From Olivia L. Clemens and Samuel L. Clemens to Charles J.
Langdon
24 April 1883 • Hartford, Conn.
(MS: CtHMTH, UCCL 02375)
‸I am a [great deal stronger] than I was a week ago. O. L. C‸
Tuesday, Apl. 24/83.
Dear Charley—
Your loving letter touched Livy deeply (both of us, indeed,) & did her more good than all the day’s medicines. I know, & she knows, that a fortnight under the home roof, with the home faces around, & the home affections & tendernesses shining out of them, would bring healing & health to Livy quicker than all other cures combined; & for a while, it was our dream to try it the moment she should be strong enough to travel; but now that Livy’s strength has really begun to dribble perceptibly back, she is afraid to venture: for it would be small benefit to her if the children were along; [wh] & to leave them behind in this town ‸whose death-rate‸ has been for months just double what it ought in reason to be, is a thing which she can contemplate‸, & has contemplated‸—contemplating is easy—but at the same time it is a thing which you & I know she isn’t ever going to do. For a while I actually thought she would; but when I saw by the paper this morning that the Hartford death-list for the month of March reached the startling & disgraceful figure of 89, I no longer wanted her to venture away & risk the children here. We shall not forget your generous words & your loving invitation, nor let our appreciation of it fall dim or lose value; but I believe, with Livy, whose judgment is always good in such matters, that she had better stand to her post, now, & do the best she can in the circumstances, until the time for the summer flight shall arrive.
We are greatly relieved & rejoiced to glean from your letter that mother has improved; for we have been feeling uneasy on her account.
Charley dear, I cannot express to you how much I value your loving letter. Mr Clemens and I both had (as the children say) “tears in our eyes ‸when we read it.‸ I want desperately to go to Elmira and your letter makes me want to go more than ever—but I feel that it is not best. Susy was quite sick the other night with sore throat and fever and I was very thankful that I was here. There is so much scarlet fever about that it makes me anxious about the children. With warm love to Mother Ida & yourself I am most lovingly
O. L. C.
Textual Commentary
Source text(s):Previous publication:
MicroPUL, reel 2.
Emendations and textual notes:
great • great great [corrected miswriting]
wh • [‘h’ partly formed]
