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[begin page 461]
APPENDIX A
Mark Twain’s Working Notes

Mark Twain’s working notes for Adventures of Huckleberry Finn show him developing the plot and considering alternatives for it, reviewing his work, perfecting the dialect of his characters, and reminding himself to tie up loose ends. In addition, they provide physical and textual evidence about the course of composition. All the extant working notes are reproduced here except for the notes he wrote in the margins of his manuscript, which are transcribed in Mark Twain’s Marginal Working Notes. In addition, there are a number of notebook entries written between 1877 and 1883 (including those for his 1882 river trip) which are to some degree relevant to the composition of the book. These entries have been published in full in N&J2 and N&J3 , and they are selectively cited here.

A total of twenty-nine manuscript pages—all in the Mark Twain Papers (CU-MARK)—are reproduced both in photofacsimile of the original manuscripts and in typographic transcription with accompanying footnotes. This extra measure of care is justified in light of the extraordinary influence these documents have had and still promise to have on our understanding of how and when Mark Twain wrote Huckleberry Finn. Bernard DeVoto pointed out that they “cast a flood of light on the writing of Huckleberry Finn” as well as on “the working of Mark’s mind and talent” (DeVoto 1942, 63).

Each group of working notes is largely consistent as to paper and writing medium. The exceptions are minor—a few words in pencil on a page of ink notes or vice versa, one leaf of differing paper in groups 1 and 2. The order of some of the pages within each group is somewhat arbitrary, although the appearance of the paper and handwriting and the styling and content of the entries often suggest a certain sequence.

Twenty-six pages of the working notes were first transcribed, grouped, and numbered by DeVoto (DeVoto 1942, 61–78). The groups are renamed and renumbered in this appendix to conform with a new chronological sequence. See the list below for the new numbers and equivalent DeVoto numbers. Three additional pages, not identified by DeVoto, are reproduced here. One, 3-14, is added to Group 3, and the remaining two, 4-1 and 4-2, comprise Group 4, a version of the burlesque Hamlet soliloquy in chapter 21.

[begin page 462] In the following list, new numbers are given first and followed by former DeVoto numbers in square brackets, thus: 1-1 [B-2].


Group 1 [DeVoto’s Group B]
1-1 [B-2] 1-2 [B-1]
Group 2 [DeVoto’s Group A]
2-1 [A-7] 2-2 [A-1] 2-3 [A-2] 2-4 [A-3]
2-5 [A-4] 2-6 [A-5] 2-7 [A-6] 2-8 [A-8]
2-9 [A-9] 2-10 [A-10] 2-11 [A-11]
Group 3 [DeVoto’s Group C]
3-1 [C-1] 3-2 [C-2] 3-3 [C-3] 3-4 [C-4]
3-5 [C-5] 3-6 [C-6] 3-7 [C-7] 3-8 [C-8]
3-9 [C-9] 3-10 [C-10] 3-11 [C-11] 3-12 [C-12]
3-13 [C-13] 3-14 [not in DeVoto]
Group 4 [not in DeVoto]

Within each group of notes the facsimiles precede the typographic transcriptions, which stop short of type facsimiles: they do not, for instance, necessarily reproduce the lineation of the manuscripts. But they are otherwise as faithful as possible to every transcribable detail of the originals, including several brief entries not noticed or transcribed by DeVoto.

Words underscored once are rendered in italics, words underscored twice are in small capitals (with Initial Capitals if so inscribed), and words underscored three times are in FULL CAPITALS. Canceled text is shown with a horizontal rule (“buttons”) or, for solitary characters, a slash mark (“T”). (Note that Mark Twain’s deletions sometimes indicate not that he rejected an idea, but that he had used it in the story.) Inserted words or characters appear enclosed by carets (“old”); solitary inserted characters appear with a single sublinear caret (“n”). Words that Mark Twain revised internally are transcribed showing the canceled and the revised form separately (“HarveyHarney” rather than the more literal but less legible “Harvney”). Words added in ink or pencil different from the original inscription are transcribed in boldface type. Where part of the original inscription has been torn away or otherwise obscured, the original reading of the text is conjectured within square brackets: shirt. Editorial description within the text itself is always within square brackets and in italic type: added in the left margin. All superscript numbers for footnotes are editorial. All inscription not by Mark Twain has been ignored in the transcription.

[begin page 463]
Group 1

Mark Twain wrote these notes (formerly designated as Group B) on two disparate leaves, possibly at different times but certainly between 1876 and 1880. For the most part, he seems to be reviewing his earliest pages (MS1a pages 1–446, written in 1876) and refreshing his memory of characters and situations. He refers to specific passages by word cue and manuscript page number, and he copies marginal notations from the MS1a pages. Unlike the Group 2 and Group 3 working notes, the Group 1 notes do not sketch out ideas for the next section of the book (MS1b pages 447 through 663, written in 1880).

Mark Twain used pencil for all the Group 1 notes: page 1-1 is a torn half-sheet of unlined wove paper bearing the watermark “Antique Parchment Note Paper” and measuring 17.3 by 11.3 centimeters (6 13/16 by 4 7/16 inches); page 1-2 is a torn half-sheet of Crystal-Lake Mills wove paper, the same paper on which most of the first half of the manuscript is written (MS1a, pages 1–446).

[begin page 464]
1-1

[begin page 466]
1-1

2/Widow Douglas—then who is “Miss Watson?”

Ah, she’s W D’s sister.—old spinster1

219 218—the dead man is Huck’s father.

223　　the ″　　″ again

244 more about Finn—his disappearance.

270 (overflowed banks?)

273—river “pretty high yet” but maybe not overflowed.2

Let Jim say putty for “pretty” & nuvver for “never”3

[begin page 465]
1-2

[begin page 467]
1-2

Baby & barrel—350—Poetry 420 1

Remarks at a funeral2

Negro sermon—& the shouts.3

Child with rusty unloaded gun always kills.4

[begin page 468]
Group 2

The combined evidence of paper and ink color suggests that the notes in Group 2 (formerly designated as Group A), like the MS1b pages, were probably written between March and mid-June 1880. (It was in late March that Mark Twain, then working in purple ink on wove paper, put aside the manuscript of The Prince and the Pauper.) The 1880 period was the second of Mark Twain’s three major stints of work on Huckleberry Finn, when he wrote MS1b pages 447 through 663 (the second half of chapter 18 and all of chapters 19 through 21). It is clear that the eleven pages of Group 2 notes were not all written at one session. Most of the pages contain ideas for the MS1b section, while some look ahead to the final section of the book (MS2). One note in pencil on the back of 2-10 was added in 1883.

Mark Twain wrote these notes on eleven leaves: 2-1 through 2-10 on ten torn half-sheets of unlined wove paper, the same paper as that used for MS1b pages 447 through 663; and 2-11 on a torn half-sheet of laid paper, ruled horizontally in blue and embossed “P&P” (probably for Platner & Porter, the Connecticut paper manufacturer) in the upper left corner. (He used this stationery sporadically, for personal letters and literary manuscript, in the 1870s and in 1880: see Blair 1958, 7-8.) The notes are in the same purple ink used for MS1b pages 447 through 663, except for an addition in blue ink on 2-8 and a few added notations in pencil on 2-8, 2-9, 2-10, and 2-11. Two pages, 2-2 and 2-3, were numbered “1” and “2” by Mark Twain. Nonetheless, it is clear that page 2-1, with its list of characters from the feud episode, is the earliest page within the group.

[begin page 469]
2-1

[begin page 480]
2-1

George Jackson (Huck)1

Shepherdsons.

