e of weeks. From Rome to Florence, at the end of April, and
so pleasing was the prospect, and so salubrious the air of that ancient
city, that they resolved to engage residence there for the next winter.
They inspected accommodations of various kinds, and finally, through
Prof. Willard Fiske, were directed to the Villa Viviani, near
Settignano, on a hill to the eastward of Florence, with vineyard and
olive-grove sloping away to the city lying in a haze-a vision of beauty
and peace. They closed the arrangement for Viviani, and about the middle
of May went up to Venice for a fortnight of sight-seeing--a break in the
travel back to Germany. William Gedney Bunce, the Hartford artist, was
in Venice, and Sarah Orne Jewett and other home friends.

From Venice, by way of Lake Como and "a tangled route" (his note-book
says) to Lucerne, and so northward to Berlin and on to Bad Nauheim,
where they had planned to spend the summer. Clemens for some weeks had
contemplated a trip to America, for matters there seemed to demand
his personal attention. Summer arrangements for the family being now
concluded, he left within the week and set sail on the Havel for New
York. To Jean he wrote a cheerful good-by letter, more cheerful, we may
believe, than he felt.

BREMEN, 7.45 A.M., June 14, 1892.

DEAR JEAN CLEMENS,--I am up & shaved & got my clean shirt on & feel
mighty fine, & am going down to show off before I put on the rest of my
clothes.

Perhaps mama & Mrs. Hague can persuade the Hauswirth to do right; but if
he don't you go down & kill his dog.

I wish you would invite the Consul-General and his ladies down to take
one of those slim dinners with mama, then he would complain to the
Government.

Clemens felt that his presence in America, was demanded by two things.
Hall's reports continued, as ever, optimistic; but the semi-annual
statements were less encouraging. The Library of Literature and some of
the other books were selling well enough; but the continuous increase
of capital required by a business conducted on the instalment plan
had steadily added to the firm's liabilities, while the prospect of
a general tightening in the money-market made the outlook not a
particularly happy one. Clemens thought he might be able to dispose of
the Library or an interest in it, or even of his share of the business
itself, to some one with means sufficient to put it on an easier
financial footing. The uncertainties