Autobiography of Mark Twain

by Mark Twain

  76.2–7 pay to him his share of that loss . . . deficit of eighteen or nineteen thousand dollars could amount to four thousand] Scott’s accounts showed a payout of $8,000 to Webster, who claimed he had drawn only $4,000. In a contract dated 1 April 1887 (NPV) Clemens raised Webster’s salary by $800 a year for five years to compensate for his loss. He later regretted his generosity, and suggested that Webster “relinquish & sacrifice” his raise to pay the salary of a new employee (28 Dec 1887 to Webster, NPV, in MTBus, 389–90). Some of the stolen funds were recovered—an estimated $8,000—partly from the sale of the house that Scott had been building in his home town of Roseville, New Jersey (Webster to SLC, 29 Dec 1887, CU-MARK; N&J3, 315–16 n. 46, 322 n. 66, 323 n. 70; MTBus, 349).

  76.10–16 ex-preacher, a professional revivalist . . . a gross sum of thirty-six thousand dollars, and Webster never got a cent of it] The Iowa agent, R. T. Root, was a member of the American Bible Society. A fellow member later described him as the embodiment of piety “to outward appearances,” but in reality a swindler who paid his debts only when “it suited his conscience” (Antrobus 1915, 1:363; American Bible Society 1872, appendix, 9). In mid-1885 Clemens received a warning from his brother Orion (then living in Keokuk, Iowa) that Root was “a sharper,” but replied with confidence that half of the general agencies “have made sales so greatly exceeding their contracts, that the other half could default, now, without hurting the book or me, either; but none of them will default. Such a thing is entirely out of the question” (OC to SLC, 21 Aug 1885, CU-MARK; 30 Aug 1885 to OC, CU-MARK). Orion was proved right, however, when Root defaulted on a debt to Webster and Company of about $30,000. In June 1888 Root offered to settle for $8,000, but was refused. In early 1889 a court judgment awarded the company the full amount, but only $9,000 was recovered, $7,000 of which was paid to Mrs. Grant for her share of the settlement (Hall to SLC, 8 June 1888, CU-MARK; N&J3, 390 n. 306).

  76.30–33 Joe Jefferson wrote me and said . . . He simply ignored it] Joseph Jefferson (1829–1905) was born into a theatrical family and became a leading comedian of his day. His signature role was in Rip Van Winkle, adapted from the story by Washington Irving, which he played for forty years. He and Clemens had been acquainted since at least 1885. On 11 May 1887 Clemens wrote to Webster, “Joe Jefferson has written his Autobiography! You see, by George we’ve got to keep places open for great books; they spring up in the most unexpected places.” Jefferson sent his manuscript to Clemens, who found it “delightful reading” (11 May 1887 and 28 May 1887 to Webster, NPV, in MTBus, 382, 383). Five months later Jefferson wrote to Webster:

  I presumed from the long silence that followed my correspondence with Mr. Clemens—to whom I am under many obligations—that you had given up the idea of publishing my book. Being under this impression I began negociations with another firm.

  Should the terms it may propose be unacceptable I will be pleased to write you on this subject. I would have replied to your letter before but have lately been acting in the West and your communication only reached me yesterday. (20 Oct 1887, NPV)

  The Autobiography of Joseph Jefferson was published by the Century Company in 1890.

  76.33–34 He accepted and published two or three war books that furnished no profit] The first of these war books was McClellan’s Own Story: The War for the Union, by Major General George Brinton McClellan, published posthumously in December 1886. This was followed in 1887 by The Genesis of the Civil War: The Story of Sumter 1860–1861, by Brigadier General Samuel Wylie Crawford, and Tenting on the Plains, by Elizabeth B. Custer, widow of General George A. Custer (see also AD, 8 Oct 1906, note at 247.30). Finally, in 1888, the company issued the Personal Memoirs of General Philip Henry Sheridan (N&J3, 269 n. 141). According to a later recollection by Frederick J. Hall, Webster’s successor, the “military memoirs” were initially successful, but sales rapidly declined (Hall 1947). Clemens’s notebooks of the period are peppered with comments and calculations relating to the poor sales and diminishing profits of all the Webster and Company books (see, for example, N&J3, 303 n. 12, 310, 332, 429–31). Clemens himself had entertained high hopes for these books. But by October 1888 it was clear, according to Hall, that “war literature of any kind and no matter by whom written is played out. We have got to hustle everlastingly to get rid of 75,000 sets of Sheridan. I had set my mind on 100,000 sets but am forced to lessen this figure. There is not a man today who could write another book on the war and sell 5000 in the whole country” (15 Oct 1888 to SLC, CU-MARK).

