Elmira, Hartford and England: Day By Day

February 11 Tuesday – Sam returned briefly to Hartford [MTL 5: 295].

February 12 Wednesday – An inch of snow fell on NYC [NOAA.gov].

February 12 Thursday – Dr. John Brown wrote:

February 13 Tuesday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Mary Mason Fairbanks, apologizing for not being able to visit during his “most detestable lecture campaign that ever was—a campaign which was one eternal worry with contriving new lectures & being dissatisfied with them.” Sam liked yanking the chains of his favorite females. “I killed a man this morning.

February 13 Thursday – Sam gave his revised “Sandwich Islands” lecture in The Tabernacle, Jersey City, New Jersey [MTL 5: 295]. The four February lectures were successful; reviews highly complementary.

In Hartford, M. Nott delivered and certified a load of wood had a certain amount of feet [MTP].

February 13 Friday – Sam wrote from Hartford to William E. Baille, a passenger on the Parthia with Sam in January. He’d received a note from fellow passengers: Samuel Morrin who was “home & happy, in Montreal”; and thought that Rev. Mr. Dunn should be in California by this time. Baille evidently invited Sam to lecture somewhere in Canada [MTL 6: 30-1].

February 14 Friday – Sam probably returned to Hartford after his last lecture. Sometime during his New York stays he met up with John McComb, the part owner and editor of the Alta California most responsible for getting Sam the assignment for the Quaker City excursion [MTL 5: 296].

February? 14 Saturday – Sam wrote a short note from Hartford to his sister Pamela Moffett. Sam returned the schoolgirl essay that either Annie or Pamela had written as a schoolgirl [MTL 6: 36].

February 15 Saturday – Sam wrote from Hartford to James Hammond Trumbull, accepting membership in and an invitation to attend the Hartford Monday Evening Club on Feb. 17. According to Sam, Trumbull, a learned and educated man, “could swear in twenty-seven languages” [MTL 5: 297]. Members of the Club included Joseph R. Hawley, and Rev. Nathaniel J.

February 16 Monday – Sam gave a dinner speech at the Wilkie Collins Dinner, at the St. James Hotel in Boston. The Boston Evening Transcript: Feb. 17, 1874:

Mark Twain gave a brief description of his reception in England, saying that he was very successful in the object of his visit there, which was to teach people good morals, and to introduce some of the improvements of the present century [Schmidt].

February 17 Monday – Livy and Sam wrote from Hartford to Livy’s mother, Olivia Lewis Langdon of family matters [MTL 5: 298].

Sam attended a meeting of the Hartford Monday Evening Club, where he heard Congregationalist minister Nathaniel J. Burton read an essay entitled “Individualism” [MTL 5: 297n2].

February 17 Tuesday – In the afternoon, Sam and Rev. Charles Kingsley were “unexpected speakers” at a dinner for the Massachusetts Press Association [MTL 6: 34n1]. Later that evening in the Tremont Temple in Boston, Sam introduced Kingsley, who lectured about Westminster Abbey [Sam’s remarks are published in Fatout, MT Speaking 83].

February 18 Tuesday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Whitelaw Reid, asking him to put a short notice in the Tribune that Sam wouldn’t be lecturing any more that season. Sam claimed it was the Tribune’s fault that he had twenty invitations to lecture in New York City alone [MTL 5: 299-300].

February 18 Wednesday – Sam probably returned to Hartford on this day [MTL 6: 36n1]. He wrote from Hartford to Osborn H. Oldroyd, a Lincoln-items collector who established a museum in the Lincoln home in Springfield in 1883. Oldroyd was a steward at a lunatic asylum and had requested Sam’s autograph. Sam answered, and, though it was clear Oldroyd was not an inmate, but a steward, Sam wrote:

February – Sam’s article “Dollinger the Age[d] Pilot Man” ran in American Publishing Co.’s in-house promotional monthly, American Publisher [Camfield, bibliog.]. See Roughing It, Ch. 51.

February – The first edition of The Humorist carried an article about Mark Twain with the famous picture of him riding a jumping frog and a reprint of “The Jumping Frog” story [eBay item 370253114643 Sept. 9, 2009].

February 19 Monday – Two copies of Roughing It were placed with the Copyright Office, Library of Congress [MTL 5: 45n4; Hirst, “A Note on the Text” Oxford edition, 1996].

February 19 Thursday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Elisha Bliss. Sam enclosed the Feb. 12 from Rufus Hatch, vice president of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, requesting 35 copies of Sam’s books to use on their steamship line. Sam’s facetious reply included:

February 2 Friday – Sam and Livy celebrated their second wedding anniversary.

Bill from Whittlesey & Bliss, grocers, terms net cash, marked paid $19.38 for tubs of butter [MTP].

February 2 Sunday – Sam wrote from the St. Nicholas Hotel in New York to Livy on their third wedding anniversary.

I am keeping the great anniversary in the solitude of the hotel; & not boisterously, for last night’s whirlwind of excitement has swept all the spirit out of me & I am as dull & lifeless as if I had just waked out of a long, stupefying sleep.

February 20 Thursday – M. Nott delivered and certified a load of wood had a certain amount of feet [MTP].

February 20 Friday – In Hartford, Sam wrote a short note to James Redpath about the arrival of Charles Kingsley and his daughter, Rose Georgiana Kinglsey (b. 1845).

“Dear Redpath: / Mr & Miss Kingsley are coming to visit us as soon as lecturing will permit. Tell me how soon they can come. We want them” [MTP, drop-in letters].

February 21 Wednesday – Sam lectured in Opera House, Danbury, Conn. – “Roughing It.” He probably stayed the night and returned to Hartford the next day [MTL 5: 46].

February 23 Friday – James Redpath was in Hartford at the Allyn House and Sam sent him a note. They probably had breakfast together. By noon Sam had left for New York City [MTL 5: 47n1].

February 23 Monday – Sam sent two short notes from Hartford to James Redpath about “floating” the fact that Sam had refused an offer of $25,000 for 30 lectures, as a way of puffing the upcoming Boston lecture [MTL 6: 43].