To Susan L. Crane
4–11 November 1872 • London, England
(MTB, 1:470, UCCL 00826)

. . . .

If you [& Theodore1 will come over in the [spring] with Livy & me, &] spend the [summer],2 you [shall] see a country that is so beautiful that you will be obliged to believe in [fairy-land]. [There is nothing like it elsewhere on the globe. You should have a season ticket & travel up & down every day between London & Oxford & worship nature].

[And] Theodore can browse with me among dusty old dens that look now as they looked five hundred years ago; & puzzle over books in the British Museum that were made before Christ was born; & in the customs of their public dinners, & the ceremonies of every official act, & the dresses of a thousand dignitaries, trace the speech & manners of all the centuries that have dragged their lagging decades over England since the Heptarchy fell asunder. I would a good deal rather live here if I could get the rest of you over.

. . . .

Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary

Editorial Signs

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1 Crane.

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2 This letter was written sometime between 4 November, when Clemens received Olivia’s cablegram saying she was willing to return with him in the spring, and 11 November, when he left London for Liverpool on the first leg of the trip home (see the next letter).

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

MTB, 1:470. Albert Bigelow Paine also quoted this portion of the letter in MTL (1:200–201), omitting two sentences (213.13–15). Letters printed in MTL are usually more complete than those excerpted in MTB, and preserve details of the MS more accurately (see the discussion in the Description of Texts). In this case, however, MTB has the fuller text and, in the few instances where it differs from MTL, seems to contain readings closer to Clemens’s usage of the period. It seems probable that the text in MTL derives from that in MTB, but since it is possible that both derive from the MS or from a lost transcription, the rejected readings of MTL are reported.

Previous publication: L5, 213–214.

Emendations and textual notes:

& ... & ... & (C) • and ... and ... and (MTB, MTL) [here and hereafter]

spring (MTB) • Spring (MTL)

summer, (MTB) • Summer, (MTL)

shall (MTB) • will (MTL)

fairy-land (MTB) • Fairyland (MTL)

There ... nature. (MTB) • [not in] (MTL)

[¶] And (MTB) • [no ¶] and (MTL)