February 8 Wednesday – George N. Stone, Chicago attorney, wrote to Sam, (at Players Club):
February 10 Friday – President William McKinley signed the peace treaty with Spain, with the U.S. paying Spain twenty million dollars for specific Spanish holdings in the Philippines. Many saw the payment as a purchase of the Philippines. The treaty turned Sam off about this being a just war and led to his staunch anti-imperialism. The treaty had been ratified by Congress on Jan. 9.
February 11 Saturday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to an unidentified man, that his “engagements already overburden me, & to add to them would not be wise” [MTP].
The Utica N.Y. Saturday Globe ran an article identifying the original of Colonel Sellers in The Gilded Age as James W. Wardner [Tenney 30: The Twainian Jan-Feb, 1957 p.4].
February 13 Monday – Chatto & Windus wrote to Sam “in reply to your letter of February 7th,” giving a list of his works which had not been given permission for translation into French: 1. More Tramps Abroad (FE); 2. JA; 3 TS,D; 4 TSA; 5 PW; 6 £ 1,000,000 Bank Note. Numbers 1, 3, 5 and 6 had already been translated into German by Robert Lutz of Stuttgart [MTP].
February 15 Wednesday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam replied to Charles Dudley Warner, whose letter is not extant.
Oh, I hope it isn’t a case of “never.” As nearly as we can guess, we shall get back home next fall. I recognise that the friends are passing, & that if we would see the remnant we must not delay too long. It has become a funeral procession, & if I want to get a good place in it I must apply soon.
February 17 Friday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Annette Hullah, a student of Theodor Leschetizky.
It was a very great pleasure you gave me in putting that book into my hands; it had ended-up a good many days comfortably & interestingly for me after my drudge of work. I thank you lots & lots.
February 18 Saturday – Hy Mayer’s article, “Unconventional Statues—V. ‘Would Make a Sphinx Laugh,’” ran in The Criterion (N.Y.), p.15: Tenney: “A full-page cartoon of MT, pipe in mouth, sitting in a lap of a laughing sphinx statue” [MTJ Bibliographic Issue Number Four 42:1 (Spring 2004) 7].
Richard Watson Gilder wrote to Sam [MTP:NYPL not yet in file]. In Gilder Letter-Press Book v.4 p. 189.
February 19 Sunday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam replied to H.H. Rogers, after receiving another letter (not extant) with profitable stock news:
February 24 Friday – Douglas M. Gane inscribed his book New South Wales and Victoria in 1885: “To Samuel L. Clemens, Esq., with compliments, from Douglas M. Gane, 24, 2, 99” [MTP]. See Gribben p. 251.
February 25 Saturday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Sam wrote to Richard Watson Gilder.
I have abandoned my Autobiography, & am not going to finish it; but I took a reminiscent chapter out of it some time ago & had it copyrighted & had it type-written, thinking it would make a readable magazine article; & sent it to my friend H.H. Rogers, 26 Broadway.
February 26 Sunday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam replied to (Major “Alligator Jack”) John B. Downing (1834-1914), Mississippi pilot for nearly three decades. Downing’s letter is not extant.
February 27 Monday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Frank Bliss.
The enclosed has just reached me from Mr. Rogers.
I don’t quite get the idea. Why should you want to take out repetitions of old copyrights? Do it if you want to, but it doesn’t seem necessary. …
If you are afraid I could be endangered by having property in my own name—but I couldn’t be, for I don’t owe money to anyone; I am out of debt.
February 28 Tuesday – Sam delivered the main after -dinner speech at a farewell banquet for Ambassador and Mrs. Charlemagne Tower at the Hotel Bristol. The dinner was sponsored by the American Colony in Vienna. Dolmetsch writes of Sam’s speech:
March – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Poultney Bigelow that he was sending a five-year supply of granules that Livy took for dysentery when watermelon wasn’t in season.
“I wouldn’t ask a physician any questions, for they know a great deal less about dysentery than a cow does…Discharge the physician and give them a trial” [MTP].
Sam wrote a maxim to an unidentified person: “Be good & you will be lonesome. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain / Viennna, March, 1899” [MTP].
March 1 Wednesday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam began a letter to John Kendrick Bangs that he added to on Mar. 11 and finished on Mar. 12. At this time Bangs was “Editor of the Departments of Humor” for Harper’s three publications.
March 2 Thursday – Sam inscribed his photograph to Countess Lutzow:
“It is best to do everything to-morrow, because it saves so much time to-day. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain / To Madam la Comtesse Lutzow / With salutations & homage of / S.L. Clemens / March 2, 1899” [MTP].
March 3 Friday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to James M. Tuohy of the N.Y. World, “obliged for the good news” that Rudyard Kipling was going to get well [MTP].
March 5 Sunday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam replied to James Ross Clemens, who evidently had sent his picture (not extant).
We were very glad to get the picture, & should have been still gladder if you had brought it yourself. You look neither strong nor hearty, & the trip could have done you good. Possibly we may have the pleasure of seeing you by the end of the summer, as we are hoping to end our long exile then, & shall expect to spend a moment or two in England on our way home.
March 7 Tuesday – In Vienna, Austria, Sam cabled Rudyard Kipling: “I TENDER MY SINCEREST CONDOLENCES / MARK TWAIN” [MTP]. Note: on Mar. 6 at 6:30 a.m., the Kiplings lost a daughter, Josephine (1892-1899). Rudyard had been seriously ill with inflammation of the lungs since early Feb. See Carrington, p.225-6.
March 8 Wednesday – Sam had agreed to give a reading and speech in German at a benefit for a charity hospital in the Festsaal of the Kaufmännische, where he had given his Concordia speech on Oct. 31, 1897. He shared the platform with Auguste Wilbrandt-Baudius) .
March 9 Thursday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam replied to Francis H. Skrine, whose letter is not extant. Evidently the Skrines had offered to rent a house reasonably to the Clemenses when they returned to London.
“If we were going to abide in London again you wouldn’t have to make that offer twice, but we shall merely pass through, on our way home next autumn. If I see anyone here who wants a house I will remember & speak” [MTP].
March 10 Friday – In Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Auguste Wilbrandt-Baudius (Mrs. Adolf von Wilbrandt).
“I am rested-up again, & am young again; & as my first pleasure I wish to thank you in the best & heartiest words for taking half my burden off my shoulders, & for so stirring the hearts of those people with the beauty & pathos of your reading; & for saying those gracious things of me.”
March 11 Saturday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam added to his Mar. 1 letter to John Kendrick Bangs that he finished on Mar. 12.
March 11. I got interrupted there; & have since prepared & delivered a lecture for a charity—it cost me a raft of time.
March 12 Sunday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam added a P.S. to his Mar. 1 and Mar. 11 letter to John Kendrick Bangs:
Please suppress “The Great Republic’s Peanut Stand” till you hear from me again.
March 14 Tuesday – At the Hotel Krantz in Vienna, Austria, Sam wrote to Richard Watson Gilder.
What is it about the “$100 clause” & my “screed on the subject,” & “that wonderful work” of mine? I can’t guess it out—nor Mrs. Clemens. And what is it the Evening Post is attacking? We don’t see the papers in this remote place.