Bob & Tom Grangerford　28 & 30.abt 30.

old man (Saul) Col.　″ 60

Betsy (negro)　　　″

old lady (Rachel)　　″

Buck　　　　　″ 12–14

Emmeline (dead)　″

Charlotte (proud & grand)　″ 25

Sophia (sweet & gentle)　　″ 20

HarveyHarney Shepherdson

[begin page 470]
2-2

[begin page continued 480]
2-2

1

DE MULE.

Negro campmeeting & sermon—“See dat sinner how he run.”1

Swell Sunday costumes of negros.2

Poor white family & cabin at woodyard in Walnut Bend. Capt. Ed. Montgomery.3

The Burning Shame boys give bill of sale of Jim. at Napoleon, Ark.4

Legend of No. 10 Earthquake.5

o

Describe Lara.6

[begin page 471]
2-3

[begin page continued 482]
2-3

Rich III—15¢—B.S.1 50c

2

Being in a close place, Huck boldly offers to sell Jim—the latter turns pale but dasn’t speak—secretly is supported in the trial by firm belief that Huck is incapable of betraying him.

Huck gets decent suit of jeans.

They go down a bayou into Reelfoot Lake?

　　　

Up a bayou where are alligators.

Tow-linen shirts or naked.

[begin page 472]
2-4

[begin page continued 482]
2-4

Let some old liar of a keel-boatman on a raft tell about the earthquake of 1811. that raised No. 10—& mak made Reelfoot Lake &c.

& about Carpenter & Mike Fink—1

& Murrell’s gang (darkly hint he belonged to it)—No. 37 & Devil’s race-track2

shabby families.

[begin page 473]
2-5

[begin page continued 483]
2-5

Mrs. Holliday,1

The trading scow & family.

The scow with theatre aboard.2

Ruffian burnt up in Calaboose.3

A house-raising.

Village school—they haze Huck, the first day—describe Dawsons or Miss N.’s school.4

Fire in village—buckets & “bigBig Mo.” engine & swell village fire Co.5

Dog fight—del describe in detail.
[begin page 474]
2-6

[begin page continued 484]
2-6

The country cotillion.

The horse-trade.

Country quilting.

Candy-pulling.

Country funeral.

Describe aunt Patsy’s house.1

& Uncle Dan, aunt Hanner, & the 90-year blind negress.2

(Jim has fever & is in concealment while Huck makes these observations.)

(Keep ’em along.)

&c. The two printers deliver temp. lectures, teach dancing, elocution, feel heads, distribute tracts, preach, fiddle, doctor (quack)3

[begin page 475]
2-7

[begin page continued 485]
2-7

The circus—Huck’s astonishment when the drunkard invades the ring, scuffles with clown, & ring-master, then rides & strips.1

Can’t he escape from somewhere on the elephant?

An overflowed Arkansaw town. River booms up in the night.2
[begin page 476]
2-8

on verso

[begin page continued 485]
2-8

Dinner manners at the tavern with a crowd.

Drunken man rides in the circus.

How funny the clown was—quote his jokes. & how the people received them—Huck envies him.

Duel with rifles. 1 written in dark blue ink

A village graveyard written in pencil

written on the verso: 6642

[begin page 477]
2-9

[begin page continued 486]
2-9

When did the raft pass St Louis? Is there any mention of it? Yes 1

Negro Sermons.2

Burning Shame

Do the mesmeric foolishness, with Huck & the king for performers 3

Jim sawed in two.

po’ $22-nigger will set in Heaven wid de $1500 niggers.

[begin page 478]
2-10

on verso:

[begin page continued 486]
2-10

Back a little, change—raft only crippled by steamer.1

written on the verso: 81–44 2

[begin page 479]
2-11

[begin page continued 487]
2-11

A lynching scene. 1

A wake.

Put in.

scrub race

L. A. punished her child several days for disobediencerefusing to answer? & inattention (5 yr old) then while punishing discovered it was deaf & dumb & dumb! (from scarlet fever). T It showed no reproachfulness for the whippings—kissed the punisher & showed non-comprehension of what it was all about.

[begin page 488]
Group 3

Mark Twain probably wrote the Group 3 (formerly designated as Group C) notes during spring and summer 1883, when he was completing his book. They include ideas for changes to the chapters he had already written (see 3-3, note 1, and 3-4, notes 3 and 4), ideas for the chapters he had yet to write (3-9 through 3-13), and lists of characters and dialect usages (3-1 and 3-2). They record the minutest details, as well as the broadest possible scenarios: on 3-9, for example, Mark Twain determined the number of hound dogs that would squeeze into Jim’s cabin in chapter 36; and on 3-8 he imagined an episode in which Tom and Huck would adventure around the countryside on an elephant.

This group of notes (except for 3-14) is the last of the three identified by DeVoto. Page 3-14 has been included here because its physical properties match those of the other thirteen pages. They were written on eleven torn half-sheets and two full sheets (3-3 and 3-9/3-10) of Old Berkshire Mills stationery, the same stationery used for the second half of the book (MS2). The top portion, about two-fifths, of page 3-1 was torn off and has not survived. The verso of the page contains notes for Mark Twain’s burlesque “1,002. An Oriental Tale,” which he completed in July 1883, the same summer in which he finished Huckleberry Finn. All the notes are in pencil, except for a few additions on 3-2 and 3-13 in black ink. Mark Twain’s references by word cue and page number are to the lost typescript (TS1), which was prepared from the manuscript (MS1) of much of chapters 1-21 in late 1882 or early 1883. Where possible, these references are identified by page and line in the present text. Identifications have been determined in part by analyzing extant contemporary typescripts of Mark Twain’s letters and literary pieces and by calculating the number of words per page in order to simulate the missing TS1.

[begin page 489]
3-1

[begin page 503]
3-1
Jim has wife & 2 children.—90.3
$40 from men—95.
Sid & Mary, Tom’s sister Betsy—100
Aunt Polly″aunt Shepherdson—101
Widow Douglas. Grangerford—109
Judge Thatcher Duke & K—1364
Becky″ (or Bessie?)1 Another ref—147.

Miss Watson, (goggles) sister to Wd Douglas.

　″　　″　’s nigger Jim.

Jo Harper, Ben Rogers (tan yard)

Little Tommy Barnes (Page 13—old Finn supposed to2

Deacon Winn GaveSold $6000 to Judge—p. 19.)

Log raft—36 Plank raft 12 × 16.

Huck’s father in floating house—62.—64.—70.

[begin page 490]
3-2

[begin page continued 503]
3-2

raff1　　　?

Jim—　　　　　　considable hund’d

Nuff’nNuffn—some’n.

　　　kin　　　suffin

W’y,　　　　　　sumfinsumf’n

(mouf.　　　　　　suthin

[begin page 504]

(generly ×　　　　sumf’n

(　　　　　　sumfn

Huck says Nuther.　　　　ef

h’yer　　reck’n

　　　　　　　wouldn’ didn’

　　　W’y

　　　　　　　 Bat—

43 “Bessie” or Becky?

[begin page 491]
3-3

[begin page continued 504]
3-3

P. 43. (“Bessie,” or Becky?)

Reflections upon the satisfaction of being a guest at one’s own funeral & with such prime refreshments furnished free.


And bread cast returns—which it don’t & can’t, less’n you heave it upstream—you letcast your bread downstream once, & see. It can’t stem the current; so it can’t come back no more. But the widow she didn’t know no better than to believe it, & it warn’t my business to correct my betters. There’s a heap of ignorance like that, around.1

$40 for Jim—who says “told you I’d be rich agin.”2

[begin page 492]
3-4

[begin page 505]
3-4

But they hived a nigger that stole a hog.

