To Unidentified
31 July 1873 • Edinburgh, Scotland
(MS: MHi, UCCL 00958)

Veitch’s Hotel1
Edinburgh, July 31.

Dr Sir:2

I am afraid I am not able to help you. Mr. Bryant is not in any way connected with the N. Y. Times, but is a large owner in the N. Y. Evening Post.3

I should think Joaquin Miller might have that signature (Longmans, his publisher4—but his rooms are 11 Museum street). Or Robert Browning or Mr. Tennyson,5 [maybe. G.] W. Smalley, of the N. Y. Tribune bureau might know his London friends—is almost sure to. Then there is a volume (issued by Scribner I think, some 3 or 4 years ago) of selections from the whole world’s poets which contains Bryant’s autograph—the collection is compiled by [Wh] Bryant but I forget its title.6 Perhaps Mr. Trübner might know where to find a copy of that.7 Of course Mr. John Lothrop Motley must (Long’s Hotel) must have that signature, I should think. If he is not at Long’s Hotel now, Lord Houghton (37 Berkeley Square,) will know his address. If poets have a fellow feeling for each other, [Mr.] Bryant has surely sent copies of the book I spoke of to members of the guild on this side.

I thank you very much for the offer of introductory letters, but shall not need them as I am too busy resting to go into company.

Ys Truly

Saml. L. Clemens.

Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary

Editorial Signs

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1 Veitch’s was a first-class private hotel at 127 George Street, in the heart of the city (Baedeker 1901, 509–10).

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2 Clemens may have been writing to Grenville Howland Norcross (1854–1937), a lawyer and avid autograph collector who eventually bequeathed this letter to the Massachusetts Historical Society. Norcross was only nineteen years old in 1873, however, and still a student at Harvard, so it seems implausible that he would offer Clemens the “introductory letters” alluded to in the final paragraph. The greater likelihood is therefore that he purchased the letter from a dealer.

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3 William Cullen Bryant (1794–1878) had been the editor of the New York Evening Post since 1829, and a half-owner in it since 1836. For thirty years he took an active role in managing the paper, although by 1869 he had greatly relaxed his control over it.

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4 Miller had published Songs of the Sierras (1871) and Songs of the Sun-Lands (1873) through the London firm of Longmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer. His most recent work, Life amongst the Modocs, had just been issued by Richard Bentley and Son.

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5 Alfred Tennyson (1809–92) had been poet laureate since 1850, when he succeeded Wordsworth. It is not known whether Clemens had met him. Lord Houghton evidently introduced Tennyson, a close friend of his, to Joaquin Miller in the summer of 1873, and might have introduced him to Clemens as well (Pope-Hennessy, 56–59, 217, 236; Marberry 1953, 115; see 15 Dec 73 to Tennyson, and 16 Dec 73 to OLC, n. 3).

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6 A Library of Poetry and Song (New York: J. B. Ford and Co., 1871), which Bryant compiled, contained his portrait, with a facsimile of his signature, as a frontispiece.

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7 Nikolaus Trübner (1817–84) was a prominent London publisher, bibliographer, and oriental scholar who had taken an early interest in reprinting American writers, such as Charles Leland.

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

MS, Norcross Collection, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston (MHi).

Previous publication: L5, 422–424; AAA 1924, lot 549, excerpts.

Provenance:The MS, offered for sale in 1924 as part of the collection of businessman William F. Gable (1856–1921), was bequeathed to MHi in 1937 by Grenville Howland Norcross.

Emendations and textual notes:

maybe. G. • maybe.—|G.

Wh • [‘h’ partly formed]

Mr. • Mr Mr. [corrected miswriting]