May 26 Friday – Sam’s notebook from Genoa to Florence:
Left for Florence 12.32 p.m. Friday, first class (about 30 fr.) in a car that goes through ohne Umsteigen [NB 33 TS 13].
Sam did not reach Florence until May 27; his first extant letter from Florence was written on May 29.
May 26 Saturday – The Athenaeum, No. 3474 p.676 printed a brief review of Tom Sawyer Abroad. Tenney quotes: “A dull book, and ‘a grievous disappointment to admirers of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and of his friend Huckleberry Finn…it is a pity that [MT] should squander himself on such a book as this’” [22].
May 27 Friday – The Clemens party arrived in Cadenabbia, where they would relax for a week. Sam’s notebook:
May 27. Cadenabbia, Lake of Como, Hotel Brittannia, 1st floor — all front rooms, looking across to Bellagio & the snow-clad peaks. Everything 90 fr. per day [NB 31 TS 49].
May 27 Saturday – Sam reached the Villa Viviani outside of Florence on the road to Settignano [June 9 to Twichell].
May 28 Saturday – The Clemens party was in Cadenabbia. Sam’s notebook:
May 28. Saturday. Took Salvitora & his boat at 8 fr. per day.
Asti is mighty dainty & good — when you call it good. But no man can tell it from champagne cider [NB 31 TS 49].
May 29 Sunday – In Cadenabbia, Italy Sam wrote to (Daniel) Willard Fiske, wealthy Cornell professor who was traveling around Italy collecting manuscripts (see Apr. 1892 listing). As Paine writes, it was through Fiske that the were directed to the Villa Viviani, which they rented for the next winter. The Villa was on a hill east of Florence, near Settignano [MTB 945].
May 29 Monday – At the Villa Viviani in Florence, Sam wrote to William Walter Phelps, congratulating him and his daughter, Marian Phelps (four years older than Susy Clemens), on her recent wedding to Dr. Franz von Rottenberg. Marian was a close friend of Clara Clemens in Berlin.
May 3 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook in Florence:
Madonna, child & child St. John. Three children, for the Madonna is a physically developed woman 9 years old. St. John is wretchedly drawn. The whole picture is poor. With Raphael’s name removed it would be dear at $1.50. / The Wrestlers are wonderful. / They try to tell when a picture or other work was made by the character of the workmanship — forgetting that there are good & bad workmen in all ages.
May 3 Wednesday – Franklin G. Whitmore wrote to Sam, “glad to hear that you are better & well enough…to travel.” Whitmore mentioned mailing Matthew Arnot’s note to Charles Langdon and lists a $25 bill from Dr. Porter and a Murray Hill Hotel bill for $30.65 [MTP].
May 3 Thursday – In the afternoon in New York, Sam and his attorneys met with President William H. Payne of the Mt. Morris Bank and his attorney, Daniel Whitford, who had also been attorney for Webster & Co.
May 30 Monday – Edward L. Starck, city surveyor in N.Y. wrote to Sam with the recommendation of Prof. W. James of Harvard, seeking $500 to publish his MS of a “philosophical nature” [MTP].
May 30 Tuesday – In Florence, Sam began a letter to Frederick J. Hall that he finished on June 2.
Dear Mr. Hall, — You were to cable me if you sold any machine royalties — so I judge you have not succeeded.
This has depressed me. I have been looking over the past year’s letters and statements and am depressed still more [MTP]. Note: this salutation and beginning left out of MTLTP, 343.
May 30 Wednesday – In Paris, Sam wrote a short note to Robert Underwood Johnson:
My dear Johnson: I reminded Dr. Boyland the other day to forward his MS. to you (about the Commune I think it is) and he said he would. It is the MS. I spoke to you about. Yours in a hell of a hurry. S.L. Clemens [MTP: Am. Art Catalog, Feb. 17, 1926, Item 97]. Note: Dr. Halstead Boyland; “the other day” may have been in London or since in Paris.
May 31 Tuesday – Daniel Willard Fiske wrote (not extant) to Sam concerning the arrangement of the Villa Viviani for the next winter, the livery addresses Livy had requested, and an offer of future help from Signor William Sordi, Fiske’s secretary [June 12 to Fiske].
May 31 Wednesday – Rodney writes of the end of May and the family’s plans:
May 31 Thursday – In Paris Sam wrote to Henry H. Rogers, minutes after hearing from his secretary, Katharine I. Harrison, of the death of Abbie Gifford Rogers (Mrs. Rogers).
May 4 Wednesday – Ceyton Saxe sent a form letter soliciting Sam’s comment on the use of tobacco for an article Saxe was preparing for “several American newspapers” [MTP].
May 4 Thursday – The Panic of 1893 got into high (or maybe more appropriately, low) gear with a severe contraction of the New York Stock Exchange May 3 and 4. Financial reverses would worsen, ultimately forcing the downfall of Webster & Co., as well as the Paige typesetter. From the N.Y. Times, p.10, “Financial and Commercial”:
VERY NEARLY A PANIC ON THE NEW-YORK STOCK EXCHANGE
Wednesday, May 3 — P.M.
May 4 Friday – In New York Sam wrote to Livy about his quick trip to Elmira (May 1-2), and the conference with Mt. Morris Bank’s Payne and attorney, Daniel Whitford (May 3). Sam said they owed the bank $29,500 but felt “a good half of it is bogus paper.”
May 5 Thursday – At the Hotel Grande Bretagne & Arno in Florence, Italy Sam wrote to Franklin G. Whitmore advising that “Three good-size boxes will leave Rome for Hartford about this time,” and to “pay the duties” on them, “which will be small, for the contents cost less than $150.” Sam gave instructions as to what to unpack and where to store the items, including glassware, and to ship the rest to Elmira for Susan Crane.
May 5 Friday – At Quarry Farm, Elmira, and still in bed recovering, Sam wrote to Frederick J. Hall. He wanted the note for $3,000 sent in error to Whitmore re-drafted in Livy’s name and sent to Charles J. Langdon, as he kept her power of attorney. Evidently, there had been a good quantity of LAL sales:
If we could corral 27 LAL’s every day — & could afford it — our financial bowels would soon begin to move.
May 5 Sunday – In Paris Sam wrote to Chatto & Windus. He’d received “that little book” and thanked them (title not given). He announced they would sail from Vancouver, B.C. on Aug. 16 and begin reading in Sydney or Melbourne in September, then reach India in mid-January, 1896. Livy and daughter Clara would accompany him.
May 6 Friday – Sitting in an art museum at Uffizi Palace in Florence, Italy Sam wrote to Poultney Bigelow. Sam’s letter is an obvious response to Bigelow’s (not extant) question about seeing Kaiser William II.
Did I “have a chat” with him? Yes, and heard others chat with him, also. He was in great form. I will tell you about it when I see you; it is too long a story for a letter.
May 6 Saturday – In Elimra at Quarry Farm, Sam wrote a short note to Livy:
May 6 Monday – Andrew Chatto wrote to Sam that they’d made arrangements with Harper to “take a duplicate set of electros of the illustrations to” JA for the English edition, and would make “the best arrangements…for translations and with Tauchnitz for the Continental edition” [MTP].