Let Huck miss Jim—king & duke have sold him.1


Sawed in two, nearly—Huck saves him.

& Jim can be smuggled north on a ship?—no, steamboat.2

143—let ’em tell these adventures.3

Back yonder, Huck reads & tells about monarchies & kings &c. So Jim stares when he learns the rank of these 2.4

They lynch a freenigger.


Solomon with child by de hine laig

Jim cries, to think of his wife & 2 chn5

Talk among Ark family & visitors.6

—using snuff with a stick.

[begin page 493]
3-5

[begin page continued 505]
3-5

Takes history class among the niggers?

Join Sunday school before 4th July 1

[begin page 506]

Teaches Jim to read & write—then uses dog-messenger. Had taught him a little before.

Desperadoes ride into village shooting promiscuously.2

Huck & Tom.

House-Raising.

Beef-shooting.

Debating Society. 3

Quilting. The world of gossip th of 75 yrs ago, that lies silent, stitched into quilt by hands that long ago lost their taper & silky silkiness & eyes & face their beauty, & all gone down to dust & silence; & to indifference to all gossip.

Cadets Temperance—Masons—Oddfellows—Militia 4 added in the left margin

[begin page 494]
3-6

[begin page 507]
3-6

He must hear some Arkansas women, over their pipes & knitting (spitting from between teeth), swap reminiscences of Sister this & Brother that, & “what become of so & so?—what was his first wife’s name? Very religious people. Ride 10 or 15 m to church & tie the horses to trees.

Let em drop in ignorant remarks about monarchs in Europe, & mix them up with Biblical monarchs.

Look through notebook & turn everything in.

s’I, sh-she, s-ze, 1

[begin page 495]
3-7

[begin page continued 507]
3-7

Incident of crazy man whose wife been dead 23 years—chaffs him & lies to him & is sorry afterwards1

Huck exposes k & d—& that makes ’em sell Jim?

Glass eye with mark on back of it—mentioned in letter. When his trunk comes, will prove everything.

The marriage?

Man interrupts at auction.

Then true appear.

Set candle in window.

& tell them not to sigh for me.

Elaborate a supper & then knock out that reference.2

[begin page 496]
3-8

[begin page 508]
3-8

They can’t play it again—they find everybody talking about it along the river.

So they lecture, &c.1

“He don’t run everage”

interlard this & powder thrown in fire by Silas Phelps.

Farmer has bought an elephant at auction. Gives him to Tom Huck & Jim & they go about the country on him & make no end of trouble.

[begin page 497]
3-9

[begin page continued 508]
3-9

Tools too handy. (How’ll we get this pen to him?) in a cake, by aunt Sally.

He ain’t satisfied. Ought to be a watchman. Nonnymous note to recommend it. This when they are nearly ready.

Get tin plates for Jim

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　 Dig a moat.

Objects because tools & everything so handy. (Spend many nights in cabin with Jim.)

Saw there, too.

3 weeks getting him out.

make the pens—Huck.

Make rope ladder, now. hiding it as they work.

Butter melts night of escape.

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　 Ladder in pie

The dogs come in through the diggings—11.1　And themselves as ghosts. Nigger watchman faints.

Swallow the sawdust—Huck has to—& Jim. Gives them stomach ache. Blow up cabin?

aunt misses brass candlestick, shirt, sheet, flour &c (for they build the pie.) Uncle reads anonymous notes at table. added in the left margin

[begin page 498]
3-10

[begin page 509]
3-10

I fetched away a dog, part of the way—I had him by his teeth in my britches, behind.

Brass buttons

Nail in a biscuit—uncle Silas got it (cut em off.) behind)

Children bring in tin plates (with marks)

Jim must disguise in nigger woman’s dress & they in aunt S to get away. Men won’t shoot at women. Scares them away, & then coolly paddles the raft home—& explains.

Steal guns & get away under a volley of blank cartridges.

Smuggle a dirk to jim—yaghtagan—1

Uncle S wishes he would escape—if it warn’t wrong, he’d set him free—but it’s a too r gushy generosity with another man’s property.

They always take along a lunch.

Smuggle powder by Si—he throws it in kitchen fire.

[begin page 499]
3-11

[begin page continued 509]
3-11

They correspond through dog & marrow bone.

[begin page 500]
3-12

[begin page continued 509]
3-12

To fall in the dust makes a good disguise

dog-bone messenger.

Wouldn’t give a cent for an adventure that ain’t done in disguise.

[begin page 510]

Cut Jim out of cabin the back way.

Mat an accomplice.1

Notes shoved under door at night, nonnymous.

Tom shot.

3 5 unarmed but desperate men

[begin page 501]
3-13

[begin page continued 510]
3-13

Got an eye like a door-knob (dragonfly snake doctor) the only creatur of the bird specie that can flydart straight sideways & straight backwards.

in defference

in defferunce

to public opinion—don’t know which how to pronounce it. (He went through the motions of imprisoning Tom in defferunce

Take shirt to him in disguise.

Make pens. Jim does—their hands sore. Jim at it all night.

spider,
flower
mouse—rat
grindstone missed. tin plates do1—notice it when nonnymous letter comes.
shirt. page torn

considers a Ber-
line2 & coffin

‘considers . . . coffin’ crossed out in ink
[begin page 502]
3-14

[begin page 511]
3-14

Publish this in England & Canada & Germany the day before the first number of it appears in S Century or N.Y. Sun—that makes full copyright.1

Turn Jim into an Injun.

Then exhib him for gorilla—then wild man Arab &c., using him for 2 shows same day.

Nigger-skin (shamoi) for sale as a pat med.

Tell me some mo’ histry, Huck.

[begin page 512]
Group 4

The duke’s recitation of “Hamlet’s Immortal Soliloquy” in chapter 21 is a comic pastiche of some of Shakespeare’s most frequently quoted lines (see the explanatory note to 179.10–39). The original soliloquy was written on four pages that were subsequently incorporated into MS1b (618-21), on the same paper and in the same purple ink as the other MS1b pages (see Alterations in the Manuscript). It cannot have been written later than 1880, and, with a few minor changes, matches the text in the first edition. The version of the soliloquy included here as Group 4 (formerly designated as Group D) was written on a letter from Charles L. Webster to Olivia L. Clemens, dated 19 March 1883. It cannot be a draft as previously thought (Blair 1958, 19–20; HF 1988 , 758), but must represent Mark Twain’s unproductive attempt to recall or tinker with his earlier text. Minor variations in the 1883 version as to punctuation and lineation were probably not intended as revisions, but were more likely caused by his failure to recreate the passage from memory. Of the few substantive variants, only one became part of the published text (see note 2, below).

Webster’s letter takes up one side of a folder of stationery, and Mark Twain used two of the three remaining blank sides for the soliloquy, which is written in pencil. It is reproduced here in facsimile. Each side of the folder measures 20.3 by 12.7 centimeters (8 by 5 inches), is made of laid paper with chain lines 2.4 centimeters (15/16 inch) apart, and bears the watermark “Pure Irish Linen F. H. D. & Co.” The notation “Mch 19,” written upside-down at the bottom of the second page of the soliloquy, was made by Albert Bigelow Paine.

