Charles Dudley Warner is charmed with the poem for its own felicitous sake; and so indeed am I, but more because it has drawn the sting of my fiftieth year; taken away the pain of it, the grief of it, the somehow shame of it, and made me glad and proud it happened.

With reverence and affection,
                         Sincerely yours,
                                   S. L. Clemens.

Holmes wrote with his own hand:  “Did Miss Gilder tell you I had twenty-three letters spread out for answer when her suggestion came about your anniversary?  I stopped my correspondence and made my letters wait until the lines were done.”

MARK TWAIN’S LETTERS 1886-1900

ARRANGED WITH COMMENT BY ALBERT BIGELOW PAINE

VOLUME IV.

XXVI

Letters, 1886-87.  Jane Clemens’s romance.  Unmailed letters, etc.

When Clemens had been platforming with Cable and returned to Hartford for his Christmas vacation, the Warner and Clemens families had joined in preparing for him a surprise performance of The Prince and the Pauper.  The Clemens household was always given to theatricals, and it was about this time that scenery and a stage were prepared—­mainly by the sculptor Gerhardt—­for these home performances, after which productions of The Prince and the Pauper were given with considerable regularity to audiences consisting of parents and invited friends.  The subject is a fascinating one, but it has been dwelt upon elsewhere.—­[In Mark Twain:  A Biography, chaps. cliii and clx.]—­We get a glimpse of one of these occasions as well as of Mark Twain’s financial progress in the next brief note.

To W. D. Howells; in Boston: 

Jan. 3, ’86.  My dear Howells,—­The date set for the Prince and Pauper play is ten days hence—­Jan. 13.  I hope you and Pilla can take a train that arrives here during the day; the one that leaves Boston toward the end of the afternoon would be a trifle late; the performance would have already begun when you reached the house.

I’m out of the woods.  On the last day of the year I had paid out
$182,000 on the Grant book and it was totally free from debt. 
                                        Yrs ever
          
                                        mark.

Mark Twain’s mother was a woman of sturdy character and with a keen sense of humor and tender sympathies.  Her husband, John Marshall Clemens, had been a man of high moral character, honored by all who knew him, respected and apparently loved by his wife.  No one would ever have supposed that during all her years of marriage, and almost to her death, she carried a secret romance that would only be told at last in the weary disappointment of old age.  It is a curious story, and it came to light in this curious way: 

To W. D. Howells, in Boston: