morning express $10 per annum.
office of the express printing company
evening
express $8 per annum.no. 14 east swan
street.
weekly express $1.50 per annum.
buffalo, Sept 8, 186 9.
Friend Crane—
I have already written Abbey that as I was so mixed about it I would keep on the safe side & not lecture in either town.1 Of course I can’t go deliberately & talk in Rondout after that. If you have me on your memorandum book, it is a mistake—for I can easily swear I didn’t promise you—the only trouble is I can’t swear I didn’t promise Abbey, though I can’t see why what I could have been thinking of to promise him when I was asked twenty times in different cities last winter to put my name down for this year & positively refused in every instance. So you see how I am [situated. Abbey’s ]word is as good as mine, & he says I promised him—I don’t deny it—I simply don’t remember it. And not denying it, of course I can’t talk for you in the face of that fact.
I would like might to be fixed so that I could talk for one or the other of you, & if I were there I would pitch pennies with both of you—but I ain’t, you see, & we’ll have to let those two communities pass unpersecuted with my lecture for this winter. Submit this to Mrs. Crane,2 & she will say again that I am right.
No, your “persistence” don’t annoy me a bit—it is complimentary to me.3 I am only going to lecture till the middle of January, anyhow. My marriage was booked for Jan. 10, but had to be postponed till the first week in February on account of m some lecture engagements which I could not get canceled. But it won’t be postponed again. , unless for the I accept your congratulations upon that forthcoming event, & thank you right cordially.
Sincerely Yrs.
Samℓ. L. Clemens.
{graphic group: 1 horizontal circle margin overlay}
It won’t do for me to book myself for 1870–71, because I hope to get out of the lecture-field forever before that time, & so I must make no promises. But you’ll receive early notice of who my from my advertisements if I do enter the field that year, for I never intend to begin late again. I’ll start early—only, I am almost willing to promise that I’ll not be in the field at all that year. Make a note of this, & see if I don’t come pretty near being a prophet. I mean to make this newspaper support me hereafter. 4
Mark.
Personal. | Henry M. Crane Esq | Rondout | N. Y. [postmarked] buffalo n.y. sep 9 [docketed by Crane:] Twain | ansd sep 11 [and] 95.13 | 142 | 142 |
200
60
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Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary
Source text(s):Previous publication:
L3, 346–347; Collector (May 1949),
lot I 948, excerpts.
Provenance:sold by Walter R. Benjamin Autographs in 1949; deposited at ViU by Clifton Waller Barrett on 17
December 1963.
Emendations and textual notes:
situated. Abbey’s • situated.—|Abbey’s
