To George L. Fall
28 November 1871 • Albany, N.Y.
(MS: Karanovich, UCCL 11412)

G.H.H. 1 Dup. to Bennington boston lyceum bureau, no. 36 bromfield street. james redpath. - - - - george l. fall. office hours from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. boston, Nov. 25 1871. Saml L. Clemens Esq Albany NY. Dear Sir we have recorded an engagement for you at place,Kalamazoo Mich date,Saturday Decem. 16th ’71 subject,“Artemas Ward Humorist” terms,$125 hotel,will notify you 2 correspondent,Delos Phillips remarks,Y. Mens Library Ass’n [on receipt hereof, please sign and return enclosed acknowledgement.] yours truly, Redpath & Fall H

[in pencil across the above:] ‸ All right. ‸

Albany.

The within is noted. I particularly wanted to talk in Kalamazoo.3

Fall, my boy, you haven’t given me a hotel, from Fredonia clear to Chicago.4 Now you think I am going to roost in a tree—but I leave it to you, as a man & a brother, if a man can do that in the winter time & keep in good lecturing condition? Now you know he can’t. Fall, this comes of your [exhuberance]—your inhuman gaiety of spirits. I shall come to Boston & shoot you, with no mere Colt’s revolver, but with a Gatling gun.

Ys

Mark.

Did you understand the Easton telegram? I had home reasons for wanting to get rid of Scranton & the necessity of going out there, away from home at that time. And I thought well to get Jersey City canceled too, if possible, though it is not so very far.5 I told Troy to-night that Feb 1 was well enough there, no doubt—it was near home.6

[letter docketed:] Clemens Saml L. | Hartford Cnn | Nov 25.

Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary

Editorial Signs

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1 Boston Lyceum Bureau chief clerk George H. Hathaway, who prepared this communication. The duplicate he sent to Bennington, Vermont, is not known to survive.

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2 Clemens jotted the Kalamazoo engagement in his lecture itinerary book and later added the hotel name—the Burdick (Redpath and Fall 1871–72, 7–8).

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3 Kalamazoo’s attraction for Clemens has not been explained. He is not known to have lectured there previously—nor do any of his surviving letters to Redpath and Fall contain a request for an engagement there.

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4 Clemens’s lecture itinerary book, as originally prepared by the Boston Lyceum Bureau, failed to specify hotel reservations for the following engagements between the Fredonia (8 December) and Chicago (18 December) lectures: Erie, Pennsylvania (9 December); Toledo, Ohio (11 December); Ann Arbor, Jackson, Lansing, and Grand Rapids, Michigan (12–15 December). Clemens himself added hotel names—presumably supplied by Fall—for Erie (the Reed) and Lansing (the Lansing) (Redpath and Fall 1871–72, 7–8).

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5 The telegram from Easton, site of Clemens’s 23 November lecture, does not survive. He lectured as scheduled in Scranton, Pennsylvania, on 29 January and in Jersey City on 30 January 1872 (“Mark Twain’s Lecture,” Scranton Republican, 1 Feb 72, 6; “Roughing It,” Jersey City American Standard, 31 Jan 72, 1).

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6 James Redpath later recalled: “You went to Albany. There the hero of Troy besieged you, & final[l]y carried you by assault. You told him that Feb 1 wd do” (Redpath to SLC, 18 Jan 72, CU-MARK). This arrangement precipitated a difficulty between the Boston Lyceum Bureau and the Paterson, New Jersey, lecture committee, which had priority in requesting the 1 February lecture date (see the next letter, n. 1). The “hero of Troy” may have been George R. Meneely, Clemens’s contact in West Troy in January 1870 (10 Jan 70 to OLL [2nd], n. 7).

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

MS, collection of Nick Karanovich.

Previous publication: L4, 501–502; Heritage Book Shop, item 31, excerpt.

Emendations and textual notes:

on . . . acknowledgment. • [canceled by George Hathaway]

exhuberance • [sic]