Elmira, Hartford and England: Day By Day

March 5 Thursday – Sam gave the “Roughing It” lecture in Horticultural Hall, Boston [MTPO].

March 6 Friday – Sam returned alone to Hartford, perhaps after luncheon at the Aldrich home. Of the lecture, The Boston Globe:

March 7 Thursday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Redpath & Fall. Sam remitted less than his bill and haggled over the balance for hiring a train to reach an out-of-the-way lecture. In response to ills plaguing the two men, Sam wrote:

March 7 Friday – Sam, in Hartford, telegraphed and also wrote a short note with enclosure to Whitelaw Reid of the New York Tribune. Sam wrote about the convicted murderer William Foster and then changed his mind and asked Reid to “tear this stuff up” [MTL 5: 310-11]. Still, the article was published in the Tribune on Mar. 10.

March 7 Saturday – Howells, Osgood, and the Aldriches left Boston on the train to Springfield, Mass., where Sam and Warner met and accompanied the group to Hartford. Howells and Osgood stayed with the Warners, while the Aldriches stayed with Sam and Livy [MTL 6: 62n1-2].

March 8 to 10 Tuesday – The visit of Howells, Osgood and the Aldriches lasted until Mar. 10.

March 8 Saturday – Budd gives this date for the first printing of Sam’s, “Poor Little Stephen Girard” In Alta California [Collected 1014]. California Digital Newspaper Collection online, however, shows as Mar. 11. [http://cdnc.ucr.edu/cdnc]. Note: previously in error as 1872. Sometimes reprinted as, “Life As I Find It.”

March 9 Monday – Sam inscribed a photograph of himself to Lillian W. Aldrich (Mrs. Thomas Bailey Aldrich): “With regards not to be expressed in their full strength because of the overlooking eye of T.B” [MTL 6: 64]. See insert photo.

May 1 Wednesday – American Publishing Co. issued a royalties statement for the period from Aug. 1, 1871 to Apr. 1, 1872 for RI, enclosing total $10,562.12 and signed by Frank Bliss, who thought it a “splendid showing.” Elisha Bliss was still sick [MTP].

May 1 Thursday – Sam wrote a short note from Hartford to Livy in Elmira. Sam asked if she was well because he’d only had two letters since she left and he figured he’d written fifteen or sixteen [MTL 5: 360]. Sam often exaggerated; Livy had only been gone a week.

Sam signed a receipt dated May 1, 1873:

May 1 Friday – Sam wrote from Elmira to William A. Seaver, a writer for Harper’s (he wrote the “Editor’s Drawer” for the monthly magazine). Sam sent a page from a sketch published without authorization by J.B. Brown of the Galena (Illinois) Gazette.

May 10 Friday – Routledge & Sons received 6,000 copies of Mark Twain’s Sketches from their printers [MTL 5: 73n4].

May 10 Sunday – Sam wrote from Elmira to his mother, Jane Lampton Clemens. Sam confided the dilemma of helping Orion and Mollie rent a chicken farm in Keokuk while at the same time giving them:

“…a lot of advice which none but children ought to need, but which THEY richly need & which will make Mollie rip & tear, no doubt.”

May 11 Thursday – James Florant Meline (1811-1873), author of Two Thousand Miles on Horseback: Santa Fe and Back (1867) wrote from Brooklyn asking for publication help in the form of a letter of introduction to Elisha Bliss [MTP]. Note: not in Gribben.

May 11 Monday – Benjamin P. Shillaber wrote to Sam: “There was a conundrum among politicians—After Grant, what? I am in a position where I must adopt something similar relative to publishing my book—After publishing, what?” He sought Sam’s advice about a publisher, since Shillaber owned the plates [MTP].

May 12 Friday – Frank Bliss wrote to Sam, sending a royalty check for $703.35 [MTP].

May 12 Monday – Sam wrote from Elmira to James Redpath with his sailing date on the Batavia from New York and the possibility of him lecturing next October in “3 or 4 large eastern cities—but nowhere else.” [MTL 5: 364]. Note: Sam would not lecture in the U.S. again until Mar. 1874

May 13 Monday – In Cleveland, Clemens wrote to John Henry Riley, letter not extant but referred to in Riley’s May 16 reply.

May 13 Tuesday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Charles Dudley Warner about taking the 600-page requirement out of the contract with Bliss. Susy had been sick most of the night [MTL 5: 365].

May 14 Sunday – In a bound scrapbook with autographic comments in Sam’s handwriting, dated 1869, there is an entry with this date. The scrapbook calls for “mental” photographic statements and even has a place for an actual photograph, though none is included in the book. Sam answers a series of questions; this is similar to other “surveys” he answered about his favorites and preferences:

May 14 Tuesday – The Clemens family returned to Elmira [MTL 5: 86].

May 14 Thursday – Robert Watt (1837-1894), world traveler, journalist, and author wrote to Sam.

May 15 Monday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Elisha Bliss, acknowledging receipt of $703.35 royalties of some 3,800 sales of IA (Bliss’ letter not extant). The book was going well, and his daily output even exceeded his best on the Innocents book, going over 30 pages of manuscript daily. The inspiration had found Sam and he “couldn’t bear to lose a single moment” of it.

May 15 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Orion and Mollie Clemens.

“The new baby is as fat as butter, & wholly free from infelicities of any kind. She weighed 4 ¼ pounds at birth—weighs about 9 now.”

May 15 Thursday – Sam, Livy, baby Susy, nurse Nellie Bermingham and Clara Spaulding, accompanied by Mrs. Fairbanks, who’d been invited by Mrs. Langdon in April to see the couple off, all left Elmira and traveled to New York.