the Plasmon Co. of America, and asking for an additional $150 to pay attorney Baldwin for increased legal fees to contest an appeal by their opponents [MTP]. Note: Ashcroft was Secretary and Treasurer of the Co. at this time, which is how he met Sam. He would later become Sam’s secretary and accompany him to London in 1907. Sam was still in Norfolk, Conn. On or about Aug. 31 he would direct Isabel Lyon to send the $150. See entries: Dec. 1901, Mar.

August 19, 1905 Saturday
August 19 Saturday – In Norfolk, Conn. Sam finished his Aug. 17 to Joe Twichell:

P.S. 19th. Your letter arrived from Dublin yesterday evening. It gave me great pleasure, although it was a breach of the prohibition.

I am still in bed—it is the sixth day, but seems the 40th—& there is no immediate prospect of my getting on my feet. However, “prospects” go for nothing in gout, I may be on my feet in three days.
August 20, 1905 Sunday

August 20 Sunday – In Norfolk, Conn. Sam began a letter to Isabel V. Lyon that he added a PS to on Aug. 21, this about the rent payment needed by Renwick on 21 Fifth Ave., since a new heating system had been installed. “If you need money, get it of Miss Harrison. Send Renwick the money, & a word hoping he is well” [MTP].

August 21, 1905 Monday
August 21 Monday – In Norfolk, Conn. Sam added a PS to his Aug. 20 to Isabel V. Lyon. They must have mailed it back and forth between Norfolk and Dublin: Monday, Aug. 21. / P.S. I expect to be able to leave for New York next Thursday or Friday; thence to Fairhaven for a day or two. But I am still in bed. [in IVL’s hand:] The amount of the check to M . Renwick is $875 . Rent for June, July & August. 01 [in SLC’s hand:]Yes, that is my idea of it [MTP].

Sam also wrote to George B. Harvey.
August 22, 1905 Tuesday
August 22 Tuesday – Sam left Boston and returned to Dublin, N.H. [Aug. 21 to Rogers].

Isabel Lyon’s journal: “The children had a frantic game of ‘Wooly, Wooly Wolf,’ and stayed for dinner” [MTP TS 89]. Isabel Lyon’s journal # 2: “Today Dr. Henderson & Mr. Stewart [Stuart] Montgomery rode over from Chesham to call on Mr. Clemens” [MTP TS 26]. Note: Ernest Flagg Henderson (1860-1928), historian.
August 23, 1905 Wednesday
August 23 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:
August 24, 1905 Thursday

August 24 Thursday – Richard McCloud, attorney in Durango, Colo. wrote to Sam about a pamphlet never published which was to have contained a letter by Sam published in the Mar. 18, 1876 Hartford Courant and later in one of Sam’s books—could he say where he might find it? [MTP]. Note: written by ? in pencil at the top “Vol. 20 of Hillcrest Edition p.438”

August 25, 1905 Friday

August 25 Friday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:

Dear Col. Higginson walked up this afternoon and had a cup of tea with me. He really came to inquire about Jean’s accident. So that is how I’ve learned about it. He talked of Mr. Clemens of course, and said that the description of the feud in Huckleberry Finn is one of the finest things in literature. He always feels that he has known those people. …I sat in my own room over my tea when I saw him coming slowly up the road. I was reading his essay on Bronson Alcott, as he came into view. … [MTP TS 90].

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