by Mark Twain
80.6–7 “Put it in Federal Steel” . . . a profit of 125 per cent] Acting on Clemens’s behalf, in October 1898 Rogers purchased preferred and common stock (heavily discounted) in the newly incorporated Federal Steel Company for $17,139.87. In December he sold it and reinvested in 712 shares of Federal’s common stock, which soared in value through January 1899 on expectations that the company would combine with rival firms to form a giant steel trust—Rogers himself being one of the prime movers behind this consolidation. Rogers sold the stock on 21 January and reported a gain of $16,000. The U.S. Steel Corporation was founded in 1901, with Rogers as one of the directors and Clemens, once again, as a shareholder (Notebook 40, TS pp. 50, 54, 55, CU-MARK; New York Times: “The Great Steel Trust,” 25 Dec 1898, 2; “Mr. Carnegie Sells Out,” 5 May 1899, 1; “Steel Trust Officers,” New York Evening Tribune, 2 Apr 1901, 1).
80.14–18 I was assisting in the work . . . The machine was a failure] Clemens gives a full account of this disastrous venture in “The Machine Episode” (AutoMT1, 101–6). In the present dictation he blames Webster almost entirely for the collapse of his publishing company, but the estimated $170,000 he invested in the typesetter was a contributing factor. In 1885, when the Grant Memoirs were in production, Clemens had nothing but praise for Webster, saying that he had a “tremendous season: but he has come through it with a superb record; & with all its array of business-inventions, -ingenuities & -triumphs, he has not made a single business-misstep” (30 July 1885 to Annie Webster, NPV). By 1888, Clemens’s growing impatience with Webster had turned to dislike, and then to contempt. In a letter of 1 July 1889 to his brother Orion he admitted, “I have never hated any creature with a hundred thousandth fraction of the hatred which I bear that human louse, Webster” (CU-MARK).
80.19 It stands in Cornell University] A note in Volume 1 states that one machine survives at the Hartford House and Museum, and that the other was donated by the Mergenthaler Company to Cornell University and later used for scrap metal in World War II (AutoMT1, 644 n. 455 footnote). New information indicates that the Mergenthaler Company, which owned both prototypes of the machine, loaned one to Columbia University and one to Cornell. The Cornell machine was displayed from 1898 to 1921, and then returned to the Mergenthaler Company, which donated it to the Mark Twain House and Museum in 1957. The one at Columbia was melted down for scrap metal (Goble 1998, 14; information courtesy of Lance Heidig).
Autobiographical Dictation, 4 June 1906
81.7 I lecturing every night] Clemens facetiously represented these lectures as a lesson in morals, illustrated by examples from his writings. He prepared a working repertoire of some twenty-five selections, drawn from The Innocents Abroad (1869), A Tramp Abroad (1880), Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885), and several other works (HF 2003, 617).
81.33 accident which I have before mentioned in a previous chapter] That is, in the Autobiographical Dictation of 13 February 1906 (AutoMT1, 356).
81.34 We took No. 14 West 10th street] The family moved to this large furnished house, secured through Clemens’s friend Frank N. Doubleday, on 1 November 1900 (JC 1900–1907).
82.4–9 Three months’ repose and seclusion in the Adirondacks . . . York Harbor for the summer] From late June to mid-September 1901 the Clemenses stayed in a summer home on Lower Saranac Lake that they called “The Lair” (see the photograph section). On 1 October they settled into a spacious home built on sixteen acres of river-front property in Riverdale (now known as Wave Hill), formerly the home of publisher William H. Appleton from 1866 until his death in 1899. The following summer, in late June 1902, they rented a cottage at York Harbor, Maine (see AutoMT1, 603 n. 387.6; MTB, 3:1135, 1141, 1176; Wave Hill 2011; “Personal Items,” The School Journal, 7 June 1902, 651).
82.9–10 Mr. Rogers brought his Kanawha, the fastest steam yacht in American waters] Rogers bought the Kanawha, a 227-foot-long steam-powered yacht, in 1901. He allowed the Clemenses to use it for transport to York Harbor but was not present himself. Clemens wrote on 26 June 1902, while en route, “By George, you ought to have been along! The sail from Riverdale till night fell was charming & exalting & beautiful beyond all experience” (26 June 1902 to Rogers, Sotheby 2003, item 105; 5 July 1901 to Rogers, photocopy in CU-MARK, in HHR, 464 n. 1).
82.14 Jean’s health was bad] Jean’s epileptic seizures, which she had suffered since 1896, struck unpredictably and were preceded by black moods and fits of mental “absence” (see the Appendix “Family Biographies,” p. 652; SLC 1899b; Ober 2003, 156–66).
