January 12 Friday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to cousin, Dr. James R. Clemens.
Are you home again, or still away?
Mrs. Clemens is up & out—yesterday, & again to-day. I think she only needs that Vienna albumen [Plasmon] now. Where does one get it? [MTP]. Note: Sam’s stationery continued to own a black-border for mourning.
On the back of an envelope dated Jan. 11, 1900, postmarked London, Sam wrote a list of notes about Samuel S. McClure’s offer
January 13 Saturday –At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to H.H. Rogers.
McClure is here & has made me a proposition [see Jan.11]. As I wanted to ask your advice, I have postponed my answer to the 1st of March.
He is going to start a new magazine next fall, whose complexion is to be peculiarly American; its writers to be nearly all of that nationality; & one of its projects is to help hatch out & develop the rising young American literature.
January 14 Sunday – In New York, William Dean Howells wrote to Sam of the horrors of the platform after his 50 performances on the road.
January 16 Tuesday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to Frank Bliss.
“Yes date the portrait 1900; & if it comes from the engraver clean & nice,—& I hope it will—send it to Mr. Rogers with my best compliments.”
January 17 Wednesday – Jonas Henrick Kellgren Osteopath, billed £37.16.0 for the first half of January, Jan. 16 & 17, 1900 included, for Livy and Jean’s treatments [1900 Financial file MTP].
January 18 Thursday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote a postcard and a letter to Poultney Bigelow (now in Chelsea, London) forwarding Harpers’ Jan. 6 referral of a request by J. Boyd Douglass. Sam asked Bigelow, “Will you transact this business for me?” Sam noted on the top margin about Harpers: “They retire from the position of helping me own my dramatic rights” [MTP].
January 19 Friday – Sam also wrote to Henry Ferguson.
I tried to get that new book out of the Harpers’s hands, but you will see by the Enclosed [HHR’s of Jan. 9, top of] that they say it is in press—& therefore too late.
However, there are two volumes—the shipwreck [Hornet, 1866] is to be in the second one, I believe; so your emendations will reach New York plenty early enough, I have no doubt. They go by tomorrow’s steamer.
January – In London, England Sam wrote an aphorism to an unidentified man:
“We ought never to do wrong when any one is looking. / Truly Yours / Mark Twain / London, Jan. 1900”
[MTP: Charles Hamilton catalog, 21 May 1965, No. 4, Item 31].
January 2 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “San Remo—4 rooms & bath, $125 to 150 a month, ohne Nahrung.[without food] / John Tablock,[sic Tatlock] jr 32 Nassau” [NB 43 TS 4]. Note: in his Apr. 20, 1900 to H.H. Rogers, Sam wrote they might stay at the Hotel San Remo, N.Y.C. upon their return to America.
January 20 Saturday – From the Royal Huts in Hindhead, England, Livy wrote to “Youth dear”:
January 21 Sunday – According to Livy’s letter of Jan. 20, the “two days” for a sitting room at the Royal Huts in Hindhead for herself and the girls, would have ended with this day, denoting a return to London either this evening or the following day.
January 23 Tuesday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam replied to Harper & Brothers’ Jan. 8 enclosure and query by Marie Wiertz, who wished to translate into French “Concerning the Jews.” Sam had no objections provided the postscript he’d written for the article, a copy of which he’d sent to H.H. Rogers, be added to the translation [MTP].
January 24 Wednesday – Sam and Livy dined with Sir William Wilson Hunter (1840-1900), Francis Henry Skrine, Frank Frankfort Moore (1855-1931), British dramatist, novelist, poet; and others [Life of Sir William Wilson Hunter, etc. by Francis Henry Skrine (1901) p. 477]. Hunter would die on Feb. 6. See also Feb. 8 and 26 entries.
January 25 Thursday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam began a reply to William Dean Howells’ Jan. 14 that Sam finished on Jan. 26.
Yes, the short things will be added to Bliss’s Uniform Edition. Harper will issue two volumes of them in the spring. I consented a couple of weeks before their smash. They decline to give them up, now.
January 26 Friday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam finished his Jan. 25 to William Dean Howells.
January 27 Saturday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to Joe Twichell [MTP:
Paine’s 1917 Mark Twain’s Letters, p.694].
DEAR JOE,—Apparently we are not proposing to set the Filipinos free and give their islands to them; and apparently we are not proposing to hang the priests and confiscate their property. If these things are so, the war out there has no interest for me.
January 29 Monday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to Felix Volkhovsky (1846 -1914). Many opponents of the Russian Czar fled Russia for the refuge of Britain. Volkhovsky fled from Siberia and settled in west London, where his home became a meeting place for a community of Russian émigrés.
January 3 Wednesday – Sam’s notebook: “Write Mr. Lawson about / Charles Stewart Walther Manager Estate Department—Army & Navy Stores (Auxiliary)” [NB 43 TS 4]. Note: unknown reference.
January 30 Tuesday – Sam tried to visit T. Douglas Murray, but the family was not at home [Jan. 31 to Murray].
January 31 Wednesday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to T. Douglas Murray, enclosing the introduction he wrote for the Official Trial Record of Joan of Arc.
I enclose the Introduction, corrected & reduced. I have retained several of the emendations made, & have added some others.
January 6 Saturday – Harper & Brothers wrote to Sam (this note was then forwarded by Sam on Jan. 18 to Poultney Bigelow:
We beg leave to enclose herewith a copy of a letter which we received from Mr. J. Boyd Douglass, in which he asks permission to use your story “The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg” as “an incentive for the construction of a “comedy drama.” We have advised Mr. Douglass that we have referred his request to you [MTP].
January 8 Monday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, England Sam wrote to Katharine I. Harrison, enclosing a typewritten sheet with sections XIV between his and Livy’s Dec. 31, 1896 contract with American Publishing Co., and V, and VI from his Dec. 31, 1896 contract between Harper & Brothers and the American Publishing Co. and Livy:
January 9 Tuesday – Henry Ferguson wrote from Hartford to Sam, enclosing a copy of Sam’s article about the Hornet saga from the Century with changes suggested.
“I should be glad to have the whole passage in regard to the supposed disaffection of the men omitted, but do not feel that I should urge this against your will if the other changes are made.” He added an interesting detail: “Captain Mitchell died on July 23rd 1876…he was taken ill in South America.” In either this or a separate note of this date Ferguson [MTP].
July 1 Sunday – At 30 Wellington Court in London, Sam wrote a postcard to John Y. MacAlister that he could not go to the Savage Club on the 8th. He would try to come by the next day but he might fail to do so as they were about to move and he had to “do a private reading in the afternoon” [MTP].
July 10 Tuesday – Sam’s notebook: “Dr. Haig, 7 Brook st (just around the corner.) / A.D. Provand, M.P. 2 Whitehall Court SW / The pocket-mine (or Frenchman’s Tunnel) in 1855. The 3 meet there again, aged 75) & strike it rich. But the girl, oh where is she? Chapparal quail” [NB 43 TS 21].
Will M. Clemens replied to Sam’s objections in his June 6 reply.