April 12 Friday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Here I am missing the sweetest of all sweet chroniclings—the daily life of the King. But I have been so busy, for there is this house to look after, and the Tuxedo house to think of and plan for, and the Redding house to be after too, and Santa to love and be with when she was here and do for, and Jean to be anxious over and to help if I can and her doctors to see, and the King’s social life to look after—for in these days he is very lonely and reaches out for people—and people he must have, so now I’m planning parties for him.
21 Fifth Ave - Day By Day
April 13 Saturday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: My hands are full and my outlet for superfluous emotions just now is my Boyagians and their “something junk”. They have thrown at me such delightful things. A marvel of a huge strange old candlestick for 50¢. Mother and I have sat around it and wondered what it’s history must be.
Mr. and Mrs. Twichell arrived and I’m so tired—so tired. They are nice and dear, but killingly hard to entertain, for Mr. Twichell’s deafness is increasing [MTP TS 52].
April 14 Sunday – With William Dean Howells and Daniel Frohman and 800 children, Sam attended a matinee performance of P&P by The Educational Alliance, Children’s Theatre, N.Y.C. and gave a curtain speech. The New York Times, p.9, “Mark Twain Tells of Being an Actor” reported:
MARK TWAIN TELLS OF BEING AN ACTOR
He Sees His Own “The Prince and the Pauper,” and Relates Story of 22 Years Ago.
——— ——— ———
STAGE SPEECH CUT SHORT
He Managed to Narrate, However,
April 15 Monday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Twichells go” [MTP TS 53].
Frederick D. Evans wrote from Fort McDowell, Calif. to Sam being bothered by a statement Sam made in “Concerning the Jews”some four years before, he thought in Harper’s Magazine. “That you had no prejudice against any nationality—save one. / What is that one?” [MTP]. Note: Lyon wrote on the letter: “Quote the paragraph / no recollection / explain it if he can”
April 16 Tuesday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam gave instructions to Lyon for reply to Mark G. McElhinney’s Apr. 3. “Thank him for his letter & say that by & by when his philosophy is printed he will send him a confidential copy” [MTP].
Sam also replied by writing on Dr. Edward Anthondy Spitzka’s Apr. 10. “Well, I read the other one, & got some thing out of it for the C. S. book. Glad to have it. Life’s getting a little dull lately, & nothing excites me like the encephalic” [MTP].
April 17 Wednesday – Sam’s A.D. of one year later noted the anniversary: “a fortunate day, a golden day, and my heart has never been empty of grandchildren since.” Cooley writes:
April 18 Thursday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam replied on Frank T. Searight’s Apr. 12 letter: “never make another land voyage that can be avoided either honorably or otherwise” [MTP].
At 8:15 p.m. Clara Clemens gave a performance in Fredonia, N.Y. The Fredonia Censor advertised her upcoming concert and on Apr. 24 reviewed it:
April 19 Friday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: We’re just starting for Hartford. It is snowing and the King who is lathering his face for a shave suggests that I get Mrs. Whitmore on the telephone and tell her that he “may be a little late in arriving for he has mislaid one of his snowshoes.” And then such a chuckle of delight he gives as he swabs his face and I go spinning up to the telephone. I wouldn’t dampen one joke of the King’s for worlds, except where Mrs. Rogers is concerned, for she can’t be joked with over a telephone. Dinner tonight at Mrs.
April 20 Saturday – Sam was in Hartford and met with the ladies who were first members of his Saturday Morning Club 30 years before. He wrote of the good time in a letter to Jean on Apr. 22.
Athenaeum printed an anonymous review of CS, p.466-8. Tenney: “Mostly summary; favorable, calls MT ‘one of the sanest, least prejudiced of men’ [43].
Clemens A.D. for this day is listed by MTP as “Imaginary Interview with the President.”
April 21 Sunday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “We left Hartford this morning, came to the station in Billy Whitmore’s mobile, and then as we couldn’t get a parlor car, we sat in the ordinary coach and the King talked every moment” [MTP TS 53].
Lillie d’Angelo Bergh wrote for Woman’s Press Club of NYC to ask Sam “some opinions” in a letter she enclosed (not in file) [MTP].
April 22 Monday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam inscribed a copy of JA to Dorothy Butes: “To Dorothy—/ with the affectionate regards of / The Author. On the whole it is better to deserve honors & not have them, thatn have them & not deserve them. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain/ April 22/07 [MTP].
Sam also wrote to daughter Jean in Katonah, N.Y.
April 23 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “The King has new and gaudy maxim: “Prostitution is the thief of time” [MTP TS 53].
