Mark Twain Project Online
Explanatory Notes        Apparatus Notes (Ⓐ)

Source: Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, N.Y. | University of California, Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft Library, Berkeley ([NPV CU-MARK])

Cue: "I lectured here"

Source format: "MS | Typed transcription"

Letter type: "[standard letter]"

Notes:

Last modified: 2022-11-23T10:53:35

Revision History: VF | RHH 2022-11-23

Published on MTPO: 2018

Print Publication: v3

This edited text supersedes the previously published text
MTPDocEd
To Pamela A. Moffett
14 January 1869 • Davenport, Iowa (MS and transcript made for Albert Bigelow Paine: NPV and CU-MARK, UCCL 00233)
Private.Ⓐemendation
Davenport, Iowa,
Jan 14.Ⓐemendation
My Dear Sister:

I lectured here to-nightⒶemendation—& have lately lectured in several Michigan towns, & in Akron, Ohio, Fort Wayne, Ind., Indianapolis, Rockford, Monmouth, Galesburg, Chicago, Peoria, Decatur, & Ottawa, Ill—& a lecture every night—& now have to talk in Iowa City, Sparta, Wis., Toledo, Ohio, Norwalk, Cleveland, & a lot of places in Illinois, Michigan, & New York City & New York State, & am getting awfully tired of it.1explanatory note I spend about half as much money as I make, I think, though I have managed to save about a thousand dollars, so far—don't think I shall save more than a thousand more.2explanatory note

One of Mrs. Pavey's daughters (she married a doctor & is living in an Illinois town & has sons larger than I am,) was in the audience at Peoria. Had a long talk with her. She came many miles to be there.3explanatory note Saw a nephew of Tom Collins in Decatur.4explanatory note

The Societies all want to engage me to lecture for them next year, but I can’t promise—I don’t want to lecture any more. I want to get at something else.Ⓐemendation


portion of MS page missing (about 65 words—17 of them now restored from Paine transcript)


That is all of the private. 5explanatory note Had a letter from Miss Lou Conrad the other day—was near where she lives, but had not time to go there.6explanatory note

What do you think of Norwich, N.Y., for a home? I think it will exactly suit you. You can run to New York or visit the sea-side whenever you please, from there.7explanatory note

No, you can't board & lodge in New York City in any sort of respectable & comfortable style for less than $25 to $35 a week apiece.

In the spring go yourself, or send Orion8explanatory note—or both of you go—to Norwich, & you will rent or buy a house & be delighted. I only wish I could live there. IⒶemendation am to lecture every night till Feb. 2. Shall be in Cleveland, Ohio, one day only—Jan. 22.

Affectionately
Sam.

Love to all.

Textual Commentary
Source text(s):

MS, Jean Webster McKinney Papers, Special Collections, NPV, and transcript made for Albert Bigelow Paine (Tr), CU-MARK. The surviving MS now consists of about three and one-third leaves, inscribed on the rectos only. Pages 1, 2 (‘Private . . . but I can't’), and 4 (‘home? . . . Love to all.’) survive intact, but a portion of page 3 (preceding ‘That is all . . . N.Y., for a’) was cut off, probably by Pamela Moffett, and does not survive. When the MS was transcribed for Albert Bigelow Paine, however, more of the page did survive, and the text is emended to include seventeen words that are part of the transcription but no longer part of the MS.

Previous Publication:

MTBus, 103–4, partial publication; L3, 43–44, partial publication.

Provenance:

See McKinney Family Papers and Paine Transcripts in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.

