December 17 Monday – At 169 rue de l’Université in Paris, Sam finished his Dec. 16 to Rogers.
Yours containing Cole’s and Paige’s letters to Brusnahan came to my bed just before I got up. By George, that wolf does seem to be approaching my door again! I wish he would apply somewhere where he hasn’t worn out his welcome. [Note: Charles J. Cole, Hartford Atty.].
December 18 Friday – Sam left Berlin with William Phelps and traveled 125 miles south to Dresden
N.Y.Times article Dec 20 p.5, dateline Berlin, Dec 19:
December 18 Sunday – In Florence Sam wrote to Arabel Moulton-Barrett, sole surviving sister of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, in Jamaica. The Barrett family had long been associated with Jamaica, amassing a fortune from sugar plantations. Arabel evidently had requested a photograph of Sam.
December 18 Monday – In New York Sam dined with the Laurence Hutton family and wrote of it on Dec. 19 to Livy:
I dined with the Huttons yesterday [Dec. 18] evening — family dinner, no dress — & we had a delightful time till 11 o’clock. Mr. Hutton thinks Pudd’nhead opens up in great & fine style. The fact is I get a great many compliments on that story & the promise it holds out to the reader [MTP].
December – “Mental Telegraphy: A Manuscript with a History” ran in Harper’s New Monthly Magazine, p.95-104. This piece was written in 1878 and first published here. McCullough traces the evolution of this article, as well as “Mental Telegraphy Again,” Harper’s, Sept. 1895 in the Mark Twain Encyclopedia, p.510. Sam had noted many instances of what he felt was mental transmission of thoughts, and had initially included them in TA, but later removed those passages as misfitting a humor book.
December – Gribben writes, “In Florence in December 1892 Clemens made a series of notes which seem to indicate that he had purchased an unspecified book by William James (NB 32, TS pp.51, 53).” Gribben lists this under James’ The Principles of Psychology (1890) [351]. Gribben also notes Sam referred to “Milton Sonnet” in his notebook this month [476-7].
December – “Traveling with a Reformer” first ran in the Cosmopolitan. It was later included in How to Tell a Story, and Other Essays (1897), and The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg and Other Stories and Essays (1900) and My Debut as a Literary Person, etc. (1903) [Budd, Collected 2: 1001]. The second installment of Tom Sawyer Abroad appeared as a serial in the Dec. issue of St. Nicholas Magazine.
December 19 Saturday – Sam may have stayed overnight in Dresden or returned late Dec. 18.
“Playing Courier” first ran as “The Tramp Abroad Again: II. Playing Courier” in The Illustrated London News on this day and also Dec. 26 [Budd, Collected 1000].
December 19 Monday – In Florence Sam wrote to daughter Clara at Mrs. Mary B. Willard’s school in Berlin. He sent Merry Christmas good wishes and sent his love to the Phelpses, the Colemans, the Jacksons and to Mrs. Mary B. Willard and her family.
Jean’s got some kind of a horse-complaint. I don’t know what it is, but I think it’s the Horse-Kiss Hives. It comes out on the mouth, & is not becoming [MTP].
December 19 Tuesday – In New York, Sam went to the Standard Oil office at noon to arrange the Chicago trip they’d planned. While waiting he met Wayne MacVeagh, now Minister to Italy, and father to Margaretta, friend of Susy’s. When told they hadn’t heard from Susy, Sam filled him in.
December 2 Wednesday – John L. Guinter sent Sam a newspaper article on “Mental Telegraphy” from the Williamsport, Penn. Republic which introduces Sam’s article and adds other examples [MTP].
December 2 Friday – In Florence Sam wrote to Frederick J. Hall, giving his “cable address” and addressing a list of items.
Your statement does indeed show up handsomely. It looks as if we’re about out of the woods at last. So mote it be!
Sam also liked a catalogue sent and noted receiving a “very pleasant letter” from Mary Mapes Dodge. He felt $4,000 was enough, he guessed, for Part I of Tom Sawyer Abroad, giving that it only took him “3 weeks to write it.” He also asked about an old article:
December 2 Saturday – In New York Sam wrote to Livy. He enclosed Howells’ Dec. 1 request that he not wear his dress coat, writing a paragraph on the back:
Livy darling, I shall go in a dress coat just the same. I had to leave there yesterday because so many people came there was no satisfaction in the visit. Several of them called Howells out for extended private interviews. Heretofore there have been many people. But they stayed in the parlor.
