November 10 Saturday – Frederick E. Church wrote from Hudson, N.Y. to Sam enclosing a bag of Colima Mexican coffee that Livy complimented when they were guests of the Church’s in June 1887. Church offered to send future orders for “the genuine berry” to a friend in Mexico [MTNJ 3: 489n27; MTP].
Frederick J. Hall for Webster & Co. wrote to Sam.
November 10 Sunday – In Hartford Sam wrote to his niece, eighteen-year-old Julia Langdon (daughter of Charles J. Langdon) now in Geneva, Switzerland with her family.
Thank you ever so much for your stirring letter from Paris, & the vivid glimpse you gave us of our mightily — prized & gratefully remembered guide, Joseph Very….
November 10 Monday – MTNJ 3: 592n69 shows Sam’s Nov. 8 letter also running in the New York World.
Charles J. Langdon wrote to Sam (Webster & Co. to Langdon Nov. 8 encl.):
Enclosed I send you draft on New York for $10,000 which mother proposes to make as a loan to Livy. I also enclose a note for Livy to sign and return for the same. I have made the rate of interest 4% that is what mother kindly charges me for some funds of hers that I have. But I trust Livy will make Chas. L. Webster & Co. pay her 6% for the same [MTP].
November 11 Tuesday – Sam wrote two letters from the Palmer House in Chicago to Livy. The first letter recounted activities of the prior day (Nov. 10). The second letter told of meeting…
“…an elderly German gentleman named Raster, who said his wife owed her life to me—hurt in the Chicago fire & lay menaced with death a long time, but the Innocents Abroad kept her mind in a cheerful attitude.”
November 11 Thursday – J.J. & T. Goodwin, Hartford, billed $28.87 for 2,300 lbs of hay & weighing; paid Mar. 10, 1881 [MTP].
November 11 Friday – In Hartford. Sam wrote to Andrew Chatto answering his note and the English copy of P&P sent. Sam liked the paper and print, but thought the U.S. engravings came “out a little cleaner than yours do.” Sam thanked them for “making that continental arrangement” for him:
November 11 Saturday –Sam typed a note from Hartford to George W. Cable, thanking him for the books that came. Sam was “infinitely obliged” [MTP].
“Please send me a New Orleans directory of this or last year. I do not know the price but inclose five dollars at random” [Gribben 652].
Sam also wrote to Charles Webster:
November 11 Sunday – The New York Times ran this article:
MARK TWAIN ON COPYRIGHT LAW.
November 11 Tuesday – Sam and Cable gave a reading in Huntington Hall, Lowell, Mass. Clemens included “Toast to Babies,” and “Encounter with an Interviewer” [MTPO].
November 11 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Frank Fuller, advising him not to pay Literary Life a cent to advertise for him. Sam wrote he’d “dropped that scheme I wrote you about” (on Sept. 26.) realizing it would take all the time from an “idle man.”
November 11 Thursday – Sam read the first three chapters of his work-in-progress, which would become CY, at the Military Service Institution, Governors Island, New York: “Yankee Smith of Camelot” Published in Mark Twain Speaking, p.211-13.
November 11 Friday – From MTNJ 3: 346n145:
November 11 Monday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Dan Beard, thrilled about the illustrations for CY.
Hold me under permanent obligations. What luck it was to find you!…it was a fortunate hour that I went netting for lightning-bugs & caught a meteor [MTP].
Frederick J. Hall wrote that completed sheets of CY would be done by Friday, Nov. 15 [MTLTP 258n2].
November 11 Tuesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Frederick J. Hall that his mother-in-law, Olivia Lewis Langdon, had agreed to loan $10,000 for one year at six percent. He asked Hall to send her the firm’s note. After his signature Sam clarified, “(Her mother lends it to her)” [MTP].
Joseph Hatton wrote from N.Y. to Sam: “My lawyer in London is in negotiation with Mrs Berringer for the acting rights to Prince & P. in England. I suppose there is no doubt that she has your rights for England?” Sam wrote on the envelope, “Joseph Hatton (will answer him)” [MTP].
November 12 Wednesday – Sam was on the stage at Haverly’s Theatre in Chicago. Fatout’s description of the scene where Sam offered impromptu remarks:
November 12 Friday – Theodore L. Pilger, Hartford merchant for Burlington letter files, billed Sam for ten letter files @ .50 = $5 [MTNJ 2: 377; MTP 1880 financials].
November 12 Saturday – On Nov. 14 Sam’s notebook entry said he’d spoken in bed “in morning of Nov. 12” of Louise Messina (identity not established—see Nov. 14 entry) [MTNJ 2: 402].
November 12 Sunday – Edward M. Bunce for Phoenix National Bank wrote advising a credit from Chatto for $1,442.87 had been made [MTP].
Mary Keily wrote another “lunatic” letter from Penn. [MTP].
November 12 Monday – In Hartford, Sam typed a note to Andrew Chatto, acknowledging receipt of “904 pounds, 7 shillings and 11 pence.” He expected to talk contracts on the new book (HF?) in about a month, and accepted their word on pricing their edition of TA [MTP].
November 12 Wednesday – Sam and Cable gave a reading in Rumford Hall, Waltham, Mass. [MTPO].
Sam wrote from Lowell, Mass. to Livy:
November 12 Thursday – Sam wrote from Hartford to James Fraser Glück, a Buffalo lawyer and rare book collector, who had written asking Sam to donate the original manuscript of Huck Finn to the Buffalo Library [MTP]. Note: this is the half that survived and was re-discovered in early 1991.
November 12 Friday – In the morning, Sam called on General James B. Fry, Mrs. Julia Grant, and William Mackay Laffan. He then met his mother-in-law, Olivia Lewis Langdon and returned with her to Hartford, where she spent the winter with the family [MTNJ 3: 264n125]. In his notebook is a reminder to: “Get spectacles,” and to meet with the above, then “Receive mother” at the hotel, “12.15. Friday.”
November 12 Monday – In Hartford Sam wrote two letters to Frederick J. Hall, the first a confidential treatment about Arthur H. Wright’s recent visit (date not found) to Hartford and their conversation. Sam wasn’t going to advise Hall what to do with Wright, saying only that if Wright was valuable in the subscription department to use him there.
November 12 Tuesday – Sam went to Boston and gave a dinner speech at the Press Club [Fatout, MT Speaking 659].
November 12 Wednesday – Robert Underwood Johnson for Am. Copyright League wrote to notify Sam that in the League’s Nov. 11 meeting Sam was elected a member of the Council of the League. Sam wrote on the env, “Brer, acknowledge this & receipt it for me / SLC” [MTP].