To Elisha Bliss, Jr.
26 February 1873 • Hartford, Conn.
(MS: CU-MARK, UCCL 00876)

Hartfd Feb. 26.

Friend Bliss—

All right. Make it March 1—& then go back to the old system & make the next statement May 1. You see it was your delay that strung it out to Nov. 26; ‸(never‸ it should have been Nov. 1.1

In inclose proxy.2

Can get sketches ready any time, but shall wait awhile, as I have good hopes of finishing a book which I am working like a dog on—a book which ought to outsell the sketches, & doubtless will. ‸It will make a pretty lively sensation I bet you.‸ 3

Ys

Mark.

[letter docketed:] [and] S. L. Clemens | Feb 26/73 | Hartford Ct | Author

Explanatory Notes

Editorial Signs

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1 The letter from Bliss to which Clemens replied is not known to survive. The two American Publishing Company quarterly statements extant for 1872 are dated 1 May and 5 August, indicating the next statements were due on 1 November 1872 and 1 February 1873. Only one statement survives from 1873, dated 1 May, but Bliss clearly did send one on or about 1 March (8 May 72 to Perkins; Elisha Bliss, Jr., to SLC, 5 Aug 72 and 1 May 73, CU-MARK; 4 Mar 73 to Bliss).

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2 The enclosed proxy, which Bliss had presumably requested from Clemens as a voting stockholder in the American Publishing Company, does not survive (4 Mar 73 to Bliss, n. 5).

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3 Clemens was at work on The Gilded Age. He did not issue a book of sketches through Bliss until 1875 (21 Mar 72 to Bliss, n. 1).

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

MS, Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley (CU-MARK).

Previous publication: L5, 301–302; MTLP, 85.

Provenance:see Mendoza Collection in Description of Provenance.