Edith Elsie Baker for the Actors’ Fund of America wrote to “gratefully acknowledge Sam’s $10 donation and 3 volumes of HF for their fair [MTP].
April 24 Wednesday – In N.Y.C. Isabel V. Lyon replied for Sam to Mrs. Arthur J. Tenney’s Apr. 22. “Thanks for photo is so overdriven in these days if the enclosed is of use glad to enclose it” [MTP].
Sam also dictated a reply to the Apr. 7 from Benjamin R. Tucker, but his response is on the back of Tucker’s letter in Josephine Hobby’s shorthand, and is undecipherable [Gribben 662].
April 25 Thursday – Sam was on the Kanawha bound for Jamestown, Va. According to Lyon’s journal entry below, he sent a telegram upon arrival—if 17 hours from 1:30 p.m. Apr. 24, the arrival was approx. . 7 a.m.
Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Telegram that the King had swift good passage. 17 hours” [MTP TS 54]. Note. telegram not extant.
A.K. Wright, Minister, Church of Christ, San Jacinto, Calif. wrote to Sam, enclosing a newspaper clipping of his poem, “The Desert” [MTP].
April 26 Friday – Sam was in Old Point Comfort, Va. In his May 2 to Clara, Sam wrote of the first day that it was “sunny and bright.” After that the fog rolled in.
“But the first day was very gay, & really paid for the excursion. I blundered into the Virginia building, thinking it was the Maryland one; but it was all right: the Governor was holding a reception & I took it off his hands. It gave him a rest & he was thankful. I knew him & his wife before.”
April 27 Saturday – Sam was in the Fort Monroe, Va. area after seeing the Jamestown Exposition, having a “foggy & gashly time!” In his May 2 to Clara he wrote that after the first day:
April 28 Sunday – Sam was in the Fort Monroe, Va. area.
Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Mrs. Baker came—stricken. Thompson came—pastels. I’m not well” [MTP TS 54].
Dorothy Butes wrote from the Hotel Majestic (NY?) to thank Sam for his “lovely book” JA. She’d been “chuckling over CS and his criticism of Mrs. Eddy’s English.” She offered an anecdote from her Latin class about a classmate, Lorraine, who she described as “about a hundred and sixy pounds, who tries to be kittenish” [MTP].
April 29 Monday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “No news from the King, and I’m down with something. Pains almost unendurable and a temperature” [MTP TS 54-55].
In Fort Monroe, Va., Sam telegraphed Isabel Lyon: “Delayed indefinitely by fog. Clemens” [MTP]. Note: Lyon mentions this the following day.
H.H. Rogers and son Harry Rogers left the Kanawha and returned to N.Y. by rail [NY Times May 4, p.1, “Twain and Yacht Disappear at Sea”].
April 30 Tuesday – On the yacht Kanawha in Old Point Comfort, Virginia, Sam wrote to Frederick A. Duneka asking him to send a green cloth set of his books to H.H. Rogers to the yacht at the N.Y.C. pier, foot of E. 23 [MTP]. Note: the NY Times article of May 4, p.1, included a bit about this day:
May – Edward A. Kimball’s article, “Mark Twain, Mrs. Eddy, and Christian Science,” ran in Cosmopolitan, p. 35-41. Tenney: “A reply to MT’s Christian Science by ‘a prominent Christian Science author’” [44].
May 1 Wednesday – At 4 a.m. the Kanawha got underway back to New York through the clearing fog [Baltimore Sun May 10, “Mark Twain in Clover” p.14]. Note: because the yacht could not be seen leaving from shore, it was thought for a day or more that it was lost at sea.
May 2 Thursday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to Edith Elsie Baker about the Actors’ Fund Fair flap:
I am back from the South, & find your letter which has given me deep & unqualified pleasure.
May 3 Friday – In London Whitelaw Reid sent a momentous cable to Sam in care of Harper & Brothers, N.Y. It was received in New York at 2:40 p.m.
May 4 Saturday – Sam moved into the William Voss house in Tuxedo Park, N.Y. [Hill 166]; his lease had begun on May 1. He gave a talk or a reading at a tea for the Tuxedo Club in his honor. He had forecasted the event in his Apr. 22 to Jean. Fatout lists the talk but gives no particulars [MT Speaking 676]. Note: see May 5 NYT article. Lyon’s entry below reveals the tea was held at Mrs. Harry Rogers’ house in Tuxedo.
May 5 Sunday – The NY Times included a telegram supposedly sent on May 4 by Sam to Milton Goodkind in a spoof article about Sam being lost at sea:
MARK TWAIN INVESTIGATING,
———
And If the Report That He’s Lost at Sea is So, He’ll Let the Public Know.