Details
CLEMENS, SAMUEL LANGHORNE. Autograph letter signed ("SLC") to his wife Livy elsewhere in Europe, Allerheiligen, Germany, n.d. [5 August 1878]. 6 pages, 8vo, in pencil on both sides of 3 sheets.
TRAMPING ABROAD
In early August 1878 Clemens and his long-time friend Joseph Twichell set out to gather "material and adventures for a European travel book. The two went off on the 'tramp abroad' of the book's title [A Tramp Abroad, 1880], a walking tour -- by rail, carriage, and boat, as it turned out -- through the Black Forest and the Swiss Alps to Lausanne and Geneva" -- Justin Kaplan, Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain (New York, 1966), p. 212. Here Clemens reports on the first days' travels to Livy, who stayed behind (probably in Heidelberg).
"...we had a rattling good time today, but we came very near being left at Baden-Baden, for instead of waiting in the waiting-room, we sat down on the platform to wait where the trains come in from the other direction. We sat there full ten minutes -- & then all of a sudden it occurred to me that that was not the right place...We took a post carriage from [Achen?] to Otterhofen for 7 marks -- stopped at the 'Pflug' to drink beer, & saw that pretty girl again at a distance. Her father, mother, & two brothers received me like an ancient customer & sat down & talked as long as I had any German left. The big room was full of red-vested farmers...with the Burgermeister at the head, drinking beer & talking public business. They had held an election & chosen a new member & been drinking beer at his expense for several hours. It was intensely Black-foresty..."
TRAMPING ABROAD
In early August 1878 Clemens and his long-time friend Joseph Twichell set out to gather "material and adventures for a European travel book. The two went off on the 'tramp abroad' of the book's title [A Tramp Abroad, 1880], a walking tour -- by rail, carriage, and boat, as it turned out -- through the Black Forest and the Swiss Alps to Lausanne and Geneva" -- Justin Kaplan, Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain (New York, 1966), p. 212. Here Clemens reports on the first days' travels to Livy, who stayed behind (probably in Heidelberg).
"...we had a rattling good time today, but we came very near being left at Baden-Baden, for instead of waiting in the waiting-room, we sat down on the platform to wait where the trains come in from the other direction. We sat there full ten minutes -- & then all of a sudden it occurred to me that that was not the right place...We took a post carriage from [Achen?] to Otterhofen for 7 marks -- stopped at the 'Pflug' to drink beer, & saw that pretty girl again at a distance. Her father, mother, & two brothers received me like an ancient customer & sat down & talked as long as I had any German left. The big room was full of red-vested farmers...with the Burgermeister at the head, drinking beer & talking public business. They had held an election & chosen a new member & been drinking beer at his expense for several hours. It was intensely Black-foresty..."