MTPDocEd
on the back:
e. h. paige,
no. 446 main street,
buffalo, n. y.
Been too busy & too frightfully lazy to write, Bill—do you pity me?
Explanatory Notes
1
Clemens probably sent this carte de visite at about the same time he enclosed one in the previous letter.
Possibly he was replying belatedly to Bowen’s most recent known letter to him (CU-MARK):
a. f. shapleigh. president. d. p. rowland. vice president. a. kempland. secretary.
phœnix insurance company of st. louis chartered 1849.
capital stock $250,000. office 304 n. main st.
st. louis
March 31st
18 70
Sam’l Langdon Clemens
Buffalo New York
Dr Sam
On arrival of Keokuk Packet I went on board (this morning) to meet Sallie Bowen and
who do you suppose I met?
No less distinguished visitors, than “Kitty Hawkins” (Lauras Sister) and “Old
Lucy Davis” for a more particular description of them, reference is hereby made to
latter portion of Shakespears Seven Ages.
Old Luce’ asked for you instanter! Said you were the worst Boy, “and I
declare in my heart he’s the funniest man in my acquaintance” Wants to know if you still climb out on
the
roof of the house and jump from 3d story windows
Yours Ever
Bill
Sallie was Sarah Robards Bowen. Catherine (Kitty) Hawkins was the older sister of
Annie Laura Hawkins Frazer. Lucy
Davis was a Hannibal schoolteacher (23 Apr 70 to Bliss, n.
6; 6? Feb 70 to Frazer;
Inds
, 95, 322). Bowen’s allusion was to As You Like It, act 2, scene 7, perhaps especially to
these lines: “. . . The sixth age shifts / Into the lean and slipper’d pantaloon,
/ With
spectacles on nose and pouch on side.”
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MS facsimile, front and back of a carte de visite photograph of Clemens. The editors have not seen the MS, which is owned by William Bowen’s grandson, Royden Burwell Bowen, Jr., who provided a photographic copy in 1993.
L4 , 136–37; Hornberger, frontispiece.