  76.40 It doesn’t contain words enough for the price and dimensions] Clemens is probably referring to Almira Russell Hancock’s book about her husband, Reminiscences of Winfield Scott Hancock (1887). This book was one-third as long as the other war books: even in large type it contained only three hundred and forty pages, and was padded with appendixes and full-page illustrations. According to Paine, it did not pay for the cost of manufacture (N&J3, 320 n. 60, 360 n. 191; MTB, 2:856).

  77.7–17 he had agreed to resurrect Henry Ward Beecher’s “Life of Christ” . . . money was eventually returned] Beecher, the famous liberal pastor of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn, had published the first volume of his Life of Jesus, the Christ, in 1871 with J. B. Ford and Company, but the second volume remained incomplete. In January 1887 Beecher agreed to write his autobiography for publication through Webster and Company. First, however, he planned to finish the Life of Jesus so that Webster could publish a complete edition. Beecher received a $5,000 advance against royalties for both works, but died on 7 March before fulfilling his contract. After lengthy negotiations, his family returned the advance in December 1888 (Hall to SLC, 27 Dec 1888, and Webster to SLC, 26 Jan 1887, CU-MARK; 11 Jan 1889 to Hall, VtMiM, in MTLP, 252; N&J3, 276 n. 169). The “ruinous scandal” began in September 1872, less than a year after the first volume of the Life of Jesus appeared, when Beecher was accused of committing adultery with a parishioner (see AD, 10 Oct 1906, note at 253.17–22).

  77.18–19 Webster kept back a book of mine, “A Yankee at the Court of King Arthur,” . . . published it so surreptitiously] Clemens did not complete A Connecticut Yankee until the spring of 1889, and it was published later that year. By that time Webster had sold his interest in the business and retired, and it was his successor, Frederick J. Hall (see the note at 78.14–15), who produced the book on a lightning schedule (CY, 571–72, 577–89; 12 Nov 1888 to Hall [2nd], NN-BGC, in MTLP, 251 n. 3).

  77.20–22 He suppressed a compilation made by Howells and me, “The Library of Humor,” . . . there was such a book] Beginning in late 1880 Clemens developed a plan to collaborate on an anthology, Mark Twain’s Library of Humor, with William Dean Howells and Charles Hopkins Clark, an editor with the Hartford Courant (Clemens discusses this book further in AD, 17 July 1906; for Clark see AutoMT1, 576 n. 317.33). They planned to publish it through James R. Osgood, but when his company failed in May 1885 the work had not yet been completed. Webster and Company bought the rights to all of Osgood’s Mark Twain titles, including the Library of Humor. By the time Howells, the principal compiler, had completed the work in late 1885, he was under contract to Harper and Brothers and could not let his name appear “except over their imprint.” Clemens paid him for his work, but decided to “pigeon-hole it & wait a few years & see what new notion Providence will take concerning it” (Howells to SLC, 16 Oct 1885, CU-MARK, in MTHL, 2:537; 18 Oct 1885 to Howells, NN-BGC, in MTHL, 2:538–39; for Howells see AutoMT1, 475 n. 70.19). In early 1887 Howells proposed giving the Library of Humor to Harpers. Webster objected, but admitted that he could not publish it until “we get some of the important pressing things off our hands,” assuring Clemens that it “cannot get too old, it will always sell” (Webster to SLC, 17 Feb 1887, CU-MARK). By the summer of 1887 Clemens had become impatient, frustrated by the need to secure permissions and arrange for illustrations. Later that year he wrote in his notebook, “Lib Humor ought to have issued & sold 100,000, fall of ’86, stead of being balled-up with Custer & Cox in the win
ter of 87–8” (N&J3, 360). The book was finally issued in 1888; its sales were good, but not as high as Clemens had hoped (3 Aug 1887 to Webster, NN-BGC, in MTLP, 221–22; 15 Aug 1887 to Hall and Webster, NN-BGC, in MTLP, 223–24; N&J3, 35–36 n. 67, 276 n. 172, 302–3 n. 10; MTB, 2:857; for the later edition, published by Harpers, see AD, 17 July 1906; for the book by Sunset Cox, see AD, 18 Dec 1906, note at 318.39–40).

