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

To Elisha Bliss, Jr.
25 August 1868 • Elmira, N.Y.
(Two independent typed transcripts prepared for Albert Bigelow Paine: CU-MARK, UCCL 12727)

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Elmira, Aug. [25.]

Friend Bliss—

I am here, enjoying myself royally. Haven’t any desire to shorten my visit. I am getting acquainted with everybody. Shall be here nearly two weeks yet. My address will be as printed on this envelope.

Staid a day & a half at Beach’s country place. Looked also at his pictures at his Brooklyn residence. He has such a multitude of them that I could not look at all. Therefore, we arranged [that] your artists should go there to his house (No. 66 Columbia [street] (Brooklyn) and select for themselves. Mr. Beach can always be heard from through his brother Alfred, in the Scientific American Office [3d] story World [building].

[Kind] [regards] to all. Write me. Everything is [jolly,—]

[Yrs]

[Sam. L. Clemens]

Textual Commentary

Editorial Signs

Description of Texts and Provenance

Source text(s):

None. The text is based on two typed transcripts prepared for Albert Bigelow Paine, each of which is likely to derive independently from the original letter, which has not been found. Tr1 was clearly made and corrected from the MS because it contains a holograph correction in Paine’s hand. Tr2 seems to be a fair copy (with carbon copy) of Tr1, but like other duplicate copies of Paine typescripts, it too was probably made with access to the original. The variants between them do not demonstrate their independence, but that independence is here assumed on the basis of dozens of other duplicate typescripts prepared for Paine which are in fact independent, or partly independent, copies of the original.

Tr1	Typed transcript prepared for and corrected by Albert Bigelow Paine, CU-MARK
Tr2	Typed transcript with carbon copy prepared for Albert Bigelow Paine, CU-MARK

glyph Previous publication:

None known.

glyph Provenance:

See Paine Transcripts in Description of Provenance.

glyph Emendations, adopted readings, and textual notes:

25. (MTP) • 25. 1868 (Tr1); 25, 1868 [datelines of extant letters in this period so rarely include the year, in any form, that its appearance in both Tr1 and Tr2 is here judged a typist’s addition, not in the MS] (Tr2)

that (Tr1) • white diamond hat (Tr2)

street (Brooklyn) and select (Tr1) • street, (Brooklyn) and select [Paine corrected Tr1 by inserting ‘(Brooklyn) and select’; the missing close parenthesis following ‘street’ or ‘street,’ is invariant in both Tr1 and Tr2 and is here deemed an authorial error in the MS] (Tr2)

3d (MTP) • 3d (Tr1, Tr2)

building (Tr1) • Building (Tr2)

[5-em indent] Kind (Tr1) • [¶] Kind (Tr2)

regards (Tr1) • regarda (Tr2)

jolly,— (MTP) • ~,-; - (Tr1); ~.— (Tr2)

Yrs (MTP) • ~ — (Tr1, Tr2)

Sam. L. Clemens (MTP) • Sam L. Clemens. (Tr2); Sam. L. Clemens. [punctuation of this signature is modeled on the signature in a nearby letter, 22 February 1868 to William C. Church] (Tr1)