To James T. Fields
7 January 1875 • Hartford, Conn.
(MS: CSmH, UCCL 01175)

‸

Those Annual Bills.

Air—Those Evening Bells.

‸By Mark Twain.‸

Those annual bills! those annual bills!

ghost discord trills

How many a song their warning thrills

fills tells swells

Of ‸“truck”‸ consumed, enjoyed, forgot

Since New Year last

Since I reviewed received

Since I was floored, strapped, fell under,

skinned, scalped, flayed by last year’s

lot!

Those joyous beans are past away

Those hams

Those onions blithe, O where are they?

Once loved, lost, mourned—now vexing

ills

shades troop back

Your ghosts return in annual bills

aground cleaned

And so will be when I am broke;

ose yearly duns will still go around

That [annual ]

While bards than I more frantic still

While other bards shall with frantic quills

Shall damn & damn these annual bills!

‸Hartford, Jan. 7/74 1

‸My Dear Fields:‸

‸I send this original rought draft just as it was when I laid the pen down to welcome you two hours ago. If you had only opened my cheque-book (which lay under the MS.,) you would have found New-Year inspiration there for even a more gifted poem than this one is. I‸

‸J. T. Fields,
148 Charles st.
Boston.‸

‸I am glad to send this to you, since youare were complimentary enough to ask it.‸

‸Ys Ever‸

Samℓ. L. Clemens.‸ 2

Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary

Editorial Signs

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1 Clemens’s date is incorrect: on 7 January 1874 he was in England.

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2 Since relinquishing the editorship of the Atlantic to Howells in July 1871, Fields had remained active as an author and lecturer (L4, 93–94 n. 1; Austin, 423–25). He did not lecture in Hartford at this time, but he visited the Clemenses on 7 January. From home he answered Clemens’s letter, addressing the envelope to “Samuel L. Clemens Esq. at the House Beautiful” (CU-MARK):

UCLC32093

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Before sending the manuscript draft of “Those Annual Bills” to Fields, Clemens had evidently made himself a fair copy. He later revised it slightly and published it in Sketches, New and Old, paired with the Thomas Moore poem it parodied (SLC 1875, 62):

A COUPLE OF POEMS BY TWAIN AND MOORE.

————

THOSE EVENING BELLS.

————

by thomas moore.

————

Those evening bells! those evening bells!

How many a tale their music tells

Of youth, and home, and that sweet time

When last I heard their soothing chime.

Those joyous hours are passed away;

And many a heart that then was gay,

Within the tomb now darkly dwells,

And hears no more those evening bells.

And so ’twill be when I am gone—

That tuneful peal will still ring on;

While other bards shall walk these dells,

And sing your praise, sweet evening bells.

————

THOSE ANNUAL BILLS

————

by mark twain.

————

These annual bills! these annual bills!

How many a song their discord trills

Of “truck” consumed, enjoyed, forgot,

Since I was skinned by last year’s lot!

Those joyous beans are passed away;

Those onions blithe, O where are they!

Once loved, lost, mourned—now vexing ills

Your shades troop back in annual bills!

And so ’twill be when I’m aground—

These yearly duns will still go round,

While other bards, with frantic quills,

Shall damn and damn these annual bills!

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

MS, Henry E. Huntington Library, San Marino (CSmH, call no. FI 5076).

Previous publication: L6, 341–43; Howe, 248–49, MS facsimile.

Provenance:See Huntington Library in Description of Provenance.

Emendations and textual notes:

annual • [‘nn’ miswritten; also at 341.29]