  77.23–24 William M. Laffan told me that Mr. Walters, of Baltimore . . . illustrate in detail his princely art collection] William Mackay Laffan (1848–1909), a longtime friend of Clemens’s, was born in Ireland and emigrated to America as a young man. From 1877 he wrote on art and drama for the New York Sun, with which paper he would be connected for the next thirty-two years, as publisher, general manager, and eventually proprietor. An authority on Chinese ceramics, he served as a trustee of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (“W. M. Laffan Dead of Appendicitis,” New York Times, 20 Nov 1909, 11; Mitchell 1924, 352). William Thompson Walters (1819–94) was born in Pennsylvania and made his fortune in commerce, banking, and railroads. His collection had special strengths in French paintings and Asian ceramics; it became the core of the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, which opened to the public in 1934.

  77.31 you can make a fortune out of that without any trouble] In a letter of 13 January 1887 to Webster, Clemens estimated the “probable” profit to be $750,000. Webster was indeed dilatory in talking to Laffan. Clemens wrote him on 5 September 1887, and again on 17 October, urging him to meet with Laffan, who planned to depart soon for France to engage artists for his project (13 Jan 1887 to Webster, NPV, in MTLP, 213; 5 Sept 1887 to Webster, NPV, in MTBus, 385–86; 17 Oct 1887 to Webster and Co., NN-BGC, in MTLP, 236). The book was later postponed for other reasons, however, which did not involve Webster. In May 1888 Clemens explained to Hall:

  Laffan was to go to Europe & get the artists, and the man to write the letter-press (the mighty Wolf of Paris), & superintend clear till the plates were made & the books printed & placed in our hands—a matter of 2 or 3 years.

  But since then I have found a job for Laffan which will pay him $210,000 in ten or twelve months, & of course he wouldn’t leave that till it is finished, to tackle the art book. In fact I could not let him. So we will leave the art book unmentioned for a year, & then maybe take another shy at it. (7 May 1888 to Hall, NN-BGC, in MTLP, 245–46)

  The catalog, with a preface by Laffan, was ultimately published by D. Appleton and Company in 1897, after Walters’s death: Oriental Ceramic Art: Illustrated by Examples from the Collection of W.T. Walters.

  77.41 new German drug, phenacetine] This drug, also known as acetophenetidin, was introduced in 1888 as an analgesic and antipyretic by the Bayer company of Germany. Although widely used for many years, it is now known to have dangerous side effects—such as kidney damage and cancer—and has been superseded by acetaminophen, to which it is related.

  78.12–13 Webster would be willing to put up with twelve thousand dollars and step out] In 1887 Webster, who suffered from a chronic condition diagnosed as acute neuralgia, found it increasingly difficult to participate actively in the business. Clemens recorded in his notebook in February 1888 that Webster had agreed to “retire from business, from all authority, & from the city, till April 1, 1889, & try to get back his health” (N&J3, 374). Webster never again acted as a member of the firm, and in December of 1888 his retirement became official when—after a series of offers and counteroffers—he agreed to sell his share for $12,000. He remained dissatisfied with the settlement, however, as he told Whitford on 31 December 1888: “I have sold out my interest for far less than I believe it to be worth but it is done and that is the end of it” (MTBus, 391). He lived quietly with his family in Fredonia until his death on 26 April 1891, at the age of thirty-nine, as a result of “an attack of grip, which led to peritonitis and hemorrhage and caused death” (“Grant’s Publisher Dead,” Columbus [Ga.] Enquirer, 29 Apr 1891, 1; N&J3, 298, 374, 374–75 n. 239, 615 n. 151, 625–26 n. 193).

  78.14–15 understudy and business manager . . . Frederick J. Hall, another Dunkirk importation] Hall (1861–1926) was born in New York City and attended Peekskill Military Academy. Hired by Webster and Company in the spring of 1884 as a stenographer and office assistant, he gradually assumed further duties. In 1886 he was made a partner in the firm, with a salary of $1,500 a year and a one-twentieth share of the net profits on all books, excepting Grant’s Memoirs (contract of 28 Apr 1886, NPV). During Webster’s absences Hall took charge of the business, and assumed its management entirely when he bought out Webster’s interest in December 1888. After the failure of the company in 1894 he continued his business career, eventually becoming vice-president of the Habirshaw Electric Cable Company. An enthusiastic golfer, he played once a week with John D. Rockefeller (Caldwell and Feiker 1919, 113; “Died,” New York Times, 17 Oct 1926, E9; Hall 1947).

