The Man in the White Suit: Day By Day

August 7 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:

“Training is everything” he said, “The Gospel is right” & if he controls himself now, it is due to the training of his age, his old age. Such a sweet old age it is. Of course, he bursts out sometimes into savage blasphemies. It wouldn’t be he if he didn’t. Early this morning, before 7, I heard a big gutteral God damn from his room & then quietness. Later I learned he was mad at the green shade which had stuck & stuck [MTP TS 103-105]. Note: see the rest of the Aug. 7 entry at the end of Aug. 6.

August 7 Wednesday – Dorothy Quick was visiting Sam in Tuxedo Park, N.Y.

Katherine Gregory wrote to Miss Lyon; this is miscatalogued as to Clemens [MTP].

Adelaide M. Lee (Mrs. Bruce B. Lee) wrote from Sacramento remembering Sam’s lectures in Sacramento and also her late husband’s lectures. She wished he would come to California for the National Irrigation Congress on Sept. 2-7 [MTP]. Note: Lyon wrote on the letter: “Answd. Aug 20, ‘07”

August 7 Friday – George B. Harvey and David A. Munro ended their 2 day visit [new guestbook].

H.C. Fish for N. Dakota State Historical Soc. wrote from Bismark, N.D. to ask if under date of May 26, 1874 Clemens had checked into the Capitol House in Bismark [MTP]. Note: IVL: “Mr. Clemens was not West at all in 1874.”

August 7 Saturday - In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to Elinor M Howells (Mrs. William Dean Howells),

Dear Mrs, Howells: / Clara thinks that if she knows young Alden’s sister it must be under a married name, as she is doubtful if she has met any Miss Alden.

August 8 Monday – In Lee, Mass. Sam sent the “TO WHOM THIS SHALL COME” note to Mary Elizabeth Phillips and added, “Miss Mary E. Phillips / Lee, Aug. 8” [MTP].

Sam also sent the “TO WHOM THIS SHALL COME” note to Elizabeth S. Wood and added, “Mrs. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Wood. Aug. 8” [MTP].

Joseph Gaylord Gessford replied to Sam’s Aug. 7. “affrontery” that he had merely asked for prices of the photographs as “a formality”: “I could no more afford to give you these pictures than you can afford to write books for free” [MTP; Madsen 68-9].

August 8 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “The fallow days are still with Mr. Clemens. All day he has been very, very tired and resting. At dinner tonight the talk was of Babylon and its great, great glories” [MTP TS 84].

Frederick T. Leigh wrote to Sam that Duneka was on vacation and Sam’s post-card scheme, according to Sam’s wishes, would be “dropped for the present” [MTP].

August 8 Wednesday – In N.Y.C. H.H. Rogers replied to the Aug. 5 from Sam, confessing that the letter he was to copy and send to Twichell about the Virgin Mary being 47 and black had been sent along without copying due to the “disordered condition” of his desk on Monday night. Rogers disagreed with Sam on his conclusions about Mary’s age and color; he felt sure he’d get a reply from Twichell, which would be his “duty to send it to your address.” He related that George B.

August 8 Thursday – Dorothy Quick was visiting Sam in Tuxedo Park, N.Y.

Howells & Stokes wrote to Sam, advising that arresting work at the Redding house at this time would “make you liable for between ten and fifteen thousand dollars,” and enclosed a letter from Mr. Carter of Carter & Haskell attys. [MTP].

August 8 Saturday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:  The King wandered out from dinner tonight to look at a wonderful sunset and he called Benares and me to look at the mighty show. But we were compelled to stop in the great room to look at the slim beautiful white figure of the King standing in an archway of the loggia, with the hills and gorgeous glow of the sunset as a background.

August 8 Sunday —- Sam’s new guestbook:

August 9 Thursday – Sam wrote to Frank N. Doubleday about “What is Man?” and a proposed special binding for ten copies:

If I understand McClure’s tentative offer I know Harvey would not consider it. When he was here the other day he said he had told McC that the price offered must be a very stiff one. Thank you very cordially for the pains you have taken with the matter.

      Good. Now if Mr. Bothwell will keep that letter-form “standing” it will come in handy in case of future distributions.

August 9 Friday – In the evening at Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam wrote to Miss Dorothy Quick in Plainfield, N.J. some five hours after she’d departed from her Aug. 5 to 9 visit.

Dorothy dear, one of these days I am going to write you a letter the first time I write my other children, but not now, now I haven’t time, because I haven’t anything to do, & I can’t write letters except when I am rushed.

August 9 Sunday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to daughter Jean in Gloucester, Mass.  

Jean dear, don’t trouble about those financial matters; there will be no occasion for that; the expenses were fair & reasonable, & in any case Miss Lyon will take care of my interests. I knew all about the arrangement when it was made, & not only approved it but helped to make it.

August – The first of two installments of “The Horse’s Tale” ran in Harper’s Monthly for August. The second ran in Sept. issue; it would be published by Harper’s as a 153 page book on Oct. 24, 1907.

Sam also wrote to H.H. Rogers: “Dear Mr. Rogers: I’m accepting…tell me if you can go & if it will pay you to go. S.L.C.” [MTP: Anderson Galleries catalog, 4-5 April 1934, No. 4098, Item 116].

Paine Hired, Dictations Begin – Retired from Congo – Auto Show – Pleas for Tuskegee Gridiron Club – Swapping Lies with Joe Cannon – Tea at Columbia U.  Blots from “Marjorie” – Pallbearer for McAleer – MT Fans Mob Majestic – Putzel Daily with Charlotte – “A” Clubbers – Gorky & Scandal – Speaks for Blind Upstaging Billiardists – Kissing Vassar Girls – Pleas for S.F. Quake Victims – Bronchitis Lying Fallow in Dublin – Harper Treacheries – Eve’s Diary – Poor Old Friend is Free Harvey Picks A.D. segments for N.A.R.

Christian Science Published, Flying Trips to Bermuda – Katonah Visits – Clara Tours - Damned Human Race Club – Suppression of Noises – Lease Tuxedo Park House - Aldrich Dies – Redding Plans – Last Trip to Elmira – 1 Angelfish – Jamestown - Saturday A.M. Club Reunion – Lost at Sea! – “Oxford Would Confer…”– Annapolis - Actors Fund Fair – Meets “Charlie”– Stevedores Shout – G.B. Shaw - Hectic Schedules – Postpones Funeral – Ascot Cup Stolen!

Year of the Angelfish – “A Good Place to Live in, a Good Place to Die In” - Autobiography House” becomes “Innocents at Home” becomes “Stormfield” - Doe Luncheons – Elinor Glyn – Knickerbocker Crisis - Bermuda Trips: Margaret, Maude, Reginald; HHR – Children’s Theatre - Jubilee City College – Aldrich Memorial– Commodore Dow – Moffett Drowns - Guests, Guests, More Guests – Redding Library “Tax” Dedication  - Burglars! Staff Quits – Requires Cat in Pace – Elizabeth Wallace Visits

“I am still rich” — Bermuda Solitude — Wanting to Die at Stormfield

[SLC used mourning border for most letters from Jean's death on.]

December 1 Thursday – Isabel Lyon’s diary: “This afternoon Mr. Clemens was restless and after he talked business with me, and after he played through The last rose of summer and Wagner’s Wedding March on the orchestrelle, we sat down to play 500 again. We played until tea time, and then after tea time we played until 6:45….We played 500 until eleven o’clock. Mr. Clemens won 14 games [Hill 98; TS 29, MTP]. Note: “Wedding March” from Wagner’s Lohengrin.

December 1 Friday – At 21 Fifth Ave., N.Y. Sam wrote a short note to Marcella Sembrich, opera star. “Dear Madame Sembrich— / It was lovely of you to send me so eloquent & so beautiful aremembrance, & I thank you out of my heart” [MTP].

Sam also wrote to Will Larrymore Smedley in Chataqua-on-Chataqua, N.Y.: “To you, & to all my other known & unknown friends who have lightened the weight of my seventieth birthday with kind words & good wishes I offer my most grateful thanks, & beg leave to sign myself” [MTP].

December 1 Saturday – In NYC Albert Paine wrote for Sam to Thomas Bailey Aldrich in Boston.

December 1 Sunday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam replied to the Nov. 30 from Miss Florence Benson.

Dear Florence:

Thank you for your nice note.—

(Private.) I have always concealed it before, but now I am compelled to confess that I am Tom Sawyer!

 [MTP]. See Florence’s Nov. 30 letter.

Sam also wrote to daughter Jean.  

December 1 Tuesday – In Redding, Conn. Sam wrote to Marjorie Breckenridge.