Home at Hartford: Day By Day

February 17 Friday – A.A. Vantine & Co., New York, billed Livy $29.75 for “1 set tea toys[?], 2 trays, 5 boxes magic flowers”; paid same day [MTP]. Note: This purchase by Livy and the Feb. 18 Times notation (see entry) support the idea that Sam and Livy made another trip to New York sometime after Feb. 12, (at least by the Feb. 14 purchase of glass case) and returned by Feb. 19.

February 17 Sunday – Sam wrote from Hartford to Augustin Daly. Would Daly consider producing Sam’s dramatization of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer? [MTNJ 3: 46n106]. Sam may have left in the evening for New York.

February 17 Tuesday – Sam and Cable gave a reading in Opera House, Ottawa, Canada.

Sam wrote from Brockville, Canada to Charles Webster. Sam still had not heard if Osgood had sent a statement for the account.

February 17 Wednesday – Alfred P. Burbank (1846-1894) wrote on Lotos Club stationery to Sam seeking permission to perform the Sellers as Scientist play written with Howells. Burbank was a professional elocutionist described as “tall, lithe, slender, and naturally inclined to action” [Proceedings by National Speech Art Assoc., 1893 p.208; MTLTP 197n1]. See Mar. 19 to Webster for Sam’s answer.

February 17 Thursday – George J. Magee for Clearfield Bituminous Coal in Corning N.Y. sent Sam a form-letter offer to buy stock to cover expenses of the purchase of said company. Sam wrote “No” on the envelope [MTP].

J.F. Swords wrote acknowledging a letter from Sam’s attorney Whitmore relating to Sam’s signature for one share in the Hartford Amusement Assoc., which was on their document [MTP].

February 17 Friday – Joseph Summers wrote from Epsom, England asking Sam if he might use a few lines in his book. Sam wrote, “I will answer this” on the envelope [MTP].

February 17 Sunday – Sam and Livy returned home to Hartford [Feb. 14 to Whitmore; MTNJ 3: 449n138].

February 17 Monday – In New York Sam wrote to Stilson Hutchins about sick Livy and his nursing her in New York. [MTP, paraphrased 1912 Anderson Galleries catalog, Item 222]. Sam also wrote a similar letter to an unidentified person [MTP].

Franklin G.Whitmore wrote to Sam: “Your check for $545 being the amt. Of 2nd dividend of the St Paul Roller Mill Co of ten per cent to Mr. Saml L Clemens is received” [MTP].

February 17 Tuesday – In Hartford Sam wrote to Frederick J. Hall of a “very pleasant visit” by an unspecified man. He also enclosed a paper which, if Hall liked it for publication, to make a copy of it and mail the original to Grace King. Sam expressed some urgency as to developing the memory game, feeling it would provide some needed income:

Come quickly, & discuss my historical game. It is the important feature now [MTP].

February 18 Wednesday – Sam wrote to Frank Fuller, responding to a proposal (not extant).

February 18 Friday – Joe Twichell wrote from Hartford to Sam. “All right, and I’m a thousand times obliged to you. Stevens (the Committee on Entertainment) says I had better not advertise you on Sunday, or that makes it next to impossible to keep it out of the papers. I’ll speak of it at the Monday Evening meeting. But there’ll be folks enough there, no fear of that. Governor Bigelow is going to be invited, for one.

February 18 Saturday – According to the New York Times, page 8 under “PERSONAL INTELLIGENCE,” Sam was staying at the Hotel Brunswick. Note: Sam may have thrown off the Times by some sort of ruse—the Clemens family stayed at the Gilsey House; see bill at end of this entry.

February 18 Sunday – In Hartford, Sam wrote a scorching letter to J.W. Bouton:

      Draw & be damned. I subscribed for your Portfolio one year & no more. I paid for it. Since then you have thrust it upon me & persecuted me with it at your own risk & in defiance of my several protests.

February 18 Monday – Sam arrived home from a quick trip to New York City, perhaps staying the night of Feb. 17 there [MTHL 2: 475]. He may have returned to talk to General Grant before leaving the city (see Feb. 16 entry).

February 18 Wednesday – The official U.S. publication date for Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. [Hirst, “A Note on the Text” Oxford edition, 1996]. Note: other dates are sometimes given, for example, Budd in MT “Collected” gives Feb. 16 [978]. In the first month the book sold 42,000 copies [Willis 161]. By the year 2000, the book had sold perhaps twenty million copies and approximately 60 foreign editions [162].

February 18 Saturday – A.B. James wrote from Pilot Rock, Ore. Asking for Sam’s autograph [MTP].

Frederick J. Hall for Webster & Co. wrote to Sam enclosing a letter from Gen. Sheridan and also Hall’s letter acknowledging Sheridan’s letter. Hall suggested the matter might be settled by allowing Scribner to publish “one or two artcles from the General’s book in the magazine.” [MTP]. Note: the “matter” to be settled was who was to publish what of Sheridan’s forthcoming book.

February 18 Monday – Frederick J. Hall wrote to Sam that sales of Mrs. Custer’s book, Tenting on the Plains had improved [MTLTP 252n3]. Hall felt they’d have to sell about 3,000 sets of the LAL in order to pay for the manufacture of the whole eleven volumes [MTP].

February 18 Tuesday – Sam and Livy returned to Hartford as planned [Feb. 16 to Crane; Feb. 19 to Richardson].

W. Norris wrote from Civil Prison, Singapore to Sam; a fellow prisoner gave him IA which he read. “I have resolved to send you this letter, and to beg of you to get me out of this prison….I am now short $20,000…” Sam wrote on the envelope, “Wants a loan 20,000”[MTP].

February 18 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook lists an invitation to lecture at Central Music Hall, Chicago for $1,000 from Edmund W. Ballentine [MTNJ 3: 603]. Note: No record exists of Sam agreeing to such a lecture, nor is a date for a proposed appearance shown.

February – Sam wrote to Frank Fuller, responding to a proposal (not extant).

February – Sam inscribed a copy of John Marshall’s (1818-1891) Anatomy for Artists (1878) to Karl Gerhardt, dating the inscription [Gribben 453].

Florence Finch’s (later Kelly) article, “Two American Humorists” ran in The Family Defender Magazine, p. 76-8. Finch compared Mark Twain with Artemus Ward:

February – Sam’s notebook: “Get Kellogg’s Andersonville experiences through a short-hand reporter,” referring to Robert H. Kellogg’s Life and Death in Rebel Prisons (1865). Kellogg was an agent for the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Co. in Hartford at this time [Gribben 366].

February – Sam inscribed The Stolen White Elephant to William M. Clemens [MTP].

Sam wrote to Francis Hopkinson Smith, returning his coat and apologizing for the used handkerchief he left in the pocket [MTP].

February – A chapter from Huck Finn, “Royalty on the Mississippi, As Chronicled by Huckleberry Finn” ran in the Feb. issue of the Century Magazine, p.544-67 [Camfield, bibliog.]. The same magazine also ran the third of three small (approx. 3” x 4”) display ads, announcing MARK TWAIN’S NEW WORK, with Kemble’s picture of Huck Finn doffing straw hat, “sold only by subscription, agents wanted, Chas. Webster” etc. [MTP, 1884-5 financial files].

February – An agreement was reached with James W. Paige and William J. Hamersley stimulated by their Jan. 20 meeting with Sam in Elmira. Sam would undertake additional capitalization input in exchange for half ownership in the Paige typesetter. Kaplan writes: