December 7 Wednesday – Isabel Lyon’s journal contains an entry for this date: “And then Mr. Thomas Bailey Aldrich came in to ask Mr. Clemens and Jean to go tonight to see a tragedy that he has recently written.” Note: The play was Judith of Bethulia, a Tragedy, which was his dramatization of an earlier poem, “Judith and Holofernes” (1896); Her Journal also contained: “This has been a day of events—for this morning Mr. [Finley Peter] Dunne came for a closeting with Mr. Clemens” [Gribben 16: 1903-1906 Diary, TS 31, MTP]. The New York Times, Dec.

December 8 Thursday – Mary C. Waters wrote to Sam, having read his Joan of Arc article in the Dec. Harper’s. She enclosed an article, no longer extant [MTP].

December 9 Friday – On or after this day at 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Sam replied to the Nov. 6 from A. Silk.

“Dear Sir: / I thank you for the library catalogue cutting for I have often wanted to know what that Diary is—and now find by the heading that it is philosophical or religious or both—and I am glad to know—“ [MTP]. Note: the “Diary” was “Extracts of Adam’s Diary.”

December 10 Saturday – At 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Sam wrote to Robert Underwood Johnson, thanking him for being elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters on Dec. 2. Johnson was the Secretary of the National Institute of Arts and Letters, which founded the Academy in emulation of the French Academy, and formed to “foster, assist, and sustain excellence” in American literature, music, and art [MTP].

December 11 Sunday – William B. Throop wrote from Aurora, Ill. to Sam, asking where he might find the old story of a man who went to Washington to collect money due on a beef contract [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote “ ‘Roughing It,’ I think,” at the top.

December 12 Monday – Hal W. Greer, attorney in Beaumont, Texas, wrote to Sam, thanking him for “The $30,000 Bequest” in Harper’s Weekly, Christmas edition [MTP].

I.M. Horsfall wrote from London to Sam, having just read his article Joan of Arc in the Dec.Harper’s. He enclosed a sonnet on Joan by his blind daughter [MTP].

December 13 Tuesday – Ralph W. Ashcroft wrote “Due back Jan. 6th S.S. Lucania” on a postcard picturing Trafalgar Square, London [MTP].

R. Howard Krause and Mrs., in Kidderminster, England, sent a Christmas card to Sam [MTP].

December 15 Thursday – In Keokuk, Iowa Edward F. Brownell wrote to Isabel Lyon to clarify if the Dec. allowance for Tabitha “Puss” Quarles (Greening) was to be increased to $25 or if the $15 was to be added to her allowance [MTP].

December 16 Friday – Sam wrote to Andrew M. Clute, NY attorney, requesting that the canceled contracts for the sale of the Tarrytown house be returned to William Evarts Benjamin, Sam’s friend and attorney who had handled the sale. This letter is not extant but referred to in the following from Clute:

December 17 Saturday – At 21 Fifth Ave. in N.Y.C. Sam wrote an autograph for Avery (not further identified): “To Avery—with kind remembrances of / Mark Twain / Dec. 1904” [MTP: Smith, Perline & Co. catalogs, Apr. 7, 1995, Item 782].

Ralph W. Ashcroft wrote to Sam [MTP]. UCCL 39141 letter is not currently available.

George W. Reeves wrote to Sam. “The copies of contract enclosed I will ask you not to sign until Mr. Benjamin has approved of them…If satisfactory, I will call with duplicates with Mr. Gardiner’s signature” [MTP].

December 19 Monday – Eleanor L. Nicholas wrote a “begging letter” from Montpelier, Vt. To Sam, who wrote on the envelope: “Curiosity” [MTP].

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].

December 23 Friday – Attorney John Larkin wrote to Sam, clearing up matters of the transfer tax on the Tarrytown property on Livy’s estate. He had had “considerable correspondence with Mr. Jervis Langdon” on the matter and prepared “additional affidavits which I believe will satisfy the transfer tax appraiser” but Sam would have to swear to an affidavit before a notary and return the document to Larkin [MTP].

December 25 Sunday – The New York Times ran a feature article on p. SM1, “Mark Twain— His Autobiography; Rescued from Oblivion After a Third of a Century,” headed by several engravings and photos. See Insert of sketch, captioned: “The latest portrait study of Mark Twain from photograph by Marceau.” The sketch also noted by J.A. Williams.

