August 11 Friday – George W. Smalley wrote from Watertown, Mass. having just rec’d Sam’s telegram forwarded from NYC. They hadn’t made plans yet but hoped they might accept his “friendly and kind invitation” though Mrs. S. had been “very ill with bronchitis & fever.” They’d been out of the country [MTP].
David Gray wrote from Buffalo.
August 11 Saturday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Charles Perkins, his attorney, sending Charles T. Parsloe’s address to contact an agent, name not known by Sam [MTLE 2: 130].
Bissell & Co. Hartford bankers & brokers wrote to Sam: “Rec’d your dispatch that you will take $4000 S. Johnson Bonds. We expect them very soon…” [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env “About $4000 bonds / Aug. 77”
August 11–14 Tuesday – Sam went to New York, business unknown, and stayed at the St. James Hotel [MTLE 2: 133].
August 12 Thursday – Sam and Livy attended a lecture on natural history given by Alexander Agassiz. They’d been invited by pastor and writer Thomas Wentworth Higginson [MTL 6: 522].
Thomas W. Higginson wrote to invite Sam and Livy to the Town and Country function on Saturday [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env. “Col. Higginson”
August 12 Saturday – Bill paid to D.S. Brooks & Sons, Hartford dealer in “hot air furnaces, cooking ranges, stoves and tin ware, low down grates and Marbelized slate mantles” $9.65 [MTP].
August 13 Sunday – Louis E. Cooke of The Martino Troupe wrote from Buffalo to send Twain a circular for Yankee Robinson’s lecture tour—could he be induced to write a lecture for him? [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env. “From an ass about ‘Yankee Robinson’ .”
August 14 Monday – Sam wrote from Elmira to Eustace D. Conway, Moncure’s seventeen-year-old son, who evidently had been working for his father and attempting to interest a play promoter named Taylor in producing The Adventures of Tom Sawyer on the stage. Sam agreed, as the story stood it was not dramatizable and explained:
August 14 Tuesday – Frank Fuller wrote to Sam on a long strip of 2& ½” paper, (Warren to Fuller July 20, Aug. 7 & 8 enclosed). “Dear Mark: / I will send you Mr. Warren’s letters & you shall decide. He is able & a miller. Beyond a doubt he can build up a big business & a highly profitable one at Lockport with some small help.” Fuller wanted to send the man $50 followed by more.
August 15 Wednesday – Sam sent a postcard from New York to Augustin Daly, writing that he was:
“this moment leaving for that bourne from whence no traveler returns when sober (Elmira, N.Y.)” [MTLE 2: 131].
Why and when Sam went to New York is not known, but it may have involved business with Daly and the Ah Sin production, or a continued effort to secure a producer for the Simon Wheeler play.
August 16 Monday – In Shirley Village, Mass., William Dean Howells sent Sam proofs on “The Curious Republic of Gondour,” which would run anonymously in the Oct. Atlantic Monthly [MTL 6: 523]. “I like Gondour greatly, and wish we could keep your name,” Howells wrote, “Send me some more accounts of the same country” [MTHL 1: 97].
August 16 Wednesday –James H. Dowland wrote from Chicago, “adding a few words” to Dr. Jackson’s letter about Dowland’s lecture. “He has handed me your reply, and I thank you cordially for the encouragement contained in it.” He asked Sam to give him “a helping hand toward success,” as he’d done with Raymond [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env. “Ass”
August 16 Thursday – Sam wrote Charles E. Perkins on financial matters; letter not extant but referred to in the Aug. 21 reply.
August 17 Friday – Sam wrote to Charles T. Parsloe; letter not extant but referred to in Parsloe’s Aug. 20 reply; evidently Sam asked how Ah Sin was going.
Bissell & Co. wrote to Sam, crediting $372.37 rec’d and billing $4000 for S. Johnson Bonds [MTP].
August 18 Wednesday – David Gray wrote from Buffalo to call Sam “a perfect unadulterated saint,” referring to his recent letters as “long, kind & welcome.” He found Twain’s Mississippi Sketches “delicious.” A long and friendly letter [MTP].
August 18 Friday – Ross R. Winans wrote to Sam; evidently Winans was at Newport when Sam and Livy vacationed there in 1875 and had been witnessed to Sam’s bowling prowess on an impossibly warped single lane with Higginson.
[on Union League Club stationery, Madison ave & 26th St., N.Y.]
My Dear Mr. Clemens,
August – The last of seven installments of “Old Times on the Mississippi” appeared in the Atlantic Monthly.
Sam inscribed a copy of Augustus John Hare’s Walks in Rome (1874): Saml. L. Clemens, Bateman’s Point, Newport, R.I, Aug., 1875. [Gribben 293].
August – Sometime during the month at Quarry Farm, Sam began “A Record of the Small Foolishnesses of Susie & ‘Bay’ Clemens (Infants)”. The document would grow for nine years [MTNJ 2: 365n32]. (See July 1880 entry.)
August 18? Saturday – In Elmira Sam sent Charles Perkins an annotated bank statement concerning S. Johnson bonds valuing $4,003.52 [MTLE 2: 132].
August 19 & 20 Sunday – David Gray from Buffalo visited with Sam and Livy [MTLE 1: 105, 101-2; MTPO notes Aug. 4 to Fairbanks].
August 2 Monday – Sam’s letter of July 29? to Redpath found its way into the Boston Herald, appearing on Monday, Aug. 2 [MTL 6: 530].
August 2 Wednesday – Thomas C. Noble, Jr. wrote from Cumberland Centre, Maine to offer his services as an “old and experienced hand” of a playwright who would “be most happy to give…all the instruction” he needed. He’d been a teacher, and added, “If you do not answer me I shall write you twice a day for the next three months” [MTP]. Note: any answer is not extant.
August 2 Thursday –Sam returned to the Hartford house, probably to wrap up issues connected with security and to check with the police.
In Conanicut, R.I., Howells wrote that the last installment of “Some Rambling Notes” was “first-rate.” Howells had received Sam’s invitation to Ah Sin, but did not go.
August 20 Friday – Julia Ward Howe invited Sam and Livy to a “Blue Tea,” where guests brought a few lines of verse or a paragraph of prose [MTL 6: 522].
August 20 Sunday – From Townsend Harbor, Mass., Howells wrote to Sam, mostly about family matters and fun. He began by asking, however:
“Why don’t you come out with a letter, or speech, or something, for Hayes? I honestly believe that there isn’t another man in the country who could help him so much as you. Do think the matter seriously over” [MTHL 1: 146].
August 20 Monday – Sam wrote a short note from Elmira to Francis D. Clark, declining to attend an invitation for an event of the Society of Pioneers, pleading other engagements. Clark’s invitation had been forwarded from the St. James Hotel in New York [MTLE 2: 133]. Sam also turned down an invitation to the group’s annual banquet back in Jan. 1876 [MTLE 1: 30].