7 March 1872 • Hartford, Conn. (MS: CU-MARK, UCCL 00730)
I cannot let you think that I overlook or underestimate the brotherly goodness & kindness of your motive in your assault upon Bliss. I would have you feel & know that I fully appreciate that, & value it. The fact that I contemn the act as being indefensible, does not in the least blind me to the virtue of the motive underlying it, or leave me unthankful for it. Livy & I have grieved sincerely over the thought of the depression & distress this matter is doubtless causing you, & Livy’s first impulse naturally (for her,) was to go straight down to your house & tell you to cast the whole thing aside & forget it, & consider that there are sunshine & cheer left in the world, & the ability in you & all of us to find them & enjoy them. And she would have gone if she could. Her idea is correct: forget it. There is no profit itⒶemendation remembering unpleasant things. Remember only that it has wrought one good: It has set you free from a humiliating servitude; a thing to be devoutly thankful for, God knows.1explanatory note
Being now free of all annoyance or regret in this matter, I hasten to say so.
Orion had apparently accused Bliss of fraud in the way he produced Roughing It—by cutting corners on the quality of the engravings, paper, printing, and binding (see 15 May 72 to OC and MEC, n. 6click to open letter). In consequence he was fired or resigned as editor of the American Publisher, a job that had grown irksome to him because of Bliss’s refusal to grant him the independence he thought he deserved. His “humiliating servitude” must have continued until the April issue was ready for the printer: his name appeared there on the masthead for the last time. Although Clemens evidently considered Orion’s “assault upon Bliss” to be an “indefensible” act of disloyalty to his own employer and his brother’s publisher, he did not dismiss Orion’s charges, but soon sought clarification from Bliss (20 Mar 72 to Blissclick to open letter draft; L4 , 364 n. 1).
MS, Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley (CU-MARK).
L5 , 55–56.
see Mark Twain Papers in Description of Provenance.