Vol 3 Section 0549

“The Niagara Book” will shortly be re-published by Doubleday, Page & Co. with additions and revisions. As originally presented eight years ago by Underhill & Nichols, it was a souvenir of Niagara Falls; in its new form it will rather be a souvenir of the Buffalo Pan-American Exposition. New sketches, stories, and essays have been added to it from the pens of Mark Twain, W.D. Howells, Prof. N.S. Shaler, and others. [Note: see other entries on the Niagara Book.]

March 3 Sunday – Sam’s notebook: “Taught dog the Morse alphabet” [NB 44 TS 6].

N.E. Guyot wrote from Cripple Creek, Colo. agreeing with his “Sitting in Darkness” article.

I served as a private soldier in the Colorado Regiment and was on the Island of Luzon from July 18, 1898 until July 16, 1899. We thought we went there to liberate the Filipinos even as other American soldiers went to Cuba to help free the Cubans. But the Americans who crossed the Pacific “to liberate” remained there to enslave….I congratulate you on your overwhelming truthful exposition of the great crime [MTP]. Note: Sam wrote on the env. “from a solider / first rate”

March 4 Monday – In N.Y.C., Sam replied to Gilbert A. Tracy’s Feb. 27 letter.

“Although you, in charity and kindness for a busy man, have forborne to require an answer, I cannot deny myself the pleasure of saying, out of my heart, I thank you” [MTP]. Note: Tracy, of Putnam, Conn. later

published Uncollected Letters of Abraham Lincoln (1917); he claimed to have known Lincoln well.

Sam also wrote to Lewis Frank Walden (ca 1835-1924), a boyhood pal of Hannibal, Mo.

Dear Frank:— / I was glad to get your letter [not extant] and find that you are still with the living. I remember your wife very well, as a girl; and of course as one’s memory takes but little account of time, she has remained to me what she was 50 or 60 years ago. I find it difficult to realize that she has been married 47 years [Hannibal Evening Courier Post, Mar. 6, 1935, p.9C]. Note: The article states that Walden was pastor of the Edinburg Methodist Church in Hannibal at this time. See Mar. 2 and 3, 4, 1870 entry for more on Walden.

Laura C. Burgess of Scarsdale, N.Y. wrote to invite Sam to be the guest of Smith College Alumnae Luncheon at the Manhattan Hotel on April 6. She added they’d appreciated “Sitting in Darkness” article

[MTP].

Franklin Pierce, N.Y. Attorney wrote a long letter complimenting Twain’s “Sitting in Darkness” article

[MTP].

Colonel Munster wrote compliments of Twain’s “Sitting in Darkness” article, but only the envelope survives with Sam’s notation of Munster’s approval [MTP]. Note: not further identified.

March 5 Tuesday – Edwin A. Brenholtz of Turnersville, Tex. wrote to Sam with a clear and elegant hand, calling him “The Voice” and complimenting “Sitting in Darkness” [MTP]. Note: Sam replied Mar. 18.

         Waterman of Cambridge, Mass. wrote from Montreal to compliment “Sitting in Darkness” [MTP].

March 6 Wednesday – Charlotte R. Conover (Mrs. Frank Conover) of Dayton, Ohio wrote for the Young Woman’s League asking “something from the pen of Mark Twain” for their fund-raising bazar [MTP].

SLC used mourning border for most letters from Susy’s death on, then from Livy’s death on.