4 September 1870 • Buffalo, N.Y. (MS: CU-MARK, UCCL 00502)
During past week have written first four chapters of the book, & I tell you the “Innocents A B Abroad” will have to get up early to beat it. It Ⓐemendationwill be a book that will jump right strait Ⓐemendationinto a continental celebrity the first month it is issued. Now I want it illustrated lavishly. , & if We shall sell 90,000 copies the first 12 months. if it I haven’t even a shadow of a doubt of that.1explanatory note I see the capabilities of my subject.
Got Franks Ⓐemendationac/.2explanatory note All right.
letter docketed: ✓ and Mark Twain | Sep 4/70
That is, nearly a third more than The Innocents Abroad had sold in its first year (69,500). Roughing It actually sold about 75,000 copies in its first year ( RI 1993 , 890–91).
Frank Bliss’s statement of the first year’s sale of Innocents, which Clemens had been expecting for a month. It does not survive (27 July 70 to JLC and family, n. 4click to open link; 2 Aug 70 to Blissclick to open link).
MS, Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley (CU-MARK).
L4 , 190; MTB , 1:421–22, with omissions; MTMF , 137 n. 3, excerpts; Hill, 44, brief excerpt; MTLP , 39.
see Mendoza Collection in Description of Provenance.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.