August 20 Tuesday – The New York Times, p.3, announced “on good authority” that Rudyard Kipling was chosen for the Nobel Prize in Literature for 1907, and that Mark Twain had been suggested for same.
Joseph T. Brown for Knickerbocker Trust wrote to acknowledge Sam’s “note of the 18th,” placing an order for 1,000 shares of Utah Consolidated [MTP].
August 21 Wednesday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam added to his Aug. 17, 18, 19 to Dorothy Quick.
The Busy Bee
August 22 Thursday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam finished his Aug. 17 to 21 to Dorothy Quick. “Thursday, 22. I’m collecting red cigar-belts for you against your coming—but I love you notwithstanding” [MTAq 54].
Sam also wrote to Charlotte Teller Johnson in Staten Island, N.Y.: “I am very glad, my dear Miss T. to learn that the option has been paid at last; & since you as desire, you can send your check for the small advance I made you, but do not do it if it can inconvenience you, for there is no hurry” [MTP].
August 23 Friday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: We went over to the Deacon’s for tea this afternoon. This is the 2nd Friday that she has had a “bridge party” and we have been bidden for tea.
August 24 Saturday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Lucia Hull came this morning to have a chat with the King and he kept her until luncheon time, talking his gospel to her. She held to her own philosophy like the staunch little maid that she is and she stayed to luncheon at my invitation and then we jiggered over to her house to see her mother… [MTP 92].
August 25 Sunday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam went to a luncheon and talked for two hours, as related by the following letter to daughter Jean in Katonah, N.Y.
August 26 Monday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam began a letter to Dorothy Quick he finished Aug. 27.
At last, you dear little tardy rascal! This morning I was going to stick up a notice on the back porch:
LOST CHILD!
Answers to the name of Dorothy.
Strayed, Stolen or Mislaid.
DISAPPEARED
On or about the 9th of August.
=== === === ===
August 27 Tuesday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam finished his Aug. 26 to Dorothy Quick.
Yes, Wednesday will be perfectly convenient—and we’ll have you a whole week, which is grand! Provided you don’t get homesick—& we do hope you won’t. We’ll do our very best to keep you happy & content. Miss Lyon will arrange about the trains with your mother by telephone, if she can; otherwise by letter.
August 28 Wednesday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam wrote to Dorothy Quick: “Dorothy dear,
I am writing you a real letter, and it will go to you in a day or two. But this is only just a line, to send you my love & say how glad we are that you are coming, and that we can have you one day earlier—which is delightful” [MTP; MTAq 47]. Note: MTAq erroneously puts this to “early August 1907,” but there was no change of plans on the earlier visit to come one day earlier. MTP puts it at Aug. 28, which is judged to be correct.
August 29 Thursday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Today I went to spend the day with Santa who appeared suddenly from Norfolk. She is beautifuller than she has ever been, for Boston agrees with her and her intense happiness in her life and in her art are making for her an existence that is ideal. It was a scurry to get off—a scurry to get my home train and to bed I am—exhausted. Mr. Baker went in on my train and he has a proper appreciation of the King. So we talked forever [MTP TS 96]. Note: George Barr Baker.
August 30 Friday – H.H. Rogers wrote from Fairhaven, Mass. to Sam.
August 31 Saturday – Sam sent a telegram to Dorothy Quick:
September – Bookman (NY) ran a sour article, “Mark Twain’s Publicity R.I.P.” p. 9-10. Tenney: “‘Mark Twain’s work,’ said one British writer when British applause was at its loudest, ‘has absolutely no connection with literature,’ and some of it ‘has for sheer concentrated vulgarity never been beaten’; and it was a pity, said another, that Oxford did not honor Henry James instead. The American press reported only England’s praise when MT visited.
September 1 Sunday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam wrote to Albert Langen.
September 2 Monday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: The King had been up in my study telephoning to Dorothy [Quick] this morning, & when we went back to his room to go on with the morning business we found the smell of tobacco pretty strong & he said it smelt “as if a stuffy old archangel had been in there”. I told him that Santa & I love the smell of an archangel. He said “yes, the smell of young ones, but not the stale old ones.”
September 3 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Dorothy arrived. / Such a very very nice dinner at the Sampsons. Mr. [Charles E.] Sampson is the head of that house, for even the fine beautiful table linen is exquisitely marked with his initials & the silver too, has his lettering. He was very delightful. He told me how when he was a boy he crossed from Europe on the steamer with Emerson & how dear Emerson was, waiting on his sister who was an invalid [MTP TS 99- 100].
September 4 Wednesday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Isabel V. Lyon wrote for Sam to William Webster Ellsworth.
September 5 Thursday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam wrote to daughter Clara, now at the Hotel Victoria, Boston.
I, also, should have been disappointed dearheart, at your not coming, but that I am aware that there is no occasion to expect you until you arrive. And so while I knew you might come, & was strongly hoping you would, I was not really expecting it. Paine’s conundrum fits you as well as it fits me: “Why is Mr. Clemens’s mind like a time-table?”
“Because it is subject to change without notice.”
September 6 Friday – In his A.D. of Oct. 5, Sam wrote of having Dorothy Quick this week as a guest.
…we had her delightful society during seven days and nights. She is just eleven years old, and seems to be made of watch-springs and happiness. The child was never still a moment, when she wasn’t asleep, and she lit up this place like the sun. It was a tremendous week, and an uninterruptedly joyful one for us all. After she was gone, and silence and solitude had resumed their sway, we felt as if we had been through a storm in heaven.
September 7 Saturday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: Dinner at the Deacons, and it was very lovely. I sat between Mr. Deacon and Mr. Condert, the latter is very interesting, and we bored each other to a nicety. But Mr. Deacon always has some good prosy interesting thing to talk about. He was telling me about Vernon Lee, and her extreme plainness and her delightfulness; and about her half brother Mr. Hamilton. He met them in Florence years ago, at a time when Hamilton was a great invalid; so great an invalid that the doctors could do no more for him.
September 8 Sunday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam wrote his june-bug…bird of paradise aphorism to Dorothy Quick [MTP].
September 9 Monday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Isabel V. Lyon wrote for Sam to Samuel E. Moffett. “Mr. Clemens asks me to thank you for sending to Washington for the lists for him.It was a pity you missed him so frequently, but we shall be back in New York about the first of November, not before I believe” [MTP].
September 10 Tuesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: “No. C.S. advertisements” [MTP TS 102].
Kate B. Lee wrote to ask Sam to write a piece on seasickness, as she suffered from it for two whole days and couldn’t explain it to friends [MTP]. Note: Lyon wrote on the letter, “Answd. Sept. 16, ‘07”
September 11 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal: I had what the King calls “an adventure” this rainy morning. A Mr. Ullman, a man who does writing for newspaper syndicates came out by appointment to see me and so write an article about the way the King spends his day. He was planning to make it seem as if he had really had “a day with Mark Twain” and only after continued determination on my part would he consent to have the interview come through me. He is to submit his ms. to me. When that was promised I could and did talk freely and we had a very good time.
September 12 Thursday – In Tuxedo Park, N.Y. Sam began a letter to Dorothy Quick who had left with Miss Lyon for New York City. Clemens added to the letter on Sept. 13 and 14. “Dorothy dear, you are gone, & I am dissatisfied” [MTAq 62].