11 January 1875 • Hartford, Conn. (Hartford Courant, 13 Jan 75, UCCL 01177)
I am aware that you are going to be welcomed to our town by great audiences, on both nights of your stay here, & ⒶemendationI beg to add my hearty welcome also, through this note.1explanatory note I cannot come to the theater on either evening, Raymond, because there is something so touching about your acting that I can’t stand it.2explanatory note {I do not mention a couple of colds in my head, because I hardly mind them as much as I would the erysipelas, but between you & me I would prefer it if they were rights & lefts.}
And then there is another thing. I have always taken a pride in earning my living in outside places & spending it in Hartford;3explanatory note I have said that no good citizen would live on his own people, but would go forth & make it sultry for other communities & fetch home the result; & now at this late day I find myself in the crushed & bleeding position of fattening myself upon the spoils of my brethren! Can I support such grief as this? {This is literary emotion, you understand. Take the money at the door just the same.}
Once more I welcome you to Hartford, Raymond, but as for me, let me stay at home & blush.4explanatory note
The first road performances of the Gilded Age play were in Hartford on 11 and 12 January. The play’s 16 September 1874 to 9 January 1875 run in New York had encompassed 119 performances, including matinees—“a very fine success” (Odell, 9:557). It did not close there for want of audiences, but because Raymond was committed to taking it on tour. As early as 4 December 1874 it was announced, “The attendance at the theatre is as good, if not better, than ever, but Mr. Raymond’s prior engagements will compel the withdrawal of the piece before many weeks are over” (“The Theatres Next Week,” New York Evening Post, 4 Dec 74, 2). Raymond shared this letter with the audience after the second Hartford performance. It survives only in two Hartford newspapers of 13 January, the morning Courant (“Col. Sellers Last Night,” 2) and the Evening Post (“Dramatic,” 2). Their texts were identical, so presumably the Post copied the Courant. The Courant prefaced it:
“Col. Sellers” unfolded his grand speculative schemes again last night to an audience that filled the Opera House in every part, and quite a number of persons unable to secure seats occupied the standing room in the rear of the parquette circle. Mr. Raymond kept the audience thoroughly amused with the peculiarities of the principal character of the drama, from the beginning of the play to the end. Miss Kate Field’s personation of Laura Hawkins was better than on the first evening. Then she labored under the disadvantages of a first appearance in the character, a position more trying to a recent debutante than to one long familiar with the stage. There was a naturalness about some portions of her acting which was quite enjoyable in contrast with the mannerism of some who depend mainly upon the tricks and clap-trap of “stage business” to win popular applause. At the end of the fourth act there were loud calls for Mr. Clemens, some of the audience believing that he was witnessing the play from one of the boxes. Mr. Raymond responded to the call and said Mr. Clemens was not in the building, but he had received a letter from him. This he read, as follows:—
And, the newspaper reported:
The reading of this letter provoked much laughter. It was a touch of humor not down in the bills, and as the audience had got their money’s worth in witnessing the play advertised, Mr. Clemens can consider the expression of “literary emotion” as an extra contribution to the enjoyment of the evening—a “chromo” awarded to each visitor.
The play was well attended and well received on both nights. The Courant called it “one of the most enjoyable entertainments ever put upon the boards,” crediting Raymond and Clemens in equal measure (“Colonel Sellers,” 12 Jan 75, 2). But the Hartford Times observed that
it is hardly proper to complain of Mr. Warner and Mark Twain for the poverty of invention, and commonplace character of this play. Especially as Colonel Sellers is there to make plenteous amends. But, a jewel of such pure water as he should have invited a better setting, not a dull background to bring it out. Therefore, it is with mixed feelings the parents of this dramatic child are to be congratulated. Parents they are, for Mr. Warner originated it, Mark Twain conceived and brought it forth. (“The Gilded Age,” 12 Jan 75, 2)
For Clemens’s opinion of Kate Field, see 19 and 25 Jan 75 to Stillson.click to open letter
This remark, although ostensibly in jest, in fact expressed genuine disapproval of Raymond’s portrayal of Colonel Sellers (see 23 Sept 74 to Mackenzie, n. 2click to open letter).
Reportedly, Clemens received ten thousand dollars as his half of the profit the Gilded Age play made before Christmas 1874 (John Hooker to unidentified, 8 Jan 75; see Thomason, 94).
Although the Clemenses did not attend either Hartford performance of the play, on 11 January they hosted Raymond, his wife (actress Marie Gordon), and Kate Field. Annie Moffett, who had been visiting since Christmas day, described the occasion in a letter of 12 January to her brother, Samuel (CU-MARK):
Yesterday Mr & Mrs Raymond and Miss Kate Field lunched with us. Lunch was to be at three. The first course was soup, the second quails & rice croquets, third, chicken croquets and salad (the kind that you hate I helped make it), fourth strawberry short cake, fifth orange ice, lastly fruit & coffee. The table was decorated with flowers. The dishes were decorated with crimson & gold. Each fruit plate had an exquisite flower painted in it. The ice cream saucers were decorated with flowers &c. The coffee cups were like dolls’ cups, the saucers matched and were all covered with birds and flowers. The spoons were the size of dolls’ spoons, the same pattern as Ma’s tea spoons.
In the evening, Annie attended the performance:
The house was crowded. And the play was splendid. Mr Raymond is perfect as Colonel Mulberry Sellers. It doesn’t seem like acting. The Hawkins family at home and the trial scene were the richest of all. When Colonel Sellers bows to the jury and will persist in making speeches to them, it was perfectly comical. His hits took well, especially those about congress and the jury. The success of the play is wonderful. They are already trying for seats at Washington and Baltimore weeks in advance. Miss Fields did much better than we feared she would do, in the shooting scene she was very good indeed.
In closing, Annie reported: “Uncle Sam and Aunt Livy have bet a lot down by this creek. She to give it to him if he makes $12,000. on the play between the first of Jan. & 1st of June, and he to give it to her if he doesn’t make that much.” Given the profitability of the play (see 26 Jan 75 to Watt, n. 4click to open letter), it is likely that Clemens won the bet. In 1946, Annie’s son, Samuel Charles Webster, gave a condensed account of her impressions of the luncheon and the performance:
My mother was visiting her uncle at the time and she remembers the opening night, and how disturbed she was because Colonel Sellers looked so unlike Cousin James, and the luncheon given by the Clemenses next day for the principals, John T. Raymond and Kate Field. They had pheasants and the maid forgot to pass the currant jelly. ( MTBus , 124)
“Col. Sellers Last Night,” Hartford Courant, 13 Jan 75, 2, clipping in the Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley (CU-MARK).
L6 , 345–347; “Dramatic,” Hartford Evening Post, 13 Jan 75; “‘The Gilded Age.’—A Letter from Mark Twain,” Boston Globe, 15 Jan 75, 4; Seaver 1875, excerpt; MTB , 1:539–40; Kiralis, 2–3.
see Mark Twain Papers in Description of Provenance.