Hartford House: Day By Day

November 24 Tuesday – William Dean Howells wrote again to Sam, adding, “The only thing I’m doubtful of is the night watchman’s story” (in the first installment of “Old Times on the Mississippi”). “…seems made-up, on your part” [MTHL 1: 43].

November 24 Friday – Sam gave a reading in Providence, R. I., and then returned home to Hartford. The reading was similar to his Nov. 13 performance in Brooklyn. Sam and Livy entertained Charles and Susan Warner for dinner. Joe and Harmony Twichell dropped by [Schmidt; MTLE 1: 144].

November 25 Wednesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Howells, responding to the editor’s “amendment” to his “pilot days” installment sent on Nov. 24 [MTHL 1: 43-4]. Sam, reading over the proofs, objected to the poor hyphenating done at the ends of lines. He also felt he shouldn’t appear in print too often. “…newspapers soon get to lying in wait for me to blackguard me.

November 25 Saturday – In the evening Sam and Livy dined with Charles and Susan Warner. The Twichells “dropped in” as well. Sam read Winny Howells’ letter and poem, “and they were received with great & honest applause” [Nov. 26 to Howells].

November 26 Sunday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Howells while the rest of the family went to church, even Fanny Hesse, his personal secretary (Charles Dudley Warner’s sister-in-law). The letter touches a half-dozen topics, from Dean Sage trying to persuade Twichell to travel in Europe with him, to a sideboard Livy wanted, to Sam’s impulse shopping at D.P.

November 26 Monday – Eighteen year old William (“Will”) M. Clemens (1860-1931) wrote to Sam, the first of over a dozen he would write by 1909.

To “That Uncle of mine”

Dear Mark; / I have just finished the “Gilded age,” for the second time, and I am determined to write you, not, for the sake of the book but to form an acquaintance with yourself.

      I am a young man of 18, or a boy in his teens, just as you like it.

November 27 Friday – Livy’s 29th birthday.

Phineas T. Barnum wrote from Bridgeport to advise he would send what begging letters he had laid aside, though he felt “some will be of no use to you probably” [MTP].

November 27 Saturday – On Livy’s 30th birthday, Sam wrote her a love letter, although both were home in Hartford.

November 27 Monday – Livy’s 31st birthday. Sam gave her a copy of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s (1772-1834) The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (1876): “To Livy L. Clemens / Nov. 27, 1876. / From S. L. Clemens” [Gribben 152].

November 27 Tuesday – Livy’s 32nd birthday. Sam gave her Pottery and Porcelain of All Times and Nations (1878) by William Cowper Prime (1825-1905). Sam inscribed it: “Livy Clemens from S.L.C./ November 27, 1877/ Hartford” [Gribben 560].

November 28 Tuesday – In London, Moncure Conway wrote to Sam:

“Chatto writes in some anxiety about your new book on the North Pole. I told him you would naturally let him have it. He has done admirably by Tom Sawyer; we shall soon send you the money for 2000…” [MTPO Notes with Dec. 13 to Conway]. Note: the “North Pole” book was a rumor published on Nov. 25 in the London Athenæum .

November 29 Sunday – Sam’s sketch, “Sociable Jimmy,” written from his letter home in 1872 was printed in the New York Times [MTL 5: 20n6; Fatout, MT Speaks 88]. An excerpt:

November 29 Wednesday – Sam, upset that he had not received a response from De Quille, wrote from Hartford:

November 29 Thursday – An unidentified “young girl” sent Clemens a poem aiming at his soul: “I gave my life for thee, / My precious blood I shed, / That thou might’st ransomed be, / and quickened from the dead; / I gave my life for thee; / What hast thou done for me?” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env “From a young girl whom I do not know, but who has been trying for 7 years to save me—ever since she was 14”

November 3 Tuesday – Sam was back in Hartford, and wrote to the editor of the Hartford Evening Post, H.T. Sperry. The paper had printed an article “The Drama of the Gilded Age,” which Sam wrote was an erroneous history of the play. Sam corrected the record and the suggestion that he had misused Gilbert Densmore [MTL 6: 267-73].

November 30 Monday – Sam’s 39th birthday. Livy presented Sam with a copy of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s The Hanging of the Crane (1875), signing her name and the date and Sam’s name [Butterfield auction catalog, July 16, 1997, p. 25 item # 2680].

November 30 Tuesday – Sam’s 40th birthday.

November 30 Thursday – Sam’s 41st birthday was also Thanksgiving Day. From Twichell’s journal:

“Called on M.T.’s and found Bret Harte there again (He and M. are writing a play together) and had some talk with him” [Yale 126].

November 30 Friday – Sam’s 42nd birthday.

November 3? Wednesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Oliver Wendell Holmes, sending an inscribed cloth copy of Sketches, New and Old. Sam wrote: “The author of this book will take it as a real compliment if Mr Holmes will allow it to lumber one of his shelves” [MTL 6: 580]. Note: Holmes wrote thanks on Nov. 4.

November 4 Wednesday – Congressional elections saw Democrats taking control of the House of Representatives. At this time Hartford and Sam were staunch Republicans.

Augustin Daly wrote Sam thanks for the referral for play collaboration to Howells, who wanted to dramatize A Foregone Conclusion [MTP].

November 4 Thursday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Howells that they’d had a “royal good time” on their visit. Sam related how once back in Hartford, he’d “caught it” from Livy, for several social faux pas, including “personating that drunken Col. James,” (unidentified.) Sam claimed Livy ran into George, the butler, in the hall and took it out on him [MTL 6: 581].

November 4 Saturday – Moncure Conway wrote from London to Sam.

November 5 Thursday – Sam referred to an unidentified correspondent who sought his biography to “Allibone’s Dictionary of Authors” [Gribben 21].

November 5 Friday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Elisha Bliss with several requests. Sam approved of True Williams receiving the manuscript to draw the pictures for The Adventures of Tom Sawyer as he had done for Innocents and Sketches, New and Old. Howells had been given a security copy.