Vol 3 Section 0780

Elisabeth Brochmann wrote to Sam from someplace in Europe asking for permission to translate some of his stories [MTP].

August 27 Wednesday – In York Harbor Sam wrote to Katharine B. Clemens (Mrs. James Ross Clemens) in St. Louis.

Your kind good letter of day before yesterday has just arrived—we got the former one, too, but we do not tell Livy anything; we only sit by & watch & nurse. She cannot bear excitement—& any talk would produce that.

We are not alarmed about her—it is the best I can say.

I steal a little while per day to answer letters with a line.

I send the household’s love to you all [MTP]. Note: Sam addressed her as “Cousin Caroline.”

In his long letter to the President of Western Union, Sam told of Clara Clemens telegraphing Mrs. Bunce in Brooklyn asking for the address of Miss Garrety, a trained nurse. After receiving the telegraph, Mrs. Bunce sent the nurse to them for Livy, who had suffered an attack on Aug. 11-12. Note: Sam wrote this was Saturday morning, Aug. 27—which was a Wednesday. He may have been off on the date, what with the stress of Livy’s illness. So, if a Saturday, it may have been Aug. 23 or Aug. 30.

Sam also wrote to H.H. Rogers.

We are scheming on a most difficult problem: how to move Mrs. Clemens to Elmira—say a month from now or a few days later. It is not expected that she will be strong enough by that time to sit up in a train, but the idea is to move her from Boston by Albany & Binghampton in a sleeping-stateroom.

The gap between here & Boston is not coverable by land, in any thinkable way. Could you cruise around to York Harbor about that time, do you think, & take us to Boston in the yacht? Mrs. Clemens does not want me to put it before you. I said there could be no indelicacy in putting it before you, for the reason that you do not dodge around stumps, but are a frank man, & will say no if the project would be inconvenient—as indeed it may, for you may be going away on a summer excursion.

She is tired of the bed, & longing to get away—go somewhere—anywhere, for a change—& there is but one place will she will be entirely at home, & that is at “Quarry Farm,” our summer home in the early days, on the hill-top 1300 feet above sea-level. The doctor recognizes the wisdom—& maybe the necessity—of moving her.

She was getting along fairly well—so much so that during the past three days I have hardly been a sick-nurse at all, but have written a story—8,000 words, which is more than 4 days’ work. But in the house, of course, & close at hand. Mrs. Crane occupies my study, in Mr. Sewell’s house. No work now for a while, I suppose. It looks that way. She had a bad night, & has lost ground a little. She will pick it up, though, I believe

[MTHHR 499-500].

Sam also wrote to Howard E. Wright of American Plasmon Co. in N.Y. asking if there was a form of plasmon that Livy could take since she was not eating small amounts of solid foods every three hours; plasmon in water would not stay down. He hoped to “flee to Elmira” as soon as she was able to move

[MTP].

Sam’s notebook includes many of his literary works, pending submission or publication:

Also, Death-Disk & / Californian’s Tale

Send “Heaven or Hell” to Harper?

“Amended Obituaries” to Collier?

“Xn Science” to Collier, first serializing second part with Walker & then the book to Collier? (including the above, with one title on each back of it) on a guaranteed sale of so many copies. Either a $1 or $1.50 book.

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