[begin page 513]
4-1

[begin page 515]
4-1
To be or not to be, that is the bare bodkin
 Makes calamity of so long life,
 For who would fardels bear, till Birnam wood do come to Dunsinane,
 But that the fear of something after death
Murders the innocent sleep,
Great Nature’s second course,
And makes us rather sling the arrows of outrageous fortune
 Than fly to others that we know not of.
That is the
There lies the deep damnation of our taking off——1
 Wake Duncan with thy knocking!
I would thou couldst—2
 For who would bear the whips & scorns of time, the oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely, the insolence of office & the pangs which he himself might take
In the dead waste & middle of the night,3
 When churchyards yawn
 In customary suits of solemn black
[begin page 514]
4-2

[begin page continued 515]
4-2
But that the undiscovered country
 From whose bourn no traveller returns
 Breathes forth contagion on the world
 Breathes forth contagion on the world—
 & all the clouds &c, with th
[begin page 516] & thus the native hue of resolution
(like the poor cat ’i’ the adage,)
With this regard their currents turn awry,
& lose the NAME of action.
 Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished— —sh—sh—
 But soft you, the fair Ophelia!
 Ope not thy ponderous & marble jaws
 But get thee to a nunnery—go.
Editorial Notes
1 Mark Twain’s forgetfulness about Jim’s owner, Miss Watson, may reflect the fact that she is not mentioned between MS1a pages 174 and 366. To refresh his memory, he returned to his first mention of the Widow Douglas on MS1a page 2 (1.15–16 in the present text) and the identification of her “old maid” sister, Miss Watson, on MS1a page 7 (3.10–11 in the present text). At the beginning of chapter 2, Mark Twain had at first identified Jim’s owner as the widow, before revising that to Miss Watson (MS1a page 16; see the alteration at 6.9–10). He overlooked Miss Watson again in 1882 when, in his introduction to the Huckleberry Finn extract in Life on the Mississippi, he stated that Jim belonged to the widow (SLC 1883a, chapter 3, 42–43). The next three passages to which Mark Twain refers, on MS1a pages 218, 223, and 244, are in the present text at 61.3–14, 63.1–22, and 69.23–70.5.
2 The references here to MS1a pages 270 and 273 are related to a marginal note Mark Twain wrote to himself on MS1a page 270 (78.3–10 in the present text), where Jim suggests that their pursuers might be using a dog to track them: “Dog no good, if island still overflowd.” All the notes reflect his concern to avoid an apparent contradiction in his narrative. He had mentioned the height of the river three times in his manuscript. First, he established that the great June rise of the river had begun just as Huck engineered his escape from Pap and that the “water was three or four foot deep on the island in the low places” (60.11–12; see the explanatory note to 37.25). Then, in the next chapter, he wrote that “the days went along, and the river went down between its banks” (65.31–32). Finally, on MS1a page 273, he described the river as “pretty high, yet.” Eventually he acted on his concerns and modified the last statement, probably on the lost typescript, by adding the phrase “very low banks being still a little under water” (78.27), to clarify that the island was not in fact too flooded to allow the use of a dog.
3 In the earliest manuscript pages (MS1a pages 1–446, written in 1876) Jim consistently uses “pretty” and “never” until page 372, where the new forms “putty” and “nuvver” are introduced. It is probable that Mark Twain’s decision here to “let Jim say putty . . . & nuvver” dates from 1876 and the writing of page 372. In his next section of manuscript, however, dating from 1880 (MS1b pages 447–663), Mark Twain twice used “pretty” in Jim’s speech and then revised his manuscript to “putty” (see the alterations at 473.6 and 474.11), changes that possibly could have been contemporary with this working note. Besides the occurrence on MS1a page 372, Jim’s only other use of “nuvver” is on MS2 page 209, written in 1883, where it is canceled and replaced by “never.” During the final stages of revision, Mark Twain adopted “pooty” and “never” as Jim’s forms: all instances of “putty” and “nuvver” in MS1a and MS1b were superseded in his published text (see the emendations at 125.6, 125.8, 150.34, and 151.3).
1 These two references are squeezed in at the top of the page and therefore were added later than the other entries. Mark Twain alludes by word cues and MS1a page numbers to the passages where the raftsmen question Ed carefully about his story of a baby strangled by its father, and where Huck sees the periodical Friendship’s Offering on the Grangerfords’ table but does not “read the poetry” (in chapters 16 and 17, at 119.3–20 and 137.15–16, respectively, in the present text). The notation “Baby & Barrel.—350” can also be found on the verso of MS1a page 103, which contains the list of supplies that Pap Finn brings to his cabin (32.8–15) just before he tries to murder Huck in a drunken fit (chapter 6).
2 This note and the two following repeat the notations that Mark Twain made, presumably in the summer of 1876, in the margins of MS1a pages 362 and 363 (see Mark Twain’s Marginal Working Notes). On reviewing his manuscript pages, probably sometime between 1876 and 1880, he copied the marginal notes to this page so that he would have the ideas at hand as he began work on the next section of manuscript. Only one—“Remarks at a funeral”—found its way into the book in some form, as the king’s remarks over Peter Wilks’s coffin in chapter 25.
3 

The “shout,” which developed in the religious practice of slaves in the antebellum South, was “a peculiar combination of singing combined with a rhythmic shuffling dance, a ‘holy dance’ as it is sometimes called” (Gordon, 446). Clearly rooted in African tradition, the “shout” was the slaves’ concession to the Methodist interdiction of dancing, and was an intense experience, “half pow-wow, half prayer-meeting” (Higginson, 13–14; Genovese, 233). It would often follow the more formal religious service:

Three or four, standing still, clapping their hands and beating time with their feet, commence singing in unison one of the peculiar shout melodies, while the others walk round in a ring, in single file, joining also in the song. Soon those in the ring leave off their singing, the others keeping it up the while with increased vigor, and strike into the shout step, observing most accurate time with the music. This step is something halfway between a shuffle and a dance. . . . At the end of each stanza of the song the dancers stop short with a slight stamp on the last note, and then, putting the other foot forward, proceed through the next verse. They will often dance to the same song for twenty or thirty minutes. (Spaulding, in Jackson, 67–68)