Explanatory Notes
1 For the dates of Clemens’s appearances in these places, see the Lecture Schedule, 1868–1870.click to open link
2 Between 17 November 1868, when his tour began, and the date of this letter, Clemens’s gross earnings were at least $2,300. He earned a fee of $100 for each performance, but evidently paid his own travel, lodging, and meal costs. As befitted a newcomer to the field, his normal fee was half that of some of his competitors, such as Petroleum Vesuvius Nasby (20 and 21 Jan 1869 to OLLclick to open link, n. 1; L2 246, 282, 294).
3 Jesse H. Pavey (1798?–1853), a brutal Hannibal tavern keeper during Clemens’s youth, and his wife, Catharine (b. 1800?), had a large family that included at least seven daughters. Clemens’s visitor might have been any one of four of them—Julia, Sarah, Fanny, or Susan. In 1897, in “Villagers of 1840–3,” he identified her as “Mrs. Strong.” The Paveys had left Hannibal for St. Louis by mid-1850. In 1855, while working in St. Louis as a printer, Clemens boarded with the widowed Catharine Pavey (for his recollections of this family, see Inds, 98–99, 340–41).
4 Thomas K. Collins (1822–85), a dry goods merchant, was one of Hannibal’s foremost businessmen (Inds, 94, 102, 315). His nephew has not been identified.
5 Pamela must have torn away the top two-thirds of this page, which presumably contained Clemens’s progress report on his courtship, even before passing the letter on to other members of the family in St. Louis. She thereby complied with his November 1868 request for strict confidentiality—“I make no exceptions” (L2, 295).
6 Clemens sent Louisa Conrad’s letter to Olivia Langdon (see 7 Jan 1869 to OLLclick to open link from Chicago, n. 5).
7 Clemens repeated his previous recommendation (of 24 Decemberclick to open link) that his sister move with her family to Norwich, in Chenango County, New York, approximately 140 miles from New York City (L2, 326–27, 348). She now lived with her mother, two children, and the family’s German maid, Margaret, at 1312 Chesnut Street in St. Louis, where she also took in boarders. The family remained at that address until May 1869, the first of several moves within St. Louis. In April 1870, they moved to Fredonia, in westernmost New York, close to Lake Erie and about forty miles from Clemens’s Buffalo home (11 May 1869 to JLCclick to open link; 1 Apr 1870 to Jervis and Olivia Lewis Langdonclick to open link, TS in CU-MARK; 21 Apr 1870 to OCclick to open link, CU-MARK; Edwards 1868, 537, 953; Edwards 1869, 569; MTBus, 47, 103, 112).
8 Orion and Mollie Clemens apparently lived in St. Louis throughout 1869 (with Mollie sometimes visiting her parents in Keokuk, Iowa). It is not known whether they were currently living with Pamela.
Emendations and Textual Notes

Adopted readings followed by ‘(MTP)’ are editorial emendations of the source readings.

Ⓐ Private. ● braces appear below and to the right of this line
Ⓐ Davenport . . . 14. ● a vertical brace spans the right margin of the place and date lines
Ⓐ to-night (MTP) ● to- | night (MS)
Ⓐ I can't . . . else. (Tr) ● seventeen words not in (MS)
Ⓐ there. I (MTP) ● ~.—| ~ (MS)

References

  1. Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, N.Y.
  2. University of California, Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft Library, Berkeley
  3. Machlis, Paul, ed. Union Catalog of Clemens Letters. Edited by Paul Machlis. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press. [In some cases, UCCL catalog numbers cited in this volume supersede those assigned in 1986 and reflect corrections or additions to the catalog since publication. An updated version of the catalog can be consulted via the Letters Search page at MTPO.] 1986
  4. Webster, Samuel Charles. Mark Twain, Business Man. Edited by Samuel Charles Webster. Boston: Little, Brown and Co. 1946
  5. SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Mark Twain’s Letters, Volume 3: 1869. Edited by Victor Fischer, Michael B. Frank, and Dahlia Armon. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Also online at MTPO[bib32371]. 1992
  6. SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Mark Twain’s Letters, Volume 2: 1867–1868. Edited by Harriet Elinor Smith, Richard Bucci, and Lin Salamo. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Also online at MTPO[bib32371]. 1990
  7. SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer among the Indians, and Other Unfinished Stories. Foreword and notes by Dahlia Armon and Walter Blair. Texts established by Dahlia Armon, Paul Baender, Walter Blair, William M. Gibson, and Franklin R. Rogers. The Mark Twain Library. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press. Also online at MTPO[bib32371]. 1989
  8. Edwards, Richard. Edwards’ Tenth Annual Director to the Inhabitants, Institutions, Incorporated Companies, Manufacturing Establishments, Business, Business Firms, etc., etc., in the City of St. Louis, for 1868. St. Louis: Richard Edwards. 1868
  9. Edwards, Richard. Edwards’ Eleventh Annual Directory to the Inhabitants, Institutions, Incorporated Companies, Manufacturing Establishments, Business, Business Firms, etc., etc., in the City of St. Louis, for 1869. St. Louis: Charless Publishing and Manufacturing Company. 1869
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