28 August 1874 • Elmira, N.Y. (MS: CU-MARK, UCCL 01120)
Yrs containing cheque for $9, received—but I fear your interest tables are sadly inaccurate. Or did Ed Brownell, a banker & mathematician, make the calculation?1explanatory note
Livy’s visit to Fredonia came within an ace of making her an invalid for life, but Mrs. Gleason thinks she has escaped, now. I was confident she had no business to attempt such a journey, but I yielded to her urgings. We tried to break the trip into short journeys, but were not able to get them short enough to do any real good.
We go to Hartford a 10 days hence if she is then in good strength. The babies are doing admirably. Love to Mollie.
Orion Clemens Esq | Keokuk | Iowa return address: if not delivered within 10 days to be returned to postmarked: elmira n. y. aug Ⓐemendation 31 10am
The interest was on the money Clemens had loaned to Orion and Mollie—“a check for $700 & another for $200” (10 May 74 to JLCclick to open link)—to finance their move to Keokuk. Orion’s payment represented an annual rate of 12 percent. But it is unlikely that Clemens expected any more than the 8 percent that Orion and Mollie had been prepared to pay Mollie’s father to purchase his Keokuk property. In 1875 Clemens charged John T. Raymond 7 percent for a short-term loan. Ed Brownell, a banker in Keokuk, had recently visited Clemens (see 23 Apr 74 to OC, n. 1click to open link; 29 July 74 to OCclick to open link; and 13 May 75 to Raymondclick to open link).
MS, Mark Twain Papers, University of California, Berkeley (CU-MARK).
L6 , 213–214.
see Mark Twain Papers in Description of Provenance.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.