82.22 we sailed to Fairhaven] In 1895 Rogers built an eighty-five-room mansion in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, which overlooked the bay in the southern part of town (Thomas and Avila 2003, 10).
82.31–36 Aix-les-Bains . . . there was nothing very serious the matter with her] Olivia was at Aix-les-Bains, France, in June and July 1891, and at Bad Nauheim from June to mid-September 1892. On 10 June 1892 Clemens wrote to Clara, “The best news of all, is that two doctors have pronounced Mamma’s case curable, & easily curable. They say these baths will do it, & that these are the only baths in the world that can” (CU-MARK).
83.16–17 I at once wrote it out . . . and sent it to Harper’s Monthly. I here append it] Clemens wrote in his notebook on 27 August 1902, “Send ‘Heaven or Hell’ to Harper?” Frederick A. Duneka (general manager of Harper and Brothers) replied on 18 September, “Thank you very much for Heaven or Hell. It is great.” The story appeared in Harper’s Monthly the following December (SLC 1902d; Notebook 45, TS pp. 24, 27, CU-MARK). Tear sheets from that issue, which Clemens attached to the typescript of this dictation, are the source of the text reproduced here.
Autobiographical Dictation, 6 June 1906
97.10–12 celebration in commemoration of . . . municipal self-constituted government on the continent of America] York, Maine, chartered as Gorgeana in 1642 and then rechartered and renamed in 1652, celebrated its 250th anniversary as “the first city in America” in August 1902 (“The Old Town of York,” New York Tribune, 3 Aug 1902, “Illustrated Supplement,” 2; Baxter 1904, 34, 38–43).
97.26–98.4 visitor was a lady . . . earn a living there by teaching] The visitor, Florence Hartwig, was a singer and voice teacher who had left America to study in Europe at the age of fourteen. She was married to Elias Hartwig, a German businessman living in Bucharest, where she became a lady-in-waiting and singer in the court of Elisabeth (1843–1916), queen of Romania. She visited the Clemenses in August 1902 bearing a letter of introduction from the queen, written on 9 May. Elisabeth of Romania was born in Germany and married at twenty-six to Prince Carol of Romania, who became king in 1881. Known for her benevolent and charitable works, she also wrote prolifically—poetry, fairy stories, plays, and novels—under the pseudonym “Carmen Sylva.” She had been a friend and admirer of Clemens’s since his sojourn in Vienna at the Hotel Metropole in 1897–98: in her letter she thanked him for “every beautiful thought you poured into my tired heart and for every smile on a weary way!” He was fond of one of her books, A Real Queen’s Fairy Tales, and in an essay published in April 1902 in the North American Review he described her as a “charming and lovable German princess and poet” (SLC 1902b, 437; “A Favorite at Carmen Sylva’s Court,” Philadelphia Inquirer, 31 May 1903, “Woman’s Magazine,” 2; Elisabeth of Romania to SLC, 9 May 1902, CU-MARK, in MTL, 2:726–27; MTB, 2:1062; Gribben 1980, 1:218–19).
98.27–28 article by an Austrian prince on Dueling in Court and Military circles on the Continent of Europe] The article, “The Effort to Abolish the Duel” by Prince Alfonso Carlos of Bourbon and Austria-Este (1849–1936), appeared in the North American Review for August 1902 (Alfonso Carlos 1902).
98.36–37 poor woman’s face was as white as marble! The French phrase stood translated] In her letter Queen Elisabeth explained that Hartwig’s husband had been forced to leave “quite a brilliant situation” in Bucharest after he “refused to participate in une affaire onéreuse” (“a tiresome affair”). Evidently Hartwig’s reaction to the ar
ticle on dueling led Clemens to conclude that the phrase was equivalent to “une affaire d’honneur”—that is, a duel (Elisabeth of Romania to SLC, 9 May 1902, CU-MARK, in MTL, 2:726–27). In 1904 Clemens wrote a letter of endorsement for Hartwig, citing the queen’s praise (16 Nov 1904 to “Whom It May Concern,” photocopy in CU-MARK, in MTL, 2:727).
99.8 next sixty days were anxious ones for us] On 13 October Clemens wrote, “We thought it was heart disease, & for 4 weeks we had but little hope. But she will get well—they all say it. If we only could get home to Riverdale!” (13 Oct 1902 to Pears, CtY-BR).
99.16–19 We secured a special train . . . delivered us at our home, Riverdale] “We left York Harbor at about 9 yesterday morning in an invalid car & special train,” Clemens wrote to Laurence Hutton 16 October, “& reached the Grand Central at 5.40; special engine rushed us up to Riverdale in 20 minutes—a long & rough journey for a sick person & terribly fatiguing” (16 Oct 1902 to Hutton, NjP-SC). He recorded in his notebook that the trip cost $339 (Notebook 45, TS p. 30, CU-MARK).
