A son was born to me yesterday, [&] with the true family instinct he has gone to lecturing already. His subject is the same as Josh Billings’s—“Milk.”1 You are hereby constituted his agent, & instructed to make arrangements with Lyceums.2
Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary
The Ruling Passion Strong
in—Birth. The Boston
Lyceum Bureau has just received the following telegram, dated
Buffalo, Nov. 8, from the famous humorist and lecturer, Mark Twain:
(“Boston and Vicinity,” 9 Nov 70, 2) For details of the telegram’s reprinting, see
the textual commentary.
Source text(s):Previous publication:
L4, 227; “Local Intelligence,” Boston Evening Transcript, 9 Nov 20, 2; “Local
Matters,” Boston Advertiser, 10 Nov 70, 1;
“Personal,” Hartford Courant,
11 Nov 70, 2; “Personal,” New York World, 11 Nov 70, 5 (clipping in Olivia Clemens’s
Commonplace Book, Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft Library, University of
California, Berkeley [CU-MARK]); “Brief Mention,”
Hartford Times, 14 Nov 70, 1, in addition to the
copy-text.
Emendations and textual notes:
& • and [also at 227.5]
Clemens • CLEMENS