  78.19–28 Stedman, the poet . . . thereby secured the lingering suicide of Charles L. Webster and Company] Clemens had known Edmund Clarence Stedman (1833–1908), an influential poet and critic, since the early 1870s (23 Feb 1872 to Redpath, L5, 47 n. 1). In 1887 Webster and Company paid $8,000 to W. E. Dibble, a Cincinnati subscription publisher, for plates of the first five volumes of the Library of American Literature. This proposed ten-volume anthology (to which an eleventh volume was ultimately added), comprising “selections of American literature, both in prose and poetry, from the earliest settlement in this country down to the present time,” was being compiled by Stedman in collaboration with Ellen M. Hutchinson (1851–1933), a writer in the literary department of the New York Tribune. Webster enthusiastically promoted the work to Clemens, who replied, “I think well of the Stedman book, but I can’t somehow bring myself to think very well of it” (1 Mar 1887 to Webster, NPV, in MTLP, 214); but Webster and Company acquired the Library, with Stedman and Hutchinson each receiving a 3 percent royalty. Sales of the series were good, but the slow receipt of installment payments could not offset the cost of producing the books. When Clemens was unable to furnish sufficient working capital, Hall was forced to borrow money to cover the expense (Webster to SLC, 25 Feb 1887, CU-MARK; Stedman and Hutchinson 1888–90; N&J3, 320 n. 62, 341 n. 123, 360–61 n. 195, 464 n. 195, 572, 612–13 n. 141; for Clemens’s opinion of Stedman see AD, 3 July 1908).

  78.30–31 a bank in which Whitford was a director] The Mount Morris Bank, located in Harlem, was one of the more persistent creditors of Webster and Company, refusing to renew notes when they became due. As of May 1894 the troubled firm owed the bank $29,500. Whitford was the bank’s attorney, but it has not been confirmed that he was also a director (Harrison to SLC, 1 June 1894, CU-MARK, in HHR, 63 n. 3; 4 May 1894 to OLC, CU-MARK; “Business Troubles,” New York Times, 19 Sept 1894, 11).

  78.42 fearful panic of ’93] The failure of the National Cordage Company on 4 May 1893 triggered a rapid decline in stock values; by the end of the year, over six hundred banks and fifteen thousand businesses had gone under. The panic led to a depression lasting five years, the country’s worst up to then (Campbell 2008b, 168–69).

  79.2–3 The property had cost a hundred and sixty-seven thousand dollars] This is the highest of the various estimates Clemens made of the house’s cost, and it is probably too high. In 1877 the property was assessed for taxes at $66,650 (Courtney 2011, 107–8; bill enclosed with 7 July 1877 to Perkins [1st], Letters 1876–1880).

  79.3 Henry Robinson] See AutoMT1, 560 n. 272.36–37.

  79.7–9 Webster and Company failed . . . ninety-six creditors an average of a thousand dollars or so apiece] The company declared bankruptcy on 18 April 1894, after the Mount Morris Bank demanded repayment. According to the New York Times, its liabilities exceeded its assets by about $40,000 (excluding its debt to Olivia). Clemens ultimately paid some $15,000 to the Mount Morris Bank, which settled for 50 percent of its claim (“Business Troubles,” New York Times, 19 Sept 1894, 11; MTLP, 365; HHR, 23–24; Rogers to SLC, 10 Dec 1897, CU-MARK, in HHR, 306 n. 1; Harrison to
SLC, 11 Feb 1898, CU-MARK, in HHR, 322).

  79.23–27 Mr. Rogers stepped in . . . they could not have my books; that they were not an asset of Webster and Company] Henry Huttleston Rogers, the wealthy vice-president of the Standard Oil Company, befriended Clemens in the fall of 1893 and guided him through the financial complexities of the bankruptcy. In an attempt to salvage Webster and Company he arranged for the sale of the Library of American Literature to his son-in-law, William Evarts Benjamin, for $50,000, and when bankruptcy became inevitable he transferred Clemens’s personal assets, including the copyright on his books, to Olivia (AutoMT1, 192; HHR, 10–11).

  79.39–80.4 We lectured and robbed and raided . . . creditors have all been paid] For details of this world lecturing tour see the Autobiographical Dictation of 4 June 1906. Clemens was accompanied by Olivia and his daughter Clara; Susy and Jean remained in the United States. After Susy died of meningitis in Hartford shortly after the end of the tour, the grieving family settled in London. There Clemens wrote his account of the trip, Following the Equator. The book was completed in May 1897 and published in November. In February 1898 Rogers’s secretary, Katharine I. Harrison (who had handled the details of the financial settlements) wrote that only three claims remained, which would soon be paid (Harrison to SLC, 11 Feb 1898, CU-MARK, in HHR, 322).