May 2 Monday – George B. Harvey wrote from NY to Sam.
“I have just returned from a hurried trip to London where I remained two weeks and, like the man in the poker game did not have an opportunity to turn my head to spit. I saw Howells several times and he is looking very well….My great sorrow was that I could not sneak out the time to come down to Florence…” He enclosed a few clippings to make Sam smile (not in the file) [MTP].
May 3 Tuesday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto, Isabel Lyon wrote for Sam to Baroness Elisabeth de Nolde in Florence. (They would meet on May 12; see entry.)
Mr. Clemens wishes me to write for him to say that for some time he has been trying to call upon you but he cannot seem to do so, and he sends you Mr. Duneka’s letter, that you may see what he says, and determine whether you will write him yourself or let the matter drop.
May 4 Wednesday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam replied to Poultney Bigelow (incoming not extant).
Indeed I should like to be at next Year’s dinner, but of course Mrs. Clemens is most unlikely to be able to make a sea voyage then or even sometime later. We hope and expect to keep her in this world for years yet, but she will never again be strong enough to travel, I am afraid. We had her on her feet for a little while, but that was many months ago.
May 6 Friday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence, Isabel V. Lyon wrote for Sam to I. Goldsmith Proctor, thanking him for the offer of Villa Granduchessa, which Sam had seen and found charming, but it was “not entirely suited to his needs” [MTP].
I. Goldsmith Proctor wrote from Florence to Sam about a possible villa for the Clemenses [MTP].
May 7 Saturday – Charles J. Langdon wrote to Livy, enclosing a statement to May 1 [MTP].
May 8 Sunday – Sam’s notebook: “Asked Dr. Kirch for his 3-months’ bill, & got it: $900! It is robbery. / Told Miss Lyon to ask him to put it in lire—which he did: 4,500—& he was embarrassed. $900 is about 4,630 lire. The man is a hog” [NB 47 TS 10]. Note: Sam would enjoin lawyers in a squabble over the billing.
May 9 Monday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to Muriel M. Pears.
May 10 Tuesday – Henry Morton Stanley, the great explorer and one of Sam’s oldest friends, died in London. They first met on Mar. 26, 1867 in St. Louis (see entry), with Stanley, then a reporter, taking in one of Mark Twain’s lectures. See May 11 for Sam’s note to the widow Stanley. As with any news that might disturb Livy, Sam withheld it from her.
May 11 Wednesday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to Dorothy T. Stanley, widow of Henry M. Stanley.
May 12 Thursday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote a letter to Richard Watson Gilder that he added to on May 13.
May 13 Friday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam finished his May 12 to Richard
Watson Gilder.
“May 13, 10 a.m. I have just paid one of my pair of permitted 2-minute-visits-per-day to the sickroom. And found what I have learned to expect—retrogression. Blue lips, the pallor of the dead, & that pathetic something in the eye which betrays the secret of a waning hope” [MTP].
May 14 Saturday – The Italian Gazette of May 17 reported:
Mr. S.L. Clemens was the honored guest of the Ponte Vecchio Club at the usual Saturday dinner last week…“Mark Twain”…proceeded to tell an excellent story of how he drove an unwilling man into matrimony [“Wapping Alice”; quoted in Hill, p.83; See Keene’s letter of Apr. 28 about this club].
May 15 Sunday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto Sam wrote to Dr. William Wilberforce Baldwin.
I hope that you will come with your mind & conscience all prepared to commit a lofty & righteous deception—if need be—to save Mrs. Clemens’s life. Tell her you want to make a more thorough examination by the light, of the past few days’ regime, & then tell her there is nothing the matter with her heart that need alarm her.
May 17 Tuesday – Frederick A. Duneka wrote to Sam, letting him know that Mark Twain day at the St. Louis Fair had been postponed until some time in September. The Fair wasn’t yet “an overwhelming success” but it was early. He asked Sam to send his portrait (the Gelli painting) so they might display it “in a splendid window in Fifth Avenue just below the Holland House” [MTP].
May 18 Wednesday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto, Sam replied to Father Nicholas Miale.
Your kind letter of yesterday has reached me, & its friendly spirit & the compliments you pay me in it have greatly gratified me. The newspaper which you have mentioned has not arrived yet, but it will come along presently.
May 19 Thursday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to Dr. William Wilberforce Baldwin in Rome.
Mrs. Clemens, with characteristic sharpness has hunted the mystery down & found out that it is proposed to have the Swiss surgeon make an examination with a view to an operation. She votes against it, & of course that settles it, for I would not want to take the responsibility of trying to persuade her. She wants me to thank you, but also to ask you not to bring Dr. Corka (if that is the name.)
May 20 Friday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to Susan Crane.
May 21 Saturday – Sam’s note about the water situation continued: “May 21. At eleven o’clock the Countess sent word by the gardener that Mr. Clemens’s cook must not leave the villa before seven o’clock in the morning. The cook has been accustomed to leave at six every morning. / May 21. At 12.10 (pm) the water still dripping from the fountain faucet. / No, not dripping—it is a jet” [DV245]. Note: the family’s chef was Carlo Cosi [AMT 1: photo of servants following p.304].
May 22 Sunday – Sam’s note this date gave details in the ongoing conflict with the Countess Massiglia.
Sunday May 22: At 5.50 am the fountain was still playing.
Also at 7 when I got up to dress.
Also at 8.05 when I was at breakfast & turned & looked over my shoulder.
There was never such an unimpeachable witness on the stand: he testifies right along,night & day, that there is plenty of water to preserve my invalid wife from added disease-attacks, & he proves his testimony at the same time.
May 24 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “Telephone countess Seristori concerning tomorrow” [NB 47 TS 11].
May 25 Wednesday – R.H. Slacke wrote from Shildon, County Durham, England to Sam: “For more than twenty years it has been on my mind to tell you that heaps of your admirers would rejoice to see the history of Joseph ‘as if fell from the lips of Scotty Briggs, riddled with slang.’ / Yours faithfully…” [MTP]. Note: see Buck Fanshaw’s funeral in ch. 47 of RI.
An unidentified person wrote from Arlington, England to Sam (only the envelope survives) [MTP].
May 26 Thursday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto Sam wrote to Gov. David R. Francis, St. Louis, Mo.
May 27 Friday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to Frederick A. Duneka.
I keep forgetting to say:
Forward NOTHING to me that comes to your care by either MAIL or EXPRESS.
Please put all such things in a barrel, & leave them there till I come.
(Barrel or furnace—take your choice.) / None of the stuff is ever worth the postage [MTP].
May 29 Sunday – At the Villa Reale di Quarto near Florence Sam wrote to Francis B. Keene. “I am very much obliged. I am writing the Harpers that I will let them know by Sept. 1, whether to pay the duties & keep the portrait in America, or decline the duties & return it to me here” [MTP].
May 31 Tuesday – Susan Crane wrote to Sam, forwarding a request by Mary P. Partridge, dated May 29, asking for his autograph. Mary was “a most respectable old lady,” Sue wrote, “whose daughter Mrs Diven was one of Livy’s old friends, therefore I could not decline to make the request” [MTP].