4 July 1873 • London, England (MS: NRU, UCCL 00942)
Independence Day
Either the 11th or the 12th will suit us. I tell Mrs. Clemens things begin to look promising. She has been wanting to see Mr. Motley,1explanatory note the Tower of London & Little Boston.2explanatory note She has had a distant glimpse of the Tower, she came as near as anything to being at a luncheon at Lord Houghton’s the other day where both Motley & Browning were present;3explanatory note & now Little Boston is within her grasp. Providence still has the party under intermittent inspection, I reckon.
Clemens had decided not to go to Paris (see the next letter). John Lothrop Motley (1814–77) entered Harvard University at the age of thirteen, and published his first serious historical paper in 1845, a review of two works on Russia. In 1856 he published The Rise of the Dutch Republic, and, between 1860 and 1868, the four-volume History of the United Netherlands. (Olivia wrote Clemens on 28 November 1871 that she had just finished reading this work { L4 , 505 n. 8}.) In 1861 President Lincoln appointed Motley minister to Austria, a post he held for six years. In 1869 President Grant made him minister to England, but recalled him (in spite of his protest) in late 1870. During July 1873 Motley was at work finishing the manuscript for The Life and Death of John Barnevald, Advocate of Holland (Motley, 2:373).
Little Boston House was Badeau’s residence (15 June 73 to Badeau, n. 2click to open link).
Neither Clemens nor Olivia attended Lord Houghton’s luncheon (6 July 73 to Fairbanksclick to open link). Although Robert Browning (1812–89) published his first poem in 1833, his fame was not widespread until “The Ring and the Book,” which appeared serially in 1868 and 1869. His most recent work was “Red Cotton Nightcap Country,” published in June 1873. The Clemenses met him soon after this letter was written, when he called on them at the Langham. According to Thompson, Browning discussed a theory he had developed about the cause of seasickness, and was extremely sociable: “Considering the usual English deliberateness and Browning’s profound style, I was surprised at his almost French like affability and rapid flow of conversation” (Thompson, 95).
MS, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Rush Rhees Library, University of Rochester, Rochester, N. Y. (NRU).
L5 , 396–397.
The MS is in the Charles A. Brown Collection of Autographs, donated to NRU in 1914.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.