28 December 1871 • Danville, Ill. (MS: CU-MARK, UCCL 00696)
Livy Darling, I am very anxious about the baby, & still more anxious about you. I do wish Sue were there to help you—I can’t & you can’t have full confidence in anybody else. Don’t overwatch yourself, my darling—don’t do it. Preserve your strength—I cannot bear to think of your wearing yourself out again & throwing yourself on a sick bed. You are too dear, too precious to me. I shall telegraph you for news.2explanatory note
I send $300—tell me if you get it. Am also sending Ma $300.3explanatory note The debt to the firm is all paid up.4explanatory note
Good night my own darling.
in ink: Mrs. Samℓ. L. Clemens | Cor. Forest & Hawthorne stⒶemendation | Hartford | Conn postmarked: danville ill. dec 28 Ⓐemendation
“Roughing It” was “well attended” on this date, according to the Danville Commercial, “and like every other lecture, some appreciated it and others did not.” The paper observed that Clemens might have supplemented his fee ($125) if he had posted a doorkeeper at his hotel room “and charged 25 cents admission, for all suckers wished to see him” (“Mark Twain’s lecture . . . ,” 4 Jan 72, 3).
Clemens did indeed telegraph Olivia when he reached Mattoon, Illinois, on 29 December. Although no text of his telegram has been found, its import may be inferred from Olivia’s reply by telegraph that afternoon: “Langdon about well no need of coming” (CU-MARK). And the next day she wrote that Clara Spaulding and Susan and Theodore Crane were visiting (26 Dec 71 to OLC, n. 2click to open letter).
The $300 that Clemens sent to Olivia was for their quarterly rent on the Hooker house in Hartford. He had promised to send it to her on 2 November. She made the payment on 5 January 1872, four days late. Clemens had previously sent $300 to his mother on 29 November (1 Nov 71click to open letter, 3 Dec 71, both to OLCclick to open letter; John Hooker’s receipt dated 5 Jan 72 for “quarter ending Jan. 1, 72,” CU-MARK).
The indebtedness was for the $12,500 Jervis Langdon had contributed to Clements’s purchase of a share of the Buffalo Express
MS, Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft, Library, University of California, Berkeley (CU-MARK).
L4 , 526–527; LLMT , 362, brief paraphrase.
see Samossoud Collection in Description of Provenance.