To William Dean Howells
25 or 26 April 1875 • Hartford, Conn.
(MS: MH-H, UCCL 01225)

My Dear Howells:1

Good for Fawcett! The idea of a Mississippi pilot writing profound essays upon so imposing a subject as Ancient Oriental Trade! I think I’ll wr ring that into a chapter, for the honor of the craft. All the boys had brains, & plenty of them—but they mostly lacked education & the literary faculty.2

We are ashamed to find that we gave you & Mrs. Howells a villainously hard bed to sleep on in the mahogany room.3 The bed is not built for that room yet, & we did not know the abandoned character of the temporary one. When you come next Saturday we’ll put you in a bed you’ll like better.4

Yrs Ever

Mark.

I’ve written you twice since I got home—directed simply to W D Howells, Cambridge.

Explanatory Notes

Editorial Signs

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1 This letter, written no later than 26 April (Howells answered the next day: see 7 May 75 to Howells, n. 1), replied to the following one (CU-MARK):

UCLC32151

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The proof that Howells asked for was the sixth (June) installment of “Old Times,” due out in mid-May.

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2 The enclosed letter from William Lyman Fawcett (or Fawcette), evidently a fellow pilot, has not been found. His “History of the Two Pillars” and “Old-Time Oriental Trade” appeared in the January 1874 and October 1875 numbers of the Atlantic Monthly. Nothing further has been discovered about him, except that in 1877 he published Gold and Debt; An American Hand-book of Finance (Chicago: S. C. Griggs and Company). Clemens did not mention Fawcett’s “profound essays” in his seventh and last installment of “Old Times on the Mississippi” in the August Atlantic.

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3 During the Howellses 11–13 March visit.

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4 The Howellses did not visit Hartford on Saturday, 1 May. On that day Howells was in Boston, where he attended a performance of the Gilded Age play (see 7 May 75 to Howells, n. 3).

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

MS, Houghton Library, Harvard University (MH-H, shelf mark bMS Am 1784 [98]).

Previous publication: L6, 463–64; MTHL, 1:78.

Provenance:see Howells Letters in Description of Provenance.