Beschreibung:

CLEMENS, SAMUEL LANGHORNE. The Public to Mark Twain. Correspondence...New Mercantile Library...Thursday Evening, July 2, 1868. [San Francisco, 1868]. Broadside, 14 15/16 x 5 7/8 in. (37.8 x 14.7 cm.), printed in two columns on thin buff paper, some light foxing . FIRST EDITION, THE EXCESSIVELY RARE HANDBILL FOR MARK TWAIN'S FAREWELL LECTURE IN SAN FRANCISCO. The text of the satirical broadside, obviously written by Clemens, ostensibly consists of letters to and from him, plus promotional material. It begins with a purported plea from a long list of distinguished Californians begging Twain not to go ahead with his lecture [based on his Quaker City travels which resulted in The Innocents Abroad , 1896]: "...we take this method of expressing our cordial desire that you will not . We beg and implore you do not . There is a limit to human endurance...we urge you to desist from the new atrocity you contemplate..." Twain responds: "...You cannot move me from my fell purpose. I will torment the people if I want to...No, gentlemen, ask of me anything else and I will do it cheerfully; but do not ask me not to afflict the people. I wish to tell them all I know about VENICE [the lecture was entitled 'The Oldest of the Republics: Venice, Past and Present']...Let me talk just this once and I will sail positively on the 6th July, and stay away until I return from China..." After noting that "Doors open at 7. Orgies to commence at 8 P.M.," the broadside concludes with descriptions of planned "public displays [on July 4] to give fitting eclat to the occasion," such as a "discharge of artillery" and "a gorgeous display of fire works from Russian Hill." On July 2 Clemens did give the lecture; four days later he sailed for New York and his great career, never to return to San Francisco or to California. This burlesque handbill became locally popular, being reprinted in The Buyers Manual and Business Guide (San Francisco, 1872). Merle Johnson. Clemens , p. 131; BAL 3313 (the sixth Clemens item listed, the Harvard copy only [slightly defective]); John Howell -- Books, California: The Library of Jennie Crocker Henderson, Catalogue 50 , Part IV (1980), item 1009 (the James Tufts copy at $3,000: "mounted on oaktag" and "slightly damaged" and "one of two or possibly three copies known"). IN FINE CONDITION. Provenance : Sold by John Howell -- Books in 1943 (for $225, less 10 "for cash if sent by return mail"), with their TLS offering this copy and discussing its rarity, etc.