November 20 Wednesday – Sam wrote two letters to his mother, Jane Clemens and family upon arriving in New York, and finished them this day.
—the Herald folks got me at 6 o’clock, & notwithstanding I had an engagement to dine at the St. Nicholas with some ladies [Mary Fairbanks and Charles Langdon have been identified]. & take them to the theatre, I sat down in one of the editorial rooms & wrote a long article that will make the Quakers get up & howl in the morning.
November 21 Thursday – After a dinner with the New York Herald’s editorial board, Sam took the night train to Washington, D.C [MTL 2: 109 n2; Bliss 58].
Sam’s “Holy Land Excursion. Letter from Mark Twain Number Twenty-five” dated Sept. 6 ran in the Alta California [McKeithan 168-72].
Elisha P. Bliss (1822-1880) of the American Publishing Co. wrote to Clemens:
November 22 Friday – Sam arrived in Washington, D.C. and roomed with his new employer, Senator William Morris Stewart (1827-1909) in a second-floor apartment run by 70-year-old Miss Virginia Wells. “Clemens took his meals and socialized at the Round Robin bar at the Willard Hotel (see insert picture)….a favorite watering hole of Washington power brokers” [Bliss 64].
November 24 Sunday – Sam wrote from Washington to Frank Fuller about his strategy for lecturing somewhere other than “in the provinces.”
November 25 Monday – Sam wrote from Washington, D.C. to Charles H. Webb, sending a penciled draft of the first two acts of a play about the Quaker City trip. He also confessed his inability to find a sweetheart named “Pauline” (unknown) and asked to be remembered to her [MTL 2: 115].
November 29 Friday – The New York Times ran a 1,700 word article on the front page signed by “Scupper Nong” about a meeting of a correspondent and General Ulysses S. Grant. Muller calls this the “Scupper Nong Letter” (in Chapter 3) and notes it was reprinted the following day in the Philadelphia Daily Evening Telegraph with the byline of Mark Twain [47]. The article was the result of Sam and Bill Swinton calling on Grant, who was not at home at the time.
November 30 Saturday – Sam’s 32nd birthday. “The Scupper Nong Letters—From the National Capital—An Interview with General Grant” ran in the Philadelphia Daily Evening Telegraph [Muller 47].
December 1 Sunday – Sam wrote from Washington, D.C. to John Russell Young about payment and questioned the amount of a $65 check he’d received. He also received a letter from Elisha P. Bliss, which he responded to the next day.
December 2 Monday – From Washington, Sam responded favorably to Bliss’ pitch, and asked for more particulars [MTL 2: 119-21].
On the same day Sam wrote Mary Mason Fairbanks:
December 4 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Washington to John Russell Young again, asking if he might use the three letters he had sent in the book he was planning for Bliss. “I am sorry to trouble you so much, but behold the world is full of sorrows, & grief is the heritage of man” [MTL 2: 125].
December 5 Thursday – Sam wrote from Washington to Miss Emeline Beach “Emma”, the seventeen year old daughter of Moses Beach, both of whom had been aboard the Quaker City. The Beach family was members of Henry Ward Beecher’s congregation, and Moses Beach took umbrage at Sam’s article about the passengers of the Quaker City.
December 8 Sunday – Sam’s “Holy Land Excursion. Letter from Mark Twain Number Twenty-nine” dated Sept. 17 ran in the Alta California [McKeithan 188-93].
December 10 Tuesday – Sam wrote from Washington to his mother and family about political prospects and about Mrs. Fairbanks.
December 12 Thursday – Sam wrote from Washington to Mary Mason Fairbanks. About Mary’s advice to get married, Sam gave the famous reply:
December 13 Friday – Sam wrote from Washington to Frank Fuller:
“I believe I have made a mistake in not lecturing this winter…I am already dead tired of being in one place so long. I have received 2 or 3 calls lately from N.Y. & Indiana towns. When are you coming down? I might take a ‘disgust’ any moment & sail for Cal” [MTL 2: 136].
December 14 Saturday – Sam dated an article this day, “Colonel Burke and the Fenians,” a humorous article for the Washington Evening Star, which was reprinted in many newspapers, including the Territorial Enterprise. The article suggested using a barrel of gunpowder to remove Edwin M. Stanton from office [Fatout, MT Speaks 50].
December 15 Sunday – Sam’s “Holy Land Excursion. Letter from Mark Twain Number Thirty” dated Sept. at “Banias” ran in the Alta California [McKeithan 193-8].
Sam’s article, “Letter from Mark Twain. The Facts in the Case of the Senate Door Keeper” dated Dec. 15, ran in the New York Citizen [Camfield, bibliog.].
December 16 Monday – Sam announced to his Territorial Enterprise readers that he had resigned his secretaryship, and that “E.A. Pretois, formerly of Virginia and Sacramento, is Senator Stewart’s private secretary, now” [MTL 2: 139n4]. Note: Sam and Senator Stewart did not hit it off, and the position had not kept Sam’s interest. Once again the vagabond itch came over Sam.
December 18 Wednesday – Sam’s article “Information Wanted” dated Dec. 10, ran in the New York Tribune [Camfield, bibliog.; The Twainian, Nov-Dec 1946 p.1-2]. Note: There is no connection with George Francis Train on this entry as mistakenly shown in the first edition.
December 20 Friday – Charles Langdon, along with his father, Jervis Langdon (1809-1870), and sister Olivia Louise Langdon, arrived at the St. Nicholas Hotel in New York for a holiday stay [MTL 2: 145 n2].
Sam included a prose poem parody on Poe’s “The Raven” in his letter to the Enterprise. “Quoth the Choctaw, ‘Nevermore’” [ET&S 2: 63].
December 22 Sunday – Sam’s MARK TWAIN’S LETTERS FROM WASHINGTON, NUMBER I, dated Dec. 4, ran in the Virginia City Enterprise:
December 24 Tuesday – Sam wrote from Washington, D.C. to Emily A. Severance about the death of Mrs. Fairbanks’ mother. After expressed sympathies, he wrote: “I am in a fidget to move.
December 25 Wednesday – Christmas – Sam arrived in New York for the holidays, and took a room in the Westminster Hotel [MTL 2: 142n1]. Since Sam did not arrive in New York until Dec. 25, Langdon family tradition and other scholars are incorrect that he met Olivia Langdon two days before Christmas.
December 26 Thursday – Sam moved to Dan Slote’s home, probably after only one night at the Westminster Hotel [MTL 2: 142n1]. One night during this week, Charles Langdon, Jack Van Nostrand, Dan Slote and Sam got together for a “blow-out” at Dan Slote’s house “& a lively talk over old times” [MTL 2: 144].
December 27 Friday – Sam accepted an invitation from the Langdons for dinner at the St. Nicholas Hotel. There he met Olivia Louise Langdon, his wife to be [MTL 2: 145n3]. (See Dec. 31 entry)