99.22 trained nurse] Margaret Garrety, who was hired on 28 September and discharged on 23 October; Clemens found her to be “vain, silly, self-important, untrustworthy, a most thorough fool, & a liar by instinct & training” (Notebook 45, TS pp. 29–30, 32, CU-MARK).
Autobiographical Dictation, 7 June 1906
100.12 Susy Crane] Susan Langdon Crane, Olivia’s foster sister (see AutoMT1, 579 n. 324.32).
100.15 young Dodges] Clara and Jean were friends of the children of Cleveland H. Dodge (see the note at 107.19–20): Elizabeth (b. 1884), Julia (b. 1885), and their twin brothers, Bayard and Cleveland Earl (b. 1888) (Riverdale Census 1900, 1127:10A).
100.29 woman named Tobin] Unidentified.
100.34 Old Point Comfort] A spit of land on the Virginia shore of the Chesapeake Bay, known for its health resorts.
100.34 Katy] Longtime family servant Katy Leary.
101.8 I will here insert the Susy Crane letter] Clemens’s preparations for this dictation go back to Florence in January 1904, when he asked Isabel Lyon to gather materials for a “Chapter which Livy must not see. Send to Susy Crane & Twichell for letters written at that time to be sent to Miss Lyon in my care” (Lyon transcript of SLC notes, CU-MARK). Both letters were obtained, and in 1906 Clemens pasted the manuscript letter to Crane into his dictation typescript; a typed copy of the letter to Twichell was made, and the original returned to him.
101.13 York Harbor experience] Susan Crane traveled from Elmira to York Harbor in mid-August 1902 to help nurse Olivia. Clemens wrote her on 15 August, “We try our best to keep hidden the doctor-secrets, but she is sharp, & penetrating, & hunts us through all our shifts & dodges, & worms everything out of us, & then the result makes her low-spirited. She wants you, & she is right” (15 Aug 1902 to Crane, CU-MARK).
101.17 Dr. Janeway] Dr. Edward Gamaliel Janeway (1841–1911) was a prominent specialist in nervous diseases and tuberculosis who had attended two presidents—McKinley and Cleveland—and was currently treating Cornelius Vanderbilt for typhoid fever (New York Times: “Mr. Vanderbilt’s Condition,” 24 Dec 1902, 1; “Worst Fears Realized,” 14 Sept 1901, 1; “Cleveland Had His Left Jaw Removed,” 21 Sept 1917, 9; “Dr. E. G. Janeway, Diagnostician, Dead,” 11 Feb 1911, 11).
101.31 Mrs. Hapgood’s luncheon] Emilie Bigelow Hapgood (1868–1930), a family friend, was the daughter of a Chicago banker; she married the author Norman Hapgood in 1896 (“Emilie Hapgood Dies of a Stroke,” New York Times, 17 Feb 1930, 17; Manhattan Census 1900, 1115:1A).
102.5 Miss Sherry] Margaret Sherry was hired sometime after 23 October 1902, when Margaret Garrety was discharged (see AD, 6 June 1906, note at 99.22). Sherry accompanied the family to Italy in the fall of 1903; when she departed a month later Clemens noted, “We can never forget her, & shall always be grateful to her” (Notebook 46, TS p. 31, CU-MARK).
102.23 feeding of the five thousand] Matthew 14:13–21 (also in the other three gospels).
102.40 John Howells] John Mead Howells (1868–1959) was the son of William Dean and Elinor Howells. After studying at Harvard and the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, he founded the architectural firm of Howells and Stokes in New York City. In 1906–8 he designed and supervised the construction of Stormfield (Clemens’s house in Redding, Connecticut), in the style of an Italian villa. In later years he designed public buildings all over the country, including several at Harvard and Yale.
103.9 Mark Hambourg] Hambourg (1879–1960) was a Russian pianist who began his career as a child prodigy. After studying with renowned piano teacher Theodor Leschetizky, he made the first of many world tours in 1895. Clara met him in Vienna in the spring of 1898, when she too was a pupil of Leschetizky (it was then that she also met fellow student Ossip Gabrilowitsch, her future husband). Hambourg was currently performing in New York (CC 1938, 1–3; New York Times: “Mendelssohn Hall,” 6 Jan 1903, 10; “Mark Hambourg’s Recital,” 11 Jan 1903, 14).
103.30 Letter to Reverend Joseph H. Twichell] See the note at 101.8.
103.42 “Was it Heaven? Or Hell?”] See the Autobiographical Dictation of 4 June 1906 and the note at 83.16–17.
