8 January 1863
Clemens' hat was stolen while he attended the Odd Fellows' Ball in Gold Hill on 7 January 1863.1 This brief sketch—the victim's announcement that inevitable retribution would be visited upon the thief—appeared in the local items column of the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise, probably the following morning. The Enterprise for that day is not extant, but the sketch is preserved in the Stockton (Calif.) Independent for January 14. The Independent editor explained: “At a ball in Gold Hill, on the eve of the 8th instant, some fellow stole the hat of the ‘local’ of the Enterprise, whereat that indignant individual sympathises with the thief in the following strain.”2 When Clemens' hat was again stolen some twenty months later in San Francisco, he called down a similar plague upon the head of the culprit; see “Due Warning” (no. 89).
We have been suffering from the seven years' itch for many months. It is probably the most aggravating disease in the world. It is contagious. That man has commenced a career of suffering which is frightful to contemplate; there is no cure for the distemper—it must run its course; there is no respite for its victim, and but little alleviation of its torments to be hoped for; the unfortunate's only resource is to bathe in sulphur and molasses and let his finger nails grow. Further advice is unnecessary—instinct will prompt him to scratch.
The first printing in the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise, probably on 8 January 1863, is not extant. The sketch survives in the only known contemporary reprinting of the Enterprise, the Stockton (Calif.) Independent for 14 January 1863 (p. 1), which is copy-text. Copy: PH from Bancroft. The Marysville (Calif.) Appeal and the Placer (Calif.) Courier reprinted the item, evidently from the Independent, on 16 and 24 January 1863 (pp. 2 and 3), respectively. Neither reprinting has any authority.
The Independent editor must have omitted the first few lines in the Enterprise text, substituting the introduction quoted in the headnote (p. 181). The Independent's extract is not intelligible without this explanation. There are no textual notes or emendations.