September 19 Monday – In Kaltenleutgeben, Austria, Sam wrote to John Brisben Walker, owner of Cosmopolitan.
Sure it’s the illegant conscience you’ve got, & few there be that can afford such an expensive one. Yes, the second cheque astonished—& gratified—me. I didn’t know what it was for; I merely uttered my little prayer of humble thanks & went & cashed it. Many would have thought God sent it; but I knew by the signature it was you.
September 2 Friday – In Kaltenleutgeben, Austria, Sam wrote to Edward Bok, editor of the Ladies’ Home Journal, suggesting “My Platonic Sweetheart” as suitable “for a periodical whose specialty is the fireside, the home.” It was longer than Bok had wanted and Sam’s price was $1,000, but Sam was mailing it that day—if Bok didn’t want it would he please mail it to H.H. Rogers.
September 20 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook entry of Sept. 21 related a dinner tale of this evening:
September 21 Wednesday – In Kaltenleutgeben, Austria, Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers that he was “finishing an article about the assassination of the Empress” Elisabeth of Austria (see Sept. 17 entry for long excerpt from “The Memorable Assassination.”) If Edward Bok rejected and returned “My Platonic Sweetheart” Sam would like for Katharine I. Harrison to offer Bok the assassination piece, which would be shorter and cheaper. Life was less stressful now in Vienna:
September 22 Thursday – Lt. Colonel F.B. Bowyer-Lane of the Nimrod Club wrote to Sam, letter not extant but referred to in Sam’s Sept. 25 notebook entry [NB 40 TS 46].
September 25 Sunday – In Kaltenleutgeben, Austria, Sam wrote to Bram Stoker in London.
“Mr. Bowyer-Lane thinks that possibly he can place the ‘Bartel Turaser.’ What do you advise? Will you communicate with him? Or will you tell me what to say? Do you know him?” [MTP]. Note: “Lane-Bowen of the Nimrod Club” was the name Sam used in his July 6 to Chatto & Windus. He remains unidentified. “Bartel” is the play Sam had translated. See Mar. 15, Sept. 10 entries.
September 26 Monday – In Kaltenleutgeben, Austria, Sam wrote to Edward W. Bok offering “The Memorable Assassination” piece for $600, which he had just completed and sent to H.H. Rogers with a “photo or two of the Empress & the funeral procession” [MTP]. Note: Sam gave his future “New address: Hotel Krantz, Neuemarket Vienna.”
Sam also wrote to Katharine I. Harrison, letter not extant but referred to in this notebook entry:
September 27 Monday – Salzburg, Austria: a gray and dreary day, rain threatened. At noon the Thomas Cook agent took the Clemens party from the hotel to the train station. At 12:40 the train left the station bound for Vienna, Austria, about 185 miles away. At 7 p.m. they arrived at the Kaiserin Elisabeth Westbahnhof, the western rail terminal in Vienna. There was a steady cold, but light rain. After a search they found two porters (Droschkes) to haul party and luggage [Dolmetsch 24; Sept. 29 to Barr; NB 42 TS 39].
September 28 Tuesday – Early in the morning the family set out to find more suitable accommodations. In his Sept. 19 to Robert Barr, Sam recounted they’d had to apply at “nineteen hotels” to finally secure rooms at what Dolmetsch calls the “fashionable” Hotel Metropole on Franz-Josefs-Kai [26]. Sam’s notebook gives the total hotels at fifteen, seven on Sept. 27 and eight on Sept. 28 [NB 42 TS 39]. Dolmetsch describes the hotel Metropole:
September 28 Wednesday – Gribben writes on Alfred von Berger’s Habsburg. Marchenspiel in drei Acten (Vienna 1898):
September 29 Wednesday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Austria Sam wrote to Robert Barr, relating that upon their arrival in Vienna the town was “filled exactly up to the brim.” He liked Barr’s article on him that would run in the Century Jan. 1898. He thanked him again for the thesaurus, not recalling whether he had or not (he had), and enclosed a “heartily & gracefully-said tribute to Kipling,” asking Barr to send it to him.
September 30 Thursday – At the Hotel Metropole in Vienna, Austria Sam wrote to Mrs. Laura Rothmann, thanking her for an advertisement sent on a rental house in Vienna by du Möblirte Wohnŭng.
Her note (not extant) had been delayed, but Sam wrote they would go tomorrow to look at the house, as we shall prefer housekeeping to boarding if we can situate ourselves satisfactorily” [MTP]. See Oct. 1 entry.
September 6 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook:
Am sending to Bok “My Platonic Sweetheart” (about 9,000 words—price $1000). Am writing him if he doesn’t (or does) want it, inform Mr. Rogers.
Am sending “Concerning the Jews” to Mr. Rogers. If Bok keeps the above send this one to Harper. But if Bok declines, send both to Harper, let him have his choice, then send the remaining one to Century [NB 40 TS 32].
September 9 Friday – Sam’s notebook:
“Sept. 9. Man hanged himself today, leaving wife & 2 chn & nothing else. He had lost 28 gulden gambling. Countess Wydenbruck took up a collection. Result, 180 gulden—just ten times what he lost
————
Man is fearfully & wonderfully made out of microbes” [NB 40 TS 32].
Despite their not having a reservation, the Clemenses’ plans for sojourning in Vienna were not unheralded. Before leaving Weggis Clemens had advised the American embassy in Vienna of his wish to have a furnished flat or house in the city, and by September 30, Bailey Hurst, the American consul general, had located a capacious furnished house, the Villa Silling, in a section called the “Cottageviertel” in suburban Döbling. Clemens had had a sudden attack of gout in his right foot that laid him up for a week, so he sent Olivia and Clara out in a fiaker the next day to inspect the villa.