Explanatory Notes        Apparatus Notes (Ⓐ)

Source: University of Virginia, Charlottesville ([ViU])

Cue: "I thank you"

Source format: "MS, correspondence card, in pencil"

Letter type: "correspondence card"

Notes:

Last modified:

Revision History: Paradise, Kate

Published on MTPO: 2022

Print Publication:

This edited text supersedes the previously published text
MTPDocEd
To Charles Follen Adams
20 December 1877 • Hartford, Conn. (MS, correspondence card, in pencil: ViU, UCCL 01513)
Hartford, Thursday AM
slcChas F Adams Esq

Dr Sir: IⒶemendation thank you very much for your courtesy. Several oth of the pieces are familiar to me, & I shall be glad to make the acquaintance of the rest.1explanatory note

Ys Truly
S. L. Clemens

Chas. F. Adams, Esq | 105 Arch st | Boston in upper left corner: Personal | flourish return address: if not delivered within 10 days, to be returned to postmarked: hartford conn. dec 20 6pm docketed: Mark Twain

Textual Commentary
Source text(s):

MS, correspondence card, in pencil, Clifton Waller Barrett Library, Alderman Library, ViU.

Previous Publication:

MicroPUL, reel 1.

Provenance:

Deposited at ViU by Clifton Waller Barrett on 17 December 1963.

More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.

Explanatory Notes
1 

Charles Follen Adams (1842–1918) fought in the Civil War, and was wounded and taken prisoner at Gettysburg. In 1872 he began to contribute humorous poems in a German or Pennsylvania Dutch dialect to periodicals. Clemens here responded to a gift from Adams, announced in the following letter (CU-MARK):

UCLC32610
office of adams & cary, importers and manufacturers, 105 & 107 arch street,
boston. Dec. 19 187 7
S. L. Clemens Esq.,
Dear Sir:

I send this day, pr. mail, a copy of “Leedle Yawcob Strauss, and other Poems,” this being my first attempt,—in the way of a book,—as a contributor to the general fund of humor. Please accept the same as a slight return for the pleasure derived from the products of your pen.

Very truly yours,
Chas. F. Adams.

Adams enclosed his business card: “Adams & Cary, Importers and Manufacturers of Real Hair Goods, Hair Dealers’ Supplies, Fancy Goods, Jewelry, Millinery Ornaments, &c.” On the envelope of his letter, Clemens wrote, “Adams, the new humorist.” The gift copy of Leedle Yawcob Strauss was still in Clemens’s library at his death (Gribben 1980, 1:7). In his autobiography he included Adams among the humorists “whose writings and sayings were once in everybody’s mouth but are now heard of no more, and are no longer mentioned” (AutoMT2, 153, 534).

Emendations and Textual Notes
Ⓐ  I ●  I I corrected miswriting
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