4 Mark Twain did not use this idea in Huckleberry Finn, but it reappeared in an 1882 speech, “Advice to Youth,” where he commented, “A youth who can’t hit a cathedral at thirty yards with a Gatling gun in three quarters of an hour, can take up an old empty musket & bag his mother every time, at a hundred” (SLC [1882?], 13), and in an 1883 notebook entry: “You can always kill a relative with a gun that ain’t loaded” (N&J3, 37).
1 After introducing the Grangerford and Shepherdson families in the portion of the manuscript written in the summer of 1876 (MS1a), Mark Twain put the book aside in the middle of chapter 18 and did not return to it for almost four years. Here he prepared to resume work on the feud episode by reviewing, roughly in order of their appearance in chapter 17 and the opening of chapter 18, Huck’s pseudonym, the name of the second feuding family, the members of the Grangerford household, and the first Shepherdson to be encountered. This page of notes is the only one that refers to the feud episode. It probably predates the other pages in this group, which sketch ideas for Huck’s later adventures and mention locations in the Arkansas stretch of the river south of the feud area.
1 Mark Twain described a camp meeting and the preaching typical at such events in chapter 20. He did not include a specifically “negro” sermon in the book, although [begin page 481] he referred to the idea several times in his notes—in a marginal note on MS1a page 362, and in other working notes on pages 1-1 and 2-9. His continued interest in making some literary use of such a sermon may have motivated an entry in his 1882 notebook, where he reminded himself to “attend a colored religious meeting” while on his trip to gather information for Life on the Mississippi. He attended a service with George Washington Cable at a black church in New Orleans on 30 April 1882, but did not use the experience in Life on the Mississippi (or Huckleberry Finn, for that matter) because it was “too good for literature” (N&J2, 458, 552). His interest in the subject was still alive two years after the publication of Huckleberry Finn: in 1887, he included in a list of potentially useful anecdotes a text from the New Testament (2 Pet. 1:10): “Negro sermon, ‘Make yo’ callin’ & election sure’ ” (N&J3, 354).
2 Mark Twain used this idea in Life on the Mississippi, a book whose composition in 1882 and 1883 interrupted the writing of Huckleberry Finn. His 1882 trip to the Mississippi River area confirmed the impression noted here of the “swell” outfits of the black population. In chapter 30 of Life on the Mississippi, he described a Sunday in Helena, Arkansas: “In the back streets but few white people were visible, but there were plenty of colored folk—mainly women and girls; and almost without exception upholstered in bright new clothes of swell and elaborate style and cut—a glaring and hilarious contrast to the mournful mud and the pensive puddles” (SLC 1883a, 336; N&J2, 482).
3 Clemens remembered Captain James Ed. Montgomery affectionately from his piloting days, when they had served together on the City of Memphis in 1860 (see N&J2, 536, and Life on the Mississippi, chapter 49). Montgomery’s connection with the woodyard at Walnut Bend, Arkansas (Dunn’s Woodyard, according to river guides of the 1840s and 1850s) is not clear. In an 1866 sketch, Mark Twain recalled Montgomery’s kindness to Mother Utterback, an “old Arkansas woman” with “six gawky ‘gals.’ ” The captain regularly stopped at her small woodyard (located in Mississippi in the sketch) and sometimes took his “lady passengers ashore to be entertained with Mother Utterback’s quaint conversation” (SLC 1866a). Walnut Bend, about fifty-five miles south of Memphis, Tennessee, was known to pilots as a treacherous, snag-ridden stretch of river, although it ceased to be a problem after an 1874 cut-off isolated it from the main channel. Mark Twain remembered it in chapter 30 of Life on the Mississippi as “the great and once much-frequented Walnut Bend” (SLC 1883a, 335), and had considered stopping at “Walnut Bend or some other wretched place” on his 1882 river trip (N&J2 , 457, 467, 571; Conclin, 99; Samuel Cummings, 95, 98, 99; James, 37; Bragg, 90). There are no references to Walnut Bend or Captain Montgomery in Huckleberry Finn.
4 See the explanatory note to 180.8–9.
5 In the winter of 1811–12 a series of violent earthquakes centered near New Madrid, in southeastern Missouri, drastically changed the topography of that region. Eyewitness accounts of gaping fissures, large sections of forest collapsing with the river banks, and giant waves hardly need embellishment to qualify as tall tales. If, in this working note and one on 2-4, Mark Twain had in mind a particular earthquake legend, it has not been identified. Island No. 10, just above New Madrid, was raised substantially higher by an elevation of the river bed. One eyewitness reported that the earth “had been raised so high as to stop the progress of the river, and caused it to overflow its banks” (Penick, 69). When the river pushed itself over the barrier, it temporarily created a dangerous waterfall right below the island. To the east of New Madrid, in western Tennessee, a huge tract of bottom land sunk by the earthquakes led to the formation of Reelfoot Lake, eighteen miles long and up to five miles wide (Penick, 5–8, 68–71, 73–74, 90).
6 Lara has not been identified. It has been suggested that Clemens intended to write Sara, referring to a town about thirty-six miles above Baton Rouge, Louisiana (DeVoto 1942, 64; Blair 1958, 11). An 1854 river guide states that Bayou Sara, situated [begin page 482] in a “rich, thickly settled, and well cultivated” region, was “a noted place for descending boats,” where “great quantities of cotton are shipped” (Samuel Cummings, 119–20). The notebook that a stenographer kept for Clemens on their 1882 river trip contains the following entry: “Below Bayou Sara the plantation buildings & most of the cabins are whitewashed. Occasionally painted brick color. These buildings are over behind the levee and lower than our boat” ( N&J2, 545).
1 An abbreviation for the “Burning Shame,” Mark Twain’s original name for the “Royal Nonesuch” (see the explanatory note to 195.1–4).
1 The famous keelboatman Mike Fink (1770?–1823?) tried to shoot a tin cup off his friend Carpenter’s head, but killed him instead; Fink was then killed by a vengeful friend of Carpenter’s. (For several versions of this story see Blair and Meine, 257–77.) In March or April 1882, just before starting his tour of the Mississippi River, Clemens repeated the substance of this note in his notebook (N&J2, 459).
2 John A. Murrell (1806–44) was a notorious bandit leader whose bloody exploits [begin page 483] Mark Twain recounted at length in chapter 29 of Life on the Mississippi: “There is a tradition that Island 37 was one of the principal abiding places of the once celebrated ‘Murel’s Gang.’ This was a colossal combination of robbers, horse-thieves, negro-stealers, and counterfeiters, engaged in business along the river some fifty or sixty years ago.” Island No. 37 was about twenty-five miles north of Memphis, Tennessee; Devil’s Race Track—a narrow channel alongside Island No. 36—was approximately ten miles above No. 37. Mark Twain made note of “Murrell’s Gang, Island 37” in his spring 1882 notebook, and in an entry immediately following recalled a “trip through Devil’s Race Ground” that he and his fellow pilot Bill Hood had made in 1860 (N&J2, 459).
1 See the explanatory note to 1.15–16.
2 Mark Twain noticed the disappearance of such scows when he returned to the river in 1882, commenting in chapter 28 of Life on the Mississippi, “Formerly . . . we should have passed . . . occasional little trading-scows, peddling along from farm to farm, with the pedler’s family on board; possibly, a random scow, bearing a humble Hamlet and Co. on an itinerant dramatic trip” (SLC 1883a, 298).
3 In chapter 56 of Life on the Mississippi Clemens recalled the drunken tramp who burned to death after accidentally setting fire to his mattress in Hannibal’s small jail; only a few hours earlier the young Clemens had provided the man with matches for his pipe. He believed himself “as guilty of the man’s death as if I had given him the matches purposely that he might burn himself up with them.” This working note is repeated in Clemens’s 1882 river notebook (N&J2 , 482).
4 Clemens explained in his autobiography that J. D. Dawson’s one-room school-house in Hannibal, which he attended from 1847 to 1849, was the model for the school in Tom Sawyer (MTA, 2:179; ATS, 479). “Miss N.” was Mary Ann Newcomb, who is identified in the explanatory note to 3.10.
5 After several unsuccessful attempts to organize a fire company, Hannibal citizens in late 1849 formed the Liberty Fire Company and purchased an engine from [begin page 484] the Missouri Fire Company of St. Louis. When the “Big Mo.,” as Clemens calls it, arrived by steamboat, the townspeople turned out to admire the “glittering structure,” with “its elegant appearance—its beautiful painting,—its appropriate devices,—and its bright gilded mountings, reflecting the rays of the sun with dazzling splendor.” The newspaper account of the engine’s arrival stated that the crowd “felt almost as much elated as the joyous troop of boys that went shouting in its train” (“The New Fire Engine,” Hannibal Missouri Courier, 29 Nov 49; “Fire Company,” Hannibal Missouri Courier, 27 Sept 49). Mark Twain wrote a caret beneath the period of “Mo.” He evidently intended to follow the word with an interlineation, but changed his mind.
1 Clemens’s Aunt Patsy was the wife of John A. Quarles, whose farm in Florida, Missouri, was the prototype for the Phelps’s plantation (see the explanatory note to 276.18). Although Clemens claimed that he “never consciously” used his aunt and uncle in a book, the following childhood reminiscence is certainly familiar: “Along outside of the front fence ran the country road; dusty in the summertime, and a good place for snakes—they liked to lie in it and sun themselves; . . . when they were ‘house-snakes,’ or ‘garters’ we carried them home and put them in Aunt Patsy’s work-basket for a surprise; for she was prejudiced against snakes, and always when she took the basket in her lap and they began to climb out of it it disordered her mind. She never could seem to get used to them; her opportunities went for nothing” (SLC 1897–98, 37, 51–52).
2 Uncle Daniel and Aunt Hannah were slaves on the Quarles’s farm (see the explanatory notes to 6.10 and 4.35–36). In his autobiography Clemens recalled, “In the little log cabin lived a bedridden white-headed slave woman whom we visited daily, and looked upon with awe, for we believed she was upwards of a thousand years old [begin page 485] and had talked with Moses. . . . She had a round bald place on the crown of her head, and we used to creep around and gaze at it in reverent silence, and reflect that it was caused by fright through seeing Pharaoh drowned. We called her ‘Aunt’ Hannah, southern fashion” (SLC 1897–98, 43–44).
3 See the explanatory note to 158.32. When Mark Twain eventually drafted the pages of chapter 19 that introduced these two characters (MS1b, 516–45), only one was an itinerant printer.
1 See the explanatory note to 192.25–26. This note projects the circus episode in chapter 22 (MS2), which Clemens wrote during the summer of 1883. There are additional notes about the circus on 2-8.
2 See the explanatory note to 180.8–9.
1 Clemens may be recalling an incident that attracted widespread attention throughout northeast Missouri in 1846. A resident of Palmyra (twelve miles from Hannibal), upon being challenged to a duel, set rather unusual terms: the parties were to fight with double-barreled shotguns and stand two feet from the muzzles. The challenger’s second objected that such “inhuman” terms were “without precedent in the code of honor.” Before new terms were negotiated, however, both principals went into hiding from the sheriff. A few weeks later, the two men’s seconds met by chance on the street and fatally shot each other. The proposed duel never took place (Holcombe, 276–82). This blue ink note, although it matches the ink of the [begin page 486] 1883 manuscript (MS2), might have been added any time between June 1880, when Mark Twain first began using blue ink, and 1883.
2 Mark Twain wrote “664” in purple ink at the top center of the back of the page containing the 2-8 working notes. Presumably, he had just completed his 1880 writing stint (MS1b pages 447 through 663), with the death of Boggs at the end of what became chapter 21, and was about to continue with page 664. Instead, he decided to turn the leaf over and use it to record some ideas for Huck’s subsequent adventures. When he finally resumed work on his manuscript in 1883, he would start a new numbering scheme, based on his typescript (see Manuscript Facsimiles, pp. 574–75).
1 The raft passed St. Louis in chapter 12 (79.3).
2 See 2-2, note 1.
3 See the explanatory note to 160.38–39.
1 Early in his 1880 writing stint (MS1b pages 447 through 663), after a three-year hiatus, Mark Twain presumably “hit upon this expedient” of having the raft merely damaged rather than destroyed by the steamboat crash as a “way to keep his story going beyond the feud chapters” (Blair 1960a, 253–54). Accordingly, as he began work on MS1b with the second half of chapter 18, he had Jim explain to Huck that the raft was not irrevocably destroyed, but only “tore up a good deal” (150.21; MS1b, 471). In this working note Mark Twain reminds himself that some modification will be necessary earlier in the book, in chapter 16 where the collision between raft and steamer is first described. That manuscript page, however, shows no evidence of revision: in the original inscription the steamer “come smashing through the raft & tore it to tooth-picks & splinters” (MS1a, 394). Apparently, he did not modify that description until the summer of 1883 when he reviewed these notes and resumed work on the book. By that time, the first half of the manuscript had been typed. He [begin page 487] must have made the change on his typescript to the less explicit expression, “she come smashing straight through the raft” (130.30). See also the next note.
2 Mark Twain undoubtedly made the pencil notation “81-44” in 1883 while reviewing the 1880 working notes. He was prompted, perhaps, by the note about the raft on the front of the same page to make another change to his early pages: the addition of a lengthy manuscript sequence written in 1883 to be inserted into the typescript of the first half of the book (see Alterations in the Manuscript, 93.26–98.7). The new pages, originally numbered 1 through 17, were renumbered 81-44 through 81-60 to follow the adventure aboard the Walter Scott wreck, itself an insertion that ended at 81-43. In the new sequence, Huck takes advantage of the books salvaged from the wreck and reads “considerable to Jim about kings, and dukes, and earls and such.” They discuss, among other topics, King Louis XVI and his son the “dolphin,” preparing the way for the introduction of Mark Twain’s two “noble” scoundrels, the king and the duke, in chapter 19.
1 Mark Twain eventually made some use of all four ideas on this page. He used three in the final section of Huckleberry Finn, written in 1883: Colonel Sherburn confronts a lynch mob in chapter 22 (also, the king and the duke fall into the hands of angry mobs in chapters 29 and 33); Peter Wilks’s wake is described in chapter 27; and the anecdote about the deaf child becomes Jim’s moving account of “po’ little ’Lizabeth” in chapter 23. Although a “scrub race” does not figure in Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain included a description of a lively and eccentric mule race in chapter 45 of Life on the Mississippi (SLC 1883a, 462–64). Such “scrub” races were impromptu or casual contests entered into for amusement, not for a prize; the term also describes a race between “scrub” horses, meaning those of poor quality.
3 For the passages referred to here and in the next four lines by TS1 page numbers 90, 95, 100, 101, and 109, see 124.20–22, 127.10–15, 132.29, 133.1, and 140.1.
4 Mark Twain’s reference to TS1 page 136 is apparently to the end of the passage where the duke and king reveal their aristocratic and royal lineage, 163.12–165.3; “Another ref” on TS1 page 147 may refer to the paragraphs where the king and duke are reunited on the raft after the king returns from the camp meeting and the duke from the printing office, 174.6–30.
1 Mark Twain repeated this question about the name of Judge Thatcher’s daughter on 3-2 and 3-3, in both cases adding a reference to page 43 of TS1, his working copy of the text on which, apparently, her name appeared as “Bessie” (47.17 in the present text; see the textual note).
2 For the passages referred to here and in the next three lines by TS1 page numbers 13, 19, 36, 62, 64, and 70, see 14.12–28, 19.27–20.7, 39.16–17, 61.3–14, 63.1–16, and 69.33–70.1. Huck and Jim find their “Plank raft 12 × 16” at 60.27–30.
