This is the first of several letters written on this stationery, evidently printed in anticipation of the Clemenses’ move to their new home, which did not occur until the fall of 1874. Olivia had probably sent a sample of the stationery for her husband’s approval.

The “peculiar fog which has prevailed for an almost unprecedented number of days in succession has inflicted a loss of thousands of pounds upon the owners of animals” at the Smithfield Club Show at Agricultural Hall, the London Times reported (“Machinery at the Cattle Show,” 13 Dec 73, 6). By the evening of 11 December, the fourth day of the show, ninety-one cattle had been removed from the hall. Some of them were “saved by being carried quickly into the clearer air of the country; but a very considerable number have been slaughtered, while several died before it was discovered that they were being poisoned by the smoke-laden atmosphere” (“Smithfield Club Show,” London Times, 12 Dec 73, 5).

This sentence is very heavily canceled in the manuscript, which remained in the Clemens family until it came to the Mark Twain Papers in 1952 as part of the Samossoud Collection. The cancellation was made with Clemens’s typical looping line, but in an ink of a slightly different color and density from that used to write the letter. (The ink used to cancel the sentence was so thickly applied that it soaked through the paper and caused it to disintegrate in two places.) The last six words of the letter—“(when I come) ‘Expedition’s the word!’”—were canceled in similar fashion. Although it is possible that Clemens made both cancellations before he sent the letter, the greater likelihood is that he did so only later, after it was received and reacted to by Olivia, who saved his letters with great care. “Expedition’s the word!” is an unidentified quotation that Clemens is known to have used at least three times before, once in early 1867 and twice in late 1870 ( N&J1 , 272; L4 , 251, 262). The present letter suggests, however, that the phrase had acquired a private significance for the Clemenses, perhaps one that they were unwilling, on reflection, to allow posterity even to guess at. The second cancellation in particular shows evidence also of a different hand (a distinct departure from Clemens’s usual looping mark). On balance, therefore, it seems unlikely that Clemens canceled these phrases before he sent the letter, and they are therefore transcribed as he sent them. For a facsimile of the manuscript, see Photographs and Manuscript Facsimilesclick to open link.

Clemens’s usually clear handwriting became notably less clear and distinct by the time he wrote the following addition to this letter, perhaps the result of alcohol consumed at the Morayshire dinner, from which he had just returned.

This picture has not been identified, although it may be one of those reproduced in Photographs and Manuscript Facsimilesclick to open link.

Alexander William George Duff (1849–1912), known as Viscount Macduff (one of the lesser titles of his father, Earl Fife), was educated at Eton, and served as lord lieutenant of the county of Elgin (1872–1902) and as member of Parliament for Elgin and Nairnshire (1874–79). As of 1883 his estates totaled nearly one-quarter of a million acres, making him the fifth largest landowner in the United Kingdom. In 1889 he married Princess Louise, daughter of the Prince of Wales, and was created duke of Fife (Cokayne, 5:379–80).

Clemens responded to the toast to “The Visitors.” According to the Elgin (Scotland) Courant,