To William Dean Howells
21 June 1875 • Hartford, Conn.
(MS: MH-H, UCCL 01242)

Hartford June 21.

My Dear Howells:

O, the visit was just jolly! It couldn’t be improved on. And after the reputation we gained on Lexington Centennial Day it would have been a pity to become commonplace again by catching trains & being on time like the general scum of the earth. Since the walk to Boston Twichell & I invariably descend in the public estimation when discovered in a vehicle of any kind.1

Thank you ever so much for the praises you give the story. I am going to take into serious consideration all you have said, & then make up my mind by & by. Since there is no plot to the thing, it is likely to follow its own drift, & so is as likely to drift into manhood as anywhere—I won’t interpose. If I only had the Mississippi book written, I would surely venture this story in the Atlantic. But I’ll see—I’ll think the whole thing over.2

I don’t think Bliss wants that type-writer, because he don’t send for it. I’ll sell it to you for the twelve dollars I’ve got to pay him for his saddle—or I’ll gladly send it to you for nothing if you choose (for, plainly to be honest, I think $12 is too much for it.) Anyway, I’ll send it.3

Mrs. Clemens is sick abed & likely to remain so some days, poor thing. I’m just going to her, now.4

Yrs Ever

Clemens

Explanatory Notes

Editorial Signs

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1 The letter Clemens answered has not been found. Howells’s visit began in the late afternoon on Saturday, 12 June. In his journal that day Twichell wrote, “Spent the evening at M. T.s with W. D. Howells.” And the next day he noted:

M. T. & W. D. H. walked home from Church with me, and subsequently I went to Mark’s and dined with them—just for love. Upon leaving H. followed me to the door and we had on the threshold quite a talk on religious subjects and I was sorry that we couldn’t have more. He seemed very humble and earnest, and vastly loveable. (Twichell, 1:107–8)

A week later, on 20 June, Howells wrote to his father: “I spent last Sunday at Hartford, with Mark Twain, and as I had to go to church with him in the morning, and talk with him all the rest of the day, why I didn’t write to you as you may well know. I had a beaming visit, of course, and did a month’s laughing” (MH-H). Howells presumably returned to Cambridge on the evening of 13 June or the following morning. In his lost letter he may have mentioned missing a train on his way home, recalling his and Clemens’s misadventures on “Lexington Centennial Day” (see 18 Apr 75 to OLC, n. 1). For the walk to Boston see Clemens’s letters of 9 and 12–17 November 1874.

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2 While in Hartford, Howells must have read some of the nearly completed manuscript of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and offered to serialize it in the Atlantic.

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3 Shortly after receiving his first typewritten letter from Clemens, Howells had mentioned his interest in borrowing the typewriter (9 Dec 74 to Howells, n. 2). He replied to the present letter with a postcard on 23 June: “Please send the machine, and if I cannot afford to receive it for nothing, I will pay the extortionate sum you name. W. D. H.” (CU-MARK).

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4 In a letter of 21 June 1875, Lilly Warner reported to her husband, George: “Poor Livy is down for a few days, with a trouble like mine of two months ago, only a good deal younger. She is immensely relieved & glad though, for she had been miserably unhappy about it—on account of her frail health only” (CU-MARK). The trouble apparently was a miscarriage.

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

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

Previous publication: L6, 496–498; MTHL, 1:87–88.

Provenance:see Howells Letters in Description of Provenance.