1 Mark Twain probably jotted down this and the following dialect words, mostly spoken by Jim and other black characters, in the summer of 1883 as he leafed through the typed version of the pages he had written between 1876 and 1880. His need to reacquaint himself with these dialect forms at this time was understandable. He was preparing to write the most sustained passages of Jim’s speech: the episode aboard the Walter Scott and the King Sollermun dialogue (which were inserted in the first half of the book), and the discussion of royalty and Jim’s account of his deaf child in chapter 23. That Mark Twain was consulting his typescript, rather than his manuscript pages, is clear: some of these dialect words (“raff,” “nuff’n,” “sumfn,” “h-yer,” and “reck’n,” for example) cannot be found in his manuscript at all, and were obviously added on the typescript.
1 This note suggests that Mark Twain considered revising or expanding the passage in chapter 8, where Huck eats the bread that has been set afloat to find his corpse and reflects on the efficacy of prayer (45.27–47.7). Huck’s reflections were inspired by the biblical admonition, “Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days” (Ecclesiastes 11:1).
2 Jim predicts in chapter 8 that he will be rich again (55.19), and, finally, in chapter 43, he is awarded forty dollars by Tom Sawyer, in a passage that is not in the manuscript but was added by Mark Twain on TS2 (360.27–361.5).
1 See chapter 31 (266.36–268.11).
2 The phrase “& Jim can be smuggled north” has been transcribed as if underlined by Mark Twain, but he may have intended to cross the words out. This working note repeats a marginal notation by Mark Twain on MS1b page 607 (see Mark Twain’s Marginal Working Notes).
3 The reference cannot be identified with assurance. The language echoes a passage in chapter 21 which refers to the king and the duke—“they took a rest, and had a talk about all kinds of adventures they’d had in other times along the river” (177.29–31; in MS1b, page 613)—but the text on TS1 page 143 would have been in the middle of chapter 20, while the king is at the camp meeting (see 171.11–172.8). If Mark Twain did mean to refer to the king and the duke, he decided to develop new episodes in subsequent chapters, rather than having them recount past adventures.
4 Mark Twain included discussions about the eccentric ways of royalty in two passages written in 1883 for chapters 14 and 23 (93.26–97.4 and 199.1–201.6). He acted on the intention expressed in this note by revising the passage in chapter 19 where the duke reveals his lineage, adding, apparently on the typescript, “Jim’s eyes bugged out when he heard that; and I reckon mine did, too” (161.38–39). See also 2-10, note 2.
5 See chapter 23 (201.8–18).
6 The conversation among the Phelpses’ gossipy neighbors is in chapter 41.
1 Joining a Sunday school before the Fourth of July would presumably make a boy eligible to march in the annual procession (see note 4 below).
2 Mark Twain later used this idea in the story of “Hellfire Hotchkiss” (1897), in which two “desperadoes” repeatedly terrorize a Missouri village by riding the streets when drunk, “firing their revolvers in the air and scaring the people out of their wits” (Inds, 130). Mark Twain modeled the characters after the Hyde brothers of Hannibal, whose violence he recalls in his autobiography (SLC [1900], MS, 16, and TS, 7, in MTA, 1:132; Inds, 327).
3 In “Villagers of 1840–3,” Mark Twain’s detailed notes about life in antebellum Hannibal, he lists the debating society as one of the town’s entertainments, together with the circus, the “mesmerizer,” and the minstrel show (Inds, 102). No doubt Mark Twain was recalling the amusing performances given by groups like the Down East Debating Society of Hannibal, formed in 1853, which argued such questions as “Where does fire go when it goes out?” and “When a house is on fire, does it burn up or burn down?” (Bowen, 3).
4 The Cadets of Temperance was an organization of boys pledged not to smoke or chew tobacco. Clemens, a smoker since the age of eight, briefly joined the Cadets at age fourteen so he could wear the red wool sash members donned for holiday processions (Wecter, 152–54). In “Villagers of 1840–3,” Mark Twain recalled that Hannibal’s Fourth of July celebrations had a “Declaration and Spreadeagle speech in public square” and a procession that included the “Sunday schools, Masons, Odd Fellows, Temperance Society, Cadets of Temperance,” and other local organizations (Inds, 102).
1 See the explanatory note to 345.32 on the Arkansas gossips.
1 When Mark Twain was in California in 1865, he made a notebook entry about a deranged miner who asked after “his wife, who had been dead 13 years” ( N&J1, 77). Subsequent notebook entries and this working note reveal Mark Twain’s interest in putting the incident to literary use, but he did not do so until 1891 when he wrote “The Californian’s Tale,” which was included in The First Book of the Authors Club; Liber Scriptorum (New York, 1893).
2 This note and most of the others on 3-7 sketch ideas for the episode of the Wilks inheritance in chapters 24 through 29. The crucial tattoo mark on the dead man’s breast in chapter 29 replaces the “Glass eye” mentioned here; the arrival of the true heirs interrupts the auction at the end of chapter 28; Huck tells Mary Jane Wilks to put a candle in the window as a signal for him in chapter 28. The description of the supper prepared for the spurious Wilks heirs is in chapter 26. It is preceded, in the manuscript (MS2, 266–67), by the reference that Mark Twain decided to “knock out”: some observations by the king and Huck on their sleeping arrangements (see Alterations in the Manuscript, 220.4–26).
1 Twice in the second half of the book, the king and the duke try to gauge whether it is safe to revive the Royal Nonesuch scam: in chapter 24 (204.10–12) and at the beginning of chapter 31 (265.1–266.12), where there is also a list of the alternative scams they attempt. Given the sequence of episodes from the manuscript mentioned on 3-7 and 3-8, the present note probably refers to the latter instance.
1 That is, eleven dogs (see 310.24–27).
1 Instead of a dirk, a straight-bladed dagger associated with the Scottish Highlanders, Mark Twain proposes smuggling to Jim a yataghan, or short saber, associated with the armies of the Ottoman Empire, whose blade usually has a cutting edge with a double curve.
1 Mark Twain’s manuscript shows that he originally planned to have two of the Phelps children, Mat and Phil, play a more prominent role in the story (see Alterations in the Manuscript, 279.26–29, 282.27, and 285.12). “Mat” may be the nickname of Matilda Angelina Araminta Phelps, whose name appears only at 314 38–39.
1 That is, “ditto.”
2 A berlin, or Berline, was “a large four-wheeled carriage with a suspended body, two interior seats, and a top or hood that can be raised or lowered” (Century Dictionary, 1:529).
1 In September 1883, just before a visit to New York City, Clemens listed in his notebook a number of errands that he planned to do. They included speaking to Charles A. Dana, editor and owner of the New York Sun, and Richard Watson Gilder of the Century magazine about possible serial publication of Huckleberry Finn. Undoubtedly both editors expressed interest, but it was Gilder who eventually convinced Clemens to publish three excerpts from the book in the Century in December 1884 and January and February 1885. Dana had solicited some such contribution from Clemens in September 1882 and renewed his urging in the spring and summer of 1884, but was rewarded only with an unsigned sketch, “Hunting for H——,” published in the newspaper on 24 August 1884 (N&J3, 58 n. 131, 59; Dana to SLC, 13 Sept 82, 20 Sept 82, 8 May 84, 10 June 84, and 3 July 84, all CU-MARK; SLC 1884a).
1 Based on a line from Macbeth (act 1, scene 7). The MS1b version of the soliloquy and the first edition have instead a scrambled line from Hamlet (act 3, scene 1).
2 These four words complete the preceding line from act 2, scene 2 of Macbeth (“Wake Duncan . . .”). They are absent from the MS1b text of the soliloquy, but are included in the first edition, presumably having been added by Mark Twain on the typescript of his book.
3 Mark Twain’s “dead waste” is not his own invention, as has been suggested (Kirkham, 18). The reading of the Shakespeare first quarto (“dead vast”) is more common, but “dead waste” also has some authority, deriving from the “dead wast” of the later Shakespeare quartos and the first folio (Rolfe, 186 n. 198; Bertram and Kliman, 36–37; Hamlet, act 1, scene 2). The acting copies of the play that Clemens purchased in August 1881 and used in writing his own burlesque Hamlet were published by Samuel French and contained the “dead waste” reading (SLC 1881e, 22; S&B, 52, 54).

