CLEMENS, Samuel Langhorne ("Mark Twain") (1835-1910). Cabinet card photograph inscribed and signed ("Mark Twain"). Rockwood, NY: Rockwood, 1905.

165 x 108 mm. Cabinet photograph on original studio cardstock mount (light surface wear, verso with some surface marring and old adhesive residue at corners).

PRESENTATION INSCRIPTION BY MARK TWAIN in the lower margin to a "Miss Stickney", dated 10 March 1906. Augustus Allen Stickney (1833-1880) was a San Francisco publisher of the newspaper "The Californian", and as such became friends with Mark Twain, Henry George, and Bret Harte who was also editor of the newspaper. Mark Twain was hired to contribute one article per week, receiving $50 per month for his contributions. In total, Twain contributed approximately fifty articles that appeared in The Californian, several of which were collected and published in 1867 in The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, and Other Sketches- Mark Twain's first published book. Presumably, this photograph was inscribed to Augustus' wife, Belzora Ross Stickney (nee Clark).

[Laid into:] TWAIN. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. New York: Charles L. Webster and Company, 1885.

8vo. Lithographic frontispiece by E.W. Kemble, photographic portrait frontispiece of the bust of Mark Twain by Karl Gerhardt (BAL state 1), in-text illustrations throughout. (Light marginal stains on pp. 154-155, few leaves with offsetting, blank bookplate.) Original green gilt-decorated pictorial cloth (extreme ends and fore-corners worn, small loss to spine near foot, hinges starting).

FIRST AMERICAN EDITION, EARLY STATE, with the following issue points: first state portrait frontispiece; first state of p. 9 with "decided" for "decides"; first state of p. 13 with "Him and Another Man" plate incorrectly listed as being on p. 99; first state of p. 57 with "was" for "saw"; BAL third state of pagination on p. 155. BAL 3415.