To
John C. Merritt
22 February 1877 • 1st of 2 • Hartford, Conn. (Transcript and paraphrase: CU-MARK, UCCL 12556)
22 February 1877 • 1st of 2 • Hartford, Conn. (Transcript and paraphrase: CU-MARK, UCCL 12556)
The check is dated February 19, 1877 on the National City Bank of Brooklyn, New York, to Saml. L. Clemens or order in the amount of 40 cents.
On the front of the check is the following endorsement:1explanatory note
“Dr. This shall be religiously devoted to the purpose specified & I shall drink your health.
S. L. C.”
Explanatory Notes
1 A typed transcript in the Mark Twain Papers is the source of the present letter and
two others (UCCL 12557click to open link and UCCL 01497click to open link) . This letter was written on the front of Merritt’s check, sent in response to Clemens’s
letter of 14 and 16 February to the editor of the New York World, in which he commented on “the difference between 5-cent & 40-cent toddy.” Merritt
has been conjecturally identified as John C. Merritt (1845–1918), a Brooklyn, New
York, physician.
Paraphrase and transcript, CU-MARK.
Source text courtesy of T. F. Flanagan.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.