Good—& all right. Within an hour I shall be deep in an old piece of work which always interests me, any time of the year that I take it up. So I will go down into that, & not appear at the surface again till the Howellses arrive here the 3d of December.

I’ll send you the play to-day—& while you are working at it, introduce more people on the stage, or new incidents, where they may seem necessary. And another turn or so of the phonograph. And maybe Sellers with his robe of the Garter & his coronet.

You make a mighty clean proof with your type-writer. (Cable is stopping with us over night. He’s been training under an expert, & he’s just a rattling reader now—the best amateur I ever heard; & with 2 seasons of public practice, I guess he’ll be the best professional reader alive.) It’ll pay the Howellses & Aldriches & their friends to go & hear him.

Of course Mrs. C instructed me to arrange about that visit with Mrs. Howells, because she said she did; & she says that you also knew that that would be a part of my Boston business—but I’ve no recollection of it. I thought it had all been fixed before. I thought you were to come here, & Mrs. Howells & Pilla to follow. I am required to explain why I thought that. It’s a hell of a thing to require of a person. But it seems to me, sometimes, that there is nothing Mrs. Clemens won’t require of a person. Why can’t a body be reasonable?—I can’t be supposed to know everything, & do everything right, & never make any mistakes. But as soon as I see Mrs. Howells, I will apologize & expl—no, just apologize.