Works cited on this page

  • N&J2. Mark Twain’s Notebooks & Journals, Volume II (1877–1883). Edited by Frederick Anderson, Lin Salamo, and Bernard L. Stein. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. 1975
  • N&J3. Mark Twain’s Notebooks & Journals, Volume III (1883–1891). Edited by Robert Pack Browning, Michael B. Frank, and Lin Salamo. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. 1979
  • CU-MARK University of California, Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft Library, Berkeley
  • DeVoto 1942 DeVoto, Bernard. Mark Twain at Work. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. 1942
  • MS2 The second half of the Huckleberry Finn manuscript, written in the summer of 1883, comprising pages numbered 160–787 (continuing the pagination of TS1, the typescript made from MS1) and pages numbered 81–A-1 through 81–60. Now at the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library (NBuBE[bib11403]). 1883
  • Blair 1958 Blair, Walter. “When Was Huckleberry Finn Written?” American Literature 30 (March): 1–25. 1958
  • TS1 Typescript, no longer extant, of the first half of the Huckleberry Finn manuscript (MS1), probably made in late 1882 or early 1883 and apparently numbered 1–159. 1882
  • MS1 The first half of the Huckleberry Finn manuscript, comprising pages numbered 1–663, written over a four-year period, 1876–1880. Paper and ink differences distinguish two subsections of MS1: MS1a (1–446), all or most of which was written in June–September 1876, and MS1b (447–663), written in March–June 1880. The manuscript was believed lost until 1990, when it was discovered in a Los Angeles attic. Now at the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library (NBuBE[bib11403]). 1876–1880
  • HF 1988 SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Edited by Walter Blair and Victor Fischer, with the assistance of Dahlia Armon and Harriet Elinor Smith. The Works of Mark Twain. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. 1988
  • SLC 1883a (SLC 1883) SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). Life on the Mississippi. Boston: James R. Osgood and Co. 1883
  • Gordon (Gordon 1927) Gordon, Robert Winslow. “Negro ‘Shouts’ from Georgia.” New York Times Magazine, 24 April. Reprinted in Dundes, 445–51. 1927
  • Higginson (Higginson 1870) Higginson, Thomas Wentworth. Army Life in a Black Regiment. Citations are to the 1960 reprint edition, Michigan State University Press. 1870
  • Genovese (Genovese 1974) Genovese, Eugene D. Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made. New York: Pantheon Books. 1974
  • Jackson (Jackson 1967) Jackson, Bruce, ed. The Negro and His Folklore in Nineteenth Century Periodicals. Austin: University of Texas Press. 1967
  • SLC [1882?] (SLC 1882?) SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). “[Advice to Youth].” Untitled speech. MS of sixteen pages, CU-MARK. Published as “Advice to Youth” in MTS 1923[bib00156], 104–8. [1882?]
  • SLC 1866a (SLC 1866) SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). “An Open Letter to the American People.” New York Weekly Review 17 (17 February): 1. 1866
  • Conclin (Conclin 1848) Conclin, George, comp. Conclin’s New River Guide; or, A Gazetteer of All the Towns on the Western Waters. Cincinnati: George Conclin. 1848
  • Samuel Cummings (Cummings 1854) Cummings, Samuel. The Western Pilot; Containing Charts of the Ohio River and of the Mississippi, from the Mouth of the Missouri to the Gulf of Mexico; Accompanied with Directions for Navigating the Same, and a Gazetteer. Corrected by Capts. Charles Ross and John Klinefelte. Cincinnati: J. A. and U. P. James. 1854
  • James (James 1857) James, U. P. River Guide: Containing Descriptions of All the Cities, Towns, and Principal Objects of Interest, on the Navigable Waters of the Mississippi Valley. Cincinnati: U. P. James. 1857
  • Bragg (Bragg 1977) Bragg, Marion. Historic Names and Places on the Lower Mississippi River. Vicksburg, Miss.: Mississippi River Commission. 1977
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  • Blair and Meine (Blair and Meine 1956) Blair, Walter, and Franklin J. Meine. Half Horse Half Alligator: The Growth of the Mike Fink Legend. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1956
  • MTA Paine, Albert Bigelow, ed. Mark Twain’s Autobiography. Edited by Albert Bigelow Paine. 2 vols. New York: Harper and Brothers. 1924
  • ATS (SLC 1982) SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Foreword and notes by John C. Gerber; text established by Paul Baender. The Mark Twain Library. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. 1982
  • SLC 1897–98 (SLC 1897–98) SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). “My Autobiography. [Random Extracts from It.]” MS of seventy-five pages, CU-MARK. Published with omissions as “Early Days” in MTA[bib00116], 1:81–115, and in full in AutoMT1[bib33010], 203–20. 1897–98
  • Holcombe (Holcombe 1884) Holcombe, Return I. History of Marion County, Missouri. St. Louis: E. F. Perkins. Citations are to the 1979 reprint edition, Hannibal: Marion County Historical Society. 1884
  • Blair 1960a (Blair 1960) Blair, Walter. Mark Twain & Huck Finn. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. 1960
  • Inds 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
  • SLC [1900] (SLC 1900) SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). “Scraps from My Autobiography. Playing ‘Bear.’ Herrings. Jim Wolf and the Cats.” MS of forty-two leaves, CU-MARK. Published in MTA[bib00116], 1:125–43, and AutoMT1[bib33010], 155–63. 1900
  • bib20890 (not in the bibliography)
  • TS Gerber, John C., Paul Baender, and Terry Firkins, eds. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; Tom Sawyer Abroad; and Tom Sawyer, Detective. Edited by John C. Gerber, Paul Baender, and Terry Firkins. The Works of Mark Twain. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press 1980
  • Bowen (Bowen 1926-43) Bowen, Clarence W. The History of Woodstock, Connecticut. 8 vols. Norwood, Mass.: Plimpton Press. 1926–43
  • Wecter (Wecter 1952) Wecter, Dixon. Sam Clemens of Hannibal. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, Riverside Press. 1952
  • N&J1. Mark Twain’s Notebooks & Journals, Volume I (1855–1873). Edited by Frederick Anderson, Michael B. Frank, and Kenneth M. Sanderson. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. 1975
  • Century Dictionary (Whitney and Smith 1889–91) Whitney, William Dwight, and Benjamin E. Smith, eds. The Century Dictionary: An Encyclopedic Lexicon of the English Language. 6 vols. New York: The Century Company. 1889–91
  • SLC 1884a (SLC 1884) SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). “Hunting for H——.” New York Sun, 24 August, 2. Reprinted in Budd 1982[bib00561], 11–15. 1884
  • Kirkham (Kirkham 1969) Kirkham, E. Bruce. “Huck and Hamlet: An Examination of Twain’s Use of Shakespeare.” Mark Twain Journal 14 (Summer): 17–19. 1969
  • Rolfe (Rolfe 1898) Rolfe, William J., ed. Shakespeare’s Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. New York: American Book Company. 1898
  • Bertram and Kliman (Bertram and Kilman 1991) Bertram, Paul, and Bernice W. Kliman, eds. The Three-Text Hamlet. New York: AMS Press. 1991
  • SLC 1881e (SLC 1881) SLC (Samuel Langhorne Clemens). “A Curious Experience.” MS of 120 pages (missing its final page or two), NjP-SC[bib20942]. Published in Century Magazine 23 (November): 35–46. 1881
  • S&B Rogers, Franklin R. Mark Twain’s Satires & Burlesques. Edited by Franklin R. Rogers. The Mark Twain Papers. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press 1967