19 September 1877 • Hartford, Conn. (MS, in pencil: NN-BGC, UCCL 02517)
All right—shan’t send anything to that San Friscos club.1explanatory note
I don’t really see how the story of the runaway horse could read well with the little details of names & places & things left out. TheyⒶemendation are the true life of all narrative. It wouldn’t quite do to print them at this time.2explanatory note
newspaper clipping pasted to the MS, simulated line by line:Obituary.
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Mrs. Mary Langdon passed from earth to heaven at 6:00 a.m. Sept. 12th, 1877. Her maiden name was Lee. She was born near Poughkeepsie, Dutchess county, N.Y., July 20, 1790. Her husband Mr. Amos Langdon, died in March, 1867. They had moved from Dutchess county to Newfield, Tompkins coun- ty in 1831, and in 1838 to a place now well known as Langdon hill, near Breesport, Chemung county, N.Y. For more than forty years she had been a most worthy and devoted member of the M. E. Church Her home for quite a num- ber of years has been with her daughter, Mrs. |
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| Ulysses Breese; and it was from their filial | ☜Ⓐemendation | |
| ☞Ⓐemendation | care and elegant residence at West Junction that she exchanged earth for Heaven. It was also there that the funeral services were held on the 13th, and from thence the pre- cious remains were borne to the “Scotch burial ground” in Erin, accompanied by nu- merous relatives and friends. Peace to her memory and blessings on her posterity. s. |
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| Erin, Sept. 13, 1877. | ||
I am not the author of this noble obituary—though deceased was a relative.3explanatory note
We’ll talk about it when you come. Delicacy—a sad, sad false delicacy—robs literature of the two best things among its belongings: Private houseⒶemendation Family-circle narratives & obscene stories. But no matter; in that better world which I trust we are all going to I have the hope & belief that they will not be denied us. ¶Ⓐemendation.—Say—Twichell & I had an adventure at sea, 4½ months ago, which I did not put in my Bermuda articles, because there was not enough to it. But the press dispatches bring the sequel to-dayⒶemendation, & now there’s plenty to it. A sailless, mastless, chartless, compassless, grubless old condemned tub thatⒶemendation has been drifting helpless about the ocean for 4 months & a half, begging bread & water like any other tramp, flying a signal of distress permanently, & with 13 innocent, marveling, chuckle-headed Bermuda niggers on board, taking a Pleasure Excursion! Our ship fed the poor devils on the 25th of last May, far out at sea & left them to bullyrag their way to New York—& now they ain’t as near New York as they were then by 250 miles! They have drifted south & west 750 miles & are still drifting south inⒶemendation the relentless Gulf Stream! What a delicious magazine chapter it would make—but I had to deny myself. I had to come right out in the papers at once, with my details, so as to try to raise the government’s sympathy sufficiently to have ◇◇ better succor sent them than the cutter Colfax, which went a little way in search of them the other day & then struck a fog & gave it up.
If the President were in Washington I would telegraph him.
When I hear that the “Jonas Smith” has been found again, I mean to send for one of those darkies to come to Hartford & give me his adventures for an Atlantic article.
Likely you will see my to-day’s article in the newspapers.4explanatory note
The revenue cutter Colfax went after the Jonas Smith thinking there was mutiny or other crime on board. It occurs to me now that since there is only mere suffering & misery & nobody to punish, it ceases to be a matter which (a republican form of ) government will feel authorized to interfere in further. Dam a republican form of government.
Clemens answered the following letter (CU-MARK):
The letter in which Clemens proposed sending “that story about the captain” to a club in San Francisco does not survive; neither the club nor the story has been identified. It is likely, however, that it was one of Captain Wakeman’s “yarns” about his adventures (see 5 Oct 1877 to Wakeman-Curtis).
MS, in pencil, NN-BGC. Clemens pasted a clipping from an unidentified newspaper to the first page.
MTL , 1:309, partial publication; MTHL , 1:202–4.
See Howells Letters in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.