November 17 Friday – Sam and Livy joined Joe and Harmony Twichell and Harriet Beecher Stowe at a dinner in honor of George P. Lathrop, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s son-in-law. From Twichell’s journals:
“…pleasure of hearing Mrs. Stowe talk. She was in the mood for it, and struck a reminiscent strain having much to say of the old anti-slavery days. We were conscious of a great reverence toward her” [Andrews 87].
November 17 Saturday – A pink 3×5 receipt to Sam, printed “Stock Account” for a check of $5,000 is in the 1883 MTP financial file.
William Dean Howells wrote: “When I supposed you were coming to us I engaged to take you out to Cambridge this (Saturday) evening to see my play at a friend’s done by children. If you can go, come to 4 Louisburg Square by a quarter to eight, and let me know, anyway”[MTP]. (not in MTHL)
November 17 Monday – Sam and Cable gave a reading in Plainfield, N.J. [MTPO]. He did not read in Elmira as planned.
Sam wrote from Hartford to Orion, who evidently had sent him some poetry and a check. The check was acknowledged and Sam added this about Orion’s poetry:
November 17 Tuesday – Sam wrote from New York City to Livy.
Livy darling, another solid day’s work on proofreading, two hours of it at Mrs. Grant’s house, & the rest at the office…
November 17 Wednesday – In Hartford in the morning, Sam received a letter from Richard Watson Gilder, which led him to write two letters to Charles Webster. In the first letter, Sam begins by referring to Henry Clews, prominent New York banker, who was shopping a book Twenty-Eight Years in Wall Street. Sam had not forgotten being caught short of funds while in Europe during the panic of Sept. 1873.
November 17 Thursday – On or about this day, Sam and Livy went to New York, no doubt at least in part in response to Mary Mason Fairbanks’ inability to visit Hartford. It was often their custom to go late in the week and return on Saturday, as at least for a period, Sam wrote there were no trains on Sunday.
November 17 Saturday – Orion and Mollie Clemens began a letter to Sam & Livy they finished on Nov. 19 (letter enclosed from Dr. J.M. Clemens in Louisville, Ky. & Orion’s Gate City clipping enclosed); Orion reported he’d received books, was reading the Library of Humor, which he was reading part of to Ma. He wrote some details of the house transaction which was not completed; and regrets about the Tennessee Land.
November 17 Monday – Sam wrote to Joe Goodman in Fresno, letter not extant but referred to in Joe’s Nov. 24 [MTP].
S.F. Fleharty wrote two one-page notes to Sam about the “Street car incident” and firing of the conductor in N.Y. “Please don’t visit New York again! Chicago, with the World’s Columbian Exposition and Theo. Thomas in her embrace, yearns for you.”; Fleharty resented the way the N.Y. Tribune had made fun of Sam in the incident (See article Nov. 11) [MTP].
November 18 Tuesday – Sam wrote from Hartford to William (Will) M.
November 18 Thursday – Sam was receipted for $3 subscription to the New York Evening Post. The subscription was for the period Nov.16, 1880 to Nov. 16, 1881. It would be one of Sam’s favorite newspapers [Gribben 503].
Sam purchased a copy of Thomas Malory’s (15th Century) The Boy’s King Arthur from Brown & Gross, Hartford booksellers [448].
November 18 Friday – Charles J. Langdon wrote to advise Sam had a balance of $2,218.76 and Livy had a balance of $20,642.26. “I told George Robinson who called this morning that you were not situated so that you could make the loan—am very sorry that Jean & Susy are under the weather. Mother has improved and is on the road to comfortable health again. We have had three weeks of the most disagreeable weather I ever experienced— In haste…” [MTP].
November 18 Saturday – Sam typed a response from Hartford to Orion, offering a familiar condescending tone about Orion’s latest idea for speculation, a local electric company. Sam was also “full of devilish irritation besides, on account of ….inability to work steadily” and to his satisfaction on LM [MTP].
Sam also inscribed The Stolen White Elephant to Harriet E. Whitmore:
November 18 Sunday – Sam was in Boston and accompanied the Howellses in a social call upon the Aldriches Sam returned to Hartford directly from the Aldriches, after the Howellses left. Howells wrote him on Nov. 19 about being “half dead …from eating & laughing yesterday” [MTHL 1: 448, 450n3].
November 18 Tuesday – Sam and Cable gave a reading in Chickering Hall, New York City. Cardwell calls the houses “well-filled” and that Pond ran the same advertisements leading up to the three New York performances [19]. Included: “King Sollermun,” “Tragic Tale of the Fishwife,” “A Trying Situation,” and “A Ghost Story” [MTPO].
November 18 Wednesday – Sam wrote from New York City to Livy on Western Union form as stationery:
“Livy dear, I suppose I shall leave for Washington at 8 in the morning, arriving at the Ebbitt House there about a quarter before 2 in the afternoon.”
Sam wrote about the dinner the night before, only three courses but “a marvel”—raw oysters, very small, fresh, terrapin stew:
November 18 Thursday – In Hartford Sam wrote to James B. Pond, who was managing the speaking tour of the renowned journalist and explorer, Henry M. Stanley. Pond sought Sam for an introduction of Stanley, presumably in Hartford.
November 18 Friday – Sam was in New York, at the Webster & Co. Office. From his notebook:
Nov. 18 — 9,689.89
November 18 Tuesday – In Hartford Sam mailed a calling card with a mourning border to John Russell Young, congratulating his wife, Rose Fitzpatrick Young (1841-1881) and hoping “that she will always try to deserve her good fortune” [MTP]. Note: Mrs. Young’s achievement is not specified.
November – Sam sent a correspondence card to an unidentified person with this maxim, altering “the great & good Franklin”:
“Never put off till tomorrow what can be put off till day after tomorrow just as well” [MTLE 4: 123].
November to December 15, 1879 – Clemens wrote to unidentified. Cue: “I consider it slander…”; not found at MTP though catalogued as UCCL 13217.
November – An envelope without contents survives that Sam addressed from Hartford to Cornelia Ward Smith (1831-1897), care of the U.S. consul, Mannheim, Germany. Cornelia was the wife of Edward Meigs Smith (1827-1884), U.S. consul, appointed by President Grant in 1876.
November – The Century Magazine for November ran Sam’s sketch, “A Curious Experience,” later part of The Stolen White Elephant [Camfield, bibliog.].
Sam’s notebook includes mention of Canadian naturalist and geologist Henry George Vennor (1840-1884) [MTNJ 2: 407, 411]. Sam joked about Farquhar Martin Tupper and his bromides [408].
November? – A short speech may have been delivered titled, “Mock Oration on the Dead Partisan,” at some private gathering this month. If given, it would have followed the election of Nov. 4 [Fatout, MT Speaking 188-9]. Note: Budd observes, “May never have been delivered” [“Collected” 1021].
November – Sam, in Hartford, inscribed a copy of P&P to Ulysses S. Grant Jr (“Buck”): “To / U.S. Grant, Jr. / from / The Author. / ~ / Nov. ’85” [MTP].
November, early – As evidenced by a notebook entry: (S & I meet the others in Webster’s office at 11.30), General Philip Sheridan signed a contract for Webster & Co., to publish his Personal Memoirs, which would be completed in 1888.
November – This month’s issue of Scribner’s Magazine carried excerpts from the Personal Memoirs of P.H. Sheridan, but without the footnote agreed to the previous August, giving Webster & Co. credit for the work. Sam’s notebook:
Scribner gives us no credit. Why? [MTNJ 3: 429n74].