December 27 Tuesday – William E. Benjamin wrote to Sam, enclosing the Hoyt bill for the balance of commission on the sale of the Tarrytown house amounting to $800. In case the sale fell through all would be returned [MTP].

Nathan Haskell Dole wrote from Jamaica Plains, NY to invite Sam to the Boston Authors’ Club 12 night dinner on either Jan. 6 or 7 [MTP].

December 28 Wednesday – Dr. Matthew Gaffney wrote from Newark to Sam. He’d written before asking for “Just a word” about Rev. Dr. Edward McGlynn and Henry George, to be included in a bio of the former [MTP]. Note: Lyon wrote on the letter that she’d written him saying in time his letter would be put in front of Sam, who had been ill.

December 29 Thursday – Marion von Kendler wrote from Vienna, Austria to Sam, noting the old year had been a cruel one for him and wishing him better with healing of time in the new year [MTP].

December 30 Friday – Herbert Ashcroft of the Koy -Lo Co. wrote to Sam. “I am today in receipt of a cable from my brother stating that the London Plasmon Company will not make any contract and that they prefere to stand the ‘freeze out’ with which they are threatened. He also confirms …that he will return on the ‘Lucania’ arriving her probably Saturday morning, the 7th prox.” [MTP].

E. Prentiss Bailey of the Utica Observer (NY) wrote to Sam.

December 31 Saturday – Sam’s notebook: “The puppy & the Christian are born blind. The puppy gets over it” [NB 47 TS 17].

George Standring sent Sam a 3×4” card with his name nicely written in the center, and in the upper left corner, was printed:

“A PLAIN CARD: FROM A PLAIN MAN: WITH NEW YEAR GREETING; WISHING YOU ALL THE GOOD YOU CAN REASONABLY HOPE FOR OR DESIRE IN THE YEAR NOW ABOUT TO BEGIN—–FROM GEORGE STANDRING TO” [MTP].

January [1905]– In N.Y.C. Sam spent the last part of December and all of January in bed, recovering from another case of bronchitis, followed by attacks of gout in his feet [Jan. 8 Lyon to Whitmore; Jan. 25 to Crane].

Sam wrote to the International Plasmon Co., London

January 1905-December 1909 – Sam wrote two drafts to be used to unidentified persons, thanking for a letter rec’d. In the first draft he saw no objection to the translation of Sam’s article on JA “for private circulation,” but that permission would have to come from Chatto & Windus; in the second draft he did not mention a specific work of his but referred the writer to Harper & Brothers [MTP]. Note: these two notes were likely boiler-plate to be used to many requests for use of Sam’s work.

Continue on to 1905:

January 1 Sunday – Sam’s notebook: contains a list of things to do lined through as if completed:

• Ask about Congo.
• And X S book.
• And Howells article—give it to Century
• Lacks loud humor [NB 47A TS 1].

January 2 Monday Sam’s notebook: contains an aphorism circled, followed by a list of things to do lined through as if completed:

• The lack of money is the root of all evil.
• Satan article.
• Change now to Dublin
• Speak of FLYNT [NB 47A TS 1].

January 3 Tuesday – Charles Langdon wrote to Sam, enclosing a check for $120, payment of coupons on bonds (Park Co. Montana, and General Electric Co.) which had been owned by Susie Clemens [MTP].

Sam’s notebook:

Reduce p.c. on Congo.
Do you want Jean’s new article?
Man born with fal[s]e teeth
Palmistry article [with hand pointing up to next page] [NB 47A TS 1].

January 4 Wednesday – The Aberdeen (S.D.) Daily News, p. 2, “Mark Twain’s Pranks” reported reminiscences by Captain H. Lacy, who was born in Hannibal in 1839. Lacy claims it was not Jim Wolfe who was the victim of the famous skeleton-in-bed prank (sometime in the 1840s), but “a tramp printer named Snell,” who “blew into Hannibal one day and was given work on the paper.” Lacy claimed to be along on the prank; his account offers not only adifferent victim than has been imagined (see MTL 1: 18n4; also Ch. 23 TA) but a different outcome: