Vol 3 Section 0971

Sam also wrote to Robertus Love, reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

I have read it, & it is true. How morals have changed since I was a journalist. I wish to say good-bye & good luck to you & all my other Missouri friends—we are sailing for Italy, on Saturday, for a years sojourn, the doctors promising that the climate will restore Mrs Clemens’s broken health [MTP: St. Louis Post-Dispatch,

Dec. 13, 1903, p.3].

Sam also wrote to Frank N. Doubleday. Cue: “Good-bye, dear old man. It has been impossible to” [MTP].

UCCL 12875 letter is not currently available.

Sam’s notebook: “Harvey, lunch—will tell me where. / [Horiz. Line separator] / Harper page has 114 lines of 8 words each: at 30 cents a word, this is $2.40 a line. Broken lines (dialogue) reduce the page by 6 lines on an average. So the page is worth only about $260” [NB 46 TS 27].

October 22 Thursday – At the Grosvenor Hotel in N.Y.C. Sam wrote to William H. Gillette at the Plaza Hotel in N.Y.C.

Thank you for the verses—fervently. They are lovely. I shall enter heaven singing these hymns. If you believe me, it will Excite Interest. And all parties will clap me on the back—(in private)—& say “Go it!” But not in public, dear sir, not in public; for heaven is not going to change the human being’s nature. …

[written sideways in top margin] P. S. Don’t you leave any of these numbers out—put in every line; including those suppressed in Job. If the 8th line’s merely unfactful, can’t you say “thinks” instead of “Job “says?” [MTP].

Sam also wrote to John Y. MacAlister in London, revealing a momentous signing on this day:

Substantially, we are ready for sea; the trunks will go on board to-morrow afternoon; we follow next morning, & sail at 11 a.m., direct for Genoa. The madam has not lost ground, but has gained a trifle, maybe.

We have just received the name of the Florentine house which we have taken for a year:

Villa Reale di Quarto

Address:                                                           Florence

The contract with the Harpers was signed to-day—& that job’s over [MTP].

Livy also wrote to Emilie R. Rogers (Mrs. H.H. Rogers).

What a delicious mass of flowers followed in your wake this afternoon. You had scarcely left our door when my maid brought them in. When I saw the box I knew they were from you. They are a great delight to us all. Thank you more than I can express for all your kind thoughts and expressions toward us.

I was so very sorry to have so short a visit with you today. If our “palace” proves to be one that we can make you and Mr Rogers comfortable in, I do hope that you will come over there….[MTHHR 540-1].

George B. Harvey of Harpers gave a dinner party in honor of Mark Twain at the Metropolitan Club.

The New York Times, p.BR10, reported the event:

MARK TWAIN

———

One of the most daring and ingenious of our critics of literature lately has been classifying Mark Twain with Aristophanes and Rabelais. The classification can do no harm to anybody, not even to Mark Twain, while it certainly does credit to the heart of the critic. Mr. Clemens is assuredly one of the great men of this hour, which, from a practical point of view, is better than being either Aristophanes or Rabelais. The author

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