Life in Exile: Day By Day

February 9 Tuesday – Joe Twichell wrote to Sam.

February 9 Wednesday – H.H. Rogers wrote notice of receipt from Sam for $653.34 “which added to the $1,959.99 previously received makes the full amount of my claim against the late firm of C.L. Webster & Company at the time of its failure” [MTHHR 321].

January 1 Saturday – Sam’s notebook: “Fine sunny day” [NB 42 TS 52].

In Vienna, Austria Sam inscribed a copy of More Tramps Abroad, (FE) to Ida Speiser- Wegenstein: “To / Mrs. Ida Speiser-Wegenstein / Wishing her many Happy New Years. With the kind regards of, / The Author / Vienna, New Years’ Day 1898” [MTP: Sothebys London catalogs, July 13, 2000, Item 48].

He also wrote an aphorism to an unidentified person:

January 1 Sunday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam’s notebook:

NEW-YEAR, 1899. Note from Schelsinger [not extant], asking another month’s delay. … He would like me to promise the use of my name in advance, I think, & unconditionally.

It will be a marvel if he produces a play which I can work into a shape which will satisfy me, after all his delays. I shan’t allow my name to be used in connection with it unless it shall in all ways warrant the risk [NB 40 TS 52-3].

January 1 Monday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam replied to Will M. Clemens (incoming not extant).

January 10 Monday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Austria Livy wrote for Sam to Chatto & Windus, acknowledging receipt of a six months statement and check for £1095.9.10; they were “greatly pleased with the excellent showing of the statement and the consquent size of the check” [MTP]. Note: in the six-month period from July 1, 1897 to Jan. 1, 1898, Chatto printed 18,000 copies of FE [Welland 238].

January 10 Tuesday – A PS excerpt from “Diplomatic Pay and Clothes,” in the March Forum ran in the N.Y. Times, and was published on Mar. 26, 1899, p.23, under “Current Literature.”

Mark Twain Wants $75,000.

From Mark Twain, in the Forum.

January 10 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook: contains a bus or train schedule for a.m. and p.m. times, “Neasden Lane, N.W. / Pillar Box” [NB 43 TS 5]. Note: an area of N.W. London.

January 11 Monday – Sam’s notebook:

January 11 Tuesday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Livy wrote for Sam to Samuel E. Moffett.

“Your Uncle wants me to say that he desires you to keep the letter that I sent you entirely private” [MTP].

January 11 Thursday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam replied to three lists of questions about his books from Adela M. Goodrich-Freer (1865-1931), English writer-traveler active in the Society for Psychical Research in Hertfordshire, England. She wrote under the pseudonym “Miss X”.

January 12 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “Cook gone—another come; 4 in 3½ months. More than we had in 18 yrs at home” [NB 41 TS 4].

January 12 Wednesday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Sam wrote to Henry Loomis Nelson, editor at Harper’s Weekly (1894-1898) .

January 12 Friday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to cousin, Dr. James R. Clemens.

Are you home again, or still away?

Mrs. Clemens is up & out—yesterday, & again to-day. I think she only needs that Vienna albumen [Plasmon] now. Where does one get it? [MTP]. Note: Sam’s stationery continued to own a black-border for mourning.

On the back of an envelope dated Jan. 11, 1900, postmarked London, Sam wrote a list of notes about Samuel S. McClure’s offer

January 13 Thursday – Sam’s notebook: “Jan 13 ’98 Sent 3 fables to Century” [NB 42 TS 53].

At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Austria, Sam replied to Henry C. Robinson’s Dec. 29, 1897 letter.

January 13 Friday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Eva Nansen; Livy added a note to Dr. Fridtjof Nansen. Sam thanked her for the photographs and sentiments and was sorry he and the family were out when the Nansen’s messenger delivered them. Livy added a paragraph to Dr. Nansen:

January 13 Saturday –At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers.

McClure is here & has made me a proposition [see Jan.11]. As I wanted to ask your advice, I have postponed my answer to the 1st of March.

He is going to start a new magazine next fall, whose complexion is to be peculiarly American; its writers to be nearly all of that nationality; & one of its projects is to help hatch out & develop the rising young American literature.

January 14 Friday – Sam’s notebook:

Jan. 14, 1898. Began to write comedy “Is He Dead?” (Francois Millet.)

———

Make Plays—with a German for Principal character (Dutchy) an Irishman, a Scotchman, a Chinaman[,] a Japanese, a negro (George) Uncle John Quarles who was very like the Yankee farmer in Old Homestead.

Write an Old Homestead of the South” [NB 42, TS 53]. Note: Denman Thompson and George W. Ryder’s The Old Homestead (4-act play 1886) [Gribben 700].

January 14 Saturday – The New York Times, on Jan. 15, ran on p.7, “Mark Twain Writes for Stead.”

LONDON, Jan 14.—Mr. William T. Stead’s new paper, intended to be the mouthpiece of his disarmament campaign, and entitled War Against War, made its appearance to-day. It is not a very striking production, its chief feature being communications from sympathizers, including some American public men.

January 14 Sunday – In New York, William Dean Howells wrote to Sam of the horrors of the platform after his 50 performances on the road.

January 15 Friday – At 23 Tedworth Square in London Sam wrote a general letter about several matters to H.H. Rogers: He liked the contracts they’d signed. He supposed Harry Rogers (H.H. Rogers, Jr.) had turned sixteen in October (actually his birthday was Dec. 28) and that he’d tried to vote in November.

January 15 Saturday – Charles De Kay (1848-1935), art and literary critic of the N.Y. Times for eighteen years, wrote a review of FE which was published this day in the Times, “Mark Twain’s Mixed Pickles,” p. BR 40:

Mark Twain’s new book will challenge comparisons with “Innocents Abroad,” because it is cast on similar lines, being a salmi of plain information spiced with wit and humor. With such works each reader must decide whether the mixture suits him or not. …

January 16 Saturday – Sam’s notebook: “New cook has come—Jan. 16. First snow. About ½ inch” [NB 41 TS 4].

January 16 Sunday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to James Whitcomb Riley in Indianapolis, thanking him for a book sent in fulfillment of a “promise made …in Washington so many years ago…” He wrote he’d direct his Hartford publisher to send him a copy of his book (likely FE). After his signature he noted, “London weather in Vienna! / —fog to smell & the electric to work by at noon-day” [MTP].

January 16 Tuesday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to Frank Bliss.

“Yes date the portrait 1900; & if it comes from the engraver clean & nice,—& I hope it will—send it to Mr. Rogers with my best compliments.”