Life in Exile: Day By Day
June 30, 1898 Thursday
June 30 Thursday – In Kaltenleutgeben Sam sent his photo-postcard to Thomas Bailey Aldrich:
“Ho. T.B.!— / Why, it has been all of 15 years since I sent you a portrait—then I sent you 56, of different vintages. I am ashamed of the long neglect. Here’s the latest. (Don’t get scared, I haven’t any more)” [MTP].
June 30, 1899 Friday
June 30 Friday – In London, Livy wrote for Sam to Andrew Chatto, asking details for a watch she’d rec’d and wanted to exchange for a fancier case. She also wanted to enclose a letter from Mr. Blair, which Sam wanted sent. Sam had been trying for two days to get down to see Chatto and expected to go in the morning, but thought Chatto might like to see the letter and consider it first [MTP].
Sam’s notebook: “Tea—Max O’Rell’s. Stanleys. 8 Acacia Road, N.W” [NB 40 TS 57].
June 30, 1900 Saturday
June 30 Saturday – Sam’s notebook: “Edgerton-Castle, 2. Sloane Gardens (49) / To-day or / In A. Goerz & Co: 60 Roodepoort Cent. Dp” [NB 43 TS 19]. Note: Egerton. The Roodepoort address was S. Africa.
Rogers office sent Sam a statement showing $44,445.70 to his credit [1900 Financial file MTP].
June 4, 1897
June 4 Friday – At 23 Tedworth Square in London, Sam wrote to Bram Stoker, thanking for and complimenting him on his book, Dracula, which had just issued; Stoker inscribed a copy of the book to him on June 1 [MTP: Parke-Bernet Galleries catalog].
June 4, 1898 Saturday
June 4 Saturday – Sam wrote a sketch given this date in Kaltenleutgeben, unpublished until 2009: “A Group of Servants” [Who Is Mark Twain? xxvi, 61-9; AMT 1: 120-4]. Note: title assigned by Paine. Sam describes the new servants in this getaway village near Vienna, including one “garrulous older maid” he nicknamed “Wuthering Heights.” See last source p. 500 n121.21 for speculation as to why Sam chose the name of Emily Brontë’s classic novel.
June 4, 1899 Sunday
June 4 Sunday – At the Grand Hotel in Broadstairs, England, Sam wrote to Chatto & Windus, informing them of their sudden move to the coast in Broadstairs by order of Clara’s doctor.
June 4, 1900 Monday
June 4 Monday – Sam’s notebook: “Chapin 8. If coming send no telegram. / Send congratulations to Miss Mai Rogers 26 E 57th—cable about noon. / CHAPIN—Dinner 8 pm” [NB 43 TS 14]. Note: Robert and Adele Chapin; Robert was US Consul in Johannesburg during Sam’s 1896 tour there.
In London, England Sam wrote a postcard to Franklin G. Whitmore.
June 5, 1897
June 5 Saturday – The N.Y. Times under its “Essays” column, p. BRA3, included a review of Sam’s How to Tell a Story and Other Essays, by Mark Twain. New York: Harper & Brothers. $1.50.
June 5, 1899 Monday
June 5 Monday – In his June 6 to Rogers, Sam related showing Frank Bliss’ Canvassing book on the deluxe Uniform Edition to Andrew Chatto “a day or two ago”, “& he was vastly taken with it, & wants to put 1000 on the English market for me at 10% commission. I have asked Bliss what he will charge me for the volumes— suggesting cost, or thereabouts” [Note: more likely been a business day than a Sunday]. See also Apr. 25 to Chatto.
June 5, 1900 Tuesday
June 5 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “Exhibition (medical) Queen’s Hall, top of Regent St—3 p.m./ Jim Clemens—dinner 7.30. 22 Queensberry Place, Cromwell Road / Jap show. Nottinghill Gate Coronet Theatre 2.30 p.m.” [NB 43 TS 15].
At 30 Wellington Court in London, Sam replied to an invitation by James Mark Baldwin to dine at one of the Oxford colleges.
Dear Professor Baldwin:—
I shall like it. It is so long since I was last in Oxford that all its features are grown dim to me; even Guy Faux’s lantern.
June 6, 1899 Tuesday
June 6 Tuesday – At the Grand Hotel in Broadstairs, England, Sam wrote to Alice Learned Bunner (Mrs. Henry Cuyler Bunner) in New London, Conn., who evidently had written (not extant) asking permission to make a calendar from his Puddn’head Wilson sayings in FE:
Unfortunately I am this long time under promise to make a Puddn’head Maxim Calendar myself, & have been gradually adding to the original list of Maxims to that end. Maxims are a slow growth, & it will take me a year or two yet.
