Mark Twain Project :: Letters :: : an electronic text

To the Editors of the Washington
Morning Chronicle
10 January 1868 • Washington, D.C.
(Washington Morning Chronicle, 11 Jan 68, UCCL 00127)

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[Eds. Chronicle: ] 1 I am sorry to see that the papers announce another lecture from me for this evening.2 [I ]meant to be [understood ] [last night ]as postponing the second [lecture], but I suppose I was not. The gentleman who engaged me to lecture was taken very sick twenty-four hours before I was to address the public. [(I ]had been reading my lecture to [him, but ]upon my sacred [honor ]I did not think it would be so severe on him as all [that.) ]He is sick yet. I cannot lecture without an agent to attend to business. Please print this for me, and let it stand as a postponement of my lecture—until what [time ]the health of my unfortunate friend must determine. I will give him a chance, though—I will not read the lecture to him any more.

Very truly,

Mark Twain.

Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary

Editorial Signs

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1 The proprietor and chief editor of the Washington Chronicle was John W. Forney (1817–81), who began his career as an editor and then co-proprietor of the Lancaster (Pa.) Journal. In 1845–51 he edited and published the Philadelphia Pennsylvanian, for which he gained a national reputation. In 1851 he came to Washington to serve four years as clerk of the House of Representatives. Strongly opposed to slavery, in 1857 he returned to Philadelphia and founded the Press, through which he waged an unrelenting attack on the proslavery Democrats. Returning to Washington, he was again elected clerk of the House in 1859, then secretary of the Senate in 1861, a position he still held. Also in 1861 he founded the Republican Sunday Chronicle, which became a daily newspaper the following year. His extensive acquaintance with leading statesmen, and his comprehensive knowledge of public affairs, gave his newspaper wide influence.

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2 On 10 January, in noticing the lecture, both the Washington National Republican and the Washington National Intelligencer announced that Clemens would repeat it on Saturday, 11 January (“Amusements,” Washington National Republican, 10 Jan 68, PH in CU-MARK; “Mark Twain’s Lecture on the Frozen Truth,” Washington National Intelligencer, 10 Jan 68, 3). Clemens sent a presumably identical copy of this letter to the National Intelligencer (and perhaps to other newspapers as well), which, like the Morning Chronicle, published it on 11 January. (For an account of the slight variants between the Chronicle text and the text published in the Intelligencer, see the textual commentary for this letter.)

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

“Mark Twain,” Washington Morning Chronicle, 11 Jan 68, 1. This letter was also published on the same morning by the (tri-weekly) Washington National Intelligencer (“Mark Twain’s Lecture,” 11 Jan 68, 1), and possibly by other Washington morning papers that the editors have not seen, evidently from separate holograph copies which Clemens presumably wrote out and delivered to them. Although Clemens probably introduced some differences from copy to copy (he would have altered, for example, ‘EDS. CHRONICLE’ to ‘Editors National Intelligencer’, or vice versa), most of the variants between the copy-text and the Intelligencer are probably errors or unauthorized changes. The Intelligencer almost certainly replaced ‘last night’ with ‘Thursday night’ (154.2–3) in its copy, whereas the Chronicle probably preserves the original reading. In fact, none of the variants in the Intelligencer printing, the salutation apart, is a convincingly authorial revision, or even more clearly authorial than the variant in the Chronicle.

glyph Previous publication: L2, 154; see Copy-text. The letter also appeared in “Letter from Mark Twain,” Washington Evening Express, 11 Jan 68, 1, which probably copied the text from the Intelligencer printing; in “Mark Twain’s First Lecture in Washington—What the Press Say of Him,” Virginia City Territorial Enterprise, 30 Jan 68, 1 (which reprinted the Chronicle version, incorrectly dating it 10 January); and in “‘Mark Twain’ Lecturing on the Frozen Truth,” San Francisco Alta California, 1 Feb 68, 1 (which reprinted the Enterprise, crediting only the Chronicle).

glyph Provenance:No MS for any of the copies distributed by Clemens is known to survive.

glyph Emendations and textual notes:

Eds. Chronicle: • Editors National Intelligencer:

I • It

understood • understood,

last night • Thursday night, [Clemens wrote his original letter on Friday, 10 January, the day after his lecture. It is likely that the Intelligencer staff rather than Clemens made this alteration, because had the need for the change occurred to Clemens himself, he would have changed both copies, which he presumably wrote at the same time.]

lecture, • lecture;

(I • ‸I

him, but • him; but,

honor • honor,

that.) • that.‸

time • time,