4 June 1869 • Elmira, N.Y. (MS: CSmH, UCCL 00313)
I have been in bed, reading & smoking, two or three hours, but I do not yet discover any inclination to go to sleep. I suppose it is because I am waiting for the morning to come, so that I can see Livy. Don’t know what else. I am in love with Livy. I think considerable of her. I had a dreadful time making this conquest, but that is all over, you know, & now I have to set up nights trying to think what I’ll do next. I believe I will commence & rehearse it all over again. I like it.
To-day the last chapters of the proof came, & to-morrow we shall finish reading & be done with the tiresome book forever. I am ever so glad of it, & I do not want another task like it shortly. I Ⓐemendation lost very nearly all my interest in it, long ago. It makes just about 650 or 65 660 Ⓐemendation pages, & so is not too bulky, after all.
We have all given you scissors1explanatory note for not stopping here, & I warn you that you will catch it livelier still if you go by again. Mr. Langdon sticks to his fell threat to follow you to Cleveland & stay 3 weeks if you repeat this iniquity—he does more than stick to it—
“A severe scolding” (Mathews, 2:1473).
References
- Henry E. Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, Calif.
- 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
- SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Mark Twain to Mrs. Fairbanks. Edited by Dixon Wecter. San Marino, Calif.: Huntington Library. 1949
- 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
- Mathews, Mitford M., ed. A Dictionary of Americanisms on Historical Principles. 2 vols. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1951
MS, Huntington Library, San Marino, Calif. (CSmH, call no. HM 14251). The surviving MS page is a torn half-sheet of beige laid paper, measuring 5 3/16 by 8 1/16 inches, with chain lines ¼ inch apart (possibly intended as rules), watermarked “LACROIX” in block letters.
MTMF 98–99; L3 , 261–262.
see Huntington Library, pp. 582–83.
More information on provenance may be found in Description of Provenanceclick to open link.