July 31 Wednesday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam sent a telegram to Miss Dorothy Quick at the Turell Inn, Plainfield, N.J.: “Letter for you at your Inn I sent it several days ago. / S.L. Clemens” [MTP].
Dorothy Quick wrote from the Truell Inn, Plainfield, N.J. to Sam.
July 4 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Painted Shadows”, I’m reading. Mr. Binner [sic Bynner] sat in front of me on the porch this afternoon. Mr. Binner— ……..and………. He came with Mr. Faulkner. The same lovely eyes that I had been remembering. His talk is very, very good, and he called me “The Lion of St. Mark”. I told Mr. Clemens of it when he came in from a Fourth of July punch with Mr. Pearmain, down the trail, and he laughed with a beautiful joy. You remember that singing laugh for days. Mr. Clemens had a pleasant time, and found Col. Higginson’s daughter beautiful.
July 4 Wednesday – In Fairhaven, Mass. Sam inscribed a copy of Eve’s Diary to Mary B. Rogers (Mrs. Harry Rogers, Jr.): “Mrs. Harry Rogers, jr / with the compliments of / The Authoress / & the kind regards of / The Translator. / July 4/06” [MTP].
In the early a.m., Sam returned with H.H. Rogers in the Kanawha to New York instead of going by rail to Dublin, N.H. as earlier planned [July 2 to Clara].
July 4 Thursday – London. Ashcroft’s notes: “Lunched at Sir James Knowles’s; attended the banquet in celebration of Independence Day at the Hotel Cecil” [MTFWE 91].
July 5 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Tonight Mr. Clemens read the work of the day. It is strong, I wonder if it is too strong? But oh the interest of it. He could satisfy those who must be satisfied by only the most highly seasoned, stinging, racy, delicious, unforbidden literature. He could do it. When I think of what must be the thoughts boiling in that marvel of a brain, I’m sick to think that he cannot feed them out to strong men of the earth. The most remarkable things issue from the innocent lips of characters that he draws, and your eyes are opened.
July 5 Thursday – In the afternoon at 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to Charlotte Teller Johnson.
July 5 Friday – Ashcroft’s notes: “Dined with Lord and Lady Portsmouth. Forty or fifty guests; two or three hundred came in afterward” [MTB 1399; MTFWE 108]. Note: Earl and Countess of Portsmouth (Newton and Beatrice Wallop). London’s Daily Telegraph, July 6, p.12, “LONDON DAY BY DAY” reported the event plus what the Countess had called a “small party” when inviting Sam.
July 6 Friday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam replied to Elizabeth Jordan. “I am here for a day, & your note of July 2 has just reached me. I shall be eager to get those first chapters, & shall hope they will inspire me to do the boy” [MTP]. Note: Jordan was ramrodding a collaborative story for Harper’s Bazaar. Clemens was chosen to do the boy chapter. Sam ultimately could not interest his pen in the story.
Isabel Lyon’s journal (in Dublin, N.H.):
July 6 Saturday – Ashcroft’s notes:
July 7 Saturday – N.Y.C.: Sam was spending his days in Rogers’ Standard Oil office or the lawyer’s office, and his nights aboard the Kanawha, which they anchored “about ten miles” out [July 10 to Jean]. Note: Harper’s lawyer and Sam’s lawyer Edward Lauterbach were negotiating to settle the dispute about the “unauthorized” Library of Humor reissue. See July 10 to Lyon.
July 7 Sunday – Ashcroft’s notes:
Called on Lady Langattock and others. Lunched with Sir Norman Lockyer
Except Linley Sambourne, the veteran Punch cartoonist, and Admiral Sir Cyprian Bridge,whom I had known in Australia in ’95, all present were scientists.
July 8 Sunday – Samuel E. Moffett wrote to Sam. “My dear Uncle, / I was in Washington last week, and took advantage of the opportunity to copy off one of those copyright lists.” Moffett included lists of 134 copyrights renewed for 1903 [MTP]. Note: evidently Clemens had requested the lists for his work on the copyright cause.
July 8 Monday – Ashcroft’s notes: “Lunched with Plasmon directors at Bath Club. Dined privately at C.F. Moberly Bell’s” [MTB 1399]. From Sam’s A.D. of Aug. 30, 1907:
July 9 Sunday – In Dublin, N.H. Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers.
If the news is correct, things have turned the other way in Kansas, by direction of Providence,& I wish to congratulate upon this evidence of your continued popularity in that quarter. I wish I had your secret. It isn’t righteousness, for I’ve tried that myself, & there’s nothing in it.
July 9 Monday – NYC: Sam again spent time in lawyers’ offices and at Standard Oil’s office.
July 9 Tuesday – Ashcroft’s notes: “Lunched at the House [of Commons] with Sir Benjamin Stone. Many guests, chief among them Mr. Balfour, and Komura, the Japanese Ambassador, were the other guests of honor. Punch dinner in the evening. Joy Agnew and the cartoon” [MTB 1399; MTFWE 108 combined]. Note: the cartoon (by Bernard Partridge) referred to may be seen in June 25 entry. It is not the inserted one below by W.A. Rogers.
June 1 Thursday – In Dublin, N.H. Sam wrote to William Evarts Benjamin.
I am very glad indeed that the Gardiner spirit is laid to rest at last; & largely because you can get a rest yourself, now; you deserve it, for you have heroically earned it, & may you get it in full measure & enjoy it. Miss Lyon brought your letter to me yesterday afternoon, & was so bursting with laughter that she couldn’t control her jaws long enough to get out an explanation. I joined in, when I struck your next-to-last sentence.
June 1 Friday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:
June 1 Saturday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Will came out today and there was very great music in the afternoon. The piano is down in hall and from my 3rd story I slipped down a flight, I had on a long thin black silk gown that made a little swish, just enough for the King who stood in his underdrawers in the 2nd hall, to hear and make him look up at me with his eyes shining with delight. He had come home from Mary Rogers’s and had gone to bed tired.
June 1 Monday – Sam was the guest of Col. George Brinton Harvey in Deal, N.J. [June 2 to Allen; June 2 to Sturgis].
Henry Hersch Hart wrote from San Francisco, Calif. to ask for Clemens’ autograph on a note [MTP]. Note: IVL: “Answd June 9, ’08 / Would be so glad to but demands are great”
Lucia Hull wrote from Newport, R.I. to thank Sam for his “awfully sweet letter.” She vowed to keep the letter and someday when her grandchildren were in financial straits she would sell it for a fortune [MTP].
June 10 Saturday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Mr. Clemens has introduced a delightful character into the microbe book—“Katherine of Arragon”—She is so sweet and so foolish and so innocent, and so profane and so sympathetic that she’s exactly right. Mr. Clemens is enjoying the writing of the book so much too. He doesn’t know that Katherine is anywhere around when in she pipes with a remark that staggers that dear cholera germ. Oh, it is so interesting, and its positively holy to hear Mr. Clemens read it [MTP TS 64-65].
June 10 Sunday – In the evening in Dublin, N.H. Sam wrote to Charlotte Teller Johnson.
Let me congratulate, let me shout! I wrote you a good deal of a letter to-day, & took a world of pains with it, in the pretty doubtful hope of persuading you to put the work aside a while & not destroy yourself with it, but I have burnt it without a regret for the labor wasted. Charlotte dear, you have come through handsomely, you remarkable creature! Take a good satisfying rest— you deserve it.