Poor Livy!  She is laid up with rheumatism; but she is getting along now.  We have a good doctor, and he says she will be out of bed in a couple of days, but must stay in the house a week or ten.

Clara is working faithfully at her music, Jean at her usual studies, and we all send love. 
                              Mark.

Mention has already been made of the political excitement in Vienna.  The trouble between the Hungarian and German legislative bodies presently became violent.  Clemens found himself intensely interested, and was present in one of the galleries when it was cleared by the police.  All sorts of stories were circulated as to what happened to him, one of which was cabled to America.  A letter to Twichell sets forth what really happened.

To Rev. J. H. Twichell, in Hartford: 

HotelMetropole,
Vienna, Dec. 10, ’97. 
Dear Joe,—­Pond sends me a Cleveland paper with a cablegram from here in it which says that when the police invaded the parliament and expelled the 11 members I waved my handkerchief and shouted ‘Hoch die Deutschen!’ and got hustled out.  Oh dear, what a pity it is that one’s adventures never happen!  When the Ordner (sergeant-at-arms) came up to our gallery and was hurrying the people out, a friend tried to get leave for me to stay, by saying, “But this gentleman is a foreigner—­you don’t need to turn him out—­he won’t do any harm.”

“Oh, I know him very well—­I recognize him by his pictures; and I should be very glad to let him stay, but I haven’t any choice, because of the strictness of the orders.”

And so we all went out, and no one was hustled.  Below, I ran across the London Times correspondent, and he showed me the way into the first gallery and I lost none of the show.  The first gallery had not misbehaved, and was not disturbed.

. . .  We cannot persuade Livy to go out in society yet, but all the lovely people come to see her; and Clara and I go to dinner parties, and around here and there, and we all have a most hospitable good time.  Jean’s woodcarving flourishes, and her other studies.

Good-bye Joe—­and we all love all of you. 
          
                                   Mark.

Clemens made an article of the Austrian troubles, one of the best things he ever wrote, and certainly one of the clearest elucidations of the Austro-Hungarian confusions.  It was published in Harper’s Magazine, and is now included in his complete works.

Thus far none of the Webster Company debts had been paid—­at least, none of importance.  The money had been accumulating in Mr. Rogers’s hands, but Clemens was beginning to be depressed by the heavy burden.  He wrote asking for relief.

Part of a letter to H. H. Rogers, in New York: