December 18 Saturday — Clemens and Albert Bigelow Paine sailed on the Bermudian bound for New York. In his Dec. 19 to Marion Schuyler Allen (Mrs. William H, Allen) Sam wrote, “We plunged into heavy seas before the waving handkerchiefs & the flag were an hour out of sight...”.
December 18-20 Monday — On board the Bermudian Sam wrote to Helen Schuyler Allen in Hamilton, Bermuda.
December 19 Monday – Eleanor L. Nicholas wrote a “begging letter” from Montpelier, Vt. To Sam, who wrote on the envelope: “Curiosity” [MTP].
December 19 Wednesday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam replied to the Dec. 13 from Miss Cally Thomas Ryland. “I am thankful to say that such letters as yours do come—as you have divined—with a happy frequency. They refresh my life, they give it value; like yours, they are always welcome, and I am always grateful for them. / Sincerely Yours …” [MTP]. Note: Ryland used a common device for humorist—she created a fictional “alter ego” who could get away with speaking blunt and outlandish truths, much like Twain’s “Mr. Brown.” She was the society editor for the Richmond News Leader.
December 19 Thursday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: I am hearing the very first words of the King’s Biography. AB is sitting here and reading them to me. The background of the book. The days that passed four months before the King was born. (He says 5 months before the King was born.) [MTP TS 121].
December 19 Saturday – In Redding, Conn. Sam replied to the Dec. 18 from H.H. Rogers.
Dear Admiral:
December 19 Sunday — On board the Bermudian Sam wrote to Marion Schuyler Allen (Mrs. William H. Allen) in Hamilton, Bermuda.
Dear Mrs. Allen:
I don’t know how to thank you & Mr. Allen enough for the perfectly charming time you have given me. I have never had a lovelier time, & I can’t get over being sorry that it had to come to an end.
December – Sam’s essay, “Saint Joan of Arc” first appeared in Harper’s Monthly (p. 3-12). It was collected in The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories (1906) [Budd, Collected 2: 1009].
Sam wrote a slightly edited version of the 1893 “Extract from Adam’s Diary”; it was edited to make it a companion piece to “Eve’s Diary,” and would be collected in The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories (1906) [Camfield’s bibliog.].
December – “Eve’s Diary” was first published in Harper’s Monthly. In June 1906 it was published in book form as Eve’s Diary Translated from the Original MS; also included in The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories (1906) [Budd, Collected 2: 1010-11].
In N.Y.C. Sam inscribed his photograph to Mrs. John C. Graham: “Perhaps Mrs. John C. Graham will divine why this picture is intruded upon her by her obliged servant. / Mark Twain Dec./05.” [MTP].
December – Sam’s story, “Hunting the Deceitful Turkey,” first ran in Harper’s Monthly, p. 57- 8 [Budd, Collected 2: 1012].
Sam inscribed a copy of The $30,000 Bequest and Other Stories to Anita Moffett: “To Anita Moffett / with affectionate Xmas greeting / from her kinsman / Mark Twain / Dec. 1906” [MTP].
Sam also wrote a letter declining to attend a gathering of Kentuckians to honor Henry Watterson, his third cousin by marriage.
December 1906 to 1907 – Sometime during this period, more likely on his 1907 trip to England, Sam enclosed a “Tuck’s Post Card” in a letter (the card itself is not postmarked) to daughter Jean. The card has a printed poem “To Mark Twain” about the “secret little maid,” so that famous picture is likely on the reverse side. He wrote:
Jean dear, do you remember this picture with the accidental child in it?
December – Sometime during the month Sam attended a private dinner hosted by Daniel Frohman. At that dinner he met Elinor Sutherlin Glyn (Mrs. Clayton Glyn) (1864-1943), British novelist and scriptwriter, the sister of Lucy, Lady Duff-Gordon. She led the way in erotic fiction for women, marketed to the masses, and had arrived that fall after the release of her first successful novel, Three Weeks (1907) which had been a hit in England.
December, last week – The estimated time of Elinor Glyn’s follow-up 90-minute visit with Clemens at his NY home. This estimate is based on Clemens’ Jan. 13 A.D. See Jan. 13 entry, which also includes Glyn’s description of the meeting, and Anthony Glyn’s Elinor Glyn: a Biography, p. 143-4 which states, “She stayed for an hour and a half and for most of the time they discussed Three Weeks, which he greatly admired, both in matter and in style.” Glyn here neglects Sam’s opinion that publishing such a book was a mistake—a fact that got duly noted in the Sept.
December – Cooley writes of the decline of the Aquarium Club, something notable in less correspondence beginning this month:
December — Sam’s article, “Marjorie Fleming, the Wonder-Child,” ran in the Dec. issue of Harper’s Bazar [Hill 250].
Sam signed his copy of A Dash at the Pole (1909) by William Lyon Phelps: “SL Clemens from / Wm Lyn Phelps / Dec 1909” [Gribben 542].
Paine writes of Sam quoting Oliver Wendell Holmes’ poem, “The Last Leaf”:
One evening he spoke of those who had written but one immortal thing and stopped there. He mentioned “Ben Bolt”.
December 2 Friday – The National Institute of Arts and Letters, founded in 1898, cast ballots and elected seven members to the first American Academy of Arts and Letters. These were, representing literature: Samuel L. Clemens, William Dean Howells, Edmund Clarence Stedman, and John Hay; representing art: Augustus Saint-Gaudens and John La Farge; representing music, Edward MacDowell. The secretary of the Institute was none other than Robert Underwood Johnson.
December 2 Sunday – At 21 Fifth Ave, NY Sam wrote a letter of thanks and greeting with a German translation on second leaf to “My far away friends” to an unidentified person [MTP: American Art Assoc. catalog, Mar. 3, 1925 Item 98].
Sam also wrote on a calling card to Robert Underwood Johnson: “Mouldy 71 thanks the Johnsons a thousand times” [MTP].
Clemens’ A.D. of this day included: Sam’s early experiments in mesmerism, continued [MTP Autodict3; MTE 125-131].
December 2 Monday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to daughter Jean.
Dear Jean I will attend to the matter regarding translations, even if the pay be very small in money it will be large in entertainment for you & well worth the labor it will cost you.
December 20 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal:
December 20 Thursday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “Geraldine Farrar” [MTP TS 150].
Clemens’ A.D. of this day included: Capt. Osborn tells to Bret Harte, in a Californian restaurant, his adventure of falling overboard and his rescue. A tramp overhears him, claims to be his rescuer, is liberally rewarded, and afterwards discovered to be an impostor [MTP Autodict3].
William R. Coe sent Sam a large fold out map of Bermuda. No letter [MTP].
December 20 Friday – At 21 Fifth Ave, N.Y. Sam wrote to Frances Nunnally.
I suppose you are about to leave for home, dear Francesca, so I am hasting to wish you a happy holiday-time before you get away down there out of my reach. Indeed you are much too far out of my reach even when you are in Catonsville. I wish you were going home by way of New York, so that I could have glimpse of you, you dear little rascal.
December 20 Sunday – In Redding, Conn. Sam began a letter to Margaret Blackmer that he finished on Dec. 21. The Dec. 20 segment:
December 20 Monday — The Bermudian arrived in New York City. Jean Clemens met Sam and Albert Bigelow Paine. According to Paine, Jean continued on to Redding, Conn. while Sam stayed “a day or two later.” He described Jean as “blue and shivering with the cold,” and felt “she should not have come.” Likely she was accompanied by Katy or one of the servants [MTB 1547].
December 21 Wednesday – At 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Isabel V. Lyon wrote for Sam to Edmund Clarence Stedman, now in Brownsville, N.Y.
“Mr. Clemens wishes me to write for him to thank you for your invitation to lunch with you and the members of the Academy of Arts and Letters on January seventh, but to say that he must decline, for he is not accepting any invitations this year” [MTP].