June 6, 1900 Wednesday
June 6 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook: “? Article Club Lord Suffield, Pr. Laurence Cowen, Sec. 6.30 for 7. Trocadero Restaurant. / Andrew Lang? / 36 Theobald’s Row with Spal—3 pm” [NB 43 TS 15].
June 7, 1899 Wednesday
June 7 Wednesday – At the Grand Hotel in Broadstairs, England, Livy wrote for Sam to Franklin G. Whitmore because her husband had “so much writing to do,” and to send a bank draft (enclosed) if he needed money in July. She related money might be forthcoming “from a magazine article” before he needed it for the taxes on their Farmington Ave. house. Also, they expected more money July 1 from Frank Bliss. They still planned to return to London on Friday [MTP].
June 7, 1900 Thursday
June 7 Thursday – Sam’s notebook: “Murray, 11.40 to Victoria, Brighton. / Went to Woldingham, Surrey. Saw Robert Bar [sic Barr] & family” [NB 43 TS 15].
At 9 p.m., 30 Wellington Court in London, Sam wrote again to James Mark Baldwin, after sending a telegram.
June 8, 1897
June 8 Tuesday – Clara Clemens’ 23rd birthday [MTP].
June 8, 1898 Wednesday
June 8 Wednesday – Clara Clemens’ 24th birthday. Sam’s notebook entry of June 11 describes the family’s collective ignoring of such events since the death of Susy:
June 8, 1899 Thursday
June 8 Thursday – Clara Clemens’ 25th birthday.
Sam’s notebook entry: “June 8/99. Goerz. 13th ?” [NB 40 TS 56]. Note: the strikeout and the new entry for Goerz on June 13 may reflect a change of appointment date; see June 13.
June 8, 1900 Friday
June 8 Friday – Clara Clemens’ 26th birthday.
Sam’s notebook: “Duke st Plasmon (noon. [ )]” [NB 43 TS 15]. Note: 56 Duke Street for Plasmon meeting.
June 9, 1897
June 9 Wednesday – The Hartford Courant: June 9, p.8, “Mark Twain’s Old House”:
Building Where He Was Born is Being Torn Down.
A dispatch from Mexico, Mo. says that the old house in which “Mark Twain” was born, in Florida, near that town, is being torn down to make way for a new residence. The old house has long been one of the interesting landmarks of the town. Numerous calls have been made upon Mrs. Roney, the owner of the property, for bits of wood with which to make walking sticks and other souvenirs.
June 9, 1899 Friday
June 9 Friday – The family left Broadstairs, England, and returned to the Prince of Wales Hotel in London. Sam wrote two notes to Chatto & Windus, one perhaps shortly after this day. The first short note asked if they couldn’t get it in the papers that “Mrs. Clemens & 2 daughters are with me? It is very awkward, on some accounts, that this is not known.” In the second note he wrote: “After reflection, Mrs. Clemens prefers that no newspaper mention be made of the family’s presence in town” [MTP].
June 9, 1900 Saturday
June 9 Saturday – Sam’s notebook: “Call at 20 at 5.30. GOUT FOOD. / Savage Club 6 p.m. with MacAlister. / Afterward, the dinner to Irving at the Savoy—8.30 or 9 will do, I guess” [NB 43 TS 15]. Note: “Call at 20” likely refers to an address.
Sam attended a welcome home dinner for Sir Henry Irving after his American tour at the Savoy Hotel in London. From the June 10 N.Y. Times, p.4
WELCOME HOME TO IRVING.
Ambassador Choate in a Witty Vein—
Life in Exile
Following the death of their eldest daughter, Suzie, the family went into a self-imposed exile in Europe for the next four years. Much of this time was spent chasing about Europe and England, seeking cures for their ailments and treatments for Jean's epilepsy. The following Day By Day entries for August to December of 1896 are found in Volume II, from January of 1897 to October of 1900 are from Volume III.
March 1, 1898 Tuesday
March 1 Tuesday – Sam also replied to a non-extant query from Charles F. Mosher, a journalist with the Cincinnati Post and later an auditor with the Scripps newspaper network; he was now in Covington, Kentucky.
Oh, no—I can’t have that. Obviously the story has but one purpose, one intention: to so place Brown that he can not be saved.
March 1, 1899 Wednesday
March 1 Wednesday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam began a letter to John Kendrick Bangs that he added to on Mar. 11 and finished on Mar. 12. At this time Bangs was “Editor of the Departments of Humor” for Harper’s three publications.
March 1, 1900 Thursday
March 1 Thursday
March 1-15? 1900 – Sam wrote to the Secretary of the London Anti-Vivisection Society secretary, to acknowledge his election as an honorary member: “I am glad of the honor, since I have no friendly feeling toward either ‘sport’ or vivisection” [MTP: NY Times Mar. 18, 1900 p.14, “‘Mark Twain’ on Sport and Vivisection”].
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