From Olivia L. and Samuel L. Clemens to Olivia Lewis Langdon and Family
18? October 1874 • Hartford, Conn.
(MTB, 1:526, UCCL 01143)

. . . .

The atmosphere is very hazy, and it makes the autumn tints even more soft and beautiful than usual. Mr. Twichell came for Mr. Clemens to go walking with him; they returned at dinner-time, heavily laden with autumn leaves.

Twichell came up here with me to luncheon after services, & I went back home with him [& ] took Susy along in her little carriage. We have just got home again, middle of afternoon, & Livy has gone to rest & left the west balcony to me. There is a shining & most marvelous miracle of cloud-effects mirrored in the brook; a picture which began with perfection, & has momently surpassed it ever since, until at last it is almost unendurably beautiful.1

. . . .

There is a cloud-picture in the stream now whose hues are as manifold as those in an opal & as delicate as the tintings of a sea-shell. But now a muskrat is swimming through it & obliterating it with the turmoil of wavelets he casts abroad from his shoulders.

The customary Sunday assemblage of strangers is gathered together in the grounds discussing the house.

. . . .

Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary

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1 Albert Bigelow Paine did not identify the addressee of this letter when he printed these excerpts (MTB, 1:526). It was probably intended for the members of the Langdon family in Elmira, the recipients of a similar joint letter of 24? September 1874. The evidence for the date is derived from Twichell’s journal: his activities in the fall rule out any Sunday before 11 or after 25 October. The most likely date is 18 October, but a week earlier and a week later are both possible (Twichell, 1:1, 2, 7, 9, 12).

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

MTB, 1:526.

Previous publication: L6, 259; Paine 1912, 249.

Emendations and textual notes:

& • and [here and hereafter]