Autograph letter signed : Hamilton, Bermuda, to Mrs. Ossip Gabrilowitsch [Clemens's daughter, Clara] 1910 February 21-23.

This is a remarkably revealing, outspoken, and at the same time poignant, letter -- written over three days just two months before his death. On February 21 he wrote: "... Indeed I don't 'disclaim relationship' with you because you are married [Clara had married the pianist Gabrilowitsch the previous October] -- no, you are nearer & dearer to me now than ever; of my fair fleet all my ships have gone down but you [Clemens's daughter Jean having died in December 1909]; you are all my wealth; but while I have you I am still rich." On February 22 he wrote that he would not appeal to his friend Archbishop Ireland to seek Easter privileges for Clara at St. Peter's in Rome because "I can't bring myself to personally ask a favor of that odious Church, whose history would disgrace hell, & whose birth was the profoundest calamity which has ever befallen the human race except for the birth of Christ -- this, because if I asked a favor I couldn't talk against that rotten concern with limitless freedom & with an unblushing cheek afterward. [Theodore] Roosevelt closed my mouth years ago with a deeply valued, gratefully received, unasked favor, & with all my bitter detestation of him I have never been able to say a venomous thing about him in print since -- that benignant deed always steps in the way & lays its consecrated hand upon my lips. I ought not to allow it to do this; & I am ashamed of allowing it, but I cannot help it, since I am made in that way, & did not make myself."