105.6–7 I wish Clara . . . could take a pen and put upon paper all the details of one of her afternoons in her mother’s room] On 31 December 1902, the same day that Clemens wrote his letter to Twichell, Clara wrote her friend Dorothea Gilder:
Dear Me! I used to maintain that there was no use in lying because if you arranged the words well, even very well the expression of face still destroyed the possibility of success in deceiving—but I must take back that statement for my whole conversation with my mother is one long string of lies. . . . Jean is out coasting with the Dodges or at a matinee[,] visit a friend in New York etc. etc. I really get so confused trying to remember that I have been to a lesson in town instead of sitting near Jean’s room all morning that I can’t see why my mother doesn’t detect my many slips & badly mended breaks. So far she has been successfully blinded but I do hope that Jean won’t be long getting well. (TS of catalog, George Robert Minkoff Rare Books, 10 Dec 1998, CU-MARK)
105.18 Joe, don’t let those people invite me—I couldn’t go] Twichell had written Clemens from Hartford on 30 December: “If you are coming up here Jan. 21st you can make a speech at the Dinner—in the Foot Guard Armory—of the Sons of the Revolution; or if you prefer at the meeting of the Workingmens’ Club in the Lafayette St Public School Hall. Or perhaps you might do both things. I have been requested to press both honors on your acceptance” (CU-MARK).
105.20–21 full report of that dinner*—issued by Colonel Harvey as a remembrancer . . . to all the guests] George Harvey—president of Harper and Brothers and editor of the North American Review and Harper’s Weekly—hosted a dinner at the Metropolitan Club on 28 November 1902 for over fifty guests in celebration of Clemens’s sixty-seventh birthday (for Harvey see AutoMT1, 557 n. 267.35). No “remembrancer” has been found, but Harper’s Weekly printed the following poems read at the dinner: “A Double-Barrelled Sonnet to Mark Twain,” by Howells; “Mark Twain (A Post-prandial Obituary),” by humorist John Kendrick Bangs (1862–1922); and “A Toast to Mark Twain!” by Henry van Dyke (Harper’s Weekly 46 [13 Dec 1902]: 1943–44). Clemens also made a brief speech, in which he mentioned Twichell, saying in part:
Another of my oldest friends is here—the Rev. Joe Twichell—and whenever Twichell goes to start a church I see them flocking, rushing to buy the land all around there. Many and many a time I have attended the annual sale in his church, and bought up all the pews on a margin and it would have been better for me spiritually and financially if I had staid under his wing. I try to serve him, I have tried to do good in this world, and it is marvelous in how many ways I have done good. (“When Twain Got His Say,” New York Times, 30 Nov 1902, 10)
105.34 Fay Davis] In November 1902 Davis made a successful New York debut in the comedy Imprudence, by H. V. Esmond (“The Theatres Last Night,” New York Times, 18 Nov 1902, 9; see AD, 5 Apr 1906, n
ote at 18.36–19.3).
106.1 “The Death-Wafer,”] Early in 1902 Clemens’s dramatization of his story “The Death-Disk” was staged at Carnegie Hall by the Children’s Theatre (“News of the Theatres,” New York Times, 7 Feb 1902, 6). For a description of the story see the Autobiographical Dictation of 30 August 1906, note at 197.40–198.8.
106.4 Mary Foote] Mary Hubbard Foote (1872–1968) was a cousin of the Clemens girls’ former governess, Lilly Gillette Foote (see AutoMT1, 579 n. 326.13–21). Orphaned at age thirteen, she was raised by an aunt in Hartford and became an especially close friend of Susy’s. In 1890 she enrolled in the Yale School of the Fine Arts, and then continued her studies in Paris. In 1901 she returned to New York, established her own studio in Washington Square, and found success as a portraitist. In the 1920s she began to withdraw from art and social life, moving permanently to Switzerland to be treated by Carl Jung, who convinced her to stop painting professionally (Fahlman 1991, 19–20; “Nook Farm Genealogy” 1974, Foote Addenda, vi).
106.45 unberufen!] Clemens frequently used this superstitious German interjection. In his own words: “If a German forgets himself & suddenly lets slip a strong desire, he immediately protects himself by exclaiming ‘Unberufen!’—otherwise, the evil spirits, having discovered the desire of his heart, would set themselves at work, right away, and smash it” (30 Aug 1881 to Norton, MH-H).
107.12 Judy] Julia Curtis Twichell (1869–1945), Joseph Twichell’s oldest daughter, was called “Judy” by her family. She had been married to Howard Ogden Wood since 1892 (Twichell to SLC, 2 Feb 1892, CU-MARK; “Wood-Twichell,” New York Times, 27 Apr 1892, 5).