16 January 1885 • Chicago, Ill. (MS: NPV, UCCL 03118)
I wish to thank you heartily for a most pleasant sojourn in Keokuk—& of course I also thank Ma & Mollie—that goes without saying. I had a perfect 24 hours there, with the sort of social activity which produces rest instead of fatigue.
I don’t like to think of the Burlington performance. Cable had been on the platform more than an hour & a half when I arrived; & so I did not dare to try to make the house listen an hour to me. I had to cut myself shorter than I wanted to, & I did not talk well, anyway, because I felt myself so heavily handicapped by the hellish circumstances.
With great love to all of you
Mr. Orion Clemens | Keokuk | Iowa return address: return to s. l. clemens, hartford, conn., if not delivered within 10 days. postmarked: chicagoⒶemendation ill. jan 17 85Ⓐemendation 9 pm and rec’d. keokuk, ioa. jan 18 10pm
References
- Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, N.Y.
- 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
- Webster, Samuel Charles. Mark Twain, Business Man. Edited by Samuel Charles Webster. Boston: Little, Brown and Co. 1946
MS, Jean Webster McKinney Family Papers, Special Collections, NPV.
MTBus, 292–93.