June 9/80.
Well, old practical joker, the corpse of Mr. B. has been here,
& I have bedded it & fed it, & put down my work
during 24 hours & tried my level best to make it do something, or say
something, or appreciate something—or even
stink—–but no, it was worse than
Lazarus. A [kind-hearted], well-meaning corpse with was this Boston young man, but lawsy
bless me, horribly tir dull company. Now old man, unless you have
great confidence in Mr. B.‸
s
‸
judgment, you ought to make him submit his article to you before he
prints it. For only think how true I was to you: Every hour that he was here I
was saying, gloatingly, “O G—
d you, when you are in bed
& your light out, I will fix you” (meaning to kill
him)—but then the thought would follow—“No,
Howells sent him—he shall be spared, he shall be
respected—he shall travel [hellwards] by his own route.”
Breakfast is frozen by this time, & Mrs. Clemens correspondingly hot. Goodbye
Yrs Ever
Mark.
Textual Commentary
Source text(s):Previous publication:
MTL, 1:382–83; MTHL, 1:311–12.
Provenance:See Howells Letters in Description of Provenance.
Emendations and textual notes:
kind-hearted • kind-|hearted
hellwards • hell-wards