Sam then wrote the balance of his letter on other pages:
December 20 Sunday – Albert B. Joy sent Sam a printed invitation requesting a visit “on Tuesdays, Wednesdays & Fridays in the afternoon / The Studio, Beaumont Road / beside the West Kensington station, North End Road” [MTP].
December 20 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook:
Dec. 20/92. Finished ‘Pudd’nhead Wilson’ last Wednesday, 14th. Began it 11th or 12th of last month, after the King girls left. Wrote more than 60,000 words between Nov. 12 and Dec. 14. One day, wrote 6,000 words in 13 hours. Another day wrote 5,000 in 11 [MTLTP 328-9; NB 32, TS 51].
Typothetae of N.Y. sent a printed invitation to Sam for their annual dinner at the Hotel Brunswick at six p.m. on Jan. 17, 1893 [MTP].
December 20 Wednesday – In New York Sam arrived home (Players Club) at 3 a.m. from unspecified engagements. Some powders were waiting for him for his cold, sent by Henry H. Rogers. He stayed awake for an hour and took them, got a few hours sleep and wrote Rogers his thanks at 9 a.m.
I got the shoes on my way home from your office, & when you see them you will be paralyzed with admiration [MTP].
December 21 Monday – The Boston Daily Globe, p.17 ran this interesting article on Orion Clemens:
MARK TWAIN’S BROTHER
Would be a Good Character for One of the Humorist’s Books.
Mark Twain has a brother living in Keokuk, Ia., who is absent-minded enough for Mark to “put in a book.”
December 21 Thursday – In New York, Sam finished the letter to Livy at 2 a.m.
December 21 Friday – In Paris, Sam sent a cablegram to H.H. Rogers:
Can you delay final action one month / Clemens [MTHHR 108].
Note: Sam explained his cable in his Dec. 22 to Rogers. Likely Rogers had cabled (not extant) that the Paige typesetter was judged a final failure at the Chicago Herald.
H.H. Rogers also wrote to Sam, the letter not extant but mentioned in Sam’s Jan. 2, 1895 to Rogers.
December 22 Tuesday – In Berlin Sam wrote to Chatto & Windus asking for four P&P’s “nicely bound.” He enclosed the second of six syndicate letters.
I will send the rest myself from month to month as they appear, so that you can set up the little book at your leisure [MTP]. Note: Sam proposed a booklet named, “Recent Glimpses of Europe” made from the six syndicated Europe letters.
December 22 Thursday – In Florence Sam wrote to his brother Orion, relating the 26 days it took to finish PW. Livy was “fairly well,” Susy was “progressing well in her singing lessons,” Clara “in her music.” There was snow on the ground with bitter cold weather.
Jean can talk with the Italians; speaks French like a native, and talks German well. She was going to have some young Italian neighbors in Xmas [MTP].
December 22 Friday – Sam and Rogers continued on to Chicago, eating breakfast in their parlor car after 9:30 a.m.
The colored waiter knew his business, & the colored cook was a finished artist. Breakfasts: coffee with real cream; beefsteaks, sausage, bacon, chops, eggs in various ways, potatoes in various — yes, & quite wonderful baked potatoes, & hot as fire. Dinners — all manner of things, including canvas-back duck, apollinaris, claret champagne, etc.
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December 22 Saturday – At 169 rue de l’Université in Paris, Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers, shocked by the final failure of the typesetter:
December 23 Wednesday – In Berlin Sam finished the Dec. 22 letter to Hall, all written in a PS and PPS longer than the Dec. 22 segment. Edmund C. Stedman wanted an increase in his royalties from LAL. Sam addressed the issue:
Mrs. Clemens urged that I wait over night and then write something pleasant anent the LAL increase of royalty.
December 23 Friday – In Florence, Sam finished a letter he began on Dec. 19 to A.M. Barnes who sent typed pages of Sam’s MS on request.
It is carefully done, & that is what I particularly want, as I must do my proof-reading on this side of the ocean. I shall have the MS ready before many days [MTP]. Note: no doubt PW.